Hunc vero triumphum, tam laude quam memoria dignum, ad Meresburgum rex
in superiori coenaculo domûs per Zeus, id est, picturam, notari praecepit, adeo ut rem veram potius quam verisimilem videas: a high encomium (Liutprand, l. ii. c. 9).
Another palace in Germany had been painted with holy subjects by the order of Charlemagne; and Muratori may justly affirm,
nulla saecula fuere in quibus pictores
desiderati fuerint (Antiquitat. Ital. Medii Aevi, tom. ii.
dissert. xxiv. p. 360, 361).
Our domestic claims to antiquity of ignorance and original imperfection (Mr. Walpole's lively words) are of a much more recent date, (Anecdotes of Painting, vol. i. p. 2, etc.)