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VIII. THE PRESENTATION OF THE VIRGIN 61
time of those latest triumphs, however, the same fault was committed in another way; and a boy of eight or ten was commonly represented-even by Raffaelle himself-as a dwarf Hercules, with all the gladiatorial muscles already visible in stunted rotundity.1 Giotto probably felt he had not power enough to give dignity to a child of three years old, and intended the womanly form to be rather typical of the Virgin’s advanced mind, than an actual representation of her person.
1 [Compare what Ruskin says of the boy in the cartoon of “The Beautiful Gate” (Vol. XXII. p. 97).]
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[Version 0.04: March 2008]
