DUCHESNE
182
DUCKETT
chapel of Santa Maria Novella and, on the authority
of Vasari, so long considered one of Cimabue's master-
pieces. But that the painting was Duccio's is now
beyond question, as Milanesi has published the text of
a contract drawn up for this picture, 15 April, 12S5,
between the artist and the rectors of the Conjfraternity
of the Virgin. Although still hieratieal and archaic,
Duccio's "Madonna", when compared, for instance,
with that of Guido of Siena, painted in 1221 and
shown to-day in the Palazzo Pubblico of Siena, seems
fully to deserve its celebrity.
But it was in 1311 that Duccio achieved his princi- pal work, the glory of which is destined to remain tra- ditional, the great reredos for the high altar of the Siena cathedral. This panel, removed in the fifteenth century, may now be seen in the museum of the Opera del Duomo. The day of its installation was observed as a public feast ; shops were closed and bells were rung and the people of the city, carrying lighted candles, solemnly escorted the picture from the artist's resi- dence at the Porta Stalloreggi to the cathedral. This painting was indeed a national masterpiece and in this regard is comparable only to the reredos by Van Eyck in Flemish painting. The two sides represent the two Testaments of the school. The back comprises twenty-six scenes from the life of Jesus between the entry into Jerusalem and the Ascension. The steps, now taken apart, were decorated with twenty other scenes representing Christ's childhood, and His mira- cles, and the life of the Virgin. In fact, the theme was the same as that treated by Giotto in 1305 in the Arena of Padua. But Duccio consulted Byzantine formularies only, and his compositions resemble the famous miniatures of the "Evangelistarium" of Ros- sano, or those of the great Benedictine school of Mont' Amiata. However, apart from his perfect taste in col- our and in style, Duccio excelled in the essentially Greek elegance of his portrayal of ordinary life. He abounds in genre pictures as pure as some of the selections in the Anthology. The scene of " Peter before the High- Priest ' ', the dialogue of the holy women with the angel at the Sepulchre, and the "Pilgrims of Emmaus" are models of poetic conception expressed in a familiar, true-to-life, lyric fashion. On the front of the great panel is the " Madonna Maesta" (Majesty), which is in reality the "Madonna de' Ruccellai" more amply, richly, and harmoniously developed. Never did Byzantine painting attain greater plasticity of expres- sion. But here the form is animated by a new senti- ment, a tenderness that manifests itself in the distich engraved on the step of the Virgin's tlirone: — ■
MATER SANCT.^ DEI, SIS CAUSSA SENIS REQUIEI SIS DUCCIO VITA, TE QUIA PINXIT ITA.
(Holy Mother of God, give peace unto Siena; obtain for me that, as I have painted Thee so fair, I may live eternally.)
Duccio painted only frame (and panel) pictures and, without doubt, miniatures, and hence the obliv- ion into which he fell in a country where monumental painting alone is glorified. Nevertheless his is the first of the great names in Italian painting. He pre- ceded Giotto by a score of years and had the honour of founding an original Sienese school at a time when there were as yet no painters in Florence: since, in 12S5, it was to him that the Florentines had to have recourse. And the most magnificent work of the Sienese School, the "Maesta" by Simone di Mar- tino, in the Palazzo Pubblico (1315) is but an en- largement of Duccio's. His type of beauty and his pootio ideal were indelibly impres-sed upon this charm- mg wliniil. Duccio seems to have been gay and hght-licarlcd. In 1313 he was imprisoned for debt and at another time fined for refusing to mount guard. Some of his lesser works are preserved in various collections in the Siena Mu.seum, the National Gallery, London, and at Wind.sor.
Milanesi, Documenti per la storia delV arte senese (Siena,
1854), I; Crowe and Cavalcaselle. Htoria della pittura in
Italia (2nd ed., Florence, 1S99). Ill; Langton Douglas,
History of Siena (London, 1902); Venturi. Storia dell' arte
Italiana (Milan, 1907), V; Pekate, Duccio in Gazette des
Beaux-Arts (Feb. and Sept., 1893); Lisini, Notizie di Duccio
pitlore (Bollettino senese di storia patria, 1898); I.angton
DonGLAS, Duccio in Monthly Review (Aug., 1903); Richteh,
Lectures on the National Gallery (London, 1898).
Louis GiLLET.
Duchesne, Philippine-Rose, founder in America of the first houses of the Society of the Sacred Heart, b. at Grenoble, France, 29 August, 1769; d. at St. Charles, Missouri, IS October, 1852. She was the daughter of Pierre-Frangois Duchesne, an eminent lawyer. Her mother was a Perier, ancestor of Casimir P^rier, President of France in 1894. She was edu- cated by the Visitation Nuns, entered that order, saw its dispersion during the Reign of Terror, vainly at- tempted the re-establishment of the convent of Ste- Marie-d'en-Haut, near Grenoble, and finally, in 1804, accepted the offer of Mother Barat to receive her com- munity into the Society of the Sacred Heart . From early childhood the dream of Philippine had been the apos- tolate of souls: heathen in distant lands, the neglected and poor at home. Nature and grace combined to fit her for this high vocation; education, suffering, above all, the guidance of Mother Barat trained her to become the pioneer of her order in the New World. In 1818 Mother Duchesne set out with foiu- companions for the missions of America. Bishop Dubourg welcomed her to New Orleans, whence she sailed up the Missis- sippi to St. Louis, finally settling her little colony at St. Charles. "Poverty and Christian heroism are here", she wrote, "and trials are the riches of priests in this land." Cold, hunger, and illness; opposition, ingratitude, and calumny, all that came to try the courage of this missioner, served only to fire her lofty and indomitable spirit with new zeal for the spread of truth. Other foundations followed, at Florissant, Grand Coteau, New Orleans, St. Louis, St. Michael; and the approbation of the society in 1826 by Leo XII recognized the good being done in these parts. She yearned to teach the poor Indians, and old and broken as she was , she went to labour among the Pot to watomies at Sugar Creek, thus realizing the desire of her life. Stirred by the recitals of Father De Smet, S.J., she turned her eyes towards the Rocky Mountain missions ; but Providence led her back to St. Charles, where she died. Thirty-four years of mission toil, disappoint- ment, endurance, self-annihilation sufficed, indeed, to prove the worth of this valiant daughter of Mother Barat. She had opened the road, others might walk in it; and the success hidden from her eyes was well seen later by the many who rejoiced in the rapid spread of her order over North and South America. Sincere, intense, generous, austere yet affectionate, endowed with large capacity for suffering and work, Mother Duchesne's was a stern character that needed and took tlie moulding of Mother Barat. Preliminary steps for her beatification have already been taken.
Baunard, Histoire de la Mire Duchesne (Paris, 1876), tr. FuLLERTON (Rochampton, 1879); Ward, Life of Venerable Madeleine Sophie Barat (Roehampton, 1900); Connelly, Rev. Mother Duchesne in The Month (London, 1898). XCI; Rev. Mother Philippine Duchesne in The Messenger (New York, 1890).
Catherine M. Lowth.
Duckett, James, Venerable, Martyr, b. at Gil- fortrigs in the parisli of Skelsmergh in Westmoreland, England, date uncertain, of an ancient family of that county; d. 9 April, 1601. He was a bookseller and publisher in London. His goelfather was the well- known martyr James Leybourne of Skelsmergh. He seems, however, to have been brought up a Protestant, for he was converted while an apprentice in London by reading a Catholic book lent him by a friend. Be- fore he could be received into the Church he was twice imprisoned for not attending the Protestant service.
