Martini, Simone

(ca. 1284-1344)

   Italian artist, trained at Siena by Duccio but active also in Naples, Assisi, and the papal court at Avignon. Unlike his Florentine contemporaries, who were domi-nated by the influence of Giotto, he continued to paint in the elegant courtly style known as International Gothic. His best-known works are his small panel painting The Road to Calvary and his delicate and aristocratic tempera painting of the Virgin Mary, The Annunciation, a work probably done at Avignon and clearly influenced by French Gothic painting. He was aware of the new Renaissance literary cul-ture represented by Petrarch, for another of his works is the fron-tispiece done for Petrarch's own manuscript of Vergil's Aeneid, and he is mentioned in two of Petrarch's poems.