He is the foremost modern historian of Italian art. Self-taught, he began his research at an early age in the archives and the Estense Gallery in Modena, of which he was appointed inspector at the age of twenty-two. Having quickly earned deserved authority in the field of historical-artistic studies, in 1880 he was called to Rome at the Ministry of Public Education in an inspector’s role and tasked with reorganizing several national galleries as well as initiating the cataloging of works of art scattered across Italy’s various regions. Having obtained his libera docenza in Art History in 1890, he began teaching at the University of Rome, where in 1896 he established a School for the advanced study of his chosen field. His teaching career, which spanned 35 years with ever-growing success, came to be seen by many as a true apostolate for the better understanding and conscious defense of Italy’s artistic heritage.
An indefatigable traveler and worker, author of countless writings published in the principal specialized journals of Europe and America and particularly in the Italian national galleries and in *L’Arte*, which he founded and directed for many years, his chief work is the monumental *Storia dell’arte italiana*, in 22 large volumes (Milan 1901–36), which reconstructs, with architectural lines not lacking in solemnity, the history of Italian art from the early Middle Ages to the end of the 16th century. Gifted with a remarkable visual memory and an astonishing capacity for synthesis, he made use of these faculties in his research without neglecting any historical or documentary element that might illuminate the work of art, which he always examined in every formal aspect in order to define its style. In so doing, he transferred the method of inquiry—first fully implemented in Italy by Francesco De Sanctis in the field of literary studies—into that of the figurative arts. A tireless master and animator, endowed with a profound sense of humanity, he trained in his school most of the Italian scholars who, in the last fifty years, have devoted their efforts to the Italian administration of Fine Arts and to teaching. He was a senator of the Kingdom.