The Palace and Park by Phillips, Forbes, Latham, Owen, Scharf, and Shenton

Massaccio-Tomasaccio (big or heavy Tom) was a nickname given to him when a boy. A devoted student of the works of Brunelleschi and Donatello. He lived for the most part in Rome and Florence, and died in the last-named city. Time has destroyed the greater number of his works. His frescos, which still remain in the Brancacci chapel of the Carmelite church in Florence, representing the history of St. Peter, are remarkable for their freedom, and for the absence of the conventionalities of the early mediæval painters. Some of his noble figures became models for the later Florentines, and were imitated by Raffaelle himself. He excelled his contemporaries in the nude form, and gave to his draperies a style unknown before, adapting them naturally and gracefully to the human shape. [By Carlo Finelli.]