consisting of a picture of a miser's death-bed, a demon drawing his
soul out of his mouth, while his attendants are searching in his
chests for his treasures.]

This chapel, built in or about the year 1303,[2] appears to have been
intended to replace one which had long existed on the spot; and in
which, from the year 1278, an annual festival had been held on
Lady-day, in which the Annunciation was represented in the manner of
our English mysteries (and under the same title: "una sacra
rappresentazione di quel _mistero_"), with dialogue, and music both
vocal and instrumental. Scrovegno's purchase of the ground could not
be allowed to interfere with the national custom; but he is reported
by some writers to have rebuilt the chapel with greater costliness,
in order, as far as possible, to efface the memory of his father's
unhappy life. But Federici, in his history of the Cavalieri Godenti,
supposes that Scrovegno was a member of that body, and was assisted by
them in decorating the new edifice. The order of Cavalieri Godenti was
instituted in the beginning of the thirteenth century, to defend the
"existence," as Selvatico states it, but more accurately the dignity,
of the Virgin, against the various heretics by whom it was beginning
to be assailed. Her knights were first called Cavaliers of St. Mary;
but soon increased in power and riches to such a degree, that, from
their general habits of life, they received the nickname of the "Merry
Brothers." Federici gives forcible reasons for his opinion that the
Arena Chapel was employed in the ceremonies of their order; and Lord
Lindsay observes, that the fulness with which the history of the
Virgin is recounted on its walls, adds to the plausibility of his
supposition.

[Footnote 2: For these historical details I am chiefly indebted to the