Church of S. Croce, where the Friars Minor have their seat. What with
the middle nave and the two lesser ones Arnolfo constructed this so
wide, that, being unable to make the vaulting below the roof by reason
of the too great space, he, with much judgment, caused arches to be made
from pier to pier, and upon these he placed the roofs on a slope,
building stone gutters over the said arches in order to carry away the
rain-water, and giving them so much fall as to make the roofs secure, as
they are, from the danger of rotting; which device was not only new and
ingenious then, but is equally useful and worthy of being considered
to-day. He then gave the design for the first cloisters of the old
convent of that church, and a little time after he caused to be removed
from round the Church of S. Giovanni, on the outer side, all the arches
and tombs of marble and grey-stone that were there, and had part of them
placed behind the campanile on the facade of the Canon's house, beside
the Company of S. Zanobi; and then he incrusted with black marble from
Prato all the eight outer walls of the said S. Giovanni, removing the
grey-stone that there had been before between these ancient marbles. The
Florentines, in the meanwhile, wishing to build walls in the Valdarno di
Sopra round Castello di San Giovanni and Castel Franco, for the
convenience of the city and of their victualling by means of the
markets, Arnolfo made the design for them in the year 1295, and
satisfied them in such a manner, as well in this as he had done in the
other works, that he was made citizen of Florence.
After these works, the Florentines determined, as Giovanni Villani
relates in his History, to build a principal church in their city, and
to build it such that in point of greatness and magnificence there could
be desired none larger or more beautiful from the industry and knowledge
of men; and Arnolfo made the design and the model of the never to be
sufficiently praised Church of S. Maria del Fiore, ordering that it
should be all incrusted, without, with polished marbles and with the so
many cornices, pilasters, columns, carved foliage, figures, and other
ornaments, with which to-day it is seen brought, if not to the whole, to
a great part at least of its perfection. And what was marvellous therein
above everything else was this, that incorporating, besides S. Reparata,
other small churches and houses that were round it, in making the site,
which is most beautiful, he showed so great diligence and judgment in
causing the foundations of so great a fabric to be made broad and deep,
filling them with good material--namely, with gravel and lime and with
great stones below--wherefore the square is still called "Lungo i
Fondamenti," that they have been very well able, as is to be seen
to-day, to support the weight of the great mass of the cupola which
Filippo di Ser Brunellesco raised over them. The laying of such
foundations for so great a church was celebrated with much solemnity,
for on the day of the Nativity of Our Lady, in 1298, the first stone was
laid by the Cardinal Legate of the Pope, in the presence not only of
many Bishops and of all the clergy, but of the Podesta as well, the
Captains, Priors, and other magistrates of the city, nay, of the whole
people of Florence, calling it S. Maria del Fiore. And because it was
estimated that the expenses of this fabric must be very great, as they
afterwards were, there was imposed a tax at the Chamber of the Commune
of four danari in the lira on everything that was put out at interest,
and two soldi per head per annum; not to mention that the Pope and the
Legate granted very great indulgences to those who should make them
offerings thereunto. I will not forbear to say, moreover, that besides
the foundations, very broad and fifteen braccia deep, much consideration
was shown in making those buttresses of masonry at every angle of the
eight sides, seeing that it was these afterwards that emboldened the
mind of Brunellesco to superimpose a much greater weight than that which
Arnolfo, perchance, had thought to impose thereon. It is said that while
the two first side-doors of S. Maria del Fiore were being begun in
marble Arnolfo caused some fig-leaves to be carved on a frieze, these
being the arms of himself and of Maestro Lapo, his father, and that
therefore it may be believed that from him the family of the Lapi had
its origin, to-day a noble family in Florence. Others say, likewise,
that from the descendants of Arnolfo there descended Filippo di Ser
Brunellesco. But leaving this, seeing that others believe that the Lapi
came from Ficaruolo, a township on the mouth of the Po, and returning to
our Arnolfo, I say that by reason of the greatness of this work he
deserves infinite praise and an eternal name, above all because he
caused it to be all incrusted, without, with marbles of many colours,
and within, with hard stone, and made even the smallest corners of that
same stone. But in order that everyone may know the exact size of this
marvellous fabric, I say that from the door up to the end of the Chapel
of S. Zanobi the length is 260 braccia, and the breadth across the
transepts 166; across the three naves it is 66 braccia. The middle nave
alone is 72 braccia in height; and the other two lesser naves, 48
braccia. The external circuit of the whole church is 1,280 braccia. The
cupola, from the ground up to the base of the lantern, is 154 braccia;
the lantern, without the ball, is 36 braccia in height; the ball, 4
braccia in height; the cross, 8 braccia in height. The whole cupola,
from the ground up to the summit of the cross, is 202 braccia.
[Illustration: _Alinari_
TOMB OF ADRIAN V
(_After the_ School of Arnolfo di Lapo. _Viterbo: Church of S.
Francesco_)]
But returning to Arnolfo, I say that being held, as he was, excellent,
he had acquired so great trust that nothing of importance was determined
without his counsel; wherefore, in the same year, the Commune of
Florence having finished the foundation of the last circle of the walls
of the city, even as it was said above that they were formerly begun,
and so too the towers of the gates, and all being in great part well
advanced, he made a beginning for the Palace of the Signori, designing
it in resemblance to that which his father Lapo had built in the
Casentino for the Counts of Poppi. But yet, however magnificent and
great he designed it, he could not give it that perfection which his art
and his judgment required, for the following reason: the houses of the
Uberti, Ghibellines and rebels against the people of Florence, had been
pulled down and thrown to the ground, and a square had been made on the
site, and the stupid obstinacy of certain men prevailed so greatly that
Arnolfo could not bring it about, through whatsoever arguments he might
urge thereunto, that it should be granted to him to put the Palace on a
square base, because the governors had refused that the Palace should
have its foundations in any way whatsoever on the ground of the rebel
Uberti. And they brought it about that the northern aisle of S. Pietro
Scheraggio should be thrown to the ground, rather than let him work in
the middle of the square with his own measurements; not to mention that
they insisted, moreover, that there should be united and incorporated
with the Palace the Tower of the Foraboschi, called the "Torre della
Vacca," in height fifty braccia, for the use of the great bell, and
together with it some houses bought by the Commune for this edifice. For
which reasons no one must marvel if the foundation of the Palace is awry
and out of the square, it having been necessary, in order to incorporate
the tower in the middle and to render it stronger, to bind it round with
the walls of the Palace; which walls, having been laid open in the year
1561 by Giorgio Vasari, painter and architect, were found excellent.
Arnolfo, then, having filled up the said tower with good material, it
was afterwards easy for other masters to make thereon the very high
campanile that is to be seen there to-day; for within the limits of two
years he finished only the Palace, which has subsequently received from
time to time those improvements which give it to-day that greatness and
majesty that are to be seen.
After all these works and many more that Arnolfo made, no less
convenient and useful than beautiful, he died at the age of seventy, in
1300, at the very time when Giovanni Villani began to write the
Universal History of his times. And because he not only left S. Maria
del Fiore founded, but its three principal tribunes, which are under the
cupola, vaulted, to his own great glory, he well deserved that there
should be made a memorial of him on the corner of the church opposite
the Campanile, with these verses carved in marble in round letters:
ANNIS . MILLENIS . CENTUM . BIS . OCTO . NOGENIS .
VENIT . LEGATUS . ROMA . BONITATE . DOTATUS .
QUI . LAPIDEM . FIXIT . FUNDO . SIMUL . ET . BENEDIXIT .
PRAESULE . FRANCISCO . GESTANTE . PONTIFICATUM .
ISTUD . AB . ARNOLFO . TEMPLUM . FUIT . AEDIFICATUM .
HOC . OPUS . INSIGNE . DECORANS . FLORENTIA . DIGNE .
REGINAE . C[OE]LI . CONSTRUXIT . MENTE . FIDELI .
QUAM . TU . VIRGO . PIA . SEMPER . DEFENDE . MARIA .
Of this Arnolfo we have written the Life, with the greatest brevity that
has been possible, for the reason that, although his works do not
approach by a great measure the perfection of the things of to-day, he
deserves, none the less, to be celebrated with loving memory, having
shown amid so great darkness, to those who lived after him, the way to
walk to perfection. The portrait of Arnolfo, by the hand of Giotto, is
to be seen in S. Croce, beside the principal chapel, at the beginning of
the story, where the friars are weeping for the death of S. Francis, in
one of two men that are talking together. And the picture of the Church
of S. Maria del Fiore--namely, of the outer side with the cupola--by the
hand of Simone Sanese, is to be seen in the Chapter-house of S. Maria
Novella, copied from the original in wood that Arnolfo made; wherein it
is noticeable that he had thought to raise the dome immediately over the
walls, at the edge of the first cornice, whereas Filippo di Ser
Brunellesco, in order to relieve them of weight and to make it more
graceful, added thereto, before he began to raise it, all that height
wherein to-day are the round windows; which circumstance would be even
clearer than it is, if the little care and diligence of those who have
directed the Works of S. Maria del Fiore in the years past had not left
the very model that Arnolfo made to go to ruin, and afterwards those of
Brunellesco and of the others.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 6: The braccio is a very variable standard of measurement. As
used by Vasari, it may be taken to denote about 23 inches.]
[Footnote 7: Vescovado includes both the Cathedral and the Episcopal
buildings of Arezzo. Vasari generally uses it to denote the Cathedral.]
NICCOLA AND GIOVANNI OF PISA
LIFE OF NICCOLA AND GIOVANNI OF PISA,
[_NICCOLA PISANO AND GIOVANNI PISANO_],
SCULPTORS AND ARCHITECTS
Having discoursed of design and of painting in the Life of Cimabue and
of architecture in that of Arnolfo di Lapo, in this one concerning
Niccola and Giovanni of Pisa we will treat of sculpture, and also of the
most important buildings that they made, for the reason that their works
in sculpture and in architecture truly deserve to be celebrated, not
only as being large and magnificent but also well enough conceived,
since both in working marble and in building they swept away in great
part that old Greek manner, rude and void of proportion, showing better
invention in their stories and giving better attitudes to their figures.
Niccola Pisano, then, chancing to be under certain Greek sculptors who
were working the figures and other carved ornaments of the Duomo of Pisa
and of the Church of S. Giovanni, and there being, among many marble
spoils brought by the fleet of the Pisans, certain ancient sarcophagi
that are to-day in the Campo Santo of that city, there was one of them,
most beautiful among them all, whereon there was carved the Chase of
Meleager after the Calydonian Boar, in very beautiful manner, seeing
that both the nude figures and the draped were wrought with much mastery
and with most perfect design. This sarcophagus was placed by the Pisans,
by reason of its beauty, in the side of the Duomo opposite S. Rocco,
beside the principal side-door, and it served for the body of the mother
of Countess Matilda, if indeed these words are true that are to be read
carved in the marble:
A.D. MCXVI. IX KAL. AUG. OBIIT D. MATILDA FELICIS MEMORIAE
COMITISSA, QUAE PRO ANIMA GENETRICIS SUAE DOMINAE BEATRICIS COMITISSAE
VENERABILIS, IN HAC TUMBA HONORABILI QUIESCENTIS, IN MULTIS
PARTIBUS MIRIFICE HANC DOTAVIT ECCLESIAM; QUARUM ANIMAE REQUIESCANT
IN PACE
And then:
A.D. MCCCIII. SUB DIGNISSIMO OPERARIO D. BURGUNDIO TADI, OCCASIONE
GRADUUM FIENDORUM PER IPSUM CIRCA ECCLESIAM, SUPRADICTA TUMBA
SUPERIUS NOTATA BIS TRANSLATA FUIT, TUNC DE SEDIBUS PRIMIS IN
ECCLESIAM, NUNC DE ECCLESIA IN HUNC LOCUM, UT CERNITIS,
EXCELLENTEM.
[Illustration: _Alinari_
THE PULPIT OF THE BAPTISTERY OF PISA
(_After_ Niccola Pisano. _Pisa_)]
Niccola, pondering over the beauty of this work and being greatly
pleased therewith, put so much study and diligence into imitating this
manner and some other good sculptures that were in these other ancient
sarcophagi, that he was judged, after no long time, the best sculptor of
his day; there being in Tuscany in those times, after Arnolfo, no other
sculptor of repute save Fuccio, an architect and sculptor of Florence,
who made S. Maria sopra Arno in Florence, in the year 1229, placing his
name there, over a door, and in the Church of S. Francesco in Assisi he
made the marble tomb of the Queen of Cyprus, with many figures, and in
particular a portrait of her sitting on a lion, in order to show the
strength of her soul; which Queen, after her death, left a great sum of
money to the end that this fabric might be finished. Niccola, then,
having made himself known as a much better master than was Fuccio, was
summoned to Bologna in the year 1225, after the death of S. Domenico
Calagora, first founder of the Order of Preaching Friars, in order to
make a marble tomb for the said Saint; wherefore, after agreement with
those who had the charge of it, he made it full of figures in that
manner wherein it is to be seen to-day, and delivered it finished in the
year 1231 with much credit to himself, for it was held something
remarkable, and the best of all the works that had been wrought in
sculpture up to that time. He made, likewise, the model of that church
and of a great part of the convent. Afterwards Niccola, returning to
Tuscany, found that Fuccio had departed from Florence and had gone to
Rome in those days when the Emperor Frederick was crowned by Honorius,
and from Rome with Frederick to Naples, where he finished the Castel di
Capoana, to-day called the Vicaria, wherein are all the tribunals of
that kingdom, and likewise the Castel dell' Uovo; and where he likewise
founded the towers he also made the gates over the River Volturno for
the city of Capua, and a park girt with walls, for fowling, near
Gravina, and another for sport in winter at Melfi; besides many other
things that are not related, for the sake of brevity. Niccola,
meanwhile, busying himself in Florence, was going on exercising himself
not only in sculpture but in architecture as well, by means of the
buildings that were going on being made with some little goodness of
design throughout all Italy, and in particular in Tuscany; wherefore he
occupied himself not a little with the building of the Abbey of Settimo,
which had not been finished by the executors of Count Ugo of
Brandenburg, like the other six, as was said above. And although it is
read in a marble epitaph on the campanile of the said abbey, GUGLIELM.
ME FECIT, it is known, nevertheless, by the manner, that it was directed
with the counsel of Niccola. About the same time he made the Palazzo
Vecchio of the Anziani in Pisa, pulled down in our day by Duke Cosimo,
in order to make the magnificent Palace and Convent of the Knights of S.
Stephen on the same spot, using some part of the old, from the design
and model of Giorgio Vasari, painter and architect of Arezzo, who has
accommodated himself to those old walls as well as he has been able in
fitting them into the new. Niccola made, likewise in Pisa, many other
palaces and churches, and he was the first, since the loss of the good
method of building, who made it the custom to found edifices in Pisa on
piers, and on these to raise arches, piles having first been sunk under
the said piers; because, with any other method, the solid base of the
foundation cracked and the walls always collapsed, whereas the sinking
of piles renders the edifice absolutely safe, even as experience shows.
With his design, also, was made the Church of S. Michele in Borgo for
the Monks of Camaldoli. But the most beautiful, the most ingenious, and
the most whimsical work of architecture that Niccola ever made was the
Campanile of S. Niccola in Pisa, where is the seat of the Friars of S.
Augustine, for the reason that it is octagonal on the outer side and
round within, with stairs that wind in a spiral and lead to the summit,
leaving the hollow space in the middle free, in the shape of a well, and
on every fourth step are columns that have the arches above them on a
slant and wind round and round; wherefore, the spring of the vaulting
resting on the said arches, one goes climbing to the summit in a manner
that he who is on the ground always sees all those who are climbing,
those who are climbing see those who are on the ground, and those who
are halfway up see both the first and the second--that is, those who are
above and those who are below. This fanciful invention, with better
method and more just proportions, and with more adornment, was
afterwards put into execution by the architect Bramante in the Belvedere
in Rome, for Pope Julius II, and by Antonio da San Gallo in the well
that is at Orvieto, by order of Pope Clement VII, as will be told when
the time comes.
But returning to Niccola, who was no less excellent as sculptor than as
architect; in the facade of the Church of S. Martino in Lucca, under the
portico that is above the lesser door, on the left as one enters into
the church, where there is seen a Christ Deposed from the Cross, he made
a marble scene in half-relief, all full of figures wrought with much
diligence, having hollowed out the marble and finished the whole in a
manner that gave hope to those who were previously working at the art
with very great difficulty, that there soon should come one who, with
more facility, would give them better assistance. The same Niccola, in
the year 1240, gave the design for the Church of S. Jacopo in Pistoia,
and put to work there in mosaic certain Tuscan masters who made the
vaulting of the choir-niche, which, although in those times it was held
as something difficult and of great cost, moves us to-day rather to
laughter and to compassion than to marvel, and all the more because such
confusion, which comes from lack of design, existed not only in Tuscany
but throughout all Italy, where many buildings and other works, that
were being wrought without method and without design, give us to know no
less the poverty of their talents than the unmeasured riches wasted by
the men of those times, by reason of their having had no masters who
might execute in a good manner any work that they might do.
Niccola, then, by means of the works that he was making in sculpture and
in architecture, was going on ever acquiring a greater name than the
sculptors and architects who were then working in Romagna, as can be
seen in S. Ippolito and S. Giovanni of Faenza, in the Duomo of Ravenna,
in S. Francesco, in the houses of the Traversari, and in the Church
of Porto; and at Rimini, in the fabric of the public buildings, in the
houses of the Malatesti, and in other buildings, which are all much
worse than the old edifices made about the same time in Tuscany. And
what has been said of Romagna can be also said with truth of a part of
Lombardy. A glance at the Duomo of Ferrara, and at the other buildings
made by the Marquis Azzo, will give us to know that this is the truth
and how different they are from the Santo of Padua, made with the model
of Niccola, and from the Church of the Friars Minor in Venice, both
magnificent and honoured buildings. Many, in the time of Niccola, moved
by laudable envy, applied themselves with more zeal to sculpture than
they had done before, and particularly in Milan, whither there assembled
for the building of the Duomo many Lombards and Germans, who afterwards
scattered throughout Italy by reason of the discords that arose between
the Milanese and the Emperor Frederick. And so these craftsmen,
beginning to compete among themselves both in marble and in building,
found some little of the good. The same came to pass in Florence after
the works of Arnolfo and Niccola had been seen; and the latter, while
the little Church of the Misericordia was being erected from his design
in the Piazza di S. Giovanni, made therein in marble, with his own hand,
a Madonna with S. Dominic and another Saint, one on either side of her,
which may still be seen on the outer facade of the said church.
[Illustration: _Alinari_
THE ADORATION OF THE MAGI
(_Detail, after_ Niccola Pisano, _from the Pulpit of the Baptistery,
Pisa_)]
The Florentines had begun, in the time of Niccola, to throw to the
ground many towers made formerly in barbaric manner throughout the whole
city, in order that the people might be less hurt by reason of these in
the brawls that were often taking place between the Guelphs and the
Ghibellines, or in order that there might be greater security for the
State, and it appeared to them that it would be very difficult to pull
down the Tower of Guardamorto, which was in the Piazza di S. Giovanni,
because the walls had been made so stoutly that they could not be pulled
to pieces with pickaxes, and all the more because it was very high.
Wherefore, Niccola causing the foot of the tower to be cut away on one
side and supporting it with wooden props a braccio and a half in length,
and then setting fire to them, as soon as the props were burnt away it
fell and was almost entirely shattered; which was held something so
ingenious and useful for such affairs that later it passed into use,
insomuch that, when there is need, any building is destroyed in very
little time with this most easy method. Niccola was present at the first
foundation of the Duomo of Siena, and designed the Church of S. Giovanni
in the same city; then, having returned to Florence in the same year
that the Guelphs returned, he designed the Church of S. Trinita, and the
Convent of the Nuns of Faenza, destroyed in our day in order to make the
citadel. Being next summoned to Naples, in order not to desert the work
in Tuscany he sent thither Maglione, his pupil, a sculptor and
architect, who afterwards made, in the time of Conradin, the Church of
S. Lorenzo in Naples, finished part of the Piscopio, and made there
certain tombs, wherein he imitated closely the manner of Niccola, his
master.
Niccola, meanwhile, being summoned by the people of Volterra, in the
year 1254 (when they came under the power of the Florentines), in order
that their Duomo, which was small, might be enlarged, he brought it to
better form, although it was very irregular, and made it more
magnificent than it was before. Then, having returned finally to Pisa,
he made the pulpit of S. Giovanni, in marble, putting therein all
diligence in order to leave a memorial of himself to his country; and
among other things, carving in it the Universal Judgment, he made
therein many figures, if not with perfect design, at least with infinite
patience and diligence, as can be seen. And because it appeared to him,
as was true, that he had done a work worthy of praise, he carved at the
foot of it these verses:
ANNO MILLENO BIS CENTUM BISQUE TRIDENO
HOC OPUS INSIGNE SCULPSIT NICOLA PISANUS.
The people of Siena, moved by the fame of this work, which greatly
pleased not only the Pisans but everyone who saw it, gave to Niccola the
making of the pulpit of their Duomo, in which there is sung the Gospel;
Guglielmo Mariscotti being Praetor. In this Niccola made many stories of
Jesus Christ, with much credit to himself, by reason of the figures that
are there wrought and with great difficulty almost wholly detached
from the marble. Niccola likewise made the design of the Church and
Convent of S. Domenico in Arezzo for the Lords of Pietramala, who
erected it. And at the entreaty of Bishop Ubertini he restored the Pieve
of Cortona, and founded the Church of S. Margherita for the Friars of S.
Francis, on the highest point of that city.
[Illustration: _Alinari_
THE VISITATION AND THE NATIVITY
(_Detail, after_ Niccola Pisano, _from the Pulpit of the Baptistery,
Siena_)]