|
From the right transept a corridor leads off to the chapel of
the
Noviciate and the Sacristy. The former, built by Michelozzo
for
Cosimo, contains some beautiful terracotta work of the school of
the
Della Robbia, a tabernacle by Mino da Fiesole, and a Coronation of
the
Blessed Virgin ascribed to Giotto. This Coronation was originally
the
altar piece of the Baroncelli chapel, and is an excellent
picture,
although its authenticity is not above suspicion; the signature
is
almost certainly a forgery; this title of _Magister_ was Giotto's
pet
aversion, as we know from Boccaccio, and he never used it. Opening
out
of the Sacristy is a chapel, decorated with beautiful frescoes of
the
life of the Blessed Virgin and St. Mary Magdalene, now held to be
the
work of Taddeo Gaddi's Lombard pupil, Giovanni da Milano. There is,
as
has already been said, very little individuality in the work
of
Giotto's followers, but these frescoes are among the best of
their
kind.
The first Gothic cloisters belong to the epoch of the
foundation of
the church, and were probably designed by Arnolfo himself; the
second,
early Renaissance, are Brunelleschi's. The Refectory, which is
entered
from the first cloisters, contains a fresco of the Last Supper--one
of
the earliest renderings of this theme for monastic
dining-rooms--which
used to be assigned to Giotto, and is probably by one of
his
scholars. This room had the invidious honour of being the seat of
the
Inquisition, which in Florence had always--save for a very
brief
period in the thirteenth century--been in the hands of
the
Franciscans, and not the Dominicans. It never had any real power
in
Florence--the _bel viver fiorentino_, which, even in the days
of
tyranny, was always characteristic of the city, was opposed to
its
influence. The beautiful chapel of the Pazzi was built
by
Brunelleschi; its frieze of Angels' heads is by Donatello
and
Desiderio; within are Luca della Robbia's Apostles and
Evangelists.
Jacopo Pazzi had headed the conspiracy against the Medici in
1478,
and, after attempting to raise the people, had been captured in
his
escape, tortured and hanged. It was said that he had cried in
dying
that he gave his soul to the devil; he was certainly a
notorious
gambler and blasphemer. When buried here, the peasants believed
that
he brought a curse upon their crops; so the rabble dug him up,
dragged
the body through the streets, and finally with every
conceivable
indignity threw it into the Arno.
Behind Santa Croce two
streets of very opposite names and traditions
meet, the _Via Borgo Allegri_
(which also intersects the Via
Ghibellina) and the _Via dei Malcontenti_; the
former records the
legendary birthday of Italian painting, the latter the
mournful
processions of poor wretches condemned to death.
According to
the tradition, Giovanni Cimabue had his studio in the
former street, and it
was here that, in Dante's words, he thought to
hold the field in painting:
_Credette Cimabue nella pittura tener lo
campo._ Here, according to Vasari,
he was visited by Charles the Elder
of Anjou, and his great Madonna carried
hence in procession with music
and lighted candles, ringing of bells and
waving of banners, to Santa
Maria Novella; while the street that had
witnessed such a miracle was
ever after called _Borgo Allegri_, "the happy
suburb:" "named the Glad
Borgo from that beauteous face," as Elizabeth
Barrett Browning puts
it. Unfortunately there are several little things that
show that this
story needs revision of some kind. When Charles of Anjou came
to
Florence, the first stone of Santa Maria Novella had not yet been
laid,
and the picture now shown there as Cimabue's appears to be a
Sienese work.
The legend, however, is very precious, and should be
devoutly held. The king
in question was probably another Angevin
Charles--Carlo Martello, grandson of
the elder Charles and titular
King of Hungary, Dante's friend, who was
certainly in Florence for
nearly a month in the spring of 1295, and made
himself exceedingly
pleasant. Vasari has made a similar confusion in the case
of two
emperors of the name of Frederick. The picture has doubtless
perished,
but the Joyous Borgo has not changed its name.
The Via dei
Malcontenti leads out into the broad Viale Carlo Alberto,
which marks the
site of Arnolfo's wall. It formerly ended in a postern
gate, known as the
Porta della Giustizia, beyond which was a little
chapel--of which no trace is
left--and the place where the gallows
stood. The condemned were first brought
to a chapel which stood in the
Via dei Malcontenti, near the present San
Giuseppe, and then taken out
to the chapel beyond the gate, where the prayers
for the dying were
said over them by the friars, after which they were
delivered to the
executioner.[37] In May 1503, as Simone Filipepi tells us, a
man was
beheaded here, whom the people apparently regarded as innocent;
when
he was dead, they rose up and stoned the executioner to death.
And
this was the same executioner who, five years before, had
hanged
Savonarola and his companions in the Piazza, and had insulted
their
dead bodies to please the dregs of the populace. The tower, of
which
the mutilated remains still stand here, the _Torre della
Zecca
Vecchia_, formerly called the _Torre Reale_, was originally a part
of
the defences of a bridge which it was intended to build here in
honour
of King Robert of Naples in 1317, and guarded the Arno at this
point.
After the siege, during which the Porta della Giustizia was walled
up,
Duke Alessandro incorporated the then lofty Torre Reale into a
strong
fortress which he constructed here, the Fortezza Vecchia. In
later
days, offices connected with the Arte del Cambio and the Mint
were
established in its place, whence the present name of the Torre
della
Zecca Vecchia.
[37] See Guido Carocci, _Firenze Scomparsa_,
here and generally.
[Illustration: OLD HOUSES ON THE
ARNO]
CHAPTER VIII
_The Baptistery, the Campanile, and
the Duomo_
"There the traditions of faith and hope, of both the
Gentile and
Jewish races, met for their beautiful labour: the Baptistery
of
Florence is the last building raised on the earth by the
descendants of the workmen taught by Dædalus: and the Tower of
Giotto is
the loveliest of those raised on earth under the
inspiration of the men
who lifted up the tabernacle in the
wilderness. Of living Greek work there
is none after the
Florentine Baptistery; of living Christian work, none so
perfect
as the Tower of Giotto."--_Ruskin._
"Il non mai
abbastanza lodato tempio di Santa Maria del
Fiore."--_Vasari._
To the west of the Piazza del Duomo stands the
octagonal building of
black and white marble--"_l'antico vostro Batisteo_" as
Cacciaguida
calls it to Dante--which, in one shape or another, may be said to
have
watched over the history of Florence from the beginning. "It is,"
says
Ruskin, "the central building of Etrurian Christianity--of
European
Christianity." Here, in old pagan times, stood the Temple of
Mars,
with the shrine and sanctuary of the God of War. This was
the
Cathedral of Florence during a portion at least of the early
history
of the Republic, before the great Gothic building rose that
now
overshadows it to the east.
Villani and other early writers all
suppose that this present building
really was the original Temple of Mars,
converted into a church for
St. John the Baptist. Villani tells us that,
after the founding of
Florence by Julius Cæsar and other noble Romans, the
citizens of this
new Rome decided to erect a marvellous temple to the honour
of Mars,
in thanksgiving for the victory which the Romans had won over the
city
of Fiesole; and for this purpose the Senate sent them the best
and
most subtle masters that there were in Rome. Black and white
marble
was brought by sea and then up the Arno, with columns of
various
sizes; stone and other columns were taken from Fiesole, and the
temple
was erected in the place where the Etruscans of Fiesole had once
held
their market:--
"Right noble and beauteous did they make it with
eight faces, and when
they had done it with great diligence, they consecrated
it to their
god Mars, who was the god of the Romans; and they had him carved
in
marble, in the shape of a knight armed on horseback. They set him
upon
a marble column in the midst of that temple, and him did they hold
in
great reverence and adored as their god, what time Paganism lasted
in
Florence. And we find that the said temple was commenced at the
time
that Octavian Augustus reigned, and that it was erected under
the
ascendency of such a constellation that it will last well nigh
to
eternity."
There is much difference of opinion as to the real date
of
construction of the present building. While some authorities
have
assigned it to the eleventh or even to the twelfth century,
others
have supposed that it is either a Christian temple constructed in
the
sixth century on the site of the old Temple of Mars, or the
original
Temple converted into Christian use. It has indeed been recently
urged
that it is essentially a genuine Roman work of the fourth
century,
very analogous in structure to the Pantheon at Rome, on the model
of
which it was probably built. The little apse to the
south-west--the
part which contains the choir and altar--is certainly of the
twelfth
century. There was originally a round opening at the centre of
the
dome--like the Pantheon--and under this opening, according to
Villani,
the statue of Mars stood. It was closed in the twelfth century.
The
dome served Brunelleschi as a model for the cupola of Santa Maria
del
Fiore. The lantern was added in the sixteenth century. Although
this
building, so sacrosanct to the Florentines, had been spared by
the
Goths and Lombards, it narrowly escaped destruction at the hands
of
the Tuscan Ghibellines. In 1249, when the Ghibellines, with the aid
of
the Emperor Frederick II., had expelled the Guelfs, the
conquerors
endeavoured to destroy the Baptistery by means of the tower called
the
Guardamorto, which stood in the Piazza towards the entrance of
the
Corso degli Adimari, and watched over the tombs of the dead
citizens
who were buried round San Giovanni. This device of making the
tower
fall upon the church failed. "As it pleased God," writes
Villani,
"through the reverence and miraculous power of the blessed John,
the
tower, when it fell, manifestly avoided the holy Church, and
turned
back and fell across the Piazza; whereat all the Florentines
wondered,
and the People greatly rejoiced."
At the close of the
thirteenth century, in those golden days of
Dante's youth and early manhood,
there were steps leading up to the
church, and it was surrounded by these
tombs. Many of the latter seem
to have been old pagan sarcophagi adopted for
use by the Florentine
aristocracy. Here Guido Cavalcanti used to wander in
his solitary
musings and speculations--trying to find out that there was no
God, as
his friends charitably suggested--and Boccaccio tells a
most
delightful story of a friendly encounter between him and some
young
Florentine nobles, who objected to his unsociable habits. In
1293,
Arnolfo di Cambio levelled the Piazza, removed the tombs,
and
plastered the pilasters in the angles of the octagonal with slabs
of
black and white marble of Prato, as now we see. The similar
decoration
of the eight faces of the church is much earlier.
The
interior is very dark indeed--so dark that the mosaics, which
Dante must in
part have looked upon, would need a very bright day to
be visible. At present
they are almost completely concealed by the
scaffolding of the restorers.[38]
Over the whole church preside the
two Saints whom an earlier Florentine
worshipper of Mars could least
have comprehended--the Baptist and the
Magdalene. And the spirit of
Dante haunts it as he does no other Florentine
building--_il mio bel
San Giovanni_, he lovingly calls it. "In your ancient
Baptistery," his
ancestor tells him in the fifteenth Canto of the _Paradiso_,
"I became
at once a Christian and Cacciaguida." And, indeed, the same holds
true
of countless generations of Florentines--among them the
keenest
intellects and most subtle hands that the world has
known--all
baptised here. But it has memories of another kind. The
shameful
penance of oblation to St. John--if Boccaccio's tale be true, and
if
the letter ascribed to Dante is authentic--was rejected by him;
but
many another Florentine, with bare feet and lighted candle,
has
entered here as a prisoner in penitential garb. The
present
font--although of early date--was placed here in the
seventeenth
century, to replace the very famous one which played so large a
part
in Dante's thoughts. Here had he been baptised--here, in one of
the
most pathetic passages of the _Paradiso_, did he yearn, before
death
came, to take the laurel crown:--
[38] The earliest of these
mosaics are those in the tribune, executed
originally by a certain Fra
Jacopo in the year 1225; those in the dome
are in part ascribed to Dante's
contemporary, Andrea Tafi.
Se mai continga che il poema
sacro,
al quale ha posto mano e cielo e terra,
si che m'ha
fatto per piu anni macro,
vinca la crudelta, che fuor mi serra
del bello ovil, dov'io dormii agnello,
nimico ai lupi che gli danno
guerra;
con altra voce omai, con altro vello
ritornero poeta,
ed in sul fonte
del mio battesmo prendero il cappello;
pero
che nella Fede, che fa conte
l'anime a Dio, quivi entra'
io.[39]
[39]
Should it e'er come to pass that the sacred poem
to which
both heaven and earth so have set hand, that it
hath
made me lean through many a year,
should overcome the
cruelty which doth bar me forth from
the fair sheepfold wherein I used
to sleep, a lamb, foe to
the wolves which war upon it;
with
changed voice now, and with changed fleece shall I
return, a poet, and
at the font of my baptism shall I
assume the chaplet;
because
into the Faith which maketh souls known of God,
'twas there I
entered.
--Par. xxv. 1-11, _Wicksteed's translation_.
This
ancient font, which stood in the centre of the church, appears to
have had
round holes or _pozzetti_ in its outer wall, in which the
priests stood to
baptise; and Dante tells us in the _Inferno_ that he
broke one of these
_pozzetti_, to save a boy from being drowned or
suffocated. The boy saved was
apparently not being baptised, but was
playing about with others, and had
either tumbled into the font itself
or climbed head foremost into one of the
_pozzetti_. When the divine
poet was exiled, charitable people said that he
had done this from
heretical motives--just as they had looked with suspicion
upon his
friend Guido's spiritual wanderings in the same
locality.
[Illustration: THE BAPTISTERY]
Though the old font has
gone, St. John, to the left of the high altar,
still keeps watch over all the
Florentine children brought to be
baptised--to be made _conti_, known to God,
and to himself in God.
Opposite to him is the great type of repentance after
baptism, St.
Mary Magdalene, a wooden statue by Donatello. What a contrast is
here
with those pagan Magdalenes of the Renaissance--such as Titian
and
Correggio painted! Fearfully wasted and haggard, this terrible
figure
of asceticism--when once the first shock of repulsion is got
over--is
unmistakably a masterpiece of the sculptor; it is as though one of
the
Penitential Psalms had taken bodily shape.
On the other side of
the church stands the tomb of the dethroned Pope,
John XXIII., Baldassarre
Cossa, one of the earliest works in the
Renaissance style, reared by
Michelozzo and Donatello, 1424-1427, for
Cosimo dei Medici. The fallen
Pontiff rests at last in peace in the
city which had witnessed his submission
to his successful rival,
Martin V., and which had given a home to his closing
days; here he
lies, forgetful of councils and cardinals:--
"After
life's fitful fever he sleeps well."
The recumbent figure in bronze is
the work of Donatello, as also the
Madonna and Child that guard his last
slumber. Below, are Faith, Hope,
and Charity--the former by Michelozzo (to
whom also the architectural
part of the monument is due), the two latter by
Donatello. It is said
that Pope Martin V. objected to the inscription,
"quondam papa," and
was answered in the words of Pilate: _quod scripsi,
scripsi_.
* * * * *
But the glory
of the Baptistery is in its three bronze gates, the
finest triumph of bronze
casting. On November 6th, 1329, the consuls
of the Arte di Calimala, who had
charge of the works of San Giovanni,
ordained that their doors should be of
metal and as beautiful as
possible. The first of the three, now the southern
gate opposite the
Bigallo (but originally the _porta di mezzo_ opposite the
Duomo), was
assigned by them to Andrea Pisano on January 9th, 1330; he made
the
models in the same year, as the inscription on the gate itself
shows;
the casting was finished in 1336. Vasari's statement that
Giotto
furnished the designs for Andrea is now entirely discredited.
These
gates set before us, in twenty-eight reliefs, twenty scenes from
the
life of the Baptist with eight symbolical virtues below--all set
round
with lions' heads. Those who know the work of the earlier
Pisan
masters, Niccolo and Giovanni, will at once perceive how
completely
Andrea has freed himself from the traditions of the school of
Pisa;
instead of filling the whole available space with figures on
different
planes and telling several stories at once, Andrea composes his
relief
of a few figures on the same plane, and leaves the background
free.
There are never any unnecessary figures or mere spectators; the
bare
essentials of the episode are set before us as simply as
possible,
whether it be Zacharias writing the name of John or the dance of
the
daughter of Herodias, which may well be compared with
Giotto's
frescoes in Santa Croce. Most perfect of all are the eight figures
of
the Virtues in the eight lower panels, and they should be compared
with
Giotto's allegories at Padua. We have Hope winged and straining
upwards
towards a crown, Faith with cross and sacramental cup, Charity
and Prudence,
above; Fortitude, Temperance and Justice below; and
then, to complete the
eight, Dante's favourite virtue, the maiden
Humility. The Temperance, with
Giotto and Andrea Pisano, is not the
mere opposite of Gluttony, with pitcher
of water and cup (as we may
see her presently in Santa Maria Novella); but it
is the cardinal
virtue which, St. Thomas says, includes "any virtue
whatsoever that
puts in practice moderation in any matter, and restrains
appetite in
its tendency in any direction." Andrea Pisano's Temperance sits
next
to his Justice, with the sword and scales; she too has a sword,
even
as Justice has, but she is either sheathing it or drawing it
with
reluctance.
The lovely and luxuriant decorative frieze that runs
round this portal
was executed by Ghiberti's pupils in the middle of the
fifteenth
century. Over the gate is the beheading of St. John the
Baptist--two
second-rate figures by Vincenzo Danti.
The second or
northern gate is more than three-quarters of a century
later, and it is the
result of that famous competition which opened
the Quattrocento. It was
assigned to Lorenzo Ghiberti in 1403, and he
had with him his stepfather
Bartolo di Michele, and other assistants
(including possibly Donatello). It
was finished and set up gilded in
April 1424, at the main entry between the
two porphyry columns,
opposite the Duomo, whence Andrea's gate was removed.
It will be
observed that each new gate was first put in this place of honour,
and
then translated to make room for its better. The plan of Ghiberti's
is
similar to that of Andrea's gate--in fact it is his style of
work
brought to its ultimate perfection. Twenty-eight reliefs
represent
scenes from the New Testament, from the Annunciation to the Descent
of
the Holy Spirit, while in eight lower compartments are the
four
Evangelists and the four great Latin Doctors. The scene of
the
Temptation of the Saviour is particularly striking, and the figure
of
the Evangelist John, the Eagle of Christ, has the utmost grandeur.
Over
the door are three finely modelled figures representing St. John
the Baptist
disputing with a Levite and a Pharisee--or, perhaps, the
Baptist between two
Prophets--by Giovanni Francesco Rustici
(1506-1511), a pupil of Verrocchio's,
who appears to have been
influenced by Leonardo da Vinci.
But in the
third or eastern gate, opposite the Duomo, Ghiberti was to
crown the whole
achievement of his life. Mr Perkins remarks: "Had he
never lived to make the
second gates, which to the world in general
are far superior to the first, he
would have been known in history as
a continuator of the school of Andrea
Pisano, enriched with all those
added graces which belonged to his own style,
and those refinements of
technique which the progress made in bronze casting
had rendered
perfect."[40] In the meantime the laws of perspective had
been
understood, and their science set forth by Brunelleschi; and
when
Ghiberti, on the completion of his first gates, was in January
1425
invited by the consuls of the Guild (amongst whom was the
great
anti-Medicean politician, Niccolo da Uzzano) to model the third
doors,
he was full of this new knowledge. "I strove," he says in
his
commentaries, "to imitate nature to the uttermost." The subjects
were
selected for him by Leonardo Bruni--ten stories from the Old
Testament
which, says Leonardo in his letter to Niccolo da Uzzano and
his
colleagues, "should have two things: first and chiefly, they must
be
illustrious; and secondly, they must be significant. Illustrious,
I
call those which can satisfy the eye with variety of
design;
significant, those which have importance worthy of memory." For
the
rest, their main instructions to him were that he should make
the
whole the richest, most perfect and most beauteous work
imaginable,
regardless of time and cost.
[40] By these "second
gates" are of course meant Ghiberti's second
gates: in reality the "third
gates" of the Baptistery.
The work took more than twenty-five years. The
stories were all
modelled in wax by 1440, when the casting of the bronze
commenced;
the whole was finished in 1447, gilded in 1452--the gilding
has
happily worn off from all the gates--and finally set up in June
1452,
in the place where Ghiberti's other gate had been. Among his
numerous
assistants were again his stepfather Bartolo, his son Vittorio,
and,
among the less important, the painters Paolo Uccello and
Benozzo
Gozzoli.
The result is a series of most magnificent pictures
in bronze.
Ghiberti worked upon his reliefs like a painter, and lavished all
the
newly-discovered scientific resources of the painter's art upon
them.
Whether legitimate sculpture or not, it is, beyond a doubt, one of
the
most beautiful things in the world. "I sought to understand," he
says
in his second commentary, that book which excited Vasari's scorn,
"how
forms strike upon the eye, and how the theoretic part of graphic
and
pictorial art should be managed. Working with the utmost diligence
and
care, I introduced into some of my compositions as many as a
hundred
figures, which I modelled upon different planes, so that those
nearest
the eye might appear larger, and those more remote smaller
in
proportion." It is a triumph of science wedded to the most
exquisite
sense of beauty. Each of the ten bas-reliefs contains several
motives
and an enormous number of these figures on different planes; which
is,
in a sense, going back from the simplicity of Andrea Pisano to
glorify
the old manner of Niccolo and Giovanni. In the first, the creation
of
man, the creation of woman, and the expulsion from Eden are seen;
in
the second, the sacrifice of Abel, in which the ploughing of
Cain's
oxen especially pleased Vasari; in the third, the story of Noah;
in
the fourth, the story of Abraham, a return to the theme in
which
Ghiberti had won his first laurels,--the three Angels appearing
to
Abraham have incomparable grace and loveliness, and the landscape
in
bronze is a marvel of skill. In the fifth and sixth, we have
the
stories of Jacob and Joseph, respectively; in the seventh and
eighth,
of Moses and Joshua; in the ninth and tenth, of David and Solomon.
The
latter is supposed to have been imitated by Raphael, in his
famous
fresco of the School of Athens in the Vatican. The
architectural
backgrounds--dream palaces endowed with permanent life in
bronze--are
as marvellous as the figures and landscapes. Hardly less
beautiful are
the minor ornaments that surround these masterpieces,--the
wonderful
decorative frieze of fruits and birds and beasts that frames
the
whole, the statuettes alternating with busts in the double
border
round the bas-reliefs. It is the ultimate perfection of
decorative
art. Among the statuettes a figure of Miriam, recalling an Angel
of
Angelico, is of peculiar loveliness. In the middle of the whole, in
the
centre at the lower corners of the Jacob and Joseph respectively,
are
portrait busts of Lorenzo Ghiberti himself and Bartolo di Michele.
Vasari has
said the last word:--
"And in very truth can it be said that this work
hath its perfection
in all things, and that it is the most beautiful work of
the world, or
that ever was seen amongst ancients or moderns. And verily
ought
Lorenzo to be truly praised, seeing that one day
Michelangelo
Buonarroti, when he stopped to look at this work, being asked
what he
thought of it and if these gates were beautiful, replied: 'They are
so
beautiful that they would do well for the Gates of Paradise.'
Praise
verily proper, and spoken by one who could judge them."
The
Baptism of Christ over the portal is an unattractive work by
Andrea Sansovino
(circa 1505), finished by Vincenzo Danti. The Angel
is a seventeenth century
addition. More interesting far, are the
scorched porphyry columns on either
side of the gate; these were part
of the booty carried off by the Pisan
galleys from Majorca in 1117,
and presented to the Florentines in gratitude
for their having guarded
Pisa during the absence of the troops. Villani says
that the Pisans
offered their allies the choice between these porphyry
columns and
some metal gates, and that, on their choosing the columns, they
sent
them to Florence covered with scarlet, but that some said that
they
scorched them first for envy. It was between these columns
that
Cavalcanti was lingering and musing when the gay cavalcade of
Betto
Brunelleschi and his friends, in Boccaccio's novel, swooped down
upon
him through the Piazza di Santa Reparata: "Thou, Guido, wilt none
of
our fellowship; but lo now! when thou shalt have found that there is
no
God, what wilt thou have done?"
From the gate which might have stood at
the doors of Paradise, or at
least have guarded that sacred threshold by
which Virgil and Dante
entered Purgatory, we cross to the tower which might
fittingly have
sounded tierce and nones to the valley of the Princes.
This
"Shepherd's Tower," according to Ruskin, is "the model and mirror
of
perfect architecture." The characteristics of Power and Beauty,
he
writes in the _Seven Lamps of Architecture_, "occur more or less
in
different buildings, some in one and some in another. But all
together,
and all in their highest possible relative degrees, they
exist, as far as I
know, only in one building in the world, the
Campanile of
Giotto."
Like Ghiberti's bronze gates, this exquisitely lovely tower of
marble
has beauty beyond words: "That bright, smooth, sunny surface
of
glowing jasper, those spiral shafts and fairy traceries, so white,
so
faint, so crystalline, that their slight shapes are hardly traced
in
darkness on the pallor of the eastern sky, that serene height
of
mountain alabaster, coloured like a morning cloud, and chased like
a
sea-shell." It was commenced by Giotto himself in 1334, when the
first
stone was solemnly laid. When Giotto died in 1336, the work
had
probably not risen above the stage of the lower series of
reliefs.
Andrea Pisano was chosen to succeed him, and he carried it on
from
1337 to 1342, finishing the first story and bringing it up to
the
first of the three stories of windows; it will be observed
that
Andrea, who was primarily a sculptor, unlike Giotto, made
provision
for the presence of large monumental statues as well as reliefs in
his
decorative scheme. Through some misunderstanding, Andrea was
then
deprived of the work, which was intrusted to Francesco
Talenti.
Francesco Talenti carried it on until 1387, making a
general
modification in the architecture and decoration; the three
most
beautiful windows, increasing in size as we ascend, with
their
beautiful Gothic tracery, are his work. According to Giotto's
original
plan, the whole was to have been crowned with a pyramidical steeple
or
spire; Vasari says that it was abandoned "because it was a
German
thing, and of antiquated fashion."
All around the base of the
tower runs a wonderful series of
bas-reliefs on a very small scale, setting
forth the whole history of
human skill under divine guidance, from the
creation of man to the
reign of art, science, and letters, in twenty-seven
exquisitely
"inlaid jewels of Giotto's." At each corner of the tower are
three
shields, the red Cross of the People between the red lilies of
the
Commune. "This smallness of scale," says Ruskin of these
reliefs
"enabled the master workmen of the tower to execute them with
their
own hands; and for the rest, in the very finest architecture,
the
decoration of the most precious kind is usually thought of as a
jewel,
and set with space round it--as the jewels of a crown, or the clasp
of
a girdle." These twenty-seven subjects, with the possible exception
of
the last five on the northern side, were designed by Giotto
himself;
and are, together with the first bronze door, the greatest
Florentine
work in sculpture of the first half of the fourteenth century.
The
execution is, in the main, Andrea Pisano's; but there is a
constant
tradition that some of the reliefs are from Giotto's own hand.
Antonio
Pucci, in the eighty-fifth canto of his _Centiloquio_,
distinctly
states that Giotto carved the earlier ones, _i primi intagli fe
con
bello stile_, and Pucci was almost Giotto's contemporary.
"Pastoral
life," "Jubal," "Tubal Cain," "Sculpture," "Painting," are the
special
subjects which it is most plausible, or perhaps most attractive,
to
ascribe to him.
On the western side we have the creation of Man,
the creation of
Woman; and then, thirdly, Adam and Eve toiling, or you may
call it the
dignity of labour, if you will--Giotto's rendering of the
thought
which John Ball was to give deadly meaning to, or ever the
fourteenth
century closed--
When Adam delved and Eve
span,
Who was then the gentleman?
Then come pastoral life, Jabal
with his tent, his flock and dog;
Jubal, the maker of stringed and wind
instruments; Tubal Cain, the
first worker in metal; the first vintage,
represented by the story of
Noah. On the southern side comes first Astronomy,
represented by
either Zoroaster or Ptolemy. Then follow Building, Pottery,
Riding,
Weaving, and (according to Ruskin) the Giving of Law.
Lastly
Daedalus, symbolising, according to Ruskin, "the conquest of
the
element of air"; or, more probably, here as in Dante
(_Paradiso_
viii.), the typical mechanician. Next, on the eastern side,
comes
Rowing, symbolising, according to Ruskin, "the conquest of
the
sea"--very possibly intended for Jason and the Argo, a type adopted
in
several places by Dante. The next relief, "the conquest of the
earth,"
probably represents the slaying of Antæus by Hercules, and
symbolises
the "beneficent strength of civilisation, crushing the savageness
of
inhumanity." Giotto uses his mythology much as Dante does--as
something
only a little less sacred, and of barely less authority than
theology--and
the conquest of Antæus by Hercules was a solemn subject
with Dante too;
besides a reference in the _Inferno_, he mentions it
twice in the _De
Monarchia_ as a special revelation of God's judgment
by way of ordeal, and
touches upon it again in the _Convivio, secondo
le testimonianze delle
scritture_. Here Hercules immediately follows
the "conquest of the sea," as
having, by his columns, set sacred
limits to warn men that they must pass no
further (_Inferno_ xxvi.).
Brutality being thus overthrown, we are shown
agriculture and
trade,--represented by a splendid team of ploughing bulls and
a
horse-chariot, respectively. Then, over the door of the tower, the
Lamb
with the symbol of Resurrection, perhaps, as Ruskin thinks, to
"express the
law of Sacrifice and door of ascent to Heaven"; or,
perhaps, merely as being
the emblem of the great Guild of wool
merchants, the Arte della Lana, who had
charge of the cathedral works.
Then follow the representations of the arts,
commencing with the
relief at the corner: Geometry, regarded as the
foundation of the
others to follow, as being _senza macula d'errore e
certissima_.
Turning the corner, the first and second, on the northern
side,
represent Sculpture and Painting, and were possibly carved by
Giotto
himself. The remaining five are all later, and from the hand of
Luca
della Robbia, who perhaps worked from designs left by
Giotto--Grammar,
which may be taken to represent Literature in general,
Arithmetic, the
science of numbers (in its great mediæval sense), Dialectics;
closing
with Music, in some respects the most beautiful of the
series,
symbolised in Orpheus charming beasts and birds by his strains,
and
Harmony. "Harmony of song," writes Ruskin, "in the full power of
it,
meaning perfect education in all art of the Muses and of
civilised
life; the mystery of its concord is taken for the symbol of that of
a
perfect state; one day, doubtless, of the perfect world."
Above this
fundamental series of bas-reliefs, there runs a second
series of four groups
of seven. They were probably executed by pupils
of Andrea Pisano, and are
altogether inferior to those below--the
seven Sacraments on the northern side
being the best. Above are a
series of heroic statues in marble. Of these the
oldest are those less
easily visible, on the north opposite the Duomo,
representing David
and Solomon, with two Sibyls; M. Reymond ascribes them to
Andrea
Pisano. Those opposite the Misericordia are also of the
fourteenth
century. On the east are Habakkuk and Abraham, by Donatello
(the
latter in part by a pupil), between two Patriarchs probably by
Niccolo
d'Arezzo, the chief sculptor of the Florentine school at the end
of
the Trecento. Three of the four statues opposite the Baptistery are
by
Donatello; figures of marvellous strength and vigour. It is
quite
uncertain whom they are intended to represent (the "Solomon"
and
"David," below the two in the centre, refer to the older statues
which
once stood here), but the two younger are said to be the Baptist
and
Jeremiah. The old bald-headed prophet, irreverently called
the
_Zuccone_ or "Bald-head," is one of Donatello's masterpieces, and
is
said to have been the sculptor's own favourite creation. Vasari
tells
us that, while working upon it, Donatello used to bid it talk to
him,
and, when he wanted to be particularly believed, he used to swear
by
it: "By the faith that I bear to my Zuccone."
*
* * * *
[Illustration: THE BIGALLO]
At the end
of the Via Calzaioli, opposite the Baptistery, is that
little Gothic gem, the
Loggia called the _Bigallo_, erected between
1352 and 1358, for the "Captains
of Our Lady of Mercy," while Orcagna
was rearing his more gorgeous tabernacle
for the "Captains of Our Lady
of Or San Michele." Its architect is unknown;
his manner resembles
Orcagna's, to whom the work has been erroneously
ascribed. The Madonna
is by Alberto Arnoldi (1361). The Bigallo was intended
for the public
functions of charity of the foundling hospital, which was
founded
under the auspices of the Confraternity of the Misericordia,
whose
oratory is on the other side of the way. These Brothers of Mercy,
in
their mysterious black robes hiding their faces, are familiar
enough
even to the most casual visitor to Florence; and their work of
succour
to the sick and injured has gone on uninterruptedly throughout
the
whole of Florentine history.
* * *
* *
In the last decade of the thirteenth century, when the People
and
Commune of Florence were in an unusually peaceful state, after
the
tumults caused by the reforms and expulsion of Giano della Bella
had
subsided, the new Cathedral was commenced on the site of the
older
church of Santa Reparata. The first stones and foundations
were
blessed with great solemnity in 1296; and, in this golden age of
the
democracy, the work proceeded apace, until in a document of
April
1299, concerning the exemption of Arnolfo di Cambio from all
taxation,
it is stated that "by reason of his industry, experience and
genius,
the Commune and People of Florence from the magnificent and
visible
beginning of the said work of the said church, commenced by the
same
Master Arnolphus, hope to have a more beautiful and more
honourable
temple than any other which there is in the regions of
Tuscany."
But although the original design and beginning were
undoubtedly
Arnolfo's, the troublous times that fell upon Florence appear to
have
interrupted the work; and it was almost abandoned for lack of
funds
until 1334, when Giotto was appointed capo-maestro of the Commune
and
of the work of Santa Reparata, as it was still called. The
Cathedral
was now in charge of the Arte della Lana, as the Baptistery was
in
that of the Arte di Calimala. It is not precisely known what Giotto
did
with it; but the work languished again after his death, until
Francesco
Talenti was appointed capo-maestro, and, in July 1357, the
foundations were
laid of the present church of Santa Maria del Fiore,
on a larger and more
magnificent scale. Arnolfo's work appears to
have been partly destroyed,
partly enlarged and extended. Other
capo-maestri carried on what Francesco
Talenti had commenced, until,
in 1378, just at the end of mediæval Florence,
the fourth and last
great vault was closed, and the main work
finished.
The completion of the Cathedral belongs to that intermediate
epoch
which saw the decline of the great democracy and the dawn of
the
Renaissance, and ran from 1378 to 1421, in which latter year the
third
tribune was finished. Filippo Brunelleschi's dome or cupola,
raised
upon a frieze or drum high above the three great semi-domes, with
a
large window in each of the eight sides, was commenced in 1420
and
finished in 1434, the year which witnessed the establishment of
the
Medicean regime in Florence. Vasari waxes most enthusiastic over
this
work. "Heaven willed," he writes, "after the earth had been for
so
many years without an excellent soul or a divine spirit, that
Filippo
should leave to the world from himself the greatest, the most
lofty
and the most beauteous construction of all others made in the time
of
the moderns and even in that of the ancients." And
Michelangelo
imitated it in St Peter's at Rome, turning back, as he rode away
from
Florence, to gaze upon Filippo's work, and declaring that he could
not
do anything more beautiful. Some modern writers have passed a
very
different judgment. Fergusson says:--"The plain, heavy,
simple
outlined dome of Brunelleschi acts like an extinguisher, crushing
all
the lower part of the composition, and both internally and
externally
destroying all harmony between the parts." Brunelleschi also
designed
the Lantern, which was commenced shortly before his death (1446)
and
finished in 1461. The palla or ball, which crowns the whole, was
added
by Andrea Verrocchio. In the fresco in the Spanish Chapel of
Santa
Maria Novella, you shall see the Catholic Church symbolised by
the
earlier church of Santa Reparata; and, as the fresco was
executed
before the middle of the fourteenth century, it apparently
represents
the designs of Arnolfo and Giotto. Vasari, indeed, states that it
was
taken from Arnolfo's model in wood. "From this painting," he says,
"it
is obvious that Arnolfo had proposed to raise the dome
immediately
over the piers and above the first cornice, at that point namely
where
Filippo di Ser Brunellesco, desiring to render the building
less
heavy, interposed the whole space wherein we now see the
windows,
before adding the dome."[41]
[41] "There is only one point
from which the size of the Cathedral of
Florence is felt; and that is from
the corner of the Via de'
Balestrieri, opposite the south-east angle, where
it happens that the
dome is seen rising instantly above the apse and
transepts" (_Seven
Lamps_).
[Illustration: PORTA DELLA MANDORLA,
DUOMO]
The Duomo has had three facades. Of the first facade, the facade
of
Arnolfo's church before 1357, only two statues remain which
probably
formed part of it; one of Boniface VIII. within the Cathedral,
of
which more presently, and a statue of a Bishop in the sacristy.
The
second facade, commenced in 1357, and still in progress in 1420,
was
left unfinished, and barbarously destroyed towards the end of
the
sixteenth century. A fresco by Poccetti in the first cloister of
San
Marco, the fifth to the right of the entrance, representing
the
entrance of St. Antoninus into Florence to take possession of his
see,
shows this second facade. Some of the statues that once decorated
it
still exist. The Boniface reappeared upon it from the first
facade,
between St. Peter and St. Paul; over the principal gate was Our
Lady
of the Flower herself, presenting her Child to give His blessing
to
the Florentines--and this is still preserved in the Opera del
Duomo--by
an unknown artist of the latter half of the fourteenth
century; she was
formerly attended by Zenobius and Reparata, while
Angels held a canopy over
her--these are lost. Four Doctors of the
Church, now mutilated and
transformed into poets, are still to be seen
on the way to Poggio
Imperiale--by Niccolo d'Arezzo and Piero di
Giovanni Tedesco (1396); some
Apostles, probably by the latter, and
very fine works, are in the court of
the Riccardi Palace. The last
statues made for the facade, the four
Evangelists, of the first
fifteen years of the Quattrocento, are now within
the present church,
in the chapels of the Tribune of St. Zenobius. There is a
curious
tradition that Donatello placed Farinata degli Uberti on the
facade;
and few men would have deserved the honour better. After the
sixteenth
century the facade remained a desolate waste down to our own
times.
The present facade, gorgeous but admirable in its way, was designed
by
De Fabris, and finished between 1875 and 1887; the first stone was
laid
by Victor Emmanuel in 1860. Thus has the United Italy of to-day
completed the
work of the great Republic of the Middle Ages.
[Illustration: STATUE OF
BONIFACE VIII.]
The four side gates of the Duomo are among the chief
artistic
monuments of Florentine sculpture in the epoch that intervened
between
the setting of Andrea Pisano and Orcagna, and the rising of
Donatello
and Ghiberti. Nearer the facade, south and north, the two plainer
and
earlier portals are always closed; the two more ornate and later,
the
gate of the canons on the south and the gate of the Mandorla on
the
north, are the ordinary entrances into the aisles of the
cathedral.
Earliest of the four is the minor southern portal near the
Campanile,
over which the pigeons cluster and coo. Our Lady of the Pigeons,
in
the tympanum, is an excellent work of the school of Nino
Pisano
(Andrea's son), rather later than the middle of the Trecento.
The
northern minor portal is similar in style, with sculpture
subordinated
to polychromatic decoration, but with beautiful twisted columns,
of
which the two outermost rest upon grand mediæval lions, who are
helped
to bear them by delicious little winged _putti_. Third in order
of
construction comes the chief southern portal, the Porta dei
Canonici,
belonging to the last decade of the fourteenth century. The
pilasters
are richly decorated with sculptured foliage and figures of animals
in
the intervals between the leaves. In the tympanum above, the
Madonna
and Child with two adoring Angels--statues of great grace
and
beauty--are by Lorenzo di Giovanni d'Ambrogio, 1402. Above are
Angels
bearing a tondo of the Pieta.
The Porta della Mandorla is one
of the most perfect examples of
Florentine decorative sculpture that exists.
M. Reymond calls it "le
produit le plus pur du genie florentin dans toute
l'independance de sa
pensee." It was commenced by Giovanni di Ambrogio, the
chief master of
the canons' gate; and finished by Niccolo da Arezzo, in the
early
years of the fifteenth century. The decorations of its pilasters,
with
nude figures amidst the conventional foliage between the angels
with
their wings and scrolls, are already almost in the spirit of
the
Renaissance. The mosaic over the door, representing the
Annunciation,
was executed by Domenico Ghirlandaio in 1490. "Amongst modern
masters
of mosaic," says Vasari, "nothing has yet been seen better than
this.
Domenico was wont to say that painting is mere design, and that
the
true painting for eternity is mosaic." The two small statues
of
Prophets are the earliest works of Donatello, 1405-1406. Above is
the
famous relief which crowns the whole, and from which the door
takes
its name--the glorified Madonna of the Mandorla. Formerly ascribed
to
Jacopo della Quercia, it is now recognised as the work of Nanni
di
Banco, whose father Antonio collaborated with Niccolo da Arezzo on
the
door. It represents the Madonna borne up in the Mandorla surrounded
by
Angels, three of whom above are hymning her triumph. With a
singularly
sweet yet majestic maternal gesture, she consigns her girdle to
the
kneeling Thomas on the left; on the right among the rocks, a bear
is
either shaking or climbing a tree. This work, executed slightly
before
1420, is the best example of the noble manner of the
fourteenth
century united to the technical mastery of the fifteenth.
Though
matured late, it is the most perfect fruit of the school of
Orcagna.
Nanni died before it was quite completed. The precise symbolism
of
the bear is not easy to determine; it occurs also in Andrea
Pisano's
relief of Adam and Eve labouring, on the Campanile. According to
St.
Buonaventura, the bear is an emblem of Lust; according to
the
Bestiaries, of Violence. The probability is that here it
merely
represents the evil one, symbolising the Fall in the Adam and
Eve
relief, and now implying that Mary healed the wound that Eve had
dealt
the human race--_la piaga che Maria richiuse ed unse_.
The
interior is somewhat bare, and the aisles and vaults are so
proportioned and
constructed as to destroy much of the effect of the
vast size both of the
whole and of the parts. The nave and aisles lead
to a great octagonal space
beneath the dome, where the choir is
placed, extending into three polygonal
apses, those to right and left
representing the transepts.
Over the
central door is a fine but restored mosaic of the Coronation
of Madonna, by
Giotto's friend and contemporary, Gaddo Gaddi, which is
highly praised by
Vasari. On either side stand two great equestrian
portraits in fresco of
condottieri, who served the Republic in
critical times; by Andrea del
Castagno is Niccolo da Tolentino, who
fought in the Florentine pay with
average success and more than
average fidelity, and died in 1435, a prisoner
in the hands of Filippo
Maria Visconti; by Paolo Uccello is Giovanni Aguto,
or John Hawkwood,
a greater captain, but of more dubious character, who died
in 1394.
Let it stand to Hawkwood's credit that St Catherine of Siena
once
wrote to him, _O carissimo e dolcissimo fratello in Cristo Gesu_.
By
the side of the entrance is the famous statue, mutilated
but
extraordinarily impressive, of Boniface VIII., ascribed by Vasari
to
Andrea Pisano, but which is certainly earlier, and may
possibly,
according to M. Reymond, be assigned to Arnolfo di Cambio himself.
It
represents the terrible Pontiff in the flower of his age; hardly
a
portrait, but an idealised rendering of a Papal politician, a _papa
re_
of the Middle Ages. Even so might he have looked when he received
Dante and
his fellow-ambassadors alone, and addressed to them the
words recorded by
Dino Compagni: "Why are ye so obstinate? Humble yourselves before me. I tell you
in very truth that I have no other intention, save for your peace. Let two of
you go back, and they shall have my benediction if they bring it about that my
will be obeyed." |
|
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