Читать книгу Lorenzo de' Medici, the Magnificent - Alfred von Reumont - Страница 8

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During the two centuries that laid the foundation of the power of the Medici the city of Florence had reached the size which it has retained to our day, and presented much the same internal appearance as it did down to a very recent period. The site was a favourable one. About midway between its source and its mouth the Arno issues from the narrow valleys of the Casentino, Aretino, and the upper Arno, and flows down the western slope of Tuscany towards the Mediterranean. On a spot where there rises a group of low hills, close to the left bank of the river, the city was founded. On the right bank a semicircle of hills, crowned with the tower and ruined walls of the ancient Etruscan city of Fiesole, recedes in gentle declivities. Not long before the decline of the Roman Republic the community was formed which was destined in the course of centuries to be the ruling power in Tuscany, to promote the revival of literature and art, and to recall to life the culture of the ancients, under the influence of Christianity.

Many circumstances combined to promote the prosperity of the city. Although the river had neither any great volume nor steadiness in its flow it afforded a means of communication, and its course lay through flowery meadows which, watered by brooks descending from the sunny hillsides, were well fitted for the cultivation of the vine and olive, inexhaustible sources of wealth to the inhabitants of those southern regions. The pure air of the mountains, which glistened with the snow upon them until late in spring, together with the powerful influence of the sun, removed all fear of the malaria incident to such low-lying districts. These advantages seem to have attracted settlers from Fiesole, who established here a fair for the convenience of trade. A Roman military colony augmented the population and importance of the settlement; and although the ancient inhabitants of the city were proud of their Roman descent, their posterity attributed the inflexibility of the popular character, ‘which still retains its stony and rocky nature,’ to the admixture of their blood with that of the mountaineers of Fiesole. The oldest traditions speak of the special veneration in which the God of War was held; and if the opinion that the baptistery built on the northern boundary of the original city was his temple be false, at all events the figure of Mars was to be seen on the old bridge, until it was swept away by one of the frequent inundations of the Arno.

Moreover, in the Roman town there are reminiscences of the Capitol in fragments of the amphitheatre which have been dug up at different times, and have been used in edifices of later date. Evidences of the same are said to have existed in the church of Santa Maria di Campidoglio, once standing in the old market-place. The circuit of the walls of the Roman town, which was connected with the opposite shore by the bridge above mentioned, may be roughly traced by following the direction of the narrow streets of the crowded quarter between the river and the cathedral square, and the Piazza of Santa Trinità and Santa Firenze. When the declining Roman Empire could no longer resist the pressure of the northern nations Florence was besieged by the wild hordes of Radagaïs. They were, however, utterly destroyed by the general Honorius Flavius Stilicho, when the city was relieved. The storm of Gothic and Lombard war subsequently swept over the country, until at length Charlemagne, who in legends is called the Restorer of Florence, established peace, and set up a form of government, founded on Lombard institutions, which, with various changes, was maintained until the uprising of the free Communes.

Towards the latter end of the eleventh century the portion of the city on the right bank of the river had been considerably enlarged, so that it extended eastward as far as the piazza of Santa Croce, northward to that of San Lorenzo, and westward to where subsequently the Carraia bridge was built. The city enclosed also within its walls, which not long afterwards withstood an assault of the Emperor Henry IV., that portion of the left bank of the river which extends as far as the Piazza de’ Pitti. This was the city that was seen in his youth by the author of the ‘Divine Comedy,’ who was born in 1265, a year before the Guelfs obtained supreme authority. But Dante beheld it already changed in its internal aspect, and in the character of its population, hurried along as they were on the path of conquest, with which this change in character was closely connected. He has described the manners and customs of the ancient citizens, ‘when they were still purely reflected in the lowest artisan,’ that is, before peasants and men of the lower classes had immigrated from the subjugated villages of the neighbourhood, attracted both by the protection they enjoyed in a powerful city and the promise of gain from the daily increasing value of their industry. This was, to use the poet’s words, before citizens of Roman descent had to endure the stench of peasants from Aguglione and Signa, whom avarice alone had allured to Florence.[14] Dante Alighieri lived to see likewise the commencement of the great architectural transformation. Numerous churches had long adorned the city, which reverenced in Zanobi a saintly bishop, and had numbered among its illustrious citizens St. John Gualbert, the founder of the Order of Vallombrosa. Beside the church of St. John, the supposed Temple of Mars, there had arisen in the first half of the eighth century Santa Reparata, the subsequent cathedral, and in the tenth and eleventh Santa Felicità, San Martino, Sant’Ambrogio, Santa Maria Maggiore, San Remigio, San Salvi, San Lorenzo, San Piero Scheraggio, San Romolo, Santa Trinità, etc., in and near the city, were either newly founded or rebuilt. Nothing now remains of the original structure of any of these churches, many of which have quite disappeared. Specimens of the Roman style are still preserved in the city and its environs, in the octagon of San Giovanni, the little Basilica of Sant’Apostolo, that of San Miniato on a neighbouring eminence,[15] and the façade of the Abbey-church at the foot of the hill of Fiesole. These buildings all belong to the eleventh and twelfth centuries, and were probably completed before the end of the latter, and the conception and finish of this architecture serve to explain how Gothic architecture, which arose in the following century, was never entirely free from reminiscences of the older style, and, notwithstanding its more graceful characteristics, declined before attaining the same degree of perfection.

The architectural industry of the thirteenth century was very great, and was exercised as much for ecclesiastical as for secular purposes. Before that period narrow streets and small, irregular squares made the city gloomy.

On every side rose lofty square brick towers without any break or ornament whatever, sometimes so close together as to be within arm’s length of one another. The dwelling-houses, which were built of freestone, were small in size and built with a view to purposes of defence and attack as much as for habitation. The streets were first paved in 1237, in which year the Milanese knight, Rubaconte da Mandello, Podestà of the corporation, built over the Arno, at that spot within the city where the river is at its broadest, the bridge named after him, but generally known by the name of the chapel of Sta. Maria delle Grazie. Bricks placed on end were used for the purposes of paving as well as for the bridges. About the middle of the century a partial demolition of the towers became necessary. This, however, by no means put an end to the civil conflicts, or even deprived them of their ferocious character. Stones were used for building the city walls, particularly on the left bank of the river. At the present day many towers, both in the oldest portion of the city between the old bridge and that of the Trinity, and also by San Pier Maggiore, and in the quarter beyond the Arno, recall the bloody feuds of the irreconcilable factions of the nobility. In these conflicts the strife was carried on from tower to tower, from house to house; streets were barricaded with heavy chains, and homes made desolate with fire and sword.

At this period the construction of those great buildings began, some of which still impart to the city its peculiar aspect, and of these some have already been named in the introduction to this history. Amongst the first were the original bridge of Sta. Trinità, the Oratory of Confuggio, out of which grew the brilliant Servite church of the Annunziata, the old Town-hall, afterwards enlarged and named after the Podestà, the Carmelite church beyond the Arno, and the magnificent Sta. Maria Novella, which is, perhaps, the purest and most graceful example of the so-called Tuscan Gothic.

The Dominicans, who are said to have come to Florence in 1219 and who at first lived in hospitals, were presented two years later by the Bishop and Chapter with the little church of St. Mary, which was extended in size till it became one of the largest houses of Divine worship, with the addition of a spacious cloister. Not long after the arrival of the Dominicans the order of the Franciscan Minorites was established in Florence, and about the middle of the century they rebuilt their great church of Sta. Croce, situated by the wall on the east side, and transformed it into the majestic temple we behold at the present day.[16] The corporation had already purchased pieces of ground and also houses in various places, to make room for widening the older streets and laying out others. In this way space was found for the Hall of Or San Michele, which was built about the middle of the century, and which took its name from a church of the Archangel, pulled down to make room.[17] Similarly space was obtained in 1282 and following years in the quarter of the city beyond the Arno and in the west suburb, for laying out the older square by Sta. Maria Novella.[18] About the same time the final enlargement of the city was commenced by laying out the line of wall which those now living have seen still perfect with its gates and towers. But of all this nothing more remains on the right bank of the river, since Florence, which for centuries had been content with its mediæval boundaries, was extended as far as the foot of the hill of Fiesole, and numerous conventual and other gardens were transformed into squares and streets, while fields and meadows were enclosed within the city. The character of its circuit has thus been materially altered, although remains of the ancient style of architecture are still visible here and there. The great work of the new boundary wall is ascribed to the two Dominican brothers, Fra Sisto and Fra Ristoro, who built Sta. Maria Novella and were employed in Rome in Sta. Maria sopra Minerva, and to Arnolfo, who stands in the first rank of the historical architects of Florence. Arnolfo, the son of Cambio, a native of Colle in the valley of the Elsa, was named after his master Arnolfo di Lasso, who was a German by origin, and known as architect of the castle of Poppi and the Palazzo del Podestà.

The development of the political power of Florence, now fully conscious of its importance, was coincident with an increase in material wealth and with an awakening of intellectual life. Arnolfo had the good fortune to be born in the period when that great movement began, which, furthered rather than hindered by the animosity of civil strife, led to a remarkable revival in Italy of literature and art. It must be remembered that the way to it was paved by the age of the Hohenstaufen.

The great poet who is so much identified with this eventful time[19] saw the foundations laid for the palace of the Signory and the new Cathedral, Sta. Maria del Fiore, Sta. Croce, and Sto. Spirito; he witnessed the construction of the Corn Exchange of Or San Michele, and the gloomy prison which still recalls the memory of party-strife.[20] In his banishment he thought of his beautiful San Giovanni, and in order to picture the steep ascent in Purgatory drew a comparison with the straight path, that now no longer exists, leading to the church of San Miniato, which looked down on the Rubaconte bridge, and commanded a view of the city.[21] Beside it in his time Bishop Andrea de’ Mozzi had begun to build the first embattled episcopal palace, which was completed by his successor, Antonio d’Orso, the same who instigated the populace to rise against the Emperor Henry IV. Dante was a witness of the indefatigable zeal with which corporation and citizens emulated each other in the erection of churches, great public buildings, the city-wall and defensive castles for the environs. No will was held valid unless a legacy was left by it towards the expenses of building the wall, while immunity from taxes was granted to the architect of the cathedral in gratitude for his excellent work. Benevolence had long been engaged in relieving human misery, and now with increase of means it was still more displayed. Folco Portinari, the father of him whose name has become celebrated far and wide through Dante Alighieri, founded the hospital of Sta. Maria, now one of the largest in any country, by extending a charitable institution commenced by Mona Tessa, a servant of his house. The corporation built the hospital at the Porto al Prato and took under their superintendence the one long since founded by a pious citizen at Porta San Gallo. The hospital of San Jacopo and that of Sta. Maria della Scala were annexed later. Contributions were everywhere given for churches and convents, for that of the Camaldulensians in the Angeli, the Servites in Cafaggio, the Silvestrines in San Marco, and others. An especial magistrate was appointed for the care of the streets and sewers, and the Carraia bridge was rebuilt.

In the midst of this activity, in June 1304, a conflagration laid a great part of the city in ashes, during a violent feud between the populace and the nobility. It is said that 1,700 noblemen’s palaces, towers, and houses of citizens were destroyed, besides incalculable wealth, and many monuments of the old town. The prior of San Piero Scheraggio, Ser Freri Abbati, was the incendiary. As an example of the ferocity of the manners of the times it may be here mentioned that in the year 1307 the belfry of the Benedictine abbey was partially demolished because the monks had rung the alarm-bell during a quarrel which had arisen respecting taxation of the clergy. Activity in construction was not, as we have said before, confined to the defence and adornment of the city itself, for at this period the building of numerous forts was determined upon for the protection of the environs, the completion of which was afterwards vigorously carried on. Such defences were necessary in times of perpetual warfare, like the feuds of the communes; and the marches upon Rome led by Henry of Luxembourg and Louis of Bavaria, with the enterprises of Uguccione della Faggiuola and Castruccio Castracane, in connection with these, gave immediate occasion for them. In much later times they were still an effectual protection, for the art of besieging was still in its infancy when the art of defence had already made important progress, and armies under celebrated generals were stayed for months by inconsiderable villages, as the history of the second half of the fifteenth century will show.

The style of palaces and houses remained faithful to the older traditions. The public palaces were like castles. For centuries those of the Podestà and the Signory, for example, had been carefully strengthened and kept in a state of defence. From the towers, the bells of which summoned the citizens, there was a wide prospect over the city and its environs. The battlements, of the square form customary among the Guelfs, were adapted for defensive purposes. The windows on the ground storey were few and narrow, the gates were strengthened by double doors. The building material, consisting of heavy stones, or macigni, was furnished by the neighbouring stone-quarries of the hills of Fiesole and Golfolina on the Arno, at the spot where the river forces a narrow passage from the Florentine to the broad lower valley.[22] Great blocks of freestone, rough-hewn and gradually blackened by exposure to the air, formed those massive walls that seemed as though built for eternity. These walls have stamped their character on the later Florentine architecture; for the fifteenth and even the sixteenth century remained faithful to this opus rusticum, which has been transmitted down to our own days—modified, it is true, in its harsher features, but essentially unchanged. The windows of the upper storeys, divided first by slender marble columns, and then by various ornaments in the spaces of the pointed arch, relieve the gloominess of the fortress. The halls of the guilds and the palaces of the nobility exhibit the same style, though in them the embossments are partly or entirely smoothed away, and the windows are quite plain. Many of them are still preserved in the older quarters of the city, in the Borgo Sant’Apostolo, in the Via delle Terme, in the Mercato Nuovo, in the Via de’ Cerchi and Condotta, in the narrow streets behind the Old Palace in Via de’ Neri and de’ Rustici, and in Piazza Peruzzi, where they have even nestled in the Roman amphitheatre and elsewhere. The former palace of the Spini, between the Arno and the Piazza of Santa Trinità, the restoration of which has been undertaken by the present municipal authorities, presents, with its massive crown of battlements, the severe character of a fortress. The houses of the Mozzi at the south end of the Rubaconte bridge, and those of the Manelli on the Ponte Vecchio, among others, represent, in spite of change, the age of Dante; some, indeed, are now, after a lapse of six centuries, occupied by descendants of the very families that then possessed them.[23] The ground floors often show the traces of walled-up loggie, an indication of more peaceful days, for this style of building was continued even when party quarrels were fought out more by change of constitution and by proscription than by force of arms.

The numerous religious institutions show of themselves how important a field was offered to ecclesiastical architecture. At the most flourishing period of German architecture, Sta. Maria Novella furnishes the first example of the endeavour to obtain as wide and slight an arching to the vault as possible, by employing antique pilasters, composed of semi-columns and pillar corners. This attempt has met with comparative success in Sta. Maria del Fiore, in which plain pillars adorned with more developed capitals composed of acanthus leaves have been used, while for the gigantic central nave of Sta. Croce the vaulting is relinquished, and the open principle of the Christian basilica of Rome adopted. The same plan is also to be seen in San Miniato al Monte. If, however, the management of the material in Sta. Maria del Fiore exhibits extraordinary skill, a certain baldness was, on the other hand, scarcely to be avoided; and this forms a contrast with the awkwardly set cupola of the choir and transept—a fault, perhaps, less to be charged upon the first architect than is generally assumed. The exterior marble facing of the first two of these churches was similar to that of San Giovanni, but displayed a greater tendency to picturesque effect, which was increased by the additions of later times. The marble was supplied from native quarries, those of Prato and the Maremma, and after 1343 particularly from Carrara.[24] The craft of the painter was and remained combined with that of the architect, as a fine art, distinguished in fact only by the employment of different materials. That same painter, to whom art history—which in the fifteenth century was just awakening, and in the next, although not yet critical, reached descriptive perfection—has given, following tradition, a higher position than belongs to him, painted both with the brush and with coloured pastilles, and his most distinguished pupil adorned the city with its most graceful architecture. Dante has extolled them both, the one as a setting and the other as a rising star. The legend derives the ancient family name of Borgo Allegri from the popular rejoicing which accompanied Charles of Anjou on his way to inspect the great Madonna picture in the studio of Giovanni Cimabue, which now adorns the church of Sta. Maria Novella. It was Giotto di Bondone who broke through the narrow circle of typical painting in the Byzantine style, and, both in single figures of Madonnas and Saints and in grand historico-allegorical compositions, opened a way to freer spiritual development, in which he was followed by a large school. Although, as was natural, considering the large number of its followers, its original principles did not continue unmodified, this school in all essentials became the authority for the fourteenth century. No new creative peculiarity, however, was evinced, and constant repetition of the same motive can be observed in form of face, drapery, architecture, and colouring. The admiration that Giotto’s works, which adorned all Italy, had excited in his native city, the talents that were ascribed to him outside the art to which he had especially devoted himself, are shown by a decree passed by the Signory on April 12, 1334,[25] in concert with the Buonuomini—an act redounding no less to the honour of the State than of the painter. By this decree Giotto was nominated architect of the Sta. Maria del Fiore, of the boundary wall, and of the other architectural undertakings of the Corporation. ‘Let it be done,’ so it ran, ‘in order that the public works may progress effectually and in fitting manner, which can only be the case if a practised and celebrated man conduct the management of them, and for this purpose no one can be found in the whole world able to do more excellently in this, as in many other things, than Master Giotto di Bondone of Florence, painter, whom, as a great artist, his native city will lovingly receive and honour.’ Giotto lived two years after his praises were thus proclaimed. After death he was honoured with the erection in the cathedral, with the building of which he had been entrusted, of a monument adorned by one of the finest inscriptions of the Renaissance period.

During the time that the façade of this church, which was destined to undergo many a change, was building, together with its side-walls, doors, and the walls and gates of the quarter Oltr’arno; and while the belfry of the cathedral, the most graceful, rich, and perfect work of its style, arose, great efforts had to be made to clear away the last traces of the fire of 1304, and the ravages of the great inundation of November 1, 1333. Three bridges were broken up; the old bridge, with those of Santa Trinità and Carraia, and even the column before the Baptistery, which had been raised in memory of St. Zanobi, was thrown down. Every nerve was strained to the work of restoration. One of the most active among the artists was Giotto’s pupil, Taddeo Gaddi, who, in the summer of 1337, began building the new Hall of Or San Michele, on the site of the one burnt down, which was, however, no longer destined to serve the former purpose, but to be used as an Oratorium, while two upper stories were to be employed for the garnering of corn. So arose this magnificent edifice, which forms one of the most remarkable ornaments of Florence, and, seen from the neighbouring hills, towers above the clustering houses. It forms a quadrangle, of which the sides are of unequal length. The character of a hall is still visible in the ground-floor, with its wide tripartite arched windows, which are richly panelled, and in the two upper stories with their arched windows, in groups, alternately, of two and three, divided by columns; the whole being surmounted by a moulded cornice. In this cornice are niches with statues and groups of marble, which had been built at the cost of the guilds, and set on the pilasters of the older hall; and here, as on the middle storey, are placed the arms of these guilds with those of the commonwealth.[26] Two years later Taddeo Gaddi began rebuilding the old bridge in essentially the same form as at present. The palace of the Podestà had been already considerably enlarged and beautified when in 1326 it served Duke Charles of Calabria, the son of King Robert of Naples, as a residence; but in February 1332 it had suffered by fire, and in the year following by the inundation, so that a thorough restoration was necessary. The Carraia bridge was finished in 1337; that of the Trinità required several years more; the belfry of the Benedictine abbey had been rebuilt in 1330. The short reign of the Duke of Athens caused no cessation in the process of construction. A new front was built to the palace of the Signory, in which the Duke took up his residence, which did not, however, protect him from the resentment of the populace; and in the palace of the Podestà, of which the picturesque courtyard was then building, with arcades running round three sides of the ground-floor, his coats of arms bear witness to his activity. The following years were so restless and disturbed, owing to the peril the country was in from the swarms of freebooters, who, towards the middle of the century, laid all Italy under contribution, and from the fearful ravages of the Black Death, that architecture was rather called into requisition for the safety of the city than for its adornment.

The brigandage and pestilence that prevailed might well cripple constructive progress for a time, but it was soon aroused to renewed activity. If the last fearful calamity led to immorality among the lower orders, it yet induced many to relinquish the bustle of the world for grave meditations and pious works. The means of charitable institutions were considerably increased by alms and legacies. In 1349 was decreed the erection of a chapel to St. Anne, in the hall of Or San Michele, in commemoration of the expulsion of the Duke of Athens on the day of that saint. The work was conducted by Neri de’ Fioravante, who, on the occasion of that event, superintended the erection of the barricades at the Place of the Signory, and by Benci di Cione of Como. Three years later Andrea Orcagna began in the same place the rich chapel of the Madonna, which may be considered as the best work of architectural sculpture belonging to this period. The graceful loggia which, in the year 1351, were commenced opposite San Giovanni, as frontage to the Oratorium, are probably by the same artist. This Oratorium originally belonged to the brotherhood of the Misericordia, a society formed after the plague in 1326, and still in meritorious activity. It came later into the hands of another benevolent society, that of the Capitani del Bigallo.[27] The building of the Certosa, which was commenced by Nicola Acciaiuoli, in the year 1341, on the neighbouring hill of Montaguto, was carried on with vigour, and the mausoleum containing the beautiful monuments of the family belongs likewise to these years. In 1360 the building of Santa Maria del Fiore, which had been so continually interrupted, was fairly proceeded with, and four years later the cupola was commenced. In the neighbourhood of the palace of the Signory the site for the new Mint was obtained in 1361. Several churches were altered or rebuilt, and the façade of the church opposite to Or San Michele—now named after St. Charles Borromeo, but formerly dedicated to the archangel—is a monument of the graceful style of the period, though of small dimensions, and sparely ornamented. An endeavour was made in 1351 to fill the voids left by the plague in the ranks of the artists, by granting permission to strangers to carry on both sculpture and architecture. The tendency of the period towards the formation of guilds had manifested itself in the year previous by the institution of the Society of Painters, under the patronage of St. Luke, which, altered and enlarged, exists at the present day.

The Hall of the Signory, which, since the 16th century, has been generally called the Loggia de’ Lanzi, is the most important architectural work of the latter part of the 14th century. In the architecture of this building the spirit of the Renaissance breaks boldly through the barriers of the Gothic style, without entirely renouncing it. A hall in which the whole members and friends of a family could meet was looked upon as a necessary distinction of the high rank of the owner, and, indeed, no house of any importance was without such an adjunct. This hall was afterwards gradually converted into a separate and public building. Even in the middle of the following century Leon Battista Alberti wrote thus: ‘Streets and markets will be adorned by halls in which older people may assemble to avoid the heat and discuss their business, while their presence will act as a restraint upon the young in their games.’ Even private family affairs were transacted here, and it is related of Giovanni Rucellai, a rich citizen of the 15th century, who built a new loggia opposite his house, that he arranged his daughter’s wedding there. None of these loggias are at present in complete preservation,[28] for even where the exterior form has been preserved the arches have been walled up, and the building has been diverted to other uses, the original destination being uncalled for by altered customs. Numerous traces of them, however, still exist, notably of the Loggias of the Cerchi, the Agli, the Buondelmonti, the Cavalcanti, the Tornaquinci, the Peruzzi, the Alberti, the Canigiani, Burdi, Frescobaldi, Guiccardini, in the quarter of Oltr’arno, and, of later origin, those of the Albizzi and Rucellai.

A commodious hall was naturally desired for the Signory in view of the public nature of the business transacted by them, and the unsuitableness of the Tribune of Ringhiera, which was added to the façade of their palaces in 1349 and pulled down during the domination of Napoleon. Notwithstanding, however, the utility of such a building and the practice of annexing loggias to private dwellings, when the square of the Signory was enlarged in 1356, to make room for the hall, by pulling down the church of San Romolo, a part of the Mint, and several houses, the general opinion was, that a great public hall was better fitted for a despotism than for a free city.[29]

As already mentioned, it was not until twenty years later that the hall of the Signory was commenced.[30] Benci di Cione and Simone Talenti were the architects. The former was an artist much in request, and was not only incessantly engaged in the architectural works of the city, but also in the construction of the fortifications. His death happened in 1388. The superintendence of this building was entrusted likewise to the directors of Sta. Maria del Fiore, their funds exceeding their necessities. Although the building of the loggia of the Signory is ascribed to Orcagna in error, seeing that he had died eight years before, and had not lived even to see the square cleared, the way for it was prepared by the hall of the Bigallos, which was undoubtedly by his hands. The Gothic style had, even at the end of the previous century, displayed great boldness in the treatment of the pointed arch. The circular arch was now adopted, which in bold sweeps forms three openings on the façade, and one at each side. An architrave rises above the capitals of lofty but strongly built pillars, surmounted by a boldly projecting cornice, with wide cross-vaulting inside. Antique tradition was nowhere so perceptible as in this building, the unsurpassed, nay, unattainable, model for all later ones of the kind until the present day. In the year 1380, in which Antonio di Puccio, the ancestor of the yet flourishing family of the Pucci, executed the third vaulting, the building seems to have approached its completion, but eleven years longer sculptors and painters were occupied with its adornment by numerous sculptures in high and low relief, in which mosaic and colouring were employed to heighten the effect.[31]

Florentine sculpture of the latter part of the thirteenth and the fourteenth centuries followed essentially the bent of Giovanni Pisano, who endeavoured to unite the decided tendencies of his father Nicolò towards the antique with those of the Gothic style, which then began to assert itself; and he thus traced out for his followers the way which they have long pursued. Andrea Pisano, the son of one Ugolino of Pontedera, was the chief representative of Giovanni’s school during the first half of the fourteenth century. If there is any question as to whether the design of the bronze door of the Baptistery, worked by him in 1330, being Giotto’s, the great influence exercised by Giotto on the sculpture of his time is undoubted. Neither Orcagna, whose most important work, the altar to the Virgin in Or San Michele, has already been mentioned, and who displays both in painting and in sculpture the greatest originality in conception and in form of any artist of this epoch, nor Andrea Pisano’s pupil, Alberto di Arnoldo, to whom the grave and noble group of the Virgin with Angels in the Oratorium of Bigallo is owing, was able to escape the influence of Giotto. The decoration of the façade of the cathedral, of the belfry and interior of the baptistery, as also of the side doors of the cathedral, with sculpture, statues, reliefs, and ornaments, gave employment, irrespectively of others, to numerous artists from foreign parts, but much of their work has unfortunately been destroyed or mutilated. Meanwhile the churches were being adorned with numerous frescoes and altar panels, particularly Sta. Croce, so rich in chapels, which was only completed in the following century, Sta. Trinità, which was enlarged in 1383, Sta. Maria Novella, Ognissanti, and others, in which work Agnolo Gaddi, Orcagna, Giovanni da Milano, Jacopo del Casentino, and many others were employed. Before the middle of the century the great chapter hall of Sta. Maria Novella, commonly called Capellone degli Spagnuoli, which contains the mural paintings ascribed, without ground, to the Siennese painter, Simon Martini, and Taddeo Gaddi, had been built by a citizen of Florence, named Buonamico di Lapo Guidalotti. The frescoes from the history of St. Benedict, by Spinello of Aretino, in San Miniato al Monte, date after the year 1380, and those from the New Testament in the Rinuccini chapel, probably by Giovanni da Milano,[32] somewhat earlier. Orcagna, who next to Giotto possessed the most catholic spirit of the century, had breathed a fresher and more original life into the school then dominant. He was followed pre-eminently by the two last-named masters, who, notwithstanding the duration of the Giottoesque traditions, herald in the coming epoch.

Not alone the end of the thirteenth, but the onward marching fourteenth century likewise beheld the establishment of great charitable institutions. In the year 1377 the building of the hospital was commenced, which Bonifacio de’ Lupi of Soragna, from Parma, formerly Podestà and Capitano del Popolo, dedicated as a mark of attachment to the city which had bestowed its freedom on him. In the course of centuries it has been much changed, but still exists as the Spedale di Bonifazio. Seven years later Lemmo Balducci, of Monticatini, founded the hospital of San Matteo, on the site now occupied by the Academy of Fine Arts. In 1400 the hospital Sta. Maria dell’Umiltà (San Giovanni di Dio) was erected by Simone Vespucci, near the houses of his family. Churches and monasteries followed one another, and, as the enlargement of the square of the Signory necessitated the demolition of a church, it was rebuilt in another place. In 1394 Bishop Onofrio Visdomini consecrated the magnificent charter-house of the Acciaiuoli, which was established at the public cost. In 1392 the convent Il Paradiso, before Porta San Nicolò, on the slope of the hill of Arcetri and Miniato, was founded by Messer Antonio degli Alberti, under the influence of the excitement created in the ecclesiastical world, then distracted with the great schism, by the report of the prophecies and piety of Bridget of Sweden, whose fame extended far beyond Rome, where she passed so many years of her life. This period showed itself grateful towards men of merit. In 1393 the directors of San Maria del Fiore received permission to raise a monument to John Hawkwood, who, as a commander under the name of Giovanni Aguto, had the thanks of the Republic for his faithful services. A year later it was resolved to erect in the same church a monument to the learned and useful public servant, the Augustine monk Luigi Marsigli. By a decree passed in the year 1396 it was intended to perpetuate in the same manner the memory of the lawyer Accursio, Zanobi da Strada, also Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio. The decree was, however, never carried out.

The power of the aristocracy, at the head of which were the Albizzi, now approached its height. After the unfortunate attempt of 1397 to obtain some popular balance to this domination, a less violent state of affairs came gradually about, one manifestation of which was the great expenditure of money, both by the State and private individuals, in the prosecution of important and valuable works. This activity renders the period worthy to be compared with the end of the previous century, and formed a new epoch in the history of art. It was formerly the custom to associate the name of the Medici with the outburst of the Italian Renaissance, and likewise with the height of its perfection at the beginning of the fifteenth century. They had, however, only followed in the footsteps of their predecessors the Albizzi, and Pope Julius II.

The stages of the progress of the Renaissance are visible, in following the history of art, from Benci di Cione, to Brunellesco, from Orcagna and Alberto d’Arnoldo to Ghiberti and Donatello, from Orcagna again, Spinello, and Nicolò di Pietro, to Masolino and Masaccio. In the province of architecture, classical art entered again upon its rights under the influence of the new spirit. Brunellesco, who, while in his native town, had fixed his attention on Roman edifices, accustomed his eye when in Rome to the large dimensions and simple yet harmonious forms of ancient art. The Italian Gothic, which is not of one cast, but more or less dependent upon the older forms of art, must, in comparison with the latter, appear arbitrary in its character. Yet the classical principle obtained by no means an easy victory. The greatest work of the period, the dome of Sta. Maria del Fiore, is the result of a compromise, which under the circumstances was unavoidable, between the traditions of two epochs, and between the characters of two different tendencies. The requirements both of a strict division and demarcation of masses, and the perception of grand beauty and ample space had also to be reconciled. So in other branches of art the Gothic style asserted itself for a length of time by the side of the new tendency.

In February 1393 a commission was first appointed for the building of the dome, the sacristy, and the canonica of the cathedral.[33] But it was a full quarter of a century before the work was fairly begun. On August 19, 1418, the famous competition, which has since been celebrated in a novel, was invited for models of the dome. On November 14, 1419, a commission of ‘Officiales Cupolæ’ was appointed, consisting of four of the principal citizens. April 16, 1420, the office of Proveditores was conferred on Filippo Brunelleschi, Lorenzo Ghiberti and Battista d’Antonio; and on August 12, 1434, it was resolved that the lantern with which the dome was to be closed should be built after Brunellesco’s model. The lantern was, however, only completed in 1462, sixteen years after the great artist’s death.[34] The greatest and most complex work of modern architecture belongs consequently to the time when the Albizzis held power. Meanwhile many other buildings were undertaken. In 1411 an illustrious citizen, Nicolò Davanzati Bostichi, began the construction of the convent S. Michele of Doccia, near Fiesole, which, built against the dark background of the wooded hillside, can be seen far and wide. In 1416 the plan for the rebuilding of San Lorenzo was sketched out; in 1421 the great foundling hospital of the Innocents, with its beautiful portico on the Piazzi of the Annunziata, was begun; and twelve years later Sto. Spirito, the two latter after Brunellesco’s designs. Notwithstanding some defects, owing chiefly to the difficulty, imperfectly surmounted, of continuing the colonnade from the nave through the transept and choir, and to the unsuitability of the dome to this form, Sto. Spirito is the finest example of the independent adoption of the Roman basilica style for modern ecclesiastical architecture. Sta. Maria Novella was consecrated September 8, 1420, by Pope Martin V., for whom a part of the adjoining convent had been converted into a dwelling the year before. This was followed the next day by the consecration of Sta. Maria Nuova (Sant’Egidio) by Cardinal Antonio Correr, Bishop of Bologna, to which ceremony the frescoes refer with which Bicci di Lorenzo, who superintended the building, adorned the façade under the modern portico of the present day.

Filippo degli Scolari, who, under the name of Pippo Spano, had been influential in Hungary in the days of King Sigismund, ordered upon his death, in 1426, the construction, by Brunellesco, of a great central building for the Camaldolensians of the Angeli, but it went no further than a portion of the vast octagon, which was vulgarly called Il Castellaccio.[35] The Place of the Signory was still too small, and the wish to procure more space for the palace on the south side occasioned the demolition in 1410 of a side-aisle of San Piero Scheraggio. This church, after being gradually more and more mutilated, made way a century and a half later for the edifice of the Uffizi, by whom this quarter of the city, in which streets and houses were crowded together down to the river-side, was completely transformed.

The splendour and beauty of the public buildings necessarily influenced the construction of private dwellings. The narrow houses, lofty in proportion to their base, fell gradually into disuse, the more as the city, which had been considerably enlarged, afforded greater space. The beginning of the fifteenth century, which reached its climax in the Florentine palaces, turned the scale in this respect; but, as already remarked in the introduction, the mediæval traditions were here more faithfully adhered to than in ecclesiastical architecture. Moreover, a sense of timidity in passing certain limits existed in this case, which was connected with the circumstances of a free republic. This feeling has been recognised in Cosmo de’ Medici, and will be found again in Filippo Strozzi. We are reminded of the same fact even in the following century by the history of the Bartoline house on the Piazza Sta. Trinità, the door and window frames of which were considered unsuitable for a private dwelling, though they were soon to appear simple enough. In earlier times, too, there were large private houses, but their number appears to have been inconsiderable. In the first decade of the fifteenth century several were erected, which we still behold essentially in their original form. The house of Nicolò da Uzzano in Via de’ Bardi, already mentioned, built probably about 1420, is of large proportions, but perfectly plain, and without any sign of the modern spirit. The palace of the Bardi family in Via del Fosso indicates, both by its straight-sided façade and by the square courtyard with the antique arrangement of the columns, the innovations of the new style; while the broad, projecting, wooden roof and the plain windows recall an earlier time. On the Trinity bridge the houses of the Capponi and Gianfigliazzi retain something of the ancient style. In the seventeenth century the interior of the house of the Albizzi, the residence of Piero, Maso, Rinaldo, was rebuilt. This building is in the street named after them, in which palace follows palace, though the full effect is lost, owing to the narrow space. The exterior bears, however, decidedly the mark of time, which is still more the case with the neighbouring palace of the Alessandri.

The streets were mostly paved with flagstones (lastrico), even in the suburbs—a custom which gradually replaced the causeways of tiles (ammattonato) or of small stones (selciato); and when adopted in the smaller Tuscan towns contributed to give them a clean and well-to-do appearance. Even before the end of the thirteenth century this kind of pavement is said to have been used. The stones were procured from the hill of San Giorgio, adjoining the city on the left bank of the river, and the immediate neighbourhood, as well as from the quarries of Fiesole and Golfolina, already mentioned. For a long time the stones were left in their polygonal quarry form, until in recent times it was preferred to hew them square. The laborious and costly work required by a strong and perfectly uniform embankment to the sewers of the city would progress but slowly. It was placed under the careful superintendence of the commissariat officials (officiales grasciæ), to whom was especially entrusted the charge of those streets in which the Barbary-horse races took place.[36] The paving of the Place of the Annunziata—the centre of which remains, however, at the present day unpaved, like those of Sta. Maria Novella, San Marco, and others—was first undertaken, in 1421, by the Servite monks, who solicited subsidies for the purpose, in consideration of the crowds which thronged to the miraculous image in their church.

It is comprehensible that the noticeable revolution in architecture should likewise affect the sister arts. Here, however, we encounter in the first rank two artistic characters essentially differing from one another. With Lorenzo Ghiberti the influence of the school of Giotto is very perceptible, and in the reliefs, his master-pieces, he allows the picturesque principle to predominate to a certain extent, and with a careful calculation of the effect, which to some degree surpasses the ability or courage of the painter so active in his youth. The attitudes and drapery, however, of Ghiberti’s figures are in harmony with the spirit of antiquity which had inspired Nicolò Pisano more than a century and a half earlier. The full outbreak of realism in conception and form is displayed in the somewhat younger Donatello, who, unpoetical and less imaginative than Ghiberti, depends for models rather upon real, if even less beautiful, nature, than upon works of antiquity, of which, indeed, Rome afforded him but scanty and doubtful specimens. Both were goldsmiths, whose art had at that time reached a high degree of perfection, and was distinguished by the production of great works. It was the profession which Brunellesco had originally followed, and for centuries remained connected with that of the sculptor. In 1408 Ghiberti, then only twenty-two, received the commission for his first bronze door of the Baptistery, the completion of which required more than twenty years. In 1414 he executed the statue of St. John, and six years later that of St. Matthew, for two niches on the exterior of the ground-floor of Or San Michele, the sculptural adornment of which, at the cost of the guilds, had been determined upon in 1406. In 1424 the execution of the second door of the Baptistery was entrusted to him, which was finished twenty-eight years after, three years before his death. One work of less importance remains from the year 1428—the bronze chest executed for the brothers Cosimo and Lorenzo de’ Medici for the reception of the relics belonging to the Camaldulensian convent of the Angeli.[37] In 1411 Donatello began the statue of St. Mark, which he produced, together with that of St. Peter, for Or San Michele; about 1420 he began the monument for Pope John XXIII.; and in 1427 he was commissioned by the Medici to execute the monument of Cardinal Rinaldo Brancacci for Naples. His most excellent work in respect to lightness and grace, and which is without a touch of the heaviness so often characteristic of him, is the statue of St. George for Or San Michele. The date of the production of this work can as little be determined as that of the excellent figures of the Prophets which adorn the niches on the belfry of Sta. Maria del Fiore.

In painting the spirit of realism gained the victory much more slowly, and to a far less extent. Even when this victory had been obtained in Florence, the softer feeling and typical form derived from Giotto prevailed in other parts of central and upper Italy in peculiar and flourishing schools. Not long before Masaccio had begun his frescoes in the Brancacci chapel in the Carmine, which was consecrated in 1422, the Camaldulensian Don Lorenzo had painted his beautiful pictures, which still represent the tendency of the previous century, although with a freshness and freedom far superior to the later Giottesque style. And Fra Angelico da Fiesole, who in 1407 entered the Dominican cloister of the little town whence he derived his name, remained his whole life long true to the tradition to which he has given the consecration of gentle poverty, pious fervency, religious sensibility, and at the same time, naïve simplicity. Not even Gentile da Fabriano, a son of the Anconite border, who was gifted with a more lively natural feeling and graceful freshness and serenity, and in 1421 had himself inscribed in the list of Florentine painters, succeeded in breaking through this narrow circle, which did not afford sufficient scope to the creative power of the new spirit of art. Masaccio has given expression to this spirit in a manner which has served as example to the most highly developed periods, by uniting the most true, lifelike, and varied expression with free but nobly naturalistic form. The artists who stand more or less under the influence of Masaccio, and also of the modern plastic art, belong chiefly to the period which we shall contemplate further on.

Thus had the city of Florence, when the fifteenth century entered on its fourth decade, developed in both severe and graceful beauty, under the influence of an art which, notwithstanding foreign traditions, was, nevertheless, in its peculiarity and luxuriance, the growth of its own soil. In external appearance, likewise, Florence was the city of a rich, active, sovereign republic, which sought its honour rather in the grandeur and brilliancy of its public buildings, both for ecclesiastical and secular purposes, than in the luxury of private houses. The city was at once munificent and thrifty, and, through all change, however precipitate, held firmly by old tradition, as was expressed by the prevailing similarity of the character of the architecture, notwithstanding the development of successive styles. Most of the streets were and remained narrow, the number of large squares was inconsiderable, but these streets were well paved, when in Rome people waded for years longer in the deep mire and dust of streets provided only with a tile causeway on each side. The greater number of houses were built of massive stone. The number of projecting upper storeys which darkened the streets had lessened more and more in the course of years. Some restriction was put on this mode of building by the imposition of a tax, which in Giovanni Villani’s time brought in 7,000 florins. Subsequently, however, it was expressly forbidden by law, and under the first Duke many of the projecting storeys were pulled down, so that their number is now proportionally small. A greater evil was the projection of the roofs over the street, but this was not removed till 1766. Although no fortress was assigned to the chief magistrate of the city, he was provided with a secure residence, and one befitting the dignity of his position. The boundary wall of Florence was a remarkable work. It enclosed the foremost height on the left bank of the river, and was fortified with towers. The gates were magnificent, among which that of St. Nicolò, with its projecting double storey, offers an example of its kind as the only one in complete preservation since the transformation undertaken in the sixteenth century.

The frame to the beautiful picture was afforded by the environs. As at the present day, so in late mediæval times, the city seemed to extend on every side into the plain, as well as up into the neighbouring mountains which skirted the flowery plain watered by the Arno. At the gates were hospitals and lazarettos for the sick and for pilgrims, particularly for all whose residence in the city seemed unadvisable, such as lepers and other sufferers from skin diseases. These charitable institutions were founded chiefly in the fourteenth century, and owe their origin to the benevolence of wealthy citizens and the companies. There were, moreover, convents, which were increased in number and extent from year to year, some of them situated immediately before the walls, some on the hills by the bridges leading across the streams and brooks of Mugnone, Terzolle, Mensola, Ema, and Greve. Celebrated names are connected with the history of many of these foundations. We may mention that of Cardinal Ottaviano degli Ubaldini, who founded in 1260 the nunnery of Monticelli, opposite the Porta Romana; also that of his relative, the saintly Chiara, who was its first abbess. We may likewise allude to the family of the Acciaiuoli, who, both in politics and in Church history, played so great a part in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Even in Dante’s time numerous villas had risen, and one of these reminds us of the poet himself—the one in possession of his family before Porta Pinti, where the ground rises towards Fiesole; while the graceful narrator of the fourteenth century brings country life in the Florentine environs in bright pictures before us. The number of villas already foreshadowed the time in which Ludovico Ariosto sang; they would exceed a twofold Rome if enclosed by a wall. The necessities of the period converted many convents and villas into fortresses, and many have retained their castellated character, as San Miniato, the Charterhouse, and Passignano, the villa of Petraja, the former villa of Salviati at the base of the hill of Fiesole, Castle Pulci on the left bank of the Arno below the town, and Torre del Gallo on the hill of Arcetri; not to speak of the mountain fortresses of a more ancient period, as Castle Vincigliata on the eastern hills, which has been restored in modern times. Such fastnesses rendered good service when, in 1363 and 1364, the Pisans pressed up to the walls with their foreign mercenaries, and stormed the gates. While the German mercenaries under the lord of Bongard, and the English under Hawkwood, at that time an adversary, saw the villas on the hills of Montughi, Bellosguardo, Arcetri, and Pozzolatico perish in flames, they could not touch the Charterhouse; and from the strong tower of Petraja the Brunelleschi, the possessors of the villa, courageously repulsed the attack of the English. In March 1397, the Abbot of Passignano withstood the troops of Alberigo of Barbiano, who had come to Pisa in the service of the Visconti, and laid waste the Florentine territory. Even in later times security from surprise was as much considered in the construction of a villa as picturesque effect and artistic adornment.