Brunelleschi's Dome ~ Ross King ~ 01/05 Export

'Cries, shouts, and the slap of racing feet erupted in that cavernous space, as seasoned politicians, ambassadors, servants, citizens, women, priests, and children ran about, bolted from the church, rushed into neighbouring houses or wherever their panic led them. Was it an earthquake? Some worshippers feared that Burnelleschi's dome was about to come crashing down, while a few bold and curious spirits pressed in closer to the melee,nearer to those brandishing knives and swords, trying to see what was happening.'

That has brought me here. Oh, and on Sunday, thanks to PBS, in a helicopter, we flew to within a few feet of the tremendous dome, close enough to make eye contact with the sightseers who had climbed to the lantern at the top of the dome. Spectacular.

Let's stick together. Goodness, already Ippolita is missing again. Did she get left behind on the Ponte Vecchio? Luca! Where's your hardhat? Do you want to get killed by a falling trowel? Alfonsina! Don't tease the oxen. They have work to do.

Could I get some help to ride herd on these guys?

JONATHAN, I'll be here if I can get the book and this new little gray and white cat off my lap.

Mal

Welcome aboard, Mal!! Lots of seats on the bus. Where would you like to sit?

A gray and white, did you say? Seems to me Santa marked your place as the first stop this year. And Mitty is in cat heaven? Pardon me if I take such a liberty with her pretty name, but it's meant affectionately. Purple, wasn't she? And such a companion she was for you. May your new one bring you much happiness in the years to come.

And now, how about a cappocino in the piazza? Just look at that! We can see DAVID from here? Have you ever wondered why these guys are all in the buff?

Jonathan

My friends call me dee, and I would like to join this group on its way to Florence. Since we'll be on the road for a while and since getting there is supposed to be half the fun why don't you all permit me to read you a story. From a book laying here on the seat. Must have been forgotten by some other traveller who came this way. Goodness, published in 1825. The Italian Novelists. And goodness as well, here's a story with Filippo Brunelleschi himself in it. I think that name is pronounced with the emphasis on the lls and the last syllable sounding out skee.

'About the year 1409, a company of young Florentines having met one Sunday evening to sup together at the house of their friend, Tommaso de'Pecori, a very good natured and respectable man, and fond of good society, the whole party agreed, as soon as they had supped, to draw their chairs sociably round the fire.

There, as is usual on such occasions, they began to converse in a pleasant way upon a variety of topics, when one of the guests looking round them, observed, "What can be the reason that we have not the company of Manetto Ammanotini here tonight? though repeatedly invited, he still refuses to come: it is very strange!"

Now Manetto was by profession a carver in ebony, who had opened a shop in the Piazza San Giovanni, and was considered a very skillful artist in his way; he possessed a very agreeable person and manners, and was about five and thirty years of age. Indeed such was his comely and comfortable appearance, that it had acquired for him the name of Grasso, Fat, and he was everywhere esteemed one of the most happy, good-tempered fellows in the world, always contributing his full share to the life and spirit of a feast. But this time, either from design or caprice, the ingenious carver was wanting to complete the social comfort of the party.

After discussing the matter over and over, they were still at a loss to imagine the reason of his absence. As he had sent no message, they felt a little piqued at it; and the person who had started the subject, said, "I wish we could play him some good trick, were it only to teach him better manners in future."

"Yes, but what kind of trick could we play on him?" said another; "unless, indeed, we could get him to treat us to a dinner, or something of the kind."

Now there was a certain Fillipo Brunelleschi belonging to the same party, a man well acquainted with Grasso and all his concerns, who on hearing this, began to ponder a little on the subject. And pondering to some purpose, he at length observed, like a clever fellow as he was, "If I thought, gentlemen, I were wicked enough to do it, I could tell you how we might have a noble revenge: oh, such a revenge! by passing off a trick upon him that will make us all laugh for an age to come: what do you think: I have not the least doubt we might persuade him that he was actually metamorphosed, and become quite another person."

"Nay, that is impossible!" they all cried at once.

"I say not," continued Fillipo, "if you will only listen, and let me explain the whole plan." And this he did in so satisfactory a manner, that they one and all agreed to join him in persuading Grasso that he was changed into Matteo, a member of the same party.

The ensuing night was accordingly fixed upon for the transformation; when Fillipo, as being upon the most intimate terms with Grasso, was appointed to go, about the time of shutting up shop, to visit him. So he went; and after talking to Grasso, as had been agreed upon, for some time there appeared a little lad running in great haste, who inquired if Signor Brunelleschi were there?

Fillipo answered, he was, and begged to know what he wanted. "Oh, Signor," said the boy, "you must come home immediately; for your mother has met with a sad accident, she is very nearly killed, so you must come home now." With well feigned grief and alarm, Fillipo exclaimed, "Good Lord defend us!" and took leave somewhat abruptly of his friend Grasso, who said he would go with him, if he thought he could be of any service; for now was the time to shew his regard.

Somewhat conscience-smitten, Fillipo thanked him saying, "No, not now; but if I want you, I will make bold to send for you."

Then pretending to hasten homewards, Fillipo turned the corner of a street, leading to Grasso's house, opposite to Santa Reparata, (now Santa Maria del Fiore) and very unceremoniously picking the lock of the door, he marched in, and fastened it behind him, so that no one could follow him.

Why has the bus stopped? I must check this out. Back in a minute.

This modern conveyance, a bus you call it?, is going my way, but if I am found worthy I won't be coming back with you. I would like to go to San Marco to see Fra Angelico's frescoes. To see Savonarola's cell in the monastery there. And Cosimo de'Medici's cell, where he came to meditate. Lorenzo's grandfather. The same Lorenzo de'Medici whose ire was aroused by Savonarola's sermons in Santo Maria del Fiore. The same Savonarola who persuaded all of Florence to throw its nicest things into the bonfire, and was finally himself burned at the stake in the Piazza della Signoria, for his troublesome sermons.

So you can see, a bit of Florence remains forever medieval. I've brought my VASARI'S LIVES along, and I'll read you a bit from the life of Fra Bartolommeo of San Marco, often called Baccio:

'Bartolommeo, called Baccio after the Tuscan usage, was born in the territory of Prato, at a place called Savignano, ten miles from Florence. In his boyhood he showed great inclination and aptitude for design, and by the influence of Benedetto da Maiano he was put with Cosimo Rosselli, lodging in the house of some relatives who lived at the gate (porta) of S Peiro Gattolini.

Here he remained for many years, so that he became generally known as Baccio della Porta. After leaving Cosimo Rosselli, he began earnestly to study the things of Lionardo da Vinci, and in a short time made such progress in colouring that he became known as one of the best of the young artists both for colour and design.

He associated with Mariotto Albertinelli, who soon acquired his style, and together they did many Madonnas which are scattered about Florence, to speak of which would take too long. I may mention one excellent example, in the house of Fillipo di Averardo Salviati. Another, bought not long ago, sold among some tapestries, was acquired by Pier Maria delle Pozze, a great lover of paintings, who recognized its beauty and did not spare his money. This Madonna is executed with extraordinary diligence.

Pier del Pugliese had a small marble Madonna in bas-relief by Donatello, a lovely work, to receive which he had a wooden tabernacle made with two small doors, which he gave to Baccio to paint. The artist did two scenes, one a Nativity, the other the Circumcision, executed like illuminations, in the best possible workmanship, and on the outside he painted an Annunciation in grissaille, the entire work being in oils. This work is now in the Scriptorium of Duke Cosimo, where he keeps all his bronze antiquities, medals and other rare illuminations, and it is highly valued by him for its undoubted excellence.

Baccio was loved in Florence for his ability, was an assiduous workman, quiet, good-natured, and God-fearing. He preferred a quiet life and avoided vicious pleasures, was very fond of sermons, and always sought the society of learned and staid people.

It is rare when Nature creates a man of genius and a clever artist that she does not prove his worth. So it was with Baccio, who, as I shall say presently, fulfilled her desires to show the full extent of his excellence, and so spread abroad his name that Gerozzo di Monna Venna Dini employed him to do a chapel in the cemetery containing the bones of the dead from the hospital of S. Maria Nuova.

He there began a Last Judgment in fresco, working with such diligence and in so good a style in the part which he completed, that he largely increased his reputation, and was much celebrated for having so well rendered the glory of Paradise and Christ, with the twelve Apostles judging the twelve tribes, the draperies being fine and the colouring charming. In the unfinished portion we see the despair of the damned and the pain and shame of eternal death, in the contrast with the joy of the elect. The work was left unfinshed because the artist thought more of the welfare of his soul than of painting.

At this time Fra Girolamo Savonarola, a Dominican of Ferrara and a most famous theologian, was at San Marco, and Baccio became deeply attached to him and intimate with him from hearing his preaching, being almost always at the convent, where he made friends with the other friars.

Fra Girolamo, continuing his preaching, declared daily from the pulpit that lascivious pictures, music and amorous books often lead men astray, and that he was persuaded that it was not good to have pictures of naked men and women in houses where there are young girls. The following carnival, it being a custom of the city to make bonfires on the piazzas on Tuesday evening, accompanied by amorous dances, the men and women taking hands and dancing around them, the people, stirred up by Fra Girolamo, brought numbers of profane paintings and sculptures, many of them the work of great masters, with books, lutes and collections of love-songs, to be burned.

This was most unfortunate, especially in the case of paintings, for Baccio brought all his studies of the nude, his example being imitated by Lorenzo di Credi and many others who were called Piagnoni. It was not long before Baccio's affection led him to make a fine portrait of Fra Girolamo. It was taken to Ferrara, and not long since it came back to Florence to the house of Alammano Salviati, who greatly values it for the artist's sake.

One day, however, the friar's opponents rose to put him to death because of the sedition which he stirred up in the city. Fra Girolamo's friends rallied to his defence, more than five hundred in number, and shut themselves up in San Marco, Baccio being among them. But, being a timid and cowardly man, when he heard the assault on the convent and that men were being killed and wounded, he began to be seriously alarmed and vowed that if he escaped he would at once assume the habit of the order, a vow which he strictly observed.

The fight ended, the friar was taken and condemned to death, as the historians have related in detail, and Baccio departed to Prato, where he entered the Dominican order, as recorded in the chronicles of the convent there, on 26 July, 1500, to the regret of all his friends, who were most sorry at having lost him, especially as they heard that he had determined to give up painting.

Mariotto Albertinelli, Baccio's friend and companion, at the prayers of Gerozzo Dini, took up the mantle of Fra Bartolommeo, as the prior called him in giving him the habit, and completed his work at S. Maria Nuova, drawing a portrait of the master of the hospital there and some friars skilful in surgery, with Gerozzo himself and his wife at the side, kneeling, while a nude figure seated is Giuliano Bugiardini, his young pupil, with a shock of hair as then worn, his hair being so carefully done that they may be counted. He drew himself, a shock-headed man, one of those coming out of a tomb. The work also contains a portrait of Fra Giovanni of Fiesole, the painter, numbered among the blessed, whose Life we have written. The entire work, both Bartolommeo's and Mariotto's, is in frecoe, and is in such an excellent state of preservation that it is much valued by artists, because it is not possible to go much farther in that branch.'

See what I mean? I wonder will they have a VACANCY sign out when we get there.

Fra

Frà voi e me, a Jonathan is a Jonathan, no matter how semplice he tries to be.

Buona notte,

Mal

Is there anyone here who could translate some Italian for me?

It's the dreams that keep us going. Especially now, in the depths of winter up here in Canada. And that is a good thing, since the days are so short they're hardly worth getting up for. What a pleasure to lay abed and dream of going to Florence.

Please read us some more, dee, from that book you found on your seat. You read so well. As easy to listen to as Bryn Terfel's reading on Christmas Eve during the M T Choir hour. It was interesting to hear that Brunelleschi was in the habit of 'pondering to some purpose.' So it seems that may be characteristic of him, whether he's working on a new roof for the Cathedral, or scheming how to get a friend to doubt his own identity.

Your own identity, dee. Don't I remember you from somewhere? Have we met before in some strange place? I've got it! That was you. In Rishakesh. In the Himalayas. You helped out with those Sanskrit words. Can you read maps. You musn't mind the frequent stops. It's either because I'm being flagged down, or I've stopped to ask directions.

But not to worry, Fra. Driving in a strange city is a problem, but I'll get you to the San Marco convent. The map I have before me shows a short drive from the Duomo. Along Via Martelli, and then Via Cavour. Just look at this. It might be fun to go via Via Serraglio, but it heads off in the opposite direction. What a pity.

I must admit I'm typographically challenged by the name you have chosen for your new, contemplated lifestyle.

Another good reading! It seems to be a time when many new things were undertaken, but not always finished, for whatever reason.

Luca, what is that heavy volume you've brought with you?

Goodness. Surely one of you must have brought a Boccaccio along to pass the time.

Every man must find his own way, Jonathan. That's what the old lama told us. Why should Florence be any different? Granted it's a difficult place to find out where, when, and who one is.

'Now it happened that Grasso's mother had set off some days before to a little country place at Polerossa, for the purpose of washing linen and such household concerns, and she was expected back again that day.

'After shutting up his shop, Grasso went sauntering along the Piazza ruminating on his friend's misfortune; until, finding that it grew late, he concluded that Filippo would hardly think of sending for him that night. So he resolved to go home, but was somewhat puzzled, on ascending the steps, to find that he could not open the door as usual; and after several attempts, he supposed it must be locked in the inside, and knocking pretty sharply, he shouted,

"Open the door!" thinking that his mother had returned, and for some reason or other had fastened it after her in the inside. But at length a voice answered, in Grasso's own tone, "Who is there?" and Grasso, a little startled, said, "It is I; let me in."

"No," returned the voice; "and I beg, Matteo, that you will go away: I am in great anxiety about a friend of mine; for as I was just now talking in my shop to Filippo, there came a messenger in haste, to say that his mother was nearly dead, and I am very sorry for him."

Filippo pretended all the while he said this, to take poor Grasso for his friend Matteo; and then, as if turning to Grasso's mother, he continued, "Pray, good mother, let me have my supper; it is really too bad; you ought to have been back two days since, and you come in just at this time of night," - and he went on grumbling and scolding exactly in Grasso's own voice.

Still more surprised at this, Grasso now said, "That is very like my own voice; what the deuce can it all mean? Who is it, speaking there up stairs? can it be I? How is it, I wonder? he says Filippo was at his shop when he heard his mother was ill, and now he is busy chiding his mother, or my mother Giovanna, I do not know which. Have I lost my senses, or what does it mean?"

Then he went down the steps again, and shouted up at the windows, when, as had been agreed upon, there passed by his friend Donatello, the sculptor, who said as he went past, "Good evening, Matteo, good evening; I am going to call upon your friend Grasso, he is just gone home."

Grasso was now perfectly bewildered, on hearing his friend Donatello address him as Matteo; and turning away, he went into the Piazzo san Giovanni, saying to himself, "I will stay here, till somebody comes by who can tell me who I really am."

He was next met by some officer of police, a bailiff, and a creditor, to whom Matteo, whom, however reluctantly, he now represented, owed a sum of money. "This is the man; this is Matteo, take him, he is my debtor, I have watched him closely, and caught him at last!" cried the creditor; and the officers, laying hands on him, led him away.

It was in vain that Grasso, turning towards the creditor, exclaimed, "Why, what have you to do with me? you have mistaken your man! my name is Grasso the Carver; I am not Matteo, nor any of his kin: I do not even know him."

And he was beginning to lay about him lustily; but they soon secured him, and held him fast. "You not Matteo?" cried the creditor surveying him from head to foot, "we shall soon see that. Do you think I do not know my own debtor Matteo? Yes, too well. Cannot I distinguish him from Grasso the Carver, think you? You have been in my books too long. I have accounts against you this year past: yet you have the impudence to tell me you are not Matteo; but will such an alias, think you, pay me my money back? Off with him: we shall soon see whether he be Matteo or not."

They then hurried him in no very gentle way to prison, and it being supper-time, they encountered no one on the road. His name was entered in the goal-book as Matteo, and he was compelled to take up his station with the rest of the prisoners, all of whom hailed him in the same tone, saying, "Good evening, Matteo, good evening!"

Hearing himself thus addressed, Grasso said, "There must be something in it certainly; what can it mean!" and he almost began to persuade himself, that, as everybody said so, he must indeed be Matteo. "Will you come and take some supper with us," said the prisoners, "and put off thinking of your case till to-morrow?" So Grasso supped with them, and took up his quarters along with one of them, who observed, "Now, Matteo, make yourself as comfortable as you can to-night, and to-morrow, if you can pay, well and good; but, if not, you must send home for bed-clothes."

Grasso, thanking him, laid himself down to rest, thinking what would become of him, if he were really changed into Matteo; "which I fear," he continued, "must in some way be the case; there are so proofs of it on all sides. Suppose I send home to my mother; but then if Grasso be really in the house, they will only laugh at me, and perhaps say I am mad. And yet surely I must be Grasso."

And with such cogitations he lay perplexing himself all night, not able to determine which of the two he was.'

Another stop! I wonder if he's lost again.

It's probably no use to look for Ippolita on the Ponte Vecchio. She's more likely to be at the Galleria Uffizi, looking at her favorite painting. She's sitting behind me and talks only about Botticelli and his Primavera. That's why she has come to Florence. And she's also crazy about Botticelli's Dante drawings, so she could also be out there looking for via dell inferno, or via del purgatoria.

And I've come to see a bridge. The ponte de Verrazzano on the Arno. The most beautiful bridge in the world for me is the Verrazzano which links Brooklyn and Staten Island, so any bridge with that name attracts me. After that it's the Duomo, and the reason I've lugged this book across the ocean. It has beautiful, large diagramatic representations of the dome in various stages of construction, with graphic illustrations of the enormous wooden hoist, and the oxen used to power it. The same oxen that Alfonsina likes to tease. I should be able to supply answers to some of the questions which might come up. But first I would like to see the bridge.

The last time I saw Ippolita she was at La Trattoria del Arte on 7th Avenue at 56th in New York City. She was looking at Le Nozze up on the wall while she waited for her antipasto to be served. She may be back in Firenze now.

JONATHAN, I ordered the book. It will be here next week. I guess you're stuck with me.

Basta.

Mal

Jonathan, Thank you for offering this book. I now have it on order and will be a background participant with my activity limited by my January move and February cataract surgery. I look forward to following your discussion.

Days are hectic right now - but managed to get book in hand - Mal, our local library had five copies! Hope to join you all in mid January, when things calm down around here. They will, please assure me they will!

Joan

Ho! Hold the bus! If Pearson's getting on I need to, too, she's something ELSE on a trip! But I'm strictly here as a hanger on, a tourist, with camera around neck (going to bore you all with photos of strange things in Florence, such as medieval pageants and gutters, one wonders why I travel) and hoping to learn a lot. I love the posts here, so evocative of the time, it's almost hard to believe what they did, what FUN!

Can't speak Italian...every time I try they respond in English, hahaha but I do know that Brunelleschi is pronounced BrunellesKI because that's where we stayed in Florence, the Hotel Brunelleschi, which has a glassed over hole in the lobby floor with views of Roman ruins. I did not know who Brunelleschi WAS, then, and until I read this book I still was not sure, this will be great!

Wish I had read this book BEFORE going! Once you read it you want to see the dome.

Love the book, it's the kind of book once you read it you talk about it endlessly and give copies to your friends, and this is a great group assembling, thank you Jonathan for thinking of it!

C H I is pronounced key in Italian. C I is pronounced chee as in cheese.

E is pronounced like a long A

B R O O - NAYL - LAY - SKI. Brunelleschi. Accent the L A Y syllable.

I is pronounced like a long E.

FEE - LEEP - PO. (Filippo) Accent the first syllable.

Mal

Of course Ippolita would come to Florence if she admires Botticelli's paintings. Everybody here loves him. His work is so representative of the spirit of the times. His paintings are so sophisticated. Every church in Florence would like to have one of his Madonnas with child. For every Venus or Neptune there must be a thousand Madonnas in Florence. Some even see the Venus in Botticelli's Primavera as a thinly disguised Madonna. And there is that Cupid hovering over her head. Botticelli, they say, has a knack for combining the pagan and the chrisian, the old and the new, avant garde with a veneer combining traditional and antique. Very intellectual and very passionate.

But why don't you let me read you what Vasari has to say about Botticelli. He was born about the time that Brunelleschi died:

'In these same days of Lorenzo de' Medici the Magnificent, which was a veritable golden age for men of genius, flourished Alissandro, called Sandro according to our custom, and di Botticelli, for reasons which I shall give presently.

He was the son of Mariano Filipepi, a citizen of Florence, who brought him up with care, teaching him everything which children are usually set to learn before the age when they are first apprenticed to trades. Although Sandro quickly mastered anything that he liked, he was always restless and could not settle down at school to reading, writing and arithmetic.

Accordingly, his father, in despair at his waywardness, put him with a goldsmith who was known to him, called Botticelli, a very reputable master of the craft. Very close and friendly relations then existed between the goldsmiths and the painters, so that Sandro, who was an ingenious lad and devoted to drawing, became attracted to painting, and resolved to take it up. When he had told his wish to his father, the latter, who knew his whims, took him to Fra Filippo of the Carmine, an admirable painter of the day, and it was agreed upon that he should teach Sandro, as the boy desired. Devoting himself heart and soul to his art, Sandro followed and imitated his master so well that Fra Fillipo became very fond of him and taught him so carefully that he soon attained to an excellence that no one would have thought possible.

While still young he painted for the Mercatanzia of Florence a Fortitude for the series of the Virtues done by Antonio and Piero del Pollajuolo. In the chapel of the Bardi in S.Spirito, Florence, he painted a panel which is diligently executed and well finished, containing some olives and palms produced with whole-hearted delight. For the Convertite nuns he did a panel, and another for those of S.Barnaba. On the screen of Ognissannti, by the door leading into the choir, he painted a St.Augustine for the Vespucci, in which he endeavoured to surpass all his contemporaries, but especially Domenico Ghirlandajo, who had done a St.Jerome on the other side. This work proved very successful, the head of the saint being expressive of profound thought and quick subtlety, such as are usually possessed by those who are always examining into difficult and abstruse questions. As I have said in the Life of Ghirlandajo, this painting was removed without suffering damage in 1564.

Having thus won fame and name, Sandro was employed by the art of Porta S.Maria to do a Coronation of the Virgin (now in the Uffizi) for San Marco, (and I was hoping to see it still there) with a choir of angels, and he executed this commission acmirably. In the Casa Medici he did many things for Lorenzo the Magnificent, the elder, notably a life-size Pallas above a design of vine-branches flaming fire, and also a St.Sebastian. In S.Maria Maggiore at Florence, there is a fine Pieta of small figures beside the Chapel of the Panciatichi.

For various houses in the city he did round pictures, and a goodly number of nude female figures, two of which are now at Castello, a villa of Duke Cosimo. One is a Birth of Venus wafted to land by the breezes, with cupids; the other is also a Venus in company with the Graces and flowers, denoting Spring, expressed by him with much grace. (the Primevra, of course, and also in the Uffizi, as Ippolita says.)

In the house of Giovanni Vespucci in the via de' Servi, now Piero Salviati's, he did a number of pictures round a room framed in an ornamental border of walnut, and figures full of life and beauty. In the Casa Pucci he did Boccaccio's story of Nosagio degli Onesto, in small figures, the series consisting of four pictures of great beauty and grace. He further did a round picture of the Epiphany. In the chapel of the monks of Costello he did an Annunciation. By the side door of S.Piero Maggiore he did a panel for Matteo Palmieri, with a large number of figures representing the Assumption of Our Lady, with zones of patriarchs, prophets, apostles, evangelists, martyrs, confessors doctors, virgins, and the orders of angels, the whole from a design given to him from Matteo, who was a worthy and learned man. He executed this work with the greatest mastery and diligence, introducing the portraits of Matteo and his wife on their knees. (Enjoy, Ippolita)

But although the great beauty of this work might well have silenced envy, some evil-disposed persons, who could find no other fault with it, said that Sandro and Matteo were guilty of grave heresy. Whether this be true or not, I cannot say, but I know that Sandro's figures are admirable for the pains which he has taken and the manner in which he made the circles of the heavens, introducing foreshortening and spaces between the groups of angels, while the general design is excellent.

At this time Sandro was commissioned to paint a small panel, with figures three braccia high, which was placed in S.Maria Novella on the main wall of the church between the two doors, on the left-hand side of the middle door on entering. The subject is the Adoration of the Magi, remarkable for the emotion of the elderly man, who overflows with love as he kisses the foot of Our Lord, clearly showing that he has attained the end of his long journey. This king is a portrait of Cosimo de'Medici, the elderly, and the finest of all that are now extant for its life and vigour. The second is Giuliano de'Medici, the father of Pope Clement VII., doing reverance with absorbed devotion and offering his gift. The third, who is also kneeling and appears to be adoring and giving thanks while he confesses the true Messiah, is Cosimo's son Giovanni. The beauty of the heads in this scene is indescribable, their attitudes all different, some full-face, some in profile, some three-quarters, some bent down, and in various ways, while the expression of the attendants, both young and old, are greatly varied, displaying the atist's perfect mastery of his profession. Sandro further clearly shows the distinction between the suites of each of the kings. It is a marvellous work in colour, design and composition, and the wonder and admiration of all the artists.'

And it reminds me that I must take a little time for my religious devotions. Back later.

Fra

I'm afraid that if we keep talking like this we'll detract from the real discussion when it starts on January 15th. Many more people will be dropping in, if only as lurkers, when that day rolls around. I just have to dig up the book by Vasari I have before this discussion officially opens.
Here's a picture of Botticelli's Primavera. Primavera means "Spring"Mal

Thanks to everyone who is stopping in here and indicating an interest in everything which appertains to this book. It shows every sign of turning into a good discussion. And I must say that the posts are beginning to seem like a splendid overture to a grand opera.

Please stop in, everyone, who has an interesting memory of Florence, or a thought about that amazing time in its history. It will all make for a good setting, a backdrop for the dome.

Let me just remind everyone planning to take this trip, to get their culture-shock immunization shots before leaving.

That's glorious, Mal. Did you know that there are 500 flowers in the painting, with 170 species represented, many of them meant to be symbolic of something. Now, if you could find The Birth of Venus for us, I will be everlastingly grateful.

Happy Holidays everyone, and say a prayer for all the victims of that terrible calamity in South Asia and Africa.

'I'll get you there' Jonathan

Birth of Venus. Scroll down a little to see this large image

A smaller version

Mal; Thanks for image of "Venus on the half shell." Botticelli ate the oyster first then did the painting. Nice to know you are in here so we can access lots of Firenzi's art works for this discussion group. Some where on the net is a site exhibiting Firenzi as seen at this moment from the lantern on the dome of the Duomo. I'll bet you can find it.

JUSTIN, there are loads of pictures of Firenze and the Duomo on the web. This probably is not the one you're thinking of.

The Duomo and Florence

Galleria degli Uffizi

Another air view of Florence

Florence: Click small images to see larger ones

Florence from the Duomo

When I lived in Florida in the 80's I had a very good friend who studied art in Florence after World War II on the GI Bill.

Carl Austen knew a great deal about Firenze and told me about it as we sat in the shade on the little patio of his St. Augustine cottage drinking espresso and listening to music on hot, humid summer afternoons.

There was an old building across the alley from where he lived that looked like a Florentine building. Without using too much imagination I was transported to Florence.

Carl was probably 70, maybe even older, when he decided to go back to Firenze to live. I never saw or heard from him again. I do have several of his paintings as reminders of that pleasant time of my life, including two portraits he did of me.

Carl was a literary man, who enjoyed reading to me from the New York Review of Books, the New Yorker and whatever book he was reading at the time, and gossiping about writers and artists, living and dead. He painted in a classical style. His paintings contain classical allusions and his depiction of mythology, all painted with a great deal of wit.

Mal

Mal, I hope this discussion will be another opportunity for you, and many others, to be transported to Florence. I can't forgive your friend, Carl, for never allowing himself to be heard from again. Were the artistic distractions of Firenze to blame, do you think?

Those are wonderful views you've found for us. The aerial of the Duomo looks great in that early morning light. It must be very early, judging by the empty streets. Must keep that in mind. Let's do our sightseeing at the crack of dawn.

But the view left me puzzling over something. It was claimed, it seems to me, that it's shadow is large enough to cover all of Tuscany. The shadow is large, but there is still a lot of Tuscany in the bright sunshine. I must have heard that wrong.

The Birth of Venus is spectacular and comes through with fine color.

Justin, good to see you here. I just know that your participation in this discussion would be to everyone's enjoyment. But for the record...for the first time in reading so many of your posts, I have to disagree with you. Perhaps I'm mistaken again, but I just can't see Botticelli finding an oyster to eat on that scallop shell. Tell me I'm wrong.

Jonathan

I'll be here too, if I can get the book. Wonderful images, Mal. It's been 40 years since the only time I was in Florence, but it still remains as one of the highlights of my life.

I ordered the book. It should be here in good time. Jonathan, I hope you won't forget to visit Troy from time to time: it's not THAT far from Florence, and only 2000 years difference.

Jonathon: The bivalve mollusk in Botticelli"s Venus is indeed comprised of radially formed ribs ending in undulating edges characteristic of a scallop. However, I must admit, that I paid much less attention to the bivalve than to Venus when last I stood in the Uffizi. Marine life does not hold my attention quite as much as other things. However, when all is in front us, we must conclude that this particular bivalve is not an oyster but a scallop.

Mal: the site is called "View Points". They engage in research and development in new media and net technologies. The part we are interested in is called "Cupola Live". They have planted a camera in the lantern and run it continuously. It turns in a 360 circle 24 hours a day. I had it once when it was showing Firenzi at night.

JUSTIN, this is what I found when I searched "Cupola Live":

Cupola Live

Cupola Live Secrets. Click image to see larger pictures

More. Click "Dettaglio" to see a larger image

They seem to have shut the camera down and have archived the images but have not made them available to site visitors. Too bad. It was a way to visit the Duomo and it's surroundings whenever one chose to do so.

Hi: I am so happy we wil be discussing this particular book. My family and I are traveling to Italy in March/April and we will definitely include Florence in our itinerary.

Gabriele

) Odenton, Maryland

Hi, Odenton from Gaithersburg. We'll be in Maryland together at the same time we're in Florence together. Neat.

Justin's imagined scenario of Botticelli enjoying an oyster on the halfshell, and thereby inspiring himself to introduce a significant component into his Birth of Venus, may just help me in persuading another friend to join the discussion. He has talked to me of doing a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela in Spain. If for no other reason than to come back with his own proverbial pilgrim's scallop shell. Now, I might persuade him that in Florence his shell would come ashore bearing the goddess of love, and that while travelling he could exchange his Don Quixote for a Decameron for profitable reading, since it's a good question who exposed more human foolishness.

Strange, that Mal should report having seen Ippolita at 7th Avenue and 56th, in New York. And I've just now received an email informing me that at last sighting, Ippolita was seen in a serious discussion with St John the Baptist at the Orsanmichele. And that she seemed to be convincing him of something, since he was seen to frown. Keep that in mind, Gabriele, when you go. Or it may be that you will have some questions of your own which you will want to ask of these distinguished people you will be meeting.

Mal, your brilliant. You did find the web cam that Justin mentioned. Here's a tough one. If it's not asking too much. Somewhere in Leonardo da Vinci's Notebooks he left drawings of the hoisting machinery that Brunelleschi devised for lifting those heavy building materials. Wouldn't it be useful to have some pictures to help us appreciate the tremendous task that Brunelleschi set himself.

Joan, crank up your memory. We want to hear everthing you can recall.

Justin, your reply, as the young crowd might say, was awesome. I enjoyed that. In fact it was even more than I deserved.

To all whose year begins on the first of every January, may the bells ring out cheerfully for you.

Jonathan

Jonathon: If your friend comes to Compostela along the Northern route following the Bay of Biscay he/she will find monasteries to house him at night.That is the ancient pilgrimage route. Saint James, as you well know, came ashore there and a shell is his symbol. Sometimes the shell is combined with a pilgrim's staff. Both symbols recognize the pilgrimage aspects of James the Great as well as the pilgrims who walked to Compostela for miracle cures.

Scroll down to see a working model of Da Vinci's hoist for the lantern in the Duomo

Brunelleschi's revolving crane. Click image for larger picture

Machines used in the building of Brunelleschi's dome

Brunelleschi light hoist

I had planned to read this book and to be a participant in this discussion. However my belove husband passed away on December 18th. It was totally unexpected and such a terrible shock that I am not about being able to read the book now. I am not able to concentrate on much yet.

I love Florence and have visited there several times. I will never forget the first time I saw the dome. I felt at that time that it was the most beautiful thing that I had ever seen.

Please know that I will be lurking in this discussion.

Joan Grimes

I never take lightly any proposal from my good friend Jonathan. But the invitation to accompany you all to Florence I will have to decline with as much grace as I can muster. My scallop shell has to do with things of the spirit and not the pencilled curves of Botticelli's lively imagination. An unembellished shell is my goal.

As for Florence, haven't you all read your Dante, and how he packed so many of its illustrious citizens off to his Inferno? And if that's not enough, listen to what Boccaccio has to say about them, the author of the Decameron that Jonathan recommends. Let me read you the prologue from a book I have here: VILE FLORINTINES, by Timothy Holme.

'In the ailing and bloated recluse of Certaldo it was hard to recognize the brilliant young philanderer, Giovanni Boccaccio, author of the outrageous DECAMERON, the most scandalous and widely read book of the century. Indeed he was hard put to it to recognize himself; and as for the DECAMERON, he had long since dismissed it in horror as the work of 'a squalid pimp, an incestuous ancient, a dirty old man, a foul-mouthed calumniator who sticks his nose into other people's misdeeds'.

Boccaccio had finally retreated to Certaldo - his childhood home, principally noted for its onions - when he was fifty-eight. He wanted no more to do with Florence, the great city. He preferred to be thought of as coming from Certaldo. Indeed, he had always been in two minds about Florence, but now it was altogether damnable in his eyes, governed as it was by low-born ignoramuses. He loathed them, 'the gluttons, the frequenters of taverns, the whoremongers and the thieving scum' who 'couldn't even count the fingers on their two hands, although they were supreme masters when it came to using them for stealing'.

'His life lay about him in ruins. His work he saw as mere literary flotsam and jetsam. He was practically penniless and had been pathetically grateful for the fifty golden florins left him by his dear friend Petrarch to buy himself something fur-lined for the bitter winter nights. Moreover, a prolonged and exacerbated andropause had embittered him. He had no love for the world about him. That magic which had haunted his young manhood had dissipated like a cloud of incense in an icy gale.

'And as for the headlong riot of carnality he had indulged in during his youth, what had it led to but the catastrophic mental and physical collapse he was now enduring? He suffered from scabies, breathlessness, constipation, a swollen spleen, atrocious kidney pains and an intermittent but cruelly hacking cough.

' "My body is heavy," he had written to a friend, "my step unfirm, my hand trembling: the pallor of death is in my face, I have no appetite, everything upsets me. The strength of my soul is failing, my memory almost gone, my genius turned to imbecility."

'He had even allowed the scholarly bachelor solitude he so greatly treasured to be violated. His brother Jacopo had married for the second time, in spite of Boccaccio's warnings, and had now come with wife and two children to live at the family home in Certaldo. Boccaccio had been appalled at the prospect, but had reluctantly given way. "I am not made of iron," he had written to a friend. "Their prayers conquered me." So now to cap everything else the household peace was shattered by female comings and goings and the dreadful clamour of two little boys.

'Sitting alone in his room Boccaccio must have thought much about his own life and the lives of his famous contemporaries and predecessors in Florence. Above all, Dante Aliighieri, the author of that COMEDY on which Boccaccio had had the honour of bestowing the adjective DIVINE.

'Boccaccio had worshipped Dante since childhood and had written the first biography of him, interviewing people who had known him, catching vital information before it was irretrievably swept away.

'Another famous Florentine Boccaccio had written about was Giotto, the peasant boy from the Mugello valley who had grown up to become the greatest artist of the age, the architect of Florence's stupendous cathedral tower and the tightest-fisted usurer in the city.

'Then a little later there had been Petrarch, the uncrowned king of intellectual Europe, the poet whose love-from-afar had brought immortality to a girl called Laura. The same Petrarch whose friendship had been the most signal honour of Boccaccio's mature years.

'And many others as well - poets, soldiers, popes, emperors, artists, courtesans...All different, yet all united by the city in whose towering tragi-comedy they had played their parts. A city every bit as deadly as ancient Rome, as lovely as Athens, as uninhibited as Sodom and Gomorrah. A city which outran Venice in pride and was the richest breeding-ground of genius that had been known since the ancient world.

'It was the story of that city Boccaccio should have told. Only now it was too late. But he had the journalist's eye for it, the poet's sensibility and just the right dosage of humour and cynicism. And all his life he had been a snapper-up of trifles, considered as well as unconsidered.

'Only to tell it you would have to go back a long way...'

One shudders to read it. Come to Santiago de Campostela with me, Jonathan.

Joan, we're all so pleased that you're coming along with us to Florence. Perhaps seeing the sights, recalling some memories, or just hearing the rest of us chattering away will make it easier to bear your painful loss. Welcome aboard.

Mal, you amaze me. You're a modern magician. No sooner asked for, and the helpful link is pulled out of your hat, or out of thin air. You certainly know your way around in cyberspace. The link 'Machines used in the building of the Dome' also has additional links that lead nicely into the book and will also be useful for reference later. Bookmark them, everyone.

Mathew, I don't know what to say to the prologue about the bitter old man that Boccaccio became in his old age. He seems to have brought most of it on himself. No doubt there is some truth in what he says about the good people of Florence. Then again he may just have turned into an unhappy old Florentine Scrooge. The English don't have any monopoly on guys like that.

If you think that you will be happier going to Santiago de Compostela you should read Justin's post about places to stay along the way. But since you're on the bus, and I don't plan to make any further stops, you'll have to rejig your pilgrim's camino starting from Florence. You might want to rest for a few days before starting out again. In that case you will be sure to find many restful places in Florence suitable for reverential meditation.

Why don't you read us some Boccaccio to pass the time. Whatever became of dee and her story of the Grasso. She had me hooked. Just as well not to distract me. These Italian drivers are something else!

Joan (Grimes) - my heartfelt condolences on the sudden death of your husband. My prayers are with you and your family.

Joan from Gaithersburg - when are you traveling to Italy? And are you going with a group or on your own?

Gabriele

Gabriele: I wish I could. I meant we will be there together in this discussion. When my husband and I went there, we did not travel with a group (always our preference). We went in Winter when there weren't too many tourists.

My fondest memory is not the great sights, which I certainly saw, but wandering alone on quiet streets, so different from any streets I'd seen before, turning the corner and coming across a Michelangelo, with people wandering by, not paying any attention. I really got the feeling of living everyday life in the midst of beauty and history.

My strongest visual memory is not the artwork, wonderful as it is, but the color of the houses. None of the pictures that I've seen come close to capturing it -- a warm golden glow, the color that the earth ought to be but isn't. I see that there is a book out called "The Stones of Florence" and I'm going to try to get it.

I hope you enjoy Florence as much as I did.

She awakened me before daylight, wanting company, I guess, in her forays into the monumental wonders of Florence. Why so early? Because it says so in her guidebook. And her guidebooks are also wonderful, believe me. This morning she has John Ruskin's MORINGS IN FLORENCE, and at the appropriate time she started reading to me as follows:

'Wait then for an entirely bright morning; rise with the sun, and go to Santa Croce, with a good opera-glass in your pocket, with which you shall for once, at any rate, see an opus; and, if you have time, several opera. Walk straight to the chapel on the right of the choir ("k" in your Murray's guide).

When you first get into it, you will see nothing but a modern window of glaring glass, with a red-hot cardinal in one pane - which piece of modern manufacture takes away at least seven-eighths of the light (little enough before) by which you might have seen what is worth sight. Wait patiently till you get used to the gloom. Then, guarding your eyes from the accursed modern window as best you can you may, take your opera-glass and look to the right, at the uppermost of the two figures beside it. It is St. Louis, under campanile architecture, painted by - Giotto? or the last Florentine painter who wanted a job - over Giotto? That is the first question you have to determine; as you will have henceforward, in every case in which you look at a freco.

Sometimes there will be no question at all. These two frescos at the bottom of the walls on the right and left, for instance, have been entirely got up for your better satisfaction, in the last year or two - over Giotto's half-effaced lines. But that St. Louis? Repainted or not, it is a lovely thing, - there can be no question about that and we must look at it, after some preliminary knowledge gained, not inattentively.

Your Murray's Guide tells you that this chapel of the Bardi della Liberta, in which you stand, is covered with frescos by Giotto; that they were whitewashed, and only laid bare in 1853; that they were painted between 1296 and 1304; that they represent scenes in the life of St. Francis; and that on each side of the window are paintings of St. Louis of Toulouse, ST. Louis king of France, ST. Elizabeth of Hungary, and ST.Claire, - "all much restored and repainted." Under such recommendations, the frescos are not likely to be much sought after; and, accordingly, as I was at work in the chapel this morning, Sunday, 6th September, 1874, two nice-looking Englishmen, under guard of their valet de place, passed the chapel without no much as looking in.

'You will perhaps stay a little longer in it with me, good reader, and find out gradually where you are. Namely, in the most interesting and perfect little Gothic chapel in all Italy - so far as I know or can hear. There is no other of the great time which has all its frescos in their place. The Arena, though far larger, is of earlier date - not pure Gothic, nor showing Giotto's full force. The lower chapel at Assisi is not Gothic at all, and is still only of Giotto's middle time. You have here, developed Gothic, with Giotto in his consummate strength, and nothing lost, in form, of the complete design.

'By restoration - judicious restoration, as Mr. Murray usually calls it - there is no saying how much you have lost. Putting the question of restoration out of your mind, however, for a while, think where you are, and what you have got to look at.

'You are in the chapel next the high altar of the great Franciscan church of Florence. A few hundred yards west of you, within ten minutes' walk, is the Baptistery of Florence. And five minutes' walk west of that is the great Dominican church of Florence, Santa Maria Novella.

'Get this little bit of geography, and architectural fact, well into your mind. There is the little octagon Baptistery in the middle; here, ten minutes' walk east of it, the Franciscan church of the Holy Cross; there, five minutes' walk west of it, the Dominican church of ST. Mary.

'Now, that little octagon Baptistery stood where it now stands (and was finished), though the roof has been altered since) in the eithth century. It was the central building of Etrurian Christianity, - of European Christianity.

'From the day it was finished, Christianity went on doing her best, in Etruria and elsewhere, for four hundrd years, - and her best seemed to have come to very little, - when there rose up two men who vowed to God it should come to more. And they made it come to more, forthwith; of which the immediate sign in Florence was that she resolved to have a fine new cross-shaped cathedral instead of her quaint old little octagon one; and a tower beside it that should beat Babel: - which two buildings you have also within sight.

But your business is not at present with them; but with these two earlier churches of Holy Cross and ST. Mary. The two men who were the effectual builders of these were the two great religious Powers and Reformers of the thirteenth century; - St. Francis, who taught Christian men how they should behave, and St. Dominic, who taught Christian men what they should think. In brief, one the Apostle of Works; the other of Faith. Each sent his little company of disciples to teach and to preach in Florence: St. Francis in 1212; St. Dominic in 1220.'

Amanuensis Lucy

JoanK: Mary Mc Carthy's Stones is very good. Ruskin's little volume called, "Mornings in Florence" is also worth reading.

My book has arrived, so now, with Jonathan's blessing, I can officially participate in this discussion.

Mal

to find the discussion proposal coming closer to reality with the move up on the organizational chart. Thanks to all who keep things moving around here. And thanks to all of you who want to participate. In any way at all. The subject lends itself to so many interests, and invites so many comments. Why, one could even argue that civilization took a wrong turn when all these Florentine bohemians came on the scene.

I would also like to renew the invitation to an interesting read.

Jonathan

Blessings on you, little man. Barefoot boy with cheek of tan.

Here's a map, JONATHAN, that will take you to where we're all spending the night.

MAP
And here's the farmhouse where we're staying.
FARMHOUSE

La Rugea looks like a lovely place to stop. And the rates are very reaasonable.

What a coincidence to find accomodations in Prato. How could you have known that I've just started reading The Merchant of Prato (1335-1410), by Iris Origa. She has lived for years in one of the Medici villas north of Florence. I believe. I had forgotten I had it in the house. It looks good.

I can't tell you how much I appreciate your help in navigating the labryinth of roads on the map. Now, remind me in the morning that I have to take those three rights to get onto SS67 to Firenze, and then left at the small village of Camaioni. What a pretty countrside.

Jonathan

“But the main attraction is the Duomo now taking shape, which later will give so many rooms in Florence a fine view”

A few decades ago a friend and me went to Italy and she trusted me with the logistics. We didn’t go with a tour group feeling more independent this way. We had agreed to do some shopping in the morning and afternoons to see museums and monuments. We had just seen Venice and we traveled by train to Florence without any kind of hotel reservation because a friend had given me Frommer’s Europe on $10. a Day (1970? edition) to find accommodations. We arrived in Florence and walked to the hotel described in the book.

I have to say that I prided myself on traveling on a very small budget, almost student style, with just a small suitcase on wheels. It took me a while to realize that a small door between small shop windows was the hotel entrance. We went up a minuscule elevator, barely wide enough for two people, to the hotel lobby.

The hotel manager explained in Italian, which I didn’t know, that they had no vacancy right now, but he was kind enough to phone a colleague for a room for us. He kindly explained to us to go back down, turn left outside the door and left again at the next corner to the address he gave us and we were expected. Same experience, same elevator, same hotel lobby. We had two tiny rooms, old furniture, but very clean. I had no idea of what we were going to see from there. Putting down my suitcase and walking to the window right in front of our eyes, with nothing else in between, stood the majestic Duomo! We were on the 6th floor, but the dome loomed above casting a huge shadow.

I couldn’t believe my eyes. By a stroke of luck, we had landed in a room a stone’s throw from this monumental piece of architecture. We hesitated to leave the room and we postponed to the next day our visit to the Academia to see M’s David. For the love of this monument we stayed in that room in total awe of its grandeur and after getting some food, we spread a tablecloth on the wide cement railing on the balcony eating chicken, sipping excellent wine, and keeping our eyes fixed on the Duomo, speechless while the sun was going down.

I hope to be able to get the book and follow this discussion. I loved Italy.

Joan G. Please come back and tell us about your travels, you have so much to share and it might keep your mind off your loss for a while.

Don't go away, Eloise. You surely have much more that we would love to hear.

And I can see it already. It's just as I had hoped. There's no way of telling where this book will take us.

One has come to inspect the bridges spanning the Arno. No doubt planning his own bridge over his own river somewhere far from here. Another has come looking for a safe harbor in some frescoed monastery. A third has come to find aesthetic satisfaction in a Botticellian fancy. And a fourth, looking at the same painting, will likely go away from here spiritually shell-shocked. Another comes wishing to see her dream turned into reality. And a sixth has come to worship in an ancient shrine with a favorite old guidebook in hand, such as John Ruskin's.

R W B Lewis, in his own excellent Florence book, has said about Ruskin's Mornings in Florence: 'A masterpiece of sorts; hypnotically readable even when it is mind-bogglingly wrongheaded.'

I believe it was Edith Wharton who kept Lewis coming back to Florence. In his biography of her he has several interesting adventures that EW had while travelling about in Italy in her landau, including the 'significant' one mentioned above. Perhaps you will all find them interesting:

'With Buckler (see following paragraph) in charge of the maps, the foursome made their meandering way up through Viterbo, Orvieto, and Montefiascone, with frquent pauses, while Edith inspected some famous if often out-of-the-way villa and garden. She took innumerable photographs, made extensive notes, and bought old books on each region in the hope of discovering the locations of forgotten villas and the original plans of their gardens. Buckler was taken aback by the crowded conditions of some of the villas - a great-aunt sleeping in a hallway, a grandmother dying on the library couch, the periodic cackling of the family lunatics in that part of the villa to which they were confined.'

And the signicant adventure:

'She (EW) had heard vaguely of a monastery, somewhere in the Tuscan hills southwest of Florence, that was said to contain a series of terra-cotta groups representing the scenes of the Passion. They were attributed to one Giovanni Gonnelli, known as the Blind Man of Gambassi, a seventeenth-century artist of no surviving reputation. Edith resolved to have a look at them. After some inquiry she learned that the monastery was thought to be near an obscure village named San Vivaldo, and on an April morning she and Teddy set off in search.

'The monastery lay in a large opening within a hushed woodland area; monks could be seen (as they still can) working the vegetable gardens nearby. The terra-cottas were housed, one by one, in the twenty-odd little chapels dotted amid the woods and the slopes. One of the monks escorted Edith and Teddy through the chapels, gravely rehearsing the life and miracles of San Vivaldo (he was born in San Gemignano in the thirteenth century, and spent most of his life in a hollow chestnut tree on what is now the site of the monastery).

'Expecting to find nothing more than crude imitations of better-known seventeenth-century terra cottas, Edith was instantly alerted by much finer and, she was rapidly convinced, much earlier work. In half a dozen cases, the life-size figures, set in a depressed arch at the far end of each chapel, had a severe simplicity, an absence of agitation, and sometimes a look of wondering ecstasy that Edith Wharton associated rather with the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries than with the stylized period of the Blind Man of Gambassi. In "Lo Spasimo" (the swoon of the Virgin at the sight of Christ bearing the cross) for example, she detected "an extremity of speechless anguish which is subtly contrasted with the awed but temperate grief of the woman who bends over her"; and she was reminded of a superb terra cotta in the Bargello museum in Florence which was confidently attributed to Giovanni della Robbia, of that famous and prolific family of terra-cotta workers.

'On her return to Florence she persuaded Signor Alinari, the distinguished photographer, to take pictures of six of the San Vivaldo group, and when she showed the results to Professor Enrico Rodolfi, director of the Royal Museum, that hitherto skeptical gentleman was peruaded. He declared in an orotund official statement that the terra cottas photographed had definitely been done around the turn of sixteenth century and by "an artist of the school of the Robbias." They are now attributed to Giovanni della Robbia, and Edith Wharton could claim credit for identifying, in her own words, "a remarkable example of late quattro-cento art (that) has remained undiscovered, within a few hours' journey from Florence, for nearly four hundred years." '

And so, in a roundabout way, after reading and discussing her House of Mirth right here in SeniorNet, I have found my way to Forence and back.

I've forgotten about Buckler. Well, some other time.

Jonathan

You folks might find the film "Tea with Mussolini" enjoyable to watch.

Two remarkable, beautiful posts, breathtaking, Eloise and Jonathan, both of you! I did not have near that adventure in Florence!! I did NOT know that about Edith Wharton! Isn't that amazing. I have seen small grottoes in Switzerland with shrines and statuary, certainly not Della Robbias but very striking, and old, none the less, so I can sort of picture it from Jonathan's lyric description. I just LOVED that Eloise about the dinner on the balcony, hopw beautifully you write. Wonderful! THIS is going to be wonderful, my own memories of Florence so pedestrian I need to hear (it was HOT) what it IS there and how others have experienced it. I think I already am, seeing it in your posts!

(I did love the Opera, the Opera del Duomo), it means Works, that's now a museum around the back where they stored things from the cathedral like Della Robbia Choir Lofts. They would remove them for special occasions so they could get IN something important, imagine.

But I must say in all the times I have been in Italy (every summer for the past many years) Florence has not been on my agenda, I want to learn what is THERE that is so special!

Justin I have heard so much about that movie, I'll try to get a copy.

After reading Eloise's beautiful post, which had me dreaming views of the Duomo all night, I had to dig up my copy of Forster's Room With A View, which, while not as breathtaking as Eloise's, is still pretty nice to wake up to:

'It was pleasant to wake up in Florence, to open the eyes upon a bright bare room, with a floor of red tiles which look clean though they are not; with a painted ceiling whereon pink griffins and blue amorini sport in a forest of yellow violins and bassoons. It was pleasant, too, to fling wide the windows, pinching the fingers in unfamiliar fastenings, to lean out into sunshine with beautiful hills and trees and marble churches opposite, and close below, the Arno, gurgling against the embankment of the road.'

Ginny, how can I say this? This is even bigger than the Iliad, if that's possible. I mean, you even meet some of the same characters here. Florence was obviously the place and time of the rebirth of ancient heros. 'Rennaisance' is becoming meaningful for me. But I'm going to rejoin you as soon as I have my party of cultural pilgrims comfortably settled on the Piazza del Duomo.

Justin, I'm very happy you've brought up Tea With Mussolini. I love the film, and watched it again just recently. And for the life of me I can't resist putting my own names to all the dear faces. Names, that is, of all the swell posters to these discussions. You're there, too, Ginny. And you, too, Justin. I hope nobody minds. It's just that I see you all in my imagination in that enticing place. Mal, you are...well, I'll let you guess.

Jonathan

Jonathan and all of you, I shall be on the bus and hope they have room for me in the farmhouse; I have so enjoyed reading all the posts, all of your adventures, stories and recommendations for books and film.

I have mentioned being in Italy to people who have said "And you never went to Florence?" - and I have to answer, most sorrowfully, that I had not stayed that long; we were in Rome two weeks with a group and then off to Venice for 4 days.

But the loveliness of Italy - I do not have the words for it - how ancient - the patina of age on all the buildings and statutes and around the corner you run into unbelievable sights that one would never encounter in America.

Particularly I remember passing each day a little statue of the Virgin Mary encased in the wall of an old buildilng with a vase for flowers in front of her and fresh flowers were there every day and you wondered who was replenishing them. And the hills of Rome - AH!

Am Looking forward to our journey together.

I will probably spend most of my time just reading these wonderful posts. Give me a seat in the middle of the bus so I can spin around to hear all these revalations about Florence and Italy. One of my favorite books was Ken Follet's "Pillars of the Earth" which, as most of you know, is about the building of a cathedral. And, then there is "Sarum" by Edward Rutherford about the building of Salisbury Cathedral. I am fascinated by the architecture of great buildings of long ago. But, I have never been to Florence, so this will be a new pretend trip for me. The name in the title makes me wonder if the Brunel of Great Britain who built all those wonderful bridges was related to Brunelleschi. Does anyone here know?? He also founded the Great Western Railroad of England.

My book came!! I have to sit on my eyes to avoid reading the whole thing tonight. How can I make it last a month?

Look at it this way, Joan. Do you think a month will be enough time to tell us all you think or feel about the thousand and one things in the book?

Ann, do you sense some impatience on Joan's part. Perhaps, as soon as your copy arrives, let me know, and, for her sake, we'll begin the discussion.

Ella, am I happy to see you. You've been to Italy and I know you have a driver's permit. I think I'll get you to spell me off occasionally. Do we drive on the right, or the left, over there...

?

EEEEEEEEEEEK! You've been driving all this time and haven't noticed? Perhaps Ella had better take over!

Don't start for me. I can wait -- I can, I can, I can!

Jonathan
Just got the book and would love to squish into the bus with some of my friends; might have to study Latin during the tea breaks, however. Does anyone mind?

Also have rented the film "Tea with Mussolini" and it was very enjoyable; I love any film with Maggie Smith, but this one does well with the atmosphere of Italy during the "prewar" years.

Mippy, thanks for reminding me. Not to forget making frequent stops for tea!!

Some of you no doubt are still wondering. Who was that Buckler, who accompanied Edith Wharton on her travels about the Italian countryside, doing an inventory of the human flotsam and jetsam inhabitating the villas, while she inspected the gardens. For her book, ITALIAN VILLAS AND GARDENS.

It was my carelessness that left you ignorant of vital information supplied so generously by Lewis himself in the aforementioned biography of Edith Wharton. It reads as follows:

'Willie Buckler was the half brother of Julian White, on whose arm Edith Jones, trembling, had entered the Patriarchs' Ball that uneasy winter evening in 1883. He was married to Geogie Waldron, a niece of the historian James Anthony Froude, and himself displayed a sporadic interest in English history and archeology. The two couples took to each other at once, and Edith invited the Bucklers to accompany the Whartons in their landau from Rome to Sienna.'

Perhaps my driving skills seem sporadic to some?

Anyone wishing further clarification should email me and we will delve further into the matter.

Jonathan

I was not just for the Duomo that I went to Florence with Mary. I had always wanted to see Michaelangelo’s David, the canals of Venice, Rome, the Isle of Capri, the Leaning Tower of Pisa, and the beautiful Tuscany countryside by train.

The train from Innsbruck to Venice was stopped at the Italian Alps border crossing because Prime Minister Aldo Moro had been murdered just the day before.

Fully armed soldiers boarded the train stopping at every cabin to examine all passenger papers. Well, I felt that no one would suspect an ordinary Canadian women, besides what could they do to me? With all the commotion it made me feel like if I was in a war movie, it was so unreal. Before they got to our cabin (compartiment), I got up and went to the bathroom, I guess I just didn't fully realize that this was for real. A soldier knocked on the bathroom door with his fist and demanded my papers. I showed him my Canadian passport, he said something roughly to me I didn’t understand and escorted me to my compartment where Mary was sitting with 4 others and she scolded me in no uncertain terms that the most suspicious thing I could have done was to go to the John. She was furious because she was the one counting on me for protection. She said: ”What if you had been arrested?”.

Every day in Italy was an adventure.

Éloïse

You guys have such wonderful adventures on trains. The most untidy thing that happened to me on a train occurred when I forgot an umbrella in a rain storm.

It seems to me, Justin, that even so there may have been an unforgetable adventure which followed from your being without that umbrella.

But surely nothing beats having an armed soldier beating down the bathroom door behind which one expects to feel secure.

Eloise, your last two posts have been very helpful in deciding how this discussion should begin. Why do people enjoy travelling to Italy. What draws us to that country. As you say, there was so much more than the Dome. It probably wasn't even on your must-see list. But there it was. And it turned out to be a highlight.

By the way, did you watch CBC's Opening Night show last night? First it featured Montreal's Jean-Pierre Perreault and his artistic experiments with the dance; and then a fine concert by two distinguished young Italian tenors in Rome on a summer evening with the Coliseum for a backdrop. The camera caught a young couple in the audience. He was trying to get her attention without a hope, while she sat there absolutely entranced by those voices. Charming. I wish I had learned to sing.

Checkpoints can get interesting. There was the time when I was on a bus with a fine group of people. Then, at one border crossing, the life of the party was left behind shackled to a policeman. For the rest of our journey we all wondered, what kind of trouble could a nice guy like that get himself into. Perhaps he had sung his way into some young girl's heart and then left her in a lurch.

Wonderful depiction of compassionate ladies taking care of an orphaned boy. I loved it! And there are also some other good movies placed in Italy that are so beautiful--Enchanted April, My House in Umbria(another Maggie Smith) are just two that I remember.

My train journeys?? As a child, I recall sitting on my suitcase in the middle aisle of a car with soldiers and sailors all around me traveling to their WWII posts. So exciting! They were all so handsome in their uniforms!

And, proudly entering the public shower room on the VIA, two years ago, preparing myself for a luxurious warm shower. Removing my clothing, running the water to just the right temperature, swaying as the train rounded a curve, I stepped into the softly falling water---only to realize that I still had my new fluffy slippers on my feet!! Oh, woe was me!! Haven't laughed that uproariously since!! Felt like the nut that I am!

Jonathan, me too, I wish I had inherited Italian vocal chords. As much as I love listening to tenors singing, I found it a bit long.

When the discussion begins I will mostly be learning from posts as I am not well versed in art and architecture being happy enough with the appreciation of it. Besides I will be away for almost two weeks starting at the end of January.

Justin, trains travel here never was as exciting as in Europe.

Ah, train adventures. My husband and I traveled on the Orient Express from Geneva to Athens. It was not quite as romantic as it sounds -- the toilets wouldn't flush and we were on the train for three days.

It was the middle of Winter. We got to the border out of (then) Yugoslavia in the middle of a cold snowy night. The police made everyone get out of the train while they searched it -- everyone but us, that is. As the only Americans on the train, we were allowed to sit in warm splendor, staring out the window at everyone else standing on the freezing platform, freezing their you-know-whats off, and glaring back at us with expressions I hope I never see again.

Until then, everyone had been amazingly helpful and friendly. After that, people hardly spoke to us. Sigh. I never did find out what the police were looking for, or if they found it.

I found us an apartment in Florence! Click small pictures to see a larger view of some of the rooms.

It's in a 19th Century building located in the center of the old city about 150 meters from the square of “Santa Croce” and 350 meters from “Piazza del Duomo.”

How does that sound, JONATHAN?

Mal

Photos of Florence. Click NEXT PHOTO to see more

Boboli Gardens

More pictures of Florence and Boboli Gardens. Click images to see larger photos

Ah train travel, I went all over Europe last year on the train. I found out I'm not 16 any more, I didn't know that? I really didn't.

AH the Orient Express! AH! I am a train NUT. My favorite trip is from Paris to Rome, AH, on the overnight with private bedrooms AH you wake up to breakfast and THE most spectacular views of the Italian coast!

AH!

Last year, thru the Chunnel to Bruges, to Amsterdam, to Cologne, those new high speed German ICE trains are out of this world, you can sit in the front car on single black leather seats and SEE out the front of the train thru glass you can SEE what the engineer sees! To Basel Switzerland, to Paris, to Rome, I LOVE Eurail!

Totally exhausted but feeling energized (I can DO this!!) and if my Greek Study trip does not make am going to do it again, but in Eastern Europe this time. I love European Trains.

One year going from Paris to Rome, the woman in the compartment next to ours began to scream. Now picture this, you're riding thru, you're rocketing thru the French countryside, the free bar lounge area at the end of the car is full of Americans from Texas having a ball, it's after 11 pm and the woman next door begins to scream?

Shades of Agatha Christie!!

Has someone been murdered?

Her water would not turn off. It was the first time I had seen such faucets, (but not the last) and we kept hitting it. Of course when you hit it, it turns on again, her room was soon flooded. The conductor was one PO'D Italian but he tried to be nice. Hahaaha she had to change rooms. Such fun, for a bit there we thought it was Agatha Christie time, the last thing the conductor on the Paris-Rome run says to you is "lock your door." That bit thru Marseilles, is not safe.

I'm so proud of you guys. Never has it been my privilege to escort such a lively, entertaining, sophisticated group as you are turning out to be. Florence is going to be unmitigated joy.

My personal opinion. You haven't travelled by rail if you haven't gone third-class in India. Mind you, I'm going only by the stories Gandhi told.

But when in Florence, thanks to you, Mal, we're definitely going first class. WOW!! What a place you've found for us! I, for one, am not going to turn my back on it, once I'm inside, no matter how nice the view from the window.

And that Piazza degli Strozzi! Looks like the perfect place for a cool drink. And after that, a walk in the Boboli Gardens. It's hard to make out who that is on the sculptored pedestal, but he certainly reflects well in the water.

Joan, that sounds wild. It all sounds to me like a conspiracy on the part of the railway officials. That little police action, or caper, was probably meant to provoke a murder. After all the 'Orient' has a reputation to maintain.

Ginny, you are some traveller. The stories you can tell. How happy I am to have you along on this adventure. And the spectacular view of the stormy sea. I couldn't help thinking of poor Shelley out there, somewhere.

My instincts were right. Better we should travel by bus. Less stressful.

Jonathan

Yes, the accomodations Mal has found for us look stunning, very comfortable. And I think I have found the bridge I'm going to take back with me. The Santa Trinita. What a lovely bridge. It should look great on my spread back home. I don't have any water to speak of, to have flowing underneath...but, what the heck, I'll come back for an aquaduct some other time.

A propos, Mary McCarthy's Stones of Florence, already mentioned here, comes in a very glitzy edition, with 100 glorious, full-page photographs. The Santa Trinita is in there, taking one in great style from page 28 to page 29. The Dome in the backround would like nice too. Perhaps a replica. I wonder is therea a blueprint somewhere. Or would that be beyond the resources of the internet?

Third class on Indian Railways is high class. They get to ride on the roof. Fourth class has the problem. They ride under the cars.

Luca: A floor plan and a section drawing of the Duomo may be found in King's text.

Trainophiles: PBS used to have a series: great train journeys of the World. I think I saw every one twice. If you haven't seen them, I hope they bring them back.

My favorite was the one through India (no, he didn't ride underneath the cars). They went through all these exotic places, so different. At one point the train stopped, and he said "Here is the exotic town of ... (some place I never heard of) and the camera showed a picture of SOMEONE I KNOW!! HEY, THAT'S JOHN. WHAT'S HE DOING THERE? I guess the world is smaller than we think.

MAL: I'll go for that apartment in a heartbeat!! If we all hock our socks, we might just be able to afford it!

India is on my list! They say the greatest railway journey is through Africa, and the price is the greatest, too. Once they get thru killing the tourists, I'm there!

Malryn, the apartment is to die for, I thought that was all different apartments it's just photos of ONE, I'll have to dress up for our stay!

Eloise, thanks for your post encouraging me to participate in this discussion. You sent me on a search for photos of my first trip to Florence which took place 22 years ago this summer. Like you I went there to see Michel Angelo's David. I had never heard of Brunelleschi's Dome. I did not see the David on that trip as the Academia was closed on the day we spent there. I went to Florence 4 times before I ever saw the David.

Although I did not find photos of that first trip I found many wonderful memories of the whole trip which a was a bus tour. The tour guide was a former Jesuit who was very knowledgeable about Florence and pparticularly about the Dome. I even remember his name he was Frenchman named Jean-François Sigueneau. However I have no earthly idea what happened to him or where he might be today.

I do not know how many times I have been to Florence. I hope to go there again someday. I have traveled there by bus on a tour several times and have traveled there by train a few times. I did not have any adventures to speak of on my train trips there. I did enjoy the trains very much though.

Ginny, it is hard to believe that you have never visited beautiful, fascinating Firenze. I remember writing my first real composition in French about my ambition to have an apartment in Paris, an apartment in London and one in Firenze. This was when I went back to school after I was old to renew my knowledge of French and to finally get my degree in it.

Thanks again for getting me started on those memories, Eloise. I really needed to remember that time in my life.

Joan Grimes

Ginny, trains bring us to the center of big cities in Europe and that is what I appreciate about them. You are one spoilt brat having a private compartment with breakfast in bed while looking at the Italian countryside. You don't know the other side of the picture then. I get a 6 berth compartment and you don't even know who will be sleeping "with" you there. I once had a mother and a baby sharing a berth, while the husband slept in the "bathroom" on a train from Switzerland to the South of France.

OK Jonathan, I am getting back to Florence.

The next day in Florence, we leave early for the Academia not even enquiring if it is open or not, it is, my heart is pounding as I walk in. If I remember well, I see daylight coming in from the roof and flooding the statue of David from above. I am struck dumb, mouth open. The pedestal where David stands is higher than me. I start moving slowly around the statue looking at every detail of that perfect anatomy wondering how a genius like M. could ever be certain of the proportion of each limb. I notice the larger left hand, the other hand holding the slingshot resting on his shoulder, the intent in the sunken eyes, the curls framing the face. I don't hear a word whispered the few people there, just admiration for the work of a genius. The minutes turned to an hour perhaps two and I had to wrench myself away.

Joan G, I am so glad you came. The Jesuit you mentioned would have to be my deceased brother's age and he would have known him. My brother taught history of the renaissance at University of Sudbury for 30 years, he knew Italy inside out.

We visited Pitti Palace on that trip and walked on Ponte Vecchio looking at souvenirs stalls but it left me not very impressed.

Eloïse

It's wonderful to hear from you, JoanG. My mind started racing at the thought of contacting your knowledgeable tour guide for a few tips on the subject. However, I can already see that so much experience is coming together here that once we have arrived, I'll be the one along for the ride

Justin, I have a suspicion that Luca is taking advantage of Mal's skills to get the info that he wants. Or, for a lark, trying to challenge her. Then again, he may be jealous.

Hang on to your socks, JoanK. We're all rich...rich as our imaginations. With that we can enjoy the very best.

Ginny, nobody goes tourist anymore. Go native.

Jonathan

The last time I saw Florence, the meat butchers had their stalls on the bridge.

Santa Trinita Bridge, oil on canvas

Another view

You know, with all of you world travelers in this discussion, who are so familiar with Italy and Florence, I'm tempted to pull out. I've never set foot in Italy and never will. All I'm good for around here is to find websites with pretty pictures of places I won't ever see.

Mal

Malryn I just saw your post, sorry, I don't mean to overdo it, our discussions are about being who WE are, and in bringing what we can individually to a discussion, so let's do that. I did love the book and it's well worth discussing, so on to Brunelleschi, the book is fanstastic!

Malryn, I, too, have never and probably will never, but we can be buddies on this "tour". I have a feeling that everyone will be gawking, not only us newbies. So come along to keep me company, and don't forget your lap top; no telling when we will need to surf the net.

Hooray, JACKIE! I'm so happy you're here! We'll travel on paper and a monitor screen together! What a lovely way to go!

GINNY, don't you dare stop posting your travel memories or photos! I"m just regretful, that's all, that I never saw Italy after studying Italian and singing Italian arias and canzone all those years.

Italy was on the agenda of places I went to the one and only time I was lucky enough to go to Europe. It was a business trip for my husband, so we went where the corporation he worked for said we were to go. At the last minute they nixed Italy and shattered my chance to see a little bit of that country. Instead, we were sent to Zurich, which, although I saw some good art there, was not a place I'd choose on my own to see. Oh, well, how many people like me can say they've had an intimate look at Zurich, Brussels and the Hague?

My experience staying in Paris in a two bit hotel with very thin walls and listening to Parisian lovemaking and opera sung in the next bathroom was unforgettable, and landing in London at the end of our stay and not being able to understand English will forever remain in my memory.

It was wonderful, too, to go into the home of some people who lived in the country outside Paris and eating one of the best meals I ever had in my life, as was spending time in an apartment of one of my husband's colleagues in the Hague where I watched American TV with Dutch subtitles for the very first and only time. A little inn outside the Hague was where I had my very first sip of Calvados, and I never saw as many tulips before or since as those I saw at Scheveningen. (Try and pronounce that the way the Dutch do! )

Alone most of the time on that trip because my husband was working, I didn't see the things people usually see, like historic landmarks and what we're going to see in Firenze when we get there, ( if JONATHAN only slows down a little with his bus driving so we can see anything at all ! )

Mal

The year was 1984. I did gdig these out of old albums and since I can'seem to get my scanner to work I took them to Walmart and had them put on a cd.

I was on a bus tour with some of my owsn students and some parents. My son Mark was also along. This time I knew about Brunellescni's Dome. This photo was taken at a spot along the road where we stopped on my previous trip to Florence. It was a place to pose for photos with the Dome in view.

Me with view of Florence in the background almost 21 years ago. Please excuse the quality of the photo. It was taken with a Pentax K 1000 and was a very good photo before it faded so much.

I wish I could show a photo like that, Joan.

Mal, with every pretty picture you post, every piece of art, I tell myself I've been there. I've seen that. And I have now walked across that beautiful Santa Trinita bridge.

I'm the biggest pretender you'll ever meet. Already I'm keeping my fingers crossed, hoping no one will suspect that I don't know my way around, that I've never been there. And I never have been to Florence physically.

But I'm going to get you there, and Jackie too, come hell or high water. But I musn't speak of either in Florence. Makes 'em nervous, I'm told.

Now, I want your opinion about several panels on Ghiberti's doors to paradise. The second and third on the left.

Jonathan

Malryn and Jackie,
Thanks for giving me the courage to post that I have never seen Florence, either. Newbies, all aboard! It's unlikely I'll be there in the near-term, either. I'm enjoying the wonderful photos everyone has posted!

Jonathan, please be sure we are sitting on the bus where we can hear all the details along the road as we approach. (I'll even put my Latin studies away when you are speaking.) We were posting at the same time; are you really a newby, also? Not possible!

Mippy, welcome! How do you say that in Italian?

It will be so easy to drift all over Florence and away from Brunelleschi and his dome while we are working on this book. I hope everyone will recognize the benefits of learning how a dome is constructed.

The book itself gives some opportunity to drift because it describes the Baptistry Door Competition as well as the work on the Duomo dome. It will be so easy to slip into the Academia to visit briefly with Buonaroti's David and Captives or to discuss Donatello's David, a more sensitive rendition of the boy, or to talk about della Robbia or Gozzoli and the many other artists who whose works reside in Firenzi.

Brunelleschi was an engineer who specialized in mathematical and mechanical solutions. He had a background as a goldsmith who was fascinated with hoists. His solution to the problem of the dome was Gothic rather than Italian Renaissance in character. I won't go further with that because it is six days before start time.

But I do want to say to Mal and to others who have not been to Italy that you will be able to get much enjoyment from the discussion of the book if we stay with the topic. It is a fascinating tale of construction and one from which a great deal can be learned.

People, generally, walk past buildings with domes, in the US, and in Italy, every day without paying the least attention. If the guide book didn't say it was a great work of art and that Brunelleschi superintended the work, few would bother to give it a nod. So let me encourage you to stay in here, Mal. You will enjoy the experience.

MAL: I've been to Florence once, 40 years ago, and this discussion is making me realize that I will never go back. I can't think of anything I'd rather do than see it in imagination in your company.

JUSTIN: "People, generally, walk past buildings with domes, in the US, and in Italy, every day without paying the least attention."

That really hit home!!. When I got my book, I noticed a reference in the index to the Capitol dome in Washington. As a Washington native, I've seen it all my life -- just 5 days ago, I was staring at it, but not paying any attention. Now, for the first time, I am wondering how it was constructed, and if they used any ideas from the dome.

Jackie said "Mippy, welcome! How do you say that in Italian? "

Benvenuto is welcome in Italian.

This is going to be a fun trip. No students to look after. We'll just let Jonathan look after us.

Isn't this the guy who finally finished the Dome that was left open for years and he designed the dome like an upside down bowl using techniques he sketched similar to buildings in Bysantium? Scratching my head I am thinking wasn't this a topic of a PBS program in recent years?? Or maybe it was an evening when they did the Medici series.

Well I have ordered the book, along with another that seemed interesting, The Feud That Sparked the Renaissance : How Brunelleschi and Ghiberti Changed The Art World - Ghiberti, the younger of the two, designed the bronze doors for the Church of St. John the Baptist and was a rival of Brunelleschi during their careers.

Ghiberti doors

Detail, panel, Ghiberti doors

North door, crucifixion, detail

La Battisteria, Sacrifice of Isaac, detail

Illustrated page about Brunelleschi with floor plan and plan of the duomo

IN her message #57 Ann Alden mentioned the great 19th century English engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel and wondered if he might have been a descendent of Brunelleschi the equally great 15th century engineer who will be the subject of our discussion. While I cannot answer her question confirming a relationship connection between the two, I though a few further words on Brunel would be in order.

Brunel, known worldwide in the mid-19th century as the “little Giant” since he was only a scant 5 ft, 4 in tall built railroads, bridges, tunnels, dry docks and steamships in Britain and throughout the world. As Ann pointed out he was the designer of the Great Western Railway between London and Bristol with tract some 7 ft wide. He also built a 2-mile tunnel near Bath, but his most famous work was his last project, the great iron ship known as the Great Eastern. This double-hulled iron ship was some 693 ft long powered by 6500 Sq yds of sail and 2 steam engines driving side paddle wheels and a screw propeller. It was the marvel of its age far out classing any other technological achievement up to that time.

Like our Brunelleschi, Brunel had to invent much of the construction technology as the project progressed. In particular this included the launching process that proved particularly difficult because of the great size and weigh of the ship. A curious steam powered tractor was developed to aid the launch that involving a new side launch scheme. Finally the operation was successful and the Great Eastern was afloat upon the Thames. The little Giant, Brunel, however, died the victim of a stroke as the Great Eastern was preparing to depart Britain on its madden voyage.

I, and I suspect many of you, remember the Great Eastern from our school years as the steam ship used to lay the Atlantic Cable in 1860’s. I also remember it from a 1953 book by a James Dugan, “The Great Iron Ship” that I acquire in the 1970’s at a local Brandise Book sale. Easily I include this book among the top 50 titles that I have read in my lifetime.

Mippy, we're counting on you. After all we're heading into Latin country. Many legal, contractual details having to do with the building of the dome are in Latin. That's where you come in. When do we get tea breaks and for how long. Paid holidays. Overtime. That sort of stuff.

Justin, thanks for pointing out the scope of the book. And the opportunities to explore much more than the dome itself. I'm enjoying the enthusiasm and anticipation of all the posts. But let's not kid ourselves. There's a lot of heavy lifting coming up. The problems confronting us, without any exaggeration, are quatrocento rocket science. My TV schedule has something on Frank Lloyd Wright on Thursday night. Perhaps that will be helpful in understanding the mind of an architect. And just last week I watched an hour on cranes. Very interesting to be told that on a foundation stone of the Pantheon in Rome the builders had chiselled the diagram of a crane. I've filed away that bit of info.

Barbara, it was in the Medice series. Do you remember seeing Brunelleschi being thrown into the street and landing on his face, his reward for trying to explain his crazy ideas to the decision makers? That sparked my interest in the subject. Ross King, our author, appeared in that series. After that I soon found his book. The Feud expands into more detail. It would be great if you would bring that along to the discussion.

Mal, I love you. Those glorious doors. My first knowledge of the Renaissance came with my Sunday School reader, richly illustrated with the scenes from the Baptistery door panels. Ghiberti's Bible. He must have had theologians advising him. Only much later did I realize their artistic dimensions. Not fully even yet, I suppose.

I'm counting on JoanG to instruct me.

Harold, thanks for picking up on Ann's suggestion of a Brunel/Brunelleschi connection. I meant to follow up on that, but didn't. At 5 ft 4 in the one could have been the twin of he other. And 'Great', unquestionably, could be applied to both. We all remember the Great Eastern as a modern wonder. Thanks for the reference to James Dugan's book.

And JoanK, I wish you could take us on more walks like the one you told us about. That was much like the one my wife must have taken when she travelled to Florence with friends ten years ago. I never stop hearing about all that I missed.

Speaking of Washington, I'll certainly take another long look at the capitol dome the next time I'm there. I wish we get to hear lots of travel incidents. My contribution. Once, after being lucky enough to find a parking place on The Mall, I returned to the car after several hours, to find a policeman waiting for me, sitting on a horse ten feet tall. Gosh, he was high. It still hurts my neck just thinking of it. Are you going to be long, he asked me. Only then did I see the LOADING ZONE sign shading my car. I'm leaving right now, I said, noticing another empty spot across the street.

Jonathan on a busman's holiday

Jonathan,
You wrote "Many contractual details having to do with the building of the dome are in Latin. That's where you come in" -- non, non, je ne sais pas ... wrong language ... Ginny, thank goodness, will be
able to decipher all the Latin! I'll just serve the tea!
Speaking of "heavy lifting", the sections of the book on the gears and levers made me wish for my long-lost notes from high school general science; who volunteers to dig out the heavy scientific stuff? Actually, I loved that part; let's hurry up and go faster on this bus!

Images of Brunelleschi

Brunelleschi's machines

Brunelleschi:- Institute and Museum of the History of Science, Florence. There are many links on this page.

I am bookmarking all of your images along with a few that I looked up while watching the DeMedici series on PBS this past Sunday. Who would have thought?? tee hee! The pictures are worth a thousand words. I also converted the weekly rate of 800,000 Euros into dollars and found that I can't afford that apartment but I can dream, can't I??

I also have never been to Italy but have watched every movie made in the last 20 years about that wonderful warm country. I left titles somewhere here so won't repeat them.

Joan, your are a beatiful lady and there you are, with the Dome right behind you. And, you didn't see it??? or did you??

I have started the book and find it fascinating. I will only be in here until Jan 28th when a few of us bookies(several of whom are in this dicussion) are going to the beach. But, some will return by Feb 4th so will return to this site. I will not be back until Feb 8th but will rejoin you then.

Fine diagrams, Mal, of the solutions for heavy lifting. It all looks so simple. While the ox is thinking: I wish people would learn to do these things for themselves.

Those famous Baptistery doors. It will be interesting to see how the group feels about the outcome of that competition.

And another of your links to Brunelleschi's other architectural achievments, including Santo Spirito. I'm almost relieved to find that the facade isn't his. I didn't like it anyways. But once inside, in the words of someone who has been there:

'...of all Brunelleschi's buildings, Santo Spirito offers the greatest opportunity to experience the mind of the architect, and to stand in the near-empty church with the afternoon sun streaming gently through the tall, arching windows and filtering into the nave is to meet God on Filippo's terms, not as a poor supplicant, but as an intelligent human being who praises the source of that intelligence.'

What an amazing man. Who was Leonardo, and all the others? Geniuses, too, of course, but many just standing on Brunelleschi's shoulders. But I must keep my eyes on the road. These Italian drivers!

Yes, yes, Jonathan,
Please do keep your eyes on the road.
I can read you and the others appropriate passages in either Latin or English, as long as Ginny
is next with me to translate the former.
As far as tea goes, since they probably don't have as many cup-holders on our vehicle as Americans
find in their cars, let us stop for a lot of tea breaks, at your discretion!

Mal, all the links you have posted have been extraordinary!

When do we really start to discuss this marvelous book?

Here's link to: Brunneleschi and Linear Perspective

Ann, yes I did see the dome. I did not see the the David. anyone who goes to Florence can see the dome. It cannot be locked up in a building. The David is in the Academia and can only be viewed when it is open. I have seen the dome numerous times. I have now seen the David several times too but had to go to Florence 4 times before I found the Academia open.

Thanks for the comment on the photo.

Joan Grimes

Here's a little more on linear perspective. When Brunelleschi came upon this, he changed thoughts about architecture and painting forever. Many people go through their entire lives without "seeing" perspective, even when they stand at one corner of a street and see the buildings and road converge at a vanishing point at the other end. Though linear perspective is really part of a mathematical process, it ie one of the first things an artist has to learn.

There are a couple of links below. The first part of Leon Battista Alberti's "On Painting" deals with perspective. It's not an easy read.

"Linear perspective is a system of drawing or painting in which the artist attempts to create the illusion of spatial depth on a two-dimensional surface. It works by following consistent geometric rules for rendering objects as they appear to the human eye. For instance, we see parallel lines as converging in the distance, although in reality they do not. Stated another way, the lines of buildings and other objects in a picture are slanted inward making them appear to extend back into space. If lengthened these lines will meet at a point along an imaginary horizontal line representing the eye level. Each such imaginary line is called an orthogonal. The point at which such lines meet is called a vanishing point."

Source:

Artlex Art Dictionary

"On Painting" by Leon Battista Alberti

Optical Illusion

Orthogonal lines are a characteristic of human sight. We do not have a wide angle lens. Flies, on the other hand, do have a wide angle lens. Lucky them. They are also able to land on ceilings. We humans are encumbered by gravity and must remain on the ground. Remove gravity and we fly as the flies fly but our sight characteristics remain the same. We see orthogonal lines in space.

One of Brunelleschi's pals was Donatello. He designed sculptures for roof pedestals that were intended for viewing from underneath and at a distance. Those sculptures continue to reside on building tops so I can not direct you to an image of one. You may, with luck, find an example, Mal. But the problem as you can imagine was one of perspective and of course the knowledge of Brunellechi contributed to this work. Masaccio and certainly, Leonardo were the major contribtors to perspective understanding. Mal, I am sure there is an image somewhere of Masaccio's Dead Christ." which is a good example of early work in perspective painting. The Last Supper of Leonardo is a prime example.

The Michelangelo Buonarotti "David" is a muscular,tall, and well proportioned image of the killer of Goliath. But Donatello's image of a vulnerable youth who found courage when it was needed is a much more sensitive sculpture than Michelangelo's. Mal, you will find it at the Bargello, in Florence.

Still waiting on my books - hope they arrive soon...! I'm enjoying the links.

Trinity by Masaccio

David by Donatello

Another view of David

Is limited, Justin! Lucky fly!! I have a little peekthru thingy that gives one the idea of how a fly sees. Darn, where is that thing? I thought that I placed it in my purse before leaving home for Florence because I just knew that Justin would broach the "fly eye topic"!!

Or is it better to be fly-eyed?

I could swear there is something in the air here that must have some resemblance to the excitement among Florentine artists six hundred years ago when the talk was all about the new way of seeing things. Or seeing new things. I'm not sure which. And which, as we can see all around us, brought about the burst of creativity still wondered at today.

Was working with the new linear perspective the only game in town? In that case we had better know something about it. So much was gained for us by these clever artists doing things in a scientific way. What a great New Year's resolution: to see things in perspective. Behold! All things are new.

Barbara, we'll wait for you. We can't start without you.

But I can't help feeling sorry for Donatello. Everybody else's masterpieces are being brought in out of the harsh elements. His, it would seem, can't be brought down off the roof without losing their reality. Gosh, maybe we've lost something with this perspective thing.

PBS aired a Trollope story the other night. One scene takes place in Florence. Two women are at a ball in Florence, when a male friend walks in.

One woman asks the other "Do you think he came to Florence to see you?"

The other answers "There is nothing in Florence worth seeing except me."

Talk about self involved.

I tried once to teach myself to draw, using a book. I stalled when I got to linear perspective.

I have tried several times to understand linear perspective, and just don't "get it" somehow. I hope if we get several different explanations, one will "sink in".

Linear perspective is one of many devices used to produce "Illusionism" in art. Fuzziness of objects at a distance, diminution of objects at a distance, overlapping, color variation ,and line convergence are all useful technigues for creating illusion. We know that diagonals in painting may be used to create an illusion of depth ie; to create a three dimensional illusion on a two dimensional surface. Leonardo's Last Supper is useful for demonstration. The vanishing point lies behind Christ's head and seemingly well back in the room . The diagonals are not pronounced but they may be seen running from each end of the table to the center.

The scientific basis for linear projection comes from geometry not painting although a recognizable tranference took place in the late quatrocento. The concept derives from geometrical optics. The rectilinear propagation of light rays in physics follows similar patterns.

If the picture surface is seen as a transparent vertical screen( such as a window pane) placed between the painter and the subject. The painter traces the outline of the subject on the surface of the glass as he sees it from a single viewpoint. The image then should evoke the real thing. You will see, then the diagonals, that work to make the image real.

Duchamps, a French Painter in the 20th century, demonstrated the principle using the camera obscura. He called the work " The Bride and her Bachelors". We may not be able to put enough of the work on the two dimensional surface of a monitor to make it understandable. It may try Mal's skills.

If you are completely lost, Joan, fear not. I will try again.

There is a useful woodcut of the "Last Supper" by Albrecht Durer which demonstrates the use of diagonals. The right side of the work uses a diagonal to penetrate the picture plane while the left side does not.

Durer Last Supper

JOAN, linked below is a nice picture of the Arno and buildings of Florence, which shows perspective. Think of a Japanese fan, which you can hold in your hand and fold up so it looks like a stick. Open it up, and put it down on a table with the part you'd hold in your hand pointing away from you. Take a ruler and draw lines from the narrow point to the round part of the fan which is closest to you. This will show you the vanishing point from your perspective. In the picture I'm linking you will see that the buildings appear to grow smaller and smaller as they reach the vanishing point.

The Arno and buildings of Florence

JUSTIN, Escher and others have done all kinds of strange things with perspective in their art, haven't they?

Mal

Oh, I love this discussion. I am a docent at the museum of art in Birmingham, Alabama These are the kind of things I try to teach school children who come there for tours. I show them the paintings and help them to see the perspective. They have a session with an art teacher at the museum with hands on activities. We call these tours Start with Art. We do a Start with Art in Math. The visit to the museum as to be incorporated into the school cirriculum as there is no money for funding art teachers most of the school systems in Alabama. We try to do a small part in teaching the children to look at art. The children seem to really enjoy it, especially if their math teacher has prepared them by using the materials sent to the schools by the museum. the kids are incredibly bright and I get such pleasure out of doing these tours with them.

Joan Grimes

I love it too, JoanG. I was about to post a thanks to Justin; but I must include you too.

Thanks Justin, I got the benefit of your explanation as well as JoanK. Like her too, perhaps, I had no problem with perspective until I started thinking about it. Perhaps unthinking acceptance of the realism in the new art, and not appreciating the 'illusionism' you describe, was my problem. I look forward to having you, and others, there for the rest of us, at such times when our appreciative skills and sensibilities will be tested.

Nice to know that you, too, Mal will be there for us.

Justin, I'm still puzzling over what Donatello did with his statues so that they would look 'real' at a distance and at rooftop height, but not close-up

Duchamp: The Bride Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors

JOAN, I'll stick my neck out here and people can't learn to draw from a book, unless they copy somebody's pictures. Train your eyes. When you look out the window, you'll see all kinds of perspective and colors you perhaps didn't realize were there.

Mal

Thanks, Justin and Mal. I'm beginning to get it. I'll do as you say, Mal.

And what better place to start than Florence!

Another picture of Florence and the Arno

Ponte Vecchio

Scroll down to see the Buddha and Turtle sculpture at the Bobili Gardens

My books came - my books came - now I need to dig in and read - since my favorite PBS Mystery Theatre isn't on tonight I should be able to get a good lick in tonight.

The Durer - perspective - another aspect of the woodcut to look at is, how perspective is achieved using the white shapes - two dimensional art is about - line, color, shapes, values, texture and space. I used to be before perspective that space in two dimensional art was shown with the more distant figures higher than the closer figure as well as smaller. Durer continued this concept with his white shapes.

When an artist is creating the work although there may be realistic forms like trees, houses, people, flowers, vegetables they are secondary to the artist - they are made of a group of shapes that are darker or lighter and a group of lines that are fat or skinny or curvey or straight.

Darker or lighter is the best way to describe 'Values' - from the lightest grey to black typically in art there are 9 values but can be more - each color has a place on the value scale - yellow is a lighter value than green or maroon just as each color has values within the color - pink to maroon.

The Durer has values of white to black and the value is established by how much texture or hatching or marks are in an area - the floor under the table is a dark value created by the lines which are fatter and close together. Where as, if you look at the jug in the foreground you can see two sets of hatching with all the lines going one way to help you realize its roundness but some lines are a bit fatter, closer together and smudged where as, other lines are indicating less darkness since each line is clear enough they could be counted. And then where the most light hits the jug is white space. That space is a shape just as the various shaded areas are each shapes - the jug is made up of a series of shapes from light to dark.

Now to another aspect of perspective - look at the woodcut [hope your computer allows you to get the enlarged view] and squint up your eyes till you really only see the values and not the particular figures - so that all the middle values in the woodcut seem like one as all the dark values are shapes and all the very white areas are shapes.

Notice the first thing you see is the larger shape just to the right of center - notice the white space looks like an exaggerated arrow or rocket - the base being the mans lower back or boomp and his middle back - the shape reminds you of a sack tied in the middle [symbolizing Judas sack of gold maybe]. The sack tied near the top that indentation where it is tied is forcing your eye to go up on that rounded rectangle shape.

Then the cape appears to be the top of the arrow or rocket with broader sides at the bottom of the shape, narrowing to the neck and head forming one of Justin's mentioned triangles.

This arrow is pointed at the Jesus who is at the center with a white space like the top of a cross extending from his head so that his body and the upper arm of John appear to be the bottom of the cross. When you are not squinting you can see how the sleeve of Jesus is shaded so just the white area is part of this cross like shape.

But it you follow the white spaces the hand and forearm [of the man with the knife in his hand] is also a triangle but the white space is somehow an echo of the white space in the front bent over figure - even thought there are lines across the sleeve there is a strong line under his arm leading your eye to his upper arm which is a white shape and so this gets your eye to pick out the white shapes and make some organization out of all this - your eye is doing this without you even telling it to do it - artists direct our eyes along a path in their paintings and most often the most important aspect of the painting is not dead center but rather left of center and below center.

On with the white shape road map - your at the top of this guys arm to his shoulders and you bounce off his head to that strange shape of white on the fold of the cape of the guy next to Jesus - that shape somehow is not exactly the same but it reminds you of a shape in the muscle of an arm and if you look at the shape with the raised arm of Jesus another of those triangles are formed - but most important the white areas went from large in the forefront to small as they lead back to the backside of the table - which is helping to create depth.

If you look at the three figures in the background they each have a bit of white with the one closes to Jesus have the least amount of white - because they are shadowed and higher than the bent over figure in front your eye is telling you they are deeper in the room. The trick there was to get them to appear deeper than even Jesus without allowing their heads to be above Jesus which would have been considered a sacrilege

Another wonder is the apostle on the left has his hand extended with a finger pointing - normally that would seem like a direction for you eye to look at what he was pointing at - but because the lower part of the arm and the hand the white area is so broken up your eye quickly goes to the larger clear white shape of his upper arm again making it all like an arrow towards Jesus.

The man on the far left with his hands folded - the smooth white shape of his chest area is shaped so it brings your eye to his arm which again is like an arrow with both arms ending at his folded hands - the fingers are like a row of pickets all pointing the the finger pointing finger of the guy we just described, and the white of his forearm is narrower at the wrist leading our eye to Jesus.

Even the ribs on the plate are like pickets pointing to Jesus - the table knife on the plate of the bent over figure is pointing to Jesus - the fork in the hand of the pointing guy is slanted toward Jesus as is the roll laying on the table.

The white table cloth is holding them all together as is the rounded shapes of the ceiling - looking at the ceiling and walls you can really pick up how hatching makes some areas darker than others or as an artist would say, a darker value than the other areas.

When you back away and squint again you can almost see this cross as continuing to include the rocket or big arrow of the man bent over the table in the forefront of the painting so that Jesus, the upper arm of John and the forefront figure all make up the base of the cross with the cross bar and top of the cross being the radiant area above the head of Jesus.

The left side has less white areas so your eye picks up the cross shape that is running from center to the bottom right. Even the shapes of the walls and ceiling are trying to make them not appear as centered above the figures at the table but as if surrounding the cross like shape that is created with all the larger white areas.

Even the table leg helps us look at the Jesus figure with the pointed bit of folded table cloth directly above the table structure and that structure is shaped much like the shape of the dome in Firenze.

hmmm never realized the symbolism of the sack like shape being the base of the cross saying that greed or love of money is the bases of the cross that crucified the Lord Jesus. Durer would have worked during the time in history when there was much symbolism in art that was for the purpose of giving the viewer a Christian message.

Oh dear! My book was suppposed to be here today, but it has not arrived. Maybe tomorrow. Please save a seat for me near the side bus exit so I can take pictures without the back of someone's head. Thank you. Also, perhaps Ginny can bring along the Latin 101 lessons to help me keep up.

Sandy, how would you like to take on the duties of this group's official photographer? You can sit anywhere you like. Should we trade for a London bus? Then you could get even better views. And of course I'll make sure you get lots of photo ops and stops.

Barbara, I am looking forward to many more posts from you. I'm thinking especially regarding the two panels submitted by Ghiberti and Brunelleschi in competing for the baptistery doors competition. There was so much church doctrine insinuated into the biblical scenes of each man's work - Abraham sacrificing Isaac - affecting mens' outlook that could have affected the course of European history. Given the popularity of the doors. Believed to give access to paradise, indeed. Perhaps the endless religious wars might have been avoided. It's in the details, as you point out so well. All affairs of men reflect that. I have to think of something Sir James Galway said during his concert at the Lincoln Center during the holidays. What if the pope had granted King Henry the divorce he wanted? He would not have broken with Rome. One thing leads to another. There might never have been any Pilgrims coming to America.

You'll be surprised how easily the book reads. Short, snappy chapters. A composite of varying themes, almost architecturally arranged, which keep the story moving merrily along. I don't want to give the ending away; but you are going to love this one. I know it.

I'm flabbergasted by how much I missed before getting the benefit of your analysis. I can't help wondering what you would do with Grunewald's Crucifixion, the one used as a model by Mel Gibson, I believe.

I'm excited at the thought of having you along.

Lovely views, Mal. Like always. It's a bit of a surprise hitting on a Buddha. Seems out of place in Florence. It might be interesting to get the history on that. I wonder did an expatriate Brit leave it behind when he went home?

Fascinating, Barbara! Thanks. Great pictures, Mal.

I'm an artist. I can't talk about art; I just do it. Every single day -- on a computer now and not with paints and a paintbrush.

Drop me off at the next corner, JONATHAN. I'm going to hitchhike the rest of the way in. I'll meet up with you at the dome probably.

Mal

...who bumbled into a dining room full of grown ups, the air filled with cigar smoke and wafts of cognac and SERIOUS discussion. Are you guys (and who are all of you) REALLY going to Florence Italy? When? Can I come too?

As a student at the PA Academy of Fine Arts I was required to attend four (or was it six?) two hour lectures on perspective and to take extensive notes. As has been pointed out, these were more like lectures in geometry than in art and were HIGHLY complex. We all hated them. Many of us fell asleep. There was a highly feared test we all had to take. We could bring our notes and copy from them and even so most of us had to re-take the test.

So don't feel bad about perspective.

And if we're going to Florence, can we pop over to Assisi and drink in what's left of the Giottos?

I don't have my book yet, either. I'll be scrambling to catch up. Feels like I've all ready had an Art 101 class from the conversation and the slide shows between stops. Mal, don't leave us! We'll stop, son't we, Jonothan, when Mal wants to?

JACKIE, I'm not leaving. I'm going to be quiet and let others talk about art.

Miz TT, I'm Marilyn Freeman aka Malryn or Mal. I live in North Carolina and publish three electronic literary magazines called Sonata, Allegro and the m.e.stubbs poetry journal. Much of the stuff in these here magazines is written by SeniorNet writers and other seniors who might not be published otherwise. I was a professional musician once and don't know anything about art -- never had an art course or a writing course in my life. That doesn't stop me from being an artist and a writer, though. I try to write novels in my spare time.

Our bus driver, JONATHAN, lives in Canada and sells ice cream sandwiches and lemonade in the stand up on the hill in the summer. In the winter he rents out snowshoes and sells hot chocolate from the same stand. He doesn't get too many customers, poor thing, so he has plenty of time to read. That's why he sounds so knowledgeable. Hope this answers part of your question about who we are. Yes, I'd love to go to Assisi.

Mal

Saying that, I must confess to disliking Duhrer's Crucifixion as its perspective is too obvious and makes my eyes cross. Can't we just look at art and architecture and enjoy what we like?

By the bye, I do love Escher's drawings which aren't so obvious and seem to have more than one perspective happening at one time. Also, I think that I do understand Brunneschi's linear perspective approach and I am fascinated by the Dome. It does take math to put together a plan for building such dome without using the flying buttress.

On my desktop, I have a button to take me to the Turning Torso of Sweden plus the new bridge taking one from Denmark to Sweden and I want to visit them as I watched the construction of both on the Discovery channel and at an online site.

Jonathan, the book is such an easy read but so much fun. I am still trying to pronounce these Italian names correctly and must go back to Mal's early explanation of Italian pronunciations. And, thanks for the Brunel facts which I have bookmarked. The man was also a genius in his time.

MizTT, we are not intimidated by the problem of perspective. In fact some of us have serious doubts about its usefulness. And it comes as a surprise, as we approach out goal, to be asked to look for a vanishing point. That seems to imply a limit to one's vision. Just the opposite to what we have come to look for in this new springtime of the human spirit. I'm glad you mentioned Giotto. The greatest artist of them all. In his work one feels drawn into an art that is its own take on the limitless frontier of our perceptions, of seeing with more than human eyes.

But first The Dome.

Jackie, I'm not worried about Mal. She can hold her own in any discussion. But what's this about 'sounds so knowledgeable'? I'm a seeker after truth, and an enjoyer of beauty. Keats tells me that's all I have to know. And save the walk for the Giardini di Boboli. I would like to see that Buddha. Can you think of any greater contrast than DAVID?

In Firenze the forecast is 43*F for tomorrow. Sounds like a fine brisk day for our arrival. And a sunny-side-up look to that combination of sun and cloud. Much nicer than those hot days of summer.

As you probably know, the Boboli Gardens are located at the Pitti Palace. Below is a link to several good pictures of the Pitti Palace and the gardens, including another of the Buddha, JONATHAN. Click the double right arrow at the bottom of the picture to access a new page.

Pitti Palace and Boboli Gardens

Mal,

Gardeners there are chosen among the most handsome and charming in their trade. The gardener we met while we were waiting in the garden for the Pitti Palace to open reminded me of Rozzano Brazzi in the movie Summertime with Kathryn Hepburn. Remember that movie? In Italy a women always feels beautiful.

Thanks for those more than fabulous links that bring back so many wonderful memories of my trip to Florence Mal.

Éloïse

tomorrow a bricklayer, today, still a happy pilgrim

I too must confess to a partiality for Giotto. As also for Fra Angelico and his wonderful frescoes at San Marco. Everything designed for a sweet uplifting life. I'll even admit that I'm drawn to the strange pagan beauty of Botticelli's work. Despite his many excellent things Leonardo da Vinci was spread too thin. The weakness of the Renaissance Man. With no solid body of work. On the other hand, in common with Fillipo Brunelleschi, da Vinci worked in code, making it both interesting and frustrating. We may never know the full man.

Fra

More pictures of Florence. Note the Church of the Ognissanti, built by Umiliati monks, mentioned on Page 2 of the book.Click small image for larger one.

St Jerome by Ghirlandaio, Fresco -- Ognissanti Church

St. Augustine by Botticelli, Fresco -- Ognissanti Church

ANN, Ognissanti is pronounced:
Own-yee-sahntee.

Some may wish to do a little companion reading while participating in the coming discussion. Here a few books available local libraries that are on target.

Romola by George Eliot: A novel. You will meet such people as Savaronola, Ghirlandaio, Lorenzo di Medici and others of the Quattrocento. You will move in and out of the Duomo, Santo Croce, Santa Maria Novella, and other churches of the era.

The Stones of Florence by Mary Mc Carthy: A well written description of much of what is available in Florence for a tourist to see.

Mornings in Florence by John Ruskin: The author walks in Florence from site to site and talks about the objects he sees. He starts with Giotto at the Brancacci and describes his work through much of his life with out leaving the city.

Henry James on Italy: He devotes a chapter to Florence in Autumn.

The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy by Jacob Burckardt: An essay with a description of the Republic of Florence and the despots of the Fifteenth century.

History of Italian Renaissance Art by Fred Hardt: Photos of Art works of the period with descriptive material. Mal's talents replace much of this work.

Some of you may wish to add to these books your own favorites so we can build up a little biliography of our own just for this discussion.

Something new about Da Vinci?

Did Da Vinci live and work near here? The Piazza Santissima Annunziata, Florence

In my new role as capomaestro of the discussion I would like to indulge in a little metaphor. Fra has it right. There are 4,000,000 bricks waiting to be piled one on top of the other, along with stone and wooden beams, until the whole forms a huge dome over the open octagon of space, and completes the cathedral begun a hundred years ago.

The hero in all this is one Fillipo Brunelleschi, who is described in the subtitle of our book as the renaissance genius who reinvented architecture. The title and subtitle of the recent book that Barbara has also mentioned, are even more flattering with, The Feud That Sparked the Renaissance: How Brunelleschi and Ghiberti Changed the Art World.

So much by way of pointing out how much recognition Brunelleschi is currently enjoying. He was probably the most talked about man during his lifetime; but his significance had dwindled seriously by the time Jacob Burckhardt published his magnum opus in mid-nineteenth century, already mentioned by Justin, The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy.

Just out of curiosity I checked the three references to Brunelleschi in the Burckhardt index.

First, Brunelleschi is found mentioned as 'excavating classical architecture', along with sundry other bits of community information in an official Florence 'statistical account' of 1422.

Secondly, in regard to festivals and the putting on of mystery plays, 'Brunelleschi invented for the Feast of the Annunciation in the Piazza San Felice a marvellous apparatus consisting of a heavenly globe surrounded by two circles of angels, out of which Gabriel flew down in a machine shaped like a mandoria.' (no date)

And one more mention, when, years later, in 1490, 'At Milan, Leonardo da Vinci directed the festivals of the Duke and of some leading citizens. One of his machines, which must have rivaled that of Brunelleschi, represented the heavenly bodies with all their movements on a colossal scale.'

And that is all.

It may seem like an odd way of starting the discussion, but it may serve as a reason why the author and others felt Brunelleschi deserved more.

I almost forgot the metaphor. Let us suppose that the building of the dome represents this discussion. Then each one of your posts becomes another brick in the venture. Let's allow a day or two for your first impressions of renaissance Florence, gotten years ago, or just this morning, or after reading the first chapter.

We're here! I tell you, I fell into bed last night I was so tired from that trip. JONATHAN's a great driver on the open road, but when he got the bus in the city limits and began dodging those little and big cars and the motorbikes, I fell you I feared for my life!

Anyway, I said goodnight to our CAPOMAESTRO, had a glass of Pinot Grigio before I went to bed and slept for 7 hours. Up this morning to find a tray with good Italian bread, formaggio and a pot of espresso outside my door. On the tray was a note from Our Glorious Leader saying he's gone to see his Zia Francesca at her villa up in the Tuscan hills and won't be back until tomorrow night sometime. "Would you please carry on?" he says.

The nerve! I know as much about Firenze as a hole in the teata! Since I don't know anything about engineering either, and can't talk about that, I think I"ll go for a walk and try to get acclimated.

Come on, JACKIE, and anyone else who wants to see what we can see, let's go! Hmm, This is the Via del Scala. Let's see what the guidebook says about this.

"The Via della Scala has its name from a well-known Foundling Hospital in this quarter, Sta. Maria della Scala, which was called after a similar hospital in Sienna, with three staircases – scale, or scalini. The founder of the Florentine hospital, at the corner of the via Oricellari and the Via della Scala, was a certain Cione di Lapo de' Pollini, whose marble bust is in the cortile of the Innocenti. In 1531 the building was ceded to the nuns of San Martino al Mugnone. In 1531 the building was ceded to the nuns of San Martino al Mugnone.

"In a chapel within the walls of the convent are frescos from the life of San Bernardo degli Uberti, and outside this chapel, which stands in a small piazza, is an inscription recording that here twenty thousand persons were buried during the plague of 1479. Sta. Maria della Scala, or San Martino al Mugnone, recognisable by the old style of rough masonry, is now used as a penitentiary."
Imagine that! I read in the book, I think, that the plague, carried by black rats, was expected to hit every ten years. How could one live with that kind of Damocletian sword over one's head? Okay, back to the guidebook.
"On the northern side of the Via della Scala, nearer the walls or boulevard, is the Conservatorio in Ripoli, once the Convent of San Jacopo in Ripoli, where was formerly a picture by Ridolfo Ghirlandaio, now in the Gallery of the Louvre at Paris.

"In the lunette over the door of this church is a fine example of Luca della Robbia ware; the subject, a Madonna and Child, with St. Dominick on one side and a saint on the other, surrounded by a beautiful garland of fruit. The treatment of this relief differs from most of Della Robbia's: the Child lies on his side, and is not as lovely as in other representations, but the virgin and saints are grand and statuesque.

"Ripoli is a village near Florence, where the Dominicans first had an oratory, dedicated to San Jacopo. It finally became a convent of Dominican nuns, who removed to the Via della Scala in 1300."
Whew! There's so much to see and think about that I can't take it all in. Does it look like they're serving coffee at that sidewalk caffe over there? Let's stop and have another espresso. Maybe I'll add a little grappa to that! Why not? How often do we get to Florence?

Mal

The many new to me names in the book have me returning to your explanation frequently. Thanks for doing that.

I can't find the Della Robbia Madonna and Child mentioned above in the "guidebook", but the link below will take you to a picture of another example of his art.

Madonna and Child by Luca Della Robbia

ANN, in Italian CH is pronounced K. Chiesa. Kee-ay-sa. Chiesa means "church."

Cathedrale (cathedral) is pronounced Kah-tay-drah-lay.

C followed by A is pronounced KA. C followed by I is pronounced CHEE. C followed by E is pronounced CHAY.

U is pronounced OOO unless is it preceded by an I. That sounds like YOU.

There is no letter Y in Italian. GN or GL give the sound of Y, so does IO when preceded by A. Magnifico = Mahn-yee-fee-co. Degli = Dale-yee. Degli means of the (plural.)

GH, as in Ghirlandaio, is pronounced like a hard G as in GOES. Gear-lan-dye-oh.

Mal

Thank you so much for the pronunciations. I am sharing them with my granddaughter who is reading "The Mixed-Up Files of Mrs Basil E. Frankweiler" at age 6 and mispronouncing many artists names like Michaelangeo but with your cheat sheet nearby, which I have shown to her, she is working to say them right.

Thanks for that link to a delightful Della Robbia. What an appealing mother and child representation. I do appreciate it! But, did you say its not the one spoken of in the book?? Oh, yes, I remember reading that the child in that one is lying down and not as well executed at the women in the picture.

A latecomer, I have been hanging on for dear life to the back of the bus, totally disheveled and out of breath. But I'm here.

It's been many moons since I was in Florence, but I will never ever forget my arrival in the town. Never had we - my friend Maria and I - seen a sky so deeply, wondrously blue. We came to study, of course, and we explored the city with abandon but concentrated on the churches - all manner of them, from the austere Santa Croce to the much more light-hearted Santa Maria Novella. Maria had the wonderful ability to always venture into the back and recruit a seminarian who would give us private viewings, some never included in tours.

It was at the beginning of the war, and the most famous museum, Gli Uffizi, was closed to protect the irreplaceable art within. The Palazzo Pitti was open, however.

Florence is not only buildings and art, glorious as they are, but Florence is a life force. It makes you breathe differently, it heightens the sense of awareness, immediacy, beauty; you sense its pulse and find yourself in a state of grace.

JONATHAN, I apologize for coming in late. But I could not possibly miss this magnificent opportunity to relive the precious time I spent in Florence and surroundings, Fiesole for one, the place in the hills where Bocaccio wrote Il Decamerone while he and other Florentine companions waited out the plague raging in the city.

With Dante Alighieri and Petrarca, Bocaccio is the third most important writer of that era.

Oh, hey, there's the Ponte Vecchio! Let's see what the guidebook says about it. After that I think I'd like to have lunch; how about you? I think I'll have foccaccio (flatbread pronounced fo-cahch-yo) with potatoes and a little pancetta (unsmoked bacon pronounced pahn-chayt-tah) on it and a salad of sliced tomatoes and fresh mozzarella (mot-zah-rel-la) with basil drizzled with extra virgin olive oil and sprinkled with Parmigiano Reggiano. (par-mee-ja-no rayj-ya-no). Now to the Guidebook:

"A bishop of the Acciajuoli family (ah-cha-woe-lee), who inhabited the palace on the Lung' Arno, which is now the Hotel dell' Arno, employed Pocetti (poe-chet-tee) to paint frescos, still in preservation in one of the rooms. The last of the family was Monsignore (mone-seen-yo-ray) Filippo Acciajuoli, who died at Venice in 1834.

"Close to the Palazzo Acciajuoli is the Ponte (pone-tay) Vecchio (vay-kee-oh) the oldest bridge in Florence, which, until 1080, was constructed of wood; in 1177 it was carried away by a flood, and rebuilt of stone; but it was again swept away by the great inundation of 1333, and was rebuilt by the painter and architect Taddeo (tad-day-o) Gaddi (gahd-di), and it has ever since resisted the violence of the Arno. From the year 1422 to the middle of the sixteenth century, the butchers of Florence had their shops here, but the Grand-Duke Cosimo I. dismissed them, and established the goldsmiths in their place; Vasari made use of the shops on the eastern side as a support for his gallery connecting the Palazzo (pah-latz-oh) Pitti (pee-tee) with the Uffizi (oo-feet-zee). The various coats of arms on the bridge are those of the Guilds which contributed to its repair, and an inscription commemorates a flood of the Arno.

"On the opposite side of the river, to the right of the bridge, was once the hospice of the Knights of Malta, which had been built in 1050 for the Templars. Near this spot, at a still earlier period, stood the column on which was the statue of mars on horseback, at the foot of which fell young Buondelmonti, (bwon-dale-mon-tee) murdered by the enemies of his family; the statue of mars was replaced by the group of Ajax and the wounded Patroclus, afterwards removed to the Loggia de' Lanzi (lahnt-zee). A small hospital was attached to the hospice of the Templars, which was afterwards ceded to the monks of San Miniato al Monte, and called the oratory of the Holy Sepulchre; this was handed over to the Knights of Malta when the Order of Templars was suppressed in 1311.

In this house the poet Ariosto (ah-ree-aws-toe) lodged for six months in 1513, the year Leo X. ascended the Pontifical throne, an event celebrated in Florence with peculiar magnificence. Ariosto came to study the Tuscan idiom, and was received by Nicolò Vespucci (vays-poo-chee), the Superior of the Order, who had at the same time permitted Alexandrina Benucci (bay-noo-chee), the beautiful widow of Titus Strozzi (strawt-zee), to spend the months of her retirement from the world in this hospice. An attachment sprang up between her and Ariosto, which only terminated with the poet's death at Ferrara, in 1533."

Roll those R's!

Mal

On pronunciation and the final "e" in words, such as ponte, mascarpone, or provolone, and the like, "ay" won't do it.

Instead, the sound is a soft "e" as in "oh sole mio" - not unlike the French accent aigu, é.

Italian is entirely phonetic and melodious. Every letter in a word is pronounced, NONE silent. Also, words are looked at in syllables - not in individual letters, as we tend to do here. For example, De-ca-me-ro-ne.

I did't mean to be technical and won't get into stress. But I wanted to emphasize that the sound of the final "e" is softer, like a throaty afterthought, and definitely not "ay".

Traude and not to forget the emphasis on the syllable before the last one, which gives the Italian language this chanting melodious sound, for example: De-ca-me-ro-ne, staying on "ro" a short moment. Italian is easier pronounce than French.

Éloïse

in the Pitti Palace?? Oh my! A ceiling in the Pitti Palace

Its the full picture and you will have to scroll and roll it but I enlarged it so I could see the figures and art on ceiling. This comes from Mal's link to the Pitti Palace and the Bobilli Garden.

I came to look at the bridges crossing the Arno, and the architecture of the churches, and the fortress palazzas of the very rich, although I have heard the interiors are extremely elegant and one should not decline an invitation to dinner if invited, not only will one miss out on a glorious experience, but one may also arouse the ire of the host.

My artistic horizon is defintely being expanded. That Madonna and Child by my namesake arrested my attention by its beauty. Whoever was it of the artist's friends or family who posed for that masterpiece? The child both clinging to his mother and looking at the world in such a wise and curious way, and that chubby bottom resting on his mother's arm. And how maternal can a woman look! Wonderful.

The tour and stops are much appreciated Mal.

Luca

From the Plaza Del Vecchio link of Mal's. What beauty awaits us inside these buildings. Amazing! Sala del Soo Palazzo Vecchio

And that too. It was glorious watching the Sala del Soo slowly coming into view on my monitor. Thanks Ann. What a podium. And the magnificent wall on the left. I suppose it reflects as well as anything the wealth in Florence.

Thank you, ANN. There are other pictures of Florence, including the gold room in the Palazzo Vecchio in Post #145. Click the small picture to access a larger one.

TRAUDE is an authority on languages. Perhaps you have a keyboard that has phonetic symbols that will show a better pronunciation of Italian words than I can give with a regular keyboard, TRAUDE? It is very hard to show correct pronunciation just with the typed word using an ordinary keyboard.

There are many Italian dialects. Americans I know who have Sicilian background say LIGORDA for RICOTTA and PASTA FAZOOL for PASTA E FAGIOLI, for example.

When I was growing up I knew no other language except English and heard none other spoken, except for phrases now and then at school. There was a large Italian population in my New England mill-town hometown (and Canadian French, Polish, etc., etc.) The "Italian" kids went around saying, "PastaFazool!", and I grew up thinking it was a dirty word. ; )

I began studying Italian in high school at the age of 15. At the end of each recitation Signore Mosca would say, "BASTA!" It was the longest time before I learned that basta meant ENOUGH and not the English word it resembles. I was the only kid in the class who did not have an Italian background. Those who did entered the class thinking it would be easy. With their Sicilian backgrounds and hearing that Italian dialect spoken at home, they found out Signore Mosca's "High" Italian wasn't all that easy.

When I studied Italian in college we worked with very old Italian that did me no good in conversation, really. We spent all the time translating all of Dante's Il Paradiso, you see.

I learned Italian primarily for music, and have sung many, many wonderful Italian arias in the past. It is a most marvelous language to sing.

Mal

I think there's just time enough to do a little more walking before it starts to get dark, don't you? After our walk we can go back to the apartment and rest for a while. Is dinner at 9 okay with all of you? I'm sure we'll find a great ristorante where we can eat. We're near the Porta Prato right now. Let's see what the guidebook says about that. (The underlined words are links to pictures of places or paintings mentioned.)

"In a direct line with the Via Oricellari, and at the end of the broad street called the Porta Prato, is the Church of Sta. Lucia del Prato, which in 1251 was built in the midst of meadows by a Confraternity of Frati Umiliati, an Order founded in 1180, and first composed of Milanese who had been expatriated by the German emperors. During their exile in Germany they improved themselves in the manufacture of cloth, and on their return to Italy settled in Florence, where they built their church and convent on this spot, and carried on their trade. In 1547 the Grand-Duke Cosimo I. obliged them to sell their convent to the Scolopi, who were canons of San Salvatore, and whom the Grand-Duke had expelled from their own Convent of San Piero Gattolino, near the Porta Romana, to make room for the fortifications of the city. The Church of Santa Lucia is now under the patronage of the Torrigiani family.

"In the first chapel to the right on entering, is a picture of St. Joseph with the infant Christ in his arms, and San Françesco di Sales and Sta. Teresa below; they are sweet in expression and soft in colour. Behind the high altar is a Nativity, by Domenico Ghirlandaio; a good picture, but in an obscure position. In the first chapel to the left is an Annunciation, by Pietro Cavallini, who painted the same subject in the SS. Annunziata. The Virgin is seated on a bench in a garden with a book beside her. She has a simple and innocent expression as she looks upwards at the dove which hovers over her; the angel kneels on the opposite side of the picture; and, though false in drawing, it is an interesting composition.

"Beyond this quarter of the town is the Cascine, or Public Gardens of Florence, the fashionable promenade of the Florentine beau monde, and a favourite resort of all classes. Long avenues of fine trees and tall hedges of ilex and other evergreens afford shade and shelter in the hot days of summer; and in the evenings of May and June they are brilliant with thousand of fire-flies. The Arno, with a lovely view of the hills and villas beyond, is on one side of the Cascine, on the other, the magnificent range of Monte Morello and the Apennines. "The first palace of any importance along the Arno is modern; it was built by the celebrated actress Madame Ristori, but is now in the possession of the Marchese Fransoni, who belongs to an old Genoese family, and is nephew of the late Archbishop of Turin. The Palace contains several pictures of value – four small pictures by Albano; St. Sebastian and St. Jerome, by Guercino; two paintings attributed to Annibale Caracci, one of which is now supposed to be by Paris Bordone or Correggio; an exquisite miniature, representing Christ amidst the Doctors, by Mazzolino da Ferrara; a Madonna by Lorenzo di Credi, and another by Domenico Ghirlandaio; a Holy Family by Procaccino of Milan; a fine family portrait by Vandyke; and a lady of the Fransoni family, with her son and daughter, by the most celebrated Genoese painter, Bernardo Strozzi."

Here's a wonderful illustrated article I just found about the building of Brunelleschi's Dome.

Brunelleschi's Dome

MAL, I know I joined you late on your walk, but didn't you stop in anywhere yet for a snack? Wouldn't a quick stop restore us right nowand tide us over to dinner at 9?

MAL, I do have diacritical marks on my computer but not yet a way of recording sounds, which is crucial when teaching a foreign language.

And yes, MAL, Florence is known as the "golden" city. There are marvelous shops on the Ponte Vecchio with priceless jewels and gems that blind the eyes.

For tourists it's always a good idea to ask the locals for a good place to eat. A Trattoria is still a good bet, and economical too, since the Euro (€) has jumped in value versus the dollar.

Florence is located in the region (=state) of Tuscany (Toscana). The purest Italian is spoken there. After the war, a large number of language schools were founded in Fiesole , up in the hills above the city. The daughter of a Washington friend of mine became a teacher in one of them. The granddaughter of a good friend here attends another school in the same area.

As MAL said, there are many Italian dialects, and the farther south one travels, the "stronger" the dialect. Even an Italian from, say, Milan in the North might have trouble understanding a man or woman in Calabria, or in Sicily. Up in the Veneto region, they speak a very different dialect which is practically a language of its own.

MAL, an excellent link.

Did you notice that right at the top where other artists are named, the article says "Leonardo's Mona Lisa", NOT Da Vinci's Mona Lisa.

Leonardo HAD no last name, he WAS from (da) Vinci (= name of village) and was known as Leonardo.

It is well I think to start a discussion of this kind with a little background.

Florence, from about 1300, was a very prosperous town. It's source of prosperity lay in the wool trade. The Arno, was a perfect site to wash wool and as result carders, dyers, spinners, loom workers, and related people earned a living in Florence. The wool came from England where sheep herding was well developed.

In nearby Assisi, the father of Saint Francis, ran a dyeing, business. He would have been very happy to pass on the business to Francis who, when he returned from the Crusades, wanted nothing more than to pass his life barefoot and in rags talking to animals.

The wool business expanded in Florence and as a result many new buildings were started to support the trade. The church made money, banking families such as the Medici, the Bardi, and the Pazzi, all made money. Much of it was expended in constructing palaces, church structures, chapels in Santa Croce and other churches, public buildings and work areas. In 1300, Giotto designed a Campanile that was built on the grounds of the Duomo. He decorated it's facade in the colors of Arno river bottom stone.

In 1420, The Duomo, in construction for about a century remained without a cover. The building had, however, been in use for many years. The rains washed the bodies of those attending Mass. Savonarolla preached from it's pulpit to as many as ten thousand parishioners. A cover was urgently needed but a dome, that was a roof cover the citizens of Florence could be proud of. No one knew how to do it. The Pantheon and Santa Sofia had been done centuries earlier.

That's not a Buddha sitting on that turtle in the Boboli Garden. Much less an over-weight DAVID. That's Cosimo I's dwarf. His court-jester immortalized as Bacchus.

I thought that was an awfully secular Buddha.

OK, at the very beginning of the book, I found the building material that many of the buildings in Florence are made of. It is sandstone, and Ross says that quarries for it were opened in the city itself. Here are some pictures of the stones -- note the range of colors.

SANDSTONE

TRAUDE, I guess you missed breakfast at the apartment (hard roll, cheese, espresso and fruit) and espresso and a snack at a sidewalk cafe around noon. Lunch at three and wine, coffee, cheese and sweets at six.

Dinner was at La Baraonda on Via Ghibellina, a charming place like a Tuscan trattoria with tile floors and tables set with tiny fresh flowers and patterned plates. The meal began with spaghetti con quattro P, pomodoro, pecorino, pepolino and peperoncini, or tomato, pecornio cheese, thyme and chili peppers and farinata a bread-based soup. The food was delicious.

When we left we happened to go behind the Archbishop's Palace, to the right of the small Piazza dell'Olio and found an archway leading to the Ghetto, a Jewish quarter of Florence, where formerly stood one of its four gates. The guidebook tells me this:

"The word Ghetto is derived from the Hebrew Geth, 'separation.' In early days the Israelite was forbidden to show his face in Florence, not from any antipathy of race, but because the Florentine would not brook a rival in his commercial transactions.

"The great families of Peruzzi, Bardi, Acciajuoli, and Strozzi derived their enormous fortunes principally from lending money at exorbitant interest; and such were their hard dealings that, at length, the government invited the Jews to settle in the city, on condition that they should not lend at a higher rate than twenty per cent.

"They were not then confined to any particular quarter, but chiefly congregated on the southern side of the river, in the Via dei Giudei, near San Jacopo oltr' Arno.

"In spite, however, of this restriction on their gains, they contrived to accumulate great wealth by their industry and frugality, which aroused the jealousy of the Florentine bankers, who, in 1495, persuaded their rulers to issue a decree expelling them from the city. Their vast numbers, and their widespread relations in Florence, made it impossible to carry out this measure, so that, notwithstanding the opposition of the clergy, the law was annulled almost as soon as made.

"The Jews increased and prospered until the reign of Cosimo I., whose policy was to deprive the Florentines of every source of wealth or power that could be turned against himself, and who found it expedient to flatter the prejudices of his subjects, by showing hostility to the Jews. He withdrew all the privileges hitherto granted to them, ordered them to wear a distinctive dress, and prohibited them from practising usury, as well as from engaging in any wholesale trade. No foreign Jews might remain in the city beyond one fortnight at a time, and in 1571 he confined the native Jews to a quarter built for the purpose by his architect, Buontalenti, which thenceforward was called 'the Ghetto.'

"The consequence of these decrees was, that all wealthy and respectable Jews left Florence, whilst the most abject remained. The Ghetto consists of two squares or piazzas, surrounded by high houses, some of them attaining nine stories. In the center of one of these squares is a large fountain.

"Beyond the Ghetto is the Mercato Vecchio, the old market of Florence, once the centre of the houses of the nobility and the pride of the citizens. Here, as related in a recent work by the late Commendatore Simon Peruzzi, were the sumptuous habitations of the most distinguished Florentines, who spent six months of the year in their villas outside the walls, whose dress was modest, and living simple, - the Tosinghi, Soldanieri, Nerli, Amieri, Tornaquinci, Medici, Pegalotti, Arrigucci, &c., &c. Antonio Pucci, a poet, and the friend of the novelist Sacchetti, as well as of the historians Villani, describes the 'Piazza' as it appeared in his days, early in the fourteenth century, and soon after the time of Dante. Pucci's poem is called 'La proprietà di Mercato Vecchio,' and was written before the 'Chronicle of the Villani.' The seventh stanza runs thus:
"Mercato Vecchio al mondo è alimento
E ad ogni altra piazza il pregio serra. . . .

"Le dignità di mercato son queste
Ch' ha quattro chiese ne suoi quattro canti
Ed ogni canto ha due vie manifeste."
Everything posted about the "walk" we took in Florence today is from this source:

Walks in Florence, Churches, Streets and Palaces

Restaurant intormation came from Fodor's Online Travel Guide

Illustrated Virtual Jewish History Tour: Florence, Italy

History of Florence. Mercato Vecchio and more

Mal: Thanks for the story of the Jews in Florence. When their expulsion was annulled, the Church did its usual thing and objected to the annulment. Hard to understand why those who not only believe in the same God but also follow essentially the same tenets can not get along.

Well I can hardly get out of chapter one there is so much that caught my eye that I had to research - I know this is not a history but a novel and thank goodness because I saw some inaccuracies right away and had fun all afternoon reading this site and that piecing it all together.

When I was in 5th grade I had Sister Borromeo and therefore knew a bit of the "Humiliati To You" that Ross uses the Latin "Umiliati" monks. Since this was a Benedictine Parish and the Umiliati adapted the Benedictine Rule I learned a bit more but didn't know the association with the "catari" the great religious alternative to the Catholic Church of the West in the XII and XIII century.

The fear that this schism could put in crisis the entire Christian institution the Pope ordered the crusade on its way to Jerusalem to stop off in Southern France and annihilate the catari, who tolerated the Christian Hebrew and like most of the Eastern Catholics they believed Jesus was an angel from heaven not born from the womb of Mary, a human.

The catari were business men, knights, transcribers, and unskilled labor which included many in the wool industry, mostly weavers - the catari broke into four groups with one of the members of the group that were mostly the unskilled labor escaping to the Cotswolds where he learned about a finer wool product. Most of the women [nuns, usually wives of the men who gave up their marriage when they joined this religious group] escaped to Germany where the group from Lombardy were led as captives. They become part of the German woollen manufactures where they learned improved methods which they brought into Italy, supplied with superior wool from the Cotswolds They provided the poor with employment all the while continuing to wear drab gray and give their profits away. Photo of the last surviving Umiliati cloister - Order of the Friars Humiliates to You - now a children's music school

Then from the other direction we have the secular - seven surrounding towns join and pass laws in 1207 that included admitting the chief guilds (the artes majores), seven in number (carpenters, wool-weavers, skinners, tanners, tailors, shoemakers, and farriers), later fourteen lesser guilds (the judges, the notaries-public, doctors, money-changers, and others). In order to hold any public office it was necessary to belong to one or other of these guilds (arti); the nobles of the Lombard League [seven town] entered their names on the books of the wool-weavers' guild, which enriched the wool-weavers guild.

The real wealth was not directly from wool-weaving but, trading wool for Gabelle and creating Gabelle.

Gabelle comes from an Arab word of origin KABALA which means tax. In the beginning this word applied to all the taxation taken for the products used for human consumption. Starting in France the word means a tiny room of salt.

Whoever owned the ground controlled the price of salt. Most often the king owned the Land but in the case of Firenze the nobles owned the land. Land, where salt is produced takes its profit directly by raising the selling prices which returned gabelle.

Where marine salt was boiled from the water and sand, the salt makers poured a quarter of their manufacture into the attics of the king or Nobles. Where the sale of salt was ensured by the attics salt, and consumption remained generally free, there was small gabelle to the local community therefore, the wealth of the community and the salt makers grew.

On top of all this the Medici were renowned as having the purest gold coins and therefore, their coins were trusted throughout Europe. A vacume is created when Edward I forbids the Jews to collect usury [interest on money]. This results in the shortage of money, which leads to an increase in clipping and a decline in the quality of the coinage. This decline only adds to the Medici reputation for trusted coins. The result in 1397 the Medici Bank is established.

Now I am really excited - this site is the wonder of wonders - it is the every transaction that took place during the building of the Dome -

From the nicknames of folks who sold goods and services to those who received goods and services - every good, from crockery to "Oath of wardens and term of payment for property gabelle and forced loans" to "Payment for expenditures for carrying the relic of the finger of Saint John in procession for the feast of the saint." to "Contract of corbels with agreement to produce them in the Opera."

The website is being prepared because of the flood - and now I cannot find what year - I think 1987 or there abouts - this flood made the pages unusable and so they are being transcribed to this site - so far there are over 200,000 entries. The Years of the Cupola

Yep, more - it was a full day that had me by the tail - tried to find out exactly what a "leadbeater" did but there was some guy with the last name Leadbeater and google just could not get around the guys name - what I did learn though is, lead is a mineral and is mined - the vein of lead is a narrow deep fissure - most medieval buiding's roofs were covered in lead.

Cinnabar may have come from the Red Sea but it was available from a town just north of Florance - and the bit about "Entire forests had been requisitioned to provide timber for it..." - at first I thought how much timber does it take to build one church, regardless how large and grand??? Then reading I learned that forges used the fuel considered at the time to make the best heat - charcoal...!

Someplace I read that the forest used is Casentino, which is still a forest today set aside as a protected National Forest in 1993!

Here is a photo of the Casentino Forest

Another view in the Casentino Forest

The Casentino in San Godenzo's area

In the Casentino Forest the Vallombrosa Abbey was built in the 11th Century. Since the 1600s the Benedictine monks of the Abbey have dedicated themselves to the cultivation of white firs and the selection of medicinal herbs.

OK in the area we have another Hermitage and this is where St. Francis Assisi talked to the animals Passo Mandrioli that leads to the Casentino, the Camaldolian Monastery & The Rock under which St Francis used to pray

Oh what a beautiful site with the whole story of St. Francis and photos that go on and on including the cave where he slept Franciscan Sanctuary along the national road which rises from Casentino

The story of the Casentino Forests

Here is a slice of the interior painting on the Dome

Oh my oh my oh my - in the site The Years of the Cupola with all the wonders included - you find them by clicking on the words on the black bar - Well I cannot believe - click on the shape that looks like an opened umbrella that is the architects drawing of the inside of the Dome - the shape is located at the very top left side of the web page - THEN click on each section of the dome and look at the wonders it opens - my oh my oh my - don't forget to click on the word Aventi at the bottom of each of these pages for more wonders - this site is like one of those Russian dolls that open and open and open - well you have the entire day to look at all this stuff - and this is only Chapter I...??!!??

BARBARA, you're a better man than I am, Charlie Brown. I'm here on vacation and don't have the time or inclination to go through all of those papers about the duomo. I did notice that the Years of the Cupola website is done under the auspices of the Max Planck Institut for the History of Science in Berlin. Max Planck was a name spoken often in my house when I was married. He was a German physicist and won a 1918 Nobel Prize for discoveries in connection with quantum theory. What does physics have to do with the duomo? I imagine we'll find out.

The History of Science Museum in Florence holds a collection of about 5,000 original scientific instruments divided into the Medici and the Lorenese collection, by the way. Does it surprise you at all that there were so many scientists and/or artists in Florence at this time? We are not long out of a very Dark Age, after all. What brought about the change from the Age of Faith to a Renaissance of Science?

Brunelleschi uses no vaults (series of arches to hold up a roof) or flying buttresses as were seen in Gothic architecture.

If Architecture Professor, Massimo Ricci, is right, Brunelleschi had many doubts about what he was doing, since he used "chains" in stone blocks connected by metal claws and the wooden chain to achieve his goal of an unvaulted dome .

Mal

UNDINE piqued my curiosity, so I found this.
"Between the years 1561 and 1564, Cosimo de Medici commissioned two fountain sculptures from an artist of little fame, Valerio Cioli, for his newly acquired estate, known today as the Boboli Gardens. The marmoreal sculptures are life-size portraits of two well known dwarfs in the Medici court. One is of the robust dwarf Morgante, who, unashamed of his nudity, straddles a turtle. The other is of the timid, modestly draped Pietro Barbino who clasps a fish in his hand."

More about the Boboli Gardens
More pictures of Florence

Another picture of artwork: Cupola del Duomo

Picture Santa Croce where Brunelleschi and other goldsmiths worked

Picture: Baptistry ceiling

Extract from The Life of Brunelleschi by Manetti

That was the next thing I was hoping someone could find. The Baptistry Ceiling. The baptistery was the place where every Florentine baby found its entry into the Church. Well, almost everyone. And then the first sight to greet the baby's eyes was that Last Judgement on the ceiling. How very strange. I would have liked to see something a little more cheerful than that. A moral purpose? Or meant to instil an artistic sense?

I'm stunned!! I've spent hours just looking at the posts since last night, and haven't begun to look at them all.

The tour of St, Francis's monestery is exceptional. I loved the del Robbia annunciation: scroll all the way down for it and details.

DEL ROBBIA

And that site on the year of the cupola: how I wish I knew Italian. But I could spend a year on the details.

The bapistry ceiling! And Joan's pictures! I'm babbling!!

The bapistry ceiling

How would you like to live:

HERE

Joan on the link to The Year of the Copula there are two tiny flags in the upper left I think on that black bar - hit the English Jack and the whole site is then in English - HURRAH!!

Yes, that site for St. Francis was so wonderful I would love to hike in that Forest...

OK the Science of Statics - well I had looked at a couple of dozen sites that all seem to be addressing the math student - they quickly become so intense with math formulas and grids I got lost -

I happened on this site early and did not realize the jewel that it is - the whole thing is reading the experiments of the early discoveries of the various forces that are called Statics.

At the bottom of the page just hit the continue word till you get to the chapter where they talk about Alchemy, which if you have in interest that is fine but, I wanted to learn what the concerns were for a building to stand that the book alludes the early architects did not understand.

When I was a kid I lived on an island and used to help the older boys make their boats - if they knew or not what they were doing it was the same thing as some of the statics -

These small boats, maybe 14 to 16 feet long, had two hulls - the interior hull was built of lapped wood over ribs and then a lot of braces, about a half inch thick and 3 or 4 inches long, were spaced around the haul every 12 inches or so. The braces were attached to the underside of the ribs, which had been spaced using the builders forearm for measurement.

Then we had to beg, borrow or steal sheets from our homes - first an old canvas sail was used to stretch it over the entire hull - took the strength of 3 or 4 guys to stretch it tight enough and then the sheets were stretched over the old sail - since they were more fragile they could not be stretched as hard and then the whole thing was coated in a tar based substance we sopped on. In affect we created two hulls with space between created by the ribs or braces. No water could get into that space so therefore, the boat could not sink and now after reading this site I understand why.

JOAN G, thank you so much for the photos, what glorious mementoes!

My college friend Maria and I went to Assisi a lifetime ago when we were based in Florence for studies. Only a few b/w pictures from Assisi survived my transatlantic move. I'll always retain the memory of seeing St. Francis's room and his bedstead, the size of a child's. People did not grow as tall and live as long then. - sorry interruption.

Here's a link to photos of the Baptistry ceiling. Scroll to the bottom of the page and then click on the two photos there to enlarge them. Quite nice photos. Baptistry Ceiling

'12 July: A morning guided tour of Florence, included the Academia and Michelangelo's "David," Duomo and Baptistry, the medieval Palazzo Vecchio, a tour of the Uffizi Gallery, the tombs of Italy's famous in Santa Croce, and more. Some time in the afternoon in Florence to explore, shop, and to view the Ponte Vecchio, Piazza Signoria, Piazza Santa Croce, the Duomo and Campanile. We stopped in on the Florentine Leather School inside Santa Croce for a demonstration of this Renaissance art, as well.'

Thanks ever so much, Ann. What an entry in her travel log. And she has the pictures to prove it. It was amusing to read under the one beautiful photo: 'I don't remember what church has these inlaid wooden panels.' I'm determined to find them. Can anyone help me out?

The ceiling alone would take up most of my morning.

dee

St. Francis' bed

Statics is essentially the process of equalizing opposing forces on a structure to ensure it's stability. In the Twelfth, Thirteenth, and Fourteenth centuries the process was hit and miss. Some master masons were able to achieve stability and others were just unlucky. Bishops prayed when the walls of a cathedral reached roof height. Storms with heavy winds were a particular problem. Then when the roof was leaded its weight bore on the walls and they often buckled.

The Bishop of Beauvais was disappointed when God chose not to support the walls of his cathedral and the entire nave and narthex came down. Beauvais today, stands with choir, transepts, ambulatory, a small nave and no narthex. It is a fragment supported by flying buttresses.

Abbot Suger at St Denis, outside Paris, one night was driven to extreme measures. The walls of the Abbey Church were up but swaying in a storm. He brought into play the chemise of the Virgin to calm the power of the storm and thus save his walls. In the morning the walls were still standing and the storm had abated. It was one of many miracles attributed to the Virgin's Chemise.

Today, the problem of neutralizing forces is a mathematical one and the forces can be controlled prior to construction. Frank Lloyd Wright's cantilevering in buildings in California and in Chicago is a demonstration of modern statics.

Roofs in the Quattrocento and earlier were covered over with lead to make them water tight. Lead added great weight to walls. It forced the Romanesque builders to construct thick solid walls and the Gothic builders to reinforce their walls with flying buttresses. Lead was also a problem in a fire. Heat from fires melted the lead in the roof and started new sources of flame where the lead fell.

These were a few of the problems that faced the builders of the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore known today as the Duomo.

"Florence is divided into five districts, out of which the historic city centre is of the greatest interest to tourists. It is itself divided into four sections, corresponding to the Medieval layout of the city. These are: San Giovanni, Santa Croce, Santa Maria Novella and Santo Spirito Oltrarno.

The Historic city centre

San Giovanni
"This is named after the Patron of Florence, St John the Baptist, in whose honour the Baptistery was built. This area covers most of the historic city centre and is now full of exclusive boutiques which are concentrated in a few of the most well-known streets, such as Via Calzaiuoli which links the 'Duomo' to the Piazza della Signoria. The university and the Tribunale di Firenze (which is housed in the Complesso di San Filippo Neri) are also in this district.

Santa Maria Novella
"This district is named after the Santa Maria Novella church ' a Dominican basilica and important cultural centre during the Middle Ages. The train station of the same name ' designed in the 1930s by the young architect Michelucci ' is also situated nearby. Not far from the station is the Basso Fortress, which is now used as an important centre for conferences, conventions and exhibitions (such as, amongst others, the one by the fashion company 'Pitti Moda'). Along the western slope of the river Arno, stretches the delle Cascine Park, one of the city's green oases. In this area lies a street which is famous for being home to some of Italy's most prestigious designer labels, Via Tornabuoni, where amongst others, you will find Gucci, Versace and the Florentine Ferragamo.

Santa Croce
"The Santa Croce church gives its name to the eastern part of the historic city centre. The church itself is a Medieval Franciscan basilica. It is bounded by the National Central Library which was built in the tenth century.

Santo Spirito Oltrarno
"This district runs from San Frediano to San Niccolò Oltrarno, but its heart is probably the Piazza Santo Spirito. It is full of artist's workshops which appeared immediately after the war. This piazza is also characterised by parties on summer evenings, which bring together young Florentines and foreigners, many of whom live in this area. The Pitti Palace with its old Medicean garden and the Boboli Garden which extends all the way to the Belvedere Fort at the top of a hill, are both in Oltrarno. Atop the other hill in this district, is the famous piazza with the panoramic view - Piazzale Michelangelo. From here, it is possible to see one of the few remaining stretches of Medieval wall around the Belvedere Fort which was spared from demolition in the nineteenth century, as is the stretch which is still visible near the Roman Gate.

"Beyond the final ring of city walls, stands 'the city outside the walls'. If few Florentines live in the historic city centre, there are many more who live in this district and in the rest of the 'city outside the walls', which was replaced by a network of ring roads during the nineteenth century:

Campo di Marte
"The Campo di Marte district lies on the north-eastern side, and is home to many historical buildings dating back to the turn of the century, as well as to many modern blocks of flats in cement and stone which were built from the fifties onwards. There are also numerous sports venues: several swimming pools and the Franchi Stadium. In Campo di Marte, you will also find both the 'delle Cure' area from where you can get to Fiesole, and the Bellariva area which once made up the Piagentina countryside ' which always induced feelings of nostalgia in Tuscan painters.

Gravinana
"This district lies south of the Arno where it meets the southern hills just before the Chiantigiana road which leads to the Chianti wine region. On the south-western side, the district takes in the urban agglomeration of Galluzo, which is famous for its Carthusian monastery.

Isolotto e Legnaia
"This district unites 'l'Isoloto' and 'Legnaia' as well as other parts of the city which were developed during the sixties and seventies and are still expanding westwards. The 'Isoletto' district in particular was once the scene of various clashes and social unrest during the sixties.

Rifredi
"Rifredi is in the northwestern part of the city, where, from the fifteenth century onwards, the Medici family had built their country villas, such as Villa di Careggi, Villa di Castello and the La Petraia Villa in the Castello region. In this district you will also find the industrialised residential areas of Novoli, Firenze Nova, Brozzi, Le Piagge and l'Olmatello ' these last ones having such poor infrastructures that they have almost been relegated to the status of commuter towns. Brozzi has a high number of Chinese immigrants and is therefore representative of the new multi-ethnic towns, as are several parts of the city centre such as Piazza Santa Maria Novella where you will often see many Somalian and Eritrean immigrants."

Source:

Districts: Florence, Italy

At 7am this morning while I was eating my soft boiled egg, I asked for an explanation of why when pressed on the outside, it didn't break. Hands flying in demonstration, Ralph, my aeronautical engineer husband, explained it to me. And, he also included the shapes that are octagonal. I do recall "hoop forces", I think. I wish I could repeat what he said but lets face it, I am not an engineer. And sometimes, I understand most of what he says and, sometimes, not!!

Undine

Did you see those incredible tapestries? Fantastic! The wood covered wall may be in one of the Medici castles? I saw one yesterday on the History International channel while watching a program about Florence.

Mal,

I have printed out both of your pronouncing charts and keep them folded inside the book. Thanks a bunch!

Also, thanks to Traude who has added to these charts.

I'm back in town, eager to get started on the dome. A happy family occasion took me away for the weekend. In conversation with a niece at the dinner table, out of the blue, she informed me that Einstein had once said that everything depends on perspective. How interesting.

And this morning, reading your posts, I've concluded that armchair travelling such as ours, provides its own perspective in a unique way. Armchair travelling has never been more fun, and Mal, you are a super guide. I'm really sorry I missed the dinner at La Baraonda on via Ghibellina.

I have never read and followed up so many enjoyable posts. And the transparent enthusiasm showing through all of them has me wondering if we should be trying to understand ecstatics instead of statics.

a link to Food in Renaissance Tuscany. A mouth-watering invitation.

an image of the last surviving Umiliati Cloister. What a beautiful place. An ultimate getaway.

and the place that JoanK has found looks extremely livable.

the tips on pronunciation...this is better than Berlitz. My friends at the coffee shop will soon be asking me where I'm picking up my Italian. Naturally, I won't tell them it's from being with my new friend Zia Francesca. I find that a good sneeze is the easiest way of handling Bishop Acciajuoli's name. But Eloise seems to be right. Italian is easier to pronounce than French. And more fun in a way.

those ceilings, Ann, are marvellous. I have an Italian ceiling in my living room. No frescoes, of course. Just wild flourishes with which the plasterer finished his job. He must have been in love.

'I'll never ever forget my arrival in Florence, austere Santa Croce, a light-hearted Santa Maria Novella. Florence is a life-force. It makes you breathe differently, it heightens the sense of awareness, immediacy, beauty, and find yourself in a state of grace.' Amazing, Traude. You convince all of us with that.

Then there is the more serious side to your posts:

Life in Florence wasn't peaceful. As Mal points out. With that Damocletian Sword of plagues, floods, and wars, always hanging over one. Half the community wiped out by a recurring plague. Does that explain the intense preoccupation with religion? The need for a bigger cathedral? New doors on the Baptistry? Costing the equivalent of the city's annual defense budget.

And the historically interesting things. The goldsmiths getting Cosimo I, with a bribe no doubt, to evict the butchers from the Ponte Vecchio. The nearby house, once the hospice of he Knights of Malta, now, or later, associated with the poet Ariosto and the Widow Strozzi.

How very curious that the Catari of southern France find their way into our story, both as victims of a papal crusade, and as a factor in the eventual wool trade in Tuscany and Florence.

Barbara, you overwhelm us with your ability to dig up such esoteric information. Are you with the IRS? From tax comes wealth? From the Greek KABALA, which means tax. I thought KABALA was Jewish mysticism.

I pounced on your link to the Buffalo Architecture Dictionary. I have already spent an hour browsing the site. Architectural features defined and illustrated, using local buildings. I was in that area over the weekend. I'll be going back to find the real thing. Many handsome buildings there.

Please spare me the Science of Statics. Let's see if we can get close to the intuitive genius of Brunelleschi. There may be inaccuracies in the book as you say. But who is right all the time? Even Jacob Burckhardt seemed to accept as fact, or as matter of official record that Brunelleschi spent his time 'excavating classical architecture'. There doesn't seem to be any actual proof of that. Perhaps it comes from Brunelleschi's own resume of his qualifications.

And Mal has Professor Ricci believing that Brunelleschi had many doubts about what he was doing. I choose to think that he had none at all. He knew he had the problem solved. He conceded that at times he was waiting for heavenly inspiration, but that was only not to divulge information. Perhaps it was blind confidence. A feel for such things. Perhaps it was faith or conviction. No doubt he studied man-made structures, old and new, and was able to organize space as a composer organizes sound with harmony and proportion. But the push and pull forces of building, well, he found the egg useful in his ponderings. Why not the structures of birds' nests. Perhaps Brunelleschi was in the Casentino Forest climbing trees to study the habits of the birds, during those missing years. Why not beaver dams? I remember trying, along with my young chums, to blast a beaver dam with sticks of dynamite, with no luck. But this is definitely getting ahead of the story.

hehehe I must have missed my calling - just never could read without a set of encyclopedia next to me and now the Internet saturates my curiosity with anything new I observe -

Those examples are a wonder aren't they - I was especially thrilled to see the example of the corbel table Russian Orthodox Church, Geneva, Switzerland and then the corbel oriel on the Miller Mansion blew me away...!

Where I knew what a Lancet window was created for - so that bowmen could shoot their arrows from behind stone walls - I never knew the name of these window - strange when you think of it that these windows should be favored by churches.

I never heard of a Crocket and now I know - I bet there are examples of foils on Santa Maria del Fiore - nor did I ever know that space above the curved arch that is in a rectangle shape is called a Spandrel some of quite beautifully done don't you think...!

For your information, JONATHAN, (welcome back, by the way), ZIA means AUNT. Didn't you spend the weekend with your AUNT FRANCESCA (ZIA FRANCESCA)?

Yes, ecstatic, not statics.

Mal

Well here we are in 1418. The Opera of 50 years earlier had accepted Neri's design for the dome. He had built a model of a double dome on a stone drum punctuated by oculi with stresses carried internally rather than borne by outside buttresses and without enlargement of the tribunes. The model remained on display in a side aisle for fifty years while the members of the Opera swore each year to construct the dome without deviation from the model. The building competition of 1418 is over and Pippo Brunelleschi has won. The play is about to open.

What a leap of faith -- to commit to a design with no idea how to do it. Would that happen today?

We have accepted a newly designed memorial in NYC for 9/11 and I doubt if the actual little details were completely worked out before it was accepted. Architects are first above all-----dreamers!

ANN, I wouldn't call architects dreamers. Visionaries perhaps, but not dreamers. Architecture is based on mathematics, after all. There is, however, a margin of error that must be considered. For example, why did the windows in I. M. Pei's John Hancock Tower in Boston keep falling out?

Mal

Designers today, must submit working plans as well as models to governmental planning commissions. The plans damn well better meet code and be workable or one gives up the project. Gone are the days of weak cement and uncertain construction. Frank Lloyd Wright had to sell his designs to planning commissions who were tough on him because he appeared to be unorthodox.

Working plans on paper did not exist in the Renaissance. Construction took too long. I some cases a century or two was needed to complete the work and each new master mason had ideas of his own. Drawings were made on a palimsest- a floor of sand. It could be wiped clean and reused after each project was completed.

If you examine in detail the construction of Gothic cathedrals in France or England you can see in the construction of a triforium, or a tribune, or even in a complete chapel, you can see the point at which one master mason left off and another began.

Yes, Mal, that's a better word for architects instead of dreamers. Its probably what I meant.

That's how cold it is up here in Canada, where the north Polar Star is directly overhead and only the faint glimmer on the horizon reminds one that somewhere the sun is shining.

It's hard to get ones thoughts together when the brain is numbed by this dreadful cold. What a blessing this computer is. No longer do I have to sit here looking at the white walls of my igloo dome. Not with the Uffize and Botticelli's SPRING just a mouse click away. I spend hours meditating on it.

And then I also have Mrs Whiley And Her Charleston Garden, to while away the time with pleasant thoughts. Dear Emily. She has done for gardeners what Izaac Walton did for anglers.

Not that I have forgotten my duties as capomaestro. I want you all to think about cathedrals and the tremendous meaning they had for Christendom. People of all faiths will appreciate that. The religious edifice has traditionally been the most imposing structure in faith-based communities... the Angkor Wat in Cambodia; the temples in Kyoto; the great mosques in the Islamic world, Solomon's Temple, to be rebuilt someday.

Who can travel about in Europe and not be impressed by the amazing array of cathedrals. What vast undertakings they were. What a commitment on the part of the community. To begin a great project and trust future generations to complete it.

I have no doubt the beginnings were just as exciting and daring then as it is today to hear it said, 'we are committed to sending a man to the moon, and to bring him back safely. By the end of the decade.' No matter that the technology was not in place. Confidence wasn't lacking, that it could and would be developed.

The same with the dome for the Santa Maria del Fiore. It took a little longer than project Apollo, and everyone puzzled over how it could be done, but the faith was always there to build

a more beautiful and honourable temple.

Good Night, auntie, wherever you are.

I'll tell ya, Maestro, it's 5 degrees right now where you are, and only 23 degrees warmer than that here in the Southland where I live. The trouble is that the central heating in this apartment quit for good a few weeks ago, so it's cold inside as well as out. The sun is shining in through the big triangular window over the sliding doors to the deck, so it feels like a veritable heatwave at 58 degrees. That's the temperature here at my computer, thanks to a space heater and those rays of the setting sun.

Here in Florence it's a balmy 48 degrees, and we're having what's called a "light thunderstorm." After it's over, what shall we do? Go out for afternoon tea or cocktails somewhere? No, let's stay in and party here.

If the rain continues we could even make an early dinner. I know there's a fully-equipped cucina in this apartment we've rented.

What should we have? I make a mean Vitello alla Marsala. Would that do? We could have homemade Minestrone first and maybe Raspberry Gelato for dessert. How does that sound?

After dinner we could sit around and listen to Traviata on the radio while we talk about the difficulty about centering Neri didn't consider too well. After all, there has to be something to support the masonry of the dome while the mortar cures, doesn't there? Of course, Alberti says that the spherical vault doesn't require centering because it doesn't just have arches, but has superimposed rings.

Figuring that one out should take us all evening. Why, we could even make a model on the table after we wash the dishes.

Is there a dishwasher in this place? Or did we bring along a Designated Dishwasher? ( Don't look at me! )

Zia Mal

Mal: Thank you for bringing this discussion back to the book.

The problem of centering is at the heart of the book and at the heart of Pippo's idea for raising the dome. It is central to the work we are about to examine.

What is centering? It is the means by which vaults are raised. Bricks placed at the top of a vault near the ocula extend beyond the previous brick by as much as 60 degrees to the horizontal. Gravity will force the bricks so laid to cave in unless they are supported by scaffolding called centering. Pippo proposed to build the dome without centering and he refused to disclose his idea to anyone. The wardens thought he was crazy.

Whew - figured out at least one meal by finding the purchases for Breakfast for the Counsels

the glasses were listed under crockery which does not sound like glass to me.
consumable coal took me awhile linking one web site after the other to figure that one out and it is simply charcoal that is used up - whatever they warmed is beyond me because the food consisted of
- Melarance - oranges
- Pinocchiati - pine nuts
- susine - plums [the kind that make prunes]
- Malvasia - Sweat Madeira [still the best brand]
- Trebbiano - pale white wine [possibly Trebbiano grapes which grow just northwest of the city]
- Pane - bread

And I love this - Pinocchiati, was a typical starter to meals in Florance during the Renaissance. Today they can still be found in Umbria where they also add cocoa powder to the recipe. They are perfect little tea-time nibbles on dull, rainy afternoons.

And so maybe the charcoal was used to prepare the Pinacchiati rather than simply having raw pine nuts available. By the way I love pine nuts don't you...

Cooking time: 15 minutes.
500g sugar
150g plain white flour
300g pine nuts
20 circles of rice paper about 5cm in diameter.

PREPARATION:
Heat the sugar with half a glass of water in a saucepan.

Dissolve the sugar completely over a low heat and cook until the mixture thickens. Take care not to let the sugar burn.

Remove from the heat and add the shelled pine nuts stirring briskly all the time. Place the circles of rice paper on your working surface and spread even quantities of the mixture on top of each piece. Leave until completely cool before serving. Instead of individual biscuits, you could make one large round using a single, circular piece of rice paper. Spread all the mixture on top and cut into small pieces.

This recipe is uniquely Florentine in origin.

Also found this great site with recipes from the 14th and 15th C. Italy - Translation of Libro di cucina

Hehe we are cooking food and you are building with bricks and morter Justin - but the inventory of all that went on did include the purchase of food and crockery and lunches and breakfasts for the workers as well as for Councel members and the clergy during various feast days.

I love this site - the various musical instrument played during this tiem in history are listed - when you click on anyone there is a photo of someone playing the instrument with further information. A Guide to Medieval and Renaissance Instruments

I guess you are right, Barbara. Everybody has to eat sometime, even masons. It's nice to know that a worker's diet was not confined to pasta and pizza. A calzetta must have been tasty now and then. The charcoal was used primarily to keep the brick ovens at 1000 degrees.

BARBARA: I love that site too. When I was a child, I owned a psaltery, we used to pick out songs on it. It looked a little different from the one in the picture though.

Ah, such fun to read about the gustatory delights of medieval Italy!

The Italian breakfast (prima colazione) nowadays is a great deal simpler. Caffè latte in a large cup, often with more hot milk on the side, is a staple. Espresso is served after dinner. Tea in the afternoon may be a concession to English and American tourists on whom the Italians lavish a great deal of attention. I have no such memory from my student days, or my subsequent visits.

But I bet the generatios of masons who worked on the cùpola had simple, hearty fare at the end of their working day. It was their lords, the dukes, who could afford those sumptuous, lengthy feasts.

May I point out in passing that, on our tentative excursion to Assisi, we wandered out of Toscana and into the region of Umbria , which dates back to Etruscan times and is very different from Tuscany/Toscana in every respect.

More igloo meditations.

It seems to me that it would be difficult to determine the proportions of art and maths, or science, in Brunelleschi's dome. The art is obviously more evident to most of us, although the scientist would probably insist that the mathematical solutions to be seen in the structural balance of forces in the dome are equally elegant.

When I am asked to consider whether architects are dreamers or visionaries, I would reply that first we must decide if architecture is science or art.

Who would care to argue the point while sitting in Mrs Whaley's garden. And she tells us very clearly. When she asked Mr Briggs to make a design for her garden, she was asking the artist and not the architect. But that is what he was,

'...by far the best-known landscape architect working around here.'

In fact he, Mr Loutrel Briggs, as Mrs Whaley tells us, 'was the head of landscape architecture at the New York School of Fine Arts, had lectured all over the world, and had designed parks and public housing projects in New York City.'

And lucky for Mrs Whaley, Mr Briggs was her neighbor on Church St in Charleston, SC, in 1940.

Brunelleschi was a goldsmith first. First comes Art. Science and math are pleased to serve her.

Vitello allo Marsala? Wonderful. But what holds it together?

The Marsala sauce, caro mio!

I've put a picture of the dome under construction and a picture of the model Professor Ricci is building together on a web page so we can better see what JUSTIN is talking about in Post #208.

Dome construction pictures

There's Vitello tonnato,veal with Tuna Sauce, a cold dish for a summer's day, famous in Lombardy, loved by the French who call it veau tonné ; the English call it tunnied veal. A somewhat cumbersome preparation of a boned veal roast (very hard to find here these days), but well worth every minute.

And then there's Scaloppine al Marsala = Veal Cutlets with Marsala Wine Sauce. The name of the dish has taken its name in the international vocabulary. The original dish remains the same and is much tastier than the many variations on the theme.

The start of this discussion has coincided with the beginning of my move to the apartment in San Antonio. This process, as I said in an early, post, limit my participation here, particularly later this week when I move the computer. I may be completely off-line for several days as I hook up to a DSL connection. Meanwhile I would like to make the following initial comment.

Those of you who like I found it strange that our medieval forbearers could tolerate a century long construction schedule might look to our own Washington National Cathedral project. I was surprised that this project too took the better part of a century to complete. These projects being intended as permanent works of art cannot be rushed.

Click Here for the history of the Washington National Cathedral.

Click Here for pictures and a virtual tour.

I remember singing in a group of choirs at the National Cathedral as a child. It was quite an experience. The choir section was huge, and filled with those young voices, it was thrilling. But the Cathedral was still under construction, and on a rainy day the roof was leaking. We kept squirming around to avoid the water.

Hidden corners of Florence

OK Mal I looked at the earlier site with the two pictures of the dome in construction - I still not sure I understand -

I think I am getting it while reading - is this about it - the weight of the tile or brick actually changes the shape of a structure [roof/dome] forcing it to push down and therefore out - hehehehe like eating - All that food just goes down to the hips and belly forcing them out - hehehe then we put a girdle on to hold it all together hahahahaha -

But it sounds like rather than a girdle - what is going on with this Dome is, Brunelleschi constructed a bra with staps that lifts the whole thing up from the inside???? is that about it...

OH dear just slap happy but it is the vision I get of this thing - surely an Opera just as when we dress to meet the public - shades of Anna Magnani in The Rose Tatoo

Think of a barrel, BARBARA.

Scroll down to see the Italianate courtyard at the Isabella Stewart Gardener Museum

The stone chain operates like a girdle except there is no give in the chain. The downward force on the drum is called compression. It takes a lot of pasta to resist that pressure which is converted to lateral pressure.

If the vaults are attempted with out something to hold them up, they will fall of their own weight, a little like a breast without a bra.

Pippo is proposing to raise the vaults without a bra. But he is not saying how he will do this for fear someone will steal his idea.So he asks the committee to take his proposal on faith. This is not easy for Florentines to do because they have little faith in the prevailing gods.

"In May 1417 the Opera del Duomo paid him ( Brunelleschi ) 10 florins for drawing plans of the dome on parchment." ( Page 13 )
Brunelleschi was best known for his experiment in linear perspective.
"Perspective drawing is similar to surveying in that both involve determining the relative positional of three-dimensional objects for the purpose of protracting them on paper or canvas." ( Page 35 )
Alberti had said that "the spherical vault" did not need centering because it consists of both arches and superimposed rings.

The 1367 model showed that the cupola was not circular. It was octagonal, and "the continuous rows of masonry would not be continuous, but broken at each of eight corners."

I never thought about de-centering, or removal of the poles used to center the brick construction. Ross says this was usually done by setting the supporting poles of the center's scaffolding in kegs of sand and unplugging the kegs to allow the sand to escape, thus lowering the level of the wooden framework. Brunelleschi said centering wasn't necessary and built a model to prove it.

According to the building program, the width of the inner dome was to be like that of the Pantheon, going from 7 feet at the bottom to 5 feet at the top. The outside shell was to go from just over 2 feet at the bottom to just over a foot at the oculus. Photo. Interior of the Pantheon dome, showing the oculus
"The wardens agreed that for the first 30 braccia ( forearm length ) of their height --- that is, for a distance of about 57 feet above the drum --- both shells were to be built without any scaffold-supported centering. Thereafter, from 30 braccia upward, the dome was to be built 'according to what shall then be advisable, because in building only practical experience will teach that which is to be followed.' " ( Page 53 )
Now to find out what Brunelleschi considered to be practical.

Professor Massimo Ricci:

"It's terrific! It's a terrific mystery that I've managed to unravel! I really believe it was my love for Brunelleschi, my love for my city, Florence, and for this monument."

"We know that at a certain point, when the walls of his dome began to curve inward, when therefore the workmen's confidence that the normal structural stability was undermined by the curve toward the centre, they refused to go out on the scaffolding, they felt it was certain to fall. Brunelleschi himself had to go out on the scaffolding, pull great weights behind him, walk up and down, jump to show them, that the walls would in fact stay in place."

"So just what did Brunelleschi do? In the stairwell of the dome one piece of evidence remains visible. The bricks are laid in an unusual pattern. "

"If you normally put brick upon brick, and if you just go up vertically, you er we all know that works, but if you start going on the slope that's that's very difficult and Brunelleschi came up with the brilliant idea of a herringbone pattern, that it it's, it's common sense in a way, but it's the intuition of an engineer at work definitely."

"Many investigations had used the herringbone brickwork to explain Brunelleschi's achievement. But for Massimo (Ricci) it wasn't enough. How had the bricks been laid in such a complex pattern? And how had the shape of the dome been preserved without any scaffold to guide it?

The maverick architect had struggled for years to arrive at a solution"

MASSIMO RICCI

"Actually studying a problem, such a difficult and complex question, will bring a person to the point where he is confronted by night after night of studies which seem to pass in a few minutes. Brunelleschi too, faced with the same problem, would certainly have done the same thing.

"Did Massimo's obsession really bring him any closer to Brunelleschi? Faced with academic sceptics Massimo pressed on with his experiments. How had his hero actually built the dome?"

MASSIMO RICCI:
"After about fifteen years, I managed to build the flower and from that moment on it was all a… well, a continuous discovery."

"A flower! Massimo believes that Brunelleschi drew a pattern of petals where the dome was to spring from the tops of the cathedral walls base of the dome. This precise mathematical form then became a key to position every single brick in the construction. It's brilliant in its simplicity."

These quotes come from a BBC program about Brunelleschi and the dome, which can be accessed by clicking the link below.

The Riddle of the Dome

Thanks Mal, I can't count the hours I've spent there.

What an interesting account, in Chapter 2, of the artistic scope to be found in goldsmithing. In which Brunelleschi got his start. He found himself in good company with all those distinguished artists mentioned there, including Paolo Ucello of whom Vasari has something interesting to say, pointing out that Ucello overtaxed his brain with his passion for perspective.

'Paolo Ucello would have been the most delightful and imaginative genius...if he had devoted as much pains to figures and animals as he did to questions of perspective, for, although these are ingenious and good in their way, yet an immoderate devotion to them causes an infinite waste of time, fatigues nature, clogs the mind with difficulties, and frequently renders it sterile where it has previously been fertile and facile....In addition to which he frequently becomes sterile, eccentric, melancholy and poor. This was the fate of Paolo Ucello, who, being endowed by Nature with a sophistical and subtle disposition, took pleasure in nothing except the investigation of difficult and impossible questions of perspective; and although these were fanciful and fine, yet they affected his treatment of figures so much that they became worse and worse as he grew older.'

Artists really are an ingenious lot. Very clever, with their tricks of the trade. I remember a very droll happenstance of that. Many years ago I caught up with an old friend who had fled to the country, had found a redundant rural church building which he had converted into an artist's studio, and was happily creating beautiful artifacts with his glass-blowing furnace, his metal-casting forge, and so on.

While showing me around his property, outback, behind the building, he pointed out some recent creations, including an impressive bronze trident, which Poseidon would have been proud to be seen with. The surprising thing about it was the genuine patina it had acquired, giving it a look of authentic antiquity. How had he ever done that so quickly I asked. Nightly, he said, he came out here and pissed on it. And invited me to do the same. The trident, he told me, along with other similiar things, was destined for the theater. Was, in fact, on its way to Broadway.

My well-kept secret until now. A smug little satisfaction that something close to me made it to the big time.

I'm astonished at the progress we're making on the dome. We'll have it finished in no time.

It's 29 degrees here in my part of North Carolina with snow and ice on the ground. Cable is out for all the computers and TV's in this house. Nothing will be done about this problem until tomorrow or later. I'm having trouble accessing SeniorNet with Dialup, so if I disappear for a while that's the reason why.

Mal

Mal; I am surprised you are able to switch back and forth between Cable and dial-up. Neat trick. How do you do it?

It was 75 degrees here today with an overnight in the fifties. I had to wear a sweater the other night. Damn , it was cold.

I admit I'm lost. Where are we in the book?

Jonathan: If you like the Gardner museum, I hope you know the mystery story that is set there: Murder at the Gardner by Jane Langton. It is full of her charming line drawings of the Gardner and it's art. The plot is based on one of the paintings found there. There is lots of chasing around the garden in the picture you showed us.

Wouldn't that be fun to watch. As also

'Casting in bronze was a delicate operation...so fraught with opportunities for mishap was the whole process that, in later years, Michelangelo would request a Mass to be said whenever he began pouring a bronze statue.'(p 17)

And I'm going to request a Mass for Mal, the poor soul.

We get an interesting look into the world of the Renaissance artists in Chapter 2, with the competition for the new set of doors for the Baptistery providing the keen ambience. If the Duomo is the big story in Brunelleschi's life, it is only because he lost out in the bronze doors competition. Ghiberti won the competition and set Florence on the way to becoming the art capital of the world. Brunelleschi waited almost twenty more years before getting his chance to place the lovely crown on his native city.

He came so close to getting the doors commission. Choosing between Brunelleschi and Ghiberti, King says, was most difficult for the judges. Filippo's panel was the more dramatic. Lorenzo's more graceful and elegant. I'm looking at two excellent photographic reproductions. My reaction is that Florence came close to waiting even longer for the dome. If Brunelleschi had spent his life on the doors, like Ghiberti ended up doing.

I was lucky to find a book that gives the Baptistery doors, all three sets, the full treatment, with truly magnificent photographs of every detail on each set of doors, including the decorations on the architraves and door jambs. I can't begin to describe the impact they make on one. Michelangelo was right: their reach goes beyond art.

For anyone interested the book is by Antonio Paolucci, The Origins Of Renaissance Art.

What a trip this discussion is.

Joan, I'm going to look for that mystery. Isn't that a beautiful place. A little bit of Italy in Boston. Well, I know there's more, but...in the way of palazzas, I don't know.

When I read about your trying to stay dry while filling the cathedral with beautiful sounds, I had to think of the scene in the PBS thing on the Medici. Cosimo and other dignitaries, under their umbrellas, in the cathedral, looking up where to where the dome should be. And the rain came pouring down.

Your cathedral got me into an interesting conversation during one visit there, over the significance of the Latin words over the main entrance. What was it. It was long ago. Something having been made out of Nihilo. God making everything out of nothing? Is that what it says?

The painting of the Flamenco dancers in the Gardner Museum is

El Jaleo by John Singer Sargent
"John Singer Sargent, son of American expatriate parents, was born in Florence, Italy. He grew up in Europe, and studied painting in the Paris studio of the noted French portraitist Carolus-Duran and at the École des Beaux-Arts. His first visit to the USA took place in 1876. He traveled much throughout Europe to study the art of different countries and times."

JoanK; I have no idea where we are in the book or even if anyone is interested.

Jonathan mentioned Chapter 2, so here's something about the Duke of Milan and the Cathedral at Milan.
"Conforming in many ways to the conventional stereotype of the Italian Renaissance prince, Giangaleazzo ( Duke of Milan ) combined high political skills with cold ruthlessness, reliance upon astrologers, and patronage of arts and letters. He fostered the university of Pavia, employed humanist secretaries, enjoyed the manuscript illumination of the Lombard school, and initiated the building of the Charterhouse of Pavia. It could be - as many historians claim - that his death saved the peninsula from the establishment of that 'Italian monarchy' which contemporary panegyrists and enemies alike saw as his ultimate aim."
Milan Cathedral

Dear Jonathan,
Joan in #229, Justin in #234, and I echo here: are we all assembling behind you, our leader
(il Duci, having no negative meaning in the time of Brunelleshi, I assume)?

Are we who know fewer web links than Mal being asked to do any particular input?
We're certainly enjoying all the links, but can hardly find a direction on our own.

You guys aren't paying me enough. I'm just kidding.

What we're into here is so enormous that it's bound to seem like a limitless ocean on which we are trying to get our bearings. But "Have NO Fear" as Il Duce tells the ladies in the movie, before this is over "the trains will be running on time", Some of you are expecting to arrive before the train is hardly out of the station. You are not stopping to smell the roses. I want to be certain of everyone's art appreciation capabilities before getting into the heavy stuff.

This is more than just a dome. This is a whole world we are exploring. It's a mistake to get lost in the engineering problems of a complex roofing problem. Far better to try to understand the mind that solved the problem, the artistry, and what it was in his environment that challenged him. What made him an artist at everything he put his hand to. And that goes for all the other artists in Florence in the quattrocento, as well as before and after.

Mal,thanks for the link to the enemy camp. To the Milanese who have caved in to the influence of those vandals beyond the mountains. That's just the kind of cathedral we don't want here in Florence. held up with a lot of supports. Ours is going to float on air.

There are so many departure points in Chapter 2. So many things to follow up. King teases the reader with fascinating detail. As we can see, there may have been more than a little politcs in deciding who should get the commission for the Baptistery doors. And the doors were not meant to be an art project. They were meant to play an important role in the community.

I'm sorry about the lack of interest. If we're not meeting anyone's specific expectations, I can only say, be patient. Of course, I'm always looking for someone else to make it interesting, same as you.

I allow myself to distracted, as well as being guilty myself, perhaps, of doing it to others. At the moment I'm exploring the library resources up here on the 13th floor, looking for Murder At The Gardner

We have a long way to go. And so much to see and think about along the way. If you're missing the interest, make it happen.

As for the heathens in our midst, never fear, here in Florence there's a church to suit every need, every temperament, as Traude has already pointed out. Why, there is even a Plato Academy out there in the hills somewhere, so I have heard.

Lewis in his book says to see the moon coming up behind Brunelleschi's Dome is really grand. I'll get the full quote when I get home. The Taj Mahal seems frivolous beside that. But that's my own opinion

hmmm - the building of this Dome is detailed and since it is not that clear the mechanics of what is being described, I am finding it less fascinating than the slices of life that are included in the story -

You have to wonder if it is pride in who you believe you are - or a higher since of ego that runs the world - On the complete opposite side of mans humanity is the story this week of Auschwitz and the final solution - both stories have so much in common as little by little the small problems are unemotionally handled with lots of measurements related to structures to accomplish the over all goal which is set in a belief system that is inaccurate.

We could too easily sway from the book and turn this into a discussion of the accuracies of religious beliefs and the less than admirable behavior of the church leadership that is now celebrating its power with the building of this church - no where I am reading this building is for the individual or a group to celebrate their adoration to their God - it is all about the ego of the builders and the satisfaction of the Guild leaders and the Church dignitaries whose power is built on this sketchy belief system much like those who cooperated in Germany believed the propaganda that the Jews were the cause of all their losses.

Interesting what has been created as a result of men needing an outlet for their gifts and talents regardless if the talent is artistic or social engineering -

Johathan,

THE MOON COMING UP BEHIND BRUNELLESCHI'S DOME

Is a sight I would have loved to see, but on that night when I was in Florence it was cloudy. We can never relive the good memories of the past, it is never the same the second time.

It sounds to me as if competition had a lot to do with the incentive to build these monuments. As far back as the pyramids we have seen the same thing. One thing that intrigues me is that it appears as if nobody has really figured out how Brunelleschi built this dome -- unless, of course, Professor Ricci is right. What do you think about its construction?

Dome diagram

Nave and choir

More pictures

From his penthouse on Via Lamarmora, Lewis could see 'the lovely Semplici Gardens; and only a step beyond, as it seemed, the Duomo itself, surprisingly intimate in the gathering dusk, awe-inspiring when the moon rose behind it.' p119

Due to lack of interest, I am now going to suggest that we proceed directly to Chapter 19, and so end on a high, with the same enthusiasm with which we set out.

Provided that we can get past one last bit of damnable perspective. For once the author has it wrong. It may seem difficult to him sitting at his desk, but for the tough masons, climbing 'the equivalent of a forty-story building' would have seemed nothing at all. That's a mere 400 feet at most, hardly ten minutes of negligible effort. I kid you not.

But the real high awaiting us, as even Agnolo Pandolfini the disillusioned politician, and Nicola de'Medici the failed banker found up there, is 'a tranquility of soul,' 'an example of grace under pressure.'

To drag out the discussion would be a needless, unforgivable deferment of the experience of that harmony, peace, and rest amidst the beauty.

I take full responsibility for not making it more attractive. For all the shortcomings of what will have been the shortest discussion on record. My apologies to the author and to Brunelleschi's ghost. My wish is that this discussion be removed from the board. I'm asking that it not be archived.

See you all in some other discussion.

Jonathan

JONATHAN! What are you talking about? Cut it out and get back on the bus!

Mal

I vote for archiving. Someone can learn from the experience.

Hehehe - not the shortest - Soul Mountain was the shortest - go look...

I don't know about you, but I don't give up easily. Besides, I've spent a lot of time researching things mentioned in this book and don't want to throw what I've learned about Florence, Brunelleschi, the dome and Santa Maria di Fiore cathedral down the drain. I know there's more than one bus driver here, so let'e all take a turn at the wheel.

The best book discussions I've been in are those where there's been a reading assignment, you know, Chapters 1 through 3 for the first week, that sort of thing. Questions are important. We've had a lot of statements here, but not many questions, and I'm as guilty as that as anyone else. We participants are the discussion, you know, so let's participate!

Let's try an experiment. Let's go on with Chapter Three and see if we can keep this discussion alive.

What will follow are some quotes from the book and some questions. Let's keep this bus rolling by giving it some answers as fuel. Okay? Ready? Let's go.

Mal

Chapter 3, Page 22

"Thus when Filippo set off for Rome sometime after the end of the competition for the Baptistry doors, patriotic arguments about the Roman origins of the Florentine republic -- arguments all the more strident during the Visconti threat -- would have been ringing in his ears. Yet in the early 1400's the Eternal City must have been in most respects, a wretchedly uninspiring sight, a parent that the Florentines may well have wisheed to disown.

"A million people had dwelled in Rome during the height of the Empire, but now the city's population was less than that of Florence. The Black Death of 1348 had reduced numbers to 20,000, from which, over the next fifty years, they rose only slightly.

"Rome had shrunk into a tiny area inside its ancient walls, retreating from the seven hills to a huddle among a few streets on the bank of the Tiber across from St. Peter's, whose walls were in danger of collapse. Livestock grazed in the Forum, now known as il Campo Vaccino, the Field of Cows. Other monuments had suffered even worse fates. The Temple of Jupiter was a dunghill, and both the Theater of Pompey and the Mausoleum of Augustus had become quarries from which the ancient masonry was scavenged, some of it for buildings as far away as Westminster Abbey.

"Many ancient statues lay in shards, half buried, while others had been burned in kilns to make quicklime or else fertilizer for the feeble crops.

"Still others were mangers for asses and oxen. The funerary monument of Agrippina the Elder, themother of Caligula, had been turned into a measure for grain and salt."

Why in the world do you think Brunelleschi decided to go to Rome at that time?

Did he go to steal artifacts to bring back to Florence?

Did he go in order to study the way the buildings and monuments were constructed?

What was his motive? And how did this trip to Rome affect his building of the dome?

Here's another question for us that BARBARA touched on in her Post #238. Why do people build these grand edifices?

In austere, Puritanical New England where I grew up, the church building is the one that stands out, the center of the town. Why?

What reason besides making a place to worship is there for constructing these buildings?

Mal, You never cease to amaze me. Thanks for your input. I would miss it terribly if the discussion was archived.

Florence at the beginning of the fifteenth century is on the cusp of the greatest expansion in art and architecture the world has ever known. The art and architecture of the classical age is lying in the dust of Greece and Rome. The Gothic Age has topped out in Beauvais' Cathedral and the style entered a period of flamboyance and excess. Florence will be the site of the next great expansion in art and architecture. The city has the money, the organization in guilds, a building site begging for completion, and no one with sufficient skill to solve the problem of building a dome on an octagonal base. Enter Pippo Brunelleschi and his buddy Donatello who have looked at Roman ruins and concluded they could build a dome. The story of how the Duomo was built is fascinating and better than many, many, historical novels. Let us begin again.

Hey, JONATHAN: I never said I wasn't interested, I'm more than interested -- I'm fascinated!! I feel immersed in Florence, and want it to last forever. I just wanted some guidance on how to proceed.

The description of Rome is extremely interesting. We value those ruins so much now -- it's hard to imagine that they were sneered at.

Those who are better historians than I am remind me: was this the period when the papacy had moved out of Rome to France? Perhaps this was either the cause or the result of the decay of Rome??

I was really tickled by the method Ross gives of measuring the height of buildings. My friends whom I told about it weren't interested, so maybe you aren't either, but that won't stop me from telling you.

You put a mirror on the ground a distance from the building, and then back up until you can see the top of the building in the center of the mirror. Then you can calculate the height of the building from the two distances: building to mirror and mirror to you.

I had to draw a diagram and resurrect my High School geometry to make sure his formula works. It does -- in theory anyway. In practice it depends on the ground being absolutely level so that the mirror is on the same level as the base of the building, and not tilted. Isn't Rome hilly? The difference between abstract mathematics and engineering (as I try to tell my mathematician husband).

He tells me there is a PBS program called "Rough Science" where young scientists are sent out to try to measure things using similar simple methods. It sounds really interesting.

Dear Jonathan, your decision to close the discussion startled and saddens me. But it is not up to me to question it.

Though I still do not have Brunelleschi's Dome, I enjoyed your wonderfully imaginative introduction to a book which we might never have heard about, except for your choice.

It is, after all, a book of ideas, and of ideals, impossible dreams and their equally stupendous realization, a stab at the heavens; a refutation of previously held principles, and the triumphant overcoming of doubt and pettiness in all its guises -

Though I joined the journey late, I would have liked to follow the innovative course you set and am infinitely sorry it ended too soon. It was a marvelous ride for me and I want to thank you with all my heart for the experience and the memories it evoked.

I think this has been an extraordinarily well conducted and successful discussion. Thank you for bring it to us. My great regret is that it has came at a time when my moving has made it impossible to participate beyond a fast browsing read of the book. Yet this quick read, and the following of the many posts by you and the participants, has introduced me to an extraordinary medieval engineer, Filippo Brunelleschi who was previously unknown to me.

Jonathan, I particularly like your plan for conducting this discussion as you expressed it in message 237

This is more than just a dome. This is a whole world we are exploring. It's a mistake to get lost in the engineering problems of a complex roofing problem. Far better to try to understand the mind that solved the problem, the artistry, and what it was in his environment that challenged him. What made him an artist at everything he put his hand to. And that goes for all the other artists in Florence in the quattrocento, as well as before and after.

Yes, I am sure many of us had trouble following some of the engineering details given in the book. You are right in centering on the art, the City of Florence, the contemporary culture, and the people involved, Filippo Brunelleschi and others mentioned by the author in telling the story. This has been your plan, and while the subject may not be one whose discussion would go on for months, it surely deserves several (3 or 4) weeks before it takes its honored place in our Senior’s Net Books archives. I urge you to continue.

Jonathan; I think you have made a wise choice in stopping the discussion. It makes no sense to continue discussion of a book meant for a very specialized audience. King's work is not for a general audience.

However, many of those who came to the discussion clearly wished to talk about the city of Florence and its many treasures. I suggest you substitute a book about Florence or Italy- one meant for a general audience and one you can do chapter by chapter or in a general discussion after a thorough reading of the text. There are many such works on the market. Henry James is a little ponderous but he covers all the interesting spots and John Ruskin's books are numerous. His "Mornings in Florence" would provide stimulus for general discussion on Florence's treasures.

As Barbara pointed out it is not uncommon to terminate discussion of a book shortly after starting it. Ginny launched a discussion of Caesar and Cicero but was hard pressed to keep participants so she dropped it. There are several examples in SN. One must just go on to find a book that appeals to a select but adequate audience. You can do it. Your style is light and friendly, and appealing.

Instead of addressing posts to JONATHAN, who I'm sure is not going to return to this discussion (and I'm not going to try to persuade him) or talking about what should have been and wasn't, why don't we talk about this BOOK? Some of us spent money we couldn't afford to buy it. Others took the trouble to get to the library and borrow it. All of us have read at least part of it, so for heaven's sake, let's talk about it!

Why did Brunelleschi go to Rome? I'm really curious about what you think.

As JUSTIN reminded us Ross says in Chapter 3, on Page 23:
"He (Brunelleschi) originally came to Rome with another Florentine, the talented young sculptor, Donatello. The two young men lived like vagabonds . . . . Together they began digging amont the vast ruins, hiring porters to carry away the rubble and becoming known to locals as 'treasure hunters '"

Ross mentions that people were supersitious about these relics. People who gathered them were suspect. Even Donatello didn't know what Brunelleschi was looking for. Manetti says that he "made his study of the ancient ruins while pretending to be doing something else."

In the time before patents and copyright laws, artists, architects, scientists and writers used code to prevent their work from being stolen.

Like Leonardo Da Vinci and many others, Brunelleschi put his findings in code. Ross asks a very good question: 'What was the purpose of Filippo's cryptic symbols and Arabic numerals, the latter of which the Commune of Florence had banned in 1206'

"Filippo must have taken a special interest in the methods of vaulting used by the ancient Romans," since he had the dome for Florence's cathedral in mind.

Another thing that must have interested Brunelleschi was Roman mortar. Ross says, "The secret of Roman concrete was its mortar, which contained a volcanic ash made available by active volcanoes such as Vesuvius. Combined with lime mortar, it resulted in a strong, fast-setting cement to which an aggregate of small broken stones waa added. Unlike conventional mortars made from quicklime, sand, and water, which set only when the waver evaporates, 'pozzalana concrete' combines chemically with water so that, like modern Portland cement, it cures swiftly, even underwater."

Ross goes on to say that the Pantheon must have been of even more interest to Brunelleschi. The dome of the Pantheon is colossal, spanning 142 feet internally and rising to a height of 143 feet. By the time Brunelleschi and Donatello arrived in Rome, the dome of the Pantheon was still intact, having been converted into a church, Santa Maria Rotonda.
Ross asks, "What structural features of this 'house of devils", as it had become known, might Filippo have studied?" Yes, what?

Is study of the Pantheon dome the real reason why Brunelleschi went to Rome? I'd like to know what you think.

Mal

We can only guess why B came to Rome. I'd say he was interested in Roman building in general, not just the Pantheon dome. Unless he was a dome fetishist. The Romans were THE builders of the ancient world, where better to study building.

I assume the pantheon dome is not still standing.

I've only read through Chapter 3 and don't know if the book will become too technical for us, but I'd like to finish it. There is an awful lot to learn about Florence, the time, and artists at work, I would think.

I just came on this description of The Dome of the Rock in Jeruselem in The Story of Civilization discussion:

""It was not a mosque, but a shrine to house the rock. The Crusaders erred twice in calling it the 'Mosque of Omar.' Upon an octagonal building of squared stones, 528 feet in circuit, rises a dome, 112 feet high, mae of wood externally covered with gilded brass. Four elegant portals -- their lintels faced by splended repousse bronze plates -- lead into an interior divided into diminishing octagons by concentric colonnades of polished marbles"

Here is a picture:

Something went wrong with the last post. here, I hope, is the picture:

DOME OF THE ROCK

This book has made me curious about other domes -- do they have the same problems as B's? The Dome of the Rock is made of wood, so I guess not.

That is as famous as any, Joan. But don't forget my lowly little igloo dome.

Dear friends, you have no idea how painful it is for me to prove our intrepid Mal to be wrong for once, while running so valiantly with the ball.

It's still the King book for me as a good portal to the Renaissance. In fact it serves better for a discussion such as this, than as a textbook for an architect. Brunelleschi obviously was a great architect, but to me it seems he also had the natural instincts to build a sturdy shelter, like the birds and the bees. Try taking apart a birds nest some time.

Here, where I live, we are taking delivery of an enormous quantity of building material. I'm talking about snow. I live at the end of cul de sac, in one of a dozen homes all facing onto our very own circular piazza, 200 feet across. The snow plough was around an hour ago and left a huge, ten foot mound of snow smack in the middle. The kids on the block, some sixes and some sixties, were out there on the double with their craftsmens' tools, burrowing into the hill. They have all vanished except for one little guy left to guard the door. The gang from two streets over is sure to come snooping around.

Another example of monumental, innovative architecture, like so many others in our past, here in the land of ice and snow. And nothing to show for it. Our heroic structures have all vanished with every returning spring. Already I'm in a state of nostalgia brought on by the noble effort out their to keep our tradition alive.

I'm sorry if I left the wrong impression. I was taking my cue from Justin about the apparent lack of interest. I'm sure he was thinking of others who aren't here who lack the interest. There has been far too much enthusiasm expressed by everyone posting to be otherwise. Perhaps even an excess of enthusiasm. But that's not possible. Perhaps something else led to a mistaken judgement. It may be that all of here are feeling a little unsure where we should start tunnelling.

Let's not exect the whole world to show up, and then have the problem of pleasing some LCD.

As a recent PBS airing of a daring Andes escapade thriller made so obvious, it only takes two to have a tremendous adventure.

I may have been in a hurry, after dallying so long along the way, to get up there for the view. And after all those stairs and blind alleys on the way up, one also needs to take a break to catch one's breath.

Lost-again Jonathan

One just has to look closely at those bronze doors. Amazing pictorial architecture. Not to mention the very real architecture of various forms, from huts to vast edifices. The same for many paintings. I'm thinking in particular of the one with Solomon greeting the Queen of Sheba.

The ball is in the dustbin, and my bill for $13.00 plus postage has been sent to the Santa Maria del Fiore Planning Committee for reimbursement.

Mal

I have not yet read the book so I scanned all of the previous posts looking especially for a reference to an egg. I found two but neither of them matched a story I heard in Florence. It goes like this:

It seems that several of Brunelleschi’s competitors were sitting with him on a plaza near the Duomo, trying to find out just what technique he had in mind for building the dome. He idly rolled a hard boiled egg across the table and challenged any of them to make it stand upright. After all of them failed he simply smashed it down on it’s broad bottom end and of course it stood upright. They then all berated him for not following the “rules”. His response was “that is why I can build the dome and you cannot!” (Or words to that effect)

Newvoyager

Alright, Jonathan. We will try once again to ignite this discussion. Stay at the helm and focus. The central issue in this book is how to span a roof opening with a mean diameter of 143 feet and an octagonal shape. The cupola would begin at a height of 170 feet above the ground. In Renaissance Italy this is an enormous undertaking and a very great challenge. A dome of these dimensions has never before been attempted. It exceeds that of the Pantheon.

There is some technical stuff in the book and there is a special language, a nomenclature, that is needed to understand the nature of the problem and its solution. The solution is elegant and when the problem is understood the beauty of the solution will be clear. The language is not difficult but it is used to draw distinctions, to identify things precisely. Lets take an example. Cupola is a general term that applies to circular vaulting. Dome is a specialized cupola. Lantern is a specialized cupola. In the book both dome and cupola are used.

B reasoned well. He was interested in mathematics and in architecture. Today, he would go to school to learn what then he could learn only by examining the architectural ruins of Rome. He had to dig up the past which was pagan and thought by the Church to be better left buried. He dug up entablatures (the upper facades of buildings) and measured their dimensions and studied their relationships. He examined the Pantheon which still stands intact.

The Pantheon still stands. It survives as a relic of the Roman religion because it was converted early to a Christian church. The dome of the Pantheon was constructed on forms called centering. It is a concrete dome raised on a base twenty feet thick and tapering to two feet at the ocula (opening in the ceiling to let in light). The concrete used was formed from volcanic dust. It was quick setting. The heaviest concrete was used at the bottom and the lightest at the top and the interior was coffered to reduce weight. The Pantheon is one solution to the problem of supporting a dome. It was not possible to use this solution in Florence because the walls of the cathedral had already been constructed. They were not wide enough to support a dome as in the Pantheon.

Voyager, I'm glad you brought that up. The famous challenge. How to make an egg stay upright. There must be many variations on its interpretation. Just what was Brunelleschi saying in replying to his competitors in that way? What "rules" were they talking about? Was Brunelleschi's plan all about breaking rules?

Justin, there was nothing in the Roman ruins that supplied Brunelleschi with the essential insight to go farther than anyone had gone before. There was that Renaissance daring and challenge motivating him, which we should look into. As for the weave of materials that he used, what are the words, they're not coming to me, the w... and the w...? The secret lays in that.

Everything you say is true and very helpful in this discussion to get an appreciation for such a dome-building spectacular as Brunelleschi's. There's still disagreement out there whether the dome is a marvel or an engineering feat. We the jury are deliberating.

Mal, the ball is still in the air for the same reason. Your thirteen dollars. We'll take that up at the next meeting.

Atta Boy, Jonathan. You are in here punching.

B's approach was not so much about breaking rules as about making new rules.

B did not find the complete answer to the problem of the dome in Rome but he learned a great deal about architecture and he applied that knowledge to the construction of the Duomo. In the end we will find that the Duomo has both Roman and Gothic characteristics as well as something new. The new characteristic is not Renaissance in the traditional sense. It is something else. It is a blend of these ideas.

Justin: "In the end we will find that the Duomo has both Roman and Gothic characteristics as well as something new. The new characteristic is not Renaissance in the traditional sense. It is something else. It is a blend of these ideas".

Now I'm really hooked!! Can't wait to understand that statement.

I would like to pause for a bit here in the third chapter to soak up the atmosphere of quattrocento Rome. King does make it macabre with his choice of detail. Three hundred thousand sepulchres lining the Via Appia, south of the once Imperial City. Now a squalid village.

The Christian pilgrims who came to see the wonders, the holy relics, ignored the ancient Roman ruins as 'so much heathen idolatry.' The Temple of Jupiter had been turned into a dunghill, in utter contempt of ancient deities. Into this squalor came Brunelleschi with his associate Donatello.

Mal has asked interesting questions about their mission. And JoanK is personally verifying the results to be obtained by calculating heights with the use of a mirror. I take it the mirror must be laying absolutely level. As in a mason's or a carpenter's use of a level.

My imagination was caught by the pagan fragments occasionally unearthed in these historic places. King cites the interesting case of the Sienese statue. It's such a remarkable story (p24), that I would like to add to it from another source. From a book by Ferdinand Schevril, Siena: The Story of a Medieval...I can't make out the last word, given to me in an illegible handwriting. Without further comment. It explains itself:

'As soon as Siena fell behind in the economic and political race among the Italian states, her mental fibre was exposed to decay from lack of hardy exercise. Perhaps this is the chief reason for the slow pulse-beat of Sienese thought. With the inclination to inertia once established, a dozen other influences, above all, the highly conservative influence of the church, came to the support of the original tendency.

'We noticed in treating of Sienese art that a curious self-satisfaction on the part of the artists induced them to adopt an unfriendly attitude toward the new ideals of the Renaissance, and that by virtue of their quattrocento contributions to the realm of painting the Sienese proclaimed themselves essentially a provincial folk. Nothing brings this fact out more clearly than a story which is related by the Florentine Ghiberti and which, as a most delightfully apposite characterization of the mercurial temper and mental philistinism of the Sienese, I set down here as my final word on the subject.

'Lorenzo Ghiberti, the Florentine sculptor of the famous bronze gates of his native Baptistery, wrote before his death some very interesting Commentaries upon art, in the course of which he narrates that, once on a visit to Siena, he was shown a beautiful drawing from the hand of Ambrogio Lorenzetti of a Greek statue existent in Ambrogio day and afterward destroyed. His informant told him that the statue had been accidentally dug up in Siena a hundred years before, and had aroused tremendous enthusiasm, not only among the painters and goldsmiths of the town, but also among the common people.

'Amidst universal rejoicing it had been escorted to the Campo, and there set up over the new fountain, the Fonte Gaia, which had just been inaugurated and which lacked as yet the monumental setting created by Jacopo della Quercia. On the strength of the drawing put into his hands, Ghiberti assigned the original to Lysippus, (!) one of the most distinguished names in of Greek art, and from the description which he adds we are led to surmise that the statue represented the goddess Aphrodite rising from the sea.

'For some years the recovered wonder of antiquity continued to crown the Fonte Gaia, smilingly prophesying to those who could understand its mysterious language the coming of a new age, when a succession of misfortunes, bringing famine and pestilence in their wake, roused to life the ever latent forces of medieval superstition. In a session of the council a citizen arose and spoke - I use Ghiberti's own words - as folllows: "Gentlemen. Considering that ever since we have set up this statue we have encountered nothing but ill-luck, and, considering further, that idolatry is totally forbidden by our religion, we are obliged to believe that our adversities have been sent us by God in punishment for our sins. As a matter of plain fact no one will deny that ever since we have honor to the said statue, matter have steadily gone with us from bad to worse. My fixed opinion is that as long as we keep it on our soil misfortunes will continue to befall us. Wherefore I move that it be taken down and broken and the remnants carried away to be buried in the territory of the Florentines."

'And Ghiberti concludes his tale by dryly adding that "the council unanimously supported the motion, which was accordingly put into execution by burying the statue in our territory."

'Very possibly the last amusing touch about the final disposal of the idolatrous statue is an invention of Ghiberti's Florentine malice.' (Schevril, 1909)

One more thing I would like to mention. It has to do with Ghiberti's own 'Gates of Paradise' doors. The panel known as The Creation, the Fall, and the Expulsion of Adam and Eve from Paradise'. Just an absolutely magnificently designed tableau. There we see our parents under the apple tree. And there they are standing outside the Gate of Eden, with Adam cowering behind Eve. But taking up much of the central part of the panel is the creation of Eve from a semi-reclining Adam, resting his head on the palm of his right hand of an upraised arm. The thought leapt to my mind immediately. Rodin must have come to Florence to study the masters. There's no doubt in my mind that his Thinker shows the influence of Ghiberti. Certainly man has had much to think about.

But the most curious detail, and this will blow you away. The little angels clinging to the newly created Eve, and the seven angels lolling admiringly on the cloud over her head, have little wings which very obviously inspired the design of the Stars and Stripes.

Jonathan, those last two paragraphs of yours are literally breathtaking!! Love that, how did you see that analogy? Awesome, the connections!!

I am so enjoying this discussion, I love the….aura of it, the feeling of wonder. Unfortunately I am swamped elsewhere and leaving for the Books at the Beach this weekend, but am taking Dome and hope to chirp in from the beach if I can.

But I just really had to say what Jonathan has just posted and what's revealed in the book is just amazing to me, especially in Chapter 3 talking about Rome. When you stand there in Rome and look at the desecration (and really there's no other word for it) and columns just lying there in the sun and you look at things like this:

the columns of the famous Temple of Antoninus and Faustina (front columns 141 BC) with the Church of San Lorenzo in Miranda sort of inside (7th and 8th centuries). And you look up at the top of the columns where they meet the architrave and you see indentations? Right above the flaring out of the top of the column? These were places where they had made holes to put ropes to pull down these columns!

It's like a frozen You Are There! Somebody, centuries ago, was in the very act of destruction (did you wonder HOW they ever dragged down those massive columns?) in carving out gaps, holes, to affix ropes and pull them down when they were stopped! Who stopped them? We know the church stepped in and took it over but WHO made that decision? What was the atmosphere? Don't you wish you could know?

It's just like a movie frozen forever in time.

You just stand there gap jawed at the horror of it. So many of the ancient ruins only saved by the intercession of the church, and there's even controversy over THAT!

The Appian Way! For many years it was the object of a sincere personal pilgrimage. We've all seen the photos of it stretching off into the distance, to get there and walk on it and walk on THAT section usually photographed is another matter. The magnificent tombs which lined it are mostly long gone but the stones of the paving remain, sometimes with grooves, and they will destroy modern vehicles, in a heart beat, it's quite jarring. I can tell you that. The old mile markers still there.

How interesting it is to read in Chapter 3 that by the 12-14th century the Florentines considered themselves to be a daughter of Rome and tried to claim antiquity as well!! I loved the bit about the Forum

(here in 2004)_ as a Field of Cows. Isn't there a famous old drawing of this? Fascinating. Mirabila Urbis.

300,000 tombs lining the Appian Way! And very little remains today!

All carted off, spat upon, etc. They've just opened a museum in the Tomb of Caecilia Metella on the Via Appia Antica, and the entire complex of the Quintilii, but 300,000 tombs!! What a sight that must have been, you can see some of them, the sarcophagi, in museums.

The mighty Baths of Diocletian, now the Church of Maria degli Angeli, saved because of Michaelangelo, still today the great dome is absolutely jaw dropping. It's almost unimaginable till you see it for yourself.

How interesting that Filippo found inspiration in those ruins. The Domus Aurea, Nero's Golden Home, with its elevators and spraying of perfume, long thought to be gone, now open, huge huge vaults. What would Filippo have DONE if he could have seen it!

I thought the sentence "The Romans seem to have possessed some understanding of the structural problems created by tension and compression.." to be an ironic understatement when you consider, just consider their buildings, their aqueducts, just amazing, it's no wonder Filippo came to drink it in, like we all still do. But he had a genius that most of us don't. Oh gosh, look at that diagram of "outward motion", on page 30 of the paperback, wasn't that how they did their arches, too? Just amazing. I would not be able to build a dog house much less something like that.

Do you ever wonder why so many geniuses seem to flourish at the same time? What seems to bring ON this type of artistic flowering? Or periods of artistic genius? Look at that pantheon of names on page 31, all inspired by ancient Rome. When you stand at the foot of the ruins of the Aqua Claudia, still there, all I personally can do is gasp, but others see possibilities, others are inspired, how well this book covers this. I love this book. AND the discussion which captures this sense of wonder SO well.

Here is:

GENISIS PANAL FROM GATES OF PARADISE

with Eve rising from Adam in the center.

Here is:

A DETAIL. ADAM?

Here's a short piece of an article from the Ohio Journal of Science ,

Science in the art of the Italian Renaissance I: Ghiberti's Gates of Paradise--linear perspective and space. (1) (Research Report) Ohio Journal of Science, The, December, 2002 by Douglas D. Kane

ABSTRACT. As with the works of a number of Italian Renaissance artists, Lorenzo Ghiberti's art contained scientific elements. In his case both his training as a goldsmith, which introduced him to concepts of mineralogy, and his knowledge and use of techniques in the realm of the science of optics demonstrated a melding of art and science. Ghiberti's Gates of Paradise was among the first works of the period to use a true scientific study of perspective and space. The greatness ascribed to these bronze doors for the Baptistery of San Giovanni in Florence is due not only to Ghiberti's artistic ...

Duomo interior from the top of the dome

Floor of the Duomo

Clock

Frescos

You can really see the octagonal shape of the dome in this one

Thanks, GINNY. Wonderful pictures. I was looking at photos of Roman ruins in Damascus this morning. They sure got around!

Ross King points out that Brunelleschi must have taken note of the cracks along the inside of the Pantheon dome. He must have been aware of what is now called "hoop stress." I'd say he learned a lot by going to Rome.

How did he and Donatello live? What did they use for money while they were there?

King mentions the fact that the Romans used perspective in their wall paintings, as did the Greeks. He says that Brunelleschi probably figured out his own ideas about perspective from surveying -- measuring what he saw in Rome. ( Chapter 4, Page 35 ) Brunelleschi got himself an education in Rome, as he prepared to build the unusal dome.

Mal

Gosh, Ann, what a teaser that is. What comes after that? I've located the Ohio Journal of Science in a downtown science library. I just have to find out how that sentence ends.

I hope I have more luck than I did when I went looking for another thing. It sounded very promising. 'Brunelleschi's Dome', an article by Rowland J Mainstone, in Architectural Review, Sept 1977. I found the journal alright, bound into annual volumes. Guess which volume was missing. Does one of you guys have it?

Ginny, I just love what you do with, and what you make of the sense of wonder which is there in all of us, once our curiousity is aroused and our interest tweaked. Why, it seems to me, it's almost as great as what King makes of the shadow of Brunelleschi's dome. Not only the people of Tuscany, but a great part of the meaning of the Renaissance finds its way into King's book. For that reason, I guess, it's difficult to remain focused. Just as there were so many questions for you among the ancient Roman ruins, so there are points of interest in the big picture suggested by the book. Great photographs. I loved studying them.

But the dome itself is the thing which should hold our attention. After all it is the main attraction on this our bibliotravel event. Thanks to

Mal, for another magnificent interior view of the dome. The first thought must be: What's holding it up!? But not for long. The details soon catch the imagination and whirl it away up there into the vast spaces of the dome. All those frescoes. And what looks like a catwalk ring at the foot of the dome. Sure enough. There is a little half-open door giving access to it from the internal passages of the dome. What a walk that would be. Let's try to get up there. Anyone suffer from vertigo?

But it doesn't go all the way around. It was stopped before it was finished. Because another architect objected to it. The story goes, Michelangelo strolled in, took one look at what was going on, and exclaimed: "What's that! A pigeon loft?" And with that work ceased and the gallery was left uncompleted.

Joan, that must be Adam there, behind Eve, almost out of sight. What is he doing there. Waiting for his wife to get him out of hot water? That must have some significance, just as every other detail in all the panels has some special meaning. With the whole a magnificently crafted composition of biblical events. Not a wrong line anywhere. If we accept the approval in Michelangelo's exclamation at the sight of the doors: The Gates of Paradise.

The pleasures of art! And of ancient ruins. The few I have seen, mostly abbeys and such in England, Shrewesbury, Whitby, Tintern, etc...and a stroll along Hadrian's wall and a few stones marking out a Roman encampment.

I know what you mean. I find myself searching for that article everywhere as I too would like to know more.

Does anyone else find themselves staring at domes wherever they appear and wondering how they stay up?? Like the Capitol dome in D.C., the many domes of the capitols of our states? The one in WV come to mind, with its shining gold top. But the Capitol building dome is just gorgeous and piques my curiosity.

Mal and Ginny, your links and your photos are wonderful and really give us a sense of the art of antiquity! That duomo ceiling is purely breathtaking.

It was cold here in this apartment this morning. (The central heating broke for good, and I don't have the few thousand dollars to replace it.) I have numerous aches and pains and am not having any fun. Worse, I'm not getting any work done. Went back to bed at 10:30 to warm up and see if I'd feel better. For three solid hours as I tossed and turned I could think of nothing but Brunelleschi and his dome.

Mal

In an Op-Ed column in the New York Times today William Safire has announced that he's retiring. The title of this article is "Never Retire."

At age 75, Safire is taking the helm of the Dana Foundation. ( See http://www.dana.org ) This is a group of neuro-scientists and others who study the brain and what it does and can do. Safire said he's going to re-channel his brain from editor, word maven, novelist, etc. to do this job. More power to him!

It occurred to me that SeniorNet and Books and Lit are places where we exercise and re- channel our brains all the time. Earlier I was thinking that I may have aches and pains; I may spend a lot of time in a wheelchair, I may not get out much any more, but I know more now and am learning more, thanks to the computer and what it offers me, than I ever did in my life.

Here's one of the results

SeniorNet on www.dana.org

Mal, this is dreadful. You shouldn't have to feel that way. I think I've botched it. Justin is right. Let's deep-six it, and turn our minds to other things. Let's take one more look at the Botticellis in the Uffizi and go home. I have some other ideas.

JONATHAN, every time I get comfortable in this Florentine pool, you come in and pull the plug!

Whether you realize it or not there are several of us here who are intrigued by this story about Brunelleschi and his dome and events that occurred in Florence at the time it was built. I mean, if thoughts of Brunelleshi keep me awake when I'm trying to sleep, that's a good thing, isn't it?

Now, just relax and try to enjoy this discussion, will you, please? I'll be back when the sun comes up to say more about the book.

Mal

In Chapter 4 on Page 37 there is a diagram which shows exactly what the wooden centering supporting an arch looks like. This is what Brunelleschi did not use when he built the dome of the Santa Maria del Fiore cathedral. As I see it, Ross King has written a book in which he tries not to explain just the riddle of how Brunelleschi accomplished this, but to show the atmophere and environment in the city where it was built.

Brunelleschi made a model of this cupola that took 90 days and several men to build. When people saw this model, there were many who were skeptical about it. Brunelleschi refused to give the details about how he was going to build the cupola without centering, and he was called "that madman who utters such nonsense." How many creative inventors and designers have been tagged with similar epithets? I think of Eli Whitney, and I remember reading that people thought splitting the atom was impossible. Brunelleschi was not a scientist, engineer or an architect, and this made his position even more difficult.

Ross tells us that the reasons the wardens of the Great Council decided to hire Brunelleschi to build the dome are unclear. Brunelleschi's biggest competition was Lorenzo Ghiberti. His model for the cupola took a much shorter time to build than Brunelleschi's did. There's proof that he used centering because he hired a carpenter to work on it.

Why, then, was Brunelleschi the winner of this competition?

Were there political reasons? Religious reasons?

What do you think? Why was Brunelleschi's plan chosen over the more conventional one done by Ghiberti?

Mal

Look at the pictures linked below once again and think about the diagram for centering on Page 37 of the book.

The dome

Arches and vaults

Models for the dome at the Museum of the Opera del Duomo in Florence. (In Italian "opera" means "work")

Some really beautiful pictures of Florence including the interiors of the Brunelleschi dome and the Baptistry dome

Type of tree used for crane??? That's 19th century thinking, isn't it? This man was a genius if he could determine another and better way to build the duomo. After looking at the drawings, I am wondering how he across the idea without the knowledge of geometry.

Mal,

Interesting question concerning why the Opera chose this man's model over Ghiberti's. Maybe they chose Brunileschi over Gilberti because they had given the Baptristry doors to Gilberti which supplied him with work for years and they thought he wouldn't give the Duomo the focused attention that a "new face on the block" might would.

I'll just bet you are intrigued by this story, Mal. I know you well enough by now. You are working on your next book. How can one sleep when those creative juices are flowing? A quick look at what is popular reading should make it obvious what you have in mind. If Dan Brown could have so much success with Da Vinci, why not someone else with Brunelleschi. The Brunelleschi Code? Why not. The code to what? His mind? Or the dome with its crazy construction and the maze of passages built into it? And those images on the ceiling!

How about The Phantom of the Dome? Do with Santa Maria della Fiore what Victor Hugo did with that other cathedral.

I'm sure your lively imagination can see the endless possibilities.

I spent a long time contemplating the lovely Florence Images. The beautiful sunset over the Arno bridge. The cityscape. It looks like some work is being done on part of the dome. Again, all those suggestive images on the ceiling. The Last Judgement, isn't it? The Florentines are hiding something with that preoccupation. There is a lot of material there for you to work with. Thinking on that would keep anyone awake all night. Have you given names to those two sitting on the bench in the Museo? Did Brunelleschi have anything to do with the architecture of Santa Maria Novella? I like the Baptistery ceiling frescoes better than the others. Again the Last Judgement. Kinder after a fashion, it seems to me. Meant for the kids of course.

Bless you, Mal. You were the first on the bus, away back then, on Christmas Eve. Were you surprised to find the ticket in your stocking? We have been on the road for a month! And we have come a long way. Just leave me out of your novel, please.

JONATHAN, have you forgotten already who's sitting on the bench at the Museo of the Opera del Duomo? How could you forget that wonderful afternoon?

What an interesting suggestion -- write a novel set in Florence, a city I've never set foot in except here! I'd have to write it in code to protect myself from well-meaning people who'd point out all my mistakes.

You're right about my working on the next novel. I'm nearly finished with the sixteenth chapter of Conspiracy. It's about two separate factions which are planning to take over the United States government, and, no, you're not in it . . . though I could sneak you in when . . .

It's a departure from what I've written before, and very different from the book being published, whose skeleton is the mounting of a stage play, but which is mostly about the people in the play and those who put it together. It's a little on the lines of "Noises Off," if you've seen that production.

It is not the first novel I ever wrote. No, that one was done over twenty years before. This new one is the 16th novel I've written. You want novels for dessert? Come rummage around in my cupboard!

I imagine that Brunelleschi had forty million ideas running around in his head all at the same time the way I do. He certainly wasn't going to tell anyone about them, either, not the way artists and architects and scientists were stealing from each other during the Renaiisance -- or any time. To tell you the truth, it's just like that now!

Mal

This was in the newspaper a few days ago, but it appeared on the web today:

Da Vinci Workshop Discovered in Italy -Researcher By Phil Stewart ROME (Jan. 25) -- A forgotten workshop of Leonardo da Vinci, complete with 500-year-old frescos and a secret room to dissect human cadavers, has been discovered in Florence, Italy...
The find was made in part of the Santissima Annunziata convent, which let out rooms to artists centuries ago and where the likely muse of the Renaissance artist's masterwork, the Mona Lisa, may have worshipped. "It's a bit absurd to think that, in 2005, we have found the studio of one of history's greatest artists. But that is what has happened," said Manescalchi, one of three researchers credited for this month's discovery.
"The proof is on the walls." Frescos adorning part of the workshop were left undisturbed over the centuries and gradually forgotten. The wing of the convent was eventually split by a wall and is partially claimed today by the Institute of Military Geography.
In a slide-show presentation to media, Manescalchi pointed to one colorful fresco with a character conspicuously missing from the foreground. The white silhouette bore a striking resemblance to da Vinci's painting of the archangel Gabriel, who appears in his "Annunciation" hanging in Florence's Uffizi gallery.
The walls were also adorned with paintings of birds, one of which strongly resembled a sketch from da Vinci's "Atlantic Codex," a 1,286-page collection of drawings and writings by the painter, sculptor, inventor and scientist.
Another painting was similar to a drawing in da Vinci's codex on the flight of birds.
Manescalchi speculated that da Vinci had assistants in his workshop and probably used a "secret" corner room for his dissections of human corpses, aimed at improving his understanding of anatomy.
While some experts have cautioned that it is still too early to say Manescalchi has found da Vinci's studio, the researcher, who made the discovery earlier this month, was convinced further research would back up his claims.
The find has sparked speculation that while da Vinci was using the workshop, he might have met the probable model for the Mona Lisa, Lisa Gherardini, wife of a Florentine merchant whose family had a chapel in the Santissima Annunziata.
Da Vinci is thought to have painted the Mona Lisa after he presumably left the convent, but Manescalchi said he was reviewing documents for evidence that the two met during his stay there from 1501 to 1502. [01/25/05]

I read that article earlier in the discussion, maybe last week. Its amazing the things they find while building something else.

Imagine my surprise tonight during a phone call when I learned that my second son, Christopher, has been in Florence. I must ask him if he has pictures taken during that trip.

When I told Chris how lucky he was to have been there, he said, "Do you want to go? I'll send you over." Of course, sadly enough, that's well nigh impossible. I don't even get out to the supermarket 6 miles away, for Pete's sake!

Mal

If I could think that the article was of greater interest to you for having taken part in this discussion, I would feel greatly rewarded.

A great thanks to everyone who participated. I hope you all enjoyed it. Everyone certainly made a unique contribution. All of you were just great in something perhaps a bit off the beaten track. Those of you who have been to Florence may have felt it was less than expected. Those of us who have not been there, now feel that we know a bit about a marvellous time and place. So, there you are. If you were lurking and want to know how the book ends...read it. The dome was finished. God, how Brunelleschi must have sweated at times. This was new ground.

I've had a lot of fun. More than any of you can imagine. I've made the journey I couldn't make ten years ago because of health problems. Sorry about the erratic driving.

"Why, then, was Brunelleschi the winner of this competition?

Were there political reasons? Religious reasons?"

Good question. After reading Dante, I was left with the feeling that everything done in Florence was politically corrupt -- and I've been waiting for that shoe to drop. But it seems unlikely that obscure B would have had political influence.

I know how you feel, Mal. My Latin class is talking about a trip to Pompeii. How I would like to go, but I don't suppose Pompeii is wheelchair accessible.

JONATHAN, you'll take me to Florence or the supermarket or both? Well, good. Though you've never driven the bus down here, you know where I live. Drive right up the driveway hill. After I get on the bus, you can turn around in the back of the house in the parking area by the woods. Then we can continue our conversation on the way.

Grazie a tutti.

Mal

Picture: Pitti Palace, home of the Medici

Royal apartments 1, Pitti Palace

Royal aprtments 2

Royal apartments 3

Caravaggio's Cupid at the Pitti Palace

Palazzo Pitti ceiling

Palazzo Pitti gallery