THE BAPTISTERY OF SAN GIOVANNI

This is the most ancient building in Florence, for if not of pagan origin it certainly dates from the earliest ages of Christianity. It was coated with marble of different colors by Arnolfo di Cambio in 1293, while in the sixteenth century Agnolo Gaddi designed the lantern ; but long before Arnolfo's time it had been employed as a Christian place of worship, being used as a cathedral up to 1128, when it was converted into a baptistery.

This building contains three gates, which have no parallel in the world. The oldest is that on the southern side, upon which Pisano spent twenty-two years of his life, a most beautiful work representing, in twenty compartments, the life of St. John the Baptist. The frieze which runs round it was commenced nearly a century afterwards by Ghiberti, and Pollaiuolo had much to do with its completion.

The northern gates are by Ghiberti, and, like those of Pisano, are divided into twenty compartments, the subject being the life of Christ. The bronze door-posts are delicately carved with flowers, fruit, and animals. These gates were first placed on the eastern side, but in 1452 were removed to make room for Ghiberti's still finer work.

On the third facade, that which faces the Duomo, is the Porta del Paradise, so named by Michael Angelo, who declared that this gate was worthy to be the entrance into Paradise. Ghiberti divided each panel into five parts, taking the following as his subjects, after suggestions made by .Leonardo Bruni Aretino: (1) Creation of Adam and Eve; (2) Cain and Abel ; (3) Noah ; (4) Abraham and Isaac ; (5) Jacob and Esau ; (6) Joseph in Egypt ; (7) Moses on Mount Sinai i (8) The Capture of Jericho ; (9) David Slaying Goliath ; (10) The Queen of Sheba and Solomon.

The frieze contains statuettes of the prophets and prophetesses and portrait-busts of men and women still alive, including Ghiberti himself and his father ; while the frame-posts, with their masses of vegetation and flora wrought in bronze, and are admirable for their truth to nature. Bronze groups representing the "Decapitation of St. John the Baptist," by Danti, and the "Baptism of our Lord," by Andrea Sansovino, surmount two of the gates, which were at one time heavily gilded, though few traces of this are now visible.

The Baptistery, empty as it appears to the eye upon first entering it, is replete with beautiful monuments, a description of which would fill a good-sized volume. It is built, as I have already said, upon an octagonal plan. The altar, which formerly stood beneath the cupola, has been removed. On the 24th of June every year the magnificent retablo in massive silver, which is preserved among the treasures in the Opera del Duomo, is displayed in the Baptistery. The silver alone weighs 325 lbs., including two centre pieces, two side pieces, and a silver crucifix with two statuettes seven feet high and weighing 141 lbs., the group being completed by two statues of Peace in engine-turned silver. Many artists were employed upon the making of it. Finiguerra, Pollaiuolo, Cione, Michelozzi, Verrocchio, and Cennini made the lower parts and the bas-reliefs of the front, while the cross, executed in 1456, is by Bette, di Francesco, and the base of it by Milano di Domenico Dei and Antonio Pollaiuolo.

The interior of the cupola of San Giovanni is ornamented with some of the oldest specimens of mosaic decoration in Florence, these Byzantine artists being the first, after Murano and Altino, to exercise their craft in Italy, and being succeeded by Jacopo da Turita, Andrea Tafi, and Gaddo Gaddi.

In the biography of Cosimo the Elder I have alluded to the handsome tomb of Baldassare Cossa (Pope John XXITI., deposed at the time of the Council of Constance), which was reared in the Baptistery by Donatello. The Holy of Holies is relatively modern, having been erected at the expense of the Guild of the, ` Calimala," as the men who gave the finishing touch to the woollen stuffs manufactured abroad were called. The baptismal font, in a building specially used for christening, would, as a matter of course, be intrusted to artists of great repute, and that at San Giovanni is attributed to Andrea Pisano. Upon each face is represented one of the Baptisms most famous in the history of the Catholic religion, an inscription beneath explaining each episode ; but this font is unfortunately so much in the background that it escapes the notice of many visitors.

Donatello carved the wooden statue of the Magdalen which occupies one of the niches, the thin emaciated face being typical of the artist's partiality for reproducing in their smallest details the physical defects of his subject. With regard to the other features of interest in the Baptistery, they will be found noticed in their proper place the mosaics of Andrea Tafi in the chapter on Painting, and the bas-reliefs of Ghiberti in that on sculpture, while the works of Donatello and Pisano have already been dealt with. The exterior aspect of the Baptistery does not give one the idea of a building restored in the thirteenth, but rather in the fifteenth century.

THE PONTE VECCHIO

Until the close of 1080 the Ponte Vecchio was built of wood, the heavy masses of timber, though offering no steady resistance to the stream, dividing the muddy course of the waters into a thousand small currents, and breaking its force. But in 1177 occurred one of those inundations which were so frequent that traces of them may still be seen on the walls of the quays. These inundations were one of the curses of Florence, and though the evil has been to a certain extent cured by the construction of massive quays, they still occur in the direction of the Calcine. An attempt was accordingly made in the twelfth century to obviate this inconvenience by the construction of a stone bridge. This, in turn, was carried away in 1333, and Taddeo Gaddi, who had already made a name for himself by his architectural skill, was employed to build a bridge capable of resisting the highest floods. The present bridge was therefore erected in 1345, being 330 feet long by 44 wide. With the double object of obtaining an income for the city and of introducing a novel feature, shops were built on the two pathways, which were 16 feet wide, and these were let to the butchers of Florence, thus realizing the Eastern plan of concentrating the meat trade of a town in one place. This arrangement lasted from 1422 until 1593, but in the latter year, under Cosimo I., the "Capitani di Parte," who had the supervision of the streets and highways, ordered that all the goldsmiths and jewellers should take the place of the butchers, and in a few months the Ponte Vecchio became the wealthiest and most crowded thoroughfare of Florence. In order to avoid shutting out a view of the stream and interfering with the perspective, an open space had been reserved in the centre, and when the Palazzo Vecchio and the Uffizi were connected with the Pitti Palace by means of the large covered way carried over the bridge, this space was left intact so as to afford a view of the eminence of San Miniato upon one side, of the windings of the stream on the other, and of the Cascine shrubberies and the mountains upon the horizon.

The first bridge above was built in 1235 by Messer Rubaconte, a Milanese of the Casa Mandella, then Podesta of Florence, and is called Alle Grazie. The first bridge of Santa Trinita, afterwards replaced by the beautiful one which we owe to the genius of Ammanati, was built by Messer Lamberto Frescobaldi, and the bridge Alla Carraja was begun in 1218 by one Lapo. The great flood of 1333 carried all of them away, and this disaster is recorded upon a stone which bears the following inscription :

Del Trentatre dopo I'mille Tracento, I1 Ponte Cadde per diluvio d'Acque Poi dodici anni, come al comun piacque, Rifatto fu con questo adornamento."