PIAZZA E CHIESA SANTA MARIA NOVELLA

Pucellai, about 1469, instructed Leo Battista Alberti to design a grand facade for the church of Santa Maria Novella. The square, upon which one now comes upon issuing from the cloister, was then the largest in Florence, even worse off for open spaces in the time of the Medici than it is now. In 1331 a decree had been issued for the laying out of this piazza, and thirteen years later, when Peter Martyr was delivering a series of sermons against an heretical sect called the Paterini, it was still further enlarged.

As all the inhabitants of Florence were very fond of festivals and sight-seeing, an open space of this kind was indispensable ; and when in after-years the Grand Duke Cosimo got up tournaments, jousts, and so forth, it was there that the chariot races, with their four colors of green, red, sky-blue and white, were held. The prize was a piece of crimson cloth, and seats were erected all round the amphitheatre for the populace. At first some wooden pyramids served as goals for the competitors, but in 1608 Giovanni da Bologna erected the two small obelisks in Seravezza marble, resting on tortoises and surmounted by bronze lilies.

The church is very famous in Florence, and with its agglomeration of monastic buildings and cloisters is one of the most interesting in the city. In 1221 the Dominicans took possession of the ancient sanctuary, and began building a new church. Two of their order, Fra Ristoro and Fra Sixtus, were appointed architects a number of years later, and the work was completed, as we see it now, in 1470. The low arcades on the right were used as tombs, beneath which the principal families living in the quarter were buried.

The interior is Gothic, and in the shape of a Latin cross, thus forming a marked contrast with the classical character of Alberti's facade. This church is as much a museum as it is a sanctuary, some of the greatest names in Italy being commemorated there. It contains the Rucellai and Strozzi Chapels, the tomb of the Beata Villana (1360), of G. B. Ricasoli, of Bishop Alliotti, of the Patriarch of Constantinople, who died in Florence in 1440, and the mausoleum of Aldobrandini Cavalcanti. The tomb of Filippo Strozzi is by Benedetto da Maiano, but the balustrade of the organ loft by Baccio d'Agnolo has been sold to the South Kensington Museum.

The Ruccellai Chapel contains the celebrated Madonna by Cimabue, which is regarded as the starting-point of the Florentine school, and there are many other paintings of great importance in Santa Maria Novella, including two frescoes of " St. Philip Exorcising the Demon " and of " St. John the Evangelist Raising Drusiana to Life." But the artist who has done most for this church is Domenico Ghirlandajo, who was employed by Tornabuoni to paint in the choir a series of scenes from the lives of the Virgin and St. John Baptist in which appear likenesses of several members of his own family and of other illustrious persons of the day. Among them are Luca Pitti, Baldovinetti, Piero Tornabuoni, Cosimo son of Lorenzo, Bartolini, Salimbeni, Francesca Pitti, Politian, Marcilio Ficino, Cristoforo Landino, Andrea de' Medici, and all the members of the Tornabuoni and Ridolfi families. At this period Michael Angelo was one of his pupils, and in the " Visitation of Mary to Elizabeth " he is said to have painted the man looking from a balcony in the distance.

The walls of the Strozzi Chapel are covered with frescoes by Filippino Lippi, and the cloisters are full of most interesting works. In the Spanish Chapel Taddeo Gaddi and Memmi painted the Church Militant and the Church Triumphant, and Memmi is believed to have introduced into his picture the leading men of his day. The subject of Gaddi's picture is St. Thomas Aquinas seated in a pulpit, surrounded by the Prophets, the Evangelists and the angelic host. The Great Cloister, as it is called, which communicates with this one, is the largest in Florence, and is decorated with paintings by various masters. It was a vast religious establishment, dispersed at the time of the Revolution, and founded in 1278, covering more than 200,000 feet of ground. There were the Pope's quarters and the Pope's chapel; and the refectory, built by Talenti in 1460, containing several paintings, including Allori's famous composition representing the miraculous supply of manna in the desert. The Spezeria of Santa Maria Novella still remains open. It is entered by a door on the Via Scala, and is celebrated for the liqueurs and perfumes prepared there.

Altogether Santa Maria Novella is a true sanctuary of art, the chapel of Ghirlandajo giving a better idea than any other place in Florence of the prolific genius of that day, while the compositions in the cloisters are worthy to be compared with those in the Campo Santo at Pisa.

THE PIAZZA DELLA SANTISSIMA ANNUNZIATA

This is one of the finest squares in Florence, surrounded by arcades and decorated with busts of the Medicean Grand Dukes. Approaching it from the south, there is a fine view of the church of the Annunziata, while to the right it is flanked by the Foundling Hospital, and to the left by the convent of the order of Servites. These buildings are all much in the same style. In the centre of the square is an equestrian statue of Ferdinand I. by John of Bologna, while to the right and left are two fountains by Pietro Tacca, in which monsters of the deep are in the act of vomiting water into bronze shells.

The statue was erected in 1608, the veteran sculptor being at that time eighty years of age, and the work was done by order of Ferdinand II., as a tribute to the memory of his predecessor, and also to commemorate the victory of the Knights of St. Stephen over the Turks, the cannon taken from the latter being used to make the statue, which bore the inscription, " Con la fusione dei metalli rapid al ficro Trace." Ferdinand II. afterwards had the large bronze shield, with motto, "Majestate Tantum," seine of bees, let in at the base of the statue.

The portico of the church is of the Corinthian order, the central arcade having been built for Leo X., after the designs of A. da San Gallo, while the money for the other arcades was found by Alexander and Robert Pucci. The central door leads into the church, and opens upon the beautiful portico decorated by Andrea del Sarto ; that to the left leads to the cloister, and thence to the church, through the door over which Sarto painted the famous " Madonna del Sacco." The door to the right opens into the chapel of St. Sebastian, with its tiny cupola which rises above the portico. This church is one of the marvels of Florence, and so many additions have been made to it of late that it is now resplendent with gold and precious marbles. Its thirty chapels were decorated by all the princes who succeeded one another in Tuscany, from the time of the first Medici down to the last representatives of their race.

The building of the Foundling Hospital was decided upon at the meeting of the Communal Council on the 25th of October, 1421, the mover of the resolution being Leonardo Bruni, who is buried in Santa Croce. When Filippo Brunelleschi, to whom the work was given, had to leave Florence on account of his previous engagements, he prepared the designs, and left his pupil, Francesco della Luna, to carry them out. This was much to be regretted, for the latter changed the lines of the edifice, and having once begun to make alterations, he did not know where to stop. The facade has a handsome portico with nine arcades, and in the spandrels may be noticed terra-cotta medallions representing infants in swaddling-clothes, as typical of the object of the building.

The frescoes are by Poccetti, an artist of some merit, and over the door leading from the court to the church is an Annunciation of the Virgin by Luca della Robbia.