United States or Russia ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
All his gifts to the Duomo of Milan are confirmed, including the rich plate and vestments presented by Azzo Visconti to the chapel of S. Gottardo in the old palace, and removed by Duke Galeazzo to the Castello, but restored by Lodovico.
This bell-tower does not display the gigantic force of Cremona's famous torrazzo, shooting 396 feet into blue ether from the city square; nor can it rival the octagon of S. Gottardo for warmth of hue. Yet it has a character of elegance, combined with boldness of invention, that justifies the citizens of Crema in their pride.
They were set on foot for the public use, and were constructed at the expense of the commonwealths. It is, however, right to add that what the communes had begun the princes continued. To the splendid taste of the Visconti dynasty, for instance, Milan owed her wonderful Duomo and the octagon bell-tower of S. Gottardo.
To Aldo were born Jacopo, who died at seventy-two; Gottardo, who died at eighty-four; and Fazio, the father of Jerome, who died at eighty. Fazio, albeit he came of such a long-lived stock, and lived himself to be fourscore, suffered much physical trouble during his life.
Azzo deserves special commendation from the student of art for the exquisite octagonal tower of S. Gottardo, which he built of terra cotta with marble pilasters, in Milan. It is quite one of the loveliest monuments of mediæval Italian architecture. Lucchino and Galeazzo Visconti were both afflicted with gout, the latter to such an extent as to be almost crippled.
It was thus that the Fabrianese murdered the members of their ruling house, the Chiavelli, during high mass, the signal being given by the words of the Creed, 'Et incarnatus est. At Milan the Duke Giovan Maria Visconti was assassinated at the entrance of the church of San Gottardo Galeazzo Maria Sforza in the church of Santo Stefano, and Lodovico il Moro only escaped the daggers of the adherents of the widowed Duchess Bona, through entering the church of Sant' Ambrogio by another door than that by which he was expected.
Ippolita, a miracle of rose and gold, in a white gauzy robe, her hair crowned with daisies, was Queen of Love and Beauty, fanned by ladies in red. Del Dardo tilted with Vittore Marzipane, Gottardo de' Brancacci with Giacomo Fèo, a young lion from the Romagna. Messer Meleagro very nearly fell off his horse.
Nor was it in their welding of the bricks alone that these craftsmen showed their science. They were wont to enrich the surface with marble, sparingly but effectively employed as in those slender detached columns, which add such beauty to the octagon of S. Gottardo, or in the string-courses of strange beasts and reptiles that adorn the church fronts of Pavia.
I made a meal there, talking to all my companions left and right in a new speech of my own, which was made up, as it were, of the essence of all the Latin tongues, saying 'Ha! Si jo a traversa li montagna no erat facile! Nenni! II san Gottardo? Nil est! pooh! poco! Ma hesterna jo ha voulu traversar in Val Bavona, e credi non ritornar, namfredo, fredo erat in alto! La tourmente ma prise...
When they came to put the puzzle together, they laid each brick against its neighbour, filling up the almost imperceptible interstices with liquid cement composed of quicklime and fine sand in water. After five centuries the seams between the layers of bricks that make the bell-tower of S. Gottardo at Milan, yield no point of vantage to the penknife or the chisel.
Word Of The Day