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The order of the composition had the form of a triumphal arch, and above the columns that supported the cornice was a marble tablet three braccia in height and four braccia and a half in width, in which was a scene in half-relief.
At that time Tribolo had finished a model for the shaft of the fountain in the labyrinth, in which are some Satyrs in low-relief, four masks in half-relief, and four little boys in the round, who are seated upon certain caulicoles.
Bartolommeo Gondi, of whom we have spoken in the Life of Giotto, has a Madonna in half-relief by the hand of Donato, wrought with so great love and diligence that it is not possible to see anything better, or to imagine the fancifulness which he gave to her headdress and the loveliness that he put into the garments which she is wearing.
Some unseen hand drew a blind over the great window and an eerie green-and-golden light began to play from one end of the room, throwing the dancers into half-relief and deepening the mystery. Sweet strange scents were wafted in from under the silken hangings. The room grew cooler by unguessed means. Every sense was treacherously wooed.
Above the counter where the friars sell the candles, moreover, he made a half-length Madonna of marble with the Child in her arms, in half-relief, of the size of life and very devout; and a similar work in the Office of the Wardens of Works of S. Maria del Fiore.
The Barrocco museum of Rome has a very lifelike replica of this type in half-relief. Though its firm, dry workmanship seems to be of a few decades later than Vergil's youth it may well be a fairly faithful copy of one of the first busts of Vergil made at the time when the Eclogues had spread his fame through Rome. Capitolino, p. 355; Bernoulli, Röm.
The same Cardinal Farnese afterwards desired to have a very rich casket made of silver, and had the work executed by Manno, a Florentine goldsmith, of whom there will be an account in another place; but he entrusted all the compartments of crystal to Giovanni, who made them all full of scenes, with marble in half-relief; and he made figures of silver and ornaments in the round, and all with such diligence, that no other work of that kind was ever carried to such perfection.
After this, being requested to return to Lucca, Jacopo went there very willingly, and made on a marble panel in S. Friano, for Federigo di Maestro Trenta del Veglia, a Virgin with her Son in her arms, and S. Sebastian, S. Lucia, S. Jerome, and S. Gismondo, with good manner, grace, and design; and in the predella below he made in half-relief, under each Saint, some scene from the life of each, which was something very lovely and pleasing, seeing that Jacopo gave gradation to his figures from plane to plane with beautiful art, making them lower as they receded.
Besides this, he made there many most beautiful animals, and also many most lovely devices of gentlemen and lords of that illustrious house, together with some scenes in half-relief, executed in stucco; and on the field of the vaulting he did the rest of the work in pictures, counterfeiting them after the manner of cameos in black and white, and so well, that nothing better could be imagined.
He then set his hand to a scene of marble, one braccio high and one and a half wide, partly in half-relief and partly in low-relief, in which he represented the restoration of Pisa by the Duke, who is in the work present in person at the restoration of that city, which is being pressed forward by his presence.
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