A Wanderer in Florence | Page 4

stone seat on
the south side and watch the builders, little thinking how soon he was
to be driven from Florence for ever. This seat--the Sasso di Dante--was
still to be seen when Wordsworth visited Florence in 1837, for he wrote
a sonnet in which he tells us that he in reverence sate there too, "and,
for a moment, filled that empty Throne". But one can do so no longer,
for the place which it occupied has been built over and only a slab in
the wall with an inscription (on the house next the Palazzo de' Canonici)
marks the site.
Arnolfo died in 1310, and thereupon there seems to have been a
cessation or slackening of work, due no doubt to the disturbed state of
the city, which was in the throes of costly wars and embroilments. Not
until 1332 is there definite news of its progress, by which time the work
had passed into the control of the Arte della Lana; but in that year,
although Florentine affairs were by no means as flourishing as they
should be, and a flood in the Arno had just destroyed three or four of
the bridges, a new architect was appointed, in the person of the most
various and creative man in the history of the Renaissance--none other
than Giotto himself, who had already received the commission to
design the campanile which should stand at the cathedral's side.
Giotto was the son of a small farmer at Vespignano, near Florence. He
was instructed in art by Cimabue, who discovered him drawing a lamb
on a stone while herding sheep, and took him as his pupil. Cimabue, of
whom more is said, together with more of Giotto as a painter, in the
chapter on the Accademia, had died in 1302, leaving Giotto far beyond

all living artists, and Giotto, between the age of fifty and sixty, was
now residing in Cimabue's house. He had already painted frescoes in
the Bargello (introducing his friend Dante), in S. Maria Novella, S.
Croce, and elsewhere in Italy, particularly in the upper and lower
churches at Assisi, and at the Madonna dell' Arena chapel at Padua
when Dante was staying there during his exile. In those days no man
was painter only or architect only; an all-round knowledge of both arts
and crafts was desired by every ambitious youth who was attracted by
the wish to make beautiful things, and Giotto was a universal master. It
was not then surprising that on his settling finally in Florence he should
be invited to design a campanile to stand for ever beside the cathedral,
or that he should be appointed superintendent of the cathedral works.
Giotto did not live to see even his tower completed--it is the unhappy
destiny of architects to die too soon--but he was able during the four
years left him to find time for certain accessory decorations, of which
more will be said later, and also to paint for S. Trinità the picture which
we shall see in the Accademia, together with a few other works, since
perished, for the Badia and S. Giorgio. He died in 1336 and was buried
in the cathedral, as the tablet, with Benedetto da Maiano's bust of him,
tells. He is also to be seen full length, in stone, in a niche at the Uffizi;
but the figure is misleading, for if Vasari is to be trusted (and for my
part I find it amusing to trust him as much as possible) the master was
insignificant in size.
Giotto has suffered, I think, in reputation, from Ruskin, who took him
peculiarly under his wing, persistently called him "the Shepherd," and
made him appear as something between a Sunday-school
superintendent and the Creator. The "Mornings in Florence" and
"Giotto and his Works in Padua" so insist upon the artist's holiness and
conscious purpose in all he did that his genial worldliness, shrewdness,
and humour, as brought out by Dante, Vasari, Sacchetti, and Boccaccio,
are utterly excluded. What we see is an intense saint where really was a
very robust man. Sacchetti's story of Giotto one day stumbling over a
pig that ran between his legs and remarking, "And serve me right; for
I've made thousands with the help of pigs' bristles and never once given
them even a cup of broth," helps to adjust the balance; while to his

friend Dante he made a reply, so witty that the poet could not forget his
admiration, in answer to his question how was it that Giotto's pictures
were so beautiful and his six children so ugly; but I must leave the
reader to hunt it for himself, as these are modest pages. Better still, for
its dry humour, was his answer to King Robert of Naples, who had
commanded him to that