Fig. 434.—Plan, Baptistery at Florence.
The most magnificent, probably, is that of the Baptistery at Florence, a noble work of early, though unknown, date. It is clearly founded in a great degree upon the Pantheon, though of octagonal plan, and with a dome of the same form ([Fig. 434]). Its sides are in two storeys—the first with deeply-recessed colonnades on each side—the upper stage a clerestory. One face, however, is occupied by the arch of the sanctuary ([Fig. 435]).
The dome had formerly an eye, like the Pantheon, but has now a lantern turret. It is encrusted with beautiful mosaic work, with an infinity of figures, the side over the sanctuary having a colossal figure of our Lord in Majesty in a vesica. The architecture is of marble, and the pavement is tesselated work. The whole internal effect is beautiful and impressive in the extreme.
Fig. 435.—Section, Baptistery at Florence.
A parallel work is the Baptistery at Parma, a work of the twelfth century. It is polygonal in plan, and greatly inferior to that of Florence (Figs. [436], [437]). The church of San Tomaso in Limine, near Bejamo, is simply like an ordinary Templars’ church, with a hemispherical dome over its clerestory, and a turret rising from its apex. San Stephano, at Bologna, is in some degree on the same type.