Through this twofold influence the dome became very frequent throughout Italy. It was carried, as we have seen, by Charles the Great, from Ravenna to Aix-la-Chapelle, and, later on, was carried forward from Lombardy, under the first three Othos, across the Alps, down the valley of the Rhine, and far into the interior of Germany. Only a few years later it was conveyed from Venice into the interior of the south-west of France, whence it spread throughout an extensive district stretching eastward into Auvergne, and even as far as Lyons, and northward to the banks of the Loire, where, to this day, the effigies of our early Plantagenet kings lie beneath a series of pendentive domes almost as perfect as if at Constantinople. I will not dwell at much length on the domes which were derived from purely Roman traditions, because they, for the most part, suggest no new type or development. [Illustration: 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. [Illustration: 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. The greater part of the Italian domes of these periods and of this class, simply cover the crossing or the central tower of a cruciform church, and exhibit no important development. The most original, perhaps, is the dome of the cathedral at Sienna, which stands upon six piers, forming a hexagon, each side of which is equal in width to the nave and choir (Fig. 438). In the next stage, the angles are corbelled-out, so as to form in the upper storey a dodecagon, which form is followed out in the dome. [Illustration: Fig. 437.--Section, Baptistery at Parma.] [Illustration: Fig. 436.--Plan of Baptistery at Parma.]