The Cathedral Builders: The Story of a Great Masonic GuildScott, Leader
History
The Cathedral Builders: The Story of a Great Masonic Guild
Scott, Leader
Cathedrals; Church architecture; Guilds
As no artist in especial is named as having received this sum, I
should myself imagine that as usual several Masters of the guild
worked at it, but that one was _capo maestro_, and drew the design.
Comparing it with the monument of Can della Scala at Verona, which is
a certified work of Bonino da Campione, Sacchi argues that he was the
designer and sculptor of this Arca. The style in both is semi-Gothic,
the arches following the same curve and resting on columns; the
friezes and ornaments are so much alike as to be in some parts
identical in design; the crown of pyramids and _cupolini_ which
finishes the monument on the top, the form of the pinnacles, and their
floriations are more than similar.
The Arca di S. Agostino is, however, the more elaborate. It has
ninety-five statues in its niches, not counting statuettes. One may
count nearly three hundred distinct works of sculpture in the
composition. (Would not this redundancy prove it the work of a school
rather than one hand?) Sacchi justly observes that if Can Scaliger
confided to Bonino the commission for his monument, it must have been
because he had seen proofs of his skill; and where could this have
been more probable than in the Arca at Milan?
A suggestive proof of the Arca di S. Agostino being the joint work of
the Comacine Guild, is suggested by Merzario.[154] Over the colonnade
of the Arca are twelve statues, but in front of these stand the
_Quattro Santi Coronati_, the four artist martyrs. One of these is
represented stooping to examine the base of a pillar; another trying
the diminution of a column with the "T" square, and a third
measures a reversed capital, and holds a scroll on which is written in
Gothic letters, _Quatuor Coronatorum_; the fourth is working with
hammer and chisel.
Now these four saints, being the special patrons of the Comacine
Guild, would have little significance to any other artists.
The sepulchre of Can Signorio de Scaliger in Verona was begun in his
lifetime, and on his own commission, and cost 10,000 gold florins. He
died in 1375, so it must date slightly prior to that. _Bonino de
Campiglione Mediolanensis_ has signed his name in marble on the
frieze. It is a fine specimen of Gothic ornamentation, at the
culmination of the Campionese school.
There were also earlier works of Bonino's at Cremona; one a sepulchre
to Folchino de Schicci, a jurisconsult, in the chapel of St. Catherine
in the Duomo, beautifully worked with friezes, etc., in bas-reliefs.
It is signed in Gothic characters--
"Hoc sepulcrum est nobilis et
Egregii militis et juris periti
D Folchini de Schiciis qui
obiit anno D,MCCCLVII
Die Julii et heredum ejus
Justitia, Temperantia Fortitudo Prudentia
Magis. Bonino de Campilione me fec."[155]
[Illustration: TOMB OF CAN SIGNORIO DEGLI SCALIGERI AT VERONA. BY
MAGISTER BONINO DA CAMPIONE, 1374.
_See page 204._]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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