Transcript Santa Croce - Artigianelli

Santa Croce
The Largest Franciscan church in the world.
Who are these?
Pretend you know these people
Susan
Bob
Today Bob and Susan are visiting Santa Croce
It is our job to tell them how to get around the church.
• Susan still doesn’t
really know anything
about Santa Croce.
• Is there any
information you
know?
• We start in the piazza.
•Looking at the church we tell Bob and Susan to walk straight.
Santa Croce is built in gothic style.
• What is gothic style?
• Gothic is a style of architecture which developed in northern France
and spread throughout Europe between the 12th and 16th centuries.
It is characterized by slender vertical piers and counterbalancing
buttresses, cross vaultings and pointed arches.
Paris – Nôtre Dame
Chartres – the Cathedral
Milan – the Cathedral
Door
Pinnacle
Pointed arch
Rosewindow
Bell-tower
• The façade is made of white marble from Carrara,
green marble from Prato and pink marble from
Verona.
• There are three doors on the front of the church
corresponding to the nave and the two aisles.
• On the left of the church there
is a statue of Dante Alighieri.
•Dante is surrounded by four
lions (symbolizing the
Florentine Republic), one on
each corner.
•It was placed here in 1865 on
the occasion of the 600th
anniversary of Dante’s birth.
Façade of Santa Croce
• The neo-gothic façade was installed between 1857-1863.
• It was designed by Nicolò Matas, a jewish architect. He
added the star of David to the front of the church.
• Matas wanted to be buried inside the church with his peers
but because he was Jewish he was buried under the porch,
not within the walls of the church.
Façade of Santa Croce
before 1857
The Bell-Tower
• It was built in1842.
• It replaced the old tower which was struck by lightning
and destroyed.
Well, let’s enter!
• The inside is lined with octagonal columns
Apse
Chapels
Octagonal
columns
Chapels
Nave
Aisles
Santa Croce
• The church is built in the shape of an
Egyptian Tau Cross. This is the symbol of
the Franciscan monks.
Roman cross
Egyptian cross
Santa Croce
The temple of the Italian glories
• Many famous Italians have tombs in Santa
Croce.
Do you recognize any of these?
… Galileo Galilei, Michelangelo, Niccolò Machiavelli.
Walking along the right aisle you can see:
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the tombstone of Michelangelo by Giorgio Vasari (1570);
the cenotaph of Dante Alighieri (1829);
the tombstone of Vittorio Alfieri by Antonio Canova (1810);
the tombstone of Niccolò Machiavelli (1787);
the tombstone of Leonardo Bruni a Chancellor of the
Florentine Republic by Bernardo Rossellino (1450);
• the tombstone of Gioacchino Rossini (1900);
• the tombstone of Ugo Foscolo (1938) who, in his poem “i
Sepolcri” spoke about these famous tombstones in Santa
Croce
Walking back along the left aisle, to the exit of the
church, you can see other funerary monuments,
among which the most important ones are:
•the monument to Leon Battista Alberti by Lorenzo Bartolini
(at the first column);
•the monument to Carlo Marsuppini secretary of the Florentine
Republic by Desiderio da Settignano;
•the monument to Vittorio Fossombroni a famous politician by
Lorenzo Bartolini;
•the monument to Galileo Galilei.
The aisles of the church host many
paintings, sculptures and key works.
trusses
pointed arches
Stained glass window
Octagonal column
Giotto and Taddeo Gaddi
in Santa Croce
Inside Santa Croce you can find famous chapels:
• the Baroncelli chapel with frescoes by Taddeo
Gaddi representing the life of the Virgin and a
Polyptych by Giotto.
• the Bardi chapel with frescoes by Giotto with
scenes from the life of San Francesco;
• the Peruzzi chapel with frescoes by Giotto
representing scenes from the lives of Saint John
the Baptist and Saint John the Evangelist.
Outside Santa Croce
The Pazzi Chapel
The Pazzi family hired Brunelleschi to build a
chapel in their honor in the cloister of Santa Croce.
The dome in the Pazzi chapel looks a lot like the dome
Brunelleschi constructed for the Cathedral.
Outside Santa Croce
The Opera Museum
In the “Cenacolo”,
among masterpieces
of the Middle Ages,
you can find:
• the huge fresco
by Taddeo Gaddi
representing the Holy
Cross Tree;
• the Crucifix by
Cimabue which was
greatly damaged by
the Flood in 1966
Cimabue’s Crucifix
Flood of 1966
• When the Arno flooded the water destroyed many
paintings in Santa Croce. It took decades to restore
them.
There is so much to do!
• There are so many things in Santa Croce
that if you wanted to, you could spend an
entire day there!
Glossary
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Aisle
Apse
Bell-tower
Buttress
Cathedral
Cenotaph
Chancellor
Chapel
Church
Cloister
Cross
Cross vaulting
Crucifix
Dome
Façade
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Fresco
Funerary monument
Lightning
Marble
Masterpiece
Monk
Nave
Octagonal column
Painting
Pier
Pinnacles
Pointed arches
Politician
Polyptyc
Porch
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Sculpture
Secretary
Shape
Stained glass window
Statue
Tombstone
Trusses