[Born at Florence, 1378. Died, 1455. Aged 77.]
One of the most memorable of the great Italian artists of the fifteenth
century. At the age of 23, he competed with Brunelleschi and Donatello
for the execution of the side doors of San Giovanni at Florence. His two
rivals confessed themselves vanquished and retired in his favour. These
gates were twenty-one years in course of completion, and are divided
into 20 panels, each containing a bas-relief cast in bronze, from a
subject in the New Testament. Another twenty years were spent in
producing the central doors of the same Baptistery, representing in ten
compartments the principal events of the Old Testament. Of these,
Michael Angelo said they were beautiful enough to stand at the entrance
of Paradise. A reproduction of these gates occupies the centre of the
south end of the Renaissance Court. Ghiberti modelled and cast statues,
worked in gold, painted on glass, and wrote a MS. history of Ancient and
Modern Artists.
[Buried in Sta. Croce, Florence; his tomb is now lost. This Bust is by
Carlo Finelli. There is an interesting portrait of him by his own
hand, amongst the heads on his celebrated gates in the Renaissance
Court. The two heads in the centre, between the upper corners of the
second panels from the ground, are portraits of Ghiberti and
Bartoluccio, the caster; the right-hand one, with the bald head, being
Ghiberti. In the original gates his name is inscribed near the head,
with the words,--
“Laurentii Cionis de Ghibertis mirâ arte fabricatum.”]