Mornings in Florence Part 11

The meaning of which entire myth is, as I read it, that men and women must both eat their bread with toil. That the first duty of man is to feed his family, and the first duty of the woman to clothe it. That the trees of the field are given us for strength and for delight, and that the wild beasts of the field must have their share with us. [Footnote: The oak and apple boughs are placed, with the same meaning, by Sandro Botticelli, in the lap of Zipporah. The figure of the bear is again represented by Jacopo della Quercia, on the north door of the Cathedral of Florence. I am not sure of its complete meaning.]

4. The fourth sculpture, forming the centre-piece of the series on the west side, is nomad pastoral life.

Jabal, the father of such as dwell in tents, and of such as have cattle, lifts the curtain of his tent to look out upon his flock. His dog watches it.

5. Jubal, the father of all such as handle the harp and organ.

That is to say, stringed and wind instruments;--the lyre and reed. The first arts (with the Jew and Greek) of the shepherd David, and shepherd Apollo.

Giotto has given him the long level trumpet, afterwards adopted so grandly in the sculptures of La Robbia and Donatello. It is, I think, intended to be of wood, as now the long Swiss horn, and a long and shorter tube are bound together.

6. Tubal Cain, the instructor of every artificer in bra.s.s and iron.

Giotto represents him as sitting, _fully robed_, turning a wedge of bronze on the anvil with extreme watchfulness.

These last three sculptures, observe, represent the life of the race of Cain; of those who are wanderers, and have no home. _Nomad_ pastoral life; Nomad artistic life, Wandering Willie; yonder organ man, whom you want to send the policeman after, and the gipsy who is mending the old schoolmistress's kettle on the gra.s.s, which the squire has wanted so long to take into his park from the roadside.

7. Then the last sculpture of the seven begins the story of the race of Seth, and of home life. The father of it lying drunk under his trellised vine; such the general image of civilized society, in the abstract, thinks Giotto.

With several other meanings, universally known to the Catholic world of that day,--too many to be spoken of here.

The second side of the tower represents, after this introduction, the sciences and arts of civilized or home life.

8. Astronomy. In nomad life you may serve yourself of the guidance of the stars; but to know the laws of _their_ nomadic life, your own must be fixed.

The astronomer, with his s.e.xtant revolving on a fixed pivot, looks up to the vault of the heavens and beholds their zodiac; prescient of what else with optic gla.s.s the Tuscan artist viewed, at evening, from the top of Fesole.

Above the dome of heaven, as yet unseen, are the Lord of the worlds and His angels. To-day, the Dawn and the Daystar: to-morrow, the Daystar arising in the heart.

9. Defensive architecture. The building of the watchtower. The beginning of security in possession.

10. Pottery. The making of pot, cup, and platter. The first civilized furniture; the means of heating liquid, and serving drink and meat with decency and economy.

11. Riding. The subduing of animals to domestic service.

12. Weaving. The making of clothes with swiftness, and in precision of structure, by help of the loom.

13. Law, revealed as directly from heaven.

14. Daedalus (not Icarus, but the father trying the wings). The conquest of the element of air.

As the seventh subject of the first group introduced the arts of home after those of the savage wanderer, this seventh of the second group introduces the arts of the missionary, or civilized and gift-bringing wanderer.

15. The Conquest of the Sea. The helmsman, and two rowers, rowing as Venetians, face to bow.

16. The Conquest of the Earth. Hercules victor over Antaeus. Beneficent strength of civilization crus.h.i.+ng the savageness of inhumanity.

17. Agriculture. The oxen and plough.

18. Trade. The cart and horses.

19. And now the sculpture over the door of the tower. The Lamb of G.o.d, expresses the Law of Sacrifice, and door of ascent to heaven. And then follow the fraternal arts of the Christian world.

20. Geometry. Again the angle sculpture, introductory to the following series. We shall see presently why this science must be the foundation of the rest.

21. Sculpture.

22. Painting.

23. Grammar.

24. Arithmetic. The laws of number, weight, and measures of capacity.

25 Music. The laws of number, weight (or force), and measure, applied to sound.

26. Logic. The laws of number and measure applied to thought.

27. The Invention of Harmony.

You see now--by taking first the great division of pre-Christian and Christian arts, marked by the door of the Tower; and then the divisions into four successive historical periods, marked by its angles--that you have a perfect plan of human civilization. The first side is of the nomad life, learning how to a.s.sert its supremacy over other wandering creatures, herbs, and beasts. Then the second side is the fixed home life, developing race and country; then the third side, the human intercourse between stranger races; then the fourth side, the harmonious arts of all who are gathered into the fold of Christ.

Now let us return to the first angle, and examine piece by piece with care.

1. _Creation of Man._

Scarcely disengaged from the clods of the earth, he opens his eyes to the face of Christ. Like all the rest of the sculptures, it is less the representation of a past fact than of a constant one. It is the continual state of man, 'of the earth,' yet seeing G.o.d.

Christ holds the book of His Law--the 'Law of life'--in His left hand.

The trees of the garden above are,--central above Christ, palm (immortal life); above Adam, oak (human life). Pear, and fig, and a large-leaved ground fruit (what?) complete the myth of the Food of Life.

As decorative sculpture, these trees are especially to be noticed, with those in the two next subjects, and the Noah's vine as differing in treatment from Giotto's foliage, of which perfect examples are seen in 16 and 17. Giotto's branches are set in close sheaf-like cl.u.s.ters; and every ma.s.s disposed with extreme formality of radiation. The leaves of these first, on the contrary, are arranged with careful concealment of their ornamental system, so as to look inartificial. This is done so studiously as to become, by excess, a little unnatural!--Nature herself is more decorative and formal in grouping. But the occult design is very n.o.ble, and every leaf modulated with loving, dignified, exactly right and sufficient finish; not done to show skill, nor with mean forgetfulness of main subject, but in tender completion and harmony with it.

Look at the subdivisions of the palm leaves with your magnifying gla.s.s.

The others are less finished in this than in the next subject. Man himself incomplete, the leaves that are created with him, for his life, must not be so.

(Are not his fingers yet short; growing?)

2. _Creation of Woman._

Far, in its essential qualities, the transcendent sculpture of this subject, Ghiberti's is only a dainty elaboration and beautification of it, losing its solemnity and simplicity in a flutter of feminine grace.

The older sculptor thinks of the Uses of Womanhood, and of its dangers and sins, before he thinks of its beauty; but, were the arm not lost, the quiet naturalness of this head and breast of Eve, and the bending grace of the submissive rendering of soul and body to perpetual guidance by the hand of Christ--(_grasping_ the arm, note, for full support)--would be felt to be far beyond Ghiberti's in beauty, as in mythic truth.

The line of her body joins with that of the serpent-ivy round the tree trunk above her: a double myth--of her fall, and her support afterwards by her husband's strength. "Thy desire shall be to thy husband." The fruit of the tree--double-set filbert, telling nevertheless the happy equality.

The leaves in this piece are finished with consummate poetical care and precision. Above Adam, laurel (a virtuous woman is a crown to her husband); the filbert for the two together; the fig, for fruitful household joy (under thy vine and fig-tree [Footnote: Compare Fors Clavigera, February, 1877.]--but vine properly the masculine joy); and the fruit taken by Christ for type of all naturally growing food, in his own hunger.

Examine with lens the ribbing of these leaves, and the insertion on their stem of the three laurel leaves on extreme right: and observe that in all cases the sculptor works the moulding _with_ his own part of the design; look how he breaks variously deeper into it, beginning from the foot of Christ, and going up to the left into full depth above the shoulder.