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of the same church, representing scenes from the life of S. Martin, allegories of the seasons, the Saviour in glory guarded by two angels — the Virgin and the twelve apostles on the architrave, — showed that, as late as 1233, sculpture must still make a weary progress before it could be entitled to serious admiration. 1 Still later a sculptor of Pisa adorned the pilasters and architrave of the eastern gate of the Baptistery with scenes from the old and new testament, 2 the compo sition of which contrasted advantageously with those of Bonamico on the frieze above them. The figures were distinguished by a certain movement and animation, by good proportion in their slenderness, and by fairly in tended draperies. The principal one of the Saviour in benediction was not without dignity, and technically su perior in design to the Saviour above the portico of S. Martin of Lucca. In the accompanying seasons, the in cidents were conceived with spirit, and the nude recalled the antique. It was a work which could not date earlier than the middle of the thirteenth century, yet how distant from those of Niccola of the very same time. Not only were the conception and execution, compared to his, rude and primitive; but, as in all the works of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries previously noticed, the creation of men of a different spirit and school. But even in 1250, Guido da Como who executed the pulpit of S. Bartolommeo in Pantano at Pistoia, showed himself little better as a sculptor than Benedictus of Parma, Bonamico of Pisa, or Guidectus of Lucca. Guido’s com position was symmetrical, his forms and types animated with a gentle religious spirit, but his figures had repose approaching to immobility. They were long and slender 1 The following inscription is in the portico “Hoc opus cepit fieri Ahelenato et Aldebrando ope- rarii A. D. 1233”. 2 On the pilasters the Saviour in glory, with incidents of his life concluding with his visit to limbo, and a figure of David, the seasons in a winding ornament, — on the architrave the sermon of S. John the Baptist. The same before Herod, the dance before Herodias and the decapitation.
