Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 2.djvu/19

Rh gate are also the work of Giuliano da Maiano, and here he executed many trophies of war, which are admirably varied and extremely beautiful, insomuch that the master w^ell merited that the king should treat him with great regard, while the liberal manner in which his labours were remunerated by that monarch, enriched both himself and his descendants. Giuliano had instructed his nephew Benedetto in the arts of tarsia and architecture; he had also taught him to produce certain works in sculpture, but Benedetto remained in Florence devoting his attention to productions in tarsia, because he thereby made larger gains than could be secured by the other arts; he therefore remained in Florence, as we have said, when Giuliano was invited to Borne by Messer Antonio Rosello, secretary to Paul the Second, whither he instantly repaired, and entered the service of that pontiff. He was then commanded to construct the Colonnade of travertine in the first court of San Pietro; three ranges of columns form this structure; the first is on the ground-floor where are now the signet-office and other chambers appropriated to the public service; the second is over this, where the apartments of the Datary and other prelates are situated, and the third, which is the last, is that wherein are those rooms of the palace which look on the court of San Pietro, the floors and other parts of which Giuliano decorated with gilding and other ornaments. The marble Loggia, from which the pope gives his benediction, was in like manner constructed after the designs of this architect—a very great work, as may be seen even to the present day; but the most admirable and extraordinary of all his works was the palace which he built for pope Paul II., together with the church of San Marco of Borne. In these erections he consumed enormous quantities of travertine, which was excavated, as is said, from certain vine-grounds situated near the arch of Constantine, and had been laid to form buttresses and counterpoises to that part of the Colosseum which is now in ruins, perhaps because the whole building gave way.