Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 4.djvu/214

206 Naples, the Signor Duke taking the daughter of Don Pietro, the Signora Leonora, to wife,—in that year, I say, and when the preparation for the nuptials was made in Florence, Tribolo received commission to erect a Triumphal Arch at the Gate of Prato, by which the bride was to enter the city as she came from the Poggio. This he constructed in a very beautiful manner, adorning it richly with columns, pilasters, architraves, cornices, and pediments; but as the arch was to be decorated with other pictures and historical representations, in addition to the statues by Tribolo, paintings were executed for the same by the Venetian Battista Franco, as well as by Ridolfo Ghirlandajo, and Michele his disciple.

The principal figure executed by Tribolo for this work was a female form, five braccia high, surrounded by five children, three of whom were about her knees, one on her lap, and the fifth in her arms; this figure represented Fertility, and was placed on the highest summit of the pediment, on the centre that is to say, and raised on a pedestal covered with rilie vi; beside this statue, but on the sides of the pediment, were two recumbent figures of the same size, one on either hand, that on the one side representing Security, and leaning on a column with a slight rod in her hand; the other signifying Eternity, and having a globe in her arms, while beneath her feet lay an old bald man representing Time, and holding in his arms the Sun and Moon. Of the works in painting whereby this arch was adorned, I say no more, because all may see the description of them in the account of the preparations for these nuptials.

It was one of the duties of Tribolo to take charge of such decorations as were required for the palace of the Medici; he, therefore, caused various devices, with mottoes appropriate to the festival of this wedding, or alluding to the various members of the Medici family, to be executed in the lunettes around the vaulting of the court. The large open court also was adorned by his direction with a most sumptuous array of historical representations; the acts and deeds of the Greeks and Romans on one side namely, with numerous pictures on the others, whereon were delineated events from the lives of the illustrious men of the said house of Medici; all executed after the designs of Tribolo by the most distin-