1 Filippo Brunelleschi Giorgio Vasari s Lives of the Artists 1550 It is a habit of Nature when she makes one man very great in any art not to make him alone but at the same time and in the same place to produce another to rival him that they may aid each other by emulation And that this is true may be seen by the example of Florence which produced at one epoch Filippo Donatello Lorenzo Paolo Uccello and Masaccio each one most excellent in his way This last who came from Castello San Giovanni di Valdarno was a most absentminded man and seemed like one who having fixed his mind on things of art only cared little for himself and less for others And because he would never trouble himself about the things of the world not even about dressing himself and never took the pains to get money from those who owed it him unless he were in extreme need he was by every one nicknamed Masaccio for Tommaso which was his real name and this not because he was a bad man but merely from his slovenliness for he was goodness itself and as ready to do another a service as any one could desire All the most celebrated sculptors and painters from his time until now have studied his works in the Brancacci chapel as Leonardo da Vinci Perugino the divine Michael Angelo Raffaello da Urbino Andrea del Sarto and many more and if I have not mentioned many Florentines and strangers who have gone to that chapel to study there it is because where the heads of the art go there the members are sure to follow Yet although his works have always been held in such reputation it is the firm belief of many that he would have brought forth much greater fruit if death had not carried him off at the age of twenty six so suddenly that there were not wanting those who laid it down to poison It is said that when Filippo di Ser Brunelleschi heard of his death he said We have suffered a great loss in Masaccio and mourned for him deeply There are some whom Nature has created little of stature but with a soul of greatness and a heart of such immeasurable daring that if they do not set themselves to difficult and almost impossible things and do not complete them to the wonder of those who behold they have no peace in their lives Thus it was with Filippo di Ser Brunelleschi who was small in stature like Giotto but great in genius His father Ser Brunelleschi taught him in his childhood the first principles of letters in which he showed himself intelligent but careless of perfecting himself in these matters Therefore seeing him occupied with matters of art he put him under a goldsmith to Filippo s great satisfaction Having become skilled in setting stones and in the science of the motion of weights and wheels not content with this there awoke within him a great desire for the study of sculpture And Donatello then a young man being held in esteem as a sculptor Filippo began to hold intercourse with him and such an affection sprang up between them that it seemed as if the one could not live without the other Filippo who was capable of many things was held also by those who understood such matters to be a good architect He studied also perspective and taught it to Masaccio his friend Messer Paolo dal Pozzo Toscanelli having returned from his studies invited Filippo with other friends to supper in a garden and the discourse falling on mathematical subjects Filippo formed a friendship with him and learned geometry from him And although he was not learned he 2 would reason on all matters from his own practical experience so as frequently to confound Toscanelli He also applied himself to the study of the sacred scriptures never failing to be present at the disputations or lectures of learned men and making such good use of his wonderful memory that Messer Paolo used to say when he heard Filippo argue he seemed to him a new St Paul Filippo as we have said entered into competition with Lorenzo and the others for the gates of S Giovanni but when the work was assigned to Lorenzo at the request of Filippo and Donatello they determined to set out together from Florence and to spend some years in Rome that Filippo might study architecture and Donatello sculpture And when he came to Rome and saw the grandeur of the buildings and the perfection of the form of the temples he remained lost in thought and like one out of his mind and he and Donatello set themselves to measure them and to draw out the plan of them sparing neither time nor expense And Filippo gave himself up to the study of them so that he cared neither to eat or to sleep having two great ideas in his mind the one to restore the knowledge of good architecture hoping thus to leave behind no less a memory of himself than Cimabue and Giotto had done and the other to find a way if it were possible of raising the cupola of S Maria del Fiore in Florence the difficulty of which was so great that since the death of Arnolfo Lapi none had had courage enough to attempt it He confided his intention neither to Donatello or any soul living but gave himself no rest until he had considered all the difficulties of the Pantheon and had noted and drawn all the ancient vaulted roofs continually studying this matter and if by chance they found any pieces of capitals or columns they set to work and had them dug out And the story ran through Rome that they were treasure seekers the people thinking that they studied divination to find treasures it having befallen them once to find an ancient pitcher filled with medals Then money becoming scarce with Filippo he set himself to work for the goldsmiths and remained thus alone in Rome when Donatello returned to Florence Neither did he cease from his studies until he had drawn every kind of building temples round and square and eight sided basilicas aqueducts baths arches and others and the different orders Doric Ionic and Corinthian until he was able to see in imagination Rome as she was before she fell into ruins In the year 1407 he returned to Florence and the same year there was held a meeting of architects and engineers to consider how to raise the cupola of S Maria del Fiore Among them came Filippo and gave it as his opinion that it should not be done according to the design of Arnolfo but in another fashion of which he made a model Some months after Filippo being one morning in the Piazza of S Maria del Fiore with Donatello and other artists talking about ancient sculpture Donatello began telling them how when he was returning from Rome he had journeyed by
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