Word: signoria
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...that the U.S. has contributed to Western civilization have been largely architectural: skyscrapers, grain silos, factories, petroleum drums, bridges. But Egypt matched its pyramids and temples with obelisks and sphinxes, while Greece's Parthenon was glorified by the handiwork of Phidias. Michelangelo unified Florence's Piazza della Signoria with his 14-ft.-high David-which was positioned in front of the Palazzo Vecchio by a committee that included Leonardo da Vinci and Botticelli...
...Florence, the tide tore through the walls of jewelers' shops on the Ponte Vecchio (built in 1345) and inundated the Piazza, della Signoria. Propelling logs and other debris, it piled autos into heaps of smashed steel and left a thick oil slick in its wake. Hundreds of rare manuscripts and books were destroyed in the slime. The water knocked out five panels of Ghiberti's "Doors of Paradise," the famed bronze reliefs on the doors of the Baptistery near the Duomo. It wrecked the priceless 13th century crucifix by Cimabue in the Museum of Santa Croce...
...goodbye, to become a Dominican novice. With the courage and cold zeal of a saintly fanatic, Savonarola continued to rage against virtue's enemies until 1498, when the exasperated city fathers of Florence, urged on by Pope Alexander VI, hanged and burned him in the Piazza della Signoria...
FLORENCE'S PIAZZA DELLA SIGNORIA can boast that it is the greatest open-air sculpture museum in the world. There, with a commanding view, stands the massive equestrian statue of Cosimo I. Past the Fountain of Neptune is the copy of Michelangelo's great David. Still on public view are Benvenuto Cellini's Perseus and Donatello's Judith and Holoferaes...
Architecturally, the Piazza della Signoria is a unique example of the harmony of three styles, separated in time by some 250 years. Dominating them all is the rough-stoned Palazzo Vecchio, with its narrow, Tuscan-Gothic windows. At right angles stands the triple-arched Loggia dei Lanzi (named for the German lancers quartered there by the Medici), which many critics consider the most beautiful secular building in Florence. Between the two is the short, narrow street which Mannerist Painter Giorgio di Vasari created as a tour de force in perspective, leading to the Arno...