Meanwhile, in Italy, sculptors, also working in shops, were melding the sort of
Gothic naturalism exemplified by Saint Joseph of Reims in Plate 6.6 (on p. 227) with
the classical style of Roman sculpture we saw on the Roman sarcophagus relief of
Meleager in Plate 1.4 (on p. 15). For the Duomo of Siena, for example, Nicola
Pisano (d. before 1284) and his assistants created a baptistery pulpit composed of
eight panels. The Adoration of the Magi, the panel shown in Plate 7.9, has the same
dense crowds as the Meleager sarcophagus. Today all the color is gone, but originally
Nicola painted the backgrounds and gilded the hemlines with gold, emphasizing
details that brought the event “to life,” melding the everyday world of thronging
people and animals with the mystery of the divine incarnation.
