"Fiorenza figlia di Roma"

New Light on the Bapistery of San Giovanni and the Chronology of Florentine Romanesque Architecture

Abstract

Since the late eighteenth century, studies of the baptistery of San Giovanni in Florence have built their chronologies around one or both of two well-known reference points: a consecration by Pope Nicholas II in 1059 and the transfer of the baptismal font from Santa Reparata to San Giovanni in 1128. Both originate in a 1684 history of Florence by Ferdinando Leopoldo Del Migliore. A close examination of manuscript sources reveals both to be spurious. Freed of these constraints, we find multiple lines of evidence to support dating the origin of the project to the 1070s and the completion of its most important elements by the 1090s.
Consequently, it is possible to propose a new perspective on the development of early Romanesque architecture in Florence. Santi Apostoli, San Giovanni, and San Miniato, likely all works of the same architect, seem to represent not an organic development but an extrinsic current introduced into a visual culture for which the antique had been only one of many formal sources. The similarity in plan between San Miniato and the Roman church of Santa Maria in Portico consecrated by Pope Gregory VII and the extraordinary reference San Giovanni makes to the Pantheon, then reserved for papal masses, are among the pieces of evidence adduced for the involvement of Roman church reformers in Florentine architecture. The article furthermore explores the support of the Tuscan margravine and the role of Bishop Ranieri in the conception and realization of the baptistery.