LAPO, ARNOLFO DI, the name by which a very celebrated and one of the most early of the Italian architects is known. He is so called by Vasari, and is said by him to have been the son of Lapo, a German, whose real name was Jacob, and who was sometimes called in Florence Jacopo Tedesco, but more frequently Lapo. This Lapo, who executed many works in Florence, died there, according to Vasari, in 1262.
Recent researches however have shown that Arnolfo and Lapo were not otherwise connected further than that they were contemporaries in Florence. Arnolfo was the son of Cambio, a native of Colle, and, according to Vasari, was born in 1232. Arnolfo did for building, says Vasari, what Cimabue did for painting : he was the pupil of Cimabue in design. He was the greatest architect of his time in Florence, and was the architect of many important works. The walls of Florence, which were erected in 1284, were planned by Arnolfo. He built the hall of Or. San Michele, the old corn-market ; the loggia and piazza De' Priori ; and in 1294 he laid the foundations and built the great church of Santa Croce, now celebrated for its many magnificent monu ments of distinguished Florentioes. Bnt his greatest work is the church of Santa Maria del Fiore, or the Cathedral of Florence, of which he laid the foundations in 1298, or, according to some accounts, in 1294. He raised the walls of the whole church, and covered part of it in, but the vast dome is the addition of Brunelleschi ; it stands however on the foundations of Arnolfo, who also, according to his model, had intended to erect a dome in the centre, though lower and of less dimensions than the enormous pile of Brunelleachi, which is one of the largest domes in the world, and but little leas than the gigantic vault of St. Peter's, which is an imitation of it. The models
of Arnolfo and Brunelleachi are now both lost. For the erection of this Immense church a tax of twopence per head was levied annually upon the citizens of Florence, and they were encouraged also by indulgences to make donations to its building-fund. The external marble facing of the walls is the work of Arnolfo. The old municipal palace, the Palazzo della Signoria, which still exists as a part of the old palace of the Florentine princes in the Piazza Granduca, was also built by Arnolfo; and there are works by him in other Italian cities : he executed in 1285 the marble tabernacle of the Basilica of San Paolo, without the walla, at Rome ; and shortly before 1290 he designed and executed the monument of the Cardinal de Brays in the church of San Domenico at Orvieto. Arnolfo died, according to Vasari, in 1300. Arnolfo's portrait by Giotto is in the picture of the death of San Franceaco, in the church of Santa Croce at Florence: it is one of the group of figures conversing together in the foreground.