style no doubt renders this view plausible; for the lunette at Lucca is
superior to any other of Pisano's works as a composition.

The full discussion of these points is rendered impossible by the want of
contemporary information, and each student must, therefore, remain
contented with his own hypothesis. Yet something can be said with regard
to the Ravello pulpit that plays so important a part in the argument of
the learned historians of Italian painting. Unless a strong similarity
between it and Pisano's pulpits can be proved, their hypothesis carries
with it no persuasion.

The pulpit in the cathedral of Ravello is formed like an ambo of the
antique type. That is to say, it is a long parallelogram with flat sides,
raised upon pillars, and approached by a flight of steps. These steps are
enclosed within richly-ornamented walls, and stand distinct from the
pulpit; a short bridge connects the two. The six pillars supporting the
ambo itself are slender twisted columns with classic capitals. Three rest
on lions, three on lionesses, admirably carved in different attitudes. A
small projection on the north side of the pulpit sustains an eagle
standing on a pillar, and spreading out his wings to bear an open book. On
the arch over the entrance to the staircase projects the head of
Sigelgaita, wife of Niccola Rufolo, the donor of the pulpit to the church,
sculptured in the style of the Roman decadence, between two profile
medallions in low relief.[411] The material of the whole is fair white
marble, enriched with mosaics, and wrought into beautiful scroll-work of
acanthus leaves and other Romanesque adornments. An inscription, "_Ego
Magister Nicolaus de Bartholomeo de Fogia Marmorarius hoc opus feci_;" and
another, "_Lapsis millenis bis centum bisque trigenis XPI. bissenis annis
ab origine plenis_," indicate the artist's name and the date of the work.

It is difficult to understand how anyone could trace such a resemblance
between this rectangular ambo and the hexagonal structure in the Pisan
Baptistery as would justify them in asserting both to be the products of
the same school. The pulpit of Niccola da Foggia does not materially
differ from other ambones in Italy--from several, for instance, in Amalfi
and Ravello; while the distinctive features of Niccola Pisano's work--the
combination of classically studied bas-reliefs with Gothic principles of
construction, the feeling for artistic unity in the composition of groups,
t