Sacratissima Cintola
di Maria Vergine, che si conserva, nella Citta di Prato, dal Dottore
Giuseppe Bianchini di Prato_, 1795.]

The chapel _della Sacratissima Cintola_ was erected from the designs
of Giovanni Pisano about 1320. This "most sacred" relic had long been
deposited under the high altar of the principal chapel, and held in
great veneration; but in the year 1312, a native of Prato, whose name
was Musciatino, conceived the idea of carrying it off, and selling it
in Florence. The attempt was discovered; the unhappy thief suffered
a cruel death; and the people of Prato resolved to provide for the
future custody of the precious relic a new and inviolable shrine.

The chapel is in the form of a parallelogram, three sides of which are
painted, the other being separated from the choir by a bronze gate of
most exquisite workmanship, designed by Ghiberti, or, as others say,
by Brunelleschi, and executed partly by Simone Donatello.

On the wall, to the left as we enter, is a series of subjects from the
Life of the Virgin, beginning, as usual, with the Rejection of Joachim
from the temple, and ending with the Nativity of our Saviour.

The end of the chapel is filled up by the Assumption of the Virgin,
the tomb being seen below, surrounded by the apostles; and above it
the Virgin, as she floats into heaven, is in the act of loosening her
girdle, which St. Thomas, devoutly kneeling, stretches out his arms to
receive. Above this, a circular window exhibits, in stained glass, the
Coronation of the Virgin, surrounded by a glory of angels.

On the third wall to the right we have the subsequent History of the
Girdle, in six compartments.

St. Thomas, on the eve of his departure to fulfil his mission as
apostle in the far East, intrusts the precious girdle to the care of
one of his disciples, who receives it from his hands in an ecstasy of
amazement and devotion.

The deposit remains, for a thousand years, shrouded from the eyes
of the profane; and the next scene shows us the manner in which it
reached the city of Prato. A certain Michael of the Dogomari family
in Prato, joined, with a party of his young townsmen, the crusade
in 1096. But, instead of returning to his native country after the
war was over, this same Michael took up the trade of a merchant,
travelling from land to land in pursuit of gain, until he came to the
city of Jerusalem, and lodged in the house of a Greek priest, to whom
the custody of the sacred re