t the trade of stone-cutter, finally betook himself to
Florence, where he opened a shop for the sale of dressed stone, keeping
it furnished with the sort of work that is apt very often to be called
for without warning by those who are erecting some building. Living in
Florence, then, there was born to him a son, Giuliano, whom his father,
growing convinced in the course of time that he had a good intelligence,
proposed to make into a notary, for it appeared to him that his own
occupation of stone-cutting was too laborious and too unprofitable an
exercise. But this did not come to pass, because, although Giuliano went
to a grammar-school for a little, his thoughts were never there, and in
consequence he made no progress; nay, he played truant very often, and
showed that he had his mind wholly set on sculpture, although at first
he applied himself to the calling of joiner and also gave attention to
drawing.

It is said that in company with Giusto and Minore, masters of
tarsia,[2] he wrought the seats of the Sacristy of the Nunziata, and
likewise those of the choir that is beside the chapel, and many things
in the Badia of Florence and in S. Marco; and that, having acquired a
name through these works, he was summoned to Pisa, in the Duomo of which
he wrought the seat that is beside the high-altar, in which the priest,
the deacon, and the sub-deacon sit when Mass is being sung; making in
tarsia on the back of this seat, with tinted and shaded woods, the three
prophets that are seen therein. In this work he availed himself of Guido
del Servellino and Maestro Domenico di Mariotto, joiners of Pisa, to
whom he taught the art so well that they afterwards wrought the greater
part of that choir both with carvings and with tarsia-work; which choir
has been finished in our own day, with a manner no little better, by
Batista del Cervelliera of Pisa, a man truly ingenious and fanciful.

But to return to Giuliano; he made the presses of the Sacristy of S.
Maria del Fiore, which were held at that time to be admirable examples
of tarsia and inlaid-work. Now, while Giuliano thus continued to devote
himself to tarsia, to sculpture, and to architecture, Filippo di Ser
Brunellesco died; whereupon, being chosen by the Wardens of Works to
succeed him, he made the borders, incrusted with black and white marble,
which are round the circular windows below the vault of the cupola; and
at the corners he placed the marble pilasters on which Baccio d