Description
The Medici Chapels are the Medici mausoleum, in Florence, behind the basilica of San Lorenzo, of which they are part. Today they are a state museum. They were built between the 1500s and 1600s to give the family a burial place worthy of its rank.
At the center of their funerary chapel the Medici wanted nothing less than the Holy Sepulchre. They tried to buy it in Jerusalem, then even to steal it. They did not succeed, but the rest of the project they did carry out, and how.
The Chapel of the Princes, commissioned by Ferdinand I from 1604, is an octagon 28 meters wide, under a dome 59 meters high, second only to the Duomo's. The walls are clad in marbles and hardstones, and a workshop was founded just to work them, the Opificio delle Pietre Dure.
The niches were meant to hold statues of the grand dukes, but only those of Ferdinand I and Cosimo II were made, by Pietro Tacca. The funereal tone of the place led to the choice of the darkest colors, porphyries and granites.
The coats of arms of the Tuscan cities are made of mother-of-pearl, lapis lazuli and coral. The chapel has two levels: above, the cenotaphs, with the sarcophagi, and below, in the crypt, the real burials of almost the whole family.
Earlier still, from around 1520, Michelangelo had built the New Sacristy, with the tombs of two Medici dukes. On the tombs rest the allegories of Night and Day, Dawn and Dusk.
Michelangelo started from the same plan as Brunelleschi's Old Sacristy and complicated it with arches and apses. The two tombs are those of Giuliano, Duke of Nemours, and Lorenzo, Duke of Urbino, each with three sculptures, and the two statues gaze at the Madonna and Child in the center.
In 1534 he left Florence for good, leaving the Sacristy unfinished: Lorenzo the Magnificent rests there, but without his monument. In the sacristy there is also a secret room, with drawings on the walls attributed to Michelangelo.
For decades the Medici had been buried in the basilica, in the Old Sacristy and in the crypt. Having become dukes and then grand dukes, they wanted something grander.
Don't miss
• The Chapel of the Princes.
• Michelangelo's Night and Day.
• The New Sacristy.
• The secret room.
Did you know?
• The great sarcophagi of the Chapel of the Princes are empty: the grand dukes rest in the crypt below.
• Michelangelo, according to scholars, lived hidden in the secret room for several months in 1530.
• Until the 1950s that room was used as a coal cellar.
At the center of their funerary chapel the Medici wanted nothing less than the Holy Sepulchre. They tried to buy it in Jerusalem, then even to steal it. They did not succeed, but the rest of the project they did carry out, and how.
The Chapel of the Princes, commissioned by Ferdinand I from 1604, is an octagon 28 meters wide, under a dome 59 meters high, second only to the Duomo's. The walls are clad in marbles and hardstones, and a workshop was founded just to work them, the Opificio delle Pietre Dure.
The niches were meant to hold statues of the grand dukes, but only those of Ferdinand I and Cosimo II were made, by Pietro Tacca. The funereal tone of the place led to the choice of the darkest colors, porphyries and granites.
The coats of arms of the Tuscan cities are made of mother-of-pearl, lapis lazuli and coral. The chapel has two levels: above, the cenotaphs, with the sarcophagi, and below, in the crypt, the real burials of almost the whole family.
Earlier still, from around 1520, Michelangelo had built the New Sacristy, with the tombs of two Medici dukes. On the tombs rest the allegories of Night and Day, Dawn and Dusk.
Michelangelo started from the same plan as Brunelleschi's Old Sacristy and complicated it with arches and apses. The two tombs are those of Giuliano, Duke of Nemours, and Lorenzo, Duke of Urbino, each with three sculptures, and the two statues gaze at the Madonna and Child in the center.
In 1534 he left Florence for good, leaving the Sacristy unfinished: Lorenzo the Magnificent rests there, but without his monument. In the sacristy there is also a secret room, with drawings on the walls attributed to Michelangelo.
For decades the Medici had been buried in the basilica, in the Old Sacristy and in the crypt. Having become dukes and then grand dukes, they wanted something grander.
Don't miss
• The Chapel of the Princes.
• Michelangelo's Night and Day.
• The New Sacristy.
• The secret room.
Did you know?
• The great sarcophagi of the Chapel of the Princes are empty: the grand dukes rest in the crypt below.
• Michelangelo, according to scholars, lived hidden in the secret room for several months in 1530.
• Until the 1950s that room was used as a coal cellar.