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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Brunelleschi’s Duomo tells a tale of Florence

Dan Webster

Above: No matter where you walk in Florence's city center, you're usually only a few steps from a sight of Filippo Brunelleschi's famous Duomo, which sits atop the cathedral Santa Maria del Fiore.

Nothing beats rising early on a Saturday morning in Florence, Italy, and getting your first glimpse of the famous Duomo. It's nice to see the masterpiece of architecture anytime during the day, but its especially nice when the streets have yet to fill with tourists, who come in the thousands.

The Duomo, of course, sits atop one of the world's most famous buildings — the cathedral Santa Maria del Fiore — which has been standing in the center of Florence since the early 14th century. The city's leaders wanted the cathedral to be a sign of Florence's magnificence, and they hoped the cathedral's Duomo (or dome) would be the world's largest.

Only problem was, no one at the time knew exactly how to build something so big. Thus the cathedral sat for decades open to the elements.

Then came the announcement: A competition would be held to see who could come up with a workable plan. One prize was 200 florins, which was a lot of money considering, from one source, staff at the Medici bank made between 14 and 50 florin per year. The other prize was enduring fame.

Both prizes went, ultimately, to "a short, homely, and hot-tempered goldsmith named Filippo Brunelleschi." Though not without controversy, mainly because Brunelleschi was a somewhat unknown quantity and because he refused to share specifics of his plans. Even so, the leaders eventually decided to award Brunelleschi the job.

This being Italy, intrigue occurred from the start, involving personal and professional jealousies. But the project, and Brunelleschi, endured, and the Duomo was completed on March 25, 1436. Brunelleschi died a decade later.

But his crowning achievement lives on — to the delight of everyone who has the pleasure of seeing it.