Chapter III: Church Architecture of the Florentine Renaissance

The Pazzi chapel--Gothic character of its central
vault--Architectural treatment of the interior--Impropriety of
a classic order in such a building--Awkward result of an
entablature passing through an arch impost--Incongruities of
design and construction in the portico--Use of stucco--Sources
from which the façade may have been derived--Other church
architecture by Brunelleschi--San Lorenzo and Santo
Spirito--Use of the entablature block in these
churches--Survival of mediæval features and adjustments--Church
architecture of Leon Batista Alberti--The façade of Santa Maria
Novella--The façade of San Francesco of Rimini--The church of
Sant’ Andrea of Mantua--Return to Roman models in the
structural forms of this building--Sant’ Andrea foreshadows St.
Peter’s at Rome--Its west front an adaptation of the Roman
triumphal arch scheme--Such fronts peculiar to Alberti--The
designers of the Renaissance worked unconsciously on a
foundation of mediæval ideas 26