Maria del Fiore, and also to see Giotto,
of whom he had heard a great deal elsewhere; but no sooner had he
arrived in Florence than he was appointed by the intendants of the
fabric of S. Maria del Fiore to make the Madonna, which stands
between two small angels above the door of that church, which leads
into the canons' quarters, a work much praised at the time. He next
made the small font for S. Giovanni, containing representations from
the life of that saint in half-relief. Proceeding thence to Bologna
he directed the construction of the principal chapel of the church of
St Domenico, in which he was also commissioned to make the marble
altar by Teodorico Borgognoni of Lucca, then bishop, a friar of that
order. Later on (1298), in the same place, he made the marble table
in which are Our Lady and eight other figures, all of very tolerable
workmanship. In the year 1300, when Niccola da Prato was at Florence
as cardinal legate of the Pope, for the purpose of settling the
discords among the Florentines, he caused Giovanni to build a nunnery
for him at Prato, which was called S. Niccola after him, and in the
same district he made him restore the convent of S. Domenico, as well
as that of Pistoia, in both of which the arms of that cardinal may
still be seen. And since the Pistolese held the name of Niccola,
Giovanni's father, in great respect, because he had displayed his
talents in that city, they commissioned Giovanni to make a marble
pulpit for the church of S. Andrea, similar to that which he had made
for the Duomo of Siena, and in competition with one which had been
made shortly before for the church of S. Giovanni Evangelista by a
German, which had been much praised. Giovanni finished his task in
four years, dividing the work into four subjects from the life of
Jesus Christ, and further introducing a Last Judgment, working with
the utmost diligence in order to equal, and perhaps surpass, that
celebrated pulpit of Orvieto. About the pulpit above some columns
which support it and in the architrave he carved the following lines,
since he thought that he had completed a great and beautiful work, as
indeed he had, considering the attainments of the age:

Hoc opus sculpsit Johannes, qui res non egit inanes.
Nicoli natus . . . meliora beatus
Quam genuit Pisa, doctum super omnia visa.

At the same time Giovanni made the holy water vessel in marble for
the same church of S. Giovanni Evangelista, borne by thre