to return to our craftsman; having acquired a good name in Rome by
the said tomb, by the sarcophagus that he made for the Minerva, on which
he placed a marble statue of Francesco Tornabuoni from nature, which is
held very beautiful, and by other works, it was not long before he
returned to Fiesole with a good sum of money saved, and took a wife. And
no long time after this, working for the Nuns of the Murate, he made a
marble tabernacle in half-relief to contain the Sacrament, which was
brought to perfection by him with all the diligence in his power. This
he had not yet fixed into its place, when the Nuns of S. Ambrogio--who
desired to have an ornament made, similar in design but richer in
adornment, to contain that most holy relic, the Miracle of the
Sacrament--hearing of the ability of Mino, commissioned him to execute
that work, which he finished with so great diligence that those nuns,
being satisfied with him, gave him all that he asked as the price of the
work. And a little after this he undertook, at the instance of Messer
Dietisalvi Neroni, to make a little panel with figures of Our Lady with
the Child in her arms, and S. Laurence on one side and S. Leonard on the
other, in half-relief, which was intended for the priests or chapter of
S. Lorenzo; but it has remained in the Sacristy of the Badia of
Florence. For those monks he made a marble medallion containing a
Madonna in relief with the Child in her arms, which they placed over the
principal door of entrance into the church; and since it gave great
satisfaction to all, he received a commission for a tomb for the
Magnificent Chevalier, Messer Bernardo de' Giugni, who, having been an
honourable man of high repute, rightly received this memorial from his
brothers. On this tomb, besides the sarcophagus and the portrait from
nature of the dead man, Mino executed a figure of Justice, which
resembles the manner of Desiderio closely, save only that its draperies
are a little too full of detail in the carving. This work induced the
Abbot and Monks of the Badia of Florence, in which place the said tomb
was erected, to entrust Mino with the making of one for Count Ugo, son
of the Marquis Uberto of Magdeburg, who bequeathed great wealth and many
privileges to that abbey. And so, desiring to honour him as much as they
could, they caused Mino to make a tomb of Carrara marble, which was the
most beautiful work that Mino ever made; for in it there are some boys,
upholding the