was a genuine leader of his guild of craftsmen,
and superintended the large body of architects who worked at
Orvieto, stone masons, mosaicists, bronze founders, painters,
and minor workmen. He lived until 1330, and practically devoted
his life to Orvieto. It is uncertain whether any of the Pisani
were employed in any capacity, although for a time it was
popularly supposed that the four piers on the facade were their
work. An iconographic description of these sculptures would occupy
too much time here, but one or two features of special interest
should be noted: the little portrait relief of the master Maitani
himself occurs on the fourth pier, among the Elect in heaven, wearing
his workman's cap and carrying his architect's square. Only his
head and shoulders can be seen at the extreme left of the second
tier of sculptures. In accordance with an early tradition, that
Virgil was in some wise a prophet, and that he had foretold the
coming of Christ, he is here introduced, on the second pier, near
the base, crowned with laurel. The incident of the cutting off of
the servant's ear, by Peter, is positively entertaining. Peter
is sawing away industriously at the offending member; a fisherman
ought to understand a more deft use of the knife! In the scenes
of the Creation, depicted on the first pier, Maitani has proved
himself a real nature lover in the tender way he has demonstrated
the joy of the birds at finding the use of their wings.

The earliest sculptures in France were very rude,--it was rather
a process than an art to decorate a building with carvings as the
Gauls did! But the latent race talent was there; as soon as the
Romanesque and Byzantine influences were felt, a definite school
of sculpture was formed in France; almost at once they seized on
the best elements of the craft and abandoned the worthless, and
the great note of a national art was struck in the figures at
Chartres, Paris, Rheims, and other cathedrals of the Ile de France.

Prior to this flowering of art in Northern France, the churches
of the South of France developed a charming Romanesque of their
own, a little different from that in Italy. A monk named Tutilon,
of the monastery of St. Gall, was among the most famous sculptors
of the Romanesque period. Another name is that of Hughes, Abbot of
Montier-en-Der. At the end of the tenth century one Morard, under
the patronage of King Robert, built and ornamented the Church of St.
Germain des Pres, Par