Io vi confesso ingenuamente, che prima d'aver fatte queste mie esperienze intorno alla generazione degl' insetti mi dava a credere, o per dir meglio sospettava, che forse la gallozzola nascesse, perchè arrivando la mosca nel tempo della primavera, e facendo una piccolissima fessura ne' rami più teneri della quercia, in quella fessura nascondesse

[Footnote 10: "Par che la dura quercia e 'l casto alloro, E tutta la frondosa ampia famiglia, Par the la terra e l'acqua e formi e spiri Dolcissimi d'amor sensi e sospiri.

Gentile da Fabriano born (d. 1450) 1371 Jacopo della Quercia born (d. 1438)

Ghiberti, Della Quercia, Brunelleschi, Donatello, all had joined the majority before his birth.

Michelangelo adapted to his own uses and bent to his own genius motives originated by the Pisani, Giotto, Giacopo della Quercia, Donatello, Masaccio, while working in the spirit of Signorelli.

Matteo Civitale, Benedetto da Majano, Mino da Fiesole, Luca della Robbia, Donatello, Jacopo della Quercia, Lo Scalza, Omodeo, and the Sansovini, not to mention less illustrious sculptors, filled the churches of Italy with this elaborate stone-work.

Their call was answered by Giacomo della Quercia of Siena, by Filippo Brunelleschi and Lorenzo di Cino Ghiberti of Florence, and by two other Tuscan artists of less note.

Thus the four great masters of Tuscan art in its prime met before the Florentine Baptistery.[80] Giacomo della Quercia was excluded from the competition at an early stage; but the umpires wavered long between Ghiberti and Brunelleschi, until the latter, with notable generosity, feeling the superiority of his rival, and conscious perhaps that his own laurels were to be gathered in the field of architecture, withdrew his claim.

How Delia Quercia treated the "Sacrifice of Isaac" we do not know.

There is no doubt but that Della Quercia was a formidable rival.

While smoothness and an almost voluptuous suavity of outline distinguish Ghiberti's naked Eve, gliding upheld by angels from the side of Adam at her Maker's bidding, Della Quercia's group, by the concentration of robust and rugged power, anticipates the style of Michael Angelo.

Della Quercia, in obedience to the stricter laws of sculpture, restrains his composition to the three chief persons, and brings them into close connection.

The similarity between Delia Quercia's bas-relief and Buonarroti's fresco of Eve is incontestable.

The young Florentine, while an exile in Bologna, and engaged upon the shrine of S. Dominic, must have spent hours of study before the sculptures of S. Petronio; so that this seed of Della Quercia's sowing bore after many years the fruit of world-renowned achievement

Two other memorable works of Della Quercia must be parenthetically mentioned.

The sepulchral portrait of Medea, daughter of the great Condottiere, has a grace almost beyond that of Della Quercia's "Ilaria."

Della Quercia, on the façade of S. Petronio, confines himself to the creative act, expressed by the raised hand of the Maker, and the answering attitude of Eve; and this conception receives final treatment from Michael Angelo in the frescoes of the Sistine.

[80] Quercia, born 1374; Ghiberti, 1378; Brunelleschi, 1379; Donatello, 1386.

Those of the font in the chapel of S. John (not the lower church of S. John), at Siena, are ascribed to Quercia, and are in his manner; but when they were finished I do not know.

Andrea Orcagna about 1369 Lorenzo Ghiberti 1378 1455 Giacomo della Quercia 1374 1438 Filippo Brunelleschi 1377 1446 Donatello 1366 1466