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| Brunelleschi's Dome |
While touring it we learns some interesting facts about it. The dome was 150 feet across and 180 feet high.
1) The basilica was built in 1296 and the place where the
dome now sits was an open roof. Under it was an altar where the sun and rain
came in. It wasn't until 1418 that a plan for a roof or dome was made. The Basilica that houses Brunelleschi's
famous Dome took 200 years to build, and it was purposely built to outdo other
cities' basilicas.
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| Looking up from under the dome |
2) In 1418 the worried Florentine fathers announced a
contest for the ideal dome design, with a handsome prize of 200 gold
florins—and a shot at eternal fame—for the winner.
3) Brunelleschi invented a three-speed hoist with an
intricate system of gears, pulleys, screws, and driveshafts, powered by a
single yoke of oxen turning a wooden tiller. It used a special rope 600 feet
long and weighing over a thousand pounds!
He also made other lifting machines, including the castello, a
65-foot-tall crane with a series of counterweights and hand screws to move
loads laterally once they’d been raised to the right height.
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| perspective to show height of dome |
4) The elders of
the town thought that anyone could finish the dome so Brunelleschi, who designed it pretended to be sick for a
week and the work stopped. The elders thought they could get someone else to
finish it because they said that Brunelleschi was being paid too much. He wound
up finishing it.
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| Rob and Tom at dome top |
5) Michelangelo called the outside of the dome a
"cricket cage" so the architect who was building it was so offended
he stopped after only 2 of the 8 sides (it was an octagon). He left it
unfinished.
6) The dome is an octagon because it symbolizes 7 days
that god created and the 8th day is a non-ending day.
NEXT: THE CLIMB TO THE TOP OF THE DOME
OUR SHORT VIDEO inside the dome...
OUR SHORT VIDEO inside the dome...
