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Hotel Pagnini
Via Montebello, 40
Florence Italy
Tel: +39 055 2381238
Fax: +39 055 216685
E-mail: info@hotelpagnini.it

THE MEDICI CHAPELS
While visiting the Basilica of San Lorenzo, make sure to see the Medici Chapels. The magnificent church was considered the official church of the Medici family because of its location in front of their residence.
It was initially projected by Leon X and Cardinal Giulio Medici, future Pope Clement VII, in March 1520, as a personal sepulchre for the family. It was to hold such tombs as those of Lorenzo the Magnificent and his third son Giuliano the Duke of Nemours, Lorenzo's brother Giuliano, Lorenzo the Duke of Urbino and his eldest son Piero and others.
They summoned the help of Michelangelo for the project of the Sacrestia Nuova (new sacristy) a chapel which was to complement the Sacristy Vecchia (old sacristy) done by Filippo Brunelleschi and found on the other side of the church. Michelangelo continued to work on the sculptures of the sarcophagi until 1533, but the only ones actually completed were the statues of the Dukes Lorenzo and Giuliano, the allegories of Dawn and Dusk, Night and Day and the group of Madonna and Child placed above the sarcophagus of the two "Magnificents" and flanked by Saints Cosmas and Damian. The poses of the two principal figures represent the Active and Contemplative lives while the famous statues on the sarcophagi probably refer to the conditions and phases of human life. The tombs also refer to the liberation of the soul after death, a philosophical concept closely linked with Michelangelo's own spirituality.
Many years later, in 1976, fifty-six drawings and sketches including legs, feet, heads and masks, drawn by the famous artist, were discovered hidden in a small niche beneath the apse and sacristies, and may be related to the statues and architecture executed on the walls of the Sacristy.