Florence Cathedral Dome: An Architectural Marvel
Shape: Dome and octagonal pointed profile. Its highest point reaches a height above ground of 114 meters, with a diameter greater than 41.7 meters. Its weight is estimated to be close to 37,000 tons.
Method: An architectural masterpiece made of stone (the base), solid brick (most of the structure), mortar, and other materials, notably the marble of the nerves and lining of the drum.
Overview: The dome of Florence Cathedral stands on an octagonal drum made of stone. Each of its eight sides is lined with marble plaques (white and green) and features a large central eye. On this drum rises the dome itself, which on the outside shows a clear profile aimed at highlighting the eight nerves constructed with blocks of white marble, four feet thick. All the space of the plementos between those covered by flat clay tiles, red. At the point of convergence of neural stands a prismatic lantern, eight sides and 16 meters high, with buttresses topped by spirals and covered by a conical structure topped by a gilt copper sphere on which stands a cross.
However, this external image hides the ingenious solution applied by Brunelleschi to lift the building without needing any wooden supports for the structure during the development works. To this end, the architect actually designed a double dome, exterior and interior, with a pointed profile, so that there was a constant gap between both and with a reinforcing beam extending horizontally between the ribs.
The interior dome, smaller, has a total of 24 brick-built nerves that receive the discharge of the structure, dividing the weight of the load and carrying it to the drum. It picks up and pushes the outer dome, while it alienates it from moisture, while eight nerves visible to the outside have no real structural function. However, this reduces the overall weight and makes possible the existence of an internal gallery between the two domes that leads to the lantern.
Finally, we mention that thanks to the self-supporting construction system used in this work, made out of concentric rings of brick that are happening in height, the dome show, seen from inside the cathedral, a completely flat surface, without nerves of any kind.
B) Symbolic Analysis
The dimensions of the dome make it the most important building of the Italian Quattrocento. The work itself symbolizes the importance of Florence as the core of Renaissance art in the fifteenth century and the largest city of the time, trying to make visible the parallels between the Tuscan city of Rome’s brilliant classical period. At the same time, the fact that it crowns the cathedral building is the visible symbol of the strength of the Christian Church in Florentine society.
C) Sociological Analysis:
Brunelleschi’s work is the result of the call for a contest that decided the architect who carried out the new dome to cover the crossing of the Florentine Duomo, Cathedral by Arnolfo di Cambio in the Gothic style. Although the victory was awarded jointly to Ghiberti and Brunelleschi, who finally assumed this would be the challenge of raising this new structure that would eventually highlight the name of Florence, where the Medici family began to highlight and main line of a city the economic activities (especially trade and banking) were already taking a moment of great splendor, noticeable not only in this great building and others made by the same architect (Basilica of San Lorenzo), but also in other areas of culture that would make Florence the heart of humanism in the fifteenth century.
