Bonanno Pisano (

Pisa Pisa ( , or ) is a city and ''comune'' in Tuscany, central Italy, straddling the Arno just before it empties into the Ligurian Sea. It is the capital city of the Province of Pisa. Although Pisa is known worldwide for its leaning tower, the cit ...

), active in the 1170s and 1180s, was an Italian sculptor, mixing

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...

and classical elements. Giorgio Vasari attributed the realization of the Leaning Tower of Pisa to him in his ''

Vite ''The Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects'' ( it, Le vite de' più eccellenti pittori, scultori, e architettori), often simply known as ''The Lives'' ( it, Le Vite), is a series of artist biographies written by 16th-ce ...

''. Pisano was born in Pisa and worked there most of his life. In the 1180s, he departed for Monreale, in

Sicily (man) it, Siciliana (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = Ethnicity , demographics1_footnotes = , demographi ...

, where he completed the doors to the cathedral before returning to Pisa, where he died. Pisano was buried at the foot of the leaning tower, where his

sarcophagus A sarcophagus (plural sarcophagi or sarcophaguses) is a box-like funeral receptacle for a corpse, most commonly carved in stone, and usually displayed above ground, though it may also be buried. The word ''sarcophagus'' comes from the Greek ...

was discovered in 1820. Bonanno contributed to the Tower of Pisa in 1175, one year after the construction beginning. Between March 1179 and March 1180, he created the bronze Porta Reale of the

cathedral of Pisa Pisa Cathedral ( it, Cattedrale Metropolitana Primaziale di Santa Maria Assunta; Duomo di Pisa) is a medieval Roman Catholic cathedral dedicated to the Assumption of the Virgin Mary, in the Piazza dei Miracoli in Pisa, Italy, the oldest of the t ...

, which was destroyed in the 1595 fire.

The San Ranieri gate in Pisa

From 1186 on, he constructed the San Ranieri door, at the right

transept A transept (with two semitransepts) is a transverse part of any building, which lies across the main body of the building. In cruciform churches, a transept is an area set crosswise to the nave in a cruciform ("cross-shaped") building withi ...

of the Duomo, depicting the main episodes of the Life of

Christ Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other Names and titles of Jesus in the New Testament, names and titles), was ...

The gate of the cathedral of Monreale

Main bronze door - Cathedral of Monreale - Italy 2015

Constructed between 1185 and 1186, the gate is signed ''Bonanno civis pisanus''. It depicts five scenes of the

Old Testament The Old Testament (often abbreviated OT) is the first division of the Christian biblical canon, which is based primarily upon the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible or Tanakh, a collection of ancient religious Hebrew writings by the Israelites. The ...

at the bottom, starting with Adam and Eve, and five scenes of the

New Testament The New Testament grc, Ἡ Καινὴ Διαθήκη, transl. ; la, Novum Testamentum. (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Christ ...

at the top, ending in "Christ and Mary in the glory of Paradise”

Joseph Bonanno ancestry

The Italian-American mafia boss,

Joseph Bonanno Joseph Charles Bonanno (born Giuseppe Carlo Bonanno; ; January 18, 1905 – May 11, 2002), sometimes referred to as Joe Bananas, was an Italian-American crime boss of the Bonanno crime family, which he ran from 1931 to 1968. Bonanno was born ...

is a descendant of Pisano, Bonanno was known to joke about the Leaning Tower of Pisa, saying that "even that was crooked".

Sources

*Antonio Milone, '"Bonanno Pisano", in ''Artifex bonus'', page 82–89, Roma-Bari 2004.

References

Gothic sculptors 12th-century Italian sculptors Italian male sculptors {{Italy-sculptor-stub