Pisa Cathedral & Baptismal

Everything was so grand and felt a little cartoony at the same time. Like this can’t be real.
I live in Dallas, Texas, and there’s just not a lot of history here. So being in a place with so much history with building centuries old is just foreign to me.

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The Pisa Cathedral and the adjacent Battistero di San Giovanni (Pisa Baptistery) form the centerpiece of the Piazza dei Miracoli in Pisa, Italy.

Pisa Cathedral (Duomo di Santa Maria Assunta)

• History & Design: Founded in 1064 and consecrated in 1118, this medieval Romanesque-to-Byzantine five-nave basilica was designed by the architect Buscheto and later expanded by Rainaldo.
• Art & Highlights: Features iconic bichromatic Carrara marble exterior striping, a famous marble pulpit carved by Giovanni Pisano around 1300, a bronze chandelier associated with Galileo Galilei, and mosaics in the apse by Cimabue.

Pisa Baptistery of St. John

• History & Design: Begun in 1152 by the architect Diotisalvi and completed around 1363, it is the largest baptistery in the world, standing 54.86 meters high with a 107-meter circumference.
• Architecture: It transitions from a Romanesque base to Gothic pinnacles, featuring a unique double-dome roof (part lead-gray and part red terracotta tile) and an intentional slight lean toward the cathedral.
• Baptismal Font: Inside sits a large octagonal baptismal font sculpted in 1246 by Guido Bigarelli da Como, designed originally for full immersion and where Galileo Galilei was baptized in 1564. It also houses an intricate 1260 marble pulpit by Nicola Pisano.Read more