Between the 1375 and the 1378, with a fine and elegant touch, Giusto de’ Menabuoi decorated the entire Baptistery with a series dedicated to the most important episodes of the Old and New Testament, illustrating them with liveliness and concreteness narrative.
In the great dome there are the Paradise, with Christ Pantocratore in its center surrounded by winged angels arranged in concentric circles, the Madonna accompanied by a double row of angels and by a triple row of saints, who is symbolically an intermediary between Christ and humanity.
In the last row, the outer, are represented the 37 venerated saints in Padua. In the small apse are presented in 43 small squares the Apocalypse’s scenes and in the dome, the Pentecost. On the apse’s altar is placed a beautiful tempera on panel altarpiece. In the center of the Baptistery there is a baptismal font of 1260.
The decoration was commissioned by Fina Buzzaccarini wife of Francesco il Vecchio da Carrara, Lord of Padua in the fourteenth century.
