rather a timid and uncertain technique, and does not show the verve
and decision which Donatello acquired so soon. It is made of olive
wood, and is covered by a shiny brown paint which may conceal a good
deal of detailed carving. The work is sober and decorous, and not
marred by any breach of good taste. It is in no sense remarkable, and
has nothing special to connect it with Donatello. Its notoriety
springs from a long and rather inconsequent story, which says that,
having made his Christ in rivalry with Brunellesco, who was occupied
on a similar work, Donatello was so much saddened at the superiority
of the other crucifix that he exclaimed: "You make the Christ while I
can only make a peasant: _a te è conceduto fare i Cristi, ed a me i
contadini_".[47] Brunellesco's crucifix,[48] now hidden behind a
portentous array of candles, is even less attractive than that in
Santa Croce. Brunellesco was the aristocrat, the builder of haughty
palaces for haughty men, and may have really thought his cold and
correct idea superior to Donatello's peasant. To have thought of
taking a contadino for his type (disappointing as it was to Donatello)
was in itself a suggestive and far-reaching departure from the earlier
treatment of the subject. In the fourteenth century Christ on the
Cross had been treated with more reserve and in a less naturalistic
fashion. The traditional idea disappeared after these two Christs,
which are among the earliest of their kind, afterwards produced all
over Italy in such numbers. As time went on the figure of Christ
received more emphasis, until it became the vehicle for exhibiting
those painful aspects of death from which no divine message of
resurrection could be inferred. The big crucifix ascribed to
Michelozzo shows how far exaggeration could be carried.[49] The opened
mouth, the piteous expression, the clots of blood falling from the
wounds, combine to make a figure which is repellent, and which lost
all justification, from the fact that this tortured dying man shows no