245. (11.) _Western Door of the Church of St. Anastasia, with the Tomb of the Count of Castelbarco on the left, over the arch._ (Photograph.)
In the door, its central pillar, carved lintels and encompassing large pointed arch, with its deep moldings and flanking shafts, are of the finest Veronese 13th century work. The two minor pointed arches are of the 14th century. The flanking pilasters, with double panels and garlands above, are the beginning of a façade intended to have been erected in the 15th century.
The Count of Castelbarco, the Chancellor of Can Grande della Scala, died about the year 1330, and his tomb cannot be much later in date.
The details of this group of buildings are illustrated under the numbers next in series.
(12.) _Pillars and Lintels of the Western Door of St. Anastasia._ (Photograph.)
The sculpture of the lintel is first notable for its concise and intense story of the Life of Christ.
1. The Annunciation. (Both Virgin and Angel kneeling.)
3. The Epiphany. (Chosen as a sign of life giver to the Gentiles.)
4. Christ bearing His Cross. (Chosen as a sign of His personal life in its entirety.)
Secondly. As sculpture, this lintel shows all the principal features of the characteristic 13th century design of Verona.
Diminutive and stunted figures; the heads ugly in features, stern in expression; but the drapery exquisitely disposed in minute but not deep-cut folds.
(13.) _The Angels on the left hand of the subject of the Resurrection in No. 12._ (A.)
The appearance of fusion and softness in the contours is not caused by time, but is intentional, and reached by great skill in the sculptor, faithfully rendered in the drawing.
(14.) _Sketch of the Capital of the Central Pillar in No. 12._ (R.)
(With slight notes of a 16th century bracket of a street balcony on each side.)
Drawn to show the fine curvatures and softness of treatment in Veronese sculpture of widely separated periods.
246. (15.) _Unfinished Sketch of the Castelbarco Tomb, seen from one of the windows of the Hotel of the "Two Towers."_ (R.)
That inn was itself one of the palaces of the Scaligers; and the traveler should endeavor always to imagine the effect of the little Square of Sta. Anastasia when the range of its buildings was complete; the Castelbarco Tomb on one side, this Gothic palace on the other, and the great door of the church between. The masonry of the canopy of this tomb was so locked and dove-tailed that it stood balanced almost without cement; but of late, owing to the permission given to heavily loaded carts to pass continually under the archway, the stones were so loosened by the vibration that the old roof became unsafe, and was removed, and a fine smooth one of trimly cut white stone substituted, while I was painting the rest of the tomb, against time. Hence the unfinished condition of my sketch the last that can ever be taken of the tomb as it was built.