'Saving the soul of Giovanni di Bicci de'Medici: function and design in the Old Sacristy of San Lorenzo

Davies, P. (2019) 'Saving the soul of Giovanni di Bicci de'Medici: function and design in the Old Sacristy of San Lorenzo. Architectural History, 62. pp. 1-37. ISSN 0066-622X doi: 10.1017/arh.2019.1

Abstract/Summary

This article explores why sacristies increasingly became such prized places for burial in late fourteenth- and fifteenth-century Florence. By focussing on one celebrated example - Giovanni di Bicci de'Medici's burial place in the Old Sacristy of San Lorenzo in Florence - it considers the various forms of benefit that the deceased soul was believed to derive from burial in such a location.