was occupied on a bust of the saint, and certain payments are recorded.[168] But beyond this fact there is no reason for assigning the Pisa bust to him.  No explanation is offered of its removal from Florence to Pisa, and had we not known that Donatello made such a bust, this uncouth and slovenly thing would never have been ascribed to him.  It is a reliquary, the crown of the head being detachable, and the head can also be separated from the bust.  It is heavily gilded and minutely chased with the trivial work of some meagre craftsman; the eyes seem to have been enamelled.  It is merely interesting as a school-piece.  Speaking generally, Donatello’s portraits are less important as busts than when they are portions of complete statues.  Excluding Niccolo da Uzzano and the old man at Berlin, the heads he made cannot compare with the portraits of John XXIII., Brancacci, Habbakuk and St. Francis at Padua.  Donatello helped to lay the foundations of the tremendous school of portraiture which flourished after his death, both in sculpture and painting; based, in certain parts of Italy, on the principles he had laid down, though thriving elsewhere upon independent lines; such, for instance, as the remarkable group of portraits ascribed to Laurana or Gagini.  But at his best Donatello rarely approached the comprehensive powers of Michael Angelo.  With the latter we see the whole corpus or entity made the vehicle of portraiture; everything is forced to combine, and to concentrate the [Greek:  ethos] of the conception; everything is driven into harmony.  Michael Angelo gives a portrait which is also typical, while preserving the real.  Donatello seldom got beyond the real; but he went far towards realising the highest forms of portraiture, and two or three of his works, though differing in standard from the Brutus or the Penseroso, surpass anything achieved by his contemporaries.

[Footnote 166:  Bargello, No. 18, and No. 6, life-sized bronze.]

[Footnote 167:  Bargello, 17.]

[Footnote 168:  Gaye, i. 121.]

* * * * *

[Sidenote:  Relief-portraits.]

A few portraits in relief require a word of notice.  As a rule they are later in date, though they are often given to Donatello.  It became fashionable to have one’s portrait made as a Roman celebrity:  an Antonine for instance; a Galba or a Faustina; or as some statesman, like Scipio or Caesar.  Donatello was not responsible for these portraits, though several have been attributed to him.  But he made one or two such reliefs, such as the little St. John in the Bargello which has already been described.  The oval-topped portrait in the same collection, made of pietra serena—­a clean-shaved man with longish hair and an aquiline nose, is wrongly ascribed to Donatello.  There is a much more interesting portrait, two copies of which exist; one is in London, the other in Milan.[169] It is a relief-portrait of a woman in profile to the right; her neck and breast