The Prato pulpit decoration by Donatello

The Prato pulpit was commissioned by the Operai del Duomo di Prato for the exterior corner of the cathedral, specifically to display the Sacra Cintola (Holy Belt of the Virgin Mary), Prato’s most treasured relic. The pulpit projects outward from the façade, facing the piazza, allowing the relic to be shown to crowds below during festivals. The architectural design of the pulpit was largely by Michelozzo, while Donatello carved the marble reliefs that decorate the hexagonal pulpit.

Donatello’s spiritelli on the Prato pulpit are among the earliest and most sophisticated reimaginings of classical motifs in early Renaissance sculpture. Their origins lie in Donatello’s close observation of ancient Roman sarcophagi, fragments of which were widely visible in Florence and Rome during his time. These sarcophagi often featured putti, nude or lightly draped children, engaged in lively processions, playing musical instruments, bearing garlands, or attending Bacchic rituals. As such the putti symbolized the joy of life, the eternal cycle of nature, and, in funerary contexts, the promise of rebirth or immortality.

Donatello studied these antique reliefs not as static archaeological specimens, but as living sources of expressive form. He absorbed the Roman sense of rhythm, bodily fullness, and animated drapery, yet transformed these motifs through the lens of Christian meaning. In the spiritelli of the Prato pulpit, Donatello revives the classical putto but recasts him as a Christian spirit, a messenger of divine joy and celestial vitality. The Roman genius loci, the spirit of place or of life, becomes, in Donatello’s hands, an emblem of heavenly exuberance.

The choice to decorate the pulpit of the Sacra Cintola with these dancing children was far from decorative whimsy. The pulpit itself was the public stage for the display of the Virgin Mary’s Girdle, a relic believed to have been given to St. Thomas at her Assumption and cherished in Prato as a guarantor of fertility, protection, and sacred intercession. The relic’s display was not only a religious act but a civic spectacle, drawing large crowds during feast days. Thus, the pulpit needed to communicate both sanctity and celebration—it was a threshold between the sacred interior of the cathedral and the communal life of the city.

The spiritelli perfectly embody that dual role. Their dance expresses the joy of divine revelation—the moment when heaven touches earth. Just as the girdle symbolizes Mary’s bodily presence made manifest, Donatello’s animated children translate spiritual energy into physical movement. Their intertwined forms and flowing draperies suggest unity and harmony, mirroring the unity of the faithful gathered below. In this sense, the spiritelli act as visual intermediaries between the celestial and the terrestrial: they celebrate divine grace through the language of human play.

On a deeper theological level, the transformation of the ancient putto into a Christian spiritello reflects the Renaissance conviction that classical antiquity could be reconciled with Christian truth. Donatello’s reliefs therefore stand as an emblem of the humanist synthesis that defined fifteenth-century art: the body as a vessel of the spirit, antiquity as a language through which to express Christian joy.

Thus, the spiritelli of the Prato pulpit are more than charming ornamentation, they are the visual counterpart to the relic they frame. Where the Virgin’s Girdle signifies divine maternity, purity, and miraculous protection, Donatello’s dancing children embody the overflowing vitality of that miracle. They give sculptural form to the idea that heaven rejoices with humankind, uniting sacred devotion and human celebration in the radiant optimism of the early Renaissance.