Chapter 13　The Gates of Paradise

This story begins with a competition. Not a competition to see who could run fastest or whistle loudest, but a much harder one.It was such a hard competition that each man in it was given a year in which to try to win.

It was a competition in sculpture. It began this way.In Florence, Italy, there is a little eight-sided building called the baptistery.A baptistery is a place where babies, or even grown-ups, are baptized as Christians.This building has four doorways, one of which had a very beautiful pair of bronze doors with reliefs on them at the time of the competition.The civic leaders of Florence decided there should be another pair of bronze doors for one of the other doorways.

There were several good sculptors living then, and the men of Florence could not decide who was the best one to make the new doors, so they held a competition. These were the rules：

Each sculptor had to make a relief in bronze to go on a door.

The relief had to be about Abraham and Isaac from the Bible.

Each sculptor could have a year for the work, and then a group of thirty-four judges would decide the winner.

The winner would make the doors.