The earliest Italian workers took a solid block of wood, chiselled out a sunken design, and then filled in the depression with other woods.  The only enemy to such work was dampness, which might loosen the glue, or cause the small thin bits to swell or warp.  The glue was applied always when the surfaces were perfectly clean, and the whole was pressed, being screwed down on heated metal plates, that all might dry evenly.

In 1478 there were thirty-four workshops of intarsia makers in Florence.  The personal history of several of the Italian workers in inlay is still available, and, as it makes a craft seem much more vital when the names of the craftsmen are known to us, it will be interesting to glance at a few names of prominent artists in this branch of work.  Bernardo Agnolo and his family are among them; and Domenico and Giovanni Tasso were wood-carvers who worked with Michelangelo.  Among the “Novelli,” there is a quaint tale called “The Fat Ebony Carver,” which is interesting to read in this connection.

Benedetto da Maiano, one of the “most solemn” workers in intarsia in Florence, became disgusted with his art after one trying experience, and ever after turned his attention to other carving.  Vasari’s version of the affair is as follows.  Benedetto had been making two beautiful chests, all inlaid most elaborately, and carried them to the Court of Hungary, to exhibit the workmanship.  “When he had made obeisance to the king, and had been kindly received, he brought forward his cases and had them unpacked... but it was then he discovered that the humidity of the sea voyage had softened the glue to such an extent that when the waxed cloths in which the coffers had been wrapped were opened, almost all the pieces were found sticking to them, and so fell to the ground!  Whether Benedetto stood amazed and confounded at such an event, in the presence of so many nobles, let every one judge for himself.”

A famous family of wood inlayers were the del Tasso, who came from S. Gervasio.  One of the brothers, Giambattista, was a wag, and is said to have wasted much time in amusement and standing about criticizing the methods of others.  He was a friend of Cellini, and all his cronies pronounce him to have been a good fellow.  On one occasion he had a good dose of the spirit of criticism, himself, from a visiting abbot, who stopped to see the Medicean tomb, where Tasso happened to be working.  Tasso was requested to show the stranger about, which he did.  The abbot began by depreciating the beauty of the building, remarking that Michelangelo’s figures in the Sacristy did not interest him, and on his way up the stairs, he chanced to look out of a window and caught sight of Brunelleschi’s dome.  When the dull ecclesiastic began to say that this dome did not merit the admiration which it raised, the exasperated Tasso, who was loyal to his friends, could stand no more.  Il Lasca recounts what happened:  “Pulling the abbot backward with force, he made him tumble