Marble sculpture group showing  Saint John the Baptist Raised to Heaven between Two Candle-bearing Angels, with two eagles and a relief showing Herod’s Feast. Work by Girolamo Ticciati sculpted for the altar of the Baptistery in 1732. The Cloth Merchants guild of Calimala financed the renovation of the altar in the Baptistery in 1732. The building had been their responsibility for centuries. Ticciati’s elaborate design, partially reconstructed here, celebrated John the Baptist, patron saint of Florence and of the Baptistery itself. The relief showing Herod’s Feast under the altar depicts John’s end, with Salome displaying his head to the king after procuring his death. But the scene above the altar illustrates the next episode in the story, with St John the Baptist raised above the clouds to contemplate God in a triumph of Eternal Life. Jesus called John “a burning and shining lamp” and here he is raised into heaven between two angels who once bore candles. In the original setting the faithful, significantly, would have seen a large mosaic of Christ in Glory above the figure of John.