He had some right to be chosen since his father, Jacopo, or Lapo, a German, was the builder of the most famous of all the Franciscan churches--that at Assisi, which was begun while S.Francis was still living.

And Giotto, who painted in that church his most famous frescoes, depicting scenes in the life of S.Francis, succeeded Arnolfo here, as at the Duomo, with equal fitness.

Arnolfo began S.Croce in 1294, the year that the building of the Duomo was decided upon, as a reply to the new Dominican Church of S.Maria Novella, and to his German origin is probably due the Northern impression which the interiors both of S.Croce and the Duomo convey.
The first thing to examine in S.Croce is the floor-tomb, close to the centre door, upon which Ruskin wrote one of his most characteristic passages.

The tomb is of an ancestor of Galileo (who lies close by, but beneath a florid monument), and it represents a mediaeval scholarly figure with folded hands.

Ruskin writes: "That worn face is still a perfect portrait of the old man, though like one struck out at a venture, with a few rough touches of a master's chisel.