ITALIAN GARDENS OF THE RENAISSANCE 
indispensable to perfect enjoyment. A fountain, as 
Crescenzi writes, is necessary to the smallest garden. 
Michelozzo and his brother architects built aqueducts 
and brought water from the Arno and Mugnone to 
supply the fountains of the Medici villas, and the 
best sculptors of the day, from Verrocchio to Tribolo, 
lavished their skill and ingenuity on the bronze and 
marble putti and colossal figures which adorned them. 
Statues, again, were a decorative element of which 
the Florentine garden-architect made extensive use. 
At first a few antique busts were placed along the 
parapet of the terrace or under the central loggia. 
But, ere long, Greek gods and heroes, fauns and 
naiads were seen at the end of every alley, while 
giants and caryatides were introduced to support walls 
and porticoes. 
One great charm of Renaissance gardens was the 
skilful manner in which Nature and Art were blended 
together. The formal design of the giardino segreto 
agreed with the straight lines of the house, and the 
walls, with their clipped hedges, led on to the wilder, 
freer growth of woodland and meadow, while the 
dense shade of the bosco supplied an effective contrast 
to the sunny spaces of lawn and flower-bed. The 
ancient practice of cutting box-trees into fantastic 
shapes, known to the Romans as the topiary art, 
was largely restored in the fifteenth century and 
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