Editing Donatello (section)

==Last years==
[[File:Donatello e aiuti, pulpito della resurrezione, dal 1460, resurrezione 01.JPG|thumb|left|Detail of ''Resurrection'', [[San Lorenzo, Florence|San Lorenzo pulpit]]]]

After returning from Siena he remained in Florence until his death in 1466.  He was evidently unable to work for a period, of uncertain extent, before his death; Vasari records this, but without any timing.<ref>Coonin, 239.</ref>  But, with the help of assistants, he embarked on a major project in these years, reliefs that now form two pulpits for [[San Lorenzo, Florence]], the burial place of the Medicis, though it is possible that this was not the function originally intended.  They were only assembled in this way in the following century, and the panel sizes vary.<ref>Seymour, 145-146; Coonin, 232-237; Olson, 90.</ref>

At least the designs of most of these are thought to have by Donatello himself, and the modelling of many parts; the precise attribution of the reliefs remains much discussed.  Some appear to have been cast from unfinished ''modelli'', and there is considerable stylistic disparity between panels, and sometimes sections of the same panel.  The treatment of the spaces in which the scenes are set is especially varied and experimental, part of "the absolutely uncompromising use of every possible means to express emotion and suffering" that marks these works.<ref>Seymour, 145-146, 146 quoted; Coonin, 232-237; Hartt, 287-288; Avery, 94-96; Olson, 90.</ref>