Rainaldo was a 12th-century architect in

Pisa Pisa ( ; ) is a city and ''comune'' (municipality) in Tuscany, Central Italy, straddling the Arno just before it empties into the Ligurian Sea. It is the capital city of the Province of Pisa. Although Pisa is known worldwide for the Leaning Tow ...

. He is assumed to be the one who completed the work on the

Pisa Cathedral Pisa Cathedral (), officially the Primatial Metropolitan Cathedral of the Assumption of Mary (), is a medieval Catholic cathedral dedicated to the Assumption of the Virgin Mary, in the Piazza dei Miracoli in Pisa, Italy, the oldest of the three s ...

started by

Buscheto Buscheto or Busketus (sometimes also Buschetto or Boschetto, early Latin writers also used Bruschettus, active in Pisa between 1063 and 1110) was an Italian architect. He designed the plans for Pisa's Cathedral Square (Piazza dei Miracoli) and thu ...

. The attribution is based on his own declaration left on the façade of the cathedral that defined the

Pisan Romanesque style Pisan Romanesque style is a variant of the Romanesque architectural style that developed in Pisa at the end of the 10th century and which influenced a wide geographical area at the time when the city was a powerful maritime republic (from the se ...

. Rainaldo, together with Buscheto, is therefore considered a creator of this influential style. No details of Rainaldo's biography are known. Extent and timing of his contributions are also uncertain. Usually Rainaldo is thought to be an architect overseeing (in the 12th century) an extension of the

nave The nave () is the central part of a church, stretching from the (normally western) main entrance or rear wall, to the transepts, or in a church without transepts, to the chancel. When a church contains side aisles, as in a basilica-type ...

by adding three

bays A bay is a recessed, coastal body of water that directly connects to a larger main body of water, such as an ocean, a lake, or another bay. A large bay is usually called a ''gulf'', ''sea'', ''sound'', or ''bight''. A ''cove'' is a small, ci ...

consistent with the original style of Buscheto, enlarging the

transept A transept (with two semitransepts) is a transverse part of any building, which lies across the main body of the building. In cruciform ("cross-shaped") cruciform plan, churches, in particular within the Romanesque architecture, Romanesque a ...

, and planning a new facade which was completed by workers under the direction of the sculptors Guglielmo and Biduino. The exact date of the work is unclear: according to some, the work was done right after the death of Buscheto about the year 1110, though others say it was done closer to 1140, yet other researchers suggest the end of the century. In any case, work was finished in 1180, as documented by the date written on the bronze knockers made by Bonanno Pisano found on the main door. Fedotova credits Raynaldo with a dominating architectural composition of the new facade, with four levels of arches and pillars, dating this change 1150–1160.

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People from Pisa 11th-century births 12th-century deaths 12th-century Italian architects Romanesque architects Pisan Romanesque style {{italy-bio-stub