The geniality and culture of the great architect and sculpturer Benedetto Antelami is completely revealed in the Battistero designed by him in hectagonal form (it is the shape of perfection because it’s the closest to a circle ) alternating with great portals which are a French gothic reminder of his name and the starting date of the construction (1196) are engraved on the main portal’s architrave dedicated to the Vergin Mary right on the square.

The sculptures which are in great part attributed to Antelami himself, are distributed externally on the three great portals: regarding the Vergin Mary with stories of St. John and Jesus, the Judgment and finally on the south door with the legend of Barlaan.

Running all along the outside of the building is the Ionic style frieze a series of sculptured tiles demonstrating real and imaginative animals, symbols of the ideas of life and nature of the Medieval period. The inside,which is now fully restored, shines in unique splendor and the great work of images unfolds itself in the dome painted by Byzantine masters between 1260 and 1270; in the internal, symmetrical, lunettes and in the external ones sculptured by Benedetto Antelami, the trace of colours are evident which once covered the figures as in the series of the great statues of the months.

In the centre rises the great immersion style Baptism font; sideways lies the Antelamic style altar. The dome is the image of a celestial Jerusalem to which are connected the stories of Abraham, St. John, the Apostles and the Prophets with Christ interceding and the Vergin Mary.