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Scaliger tombs
Passing under the arch linking the Palazzo degli Scaligeri to the Palazzo del Capitano, you come to the little Romanesque church of Santa Maria Antica, in front of which are ranged the Arche Scaligeri, some of the most elaborate Gothic funerary monuments in Italy. Over the side entrance to the church, an equestrian statue of Cangrande I ("Big Dog"; d.1329) gawps down from his tomb's pyramidal roof; the statue is a copy, the original being displayed in the Castelvecchio. The canopied tombs of the rest of the clan are enclosed within a wrought-iron palisade decorated with ladder motifs, the emblem of the Scaligers - the family name was della Scala, "scala" meaning ladder. Mastino I ("Mastiff"; d.1277), founder of the dynasty, is buried in the simple tomb against the wall of the church; Mastino II (d.1351) is to the left of the entrance, opposite the most florid of the tombs, that of Cansignorio ("Top Dog"; d.1375).
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