The huge block of marble was flawed. Agostino di Duccio had begun to chip away at it, but realized he could do nothing with the block. So it lay gathering dust for 40 years.
But 26-year-old Michelangelo saw something in the marble. In 1501, after winning the right to carve it in a competition sponsored by the Florentine Republic -- triumphing even over Leonardo da Vinci -- he began working.
First, he studied the block for days, from all different angles. Then for three years he carved his 13.5-foot-tall "David," sometimes called "The Giant" because of its size.
Unlike other sculptors, who had shown the young Israelite warrior in his moment of triumph over the giant Goliath, Michelangelo chose a more subtle moment, the time just before the battle. Out of the block of marble Michelangelo combined both his faith and love for classical Greek sculpture in a powerful, athletic David who gazes into the distance -- as if at the giant -- with his sling at the ready on his shoulder.
When the statue was unveiled, it stunned the Florentines with its power.
Well, not everybody.
One city leader, Piero Soderini, thought the nose was too long.
So Michelangelo climbed up and pretended to carve it, letting a little marble dust drop, then came back down.
"That is much better," Soderini said, "Now you have really brought it to life."
