Michelangelo was probably 73 years old when he began work on the Pieta which was destined to be placed in Santa Maria del Fiore, the cathedral in Florence. He worked on it intermittently for about ten years while he carried out other projects which had been thrust upon him. This Pieta was not a commissioned work. Michelangelo carved it because the carving of statues in marble was the most important part of his life. When he was compelled to paint or to make architectural plans he still worked on statues in his own studio. He was at this time an old man and he wrote to his faithful friend Vasari that "No project arises in my brain which hath not the figure of death graven upon it." With each work he became more intensely spiritual. We see in his later works a yearning to merge his soul with God.

The Florentine pieta, or Deposition as it is sometimes called, was probably intended for his own tomb. Mary, Mary Magdalene and Nicodemus (properly, Joseph of Arimathea) support the crumpled figure of Christ. The statue was left unfinished after the leg of the Christ figure had been broken. A pupil and young friend, Tiberio Calcagni, attempted to complete the statue but died before he had done great damage to the masterpiece. His work on the Magdalene is incongruous to the Michelangelo style; we must look past it to see the greatness of Michelangelo's conception. In the sad but tender face of Joseph we recognize the features of Michelangelo himself.

Fifty years had passed between the beginning of the Rome Pieta and that of Florence. Michelangelo's style had so greatly changed during those fifty years that it is difficult to realize that the two statues were executed by the same sculptor. The polished details and classical concept of the early Pieta have been replaced by a rough dramatic style which sought through broken angular lines to expediently capture the pathos of the scene. The style was a harbinger of the baroque which was to become the art style of the next century.