Preaching of St John the Baptist: the Levite

This statue represents the Levite, to the right of the Baptist. He is gross and bald, deliberately recalling Donatello’s Habakkuk on the Campanile nearby. His powerful arms resemble those of Michelangelo’s figures on the Sistine ceiling and the bulges and rolls on his forehead extend Verrocchio’s expressive anatomy and reflect Leonardo’s studies of the grotesque.