Francesco Fiorentino’s monument is studied systematically against Italian Quattrocento decorative sculpture, throwing light on this architect’s and stonecutter’s training. His collaboration with local masters working in Gothic rather than Italian idiom, sometimes referred to as something peculiar to Central Europe, is compared to similar contemporary phenomena in other countries. This study offers insights into the underlying cultural and religious motifs that drove Francesco’s royal clients to break with artistic and iconographic tradition and to establish the taste for ‘Roman’ architecture and decoration in Poland.