Late in Donatello's [who] career the famous Florentine sculptor spent about a decade in the Venetian controlled northern Italian city of Padua [where] where, between 1444 and 1455 [when] he worked on two large bronze projects: the Gattamelata monument and the altarpiece of the Santo. The Gattamelata, [what] which was a life size equestrian monument highly reminiscent of the famous equestrian statue of Marcus Aurelius in Rome, memorialized the well-known condottieri Erasmo di Narni, [who #two] who had led the Venetian forces in the early 15th century. The highly public placement of the monument in Padua's most important piazza, in front of the city's principal church of St. Anthony's, invites one to consider how the Gattamelata might be a conscious embodiment of the political and social ideology of the city of Padua. [why, the statue] Even today, the statue is one of the city's most recognized symbols. This paper will consider the ways in which the Gattamelata might have functioned in defining the city of Padua. Such a consideration might lend some insight, in a general way, into how Italian city states in the Renaissance used art to personify their civic ideals, while also determining specifically how Padua represented itself in the image of the famous general. [why, the paper] Evidence for the study will be gleaned from considering the political relationship between Padua and Venice, the historical view of the figure of the condottieri in Italy at the time, and the humanist aspects of the equestrian monument and the practice of memorializing military heroes. [how]