and painter Eugene Savage. The building's exterior is decorated with stone gargoyles, reliefs, and inscriptions. The nave is the most ornately decorated library interior, although ornamental features, particularly stained-glass windows, can be found in nearly every room in the building. Entrance relief A relief above the library's main entrance symbolizes the scholarly achievements of ancient civilizations. It is the work of architectural sculptor Rene Paul Chambellan, who executed a design produced by Lee Lawrie. The scene depicts Cro-Magnon, Egyptian, Assyrian, Hebrew, Arab, Greek, Mayan, and Chinese scholars in low relief, with inscriptions from major works in each writing system. At center is a medieval scholar, and directly above the doors are symbolic representations of major civilizations, which include a Phoenician ship, a Babylonian lamassu and the Capitoline wolf of Rome. Alma Mater mural At the western end of the nave is a fresco painted by Eugene Savage, a professor in the Yale School of Art and Architecture. Savage titled it "The Imagination that Directs the University's Spiritual and Intellectual Efforts," but it is commonly known as the Alma Mater mural for its depiction of a personified "University." Savage, an expert in Early Renaissance techniques, painted the mural in his characteristic style, an Art Deco interpretation of traditional Renaissance composition. Surrounding "Alma Mater" are personifications of academic disciplines. Stained glass 680 unique stained glass panels by G. Owen Bonawit adorn the nave, reading rooms, offices, and tower of the library. Eighty decorate the nave, depicting scenes from the history of Yale and New Haven. Most reading rooms have stained glass panels that represent themes from their subject matter. Bonawit's firm also designed over 2,000 small outline images to inset in windows without stained glass panes. Although Sterling contains the most in number, Bonawit's panels can be found in many of Yale's Gothic Revival buildings of the same period, including the Sterling Law Building, the Hall of Graduate Studies, and the residential colleges. Other notable ornament In the nave, ten high relief stone panels by Chambellan depict the history of the Yale University Library up to 1865. Bosses on the nave's ceiling depict writing implements. Samuel Yellin, the blacksmith who shaped most of the ironwork for Yale's Gothic buildings, created handwrought elevator doors for the Stacks depicting major trades, as well as ironwork and gates for the building. Other decorative stonework by Chambellan—gargoyles, corbels, and reliefs—can be found throughout the building. While