Chapter III: Preface (3)

About a mile outside Porta Romana on the heights of Arcetri stands the fine Villa Poggio Imperiale, now a school for girls. Formerly it was called Poggio Baroncelli, from the rich and powerful family of that name who owned large possessions on this side of Florence, and turned an old castle into a dwelling-house; but they failed in 1487, when the villa and much of the land belonging to it became the property of Agnolo Pandolfini, whose descendants sold it to Piero d’Alamanno Salviati. In 1548 the Salviati were declared rebels and Cosimo I seized all their possessions.

Cosimo had such an affection for Tommaso, one of the descendants of the Baroncelli, that he insisted on his living in the Medici palace in Via Larga (now palazzo Riccardi, Via Cavour). When in 1569 Pius V gave the Duke Cosimo I, in spite of strenuous opposition on the part of the Emperor Maximilian, the title of Grand Duke of Tuscany, Tommaso Baroncelli rode out to meet him on his return from the coronation at Rome. “Such was his joy,” writes Cosimo Baroncelli (son of Tommaso) in a manuscript history of his family, “on seeing that great Prince his most gracious Lord, that he fainted and would have fallen from his horse if the attendants had not quickly supported him and lifted him from the saddle. They placed him on a low wall near the fountain of San Gaggio where he died, to the very great grief of H.H. and of the whole court; he being singularly beloved for his kind and courteous manners. He died in the year 1569 on the 21st March, the day of St Benedict the Abbot.”

There is a tradition that a duel took place close to the villa in 1312 between four Florentines and four Germans during the siege of Florence by the Emperor Henry VII, but the one between Lodovico Martelli and Giovanni Bandini is historical and has been minutely described by Varchi. “Lodovico di Giovan Francesco Martelli, a youth of great courage, having a secret enmity against Giovanni Bandini, seized a favourable occasion of fighting and if necessary dying, for the love of his city; he sent him a challenge, written by Messer Salvestro Aldobrandini, setting forth that he (Bandini) and all Florentines serving in the enemy’s ranks were traitors to their country, and that he was ready to prove this in the lists fighting hand to hand, leaving the choice of place, of arms and whether on foot or on horseback to him.... Giovanni, who lacked not courage and abounded in wit, tried to evade fighting in so bad a cause, and replied with more prudence than truth, that he was in the enemy’s camp to visit certain friends and not to fight against his country which he loved as well as anyone. This, whether true or false, ought to have sufficed Lodovico; but he being desirous at all costs to cross swords with Giovanni replied in such manner, that not to fail in the honour of a gentleman, on which he particularly prided himself, Giovanni was obliged to accept; it was arranged that each should choose a companion. Giovanni ... chose Bertino di Carlo Aldobrandini, a youth whose beard had but just begun to sprout ... Lodovico chose Dante di Guido da Castiglione, who accepted the risk solely for love of his country.

“Lodovico and Dante quitted Florence on the 2nd day of March (1530) leaving the Piazza San Michele Berteldi in the following order—to recount everything in minute fashion. In front of them were two pages clothed in red and white, on horses whose caparisons were of white leather, and then two other pages mounted on great chargers and dressed in the like manner; followed by two trumpeters blowing continuously. After these came Captain Giovanni da Vinci, a youth of extraordinary stature, the second of Dante, and Pagolo Spinelli, a citizen and an old soldier of great experience, second of Lodovico, and Messer Vitello Vitelli, umpire of both.... Then followed the two champions on fine Turkish horses of marvellous beauty and value. They wore tunics of red satin with sleeves of the same slashed with lace, their breeches were of red satin laced with white and lined with cloth of silver; on their heads were skull-caps of red satin and hats of red silk with white plumes. Six servants dressed in the same fashion as the pages on horseback walked by the stirrups of the knights ... and in their wake were several captains and brave soldiers with many of the Florentine militia, who having eaten with them that morning bore them company as far as the gate.... They followed the Via di Piazza, by Borgo Santo Apostolo, down Parione, crossing the Carraja bridge to the San Friano gate where was their baggage; twenty-one mules laden with all and every sort of thing they might want in the way of food or arms for man and horse. Not to be beholden to the enemy for anything, they carried with them bread, wine, oats, straw, wood, meat of all kinds, every sort of bird and of fish and of pastry, tents fitted with every convenience and furniture they could need even to water. They took a priest, a doctor, a barber, a butler, a cook and a scullion with them. Going out of the gate with all this baggage they went along under the walls, until close to the gate of San Pier Gattolini [now Porta Romana] they turned to the right ... where was the last of the enemy’s trenches, and then proceeded to Baroncelli [Poggio Imperiale], the whole camp running to see them, it having been agreed that until they stood before the Prince of Orange no shot should be fired from any artillery, either large or small on either side, and this was faithfully observed.

“At twelve on the day of St Gregory, which fell on a Saturday, they fought in two stockades.[28] ... They fought in their shirts, that is breeches and no jackets, with the right sleeve cut off at the elbow, a sword and a short mailed glove on the sword hand and nothing on their heads.... Thus it was chosen by Giovanni to gainsay the opinion held of him in Florence, that he had more prudence than valour and behaved with more cunning than courage.

“Dante having caused his red beard which descended nearly to his waist to be shaved, attacked Bertino, and in the first round received a wound in his right arm and a slight touch on the mouth; he was then assailed with such fury by his adversary that without being able to shield himself he got three wounds on his left arm, one severe, and two slashes, so that if Bertino had continued to press him as he should have done, he was in such condition that he would have been forced to yield; being unable to hold his sword in only one hand he took it with both, and keenly watching the movements of his adversary saw how he rushed towards him with the utmost fury and inconsiderateness ... so advancing and extending both arms he drove his sword into Bertino’s mouth between the tongue and the uvula in such fashion that his right eye swelled forthwith; thus he who just before had boastingly promised to die a thousand times sooner than yield once, either vanquished by the extreme pain ... or else out of his senses, asked for quarter, to the very great displeasure of the Prince [of Orange] ... and died the following night at the sixth hour. Then Dante, to encourage his companion, shouted twice aloud ‘Victory, Victory,’ not being able, by reason of the laws agreed upon between them to otherwise help him.

“Lodovico at the first trumpet blast attacked Giovanni with incredible fury; but Giovanni, who was a master of fence and did not allow himself to be carried away by anger or any other passion, gave him a cut above the eyebrow, the blood from which began to impede his sight; therefore he with increased rage tried three times to seize his opponent’s sword with his left hand and wrest it from him, but Giovanni turning it quickly and drawing it hard towards him, always pulled it out of his hand and wounded him in three places in the said left hand; so that the more Lodovico tried to clear his eye from blood with his left hand in order to see light, the more he besmeared himself; nevertheless with his right hand he made a ferocious pass at Giovanni which passed more than a span beyond him, but did him no other harm than a slight scratch beneath the left breast. Then did Giovanni deal him a right-handed blow on the head, which he not being able to ward off in other fashion parried with his wounded left hand and tried once more to seize the sword. Failing in this and being severely wounded, he placed both hands to the hilt of his sword and resting it against his breast rushed at Giovanni to run him through; but the latter, agile as he was strong, sprang back, and at the same moment dealt him a blow on the head saying: ‘If thou wouldst not die yield thyself to me.’ Lodovico, unable to see and wounded in several places, answered: ‘I yield myself to the Marquis del Guasto,’[29] but Giovanni insisting he yielded unto him.”[30]

Lodovico Martelli died of his wounds twenty-four days after the duel, and it was solemnly decreed that his portrait should be placed in the Uffizi gallery among those of men famous for their patriotic virtues. Patriotism had, however, little to do with the duel, which was fought for love of Marietta Ricci, wife of Niccolò Benintendi.[31]

In 1565 Cosimo I gave the villa to his favourite daughter Isabella, married to Paolo Giordano Orsini, Duke of Bracciano, with faculty to leave it by will to her children; if she died intestate it was to revert to the crown. Eleven years later she was strangled one summer’s night by her husband at their villa Cerreti Guidi, and in the following October her brother, the Grand Duke Francesco I, confirmed his brother-in-law in the possession of Poggio Baroncelli.

In 1619 it became the property of the Grand Duchess Maria Maddalena of Austria, wife to Cosimo II. She bought it from Paolo Giordano Orsini, who was in want of money to pay the dower of his sister Camilla, engaged to Marcantonio Borghese, Prince of Sulmona. At the same time the Grand Duchess bought several farms to enlarge the grounds and make the broad carriage road leading up to the villa. She also planted the ilexes and cypresses which are now such a feature in the landscape. It became her favourite residence, and here Claudia de’ Medici, her sister-in-law, was married to Federigo Ubaldo della Rovere, eldest son to the Duke of Urbino, with less pomp than was usually displayed by the Medici owing to the recent death of the Grand Duke Cosimo II.

Maria Maddalena determined to enlarge and beautify her villa, and chose Giulio Parigi as her architect, changing its name from Poggio Baroncelli to Poggio Imperiale. She and Christine of Lorraine (mother, grandmother and guardians of the young Grand Duke Ferdinando II) entertained Prince Stanislao of Poland there in 1625 with the tragedy of St Ursula, a ball, and a ballet on horseback performed in an amphitheatre built for the purpose in front of the villa.

Ferdinando II married his cousin Vittoria, only child of Claudia de’ Medici and Federigo della Rovere, who died soon after the birth of his daughter. Brought up at Poggio Imperiale by her aunt Maria Maddalena, Vittoria bought the villa from her husband after his mother’s death for 62,500 scudi and spent large sums in enlarging and embellishing the place; several of the rooms added by her were frescoed by Volterrano (Baldassare Franceschini). When her half-brothers (by her mother’s second marriage with the Arch Duke Leopold of Austria) came to Florence she gave a magnificent entertainment there, including the favourite Florentine pastime of the _Buratto_ or Saracen. Loud laughter greeted the unhappy wight whose lance missed the proper spot on the breast of Buratto and was then knocked off his horse by the staff unerringly wielded by the wooden statue.

Violante of Bavaria, wife of Prince Ferdinando, son of Cosimo III, lived occasionally at Poggio Imperiale, and it was frequently visited by her brother-in-law Gastone, the last of the Medicean Grand Dukes, who inherited all the vices but none of the talent of his house. Pietro Leopoldo of Lorraine, his successor, had a particular predilection for the imperial villa and spent 1,300,000 francs on enlarging it and building immense stables (now cavalry barracks). When he, on the death of his brother in 1790, became Emperor of Austria, his second son Ferdinando III succeeded to the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, and gave hospitality at Poggio Imperiale to the King of Sardinia and his wife, who had been compelled to quit Piedmont by the revolution. Charles Emanuel IV and Marie Clotilde arrived on the 19th January 1799, only to be driven out after a month of quiet and repose. They fled to Sardinia, and Napoleon having abolished Tuscany with a stroke of a pen, the Grand Duke took refuge with his brother in Vienna. A new kingdom—Etruria—was then created, with Lodovico of Bourbon, son of the Duke of Parma, as king. He died in 1803, leaving his young widow as regent for his little son, and Poggio Imperiale became her favourite residence. She added the rustic loggia and was beginning other improvements when Napoleon, unmoved by her tears and entreaties, swept Etruria off the map of nations and the poor Queen Regent and her small boy were driven into exile. A new mistress now ruled in the great villa—Napoleon’s sister, the brilliant Elise Bonaparte married to Captain Felice Baciocchi, who had been created Prince of Lucca and Piombino; and she gave balls and festivals to celebrate her brother’s victories in the villa which owed most of its splendour to Austrian princesses. Her grandeur was, however, short-lived; in 1814 she left Poggio Imperiale at dead of night, and Ferdinando III returned to Tuscany.

Three years later a royal company assembled in the “Villa of five hundred rooms,” as Poggio Imperiale was commonly called, to say farewell to the Arch Duchess Leopoldine of Austria who was to embark at Leghorn as the bride of the Crown Prince of Portugal and the Brazils. Her two sisters, one married to Prince Leopold of Naples the other to Napoleon, then a prisoner at St Helena, met her there together with the Princess of the Brazils who had come to receive her son’s future wife at the hands of Prince Metternich.

In the autumn of 1822, when Carlo Alberto, Prince of Carignano, that strange compound of hesitation and daring, religion and mysticism, came as an exile to Florence, his father-in-law Ferdinando III lent him Poggio Imperiale, and here his son Victor Emanuel, the future King of United Italy, narrowly escaped being burnt to death as a baby. His nurse, driven distracted by the mosquitoes tried to burn them on the mosquito-net and set fire to the bed. Snatching up the child she clasped him to her breast and saved his life at the sacrifice of her own. When the “Re Galant’ Uomo” entered Florence on the 15th April 1860, his first visit was to Poggio Imperiale to see the room he had inhabited as a child, and the apartments occupied by his parents.

FOOTNOTES:

[28] Lodovico Martelli and Giovanni Bandini in one, Dante da Castiglione and Bertino Aldobrandini in the other.

[29] Colonel in command of the Spanish infantry.

[30] Varchi. _Storia Fiorentina._ Firenze, 1836–1841. Vol. II. p. 302.

[31] See Letter XVIII. Busini.

VILLA DI LAPPEGGI

The hamlet of Lappeggi lies some six miles south-east of Florence in the picturesque valley of the Ema, and here the Ricasoli had a villa which in 1569 they sold to Francesco de’ Medici, son of Cosimo I. Francesco I was succeeded by his brother Ferdinando I, who, in order to avoid any controversy with Don Antonio de’ Medici, the supposed illegitimate son of the Grand Duke Francesco and Bianca Cappello,[32] gave him a life interest in a considerable share of the family property, Lappeggi among the rest. On the death of Don Antonio in 1604 the Grand Duke again came into possession and bestowed it on the Orsini family. Alessandro, last of the Orsini, died about thirty years later, and once more Lappeggi reverted to the crown when Don Mattias de’ Medici had it for his life, but seldom lived there, as he was governor of Siena. Finally the villa became the property of Cardinal Francesco Maria de’ Medici, whose favourite place of residence it was.

Antonio Ferri, the court architect, was then ordered to prepare designs for a villa, and choosing the most magnificent the Cardinal asked what the cost would be; after a few moments of reflection Ferri answered forty thousand scudi for solid good building. “And if I only desire to spend thirty thousand, and yet have my villa built according to this design, how long would it last?” said the Cardinal. On the architect replying that he would guarantee it for eighteen years, the Cardinal exclaimed, “Eighteen years? That is enough; that will serve my time.”

Lappeggi is celebrated in the _Rime Piacevole_ of Giovan Battista Fagiuoli, a poet who was one of the chief boon companions of the pleasure-loving Cardinal, and seems to have been consulted as to the planting of the grounds. He strongly recommended bay trees: “they are evergreen, but not funereal like cypresses, so noble that kings make crowns of their leaves; and above all they avert thunderbolts, which are frequent at Lappeggi. But,” he continues in his facetious poem, “plant what you will, everyone is sure to praise your work, for a Prince can do no wrong. Should he by chance commit some gross error, liars and courtiers will make it out a miracle; so that if you plant a pumpkin to-morrow they will all exclaim, ‘What a beautiful outlandish fruit.’ Or if you sow a bean—a common enough thing—you will hear, ‘What a glorious plant, what a show it makes, what taste the Cardinal has.’”

Francesco Maria de’ Medici was very fond of practical jokes. Once he saw an ass go pass the villa with her foal, and calling his French cook Monsù Niccolò and his two aids bade them buy the foal and serve it dressed in various ways at dinner. After the guests had eaten their fill, particularly of an excellent pasty, the bleeding legs and head of the little donkey with the hair on, were solemnly placed on the centre of the table. Some of the party had to leave the room, but most of them praised the good dinner and laughed, or pretended to laugh, at the Cardinal’s wonderful wit. Fagiuoli writes a long description of the scene in verse, saying that for his part, he preferred the long ears. He also describes the game of _pallone_, in high favour at Lappeggi, and various games of cards over which large sums of money were lost. Comedies written by him were learned and acted by the courtiers within six hours, in obedience to a master whose every whim had to be gratified at once. On the Cardinal’s birthday there was a fair on the sward near the villa; all Florence, and the inhabitants of the neighbouring villages, flocked to see the fun and danced till late in the night. Marionettes, musicians, astrologers, conjurors “who,” says our satirical poet, “did not much astonish me, because the talent of changing cards by sleight of hand is by no means uncommon in these days.”

There were great doings at Lappeggi in 1709; Frederick IV, King of Denmark,[33] was in Florence, and the Cardinal de’ Medici begged him to honour his villa with his presence, and asked ten ladies of the aristocracy, chosen for their knowledge of French, to meet him. Prince Giovan Gastone waited betimes upon the King with all the court dignitaries to accompany him to his uncle’s villa where the ladies received His Majesty at the door with much reverence and courtesying, and at dinner they and Prince Giovan Gastone sat at the King’s table and were served by the pages of the court; the Cardinal having a bad fit of the gout being unable to do the honours himself. The dinner consisted of four complete changes: one cloth after another was removed and towards the end came a course of sweet dishes of various kinds; after these had been tasted, sugar-plums disposed in pyramids and many kinds of liqueur were placed on the table. In front of the King was put a large coffee-pot in the shape of a fountain with four jets, and at the sides of the table were four golden dishes, two containing three cups of chocolate each, the others cups of water. Between the golden dishes the space was covered with Savoy and other biscuits, and when the coffee-pot was removed, “trionfi” of bottles of San Lorenzo and other rare wines took its place, and all the glasses used were of the finest engraved Bohemian glass. During dinner there was a concert, and the same musicians followed the King about during the whole day, and managed so well as to be ready to receive him with dulcet tunes at every halting-place. After the banquet the King withdrew with the ladies and cavaliers into another room and played games until four o’clock, when they drove about the grounds and visited the home farm. Then going into the orange garden they found a sumptuous cold repast, preparations of milk, capons in jelly, iced fruit and sweetmeats of divers kinds. The iced fruit, a dish new to the King and to all his people, delighted them so much that His Majesty asked permission to make a present of a dish to his dwarf, who was of noble birth and a great favourite and trusted counsellor. On a table apart stood small flasks of the most costly Tuscan wines, chiefly those made on the surrounding hills praised so highly by Redi in his _Bacco in Toscana_. The King and all the company sat down and ate heartily of the good things, and then, to crown so royal a day, it was proposed to dance; the King set the example, but as night was approaching and dew began to fall it was considered prudent to retreat indoors. More liberty and jollity being permitted in the country than in town, French dances were abandoned and peasant dances, such as the _Spalmata_, the _Mestola_ and the _Scarpettaccia_ were indulged in, to the great satisfaction and delight of His Majesty. Thus they amused themselves until three in the morning, when all returned to Florence.”[34]

In July of the same year the Cardinal was, for family reasons, induced to obtain dispensation from Holy Orders and marry the Princess Eleonora Gonzaga of Guastalla, twenty-five years his junior, and the bachelor amusements at Lappeggi came to an end. The young Princess openly manifested her dislike and contempt for her worn-out, gouty and corpulent husband, and he, they say, took this so much to heart that he died after only eight months of married life.

Lappeggi was then abandoned and shut up for four years when Cosimo III lent it to Princess Violante of Bavaria, widow of his eldest son. She loved the society of literary men and poets and had a particular admiration for _improvisatori_. Cavaliere Bernadino of Siena, famous for his talent in improvising, often visited her at Lappeggi, where he met the burlesque poet Ghivizzani, and a peasant girl who lived near by called Domenica Maria Mazzetti, surnamed la Menica di Legnaja, who had a great reputation for improvising in “terza rima.” So delighted was Princess Violante with the girl’s talent that she had her taught reading, writing, Latin and music, all which she learnt with ease. After the death of Cosimo, Princess Violante had to give up Lappeggi and went to live in Rome; she took the peasant girl with her and caused her to be crowned with bays on the Campidoglio.

In 1816 Lappeggi was sold by public auction to Signor Capacci; he soon resold it to Captain Cambiagi, who was obliged to take down the second story, which was causing the walls to bulge and threatened to destroy the whole house, and at his death the Gheradesca family bought it and turned the royal villa into a lodging-house for poor people. In 1876 it came into the possession of the well-known sculptor Giovanni Dupré, whose daughter, also a sculptress, still owns it. In May 1895 the villa, like so many in the neighbourhood of Florence, suffered severely from an earthquake; but time, neglect and earthquakes have been unable to quite destroy the beauty of the place, and as we stand on the wide broad terrace in front of the villa looking out across the valley of the Chianti towards Siena, the talent of Antonio Ferri the architect is realised, who so happily placed the villa of Lappeggi and its gardens in sight of so fine a scene. The lines of the balustrade, projecting above the garden in a bold half circle, are seen against the hills where they slope down towards the valley, thus forming a scene as austerely beautiful as a drawing by some great Tuscan Master. A wide staircase leads swiftly down on either side of the terrace to the lower level of the garden, which is raised above the vineyards by strong bastions and confined by a low rampart wall. The outline of the beds remain as in Zocchi’s print, but where the pleasure-loving Cardinal once walked with a gay company of Florentines among the brightness of his flowers now are seen only artichokes and potatoes, and the statues and vases are no longer standing to recall the pageantry of those days. At the top of the garden a big grotto has been scooped out beneath the upper terrace, which Francesco Maria, no doubt remembering for a brief moment his title of Cardinal, caused to be ornamented with terra-cotta bas-reliefs illustrating such scenes as Moses before the burning bush, while a huge statue of St Mark with his lion seated above a pool of water, might easily be mistaken by a casual observer for a Neptune rising from the sea with his dolphin.

From the loggia of the house one enters a finely proportioned room, decorated with charming frescoes of landscapes seen through arches, where pheasants strut on terraced walks, while a statue of Venus looks down upon a lake, all faintly painted and with a dim distance which gives to the room that great idea of space which the Italians of the eighteenth century so well knew how to render. We sat here one rainy day reading of the gay doings of Cardinal Francesco Maria, and as we saw the rents in the walls made by the earthquake, and recalled the bargain between the Cardinal and his architect, we wondered that the villa should have stood so long.[35]

FOOTNOTES:

[32] A new-born babe was smuggled into the Pitti Palace in a lute and presented to the Grand Duke by Bianca Cappello as his child; Francesco I bought for him the estate of Capistrano in the Abruzzi which carried the title of Prince with it, and left him also large property by will. The real mother was murdered, as soon as she had given up her child, by the orders of Bianca.

[33] When travelling in Italy as crown prince in 1691, Frederick fell in love with Maddalena Trenta, daughter of a gentleman at Lucca; and being at Venice for the carnival in 1709 he could not resist going to Florence in order to see once more the woman he had loved so passionately. After his departure she had sought refuge and consolation in the convent of Santa Maria Maddalena de’ Pazzi, and he obtained a special dispensation to pay visits to the still beautiful nun, who they say tried to convert him.

[34] Taken from a manuscript (No 893 in the MSS. Moreniani). “Relazione di tutti le Cerimonie, Trattamenti, Feste e Trattenimenti seguiti in Firenze l’anno 1708 in 1709, nella venuta di Federigo IV, Re di Danimarca e Norvegia.”

[35] For the account of Lappeggi in the days of the Cardinal Francesco Maria de’ Medici, I am chiefly indebted to a rare pamphlet by Signor G. Palagi, _La Villa di Lappeggi e il Poeta Gio. Batt. Fagiuoli_. Firenze, Succ. Le Monnier 1876.

VILLA DELLA PETRAJA

The number of beautiful homes owned by the Medici strikes one with fresh surprise when visiting the villas of Petraja and Castello, which lie close together with a shady ilex wood between them, about three miles from Florence. Something of the old charm still lingers about them although the life of that time has departed, and few now pace the terraced walks, or sit in the shade of the quiet ilex woods, where once all the gay world of Florence thronged to hold court round their Medicean rulers. The charm of both villas now lies in their gardens and surroundings, and though so essentially Florentine each has its individual character—Petraja, within sight of the city, peaceful, amidst a garden of roses and carnations, its terraces sinking gradually down to the plain, with an enormous marble reservoir of clear green water, in which colossal carp disport themselves under the first one, on which the villa and a few huge ilexes stand. A rustic staircase twines round the trunk of the largest of these trees leading up to a platform among the branches, where Victor Emanuel used to dine. The view of Florence at one’s feet, surrounded by villa-crowned hills, is lovely, and Ariosto is said to have written his well-known lines while standing on the terrace of Petraja—

“To see the hills with villas sprinkled o’er
Would make one think that, even as flowers and trees,
Here earth tall towers in rich abundance bore.

“If gathered were thy scattered palaces
Within a single wall, beneath one name,
Two Romes would scarce appear so great as these.”[36]

The beautiful fountain on the east side of the villa was removed from Castello and brought here by the Grand Duke Pietro Leopoldo. It is one of Tribolo’s masterpieces, and Vasari tells us “he carved on the marble base a mass of marine monsters, all plump and under-cut, with tails so curiously twisted together that nothing better can be done in that style; having finished it, he took a marble basin, brought to Castello long before ... and in the throat, near to the edge of the said basin, he made a circle of dancing boys holding certain festoons of marine creatures carved with excellent imagination out of the marble; also the stem to go above the said basin he executed with much grace, with boys, and masks for spouting out water of great beauty, and on the top of this stem Tribolo placed a bronze female figure a yard and a half high to represent Florence ... of which figure he had made a most beautiful model, wringing the water out of her hair with her hands.”[37]

Petraja is first celebrated in Florentine history for a gallant defence made by its owners the Brunelleschi, against the Pisans and their English and German allies in 1364. It was the time of the fierce feud between Pisa and Florence, when the Pisans were smarting under the loss of the great iron chain used for closing the entrance of their port, which the Florentines had carried off in triumph and hung over the western door of San Giovanni. Piero de’ Farnese, commander of the Florentine army, had also taunted the Pisans by striking a commemorative coinage under their very walls; Piero, however, died of the plague, and the fortune of war changed. The Pisans not only coined money under the walls of Florence, but they ravaged the whole country. “The Germans,” writes Scipione Ammirato, “the Pisan despoilers and the English, encamped at Sesto and Colonnato on their way back from the Mugello, and spreading over the slopes of Monte Morello took San Stefano in Pane, where they remained some days devastating the villas, which they burned down over a radius of three miles. The sons of Boccaccio Brunelleschi, most valorous youths, then owned Petraja.... The villa being therefore well defended by the young Brunelleschi, who showed no sign of surrendering, the enemy determined to take it by force, with the intention of cutting the defenders to pieces and razing the building to the ground. The English[38] first undertook the work and advanced in fine order with the greatest ferocity, carrying ladders and catapults as though they had to storm the walls of Florence itself. But all was in vain. Some were killed, many others were bruised and wounded. The Germans then determined to try their luck and made a second assault as furious as any castle ever underwent. Neither more nor less happened to them than what had befallen the English. So they determined with combined forces to assault the villa a third time, and to their shame and the everlasting glory of the Brunelleschi they were once more repulsed.”[39]

The Brunelleschi were on the winning side, and had the joy of witnessing the triumphal entry of Galeotto Malatesta and his army into Florence; when, by way of insulting a fallen foe, the Pisan prisoners were compelled to kiss the tail of the Marzocco, the stone lion beloved of all Florentines.

The Strozzi were the next owners of Petraja, and we can fancy the pleasure Palla Strozzi took in spending some of his wealth on laying out terraces and beautiful gardens and filling his villa with costly works of art and valuable manuscripts. He occupied several high offices in Florence and took a leading part in the affairs of the city; unfortunately he joined the Albizzi against the Medici and was exiled in 1435. His son Messer Lorenzo di Palla Strozzi seems however to have still owned Petraja in 1438, as is shown by a deed executed by him before a public notary dated “from my villa of Petraja.” Whether it came into the possession of the Medici when the estates of Palla were confiscated by the Republic of Florence after the return of Cosimo the Elder from exile, or whether it was confiscated in consequence of the rebellion of Filippo Strozzi against the government of Cosimo, is not ascertained. Palla Strozzi was sixty-six years old when he was driven into exile, and although he carefully avoided the society of other Florentine malcontents and lived entirely with learned men, his sentence of banishment was renewed. He lost one son after another, and died in 1462 without seeing his beloved Florence again.

Cosimo de’ Medici died two years later at the age of seventy-six, the Republic inscribed the glorious title of “Pater Patriae” on his tomb, and he was universally mourned as the most sagacious man in Italy. “His financial genius,” says Galluzzi, “was such that when Alfonso, King of Naples, joined the Venetians against the Republic of Florence, he caused so great a dearth of coin by drawing bills as to compel them to come to terms. There are few examples in history of a citizen who, without arms, and solely by the admiration excited by his virtues, became the master of his fatherland.”[40] “Nothing is denied to him,” exclaimed Pius II, “he is a judge of war and peace, a moderator of the laws; not so much a citizen as the lord of the country. The policy of the Republic is settled in his house, he gives commands to the magistrates.” “Write in private to Cosimo,” was the advice Sforza’s envoy gave to his master, “if you want anything particularly.... Cosimo does everything.... Without him nothing is done.”[41] The most eminent men in Florence were among his intimate friends: Antonino the saintly archbishop, Fra Angelico the holy painter, and the learned monk Ambrogio Traversari, who set aside one of the cells of St Marco for his use. Cosimo invited Argyropulos the Greek to Florence, and made him one of the teachers of his son Piero and of his grandson Lorenzo. Marsilio Ficino was brought up in his house, and the last year of his life he spent in studying the translation made by his protegé of Plato’s _On the highest good_.

Cosimo I, his collateral descendant, was like all his house a patron of men of letters; he lived much at Petraja, and wishing to have Varchi near him “to enjoy his sweet converse,” lent him “La Topaja,” a small villa on the hillside above Petraja. Poets, artists and strangers of note who came to Florence, toiled up the steep road to visit the great historian, and Varchi must often have entertained there the celebrated courtezan Tullia d’ Arragona, whose portrait at Brescia by Bonvicino fully justifies the passionate verses addressed to her by so many poets of that time.

... “occhi belli.
Occhi leggiadri, occhi amorosi e cari,
Piu che le stelle belle e piu che il sole.”

writes Muzio; while Ercole Bentivoglo indited sonnets to her celestial brow. Tasso called her “la mia Signora,” and Alessandro Arrighi praised her wise conversation, her most rare beauty, and her singing, which could turn a marble statue into flesh and blood. Tullia was the daughter of Cardinal Luigi d’ Arragona (son of the Marquis of Gerace, a natural son of Francis I of Arragon, King of Naples, and of Diana Guardato). Born in Rome and educated in Siena and Florence, she aspired to be a second Sappho. Varchi, in spite of the silvered hair he talks so much about, evidently succumbed to the charms of the beautiful woman, and even when love had cooled into a platonic friendship he continued to polish and sometimes re-write, in his elegant scholarly language, the sonnets and verses of the lovely Tullia. Her reputation as a poetess induced Cosimo to excuse her from wearing the yellow veil, odious sign of her profession. The sonnet sent with her petition, which is still in the state archives of Florence, bears _Fasseli gratia per poetessa_ in his handwriting on the margin. In her old age she became devout and was a protegée of the pious Duchess Eleonora of Toledo, wife of Cosimo. Tullia’s poem _Guerrino il Meschino_, which she declared to be the versification of a Spanish story, was written about this time; it is no doubt an old popular tale, and some critics hold that from it Dante took the conception of his Divine Comedy. In the preface she rates Boccaccio soundly for “the improper, indecent and truly abominable things” in his book, and wonders how people calling themselves Christians can hear his name mentioned without making the sign of the Holy Cross. “Yet,” she goes on, “so corrupt is our nature, that the book is not avoided as an abomination, but run after by all.” Poor Tullia, when young and beautiful she no doubt read the _Decameron_ with as much zest as other people, and one cannot help thinking she must occasionally have been rather bored in her new rôle of a well-conducted woman. Her patroness Eleonora, disliked in spite of many virtues by the Florentines on account of her “insopportabile gravità,” died in 1562, and Tullia did not long survive her.

After the death of Cosimo I, Petraja was the favourite residence of his son, Cardinal Ferdinando de’ Medici, on his rare visits to Florence. He commissioned Bernardo Buontalenti to enlarge and improve the villa, “but,” says Ammirato, “I am persuaded that the tower we see to-day, which Cardinal Ferdinando certainly did not touch when he altered the rest of the building, is the same that was assaulted by the Pisan army.[42] When the Cardinal left the church and married Christine of Lorraine, Petraja was their favourite residence; and here in May 1598 they received the _Chiaus_ of the _Gran Signore_, as old Settimanni calls the Sultan’s ambassador, who came to treat about Levantine commerce, a very important thing for Leghorn. The Turk evidently enjoyed himself at Florence, as he spent seventy-four days there, and “although he had a large company with him he was a cheap and frugal guest,” remarks the old chronicler.

Ferdinando, one of the best of the Medici, was fond of gathering literary society about him. He gave Scipione Ammirato, “the modern Livy,” rooms in his palace in Florence, and offered him La Topaja as a country residence. But the steepness of the road alarmed the southern Italian, accustomed to the dead flat of the country about Lecce; so the Grand Duke gave him an apartment in Petraja, where the history of Florence was chiefly written. In front of La Topaja is an orchard garden with a marble statue of St Fiacrio, whom Moreni calls a son of Eugenius IV, King of Scotland (he really was I am told an Irish Chief), who devoted all the hours he could spare from his orations to the culture of medicinal plants. A laudatory inscription was put on the base of the statue by Cosimo III, in 1696.[43]

When Victor Emanuel came to Florence (as a stepping-stone to Rome) Petraja and Castello were his two favourite villas, and enormous aviaries were erected on the upper terrace of Petraja for his fine collection of pheasants. His wife “la bella Rosina” lived there, and her beauty is still talked of by the people about the place. For the King’s convenience the great inner courtyard, with frescoes by Volterrano—or what little was left of them after having been white-washed and then “restored”—was glazed over, which though perhaps convenient has entirely spoiled the look of the villa.

FOOTNOTES:

[36] Translated by R. C. Trevelyan.

[37] Critics declare the “Florence” to be by Giovanni Bologna.

[38] Under the command of Sir John Hawkwood, “Giovanni Aguto, who for a surname in his own country,” says Ammirato, “had the appellation _Falcone di Bosco_ (Hawk of the wood), because his mother being taken with the pains of labour on an estate belonging to her, had herself carried into a wood and there gave birth to a son.”

[39] Scipione Ammirato. _Istoria di Firenze_, p. 638.

[40] Galluzzi. _Istoria del Granducato di Toscana._ Vol. I. p. 22.

[41] _Cosimo de’ Medici._ Dorothea Ewart. P. 184.

[42] The tower is commonly called _La Torre de’ Brunelleschi_ from the name of the former owners of Petraja, and not because it was built by the great architect Filippo Brunellesco as is often said. Filippo was of a different family. See _Notizie Storiche dei Palazzi e Villa appartente alla I.E.R. Corona di Toscana._ G. Anguillesi. Pisa, 1815.

[43] See Moreni. _Contorni di Firenze._ Vol. I, p. 101.

By DUPRÈ.

(_Villa di Poggio Imperiale_).]

By SELVI.

(_Villa di Poggio a Caiano_).]

By DUPRÈ.

(_Villa di Poggio Imperiale_).]

VILLA DI BELLOSGUARDO

“... Tuscan Bellosguardo,
Where Galileo stood at night to take
The vision of the stars....”

Bellosguardo near Florence is mentioned as a favourable spot for erecting villas as early as 1427. But the great Villa Bellosguardo was in existence long before, as it belonged to the noble knight Messer Cavalcante Cavalcanti, father of the poet Guido, and lord of the castle of Le Stinche, of Montecalvo in Val di Pesa, of Luco, of Ostina in the Upper Val d’ Arno, and of other places. Some say his ancestors came from Cologne in 806 with the Emperor Charlemagne, others declare them to have come from Fiesole. Dino Compagni mentions Guido, who died about 1301, as “a gracious youth, courteous and brave, but of a quick and solitary temper and much given to study.” He was an intimate friend of Dante, and no doubt the two poets often stood on the terrace of the fine old villa gazing on the fair city below while discussing poetry and philosophy. Both were Guelphs; and Guido’s hatred of Messer Corso Donati, the head of the Ghibelline party, who had tried to assassinate him while on a pilgrimage, was so intense that he tried one day to kill him in the streets of Florence, and in consequence had to fly the country. Villani tells us that when the two rival factions were reconciled in 1267 a marriage was arranged between Guido Cavalcanti and a daughter of the staunch Ghibelline Farinata degli Uberti; but discord again broke out, the Priors of Florence exiled the chief leaders, and Dante was one of the Priori who voted in favour of the banishment of his friend. The Ghibellines were sent to Castello della Pieve; the Guelphs, Guido among them, to Sarzana. He was, however, almost immediately released as the bad air made him ill, and he died soon after reaching Florence.

Lorenzo de’ Medici in a letter to Don Federigo d’ Arragona, son of the King of Naples, writes about “the delicate Florentine Guido Cavalcanti, a subtle logician, and for his century a profound philosopher. Even as he was handsome, winning and of gentle blood, so was he above nearly all the others in the grace and charm of his writings: accurate and admirable in conception, dignified in his sentences, copious and elevated, wise and far-seeing in his composition. All these gifts are adorned, as though with an embroidered vest, by an enchanting, sweet and ever-youthful style, which, had it been used in a wider field, would indubitably have set him in the first rank.” Dante did place him in the first rank, even above Guido Guinicelli then considered the greatest of Italian poets, when he wrote—

“Thus hath one Guido from the other snatch’d
The letter’d prize....”

He dedicated the _Vita Nuova_ to Guido Cavalcanti, whom he calls “primo de’ miei amici,” and they wrote many sonnets to each other; but Guido’s _Ballate_ are by far the most natural and charming of his productions; “Here,” says Symonds, “we find the first full blossom of genuine Italian verse. Their beauty is that of popular song, starting flower-like from the soil and fragrant in its first expansion beneath the sun of courtesy and culture.” His poem, _Donna mi prega perch’ io voglia dire_, has had volumes of commentaries written on its beauties, and is one of the poems cited by Petrarch as among the finest in the Italian language.

Soon after Guido’s death new dissensions broke out between the rival factions: Masino Cavalcanti was beheaded by the advice of Pazzino de’ Pazzi, the palaces of the Cavalcanti in Florence were burnt and they fled to their castles, from whence they harried the territory of the Republic. The Florentines marched out to attack the strong castle of Le Stinche which after a desperate struggle fell into their hands, and the defenders were immured in a new prison the Signoria had just built on the site of some houses belonging to the Uberti in the parish of San Simone. From these first inmates the prison came to be called Le Stinche—dreaded name in the later annals of the city. Montecalvo was also taken, and the Cavalcanti were only permitted to return to Florence three years later, to be again driven out in 1311 when Paffiero Cavalcanti murdered Pazzino de’ Pazzi to revenge the decapitation of his brother Masino. Several of the family then emigrated to Naples, where their descendants filled some of the highest posts in the kingdom.

In 1447 the Cavalcanti sold Villa Bellosguardo to Tommaso, son of Gino Nerii de’ Capponi, for 1500 golden florins. After in vain trying on a hill lacking both springs and wells to make lakes and build brick kilns, “which have not turned out what I wished and have cost me fifty florins more than I encashed,” as Tommaso writes to his brother, he soon sold the place again to its old owners the Cavalcanti. Whether they destroyed the villa of their own free will in 1530 when Florence was besieged, or whether the Prince of Orange, or the German commander, Felix von Werdenberg, wilfully made a target of it, is unknown, but in some of the chronicles of that time it is mentioned as being in ruins.

Cosimo I confiscated Bellosguardo with other property of the Cavalcanti in 1559 and gave it to one of his servants for life. Eight years afterwards it reverted to the Medici and was bought from them by Lionardo Marinozzi, another of Cosimo’s favourites. His son sold it in 1583 to Girolamo di Antonio Michelozzi, whose descendants still own it. It was then described as “una torre ad uso di palazzo,” which would seem as though Lionardo had added the magnificent tower on to an already existing villa instead of building, as was usually done, a dwelling-house round an old tower. It has been immortalised by Mrs Browning as—

“... a tower that keeps
A post of double observation o’er
The valley of the Arno (holding as a hand
The outspread city) straight toward Fiesole
And Mount Morello and the setting sun.”

The front of the villa is ornamented with _grafite_, and over the front door is a Pietà by Francavilla, a Dutch pupil of Giovan Bologna, while the large entrance hall contains damaged frescoes said to be by Poccetti. The fine old place is now inhabited by Lady Paget, who has converted an orangery into a most picturesque and delightful sitting-room, and restored Villa Bellosguardo to its pristine splendour. All parts of the town can be seen from the terrace; only the Arno lies hidden between two endless rows of palaces, until it reaches the long line of trees in the Cascine, whence its course can be traced for many miles along the valley. From here Florence seems to be closely set between olive-clothed hills, with villas spreading like endless chains as far as the eye can reach, up to the summits above Fiesole, on to the slopes beyond Prato, and behind us towards the Val di Pesa, where the pine woods stand like sentinels against the sky. Straight in front, towards the north, are the heights of Monte Senario, three serrated peaks black even in the sunlight, with the Servite convent lying like a streak of snow among the fir woods. On clear days the point of the Falterona, where the Arno takes its rise, can be seen to the right of the long hill of Vallombrosa on the east.

This view has been celebrated by more than one poet and has given the world-known name—Bellosguardo—to this side of Florence. But only at twilight does the whole beauty of the scene appear. Strange white gleams touch the hills, and in the uncertain light of the closing day there is a confused sense of colour as though the wind were driving great masses of autumn leaves before it through the valley. Then the clearer evening glow succeeds the twilight, and Florence and her russet-coloured roofs stand out clear again in a setting of shadowed hills.

* * * * *

Adjoining Villa Bellosguardo is the Villa dell’ Ombrellino, now belonging to M. Zouboff. Here lived for sixteen years one of the greatest of Italians—Galileo Galilei; and here he composed the dialogue discussing the Ptolemaic and the Copernican systems. All learned Florentines and every foreigner of distinction breasted the steep hill of Bellosguardo to listen to the wonderful conversation of Galileo. Eloquent, sarcastic, brimming over with fun and humour yet full of learning, he was a delightful companion. Virgil, Horace and Seneca he knew by heart and often quoted, as he did the poetry of Petrarch, of Berni, and especially of Ariosto, for whom he had a great admiration. He never permitted Tasso to be compared to Ariosto, saying there was the same difference between them as though a man tried to eat a cucumber after a good melon. Galileo was only happy in the country, declaring cities to be the prisons of human intellect, “whereas the country is the book of nature, always open to him who cares to read and study it with intelligence, for the writing and the alphabet in which it is written are so many propositions, problems and geometrical corollaries, by whose help some of the infinite mysteries of nature may be penetrated.”

In 1633, after the second bitter persecution suffered at Rome by Galileo, he was allowed to return to Florence and live on

“Thy sunny slope, Arcetri, sung of old
For its green wine; dearer to me, to most,
As dwelt on by that great Astronomer,
Seven years a prisoner at the city gate,
Let in but in his grave-clothes. Sacred be
His villa (justly was it called the Gem).
Sacred the lawn, where many a cypress threw
Its length of shadow, while he watched the stars.
Sacred the vineyard, where, while yet his sight
Glimmered, at blush of morn he dressed his vines,
Chanting aloud in gaiety of heart
Some verse of Ariosto.—There unseen,
In manly beauty Milton stood before him,
Gazing with reverent awe—Milton, his guest,
Just then come forth, all life and enterprise;
_He_ in his old age and extremity,
Blind, at noonday exploring with his staff;
His eyes upturned as to the golden sun,
His eyeballs idly rolling.”[44]