Chapter V: Preface (5)

Mecatti gives a vivid account of the attempted murder of Lorenzo, who seems to have behaved with admirable coolness, in his _Storia Chronologica di Firenze_. “When Cesare Petrucci was Gonfalonier of Florence in 1478, the Pazzi, brothers-in-law of the Medici, for Guglielmo had a sister of Lorenzo and Giuliano to wife, proposed, together with the Salviati, to murder Lorenzo and Giuliano; they knew that the Pope would give them a free hand in this undertaking because Francesco Pazzi, treasurer to the Pope, wrote that on account of the aid given to Vitelli the Pontiff was exceeding wroth with him, and also that the King of Naples approved of it. On communicating this their idea to Salviati, archbishop of Pisa, he immediately joined them, accounting himself offended by Cosimo for having outlawed Jacopo Salviati his relation, and by Lorenzo for not having been able to take possession of his archbishopric; moreover he promised to bring with him many of his relations and friends. Matters being thus arranged they thought of how to execute their design. Now there was in Florence at the Loggia de’ Pazzi[51] a nephew of Count Girolamo Riario lately created a cardinal, who was studying at Pisa and considered as an archbishop; so they thought their design might be effected when they went to dine at the villa of Lorenzo at Fiesole. But this came to nought because Giuliano did not come; then they determined to do the deed in the Medici house, for they made sure that when the archbishop came to Florence to attend High Mass Lorenzo, according to his custom, would invite him to dinner. Thus was it therefore settled, and on the 26th April, the day fixed for the function, the cardinal went with a large following to the house of Lorenzo, who received him with every mark of extreme benevolence and courtesy and invited him and all his company to dinner. But on the conspirators hearing that Giuliano would not be present, they determined to do that in church which they had thought to accomplish at table, and settled among themselves that the signal was to be the elevation of the Body of Christ. Therefore when all had gone into the cathedral and the mass had begun, the archbishop of Pisa went with thirty of his companions to the Palace of the Signoria to kill the Gonfaloniere and take possession of the Palace. But on entering to speak with the Gonfaloniere his confusion was such that Petrucci, calling his people ordered them to arm and take prisoner the archbishop, his brother, his nephew Jacopo del Poggio, secretary of the cardinal Riario and the five brothers Perugini with the rest of their company. A short while after securing them a great noise was heard in the street, and Jacopo de’ Pazzi appeared on horseback, galloping hither and thither and shouting aloud Liberty, Liberty. Then the Priors and their familiars threw several stones from the windows: and meanwhile came the news that in Santa Maria del Fiore at the elevation of the Host Giuliano de’ Medici had been murdered, and Lorenzo wounded in the neck by Stefano Bagnone, rector of Montemurlo and chancellor of Jacopo de’ Pazzi, and Antonio Maffei of Volterra an apostolic scribe: that Francesco Nori had fallen by his side, and that Lorenzo, all streaming with blood, had been carried to his own house. When the Gonfaloniere heard this he commanded cords to be put round the necks of the archbishop, of his brother, of his nephew and of Jacopo del Poggio, and that they should be thrown out of the windows, the cords being attached to the columns; the other wounded he caused to be either driven out of the doors on to the Piazza or thrown also out of the windows. Then the people rose in fury, and rushing to the house of the Pazzi found Francesco in bed, he having wounded himself on the leg when he struck Giuliano, and naked as he was they took him to the Palace and hung him at once by the side of the archbishop. They would have done yet more ferocious things, but that on going to the Medici house Lorenzo showed himself, and begged them to let vengeance be taken by the magistrate. In a short time Giovanni and Galeotto de’ Pazzi Riario himself and his brother were brought in, when Lorenzo entreated of the Signoria that no proceedings should on any account be taken against the cardinal or his brother. Meanwhile from the Mugello arrived Renato, Giovanni and Niccolò de’ Pazzi with many men from Montesicco as prisoners, and soon after Jacopo and Renato his nephew were hung, the latter somewhat unjustly, because, being a man of letters, when he heard of the plot he disapproved and hastened away to his villa in order not to be present.”[52]

It was after this attempt on his life that Lorenzo sent his wife and children and their tutor Angelo Poliziano to Cafaggiuolo for safety. Madonna Clarice had always disliked Poliziano and he was bored to death in such uncongenial company, so after a little while Clarice dismissed him, and was very irate when Lorenzo gave him hospitality in his Fiesole villa. A delightful description of the life led by the Platonists is to be found in a letter from Poliziano to Marsilio Ficino: “When your retreat at Careggi becomes too hot in the month of August, I hope you may think this our rustic dwelling of Fiesole not beneath your notice. We have plenty of water here and, as we are in a valley, but little sun, and are never without a cooling breeze. The villa itself, lying off the road and almost hidden in the midst of a wood, yet commands a view of the whole of Florence; and although in a densely populated district yet have I perfect solitude, such as is loved by him who leaves the town. I have a double attraction to offer you, for Pico often comes from his oak wood to see me, stealing in unexpectedly he drags me out of my den to share his supper, which as you know is frugal, yet well served and sufficient, and seasoned with most pleasant talk and jests. But come to me, you shall not sup worse and perchance you shall drink better; for the palm of good wine I am ready to contend even with Pico himself.”[53]

It was in this “perfect peace” that Poliziano wrote his famous Latin poem _Rusticus_, full of the same love of woods and fields that animated Lorenzo the Magnificent, to whom he affectionately refers towards the end of the poem:

“Such was my song, with idle thought
In Fiesole’s cool grottoes wrought,
Where from the Medici’s retreat
On that famed mount, beneath my feet
The Tuscan city I survey,
And Arno winding far away.
Here sometime at happy leisure
Bounteous Lorenzo takes his pleasure
His friends to entertain and feast,
(Of Phœbus’ sons himself not least)
Offering a haven safe and free
To stormtossed ships of Poesy.”[54]

Little is heard of the Fiesole villa after the death of Lorenzo the Magnificent; eventually it was sold to the Marchese del Serre, who let it to that eccentric Englishwoman the Countess of Orford, about whom Sir Horace Mann tells Walpole: “she has been detained by the purchase of her own Villa, at Fiesole, which, about a year ago, had been bought over her own head.... Cavaliere Mozzi, her messenger told me that she had commissioned him to desire that I would inform you that, if her age and ill-health permitted, she would hasten to England, though she does not see in what shape she could be useful to her son.... She set out yesterday for Naples, I believe to bring away all her furniture, in order to fix in Tuscany.... She has bought the villa at Fiesole.” Later in the same year he mentions her again as riding for some hours every morning and maintaining “a vivacity not common at her age.” In Jan. 1781, Mann informs Walpole: “Lady Orford died at Pisa on the 13th.... She has left everything she was possessed of to Mozzi. The whole inheritance will be very considerable, reckoning only what she had here and at Naples.” Three years later he notes, “Lady Orford’s old Cicisbeo, Cavaliere Mozzi married.” He sold the Medicean villa to the Buoninsegni family of Siena, from whom Mr Spence bought it in 1862, and for many years it was the meeting-place of all English visitors to Florence, attracted by the genial hospitality of its versatile owner. In 1897 it passed into the possession of Col. Harry Macalmont, whose mother now lives there. But little remains of the original design of Michelozzi as Mozzi unfortunately restored and altered the building considerably, turning it into a villa of the eighteenth century.

FOOTNOTES:

[49] Dante. _Paradise_, Canto XV. Cary’s translation.

[50] Translated by R. C. Trevelyan.

[51] A villa then belonging to the Pazzi family, bought afterwards by the Panciaticchi and eventually by the great singer Catalani; near the village of La Lastra some two miles outside Porta San Gallo.

[52] _Storia Chronologica della Città di Firenze._ Dell’ Abbate Guiseppe Maria Mecatti. Vol. II. p. 450. Napoli, 1755.

[53] Politian. _Ep._ Lib. X. Ep. 14.

[54] Translated by R. C. Trevelyan.

VILLA DELL’ AMBROGIANA

The villa of the Ambrogiana, near the junction of the Pesa and the Arno, was built by the Grand Duke Ferdinando I, on the ruins of a more ancient villa belonging to the extinct family of the Ardinghelli. Going from Florence to Pisa by the railway none can fail to admire the villa—a huge cube with a tower at each corner—close to Montelupo. Near by is the small parish church of San Quirico, where, probably the preliminaries of the peace between the Republic of Florence, the Commune of Pistoja and the Counts of Capraja, were signed in 1204.

The Ambrogiana was a favourite hunting-lodge of Ferdinando de’ Medici, and the court spent a week or ten days there several times a year. In October 1592 the marriage of Donna Eleonora Orsini, his niece, to the Duke of Segni, son of Count of Federigo Sforza, was celebrated with great magnificence in the private chapel of the villa. After the ceremony a banquet was given in the large hall, when the Grand Ducal table was served by pages dressed in white satin, with Spanish cloaks of red velvet embroidered in gold with the Medici arms and collars of fine lace; four negroes in rich oriental costume handed them the dishes and the servants who waited on the other guests, seated at small tables round the hall, wore sky-blue liveries trimmed with gold lace and a short sword at their sides. In the evening the terrace was illuminated, fireworks were let off and a cantata was sung. For four days the court remained at the beautiful river-side villa and much game was shot in the well stocked preserves, and then the Duke and Duchess of Segni left for Florence and stayed at the Casino di San Marco, lent to them by Don Antonio de’ Medici, until they returned to the Ambrogiana in December to assist the Grand Duke and Duchess to receive Cardinal de Retz.

In November 1594 Don Antonio returned from Hungary, where he had been fighting the Turks with the Tuscan contingent sent to the aid of the Emperor of Austria by Ferdinando, and joined the court at the Ambrogiana. His descriptions of battles and sieges amused the Princesses, and if he spoke as well as he wrote to his uncle during the campaign the young ladies were right to linger over their sweetmeats. In the summer of the following year Don Antonio left for Transylvania to join the Austrian army, and some of the best names of Florence appear on the roll of the killed and wounded in battle. When he returned in January he again went to the Ambrogiana to report himself to the Grand Duke who was shooting in the woods of Mount Vettolini.[55]

In October 1600 when Maria de’ Medici left Florence for France as the bride of Henry IV, she rested awhile at the Ambrogiana on her way to Pisa. She must have had enough of triumphal arches, addresses, offerings of flowers and madrigals by the time she stepped on board the chief galley of the Knights of San Stefano, where a raised dais had been prepared on the poop for the future Queen of France, with a gilt chair having the fleur de lis of France and the balls of the Medici embroidered on the back in jacinths, topazes and other precious stones. Nine years later the Grand Duke Ferdinando died, and the court retired to the Ambrogiana for the first weeks of deep mourning.

Cosimo III, decorated the villa with numerous paintings of animals and flowers by the two Scacciati and by Bartolomeo Bimbi of Settignano, which no longer exist. He seldom went there, perhaps on account of its proximity to the high road, or else because of the wind “which blows there, and will blow to all eternity,” as his doctor, the well-known poet Redi, wrote to a friend.

The last record of court festivities I can find in connection with the Ambrogiana is on April 1791, when Ferdinando III, second son of the Grand Duke Pietro Leopoldo, who succeeded his brother as Emperor of Austria after governing Tuscany with wisdom and liberality for twenty-five years, met his bride Louisa Maria of Bourbon at the villa and escorted her to Florence.

Now the fine old villa has fallen from its high estate and is used as a prison. The forests where Ferdinando I, shot and hunted have long since been destroyed, and the picturesque little hill-village of Capraja has forgotten that her name was really _Cerbaria_, from the thick and wild woods surrounding the hill whence she frowns defiance at her enemy Montelupo on the opposite side of the river. Cerbaria is first mentioned in a concession by the Emperor Otho III, to the Bishop of Pistoja in 998, and again in 1155 in a diploma of Frederic II. It must have been well nigh impregnable in those days, and the narrow, steep tortuous streets, which are only practicable to mules in single file, are most picturesque. Gradually the name was changed to Capraria, then to Capraja (Capra, a goat), and when the Republic of Florence built the castle of Montelupo on the heights opposite, the proverb arose: “Per distrugger questa Capra, non vi vuol altro che un Lupo.” (To destroy this Goat, a Wolf is necessary.)

The ruined church and castle of Montelupo on the opposite side of the river is well worth a visit, and the view thence is very fine. Down by the Arno the potteries still exist where those quaint plates with straddling men at arms and wonderful purple horses, and the _bocale_ or wide-mouthed jugs inscribed with pithy sentences, were once made. These jugs were in such common use that they gave rise to the proverb: “E scritta nei bocale di Montelupo” (It is written on the jugs of Montelupo), to indicate that a thing is of public notoriety.

FOOTNOTES:

[55] See _Don Antonio de’ Medici al Casino di San Marco_, by Count P. F. Covoni. Firenze, 1892.

VILLA DI PRATOLINO

The villa of Pratolino, about six miles from Florence on the high road to Bologna, lies on the eastern slope of Mount Uccellatojo and owes its existence to the Grand Duke Francesco I, who bought the estate of Benedetto di Buonaccorso Uguccione in 1569 and squandered enormous sums upon the villa and the garden, which he filled with statues, grottoes, fountains and _jeux d’eaux_ of every description. The peasantry around were reduced to misery by the large amount of ground he threw out of cultivation to make the park, and by the destruction of their cattle in hauling marble, stone and sand up the long steep hill from Florence. Bernardo Buontalento was the architect, and Baldinucci tells us that “all the architects of that day declared that never had so simple, yet so elegant a building been seen.” The rooms were frescoed by Crescenzio Onofrio Romano, Francesco Petrucci, Pier Dandini and Giovanni da San Giovanni, while the best landscape gardeners of the day were employed to lay out the beautiful gardens and park. Stefano Della Bella has left some delightfully fantastic engravings of the grottoes wherein graceful ladies and tall cavaliers are disporting themselves; of a gigantic tree with a platform high up in its branches on which a gay company is supping; of various fountains; of a long alley, shaded, not by trees but by arches of water under which stately lords and ladies are walking; and of several statues. A rare pamphlet, by Bernardo Sgrilli, gives elaborate plans of the villa and describes the marble statues standing in niches cut out of evergreen hedges; the wonderful animals lurking in caves which suddenly spouted water over the unwary admirer; and the cunningly devised grottoes containing life-like figures or groups. In one a shepherd piped to his flock, in another a knife-grinder sharpened a scythe; then there was a fortress whose walls suddenly became alive with soldiers firing volleys at an imaginary enemy whilst cannon boomed from the embrasures and the rattle of drums was heard; in others a pretty shepherdess tripped daintily along and filled her pails with water at a well, disdaining to look at a lovesick swain who played plaintive airs on his bagpipes; Vulcan made sparks fly from his anvil; a miller ground corn at his mill; a huntsman encouraged his hounds, “baying as though they were alive”; birds sang sweetly in the boughs of fairy-like trees; gliding serpents, hooting owls and “other most beautiful and stupendous inventions too many to enumerate were set in motion by diverse hidden machines driven by water.” But if any unwary spectator sat down on an inviting bench, or took refuge from the sun in a cool grotto, streams of water would pour on him from every side and he was drenched to the skin in an instant.[56]

Of all these marvels nothing remains but the beautiful park with its magnificent trees, and a few of the rare shrubs planted by Francesco, a passionate collector of curious plants and animals, who was in correspondence with all the famous botanists of the day; and the huge statue of the Apennines, cunningly built of large blocks of stone by Giovanni da Bologna. (?)

Bianca Cappello, the second wife of Francesco I, was fond of Pratolino, where she passed the summer months to escape the heat in Florence. No less a person than Torquato Tasso has sung its beauties in many charming sonnets, mingling praises of the place with adulation of the all-powerful Venetian:

“Pleasant and stately grove,
Your scented foliage spread forth cool and green,
For here beneath your screen
This noble maid to couch on grass doth love.
Together join your boughs, beeches and firs;
Ye too link yours together, pine and oak,
Thou, sacred laurel, and thou myrtle bright:
Guard from all harm those fairest locks of hers
And keep her from fierce noonday’s fiery stroke;
Mingle your green with golden glancing light.
Shades gentle and serene,
Nobler is this your victory o’er the sun
Than that each night by pale Astræa won.”[57]

Bianca was helpful to the unhappy poet, who in return indited madrigals in her honour. “Had Your Royal Highness not experienced both good and evil fortune, you would not so well understand the misfortunes of others,” he writes to her in 1586. People who wished to make presents to the Grand Duchess occasionally asked Tasso to write a madrigal to be sent with the gift, thus enhancing its value. Among others, a Florentine lady, Caterina Frescobaldi, sent Bianca a magnificent dress embroidered with eight different designs, and to each was pinned an appropriate poem. In the collection of fifty madrigals, privately printed in 1871 from the copy given by Tasso to the fair Venetian, he plays fancifully with her name Bianca, turning it into Alba, Candida, Bianca Luna, etc.; this play upon words renders it difficult to translate them into English.

“Behold Love’s miracle,
That my White Dawn should shed
Glory, which doth the light by Day’s Dawn spread
In radiance far excell.
Dawn’s glory is not her own, the Sun knows well;
For that himself doth lend her;
But from herself hath my White Dawn her splendour.”

When on his way from Bologna to Florence in 1580 Montaigne visited Pratolino and quaintly remarks, “the Grand Duke has used all his five senses to beautify it.... The house is contemptible as seen from afar, but very fine when you come near, though not so handsome as some of ours in France.... But marvellous is a grotto with several chambers; this surpasses anything we have seen elsewhere. It is all encrusted with certain stuff they say was brought from the mountains which is fastened on with invisible nails. Not only does the movement of water make music and harmony, but it causes various statues to move and doors to shut, animals also plunge in to drink, and other such devices. In one moment the whole grotto is filled with water, every chair squirts it over your thighs, and fleeing therefrom up the steps to the villa, if they choose they can start a thousand jets and drench you to the skin.” Montaigne goes on to describe the statues and the gardens, and particularly notices the ingenious manner of storing ice and snow, much as is done at the present time, invented by that universal genius Bernardo Buontalento, and the building of the huge statue of the Apennines, then nearly finished. Twelve years later Sir Henry Wotton writing to Lord Zouch in June about the feast day of St John says: “it was somewhat more than ordinary upon the arrival of the Count di Santa Fiore in the court here, who is espoused unto Leonora Ursina, but of the marriage day no speech; for the Grand Duke hath desire to celebrate the marriage of his Niece, and the other, both in one day, because they have been jointly brought up together and (for congruity sake) aparall’d all days alike. The fore-named Earl is nephew of the lively Cardinal Sforza.... In person not tall nor low, and one of the worst faces a man shall ordinarily see, so that some think Leonora Ursina would be contented to revoke the match, and take her first offer.” In August he writes again, “since my last unto your honour (contrary to the expectation of all) is the marriage of Leonora Ursina accomplished at Pratolino, where the Cardinal Sforza arrived on the 16 of August, and gave the ring on Sunday last. I hear the Gentlewoman to be in some pensiveness of mind and to have abandoned her Cythern, on which she was wont to play; having rather been the wife of the Prince of Transylvania than of the Count of Santa Fiore, but that, since she saw him, or rather (as some say) since she tried him. To grace her husband the better, they style him Duke Sforza, which here we laugh at.” The court, he notes in a later letter, “is still at Pratolino attending unto the fresh air.”[58]

It must have been this same Prince of Transylvania who in the summer of 1597 sent an ambassador to Florence called Sigismondo Sarmorago with gifts for the Grand Duke Ferdinando I, (who had succeeded his brother Francesco) and his wife Christine of Lorraine. They were at Pratolino, and the ambassador climbed the long hill from Florence followed by a pair of magnificent iron-grey Turkish horses and two very large dogs with collars _alla Turca_ set with precious stones for the Grand Duke, and a wonderful Indian naked spotted dog for the Grand Duchess, whose collar was resplendent with pearls and diamonds.

Pratolino, or rather its garden, seems to have astonished all beholders; John Evelyn stopped there on his way to Bologna from Florence in 1645 and notes in his Diary:—

“The house is a square of four pavilions, with a fair platform about it, balustred with stone, situate in a large meadow, ascending like an amphitheatre, having at the bottom a huge rock, with water running in a small channel, like a cascade; on the other side are the gardens. The whole place seems consecrated to pleasure and summer retirement. The inside of the Palace may compare with any in Italy for furniture of tapestry, beds, etc., and the gardens are delicious, and full of fountains. In the grove sits Pan feeding his flock, the water making a melodious sound through his pipe; and a Hercules, whose club yields a shower of water, which, falling into a great shell, has a naked woman riding on the backs of dolphins. In another grotto, is Vulcan and his family, the walls richly composed of corals, shells, copper, and marble figures, with the hunting of several beasts moving by the force of water. Here, having been well washed for our curiosity, we went down a large walk, at the sides whereof several slender streams of water gush out of pipes concealed underneath, that interchangeably fall into each other’s channels, making a lofty and perfect arch, so that a man on horseback may ride under it, and not receive one drop of wet. This canopy, or arch of water, I thought one of the most surprising magnificences I had ever seen, and very refreshing in the heat of the summer. At the end of this very long walk, stands a woman in white marble, in posture of a laundress wringing water out of a piece of linen, very naturally formed into a vast laver, the work and invention of M. Angelo Buonarotti. Hence we ascended Mount Parnassus, where the Muses played to us on hydraulic organs. Near this is a great aviary. All these waters came from the rock in the garden, on which is the statue of a giant representing the Apennines, at the foot of which stands this villa.”[59]

Cosimo III does not seem to have frequented Pratolino, but his son Prince Ferdinando, who even as a child showed an extraordinary talent for music, had a special love for the place. He sang well and played various instruments, and to his father’s anger often spent the carnival in Venice when no less than six theatres were open, four for opera, two for prose. An old writer tells us “he was such a master of counterpoint that a most difficult sonata being put before him at Venice, not only did he read it off at sight, but to the astonishment of all played it through from memory afterwards.”

After his marriage with Violante of Bavaria he decided to build a theatre at Pratolino, the big room there being unfit for the operas he wished to give. He called in the architect who rebuilt the cathedral at Pescia, Antonio Ferri, and an admirable theatre was erected on the third floor of the villa, the Prince himself directed the painting of the scenery and the making of the stage machinery. He corresponded with composers, singers and poets, and often suggested changes in the _libretti_, or the addition of a song for the reigning favourite of the hour. An army of singers and musicians were in his pay and several musical critics, whose duty it was to travel from city to city in search of fresh talent. Every year saw the birth of at least one new opera, and Scarlatti composed no less than five for Pratolino. In a long letter to Prince Ferdinando about one called Lucio Manlio, he explains: “where it is marked _grave_ I do not mean _melancolico_, where _andante_ not _presto_ but _arioso_, where _allegro_ not _precipitoso_, where _allegrissimo_ not so fast as to exhaust the singers and drown the words, where _andante lento_, I exclude the pathetic, but desire a charming vagueness which should not lose the _arioso_; and none of the airs are to be melancholy. In my theatrical compositions I have always attempted to make the first act as it were, a child beginning to learn how to walk, the second, a youth already sure of himself, the third, a young man who gallantly attempts, and by his ardour succeeds, in every undertaking. Thus have I done in Lucio Manlio, the eighty-eighth opera composed by me in less than thirty-three years, which I should like to crown as the Queen of all the others. If I have failed to succeed, at least I have had the courage to attempt this; let Your Highness deign to accept it as Your vassal; as a maiden forlorn and homeless, to be guarded from the shocks and tricks of fortune....”

Prince Ferdinando de’ Medici died in 1713 before his father and the theatre was closed for ever. A hundred years later another Ferdinand, but of the family of Lorraine, called in a Bohemian engineer of the name of Frichs, who made new roads, threw many farms out of cultivation, planted trees and finally persuaded the Austrian Grand Duke to destroy the Medici villa built by Buontalento. Ferdinand died in 1824, before the new villa designed by Frichs had been begun, and Pratolino became the private property of his successor, Leopold II, as compensation for large sums advanced from his privy purse for the bonification of the Maremme of Massa and Grosseto. Not only were the foundations of the old villa blown up, but all the water-works and grottoes, save one, were destroyed; some of the statues were removed to Florence, many were stolen, others broken up and used to fill in cisterns and under-ground grottoes.

When in 1872 Prince Paul Demidoff bought Pratolino from the house of Lorraine he added to the old _Paggeria_ or villa of the pages, and restored other smaller villas in the magnificent park; but his death in 1885 put a stop to further work, and the present villa is not worthy of its beautiful surroundings or of the memories of bygone splendour.

FOOTNOTES:

[56] _Descrizione Della Regia Villa, Fontane, e Fabbriche di Pratolino._ Bernadone Sgrilli. Architetto Fiorentino. Nella Stamperia Ducale. Firenze, 1742.

[57] The translations are by R. C. Trevelyan, from _Cinquanta Madrigalli Inediti_, del Signor Torquato Tasso, alla Gran Duchessa Bianca Cappello nei Medici. Firenze, M. Ricci, 1871. Ediz. di CCL Esemplari non venale.

[58] _Reliquæ Wottonianæ_, pp. 672, 690.

[59] _Diary of John Evelyn._ Vol. I. p. 190.

VILLA SALVIATI

It is strange no records remain about either the building or the builder of Villa Salviati, one of the finest and most widely known villas round Florence. But a search among archives and chronicles has only elicited the meagre facts that in 1100 a fastness stood on the site of the present villa and was owned by the Montegonzi, who about the year 1450 sold it to Messer Alemanno Salviati. It was then described as “a strong castle with towers and battlements,” which suggests the idea that the last members of the Montegonzi may have transformed their twelfth century fastness into a fortress-villa, and the rich and powerful Salviati no doubt added to its splendour and magnificence. One is tempted to think the great architect Michelozzi must have been called in, so strong is the resemblance of Villa Salviati to his known works Cafaggiuolo and Careggi. Certainly it belongs to his epoch, 1396–1472, and the bastion-like walls, the towers and machicolations give the impression that he who commissioned the villa lived at a time when a dwelling-house in town or on the hills within sight of the city, had also to be a fortress and serve as a place of refuge during civil strife. The only positive information about the villa we have from Vasari, who tells us that in 1529 it was besieged and burnt during the siege by the Florentine mob, when all the fine sculptures by Giovan Francesco Rustici were destroyed; but like Careggi its massive walls must have withstood the fire. In more modern times a pent-roof, as at Careggi and Cafaggiuolo, was placed above its battlements in the vain endeavour to hide its war-like aspect, and layers of pink and chocolate coloured paint now give a somewhat artificial and mean appearance to what really is a magnificently proportioned and boldly conceived fortress-villa. The principal block of building rises in the form of a massive tower, crenelated and with bastioned walls sloping out on to the grass terrace, while the remainder rises round a courtyard with elegant Renaissance arches and capitals of grey Fiesole stone, and then broadens out at each corner into a tall tower whence, in days of trouble between noble and citizen, the retainers of the Salviati must have often watched for the sign of coming danger.

Certainly as we walk round the villa, especially on its north side where it looks towards the double-peaked hill of Fiesole, seen somewhat bleak on a winter’s day, our mind is full of mediæval Florence, of a time before the nobles built such peaceful dwelling-houses with terraced gardens as the Villa Palmieri for instance, just in sight across the narrow valley of the Mugnone. Viewed only from this its austerest aspect the Salviati villa would be beautiful indeed, but unlike any other we know of it possesses a very different side of which Zocchi shows us something. An eighteenth century owner, feeling perhaps that the somewhat menacing look of his ancestral villa ill coincided with the more joyous tastes of his day, laid out the enchanting rococo orange houses with graceful balustrade ornamented with vases and a clock tower. Joined on to the villa at right angles and built in so opposite a style, it yet fascinates by very contrast, leading the eye gradually to feast with delight upon the terraced gardens laid out with such taste by Jacopo Salviati in 1510. From under the heavy foliage of the ilexes, trimmed and trained so closely as to let no glimpse of sky be seen between their branches, we look out across the city of Florence to the hill of San Miniato, a view, it is true, familiar to everyone who has walked on these slopes, but what a different foreground we have here! Where in Italy can one see not only so fair a city, bell-towers, domes and palaces, the late afternoon sun playing soft lights about them so that they seem distant, ethereal and shrouded in a thin faint film of golden mist; but between us and this fairy city lie two small lakelets, one below the other, their shining limpid water catching every glint of light till the sun shall have dropt behind the Signa hills. All the winds are hushed in this dell. They move the leaves and sway the branches of the narrow wood above, but here reigns a peace such as one finds in northern valleys, even the thin sharp shadows across the pools, from the clumps of white plumes of the pampas grass and the aloes in flower upon the banks, lie still on the unruffled surface of their waters.

The rich and powerful family of Salviati descended from a doctor, Messer Salvi di Maestro Guglielmo di Forese di Gottifredo, of great reputation in Florence towards the end of the thirteenth century. His two sons, Cambio and Lotto, both became Priors of the city, and altogether the Salviati had sixty-three Priors and twenty-one Gonfaloniers in their family. A grandson of Lotto, named Forese, was extremely popular, and distinguished himself first as a diplomatist and afterwards as Captain-General of the Tuscan Romagna in 1397; and his descendants served the Republic with honour as soldiers or as envoys and ambassadors. The only one of the family whose name is still a by-word in Florence was Giuliano, son of Francesco Salviati and Laudomia de’ Medici. One of the first to incite the mob to plunder the Medici palaces and deface their arms when driven from Florence in 1527, he afterwards became the boon companion of the dissolute Duke Alessandro, and he it was who insulted Luisa Strozzi at a masked ball and paid for it by being maimed for life by her brother; whilst his wife was always supposed to have been instrumental in poisoning the beautiful and virtuous woman who had resented the infamous behaviour of the Duke and of Salviati. Fortunately that branch of the family ended with his daughter. A very different man was his cousin Jacopo Salviati, married to Lucrezia, daughter to Lorenzo the Magnificent and sister to Leo X, with whom Jacopo was a favourite. He was the one man amongst the envoys from Florence who dared to raise his voice at the court of Clement VII, against creating the bastard Alessandro de’ Medici absolute Lord of Florence, and against building the great fortress of San Giovanni, now called Fortezza da Basso, to dominate the town. Setting forth how at the death of Leo X, the citizens of Florence had preserved the State for the Medici, he contended that the best and surest fortress was the love of the people, who are content when food is abundant and justice properly administered. And when Filippo Strozzi argued against him Jacopo turned round saying, “Filippo, either you speak not your thoughts, or if you think as you speak you think amiss”; then as though gifted with the spirit of prophecy he continued, “God grant that in advocating the building of this fortress Filippo is not preparing his own grave.” “For these words,” as Varchi who describes the scene writes, “the Pope called him no more to council, and those citizens who once bore him on the palms of their hands avoided him ... and his dependants who had received favours from him turned away when they saw him in the distance.”

Maria, daughter of Jacopo Salviati, married Giovanni de’ Medici surnamed Delle Bande Nere, and was the mother of Cosimo I, to whom she in vain preached moderation and respect for the law. Three of her brothers joined the anti-Medicean faction and were implicated in every attempt to dethrone their nephew; but Messer Alamanno, the youngest, was one of the most trusted counsellors of the two Dukes Alessandro and Cosimo and left enormous wealth to his son Jacopo. Clement VIII, created Lorenzo Salviati, Jacopo’s son, a Marquis after he had bought the castles and lands of Giuliano and Rocca Massima, and Urban VIII, made his grandson Jacopo, who married Donna Veronica Cybo, daughter of the Prince of Massa, Duke of Giuliano. The following account of the marriage by a contemporary was, according to that excellent Italian fashion, privately printed in honour of a marriage some thirty years ago. I have translated the whole letter for the curious insight it gives into the manners of that day.

“Being sure of giving Your Excellency agreeable tidings, I send a detailed account of the marriage of my Lord the Duke of Salviati and of my Lady Donna Veronica, which causes the people the more joy that my Lords the Prince and the Princess are so gratified thereat.

“My Lord the Duke was to be in Massa on the 27th and sent one of his gentlemen on the day before to announce his arrival; he sent to the Duchess his wife four most beautiful dresses with jewels to match; one was white, one of flax-flower blue, one turquoise and one crimson, all enriched with gold and as yet uncut. At the same time I was sent by Their Excellencies to meet the Lord Duke and kiss his hands. We arrived at sundown at Massa, and at Salto della Cervia the Lord Marquis of Carrara,[60] accompanied by many gentlemen and 100 archibusiers of Massa on horseback, met H.E., and soon afterwards the Prince himself with many gentlemen and 80 archibusiers of Carrara and his usual bodyguard came in sight. When we reached Nostra Signora del Monte the salvos of artillery from the castle began which made a fine effect, as besides the heavy artillery, which Y.E. knows of, and the 200 spingards, the Prince had placed 500 musketeers, who repeated the salvos, and thus the castle seemed no less terrific than pleasing.

“When we reached the palace the Duke retired to his apartments and sent to ask permission of the Prince, my master, to present some flowers he had brought from Florence to his bride; these were enclosed in a gilt enamelled glove box, and in other velvet cases were a ring with a splendid diamond, a necklace of very large diamonds, a jewel of large diamonds with a feather also of diamonds and a large pearl at the tip; these, with the chain of diamonds which the Duke had already sent with his portrait in a jewelled box, certainly were worth more than 15000 scudi. That same evening my comedy was acted and proved a success. The wedding was on Monday morning, and when the bride and bridegroom left the palace and entered the Piazza a squadron of 1000 musketeers fired a salute, which was repeated at the bestowal of the ring and when they returned to the palace. The ring was splendid, my Lord Duke not permitting that the one sent before the marriage should be used, but this other special one. The Duchess was attired most richly in white, adorned with the jewels given to her the day before. My Lord Duke was habited in blue, but the extreme richness of the suit rendered it useless and of such weight that it could only be worn for a few hours and he was begged by all to change. If the first was rich the second was not less elegant, and every day H.E. wore a new suit each one more beautiful than the last; and he bestowed one on that silly buffoon of a doctor, who was present at all the marriage feasts, of cloth of gold embroidered also in gold, and the said doctor made a good meal one morning, filling himself with doubloons and zecchins given him by all the Seigneury who were at table.

“On the night of the marriage there was a splendid entertainment; seventy-four ladies were there unmasked and forty-eight came masked, divided in companies of six, variously costumed in appropriate and pleasing dresses. Although the room was large four rows of seats were none too many and all passed with great order and contentment. Next day at a game my Lord Duke gave, with a pretty pretext, a bottle containing 500 zecchins to the bride. That and the following days were spent in feasting and festivity, and for an improvised masquerade the Duke caused a hat to be made for my Lady Duchess with a rich garland of diamonds and under the brim he placed a very large diamond worth 14000 scudi. The Duke asked to see the castle and was received with much honour, and left a good present to each soldier and bombardier and a chain worth 100 scudi to the Castellan.

“The charitable gifts to convents and other institutions are also worthy of note, amounting to some hundreds of scudi. On the palace guard and the company of archibusiers which accompanied him to the confines of Tuscany with my Lord the Prince, he also bestowed largesse. Not only has he given to all but he also caused his bride to give to many; among others to her sister-in-law Princess Fulvia[61] she gave two of those dress-lengths sent to her by the Duke and the others she left to Donna Placidia, her sister. The Duke has bestowed many chains, besides presents in money, to the officers and to many others; and the Prince, my master, has at his request condoned many punishments, pardoned many exiles and released all the prisoners who were in the castle when he visited it. The Prince also insisted on giving a horse which once belonged to the Duke, and has been cured of vicious tricks so as now to be most pleasant to ride, back to him, and with it another which he thought the Duke admired. Also knowing his love of pictures my master gave him one by Raffaelle d’Urbino, besides hounds and a body-slave who waited on him here. The Princess, my mistress, gave him most finely worked linen shirts, and Don Alessandro an archibuse of perfect workmanship and great beauty.

“To sum up, my Lord the Duke has been pleased with Massa and Massa pleased with my Lord Duke, as he is open-handed and of exquisite tact in all his dealings. All thought the Duchess very handsome as is but natural, she being of this house and sister to Princess Maria;[62] and I hope Tuscany will be no less satisfied with the Duchess Salviati than is Lombardy with the Princess della Mirandola. God preserve them both in the prosperity which he has granted them.

“Bride and bridegroom took their departure on Friday morning in the Duke’s travelling carriage, which is so splendid that it would be sumptuous in a city; and were followed also by the lettiga (litter carried by mules), with velvet lining and golden fringes, columns of silver and beautiful carving; on a par with the magnificence of all else. Twelve grooms there were in livery and many gentlemen of goodly presence. Having thus satisfied my desire to serve Y.E. in a way that I know to be pleasing unto you, I kiss your hands, wishing you every felicity.

“GIULIO BEGGIO. Massa, 5th March 1628.”[63]

* * * * *

The glowing description of Donna Veronica given by the obsequious courtier of the house of Massa was not ratified by Florentine opinion. One old writer declares: “Donna Veronica was endowed with but small beauty, but _per contra_ with a most violent and imperious temper and a jealous disposition. Her husband, poor man, had small joy with her.” Duke Jacopo Salviata, handsome, gallant and accomplished, a brave soldier and an elegant poet, soon found his loveless life hard to bear, and some eight years after his marriage met (for her misfortune) the beautiful woman popularly called “the fair Cherubim” from her silken, wavy, golden hair and her exquisite colouring. The following account by an anonymous writer of the time, existing in manuscript in the Marucelliana library at Florence, tells the tragic tale graphically, and has, I believe, never been published.

“All know of how much perfidy and cruelty a woman is capable when moved by a spirit of vengeance, particularly when roused thereto by offended love. I have often heard recounted a case which happened in the city of Florence, and will describe it as far as my feeble memory permits. There was in Florence a gentleman of the old and honourable family of the Canaccj named Giustino, well-known to me and to many still alive. He was considered a man of but small sense because, having several grown-up children by a first wife and being near seventy years of age, he took as his second wife a young girl called Caterina, inferior to himself in rank but endowed with marvellous beauty, daughter to a dyer from the Casentino. Now Giustino was also the ugliest, the most tiresome and the dirtiest man then in Florence, which encouraged many to solicit the good graces of Caterina who, though apparently leading a modest life, at length they said listened to Lorenzo da Jacopo Serzelli and to Vincenzio Carlini, a young Florentine who has now changed his habit and way of life, being the head of that hospital commonly called Bonifazio. There were also two youths, familiars of Jacopo Salviati Duke of Giuliano the greatest personage for birth, enormous wealth and other admirable qualities in the city of Florence, always excepting the Princes of the ruling house, who a few years before had taken to wife Donna Veronica daughter to Don Carlo Cybo, Prince of Massa and Carrara. This lady had not much beauty, but such pride and conceit that the Duke was driven to seek for comfort elsewhere. Once introduced to Caterina, the Duke, not to excite the suspicions of his wife, excused his occasional absences by an obligation to attend one of those Confraternities which meet only at night, and in Florence are called _Bucche_ (Holes), this one was named after St Anthony and situated in Pinti near Santa Maria Maddalena; and leaving it at a late hour he went to Caterina’s house in Via de’ Pilastri near S. Ambrogio. But he could not prevent this reaching the ears of the Duchess, who with other qualities possessed that of jealousy in a superlative degree.

“It was rumoured, but I do not know if it be true, that the Duchess entered San Pier Maggiore one morning where was Caterina whom she knew well by sight, and as though by chance Donna Veronica placed herself by her side and in a few words bade her never again speak to her husband under pain of her dire displeasure. And Caterina replied, perchance with more arrogance and spirit than became her condition, thus increasing the ire of the Duchess and ensuring her own ruin. The Duke’s love grew every day and the Duchess determined to cut the thread; rumour has it that she tried to poison Caterina, but failing, determined to take vengeance in another way; and she did it with such cruelty and barbarity that one may rightly say it was done according to Genoese fashion, and it was as follows:—

“She contrived, according to what was said at the time and it seems to be truth, to get hold of the brothers Bartolomeo and Francesco, sons of Giustino Canaccj, youths of about twenty-four or twenty-five, who though they did not inhabit, yet frequented their step-mother’s house; and after much talk representing to them how her licentious life brought ignominy on themselves and their posterity and that as persons of birth and consideration it behoved them to free themselves of her presence, she promised if they would do this not only to give them every help but such protection as would save them from any peril, and as they were poor she also promised to grant them a life-long allowance. I am by no means certain that the Duchess spake thus to both, or only to Bartolomeo the elder brother, who as we shall see was present at the misdeed and paid the penalty. It was said that the brothers, or the one, as it may have been, at first refused, but the offers being at length accompanied by threats they agreed to introduce into their step-mother’s house those persons chosen by the Duchess to work their vengeance (which was in truth her own) on poor Caterina. Some imagined that one of the reasons which led Bartolomeo to assist in the murder of his step-mother was her rejection of his love. Now as such things have occurred I do not absolutely deny that it may have been so, but it seems unlikely to me that Bartolomeo would have been received in his father’s house, also people would have talked much about it and I never remember to have heard it mentioned. Anyhow the Duchess got four assassins from Massa, and they entered one by one into the city so as to avoid observation and suspicion and were kept by her until the time was ripe for effecting her abominable project, which was not until the night of 31st December 1638, and was in this guise. At about three hours of the night Bartolomeo Canaccj, accompanied by the aforesaid bandits who stood at the opposite side of the street in the shade, knocked at his step-mother’s door; her maid looked out of the window and asked who was there, and on his answering _friends_ she recognised his voice and drew the cord of the latch; when Bartolomeo and the assassins rushed up the stairs with such fury that Lorenzo Serzelli and Messer Vincenzio Carlini, who were talking with Caterina, suspected some evil thing and springing to their feet had hardly time to fly by another staircase on to the roof, whence they escaped to a neighbouring house, before the ruffians with naked swords in their hands appeared at the door. Poor Caterina was then murdered by these infamous executors of the barbarous cruelty of the Duchess, together with her maid probably to prevent her from giving evidence. After which the bodies of these two most unfortunate women were cut into pieces, carried silently out of the house and put into a carriage; parts of the bodies were thrown down a well at the corner of Via de’ Pentolini and Piazza Sant’ Ambrogio, others were thrown into the Arno and found next day, all save the head of poor Caterina which those murderers carried to the Duchess for the full execution of this Tragedy as shall be hereafter set forth.

“All these particulars were seen by Carlini and Serzelli, who with hot haste had left the house where they had taken refuge and knocked at one opposite to Caterina’s where lived a well-known woman commonly called Aunt Nannina, because three of the most famous courtezans of our day were her nieces. The door was at once opened to them, and from a slit in the window of an upstairs room they saw and heard what I have related.