works, although I do not intend to speak of them at any length, because
they are alive and for the most part most illustrious in name and fame,
I say that Benvenuto Cellini, a citizen of Florence, who is now a
sculptor (to begin with the oldest and most honoured), had no peer in
his youth when he was a goldsmith, nor perhaps had he for many years any
equal in that profession and in making most beautiful figures in the
round and in low-relief, and all the other works of that craft. He set
jewels, and adorned them with marvellous collets and with little figures
so well wrought, and at times so bizarre and fantastic that it is not
possible to imagine anything finer or better. And the medals that he
made in his youth, of silver and gold, were executed with incredible
diligence, nor can they ever be praised enough. He made in Rome for Pope
Clement VII a very beautiful morse for a pluvial, setting in it
excellently well a pointed diamond surrounded by some children made of
gold plate, and a God the Father marvellously wrought; wherefore,
besides his payment, he received as a gift from that Pope an office of
mace-bearer. Being then commissioned by the same Pontiff to make a
chalice of gold, the cup of which was to be supported by figures
representing the Theological Virtues, he carried it near completion with
most marvellous artistry. In these same times there was no one who made
the medals of that Pope better than he did, among the many who essayed
it, as those well know who saw his medals and possess them; and since
for these reasons he received the charge of making the dies for the Mint
of Rome, no more beautiful coins have ever been seen than were struck in
Rome at that time. Wherefore Benvenuto, after the death of Clement,
having returned to Florence, likewise made dies with the head of Duke
Alessandro for the coins of the Mint of Florence, so beautiful and
wrought with such diligence, that some of them are now preserved as if
they were most beautiful antique medals, and that rightly, for the
reason that in these he surpassed himself. Having finally given himself
to sculpture and to the work of casting, Benvenuto executed in France
many works in bronze, silver, and gold, while he was in the service of
King Francis in that kingdom. Then, having returned to his own country
and entered the service of Duke Cosimo, he was first employed in some
goldsmiths' work, and in the end was given some works of sculpture;
whereupon he executed in metal the statue of the Perseus that has cut
off the head of Medusa, which is in the Piazza del Duca, near the door
of the Ducal Palace, upon a base of marble with some very beautiful
figures in bronze, each about one braccio and a third in height. This
whole work was carried to perfection with the greatest possible study
and diligence, and set up in the above-named place as a worthy companion
to the Judith by the hand of Donato, that famous and celebrated
sculptor. And certainly it was a marvel that Benvenuto, after being
occupied for so many years in making little figures, executed so great a
statue with such excellence. The same master has made a Crucifix of
marble, in the round and large as life, which of its kind is the rarest
and most beautiful piece of sculpture that there is to be seen.
Wherefore the Lord Duke keeps it, as a thing most dear to him, in the
Pitti Palace, intending to place it in the chapel, or rather, little
church, that he is building in that place; which little church could not
have in these times anything more worthy of itself and of so great a
Prince. In short, it is not possible to praise this work so much as
would be sufficient. Now, although I could enlarge at much greater
length on the works of Benvenuto, who has been in his every action
spirited, proud, vigorous, most resolute, and truly terrible, and a
person who has been only too well able to speak for himself with
Princes, no less than to employ his hand and brain in matters of art, I
shall say nothing more of him here, seeing that he has written of his
own life and works, and a treatise on the goldsmith's arts, and on
founding and casting in metal, with other things pertaining to such
arts, and also of sculpture, with much more eloquence and order than I
perchance would be able to use here; as for him, therefore, I must be
content with this short summary of the rarest of his principal works.
[Illustration: PERSEUS
(_After the bronze by =Benvenuto Cellini=. Florence: Loggia de' Lanzi_)
_Brogi_]
Francesco di Giuliano da San Gallo, sculptor, architect, and
Academician, and now a man seventy years of age, has executed many works
of sculpture, as has been related in the Life of his father and
elsewhere; the three figures of marble, somewhat larger than life, which
are over the altar of the Church of Orsanmichele, S. Anne, the Virgin,
and the Child Christ, figures which are much extolled; certain other
statues, also in marble, for the tomb of Piero de' Medici at Monte
Cassino; the tomb of Bishop de' Marzi, which is in the Nunziata, and
that of Monsignor Giovio, the writer of the history of his own times.
In architecture, likewise, the same Francesco has executed many good and
beautiful works in Florence and elsewhere; and he has well deserved,
both for his own good qualities and for the services of his father
Giuliano, to be always favoured by the house of Medici as their protege,
on which account Duke Cosimo, after the death of Baccio d'Agnolo, gave
him the place which that master had held as architect to the Duomo of
Florence.
Of Ammanati, who is also among the first of our Academicians, enough
having been said of him in the description of the works of Jacopo
Sansovino, there is no need to speak further here. But I will record
that disciples of his, and also Academicians, are Andrea Calamech of
Carrara, a well-practised sculptor, who executed many figures under
Ammanati, and was invited to Messina after the death of the above-named
Martino to take the position which Fra Giovanni Agnolo had once held, in
which place he died; and Battista di Benedetto, a young man who has
given promise of becoming, as he will, an excellent master, having
demonstrated already by many works that he is not inferior to the
above-named Andrea or to any other of the young sculptors of our
Academy, in beauty of genius and judgment.
Vincenzio de' Rossi of Fiesole, likewise a sculptor, architect, and
Academician of Florence, is worthy to have some record made of him in
this place, in addition to what has been said of him in the Life of
Baccio Bandinelli, whose disciple he was. After he had taken leave of
Baccio, then, he gave a great proof of his powers in Rome, although he
was young enough, in the statue that he made for the Ritonda, of a S.
Joseph with Christ as a boy of ten years, both figures wrought with good
mastery and a beautiful manner. He then executed two tombs in the Church
of S. Maria della Pace, with the effigies of those who are within them
on the sarcophagi, and on the front without some Prophets of marble in
half-relief and large as life, which acquired for him the name of an
excellent sculptor. Whereupon there was allotted to him by the Roman
people the statue of Pope Paul IV, which was placed on the Campidoglio;
and he executed it excellently well. But that work had a short life,
for the reason that after the death of the Pope it was thrown to the
ground and destroyed by the populace, which persecutes fiercely one day
the very men whom it has exalted to the heavens the day before. After
that figure Vincenzio made from one block of marble two statues a little
larger than life, a Theseus, King of Athens, who has carried off Helen
and holds her in his arms in the act of knowing her, with a Troy beneath
his feet; than which figures it is not possible to make any with more
diligence, study, labour, and grace. Wherefore when Duke Cosimo de'
Medici, having journeyed to Rome, and going to see the modern works
worthy to be seen no less than the antiques, saw those statues,
Vincenzio himself showing them to him, he extolled them very highly, as
they deserved; and then Vincenzio, who is a gentle spirit, courteously
presented them to him, and at the same time freely offered him his
services. But his Excellency, having conveyed them not long afterwards
to his Palace of the Pitti in Florence, paid him a good price for them;
and, having taken Vincenzio himself with him, he commissioned him after
no long time to execute the Labours of Hercules in figures of marble
larger than life and in the round. On these Vincenzio is now spending
his time, and already he has carried to completion the Slaying of Cacus
and the Combat with the Centaur; which whole work, even as it is most
exalted in subject and also laborious, so it is hoped that it will prove
excellent in artistry, Vincenzio being a man of very beautiful genius
and much judgment, and prodigal of thought in all his works of
importance.
Nor must I omit to say that under his discipline Ilarione Ruspoli, a
young citizen of Florence, gives his attention with much credit to
sculpture; which Ilarione, no less than his peers in our Academy, showed
that he had knowledge, design, and a good mastery in the making of
statues, when he had occasion together with the others in the obsequies
of Michelagnolo and in the festive preparations for the nuptials named
above.
[Illustration: FOUNTAIN OF NEPTUNE
(_After =Giovanni Bologna=. Bologna_)
_Alinari_]
Francesco Camilliani, a sculptor and Academician of Florence, who was a
disciple of Baccio Bandinelli, after having given in many works proof of
being a good sculptor, has consumed fifteen years in making ornaments
for fountains; and of such there is one most stupendous, which the
Lord Don Luigi di Toledo has caused to be executed for his garden in
Florence. The ornaments about that garden are various statues of men
and animals in divers manners, all rich and truly regal, and wrought
without sparing of expense; and among other statues that Francesco has
made for that place, two larger than life, which represent the Rivers
Arno and Mugnone, are of supreme beauty, and particularly the Mugnone,
which can bear comparison with no matter what statue by an excellent
master. In short, all the architecture and ornamentation of that garden
are the work of Francesco, who by the richness of the various fountains
has made it such, that it has no equal in Florence, and perhaps not in
Italy. And the principal fountain, which is even now being carried to
completion, will be the richest and most sumptuous to be seen in any
place, with its wealth of the richest and finest ornaments that can be
imagined, and the great abundance of waters that will be there, flowing
without fail at every season.
Also an Academician, and much in favour with our Princes for his
talents, is Giovan Bologna of Douai, a Flemish sculptor and a young man
truly of the rarest, who has executed with most beautiful ornaments of
metal the fountain that has been made recently on the Piazza di S.
Petronio in Bologna, opposite to the Palazzo de' Signori, in which there
are, besides other ornaments, four very beautiful Sirens at the corners,
with various children all around, and masks bizarre and extraordinary.
But the most notable thing is a figure that he has made and placed over
the centre of that fountain, a Neptune of six braccia, which is a most
beautiful casting and a statue studied and wrought to perfection. The
same master--not to speak at present of all the works that he has
executed in clay, terracotta, wax, and other mixtures--has made a very
beautiful Venus in marble, and has carried almost to completion for the
Lord Prince a Samson large as life, who is combating on foot with two
Philistines. And in bronze he has made a statue of Bacchus, larger than
life and in the round, and a Mercury in the act of flying, a very
ingenious figure, the whole weight resting on one leg and on the point
of the foot, which has been sent to the Emperor Maximilian, as a thing
that is indeed most rare. But if up to the present he has executed many
works, he will do many more in the future, and most beautiful, for
recently the Lord Prince has had him provided with rooms in the Palace,
and has commissioned him to make a statue of a Victory of five braccia,
with a captive, which is going into the Great Hall, opposite another by
the hand of Michelagnolo; and he will execute for that Prince large and
important works, in which he will have an ample field to show his worth.
Many works by his hand, and very beautiful models of various things, are
in the possession of M. Bernardo Vecchietti, a gentleman of Florence,
and Maestro Bernardo di Mona Mattea, builder to the Duke, who has
constructed with great excellence all the fabrics designed by Vasari.
[Illustration: MERCURY
(_After the bronze by =Giovanni Bologna=. Florence: Museo Nazionale_)
_Anderson_]
Not less than this Giovan Bologna and his friends and other sculptors of
our Academy, Vincenzio Danti of Perugia, who under the protection of
Duke Cosimo has adopted Florence as his country, is a young man truly
rare and of fine genius. Vincenzio, when a youth, worked as a goldsmith,
and executed in that profession things beyond belief; and afterwards,
having applied himself to the work of casting, he had the courage at the
age of twenty to cast in bronze a statue of Pope Julius III, four
braccia high, seated and giving the Benediction; which statue, a very
creditable work, is now in the Piazza of Perugia. Then, having come to
Florence to serve Duke Cosimo, he made a very beautiful model in wax,
larger than life, of a Hercules crushing Antaeus, in order to cast from
it a figure in bronze, which was to be placed over the principal
fountain in the garden of Castello, a villa of the said Lord Duke. But,
having made the mould upon that model, in seeking to cast it in bronze
it did not succeed, although he returned twice to the work; either by
bad fortune, or because the metal was burnt, or for some other reason.
Having then turned, in order not to subject his labours to the whim of
chance, to working in marble, he executed in a short time from one
single piece of marble two figures, Honour with Deceit beneath it, and
with such diligence, that it seemed as if he had never done anything but
handle the hammer and chisels; and on the head of Honour, which is
beautiful, he made the hair curling and so well pierced through, that it
seems real and natural, besides displaying a very good knowledge of the
nude. That statue is now in the courtyard of the house of Signor Sforza
Almeni in the Via de' Servi. And at Fiesole, for the same Signor
Sforza, he made many ornaments in his garden and around certain
fountains. Afterwards he executed for the Lord Duke some low-reliefs in
marble and in bronze, which were held to be very beautiful, for in that
manner of sculpture he is perhaps not inferior to any other master. He
then cast, also in bronze, the grating of the chapel built in the new
apartments of the Palace, which were painted by Giorgio Vasari, and with
it a panel with many figures in low-relief, which serves to close a
press wherein the Duke keeps writings of importance; and another panel
one braccio and a half in height and two and a half in breadth,
representing how Moses, in order to heal the Hebrew people from the
bites of the serpents, placed one upon a pole. All these things are in
the possession of that lord, by order of whom he made the door of the
sacristy in the Pieve of Prato, and over it a sarcophagus of marble,
with a Madonna three braccia and a half high, and beside her the Child
nude, and two little children that are one on either side of a head in
low-relief of Messer Carlo de' Medici, the natural son of the elder
Cosimo, and once Provost of Prato, whose bones, after having long been
in a tomb of brick, Duke Cosimo has caused to be laid in the above-named
sarcophagus, thus giving him honourable sepulture; although it is true
that the said Madonna and the head in low-relief (which is very
beautiful), being in a bad light, do not show up by a great measure as
they should. The same Vincenzio has since made, in order to adorn the
residence of the Magistrates of the Mint, on the head-wall over the
loggia that is on the River Arno, an escutcheon of the Duke with two
nude figures, larger than life, on either side of it, one representing
Equity and the other Rigour; and from hour to hour he is expecting the
marble to make the statue of the Lord Duke himself, considerably larger
than life, of which he has made a model; and that statue is to be placed
seated over the escutcheon, as a completion to the work, which is to be
built shortly, together with the rest of the facade, which Vasari, who
is the architect of that fabric, is even now superintending. He has also
in hand, and has carried very near completion, a Madonna of marble
larger than life, standing with Jesus, a Child of three months, in her
arms; which will be a very beautiful work. All these works, together
with others, he is executing in the Monastery of the Angeli in
Florence, where he lives quietly in company with these monks, who are
much his friends, in the rooms that were once occupied there by Messer
Benedetto Varchi, of whom the same Vincenzio is making a portrait in
low-relief, which will be very beautiful.
[Illustration: THE BRAZEN SERPENT
(_After the bronze relief by =Vincenzo Danti=. Florence: Museo
Nazionale_)
_Alinari_]
Vincenzio has a brother in the Order of Preaching Friars, called Fra
Ignazio Danti, who is very excellent in matters of cosmography, and of a
rare genius, insomuch that Duke Cosimo de' Medici is causing him to
execute a work than which none greater or more perfect has ever been
done at any time in that profession; which is as follows. His
Excellency, under the direction of Vasari, has built a new hall of some
size expressly as an addition to the guardaroba, on the second floor of
the apartments in the Ducal Palace; and this he has furnished all around
with presses seven braccia high, with rich carvings of walnut-wood, in
order to deposit in them the most important, precious, and beautiful
things that he possesses. Over the doors of those presses, within their
ornaments, Fra Ignazio has distributed fifty-seven pictures about two
braccia high and wide in proportion, in which are painted in oils on the
wood with the greatest diligence, after the manner of miniatures, the
Tables of Ptolemy, all measured with perfect accuracy and corrected
after the most recent authorities, with exact charts of navigation and
their scales for measuring and degrees, done with supreme diligence; and
with these are all the names, both ancient and modern. His distribution
of these pictures is on this wise. At the principal entrance of the
hall, on the transverse surfaces of the thickness of the presses, in
four pictures, are four half-spheres in perspective; in the two below is
the Universe of the Earth, and in the two above is the Universe of the
Heavens, with its signs and celestial figures. Then as one enters, on
the right hand, there is all Europe in fourteen tables and pictures, one
after another, as far as the centre of the wall that is at the head,
opposite to the principal door; in which centre is placed the clock with
the wheels and with the spheres of the planets that every day go through
their motions, which is that clock, so famous and renowned, made by the
Florentine Lorenzo della Volpaia. Above these tables is Africa in eleven
tables, as far as the said clock; and then, beyond that clock, Asia in
the lower range, which continues likewise in fourteen tables as far as
the principal door. Above these tables of Asia, in fourteen other
tables, there follow the West Indies, beginning like the others from the
clock, and continuing as far as the same principal door; and thus there
are in all fifty-seven tables. In the base at the foot, in an equal
number of pictures running right round, which will be exactly in line
with those tables, are to be all the plants and all the animals copied
from nature, according to the kinds that those countries produce. Over
the cornice of the presses, which is the crown of the whole, there are
to be some projections separating the pictures, and upon these are to be
placed such of the antique heads in marble as are in existence of the
Emperors and Princes who have possessed those lands; and on the plain
walls up to the cornice of the ceiling, which is all of carved wood and
painted in twelve great pictures, each with four celestial signs, making
in all forty-eight, and little less than lifesize, with their
stars--there are beneath, as I have said, on those walls, three hundred
portraits from life of distinguished persons for the last five hundred
years or more, painted in pictures in oils (and a note will be made of
them in the table of portraits, in order not to make too long a story
here with their names), all of one size, and with one and the same
ornament of carved walnut-wood--a very rare effect. In the two
compartments in the centre of the ceiling, each four braccia wide, where
there are the celestial signs, which open with ease without revealing
the secret of the hiding-place, in a part after the manner of a heaven,
will be accommodated two large globes, each three braccia and a half in
height. In one of them will be the whole earth, marked distinctly, and
this will be let down by a windlass that will not be seen, down to the
floor, and will rest on a balanced pedestal, so that, when fixed, there
will be seen reflected all the tables that are right round in the
pictures of the presses, and they will have a countermark in the globe
wherewith to find them with ease. In the other globe will be the
forty-eight celestial signs arranged in such a manner, that it will be
possible with it to perform all the operations of the Astrolabe to
perfection. This fanciful invention came from Duke Cosimo, who wished to
put together once and for all these things both of heaven and of earth,
absolutely exact and without errors, so that it might be possible to
see and measure them separately and all together, according to the
pleasure of those who delight in this most beautiful profession and
study it; of which, as a thing worthy to be recorded, it has seemed to
me my duty to make mention in this place on account of the art of Fra
Ignazio and the greatness of the Prince, who holds us worthy to enjoy
such honourable labours, and also to the end that it may be known
throughout the whole world.
And now to return to the men of our Academy; although I have spoken in
the Life of Tribolo of Antonio di Gino Lorenzi, a sculptor of
Settignano, I must record here with better order, as in the proper
place, that he executed under his master Tribolo the statue of
AEsculapius described above, which is at Castello, and four children that
are in the great fountain of that place; and since then he has made some
heads and ornaments that are about the new fish-pond of Castello, which
is high up there in the midst of various kinds of trees of perpetual
verdure. Recently he has made in the lovely garden of the stables, near
S. Marco, most beautiful ornaments for an isolated fountain, with many
very fine aquatic animals of white and variegated marble; and in Pisa he
once executed under the direction of the above-named Tribolo the tomb of
Corte, a most excellent philosopher and physician, with his statue and
two very beautiful children of marble. In addition to these, he is even
now executing new works for the Duke, of animals and birds in variegated
marble for fountains, works of the greatest difficulty, which make him
well worthy to be in the number of these our Academicians.
[Illustration: BRONZE RELIEF
(_After =Vincenzo Danti=. Florence: Museo Nazionale_)
_Alinari_]
In like manner, a brother of Antonio, called Stoldo di Gino Lorenzi, a
young man thirty years of age, has acquitted himself in such a manner up
to the present in many works of sculpture, that he may now be numbered
with justice among the first of the young men in his profession, and set
in the most honourable place in their midst. At Pisa he has executed in
marble a Madonna receiving the Annunciation from the Angel, which has
made him known as a young man of beautiful judgment and genius; and Luca
Martini caused him to make another very lovely statue in Pisa, which was
presented afterwards by the Lady Duchess Leonora to the Lord Don
Garzia di Toledo, her brother, who has placed it in his garden on the
Chiaia at Naples. The same Stoldo has made, under the direction of
Vasari, in the centre of the facade of the Palace of the Knights of S.
Stephen at Pisa, over the principal door, a very large escutcheon in
marble of the Lord Duke, their Grand Master, between two statues in the
round, Religion and Justice, which are truly most beautiful and highly
extolled by all those who are good judges. The same lord has since
caused him to execute a fountain for his garden of the Pitti, after the
likeness of the beautiful Triumph of Neptune that was seen in the superb
masquerade which his Excellency held for the above-mentioned nuptials of
the most illustrious Lord Prince. And let this suffice for Stoldo
Lorenzi, who is young and is constantly working and acquiring more and
more fame and honour among his companions of the Academy.
Of the same family of the Lorenzi of Settignano is Battista, called
Battista del Cavaliere from his having been a disciple of the Chevalier
Baccio Bandinelli; who has executed in marble three statues of the size
of life, which Bastiano del Pace, a citizen of Florence, has caused him
to make for the Guadagni, who live in France, and who have placed them
in a garden that belongs to them. These are a nude Spring, a Summer, and
a Winter, which are to be accompanied by an Autumn; which statues have
been held by many who have seen them, to be beautiful and executed with
no ordinary excellence. Wherefore Battista has well deserved to be
chosen by the Lord Duke to make the sarcophagus, with the ornaments, and
one of the three statues that are to be on the tomb of Michelagnolo
Buonarroti, which his Excellency and Leonardo Buonarroti are carrying
out after the design of Giorgio Vasari; which work, as may be seen,
Battista is carrying to completion excellently well, with certain little
boys, and the figure of Buonarroti himself from the breast upwards.
The second of these three figures that are to be on that sepulchre,
which are to be Painting, Sculpture, and Architecture, has been allotted
to Giovanni di Benedetto of Castello, a disciple of Baccio Bandinelli
and an Academician, who is executing for the Wardens of S. Maria del
Fiore the works in low-relief that are going round the choir, which is
now near completion. In these he is closely imitating his master, and
acquitting himself in such a manner that an excellent result is expected
of him; nor will it fall out otherwise, seeing that he is very assiduous
in his work and in the studies of his profession.
The third figure has been allotted to Valerio Cioli of Settignano, a
sculptor and Academician, for the reason that the other works that he
has executed up to the present have been such, that it is thought that
the said figure must prove to be so good as to be not otherwise than
worthy to be placed on the tomb of so great a man. Valerio, who is a
young man twenty-six years of age, has restored many antique statues of
marble in the garden of the Cardinal of Ferrara at Monte Cavallo in
Rome, making for some of them new arms, for some new feet, and for
others other parts that were wanting; and he has since done the same for
many statues in the Pitti Palace, which the Duke has conveyed there for
the adornment of a great hall. The Duke has also caused the same Valerio
to make a nude statue of the dwarf Morgante in marble, which has proved
so beautiful and so like the reality, that probably there has never been
seen another monster so well wrought, nor one executed with such
diligence, lifelike and faithful to nature. In like manner, he has
caused him to execute the statue of Pietro, called Barbino, a gifted
dwarf, well-lettered and a very gentle spirit, and a favourite of our
Duke. For all these reasons, I say, Valerio has well deserved that there
should be allotted to him by his Excellency the statue that is to adorn
the tomb of Buonarroti, the one master of all these able men of the
Academy.