The Duomo—Its interior—Michael Angelo’s farewell—Vasari—Congress
of artists convoked—A dome of pumice stone—Brunelleschi turned
out as a madman—The egg—His colleague Ghiberti—His feigned
illness—The difficulties divided—Height of the dome—Giotto—The
Campanile—Pietro Farnese—His gilded mule—Dante—Condemned to be
burned at the stake—Peter of Toledo—Conrad the traitor—The
sacristy—The Pazzi—Julian murdered—Salviati hanged in his
cardinal’s robes—Seventy executions—The artist nicknamed Andrea
of the Hanged—The Baptistery—The withered elm restored—The story
of Joseph—John the Twenty-third from pirate become pope—Palazzo
Riccardi—Gardens of Lorenzo—Michael Angelo—The Strada del
Traditore—Lorenzino—The Duke Alessandro—Made unpopular through
his vices—The plot—Anecdote told by Benvenuto Cellini—The
rendezvous—The murder—Lorenzino assassinated in turn—The
Galleria—The Palazzo Pitti—Cosmo—His sons’ quarrel—The eldest
killed by his brother—The father’s revenge—His wife
poisoned—Duke Francesco and Bianca Capello—Her story and death.
October 13th.
Went to the Duomo to hear the celebration of high mass, which was not
performed at the principal altar, now under repair, but in one of the
side chapels. The effect of the cathedral is grand from its immensity.
Divided into three aisles, the octagon choir, surrounded by its marble
balustrade, is placed beneath the dome, with which it corresponds, and
the spaces, octagon also, on either side, form the cross, each
containing, as well as that behind the choir, five chapels. Though
richly ornamented with paintings and stained glass, and the marble
statues of prophet and apostle; though the unfinished figure of Pity,
behind the high altar, is the work of Michael Angelo; the pavement
round the choir laid after his designs; the frescoes of its cupola by
Vasari; it yet disappointed me, seen after the Duomo of Milan. The
construction of this church, named Santa Maria del Fiore from the lily,
the arms of Florence, occupied a space of one hundred and sixty-nine
years; it had been commenced in 1298, and the year 1417 arrived before
any of its successive architects had raised a stone of that cupola, to
which Michael Angelo said, when, before quitting Florence to build that
of St. Peter’s at Rome, he paid it a farewell visit: “Adieu, I am going
to build your likeness, not your equal!”
In Vasari’s Life of Filippo Brunelleschi, he gives interesting details
of the struggles to persuade, and the success when permitted to act, of
this extraordinary man. He was a Florentine, but residing in Rome, and
appreciated there at the time of which I speak; and the members of the
“Opera del Duomo,” weary of their architect’s indecision, agreed to
summon him; and the syndics of the woollen trade, who supplied the
funds, offered to his consideration all the difficulties of execution
which had been presented to themselves. Brunelleschi answered vaguely:
he said, “That as the temple was dedicated to God and to the Virgin,
there was little doubt of their conferring on him who was destined to
conclude this great work the science and invention necessary;” and
added, he doubted not if himself were concerned, that he might find
resources and master obstacles. He advised that they should convoke at
Florence a congress of the most skilful artists of Italy, France, and
Germany, and confide the direction to the ablest when all should have
given counsel. He forbore, however, to bestow his own, evaded making
the models demanded of him, and returned to Rome, where he passed the
next three years in the most arduous studies, all tending to the
solving of this problem. In 1420 there met, as he had advised, a
company of foreign and Tuscan artists at Florence, and Brunelleschi
left Rome to join them. The meeting was held in the church, the members
of the “Opera,” the syndics of the woollen trade, and the principal
citizens being present; and it was amusing to hear the strange
propositions made. Some spoke of constructing the dome of pumice-stone,
for the sake of its lightness; a number adopted the idea of supporting
its centre by a pillar like the pole of a tent. Several advised the
first raising within the church a mountain of earth, mingled with coins
of small value, so that when the dome should be built over it, the
multitude would gladly free the church of its presence on account of
that of the money. Brunelleschi alone condemned all plans proposed,
asserting the necessity of a double roof; and following up his own
idea, without explaining the manner of its execution, entering into
minute details, and not comprehended by the assembly; till at last,
after having been several times prayed to retire, and refusing to
depart, the consul’s pages laid hands on him, and pushed him forth as a
madman. Still undiscouraged, he resolved on persuading separately the
consul, and some of the members and more enlightened citizens, and
persevering till he succeeded, it was decided that the choice to be
made should lie between himself and the foreign architects; and another
meeting was convoked for the purpose of hearing their arguments for the
last time.
It was then that took place the famous dispute, which had an egg for
subject. The rivals of Brunelleschi desired that he, as they had done,
should exhibit plans and models. The Florentine refused, but he dared
them to stand an egg upright on the marble table, saying, that he who
should succeed in so doing could certainly raise the cupola also. Each
attempted the feat vainly, and Brunelleschi, his turn come, quietly
striking one end of the egg against the table, it stood erect on its
cracked shell. Those present exclaimed, “We could all have done as
much;” and Brunelleschi answered, “Very true, and you could raise the
dome if you had my model!”
The syndics were henceforth decided, but the annoyance of the artist
was not yet over. It was agreed that his work should proceed to a
certain height, with a promise only of continuing if it so far
satisfied. When this first condition was fulfilled, Lorenzo Ghiberti,
who had attained celebrity by the bronze doors of the Baptistery, was
named his colleague—having powerful protectors in Florence; and
Brunelleschi, in vexation and fury, had almost abandoned an enterprise
whose difficulties were thus to remain, while its glory would vanish.
Determined on ridding himself of his coadjutor, he, after a time,
pretended illness, and, instead of arriving to superintend as usual,
remained in his bed, complaining of pains in his side—submitting to
frictions and remedies. The master workmen applied for directions to
Ghiberti, who answered that they must wait his colleague’s recovery, as
he could issue no order singly, and evaded confessing that he neither
knew Brunelleschi’s plans, nor had seen his model.
The latter’s malady proving obstinate, the workmen repaired to his
bedside, but obtained neither orders nor satisfaction; for he turned to
the wall, saying, “Have you not Ghiberti, and can he not work a little
in turn?” As it was vain to urge him farther, they departed, as he
desired, to seek his fellow architect, but as time went on, and a stop
was decidedly put to the building, the workmen began, as he had hoped,
to murmur, and to doubt Ghiberti’s capacity, and at last resolved on
going in a body to Brunelleschi’s lodgings, to make known to him the
cessation of the work, the disorder ensuing on Ghiberti’s ignorance,
and the unhappy consequences to them who were poor, and dependent on
their exertions for the support of themselves and their families.
“Wherefore is Ghiberti idle?” asked the mock patient; “have you not him
to issue all needful directions?”
“He can do nought without you,” said the workmen.
“Ah,” rejoined Brunelleschi, “without his co-operation _I_ could
proceed very well.”
At last, weary of idleness, urged by his friends, who had whispered
abroad the cause of his malady, and represented that he would more
easily free himself of Ghiberti by recommencing his labours, and
proving his colleague’s ignorance of architecture, he returned to his
post of director, but seeing that his patron’s support retained
Ghiberti in office, notwithstanding what had past, he resolved on
forcing his retreat through his humiliation. “I might have died in my
late illness,” he said, “and had I done so, you have still Ghiberti,
whom heaven preserve to you; but as our salary is shared equally, may
it please you that our labours be divided also, in order that each of
us may prove his anxiety for the republic’s glory. There are now two
difficulties to overcome—the construction of scaffoldings, solid and
convenient, and adapted for the labours to be prosecuted within and
without the dome, and the establishing the chain of masonry which is to
bind together the eight sides of the cupola; let him choose one of
these, leaving the other to me.”
Not daring to refuse, Ghiberti decided on the latter as most easy of
performance, and relying on the cupola of St. John as a pattern, and
the master masons for advisers. The scaffoldings of Brunelleschi,
entirely different from any used before, were so happily invented, and
ably executed, that their models were preserved in the cathedral
stores. Ghiberti had established the stonework on one of the eight
sides; but his colleague, visiting it in company of the members of the
Opera del Duomo, on his return analyzed its construction,—pointed out
its defects,—proved its want of solidity,—and said, in conclusion,
that Ghiberti’s building and salary should be alike put a stop to.
The latter was, however, not discontinued; but Brunelleschi,
thenceforward, was sole director of the works. Observing that the
higher they rose, the more time his masons lost, he imagined the
constructing of small houses of refreshment on the dome itself, and
thus prevented their long absences. The height of the dome, from the
cathedral floor to the ball, is three hundred and twenty-seven feet,
and the whole was terminated twenty years after Brunelleschi’s death,
and in conformity with his designs.
I saw with regret that some of the best statues, those of Florentine
saints which ornament the lateral aisles, are in _carta pesta_; the San
Giovanni Gualberto, who holds a cross, and whose expression and
execution are alike beautiful, is crumbling away.
On the right hand, entering the church, is the portrait in marble of
Brunelleschi, sculptured by his scholar; and near it that of Giotto,
the painter and sculptor, the architect of the Campanile, and the
labourer’s son, whose genius was first guessed by the artist Cimabue,
when crossing the fields on foot he found him, then a shepherd boy,
occupied in tracing on a stone the figure of one of his lambs. He took
him to Florence, where he became his pupil, soon leaving far behind
both his master and all the artists who had, till then, enjoyed
celebrity,—studying nature, which they had neglected, and grace, which
they had misunderstood. He was celebrated in the verse of his
contemporary and friend Dante, whose tomb he afterwards decorated when
the poet died in exile. The Campanile was commenced in 1334, and the
bas reliefs and the statues which ornament the interior of the edifice
are in greater part the work of Giotto’s own chisel, and the remainder
executed after his designs.
Beyond his and Brunelleschi’s portrait, and the mausoleum of a
Florentine bishop, there is placed, above a side portal of the edifice,
a monument in honour of Pietro Farnese, captain of the Florentines,
which has, at first sight, a ludicrous effect, the equestrian statue
being highly gilded; but the animal, which the warrior bestrides,
meek-faced and long-eared. Chosen by the Florentines for their general
against the forces of Pisa, the 11th of May, 1363, he led an army
against theirs; and his horse killed under him, the sole charger found
disposable was an ignoble mule, mounted on which he gained the victory,
took prisoner the Pisan general, and the greater part of his army. The
19th of June following, seized by plague, which then desolated Tuscany,
he died the same night, deeply regretted by the Florentines.
Near the transept, but on the left hand, is the portrait of Dante by
Orcagna, with a sketch of his triple kingdom, and a view of Florence:
it is curious as painted in 1430, at the suggestion of a Franciscan
monk, who in the church gave lectures on the Divina Commedia. This
strange old painting recalls an eventful story; his fame predicted at
his birth, in 1265, by the astrologer Brunetto Latini; his love
awakened at nine years of age for the Beatrice, who was his dream
through life; his bravery as a soldier and ability as an ambassador,
and his banishment,—for Charles of Anjou, entering Florence, finding
Dante of the Bianchi party, (which he had espoused, says his
biographer, principally because the wife, whom he had married and
parted from, belonged to that of the Neri,) he issued against him two
sentences, which still exist,—the first condemning to spoliation and
exile, the last to be burned at the stake with his friends and
adherents; a wanderer over a world whose admiration could not
compensate for absence from his country; in 1304, in company of his
fellow exiles, striving and failing to force a way thither; everywhere
received kindly, but wearying his hosts by the proud temper which
misfortune soured, or by the very fact of being unfortunate,—for in
the company of women he was gay and gentle, though bitterness of retort
has been reproached to him by those who provoked it: misunderstood
through life, his history is concluded in the verse of Byron:—
“Ungrateful Florence! Dante sleeps afar.”
Above a side door of this lateral aisle is the monument of Peter of
Toledo, vice-king of Naples, and father of Eleonora of Toledo, the
broken-hearted or the murdered wife of the first duke Cosmo; and nearer
the principal entrance, still on the left hand as we face the altar,
there is a marble mausoleum, distinguished by a cross, from whose
extremities spring lilies, and placed between two eagles. It is
believed to contain the ashes of Conrad, the traitor-son of that
Emperor Henry the Fourth, who at Canossa was the penitent and victim of
Pope Gregory the Seventh, and the Countess Matilda; urged to treason
against his father by Urban the Second, Gregory’s successor, and after
eight years of civil war, dying despised for the revolt which the court
of Rome had instigated, and for the calumnies which he had promulgated
against his father as excuse for his unnatural rebellion.
In the octagon space, to the left of the choir, is the Sagrestia de’
Canonici, that which once sheltered Lorenzo de’ Medici from the fury of
his foemen, the Pazzi. They had determined on crushing a power which
the Pitti had attempted, but vainly, to extinguish in the person of his
father Pietro.
Sixtus the Fourth was personally his enemy, and with his assent was
obtained the co-operation of the archbishop of Florence, Francesco
Salviati. Two fêtes were given by the conspirators: the first at
Fiesole, the second at Florence,—to which the Medici were invited; but
Julian each time failed to come. The day and place at last appointed
were the 26th of April, 1478, in the cathedral; and the moment that of
the elevation of the host, as the brothers never failed to attend high
mass on Sundays, and it was difficult to be certain of their presence
together, and off their guard, elsewhere. The condottiere Montesicco
was charged with the murder of Lorenzo; Bandini and Francesco Pazzi
with that of young Julian, and no circumstance of the plot having
transpired, its success seemed certain. When, however, the mercenary
soldier had been informed of the time chosen, in horror excited by the
sacrilege, not the murder, he refused the part assigned him, and
yielded its performance to two priests less scrupulous. Francesco
Salviati was to remain near the old palace, to take instant possession
on receiving news of the brothers’ death. Giacopo Pazzi, drawn into the
conspiracy against his will, was commissioned to call the citizens to
arms, and proclaim their freedom. Mass had begun, and Lorenzo was
present; but Julian had not appeared, and Francis Pazzi and Bandini
went to seek him, and accompanied him to the cathedral, conversing with
him gaily as they went along, and, arrived there, Francis Pazzi
embraced the young man with seeming amity, but to assure himself that
he wore beneath his peaceful attire no cuirass which would interrupt
the passage of steel. The moment arrived, Bandini, who stood ready,
plunged his dagger into young Julian’s breast, who staggered a few
steps and fell; but Francis Pazzi, rushing upon him also, inflicted so
deep a wound on his own thigh, as incapacitated him for further effort.
The priests attacked Lorenzo, but Maffei only succeeded in slightly
wounding him in the throat; and drawing his sword and defending himself
gallantly, he fought retreating, till succour came, and the assassins
fled, and took refuge with his friends in the sagrestia, where Bandini,
who, having murdered Francis Neri, as well as Julian, advanced to try
his firmer hand against Lorenzo’s life, could not reach him. Meanwhile
the Archbishop Salviati, proceeding to take possession of the palace
with his thirty followers, and Giacopo Pazzi, arriving on the public
square with a hundred men-at-arms, found the Medici party too strong,
were taken or fled. The former, in his cardinal’s robes, with Francis
Poggio, the historian’s son, was hanged from the windows of the palace;
and Francis, who had dragged himself home, and striven to mount his
horse, but, weak from pain and loss of blood, had sunk down on his bed,
was brought thither, half clothed as he was, and suspended by the
archbishop’s side. His doom inflicted with haste and carelessness,
death did not immediately follow, and in his prolonged agonies he
gnawed the breast of his neighbour.
Torn in pieces by the infuriated populace, or flung from the
castle-battlement; or by the hand of the executioner, there perished
seventy persons. Giacopo Pazzi, who had escaped, was taken in the
mountains, brought back to Florence, and hanged also. Only the pope’s
nephew, the Cardinal Riario, who, too young to be made privy to the
plot, had been conducted to the city and the cathedral to lure the
Medici more surely thither, was spared to appease the pontiff, having
first suffered insult and injury; but Paul the Fourth, nevertheless,
placed Florence under interdict for the violent death of her
archbishop, Salviati. Vasari mentions that the artist, Andrea del
Castagno was selected to fulfill the decree issued,—bearing, that all
who had taken part in the conspiracy should be represented, with the
ignominy they merited, on the façade of the old palace. Andrea, being
under obligation to the Medici, executed this painting with so much
energy and truth, representing all the personages hanged by the feet,
but in varied and admirable attitudes, that his work awakened the
curiosity of the town and the enthusiasm of connoisseurs, while it
bestowed on him the nickname of “Andrew of the Hanged.”
From the Duomo we went to the Baptistery, entering by the northern
door, which, as well as that facing the cathedral, is the work of
Ghiberti, and opposite which is the little pillar of St. Zanobi,
recalling a miracle his ashes performed when they were transported to
Santa Maria del Fiore:—The bier touched by accident a withered elm,
which then occupied the place since yielded to the column, and its dead
branches were instantly covered with leaves!! Above these celebrated
doors are bronze statues of remarkable workmanship. It was in the year
1293 that the edifice was encrusted with marble, at the expense of the
shopkeepers of Florence, who were its patrons; and young Arnolfo di
Lapo, entrusted with the restoration, also agreed to preserve and
employ all ornaments and sacred fragments he should find at his
disposal: and this may account for the irregularities within, for the
mingling of Composite with Corinthian architecture, and the difference
existing in the sixteen granite columns which, ranged within the
circle, support the terrace carried round the temple. Between these
pillars are the figures of the twelve apostles, and two statues
representing Natural and Revealed Religion, the former very beautiful,
in carta pesta. The mosaics of the dome were chiefly executed by
Giotto’s pupils, and are admired for their execution. I think I never
saw anything more horrid than the Last Judgment, a representation of
which fills a large circle in the part of the dome immediately above
the high altar, and its fine group in white marble of St. John
supported by angels, and ascending to heaven. The Saviour (so the
artist has named an ignoble figure of gigantic size) is placed between
the elect and the damned, which last a devil of extraordinary shape is
employed in thrusting down his large throat whole, with an eagerness
which threatens indigestion.
The story of Joseph occupies another compartment; the creation of the
world and the deluge, and the life of John the Baptist, fill the
remainder, making sad burlesque of serious things. The tomb, which,
entering at the northern door, is on the right hand (its statue of
gilded bronze representing the buried pontiff, and the basso relievo
bearing the three Cardinal Virtues), is that of John the Twenty-third;
his name was Balthazar Cossa, a Neapolitan of noble family, but scanty
fortune, and in his youth a pirate. Abandoning the sea, and the trade
it offered him, ambitious, clever, and bold, he became an ecclesiastic,
found means to introduce himself to Boniface the Ninth, and, obtaining
his favour, was by him made cardinal and his legate at Bologna.
His conduct was scandalous and tyrannical, and discontented the
successor of Boniface; yet the imperious legate resisted, and with
success, the papal power; and Alexander the Fifth, to whom, when
opposed to Ladislas, king of Naples, he rendered great services,
received him into favour and intimacy. The ci-devant corsair was
nevertheless suspected of poisoning his benefactor in his impatience to
take his seat. He was crowned at Bologna, as John the Twenty-third, in
1410; but Ladislas first menaced Rome, next, in perfidy, recognised
John as pope; but when the latter, believing in his sincerity, had
allowed his best troops to depart thence, made his entry during the
night; and John, laying aside his sacred character, found barely time
left him to mount his horse and escape towards Florence.
Though Ladislas was shortly after poisoned by his mistress, the tiara
remained ill secured on the brow of the pope. A council-general was
assembled at Constance; a list of important accusations presented
against him; and finally, having fled in disguise from Constance, been
delivered up by the duke of Austria, (forced to the act by the Emperor
Sigismund,) he found himself obliged to ratify the sentence which
declared him to have caused scandal to the church, and deposed him from
his dignity, forbidding the faithful to obey him.
Martin the Fifth being elected in his place, John sought him at
Florence, and, on his knees, both implored pardon and fully ratified
the act of abdication. Martin received him kindly, and created him dean
of the Sacred College. The short time which intervened between this
circumstance and his death, he spent in retirement and literary
pursuits, for he wrote verses of some elegance, referring to his
gone-by greatness and solitary close. He died in 1419, about six months
after, and from his friend Cosmo de’ Medici received a splendid burial.
Continuing our walk, we passed before the Palazzo Riccardi, now the
Public Library, built, in 1430, on the designs of Michelozzo, by Cosmo,
father of his country, and sold to the Riccardi family by the Grand
Duke Ferdinand the Second. Nearly opposite the Baptistery, on the
northern side, in the time of Lorenzo the Magnificent, its gardens were
filled with the fine antiques which have since formed the Florentine
Gallery, and then drew within the sphere of the owner’s liberality the
young sculptors of Florence. The most famous among these was Michael
Angelo, whose noble name, for he was a descendant of the family of
Canossa, is well nigh forgotten in that his genius ennobled more. Born
in 1474, in the territory of Arezzo, his father, Buonarotti Simoni,
opposed his taste for the arts, till he recognized that the natural
bent of his son’s mind was too decided to be thwarted, and Michael
Angelo, who, fearing his father’s severity, had worked assiduously, but
in secret, was placed as a pupil with the Ghirlandai, the most
celebrated painters of the time.
In the year 1489, Michael Angelo, then about fifteen, wandering over
Florence with his friend Granacci, was by him introduced into the
gardens of the Medici. To study the rich antiques it contained, he
abandoned the workshop of Ghirlandaio, and it was here that, at that
early age, he executed, from a mutilated antique, the head of the Fawn,
now admired in the galleria, supplying in his copy, which surpassed the
original, the parts wanting, and adding details whose truth belonged to
himself only.
It was this juvenile work which awakened Lorenzo’s wonder. He said
jestingly to the boy, “You have made your fawn old, and yet his teeth
are perfect; do you not know, that to old people some are always
wanting?”
The duke had hardly departed, when he broke away a tooth with his
chisel, and hollowed the gum so that it appeared to have dropped from
age.
On Lorenzo’s return, noticing the alteration, and admiring the youth’s
intelligence, he assigned him apartments in his palace, treated him as
his own son, and continued to protect him till he died. During this
time, four years, he had profited by the society of learned men and
artists, who frequented the Medici palace, and by the instructions of
Angelo Poliziano, then entrusted with the education of Lorenzo’s son,
Pietro, who, profiting by them less than his young comrade, was the
puerile successor of a great father.
Michael Angelo was eighteen years of age when his friend died. Feeling
his loss deeply, he quitted the Medici palace, and returned to his own
home, where he shut himself up, alone and inactive, during several
days, and then, finding by chance a block of marble, which had long
lain exposed to wind and rain, he produced from it a Hercules. During
the severe winter which ensued, he yielded to the childish wish of
Pietro, and lost his time by making statues of snow, not through the
complaisance of a flatterer, but such feeling of love to the dead as
excuses the failings of the living representative. He was again lodged
in the Palazzo, now Riccardi; but the Medici family, in consequence of
Pietro’s conduct, was driven from Florence, and the artist thought it
wise for a time to depart also, and did not again inhabit the palace,
which had been the home of his boyhood.
In the year 1715, Francisco Riccardi enlarged the palace considerably,
without altering its architecture—enclosing within its walls the
Strada del Traditore, so named from Lorenzino de’ Medici, the murderer
of Duke Alessandro. On the site his house had occupied were constructed
the stables. The close of Alessandro’s life forms one of the darkest
portions of Florentine history.
An instrument in the hands of Charles the Fifth, the emperor; by him
chosen to rule Florence, to prepare its possession by Austria; a
bastard of the Medici, as being son of Lorenzo, duke of Urbino, and an
African woman, whom it is said he poisoned that she might no longer
witness to his base birth; he was one-and-twenty when, accompanied by
the emperor’s delegate and the imperial decree, which named him chief
of the state, he entered Florence.
Gay and clever, popular for a time with the people on account of these
qualities, and losing their favour through a depravity of conduct which
did not even respect the barrier of their convent walls, he excited the
indignation of the republican party, as well by his vices as by his
tyranny and system of espionage, which in their houses, as well as in
the streets, made it dangerous for the citizens to hold communication
by word or sign.
Louisa Strozzi, the young daughter of Filippo, chief of this powerful
family, had not escaped insult from Alessandro’s companions: he
himself, it was thought, had singled out, as another victim, this noble
lady, who shortly after died poisoned. It was in the father’s palace
that the discontented assembled nightly.
Lorenzo, named, from his slight figure and delicate features,
Lorenzino, belonged to the legitimate branch of the Medici and the
republican party of Florence. He was a poet, and had written works
which ranked among the best of his time,—but still more a politician;
and devoted to the study of antiquity, his admiration centered on those
who had freed their country from a tyrant; and resolved to imitate them
he confided his intentions to none, resting on the strength of his
single arm.
To become more surely the intimate and friend of Alessandro, he plunged
into all kinds of dissipation with more ardour than himself. The young
student, with his pale features and melancholy habits, became the
minister of the duke’s pleasures, and day and night his companion; till
Alessandro, the most suspicious of princes, placed in the traitor who
dogged his steps a confidence so boundless, that he replied to one who,
noticing the strange change in his flatterer’s character, bade him
beware: “If I were obliged to leave Florence, I would confide the care
of mine interests to Lorenzino.”
Near the houses of the duke and his confidant, lived a fair lady, the
wife of Leonardo Ginori, who as yet had evaded stratagems and resisted
bribes. Alessandro confided his love to Lorenzino, and said that his
last hope rested on him; and Lorenzino promised to serve him, and
assured him of success.
Some time before, Benvenuto Cellini, who himself tells the
circumstance, had asked an audience of the duke, to show the coin on
which, by his order, he had engraved his portrait, and ask leave to
finish his work in Rome.
The reverse of the medal was yet undesigned, and the duke, unwilling
his artist should depart, desired Lorenzino (present as usual) would
advise him to stay. The young man obeyed; and Benvenuto, having argued
for the necessity of his repairing to Rome, where his workshop was,
suddenly turning to the favourite, added, “And you, my lord, who are
both learned and witty, will you not supply a reverse for this coin?”
“I was at that moment,” said Lorenzino gravely, “thinking of such a one
as might be worthy of his excellency.”
The duke said, smiling, “Give it him, Lorenzo, and he will remain.”
“I will,” replied the favourite, with a sarcastic expression of
countenance; “as soon as to do so lies in my power, and I hope it will
astonish the world.”
Alessandro laughed, and Benvenuto departed.
* * * * *
The 6th of January, 1537, Lorenzino informed the duke, that Caterina
Ginori had promised to meet him that night, but not at the palace. She
had chosen for greater secresy the favourite’s house, to which a
private passage, constructed by Alessandro’s command, led from the
ducal residence. Masked, and holding his sword in his hand, but not
having beneath his cloak the cuirass which he constantly wore by day to
protect him from his suspected Florentines, the duke arrived at the
place of rendezvous; and Lorenzino quitting him to seek the lady, he
stretched himself on a couch to await his return—his weapon laid on
his pillow, but the sword knot so twisted by Lorenzino’s hand, that to
draw it forth was impossible. The assassin lingered some time: he had
placed as watch on the duke a man in whom he could confide, named
Scoroucoucolo; and he staid to prepare him for a murder without
revealing who was to be the victim. Returning softly to the chamber,
they saw that the duke slept, and Lorenzino, profiting by the
opportunity, plunged his sword in his body. The duke sprang up
notwithstanding, and, seizing a footstool for shield against his enemy,
rushed towards the door, but Scoroucoucolo struck him with his knife on
the cheek, and Alessandro, dropping the footstool, sprang furiously not
on him, but on Lorenzino. “Traitor,” he shouted, and these were the
sole words he spoke, “traitor, I did not expect this from thee.”
Lorenzino, weak of body, inferior in strength to his antagonist, even
though wounded, by a violent effort forced him back upon the couch, and
held his hand on his mouth to stifle his cries, but he felt the
impossibility of ending his fearful work alone; and while Alessandro in
his struggles bit his thumb so violently as almost to sever it from his
hand, he called to Scoroucoucolo for aid, and the bravo cut the duke’s
throat, while Lorenzino exerted his last strength in holding him down;
but, recognising him when the deed was done, he had well nigh fallen
from fear. He followed Lorenzino, who fled first to Bologna, and then
to Venice, to join Filippo Strozzi: forgetting his interest in the
republic in his private fears; proving himself throughout a coward; and
having wandered long, evading the snares laid for him, died at last the
death he merited by the swords of two Florentine soldiers of
Alessandro’s guard, assassins also.
To-day and every day we have visited the Galleria with its collection
of statues and paintings, which would alone make a pilgrimage to
Florence an enjoyment not to be forgotten; but though even the
enthusiasm of guide-books could not here succeed in cooling mine,
though we offered, like the rest, our quota of homage to the “Venus of
the tribune,” acknowledging that no copy conveyed an idea of her
perfection, and no praise could exaggerate it; though we have lingered
before the marks of the immortality of those who have long been dust,
and brought away recollections which summon back as the loadstone iron,
you will not expect a description of all which has been so often
criticised before both ill and well, and in either case can convey no
definite ideas on the subject. On the splendid collection of the
Palazzo> Pitti the same reasons make me silent also, for one must write
either a mere catalogue of names or a volume, and both would weary;
though it contains the battles of Salvator Rosa and his conspiracy of
Catiline, and Guido’s Cleopatra and the Madonna della Seggiola of
Raphael, and the Fates of Michael Angelo with their purity of outline
and coldness of colouring, perhaps resembling the painter’s disposition
and life, and the productions of Titian and Vandyck and Paul Veronese
and others, not unworthy of being companions of these, forming a mass
of precious things, among which there is not one counterfeit. I found
the fine suites of rooms occupied by them, always full of students, to
whom the grand duke’s liberal feelings afford every facility for
improvement in their art. Yesterday afternoon we passed in the Boboli
gardens, which fine old trees and irregularity of ground render, if
less majestic, far more beautiful than those of Versailles, which took
them for model. It was in the year 1418, that Luca Pitti purchased for
about £230 sterling of that time, the ground on which the palace was
constructed; destined, at the ruin of that rich and proud family, to be
sold to the Medici, but to retain its original name, rather in token of
the downfall of the first possessors than of the modesty of the last.
Its purchaser was Cosmo de’ Medici, son of John of the black bands,
elected duke after the murder of Alexander, and husband of the
unfortunate Eleonora of Toledo, who died of grief for the loss of her
slaughtered sons, or, as some records assert, by the duke’s hand also.
Cosmo united in his person qualities the most opposite, patient as a
botanist in the Boboli gardens which himself had planted; a laborious
chemist, methodical even to minutiæ in the sciences which were his
amusement; calm as persevering, yet a man of terrible and uncontrolled
passions, who assassinated a nobleman in his own halls and with his own
hand, and, in the four first years of his reign, condemned to death by
default four hundred and thirty emigrants, placing a price on the heads
of five and thirty. In 1562, during the hunting season, he had gone to
enjoy this amusement, which, notwithstanding his severe and sombre
disposition, he preferred, to the castle of Rosignano in the Maremma,
an unhealthy part of the state of Sienna. While there, the two youths,
one aged nineteen, the other but fifteen years, died suddenly, and
their mother a day or two after. An attempt was made to persuade the
Florentines that the pestilential air of the country, marshy and
unwholesome, had produced the short and fatal illness which carried off
three persons in so brief a time, but it became known that, on their
return from a hunting party, a dispute had arisen between the brothers,
at the close of which the eldest, Cardinal John, had received a mortal
blow from the boy Don Garcia. The enraged duke sprang upon his second
son and laid him dead at his feet; their mother was a spectator of this
scene; she might well have died of sorrow as was averred, but many
whispered that a witness of his conduct so nearly interested, was not
to be borne by Duke Cosmo.
On the death of Eleonora of Toledo, Cosmo had attached himself to a
fair young lady of the house of Albizzi, named Eleonora also, and with
a love so excessive, that it was feared he might marry. A person of his
household thought it well to communicate these fears to his son, and
Francesco had the temerity to speak on the subject to his father. The
old duke’s violent temper roused, his heir had almost fallen its
sacrifice; the presence of the informer only saved him, for Cosmo, like
a wild animal baffled in his first spring, rushed on this easier prey
and plunged his sword into his bosom. It was Cosmo, who having been
crowned grand duke in St. Peter’s at Rome, returned to his Palazzo
Pitti, to marry there the poor and beautiful Camilla Martelli, who
replaced in his affections the second Eleonora, and Francis, in whose
favour he had abdicated, dared make no further observation, since he
himself, though husband of the austere and pious arch-duchess Jane, was
the lover of Bianca Capello. Well known as is the latter’s romantic
story, its place is here recalled by the walls in which she was the
light love and the regal mistress; and the palace court where was held
the joust in her honour, in which Duke Francis broke a lance.
Two years before his marriage with Jane of Austria, a fugitive pair
arrived in Florence; Bianca, daughter of the noble house of Capello,
and Pietro Bonaventuri, clerk in the bank of Salviati at Venice.
Proximity of residence caused their meeting frequently, and they loved
“not wisely, but too well,” both too young to feel difference of
fortunes an obstacle. Their affection was favoured by a menial of
Bianca’s, who procured a false key for a private entrance of the
palazzo: and while its inmates slept, the young girl nightly left the
protection of her father’s roof to visit her lover, and returned before
dawn. There occurred at last some mistake on the part of the attendant:
the door had been barred or the key left within, or an uninterested
passenger passing along had shut it in precaution, and Bianca, who
could not enter unobserved, or remain to confess her fault, since she
knew what vengeance must follow, tottered back to Bonaventuri’s
presence, and they fled together.
Apprised of their flight and of their marriage, her infuriated father
obtained from the Council of Ten its sentence, condemning Bonaventuri;
and casting his uncle Baptista, innocent of any fault, into an
unwholesome prison, where the old man was seized with fever and died.
At Florence, Bianca implored the duke’s protection. Made curious by the
fame of her beauty, he sought an interview; she first refused, then
consented to one,—to several,—then looked for his coming,—then
changed by degrees. Her husband was named to a place in the household,
which he accepted; and when the marriage of Francis was concluded, for
till then the intrigue was kept secret through policy, the most
pleasant apartment of his palace was assigned to Bianca, and in their
gratified ambition and flattered vanity, the husband and the wife were
content to forget their early love with its fondness and its
sacrifices. The arch-duchess was amiable but grave and proud, and while
her beauty was unnoticed by Francis, of whose life hers was a continued
criticism, passed as it was in exercises of piety, Bianca’s favour
increased daily. Her wit and gaiety became more necessary to unbend the
sombre temper and warm the sterile imagination of Francis, and as a
relaxation from his fatigues and calculations, as banker, trader,
diamond merchant and sovereign. On the first coming of Bonaventuri,
when the Venetian senate had offered two thousand ducats for his life,
and the family of Capello dispatched assassins on his track, Francis
protected him for love of Bianca; but he had grown insolent in his
dishonour, and become the admirer of a young widow of high rank, he
boasted of it so openly, that her relations in turn complained to the
duke both of his conduct and its publicity. Francis desired Bianca to
send for and remonstrate with him; and anxious to hear their private
conversation, placed himself where, unseen, he might witness the
interview. It fell not out as he expected: for when the two were once
more in presence, each betraying and betrayed, and Bianca faltered
forth her message, Pietro, whose love was not wholly extinguished,
yielding to a sudden burst of jealousy, loaded her with invective,
threatened her with death; and while Francis, hid and observing
silently, decided that the life of the violent man he had supplanted
henceforth might endanger his own, Bianca softened, in sorrow not in
anger, wept her reply to his words of contempt and passion; and when he
had flung from her, sought the duke to plead her husband’s cause.
As Bonaventuri left the Palazzo Pitti, he met one of those relations of
the fair widow whose remonstrances had caused his late interview with
Bianca. He held a pistol to his throat, and said, “I know not wherefore
I do not kill thee,” cast him from his path, and passed on. The
insulted nobleman asked an audience of the duke that very day. They
took several turns in the presence-chamber together, in view but not in
hearing of the court, as they conversed in a very low tone. That
evening Francis left Florence for his villa, and remained absent but
two days. On their return, Bianca was told that, waylaid by ten persons
of the widow’s family, Bonaventuri had been murdered. If she gave a few
tears to his memory, it was the only tribute offered it: for no search
was made for the assassins, and no punishment awarded. This was in
1572, and in —74 Cosmo died; and the first act of Francis, having
taken the title of Grand Duke, was to enclose in a cloister, where she
ended her days, his father’s widow, Camilla Martelli. The new grand
duke, of inexorable temper, though needing himself indulgence, by the
rigour of his laws and the scandal of his life, by trading on his own
account, ruining the state while he tripled his private revenues, drew
on him his subjects’ hatred. His archduchess, Jane, died 1578, her
pride and affection alike trampled on, the last stroke she received
being the reception, like a triumph, which greeted Bianca’s brother.
Weary of hearing her praises, he quitted Florence and Bianca for a
time. Even before the murder of the latter’s husband, he had made her a
promise of marriage, and, fearing the power of absence, she wrote
eloquent letters, in some reminding him of his word passed to her, in
others apparently resigned, but saying, that to reconcile herself to
his loss she was determined to die. The softened duke returned and
repeated his promise. A priest, employed by the Venetian, commanded him
to marry her on pain of the church’s anger; and on the 5th of June,
“not two months” after the death of the archduchess Jane, so that “the
funeral baked meats might have furnished forth the marriage table,” he
espoused Bianca, their nuptials being solemnized in the palazzo, but so
secretly as to remain unknown even to the grand duke’s family. The
Cardinal Ferdinand, his attached brother, who, having saved him from a
conspiracy got up against him some time before, in grief at his conduct
had quitted Florence, now returned, hoping it had changed. The grand
duke was indisposed, and tending him at his bedside sate Bianca. The
former was constrained to confess their marriage,—a piece of news
which the cardinal received in silence, and soon quitted the apartment.
As he departed, which he did immediately, he was observed to brush away
a tear. The term of mourning for the archduchess passed, and the
approbation of Philip the Second obtained, the duke made public his
ties with Bianca, and celebrated them with tournament and festival at
the Palazzo Pitti. The Venetian senate proclaimed her “Daughter of the
Republic;” the cannon thundered, and the bells of St. Mark rang; the
palaces were illuminated; and the father and brother of the dame, who,
more pure but less fortunate, had quitted their city beneath their ban
as the fugitive love of the low-born Bonaventuri, were created knights,
and styled “_most illustrious_,” and took precedence of the nobles of
Venice, whose names were more ancient as well as brighter. Bianca was
crowned Grand Duchess in the cathedral of Florence,—embassies from her
native town, and from others of Italy, arriving to do her honour. The
Cardinal Ferdinand was a solitary contrast to the vile flatterers who
crowded thither. He remained at Rome; but his sister-in-law had
resolved that their family differences should at least be no longer
apparent to the world.
Since the rupture of their friendship, Francis, with little delicacy,
had refused to pay the revenues due to his brother, who, being generous
and prodigal, was necessarily in extreme embarrassment. Of this Bianca
was aware, and using all her influence with Francis, she determined him
to pay not only the sums due yearly to Ferdinand, but likewise the
accumulated arrears.
Her seeming generosity won over the cardinal, and he returned to
Florence; where, as he was a man of honour and probity, the
reconciliation was on his part sincere. The duke, whose love had
suffered no change, earnestly desired a son by Bianca, who expressed
hopes of maternity, but so as to awaken the suspicion of Ferdinand,
who, as heir presumptive, kept close watch on his sister-in-law’s
conduct. It is told of him, that the hour being arrived, and he waiting
in her ante-chamber, there entered from without an attendant, bearing a
lute with apparent care, who passed towards the grand duchess’s
apartment. The cardinal seized her arm, took from her hands the case,
and opening it, found within a new-born infant. Thenceforward sworn,
though secret foes, they yet met as before, and Ferdinand was invited
to accompany his brother and the duchess to Poggio, their villa at
Caiano. There was served at the repast which awaited them, a favourite
dish of the cardinal, but of which Bianca pressed him to taste so
earnestly and strangely, that he pleaded indisposition, and ate
nothing. The grand duke, on the contrary, ignorant of the plot, and
tempted by the meat so praised, insisted on eating of it,
notwithstanding her entreaties. In despair she did likewise, and both
died of the poison. The cardinal, for whom it had been prepared,
returned unharmed to preside at their funerals; the bodies were carried
for interment to San Lorenzo, but with his command that Bianca’s corpse
should be so disposed of, that no trace might remain; while, in the
meantime, by his order also, the insignia of power, worn by her, were
trodden under foot, and annihilated.