_Borgo degl’Albizzi. No. 24._
In 1540 a page named Antonio Ramirez di Montalvo came from Spain in
the train of the Cardinal Don Giovanni di Toledo, Bishop of Burgos
and uncle to the Duchess Eleonora, wife of Cosimo I. de’ Medici. The
Cardinal passed some weeks in Florence, and when obliged to proceed
to Rome left the lad Antonio, who was ill, in the charge of the
Duchess. She took him into her service, and the clever young Spaniard
gained the good graces of the Duke, became tutor to the young Prince
Francesco de’ Medici, and married Donna Giovanna di Ghevara, one of
the ladies-in-waiting of the Duchess. In 1568 he bought a house with
a tower and a garden, in Borgo degl’Albizzi, from Giovanni Bonafedi,
and afterwards two or three smaller ones adjoining, and then built the
palace we now see. By the Duke’s order the overseer of the works at
the Duomo supplied him with the wood necessary for the roof, doors,
windows, etc., and it appears that Cosimo also gave considerable sums
towards the cost of building. With good reason, therefore, the grateful
Spaniard placed his master’s arms, instead of his own, on the façade
with the inscription: COSMOS;MAGN;FLOR;ET;SEN;D;II.
[Illustration: PALAZZO MONTALVO.]
The palace is decorated in _grafite_, and on a line with the arms are
the favourite emblems of the Duke, a capricorn, a tortoise with a sail
and two crossed anchors. It has always been attributed to Bartolomeo
Ammanati, though neither Baldinucci nor any other contemporary writers
give the name of the architect. But as Ammanati was at that time
(1566–1569) engaged in rebuilding the bridge of Sta. Trinita, and was
Cosimo’s favourite architect (he built the courtyard of Palazzo Pitti),
it is more than probable that he was also employed by his courtiers.
When Cosimo I. instituted the order of S. Stefano Don Antonio Ramirez
di Montalvo was one of the first knights created, and was given a
rich _Commenda_ in perpetuity. The name of his grand-daughter, Donna
Leonora, is well-known in Florence as the foundress of the convent of
Le Quiete, the great school where the daughters of the nobility are
educated by nuns called the Signore della Quiete, all ladies of good
birth who do not take solemn vows. The life of Donna Leonora, written
in 1740, is curious reading. As a baby she reproved her nurse if she
was idle, and as a girl she must have been a trial to her father
confessor from her scruples and incessant fears that everything was
a deadly sin. She had visions, during which Our Lord and the Virgin
Mary talked with her; she predicted the restoration to health, or the
death, of many people and performed many miraculous cures. A singular
mixture of Spanish bigotry and Tuscan common-sense was Donna Leonora.
Many of the rules she laid down for the teaching of the young ladies at
Le Quiete would be considered admirable at the present day. “Let them
be trained to order,” she writes, “and to cleanliness. Teach them to
put away their clothes properly.... Let them not be lazy or negligent,
but sprightly and diligent. They should know how to sweep and clean
a room, how to make a bed, to take charge of the linen and woollen
things, and of what pertains to the furniture of the house. They should
learn how to nurse a sick person with care, according to the doctor’s
orders, and how to prepare all kinds of milk dishes, cordials, candied
fruit and sweet pastry. It would be well, too, that they should know
how to sew and wash fine linen, such as is used in a sacristy. Not that
they are to perform such fatiguing duties, save for exercise and their
own pleasure; on the contrary, I desire that they should be served in
seemly fashion, but so that in case of necessity they may be able to
direct how things ought to be done, for that is most necessary for the
good ruling of a household.”[50] After all these excellent, but rather
commonplace, precepts, the bewildered reader is suddenly plunged into
chapter after chapter of prophecies made, and miracles worked, by Donna
Leonora; the miracles continued even after her death in 1659. She did,
however, good work in founding the convent of the Signore della Quiete.
Her brother, Don Antonio, died in 1581, and was succeeded by the eldest
of his five sons. According to his friend Vasari, he drew well, and was
a munificent patron of art. The last of the family, another Antonio,
inherited the tastes of his ancestor. He was President of the Academy
of Drawing in Florence, and Director of the Palatine gallery in Palazzo
Pitti; it was under him that the gallery was first thrown open to the
public on Sundays and half-holidays in 1833.
In 1739 the palace was let to Baron von Stosch, an antiquary, and a
spy in the service of the English government to watch the doings of
the Pretender. That delightful old gossip, Sir Horace Mann, notes in
1757, “Baron Stosch is dead at last.... His effects consist only in
his Collection, which is very great, and worth a large sum. It is to
be offered to the Emperor. He has appointed me and Abbé Buonacorsi
his executors, and has left him a picture, and me a cameo, which I
might have bought some years ago for six zecchins.” The palace still
belongs to a collateral descendant of the old Spanish family, the Count
Matteucci Montalvo.