_Borgo Pinti. No. 60._
Giuliano da San Gallo built this palace for himself and his brother in
1490, while he was engaged in designing the Villa of Poggio a Cajano.
Lorenzo the Magnificent ordered him to construct a large hall, the
ceiling of which was to be one huge arched vault, so Giuliano tried the
experiment on rather a smaller scale in his own house. The result can
be seen in a noble room on the second floor. The palace, bought by the
great Portuguese family Ximenes d’Aragona, was considerably enlarged
by Gherardo Silvani in 1603; the large entrance hall and the courtyard
with a fine loggia leading into the garden were probably built by him.
In 1769 the daughter of the last of the Ximenes d’Aragona married the
Marquess Niccolò Panciatichi. After her father’s death the palace was
let to General Miot, French Minister at the Court of Tuscany, whose
guest Napoleon Bonaparte was for two days in 1796. Lord Burgersh lived
here when British Minister at Florence, and his entertainments were the
talk of the town, as he turned the large courtyard into a ball-room
by covering it with a tent. The late Marquess Panciatichi Ximenes
d’Aragona only left his family palace in Via Cavour for this one in
1850. Sixteen years later, in order to prolong the Via del Mandorlo, it
was cut in two, but it is still one of the largest in Florence.