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On the opposite wall are four Botticellian pictures. The
Magnificat
(1267 _bis_)--Sandro's most famous and familiar tondo--in which
the
Madonna rather sadly writes the Magnificat, while Angels cluster
round
to crown their Queen, to offer ink and book, or look into the
thing
that she has written, while the Dove hovers above her, is full of
the
haunting charm, the elusive mystery, the vague yearning, which
makes
the fascination of Botticelli to-day. She already seems to
be
anticipating the Passion of that Child--so unmistakably divine--who
is
guiding her hand. The Madonna of the Pomegranate (1289) is a
somewhat
similar, but less beautiful tondo; the Angel faces, who are said to
be
idealised portraits of the Medicean children, have partially lost
their
angelic look. The Fortitude (1299) is one of Sandro's earliest
paintings, and
its authenticity has been questioned; she seems to be
dreading, almost
shrinking from some great battle at hand, of which no
man can foretell the
end. The Annunciation (1316) is rather
Botticellian in conception; but the
colouring and execution generally
do not suggest the master himself. Antonio
Pollaiuolo's Prudence
(1306) is a harsh companion to Sandro's Fortitude. The
tondo (1291) of
the Holy Family, by Luca Signorelli, is one of his best works
in this
kind; the colouring is less heavy than is usual with him, and
the
Child is more divine. Of the two carefully finished Annunciations
by
Lorenzo di Credi (1314, 1160), the latter is the earlier and finer.
Fra
Filippo's little Madonna of the Sea (1307), with her happy
boy-like Angel
attendants, is one of the monk's most attractive and
characteristic works;
perhaps the best of all his smaller pictures.
And we have left to the last
Fra Angelico's divinest dream of the
Coronation of the Madonna in the
Empyrean Heaven of Heavens (1290),
amidst exultant throngs of Saints and
Angels absorbed in the Beatific
Vision of Paradise. It is the pictorial
equivalent of Bernard's most
ardent sermons on the Assumption of Mary and of
the mystic musings of
John of Damascus. Here are "the Angel choirs of
Angelico, with the
flames on their white foreheads waving brighter as they
move, and the
sparkles streaming from their purple wings like the glitter of
many
suns upon a sounding sea, listening in the pauses of alternate
song,
for the prolonging of the trumpet blast, and the answering of
psaltery
and cymbal, throughout the endless deep, and from all the star
shores
of heaven."[31]
[31] _Modern Painters_, vol.
ii.
SALA DI MAESTRI DIVERSI ITALIANI.
In the small room which
opens out of the Tribune, on the opposite side
to these three Tuscan rooms,
are two perfect little gems of more
northern Italian painting. Mantegna's
Madonna of the Quarries (1025),
apart from its nobility of conception and
grand austerity of
sentiment, is a positive marvel of minute drawing with the
point of
the _pennello_. Every detail in the landscape, with the winding
road
up to the city on the hill, the field labourers in the meadow,
the
shepherds and travellers, on the left, and the stone-cutterss
among
the caverns on the right, preparing stone for the sculptors
and
architects of Florence and Rome, is elaborately rendered
with
exquisite delicacy and finish. It was painted at Rome in 1488,
while
Mantegna was working on his frescoes (now destroyed) for Pope
Innocent
VIII. in a chapel of the Vatican. The other is a little Madonna
and
Child with two Angels playing musical instruments, by
Correggio
(1002), a most exquisite little picture in an almost perfect state
of
preservation, formerly ascribed to Titian, but entirely
characteristic
of Correggio's earliest period when he was influenced by
Mantegna and
the Ferrarese.
Beyond are the Dutch, Flemish, German, and
French pictures which do
not come into our present scope--though they include
several excellent
works as, notably, a little Madonna by Hans Memlinc and two
Apostles
by Albert Durer. The cabinet of the gems contains some of
the
treasures left by the Medicean Grand Dukes, including work by
Cellini
and Giovanni da Bologna.
SCUOLA VENETA.
Crossing
the short southern corridor, with some noteworthy ancient
sculptury, we pass
down the long western corridor. Out of this open
first the two rooms devoted
to the Venetian school. In the first, to
seek the best only, are Titian's
portraits of Francesco Maria della
Rovere, third Duke of Urbino, and Eleonora
Gonzaga, his duchess (605
and 599), painted in 1537. A triptych by Mantegna
(1111)--the
Adoration of the Kings, between the Circumcision and the
Ascension--is
one of the earlier works of the great Paduan master; the face
of the
Divine Child in the Circumcision is marvellously painted. The
Madonna
by the Lake by Giovanni Bellini (631), also called the Allegory of
the
Tree of Life, is an exceedingly beautiful picture, one of
Bellini's
later works. Titian's Flora (626), an early work of the
master,
charming in its way, has been damaged and rather overpraised. In
the
second room, are three works by Giorgione; the Judgment of Solomon
and
the Ordeal of Moses (630 and 621), with their fantastic costumes
and
poetically conceived landscapes, are very youthful works indeed;
the
portrait of a Knight of Malta (622) is more mature, and one of
the
noblest of Venetian portraits. Florence thus possesses more
authentic
works of this wonderful, almost mythical, Venetian than does
Venice
herself. Here, too, is usually--except when it is in
request
elsewhere for the copyist--Titian's Madonna and Child with the
boy
John Baptist, and the old Antony Abbot, leaning on his staff
and
watching the flower play (633)--the most beautiful of Titian's
early
Giorgionesque Madonnas.
[Illustration: VENUS
BY SANDRO
BOTTICELLI]
SALA DI LORENZO MONACO.
The following passage
leads to the Sala di Lorenzo Monaco, the room
which bears the name of the
austere monk of Camaldoli, and, hallowed
by the presence of Fra Angelico's
Madonna, seems at times almost to
re-echo still with the music of the Angel
choir; but to which the
modern worshipper turns to adore the Venus of the
Renaissance rising
from the Sea. For here is Sandro Botticelli's famous Birth
of Venus
(39), the most typical picture of the Quattrocento, painted
for
Lorenzo dei Medici and in part inspired by certain lines of
Angelo
Poliziano. But let all description be left to the golden words
of
Walter Pater in his _Renaissance_:--
"At first, perhaps, you are
attracted only by a quaintness of design,
which seems to recall all at once
whatever you have read of Florence
in the fifteenth century; afterwards you
may think that this
quaintness must be incongruous with the subject, and that
the colour
is cadaverous or at least cold. And yet, the more you come
to
understand what imaginative colouring really is, that all colour is
no
mere delightful quality of natural things, but a spirit upon them
by
which they become expressive to the spirit, the better you will
like
this peculiar quality of colour; and you will find that quaint
design
of Botticelli's a more direct inlet into the Greek temper than
the
works of the Greeks themselves, even of the finest period. Of
the
Greeks as they really were, of their difference from ourselves, of
the
aspects of their outward life, we know far more than Botticelli,
or his most
learned contemporaries; but for us long familiarity has
taken off the edge of
the lesson, and we are hardly conscious of what
we owe to the Hellenic
spirit. But in pictures like this of
Botticelli's you have a record of the
first impression made by it on
minds turned back towards it, in almost
painful aspiration, from a
world in which it had been ignored so long; and in
the passion, the
energy, the industry of realisation, with which Botticelli
carries out
his intention, is the exact measure of the legitimate influence
over
the human mind of the imaginative system of which this is the
central
myth. The light is indeed cold--mere sunless dawn; but a later
painter
would have cloyed you with sunshine; and you can see the better
for
that quietness in the morning air each long promontory, as it
slopes
down to the water's edge. Men go forth to their labours until
the
evening; but she is awake before them, and you might think that
the
sorrow in her face was at the thought of the whole long day of
love
yet to come. An emblematical figure of the wind blows hard across
the
grey water, moving forward the dainty-lipped shell on which she
sails,
the sea 'showing his teeth' as it moves in thin lines of foam,
and
sucking in, one by one, the falling roses, each severe in
outline,
plucked off short at the stalk, but embrowned a little,
as
Botticelli's flowers always are. Botticelli meant all that imagery
to
be altogether pleasurable; and it was partly an incompleteness
of
resources, inseparable from the art of that time, that subdued
and
chilled it; but his predilection for minor tones counts also; and
what
is unmistakable is the sadness with which he has conceived the
goddess
of pleasure, as the depositary of a great power over the lives
of
men."
In this same room are five other masterpieces of early
Tuscan
painting. Don Lorenzo's Coronation of the Madonna (1309),
though
signed and dated 1413, may be regarded as the last great
altar-piece
of the school of Giotto and his followers. It has been
terribly
repainted. The presence in the most prominent position of St.
Benedict
and St. Romuald in their white robes shows that it was painted for
a
convent of Camaldolese monks. The predella, representing the
Adoration
of the Magi and scenes from the life of St. Benedict, includes a
very
sweet little picture of the last interview of the saint with
his
sister Scholastica, when, in answer to her prayers, God sent such
a
storm that her brother, although unwilling to break his monastic
rule,
was forced to spend the night with her. "I asked you a favour,"
she
told him, "and you refused it me; I asked it of Almighty God, and
He
has granted it to me." In Browning's poem, Don Lorenzo is one of
the
models specially recommended to Lippo Lippi by his
superiors:--
"You're not of the true painters, great and
old;
Brother Angelico's the man, you'll find;
Brother Lorenzo
stands his single peer;
Fag on at flesh, you'll never make the
third."
The Madonna and Child with St. Francis and St. John Baptist,
St.
Zenobius and St. Lucy (1305), is one of the very few authentic
works
by Domenico Veneziano, one of the great innovators in the painting
of
the fifteenth century.
Sandro Botticelli's Adoration of the Magi
(1286), painted for Santa
Maria Novella, is enthusiastically praised by
Vasari. It is not a very
characteristic work of the painter's, but contains
admirable portraits
of the Medici and their court. The first king, kneeling
up alone
before the Divine Child, is Cosimo the Elder himself, according
to
Vasari, "the most faithful and animated likeness of all now known
to
exist of him"; the other two kings are his two sons, Piero il
Gottoso
in the centre, Giovanni di Cosimo on the right. The black-haired
youth
with folded hands, standing behind Giovanni, is Giuliano, who fell
in
the Pazzi conspiracy. On the extreme left, standing with his
hands
resting upon the hilt of his sword, is Lorenzo the Magnificent,
who
avenged Giuliano's death; behind Lorenzo, apparently clinging to
him
as though in anticipation or recollection of the conspiracy, is
Angelo
Poliziano. The rather sullen-looking personage, with a certain dash
of
sensuality about him, on our extreme right, gazing out of the
picture,
is Sandro himself. This picture, which was probably painted
slightly
before or shortly after the murder of Giuliano, has been called
"the
Apotheosis of the Medici"; it should be contrasted with the
very
different Nativity, now in the National Gallery, which Sandro
painted
many years later, in 1500, and which is full of the
mystical
aspirations of the disciples of Savonarola.
The Madonna and
Child with Angels, two Archangels standing guard and
two Bishops kneeling in
adoration (1297), is a rich and attractive
work by Domenico Ghirlandaio. Fra
Angelico's Tabernacle (17), Madonna
and Child with the Baptist and St. Mark,
and the famous series of
much-copied Angels, was painted for the Guild of
Flax-merchants, whose
patron was St. Mark. The admirable Predella (1294)
represents St. Mark
reporting St. Peter's sermons, and St. Mark's martyrdom,
together with
the Adoration of the Magi.
* *
* * *
Passing down the corridor, we come to the entrance to
the passage
which leads across the Ponte Vecchio to the Pitti Palace. There
are
some fine Italian engravings on the way down. The halls of
the
Inscriptions and Cameos contain ancient statues as well, including
the
so-called dying Alexander, and some of those so over-praised
by
Shelley. Among the pictures in the Sala del Baroccio, is a very
genial
lady with a volume of Petrarch's sonnets, by Andrea del Sarto
(188).
Here, too, are some excellent portraits by Bronzino; a lady with
a
missal (198); a rather pathetic picture of Eleonora of Toledo, the
wife
of Cosimo I., with Don Garzia--the boy with whom Cellini used to
romp (172);
Bartolommeo Panciatichi (159); Lucrezia Panciatichi (154),
a peculiarly
sympathetic rendering of an attractive personality.
Sustermans' Galileo (163)
is also worth notice. The Duchess Eleonora
died almost simultaneously with
her sons, Giovanni and Garzia, in
1562, and there arose in consequence a
legend that Garzia had murdered
Giovanni, and had, in his turn, been killed
by his own father, and
that Eleonora had either also been murdered by the
Duke or died of
grief. Like many similar stories of the Medicean princes,
this appears
to be entirely fictitious.
The Hall of Niobe contains the
famous series of statues representing
the destruction of Niobe and her
children at the hands of Apollo and
Artemis. They are Roman or Græco-Roman
copies of a group assigned by
tradition to the fourth century B.C., and which
was brought from Asia
Minor to Rome in the year 35 B.C. The finest of these
statues is that
of Niobe's son, the young man who is raising his cloak upon
his arm as
a shield; he was originally protecting a sister, who, already
pierced
by the fatal arrow, leaned against his knee as she died.
In a
room further on there is an interesting series of miniature
portraits of the
Medici, from Giovanni di Averardo to the family of
Duke Cosimo. Six of the
later ones are by Bronzino.
At the end of the corridor, by Baccio
Bandinelli's copy of the
Laocoon, are three rooms containing the drawings and
sketches of the
Old Masters. It would take a book as long as the present to
deal
adequately with them. Many of the Florentine painters, who were
always
better draughtsmen than they were colourists, are seen to much
greater
advantage in their drawings than in their finished pictures. Besides
a
most rich collection of the early men and their successors,
from
Angelico to Bartolommeo, there are here several of Raphael's
cartoons
for Madonnas and two for his St. George and the Dragon; many of
the
most famous and characteristic drawings of Leonardo da Vinci (and
it
is from his drawings alone that we can now get any real notion of
this
"Magician of the Renaissance"); and some important specimens
of
Michelangelo. Here, too, is Andrea Mantegna's terrible
Judith,
conceived in the spirit of some Roman heroine, which once belonged
to
Vasari and was highly valued by him. It is dated 1491, and should
be
compared with Botticelli's rendering of the same
theme.
CHAPTER VI
_Or San Michele and the Sesto di San
Piero_
"Una figura della Donna mia
s'adora, Guido, a San
Michele in Orto,
che di bella sembianza, onesta e pia,
de'
peccatori e gran rifugio e porto."
(_Guido Cavalcanti_ to _Guido
Orlandi_.)
At the end of the bustling noisy Via Calzaioli, the Street
of the
Stocking-makers, rises the Oratory of Our Lady, known as San
Michele
in Orto, "St. Michael in the Garden." Around its outer
walls,
enshrined in little temples of their own, stand great statues
of
saints in marble and bronze by the hands of the greatest sculptors
of
Florence--the canonised patrons of the Arts or Guilds, keeping
guard
over the thronging crowds that pass below. This is the grand
monument
of the wealth and taste, devotion and charity, of the
commercial
democracy of the Middle Ages.
[Illustration: ORCAGNA'S
TABERNACLE, OR SAN MICHELE]
The ancient church of San Michele in Orto was
demolished by order of
the Commune in the thirteenth century, to make way for
a piazza for
the grain and corn market, in the centre of which Arnolfo di
Cambio
built a loggia in 1280. Upon one of the pilasters of this loggia
there
was painted a picture of the Madonna, held in highest reverence by
the
frequenters of the market; a special company or sodality of laymen
was
formed, the _Laudesi_ of Our Lady of Or San Michele, who met here
every
evening to sing _laudi_ in her honour, and who were
distinguished even in
mediæval Florence, where charity was always on a
heroic scale, by their
munificence towards the poor. "On July 3rd,
1292," so Giovanni Villani
writes, "great and manifest miracles began
to be shown forth in the city of
Florence by a figure of Holy Mary
which was painted on a pilaster of the
loggia of San Michele in Orto,
where the grain was sold; the sick were
healed, the deformed made
straight, and the possessed visibly delivered in
great numbers. But
the preaching friars, and the friars minor likewise,
through envy or
some other cause, would put no faith in it, whereby they fell
into
much infamy with the Florentines. And so greatly grew the fame
of
these miracles and merits of Our Lady that folk flocked hither
in
pilgrimage from all parts of Tuscany at her feasts, bringing
divers
waxen images for the wonders worked, wherewith a great part of
the
loggia in front of and around the said figure was filled." In spite
of
ecclesiastical scepticism, this popular devotion ever increased;
the
company of the Laudesi, amongst whom, says Villani, was a good part
of
the best folk in Florence, had their hands always full of offerings
and
legacies, which they faithfully distributed to the poor.
The wonderful
tidings roused even Guido Cavalcanti from his melancholy
musings among the
tombs. As a sceptical philosopher, he had little
faith in miracles, but an
_esprit fort_ of the period could not allow
himself to be on the same side as
the friars. A delightful _via media_
presented itself; the features of the
Madonna in the picture bore a
certain resemblance to his lady, and everything
was at once made
clear. So he took up his pen, and wrote a very beautiful
sonnet to his
friend, Guido Orlandi. It begins: "A figure of my Lady is
adored,
Guido, in San Michele in Orto, which, with her fair semblance,
pure
and tender, is the great refuge and harbour of sinners." And
after
describing (with evident devotional feeling, in spite of the
obvious
suggestion that it is the likeness of his lady that gives the
picture
its miraculous powers) the devotion of the people and the
wonders
worked on souls and bodies alike, he concludes: "Her fame
goeth
through far off lands: but the friars minor say it is idolatry,
for
envy that she is not their neighbour." But Orlandi professed
himself
much shocked at his friend's levity. "If thou hadst said, my
friend,
of Mary," so runs the double sonnet of his answer, "Loving and full
of
grace, thou art a red rose planted in the garden; thou wouldst
have
written fittingly. For she is the Truth and the Way, she was
the
mansion of our Lord, and is the port of our salvation." And he
bids
the greater Guido imitate the publican; cast the beam out of his
own
eye and let the mote alone in those of the friars: "The friars
minor
know the divine Latin scripture, and the good preachers are
the
defenders of the faith; their preaching is our medicine."
One of
the most terrible faction fights in Florentine history raged
round the loggia
and oratory on June 10th, 1304. The Cavalcanti and
their allies were
heroically holding their own, here and in Mercato
Vecchio, against the
overwhelming forces of the Neri headed by the
Della Tosa, Sinibaldo Donati
and Boccaccio Adimari, when Neri Abati
fired the houses round Or San Michele;
the wax images in Our Lady's
oratory flared up, the loggia was burned to the
ground, and all the
houses along Calimara and Mercato Nuovo and beyond down
to the Ponte
Vecchio were utterly destroyed. The young nobles of the Neri
faction
galloped about with flaming torches to assail the houses of
their
foes; the Podesta with his troops came into Mercato Nuovo, stared
at
the blaze, but did nothing but block the way. In this part of the
town
was all the richest merchandise of Florence, and the loss
was
enormous. The Cavalcanti, against whom the iniquitous plot
was
specially aimed, were absolutely ruined, and left the city
without
further resistance.
The pilaster with Madonna's picture had
survived the fire, and the
_Laudesi_ still met round it to sing her praises.
But in 1336 the
Signoria proposed to erect a grand new building on the site
of the old
loggia, which should serve at once for corn exchange and provide
a
fitting oratory for this new and growing cult of the Madonna
di
Orsanmichele. The present edifice, half palace and half church,
was
commenced in 1337, and finished at the opening of the
fifteenth
century. The actual building was in the hands of the Commune,
who
delegated their powers to the Arte di Por Sta. Maria or Arte
della
Seta. The Parte Guelfa and the Greater Guilds were to see to
the
external decoration of the pilasters, upon each of which
tabernacles
were made to receive the images of the Saints before which each
of the
Arts should come in state, to make offerings on the feasts of
their
proper patrons; while the shrine itself, and the internal
decorations
of the loggia (as it was still called), were left in the charge
and
care of the _Laudesi_ themselves, the Compagnia of Orsanmichele,
which
was thoroughly organised under its special captains. It is
uncertain
whom the Arte della Seta employed as architect; Vasari says
that
Taddeo Gaddi gave the design, others say Orcagna (who worked for
the
Laudesi inside), and more recently Francesco Talenti has
been
suggested. Benci di Cione and Simone di Francesco Talenti, who
also
worked at the same epoch upon the Duomo, were among the
architects
employed later. The closing in of the arcades, for the
better
protection of the tabernacle, took away the last remnants of
its
original appearance as an open loggia; and, shortly before, the
corn
market itself was removed to the present Piazza del Grano, and
thus
the "Palatium" became the present church. The extremely
beautifully
sculptured windows are the work of Simone di Francesco
Talenti.
There are fourteen of these little temples or niches, partly
belonging
to the Greater and partly to the Lesser Arts. It will be seen
that,
while the seven Greater Arts have each their niche, only six out
of
the fourteen Minor Arts are represented. Over the niches are
_tondi_
with the insignia of each Art. The statues were set up at
different
epochs, and are not always those that originally stood
here--altered
in one case from significant political motives, in others from
the
desire of the guilds to have something more thoroughly up to
date--the
rejected images being made over to the authorities of the Duomo
for
their unfinished facade, or sent into exile among the friars of
Santa
Croce. In 1404 the Signoria decreed that, within ten years from
that
date, the Arts who had secured their pilasters should have
their
statues in position, on pain of losing the right. But this does
not
seem to have been rigidly enforced.
[Illustration: WINDOW OF OR
SAN MICHELE]
Beginning at the corner of the northern side, facing towards
the
Duomo, we have the minor Art of the Butchers represented
by
Donatello's St. Peter in marble, an early and not very excellent
work
of the master, about 1412 (in a tabernacle of the previous
century);
the _tondo_ above containing their arms, a black goat on a gold
field,
is modern. Next comes the marble St. Philip, the patron saint of
the
minor Art of the Shoemakers, by Nanni di Banco, of 1408, a
beautiful
and characteristic work of this too often neglected
sculptor. Then, also by
Nanni di Banco, the _Quattro incoronati_, the
"four crowned martyrs," who,
being carvers by profession, were put to
death under Diocletian for refusing
to make idols, and are the patrons
of the masters in stone and wood, a minor
Art which included
sculptors, architects, bricklayers, carpenters, and
masons; the
bas-relief under the shrine, also by Nanni, is a priceless
masterpiece
of realistic Florentine democratic art, and shows us the
mediæval
craftsmen at their work, the every-day life of the men who
made
Florence the dream of beauty which she became; above it are the
arms
of the Guild, in an ornate and beautiful medallion, by Luca
della
Robbia. The following shrine, that of the Art of makers of swords
and
armour, had originally Donatello's famous St. George in marble,
of
1415, which is now in the Bargello; the present bronze
(inappropriate
for a minor Art, according to the precedent of the others) is
a modern
copy; the bas-relief below, of St. George slaying the dragon, is
still
Donato's. On the western wall, opposite the old tower of the Guild
of
Wool, comes first a bronze St. Matthew, made together with
its
tabernacle by Ghiberti and Michelozzo for the greater Guild
of
Money-changers and Bankers (Arte del Cambio), and finished in 1422.
The
Annunciation above is by Niccolo of Arezzo, at the close of the
Trecento. The
very beautiful bronze statue of St. Stephen, by
Ghiberti, represents the
great Guild of Wool, Arte della Lana;
originally they had a marble St.
Stephen, but, seeing what excellent
statues had been made for the Cambio and
the Calimala Guilds, they
declared that since the Arte della Lana claimed to
be always mistress
of the other Arts, she must excel in this also; so sent
their St.
Stephen away to the Cathedral, and assigned the new work to
Ghiberti
(1425). Then comes the marble St. Eligius, by Nanni di Banco
(1415),
for the minor Art of the Maniscalchi, which included
farriers,
iron-smiths, knife-makers, and the like; the bas-relief below, also
by
Nanni, represents the Saint (San Lo he is more familiarly called,
or
St. Eloy in French) engaged in shoeing a demoniacal horse.
On the
southern facade, we have St. Mark in marble for the minor Art
of Linaioli and
Rigattieri, flax merchants and hucksters, by
Donatello, (about 1412).[32] The
Arte dei Vaiai e Pellicciai,
furriers, although a greater Guild, seems to
have been contented with
the rather insignificant marble St. James, which
follows, of uncertain
authorship, and dating from the end of the Trecento;
the bas-relief
seems later. The next shrine, that of the Doctors and
Apothecaries,
the great Guild to which Dante belonged and which included
painters
and booksellers, is empty; the Madonna herself is their patroness,
but
their statue is now inside the church; the Madonna and Child in
the
medallion above are by Luca della Robbia. The next niche is that
of
the great Arte della Seta or Arte di Por Santa Maria, the Guild of
the
Silk-merchants, to which embroiderers, goldsmiths and
silversmiths
were attached; the bronze statue of their patron, St. John
the
Evangelist, is by Baccio da Montelupo (1515), and replaces an
earlier
marble now in the Bargello; the medallion above with their arms,
a
gate on a shield supported by two cherubs, is by Luca della
Robbia.
[32] The eight Arti Minori not represented are the vintners
(St.
Martin), the inn-keepers (St. Julian), the cheesemongers
(St.
Bartholomew), the leather-dressers (St. Augustine), the
saddlemakers
(the Blessed Trinity), the joiners (the Annunciation), tin
and
coppersmiths (St. Zenobius), and the bakers (St.
Lawrence).
Finally, on the facade in the Via Calzaioli, the first shrine
is that
of the Arte di Calimala or Arte dei Mercatanti, who carried on
the
great commerce in foreign cloth, the chief democratic guild of
the
latter half of the thirteenth century, but which, together with
the
Arte della Lana, began somewhat to decline towards the middle of
the
Quattrocento; their bronze St. John Baptist is Ghiberti's, but
hardly
one of his better works (1415). The large central tabernacle
was
originally assigned to the Parte Guelfa, the only organisation
outside
of the Guilds that was allowed to share in this work; for
them,
Donatello made a bronze statue of their patron, St. Louis of
Toulouse,
and either Donatello himself or Michelozzo prepared, in 1423,
the
beautiful niche for him which is still here. But, owing to the
great
unpopularity of the Parte Guelfa and their complete loss of
authority
under the new Medicean regime, this tabernacle was taken from them
in
1459 and made over to the Universita dei Mercanti or Magistrato
della
Mercanzia, a board of magistrates who presided over all the
Guilds;
the arms of this magistracy were set up in the present medallion
by
Luca della Robbia in 1462; Donatello's St. Louis was sent to the
friars
minor; and, some years later, Verrocchio cast the present
masterly group of
Christ and St. Thomas. Landucci, in his diary for
1483, tells us how it was
set up, and that the bronze figure of the
Saviour seemed to him the most
beautiful that had ever been made. Last
of all, the bronze statue of St. Luke
was set up by Giovanni da
Bologna in 1601, for the Judges and Notaries, who,
like the
silk-merchants, discarded an earlier marble. It must be observed
that
the substitution of the Commercial Tribunal for the tyrannical
Parte
Guelfa completes the purely democratic character of the
whole
monument.
Entering the interior, we pass from the domains of the
great
commercial guilds and their patrons to those of the _Laudesi_ of
Santa
Maria. It is rich and subdued in colour, the vaults and
pilasters
covered with faded frescoes. It is divided into two parts, the
one
ending in the Shrine of the Blessed Virgin, the other in the
chapel
and altar of St. Anne, her mother and the deliveress of the
Republic.
These two record the two great events of fourteenth century
Florentine
history--the expulsion of the Duke of Athens and the Black Death.
It
was after this great plague that, in consequence of the
Compagnia
having had great riches left to them, "to the honour of the
Holy
Virgin Mary and for the benefit of the poor," the Captains
of
Orsanmichele, as the heads of these Laudesi were called,
summoned
Orcagna, in 1349, to the "work of the pilaster," as it was
officially
styled, to enclose what remained of the miraculous picture in
a
glorious tabernacle. He took ten years over it, finishing it in
1359,
while the railing by Pietro di Migliore was completed in 1366. It
was
approximately at this epoch that it was decided to find another
place
for the market, and to close the arcades of the loggia,
_per
adornamento e salvezza del tabernacolo di Nostra Donna_.
It is
goldsmith's work on a gigantic scale, this marble reliquary of
the
archangelic painter. "A miracle of loveliness," wrote Lord
Lindsay, "and
though clustered all over with pillars and pinnacles,
inlaid with the richest
marbles, lapis-lazuli, and mosaic work, it is
chaste in its luxuriance as an
Arctic iceberg--worthy of her who was
spotless among women." The whole is
crowned with a statue of St.
Michael, and the miraculous picture is enclosed
in an infinite wealth
and profusion of statues and arabesques, angels and
prophets, precious
stones and lions' heads. Scenes in bas-relief from Our
Lady's life
alternate with prophets and allegorical representations of
the
virtues, some of these latter being single figures of great beauty
and
some psychological insight in the rendering--for instance,
Docilitas,
Solertia, Justitia, Fortitudo--while marble Angels cluster round
their
Queen's tabernacle in eager service and loving worship. At the back
is
the great scene beneath which, to right and left, the series begins
and
ends--the death of Madonna and her Assumption, or rather, Our Lady
of the
Girdle, the giving of that celestial gift to the Thomas who had
doubted, the
mystical treasure which Tuscan Prato still fondly
believes that her Duomo
holds. This is perhaps the first
representation of this mystery in Italian
sculpture, and is signed and
dated: _Andreas Cionis pictor Florentinus
oratorii archimagister
extitit hujus, 1359._ The figure with a small divided
beard, talking
with a man in a big hat and long beard, is Orcagna's own
portrait. The
miraculous painting itself is within the tabernacle. The
picture in
front, the Madonna and Child with goldfinch, adored by eight
Angels,
is believed to be either by Orcagna himself or Bernardo Daddi[33];
it
is decidedly more primitive than their authenticated works,
probably
because it is a comparatively close rendering of the
original
composition.
[33] There are three extant documents
concerning pictures of the
Madonna for the Captains of Saint Michael; two
refer to a painting
ordered from Bernardo Daddi, in 1346 and 1347; the
third to one by
Orcagna, 1352. _See_ Signor P. Franceschini's monograph on
Or San
Michele, to which I am much indebted in this chapter.
On the
side altar on the right is the venerated Crucifix before which
St. Antoninus
used to pray. At one time the Dominicans were wont to
come hither in
procession on the anniversary of his death. In his
Chronicle of Florence,
Antoninus defends the friars from the
accusations of Villani with respect to
their scepticism about the
miraculous picture. On the opposite side altar is
the marble statue of
Mother and Child from the tabernacle of the Medici e
Speziali. It was
executed about the year 1399; Vasari ascribes it to a Simone
di
Firenze, who may possibly be Simone di Francesco Talenti.
The altar
of St. Anne at the east end of the left half of the nave is
one of the
Republic's thank-offerings for their deliverance from the
tyranny of Walter
de Brienne. Public thanksgiving had been held here,
before Our Lady's
picture, as early as 1343, while the "Palatium" was
still in building; but in
the following year, 1344, at the instance of
the captains of Or San Michele
and others, the Signoria decreed that
"for the perpetual memory of the grace
conceded by God to the Commune
and People of Florence, on the day of blessed
Anne, Mother of the
glorious Virgin, by the liberation of the city and the
citizens, and
by the destruction of the pernicious and tyrannical yoke,"
solemn
offerings should be made on St. Anne's feast day by the Signoria
and
the consuls of the Arts, before her statue in Or San Michele, and
that
on that day all offices and shops should be closed, and no one
be
subject to arrest for debt. The present statue on this votive
altar,
representing the Madonna (here perhaps symbolising her faithful
city
of Florence) seated on the lap of St. Anne, who is thus protecting
her
and her Divine Child, was executed by Francesco da Sangallo in
1526,
and replaces an older group in wood; although highly praised
by
Vasari, it will strike most people as not quite worthy of the place
or
the occasion. The powerful and expressive head of St. Anne is the
best
part of the group.
The beneficent energies of these Laudesi and
their captains spread far
beyond the limits of this church and shrine. The
great and still
existing company of the Misericordia was originally connected
with
them; and the Bigallo for the foundling children was raised by them
at
the same time as their Tabernacle here. They contributed generously
to
the construction of the Duomo, and decorated chapels in Santa Croce
and
the Carmine. Sacchetti and Giovanni Boccaccio were among their
officers; and
it was while Boccaccio was serving as one of their
captains in 1350 that they
sent a sum of money by his hands to Dante's
daughter Beatrice, in her distant
convent at Ravenna. They appear to
have spent all they had in the defence of
Florentine liberty during
the great siege of 1529.
The imposing old
tower that rises opposite San Michele in the Calimala
is the Torrione of the
Arte della Lana, copiously adorned with their
arms--the Lamb bearing the
Baptist's cross. It was erected at the end
of the thirteenth or beginning of
the fourteenth century, and in it
the consuls of the Guild had their
meetings. It was stormed and sacked
by the Ciompi in 1378. The heavy arch
that connects the tower with the
upper storey of Or San Michele, and rather
disfigures the building, is
the work of Buontalenti in the latter half of the
sixteenth century.
The large vaulted hall into which it leads, intended
originally for
the storage of grain and the like, is now known as the Sala di
Dante,
and witnesses the brilliant gatherings of Florentines and
foreigners
to listen to the readings of the _Divina Commedia_ given under
the
auspices of the _Societa Dantesca Italiana_.
This is the part of
the city where the Arts had their wealth and
strength; the very names of the
streets show it; Calimala and
Pellicceria, for instance, which run from the
Mercato Vecchio to the
Via Porta Rossa. The Mercato Vecchio, the centre of
the city both in
Roman and mediæval times, around which the houses and towers
of the
oldest families clustered--Elisei, Caponsacchi, Nerli, Vecchietti,
and
the rest of whom Dante's _Paradiso_ tells--is now a
painfully
unsightly modern square, with what appears to be a triumphal
arch
bearing the inscription: _L'antico centro della citta da
secolare
squallore a vita nuova restituita_(!). Passing down the Calimala
to
the Via Porta Rossa and the Mercato Nuovo, near where the former
enters
the Via Calzaioli, the site is still indicated of the Calimala
Bottega where
the government of the Arts was first organised, as told
in chapter i. Near
here and in the Mercato Nuovo, the Cavalcanti had
their palaces. In the Via
Porta Rossa the Arte della Seta had their
warehouses; the gate from which
they took their second name, and which
is represented on their shield, is of
course the Por Santa Maria, Our
Lady's Gate of the old walls or Cerchia
Antica, which was somewhere
about the middle of the present Via Por Santa
Maria. The Church of
Santa Maria sopra la Porta, between the Mercato Nuovo
and the Via
delle Terme, is the present San Biagio (now used by the
firemen);
adjoining it is the fine old palace of the dreaded captains of
the
Parte Guelfa. The Via Porta Rossa contains some mediæval houses
and
the lower portions of a few grand old towers still standing;
as
already said, in the first circle of walls there was a postern gate,
at
the end of the present street, opposite Santa Trinita. In the
Mercato Nuovo,
where a copy of the ancient boar--which figures in Hans
Andersen's familiar
story--seems to watch the flower market, the
arcades were built by Battista
del Tasso for Cosimo I. Here, too,
modernisation has destroyed much. Hardly
can we conjure up now that
day of the great fire in 1304, when the nobles of
the "black" faction
galloped through the crowd of plunderers, with their
blazing torches
throwing a lurid glow on the steel-clad Podesta with his
soldiers
drawn up here idly to gaze upon the flames! A house that once
belonged
to the Cavalcanti is still standing in Mercato Nuovo, marked by
the
Cross of the People; the branch of the family who lived here left
the
magnates and joined the people, as the Cross indicates, changing
their
name from Cavalcanti to Cavallereschi.
[Illustration: TOWER OF
THE ARTE DELLA LANA]
The little fourteenth century church of St. Michael,
now called San
Carlo, which stands opposite San Michele in Orto on the other
side of
the Via Calzaioli, was originally a votive chapel to Saint Anne,
built
at the expense of the captains of the Laudesi on a site purchased
by
the Commune. It was begun in 1349 by Fioraventi and Benci di
Cione,
simultaneously with Orcagna's tabernacle, continued by Simone
di
Francesco Talenti, and completed at the opening of the
fifteenth
century. The captains intended to have the ceremonial offerings
made
here instead of in the Loggia; but the thing fell through owing to
a
disagreement with the Arte di Por Santa Maria, and the votive
altar
remained in the Loggia.
Between San Carlo and the Duomo the
street has been completely
modernised. Of old it was the Corso degli Adimari,
surrounded by the
houses and towers of this fierce Guelf clan, who were at
deadly feud
with the Donati. Cacciaguida in the _Paradiso_ (canto xvi.)
describes
them as "the outrageous tribe that playeth dragon after whoso
fleeth,
and to whoso showeth tooth--or purse--is quiet as a lamb." One
of
their towers still stands on the left. On the right the place is
marked
where the famous loggia, called the Neghittosa, once stood,
which belonged to
the branch of the Adimari called the Cavicciuli,
who, in spite of their
hatred to the Donati, joined the Black Guelfs.
One of them, Boccaccio or
Boccaccino Adimari, seized upon Dante's
goods when he was exiled, and exerted
his influence to prevent his
being recalled. In this loggia, too, Filippo
Argenti used to sit, the
_Fiorentino spirito bizzarro_ whom Dante saw rise
before him covered
with mire out of the marshy lake of Styx. He is supposed
to have
ridden a horse shod with silver, and there is a rare story in
the
_Decameron_ of a mad outburst of bestial fury on his part in this
very
loggia, on account of a mild practical joke on the part of Ciacco,
a
bon vivant of the period whom Dante has sternly flung into the hell
of
gluttons. On this occasion Filippo, who was an enormously big,
strong,
and sinewy man, beat a poor little dandy called Biondello within
an
inch of his life. In this same loggia, on August 4th, 1397, a party
of
young Florentine exiles, who had come secretly from Bologna with
the
intention of killing Maso degli Albizzi, took refuge, after a
vain
attempt to call the people to arms. From the highest part of
the
loggia, seeing a great crowd assembling round them, they harangued
the
mob, imploring them not stupidly to wait to see their
would-be
deliverers killed and themselves thrust back into still more
grievous
servitude. When not a soul moved, "finding out too late how
dangerous
it is to wish to set free a people that desires, happen what may,
to
be enslaved," as Machiavelli cynically puts it, they escaped into
the
Duomo, where, after a vain attempt at defending themselves, they
were
captured by the Captain, put to the question and executed. There
were
about ten of them in all, including three of the Cavicciuli
and
Antonio dei Medici.
On November 9th, 1494, when the Florentines
rose against Piero dei
Medici and his brothers, the young Cardinal Giovanni
rode down this
street with retainers and a few citizens shouting, _Popolo e
liberta_,
pretending that he was going to join the insurgents. But when he
got
to San Michele in Orto, the people turned upon him from the
piazza
with their pikes and lances, with loud shouts of "Traitor!" upon
which
he fled back in great dread. Landucci saw him at the windows of
his
palace, on his knees with clasped hand, commending himself to
God.
"When I saw him," he says, "I grew very sorry for him
(_m'inteneri
assai_); and I judged that he was a good and sensible
youth."
To the east of the Via Calzaioli lies the Sesto di San Piero
Maggiore,
which, at the end of the thirteenth century, received the
pleasant
name of the Sesto di Scandali. It lies on either side of the Via
del
Corso, which with its continuations ran from east to west through
the
old city. In the Via della Condotta, at the corner of the Vicolo
dei
Cerchi, still stands the palace which belonged to a section of
this
family (the section known as the White Cerchi to distinguish them
from
Messer Vieri's branch, the Black Cerchi, who were even more "white"
in
politics, in spite of their name); in this palace the Priors sat
before
Arnolfo built the Palazzo Vecchio, which became the seat of
government in
1299. It was there, not here, that Dante and his
colleagues, on June 15th,
1300, entered upon office, and the same day
confirmed the sentences which had
been passed under their predecessors
against the three traitors who had
conspired to betray Florence to
Pope Boniface; and then, a few days later,
passed the decree by which
Corso Donati and Guido Cavalcanti were sent into
exile. Later the
vicars of Robert of Anjou for a time resided here, and
the
administrators appointed to assess the confiscated goods of
"rebels."
At the corner of the Via dei Cerchi, where it joins the Via
dei
Cimatori, are traces of the loggia of the Cerchi; the same
corner
affords a picturesque glimpse of the belfrey of the Badia and
the
tower of the Podesta's palace.
There was another great palace of
the Cerchi, referred to in the
_Paradiso_, which had formerly belonged to the
Ravignani and the Conti
Guidi, the acquisition of which by Messer Vieri had
excited the envy
of the Donati. This palace is described by Dante (_Parad._
xvi.) as
being _sopra la porta_, that is, over the inner gate of St. Peter,
the
gate of the first circuit in Cacciaguida's day. No trace of
it
remains, but it was apparently on the north side of the Corso where
it
now joins the Via del Proconsolo. "Over the gate," says
Cacciaguida,
"which is now laden with new felony of such weight that there
will
soon be a wrecking of the ship, were the Ravignani, whence
is
descended the Count Guido, and whoever has since taken the name of
the
noble Bellincione." Here the daughter of Bellincione Berti, the
_alto
Bellincion_, lived,--the beautiful and good Gualdrada, whom we
can
dimly discern as a sweet and gracious presence in that far-off
early
Florence of which the _Paradiso_ sings; she was the ancestress of
the
great lords of the Casentino, the Conti Guidi. The principal houses
of
the Donati appear to have been on the Duomo side of the Corso,
just
before the Via dello Studio now joins it; but they had possessions
on
the other side as well. Giano della Bella had his house almost
opposite
to them, on the southern side. A little further on, at the
corner where the
Corso joins the Via del Proconsolo, Folco Portinari
lived, the father,
according to tradition, of Dante's Beatrice: "he
who had been the father of
so great a marvel, as this most noble
Beatrice was manifestly seen to be."
Folco's sons joined the Bianchi;
one of them, Pigello, was poisoned during
Dante's priorate; an elder
son, Manetto Portinari (the friend of Dante and
Cavalcanti),
afterwards ratted and made his peace with the Neri. All the
family are
included, together with the Giuochi who lived opposite to them, in
a
sentence passed against Dante and his sons in 1315, from which
Manetto
Portinari is excepted by name. The building which now occupies
the
site of the Casa Portinari was once the Salviati
Palace.
[Illustration: HOUSE OF DANTE]
In the little Piazza di
San Martino is shown the Casa di Dante, which
undoubtedly belonged to the
Alighieri, and in which Dante is said to
have been born. It has been
completely modernised. The Alighieri had
also a house in the Via Santa
Margherita, which runs from the Piazza
San Martino to the Corso, opposite the
little church of Santa
Margherita. Hard by, in the Piazza dei Donati a
section of that family
had a house and garden; and here Dante saw and wooed
Gemma, the
daughter of Manetto Donati. The old tower which seems to watch
over
Dante's house from the other side of the Piazza San Martino,
the
Torre della Castagna, belonged in Dante's days to the monks of
the
Badia; in it, in 1282, the Priors of the Arts held their
first
meeting, when the government of the Republic was placed in
their
hands. At the corner of the Piazza, opposite Dante's house, lived
the
Sacchetti, the family from which the novelist, Franco, sprang.
They
were in deadly feud with Geri del Bello, the cousin of Dante's
father,
who lived in the house next to Dante's; and, shortly before the
year
of Dante's vision, the Sacchetti murdered Geri. He seems to
have
deserved his fate, and Dante places him among the sowers of discord
in
Hell, where he points at Dante and threatens him vehemently.
"His
violent death," says the poet in _Inferno_ xxix, "which is not
yet
avenged for him, by any that is a partner of his shame, made
him
indignant; therefore, as I suppose, he went away without speaking
to
me; and in that he has made me pity him the more." Thirty years
after
the murder, Geri's nephews broke into the house of the Sacchetti
and
stabbed one of the family to death; and the two families were
finally
reconciled in 1342, on which occasion Dante's half-brother,
Francesco
Alighieri, was the representative of the Alighieri. Many years
later,
Dante's great-grandson, Leonardo Alighieri, came from Verona
to
Florence. "He paid me a visit," writes Leonardo Bruni, "as a friend
of
the memory of his great-grandfather, Dante. And I showed him
Dante's
house, and that of his forebears, and I pointed out to him
many
particulars with which he was not acquainted, because he and
his
family had been estranged from their fatherland. And so does
Fortune
roll this world around, and change its inhabitants up and down as she
turns her wheel." |
|
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