CHAPTER I

ON THE DIGNITY AND WEALTH OF OLD FLORENCE

Giovanni Villani, _Historie_, XII, 4, regrets the passing of decorum with the advent of the French and the Duke of Athens in 1342, but wealth increased.

“Formerly the clothing and costumes [of the Florentines] was the most beautiful, noble and distinguished of any nation, in the manner of the togaed Romans.” Evidently the look of things favored the art of a Giotto.

In book XI, ch. 91–93, Villani gives remarkable and quite modern statistics which I paraphrase and quote, in part from the Giunta edition, Venice, 1559. The time is about 1340.

“We found by diligence that in these times there were in Florence 25,000 men fit to bear arms, from 15 to 70 years old, among whom there were 1506 nobles.... There were then in Florence 65 fully equipped knights, though before the middle class which now rules was organized, there were more than 250 knights.... There was estimated to be 90,000 ... men, women and children in the city. There is supposed to be generally in the city 1,500 foreigners, travellers, and soldiers not counting in the population the clergy, monks, and nuns.... In the outlying districts are supposed to be 80,000 people. We have found from the rector who baptizes the children (since for every male who was baptized in San Giovanni—in order to have the count—was dropped a black bean, and for every female a white) that for every year in these times there were from 5,800 to 6,000, the males generally exceeding by 300 to 500 a year.

“We find that the boys and girls at [primary] school were from 8,000 to 10,000. The boys who study the abacus (calculation) and arabic numbers, in six schools, from 1,000 to 1,200. And those who are learning [Latin] grammar and logic, in four great schools, from 550 to 600.

“The churches, which were then in Florence and in the suburbs, counting the abbeys, and monastic churches, we find to be 110, of which 57, parish churches ... 5 abbeys and two priories with 80 monks, 24 convents of nuns, with more than 500 women, 10 friaries with more than 700 friars, 30 hospitals with more than 1000 beds to lodge the poor and infirm, and from 250 to 300 chaplain priests.

“The shops of the cloth makers (_arte della lana_) were 200 and more, and they made from 70,000 to 80,000 bolts, at a value of more than 1,200,000 gold florins, although fully a third part staid in the city for the workers, without gain for the cloth handlers, and the workers are more than 30,000 persons....

“The warehouses of the art of the _Calimala_, for the French and transalpine cloth, were 20, which brought in per year more than 10,000 bolts of a value of 300,000 gold florins, all of which was sold in Florence....

Banks of money changers 80.... Shops of bootmakers ... 300. The college of judges, from 80 to 100. And notaries from 600 up, doctors of physic and surgery 60, and druggists’ shops 100....

“The greater part of the well-to-do, rich, and noble citizens with their families, staid in the country for four months, and some, more, a year.”...

“Other dignities and magnificences of our city of Florence I should not fail to bring to memory, for information of such as shall come after us. It was, within, well built with many beautiful palaces and houses, and in these times they were continually demolishing, thus bettering the building by making it more comfortable and rich, bringing in from outside the examples for every sort of betterment and beauty. Churches, cathedrals, friaries of every rule, monasteries, magnificent and rich. Furthermore, there was no citizen who did not have a country place, great or small, which was not richly built, indeed far greater buildings than in the city; and every citizen sinned by inordinate spending, whence they were thought crazy. But it was so magnificent a thing to see, that a foreigner, not used to coming in, believed, because of the rich structures for three miles about, that it was all one city after the manner of Rome, not to mention the rich palaces, towers, court yards, terraced gardens, still further from the city, which in any other country would have been called the rural districts. In short one would have thought that within six miles of the city were more rich and noble inhabitants, than, taking them together, two Florences could have produced. And let this suffice for telling of the facts of Florence.”

GIOTTO’S VIEW OF FRANCISCAN POVERTY

Giotto’s humanistic detachment from the Franciscan doctrine of voluntary poverty is well illustrated in his poem which is quoted in part from Dante Gabriel Rosetti’s translation. The original is in G. Milanesis’ edition of Vasari, _Le Vite_, Vol. I, Florence 1878, pp. 426–8.

“Many there are, praisers of Poverty; The which as man’s best state is register’d When by free choice preferr’d, With strict observance, having nothing here. For this they find certain authority Wrought of an over-nice interpreting. Now as concerns such thing, A hard extreme to me it doth appear, Which to commend I fear, For seldom are extremes without some vice, Let every edifice, Of work or word, secure foundation find; Against the potent wind, And all things perilous, so well prepared— That it needs no correction afterward.”

A CONTRACT WITH ORCAGNA FOR THE ALTAR-PIECE OF 1357

Tommaso di Rossello Strozzi left a rough note of the terms of the contract for the altar-piece of his chapel. Doubtless the actual contract was much fuller. The minute is published by Filippo Baldinucci, _Opere_, Milano 1811, Vol IV. p. 397.

“Herewith is to be written [on my part] and Andrea called Orcagna that I Tommaso di Rossello aforesaid have given to paint for the altar-piece which is made for the altar of [the chapel] in Santa Maria Novella, of a breadth of five braccia, 1 sol. [over 10 feet] there or thereabouts. The aforesaid Andrea is to paint in fine and splendid colors; and gold, silver and everything else are truly to be used in the entire panel and pinnacles, that is [gold] leaf. Only in the side columns may silver be used.... And [with] as many figures as [directed] by me Tommaso it shall be completed. And the said panel to be entirely painted by his own hand.

“[1] 354 in twenty months....

“Should it come about that the aforesaid Andrea should not give it to us completed and painted.”

“He should pay me for every additional week that he works at the painting as it shall seem right to the judgment of the here named arbitrators.”...

“Should it come to more than the aforesaid price, we will take the judgment of Carlo, Paolo and Fra Jacopo.”

Such is approximately the sense of this very difficult and quite grammarless annotation of Tommaso Strozzi. The arbitrators must have had occasion to act, for the panel is dated 1357, two years after the promised time.

[Illustration:

FIG. 33. Ambrogio Lorenzetti. Madonna of San Francesco. ]

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