Part 11

The majestic tower of the Monaldi (which has been restored), with part of the old house attached, stands nearly opposite Palazzo Davanzati. I cannot do better than tell the history of the family, mentioned by Dante as among the oldest in Italy, in the words of Piero Monaldi, whose manuscript history has been kindly lent to me by one of his descendants. “Our family comes from the Monaldeschi of Orvieto, and took its origin from the Duke and Baron Monaldo, connected with the famous house of Anjou, who governed Tuscany for the Emperor Charlemagne. His descendants were lords of Orvieto and of many other places in the Tuscan land.... Civil discord between them and the Filippeschi drove Monaldo and his family to Florence; he settled in the parish of Porta Rossa, and built a tower of square hewn stone 430 braccie in height. In this spot they had so many houses that the street was called de’ Monaldi [now Via Monalda]. The houses extended from the Piazza di Sta. Trinita and Porta Rossa as far as the church of Sta. Maria Ughi, until in 1346, on the day of S. John the Baptist, they were nearly destroyed by a very great fire, with the loss of much property, and of the lives of some of the family, as is related by Giovanni Villani. They were at once rebuilt, for the said houses are mentioned in the first _catasto_ of the citizens of Florence as belonging to the sons of Antonio di Guido, who was an ancestor of mine. I note that as _Grandi_ of the city we had not much to do with the government, being in opposition to the people; so that when in 1378 the mob became masters, our family was admonished and condemned; Lipozzo di Mangieri, who was then Podestà of Terra Nuova, being exiled together with his sons. When the recall of the exiles was talked of in 1395, we were again admonished and banished, and some went to Pisa and became citizens of that city, where to this day their ancient monuments can be seen. Buonfiglio Monaldi, a saintly man, one of the seven founders of the Servite Order, was of our family; his brother Buonconte, a knight, captain of Arezzo in 1260, was chosen by Cardinal Latino as one of the guarantors of the universal peace between the Guelphs and the Ghibellines in 1280. Ugo, knight of the Golden Spur, was captain of the cavalry of the King of Hungary, and is mentioned by Verino in his second book, _De Illustratione Urbis Florentie_.

Gloria Folcorum Federicus et Impiger Ugo Pannoni Regis Turmas ductavit equestres Pluraque Turcarum caepit Castella Monaldus, etc.

His magnificent tomb in Sta. Maria Novella was destroyed when the church was enlarged, but the old stone of our vault can still be seen in the pavement, on which is inscribed: _Hic jacet_ [_sic_] _Ossa Nobilis Militis Ugonis de Monaldis equitis Florentini et eorum Descendentium_.

“Piero, my grandfather, was captain under the lord Tommaso de’ Medici. Alessandro was captain in 1530, and took the city of Volterra. Another was Archbishop of Rieti, but at present there only remain Fra Francesco, a Cappucin, and Piero di Giovanni, writer of this notice, and of this family history. Our arms have a white peacock on a red field, emblem of the city of Orvieto, from whence we came. Some add a silver rose, given by the King of England to Giovanni Monaldi.”[49] The tower of the Monaldi now belongs to Signor Majolfi.

PALAZZO RAMIREZ DI MONTALVO

_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.

PALAZZO MOZZI

_Piazza Mozzi. No. 3._

When the second line of walls was built round Florence in 1173, the Oltrarno consisted of suburbs, and was chiefly inhabited by the poor. But early in the following century rich and powerful families began to build their houses and towers there, and among them were the Mozzi.

“Mozorum prisca paucide stirpe superunt Area sola tenet nomen vicina fluente,”

writes Verino. In 1260 Jacopo di Cambio Mozzi was one of the leaders of the Florentine army, and after the defeat of the Guelphs the houses and towers of the Mozzi were sacked and destroyed, for which the city paid them an indemnity. They then built a palace on the same spot, where they received Pope Gregory X. and his whole court in magnificent fashion, when going to the Council of Lyons. All the prelates of distinction who passed through Florence were guests of the Mozzi, as they, together with the Spini, were bankers of the Pope, and farmers of the revenues of the Holy See. For that reason they had houses or correspondents all over the world.

The Pope arrived on the 18th June, 1273, with Charles of Anjou, King of Naples, and Baldwin of Flanders, who styled himself Emperor of Constantinople, “and, as the sojourn of Florence pleased them,” writes Villani, “because of the goodness of the water, the salubrity of the air and the comfort to be found in the city, they determined to spend the summer there. The Pope observing that so fine a city suffered by reason of the parties (for the Ghibellines were in exile), willed that they should return and make peace with the Guelphs, and it was done. On the 2nd July the said Pope, with his cardinals, King Charles, the Emperor Baldwin, all the barons and courtiers, and the Florentine people, collected in the dry bed of the Arno at the foot of the bridge of Rubaconte [now alle Grazie]; and the illustrious and great people took their places on huge scaffoldings of wood which had been erected. And there the Pope judged between the Guelphs and the Ghibellines, under pain of excommunication to whomsoever did not obey. He caused the leaders of each party to kiss each other on the mouth and make peace, and give bail and hostages; and all the castles held by the Ghibellines were to be given into the hands of King Charles.” The peace was but short-lived, as the Ghibellines, warned of the evil intentions of the King towards them, left the city four days later.

Things in Florence went from bad to worse, so that Pope Nicholas III. was begged to send a legate to promote peace. Once more Palazzo Mozzi “became a second Rome,” for the Cardinal Fra Latino Frangipani was an honoured guest there in October 1278. His first task was to reconcile the Guelphs, who had fallen out among themselves, and then he made peace between them and the Ghibellines. The “Peace of Cardinal Latino” was signed, amid general rejoicing, in the Piazza Vecchia of Sta. Maria Novella in 1280.

In 1314 King Robert of Naples sent his brother Piero, Count of Gravina, with three hundred horsemen, at the urgent request of the Florentines, to help them against Uguccione della Fagiuola, whom the Pisans had taken into their pay. The young Count dismounted at Palazzo Mozzi in August, and Ammirato describes him as “prudent and discreet. He showed no sign of the pride and haughtiness of royalty in his dealing with the citizens, behaving courteously to all.... To these qualities were added the natural advantages of remarkable beauty both of face and person.” The Florentines were delighted with him, and his death at the battle of Montecatini the following year was sincerely mourned. Seven years later the old palace opened its doors to a very different guest. Walter de Brienne, Duke of Athens and Count of Lecce, who was to become the hated tyrant of Florence, stayed there for some time when he first arrived as Vicario of the Duke of Calabria.

Several of the Mozzi were gallant soldiers, and became knights of the Golden Spur. Vanni fought against the Pisans in 1292, and three years later was sent as ambassador to the Pope, to beg him once more to intervene in the internal dissensions of the city. Luigi Mozzi was amongst those sent to Venice to negociate a treaty in 1337, and four years later he was one of the twenty citizens of Florence who treated for the purchase of Lucca. Afterwards he arranged a league with Siena and Perugia. Marcantonio, canon of the cathedral of Sta. Maria del Fiore in 1707, a man of considerable learning, was an “Arcadian,” under the name of Dariseo Gortinano, and Archconsul of the Academia della Crusca. His brother, Pier-Giannozzo Mozzi, was created a Count of the Empire by Napoleon I.

It must have been a grandson of Pier-Giannozzo whom Sir Horace Mann mentions as the friend of the eccentric Lady Orford. She died at Pisa in 1781, and Mann writes: “Mozzi brought me her writing-box, which I opened in his presence, and of a lawyer’s, in which I saw a paper sealed with her seal, and, wrote on the cover by her, ‘A copy of my last will.’... She has left everything she was possessed of to Mozzi.... He is one of the most antient families among the nobilità here, and not poor for this country. She, to be sure, chose him for his beauty, which was then great and in its prime, but she wished it to be thought that his learning (for which he is distinguished, and he has just published some approved works on Mathematicks) biassed her choice.... Mozzi’s attention has been greatly rewarded.” In 1784 Sir Horace notes that “Florence is much amused by the marriage of Lady Orford’s old Cicisbeo, Cavaliere Mozzi.”

The old palace and its large garden was sold by the last of the family a few years ago to the Dowager Princess Carolath Beuthen.

PALAZZO NERLI

_Via de’ Servi. No. 10._

[Illustration: WINDOW OF PALAZZO NERLI.]

This quaintly shaped palace with a fine courtyard, and ending in a sharp angle at Via de’ Castellaccio, belonged to the ancient family of the Nerli, praised by Dante as still living soberly according to the good old fashion.

“... The sons I saw Of Nerli, and of Vecchio, well content With unrobed jerkins; and their good dames handling The spindle and the flax. Oh happy they.”

In the XIth century they had houses and a tower in the centre of old Florence and took their name from one Nerlo, son of Signorello di Ridolfo d’Ildebrando di Leone, who lived in 1079. Another Messer Nerlo was Consul of the city of Florence in 1196 and again in 1202. The Nerli joined the sect of the Paterines, and when Fra Piero da Verona preached a crusade against the heretics they fled and took refuge in France. Not being able to burn the living, the Friar desecrated the family tombs and burnt the corpses and the bones of their ancestors. The Nerli remained in France for a hundred and fifty years and must have abjured their heretic faith, as Cosimo the Elder recalled Francesco de Nerlo to Florence, and caused him to be made a _Popolano_ and a Prior, the first of his house. His son Tanay became a man of great consequence in the city, and was one of the chief adversaries of Savonarola. It was at his instigation that the bell of S. Marco, with which the friars had summoned the people to their aid when Fra Girolamo was arrested, was taken to S. Miniato. Tradition says it was never tolled there but once, and that was for the funeral of Tanay Nerli. One of his sons was a good Greek scholar to whom we owe the first edition of Homer. Another son was father to the historian Filippo Nerli (1485–1536), whose Commentary is a model of pure and elegant Italian, but marred by too great a partiality to the Medici, to whom he was related through his wife Caterina Salviati, aunt of Duke Cosimo I. The descendant of another son was Archbishop of Florence and a Cardinal in 1669. About the same time his brother, Senator Nerli, bought the estate of Rassina from the Altieri with the title of Marquess, and one of his sons succeeded his uncle as Archbishop and as Cardinal. The palace now belongs to Signor Fiaschi Cuccoli.

[Illustration: CORNER OF PALAZZO NONFINITO, WITH COAT OF ARMS OF THE STROZZI.]

PALAZZO NONFINITO

_Via Proconsolo. No. 12._

“In 1592,” writes Baldinucci in his life of Matteo Nigetti, “Alessandro Strozzi bought a house from Camillo de’ Pazzi, that same Camillo who was father to S. Maria Maddalena, and a small one adjoining with a shop, at Canto del Papa, so-called in olden times from a family who lived there, but afterwards called the Canto de’ Pazzi; near to where the first wall of Florence ended towards the east with the Porta S. Pietro.” They were bought with the intention of building the fine, but unfinished, palace we now see, and Alessandro charged Bernardo Buontalenti not only to make the design but to superintend the work. Nigetti worked under him for seven years, until the façade as far as the sills of the first floor windows on the side towards the Duomo was finished. “The kneeling windows and the door in Borgo degl’Albizzi show how great was the talent of Buontalenti,” says Vasari; “he only built the first floor of the palace, as a difference arose with the owner about a certain staircase proposed by Santi di Tito, who did what little he knew and no more, and the building was then entrusted to other hands.” Scamozzi the Roman architect was at that time in Florence and continued the work for Ruberto Strozzi. When he left, Caccini became the architect and sculptured the fine coat of arms at the corner, shown in the drawing. After his death Nigetti was once more called in to superintend, and Cigoli designed the courtyard. The Guasti family bought the palace in the XVIIth century, and the entrance court, which till then had been open, was roofed over. With so many architects it seems strange that the palace should have remained in such a condition as to have merited the special name of Nonfinito (the Unfinished) in a city where but few of the great buildings are completed. It is possible that some dispute arose between the Strozzi and the Salviati, whose palace was opposite, about the height; in which the latter, connected with the Medici by the marriage of Maria Salviati with Giovanni delle Bande Nere, would have gained the day.

In 1814 the palace was bought by the Grand Ducal government, and Fossombroni, the enlightened minister of Fernando III., inhabited it for some time. It then became the office of the head of the police, and now is the central telegraph office of Florence.

PALAZZO PANCIATICHI

_Via Cavour. No. 2._

This palace was built by Carlo Fontana for the Cardinal Bandino Panciatichi and is celebrated for its fine staircase, the incline of which is so gradual that one of the Panciatichi, an officer on the staff of the Arch Duke of Austria, used to ride upstairs. It was erected on the site of the houses of the Della Casa family, who would not merit special mention if Monsignore Giovanni Della Casa, born in 1503, had not belonged to the chief academies of the day and written _Galateo_, that elaborate essay on good manners whose title has passed into a proverb. He was Archbishop of Benevento in 1544 and soon afterwards Nuncio at Venice. The scandal caused by his burlesque poem _Capitolo del Forno_ probably prevented his being made a Cardinal.[51]

The story of the Panciatichi family would be almost a history of Pistoja, as for more than three centuries the little town was torn to pieces by the bloody feuds between them and the Cancellieri. According to tradition they descend from a Roman Consul:

“Et genus et nomen gens haec Panseatica sumpsit E Pansa eximio Consule magnanimo; Belligeri Tuscam Pistori venit ad urbem Cum cecidit fato consul uterque pari,”

wrote Giovanni Navarra in the XVth century; and in public acts and ancient inscriptions the Panciatichi called themselves _Pansea progenies_. They were lords of many strong castles and townlets in the Apennines; amongst others of San Marcello, which from time immemorial paid them a yearly tribute of 100 lbs. of cheese, 50 loads of beech wood and 3 bushels of chestnuts. The oldest existing document about the family is dated 1057, and relates to Pansa, or Pancio, son of Bellino a knight of the Golden Spur who conceded to the Bishop of Pistoja the right of allowing the friars of S. Salvatore to collect certain tithes. Infrangilasta Panciatichi went to the crusades in 1190 and was taken prisoner by Saladin, but after some months he escaped and returned to Pistoja, where in fulfilment of a vow he gave lands to the church of S. Angelo in Gora.[52] The documents relating to his sons Inghiramo and Lanfranco are curious as showing the feudal rights enjoyed by a great Ghibelline family. Ridolfo Panciaticho, his sons and his brother Angelo, were created knights of the Golden Spur in 1329 by the Commune of Florence, and a few years afterwards the latter was made a citizen. His son Diliano was ambassador to the Emperor Charles IV., and a descendant of his, Bartolomeo, was a most successful merchant at Lyons. His son and namesake, a friend of the artists and men of letters of his day, was himself a poet. In France, where he was ambassador for some years, he became a Protestant, and on his return to Florence was imprisoned by the tribunal of the Inquisition. After suffering torture he publicly abjured in 1552 and was received again into the Roman Catholic Church after long and wonderful ceremonies. The portraits of himself and his wife Lucrezia by Bronzino, are in the Uffizi. His son Carlo, a man of violent temper, was condemned to death for murdering his servant, but was pardoned by Cosimo I. on the condition that he married his mistress Eleonora degl’Albizzi, of whom the Grand Duke was tired after she had borne him a son.