Money
and Beauty
Bankers,
Botticelli
and the Bonfire
of the Vanities
curated by
Ludovica Sebregondi
and Tim Parks
Florence, Palazzo Strozzi,
17 September 2011–22 January
2012
You are about to take a journey
to the origins of modern banking
No bankers, no Renaissance. It wasn’t just the vast sums of money these men
invested in paintings and palazzi, they constantly had to worry about the Church’s
disapproval. Any interest-bearing loan was evil, unnatural—usurers went to hell.
In response, these rich Christian men tied themselves in knots to invent profitable
loans that didn’t involve interest. They appeased the Church with donations, and
discovered that art, which they could buy with money, created a value beyond
money; art brought social prestige—and it might also make the Church more
comfortable. Some churchmen were delighted to accept bankers’ money. Others,
like Savonarola, would accept no compromise.
On this journey, you will have two guides. Art historian Ludovica Sebregondi,
author of Iconography of Girolamo Savonarola. 1495-1998, and Tim Parks, writer,
translator and author of Medici Money. Banking, Metaphysics and Art in Fifteenthcentury Florence. Their voices form a ‘duet’, in which they present different—and
sometimes opposing—views of the exhibition’s content.
Section 1
The Florin: Florence’s ambassador to the world
Before governments underwrote the value of their currencies, whether in paper or
metal, money had to have an intrinsic worth; it had to be silver or gold. Only then
would a tradesman exchange his wares for it. This created the need for a wide range
of coins to deal with the smallest and largest purchases. In the early 13th century
the Florentines, like many other western Europeans, were still using the silver denaro
introduced by Charlemagne four hundred years before, but the coin was worth so
little it had to be supplemented with more valuable coins from Lucca and Siena. The
situation was confusing and the time ripe for someone to produce a more practical
currency for larger transactions. In 1237 Florence opened its own mint and launched
the silver florin worth 12 denari (or one soldo), then in 1252 the gold florin, worth
20 soldi (or one lira). This was a serious coin in pure, 24 carat gold weighing 3.53
gm, gold that on today’s market would cost €110 or $150.
The city’s ambitions were quickly rewarded. By the end of the century the florin was
in use all over Europe, not only as a coin, but also as a currency of account. The
achievement brought Florence great prestige and proved an important asset to the
city’s merchants and bankers.
T.P.
1.1
Statutes of the Florentine Mint
1314–1461
parchment codex, bound in studded half-leather and
wooden panels; 22 fols.
29 x 21 cm
Florence, Archivio di Stato, Ufficiali della Moneta, later
Maestri di Zecca, 1
The monetieri, or Officers of the Mint, oversaw the
minting of coins and controlled both the process—the
steel moulds with the symbols to be impressed—and
the weight and make of the coins. The election of
the two officers, whose mandate lasted 6 months,
was in the hands of the Merchants’ Guild of Calimala,
responsible for international commerce, and of the
Money Changers’ Guild. From the 14th century on, to
avoid frauds the Officers began to mark coins with a
symbol or a crest.
L.S.
Halos and coins. The biblical John the Baptist lived in
poverty wearing a raiment of camel’s hair. The Florence
Mint adds the scarlet cloak of wealth and authority.
As patron saint of Florence, he would feature on every
florin the mint produced. It was comforting to see
no conflict between money and sanctity. The statute
contains regulations to prevent cheating and forgery,
plus details of those condemned for these crimes
between 1314 and 1461.
T.P.
1.2
‘Fiorinaio’ (Florin Register)
1317–1834
parchment register bound in leather and wooden
panels, with metal studs and fasteners; 235 fols.
47.5 x 35 cm
Florence, Archivio di Stato, Ufficiali della Moneta, later
Maestri di Zecca, 79, fol. 14r
The mint was a service offered to private citizens
who brought their gold, in ingots or foreign coins,
to have it transformed into florins, mostly for
business transactions, paying a small percentage as
commission. The commune did not control the money
supply, but this register recorded the numbers and
designs of coins minted. Such was the wealth of the
town that output exceeded 100,000 florins for every
year from 1344 to 1351.
T.P.
1.3
Gold florin
1252–1303
gold; Ø 2.03 cm; weight 3.4 g
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, Coins inv.
no. 117
1.4
Old florin, worth 12 denari
1250/1252–60
silver; Ø 1.96 cm; weight 1.75 g
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, Coins inv.
no. 1
1.8
Gold florin (XI series)
second semester 1375
gold; Ø 1.95 cm; weight 3.44 g
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, Coins inv.
no. 253
1.5
Grosso (popolino), worth two soldi (24 denari)
1306
silver; Ø 1.98 cm; weight 1.77 g
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, Coins inv.
no. 12
1.10
Gold florin (XXI series)
second semester 1422
gold; Ø 2.04; weight 3.47 g
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, Coins inv.
no. 275
1.6
Grosso, worth twenty denari
second semester 1316
silver; Ø 2.0 cm; weight 1.44 g
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, Coins inv.
no. 29
1.3-1.8-1.10
On one side the lily of Florence, on the other John
the Baptist: politics and piety, fused in gold. For 200
years after its first minting in 1252 the florin would
be the most popular currency for business transactions
in Western Europe. Although originally designed to be
worth 20 silver florins (or 20 soldi), the gold florin
was a quite separate currency, increasing in value as
the price of silver fell. By 1533 it would be worth 150
silver florins.
T.P.
1.4-1.5-1.6
It was complicated. The system was 12 denari
(pennies) to a soldo (shilling) and 20 soldi to a lira
(a pound, though there was no pound coin). So: the
silver florin was worth one soldo, and the grosso two.
The grosso guelfo (5 soldi and 6 denari) was brought
in as the value of silver fell and bigger coins were
needed. The odd man out was the grosso worth 20
denari (1 soldo 8 denari), a confusing multiple that
was quickly withdrawn.
T.P.
1.10
The men who engraved the punches used to make
coins were goldsmiths who worked for the Mint.
Michelozzo di Bartolomeo (Cosimo de’ Medici’s trusted
architect and a sculptor) began to collaborate with
the Mint in 1410, when he was only 14 years old, for
20 florins a year. At that time, one began to work
as an apprentice when one was little more than a
boy, learning the various techniques of the trade: a
practice that formed the basis for the eclecticism of
Renaissance artists.
L.S.
1.7
Picciolo, worth one denaro
first semester 1323
silver, Ø 1.5 cm; weight 0.52 g
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, Coins inv.
no. 839
1.9
Grosso Guelfo, worth five soldi six denari
first semester 1402–second semester 1406
silver; Ø 2.34 cm; weight 2.50 g
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, Coins inv.
no. 38
1.11
Soldino, worth twelve denari
first semester 1465
silver; Ø 1.51 cm weight 0.52 g
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, Coins inv.
no. 93
1.12
White quattrino, worth four denari
first semester 1493
silver; Ø 1.83 cm; weight 0.72 g
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, Coins inv.
no. 830
1.7-1.9-1.11-1.12
Aesthetics count. The picciolo (little one), worth 1
denaro, was also known as the black florin because
of its cheap look. In 1325 the mint started applying
a silver coating to cheer people up. The quattrino,
worth 4 denari, was called “bianco” because of its
higher silver content. Coins had to look their worth,
otherwise people would start using money from
elsewhere, since what counted was the quantity of
precious metal, not who minted it.
T.P.
1.13
Jacopo di Cione, Niccolò di Tommaso, Simone di Lapo
Coronation of the Virgin, with St. John the Baptist,
St. Catherine of Alexandria, St. Anne, St. Matthew, St.
Victor the Pope, St. John the Evangelist, St. Zanobius,
St. Barnabas, St. Anthony the Abbot, St. Reparata; the
prophets Isaiah and Ezekiel (upper corners); Coats of
arms of the Florentine mint (on the predella)
1372–3
panel painting
350 x 192.3 cm
Florence, Galleria dell’Accademia, 1890 inv. no. 456
The panel, created for the Mint’s headquarters, gathers
the patron saints of Florence, among whom St. John
the Baptist and St. Anne, who holds a model of the
city. Surrounded by walls and with the Baptistery and
cathedral clearly visible, Florence is depicted as it
was in 1343 when, on the feast-day of St. Anne, it
expelled the Duke of Athens. The various crests on the
panel’s predella include those of the Merchant’s Guild
(an eagle with a bale) and of the Money Changers’
Guild (coins).
L.S.
The Coronation of the Virgin gives you a chance to put
gold on the Madonna’s head. It was a favourite subject
for the money men of Renaissance Florence. Here, the
Florence Mint commissions an image of the sacred
realm where values are sublime and indivisible to
grace a building that produces countable cash.
T.P.
Section 2
Everything has its price
The wonderful convenience of money is that it allows us to store wealth, then
divide it and use it when and where we like. The downside is that every product
and service now takes a unit value, so the most unlikely comparisons are possible:
a barrel of wine costs 20 soldi, a prayer for a deceased loved one 10, a prostitute
15. This creates uneasiness. We feel things should not be put on a level this way.
The unease was stronger at a time when differences in social status were thought
to be a reflection of the divine will. It was a common complaint in 14th-century
Florence that certain vulgar peasants could use money to climb from a lower to
a higher estate, or even “to open the gates of paradise.” The free use of wealth
threatened both the status quo and Christian metaphysics. Here a number of images
and objects, sacred and otherwise, suggest the tension between money value and
other ideas of worth. The Madonna and child, for example, was painted to assist a
private client in his prayers, but only the very rich could afford such a painting; the
devotional aid had become a luxury consumer good. And though she gave birth in a
stable, the Madonna is tastefully and expensively dressed.
T.P.
2.1
Tommaso di Piero Trombetto
Portrait of Francesco di Marco Datini
1491–2
panel painting
131 x 69 cm
Prato, Fondazione Casa Pia dei Ceppi
This portrait celebrates Francesco Datini, founder of
the hospital in Prato, with the symbols of his wealth:
an ermine-lined surcoat, rings, tapestries, a marble
floor—all products reserved for the ruling class, which
Datini had entered thanks to his mercantile and
lending activities. Not having had children from his
wife, he proved himself generous towards illegitimate
children, and not only his own—with a bequest of
1000 florins he encouraged Florence to build a hospice
for foundlings.
L.S.
A man “who kept women and lived only on partridges,
adoring art and money and forgetting his creator and
himself.” Over his long life the workaholic Merchant
of Prato, Francesco Datini, must have set a price on
every commodity imaginable, including the 20-yearold
slave who bore him the only child he recognised:
Ginevra. At his death in 1410, he left 124,549
business letters, 573 account books, and a fortune of
over 100,000 florins. The scarlet gown cost around 80
florins, rather more than the slave girl.
T.P.
2.2
Florentine painter
The Miracle of the Bianchi Crucifix (The Miracle; Homage
to the Crucifix; The Procession)
post 1399
tempera on panel
18 x 86.5 cm (The Miracle, The Procession);18 x 103.5
cm (Homage to the Crucifix)
Empoli, Museo della Collegiata di Sant’Andrea, inv. 11
This predella tells of a miracle that took place near
Prato on 24 August 1399 when a withered almond tree
on which a cross had been leaned blossomed during
a procession of the Bianchi (Whites), the religious
movement that crossed Italy on the eve of the nubile
year. The pilgrimage in the predella is clearly local,
like the one Datini undertook: for nine days the
faithful—barefoot and dressed in white robes with a
red cross on them—followed similar crosses, slept on
straw, abstained from meat, and scourged themselves
while calling for “mercy and peace.”
L.S.
Urged by his friend Lapo Mazzei to turn away
from money-making and think of his soul, in 1399
Francesco Datini went on a nine-day pilgrimage with
the penitential Bianchi “all barefoot…and scourging
ourselves with a rod.” Incorrigible accountant that
he was, he couldn’t resist recording that a rosary cost
14 soldi and 8 denari. “God make it profitable to our
souls,” he concludes.
T.P.
2.3
Fra Angelico (?)
Virgin Enthroned with the Infant Jesus
early 15th century
panel painting
63 x 34 cm
Florence, Mario and Luigi Bellini Collection, inv. 1645
Fra Angelico “could have become rich, but made no
effort to do so.” So Vasari tells us. Instead he painted
for the wealthy. Privately commisioned, this painting
was intended to enhance the quality of a rich man’s
prayers. The viewer is not reminded that Christ was
born in poverty. Francesco Datini advised agents
procuring devotional paintings to wait until artists
were in need of money, then talk down their prices.
Blue paint 2 florins (approx) / Gold background 38
florins (approx) / Artist’s work 35 florins (approx).
T.P.
2.4
Tax Register
mid 14th century
miniature on parchment
260 x 190 mm
Florence, Biblioteca Riccardiana, Ms. 2526
From 1427 Florentine families were obliged to declare
their incomes and wealth for tax purposes, but these
returns were notoriously dishonest. The city relied
for revenue on “gabelles” customs duties at the
town gates on products entering and leaving. This
book lists hundreds. Often bankers were allowed to
collect gabelles to repay loans they made to the
Commune. Corruption was not unusual: condemned
for appropriating gabelle money in 1410, Pippo di
Giovanni di Nuto was punished with the amputation of
both ears and his nose.
T.P.
2.5
Theatrum Sanitatis
14th–15th century
miniature on parchment
346 x 242 mm
Rome, Biblioteca Casanatense, Ms. 4182, 170 fols.
The Tacuina sanitatis are medical handbooks of Arabic
origin that use images and short explanations to
illustrate the medicinal properties of herbs and plants,
as well as the basic principles for maintaining good
health. The first were created at the Visconti court,
whose elegant late-gothic environment they reflect.
They attest to practices, customs, and daily life in
Datini’s time, at the end of the 1300s.
L.S.
“You take so many medicines it has weakened your
stomach,” a friend wrote to Francesco Datini. Along
with sanctity, health was another thing rich merchants
wished they could buy, consulting treatises like
Theatrum Sanitatis and making liberal use of herbs and
syrups. All their wealth could not save the men of the
Medici family from the misery of gout; often they were
in too much pain to show guests the splendours of
their palazzo. A doctor’s visit would cost 1-3 florins.
Average life expectancy was below thirty.
T.P.
Section 3
Usury
The word usury refers to financial practices prohibited by the Church: when there
is no production or transformation of concrete goods, but only the collection of
cash interest on cash. From late Antiquity to the present, usury is one of the great
problems that joins, but also separates, economics and morality. Where does just
compensation end and the lucre that destroys lives begin? In the Church’s list of
capital sins, Usury stands with Avarice. The usurer sins because he sells the interval
of time between the moment when he lends and the moment when he is reimbursed
with interest: he thus trades time, which belongs to God alone. But the veto had
exceptions: Thomas Aquinas set the basis for including an interest rate in legitimate
contracts, while Bernardine of Siena distinguished between a usurer and a banker
whose business allowed for the circulation of wealth, since borrowing is at the
root of the modern financial system. In this tension, donations “for the salvation
of the soul” became common. They were directed at charitable works or art works,
yet lenders were always represented in a negative way. The usurer was linked to the
Jew: since Christian society prohibited Jews from practicing nearly all activities,
only medicine and lending were left to them. The Church was conscious of the need
to help people in financial difficulty and the Franciscans, starting in 1462, preached
and helped to establish the Monti di Pietà as institutions to prevent usury.
L.S.
3.1
Orcagna
Punishment of the Misers
c. 1345
detached fresco
260.7 x 337.5 cm
Florence, Museo dell’Opera di Santa Croce
Direzione Centrale per l’Amministrazione del Fondo
Edifici di Culto – Ministero dell’Interno – Dipartimento
per le Libertà Civili e l’Immigrazione
This fragment comes from Santa Croce, where it
was part of a scene depicting Hell, represented
as a mountain with a cavity for sinners. It shows
those damned for their avarice, one of the seven
capital sins. Orcagna is the first to follow Dante’s
contrappasso, the idea that the punishment of the
damned fits their sin. Among the damned he includes
a pope, a cardinal, a nun, and wealthy lay persons, but
no member of a Mendicant order—perhaps because
the Franciscans had commissioned the fresco.
L.S.
The avid rich are whipped with their own moneybags,
including cardinals and bishops, always important
deposit holders in Florentine banks. This was the kind
of painting that must have made church-going an
uncomfortable experience for 14th-century moneymen.
When they themselves commissioned works to fill the
sacred space, there would be fewer Judgement Days
and more reassuring images of wealthy folk adoring
the Virgin.
T.P.
3.2
Pesellino
Nativity; Martyrdom of Saints. Cosmas and Damian;
St. Anthony causes a usurer’s heart to be found in a
strong-box
c. 1445
panel
34 x 144 cm
Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi, 1890 inv. no. 8355
This predella was commissioned by Cosimo de’ Medici
who, fearing for his soul because of his illicit gains,
built and decorated sacred buildings, and even
specified fitting subjects for them. He chose the story
of the usurer whose heart was found in a strongbox
and Sts. Cosmas and Damian as patrons of his family.
The two medic saints thus became Medici saints.
Because they had practiced their profession gratis,
Cosimo sought to associate their disinterested actions
to those of his House.
L.S.
“Never,” said Cosimo de’ Medici, would he “be able
to give God enough to set him down in my books as
a debtor.” But he went on commissioning devotional
paintings. The stories here are as gruesome as their
representation is gracious: the doctor saints, Cosmas
and Damian, are about to have their heads hacked off:
meantime St. Anthony performs the messy miracle of
showing that the usurer’s heart is not in his chest but
his safe. Cosimo hopes to be associated with his name
saint, not the sinner who shared his line of work.
T.P.
3.3
Jan Provoost
Death and the Miser
1505–10
oil on panel
119.7 x 78.5 and 119.8 x 78.8 cm
Bruges, Musea Brugge, Groeningemuseum
The curious thing here is that the moneylender
meeting Death is the same man who commissioned the
painting. We know because these panels were painted
on the back of two laterals of a triptych which showed
donor and wife either side of an image now lost. When
the triptych was folded closed the panels formed a
single scene. So what kind of deal is being done?
Hypotheses abound. My guess is that the lender uses
the painting to express his concern that when the day
of reckoning comes his spiritual books will balance.
T.P.
3.4
after Marinus van Reymerswaele
The Usurers
c. 1540
oil on panel
100 x 76 cm
Florence, Museo Stibbert, inv. no. 4080
Two usurers, their wealth evident from their clothes,
record transactions in an account book surrounded by
symbols of their trade. Their money has deformed their
bodies and faces, amplifying their hidden desires to the
point of the grotesque, making them appear rapacious
and spiritually filthy. After the Reformation, this subject
appeared often in Flemish art. The moralistic intention
is also present in the phrase in the book that invites
reflection on the futility of unjustly gained wealth.
L.S.
They were always writing. “It is the ninth hour,” says
Datini “and I have not yet eaten nor drunk, and I have
been seated all day, without ever going out, and shall
not eat until tonight…tomorrow I intend to do the
same.” Here the painter looks to capture this fanatic
mind-set, with the implication that the usurer’s
enjoyment lay in obsessive recording, calculating and
gloating, the body curved and constrained over the
constantly moving pen.
T.P.
3.5
Mantuan painter
Madonna with Child, St. Jerome offering a model of a
church, Sts. John the Baptist and Elizabeth with four
members of the Jewish community below them
c. 1515
oil on canvas
Mantova, Basilica di Sant’Andrea
In 1495 the Jewish banker Daniel Norsa was allowed
to remove Christian sacred images from the exterior of
his house in Mantua, but the population reacted and
attacked the building. After Francesco II Gongaza’s
victory over King Charles VIII a church (Santa Maria
della Vittoria) was erected on the site of the house,
with a painting by Mantegna, now in the Louvre, that
Norsa was made to pay for. This is the context for the
canvas here displayed, showing two men from the
Jewish community wearing the yellow mark (filugello)
on their clothes.
L.S.
3.6
Tuscan sculptor (workshop of Agnolo di Polo?)
Bust of St. Antonino Pierozzi
late 15th–early 16th century
polychrome terracotta
58 x 60 x 32 cm
Florence, Basilica of Santa Maria Novella
Direzione Centrale per l’amministrazione del Fondo
Edifici di Culto – Ministero dell’Interno – Dipartimento
per le Libertà Civili e l’Immigrazione
This portrait of Antoninus (1389–1459), a Dominican
friar, prior of San Marco and archbishop of Florence,
is taken from his death mask. He is credited with
the founding of the Buonomini di San Martino,
which assisted wealthy persons who suddenly found
themselves in financial difficulty, especially—but
not only—after the return of Cosimo de’ Medici from
exile. The cult of Antoninus, and portraits of him,
became quite common when Savonarola intensified his
predecessor’s anti-Medicean stance.
L.S.
“Frivolously adorned with superfluous sculptures and
paintings.” Such was Antoninus’s comment when
he moved into San Marco after Cosimo de’ Medici’s
expensive restoration. As head of the Dominican order
and later bishop of Florence, Antoninus condemned
usury and attacked Cosimo’s faction for reducing the
silver content in the picciolo, the money of the poor.
But when the bishop set up the charity The Good
Men of St. Martin, Cosimo was the main contributor.
Churchman and banker needed each other.
T.P.
3.7
Vicino da Ferrara
Bernardino da Feltre
post 1494
tempera on canvas
172 x 70 cm
Ferrara, Pinacoteca Nazionale, inv. 67
Martino Tomitano (1432–1509), better known as
Bernardino da Feltre, was an Observant Friar Minor
and a famous preacher venerated even before his
beatification (1654). In his right hand he holds a
Mons pietatis, the symbol of the institution he helped
to found. Bernardino strongly attacked Jews, sparking
persecutions and even causing deaths, but in Florence
the Medici instituted protective laws for the Jewish
community and eventually distanced the friar from
the city.
L.S.
3.8
Anonymous engraver
The figure of Eternal Life in Marco da Montegallo, Libro
delli comandamenti di Dio del testamento vecchio et
nuovo e sacri canoni [Book of God’s commandments
from the Old and New Testaments and the holy
canons] Florence, for Antonio Miscomini
1494
woodcut
210 x 138 cm
Florence, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, Palat.
E.6.3.99, fol. 1v
Marco da Montegallo (1425–96), an Observant
Franciscan, was a famous preacher involved in the
founding of the Monti di Pietà (lending institutions).
In this woodcut he is preaching in front of a symbolic
representation of the Mons pietatis and is surrounded
by six groups of persons who represent the works of
mercy outlined in the gospel of Matthew (25, 34-46).
The image suggests how assistance for the needy
was now being ever more tightly controlled through
specialised institutions.
L.S.
Section 4
The Art (and Mystery) of Exchange
The Church’s ban on usury and the images of usurers burning in hell troubled
lenders and borrowers alike. But people needed loans and there was no point in
lending without a return. It was important to find a solution that was not just ‘a
way around’ the ban, but that really did not seem to be usury at all. The letter
of exchange was a “most delicate invention” and “a most subtle activity,” wrote
Benedetto Cotrugli in 1458 and what’s more “impossible for a theologian to
understand.” For more than 200 years it allowed bankers to make a profit on loans
without feeling they were usurers.
Foreign currencies were not usually held in quantity in any one town, so if someone
wanted to change florins into, say, English pounds, the florins were handed over in
Florence and the pounds picked up in London. Officially, travel to London took 90
days, so someone kept the florins a while before repaying. Since the exchange rate
was always more favourable for the local currency, in London a similar exchange deal
could be made to turn pounds back into florins, such that after another 90 days, in
Florence again, there might be a profit of 10 to 20 per cent. The letter of exchange
tied finance and trade together as distance and exchange rates substituted for time
and interest rates.
T.P.
4.1
Florentine engraver
De mercatanti et cambiatori [Of merchants and moneychangers] in Jacopo da Cessole, Libro di giuocho di
scacchi [Book of the game of chess] Florence, for
Antonio Miscomini
March 1, 1493/1494
woodcut
205 x 141 mm
Florence, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, P. 5.4.
Merchants and bankers were forever weighing and
measuring, and with an air of great solemnity, as if
something terribly important were at stake. This book
likens each social role to a different chess piece,
celebrating a hierarchical society where everyone has
a fixed position. In reality commercial speculation
was making society more fluid: the banker is included
among the pawns, but in chess some pawns are
transformed into royalty.
T.P.
4.2
Florentine engraver
Bankers at Work in the Libro di Mercatantie et usanze
de paesi [Book of commerce and customs of various
countries]
Florence [Bartolomeo de’Libri], for Piero Pacini da
Pescia
c. 1490
woodcut
154 x 104 mm
Florence, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, Palat.
E.6.4.95, fol. 1r
The text belongs to the genre of “Practices of
Commerce,” pocket-book merchants’ manuals
describing the markets, currencies in use, monies
accepted, measures used and their value, available
products and their quality. Already widely available
in manuscript form, it was soon published in print.
This exemplar was printed by Bartolomeo de’ Libri
and edited by the notary Ser Piero Pacini da Pescia.
It depicts the interior of a bank in a descriptive, not
moralistic manner.
L.S.
The world was fragmented. Every tiny state had a
different currency, different weights and measures,
different trade laws, taxes, shipping and insurance
costs. Exchange rates fluctuated with trade fairs and
seasonal periods of travel. “This is the book that
explains commerce and the customs of countries,”
announces the first page of this solemn business
manual; the edition on display was printed in a small
format to be easily portable. In 1490.
T.P.
4.3
Filippo Calandri
Treatise on Arithmetic
late 15th century
miniature on parchment
170 x 110 mm
Florence, Biblioteca Riccardiana, Ms. 2669
The abacus was hard work. This lush study book was
given to a son of Lorenzo de’ Medici to teach him
the maths a banker’s boy would need for double
entry book-keeping. Since one Florentine accounting
currency, the fiorino a fiorini, required working on the
basis of 29 soldi (or 348 denari) to the florin, skilled
use of the abacus was a must. Ironically, none of the
Magnifico’s children worked as bankers; the family had
become too grand.
T.P.
4.4
Marinus van Reymerswaele
The Money Changer and his Wife
1540
oil on panel
84 x 114 cm
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello
Two Money Changers, man and wife, sit at a desk. The
image is devoid of the totally negative connotations
of the paintings that used to depict usurers. The man
tests, that is, compares the weight of the coins. On
the table the money lies next to a leather pouch while
on the shelf sits a burned-out candle, a symbol of
the transience of all things. The context is elegant,
but the actions are rapacious—as is usual in the
moralizing art of Lutheran extraction—as if to suggest
the true nature of those who traffic in money.
L.S.
Does anything demand more attention than money?
Eyes, hands, shoulders and elbows all gravitate
towards a pile of coins. But the Money Changers are no
longer grotesques; the wife is as pretty as she is rapt.
Nothing is more ordinary, the painter acknowledges,
than our relating to one another through money.
Above and between their intent faces, the candle has
gone out.
T.P.
4.5
Flemish or French art
Chamois leather money-bag with eight pockets
16th century
embroidered leather; forged, burnished and gilt metal
28 x 26 cm
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello
This money-bag is similar to the one on the table in
van Reymerswaele’s painting: a rare object and one of
the few to survive in spite of an extensive production.
Most were lost intense use and because they were not
considered worthy of being preserved. Money-bags
were used especially by merchants and travellers: the
largest pocket contained a smaller pocket for more
precious objects.
L.S.
4.6
German artist (Nuremberg?)
Balance for gold and gemstones owned by Hans II
Harsdorf
1497
wooden case covered with painted paper; iron;
partially gilded silver; yarn; pearl
Nuremberg, Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Property
of Freiherrlich Harsdorfsche Familienstiftung, HG 11
161
Bankers were never entirely resigned to the dry world
of weights, measures and countable value, but always
hankering after heraldry and nobility. Nobody wants to
be remembered merely for their money. Commissioned
by Hans II Harsdorfer, head of the mint of Bohemia
from 1496 to 1499, these precision weighing scales
keep company with sumptuous images suggesting a
charming and chivalrous virility.
T.P.
4.7
Casket/strong-box
14th-15th centuries
wood covered in tooled leather
15 x 38 x 22,5 cm
Florence, Museo di Palazzo Davanzati, inv. 22
In Florence, containers such as this were crafted by
the Guild of Key and Buckle Makers, which formed part
of the Blacksmiths’ Guild, the outer covering being
provided by the Leatherworkers.
Strong-boxes, jewel-boxes, and cases of various sizes
and materials used for keeping money, documents,
or jewels were also imported from France, Spain,
Flanders, or Venice. The terminology used to
categorise them formed a rich lexical group that
is rapidly disappearing along with the craft that
produced it.
L.S.
4.8
Florentine workshop
Document box belonging to the Cavalcanti family
third or fourth quarter of the 15th century
wood, cast iron, tooled leather, leather tanned with
rock alum
15 x 51.4 x 29 cm
Florence, Galleria e Museo di Palazzo Mozzi Bardini,
Bd. inv. 5822
Banking thrives on secrecy, which wasn’t easy when
employees in a distant branch all lived and worked
together. Designed to keep a hefty account book under
lock and key, this case was the kind of thing a director
would store in his bedroom to protect the names of
rich depositors. Medici bank regulations stipulated
that employees must not know each other’s salaries.
“Always have a book to write on,” advises Paolo da
Certaldo, “then keep what you’ve written in the safe.”
T.P.
4.9
Safe
16th century
iron, wood
43.5 x 87 x 43
Lucca, Museo di Villa Guinigi
Looking after riches, said one banker, was harder than
preservino your freedom or your women. In 1433,
shortly before his arrest, Cosimo de’ Medici had 3000
Venetian ducats hidden among sacred relics in the
monastery of San Miniato al Monte. When money was
moved from town to town it was often concealed in
bales of wool. With the ingenuity born of distrust, this
safe has a very visible lock that won’t open anything,
while the real keyhole is tucked away under a sliding
plate operated by a hidden button.
T.P.
4.10
Italian art
Keys
13th century (a); 14th century (b-c)
iron; 13 cm (a, key-bit 3.2 cm); 11.5 cm (b, key-bit
1.8 cm); 10.2 cm (c, key-bit 3.8 cm)
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, inv. nos. 1460
C; 1465 C; 1464 C
4.11
French art
Six padlocks
13th century (a); 15th century (b-c-d-e-f)
bronze (a); iron (b-c-d-e-f); 4.5 x 3 cm (a); 2.1 x 16
cm (b); 3.6 x 2.3 cm (c); 3.7 x 2.1 cm (d); 4.2 x 2.5
cm (e); 5 x 2.5 cm (f)
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, inv. nos. 1449
C, 1450 C, 1451 C, 1452 C, 1453 C, 1454 C
4.10-4.11
The world of banking led to a great multiplication of
locks and safes. The Money Changer’s Guild in Florence
kept the account books of dead or failed bankers in
a safe with three locks whose three keys were kept
by three guild officials, so the books could only be
consulted if all members were present. But this was
common practise in many institutions. “He who
doesn’t trust won’t get fooled,” was a typical proverb.
T.P.
4.12
Messenger’s dispatch bag
late 15th–early 16th century
leather, velvet
19.5 x 20.5 cm
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, inv. 1338 C
“About letters from here to Venice,” writes an agent
in Milan in 1395 “you can reckon on one horseman
leaving every Sunday morning, likewise for Bruges. The
courier from Lucca passes here on his way to Paris.”
Regular information was essential for commerce.
Bankers would list the day’s exchange rates at the
end of every letter. Courier services were organised by
guilds or consortiums of companies and rewarded for
rapid delivery. The world was speeding up.
T.P.
4.13
Messenger’s dispatch bag
late 15th–early 16th century
leather
21 x 19.5 cm
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, inv. 1339 C
4.12-4.13
These pouches are a rare example of everyday objects
from the past. Their shape and structure were carefully
designed to hold and protect documents, letters, or
papers during long journeys. For security reasons they
were kept as close as possible to the body, making it
that much more difficult for purse snatchers to steal.
L.S.
4.14
Bill of exchange from Diamante and Altobianco degli
Alberti to Francesco di Marco Datini and Luca del Sera
Bruges–Barcelona, September 2, 1398
sheet of paper
73 x 224 mm
Prato, Archivio di Stato
In a few handwritten lines, this is the financial
instrument that revolutionised banking. A merchant
in Bruges owing money in Barcelona pays into a local
bank which sends this bill to its contact bank in
Barcelona which pays out the money, in local currency,
to the merchant’s creditor.
As many as four copies were made and sent separately
to make sure of safe arrival. The only problem now was
balancing the accounts between the two banks.
T.P.
4.14bis
Insurance contract between Francesco Datini and
Company of Pisa and messer Giusto Marini
Pisa, 1 July 1399
sheets of paper
Prato, Archivio di Stato
If God and fortune let you down, there was insurance.
Here Francesco Datini’s company in Pisa insures
messer Giusto Marini for 500 florins’ worth of “spices
and other stuff” heading from Alexandria to L’Écluse
(the port of Bruges). The premium for this long and
dangerous journey was 101/4 per cent, the broker Ibo
di Tommaso di ser Tieri from Poggibonsi. With the
various copies required, one can see why merchants
and bankers always had “ink-stained fingers.”
T.P.
4.15
Bill of exchange from the Medici Bank to Baldo d’Ambra
di Piombino
May 15, 1424
sheet of paper; 40 x 225 mm
Florence, Archivio di Stato, Mediceo avanti il
Principato 148, no. 22
A letter of exchange became a credit instrument when
instead of a merchant giving a bank money to pay
a bill abroad, the bank gave the merchant money,
to acquire foreign currency abroad. The merchant’s
agent would repay this money in a foreign town after
a fixed period of time. The bank then took advantage
of exchange rates favourable to the local currency to
purchase another bill and change back to the home
currency. The merchant got a short-term loan and the
bank a profit of 10-20 percent.
T.P.
4.16
Account book of Averardo de’ Medici’s steward
1412–7
register on paper; 32 x 25 cm; 212 fols.
Florence, Archivio di Stato, Mediceo avanti il
Principato 130, fol. 1r
How not to go bust over one bad debt? It happened
to three major banks in the 1340s when Edward III
of England reneged on huge loans. The Medici set up
a parent company in Florence that held a controlling
interest in various branch companies (from Naples to
London), but without liability for their debts. This
contract of 1435 refounds the parent company after
Cosimo de’ Medici’s return from exile, kicking out the
powerful Bardi family who hadn’t fully supported him
and introducing Giovanni Benci, star of the bank’s
future success.
T.P.
4.17
Contract reorganizing the central “holding” company of
the Medici Bank
June 8, 1435
sheet of paper; 40 x 32 cm; mercantile penmanship in
the hand of Giovanni Benci
Florence, Archivio di Stato, Mediceo avanti il
Principato, 94, 137
Secrets. Written on parchment to last and always under
lock and key, a bank’s secret account book recorded the
investments and profits of the main partners and was
kept personally by the director, in this case Giovanni
Benci, head of the ‘parent’ company in Florence. Aside
from the names of bishops and cardinals holding big
deposits, Giovanni Benci had other secrets. With two
illegitimate children by slave girls, he left large sums of
money to an order of cloistered nuns.
T.P.
4.18
Secret account book of the Medici Bank kept by
Giovanni Benci
1440–50
parchment register; 36 x 26.5 cm; mercantile
penmanship in the hand of Giovanni Benci
Florence, Archivio di Stato, Mediceo avanti il
Principato, 153
Secrets. Written on parchment to last and always under
lock and key, a bank’s secret account book recorded the
investments and profits of the main partners and was
kept personally by the director, in this case Giovanni
Benci, head of the ‘parent’ company in Florence. Aside
from the names of bishops and cardinals holding big
deposits, Giovanni Benci had other secrets. With two
illegitimate children by slave girls, he left large sums of
money to an order of cloistered nuns.
T.P.
4.19
Francesco Sassetti’s personal secret account book
1462–9
parchment register bound in leather; 28 x 21.5 cm;
66 fols.
Florence, Archivio di Stato, Carte Strozziane, II series,
20, fol. 1r
Francesco Sassetti, a man of culture more than of
business, paid homage to his friendship with Lorenzo
the Magnificent in his family chapel in Santa Trinita,
frescoed by Domenico Ghirlandaio with stories of St.
Francis. The scene of The Renunciation of his Father’s
Wealth shows a northern city, perhaps Geneva, where
in 1466 Sassetti managed the local branch of the
Medici Bank without much success.
L.S.
Delegating is difficult. Busy with politics, the Medicis
relied on managers. Lorenzo the Magnificent hardly
bothered to check on them. So from 1463–90,
Francesco Sassetti lined his pockets presiding over the
bank’s decline. Marrying an upper-class fifteenyear old
while in his late thirties, he was chiefly interested in
collecting books, silverware and other luxury items.
Fittingly, this is his personal book, recording “secret
money matters,” not the bank’s accounts for this
period, which have been lost.
T.P.
4.20
Secret code used by Lorenzo de’ Medici
1470
sheet of paper; 29 x 21.5 cm
Florence, Archivio di Stato, Manuscripts, 727, doc. 73
Suspicion! That was Il Magnifico’s “greatest failing.”
So said historian Francesco Guicciardini in 1509.
Having reduced Florence’s electoral system to a farce
that guaranteed him control, Lorenzo used bank
employees as spies to shadow Florentine diplomats.
From Venice Giovanni Lanfredini corresponded with
Lorenzo using this secret code. Letters are substituted
by numbers and symbols; to complicate matters, some
letters have more than one symbol and some symbols
refer to an entire word or name.
T.P.
4.21
Memorandum of Lorenzo de’ Medici detailing losses
incurred by Tommaso Portinari in the management of
the London and Bruges branches of the Medici Bank
1478
sheet of paper; 29.5 x 22 cm; mercantile penmanship
Florence, Archivio di Stato, Mediceo avanti il
Principato, 84, 21
Reality check. Too busy with politics, poetry and
women to look into the accounts, in 1478 Il Magnifico
finally realises that Tommaso Portinari’s aristocratic
lifestyle and huge loans to Charles the Bold, Duke
of Burgundy, have pushed the Bruges branch close
to bankruptcy. In this memorandum he lists losses
of 70,000 florins and concludes, “Such are the great
earnings Tommaso Portinari’s management has
brought.” Actually, losses were over 100,000 florins.
T.P.
4.22
Coded letter from Ambassador Giovanni Lanfredini to
the Dieci di Balia
Naples, February 1, 1486 (ordinary style)
paper file bound in parchment; 33 x 30 x 8 cm; 613
fols.
Florence, Archivio di Stato, Dieci di Balia, Responsive
33, fols. 265-268
War was bad for business. The enemy might seize
your assets abroad. In 1485 King Ferrante of Naples
appealed to his ally Florence to help him fight local
barons in alliance with Pope Innocenzo VIII. Lorenzo
stalled to avoid repercussions on Florentine businesses
in Rome. In this coded letter (with a translation
between the lines), Lorenzo’s envoy in Naples talks
of problems getting letters back to Florence through
the Papal States where officials were intercepting all
correspondence.
T.P.
Section 5
International trade: Merchants and Merchandise
As the main instrument of credit, the letter of Exchange usually financed
International trade. Often bankers acted as merchants themselves; there was no
strict distinction. Spices, alum, silks and luxury goods travelled north from Italy,
while wool, cloth, tin, lead and hides came back from northern Europe. Because the
trade balance was very much in Italy’s favour, and because no one wanted to travel
with large quantities of money, to get their profits home from abroad Venetians,
Genoese and Florentines had to invent triangular trade deals, often through
Barcelona and Valencia, or via the major trade fairs in Geneva and Lyons. Since
the roads were poor and vulnerable to highwaymen, bulky goods usually went by
sea around the Bay of Biscay. The going was slow and the ships often dangerously
overloaded; the coast of Catalonia was notorious for pirates. It was not unusual
to find that by the time the goods reached their destination market conditions
had changed for the worst. Most sailings were insured, with banks and private
individuals clubbing together to share risk and profits between them. Premiums
were lower if the ship carried archers for defence. “May God and fortune be our aid,”
implored the shipping documents.
T.P.
5.1
Jug
c. 1290–1330
archaic maiolica (early tin-glazed ware)
13.8 cm., max Ø 7.8 cm; Ø foot 5.9 cm
Fragment of steelyard
c. 1290–1330
brass, iron
length 9.3 cm; sides 3.3 x 2.8 cm; riders h. 8 cm;
hooks h 9.5 cm
‘Double-Tee’ shaped dagger (basilarda)
c. 1290–1330
steel, wood, iron
length 44 cm
Bucket
c. 1290–1330
iron
9 cm; Ø rim 14.5 cm; Ø bottom 16.6 cm
Barrel-maker’s axe
c. 1290–1330
iron, wood
length 18 cm; width at edge 9.4 cm; at heel 3.1 cm
Fragments of a chain
c. 1290–1330
forged iron
length of elements 12.5; maximum length 115 cm
Florence, Museo Archeologico Nazionale
These objects were taken from the wreck of a
riverboat, probably sunk in the flood of 1333, and
recently discovered in the Arno where it passes
through Empoli. Goods were often moved by riverboat,
as they were on land with caravans of mules and carts.
Here we have a hatchet and a pail for the tar used to
waterproof the hull, a mooring chain, scales capable
of weighing loads of up to a ton (something that
suggests mercantile activity) and a weapon for self
defence.
L.S.
5.2
Francesco de Cesanis
Nautical Map
1421
watercolour and ink on parchment
58 x 96.6 cm
Venice, Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia, Museo
Correr, Portolano no. 13, Emanuele Cicogna Legacy
3451
Merchants needed nautical maps. Venice provided
them. The world appeared as a string of trading
towns—red for the major ports, black for minor—
drawn on a grid that allowed mariners to establish
compass settings between one port and another.
Pilgrims also used these maps and were frequent
travellers creating an economy all their own. A ship
arriving in Genoa from Roumania in 1396 carried “37
bales of pilgrims robes, 191 pieces of lead and 80
slaves.”
T.P.
5.3
Fra Angelico
St. Nicholas with the Emperor’s Envoy and the
Miraculous Rescue of a Sailing Vessel
between 1437 and 1449
tempera and gold on panel
34 x 63.5 cm
Vatican City, Musei Vaticani, inv. 40252
A storm bursts on a sailing ship carrying grain and
puts crew, ship, and cargo in danger. Having lost
control of the ship, the crew seeks supernatural help
and, as a last resort, prays to St. Nicholas of Bari,
patron saint of sailors. The ship is depicted four
times: in the distance before the storm, then at the
mercy of the elements (and of a seemingly diabolic
sea creature), then while it sails, and finally safe at
anchor in port.
L.S.
5.4
Model of a merchant ship of about 1450
first half of the 20th century
wood, cotton
104 x 119 x 58.1 cm
Antwerp, MAS - Museum Aan de Stroom, inv. AS.
1946.005.005
Capacity, speed, safety: these were the variables. In
the relatively tame Mediterranean the small galley
with its mix of sail and oarsmen was ideal for moving
luxury goods fast. Italian galleys did reach Bruges
and London, but in northern seas the round ship, or
carrack, was safer and carried more. This is a Flanders
pleyt with a flat bottom for offloading on beaches
and a high forecastle that allowed archers to shoot
down on pirates. “May God and fortune be our aid,”
implored the shipping documents.
T.P.
5.5
Master of Charles III Durazzo
Stories of Saladin and Torello di Strà
early 15th century
fragment of chest, painted wood and gilt plaster
45.5 x 121.5 cm
Florence, Museo Stibbert, inv. 16202
This panel formed the front of a wedding chest
commissioned as a set of two. It depicts Boccaccio’s
story from Decameron (X, 9) that tells of a Lombard
merchant and his friendship with a Muslim
colleague, while at the same time singing the
praises of commercial enterprises (probably the
groom’s), trade with the Near East, and the loyalty
that overrides religious differences. The other chest
celebrated conjugal faithfulness, a warning to the
newlyweds in whose bedroom the chests would be
placed.
L.S.
5.6
Francesco Botticini
The Archangel Raphael and Tobias with a Young Devotee
c. 1485
tempera on panel
156 x 89 cm
Florence, Soprintendenza Speciale per il Polo Museale,
inv. 1890 no. 8676
The northern city in the background is perhaps an
idealised view of the one that the young Raffaello
Doni was going to when this votive image was
commissioned. In 1464, after the sinking of a
galley in Flanders, Alessandra Macinghi Strozzi, with
her thoughts turning to one of her sons, wrote: “I was
thinking earlier about Lorenzo whom I hear is going
by sea; but now I worry even more knowing he has
to go and return by ship. May the Archangel Raphael
accompany him.”
L.S.
No sooner had he mastered pen and abacus than
a merchant’s boy would be on his way to an
apprenticeship in a distant town where he should
“seek out a little of the world […] the customs and
conditions of places” and come back “more expert
and practical in everything.” Meantime the anxious
parents implored divine protection, in this case paying
handsomely to evoke the archangel’s protection of
Tobias, a story in The Book of Tobit. Alas, the boy in
question, most likely Raffaello Doni, son of wealthy
wool merchants, died in 1487 aged 14.
T.P.
Section 6
Sumptuary Laws
From the 13th century on, with the spread of commercial exchange and new
necessities, the symbols of wealth were updated and those who could display rich
clothes and ornaments became more numerous, to the point of threatening the
distances between social classes and of coming into conflict with the teachings of
the Church. Sumptuary laws were issued to regulate not only clothes and ornaments,
but also banquets, weddings, baptisms, and funerals. They sought to limit luxury by
limiting imports and expenses, to defend traditional values of austerity even to the
detriment of the new world that was opening itself to commerce. The authorities,
however, were moved by two nearly antithetical concerns: the need to let money
circulate and the fear of contamination between the social classes. The 14th
century saw two new developments: knights, doctors in civil and canonical law,
medical doctors, judges and their women were allowed to display their wealth, and
it became acceptable to get around the law by paying a fine, something that also
helped to replenish the city’s coffers. Loop-holes and sophistry thus always allowed
Florentines to display the wealth they had acquired: “When a law is issued, a way
around it is quickly found.”
L.S.
6.1
L’Ufficiale delle donne, degli ornamenti e delle vesti
[Regulations for women, ornaments and clothing]
1343–4
parchment codex with parchment cover, 21 fols.; 350
x 255 mm
Florence, Archivio di Stato, Giudice degli appelli e
nullità, 119, ins. 16
6.2
Sumptuary provisions inserted in the Florentine Statutes
1415
parchment codex, bound in cardboard and all leather,
314 fols.; 453 x 330 mm
Florence, Archivio di Stato, Statuti del Comune di
Firenze, 24, 280v-281r fols.
6.1-6.2
No fancy buttons, no patterned cloth, only so many
pearls, necklaces, rings. Individually people sought
wealth and visibility but society as a whole prized
sobriety. So in a town producing luxury textiles, we
have laws forbidding you to wear them. Because no
one wanted to be unpopular, out-of-towners were
brought in to play police and check what the ladies
were wearing. This register lists misbehavers between
November 1343 and April 1344. Many were denounced
by anonymous letter.
T.P.
6.3
Florentine workshop
Belt
c. 1470
red taffeta brocaded and shot with gold thread wound
around a yellow silk core; silver-gilt, cast, chased,
fretwork; translucent enamel with drowned threads;
niello-work
6.8 x 154.5 cm
London, Victoria and Albert Museum, inv. no. 42781857
This very luxurious man’s belt is comparable to similar
official gifts for important persons throughout Europe.
Such accessories, which were prohibited to the
majority of the population by sumptuary laws, were
fashioned in Florence by specialised silkworkers in
goldsmiths’ shops where such belts were then mounted
with buckles and prongs.
L.S.
6.4
Florentine workshop
Money-bag
last quarter of the 15th century
silk and gold metal thread; leather; cast bronze,
scraped with graving tool, chased and nielloed.
Monochromatic cut voided velvet with brocading weft;
monochromatic cut voided velvet
30.5 x 32 cm
Prato, Museo del Tessuto, Collezione Comune –
Cariprato, inv. 81.01.182
The money bag used to keep coins was hung from the
belt because clothes did not have internal pockets.
This exemplar is unique, but the same typology is
evident in the painting by Francesco Botticini in this
exhibition. Next to the crest of the Bracci, a family
of merchant-bankers, there is a lily, perhaps to recall
their Florentine origins. The cloth, so rich as to
have been prohibited, recalls the crest of the Money
Changers’ Guild.
L.S.
6.5
Maso Finiguerra, attributed to
Woman Wearing Peacock Feather Headdress
c. 1460
pen and brown ink, traces of stylus; white lined paper
197 x 100 mm
Florence, Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe degli Uffizi, inv.
59 F.
Showy headdresses with pearls and peacock’s feathers
were produced, among others, in the workshop of Maso
Finiguerra, but were prohibited by sumptuary laws. In
a letter of 1477, Alessandra Macinghi Strozzi describes
a similar headdress worn by her daughter Caterina on
the day of her engagement: “and make a garland of
feathers with pearls, which costs 80 florins; and the
headdress underneath, consisting of two tresses of
pearls, which costs 60 florins or more.”
L.S.
6.6
Lo Scheggia
Virgin and Child, in the cusp God the Father and the
Holy Spirit
c. 1470–80
tempera on panel
150 x 84 cm
Arezzo, Soprintendenza BAPSAE di Arezzo - Museo
Statale d’arte Medievale e
Moderna, inv. 28
Similar clothes, prohibited to most people by
sumptuary laws, were allowed for “knights, doctors in
law, medical doctors, foreigners and their women” and,
naturally, also for saints and the Virgin.
Although unique in every detail, this tabernacle
is a good example of a colmo da camera, a type of
architectural frame used for images meant for private
devotion, often mentioned in contemporary
documents. This one was probably meant for the
Bardelli family.
L.S.
How to curb the “indomitam feminarum
bestialitatem”—the indomitable bestiality of our
women? asked one member of the Florence commune
in a discussion of the sumptuary laws. Woman was
the height of purity in the Madonna and the depth
of depravity in the wife who frittered away a family
fortune on silks and jewels. But in art the two could
be reconciled: here the pure Madonna
wears all the rich clothes forbidden by law. Mother and
child are good as gold.
T.P.
6.7
Jacopo del Sellaio
The Banquet of Ahasuerus
c. 1485
panel painting
cm 44,5 x 62
Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi, inv. 1890 no. 491
Together with four other panels, this painting was
part of a spalliera that covered bedroom walls up to
shoulder height (from the Italian spalla, shoulder).
Like all paintings meant to be placed in the
newlyweds’ bedroom, it tells an edifying story, that of
Esther and Ahasuerus. It depicts a banquet, such as
those regulated by sumptuary laws. For Lorenzo the
Magnificent’s wedding banquet in 1469, 150 calves,
4,000 chickens and ducklings, fish, and barrels of wine
were brought to the Palazzo Medici.
L.S.
6.8
Niccolò di Pietro Gerini
Funeral of a Brother in the Company of Gesù Pellegrino
(predella)
1404–8
tempera on panel
81 x 156 cm
Florence, Galleria dell’Accademia, inv. 1890 no. 5066
This predella is the lower part of a “panel of death”
from the confraternity of Gesù Pellegrino (Christ the
Pilgrim), with headquarters in Santa Maria Novella. It
shows the funeral of a confraternity member, with the
brothers in prayer and wearing the cowl that was used
to hide one’s face and thus fulfil the gospel precept
that “charity is secret.” Confraternal ceremonies
allowed the poor to have a dignified funeral and be
interred in the confraternity’s tomb.
L.S.
6.9
Fra Angelico
Funeral of the Virgin (predella panel)
1432–5
tempera on panel
19 x 51.5 cm
Florence, Museo di San Marco, 1890 inv. no. 1493
In spite of sumptuary laws, funerals could be
expensive, as was that of Filippo Strozzi (d. 1491),
who built the family palazzo: “His was one of the
most magnificent funerals in Florence in some time;
four different orders of friars, all the clergy from Santa
Maria del Fiore and San Lorenzo, a group of 150 men,
all the stone-cutters and superintendents from the
quarries, his farmers, all the masters, two rows of
flags, forty candlesticks; all relatives were given new
mourning clothes.”
L.S.
6.10
Fra Angelico
Marriage of the Virgin (predella panel)
1432–5
tempera on panel
19 x 51.5 cm
Florence, Museo di San Marco, 1890 inv. no. 1493
In the early 15th century, Fra Angelico presented the
wedding of the Virgin in contemporary terms. At that
time the exchange of rings did not take place in a
church in front of a priest: it needed only the presence
of witnesses. In Tuscany, during the ceremony the
friends of the bridegroom used to hit him on his
shoulder, a gesture derived from the folk tradition that
marked the groom’s renunciation of bachelorhood and
his passage from one social group to another.
L.S.
Dilemma. Florentines just couldn’t decide whether
to be lavishly aristocratic or austerely virtuous.
Organising friend Cardinal Coscia’s funeral, Giovanni
di Bicci de‘ Medici spared no expense, while at his
grandson, Piero di Cosimo’s funeral, the family wore
black cloth pinned together so it could be reused.
If Scheggia’s nursing Madonna, painted for a private
client, is sumptuously dressed, here Angelico’s,
commissioned for a church altar piece, obeys all the
restrictions on overspending at weddings.
T.P.
Section 7
Bankers and Artists
Patronage links economics and art, while disposable cash is the crucial prerequisite,
but not enough to explain an artistic commission. Another crucial prerequisite is
the easing of the moral brakes that impede the display of non-profit-bearing wealth
and expenditures. Refined and precious objects and paintings were imported from
far away. Those coming from Flanders bear witness to the importance attained by
families such as the Portinari, Baroncelli, or Tani, who managed banks in Bruges.
These merchant-bankers surrounded themselves with wealth, but also with the
Beauty that was associated with culture. This is evident in the works that point
to their expertise in music, their knowledge of the classical world, of literature
and philosophy, in a perfect union of opulence, knowledge, and harmony. The
same atmosphere pervades the paintings of Botticelli, a sensitive representative
of the Florentine Renaissance in an artistic journey that, from the works of his
youth, passes through the idealised grace of the Neoplatonic writers of the famous
mythological fables for the Medici. A world in which Money and Beauty are at each
other’s service.
L.S.
7.1
Hans Memling
Portrait of Benedetto di Pigello Portinari; St Benedict
1487
oil on panel
54.4 x 34.5 cm each
Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi
These are the lateral panels of a triptych
commissioned in Bruges by Benedetto Portinari from
Hans Memling, one of the most important artists in
Flanders, for the local seat of the Medici Bank, the
Hotel Bladelin, which his uncle Tommaso had bought
from Lorenzo de’ Medici in 1480. The panels were
then shipped to the Ospedale di Santa Maria Nuova in
Florence, which enjoyed the family’s patronage and for
whose church Tommaso commissioned the triptych by
Hugo van der Goes now in the Uffizi.
L.S.
The wreckers. Brought up in the Medici household,
brothers Pigello and Tommaso Portinari eventually
ruined the Milan and Bruges branches of the bank,
spending more time at Dukes’ courts than in the office.
But they loved their art. It was part of the social
climbing. Here Pigello’s son, Benedetto, commissions
work from the fashionable Hans Memling. Elegantly
dressed, he is placed opposite his austere name saint
who exists in paint thanks to Benedetto’s money. We
have no cause to doubt the banker’s devotion.
T.P.
7.2
Workshop of Domenico Ghirlandaio
Adoration of the Shepherds with Filippo Strozzi
(predella of the Lecceto Altarpiece)
1487–8
panel painting
27 x 65.5 cm
Rotterdam, Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, inv.
2553
Filippo Strozzi (1428–91), whom the Medici banished
from Florence as a child, spent many years in Naples.
When he returned in 1466 he said: “I am always
thinking and planning, and if God grants me enough
life I hope to do something memorable.” His name is
linked to the family chapel in Santa Maria Novella, to
the great palazzo where we are at the moment, and
to the church of Santa Maria a Lecceto, from which
comes the predella that depicts him in front of the
Holy Family in near-equal dimensions.
L.S.
7.3
An Astrologer’s advice to Filippo Strozzi on laying the
first stone of his palace
[Filippo Strozzi’s register of debtors and creditors]
1484–91
register on paper with leather cover
355 x 265 x 70 mm
Florence, Archivio di Stato, Carte Strozziane, Quinta
serie, 41, fol. 172
The pit dug for the foundations of Palazzo Strozzi so
impressed a neighbour, the apothecary Tribaldo de’
Rossi, that as the first stone was being laid he threw
a pebble and a coin into it. He then called for his
children and had them dressed as if for a festivity so
that they might always remember that day. The oldest,
in his father’s arms, “kept looking down there; I gave
him a coin with a lily on it and he threw it down there
and a bunch of damask roses that he had in his hand.”
A gesture inviting good luck and involving a coin.
L.S.
Planning to spend a third of his vast fortune to
build a huge palazzo, Filippo Strozzi asks Benedetto
di Giannozzo Biliotti to divine the most propitious
moment to lay the foundation stone. Astrology
thrived despite the anathema of certain churchmen.
Benedetto’s advice is recorded here in Filippo’s book
of accounts and memoirs: on 6 August, 1489, at 10
& 1/6 hours the ascendant Leone would guarantee a
house for great and noble men, forever. Filippo died in
1491 and the palazzo was left unfinished.
T.P.
7.4
Lo Scheggia (Giovanni di ser Giovanni; San Giovanni
Valdarno 1406-Florence 1486
Game of the ‘Civettino’ (front)
Two Children Wrestling (reverse)
c .1450
tempera on panel
Ø 59 cm
Florence, Museo di Palazzo Davanzati, 1890 inv. no.
488
At the birth of a child or at a wedding it was
customary to give as a gift a desco da parto, that is,
a tray to be used to bring food to the new mother
after her delivery. Often the tray was decorated on
both sides with images so precious as to turn it into
a veritable painting to be hung on the wall of the
couple’s bedroom. Some of the favourite subjects
were birth scenes, games (as in this case), and naked
babies, a good omen of fertility.
L.S.
7.5
‘Stories of Susannah’ workshop, Northern Italy
Wall mirror
second quarter of the 15th century
bone, horn and wood, parts dyed in green and orange
51.5 x 28.2 cm
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, inv. 125 C
Similar wall mirrors were popular among the uppermiddle class and were given as gifts at engagements
and marriages. The materials for the frame (wood
and bone) were not as expensive as the ivory they
imitated, but the results did achieve the desired level
of refinement. The most expensive part was the convex
mirror (here replaced by a modern mirror) of northern
origin that grew in popularity from the early 15th
century on.
L.S.
7.6
Mino da Fiesole
Mirror frame
c. 1460–70
carved, painted and gilt marble
50 x 33.5 cm
Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, inv. 57-244
A work of absolute rarity, signed by Mino da Fiesole,
this frame used to hold a mirror (now lost) with wings
beside it. The image is a platonic symbol: the young
girl is True Beauty, who invites the viewer who sees
her reflection to put on “platonic wings” and rise in
flight, free from the prison of matter. The relief is thus
an expression of the milieu around Marsilio Ficino and
the Medici and points to a rich, learned, and refined
commissioner.
L.S.
7.7
Northern French or Flemish
Comb decorated with Stories of Susannah
late 15th–early 16th century
ivory
12 x 14.8 cm
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, inv. 12A
This comb, with its row of widely spaced teeth for
fixing one’s hair and a row of tightly spaced teeth
for removing parasites, was probably never used: the
ivory was too expensive and the handiwork too refined
to risk breaking it. It was thus a show piece more
suitable as a wedding present. The comb comes from
the Medici household, but is too late for it to be one
of the twelve combs listed in the inventory of goods
drawn up at Lorenzo de’ Medici’s death.
L.S.
7.8
Maso Finiguerra
Nude Woman Draped in a Cloth
c. 1455–60
pen and brown ink, brown watercolour wash, traces of
black pencil, white paper
194 x 100 mm
Florence, Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe degli Uffizi, inv.
74 F.
Gold clocks, sacred relics, crystal goblets, ceremonial
flags, ornamental armour, Cosimo de’ Medici collected
them all. Drawn a few years before his death, this
female nude was found among the family’s papers. As
Cosimo blended a medieval piety with a Renaissance
openness and curiosity, the figure here hovers between
reproduction of older standard models and a drawing
from life. Finiguerra was expert in transferring such
drawings to gold and silverware in a process known as
niello. Expensive.
T.P.
7.9
Piero del Pollaiolo
Nude Male Figure in Semi-reclining Pose
1465–70
pen and brown ink, brown watercolour wash, white
watermarked paper (three hills surmounted by a cross)
210 x 248 mm
Florence, Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe degli Uffizi, inv.
100 F.
This study points to the growing interest in Florence
in the second half of the 15th century for lifedrawings of the human body. The model’s position is
inspired by ancient sculptural models (such as The
Dying Gaul), but the naturalistic view clearly reflects
humanist ideals. Twenty years later, Fra Bartolomeo
would throw into Savonarola’s bonfires of vanities “all
the study sketches of nudes that he had done,” which
were probably very similar to this one.
L.S.
7.10
Sandro Botticelli
Virgin and Child with an Angel
c. 1465
tempera on panel
95 x 64 cm
Florence, MUDI - Museo degli Innocenti
The panel is inspired by the famous Madonna and Child
by Filippo Lippi now at the Uffizi and exemplifies the
diffusion, in the bedrooms of 15th-century Florentine
houses and palazzi, of devotional images derived from
well-known models. It also bears witness to a first
period in which Botticelli was still tied to the master
in whose shop he apprenticed.
L.S.
7.11
Sandro Botticelli
Madonna and Child, Two Angels and the Young St. John
1468
tempera and oil on panel
85 x 62 cm
Florence, Galleria dell’Accademia, 1890 inv. no. 3166
Were devotional paintings the first fashion-driven
consumer product? If the bankers had invaded the
church with their lapis private chapels, now the
Church increasingly invaded the home. Friends seeing
this on your wall knew you were pious, wealthy and
had taste. For a new painter on the block, finding a
fresh look for an old theme—dressing the Madonna in
lush contemporary clothes, for example—was a way of
attracting clients and creating demand.
T.P.
7.12
Cosimo Rosselli
Adoration of the Magi
c. 1470
tempera grassa on panel
101 x 217 cm
Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi, 1890 inv. no. 494
From 1436 on, the Confraternity of the Magi, or of
the Star, housed in San Marco, was under Medici
protection, so much so that in 1494, after the
expulsion of the Medici, the confraternity was
suppressed. Many learned humanists and members
of the Florentine intellectual elite, such as Donato
Acciaioli, Gentile Becchi, Cristoforo Landino, Luigi
Pulci, and Giovanni Nesi were members. The panel
seems to be a Medicean commission, as indicated by
the portraits of Medici family members.
L.S.
“How many gowns of gold and silk…” On January
6th the Company of the Magi paraded in fancy dress
through the streets of Florence to present their
opulence to the Madonna. Head of the Company was
head of the Medici bank. Paintings were commissioned
showing Medici men in the Magi entourage, and here
the Medici emblem on the horse’s butt. Florence and
the Holy Land superimposed. Money paying art to
bring people closer to God. “La repubblica de’ Magi,”
Donato Acciaioli called it.
T.P.
7.13
Sandro Botticelli
Nativity
1472–4
detached fresco
117 x 226 cm
Florence, Basilica di Santa Maria Novella, , inner
façade
Direzione Centrale per l’Amministrazione del Fondo
Edifici di Culto – Ministero dell’Interno – Dipartimento
per le Libertà Civili e l’Immigrazione.
This frescoed lunette topped Gaspare del Lama’s
chapel in Santa Maria Novella. The son of a barber
from Empoli, Gaspare was an ambitious patron who,
in the Adoration of the Magi that stood beneath and
is now at the Uffizi, paid homage to the Medici family.
A member of the Money Changers’ Guild, he made his
fortune as a middleman, that is, as a business broker.
The work was completed before 1476 when the Guild
found Del Lama guilty of fraud.
L.S.
7.14
Sandro Botticelli: design
Florentine manufacture: embroidery
Hood of a liturgical cope showing the Coronation of
the Virgin
1490–95
silk, gold and linen
46.5 x 46.5 cm
Milan, Museo Poldi Pezzoli, inv. 444/155
Here’s a puzzle. Through the Cambini bank Portugal
sent Florence coral, cochineal, cork and slaves, while
Florence paid with silks, luxury goods and quality
liturgical items, like this embroidered priest’s hood
with the royal arms of Portugal. But it never left Italy
and the royal arms are clearly tagged on to a separate
Coronation of the Virgin. Probably ordered by King
John II, it was left unfinished when the King died,
then joined to another unfinished work. Desperate
measures in Botticelli’s workshop.
T.P.
7.15
Sassanian (body); Andrea del Verrocchio (setting),
attributed to
Ewer
11th century, 1469–77
sardonyx (hardstone); embossed, chased, engraved
and gilded silver; cast and chased (setting)
42 cm
Florence, Museo degli Argenti, 1921 inv. no. 777
Lorenzo de’ Medici’s collection of vases is one of the
most important treasures from the 15th century and
attests to his collector’s eye for antique objects,
which he renewed by having them elegantly mounted
by artists of the calibre of Andrea del Verrocchio.
In the inscription “LAV·R·MED,” the “R” written
separately from the first syllable of his baptismal name
still raises questions, even if a first interpretation is
that it stands for Rex.
L.S.
7.16
Domizio Calderini
Commentary on Juvenal
1471
miniature on parchment
270 x 180 mm; fols. III, 154; Medicean binding
Florence, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Plut. 53.2
fol. 5r
These happy satyrs
Warmed on wine
Dance, leap, anyhow
When you want to party, do
Tomorrow you never know
Lorenzo de’ Medici
A humanist education allowed the rich to move in
a classical world that acknowledged other values
than Christian morals. A relief no doubt. In this gift
to Giuliano de’ Medici, Il Magnifico’s brother, the
red balls of the family emblem, so often seen in
devotional art, are juggled by two lecherous satyrs and
surrounded by all kinds of dubious goings on.
T.P.
7.17
Songs for Three and Four Voices
late 15th century
manuscript on paper and parchment; 250 x 170 mm;
fols. V, 325; binding restored using original leather
cover, embossed and gilt edge Florence, Biblioteca
Nazionale Centrale, Banco rari 229, fols. IIIIv-Vr
The codex contains 268 compositions. A Tubalcain,
associated with Music in the representation of the
Liberal Arts, stands next to the codex’s patron,
Alessandro Braccesi, secretary of the Florentine
Republic and a man of letters. Although written in the
square notation (or neumes) of Gregorian chant, the
music is on a fiveline staff fully in use at the end of
the 15th century. In 1501, with the invention of music
printing, neumatic notation was definitely replaced by
modern notation.
L.S.
7.18
Florentine textile manufacture
Fragment of fabric composed of six pieces with Medici
coat of arms
late 15th century
silk and gold metal thread; polychrome cut voided
velvet, brocaded, satin weave ground
37 x 120 cm
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, Franchetti inv.
no. 114
It seems impossible, but this piece of cloth was worth
a lot more than many other precious objects. Its
cost was determined not only by its materials (gold
thread was used for the background), but also by the
workmanship. The weavers who produced such velvets
were the best paid in the trade and could produce only
two rolls a year on especially constructed looms.
L.S.
7.19
Sandro Botticelli workshop
Venus
c. 1482
oil on canvas
174 x 77 cm
Turin, Galleria Sabauda, inv. 656
Plato and the nudes. Sponsored by the Medici, Marsilio
Ficino translated and commented Plato: all beauty was
a gateway to a higher level of knowledge and being.
So a poem or painting need no longer have a Christian
theme to be essentially good; the beautiful Venus was
not just a pretty woman, but an idea, an ideal. And as
Vasari tells us, Botticelli worked for many families
painting “very nude women.”
T.P.
7.20
Sandro Botticelli
Portrait of a Woman
c. 1485
tempera on panel
61.3 x 40.5 cm
Florence, Galleria Palatina di Palazzo Pitti, Palatina
inv. no. 353 (1912)
The perfect wife, elegantly but modestly dressed,
beautiful but sober. Seen in a sombre, domestic
interior but with a celestial evanescence at her back,
she is transformed into an ideal by this depiction
in rigorous profile, as if we were looking at an
antique medallion. An exquisite balance between the
fashionably Platonic and the traditionally pious.
T.P.
7.21 T
uscan sculptor
Young Gentlewoman
last twenty years of the 15th century
marble relief
48 x 38 cm
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, Bargello
Sculptures inv. no. 226 (1879)
The relief comes from the palazzo built by Jacopo
Salviati in the 1470s and has been identified as the
one bequeathed by Lorenzo the Magnificent to his
daughter Lucrezia, who married Salviati in 1488 and
may be the young woman depicted in the marble. The
clothes she wears are modern, though her pose has an
antique air about it, perhaps to recall the figure of the
Roman Lucretia, an icon of marital virtue because she
committed suicide rather than live with the dishonour
of rape.
L.S.
7.22
Lorenzo di Credi
Portrait of a Young Woman or Lady with Jasmine
Flowers
1485–90
oil on panel
77.2 x 55.2 x 2.2 cm
Forlì, Pinacoteca civica, Musei San Domenico, inv. 119
The young woman, dressed and coiffed according to
Florentine style of the 1480s, has an austere air about
her, like those advised by Savonarola at the end of the
century when he convinced Lorenzo di Credi to burn
his studies of nudes on the bonfire of vanities. 19thcentury historiography and local historians in Forlì
have identified the sitter as Caterina Sforza, duchess
of the city, but there is no evidence to support such
a claim.
L.S.
Section 8
Crisis
The crisis of Florentine society at the end of the century is tied to the Medici and
their opponent, Girolamo Savonarola. The struggle between Lorenzo and the friar
from Ferrara marks the end of the 15th century: in one corner the Medicean world
of Neoplatonic culture and art accessible only to an élite, in the other, political
freedom and a religious spirit expressed in clearly understandable works of devotion.
The Pazzi Conspiracy of 1478 foreshadowed the end of an era, but also the start
of Lorenzo’s splendid 15-year rule. Botticelli’s adherence to Savonarola’s teachings
comes late and out of his own personal crisis following Lorenzo’s death on 8 April
1492 and subsequent loss of commissions. Piero de’ Medici’s expulsion and the
entry of Charles VIII on 7 November 1494 bear witness to the family’s crisis, which
culminated in the failure of their bank. On the last day of Carnival in 1497 and
1498, Savonarola organised two bonfires of “vain, lascivious, or dishonest things”
on the Piazza della Signoria. These were highly contested and celebrated events
that contributed to the friar’s demise. On 23 May 1498, on the same place where
the “triumph” had been erected to burn all vanities, a post was raised to hang
Savonarola and his two companions. Even their bodies were burned.
L.S.
8.1
Buglioni workshop
Tondo with Medicean device
first quarter of the 16th century
enamelled terracotta relief
Ø 79 cm
Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi, Donazione Contini
Bonacossi, inv. CB 93
Dynasty. Increasing family wealth and reputation gave
noble purpose to the otherwise selfish accumulation
of money. Coats of arms and family emblems were all
the rage among merchant bankers. Tightening their
(illegal) grip on power with lavish patronage, the
Medici chose the family motto, Semper (Always). It
was not encouraging for their rivals. After 30 years
of Cosimo’s dominance, Piero took over in 1464,
then Lorenzo il Magnifico in 1469. The bank turned
dictatorship. When would it end?
T.P.
8.2
Giovanni della Robbia
Tondo with Pazzi coat of arms
1510–25
enamelled terracotta relief
Ø 121 cm
Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi, Donazione Contini
Bonacossi, inv. CB 92
An elderly uncle with ten nephews running an
international merchant bank. Such was the Pazzi
family in the 1470s. Exploiting political differences
between Lorenzo de’ Medici and the Pope, they
took over the alum trade monopoly that had been
the Medici’s. Lorenzo had the family excluded from
political positions in the town. The Pazzi concluded
that assassination was the only way forward. Very
soon their coat of arms, two dolphins on a blue
background, and even their family name would be
banned forever from all official records.
T.P.
8.3
Bertoldo di Giovanni
Medal commemorating the Pazzi conspiracy
1478
bronze
Ø 64.85 mm; 1.9-4.7 thk.; 70 g
Florence, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, Medals inv.
5956
Poor banker, but brilliant politician, after the Pazzi
conspiracy Lorenzo il Magnifico spent heavily on
propaganda. Poet Agnolo Poliziano’s “official version”
of events was rushed to press. This medallion was
struck showing the attacks on the two brothers on
different sides. Botticelli and Andrea del Castagno
were commissioned to fresco facades showing the
conspirators’ executions. “Hung upside down by
their feet in strange positions,” enthused Vasari “all
different and bellissimi.”
T.P.
8.4
Germany or Austria
Dagger
15th century
chased and gilt bronze, steel
64 x 12 cm
Firenze, Galleria e Museo di Palazzo Mozzi Bardini, inv.
no 2445
Bankers with knives (not this one, but very like). On
April 26, 1478, in the Duomo, during mass, Francesco
Pazzi, head of the Pazzi bank in Rome, stabbed
Giuliano de’ Medici. The two priests assigned to kill
Lorenzo were blocked by Francesco Nori, head of the
Medici bank in Florence. They killed him. Lorenzo
escaped to the sacristy. The Pope had supported the
plot to rid Florence of the Medici, on the unrealistic
condition that “no one get killed.” By the following
morning reprisals had left at least 80 dead.
T.P.
8.5
Fragment of bloodstained shirt (once thought to be that
of Giuliano de’ Medici)
15th–16th century; display case: late 19th–early 20th
century
fabric; wood and glass display case
display case 23 x 28 x 55 cm
Florence, Provincia di Firenze, depositi, Provinciale
inv. 22.118
This fragment was long thought to be the shirt worn
by Giuliano de’ Medici when he was assassinated in
the Duomo in 1478. As such, it was placed in a case
and exhibited in the Museo Medici in the Palazzo
Medici Riccardi. Recently, however, it has been proven
to be the shirt worn by Duke Alessandro when he
was assassinated in 1537. Much like a lay relic, the
fragment bears witness to the long-lasting evocative
power of the Pazzi Conspiracy that sought to change
Florentine history.
L.S.
8.6
Pietro Torrigiano
Bust of Lorenzo the Magnificent
1515–20
polychrome terracotta
80 x 80 x 40 cm
Florence, Liana and Carlo Carnevali Collection
The bust was probably moulded by Pietro Torrigiano,
who had met Lorenzo in the gardens of San Marco
that were frequented by young sculptors such as
Michelangelo. Moulded, perhaps, when Pope Leo X
Medici returned to Florence in 1515, it highlights
the myth of Laurentian patronage by idealising his
appearance. Twenty years after his death, this is
already “Lorenzo after Lorenzo.”
L.S.
“Marvellously involved in the things of Venus,” as
Machiavelli said of him, Il Magnifico had the poet’s
and womaniser’s’ obsession with control. He “held
the city completely in his will,” Guicciardini observes
“as if he were a prince waving a baton.” His money
paid artists to promote his image, aestheticising
politics. This bust, attributed to Torrigiano, may
draw inspiration from three wax life-size statues by
Verrocchio and Orsino Benintendi that Lorenzo had
placed in churches to remind people of his charisma.
T.P.
8.7
Francesco Granacci
Arrival of Charles VIII at Palazzo Medici in Florence
1522–30
tempera on panel
76 x 122 cm
Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi, 1890 inv. no. 3908
The entry of Charles VIII into Florence marks the
beginning of Savonarola’s political power. As fears
that the city would be sacked grew, the friar, at the
request of the Signoria, went to the Palazzo Medici
and threatened Charles with terrible misfortunes. This,
and Pier Capponi tearing up the proposed treaty and
threatening to call the citizenry by ringing the city’s
bells, convinced the king to spare Florence and move
on towards Rome. Savonarola was seen as the city’s
saviour and this started his political fortune.
L.S.
“Behold, swift and sudden the sword of the Lord
upon our land.” Apparently fulfilling Savonarola’s
prophecies of catastrophe, Charles VIII of France,
marched through Italy, on his way to capture Naples
in November 1494. Piero de’ Medici, the now dead
Lorenzo’s son, tried to negotiate but was chased out
of town for conceding too much. Savonarola welcomed
the French scourge. Charles occupied Palazzo Medici
(bottom left of painting). The bankers’ reign was over.
T.P.
8.8
Sandro Botticelli
The Calumny of Apelles
c. 1497 (?)
tempera on panel
62 x 91 cm
Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi, 1890 inv. no. 1496
This work was perhaps donated by the painter to his
friend Antonio Segni, a banker at the papal curia
and recalls a painting from Antiquity. Somewhat of a
farewell to the Florence of Lorenzo the
Magnificent, its architecture and reliefs hark back
to the classical world, but also to the Bible and
to Boccaccio, marking a moment of transition in
Botticelli’s journey towards the ideals of Savonarola.
The figure of Penance, dressed in mourning, appears
next to Truth, which still bears the features of Venus.
L.S.
What does it mean? Humanism had a habit of
superimposing contemporary events on classical
history or myth. For the expensively educated there
was the pleasure of being among the few who
understood. In the 1490s Savonarola’s condemnation
of all and every luxury created a witch-hunt climate.
Someone has been slandered, defamed. Botticelli? A
friend? King Midas, who turned everything to gold,
will not be a reliable judge. Against the erudite
backdrop of antique statuary, the emotional turmoil
could hardly be more intense.
T.P.
8.9
Ludwig von Langenmantel
Savonarola Preaching Against Luxury and Preparing the
Bonfire of the Vanities
1881
oil on canvas
193.04 x 312.42 cm
St. Bonaventure, NY, St. Bonaventure University, The
Regina A. Quick Center for the Arts
In the crowd witnessing the bonfire of vanities,
which the painter sets in a building all’antica, one
can recognise Machiavelli, Fra Bartolomeo, Filippino
Lippi, Andrea della Robbia, Gentile Becchi, Botticelli,
Antonio del Pollaiolo and Pico della Mirandola.
Savonarola’s bonfires were nothing new: books,
paintings, and other objects have been burned since
Antiquity and still are, because the destructive power
of fire is projected on one’s opponents and on the
books that contain their thought.
L.S.
No compromise. Hitherto Florentine elite and church
leaders had always reached some accommodation.
Savonarola was inflexible. “Oh ye who have your
homes full of vanities, dishonest images and wicked
books,” he preached. He sent his child disciples
around the town to gather all the sinful artworks
and luxury goods the rich had been accumulating. It
was time for a bonfire. A century’s creative exchange
between wealth and piety, metaphysics and money
was brutally interrupted.
T.P.
8.10
Filippo Dolciati
Execution of Girolamo Savonarola
1498
tempera on panel
38 x 58 cm
Florence, Museo di San Marco, 1915 inv. no. 479
Savonarola and his companions are judged, hanged,
and their bodies burned in Piazza della Signoria. The
inscription “the abovementioned Father died on 23
May,” with no indication of the year, an immediate
chronicle, but the panel is also an ex-voto because
the friars in glory hold in their hands the palm of
martyrdom. In the lower register, Savonarola and
Domenico Buonvicini (Silvestro Maruffi surrendered
himself only later) are taken to the Palazzo Vecchio on
the evening of 8 April in the wake of the assault on
San Marco.
L.S.
8.11
Veneto engraver
Sic transit Gloria mundi in Processo de fra Hieronymo
Savonarola da Ferrara [The trial of Fra Girolamo
Savonarola of Ferrara]
[Venice, Simone Bevilacqua, post 23 May 1498]
woodcut
210 x 160 mm
Florence, Biblioteche della Cassa di Risparmio di
Firenze, Fondo Ridolfi 261A/210
“Oh Lord… all I want is your cross: let me be
persecuted, I beg you this grace, that I not die in
my bed, but shed my blood for you, as you did for
me.” Savonarola had always sought and foreseen his
death. In a society full of ambiguity and compromise,
he insisted on clarity and confrontation. In a town
that made its living producing luxury goods, he
demanded the virtues of poverty. It couldn’t last.
Excommunicated, he denied the Pope’s legitimacy.
Children threw stones as the bodies burned.
T.P.
8.12
Florentine painter
Portrait of Girolamo Savonarola (front)
Execution of Girolamo Savonarola (reverse)
ante 1520
oil on panel
21.2 x 16.5 cm
London, The National Gallery. Presented by Dr. William
Radford, 1890, inv. NG1301
Savonarola’s profile is joined to the scene of his death.
For the portrait, the artist drew his inspiration from the
terracotta medallions that circulated like santini (small
holy images) among the friar’s followers.
The pyre that followed the hanging and the dispersal of
the ashes in the Arno were motivated by the vain desire
to suppress the cult of Savonarola by preventing his
followers from acquiring relics of him.
L.S.
At last a man who did no deals, who had no use for the
art of exchange. In 1490, impressed by the intensity of
Savonarola’s preaching, humanist Pico della Mirandola
encouraged Il Magnifico to bring him to Florence. They
tried to collect him, as bankers and humanists had
collected so much. “The real preacher,” Savonarola
responded, “cannot flatter a prince, only attack his
vices.” The sharp contrast between light and dark, the
shaven head and the intense gaze, wonderfully capture
the psychology of the fundamentalist.
T.P.
8.13
Anonymous painter
Execution of Girolamo Savonarola
17th century
tempera on canvas
94 x 120 cm
Perugia, Galleria Nazionale dell’Umbria, Deposito
Superiore, inv. 187
The stages of Savonarola’s “martyrdom” are shown
contemporaneously. The work, one of the many
copies of the popular subject that includes the city, is
important because it is the first with a scroll bearing
the inscription “This is how the just man dies and how
the saints are taken from the earth,” a phrase from
a text by Savonarola. In other copies the inscription
is either missing or removed. It bears witness, well
into the 17th century, to the continuing cult of the
Dominican friar.
L.S.
8.14
Filippo Dolciati
Story of Antonio Rinaldeschi
1501
oil on canvas and panel
102 x 115.5 cm
Florence, Museo Stibbert, inv. 16719
8.15
Sandro Botticelli
Christ Crucified
post 1496
tempera on moulded panel
157.5 x 82,8 cm
Prato, Diocesi di Prato - Musei Diocesani MOp35
Antonio Rinaldeschi’s case appears as if on a storyteller’s placard. In 1501, Rinaldeschi committed a
sacrilege by defacing an image of the Virgin: the
dice game at the Osteria del Fico, the profanation
spurred by a diabolic impulse, the flight, the arrest,
the transfer to the Bargello, the verdict, the night
spent in prayer and the comfort of the Confraternity of
the Blacks, the hanging and the struggle for his soul
as devils and angels fight over it, with the eventual
victory of good.
L.S.
Serious bad luck. Dice and gambling were endemic
in 15th-century Florence. The Commune licensed
premises and collected taxes. Rumour has it that when
Bishop Antoninus asked Cosimo de’ Medici how to
stop the clergy gambling, Cosimo proposed they first
stop using loaded dice. After the Savonarola interlude,
times were unforgiving. A loss at dice leads to an
angry act of profanation, arrest, trial, execution. Piety
and propaganda produce this painting within the year.
The profaned Madonna acquires miraculous powers…
T.P.
The suffering Christ on the cross is in line with
Savonarola’s teachings, though Botticelli’s full
adherence to Savonarola’s ideas took place only after
the friar’s death. In this work the signs of a changing
typology are becoming evident: the processional
Crucifix painted on both sides, popular at the turn
of the 13th–14th centuries, is now supported by
Savonarola. The work was commissioned for the
Dominican convent in Prato, a city where Savonarola
had a large following.
L.S.
8.16
Sandro Botticelli and workshop
Coronation of the Virgin
last decade of the 15th century
oil on panel
279 x 191 cm
Florence, Villa La Quiete
Painted for Montevarchi, the panel reflects Botticelli’s
development in the troubled climate of late 15thcentury Florence, evoked by the gold leaf and the
saints compressed in space. The artist turns to the
14th century, in line with Savonarola’s teachings
according to which the art of the past was good and
even saintly. An angelic concert celebrates the event
with a portable organ, lute, plucked psaltery, lira da
braccio, straight flute, cymbals, medieval harp, and a
tambourine with flat bells.
8.17
Sandro Botticelli
Madonna and Child with the Young St. John
c. 1500
panel painting
134 x 92 cm
Florence, Galleria Palatina, Palatina inv. no. 357
(1912)
The Virgin, too large for the panel, must bend over
as if to follow Jesus as he reaches out to embrace
the little John the Baptist. The result is a sense of
constraint and unease characteristic of the final stage
of Botticelli’s career when a new, typically Savonarolan
sensibility produced a change in style: the painter
now sought unnatural, suffering poses and proposed
an archaic use of space, disregarding the laws of space
and perspective.
L.S.
Luxury gothic. We know Savonarola’s thoughts on art
were discussed in Botticelli’s workshop. The friar had
said the old painters were good and holy. Botticelli
gestures back to 14th-century styles, intensifying
pathos and foreboding. Whether the change indicates
a religious conversion or just an exploration of a
possible new fashion to suit the penitential times,
we cannot know. The artist is painting for a wealthy
client and for all its sombreness, the rich colour and
wonderful lines make this a decidedly sumptuous
piety.
T.P.
I, Alessandro, painted this picture at the end of the year
1500 during the troubles of Italy, in the half time after the
time according to the Eleventh [chapter] of St. John in the
second woe of the Apocalypse, when the devil was loosed
for three and half years. Then shall he be bound in the
Twelfth [chapter] and we shall see him trodden down as in
this picture.
Sandro Botticelli, Mystic Nativity, 1501, Londra, National Gallery
This publication brings together
the explanatory texts of the
exhibition
Money and Beauty.
Bankers, Botticelli and the
Bonfire of the Vanities
Florence, Palazzo Strozzi
17 September 2011-22 January
2012
From an idea of
James M. Bradburne
Curated by
Ludovica Sebregondi
Tim Parks
Under the High Patronage of the
President of the Italian Republic
With the sponsorship of
Ministero per i Beni e le Attività
Culturali
Promoted and organised by
with
Comune di Firenze
Provincia di Firenze
Camera di Commercio di Firenze
Associazione Partners Palazzo
Strozzi
and
Regione Toscana
Main Sponsor
Sponsor
eni, Ferrovie dello Stato, ATAF,
Aeroporto di Firenze, Aeroporto
Galileo Galilei-Pisa, Coop-Unicoop
Firenze, Firenze Parcheggi
Original texts
Ludovica Sebregondi
Tim Parks
Editorial coordination
Ludovica Sebregondi
Translation of
Ludovica Sebregondi texts
Konrad Eisenbichler
Graphic design
RovaiWeber design
www.palazzostrozzi.org
Fondazione
Palazzo Strozzi
Piazza Strozzi
50123 Firenze