The Ugly Renaissance (62 page)

In one tale loosely derived:
Boccaccio,
Decameron
, 7.2.

“in the manner of a hot-blooded stallion”:
Ibid., trans. McWilliam, 494.

In another tale, one Madonna Filippa:
Boccaccio,
Decameron
, 6.7.

“If he has always taken”:
Ibid., trans. McWilliam, 464.

Boccaccio’s
Decameron
includes at least two stories:
Boccaccio,
Decameron
, 2.5, 9.5; the character of Madonna Jancofiore in 8.10 is similar to a prostitute but is more of a sexual deceiver.

Prostitutes were expelled from Venice:
Davidsohn,
Storia di Firenze
, 7:616–17; Brackett, “Florentine Onestà and the Control of Prostitution,” 277.

By 1384, the priors had acknowledged:
Rezasco, “Segno delle meretrici,” 165.

Though prosecutions were not irregular:
See Brucker,
Society of Renaissance Florence
, 191–98.

On April 30, 1403, the city established a magistracy:
For an excellent overview of the history of this magistracy, see Brackett “Florentine Onestà and the Control of Prostitution.”

Barely thirty years later, seventy-six women:
Trexler, “La prostitution florentine au XV
^e
siècle,” 985–88.

By 1566, the acceptance of prostitution:
Brackett, “Florentine Onestà and the Control of Prostitution,” 287n64.

Prosecutions for “unofficial” prostitution:
For example, in 1416, Bartolomeo di Lorenzo was convicted of attempting to sell his wife, Stella, to a brothel owner named Checco; see Brucker,
Society of Renaissance Florence
, 199–201.

Michelangelo’s own sexual orientation:
See Liebert,
Michelangelo
; Saslow, “ ‘Veil of Ice Between My Heart and the Fire’ ”; Francese, “On Homoerotic Tension in Michelangelo’s Poetry.”

Normally grouped together with masturbation and bestiality:
D’Elia, “Marriage, Sexual Pleasure, and Learned Brides,” 409.

In a series of Lenten sermons:
Hughes, “Bodies, Disease, and Society,” 113.

“To the fire!”:
Trexler,
Public Life in Renaissance Florence
, 381.

Having established a special magistracy:
The provision authorizing the establishment of the Office of the Night can be found at Brucker,
Society of Renaissance Florence
, 203–4, doc. 95.

Jacopo di Cristofano was found guilty:
The court record for this case is given at ibid., 204–5, doc. 96.

“carried out the most extensive”:
Rocke,
Forbidden Friendships
, 4.

“men are not satisfied with servant girls”:
Sabino,
De uxorum commodis et incommodis
, fol. 115r, trans. in D’Elia, “Marriage, Sexual Pleasure, and Learned Brides,” 408.

As a reflection of the moral distinction:
Brackett,
Criminal Justice and Crime in Late Renaissance Florence
, 131.

the Platonic Academy:
On historiographical debates surrounding the Platonic Academy, see the penetrating essay by Hankins, “Myth of the Platonic Academy of Florence.”

Ficino suggested that homoerotic attraction:
On this topic, see Maggi, “On Kissing and Sighing.”

There is some evidence that same-sex unions:
Rocke,
Forbidden Friendships
, 171.

5. M
ICHELANGELO IN
L
OVE

Pier Antonio Cecchini:
For Cecchini, see Frommel,
Michelangelo und Tommaso dei Cavalieri
, 14–15; Michelangelo,
Carteggio
, 3:419–20.

In a break with habit:
Although it is not absolutely certain that Cecchini effected the meeting between Michelangelo and
Tommaso de’ Cavalieri, the surviving evidence suggests that it was likely. Michelangelo and Tommaso can, after all, only have met within a relatively brief window of time. While the date of their first encounter is unclear, it can only have happened in the autumn, between Michelangelo’s arrival in Rome (at some point between mid-August, when his house at Macel de’ Corvi was made ready, and mid-September 1532, when a letter was addressed to him in the Eternal City) and January 1, 1533, by which point the relationship had already gathered steam. As Wallace has noted, this fact recommends the suggestion that they were introduced by a mutual friend (Wallace,
Michelangelo,
177). Of those who could have brought them together, Cecchini is certainly the most likely. Cecchini was undoubtedly one of Michelangelo’s closest friends in Rome during this period (see the familiarity of Michelangelo,
Carteggio
, 4:69) and knew Cavalieri prior to his meeting the artist (the acquaintance between Cecchini and Cavalieri may have been made through Cardinal Niccolò Ridolfi, to whose household Cecchini belonged). Most tellingly, however, Cecchini is referred to as a mutual friend and acted as a go-between for the two men on a number of occasions, both of which seem to lend weight to the supposition that he facilitated their friendship in a meaningful enough manner to have enjoyed the trust of both men as a matter of course (Michelangelo,
Carteggio
, 3:443–44; 4:3). That Cecchini introduced Cavalieri to Michelangelo is a suggestion that has recently been endorsed by Hirst,
Achievement of Fame
, 261.

the Cavalieri were noted collectors:
On the Cavalieri family’s collection, see Hirst,
Achievement of Fame
, 261; Steinmann and Pogatscher, “Dokumente und Forschungen zu Michelangelo, IV, Cavalieri-Dokumente,” 502–4.

Having received the thorough humanistic education:
This is evident from the
tenor of Michelangelo’s later poetry but is, in any case, entirely consistent with the educational program followed by Roman nobles in this period. On the latter, see Grendler,
Schooling in Renaissance Italy
; Grafton and Jardine,
From Humanism to the Humanities
; Kallendorf,
Humanist Educational Treatises
; note also the rather brief comments at Castiglione,
Book of the Courtier
, IV, 291, 306.

he remarked upon Tommaso’s “fear”:
Michelangelo,
Poems and Letters
, letter 30.

“would provoke a poetic outpouring”:
Hirst,
Achievement of Fame
, 260.

“brought back dead poetry”:
Guido da Pisa,
Expositiones et glose super Comediam Dantis
, 4: “Ipse enim mortuam poesiam de tenebris reduxit ad lucem.”

Having studied the
Commedia
:
Wallace,
Michelangelo
, 41.

Cristoforo Landino’s highly influential commentary:
On Landino’s
Comento … sopra la Comedia di Danthe Alighieri poeta fiorentino
(1481), see Gilson,
Dante and Renaissance Florence
, 163–230.

In later years, he would deepen his knowledge:
Hirst,
Achievement of Fame
, 23.

“radiant star” whose “splendour burned”:
Michelangelo,
Poems and Letters
, nos. 248 and 250.

Indeed, for Michelangelo, as for Boccaccio:
On Dante’s reception, see Gilson,
Dante and Renaissance Florence
, esp. chaps. 1–2.

Running around playing at a May Day party:
The date of this event is known only through Boccaccio’s biography of Dante but has since become “traditional.” That the party was held at the house of Folco dei Portinari is similarly inferred from other evidence: Dante never mentioned Beatrice’s family name, and Boccaccio indicates only that the celebration was held at her father’s house.

“the vital spirit, which dwells”:
Dante,
La Vita Nuova
, II, 3.

“From then on,” Dante confessed:
Ibid., II, 4.

“dressed in purest white”:
Ibid., III, 5.

“Joyful Love seemed to me”:
Ibid., III, sonnet 1, 6.

“I was so overwhelmed with grief”:
Ibid., XII, 14.

At a wedding, his rather affected swooning:
Ibid., XIV, 18–20.

After he endured this humiliating episode:
Ibid., XVIII, 24–25.

“expositor, … Beatrice is a superior intelligence”:
Pope-Hennessy,
Paradiso
, 35.

As Bartolomeo Angiolini observed:
Michelangelo,
Carteggio
, 3:53–54.

Although he claimed to esteem:
Cavalieri’s comments are at ibid., 3:445–46.

Tommaso even teased him:
See, for example, Michelangelo’s response to Tommaso’s teasing after his return to Florence: ibid., 4:26.

In Michelangelo’s gift drawing:
Although Ovid remains the most obvious point of reference for Michelangelo to have used, the sources for the myth of Tityus are many and varied: Ovid,
Met
. 4.457–58; Virgil,
Aen
. 6.595–600; Lucretius,
De rerum nat.
3.984–94; Homer,
Od
. 11.576–81. Curiously, however, the reference to Tityus’s crime—the attempted rape of Leto—appears only in Homer. In order for the gift portraits to make coherent sense as a pair, it seems essential that Tityus’s offense is known. Consequently, it appears reasonable to postulate that Michelangelo had direct or indirect knowledge of Homer.

It was in Avignon on April 6, 1327:
The date is known from an inscription that Petrarch wrote on the flyleaf of his manuscript copy of Virgil (the so-called Ambrosian Virgil) and from a later verse. It is worth noting that although Petrarch was subsequently to associate April 6, 1327, with Good Friday, the ascription is mistaken (
albeit deliberately so): it was, in fact, Easter Sunday. Petrarch,
Canzoniere
, poems 3, 211, in
Petrarch’s Lyric Poems
, 38–39, 364–65.

As he later reminisced:
Petrarch,
Fam
. 10.3; Wilkins,
Life of Petrarch
, 8.

But even though he was well placed:
Petrarch,
Posteritati
(
Sen
. 18.1); text in
Prose
, 8–10.

Petrarch gives us little clue:
That Petrarch’s Laura is to be identified with Laura de Noves (1310–48) was first suggested by Maurice Scève in 1533 (Mann,
Petrarch
, 58). But while the association is widely accepted—and even more widely cited—there has never been any conclusive proof.

“such lovely eyes”:
Petrarch,
Canzoniere
, poem 30, lines 19–21, in
Petrarch’s Lyric Poems
, 86–87.

From that moment, he was in love:
Q.v. Petrarch,
Canzoniere
, poem 3, lines 4, 9–11, in
Petrarch’s Lyric Poems
, 38–39.

But despite his bucolic solitude:
See Petrarch,
Canzoniere
, poem 35, in
Petrarch’s Lyric Poems
, 94–95.

he even compares himself to Actaeon:
Petrarch,
Canzoniere
, poem 52, in
Petrarch’s Lyric Poems
, 122–23.

“through fields and across hills,” and “from mountain to mountain”:
Petrarch,
Canzoniere
¸ poems 125, line 9; 129, line 1, in
Petrarch’s Lyric Poems
, 238–39, 264–65.

His thoughts were no longer his own:
Note Petrarch,
Canzoniere
, poem 29, line 36, in
Petrarch’s Lyric Poems
, 84–85: “Da me son fatti i miei pensier diveri” (My thoughts have become alien to me).

“in the clear water”:
Petrarch,
Canzoniere
, poem 129, lines 40–47, in
Petrarch’s Lyric Poems
, 266–67.

“want, grief, ignominy”:
Petrarch,
Secretum
, I, in
Prose
, 30.

Equipped with a proper understanding:
Summarizing this same sentiment in the
De otio religioso
(
On Religious Leisure
), Petrarch explained that “no thought is more useful than the thought of one’s own death, nor has it been said without purpose ‘Be mindful of your end, and you will not sin for eternity.’ ” Petrarch,
De otio religioso
, II, 3, lines 12–14, p. 78, in
On Religious Leisure
, 110, quoting
Ecclesiasticus
7:40.

Marchionne di Coppo Stefani estimated:
Stefani,
Cronaca fiorentina
, 230, r. 635.

on hearing of the death of his kinsman:
Petrarch,
Fam
. 7.10.

“My lady is dead”:
Petrarch,
Canzoniere
, poem 268, line 4.

“Life flees and does not stop”:
Petrarch,
Canzoniere
, poem 272, in
Petrarch’s Lyric Poems
, 450 (adapted).

From beyond the grave, Laura pointed:
Petrarch,
Canzoniere
, poem 142.

“the kinds of beauty”:
Castiglione,
Book of the Courtier
, IV, 340–42.

“Your soul,” he claimed in a poem:
Michelangelo,
Poems and Letters
, no. 72, lines 5–7.

Distraught, Michelangelo felt obliged:
Ibid., no. 58.

“my sweet and longed-for lord”:
Ibid., no. 72, lines 12–14.

“If only blest when caught”:
Ibid., no. 98, lines 12–14.

“was to drink heavily”:
Boccaccio,
Decameron
, prologue, trans. McWilliam, 7.

“the rules of obedience”:
Ibid., 15.

Although many of his early works:
Muscetta,
Giovanni Boccaccio
, 147; Wilkins,
History of Italian Literature
, 106.

“a frivolous and scatterbrained young woman”:
Boccaccio,
Decameron
, 4.2, trans. McWilliam, 304.

But while the storyteller (Pampinea) observes:
Ibid., 312.

“putting the devil back into Hell”:
Boccaccio,
Decameron
, 3.10, trans. McWilliam, 276.