Durant W. The Renaissance. A History of Civilization in Italy from 1304-1576 A.D

till they have passed the age of forty. This duty occurs to my own

mind, now that I am traveling beyond the term of fifty-eight years,

and am in Florence, the city of my birth.

-

He is proud that he was "born humble" and made his family famous; at

the same time he assures us that he was descended from a captain of

Julius Caesar; "in a work like this," he warns us, "there will

always be found occasion for natural bragging." `052335 He was

called Benvenuto- welcome- because his parents expected a girl and

were pleasantly surprised. His grandfather (probably violating all

of Cornaro's precepts) lived a hundred years; Cellini, inheriting

his vitality, crowded as many into seventy-one. His father was an

engineer, a worker in ivory, and a devotee of the flute; his fond hope

was that Benvenuto would become a professional flutist and play in the

band at the Medici court; in later years he seems to have derived more

pleasure from hearing that his son had become a flutist in Pope

Clement's private orchestra than from the goldsmithery by which the

youth was earning florins and fame.

But Benvenuto was enamored of beautiful forms rather than of

melodious sounds. He saw some of the work of Michelangelo, and

caught the fever of art. He studied the cartoon for The Battle of

Pisa, and was so impressed by it that even the Sistine Chapel ceiling

seemed to him less marvelous. Against his father's pleading he

apprenticed himself to a goldsmith, but in filial compromise he

continued to practise the hated flute. In Filippino Lippi's house he

found a book of drawings representing the art antiquities of Rome.

He burned with desire to see those renowned exemplars with his own

eyes, and often he talked with his friends about going to the capital.

One day he and a young woodcarver, Giambattista Tasso, walking

aimlessly and talking passionately, found themselves at the gate San

Piero Gattolini; Benvenuto remarked that he felt himself already

halfway from Florence to Rome; on a mutual dare they walked on, mile

after mile, until they reached Siena, thirty-three miles away. There

Gian's feet rebelled. Cellini had money enough to hire a horse; the

two youths rode the one animal, and, "singing and laughing, we

traveled the whole way to Rome. I had just nineteen years then, and so

had the century." `052336

In Rome he found work as a goldsmith, studied the ancient remains,

and earned enough to send his father consolatory sums. But the

doting father pled so earnestly for his return that after two years

Benvenuto went back to Florence. He had hardly domiciled himself there

when he stabbed a youth in a quarrel. Thinking he had killed him, he

fled again to Rome (1521). He pored over Michelangelo's paintings in

the Sistine Chapel, Raphael's in the Villa Chigi and the Vatican; he

noted all interesting forms and lines in men and women, metals and

foliage; soon he was the best goldsmith in Rome. Clement took to him

first as a flutist, then discovered his excellence in design.

Cellini made such handsome coins for him that the Pope appointed him

"stamp master of the papal mint"- i.e., designer of currency for the

Papal States. Each cardinal had a seal, sometimes "as large as the

head of a twelve-year-old child," which was used to impress the wax

that sealed a letter; some such seals were worth a hundred crowns

($1250?). Cellini engraved seals and coins, cut and set gems,

modeled medallions, enameled cameos, made a hundred varieties of

objects in silver and gold. These "various departments of art," he

writes, "are very different from one another, so that a man who excels

in one of them, if he undertakes another, hardly ever achieves the

same success; whereas I strove with all my power to become equally

versed in all of them; and in the proper place I shall demonstrate

that I attained my object." `052337

Benvenuto brags on almost every page, but with such consistency

and ardor that at last we come to believe him. He speaks of his

"fine physiognomy and bodily symmetry," and we cannot deny it. "Nature

bestowed on me a temperament so happy, and of such excellent parts,

that I was freely able to accomplish whatever it pleased me to take in

hand." Among these pleasant objects was "a girl of great beauty and

grace, whom I used as a model.... I used frequently to pass the

night with her.... After indulgence in sexual pleasure my slumber is

sometimes very deep." `052338 From one such slumber he woke to find

himself host to the "French disease." In fifty days he was cured,

and took another mistress.

We glimpse the lawlessness of Italian city life in the sixteenth

century when we note with what easy conscience Cellini overrode the

commandments of Church and state. Apparently the policing of Rome

was lax and fragmentary; a man of strong instincts could be- sometimes

had to be- a law unto himself. When provoked Benvenuto "felt a

fever" which "would have been my death had I not resolved to give it

vent"; `052339 when offended "I thought I ought to act as well as

intone my misereres." `052340 He fell into a hundred quarrels,

and, he assures us, was in the right in all but one. He stuck a dagger

into the neck of one offender, and with such matador precision that

the man fell dead. `052341 In another case "I stabbed him just beneath

the ear. I gave him only two blows, for he fell stone dead at the

second. I had not meant to kill him, but, as the saying goes, knocks

are not dealt out by measure." `052342

His theology was as independent as his morality. Since he was always

right (but once), he felt that God must be on his side, giving more

power to his arm; he prayed to God for aid in his murders, and gave

Him due credit for his success. However, when God failed to answer his

prayers to help him find his lost love Angelica, he turned to devils

for supplementary aid. A Sicilian sorcerer took him to the deserted

Colosseum at night, drew a magic circle in the ground, lit a fire,

sprinkled perfumes on the flames, and with Hebrew, Greek, and Latin

invocations summoned demons to appear. Benvenuto was sure that

hundreds of phantoms rose before him, and that they predicted his

early reunion with Angelica. He returned to his house, and spent the

rest of the night seeing devils. `052343

When the imperial army sacked Rome Cellini fled to the Castel

Sant' Angelo, and served as a gunner; it was one of his shots, he

avers, that killed the Duke of Bourbon; and it was his expert

marksmanship that kept the besiegers at a distance from the Castle, so

saving the Pope, the cardinals, and Benvenuto. We do not know how true

this is; but we have it on the same authority that when Clement

returned to Rome he made Cellini a mace-bearer with a salary of 200

crowns ($2500?) a year, and said: "Were I but a wealthy emperor, I

would give Benvenuto as much land as my eyes could survey; yet,

being now but a needy bankrupt, I will at any rate give him bread

enough to satisfy his need." `052344

Paul III continued Clement's patronage. Probably exaggerating to his

heart's delight, Cellini quotes Paul as saying, to one who protested

his lenience with the artist: "Know then that men like Benvenuto,

unique in their profession, stand above the law; and how far more,

then, he who received the provocation I have heard of." `052345 But

Paul's son Pierluigi, as reckless a rascal as Benvenuto himself,

turned the Pope against the artist. Even Cellini's arts proved

inadequate to overcome such influence, and in 1537 he abandoned his

shop in Rome and made for France. On the way he was handsomely

entertained by Bembo at Padua, made a small portrait of him, and was

in return presented with horses for himself and his two companions.

They mounted and descended the Grisons, and rode through Zurich,

Lausanne, Geneva, and Lyons to Paris. There too Benvenuto found

enemies. Giovanni de' Rossi, Florentine painter, wanted no more rivals

for the King's money; he put difficulties in the way of the

newcomer; and when at last Cellini got to Francis he found him

inextricably tangled in war. Ill and homesick, he climbed back over

the Alps, made a pilgrimage to Loreto, and crossed the Apennines to

Rome. To his dismay he found himself accused by Pierluigi of having

embezzled papal jewelry. He was flung into the same Castello that he

had helped to save, and suffered months of imprisonment. He escaped,

but broke a leg in the process; captured, he was confined in an

underground dungeon for two years. He was released at the request of

Francis I, who now urgently solicited his services in France. Once

more he clambered over the Alps (1540).

He found King and court at Fontana Belio- i.e., Fontainebleau; was

warmly welcomed, and was assigned a castle in Paris for his workshop

and home. When its occupants refused to leave he expelled them by

force. The French did not like his manners or his language, and Mme

d'Etampes, the King's mistress, resented Cellini's lack of courtesy to

her high estate. When she heard how he had thrown out of the castle

windows the furniture of the tenants whom he had dispossessed, she

warned Francis that "that devil will sack Paris one of these

days." `052346 The merry monarch enjoyed the story, forgave

Cellini's violence for his artistry, and paid him 700 crowns a year

($8750?), 500 more for the expenses of his trip from Rome, and

promised an additional sum for each work of art that Cellini should

produce for him. Benvenuto was proud to learn that these were the same

terms that had been given to Leonardo twenty-four years

before. `052347

One of the dispossessed tenants sued him in court on a charge of

stealing some effects. The court decided against Cellini. He

reversed the judgment in his own striking way:

-

When I perceived that my cause had been unjustly lost, I had

recourse for my defense to a great dagger which I carried; for I

have always taken pleasure in keeping fine weapons. The first man I

attacked was the plaintiff who had sued me; and one evening I

wounded him in the legs and arms so severely, taking care, however,

not to kill him, that I deprived him of the use of both his

legs. `052348

-

Apparently the plaintiff dared not press the matter further, and

Cellini could turn his energies to other outlets. He had in his

Paris studio "a poor young girl, Caterina; I keep her principally

for my art's sake, since I cannot do without a model; but being a

man also, I have used her for my pleasure." `052349 However

Caterina, with yielding largesse, slept also with his helper, Pagolo

Micceri. Benvenuto, learning of it, beat her till he was exhausted.

His servant Roberta reproved him for punishing so violently so

ordinary an incident; did he not know that "there's not a husband in

France without horns"? The next day he modeled from Caterina again,

"during which occurred some amorous diversions; and at last, on the

same hour as on the previous day, she irritated me to such a pitch

that I gave her the same drubbing. So we went on for several days,

repeating the same round.... Meanwhile I completed my work in a

style which did me the greatest credit." `052350 Another model,

Jeanne, presented him with a daughter; he settled a dowry on the

mother, "and from that time I had nothing more to do with

her." `052351 The child was later smothered by its nurse.

Francis bore patiently with all this lawlessness; but finally

Benvenuto had so many enemies in Paris that he begged the King's

permission to visit Italy. Consent was not given, but Cellini took

French leave, and, after an arduous trip, found himself in his

native Florence (1545). There he showed a better side of his nature,

contributing materially to the support of his sister and her six

daughters. He found Cosimo less openhanded than Francis. He made the

usual enemies, but he cast a good portrait bust of the Duke (in the

Bargello), and produced for him his most celebrated work- the

Perseus that still stands in the Loggia dei Lanzi. He tells a

vivid story of the casting. His anxieties, toil, and exposure to

heat and cold culminated in a severe fever that compelled him to

take to his bed just when the furnace that he had designed

especially for this work was melting the metal, and this proved

insufficient to fill the gigantic mold. The labor of months was

about to be spoiled when Cellini rose from his bed and threw into

the furnace a block of tin and two hundred pewter vessels. These

proved enough; the casting was a complete success; and when the work

was exposed to public view (1554) it was praised as highly as any

statue made in Florence since Michelangelo's David, even

Bandinelli said a good word for it.

From this climax the story descends to prosaic pages of haggling

with the Duke about the fee for the Perseus. Benvenuto was long on

expectations, Cosimo was short of funds. The narrative abruptly ends

at 1562. It does not mention the fact, otherwise fairly well

established, that in 1556 Benvenuto was twice imprisoned, apparently

on charges of criminal immorality. `052352 In these late years Cellini

composed a treatise on the goldsmith's art- Trattato... dell'

Orificeria. Having sown wild oats for half a century, he married in

1564, and had two legitimate children to add to one illegitimate child

begotten in France and five generated in Florence after his return.

Of his works- usually small enough to be readily movable- only a few

can now be located and identified. The Treasury of St. Peter's has

an ornate silver candelabrum attributed to Cellini; the Bargello

preserves his Narcissus and his Ganymede, both in marble, and both

excellent; the Pitti has a salver and a pitcher in silver; the

Louvre has his fine medallion of Bembo, and a lovely bronze relief

called The Nymph of Fontainebleau; Vienna claims the saltcellar made

for Francis I; the Gardner Collection in Boston has his bust of

Altoviti; his large Crucifixion is in the Escorial. These

scattered specimens hardly equip us to judge Cellini as an artist;

they seem too slight for his fame, and even the Perseus, violent and

overwrought, inclines to the baroque. Yet Clement VII (we have it on

Benvenuto's word) rated him as "the greatest artist in his craft who

was ever born"; `052353 and an extant letter of Michelangelo to

Cellini reads: "I have known you all these years as the greatest

goldsmith of whom the world has ever heard." `052354 We may conclude

that Cellini was a genius and a ruffian, a master craftsman and a

murderer, whose spirited Autobiography outshines his silver and gold

and cameos, and reconciles us to the morals of our time.

VI. LESSER LIGHTS

-

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

++++++++++

This age of decline for Italy was a resurrection for Savoy. As a lad

of eight Emmanuel Philibert might have seen the French invade and

conquer the duchy (1536). At twenty-five he inherited its crown but

not its soil; at twenty-nine he played a leading part in the victory

of the Spanish and the English over the French at St. Quentin

(1557); and two years later France surrendered to him his ruined

country and bankrupt throne. His regeneration of Savoy and Piedmont

was a masterpiece of statesmanship. The Alpine slopes of his duchy

were the haunts of Vaudois heretics, who were progressively

transforming Catholic churches into whitewashed conventicles of

Calvinist worship. Pope Pius IV offered him a year's ecclesiastical

revenues to suppress the sect; Emmanuel took some drastic measures;

but when these resulted in large-scale emigration he turned to a

policy of tolerance, checked the ardor of the Inquisition, and gave

asylum to Huguenot refugees. He founded a new university at Turin, and

financed the compilation of an encyclopedia- Teatro universale di

tutte le scienze. He was always courteous, and repeatedly unfaithful,

to his wife, Margaret of Valois, who gave him wise counsel and

diplomatic aid, and who presided over the bright social and

intellectual life of Turin. When Emmanuel died (1580) his duchy was

one of the best-governed lands in Europe. From his line in the

nineteenth century would come the kings of united Italy.

Meanwhile Andrea Doria, who in the late wars had passed from the

French to the Spanish side with timely treachery, maintained his

leadership in Genoa. The bankers there had helped to finance the

campaigns of Charles V, who repaid them by leaving undisturbed their

domination of the city. Not as badly hurt as Venice by the movement of

commerce out of the Mediterranean into the Atlantic, Genoa became

again a great port and strategic citadel. Galeazzo Alessi of

Perugia, a pupil of Michelangelo, built sumptuous churches and palaces

in Genoa. Vasari described the Via Balbi as the most splendid street

in Italy. *05061

When Francesco Maria Sforza, last of his line as rulers, died in

1535, Charles V appointed an imperial vicar to govern Milan.

Subjection brought peace, and the ancient city prospered once more.

Alessi built there the handsome Palazzo Marino; and Leone Leoni,

engraver in the Milan mint, rivaled Cellini in the miniature plastic

arts, but found no Cellini to publish his excellence. The most

distinguished Milanese of the age was San Carlo Borromeo, who

re-enacted at the close of the Renaissance the role played by St.

Ambrose in the decline of antiquity. He came of a rich patrician

family; his uncle Pius IV made him a cardinal at twenty-one, and

archbishop of Milan at twenty-two (1560). He was probably at that time

the richest prelate in Christendom. But he renounced all his benefices

except the archbishopric, gave the proceeds to charity, and consumed

himself in almost fanatical devotion to the Church. He founded the

order of Oblates of St. Ambrose, brought the Jesuits into Milan, and

vigorously supported all movements for ecclesiastical reform that

remained loyal to Catholicism. Accustomed to wealth and power, he

insisted on the full medieval jurisdiction of his episcopal court,

took into his hands much of the work of maintaining law and order,

filled his archiepiscopal dungeons with criminals and heretics, and

for twenty-four years was the real ruler of the city. Literature and

art suffered under his passion for conformity and morality; but

Pellegrino Tibaldi, architect and painter, flourished under his

patronage, and designed the grandiose choir of the great cathedral.

All the cardinal's severity was forgiven when, in the plague of

1576, while most notables fled, he stayed at his post and comforted

the sick and bereaved with tireless visits, vigils, and prayers.

At Cernobbio, on Lake Como, Cardinal Tolomeo Gallio, perhaps not

sure of another heaven, built the Villa d'Este (1568). At Brescia

Giambattista Moroni, pupil of Moretto, painted some portraits worthy

to stand beside most of Titian's. *05062 In Cremona Vincenzo Campi

carried on the family tradition of painting less than immortal

pictures. At Ferrara Ercole II compromised the long quarrel of his

state with the papacy by paying Paul III 180,000 ducats, and

pledging 7,000 ducats tribute per year. Alfonso II gave the city

another era of prosperity (1558-97), which culminated in the

Gerusalemme liberata of Torquato Tasso and the Pastor fido of

Giovanni Guarini. Girolamo da Carpi learned the art of painting from

Garofolo, but (Vasari says) spent too much time on love and the

lute, and married too soon, to indulge himself in the

self-centeredness of genius.

Piacenza and Parma rose to excited prominence in this age. Though

they had for centuries belonged to Milan, and that duchy was now a

dependency of Charles V, Pope Paul III claimed the two cities as papal

fiefs, and invested his son Pierluigi Farnese with them in 1545. Not

quite two years later the new duke was assassinated at Piacenza by a

revolt of nobles reconciled to his lechery but resenting his

monopoly of power and plums. Paul rightly ascribed the initiative in

the conspiracy to Ferrante Gonzaga, then ruling Milan as vicar for

Charles; and noted that imperial troops, providentially at hand, at

once took possession of Piacenza for the Emperor (1547). Soon after

Paul's death Julius III appointed Pierluigi's son Ottavio Duke of

Parma; and as Ottavio was also Charles's son-in-law, he was allowed to

rule Parma till his death (1586).

No decline was visible in Bologna. Here Vignola designed the Portico

de' Banchi for a group of traders; Antonio Morandi added to the

University an Archiginnasio famous for its noble cortile; and

Sebastiano Serlio wrote an architectural treatise that rivaled

Palladio's in influence. In 1563 Pope Pius IV commissioned Tommaso

Laureti of Palermo to set up a fountain in the Piazza di San Petronio.

The sculptural part of the undertaking was offered to a young

Flemish artist, who now came from Florence and perhaps received his

name from the city in which he produced his greatest work. Giovanni da

Bologna, or Gian Bologna, molded nine figures for the immense

Fontana di Nettuno. At the summit of the group he raised a gigantic

god of the waters, naked and strong; on the corners of the basin he

cast in bronze four happy children in a game with leaping dolphins; at

the feet of Neptune he placed four graceful maidens squeezing

streams of water from their breasts. Bologna sent Gian back to

Florence with florins and praise, and did not grudge the 70,000

florins ($875,000?) that it had spent on the magnificent fountain. The

spirit of civic art was still alive in Italy.

-

As we take our parting look at Renaissance Rome, we are struck by

the rapidity of her recovery from the disaster of 1527. Clement VII

had shown more skill in remedying the ruin than in preventing it.

His surrender to Charles had saved the Papal States, and their

revenues helped the papacy to finance the restoration of Church

discipline and the partial reconstruction of Rome. The full effect

of the Reformation in reduced income was not yet felt in the papal

treasury; and under Paul III the spirit and splendor of the

Renaissance seemed for a moment revived.

Some arts were dying, others were being born or changing form.

Giulio Clovio, a Croatian domiciled with Cardinal Farnese, was

almost the last of the great illuminators of manuscripts. But in

1567 Claudio Monteverdi was born at Cremona; soon opera and oratorio

would be added to the arts; and the polyphonic masses of Palestrina

were already celebrating the reinvigoration of the Church. The great

age of Italian painting was ending; Perino del Vaga and Giovanni da

Udine, epigoni of Raphael, turned the art toward decoration. Sculpture

was becoming baroque; Raffaello da Montelupo and Giovanni da

Montorsoli exaggerated the exaggerations of their master Michelangelo,

and produced statues with limbs contorted into original but bizarre

and ungainly poses.

Architecture was now the most flourishing of the arts. The Farnese

Palace and Gardens on the Palatine were improved by Michelangelo

(1547) and completed by Giacomo della Porta (1580). Antonio da

Sangallo the Younger designed the Pauline Chapel of the Vatican

(1540). In the Sala Regia- leading to the Pauline and Sistine Chapels-

Pope Paul III had the marble floor and paneling designed by this

Sangallo, the walls frescoed by Vasari and the Zuccari brothers, the

ceiling beautifully carved in stucco by Daniele da Volterra and Perino

del Vaga. The papal apartments in Sant' Angelo were embellished with

frescoes and carvings by Perino, Giulio Romano, and Giovanni da Udine.

The second Cardinal Ippolito d'Este built near Tivoh (1549) the

Durant W. The Renaissance. A History of Civilization in Italy from 1304-1576 A.D

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