Lucrezia Maria Romola de’ Medici – noblewoman

Daughter of Lorenzo the Magnificent supported popes and poets

Lucrezia de' Medici

Lucrezia Maria Romola de’ Medici, who as a newborn baby inspired Sandro Botticelli’s depiction of baby Jesus in one of his paintings, was born on this day in 1470 in the Republic of Florence.

After her brother became Pope Leo X, Lucrezia helped him fund papal building projects in Florence and Rome. She also raised money to pay a ransom and secure the release of her husband when he was taken prisoner by the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V.

She had 11 children, many of whom were to play an important part in the history of Renaissance Europe.  

Lucrezia was the eldest daughter of Lorenzo de’ Medici and Clarice Orsini. After her birth, Botticelli painted Our Lady of the Magnificat, which is now in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, and used her image as a baby as the model for the figure of the newborn Christ in his masterpiece.

She grew up to be married to Florentine politician Jacopo Salviati in 1488 and brought a dowry of 2000 florins with her. But after her brothers were exiled from Florence, she was unable to help them because her husband was a supporter of the new rulers.

In 1497 she spent 3000 ducats to support a plot to bring her brother, Piero, to power in the city. The plot failed and all the men involved in it were executed, but Lucrezia was spared from harm because she was a woman.

Lucrezia is thought to have inspired
Botticelli's depiction of baby Jesus

Afterwards she worked to build more support for the Medici family and organised a marriage for her niece, Clarice de’ Medici, to Filippo Strozzi the Younger, even though it was against the wishes of the rulers of Florence at the time.

When her brother, Giuliano, returned to Florence in 1512, he asked for her advice on how to restructure the government of the city.

Another of Lucrezia’s brothers, Giovanni di Lorenzo de’ Medici, became Pope Leo X in 1513, and during the celebrations in Florence, Lucrezia and her family gave out money and gifts to the crowds who gathered outside their palace.

By 1514, Leo X had drained the Vatican treasuries and had to pawn the papal tiara, which was worth 44,000 ducats, to Lucrezia and her husband.

Lorenzo the Magnificent
was Lucrezia's father

After Leo X had appointed Lucrezia’s son, Giovanni, a cardinal, Lucrezia managed his household and office for him, especially when he was travelling as a papal legate, and she used her influence to promote Medici causes in Rome.

When the Medici were again exiled from Florence in 1527, Lucrezia’s husband, Jacopo, was taken prisoner by Charles V along with her cousin, who had become Pope Clement VII, and she worked to gather money for a ransom to get them released.

During her life, Lucrezia supported convents in Florence, funding new dormitories, cloisters, and workshops, and she also paid for the building of chapels in Rome, including a chapel that would be a resting place for members of the Medici family.

She corresponded with Niccolò Machiavelli about editing a biography of Alexander the Great and was a patron of the poet, Girolamo Benivieni.  With Benivieni, she petitioned her brother, Pope Leo X, to support their efforts to bring the body of the poet, Dante Alighieri, back to his home town of Florence.

After her husband, Jacopo, died in 1533, Lucrezia survived him by 20 years. She died at the age of 83. Of their children, Maria Salviati (1499–1543) was married to Lodovico de' Medici, uniting two branches of the Medici family, while Bernardo Salviati (1505/1508 - 1568) served Catherine de' Medici in France.

Lorenzo de' Medici was living at the family
villa in Careggi at the time of Lucrezia's birth

Travel tip:

Lorenzo de’ Medici, Lucrezia’s father, who is usually known as Lorenzo the Magnificent, lived at the Villa Medici at Careggi, originally a working farm acquired in 1417 by Cosimo de’ Medici’s father to help make his family self-sufficient. Cosimo employed the architect Michelozzo, who was considered one of the great pioneers of building design during the Renaissance, to remodel it around a central courtyard overlooked by loggias. Lorenzo - Cosimo’s grandson - extended the terraced garden and the shaded woodland area. After his death, in 1492, the villa was allowed to become somewhat run down until the early 17th century, when Cardinal Carlo de' Medici commissioned the remodelling of the interior, and updated the garden. Careggi, which is not far from Florence’s airport, is nowadays a suburb of the city, about 8km (5 miles) northwest of the centre.

The Piazzale degli Uffizi in Florence
offers access to the Uffizi Gallery

Travel tip:

The Uffizi Gallery evolved from a building project that began in around 1560, when the artist and architect Giorgio Vasari was engaged to build offices for the Florentine magistrates, hence the name uffizi (offices). Cosimo I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, who commissioned the building, planned to display prime art works of the Medici collections in a part of the complex lit by a wall of windows .  Over the years, more sections of the palace were recruited to exhibit paintings and sculptures collected or commissioned by the Medici.  In 1765 it was officially opened to the public as an art gallery. Located in Piazzale degli Uffizi, it is close to Piazza della Signoria and the Palazzo Vecchio. Opening hours today are from 8.15 am until 6.50 pm from Tuesday to Sunday.

Also on this day:

1463: The birth of Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de’ Medici

1521: The birth of Pope Urban VII

1994: The death of politician Giovanni Spadolini

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Alesso Baldovinetti - painter

One of first to paint realistic landscapes

A self-portrait of Alesso Baldovinetti from a fragment of
damaged fresco, now in the Accademia Carrara in Bergamo

The early Renaissance painter Alesso Baldovinetti, whose great fresco of the Annunciation in the cloister of the Basilica of the Santissima Annunziata in Florence is still intact, was born on this day in 1425 in Florence.

Baldovinetti was among a group described as scientific realists and naturalists in art which included Andrea del Castagno, Paolo Uccello and Domenico Veneziano. Influenced by Uccello’s use of visual perspective, he had a particular eye for detail and his views of the Arno river in his Nativity and Madonna are regarded as among Europe’s earliest paintings of accurately reproduced landscapes.

Veneziano’s influence is reflected in the pervasive light of his earliest surviving works, and he was also greatly influenced by Fra Angelico. Historians believe that in the 1460s Baldovinetti was the finest painter in Florence, although some argue that he did not fulfil all his initial promise.

Born into the family of a wealthy Florentine merchant, Baldovinetti rejected the chance to follow his father’s trade in favour of art.

Baldovinetti's Nativity in the Basilica of Santissimi Annunziata
in Florence with the Arno river in the background

In 1448, he became a member of the Accademia di San Luca in Rome. It is thought that he assisted with decorations in the church of Sant’ Egidio in Trastevere, with Veneziano and del Castagno, with whom he later collaborated on the frescoes in the Santa Maria Nuova in Florence.

Apart from his frescoes in the Annunziata basilica in Florence, other surviving works include those done for the chapel decorations in the Basilica of San Miniato al Monte, also in his home city.  It is regrettable that he did not help some of his work by using a mixture of yolk of egg and liquid varnish - his own invention - to protect his paintings from damp, but which in the event caused them to deteriorate more quickly.

Baldovinetti worked on several pieces for the church of Santa Trinita, where he painted an altarpiece of the Virgin Mary and child with the saints Gualberto and Benedetto, which is now in the Academy of Florence.

Baldovinetti's Annunziation

During this period, Baldovinetti also gained a reputation as one of the best mosaic workers of the day, earning praise for his restoration of the mosaics at the San Miniato.

Two of his works are in the Uffizi Gallery, including an Annunciation and Madonna and Child with Saints. The National Gallery in London has a Portrait of a Lady in Yellow that for centuries was wrongly attributed to Piero della Francesca, while there is a Madonna and Child in the Louvre in Paris.

Among Baldovinetti’s own pupils was Domenico Ghirlandaio, who went on to become a major figure in the so-called "third generation" of the Florentine Renaissance, a contemporary of Verrocchio and Sandro Botticelli.

Baldovinetti died in August 1499 at the age of 73 and was buried in the Basilica of San Lorenzo.

The facade of the Basilica della Santissima Annunziata
in the San Marco district of Florence

Travel tip:

The Basilica della Santissima Annunziata is in the Piazza della Santissima Annunziata in the San Marco district of Florence. The church was founded in 1250 and rebuilt by Michelozzo between 1444 and 1481. Frescoes by Andrea del Sarto can be seen in the atrium of the church. Newly wed couples traditionally visit the church to present a bouquet of flowers to a painting of the Virgin by a 13th century monk, where they pray for a long and fruitful marriage.

The church of Santa Trinita, where Balodovinetti
worked on a number of pieces

Travel tip:

The church of Santa Trinita, which overlooks the square of the same name, can easily be reached by walking down the elegant Via de' Tornabuoni towards the Arno. Standing near the Santa Trinita bridge, it was founded in the middle of the 11th century. Originally built in a simple Romanesque style, it was later was enlarged and restored following Gothic lines. The church’s Sassetti Chapel contains 15th-century frescoes by Domenico Ghirlandaio.

More reading:

The humble friar who became one of the greatest artists of the 15th century

Why the talent of Sandro Botticelli was forgotten for four centuries

How Piero della Francesca applied geometry and maths to his work

Also on this day:

1628: The death of painter Palma Giovane

1963: The birth of singer Alessandro Safina


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Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de’ Medici - politician

Art enthusiast who was Botticelli’s major patron

Botticelli's 1479 Portrait of a Young Man,
is thought to be Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco

The Florentine banker and politician Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de’ Medici, who was a significant figure in Renaissance art as the main sponsor and patron of the painter Sandro Botticelli, was born on this day in 1463.

The great-grandson of Giovanni di Bicci de’ Medici, the founder of the Medici bank, Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco belonged to the junior, sometimes known as ‘Popolani’ branch of the House of Medici.

In 1476, when he and his brother, Giovanni, were still boys, their father, Pierfrancesco de’ Medici the Elder, died. They became wards, effectively, of their cousin, Lorenzo il Magnifico - Lorenzo the Magnificent - a member of the senior branch of the family and the effective ruler of Florence.

Relations between the two branches had been tense for some years and were not helped when Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco discovered, on becoming an adult, that Lorenzo had plundered a considerable sum from he and his brother’s joint inheritance in order to stave off a threatened bankruptcy of the family’s financial empire.

Although Lorenzo had provided the boys with the best education money could buy - the notable Florentine Renaissance humanists Marsilio Ficino, Angelo Poliziano and Giorgio Antonio Vespucci (uncle of Amerigo) were among their tutors - and given them a number of properties in compensation, the incident created a lingering bitterness.

Meanwhile, thanks to the curiosities stirred by the education he received, Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco developed a reputation as an art connoisseur. In around 1485, he commissioned an illuminated manuscript of Dante's Divine Comedy featuring artwork by Botticelli, to whom he had been introduced by the Vespucci family, who were neighbours of the Botticellis in Florence.

Botticelli's Primavera is thought to have been commissioned
to celebrate Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco's marriage

Two of Sandro Botticelli’s most famous works may have been commissioned to celebrate the marriage that Lorenzo il Magnifico arranged between Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco and Semiramide Appiano, daughter of the Appiani lord Jacopo III of Piombino.

It is thought that Lorenzo il Magnifico commissioned Botticelli's Pallas Athene Taming a Centaur as a wedding gift to the new couple, while either Lorenzo il Magnifico or Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco himself had Botticelli paint his allegorical work Primavera as a celebration, with Mercury representing Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco and Semiramide by the central figure of Grace.

After the wedding, both paintings were displayed on the walls of Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco’s villa in the centre of Florence. Some accounts suggest that he also commissioned Botticelli's best known work, The Birth of Venus, one of the most famous paintings of the Renaissance by any artist.

The tension that still existed between him and Lorenzo il Magnifico came to a head in October 1484, when his cousin, determined to protect the primacy of the senior branch of the Medici family, had Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco's name removed from the lists of persons eligible for election to the Florentine political institutions.

Angelo Bronzino's portrait of the Florentine
leader Lorenzo il Magnifico

A settlement was agreed in 1485 by which Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco and his brother were given the Medici family property of Villa Cafaggiolo in the Mugello region. Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco was unhappy, though, at having to shelve his political ambitions.

When Lorenzo il Magnifico died in 1492, Lorenzo and Giovanni sided against il Magnifico's son, Piero. They were exiled as a result but returned when King Charles VIII of France invaded Italy and Piero was ousted from Florence by a Republican government.

The nickname Popolano - meaning ‘of the people’ - was coined for the brothers and Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco became a popular figure in the new administration. He extended his patronage of the arts to protect Botticelli, Michelangelo, Filippino Lippi and Bartolomeo Scala, and in 1494 he founded a workshop of ceramics at Cafaggiolo.

He was pushed out when the hellfire preacher Girolamo Savonarola swept to power in 1494 with his denunciation of clerical corruption, despotic rule and the exploitation of the poor, yet refused to return even after the controversial Dominican friar was burned at the stake in the main square of the city in 1498.

Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco died in Florence in 1503, aged only 39. Years later, his grandson Lorenzino de' Medici murdered Alessandro de' Medici, the last ruler of Florence from the senior branch of the Medici, thereby passing power to Lorenzo's great-grandson Cosimo I de' Medici.

The Villa del Trebbio, which Cosimo de' Medici turned
into a fortified castle

Travel tip:

One of the properties owned by Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco was the Villa del Trebbio, which he inherited from his grandfather Lorenzo the Elder.  Located near San Piero a Sieve in the Mugello region, the area from which the Medici family originated, it was possibly the first of the Medici villas built outside Florence, on top of a hill dominating the Val di Sieve. It had earlier belonged to Giovanni di Bicci de' Medici, the founder of the Medici bank, and was remodelled by his son, Cosimo de' Medici, whose architect, Michelozzo, restyled it as a fortified castle.

The Piazzale between the two wings of the Uffizi, which links
Piazza della Signoria with the Arno river

Travel tip:

Primavera, Pallas Athene Taming a Centaur and The Birth of Venus are among a number of Botticelli paintings displayed in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, which is one of the largest and best known art museums in the world. Its collection of priceless works, particularly from the period of the Italian Renaissance, owes much to Anna Maria Luisa de' Medici, the last Medici heiress, who bequeathed the family’s entire art collection to the city of Florence. The Uffizi was open to visitors by request as early as the 16th century, and in 1765 it was officially opened to the public.

More reading:

Why Lorenzo the Magnificent was seen as a benign despot

Cosimo de' Medici  - the first Medici ruler of Florence

How Sandro Botticelli's paintings became forgotten works of genius

Also on this day:

1521: The birth of Pope Urban VII

1994: The death of politician Giovanni Spadolini

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