Palazzo Davanzati is a historic building in the center of
Florence, located in via Porta Rossa 9 and overlooking the
homonymous piazza Davanzati. Inside it houses the Palazzo Davanzati
Museum, born as the Museum of the ancient Florentine house.
The building appears in the list drawn up in 1901 by the Directorate
General of Antiquities and Fine Arts, as a monumental building to be
considered a national artistic heritage.
The palace represents an excellent example of Florentine residential
architecture of the fourteenth century, built towards the middle of the
century by the Davizzi family, wealthy merchants of the Calimala (or
Merchant) art. It was the residence of the Ufficiali della Decima (the
office that collected the complaints from private properties for the
application of taxes), then in 1516 it passed to the Bartolinis, who
sold it in 1578 to Bernardo Davanzati, a famous historian and man of
letters, whose family died out in 1838. The palace enjoyed a certain
splendor at the end of the eighteenth century when it housed the
Accademia degli Armonici, which was attended by composers such as Luigi
Cherubini and Pietro Nardini.
When the last exponent of the
Davanzatis, Carlo, committed suicide in 1838, the property was shortly
afterwards divided into several quarters and suffered, in addition to
various tampering, from progressive abandonment, with the exception of
some restoration work promoted around 1884 by the Orfei property. In
1902, a room in the building was rented by Giovanni Papini and Giuseppe
Prezzolini, together with Giovanni Costetti, Adolfo De Carolis, Alfredo
Bona, Ernesto Macinai, Giuseppe Antonio Borgese, to found the literary
magazine Il Leonardo, published by Vallecchi, which twenty-five issues
were published, from 4 January 1903 to August 1907. It was Papini
himself who testified to the state of deterioration of the building in
the pages of A finished man: «all dirty and dark, with half-ruined
stairs, scratched walls; the half-walled galleries and the great
courtyard full of crooked turns, pissy corners and abandoned crates».
In 1904 the building, which narrowly escaped the nineteenth-century
demolitions, was purchased by the antiquarian Elia Volpi who restored it
with complex works that lasted five years, enhancing the characteristics
of the fourteenth-century residence, furnishing it accordingly, so as to
constitute a suitable scenario for the exhibition of the many works of
art collected. It was in this period that numerous ancient wall
decorations were recovered, restored and integrated by the painter
Silvio Zanchi. In 1910 Volpi made it the seat of his antiquarian gallery
and opened it to the public for the first time as a private museum of
"the ancient Florentine house", which was immediately much loved by
foreign collectors and travellers, who often visited it to get ideas for
the furnishing of their homes. In 1916 Volpi organized a memorable
auction in New York, where he sold the entire furniture of the building
with a great profit: the event is remembered as an important stage for
the diffusion of neo-Renaissance taste in the United States.
In
1920 the house had been refurnished and again the furniture was sold in
1924, but this time instead of being lost it was bought by the antique
dealers of Egyptian origin Vitale and Leopoldo Bengujat, who also rented
the building and soon purchased (1926), facilitated by a series of
commercial misfortunes of Volpi. In 1934 the furniture was auctioned off
and bought by the Spanish Art Gallery.
Subsequently, "at the
outbreak of the Second World War, the building, now owned by a London
antiquarian group, was requisitioned and given to Monte dei Paschi to
manage: it was used as an office for ration cards and consumption
control for the Municipality of Florence; electrical systems office of
the State Railways Provincial Censorship Commission At the end of the
war the building was returned to the owner and through Count Alessandro
Contini Bonacossi it was purchased by the State in 1951".
Intended to house the Museo dell'Antica Casa Fiorentina, inaugurated in
1956, the building underwent new restorations directed by Alfredo
Barbacci, and had a new decor under the care of Filippo Rossi and
Luciano Berti, seeing here paintings, furnishings and objects of
domestic use from the Bargello National Museum, the Florentine Galleries
and private donations.
Due to serious instability to the
structure, the museum was closed in 1995 and the factory involved in a
complex consolidation intervention directed by the architect Laura
Baldini and then by Fulvia Zeuli with the advice of the engineer
Leonardo Paolini, until the progressive reopening of the rooms starting
in 2007 until June 2009.
Overall, despite the many alterations,
the building remains one of the most significant examples of Florentine
stately homes of the fourteenth century, also thanks to the windows, the
horse bells and the pole shoes, obviously the result of modern additions
and in any case more than plausible .
The front of the building is narrow and high, marked on the sandstone
rusticated ground floor by three large arches, and on the three upper
floors by five axes of lowered arched windows, which illuminate the
halls and are underlined by string course frames. Above is a large
loggia (from the 16th century) covered by a very protruding roof. Also
from the sixteenth century is the large shield with the Davanzati arms
placed in the center of the facade (already supposed by tradition to be
from the fifteenth century and attributed to the art of Donatello, but
in reality it is clearly a Mannerist work, from the time of Bernardo
Davanzati). On the facade there are numerous erri (r-shaped decorations)
and other probably neo-medieval iron structures, which originally had
various structural and decorative functions: for example, colored
drapes, clothes to hang or cages with birds could be placed there. On
the sides of the windows you can still see the torch holders or flag
holders.
The building did not enjoy architectural fame, because
it was considered inharmonious due to the tall and narrow facade.
Ground floor
Lobby
Crossing the threshold of the door, you
enter a room that was once the private loggia of the family, open onto
the street. Over time, shops were also kept here, plugging up the
openings.
It is covered by cross vaults and divided into three
bays. On the ceiling you can see four defense machicolations, openings
with which it was possible to monitor the loggia from the first floor
and chase away any aggressors by throwing bullets and boiling liquids. A
coat of arms of the Corbinellis and other coats of arms of the Davizzis
can be seen painted on the front wall. Detached fragments of wall
paintings, very similar to those in the rooms of the palace in the upper
rooms, come from the houses of the Davanzati, Pilli and Lamberti
families which, once in the adjacent alleys, were demolished during the
Renovation of Florence. Two marble plaques recall the restoration works
of the time of Elia Volpi. In the showcases there are some photographic
memories of the ancient arrangement of the antiquarian and some of his
colleagues who succeeded him in the property, and memorabilia, such as
the ancient album of visitors' signatures.
Courtyard
The
evocative courtyard is the center of the building, from which the floors
above can be seen spectacularly in a maze of stairs, passages and
galleries. The courtyard has rings for tying horses and a private wall
well in a corner, a real luxury for the time, which, using a system of
pulleys, made it possible to hoist water to all floors of the building.
Numerous drips conveyed the rainwater towards the center of the
courtyard where, within a slightly sloping impluvium, it flowed into the
cistern in the basement, which fed the well.
The courtyard has a
portico on two sides made up of arches, vaults and octagonal pillars
with capitals decorated with foliage, except one which is admirably
sculpted with figures, perhaps members of the Davizzi family. There are
two coats of arms of the Davanzatis, one of which dates back to the 15th
century and, coming from another demolished residence, shows the coat of
arms surmounted by the papal insignia and an inscription which recalls
Giuliano Davanzati's appointment as knight of the golden spur in 1434.
Three doors equipped with wrought iron gates communicate with the
alleys that surround the building: from here passed mules and donkeys
carrying the supplies stored in the cellars.
In the perimeter
part there is a carved chest (northern Italy, 17th century), a chest
(Lombardy, end of the 17th century) and fragments of wall decorations
from 14th and 15th century houses, such as Ladies and Knights in a Wood
by an unknown artist referable in the context of the late Gothic of the
mid-fifteenth century. A genealogical tree of shortly after 1676
summarizes the relationships of the Davanzati family.
A rather
steep stone staircase on the left side, supported by flying buttresses
and corbels, leads to the floors, which protrude on large corbels
towards the courtyard itself. Next to the first ramp is a detached
fresco of the Madonna and Child, perhaps from the Umbrian school of the
second half of the 13th century, from the demolished church of San
Salvatore in Mantua.
The first and subsequent floors follow an almost identical layout of the rooms. Overlooking the street is a large rectangular hall (to the north, also called "sala madornale"), which leads, on the opposite side, to two service rooms (east) and a large trapezoidal room (west). The latter is often equipped with a "comfort" (bathroom) at the tip and borders on a smaller study on the south side, which can also be equipped with commodities, which on the second floor is shared with that of the bedroom. The room, equipped with independent access from the balcony along the courtyard, is in the south-east corner, and protrudes in plan creating a spur in the back alleys: probably these rooms, not aligned with the rest of the plan, must have been part of a ancient independent tower-house of the Davizzi family, which was later incorporated into the palace.
On the first floor there is a "major" hall, which corresponds to the
loggia on the ground floor, a dining room, a study and a bedroom, which
correspond to the courtyard porch.
The main hall, with five
windows and a richly decorated ceiling (14th century original in the
first and second bay to the right as you enter, 15th century in the
third and fourth), has hooks for drapes and tapestries on the walls.
There are two column tapestries and a back with grotesques from the
Florentine tapestry of the first half of the seventeenth century.
Hanging on the entrance wall are three busts of Roman emperors in glazed
terracotta, the work of Benedetto Buglioni.
On a
fifteenth-century Tuscan sideboard there are some sculptures, such as a
Madonna del libro from the Ferrara school (about 1450), a Madonna della
Misericordia with Serragli coats of arms attributed to Marco della
Robbia and from Carmine (1528), a painted altarpiece from the Florentine
school 1450-1475 circa, a statuette of a holy pope from the Lombard
school (perhaps by the De Donati brothers) from around 1490-1510.
On the wall along the road are two walnut high chairs of Italian
manufacture from around 1650, and a cabinet inlaid with geometric motifs
(Florentine workshop from the 15th century), which is surmounted by a
marble bust of a boy, attributed to Antonio Rossellino.
In the
center of the room, on a 16th century Florentine walnut table, there are
two caskets in the same material and coeval in date and workmanship. On
the right wall, a pair of Medici-made column tapestries from around
1550-1600, and a Tuscan wardrobe with three doors (16th century), on
which are placed two Sienese candle-bearing angels and the Madonna and
Child in stucco and plaster, previously attributed to the workshop of
Lorenzo Ghiberti and recently reassigned by Luciano Bellosi to the
Master of the San Pietro di Orsanmichele, i.e. the young Filippo
Brunelleschi. The tondo with the Madonna and Child and two saints is of
Tuscan workmanship and can be dated to around 1475-1500.
In the
hall there is also a Madonna and Child enthroned in polychrome wood
(Umbrian school, mid-13th century).
In the first room adjacent to the hall, the collection of needle and bobbin lace of European manufacture is exhibited, as well as embroideries, all datable between the 16th and 20th centuries. The collection of "learning tools" is interesting, i.e. those pieces with the most imaginative motifs used as an exercise in learning the art of embroidery.
The most famous room of the building is what was perhaps a dining
room, covered with restored late fourteenth-century frescoes that
imitate draperies and tapestries, with the ornamental motif of parrots,
hence the name of Sala dei Parrots. Trees and small columns are painted
in the upper register.
The sideboard on the right and the wall
cabinets house a collection of ceramic furnishings: basins, jugs and
small bowls with archaic decoration from the 14th and 15th centuries
made in Florence, Umbria and Lazio; in the high sideboard examples of
17th century Montelupo majolica. In front of the wall fireplace there is
a seventeenth-century bellows of Italian production. The "armario" is of
Bolognese manufacture from the first half of the 15th century and above
it hangs a tondo with the Madonna and Child with saints, painted by the
Florentine school from the end of the 16th century. The bas-relief with
the Madonna and Child in stucco is instead the work of the school of
Desiderio da Settignano.
The refectory chairs, a 16th century
sideboard from a Tuscan workshop and various objects complete the
furnishings: a casket with iron rods (16th century Italian art), and two
waffle irons in the fireplace.
The nearby studiolo contains various pictorial works: two panels by
Scheggia with the Triumvirs questioning the oracle and the Story of
Susanna; the Stories of Andromeda and other espaliers by Maestro di
Serumido and Antonio di Donnino del Mazziere, which copy, simplifying,
paintings by Piero di Cosimo; a Portrait of a Tuscan school sculptor
from the 16th century.
The piece of furniture contains a
terracotta of the announced Madonna by Antonio Rizzo, a work done for
the orphanage in Ferrara. The writing desk is from a Florentine workshop
from the 16th century, the cabinet is from the Veneto region from the
beginning of the 16th century and the iron safe is from Lombardy from
the second half of the 16th century.
In the center of the room is
a 16th-century Florentine coin cabinet and a small bronze statue of the
Medici Venus attributed to Massimiliano Soldani Benzi.
A narrow corridor leads to the nuptial chamber, also known as the
"Sala dei Pavoni" from the frescoes on the walls, with a fake wallpaper
with geometric motifs (with lions, crowns and lilies of France) and a
row of coats of arms of families allied to the Davizzis peacocks and
other figures.
The "Genovese" bed was produced in Tuscany in the
second half of the sixteenth century, while the cradle is Lombard, from
the seventeenth century. Finally, the kneeler is of Tuscan workmanship
from the 16th century. There is the domestic devotional painting, a
triptych with the Coronation of the Virgin in the centre, Tobiolo and
the angel and Saint Paul and the Annunciation in the compartments,
attributed to Neri di Bicci, which frame a terracotta Madonna and Child
from the school by Desiderio da Settignano.
lounge area
The hall, similar to the one on the lower floor, has
four Flemish tapestries on the walls with Stories of David and Bathsheba
(15th century), a stucco Madonna by Gregorio di Lorenzo (about 1470),
small bronzes from the 15th and 16th centuries, a painting with portrait
of Giovanni di Bicci de' Medici attributable to Zanobi Strozzi, a
Madonna del Latte by Bicci di Lorenzo (workshop, circa 1420-30), a
Madonna and Child from the workshop of Jacopo di Cione and two panels by
the Maestro di Marradi, perhaps from a predella. In a niche on the wall,
three historiated ceramic plates from Urbino (16th century).
Standing out among the furniture is a chest with back (Florence, second
half of the 16th century), a 16th-century table with 20th-century
restorations, on which stands out a Venetian chest from the second half
of the 16th century with oriental decorations, and a similar example of
smaller size. Above the 16th century Tuscan sideboard (remodeled in the
19th century), a wooden triptych with the Coronation of the Virgin
(about 1390-1410), a bust of a nun (Florentine art from the beginning of
the 16th century), and a small crucifix shaped and painted attributed to
Jacopo del Sellaio. On the wall with the doors, a Florentine Adoration
of the Child from the second half of the 15th century, a
Lombard-Piedmontese wooden relief with St. John the Baptist and a Tuscan
16th-17th century reliquary box, remodeled in the 19th century.
The dining room contains various examples of glazed terracotta from
various Italian manufacturers, including a collection of
eighteenth-century salt cellars, seven eighteenth-century shoe-shaped
hand warmers from the Ariano or Cerreto factories, a collection of
majolica dishes from Castelli, Orvieto and of Viterbo. An "armario"
(furniture with doors to contain weapons) of the Sienese school (perhaps
tampered with in the 19th century) has doors painted by Sodoma's pupil
Bartolomeo di David (about 1530). Here a painted chest is from the 16th
century with alterations, and the plaque with Flight into Egypt between
Saint Catherine of Siena and the Alberti coat of arms of the Sienese
school from around 1550-1600. The panel with the blessing Christ is by
Mariotto di Nardo (c. 1400-1410), and the panel with the Capture of
Christ is from the school of Sandro Botticelli.
The furnishings
are completed by an antique-style 20th-century walnut table, on which is
arranged a collection of medieval and Renaissance caskets of French and
Italian workmanship. The garland of flowers and fruit is from the
workshop of Benedetto Buglioni, the cedar chest with carvings and Indian
ink decorations is from northern Italy around 1550-1600, the painting of
St. Joseph ordering the search for the cup is attributed to Francesco
Granacci , the marble relief of a cherub by Leonardo de' Vegni (about
1770-80) and the tapestry with the Allegory of Fortress is of Florentine
manufacture (Pietro Févère, 1654).
The study on the second floor is similar in size to that on the
first. There are two trousseau chests (Lombard workshop and northern
Italian workshop from the end of the 15th century), a "lettuccio" from a
Tuscan-Umbrian workshop from the 15th-16th centuries with inlays
(restored in the 19th century) and four semicircular tables painted by
Scheggia, with some Triumphs by Petrarca: Triumph of Love, Death, Fame
and Eternity, as well as the panel with the Stories of Susanna.
Other works are: the tabernacle with Santo Stefano is the work of
Spinello Aretino; a small bronze of Venus and Cupid from the workshop of
Tiziano Aspetti (about 1590-1600); a profile of a young man in marble
from the Florentine school (about 1450-1500) and a Saint from the
Lombard school from the 15th century. In a late 15th-early 16th century
frame is the Trinity with Saints Dominic and Jerome from the school of
Jacopo del Sellaio;. The Initiation of Icarus is perhaps an early work
by Andrea del Sarto.
On the second floor, the bedroom is the only room that retains the
fresco decoration (the others are wall paintings). In a figurative band
there is a series of stories of love, adventure and death, taken from
the medieval legend of the Castellana di Vergi.
In 2007 the
entire hall was restored. The wall paintings mainly executed on a single
somewhat smooth plaster (there are no days of execution), present a
brush drawing based on red clay, ocher and verdaccio in fresco, while
the actual painting was made with the use of egg tempera and the use of
pigments based on red lead, white lead, green earth, chalk, vermilion
and azurite, used pure or mixed together.
As for the furnishings,
the bed with columns is from a Tuscan workshop (16th century with
additions from the 19th century) and there are also a cradle (Southern
Italy, 18th century), a kneeler (Tuscany, 17th century), a carved chest
(Tuscany, end of the 16th century), a chest painted with scenes from the
Judgment of Paris (Florence, around 1425-1450) and a coffer (Sienese
workshop from the first half of the 14th century). A niche in the wall
preserves a Crucifixion of the Florentine school from the first half of
the fourteenth century.
The painted birth tray, located just
above, is attributed to the Maestro del Cassone Adimari, probably lo
Scheggia (Masaccio's brother), and represents the Game of the civettino.
A group of caskets decorated with pastiglia in a showcase date back to
the second half of the 15th century and are produced in Ferrara or
Padua.
On the bed (central Italy 16th century) a rare Italian
filet blanket from the 19th century. The table with the Madonna del
parto is attributed to Rossello di Jacopo Franchi.
On the third floor is the Camera delle Impannate, with the walls
painted with a frieze of an orchard with vases. The bed is ancient, from
the 16th century, with elements from the 17th and 19th centuries; the
embroidered blanket is of Sicilian manufacture from the 19th century. It
preserves a Tuscan chest from the first half of the 15th century, a 16th
century mirror remodeled in the 19th century, a wrought iron torch
(perhaps 14th century), an 18th century cradle, two 17th century dwarf
chairs, a 17th century prie-dieu; in the fireplace andirons and iron
tools from the 17th and 19th centuries. In the niches on the walls, a
processional mannequin from a Sienese workshop from the early 16th
century and a painted terracotta Saint Onofrio referred, after the
restoration, to the circle of Jacopo Sansovino. A glass cabinet has
antique pillows and slippers; the Madonna and Child in stucco derives
from a prototype by Benedetto da Maiano.
On the top floor was the
kitchen, placed high up to avoid impregnating the house with fumes and
vapors and also to allow quick escape in the event of fire. Today it is
furnished with a cupboard from Northern Italy (second half of the 16th
century), a table from a Tuscan workshop (end of the 16th century) and
various ancient utensils and women's work tools: kneader, rotisserie,
juicer, lamps, looms, iron for ironing, reel for spinning, etc.
The adjoining room, which corresponds to the halls on the lower floors,
contains a chest from a Sienese workshop from the 14th century and some
didactic panels on daily life in the 14th century.