Palazzo Nonfinito is a historic building in Florence, located
with the main front on via del Proconsolo 12, but with a notable
prospect also on Borgo degli Albizi 32, of which it determines the
corner called Canto de' Pazzi. The origin of the name lies in the
fact that many architects have started it and no one has ever
"finished" it. This denomination can be read for the first time in a
guide to Florence published in 1822 corrected by Bartolomeo Follini.
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 literature on Palazzo Nonfinito is quite vast. There are many
hypotheses advanced by historians on the origins of its construction,
but only at the beginning of the last century did the historian Jodoco
Del Badia report a chronology, supported by archival indications, where
events, clients and the first designer are precisely cited.
The
palace was erected over some houses and towers, properties that
Alessandro Strozzi had purchased from Camillo de' Pazzi, father of Saint
Maria Maddalena de' Pazzi, in November 1592. Other adjacent properties
belonging to the Niccolini and Perini families were incorporated; after
the demolition of a very popular apothecary's shop, construction began
in July 1593, as reported in an inscription on the tribune in Borgo
Albizi. Alessandro, due to financial difficulties, was forced to sell
the entire complex to his brother Roberto, half in 1596 and the other
half the following year. Often absent for long business stays in Venice,
Roberto nevertheless left the direction of the works to his brother,
exempting him from sharing the costs. Another brother, Bernardo, made
available the stones extracted from his own quarry located in Le Campora
(near the Marignolle hill). In the request for permission from the
municipality for the construction of windows, the architect Bernardo
Buontalenti is mentioned.
It is probable that for the project
Buontalenti drew inspiration from the work of Michelangelo, whose works
he often studied.
The first news of the building is found in the treatise The Idea of
Universal Architecture by Vincenzo Scamozzi, an architect from Vicenza
called, according to him, by Roberto Strozzi with the task of designing.
He fully claimed the authorship of the work; the affirmation could not
be denied by Buontalenti himself, because he had been dead for some
years, but it was by later historians who instead highlighted the
alternation of several architects.
Around the middle of the
seventeenth century Gherardo Silvani in his Life of Bernardo Buontalenti
attributed the facade of Borgo degli Albizi to Buontalenti.
In
1724 Ferdinando Ruggeri in the Civil Architecture Studio provided the
first survey of the building and attributed the construction to several
architects, without however indicating the sources.
Filippo
Baldinucci, documenting the construction phases, provided the following
chronology, also taken up in 1910 by Walther Limburger:
from 1593 to
1600 the project by Bernardo Buontalenti was carried out, assisted by
Matteo Nigetti. The beginning of the works, the construction of the
ground floor, the portal of Borgo degli Albizi and the kneeling windows
are attributed to them.
In 1600, having come into conflict with the
Strozzis regarding the location of the main staircase, later built to
the right of the atrium by the architect Santi di Tito, Buontalenti
abandoned the construction site.
from 1600 to 1612 Vincenzo Scamozzi
was given the task of completing the design and Giovanni Battista
Caccini of directing the execution of the works. The very high entrance
on via del Proconsolo and the first floor decorated with giant order
Ionic pilasters are attributed to them. Furthermore, Caccini, better
known as a sculptor, was attributed the marble coat of arms of the
Strozzi placed at the top corner of the building. Scamozzi probably had
Buontalenti's drawings at his disposal, from which he took his cue but,
contrary to what he said, he found the factory already underway.
Furthermore, the chronological list of his works reports other important
construction sites in the Veneto and in Salzburg in the same period,
commitments that certainly limited his stay in the city and his presence
on the construction site. It is reasonable to assume that he only had
time to take stock of the work already done, provide a new project and
find an architect to carry it out.
around 1604 Lodovico Cardi known
as il Cigoli, a pupil of Buontalenti, built the courtyard.
From
1612 onwards, when Caccini died, Nigetti returned again to direct the
works.
In both Buontalenti's and Scamozzi's plans, the building included two
more floors, but in fact not even the interiors or the main façade were
completed, a fact that led to the current name of the building
"Nonfinito".
Other information, about the construction phases of
the interiors and the transfer of ownership, is contained in the text by
Luigi Biadi, Notizie sulle antica Fabbrica di Firenze unfinished. Even
in the absence of archival evidence, Biadi believed that the reason that
prevented the completion of the building was the traditionally narrated
rivalry between important families. He writes:
«Many disputes had
arisen between the family that descended from Duke Salviati, between
that of the Medici and Roberto Strozzi. The Salviatis demanded, leaving
aside questions not of interest to the purpose, that Roberto Strozzi did
not continue the construction of the palace; and they demanded it, or
perhaps because they were overcome by the fanatical prejudice that sadly
dominated most of the grandees in past centuries, that is, of not
allowing the new construction of a building either nearby, or almost
opposite, or with greater splendor than its own [ …] Strozzi, not
wanting to submit to such a harsh law, refusing to compromise on this
and the remaining disputes that had arisen, the Salviatis and the
Medicis appealed to the Giudiciara Power, making a request to inhibit in
the first place the continuation of the construction of the palace and
to decide on all the heads of the question against Strozzi himself. It
is said that the sentence was issued in any favorable relation to the
Salviatis and de' Medici. [...] useless wherever the search for the
aforementioned sentence remained..."
(Luigi Biadi)
Although a
large plaque from 1607, placed above the portal of Borgo degli Albizi in
memory of the munificence of Ferdinando I de' Medici, would suggest more
relaxed relations at least with the Medici, Biadi believed that the
impediment had been the true cause of the non-completion, without which
Roberto Strozzi could have easily completed the work with the
collaboration of Scamozzi, or Caccini, or Cigoli; Biadi does not mention
probable economic problems of the Strozzi family.
Changes of
ownership and intended uses
From the Strozzi family in 1802 the
property passed to Giovanni Guasti who in 1814 resold it to the Royal
Government of Tuscany; Pasquale Poccianti was called to adapt the
premises to accommodate the offices of the Royal Customs, the
departments of the Chamber of Community and the Super Mayor, and the
office of the Mendicità Deputation. In 1850 the Prefecture, the
Foreigners' Office and the Delegation of the San Giovanni district were
located there.
Passed from 1865 to the Kingdom of Italy, in the
period of Florence Capital (1865-1871) the palace was chosen as the seat
of the Council of State and involved in works of consolidation,
restoration and decoration of some rooms designed by the architect
Francesco Mazzei, with the direction of the construction site entrusted
to the engineer Nicola Nasi.
It was purchased and used by the
Post and Telegraphs from 1901 to 1911 (since the central post office
building in via Pellicceria had not yet been built); in 1917 it was
occupied by military offices after adequate works for the barracks.
Museum of Anthropology and Ethnology
After being granted to the
University of Florence in 1919, the building was identified as the seat
of the National Museum of Anthropology and Ethnology, founded by Paolo
Mantegazza, and moved here in 1924 and officially inaugurated in 1932.
The museum was subsequently enlarged by Aldobrandino Mochi, Nello
Puccioni and others, and today it houses artifacts of peoples from all
over the world, divided by geographical area.
Restorations
A
few years after the opening of the museum, the facade underwent major
restorations carried out between 1938 and 1944 directed by Piero
Sanpaolesi. It suffered some damage during the world war and was
restored in 1948. Other restorations were carried out in 1956, 1967,
1972.
The ground floor was built between 1593 and 1600 by Bernardo
Buontalenti, assisted by Matteo Nigetti. The exterior is characterized
by flat ashlars, monumental corner pillars and large kneeling windows.
These rest on large corbels, are closed by a grate and crowned by a
tympanum. Some tympanums are triangular, others are broken and crumpled,
and bear a zoomorphic figure inside that resembles a sinister-looking
bat. At the end of the 19th century, these figures inspired a legend
written by Charles Godfrey Leland, according to which Roberto Strozzi
would have made a pact with the devil, who, cursing the building, would
have prevented its completion forever.
Via del Proconsolo
Six
kneeling windows are arranged on the ground floor symmetrically with
respect to the large and high arched door attributed to Caccini. The
door is surmounted by a balcony and the Strozzi coat of arms, with the
date 1614. Another very ornate marble coat of arms is clearly visible
near the corner at the top, with two female figures holding up the
shield with the family coat of arms ; this sculpture can be traced back
to Caccini.
Borgo degli Albizi
Although considered secondary
to that of via del Proconsolo, the building has a complete front in
every detail on Borgo degli Albizi; Ferdinando Ruggieri dedicated most
of the surveys he carried out to this portion, reiterating the
authorship of the first floor to Bernardo Buontalenti, that of the
second to Vincenzo Scamozzi.
The four large kneeling windows on
the ground floor are arranged with respect to a central axis marked by a
large door, crowned at the top by a small rectangular window and above
by the Strozzi coat of arms held by a winged lion. Above is a balustrade
beyond which opens a large window closed by an arch resting on coupled
columns, surmounted by figured capitals and a dedication inscription.
On the left is a small aedicule, inserted in the ashlar, which once
housed a Crucifixion which unfortunately disappeared.
On the
ground floor, masked by a fake ashlar, a small secret door is barely
visible which corresponds to the civic number 30, used as a secondary
passage by informants on their way to the offices of the Royal Customs.
The courtyard is characterized by Venetian influences perhaps
inspired by Scamozzi, reinterpreted with typically Florentine elements.
It has a loggia on the ground floor decorated with serliana motifs on
Tuscan columns; two of the four sides made square in 1604 can be traced
back to Lodovico Cardi known as Cigoli. The other two are the result of
the completion in style implemented by the engineer Nasi in 1865-1866.
In a niche, prospectively created in front of the main entrance, there
is a sixteenth-century statue, Perseus killing the dragon, by the
sculptor Giovanni Battista Lorenzi. In the loggia on the right there is
a bust of Paolo Mantegazza, founder of the Museum of Anthropology,
created by Ettore Ximenes, the marble memory of Nello Puccioni and the
medallion in memory of Aldobrandino Mochi; both enriched the museum's
collections with their donations.
The staircase, the cause of the
conflicts between Buontalenti and the Strozzi, develops to the right of
the atrium and occupies a considerable space; it is covered by barrel
vaults and winds at an elbow angle with three ramps.
On the
ground floor there is a very large, rectangular hall covered by a
pavilion vault, with three doors that access two other rooms.
On the ground floor some rooms of Buontalenti's project remain: in
particular a corner room in which there are some elaborate corbels with
the Strozzian emblems of the falcon plucking its feathers and the lamb.
In another room there is a seventeenth-century painting on the vault
with the representation of the company dwarf of the Cospi family.
The staircase is distinguished by the original design of the
handrails, supported by rows of stone balustrade shapes. On the main
floor, in the rooms of the museum, there are some frescoed ceilings from
the time of Florence as the capital, with the coats of arms of Savoy and
the Italian cities, and allegorical figures.