This article appeared
in Volume 20: No. 1 of the Orient
Express magazine.
Florence past & present
HRH Princess Michael of Kent visits special places new and old.
For my husband’s 60th birthday, he was given a long weekend’s
stay at the Villa San Michele, nestling in the hills of Fiesole outside
Florence. The 15th-century villa, now a luxury hotel, was formerly
a Franciscan monastery named after the church of St Michael the Archangel.
Its façade is attributed to Michelangelo. Fortunately, my
husband chose to share this wonderful gift with me—the drawback
being that from the reputation of the Villa San Michele’s international
cuisine, I sensed each meal would add two kilos.
Having arrived at night, in the morning we gazed out at Florence
on the plain below. A mist of mohair blanketed the city with just
Brunelleschi’s great dome rising above it, like a ribbed breast
pointing skywards. We wandered the city, renewing our acquaintance
with one treasure after another. As I am currently writing a book
that includes Catherine de Medici, we had our programme of buildings
and art to see planned out in advance.
We stopped off at the pharmacy of Santa Maria Novella, whose history
dates from the mid-13th century, when it was administered by Dominican
friars. The earliest brothers devoted themselves to cultivating herbs
and developing skills to heal their ill brethren.
Various references to their medicinal skills exist in books of the
time, including mention of the use of effective antiseptics to cleanse
houses during plague epidemics, and of mild medicines to be diluted
in wine, an early reference to the practice of distilling, roughly
a century before it became widespread. From the end of the 16th century,
the pharmacy of Santa Maria Novella has continued its work almost
without interruption. I had caught the mother of all colds but with
a few well-advised potions taken precisely as ordered, it was gone
within a day.
We both know Florence and its surroundings well. In the early 1960s,
I spent a year of my History of Art course in the city. Naturally,
I fell in love—with Florence, the art, the buildings, and a
young Italian “Dorian Gray” more beautiful than Michelangelo’s
David. In love, that is, until I discovered that the water I thought
he drank from dawn to dusk was, in fact, vodka, and his quiet solicitude
really a state bordering on the comatose. I tried, but failed, to
reform him. We parted but remained friends.
My husband, too, visited Florence in his youth. Each summer he stayed
at the Villa Demidoff at Pratolino in Fiesole, not far from our hotel.
Idyllic, lazy days were followed by evenings spent listening to the
nightingales.
With its astonishing park by the architect Buontalenti, the villa
had been left to Prince Paul of Yugoslavia, related through marriage
to my mother-in-law, Princess Marina, Duchess of Kent. There was
no swimming pool to entertain the young cousins during their summer
sojourns but, in the 16th century, the villa’s park had
been created by Francisco I de Medici as a splendid amusement area.
His concept was to install natural-looking wonders, which were actually
sophisticated “jokes” to amuse Francisco’s mistress,
the beautiful Venetian, Bianca Capello—a married woman. Francisco
was the eldest son and heir of Cosimo I de Medici and, as such, he
was contracted to an obligatory political marriage with Giovanna
of Austria, a plain and unpleasant woman by all accounts. The moment
he saw Bianca, he lost his heart and installed her in the magnificent
villa at Pratolino, since demolished by later Habsburg owners as
being too large and expensive to keep up. The existing contemporary
Villa Demidoff is smaller, (built for the Medici household staff)
and has recently been beautifully restored to be used for exhibitions
and conferences.
Francisco de Medici, Duke of Tuscany and ruler of Florence, was
a student of alchemy (among other sciences), and was considered a
most learned man. To enhance the park at Pratolino, he created a
number of pavilions and intimate grottoes in the grounds. One is
called the Grotto of Love, containing an alcove, a recess with a
shower sprouting from all directions inside a dome, and walls of
stalactites. The corners of the floor are filled with ferns and mossy
benches inviting love.
One of the “jokes” was part of a walk from the original
villa site to a sunken garden below.On our recent visit, as we strolled
through cyclamen-carpeted woods, my husband told me how, at the touch
of a lever, double arches of water would spout overhead, creating
a tunnel leading down the bank to another concealed grotto studded
with tiny shells. There had been other secret water spouts carefully
hidden near picnic spots, where the host could shower his unsuspecting
guests. But the most impressive of all the various pavilions and
follies the park offered its amorous inhabitants, is the Apennino.
This statue of a giant the size of a house, sitting in a pose of
gentle contemplation and consisting largely of stalactites, is the
main attraction of the park. He too sits astride a grotto, and has
a narrow little walkway over his shoulders, offering the intrepid
a dramatic view from a precarious position next to his head.
Francisco’s Austrian wife died in childbirth—as so many
did—and it seems he married his Bianca Capello, although the
locals tell a sadder story. Marriage was not mentioned to us, just
undying love of such passion that as they grew older (she was almost
40) Bianca drank love potions to retain her hold on Francisco. Mysteriously,
she died; and so did he a few days later—out of love, we were
told, but poison was suspected, administered to Francisco by Bianca,
who then drank it herself with speedier results.
Our visit coincided with that of a bridal party, undeterred by Bianca’s
story. As we viewed the giant from the other side of the park, I
noticed a figure in white, veil afloat, walking towards him. It seems
the Apennino bestows buona fortuna on the local newlyweds who pose
in front of him on their special day.
My husband had shared a different experience with the giant. Taught
by Queen Mary, his grandmother, to clear woodland of undergrowth,
he was cutting down ivy from a tree by the Appenino with a small
blunt axe one day, when he caught his foot instead of the root. The
result was pain, gore and domestic mayhem, and several weeks in plaster.
He was telling me this tale when I saw a large foot by the villa
upon which I promptly posed. It too had met with an accident, and
had long ago parted company from the giant. Fortunately, my husband
had been luckier.
Our stay in Florence drew to a close with an invitation from an
old friend from my student days to visit his Medici villa just outside
the city, with instructions to take the scenic route. The idea was
to spend the day and remain to watch the sunset and breathtaking
view from the tower—a dream programme I remembered well. The
morning dawned wet and shrouded in mist. Ever optimistic, we took
the prescribed scenic route and saw absolutely nothing. My youthful
memories, which I described eloquently to my husband, had to suffice.
Il Trebbio is one of the most beautiful castles I have ever known.
Famous as the seat of the Medici hero, Giovanni della Bande Nere,
it sits astride its Tuscan hill with a nonchalance only the victorious
would dare to assume. We guests gathered in the drizzle and fog,
unable even to admire the gardens and Medici loggias, so our host
had the bright idea of showing us a tour of the castle and grounds
filmed on a sunnier day. With good Tuscan wine, hors d’oeuvres
(including mortadella made from the horses he bred—ugh!), followed
by an excellent lunch, no one noticed the English autumn weather
we had so thoughtfully provided.
By sunset we had climbed the tower, vainly hoping the sky would
clear. It did not, but I remembered the glorious sunsets of 30 years
earlier when, as a girl, I stood there on that turret, dreaming of
long-gone Medici heroes and what might have been.
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