Travelogue 1213 – 10 October
Colonna
Vittoria Colonna was born in the fateful year of 1492, the year Lorenzo the Magnificent died, the year Columbus sailed the ocean blue, the year young Michelangelo completed his marble relief sculpture, “Batte of the Centaurs”. She was born into the famous Roman noble family in a villa outside of Rome.
The Colonnas were an ancient family. They claimed their ancestry could be traced back to Julius Caesar’s own clan. They appeared in recorded history in the eleventh century, among the extended family of the Counts of Tuscany. This heritage, emerging from the Lombard era, is obscure, but they were already installed at the Castle called Columna outside Rome.
Medieval Rome – and the papacy - was a battleground for aristocratic families throughout the first centuries of the second millennium, and the Colonna family were nearly always in the mix. This required of them that they suffer exile from time to time. They suffered it in the fourteenth century, when a family squabble precipitated the Avignon papacy. For nearly a hundred years, the papacy was captive in France. Poetically, it was a Colonna pope, Martin V, who brought the papacy permanently home to Rome in 1420, during Brunelleschi’s time.
The family suffered exile again as the sixteenth century dawned, when Vittoria Colonna was only nine, because of a conflict with the Borgia pope, Alexander VI. Alexander used the French wars in Italy to consolidate his power over the city and the Papal States.
Noble families always had options. The Colonna family had married into so many noble families over the centuries that they had refuge ready. Fabrizio, Vittoria’s father was grand constable to the King of Naples. They moved to the island of Ischia. Already, at the age of three, Vittoria had been engaged to marry the son of a general in the king’s service, a boy who would become the Marquis of Pescara. The boy was Spanish by blood, and born in Naples, but he was heir to lands on the other side of Italy, a place I’m not sure he ever visited.
Friday, October 10, 2025
Thursday, October 02, 2025
Travelogue 1212 – 2 October
Conscience
It’s sure that Brunelleschi’s dome was immediately famous. I imagine it took only a generation for the building to become an established symbol of the city. For Florentines, for Tuscans, and perhaps farther. Certainly, the popes cast a jealous eye on Florence’s architectural achievements.
By the time of Lorenzo the Magnificent’s waning years, when he wrote his essay on sonnets, when young Michelangelo was getting started, impressing patrons with his first productions, the Duomo was half a century old, still exciting, while also slipping into the background, an unchanging component of scenery on a stage set for great things.
By the time a century had passed since the Duomo was consecrated, Lorenzo’s great grandson, Cosimo, was ruling as the Duke of Florence. Duke was a title created by the Medici pope, Clement VII, for his illegitimate son, Alessandro. Alessandro did not last long; he was murdered by a jealous cousin. Duke Cosimo ruled then for more than thirty years. Perhaps the young lutenist, Vincenzo, played for Cosimo in his first years as duke. Cosimo was a great patron of the arts, after all.
The world was different than in Brunelleschi’s day. The republican past seemed a romance. But the Duomo still stood, one hundred years old, gathering soot from hearth fires, tall symbol of the city of art and influence, and still a source of pride. To give some perspective, the Empire State Building is just approaching the completion of its first century now. And the Eiffel Tower is approaching 140 years.
Michelangelo, son of Florence, was in Rome. He felt nervous in Medici Florence. A Medici was also in charge of Rome, but the second Medici pope, Clement VII, was a liberal-minded and a generous man, having less need than the Medici in Florence for continuous consolidation of power. The Florentine republican instinct died hard. One of Clement’s last acts of patronage before he passed away in 1534 was to commission the “Last Judgement” in the Sistine Chapel from Michelangelo. The artist carried on with the huge fresco, through the rest of the decade, under the reign of Paul III.
Paul III was a Farnese, a friend of the Medici. The sculptor and the pope may have known each other from Lorenzo’s days in Florence, when Farnese studied under the Florentine humanist, Giulio Pomponio Leto. The new pope was an old man, but he was alert, ambitious, and tireless. He was a reformer. The Protestant rebellion was in full swing in northern Europe. In the year of Paul’s accession, Luther completed his German translation of the Bible. In response to the rebellion, the pope launched a stern reform movement, the first sincere response to Protestant accusations of corruption. He called the Council of Trent. He oversaw sincere efforts to root out abuses among the Curia.
He also oversaw an aggressive reaffirmation of church doctrine along conservative lines. He approved the founding of the Jesuit order. And, in history, his pontificate became known as the starting point of the Counter-Reformation, a force of some magnitude over the next few centuries.
However, history is messier than the colourful maps that divide Europe into solid blocks of territory. People wrestled with their conscience in every country. Even in Rome. Even Michelangelo, artist for the popes, struggled with his conscience.
Conscience
It’s sure that Brunelleschi’s dome was immediately famous. I imagine it took only a generation for the building to become an established symbol of the city. For Florentines, for Tuscans, and perhaps farther. Certainly, the popes cast a jealous eye on Florence’s architectural achievements.
By the time of Lorenzo the Magnificent’s waning years, when he wrote his essay on sonnets, when young Michelangelo was getting started, impressing patrons with his first productions, the Duomo was half a century old, still exciting, while also slipping into the background, an unchanging component of scenery on a stage set for great things.
By the time a century had passed since the Duomo was consecrated, Lorenzo’s great grandson, Cosimo, was ruling as the Duke of Florence. Duke was a title created by the Medici pope, Clement VII, for his illegitimate son, Alessandro. Alessandro did not last long; he was murdered by a jealous cousin. Duke Cosimo ruled then for more than thirty years. Perhaps the young lutenist, Vincenzo, played for Cosimo in his first years as duke. Cosimo was a great patron of the arts, after all.
The world was different than in Brunelleschi’s day. The republican past seemed a romance. But the Duomo still stood, one hundred years old, gathering soot from hearth fires, tall symbol of the city of art and influence, and still a source of pride. To give some perspective, the Empire State Building is just approaching the completion of its first century now. And the Eiffel Tower is approaching 140 years.
Michelangelo, son of Florence, was in Rome. He felt nervous in Medici Florence. A Medici was also in charge of Rome, but the second Medici pope, Clement VII, was a liberal-minded and a generous man, having less need than the Medici in Florence for continuous consolidation of power. The Florentine republican instinct died hard. One of Clement’s last acts of patronage before he passed away in 1534 was to commission the “Last Judgement” in the Sistine Chapel from Michelangelo. The artist carried on with the huge fresco, through the rest of the decade, under the reign of Paul III.
Paul III was a Farnese, a friend of the Medici. The sculptor and the pope may have known each other from Lorenzo’s days in Florence, when Farnese studied under the Florentine humanist, Giulio Pomponio Leto. The new pope was an old man, but he was alert, ambitious, and tireless. He was a reformer. The Protestant rebellion was in full swing in northern Europe. In the year of Paul’s accession, Luther completed his German translation of the Bible. In response to the rebellion, the pope launched a stern reform movement, the first sincere response to Protestant accusations of corruption. He called the Council of Trent. He oversaw sincere efforts to root out abuses among the Curia.
He also oversaw an aggressive reaffirmation of church doctrine along conservative lines. He approved the founding of the Jesuit order. And, in history, his pontificate became known as the starting point of the Counter-Reformation, a force of some magnitude over the next few centuries.
However, history is messier than the colourful maps that divide Europe into solid blocks of territory. People wrestled with their conscience in every country. Even in Rome. Even Michelangelo, artist for the popes, struggled with his conscience.
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