In 1847 the people rose against the birri, who had made themselves odious by their insolence and violence, and would have released the prisoners in the Bargello if the civic guard had not been called out. Ten years later the Grand Duke gave orders that the building should be restored, and all the prisoners removed to the Murate. In 1860 it was finally decreed that the weatherbeaten, stern old Palazzo del Podestà should be turned into a national museum.
PALAZZO PUCCI
Via de’ Pucci. No. 4.
The great Pucci palace was built by Paolo Falconieri for Orazio Roberto Pucci in the middle of the XVIIth century on the site of several old houses belonging to the family. In 1664 Orazio was created Marquess of Barsento by the King of Spain, a title still borne by the present representative of the family. Progenitor of this once powerful house was Puccio, son of Benintendi, a poet of the XIIIth century. His descendant, Antonio, inscribed in the Guild of Carpenters, was the first of twenty-nine Priors the Pucci gave to Florence, but as an ally of the Alberti he was soon afterwards banished. Puccio Pucci his son, the intimate friend and adviser of Cosimo the Elder, was Gonfalonier of Justice in 1447. He died two years later leaving an enormous fortune to his sons, of whom Antonio was several times Gonfalonier of Justice, and as Commissary-General at the siege of Pietrasanta distinguished himself by heading the troops at the final assault and by his care of the wounded soldiers. By his wife, a daughter of the celebrated Giannozzo Manetti, he left many sons. Giannozzo, the eldest, was beheaded for conspiring with Bernardo del Nero in 1497 in favour of the Medici; Puccio married Girolama Farnese, sister of Pope Paul III., and was distinguished as a jurist; Lorenzo entered the Church, was Bishop of eight Sees, Archbishop of Amalfi and Chief Penitentiary. Denounced by Luther for selling indulgences, only the death of Adriano VI. and the accession of his friend Giulio de’ Medici to the papal chair saved him from severe punishment. Antonio’s nephew, Pandolfo, was a worthy boon-companion to the infamous Duke Alessandro. Cosimo I. dismissed him with ignominy from his court and he then plotted against the Duke’s life, but for one reason or another did not succeed in accomplishing his purpose. When the plot was discovered Pandolfo Pucci and his companions were hung without trial from the iron bars of the windows of the Bargello, in January, 1560.
WINDOW OF PALAZZO PUCCI.
Nearly all Pandolfo’s sons died violent deaths. Orazio, the eldest, attempted the life of Francesco I. and was hung fifteen years after his father, at the same window of the Bargello. Another fled to Rome, found favour with Clement VIII., and was about to be made a Cardinal when he died of poison, administered by order of the Cardinal Ferdinando de’ Medici. A third was killed by a madman.
The present branch of the family descend from Saracino, a brother of Puccio, who also made a large fortune under Cosimo the Elder. One of his sons, implicated in the Pazzi conspiracy, was hung; another, named Priore, cautiously kept aloof from politics and occupied himself with commerce. His descendant, Niccolò inherited the riches of the eldest branch of the family, married an heiress and left a large fortune to his grandson, who built the palace, and owned many houses and villas, on which the moor’s head (the Pucci arms) is to be seen. The Marquess Pucci still inhabits the old palace.
PALAZZO RICCARDI
Via Cavour. No. 1.
The first of the great house of Medici, according to Passerini, was Giambuono, an ecclesiastic. He lived in the XIIth century, and his son Chiarissimo owned houses and a tower in Florence near S. Tommaso. Admirers of the Medici attributed to them a far more magnificent origin—Perseus; a Roman Emperor; a learned physician who saved the life of Charlemagne; or Averardo de’ Medici, a brave knight who slew Mugello, a giant who was the terror of Tuscany. Their enemies, on the other hand, assert that the son of a poor charcoal-burner in the Mugello who became a doctor (medico) was their progenitor, and point to the well-known balls, or pills, on the Medici arms as confirming their story; whilst to their admirers they represent golden apples from the gardens of the Hesperides, or dents in Averardo’s shield, made by the mace of the giant Mugello.
