The Rebirth of Venus

by Linda Proud

  Turin, August 16th, 1506.

  From our hosts we hear the news of a country still recovering from the ravages of Cesare Borgia who, during the years of my absence, gave up the priesthood to become the sword of his father, Pope Alexander. Through siege and conquest he brought the cities of the Romagna back under papal control and created a state in the centre of Italy to rival Naples, Florence, Venice and Milan. Cesare was not only merciless and brutal, he was a Borgia, with a Borgia’s disdain for God and His laws. His adventures, however, came to an end with the death of his father and the accession of the new pope. Three years have passed, but the aftershocks are still felt. Since Cesare fled to Spain, the Romagna has been lost to Venice. The rumour is that Pope Julius is planning to retake it.

  Erasmus has been advised not to travel any further south but to sit his examination here. ‘In Turin? I may as well have done it in Paris.’

  ‘It is still an Italian degree,’ I told him. ‘You do not have to mention where in Italy you obtained it.’

  ‘True enough.’

  He has done all the work in Paris and needs only to sit the examination. He thinks we can move on in two to four weeks.

  74

  THE VOICE OF GOD

  1493

  IN ADVENT SAVONAROLA RESUMED HIS SERMONS ON Genesis in the Duomo. Even that vast place could not now contain everyone who wanted to listen to the Frate. The crowd was restless during the mass; the introit, the gloria, the agnus dei – all familiar and not what we had come to hear. But then he rose from his chair in the choir and ascended the pulpit, a pulpit of cast bronze, a masterpiece of new art from a sculptor who had studied the ancients. Savonarola appeared in it like a righteous captain who had boarded a pirate boat. He raised up his hands to greet us. Then he began to relate a vision he had had.

  ‘I have seen swords in the sky, and the voice of God issuing from three faces, saying, People, repent before the coming punishment! I have seen multitudes of angels, angels in white descending from heaven to earth. They carry white mantles with red crosses to offer to men, but only some men accept them. I have seen the sword of God being brandished and the air full with vaporous clouds. I have seen daggers in the sky, hail, thunder, arrows and fire. On the face of the earth – wars, plague, famine, a host of tribulations. But one shall come from beyond the mountains like Cyrus, and God shall be his guide and leader, and no one will be able to resist him, and he will take cities and fortresses with great ease.’

  Then a strange collective fever took hold. All around me twenty thousand people moved and swayed, a whipped-up sea that Savonarola commanded from his pulpit-boat. He alone was still, suspended above us, half-way to heaven. ‘The mighty hand of God is upon you, Florence! Neither power nor wisdom nor flight can withstand it.’ A groan came then from the crowd, a terrible sound of human remorse, as if from one of the ditches of purgatory. ‘But the Lord is merciful! He waits for you, to shower you with his love and pity. Convert, Florence, to the Lord your God with all your heart, because He is kind and compassionate. If you do not, He will avert His eyes from you forever.’

  Cries went up all around, cries of ‘I believe!’ and ‘Alleluia!’ and ‘Forgive me, Lord, for I have sinned!’

  ‘Know this, Florence! These are not the words of Holy Scrip- ture!’ thundered the Frate. ‘These are the words of God Himself, direct from Heaven! I speak as I hear. God is with us, now.’

  Then many dropped shivering to their knees like the children of Israel before Moses, and threw up their hands in awe.

  75

  THE CALUMNY OF APELLES

  1493

  I WENT TO BOTTICELLI’S WORKSHOP WITH A PILE OF NOTES from Angelo – references to stories, fables, mythological characters to inform a new picture. Sandro was working on a painting of St Augustine, trying to concentrate while his brother, Simone, stood warming his backside at the roaring hearth and arguing with Doffo Spini. Although Doffo had not tired of the streets, the curiosity of his childhood for the painter’s workshop close to the family palazzo had returned. These days, in the absence of naked goddesses, he enjoyed provoking Sandro’s brother.

  ‘Look at you!’ Simone was saying. ‘You are a peacock, with a peacock’s brain. What you spend at the tailor’s in one week would feed a family for a year.’

  ‘You’re jealous, old man.’ Doffo’s voice was deep with new manhood. ‘You want this tunic and mantle yourself, but what a fool you’d look with your figure.’ He turned to look me up and down. If he found little to appreciate, he found nothing to criticise either. His own hair was thin and though he wore it long, it was not as long as mine, and the pointed tips of his ears stood up on either side of his cap. If my own was long – half way down my back, indeed – it was not, I hasten to add, from vanity or, as Doffo supposed, because I was aping the style of Pico della Mirandola. I had simply neglected to get it cut. Perhaps there was something more to it. Perhaps, like Pico, I was reacting to the shorn heads of the new zealots.

  Simone jabbed Doffo in the shoulder. ‘Did your father teach you no respect for your elders? You are a cuckoo. You are not Spini’s son. What you need, boy, is discipline. Do you go to mass? When did you last go to mass?’

  Doffo sighed. ‘Here it is – the sermon. Next it’ll be what the Friar says.’

  ‘What the Friar says is true: we can have no peace while we are at war with ourselves.’

  ‘I can certainly have no peace with you two around,’ muttered Sandro, sitting back and squinting at his picture.

  ‘I’m not at war with myself,’ said Doffo to Simone. ‘I’m at war with you, you weeper. You are corrupting your brother. Where have all those lovely myths gone, Sandro? You should kick this snivelling old goat out – he’s oppressing you.’

  ‘God help me.’ Sandro glanced up and with a slight inclination of his head, directed me to a back room. I went there with my notes; Sandro came in and closed the door in the face of Doffo who had followed us. Hidden under a tablecloth were the first sketches of The Calumny of Apelles, a work he did not want his brother to see, for Simone had become one of the piagnoni, or ‘weepers’ – the name we had given to the followers of Savonarola, not because they had a particular tendency to cry, but because they believed in their own sin to an extravagant degree. ‘Breast-beaters’ would have been a better name, but ‘weepers’ was the one generally used.

  I read out Angelo’s notes to Sandro and discussed them with him while he sketched images of the characters and scenes. Although Angelo met Botticelli frequently, he had delegated the task to me as it was lengthy and laborious – he wanted only to see the sketches in their final stage. Several books from the Medici library were kept in Sandro’s back room for consultation: De Pictura by Leon Battista Alberti, Lucian’s book on slander, The Defence of Poetry by Boccaccio and the Imagines of Philostratus. These I referred to often, reading passages out to Sandro sometimes for the seventh or eighth time.

  The scene is set in a gilded hall in which a ruler with large, asinine ears sits on a raised dais, extending his hand to Slander, a woman beautiful beyond measure who is being adorned by two other beautiful maids: Treachery and Deceit. Near to the ruler and whispering in his large, shaggy ears are Suspicion and Ignorance. Slander approaches the ruler with a blazing torch in one hand while with the other she drags the naked male figure of Innocence. She is conducted by Envy, a wasted, ragged man. These figures are followed by Repentance, a wretched old woman in rags who is glancing back at the figure behind her, naked Truth.

  The work had been commissioned by Poliziano himself, intended as a gift – and a lesson – for Piero de’ Medici. The Calumny of Apelles had been treated before by modern painters, but in this version there was so much more, layers and layers of symbolic reference. Botticelli even referred freely to previous works of his own. He showed me a sketch of the whole design and I sat back in astonishment, recognising a perverted version of his wondrous Realm of Venus. Here was Ven
us again, only this time representing Truth and standing in the position taken by Mercury in the earlier painting, and, like Mercury, she pointed heavenwards. Then there were the three Graces or, rather, three dis-Graces: Slander, Treachery and Deceit. The very composition itself had the serpentine flow of The Realm of Venus.

  Sandro chuckled at my expression. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘is it not the same message? My work, like Angelo’s, has been slandered and is being dragged by its hair to a judge corrupted by Suspicion and Ignorance.’ He rubbed his charcoaled hands off on his apron, ‘Oh, I am enjoying myself. Let’s continue.’

  We worked together for an hour or more. When we went back into the workshop, Simone was saying his prayers out loud, rocking on his knees before a crucifix on the wall.

  ‘Ah well,’ Sandro sighed, ‘back to St Augustine.’

  And that was how it was – philosophers, poets and painters in love with the ancient world were beginning to work in secret, covering their shame with holy images.

  76

  POLIZIANO AT WAR AND IN LOVE

  1493

  LORENZO’S DEATH HAD ROBBED POLIZIANO OF NOT ONLY a friend and patron, but also of any power of toleration he might possess. Where once he had at least tried to be gracious to his enemies, now he was savage and tore at them without thought to their feelings. The most vicious of his opponents was Bartolommeo Scala.

  The rivalry between them had begun many years earlier when Angelo had corrected a letter written by Scala which had contained a grammatical error serious enough to start a war. Although Lorenzo had favoured the man, he had not been above baiting him. For instance, he once sent Scala an exaggerated testimonial of his worth just to inflate his pride. Then he left it to Angelo to ‘prick the pig’s bladder with the point of his wit.’ This drew a letter out of Scala, addressed to Angelo.

  ‘You will hardly venture to compete with my honours,’ he wrote. ‘The Florentine people have raised me first to the Priorship, then to the Gonfaloniership, and now to the rank of senator and knight, with such unanimity that many are of the opinion that there has never been a more popular man; besides which I have the brilliant testimony of Lorenzo de’ Medici that distinctions were never conferred on one more worthy.’

  Lorenzo had laughed until the tears ran. What was odd was that he consistently advanced Scala in wealth and office as if he did, indeed, merit the testimonial. Angelo, in whom laughter had not come so readily, challenged him on the matter. Lorenzo said that when he promoted Scala he was moved by ‘considerations other than merit’. So often had Scala been promoted that he now lived in a quite beautiful palazzo in open meadows close to the Porta Pinti. As Chancellor he had made orations before princely visitors. When he was elected Gonfalonier, the Marzocco, the statue of the lion of the Republic, wore a gold crown for the occasion and the people cried, ‘Viva Messer Bartolommeo!’ He was a titular senator of Rome, an apostolical secretary, a Knight of the Golden Spur. Scala, whose name meant ‘stairs’ and whose arms were an azure ladder transverse on a golden field with the motto ‘graditim’, was born for advancement. His annual income was eight times greater than Angelo’s and he had a villa on the sunny side of Fiesole. So when Poliziano tore into him for his solecisms, I suspect it was not entirely on behalf of Lady Grammatica. He was resentful that Fortuna had smiled on such a vain braggart, a man who had once had the cruelty and temerity to beat a soldier in the Florentine army, for no other reason than that he was a cousin of Poliziano. When he attacked Scala, Poliziano attacked Fortuna herself. And she, tricky goddess, planned her revenge.

  Scala did have his merits, or he would not have advanced so far. One of them was geniality – when he wasn’t torturing enemies, he was being magnanimous to friends. After all, the good courtier knows it is better to be amiable and civil to one’s rivals than to be perceived as jealous. Therefore Scala arranged that Poliziano should tutor one of his daughters in Greek, for among his brood was a prodigy. Alessandra was about seventeen at the time and for Angelo, whose female acquaintances tended to be pug-faced Medici women, she had more virtues than it was possible for a human to bear. I thought he was exaggerating until I met her myself but it was more or less true: here was a girl of both inward and outward beauty, with a gaiety and wit that would charm Pluto himself and bring him back to life. Her beauty, her modesty, her eyes full of laughter – all this Poliziano could perhaps have resisted. What undid him was her intelligence. To find such a facility for Greek in anyone would have been a wonder; in a woman, it was a miracle. He began to look somewhat abstracted in those hours – those long hours and days – when he was not with her. One would think that he only drew breath in her presence, that the rest of the time he was living on borrowed air. He who could never find enough hours in the day began to complain of time dragging, and all those suddenly spare hours he devoted to the composition of amorous little verses.

  Angelo Poliziano was in love.

  77

  WHAT IS LOVE?

  1493

  SAVONAROLA’S SERMONS WERE BECOMING EVER MORE urgent and forceful. He was preparing us, he said, for the ‘coming scourge’ which we could only meet safely if we purified our hearts. He never avoided striking at poets and philosophers, and in such a telling way that several were burning their works and taking the habit.

  ‘Scripture must be studied in the light of faith. Further than this you may not go, lest you stumble. Origen,’ he said, ‘over- stepped the limit when he said predestination depended on our previous lives. Heresy! The Pelagians said it depended on our good deeds in this life. Heresy! It is not true that the grace of God may be obtained by our deeds. It comes by God’s will alone. Was not St Peter restored to grace, despite his sins in denying the Lord?’

  That had everyone talking in the market places, the loggie, the barber shops: if good deeds will not take us to heaven, then what will? If good deeds are of no use, why do them?

  Savonarola answered from the pulpit. We perform charity for the simple sake of those who require it. In that way we imitate the life of Christ. We must bring ourselves into tune with the Divine, and that requires us to be good, to be truthful, to pray. But it is a mistake when we take the goodness in our deeds to be our own: all goodness proceeds from God. ‘The voice of God calls us. All we are asked to do is to hear it and obey His will. When Love approaches a soul disposed to grace, that soul is inflamed by charity.’

  He gave examples. ‘Consider the physician who works from love. Love teaches him everything and is the measure and rule of medicine. He will never tire, he will enquire into everything, will order his remedies and see them prepared, and will never leave the sick man. But if gain is his object, then he will have no care for the sufferer and his skill will fail him. Likewise the mother. Who taught this woman, who had no child before, how to nurse a baby? Love. See what fatigue she endures, night and day, to rear it. What is the cause of this? Love. Love is the true and only doctrine, but in these days the preachers teach nothing but empty subtleties.’

  With Savonarola as its Vicar General, the reformation at San Marco was dramatic. All costly vestments and precious plate were being sold to feed the poor. ‘In the primitive Church, the chalices were of wood and the prelates of gold. These days we have chalices of gold and prelates of wood.’ The lay brothers were being trained in the arts in order to earn a living, and schools of painting, sculpture and architecture were being established within the monastery. Men versed in ancient languages were teaching the friars to read the Bible in the original tongues. A scriptorium had been opened, and young friars were training in the art of copying and illuminating. At San Marco they were reviving my art.

  In his academy and in the pulpit, Savonarola gave us his teaching on love, love as a means of redemption. ‘Those philosophers care only for their own souls. Love teaches us to care for the souls of others. Love teaches us to serve.’ This last had me sleepless. Whom did I serve? Only myself. ‘The love you love is the wrong love.’ That
is what he had said to me all those years before, and now the meaning was becoming clear. The wrong love is directed to one person only, and for selfish reasons. True love… ‘This love is a gift from the Lord. It is a fire that kindles all dry things, and whoever is disposed to it will find it descending into his heart, and his heart shall be set aflame.’

  78

  SNOW

  1494

  AS I LEFT SAN MARCO ONE DAY IN JANUARY, THE SKY BECAME threateningly dark, so dark that many stood looking up at the great cloud hanging low over the city, a blue-black ominous cloud, from which great flakes of snow began to fall. We had seen snow before, of course, but not like this, with flakes so big that they lay without melting. Some people were frightened and ran indoors; others turned into children and stood with their mouths open to catch the snow on their tongues. I gazed at the flakes falling on my mantle and could see the beauty of their crystalline structure; such wonder did I feel then at the Creator. Was this a seduction of the senses or divine rapture? I wondered if I should continue on my way, unswayed by the weather, or if I should dance with those Florentines who saw nothing in the snow but a source of joy. Only the holy is beautiful? Very well. Snow is holy.

  Poliziano was now living in the casino of the garden of Monna Clarice. Having ascertained that Maria was with her sister-in-law, I visited him and ended up staying the night, for the snow was settling. By the following morning it lay in great drifts throughout the city, bringing all work to a halt. I awoke to silence and such a pristine light filling the room that I lay in bed awhile, feeling my heart pump with something that seemed to be happiness. Or, the potential for happiness. A servant came to say that Messer Angelo was calling for me.