which he had produced those admired works, was preserved, with the utmost veneration, in a tabernacle, together with that of another monk called Don Silvestro,[1] who adorned the same books with miniatures, no less excellent—the knowledge of those times considered—than the writings of Don Jacopo. I have myself often examined these books, and have been astonished at the accuracy of design, and beauty of execution displayed in works of a period when the arts of design were almost wholly lost, for the productions of these monks date from about the year of our salvation 1350, a little more or a little less, as may be seen on any one of the books themselves.[2] It is said, and there are still some old men who remember the fact, that when Pope Leo X came to Florence, he demanded to see these books, which he examined minutely, remembering to have heard them much praised by Lorenzo the Magnificent, his father. It is further related, that after he had considered them attentively, and with great admiration, as they all stood open upon the desks of the choir, he remarked, “If these works were according to the Romish Church, and not, as they are, according to the rule and custom of the monastic, and especially the Camaldoline order, we would gladly take certain portions of them (giving the just recompense to the monks) with us to Rome, for the church of San Piero.” Two very beautiful books, by the same monks, were indeed formerly in that cathedral, where they probably still remain. There are, moreover, many specimens of ancient embroideries, worked in a very beautiful manner, preserved in the same monastery of the Angeli. These also were done by the ancient fathers of that place,[3] while they were shut up in perpetual seclusion, not bearing the name of monks, but that of hermits, and never coming forth from
- ↑ This is no fable. In the sacristy of the monastery of the Angeli, we have ourselves seen two hands, with the arms, perfectly well preserved; but it is not easy to say to whom they have belonged, especially as Vasari, in his first edition, attributes them to Don Lorenzo, with these words:—“The monks of the Angeli retain his hands as a relic and memorial of him.” And they certainly do seem to have belonged to one person, not only because one is the right and the other the left hand, hut also from their resemblance in size and form.—Ed. Flor. 1846.
- ↑ The choral books of the monastery of the Angeli were appropriated to the Mediceo-Laurenziana Library, but almost all were first rapaciously deprived of their miniatures. — Ibid.
- ↑ They are no longer there, nor can their fate be ascertained.
