boast in the way of princes, have been most commodiously lodged in this palace, to the infinite credit of the magnificent Cosimo, as well as to that of Michelozzo’s eminent skill in architecture.[1]
In the year 1433, when Cosimo was exiled, Michelozzo, who loved him greatly, and was faithfully devoted to his person, voluntarily accompanied him to Venice, and would always remain with him during the whole time of his stay there; wherefore, in addition to the many designs and models which he made in that city for various private dwellings and public buildings which he decorated for the friends of Cosimo and other nobles, Michelozzo constructed the library of the monastery of San Giorgio Maggiore, a house of the Black Monks of Santa Giustina. This was built by the command and at the expense of Cosimo, who completed it, not only externally, and with the wood-work, seats, and decorations required, but also furnished it with many books,.[2] Such was the occupation, and such the amusement of Cosimo during that exile, from which, having been recalled by his country, in the year 1434, he returned almost in triumph, and Michelozzo with him. The master was thus again in Florence at the time when it was perceived that the public palace of the Signoria began to show symptoms of decay, some of the columns of the courtyard giving way, either because the weight with which they were loaded was too great, or that their foundations were weak and awry, or perhaps because the parts which composed them were not well put together; but whatever may have been the cause of decay, the care of the restoration was entrusted to Michelozzo, who willingly accepted that charge, and the rather as, while in Venice, he had provided against a similar peril which was threatening a house in the neighbourhood of San Barnaba. A gentleman had a palace there
- ↑ For certain strictures on some parts of this building, the student in architecture is referred to Milizia, ut supra, vol. i, lib. iii, cap. i.
- ↑ Schorn remarks that this library is mentioned by Sansovino, Descrizione di Venezia, p. 81; by Ammirato, Ritratti d’Uomini Illustri di Casa Medici; by Lorenzo Seradero, Monum. Italiae; and at greater length by the Canon Biscioni, in his Preface to the Catalogue of the Medicean Library, Florence, 1752. Vasari himself also alludes to it in his namenti, p. 17. The Marchese Selvatico attributes an efficacious influence on Venetian art to the works of Michelozzo. See his learned Studi sull'Architettura e Scultura in Venizia, Venice, 1847, 8vo.; a work not unfrequently quoted by the later Florentine commentators.
