The Villa di Castello, near the hills bordering Florence, Tuscany, central Italy, was the country residence of Cosimo I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany (1519-1574). The gardens, filled with fountains, statuary, and a grotto, became famous throughout Europe. The villa also housed some of the great art treasures of Florence, including Sandro Botticelli's Renaissance masterpieces The Birth of Venus and Primavera. The gardens of the Villa had a profound influence upon the design of the Italian Renaissance garden and the later French formal garden.Isabella Ballerini, The Medici Villas, p. 32
History Villa Castello is located at the foot of the hills northwest of Florence, near the town of Sesto Fiorentino. The villa was located near a Roman aqueduct, and took its name from the water cisterns (castella) near the site.
A fortified building had been standing on the site since at least 1427, and was purchased in 1477 by Lorenzo and his brother Giovanni di Pierfrancesco de' Medici. This the year after their father died at the age of 46, leaving the young boys wards of their cousin Lorenzo il Magnifico, of the senior branch of the Medici family and de facto ruler of Florence.
They reconstructed the old building, adding a courtyard, a loggia, kitchens and stables.Ballerini, Isabella. The Medici Villas: The Complete Guide. (2003) Florence: Giunti. , p. 30-31 The house was inherited by a famed condottiere, or mercenary soldier, Giovanni dalle Bande Nere and his wife, Maria Salviati, the parents of Cosimo, who was born in 1519, and lived in the house as a child.
In 1537, the 26-year-old Duke of Florence, Alessandro de' Medici, was assassinated, and Cosimo, though he was only seventeen and a relatively unknown member of the Medici family, was elected by the influential men of Florence to replace him. They were under the impression that they could control him, but they were mistaken. In 1537, the young Cosimo faced a rebellion by a faction which wanted to restore the Republic of Florence. He defeated them at the Battle of Montemurlo, and established himself as the unrivaled ruler of the city.
The design and construction of the garden
Once his power was secure, Cosimo began to spend more time at his villa in Castello. As the architect and writer Giorgio Vasari wrote, "At this place the Duke began to build a little, one thing after another, to the end that he might reside there more commodiously, himself and his court."Vasari, Lives of the Most Eminent Painters, Sculptosr, and Architects, Gutenberg online edition.
Cosimo commissioned the engineer Piero da San Casciano to construct a system of aqueducts to bring water to the villa and its gardens, the sculptor Niccolò Tribolo to create fountains, statues and a garden, and the architect Giorgio Vasari to restore and enlarge the villa.
First, under the direction of Piero da San Casciano, an aqueduct was constructed from the Castella higher up the slope of Monte Morello to a small reservoir he built on the hill above the villa. Later, when more water was needed, a second aqueduct was built from another spring at Petraia.
Tribolo's design for the garden was described in great detail in Vasari's Lives of the Artists.Giorgio Vasari, The Lives of the Artists. The garden was laid out on the site of original walled garden, which ran from the villa up the gentle slope toward the mountain. On the hillside above the back wall of the garden, where the water reservoir was located, Tribolo created a bosco, or a simulated natural forest, separated from the garden by a high retaining wall. Below this, he divided the old walled garden into two by another wall, and carved out a small upper terrace and a large lower terrace, connected by two ornamental stairways. The smaller upper garden was planted with orange and lemon trees, trained to grow up the walls. It also contained, in the center of the back wall, the entrance to the grotto, a small cave whose walls resembled a natural cavern, richly decorated and filled with sculpture.
The larger lower garden was divided into squares, like small rooms, divided by paths and bordered by hedges and rows of cedar and olive trees, and filled with flower beds. In the center of the terrace was a circular labyrinth of cypress trees interplanted with laurel, myrtle and roses. In the center of the labyrinth was fountain crowned by a statue of Venus. A second, larger fountain, crowned with a bronze statue of Hercules defeating Antaeus, was located between the labyrinth and the villa.
The water in the garden The hydraulic system of the garden was one of the wonders of the High Renaissance, and also played an important part in the symbolism of the garden. In the center of the reservoir above the garden, in the "sacred wood," was a statue of Appenino, symbolizing the mountains of Tuscany, portrayed as an old man shivering, with water pouring over his head. Water flowed from the reservoir down bronze pipes and emerged in two fountains built in the retaining wall on either side of grotto, representing the two rivers of Florence. Water also flowed into the grotto, running down the walls. The two "rivers" flowed in channels through the garden, while other pipes carried water to the two fountains.
All fountains during the Renaissance depended upon gravity, and the elevation of the water source above the fountain, to make the water shoot upwards. Because the water source for the fountain of Hercules and Antaeus was on the hillside high above the fountain, a jet of water spouted a full three meters above his mouth.
Once it had passed through the fountains, the water flowed in two separate channels into two small private gardens on either side of the villa, and then entered two large fishponds in front of the villa. After that, the water was used to irrigate the fields and gardens below.
The garden also contained a series of ingenious giochi d'acqua, or "water features", to entertain the Duke and his visitors. The grotto was designed so that, by turning a key, the gate would lock guests inside the grotto and they would be soaked with water from hidden pipes. The fountain of Hercules was to be surrounded by a circle of trees, and also by a hidden pipe. By turning another key, spectators looking at the fountain would be sprayed with water from hidden nozzles. There was also a small house located in the branches of an enormous oak tree, just east of the garden. The house was reached by a stairway, and contained a marble table and a fountain served by pipes from the reservoir.
The symbolism of the garden
The garden was designed to deliver a clear political message; that, after a long period of warfare and suffering, Cosimo was going to lead Florence into a new Golden Age, with peace, prosperity, and harmony. Tribolo placed symbolic messages all throughout the garden. The fountain of Hercules and Antaeus showed how Cosimo, like Hercules, had defeated his enemies by wisdom, rather than just brute strength. The fountain of Venus was a tribute to Venus, one of the symbols of Florence; It was also a reminder that Venus had ruled over the isles of the Hesperides. Venus was also honored inside the Villa, where Cosimo placed the famous painting by Botticelli, the Birth of Venus. Tribolo continued the message with statuary throughout the garden. The stairways were decorated with busts of the earlier Medici rulers, in Roman costumes. Tribolo planned to place other statues around the gardens representing the four seasons, and the virtues of the House of Medici: justice, compassion, valor, nobility, wisdom, and liberality.Attlee, The Italian Garden - a Cultural History
The garden under the Medici
The garden was not only a form of political theater; it was also a pleasure garden. Cosimo's letters report that he spent many long summer afternoons with his family, enjoying the coolness of the shade and the fountains. Important visitors to Florence visited the gardens, and their fame spread around Europe.
Unfortunately, Tribolo did not have the time to complete all of his project, because, as Vasari wrote, "of his being too much occupied with the affairs of the Duke." He was able to personally finish the two major fountains, and the two rivers, but not the other works. He died in 1550, and the statues for the fountains were finished by his pupil, Antonio di Gino.
Work on the villa and gardens continued for twenty years, and Cosimo had more ambitious plans, including a project for a second villa, as large as the first, connected to it by a loggia, but this was never begun. The Duke became occupied in other projects. He began making new apartments in the Palazzo Vecchio, and he purchased the Pitti Palace in 1549, and began building the Boboli garden, with more fountains and an even larger grotto, decorated with statues by Michelangelo. Struck by the death of two of his sons from malaria, he retired from political life, turned over power his heir, Francesco I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, and spent the last ten years of his life in the villa and gardens.
Cosimo died in 1574, and a long succession of other Medicis occupied the Villa. Ferdinando I de' Medici, completed the villa in its present form, between 1588 and 1595, enlarging the east side, remaking the facade, and adding a new entrance on the south side. Don Lorenzo de' Medici commissioned the painter Il Volterrano to decorate the villa with a fresco, Vigilance and Sleep, in 1640. Cosimo III de' Medici, deeply interested in botany, introduced a very rare species of Indian jasmine, called mugherino, in 1688, and built a special greenhouse to protect it in winter.Isabella Ballerini, The Medici Villas, p. 34-35 During the Medici years, many foreign travelers, including Michel de Montaigne and the botanist Pierre Belon, visited the villa and wrote descriptions, which made it known throughout Europe. It inspired other European gardens which were designed to illustrate the grandeur, wisdom and power of the ruler.
The later years When the Medici dynasty became extinct in 1737, the villa was inherited by the Habsburg-Lorraine dynasty. The new owners saw the villa and garden as a practical enterprise rather than a political symbol; they enlarged the collection of citrus trees and built two limonaie, or lemon houses, but at the same time they dismantled several fountains, cut off the water to the grotto, and destroyed the maze of trees. In 1788 they transferred the fountain of Florence to the neighboring Villa La Petraia, and moved the monumental fountain of Hercules and Antaeus to the middle of the garden. The Medici symbolism of the two rivers reuniting and the classical virtues of Medici rulers was erased.
A number of neo-classical murals were painted in the villa during the time of Napoleon Bonaparte, but after that the villa and garden went into a long period of neglect and decay. It was donated to the Italian state in 1919, and served variously as a dormitory for gardeners, school, and hospital. The house became the property of the Accademia della Crusca, which owns it today. The garden became a national museum in 1984.Isabella Ballerini, The Medici Villas, p. 36
The villa gave its name to the Castello Plan, an early city map of Lower Manhattan (New Amsterdam the later New York City) from 1660, which was found in the villa in 1900 and printed in 1916.
The features of the garden
The fountain of Hercules and Antaeus