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On the night of 8th April 1498, a bell was desperately
ringing out for help. Its home, San Marco monastry in Florence, was under
attack from an armed mob. Bell-ringing was an essential part of the civic defence
system: it was supposed to alert the authorities of crises occurring all over
the city whether they be foreign attack, fire, or uprisings. Yet the bell of
San Marco continued to toll as the authorities ignored its call. The monks were
left to fend for themselves; luckily, they had stockpiled weapons in case of
such an attack. Surprised by the sudden forced entry, they initially took ahold
of the torches and crucifixes and used these to hold back the attackers. As it
became apparent that no one was going to answer their cry for help, they
resorted to their weapons, resting their harquebuses on the pulpits and firing
into the angry mob.
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| A Harquebus (or "arquebus") was a portable matchlock gun with a tripod |
Their prior hopelessly watched as his brothers were injured
and killed around him. He finally made the decision that their violence in turn
could not be sanctioned. “I had not foreseen” he told his monks “that all the
city would so quickly turn against me; nonetheless, may the Lord’s will be
done. My last exhortation to ye is this: let faith, prayer, and patience be
your weapons.” With this command, the monastery of San Marco surrendered to
their attackers, aware that this would mean almost certain death. The rabble
fell upon the prior, spitting with insults and subjecting him to physical abuse
as they dragged him to the Florentine authorities - who immediately placed him
under arrest.
That prior, who had provoked such rage from the people of
Florence, was Girolamo Savonarola.
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| The Dominican friar, Savonarola (1494-1498), painted by Fra Bartolomeo |
Girolamo Savonarola was a Dominican friar whose fiery sermons and denunciation of earthly temptations earned him a mass following, making him for a short period the de facto ruler of Florence.
His sermons had not always stirred the passions of the Florentine people. Although a renowned preacher, he was nothing out of the ordinary and was even approved of by the establishment of the time: the ruling Medici family. After a stint in northern Italy, he was invited back to Florence by Lorenzo de'Medici himself to take up the role of prior of San Marco.
Circumstance not substance shaped Savonarola into one of history's most infamous figures. After the death of Lorenzo de'Medici in 1492, the French army of King Charles VIII invaded in 1494 and the Medici were expelled from the city. Savonarola had helped to negotiate with Charles, but played no political role in the new popular government that was established. However, a Florence that was demoralized and humiliated desired to see itself made great once more, and that is exactly what Savonarola provided: a vision of Florence risen out of the ashes. Except this vision of Florence was unlike the sumptuous and extravagant period of Medici rule that had preceded; rather, Savonarola's Florence was built upon strict adherence to moral purity, and was to be a 'city of God'. This was an attack on the humanist and artistic culture - along with the corruptness and lavishness - that we now regard as typifying the Renaissance period.
This religious fervour culminated in the event that Savonarola is best remembered for: the Bonfire of the Vanities. Savonarola's followers - known as the Piagnoni (the "wailers" or "snivellers") for their emotional sobs which overcame them during his sermons - traveled round the houses of Florence on the Carnival day of February 1497 to seize objects associated with sin. Inhabitants were encouraged to renounce those things they clung onto most. The Piagnoni acquired items such as lavish dresses and accessories, debaucherous books, paintings of nude figures, antique sculptures, perfumes, mirrors, musical instruments, and gambling dice. Among the artifacts were works by Dante, Boccaccio, Ovid, and Botticelli. All of these were to be burned in a dramatic display of religious purification.
A huge pyre was constructed in the Piazza della Signoria, loaded with symbolic intent. The wooden structure had 7 tiers upon which the items were organized to represent each of the Seven Deadly Sins. 'At the pinnacle was a beaded Satyr, the image of sensuousness and unbridled sex' (Mapp, p.73). Savonarola may have rejected the luxury of Medici Florence, but he did not abandon the performative dimension of ruling. Dynamite was littered throughout the bonfire in order to hasten the flames and to cause sparks and bangs to dramatize the event.
To give some idea of the size of the spectacle, this building is about the height of the bonfire:
To give some idea of the size of the spectacle, this building is about the height of the bonfire:
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| The Bonfire was 60 feet tall (about the height of a 6 storey building) and at its base was 240 feet in circumference |
Just over a year later, on the morning of May 23rd 1498, this would be the exact spot where Savonarola and two fellow monks would be strangled and burned to death.
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| The Execution of Savonarola in the Piazza della Signoria |
There were several factors leading to Savonarola's fall from favour, including the unpopularity of the deal he helped to negotiate with Charles VIII and his association with the failures of government, scheming by the opposing political parties, his excommunication by Pope Alexander, and his failure to follow through with a trial by fire miracle he promised would prove his holiness.
After he was arrested by the authorities, he was tortured, made to confess the lies of his visions, he recanted, and was tortured again, and so on until his execution. The diarist Luca Landucci records the execution:
They were thus taken to the cross at the end of the platform. The first one to be hanged from one of the arms of the cross was Fra Silvestro [Maruffi]. Since the rope did not choke him, it took a while before he passed away; one could hear him repeating, "O Jesus," while hanging from the cross. The second to be hanged was Fra Domenico [da Pescia], who also continually repeated, "O Jesus." The third was the friar who had been called a heretic, who did not speak in a loud voice, but softly, and that is how he was hanged. None of them addressed the crowd, and this was regarded as a very surprising thing, especially since everyone expected to see signs from God and thought that on such an occasion the friar would somehow reveal the truth. This is what was expected, especially by the righteous people, who were eagerly awaiting God's glory, the beginning of a virtuous life, the renovation of the Church, and the conversion of the infidels. They were disappointed, therefore, that neither Savonarola nor the other two made any sort of speech. As a consequence, many lost their faith.
However dramatic the life and death of Savonarola was, the most interesting event for me occurred after his death. It is perhaps the most bizarre episode of this story.
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| San Marco Monastery, Florence |
The bell of San Marco was dragged down from its tower and put on a public "trial". This bell, known as la Piagnora after Savonarola's snivelling followers, was accused of ringing out in defense of Savonarola during the chaotic crisis of the attack on San Marco monastery. This strange ritual of persecution saw the bell subjected to flogging by the official hangman as it was carted out of Florence in order to fulfill its exile. The bell was sentenced to 50 years of exile in the Franciscan Church of San Salvatore al Monte, which resided outside of the city walls of Florence.
This episode reveals just how pent up the Florentine people had become under Savonarola's reign. As Lauro Martines asserts 'their message was unmistakable: Florence had been overly and wrongly pious for too long'. The aftermath of Savonarola's execution witnessed a string of acts of impiety, and a return to the debauchery and irreverence that made up the fabric of Florentine society.
It is unusual for an object to have the wrongs of its users conferred upon it in such a literal manner. But the bell of San Marco represented the oppression of the Savonarola regime in a way that would not resonate with us today - the sounds of ringing bells were an essential characteristic of Renaissance life, and the system of bell ringing helped to maintain civic order and legitimize power. Now that Savonarola was gone, all of his supporters, including the monastery, were not to have a voice in the new Florence that was forged.
It shows us that during the Renaissance there could be a fury more powerful than religious righteousness; the anger of a people whose every day sinful pleasures were taken away from them.
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| The bell of San Marco, returned to the convent of San Marco and restored |
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Bibliography
Image sources:
Unless otherwise noted here, the images are my own.
Image 2: Michael Murrin, History and Warfare in Renaissance Epic (Chicago, 1994)
Textual Sources:
Luca Landucci extract: http://www2.idehist.uu.se/distans/ilmh/Ren/flor-sav-landucci.htm
Websites:
Alexandra Lawrence, 'For whom the bell tolls', The Florentine (2010), http://www.theflorentine.net/art-culture/2010/11/for-whom-the-bell-tolls/
'Florence', The Encyclopedia Britannica, https://www.britannica.com/place/Italy/Florence#ref318601
Books:
Alf J. Mapp, Three Golden Ages: Discovering the Creative Secrets of Renaissance Florence, Elizabethan England, and America's Founding (Oxford, 1998)
Lauro Martines, Fire in the City: Savonarola and the struggle for the Soul of Renaissance Florence (Oxford, 20016)
Pasquale Villari, Life and Times of Girolamo Savonarola (New York, 1969)
Paul Strathern, Death in Florence: The Medici, Savonarola and the Battle for the Soul of Man (London. 2011)
Niall Atkinson, The Noisy Renaissance: Sound, Architecture, and Florentine Urban Life (Pennsylvania, 2016)
Articles:
Nial Atkinson, 'The Republic of Sound: Listening to Florence at the Threshold of the Renaissance', I Tati Studies in the Italian Renaissance, Vol. 16, No. 1/2 (Fall 2013), pp. 57-84
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