1. On this floor, enter the dark vestibule and climb the staircase of Michelangelo, built in grey sandstone, to enter into the brightness of the reading room, with its beautifully carved wooden ceiling, splendid stained-glass windows, and carefully designed floor in red and white terracotta.
2. The library was opened to the public in 1571. The collection itself – put together by the Medici family - predates, however, this date.
As you enter the reading room, with its two series of wooden benches, you should keep in mind that, in those times, the manuscripts and printed books were fixed by chains to the benches, which functioned both as lecterns and bookshelves. The public could read the manuscripts and printed books, seated at those desks, but they were not allowed to carry them away as in a modern lending library.
This display was maintained until the beginning of the twentieth century, when the manuscripts were transferred downstairs, in the vaults were they are still housed. The printed books, on the other hand, were given to the Magliabechiano Library, now part of the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di Firenze.
The benches, known as plutei in Latin, are numbered. There are 88 benches. Attached to the side of each bench you will find a wooden panel, a kind of table of contents, stating the subject matter of the items originally chained to this desk (e.g. Patristics, Rhetoric, or History) and listing the authors, titles, size and date. One of these wooden panels even mentions one of the works written by Brunetto Latini. Have a look, search, and you will find!
3. In these wonderful surroundings, fitting for a man of letters, our tour must come to an end. You have explored the city centre of Florence in the footsteps of Brunetto Latini. You have put a face to this figure, discovered the material traces of his professional life affixed to the exterior wall of the communal palace, seen his handwriting, and visited his final resting place. Now, I would like to end this tour by telling you something about the lasting heritage of Brunetto Latini, namely his literary production – and there is no better place to do that than in a library – and especially this library which, as we have seen, still has many of Brunetto’s works in its collection.
These literary works have been mainly written during his exile in France, although the exact chronology of certain works is still uncertain and subject to scholarly debate. We have already spoken about the Tresor – that magnificent medieval encyclopaedia – a treasure trove of medieval knowledge, covering areas as diverse as medieval geography, world history, or the arts of rhetoric and politics – an encyclopaedia which is generally regarded as the centre piece of his collected works.
It is, however, not his only text. His literary heritage also encompasses the Rettorica, an incomplete translation into Old Italian of the first seventeen chapters of Cicero’s De Inventione. Brunetto Latini took a particular interest in Cicero – not only as philosopher, but also as historical figure. In addition to the Rettorica, he translated three orations by Cicero, the Pro Ligario, Pro Marcello and Pro rege Deiotaro. Latini’s Tesoretto is an unfinished allegoric and didactic poem in Old Italian, inspired by the French Roman de la Rose. Il Favolello – listed on the wooden table of contents to be found in the library - is a poetic letter to his friend, Rustico di Filippo, on the concept of friendship. Brunetto Latini even composed a canzone, a poem entitled ‘S’eo son distretto inamoratamente’.
With this overview of the literary heritage of Brunetto Latini – his great treasure, which commends itself and in which he continues to live on - we have to say goodbye to our generous guide. Luckily, we will always have his books, offering us a unique window into thirteenth-century Florence.
Happy reading!
Photo credit:
1. Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Courtyard - Maaike Napolitano-Rietrae, 2016
2. Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Staircase by Michelangelo - Maaike Napolitano-Rietrae, 2016
3. Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Library - Maaike Napolitano-Rietrae, 2016
4. Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Wooden panel - Maaike Napolitano-Rietrae, 2016
5. Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Wooden panel (fragment) - Maaike Napolitano-Rietrae, 2016
