DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.32873#0047
INTRODUCTION xxxiii
of a sentence—the MS. abruptly ceases. To whom
Cellini then entrusted it is unknown, nor—strange to
relate—does any mention of it occur in the very elaborate
inventory of his property (books and papers included)
made at his death in 1571. No trace of its intermediate
history can be discovered until (as the inscription that
it still bears tells us) it formed one of the most jealously
guarded treasures of the Cavalcanti family at some period
in the seventeenth century. Although the then owner,
Lorenzo Maria Cavalcanti, makes special allusion to the
almost selhsh importance that his father attached to the
sale custody of this precious MS., we know that some-
where about 1691 he presented it to the learned Francesco
Redi, who quoted from it, and employed it in preparing
the last volume of the fourth edition of the
(Florence, 1729). From Redi the MS. seems
to have passed into the hands of the Jesuit Fathers in
Florence, and from them to their brethren of the Scolo-
pian Confraternity, whence it vanished; removed it is
supposed amongst a quantity of waste paper from their
library and sold. It happily reappeared about 1805 in
the well-known book-shop of Cecchino del Seminario,
where by great good luck it was espied and secured by
Signor Luigi Poirot. On his death, in 1825, it passed
under his Will to the Biblioteca Mediceo-Laurenziana
in Florence, where it now rests—safe, let us hope—from
further vicissitudes. But though in material form it rests
in that famous shrine of learning, no building or country
can confine the dauntless and blustering, but withal,
fascinating spirit. Cellini belongs to all the world/
It is a source of much discussion to know how and when the
various copies of this famous work were made ; since no authoritative
of a sentence—the MS. abruptly ceases. To whom
Cellini then entrusted it is unknown, nor—strange to
relate—does any mention of it occur in the very elaborate
inventory of his property (books and papers included)
made at his death in 1571. No trace of its intermediate
history can be discovered until (as the inscription that
it still bears tells us) it formed one of the most jealously
guarded treasures of the Cavalcanti family at some period
in the seventeenth century. Although the then owner,
Lorenzo Maria Cavalcanti, makes special allusion to the
almost selhsh importance that his father attached to the
sale custody of this precious MS., we know that some-
where about 1691 he presented it to the learned Francesco
Redi, who quoted from it, and employed it in preparing
the last volume of the fourth edition of the
(Florence, 1729). From Redi the MS. seems
to have passed into the hands of the Jesuit Fathers in
Florence, and from them to their brethren of the Scolo-
pian Confraternity, whence it vanished; removed it is
supposed amongst a quantity of waste paper from their
library and sold. It happily reappeared about 1805 in
the well-known book-shop of Cecchino del Seminario,
where by great good luck it was espied and secured by
Signor Luigi Poirot. On his death, in 1825, it passed
under his Will to the Biblioteca Mediceo-Laurenziana
in Florence, where it now rests—safe, let us hope—from
further vicissitudes. But though in material form it rests
in that famous shrine of learning, no building or country
can confine the dauntless and blustering, but withal,
fascinating spirit. Cellini belongs to all the world/
It is a source of much discussion to know how and when the
various copies of this famous work were made ; since no authoritative