This powerfully-conceived head is said to have
been taken from a small intaglio cut in cornelian. It has been pointed out
that the chisel marks are cut by both the right and left hand. The vigour
of the workmanship indicates that the bust was begun soon after Michael
Angelo left Florence in 1584, and may indicate Michael Angelo's feelings
towards the tyrant Alessandro de' Medici. We may remember in this
connection that the exiles nicknamed Lorenzino, his murderer, Brutus.
The Duke of Florence, through Vasari,(170) attempted to get at the ideas
of Michael Angelo with regard to the Medici Chapel and the entrance to the
Laurenziana, but the old man had lost and forgotten the plans, if he had
ever made them. The difficulties that beset the Duke and the academicians
in completing the designs, and the meagreness of Michael Angelo's
instructions to them, must give us pause when we attempt to attribute the
faults of these monuments to the master mind. "About the staircase of the
Library, of which so much has been said to me, believe that if I could
remember how I had arranged it I should not need to be begged for
information. There comes into my mind, as in a dream, the image of a
certain staircase, but I do not believe this can be the one I then thought
of, for it seems so stupid. Nevertheless, I will write about it."
Leone Leoni erected the monument of Giangiacomo de' Medici in Milan
Cathedral from a design supplied by Michael Angelo at the request of Pope
Pius IV.
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