Simonetta Vespucci (1453-1476), “la bella Simonetta”, was the most beautiful woman in Florence, Italy in her day. She was so beautiful that men were still painting her more than 20 years after her death. She is the woman you keep seeing over and over again in Botticelli’s paintings, like the “Birth of Venus”.
Botticelli painted her as the Virgin Mary, Venus and Athena. Piero di Cosimo painted her as Cleopatra and Procris. Poliziano and Lorenzo the Magnificent wrote about her in verse – as did Gabriele d’Annunzio in our own age. Many other poets and painters honoured her as well with their works. You can see her today on some of the money in Europe.
She had brown eyes, white skin and long, flowing dark yellow hair. She had what in those days was considered to be a perfect figure.
In Botticelli’s paintings she looks a bit sad, but also like she is in a dream.
Lorenzo the Magnificent read her look differently: that she was not just beautiful on the outside but had a beautiful soul too: she was serious, never had an unjust feeling, was not proud or stuck on herself and had an excellent mind. She walked and danced with grace, a sign of the inner balance of her soul.
She was the perfect Renaissance woman.
She was born in either Genoa or Portovenere, the place where they say Venus arrived in Italy. At 15 she married a cousin of Amerigo Vespucci, after whom America is named. Her husband brought her to Florence, the city ruled by the Medicis. Because her father-in-law was an important man there, the Medicis soon came to know her.
Two Medici brothers, Lorenzo and Giuliano, fell in love with her. Lorenzo was too busy with affairs of state, but Giuliano pursued her.
At the La Giostra games in 1475 Giuliano rode into battle under a flag with her picture on it and the French words “La Sans Pareille” – the woman without parallel. Botticelli had made the flag. At the games she was named the “Queen of Beauty”.
Some say that Giuliano won her heart that day and they became lovers. Others say that she refused him.
A year later, at the age of 23, she became very sick and was coughing up blood: she had tuberculosis.
There is a strange story that Giuliano tried to keep her alive as a vampire: better that than to see her die. In that story she becomes a vampire and hides in the tower overlooking the main square. When she is cornered she jumps to her death.
In any case she died that spring. At her funeral thousands followed her body to its grave.
It seems that Botticelli had fallen in love with her too: after he first saw her, she was the only woman he ever painted, even after her death. He never married and was laid to rest at her feet.
– Abagond, 2007.
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Simonetta Vespucci is indeed one perfect Renaissance beauty. Her beauty reflected the time when women were still at the mercy of husbands and fathers and had less opportunities to advance other than marriage or courtesan.
Simonetta reflects the youthful optimism of Florentine as embodied by Lorenzo de Medici, who took over the rulership of the city when he was still a teen.
I’m thankful that Sandro Botticelli left Simonetta’s legacy in paint.
I know that she still lives on today.
Stephanie B.
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Her beauty will live down through the ages – a measure of both her beauty and Botticelli’s genius as a painter.
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excelent!
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I think Simonetta is a stunning beauty.
I have painted her portrait. Look at my website http://www.bluebells.nl portfolio Classics
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Thanks. Is Bosch your real name? Are you related to you-know-who?
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Bosch is my real name.
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I am puzzled over perceived inaccuracies in the painting of her http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simonetta_Vespucci by Boticelli at the Berlin State Museum. Look at the shadows on her masterly painted face. There is no doubt the light that illuminates the face comes from above. Nevertheless the light spots on the beads (look at the three upper ones on her neck) point to slightly different directions. Did a great master like Botticelli permit himself such minor inaccuracies? Do I misunderstand something about how to paint? Is it a common trick of painters to make a painting more lively by purposely disregarding physics? Or did Botticelli even wanted to convey a meaning?
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Leonardo was into scientific accuracy like that. In his notebooks he goes on and on about lighting. But I doubt that sort of thing kept Botticelli up at nights. I mean, look at his trees and compare them to Leonardo’s. I love them both, but Botticelli’s style is stiffer and less life-like.
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love the vampire myth surrounding it.
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That is cool – and creepy.
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It’s not unusual for artists to manipulate light in physically impossible ways to create an emotional or narrative effect. Here’s a very different contemporary example of deliberately impossible lighting: http://www.alexrossart.com/popup.asp?img=galleries/kingdom/full/kindomcome20.jpg
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Hello
I am from Croatia. I study History of art. Botticelli and Piero di Cosimo are my favourite artists, thank you for this article!
(sorry for my bad English:)
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This is a beautiful posting about the unforgetful beauty. I found a phrase in Botticelli’s painting. Is there anyone who can translate in English?
‘Ripatto Muliebre Gia Ceduto della belle Simonetta’
I found this is Piti palace in Florence. I will appreciate if anyone can let me know. Thanks.
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I distinctly remember reading that this great beauty died, at the age of 26years, of syphilis – she had been handed about among the nobles of Florence from a VERY early age….sad if true.
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It would seem somewhat at odds with what is known the records, and it would be unreasonable on the part of the nobility of Florence.
She came to the city of Florence at the age of 15 or 16 and reportedly became ill at the age of 22 with an illness characterized by a bloody cough. She died that year.
Syphillis causes death through a manner called tertiary syphillis, a broad inflammatory process affecting multiple organs, including the brain, causes marked mental degeneration and insanity. It takes years to progress from primary syphillis to tertiary syphillis, between five to ten commonly but might take as many as fifty. Tertiary syphillis often results in the formation of large disfiguring gumma’s, and though a cough could develop, it is an irritant cough from irritation of the laryngeal nerve, not a bloody cough from inflammation and bleeding into the lungs.
Lastly, if she was ‘passed around’ as you suggest, she would have infected all the nobilityof Florence. This would be an unreasonable risk for the nobility to take, and would be difficult to keep out of the historical record.
Pneumonia or tuberculosis seem more likely as the cause of death for the young Simonetta Vespucci.
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Simonetta is one of the most mysterious women of medieval.
First time I heard for her when I was sixteen and because of her I start to study and learn art.
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where did u get that information?
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Where did you find the ‘strange rumor’ of her being a vampire? I can only find one website on the internet that even mentions that…although there may be more not in english. Would you mind giving me the link or the source? Thank you:)
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No mystery in the life of Simonetta, she died of tuberculosis at 23, what was common in those days.
A very short life immortalized by painters portraits.
When they talk about “Love” in Renaissance Florence they speak about the “Platonic Love”.
Simonetta was not a courtesan, she was a noble girl of Genoa, who married one of the noblest sons of Florence, Marco Vespucci (the name tells you something?)
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Please Andromeda, do not say Simonetta wa a Medieval woman, she was a Renaissance woman. She lived in the 1400s, not in the 1000s or 1200s.
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Thomas
I think that her skeleton should be examined. I hope it is still preserved in her grave.
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Thank you for the information !
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@abagond
“Leonardo was into scientific accuracy like that.”
Botticelli is considered early Renaissance. They were pioneering that kind of scientific accuracy perfected in the High Renaissance by Leonardo, Raphael and Michelangelo.
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Yep. That’s right. Them boys smoked so much pot they called it the High Renaissance.
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@ Nomad
LOL!
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I wonder if she still would be considered beautiful today by Hollywood standards?
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@Solitaire
“I wonder if she still would be considered beautiful today by Hollywood standards?”
Yes, I think so. She”s slender soft and blonde with a long neck. The length of her limbs suggests that she was tall, like today’s supermodels. The bodily proportions that we think of as ideal derive from this period. Eight heads high for a man. Seven and a half for a woman. My masters thesis in art was based on this idea.
Though in Botticelli’s hands, she looks to be eight heads high or more The ideal body proportions was established later by the High Renaissance artists.
Now Baroque standards. That’s when ‘thick’ chics ruled.
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@ Nomad
“The bodily proportions that we think of as ideal derive from this period. Eight heads high for a man. Seven and a half for a woman.”
Interesting, I didn’t know that. I’ve never even heard of “heads” used as a term of measurement like that. I mean, I’ve heard “he’s a head taller than the rest of them” but not “he’s eight heads high” — reminds me of “hands” for horses, though.
I bet you’re right about her general appearance and body shape, but I was thinking more about her face. She might be advised to get a nose job these days?
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Solitaire
hmmm…
Maybe. I have a feeling that the nose is Botticelli’s stylization. Artists tend to develop formulaic ways of depicting facial features that sometimes deviates from actual appearances. He tends to flatten and slightly exaggerate form. Notice how different the nose of the same person is in a portrait by Piero Di Cosimo.
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Solitaire
Artist stuff. That’s how they teach you to draw human figures of proper proportion. The height of the head used as the unit of measure.
Perfected in the stoned -I mean- High Renaissance by Leonardo, Michelangelo et al.
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@ Nomad
Huh. I’ve seen grids like that first drawing before but never realized until now that all of those blocks are the same height as the head. I see now what you mean.
I have difficulties with math, spatial awareness, facial recognition, and stuff like that. Can barely draw a recognizable stick figure. I very much envy those who have artistic talent.
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@Solitaire
don’t need that stuff for cia created modern art
The High Renaissance
https://politicalfilm.files.wordpress.com/2017/03/reefer-23043.jpg?w=284&h=421
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CIA created modern art
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/25/modern-art-was-cia-weapon_0_n_3156994.html
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@ Nomad
“CIA created modern art”
Wow, that also is something I didn’t know! Thanks for the link.
There is very little modern art I like, but yes, much of it does look as if it was painted by someone like me with no artistic ability whatsoever! I’ve read enough to know that isn’t really true, that with at least some modern art, there’s actually artistic examination of color contrast, proportionality, etc. I just can’t see it.
I do have enough of an eye to appreciate beautiful paintings like the Botticelli’s above and I do have some favorite artists and eras, but I know I miss a lot by not seeing the geometry underlying the artwork and other aspects of that sort.
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@Solitaire
“CIA created modern art”
I didn’t know it either until maybe a year or two ago. That’s what I like about the Internet. You learn stuff.
You don’t have to be able to do it to appreciate artt. Like music.
Art historians, for example. They may not be able to do it, but they can tell you everything about it.
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BTW, one thing I’ve learned is that the CIA is controlling a lot of what we think and do. Even choosing our president. And that it is a covert fascist organization.
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