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Book FirstPart II
Part II
It is true that men who have laboured with some show of excellence, have
already given knowledge of themselves to the world; and this alone ought to
suffice them; I mean the fact that they have proved their manhood and achieved
renown. Yet one must needs live like others; and so in a work like this there
will always be found occasion for natural bragging, which is of divers kinds,
and the first is that a man should let others know he draws his lineage from
persons of worth and most ancient origin.
I am called Benvenuto Cellini, son of Maestro Giovanni, son of Andrea,
son of Cristofano Cellini; my mother was Madonna Elisabetta, daughter to
Stefano Granacci; both parents citizens of Florence. It is found written in
chronicles made by our ancestors of Florence, men of old time and of
credibility, even as Giovanni Villani writes, that the city of Florence was
evidently built in imitation of the fair city of Rome; and certain remnants of
the Colosseum and the Baths can yet be traced. These things are near Santa
Croce. The Capitol was where is now the Old Market. The Rotonda is entire,
which was made for the temple of Mars, and is now dedicated to our Saint John.
That thus is was, can very well be seen, and cannot be denied, but the said
buildings are much smaller than those of Rome. He who caused them to built,
they say, was Julius Caesar, in concert with some noble Romans, who, when
Fiesole had been stormed and taken, raised a city in this place, and each of
them took in hand to erect one of these notable edifices.
Julius Caesar had among his captains a man of highest rank and valour,
who was called Fiorino of Cellino, which is a village about two miles distant
from Monte Fiascone. Now this Fiorino took up his quarters under the hill of
Fiesole, on the ground where Florence now stands, in order to be near the
river Arno, and for the convenience of the troops. All those soldiers and
others who had to do with the said captain, used then to say: "Let us go to
Fiorenze;" as well because the said captain was called Fiorino, as also
because the place he had chosen for his quarters was by nature very rich in
flowers. Upon the foundation of the city, therefore, since this name struck
Julius Caesar as being fair and apt, and given by circumstance, and seeing
furthermore that flowers themselves bring good augury, he appointed the name
of Florence for the town. He wished besides to pay his valiant captain this
compliment; and he loved him all the more for having drawn him from a very
humble place, and for the reason that so excellent a man was a creature of his
own. The name that learned inventors and investigators of such etymologies
adduce, as that Florence is flowing at the Arno, cannot hold; seeing that Rome
is flowing at the Tiber, Ferrara is flowing at the Po, Lyons is flowing at the
Saone, Paris is flowing at the Seine, and yet the names of all these towns are
different, and have come to them by other ways. ^1
[Footnote 1: He is alluding to the name Fluenzia, which some antiquaries of
his day thought to have been the earliest name of the city, derived from its
being near Arno Fluente. I have translated the word fluente in the text
literally, though of course it signifies "situated on a flowing river." I need
not call attention to the apocryphal nature of Cellini`s own derivation from
the name of his supposed ancestor.]
Thus then we find; and thus we believe that we are descended from a man
of worth. Furthermore, we find that there are Cellinis of our stock in
Ravenna, that most ancient town of Italy, where too are plenty of gentle folk.
In Pisa also there are some, and I have discovered them in many parts of
Christendom; and in this state also the breed exists, men devoted to the
profession of arms; for not many years ago a young man, called Luca Cellini, a
beardless youth, fought with a soldier of experience and a most valorous man,
named Francesco da Vicorati, who had frequently fought before in single
combat. This Luca, by his own valour, with sword in hand, overcame and slew
him, with such bravery and stoutness that he moved the folk to wonder, who
were expecting quite the contrary issue; so that I glory in tracing my descent
from men of valour.
As for the trifling honours which I have gained for my house, under the
well-known conditions of our present ways of living, and by means of my art,
albeit the same are matters of no great moment, I will relate these in their
proper time and place, taking much more pride in having been born humble and
having laid some honourable foundation for my family, than if I had been born
of great lineage and had stained or overclouded that by my base qualities. So
then I will make a beginning by saying how it pleased God I should be born.
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