Pisa, residences in Via Lungo l’Arno (ora Lungarno Pacinotti)
ITA | ENG
Introduction:
During their long, albeit intermittent, stay in Pisa, the Shelleys lived in as many as four different residences on the Tramontana side of the Lungarno (the northern side), which was then considered the healthier side due to its southern exposure.
In the spring of 1818, after a stay in Milan and by Lake Como, the family – together with Claire Clairmont, Mary’s stepsister – decided to move to the Tuscan city. Percy hoped to find introductions there who could assist him and, at the same time, lift Claire’s spirits, as she was struggling with the recent separation from her daughter Allegra, who had been entrusted to her father, Lord Byron (P. Shelley 1964, p. 13).
Like many travellers of the time, the group initially stayed at an inn, intending to find a permanent residence that suited their needs while on-site: this was the Locanda delle Tre Donzelle. Due to its location between what is now Lungarno Pacinotti [link a Fig. 1] (then simply called ‘Via Lungo l’Arno,’ later Lungarno Regio) and Piazza Garibaldi (then Piazza del Ponte), the inn was particularly popular among travellers, especially the English. However, the Shelleys’ first impression of Pisa must not have been very favourable, as they stayed only three days before moving to Livorno, where the Gisborne family resided, and then to the cooler Bagni di Lucca. Percy’s terse description of the city was that of a “a large disagreeable city almost without inhabitants” (P. Shelley 1964, p. 18), while Mary found it “dull” and was also “disgusted” by the sight of prisoners forced to work in chains along the streets (M. Shelley 1980, p. 67).
The second stay, however, was far more promising: on January 26, 1820, the Shelleys returned to Pisa, initially staying again at the Locanda delle Tre Donzelle, before renting first the mezzanine and then the more spacious top floor of Casa Frassi, a residence they found spacious, suitable for the family, and particularly fitting their economic situation (link a Mary Shelley to Marianne Hunt, March 24, 1820). Comfortably settled in Pisa, the Shelleys began establishing the relationships Percy had hoped for a year and a half earlier. In addition to maintaining close correspondence with other expatriates, such as Maria Gisborne and Sophia Stacey – to whom he dedicated (link a) Song, On a Dead Violet (sent from Casa Frassi) – they formed new acquaintances, including a brilliant and cosmopolitan Anglo-Irish couple, Margaret King [link a Fig. 2] and George William Tighe, known as Mrs. and Mr. ‘Mason’ (link a Percy Shelley to Leigh Hunt, April 5, 1820), and the Irish translator and poet John Taaffe.
The family did not isolate itself from Pisan social life: one of the reasons for choosing this city was the presence of the renowned surgeon Andrea Vaccà Berlinghieri [link a Fig. 3] (mentioned in Mary Shelley’s letter to Marianne Hunt), a prominent intellectual who had received part of his training in Paris and London. The Shelleys’ hope was that he could assist Percy with what the doctor identified as nephritis. Vaccà’s broad interests and republican sympathies, as well as his involvement in the Carbonari circles of the time, placed him among the key figures of the ‘Pisan Circle,’ which was gradually forming around the Romantic nucleus in the city.
After leaving Pisa for the summer and following Vaccà’s advice to stay in Bagni San Giuliano for a milder climate and thermal treatments, the Shelleys returned to the city in October 1820, this time settling in Palazzo Galletti (also referred to as ‘Casa Galletti’ in family letters and diaries), where they remained until April 1821. Also located on the northern side of the Lungarno, next to Palazzo Lanfranchi, the residence (now home to the Faculty of Political Science [link a Fig. 4] of the University of Pisa) was large enough to accommodate a study for Percy, spacious rooms for Mary and their only surviving child, Percy Florence, and Thomas Medwin, Shelley’s (ill-tolerated) cousin (link a Percy Shelley to Claire Clairmont, October 29, 1820).
This was a particularly prolific period for both Percy and Mary: he wrote, among other works, the Ode to Liberty (1820), celebrating the revolutionary uprisings in Spain, and the treatise A Defence of Poetry (1821). Mary dedicated herself to writing the historical novel [link al testo] Valperga (1823), based on the life of the Lucchese captain Castruccio Castracani, which Percy later sent to publisher Ollier in July 1821 (link a Percy Shelley to Charles Ollier, July 17, 1821). Socially, the Shelleys’ circle expanded further: during this time, as described in letter from Mary to Leigh Hunt, they associated with the poet and improviser Tommaso Sgricci and with Francesco Pacchiani, a professor of Eloquence at the University of Pisa (link a Mary Shelley to Leigh Hunt, December 3, 1820). Pacchiani’s fiery yet unreliable nature soon tired the Shelleys, who took to calling him ‘the Devil Pacchiani.’
Another figure of significant impact was Teresa Viviani Della Robbia, known as Emilia, daughter of the Governor of Pisa. The Shelleys took a particular interest in the young Countess, who had been confined by her family to the Convent of Sant’Anna until a suitable marriage could be arranged for her (link a Mary to Leigh Hunt, December 29, 1820). Percy dedicated several poems to ‘Emilia,’ including To Emilia Viviani [link] (1821) and the well-known Epipsychidion (1821).
The last residence on the Tramontana side occupied by the Shelleys was Casa Aulla (now Palazzo Prini-Aulla [link a Fig. 5]), where the family moved in March 1821. The apartment, now incorporated into the Royal Victoria Hotel complex [link a Fig.6], was also very spacious, offered an enviable view of the Arno, and allowed them to enjoy the splendid spring days (link a Mary Shelley to Claire Clairmont, April 2, 1821). The stay was brief: just over two months, until the usual summer retreat to Bagni San Giuliano. However, the peace they experienced in Pisa, further enriched by the arrival of Edward and Jane Williams, with whom Percy and Mary quickly formed a strong bond, led them, after careful consideration, to choose the city once again as their ‘nest’ in October 1821 (link a Percy Shelley to Mary Shelley, August 19, 1821). The Shelleys rented an apartment in the Tre Palazzi di Chiesa, this time on the Mezzogiorno side (the southern side), while also preparing for the arrival of Lord Byron and Leigh Hunt in the city.
Documents:
- Lettera from Mary Shelley to Marianne Hunt, 24 March 1820 (in The Letters of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, I, p. 136)
The most famous surgeon in all Italy lives at Pisa, Vaccà —he is a very pleasant man—a great republican & no Xtian—He tells Shelley to take care of himself & strengthen himself but to take no medecine. At Pisa we have an appartment on the Lung’ Arno—a street that runs the length of the town on each side of the Arno, and the side which receives the southern sun is the warmest & freshest climate in the world—We have two bed rooms 2 sitting rooms kitchen servants rooms nicely furnished—& very clean & new (a great thing in this country for 4 guineas & a 1⁄2 a month—the rooms are light and airy—so you see we begin to profit by Italian prices—One learns this very slowly but I assure you a crown here goes as far in the conveniences & necessaries of life as £1 in England & if it were not for claims on us & expences that are as it were external or perhaps rather internal for they belong to ourselves & not to the Country we live in we shd be very rich indeed. As it is for the first time in our lives we get on easily—our minds undisturbed by weekly bills & daily expences & with a little care we expect to get the things into better order than they are.
- Letter from Percy Shelley to Claire Clairmont, 29 October 1820 (in The Letters of Percy Bysshe Shelley, II, p. 242)
We are now removed to a lodging on the Lung Arno, which is sufficiently commodious, and for which we pay thirteen sequins a month. It is next door to that marble palace, and it is called Palazzo Galetti, consisting of an excellent mezzanino, and two rooms on the fourth story, all to the south, with two fireplaces. The rooms above, one of which is Medwins’ room and the other my study (congratulate me on my seclusion) are delightfully pleasant, and today I shall be employed in arranging my books and gathering my papers about me. Mary has a very good room below, and there is plenty of space for the babe. I expect the water of Pisa to relieve me, if indeed the disease be what is conjectured.
- Letter from Percy Shelley to Leigh Hunt, 5 April 1820 (in The Letters of Percy Bysshe Shelley, II, p. 180)
We have pleasant apartments on the Arno, at the top of a house, where we just begin to feel our strength, for we have been cooped up in narrow rooms all this severe winter, and I have been irritated to death for the want of a study. I have done nothing, therefore, until this month, and now we begin our accustomed literary occupations. We see no one but an Irish lady and her husband, who are settled here. She is everything that is amiable and wise, and he is very agreeable. You will think it my fate either to find or to imagine some lady of 45, very unprejudiced and philosophical, who has entered deeply into the best and selectest spirit of the age, with enchanting manners, and a disposition rather to like me, in every town that I inhabit. But certainly such this lady is.
- Lettera from Mary Shelley to Leigh Hunt, 3 December 1820 (in The Letters of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, I, pp. 163-164)
I must tell you, my friend, of an acquaintance that we have made with a Professor in Pisa. He is really the only Italian that has a heart and a soul. He has the highest mind, a profound genius, and an eloquence that transports. The poor Pisans believe him to be mad; and recount many tales about him that make one believe that he is a little odd, or to say it in English eccentric. But he says—They believe me to be mad and it pleases me that they make this mistake; but perhaps the time will come when they will see that it is the madness of Brutus. He comes to our house every evening and always delights us with his original ideas. He speaks the most beautiful Italian tongue, completely different from today's idiom, which makes one believe that he might be hearing Boccaccio or Machiavelli speaking as he wrote. We have also made the acquaintance of an Improvisatore—a man of great talent and very strong in Greek, with an incomparable poetic genius. He improvises with an admirable fire and precision. His subject is the future destiny of Italy. He recalled that Petrarch said that neither the very high Alps nor the sea was enough to defend this unsteady and aged country from the foreign masters-But he says—I see the Alps grow—and the sea rise and become agitated in order to impede the enemies. […] You see that in the meantime we get to know a few more Italians every day, and we take a great interest in the threatened war at Naples. What will they do? The Noblemen of Naples are independent and brave; but the populace is enslaved.
- Letter from Mary Shelley to Leigh Hunt, 3 December 1820 (in The Letters of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, I, p. 172)
…tomorrow I will finish my letter and talk to you about our unf[ortu]nate young friend, Emilia Viviani. It is grievous to see this beautiful girl wearing out the best years of her life in a[n] odious convent where both mind and body are sick from want of the appropriate exercize for each-I think she has great talent if not genius or if not an internal fountain how could she have acquired the mastery she has of her own language which she writes so beautifully, or those ideas which lift her so far above the rest of the Italians. She has not studied much and now hopeless from a five years confinement every thing disgusts her and she looks with hatred & distaste even on the alleviations of her situation. Her only hope is in a marriage which her parents tell her is concluded although she has never seen the person intended for her-Nor do I think the change of situation will be much for the better for he is a younger brother and will live in the house with his mother whom they say is molta secante—Yet she may then have the free use of her limbs—she may then be able to walk out among the fields-vineyards & woods of her dozen country and see the mountains and the sky and not be as now a do steps to the right and then back to the left another dozen which is the longest walk her convent garden affords and that you may be sure she is very seldom tempted to take.
- Letter from Mary Shelley to Claire Clairmont, 2 April 1821 (in The Letters of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, I, p. 187)
April has opened with a weather truly heavenly after a whole week of libeccio―rain & wind it is delightful to enjoy one of those days peculiar to Italy in this early season―the clear sky animating sun & fresh yet not cold breeze―Just that delicious season when pleasant thoughts bring sad ones to the mind—when every sensation seems to make a double effect— and every moment of the day is divided, felt, and counted. One is not gay―at least I am not―but peaceful & at peace with all the world.
- Letter from Percy Shelley to Mary Shelley, 19 August 1821 (in The Letters of Percy Bysshe Shelley, II)
…with Lord Byron and the people we know at Pisa, we should have a security and protection, which seems to be more questionable at Florence. […] What think you of remaining at Pisa? The Williams’s would probably be induced to stay there if we did; Hunt would certainly stay, at least this winter, near us, should he emigrate at all; Lord Byron and his Italian friends would remain quietly there; and Lord Byron has certainly a great regard for us […]. The Masons are there, and as far as solid affairs are concerned, are my friends. […] Our roots never struck so deeply as at Pisa, and the transplanted tree flourishes not.
Illustrations:
Texts
- Percy Shelley, Song, On a Faded Violet, 1820 [1824]
The odour from the flower is gone,
Which like thy kisses breathed on me;
The colour from the flower is flown,
Which glowed of thee, and only thee!
A shrivelled, lifeless, vacant form,
It lies on my abandoned breast,
And mocks the heart which yet is warm
With cold and silent rest.
I weep—my tears revive it not!
I sigh—it breathes no more on me:
Its mute and uncomplaining lot
Is such as mine should be.
- Mary Shelley, Valperga, extract from Chapter I (1823) [2000]
The other nations of Europe were yet immersed in barbarism, when Italy, where the light of civilization had never been wholly eclipsed, began to emerge from the darkness of the ruin of the Western Empire, and to catch from the East the returning rays of literature and science. At the beginning of the fourteenth century Dante had already given a permanent form to the language which was the offspring of this revolution; he was personally engaged in those political struggles, in which the elements of the good and evil that have since assumed a more permanent form were contending; his disappointment and exile gave him leisure to meditate, and produced his Divina Comedia. Lombardy and Tuscany, the most civilized districts of Italy, exhibited astonishing specimens of human genius; but at the same time they were torn to pieces by domestic faction, and almost destroyed by the fury of civil wars.
- Percy Shelley, To Emilia Viviani, 1821 [1824]
Madonna, wherefore hast thou sent to me
Sweet basil and mignionette?
Embleming love and health, which never yet
In the same wreath might be.
Alas, and they are wet!
Is it with thy kisses or thy tears?
For never rain or dew
Such flagrance drew
From plant or flower—the very doubt endears
My sadness ever new,
The sighs I breathe, the tears I shed for thee.
References:
Curreli, Mario, Scrittori inglesi a Pisa: viaggi, sogni, visioni dal Trecento al Duemila, Pisa, ETS, 2005.
Shelley, Mary, The Letters of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, ed. B. T. Bennett, Baltimore and London, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1980, 3 vols.
Shelley, Mary, The Journals of Mary Shelley, 1814-1844, eds P. R. Feldman and D. Scott-Kilvert, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1987, 2 vols.
Shelley, Mary, Valperga, or, the Life and Adventures of Castruccio, Prince of Lucca, ed. by M. Rossington, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2000.
Shelley, Mary, Valperga, a c. di L. M. Crisafulli e K. Elam, Milano, Mondadori, 2007 [2021].
Shelley, Percy Bysshe, Posthumous Poems of Percy Bysshe Shelley, edited by Mrs. Shelley, London, John and Henry L. Hunt, 1824.
Shelley, Percy Bysshe, The Letters of Percy Bysshe Shelley, ed. F. L. Jones, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1964, 2 vols.
Shelley, Percy Bysshe, Opere poetiche, a cura di F. Rognoni, Milano, Mondadori, 2018.
Villani, Stefano, “l Grand Tour degli inglesi a Pisa (secoli XVII-XIX)”, in E. Daniele (ed.), Le dimore di Pisa. L’arte di abitare i palazzi di una antica Repubblica Marinara dal Medioevo all’Unità d’Italia, Atti del Convegno di studi, Firenze, Alinea, 2010, pp.173-180.
Ultimo aggiornamento
05.04.2025