Pisa, Tre Palazzi di Chiesa
Commentary
The complex of the three palaces stood at the beginning of Lungarno Galilei, next to the residence of the Scotto family, shipowners who, in addition to the palace that bears their name, also purchased the park now transformed into a public garden. The third palace, on the riverside, was destroyed during the bombings of the Second World War.
Upon their return from Bagni di Pisa in October 1821, the Shelleys rented the top floor (Mary Shelley to Maria Gisborne, 25 October 1821), where they hosted a lively salon and led an active social life. In the same period they also rented, on the opposite side of the Lungarno, Palazzo Lanfranchi (today Palazzo Toscanelli, seat of the State Archives) for Lord Byron (Percy Shelley to Mr. Gisborne, 25 October 1821). Together with him, the Shelleys formed an English circle that included the Williamses, the “Masons” (George William Tighe and Lady Mountcashell), John Taaffee, and Thomas Medwin.
During his stay at the Tre Palazzi di Chiesa, Shelley composed the lyrical drama Hellas, conceived as a celebration of the Greek War of Independence—an event on which, in his view, the British public opinion not only maintained an unacceptable silence but also ignobly supported the Turkish oppressor. In the poem, Shelley recounts the events from the enemy’s perspective, a diegetic stratagem borrowed from Aeschylus, while adding a chorus of Greek women prisoners at the Sultan’s court. Shelley dedicated the poem to Alexandros Mavrokordatos (1791–1865), a regular guest at the Shelleys’ circle in Pisa from November 1820 until June 1821, when he returned to his homeland following the proclamation of Greek independence. Mavrokordatos was one of the authors of the first Greek constitution of 1822 and later held several offices in the new independent state. The War of Independence had begun in February 1821, and the presence of Prince Mavrokordatos was undoubtedly a catalyst for Shelley’s poetic inspiration.
Documents
- Letter from Mary Shelley to Mrs. Gisborne, 25 October 1821 (in The Letters of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, L 1, 209)
Here we are in Pisa, having furnished very nice apartments for ourselves, and what is more paid for the furniture out of the fruits of two years’ economy. […] I daresay you know the house, next door to La Scoto’s house of the North side of Lung’Arno: but the rooms we inhabit are South, and look over the whole country towards the Sea, so that we are entirely out of the bustle and disagreeable puzzi, &c. –– of the town, and hardly know that we are so enveloped until the descent into the street.
- Letter from Percy Shelley to Mr. Gisborne, 25 October 1821 (in The Letters of Percy Bysshe Shelley, II, 667-668)
Did I tell you that Lord Byron comes to settle at Pisa, & that he has a plan of writing a periodical work in conjunction with Hunt? His house – Madame Felichi’s, is already taken and fitted up for him – and has been expected every day these six weeks. – La Guiccioli his cara sposa who attends him impatiently, is a pretty sentimental, stupid innocent, superficial Italian, who has sacrifized an immense fortune to live with for Lord Byron; and who, if I know any thing of my friend of her, or of human nature will hereafter have plenty of leisure & opportunity to repent of her rashes. Lord B. is however quite cured of his gross habits – as far as his habits – the perverse ideas on which they were founded are not yet eradicated.
We have furnished a house in Pisa, & mean to make it our headquarters. – I shall get all my books out, & intrench myself – like a spider in a web.
Images
Tre Palazzi di Chiesa before World War II
https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=368291227141198&set=pcb.368291293807858
Tre Palazzi di Chiesa nowadays
https://www.turismo.pisa.it/luogo/palazzo-chiesa
Texts
- Hellas, a Lyrical Drama, 25 October 1821, vv. 197-238 (Opere poetiche, ed. F. Rognoni, 2019, pp. 1006-1011)
Chorus
Worlds on worlds are rolling ever
From creation to decay,
Like the bubbles on a river
Sparkling, bursting, borne away.
But they are still immortal
Who through Birth’s orient portal
And Death’s dark chasm hurrying to and fro
Clothe their unceasing flight
In the brief dust and light
Gathered around their chariots as they go;
New shapes they still may weave,
New Gods, new Laws receive,
Bright or dim are they as the robes they last
On Death’s bare ribs had cast
A Power from unknown God.
A Promethean Conqueror came;
Like a triumphal path he trod
The thorns of death and shame.
A mortal shape to him
Was like the vapour dim
Which the orient planet animates with light;
Hell, Sin and Slavery came,
Like bloodhounds mild and tame,
Not preyed, until their Lord had taken flight;
The moon of Mahomet
Arose, and it shall set,
While blazoned as on Heaven’s immortal noon
The cross leads generations on.
Swift as the radiant shapes of sleep
From one whose dreams are Paradise
Fly, when the fond wretch wakes to weep
And Day peers forth with her blank eyes;
So fleet, so faint, so fair,
The Powers of earth and air
Fled from the folding star of Bethlehem;
Apollo, Pan, and Love,
And even Olympian Jove
Grew weak, for killing Truth had glared on them;
Our hills and seas and streams
Dispeopled of their dreams,
Their waters turned to blood, their dew to tears,
Wailed for the golden years.
Bibliography
Curreli, Mario, Una certa Signora Mason. Romantici inglesi a Pisa ai tempi di Leopardi, Pisa, Edizioni ETS, 1997.
D’Amico, Masolino, Lord Byron. Vita attraverso le lettere, Torino, Einaudi, 1989.
Rognoni, Francesco, “Notizie sui testi e note di commento”, in P. B. Shelley, Opere poetiche, Milano, Mondadori, 2018.
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, Percy Bysshe, The Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley, ed. M. Shelley, London, Edward Moxon, 1839.
Shelley, Percy Bysshe, The Letters of Percy Bysshe Shelley, ed. F. L. Jones, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1964, 2 vols.
Ultimo aggiornamento
22.09.2025