Villa Medici at Cafaggiolo

The Villa Medici in Cafaggiolo is Cafaggiolo del Mugello, municipality of San Piero a Sieve, Province of Florence, Region of Tuscany, Italy.

History

Averardo de ' Medici seems to land in the year 1427 as the owner of the castle in the Mugello Valley. Cosimo de ' Medici ( Il Vecchio ), son of Giovanni di Bicci de' Medici commissioned the architect Michelozzo in 1451 with the conversion to a summer residence. The agricultural use was underscored by the laterally -scale farm buildings ( fattoria ).

With the extinction of the Medici with death of Gian Gastone in 1737, the villa passed to Francis Stephen of Lorraine. With the unification of Italy, the villa was confiscated and passed to the House of Savoy, which sold it to the Borghese family.

The Villa

The villa provides a fairly defensive impression and how to be seen on the painting in the museum Giusto Utens Firenze com'era, they originally had two towers. One of them was located in the outer wall and secured the gate with a drawbridge over the moat. Here in the country, thirty kilometers from Florence, it was still possible to build such tall towers, because since 1325, the height of the towers had been limited in the city.

In 1864, the Borghese acquired the villa and let the wall and grind the tower, as well as the trench with soil to alleviate the martial appearance slightly.

The Garden

From the Renaissance garden, you can still see on the painting Utens behind the villa, no trace remains.