VILLA OF CAFAGGIOLO.
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grotto in which one of the founders, the Beato Manetto dell’
Antella, died in 1268, is still shown, and is reached through
the woods. Several other grottoes, which were formerly in-
habited by the Hermits, are also preserved for the visits of
pious pilgrims, who are promised a hundred days’ indulgence
for their sins, in reward for prayers offered up at these shrines.
The view into the Valley of the Mugello, the country of
Giotto, from Monte Senario, is extremely beautiful. At no
great distance is the Abbey of Buonsollazzo (good comfort), on
whose site Hugh of Brandenburg, Viceroy of Tuscany for the
Emperor Otho III., beheld a vision so terrible, that he resolved
to expiate his sins by founding this abbey, and, shortly after¬
wards, he built the Abbey, or Badia, of Florence.
The battle of Radagasius, which, as before mentioned, is
supposed by some to have taken place in the hollow near the
Salviati Villa, is by others said to have been fought in the
Valle le Croci, seen from Monte Senario ; and the name Croci
to have been given from the sufferings of the combatants. In
the Valley of the Mugello is also situated the Villa of Cafag-
giolo, built by Cosimo de’ Medici, Pater Patriae ; here he also
founded a Convent of Minorites, or Lesser Franciscans.
Cafaggiolo and Careggi were Cosimo’s favourite residences,
and his son Piero placed his children, Lorenzo and Giuliano,
in the former villa during their boyhood. Lorenzo selected
the same villa in which to educate his young sons Piero and
Giovanni, afterwards Pope Leo X. They were living at
Cafaggiolo with their mother, Clarice Orsini, at the time of
the Pazzi conspiracy ; for Lorenzo considered it prudent to
keep his wife and children far removed from the dangers
which menaced the family in Florence.
Catharine, the daughter of Lorenzo de’ Medici, Duke of
Urbino, afterwards the wife of Henry II. of France, and the
instigator of the massacre of St. Bartholomew, was sent to
Cafaggiolo when a girl, attended by twelve noble Florentine
maidens, to receive Margaret the natural daughter of the
