THE VILLA TORRE A CONA 
AND ITS GARDENS—NEAR FLORENCE, ITALY 
By B. C. Jennings-Bramly 
Illustrated with Photographs by Arthur Murray Cobb 
S OME eight or nine miles from Florence 
over the hills behind Bagno a Ripoli 
stands a villa known as Torre a Cona, till 
lately the property of the Rinuccini, one of the 
oldest Tuscan families. This family became 
extinct in 1848 at the death of Marchese Pier- 
francesco Rinuccini. His eldest daughter, 
Maria Anna, married to the Marchese Giorgio 
Trivulzio of Milan, inherited the house and 
lands of Torre a Cona. Her son, Principe 
Gian Giacomo, sold the property about 1890 
to Baron Padoa, its present owner. 
It is not known when first the old fortress 
was begun, or whether the Rinuccini built it 
or bought it, but the group of fortified build¬ 
ings at Torre a Cona appears as an old prop¬ 
erty of the family in the declaration made for 
taxation by Messer Francesco Rinuccini in 
G78- 
We can see it, such as it was then, in the 
gradino of the altar-piece in the Rinuccini 
Chapel in the sacristy of Santa Croce in Flor¬ 
ence. This picture 
was painted about 
the middle of the 
fourteenth century. 
In 1409, however, 
so the archives of 
the Florentine Re¬ 
public tell us, the 
then owner, one 
Jacopo Rinuccini, 
was formally thank¬ 
ed by the State for 
having restored the 
fortifications of his 
castle. This is cu¬ 
rious, and proved 
that the said Jacopo 
was a trusted citi¬ 
zen, for, in the pre¬ 
ceding century, the 
stout burghers of 
Florence had made it their business to raze 
the walls round many a noble’s castle, 
thereupon turning the owners, whether they 
would or no, into peaceful citizens. 
There are but few traces now of fortifica¬ 
tions at Torre a Cona. The tower, which 
gives the name to the villa, still exists. Orig¬ 
inally, it stood alone in the centre of a court¬ 
yard, connected with the house by two walls 
which ran out to the wings, east and west. 
The western wall is now incorporated in the 
house. I he eastern has a gateway and on it 
the ancient escutcheon of the Rinuccini, seven 
lozenges per bend on a field argent. This is 
proof positive that this wall was built before 
1376, for in that year Queen Joan of Naples 
granted the family the additional of a label 
gules, which appear subsequently on their 
shield. 
A large courtyard, surrounded by battle- 
mented walls, completed the fortifications. 
Two sides of this wall are still standing, 
but the battlements 
have been closed 
on the inner side, 
and baroque vases 
have been placed 
here and there upon 
them. From the 
outside the battle¬ 
ments are still visi¬ 
ble. Alterations 
and additions were 
made from time to 
time. A picture 
which still hangs in 
one of the principal 
rooms on the second 
floor, shows the 
house as it stood in 
the seventeenth cen¬ 
tury. From 1750 to 
1760, the last altera- 
ENTRANCE TO THE VILLA GROUNDS 
x 45 
