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The Borgherini Enigma Page: 46 / 179and Roberto’s daughter mingled with the crowd in the Borgo, and ran on. Pierfrancescodreaded facing his scolding father tomorrow, for Roberto di Donato would surely complainand cry to Salvi that Pierfrancesco just could not, absolutely not, elope with an Acciaiuolidaughter like that. Pierfrancesco did not really care. He was certain of Margherita’s love,now. He was also certain she was as headstrong as her father, if not more so, and he wascertain of Roberto’s love for his daughter.Pierfrancesco and Margherita ran in the Borgo Santi Apostoli past the Palazzo Borgherini.Pierfrancesco lowered his head there to avoid being spotted by somebody of his family. Theysped towards the Piazza della Signoria.The streets were filled with people. Most of them wore masks. Pierfrancesco also had broughttwo small, black masks made of silk and leather, and lined with variously coloured feathers oneither side. The masks covered only one’s eyes and had to be held up with a little baton, sothey were useless to running youths. Pierfrancesco and Margherita did not use the masks fornow; the masks were only a token, to be brought up when people bothered them, or when theywanted to make fun of other people.Many men and women wore costumes. Pierfrancesco and Margherita had also not botheredwith these. Pierfrancesco ran in his gaudy Borgherini outfit, the red-and-yellow striped tighttrousers, and the red-and-yellow jacket with the pink roses on yellow bands. He was ascolourful as the Pantalones, the Brighellas, the Pulcinellas, the Arlechinoes, the Stentorelloesand the Meneghinoes, the characters of the Commedia del’Arte, around him. It was still chillyaround the river, so he also held a thick brown, woollen cloak with a hood on the arm withwhich he wore the masks. Margherita wore a simple dress of flame-coloured wool, a tightlacedbodice under which she wore a yellow blouse, and a heavy cape of dark red brocadedfabric, which hung on her shoulders. She had yellow brocaded little boots at her feet. On herhair sat a pink satin cap encrusted with Venetian glass jewels of all colours. Her cloak alsohad a hood, which hung loosely at her shoulders too. Pierfrancesco could not hold his eyes offher, which Margherita delightfully remarked, and chose to ignore.Carnival in Florence was not merely one cortège of chariots to be admired in a single longserpent procession advancing slowly through the streets of the city. Chariots would emergefrom everywhere, from every quarter and ward of the town. Each chariot simply movedthrough the streets at random, seeking acclamations, cheers and admiration for the workinvested in the displays, and offering general delight. Pierfrancesco and Margherita hadalready seen one chariot on the Ponte alle Grazie in the far, moving from the Altr’ Arnoquarter, but they had not run to there. That chariot would soon roll into the city, and theycould watch it with the other.Musicians played happy tunes in every street and alley. Violinists and flutists wanderedamong the crowd. Groups of singers sang fine, romantic or ribald songs. Groups of up totwenty drummers marched, dressed in outrageous, garish hues. Jugglers and magicians, firespewingorientals and funny-dressed clowns, as well as brightly-clad country men on highstilts mixed with the crammed mass. Groups of dancing girls erupted from a side street,pirouetting and jumping, beating their tambourines. Florence was in joy!At the Duomo, Pierfrancesco and Margherita saw their first chariot of the day close by. Itrepresented the mythological scene of Paris and Helena. The chariot was a long and wide, sixwheeledplatform drawn by eight oxen. The episode showed the rapt of Helena by Paris. Oneof the most beautiful girls of Florence had been chosen to impersonalise Helena, and one ofCopyright © René Dewil Version 2 Number of words: 108230 July 2009
The Borgherini Enigma Page: 47 / 179the finest boys was Paris. They stood immobile as two lovers on a green bed of palm leaves,holding each other’s hands and looking at each other’s eyes like enamoured angels. Behindthem, Agamemnon raged, holding a monstrous halberd in his hands. Arms-crossed, impassiveAchilles turned his back to Agamemnon and watched intently at the crowd as if he couldn’tcare less of what happened on the platform. Hector and Priam stood on guard in a castle-likestructure, a high contraption of crenellated walls painted with patterns of large stones,representing Troy. The platform was hidden by decorated panels cut out of wood. At thefront, where Paris and Helena embraced, the panels formed a background of sea-waves and ofthe low green hills of Ilion. In the middle the panels imitated the ragged mountains of Sparta,and at the end the scene was of the roads to Troy. The oxen wore long, red-and-golden cloths,which hid almost entirely their powerful bodies. Garlands of flowers adorned their silverpaintedhorns. Peasants dressed as Greek warriors, wearing mock swords and shields, steppedaside the oxen and drove them on. Twenty young girls were dancing Spartan virgins, andtwenty young boys in gilded harnesses followed the chariot. The boys saluted and waved tothe bystanders, the girls whirled around. All wore stylised white and blue masks. The cheersof the crowd accompanied this chariot made by the quarter of Santa Maria Novella.Twice already, Pierfrancesco and Margherita had put on their masks, drawn their cloaks overtheir dresses and their hoods over their heads, to kiss passionately in recesses of the houses.Margherita seemed insatiable of kisses that day. Pierfrancesco happily complied. Then theyran on, cloaks open in the wind, masks down, and mixed with the joyful crowd.They walked to the Piazza Santa Maria Novella, eager to see Francesco Granacci’s chariot.This would be the platform constructed on Granacci’s directions by the wards of Leon Blancoand Unicorno.The chariot waited still in the Piazza for the sign to start moving. It would soon be set inmotion. Granacci’s chariot was about the same size as the one of Paris and Helena, this onehowever drawn by ten pairs of white horses. The horses had been decorated by garlands of redand green silk flowers, which hung over their bodies from head to tail. Each horse was led bya Greek hero, young men dressed in short, white togas that went no further down than theirknees. The men had received a thick, white cape too, but they stood shivering in the old coldof the end of winter.It was indeed Granacci’s chariot, for Margherita cried out she had recognised their friend,after which she doubled over in laughter. Granacci throned in a scene of clouds as ZeusMoiragetes, the father and leader of the Fates. Granacci looked sternly, dressed in white toga,a gilded thunderbolt in his hand. He wore a mask of a terrible god with a long, white beard.Granacci spotted Pierfrancesco and Margherita mocking him.‘The Fates drive Jupiter, not Jupiter the Fates,’ Pierfrancesco shouted.Granacci responded with a grave, rolling voice, ‘beware of the revenge of the Fates, youmortals! I will release them on you! Make way for the Fates, for they spin the thread of yourlives, measure them, and cut them with the scythe of death!’In front of Jupiter three beautiful women sat on thrones, in a scene decorated like a Greektemple. Nona spun the thread of life at a distaff and spindle. Decima pointed a rod to measurethe length of the thread, and Morta wielded a scythe to cut the thread. The fates should havebeen old hags, but that would have offended Granacci’s tastes. Jupiter’s daughters werehandsome, generously endowed women. Pierfrancesco even thought he recognised Lucreziadel Fede, Andrea del Sarto’s beloved, in Decima.The fates were remorseless and unfeeling, so Granacci had painted ice-panels, a frozen river,and plains covered with snow at their feet.Copyright © René Dewil Version 2 Number of words: 108230 July 2009
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