Gelli Giovanni

Giovan Battista Gelli was born in 1498 in Florence, the son of Carlo, a rather well-to-do wine merchant who had left the village of Peretola to seek his fortune in the city. Instead of following in his father’s footsteps among barrels and fine wine, the young Battista chose a much humbler path: he spent his entire life working as a shoemaker.By day he hammered soles, and by night he transformed into a self-taught philosopher and man of letters. A true “tailor of the soul” ante litteram.He married a woman named Pantesilea (a name worthy of a Homeric heroine, which already says a great deal) and together they had two daughters, Alessandra and Marietta. He moved in the intellectual circles of his time without ever making too much noise: he was a pupil of Antonio Francini and Francesco Verini, breathed in the Savonarolan and Platonic air of the Orti Oricellari, and always remained somewhat in the background, as a keen observer.Loyal to Cosimo I, he held some very modest public offices—the kind of positions that get you into history books without ever making you powerful. In 1540 he joined the Accademia degli Umidi, enthusiastically supported its transformation into the Accademia Fiorentina, and even became its consul in 1548.His true passion was Dante. On 5 August 1541, he delivered his first lecture at the Academy, commenting on none other than the language of Adam in Paradiso. From then on, between one shoe and another, he continued to speak about Dante and Petrarch on a regular basis.His best-known works are two gems of the 16th century:

• I capricci del bottaio (1546), a series of dialogues between a cooper and his own soul that went straight onto the first Index of Forbidden Books (evidently the cooper’s soul reasoned a bit too freely);
• La Circe (1549), in which Ulysses chats amiably with his companions who have been transformed into animals—a brilliant pretext for letting beasts speak uncomfortable truths about human beings.

Gelli was convinced (like many at the time) that the founders of Florence were direct descendants of Noah, a theory “strengthened” by a spectacular forgery by Annio da Viterbo that he took very seriously. He also passionately defended the superiority of the Florentine language over all others: typical local pride, seasoned with healthy Tuscan arrogance.In 1553, Cosimo I appointed him official reader of the Commedia. From that moment until his death, he delivered nine Dante lectures, published year after year, which had a considerable influence on the entire Florentine 16th century.He passed away on 24 July 1563 in his house on via dei Fossi and was buried in the family tomb in Santa Maria Novella.Shoemaker by day, philosopher by night, and Dante scholar by vocation: a figure who proves that you can leave your mark on history without ever stopping mending shoes.