Filicaia, Vincenzo da

FILICAIA, Vincenzo da. - Poet, b. in Florence on 30 Dec. 1642. Educated by the Jesuits, he attended law studies in Pisa, cultivated philosophy and theology, and also devoted himself to music. Financial difficulties reduced him to living near Figline (Florence) with his wife Anna Capponi, a poetess, and his children Braccio and Scipione.

The Christian victory over the Turks in 1683 inspired in him six Canzoni on the occasion of the siege and liberation of Vienna, which made him famous. Cosimo III appointed him senator, commissioner of Volterra and then of Pisa, and Christina of Sweden had his children educated at her own expense. He died in Florence on 14 Sept. 1707. He is buried in S. Croce. The religiosity of his life was matched by the sincerity of his sentiments in his sacred lyrics, especially in the canzoni Alla bratissima Vergine and in nine sonnets: Fede in Dio nelle disgrazie, Sopra la divina Provvidenza, Memoria della morte. De Sanctis and Croce saw in F. a rhetorician versifying; Foscolo, on the other hand, praised his poetry, because it proclaimed the noblest and most manly sentiments of the soul; Leopardi, while accusing the canzoni of monotony, noted that F. «parlando sempre di cose della nostra religione ha tolto a imitare quel sommo sublime della Scrittura e per questo sommo sublime si fa pregare».

Giovani Fallani