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patrician would never have fallen upon our ears, nor would her image have haunted our imaginations. Nevertheless, I have held it my duty, as a historian, to attack this problem, and to add some details, still very far from complete, to the biography of Leonardo's heroine.

The Giocondo family was one of the most important in Florence. Lisa's husband, Francesco di Bartolommeo di Zanobi del Giocondo (born 1460, died 1528), filled several important public offices: in 1499 he was one of the twelve " Buonomini," in 1512 he was one of the "Priori," and was confirmed in the office in 1524.

The Giocondo race loved art and artists. Francesco commissioned D. Puligo to paint him a St. Francis receiving the Stigmata. His son caused Antonio di Donnino Mazzieri to paint a History of the Martyrs, intended for the chapel in the Annunziata, which contained the family burying-place. Another member of the family, Leonardo, bought a Madonna from Andrea del Sarto.

When (in the year 1495) Francesco took to wife Mona (the abbreviation of Madonna) Lisa, he had already, within the space of four years, seen two wives depart to a better world. He had married Camilla di Mariotto Ruccellai in 1491, and Tommasa di Mariotto Villani in 1493. His third wife was of Neapolitan origin; she belonged to the Gherardini family, possibly a branch of the Florentine stock bearing the same name. To these facts, unfortunately, the information I have been able to collect as to this first phase of her existence is limited. The enquiries kindly instituted at my request by Signor Barone, archivist of the Neapolitan state archives, have borne no fruit. In all probability, the child which died in 1499, and was buried at Sta. Maria Novella, was the issue of this third marriage, and consequently Lisa's daughter.1

As for Bartolommeo del Giocondo, to whom we have just referred in connection with a picture by Mazzieri, it is not known whether he was the son of Mona Lisa, or of one of Francesco's two former

1 "Il 1° giugno 1499. Una fanciulla di Francesco del Giocondo, riposta in Sta. Maria Novella" (Libro dei Morti. State archives, Florence. Communicated by Signor Al. Carli). Between 1490 and 1545 were buried in the same church, Zanobi di Domenico, Piero di Bartolommeo, a daughter of Amadeo's, Antonio di Zanobi, two sons of Zanobi's, Maddalena di Amadeo, Lorenzo, Fiammetta, wife of Amadeo, Elisabetta, one of Jacopo's wives, Andrea d'Antonio, and Raffaello.

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