A love-story, ending in a happy marriage, is symbolized in the quaint ornamentation of the palace. Bernardo Vettori, surnamed “il Biondo” (the fair-haired) died, leaving his widow Ginevra with one daughter, heiress to a large fortune. Piero Salviati married the young widow and induced her to affiance little Maddalena to his own son by a former marriage, but before Maddalena was of marriageable age her intended husband was killed in battle. In summer, like most Florentines, the Salviati went to their villa which was near to one owned by young Lodovico Capponi. He fell passionately in love with the golden-haired Maddalena, and she with him. Her step-father opposed the marriage as he wanted to keep her fortune in his own family, and he had influence enough at court to induce Duke Cosimo I. to forbid it. In spite of her mother’s entreaties Maddalena was put into a convent and every effort was made to provoke her lover, whose fiery temper was well known, into committing some act of violence. Ginevra at last succeeded in interesting the Duchess Eleonora in her behalf, who asked Maddalena to stay at the Pitti palace for a few days. Instead of days she remained months and, by order of the Duke, Lodovico Capponi’s name was always mentioned with contempt and contumely, while Sigismondo de’ Rossi, a favourite of Cosimo, was lauded to the skies. Lodovico, thus separated from Maddalena, determined that at any rate he would see her from afar and took a house belonging to the Gianfigliazzi at Santa Trinita, from the windows of which he could see the court pass over the bridge. The Florentines took such interest in the lovers that a crowd always assembled to watch the stolen glances they exchanged.

The Duchess was touched by the unhappiness and constancy of Maddalena, and it is supposed that it was by her suggestion that one morning at daylight an old woman appeared at Capponi’s bedside and bade him go at once to the palace and fetch Maddalena, and to prepare everything for the marriage. “In twenty-four hours,” writes an old chronicler, “Lodovico, among other magnificent things, caused an artist to paint a splendid and large shield with his arms and those of Maddalena, surrounded with olive branches and the word OPTATA, a motto of his own invention much praised for its brevity and its meaning; she being a Vettori, and peace, symbolized by the olive, following on the victory gained by her after war.” The wedding was a gay one and the house not being large enough Piazza Santa Trinita was used as a ball-room. “Comfits fell thick as hail in spring, and wine flowed like water.” The triumph of true love was very popular among the nobles, who feared the Duke would interfere in other marriages had he succeeded in preventing this one.

The lovers went to live in the old Vettori palace and amused themselves by decorating it in charming and symbolical fashion. Above the two large windows was inscribed LODOVICUS CAPPONIUS, to show that he was now the master of the palace and of its mistress, while the olive with the word OPTATA served as a decoration to the capitals of the pilasters, which bore at their base the Capponi arms on one side, the Vettori on the other. The motto OPTATA and the olive branches appeared also on the ornamented frieze under the first-floor windows, while on the smaller windows, in lieu of the ornaments generally used, were the arms of the two families.44

The name of the architect is unknown, but Bernardo Buontalenti, a friend of Capponi’s, did other work for him, so he may have aided in carrying out this memorial of faithful love; although as Signor Iodico Del Badia remarks, nothing in the façade recalls his style.45 In the large saloon there is a stone fire-place, decorated with the arms, the motto and the olive branches, and the whole room is finely frescoed by Bernardo Poccetti with episodes from the lives of the Capponi family. Lodovico died in 1614, and by the marriage of his grandson’s daughter, Cassandro Capponi, the palace went to the Riccardi who sold it in 1803. Since then it has changed hands several times, and the last owner, Count Leonetti, sold it to M. de Witte.