Jacopo Saltarelli
Jacopo d’Andrea Saltarelli (born c. 1459) was an apprentice goldsmith and male prostitute, sometimes described in modern literature as an artist's model, about whom nothing is known except the details of court records of several charges of prostitution, in one of which Leonardo da Vinci was among the accused. On April 9, 1476, an anonymous denunciation was left in the tamburo (letter box) in the Palazzo della Signoria (town hall) accusing him of being "party to many wretched affairs and consents to please those persons who request such wickedness of him".
Jacopo Saltarelli
- Born
- 1459 · Florence.
- Occupation
- goldsmith · prostitute · apprentice
- Languages
- Italian
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Documentary summary
Jacopo d’Andrea Saltarelli (born c. 1459) was an apprentice goldsmith and male prostitute, sometimes described in modern literature as an artist's model, about whom nothing is known except the details of court records of several charges of prostitution, in one of which Leonardo da Vinci was among the accused. On April 9, 1476, an anonymous denunciation was left in the tamburo (letter box) in the Palazzo della Signoria (town hall) accusing him of being "party to many wretched affairs and consents to please those persons who request such wickedness of him".
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wikidata · Q952631 · wikipedia · Jacopo Saltarelli
In this article
Biography
Biography
The denunciation accused four people of engaging in sodomy with Saltarelli: Baccino, a tailor; Leonardo da Vinci; Bartolomeo di Pasquino; and Leonardo Tornabuoni, a member of the aristocratic Tornabuoni family. Saltarelli's name was known to the authorities because another man had been convicted of sodomy with him earlier the same year. Charges against the five were dismissed on the condition that no further accusations appear in the tamburo. The same accusation did in fact appear on June 7 but charges were again dismissed. The charges were dismissed because the accusations did not meet the legal requirement for prosecution: all accusations of sodomy had to be signed, but this one was not. (Such accusations could be made secretly, but not anonymously.) There is speculation that since the family of one of the accused, Leonardo Tornabuoni, was associated with Lorenzo de' Medici, the family exerted its influence to secure the dismissal. A painting of Jacopo Saltarelli was then used to represent a white version of Jesus Christ.
The recorded working language is Italian.
Life and career
Dated record
Life and career
The full dated record · 1 entries
1459
Jacopo Saltarelli was born on 1 January 1459.
Primary material
Documents and archives
authority record
- Wikidata, structured authority record Q952631: Jacopo Saltarelli
General reference · Wikidata
reference work
- “Jacopo Saltarelli”, English Wikipedia, consulted as further reading
Reputable secondary · Wikipedia
Notes from the source article
Cited by Wikipedia
Notes from the source article
These works are cited by the source article, in its own numbering. They are recorded as its citations, not as sources VALÉORINE has verified.
- 1.Danielle Hunebelle, Les clairs obscurs d'une vie géniale et solitaire in Léonard de Vinci, Éd. Hachette, Paris, 1973, p. 55.
- 2.Lara Mercanti, Giovanni Straffi, Le torri di Firenze e del suo territorio, Éd. Alinea, Florence, 2003
- 3.Fortunato Grimaldi, Le case-torri di Firenze, Éd. Tassinari, Florence, 2005.
- 4.Urne en forme de tambourin, d'où l'appellation, destinée à recevoir les récriminations et les plaintes de la population.
- 5.Bouches de la Vérité
- 6.Giuseppina Fumagalli, Eros di Leonardo, Éd. Garzanti, Milano 1952, pp. 97-98, à partir des Archives d'État de Florence, « Uffiziali de Notte », XVIII (2), f° 46 v°, 9 avril 1476.
- 7.Marc-André Fournier, Léonard de Vinci en Toscane, Vol. 2, Guide MAF, Boulogne-Billancourt, 2007, p. 114,
- 8.Léonard de Vinci et ses deux amours
- 9.Ce fils de famille est décrit comme étant habillé de noir
- 10.manet cum Andrea del Verrochio
- 11.Elizabeth Abbott, A History of Celibacy. Éd. Da Capo Press, 2001, p. 340.
- 12.« Les accusés furent absous jusqu'à ce que le cas fut réexaminé, c'est-à-dire remis au tambour avec une requête signée »
- 13.Danielle Hunebelle, « Les clairs obscurs d'une vie géniale et solitaire » in Léonard de Vinci, Éd. Hachette, Paris, 1973, p. 64.
- 14.Alessandro Vezzosi. Leonardo da Vinci: the mind of the Renaissance. Harry N. Abrams. 1997.
- 15.ibid. , p. 63.
- 16.Michael Rocke Forbidden friendships. Homosexuality and male culture in Renaissance Florence, Oxford University Press, New York, 1996, p. 298, note 120.
Bibliography printed in the source article · 4
- Abbott, Elizabeth, A History of Celibacy. Da Capo Press, 2001.
- Crompton, Louis, Homosexuality and Civilization. Harvard University Press, 2006.
- Creighton, Gilbert and Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, Caravaggio and His Two Cardinals. Penn State Press, 1995.
- Wittkower, Rudolph and Margaret Wittkower, Born Under Saturn: The Character and Conduct of Artists : A Documented History from Antiquity to the French Revolution. New York, New York Review of Books, 2006.
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The Encyclopedia exists whether or not anything is for sale. Corrections are recorded rather than overwritten, and every version of this record is kept. Published 16 August 2026.
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