The Filza Dei: Giovanni Battista and his unpublished documents about Leonardo da Vinci

Abstract

Between the late XVIII century and the first two decades of the XIX century, there was a great interest in the figure of Leonardo da Vinci in scholarly studies in the Milanese area. It is known that among the first scholars who took an interest in Leonardo, thus contributing to the development of modern Leonardo historiography, there was the Como count Antonio Giuseppe della Torre di Rezzonico (1709-1785). Thanks the intercession of Angelo Maria Bandini, Count Rezzonico managed to obtain some precious information from Tuscany thanks to the work collected by the Florentine antiquarian, genealogist and archivist Giovanni Battista Dei (1703-1786). For a hefty fee, in fact, Dei researched and transcribed for the Prefect of the Laurentian Library of Florence, who promptly sent to Count Rezzonico a report of numerous documents concerning Leonardo and his family which he was able to find both in the family archive, then existing, and with a careful inspection of the various city archives achieved thanks to his exceptional knowledge of the organization of the huge archival material.