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Updated: June 28, 2025
This contention between Condivi and Vasari, our two contemporary authorities upon the facts of Michelangelo's life, may not seem to be a matter of great moment for his biographer after the lapse of four centuries. Yet the first steps in the art-career of so exceptional a genius possess peculiar interest.
This may now be seen at S. Pietro ad Vincula; and though, truth to tell, it is but a mutilated and botched-up remnant of Michelangelo's original design, the monument is still the finest to be found in Rome, and perhaps elsewhere in the world, if only for the three statues finished by the hand of the great master." In this account, Condivi, has condensed the events of seven years.
Condivi says that "he had hardly begun painting, and had finished the picture of the Deluge, when the work began to throw out mould to such an extent that the figures could hardly be seen through it. Michelangelo thought that this excuse might be sufficient to get him relieved of the whole job.
See the story as told by Torrigiani himself in Cellini, ed. Le Monnier, p. 23. After saying that he talked of love like Plato, Condivi continues: "Non senti mai uscir di quella bocca se non parole onestissime, e che avevan forza d' estinguere nella gioventù ogni incomposto e sfrenato desiderio che in lei potesse cadere." Compare Scipione Ammirato, quoted by Guasti, "Le Rime," p. xi.
Having begun his task unwillingly, he now felt an equal or greater unwillingness to leave the stupendous conception of his brain unfinished. Against all expectation of himself and others, he had achieved a decisive victory, and was placed at one stroke, Condivi says, "above the reach of envy." His hand had found its cunning for fresco as for marble.
A far more important commission was intrusted to Michelangelo in August of the same year, 1501. Condivi, after mentioning his return to Florence, tells the history of the colossal David in these words: "Here he stayed some time, and made the statue which stands in front of the great door of the Palace of the Signory, and is called the Giant by all people. It came about in this way.
Condivi has given us the story of his early difficulties and of his first picture, probably in Michael Angelo’s own words; we may supplement this account by the following extract from Vasari, who gathered his information from the gossip of the workshops of Florence, and from Ridolfo Ghirlandaio, the son of his first master.
On November 1, 1509, a certain portion was uncovered to the public; and before the end of the year 1512 the whole was completed. Thus, though the legend of Vasari and Condivi has been stripped of the miraculous by careful observation and keen-sighted criticism, enough remains to justify the sense of wonder that expressed itself in their exaggerated statements.
We shall see that he succeeded in expelling both San Gallo and Buonarroti during the course of 1506, and that in their absence he reigned, together with Raffaello, almost alone in the art-circles of the Eternal City. I see no reason, therefore, to discredit the story told by Condivi and Vasari regarding the Pope's growing want of interest in his tomb.
We do not know at what exact time Michelangelo finished his Cartoon in 1506. He left it, says Condivi, in the Sala del Papa. Vasari asserts that it was taken to the house of the Medici, and placed in the great upper hall, but gives no date. This may have taken place on the return of the princely family in 1512.
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