Angelica Palli

Anghelikì Pallis (1798–1875), daughter of the consul, as well as director of the Greek school, in Livorno, was born to both Hellenic parents. She studied with Maestro de Coureil (who was of French origin but died in Livorno). She inherited her love for literature and the classics from her father and began to versify from adolescence. She wrote poems, short stories, tragedies, novels. Her Tieste, dated 1814, deserved the praise of Monti. In 1919 she became a member of the Labronica Academy, with the name of Zelmira.

Her interests, as well as artistic, are political and social. She is an active supporter of Risorgimento ideals and struggles, she is dedicated to the cause of the Greek people against the Ottomans (the same for which Byron dies). The only woman to be admitted to the Vieusseux cabinet — the club founded in Florence which, in addition to serving as a newspaper and circulating library, also serves to bring together the intellectuals of the future united Italy — she is offered a collaboration but refuses not feeling up to the task.

The angelicapalli.blogspot.com site is a valuable source of information for knowing the private life of the Livorno writer. It is said that, in 1970, in the attic of a country house in the Benedetta valley, a chest was found containing letters from Angelica to her father.

We are in 1830, Angelica is thirty one years old, a face of classic and clean beauty. She meets the nineteen year old Giovanni Paolo Bartolomei, nobleman of Corsican origin and patriot, and falls in love with him. He is Catholic, she is Orthodox, he is a boy, she is a grown woman. His family opposes the relationship. The two flee, helped by Angelica’s brother, Michele, with the intention of asking for papal dispensation to get married. They then retreat to Corfu, where they are united in marriage with an Orthodox rite. The following year Angelica writes heartfelt letters to her father, imploring forgiveness, explaining that she has received so much but has also suffered. These are the letters found in the box.

From the marriage a son, Lucianino, is born, and the three finally return to Livorno. Palazzo Palli — Bartolomei, on the scali del Pesce in Venezia, became the main Mazzinian salon, between 20 and 40, frequented by Lamartine, Champollion, Niccolini, Guerrazzi, Bini and Manzoni. The latter immortalizes Angelica in an ode written for her, where he defines her “Offspring elected by the Sky, a new Sappho”.

During this period, Palli’s political activity intensified, she collaborated with magazines and newspapers, wrote poems and short stories on a civil topic, and in 47 dealt with the organization of Tuscan volunteers. Her husband and teenage son leave together with a group of patriots from Livorno to fight in Milan during the riots of 48 and Angelica reaches them and then returns to Livorno in 49.

During the autumn months, for some years she stays in Fauglia, in corso della Repubblica 47 (where a plaque reminds her). Here she writes the famous “Discourses of a woman to the young married women of her country”, in which she re-evaluates the role of women in society in a feminist sense. She also writes “Cenni sopra Livorno e i suoi contorni”, where she shows her appreciation for the fighting spirit of Labronic women, describing them as good, generous but disrespectful and irreverent. Pietro Vigo also refers to this text in his historical research.

In 53 she was widowed and moved to Turin but then died in Livorno in 1875. Her remains lie in the Greek cemetery in via Mastacchi.