A short life of the author
Benvenuto Cellini (1500–1571) was born in Florence and became one of the most celebrated goldsmiths and sculptors of the Renaissance — and one of the most outrageous autobiographers in Western literature. His Vita (written 1558–1566, first published 1728) is a headlong, self-aggrandizing, completely captivating account of a life lived at full intensity: he kills rivals, defends the Castel Sant’Angelo during the Sack of Rome, casts the bronze Perseus in a single heroic pour, escapes from a papal prison, and converses with God — all narrated in a voice of supreme confidence and zero self-doubt.
Life and Career
Cellini was the son of a musician and grew up in Florence during its golden age. He was apprenticed to a goldsmith as a teenager and quickly established a reputation for extraordinary skill and an equally extraordinary temper. He killed at least two men (he admits to these in his autobiography with minimal remorse), was imprisoned multiple times, and fled from one Italian city to another to escape enemies and creditors.
He worked for Pope Clement VII during the Sack of Rome in 1527, claiming to have personally shot the Constable of Bourbon and wounded the Prince of Orange from the walls of the Castel Sant’Angelo — claims that may be exaggerated but are told with irresistible bravado. He worked in France for Francis I, producing goldsmiths’ work of legendary refinement, and quarrelled his way out of the king’s favour.
His masterpiece in sculpture is the bronze Perseus with the Head of Medusa (1545–1554), which still stands in the Loggia dei Lanzi in Florence. The casting of this statue — described in the Vita with extraordinary dramatic power — nearly failed; Cellini claims to have thrown all his household pewter into the furnace to keep the bronze flowing.
He was imprisoned in the Castel Sant’Angelo on charges of stealing papal gems and describes his escape (lowering himself on knotted sheets) and subsequent recapture with the vividness of a thriller writer.
The Vita was dictated to an amanuensis between 1558 and 1566 and circulated in manuscript. It was first published in 1728 in Naples and became famous through Goethe’s German translation (1803), which Goethe called one of the most readable books in any language.
Major Works and Themes
The Vita is simultaneously a craftsman’s memoir, a picaresque adventure, and an assertion of artistic genius against all obstacles. Cellini presents himself as a man of absolute integrity and superhuman talent — the bragging is so magnificent that it becomes its own form of art.
Critical Reception and Legacy
Cellini’s autobiography is one of the foundational texts of Western autobiographical writing. Its influence on subsequent memoir — the artist as heroic individual, the life as adventure story — is profound. Berlioz wrote an opera based on it (Benvenuto Cellini, 1838).
Key Works
- Vita (written 1558–1566; first published 1728)
- Due Trattati (treatises on goldsmithing and sculpture, 1568)
Collecting Cellini
The first printed edition of the Vita (1728, Naples, published by Antonio Cocchi) is an important eighteenth-century book: $1,000–$5,000.
Goethe’s German translation (1803) is separately collected by Goethe scholars: $200–$800.
The John Addington Symonds English translation (1888) is the standard English version and the most commonly collected edition for English-language readers: $50–$200 for a fine copy.
Earlier manuscript copies of the Vita are institutional-level items.