re Buonarroti, seeing the genius and skill of Silvio, caused him
to begin certain trophies to complete those tombs, but they remained
unfinished, with other things, by reason of the siege of Florence.
Silvio executed a tomb for the Minerbetti in their chapel in the
tramezzo[1] of the Church of S. Maria Novella, as well as any man could,
since, in addition to the beautiful shape of the sarcophagus, there are
carved upon it various shields, helmet-crests, and other fanciful
things, and all with as much design as could be desired in such a work.
Being at Pisa in the year 1528, Silvio made there an Angel that was
wanting over a column on the high-altar of the Duomo, to face the one by
Tribolo; and he made it so like the other that it could not be more like
even if it were by the same hand. In the Church of Monte Nero, near
Livorno, he made a little panel of marble with two figures, for the
Frati Ingesuati; and at Volterra he made a tomb for Messer Raffaello da
Volterra, a man of great learning, wherein he portrayed him from nature
on a sarcophagus of marble, with some ornaments and figures.
Afterwards, while the siege of Florence was going on, Niccolo Capponi, a
most honourable citizen, died at Castel Nuovo della Garfagnana on his
return from Genoa, where he had been as Ambassador from his Republic to
the Emperor; and Silvio was sent in great haste to make a cast of his
head, to the end that he might afterwards make one in marble, having
already executed a very beautiful one in wax.

Now Silvio lived for some time with all his family in Pisa; and since he
belonged to the Company of the Misericordia, which in that city
accompanies those condemned to death to the place of execution, there
once came into his head, being sacristan at that time, the strangest
caprice in the world. One night he took out of the grave the body of one
who had been hanged the day before; and, after having dissected it for
the purposes of his art, being a whimsical fellow, and perhaps a wizard,
and ready to believe in enchantments and suchlike follies, he flayed it
completely, and with the skin, prepared after a method that he had been
taught, he made a jerkin, which he wore for some time over his shirt,
believing that it had some great virtue, without anyone ever knowing of
it. But having once been upbraided by a good Father to whom he had
confessed the matter, he pulled off the jerkin and laid it to rest in a
grave, as the monk had urged him to do. M