Vegni - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The Vegni are an Italian family from Siena

Siena

Siena is a city in Tuscany, Italy. It is the capital of the province of Siena.The historic centre of Siena has been declared by UNESCO a World Heritage Site. It is one of the nation's most visited tourist attractions, with over 163,000 international arrivals in 2008...

. The medioeval origins of the family are uncertain and with limited documentation.

A notary

Notary

A notary is a lawyer or person with legal training who is licensed by the state to perform acts in legal affairs, in particular witnessing signatures on documents...

of the royal chamber, called Bencivennis , was active in Siena in the first part of the 13th century. The patronymic

Patronymic

A patronym, or patronymic, is a component of a personal name based on the name of one's father, grandfather or an even earlier male ancestor. A component of a name based on the name of one's mother or a female ancestor is a matronymic. Each is a means of conveying lineage.In many areas patronyms...

Bencivennis (the Latin genitive) is used, abbreviated as bcVennis in the documents signed by Luca, a notary, in documents he drew up during late 13th. Pietro olim (of) Luca bcVennis was active in Siena until 1321. The sons of Pietro settled in the area of Chianciano, focusing the centre of interests of the family in the South of the Siena

Siena

Republic until the fall of it in 1555. The surname Bencivennis remains in official documents during all the Repubblican period, to disappear at the end of the 16th century, substituted by Vegni. The last one to use it in official documents is Eustachio Bencivennis or bcVegnis, again a notary, who died in 1585. His grandson Giovanni Battista di Pietro, a notary in Chianciano between 1600 and 1641, signs his documents as Vegni, although he still uses the same private legal seal with the family coat of arms.

Besides the local government positions held by family members, the only member worth of notice in these early period is Andrea, bishop of Chiusi in the mid-16th century.
Biagio, Giovanni Andrea and Giovanni Battista and Ventura consolidated the family presence in Chianciano during the 17th.
At the turn of the 18th century three main branches of the family are known, second cousins, one in Chianciano, headed by Francesco, of Deo' (Adeodato of Ventura), a lawyer and then local judge. Pietro, a landowner in Montisi, son of Giovanni Andrea, with his three sons, Giacomo, Giuseppe and Luca, and a daughter, Laura. Luca became a priest, with Giuseppe and Giacomo dividing, but only in 1745, the properties of the father Pietro, who died in 1728. At that time, the third branch of the family, that of Montegiovi, near Pienza

Pienza

Pienza, a town and comune in the province of Siena, in the Val d'Orcia in Tuscany , between the towns of Montepulciano and Montalcino, is the "touchstone of Renaissance urbanism."...

and Castel del Piano, was headed by Carlo Giuseppe of Ventura.

During the first half of the 18th century the family still maintains its centre of interests in the region South of Siena

Siena

, which remains the city of reference for education, with its university, and local political power.
A member of international relevance is Leonardo , born from Francesco Vegni and Caterina Apolloni in 1731.

Leonardo, who was pleased to add a "de" to the surname Vegni in order to stress his ancient nobility, graduated with a degree in civil and canon law from the University of Siena

University of Siena

The University of Siena in Siena, Tuscany is one of the oldest and first publicly funded universities in Italy. Originally called Studium Senese, the University of Siena was founded in 1240. The University has around 20,000 students, nearly half of Siena's total population of around 54,000...

in 1750, but he was also very much interested in design, architecture, poetry (he was a member of the Roman academy Arcadia

Arcadia

Arcadia is one of the regional units of Greece. It is part of the administrative region of Peloponnese. It is situated in the central and eastern part of the Peloponnese peninsula. It takes its name from the mythological character Arcas. In Greek mythology, it was the home of the god Pan...

) and science. He invented a new technique for the creation of bas-reliefs: Tartar modelling [La plastica dei tartari], which exploited the cementing properties of the calcareous waters of the Baths of San Filippo. Leonardo opened a factory for the production of bas-reliefs, which the Grand Duke Peter Leopold

Leopold II, Holy Roman Emperor

Leopold II , born Peter Leopold Joseph Anton Joachim Pius Gotthard, was Holy Roman Emperor and King of Hungary and Bohemia from 1790 to 1792, Archduke of Austria and Grand Duke of Tuscany from 1765 to 1790. He was a son of Emperor Francis I and his wife, Empress Maria Theresa...

visited in 1769. He was much esteemed by his contemporaries, not least for his creation of the theatre of Montalcino

Montalcino

Montalcino is a hilltown and comune in Tuscany, Italy. It is famous for its Brunello di Montalcino wine.The town is located to the west of Pienza, close to the Crete Senesi in Val d'Orcia. It is 42 km from Siena, 110 km from Florence and 150 km from Pisa...

, the gate at Sole di Chianciano, the Albergotti palace in Arezzo. He also published a series of critical works on architecture. He died in 1801, in Rome. His adopted child, Luigi, continued his works with less success during the first half of the 19th century, and he had no children. The entire collection of engravings and Leonardo's library went lost. Leonardo de Vegni prints of Italian arts and landscapes are a rarity for today's antique lovers, and his legacy in architecture is only recently being rediscovered by experts.

A first noticeable physician of the family was Ignazio Vegni, son of Giacomo, who studied medicine in Siena, and after a few years at the university was called as court physician to the Grand Ducal Court

Grand Duchy of Tuscany

The Grand Duchy of Tuscany was a central Italian monarchy that existed, with interruptions, from 1569 to 1859, replacing the Duchy of Florence. The grand duchy's capital was Florence...

in Florence in the second half of the 18th century.

Religion is once again at centre stage with the family branch of Montegiovi, near Pienza: Antonio, born in 1686, after a long period in Rome, was bishop of Sovana and Pitigliano from 1739 to 1746. His nephew, Andrea Domenico, also born in Montegiovi in 1711, was Bishop of Montalcino from 1767 to his death, in November 1773.

Another member of the family dedicated his life to the people, but in a slightly different way. Andrea was born in Montisi

Montisi

Montisi is a frazione of the comune of San Giovanni d'Asso. It's situated in the Province of Siena, in the Southern Tuscany, near Pienza and Montalcino. The hill on which is Montisi in on the boundary between the Val d'Orcia and the Crete Senesi.- History :...

in 1751 from Giuseppe of Pietro. After qualifying in civil and canon law from the University of Siena

University of Siena

, he started his career as a judge, in 1772, in Siena. He lived exceptional times for his profession, with the Peter Leopold

Leopold II, Holy Roman Emperor

penal code reform, which, among other important advances, abolished the death penalty in Tuscany, first country in the world, well before the others. In 1777 he is at the Court of Justice in Radicofani

Radicofani

Radicofani is a comune in the Province of Siena in the Italian region Tuscany, located in the natural park of Valdorcia about 110 km southeast of Florence and about 60 km southeast of Siena...

, then from 1783 he works in Asinalunga, as head of cabinet of the Imperial Royal Vicar (head of the governmental authority in the area - a sort of a Prefect) Siminetti, later the Ministry of Justice in Florence

Florence

Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....

. In 1792, under the rule of the new Grand-Duke, Ferdinand III, Andrea was finally Royal Vicar in Pienza, responsible for the peaceful living of citizens in the area from Val di Chiana to the hills towards the Amiata, in the South Tuscany. His frequent travels obliged him to move the family (he married with Josepha Filugelli) to Asciano

Asciano

Asciano is a comune and hill town in the province of Siena in the Italian region Tuscany. It is located at the centre of the Crete senesi between the river Ombrone and the torrent Copra, some 30 km southeast of the town of Siena by rail.-History:Asciano has origins as Etruscan, Roman and...

, mid way between Siena

Siena

and Pienza

Pienza

Pienza, a town and comune in the province of Siena, in the Val d'Orcia in Tuscany , between the towns of Montepulciano and Montalcino, is the "touchstone of Renaissance urbanism."...

, where his brothers and cousins lived. His brother, Girolamo, was Canonico( prior) of the Collegiata of Asciano

Asciano

. Andrea's son, Giuseppe Antonio Maria, born in 1785, was educated by his uncle in Asciano, and then sent to Siena to study medicine.

Siena, in the first years of the 19th century, was under the rule of Napoleon, and the region was called Ombrone.
Giuseppe graduated in 1813, at the time of his marriage with Maria Carolina Neri (1792–1836). She was a beautiful, well educated and wealthy woman, living close to the old hospital (Ospedale Santa Maria della Scala) where he was intern. Giuseppe, after a brief period of activity as a physician, dedicated his life to the family and to Siena's cultural and social life(he was a member of the Accademia dei Rozzi). He had three children, Adelaide (1816–1883), Girolamo (1826–1857) and Giovanni (1830–1907).
They moved to the building which was part of her dowry, in via Franciosa, just at the end of the splendid square of the baptistry, Piazza S. Giovanni. On the opposite side of the square lived Andrea's second cousin Niccola(1783–1864), a lawyer son of Eustachio of Giacomo, who lived at the corner with via dei Pellegrini, in the Palazzo del Magnifico.
With the acquisition of these two houses in Siena, the family's centre of interests had finally moved to Siena, with both the surviving branches of the family maintaining only land ownership links to the val di Chiana and Asciano. The two branches were identified by slightly different coats of arms .
Girolamo, son of Giuseppe, a judge, dies at 34 in 1857, his wife and son leaving to Brasil in the 1870s.
With the death of Niccola in 1864 and the lack of offspring from the cousins in Asciano, only Angelo (son of Niccola, born in 1811) and Giovanni remains.
They grew up in the same square, but the characters of the two were certainly very different, with Giovanni staying all his life in Siena, getting married to the daughter of an industrialist, dedicating the rest of his life to the family and his own pleasure; Angelo, travelled the world, became a professor of engineering and an industrialist himself, finally, having no children, he left all his vast fortune to the "son who will never die", a school which still proudly bears his name and his coat of arms.

The links with the Tuscan town remained strong even in recent times, with Mario, who was mayor of Siena between 1949 and 1951, and the many ties to the Contrada della Selva which uses the gardens and runs an "osteria" in the grounds of palazzo Vegni. The stables of the Contrada, used during the Palio

Palio

The oldest extant palio is the Palio di Asti, but the Palio di Siena is better known internationally. There are many other palios that are held throughout the various regions of Italy. Here follows an incomplete list:-Tuscany:...

for the racing horse, was donated by the family.

Giovanni's line is now divided into four main families, discendents of Guido (1869–1941) and Giuseppe Vegni (1864–1927), living in Siena, Milan, Rome and London.

External links

Vegni family's website

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