fbpx

10 Incredible Italian Women who made History

We always love to hear about amazing women and their contributions to art, history and science! Here is a good one for Italy lovers. 10 incredible famous Italian women throughout the centuries; from ancient Rome to the end of the XX century.

Let’s discover together what Catherine de’ Medici, Rita Levi Montalcini or Matilde di Canossa and others became famous women for.  

 

THE FIRST WOMEN’S MARCH EVER


This is not the story of a woman but a story that belongs to women’s history and it deserves to open this list. It was 195 b.c. when women marched – probably for the first time in history – against a law that was limiting their rights.
The Lex Oppia was a sumptuary law established in 215 b.c. in Rome, during the Second Punic War, to face the serious financial and social issues caused by the war.
This particular law – the first of a series of sumptuary laws – restricted women’s wealth, forbidding them to wear multi-colored clothes, to possess more than half an ounce of gold, and to ride in an animal-drawn vehicle in the city.
In 195 b.c. Rome, after the victory over Carthage, was wealthier than ever and the patrician families of Rome got tired of following the law. Two tribunes proposed repealing the Lex Oppia, saying it was no longer needed.
The consul Cato the Elder spoke in favor of the law saying that it was promoting equality between different social classes. Nonetheless – while the debate was raging in the Senate – the matrons of Rome gathered on the Capitol hill and marched towards the Forum, blocking all the streets and asking the tribunes to support their cause and abrogate the law.
The day after they gathered, sitting in in front of the house of Marcus Junius Brutus and Publius Junius Brutus – tribunes and big supporters of the law – to protest nonstop until the law was abrogated.
The siege worked and eventually, the law was finally repealed.

Here’s a list of our top 10 amazing women from Italy, famous Italian women:

 

1 – Hortensia – the first female lawyer in history


Daughter of the Roman orator Quintus Hortensius, Hortensia is considered probably the first female lawyer in history thanks to a famous oration she delivered in the Roman Forum in 42 B.C..
During the civil war against Brutus and Cassius (who murdered Julius Cesar) the triumvirate of Marc Anthony, Octavian and Lepidus proposed to raise money for the war by taxing the property of 1400 rich Roman women, who – being women – could not defend themselves against this decision.
Hortensia took the word in the Forum declaring that women should not pay for a war they didn’t ask for or take any part in. Women, she said would help fighting against the enemies but wouldn’t pay for the cost of the war. Her oration worked and the number of women liable to the taxes was reduced to 400 and the same taxation was extended to men.               

2 – Matilda of Tuscany – The Great Countess

 

 

Powerful and determined, Matilda was one of the most important political figures of the Middle Age. Born in 1046 she was the heir of the Duke of Tuscany, Boniface III and of Beatrice of Lorraine.
She eventually got to rule a vast territory that included present-day Tuscany, Lombardy and Emilia-Romagna.
Well-educated, strong, fearless and determined, she was one of the few Medieval women to be remembered for her military accomplishments.
A natural leader in a period of constant battles she was able to change radically the course of history. She lived also in Florence and gave a new shape and direction to the city that finally went towards the Commune.
She died quite old for the average of the time when she was 69 years old and she is now buried in the Basilica of St. Peter in Rome – one of only six women who have the honor of being buried there. Her Memorial Tomb was commissioned by the Pope, centuries later in the 1600’s to Gian Lorenzo Bernini, the architect famous for being the creator of the Baroque in Italy.

 

3 – Catherine de’ Medici (1519-1589) – the French queen in Italy

Catherine de’ Medici was born in Florence in 1519; her father was Pierode’ Medici – son of Lorenzo Il Magnifico – and her mother the French countess Maddalena de la Tour d’Auvergne.

Her mother died a few days after her birth, her father passed shortly after and she was brought and raised in Rome by her grandmother Alfonsina Orsini and then by Pope Leone X – her grand-uncle – and Pope Clemente VII – her second cousin.   
She was a well-educated girl, maybe more educated than usual, even for a very well-off family. A Medici, indeed; a smart, tough, independent girl since she was little.
She married the French prince Henry II, second son of King Francis I of France, and eventually became Queen of France from 1547 to 1559 and mother of three kings of France.
She was a powerful woman, remembered as a strong Queen but also as a memorable trendsetter. She appreciated creativity and fashion and brought many new habits to the French court:
she invented the corset and the bloomers, she brought her personal scent maker from Florence and brought the habit of using perfumes to France.
She started to use a particular kind of wedge heel shoes – higher than a pair of Louboutin –  that immediately became a huge trend. From Florence she also brought the innovation of the fork – that was practically nonexistent anywhere else – and the Florentine cooking tradition, making the basis for French cuisine with recipes like the onion soup and béchamel sauce.

 

 

4- Artesemisia Gentileschi  (1593-1656)                        


Daughter of the painter Orazio Gentileschi – an artist who was strongly influenced by the work of Caravaggio – Artemisia started painting in her father’s workshop, showing very early her talent.
She was the first woman to become a member of the Academia delle Arti del Disegno in Florence.
Her paintings are famous for the strong, brave, powerful female characters she depicted – mainly biblical or mythical heroines – and for the characteristic use of colors.
Her paintings are famous for the strong, brave, powerful female characters she depicted – mainly biblical or mythical heroines – and for the characteristic use of colors.
The women on Artemisia’s paintings are very distant from the stereotypical shy and elegant woman depicted in the artworks of the time.
Artemisia was raped when she was very young by her tutor and Orazio’s coworker Agostino Tassi. She had to suffer a very long trial against her rapist, during which she was tortured in order to prove her virginity and her innocence. Her father Orazio, after the trial, arranged a marriage between his daughter and a Florentine painter, Pierantonio Stiattesi, to save Artemisia’s social respectability.
When in Florence Artemisia blossomed as a mature artist, became a successful court painter under Cosimo II de’ Medici and established friendly relationships with artists and intellectuals like the artist Cristofano Allori and the scientist Galileo Galilei. Now she is one of our favourite famous Italian women from history for her story, strength of character and incredible talent as a painter.

 

5- Maria Montessori (1870-1952)

Doctor, philosopher and pedagogist Maria Montessori was one of the first women to graduate in Medicine in Italy in 1896. She became an assistant doctor at the psychiatric clinic of the University of Rome where she developed a new teaching method to support the education of children with mental disabilities. In 1907 she opened her first school in a poor neighborhood dedicating her work and research to the children of working families; in that school  – called Casa dei Bambini (House of Children) – she applied her method to mentally normal children between the ages of 3 and 6. The school was a huge success and Montessori’s method – based on building a favorable environment, both physical and spiritual, to follow the childrens needs, and on specifically designed materials – became immediately famous worldwide; in less than 10 years, schools based on her method opened in more than 10 countries. The popularity of the child-centered Montessori approach never decreased and is still very popular more than a century later.

 

6- Grazia Deledda (1871-1936)


The first Italian woman to be awarded with the Noble prize for literature (1926), she was also the second woman to win it after Selma Largerlöf. Born on the island of Sardinia, in 1871 she died in Rome in 1936. She came from a wealthy, middle-class, well educated family who taught her to read and write even before she was of school age. Nonetheless her formal education ended after the fourth grade and she was mainly a self-taught kind of intellectual. When she published her first short story – Sangue Sardo (Sardinian blood) – the plot about a love triangle involving a teenage girl was not well received by the very traditional social environment of her town but, despite that, she went on writing under a nom de plume. When she moved to Rome with her husband she found success as a writer; her books translated into many languages and adapted for the screen. Normally labelled as a representative of the verismo (realism) literary movement, Deledda was quite an original voice within her contemporaries; rooted in her native island’s stories and traditions, her writing was deeply autobiographical and focused on important concepts like love, sin, death and pain.

 

 

7- Rita Levi Montalcini (1909-2012)



Born in 1909 in Turin she died in Rome in 2012. Neurobiologist, she was awarded with the Nobel Prize for medicine in 1986 for the discovery of nerve growth factor. In 1938, due to the publication of the Manifesto of Race and the subsequent introduction of laws barring Jews from academic and professional life, Rita, coming from a Jewish family, was banned from the university. She and her family fled to Florence where they could survive the holocaust, hiding under false identities. They went back to Turin only in 1945 after the end of the war. During the whole period of the war, even when hiding in Florence, she went on doing scientific experiments, setting up laboratories in her family’s apartment. She was a Senator of the Italian Republic and was still regularly attending the parliament activities the year she died. She was 103 years old.

 

8- Margherita Hack (1922-2013)


Born in Florence in 1922, she was the first woman in Italy, to head of an Observatory. Margherita Hack, had a very long, successful life and was one of the most brilliant minds of the XX century. Astrophysicist and scientific disseminator she was a Professor at the University of Trieste for much of her life and brought the University’s observatory to international fame.
She became an iconic personality.  Not just for her scientific talent – which was outstanding – but also for her personal choices and her nonconformist lifestyle. She was a vegetarian for her whole life – she said that she never ate meat in her life – and also wrote a book on vegetarianism that became immediately very popular. She was also a firm atheist, critical of the Catholic Church hierarchy. Her strong Florentine – that she proudly maintained even if she lived most of her life in Trieste –  accent and very straightforward “no-frills” way of talking became iconic too. Her most popular quote is that “we are made of star matter”.

 

9- Teresa “Chicchi” (1921-2013)

Born in Genova she graduated in philosophy at the University of Florence in 1944.  She was a partisan with the nom de guerre “Chicchi”. After the war, Mattei was the youngest elected to the Constituent Assembly – in which she served as a secretary bureau – and was so-called “the girl of Montecitorio”.
She introduced the Italian tradition of using mimosa as a symbol for Women’s Day. Mimosa was a flower that was growing wild almost everywhere, was inexpensive and resistant, so it was easier to find and could be within everyone’s reach, even by the many poor of the rural areas of Italy. She was a strong and determined woman since her early teenage years. She started to protest against the racial laws of Benito Mussolini when she was in high school and from that moment she never stopped. Her whole life was dedicated to the defense of the Constitution and to attempting to spread a deeply anti-fascist culture to the youngest.

 

 

10- Anna Magnani (1908-1973)


Iconic actress of the Italian neorealismo, Anna Magnani was one of the greatest artists of the XX century. She was the first Italian to win an Academy Award for Best Actress (1955) and one of the few Italian personalities to have a dedicated star on the Walk of Fame in Hollywood. Born in 1908 in Rome she paid for her studies at the Academy of Dramatic Art in Rome by singing at night clubs. She had an incredible career and worked with the most important Italian and international film directors; she was described as “fiery” by Time Magazine, and “earth mother of Italian cinema” by the critics, but for sure she was one of the most beloved Italian women of the XX century. Women loved her because they felt represented by her true face and emotions. Famous was her answer to the make-up artist who tried to camouflage her wrinkles: “Why would you do that? It took so many years to get those wrinkles!!!”.

 

Are you planning a trip to Florence? Take a look at our tour celebrating the amazing Women of Florence from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance and beyond. We’ll walk with you unraveling their stories through the streets of the city center. We’ll meet some women from the most famous family of the city, the Medici. We’ll meet a Queen, a beautiful nun and a brave countess of the year 1000 A.D. We’ll talk about scandals, passions, loves and sacrifice. We’ll talk about what women read and how they dressed. Starting from the Middle Ages we’ll delve into and discover the lives of Renaissance of women from all walks of life. 

You also may enjoy our Artemisia Gentileschi tour with one of our world-leading expert guides. 

Artemisia Gentileschi: The Feminist Caravaggio

Or our Amazing Women in Florence walking tour

Simonetta Vespucci famous woman in Florence

We use cookies to personalise content and ads, to provide social media features and to analyse our traffic. We also share information about your use of our site with our social media, advertising and analytics partners. View more
Cookies settings
Accept
Privacy & Cookie policy
Privacy & Cookies policy
Cookie name Active

Privacy Policy

EU's new General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) comes into effect on May 25, 2018. We want to let you know we’ve updated our Privacy Policy and Terms and Conditions

Information about the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)

We inform you that for the establishment and execution of the contract with you, when you book one of our services our organization comes into possession of some of your data, also acquired verbally, qualified as personal by the European Regulation 2016/679 (GDPR).According to the law, this treatment will be based on principles of correctness, lawfulness, transparency and protection of your privacy. According to article 13 of the GDPR 2016/679, therefore, we provide you with the following information: Nature of the data processed:We process your data:• Anagraphic, fiscal and of an economic nature necessary for the performance of contractual relationships with you, whether current or future;• Spontaneously supplied by you for the personalized execution of the current or future contract, bearing in mind that there is no obligation on your part to supply them. The data are processed with your express consent (Article 24 letter a, b, c Privacy Code and Article 6 letter b, and GDPR) accepting - with a click in the box at the end of the completion of the form - the terms and conditions of the service we perform.All data will be used solely and exclusively to fulfill:• Pre-contractual, contractual, post-contractual and tax obligations arising from relationships with you;• To the obligations established by law, regulations, community legislation or an order of the Authority.We are not in possession of your data that can be classified as sensitive, particular or of a judicial nature (articles 9 and 10 of the GDPR). Purpose of the processing and duration:Your data are processed for the entire duration of the relationship contract and also subsequently, for contractual requirements and related fulfillment of legal obligations and taxation, and for effective management of financial and commercial relationships. The Data Controller will process personal data for the time necessary to fulfill the aforementioned purposes and in any case for no more than 10 years from the termination of the relationship for the purposes of service. Methods of processing: The processing will be carried out with both manual and / or computerized tools telematics with organizational and elaboration logistics closely related to the purposes themselves and however in order to guarantee the security, integrity and confidentiality of the data in compliance with the organizational, physical and logical measures provided for by the provisions in force. Obligation or right to provide data:As regards the data that we are obliged to know, in order to fulfill the obligations established by law, their non-conferment by you involves the impossibility of establishing or continuing the relationship, to the extent that such data are necessary for execution of the same. Scope of knowledge of your data: The following categories of subjects may become aware of your data, as managers or processors, appointed by the undersigned company:• Data controller;• Accounting and billing staff;• Those involved in the marketing and execution of services. Communication and dissemination:Your data will not be disseminated to third parties by us for their provision or consultation.Your data may be communicated by us to entities, as far as their respective and specific competence is concerned and in general to any public or private entity with respect to which there is obligation for us (or faculty) recognized by law or secondary or community legislation) or need for communication, as well as to our consultants, within the limits necessary to carry out their duties at our office organization, after our letter of appointment imposing the duty of confidentiality and security. Rights of the interested party: In accordance with Art. 7 of Legislative Decree 196/03 of the Articles of the GDPR 679/16: 15 / Right of access, 16 / Right of rectification, 17 / Right to cancellation, 18 / Right to limitation of treatment, 20 / Right to portability, 21 / Opposition right, 22 / Right to oppose the automated decision-making process of GDPR679 / 16. You can exercise your rights by writing to the Data Controller with an email to: [email protected] Withdrawal of consent: With reference to Art. 23 of Legislative Decree 196/03 and Article 6 of GDPR 679/16, you can revoke the consent given at any time. Owner and manager of the treatment: The data controller is PIER CARLO TESTA, Director of the company "The Original & Best Walking Tours" with registered office in Via Sassetti 1 in Florence (Italy). The Data Processor, who can be contacted to exercise  rights and / or for any clarificationsregarding the protection of personal data, can be reached at: [email protected]
Save settings
Cookies settings

a virtual trip to tuscany

Sign up here to receive your free link to the online event, December 6th at 7pm CET