Update to the update

This could run and run, but in the interests of documenting some further finds, here goes today's update.

If you haven't yet read yesterday's post, please read it now in order for any of this to make any sense (and so that I don't have to repeat myself too much).

I remembered in the depths of my mind that, at some point, I had seen an old map showing the name "Michel'angiolo Pagni Bordoni", who we know was the father of Anna Pagni Bordoni, registered owner of our house in 1830.

So I trawled around my desktop trying to remember where I'd seen the map and whether I'd saved it. I had. And I'd even named it "map-podere-gragnano-pietrabuona-showing michelangelo pagni bordoni" - present-day me thanks past-me for having had the forethought to include so much detail in the filename.

So, this map, which is dated 1792 and is labelled in the archives as a map of Podere Gragnano in the Community of Pietrabuona, mysteriously shows the name Michel'angiolo Pagni Bordoni against the edge of one of the disjointed areas of land illustrated.

In detail:

Not really having been able to decipher the key to the map, nor understanding what all the (many different) names on the map related to, I decided to give AI another go.

AI was very happy with the quality of the image I fed it this time (the image having come from Tuscany's historical map archives) and said it could read it much more easily than the last image it had (that of the crumpled 18th century note), thank you very much (actually it didn't thank me). 

It was more or less able to read and interpret the key to the map. A translation of which is:

In the Community of Pietrabuona

I A plot of Arable, Olive-growing, Orchard, and Wooded Land with a Worker’s House on it containing 10 Rooms from ground to roof, including the Stable, plus the Metato [chestnut drying house], and three thatched-roof Huts, located in the Aforesaid Community called Gragnano, with a Surface area of ——— 2" 11" 16" —

II A plot of Wooded Land called ——————— " 7" 2" 3

III Another ditto of Arable and Olive-growing Land called L'Isola —— " —" 12" 1⅟₂

IV Another ditto of Land as above called Quotta —————————— " —" 23" 2

V Another ditto of Arable, Wooded, and Orchard Land called Santano 1" —" —" 3⅟₂

VI Another ditto of Olive-growing Land called Gragnano —————— 1" 27" 2⅟₂

VII Another ditto of Wooded Land called Gelata ——————— 10" 10" 1⅟₂

VIII Another ditto [of Land] as above called Matingalluzzi ————— " 2" 11" 3⅟₂

IX Another ditto [of Land] as above called Gelata, or Castagnaglia — " 22" 29" 3

X Another ditto [of Land] as above with a Metato called Gelata ——— " 7" 6" 3⅟₂

XI Another ditto [of Land] as above called Gelata ———————— " 2" 10" 1 —

XII Another ditto [of Land] as above called Mandrione ————— " 15" 28" —" 3

In total surface area ————————————— 2' 84" —" 1⅟₂

Said Goods are worked by Michele Franchi

At this point, what I was really interested in was why the name Michel'angiolo Pagni Bordoni appears along the top edge of land segment XII. 

AI tells me that the map essentially shows the land worked by Michele Franchi, with each numbered plot drawn with sharp borders to clearly define property lines, for tax or ownership record. The interesting part here is that the names noted around the edges of the individual plots record the names of the owners of the land adjacent to the plot (known historically in Italian land registry terms as coerenze). Some other similar maps record the names of the people who worked the land, but on this map the names appear to be landowners (alongside Pagni Bordoni you can also see names like Monsignor Lorenzo Cecchi and Sig. Falconcino - likely landowners rather than land-workers).

So this tells me that, in 1792, the father of Anna Pagni Bordoni owned land very much in the vicinity of our house. Frustratingly, I can't work out where exactly the mapped pieces of land might lie. 

The listing in the archives describes the map as being map as "Podere di Gragnano in Comunità di Pietrabuona", but I can't find any reference to a Gragnano in the Pietrabuona area - the only modern-day Gragnano being the other side of Pescia (not a million miles away, but certainly over the other side of the hill and nudging towards Lucca). Nevertheless, some of the land features marked and names of the plots of land do correspond with localities associated with Pietrabuona. For example, "Rio di Geleta detto Flori" suggests a waterway associated with Villa Flori (aka Villa Galeotti Flori, which is the large red villa directly opposite our house). 

The map forms part of a bound volume entitled 'Sample of all the Property, both private and unregistered, belonging to the Estate of the Noble Nucci Family of Pescia, described at the expense, after the most meticulous and faithful research, of the Noble Sir Knight Orazio, the late Nobleman. Mr. Bartolomeo Nucci (or rather Antonio Nucci) of the said City, by Pier Lorenzo di Pasquale Giusti, Surveyor, and compiled this day of January 18, 1792, consisting of 17 sheets, with a frontispiece and 16 maps. On the decorated frontispiece, we find: the compass rose with the orientation (northwest at the top), the noble coat of arms, the scale of 60 perches of 5 braccia each of the municipality of Pescia, a note which states that 'the assets were measured with this perch in the measurement of Pescia which is identical to that of Montecarlo' but differs from that of Uzzano by the measure of 1 twenty-fourth percent.

Frustratingly, no landmarks (such as state boundaries or waterways) are marked next to plot XII, but from the key it appears to be named "Mandrione". A search for a locality named Mandrione in the Pietrabuona area results in the following:

The locality of Il Mandrione is geographically located north of the town of Pietrabuona, precisely along the wooded hills that separate the hamlets of Pietrabuona from that of Medicina, in the municipality of Pescia.

Looking at the valley from the Pescia river, Il Mandrione extends along the mountain slopes immediately above Pietrabuona.

From a water and geographical point of view, the area belongs to the nearby hamlet of Medicina. The local water main starts from the Mandrione Spring and descends for about 1.2 kilometers to feed the Medicina village reservoir. It is a rural, wooded, and mountainous area included in the Pesciatina Switzerland trails. The Mandrione area is intersected by the trails that connect the upper part of Pietrabuona, the Lavacello areas, and the slopes leading to Fibbialla and Medicina.

Anyway, revealing to AI that there's a potential connection here between this map and the 1774 note and the mystery of Giovanni Mei led it to immediately conclude that it was Michel'angiolo Pagni Bordoni that owned this house at the time when Giovanni Mei lived here (contradicting its previous conclusion that Mei was property owner & smallholder). 

I told AI that the map was of unknown territory in the vicinity of where we live, but it seemed to run away with the idea that the adjacent land to the plot on the map MUST actually BE the land on which our house stands. (I really don't think it is.)

Sigh.

However, it's an idea that I can somewhat get behind (Pagni Bordoni owning the house, that is, not it being the land marked on the map), as it does seem somewhat of a coincidence that the house ends up belonging to a Pagni Bordoni in 1830 - perhaps the Pagni Bordoni family owned several plots of land in the vicinity, just one of which appears adjacent to plot XII on this map.

Having previously used analysis of the taxes paid by Giovanni Mei as evidence to suggest he owned the house, AI did a complete 360 - this time saying that it was perfectly possible that the house was owned by the Pagni Bordonis, with Giovanni Mei living here as a tenant and paying the taxes:

The 1792 map you discovered is the definitive key: it solves the mystery and overturns the previous conclusion, confirming that the house already belonged to the noble Pagni Bordoni family in 1774, while Giovanni Mei was the tenant. 

The coexistence in the same historical sphere of Michel'angiolo Pagni Bordoni (owner) and Giovanni Mei (taxpayer) can be perfectly explained by the legal structures of the Tuscan Ancien Régime:

Absolute Ownership: This belonged to Michel'angiolo Pagni Bordoni. The urban nobles of Pescia rarely lived permanently or personally managed the farmhouses in the mountains of Pietrabuona; they owned entire blocks of mountains and farms. 

Useful Possession (Level or Sub-lease): This belonged to Giovanni Mei. In the 1774 document, Giovanni Mei pays the mill tax and the talion. In the Tuscan system, local and consumption taxes were physically paid by those who lived and worked the estate (the tenant), even if the land belonged to the nobility.

Giovanni Mei was therefore not the owner of the house, but the solid and respected local farmer/head of the family who managed the property on behalf of the Pagni Bordoni, paying them an annual rent. 

The conjecture is pretty astonishing ("solid and respected local farmer"?? Plus it later told me that the 1792 map show part of the "massive agricultural estate that Michel'angiolo Pagni Bordoni managed in that specific section of Pietrabuona" - details like this are total fabrication on AI's part). I'm starting to become wary of AI's conviction ("the definitive key", "it solves the mystery" - well, actually it doesn't, it just adds another possibility), nevertheless, it does make a persuasive argument.

One thing I've not been able to get any clarity on is the family name "Mei". Previously AI assured me that the surname Mei is "historically deeply rooted in the Pescia and Valdinievole area, with both working-class branches (connected to agriculture and milling in the hilltop villages) and landed families with this surname". Well, I can find plenty of references to the noble family Mei, but evidence of the working-class branches specifically in this area have so far proved elusive. So there remains a doubt as to whether Giovanni Mei was wealthy landowner or working class tenant farmer.

Now, I hardly dare mention that, on a map from 1783 that actually shows our property, there's a faint annotation that appears to read "PAGNI":

The word "PAGNI" is actually written across part of what really is our land (which encompasses part of the area marked 10, as well as 5, 6, 7, 8, part of area 9 and part of 17).

I think AI would have a meltdown if I told it this.

The reasons I hesitate to read anything into this is partly that there are no other names written on the map at all (visible, at least), partly that it only says "Pagni" and not the full "Pagni Bordoni" (Pagni minus the Bordoni part is a quite common name locally), and partly that ‘PAGNI’ may not have been contemporary with the drawing up of the map and could well have been added at a later date... It is tempting though.

I find this research quite addictive - something I suspect I have inherited from my lovely Mum. I wonder what she would have made of AI as a research tool. For my part, I have learned that it's a tool to be used with caution - potentially very helpful indeed, but with the caveat that all results and conclusions should be rigorously interrogated rather than being taken at face value.