Wonders and legends of Genoa
A narrow alley, a few steps from Campetto, today bears a name that intrigues tourists and Genoese alike.
This is piazza dell’Amor perfect, which can be reached from the alley that bears the same name.
A piece of the historic center dedicated to love to which the title, historically, has conflicting opinions.
If on the one hand the accredited hypothesis wants that to give the name to this small open space was the image of the Madonna that was found here, indicating perfect love as divine love, the history of the city finds in the events of Tommasina Spinola a motivation definitely more romantic.
We have to go back to the sixteenth century, a particularly flourishing era for the Genoese.
In 1502, Louis XII, the French sovereign, arrived in the city and stayed in Genoa for some time, divided between official commitments and informal visits to discover the Superb.
During a party in her honour, the French monarch meets Tommasina Lomellini, considered one of the most beautiful women in Italy.
Love at first sight between the two and between a chat and the other mutual interest seems to grow dramatically.
However, a friendship develops between the two, also because Tommasina was married to the merchant Battista Spinola.
The king, however, learned that Genoese women usually wear heavy make-up and, determined to discover Tommasina’s “wash and water” look, on the last day of his stay in Genoa, he decides to pass at dawn in front of to the woman’s house; accompanied by the royal procession Luigi sends for her and Tommasina looks out without having time to get ready.
A stroke of lightning for the French sovereign, also recounted by the sixteenth-century historian Ludovico Domenichi: the king has an even more beautiful woman before him.
An epistolary relationship arises between the two which leads Tommasina to lose her head for Luigi so much that she begins to reject her husband.
A fatal passion for the woman so much so that when the news arrives, later revealed to be unfounded, of the death of the king in the battle of Cerignola, Tommasina will let herself die of starvation.
When, in April 1503, the king asked for news of Tommasina, he learned of her death and decided to return to Genoa to see once more the house of his beloved.
And it seems that right in front of Tommasina’s windows, Luigi let himself go with the phrase: “It could have been perfect love”.