It is now generally agreed that if Boccaccio had any particular house in his mind it was this.

It used to be thought that the Villa Poggio Gherardo, Mrs.Ross's beautiful home on the way to Settignano, was the first refuge, and the Villa Palmieri the second, but the latest researches have it that the Palmieri was the first and the Podere della Fonte, or Villa di Boccaccio, as it is called, near Camerata, a little village below S.Domenico, the other.

The Villa Palmieri has another and somewhat different historical association, for it was there that Queen Victoria resided for a while in 1888.

But the most interesting thing of all about it is the circumstance that it was the home of Matteo Palmieri, the poet, and Botticelli's friend and fellow-speculator on the riddle of life.

Palmieri was the author of a remarkable poem called "La Citta della Vita" (The City of Life) which developed a scheme of theology that had many attractions to Botticelli's curious mind.