ABSTRACT
Early modern Florence was a confluence of multifarious socio-political ideals and realities complicated by an intense wave of religious reform. Familial heads, governmental agencies and ecclesiastical authorities variously appropriated the physical and ideological space entangling the cloister and its inhabitants in conflicting political agendas and contested religious interests. This chapter considers these variances by exploring the intentions of the Medici family in founding the convent, the strategies of noble families who requested admittance for their daughters, and the realities of life for the enclosed women. Several convents sought and received the protection and benefice of the Medici court. The appeal of a wealthy, selective convent for aristocratic daughters was not lost on Florentine nobility seeking strategies to protect their family and their family's assets and strengthen their ties to the powerful Medici family. Across early modern Italy, as in most places in Europe, women had relatively little control over the direction of their lives.
