She has been called "the most beautiful woman in the Renaissance" and "the first beauty of Florence"
She had the famous Medici brothers duel for her
She had top artist Botticelli dump her for life without marrying
She is the prototype of Venus in the world famous painting "Spring"
After her death, she was resurrected as a "vampire"
She was Simoneta Catanio Vespucci, married at the age of 15 and died at the age of 22. Simonetta Vespucci's fair and clean skin, nearly brown or pale yellow hair, and a pair of large dark eyes, were considered the most beautiful woman of the entire Renaissance not only at that time, but also in the centuries that followed, and poured out the hearts of all Florentines.
In 1469, the brothers Lorenzo Medici and Giuliano Medici, who co-ruled Florence, both fell in love with her at the same time. It is said that she was once Lorenzo's mistress, but because Lorenzo was more pragmatic and busy with government affairs all day, she lost to his romantic brother in a secret struggle in which both of them tried to show their love for her more than each other.
But soon after becoming Giuliano's wife, Simonetta fell ill. She was suffering from tuberculosis, which was in her advanced stages of discovery, and soon she withered like a beautiful flower and died on 26 April 1476.
Legend has it that Giuliano loved his wife so much that he was going to die when he saw her, and Giuliano was in pain as if he were going crazy. He was too reluctant to lose his lovely wife, and like many superstitious people at the time, he decided that instead of allowing her to die like this and disappear forever, he would let her live again as a vampire. So he summoned Dominic Salcedo, the city's most famous warlock, and Simonetta turned into a vampire after 48 hours, but when he approached her, she bit her to death.
Botticelli, an artist with Medici as his patron, saw Simoneta Vespucci as his idol and used her as a model for paintings such as "Spring". Simonetta's death devastated him and he is said to have never married.
In the painter's later years, Botticelli depicted with sadness the reappearance of the famous "Calunnia" Simoneta, pointing to the sky, incarnating as a symbol of truth. At this time, it had been 20 years since The Death of Simonetta, but her beauty was immortalized by the painter's brilliant brushstrokes.