Her portrait by Alessandro Allori hangs now in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence and we can assume that while posing for it she didn’t fancy she would have died shortly after. Nonetheless, a closer observation of the beautiful face of Isabella de’ Medici reveals an underlying tension in her perfect features, a fear frozen at the bottom of her eyes, as she knew that the death of her father, the grand duke Cosimo I (1574 a.C.), had left her without the protection that had kept her alive so far.
Isabella Romola de’ Medici, born third to Cosimo I and Isabella da Toledo, has an exuberant and passionate personality and the marriage with Paolo Orsini, a contract established by her father when she was born, didn’t help taming it. Paolo is a man of little qualities, who loves hunting and chasing women. Isabella spends most of her time alone in their palace in Florence waiting for him to return and neglect her all the more.