Ermino de' Grimaldi

Ermino de' Grimaldi is the fabulously wealthy Genoese miser whom Guglielmo Borsiere persuades to change by asking him to depict Liberality in his new house. The request makes visible the distance between Ermino’s immense fortune and his habitual refusal to spend it; his shame at that contrast marks a decisive change in his conduct.

Identity and Reputation

Once regarded as the richest citizen in Italy, Ermino surpassed other wealthy men in the severity of his avarice. He withheld hospitality and denied himself even necessities, including proper food and drink, rather than incur expense. This restraint ran against the Genoese custom of dressing sumptuously. His family name, de' Grimaldi, gave way in common usage to the nickname Avarizia, a public judgment that reduced his identity to his defining vice.

The Encounter with Guglielmo Borsiere

Guglielmo Borsiere, a well-regarded minstrel, came to Genoa and heard repeated accounts of Ermino’s miserliness. Curious to see him, he was received amicably: despite his reputation, Ermino retained some tincture of gentle breeding and spoke with him at length. Ermino then showed Guglielmo and the other Genoese in their company a fine new house he had recently built.

In its saloon, Ermino asked Guglielmo to name something never before seen that could be depicted there. Guglielmo first observed that he could hardly propose anything genuinely unseen, except something like sneezing; he then offered a more pointed answer, saying Ermino might depict something he himself had never beheld. When Ermino asked what, Guglielmo named Liberality. The answer made the room’s proposed decoration a judgment on its owner: the missing subject was not a marvel beyond human experience, but a virtue absent from Ermino’s life.

Change and Consequences

The rebuke brought Ermino such immediate shame that, as the narrative puts it, it changed his disposition almost entirely. He promised that Liberality would be depicted in the house so that Guglielmo—and anyone else—would have no further cause to say he had never seen or known it. The account does not describe the painting’s completion; it records instead the more consequential change in the person who had requested it.

From then on, Ermino became the most liberal and courteous gentleman of his day in Genoa, hospitably receiving both visitors and fellow citizens. His transformation reverses the terms of his former reputation: a man who had accumulated wealth by refusing expenditure becomes distinguished by generous treatment of others.

Narrative Significance

Ermino’s story turns a question about an unprecedented image into a compact moral confrontation. His wealth and newly built house make the encounter possible, but neither can supply the virtue that Guglielmo names. The minstrel’s brief answer exposes what Ermino’s reputation already implied; shame, rather than force or financial loss, prompts the change. The contrast between the requested image and the conduct that follows gives the episode its measure: Liberality becomes more than a subject for a wall, because Ermino’s hospitality makes it visible in practice.