Giacomo Puccini was born in this house, at 2.00 am in the night of 22 December, 1858, and the next day – with a special permit, perhaps because in danger of death – he was christened with the names of Giacomo Antonio Domenico Michele and Secondo Maria. Indeed, he was the last musician of a singular dynasty that had dominated the musical life of Lucca in a span of a century and a half. This is the direct lineage: Giacomo senior (Celle dei Puccini, 1712 – Lucca, 1781), Antonio (Lucca, 1747 – Lucca, 1832), Domenico (Lucca, 1772 – Lucca, 1815), Michele (Lucca, 1813 – Lucca, 1864 ), Giacomo (Lucca, 1858 – Brussels, 1924). One can then truly say that Giacomo Puccini summarizes in himself, as well as family inheritance, the glorious musical tradition of Lucca as well.
At the time of his birth his parents lived in this house, Michele and Albina Magi, with his grandmother Angela Cerù, his sisters Otilia, Tomaide (the third born, Temi, had lived less than a year), Maria Nitteti, Iginia, and a “servant” a certain Assunta Menconi. A year later his other sister Ramelde was to be born, and another “servant” taken, Carola Martinelli, and later on Macrina was born and finally, after the death of his father, Michele junior.

The Puccini family, which in the first half of the 18th century had settled in a house in Lucca in Via Pozzotorelli, today’s Via Vittorio Veneto, had moved to corte S. Lorenzo around 1815, shortly after the sudden and premature death of Domenico, grandfather of Giacomo and fine opera composer. The young widow, Angela Cerù, preferred it so, moving closer to her family of origin, which lived in the same building. The Cerù family – in particular Nicolao, cousin of his father Michele – was to play an important role in the forming years of Giacomo.
The apartment is quite large but scarcely sufficient for a large family like Giacomo’s (in which everyone, at least the father and children, made music). As then it has two entrances on the same landing, as evidenced by a letter of 1817 by Antonio, great-grandfather of Giacomo. The layout of the rooms was at that time the same as is on view today (thanks to the restoration of 2011).

It is in this house that Giacomo lived his childhood years, before moving to Milan to continue his studies (1880). After the death of his mother Albina (17 July 1884) the house was rented.

In a time of great economic hardship, Giacomo and Michele junior, owners of the house thanks to the waiver of inheritance in their favour by the sisters, sold the house (in September 1889) to Raffaello Franceschini, husband of Giacomo’s sister Ramelde. They included a special clause in the contract that allowed them to repurchase it within five years. At the end of this period, after the success of Manon Lescaut had led to a radical change in his economic situation, Giacomo was finally able to buy back his father’s house. The joy of redemption, however, cannot be shared with his brother Michele, who died in the meantime (1891) in Brazil.

Since 1894 the house continued to belong to Giacomo Puccini, who still rented it out.

On the outside wall of the house on Via Di Poggio, visitors can see a commemorative plaque, which bears the following inscription:

From a long line of musicians
Worthy of the living tradition of the homeland
Here was born on December 22, 1858
GIACOMO PUCCINI
Who to the new voices of life
Tuned shrewd notes of truth and grace
Reaffirming with blunt agile forms
The nationality of art
In its primacy of glory in the world.

The city proud of him
On the thirtieth day after his death
29 December, 1924