Eufrasia Burlamacchi was born around 1482 in the city of Lucca, Italy to Giovanni Burlamacchi and Caterina Trenta Olso and was one of five children. Giovanni Burlamacchi was active in Lucca, working as a merchant, banker, silk maker, and served as Anziano, or elder, in the local government. The Burlamacchi family has an extensive political history in Italy and played a pivotal role in Lucca from the fourteenth to the sixteenth century. Of the twenty-five recorded generations, the position of Anziano has been held three hundred times by a Burlamacchi. Despite the careful records of the Burlamacchi family, there is little information regarding the life of Eufrasia outside of her surviving works and her obituary.
Giovanni’s two daughters, Eufrasia and Gabriella, entered the convent of San Nicalao at a young age. On April 15, 1502, Eufrasia left San Nicalao to found the convent of San Domenico with her sister and ten other nuns. The two sisters were ardent in their efforts to found San Domenico and succeeded with the assistance of their father. Eufrasia’s obituary states that she was twenty at the time of the founding. It is also interesting to note that she went on to serve as Mother Superior of the convent. Eufrasia and Gabriella established a strong tradition with San Domenico and nineteen Burlamacchi women entered that specific convent over the course of history. Additional family members are recorded as having served other Dominican convents and monasteries.
The nuns of San Domenico were fervent followers of the teachings of Fra Girolamo Savonarola (1452-1498), a priest whose uncompromising view of Christian morality and acceptable personal behavior transformed Italian Catholicism during his lifetime, and his teachings were the founding principles of the convent. Although he was excommunicated and sentenced to be burned at the stake by the Pope, Savonarola was revered as a saint and martyr by many Dominican convents and monasteries in Italy, including the nuns of San Domenico. Eufrasia’s first cousin and subprior of the community of San Marco, Fra Pacifico (1465-1519), was closely associated with Savonarola and served briefly as the confessor for the nuns of San Domenico.
Although it is clear that Eufrasia learned the art of illumination during her time within the convent, there are no records of her training. The style of her work echoes the illuminations of Fra Bartolomeo, a priest of San Marco, and it can be presumed that she was influenced by his work. It is believed that her active period as an artist began in 1502, a date that coincides with a collection of four antiphonaries and one gradual (executed between 1502 and 1515) that are commonly attributed to the artist. The colophon that cites these dates and Eufrasia’s authorship is now lost. According to her obituary, Eufrasia Burlamacchi died on January 2, 1548, as a respected member of San Domenico.