Source note

TINTI (Clarina), born in Sicily about 1803; was maid in an inn, when her glorious voice came under the notice of a great nobleman, her fellow-countryman, the Duke Cataneo, who had her educated. At the age of sixteen, she made her debut with brilliant success at several Italian theatres. In 1820, she was "prima donna assoluta" of the Fenice theatre, Venice. Being loved by Genovese, the famous tenor, Tinti was usually engaged with him. Of a passionate nature, beautiful and capricious, Clarina became enamored of Prince Emilio du Varese, at that time the lover of the Duchesse Cataneo, and became, for a while, the mistress of that descendant of the Memmis: the ruined palace of Varese, which Cataneo hired for Tinti, was the scene of these ephemeral relations. [Massimilla Doni.] In the winter of 1823-1824, at the home of Prince Gandolphini, in Geneva, with Genovese, Princesse Gandolphini, and an exiled Italian prince, she sang the famous quartette, "Mi manca la voce." [Albert Savarus.]