Marella Agnelli and Jacqueline Kennedy on a pier in Amalfi before embarking on the Agnelli’s yacht. Bettmann Archive Courtesy of Getty Images

Before Truman Capote’s Swans, there was the original: Marella Agnelli. The name came about when she was photographed by Richard Avedon in 1949. With her long limbs and Modigliani-esque neck, he declared her “the swan.” Later, Truman Capote would call her “European Swan Numero Uno.” 

But before then, she was Donna Marella Caracciolo di Castagneto. Her father was from a noble Neapolitan family. Her mother came from Peoria, Illinois, where her family ran a distillery. She grew up in Rome and Turkey and spoke Italian, French and English. When Marella was 26, she married the 32-year-old Gianni Agnelli, the head of Fiat, whom she had met through his sisters shortly after World War II, when she was thrust forward as a perfect, beautiful and highly respectable bride for him. In Italy, the Agnellis were not only massively wealthy, but also a family that was seen as comparable to the American Kennedys, “that is,” quipped the Miami Herald, “if the Kennedys controlled the press, held the reins of society, and ran the largest business in the United States.”

Italian art collector, socialite and style icon Princess Donna Marella Caracciolo di Castagneto, wife of Italian tycoon Gianni Agnelli, attends a dinner party in Punta Ala. Corbis via Getty Images

Gianni Agnelli was perhaps the catch when Marella married him. In addition to being known as “the unofficial King of Italy”, he was also known to be a playboy. Famously, after Pamela Harriman converted to Catholicism for him, he explained he could not, as a Catholic, marry a divorced woman, a problem she’d now surely understand as a fellow Catholic. When First Lady Jackie Kennedy, on a trip to Italy with her daughter, Caroline, was seen lounging on his yacht—with pictures published in the New York Daily News—JFK sent her a telegram reading “a little more Caroline, a little less Agnelli.” Jackie went scuba diving with him the next day. 

Marella understood that she was, temperamentally, very different from Gianni. She recalled that, “Their lives filled the gossip columns. I wouldn’t say they belonged to an immoral world, just a freely amoral one – at least by comparison with the one I had grown up in, an isolated, slightly conservative world known as the anglo-beceri…a set of people who spent their days visiting one another’s exquisitely refined gardens and crumbling villas on the hills of Florence and getting into interminable philosophical disquisitions.” 

Italian princess Marella Caracciolo di Castagneto Agnelli in the 1960s. Mondadori via Getty Images

Marella was thrilled by stories of Gianni’s wild driving on city sidewalks in his fast cars, his tendency to jump out of helicopters into the oceans, and his wartime exploits. If he was not going to be a perfect husband, he would certainly be an exciting one, filled with midnight bobsled runs where they could go “as much as eighty miles an hour on the blue ice.” Which is to say, an antidote to a life spent in quiet philosophical discussion. 

Gianni understood this too, and later described himself as a “devoted, rather than faithful, husband.” As for his infidelities, Marella knew all about her husband’s taste for “fast cars, gambling, and beautiful women.”

Giovanni and Marella Agnelli in Turin, Italy, on July 16, 1986. Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images

There were moments when she was upset by the behavior, as when Gianni had an affair with Princess Laudomia Hercolani while Marella was pregnant with their second child. A relative came to assure her that Gianni would never leave her. One might understandably wonder if Marella also enjoyed moments of extramarital romance, but friends claimed, “Marella has had one great love in her life: Mr. Agnelli…it has been unwavering.” 

Marella herself later reflected, “I knew Gianni would always come and go, but he would always come back. Who was the wife of Ulysses? Penelope? I was like that.”

Giovanni and Marella Agnelli at home, with their children and grandchildren. Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images

She did not weave. But she did prove herself an expert manager of her homes, inspired by the advice of the renowned Venetian hostess, Contessa Volpi. Immediately after her marriage, Marella indulged in what she called “a permanent holiday” and lay on the couch reading all day. At least until the Contessa called, saying that she had heard there were complaints that she had no idea how to run a home, and declaring, “Remember, my dear girl, all one needs to catch a husband may be a bed, but it takes a whole house to keep one!” Soon, Marella learned how to host a dinner party, maintain a beautiful garden, and decorate a home, of which the couple would have several, ranging from a villa in Turin to a duplex in New York. In 1979, Marella would even go on to start a line of furnishing fabrics, inspired by her visit to a 19th-century palazzo in Piedmont.

She became known for her impeccable taste, and many of her home design trademarks, such as the frequent use of wicker inside and out, combinations of pinks and reds, and magnificent gardens she lovingly cultivated, which she considered proof of man’s mastery over the landscape.

Richard Avedon and Marella Agnelli. Ron Galella Collection via Getty

And, memorably, she was a member of Capote’s coterie of Swans, which also included Babe Paley, C.Z. Guest and Slim Keith. Comparing Marella to Babe Paley, Truman noted, “if both were in Tiffany’s window, Marella would be slightly more expensive.”

But Marella did not want to be the prettiest jewel. She wanted to be the only swan. “He called us his “swans,” but now it seemed there were just too many swans. Some of the swans I didn’t even like that much. I had always thought my relationship with Truman was personal. The intimacy, the laughs, the giggles…I thought it was a special friendship between Truman and me, unaware he was also giggling and laughing with Babe or Gloria or Slim. When I told him, “Strange, I thought I was the only swan,” he answered only, “Oh, well, darling.”

Marella Agnelli at Truman Capote’s BW Ball on November 28, 1966, in New York. Getty Images

Marella was able to deal with her husband’s infidelities and even take pride in her equanimity. But she could not deal with the fact that Truman Capote was her best friend, though she was not his. 

Though if there’s something to indicate that he did, indeed, feel particularly warmly toward her, it is that he did not eviscerate her as he did so many others in his infamous La Côte Basque piece. He even came to her before publishing it in 1975; Marella recalled, “I had tried to warn him on the boat when he gave me a short section of his book. I can read English only very slowly, and so I asked him to read me a few chapters. What he was writing was very shallow, and I remember getting quite cross with him one day, saying, “Oh, Truman, this is a gossip column. What are you getting yourself into?”

Marella Agnelli is shown during Malcolm Forbes’ 70th Birthday Party on August 19, 1989. Ron Galella Collection via Getty

Truman declined her advice and was consequently ostracized from society. As for his friendship with Marella, she decided, with great difficulty, to cut ties with him also. However, “Truman was so self-absorbed that it took him a long while to realize Marella had taken him out of her life.” He barely even noticed. 

Marella remained married to Gianni until his death in 2003. For someone who seemed so singularly devoted to the men in her life, it’s rather tragic that none were as devoted to her in turn.