Visit of Duke Ercole to Milan, and of Isabella d'Este--Election of Pope
Alexander VI.--Bribery of the Cardinals--Influence of Ascanio Sforza
over the new Pope, and satisfaction of Lodovico--Hunting-parties at
Pavia and Vigevano--_Fêtes_ at Milan--Visit of Isabella to
Genoa--Lodovico's letters--Piero de Medici--King Ferrante's jealousy of
the alliance between Rome and Milan.
1492
That summer Isabella d'Este at length accomplished her long-intended
visit to her sister, whom she had not seen since the wedding _fêtes_.
Early in July she received a pressing invitation from Lodovico himself,
urging her to accompany her father, Duke Ercole, who was expected at
Milan towards the end of the month. But, as she wrote to her husband,
who was then in Venice, it was quite impossible for her to start on her
journey at this early date. In the first place, half of her household
was in bed, ladies and servants alike were suffering from a feverish
epidemic which had attacked the whole court; and in the second place,
many preparations were necessary if she were to appear at Milan in state
worthy of the Marquis of Mantua's wife. "Of course, if you wish it," she
adds proudly, "I will set off alone, in my chemise, but this I think you
will hardly desire."
Signor Lodovico's invitation, however, was gladly accepted, and Isabella
made every preparation to start by the middle of August. She sent to
Ferrara, urging her favourite goldsmith, as he loved her, to finish a
necklace of a hundred links by next week, and begging him to lend her
some more jewelled chains for the use of her courtiers and
maids-of-honour. And the same day she wrote to the Venetian merchant
Taddeo Contarini, excusing herself for her delay in paying for some
jewels which she had lately bought, since her visit to Milan necessarily
entailed heavy expenses. By the 10th of August she was able to start on
her journey, and spent a night on the way at Canneto with her kinswoman,
Antonia del Balzo, wife of Gianfrancesco Gonzaga of Bozzolo, who came to
meet her with two beautiful daughters. "Messer Andrea Mantegna himself,"
exclaimed the marchioness, "could not paint fairer maidens!" On the
12th, she reached Cremona, where Lodovico's cousin, Francesco Sforza,
was awaiting her, and a crowd of people hailed her arrival with
enthusiasm. After spending a night in the Episcopal palace, she went on
to Pizzighettone, where she discovered that her best hat had been
forgotten, and sent a messenger back to Mantua with the key of her black
chest, desiring one of her servants to look out her hat with the
jewelled feather and send it after her by a flying courier. On the 15th,
the Marchesana reached Pavia, where both the Duchesses of Milan and Bari
rode out to meet her, and placing her between them, after many embraces,
conducted her through the city. Here the two dukes and all the
ambassadors were awaiting her, and a troop of trumpeters and outriders
escorted the party up to the castle gates. That evening she supped alone
with Beatrice, and the hours flew by in delightful intercourse. Both
sisters were in the highest spirits, and Isabella anticipated the
greatest pleasure from her visit, only regretting that her husband had
not been able to accompany her.
"The only news here," she wrote next day to the marquis, "is the
election of this new Pope, which fills every one with great joy, and is
said to be entirely due to Monsignore Ascanio, who will, they say, be
the new Vice-Chancellor."
On the 25th of July, Innocent VIII. had breathed his last, and on the
6th of August, the conclave met to elect a new Pope. Among the
twenty-three Cardinals of which the Sacred College then consisted, three
were prominent candidates for the papal tiara. First of all there was
Cardinal Roderigo Borgia, the oldest and wealthiest of the group, who
held the three most important archbishoprics in Spain, as well as
innumerable benefices in the rest of Christendom, and whose scandalous
vices amid the general corruption of morals in Rome offered no bar to
his advancement to the chair of St. Peter. Cardinal Ascanio Sforza, the
rich and powerful brother of Lodovico Moro, was the second candidate
for the tiara; while the third was Giuliano della Rovere, Cardinal of
S. Pietro in Vincula, whose well-known French sympathies, as well as the
influential position which he had occupied in Rome under his uncle,
Sixtus IV., made him unpopular with most of his colleagues. When Ascanio
Sforza saw that he could not ensure his own election, he threw his whole
influence on the side of Borgia, who lavished his gold and promises
freely among the other members of the Sacred College, with the result
that he was elected on the 11th of August, and proclaimed Pope under the
title of Alexander VI. The secret Archives of the Vatican[28] give full
particulars of this election, which was obtained by the most flagrant
simony, and proved a prelude to the days of confusion and misery which
Fra Girolamo Savonarola, the Dominican of Florence, daily prophesied
were in store for the Church. Ascanio Sforza was the first to reap the
reward of his base compliance. The new Pope loaded him with favours, and
openly acknowledged his indebtedness both to him and Lodovico, while at
Milan the event was hailed with public rejoicings, and joy-bells and
solemn processions celebrated the accession of this pontiff, who was
destined to prove the most bitter enemy of the House of Sforza.
"Signor Lodovico," wrote the Ferrarese envoy, our old friend Giacomo
Trotti, to his master, "is in the highest spirits at the success of his
brother's efforts. Cardinal Ascanio is likely, people say, to administer
all the papal estates, and will be every bit as much pope as if he sat
in Alexander's chair."
Isabella's letters to her husband give the same impression. On the 19th
of August she wrote from Pavia--
"To-day I dined with Signor Lodovico and my sister in their rooms,
according to our usual habit of taking our meals together, sometimes in
my rooms, sometimes in theirs. After dinner he dismissed all the
company, excepting the Duke and Duchess of Milan, myself, and my
companions, whom Signor Lodovico invited to remain, and with his own
lips he read aloud a letter from his ambassador in Rome, saying that His
Highness had sent for him, and addressed him in the following terms:
'Take note of my words. I acknowledge that I have been made pope by the
action of Monsignore Ascanio, contrary to all expectations, and in a
truly miraculous manner. I mean to show myself the most grateful of
popes. It is my pleasure that he should sit in my chair, and dispose of
my spiritual and temporal estate as if I were myself,' with many other
affectionate words. Cardinal Ascanio has already received the first
proofs of his gratitude, since, besides the vice-chancellorship, the
Pope has given him his own furnished house in Rome, as well as the city
of Nepi, and many other things. And His Highness has already dined with
him in private.
"Besides this, Signor Lodovico read us a letter which the Pope had
written with his own hand to Monsignore Ascanio, complaining that he had
not seen him for half a day, a period which seemed to him more like a
thousand years, and begging him to come to him at once, since he had
many things of the utmost importance to settle with him. After
describing this interview, the said Monsignore went on to tell how
warmly His Holiness spoke of Signor Lodovico, saying that he was
determined to maintain the most cordial relations with His Highness, and
profit in all cases by his advice, and only wished that he were seated
in his chair. All of this, my dear lord, affords the court here reason
for the greatest rejoicings, and I have expressed both in word and
gesture the pleasure which your Highness and I take in these things,
because of our close union with Signor Lodovico."
The marchioness goes on to describe a hunting-party, in which the whole
court had taken part.
"Yesterday, about four o'clock, all of these lords and ladies rode out
with me to a place called S. Pirono, some four miles from Pavia, and had
fine sport. White tents were erected in the meadows on the edge of the
forest, and in the midst a _pergola_ of green boughs, under which the
duchess and I took our places, the duke and others, whether on horseback
or on foot, occupying other tents. One stag of the eight which were
found there, ran out of the wood, followed by eight of the Duke of
Bari's dogs. Messer Galeazzo galloped after it with a long spear, and
killed it before our eyes. To-morrow we dine at Belriguardo, and go on
to supper at Vigevano, where we expect my father, who is to arrive on
Thursday."
Duke Ercole had reached Pavia on the 4th of August, and had paid a
visit to the Certosa with his son-in-law, after which he returned to
Ferrara, where his presence was required, owing to urgent affairs of
State connected with the Pope's death. Now he once more joined his
daughters, accompanied by his son Alfonso and a troop of actors and
pages skilled in singing and reciting poetry. Among them was young
Ariosto, the bard of the Orlando Furioso, who was to celebrate the
praises of all the princely personages present at Pavia and Vigevano, in
his great poem, and who on this occasion probably met Leonardo for the
first time. _Fêtes_ and hunting-parties now succeeded each other every
day. Even the King of Naples' ambassadors went out hunting, and one of
them succeeded in wounding a wild boar. Isabella sent her husband
wonderful accounts of the thrilling adventures and splendid sport which
afforded the two sisters such unfeigned delight.
"To-day," she wrote on the 27th of August, "we went out hunting in a
beautiful valley which seemed as if it were expressly created for the
spectacle. All the stags were driven into the wooded valley of the
Ticino, and closed in on every side by the hunters, so that they were
forced to swim the river and ascend the mountains, where the ladies
watched them from under the _pergola_ and green tents set up on the
hillside. We could see every movement of the animals along the valley
and up the mountain-side, where the dogs chased them across the river;
but only two climbed the hillside and ran far out of sight, so that we
did not see them killed, but Don Alfonso and Messer Galeazzo both gave
them chase, and succeeded in wounding them. Afterwards came a doe with
its young one, which the dogs were not allowed to follow. Many wild
boars and goats were found, but only one boar was killed before our
eyes, and one wild goat, which fell to my share. Last of all came a
wolf, which made fine somersaults in the air as it ran past us, and
amused the whole company; but none of its arts availed the poor beast,
which soon followed its comrades to the slaughter. And so, with much
laughter and merriment, we returned home, to end the day at supper, and
give the body a share in the recreations of the mind."[29]
Four venison pasties were despatched to Mantua the next day as a
present to the marquis, whose absence from these expeditions his wife
never ceased to regret, and for whom, at least in these early years of
her married life, she had a genuine affection.
"All of these days," she writes on the 22nd, "I have been trying to
write to Your Highness, but have never been able to find time, as I am
always in my sister's and Signor Lodovico's company. Now I have at
length snatched a moment, and hasten to pay you a visit in mind, since I
cannot do so in person. For greater even than all the pleasures which I
am enjoying here, is the satisfaction I receive when I hear that you are
well and happy." A week later she wrote again: "It really seems an age
since I saw Your Highness, and, pleasant and delightful as it is here, I
begin to get a little tired of these scenes, but rejoice at the prospect
of paying a visit to Genoa before long." And in an affectionate letter
to her mother, she says that sometimes in the middle of the finest hunt
she remembers with a pang how long it is since she has seen her, and how
far away she is from Ferrara, and the thought throws a shadow over the
brightest sunshine and the gayest pastimes.
After a succession of boar hunts at Novara and Mortara, Lodovico and
Beatrice took their guests to Milan on the 15th of September, and
Isabella entered the capital on horseback between the two young
duchesses, while "the old Duchess Bona," she tells her husband, "and her
daughter Madonna Bianca, with many other ladies, were awaiting me in my
rooms in the Castello, the same suite which Signor Lodovico occupied at
the time of his wedding."
The duke's mother still remained at court, and occupied rooms in the
Castello, although she made no secret of her aversion for her powerful
brother-in-law, and was secretly intriguing against him with her nephew,
Charles VIII. At her request the French king wrote a letter to Lodovico,
desiring him to give the duchess's mother leave to come to France for
his wife Anne of Brittany's confinement. But the Moro, fearing the
effect of Bona's presence at the French court, courteously declined
Charles's invitation, alleging as an excuse the fact that both Bona's
daughter-in-law, the Duchess Isabella, and her young sister-in-law, his
own wife Beatrice, were expecting similar events early in the next
year, while her daughter Bianca was of marriageable age and needed her
mother's protection. At Milan new pleasures awaited Isabella. Theatrical
representations in honour of Duke Ercole, were given by the Delle Torre
family and other noble houses, and Isabella spent long days with her
sister in the park and beautiful gardens of the Castello, among the
roses and fountains which Lodovico loved. He was never tired of
beautifying and enlarging the grounds, which now extended three miles
round the Castello, and sent to Mantua for a pair of swans to adorn the
lake, saying how much he liked to watch the movements of these
white-plumed birds upon the water. To his sister-in-law, as Isabella
always repeated in her letters, the Moro showed himself the kindest and
most generous of hosts, and was unwearied in providing for her
amusements and gratification.
"To-day," she writes on the evening after her arrival at Milan, "Signor
Lodovico showed me the treasure, which Your Highness saw when you were
last here, but which has lately received the addition of two large
chests full of ducats, and another full of gold quartz about two and a
half feet square. Would to God that we, who are so fond of spending
money, possessed as much!"[30]
After which characteristic expression, the Marchesana proceeds to tell
her lord that the date of her departure for Genoa has been fixed for the
last day of September, and to describe her brother-in-law's preparations
for the visit. Before her departure, he made a splendid present, which
she describes in a letter written on the 20th of September. "Yesterday
Signor Lodovico sent me, with the Duchess of Milan and Bari, to look at
some sumptuous brocades which he had seen in the house of one of the
richest merchants here. When we came home, he asked me which I
considered the finest. I replied that what I had most admired was a
certain gold and silver tissue embroidered with the twin towers of the
lighthouse in the port of Genoa, bearing the Spanish motto, _Tal
trabalio mes plases par tal thesauros non perder_."
The Moro praised her good taste, saying that he had already had a
_camora_, or robe, made for his wife of this material, and begged her
to accept fifteen yards of the same stuff, and wear it for his sake.
"This brocade," wrote Isabella joyfully to her husband, "is worth at
least forty ducats a yard!" And without delay she sent for a tailor to
cut out the gown, in order that she might wear it once before she left
Milan.
The Marchesino Stanga and Count Girolamo Tuttavilla were chosen to
escort Isabella to Genoa, where she was received in state by the
governor Adorno, and splendidly entertained at the Casa Spinola by the
chief citizens. Beatrice's delicate state of health had prevented her
from accompanying her sister on this journey, but she still persisted in
taking long hunting expeditions, and one day when she and the Moro were
staying at Cuzzago, encountered a savage boar which had already wounded
several greyhounds.
"My wife," wrote the Moro to his sister-in-law, "came suddenly face to
face with this furious beast, and herself gave it the first wound, after
which Messer Galeazzo and I followed suit, so that the boar must have
had great pleasure in feeling how much trouble it had given us and to
what dangers its hunters had been exposed."
The result of this long and fatiguing hunting expedition was that
Beatrice fell seriously ill. Lodovico was much alarmed, and sent daily
bulletins both to his sister-in-law and to her mother at Ferrara. "There
is no fresh news to give you here," he wrote on the 6th of October. "My
whole days are spent at the bedside of my dear wife, endeavouring to
distract her thoughts and amuse her mind as best I can during her
illness."
Isabella, who had intended to return home from Genoa, hurried back to
Milan at the news of her sister's illness, and did not leave her until
she was convalescent. During these weeks Lodovico showed himself the
most devoted and attentive of husbands, and his letters to Isabella are
full of the practical jokes and witty dialogues and repartees with which
he and Messer Galeazzo amused the duchess. The following letter affords
a characteristic specimen of the kind of fooling which these great
Renaissance lords and ladies carried on at the expense of the
half-witted jesters and buffoons who were attached to their different
households:--
"DEAR SISTER AND MOST ILLUSTRIOUS AND EXCELLENT LADY,
"You know what good sport we had in the wild boar-hunts at which you
were present this last summer. Poor Mariolo, you remember, could not be
there, first because he was ill at Milan, and afterwards because he was
required to keep my wife company during her illness, and was much
distressed to have been absent from these expeditions, when he heard
that even the king's ambassadors had wounded a wild boar. And he told us
all what great things he would have done, had he only been present. Now
that my dearest wife is better, and begins to be able to go out-of-doors
again, I thought we would have a little fun at his expense. Some wolves
and wild goats having been driven into a wood near La Pecorara, which,
as you know, is about a mile from here, on the way to La Sforzesca,
Cardinal Sanseverino had a common farm pig shut up in the same
enclosure, and the next day we went out hunting, and took Mariolo with
us. While we hunted the wolves and wild goats, we left the pig to him,
and he, taking it for a wild boar, chased it with a great hue and cry
along the woods. If your Highness could only have seen him running after
this pig, you would have died of laughter, the more so that he gallantly
tried to spear it three times over, and only succeeded in touching its
side once. And seeing how proud he was of his prowess, we said to him,
'Don't you know, Mariolo, that you have been hunting a tame pig?' He
stood dumb with astonishment, and stared as if he did not know what we
could mean, and so we all came home infinitely amused, and every one
asked Mariolo if he did not know the difference between a wild boar and
a tame pig!
"Your brother,
LODOVICO MARIA SFORTIA.[31]
Vigevano, December 6, 1492."
The most remarkable thing about these letters is that a prince who was
engaged in so much and varied business, who himself conducted a vast
correspondence in which the most intricate diplomatic questions of the
day were involved with his envoys at the different European courts, and
personally superintended every detail of administration, while at the
same time he gave minute instructions to the hundreds of architects,
sculptors, and painters in his service, should have found time to write
these bantering epistles to his sister-in-law. One of these letters, for
instance, is devoted to a long account of the jokes that passed between
Messer Galeazzo and the duchess at table, how Messer Galeazzo begged to
be allowed a taste of the duchess's soup, and complained that he was
forgotten now that the Marchesana was no longer there, and how Beatrice
told him she would write and tell her sister, to which he replied, "Tell
her whatever you like, as long as I get my soup!"
Yet at this very moment, when he penned these joking letters to
Isabella, Lodovico was engaged in some of the most difficult and anxious
negotiations with other States.
During Ercole d'Este's visit, the question of sending the customary
congratulations to the new Pope had been discussed, and Lodovico had
suggested that the ambassadors of the four allied powers--Milan, Naples,
Florence, and Ferrara--should send a joint deputation, both as a mark of
special honour to His Holiness, and as a public manifesto to foreign
powers of the strength of these united States. The step, he was
confident, would produce a good effect both on the King of the Romans
and Charles VIII. of France, whose designs on Italy were already
exciting alarm. Both the Duke of Ferrara and King Ferrante, who had been
consulted through his ambassadors, when they came to hunt at Vigevano,
agreed readily to Lodovico's proposal, and the only person to raise
objections was Piero de' Medici, who had lately succeeded his father as
chief magistrate of Florence, and pretended to the same power. The death
of his friend Lorenzo had been sincerely deplored by Lodovico, who,
before many months had passed, began to discover how weak and
contemptible a character his son possessed, and had already consulted
his astrologer as to the influence which this young man would have upon
his own fortunes. Now the vain and foolish youth refused to join in the
proposed embassy to the Vatican, because he wished to appear alone
before Alexander VI. and impress that new Pope by the magnificence of
his apparel and retinue. Not content with frustrating the Moro's plan,
Piero induced King Ferrante to withdraw his consent to the joint
deputation, a step which did not tend to improve the strained relations
that had existed for some time past between Naples and Milan. Cardinal
Giuliano della Rovere had retired to Ostia in disgust at the election of
the Borgia Pope, leaving Ascanio Sforza all powerful at the Vatican, and
the Pope availed himself of every occasion to show his friendship for
Lodovico. Already a marriage had been proposed between Alexander's
daughter Lucrezia Borgia and Giovanni Sforza, Prince of Pesaro, and the
King of Naples looked with alarm on the friendly relations that existed
between the Holy See and Milan. "Alexander VI.," said Ferrante,
bitterly, "has no respect for the Holy Church, and cares for nothing but
the aggrandisement of his own family. Rome will soon become a Milanese
camp."
But while Lodovico Sforza looked with suspicion on the intrigues of
Ferrante's son Alfonso, and was anxious to strengthen his alliance with
other powers, he had as yet no thought of inviting the French to invade
Italy. On the contrary, the whole tenor of his private letters and
public despatches was marked by the same anxiety to maintain cordial
relations with the different Italian states, in order that they might
present a united front to foreign enemies. However friendly were his
advances to the King of France, he had never by word or hint given him
the slightest encouragement to invade Italy or assert his claim to the
crown of Naples. It was only when he saw peace restored between Charles
and Maximilian, on the one hand, and on the other a treaty of alliance
concluded between the Pope and the King of Naples, that he began to
tremble for his own safety, and suddenly changed his policy. But for the
moment counsels of peace prevailed, and the ambitious Moro could look
forward with hope and confidence to the coming year, that promised to
bring him new joys, and perchance the fulfilment of his long-cherished
desire, in the birth of a son and heir.
FOOTNOTES:
[28] Pastor's "History of the Popes," vol. v. p. 383, etc.
[29] Luzio-Renier, _op. cit._, p. 350, etc.
[30] Luzio-Renier, _op. cit._, p. 356.
[31] Luzio-Renier, _op. cit._, p. 361.