CHAPTER I.

LORENZO DE’ MEDICI

VOL. I.

LORENZO DE’ MEDICI

_THE MAGNIFICENT_

BY

ALFRED VON REUMONT

_TRANSLATED from THE GERMAN by ROBERT HARRISON_

IN TWO VOLUMES

VOL. I.

LONDON

SMITH, ELDER, & CO., 15 WATERLOO PLACE

1876

[_All rights reserved_]

TO

CINO CAPPONI

THE HISTORIAN OF HIS NATIVE CITY

WITH

RESPECTFUL HOMAGE AND

FRIENDSHIP

NOTE BY THE TRANSLATOR.

I AM bound to confess that it has been no easy task to interpret

for English readers the admirable biography of Lorenzo which Herr

von Reumont has given to the world. His extraordinary talent for

research seems to have spent itself freely over every scrap of paper

or parchment written or printed on the subject of the Medici and their

times that has come within his reach. If these volumes convey to their

readers the vivid impression of the Medicean age which may be derived

from the original work my humble but laborious duty will not have been

undertaken in vain.

R. H.

LONDON LIBRARY: _June 1876_.

AUTHOR’S PREFACE.

THE second half of the fifteenth century exhibits, in the development

of the Renaissance in Italy, the singular spectacle of a transformation

of the modern world under the influence of ancient classical culture in

conjunction with the opening out of a new intellectual horizon. In a

state the importance of which cannot be measured by its circumference

or material strength, we see a struggle between form and spirit among

a community that had stood there alone from the Middle Ages. This

struggle was the exciting cause of a new growth, of the production of

fresh branches and new foliage on a tree that had become incurably

rotten and hollow. The Christian world has only once taken up a

position like this in the fruitful interpenetration and transmutation

of real and ideal elements. It shows us a man, the product and

consummation of these circumstances and conditions, at once the child

and the pioneer of his age, an age which was filled with the most

joyous and elevated existence both in material and spiritual things. A

man like him could only be born and grow up under such circumstances,

in the ferment and strife of events and of the moral forces of the

time. Family and civic influence as well as the temper of the people

and of the century contributed to this result.

A justly popular life of Lorenzo [by Roscoe] was written when the

knowledge of Italian history was limited and its sources confused and

difficult of access. If a similar attempt is now made eighty years

later, it is under altered circumstances and with expectations greatly

enhanced. The supply of original materials, then very small, however

skilfully arranged, has increased in our day to a degree almost beyond

management. At that period the insight of the historian, not informed

as to the internal politics of Florence, reached no great depth below

the dazzling surface of Lorenzo’s magnificence. At the present day deep

places are exposed to view which had been kept only too dark. A flood

of light envelops the personality of the man who was distinguished by

so many things that charm and attract. If the sum-total of his history

conveys a graver impression and comes upon us with a feeling of pain,

our interest in it is scarcely less keen because of the obstacles

through which this brilliant spirit made its own way, or of the

entanglements and dangers against which he had to struggle. Should I

succeed in describing truthfully him and the surroundings from which he

was never separated and without which it is difficult to imagine him,

I shall have completed a thank-offering due for a past full of varied

enjoyment and for many friendly aids, received during the preparation

and composition of this book from the countrymen of Lorenzo de’ Medici.

I am indebted to scholars and art-critics, to keepers of archives and

museums, to librarians, and above all to the man whose name rendered

famous by the history of his native city stands in the front of this

book, which attained its present form for the most part under his roof.

To him do I owe it especially that after a deep and critical change in

my own life, Florence remained to me a second home.

BONN: _Palm Sunday, 1874_.

CONTENTS

OF

THE FIRST VOLUME.

FIRST BOOK.

_FLORENCE AND THE MEDICI TO THE DEATH OF COSIMO THE ELDER._

CHAPTER I.

THE HOUSE AND FAMILY OF THE MEDICI. DEVELOPMENT

OF THE FLORENTINE DEMOCRACY.

PAGE

The House of Medici—Original Dwelling-places—The first

Appearance of the Medici—Commencement of the Florentine

Community—The Community and the Imperial Power—Ghibellines

and Guelfs—Consuls and Podestà—Government by a Citizen

Guard—Captain of the People—Flourishing State of the

Town in the Thirteenth Century—Party Factions in the Last

Days of the Hohenstaufen—Decisive Victory over the Guelfs

after King Manfred’s Death—Internal Condition—Foreign

Viceroys—Growth of the Class of Citizens after the Middle of

the Thirteenth Century—Beginnings of the Guild System—The

Seven Great Societies—Government and Magistracy of the

Priors—Democratic Reform of Giano della Bella—Limitation

of the Citizens’ Share in the Government—The Ordinances of

Justice against the Nobility—The Signory, or Upper Governing

Department, and the Councillors—Exercise of the Municipal

Franchise—Parliament—Vain Endeavours for Equality of Power

among the Public Authorities 3

CHAPTER II.

THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY. RULE OF THE ALBIZZI. GIOVANNI AND

AVERARDO DE’ MEDICI.

Origin and Arms of the Medici—Public Affairs in the First

Half of the Fourteenth Century—Mistakes at Home and

Misfortunes Abroad—The Duke of Athens—Party Politics—Guelf

Magistracy—Expulsion of the Proscribed (Ammoniti)—Salvestro

de’ Medici—Rebellion of the Lower Classes (Tumulto de’

Ciompi)—Averardo de’ Medici, called Bicci—Great Authority of

the Albizzi Family and their Friends—Giovanni de’ Medici, son

of Averardo—Florence under the Rule of the Albizzi—Campaign

against the Visconti—Plunder of Pisa—The State of Finance

in Florence—Wealth and Activity of John de’ Medici—Florence

and Filippo Maria Visconti—Internal Condition during the War

against Milan—Rinaldo degli Albizzi—Position of the great with

regard to the smaller Citizens—Public Troubles—The Estimo

and Loans—Increase and Inequality of the Taxes—The Cadaster,

its Framework, Operations, and Product Position of Giovanni

de’ Medici with regard to the Cadaster—Death of Giovanni de’

Medici—Opinions about him 20

CHAPTER III.

THE CITY OF FLORENCE TO THE BEGINNING OF THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY.

Situation and Origin of Florence—Roman Times and the

Early Part of the Middle Ages—Florence before and

in the Time of Dante—Architecture in the Thirteenth

Century—Towers—Rubacon Bridge—Churches—Sta. Maria

Novella and Sta. Croce—Enlargement of the Town and Third

Wall—Arnolfo di Cambio, called di Lapo—St. Maria del Fiore

and Palace of the Signoria—Churches, Hospitals, Castles

in the Province—Building of Palaces and Houses—Style of

the Churches—Tuscan Gothic—Cimabue and Giotto—Giotto and

the Cathedral—Belfry of the Cathedral—Taddeo Gaddi—The

Hall of Or San Michele—Enlargement of the Palace of the

Podestà—Architecture of the Middle of the Fourteenth

Century—Religious Institutions—St. Anne’s Chapel in Or San

Michele—New Church-building—Society of Artists—Hall of the

Signory (Loggia de Lanzi)—Family Residences—Sculpture—Andrea

Pisano and his School—Painting—Andrea di Cione, called

Arcagna—Hospitals and Monuments—Filippo Brunelleschi—Church

of Sta. Maria del Fiore—The Foundling Hospital (Innocenti)—San

Lorenzo—Sto. Spirito—Other Works of Brunelleschi—Dwelling

Houses—Streets and Pavements—Sculpture of the Fifteenth

Century—Ghiberti and Donatello—Painting—Fra Angelico of

Fiesole and Masaccio—General Appearance of the Town—The

Environs—Fortified Villas and Monasteries 38

CHAPTER IV.

INDUSTRY, COMMERCE AND LIFE.

The great Guilds and their Position—Guild of Woollen-weavers

(Arte della Lana)—Guild of Cloth Merchants (Catimala)—Guild

of Silk-weavers (Arte della Seta)—Guild of Money-changers

(Cambia)—Tuscan Money-changers Abroad—Positions of

Money-changers in France and England—Bankruptcy of the large

Banks—Financial Distress at Home—Revival of Commerce in

the Beginning of the Fifteenth Century—Customs of the Money

Exchange—General Feeling of the Citizen Class—Regulations

for the Beautifying and Security of the Town—Character of the

Populace—Habits and Customs in the Fourteenth Century—Popular

and Church Festivals—St. John’s Day—Merry-making and Pastimes

of the People—The Florentines in the Beginning of the Fifteenth

Century 67

CHAPTER V.

THE ALBIZZI AND COSIMO DE’ MEDICI.

Cosimo de’ Medici in his Youth—Countess of Bardi and her

Family—The Medici and Pope John XXIII.—Death of John

XXIII. in Florence—Public Acts of Cosimo de’ Medici—The

Position of Cosimo towards the Party of Albizzi—The

Albizzi in the Fourteenth Century—Piero degli Albizzi

and the Magistracy of the Guelf Party—The Tumult of the

Ciompi, Exile of the Albizzi—Authority of Maso degli

Albizzi—Rinaldo degli Albizzi—Niccolo da Uzzano—Palla

Strozzi and his Family—Flourishing Condition of the Town

and Commonwealth—War against Lucca—Relation of Rinaldo

to Cosimo de’ Medici—Proceedings of the Oligarchy against

Cosimo—Cosimo’s Capture—Cosimo’s Banishment—Unsettled State

of Things—Rinaldo’s Appeal to Arms—Cosimo is called back, and

returns—Exile of the Albizzi—Cosimo’s Gonfaloniership—Review

of the Albizzi Rule—Florentine Order and its Formation—The

Subjection of the smaller Communes—Conditions of this

Subjection—Statutes—Acquisition of Pistoja, Volterra, Prato,

and Arezzo—The Accomandigia 86

CHAPTER VI.

SUPREMACY OF COSIMO DE’ MEDICI TO THE REFORM OF LUCCA PITTI.

Pope Eugene in Florence—Political Positions on Cosimo’s

return Home—Antecedents of the Medici Party—Lucca

Pitti—Neri Capponi—The Acciaiuoli—Agnolo and Donate

Acciaiuoli—Diotisalvi Neroni—The Giugni and other Friends of

the Medici, the Pandolfini, Salviati, Guicciardini—Cosimo’s

Party-management—Restriction of free Voting by the Practice of

Nominating to the Magistracy—Abrogation of the Law against the

Nobles—Relations towards his Opponents—Palla Strozzi—Troubled

Lot of Rinaldo degli Albizzi and his Family—Cosimo’s

Attitude towards his own Party—Neri Capponi—Baldaccio

d’Anghiari—Disunion in the Dominant Party—Termination of

Extra-legal Authority—Re-introduction of the Selection of

Magistrates by Vote—The Formation of the Cadaster—Progressive

Scale—Taxation in the Hands of the Medici—Revision of

the Cadaster in 1458—Discontent of powerful Burghers of

the Medici Party—Luca Pitti, Gonfalonier—Change in the

Government—New Commission for the Choice of Magistrates and

for Taxation—Weakening of Cosimo’s Authority—Violence of his

Adherents 114

CHAPTER VII.

FOREIGN AFFAIRS. PEACE AND WAR. COUNCIL OF UNION.

War with Milan and Naples—Filippo Maria Visconti and Alfonso

of Naples—End of the Visconti—Francesco Sforza, Duke of

Milan—Relations of Sforza with Florence and Cosimo de’

Medici—Alliance of Venice and Naples against Florence—War in

the Valley of Chiana and in the Maremma—Peace of Lodi—The

Sack of Constantinople—Triumph of the House of Aragon in

Naples—Pope Eugene IV.—Contest of the Holy See with the

Council of Basle—Council of Union at Florence—Reunion of the

Churches of the East and West—Sojourn of Pope Eugenius IV. in

Florence—Consecration of the Cathedral and of the Church of

Sta. Croce—The Eugenius College—Political Complications—René

of Anjou in Florence—Return of the Pope to Rome—Pope Pius II.

in Florence—Death of Archbishop St. Antonine—Charlotte of

Lusignan in Florence 139

CHAPTER VIII.

LAST DAYS OF COSIMO DE MEDICI.

Cosimo in Advanced Age—Death of his Brother Lorenzo—His

sons Piero and Giovanni—Piero’s Marriage to Lucrezia

Tornabuoni—Death of Giovanni—Piero’s Children—Cosimo’s

Manner of Life—Cosimo’s Disposition and Character—Cosimo in

Outward Demeanour and in Business—Cosimo’s Ecclesiastical

Edifices—Churches and Monasteries, Palace and Villas—Buildings

and Foundations Abroad—Cosimo’s Last Days at Careggi

Villa—Piero’s Letter to his Sons—Death of Cosimo—Marsilio

Ficino on Cosimo—Cosimo de’ Medici the Father of his Country 153

SECOND BOOK.

_PIERO DE’ MEDICI. FIRST YEARS OF LORENZO THE MAGNIFICENT._

CHAPTER I.

PIERO DE’ MEDICI, HIS RELATIONS AND FRIENDS.

Piero de’ Medici and his Family—Lucrezia Tornabuoni de’

Medici—Lorenzo de’ Medici—Lorenzo’s Education—Gentile de’

Becchi of Urbino—His Youthful Years and Dispositions—Giuliano

de’ Medici—Bianca de’ Medici Pazzi—The Family of

Pazzi—Andrea, Piero, Jacopo de’ Pazzi and their

Relatives—Nannina de’ Medici Rucellai—The Rucellai—Giovanni

and his Son Bernardo—The Soderini—Lorenzo Soderini and his

Sons Niccolò and Tommaso 167

CHAPTER II.

LORENZO’S YOUTH. CONSPIRACY OF DIOTISALVI NERONI AND HIS

COMPANIONS.

Meeting of Lorenzo de’ Medici with Federigo d’Aragona,

younger Son of King Ferrante of Naples—Florence in relation

to the Aragonese and to Sforza—Lorenzo in Upper Italy—The

Pulci—Luigi Pulci—Lorenzo in Rome—Pope Paul II.—Death

of Francesco Sforza—Piero de’ Medici and the House of

Sforza—Galeazzo Maria, Duke of Milan—The Medici Party

after the Death of Cosimo—Piero de’ Medici and Diotisalvi

Neroni—Diotisalvi’s Designs against the Medici—His

connection with Niccolò Soderini and Luca Pitti—Agnolo

Acciaiuoli—The Causes of Discord—Niccolò Soderini as

Gonfalonier—Neglected Opportunities of Trade—Fruitless Attempt

at Compensation—Conspiracy against the Medici—Lorenzo with

King Ferrante in Naples—Preparations on both Sides—The Villa

of Careggi—Piero’s Illness there—Lorenzo’s Presence of Mind at

an Attempt on his Father’s Life—The Medici in the City—Both

Factions appeal to Arms—Indecision of the Leaders—Negotiations

and Defection—Luca Pitti and the Medici—Failure of the

Conspiracy and Banishment of its Leaders—End of Luca Pitti 179

CHAPTER III.

FOREIGN AFFAIRS. FRANCE, VENICE, THE ROMAGNA. THE WAR OF

COLLEONE.

The Medici after the Neroni Conspiracy—King Ferrante

to Lorenzo—Louis XI. of France and the Medici—The

Florentine Exiles and Venice—The Relations of Venice

with Florence—Bartolommeo Colleone—Colleone and the

exiled Florentines—State of the Romagna—The Popes and

the Dynasties—Relations of the Romagna with Venice and

Florence—The Raccomandati of the Romagna—The Este Counts of

Montefeltro and Urbino—The Malatesta of Rimini—The Ordelaffi

of Forli—The Manfredi, Alidosi, Sforza of Pesaro—Bologna and

the Bentivogli—Sante and Giovanni Bentivoglio.—Relations

with Florence and the Papacy—Preparations of the Allies

against Colleone—Colleone in the Romagna.—Battle at La

Molinella—Galeazzo Maria Sforza and Venice—Ineffective

Meeting of the Allies—Miserable Condition of the Army—Close

of the War—Pope Paul II.—End of Colleone and the Florentine

Exiles—Attack on Lucrezia de’ Medici 197

CHAPTER IV.

LATTER DAYS OF PIERO DE’ MEDICI. LORENZO’S MARRIAGE.

Battle near Rimini—Robert Malatesta—Finances of

Florence—Purchase of Sarzano—Gay Life amid Financial

Difficulties—Position and Life of Lorenzo de’ Medici—Lucrezia

Donati—Lorenzo’s Tournament—Lorenzo’s Engagement—Clarice

Orsini and her Relations—Lucrezia de’ Medici in

Rome—Intelligence of Clarice Orsini—Conclusion of the

Engagement, and Marriage Ceremony in Rome—Marriage Festival

in Florence—Lorenzo’s Journey to Milan to the Christening

of Gian Galeazzo Sforza—Death of Piero de’ Medici, and his

Character—Piero’s Relation to his Party and to the Exiles—King

Ferrante and Piero de’ Medici 222

CHAPTER V.

EVENTS AT HOME AND ABROAD DURING THE FIRST YEARS OF LORENZO’S

SUPREMACY.

Nature and Form of the Medici Rule—The Heads of the Medici

Party after Piero’s death—Tommaso Soderini—Council in St.

Antonio—Accession of the Sons of Piero de’ Medici to the

Position of their Father and Grand-father—Position of Lorenzo

before the Party—Appointment of the Civic Officers—The

Electors—Lorenzo assumes the Direction of Affairs—Foreign

Affairs—Pope Paul II. and Naples—Alliance between Florence,

Naples, and Milan—General Alliance against the Osmanli—Death

of Pope Paul II 244

CHAPTER VI.

POSITION AND RELATIONS OF THE MEDICI.

Splendour of the Medici Family—Their Position at Home and

their Connections Abroad—The Royal Family of Naples—Ippolita

Maria, Duchess of Calabria—The Queen of Bosnia—Luigi Pulci in

relation to the Medici—Pulci’s Journeys and Missions—Camerino

and Naples—Unfortunate Attack against Piombino—Galeazzo Maria

Sforza and his Wife, Bona of Savoy, in Florence—Visit of King

Christian of Denmark—Giovanni Bentivoglio in relation to the

Medici—Proceedings of King Louis XI. and Lorenzo concerning

King Ferrante of Naples—The Relation of Lorenzo towards his

Fellow Citizens—His Manner of Life, Residence in the Country,

and Travels—Madonna Clarice in Umbria and Rome—Visit to Zoe

Palæologa—Lucrezia de’ Medici in Bagno a Morba—The Death of

Madonna Contessina 255

CHAPTER VII.

LORENZO DE’ MEDICI IN ROME. PRATO AND VOLTERRA.

Accession of Sixtus IV. to the Papal Chair—Congratulatory

Embassy from Florence—Lorenzo accompanies it—Disposition

of the new Pope—Attempted Insurrection in Prato—Bernardo

Nardi—Connection of Volterra with Florence—Alum Pits of

Volterra—Dispute about Leasing the Alum—Intervention of

Florence—Tumult in Volterra—Various Views in Florence—Triumph

of the Reigning Faction—Expedition against Volterra—Its

Capture and Sack—Volterra and Florence—Misery of the

Volterraneans 274

CHAPTER VIII.

POPE SIXTUS IV., KING FERRANTE, AND THE MEDICI.

Feelings of Sixtus IV. towards the Medici—Plan for obtaining

the Cardinalate for Giuliano—Cardinal Pietro Riario, Archbishop

of Florence—Eleanor of Aragon Este in Florence—Arrival of

Cardinal-Archbishop Riario—Beginning of the Misunderstanding

between Sixtus and the Medici—Dynastic Ambition of the

Pope—Girolamo Riario, Lord of Imola—Affairs of the City of

Castello—The Vitelli—Niccolò Vitelli in Contention with the

Pope—Florence supports the Vitelli—Displeasure of Sixtus at

the Policy of Florence—Federigo of Montefeltro, Duke of Urbino,

won by the Pope—King Ferrante in the Conflict with Venice and

the Pope—Complications in the East—Alliance of Florence with

Milan and Venice—Alliance of Sixtus IV. with Naples—Uncertain

Policy—Second Marriage of King Ferrante 284

CHAPTER IX.

MILAN, GENOA, AND SIENA.

Cheerful Life in Florence—Tournament of Giuliano de’

Medici—Death of Galeazzo Maria Sforza—Exertions of Florence

on behalf of the Duchess Bona—Roberto da Sanseverino—Parties

in Milan—The Brothers Sforza—Disturbances in Genoa—Relations

of Genoa with France and Milan—Revolt of the Genoese against

the Domination of Milan, and its Suppression—Intrigues of

the Brothers Sforza against the Duchess-Regent, and their

Banishment—Rupture between the Pope and Lorenzo—Francesco

Salviati, Archbishop of Pisa—Causes of the Animosity between

Lorenzo and the Archbishop—Carlo Fortebraccio of Montone

opposed to Siena—Equivocal Conduct of the Florentines—The

Pope and Naples in Favour of Siena—Retreat of Carlo

Fortebraccio—Troubled Relations between the Pope, Siena, and

Florence 298

THIRD BOOK.

_CONSPIRACY OF THE PAZZI. WAR WITH ROME AND NAPLES._

CHAPTER I.

PAZZI CONSPIRACY.

State of Affairs at Home and Abroad—Lorenzo de’ Medici and

the Pazzi—Causes of Enmity—Attitude of Sixtus IV. and

Girolamo Riario towards the Medici—The Plot against the

Medici—Girolamo Riario, Francesco de’ Pazzi, and Francesco

Salviati—Preparations for the Enterprise—Invitation to

Lorenzo to visit Rome—Consultations in Rome—Giovanni Batista

da Montesecco—Meeting of the Conspirators—The Conspirators

and the Papacy—Francesco de’ Pazzi and Montesecco in

Florence—Agreement with Jacopo de’ Pazzi—Francesco Salviati

and Cardinal Raffael Riario—The other Participators in the

Plot—The 26th April, 1478—Attempt in the Cathedral—Death

of Giuliano—Rescue of Lorenzo—The Archbishop of Pisa in

the Palace of the Signory—Conflict around the Palace—Deeds

of Blood in the Palace and in the Streets—Executions and

Murder—Lorenzo’s Address to the People—Legal Measures against

the Pazzi—The Funeral of Giuliano de’ Medici—His Son Giulio 313

CHAPTER II.

ALLIANCES AND COUNTER-ALLIANCES. PREPARATIONS FOR THE CONFLICT.

Dangerous Position and Measures of Precaution—Donato Acciaiuoli

in Rome—The Florentines and the Papacy—Demands of Sixtus

IV.—Florentines in the Castle of St. Angelo—Cardinal Riario in

Florence—His Return to Rome—Bull of Excommunication against

Lorenzo de’ Medici—King Ferrante and Lorenzo—Relations of the

King with Florence and Siena—The Papacy and Bologna—Sixtus

IV.’s Observations on the Events at Florence—The Republic of

Venice and the Florentines—Representations of Venice to the

Papacy—King Louis XI. and his Relation to Florence and the

Papacy—Naples and Burgundy—Mission of Philippe de Commines,

Lord of Argenton—Commines in Florence and Rome—His Opinion of

the States of the Church 337

CHAPTER III.

CAMPAIGN OF 1478.

Allies and Opponents of the Florentines—The Duke of Urbino

on Lorenzo de’ Medici and the Political Situation of

Milan and Venice—Florentine Preparations—The Papal and

Neapolitan Forces—The Valley of the Chiana—Commencement

of the Campaign at Montepulciano—Brief of Pope Sixtus

IV. to the Florentines—Lorenzo de’ Medici before the

Council—Opposition of the Clergy to the Curia—Official

Vindication of the Republic—Reply of Pope Sixtus IV. to

the Florentine Document—Death of Donato Acciaiuoli—Revolt

in Genoa in the Interest of the Brothers Sforza and King

Ferrante—War in the Valley of the Chiana—Bad Condition of the

Florentine Troops—Gian Jacopo Trivulzio—Siege and Capture

of Castellina in Chianti—Ercole of Este Captain-General of

the Florentines—Wretched Management of the War—Loss of Monte

San Savino—Unfavourable Position of the Florentines—Lukewarm

Assistance from the Allies—Plans for the Second Campaign 356

CHAPTER IV.

LOUIS XI. AND SIXTUS IV. SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

Philip de Commines on the Condition of Florence—His Second

Residence in Florence and Milan—Louis XI. and Italian

Affairs—French Embassy to Rome—The Envoys and Sixtus

IV.—The Pope’s Stipulations for Peace—Answer of the

Florentines—Ineffectual Negotiations—Departure of the

Envoys from Rome—State of Affairs in Naples and the Papal

Court—Disorder in Milan—Conspiracy of Roberto da Sanseverino

and the Brothers Sforza against the Duchess-Regent—Seizure

of Pisa—Recommencement of the Conflict in the Valley of the

Chiana—War in Perugia—Discord in Florence—Enterprise of

Sanseverino and Ludovico Sforza against Milan—Ludovico Sforza

il Moro Governor-General in Milan—Blowing up of the Florentine

Head-quarters at Poggibonzi in the Valley of the Elsa—Cessation

of Hostilities 371

CHAPTER V.

FLORENCE AND HER ALLIES. LODOVICO IL MORO.

Unfavourable Condition of Florence—Lorenzo’s Position—King

Louis XI. and Italian Intrigues—Negotiations between King

and Pope—Necessity, for Lorenzo, of an Agreement—Diplomatic

Transaction with Lodovico il Moro—Lodovico’s Character and

Position—Lodovico il Moro as Governor—Lodovico on the

Condition of the Florentines—Advice for an Arrangement with

Naples—Filippo Strozzi’s Mission to Naples—Lorenzo de’

Medici’s Resolve on a Journey to Naples—Departure for Pisa and

Bada 386

CHAPTER VI.

LORENZO DE’ MEDICI IN NAPLES. PEACE WITH KING AND POPE.

Lorenzo’s Arrival in Naples—Lorenzo and King

Ferrante—Impression produced in Florence by his Decision

and the Variety of Opinions—Uncertainty in Florence and in

the Romagna—Sixtus IV. and the Peace Negotiations—Sixtus

IV. on the Management of the Dispute—Lorenzo’s insecure

Position—The Dynasties of the Romagna—Diomede Carafa,

Count of Maddalini—Lorenzo’s Connections in Naples—The

Royal Family—The Duchess of Calabria—Lorenzo’s Return

Home—Proclamation and Conditions of Peace—Insecure Relations

with Sixtus IV.—Difficulties of the Affairs of Romagna—The

Ordelaffi—Forli in Possession of Girolamo Riario—The Condition

of Siena—The Duke of Calabria and the Sienese—Political

Agitation in Siena in Favour of the Nobility, at the

Instigation of the Duke of Calabria—Conquest of Otranto by the

Turks—Retirement of the Duke of Calabria from Siena—Florentine

Embassy to Sixtus IV.—Reconciliation and Peace 401

FOURTH BOOK.

_THE MEDICI IN RELATION TO LITERATURE AND ART._

FIRST PART.

HUMANIST AND POPULAR LITERATURE TO THE SECOND HALF OF THE FIFTEENTH

CENTURY.

CHAPTER I.

BEGINNINGS OF HUMANISM. COLUCCIO SALUTATI AND POGGIO

BRACCIOLINI. THE BOOK TRADE.

Contrast between Mediæval Culture and Humanism—Character

and Significance of Humanism—Florentine Education—Lapo da

Castiglionichio and Luigi Marsigli—The University—Greek

Studies—Manuel Chrysoloras—Early Study of Greek Learning in

Florence—Poggio Bracciolini and his Discoveries—The Manuscript

Business of the Fourteenth Century—Ancient Book Trade—Copyists

in the Universities and Monasteries—Scarcity of Books and

their High Prices—Increase of the Trade in Manuscripts—Paper

Manufacture 425

CHAPTER II.

LEONARDO BRUNI AND THE FLORENTINE HUMANISTS. FRANCESCO FILELFO.

COSIMO DE’ MEDICI.

Leonardo Bruni Aretino—Ambrogio Traversari—The Camaldula

Convent of the Angeli—Niccolò Niccoli—Niccoli’s Collection of

Books—Carlo Marsuppini Aretino—Beginning of the Translation

of the Iliad—Giannozzo Manetti—Higher Education and the

Universities—Jurisprudence and Statute Law—Palla Strozzi

and the University—Rinaldo degli Albizzi, and his Political

Writings—Francesco Filelfo of Tolentino in Florence—Filelfo

as Teacher and Politician—The Brothers Cosimo and Lorenzo de’

Medici in the World of Letters—Their Connection with Poggio

Bracciolini—Cosimo as a Collector—Ciriaco Pizzicolli of

Ancona—Roman Want of Culture—Enoch of Ascoli and Antonio of

Todi 440

CHAPTER III.

THE COUNCIL OF UNION AND PLATONISM. COSIMO DE’ MEDICI’S LATER

YEARS.

Pope Eugene IV. and the Papal Court in Florence—The

Greeks in Florence—Gemisto’s Plethon—Origin of the

Platonic Academy—Youth of Marsilio Ficino—John

Argyropulos—Philosophical Studies—Cristoforo Landino

Saint Antoninus Archbishop of Florence—Orlando

Bonarli as Archbishop—Epistolaries and

Dedications—Hermaphroditus—Literature and Life—Agnolo

Pandolfini—Villa Life—Franco Sachetti—Poggio Bracciolini’s

Country Life—Learned Connections of Florence with Foreign

Countries—William Grey, Earl of Worcester, and others—The

Humanists during the Last Years of Cosimo de’ Medici—Erudition

and the Vernacular 457

CHAPTER IV.

LIBRARIES AND THE BOOK TRADE. VESPASIANO DA BISTICCI.

Cosimo de’ Medici’s Library Establishments—San Giorgio Maggiore

in Venice—Library of the San Marco Convent—The Niccolo

Manuscripts—Library of the Abbey of Fiesole—Inscriptions of

the Codices—The Duke of Urbino and Vespasiano da Bisticci—The

Copyists of the Fifteenth Century—The Material Perfection of

the Copies—Prices—Manuscripts and Printed Matter 472

CHAPTER V.

LITERATURE OF THE VULGAR TONGUE. POPULAR AND SACRED POETRY OF

THE PEOPLE.

The Italian Language and Literature at the Beginning of the

Fifteenth Century—Fra Giovanni de’ Medici’s Book on Domestic

Life—Leon Batista Alberti and the Vulgar Tongue—Poetical

Competition in the Cathedral—Corruption of the Language in

the Hands of the Learned—The Vulgar Tongue—Caterina of Siena

Letters—Religious Sentiment among the People and in their

Literature—Sacred Poetry of the People—The Fraternities

and their Hymns—The Jesuits and their Poetry—Substance

and Melody of the Hymns—Feo Belcari; his Poems and Prose

Writings—Girolamo Benivieni—Lucrezia Tornabuoni de’ Medici

as a Sacred Poetess—Historical Writings in the Vulgar

Tongue—Gino Capponi—Buonaccorso Pitti—Jacopo Salviati—Neri

Capponi—Domenico Buoninsegni—Goro Dati—Giovanni Cavalcanti 482

_FIRST BOOK_

FLORENCE AND THE MEDICI TO THE DEATH OF COSIMO THE ELDER

CHAPTER I.

THE HOUSE AND FAMILY OF THE MEDICI—DEVELOPMENT OF THE FLORENTINE

DEMOCRACY.

AT the entrance of the Via Larga in Florence there rises to view,

at the corner of one of the cross streets leading to the church

of San Lorenzo, one of the most magnificent palaces of that rich

and beautiful city. The recent enlargement of the passage to the

neighbouring cathedral square—the Via de’ Martelli—has exposed to

view the southern aspect of the palace, and displays the harmony of its

proportions on a side that formerly was not to be seen. The traditions

of mediæval life are still manifest in the building, notwithstanding

the modification introduced by the large windows on the ground-floor,

and by the additional wing that prolongs the façade. Huge blocks of

stone, rough-hewn, with deep incisions, lend to the basement of the

edifice the appearance of a fortress. They recall to mind the fortified

palaces of the ancient nobles who, when transplanted from the country

to the town, found themselves associated, willingly or unwillingly,

with the burghers, and before long under the control of men who vied

with them in the erection of towers and strongholds that overawed

their own. The great town-hall was as solid a structure as any castle,

even at a time when milder manners had subdued, if not the violence of

party spirit, at least the fury of street riots, and had proscribed the

towers which once by hundreds dominated the narrow streets, with their

heavy iron chains ready for a barricade. The progress of civic life

may be traced in other parts of the building—in the bow windows of

the upper stories, divided by slender pilasters, in the _renaissance_

decoration, and in the Corinthian pillars which ornament the quadrangle

of the courtyard. Inscriptions and antiques introduced at a later

period adorn the walls of the portico of the courtyard; but the statue

of David has disappeared from the centre, and although fountains still

exist in the second court—once a garden—the figure of Alessandro de’

Medici, yet visible, indicates a century later. Though much altered

in modern times, the original plan of the interior, which was regular

and commodious, can be traced. Such a design was uncommon in days when

the comparatively small area of the houses made a large suite of rooms

a matter of rare occurrence, and when generally one story rose above

another, with steep stairs and narrow passages into which a scanty

supply of light was admitted from courtyards deep as wells.

The house was built by Michelozzo di Bartolommeo, then forty years old,

for Cosimo de’ Medici, in the first half of the fifteenth century.

Filippo Brunelleschi, the greatest architect of modern Italy, had made

a design for the palace of the rich and art-loving citizen, who was one

of his best friends. It was the plan of a vast building, unenclosed on

all sides, and fronting towards the square of San Lorenzo, where stood

the church, the restoration of which had been begun by the same artist

for Cosimo’s father. But cautious, calculating Cosimo, fearing that

a house on so magnificent a scale as that designed by Brunelleschi,

even if not beyond his means, would exceed the ordinary dimensions

of a citizen’s dwelling, and might excite popular jealousy, gave the

preference to Michelozzo’s more limited design.[1] Brunelleschi took

offence at this neglect of himself, and destroyed his model. Yet

Cosimo acted more prudently than did, at a later period, a countryman

of his, who began to build from the design of the same master the

largest edifice that perhaps a private citizen ever undertook, and who

consequently lost much in public estimation and respect.

In the second half of the fourteenth century the Medici had removed

into the neighbourhood of San Lorenzo’s church, where their residence

occupied the ground adjoining Cosimo’s palace on the north, and

remained in the possession of his brother Lorenzo, the founder of the

subsequent ducal line.[2] Their original dwelling-place was in the

centre of the old town, on the market-place, inside the first wall.

Many of the foremost families were once settled here, and even now the

lover of history and antiquity will find among the damp stalls of the

butcher, fishmonger, and dealer in vegetables, sparse remains of past

and, so far as concerns this part of the town, better days. The little

church of San Tommaso in this place was in the patronage of the Medici

from time immemorial.

The Medici did not belong to the historic families of the city on the

Arno. The first trace of them is to be found about the end of the

twelfth century in Giambuono, of whose extraction nothing is known.

The coat of arms exhibits red balls in a gold field, whose number and

arrangement were different at different times, until, under Cosimo’s

son, the coat of arms assumed the form which it has ever since

retained. From these balls (_palle_) the dependents of the family

bore the name of Palleschi. From whence the Medici came, what was the

meaning of the coat of arms, no one knew. Genealogical dreams have gone

as far back as Perseus and the apples of the Hesperides, whilst modest

historians have contented themselves with the time of Charlemagne, and

the mountainous land north of Florence, known by the name of Mugello,

where the family had always held important possessions, designated as

their home.

The only dispute now is whether they descend from a knight who in days

of yore received on his shield the blows of a giant’s iron flail, or

from a physician who chose for his sign, in his small beginnings, three

pills or cupping-glasses.

Giambuono’s son Chiarissimo sat in the Council of the Commune in 1201,

when an alliance was formed with the town of Siena for the purpose of

attacking the castle Semifonte in the Elsethal, which lay between the

territories of the two towns, and was soon after destroyed. This was

the first step towards the extension of territory and the overthrow

of the landed aristocracy. The thirteenth century, at the beginning

of which the Medici first stand forward in history, was the period in

which the community of Florence, after many vicissitudes, received

its definitive form. Just at the time of the first attempts of the

Florentines to acquire an independent self-government do we meet with

the first of that race which three centuries later strove successfully

to transform what had become a powerful republic into a monarchy.

The province of Tuscany, divided into two duchies, in the time of the

Longobards formed, first under dukes, then under margraves, a part of

the Roman Teutonic kingdom, whose dependence on the later powerful

emperors, and also on margraves ruling over wide stretches of land

to the north of the Apennines, was more nominal than real, yet still

existed according to right.

In the summer of 1115, after the death of the great Countess

Mathilda—daughter and heiress to the last Margrave Bonifacius, who

lived mostly in Lucca—first began the freer movement of the Tuscan

Commune. At this time the men who afterwards attained to the lordship

over the greater part of the country occupied anything but a prominent

position. The great changes in the strength and extent of the imperial

power in Italy as it was under the last of the Franconians, under

Lothair of Saxony, and the two first Hohenstaufen, necessarily affected

the position of these Communes. Their form of government under consuls

changed just as their dependence or independence of the imperial

authority was affected by the prevailing political condition of the

empire. The landed nobility, of Germanic origin for the most part, were

supported by Frederic Barbarossa against the Commune of Florence, with

which several great families, headed by the Uberti, had engaged in a

bloody and protracted feud on account of their claims to an authority

which was not compatible with consular government. Henry VI. exercised

his imperial rights and privileges in Tuscany still more vigorously

than his father had done. His brother Philip, invested with this

province as a dukedom, maintained a command such as, perhaps, no other

vice-emperor had possessed. In a part of the country claimed by the

Popes as the patrimony of Mathilda, Philip’s power overcame the Guelfic

element which was so much opposed to the ‘Imperium,’ and which in most

of the towns was the predominant principle.

Suddenly, however, all was changed, when the Emperor died in the

prime of his manhood, leaving behind him an infant son, three years

old, and a distracted kingdom, which never fully resumed its ancient

greatness. In the Papal chair, on the other hand, sat one of the most

aspiring and successful of the Pontiffs—Innocent III., who at once

assumed that authority in the legations which Henry VI. had taken so

much pains to put down. The Tuscans, however, were not more disposed to

submit patiently to the Papal sovereignty than they had been to that

of the Emperor, and this the Pope was not slow to perceive. But while

he avoided all direct assertions of sovereign power over the towns,

he made use of his influence to form a Tuscan Union, that should be

closely allied with the ecclesiastical government at Rome, and firmly

opposed to the Imperial authority. In 1198 a Union was formed at San

Genesio, which lies at the foot of the hills in the lower valley of

the Arno, and within sight of the venerable towers of San Miniato. The

negotiators on this occasion were two Cardinals representing the Pope

on one side, and on the other deputies elected by the several towns

interested. Pisa, which was Ghibelline, alone of the great towns held

aloof. The federation was intended to form a bulwark against Imperial

encroachments, and all matters of internal administration and municipal

government were left untouched. The supremacy of the Papacy was felt to

be a lighter yoke than that of the Empire.

It is worthy of remark that this practical protest against Imperial

domination should have its starting-point in a spot where the Guelfs,

especially the Florentines, were reminded that their liberties depended

on the pleasure of the Emperors. For the lofty towers that from the

hill of San Miniato look down upon the Val d’Arno, and across the

well-watered plain that stretches to the borders of Lucca, formed part

of the palace of Barbarossa, and from it his high decrees were sent

forth in the name of the Arch-chancellor of the Empire, the Archbishop

of Cologne. Here tarried Henry VI. and Frederick II., and here the

Vicar of the Empire, under Rudolf of Hapsburg, received the oath of

allegiance. At a later period, in March 1355, Charles IV. revived the

ancient dignity by stopping at San Miniato both before and after his

coronation. The deputies of the place, called from these circumstances

San Miniato the German (_al Tedesco_), had gone to Pisa to pay their

obeisance to Charles.

Events like those enumerated above were favourable to the territorial

extension of the Florentine Commune. Their progress would have been

greater, had not an ancient feud among the nobles come to a bloody

outbreak in the second decade of the thirteenth century. The effect of

this factious contest, which was embittered by religious animosity

and the quarrel of Frederic II. with the Pope, was to enfeeble the

nobility, and react mischievously on the people. The murder of Messer

Buondelmonte de’ Buondelmonti at the entrance of the old bridge in

1215 is celebrated in history and poetry as the presumed origin of

the hostile factions of Guelf and Ghibelline. A stone cross in the

small square, called, from the junction of three streets, the Trebbio,

commemorates the victory of the orthodox citizens, led by Peter Martyr

of Verona, against the Patarian heretics. About 1247 the most violent

civil war raged. Although the Ghibelline faction had the upper hand

at first, and Frederick of Antioch, the Emperor’s son and Imperial

Vicar in Tuscany, drove out the Guelf nobility, the tables were turned

when heavy losses overtook Frederick in Lombardy and were followed by

his death. The year of Frederick’s death, 1250, marks the victory of

the Guelfic cause in Florence, for although their adversaries had a

momentary triumph they could not hold out, and the city so famous under

the Salieri for its devotion to the Emperor, became the stronghold of

the Guelfs. This decisive change, which brought constitutional changes

with it, took place towards the end of October 1250, a little before

the Emperor’s death.

Up to that time, from the beginning of the twelfth century, the city

had been governed by a magistracy consisting of first four and then six

consuls, assisted by a council of one hundred good men (_Buonuomini_).

From 1207 the administration was entrusted to a foreign knight, learned

in the law, and called the Podestà. After the fashion of the Lombard

cities, he was elected for six months, then for twelve, and had the

assistance of a general council. Encouraged by the factiousness and

weakness of the nobility, who had till then been supreme in the place,

the citizen class banded together in an organised insurrection,

and initiated great political reforms. The town was divided into

sixths, (_Sestieri_), each sixth into twenty militia companies (the

number being subject to change, under different standard-bearers, or

_gonfaloniers_, each of whom had a distinguishing mark). At the head of

all, in place of the Ghibelline Podestà, who was done away with, was a

captain of the people (_Capitano del Popolo_), assisted by a council

of twelve elders, two for every sixth, and six and thirty corporals.

At a later period these institutions developed into the small and the

great councils. The standard of the people, put into the hands of the

captain, was half red, half white, and was subsequently replaced by

one bearing a red cross on a white ground. The banner of the Commune,

displayed by the Podestà, bore first a white lily on a field of red,

then a red lily on white ground. The civic militia were called to

arms by the tolling of a bell from the Lion’s Tower, which has long

disappeared, but stood probably near the palace of the Capitano, on the

site of which the palace of the Signoria, now the Palazzo Vecchio, was

erected in the sixteenth century. The country districts also received

a military organisation. To the Capitano was attributed authority over

both the civil and criminal administration, with the co-operation

of the elders, but the Podestà subsequently resumed his criminal

jurisdiction. The latter also occupied the palace, built originally

in 1255 as a council-chamber for the Capitano and his assessors, but

much enlarged in the following century. It is still called after the

Podestà, and, restored after long neglect to somewhat of its ancient

dignity, now looks down in lofty grandeur upon the bustle of modern

life going on around its walls.

Though not free from factious disturbance the city continued to prosper

for years after the revolt against the nobility. Its commerce was

extended and its influence over neighbouring communes strengthened

either by treaty or by force of arms. No better witness of this

prosperity can be cited than the number of buildings erected for the

public good about this time. Besides this, many religious houses arose

at the time when the order called the Humiliates were manifesting

extraordinary activity. In the year 1252 also was coined the golden

florin which, exercising a patent influence on the currency of mediæval

and modern times, contributed largely to the influence of Florence

among men of commerce, and shadowed forth her subsequent supremacy.

As yet the two hostile factions of the city, though coming frequently

into jealous collision, dwelt near together. In the summer of 1258

an attempt was made to overthrow the Constitution as settled by the

Guelfs, and bind Florence to the Imperial interests, to which Pisa and

Siena were already attached. The promoters of this revolution were the

family of the Uberti, champions of the Ghibelline cause, in alliance

with King Manfred, the Emperor Frederick’s son.

It was plain that the triumph of the Imperialists in the South of

Italy would be incomplete without the acquisition of Tuscany. The

attempt miscarried and the natural consequences ensued. All the great

Ghibelline families were sent into exile, and they took refuge for

the most part in Siena. The refusal on the part of the conquerors to

respect any obligations that had been previously entered into with the

banished families led to a war in 1260. On September 4 in that year the

Tuscan Guelfs suffered a severe defeat at Montaperti on the Arbia, in

view of the walls of Siena, whose inhabitants, assisted by the horsemen

of Manfred, were the victors. The effect in Florence was instantaneous.

Without waiting for the return of their enemies, the principal Guelf

families, patrician and plebeian, at once quitted the city and sought

shelter in Lucca. The Guelfs of the dependent towns soon followed this

example, and in three days the Ghibellines were installed in Florence,

with Giordano of Anglona, a captain of Manfred’s, at their head, as

the king’s vicegerent. Guido Novello, of the race of the Palsgrave of

Tuscany, assumed the office of Podestà. The Guelfs were compelled to

abandon Lucca and retire to Bologna, leaving the Ghibellines masters of

the whole of Tuscany. Affairs continued in this state for six years,

when King Manfred overthrew at Benevento the army of Charles of Anjou,

Count of Provence, who had been called in by the Pope, and who was

assisted by many Tuscan Guelfs.

An attempt at compromise between the two factions and a settlement of

the differences of the nobility and the burghers was made by appointing

two Knights of the Order of the Virgin Mary to the joint exercise of

the office of Podestà. With these _fratres gaudentes_ was associated a

Council of thirty, selected from the trading classes. The arrangement

was made with the consent of Pope Clement IV., and accepted by the

threatened Ghibellines as an expedient. It was soon discovered,

however, that a real reconciliation was impossible, and that the Pope

was pursuing extensive political schemes that were agreeable to no

party.

On November 11, nearly nine months after the battle of Benevento, an

insurrection against a tax, forced the Ghibellines and Germans to

evacuate Florence. The Knights of Mary were replaced by two knights

from Orvieto, who were respectively appointed Podestà and Capitano.

Again efforts were made at a reconciliation by the recall of the more

moderate among the exiles, and by offers of family alliances, but

without success.

Charles of Anjou, now King of Sicily and Naples, was striving, like

Manfred, to strengthen his influence in Tuscany, and being secretly

incited by Guelf leaders he sent a troop of 800 armed men to Florence,

under Guy de Montfort, in 1267. The Ghibellines proved irreconcileable,

and left the city on the night of Good Friday in that year. Further

endeavours at pacification were alike unavailing. The party spirit was

too strong, and resisted the authority of Pope Gregory X. in the spring

of 1273, as steadily as that of Cardinal Latino Malabranca (a nephew

of Pope Nicholas III.), in February 1279. Nor was the influence of the

two holders of supreme power of much avail even after the accession of

Rudolf of Hapsburg to the throne of Germany had altered the relations

between Church and State.

Meanwhile two changes occurred in the internal government of the city

of great, if unequal, importance. The first was the vice-regency of

foreign princes, who now held in the Commune the position formerly

belonging to the chief of the empire, with this difference, that the

Commune awarded the dignity to foreign princes on certain conditions,

and for a certain number of years. The supremacy of King Manfred was

followed in 1267 by that of Charles of Anjou, which the city bore for

ten years. The authority of these princes and their representatives was

limited. A committee of twelve good men selected from the municipal

nobility sat as assessors to the viceroy. Besides this there were both

the council-boards already named, to which was now added a third body,

the secret council of the Guelf burghers, making together a general or

common council. The statutes introduced by the viceroy were sent to

the united councils as to a court of general jurisdiction, before they

were definitively accepted by the Council of Three Hundred. The limits

of the viceroy’s authority were not easily fixed. In the first half

of the ensuing century, when the city was unable to hold out against

the arms of the Ghibellines without the aid of Charles of Anjou, this

part of the Constitution was remodelled more than once. The Anjou

viceroyalty, in concert with the Guelfs, thoroughly rooted out the

suspected Ghibellines. In 1268-69 some three thousand were banished,

many of whom went to the south of France. Their goods were sold, and

the profits devoted to the interests of the victorious party. A special

Commission was appointed to manage the ‘capitani di parte Guelfa,’ and

was assisted by a committee of the Council, composed of nobles and

burghers. In the course of years this body acquired almost dictatorial

power in the State.

The second fact alluded to above was of far more importance in its

social and political bearing than the position of the vice-kings of

Tuscany. It was the enfranchisement of the lower class of Florentine

citizens. The population of the city was divided into three classes:

1, the feudal nobility; 2, the municipal nobility, or wealthy burgher

families; 3, the common people. The influence of the first, who were

never very numerous, was based on their landed possessions in the

provinces; that of the second on their wealth in money and their trade;

while the third class were held in no consideration, and up to the

middle of the thirteenth century had no share in the government of the

State. When Frederic II. died a democratic spirit manifested itself in

union with the Guelfic feeling of opposition to the Imperial authority,

and made rapid progress. The old and new nobility united to resist the

popular movement; but the people, who had increased in numbers and in

substance by the free exercise of their skill in arts, manufactures,

and commerce, aspired to a share in the civil government, and made an

effort to attain it. The discords of the nobility and the confusion

of the government in 1250 gave the people an opportunity of forming

an independent body, half political, half military. While the Podestà

remained at the head of the administration of justice, the ‘Capitano

del Popolo’ was military chief of the third or lower class, who, set

on securing their own rights, paid little attention to the quarrels of

the factions. After the overthrow of King Manfred and the Ghibelline

party the third class advanced a step forward by the definite formation

of guilds. The object of the organisation of 1250 was mainly military;

the end now in view was to give a more solid form and more popular

character to the civil relations. An excellent means for the attainment

of this was at hand in the corporations, already large, to which

the richest and most respectable members of the third class already

belonged.

The industrial and commercial societies, the origin of which is

traceable to Roman times, kept pace in development with the Commune

of the twelfth century. We shall presently see how, at the end of

this century, their influence extended abroad, and at the beginning

of the next was felt through their delegates in matters of state.

They gave themselves statutes and exercised influence before they

assumed that form which erelong enabled them to take the chief share

in the executive as well as in the legislative power. They consisted

principally of professional men, traders, and the higher class of

artisans, and these represented the whole class of lower citizens.

There were seven guilds: the lawyers, merchants, money-changers,

weavers, silkworkers, doctors and apothecaries, and the furriers. These

were the grand guilds which always retained exceptional privileges.

Each one had a first and a second delegate or consul elected every

four months, and representing severally two quarters of the town.

There was a syndic and other officers with jurisdiction over all the

members of the guild. They bore arms and banners, and were commanded

by a gonfalonier or captain, thus forming a complete society, having

its own residence or guild-hall. Supreme over all the seven guilds

was a proconsul, whose place was among the highest officers of the

Commune, and who was chosen from the first, or lawyer’s guild. He

superintended the general interests of these incorporated societies,

decided questions of competency and the like. The presidents and

officers formed a council, called the ‘Consiglio delle Capitudini delli

Maggiore,’ to which were referred the enactments which had previously

been laid before the ‘Consiglio del Popolo.’ There is still in Florence

much that wears the stamp of the power of these city liveries of the

Middle Ages. The architecture of the guildhalls bears witness to

the greatness of the institution which, soon exceeding its original

purpose, was blended with the powers of the State. Coats of arms and

names of streets and other things give similar testimony. In the course

of sixteen years fourteen guilds—called the smaller—were added to the

original seven; and, with slight modifications, the same number has

been preserved in the same relative position.

It is natural that an institution like this should grow stronger with

the increasing strength of the people and the decay of the nobility. In

1279, when Cardinal Latino first extinguished the strife of the leading

Guelfs, tormented by continual intestine discords, and then reconciled

them to the Ghibellines, a supreme magistracy of fourteen Buonuomini

was instituted, consisting of eight Guelfs and six Ghibellines, both

nobles and citizens. This harmony lasted but a short time. In 1282, the

Sicilian Vespers having given a heavy blow to the house of Anjou, the

Ghibelline party raised its head once more, but was again defeated.

Hereupon the guilds resolved to take the government into their own

hands, and that they were able to do so without serious opposition

shows to what a height their power had risen. The new administration

was styled ‘The Priors of the Guilds,’ the chief being the Captain of

the People, who was called ‘Defender of the Guilds.’ At first three,

then six priors were elected from the Grand Guilds—being one for

every _sestieri_, or sixth part of the city. The term of office was

two months, except for those of the Lawyer Guild, who took part in the

administration in any other way. Subsequent changes made the number

of priors eight, two for each quarter of the city. The magnates, or

_grandi_, as they were called, might belong to the administration if

they became members of a guild. This gave a powerful check to the

popular tendencies which were already so far advanced. The nobility

made no difficulty of entering the guilds; and before long two jealous

classes stood face to face and threatened the destruction of the

government, by corporations which the people had set up as a defence

against the aristocracy.

The reform of 1293, when Guelfism was in the ascendant, was carried by

Prior Giano della Bella, a respected popular tribune, who, with the

consent of his colleagues, and of the higher magistracy, did the work

very thoroughly. It was declared essential to everyone who desired to

take part in the administration that he must really practice the art

or craft of the guild he belonged to. This declaration was tantamount

to an exclusion of the nobles, so tenacious of their dignity, from

all civil offices. Stringent orders, called ‘Orders of Justice,’ were

issued against the noble class,[3] the execution of which was entrusted

to a newly made officer, called the gonfalonier of justice, who, at his

pleasure, could summon to his banner, the red cross on the white field,

1,000 or 2,000 of the popular militia. The office of gonfalonier, who,

in conjunction with the priors, formed the Signoria, afterwards became

the highest in the community. In 1306 the special application of the

penal laws against the aristocrats was committed to the ‘esecutore

degli ordini di giustizia,’ whose attributes resembled those of a Roman

tribune. This new addition to the number of upper magistrates increased

the evils arising from a conflict of jurisdiction, and, like the number

and frequent changes of the larger council-boards, became a source of

confusion and weakness in the State. The age of the gonfalonier was

to be not less than forty-five, that of the prior thirty, the term of

office two months. The elections to the new Signory were originally

left to the retiring members, the president of the guilds, and a

number of deputies, summoned from different parts of the town by the

priors. But electoral practices were subject to change according to the

pleasure of the ruling faction. At the time when the fortune of the

family which deprived the city of its freedom was at the highest the

whole business of the elections was a mere pretext, as only the names

of supporters found their way into the bag, while the drawing by lot

depended on commissaries chosen from among the adherents of the actual

chief of the State. The Signory held its sittings in the beginning,

and for some time after, in the convent (Badia) opposite the palace of

the Podestà. Later on, a magnificent palace was erected, worthy of the

first magistracy of a large community, and with its prominent tower

indicative of a stormy period replete with heroic deeds.

There was vested in the Signory the highest deliberative, legislative,

and executive power, spite of many modifications and changes more

or less illusory. In connexion with the Signory under the name of

Colleges were the gonfaloniers of the militia companies, now sixteen in

number, with the Captain of the People, and after 1312 a magistracy of

twelve Buonuomini, without whom nothing of importance was decided. The

projects of law finally went to the General Council. The exercise of

authority thus came into the hands of the people who formed the great

guilds—the fat people, as they were called—_popolo grasso_. In course

of time, it is true, the latter had to share political power with the

smaller guilds; but the nobility was shut out, as well as the common

people who paid no taxes nor belonged to any guild. Citizens pronounced

guilty of any civil or political offence (_ammoniti_) were excluded

from the franchise and from office for life or for a certain period, as

were also persons marked in the register as negligent in the payment of

dues. This ostracism was a weapon of great power in the hands of the

factions during the fourteenth century, by which they kept the road

to office clear for their own followers. The Balia was another and

effective means to the same end. When a signory or party dreaded any

hostile influence they called the people together by means of a great

bell. Assembled in the square in front of the palace, the signory came

out to them on the tribune, or ringhiera and asked them if they would

like to grant power to a certain number of citizens to change the laws

and constitution. The square being surrounded by armed men a refusal of

this request was not to be expected. The select few, invested thus with

discretionary power, nominated a second group to the task of naming

citizens eligible for office. The privileges of these _accoppiatori_,

as they were called, sometimes lasted for years, so that freedom of

election to the magistracy and other offices became illusory in

respect to many citizens who were eligible. It will presently be seen

what resulted, in the second half of the fourteenth century, from the

abuse of the Ammonire and the Balia. When the citizens of Florence

reformed their constitution they had a twofold object in view. They

wanted first to have the chief power in their own hands, and secondly

to prevent internal dissensions by a wide distribution of places among

the citizens, which was to be effected by short terms of office and

frequent changes. The first of these objects was attained, but the

endeavour to accomplish the second was not successful. The rigour of

the suspensive laws augmented the opposition of the class who suffered

by them, and the Guelf faction shook the city to its very foundations.

The quarrel of the Neri and Bianchi, made famous by the greatest poet

of the Middle Ages, induced consequences that were fatal to the Liberal

and popular party, and restored for a time the nobles to power. But

again the lapse of a few years was sufficient to show their weakness.

This brought disorder and violence into the town, and led to the

recovery of political power by the citizen class at the very moment

when the efforts of the Imperialists to reconquer their old position in

Italy more than ever demanded strength in the popular element of the

governing power.

CHAPTER II.

THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY—RULE OF THE ALBIZZI—GIOVANNO D’AVERARDO DE’

MEDICI.

THE sanguinary conflict of Campaldino was fought, in 1289, in the

plain on the Arno which is overlooked by Poppi, the principal place

in the Tuscan valley of the Casentino, where stood the stronghold of

those Counts Guidi, who were the protectors of the Guelf cause when

brought to its lowest ebb by the war of the Vespers. Two years after

the battle, in 1291, Ardingo de’ Medici first sat among the Priors of

Florence, and in 1296, when the office was still a new one, he was

appointed Gonfalonier, as also was his brother Guccio three years

later. Of the last-named there exists a memento, the oldest relating to

the family, in the sarcophagus that once held his bones and was immured

in the outer wall of the Baptistery. This antique, which is carved in

relief with a representation of the chase in Calydon, was placed in the

courtyard of the Medici palace, and bears on its modern cover the arms

of the family, as well as those of the Guild of Woolstaplers, to which

the Medici belonged. Thus, at the end of the thirteenth century we see

members of the family in a position of respectable burghers in the

enjoyment of civic honours.

Nothing remarkable is heard of them until the middle of the fourteenth

century. They formed part, in their numerous branches, of the large

family of the people who were increasing more and more their trade and

manufactures, and shared on an equal footing in the government of their

city.

In the second half of the century two of them became remarkable in

different ways, Averardo, called Bicci, son of Salvestro, called

Chiarissimo, and Salvestro, son of Alamanno, two cousins in the fourth

degree. Of the first we shall speak presently. Salvestro played the

chief part in a transaction that shed a lurid light on the history of

Florence of that period, but which was the beginning of that influence

which ended in the sole supremacy of the Medici.

The heroic age of Florence terminated with the first decade of the

fourteenth century. The city, at the head of the Tuscan league, which

bound together the Anjous and the Guelfs of Rome and Upper Italy, had

manfully resisted Henry of Luxemburg, but succumbed to Louis of Bavaria

and the Ghibellines, spite of the aid of foreign auxiliaries. At the

same time the rulers from Naples, as well as the foreigners who were

appointed to enforce established ordinances, were in a certain measure

above the law, and in the exercise of arbitrary power. Fortune smiled

on none of their undertakings, nor was the State guided to any better

state of things by what the poet of the ‘Divine Comedy’ called ‘the new

people and the sudden gains.’ Strength in arms began to decline, and

an undue preponderance of material interests to prevail. No period of

Florentine history is so poor in men distinguished by arms or policy

as that which followed the repulse of Henry VII. Material interests

even were not adequately protected. For although the springs of gain

had yielded copiously, and still continued partially to flow, the cost

of war and the taxes pressed with proportionate weight; and in the

third decade of the century began the failures of the great banking

houses, from which they did not recover for a long time, if they ever

did completely. To this must be added distressing losses occasioned

by inundations and epidemics. Confusion in the government, due on

the one hand to the resentment of the aristocracy, on the other to

the ill-feeling of the lower classes, brought matters at length to

a crisis in 1342. A foreign adventurer, closely connected with the

house of Anjou, Walter de Brienne, Count of Lecce and Duke of Athens,

was enabled by the assistance of the lowest class of artisans, and

some adherents of the nobler families, to make himself for a short

time absolute master of Florence. The tyranny, indeed, was overthrown

in the following year by a union of the upper and lower classes, who

were not, however, long in falling out again, to the great detriment

of the nobility. On the pretext of purging the Guelf party the system

of _Ammonirism_—_i.e._ exclusion from public offices—was put in

practice. It was directed against the decaying nobility on the one

hand, and on the other against certain suspected persons in the

lower classes. In this way, some thirty years after the expulsion of

the Duke, the supreme power was vested in an oligarchy, at the head

of which was the Captain of the Guelf faction. They had the whole

machinery of government under their control, and were mainly supported

by a few families of the wealthier burghers.[4] Among these were the

Albizzi, who, originally from Arezzo, having acquired great riches and

a high position, stood first in the city of Florence.

Salvestro de’ Medici, who in 1370 had held the office of Gonfalonier,

sought to put an end to the tyranny of party when he was again

appointed Gonfalonier in the spring of 1378. The reigning faction,

though mistrusting him, dared not oppose him, for fear of the

multitude, who were in his favour. His attempt to diminish the

authority of the Capitano and re-open the way to office to the excluded

ones (_Ammoniti_) brought on a violent insurrection of the common

people. This ‘tumulto dei ciompi,’ as it was called, placed Florence

for a time under mob-rule, and would have degenerated into the wildest

anarchy but for the energy of one poor man, Michele di Lando, the

woolcomber, whom the infuriated populace had raised to the chief

magistracy, and who, with remarkable instinct, steered the State safely

through the storm which threatened its ruin. This state of things

lasted three years, during which the all-powerful mob became the tool

of designing men, who wreaked their vengeance on the party that had

so lately been supreme. The latter, however, in their turn seized the

opportunity when the better sort among the populace were disgusted with

the tyranny of their fellows, and overthrew the mobocracy, setting up

in its place a conservative government, formed of the _Optimates_,

or better citizens, under the lead of the Albizzi. Salvestro de’

Medici, the original author of the revolt, contributed nothing to its

suppression. It was, perhaps, beyond his power to do anything. He died

in 1388, and the name of the Medici became identical with that of

representatives of the interests of the people. Five years later, when

the oppressions of the Albizzi had excited general discontent, an armed

body of the people marched to the house of Vieri de’ Medici, and asked

him to be their leader. He was of the same branch of the family as

Salvestro, but he prudently declined the proposed honour, and appeased

the revolters.

Averardo, styled Bicci, was the founder of the line that came to be

talked of in the world. Little more is known of him than that in

1357 he was employed on behalf of the Republic in the Mugello. His

grandfather, of the same name, was Gonfalonier in 1314, when Florence,

to escape from the pressure of the Ghibellines, submitted to the

Anjous. He was, it is said, the first of the family that amassed

wealth by trade, and laid the basis of that prosperity which was a

potent factor in the political transactions of his successors. The

real splendour of the family, however, began with his son Giovanni

d’Averardo, commonly called Giovanni di Bicci, who was born in 1360,

and was in the bloom of manhood when the Albizzi held undisputed sway

over Florence. The position of the Medici was a difficult one, for the

favour they enjoyed among the people exposed them to the suspicion and

dislike of the upper class. An attempt made in 1397 to restrict the

power of Maso degli Albizzi, head of his family and of the State, ended

in the exile and execution of the ringleaders, among whom were found

some of the Medici. The prudence and foresight which Giovanni exhibited

not only preserved his authority among his friends, but extorted

respect from his opponents.

There were stirring times in Giovanni’s maturer years. The government

of the conservative party was burdensome on the people and their

friends, who were heavily taxed, but it was a successful government

in the conduct of foreign affairs, and in the production of public

works at home. Florence increased in political importance. The war

against the Visconti of Milan, who were extending their power, and

aiming at the establishment of a kingdom in Italy, was very costly and

not always fortunate to the Guelf republic. Among the vicissitudes

undergone by the latter was the defeat of their German champion, King

Ruprecht of the Palatinate, whom they had summoned across the Alps.

Nevertheless, the ultimate issue was favourable to Florence, which at

this time enjoyed a brilliant and comparatively quiet existence. The

death of Gian Galeazzo Visconti, in 1402, relieved her of an enemy

who had already set foot in Tuscany, and in 1406 she took possession

of Pisa, which, weakened by centuries of war and internal commotion,

surrendered after an heroic resistance. With varying fortune, Florence

made war against Ladislaus, King of Naples, with whom expired in 1414

the male branch of that house of Anjou with whom she had once been so

closely allied. She also extended her political influence to Umbria,

took Cortona in 1411, and, ten years later, Livorno. With all this her

trade and manufactures expanded and matured, increasing her resources

and preparing her for other emergencies. The republic which had been

the most steadfast friend of the Holy See, was in bitter dispute with

it during the later period of the Avignon Papacy. Actively desirous

for the restoration of ecclesiastical unity, Florence, in the midst

of the great schism, witnessed in her newly acquired territory of Pisa

an attempt to reunite the adherents of both Popes, the one at Avignon

and the one at Rome. The attempt was a failure, and only added to the

confusion by setting up a third Pope, but it gave occasion to the next

General Council of Constance, which brought the rupture to a close in

1417.

Notwithstanding so large a military expenditure the wealth of the

republic continued to flourish. There was a discrepancy, indeed, in

the account of private wealth and public revenue. Two hundred thousand

gold guilders were promised for Pisa, sixty thousand were paid to

King Ladislaus for Cortona, and a hundred thousand to the Genoese for

Livorno. In this way the balance of income and revenue was seriously

disturbed. An attempt was made in 1411 to avoid the risks of large

grants of money by increasing the number of courts that had to consider

the projects of law laid before the Signory. In the fourteenth century

was manifested the canker in the finances of Florence that was never

quite eradicated. It is true the income of 1328 amounted to more than

300,000 gold guilders, while the regular expenditure was only 40,000,

showing a surplus of more than 260,000. The sum was raised in great

part by the excise or other indirect taxes, detailed statistical

accounts of which still exist.[5] This surplus was so far inadequate

to meet the oppressive military expenditure, the pay of the Anjou

and other leaders hired by the republic, the cost of fortifications,

the purchase of new territory, and the outlay on public works, that

by degrees a considerable State debt was contracted, which we hear

of under the name of _Monte Comune_. The growth of this debt is made

intelligible by the fact that in the twenty-nine years from 1377 to

1406, eleven and a half million guilders were spent in war, while the

sojourn of Duke Charles of Calabria in the city, cost 900,000, and

that of the Duke of Athens 400,000. In the wealth of families great

changes had taken place. The fourteenth century exhibited remarkable

peculiarities in the matter of private property. Shortly before the

middle of the century, the insolvency of England had brought to

the ground most of the Florentine bankers, some of them for ever.

Immediately after that, famine and the Black Death produced a change,

which was intensified by the measures taken against the families of

those nobles and the ruling party who were hated or suspected. Most of

the old families became poor, while a crowd of small folks grew into

importance; and the haste to grow rich, infinitely greater than it was

in the time of the author of the ‘Divine Comedy,’ whose admonishing

voice we have heard, augmented the recklessness and corruption which

greatly contributed to the great revolution of 1378. In spite of

considerable fluctuation an aristocracy of wealth was formed consisting

chiefly of members of the seven great guilds, in whose hands, after

the close of the thirteenth century, lay the government of the State.

The guilds of the money-changers and of the woolstaplers were the

principal, for the first gave the law to all foreign banks, the last,

to which smaller societies were subject, governed all foreign markets.

Giovanni di Bicci was one of those who knew how to avail himself

skilfully of the favourable opportunities offered by the conclusion of

peace at the beginning of the fifteenth century. At the time of the

Council of Constance, which agitated the world to an unusual degree,

all the great monetary affairs in which Italy was concerned passed

through Giovanni’s hands. He is said to have gained enormous sums of

money, which were increased when the acquisition of Livorno afforded an

advantageous outlet to the commerce of Florence. The advantage would

have been lasting, but for the war with Milan, which broke out a few

years later, and caused grave troubles. If Giovanni gained much, he

was generous with his gains. Where need was, he showed no stint, and

for public works his contribution was always ready. Having promised a

chapel and sacristy for San Lorenzo, when the enlargement of the whole

church was taken in hand (1419) he prompted Filippo Brunelleschi to

design a grand plan for its entire reconstruction, which was begun in

1421, and in which the Medici and seven other families took an especial

interest. Giovanni, though he did not seek offices in the State, never

refused any to which he was called. He conducted negotiations with

Ladislaus, King of Naples, went to congratulate Alexander V. on his

election as Pope by the Council of Pisa, and accompanied Martin V. when

the latter, on his return from Constance, passed through Florence to

Rome. Giovanni was elected to the office of Podestà in Pistoja, and

in 1421 was chosen Gonfalonier in Florence. The choice was not quite

agreeable to the ruling party, for popular traditions were associated

with the name of Medici, and Giovanni stood so high in the favour of

the multitude that he could, if he had wished, easily have stirred up

an insurrection against the oligarchy. Niccolo Uzzano, a prudent and

moderate man, who, after Maso degli Albizzi’s death in 1417, shared

with Rinaldo the leadership of the conservative party, opposed the

election of Giovanni, but did not push his opposition to extremes, for

he saw there was a struggle coming on. Giovanni, on his side, made no

attempt during his term of office at anything that would disturb the

peace.

Ere long external causes placed the party in danger. The antagonism

between Florence and Milan could not be removed by mere treaties of

peace. Gian Galeazzo’s only remaining son, Filippo Maria, was treading

in his father’s steps. He had not only recovered the dominion which,

at his father’s death, fell to pieces, but had added Genoa to it. He

now stretched out his hand to the Romagna, where he came into collision

with the interests of Florence, for the small gentry of that province,

hitherto in connection with the republic, were in danger of being

subjected to the will of a powerful and ambitious neighbour. Out of

this arose the war of 1423, which was far from being successful. As

in earlier times, the Florentine forces in 1424 were unable to cope

with the Milanese, whom they encountered, first in the Romagna and

afterwards in their own territory. The fault lay not so much in the men

and their officers as in the absurd system of directing the movement of

troops by a committee of civilians, called the Board of War, seated at

home. Rinaldo degli Albizzi succeeded in calming the agitation of the

people after the severe defeat of Zagonara on July 24th, but the damage

done to his party only increased the ascendancy of Giovanni di Bicci.

At the beginning of the war he had advised that the Duke of Milan

should not be followed into the Romagna, but should be waited for on

this side of the Apennines, but his advice was overruled.

In the beginning of 1426 Florence succeeded in forming an alliance

with Venice, which, though a rival in mercantile interests, was as

sensitive about the encroachments of Milan in the north as was the

sister republic about his encroachments in the centre of the peninsula.

The lords of Ferrara, Mantua, and others joined the alliance. The

disasters of the war and increase of expenditure gave rise to much

dissatisfaction, more loudly expressed among the higher than by the

lower classes, the fear of whom led the administration to press their

fiscal measures most heavily on the richer citizens. Rinaldo degli

Albizzi thought to effect a change by weakening the democratic element

in the Council. At a meeting of the heads of his party in the Church

of Sto. Stefano, near the old bridge, he proposed that the number

of lesser guilds should be reduced one half, and the votes of the

smaller citizens diminished correspondingly. Changes in the relative

numbers of the guilds had always been the means employed by either

party for securing political preponderance; for the relative position

of the parties was not strong enough to make manœuvres of this kind

superfluous. Besides the twenty-one guilds, there was a number of

smaller corporations representing branches of the different trades. No

less than twenty-five such societies were the offspring of the largest

of the guilds, that of the woolstaplers. They had their delegates too,

but were dependent on the greater guilds, who represented them in the

State. On one occasion, in 1300, the representatives of seventy-two

companies, were gathered together in council. The Duke of Athens, who

relied on the lower classes, made the smaller companies independent,

and put their consuls on a level with the others, but this did not

last. The same thing happened at the insurrection of 1378, but the

members of the small companies were again unable to keep their

independence long. The diminution of the small companies, proposed by

Rinaldo degli Albizzi, was at this time a question of some delicacy.

Nicolò da Uzzano remarked that before anything was proposed against the

people it would be advisable to come to an understanding with their

friends. On this Rinaldo conferred with Giovanni di Bicci, whom, of

course, he found opposed to the innovation. Had he wished to see a

new insurrection he might have agreed to the project, but his native

prudence had increased with years. Anyhow, he reaped this advantage,

that, as the matter could not remain secret, to him would be ascribed

the merit of thwarting a scheme intended for the oppression of the

lower classes. Ere long they had to face another great undertaking.

The distribution of the public burdens among individual contributors

was for a long time connected with serious evils, that were the more

conspicuous in proportion to the severity of the taxation. The scale

was furnished by the _estimo_ or assessment of real and personal

property,[6] which was in use as early as the eleventh century, and

resembled the _colletta_ that prevailed in the Two Sicilies after the

time of King Roger. The tax-system of Florence, where Neapolitan rulers

had often exercised power, bore the mark of Southern Italy. At the time

of its fullest application, when the Anjou Viceroys were supreme the

_estimo_ attached to land, capital and personal income. It extended

from the city to the country, where its operation was regulated in

districts. The framework underwent frequent revisions in the thirteenth

and fourteenth centuries, particularly in the latter, when the example

of Naples increased the rigour of the fiscal authorities and gave rise

to frequent complaints and petitions for a reform of the taxation. The

_arbitrium_ was often called into play before 1346, when the Government

of the Duke of Athens ordered a register of all estates. The _estimo_

was the standard on which the public loans were based. These, with the

excise and other indirect taxes—which, in the palmy days of commerce,

were very productive—served to cover the public expenditure. Loans

were made in the first half of the thirteenth century, and before

its close the _taille_ was introduced by the Viceroy of Anjou for

the maintenance of the French and other mercenaries. There were two

methods of raising a loan. By the first, the treasurers of the commune

made an agreement with one or more of the great banking-houses, who,

on an assignment of the custom duties to them, advanced the money and

distributed the loan among their customers and friends.[7] By the

second method, the government itself announced the loan and allotted it

to the citizens according to their income, as recorded on the _estimo_,

the security being in this case also the customs duties for a certain

definite period. Instead of a percentage the contributors received

a monopoly of salt, with the privilege of selling it to the retail

dealers at an enhanced price.

As the necessities of the State increased, other sources of revenue

were looked for. In 1343 the hearth or fire tax was adopted (_fumanti_

or _focatico_). Before that attempts had been made to tax the clergy.

In the war against Mastino della Scala, Lord of Verona, which ended in

1339, the loans amounted to 350,000 gold guilders, and exceeded the

annual revenue from the excise by 50,000 guilders. The accumulation

of the debt after the expulsion of the Duke of Athens necessitated

the continuance of the _monte comune_, already mentioned, for the

administration of the public debt. In the previous century, when

payment of the debt due to the citizens became impossible, a ‘great

book’ was opened, which in the course of forty years was superseded.

During the war of 1325, against Castruccio Castracane, resort was had

to similar means for raising money, and the Republic, being unable to

pay the debt without borrowing again, established the _monte comune_.

The interest paid was at the rate of five per cent., though at other

times it reached as high as twenty-five.[8]

At the beginning of the fifteenth century the taxation was continually

rising, and in the war with King Ladislaus the whole of the income

registered on the _estimo_ was charged with a tax of five per cent.

for three years. Nonpayment of the tax was punished by exclusion from

office. The defaulter’s name was entered in a register called the

‘looking-glass’ (_specchio_), whence the expression _netto di specchio_

applied to a man eligible for office. According to a regulation of 1421

no man was so eligible unless he, his father, or grandfather, had been

regular in paying his taxes for thirty years.

Of course there were manifold murmurs at these extraordinary

proceedings. The real evil, however, and cause of discontent was

not only the high rate of taxation, but its arbitrary and partial

distribution. When the partition of the burdens was made an arm of

offence against which the citizens rose to defend themselves by

violence it was necessary to find some other basis, if the State

economy were to be preserved from ruin. The regulation of the

_cadastre_ in 1427 had a twofold object in view, namely, first to raise

the public income by putting together the property tax, the income

tax, and the interest on the national debt (_paghe_ or _luoghi di

monte_); secondly, to make the distribution of the imposts independent

of personal and political opinions. This financial reform, which

changed nothing in the nature of the tax, but only established a

better partition of it, was not a new thing. At bottom it was but a

complement of the _estimo_, and the expression _catasto_ for census,

from _accatastare_, to pile together, was used in Florence a century

earlier. That it was brought forward with a view to adjust more equally

the incidence of taxation may be gathered from the preamble of the

ordinance of May 22, 1427: ‘It is hard to express in speech or writing

how much the citizens have suffered in their goods and their liberty by

the inequality of the public burdens. They have been robbed and driven

to desperation. How many, who would gladly have returned to their

homes, have been kept back in doubt and uncertainty, exposed to all the

ills that flow therefrom.’

A commission of ten members was appointed to make within the year a

register of property. Arranged methodically, it was to specify the

various families in each quarter of the town, the name and age of

the several members of the family, the estimated value of each one’s

property, real and personal, in town and country, and in foreign

parts. In the estimate were reckoned the domestic animals of value,

merchandise, ready cash, money in the funds, and all good debts. The

rent of houses was specified, and in the case of land cultivated by

the owner the average crop was taken. The _mezzeria_, or lands let

out to farm, were valued according to the market-price of produce,

allowance being made for the working material furnished to the farmer

by the proprietor. The capitalised value of property was estimated

at 100 for 7 per cent. produce, and on this capital half a guilder,

that is, one-half per cent., was levied. In casting up the various

elements of personal property and income the same principle prevailed

as when it was capitalised. Both sources of revenue united furnished

the total of what was called the _sostanza_, according to which the

quota of taxes was fixed. Certain deductions were allowed by law, so

that the tax-paying portion of the income was only the surplus over

the sum required for the strict necessaries of life. Among these

deductions was the rent of the dwelling-house, and of the warehouse,

stall, or booth used in the way of business. The fiscal legislation

adhered to the principle of burdening the old nobility of the city,

nor did it spare the magnates of the provinces, many of whom, up to

the time of the French Revolution, preserved an exceptional position.

They had to pay twice, nay, three and four times, as much in taxes

as other people, and were charged with rates from which the ordinary

inhabitants of the country were free. The valuation held good for three

years. Five registers were opened. The first was for the burghers; the

second for country-people of various shades and degrees, including

the peasantry; the third for the clergy; the fourth for guilds and

corporations holding land, such as the woolstaplers’, silkmercers’, and

money-changers’ guilds; the fifth and last for persons not belonging to

the State, yet possessed of territory or engaged in commerce.

An examination of the first _cadastre_ for the years 1427-30 gives a

clear insight into the condition of property in town and country. The

gross income of the citizens of Florence, then 90,000 to 95,000 in

number, was estimated in round numbers at 620,000 gold guilders, which,

allowing for the triple value of money, would be equal to 5,000,000

thalers (750,000_l._ sterling) at the present day. The town duties

produced 25,300 guilders, those of the country 18,500. Thirty-two

families paid upwards of a hundred guilders in taxes, two hundred paid

in all more than 12,800 guilders. The highest tax—that paid by Palla

Strozzi—was 507 guilders, which presupposes a fortune of 101,400

guilders, or, in present currency, 820,000 thalers (123,000_l._).

Second in the list of rich contributors is Giovanni de’ Medici,

who pays 397 guilders. Then come two branches of the Panchiatichi,

Francesco Tornabuoni, Niccolò da Uzzano, and Bernardo Lamberteschi,

with more than 200 others. The landed property belonging to the clergy,

to most of the benevolent institutions, and to the guilds within the

jurisdiction of the Republic, was valued at 1,577,000 guilders, while

the revenues of the clergy and the charities were put down at 130,000

guilders. The value of the untaxed monasteries was registered at

152,000 guilders. A few years later than this Cosimo de’ Medici, with

his sons and relatives, were charged with a tax of 428 guilders for his

business transactions. Seventy guilders of this amount were paid by the

bank at Florence, as much by the branches at London and Bruges, 96 by

those of Avignon and Geneva, 65 by that of Venice, and the rest by the

partners in the firm.

Undoubtedly the new mode of taxation distributed taxation more

equally than before. All those—some 3,000 in number—who, divested

of property, lived only by the labour of their hands, were valued

_pro formâ_, and counted by heads; but the payment of rates was not

strictly enforced on them. They constituted a particular class, known

as _miserabili_. Another class, one degree better off than these, and

numbering more than 5,000, came to terms with the revenue officers for

the payment of a small quota of taxes. If, however, the poorer classes

were very lightly burdened, the charges on the rich were enormously

heavy. Many among them paid the _estimo_ ten and twenty times over, and

could not as formerly obtain exemption from any charge on the plea of

expenses incurred in the public service by the discharge of official

duties confided to them. Malcontents were numerous. Those who owned

land and capital, which are easy to get at and to tax, complained of

the favour extended to trade and commerce. The lower classes, however,

still dissatisfied, demanded political power, and a revision of the old

payments. Giovanni di Bicci, by acting as mediator between the classes,

did more than anyone in keeping off injudicious demands and maintaining

peace. To him is generally ascribed the merit of the measure which

aimed at a more just distribution of the public burdens. But in the

deliberations on the subject that took place after 1426 he played but

a secondary part, and at the last sitting declared that his adhesion

to the measure was due not to his confidence in its success, but to

his feelings of deference for the many citizens who had recommended

it.[9] Rinaldo degli Albizzi and Niccolò da Uzzano were, for political

reasons, both secret and avowed, foremost in supporting the proposal,

although, as it happened, they and their friends were the most

seriously affected by the new mode of taxation. There were insinuations

against Medici that he profited by the embarrassments of his country

in time of war, as he did by the distresses of individuals in time

of panic, for all came to him for advances. It must be remembered,

however, that his business extended far beyond Italy to all parts of

France, and to Flanders especially, and that his trading interests

would be best promoted by the peace of his country and the prosperity

of his neighbours. With Pope Martin V., as with his predecessor, John

XXIII., Di Bicci was on the best terms. The former made him Count of

Monteverde, in the province of Fermo, on May 8, 1422.

Giovanni di Bicci lived to be sixty-nine. Only two sons remained to

him, the children of his wife Piccarda, daughter of Odoardo Bueri. She

survived her husband three years. He, on feeling his end approach,

called his sons to him, and bade them follow his example—to be

prudent, benevolent, and on friendly terms with those who wished them

well. ‘Do nothing,’ he said, ‘against the wish of the people, and

if they wish what they ought not, endeavour to turn them from it by

friendly remonstrance rather than by arrogant dictation. Do not make

the government-house your workshop, but wait until you are called to

it, then show yourselves obedient, and avoid big swelling words. Strive

to keep the people at peace, and the strong places well cared for.

Engage in no legal complications, for he who impedes the law shall

perish by the law. Do not draw public attention on yourselves, yet keep

free from blemish as I leave you. Take care of my wife, your mother,

and let her keep the place she now has.’[10] He expired on February

20, 1429, and was carried to San Lorenzo on an open bier. His remains

were followed by his two sons, and twenty-eight members of the family,

accompanied by the ambassadors of Venice and of King Sigismund, with

many other persons, including the magistrates. The obsequies cost more

than 3,000 guilders, and Cosimo and Lorenzo presented to the chapter

a sum of 800 guilders for the institution of an annual festival in

memory of the departed, to be held on the day of his death.[11] There,

in the sacristy built at his own cost, lies Giovanni di Bicci, with

his spouse, in a sarcophagus worked by the hand of Donatello, with

genii holding the coat-of-arms carved in semi-relief on the cover,

and inscriptions cut on the lower parts.[12] The contemporary already

mentioned has described the personal appearance of Giovanni.[13] ‘He

was tall and strong in figure, and broad in the face, with a dark,

sallow complexion. His sense of humour was greater than anyone would

have imagined from his melancholy expression. In business transactions

he was straightforward, though not exactly eloquent, for nature had

not endowed him with the graces of speech. Yet in public he was always

ready with a good argument and sound advice. No one spoke ill of him.

Niccolò da Uzzano, who passed for his rival, said to his sons, with

tears in his eyes, “Your excellent father has left you in favour with

the people, and beloved by the burghers, with splendid and improving

pecuniary prospects.” He loved the good, and pitied the bad. The

wicked, he said, existed for their own misfortune, and the good by

the grace and good providence of God. He never complained of other

citizens, nor they of him. The poor excited his compassion, and the

rich enjoyed his friendship and support. He strove against misery, and

promoted the happiness of mankind, when he could do so without injury

to the Commonwealth. His hands were clean, and not seldom he neglected

his own interests in the service of others. For others, too, he would

often ask favours of the Government, never for himself. Yet, the fewer

the pretensions he had, the more did the duties of State devolve upon

him.’

CHAPTER III.

THE CITY OF FLORENCE UP TO THE BEGINNING OF THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY.

DURING the two centuries that laid the foundation of the power of the

Medici the city of Florence had reached the size which it has retained

to our day, and presented much the same internal appearance as it did

down to a very recent period. The site was a favourable one. About

midway between its source and its mouth the Arno issues from the narrow

valleys of the Casentino, Aretino, and the upper Arno, and flows down

the western slope of Tuscany towards the Mediterranean. On a spot

where there rises a group of low hills, close to the left bank of the

river, the city was founded. On the right bank a semicircle of hills,

crowned with the tower and ruined walls of the ancient Etruscan city of

Fiesole, recedes in gentle declivities. Not long before the decline of

the Roman Republic the community was formed which was destined in the

course of centuries to be the ruling power in Tuscany, to promote the

revival of literature and art, and to recall to life the culture of the

ancients, under the influence of Christianity.

Many circumstances combined to promote the prosperity of the city.

Although the river had neither any great volume nor steadiness in its

flow it afforded a means of communication, and its course lay through

flowery meadows which, watered by brooks descending from the sunny

hillsides, were well fitted for the cultivation of the vine and olive,

inexhaustible sources of wealth to the inhabitants of those southern

regions. The pure air of the mountains, which glistened with the snow

upon them until late in spring, together with the powerful influence

of the sun, removed all fear of the malaria incident to such low-lying

districts. These advantages seem to have attracted settlers from

Fiesole, who established here a fair for the convenience of trade. A

Roman military colony augmented the population and importance of the

settlement; and although the ancient inhabitants of the city were proud

of their Roman descent, their posterity attributed the inflexibility

of the popular character, ‘which still retains its stony and rocky

nature,’ to the admixture of their blood with that of the mountaineers

of Fiesole. The oldest traditions speak of the special veneration in

which the God of War was held; and if the opinion that the baptistery

built on the northern boundary of the original city was his temple

be false, at all events the figure of Mars was to be seen on the old

bridge, until it was swept away by one of the frequent inundations of

the Arno.

Moreover, in the Roman town there are reminiscences of the Capitol

in fragments of the amphitheatre which have been dug up at different

times, and have been used in edifices of later date. Evidences of

the same are said to have existed in the church of Santa Maria di

Campidoglio, once standing in the old market-place. The circuit of the

walls of the Roman town, which was connected with the opposite shore

by the bridge above mentioned, may be roughly traced by following the

direction of the narrow streets of the crowded quarter between the

river and the cathedral square, and the Piazza of Santa Trinità and

Santa Firenze. When the declining Roman Empire could no longer resist

the pressure of the northern nations Florence was besieged by the

wild hordes of Radagaïs. They were, however, utterly destroyed by the

general Honorius Flavius Stilicho, when the city was relieved. The

storm of Gothic and Lombard war subsequently swept over the country,

until at length Charlemagne, who in legends is called the Restorer of

Florence, established peace, and set up a form of government, founded

on Lombard institutions, which, with various changes, was maintained

until the uprising of the free Communes.

Towards the latter end of the eleventh century the portion of the

city on the right bank of the river had been considerably enlarged,

so that it extended eastward as far as the piazza of Santa Croce,

northward to that of San Lorenzo, and westward to where subsequently

the Carraia bridge was built. The city enclosed also within its walls,

which not long afterwards withstood an assault of the Emperor Henry

IV., that portion of the left bank of the river which extends as far

as the Piazza de’ Pitti. This was the city that was seen in his youth

by the author of the ‘Divine Comedy,’ who was born in 1265, a year

before the Guelfs obtained supreme authority. But Dante beheld it

already changed in its internal aspect, and in the character of its

population, hurried along as they were on the path of conquest, with

which this change in character was closely connected. He has described

the manners and customs of the ancient citizens, ‘when they were still

purely reflected in the lowest artisan,’ that is, before peasants and

men of the lower classes had immigrated from the subjugated villages

of the neighbourhood, attracted both by the protection they enjoyed

in a powerful city and the promise of gain from the daily increasing

value of their industry. This was, to use the poet’s words, before

citizens of Roman descent had to endure the stench of peasants from

Aguglione and Signa, whom avarice alone had allured to Florence.[14]

Dante Alighieri lived to see likewise the commencement of the great

architectural transformation. Numerous churches had long adorned the

city, which reverenced in Zanobi a saintly bishop, and had numbered

among its illustrious citizens St. John Gualbert, the founder of the

Order of Vallombrosa. Beside the church of St. John, the supposed

Temple of Mars, there had arisen in the first half of the eighth

century Santa Reparata, the subsequent cathedral, and in the tenth

and eleventh Santa Felicità, San Martino, Sant’Ambrogio, Santa Maria

Maggiore, San Remigio, San Salvi, San Lorenzo, San Piero Scheraggio,

San Romolo, Santa Trinità, etc., in and near the city, were either

newly founded or rebuilt. Nothing now remains of the original structure

of any of these churches, many of which have quite disappeared.

Specimens of the Roman style are still preserved in the city and its

environs, in the octagon of San Giovanni, the little Basilica of

Sant’Apostolo, that of San Miniato on a neighbouring eminence,[15] and

the façade of the Abbey-church at the foot of the hill of Fiesole.

These buildings all belong to the eleventh and twelfth centuries,

and were probably completed before the end of the latter, and the

conception and finish of this architecture serve to explain how Gothic

architecture, which arose in the following century, was never entirely

free from reminiscences of the older style, and, notwithstanding its

more graceful characteristics, declined before attaining the same

degree of perfection.

The architectural industry of the thirteenth century was very great,

and was exercised as much for ecclesiastical as for secular purposes.

Before that period narrow streets and small, irregular squares made the

city gloomy.

On every side rose lofty square brick towers without any break or

ornament whatever, sometimes so close together as to be within

arm’s length of one another. The dwelling-houses, which were built

of freestone, were small in size and built with a view to purposes

of defence and attack as much as for habitation. The streets were

first paved in 1237, in which year the Milanese knight, Rubaconte da

Mandello, Podestà of the corporation, built over the Arno, at that

spot within the city where the river is at its broadest, the bridge

named after him, but generally known by the name of the chapel of Sta.

Maria delle Grazie. Bricks placed on end were used for the purposes of

paving as well as for the bridges. About the middle of the century a

partial demolition of the towers became necessary. This, however, by no

means put an end to the civil conflicts, or even deprived them of their

ferocious character. Stones were used for building the city walls,

particularly on the left bank of the river. At the present day many

towers, both in the oldest portion of the city between the old bridge

and that of the Trinity, and also by San Pier Maggiore, and in the

quarter beyond the Arno, recall the bloody feuds of the irreconcilable

factions of the nobility. In these conflicts the strife was carried on

from tower to tower, from house to house; streets were barricaded with

heavy chains, and homes made desolate with fire and sword.

At this period the construction of those great buildings began, some

of which still impart to the city its peculiar aspect, and of these

some have already been named in the introduction to this history.

Amongst the first were the original bridge of Sta. Trinità, the Oratory

of Confuggio, out of which grew the brilliant Servite church of the

Annunziata, the old Town-hall, afterwards enlarged and named after the

Podestà, the Carmelite church beyond the Arno, and the magnificent Sta.

Maria Novella, which is, perhaps, the purest and most graceful example

of the so-called Tuscan Gothic.

The Dominicans, who are said to have come to Florence in 1219 and

who at first lived in hospitals, were presented two years later by

the Bishop and Chapter with the little church of St. Mary, which was

extended in size till it became one of the largest houses of Divine

worship, with the addition of a spacious cloister. Not long after the

arrival of the Dominicans the order of the Franciscan Minorites was

established in Florence, and about the middle of the century they

rebuilt their great church of Sta. Croce, situated by the wall on the

east side, and transformed it into the majestic temple we behold at

the present day.[16] The corporation had already purchased pieces of

ground and also houses in various places, to make room for widening

the older streets and laying out others. In this way space was found

for the Hall of Or San Michele, which was built about the middle of

the century, and which took its name from a church of the Archangel,

pulled down to make room.[17] Similarly space was obtained in 1282 and

following years in the quarter of the city beyond the Arno and in the

west suburb, for laying out the older square by Sta. Maria Novella.[18]

About the same time the final enlargement of the city was commenced

by laying out the line of wall which those now living have seen still

perfect with its gates and towers. But of all this nothing more remains

on the right bank of the river, since Florence, which for centuries

had been content with its mediæval boundaries, was extended as far as

the foot of the hill of Fiesole, and numerous conventual and other

gardens were transformed into squares and streets, while fields and

meadows were enclosed within the city. The character of its circuit has

thus been materially altered, although remains of the ancient style

of architecture are still visible here and there. The great work of

the new boundary wall is ascribed to the two Dominican brothers, Fra

Sisto and Fra Ristoro, who built Sta. Maria Novella and were employed

in Rome in Sta. Maria sopra Minerva, and to Arnolfo, who stands in the

first rank of the historical architects of Florence. Arnolfo, the son

of Cambio, a native of Colle in the valley of the Elsa, was named after

his master Arnolfo di Lasso, who was a German by origin, and known as

architect of the castle of Poppi and the Palazzo del Podestà.

The development of the political power of Florence, now fully conscious

of its importance, was coincident with an increase in material wealth

and with an awakening of intellectual life. Arnolfo had the good

fortune to be born in the period when that great movement began, which,

furthered rather than hindered by the animosity of civil strife, led

to a remarkable revival in Italy of literature and art. It must be

remembered that the way to it was paved by the age of the Hohenstaufen.

The great poet who is so much identified with this eventful time[19]

saw the foundations laid for the palace of the Signory and the new

Cathedral, Sta. Maria del Fiore, Sta. Croce, and Sto. Spirito; he

witnessed the construction of the Corn Exchange of Or San Michele, and

the gloomy prison which still recalls the memory of party-strife.[20]

In his banishment he thought of his beautiful San Giovanni, and in

order to picture the steep ascent in Purgatory drew a comparison with

the straight path, that now no longer exists, leading to the church of

San Miniato, which looked down on the Rubaconte bridge, and commanded

a view of the city.[21] Beside it in his time Bishop Andrea de’ Mozzi

had begun to build the first embattled episcopal palace, which was

completed by his successor, Antonio d’Orso, the same who instigated

the populace to rise against the Emperor Henry IV. Dante was a witness

of the indefatigable zeal with which corporation and citizens emulated

each other in the erection of churches, great public buildings, the

city-wall and defensive castles for the environs. No will was held

valid unless a legacy was left by it towards the expenses of building

the wall, while immunity from taxes was granted to the architect of

the cathedral in gratitude for his excellent work. Benevolence had

long been engaged in relieving human misery, and now with increase

of means it was still more displayed. Folco Portinari, the father

of him whose name has become celebrated far and wide through Dante

Alighieri, founded the hospital of Sta. Maria, now one of the largest

in any country, by extending a charitable institution commenced by

Mona Tessa, a servant of his house. The corporation built the hospital

at the Porto al Prato and took under their superintendence the one

long since founded by a pious citizen at Porta San Gallo. The hospital

of San Jacopo and that of Sta. Maria della Scala were annexed later.

Contributions were everywhere given for churches and convents, for

that of the Camaldulensians in the Angeli, the Servites in Cafaggio,

the Silvestrines in San Marco, and others. An especial magistrate was

appointed for the care of the streets and sewers, and the Carraia

bridge was rebuilt.

In the midst of this activity, in June 1304, a conflagration laid a

great part of the city in ashes, during a violent feud between the

populace and the nobility. It is said that 1,700 noblemen’s palaces,

towers, and houses of citizens were destroyed, besides incalculable

wealth, and many monuments of the old town. The prior of San Piero

Scheraggio, Ser Freri Abbati, was the incendiary. As an example of the

ferocity of the manners of the times it may be here mentioned that

in the year 1307 the belfry of the Benedictine abbey was partially

demolished because the monks had rung the alarm-bell during a quarrel

which had arisen respecting taxation of the clergy. Activity in

construction was not, as we have said before, confined to the defence

and adornment of the city itself, for at this period the building of

numerous forts was determined upon for the protection of the environs,

the completion of which was afterwards vigorously carried on. Such

defences were necessary in times of perpetual warfare, like the feuds

of the communes; and the marches upon Rome led by Henry of Luxembourg

and Louis of Bavaria, with the enterprises of Uguccione della

Faggiuola and Castruccio Castracane, in connection with these, gave

immediate occasion for them. In much later times they were still an

effectual protection, for the art of besieging was still in its infancy

when the art of defence had already made important progress, and armies

under celebrated generals were stayed for months by inconsiderable

villages, as the history of the second half of the fifteenth century

will show.

The style of palaces and houses remained faithful to the older

traditions. The public palaces were like castles. For centuries those

of the Podestà and the Signory, for example, had been carefully

strengthened and kept in a state of defence. From the towers, the bells

of which summoned the citizens, there was a wide prospect over the

city and its environs. The battlements, of the square form customary

among the Guelfs, were adapted for defensive purposes. The windows on

the ground storey were few and narrow, the gates were strengthened

by double doors. The building material, consisting of heavy stones,

or _macigni_, was furnished by the neighbouring stone-quarries of

the hills of Fiesole and Golfolina on the Arno, at the spot where

the river forces a narrow passage from the Florentine to the broad

lower valley.[22] Great blocks of freestone, rough-hewn and gradually

blackened by exposure to the air, formed those massive walls that

seemed as though built for eternity. These walls have stamped their

character on the later Florentine architecture; for the fifteenth and

even the sixteenth century remained faithful to this _opus rusticum_,

which has been transmitted down to our own days—modified, it is true,

in its harsher features, but essentially unchanged. The windows of

the upper storeys, divided first by slender marble columns, and then

by various ornaments in the spaces of the pointed arch, relieve the

gloominess of the fortress. The halls of the guilds and the palaces of

the nobility exhibit the same style, though in them the embossments

are partly or entirely smoothed away, and the windows are quite plain.

Many of them are still preserved in the older quarters of the city,

in the Borgo Sant’Apostolo, in the Via delle Terme, in the Mercato

Nuovo, in the Via de’ Cerchi and Condotta, in the narrow streets

behind the Old Palace in Via de’ Neri and de’ Rustici, and in Piazza

Peruzzi, where they have even nestled in the Roman amphitheatre and

elsewhere. The former palace of the Spini, between the Arno and the

Piazza of Santa Trinità, the restoration of which has been undertaken

by the present municipal authorities, presents, with its massive

crown of battlements, the severe character of a fortress. The houses

of the Mozzi at the south end of the Rubaconte bridge, and those of

the Manelli on the Ponte Vecchio, among others, represent, in spite

of change, the age of Dante; some, indeed, are now, after a lapse

of six centuries, occupied by descendants of the very families that

then possessed them.[23] The ground floors often show the traces of

walled-up loggie, an indication of more peaceful days, for this style

of building was continued even when party quarrels were fought out more

by change of constitution and by proscription than by force of arms.

The numerous religious institutions show of themselves how important

a field was offered to ecclesiastical architecture. At the most

flourishing period of German architecture, Sta. Maria Novella furnishes

the first example of the endeavour to obtain as wide and slight an

arching to the vault as possible, by employing antique pilasters,

composed of semi-columns and pillar corners. This attempt has met with

comparative success in Sta. Maria del Fiore, in which plain pillars

adorned with more developed capitals composed of acanthus leaves have

been used, while for the gigantic central nave of Sta. Croce the

vaulting is relinquished, and the open principle of the Christian

basilica of Rome adopted. The same plan is also to be seen in San

Miniato al Monte. If, however, the management of the material in Sta.

Maria del Fiore exhibits extraordinary skill, a certain baldness was,

on the other hand, scarcely to be avoided; and this forms a contrast

with the awkwardly set cupola of the choir and transept—a fault,

perhaps, less to be charged upon the first architect than is generally

assumed. The exterior marble facing of the first two of these churches

was similar to that of San Giovanni, but displayed a greater tendency

to picturesque effect, which was increased by the additions of later

times. The marble was supplied from native quarries, those of Prato

and the Maremma, and after 1343 particularly from Carrara.[24] The

craft of the painter was and remained combined with that of the

architect, as a fine art, distinguished in fact only by the employment

of different materials. That same painter, to whom art history—which

in the fifteenth century was just awakening, and in the next, although

not yet critical, reached descriptive perfection—has given, following

tradition, a higher position than belongs to him, painted both with

the brush and with coloured _pastilles_, and his most distinguished

pupil adorned the city with its most graceful architecture. Dante has

extolled them both, the one as a setting and the other as a rising

star. The legend derives the ancient family name of Borgo Allegri

from the popular rejoicing which accompanied Charles of Anjou on his

way to inspect the great Madonna picture in the studio of Giovanni

Cimabue, which now adorns the church of Sta. Maria Novella. It was

Giotto di Bondone who broke through the narrow circle of typical

painting in the Byzantine style, and, both in single figures of

Madonnas and Saints and in grand historico-allegorical compositions,

opened a way to freer spiritual development, in which he was followed

by a large school. Although, as was natural, considering the large

number of its followers, its original principles did not continue

unmodified, this school in all essentials became the authority for the

fourteenth century. No new creative peculiarity, however, was evinced,

and constant repetition of the same motive can be observed in form

of face, drapery, architecture, and colouring. The admiration that

Giotto’s works, which adorned all Italy, had excited in his native

city, the talents that were ascribed to him outside the art to which

he had especially devoted himself, are shown by a decree passed by the

Signory on April 12, 1334,[25] in concert with the Buonuomini—an act

redounding no less to the honour of the State than of the painter. By

this decree Giotto was nominated architect of the Sta. Maria del Fiore,

of the boundary wall, and of the other architectural undertakings of

the Corporation. ‘Let it be done,’ so it ran, ‘in order that the public

works may progress effectually and in fitting manner, which can only be

the case if a practised and celebrated man conduct the management of

them, and for this purpose no one can be found in the whole world able

to do more excellently in this, as in many other things, than Master

Giotto di Bondone of Florence, painter, whom, as a great artist, his

native city will lovingly receive and honour.’ Giotto lived two years

after his praises were thus proclaimed. After death he was honoured

with the erection in the cathedral, with the building of which he had

been entrusted, of a monument adorned by one of the finest inscriptions

of the Renaissance period.

During the time that the façade of this church, which was destined to

undergo many a change, was building, together with its side-walls,

doors, and the walls and gates of the quarter Oltr’arno; and while the

belfry of the cathedral, the most graceful, rich, and perfect work of

its style, arose, great efforts had to be made to clear away the last

traces of the fire of 1304, and the ravages of the great inundation of

November 1, 1333. Three bridges were broken up; the old bridge, with

those of Santa Trinità and Carraia, and even the column before the

Baptistery, which had been raised in memory of St. Zanobi, was thrown

down. Every nerve was strained to the work of restoration. One of the

most active among the artists was Giotto’s pupil, Taddeo Gaddi, who, in

the summer of 1337, began building the new Hall of Or San Michele, on

the site of the one burnt down, which was, however, no longer destined

to serve the former purpose, but to be used as an Oratorium, while

two upper stories were to be employed for the garnering of corn. So

arose this magnificent edifice, which forms one of the most remarkable

ornaments of Florence, and, seen from the neighbouring hills, towers

above the clustering houses. It forms a quadrangle, of which the sides

are of unequal length. The character of a hall is still visible in the

ground-floor, with its wide tripartite arched windows, which are richly

panelled, and in the two upper stories with their arched windows, in

groups, alternately, of two and three, divided by columns; the whole

being surmounted by a moulded cornice. In this cornice are niches with

statues and groups of marble, which had been built at the cost of the

guilds, and set on the pilasters of the older hall; and here, as on

the middle storey, are placed the arms of these guilds with those of

the commonwealth.[26] Two years later Taddeo Gaddi began rebuilding

the old bridge in essentially the same form as at present. The palace

of the Podestà had been already considerably enlarged and beautified

when in 1326 it served Duke Charles of Calabria, the son of King Robert

of Naples, as a residence; but in February 1332 it had suffered by

fire, and in the year following by the inundation, so that a thorough

restoration was necessary. The Carraia bridge was finished in 1337;

that of the Trinità required several years more; the belfry of the

Benedictine abbey had been rebuilt in 1330. The short reign of the

Duke of Athens caused no cessation in the process of construction. A

new front was built to the palace of the Signory, in which the Duke

took up his residence, which did not, however, protect him from the

resentment of the populace; and in the palace of the Podestà, of which

the picturesque courtyard was then building, with arcades running round

three sides of the ground-floor, his coats of arms bear witness to his

activity. The following years were so restless and disturbed, owing

to the peril the country was in from the swarms of freebooters, who,

towards the middle of the century, laid all Italy under contribution,

and from the fearful ravages of the Black Death, that architecture was

rather called into requisition for the safety of the city than for its

adornment.

The brigandage and pestilence that prevailed might well cripple

constructive progress for a time, but it was soon aroused to renewed

activity. If the last fearful calamity led to immorality among the

lower orders, it yet induced many to relinquish the bustle of the

world for grave meditations and pious works. The means of charitable

institutions were considerably increased by alms and legacies. In 1349

was decreed the erection of a chapel to St. Anne, in the hall of Or San

Michele, in commemoration of the expulsion of the Duke of Athens on

the day of that saint. The work was conducted by Neri de’ Fioravante,

who, on the occasion of that event, superintended the erection of

the barricades at the Place of the Signory, and by Benci di Cione of

Como. Three years later Andrea Orcagna began in the same place the

rich chapel of the Madonna, which may be considered as the best work

of architectural sculpture belonging to this period. The graceful

loggia which, in the year 1351, were commenced opposite San Giovanni,

as frontage to the Oratorium, are probably by the same artist. This

Oratorium originally belonged to the brotherhood of the Misericordia,

a society formed after the plague in 1326, and still in meritorious

activity. It came later into the hands of another benevolent society,

that of the Capitani del Bigallo.[27] The building of the Certosa,

which was commenced by Nicola Acciaiuoli, in the year 1341, on the

neighbouring hill of Montaguto, was carried on with vigour, and the

mausoleum containing the beautiful monuments of the family belongs

likewise to these years. In 1360 the building of Santa Maria del Fiore,

which had been so continually interrupted, was fairly proceeded with,

and four years later the cupola was commenced. In the neighbourhood

of the palace of the Signory the site for the new Mint was obtained

in 1361. Several churches were altered or rebuilt, and the façade of

the church opposite to Or San Michele—now named after St. Charles

Borromeo, but formerly dedicated to the archangel—is a monument of

the graceful style of the period, though of small dimensions, and

sparely ornamented. An endeavour was made in 1351 to fill the voids

left by the plague in the ranks of the artists, by granting permission

to strangers to carry on both sculpture and architecture. The tendency

of the period towards the formation of guilds had manifested itself in

the year previous by the institution of the Society of Painters, under

the patronage of St. Luke, which, altered and enlarged, exists at the

present day.

The Hall of the Signory, which, since the 16th century, has been

generally called the Loggia de’ Lanzi, is the most important

architectural work of the latter part of the 14th century. In the

architecture of this building the spirit of the Renaissance breaks

boldly through the barriers of the Gothic style, without entirely

renouncing it. A hall in which the whole members and friends of a

family could meet was looked upon as a necessary distinction of the

high rank of the owner, and, indeed, no house of any importance was

without such an adjunct. This hall was afterwards gradually converted

into a separate and public building. Even in the middle of the

following century Leon Battista Alberti wrote thus: ‘Streets and

markets will be adorned by halls in which older people may assemble to

avoid the heat and discuss their business, while their presence will

act as a restraint upon the young in their games.’ Even private family

affairs were transacted here, and it is related of Giovanni Rucellai, a

rich citizen of the 15th century, who built a new loggia opposite his

house, that he arranged his daughter’s wedding there. None of these

loggias are at present in complete preservation,[28] for even where the

exterior form has been preserved the arches have been walled up, and

the building has been diverted to other uses, the original destination

being uncalled for by altered customs. Numerous traces of them,

however, still exist, notably of the Loggias of the Cerchi, the Agli,

the Buondelmonti, the Cavalcanti, the Tornaquinci, the Peruzzi, the

Alberti, the Canigiani, Burdi, Frescobaldi, Guiccardini, in the quarter

of Oltr’arno, and, of later origin, those of the Albizzi and Rucellai.

A commodious hall was naturally desired for the Signory in view

of the public nature of the business transacted by them, and the

unsuitableness of the Tribune of Ringhiera, which was added to the

façade of their palaces in 1349 and pulled down during the domination

of Napoleon. Notwithstanding, however, the utility of such a building

and the practice of annexing loggias to private dwellings, when the

square of the Signory was enlarged in 1356, to make room for the hall,

by pulling down the church of San Romolo, a part of the Mint, and

several houses, the general opinion was, that a great public hall was

better fitted for a despotism than for a free city.[29]

As already mentioned, it was not until twenty years later that the hall

of the Signory was commenced.[30] Benci di Cione and Simone Talenti

were the architects. The former was an artist much in request, and was

not only incessantly engaged in the architectural works of the city,

but also in the construction of the fortifications. His death happened

in 1388. The superintendence of this building was entrusted likewise

to the directors of Sta. Maria del Fiore, their funds exceeding their

necessities. Although the building of the loggia of the Signory is

ascribed to Orcagna in error, seeing that he had died eight years

before, and had not lived even to see the square cleared, the way for

it was prepared by the hall of the Bigallos, which was undoubtedly

by his hands. The Gothic style had, even at the end of the previous

century, displayed great boldness in the treatment of the pointed arch.

The circular arch was now adopted, which in bold sweeps forms three

openings on the façade, and one at each side. An architrave rises

above the capitals of lofty but strongly built pillars, surmounted

by a boldly projecting cornice, with wide cross-vaulting inside.

Antique tradition was nowhere so perceptible as in this building, the

unsurpassed, nay, unattainable, model for all later ones of the kind

until the present day. In the year 1380, in which Antonio di Puccio,

the ancestor of the yet flourishing family of the Pucci, executed the

third vaulting, the building seems to have approached its completion,

but eleven years longer sculptors and painters were occupied with its

adornment by numerous sculptures in high and low relief, in which

mosaic and colouring were employed to heighten the effect.[31]

Florentine sculpture of the latter part of the thirteenth and the

fourteenth centuries followed essentially the bent of Giovanni Pisano,

who endeavoured to unite the decided tendencies of his father Nicolò

towards the antique with those of the Gothic style, which then began

to assert itself; and he thus traced out for his followers the way

which they have long pursued. Andrea Pisano, the son of one Ugolino

of Pontedera, was the chief representative of Giovanni’s school during

the first half of the fourteenth century. If there is any question as

to whether the design of the bronze door of the Baptistery, worked by

him in 1330, being Giotto’s, the great influence exercised by Giotto

on the sculpture of his time is undoubted. Neither Orcagna, whose most

important work, the altar to the Virgin in Or San Michele, has already

been mentioned, and who displays both in painting and in sculpture the

greatest originality in conception and in form of any artist of this

epoch, nor Andrea Pisano’s pupil, Alberto di Arnoldo, to whom the grave

and noble group of the Virgin with Angels in the Oratorium of Bigallo

is owing, was able to escape the influence of Giotto. The decoration

of the façade of the cathedral, of the belfry and interior of the

baptistery, as also of the side doors of the cathedral, with sculpture,

statues, reliefs, and ornaments, gave employment, irrespectively of

others, to numerous artists from foreign parts, but much of their

work has unfortunately been destroyed or mutilated. Meanwhile the

churches were being adorned with numerous frescoes and altar panels,

particularly Sta. Croce, so rich in chapels, which was only completed

in the following century, Sta. Trinità, which was enlarged in 1383,

Sta. Maria Novella, Ognissanti, and others, in which work Agnolo Gaddi,

Orcagna, Giovanni da Milano, Jacopo del Casentino, and many others were

employed. Before the middle of the century the great chapter hall of

Sta. Maria Novella, commonly called Capellone degli Spagnuoli, which

contains the mural paintings ascribed, without ground, to the Siennese

painter, Simon Martini, and Taddeo Gaddi, had been built by a citizen

of Florence, named Buonamico di Lapo Guidalotti. The frescoes from

the history of St. Benedict, by Spinello of Aretino, in San Miniato

al Monte, date after the year 1380, and those from the New Testament

in the Rinuccini chapel, probably by Giovanni da Milano,[32] somewhat

earlier. Orcagna, who next to Giotto possessed the most catholic

spirit of the century, had breathed a fresher and more original life

into the school then dominant. He was followed pre-eminently by the

two last-named masters, who, notwithstanding the duration of the

Giottoesque traditions, herald in the coming epoch.

Not alone the end of the thirteenth, but the onward marching fourteenth

century likewise beheld the establishment of great charitable

institutions. In the year 1377 the building of the hospital was

commenced, which Bonifacio de’ Lupi of Soragna, from Parma, formerly

Podestà and Capitano del Popolo, dedicated as a mark of attachment

to the city which had bestowed its freedom on him. In the course of

centuries it has been much changed, but still exists as the Spedale di

Bonifazio. Seven years later Lemmo Balducci, of Monticatini, founded

the hospital of San Matteo, on the site now occupied by the Academy of

Fine Arts. In 1400 the hospital Sta. Maria dell’Umiltà (San Giovanni

di Dio) was erected by Simone Vespucci, near the houses of his family.

Churches and monasteries followed one another, and, as the enlargement

of the square of the Signory necessitated the demolition of a church,

it was rebuilt in another place. In 1394 Bishop Onofrio Visdomini

consecrated the magnificent charter-house of the Acciaiuoli, which was

established at the public cost. In 1392 the convent Il Paradiso, before

Porta San Nicolò, on the slope of the hill of Arcetri and Miniato, was

founded by Messer Antonio degli Alberti, under the influence of the

excitement created in the ecclesiastical world, then distracted with

the great schism, by the report of the prophecies and piety of Bridget

of Sweden, whose fame extended far beyond Rome, where she passed so

many years of her life. This period showed itself grateful towards

men of merit. In 1393 the directors of San Maria del Fiore received

permission to raise a monument to John Hawkwood, who, as a commander

under the name of Giovanni Aguto, had the thanks of the Republic for

his faithful services. A year later it was resolved to erect in the

same church a monument to the learned and useful public servant, the

Augustine monk Luigi Marsigli. By a decree passed in the year 1396 it

was intended to perpetuate in the same manner the memory of the lawyer

Accursio, Zanobi da Strada, also Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio. The

decree was, however, never carried out.

The power of the aristocracy, at the head of which were the Albizzi,

now approached its height. After the unfortunate attempt of 1397 to

obtain some popular balance to this domination, a less violent state of

affairs came gradually about, one manifestation of which was the great

expenditure of money, both by the State and private individuals, in the

prosecution of important and valuable works. This activity renders the

period worthy to be compared with the end of the previous century, and

formed a new epoch in the history of art. It was formerly the custom

to associate the name of the Medici with the outburst of the Italian

Renaissance, and likewise with the height of its perfection at the

beginning of the fifteenth century. They had, however, only followed in

the footsteps of their predecessors the Albizzi, and Pope Julius II.

The stages of the progress of the Renaissance are visible, in following

the history of art, from Benci di Cione, to Brunellesco, from Orcagna

and Alberto d’Arnoldo to Ghiberti and Donatello, from Orcagna again,

Spinello, and Nicolò di Pietro, to Masolino and Masaccio. In the

province of architecture, classical art entered again upon its rights

under the influence of the new spirit. Brunellesco, who, while in his

native town, had fixed his attention on Roman edifices, accustomed his

eye when in Rome to the large dimensions and simple yet harmonious

forms of ancient art. The Italian Gothic, which is not of one cast, but

more or less dependent upon the older forms of art, must, in comparison

with the latter, appear arbitrary in its character. Yet the classical

principle obtained by no means an easy victory. The greatest work

of the period, the dome of Sta. Maria del Fiore, is the result of a

compromise, which under the circumstances was unavoidable, between the

traditions of two epochs, and between the characters of two different

tendencies. The requirements both of a strict division and demarcation

of masses, and the perception of grand beauty and ample space had also

to be reconciled. So in other branches of art the Gothic style asserted

itself for a length of time by the side of the new tendency.

In February 1393 a commission was first appointed for the building of

the dome, the sacristy, and the canonica of the cathedral.[33] But

it was a full quarter of a century before the work was fairly begun.

On August 19, 1418, the famous competition, which has since been

celebrated in a novel, was invited for models of the dome. On November

14, 1419, a commission of ‘Officiales Cupolæ’ was appointed, consisting

of four of the principal citizens. April 16, 1420, the office of

_Proveditores_ was conferred on Filippo Brunelleschi, Lorenzo Ghiberti

and Battista d’Antonio; and on August 12, 1434, it was resolved that

the lantern with which the dome was to be closed should be built after

Brunellesco’s model. The lantern was, however, only completed in 1462,

sixteen years after the great artist’s death.[34] The greatest and

most complex work of modern architecture belongs consequently to the

time when the Albizzis held power. Meanwhile many other buildings

were undertaken. In 1411 an illustrious citizen, Nicolò Davanzati

Bostichi, began the construction of the convent S. Michele of Doccia,

near Fiesole, which, built against the dark background of the wooded

hillside, can be seen far and wide. In 1416 the plan for the rebuilding

of San Lorenzo was sketched out; in 1421 the great foundling hospital

of the Innocents, with its beautiful portico on the Piazzi of the

Annunziata, was begun; and twelve years later Sto. Spirito, the two

latter after Brunellesco’s designs. Notwithstanding some defects, owing

chiefly to the difficulty, imperfectly surmounted, of continuing the

colonnade from the nave through the transept and choir, and to the

unsuitability of the dome to this form, Sto. Spirito is the finest

example of the independent adoption of the Roman basilica style for

modern ecclesiastical architecture. Sta. Maria Novella was consecrated

September 8, 1420, by Pope Martin V., for whom a part of the adjoining

convent had been converted into a dwelling the year before. This

was followed the next day by the consecration of Sta. Maria Nuova

(Sant’Egidio) by Cardinal Antonio Correr, Bishop of Bologna, to

which ceremony the frescoes refer with which Bicci di Lorenzo, who

superintended the building, adorned the façade under the modern portico

of the present day.

Filippo degli Scolari, who, under the name of Pippo Spano, had been

influential in Hungary in the days of King Sigismund, ordered upon

his death, in 1426, the construction, by Brunellesco, of a great

central building for the Camaldolensians of the Angeli, but it went

no further than a portion of the vast octagon, which was vulgarly

called _Il Castellaccio_.[35] The Place of the Signory was still too

small, and the wish to procure more space for the palace on the south

side occasioned the demolition in 1410 of a side-aisle of San Piero

Scheraggio. This church, after being gradually more and more mutilated,

made way a century and a half later for the edifice of the Uffizi, by

whom this quarter of the city, in which streets and houses were crowded

together down to the river-side, was completely transformed.

The splendour and beauty of the public buildings necessarily influenced

the construction of private dwellings. The narrow houses, lofty in

proportion to their base, fell gradually into disuse, the more as the

city, which had been considerably enlarged, afforded greater space.

The beginning of the fifteenth century, which reached its climax in

the Florentine palaces, turned the scale in this respect; but, as

already remarked in the introduction, the mediæval traditions were

here more faithfully adhered to than in ecclesiastical architecture.

Moreover, a sense of timidity in passing certain limits existed in this

case, which was connected with the circumstances of a free republic.

This feeling has been recognised in Cosmo de’ Medici, and will be

found again in Filippo Strozzi. We are reminded of the same fact

even in the following century by the history of the Bartoline house

on the Piazza Sta. Trinità, the door and window frames of which were

considered unsuitable for a private dwelling, though they were soon to

appear simple enough. In earlier times, too, there were large private

houses, but their number appears to have been inconsiderable. In the

first decade of the fifteenth century several were erected, which we

still behold essentially in their original form. The house of Nicolò

da Uzzano in Via de’ Bardi, already mentioned, built probably about

1420, is of large proportions, but perfectly plain, and without any

sign of the modern spirit. The palace of the Bardi family in Via del

Fosso indicates, both by its straight-sided façade and by the square

courtyard with the antique arrangement of the columns, the innovations

of the new style; while the broad, projecting, wooden roof and the

plain windows recall an earlier time. On the Trinity bridge the houses

of the Capponi and Gianfigliazzi retain something of the ancient style.

In the seventeenth century the interior of the house of the Albizzi,

the residence of Piero, Maso, Rinaldo, was rebuilt. This building is

in the street named after them, in which palace follows palace, though

the full effect is lost, owing to the narrow space. The exterior bears,

however, decidedly the mark of time, which is still more the case with

the neighbouring palace of the Alessandri.

The streets were mostly paved with flagstones (_lastrico_), even in

the suburbs—a custom which gradually replaced the causeways of tiles

(_ammattonato_) or of small stones (_selciato_); and when adopted

in the smaller Tuscan towns contributed to give them a clean and

well-to-do appearance. Even before the end of the thirteenth century

this kind of pavement is said to have been used. The stones were

procured from the hill of San Giorgio, adjoining the city on the left

bank of the river, and the immediate neighbourhood, as well as from

the quarries of Fiesole and Golfolina, already mentioned. For a long

time the stones were left in their polygonal quarry form, until in

recent times it was preferred to hew them square. The laborious and

costly work required by a strong and perfectly uniform embankment to

the sewers of the city would progress but slowly. It was placed under

the careful superintendence of the commissariat officials (_officiales

grasciæ_), to whom was especially entrusted the charge of those streets

in which the Barbary-horse races took place.[36] The paving of the

Place of the Annunziata—the centre of which remains, however, at the

present day unpaved, like those of Sta. Maria Novella, San Marco,

and others—was first undertaken, in 1421, by the Servite monks, who

solicited subsidies for the purpose, in consideration of the crowds

which thronged to the miraculous image in their church.

It is comprehensible that the noticeable revolution in architecture

should likewise affect the sister arts. Here, however, we encounter in

the first rank two artistic characters essentially differing from one

another. With Lorenzo Ghiberti the influence of the school of Giotto

is very perceptible, and in the reliefs, his master-pieces, he allows

the picturesque principle to predominate to a certain extent, and with

a careful calculation of the effect, which to some degree surpasses

the ability or courage of the painter so active in his youth. The

attitudes and drapery, however, of Ghiberti’s figures are in harmony

with the spirit of antiquity which had inspired Nicolò Pisano more

than a century and a half earlier. The full outbreak of realism in

conception and form is displayed in the somewhat younger Donatello,

who, unpoetical and less imaginative than Ghiberti, depends for

models rather upon real, if even less beautiful, nature, than upon

works of antiquity, of which, indeed, Rome afforded him but scanty

and doubtful specimens. Both were goldsmiths, whose art had at that

time reached a high degree of perfection, and was distinguished by the

production of great works. It was the profession which Brunellesco had

originally followed, and for centuries remained connected with that

of the sculptor. In 1408 Ghiberti, then only twenty-two, received the

commission for his first bronze door of the Baptistery, the completion

of which required more than twenty years. In 1414 he executed the

statue of St. John, and six years later that of St. Matthew, for two

niches on the exterior of the ground-floor of Or San Michele, the

sculptural adornment of which, at the cost of the guilds, had been

determined upon in 1406. In 1424 the execution of the second door of

the Baptistery was entrusted to him, which was finished twenty-eight

years after, three years before his death. One work of less importance

remains from the year 1428—the bronze chest executed for the brothers

Cosimo and Lorenzo de’ Medici for the reception of the relics belonging

to the Camaldulensian convent of the Angeli.[37] In 1411 Donatello

began the statue of St. Mark, which he produced, together with that of

St. Peter, for Or San Michele; about 1420 he began the monument for

Pope John XXIII.; and in 1427 he was commissioned by the Medici to

execute the monument of Cardinal Rinaldo Brancacci for Naples. His most

excellent work in respect to lightness and grace, and which is without

a touch of the heaviness so often characteristic of him, is the statue

of St. George for Or San Michele. The date of the production of this

work can as little be determined as that of the excellent figures of

the Prophets which adorn the niches on the belfry of Sta. Maria del

Fiore.

In painting the spirit of realism gained the victory much more slowly,

and to a far less extent. Even when this victory had been obtained

in Florence, the softer feeling and typical form derived from Giotto

prevailed in other parts of central and upper Italy in peculiar and

flourishing schools. Not long before Masaccio had begun his frescoes in

the Brancacci chapel in the Carmine, which was consecrated in 1422, the

Camaldulensian Don Lorenzo had painted his beautiful pictures, which

still represent the tendency of the previous century, although with a

freshness and freedom far superior to the later Giottesque style. And

Fra Angelico da Fiesole, who in 1407 entered the Dominican cloister of

the little town whence he derived his name, remained his whole life

long true to the tradition to which he has given the consecration of

gentle poverty, pious fervency, religious sensibility, and at the same

time, _naïve_ simplicity. Not even Gentile da Fabriano, a son of the

Anconite border, who was gifted with a more lively natural feeling and

graceful freshness and serenity, and in 1421 had himself inscribed in

the list of Florentine painters, succeeded in breaking through this

narrow circle, which did not afford sufficient scope to the creative

power of the new spirit of art. Masaccio has given expression to this

spirit in a manner which has served as example to the most highly

developed periods, by uniting the most true, lifelike, and varied

expression with free but nobly naturalistic form. The artists who stand

more or less under the influence of Masaccio, and also of the modern

plastic art, belong chiefly to the period which we shall contemplate

further on.

Thus had the city of Florence, when the fifteenth century entered on

its fourth decade, developed in both severe and graceful beauty, under

the influence of an art which, notwithstanding foreign traditions,

was, nevertheless, in its peculiarity and luxuriance, the growth of

its own soil. In external appearance, likewise, Florence was the

city of a rich, active, sovereign republic, which sought its honour

rather in the grandeur and brilliancy of its public buildings, both

for ecclesiastical and secular purposes, than in the luxury of private

houses. The city was at once munificent and thrifty, and, through

all change, however precipitate, held firmly by old tradition, as

was expressed by the prevailing similarity of the character of the

architecture, notwithstanding the development of successive styles.

Most of the streets were and remained narrow, the number of large

squares was inconsiderable, but these streets were well paved, when

in Rome people waded for years longer in the deep mire and dust of

streets provided only with a tile causeway on each side. The greater

number of houses were built of massive stone. The number of projecting

upper storeys which darkened the streets had lessened more and more in

the course of years. Some restriction was put on this mode of building

by the imposition of a tax, which in Giovanni Villani’s time brought

in 7,000 florins. Subsequently, however, it was expressly forbidden

by law, and under the first Duke many of the projecting storeys were

pulled down, so that their number is now proportionally small. A

greater evil was the projection of the roofs over the street, but this

was not removed till 1766. Although no fortress was assigned to the

chief magistrate of the city, he was provided with a secure residence,

and one befitting the dignity of his position. The boundary wall of

Florence was a remarkable work. It enclosed the foremost height on the

left bank of the river, and was fortified with towers. The gates were

magnificent, among which that of St. Nicolò, with its projecting double

storey, offers an example of its kind as the only one in complete

preservation since the transformation undertaken in the sixteenth

century.

The frame to the beautiful picture was afforded by the environs. As at

the present day, so in late mediæval times, the city seemed to extend

on every side into the plain, as well as up into the neighbouring

mountains which skirted the flowery plain watered by the Arno. At the

gates were hospitals and lazarettos for the sick and for pilgrims,

particularly for all whose residence in the city seemed unadvisable,

such as lepers and other sufferers from skin diseases. These charitable

institutions were founded chiefly in the fourteenth century, and owe

their origin to the benevolence of wealthy citizens and the companies.

There were, moreover, convents, which were increased in number and

extent from year to year, some of them situated immediately before the

walls, some on the hills by the bridges leading across the streams

and brooks of Mugnone, Terzolle, Mensola, Ema, and Greve. Celebrated

names are connected with the history of many of these foundations. We

may mention that of Cardinal Ottaviano degli Ubaldini, who founded in

1260 the nunnery of Monticelli, opposite the Porta Romana; also that

of his relative, the saintly Chiara, who was its first abbess. We may

likewise allude to the family of the Acciaiuoli, who, both in politics

and in Church history, played so great a part in the fourteenth and

fifteenth centuries. Even in Dante’s time numerous villas had risen,

and one of these reminds us of the poet himself—the one in possession

of his family before Porta Pinti, where the ground rises towards

Fiesole; while the graceful narrator of the fourteenth century brings

country life in the Florentine environs in bright pictures before us.

The number of villas already foreshadowed the time in which Ludovico

Ariosto sang; they would exceed a twofold Rome if enclosed by a wall.

The necessities of the period converted many convents and villas into

fortresses, and many have retained their castellated character, as San

Miniato, the Charterhouse, and Passignano, the villa of Petraja, the

former villa of Salviati at the base of the hill of Fiesole, Castle

Pulci on the left bank of the Arno below the town, and Torre del Gallo

on the hill of Arcetri; not to speak of the mountain fortresses of a

more ancient period, as Castle Vincigliata on the eastern hills, which

has been restored in modern times. Such fastnesses rendered good

service when, in 1363 and 1364, the Pisans pressed up to the walls with

their foreign mercenaries, and stormed the gates. While the German

mercenaries under the lord of Bongard, and the English under Hawkwood,

at that time an adversary, saw the villas on the hills of Montughi,

Bellosguardo, Arcetri, and Pozzolatico perish in flames, they could

not touch the Charterhouse; and from the strong tower of Petraja the

Brunelleschi, the possessors of the villa, courageously repulsed the

attack of the English. In March 1397, the Abbot of Passignano withstood

the troops of Alberigo of Barbiano, who had come to Pisa in the service

of the Visconti, and laid waste the Florentine territory. Even in later

times security from surprise was as much considered in the construction

of a villa as picturesque effect and artistic adornment.

CHAPTER IV.

INDUSTRY, TRADE, AND LIFE IN FLORENCE.

THE large sums which were continually expended by the Government as

well as the citizens of Florence, from the middle of the thirteenth

century, for public objects—such as the enlargement, fortification,

and embellishment of the city, for palaces and the residences of

officers of the State, bridges and streets, churches and convents,

hospitals and charitable institutions—would lead us to infer pecuniary

means apparently out of proportion with the extent and resources

of the territory and the site of the town, excluded as it was from

the unrestricted use of the sea route till far into the fifteenth

century. The great industrial activity and unusual intelligence of

the inhabitants profited by favourable and conquered unfavourable

circumstances so far, that while the Pisans still commanded the port

which bore the name of their town, and was afterwards replaced by that

of Leghorn—while Lucca possessed the harbour of Motrone, and Siena

that of Talamone, and could thus shut out the inland state from the

sea—the trade and industry of Florence had long surpassed theirs.

The political importance attained by the great guilds so soon after

their institution shows how firmly rooted was their power, even at

the commencement of their existence, and that they really represented

the most respected and affluent part of the community. We are vividly

reminded of these corporations when we stand before the magnificent

building of Or San Michele, or, at the eastern end of the Piazza della

Signoria, gaze upon the arms graven in stone upon the residence of the

Magistrate of Trade, who had to decide in all disputes and questions

of competition between the magistrates of the different guilds. Four

of these guilds come under consideration when we treat of industrial

and commercial activity on a large scale—viz., the cloth-weavers,

merchants or traders in foreign cloth, silk-weavers, and money-changers.

The woollen manufacture arose perhaps earliest of all, to satisfy

one of the most important demands; and though it is doubtful whether

native productions are spoken of in a Lucchese document of the year

840 respecting woollen and silk goods, we certainly do not err in the

inference that Florence knew and practised this branch of industry

at least from the time of her political rise, after the death of

the Countess Matilda. In the beginning of the following century,

a corporation of cloth-weavers existed, whose consuls signed a

treaty of peace between their fellow-citizens and Siena in the year

1202. Thirty-seven years later, this branch of industry received an

important accession from the Lombard order of the Humiliates, founded

by Bishop Pietro Manadori. They settled first in the neighbourhood

of the city, where the extensive buildings and gardens of the Villa

San Donato are now to be seen, and finally, removed in 1256, to the

monastery of Ognissanti, where they were long actively employed in

their own interests and the welfare of the community who protected

them, and did much to promote and perfect the woollen manufacture. On

the neighbouring banks of the Arno arose workshops, houses for dyeing

and washing wool, warehouses and booths of these brethren, who also

aided essentially in the draining and cultivation of a somewhat marshy

district. By the time the useful activity of the order slackened (about

1330 it entirely ceased), the Florentines had learnt all they could

teach, and the city was full of cloth-weavers, as the names of several

streets still remind us. From the ordinary kinds of cloth, with which

they began, when the finer still came from the Levant, they advanced

to better and best qualities, and strict regulations after the fashion

of the guilds in the Middle Ages, certainly not to the disadvantage

of the producers and their wares, guaranteed their excellence. The

extensive sale and higher prices testified to their value. The wool was

imported principally from France and Flanders, and also in considerable

quantity from England and Scotland, especially from the wealthy abbeys

and convents; and in the eighth decade of the thirteenth century we

hear of Florentine agents in London buying up the wool for several

years in advance. These agents stood in connection with no less than

two hundred convents.[38]

In close and varied connection with the Arte della Lana was that of

the Mercatanti, usually called Arte di Calimala, the oldest statutes

of which date from 1339. As the native cloth manufacture did not

suffice for the demand, and at first only supplied ordinary kinds,

French and Flemish cloth was imported from abroad in great quantity,

in a raw state, to Florence, where it was dyed, shorn and dressed, and

returned to foreign countries, often to the place whence it had come.

The skill of the dyers and other workmen in Florence, whose processes

long remained a carefully guarded secret, made this profitable trade

a monopoly until the rise of manufactures in the western countries of

Europe. The guild had its representatives, couriers, settlements, and

hostelries in France. It is clear that only the most conscientious

honesty could sustain their credit, wherefore the strictest statutes

respecting the different qualities of the cloth, the dyeing, and all

other things to be taken into consideration, regulated the manufacture

as well as the sale. The dyers formed a special guild, which, however,

was subordinate to the consuls of Calimala, to whom also, rather

singularly, the gold and silver smiths were subject. Another guild

belonging to that of the Arte della Lana was that of the washers and

combers of wool, which still exists as Compagnia dei Battilani, and

has its meeting-place in Via delle Ruote, near Via San Gallo. Its

church, whose sacristy is adorned by the portrait of Michele di Lando,

was publicly exhibited every year on the feast of the Assumption of

the Virgin, the high festival of the company. That such subordinate

connections gave rise to misunderstandings in troublous times, and that

new guilds arose without being able to maintain themselves permanently,

has been already stated.

In the year 1338 the number of workshops (_botteghe_) of the clothiers’

guild amounted to more than 200, which supplied from seventy to eighty

thousand pieces of cloth at the price of 1,200,000 gold florins, the

third of which sum at least remained in the city as workmen’s wages,

not to mention the profits of cloth merchants. The number of workmen

amounted to 30,000. In the first years of this century the number of

workshops had been a third more, and that of the pieces of cloth above

100,000; but the quality and price were lower, as they had not then

the excellent English wool. The number of the magazines (_fondachi_)

of the Calimala guild amounted to twenty. These imported yearly more

than 10,000 pieces of foreign cloth, to the worth of 300,000 gold

florins, for sale in the city itself, besides those which were again

exported.[39] Among the proprietors of such magazines, we find the

names Acciaiuoli, Alberti, Albizzi, Bardi, Buonaccorsi, Capponi,

Corsini, Peruzzi, Pucci, Ricci, Ridolfi, Rinuccini—names which are

mentioned a hundred times in the annals of the city, and which mostly

are still heard there. Even in the second half of the thirteenth

century, and therefore some time before their political power, these

two guilds were very active in France, and we find their agents in

1281, beside those of the Genoese in Nismes, where, fifteen years

later, we meet with the representatives of the trading companies of

the Cerchi, Mozzi, Spini, Scali, and Folchi. In 1325, Filippo Villani

and Cione di Lapo Ghini conducted the business of the Peruzzi and the

Scali as Florentine consuls at Paris. The great fairs of Beaucaire and

Forcalquier, with those of Provins, Lagny, Troyes, Bar-sur-Aube, etc.,

were of the greatest importance for this branch of industry.[40] In

Italy, Venice was an important emporium for this trade, for Germany

and Hungary as well as for the Levant. Till a few years ago, the

extensive barn-like building which served for the dyeing and washing

of the wool was still to be seen on the Lung’arno above the Uffizi;

and on several palaces we still see the rings for holding the wooden

staves on which the woollen fabrics were hung out as an indication that

the houses belonged to the guild. The guild-hall of the Arte della

Lana was the present Canonica of Or San Michele, where the coat of

arms—the lamb with the flag, and the comb with the lily above it, in

a blue field—still reminds one of its former destination, as well as

an inscription of the date of 1308. The guild-hall of the Calimala,

which had as a device a golden eagle standing over a ball of wool in

a red field, stood in the little street leading from the Piazza della

Signoria to the New Market, which is now called Calimaruzza: though it

was converted into private houses after the abolition of the guild, the

old devices may still be seen upon them. The street leading from the

New to the Old Market still preserves the name Calimala, respecting

the origin of which only untenable conjectures exist, and which in

its present aspect reminds us as little as does any part of the whole

centre of the old city of the former flourishing state of the trade.[41]

Of no less importance, and perhaps hardly less ancient than the cloth

manufactures, was the weaving of silk, which, after its introduction

into Sicily by King Roger, had been in a short time transplanted to

Central Italy, if, indeed, it was not previously cultivated in Lucca.

Of all the great branches of industry of the Middle Ages, this is the

only one which has preserved a certain importance down to our day.

The Arte della Seta was usually called the Por Sta. Maria, after the

St. Mary’s Gate, or Porta Regina, opposite the Ponte Vecchio, at the

entrance of the street still called Via di Por Sta. Maria (usually

Mercato Nuovo), where the former guild-hall still stands, near the

church of Sta. Maria sopra Porta, in the Via di Capaccio, distinguished

by the coat of arms, a closed red door in a white field. The

silk-weavers appear already, in the twelfth and oftener still in the

thirteenth century, as a corporation in public acts and treaties, in

the conclusions of peace and other compacts. In the list of the masters

of the guild in the year 1225 their number is given as more than 350,

and probably they had even then statutes; but the oldest still extant

date from 1335, and therefore from a time when this industry seems to

have attained considerable importance under the Guelfs from Lucca, who

had emigrated to Florence in great numbers in 1316. The dyeing of silk

was pursued here with great skill, and in particular the crimsoned

tissue stood in high reputation in the fourteenth century. We shall

speak later of the most brilliant epoch, the fifteenth century. The

Vicolo della Seta, in the vicinity of the former hall, and the Via de’

Velluti, on the left bank of the river, near Via Maggio, where numerous

silk-weavers and other mechanics originally lived, and where the still

flourishing family of the Velluti took its rise, remind us of their

former great activity.[42]

Though the branches of industry we have mentioned contributed much

to increase the wealth of the Florentine people, and make their

name famous in foreign lands, they were not the chief source of

national wealth. The business of money-changing seemed thoroughly at

home here, and it is not surprising that the invention of bills of

exchange, which we first meet with in 1199 in the relations between

England and Italy, should be ascribed to Florence. The money trade

seems to have flourished as early as the twelfth century, towards

the end of which a Marquis of Ferrara raised money on his lands

from the Florentines. In 1204 we find the money-changers as one of

the corporations. In 1228, and probably from the beginning of the

century, several Florentines were settled in London as changers to

King Henry III.; and here, as in France, they conducted the money

transactions of the Papal chair in conjunction with the Sienese. Their

oldest known statute, which established rules for the whole conduct

of trade (Statuto dell’Università della Mercatanzia) drawn up by a

commission consisting of five members of the great guilds, is dated

1280. Their guild-hall was in the Via Calimaruzza, opposite that of the

Calimala, and was later included in the buildings of the post-office,

on the site of which, after the post-office had been removed to what

was formerly the mint, a building was lately erected, similar in

architecture to the Palazzo of the Signoria, which stands opposite.

Their coat of arms displayed gold coins laid one beside another on

a red field. At the end of the thirteenth century their activity,

especially in France and England, was extraordinarily great. But if

wealth surpassing all previous conception was attained, it not seldom

involved loss of repute, and those who pursued the calling ran the

risk of immense losses from fiscal measures to the carrying out of

which they themselves contributed, as well as those which were caused

by insolvency or dishonesty. These losses would indeed have ruined the

trade and credit of the Florentines in the fourteenth century, had

not their resources been so varied, and their intelligent activity

so great. The names of Tuscans and Lombards, and that of Cahorsiens

in France, no longer indicated the origin, but the trade of the

money-changers, who drew down the ancient hatred upon themselves which

the _fœneratores_ had incurred from too frequently confounding usury

with rightful gains. It is this which the _Divina Commedia_ describes

where it speaks of shadows sitting mournfully shielding themselves

from the glow of vapours with their hands, and with bags round their

necks on which they feed their eyes.[43] France possessed at this time

the greatest attraction for the Florentine money-makers, although they

were sometimes severely oppressed, which is sufficient proof that

their winnings were still greater than their occasional losses. In

1277, they, with other Italians, were obliged to compound for a sum of

120,000 gold florins, when King Philip III. took advantage of a decree

of the Council to proceed against the usurers, a manœuvre which Philip

IV. the Fair repeated fourteen years later.

If Florentines suffered among those prosecuted by this king for

‘money coining on the Seine,’[44] Florentines certainly aided him in

other extortions and dishonesties in France and in Flanders, and it

was the bank of the Peruzzi which paid the sum by means of which the

constables of Philip the Fair, and chief among them the Tuscan knight

and financier Musciatto Franzesi, accomplished the attempt on Pope

Boniface VIII. in 1303 at Anagni.[45] New oppressions arose under

Philip VI., in whose person the line of Valois ascended the French

throne. He not only again debased the coinage for the necessities of

the English war, but also extorted a heavy forced loan from all foreign

merchants and bankers, and furthermore assisted the Duke of Athens,

after his expulsion, in his reprisals against the Florentine trade. But

notwithstanding all partial losses, and the great catastrophes which

befell the Florentine trade in the same century, it remained, even

in the following, mistress of the French money transactions, and, in

certain respects, of French trade.

The Florentine money market suffered the severest blow from England.

At the end of the twelfth century there were already Florentine houses

of exchange in London, and if Pisans, Genoese, and Venetians managed

the trade by sea in the times of the Crusades, it was the Florentines

mostly who looked after financial affairs in connection with the Papal

chair, as we have seen. Numerous banks appeared about the middle of the

thirteenth century, among which the Frescobaldi, a family of ancient

nobility, and as such attainted by the prosecutions against it, took

the lead, and were referred to the custom-house of the country for

re-imbursement of the loans made to the kings Edward I. and II. Later,

the two great trading companies of the Bardi and Peruzzi came into

notice, and with their money Edward III. began the French war against

Philip of Valois. But even in the first year of this war, which began

with an unsuccessful attack upon Flanders, the king suspended the

payments to the creditors of the State by a decree of May 6, 1339. The

advances made by the Bardi amounted to 180,000 marks sterling, those

of the Peruzzi to above 135,000, according to Giovanni Villani,[46]

who knew only too well about these things, since he was ruined by them

himself to the extent of ‘a sum of more than 1,355,000 gold florins,

equivalent to the value of a kingdom.’ Bonifazio Peruzzi, the head of

the house, hastened to London, where he died of grief in the following

year. The blow fell on the whole city, for, as may be supposed,

numerous families were interested in the business of the great houses,

which not only counted a number of partners or shareholders, but had

also money from all sides, from the city and from foreign countries,

to keep as deposits or to invest profitably. The injury to credit was

very threatening. In the year 1326, the fall of one of the oldest and

most important of the banking companies, that of the Scali, Amieri, and

Petri, had occurred just as the war against Castruccio, the lord of

Lucca, took an evil turn. But the position of affairs was now far more

critical. Both houses began at once to liquidate, and the prevailing

disturbance contributed not a little to the early success of the

ambitious plans of the Duke of Athens. The real bankruptcy ensued,

however, in January 1346, when new losses had occurred in Sicily on

account of the measures of the French Government which we have already

mentioned. The banks of the Acciaiuoli, Bonaccorsi, Cocchi, Antellesi,

Corsini, da Uzzano, Perendoli, and many smaller ones, as well as

numerous private persons, were involved in the ruin. ‘The immense

loans to foreign sovereigns,’ adds Villani, ‘drew down ruin upon our

city, the like of which it had never known.’ There was a complete lack

of cash. Estates in the city found no purchasers at a third of their

former value; those in the country were disposed of at two-thirds their

value, and fell even lower than this. The chronicler who gives us this

sad information was imprisoned for debt on account of the failure of

the Bonaccorsi, whose partner he was.

As the first result of these misfortunes was the impoverishment of

numerous families, the community at large was soon involved in it; as

the revenues diminished quickly with the public affluence, money was

only to be obtained at unheard-of usurious interest, and the _prestige_

of the Florentine trade lost considerably in foreign countries.

The famine and pestilence of 1347 and 1348, the oppressions of the

mercenary bands and the heavy expenses caused by them, the cost of the

war against Pope Gregory XI., and finally the tumult of the Ciompi,

left Florence no peace for a long time. The aristocracy, which came

into power in 1382, at last succeeded in restoring the equilibrium,

opening new resources to industry and trade, and rendering the old

connections again secure. Thus, at the beginning of the fifteenth

century industry was again flourishing in all its branches in Florence,

financial operations were extended, and foreign countries filled with

Florentine banks and mercantile houses. After the fall of Pisa the

last restrictions on navigation were removed, and it was no longer

necessary, as in past times, to hire French vessels in Aiguesmortes

for conveyance to the insecure and small roadsteads of Motrone or

Pietrasanta, or to conclude treaties with the Sienese for the use of

the bad and pestilential harbour of Talamone. The number of Florentine

settlements and offices had been already very considerable a century

earlier. In London the most important firms had their representatives,

Bruges was the chief place for Flanders, and we shall see how these

connections lasted to the time of the greatest splendour of the

Medici. France is frequently mentioned. The official representatives

of the Florentine nation resided in the capital, while numerous

houses established themselves in Lyons, in Avignon (since the removal

of the Papal chair to this town), in Nismes, Narbonne, Carcassonne,

Marseilles, &c. Large transactions were made in Upper Italy at Venice

and Genoa, at Castel di Castro in Sardinia, in Apulia, Barletta, and at

Palermo in the island of Sicily; Rome and Naples saw in the fifteenth

century the greater part of the banking business and a considerable

portion of other trade in Florentine hands. There were Florentine

colonies in Majorca, at Tunis, at Chiarenza in the Morea, in Rhodes

under the supremacy of the Knights of St. John, and in Cyprus under

that of Guy de Lusignan; while Florentine merchants carried trade into

Asia Minor, Armenia, the Crimea, far into Central Asia and Northern

China. The house of the Peruzzi alone had sixteen counting-houses in

the fourteenth century, from London to Cyprus.

The prudence and careful calculation which were in general

characteristic of the Florentine trade prevailed in everything relating

to the transmission and receipt of money and the term of payments.

Not only have we general rules from Balducci Pegolotti, in the first

thirty years of the fourteenth century, as to how they should proceed

in calculating the money to be paid abroad, but detailed notes on the

fluctuations of the money market in consequence of fairs, expeditions

of galleys, regular proceedings of the State, purchase of wool, etc.,

in the most important places, as Naples, Genoa, Bologna, Venice,

Avignon, Paris, Bruges, Barcelona, etc. The Papal court, with which

such extensive business was pursued—whether Rome or Avignon, or for

the time another town, were its residence—seemed to the experienced

Florentine to deserve especial remark. ‘Wherever the Pope goes, money

is dear, because from all sides one has to pay so much to him. When he

goes away, an ebb sets in, because the members of his court, if they

are not rich, must borrow.’ The times when the bills fell due were

regulated generally by the distance. An order drawn at Florence on

Pisa or Venice was due on the fifth day after the money was paid in;

in Rome and Genoa it was the fifteenth day; in Naples the twentieth;

in Provence, Majorca, and France, the sixtieth; in Flanders the

seventieth; in England the seventy-fifth; and in Spain, after three

months. The contracting parties could, however, make arrangements at

will.[47] According to the report of an annalist,[48] seventy-two

exchange houses and tables were counted in Florence, in the Mercato

Nuovo and its vicinity, in the year 1422, and the sum of money in

circulation was calculated at two millions of gold florins; while the

value of the wares, the letters of credit, and other property defied

calculation.

While industry and trade had accumulated great wealth in Florence, the

spirit of the community accorded well with it. In spite of the many

wars and other disturbances the city rose to such prosperity in the

first decades of the fourteenth century (when its territory included

only Pistoja, Colle, and Arezzo, and therefore scarcely a third of

Tuscany in later times) that Giovanni Villani could remark in 1336-1338

that her revenues exceeded those of the kings of Naples, of Sicily,

and of Aragon. With all the changes after the rise of the new wealthy

families at the beginning of the century the style of living had

remained simple, and even continued so after the luxury of the court of

Anjou, partly supported by Florentine money, had affected Florentine

manners unfavourably; yet there was no stinting for public works. The

citizens were in general beneficent: the number and importance of the

charitable institutions prove it. As with the Government, so with the

corporations, a lively sense was always displayed of the dignity and

grandeur of the city and community. And even if that oft-mentioned

decree of the republic of the year 1294,[49] according to which the

architect Arnolfo shall be charged to design the model of a cathedral

church ‘of such splendour that human power should be unable to invent

anything grander or more beautiful, in consideration that a people of

noble origin ought so to arrange its affairs that even in the exterior

works a wise and lofty mind may be recognised’—even if this decree

appears to be a production of the sixteenth instead of the thirteenth

century, there are not wanting reliable records which announce the same

spirit, and, still more, works which testify to it. In the year 1296,

legacies in aid of this church were made a duty for every one; notaries

were obliged to enjoin them in drawing up wills, and omissions were

punished.[50] In 1338 the community granted subsidies for this same

building, ‘that a work so beautifully and honourably begun might be

continued and completed still more beautifully, and the grants made

by the community appear liberal and considerable.’ When a pavement for

the Piazza della Signoria was ordered in June 1351 it was especially

insisted upon that the dignity and importance of the whole town were

concerned, as well as the stateliness and beauty of the palace of the

chief magistrate of state. When in August 1373 the public reading and

exposition of the _Divina Commedia_ was applied for and permitted, the

petitioners assigned as the ground of their request the wish that,

even if otherwise unlearned, they themselves, their fellow-citizens,

children, and posterity, be instructed in eloquence, guided to virtue,

and warned against vice. When in 1409 the fabrication of the bronze

gates of the shrine of St. Zanobius was entrusted to Lorenzo Ghiberti,

it was said that he must have regard to the ancient veneration for the

saint, as well as to the high dignity of the community, and respect to

the cathedral in which this work was to have the most honourable place

possible allotted to it. At the first mention of the building of the

Foundling Hospital, begun in 1421 at the expense of the silk-weavers’

company, it is remarked that ‘this beautiful building is destined

for the reception of those whose father and mother have maliciously

forsaken them, contrary to the rights of nature.’ As the silk guild

here, so was the woollen guild in Sta. Maria del Fiore entrusted with

the guidance of the works, beside the regular building committee (Opera

del Duomo). The share of the companies in the building and decoration

of Or San Michele is repeatedly mentioned. As a matter of course, all

that concerned the adornment of the city, the churches not excepted,

must be subordinate to the requirements of safety and defence. In

1353, when the people were fighting against Giovanni Visconti, and

afterwards, when the enterprise of Cardinal d’Albornoz for regaining

Romagna for the Holy See gave a prospect of unsettled times, and the

disorder of the freebooters led by the Knight of St. John of Montreal

(Fra Moriale) began, the money held in readiness for the bell-tower

was employed in enlisting men. As late as October 1368, when the city

fell to bickerings with the Emperor Charles IV., which were then, as

usual, made use of by the Visconti for the extension of their own power

over Tuscany, and when their mercenary bands penetrated to the gates of

Florence, a decree was passed that the sums destined for the completion

of Sta. Maria del Fiore should be employed for strengthening and

repairing the walls. The architects of the church were soon afterwards

commanded to build a wall along the river, from the Castell Altafronte,

which is still in partial preservation, and which joins the Uffizi,

built in the sixteenth century, to the Rubaconte bridge, and to level

the road ‘as should appear most suitable to the adornment of the city.’

A people which accomplished such great things must have possessed

unusual civic virtues, apart from their more brilliant intellectual

qualities, and spite of the weaknesses and faults which the greatest

of the sons of Florence has scourged in angry love and loving anger. A

despot can in a short time heap splendour on splendour; the activity

of spirit of a popular commonwealth is different and more steady. The

two free States in which we meet with the most perfect expression of

this, Venice and Florence, show that this is not dependent on the form

of government, but on a firm will and clear conception. The Florentine

people combined these in a high degree. In the midst of political

troubles and civil disturbances they constantly advanced; the final

gain was greater than the losses through momentary retrogression,

however violent. The people were contented, frugal, industrious, and

attached at all times to ancient customs. That great changes were

gradually made in customs and modes of life was according to the law

of all ages, and of natural development, though some aspects of it did

not seem the most pleasing. Manners and feelings of those days, which

the Paradiso in the ‘Divina Commedia’ describes with such incomparable

beauty and at the same time with such melancholy, when ‘in the old

encircling walls, Florence was peaceful, moderate, and modest,’ the

‘civic life so calm, so beautiful, the society so reliable,’—a state

of things which the poet closes with the time ‘before Frederic had

fought out his quarrel,’[51]—they indeed lay far behind him who has

lent to their memory form and duration for all future time. But the

greatest change was to come after his death. The influence of the

numerous foreigners, especially the French and Frenchified Neapolitans

who came with the Angevins and their regents, was by no means

beneficial; and the various sumptuary laws which were to restrain the

women point especially to the example set in 1326, by Charles Duke of

Calabria and his consort, Marie of Valois, the parents of the unhappy

Joanna I., with their whole court. Then came the times of the Duke of

Athens; soon after, the pestilence with its evil results, which are

open to all in the stories of the ‘Decamerone.’ Giovanni Villani, who

died in the year 1348, says once that the Florentines of the thirteenth

century in their simple life and poverty achieved more than those of

his time in the midst of their wealth and luxury.

Nevertheless, the age was in many respects simple, and remained so

even after communication had been rendered easier in all directions,

wealth accumulated, and more connections formed. The houses were

simple, with their windows closed, not yet by panes of glass, but by

wooden shutters, with their steep staircases and narrow courtyards;

the furniture and the meals were simple, even of the foremost citizens

and high magistrates; the clothing of the men was simple—and all

this lasted to the fifteenth century, and during a part of it. The

loggie have been already spoken of, in which, about the middle of this

century, important family affairs were still despatched. At weddings

and other family festivals, those who were invited assembled before

the house, which often had not space to hold them all—as may be

easily comprehended, when we find that the statutes of 1415 decreed

that the number of the guests on both sides should not exceed two

hundred. Notwithstanding Dante’s complaint that a father, at the birth

of a daughter, thought with terror on the time of her marriage, the

dowry was still, a century after his time, small in comparison with

the wealth of the family. They saved at home, in order to gain means

for public purposes, for ecclesiastical buildings and endowments,

for beneficent institutions and patriotic festivals. The building

of churches and hospitals came before the expenses for decorating

town-house and villa. The public festivals were brilliant, and united

spiritual and worldly interests. First in rank were those on the day of

John the Baptist, the patron saint of the city, to which all the towns,

villages, and _protégés_ of the territory brought votive offerings, and

races were held in the afternoon, a custom which dated from 1288, when

the Florentines had besieged Arezzo on that day. Races were customary

on other festivals also, either with riders or free horses (_barberi_),

as in the present day in Florence and other towns of Italy. The prizes

consisted of large pieces of gold and silk brocades, called _palio_.

Beside the feast of St. John, in which the whole city with the signoria

and other magistrates took a part, and that on St. Peter’s day, various

others celebrated patriotic events. Thus the feast on St. Romulus’ day

commemorated deliverance from the threatening hordes of Radagaïs; that

on St. Barnabas’ day the victory over the Ghiellines on Campaldino in

1279; that on St. Anne’s day the expulsion of the Duke of Athens; St.

Victor’s day the victory over the Pisans in 1364. Church festivals were

frequently united with mysteries in Carmine, Sto. Spirito, San Felice,

&c.; representations which we find shared in by the highest classes,

and customary even in the second half of the fifteenth century. Various

kinds of amusements took place in the open air; and the history of

the Carraia bridge tells of the accident which occurred on May 1,

1304, when the bridge fell in, during a representation of the infernal

regions by means of a grand apparatus.

May 1, the Calendimaggio, was the high day for the people, and the

green branches on the door-posts have preserved the name of May in

Italian as well as in German (and in English). It was on this day that

Dante first saw Beatrice Portinari at an entertainment for children.

Among the popular festivals were the Epiphany (_Befana_), celebrated

by processions and masquerades, which are still carried on; and the

Ferragosto, the Roman August holidays, where a donkey-race took place,

with a buffalo-race as counterpart. Public games in which physical

strength and, still more, agility were brought into play, delighted

high and low. Among these were _calcio_ and _maglio_: the first of

which was played on the large oblong square, afterwards shut in by

rows of houses which bears the name of Prato d’Ognissanti; the latter

in the vicinity of the Piazza San Marco, where the Via del Maglio

still reminds us of it. In the one game the feat consisted in throwing

a ball with the hand; in the other it was propelled by a wooden

hammer weighted with iron. We shall speak farther on of the tourneys,

exercises, and festivals of the high, and the merry popular gatherings

of the _potenze_. There was never a lack of music. The trumpeters and

other musicians of the Signoria were never absent from any procession,

and cheerful tunes accompanied every festival. Boccaccio’s tales

and the frescoes in the Camposanto of Pisa show how music formed an

integral part of social life. The most renowned instrumental performer

who flourished in the second half of the fourteenth century, Francesco

Landino, enchanted all by his delicate performances on the harpsichord,

even in his old age and blindness.

Such were life and manners in the times preceding the rise of the

Medici to power. The original simplicity no longer existed, and could

no longer exist; but, in the tone and conduct of public as well as

private life, the good old traditions still retained their influence.

When the Romans and Neapolitans mocked at the frugal habits of the

Florentines, the Florentine, seeing the anarchy and degeneracy of the

former, and the effeminacy and instability of the latter, could point

to his beautiful city, and the order in his private life, in which,

though everything was conducted with the most scrupulous economy, the

necessaries of life, and, in many cases, its luxuries, were always

to be found. In Florence we find no Roman and no Neapolitan in trade

and industry; but in both Naples and Rome, the principal business

was in the hands of the Florentines, whose gains were profitable to

their native city. Among these, in the fourteenth century, none was so

conspicuous as Niccolò Acciaiuoli, who became a great and influential

man at the court of Anjou, and lord of extensive possessions in Apulia

and Greece, but whose heart belonged to his native city, in the

neighbourhood of which he prepared his family vault. The heroic times

of the Farinata, Cavalcanti, and Donati were past; but the Florentine

of the later times combined the citizen and the great lord, the

merchant, statesman, and patron of art, in a harmonious whole, to a

degree never surpassed by the denizen of any other country.

CHAPTER V.

THE ALBIZZI AND COSIMO DE’ MEDICI.

COSIMO DE’ MEDICI was a man of mature age when his father died. Born

on September 27, 1389, the day of the saints Cosmo and Damian, he

was christened after the former; and a Florentine expression blended

veneration for the sacred martyrs with veneration for the ruling

family, who had chosen them as patrons: ‘Per San Cosmo e Damiano

ogni male fia lontana.’ His education was excellent; and, although

he was intended for a mercantile life, he studied the Latin language

thoroughly, and under the guidance of masters such as the grammarians

Niccolò of Arezzo,[52] and Roberto de’ Rossi, acquired a taste for

literature and science which remained with him, and even increased,

during the whole of his long life. He was, perhaps, twenty-four years

old when he married Contessina de’ Bardi. Her father, Alessandro, Count

of Vernio, belonged to a family which is of note among the Florentines

from the eleventh century; and from which the principal street on the

left bank of the Arno, between the old bridge and that of Sta. Maria

delle Grazie, derived its name. The Bardi were originally a plebeian

family, but were afterwards counted among the nobility. They, with

other nobles, had aided the people to break the tyranny of the Duke of

Athens, but were defeated a year later in valiant strife with the same

people, who would no longer suffer ‘the great’ to have any share in the

government, and set on fire the houses of those who had shortly before

fought beside them. Piero de’ Bardi, Contessina’s great-grandfather,

then withdrew to his castle of Vernio, situated in the Apennines to

the north of Prato, which had been purchased ten years before by

his brother from the Alberti, and recognised by the Emperor Charles

IV. as a fief held under him. The enmity between the castellans and

the Florentine people grew so violent, that Sozzo, Piero’s son, was

condemned by the commune _in contumaciam_ to death by fire, under the

seemingly false accusation of having coined false money in Vernio.[53]

Sozzo’s son was the father of Contessina, whose mother, Milla

Pannocchieschi, was descended from the ancient Sienese dynasty of the

Counts of Elci, which has lately become extinct. The name of Contessina

(Contessa, Tessa), which we so frequently meet with in earlier times

in Tuscany, calls to mind the great Countess Matilda, whose memory was

preserved by a grateful people. The enmity between the great and the

plebeians, though it still prevailed, and was used as a pretext when

the question of political rights arose, never at that time interfered

with family alliances.

We hear nothing of Cosimo till the time when Pope John XXIII., on his

eventful journey to the Council of Constance, halted in Florence.

The relations between the republic and the Pope were to be traced

from the time when the latter was all-powerful under his predecessor,

Alexander V., as Cardinal Baldassar Cossa. When John XXIII. called

upon the Florentines to send plenipotentiaries to Constance, and the

counsellors were undecided, Filippo Corsini observed that they must not

say ‘No’ to the Pope. He it was who had first originated the Council

of Pisa, through which the way had been paved to the new assembly, and

without his active assistance Florence would not have been able to

resist King Ladislaus. The Pope had been already in connection with

the Medici when he was legate of Bologna, and during his reign the

money matters of the Curia were chiefly in the hands of Giovanni di

Bicci. After John XXIII., yielding to King Sigismund’s urgency, had

consented to the Council of Constance, in spite of his disinclination

to a council on German soil, he was for a time in Florence, where he

resided in the convent degli Angeli of the Camalduli. It was here that

the Medici, with many respected citizens, visited him, and entered into

negotiations with him. Here, too, he addressed to Bartolommeo Valori,

in whom he had great confidence, upon his warning of the danger of

holding this council in a foreign country, the remarkable words: ‘I own

that this council is not to my advantage; but what can I do if my fate

compels me to it?’[54] When the Pope set out for the Lake of Constance

in the autumn of 1414, Cosimo de’ Medici was among his escort; not, as

has been supposed, overrating the position as an aid to him in his own

affairs, but simply to manage the money matters of the Holy See.

In these matters the Medici, who always remained true to John XXIII.,

were helpful to him even after his fall. On December 6, 1418, the

deposed and imprisoned Pope drew up a bond in the Castle of Heidelberg

for 38,500 Rhenish florins, which Giovanni de’ Medici and Niccolò

da Uzzano, with the consent of Pope Martin V., paid by a bill on

the Nuremberg house of Romel, as ransom to Duke Louis of Bavaria.

When, after many difficulties, the liberated man had by means of his

Florentine friends come to terms with his persecutor and obtained a

safe-conduct from him, the Medici received him in Florence, where they

undoubtedly aided in his reconciliation with Pope Martin. When the

afflicted man, who in his misfortunes assumed a far more dignified

attitude than formerly in the times of his greatness, made his last

will on December 22, 1419, he appointed Giovanni di Bicci and three

other distinguished Florentines as executors. That the first enriched

himself with the legacy was a calumny which has long been disproved,

for Baldassar Cossa left scarcely enough for his legatees to be

paid.[55] The beautiful monument which the Medici erected to the

deceased stands in the baptistery; the reclining figure was cast in

bronze by Donatello, and in the marble portions Michelozzo assisted.

‘Johannes quondam Papa XXIII.’ says the significant inscription.[56]

Their friendship with the late Pope did not prevent the Medici from

coming to a good understanding with the new one. The mark of favour to

Giovanni di Bicci already mentioned tells of friendly relations even

at a time when Martin V. was not well disposed towards the city, on

account of disagreeable occurrences during his residence in Florence

in 1420. We have seen how Cosimo accompanied John XXIII. to Constance,

where, in the words of a contemporary, the whole world was assembled.

On the flight of his patron he left the town in disguise, and resided

for some time in Germany and France, till he returned home after about

two years’ absence. In 1426, having been entrusted with embassies in

Milan, Lucca, and Bologna, he stayed for some months in Rome, employed

in State affairs at the time that the tedious strife with Filippo Maria

Visconti had, by the conquest of Brescia, taken a favourable turn for

the allied Florentines and Venetians; and it was important to persuade

the Pope to act as umpire, since all parties, and especially the

Florentines, longed for peace. This peace was actually signed at Venice

on December 30, the Bishop of Bologna, the excellent Niccolò Albergati,

representing Martin V.; and when the duke broke the treaty, which had

only just been concluded, new and heavy misfortunes in arms forced him

to appeal to the same mediation which he had so lately scorned. But it

was only in the spring of 1428 that terms were agreed upon advantageous

to Venice, which retained Brescia, but offered no compensation to

the Florentines for their enormous expenses, thus justifying the

prudence of old Giovanni di Bicci, who had counselled against the war.

In gratitude to the Pope for his support, the Florentines, in 1427,

bestowed the freedom of their city on his relations, the Colonna family.

At the death of his father, Cosimo was forty years old. In all

business, public as well as private, he had proved himself skilful,

active, and prudent. All who did not belong to the party which guided

affairs since 1380 regarded him as their natural leader. The number of

these opponents of the ruling faction was great, not only among the

people—in whom more or less indistinct hereditary traditions were

instinctively hostile to a government which had now existed for fifty

years, and which, though it originated with the people, had from the

first been tinctured with the character of an oligarchy—but also

among the higher classes, many of whom were considerably oppressed by

this faction. Giovanni di Bicci had always avoided appearing as the

actual head of a party, perhaps from prudence, perhaps also for fear of

exposing himself to the risk of catastrophes such as he had experienced

in his youth. It was to be proved whether his son shared this feeling,

and Cosimo’s behaviour hitherto implied that he did. It was a question,

however, whether the oligarchy would find it advisable to suffer a man

beside them whose reputation and wealth daily increased, and who, even

without wishing it, must be dangerous to them if misfortune or blunder

should arouse discontent. Since the death of Maso degli Albizzi, his

son Rinaldo, Niccolò da Uzzano, and Palla Strozzi stood at the head of

the party.

The Albizzi, who, as we have said, derived their origin from Arezzo,

were at first of the Ghibelline faction, and appeared in Florence

about the middle of the thirteenth century. They soon obtained repute

among the plebeian families. From 1282 ninety-eight of their family sat

in the magistracy of the priors, and fourteen attained to the office of

_Venner_ or Gonfalonier. Piero son of Filippo, the first Gonfalonier,

was he who in a short time raised the authority of his family above

that of all others. He led an active life at a time when the republic

claimed much of the time and pecuniary means of the principal citizens,

but in return afforded them opportunities of satisfying their ambition,

and attaining to a height of power which might become dangerous to the

commonwealth. He had repeatedly been charged with embassies to princes

and republics; had been present at coronations; concluded treaties,

among them those with the plundering mercenary bands, and with Bernabò

Visconti; had been sent with congratulatory messages, as in 1367, when

Pope Urban V., summoned by all the Italian patriots, returned from

Avignon to Rome, unfortunately only for a time. Jealousy of his rising

authority induced the heads of the Ricci, a rival family to his own,

and their friends, to propose the exclusion from office of all such

as were suspected of Guelphism. This measure was directed principally

against the Albizzi; but Piero, cleverer than his opponents, helped

to carry it through, while they had counted on his opposition. He

knew how to make use of them. In 1357, being chosen president of the

tribunal entrusted with this political inquisition of the Parte Guelfa,

it was he who, with his friends, began that proscription which united

all power in the city and government in his hands and those of his

adherents, but also created that unendurable condition of affairs

against which the rebellion of 1378 broke out. In the following year

Piero, banished at first from Florence, having returned to one of

his estates, fell a victim to the summary justice executed by the

aristocratic leaders of the mob. A false accusation brought him to the

scaffold; at a time when no law was respected, he paid the penalty of

having himself made the laws subservient to political ends.

The family retired into exile; their houses were plundered and burnt.

One of the branches, in a quarrel with relations, had discarded

the name and altered the coat of arms, and flourishes still under

the name of the Alessandri. The reaction of the year 1381 brought

the exiles back, and they were soon more powerful than ever. Maso

(Tommaso), Piero’s nephew, had been first banished to Barletta, on

the Apulian coast, and then made a ‘Grande,’ _i.e._ disqualified for

holding communal offices. He now attained almost dictatorial power,

and exercised it with political insight, and a consistency which

essentially aided in raising the republic to that height of power

and repute on which it remained thenceforward, and long after his

own faction was destroyed, till the revolution in Italian affairs at

the end of the fifteenth century. If he acted intolerantly in home

affairs; if proscriptions did not cease, and the prosecution of the

Alberti, who were concerned in the insurrection of 1378 and in the

execution of Piero degli Albizzi, showed cruelty in the enactment

which commanded their houses to be razed to the ground, their coats

of arms to be destroyed, and their property confiscated; a law that

punished alliances by marriage and commercial transactions with them,

extended even to their posterity;[57] it is less the fault of the man

than of the spirit which had prevailed in the republics for centuries,

and which led even the most discerning to make the commonwealth ever

subservient to party policy, and to look upon their own faction as

the State. Embassies to Gian Galeazzo Visconti, to King Rupert of

the Palatinate, Pope Gregory XII., &c., alternated for Maso with a

continuous series of the most important offices. Even when he was out

of office, nothing was done without him. When the republic manfully

resisted the progress of Gian Galeazzo in Central Italy, enlarged and

secured her own territory by the conquest of Pisa, actively contributed

to ecclesiastical union, and brought the dangerous war with King

Ladislaus to a successful end, it was all really due to Albizzi. He was

a rich man; the street outside the oldest district of the town, still

named after his family, was almost entirely occupied by their houses

and those of the Pazzi; and in our time, the palace belonging to his

descendants, as well as that of the Alessandri, the half-ruined tower,

the walled-up loggia, the passage to the market of San Piero, with the

portico of the demolished church built by a descendant of Maso, remind

us of the brilliant days of the family, whose coat of arms is still

to be seen on the buildings—two concentric golden circles on a black

field, and above it on a silver field the cross of the German order

granted to Maso. In the lower valley of the Arno, on the right bank of

the river, where a low range of hills stretches between the Lake of

Bientina, reaching to the foot of the mountains of Pisa, and the green

level of the marshes of Fucecchio, lies the large Villa Montefalcone,

which came into the possession of the family in the second half of the

fourteenth century. It was formerly a castle (destroyed by Castruccio)

with a splendid view over the valley, strewn with villages lying mostly

on low hills, and the beautiful wooded heights of Monte Albano, behind

which the fertile Pistojan plain joined the Florentine valley of the

Arno, which, while more varied, rivalled it in fertility.

Maso degli Albizzi died in 1417, aged seventy-four. His eldest son,

Rinaldo, was the heir to his position in the Senate. He was a boy

eight years of age when his relations fell in the tumult of Ciompi,

had grown up in the traditions of his house, and from the year 1399

was active in affairs of State. No citizen was employed so much as

he in embassies and commissions of all kinds. We meet with him in

great and small matters; for the statesmen of the free city as little

thought of declining small matters, as the greatest artists thought it

beneath their dignity to paint shields and domestic implements, or to

carve coats of arms on door-posts and chimney-pieces. Fifty different

commissions were entrusted to Rinaldo, some in the vicinity, and some

to the Popes, King Sigismund, to Naples, Lombardy, Genoa, Ferrara,

Romagna, &c. The hard-working man left careful and detailed notes of

all, which, with the documents and letters relating thereto, he first

collected in 1423, and afterwards continued. They are models of a

natural, pure, perspicuous, and always appropriate diction, at a time

when the Tuscan dialect was threatened with an overgrowth of learned

affectation and distortion, and was losing its popular simplicity.

These notes are a source of the amplest knowledge of details for any

one who earnestly studies the history of this period, remarkable in

so many ways.[58] While he was so frequently employed in foreign

service—for the year before his exile we find him at Rome—his

opponents laboured at home for his ruin. It is as if Gino Capponi,

Neri’s son, had thought of him when he wrote the advice intended for

his son: ‘He who wishes for a great position in his native city, should

not leave it too often, except in important cases.’ ‘Messer Rinaldo,’

says Giovanni Cavalcanti, a contemporary and adherent of the Medici,

‘knew not what fear is. He had clean hands, was well read in the

sciences, was full of perseverance and love of justice, so that the

multitude accused him of being hard and cruel. He lived only on simple

fare, and hated feastings, and was accustomed to say that he who wished

to keep in health must be no gormandizer; which his enemies interpreted

as meanness. Would to God that we could not have said of this man that

he was proud! for else he would have excelled many others in good

qualities. But his pride clouded his own virtues, and misjudged those

of others.’[59]

Beside the two Albizzi, none exercised greater influence in the

guidance of affairs in the half-century of the oligarchy than Niccolò

da Uzzano. The name of the family, extinct in the second half of

the seventeenth century, was Miglioretti; but they were generally

named after a little castle, now a gentleman’s villa, lying south of

Florence, in the Greve valley, the environs of which are renowned for

their excellent wine. The Da Uzzano appeared first in Florence in the

days of the Emperor Henry VII. Niccolò, the son of Giovanni and Lena

de’ Bardi, born about the middle of the fourteenth century, represented

the moderate principle in the ruling party, as Giovanni di Bicci did

among the opposition. He wished for an oligarchy, but did not desire

the supremacy of a single family. As long as he lived, a restraint was

laid upon the Albizzi; nay, he was even reported to have said, that,

if he must live to see one stand at the head of affairs, he would

sooner endure Cosimo than Rinaldo. For he feared the violent ambition

of the latter more than the crafty calculation of his rival, and said

of Rinaldo, that he would see no citizen by his side, but all beneath

him, and did not think so much of destroying the Medici as of acquiring

unlimited authority over his own party.[60] Niccolò did not, however,

trust to its unity, and sought, therefore, to hold and preserve matters

equally balanced. His repute was so high, that the faction was indeed

named after him, and his beneficence equalled his wealth. In the Via

de’ Bardi we still see the great palace which he is said to have had

built by the painter Bicci di Lorenzo, and which, as he had no sons,

passed with his daughter Ginevra to a branch of the Capponi, which

still possesses it.[61] The severe unadorned façade of Opus rusticum

still represents the simplicity of the time, which was soon replaced

by the greater richness of form of the Medicean epoch; and his statue

in marble, said to be a work of Donatello’s, is still shown in the

house; whereas another likeness, painted by Masaccio, and once in one

of the houses of the Corsican,[62] is said to have disappeared.

But Niccolò wished to leave his native town a memorial of his

affection, and began building a lyceum for young men after a design by

the same Bicci. By his last will he left a considerable sum invested in

the national funds for completing the work and endowing lectureships;

but the State expended the money for other purposes, and in the present

day only the name of the broad Via della Sapienza, leading from the

Piazza di San Marco to the Annunziata, reminds us of Niccolò da

Uzzano’s patriotic intention. ‘He who wishes to be of use to the world,

and to found of himself an honourable memory,’ remarks Giorgio Vasari,

‘must work himself as long as he lives, and not trust to posterity and

heirs.’

Palla Strozzi was not made for the strife of factions; his heart

belonged to study. ‘Messer Leonardo of Arezzo,’ remarks the Florentine

bookseller Vespasiano da Bisticci,[63] ‘who has left us a whole

gallery of interesting portraits of remarkable and meritorious men,

used to say of him, that he was the happiest man he had known; for he

possessed all that is requisite for human happiness, in intellectual

as well as physical gifts. He was very useful to his native city, and

obtained all the honours in the home and foreign administration which

could be granted to a citizen. As ambassador he received honourable

commissions, and, at the same time, always promoted the welfare of his

country. With these gifts he united the strictest sense of honour, and

was personally the most cultivated and respected burgher of the city.

His modesty extended from his private life to his public position. He

sought to avoid envy as much as he could, well knowing what harm is

wrought by it to the commonwealth, and how it pursues deserving men.

He did not like to be seen in public; he never appeared on the square

of the Signoria, or the new market-place, except when he was summoned

thither. If he went to the Piazza, he took the way past Sta. Trinità,

through the Borgo Sant’Apostolo, stayed there only a short time, and

then repaired to the palace. He was sparing of time, never wandered

about the streets and squares, and scarcely had he arrived at home than

he studied Greek and Latin, and lost not an hour.’ He was a rich man.

In the registers of 1427 he opened the list of the tax-payers with a

sum exceeding the valuation of Giovanni di Bicci by more than a fifth.

A great part of his income he employed in the purchase of manuscripts

and for scientific purposes. The origin of his family is unknown: the

name occurs towards the end of the thirteenth century. That the Strozzi

were Guelphs and plebeians is shown by their whole position; that they

were popular, we see from the circumstance that the names of more than

a hundred of their family occur among the priors of the corporations,

while not less than sixteen attained the office of Venner. Their

wealth increased rapidly, as did the branches into which they were

divided, and in the territory they possessed lands and castles. One of

them, Tommaso, was among those of higher rank who turned the popular

insurrection of 1378 to their own purposes, and had to esteem himself

fortunate in escaping the victorious reaction by a flight to Mantua,

where he founded a branch of his family, which is still flourishing.

Onofrio (Noferi), Palla’s father, who had died in 1417, seventy-two

years old, was one of the most respected men of the republic. He was

twice elected Gonfaloniere, and, beside other offices, he filled that

of superintendent of the Mint; while embassies led him to the Popes

Gregory XII. and Alexander V., when Florence tried her best to restore

unity in the Church. It was he who determined on building the beautiful

chapel in Sta. Trinità which now serves as sacristy, a building which

was completed by his son, and the exterior of which is adorned with the

three crescents, the arms of the Strozzi. The epoch of their greatest

brilliancy had not yet begun, but they were approaching it rapidly.

As long as the different elements which formed the political parties

held the balance of power, peace remained intact at home. The city

had never been so rich or so splendid, trade and industry never so

flourishing as then; the great burghers had never shown more lively

common feeling, or created more beautiful public works, or devoted more

helpful interest to science. It was felt that any inconsiderate step,

from whatever side it might come, would disturb this peace; but it was

this very consciousness of responsibility which enforced prudence.

Niccolò da Uzzano used to say that he who summoned a parliament—_i.e._

who would bring about any decided change in the existing state of

things—would dig his own grave.[64] Many respected burghers shared his

views. It was natural however that an event should at last occur to

cause open discontent in the city, and a more hostile position of the

parties. The conquest of Pisa had not satisfied Florentine ambition;

Lucca, with which Florence had so often quarrelled, remained a thorn in

her side. When, a hundred and twenty six years after the time of which

we are treating, Giorgio Vasari was employed in painting the great

hall in the former palace of the Signoria with representations from

the history of Florentine conquests, he was visited by the Lucchese

ambassador at his work, and on his question, what he intended to

portray on the remaining space, gave the bold answer, ‘The conquest of

Lucca.’ This is only an insolent expression of the popular wish. In the

Milanese war, Lucca, where, for nearly thirty years, a citizen, Paolo

Guinigi, had ruled with almost absolute power, had taken sides for

the Visconti, and thereby certainly placed Florence in some danger.

Rinaldo degli Albizzi stood at the head of those who demanded that

their neighbours should be chastised. But division arose in his own

party; Niccolò da Uzzano, Palla Strozzi, Agnolo Pandolfini, and others,

opposed him. The attitude of Cosimo de’ Medici was ambiguous. The

reproach of having agreed to the plan of war in order to ruin the hopes

of his rival, cleaves to him in spite of its being contradicted.[65]

The war party, supported by Neri Capponi, one of the most influential

burghers, and son of him who had taken Pisa, prevailed. In the Council

the opponents were scarcely allowed to speak; a pretext was easily

found, and the determination was taken at the end of 1429. Rinaldo

degli Albizzi undertook the guidance of affairs as Commissary of the

Republic, with extensive authority.

It was an undertaking as unsuccessful as it was unjust, notwithstanding

the guilt of the Lucchese. The Florentines accomplished nothing from

a military point of view; their great architect, Filippo Brunellesco,

forfeited his fame as an engineer; the land was as cruelly as uselessly

desolated; and the Duke of Milan was drawn into the war. Venice, Genoa,

even Siena, took sides for or against; and after the leadership of

Guinigi, by no means to the advantage of the Lucchese, had been lost by

it, a peace was concluded in April, 1433, which was to restore every

one his own—in what condition no one ventured to ask. The unsuccessful

campaign had already caused much disturbance in Florence from the

beginning, and given abundant material for evil speaking. Rinaldo degli

Albizzi had returned from the camp without leave of absence: he was

accused of having acted as a trader, and employed rations and booty for

his villa of Montefalcone. His successor, Messer Giovanni Guicciardini,

did not fare much better; the least offence he was accused of was, that

he had sold the bread intended for the camp to the Lucchese.[66] Every

one was in an ill-humour and at enmity when the costly and fruitless

war was ended. Rinaldo could not conceal from himself the fact that his

authority had suffered a dangerous blow. He thought to re-establish it

more firmly by drawing the reins tighter. The one man of his party who

had always dissuaded him most decidedly from this was no more: Niccolò

da Uzzano had died during the war, in 1432. The void created by his

death was soon visible to all.

The bitter enmity between Cosimo and Rinaldo seems first to have arisen

at this time, for the two men do not appear to have been personal

opponents till then. In the autumn of 1430 Cosimo had repaired to

Verona on account of a sickness prevailing in Florence; at Ostiglia,

on the Po, he heard of the loss suffered before Lucca. Appointed with

Francesco Tornabuoni as ambassador at Venice, he had, on what grounds

is unknown, declined the commission, but had gone, in March 1432,

with Palla Strozzi to Ferrara, to make an agreement with Milan in the

affair of Lucca, which, however, as we have said, was not carried out

till a year later.[67] What had kindled such irreconcilable hatred

between Rinaldo and Cosimo—who, hitherto, whatever might be their

private feelings, had frequently worked together—is not known. The

rival party reproached both Cosimo and his brother Lorenzo, who had

for some time resided at Milan as Florentine ambassador, with having

taken part in intrigues against the State, in order to prolong the

war. But accusations of this kind usually rest on one-sided testimony,

and it is much more likely that both the Medici quietly waited for a

change at home, which public discontent, and the loss of reputation

to the reigning party in consequence of the failure in war, seemed to

announce. Cosimo did not deceive himself respecting the prevailing

opinion against him. He kept himself aloof from the eminent men of the

ruling faction, and appeared seldom in the palace; but it availed him

little, for it was said he wished to lull the suspicions of the rulers,

and his relations to the lower orders, which he could not, and perhaps

would not, conceal, were made out a crime. The large loans which at

different times he had been making to the public finances, as well as

those to private citizens for whom he procured access to office by

paying their arrears of taxes, had made him a popular favourite, but at

the same time had increased the number of his political adversaries. It

became more and more plain that things could not remain as they were.

Rinaldo had tried, through Niccolò Barbadore, to persuade Niccolò da

Uzzano to mediate shortly before his death, but had been repulsed.

He now determined to act. He could reckon all the more on support

because Cosimo, if he relied on popular favour, was suspected by the

decided Guelphs from his connections with the old nobility—being

a brother-in-law of the Bardi and Pannocchieschi, and through his

brother Lorenzo related to the Cavalcanti and Malaspina, families of

the Lunigiana; while he was united by friendship to the Buondelmonti

and other nobles. Rinaldo had attempted to secure the consent of many

partisans to violent measures against Cosimo and his adherents, when

the election of a Signoria decidedly favourable to his plans, which

entered on office with the gonfaloniere Bernardo Guadagni on September

1, 1433, seemed to offer the favourable moment. Bernardo Guadagni

belonged to a distinguished family, the name of which occurs in various

offices since the beginning of the thirteenth century; he was opposed

to the Albizzi in the political movements of 1378, but afterwards

became attached to them. Bernardo had not been eligible because he owed

taxes, but Rinaldo cancelled the debt, and made him his tool.[68]

On September 7 Cosimo de’ Medici was summoned before the Signoria.[69]

He had been at his villa in Mugello, from whence he was recalled to

town under the pretext that his counsel was desired, and he was in

fact appointed a member of a commission (_pratica_) for affairs of

the commonwealth. As he passed the Or San Michele, Alamanno Salviati

warned him that evil was intended, but he replied that he must obey

the Signoria. Arrived at the palace, he was confined as a prisoner

in a chamber of the upper storey called _La Berberia_. The principal

accusation concerned treasonable machinations in the Lucchese war. That

his life was aimed at is scarcely to be supposed, though certainly

possible: that the prisoner feared it, is certain. The waves of party

feeling ran so high, tongues were so sharp, and even the assemblies

held in churches, ostensibly for purposes of Divine worship, were so

openly employed for political ends, and for manœuvring against the

Government, that it was not difficult by inquisitorial proceedings

to justify the severest measures. The city was in the power of the

opponents of the Medici; Lorenzo, his brother, who was in the country,

seems to have tried in vain to bring about a rising. Niccolò da

Tolentino, the general of the Republic, and a friend of Cosimo’s, rode

with a squadron from Pisa to the village of Lastra, on the Arno, seven

miles from the city, but hesitated to proceed farther, and declared

that he appeared in support of the public peace. It was an anxious time

of suspense.

The Signoria summoned the people to a parliament on the Piazza,

surrounded by armed friends of the Albizzi. The result at first was

favourable; but when the newly-appointed Balia had to decide on

Cosimo’s fate, the differences of opinion showed themselves. The

prisoner had found means to employ his money, and had bribed the

Gonfaloniere, among others, with 1,000 gold florins. He has himself

remarked that the people did not understand their own advantages; if

they had wished for 10,000 gold florins, he would have paid the sum

to save himself from the danger. There was no lack of representations

of many kinds, even from foreign countries. The end was, that all the

Medici, with the exception of Vieri’s descendants, were excluded from

office. Cosimo was banished on September 29 to Padua for ten years,

his brother for five years to Venice, and others of the family to

Naples, Rimini, Ancona, and other towns. On the evening of October 3,

as Ormanno degli Albizzi held the Piazza, guarded with his people,

and an attack upon Cosimo was feared if the latter left his prison

in the palace, the Gonfaloniere caused him, after the penalty had

been announced to him, to be brought into his own lodgings under a

safe-guard. Here he partook of some supper, left the city by the Porta

San Gallo, and rode through Pistoja to the village of Cutigliano,

on the road leading over the Apennines to Modena, where he arrived

on October 4, the day of St. Francis d’Assisi. ‘On the 11th,’ so he

relates, ‘I reached Venice, where many nobles with Lorenzo came to

meet me, and I was not received like an exile, but as an ambassador.

On the following day I visited the Signoria, to thank them for their

influential mediation in my favour. The Signoria received me with

kindness and honour, expressed regret at what had happened to me,

offered residence and money supplies to whatever extent I wished. Many

nobles came to visit me. On the 13th I repaired to Padua, as I had been

enjoined, accompanied by Messer Jacopo Donato, who placed his beautiful

house, provided with everything, at my disposal.’

While Cosimo de’ Medici thus resided, partly in Padua and partly

in Venice, where he was allowed to go, honoured and loved for his

well-calculated liberality, in personal connection with some of his

friends and in correspondence with others, affairs in Florence rapidly

approached another crisis. Other banishments had followed: that of the

brothers Pucci, the eldest of whom, Puccio, was one of the most eager

adherents of Cosimo, and one who had circulated the gold florins of his

patron, when in prison, most skilfully; and Agnolo Acciaiuoli, whose

correspondence with the exiles had been discovered. The fortune of war,

already unfavourable to the Albizzi, now entirely forsook them. When

new quarrels broke out in the Romagna between the Florentines and the

Duke of Milan, the former were defeated. The excitement in the city

increased to an alarming degree. Rinaldo soon perceived that he was no

longer master of the situation. When, towards the end of August 1434,

came the election of the Signoria, who were to take office on September

1, Rinaldo perceived that he must use force if he would prevent his

enemy’s return. When neither the attempt to force new elections nor

the endeavours to attract the old nobility succeeded, and the new

Signoria expressed itself without reserve in favour of the Medici,

while representations on the other side were useless, the Albizzi

began to arm their followers, and to draw a number of discharged

warriors to their service, in the hope of having the majority of the

city with them, and dictating the law to the highest magistrate. But

they calculated wrongly; even the heads of their own party, like Palla

Strozzi and Giovanni Guicciardini, did not all flock to them. The city

remained divided.

At the news of the warlike preparations which threatened them, and

relying upon the support of the majority of the people, the Signoria

determined to be beforehand with their opponents. On September 26,

they caused the Piazza to be lined with armed men, and invited Rinaldo

and some of his most eminent friends to appear before them; when,

however, instead of obeying, the latter came to Sant’Apollinare, and

advanced to the Piazza, with more than 600 men, the gates of the palace

were hastily closed. Had the assailants proceeded vigorously, their

cause would have prevailed—at least for the moment; but instead of

advancing, they condescended to bargain, and then they were lost. While

Ridolfo Peruzzi, one of the leaders of the party, was parleying in the

palace with the Signori, who did not spare fair words, Rinaldo allowed

himself to be persuaded to repair to the convent Sta. Maria Novella, to

Pope Eugene IV., who, having fled before the insurrectionary Romanists,

had reached Florence not long before, and now wished to play the

peace-maker. As the adherents and people of Albizzi in vain awaited

their leader, whom the Pope delayed with long speeches, the crowd

dispersed, some going here, some there. The Signori gathered courage

as they saw the crowd of opponents diminish, and ordered the alarm to

be rung. Armed burghers hastened from all sides, and country people

flocked into the city.[70] Messer Bartolommeo Orlandini caused the

entrances to the Piazza to be guarded: Papi di Medici came at the head

of the peasants. The Signori appeared on the balcony of the palace,

and summoned the people to a parley. About three hundred and fifty

voices gave the Signoria full power to appoint a Balia, after the usual

manner, to proceed to urgent measures. With the Pope it was easy to

come to an agreement by means of his confidant, Giovanni Vitelleschi,

then Bishop of Recanati, the same whom Rinaldo had withheld from

advancing. The revolution had succeeded without bloodshed. The speedily

chosen extraordinary commission, more numerous than any before,

conjointly with the colleges, recalled with one voice, Cosimo and his

companions from banishment, into which they sent Rinaldo degli Albizzi,

and with him more than seventy of his most distinguished partizans.

‘Oh, Pope Eugenius,’ said the knight to him, who now sought to console

him with words, as he had before put him off with words, ‘I am not

surprised at the destiny which befalls me, but I blame myself for

having trusted to the promises of one who could not help himself; for

he who is powerless in his own affairs cannot help others.’ Rinaldo

degli Albizzi never saw his home again.

Cosimo de’ Medici had set out from Venice, September 26, accompanied by

his brother, on the news of the first favourable events in Florence.

On October 1 they learned the victory of their party; on the 5th they

reached the territory of the Republic—on the same date, and at the

same spot in the Pistojan mountains, where they had quitted it. ‘I have

noted this,’ he observes in his ‘Ricordi’ above mentioned, ‘because at

our expulsion several good and devoted persons said not a year would

pass before we should again be in Florence. On the way several burghers

met us, and in Pistoja the whole population flocked out of the gates to

see us so armed. We did not enter the city. On the 6th we dined at our

villa at Careggi, where a number of people had assembled. The Signori

informed us that we should not enter Florence till they had sent us

word. This happened after sunset, and we set out with a numerous

escort. As it was expected that we would repair to our house, the whole

street was filled with men and women. Lorenzo and I, accompanied by a

servant, rode, however, along the wall, and so we passed the Santissima

Annunziata and the back of the cathedral, the palace of the Podestà

and that of the executors, to the palace of the Signoria, almost

without being observed, for every one was in the Via Larga and at our

house. The Signori had arranged it so in order to avoid excitement.

They received us kindly, and I thanked them as was fitting, and at

their wish we remained with them. We heard that, before our arrival,

Messer Rinaldo and Ormanno his son, Ridolfo Peruzzi, and several other

citizens, had been banished. The city was quiet, but, nevertheless, for

security, the square and palace were guarded by a number of armed men.’

Florence had now a master. On January 1, 1435, Cosimo de’ Medici

entered upon office as Gonfaloniere.

In an early work, unfortunately incomplete, and unknown till a few

years ago, which relates the history of Florence from the return of

Cosimo de’ Medici to the League of Cambray, Francesco Guicciardini[71]

thus condenses his views on the government of the Albizzi: ‘After

various disorders, a firm order of government was at last introduced

by Parliament in 1393,[72] when Maso degli Albizzi held the office of

Gonfaloniere. He, in order to avenge his uncle Piero, expelled almost

all the Alberti, and the government remained in the hands of clever

and sensible men, who conducted it in great harmony and safety till

towards the year 1420. One cannot be astonished at this, for the people

were so tired of the preceding disturbances that, when an orderly state

of things began, every one adapted himself gladly to it. At this time

it was plainly shown how great the power of our city is when unity

prevails in her. For twelve years she maintained the war against Gian

Galeazzo with infinite expense, and with Italian or foreign armies,

for they often summoned a duke of Bavaria, a count of Armagnac, or a

King Rupert over the Alps, to their aid. Scarcely was this war at an

end, and, as was thought, the city exhausted and without means for some

time, when she began the undertaking against Pisa which cost heavy

sums in buying as well as in the siege. Then followed the war with

King Ladislaus, in which she not only defended herself bravely, but

also gained Cortona, though certainly at a heavy price. In short, the

city attained such important success, preserved her freedom under the

guidance of capable and honest men, warded off powerful enemies and

enlarged her territory so considerably, that it was rightly said to be

the wisest, most glorious, and successful government which Florence

had ever had. The years from 1420 to 1434 were occupied with the war

against Duke Filippo Maria, and the division of the city into two

parties. At the head of one stood Niccolò da Uzzano, a man respected

by all as wise and a lover of freedom; at the head of the other,

Giovanni di Bicci de’ Medici, and then his son Cosimo. Disunion and

various excitements were introduced by the year 1433, after Niccolò had

departed this life—first, Cosimo’s exile, then his return and the fall

of his opponents; and as both changes, that of 1433 as well as of 1434,

were brought about by the Signoria which entered on office on September

1 (it was usually elected on the day of the decapitation of St. John,

August 29), it was decreed that the drawing of the lots should no

longer take place on this day, but on the preceding, as has happened

since, with the exception of a few years at the time of Fra Girolamo

Savonarola.’

When the government of the Albizzi came to an end, the domain of the

Republic had, with the exception of some smaller territories and

villages in the mountainous regions of the Casentino and the valley of

the Tiber, attained pretty nearly the same extent which she preserved

up to the union of the Sienese State with that of Florence, and the

consequent formation of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany. The enlargement

of this territory had proceeded of course gradually, but constantly.

Dante Alighieri says once it would have been far better for Florence

had the inhabitants of Campi, Figline, and Certaldo remained her

neighbours, instead of becoming her fellow-citizens, and corrupting the

pure Latin blood of her old families. Two centuries after the writer

of the ‘Divina Commedia,’ the most famous statesman of modern Italy

expressed pretty nearly the same opinions. ‘Venice and Florence’—such

are Niccolò Machiavelli’s words in his reflections on the first ten

books of Titus Livius—‘were far weaker when the first had attained

the supremacy over Lombardy the latter over Tuscany, than when Venice

was content with the sea and Florence with six miles of territory.’

The increase of subjects by the absorption of other communities is

certainly of small advantage: when it once exceeds due measure it is

ruinous. While it cannot contribute to the strength of warlike States,

it has a most hurtful influence on unwarlike ones, of which the Italian

republics give evidence: an opinion which would sound paradoxical

if we did not consider that he who expressed it had before his eyes

the spectacle of a State, without unity in itself, consisting of the

most different elements, united only by an outward bond, whose laws,

founded on systematic oppression of the nobles, appeared to him as the

reason of its evident helplessness in the second half of the fourteenth

century.

With the aid of many hundreds of documents in the Tuscan archives[73]

we can closely follow the history of the growth of the Florentine

territory, as it increased in all directions above the valley of the

Arno, often with difficulty and with the most violent struggles, beyond

Prato, Pistoja, on the shore of the Mediterranean towards Leghorn,

through the Elsa and Chiana valley, where the conflicts took place with

Siena, beyond Arezzo; finally, by way of Cortona, to the upper valley

of the Tiber, and towards the Umbrian frontier, as along the Apennines

to that of Romagna, including, on the other side, Volterra and the

long-contested Pisa. The forms under which the villages and territories

were annexed were very various. First of these, was the submission

(_submissio_), a result generally of war, but which sometimes was

brought about by compacts with other commonwealths and rulers, and

at times occurred spontaneously. The submitting commune assembled in

such case a parliament to appoint a syndicus, who repaired to Florence

to settle affairs with the Signoria, after which the Chapter was

consulted, and a commissary of the Republic was sent to the place in

question to receive homage, and complete the so-called act of taking

bodily possession. These things were very simple in small communes.

They expressed to the Signoria by their syndics and procurators the

hope that they might be well governed by them, and live in peace;

promised faith and obedience—appointing a fine in case of a breach

of this promise; received a podestà and judge from Florence; retained

free choice of their presidents from their own citizens; stipulated

conditions in respect to markets, customs, weights and measures,

etc., as well as observance of their own statutes, such as even the

smallest communes possessed. For if, with the decline of the imperial

power towards the time of the Swabian emperors, the legal power once

pertaining to the empire might be considered as having passed actually

to princes and commonwealths, the case now occurred that princes and

larger towns claimed the former rights of the empire over little

towns, which defended themselves as far as they could by reservations.

In such cases the statute of the chief town represented towards the

subject communes the common law, to which there was an appeal from

the separate municipal statutes where appeal to the Roman law was not

stipulated. After the subjection of Pisa, the Pisan statutes remained

valid for all the dependencies of this town; but in Florence such

dependencies had always a hearing if they appealed to the Florentine

statute law. But where there was a special fortress in the stipulating

place (Rocca, Cassero), the garrisoning of it was decided by the ruling

commune.

The different conditions are as different as the nature of the

community was varied. Larger cities naturally made their importance

felt. A whole series of treaties were concluded with Pistoja, beginning

with the peace made after the death of Castruccio Castracane on May

11, 1329, at the time of the confusion caused by Louis the Bavarian’s

Roman expedition. In the summer of 1331 the Florentine Signoria

received full powers for a year for ‘the security of freedom’ and

the government of city and territory. These temporary powers were

repeatedly prolonged: commissions of Florentine citizens were appointed

for the revision of statutes; the powers of the sovereign Signoria, and

those of the magistrates of the subject town, were carefully limited

in such a way that the actual decision in local government remained

to the latter, which limited the supreme government. Volterra, which

acknowledged the supremacy of the Duke of Athens, but had asserted its

own independence after his fall, preserved it nominally up to the end

of the fourteenth century; but the Republic of Florence had attained to

such extensive rights that scarcely more independence remained to the

commune than to subject States, especially after a rebellion excited

by the introduction of the _Cadastre_ had ended to the disadvantage of

the people of Volterra. As can easily be understood, quite peculiar

circumstances followed, when places were obtained through agreement

with foreign powers. By the repeated interference of the Neapolitan

Angevin princes in Tuscan affairs, and the increasing military weakness

of the communes, this occurred only too frequently. Prato, in the

midst of the wars of the Ghibellines and Guelphs, in the times of the

emperors of the houses of Bavaria and Luxembourg, powerless to protect

itself, had acknowledged King Robert of Naples as its Signore in 1313,

and remained under the rule of Neapolitan viceroys till Robert’s

granddaughter Johanna gave up the town to the Republic of Florence, in

the year 1350, for the sum of 13,500 gold florins, which a citizen of

Florence, Francesco Rinuccini, advanced without interest. Florence thus

succeeded to the king’s rights, and appointed the superior officers,

while the town retained her own municipal government. It had happened

most strangely of all with Arezzo. Unable to assert herself against the

superior powers of the Guelphs, she had acknowledged the supremacy of

Florence in 1337, and while retaining her own territories, statutes,

and privileges, received only the higher magistrates, Podestà and

Capitano, from Florence, to whom she promised fidelity and assistance

in peace and war. The oppressions, and especially the building of

fortresses, by which the ruling community here, as elsewhere, sought to

secure itself, went so far, that when, after the fall of the Duke of

Athens, the majority of the larger towns revolted from Florence, Arezzo

also regained her independence, which she preserved till 1380, when

she fell into the power of Duke Charles of Durazzo, in his expedition

against Queen Johanna. Four years later the town was taken by the

French army under Duke Louis of Anjou, marching to the assistance of

the queen; and the commander, Enguerraud de Coney, sold it four years

afterwards to the Florentines for 50,000 gold florins.

But there were other political connections beside that of subjection.

The Accomandigia, or assumption of a protectorate, was an act, more

or less solemn, by which a possession, either of the Church or the

commune, was recommended to protection, that might extend to the

person of the possessor, who was then called _Raccomandato_. It was

a very old connection, which united Florence with other communes, as

for instance with Siena. As in the earliest times of the commonwealth,

the distinguished family of the Buondelmonti recommended their castle,

Montebuoni, to the Florentine bishop for protection, so did numerous

and powerful lords of the commune recommend themselves afterwards. A

kind of homage was always combined with the Accomandigia; it usually

consisted of a pallium or banner of brocade or gold and silver cloth,

presented on St. John’s day. Those recommended for protection promised

to be friendly to the commune, to assist it at its summons in its

feuds, to share friendship and enmity with it, to grant free passage

through their territories, not to hinder the transport of provisions

and merchandise, and to grant refuge to none who had been banished by

the commune. The commune, on the other hand, allowed the _Raccomandati_

law of arms on their own territory, promised defence or compensation

for loss, and empowered the planting of the Florentine banner on

their castles. The second half of the fourteenth century and the

first of the following were exceedingly rich in such Accomandigie,

because the smaller landowners felt themselves more and more weakened

and threatened in their independence, in consequence of the great

diminution of the number of independent communes, and thereby the

accession of power to those still remaining, as Florence, Siena, and

Lucca. Florence had begun by drawing the nobles in the nearer vicinity

of the Arno valley into such a connection with herself, and also to

absorb the smaller communes. Then the Accomandigia expanded more and

more, till all the great noble families, so to say, for the most part

originally free, imperial and Ghibellines, had lost their independence

in the higher sense of the word. At last the turn came to others, even

distant, where the relation of protection was essentially altered, as

with the Grimaldi of Monaco, the Genoese Campofregoso, the Appiani of

Piombino, the Marchese of Monte Sta. Maria, the numerous Malaspine,

who resided at their imperial fiefs in the Lunigiana, but naturally

looked more to Florence and Genoa, to the Visconti and the Esti, than

to the empire. Even Roman barons entered into connections of this kind.

In 1395 the Colonna of Palestrina placed themselves, with all their

castles, for five years under the protection of the Republic, whose

service they entered. The Orsini of Savona whose relations, the Counts

of Pitigliano, stood in the same relation to Siena, had preceded them.

More important for Florence was the protection of many dynasties of

Romagna and Umbria, of which we shall speak farther on. With regard

to the landowners settled in Tuscany, if we except a few independent

imperial vassals, who remained so up to the French time, the Counts

Bardi of Vernio and Barbolani of Montanto, as well as the Macchesi of

Monte Sta. Maria (Bourbon de Monte), whom we have just mentioned, the

Accomandigia led to their subjection. In the States of the Church the

Papal sovereignty prevailed, as might be expected.

CHAPTER VI.

SUPREMACY OF COSIMO DE’ MEDICI UP TO LUCA PITTI’S REFORM OF THE

ADMINISTRATION.

THE time at which Cosimo de’ Medici attained to a position in his

native town, such as a citizen had never yet held, promised neither

rest nor peace to Italy.

We have already mentioned how, in the decisive crisis when Rinaldo

degli Albizzi sought to carry the citizens along with him, and to

destroy the Medicean party with one blow, Pope Eugenius IV. was

a fugitive in the same convent of Sta. Maria Novella which his

predecessor had inhabited on his way from Constance to Rome. Martin

V. had died February 20, 1431, at the moment when the war of the

Florentines with the Duke of Milan had brought the armies of the

latter over the Apennines. His successor, descended from a Venetian

family, did not understand how to preserve the quiet which Martin’s

skill and policy had established. While he fell into disputes with

the relations of the latter, the Colonna—disputes which threatened

the city of Rome itself—the eventful complication began with the

council opened at Basle on July 23rd of the same year, which was to

complete the reform of the Church, which the Council of Constance had

not thoroughly effected. Eugenius had united with Florence and Venice

in order to overthrow the Colonna family, but had thereby embittered

Filippo Maria Visconti, who now, when the violent strife raged between

Pope and Council, ranged himself on the side of the latter, and in May,

1434, even assisted to excite a revolt in Rome, which forced the Pope

to fly. In the autumn of the same year, although the Pope saw the city

of Rome return to its allegiance, he still lingered on in Florence, at

strife with the Council, which was pursuing the policy of striving to

diminish the authority of the head of the Church, while the surrounding

country was desolated by the Duke’s mercenaries, till the Pope at

last succeeded in coming to terms with his oppressor. Meanwhile, the

intrigues began at Naples which for a century were the curse of that

country, and finally of all Italy. The last of the Anjous, Ladislaus’

sister, Johanna II., died on February 2, 1435, and left to the country,

in consequence of her fickleness, a contest for the throne between

Renè, Count of Provence, and Alfonso of Aragon, King of Sicily,

whom she had successively adopted as sons, while the Pope showed an

inclination to claim Naples as a relapsed fief of the Church. Alfonso,

defeated and taken prisoner at the Ponza Islands by the Genoese,

allied with Renè, was restored to liberty by Filippo Maria Visconti,

then ruler over the Sigurian harbour, but this generosity was regarded

as detrimental by the victors, and excited an insurrection in Genoa

against the supremacy of Milan, which found support from the republic

of Venice, the ancient enemy of the Visconti. Hereupon the Duke, not to

have to cope with too many enemies at once, entered into the alliance

with the Pope which has just been mentioned. As far as the resistance

to Filippo Maria was concerned, the Venetians were hand-in-hand

with the Florentines; as soon as Cosimo had returned, the Senate

congratulated the Signoria. But Florentine plans of winning still

independent parts of Tuscany, and the Venetian intentions on Romagna,

upon which, for the sake of the safety of their own frontiers, the eyes

of the Florentines were always directed, could not but endanger the

harmony of the two republics. The whole of the remaining lifetime of

Cosimo de’ Medici was occupied with the endeavour to support and secure

his position at home, and his connection with foreign countries, each

reciprocally aiding the other.

He found favourable soil in Florence. His partizans had prepared the

way for him. All the heads of the opposite faction were exiled, and

most of them ruined. Many were dead. It was easy for him to boast in

his memoirs, that during his administration not one individual was

banished or injured in any way. It was not lenity on his part, for he

had no more horror of violence or bloodshed than the majority of his

contemporaries where political ends were at stake, but it was prudent

calculation. He knew that he could allow others to give the laws an

interpretation which secured him, without being himself taxed with

using hard measures. He did this by the execution of penal laws, and by

making changes in the constitution. He first put forward Puccio Pucci,

who showed such zeal, and attained such authority, that the Hotspurs

of the party were named after him Puccini. When it was an object to

further the aims of this party even by the most sanguinary measures, or

to raise money, Puccio, otherwise an able man, and proved to be such in

office and in embassies, knew no scruples. Cosimo employed the services

of Luca Pitti even more frequently than those of Pucci. The family came

originally from Semifonte, in the Elsa valley, a castle the conquest

and destruction of which, as has been mentioned, plays a part in the

oldest annals of the development of the commonwealth. Maffeo Pitti sat

as early as 1283 in the magistracy of the Priors. Buonaccorso was a

man much employed about the end of the fourteenth and beginning of the

fifteenth centuries. His activity partakes somewhat of the character of

an adventurer, and he seems to have been equally versed in political

and mercantile affairs. No one was so successful as he in obtaining

foreign assistance against Gian Galeazzo Visconti, and it was chiefly

he who, on the part of Florence, persuaded Rupert of the Palatinate to

undertake the unsuccessful march into Lombardy, particulars of which

are given in his instructive memoirs.[74]

Buonaccorso’s son was the principal tool of Cosimo. ‘Luca Pitti,’ says

Francesco Guicciardini, ‘was not a man of remarkable capabilities, but

vivacious, liberal, courageous; one who ventured more for his friends

than any one in Florence; a man who might safely be allowed to carry

out everything, while he had not head enough to become formidable.’

Cosimo had friends of another kind than these two. At their head

stood Neri Capponi. His father Gino, descended from a family which

appears in the second half of the thirteenth century among the most

distinguished, had won a good name for himself by the capture of Pisa

in 1406, and by the judicious and reasonable administration of the

severely tried city, while his history of the popular rebellion of 1378

is one of the most important aids to a right understanding of this

important occurrence.[75] Neri belonged to those who before 1433 formed

a kind of moderate party, but after the death of Niccolò da Uzzano he

inclined more and more to Cosimo, and if unable to prevent his exile,

he aided essentially in his recall. He was for the Medicean party what

Niccolò had been for the Albizzi, the mediating element, but he never

attained to the position which the latter held, because Cosimo was of a

different nature from Maso, and still more unlike Rinaldo, and because

in many cases Neri rather complemented him than represented a different

principle. Neri Capponi certainly aided essentially in restraining

the Medicean party government within certain limits; yet the measures

which most confirmed their government were effected under his eyes.

Cosimo, who required him because he enjoyed general confidence, and

was skilled alike in peace and war, always found means to counteract

his influence when it was inconvenient to himself. ‘Neri,’ says

Francesco Guicciardini,[76] ‘well knew the means employed against him.

As he saw, however, that Cosimo’s position was impregnable, and that

to break with him would be to run his own head against the wall, he

pretended, intelligent as he was, not to observe anything that passed,

and waited patiently for time and opportunity.’ But it is evident that

this waiting, which we cannot but attribute to weakness of character or

selfish indirect motives, established Cosimo’s position more and more

firmly; Neri’s influence did not, however, increase, notwithstanding

the great services accomplished by him, which will be more fully dwelt

upon as we proceed.

Agnolo Acciaiuoli held a position scarcely inferior to that of Neri

Capponi. In the preceding century, his family, which rose with the

majority of the plebeian races, attained to unusual splendour. When

we descend the high road, leading southward from Florence to Siena,

we perceive, three miles from the town, on an isolated height on the

banks of the river Ema, the Certosa of Montacuto, convent and fortress

at the same time, with towers and pinnacles, with grand colonnades

and monuments of sculpture and painting in the splendid church. If we

wander farther, quitting the high road to descend to the right into the

valley of the Pesa, a tributary of the Arno, we see before us, on a low

hill rising from the midst of a green valley, an imposing building,

rather resembling a castle than a villa, the extensive mass of building

surmounted by a tower resembling the Florentine Palazzo Vecchio—Monte

Gufoni, once a splendid country seat, now, after the extinction of

the family of its possessors, deprived of its glory, and inhabited

by poor peasants. Niccolò Acciaiuoli built convent and villa in the

first half of the fourteenth century, when he wished to leave his

native country monuments of his affection and piety. Like so many of

his fellow-countrymen, having been originally attracted to the south

by commercial business, he had become, by talent and good fortune,

all-powerful at the court of the Neapolitan Anjous, who made him grand

seneschal of the kingdom, and afterwards a mighty ruler in Greece,

where his relations became dukes of Athens and Corinth. Agnolo’s

grandfather Donato, in former years governor in Corinth for his brother

the seneschal, was one of those who put an end to the ochlocracy of

the Ciompi, but his attempts to moderate the supremacy of the Albizzi

resulted in the exile in which he died. Agnolo had inherited his

spirit. He wished, indeed, for the supremacy of a party in Florence,

since Florence could no longer exist without the preponderance of one

or the other, but he resisted the entire subjection to one family

or one man. This opinion, which was held by a number of influential

citizens, explains the frequent internal disturbances, the history

of which, and consequently that of the whole State, is but half

understood, if we do not take into consideration the great number of

eminent men who exercised a secondary but yet important influence on

the conduct of affairs, as was the case especially under Cosimo de’

Medici, not to speak of later times, after the death of Lorenzo il

Magnifico and during the last years of the Republic. Agnolo Acciaiuoli

had during Cosimo’s exile engaged in transactions which would have cost

him his head if his brother-in-law had not, in the moment of danger,

burned the incriminating correspondence, which did actually bring him

to the torture, and to banishment to Cephalonia. That he, an active and

capable man, afterwards attained to influence and dignity is easily

explained: embassies and honours were heaped upon him, and he remained

among the foremost of the Medicean party, although there were not

wanting misunderstandings between him and Cosimo, which were revealed

after the death of the latter.[77]

Together with Agnolo Acciaiuoli rose into eminence his cousin Donato,

whose great-uncle, the celebrated and active cardinal-vice-chancellor,

also bore the name of Agnolo, and was the first Duke of Athens. At

Cosimo’s return, Donato was only six years old, but under the guidance

of a sensible mother, Palla Strozzi’s daughter, he developed rapidly,

and we shall meet him repeatedly in later years engaged in important

matters. Among those who held to the Medici there was no one who

enjoyed the general confidence in a higher degree, while he, although

State affairs claimed so much of his time, took a lively interest in

scientific pursuits.[78]

If Diotisalvi Neroni, who attained in Cosimo’s later years the

reputation of great acuteness and skill, was involved in the

misunderstandings to which we have alluded, other causes weighed in the

opposite scale; for as the father of this man essentially contributed

in 1434 to the prevention of Rinaldo degli Albizzi’s elevation to

power, so did he, as long as Cosimo lived, act as his clever and

willing tool. To the most estimable partisans of the Medici belonged

Bernardo Giugni, who was constantly employed on diplomatic embassies,

and Agnolo Pandolfini, with his sons Carlo and Giannozzo. Whoever

enters the Church of the Benedictines (Badia), which spite of repeated

alterations even now recalls the old times of the Republic, may see

the beautiful monuments, which were erected to Giugni and Giannozzo

Pandolfini, whom the commonwealth honoured with a funeral at the public

expense. The Giugni belonged to the oldest Guelph plebeian families,

and took part in the administration at its beginning. The Pandolfini

stood with them in the ranks of the Guelphs on the bloody field of

Montaperti, and streets of the city are yet named after both families,

which still flourish; while a palace built long after the time of which

we are now treating, which, if not one of the largest, is one of the

most beautiful in Florence—a work of Raffael Sanzio’s—keeps alive

the remembrance of the Pandolfini even in the history of art. Alamanno

Salviati would have been recommended by the talents of his father

Jacopo, one of the most eminent citizens of the oligarchical time, even

if he had not made himself remarkable by his talents and activity.

No one could anticipate in those days that, a generation later, his

relations would be involved in the most sanguinary catastrophe of the

Medicean history. The Guicciardini,[79] a family from the Pesa valley,

which had risen by trade, had stood on the side of the Albizzi. Of

Luigi’s two sons, who in 1378 filled the office of Gonfalonier when the

popular tumult broke out, in which he displayed no great energy, only

one, Giovanni, remained true to his colours, and though he did not go

into banishment at the return of his old enemy Cosimo, he was still

excluded with his descendants from all share in the administration.

The other son, Piero, went over to the Medicean party, was one of the

most active in bringing about Cosimo’s recall, and laid the foundation

of the subsequent high position of his family, among whom his

great-grandson gained immortal fame as statesman and historian, but as

citizen of a free city he has left a name not free from censure.

It is evident that Cosimo de’ Medici, powerful as he was, had no

freedom of action. He had to contend with different elements, fulfil

many obligations, and humour much sensitiveness. He understood it.

Scarcely any one has ever guided a great party as he did, and placed

himself so little in the foreground. His means were of different kinds.

When he returned he found the political power in the hands of a Balia

appointed by the Signoria of September, 1434, which had already freed

the city from his most decided or most powerful opponents. He only

needed to let them continue their work, and so their extraordinary

power was prolonged from one period of five years to another. The

ballot-boxes were of course only filled with the names of partisans

or unsuspected persons, for all in any way disaffected to the faction

were excluded, or, according to the expression then in vogue,’messi

a sedere.’ But even this did not satisfy the party leaders, and

instead of allowing the magistrates to be drawn by lot, they caused

them to be appointed, at their own pleasure, by the Accoppiatori from

among the eligible. While all offices thus fell to his confidants,

Cosimo meditated another and most peculiar means of excluding those

of whom he was not perfectly certain from any share whatever in the

administration. He annulled the statutes which disqualified the old

nobility and the so-called ‘grandi’ from holding office, and declared

these families to have equal rights with the citizens. It was regarded

as an important concession, as Cosimo was connected with many of them,

but in practice the matter proved otherwise. The names of the families

in question were not found in the ballot-box, and, besides, they

lost the offices to which they had hitherto been admissible, such as

legations, ministries of war, &c. It was said that the pride of the old

families was a thorn in the eyes of the upstart, who had never trusted

them.

That Cosimo promoted a number of people of the lower order evinces

equally his intention of weakening the opposition, as the cynical

answer which he gave to those who remonstrated with him on the subject

expresses his unmitigated selfishness. For when it was observed to him

that he did not do well to ruin so many noble families, and that the

town must suffer by the loss of many of her most excellent citizens,

he answered that a few ells of fine scarlet cloth would fill Florence

again with distinguished citizens. A ruined city, he said, was better

than a lost one, and one could not rule a state with Paternosters. So

he showed himself unmerciful to all who had once opposed him, and while

such as left the places of exile (_confine_) assigned to them, were

declared rebels and lost their property, those who observed the decree

of banishment had their exile prolonged when the time of penalty had

expired. Thus it was with Palla Strozzi. He had shown himself weak

at the decisive moment of 1434, instead of supporting Rinaldo degli

Albizzi. It did not save him; he was banished to Padua for ten years.

When the ten years were over, he, who had only lived for science, kept

himself within the prescribed limits, and never allowed any one to

speak ill of Florence before him, hoped to see home again, but Cosimo

condemned him to ten more years. It was very painful to him, for he

was seventy-two years old, and loved Florence. He lived eighteen years

longer in banishment, and his descendants never returned to his native

city. His relations experienced the like hard fate with him. His

daughter-in-law, Alessandra de Bardi[80] was, as a girl and young wife,

a model of modesty and beauty: that did not save her. She saw her own

father as well as her father-in-law go into exile, and die in exile.

She saw her husband, Lorenzo, who could no longer bear the scorn,

ill-treatment, and oppression to which the families of the exiles were

exposed, and who went to Gubbio to earn his bread by teaching, die

beneath a murderer’s hand. She saw one portion of her property vanish

after the other, and her life pass away joylessly in constant change of

residence, and constant anxiety for her children. Numerous families,

once affluent, were reduced to misery; fathers and husbands wandered

about in foreign lands, and their property was confiscated. Noble

ladies begged alms. The poverty to which many were reduced by merciless

party spirit, even more than by losses in war and bad harvests, incited

the saintly Archbishop Antoninus in 1441 to found the charitable

institution which still exists under the name of Buonuomini di San

Martino, and which, managed by a society of trustworthy citizens, has

for its object to soften misery, especially when undeserved and borne

in silence.

The sad fate of Rinaldo degli Albizzi and his nearest relations is

the most striking example of the ruin impending over great families

in those days from party spirit. On October 2, 1434, the Balia

appointed in the Medicean interest gave orders to the Captain of the

People, Messer Jacopo de’ Lavagnoli of Verona, to proceed against the

originators of the tumult which had taken place near Sant’Apollinaris.

The sentence passed against Messer Rinaldo and his eldest son, Ormanno,

was eight years of banishment, during which the exiles should remain

at least a hundred miles distant from the Florentine frontiers, and

present themselves every three days to the magistrates of their chosen

place of residence, which must be certified by a notary’s act. The bail

for Rinaldo amounted to 4,000, and for Ormanno to 2,000 gold florins;

but all their moveable and immoveable property, including that of the

sons and wives, was made security for their proceedings. Of course the

exiles were made incapable of all offices. Father and son presented

themselves, according to order, in the towns of the district of Ancona,

whither they first repaired, Matelica, Montalboddo, Yesi. On November

3, Naples was assigned to the former as his place of exile, Gaeta to

the latter, and the banishment prolonged by ten years. Before Rinaldo

could reach Naples his destination was changed to Frani, on the Apulian

coast, with the command to repair thither in the space of a month.

Thus the homeless ones were hunted like wild animals. They of course

understood that even the most conscientious observation of the commands

given them would never re-open the gates of Florence to them. That

they then, driven by rage and despair, disregarded these commands,

left the places indicated (it was called ‘rompere il confine’), and

sought to return by force of arms, is to be explained, if not to be

justified. In the law that had fallen on them they recognised only

violence, which they on their side determined to oppose by violence.

When Filippo Maria Visconti undertook his last campaign against

Florence, the Albizzi and several of their fellow-sufferers were in the

Milanese army. The day of Anghiari destroyed their hopes. Eight days

after the battle, on July 6, 1440, the penalty was pronounced against

the rebels, for that they were now. Rinaldo and Ormanno degli Albizzi,

Messer Niccolò and Baldassarre Gianfigliazzi, Ludovico de’ Rossi,

Lamberto de’ Lamberteschi, Bernardo Barbadori, and Stefano Peruzzi, all

men of distinguished families, were declared to have forfeited their

honour, and their portraits were painted on the wall of the Palazzo

del Podestà, with insulting verses beneath, according to custom.

Andrea del Castagno, an artist of reputation, painted the pictures, as

Stefano, named Giottino, did before, and Andrea del Sarto after him.

The official poet and jester of the Signoria (the Araldo or herald),

Antonio di Meglio, to whose office it belonged to recite something to

the Signori during their meals, and to compose eulogies or satires

on public occasions, wrote the doggerel verses which indicated the

character and crime of each. The painter obtained from his pictures the

name of Andrea degli Impiccati.[81]

Rinaldo degli Albizzi resigned himself to his fate. Francesco Filelfo,

the humanist, whom hatred against Cosimo de’ Medici united to him,

informed him from Milan that nothing was to be hoped for from thence.

It was probably shortly after the lost battle that he made a pilgrimage

to the Holy Land, in fulfilment of an old vow. Returned from thence, he

stayed at Ancona, where he died, an aged man, on February 2, 1442, on

the marriage-day of a daughter.[82] Seven years later, Ormanno, then

more than fifty years old, turned to Cosimo’s younger son, Giovanni,

to beg him to obtain a favour in family affairs.[83] The letters from

Mantua, where the Albizzi resided with the Margrave Ludovico Gonzaga,

have the tone of old friendly connections; but how painfully clear is

the fallen condition of the once rich and powerful family! How terrible

it was we perceive from the narrative of a simple and trustworthy

man, a friend and client of the Medici.[84] Messer Rinaldo’s younger

son Maso, married to a Gianfigliazzi, saw himself involved with his

family in his father’s misfortunes. He had a son, also called Rinaldo,

who, in order to earn a livelihood, entered the service of Antonio

Cicinello, the influential councillor of King Alfonso of Aragon, and

attained his confidence and affection in a high degree. When Rinaldo

was going to Ancona one day to visit his mother, who lived there, he

was plundered on the way, and appeared in the doublet of a wretch whom

he had seen hanging by the wayside on a tree. The young man died not

long after, and Cicinello sent the unhappy woman, who had lost her

husband also, and lived in extreme want at Ancona, a sum which he had

been able to obtain from the property of the deceased, and which was

part of what he had helped her son to gain. When the widow returned to

Florence some time afterwards, Cicinello repaired thither on affairs

of state, and took with him the remainder of the money. We will let

our authority speak for himself: ‘One morning Messer Antonio repaired

to Sta. Trinità, and sent to the widow of Maso degli Albizzi (whose

parental house joined the church) with the request to come to him, as

he wished to speak with her. But the poor woman lay ill in bed, so that

Messer Antonio sent her the thirty ducats which he had by him, with the

words, he had once procured this money for her son, and now wished that

it should be of use to her. When the poor woman received the money,

and remembered the kindness which the sender of this money had shown

her son, she said, weeping, ‘It is now nearly thirty-five years since

my husband was banished from Florence. I have wandered miserably about

many parts of Italy, and during my husband’s lifetime, as afterwards

when I lost him, no one regarded me or helped me in my distress, but

I have been forsaken by all. Messer Antonio has shown greater sympathy

with me and my son than has been evinced all this time by the whole

world, in the midst of all the strokes of fate.’

Cosimo de’ Medici did not content himself with rendering his old

opponents harmless; he took care also that none of his adherents

should become too powerful and dangerous to him. Therefore, remarks

Francesco Guicciardini, he retained the Signoria, as well as the taxes,

in his hand, in order to be able to promote or oppress individuals at

will. In other things the citizens enjoyed greater freedom and acted

more according to their own pleasure than later, in the days of his

grandson, for he let the reins hang loose if he was only sure of his

own position. It was just in this that his great art lay, to guide

things according to his will, and yet to make his partisans believe

that he shared his authority with them. It was necessary, however,

that there should be one against the others, as was the case with Neri

Capponi. To weaken the respect in which the latter was held when his

name was in all mouths after the great victory over the Duke of Milan

in 1440, Cosimo is said to have commanded the murder of the captain,

Baldaccio da Anghiari, who remained in the service of the Republic,

and was an intimate friend of Neri. The sanguinary deed was executed

in the palace, whither the unsuspecting man had been summoned by

command of the Gonfaloniere Bartolommeo Orlandini. Thus the share of

Cosimo and his motives are veiled in obscurity, but the suspicion has

never been removed from him.[85] The name of the Casa Annalena still

recalls Baldaccio’s widow, of the family of the Malateste of Rimini,

who founded here a convent for destitute women and girls, the extensive

buildings and gardens of which were employed for other purposes at the

dissolution of the monastic orders in 1808.

When Neri Capponi, who still acted as a counterbalance, though a very

weak one, to the Medicean authority, died, November 22, 1457, at the

age of sixty-nine, the prevailing party had already begun to divide.

The old opponents were entirely annihilated, most of their chiefs dead

and their families impoverished; the anxieties in which the long wars,

first with the Visconti, then with Venice, had kept the government

and the people, had been ended by the peace of 1454, which we shall

mention later. Those who had held together in the face of danger,

relaxed after safety had been gained. Cosimo’s supremacy was burdensome

to the aristocratic partizans of the Medici. They demanded that the

extraordinary powers with which he had governed since 1434 should be

terminated. Cosimo consented. The Balia, renewed only two years ago,

was declared extinct in the summer of 1455, and the members of the

Signoria were again drawn by lot like other magistrates. Giovanni

Rucellai, a deserving man, was the first who thus received the office

of Gonfaloniere. The people, who hated every appearance of arbitrary

power, desired a return to the old forms as much as those who had

caused the changes, but the latter soon perceived that the greater

freedom was more apparent than real; for when the ballot-boxes were

filled with the names of such as held to Cosimo, the latter attained

his ends without appearing on the stage. The revision of the registers

revealed this. Then, according to the decree laid down when these were

instituted, a revision ought to have been held every three years, but

this had only happened in 1433. One of the restrictions put upon the

extraordinary commission (Balia) of that year had been that it neither

had power to change the ballot-boxes nor to abolish the registers, but

at Cosimo’s return no such limits were put to the authority of his

partisans, and they returned indeed to the ancient arbitrary system

which the law of 1427 had been meant to do away with. Instead of a

firm base of taxation, party spirit and party manœuvres prevailed.

The measures resorted to had the double aim of ruining antagonists,

or such as were suspected, and of gaining the lower classes. The most

offensive of these measures, one which had been in contemplation during

the mob-government of 1378, was the adoption of a progressive scale,

which, by dividing the citizens into fourteen classes, ascended from

a trifling imposition to fifty per cent of the supposed income, which

was fixed by arbitration. Moreover, taxation was not limited as to

time, but depended entirely on the want of means alleged by Government.

The continuous wars which led the enemy at times into the interior of

the country, caused a constant drain upon the revenue. One war-tax

after another was proclaimed, and the results by no means corresponded

always with the demand. In the summer of 1442 no less than 180,000

gold florins were paid as a reward to Francesco Sforza for his support

of René of Aragon against Alfonso of Aragon—a vain expenditure,

since Alfonso took besieged Naples, and established himself so firmly

that all the enterprises of Anjou against him, and his son and

successor Ferrante, were frustrated. The distribution of the taxes

was a perpetual means for the faction to oppress those whom they

disliked. Many people were entirely ruined. A number of considerable

citizens had left the city and retired to villas, to escape the

immoderate exactions, as the country had less to pay than Florence,

but it availed them little. It was said of Cosimo de’ Medici, that

instead of the dagger, the usual weapon, he employed the taxes to rid

himself of his enemies. He retained the instrument, or, as Francesco

Guicciardini says, the dishonesty of the taxes, in his own hands, in

order to ruin those in whom he saw declared opponents, to bring down

to poverty others whom he mistrusted or who were inconvenient to him,

and to favour partisans. The members of the commission entrusted with

laying on the taxes were either his creatures or dependent on him.

Lightening the burdens of the lower classes was only the pretext,

and the humiliation of the independent burghers the real aim. This

aim was attained by Cosimo, his son, and his grandson. ‘It is well

known,’ remarks the statesman and historian just mentioned, in his

reflections on the Florentine administration, ‘how much nobility and

wealth were destroyed by Cosimo and his descendants by taxation. The

Medici never allowed a fixed method and legal distribution, but always

reserved to themselves the power of bearing heavily upon individuals

according to their pleasure. Had they only employed this weapon to

protect themselves against enemies and suspicious persons, they would

have been to a certain extent excusable; but as they did not succeed by

other means, or by appealing to their ambition and vanity, in attaching

to themselves peaceful citizens more intent on their own business than

on affairs of State, they made use of the taxes to win them over, and

to set themselves up as lords of all, while they forced the people to

seek to divine their will even in trifles.’ The most striking example

of the abuse of the power of taxation is the history of Giannozzo

Manetti. After a life spent in the service of the State and of science,

the veneration shown him both at home and abroad, as well as his

inclination for Venice, brought on him the disfavour of Cosimo and his

adherents, and he saw himself reduced to beggary by taxes which reached

the incredible height of 135,000 gold florins. Abandoning house,

property, and State-papers he went into voluntary exile, to drag out

the few days still remaining to him, by means of first a Papal, and

later a Neapolitan pension.

The shameless enrichment of many of Cosimo’s personal adherents, and

the discontent evinced in the city, made it at last appear advisable

to many of the ruling party to make an end of the system which had

lasted since 1434. It was asserted of Puccio Pucci that he had acquired

50,000 gold florins of the public moneys by usury and dishonest

administration. It was calculated that a certain Giovanni Corsini,

who began with scarcely the necessary means of life, had cheated

Government of 20,000 florins. Florence was rife with evil tales of

dishonest upstarts, of theft at the public cost, of dirty actions and

extortion.[86] With Cosimo’s silent consent (without this nothing could

have been done), the Signoria at last commanded, on January 11, 1458, a

revision of the registers, indicating, as far as it seemed advisable to

them, the prevailing evils.[87] Scarcely was the measure decreed than

many of Cosimo’s party, and precisely those who had sought to fetter

him by withdrawing the former extraordinary powers, were seized with a

violent terror. For they saw themselves not merely obliged to declare

the increase on moveable and immoveable property, which in a quarter

of a century was immense with many of them, but the progressive scale

employed in the new declaration threatened them with a double weight.

Only from Cosimo could they expect assistance. The same people who had

attempted to weaken his authority three years before, now entreated

him to resume it, and proceed to action—that is, summon a parliament,

and cause extraordinary powers to be granted by it. They had already

formed the plan of doing away with the ballot-boxes, in order to effect

new elections more favourable to them, but Cosimo declined to do their

will. It suited him that those for whom his power was too great should

perceive that they not only gained nothing by the independence more

apparent than real of the Government, but sacrificed their authority

while his own remained undiminished. He had ready the convenient

explanation that extraordinary measures were only permissible in the

case of highest need and danger, that now the heavy debts contracted

in the long wars would be paid, the numerous changes in property taken

into account, the irregularities in the valuation of movable property

done away with, and the regular payment of the interest of the

national debt be re-established. As long as Alfonso of Aragon lived,

who never lost sight of Tuscany, it did not seem advisable to undertake

alterations which might arouse displeasure among the people. For Cosimo

was never certain of this people, and in times of dearth, bad harvests,

storms, contagious disease, which repeatedly occurred, or under

oppressive war-taxes, the easily moved crowd was not to be trusted.

It was by no means always on Cosimo’s side. His measureless riches

aroused much envy and evil-speaking. If he built much, and expended

large sums in particular on churches and convents, it was said, We pay

for his hypocrisy, which is, moreover, full of spiritual pride, by

emptying our own purses. Even the secret cells of the brethren in the

cloister he fills with the balls of his coat-of-arms! His palace might

bear a comparison with the Colosseum. Who would not build splendidly

could he but employ other people’s money for it? It was said that the

money-boxes at the city gates were emptied in the house of the Medici.

When Cosimo, says a contemporary, advanced to the commune far greater

sums than he took, nothing was remarked upon it. He did this certainly,

but he kept an exact account of it, and it could hardly be said that

the partnership between the State and the Medici was solely to the

advantage of the former. One morning the doors of Cosimo’s palace were

found stained with blood.[88]

Such things occurred long before the time we are now considering.

Cosimo had meanwhile no wish to remain passive after his haughty

partisans had received a wholesome lesson. The license to which the

lower classes inclined more and more, might have risen to such a

point that his own authority would be endangered. He himself did not

appear, but the tool was readily found. On July 1, 1458, Luca Pitti

undertook the office of Gonfalonier. Three days before, King Alfonso

had died; from his son—Ferrante—who had a difficult position in

Naples on account of his illegitimate birth, and who did not, like

his father, command the powers of Sicily and Aragon—there was for

the time nothing to fear. Neither reform of registers nor drawing the

magistrates by lot were to the taste of the new Gonfalonier; and urged

by his friends, but with consideration for Cosimo, who wished to avoid

open violence, he sought to induce priors and colleges to proceed to

new elections, and choose new magistrates. When he met with opposition

in this, he determined to employ the usual violent means. On August 9

he caused the palace and square to be surrounded by mercenaries, had

the neighbouring streets secured, and summoned the people by ringing

the great bell. That the Gonfalonier could do this in opposition to

the priors, or at least to the majority of them, is an evident sign

how weak the laws were. The Parliament, however it might be composed,

granted to the Senate, and 250 of the burghers proposed by the party,

the extraordinary powers demanded. These now proceeded to the new

elections, and appointed a commission of eight citizens to preside at

all elections for the future. It is easily understood that all actual

authority was now more than ever in the hands of the heads of the

faction, who filled the offices at their pleasure, and when the priors

of the guild were after this called priors of freedom, it was in bitter

irony. All opponents of the measures, several of whom endured torture,

and a number of people who were either not trusted, or of whom one or

other of the new wielders of power had to complain, were banished. In

the months next following, exile and exclusion from office were but

too common, and if in this way justice was sometimes done, as on the

dishonest tax officials in Florence, Pisa, Arezzo, yet this made but a

poor show in the presence of so many deeds of violence. According to

the reform of taxation, the mercantile order was to be obliged to show

their account books; an agreement was then made with them, agreeably to

which a fixed sum of movable capital was declared, which was not the

means to find out the real amount, or to ensure the just distribution

of the burdens. Luca Pitti became a great man. The Signoria granted

him the dignity of knighthood, and Cosimo made him rich presents, in

which others imitated him. His momentary splendour eclipsed that of

Medici; not he, but Luca seemed to stand at the head of the State, and

if his nature inclined generally to pomp and power, he now allowed it

free scope. His arbitrary and unjust administration was to find its

punishment years after.

In the last years of his life, Cosimo had no longer the guidance of his

party in his hands, as formerly. What he had always feared and long

managed to prevent, now happened: his most distinguished adherents

grew too strong for him. He had always feared to place himself in a

clear light; what would once have aided him, when it was a question of

arousing no envy, now injured him, as others employed it to outshine

him. His continual illness combined to render his share in affairs

more difficult. He allowed much to pass that he could not hinder, but,

crafty and accustomed to rule as he was, he would not confess that he

could not hinder it. Thus, as people like Luca Pitti and his companions

stood far below him, and knew nothing of that kind of prudent and

calculated moderation which lay in his character, a grasping and

unconscientious party-government was formed, such as Florence, with the

exception of transient periods of disturbances and passion, had never

known.

It is easy to conceive that, with such a government, and with men

at its head ever ready to infringe or to corrupt the laws and

constitution, the magistrates of the Republic enjoyed but a small

measure of authority, which was allowed to them by the chiefs on whom

they depended. The machinery of government remained the same as it had

been in former days, but real power rested elsewhere. The oligarchy,

which obtained a firm footing in Cosimo’s last years, which tried to

overthrow his son, and yielded to his grandson’s consummate skill,

kept in its hands the reins even when its own independence was most

doubtful. The thirst for public offices continued immoderate. These

offices preserved ostensibly their dignity, and secured advantages

of various kinds; but they no longer, as such, had any influence

upon politics. The majority of them had been established between the

thirteenth and fourteenth centuries; some had been added during the

fifteenth. The upper magistracy, generally called the Signory, was the

College of Priors of the Guilds, or of Freedom, as they were called

after 1458. It had been established in 1282, and though afterwards

transformed, was originally composed of eight members chosen every two

months, with the Gonfalonier (_vexillifer justitiæ_) at their head.

In him was vested the highest power, which he, apart from the

executive, shared with the colleges, with the Buonuomini appointed in

1312, with the assessors of the priors, and with the sixteen bannerets

of the militia companies, at whose head was the Capitano del Popolo.

There has been a question raised as to the original military character

of this institution. The projects of law agreed to by the Signory and

the colleges were carried to three councils; first to the council of

the people, which consisted of a hundred members, chosen originally

only from the higher class of citizens, the _popolo grasso_. Then they

went to the council of the ‘Credenza,’ which was formed of the same

number of members, and in which sat all the consuls and other officials

of the guilds; lastly, to the Podestà’s council, composed of the judges

and legal functionaries, nobles and citizens, ninety in number. When

a bill had passed through these three courts, it was brought before a

General Assembly of them all, and not until then became law.

Forms, indeed, were duly observed, but these forms did not prevent

the adoption of laws which fatally attacked the constitution from

within. For the consideration of bills relating to foreign affairs,

to peace and war, two other consultative bodies were established

after 1411, when greater care seemed to be necessary, on account

of the heavy burdens caused by the dissensions of the great Schism.

The one was the Council of Two Hundred, to which only those could be

elected who had occupied the highest offices of State, and to which

legislative proposals were sent before they came to the Council of a

Hundred and Thirty-one—in which sat the members of the Signory and of

the colleges, the ‘Capitani di parte Guelfa’, the ‘War Ten,’ the six

councils of the craftsmen, the consuls of the guilds, and forty-eight

other citizens. The bills had to be accepted in these two assemblies

before they reached the first-mentioned councils. From such a mass of

incongruous materials was the machine of State compiled.

The chief judicial functionary, and until Luca Pitti’s reform the

first dignitary, was the Podestà, assisted as he was by the Capitano

del Popolo—whose rights and privileges were often changed—and by the

executor of legal ordinances. All three were strangers: the first two

noble personages learned in the law, the third a man of the people,

of Guelfish family, holding office for one year. The Podestà’s court

included several adjuncts who took turn with the chief. The armed

guard of the latter were under the chief bailiff or Bargello. Attached

to these were the Magistracy of Eight (Otto di Guardia), who were

nominated by the Signory, and installed in office for four months. They

had to try criminal and police cases, and were conservators of the

law—a sort of appeal court for the revision of the decisions of the

Podestà’s court. Much of their time, however, was spent in detecting

the artifices and evasions of the tax-payers. The uncertain line

of demarcation between the jurisdiction of the several co-existing

law courts has always been one of the most serious evils of the

constitution of Florence. For the separate branches of the constitution

different functionaries were appointed. Foreign affairs and war were in

the hands of the ‘Peace and War Ten,’ who were appointed in 1423 during

the campaign against Milan. There had indeed been, half a century

earlier, a similar magistracy, nicknamed by popular wit, the ‘Eight

Saints,’ because they conducted warlike operations against Pope Gregory

XI. It was as secretary of the ten that Niccolò Machiavelli manifested

that activity which, together with the literary talents which he

afterwards developed, made the ‘Segretario fiorentino’ so celebrated.

The influence exercised by this committee upon military operations was

often most unfortunate, and in the peaceful times of 1480, we see it

replaced by the ‘Otto di Pratica.’

The office of Capitani di parte Guelfa, to whom was entrusted, by the

statutes of 1267, the control of the property of the rebels—an office

open also to the nobility—had long lost the political importance

it acquired in the second half of the fourteenth century. To the

magistracy of custom-dues, established in 1352, and in which always sat

one of the nobility, was given the control of the indirect taxation;

to the Uffiziali del Monte, the direction of the state debt; to the

consuls, appointed after the acquisition of Leghorn, the management

of navigation and of commerce beyond the seas. The assessment of

loans was managed by special commissions. The tribunal of commerce

(Mercanzia) was composed of six members of the large corporations and

six foreigners learned in the law. The chief of the affairs of the

guilds, the proconsul, who ranked immediately after the Signory and

colleges, belonged to the first guild, that of the lawyers. In a town

and commonwealth where a strong principle of beneficence prevailed,

all charities had to be well arranged. The officials of the widow and

orphan fund, whose premises are now occupied by the Society of Brethren

of Mercy, on the Cathedral square; the Capitani di Sta. Maria, who were

originally appointed to oppose the Patarian heresy, but subsequently

devoted themselves to the care of orphans, and survive in the Uffizio

del Bigallo opposite the Baptistery; the Buonuomini di San Martino,

founded by St. Antoninus with their domicile in the dwellings of the

Alighieri—all these belong properly to the municipality. All the

courts and committees had their chancellors or secretaries, whose

importance depended on circumstances, but was enhanced by the fact

that they were permanent officials, while the members were constantly

changing. The Signory and other assemblies had many subordinate

officers besides. The salaries were insignificant, and the only persons

who received them were the foreign judges, chancellors, secretaries,

subordinate officers, and servants; as also the officers in the towns

of the district, the commissaries of the troops, and the ambassadors

abroad, while the acting magistrates at home were unpaid.

This form of government and councils continued, with slight

modifications, until the month of December 1494, when the overthrow

of the Medici was the signal of events which materially altered the

constitution of the Republic.

CHAPTER VII.

FOREIGN RELATIONS. WAR AND PEACE. COUNCIL OF UNION.

WHILE these things were going on at home, the exigencies of war for

many years made serious demands on the State and its resources, and

more than once the contest was carried into the territory of the

Republic. To the dangers which arose from the fact that two ambitious

and warlike princes governed the north and south of Italy, was added

the unfavourable circumstance, that a Pope sat in St. Peter’s chair who

was constantly drawn into the din of war, less, perhaps, from his own

restlessness, than from the hopeless confusion in the States of the

Church. The principal scene of the war was Romagna, a country which,

by its distracted condition, by the number of its petty lords, and the

violent character of its inhabitants—still more by its geographical

position and the vicinity of powerful States—seemed destined to be the

general battle-field.

The hereditary enmity of Filippo Maria Visconti was aggravated by the

hatred of the Florentine exiles, who, despairing of a return to their

country on peaceful terms, stirred up the Duke of Milan to strife

with her, under the usual pretext that it was not a war against their

country, but against a faction. The want of success which attended

the troops of Visconti in the territory of Lucca, under Niccolò

Piccinino, was an enticement for Cosimo de’ Medici to strive to obtain

possession of this town, as he did six years later, but with no greater

success than before. The war, begun in the Lucchese territory, was

continued in the Romagna, where Florence and Venice, with the aid of

Pope Eugenius IV., resisted Visconti. The Milanese army did indeed

once again cross the Apennines, but only to suffer a decisive defeat,

on June 29, 1440, at Anghiari, between Arezzo and the valley of the

Tiber. This defeat led to peace in the following year, and enlarged

the Florentine territory by the mountain region of the Casentino,

where the supremacy of the counts Guidi, allied with Milan, who, since

the days of imperial power in Italy, had had dominion here, came to

an end. Scarcely was the Milanese war at an end than Florence, like

Venice, was drawn into the contest with Naples which Renè of Anjou was

carrying on against King Alfonso of Aragon; both representatives of

the dualism which the fall of the Hohenstaufen had bequeathed to South

Italy. The Sienese country, the territory of Volterra and the Pisan

Maremma, were the scenes of a struggle which might have been dangerous

to the Republic, if the king had not been detained by besieging smaller

places—though he was not unskilled in war; he suffered moreover from

the malaria of the plains, and wasting the years 1447 and 1448 in

inglorious and fruitless undertakings, was obliged for a while to lay

down his arms without concluding peace, with the intention of taking

them up again under more favourable circumstances. The opportunity was

not long delayed.

In the midst of the feud between Florence and the Aragonese, Filippo

Maria Visconti died, the last of a race which, more than any other,

had represented the arbitrariness and cruelty of mediæval tyranny. He

had appointed Alfonso of Aragon his heir, with a view perhaps that the

weapons which he had wielded all his life long without stirring from

the walls of his castle, might not rest even after his death. But the

dukedom of Milan was in danger of dissolution. The capital, with Como,

Novara, and Alessandria, cried out for a republic; Lodi and Piacenza

threw themselves into the arms of Venice, which, engaged in ceaseless

strife with Visconti, was just now pressing him hard. Duke Charles of

Orleans, Filippo Maria’s nephew, prepared to support the rights of

inheritance by force of arms; while the Duke of Savoy turned his eyes

towards the rich Lombardy which his successors never again lost sight

of. But there was another competitor—not a prince, but more able and

skilled in arms than all the princes of the time: Francesco Sforza,

the son of a valiant and successful _condottiere_, who had risen from

the ranks of the peasantry. He had been at the age of twenty-three

leader of the victorious mercenary troops of his father, who gave his

name to a famous school of warriors. He had served Florence and Venice

in war against the Visconti and Alfonso of Aragon; striven for and

against Pope Eugenius IV. in Romagna and the frontiers; and in the

midst of rapid changes of fortune and party, preserved relations with

Florence which proved more lasting than those of the _condottieri_

generally were. Now attracted by Filippo Maria, again repelled by

suspicion even after the latter had bestowed on him the hand of his

natural daughter, Bianca Maria, he was about to come to his assistance,

when the victorious Venetians had already crossed the Adda. The duke

died, and the new republic, threatened by so many foes, chose him to

be their general. Three years later he became Duke of Milan. Francesco

Sforza possessed himself of the supreme power by treachery and force

of arms, but he saved for half a century the independence of a State

which, after 170 years of tyranny, was no longer capable of life as

a commonwealth, and furthered its prosperity, while he powerfully

contributed to the formation of a political system which, however great

its weakness, was the most reasonable under existing circumstances.

Without the aid of Florence and Cosimo de’ Medici, he would not have

attained his ends. Cosimo had recognised his ability in the war with

Visconti, and made a close alliance with him. In order to retain him

in his service, when Filippo Maria offered him as a bait the hand of

his daughter, Cosimo had gone in 1438 to Venice, in order to obtain

more favourable conditions for him from the Republic, friendly to

himself, in which, however, he failed. During the distress of Sforza

on the frontiers, he had supported him as much as he could. His son

Piero was present at Sforza’s marriage. Now it was necessary to choose

between Sforza and Venice, for there was only one alternative; either

the _condottiere_ would make himself Duke of Milan, or the Republic

of San Marco would extend its rule over all Lombardy. In Florence

several voices declared in favour of the old ally on the Adriatic,

who, however she might seek her own advantage with unscrupulous zeal,

had yet ever been faithful at critical moments. Cosimo de’ Medici gave

the casting-vote in Sforza’s favour. Perhaps it was hard to think of

his old personal connections and obligations, but political expediency

gained the day. Without Florentine money, Sforza would never have been

able to maintain the double contest—on the one side against Milan,

which he blockaded and starved out; and on the other against the

Venetians, who sought to relieve it, and whom he repulsed. And when,

on March 25, 1450, he made his entry into the city which proclaimed

him ruler, he was obliged to maintain himself with Florentine money

till he had established his position and re-organised the State. A

Florentine embassy went to congratulate him—Piero de’ Medici, Neri

Capponi, Luca Pitti, Diotisalvi Neroni. The Venetians were exceedingly

irritated, as was natural. They judged rightly that the Sforza owed

his success essentially to the favour of their former friends. Their

indignation became fiercer when Florence entered into negociations

(June 29) with King Alfonso, with whom they were still at war. Common

animosity to Florence and Sforza drew Venice and the king nearer to one

another, and at the end of 1451 an alliance, offensive and defensive,

was concluded against them, which Siena, Savoy, and Montferrat joined.

It was at first directed against the Duke of Milan; the Florentines had

the choice of joining it, for form’s sake. But when they replied that,

as peace prevailed in Italy, new alliances were not necessary, the

Venetians banished all the Florentine merchants from their territories,

refused a hearing to Otto Niccolini, who was entrusted with an embassy,

and persuaded the king to adopt like measures. On May 16, 1452, the

Republic and, four weeks later, King Alfonso declared war, which the

Emperor Frederick III., then in Italy, and Pope Nicholas V., successor

to Eugenius IV. since 1447, in vain endeavoured to prevent.

The Venetians began the war in Lombardy, the Neapolitans in the valley

of the Chiana. Ferrante, Duke of Calabria, the king’s son, commanded

the latter; Sigismundo Malatesta, lord of Rimini, the Florentines, who

sent only foreign mercenaries to the field this time. The persistency

with which the democracy had borne down the ancient nobility, who were

trained to bear arms, had, in conjunction with the preponderance of the

industrial and mercantile interests, completely annihilated the former

warlike skill of the people, and though the Republic, in reliance on

her pecuniary power, tried to hold her ground by means of mercenaries,

she was far from being able to compete with States like Venice, Naples,

and Milan, who, partly in consequence of their political form, attained

greater unity in the conduct of war, and also had more men at their

command, from their greater territorial power. The Florentines achieved

some brilliant successes, but most of their campaigns were unfortunate,

and the ability of individual citizens employed as military

commissaries could not outweigh the disadvantages which sprung from

general strategic incapacity and the want of unity in the commanders.

The tactics of the _condottieri_ were on the decline throughout Italy,

while the art of fortification and besieging was still in its infancy.

The fertile though unhealthy plain which stretches on both sides of

the sluggish Chiana, between Arezzo, Cortona, and Montepulciano, was

desolated by the enemy, who, however, lay for thirty-six days before

the little castle of Fojano, which was only defended by 200 people.

They had to retire from Castellina, another weakly-fortified place

between Siena and Florence, without having effected anything, and only

owed to the cowardice of the commander of Bada, in the Maremma, the

capture of this unimportant fortress, before which a fleet of twenty

galleys and other vessels cruised. So low had Italian strategy fallen,

that they were only able to reduce even slightly defended places by

hunger, while even the more practised generals feared to venture a

battle, and the principal method of war was unsparing devastation of

the land. The Florentines, destitute of good soldiers, sought to give

another turn to affairs by inviting once more into Italy Alfonso’s old

rival, René, and then his son, John of Anjou, who also bore the title

of Duke of Calabria, as his father retained that of King of Naples.

They thus sought to relieve the Duke of Milan, and free themselves from

the incursions of the Neapolitans, who once advanced to within six

miles of the town, and did great damage. In the summer of 1453 their

enemies were driven back upon the Sienese territory. But a foreign

event contributed more than all to terminate this miserable war, and

put an end to the petty squabbling of the Italian powers.

On May 29, 1453, Mohammed II. stormed Constantinople. The West was

threatened, more especially Venice, which had such great and wealthy

possessions in the Levant, and Naples. This time the excellent Pope

Nicholas V. did not exert himself in vain. On April 9, 1454, Venice

concluded a tolerably favourable peace with Francesco Sforza at Lodi,

in which King Alfonso, Florence, Savoy, Montferrat, Mantua, and Siena,

were to be included. The king, who had made considerable preparations

for war, did not ratify the compact till January 26 of the following

year. The States of Northern and Central Italy then joined in an

alliance, and a succession of peaceful years followed, which were only

momentarily interrupted in the case of Florence by the freebooting

expedition of Jacopo Piccinino, a son of the Niccolò who was conquered

at Anghiari. Dismissed from the Venetian service, he attacked the

Sienese territory in 1455, on his own account, but was defeated and

compelled to set sail for Naples from Orbetello. In the confusion which

broke out in Naples after king Alfonso’s death neither Florence nor

Venice was involved. The ancient Florentine friendship with the house

of Anjou had to yield to other influences. At the same time, when

the Turks conquered the Morea, and thus approached nearer and nearer

to the coasts of Italy, the Angevin party in the kingdom attempted a

new rising against Ferrante of Aragon, who in 1460 suffered a defeat

from Duke John, which would have driven him from the throne had his

opponents been more united and more powerful. Assistance from Milan and

from Rome, where Pius II. now occupied the Holy See, after the short

reign (not quite three years) of Calixtus III., combined with his own

energy and skill, facilitated the King’s restoration to power; and not

long after, he saw the Anjou expelled from the kingdom by the decisive

victory at Troia, and the insurrectionary barons, among whom were

several of his near relations, given into his power. Thus Florence,

like Venice, which had then little time to think of anything except

danger from the Turks, was appealed to for assistance by Ferrante on

the ground of the alliance concluded in consequence of the peace of

Lodi; but Florence refused, from a consideration of the late King’s

double dealing in the affair of Piccinino.

In the midst of the civil disputes and confusion above described, of

repeated foreign troubles, and an immense exertion of material power

to secure her political position, Florence in the times of Cosimo

de’ Medici was still the harbour of refuge for all Italy, and, in

consequence of an event important in the history of the world, the

haven of Christendom. The ever-memorable movement in the intellectual

world will be mentioned later; the occurrence which forms an important

epoch in ecclesiastical history must be considered here.

Pope Eugenius IV. had, as we have seen, to battle at once with a double

opposition, which, different in origin as in significance, united

for a time, and clouded a considerable part of his reign of sixteen

years. The attempt to restrain within reasonable limits the Colonna,

the relations of his predecessors, who had been immoderately favoured

and had grown insolent, excited agitation in Rome, and kindled a

strife which extended through the greater part of the States of the

Church. The course pursued by the council at Basle, opened not much

more than four months after the elevation of Eugenius, necessarily

led to irreconcilable dissension with the pontificate, because the

new assembly, instead of considering the altered position of affairs

since the termination of the great schism, and confining itself firmly

and with wise moderation to what was truly edifying and necessary (as

exemplified, for instance, in the new Frankish-Germanic countries),

raised its pretensions so high, that if they had prevailed, the

Papacy would have become a cipher. The simultaneous occurrence of

the ecclesiastical contest at Basle with the ambitious plans of

Filippo Maria Visconti, had filled Romagna and the frontiers, the

patrimony—nay, even the Campagna—with the din of war; and on June

4, 1434, the Pope was obliged to take flight from Rome. As early as

the end of January affairs had assumed such an aspect in the States of

the Church, especially in Bologna, that Florence deemed it necessary

to arm, foreseeing that the Pope would be forced to leave Rome, and

Rinaldo degli Albizzi had then expressed his opinion that it would be

advantageous and honourable for the State if Eugenius IV. should choose

Florence as his residence.[89] Received honourably in the city, where

he had already found support in his feud with the Colonna, and residing

in the convent of Sta. Maria Novella, he was witness of the revolution

which brought Cosimo de’ Medici to the helm of affairs, and he remained

at Florence till April 1436, when he repaired to Bologna. As the

controversy with the fathers assembled at Basle became hotter every

year, and he himself was cited before their tribunal, he transferred

the council to Ferrara on October 1, in the following year.

While, early in 1438, the fathers at Basle were pronouncing the

suspension of the Pope, the latter opened, in the capital of the house

of Este, a council, at which appeared shortly afterwards the Greek

Emperor, John Palæologus, in whom the distress of his crumbling empire

had aroused the hope of securing the assistance of the West by a union

with the Church. A pestilence which broke out in Ferrara caused the

removal of the synod to Florence, where in January 1439 it began its

sittings, and on July 6 proclaimed the reunion of the two churches,[90]

six weeks after the deposition of Eugenius IV. had been decreed by

the council at Basle, which had degenerated into a _conciliabulum_,

and which a few months later elected Duke Amadeus VIII. of Savoy, a

powerless anti-Pope, under the name of Felix V. The bronze doors of

the church of St. Peter’s in the Vatican, the work of two Florentine

artists, though not the best specimen of the Florentine sculpture of

that age, commemorate these events in the reliefs. The reconciliation

between East and West could not be of long duration; the schism, a

double one, as it was a question of doctrine as well as supremacy,

and was deeply rooted in the feelings of the people, broke out again

immediately afterwards. But for Florence, where also a reconciliation

of the Armenians with the Church of Rome took place, the council formed

an epoch in the world’s history.

Eugenius IV. resided for four years in the city, while powerful

regents, entrusted with full power, governed Rome. First, the

cardinal-patriarch Giovanni Vitelleschi, for a time Archbishop of

Florence, and involved in the catastrophe of Rinaldo degli Albizzi,

as Luca Pitti was, six years later, in that which ended in his

violent death; then Cardinal Ludovico Scarampi, likewise Archbishop

of Florence at a time when this see needed a more worthy pastor than

these prelates, wearing coat-of-mail and sword. It was precisely during

these years that the Pope was more involved than suited his pastoral

dignity in that endless confusion in the Romagna and the frontiers

which occupied the last years of Filippo Maria Visconti, nor did his

Holiness hold himself quite aloof from a share in Florentine party

divisions. It would have been better for him if he had appeared there

less as a temporal prince than as Pope. On March 25, the feast of

the Annunciation, with which the year began, according to Florentine

custom, he consecrated Sta. Maria del Fiore, where the solemn

proclamation of union in the Church followed: two occurrences recorded

on the large marble tablets which are to be seen on each side of the

entrance to the new sacristy. After the consecration, the Gonfaloniere,

Giuliano Davanzati, received the honour of knighthood. The church

of Sta. Croce was consecrated in 1442, in the presence of the Pope,

by Cardinal Bessarion, Archbishop of Nicæa, one of the few Greeks

who remained in communion with the Latin church. Another memorial of

this Pope is the Collegium Eugenianum, founded in the year 1435, an

institution for young priests, which now occupies the former locality

of the Florentine university in the street named after it, Via dello

Studio, where the antique modest building speaks of former days.

The contest for the Neapolitan throne almost produced a serious rupture

between Eugenius IV. and Florence. The Pope had once recognised the

claims of René of Anjou, and granted him the investiture which Cosimo

de’ Medici received February 23, 1435.[91] He afterwards inclined

to the side of his opponent, who, after the conquest of the capital,

forced René to evacuate the kingdom. In the summer of 1442 the latter

had come to Florence, with the hope of regaining the Pope’s favour,

and also of inducing the Republic to give active support to Francesco

Sforza, who, as we have seen, had fought on his side, but was now hard

pressed in Romagna and on the frontiers. The King, without a kingdom,

was honourably received by the Gonfaloniere, Giovanni Falconi; one

of the houses of the Bardi was assigned to him as residence, and

twenty-five gold florins a day granted him for his maintenance. But

Eugenius IV. was not to be won over, and the Florentines seem also to

have despaired of any favourable result, after Sforza’s contest had

cost, and continued to cost, them such heavy sums. When René saw that

he was wasting his time, he embarked at Leghorn in a Genoese ship,

which brought him back to Provence.

At last, March 7, 1443, the Pope quitted Florence. The mistrust felt

towards him on account of his supposed understanding with the exiles,

had declared itself so openly, that advice was sent from Venice

rather to hinder his departure than to let him go with anger and evil

intentions in his heart. Leonardo Aretino, the chancellor, and other

judicious citizens spoke against it. Venice herself, he said, would

take care not to act so in a similar case. He was right, for the Pope

was a power not to be despised. Vespasiano da Bisticci describes the

impression which he made on the people.[92] When Eugenius, surrounded

by the cardinals, stood on the scaffolding erected at the entrance to

the cloisters of Sta. Maria Novella, to dispense his blessing, not a

sound was to be heard in the Piazza, which with the adjoining streets

was filled with people, and as he pronounced the ‘Adjutorium nostrum

in nomine Domini,’ sobs and cries of ‘Misericordia’ were heard on

every side. At such moments he really appeared to be the Deity, whose

vicegerent he was. The way in which Eugenius IV. departed from the city

which had afforded him hospitality so many years, is a strange picture

of the confused state of things. ‘During the whole night before the day

on which the Pope took his departure,’ relates Vespasian again,[93]

‘there had been a contention as to whether he should be allowed to go

or not. After all the influential citizens had come to an agreement,

they commissioned Messer Agnolo (Acciaiuoli) to go to the Pope early in

the morning, and to inform him he could go whither he pleased. The Pope

and his suite waited for this announcement. When Messer Agnolo entered

Sta. Maria Novella, Messer Francesco of Padua (Cardinal Condulmer,

nephew of Eugenius) came to meet him outside the Pope’s chamber, and

asked if they were prisoners. Messer Agnolo answered that, had they

been prisoners, he would not have been charged with the commission, but

another citizen who had voted in that sense. When the Pope heard it,

he thanked him and the Signoria many times, instantly mounted and rode

with his suite to Siena.’

In the Augustinian convent of Lecceto, before the Fontebrand, a gate of

this city, where Eugenius IV. resided several months before returning

to Rome, which had become more and more anarchical during his nine

years’ absence, he granted the investiture of the kingdom of Sicily

to Alfonso, on July 15,[94] and thus began the uninterrupted though

often threatened reign of the Aragonese line, which lasted till the

oft-revived question of the succession ended in the violent overthrow

of the whole political system for which the Medici had laboured in a

different way and in another sense.

Sixteen years after the departure of Eugenius, another Pope came to

Florence—another man, with other plans and thoughts. On April 25,

1459, Pius II. came hither from Siena on his way to the conference of

princes assembled at Mantua to organise a crusade against the Turks.

Florence was by no means well inclined towards her Sienese neighbours,

and the last Neapolitan war, favoured by Siena, had not exactly

improved the feeling. The Sienese priest, raised to the highest dignity

of Christendom, and desirous of setting a limit to the threatening

progress of Islam, was, however, most honourably received. Several

princes and lords had repaired to the city before the Pope, to welcome

him. Galeazzo Maria Visconti, son of the Duke of Milan, sixteen years

old, appeared with a troop of 350 horse and Cosimo de’ Medici, although

ill, could not be induced to neglect the duty of hospitality towards

the son of his ally and friend; Sigismondo Malatesta, an Ordelaffi of

Forli, a Pio of Carpi, one of the Feltrieri of Urbino, and others rode

out with the young Sforza to San Casciano, where, eight miles from

the city, the road descends into the valley of the Arno, and where

the solemn reception took place. The Gonfaloniere, Agnolo Vettori,

led Pius II. to Sta. Maria Novella, the usual residence of the Pope.

The lover of learning and art delighted in the many beautiful things

which the city, then exceedingly rich, offered to him; business, with

the exception of a new election of bishops, does not seem to have been

attended to. Cosimo de’ Medici was hindered from being present by

indisposition which could not have been feigned.

During the ten days’ visit of the Pope there died on May 2, Archbishop

Antoninus, who was already called a saint, before Pope Adrian VI.

canonised him. Sound common sense, great goodness of heart, piety, and

well-directed benevolence, which founded several institutions still

standing, reformatory zeal and firmness in defending the rights of the

Church, had made him, who was also learned in science, appear the model

of an excellent pastor to the people during the fourteen years which

he dedicated to the office of archbishop, in a time full of suffering

and sudden revolutions of fortune. Such a model he has remained

to the present day, when his writings have been collected, and a

beautiful marble statue has been erected to his memory among those

of distinguished Florentines. The pageantry of the days immediately

preceding and following his decease suited but ill with the loss of

a man so honourable and excellent, which was heavily felt by all the

people. Splendid games and festivals were arranged for the princes of

Milan and the other lords. To a tourney succeeded a festival on the

New Market Place, where the most beautiful women were assembled; then

a hunting-party on the Piazza before Sta. Croce, where, besides the

usual forest animals, a lion and a giraffe were exhibited. A triumphal

procession took place in the evening. A silver table-service, weighing

125 pounds, was presented to the youthful Sforza. It was a custom to

entertain princely personages at the cost of the Commune.

On November 10, 1461, Charlotte of Lusignan, consort of Prince Louis

of Savoy, arrived at Florence[95] on her way to Rome, whither she

was going to entreat the aid of Pius II. against her illegitimate

step-brother Jacob. The latter had possessed himself of the supremacy

over Cyprus, belonging to her of right, and held her husband

besieged in Nicosia. The Signoria, with the Gonfaloniere, Alessandro

Machiavelli, at their head, went to meet her, and conducted her under a

canopy to the house of Cambiozzo de’ Medici, in the Borgo San Lorenzo,

which was prepared for her reception. During her seven days’ visit she

went up to the basilica of San Miniato, which towers above the city,

to visit the grave of the cardinal of Portugal, brother of Juan of

Coimbra, her first husband, who had died here in 1459, on an embassy

from Pius II. Pope Pius has described in his memoirs the last of the

Lusignans, who in the summer of 1487, after more than a quarter of a

century spent in exile, found in St. Peter’s church in the Vatican that

rest which had been denied to her in this life.

CHAPTER VIII.

COSIMO DE’ MEDICI’S LAST DAYS.

AS the year 1464 approached, Cosimo de’ Medici’s life drew to a close.

He had long suffered from gout, which now became more violent, and

attacked more sensitive parts. Often he could not quit the house for

months together. He had experienced the fulness of joy and of sorrow,

especially in his own family. His brother Lorenzo, his junior by six

years, had always been of one mind with him, had eagerly furthered his

interests and those of his sons in the critical moments of 1433, and

had drawn upon himself the enmity of those in power. He had afterwards

been an active and vigilant administrator of money matters for the

Papal curia, and had rivalled his elder brother in collecting literary

treasures. He was only forty-five years old when he died in the autumn

of 1440, at his villa at Careggi, leaving a son, Piero Francesco, who

at first had a share in the mercantile business of his uncle, then

parted from him, and lived aloof from all political matters in his

native city, superintending the management of his large property. This

Lorenzo was the founder of two lines which both fell into enmity with

the elder branch. One of them ended with the murder of the first duke,

the last illegitimate descendant of Cosimo’s line, while the other

gave to Tuscany one of her most valiant warriors and seven rulers.

Cosimo had two sons by Contessina de’ Bardi, Piero and Giovanni. The

former was born in 1416, and carefully educated. At first there was an

intention of giving him the daughter of the Count of Poppi, Francesco

de Guidi, in marriage. But his father seems to have been fearful of

allying himself with this old noble family, which would have brought

him into connection with the lords of Romagna and Umbria, as well as

with the house of the Roman prefects; connections which might have

injured his position in a democratical community, not to mention the

alliance of the Count of Poppi with the Visconti and Albizzi, which led

to his ruin in 1440.

Piero de’ Medici married Lucrezia, daughter of Francesco Tornabuoni,

of a distinguished Florentine family, a woman of extraordinary

endowments, who will be often mentioned in the course of this history.

As Cosimo’s elder son, who was sickly from his earliest youth, seemed

to be incapable of taking his eminent and arduous position in city

and state, the father built all his hopes on the younger son. He lost

him, however, at the age of twenty-two, in the beginning of November

1463, not a year after he had buried his little son Cosimo, whom Maria

Ginevra degli Alessandri had borne to him, and the loss of whom is said

to have broken his father’s heart. The old man wandered inconsolable

through the rooms: ‘This is a large house,’ he lamented, ‘for so small

a family.’ Among those who addressed expressions of sympathy to him

was Pope Pius II. ‘Not the departed one is the loser,’ replied Cosimo;

‘for what we call life is death, and that beyond is the true life; but

who needed him are the losers.’[96] Thus there only remained to him

the family of Piero, who, besides his two sons, had two daughters,

Bianca and Nannina, who, the eldest in her grandfather’s lifetime,

married into two Florentine families, the Pazzi and Rucellai. Besides

his legitimate children, Cosimo had a natural son, Carlo, probably by

Maddalena, a Circassian whom Giovanni Portinari had bought at Venice in

the summer of 1427.[97]

He maintained great reserve in his whole manner of life. For a quarter

of a century he was the almost absolute director of the State, but he

never assumed the show of his dignity. Many works of art and _virtù_

were to be seen in his house; but in style of living, retinue and

horses, he was modest. The ruler of the Florentine State remained

citizen, agriculturist, and merchant. In his appearance and bearing

there was nothing which distinguished him from others; he was simple,

moderate, accessible, friendly and familiar with the common people. ‘He

understood agriculture thoroughly,’ remarked Vespasiano da Bisticci,

‘and talked about it as if he had never occupied himself with other

matters. He laid out the garden of the brethren of San Marco, which had

been waste land, and created something really beautiful. Thus it was

with his own possessions; he everywhere superintended the planting,

grafted and pruned with his own hand. When residing at Careggi, on

account of a pestilence, he dedicated the hours of the morning to two

worthy employments. Hardly was he up than he went into the vineyard,

where he worked for two hours, just as Pope Boniface IX. did in the

Vigne at the palace of the Vatican. When he returned home he read

the moral writings of Gregory the Great. In the midst of all his

employments he remembered every single plantation on his estates, and

when his peasants came to him he conversed with them about them.’

He was a grave man, temperate in all enjoyments. Players, rioters,

and jugglers found as little favour with him as those who displayed a

luxury unsuited to their position. This, however, did not prevent him

from granting free course at the banquets of the learned men who were

about him, members of the Platonic Academy and others, to the hilarity

and wit which the Florentines of that period were apt to flavour with

licence as well as with Attic salt.

Of games he indulged in chess only, and this rarely, and not till after

dinner. In his latter years he was very silent, and remained several

hours without speaking. When his wife asked him the reason one day, he

replied,’When you remove to your villa, you consider for a fortnight

what you have to see about. Do you think I have not much to think of

when about to exchange this life for another?’ In his speech he was

witty, but cautious, and it was said of him that he liked to give

ambiguous answers. He shrank from boasting, and said that there was a

weed called envy, which must not be watered, but left to wither. But

when he chose he could give sharp answers. When Rinaldo degli Albizzi,

at the time of Visconti’s warlike preparations, on which the exile

fixed his hopes, said to him that the hen was brooding, he answered,

‘It is difficult to brood outside the nest.’ And on the warning of

other exiles, that he ought to take care, for they were awake, he

replied that he believed it, for he must have banished sleep from them.

His remarks were always to the purpose. When Pius II. was arming for

the crusade, he said the Pope was an old man, and was attempting a

youthful feat. He reproved many without using a hard expression. His

counsels in political and personal affairs were always moderate and

prudent. When one of his partisans, a man of small capabilities, was

going to a foreign town as Podestà, and asked him for advice, he only

answered: ‘Dress according to your position, and speak little.’ In

this way he maintained his position and that of the State for so many

years in the midst of difficult circumstances. As has been already

said, there was something cynical in him. Nothing characterises him so

much as the words which he once addressed to an influential man, who,

differing in opinion, quarrelled with him, and complained of Cosimo’s

being in his way. ‘You,’ he said, ‘pursue the infinite; I the finite.

You plant your ladder in the air; I on the ground, in order not to fall

instead of flying. If I am anxious for the honour and advantage of my

house, if I wish that it may retain pre-eminence over yours, there is

nothing in that which is not honourable and just, and no one will blame

me because I prefer my interests to yours. You and I are like two great

dogs, who spring upon one another, but then pause and sniff. As they

both have teeth, each goes his own way. I advise you to look after your

business; I will attend to mine.’

He did not deceive himself as to the difficulties which surrounded him,

or as to the still greater hindrances with which his descendants would

have to contend. The example of the heads of parties who had preceded

him was not lost upon him. He knew, says Vespasian, that he owed his

recall from exile to powerful friends, who did not intend to give up

their position, and that it was not easy to keep on good terms with

them except by temporising and making them believe that they were as

powerful as he. Here he proved his great art. In all that he wished to

carry out he managed to make it appear that it proceeded from others,

not from him. He said that the greatest fault which he had been guilty

of was not having begun to expend money ten years earlier; for now that

he knew the character of his fellow-citizens, he foresaw that nothing

would remain of his family and his house after fifty years except, the

little that he had built; for after his death his descendants would

find themselves in the midst of greater troubles than any that he had

seen. He never spoke ill of others, and was very impatient when any

one did so in his presence. His promises could be relied on, for he

did more than he promised. His immense wealth enabled him to oblige

many. His position was such a one that it was a proverbial expression

to boasters, ‘So you think you are Cosimo de’ Medici?’ From his father

he had inherited a fine property, which he considerably increased by

industry, acuteness, and good fortune. He ruled the money market,

not only in Italy, but throughout Europe. He had banks in all the

western countries, and his experience and the excellent memory which

never failed him, with his strong love of order, enabled him to guide

everything from Florence, which he never quitted after 1438 except to

go to the country. While he watched over his own advancement, all who

were in business connection with him and conducted his banks abroad,

enriched themselves also. Thus it was with the Tornabuoni in Rome,

with the Portinari in Bruges, with the Benci, Sassetti, Spini, &c.

Besides this, numerous citizens had money from him in their possession,

as was revealed after his death. How much he was capable of in

financial affairs was seen when Venice and King Alfonso united against

Florence. By withdrawing credit from them, he forced them to peace,

notwithstanding their superior power. Pope Eugenius IV. mortgaged the

castle of Assisi to him for the considerable sums advanced to him. The

mutual relations into which he brought the finances of the State with

those of his house by advances and repayments, laid the foundation, it

is true, of those evils which assumed the most serious form under his

grandson, when Cosimo’s mercantile insight and success were wanting.

His conscience was not at peace. ‘In the arrangement and administration

of affairs of the city,’ says the honest Vespasiano, with the

straightforward naïveté and conscientiousness which he never lays

aside, even when speaking of a man for whom he has great respect and

admiration, ‘it could not fail that his conscience was loaded with

many things, as is usually the case with those who govern states and

rule others. He perceived that if he wished to preserve himself in his

position and obtain the mercy of God, works of piety were necessary.

As it now appeared to him that a part of his possessions, I know not

how, had been obtained in a doubtful manner, he wished to roll off this

burden from his shoulders, and poured out his heart to Pope Eugenius

IV., who was then in Florence, begging him to tell him how he could

lighten his conscience.’

The building of churches and convents was a principal means of paying

this debt, according to the ideas of the time; Duke Gian Galeazzo,

not to mention a thousand others, built the cathedral of Milan and

the Certosa of Pavia, and the citizen of Florence, whatever his sins

may have been, was certainly no Visconti. But he built, in spite

of dukes and kings, in Florence and out of it. It was his special

passion, and he understood this art. He had always architects around

him; Michelozzi accompanied him into his exile, and Brunellesco was

among his intimate friends. He executed great works in the city, not

to mention his magnificent house, which must have been completed in

1440. We have already spoken of many of these works, and they will be

treated of more in detail subsequently; here they may be enumerated in

succession. San Lorenzo and San Marco are for the greater part due to

him. The Vallombrosan cloister of Sta. Verdiana, founded at the end

of the fourteenth century by Ser Niccolò di Buonagiunta, was restored

by him. In the cloister of Sta. Croce, he built the novitiate, with

the adjoining chapel and choir. He enriched with altars and adornments

many churches. The Canonica of San Lorenzo is said to have cost him

40,000 gold florins, that of San Marco 70,000, and the palace 60,000.

At the foot of the hill of Fiesole he built a church and abbey for

the canons of the Augustinians, whom Pope Eugenius IV. transplanted

thither in 1439; and higher up, not far from the little town, the

church of San Girolamo, on the site where the congregation of the

Jeromites was founded, about the end of the last century, by Carlo, of

the family of the Counts Guidi, where the villa Ricasoli is now to be

seen. The villa at Careggi, in the most beautiful situation, scarcely

two miles from the city, and the favourite residence of himself and

his sons, received its present form from him, as well as the villa now

named after the Mozzi, on the Fiesolan hill, and that of Cafaggiuolo,

in the thickly-wooded country on the slope of the Apennines, on the

road leading to Bologna. He built a Franciscan convent in the midst

of the woods in the neighbourhood of the latter. Nor far from thence

he enlarged the villa of Trebbio, the castellated building of which

reminds us of Cosimo, the first Grand Duke, who resided there in his

youth. In Assisi he enlarged the cloister of St. Francis, and had the

road paved which leads up to the town from the church of Sta. Maria

degli Angeli, lying at the foot of the hill. This church, the large

marble fountain of which he caused to be built by Michelozzo for the

benefit of the pilgrims, still bears his name and arms. The palace in

Milan, presented to him by Francesco Sforza, he caused to be rebuilt by

Michelozzo, and painted by Vicenzo Zoppa and others. He restored the

collegium built by a Florentine cardinal for his countrymen in Paris.

In Jerusalem he erected a pilgrims’ house for the Florentines on the

spot where, according to tradition, the Holy Ghost descended on the

Apostles, and where a building stood, which he restored by appointing

regular payments for its maintenance. He used to say that whatever he

had given to God, he in his balance of accounts had never found Him

to be his debtor. His connection with artists and scholars will be

mentioned when we come to the description of his extraordinary services

to art and his active interest in learning.

Such was Cosimo de’ Medici—certainly, with all his faults, a

remarkable man, who more than anyone contributed to keep alive not only

the forms, but much of the spirit of civil equality and dignity, after

it had become impossible to avoid a party government, leading sooner

or later to the preponderance of one family. A spirit, which lay at

all events in the character of the people, but also in the character

of a race which had sprung from the people, which at last attained to

power, and even in arbitrary times, preserved something of that which

distinguishes it from other princely families. The people, those who

disliked Cosimo not excepted, observed with anxiety his increasing

ill-health. They said to each other that his influential adherents were

infinitely inferior to him in goodness, consideration, and prudence,

and feared that his son would not be able to restrain them. In the

spring of 1464 he caused himself to be brought, with much suffering, to

Careggi, where his wife and son were with him. When Francesco Sforza

heard of his condition, he sent him a skilful physician, who, however,

could effect as little as the others. On July 26, Piero de’ Medici

addressed the following letter to his two sons, who were residing at

Cafaggiuolo:[98] ‘The day before yesterday I gave you news of Cosimo’s

increasing illness, which, as it seems to me, is exhausting his

strength. He himself feels it, so that on Tuesday evening he would have

no one but Monna Contessina and myself in his room. He began to speak

of his own life, then passed to the government of the city, family,

his trade connections, and the state of his property. At last he came

to speak of you, and encouraged me, as you have good intellectual

endowments, to give you a careful education, that you might make many

things easier for me in life. He said two things grieved him—first,

that he had not done so much as he wished to do and might have done,

and that he left me in bad health in the midst of many difficulties. He

had not wished to make a last will even in Giovanni’s lifetime, as he

had always seen us united and affectionate. When God should take him

to Himself, he wished for no pomp at the funeral; he then reminded me

of what he had already said concerning his interment in San Lorenzo.

He said all this so calmly and sensibly that it seemed wonderful to

me, adding that he had lived long, and was content to leave the world

at God’s pleasure. Yesterday morning he rose and had himself fully

dressed, in presence of the priors of San Lorenzo, San Marco, and

the monastery. He confessed to the former, and then had mass said,

repeating the responses with a strong voice. He afterwards pronounced

the Creed, said the Confiteor, and devoutly received the sacrament

after entreating the forgiveness of all. All this strengthened my hope

and confidence in God, and although, according to human feelings, I am

not free from sorrow, I am yet contented, having seen his strength of

soul and pious frame of mind, to see him attain that end to which we

must all come. He felt well yesterday, and also to-day, but at his

advanced age no recovery is to be hoped for. Let the brethren in the

forest (the Franciscans at Cafaggiuolo) pray for him, and distribute

alms at your good pleasure. Pray yourselves to God that He may leave

him to us for a little time, if it be for his good. And take your

example by him; accept your share of toil as God wills while still

young, and become men, for circumstances demand it. But above all,

consider that which may bring you honour and advantage, for the time is

at hand when you must be tried. Live in the fear of God, and hope. I

will let you know how Cosimo is. We expect hourly a doctor from Milan,

but I trust more to God than to men.’

In his memorandum-book Piero de’ Medici wrote a few days later as

follows:[99] ‘On August 1, 1464, about half-past the twenty-second

hour, Cosimo, son of Giovanni, the son of Averardo de’ Medici, departed

this life, after he had been long tortured with pains in the limbs,

although otherwise in health, with the exception of the last month of

his life, when a complaint of the bladder, with some fever, reduced

his strength much. He was 77 (75) years old, a tall and handsome man,

and, excepting the complaints mentioned, of an excellent constitution.

A man of great ability and yet greater kindness, the most respected

and influential citizen, who had long ruled the city, possessed more

confidence than all others, and was beloved by the whole people. No

one can be remembered who stood in greater favour or better repute, or

whose death awakened more general sympathy. This was deservedly the

case, inasmuch as no one had to complain of him, while he promoted

and assisted many; for his great pleasure consisted in well-doing,

not only where relations and friends were concerned, but also in the

case of strangers and even opponents, difficult of belief as this may

appear and hard to carry out. In this way the number of those who

wished him well was always increasing. He was liberal, benevolent,

merciful; his alms were numerous, in behalf of churches and convents,

not merely in town and country, but even in distant lands. On account

of his wisdom he enjoyed the respect and confidence of all the lords

and powers of Italy, and of foreign countries. All honourable offices

in the city were bestowed on him; he would undertake none abroad. The

most honourable embassies fell to him. He enriched many citizens by his

mercantile connections, not to mention the great fortune which he left,

for he was a merchant as skilful as he was successful. He died at our

house in Careggi, after having received all the sacraments of the holy

Church with piety and reverence. He would not make a will, but left

everything at my free disposal. On the following day he was interred

in the church of San Lorenzo, in the vault previously chosen by him,

without pomp of burial, in the presence of the canons and priests of

the aforesaid church, and the regular canons of Fiesole, with neither

more nor fewer tapers than are used at ordinary obsequies, as he had

commanded with his last words, saying, one should give alms during

life, then they were of more use than after death. I did what was my

duty, and gave the orders for alms-giving and Divine worship, as my

books will show.’[100]

Marsilio Ficino, the confidant of the family for four generations, and

witness of Cosimo’s last days, wrote the following to the grandson

of the latter, and his own pupil, Lorenzo, then sixteen years of

age:[101] ‘A man intelligent above all others, pious before God, just

and high-minded towards his fellow-men, moderate in everything that

concerned himself, active in his private affairs, but still more

careful and prudent in public ones. He did not live for himself alone,

but for the service of God and his country. None surpassed him in

humility or magnanimity. More than twelve years I had philosophic

conversations with him, and he was as acute in disputation as he was

wise and strong in action. I owe Plato much, to Cosimo I owe no less.

He showed me in practice those virtues which Plato presented to my

mind. He was as covetous of time as Midas of gold; he measured days

and hours, and complained even of the loss of minutes. After he had

occupied himself with philosophy all his life, and in the midst of the

gravest matters, he devoted himself, after Solon’s example, more than

ever to it in the days when he was passing from darkness to light. For

as you know, who were present shortly before his departure, he still

read with me Plato’s book “On the One Reason of Things and Highest

Good,” as though he would in reality now go to enjoy the good which he

had tasted in conversation.’

The Signoria ordered a commission of ten citizens, Luca Pitti at their

head, to make a proposal as to the manner in which the State could

honour the memory of Cosimo de’ Medici, and express its gratitude.

Donato Acciaiuoli made a speech, in which the determination to grant

him the title of father of his country was announced.[102] In San

Lorenzo, before the high altar, above the place in the crypt where

stands the tomb inscribed with his name, the words may be read on the

marble pavement:

COSMUS MEDICES

HIC SITUS EST

DECRETO PUBLICO

PATER PATRIÆ.

VIXIT ANNOS LXXV. MENSES III.

DIES XX.

_SECOND BOOK._

PIERO DE’ MEDICI.

FIRST YEARS OF LORENZO THE MAGNIFICENT.

CHAPTER I.

PIERO DE’ MEDICI, HIS FAMILY AND FRIENDS.

AT the death of Cosimo de’ Medici, his descendants, besides his natural

son Carlo, who once more entered the ecclesiastical order, consisted

of Piero, surnamed the Gouty (_il Gottoso_), and his four children.

Piero was born in 1416, and was now forty-eight years old. He was

a youth when the swift change of fortune in his father’s life took

place, which, at first threatening his house with ruin, had suddenly

raised it to supreme power, and his manhood passed during the envied

but not seriously disputed exercise of that power. His health was

feeble, yet this did not hinder him from undertaking various civil

offices, and may, perhaps, have been of service to him by covering his

mediocre character and intellect, and enabling him to preserve that

middle course which is so difficult for the head of a party filled with

great and ambitious men. He was a sensible, quiet man, experienced

in business, with a sound judgment and far more kindliness of heart

and sincerity than his father, but without his political acuteness,

knowledge of men, and talent for steering safely among the numerous

rocks that beset his position.

A clever wife stood beside him. At a time when Florence had no lack of

distinguished women, Lucrezia, the daughter of Francesco Tornabuoni,

surpassed most in intellectual gifts and domestic virtues. Her family

was a branch of an ancient and noble Florentine race, which, since

the democratic reforms of 1293, had been excluded from holding civic

offices, yet without losing importance. Like many others, Simon

Tornaquinci, a hundred years later, had altered his coat-of-arms,

enrolled himself among the plebeian families under the name of

Tornabuoni, and attached himself to the Medicean party, in which

his son Francesco took a not unimportant position. Tornaquinci and

Tornabuoni possessed considerable landed property in the western part

of Florence. A gate of the second wall, since called San Pancrazio,

was once named after the former, and a street still bears the name of

the latter.[103] Lucrezia de’ Medici never experienced the anguish of

exile; neither, separated from an exiled husband, had she to remain

at the head of a ruined household, like so many noble ladies in those

days of magnificence so often changing into misery. She beheld three

generations in the possession of power, with its charge of care and

sorrow. While conducting her household, which never lost its simple

character, she paid homage to the muse in lyric poems and translations

of Biblical histories. We shall speak later of her intercourse with

Luigi Pulci (whom she encouraged to complete his poem on the legends

of Charlemagne), with Politian and others. Lucrezia possessed great

influence over her eldest son, whose youth she guided, and she lived to

enjoy the period of his highest greatness.

Lucrezia gave birth to seven children, four of whom, two sons and two

daughters, survived. Lorenzo was born January 1, 1449.[104] Nature had

given him strength, but not beauty. To judge from his exterior, one

might have prophesied him a long life, but not a brilliant one. He was

above the middle height, broad-chested, powerfully built, and agile of

limb. His features were, however, unpleasing; the sight weak, the nose

flattened, the chin sharp, with a pale complexion. He was entirely

destitute of the sense of smell, and his voice was harsh.[105] These

natural defects he conquered with equal skill and perseverance, but

the advantages of his bodily health and strength did not last long.

His early education was confided to Gentile de’ Becchi of Urbino,

afterwards canon at Florence and Pisa, and finally Bishop of Arezzo, a

man of great ability and deeply attached to the family, an attachment

which, at an important epoch in the life of his pupil and in Florentine

history, led him to exaggerations which did not suit the ecclesiastical

dignity.

Cosimo had attracted Gentile[106] and entrusted him with the education

of his grandson. This learned man, who was connected with the most

famous scholars of his time, such as Francesco Filelfo, Marsilio

Ficino, Cardinal Ammanati, Giovan. Antonio Campano, Politian, and

others, certainly spared no pains in the education of the richly-gifted

boy. Under his guidance and that of Ficino, Cristoforo Landino, and

John Argyropulos, one of the Greek fugitives received by Cosimo, the

youth amassed an amount of knowledge not often possessed even at that

time, when learned culture was so general among the rich. He developed

his excellent talents in many directions. A letter addressed by his

tutor to Piero de’ Medici, June 3, 1454,[107] with its assertion

that the boy of sixteen excited the admiration of the whole city,

is a pattern of that courtly style which began to be practised by

the dependants of powerful families. It is worth mentioning here,

because it speaks of a visit the boy paid to the Duke John of Anjou,

who was then staying in Florence. ‘On the day before your departure,

Lorenzo assumed the French costume, which suited him so well that we

had scarcely set out when we were surrounded by a crowd of children

and adults, who followed us on the way to King René’s son, whom we

intended to visit. The Duke received him with great pleasure, as if he

had been a little Frenchman fresh from his native country, and kept him

the whole day in his presence. But not many were deceived by him, for

his gravity, so little suited to the French character, betrayed his

individuality.’

His education was serious according to the custom of the time. Several

hours were devoted to religious exercises, especially in the evening,

when a fraternity of St. Paul was visited. His mother was especially

particular in this respect, as she was also in inculcating on the youth

habits of benevolence, by appointing dowries for poor girls, supporting

poor convents, giving abundant alms to the needy, and pursuing every

noble stratagem that would lead to popular favour. In bodily exercises

Lorenzo soon surpassed most of his companions, and he early displayed

that love for beautiful horses which he preserved all his life; he was

also an accomplished rider. He was highly delighted when, just out of

his boyhood, a valuable horse was sent him from Sicily. He made a rich

present in return, and upon its being suggested to him that it would be

better under such circumstances to buy the horse than receive it as a

gift, he replied, ‘Do you not know that it is a royal gift, and does it

not seem royal not to be conquered in liberality?’[108]

Piero’s younger son, Giuliano, was born in 1453. He was not permitted

to arrive at maturity. Compared with his brother, he was rather in the

shade, yet he promised to rival him in many things, as he certainly did

in knightly exercises. He was tall, handsome, and strong, according to

Angelo Politian’s description,[109] who was intimately associated with

him; had lively dark eyes, dark complexion, black hair falling on his

shoulders, excelled in all bodily exercises, and was an eager huntsman.

His expression and bearing were commanding. He was fond of poetry, and

took a lively interest in the fine arts. Giuliano did not, however,

equal his brother in versatile talents; his character rather resembled

his father’s than his grandfather’s.

The elder of the two daughters, Bianca, was married in Cosimo’s

lifetime to Guglielmo de’ Pazzi. The great influence which the Pazzi

family had on the fortunes of the Medici and of the State makes it

necessary to dwell awhile upon their history.[110] Their origin is

veiled in obscurity. Some have considered them as identical with

the lordly family of the same name in the Arno valley, which was

connected with the Donati, frequently mentioned in the heroic days

of Florence, and related to Dante Alighieri. Others have traced them

from Fiesole, whence the old family arms are said to be derived—six

moons, alternately blue and red, in a silver field, a device which they

exchanged in 1388 for that granted by the dukes of Bar, two golden

barbs in a blue field, and at present changed into dolphins with four

small double crosses. According to unauthenticated tradition, Pazzo

de’ Pazzi went to Jerusalem in Godfrey de Bouillon’s army, and the

people of Florence preserved a fragment of stone which he is said to

have brought home from the Saviour’s tomb. At one time placed in Sta.

Maria del Fiore, and then in Sant’Apostolo, this stone was used to

strike the sparks from which the tapers were lighted, and in Sta. Maria

del Fiore, during the mass, it set alight the Columbina, a squib in

the shape of a dove, which ignited a cart full of rockets and other

fireworks exploded between the church and baptistery. This cart,

called the Carro de’ Pazzi, drives round a part of the inner town,

and stops at the entrance of the Borgo degli Albizzi, named after the

family, where one of their palaces forms the corner. About the middle

of the twelfth century we meet with the name of the Pazzi in documents;

towards the close they became divided into three principal branches.

In the bloody battle of Montaperti, Jacopo de’ Pazzi bore the banner

of Florence, which, when the traitor Bocca degli Abati hewed his hands

off, he pressed to his breast with the stumps till he sank down dead.

His son Pazzino stood at the head of the Black party in the desolating

party strife which preceded the Roman expedition of the Emperor Henry

of Luxemburg. At the beginning of the fifteenth century the still

flourishing line was strictly aristocratic, and only passed over to the

plebeian families in 1434. This change arose out of the circumstance

that so many of the families hitherto admitted to hold office were

proscribed by being ranked among ‘the great,’ so that Cosimo feared

to increase their numbers and consequently their power. He therefore

caused the old noble families, if they did not exactly oppose him and

his family, to be ranked among the plebeians. Thus it happened with

Andrea de’ Pazzi, who was born in 1372, and with whom the importance

of the family in civic affairs commences. He was already experienced

in embassies, and had treated with Pope John XXIII. When, as has been

already related, King René resided in Florence in 1442, Andrea de’

Pazzi was assigned to him as escort, and obtained the favour of that

prince, who, though neither skilful nor successful in things political

or military, had talents and was amiable. He made Andrea a knight, and

stood godfather to one of his children, who was called Renato after

the King. He erected the beautiful chapel of Sta. Croce and the palace

at the Canto de’ Pazzi, which, rebuilt by his son Jacopo, is still a

monument of a style uniting severity with elegance, and is, moreover,

the witness of an occurrence which has made the name of the family

historical.

Andrea de’ Pazzi left several sons by his wife Caterina Salviati, two

of whom, Piero and Jacopo, played an important part. Piero was one of

the most brilliant and cultivated persons of his time. Niccolò Niccoli,

to whom so many of his countrymen were indebted for mental culture,

roused in him an interest in scholarship. ‘Piero de’ Pazzi,’ relates

Vespasiano da Bisticci,[111] ‘was a most beautiful youth, and pursued

his pleasures without thinking of graver employments, while his father,

a wealthy merchant, who cared little for literature, which he did not

understand, thought to dedicate him to his own pursuits. As he one day

passed the Palazzo del Podestà, Niccolò Niccoli, another Socrates,

saw him. Impressed by his exterior, he called him to him, and asked

whose son he was and what he was doing. The youth, not unaware of the

respect paid to the excellent man, replied that he was the son of

Messer Andrea de’ Pazzi, and passed his time as he best might. Niccolò

continued, “As you are the son of such a highly placed citizen, and

yourself of such favourable appearance, it is a shame that you do not

study Latin literature, which would be a great accomplishment for you.

If you do not learn it, you will reap no honour, and remain without

inward resources when the bloom of youth has vanished.” Piero was

struck, and answered that he would willingly follow the good advice

if Niccolò would procure him a suitable teacher.’ Thus he began his

studies under the guidance of Pontano, and soon made so much progress

that he was a pattern for all the youths in the city. When he went

with the Archbishop of Pisa, Filippo de’ Medici and Buonaccorso

Pitti, in October 1461, to France, to congratulate King Louis XI.

on his accession,[112] he displayed extraordinary pomp and princely

liberality, as well as skill and political address, and he was knighted

by the King. When he returned he met with a brilliant reception. ‘At

his entry,[113] the whole city seemed to rejoice, for he was beloved

by all on account of his kindness and liberality. All the streets

and windows were filled with people who awaited him. He came with a

suite in attire completely new, with costly pearls on their hats and

sleeves. In the memory of man no knight had entered Florence as he did,

which was a great honour for his family. He rode to the palace of the

Signory, dismounted at the great door, and went in to fetch the banner,

like those who returned home as knights. He then mounted again and rode

to the palace of the principal men of the Guelph party, to receive the

party badge. Here Messer Piero Acciaiuoli welcomed him in the presence

of many, with a well-composed speech in the vulgar tongue. Upon this

he received the badge, took the banner in his hand, and rode with a

great suite home again, where for some days open house was kept. If a

reproach could be cast upon him, it was that of excessive liberality.

Only the man who asked for nothing received nothing from him. At the

death of his father it was found that he had spent 12,000 gold florins,

of which there was no account. To be sure, he had spent all, or nearly

all, on things which, according to worldly ideas, sufficed for his

honour and distinction.’

We know that Andrea de’ Pazzi formed a friendship with King René. Piero

attached himself to that king’s son when he came to Florence in 1454.

The connection served Duke John when he made war against the Aragonese,

and the money of Florence and of Florentine citizens, especially of

the Medici and Pazzi, was of great assistance. Had the Angevin been

fortunate, Piero would undoubtedly have become a great lord like Nicola

Acciaiuoli in older times. His friendly connections with Piero de’

Medici led to the marriage of Medici’s daughter Bianca with Guglielmo

de’ Pazzi, Piero’s nephew. Piero attained to the office of Gonfaloniere

in 1462, and died not long afterwards, a little over forty-six years

old. ‘Had he,’ remarks Vespasiano da Bisticci, ‘who surpassed all

his family in good sense, lived longer, they would not have fallen

into the disorders which brought ruin to them and to the city.’ His

brother Jacopo, who was involved in these troubles, was nevertheless

a clever man, and seemed to stand as high in the popular favour as

Piero. After he had administered the office of Gonfaloniere in the

beginning of 1469, the dignity of knighthood was accorded to him by a

public vote, and bestowed on him by Messer Tommaso Soderini. He went

twice as ambassador to the Emperor Frederick III. After his tragical

end, his widow, Maddalena Serristori, retired into the cloister of the

Franciscan nuns of Monticelli, before the Porta Romana. Here also the

veil was taken by Jacopo’s natural daughter Caterina, whose tutor had

been a man who played a sad part in the tragedy of 1478. Caterina,

after her death in 1490, was venerated as a saint. Of Antonio, a third

son of Andrea, who died in 1459, there is not much to say; the three

sons whom Cosa degli Alessandri bore him, Guglielmo, who married Bianca

de’ Medici, Giovanni, whose wife was Beatrice Borromeo, and Francesco,

will often be mentioned again.

In the year 1466, Bianca’s younger sister, Nannina, married Bernardo

Rucellai. His family,[114] which has been supposed to come from

Germany, was called Alamanno. They are first met with in the second

half of the thirteenth century as members of the woollen guild, having

risen to their position by industrial activity, as the name itself

intimates; for Rucellai is nothing but a corruption of Oricellari,

and at the present day one of the streets of a new part of Florence

is called from the Latin name of the turnsole Oricella, or Roccella

Tinctoria. The Florentine tradesman discovered in the East that the

dye of this plant, treated with acids, gives a beautiful violet. The

dyeing-works of Alamanno brought him and his descendants rich gain.

His well-earned wealth was speedily followed by civic honours, and

after 1302 a share in the highest offices of state. The fourteenth

century witnessed the rise and fall of several of the Rucellai, till

they attained the highest respect and great wealth at the beginning

of the fifteenth century. Giovanni Rucellai, the grandson of a man

who had played some part in the times of the Duke of Athens, was born

in 1403. His mother, Caterina Pandolfini, a widow after three years

of wedlock, brought the boy to Palla Strozzi, who assigned him a post

in his bank, and grew so fond of him that he gave him his daughter

Jacopa in marriage when he had attained the age of twenty-four. The

events which expelled Palla and his sons did not leave his son-in-law

unmolested. Though Giovanni Rucellai was not banished, he was excluded

from all offices, and remained out of the administration up to the

last days of Cosimo, when the latter deemed it advisable to procure

adherents in the family he had until then oppressed. This did not,

however, prevent him from increasing his wealth and making use of it

for the general good, in which he was aided by the genius of Leon

Battista Alberti. He completed the marble façade of Sta. Maria Novella,

on which his name may still be read. He erected a chapel near the

church of San Pancrazio, with an exact imitation in marble of the

Saviour’s tomb, as measured and copied by his orders in Jerusalem.

This is still to be seen, though the church has long been disused for

Divine worship. His family palace, already mentioned, in the Via della

Vigna Nuova, with the Loggia opposite, now unfortunately walled up,

is the most graceful example of the transition style from the ancient

severity of the immense freestone façade to the antiquated ornaments

of the Renaissance. He and his son will be mentioned later. The latter

was born in 1448, a few months before Lorenzo de’ Medici, whose

grandfather, by becoming his sponsor, gave public expression to the

reconciliation of the two families. Near relationship, however, could

not make him feel attached to the family whose blood flowed in the

veins of his children.

Thus was Piero de’ Medici’s family composed. Other connections of

equal importance belonged to them. Foremost of all were the two

Soderini, Niccolò and Tommaso.[115] Their ancestors are said to have

been Counts of Gangalandi, and heads of the Ghibelline party, but they

are found as a Florentine plebeian family in the second half of the

twelfth century. They attained importance only 200 years later. Tommaso

Soderini, like so many of his countrymen, spent a great part of his

life in business matters at Papal Avignon, and returned in 1370 to his

home, where, as a member of the magistracy of the Guelph party, he took

so violent a part in the proscriptions, that in the insurrection of

1378 he was one of the first to have his house plundered and burnt. He

went into exile to Tarascon, on the Rhône, but returning home after the

victory of the oligarchy, he again attained to office and influence.

In 1395, seven years before his death, he was Gonfaloniere. His two

sons, Francesco and Lorenzo, went separate ways. Francesco, the son

of Elisabetta Altoviti whom Tommaso had married after his return to

Avignon, passed through the usual career of distinguished Florentines

who attained to civic offices and embassies as soon as they reached

the legal age. One of his missions took him to Mantua to celebrate

the marriage of Ludovico Gonzaga with Barbara of Hohenzollern, the

granddaughter of Frederick I., elector of Brandenburg. Like his father,

he belonged to the party of the Albizzi, and had one of the daughters

of Palla Strozzi as his wife. When Cosimo de’ Medici went into exile he

was one of the magistracy of eight that escorted him to the frontiers.

He was not expelled when the Medici gained the victory, but his

influence was at an end, and he only became Podestà in towns of Umbria

and Romagna, and for a time he lay in prison on suspicion of having

shared in the movements of his partisans. Niccolò da Uzzano destined

him to be the rector of his university, and Donatello has given us his

portrait in one of the statues which are to be seen on the front of

the bell-tower of Sta. Maria.[116] It is the figure standing next to

the church called that of St. John the Baptist, and in its natural free

bearing reminds one of the famous St. George of Or San Michele.

Lorenzo, Tommaso’s other son, passed through a stormy career. Born at

Avignon, of a woman of Auvergne, he endeavoured to cover his want of

legitimacy by the diplomas of a Count Palatine and of Gian Galeazzo

Visconti. After having been enrolled by King Charles V. of France in

an order of knighthood, and married in Florence to Ghilla Cambi, he

conceived the unfortunate idea, after his father’s death, of proving

the legality of his birth and his right to more wealth by means of

forged documents. The severity, of the laws sentenced him to death,

which he suffered in 1405. His two sons, Niccolò and Tommaso, born, the

former in 1401, the latter in 1403, became eager partisans of Cosimo

de’ Medici on the sole ground of hatred of their uncle, to whom they

attributed a participation in the tragical end of their father, and

who took the other side. Niccolò received the dignity of Gonfaloniere

in 1451, Tommaso in 1449 and 1454. The latter, by far the most

distinguished, filled various offices in the provincial towns at an

early age; when thirty-five he sat in the magistracy of the Priori. By

his marriage with Dianora Tornabuoni, Lucrezia’s sister, he was riveted

to the Medicean interests, which no one supported with greater zeal

and success, or with more statesmanlike ability. To no one did Piero

or Lorenzo owe so much as to this man. We have already mentioned other

families with whom the Medici were connected. Further mention will be

made of them in the course of this history.