It is in the Ciompi rising of 1278, that social revolution in which all
Florence seems for once to have been interested, that we catch really
for the first time the name of Medici. In 1352, Salvestro de'
Medici--_non già Salvestro ma Salvator mundi_, Franco Sacchetti calls
him--had led the Florentines against the Archbishop of Milan, and in
1370 he had been chosen Gonfaloniere of Justice. He was filling this
office against the wishes of the Parte Guelfa, when, not without his
connivance, the Ciompi riot broke out against the magnates, whose power
he had sought to break by means of the Ordinances of Justice.
The result of that bloody struggle was really a victory for the Arti
Maggiori, the Arti Minori being bribed with promises and thus separated
from the populace, who had sided with the Parte Guelfa, which was beaten
for ever. The oligarchy was saved, but the struggle between rich and
poor was by no means over. Soon the older Guilds seem to lose grip, and
we see instead great trusts arising, associations of wealth, and above
all, Banking Companies. What was wanting in Florence, as elsewhere in
Italy, was some legitimate authority that might have guided the people
in their desire for power. As it was, the city became divided into
classes, each anxious to gain power at the expense of others, the result
being an oligarchy, continually a prey to schism, merely waiting for a
despot to declare himself.
Seemingly in the hands of a group of families without any legitimate
right, the government was really in the power of one among them, and
thus of one man, the head of it, Maso degli Albizzi. Brilliant, clever,
and fascinating, Maso ruled with a certain strength and generosity; but
Florence was a city of merchants, and between the Scylla of oligarchy
and the Charybdis of despotism, was really driven into the latter by her
economic position. The Duke Gian Galeazzo of Milan closed the trade
routes, and Florence was compelled to fight for her life. Pisa, too, had
to be overcome, again for economic reasons, and in 1414 a long war with
King Ladislaus brought Cortona into the power of the Republic; but all
these wars cost money, and the taxes pressed on the poor, who obtained
no advantage from them. Maso's son Rinaldo, who succeeded him before the
wars were over, had less ability than his father, and was certainly less
beloved; he seems, however, to have been upright and incorruptible. He
was, nevertheless, capable of mistakes, and, while engaged in war with
Milan, attempted to seize Lucca. At length, when the grumbling of the
poor had already gone too far, he readjusted the taxes, and thus
alienated the rich also. His own party was divided, he himself heading
the more conservative party, which refused to listen to the clamour of
the wealthier families for a part in the government, while Niccolò
Uzzano, with the more liberal party, would have admitted them. Among
these wealthy families excluded from the government was the Medici.
The Medici had been banished after the Ciompi riots, but a branch of the
family had returned, and was already established in the affections of
the people. To the head of this branch, Giovanni de' Medici, all the
enemies of Rinaldo looked with hope. This extraordinary man, who
certainly was the founder of the greatness of his house, had long since
understood that in such an oligarchy as that of Florence, the wealthiest
must win. He had busied himself to establish his name and credit
everywhere in Europe. He refused to take any open and active part in
the fight that he foresaw must, with patience decide in his favour, but
on his death, Cosimo, his elder son, no longer put off the crisis. He
opposed Rinaldo for the control of the Signoria, and was beaten, in
spite of every sort of bribery and corruption. It fell out that Bernardo
Guadagni, whom Rinaldo had made his creature, was chosen Gonfaloniere
for the months of September and October 1433. Rinaldo at once went to
him and persuaded him that the greatest danger to the State was the
wealth of Cosimo, who had inherited vast riches, including some sixteen
banks in various European cities, from his father. He encouraged him to
arrest Cosimo, and to have no fear, for his friends would be ready to
help him, if necessary, with arms. Cosimo was cited to appear before the
Balia, which, much against the wishes of his friends, he did. "Many,"
says Machiavelli, "would have him banished many executed, and many were
silent, either out of compassion for him or apprehension of other
people, so that nothing was concluded." Cosimo, however, was in the
meantime a prisoner in the Palazzo Vecchio in the Alberghettino
tower[96] in the custody of Federigo Malavolti. He could hear all that
was said, and the clatter of arms and the tumult made him fear for his
life, and especially he was afraid of assassination or poison, so that
for four days he ate nothing. This was told to Federigo, who, according
to Machiavelli, addressed him in these words: "You are afraid of being
poisoned, and you kill yourself with hunger. You have but small esteem
of me to believe I would have a hand in any such wickedness; I do not
think your life is in danger, your friends are too numerous, both within
the Palace and without; if there be any such designs, assure yourself
they must take new measures, I will never be their instrument, nor
imbrue my hands in the blood of any man, much less of yours, since you
have never offended me. Courage, then, feed as you did formerly, and
keep yourself alive for the good of your country and friends, and
that you may eat with more confidence, I myself will be your taster."
[Illustration: THE FLOWER MARKET, FLORENCE]
Now Malavolti one night brought home with him to supper a servant of the
Gonfaloniere's called Fargannaccio, a pleasant man and very good
company. Supper over, Cosimo, who knew Fargannaccio of old, made a sign
to Malavolti that he should leave them together. When they were alone,
Cosimo gave him an order to the master of the Ospedale di S. Maria Nuova
for 1100 ducats, a thousand for the Gonfaloniere and the odd hundred for
himself. On receipt of this sum Bernardo became more moderate, and
Cosimo was exiled to Padua. "Wherever he passed," says Machiavelli, "he
was honourably received, visited publicly by the Venetians, and treated
by them more like a sovereign than a prisoner." Truly the oligarchy had
at last produced a despot.
The reception of Cosimo abroad seems to have frightened the Florentines,
for within a year a Balia was chosen friendly disposed towards him. Upon
this Rinaldo and his friends took arms and proceeded to the Palazzo
Vecchio, the Senate ordering the gates to be closed against them;
protesting at the same time that they had no thought of recalling
Cosimo. At this time Eugenius IV, hunted out of Rome by the populace,
was living at the convent of S. Maria Novella. Perhaps fearing the
tumult, perhaps bribed or persuaded by Cosimo's friends, he sent
Giovanni Vitelleschi to desire Rinaldo to speak with him. Rinaldo
agreed, and marched with all his company to S. Maria Novella. They
appear to have remained in conference all night, and at dawn Rinaldo
dismissed his men. What passed between them no man knows, but early in
October 1434 the recall of Cosimo was decreed and Rinaldo with his son
went into exile. Cosimo was received, Machiavelli tells us, "with no
less ostentation and triumph than if he had obtained some extraordinary
victory; so great was the concourse of people, and so high the
demonstration of their joy, that by an unanimous and universal
concurrence he was saluted as the Benefactor of the people and the
Father of his country." Thus the Medici established themselves in
Florence. Practically Prince of the Commune, though never so in name,
Cosimo set himself to consolidate his power by a judicious munificence
and every political contrivance known to him. Thus, while he enriched
the city with such buildings as his palace in Via Larga, the Convent of
S. Marco, the Church of S. Lorenzo, he helped Francesco Sforza to
establish himself as tyrant of Milan, and in the affairs of Florence
always preferred war to peace, because he knew that, beggared, the
Florentines must come to him. Yet it was in his day that Florence became
the artistic and intellectual capital of Italy. Under his patronage and
enthusiasm the Renaissance for the first time seems to have become sure
of itself. The humanists, the architects, the sculptors, the painters
are, as it were, seized with a fury of creation; they discover new
forms, and express themselves completely, with beauty and truth. For a
moment realism and beauty have kissed one another: for reality is not
enough, as Alberti will find some day, it is necessary to find and to
express the beauty there also. It was an age that was learning to enjoy
itself. The world and the beauty of the world laid bare, partly by the
study of the ancients, partly by observation, really almost a new
faculty, were enough; that conscious paganism which later, but for the
great disaster, might have emancipated the world, had not yet discovered
itself; in Cosimo's day art was still an expression of joy, impetuous,
unsophisticated, simple. In this world of brief sunshine Cosimo appears
to us very delightfully as the protector of the arts, the sincere lover
of learning, the companion of scholars. To him in some sort the world
owes the revival of the Platonic Philosophy, for the Greek Argyropolis
lived in his house, and taught Piero his son and Lorenzo his grandson
the language of the Gods. When Gemisthus Pletho came to Florence, Cosimo
made one of his audience, and was so moved by his eloquence that he
determined to establish a Greek academy in the city on the first
opportunity. He was the dear friend of Marsilio Ficino, and he founded
the Libraries of S. Marco and of the Badia at Fiesole. The great
humanists of his time, Leonardo Bruni, Carlo Marsuppini, Poggio and
Niccolò de' Niccoli were his companions, and in his palace in Via Larga,
and in his villas at Careggi and Poggio a Caiano, he gathered the most
precious treasures, rare manuscripts, and books, not a few antique
marbles and jewels, coins and medals and statues, while he filled the
courts and rooms, built and decorated by the greatest artists of his
time, with the statues of Donatello, the pictures of Paolo Uccello,
Andrea del Castagno, Fra Filippo Lippo, and Benozzo Gozzoli. Cosimo,
says Gibbon, "was the father of a line of princes whose name and age are
almost synonymous with the restoration of learning; his credit was
ennobled with fame; his riches were dedicated to the service of mankind;
he corresponded at once with Cairo and London, and a cargo of Indian
spices and Greek books were often imported in the same vessel." While
Burckhardt, the most discerning critic of the civilisation of the
Renaissance, tells us that "to him belongs the special glory of
recognising in the Platonic philosophy the fairest flower of the ancient
world of thought, and of inspiring his friends with the same belief."
Among those who had loved Cosimo so well as to go with him into exile,
had been Michelozzo Michelozzi, the architect and sculptor, the pupil of
Donatello. Already, Vasari tells us in 1430, Cosimo had caused
Michelozzo to prepare a model for a palace at the corner of Via Larga
beside S. Giovannino, for one already made by Brunellesco appeared to
him too sumptuous and magnificent, and quite as likely to awaken envy
among his fellow-citizens as to contribute to the grandeur and ornament
of the city, and to his own convenience. The palace which we see to-day
at the corner of Via Cavour and Via Gori and call Palazzo Riccardi, was
perhaps not begun till 1444, and is certainly somewhat changed and
enlarged since Michelozzo built it for Cosimo Vecchio. The windows on
the ground floor, for instance, were added by Michelangelo and the
Riccardi family, whose name it now bears, and who bought it in 1695 from
Ferdinando II, enlarged it in 1715.
In 1417, Cosimo, after his marriage with Contessina de' Bardi, had
bought and Michelozzo had rebuilt for him the Villa Careggi, where, in
the Albizzi conspiracy, he had retired, he said, "to escape from the
contests and divisions in the city." It was here that he lay dying when
he wrote to Marsilio Ficino to come to him. "Come to us, Marsilio, as
soon as you are able. Bring with you your translation of Plato _De Summo
Bono_, for I desire nothing so much as to learn the road to the greatest
happiness": and there too Lorenzo his grandson turned his face to the
wall, when Savonarola came to him in his last hours and bade him give
back liberty to Florence.
It is, however, the palace in the Via Larga that recalls to us most
vividly the lives and times of these first Medici, Cosimo Vecchio, Piero
the gouty, Lorenzo il Magnifico. Michelozzo, Vasari tells us, deserves
infinite credit for this building, since it was the first palace built
in Florence after modern rules in which the rooms were arranged with a
view to convenience and beauty. "The cellars are excavated," he
explains, "to more than half their depth under the ground, having four
braccia beneath the earth, that is with three above, on account of the
lights. There are, besides buttresses, store-rooms, etc., on the same
level. In the first or ground floor are two court-yards with magnificent
loggia, on which open various saloons, bed-chambers, ante-rooms,
writing-rooms, offices, baths, kitchens, and reservoirs, with staircases
both for private and public use, all most conveniently arranged. In the
upper floors are dwellings and apartments for a family, with all those
conveniences proper, not only to that of a private citizen, as Cosimo
then was, but sufficient also for the most powerful and magnificient
sovereign. Accordingly, in our time, kings, emperors, popes, and
whatever of most illustrious Europe can boast in the way of princes,
have been most commodiously lodged in this palace, to the infinite
credit of the magnificent Cosimo, as well as that of Michelozzo's
eminent skill in architecture."
It is not, however, the splendour of the palace, fine as it is, or the
memory of Cosimo even, that brings us to that beautiful house to-day,
but the work of Donatello in the courtyard, those marble medallions
copied from eight antique gems, and the little chapel on the second
floor, almost an afterthought you might think, since in a place full of
splendidly proportioned rooms, it is so cramped and cornered under the
staircase, where Benozzo Gozzoli has painted in fresco quite round the
walls, the Journey of the Three Kings, in which Cosimo himself, Piero
his son, and Lorenzo his grandson, then a golden-haired youth, ride
among the rest, in a procession that never finds the manger at
Bethlehem, is indeed not concerned with it, but is altogether occupied
with its own light-hearted splendour, and the beauty of the fair morning
among the Tuscan hills. Is it the pilgrimage of the Magi to the lowly
cot of Jesus that we find in that tiny dark chapel, or the journey of
man, awake now on the first morning of spring in quest of beauty? Over
the grass scattered with flowers, that gay company passes at dawn by
little white towns and grey towers, through woods where for a moment is
heard the song of some marvellous bird, past running streams, between
hedges of pomegranates and clusters of roses; and by the wayside rise
the stone-pine and the cypress, while over all is the far blue sky, full
of the sun, full of the wind, which is so soft that not a leaf has
trembled in the woods, nor the waters stirred in a single ripple. Truly
they are come to Tuscany where Beauty is, and are far from Bethlehem,
where Love lies sleeping. There on a mule, a black slave beside his
stirrup, rides Cosimo Pater Patriae, and beside him comes Piero his son,
attended too, and before them on a white horse stepping proudly, with
jewels in his cap, rides the golden-haired Lorenzo, the youngest of the
three kings, already magnificent, the darling of this world of hills and
streams, which one day he will sing better than anyone of his time. Not
thus came the Magi of the East across the deserts to stony Judaea, and
though the Emperor of the East be of them, and the Patriarch of
Constantinople another, we know it is to the knowledge of Plato they
would lead us, and not to the Sedes Sapientiae. And so it is before an
empty shrine that those clouds of angels sing; Madonna has fled away,
and the children are singing a new song, surely the Trionfo of Lorenzo,
it is the first time, perhaps, that we hear it--
Quant' e' bella giovinezza.
Ah, if they had but known how tragically that day would close.
As Cosimo lay dying at Careggi, often closing his eyes, "to use them to
it," as he told his wife, who wondered why he lay thus without sleeping,
it was perhaps some vision of that conflict which he saw and would fain
have dismissed from his mind, already divided a little in its
allegiance--who knows--between the love of Plato and the love of Jesus.
Piero, his son, gouty and altogether without energy, was content to
confirm his political position and to overwhelm the Pitti conspiracy. It
is only with the advent of Lorenzo and Giuliano, the first but
twenty-one when Piero died, that the spirit of the Renaissance, free for
the first time, seems to dance through every byway of the city, and,
confronted at last by the fanatic hatred of Savonarola, to laugh in his
face and to flee away through Italy into the world.
Born in 1448, Lorenzo always believed that he owed almost everything
that was valuable in his life to his mother Lucrezia, of the noble
Florentine house of Tornabuoni, which had abandoned its nobility in
order to qualify for public office. A poetess herself, and the patron of
poets, she remained the best counsellor her son ever had. In his early
youth she had watched over his religious education, and in his
grandfather's house he had met not only statesmen and bankers, but
artists and men of letters. His first tutor had been Gentile Becchi of
Urbino, afterwards Bishop of Arezzo; from him he learned Latin, but
Argyropolus and Ficino and Landino taught him Greek, and read Plato and
Aristotle with him. Nor was this all, for we read of his eagerness for
every sort of exercise. He could play calcio and pallone, and his own
poems witness his love of hunting and of country life, and he ran a
horse often enough in the palii of Siena. He was more than common tall,
with broad shoulders, and very active. In colour dark, though he was not
handsome, his face had a sort of dignity that compelled respect, but he
was shortsighted too, and his nose was rather broad and flat. If he
lacked the comeliness of outward form, he loved all beauteous things,
and was in many ways the most extraordinary man of his age; his verse,
for instance, has just that touch of genius which seems to be wanting in
the work of contemporary poets. His love for Lucrezia Donati, in whose
honour the tournament of 1467 was popularly supposed to be held, though
in reality it was given to celebrate his betrothal with Clarice Orsini,
seems to have been merely an affectation in the manner of Petrarch, so
fashionable at that time. Certainly the Florentines, for that day at
least, wished to substitute a lady of their city for the Roman beauty,
and Lorenzo seems to have agreed with them. Like the tournament that
Giuliano held later in honour of Simonetta Vespucci, which Poliziano has
immortalised, and for which Botticelli painted a banner, this pageant of
Lorenzo's, for it was rather a pageant than a fight, was sung, too, by
Luca Pulci, and was held in Piazza S. Croce. A rumour of the splendour
of the dresses, the beauty and enthusiasm of the scene, has come down to
us, together with Lorenzo's own account of the day, and Clarice's
charming letter to him concerning it. "To follow the custom," he writes
unenthusiastically in his Memoir--"to follow the custom and do as others
do, I gave a tournament in Piazza S. Croce at a great cost, and with a
considerable magnificence; it seems about 10,000 ducats were spent.
Although I was not a great fighter, nor even a very strong hitter, I won
the prize, a helmet of inlaid silver, with a figure of Mars as a crest."
"I have received your letter, in which you tell me of the tournament
where you won the prize," writes Clarice, "and it has given me much
pleasure. I am glad you are fortunate in what pleases you and that my
prayers are heard, for I have no other wish but to see you happy. Give
my respects to my father Piero and my mother Lucrezia, and all who are
near to you, and I send, too, my respect to you. I have nothing else to
say.--Yours, Clarice de Orsinis." Poor little Clarice, she was married
to Lorenzo on June 4, in the following year. "I, Lorenzo, took to wife
Clarice, daughter of Signor Jacopo, or rather she was given to me." He
writes more coldly, certainly, than he was used to do. The marriage
festa was celebrated in Palazzo Riccardi with great magnificence.
Clarice, who was tall, slender, and shapely, with long delicate hands
and auburn hair, but without great beauty of feature, dressed in white
and gold, was borne on horseback through the garlanded way, in a
procession of girls and matrons, trumpeters and pipers, all Florence
following after to the Palace. There in the loggia above the garden she
dined with the newly-married ladies of the city. In the courtyard, round
the David of Donatello, some seventy of the greatest among the citizens
sat together, while the stewards were all sons of the _grandi_. Piero
de' Medici entertained each day some thousand guests, while for their
entertainment mimic battles were fought, and in the manner of the time
wooden forts were built, defended, and taken by assault, and at night
there were dances and songs. Almost immediately after the marriage
Lorenzo set out for Milan to visit the new Duke, and stand godfather to
his heir. All his way through Prato, Pistoja, Lucca, Pietrasanta
Sarzana, Pontremoli to Milan was a triumphal progress. He came home to
find his father ailing, and on 2nd December 1469, Piero de' Medici died.
He was buried in S. Lorenzo, in a tomb made by Verrocchio.
It was to a great extent owing to the prompt action of Tommaso Soderini
that the power of the Medici did not pass away at Piero's death, as that
of many another family had done in Florence. The tried friend of that
house, Soderini gathered some six hundred of the leading citizens in the
convent of S. Antonio, and, as it seems, with the help of the relatives
of Luca Pitti, persuaded them that the fortunes of Florence were wrapped
up in the Medici. "The second day after my father's death," writes
Lorenzo in his Memoir, "although I, Lorenzo, was very young, in fact
only in my twenty-first year, the leading men of the city and of the
ruling party came to our house to express their sorrow for our
misfortune, and to persuade me to take upon myself the charge of the
government of the city as my grandfather and father had already done.
This proposal being contrary to the instincts of my age, and entailing
great labour and danger, I accepted against my will, and only for the
sake of protecting my friends and our own fortunes, for in Florence one
can ill live in the possession of wealth without control of the
government." Thus Lorenzo came to be tyrant of Florence. It was a rule
illegitimate in its essence, purchased with gold, and without any
outward sign of office. That it would come to be disputed might have
seemed certain.