Magnifico
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So strong was the momentum for reform: Ibid., 163.
“a great crowd”: Machiavelli, Florentine Histories, VII, 14.
“Not without cause”: Rubinstein, Government of Florence Under the Medici, 164.
“a man both proud and bold”: Parenti, Ricordi Storici, 89.
“some honorable excuse”: Clarke, The Soderini and the Medici, 49.
“the people called down blessings”: Landucci, 4.
“Piero di Cosimo”: Parenti, Ricordi Storici, 90.
“Piero has well demonstrated”: Rubinstein, Government of Florence Under the Medici, 168.
questionable business dealings: Parenti, Ricordi Storici, 90.
“Niccolò went in boldly”: Alessandra Strozzi, Selected Letters, 193.
“[I]n this bill”: Rinuccini, Ricordi Storici, xcvi–xcvii.
“a paradise inhabited by devils”: Rubin and Wright, Renaissance Florence. Agnolo Acciaiuoli to Filippo Strozzi.
“greater than any other that had been built”: Machiavelli, Florentine Histories, VII, 5.
[Piero’s] reputation was much diminished: Parenti, Ricordi Storici, 122.
Only seven years earlier: Machiavelli, Florentine Histories, VII, 4.
“You raise your ladder to the heavens”: Bisticci, 225.
“a man entirely devoted to Cosimo”: Phillips, 93.
“[a]ll the affairs of the commune”: Rubinstein, Government of Florence Under the Medici, 178.
“Thinking that Messer Luca Pitti”: Francesco Guicciardini, History of Florence, 15.
“superior in prudence”: Phillips, 101.
“Now Agnolo had been absent from Florence”: Bisticci, 301.
“Nine fools out”: Clarke, 87.
under six feet of water: Parenti, Lettere, no. 62. Marco Parenti to Filippo Strozzi, January 25, 1466.
“everyone knows that Florence has turned towards Venice”: Ibid.
“So you intend, finally”: Pulci, Lettere di Luigi Pulci, II. Luigi Pulci to Lorenzo, February 1, 1466.
no end of worry: Archivio di Stato di Firenze, Mediceo Avanti il Principato, filza 34, no. 147. Giovanni Tornabuoni, May 17, 1477, on the difficulty of making good on bad debts.
“Pope Paul’s head is empty”: Rendina, 421.
“that sink of all iniquities”: Ross, Lives, 332. Lorenzo to Cardinal Giovanni de’ Medici, March 1492.
“You may turn all the pages of history”: Bracciolini, “The Ruins of Rome,” in The Portable Renaissance Reader, 380.
at least pleasant associations: Ross, 108–11. See Lucrezia to Piero, March 27 and April 1, 1467.
“I am in such affliction”: Ross, Lives, 102. Piero to Lorenzo March 15, 1466.
“put an end to all playing on instruments”: Ibid.
“the King took Lorenzo by the arm”: Rochon, 107. Becchi to Piero, April 14, 1466.
“I spoke with him”: Lorenzo, Lettere, I, no. 9.
“love which we bear”: Ibid., 20.
“well-disposed towards his state”: Rochon, 107. Sacramoro da Rimini to Lorenzo, May 6, 1466.
one hundred troops to the Medici cause: Black, “Piero de’ Medici and Arezzo,” in Piero il Gottoso, 25–27.
Strong anti-Medici sentiment: Rubinstein, Government of Florence Under the Medici, 177–78.
CHAPTER VI: GAMES OF FORTUNE
“vile rabbit”: Rubinstein, Government of Florence Under the Medici, 155.
“There were three chiefs”: Parenti, Ricordi Storici, 125.
“unified more by a common hatred”: Rochon, 80.
“Nicodemo [Tranchedini], well schooled in these arts”: Parenti, Ricordi Storici, 125.
“And thus there arose two fortresses”: Parenti, Ricordi Storici, 125.
“around the 22nd hour”: Ibid., 124.
“in the midst of a great multitude of armed men”: Machiavelli, Florentine Histories, 293.
would tear him limb from limb: Ibid.
“The plebs, thirsting after novelty”: Valori, 31–32.
“While things were in such a state”: Parenti, Ricordi Storici, 126–27.
“very cowardly”: Ibid., 127.
“With this money he showed great liberality”: Ibid., 125.
“Messer Luca, messer Dietisalvi and messer Agnolo”: Ibid.
Messer Antonio Ridolfi, one of Piero’s friends: Ibid., 127.
Now Piero’s foresight: Ibid., 127–28.
“Better a city”: Machiavelli, Florentine Histories, VII, 6.
“That same morning”: Parenti, Ricordi Storici, 127–28.
“before the drawing for the Signoria”: Rinuccini, Ricordi Storici, CI.
“a sensible man and a good man”: Parenti, Ricordi Storici, 128.
Piero persuaded his newfound allies: Clarke, “A Sienese Note on 1466,” in Florence and Italy: Renaissance Studies in Honor of Nicolai Rubinstein, 50.
“excused himself because of his illness”: Rinuccini, Ricordi Storici, CI.
“In not coming, [Piero] showed his arrogance”: Ibid.
“expel from Florence all the soldiers”: Ibid.
“the soul of a tyrant”: Ibid.
“In part through persuasive words”: Valori, 31–32.
“Messer Luca had a daughter of tender age”: Parenti, Ricordi Storici, 130.
“declaring himself ready to live or die with me”: Rubinstein, Government of Florence Under the Medici, 186.
“very submissive words”: Ibid., 192.
“if Piero had not held them back”: Machiavelli, Florentine Histories, VII, 16.
“To establish the peace of the city”: Brown, “Piero’s Infirmity,” in Piero il Gottoso, 18.
“so many soldiers in one place”: Clarke, “A Sienese Note on 1466,” in Florence and Italy: Renaissance Studies in Honor of Nicolai Rubinstein, 49.
“it was approved with excited and loud voices”: Parenti, Ricordi Storici, 132.
“I knew that in an instant I had lost honor”: Rubinstein, Government of Florence Under the Medici, 188–89.
“after the failure of the plot”: Landucci, 8.
“little torture”: Rubinstein, “La Confessione di Francesco Neroni” Archivio Storico Italiano, 380.
“Unlike his father Cosimo”: Francesco Guicciardini, History of Florence, 17.
“From vileness or because he had been corrupted”: Rinuccini, Ricordi Storici, CIV.
“He remained cold and alone at home”: Parenti, Ricordi Storici, 141.
“I am laughing at the games of fortune”: Machiavelli, Florentine Histories, VII, 18.
“Pietro de’ Medici, son of Cosimo”: Lucrezia Tornabuoni, Sacred Narratives, 47.
“most honorable and famous young son Lorenzo”: Alison Brown, “Piero’s Infirmity,” in Piero il Gottoso, 14.
“Already we loved you on account of your excellent qualities”: Reumont, I, 197.
CHAPTER VII: LORD OF THE JOUST
“[Piero] was crippled with gout like his father”: Parenti, Ricordi Storici, 58.
“Magnificent Lord”: Lorenzo, Lettere, I, no. 14, March 21, 1468.
“I have received your letters both thick and thin”: Ibid., no. 16, September 13, 1468.
“[Lorenzo] is of such a nature”: Alison Brown, Bartolomeo Scala, 61. Sacramoro da Rimini to Galcazzo Maria Sforza.
“I shall be as a man without hands”: Ross, Lives, 94. Piero to Lorenzo, May 4, 1465.
“The enduring and intimate good will”: Lorenzo, Lettere, I, no. 13, March 10, 1468.
“Lorenzo demonstrates that he has thought things out”: Sorzano, “Lorenzo il Magnifico alla Morte del Padre e il Suo Primo Balzo Verso la Signoria,” Archivio Storico Italiano, 42–77. These remarks were made in September 1469, when Milan was unhappy with Piero’s policies and looking toward Lorenzo as an alternative.
“[He] who want[s] a son”: Chambers, “Spas in the Italian Renaissance,” in Reconsidering the Renaissance, 9.
“are all dreams”: Ross, Lives, 116. Piero to Lucrezia, October 1, 1467.
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p; “There [at the baths] you risk unnecessary peril”: Archivio di Stato di Firenze, Mediceo Avanti il Principato, filza XX, 339. In Martelli’s “Giacoppo” (Interpres, 104), the date given is September 26, 1466, but this is almost certainly an error. While the date on the original document is illegible, two letters by Lorenzo to his mother in Bagno a Morba confirm her presence at the baths in the fall of 1467 and his intention of visiting her there. (See letters 11 and 12 in Lorenzo, Lettere, I, the first dated September 19, in which he writes, “I had hoped to be there already days ago…” and the second, from October 4, in which he says, “I do not think I shall be able, as I had wished, to return to see you there…”)
“Let search who will for pomp”: Lorenzo, il Commento de’ Miei Sonetti, Sonnet 21.
And where is Pulci: Lorenzo, “The Partridge Hunt,” Selected Poems and Prose.
“to prove the dignity of our language”: Lorenzo, il Commento de’ Miei Sonetti, 46.
“honor, according to the philosophers”: Ibid., 51.
“At the end of the volume”: Ross, Lives, 92.
“because you have a quite complete understanding”: F. W. Kent, Lorenzo de’ Medici and the Art of Magnificence, 1.
Whilst Arno, winding through the mild domain: Roscoe, Life of Lorenzo de Medici, 236.
O sleep most tranquil: Lorenzo, Commento de’ miei, sonnet 20.
“I could easily be thought”: Ibid., 31.
“[H]aving in my youth”: Ibid., 42.
“He seemed to be two men”: The Medici: Godfathers of the Renaissance.
“one might see in him”: Machiavelli, Florentine Histories, VIII, 36.
“He was libidinous”: Francesco Guicciardini, History of Florence, ix, 6.
We also have some beanpods, long: Lorenzo, Selected Poems and Prose, 159.
Soon autumn comes: Ross Williamson, 104.
repay what had been borrowed: See, for example, de Roover, 204.
“On the way to S. Peter”: Ross, Lives, 108–9.
“You say I write coldly about her”: Ibid., 110.
“O that the marriage bond”: Roscoe, 232.
“I, Lorenzo, took to wife Clarice”: Ross, Lives, 152.
“the city no longer included him as a citizen”: Machiavelli, Florentine Histories, VII, 2.
“their pleasure is not to be described”: Ross, Lives, 121.
“Not a day passes”: Ibid., 122.
“Magnificent consort, greetings”: Ibid., 123
“she told me you were evidently extremely occupied”: Ibid.
Lorenzo, laughing, donned his helm: Pulci, Stanze sur la Giostra di Lorenzo de’ Medici, c.
“the blond Elena”: Beccadelli, The Hermaphrodite, xxxvii.
“and as you know”: Martelli, “Il ‘Giacoppo’ di Lorenzo,” 105.
“I do not believe that your relations”: Rochon, 96.
“The Graces and Venus chose Alda’s beautiful eyes”: Beccadelli, The Hermaphrodite, I, xvi
the bridle alone required 168 pounds of silver: Davie, Half-Serious Rhymes, 100.
“To do as others do”: Ross, 154.
“one can interpret them as meaning”: Pulci, Stanze sur la Giostra di Lorenzo de’ Medici, LXV.
Seeing this his famous father: Ibid., CXLIII.
“carried on his helm both honor and victory”: Ibid, CLVIII.
“to be youth”: Ibid., CLV.
“A few days ago I heard”: Ross, Lives, 126.
“Most magnificent consort”: Ibid., 125.
“[A]nd although I was not highly versed”: Ibid., 155.
CHAPTER VIII: A WEDDING AND A FUNERAL
“For in starkest winter”: Poliziano, Stanze per la hostra di Giuliano di Medici, II,vii.
“Handsome Julio”: Ibid., II, x–xi.
“How beautiful is youth”: gioventù to uomo fatto: Trexler, Public Life in Renaissance Florence. See especially 387–99 for an illuminating discussion of Florentine attitudes toward the young.
“I know not where I shall begin”: Reumont, 234.
“touched one another’s bare leg”: Lubkin, 49.
“How glad I should be to see you”: Maguire, 139.
“Calves 150”: Ross, Lives, 129–34.
“In the house here”: Ibid., 132.
“She doesn’t want to go”: Alessandra Strozzi, Selected Letters, no. 34, May 8, 1469. Fiametta, it turns out, did attend, since her presence among the thirty young matrons accompanying Clarice to the Palazzo Medici is recorded by the anonymous chronicler.
“Cosimo Bartoli, one of the principal”: Ross, Lives, 131.
a charming rustic dance: Ibid., 61.
“It would be a burden”: Lorenzo, Lettere, III, 404.
“too insolent and haughty”: Trexler, Public Life in Renassance Florence, 462.
I would never have believed: Machiavelli, Florentine Histories, VII, 24.
“Until now, no mortal”: Pernis and Adams, 27.
the secret backing of the duke of Urbino: Lorenzo, Lettere, I, 44.
a policy of appeasement: Ibid., I, 48.
“of the enemies of Piero”: Ibid., I, 49.
“to live in a manner”: Ibid.
Piero was losing his grip: Ibid. Sacramoro to Galeazzo Maria, October 25, 1469, in which he reports that Piero used “very strange words.”
“will show himself to be of a different nature”: Ibid., I, 50.
“I would like to declare myself”: Ibid., I, no. 22. Lorenzo to Galeazzo Maria, December 1, 1469.
“My Most Illustrious Lord”: Ibid., I, no. 23. Lorenzo to Galeazzo Maria, December 2, 1469.
“[W]hile certain of having here”: Ibid., I, no. 22. Lorenzo to Galeazzo Maria, December 1, 1469.
“I can report”: Ibid., I, 51.
“all business will once again return”: Rubinstein, Government of Florence Under the Medici, 198. Niccolò Roberti to Borso d’Este, December 4, 1469.
the marriage of his son Piero: Clarke, The Soderini and the Medici, 177–78. The marriage allied the Soderini with Gabriele Malaspina, Marquis of Fosdinovo, whose ambitions in northwest Tuscany often clashed with those of Milan.
“well respected but of varying views”: Lorenzo, Lettere, I, 52.
“At the twenty-third-and-a-half hour”: Sorzano, “Lorenzo il Magnifico alla morte del padre e il suo primo balzo verso la Signoria,” Archivio Storico Italiano, 45. Sacramoro to Galeazzo, December 2, 1469.
“Messer Tommaso Soderini took the word as eldest”: Reumont, 246–47. Niccolò Roberti to Borso d’Este, December 4, 1469.
“work together for the good of the state”:Lorenzo, Lettere, I, 52.
“The common people don’t believe”: Clarke, The Soderini and the Medici, 180. Sacramoro to Galeazzo Maria, December 1, 1469.
“leaders, knights and citizens”: Lorenzo, Lettere, I, 59.
The second day after [my father’s] death: Ross, Lives, 150–56.
“When shall we find another so reasonable”: Reumont, 240.
little of the emotional turmoil of the moment: See Lorenzo, Lettere, I, especially letters no. 25 (to Guglielmo Paleologo) and no. 26 (to Otto Niccolini) for the most timely expressions of his feelings.
wept openly on his way back from church: Parenti, Lettere. The preceding account of Piero’s funeral comes largely from Parenti’s letter to Filippo Strozzi begun December 3, 1469, but apparently continued over the course of the next few days.
CHAPTER IX: MASTER OF THE SHOP
But if [philosophy] be an occupation: Roscoe, Life of Lorenzo de Medici, 99.
“It does amaze me greatly, though”: Lorenzo, Selected Poems and Prose, “The Supreme Good,” II, lines 40–51.
“It was merely a ceremony”: Parenti, Lettere, no. 75. To Filippo Strozzi, December 3, 1469.
“Some say that this city is taking a republican path”: F. W. Kent, Lorenzo de’ Medici and the Art of Magnificence, 45.
“They are agreed that the private affairs”: Reumont, 248–49. Niccolò Roberti to Borso d’Este, December 4, 1469.
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br /> “one lord and superior”: Rubinstein, Government of Florence Under the Medici, 200.
“the stupid crazy mob”: Kent, Rise of the Medici Faction, 7.
“Our intention was to remove the city”: Francesco Guicciardini, Dialogue on the Government of Florence, 18.
“I have enjoyed a very long friendship”: Rochon, 227.
“in another gain something better”: Dale Kent, Rise of the Medici Faction, 115.
“Among other things I told Lorenzo”: Sorzano, “Lorenzo il Magnifico alla Morte del Padre e il Suo Primo Balzo Verso la Signoria,” Archivio Storico Italiano, 45, 50. Sacramoro to Galeazzo Maria, December 15, 1469.
“follow his grandfather’s example”: Rubinstein, Government of Florence Under the Medici, 204. Sacramoro to Galeazzo Maria, July 3, 1470.
“master of the shop”: See F.W.Kent, “Patron-Client Networks in Renaissance Florence,” in Lorenzo de Medici: New Perspectives, for a discussion of the sources and limitations of Lorenzo’s authority.Benedetto Dei was one of those who employed the phrase “maestro della bottega” to describe Lorenzo’s role.
“Today the proposal went before the Signoria”: Sorzano, “Lorenzo il Magnifico alla Morte del Padre e il Suo Primo Balzo Verso la Signoria,” Archivio Storico Italiano, 49.
withdrew his delegates from the conference: See Lorenzo to Otto Niccolini, March 24, 1469, in Lettere, I, no. 39.
the Neapolitans followed suit: See ibid., I, 126.
Soderini’s interests were not necessarily his own: Clarke, The Soderini and the Medici, 192. Sacramoro to Galeazzo Maria, June 4, 1470.
“honey in his mouth and a knife in his belt”: Alessandra Strozzi, Selected Letters, 87.
banishing his chief opponents from Florence: Clarke, The Soderini and the Medici, 186.
including the Milanese ambassador: Ibid., 184–85.
to prevent them from bolting the alliance: Ibid., 188–89.
“found the letter already completed”: Lorenzo, Lettere, I, 131.
“Let us abide by [the King’s] advice”: Ibid.
“upset and desperate”: Clarke, The Soderini and the Medici, 192. To the duke, Sacramoro wrote that Tommaso’s intention was to “beat Lorenzo over the head and deprive him of the benevolence of Your Highness, in order to be able to manage him in his own way.” Lettere i, 132.
until after it had heard from the Duke: Lorenzo, Lettere, I, no. 46. To Agnolo della Stufa, May 21, 1470.