CHAPTER VII.FAMILY EVENTS. MARRIAGES AND DEATHS.Themarriage of Maddalena de’ Medici with Franceschetto Cybò took place about this time. When her journey to Rome was partially decided on, Lorenzo wrote to Lanfredini,[322]without making any positive statement on the subject: ‘Clarice, my wife, is partly minded to visit her relations there, and at the same time to try the effect of the Roman air, as you know that of our neighbourhood does not suit her in winter. You formerly mentioned a desire that Maddalena should go to Rome. If this is still the case, she might conveniently accompany her mother. These are our own present plans, which you can communicate to the Pope and Signor Francesco. If they are pleased with them, the thing shall take place, but not otherwise.’ On November 4, 1487, Madonna Clarice set out for Rome with her daughter the bride, her eldest son, the Bishop of Arezzo, Jacopo Salviati, and a numerous suite. Lorenzo did not omit to give his daughter on her departure from home precepts and advice such as he knew how to give wisely and well. He reminded her of her own descent and family, as well as of the position she was about to take; of the consideration due both to the Roman people and to the Pope, with whom she was to be so nearly connected; of her duty towards her husband; of the precepts of honour and obedience, and of respect to her elders and superiors in rank. On arrivingnear the city the travellers were met by the bridegroom, with some prelates of the Pope’s household, several ambassadors and members of the Florentine colony at Rome, amid whom they were conducted to the Leonine city. Here Franceschetto dwelt in a house built by his uncle Maurigio, near that in which Charlotte de Lusignan, queen of Cyprus, had died after a long exile, on June 12 of that same year. The servants of the prelates and those of the ambassadors and the Medici rode foremost. On Franceschetto’s right rode his future brother-in-law, Piero, on his left, Jacopo Salviati, with whom he was to be similarly connected. The bride rode between the Archbishop of Cosenza and the Bishop of Oria, her mother between the Milanese ambassador (the Bishop of Roveredo) and the Bishop of Volterra. Prelates, jurists, ladies and others followed.[323]On the Sunday before the 24th, the day on which the Venetian envoys Sebastiano Badoer and Bernardo Bembo were received in a secret consistory, the Pope gave a banquet at his palace to Clarice and her daughter, at which the bridegroom, the Florentine ambassador, and several prelates were present. To the bride he presented jewels to the value of about eight thousand ducats, to Franceschetto, one of two thousand.[324]On January 20, 1488, the marriage contract was signed.[325]Franceschetto was in his thirty-ninth year; his bride was yet in her girlhood, gentle and bashful. One of those sent by her father to accompany her always calls herla fanciulla. Her dowry does not seem to have been large; four thousand ducats, part in cash, part in state bonds. From a letter of Lorenzo to Lanfredini,[326]it appears that this sum was not ready at the time of the wedding. ‘You know how manyholes I have to fill up.’ But Franceschetto was no loser. In the days of Paul II. the countship of Anguillara had been taken from its ancient lords, on account of their repeated rebellions, and given to the Apostolic Chamber. The relatives of Everso of Anguillara had never ceased to protest, and we have already pointed out that after the death of Sixtus IV. Deifebo regained possession of the castles. Lorenzo made terms with the claimants by means of a considerable sum, and offered the county to Cybò as an addition to Maddalena’s dowry; whereupon, on February 21, 1490, Innocent VIII. conferred on Franceschetto the fief of Anguillara, without mentioning the transaction, so as not to call in question the rights of the Chamber. In 1487 Franceschetto had bought of Bartolommeo della Rovere the Roman castles of Cerveteri and Sta. Severa.[327]These places, alienated after the Pope’s death to the Orsini of Bracciano, were, at the beginning of Alexander VI.’s reign, near kindling a war which threatened to set all Italy on fire. This was not all the wealth that the Cybò gained by their connection with the Medici. In Tuscany they acquired property. The palace of Jacopo de’ Pazzi passed to Lorenzo’s son-in-law, whose descendants long possessed both it and the country-house of the Pazzi at Montughi.[328]The Medici’s estate in the Volterra district, which also passed to the Cybò, has been already mentioned. The intended acquisition of the unfinished Pitti Palace came to nothing.Lorenzo, who always knew how to combine his love of splendour with useful aims, and judged others from the same point of view, had no very high opinion of his son-in-law.‘As you have before heard from me,’ he wrote to Lanfredini before the marriage on November 4, 1487, when Franceschetto had got himself made captain-general,[329]‘I think Signor Francesco should not pursue mere smoke; things without moderation do not suit me. A captain ought to have seen service and made himself a reputation. I wish he had rather sought to secure a maintenance, and I wonder it does not strike him that the day after the Pope dies he will be the poorest man on earth, and I shall have to provide for him and his wife. Endeavour to make this clear to him if you see that he hankers after titles and vanities; I must speak to him freely and then help him, however he may take it. I hear he keeps aloof from frivolous people and those of evil report, and that he avoids play. We must support him as much as possible, and lovingly point out to him what is becoming, if we are to fulfil our duty.’ Lorenzo did not wish his son to remain in Rome longer than was absolutely necessary. On December 9, he wrote to his wife desiring that Piero should return with the bishop and Jacopo Salviati as soon as he had despatched certain business of his own, of which more will be said hereafter. Piero returned to Florence, the bishop remained. Lorenzo wrote repeatedly to Clarice leaving the length of her stay to her own decision, but expressing a wish, towards the end of the winter, that she might stay somewhat longer.[330]Everything did not go according to Lorenzo’s wishes. The elevation of his son Giovanni to the cardinalate, undoubtedly one of the motives for the match, was delayed; Clarice was ill; and the home arrangements of the Cybò seem not to have suited Florentine and Medicean ideas. ‘I have received,’ wrote Lorenzo to Lanfredini on April 11, 1488,[331]‘your information about Clarice, and am grieved at it, though her ill-health is nothingnew to me. I have informed her of the cause which will somewhat delay Piero’s departure from here, but let her not trouble herself about it if she wishes to return here sooner, though I should be glad if she could wait for Alfonsina [Piero’s bride]. I wish Maddalena might come with her, for the latter is still quite a child, and Signor Francesco’s household is badly managed; and, besides, she would be a comfort to Clarice. But I should wish this to be done with the full consent and without the slightest dissatisfaction of his Holiness or Signor Francesco, and I should take it as a favour.’ And after recurring to the insecure position of his son-in-law, he adds: ‘His Holiness seems to me to go to work with great lukewarmness in all these things. Independently of Signor Francesco I also regret that my daughter should find herself in unfavourable circumstances, and I am in a kind of despair over this and other matters when I hear of the slowness and carelessness yonder.’Madonna Clarice stayed in Rome till May 1488, when her son Piero came with Giovanni Tornabuoni to fetch her back. From a letter written to Lorenzo by their companion Poliziano, on May 2,[332]it appears that on that day Piero set out from Acquapendente to Viterbo, and that the travellers were all in good health and spirits and did not forget to celebrate the merry month of May with songs and various amusements on their journey. Piero’s expedition had also another object, he was going to bring home his own bride. On April 16 Lorenzo wrote to Lanfredini:[333]‘My Piero starts in a few days to go and fetch his wife, and also to help Clarice. If the latter is able to travel I shall be very glad.’ As well as an unknown son-in-law Lorenzo had chosen an unknown daughter-in-law; but she came of a family which had long been intimately associated with his and had many relations with the Republic, at the same time enjoying the special favour of the ruling house of Naples.Alfonsina Orsini was the daughter of a man who had preserved and displayed his loyalty to the house of Aragon when most of his own people were in the enemy’s camp. Roberto Orsini was a younger son of that Carlo from whom sprang the line of Bracciano, afterwards the principal branch of this wide-spreading race. He had fought for King Ferrante against the Angevins, and for the Florentines against Bartolommeo Colleone, and died of sickness at Siena in 1476. One of his children by his second marriage with Caterina da Sanseverino was Alfonsina, thus named in honour of Aragon. She was married by proxy at Castelnuovo towards the end of February 1487, in presence of the royal pair and other members of the reigning family. Ferrante laid aside his family mourning on this day, and after supper there was a festival and a ball. The bridegroom was represented by Bernardo Rucellai; the bride’s next of kin by her cousin Gentil Virginio, lord of Bracciano. Alfonsina brought a dowry of 12,000 ducats, which popular belief magnified to 30,000.[334]A whole year passed before Piero brought her home. Her entry into Florence was to have taken place on May 22, 1488, but the Medici family were in mourning for the death of the third daughter, Luigia; so, instead of coming to the city, the young couple went to Careggi. About ten days afterwards Lorenzo gave, in honour of his daughter-in-law and her suite, a grand banquet, at which the chief men of the city and the foreign ambassadors were present.[335]There was no lack of festivities in Florence, and the Medici contributed not a little to their splendour. Maddalena Cybò came with her mother and sister-in-law; Franceschetto followed her on June 22. He was accompanied by Giorgio Santacroce of an old Roman family, Girolamo Tuttavilla, son of Cardinal d’Estouteville, and many others.‘We received him,’ wrote Lorenzo to Lanfredini two days after,[336]‘heartily rather than splendidly. Yesterday he made a visit to the Signoria; his appearance, bearing, and mode of speech give general satisfaction. As yet I have been little alone with him. I will endeavour to fulfil the Pope’s wishes; you will then report to me what he thinks of us on this first meeting. I will take care that he finds occasion to come to us often.’ The Florentines helped Lorenzo in this. In honour of his son-in-law’s presence numerous diversions for the people and magnificent spectacles were arranged. It was long since Florence had beheld such triumphal processions, such improvised buildings, arches, and other decorations, though they had long been customary there. Franceschetto, who had been presented with the freedom of the city, did all he could to make himself popular, and succeeded. When he rode through the streets on the feast of St. John the children shouted, ‘Cybò and Palle!’ From the piazza of the Signoria to that of the cathedral there was such a throng that great wax candles and other consecrated gifts could not be carried to the Baptistery; and when the street officials tried to clear a space, the people cried out that they wanted to see Lorenzo’s son-in-law, the Pope’s son. Franceschetto occupied the place of honour next to the Gonfalonier at the public banquet given by the Signoria to the distinguished nobles who were in the city and the foreign ambassadors, among whom, besides those of the friendly Italian powers, the Turkish envoy was present. Giovanni Tornabuoni, Bernardo Rucellai, Lorenzo, son of Pier-Francesco de’ Medici, and others, gave banquets and festivities; the latter gave one at his villa at Castello, situated to the west of the city on a gentle slope overlooking the valley of the Arno where it spreads out into a beautiful plain. Lorenzo saw his daughter and son-in-law daily. But throughout all the rejoicings of which his house was the centre, hewas not free from cares of all kinds. The bad state of affairs in Romagna will be mentioned presently; in his own home there were other causes for discomfort and anxiety.Lorenzo himself was ill and overwhelmed with business. Ser Piero da Bibiena wrote to Lanfredini on June 26:[337]‘Lorenzo has ridden out to Monte Paldi [a factory now belonging to the Corsini, in the neighbourhood of San Casciano] to get a little air and freedom from this mass of business. For two months he had not left the city; he intends to be back on Saturday.’ A few days before this the Ferrarese ambassador wrote that Lorenzo positively must go to the baths, but it was very difficult for him to get away. His own health was not his only trouble; for a long time past Clarice had been ill. It was hoped that native air would do her good, but not only did her condition not improve, but, even before her return from Rome, it became such as to cause anxiety; and the interior of the household must have been little suited to the festivities occasioned by the presence of two newly-married couples. The mother could not bear the thought of parting from her daughter. ‘Signor Francesco,’ wrote Lorenzo to Lanfredini on June 30,[338]‘thinks of setting out in a week, and, as I understand, taking Maddalena with him. I have not yet spoken of it to him, but I should be glad if you would mention the matter to his Holiness and get it arranged that she should remain here the rest of the summer and autumn. I have two chief motives for this wish. First, Clarice is very ill, so much so that the doctors are doubtful whether the disease will soon end fatally or whether it will drag on and the immediate danger pass over; secondly, the air yonder is unhealthy, and Maddalena is not used to it. For these reasons, and also because I have never yet had time to see my daughter comfortably, I earnestly beg his Holiness that of his kindnesshe will let me have her a few more months and write to Signor Francesco accordingly, so that the occasion may not appear to have come from us.’Lorenzo’s desire was fulfilled. On July 4, he received from Rome the news that the Pope had determined to entrust Franceschetto with a mission to Perugia, and to leave his wife in Florence for a time. It may easily be imagined how pleasing this last arrangement was to Lorenzo; the former seemed rather questionable to the experienced politician. ‘This Perugian affair,’ he wrote at once to Lanfredini,[339]‘seems to me very grave, and such as may create embarrassment; all the more so as Signor Francesco has had no practice in such things, and has no one near him to whom anything important can be entrusted.’ Then, after relating how he dined the day before with his son-in-law at Careggi, and they had visited the Petraja and other places, which he had much liked, he continues: ‘Maddalena will remain here, to which Signor Francesco seems quite agreed. Clarice could not be worse than she is now, and I fear we shall soon lose her. You can imagine what comfort she finds in the presence of her daughter, who has always seemed to me to be the apple of her eye (l’occhio del capo suo); so we are both very grateful to his Holiness. Of myself I say nothing, for you know how I love my children, especially in the present case.’On July 6, Franceschetto Cybò left Florence. His experiences at Perugia will be mentioned hereafter. Lorenzo, though much in need of the baths, was detained in the city by the weak state of Clarice and the pressure of business. At last, on the morning of July 21, he set out for Filetta in the Merse Vale in the Sienese territory. It is a small village consisting of only a few houses, in a valley surrounded with woods; the waters of the neighbouring sulphur-springs of Macereto have been brought thither, and it lies lonelyand deserted on the road leading from Siena to Grosseto and the Maremma. In the summer of 1813 Emperor Henry of Luxemburg was carried thither, with the hand of death upon him; in 1459 Pope Pius II., who repeatedly visited the waters of his native land, sought relief from his inveterate enemy the gout in these springs. Scarcely had Lorenzo arrived at Filetta when the fatal news reached him—Clarice died on the afternoon of July 30. The day before, Ser Piero had written to Lanfredini:[340]‘I know not what to tell you of Madonna Clarice; she gets better for a day or two, and then gets worse again, so that she is slowly approaching dissolution.’ The dissolution came much quicker than was expected, yet it hardly looks well that Lorenzo should leave the city when her state was so critical, and that he did not return on hearing that she was worse. ‘If you should hear Lorenzo blamed for not being present at his wife’s death,’ wrote Ser Piero to Lanfredini on July 31, ‘excuse him. Leoni (the physician) considered it necessary for his health for him to go to the baths, and no one thought death was so near.’ The Ferrarese ambassador confirms the statement that, according to the doctors’ advice, Lorenzo’s stay at the baths was absolutely necessary, and all his friends had entreated him not to return till the cure was completed. On the evening after her death Clarice de’ Medici was entombed without pomp in San Lorenzo, and on the following morning all the ambassadors present in Florence went to Piero to offer their condolences. The solemn obsequies, at which the whole city was present, took place on August 1.[341]Lorenzo’s wife was not quite forty. No notice is to be found in his writings of the woman who shared the lights and shadows of life with him for nineteen years; an idea of their conjugal relations can be formed only from a few words of his in earlier days, and the inadequate testimony of contemporaries, which seems to indicate that their views and inclinationsdid not always agree. Clarice’s disagreement with such a celebrated man as Poliziano has tended to bias the judgment of her contemporaries against her. Nevertheless, this daughter of an old Roman baronial house, obliged, when young and inexperienced, to enter a strange world as the wife of a man for whom she had no affection, displayed in all things tact and sound judgment; without putting herself forward she did honour to her position and her husband, and she brought up her children tenderly and carefully. Her feelings and her relations to Lorenzo are indicated, amongst others, by the following letter, written to her husband from Caffaggiuolo on December 13 of the year they were so long separated, 1478, on behalf of a servant who had been dismissed for some misconduct.[342]‘Illustrious husband,’ she wrote; ‘Andrea your messenger has been up here for two days, and earnestly begged me to put in a good word for him as he is deeply grieved for his fault. I therefore beg you to keep him with you or procure him another situation; for, as he has formerly shown his fidelity, you would be acting contrary to your nature if you did not forgive him his error, besides being responsible for his falling into worse ways; also you might inadvertently by this means discourage others who are faithful to you. He has a mother who was delighted at his position in your service, and is now in like measure distressed, fearing that her son may, if you dismiss him, go astray and bring her to sorrow. He has already expiated his fault by grief and shame; for, since you sent him away, he has been like one beside himself and has never had a moment’s happiness. I think he is especially touched on the point of honour, which is a good sign and should have weight with you. I beg you therefore to be indulgent to him, whether for the sake of his proved fidelity, or from pity for his mother, or because he shows right feeling, or, lastly, for the sake of my intercession,either by taking him back or by providing for him in some other way.’A letter written to Innocent VIII. the day after Clarice’s death[343]displays a warmth of feeling which, after the passages that have been mentioned, one would hardly have expected from Lorenzo, and which give a favourable impression of him: ‘I am too often obliged to trouble your Holiness with what is daily sent me by fate and prepared for me by the will of God, against which all striving is vain, and to which everyone must bow with patience and humility, accepting His ways as tokens of goodness and love. But the recent death of my sweet and beloved companion Clarice is for numberless reasons such a grief and loss to me that it has conquered my resignation and endurance amid the trials and persecutions of fate, against which I thought myself proof. Bereaved of the pleasant society to which I was accustomed, I feel the limit is passed, and I can find no comfort or rest for my deep sorrow. As I do not cease to pray the Lord God to give me peace, I trust that of His goodness He will put an end to this sorrow and spare me any more such trials as have visited me lately. I humbly and from my inmost heart beseech your Holiness to pray for me, for I know your prayers will do me good. Filetta, July 31.’ August 6, Lorenzo returned to Florence, from whence he wrote to the ambassador at Rome on behalf of an Englishman who was going thither to procure a Papal brief and had been specially recommended to him by the Queen, Elizabeth of York. Two days later, he apologised to Lanfredini for not having answered some business questions:[344]‘You know the cause; when my mind is entirely occupied with one thing, it cannot think of anything else.’Clarice’s death obliged Lorenzo to seek a companion for his daughter to take her back to Rome. He chose a distantrelative, Maria de’ Medici, widow of Galeazzo Malatesta. ‘Maddalena,’ he wrote to Lanfredini on September 3,[345]‘starts to-morrow for Rome. She will be accompanied by my Piero and my uncle Giovanni, who will take her as far as Acquapendente, as arranged by Signor Francesco. I have chosen for her companion one Madonna Maria de’ Medici, widow of Signor Galeazzo Malatesta and daughter of Madonna Ciulla. She is a very well-bred and truly venerable lady over fifty, who since her widowhood has lived the retired life of a nun. I think that the more Signor Francesco thinks over this choice of mine, the better pleased he will be.’ Maddalena remained with her husband in Rome, whence she wrote to her father, September 1 of the next year, that she was about to become a mother. The young wife’s days seem not to have been very cheerful ones. When she went to Rome with her mother, Lorenzo sent with her a man whom he trusted and who was faithfully attached to his house—the same Ser Matteo Franco whose name holds a place in the history of burlesque poetry. He was Maddalena’s adviser and confidant, her man of business and, perhaps, her house-chaplain; and his many letters to members of the Medicean household display a sympathy and warmth of feeling doubly pleasing in such a jovial man. Franceschetto neglected his young wife, who fretted continually, while he passed the nights in play and feasting. With no one to keep her company, she soon languished and lost her health, thinking regretfully of her father’s house and the pleasant villas around Florence, where she had passed her happy childhood.[346]A few days after the loss of Clarice, another death took place which did not affect the Medici family personally, but whose consequences had no little influence on the family relations which were closely connected with later politicalevents. On August 19, at the castle of Capuano near Naples, died at the age of forty-two Ippolita Maria, Duchess of Calabria.[347]Her death broke the ties which bound together the Houses of Aragon and the Sforza. This was probably not perceived at the moment, for not only did the alliance continue which seemed to unite the two states, but the death caused no change in the plans for the new connection long decided on between the two families, whereby their interests were to be yet more closely and firmly linked together. But the death of this clever and accomplished woman dissolved the union between Ippolita’s husband and brother, two men who were willing and accustomed to sacrifice every consideration and every scruple to their ambition, greed and hatred, and who, since the Ferrarese war, had regarded each other with ever-increasing distrust and ill-will. The longer Lodovico il Moro held the reins of government in Milan, the less disposed he was to surrender them to his nephew, who, although now nineteen years old, was still duke only in title. Whether the accusation is true that Lodovico had neglected the youth’s education to such an extent that, delicate as he had been from childhood, he was unfit to govern, must be left an open question. At all events, Gian-Galeazzo took no part in public affairs, and though everything was done in the name of the Duke of Milan, it all went through the hands of the Duke of Bari. From early childhood Gian-Galeazzo had been betrothed to his cousin Isabella. Alfonso of Calabria had already often pressed for the completion of the marriage; and as the bride was now eighteen, Lodovico at last had to yield. The mourning for the Duchess was not yet over, when, on December 11, Hermes Sforza, Gian-Galeazzo’s younger brother, arrived in the bay of Naples with six galleys, and with a brilliant suite landed to fetch his future sister-in-law, whose father came to meet him and conducted him to the king andqueen at Castelnuovo. On the 21st of the same month Hermes, in his brother’s name, placed the wedding-ring on Isabella’s finger. The court mourning prevented all festivities. A gloomy shadow seemed to hang over this marriage, which was destined to bring nothing but suffering and misery to the contracting parties.Its early days, however, were not lacking in splendour. On December 30 the young Duchess of Milan embarked, accompanied as far as the Molo by her father, her grandparents and their court. Many distinguished Milanese and Genoese had come with Hermes Sforza; among them Vitaliano Borromeo, Gasparo Visconti, Ambrosio del Maino, and Giovan Francesco da Sanseverino Count of Cajazzo (son of Roberto). Ten galleys were filled by these and the Neapolitan suite, the Duke and Duchess of Melfi, the Countess of Terranuova, the Counts of Potenza and Consa, and others. They touched at Civitavecchia, Piombino, and Livorno. At the first-named port the bride was received by the Cardinals Sforza, Riario, and de Foix, with the Senator of Rome; at Piombino by Jacopo IV. Appiani. At Livorno, Lorenzo, again confined at home by the gout, was represented by his son Piero, accompanied by Pier Antonio Carnesecchi and Alessandro Nasi. The Republic sent Jacopo Guicciardini, Pier Filippo Pandolfini, and Paol’Antonio Soderini as envoys to welcome the Duchess; but Lorenzo’s son put them all in the shade by his princely appearance. It was the same at Milan, whither Piero went towards the end of January 1489, to be present at Isabella’s triumphal entry and the final marriage, which took place on Candlemas day. On reaching the Milanese frontier, Piero was received by several nobles sent by il Moro to form his train. At the wedding in the cathedral, where the ceremony was performed by Federigo Sanseverino (another son of Roberto, and afterwards a Cardinal), Piero outshone everybody; though the splendour was such that, as a reporter wrote to Lorenzo, the very cooks were in velvet and silk. After theceremony the Ducal couple sent to Piero to fetch his attire and admire it again. Lodovico exhausted himself in attentions towards the son of the man in whose hands were the destinies of Florence. ‘It seems a perfect marvel,’ wrote the Florentine ambassador, Piero Alamanni, on January 31, 1489, ‘to all these Lombards, as well as to the ambassadors, that young as he [Piero] is, he maintains such a dignified bearing and discourses on everything with so much readiness. Yesterday morning my lord Lodovico spoke for half an hour in his praise before the ambassadors, and assigned to him a place of honour next Messer Galeotto della Mirandola, Rodolfo Gonzaga, and Annibale Bentivoglio.’ After the nuptial ceremony Alamanni was knighted by the young Duke and presented with a splendid robe of brocade, and his spurs were fastened on by Galeazzo and Gian Francesco da Sanseverino. The splendour of the festivities was such as the Milanese court had been wont to display since the days of Galeazzo Maria.[348]
CHAPTER VII.FAMILY EVENTS. MARRIAGES AND DEATHS.Themarriage of Maddalena de’ Medici with Franceschetto Cybò took place about this time. When her journey to Rome was partially decided on, Lorenzo wrote to Lanfredini,[322]without making any positive statement on the subject: ‘Clarice, my wife, is partly minded to visit her relations there, and at the same time to try the effect of the Roman air, as you know that of our neighbourhood does not suit her in winter. You formerly mentioned a desire that Maddalena should go to Rome. If this is still the case, she might conveniently accompany her mother. These are our own present plans, which you can communicate to the Pope and Signor Francesco. If they are pleased with them, the thing shall take place, but not otherwise.’ On November 4, 1487, Madonna Clarice set out for Rome with her daughter the bride, her eldest son, the Bishop of Arezzo, Jacopo Salviati, and a numerous suite. Lorenzo did not omit to give his daughter on her departure from home precepts and advice such as he knew how to give wisely and well. He reminded her of her own descent and family, as well as of the position she was about to take; of the consideration due both to the Roman people and to the Pope, with whom she was to be so nearly connected; of her duty towards her husband; of the precepts of honour and obedience, and of respect to her elders and superiors in rank. On arrivingnear the city the travellers were met by the bridegroom, with some prelates of the Pope’s household, several ambassadors and members of the Florentine colony at Rome, amid whom they were conducted to the Leonine city. Here Franceschetto dwelt in a house built by his uncle Maurigio, near that in which Charlotte de Lusignan, queen of Cyprus, had died after a long exile, on June 12 of that same year. The servants of the prelates and those of the ambassadors and the Medici rode foremost. On Franceschetto’s right rode his future brother-in-law, Piero, on his left, Jacopo Salviati, with whom he was to be similarly connected. The bride rode between the Archbishop of Cosenza and the Bishop of Oria, her mother between the Milanese ambassador (the Bishop of Roveredo) and the Bishop of Volterra. Prelates, jurists, ladies and others followed.[323]On the Sunday before the 24th, the day on which the Venetian envoys Sebastiano Badoer and Bernardo Bembo were received in a secret consistory, the Pope gave a banquet at his palace to Clarice and her daughter, at which the bridegroom, the Florentine ambassador, and several prelates were present. To the bride he presented jewels to the value of about eight thousand ducats, to Franceschetto, one of two thousand.[324]On January 20, 1488, the marriage contract was signed.[325]Franceschetto was in his thirty-ninth year; his bride was yet in her girlhood, gentle and bashful. One of those sent by her father to accompany her always calls herla fanciulla. Her dowry does not seem to have been large; four thousand ducats, part in cash, part in state bonds. From a letter of Lorenzo to Lanfredini,[326]it appears that this sum was not ready at the time of the wedding. ‘You know how manyholes I have to fill up.’ But Franceschetto was no loser. In the days of Paul II. the countship of Anguillara had been taken from its ancient lords, on account of their repeated rebellions, and given to the Apostolic Chamber. The relatives of Everso of Anguillara had never ceased to protest, and we have already pointed out that after the death of Sixtus IV. Deifebo regained possession of the castles. Lorenzo made terms with the claimants by means of a considerable sum, and offered the county to Cybò as an addition to Maddalena’s dowry; whereupon, on February 21, 1490, Innocent VIII. conferred on Franceschetto the fief of Anguillara, without mentioning the transaction, so as not to call in question the rights of the Chamber. In 1487 Franceschetto had bought of Bartolommeo della Rovere the Roman castles of Cerveteri and Sta. Severa.[327]These places, alienated after the Pope’s death to the Orsini of Bracciano, were, at the beginning of Alexander VI.’s reign, near kindling a war which threatened to set all Italy on fire. This was not all the wealth that the Cybò gained by their connection with the Medici. In Tuscany they acquired property. The palace of Jacopo de’ Pazzi passed to Lorenzo’s son-in-law, whose descendants long possessed both it and the country-house of the Pazzi at Montughi.[328]The Medici’s estate in the Volterra district, which also passed to the Cybò, has been already mentioned. The intended acquisition of the unfinished Pitti Palace came to nothing.Lorenzo, who always knew how to combine his love of splendour with useful aims, and judged others from the same point of view, had no very high opinion of his son-in-law.‘As you have before heard from me,’ he wrote to Lanfredini before the marriage on November 4, 1487, when Franceschetto had got himself made captain-general,[329]‘I think Signor Francesco should not pursue mere smoke; things without moderation do not suit me. A captain ought to have seen service and made himself a reputation. I wish he had rather sought to secure a maintenance, and I wonder it does not strike him that the day after the Pope dies he will be the poorest man on earth, and I shall have to provide for him and his wife. Endeavour to make this clear to him if you see that he hankers after titles and vanities; I must speak to him freely and then help him, however he may take it. I hear he keeps aloof from frivolous people and those of evil report, and that he avoids play. We must support him as much as possible, and lovingly point out to him what is becoming, if we are to fulfil our duty.’ Lorenzo did not wish his son to remain in Rome longer than was absolutely necessary. On December 9, he wrote to his wife desiring that Piero should return with the bishop and Jacopo Salviati as soon as he had despatched certain business of his own, of which more will be said hereafter. Piero returned to Florence, the bishop remained. Lorenzo wrote repeatedly to Clarice leaving the length of her stay to her own decision, but expressing a wish, towards the end of the winter, that she might stay somewhat longer.[330]Everything did not go according to Lorenzo’s wishes. The elevation of his son Giovanni to the cardinalate, undoubtedly one of the motives for the match, was delayed; Clarice was ill; and the home arrangements of the Cybò seem not to have suited Florentine and Medicean ideas. ‘I have received,’ wrote Lorenzo to Lanfredini on April 11, 1488,[331]‘your information about Clarice, and am grieved at it, though her ill-health is nothingnew to me. I have informed her of the cause which will somewhat delay Piero’s departure from here, but let her not trouble herself about it if she wishes to return here sooner, though I should be glad if she could wait for Alfonsina [Piero’s bride]. I wish Maddalena might come with her, for the latter is still quite a child, and Signor Francesco’s household is badly managed; and, besides, she would be a comfort to Clarice. But I should wish this to be done with the full consent and without the slightest dissatisfaction of his Holiness or Signor Francesco, and I should take it as a favour.’ And after recurring to the insecure position of his son-in-law, he adds: ‘His Holiness seems to me to go to work with great lukewarmness in all these things. Independently of Signor Francesco I also regret that my daughter should find herself in unfavourable circumstances, and I am in a kind of despair over this and other matters when I hear of the slowness and carelessness yonder.’Madonna Clarice stayed in Rome till May 1488, when her son Piero came with Giovanni Tornabuoni to fetch her back. From a letter written to Lorenzo by their companion Poliziano, on May 2,[332]it appears that on that day Piero set out from Acquapendente to Viterbo, and that the travellers were all in good health and spirits and did not forget to celebrate the merry month of May with songs and various amusements on their journey. Piero’s expedition had also another object, he was going to bring home his own bride. On April 16 Lorenzo wrote to Lanfredini:[333]‘My Piero starts in a few days to go and fetch his wife, and also to help Clarice. If the latter is able to travel I shall be very glad.’ As well as an unknown son-in-law Lorenzo had chosen an unknown daughter-in-law; but she came of a family which had long been intimately associated with his and had many relations with the Republic, at the same time enjoying the special favour of the ruling house of Naples.Alfonsina Orsini was the daughter of a man who had preserved and displayed his loyalty to the house of Aragon when most of his own people were in the enemy’s camp. Roberto Orsini was a younger son of that Carlo from whom sprang the line of Bracciano, afterwards the principal branch of this wide-spreading race. He had fought for King Ferrante against the Angevins, and for the Florentines against Bartolommeo Colleone, and died of sickness at Siena in 1476. One of his children by his second marriage with Caterina da Sanseverino was Alfonsina, thus named in honour of Aragon. She was married by proxy at Castelnuovo towards the end of February 1487, in presence of the royal pair and other members of the reigning family. Ferrante laid aside his family mourning on this day, and after supper there was a festival and a ball. The bridegroom was represented by Bernardo Rucellai; the bride’s next of kin by her cousin Gentil Virginio, lord of Bracciano. Alfonsina brought a dowry of 12,000 ducats, which popular belief magnified to 30,000.[334]A whole year passed before Piero brought her home. Her entry into Florence was to have taken place on May 22, 1488, but the Medici family were in mourning for the death of the third daughter, Luigia; so, instead of coming to the city, the young couple went to Careggi. About ten days afterwards Lorenzo gave, in honour of his daughter-in-law and her suite, a grand banquet, at which the chief men of the city and the foreign ambassadors were present.[335]There was no lack of festivities in Florence, and the Medici contributed not a little to their splendour. Maddalena Cybò came with her mother and sister-in-law; Franceschetto followed her on June 22. He was accompanied by Giorgio Santacroce of an old Roman family, Girolamo Tuttavilla, son of Cardinal d’Estouteville, and many others.‘We received him,’ wrote Lorenzo to Lanfredini two days after,[336]‘heartily rather than splendidly. Yesterday he made a visit to the Signoria; his appearance, bearing, and mode of speech give general satisfaction. As yet I have been little alone with him. I will endeavour to fulfil the Pope’s wishes; you will then report to me what he thinks of us on this first meeting. I will take care that he finds occasion to come to us often.’ The Florentines helped Lorenzo in this. In honour of his son-in-law’s presence numerous diversions for the people and magnificent spectacles were arranged. It was long since Florence had beheld such triumphal processions, such improvised buildings, arches, and other decorations, though they had long been customary there. Franceschetto, who had been presented with the freedom of the city, did all he could to make himself popular, and succeeded. When he rode through the streets on the feast of St. John the children shouted, ‘Cybò and Palle!’ From the piazza of the Signoria to that of the cathedral there was such a throng that great wax candles and other consecrated gifts could not be carried to the Baptistery; and when the street officials tried to clear a space, the people cried out that they wanted to see Lorenzo’s son-in-law, the Pope’s son. Franceschetto occupied the place of honour next to the Gonfalonier at the public banquet given by the Signoria to the distinguished nobles who were in the city and the foreign ambassadors, among whom, besides those of the friendly Italian powers, the Turkish envoy was present. Giovanni Tornabuoni, Bernardo Rucellai, Lorenzo, son of Pier-Francesco de’ Medici, and others, gave banquets and festivities; the latter gave one at his villa at Castello, situated to the west of the city on a gentle slope overlooking the valley of the Arno where it spreads out into a beautiful plain. Lorenzo saw his daughter and son-in-law daily. But throughout all the rejoicings of which his house was the centre, hewas not free from cares of all kinds. The bad state of affairs in Romagna will be mentioned presently; in his own home there were other causes for discomfort and anxiety.Lorenzo himself was ill and overwhelmed with business. Ser Piero da Bibiena wrote to Lanfredini on June 26:[337]‘Lorenzo has ridden out to Monte Paldi [a factory now belonging to the Corsini, in the neighbourhood of San Casciano] to get a little air and freedom from this mass of business. For two months he had not left the city; he intends to be back on Saturday.’ A few days before this the Ferrarese ambassador wrote that Lorenzo positively must go to the baths, but it was very difficult for him to get away. His own health was not his only trouble; for a long time past Clarice had been ill. It was hoped that native air would do her good, but not only did her condition not improve, but, even before her return from Rome, it became such as to cause anxiety; and the interior of the household must have been little suited to the festivities occasioned by the presence of two newly-married couples. The mother could not bear the thought of parting from her daughter. ‘Signor Francesco,’ wrote Lorenzo to Lanfredini on June 30,[338]‘thinks of setting out in a week, and, as I understand, taking Maddalena with him. I have not yet spoken of it to him, but I should be glad if you would mention the matter to his Holiness and get it arranged that she should remain here the rest of the summer and autumn. I have two chief motives for this wish. First, Clarice is very ill, so much so that the doctors are doubtful whether the disease will soon end fatally or whether it will drag on and the immediate danger pass over; secondly, the air yonder is unhealthy, and Maddalena is not used to it. For these reasons, and also because I have never yet had time to see my daughter comfortably, I earnestly beg his Holiness that of his kindnesshe will let me have her a few more months and write to Signor Francesco accordingly, so that the occasion may not appear to have come from us.’Lorenzo’s desire was fulfilled. On July 4, he received from Rome the news that the Pope had determined to entrust Franceschetto with a mission to Perugia, and to leave his wife in Florence for a time. It may easily be imagined how pleasing this last arrangement was to Lorenzo; the former seemed rather questionable to the experienced politician. ‘This Perugian affair,’ he wrote at once to Lanfredini,[339]‘seems to me very grave, and such as may create embarrassment; all the more so as Signor Francesco has had no practice in such things, and has no one near him to whom anything important can be entrusted.’ Then, after relating how he dined the day before with his son-in-law at Careggi, and they had visited the Petraja and other places, which he had much liked, he continues: ‘Maddalena will remain here, to which Signor Francesco seems quite agreed. Clarice could not be worse than she is now, and I fear we shall soon lose her. You can imagine what comfort she finds in the presence of her daughter, who has always seemed to me to be the apple of her eye (l’occhio del capo suo); so we are both very grateful to his Holiness. Of myself I say nothing, for you know how I love my children, especially in the present case.’On July 6, Franceschetto Cybò left Florence. His experiences at Perugia will be mentioned hereafter. Lorenzo, though much in need of the baths, was detained in the city by the weak state of Clarice and the pressure of business. At last, on the morning of July 21, he set out for Filetta in the Merse Vale in the Sienese territory. It is a small village consisting of only a few houses, in a valley surrounded with woods; the waters of the neighbouring sulphur-springs of Macereto have been brought thither, and it lies lonelyand deserted on the road leading from Siena to Grosseto and the Maremma. In the summer of 1813 Emperor Henry of Luxemburg was carried thither, with the hand of death upon him; in 1459 Pope Pius II., who repeatedly visited the waters of his native land, sought relief from his inveterate enemy the gout in these springs. Scarcely had Lorenzo arrived at Filetta when the fatal news reached him—Clarice died on the afternoon of July 30. The day before, Ser Piero had written to Lanfredini:[340]‘I know not what to tell you of Madonna Clarice; she gets better for a day or two, and then gets worse again, so that she is slowly approaching dissolution.’ The dissolution came much quicker than was expected, yet it hardly looks well that Lorenzo should leave the city when her state was so critical, and that he did not return on hearing that she was worse. ‘If you should hear Lorenzo blamed for not being present at his wife’s death,’ wrote Ser Piero to Lanfredini on July 31, ‘excuse him. Leoni (the physician) considered it necessary for his health for him to go to the baths, and no one thought death was so near.’ The Ferrarese ambassador confirms the statement that, according to the doctors’ advice, Lorenzo’s stay at the baths was absolutely necessary, and all his friends had entreated him not to return till the cure was completed. On the evening after her death Clarice de’ Medici was entombed without pomp in San Lorenzo, and on the following morning all the ambassadors present in Florence went to Piero to offer their condolences. The solemn obsequies, at which the whole city was present, took place on August 1.[341]Lorenzo’s wife was not quite forty. No notice is to be found in his writings of the woman who shared the lights and shadows of life with him for nineteen years; an idea of their conjugal relations can be formed only from a few words of his in earlier days, and the inadequate testimony of contemporaries, which seems to indicate that their views and inclinationsdid not always agree. Clarice’s disagreement with such a celebrated man as Poliziano has tended to bias the judgment of her contemporaries against her. Nevertheless, this daughter of an old Roman baronial house, obliged, when young and inexperienced, to enter a strange world as the wife of a man for whom she had no affection, displayed in all things tact and sound judgment; without putting herself forward she did honour to her position and her husband, and she brought up her children tenderly and carefully. Her feelings and her relations to Lorenzo are indicated, amongst others, by the following letter, written to her husband from Caffaggiuolo on December 13 of the year they were so long separated, 1478, on behalf of a servant who had been dismissed for some misconduct.[342]‘Illustrious husband,’ she wrote; ‘Andrea your messenger has been up here for two days, and earnestly begged me to put in a good word for him as he is deeply grieved for his fault. I therefore beg you to keep him with you or procure him another situation; for, as he has formerly shown his fidelity, you would be acting contrary to your nature if you did not forgive him his error, besides being responsible for his falling into worse ways; also you might inadvertently by this means discourage others who are faithful to you. He has a mother who was delighted at his position in your service, and is now in like measure distressed, fearing that her son may, if you dismiss him, go astray and bring her to sorrow. He has already expiated his fault by grief and shame; for, since you sent him away, he has been like one beside himself and has never had a moment’s happiness. I think he is especially touched on the point of honour, which is a good sign and should have weight with you. I beg you therefore to be indulgent to him, whether for the sake of his proved fidelity, or from pity for his mother, or because he shows right feeling, or, lastly, for the sake of my intercession,either by taking him back or by providing for him in some other way.’A letter written to Innocent VIII. the day after Clarice’s death[343]displays a warmth of feeling which, after the passages that have been mentioned, one would hardly have expected from Lorenzo, and which give a favourable impression of him: ‘I am too often obliged to trouble your Holiness with what is daily sent me by fate and prepared for me by the will of God, against which all striving is vain, and to which everyone must bow with patience and humility, accepting His ways as tokens of goodness and love. But the recent death of my sweet and beloved companion Clarice is for numberless reasons such a grief and loss to me that it has conquered my resignation and endurance amid the trials and persecutions of fate, against which I thought myself proof. Bereaved of the pleasant society to which I was accustomed, I feel the limit is passed, and I can find no comfort or rest for my deep sorrow. As I do not cease to pray the Lord God to give me peace, I trust that of His goodness He will put an end to this sorrow and spare me any more such trials as have visited me lately. I humbly and from my inmost heart beseech your Holiness to pray for me, for I know your prayers will do me good. Filetta, July 31.’ August 6, Lorenzo returned to Florence, from whence he wrote to the ambassador at Rome on behalf of an Englishman who was going thither to procure a Papal brief and had been specially recommended to him by the Queen, Elizabeth of York. Two days later, he apologised to Lanfredini for not having answered some business questions:[344]‘You know the cause; when my mind is entirely occupied with one thing, it cannot think of anything else.’Clarice’s death obliged Lorenzo to seek a companion for his daughter to take her back to Rome. He chose a distantrelative, Maria de’ Medici, widow of Galeazzo Malatesta. ‘Maddalena,’ he wrote to Lanfredini on September 3,[345]‘starts to-morrow for Rome. She will be accompanied by my Piero and my uncle Giovanni, who will take her as far as Acquapendente, as arranged by Signor Francesco. I have chosen for her companion one Madonna Maria de’ Medici, widow of Signor Galeazzo Malatesta and daughter of Madonna Ciulla. She is a very well-bred and truly venerable lady over fifty, who since her widowhood has lived the retired life of a nun. I think that the more Signor Francesco thinks over this choice of mine, the better pleased he will be.’ Maddalena remained with her husband in Rome, whence she wrote to her father, September 1 of the next year, that she was about to become a mother. The young wife’s days seem not to have been very cheerful ones. When she went to Rome with her mother, Lorenzo sent with her a man whom he trusted and who was faithfully attached to his house—the same Ser Matteo Franco whose name holds a place in the history of burlesque poetry. He was Maddalena’s adviser and confidant, her man of business and, perhaps, her house-chaplain; and his many letters to members of the Medicean household display a sympathy and warmth of feeling doubly pleasing in such a jovial man. Franceschetto neglected his young wife, who fretted continually, while he passed the nights in play and feasting. With no one to keep her company, she soon languished and lost her health, thinking regretfully of her father’s house and the pleasant villas around Florence, where she had passed her happy childhood.[346]A few days after the loss of Clarice, another death took place which did not affect the Medici family personally, but whose consequences had no little influence on the family relations which were closely connected with later politicalevents. On August 19, at the castle of Capuano near Naples, died at the age of forty-two Ippolita Maria, Duchess of Calabria.[347]Her death broke the ties which bound together the Houses of Aragon and the Sforza. This was probably not perceived at the moment, for not only did the alliance continue which seemed to unite the two states, but the death caused no change in the plans for the new connection long decided on between the two families, whereby their interests were to be yet more closely and firmly linked together. But the death of this clever and accomplished woman dissolved the union between Ippolita’s husband and brother, two men who were willing and accustomed to sacrifice every consideration and every scruple to their ambition, greed and hatred, and who, since the Ferrarese war, had regarded each other with ever-increasing distrust and ill-will. The longer Lodovico il Moro held the reins of government in Milan, the less disposed he was to surrender them to his nephew, who, although now nineteen years old, was still duke only in title. Whether the accusation is true that Lodovico had neglected the youth’s education to such an extent that, delicate as he had been from childhood, he was unfit to govern, must be left an open question. At all events, Gian-Galeazzo took no part in public affairs, and though everything was done in the name of the Duke of Milan, it all went through the hands of the Duke of Bari. From early childhood Gian-Galeazzo had been betrothed to his cousin Isabella. Alfonso of Calabria had already often pressed for the completion of the marriage; and as the bride was now eighteen, Lodovico at last had to yield. The mourning for the Duchess was not yet over, when, on December 11, Hermes Sforza, Gian-Galeazzo’s younger brother, arrived in the bay of Naples with six galleys, and with a brilliant suite landed to fetch his future sister-in-law, whose father came to meet him and conducted him to the king andqueen at Castelnuovo. On the 21st of the same month Hermes, in his brother’s name, placed the wedding-ring on Isabella’s finger. The court mourning prevented all festivities. A gloomy shadow seemed to hang over this marriage, which was destined to bring nothing but suffering and misery to the contracting parties.Its early days, however, were not lacking in splendour. On December 30 the young Duchess of Milan embarked, accompanied as far as the Molo by her father, her grandparents and their court. Many distinguished Milanese and Genoese had come with Hermes Sforza; among them Vitaliano Borromeo, Gasparo Visconti, Ambrosio del Maino, and Giovan Francesco da Sanseverino Count of Cajazzo (son of Roberto). Ten galleys were filled by these and the Neapolitan suite, the Duke and Duchess of Melfi, the Countess of Terranuova, the Counts of Potenza and Consa, and others. They touched at Civitavecchia, Piombino, and Livorno. At the first-named port the bride was received by the Cardinals Sforza, Riario, and de Foix, with the Senator of Rome; at Piombino by Jacopo IV. Appiani. At Livorno, Lorenzo, again confined at home by the gout, was represented by his son Piero, accompanied by Pier Antonio Carnesecchi and Alessandro Nasi. The Republic sent Jacopo Guicciardini, Pier Filippo Pandolfini, and Paol’Antonio Soderini as envoys to welcome the Duchess; but Lorenzo’s son put them all in the shade by his princely appearance. It was the same at Milan, whither Piero went towards the end of January 1489, to be present at Isabella’s triumphal entry and the final marriage, which took place on Candlemas day. On reaching the Milanese frontier, Piero was received by several nobles sent by il Moro to form his train. At the wedding in the cathedral, where the ceremony was performed by Federigo Sanseverino (another son of Roberto, and afterwards a Cardinal), Piero outshone everybody; though the splendour was such that, as a reporter wrote to Lorenzo, the very cooks were in velvet and silk. After theceremony the Ducal couple sent to Piero to fetch his attire and admire it again. Lodovico exhausted himself in attentions towards the son of the man in whose hands were the destinies of Florence. ‘It seems a perfect marvel,’ wrote the Florentine ambassador, Piero Alamanni, on January 31, 1489, ‘to all these Lombards, as well as to the ambassadors, that young as he [Piero] is, he maintains such a dignified bearing and discourses on everything with so much readiness. Yesterday morning my lord Lodovico spoke for half an hour in his praise before the ambassadors, and assigned to him a place of honour next Messer Galeotto della Mirandola, Rodolfo Gonzaga, and Annibale Bentivoglio.’ After the nuptial ceremony Alamanni was knighted by the young Duke and presented with a splendid robe of brocade, and his spurs were fastened on by Galeazzo and Gian Francesco da Sanseverino. The splendour of the festivities was such as the Milanese court had been wont to display since the days of Galeazzo Maria.[348]
FAMILY EVENTS. MARRIAGES AND DEATHS.
Themarriage of Maddalena de’ Medici with Franceschetto Cybò took place about this time. When her journey to Rome was partially decided on, Lorenzo wrote to Lanfredini,[322]without making any positive statement on the subject: ‘Clarice, my wife, is partly minded to visit her relations there, and at the same time to try the effect of the Roman air, as you know that of our neighbourhood does not suit her in winter. You formerly mentioned a desire that Maddalena should go to Rome. If this is still the case, she might conveniently accompany her mother. These are our own present plans, which you can communicate to the Pope and Signor Francesco. If they are pleased with them, the thing shall take place, but not otherwise.’ On November 4, 1487, Madonna Clarice set out for Rome with her daughter the bride, her eldest son, the Bishop of Arezzo, Jacopo Salviati, and a numerous suite. Lorenzo did not omit to give his daughter on her departure from home precepts and advice such as he knew how to give wisely and well. He reminded her of her own descent and family, as well as of the position she was about to take; of the consideration due both to the Roman people and to the Pope, with whom she was to be so nearly connected; of her duty towards her husband; of the precepts of honour and obedience, and of respect to her elders and superiors in rank. On arrivingnear the city the travellers were met by the bridegroom, with some prelates of the Pope’s household, several ambassadors and members of the Florentine colony at Rome, amid whom they were conducted to the Leonine city. Here Franceschetto dwelt in a house built by his uncle Maurigio, near that in which Charlotte de Lusignan, queen of Cyprus, had died after a long exile, on June 12 of that same year. The servants of the prelates and those of the ambassadors and the Medici rode foremost. On Franceschetto’s right rode his future brother-in-law, Piero, on his left, Jacopo Salviati, with whom he was to be similarly connected. The bride rode between the Archbishop of Cosenza and the Bishop of Oria, her mother between the Milanese ambassador (the Bishop of Roveredo) and the Bishop of Volterra. Prelates, jurists, ladies and others followed.[323]On the Sunday before the 24th, the day on which the Venetian envoys Sebastiano Badoer and Bernardo Bembo were received in a secret consistory, the Pope gave a banquet at his palace to Clarice and her daughter, at which the bridegroom, the Florentine ambassador, and several prelates were present. To the bride he presented jewels to the value of about eight thousand ducats, to Franceschetto, one of two thousand.[324]On January 20, 1488, the marriage contract was signed.[325]Franceschetto was in his thirty-ninth year; his bride was yet in her girlhood, gentle and bashful. One of those sent by her father to accompany her always calls herla fanciulla. Her dowry does not seem to have been large; four thousand ducats, part in cash, part in state bonds. From a letter of Lorenzo to Lanfredini,[326]it appears that this sum was not ready at the time of the wedding. ‘You know how manyholes I have to fill up.’ But Franceschetto was no loser. In the days of Paul II. the countship of Anguillara had been taken from its ancient lords, on account of their repeated rebellions, and given to the Apostolic Chamber. The relatives of Everso of Anguillara had never ceased to protest, and we have already pointed out that after the death of Sixtus IV. Deifebo regained possession of the castles. Lorenzo made terms with the claimants by means of a considerable sum, and offered the county to Cybò as an addition to Maddalena’s dowry; whereupon, on February 21, 1490, Innocent VIII. conferred on Franceschetto the fief of Anguillara, without mentioning the transaction, so as not to call in question the rights of the Chamber. In 1487 Franceschetto had bought of Bartolommeo della Rovere the Roman castles of Cerveteri and Sta. Severa.[327]These places, alienated after the Pope’s death to the Orsini of Bracciano, were, at the beginning of Alexander VI.’s reign, near kindling a war which threatened to set all Italy on fire. This was not all the wealth that the Cybò gained by their connection with the Medici. In Tuscany they acquired property. The palace of Jacopo de’ Pazzi passed to Lorenzo’s son-in-law, whose descendants long possessed both it and the country-house of the Pazzi at Montughi.[328]The Medici’s estate in the Volterra district, which also passed to the Cybò, has been already mentioned. The intended acquisition of the unfinished Pitti Palace came to nothing.
Lorenzo, who always knew how to combine his love of splendour with useful aims, and judged others from the same point of view, had no very high opinion of his son-in-law.‘As you have before heard from me,’ he wrote to Lanfredini before the marriage on November 4, 1487, when Franceschetto had got himself made captain-general,[329]‘I think Signor Francesco should not pursue mere smoke; things without moderation do not suit me. A captain ought to have seen service and made himself a reputation. I wish he had rather sought to secure a maintenance, and I wonder it does not strike him that the day after the Pope dies he will be the poorest man on earth, and I shall have to provide for him and his wife. Endeavour to make this clear to him if you see that he hankers after titles and vanities; I must speak to him freely and then help him, however he may take it. I hear he keeps aloof from frivolous people and those of evil report, and that he avoids play. We must support him as much as possible, and lovingly point out to him what is becoming, if we are to fulfil our duty.’ Lorenzo did not wish his son to remain in Rome longer than was absolutely necessary. On December 9, he wrote to his wife desiring that Piero should return with the bishop and Jacopo Salviati as soon as he had despatched certain business of his own, of which more will be said hereafter. Piero returned to Florence, the bishop remained. Lorenzo wrote repeatedly to Clarice leaving the length of her stay to her own decision, but expressing a wish, towards the end of the winter, that she might stay somewhat longer.[330]Everything did not go according to Lorenzo’s wishes. The elevation of his son Giovanni to the cardinalate, undoubtedly one of the motives for the match, was delayed; Clarice was ill; and the home arrangements of the Cybò seem not to have suited Florentine and Medicean ideas. ‘I have received,’ wrote Lorenzo to Lanfredini on April 11, 1488,[331]‘your information about Clarice, and am grieved at it, though her ill-health is nothingnew to me. I have informed her of the cause which will somewhat delay Piero’s departure from here, but let her not trouble herself about it if she wishes to return here sooner, though I should be glad if she could wait for Alfonsina [Piero’s bride]. I wish Maddalena might come with her, for the latter is still quite a child, and Signor Francesco’s household is badly managed; and, besides, she would be a comfort to Clarice. But I should wish this to be done with the full consent and without the slightest dissatisfaction of his Holiness or Signor Francesco, and I should take it as a favour.’ And after recurring to the insecure position of his son-in-law, he adds: ‘His Holiness seems to me to go to work with great lukewarmness in all these things. Independently of Signor Francesco I also regret that my daughter should find herself in unfavourable circumstances, and I am in a kind of despair over this and other matters when I hear of the slowness and carelessness yonder.’
Madonna Clarice stayed in Rome till May 1488, when her son Piero came with Giovanni Tornabuoni to fetch her back. From a letter written to Lorenzo by their companion Poliziano, on May 2,[332]it appears that on that day Piero set out from Acquapendente to Viterbo, and that the travellers were all in good health and spirits and did not forget to celebrate the merry month of May with songs and various amusements on their journey. Piero’s expedition had also another object, he was going to bring home his own bride. On April 16 Lorenzo wrote to Lanfredini:[333]‘My Piero starts in a few days to go and fetch his wife, and also to help Clarice. If the latter is able to travel I shall be very glad.’ As well as an unknown son-in-law Lorenzo had chosen an unknown daughter-in-law; but she came of a family which had long been intimately associated with his and had many relations with the Republic, at the same time enjoying the special favour of the ruling house of Naples.Alfonsina Orsini was the daughter of a man who had preserved and displayed his loyalty to the house of Aragon when most of his own people were in the enemy’s camp. Roberto Orsini was a younger son of that Carlo from whom sprang the line of Bracciano, afterwards the principal branch of this wide-spreading race. He had fought for King Ferrante against the Angevins, and for the Florentines against Bartolommeo Colleone, and died of sickness at Siena in 1476. One of his children by his second marriage with Caterina da Sanseverino was Alfonsina, thus named in honour of Aragon. She was married by proxy at Castelnuovo towards the end of February 1487, in presence of the royal pair and other members of the reigning family. Ferrante laid aside his family mourning on this day, and after supper there was a festival and a ball. The bridegroom was represented by Bernardo Rucellai; the bride’s next of kin by her cousin Gentil Virginio, lord of Bracciano. Alfonsina brought a dowry of 12,000 ducats, which popular belief magnified to 30,000.[334]A whole year passed before Piero brought her home. Her entry into Florence was to have taken place on May 22, 1488, but the Medici family were in mourning for the death of the third daughter, Luigia; so, instead of coming to the city, the young couple went to Careggi. About ten days afterwards Lorenzo gave, in honour of his daughter-in-law and her suite, a grand banquet, at which the chief men of the city and the foreign ambassadors were present.[335]
There was no lack of festivities in Florence, and the Medici contributed not a little to their splendour. Maddalena Cybò came with her mother and sister-in-law; Franceschetto followed her on June 22. He was accompanied by Giorgio Santacroce of an old Roman family, Girolamo Tuttavilla, son of Cardinal d’Estouteville, and many others.‘We received him,’ wrote Lorenzo to Lanfredini two days after,[336]‘heartily rather than splendidly. Yesterday he made a visit to the Signoria; his appearance, bearing, and mode of speech give general satisfaction. As yet I have been little alone with him. I will endeavour to fulfil the Pope’s wishes; you will then report to me what he thinks of us on this first meeting. I will take care that he finds occasion to come to us often.’ The Florentines helped Lorenzo in this. In honour of his son-in-law’s presence numerous diversions for the people and magnificent spectacles were arranged. It was long since Florence had beheld such triumphal processions, such improvised buildings, arches, and other decorations, though they had long been customary there. Franceschetto, who had been presented with the freedom of the city, did all he could to make himself popular, and succeeded. When he rode through the streets on the feast of St. John the children shouted, ‘Cybò and Palle!’ From the piazza of the Signoria to that of the cathedral there was such a throng that great wax candles and other consecrated gifts could not be carried to the Baptistery; and when the street officials tried to clear a space, the people cried out that they wanted to see Lorenzo’s son-in-law, the Pope’s son. Franceschetto occupied the place of honour next to the Gonfalonier at the public banquet given by the Signoria to the distinguished nobles who were in the city and the foreign ambassadors, among whom, besides those of the friendly Italian powers, the Turkish envoy was present. Giovanni Tornabuoni, Bernardo Rucellai, Lorenzo, son of Pier-Francesco de’ Medici, and others, gave banquets and festivities; the latter gave one at his villa at Castello, situated to the west of the city on a gentle slope overlooking the valley of the Arno where it spreads out into a beautiful plain. Lorenzo saw his daughter and son-in-law daily. But throughout all the rejoicings of which his house was the centre, hewas not free from cares of all kinds. The bad state of affairs in Romagna will be mentioned presently; in his own home there were other causes for discomfort and anxiety.
Lorenzo himself was ill and overwhelmed with business. Ser Piero da Bibiena wrote to Lanfredini on June 26:[337]‘Lorenzo has ridden out to Monte Paldi [a factory now belonging to the Corsini, in the neighbourhood of San Casciano] to get a little air and freedom from this mass of business. For two months he had not left the city; he intends to be back on Saturday.’ A few days before this the Ferrarese ambassador wrote that Lorenzo positively must go to the baths, but it was very difficult for him to get away. His own health was not his only trouble; for a long time past Clarice had been ill. It was hoped that native air would do her good, but not only did her condition not improve, but, even before her return from Rome, it became such as to cause anxiety; and the interior of the household must have been little suited to the festivities occasioned by the presence of two newly-married couples. The mother could not bear the thought of parting from her daughter. ‘Signor Francesco,’ wrote Lorenzo to Lanfredini on June 30,[338]‘thinks of setting out in a week, and, as I understand, taking Maddalena with him. I have not yet spoken of it to him, but I should be glad if you would mention the matter to his Holiness and get it arranged that she should remain here the rest of the summer and autumn. I have two chief motives for this wish. First, Clarice is very ill, so much so that the doctors are doubtful whether the disease will soon end fatally or whether it will drag on and the immediate danger pass over; secondly, the air yonder is unhealthy, and Maddalena is not used to it. For these reasons, and also because I have never yet had time to see my daughter comfortably, I earnestly beg his Holiness that of his kindnesshe will let me have her a few more months and write to Signor Francesco accordingly, so that the occasion may not appear to have come from us.’
Lorenzo’s desire was fulfilled. On July 4, he received from Rome the news that the Pope had determined to entrust Franceschetto with a mission to Perugia, and to leave his wife in Florence for a time. It may easily be imagined how pleasing this last arrangement was to Lorenzo; the former seemed rather questionable to the experienced politician. ‘This Perugian affair,’ he wrote at once to Lanfredini,[339]‘seems to me very grave, and such as may create embarrassment; all the more so as Signor Francesco has had no practice in such things, and has no one near him to whom anything important can be entrusted.’ Then, after relating how he dined the day before with his son-in-law at Careggi, and they had visited the Petraja and other places, which he had much liked, he continues: ‘Maddalena will remain here, to which Signor Francesco seems quite agreed. Clarice could not be worse than she is now, and I fear we shall soon lose her. You can imagine what comfort she finds in the presence of her daughter, who has always seemed to me to be the apple of her eye (l’occhio del capo suo); so we are both very grateful to his Holiness. Of myself I say nothing, for you know how I love my children, especially in the present case.’
On July 6, Franceschetto Cybò left Florence. His experiences at Perugia will be mentioned hereafter. Lorenzo, though much in need of the baths, was detained in the city by the weak state of Clarice and the pressure of business. At last, on the morning of July 21, he set out for Filetta in the Merse Vale in the Sienese territory. It is a small village consisting of only a few houses, in a valley surrounded with woods; the waters of the neighbouring sulphur-springs of Macereto have been brought thither, and it lies lonelyand deserted on the road leading from Siena to Grosseto and the Maremma. In the summer of 1813 Emperor Henry of Luxemburg was carried thither, with the hand of death upon him; in 1459 Pope Pius II., who repeatedly visited the waters of his native land, sought relief from his inveterate enemy the gout in these springs. Scarcely had Lorenzo arrived at Filetta when the fatal news reached him—Clarice died on the afternoon of July 30. The day before, Ser Piero had written to Lanfredini:[340]‘I know not what to tell you of Madonna Clarice; she gets better for a day or two, and then gets worse again, so that she is slowly approaching dissolution.’ The dissolution came much quicker than was expected, yet it hardly looks well that Lorenzo should leave the city when her state was so critical, and that he did not return on hearing that she was worse. ‘If you should hear Lorenzo blamed for not being present at his wife’s death,’ wrote Ser Piero to Lanfredini on July 31, ‘excuse him. Leoni (the physician) considered it necessary for his health for him to go to the baths, and no one thought death was so near.’ The Ferrarese ambassador confirms the statement that, according to the doctors’ advice, Lorenzo’s stay at the baths was absolutely necessary, and all his friends had entreated him not to return till the cure was completed. On the evening after her death Clarice de’ Medici was entombed without pomp in San Lorenzo, and on the following morning all the ambassadors present in Florence went to Piero to offer their condolences. The solemn obsequies, at which the whole city was present, took place on August 1.[341]Lorenzo’s wife was not quite forty. No notice is to be found in his writings of the woman who shared the lights and shadows of life with him for nineteen years; an idea of their conjugal relations can be formed only from a few words of his in earlier days, and the inadequate testimony of contemporaries, which seems to indicate that their views and inclinationsdid not always agree. Clarice’s disagreement with such a celebrated man as Poliziano has tended to bias the judgment of her contemporaries against her. Nevertheless, this daughter of an old Roman baronial house, obliged, when young and inexperienced, to enter a strange world as the wife of a man for whom she had no affection, displayed in all things tact and sound judgment; without putting herself forward she did honour to her position and her husband, and she brought up her children tenderly and carefully. Her feelings and her relations to Lorenzo are indicated, amongst others, by the following letter, written to her husband from Caffaggiuolo on December 13 of the year they were so long separated, 1478, on behalf of a servant who had been dismissed for some misconduct.[342]‘Illustrious husband,’ she wrote; ‘Andrea your messenger has been up here for two days, and earnestly begged me to put in a good word for him as he is deeply grieved for his fault. I therefore beg you to keep him with you or procure him another situation; for, as he has formerly shown his fidelity, you would be acting contrary to your nature if you did not forgive him his error, besides being responsible for his falling into worse ways; also you might inadvertently by this means discourage others who are faithful to you. He has a mother who was delighted at his position in your service, and is now in like measure distressed, fearing that her son may, if you dismiss him, go astray and bring her to sorrow. He has already expiated his fault by grief and shame; for, since you sent him away, he has been like one beside himself and has never had a moment’s happiness. I think he is especially touched on the point of honour, which is a good sign and should have weight with you. I beg you therefore to be indulgent to him, whether for the sake of his proved fidelity, or from pity for his mother, or because he shows right feeling, or, lastly, for the sake of my intercession,either by taking him back or by providing for him in some other way.’
A letter written to Innocent VIII. the day after Clarice’s death[343]displays a warmth of feeling which, after the passages that have been mentioned, one would hardly have expected from Lorenzo, and which give a favourable impression of him: ‘I am too often obliged to trouble your Holiness with what is daily sent me by fate and prepared for me by the will of God, against which all striving is vain, and to which everyone must bow with patience and humility, accepting His ways as tokens of goodness and love. But the recent death of my sweet and beloved companion Clarice is for numberless reasons such a grief and loss to me that it has conquered my resignation and endurance amid the trials and persecutions of fate, against which I thought myself proof. Bereaved of the pleasant society to which I was accustomed, I feel the limit is passed, and I can find no comfort or rest for my deep sorrow. As I do not cease to pray the Lord God to give me peace, I trust that of His goodness He will put an end to this sorrow and spare me any more such trials as have visited me lately. I humbly and from my inmost heart beseech your Holiness to pray for me, for I know your prayers will do me good. Filetta, July 31.’ August 6, Lorenzo returned to Florence, from whence he wrote to the ambassador at Rome on behalf of an Englishman who was going thither to procure a Papal brief and had been specially recommended to him by the Queen, Elizabeth of York. Two days later, he apologised to Lanfredini for not having answered some business questions:[344]‘You know the cause; when my mind is entirely occupied with one thing, it cannot think of anything else.’
Clarice’s death obliged Lorenzo to seek a companion for his daughter to take her back to Rome. He chose a distantrelative, Maria de’ Medici, widow of Galeazzo Malatesta. ‘Maddalena,’ he wrote to Lanfredini on September 3,[345]‘starts to-morrow for Rome. She will be accompanied by my Piero and my uncle Giovanni, who will take her as far as Acquapendente, as arranged by Signor Francesco. I have chosen for her companion one Madonna Maria de’ Medici, widow of Signor Galeazzo Malatesta and daughter of Madonna Ciulla. She is a very well-bred and truly venerable lady over fifty, who since her widowhood has lived the retired life of a nun. I think that the more Signor Francesco thinks over this choice of mine, the better pleased he will be.’ Maddalena remained with her husband in Rome, whence she wrote to her father, September 1 of the next year, that she was about to become a mother. The young wife’s days seem not to have been very cheerful ones. When she went to Rome with her mother, Lorenzo sent with her a man whom he trusted and who was faithfully attached to his house—the same Ser Matteo Franco whose name holds a place in the history of burlesque poetry. He was Maddalena’s adviser and confidant, her man of business and, perhaps, her house-chaplain; and his many letters to members of the Medicean household display a sympathy and warmth of feeling doubly pleasing in such a jovial man. Franceschetto neglected his young wife, who fretted continually, while he passed the nights in play and feasting. With no one to keep her company, she soon languished and lost her health, thinking regretfully of her father’s house and the pleasant villas around Florence, where she had passed her happy childhood.[346]
A few days after the loss of Clarice, another death took place which did not affect the Medici family personally, but whose consequences had no little influence on the family relations which were closely connected with later politicalevents. On August 19, at the castle of Capuano near Naples, died at the age of forty-two Ippolita Maria, Duchess of Calabria.[347]Her death broke the ties which bound together the Houses of Aragon and the Sforza. This was probably not perceived at the moment, for not only did the alliance continue which seemed to unite the two states, but the death caused no change in the plans for the new connection long decided on between the two families, whereby their interests were to be yet more closely and firmly linked together. But the death of this clever and accomplished woman dissolved the union between Ippolita’s husband and brother, two men who were willing and accustomed to sacrifice every consideration and every scruple to their ambition, greed and hatred, and who, since the Ferrarese war, had regarded each other with ever-increasing distrust and ill-will. The longer Lodovico il Moro held the reins of government in Milan, the less disposed he was to surrender them to his nephew, who, although now nineteen years old, was still duke only in title. Whether the accusation is true that Lodovico had neglected the youth’s education to such an extent that, delicate as he had been from childhood, he was unfit to govern, must be left an open question. At all events, Gian-Galeazzo took no part in public affairs, and though everything was done in the name of the Duke of Milan, it all went through the hands of the Duke of Bari. From early childhood Gian-Galeazzo had been betrothed to his cousin Isabella. Alfonso of Calabria had already often pressed for the completion of the marriage; and as the bride was now eighteen, Lodovico at last had to yield. The mourning for the Duchess was not yet over, when, on December 11, Hermes Sforza, Gian-Galeazzo’s younger brother, arrived in the bay of Naples with six galleys, and with a brilliant suite landed to fetch his future sister-in-law, whose father came to meet him and conducted him to the king andqueen at Castelnuovo. On the 21st of the same month Hermes, in his brother’s name, placed the wedding-ring on Isabella’s finger. The court mourning prevented all festivities. A gloomy shadow seemed to hang over this marriage, which was destined to bring nothing but suffering and misery to the contracting parties.
Its early days, however, were not lacking in splendour. On December 30 the young Duchess of Milan embarked, accompanied as far as the Molo by her father, her grandparents and their court. Many distinguished Milanese and Genoese had come with Hermes Sforza; among them Vitaliano Borromeo, Gasparo Visconti, Ambrosio del Maino, and Giovan Francesco da Sanseverino Count of Cajazzo (son of Roberto). Ten galleys were filled by these and the Neapolitan suite, the Duke and Duchess of Melfi, the Countess of Terranuova, the Counts of Potenza and Consa, and others. They touched at Civitavecchia, Piombino, and Livorno. At the first-named port the bride was received by the Cardinals Sforza, Riario, and de Foix, with the Senator of Rome; at Piombino by Jacopo IV. Appiani. At Livorno, Lorenzo, again confined at home by the gout, was represented by his son Piero, accompanied by Pier Antonio Carnesecchi and Alessandro Nasi. The Republic sent Jacopo Guicciardini, Pier Filippo Pandolfini, and Paol’Antonio Soderini as envoys to welcome the Duchess; but Lorenzo’s son put them all in the shade by his princely appearance. It was the same at Milan, whither Piero went towards the end of January 1489, to be present at Isabella’s triumphal entry and the final marriage, which took place on Candlemas day. On reaching the Milanese frontier, Piero was received by several nobles sent by il Moro to form his train. At the wedding in the cathedral, where the ceremony was performed by Federigo Sanseverino (another son of Roberto, and afterwards a Cardinal), Piero outshone everybody; though the splendour was such that, as a reporter wrote to Lorenzo, the very cooks were in velvet and silk. After theceremony the Ducal couple sent to Piero to fetch his attire and admire it again. Lodovico exhausted himself in attentions towards the son of the man in whose hands were the destinies of Florence. ‘It seems a perfect marvel,’ wrote the Florentine ambassador, Piero Alamanni, on January 31, 1489, ‘to all these Lombards, as well as to the ambassadors, that young as he [Piero] is, he maintains such a dignified bearing and discourses on everything with so much readiness. Yesterday morning my lord Lodovico spoke for half an hour in his praise before the ambassadors, and assigned to him a place of honour next Messer Galeotto della Mirandola, Rodolfo Gonzaga, and Annibale Bentivoglio.’ After the nuptial ceremony Alamanni was knighted by the young Duke and presented with a splendid robe of brocade, and his spurs were fastened on by Galeazzo and Gian Francesco da Sanseverino. The splendour of the festivities was such as the Milanese court had been wont to display since the days of Galeazzo Maria.[348]