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| 1478 |
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| The Pazzi conspiracy. The Riarios plotted to have Lorenzo and Giuliano assassinated in the cathedral at Easter Mass. Giuliano was killed, Lorenzo wounded. The Medici almost exterminated the Pazzi and hounded the fugitives all over Italy. Sixtus laid an interdict on Florence and excommunicated Lorenzo; Alfonso of Calabria invaded Tuscany. Ferrante engineered a Milanese revolt; the Turks diverted Venice at Scutari; plague broke out. Desperate, Lorenzo visited Ferrante (the cruelest and most cynical despot in Italy), and through his charm and the threat of a revival of Angevin claims, arranged (1480) a peace. Florence suffered considerable losses, but Lorenzo was a popular hero and succeeded in establishing the council of seventy, a completely Medici organ, the instrument of de facto despotism, but a source of real stability in government. | 1 |
| The princely court. In the 15th century, political power and elite culture were centered in the princely courts of despots and oligarchs such as the Medici. “A court was the space and personnel around a prince as he made laws, received ambassadors, made appointments, took his meals and proceeded through the streets,” in the words of Lauro Martines. At his court, a prince flaunted his patronage of learning and the arts through lavish gifts to writers, artists, philosophers. The princely court gave the ruler the opportunity to display his wealth, in ceremonies such as baptisms, marriages, funerals, and triumphal entries into the city. Ritual and pageantry were used to display wealth and power. | 2 |
| Lorenzo's brilliant foreign policy was costly; he had neglected the family business and apparently used some of the state money for Medici purposes; he also debased the coinage. Florentine prosperity, under the pressure of rivals, heavy taxation, and business depression, declined. Nonetheless, Lorenzo, the leading statesman of his day, brought a 12-year calm to Italy, resuming the Medici alliance with Naples and Milan to balance the papacy and Venice, and to keep a united front against alien invasion. Florence, on good terms with Charles VIII, regained most of her Tuscan losses. Savonarola, prior of San Marco (1491), had begun his denunciations of Florentine corruption and his attacks on Lorenzo (See 1484–92). | 3 |
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| 1492 |
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| PIERO succeeded Lorenzo on his death. Son of an Orsini mother, married to an Orsini, he supported Naples, angered Milan, and threw Ludovico Sforza into alliance with the Neapolitan exiles, who summoned Charles VIII. | 4 |
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| 1494 |
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| Charles's invasion began the age-long subjugation of Italy to alien invaders, who dominated Italy until 1859. Piero, alarmed at public opinion, fled the city. | 5 |
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| 1498 |
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| Florentine rejection of Savonarola's moral crusade, together with papal anger at his preachings against Alexander VI, led to Savonarola's fall: accused of heresy, he was hanged and burned. | 6 |
| Florence, center of the Italian Renaissance. For more than a century the Medici were the greatest patrons of the Renaissance and led the rich bourgeoisie of Florence in fostering a brilliant development of culture. Cosimo was an enthusiastic patron of manuscript collectors, copyists, and humanists; he established the library of San Marco and the Medici library. The council of Ferrara-Florence sat in Florence (1439) and brought a number of learned Greeks to the city who stimulated Platonic studies. Under Cosimo's auspices, Ficino was trained to make his great translation of Plato and the Platonic Academy was founded. Lorenzo, a graceful poet (carnival songs), ardent champion of the vernacular, lover of the countryside, and generous patron, drew about him a brilliant circle. He continued the support of Ficino. Florentine leaders in the arts during the Renaissance: (1) painting: Masaccio (1401–28?), Botticelli (1444–1510), Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519), sculptor and polymath; (2) architecture: Brunelleschi (1377–1446); Alberti (1405–71); (3) sculpture: Donatello (c. 1386–1466), Ghiberti (1378–1455), Verrocchio (1435–88), Michelangelo (1475–1564), also painter, poet, architect; (4) history and political theory: Machiavelli (1469–1527), Guicciardini (1485–1540); (5) romantic poetry: Pulci (1432–c. 1487). (See Other Italian States) | 7 |
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