The prince Character Analysis Savonarola

Ø The prince Character Analysis Savonarola

          The republic that succeeded the Medici in 1492 was a peculiar political institution, having apocalyptic religious fervor as its driving force. Its leader was Girolamo Savonarola (1452-1498), a friar of the Dominican order who had come to Florence as a preacher in 1481. His personality was so charismatic and his sermons so vivid and emotionally stirring that he soon had his audiences spellbound. He drew a varied group of disciples, including artists and members of noble families. Savonarola was a reformer who railed against the luxurious extravagances of the Florentines and the sins of Italy in general. He also claimed to be a prophet, having predicted the deaths of several rulers and a coming time of retribution when Italy would be conquered. When Charles VIII invaded, Savonarola declared it the punishment of God for the sins of the Italian people.

          When Piero de Medici was deposed, Savonarola and his followers set up a kind of theocracy in place of the Medici government. To his credit, he reformed the institutions that the Medici had turned into props for their own power. But policy was directed by the will of God as Savonarola interpreted it, and disagreement with such policies was a sin. In an excess of reforming zeal, he commanded the Florentines to give up all vices and luxuries that tempted them to sin, and many of them happily did so. In 1497, an immense pile of artwork, literature, gambling equipment, fashionable clothing, carnival masks, jewelry, and other sinful frivolities was burned in a public square, an event known as "the Bonfire of the Vanities." Savonarola, preaching almost daily, vowed to make Florence the New Jerusalem, the city of God on earth, and foretold that when this was accomplished, the new age of universal peace would begin.

          Chief among the sinners that Savonarola denounced was the infamous Pope Alexander VI, whose riches and lascivious lifestyle perfectly represented the corruption that Savonarola sought to purge. Savonarola's opponents in Florence, urged on by Alexander, were becoming more vocal, and bad economic times in Florence meant that Savanarola's influence was waning. Gangs of young aristocrats harassed Savonarola's followers and heckled him during his sermons. The Franciscan order, traditional rivals of Savonarola's Dominicans, demanded that he show some evidence of his holiness and proposed a trial by fire. Representatives from both orders met in the piazza on April 7, 1498, but the contest was delayed by squabbles over what items the contestants could carry into the fire with them, and a rainstorm finally led to the cancellation of the event. It was perceived that the entire event had been a sham from the start, and Savonarola's charismatic hold over the populace was broken. The next day, a mob attacked his church, and he was put in prison. He and two fellow friars were hanged in May 1498, their bodies burned, and their ashes thrown in the Arno river. In June, Machiavelli would take up his post in the new republican government.

 

Ø Character Analysis The Borgia Family

          The Borgia family originated in Spain, where the family name was spelled "Borja." When Cardinal Alfonso de Borja was unexpectedly elected Pope Calixtus III in 1455, the career of the Borgias was launched.

         

          In 1456, Calixtus made his nephew Rodrigo, then only 25 years old, a cardinal and vice-chancellor of the church. Rodrigo used his position to acquire lucrative church offices and build alliances that would eventually allow him to maneuver his own election as Pope Alexander VI in 1492. Expert at accumulating wealth both for himself and the church, Alexander would use his money to maintain a luxurious court and to advance the position of his family.

          Alexander VI was Sensuous by nature and notoriously attractive to women, Alexander openly kept a series of mistresses, most notably Vannozza Catenei, a Roman beauty who bore him four children. In all, he had nine children, including two born after he became pope. Alexander shamelessly used his children as political pawns, plotting strategic marriages to establish a Borgia dynasty. He arranged three marriages for his unfortunate daughter Lucrezia: When her first husband, a member of the Sforza family, proved no longer politically useful, Alexander annulled the marriage, publicly claiming that the groom was impotent. Alexander then married Lucrezia to a prince of Naples, who was murdered a few years later by a gang of thugs, supposedly because Borgia policy toward Naples had changed. She was then married to Alfonso d'Este of Ferrara, who agreed only after a combination of threats and bribes from Alexander. Happily for Lucrezia, she became loved and respected as the lady of Ferrara.

          Alexander's most famous child was Cesare, his second son. Originally marked for a career in the church, Cesare became a cardinal in 1493 at the scandalously young age of 18. In 1497, his older brother Juan, his father's favorite, disappeared. His body, bearing nine stab wounds, was found floating in the Tiber river a few days later. Cesare was rumored to have arranged the murder. Whether or not he was responsible, the murder completely changed Cesare's situation. The next year, he renounced his cardinalate and went to France to give the new king, Louis XII, the marriage annulment he had requested from Alexander, getting in exchange a French princess for a bride and the help of the French armies to conquer the Romagna. This region was traditionally a part of the Papal States, but was not under firm control. In 1499, he began his conquests, and by 1501, he had been named Duke of Romagna by his father. In 1502, he conquered Urbino and Camerino, and a group of his allies, feeling threatened by his success, formed a conspiracy against him. They were unsuccessful, and Cesare, pretending forgiveness, invited them to a meeting at Senigallia, where he had all of them executed.

          Cesare was at the height of his power in 1503 when Alexander suddenly died. Without his father's political influence and money, Cesare's resources dried up. Hated and feared by many in Rome for his ruthless tactics and his lust for power, he found himself without friends. The election of a sworn Borgia enemy, Giuliano della Rovere, as Pope Julius II, sealed Cesare's fate. Ferdinand of Spain, an ally of the new pope, had Cesare arrested and imprisoned in 1504, but in 1506 Cesare escaped to France, where he worked as a captain for his brother-in-law, the King of Navarre. He was killed in a minor battle in 1507.

          The Borgia reputation for cunning, decadence, sensuality, and brutality was firmly based in reality, but malicious gossip and the popular imagination exaggerated it to fantastic proportions. For centuries, historians portrayed the Borgias as the grand villains of the Italian Renaissance. Cesare was believed to have murdered not only his brother and his rebellious captains, but also his sister's second husband and numerous others who either offended him or stood in his way. The Borgias were also believed to have been expert poisoners, and almost every unexplained death among their opponents was attributed to poison. Machiavelli's unqualified admiration for Cesare's methods reinforced both their reputations as diabolical figures.

 

The Sforza Family

          The founder of the Sforza dynasty was Muzio Attendolo Sforza (1369-1424). The son of a peasant family, he became a successful condottiere, a professional soldier for hire. In the course of his career, he fought for many employers, including the Visconti family, who ruled the city of Milan. When Muzio died in battle, his son Francesco (1401-1466) succeeded him as commander of his troops. While employed by Queen Giovanna of Naples, he left to fight for the Visconti against the Venetians. He was dismissed when the Visconti grew suspicious of his loyalties. But they soon needed him back, and as an inducement, he was promised the Visconti heir, Bianca Maria, as his wife. Mutual distrust still prevailed between Francesco and his future father-in-law, Filippo Maria, and it was years before the marriage took place. When Filippo died, Francesco wanted Filippo's dukedom. He ended up laying siege to Milan, which surrendered to him in 1450. He became a highly respected duke. He had numerous illegitimate children, as well as four children by Bianca Maria.

          Francesco was succeeded by his son Galeazzo Maria, a cruel and dissolute ruler who was assassinated in 1476. Galeazzo Maria's heir, Gian Galeazzo, was only eight years old at the time, and it was Galeazzo Maria's brother Ludovico who finally controlled Milan after the resulting power struggle. Although he was supposedly Gian Galeazzo's guardian, Ludovico refused to give up power when Gian married Isabella of Naples in 1489, and a feud with Naples ensued. Ludovico began courting the French king, Charles VIII, who had claims to Naples, in the hope that Charles would put an end to his troubles with Naples and with rival Venice. When Gian Galeazzo conveniently died soon after Charles' invasion in 1494, Ludovico become the uncontested ruler of Milan.

However, Ludovico soon found that he had made a serious mistake by encouraging the French invasion, because the Duke of Orleans, who would later become King Louis XII, had accompanied Charles to Italy and claimed Milan as his own because of his relationship to the Visconti family. Ludovico joined Pope Alexander VI and the other Italian powers to push Charles out of Italy. Louis XII returned to Milan and forced Ludovico to flee in 1499. Ludovico returned to power briefly in 1500, but was betrayed and taken prisoner by the French a few months later. He died in a French castle in 1508. After the departure of the French, the Sforza family ruled Milan with some interruptions until 1535.

          Machiavelli mentions Ludovico with undisguised contempt, regarding him as one of the primary causes of Italy's misery. Ludovico was a plotter and intriguer, constantly making alliances and counter alliances that he imagined would propel him to greatness. He was ultimately undone by forces too powerful for him to manipulate. He was also a great patron of the arts. Leonardo da Vinci was in his employ at Milan for several years, and it was Ludovico who commissioned the painting of da Vinci's "Last Supper" for his favorite church.

Character Analysis Pope Julius II

          Giuliano della Rovere (circa 1445-1513), the son of a poor family, was appointed cardinal over the church of San Pietro by his uncle, Pope Sixtus IV, in 1471. He became papal legate for his uncle, a position that took him on diplomatic missions to France and to the papal states. He was a bitter rival of Alexander VI, and by 1494, two years into the Borgia pope's reign, Giuliano left Rome, fearing for his life. He went to France, where he encouraged Charles VIII to press ahead with his plans for an Italian invasion, hoping to thereby depose Alexander. He accompanied Charles on his invasion and on his subsequent retreat. While in France, he judiciously welcomed Cesare Borgia's visit and even encouraged his conquest of the Romagna. He did not return to Rome until Alexander's death in 1503. He lacked the votes to get himself elected, but Alexander's pious and ascetic successor, Pius III, was in poor health and died after less than a month in office. Giuliano made a deal with Cesare Borgia, then desperate for allies, to get the votes of the Spanish cardinals, and became Pope Julius II on October 1, 1503.

         

          Julius spent the majority of his papacy occupied by war, often appearing on the battlefield himself, wearing armor under his papal robes. Julius quickly disposed of Cesare, regardless of their arrangement, and set about putting the Romagna back under the control of the Papal States. The Venetians refused to give up several cities they had seized after Cesare's fall, so Julius formed the League of Cambrai, an alliance with Louis XII, Ferdinand of Spain, and Emperor Maximilian I, to defeat them. The Venetians surrendered, and Julius, chafing under the domination of Louis, formed an alliance with Venice and Switzerland to drive out the French. This alliance eventually included Ferdinand, Maximilian, and even Henry VII of England in what was called the "Holy League." The League's forces were defeated by the French at Ravenna in April 1512, but the demoralized French army subsequently withdrew, and the League proved victorious. Julius restored the Sforza to power in Milan and the Medici in Florence. He was turning his efforts against Spanish domination when he died unexpectedly in 1513. Machiavelli observes that the impetuous and energetic pope's unlikely successes probably could not have continued had he lived longer. Exhausted by Julius' military exploits and Alexander's debauchery, most Italians were pleased to see the milder Giovanni de Medici elected as Pope Leo X.

          An indefatigable warrior and defender of the church's authority, Julius also adorned his church with grand works of art. He commissioned Michelangelo to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. A never-completed commission for Julius' monumental tomb produced some of Michelangelo's best sculpture. He hired Raphael, then in his 20s, to paint his new papal chambers, replacing pictures of the despised Borgias. Julius also began construction of what would become the present day church of St. Peter's in Rome.