Magnifico (18 page)

The triumphant Lorenzo then dismounted and greeted the
Signoria,
accepting on behalf of his father the congratulations of the duly elected government. While the crowds dispersed, Lorenzo rode back to his palace surrounded by cheering supporters. Few could have missed the significance of the scene. The day had been a demonstration of raw power on the part of the Medici, an affirmation, were any needed, that a single family now dominated the city. While the constitution was not suspended, and in fact the whole charade had been conducted with scrupulous observance of Florentine law, no one doubted that the Medici and their supporters were now in complete control of the levers of government.

Over the next days and weeks the victorious party meted out punishment not only to the ringleaders but to many others whom the government suspected of having been sympathetic to the rebels.
*
Typical of this latter group was one Carlo Gondi, who was stripped of his rights as a citizen, though he protested he had done nothing more than affix his signature to the oath of May 4. “I knew that in an instant I had lost honor, wealth, friends and relatives,” he wrote despairingly, “and not only me but also Marriotto [my brother] and his and my sons.”

Despite Gondi’s bitter recriminations, the reprisals were moderate by the standards of the day. One eyewitness, the apothecary Luca Landucci, reveals that “after the failure of the plot, many citizens connected with it were exiled, about twenty-seven of them being restricted within certain boundaries and made ineligible for office.” Benedetto Dei’s chronicle contains the names of twenty-six among the banished or disenfranchised, starting with Agnolo Acciaiuoli, Dietisalvi Neroni, and Niccolò Soderini and concluding with Carlo Gondi. It is true that Piero’s treatment of his foes would certainly not pass muster in a modern courtroom—he himself admitted that Francesco Neroni’s confession, upon which much of our knowledge of the rebellion is based, was extracted after “little torture, or hardly any”—but what struck contemporaries was the mildness of his response. “Unlike his father Cosimo,” concludes Guicciardini, “Piero proved most clement, for he allowed no one to be punished except for those whom it would have been too dangerous not to punish.” Having been ruthless in pursuit of victory, Piero could afford to be generous. His clemency reassured a jittery public and reconciled the majority to whatever loss of liberty his triumph entailed. Having lived in fear of wholesale retribution and feeling relief when the response proved milder than anticipated, the citizens had little to complain of when the electoral bags were again held open to the prying hands of the
Accoppiatori
.

Chief beneficiary of Piero’s clemency was Luca Pitti. Having been the public face of the rebellion, Pitti was now one of the regime’s most ardent supporters. But Pitti’s last-minute conversion brought him little happiness in the end. Alamanno Rinuccini sums up the attitude of the reformers toward their fickle friend: “From vileness or because he had been corrupted with money or with promises from the other party, he brutally betrayed his allies and himself.” Nor was he fully trusted by those whose cause he now espoused. Abandoned by those who felt betrayed and excluded from the inner circle of the regime, he was now a broken man. “He remained cold and alone at home,” Parenti remarks, believing he got nothing better than he deserved, “and no one visited him to confer on matters of state, where once his house was filled with every kind of person.” This was a kind of living death for a Florentine, shut out from the lively give-and-take that was part of every citizen’s daily life.

For their parts in the rebellion, Dietisalvi Neroni and Niccolò Soderini were banished from Florence, the usual fate of those on the losing side in the periodic struggle for political control; after the two continued to conspire against their homeland from their places of exile death sentences were imposed in absentia. Agnolo Acciaiuoli was also banished from Florence but, unlike his colleagues, he still hoped for a reconciliation, something that, according to Machiavelli, he had almost achieved when Piero’s untimely death intervened. The State Archives of Florence contain a moving exchange of letters between the two former friends that reveals feelings embittered but not entirely extinguished by the events of that summer. First Agnolo, writing to Piero from Naples:

To which Piero replied:

With the successful
parlamento
and the banishing of his principal enemies, Piero’s position as the preeminent citizen of Florence was assured. But even now he was by no means the tyrant of Florence. His own verdict is reflected in the inscription he had placed on the statue by Donatello of Judith slaying the tyrant Holofernes that stood in the garden of his palace: “Pietro de’ Medici, son of Cosimo, dedicated the statue of this woman to the strength and liberty that the citizens, through their constant and invincible spirit, restored to the republic.” While certainly biased, the inscription reflects his own view of himself as the champion of Florentine liberty, not the uncrowned king of the city.

As he reasserted his control over the government, Piero came to rely more than ever on his son, who now acted as his eyes and ears in the Palace of the Priors. At his request the
Balìa
granted that Piero’s “most honorable and famous young son Lorenzo—notwithstanding the fact he is under age, since his outstanding probity and virtue supply his defect in age—to represent his father in the Council of One Hundred.” Here, then, is official recognition of the new role Lorenzo had begun to assume. Though still only a teenager, he was now a fixture in the inner circle of the
reggimento.

In addition to playing an ever more visible role on the domestic scene, the events of August and September 1466 raised Lorenzo’s stature in the eyes of the world. He was no longer the awkward son of Florence’s first citizen but a leader in his own right, his father’s right-hand man and the ruler-in-waiting of one of the richest and most powerful states in Italy. The transformation is most clearly marked in a letter to Lorenzo from King Ferrante, dated September 28. “Already,” he wrote, “we loved you on account of your excellent qualities and the services done by your grandfather and father. But as we have lately heard with what prudence and manly courage you behaved in the late revolutions, and how courageously you placed yourself in the foremost ranks, our affection to you has grown remarkably.” At the tender age of seventeen, Lorenzo had marched boldly onto the world stage and grabbed the spotlight. It was a starring role he would not relinquish for the remainder of his years.

THE DEFEAT OF THE HILL AND THE EXILE OF THE MOST
prominent exponents of reform left the Medici and their friends in undisputed control of the machinery of government. But perhaps Piero’s greatest success lay in securing the acquiescence of the majority of Florentines to the new state of affairs. Over the coming months and years any lingering wounds were healed by a concerted effort to broker marriages between families on either side of the political divide.

Though Piero was more than ever confined to his own bed, this did not mean that he was out of the loop. “[Piero] was crippled with gout like his father,” recalled Marco Parenti, “to such an extent that he could no longer get out of bed. Because of this all those who had need of him went to his chambers, including the magistrates who would take no decision in serious matters without his approval; similarly foreigners, ambassadors and lords, who had any business with our city were forced to seek him there, so that his rooms were always crowded with men on diverse errands and it was often difficult to speak with him.”

The job of keeping Piero abreast of what went on in the
Palazzo della Signoria
fell largely to Lorenzo. A letter written in March 1468 reveals the nature of his role. “Magnificent Lord,” Lorenzo wrote to Cipriano Seregni, then
Gonfaloniere di Giustizia,
“In obedience to the
Signoria
I spoke with Piero. He declared himself, in respect to creating a new
Dieci
[council of war], to be wholly in favor.” Dividing his time between the halls of the
Signoria
and his father’s private chambers, Lorenzo was the vital link between the elected officials and the effective boss of the city.

Aiding Piero in his efforts to direct the city’s foreign policy were the vast resources of the Medici bank, which maintained, in effect, its own intelligence service; agents in foreign capitals had access to information vital to political decision-making, and well-placed friends in strategic locations reported to Piero directly, rather than through official channels. Much of this correspondence now passed through Lorenzo’s hands. “I have received your letters, both thick and thin,” the nineteen-year-old Lorenzo wrote to Cristofano di Valsvignone, Piero’s private secretary, “filled with news of Flanders, England and of [the castle of] Marradi, of the plague, of the [clerical] benefices, and every other thing.”

Lorenzo’s able performance during the recent crisis had dramatically increased his influence and prestige. Foreign leaders paid him tribute, while his compatriots began to treat him with newfound respect. As his father’s closest aide and confidant he spent much time conferring with the
principali.
Veterans of the political scene like Tommaso Soderini, Otto Niccolini, Carlo Pandolfini, and Luigi Guicciardini had a chance to observe him on a daily basis and judge his character, and as Piero’s health continued to deteriorate, the question uppermost in the minds of all those concerned about the future of the republic was whether the ship of state could be entrusted to the captaincy of one so young and untested.

Reviews of Lorenzo’s character in this period reveal a young man whose gifts exceed his wisdom. The Milanese ambassador wrote what is probably the most balanced judgment: “[Lorenzo] is of such a nature as I have written previously: astute and possessing great insight he surely is; but he thinks too highly of himself and he sets his sails too high for comfort.” This observation on the part of a friend is similar to the conclusion reached by his bitter critic Alamanno Rinuccini—that Lorenzo was immensely able but dangerously arrogant. Piero himself noted similar qualities in his son and often seemed to think that paternal duty required him to knock Lorenzo down a peg or two.

Indeed, relations between father and son were not without difficulties. Lorenzo was too much the dutiful son for the natural tension that existed between them to lead to an open breach, but as Piero struggled with his infirmities, Lorenzo, bursting with youthful energy, grew increasingly impatient with his father’s efforts to hold him back. Their relations mirrored in miniature the perennial rivalry between generations, which in fifteenth-century Florence had traditionally been heavily slanted toward age and experience and had only partially succumbed to the cult of youth built up around Lorenzo and Giuliano. Complaints that the government had been handed over to unruly adolescents were surely exaggerated, but they were common enough to have contained at least a grain of truth. Lorenzo’s government would be distinguished by its youth, vitality, and dynamism, qualities that stirred up resentment among the city’s entrenched elites.

Tensions between father and son, however, were as much a matter of temperament as of age. While Lorenzo was outgoing and socially skilled, Piero was reserved with strangers and uncomfortable with the ceremonial aspects of government. Piero knew that Lorenzo was blessed with skills he did not possess, confessing during one of his absences that without him, “I shall be as a man without hands.” Particularly after the death of his gregarious uncle, Giovanni, in 1462, Lorenzo became the social coordinator and principal spokesman for the Medici regime.

During his adolescent years Lorenzo was busy building up his own personal authority, a process that fostered a growing belief in his own abilities and encouraged a sense of independence. Those in Florence wishing to advance their careers, or who found themselves on the wrong side of the law, appealed to Lorenzo, who thus developed a following of clients dependent on his favor.
*
The way in which Lorenzo wielded patronage in these years is suggested by a letter he wrote to the leaders of the commune of Arezzo: “The enduring and intimate good will that has always existed between your community and our house, particularly owing to the revered memory of my grandfather Cosimo and now with Piero my father, encourages me to appeal to Your Lordships with great confidence in every case.
Ser
Carlo di Piero di Berto da Firenzuola, notary, a noble youth and my great friend…would like to obtain from your community the position of notary of the office of the Civil Court, at the first vacancy, or whenever possible.”

After 1466, Lorenzo’s day-to-day role became more prominent and that of his father receded somewhat into the background. Lorenzo was no longer merely the “hope of the city” but a practicing and practical political operative. As his confidence grew and as he became more familiar with the intricacies of statecraft, Lorenzo began to criticize his father’s ways of doing business. “Lorenzo demonstrates that he has thought things out for himself,” reported the Milanese ambassador to Galeazzo Maria Sforza, “and he complains that he was unable to remedy the many ways of his father, which were more apt to lose him every friend within the city than to increase them abroad by even one.”

It is a tribute to Lorenzo’s prodigious energy that the growing list of official duties did nothing to dampen his appetite for more frivolous pursuits. Far from trimming his sails, Lorenzo seemed more determined than ever to enjoy himself at every opportunity. One incident in particular shows how Lorenzo chafed under the burdens imposed by his newfound responsibilities. It came in the fall of 1467, during a period of unrest stirred up by the continuing machinations of the exiled leaders of the Hill,
*
and the streak of recklessness that Lorenzo exhibited at the time caused friends and family once again to question his judgment.

In mid-September, with the countryside plagued by marauding bands of mercenary soldiers, many of them in the pay of the exiles, Lorenzo set aside his duties in the city and headed for the spa at Bagno a Morba, an isolated hamlet located in the rugged hills near Volterra.
*
There was nothing unusual about such a trip. Lorenzo, like all the Medici, was plagued by eczema as well as gout and arthritic pains, and throughout his life he would seek relief in the various mineral spas that dotted the countryside. An additional motivation was that his mother had stopped by the baths on her return from Rome to recover from a bout of fever, and Lorenzo was anxious to see her and to catch up on the news from the great capital.

But spas like Bagno a Morba were not only prized for their medicinal effects: something about the sulfurous vapors seemed to loosen morals as well as muscles, and there is no doubt that Lorenzo left the city in order to pursue some sort of sexual liaison. “[He] who want[s] a son,” went an old Tuscan saying, “leaves his wife at the baths, where she’ll have fun.”

No sooner had Lorenzo and his companions set out than word began to spread that bandits in the pay of the exiles were planning to descend on the village to kidnap or murder him. Alerted to the danger, Piero hurried messengers to the baths and urged his family to seek safety, though he concluded that the threats “are all dreams.” The rumors, though unsubstantiated, brought forth one letter that provides a telling glimpse into the character of the young Lorenzo. It was Gentile Becchi, Lorenzo’s tutor, who was given the task of coaxing the young man back to Florence. “There [at the baths] you risk unnecessary peril,” he scolded Lorenzo. “It seems to your friends that you should return. And they wish that, having returned, you looked after yourself better, valuing those who value you, and not putting us off with one of your ‘leave-it to-me’s,’ and that
in re venere
[i.e., in matters of love] you avoid those places where you are in danger.”

The
re venere
that enticed Lorenzo to the baths are not spelled out by Becchi, but gossip about Lorenzo’s mistresses, as well as the ribald banter of letters from his friend Braccio Martelli, confirm that young Lorenzo was not leading a life of monkish denial. Becchi’s missive had the desired result of bringing an early end to Lorenzo’s tryst. More important from the historian’s point of view, his admonishment reveals a headstrong young man unwilling to forgo his pleasures and liable to respond to criticism or advice with a dismissive “leave-it-to me.” Such self-assurance was to be both a source of strength and significant weakness throughout Lorenzo’s life, allowing him to take decisive action while others hesitated, but also leading him into perilous waters when he failed to heed the council of more experienced men.

The incident, though amounting to little in the end, is significant for the light it sheds on that perennial conflict within Lorenzo between duty and pleasure. Such conflicts are, of course, a natural part of growing up, but the violent backdrop to this inner struggle, and the potential for disaster should any of the choices he made turn out badly, added to the normal stresses of adolescence.

The incident also highlights the contrasting roles played by town and country in Lorenzo’s mind, a contrast that imparted a certain predictable rhythm to his life. While it was largely in the city that important business was conducted, the countryside provided a much needed release whenever the pressures of city life grew too great. Lorenzo drew sustenance from the hard physical labor of the fields and the practical hands-on management of his various estates; in his library ancient and modern texts on agronomy and animal husbandry shared the shelves with beautifully illuminated manuscripts and rare volumes of Plutarch, Homer, and Plato. Like his grandfather before him, he found in the workaday chores of pruning and planting the perfect means to clear his head after the intrigues and petty squabbles of political life. He was invigorated by the pungent smell of the stable (where he preferred to groom his horses himself) and rejuvenated by the feel of the hot Tuscan sun on his neck.

But the family’s many villas in the Tuscan hills offered more than simple rustic pursuits. Those close to the city, like Fiesole and Careggi, were the preferred venues for the philosophical discussions to which Lorenzo and his circle of friends were addicted. Music and dance were also part of the daily fare, with Lorenzo an enthusiastic participant in both, performing with particular skill on the lyre. The more distant villas, like Trebbio and Cafaggiolo in the Apennine foothills, served as hunting lodges from which to set out in pursuit of a stag or to watch the soaring flight of a well-trained hawk. These pastimes, too, were not entirely without intellectual content since they provided the inspiration for much of his best poetry.

Lorenzo’s need to find a refuge from the cares of the city grew with his political responsibilities. “Let search who will for pomp and honors high” he wrote in one of his sonnets,

It is not surprising that Lorenzo longed to put the stone and brick of Florencefar behind him. In the city he could not avoid the crowds clamoring for his attention. Down the Via Larga flowed an endless stream of citizens, rich and poor, begging a little more of his time to plead their case. In the piazza and even in the privacy of his chambers men and women tugged at his sleeve. Just a word from him and all could be arranged! A letter to the proper official and the petitioner or his son would be set for life; a nod from Lorenzo and a debtor might be set free or a judge persuaded to change his verdict. Even the most intimate matters were the business of the Medici heir. Marriages were as much a political as a personal affair, and soon Lorenzo found himself the city’s matchmaker, with the power to determine whose daughter would share a bed with whose son.
*
The role of
mezzano
(intermediary) gave him a wide, if somewhat jaundiced, view of the human condition. As thousands of trivial and sordid details were whispered in his ear he came to know more about the private lives of his fellow citizens than any priest hearing confession.