Tag: medici family

Calendar: August 4

 

A Year: Day to Day Men: 4th of August

Early Morning

August 4, 1470 was the birthdate of Lucrezia Maria Romola de’ Medici, the eldest daughter of Lorenzo de’ Medici.

Lucrezia de’ Medici was married to Jacopo Salviati, an Italian politician, in February of 1498, bringing a dowry of 2000 gold florins to the marriage. When her brothers Piero and Giovanni were exiled from Florence, she was in a bad position, as her husband Jacopo was a supporter of the newly appointed rulers of Florence. In August of 1497 Lucrezia de’ Medici spent 3000 ducats to support a plot to return her brother Pietro to power. The plot failed. Francesco Valon, the head of Florence, executed all the male participants but spared Lucrezia.

Lucrezia de’ Medici continued to build support for the rise of the Medici family. She negotiated the marriage of her niece, Clarice de’ Medici, to Filippo Strozzi the Younger, a military man and influential banker. This was done against the wishes of the current leaders of Florence. When her youngest brother Giuliano returned from his stay in Venice, he would often ask Lucrezia for advice on restructuring the Florence government.

In March of 1513, Licrezia’s brother Giovanni, then a Cardinal in Rome, was elected Pope upon the death of Pope Julius II, with the support of the younger members of the Sacred College. He was the last non-priest to be elected Pope and took the name of Leo X. The Medici family held days of celebration in Florence, giving gifts and money to the crowds outside their palace. Pope Leo appointed Lucrezia’s son Giovanni to the position of Cardinal in 1517. Lucrezia managed her son’s household and office for him, particularly while he traveled as a Papal Legate. An astute politician herself, she used her son’s influence to further Medici causes in Rome.

Pope Leo X asked his sister Lucrezia to help support convents in Florence. Lucrezia paid for a significant expansion of the convent of San Giorgio, funding new dormitories, cloisters, and workshops. She also built other chapels in 1530 in Rome. Lucrezia and Pope Leo X later worked together to pay for a chapel in Rome which would also serve as a resting place for the family.

The Medici family were again exiled from Florence in 1527. Jacopo Salviati wound up a prisoner of Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor, and Pope Clement VII, who was Lucrezia’s cousin. Lucrezia managed to gather a ransom and was able to get her husband Jacopo released. There is no exact date for Lucrezia de’ Medici’s death; but it is estimated as having occurred between the 10th and 15th of November in 1553. She was 83 years old.

Calendar: February 15

Year: Day to Day Men: February 15

The Edge of the Known World

The fifteenth of February in the year 1472 marks the birth date of Piero di Lorenzo de’ Medici, who was the eldest son of Lorenzo de’ Medici and Clarice Orsini, a daughter from the noble Roman house of Orsini. Piero was the lord of Florence from 1492 until his exile in 1494.

Piero di Lorenzo de’ Medici was raised alongside his younger brother Giovanni, who would later be installed as Pope Leo X, and his cousin Giulio who later became Pope Clement VII. As the eldest son, he was educated to succeed his father as the head of the Medici dynasty. Piero studied under classical scholar and poet Angelo Poliziano and Catholic priest Marsillo Ficino, the head of the newly restored Florence Academy. 

Piero de’ Medici was arrogant, disruptive and had an undisciplined character. He was constantly at odds with his older and richer cousins Lorenzo and Giovanni, the two sons of Pierfrancesco de’ Medici. Piero was also a suspect in his teacher Angelo Poliziano’s death by poisoning in September of 1494. .

In 1486, Piero’s uncle Bernardo Rucellai, a member of Florence’s social and political elite, arranged a political marriage between Piero and Tuscan noblewoman Alfonsina Orsini. The marriage took place with Rucellai standing as proxy for the groom; Piero finally met Alfonsina in 1488. Their union produce three children: two daughters Luisa and Clarice, and a son named Lorenzo who later became the Duke of Urbino. Baptism records show that Piero had a third daughter named Maria in February of 1492.

Upon the death of his father Lorenzo de’ Medici in 1492, Piero de’ Medici became the leader of Florence. The peaceful existence between the Italian states, established by his father, collapsed in 1494 with King Charles VIII of France’s decision to assert hereditary claims to the Kingdom of Naples. After settling issues with the city-state of Milan, King Charles VIII sent envoys to Florence to ask for support for his claims. After five days, Piero de’ Medici responded that Florence would remain neutral, an answer that was unacceptable to King Charles who subsequently threatened Florence. 

Piero attempted to form a resistance but received little support from the Florentine elite who had fallen under the influence of the fanatical Dominican priest Girolamo Savonarola. Piero’s own cousins allied themselves with both pledges and funds to King Charles VIII. At the end of October in 1494, Piero, without consulting the governing Signoria of Florence, visited King Charles at his camp and acceded to all of the king’s demands by surrendering the cities of Pisa and Lvorno as well as four fortresses in the area. 

Upon his return to Florence to report his actions to its Signoria, Piero de’ Medici encountered strong public outrage. King Charles VIII, following his conquest of the Kingdom of Naples, made his entrance as ruler into Florence on the seventeenth of November. Because of his isolation and lack of allies, Piero de’ Medici had not sent an army to stop the invasion, thus fuelling the resentment of the Florentine people who finally forced him and his family into exile. Their palazzo was looted, and the Republic of Florence was re-established.

Piero and his family fled to Venice with the aid of French diplomat Philippe de Commines, a servant of King Charles VIII. They supported themselves by the sale of the Medici jewels. Piero tried several times to reinstate himself in Florence but he was rejected. After the French lost the Battle of Garigliano, Piero de’ Medici drowned in the Garigliano River on the twenty-eight of December in 1503 while attempting to flee the battlefield. He was buried in the Abbey of Monte Cassino.

A member of the Medici family would not rule Florence again until 1512, when Giovanni de’ Medici forced the city to surrender. In the next year, he was elected Pope Leo X which solidified the Medici’s power.