On this point Franc. Vettori, Arch. Stor. vi. p. 29. 3 sqq.: ‘The investiture at the hands of a man who lives in Germany, and has nothing of the Roman Emperor about him but the empty name, cannot turn a scoundrel into the real lord of a city.’
33
M. Villani, iv. 38, 39, 44, 56, 74, 76, 92; v. 1, 2, 14-16, 21, 22, 36, 51, 54. It is only fair to consider that dislike of the Visconti may have led to worse representations than the facts justified. Charles IV. is once (iv. 74) highly praised by Villani.
34
It was an Italian, Fazio degli Uberti (Dittamondo, l. vi. cap. 5—about 1360) who recommended to Charles IV. a crusade to the Holy Land. The passage is one of the best in this poem, and in other respects characteristic. The poet is dismissed from the Holy Sepulchre by an insolent Turk:
‘Con passi lunghi e con la testa bassaOltre passai e dissi: ecco vergognaDel cristian che’l saracin qui lassa!Poscia al Pastor (the Pope) mi volsi far rampognaE tu ti stai, che sei vicar di Cristo,Co’ frati tuoi a ingrassar la carogna?Similimente dissi a quel sofisto (Charles IV.)Che sta in Buemme (Bohemia) a piantar vigne e fichiE che non cura di si caro acquisto:Che fai? Perchè non segui i primi antichiCesari de’ Romani, e che non segui,Dico, gli Otti, i Corradi, i Federichi?E che pur tieni questo imperio in tregui?E se non hai lo cuor d’esser Augusto,Che non rifiuti? o che non ti dilegui?’ etc.
Some eight years earlier, about 1352, Petrarch had written (to Charles IV., Epist. Fam., lib. xii. ep. 1, ed. Fracassetti, vol. ii. p. 160): ‘Simpliciter igitur et aperte … pro maturando negotio terræ sanctæ … oro tuo egentem auxilio quam primum invisere velis Ausoniam.’
35
See for details Vespasiano Fiorent. ed. Mai, Specilegium Romanum, vol. i. p. 54. Comp. 150 and Panormita, De Dictis et Factis Alfonsi, lib. iv. nro. 4.
36
Diario Ferrarese, in Murat. xxiv. col. 217 sqq.
37
‘Haveria voluto scortigare la brigata.’ Giov. Maria Filelfo, then staying at Bergamo, wrote a violent satire ‘in vulgus equitum auro notatorum.’ See his biography in Favre, Mélanges d’Histoire littéraire, 1856, i. p. 10.
38
Annales Estenses, in Murat. xx. col. 41.
39
Poggii, Hist. Florent. pop. l. vii. in Murat. col. 381. This view is in accordance with the anti-monarchical sentiments of many of the humanists of that day. Comp. the evidence given by Bezold, ‘Lehre von der Volkssouverainität während des Mittelalters,’ Hist. Ztschr. bd. 36, s. 365.
40
Some years later the Venetian Lionardo Giustiniani blames the word ‘imperator’ as unclassical and therefore unbecoming the German emperor, and calls the Germans barbarians, on account of their ignorance of the language and manners of antiquity. The cause of the Germans was defended by the humanist H. Bebel. See L. Geiger, in the Allgem. Deutsche Biogr. ii. 196.
41
Senarega, De reb. Genuens, in Murat. xxiv. col. 575.
42
Enumerated in the Diario Ferrarese, in Murat. xxiv. col. 203. Comp. Pic. ii. Comment. ii. p. 102, ed. Rome, 1584.
43
Marin Sanudo, Vita de’ Duchi di Venezia, in Murat. xxii. col. 1113.
44
Varchi, Stor. Fiorent. i. p. 8.
45
Soriano, Relazione di Roma, 1533, in Tommaso Gar. Relaz. della Corte di Roma, (in Alberi, Relaz. degli ambasc. Veneti, ii. ser. iii.).
46
For what follows, see Canestrini, in the Introduction to vol. xv. of the Archiv. Stor.
47
For him, see Shepherd-Tonelli, Vita di Piggio, App. pp. viii.-xvi.
48
Cagnola, Archiv. Stor. iii. p. 28: ‘Et (Filippo Maria) da lei (Beatr.) ebbe molto tesoro e dinari, e tutte le giente d’arme del dicto Facino, che obedivano a lei.’
49
Inpressura, in Eccard, Scriptores, ii. col. 1911. For the alternatives which Macchiavelli puts before the victorious Condottiere, see Discorsi, i. 30. After the victory he is either to hand over the army to his employer and wait quietly for his reward, or else to win the soldiers to his own side to occupy the fortresses and to punish the prince ‘di quella ingratitudine che esso gli userebbe.’
50
Comp. Barth. Facius, De Viv. Ill. p. 64, who tells us that C. commanded an army of 60,000 men. It is uncertain whether the Venetians did not poison Alviano in 1516, because he, as Prato says in Arch. Stor. iii. p. 348, aided the French too zealously in the battle of S. Donato. The Republic made itself Colleoni’s heir, and after his death in 1475 formally confiscated his property. Comp. Malipiero, Annali Veneti, in Arch. Stor. vii. i. 244. It was liked when the Condottieri invested their money in Venice, ibid. p. 351.
51
Cagnola, in Arch. Stor. iii. pp. 121 sqq.
52
At all events in Paul Jovius, Vita Magni Sfortiæ, Rom. 1539, (dedicated to the Cardinal Ascanio Sforza), one of the most attractive of his biographies.
53
Æn. Sylv. Comment. de Dictis et Factis Alfonsi, Opera, ed. 1538, p. 251: Novitate gaudens Italia nihil habet stabile, nullum in eâ vetus regnum, facile hic ex servis reges videmus.’
54
Pii, ii. Comment. i. 46; comp. 69.
55
Sismondi, x. 258; Corio. fol. 412, where Sforza is accused of complicity, as he feared danger to his own son from P.’s popularity. Storia Bresciana, in Murat. xxi. col. 209. How the Venetian Condottiere Colleoni was tempted in 1466, is told by Malipiero Annali Veneti, Arch. Stor. vii. i. p. 210. The Florentine exiles offered to make him Duke of Milan if he would expel from Florence their enemy, Piero de’ Medici.
56
Allegretti, Diari Sanesi, in Murat. xxiii. p. 811.
57
Orationes Philelphi, ed. Venet. 1492, fol. 9, in the funeral oration on Francesco.
58
Marin Sanudo, Vita del Duchi di Venezia, in Murat. xxii. col. 1241. See Reumont, Lorenzo von Medici (Lpz. 1874), ii. pp. 324-7, and the authorities there quoted.
59
Malipiero, Ann. Venet., Arch. Stor. vii. i. p. 407.
60
Chron. Eugubinum, in Murat. xxi. col. 972.
61
Vespas. Fiorent. p. 148.
62
Archiv. Stor. xvi., parte i. et ii., ed. Bonaini, Fabretti, Polidori.
63
Julius II. conquered Perugia with ease in 1506, and compelled Gianpaolo Baglione to submit. The latter, as Macchiavelli (Discorsi, i. c. 27) tells us, missed the chance of immortality by not murdering the Pope.
64
Varelin Stor. Fiorent. i. pp. 242 sqq.
65
Comp. (inter. al.) Jovian. Pontan. De Immanitate, cap. 17.
66
Malipiero, Ann. Venet., Archiv. Stor. vii. i. pp. 498 sqq. After vainly searching for his beloved, whose father had shut her up in a monastery he threatened the father, burnt the monastery and other buildings, and committed many acts of violence.
10. in speaking of Sep. Severus.
