de Vicenza, quoted and used by Gregorovius, viii. 130. L. B. Alberti, De Porcaria Conjuratione, in Murat. xxv. col. 309. Porcari was desirous ‘omnem pontificiam turbam funditus exstinguere.’ The author concludes: ‘Video sane, quo stent loco res Italiæ; intelligo qui sint, quibus hic perturbata esse omnia conducat....’ He names them ‘Extrinsecus impulsores,’ and is of opinion that Porcari will find successors in his misdeeds. The dreams of Porcari certainly bore some resemblance to those of Cola Rienzi. He also referred to himself the poem ‘Spirto Gentil,’ addressed by Petrarch to Rienzi.
227
‘Ut Papa tantum vicarius Christi sit et non etiam Cæsaris.... Tunc Papa et dicetur et erit pater sanctus, pater omnium, pater ecclesiæ,’ &c. Valla’s work was written rather earlier, and was aimed at Eugenius IV. See Vahlen, Lor. Valla (Berlin, 1870), pp. 25 sqq., esp. 32. Nicholas V., on the other hand, is praised by Valla, Gregorovius, vii. 136.
228
Pii II. Comment. iv. pp. 208 sqq. Voigt, Enea Silvio, iii. pp. 151 sqq.
229
Platina, Vita Pauli II.
230
Battista Mantovano, De Calamitatibus Temporum, l. iii. The Arabian sells incense, the Tyrian purple, the Indian ivory: ‘Venalia nobis templa, sacerdotes, altaria sacra, coronæ, ignes, thura, preces, cælum est venale Deusque.’ Opera, ed. Paris, 1507, fol. 302 b. Then follows an exhortation to Pope Sixtus, whose previous efforts are praised, to put an end to these evils.
231
See e.g. the Annales Placentini, in Murat. xx. col. 943.
232
Corio, Storia di Milano, fol. 416-420. Pietro had already helped at the election of Sixtus. See Infessura, in Eccard, Scriptores, ii. col. 1895. It is curious that in 1469 it had been prophesied that deliverance would come from Savona (home of Sixtus, elected in 1471) within three years. See the letter and date in Baluz. Miscell. iii. p. 181. According to Macchiavelli, Storie Fiorent. l. vii. the Venetians poisoned the cardinal. Certainly they were not without motives to do so.
233
Honorius II. wished, after the death of William I. (1127), to annex Apulia, as a feof reverted to St. Peter.
234
Fabroni, Laurentius Mag. Adnot. 130. An informer, Vespucci, sends word of both, ‘Hanno in ogni elezione a mettere a sacco questa corte, e sono i maggior ribaldi del mondo.’
235
Corio, fol. 450. Details, partly from unpublished documents, of these acts of bribery in Gregorovius, vii. 310 sqq.
236
A most characteristic letter of exhortation by Lorenzo in Fabroni, Laurentius Magn. Adnot. 217, and extracts in Ranke, Popes, i. p. 45, and in Reumont, Lorenzo, ii. pp. 482 sqq.
237
And perhaps of certain Neapolitan feofs, for the sake of which Innocent called in the Angevins afresh against the immovable Ferrante. The conduct of the Pope in this affair and his participation in the second conspiracy of the barons, were equally foolish and dishonest. For his method of treating with foreign powers, see above p. 127, note 2.
238
Comp. in particular Infessura, in Eccard. Scriptores, ii. passim.
239
According to the Dispacci di Antonio Giustiniani, i. p. 60, and iii. p. 309, Seb. Pinzon was a native of Cremona.
Except the Bentivoglio at Bologna, and the House of Este at Ferrara. The latter was compelled to form a family relationship, Lucrezia marrying Prince Alfonso.
242
According to Corio (fol. 479) Charles had thoughts of a Council, of deposing the Pope, and even of carrying him away to France, this upon his return from Naples. According to Benedictus, Carolus VIII. (in Eccard, Scriptores, ii. col. 1584), Charles, while in Naples, when Pope and cardinals refused to recognise his new crown, had certainly entertained the thought ‘de Italiæ imperio deque pontificis statu mutando,’ but soon after made up his mind to be satisfied with the personal humiliation of Alexander. The Pope, nevertheless, escaped him. Particulars in Pilorgerie, Campagne et Bulletins de la Grande Armée d’Italie, 1494, 1495 (Paris, 1866, 8vo.), where the degree of Alexander’s danger at different moments is discussed (pp. 111, 117, &c.). In a letter, there printed, of the Archbishop of St. Malo to Queen Anne, it is expressly stated: ‘Si nostre roy eust voulu obtemperer à la plupart des Messeigneurs les Cardinaulx, ilz eussent fait ung autre pappe en intention de refformer l’église ainsi qu’ilz disaient. Le roy désire bien la reformacion, mais il ne veult point entreprandre de sa depposicion.’
243
Corio, fol. 450. Malipiero, Ann. Veneti, Arch. Stor. vii. i. p. 318. The rapacity of the whole family can be seen in Malipiero, among other authorities, l. c. p. 565. A ‘nipote’ was splendidly entertained in Venice as papal legate, and made an enormous sum of money by selling dispensations; his servants, when they went away, stole whatever they could lay their hands on, including a piece of embroidered cloth from the high altar of a church at Murano.
244
This in Panvinio alone among contemporary historians (Contin. Platinæ, p. 339), ‘insidiis Cæsaris fratris interfectus … connivente … ad scelus patre,’ and to the same effect Jovius, Elog. Vir. Ill. p. 302. The profound emotion of Alexander looks like a sign of complicity. After the corpse was drawn out of the Tiber, Sannazaro wrote (Opera Omnia Latine Scripta 1535, fol. 41 a):
‘Piscatorem hominum ne te non, Sixte, putemusPiscaris natum retibus, ecce, tuum.’
Besides the epigram quoted there are others (fol. 36 b, 42 b, 47 b, 51 a, b—in the last passage 5) in Sannazaro on, i.e. against, Alexander. Among them is a famous one, referred to in Gregorovius i. 314, on Lucrezia Borgia:
Ergo te semper cupiet Lucretia Sextus?O fatum diri nominis: hic pater est?
Others execrate his cruelty and celebrate his death as the beginning of an era of peace. On the Jubilee (see below, p. 108, note 1), there is another epigram, fol. 43 b. There are others no less severe (fol. 34 b, 35 a, b, 42 b, 43 a) against Cæsar Borgia, among which we find in one of the strongest:
Aut nihil aut Cæsar vult dici Borgia; quidni?Cum simul et Cæsar possit, et esse nihil.
(made use of by Bandello, iv. nov. 11). On the murder of the Duke of Gandia, see especially the admirable collection of the most original sources of evidence in Gregorovius, vii. 399-407, according to which Cæsar’s guilt is clear, but it seems very doubtful whether Alexander knew, or approved, of the intended assassination.
245
Macchiavelli, Opere, ed. Milan, vol. v. pp. 387, 393, 395, in the Legazione al Duca Valentino.
246
Tommaso Gar, Relazioni della Corte di Roma, i. p. 12, in the Rel. of P. Capello. Literally: ‘The Pope has more respect for Venice than for any other power in the world.’ ‘E però desidera, che ella (Signoria di Venezia) protegga il figliuolo, e dice voler fare tale ordine, che il papato o sia suo, ovvero della signoria nostra.’ The word ‘suo’ can only refer to Cæsar. An instance of the uncertainty caused by this usage is found in the still lively controversy respecting the words used by Vasari in the Vita di Raffaello: ‘A Bindo Altoviti fece il ritratto suo, &c.’
247
Strozzii Poetae, p. 19, in the ‘Venatio’ of Ercole Strozza: ’ … cui triplicem fata invidere coronam.’ And in the Elegy on Cæsar’s death, p. 31 sqq.: ‘Speraretque olim solii decora alta paterni.’
