THE HISTORY OF FLORENCE

List of Books

[DEDICATION TO POPE CLEMENT VII]

[PREFACE]

1. [FROM THE DECLINE OF THE EMPIRE TO 1434]

2. [THE ORIGIN AND EARLY HISTORY OF FLORENCE, TO 1353]

3. [FLORENCE FROM 1353 TO 1414]

4. [FLORENTINE AFFAIRS FROM 1414 TO 1434]

5. [THE GOVERNMENT OF COSIMO UNTIL THE BATTLE OF ANGHIARI. 1434-1440.]

6. [THE POWER OF COSIMO DE'MEDICI; FROM DUKE FILIPPO'S EFFORTS FOR PEACE TO THE ABANDONMENT OF NAPLES BY THE ANGEVINS. 1440-1463.]

7. [LARGELY BUT NOT WHOLLY ON AFFAIRS IN FLORENTINE TERRITORY DURING THE LATTER YEARS OF COSIMO AND THE EARLY YEARS OF LORENZO. 1427-1478.]

8. [FLORENCE FROM THE PAZZI CONSPIRACY TO THE DEATH OF LORENZO THE MAGNIFICENT. 1478-1492.]

[Late in the year 1520 Machiavelli received from Pope Leo X (Giovanni de'Medici) a commission to write the History of Florence. Eight books were presented to Pope Clement VII in 1525; no others were completed.

Machiavelli announces dissatisfaction with the historians of Florence accessible to him, in that they dealt inadequately with the internal affairs of the city, though they were satisfactory for external matters, such as warfare. From his own attempt to treat those internal affairs, however, he allowed himself to be turned aside, partly through his interest in the Sforza wars in Lombardy, partly because all Italian activities were of import for his city. Moreover, Machiavelli did not spend his life in archives. But an archival attempt would have demanded that he be ahead of his age, and would have occupied time far longer than the four years and a half he gave to the History. What could one man hope to do with the uncalendared records of the city of Florence? The latter part of his work and the notes for its continuation do indicate documentary study. Yet part of the History is only a compilation, not to be used, as historians did until an astonishingly recent time, as a source for facts. Still there is in it truth enough to serve as a basis for Machiavelli's observations on man as a political animal.

One of the chief of these is that government exists for the common good. To forgetfulness of this truism is to be charged the long list of Florentine troubles, where political changes were made for the benefit of a party, not for that of the city as a whole. The city was continually torn by divisions, not united for the happiness of the citizens. On this internal strife Machiavelli often remarks, handling his material to emphasize it. For example, the story of Michele di Lando, not for the most part unreliable in fact, is that of a man who in his unselfish virtue thought of the city as a whole, and for his patriotism suffered ingratitude inspired by party spirit.

Avowedly fictitious are the frequent orations in the Thucydidean manner of the Florentine historians before Machiavelli. These are developed beyond dramatic requirements into expositions of social and political truths suggested by Florentine events. Incidentally, these orations enabled Machiavelli to deal with the problem of the Medici. They were de facto rulers of Florence, and her only possible rulers. For a wise patriot the clear path was to accept them, hoping for a better future. So Machiavelli did. He writes of the family up to the death of Lorenzo, where his history ends, with a frankness that shows his courage or his knowledge of the good sense of the living Medici. Yet one of his friends, Donato Giannotti, reports that Niccolò often said to him:

I cannot write this history from the time when Cosimo took over the government up to the death of Lorenzo just as I would write it if I were free from all reasons for caution. The actions will be true, and I shall not omit anything; merely I shall leave out discussing the universal causes of the events. For instance, I shall relate the events and the circumstances that came about when Cosimo took over the government; I shall leave untouched any discussion of the way and of the means and tricks with which one attains such power; and if anyone nevertheless wants to understand Cosimo, let him observe well what I shall have his opponents say, because what I am not willing to say as coming from myself, I shall have his opponents say.

Yet even in such speeches, Machiavelli sometimes substituted for his first draft softer second thoughts. For example, a speech by Rinaldo degli Albizzi is changed from direct to indirect discourse, and the following is bolder than the final form:

Union and prosperity are impossible while Cosimo de'Medici lives in this city, because his way of living surpasses what is proper for a citizen; his excessive wealth makes him bold; with it he has bribed all the heads of the common people and many other citizens, in such a way that in all the councils and magistracies of the city he can do what he wants to; our soldiers are all his partisans, because he employs whom he likes, whom he likes he gets rid of. ... He lacks nothing of being prince but the title. It is the duty therefore of a good citizen to find a remedy for this, to call the people to the Public Square, and to take over the government, in order to restore to the republic her liberty. [Cf. bk. 4, chap. 28.]

That even a weakened form of this stood in the manuscript put in the hands of Giulio de'Medici, Pope Clement VII, is astonishing enough, a tribute to Machiavelli's desire to write a history that would inspire all lovers of the common good of man in whatever age or nation.]

THE HISTORY OF FLORENCE

TO THE MOST HOLY AND BLESSED FATHER OUR RULER CLEMENT VII, HIS HUMBLE SERVANT NICCOLÒ MACHIAVELLI

Since Your Holiness, Most Blessed and Most Holy Father, when you were still occupying a lower position, charged me to write out what has been done by the Florentine people, I have used all the industry and skill given me by nature and bestowed on me by experience to satisfy you. And since, in writing, I have come to those times which, through the death of the Magnificent Lorenzo de' Medici, changed Italy's condition, and since the events occurring afterward have been loftier and greater, and must be set forth with a loftier and greater spirit, I have thought it well that all I have written up to those times should be assembled in one volume and presented to Your Most Blessed Holiness, in order that in some measure you may now enjoy the fruits of your seeds and my toils.

As you read then, Your Holiness will first see, beginning with the time when the Roman Empire lost her power in the West, with how many disasters and under how many princes Italy for centuries suffered change in her governments; you will see that the Papacy, the Venetians, the Kingdom of Naples, and the Duchy of Milan took the first places and the chief authority in the land; you will see that your native city, withdrawing as a result of internal division from her allegiance to the Emperors, continued to be divided until her government came under the protection of your house. And because Your Blessed Holiness especially charged and required me to write in such a way of the things done by your ancestors that I should be far from all flattery (because however much it pleases you to hear men's true praises, to the same extent fictitious praises and those described with special favor displease you), I greatly fear lest, as I describe the probity of Giovanni, the wisdom of Cosimo, the kindness of Piero, and the high-mindedness and prudence of Lorenzo, I may seem to Your Holiness to be disobeying your orders. Of that transgression I clear myself before you and before anybody whom such descriptions displease as inaccurate, because finding how full of their praises were the accounts of those who at various times have written of them, I was obliged either to write of them just what I found or, as hostile, to be silent about them. And if underneath their excellent works was concealed any ambition which, as some say, was opposed to the common good, I who do not recognize it in them am not obliged to write of it; indeed in all my narratives I have never permitted a dishonorable deed to be defended with an honorable reason nor a praiseworthy deed, as though done for an opposite purpose, to be blackened.

But how far I am from flattery can be observed in all the parts of my history, and especially in the public speeches and private conversations, both quoted and reported, which in their ideas and arrangement preserve what is fitting to the temperament of the person who speaks without any reservation. Yet I avoid, in all places, offensive terms, as unnecessary to the dignity and truth of history. So nobody who rightly examines my writings can rebuke me as a flatterer, especially when he sees that I have said little on the achievement of Your Holiness' father. The cause of this was his short life, in which he had no opportunity to make himself known, nor have I with my writings been able to make him glorious. Nevertheless great and splendid enough were his deeds, since he begot Your Holiness—an act that far outweighs all those of his ancestors and will give him more ages of fame than the malice of Fortune took from him years of life. I have then striven, Most Holy and Blessed Father, in these writings of mine, without defacing the truth, to satisfy everybody; and perhaps I have not satisfied anybody, and if this should be so, I shall not be astonished by it, because I judge it impossible, without angering many, to write on the affairs of their own times. Nevertheless, I come cheerfully into the field, hoping that, as by the kindness of Your Holiness I am honored and supported, so by the armed legions of your most sacred judgment I shall be aided and protected; and with the same spirit and confidence in which I have written up to now, I am going to continue my undertaking, if life does not desert me and Your Holiness does not forsake me.

PREFACE

It was my purpose, when I first decided to write of the things done at home and abroad by the Florentine people, to begin my narrative with the year of the Christian era 1434, the date when the Medici family, through the abilities and laudable deeds of Cosimo and Giovanni his father gained more power than any other in Florence, because I considered that Messer Lionardo d'Arezzo and Messer Poggio, two very good historians, had told in detail all the things that happened before that time. But later carefully reading their works, in order to see with what ruling ideas and methods they carry on their writing, so that, by imitating them, I might make my history more acceptable to readers, I found that in description of the wars fought by the Florentines with foreign princes and peoples they are very careful, but as to civil strife and internal hostilities, and the effects these have produced, about one part of them they are wholly silent, and the other part they describe so briefly that their readers can get no profit or pleasure. The cause of their doing so is either that they considered these affairs so paltry as to be unworthy of preservation in writing, or that they feared to offend the descendants of those whom, in such narratives, they would have to calumniate. These two causes (with all respect to them) appear to me wholly unworthy of great men, because if anything in history delights or teaches, it is what is presented in full detail. If any reading is useful to citizens who govern republics, it is that which shows the causes of the hatreds and factional struggles within the city, in order that such citizens having grown wise through the sufferings of others, can keep themselves united.

If the experiences of any republic are moving, those of a man's own city, when he reads about them, are much more moving and more useful; and if in any republic internal dissensions were ever worth noting, in that of Florence they are especially noteworthy, because most of the other republics of which there is any record have been content with one sort of factional struggle, with which, according as it has happened, they have sometimes expanded, sometimes ruined their cities. But Florence, not content with one sort of factional quarrel, has had many. In Rome, as everybody knows, after the kings were driven out, there was disunion between the nobles and the people, which continued in the city until her fall. So it did in Athens, and in all the other republics that flourished in those days. But in Florence first there were factions among the nobles, then factional struggles between the nobles and the middle class, finally between the middle class and the masses. Many times it happened that one of these parties, having conquered the others, was itself divided into two factions. From these dissensions resulted as many deaths, as many exiles, as many ruined families as ever were known in any city of which we have record.

Certainly, according to my judgment, nothing shows so well the vigor of our city as does the quality of these dissensions, which had might enough to destroy the greatest and most powerful of cities. Nevertheless ours seemed always to grow stronger. Such was the ability of those citizens and the power of their intelligence and spirit to make themselves and their native city great, that as many as remained superior to so many ills could do more to exalt her with their ability than the evil influence of those events that might have weakened her could do to depress her. And beyond doubt if Florence had had the good fortune, when she freed herself from the Empire, to take a form of government that would have kept her united, I do not know what republic, modern or ancient, would have been superior to her—with such ability in arms and in peaceful arts she would have abounded. She expelled such numbers of the Ghibellines that they filled Tuscany and Lombardy. Yet the Guelfs and those who remained within her walls, when they fought against Arezzo, a year earlier than the battle of Campaldino, raised among the citizens of their party twelve hundred men-at-arms and twelve thousand infantry. Later, in the war fought against Filippo Visconti Duke of Milan, when she had to put to the test her economic ability and not her own arms (which by then had disappeared), we see that in the five years while that war lasted the Florentines spent three million five hundred thousand florins. When that was ended, being discontented with peace, in order to show further the power of their city, they besieged Lucca.

I cannot, therefore, see any reason why these divisions do not deserve to be fully described. And if those very noble writers held back in order not to injure the memory of those whom they were going to discuss, they deceived themselves and showed that they did not understand the ambition of men and the desire they have to perpetuate the names of their ancestors and themselves; these historians did not remember that many who have not had opportunity to gain fame with praiseworthy deeds have striven to gain it with blame worthy actions, nor did they consider that conspicuous actions such as those of government and state, however they are carried on or whatever outcome they have, are always looked upon as bringing their doers honor rather than censure.

These things, when I had considered them, made me change my plan, and I determined to begin my history with the origin of our city. And because it is not my intention to fill the places of others, I shall describe in detail, up to 1434, only the things that happened inside the city, and of those outside I shall say nothing else than what is necessary for understanding of those inside. Then, when I have passed the year 1434, I shall write in detail of both sorts. Besides this, in order that this History may at all times be better understood, before I deal with Florence I shall describe by what means Italy came under those powers which at that time ruled her. All these things, both Italian and Florentine, will be completed in four books. The first will tell in brief all the events that happened in Italy from the decline of the Roman Empire to 1434; the second will carry its narrative from the origin of the city of Florence to the war that, after the expulsion of the Duke of Athens, was fought against the Pope; the third will end in the year 1414, with the death of King Ladislas of Naples; and with the fourth I shall come to the year 1434. From that time on, I shall present, with many details, the things that happened in Florence and outside, up to our present times.