Part 76

Note 257 page 142. Giovanni’s son ALESSANDRO GONZAGA was born in 1497, and died in 1527.

Note 258 page 142. GIACOMO D’ATRI (or d’Adria Picena) was made Count of PIANELLA by Ferdinand II of Naples in 1496, as a reward for faithful service. He acted as confidential secretary to the Marquess Gianfrancesco of Mantua in various wars, and especially in the campaigns against Charles VIII.

Note 259 page 143. PHILIP II of Macedon, the conqueror of Greece, was born 382 and died 336 B.C.

Note 260 page 143. This retort has by others been ascribed to a Florentine ambassador at Siena, and his name given as Guido del Pelagio.

Note 261 page 144. MARIO DE’ MAFFEI DA VOLTERRA, (born 1464; died 1537), occupied successively the offices of Archpriest at Volterra, Sacristan of the Vatican, Bishop of Aquino, and Bishop of Cavaillon in France.

Note 262 page 144. AGOSTINO BEVAZZANO or Beazzano, (flor. 1500-1550), was born at Treviso, near Venice, of which republic his ancestor Francesco had been chancellor in the 15th century. His own portrait hung in the Grand Council Chamber at Venice. He lived some time in Venice, but in 1514 he was employed as secretary by Bembo and sent to Leo X at Rome, where he resided chiefly until 1526. Besides being a noted writer of Italian and Latin verse, he acquired great skill in public affairs and came to be regarded as an oracle at the papal court. Late in life he was painfully afflicted with gout, and passed the last years of his life at Verona and at Treviso, where he died and was buried in the cathedral.

Note 263 page 145. The MARQUESS FEDERICO GONZAGA of Mantua, (born 1440; died 1484), was the son of the Marquess Ludovico and Barbara of Brandenburg, and married Margarita, daughter of Duke Albert III of Bavaria. His family attained sovereign power at Mantua in 1354 and continued to exercise it for nearly four centuries. Having succeeded to the marquisate on the death of his father in 1478, he expelled from Italy the Swiss who were besieging Lugano, joined the Milanese in a league against the pope in 1479, and in 1482 joined another league against Venice. He is said to have committed suicide.

Note 264 page 145. NICCOLÒ LEONICO TOMEO, (born 1456; died 1531), was a native of Venice, and belonged to an Albanian family. He studied Greek under Chalcondylas at Florence, and for many years taught philosophy at Padua, being the first Italian to expound Aristotle from the original text. He wrote philosophical and moral dialogues and also some Italian verse. His friend Bembo wrote of him: “An illustrious philosopher both in life and learning, equally versed in Latin and Greek, wherein he lived and dwelt, leaving ambition and thirst for riches to others.” He was also a wit.

Note 265 page 145. AGOSTINO FOGLIETTA, (died 1527), was a Genoese nobleman, who exercised great authority at Rome under Leo X and Clement VII. He was a warm friend of Castiglione, who received cordial aid from him in the efforts that were made on behalf of Francesco Maria della Rovere. He was slain in the sack of Rome by a shot from an arquebuse. In other MS. versions of THE COURTIER the names of Fedra (Tommaso Inghirami) and Antonio di Tommaso appear in place of Foglietta’s.

ALFONSO I OF NAPLES 1385-1458 ]

Reduced from Giraudon’s photograph (no. 137) of a drawing, in the Louvre, by Vittore Pisano, better known as Pisanello, (1380?-1451?). The drawing is believed to have been used in designing medals.

Note 266 page 146. GIOVANNI DI CARDONA was a Spanish soldier in the service of the “Great Captain” and of Cesare Borgia. He had a brother Ugo (mentioned at page 147, see note 271) and another brother Pedro, who was Count of Gosilano. Giovanni seems to have fallen at the battle of Ravenna in 1512.

Note 267 page 146. Of ALFONSO SANTACROCE nothing more is known than is contained in this mention of him in the text.

Note 268 page 146. Francesco Alidosi, CARDINAL OF PAVIA, (died 1511), was descended from the Lords of Imola, being the second son of the Lord of Castel del Rio. Having been educated for the Church, he attached himself to Cardinal Giuliano della Rovere, whose lasting gratitude he won by steadfastly refusing to poison the cardinal at the desire of Alexander VI. On the accession of Julius II, he was rapidly promoted in spite of the objections raised in the consistory on the score of his questionable character. He was made Bishop of Miletus, Bishop of Pavia, a cardinal (1505), Legate of the Patrimony, Legate of Romagna, and Archbishop of Bologna. In these offices he proved violently tyrannical and a ruthless and bloody persecutor, especially of the Bolognese partisans of the Bentivogli; so that the city rose against him in 1511 and drove him out. His assassination by young Francesco Maria della Rovere has been already mentioned (see note 3). The odium connected with his name finds an echo also in another passage in the text, page 151.

Note 269 page 146. ALFONSO I of Naples, (born 1385; died 1458), succeeded his father Ferdinand the Just as King of Aragon and Sicily in 1416, and in 1435 managed to enforce against René of Provence his double claim to Naples, based upon his descent from the former Hohenstauffen rulers of that kingdom, and also upon his adoption as heir by the last Angevin queen of Naples. Scholarly, enlightened, generous and benevolent, he was the ideal type of royal Mæcenas and the hero of his century. He often went afoot and alone about his capital, saying that “a father, walking amid his children, has naught to fear.” On one occasion when a galley full of soldiers and sailors was about to sink, and the men he had ordered to their rescue were hesitating, he leaped into a skiff, crying, “I prefer to be the companion rather than a spectator of their death.” When Constantinople fell into the hands of the Turks in 1453, he welcomed learned refugees to his capital; his court was a meeting-place for the savants of his time; and even when engaged in war, his captains might be seen gathered near their king, listening to his exposition of Livy instead of wasting their leisure at games of chance. He was noted also for his gentle disposition and merry humour and seems to have deserved his title of “the Magnanimous.”

Note 270 page 147. The battle of Cerignola (a town in Apulia near Cannæ, the scene of one of Hannibal’s victories) was fought 28 April 1503, between the Spanish army under the “Great Captain” and the French forces of Louis XII, and resulted in the defeat of the latter with the loss of more than half their men.

Note 271 page 147. UGO DI CARDONA, a brother of the Giovanni already mentioned, was a Spanish soldier who fought under Cesare Borgia and the “Great Captain,” and was killed by the hand of Francis I at the battle of Pavia in 1525.

Note 272 page 147. This is a corruption of the name of St. Erasmus, a Syrian bishop who suffered martyrdom about 304, and became a favourite saint among the sailors on the Mediterranean. His name is given to certain electrical phenomena often seen at sea and on land also.

Note 273 page 147. OTTAVIANO UBALDINI, (died 1498), was the son of a famous condottiere, Bernardino Ubaldini, and Aura di Montefeltro, a sister of Duke Federico. His father having died in 1437, he was bred at the court of Urbino and became the trusted counsellor of his uncle Federico, who left to him the guardianship of the young duke, Guidobaldo. To personal valour and address in statecraft he united (if we may trust the rhymed chronicle of Raphael’s father) a knowledge of classic literature, and a taste for music and the other fine arts. He is known to have been a zealous cultivator of astrology. By some writers Duke Federico (the circumstances of whose birth were not free from mystery) was believed to have been an Ubaldini, and this Ottaviano was openly regarded as his brother.

Note 274 page 147. ANTONELLO DA FORLI was a soldier of fortune who died before May 1488, and of whom little seems to be known apart from this anecdote. It is found also in two other books, where the witty Florentine is named as Cosimo de’ Medici.

Note 275 page 147. San Leo was a fortress perched on an almost inaccessible crag eighteen miles north-west of Urbino. It is mentioned by Dante (Purgatorio, iv, 25) and also by Machiavelli (Art of War, iv) as a place of great natural strength. When in the spring of 1502 Cesare Borgia disclosed his hostile designs against Duke Guidobaldo, the latter, knowing that he could not hold out at Urbino, retired to San Leo, but soon afterwards fled in the garb of a peasant, and the castle was surrendered. In the same year, however, it was recaptured by stratagem. In the spring of 1503 it was besieged by the adherents of Borgia, and bravely defended for six months by Ottaviano Fregoso and the castellan Lattanzio da Bergamo (referred to in the text), in the hope of succour from Guidobaldo, who had taken refuge at Venice. Cian says that the place at last fell and was not again recovered by Guidobaldo until after the death of Alexander VI. On the other hand Dennistoun (ii, 13) asserts that by a reinforcement of twenty-five men the castle was enabled to hold out until Guidobaldo’s restoration; he assigns the incident in the text to the first capture (1502), gives the name of the castellan as Scarmiglione da Foglino, and affirms that the surrender was treacherous.

CESARE BORGIA 1478-1507 ]

Reduced from Alinari’s photograph (no. 13438) of the portrait, in the Correr Museum at Venice, formerly ascribed to Leonardo da Vinci, but recently attributed by Berenson to Francesco Beccaruzzi.

Note 276 page 147. DUKE VALENTINO, i.e. Cesare Borgia, Duke of Valentinois, (born 1478; died 1507), was an openly acknowledged son of Cardinal Roderigo Borgia (afterwards Alexander VI) by Rosa Vanozza, who was the mother also of Cesare’s sister Lucrezia. Created a cardinal on his father’s accession, he procured the murder of his brother Giovanni in 1497, resigned his cardinalate the same year, was given the French duchy of Valentinois in 1498, and married Charlotte d’Albret, daughter of the King of Navarre, in 1499. Having been created Duke of Romagna by his father in 1501, he proceeded to reduce the various fiefs comprised within his intended domain, including the duchy of Urbino. After the death of Alexander VI, Cesare was held in captivity by Julius II and by Ferdinand the Catholic, escaped to his father-in-law’s court in 1506, and fell in battle the following year, the very day after the close of the Courtier dialogues. Handsome, accomplished and subtle, he was a patron of learning and an adept in the cruel and perfidious politics of his day. Upon his public career is founded the famous Principe of Machiavelli, who says: “If all the duke’s achievements are considered, it will be found that he built up a great superstructure for his future power; nor do I know what precepts I could furnish to a prince better than such as are to be derived from his example.”

Note 277 page 148. Literally: “It must be believed to have been in despair.”

Note 278 page 148. PUBLIUS CORNELIUS SCIPIO NASICA (Scipio with the pointed nose), was an eminent Roman jurist who was Consul in 191 B.C., and own cousin of Scipio Africanus the Elder.

Note 279 page 148. ALONSO CARILLO is said by Cian to have been one of the many Spaniards who lived at Rome in the service of popes and cardinals belonging to that nation. The Spanish annotator Fabié identifies him as a son of Don Luis and Donna Costanza de Rivera.

Note 280 page 148. MY LADY BOADILLA. Cian’s identification of this lady as Beatriz Fernandez de Bobadilla, Marchioness of Moya, is confirmed by the fact that Boscan’s translation (1534) gives her name as the Marchioness of Moya instead of ‘my lady Boadilla.’ She and her husband are warmly mentioned in a codicil to Isabella the Catholic’s will, as being among that queen’s most dear and faithful friends.