The History of Italy, from the fall of the Western Empire, to the commencement of the wars of the French Revolution

Part I

State of Italy at the Opening of the Fifteenth Century — Overwhelming Power of Gian Galeazzo, Duke of Milan — Continued Resistance of Florence lo his Projects — Expedition of the Emperor Robert — Revolution in the Military System of Italy — School of Italian Generals — Discomfiture of the German Chivalry — Evacuation of Lombardy by the Emperor — Danger of Florence — Death of Gian Galeazzo — Dismemberment of the Milanese States — Restoration of the political Balance in Italy — Conquests of Francesco da Carrara, Lord of Padua — Hatred and Jealousy of the Venetians towards him — Their last War against him — Gallant Defence of Carrara — Fall of Padua to the Venetians — Murder of Francesco da Carrara and his Sons in the Prisons of Venice — Extinction of the Houses of Carrara and Scala — The Possessions of Venice extended to the Adige — Florence — Her iniquitous Purchase of the Signiory of Pisa — Resistance of the Pisans — Blockade of their City — Sufferings VOL. II. B ■J, CHAP VI.

PART I

, Stateofltaly at the open- HISTORY OF ITALY. and Fortitude of the Inhabitants — Subjugation of Pisa by Flo rence — Papal Affairs — Progress of the Great Schism — Succes sors of Urban VI. ; Boniface IX., Innocent VII., Gregory XII. — Eager Desire of Europe for the Re-union of the Church — Benedict XIII., the Successor of Clement VII. at Avignon — His Efforts to prolong the Schism — Mutual Evasions of Gre gory XII. and Benedict XIII. — Council of Pisa — Deposition of Gregory XII. and Benedict XIII. — Election of Alexander V. — Resistance of the deposed Pontiffs — The Schism rendered more desperate— Ladislaus, King of Naples — Insidiously inter feres in the jlffairs of Rome, and occupies that Capital and the Papal Territory — His ambitious Designs — War of Florence against him — Successes of the Republic — Ladislaus driven from Rome — New Expedition of Louis II. of Anjou against Naples — Battle ofRocca Secca — Defeat and Danger of Ladis laus — His final Triumph over Louis and Peace with his Ene mies — His Treachery, Sack of Rome, and new Conquest of the Papal States — Power of Ladislaus — Italy in Danger of his universal Tyranny — His Death — Scandal excited in Europe by the Continuance of the Great Schism — Infamous Reputation of Pope John XXIII. the Successor of Alexander V. — The Em peror Sigismund — His laudable Efforts to give Peace to the Church — Council of Constance — Deposition of John XXIH. — Resignation of Gregory XII. — Deposition of Benedict XIII. — Election of Martin V. — Termination of the Great Schism of the Church — Affairs of Lombardy — Continued Anarchy in that Province after the Death of Gian Galeazzo — Giovanni Maria, Duke of Milan — His Atrocities and Assassination — Filippo Maria, Duke of Milan — Revival of the Milanese Power — Cruel Ingratitude of Filippo Maria to his Duchess — His Ac quisition of the Signiory of Genoa, and Conquests in Lombardy — Encounter between the Milanese and Swiss — Battle of Arbedo — Grandeur of Filippo Maria.

The fifteenth century dawned heavily on the only Italian state which still enjoyed or merited the possession of freedom. Without allies and almost without hope, while the spirit of liberty was every where expiring around her, Florence found CHAP. herself the solitary champion of independence VI-

PART I

* against the crafty and perfidious tyrant, who was y__»yw eagerly watching the moment for her destruction. ime.n.b Already master of almost all Lombardy, the duke oTe. wheim- Gian Galeazzo of Milan had now entangled the '^eSf republics of Tuscany in his snares ; the preponderance of his power was hourly becoming more overwhelming and terrific ; and having entirely encompassed Florence with fiefs and cities sub jected to his dominion, he only awaited the first favorable occasion for undermining by fraud or razing by violence that last strong hold of Italian democracy. The Ghibelin chieftains of the Apen nines, the republics of Pisa, Perugia, and Sienna, had all been inveigled, as if by a species of fasci nation, into the circle of his tyranny ; and these powers, which even by their dissensions had hitherto preserved and balanced the safety of Tuscany, could now in their union under one master contribute only to the completion of the general slavery.

Lucca, except Florence, was the sole Tuscan city in any degree independent of Gian Galeazzo ; but she had just fallen under a domestic tyrant, Paolo Guinigi, who cultivated 1401 the alliance and protection of the duke. The condition of Italy generally was as little calculated to animate the courage of the Floren tines, as that of their own province. The selfish oligarchy of Venice, in imaginary security within their lagunes, would make no effort to check the projects of the duke of Milan ; Genoa herself no b2 longer free, was the subject of France ; and, of the three signors of eastern Lombardy, Gonzaga lord of Mantua and the marquis of Este had sedu lously reconciled themselves with the Milanese duke. In the interest of the Florentines there remained only the lord of Padua, less an ally from whom succours could be expected, than a faithful dependant who might himself need their protec tion.

While such was the condition of Tuscany and northern Italy, the remainder of the peninsula presented an equally unpromising aspect. In the long train of disorders and civil wars from which Naples was but just emerging under young La dislaus, that kingdom had almost ceased to be numbered in the political combinations of Italy. The papal power, too, had been reduced to a shadow by the great schism of the church ; the ecclesiastical province of Romagna was as usual broken up into petty tyrannies ; and its principal city, Bologna — the only interesting spot in this obscure division of the peninsula — was no longer the powerful republic who had lately ranged her self by the side of Florence against Milan. In the first year of the new century the fatal violence of faction threw Bologna into the power of one of her citizens who established himself in the signiory.

This was Giovanni Bentivoglio, a name indebted to this revolution for the origin of its celebrity in Italy in later times. For it was part of the unhappy destiny of this country, that the greatness of her sons seemed to flow from the wounds which they inflicted on her bosom. ContiDued resistance of Florence to bis projects. Even the consternation which filled Florence at the intelligence that, to crown all the defection which the cause of freedom had sustained, her ancient ally Bologna had passed away under a master from her republican government, could not subdue the resolution of the people and their rulers. They saw by the secret machinations of the duke of Milan, and even by his open aggres sion upon their frontiers, that the maintenance of peace with him was still impossible. They there fore laboured to prevent the new signor of Bologna from falling under his influence, by themselves concluding an alliance foreign to their principles with Bentivoglio ; and they extended their negociations to discover beyond the Alps a source of aid which was denied to them in Italy.

The situation of the empire at this moment favored their views. The electoral body had deposed the feeble Wenceslaus, and substituted in his place Robert elector-palatine. The German princes considered the creation of the duchy of Milan by Wenceslaus as an alienation of an imperial province ; and, in raising Robert to the throne, they made it an article of their compact with him, that he should annul the investiture which his predecessor had sold to Gian Galeazzo. The Florentines there fore found little difficulty in inducing the new emperor to attack the duke of Milan ; and a treaty was concluded between Robert and the wealthy republic by which he undertook, on re ceipt of large subsidies, to invade Lombardy and to strip Gian Galeazzo of his dominions. As the war was declared in the name of the empire, the whole force of the German confederation was summoned to swell the expedition.

The preparations which the duke of Milan made for his de fence were proportioned to the magnitude of the impending struggle. He levied an extraordinary contribution on his states ; and with the immense resources which he thus collected, and by his per sonal influence with the condottieri, he assembled under his banners all the most famous captains of Italy with their bands. In this manner he drew together an army of above 13,000 cuirassiers, with 12,000 infantry. The emperor Robert on his part, though the contingents of the German feudatories did not amount to above half of their stipulated force, mustered 15,000 cuirassiers be sides infantry ; and entering Italy with this army, he was immediately joined by the lord of Padua. CHAP. VI.

PART I.

Expedition of the emperor Robert. 1401 This invasion which was attended with such imposing circumstances, and which appeared to anxious expectation destined to change the political condition of the peninsula, by a strange caprice of fortune produced only a single skir mish. But this partial affair of arms had in itself consequences which, however unlooked for and contrary to vulgar anticipation, held no unimportant influence upon the subsequent fate of Italy for nearly one hundred years. I have formerly noticed the infatuation by which the Italians of the fourteenth century voluntarily yielded to strangers a superiority in martial reputation; and we have seen the long course of degradation and shame Revolution in the military system of Italy. School of Italian generals. which was inflicted on their country by the exclusive employment of foreign mercenaries, and the unresisted ravages of foreign companies of adven ture.

Thus, although a few native captains and soldiers of fortune were still to be found thinly scattered among those mercenary bands which fought the battles of the Italian states, the profes sion of arms was almost wholly abandoned to German, French, and English adventurers, led by captains of their own nations. But before the death of Sir John Hawkwood, the most celebrated and the last of the foreign condottieri, a revolution had silently been prepared in the mili tary system of Italy. In the year 1379, Alberic di Barbiano, a petty Romagnol chieftain, formed under the auspices of St. George a band, com posed exclusively of Italians, which successively passed under his orders into the stipendiary ser vice of the different states of the peninsula. This company of St. George, which was ably disci plined by Barbiano, soon became distinguished for valour and military skill, and formed the favorite school into which the adventurous youth of the peninsula entered to learn the qualities of soldiership .

Barbiano was himself an accomplished captain, but his fame has been eclipsed by that of more celebrated leaders, who emulated his ex ample, or were formed in the school of St. George. Among his contemporaries, Jacopo del Verme, the faithful general of the duke of Milan, Carlo and Pandolfo Malatesti of Rimini, Ottobon Terzo, Facino Cane, and other Italian captains who had trained bodies of their countrymen, rivalled or surpassed him in reputation ; and after his death we shall find the two most famous generals educated in the school of St. George, separating the military adventurers of Italy into opposite factions by a rivalry which continued through more than a single generation. Notwithstanding the revival of military spirit among the Italians, a lingering prejudice that the native bands were unequal to resist the shock of Transalpine heavy cavalry still pervaded the peninsula, when the emperor Robert descended into the Milanese dominions with the gens-d'armerie of Germany.

The army of Gian Galeazzo was composed entirely of Italians ; and the timid duke gave a positive order to Jacopo del Verme, who commanded in chief for him amidst a galaxy of the ablest captains of Italy, to avoid the dangerous encounter with the German cuirassiers, and to protract the war by throwing his forces into the strong places of Lombardy. But Jacopo and his brother leaders had a more correct sentiment of their own talents and of the qualities of their bands. The German discipline had remained unchanged and unimproved for a century : the Italians, in resuming the career of arms and in exercising their ingenuity against each other, had exhausted all the resources of that inventive and intelligent spirit which belonged to their nation. They had wrought many advantageous alterations in the tactics, such as they were, of their age ; their offensive weapons were wielded Discomfi ture of the German chi valry. with new dexterity, their armour was tempered to perfection, their horses were trained, bridled, and bitted with superior skill ; and while armies were only masses of heavy cavalry, excellence in these minutiæ was sufficient to determine the balance of victory.

Jacopo del Verme fearlessly threw his squadrons into contact with the German chivalry, and in the first skirmish near Brescia the invaders were routed. The duke of Austria and the burgrave of Nuremburg were unhorsed and captured, and the affair would have drawn on the discomfiture of the whole imperial army, if the lord of Padua had not covered its retreat with a body of Italian cuirassiers who served under his orders. The Germans were thrown by this check into a panic which was the greater from their previous confidence. The discovery of their in feriority, where they had calculated on easy victory, at once completely subdued their courage, and intimidated them from a second encounter ; and the Italians, thus taught to despise their an cient masters, learnt also to discard the apprehen sion of danger from their future attacks.

Until the close of the fifteenth century their sense of martial superiority remained unchanged from that hour. However flattering this trial of arms might have proved to the pride of Italy, if Italy had been united, it was calculated to increase the gloomy forebodings with which Florence had reason to regard the continued success of Gian Galeazzo. Notwithstanding the courageous resistance which the republic had hitherto opposed Evacuation of Lombar dy by the emperor. 1402 to his schemes of aggrandizement, his power seemed only to have been confirmed and extended by a vain resistance. After the last pecuniary sacrifices which Florence had cheerfully made to secure the alliance of the emperor and to enlist his cupidity in her cause, his assistance was at an end. A few days after the capture of the duke of Austria, Gian Galeazzo released his prisoner, and it was immediately evident that this act of apparent generosity was not without a sufficient motive.

The duke of Austria, after sow ing dissensions and distrust in the imperial camp, quitted the army and returned into Germany. His example was contagious where despondency had already succeeded to presumption, and Ro bert was compelled to retire to Padua and to disband the contingents of the empire. Thus weakened by the desertion of the greater part of his force, he only lingered in Padua with the hope of extorting new subsidies from the Florentines ; but that people were weary of paying for services which were sure of never being performed. By the interested offices of the Venetians, who de sired the continuance of the war against the duke of Milan, without choosing to contribute to it themselves, or daring openly to provoke the hostility of Gian Galeazzo, the Florentines were in deed persuaded to make one more advance of money to Robert ; but finding this supply pro duce no efficient exertion, they refused farther issues ; and the emperor at length withdrew into Germany. CHAP. VI.

PART I

, The whole weight of the war was now to de scend upon the Florentines, and their territory was only preserved from being inundated by the Milanese armies, by a new enterprise which de layed the vengeance of Gian Galeazzo. With the design of possessing himself of the signiory of Bologna, he declared war against Giovanni Bentivoglio the tyrant of that city ; and inducing the numerous Bolognese exiles to join his ranks, by the hope which he deceitfully held out to them, that he would restore their republic to freedom, he poured his troops into its territory. This attack obliged Bentivoglio to throw himself into the arms of the Florentines, and their forces were immediately sent to his protection. But their alliance could not avert his ruin ; and his impa tient presumption exposed the Florentine army to an overthrow at Casalecchio, where the Bolog nese militia who detested his yoke refused to fight for him.

He fled after his defeat to Bologna ; the people rose in arms and delivered the gates to the Milanese troops and their own exiles; and Bentivoglio, after a desperate resistance, was secured, and murdered in prison by order of the Milanese general. It was then seen how well Gian Galeazzo designed to keep his promise to the Bolognese : the forms of their state were restored only that one of his creatures might pro pose him for signor ; his cavalry rode the city ; and the republican party were driven again into exile. HISTORY OF ITALY. CHAP VI PART r. Danger of Florence. Death os Gian Gale azzo. 1402 The fall of Bologna under her dangerous enemy entailed the last crisis in the fortunes of the Florentine republic. For ten years that free state had maintained an unequal struggle against the power and ambition of the duke of Milan ; and had exhausted her strength and drained her resources by the repetition of unsuccessful efforts.

She had no longer allies in the peninsula or hope of foreign succour ; the whole circuit of her frontiers was enclosed by the dependencies of Milan ; and Gian Galeazzo, instead of vigorously assailing her territory, stationed his troops with his usual art around it, to cut off" all communication with the sea and with the other states of Italy. By this plan of blockade, he designed at a blow to paralyze the commerce of Florence, to leave the total languor of trade to work its silent and wasting effects, and to await the moment when the enfeebled republic should sink from exhaustion and internal decay. But just at the epoch when Gian Galeazzo seemed about to reach the consummation of his projects, when the prosperity of Florence was sapped at its foundations, and her people were plunged in despair, the days of the tyrant, as if Heaven had interposed for her relief, were already numbered to their close.

Gian Galeazzo died suddenly of the pestilence at a castle to which he had retired to escape its con tagion. Thus Florence was unexpectedly delivered; and a verse which was applied to the occasion echoed the public joy through her V^/W streets, that the snare was broken and the cap tives freed. * The death of Gian Galeazzo at once restored the balance of Italy which his successes had de stroyed. He left a widow with two sons, Gio vanni Maria and Filippo Maria, of whom the eldest was only thirteen years of age. Between these children his last testament divided his ample dominions, with the exception of Pisa and Cremona which he bequeathed to his natural son Gabriele Maria. The two young princes were committed by his will to the guardianship of the duchess-mother, assisted by a council of regency, of which several of the great captains of mercenaries were members.

But if Gian Galeazzo, in leaving the most celebrated condottieri of Italy in the pay of his house, imagined that the fidelity to him which his vigilance and their fears had produced would be transferred to his children, this confidence was strangely opposed to his ordinary political sagacity and foresight, and miserably belied by the event. The tyrant was no sooner dead than the great states, which he had passed his life in enlarging by the dark alter nation of perfidy and violence, were seized and rent into pieces by the rapacity and ambition of the men to whose protection he had consigned his boy-heirs. There can be little to deserve attention or excite interest in the internal commotions of a despotism ; and I shall rather relate the result of * II laecio e rotto e noi siam liberi. Dismember ment of the Milanese states. the dismemberment of the Milanese states, than plunge the reader into a black chaos of rapine and violence and cruelties, of perjuries and trea sons and murder.

The duchess-mother — herself a Visconti and the daughter of Bernabo — was worthy of all her house. Mistaking ferocity for courage, wanton cruelty for masculine vigour, and atrocious perfidy for political skill, she ex cited universal resistance to her authority ; and after provoking an insurrection of the Milanese, was finally seized in 1404 by the party which had usurped the name and authority of her eldest son, and poisoned in prison. In the general dispersion of the elements of government which Gian Gale azzo had established, many of the Lombard cities revolted from Milan ; and without one aspiration after freedom, voluntarily surrendered themselves to the descendants of their ancient signors : the original order of petty tyrants whom the Visconti had long dispossessed of their power. Thus Cre mona submitted to Ugolino Cavalcabo, Crema to the Benzoni, Placentia to the Scotti, Bergamo to the Suardi, Como to Franchino Rusca.

Lodi passed under the dominion of an obscure plebeian ; the Beccaria promised to recover their ancient influ ence in Pavia ; and of the generals of Gian Gale azzo, Facino Cane seized the city of Alessandria, Ot tobon Terzo occupied Parma, and Pandolfo Mala testa established himself in the signiory of Brescia. The independent powers of Italy availed them selves of the general ruin which thus appeared to have overtaken the house of Visconti to aggran- CHAP, VI.

PART I

, Restoration of the political balance of Italy. 1404 dize themselves at their expence. Thus Florence, who had been abandoned by all in the hour of her need, easily succeeded, when the danger was past, in forming a powerful confederacy to despoil the heirs of her ancient foe. But she at first pro cured few immediate advantages for herself. Pope Boniface IX. joined her in a league with the view of recovering the possessions of the church in Romagna ; but he had no sooner re ceived the cession of Bologna and Perugia, which gladly exchanged the Milanese tyranny for the milder form of papal government, than he con cluded a separate peace with the Milanese regency. In Tuscany the efforts of the Florentines were incessant to restore freedom to the two republics which Gian Galeazzo had enslaved. With their support Sienna recovered her liberty ; but Pisa was secured to the bastard Gabriele Maria of Visconti by the protection which that lord obtained in his new inheritance from the lieutenant who governed for the king of France at Genoa.

Florence was compelled by the measures which the French governor adopted for confiscating her merchandize in the Genoese ports, to desist from further enterprises against the signor of Pisa ; but she had, within two years after the death of Gian Galeazzo, already per fected the great end of her war against the Vis conti. Her arms reduced the Ghibelin nobles of the Apennines, whose castles overhung her ter ritory, to obedience and subjection ; all Tuscany, except Pisa, was delivered from foreign influence ; Conquests of Francesco da Carrara, lord of Pa dua. Sienna was free; Bologna and Perugia were wrested from the Milanese yoke. These objects attained, Florence relaxed in her efforts : she in deed still supported those signors who, after the long proscription of the Guelf party in Lombardy, had now revived that faction in the cities under their dominion ; but she ceased to act otherwise than as an auxiliary, and left the house of Visconti to struggle with the difficulties by which that family were now sufficiently oppressed. * Amidst the general dissolution of the Milanese power which had followed the death of Gian Ga leazzo, the lord of Padua was too enterprising and ambitious, and had too many resentments to gratify against the house of his ancient oppressor, to remain a quiet spectator of the distractions and weakness of Lombardy.

The duchess-mother of Milan had desired to obtain his alliance or neutrality by large cessions of territory ; but the personal hatred which Jacopo del Verme and others in her council bore to Carrara, had occa sioned the rupture of her negociations and the * Poggio Bracciolini, Istor. Fiorent. b. iii. p. 280. ad fin. and b. iv. ad p. 294. Mura tori, Annali, A.D. 1 400— 1 404. I have laboured almost in de spair to collect from my con stant guide Muratori, and from Sismondi,_cc. 56 and 58, ma terials for composing a view in any degree satisfactory of the confused and stormy period which immediately preceded and followed the death of Gian Galeazzo. The account, in the third book of Bracciolini, of the expedition of the emperor Robert, which effected such a revolution in the military reputation of Italy, is extremely in teresting ; but in political de tails the history of Bracciolini is not always sufficiently com prehensive for our purpose.

HISTORY OF ITALY. CHAP VI. PART invasion of the Milanese states by the lord of Padua. After some indecisive hostilities, he was invited to undertake an attempt upon Verona. Guglielmo della Scala, son of the last signor of that house, whom Gian Galeazzo had driven from his dominions to close his days miserably, in exile and by poison, now trusted that the moment had arrived for the recovery of his inheritance. He knew that the people of Verona desired to return under the government of his family ; he held a correspondence with his partizans in that city; and he induced Carrara, to whose kindness he had been indebted for a subsistence in exile, to aid him in surprising the place. The Paduan army suddenly appeared before Verona, the affection of the citizens seconded their attempt, and the walls were carried by escalade during the night.

The eagle of the Scala * again rested on the towers of Verona, but amidst the rejoicings which welcomed him to the capital of his fathers, Guglielmo was already seized with a mortal disease. He was so weak that he could not sit on horseback to make his triumphal entry into the city ; the fatigue of his inauguration increased his disorder ; and he died within a few days, f The fall of Verona * An eagle perched on a ladder (scala) was the device of their family: — ahouse which, in spite of its gloomy genea logy of crime, has some interesting associations for the Ita lian scholar, from the protection which Dante once found at the court of Verona. + The lord of Padua did not escape suspicion of having ad ministered a slow poison to him that he might make him self his heir ; but the noble and VOL. II.

C Hatred and jealousy of the Vene tians towards bim seemed to the Milanese regency only a preparation for the conquest by the lord of Padua of all the cities beyond the Adige ; he had already taken many castles and laid siege to Vicenza; and in the consciousness of the inability of their own weak and disturbed government to resist his pro gress, they applied themselves to alarm the jealousy and revive the slumbering hatred of the ancient enemies of his house. The vindictive oligarchy of Venice had never forgiven the family of Carrara their share in the war of Chiozza, and the ingratitude which had preceded that contest ; and though from tempo rizing policy they had indirectly aided Francesco Novello in recovering his throne from the duke of Milan, and had even allowed him formally to reconcile himself with them, they still regarded him with no feelings of amity.

Thus, therefore, though they had made few efforts to check the wide-spreading power of Gian Galeazzo, which really threatened the total subversion of Italian independence, they were easily rouzed by their generous character of Carrara should throw every discredit on the accusation, and Gugli elmo is expressly declared by several contemporary writers t8 have died naturally of fever and dysentery. Besides, the guilt of Carrara would have been useless, as Scala left two sons whom the Paduan lord himself immediately invested in their father's possessions. There can be no doubt that the frequency of crime in Italy in these ages has groundlessly multiplied similar accusations beyond all probability ; for we scarcely read any instance of death in the palaces of her chieftains, which is not coupled with a charge of poison. CHAP, VI

PART I.

Their last war against him. long-cherished hatred of Carrara to believe, or to feign to believe, that the projects of so skilful and warlike a prince must endanger the safety of their state. They were also perhaps prone to suspect that, under the veil of deference to the republic, he doubtless meditated revenge for the misfortunes into which she had plunged his father and himself fifteen years before. If the Venetian rulers had forgotten their habitual dislike and suspicion, Jacopo del Verme, who from his per sonal enmity to Carrara chose himself to appear before the senate with the Milanese embassy, would have instilled into that body distrust and dread of their enterprising neighbour ; and he at least knew how to enlist the ambition of the doge and senate in the Milanese alliance. He offered in the name of the regency of Milan to cede to Venice all the country, of which Gian Galeazzo had possessed himself, to the eastward of the Adige.