The Renaissance : its art and life : Florence (1450-1550)

Front matter

By SELWYN BRINTON, M.A.

ILLUSTRATIONS

From Contemporary IVorks of Art

Chapter 1. The New Learning

n the eighth century Italy had become completely over-run by the barbarians. The Goth, the Hun, the Frank, the Lombard had succeeded one another, carrying fire and sword through the land, blotting out the ancient culture of life and reducing the once Imperial race to servitude.

The Lombards represent the last wave of these invading hordes; and at the time just mentioned the Lombard Monarchy was dominant in Northern Italy (568-774). Thirty Dukedoms or Marquisates had beneath them numerous Counts or Vavasors, who in their turn could call their dependents to arms : the feudal system, the outcome of the fear

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and military necessity of the invader, was in some parts already applied by the barbarian who held Italy beneath his feet.

But yet the old past of Roman power was not entirely dead . Its memory survived in two still living forces ; in the Church, who, mistress within the Eternal City, had inherited from the departed Caisars their claim to universal sovereignty; in the Cities, which, where they had survived those years of pillage and bloodshed which marked the fall of Rome, were still proud to consider themselves as direct descendants of the Roman Municipia. While without the city the land is covered with castles, and tilled by the degraded serfs of the new feudal lord, within its walls the Count holds sway beside the Bishop. But it is to the latter, as champion of their Church, as a link with their past greatness, that the sympathies of the citizens turn in their troubles. Then some new exaction of the feudal ruler, some act of injustice more flagrant than usual sets these elements into a blaze. The citizens fly to arms. The Count is driven to his own stronghold in the open country. Walls arise, or are strengthened, about the old municipium ; the Bishop forms a temporary government within the city, with at his side the better class of burghers; and the Italian Commune is started on its career.

Milan is an example of this development, and her Archbishop Heribert, who devised the Caroccio, the great war-car of the Commune, drawn by oxen with its altar and ministrant priest, is the hero of this earliest revolution; the forgotten word — that vivifying word of Liberty — is heard again, and beside it the words Popolo and Parlarnento, as meaning government by the people for the people’s good.

But Popolo has here and onwards through Italian political history a more restricted sense than has its modern equivalent : it does not mean the people at large, even within the City or State but those burghers only, who from the first had claimed, and had later obtained, this privilege of civic rule. The distinction is essential to Italian politics, and is often our one thread through these tortuous and confused civic revolutions. The Popolo itself becomes divided into first and second orders, into (as at Flo-

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rence) popolo grasso (fat or wealthy) and popolo minuto ; and without these privileged orders there yet remains the unenfranchised mass of citizens, who constantly make their voices heard.

Florence herself is a very perfect example of these conditions of political existence. The city here seems almost organic, a living thing (as Macchiavclli recognised), struggling always, yet struggling vainly, to develop, to complete her political organism ; and at the same time intensely selfconscious, intensely critical of and interested in herself.

For this constitution of Florence is as complicated as it is constantly varying. The turning point in its evolution is the year 1292, when — as Varchi says, “The people overcame the nobles (grandi) and passed the Ordinances of Justice against them, whereby no nobleman could exercise any magistracy ; so that such of the patricians as desired to be able to hold office had to enter the ranks of the people (as did many great Houses of quality) and matriculate into one of the Arts.... The Arts were these. (1) Judges and Notaries. (2) The Art of Calimala (cloth-weaving). (3) Of Exchange. (4) Wool. (5) Silk. (6) Physicians and Apothecaries, (7) and Furriers.” These were called the Greater Arts; and beside these there were the Lesser Arts, such as those of Butchers, Shoemakers, Blacksmiths, Linen-drapers, Vintners, Inn keepers, Carpenters, Bakers, etc., making twenty-one Arts in all. Varchi adds — “The last fourteen were called Lesser Arts; whoever was enrolled or matriculated into one of these was said to rank with the lesser ; and though there were in Florence many other trades than these, yet having no guild of their own, they were associated to one or other of those that I have named.”

Each Art had a mansion, large and noble, where they assembled, appointed officers and gave account of debit and credit to all the members

of the Guild These Arts, the greater as well as the lesser have varied

in numbers at different times, and often have not only been rivals, but even foes amongst themselves. Yet after long dispute it was finally settled that the Gonfalonier could not be chosen from the Lesser, but should always rank with the Greater, and that in all other offices and magistracies

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the Lesser should always have a fourth and no more. Consequently, of the eight Priors, two were always of the Lesser; of the Twelve three — and so on through all the magistracies.

Nardi, too, in his account of the Florentine constitution says — “After the freedom regained by the expulsion of the Duke of Athens, and the humbling of the nobles, regularity for the future in the Government might have been expected, since a very great equality among the burghers had been established. The city too had been divided into quarters and the supreme Magistracy of the Republic assigned to the eight priors, called the Signori priori di Liberia, together with the Gonfalonier of Justice. The eight priors were chosen two for each quarter : the Gonfalonier as their chief, differed in no respect from his colleagues save in precedence of dignity ; and as the fourth part of the civic honours appertained to the Lesser Arts their turn kept always coming round to that quarter to which the Gonfalonier belonged. This magistracy remained for twro whole months always living and sleeping in the Palace ; in order that they might be able to attend with greater diligence to the affairs of the .Commonwealth in concert with their Colleagues, who were the sixteen gonfaloniers of the Companies of the People, and the twelve buoni uomini, or special advisers of the Signory. These magistrates collectively, in a body, were called the College, or else the Signory and the Colleagues.”

Turning yet once again to Varchi we find that “the whole city of Florence is divided into four quarters, the first of which takes in the whole of that part which is now called “Beyond the Arno” (Oltr’ Arno)” and the chief church of this district gives it the name of Santo Spirito. The other three quarters, which embrace all that is called “ This side Arno,” also take their names from their chief churches, and are the quarters of Santa Croce, Santa Maria Novella and San Giovanni. Each of these four

quarters has its standard (gonfalone) each standard has its standard-

bearer (gonfaloniere) their office being to run with arms whenever they

are called by the Gonfaloniere of Justice, and to defend, each under his own ensign, the Palace of the Signory, and to fight for the people's liberty.

A NOBLE FLO UK NT INK LADY.

Detail from the Fresco of the “ Birth of St. John

By Domenico Giiirlandajo.

Church of Santa Maria Novella, Florence.)

THE NEW LEARNING.

We may note here the immense importance attached to that symbol of civic life, the Palace of the Signoria. Again and again in these pages we shall find the first effort of the conspirator (whether popular or

Medicean) is to get inside the Palace, and to hold it : that first step gained

the rest seemed to him pretty easy, but its failure meant exile or instant death.

The reader who has followed this fairly clear account which I have summarized (leaving out less essential features) from the Florentine writers, wfill see at once that a large number of the citizens were either without any civic rights at all, or possessed these to a limited extent only. In a word the “popolo” wras not the people, — but only a portion of the people who held , and fully intended to keep in their hands, the government of their own city. It is no less obvious that there wras almost certain to follow, in course of time, an effort on the part of the unenfran-

chised to attain civic rights, or to complete what rights they had; and this happened at Florence in the following manner. Even the Guelph nobles had, as we have seen, by the Ordinances of Justice (1292) been driven from the City, and deprived for the future of all political office ; and the citizens themselves had been divided into twenty-one corporations of arts and trades, from the seven higher ‘ Arts ’ of which — the Arti Maggiori — the magistrates of the Republic were mainly taken. But among the rich families who have held the power in Florence with, on the whole, success to the State, a new aristocracy had gradually formed itself of the so-called nobili popolani (nobles from the “ popolo ) ; and these really formed a limited Guelph oligarchy. They deliberately used the “ lawr of admonition (which was still in force against the entrance of any Ghibelline noble into political life) to prevent any novus homo, any new family from entering into their number. At the head of this oligarchy stood the great House of the Albizzi, w’hich had given the distinguished political leader, Maso degli Albizzi, to the Republic : against them wrere the families of the Ricci, Strozzi and Alberti, who had come later to the front, and with these wrere ranged the Medici, who now first come into political prominence. It was Salvestro de’ Medici, in fact, who, in 1378, when he was holding the office

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of Gonfaloniere of the Republic, proposed to abolish the “ law of admonition ” which had been put to such unfair use by the Albizzi and their friends. The College of the Signory rejected his proposal, but Salvestro

next appealed to a Council of the people, and finally to the people them-

selves : popular feeling was entirely on his side, and the law he proposed was carried by an immense majority.

But behind this proposal of the “ Medici ” lay really the popular craving for an equal and extended franchise ; and the people, having once felt

their power, were not inclined to stop half way. It was now proposed that the “ lawr of admonition ” should be cancelled in the past as well as the future ; that the “ lesser arts ” should furnish members of the magistracy in the same proportion as the “greater;” and that three new’ ‘arts’ should be created to include the dyers, weavers and workers in the wool trade, who were at present left out of the franchise entirely. The College of the Signory, which we have seen already to have been essentially conservative, endeavoured to crush this new popular movement by arresting one of its leaders, and putting him to torture. So far from crushing it they only put a match into a powder magazine. The “ Ciompi,” as these wool w’orkers were nicknamed , and many others of the lower class of artisans flew to arms at the news of this outrage : they stormed the Palace of the Podcsta, and later that of the Signory. One of their number, named Michele Lando, had seized the Gonfalone or Standard of the Republic ; and as he marched with it, barefooted, at the head of the mob, he was suddenly proclaimed by his followers as Gonfaloniere. He was, in fact, actually set by them in that capacity at the head of the Republic, and shewed himself a man of ability and a credit to his post- lie quickly restored order, and repressed with a firm hand the excesses of his own party.

At the next election Salvestro do’ Medici, with an Alberti and a Scab as his colleagues, found himself at the head of the Government. The Albizzi, who seems to have attempted a revolution were condemned and brought to the scaffold; but the new rulers could not agree among themselves. One of their number, Giorgio Scab — who had stormed and pil-

PORTRAIT BUST OF NICCOLO I ) A UZZANO

Bv Donato hi Betto Bardi, called Donatello.

National Museum , Florence

Photo Aliuari. Florence.

THE NEW LEARNING.

laged (1.382) the Palace of the Captain of the People — was condemned by his own colleagues, and executed ; and a reaction in favour of the Albizzi and the Guelph party made itself apparent seven days later. By the summar^ process of parlamento and balia a new government was created, consisting of the nobles, merchants and citizens belonging to the Gi’eater Arts ; Benedetto Alberti and Michele Lando were exiled, and the oligarchy of the nobili popolani was more firmly established than ever. This inconclusive outbreak of the Ciompi is none the less of the highest importance to our survey : it makes (1378) — just as much as the exclusion from political privileges of the nobles (1292) by the Ordinances of Justice — a decisive landmark jin Florentine political life. Had the just demands of the Lesser Arts, and, behind them, of the proletariat, to a share in the franchise and political power been then granted the history of Florence might have been — we may almost say certainly would have been — very different. The movement was completely crushed, the oligarchy — which it is but fair to admit continued to rule the State with brilliant success and great political ability — was re-imposed; but the feeling of resentment, of injustice remained, and was certain to bear fruit.

The Medici, as we have seen, had been the helpers of the people in their struggle for political justice : and this fact was never forgotten, either by the people themselves, or by that astute politician and remarkable personality Cosimo de’ Medici, when he became the head of his House. His father, Giovanni de Medici, had been Gonfaloniere in 1421; for though the now dominant Albizzi regarded these rivals with suspicion they could not entirely exclude them from office. Cosimo himself (born in 1389) had been “ Priore di Liberta ” in 1416; in the meantime his commercial position had made him one of the richest men in Florence, while his own taste for culture filled the Palace of the Medici in Via Larga with artists, poets, and with the leaders in Florentine intellectual life.

Even without taking any very direct part in political life Cosimo’s position was now such that nothing of importance could take place in the State without his opinion being considered ; on the other hand the great leader

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of the ruling party, Maso degli Albizzi, had now passed away, and the no less eminent Republican statesman Niccolo d’Uzzano had now (1427) followed him, leaving at the head of the oligarchy the impetuous and arrogant Rinaldo degli Albizzi. A series of brilliant political successes had increased the frontiers of the Republic, had brought neighbouring Pisa (1406) under the sway of Florence, and carried the prestige of the ruling oligarchy to its highest point : but the swing of the political pendulum brought reverses, and their popularity was already on the wane.

Gosimo’s position however remained purely critical. He did not approve of the policy pursued in the years following Niccolo d’Uzzano’s death, and among Ids own friends he did not hesitate to criticize the existing mismanagement and financial peculation : but this negative attitude so exasperated the fiery Rinaldo that he determined, while the power was yet within his hands, to use it to crush his critic and enemy. The great bell was heard (on the 7th. September, 1433) to toll out from the tower of the Palace of the Signory, summoning the citizens of Florence to a “ Parlamento ” within the Piazza on which that Palace looks out : there the issues of those narrow streets which enter or issue from this famous Piazza della Signoria were carefully guarded — but guarded, most probably, by Rinaldo’s own partisans.

According to the custom of the Republic a Balia, or Committee of Public Safety, was then and there voted by acclamation, and invested with the full powers of the State. By its authority Cosimo de’ Medici was sum-

moned to the Palace, and imprisoned within its tower. The hours which followed must have been the most anxious of his long life. He was at the mercy of a vindictive enemy, and even the food given him (for two days he preferred to starve) might contain poison. A friendly gaoler reassured him by partaking of it first himself, and through him he sent a large sum of money, which he had hidden on his person, to the man who was to be his judge, Bernardo Guadagni. Bernardo pocketed the money quietly; but when the day of trial came — to the surprise of all — he voted for Cosimo’s exile, but not his death.

M C C 0 L U M A C C H I A V E LEI.

Terra-cotta of the Fifteenth Century.

I The property of the Societu Colombana , Violence ) Photo Aliuari, Florence.

THE NEW LEARNING.

Rinaldo saw his enemy escape from his bonds, with the knowledge and the fear that some day his own time might come. In fact within a year of Cosimo’s exile (1434) a new Signory was elected, with Donati as its president ; and Rinaldo found himself summoned in his turn to the Palace of the Signory to account for his actions. This time, instead of obeying, like his rival, he appeared in full armour, surrounded by his armed partisans; but his attack on the Signory was frustrated, the people were tired of his government, and the new Signory sent him into exile, while Cosimo returned to Florence amidst the jubilations of his many friends.

As he had borne his reverses with courage and cool judgment so now Cosimo used his success and good fortune with moderation ; he returned to his counting house, to the management of his vast commercial concerns, to the superintendence and control of the noble buildings and great libraries with which he was enriching the city, and giving employment to thousands of its citizens. lie left to his partisans the vengeance, which brought many of the Albizzi faction , as well as the son of his own judge, Bernardo Guadagni, to the scaffold.

But though the forms of Republican government survived, and were indeed studiously respected, the real “ power behind the throne ” was now that of the great Medici leader. But a few years after his return to Florence the city of Milan (1450) opened her gates to the successful Condottiere Francesco Sforza, receiving him with frantic rejoicing, with cries of “Prince” and “Duke;” and the Republic of Milan, the first of all the great north Italian Communes, ceased from that day to exist. The movement of the age seemed, indeed, to be fatal to liberty. “ But,” says Sismondi, “ Milan would never have been conquered by Francesco Sforza, nor Lombardy have become the prey of an ambitious Captain of Adventure, had not the Republic of Florence, the very State which had caused to flourish art, ancient literature, philosophy and poetry, first

changed her government and yet the name of Cosimo de’ Medici is

alone remembered by posterity, and the Albizzi are forgotten ; because we are more attracted by the splendour which surrounds a great man than

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by that power from which his greatness draws its source, or because we can yet read the praises of those who flattered and courted the first of the Medici Princes — of Ambrogio Traversari, of Poggio Bracciolini, of Flavio Biondo, of Gianozzo Manetti and Leonardo Aretino — who had lived in his intimacy, were fed by his bounty, and dedicated to him the writings which , in a large measure , contributed to the recovery of letters : but the deserving Government, under which all these great men were born and grew up, with amongst their number even Cosimo himself, had no one to celebrate its achievements , because it was struck down at the very moment when these writers had just reached their most creative period, and because gratitude, even among famous authors, does not often survive a political benefactor.”

But the great author of “The Italian Republics,” though he holds always the brief for civic liberty, can yet appreciate the remarkable qualities of Cosimo.

This Florentine merchant, who at no period of his splendid career ever abandoned his family business, whose vast riches gave life to the industries of his epoch, this merchant was at the same time undoubtedly one of the shrewdest politicians of his age, was a man too of the most refined taste in the arts, of considerable erudition in literature, of a just and profound judgment in philosophy, — which last field of thought owed much of its recovery to his care.

We have now traced in some measure the story of Florence up to the point when the new power of the Medici had become dominant within the city. We have seen how the Guelfic oligarchy, which had come into power in 1382, had raised to the highest point the external power and the internal resources of the Republic, how her frontiers had been enlarged, Pisa, Arezzo and Cortona brought under her sway, till the half at least of Tuscany was subject to the City of the Lily ; how within her borders trade and agriculture flourished ; how the accumulated riches of the State or individuals were spent not on vain display, but on noble buildings, on the works in sculpture and paintings of her native masters — such as were

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Ghiberti, Donatello, Verrocchio, the Pollajuoli, Masaccio, Uccello and Fra Lippo, — on the recovery and elucidation of the classic texts by such scholars as Colluccio, Salutato, the chancellor of the Republic, as Niccolo de Niccoli, Leonardo Bruni, Carlo Marsuppini or Gianozzo Manetti, — in one word, we may say, on the pursuit of the highest intellectual and artistic culture.

At this same time we have noted that a succession of statesmen, chosen from the great houses whom the new order of things had brought into prominence, ruled Florence during this period with Republican integrity, even while keeping the chief power of the State within the hands of their own class.

The name of Maso degli Albizzi came to our notice among the first and greatest of these leaders of the Florentine Republic, and his house remained dominant during the whole period we have just left behind us.

We are reminded here of Niccolo Macchiavelli’s shrewd criticism in the prelude to his History of Florence : — “First of all the nobles of Florence took sides against each other, then next the nobles and the people (il popolo) and finally the people and the lowest classes (la plebe)\ and many a time it took place that the party among these which remained the victor itself split up again into two opposing camps.” We have here the whole course of Florentine political development, during the two centuries which preceded 1450, summarised into a sentence : just as in the earlier days the people had divided itself from the nobles, so now the people, after many years of successful rule , divided again and formed two camps, those of the great houses, the new aristocracy, the nobili popolani who had grown up out of the people themselves, and the plebe, the plebeians who were excluded from the government. It was at the head of this latter party that the Medici placed themselves : the first source of their power lay in the legitimate aspirations of their fellow citizens, over whom the prestige of their family position and their wealth gave them a preponderating influence, while they belonged themselves — though as a later addition — to the ruling oligarchy of the nobili popolani.

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We have traced already the course of events which led up to the political crisis of 1434, which marks the date of the final victory of Cosimo di Medici over his enemies, and the fall and immediate proscription of the great house of the Albizzi. “Three members of this family” — says Dumas in his brilliant little study of the Medici — “ Maso degli Albizzi, Nicholas d'Uzzano and Rinaldo degli Albizzi had during the period of fifty-tliree years succeeded to the power without any one of them having ever ceased to be simple citizens. Against their calm cool political judgment, against their hereditary political integrity, their firm and enduring patriotism all the bribes and scheming of Gian Galeazzo of Milan, the aggressions of the King of Naples, the attempts of Filippo Maria Visconti had equally failed . When they were driven from the city, like Pompey and Cato of old by the movement of the people, at Florence (as then at Rome) that movement brought back within itself the future tyrants of the country. It is true that the return of Cosimo from exile meant the triumph of the democracy over the aristocracy ; but the victor was himself, by his family position and his immense means, too far above his supporters to consider them for very long, I do not say as his equals, but even as his fellow-citizens.”

Cosimo gave indeed for the moment no sign of his latent ambitions, no hint which might alarm too much the Republican susceptibilities of his supporters ; he returned to the management of his vast commercial interests, the splendid buildings with which he was enriching the city or raising for his pleasure at Careggi or Caffagiolo or Trebbio without her walls, the libraries which he was forming, the scholars and artists whom he was protecting.

But his whole aim, even perhaps in this very munificence, was to create a party bound to himself and his house by the closest pecuniary obligations, devoted to the Medici by interest or necessity — “ ames damnees ” upon whose vote, and, if necessary, upon whose weapons he could count.

He had entered upon his power through a Balia, which was itself an instrument of tyranny, and , as such , justly condemned later by Savona-

BRONZE PORTRAIT BUSJ OF A GENTLEMAN.

By Donato di Betto Bahdi. called Donatello.

i Motional Museum. Florence )

Flioto Aliuari, Florence I

THE NEW LEARNING.

rola : but as Cosimo had been sent into exile through one Balia he cannot be blamed for profiting by another by return. This “Parliament” (Parlamento) meant the gathering of the citizens of Florence in the old Piazza of the Signory. “When the Signory,” says Segni, “has taken its place to address the meeting the Piazza is guarded by armed men, and then the people are asked whether they wish to give absolute power (Balia) and authority to the citizens named, for their good. When the answer, yes, prompted partly by inclination and partly by compulsion, is returned, the Signory immediately retires into the Palace. This is all that is meant by this Parlamento, which thus gives away the full power of effecting a change in the State.”

No wonder that the proverb ran — “ Chi disse Parlamento disse Guastamento (who says Parliament spells ruin to the State);” but for the moment Cosimo used with the greatest moderation the power which had thus come into his hands . He left to his followers to execute vengeance on his enemies, to drag Antonio Guadagni to the scaffold and to bring back Barbadori from Venice to meet the same doom : though his influence may be traced in the proscriptions which followed , and which drove such a distinguished citizen as Palla Strozzi into life-long exile, during the period which immediately followed upon his return Cosimo was careful to adhere to Republican forms. “ The party of Cosimo di Medici,” says Macchiavelli

in his Istorie Florentine “ remained the victor in the year 1434 ; but,

since the vanquished party was still strong and full of powerful men, the victors remained for a time united and moderate (umana), so much so that no political mistake can be recorded of them, nor any sinister action which could win the people’s hatred. So much was this the case that whenever that party was pressed by the people to be allowed to resume

their authority it was always found ready and willing to hand over to the

said people’s leaders all that Balia and power which they desired ; and so it happened that between the years 1434 and 1455, which makes up twenty-one years, no less than six times did the Council ’’ (of the people) “ reassert the authority of the Balia in the ordinary legal manner.”

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This subtle political observer, who was for fifteen years Secretary of the Republic, goes on to analyse very closely and carefully Cosimo’s political methods, “lie knew,” says Macchiavelli, “how to so arrange matters that the horse ” (in which were placed the names of those competent for election to any magistracy, to be subsequently drawn by lot) “were always filled with the names of its own friends, so that in this way he ran no risk whatever, and could at any time resume his control at his own convenience. At the same time, as the city continued to elect its magistrates by lot, it seemed to the mass of the citizens, that they had recovered their liberty, and that the magistrates administered the laws not according to the will of those in power, but according to their own good judgment; and this all the more so that here they saw the friends of one great person , here that of another to be beaten at law and lose his case — and whenever there arose any question at issue which interested the people he (Cosimo) was the first to give it a favourable hearing.”