rich new costumes. About fifty more or less valuable rings were presented to the newly-married pair, with a silver sweetmeat dish, a piece of brocade, and from Messer Gentile Becchi, an office of the Madonna of wonderful beauty, golden letters on an ultramarine ground, with miniatures, and a binding of crystal and silver, which is said to have cost 200 florins.[169] After divine service on Tuesday there was a joust of arms, after which Clarice once more rode to the house of the Alessandri in the same costume which she had worn on Sunday, and with the same escort.
Thus was the marriage of Lorenzo de’ Medici and Clarice degliOrsini celebrated. In Lorenzo’s oft-mentioned notices we find the event spoken of in the following words:—‘I, Lorenzo, took to wife Clarice, the daughter of the lord Jacopo Orsini, or rather she was given to me, in December 1468, and I celebrated the marriage in our house on June 4, 1469.’ These words he wrote some months after the birth of Piero, who came into the world on February 15, 1471. A daughter had preceded him, for whom King Ferrante stood sponsor. She was named Lucrezia after the grandmother; it was at the same time the name of her who was the object of the father’s poetical homage, years before. Clarice was again about to be a mother when the above named notice was written. ‘God leave her long in our midst, and preserve her from all harm.’ The words betray more feeling than the expressions about the wedding. But we should be mistaken if we regarded the ‘mi fu data’ as an indication of coldness. It would be a misunderstanding of the naïveté with which the events of life were judged and spoken of at the time. Lorenzo de’ Medici saw no harm in simply mentioning the fact, as it was not only in his case but generally customary, as indeed it still is in Italy. The parents chose their children-in-law, and choose them still. And his friends saw as little harm in celebrating the bridegroom and husband of Clarice Orsini as the poetical admirer of Lucrezia Donati.
In July, Lorenzo, in company with his two brothers-in-law, Guglielmo de Pazzi and Bernardo Rucellai, the chancellor Bartolommeo Scala, his former tutor, Gentile Becchi, Francesco Nori, one of the most zealous adherents of the family, and others, repaired to Milan, to stand sponsor in his father’s name to the son (born June 20) of Galeazzo Maria Sforza, who had married, in the preceding summer, Bona of Savoy, the daughter of Duke Louis and Anna of Lusignan, and sister-in-law to King Louis XI.[170] The child was the unhappy Gian Galeazzo, who was destined to fall a sacrifice to family intrigues, which the Sforzas had inherited from their predecessors. Not only the child to whom Lorenzo stood sponsor had an unhappy fate; the father and mother also experienced vicissitude of fortune. But then all was brilliant and joyful, and the Medici appeared like princes. ‘I was much honoured,’ says Lorenzo, ‘more than any of those who had come for the like purpose, even though they were above me in dignity. In order to do what was fitting, we presented the duchess with a gold chain and a large diamond, which had cost about three thousand ducats. The result was that the duke wished me to stand sponsor to all his children.’[171]
Immediately after his arrival at Milan, Lorenzo had written to Clarice. The letter[172] is simple, but warm. ‘I have arrived here without any mishap, and am well. This, I think, will be more welcome to you than any other news, excepting my return, for so it is with me, who long for you, and wish to be again with you. Be good company to Piero, Mona Contessina and Mona Lucrezia. I shall finish my business here quickly and return to you, for it seems to me a thousand years till I see you again. Pray God for me, and if you wish for anything from here, let me know it before I depart.—Your Lorenzo de’ Medici.’ The details wanting in this short letter were contained at full length in another addressed to Clarice by Gentile Becchi, enumerating all the civilities shown to Lorenzo during his journey, which took eight days, from Florence to Milan. Lorenzo de’ Medici had scarcely returned four months, when the event occurred which placed him at the head of his family and the State.
‘Piero our father,’ so he writes in his notices, ‘quitted this life on December 2 (3), 1469, at the age of fifty-three, after long rheumatic sufferings. He did not wish to make a will, but after his death an inventory was made which showed an amount of 237,982 scudi, as was proved by the memoranda made by my hand on p. 32 of our large green parchment-book. He was interred in San Lorenzo, where we are now erecting a tomb, as worthy as we can devise, for the reception of the mortal remains and those of his brother Giovanni. May God grant mercy to their souls. His loss was sincerely regretted by the whole town, for he was a just man and of great kindness of heart. The Italian princes, especially the greater ones, consoled us by letters of condolence and embassies, and offered their assistance for our protection.’ The funeral procession was simple, as the deceased had wished it. Three years after his departure, the monument which the son mentions was set up in San Lorenzo, where it is let into the wall which separates the sacristy from the sacraments-chapel then dedicated to SS. Cosmo and Damian. It consists of a tomb of red porphyry, resting on four lions’ paws on a pedestal, and ornamented at the four corners and on the top with rich antique foliage and beautifully formed cornucopias of bronze. This sarcophagus stands in a round arched window niche, enclosed by an elegant railing, the upper part of which is occupied by net-like bronze interlacings, with artistically twisted knots. On the front we read in a full wreath of foliage and flowers, ‘Petro et Johanni de’ Medici Cosmi P.P.F.,’ and on the pedestal ‘Laurent. et Jul. Petri F.’ Andrea del Verrocchio executed this excellent work, which exceeds in artistic value many more splendid monuments by its tasteful simplicity.[173]
The opinions of contemporaries and later writers on Piero de’ Medici are pretty unanimous. Donato Acciaiuoli, then captain of Volterra, wrote immediately after the event to Lorenzo.[174] ‘When shall we find another so reasonable in council, so just, true, mild in character, so loving towards home, relations, friends, so worthy of respect, as your excellent father, who has been taken from us to our great sorrow. When we see the whole nation saddened at his loss—the neighbouring towns, ecclesiastics and laymen, people of every rank—how much must not you, his family, suffer, with myself and his other intimate friends, for whom the general loss was a personal one?’ The high character of the man who wrote these words gives them a higher value than that of an ordinary letter of condolence. ‘Florence,’ says Machiavelli, in the seventh book of the Florentine History, ‘could not perfectly recognise the value and kindness of this man, because he only survived his father for a few years, and this short time was occupied by internal difficulties of the State and his own illness.’ In a similar strain Francesco Guicciardini[175] says: ‘His death saddened the whole town on account of his reasonable and mild disposition. Of his zeal for the common good he gave proof in 1466, for he punished only where it was necessary, and would have proceeded still more cautiously had not many of his partizans urged him on.’ To these opinions we can add that of a man in whom the Medicean family traditions of the older time still lived, which he had known through his parents, Alessandri de Pazzi, Piero’s grandson. ‘He was,’ so speaks he of his grandfather,[176] ‘rather a good man and anxious for the good of all than the head of a party. Unfortunately, he was much troubled with rheumatism, and for some time nearly lamed by it. It thus chanced that his position was endangered in 1466. Not only were several friends from Cosimo’s time already dead, but fresh accessions to their number was small, because the Medici did not take so much pains to conciliate as formerly.’
That Piero’s relation to the distinguished and influential members of his party was not that of his father is evident. If his character had been different, his health stronger, and his action prompter, he would still have not attained to Cosimo’s authority, the fruit of many years’ experience and unusually favourable circumstances. It had even been difficult for Cosimo, with all his skill and activity, to attach permanently to him men who only acknowledged his supremacy because it was for their interest to do so. ‘In Florence,’ says Francesco Guicciardini,[177] ‘the citizens love equality by nature, and yield unwillingly when they should acknowledge anyone as their superior. Besides this, our head men are restless and active, so that the few who guide affairs do not understand each other; and in the desire to surpass each other, one draws in one direction and one in the other, whence it naturally follows that the guidance is uncertain. This disinclination to the preponderance of others has for its result, that on the slightest occasion the existing government falls into ruin. For as the greatness of others displeases all who do not belong to their circle, so it cannot exist if it has not