When the news arrived in Rome Donato Acciaiuoli was there as ambassador of the Republic.[239] It was the second time that he had represented his native city under Sixtus IV., and his caution and shrewdness seem to have succeeded in restoring a tolerable feeling between the two neighbours when this new complication arose and threatened a dangerous crisis. Acciaiuoli, to whom Riario’s plans had remained a secret, saw the danger immediately, but he was not prepared for the violence to which the Pope’s nephew resorted. When the latter heard what had happened he flew into a great rage. Exasperated at the ill-success of his enterprise, and the insult done to his family, he urged the Pope and the Sacred College to violent measures. He then hastened, with a company of 300 mercenaries, with halberds on their shoulders, to Acciaiuoli’s lodging, and summoned him to follow him. Donato answered that he was much surprised at a demand which insulted both himself and the Republic he represented, which was contrary to all custom, and the respect befitting foreign ambassadors, so that he could not believe that it had happened with the knowledge of the Pope and the College of Cardinals. He, the count, might go wheresoever he pleased: the Signoria would know how they ought to avenge a slight shown to them in the person of their ambassador. Girolamo Riario in his rage scarcely deigned an answer, so that Acciaiuoli, to guard against worse violence, commissioned his chancellor to bring the ciphers and important papers in safety, and instantly to inform those at home of the occurrence; after which he prepared to leave. Surrounded by armed men, he reached the Vatican, where he demanded an interview with the Pope. Before the Holy Father he complained bitterly of the undignified proceeding, and then turned to Riario: ‘Count,’ he said, ‘I am astonished at the insolent daring with which you came armed to my residence, the residence of the Florentine ambassador, and led me like a criminal through the city to the palace. I declare to you that the insult done me is so great that the Republic will not rest till you have been brought to reason.’ Hereupon he represented to the Pope that His Holiness had done wrong in allowing such a thing, contrary to all custom and the respect due to all foreign ambassadors. Sixtus protested with an oath it had happened without his knowledge, and that he regretted the event, upon which he dismissed Donato to his lodging in the city.
The latter was so affected at the insult to himself, the slight cast upon his native city, and the prospect of irremediable evils, that he fell into a dangerous illness, from which he never recovered. He immediately wrote to Florence an account of what had happened, and urged most pressingly that the cardinal should be set at liberty without delay. The Signoria had announced to the Pope that he had been brought to a safe place to protect him from the popular fury, and was now at the disposal of his Holiness. The ambassador confirmed this statement, and urged his government to fulfil it, if they did not intend to plunge him into still greater difficulties. King Ferrante commissioned his ambassador to the Republic to act in a like manner. But in Florence they seem to have listened to other counsels from Rome than these commendable suggestions, and only increased the seriousness of the situation. The execution of Montesecco, and the disturbance made about his revelations, irritated the Pope and Girolamo as much as the imprisonment of the Cardinal. The demand of the former, that Lorenzo should be banished and complete satisfaction given for all that had taken place, a demand which seems to have been supported by King Ferrante, added fuel to the flames in Florence. It is said that the Pope intended to put Acciaiuoli in the castle of St. Angelo, and the reason it was not done was that the Venetian and Milanese ambassadors declared they would share the fate of their colleagues. Certain it is, that the Florentine feared to leave his house, and as matters grew daily worse he soon begged permission to quit a post in which he could no longer work for the good of his native place. But it was only towards the end of June that he reached Florence, seriously ill.
What had been threatened against the ambassador actually happened to the other Florentines in Rome. Many of the merchants and bankers were taken to the Castle and had their property confiscated in order to prevent them leaving the city with it, according to a summons which they had received from home. A migration like that would have excited public attention and brought serious loss to many persons of the Pope’s court, who had deposited considerable sums in their banks. Scarcely, however, had they been shut up when the matter was reconsidered, and the prisoners set at liberty again, on their promising not to leave Rome. Thus four weeks slipped by without either party arriving at a decision, one way or the other, while they naturally irritated each other more and more. On May 24 the bishop of Perugia was sent to Florence to fetch the cardinal and accompany him to Rome, and he delivered a letter addressed to Lorenzo by the Cardinal Camerlengo Guillaume d’Estouteville, Archbishop of Rouen, who knew Florence and the Medici well, since Cosimo’s time, and had gone in person to Castle Sant’Angelo to effect the liberation of the prisoners. The letter announced that the Pope and College of Cardinals had determined to proceed to measures against the Republic if the cardinal of San Giorgio (Riario) were not immediately set at liberty, and a commission consisting of five cardinals had already been appointed to commence legal proceedings. Lorenzo might thus, in order to avoid anger and injury, use his influence to a conciliatory purpose. The imprisonment and liberation of the Florentine merchants were explained by the circumstance mentioned above, and would, it was said, give the Republic no cause to complain.[240]
In Florence they were by no means inclined to push matters to extremes, because the Venetian Signoria, when asked for advice respecting the cardinal, gave it as their opinion, on May 22, that his captivity not only served no purpose, but afforded the enemies of the Republic ground for accusation, and that it would be most rational to announce at Rome that from respect to His Holiness and the Sacred College, they had protected the cardinal from popular fury, and would leave him entire personal freedom.[241] Ample time had been afforded them to convince themselves of the innocence of young Riario. On June 5 he quitted the palace and repaired first to the Servite cloister by S. Annunziata, from whence he addressed to the Pope, on the 10th of the same month, the following letter which may have been dictated to him, but which did not describe the situation of affairs incorrectly. ‘A few days ago I informed your Holiness that perfect freedom over my movements had been granted me. Besides this, I said how much I was obliged to the Government here, and especially to Lorenzo de’ Medici for their great kindness to me. Finally, I begged your Holiness to grant the Florentines some favour in return for the benefits shown me in your name. My hope has, however, been bitterly disappointed on learning that Lorenzo and the Florentine people have been laid under an interdict; and I, unhappy man that I am, expected and wished that good might befall them, whereas the contrary has happened. But I cannot say, Holy Father, how much it grieves me that my requests have so little weight with your Holiness, and that I should appear ungrateful towards those to whom I owe so much, and it seems to me not fitting I should leave this city before such a sentence should be reprieved. Were the attachment of this people to the Medici fully known to your Holiness, you would not hate them as you do. As I rejoiced when your Holiness granted me the cardinal’s dignity, just so and even more will I rejoice if I hear that these men, who have deserved so much from us, have received grace for my sake. I shall then believe that I am in favour with your Holiness when this senate, and Lorenzo above all, have a share in your favour. From the cloister of S. Annunziata, June 10, 1478.’[242]
On June 12 Riario set out on his journey to Siena. A Sienese chronicler relates that the cardinal reached the city June 13th, and alighted at the house of Messer Tommé, bishop of Pienza, more dead than alive from the terror he had undergone, which was still so bewildering in its effect that he thought he felt the rope round his neck.[243] The scene of which he had been an involuntary spectator, and the danger which he had incurred of being seized by the furious crowd, had made the deepest impression on him. If it is true, as some say, that he never recovered his natural spirits, his whole later life proves at least that his frivolous disposition suffered no change; for forty years he lived in a turmoil of gaiety, splendour, and luxury, occupied with the execution of works of art, and sharing in amusements and intrigues which, towards the end of his worldly career, involved him in a far worse complication than did the conspiracy of the Pazzi.
Four days before Riario’s liberation on June 1st, Sixtus IV. had published the bull of excommunication against Lorenzo de’ Medici who, according, to the usual style of such documents, was termed ‘iniquitatis filius et perditionis alumnus.’ His adherents and the members of the government were included. The bull begins with the enumeration of the old differences existing between the Pope and Florence, the protection afforded to Niccolò Vitelli, Carlo Fortebraccio, Deifebo dell’Anguillara, the attacks on the Papal territory in the valley of the Tiber, the hindrance to those journeying to Rome, whether they came to the city by land or by water, and the refusal to allow Francesco Salviati to take possession of his archiepiscopal chair. It then passed on to mention recent events, the murder of the archbishop and other priests, and the imprisonment of the cardinal on account of civil and family feuds, which had arisen because the Medici and their party had seized all power for themselves and had exercised it to the prejudice of others with severity and despotism. On these grounds the ban of the church was pronounced against Lorenzo, the priors, the Gonfaloniere, and other magistrates, and everyone who should afford them assistance, or had done so, as against traitors and desecrators of the Church. They were declared to be deprived of all possessions, all honours and offices, and the capability of bequeathing to their heirs. All their male descendants were included in this sentence. If Florence did not deliver up Lorenzo and his fellow culprits within a month, she should be deprived of her archbishopric, and with her entire territory, and those of Fiesole and Pistoja, be placed under an interdict.[244] It is a singular fact that, even after the publication of the bull, Cardinal d’Estouteville wrote to Lorenzo to acquaint him with the Papal grants of tithes in the territory of the Republic.[245]
Thus war was declared. On both sides it was necessary to collect forces and gain allies.
The history of the events of the last years has shown how intimate the connection of King Ferrante and his family was with the Medici. Outwardly this connection was still existing when the strife between Florence and the Pope began. In November 1477, the Duke of Calabria, when he wrote to Lorenzo, styled him ‘my dear and most beloved;’ the Neapolitan ambassador, Marino Tomacelli, had the best position in Florence; the king sent horses and falcons to Medici, and entrusted Giovan Batista Coppola, on March 23, 1478, with a mission, the aim of which is unknown. A letter of April 30 of the same year, four days, therefore, before the terrible event, begins with the words: ‘Illustrious lord, dearest friend and gossip.’ But there was no lack of grounds for displeasure and disunion. Ferrante, who was as shrewd as he was ambitious, soon discovered that Lorenzo stood in the way of his endeavour to attain the preponderating influence in Italy, and if he had earlier sought to use the position of the Medici for his own purposes he easily offered his aid to overthrow them when he found them to be no mere tools of his. There is no record that he knew of Riario’s plans; but we know from Sixtus’s own words that he not only agreed to the enraged Pope’s proposal to proceed against Florence, but fomented his hatred of her. Causes easily to be understood contributed to render a change in Florence desirable to the king. Whether the supposition be true or not, that Ferrante had once projected a marriage between his second son and the duchess dowager of Milan, but that the plan was frustrated by Lorenzo, cannot be decided. But other facts are undoubted. It was the ancient policy of the rulers of Naples to employ the Sienese against their neighbours. Even King Manfred had pursued this. Ferrante, and still more his son Alfonso, cherished the secret hope of gaining firm footing in Siena, which wavered like a reed in every wind, and thus keeping Florence in check. By her very dubious conduct in the predatory attack of Fortebraccio, of whom it was supposed that, had he succeeded in getting possession of Siena, he would have delivered it to the Florentines, the latter had played their enemies’ game. We shall see how it was by the merest chance that the plans of the Aragonese were not realised.
The result of such mistakes was that the connection between the Sienese and the King and the Pope became closer, and the confirmation of the alliance between them had been published in Siena on February 8, giving general satisfaction. It may be easily understood that Ferrante made use of these circumstances, and after the Duke of Calabria had arrived at Rome on May 12 to consult with the Pope and his captains respecting military measures, the valley of the Chiana was chosen as the basis of the operations which should receive support from Umbria. The Duke of Urbino, as captain-general of the church, undertook the chief command in conjunction with the Neapolitan prince. Not only the military skill of Federigo di Montefeltro, but the affairs of Romagna, rendered his accession important.
We have already pointed out the disturbed state of this province, and the different interests which prevailed among its dynasties. Several of these remained faithful for a long time on the side of Florence, others only waited for an opportunity of declaring themselves for the Republic. Sixtus IV. fully perceived how serious was the position of affairs. Bologna especially inspired him with anxiety, on account of the friendship of the Bentivogli with the Medici, so that he sent thither the legate of the city, the Cardinal of Mantua, as Francesco Gonzaga was commonly called, in order to win and preserve them in fealty to the Holy See. The instructions that he gave him plainly betrayed his anxiety as well as his consciousness of the bad impression which the events at Florence had produced. After he had spoken of his duty to watch over the whole State, and especially over a city which was the first and most illustrious after Rome, and exhorted its inhabitants not to waver in their fidelity nor allow a passage to hostile troops which might be intended to attack the Papal army, but to abstain from all communications with the Florentines, he continues thus: ‘That on the first news of the Florentine disturbances our Bolognese assisted their neighbours, has not been taken amiss by us, nor blamed, but we have regarded it as an act of sympathy, as they had as yet done nothing against the dignity of the Church, and we, too, lamented the first occurrence, to which we testified in a letter to the Florentines. But as the latter subsequently showed such unworthy slights and insults to the ecclesiastical order, every honourable ground has been removed for the Bolognese assisting a people obstinately offending the dignity of the Holy Roman Church, and rightly condemned by her on account of public crimes; for aid to them would be rather a personal insult to us.’ If any projects for aid were in progress the legate was first to exhort paternally, and if this did not avail, to excommunicate the offenders, and, in the last extremity, to lay the city under an interdict and shake the dust from their feet. In like manner he was to proceed with Giovanni Bentivoglio, who, as he took a privileged position in the city with Papal consent, was especially bound to the Holy See as feudatory and vassal. But the Pope hoped that the inhabitants would show themselves good and loyal sons.[246]