In these favourable conditions Milan flourished exceedingly, and could contribute without overwhelming distress her share of the duke’s annual revenue of twelve hundred thousand florins, and of the extra levies for special purposes, amounting sometimes to eight hundred thousand florins in one year—sums far exceeding those commanded by any other Italian prince.
Gian Galeazzo’s rule, though sometimes oppressive, was not carried on by the harsh methods of his predecessors. Violence and wanton cruelty were probably repugnant to his sensitive physical temperament and despicable to his unimpassioned mind. He was never bloody, except for a purpose, as in the awful sack of Verona after her revolt and recapture in 1390. But for a refined and ingenious cruelty which exercised itself in long worming plots ending far off in some unexpected catastrophe, Gian Galeazzo seems to have had an artistic predilection. It was he, men said, who by Iago-like suggestions drove Francesco Gonzaga of Mantua to slay his wife Agnese, one of Bernabò Visconte’s daughters, in a frenzy of jealousy, that he himself might be first and loudest afterwards in proclaiming the innocence of the lady and exciting general execration of the murderer. The beheading of young Obizzo d’Este at Ferrara has been also attributed to evil suspicions which the Milanese prince instilled into the Marquis Alberto for political ends. The Visconte’s influence is plainer still in the hideous treachery and ingratitude of Jacopo d’Appiano, who, with a kiss of peace, slew his protector and friend, the noble Pietro Gambacorti, and made himself Lord of Pisa for Gian Galeazzo’s benefit, as very shortly appeared.
The Duke’s piety was as marked as his less estimable characteristics. He did not doubt his own righteousness or hesitate to invoke the aid of Heaven for all his enterprises. He was assiduous in his devotion to the Saints and observance of the Church’s rites and ceremonies. The Cathedral of Milan, the vast Certosa of Pavia, and many other great buildings, were planned and founded by this prince. These works were not done solely for a spiritual reward, but also to proclaim his own glory to the world and to encourage art and industry. All Gian Galeazzo’s greatness of spirit showed in his buildings. His engineering schemes were as mighty and daring in conception as undaunted and patient in accomplishment. To subdue Padua and Mantua he undertook the gigantic task of diverting the Brenta and Mincio. But here he measured himself too audaciously against natural forces. One night the Mincio, ‘in piena,’ hurled its waters at the huge dam and swept away the work which had cost untold labour and gold.
With all his occupations of war and statesmanship, Gian Galeazzo found time to continue his father’s patronage of Letters. He had as a youth studied deeply himself in the University of Pavia. An early fresco at Pavia, now long lost, represented him as a child standing in a crowd of nobles and distinguished men in his father’s palace, and in answer to the question, who was the greatest man present, pointing to the poet Petrarca. This allegory recorded the honour which he paid all his life to intellect and learning. He called the greatest scholars to the Chairs of the University, including Emanuel Chrysoloras, who thus brought to Milan the newly reviving knowledge of Greek. He made these men his councillors and familiar associates. They read poetry to him and discussed the new discoveries of antiquity, so that his castle has been called a temple of wisdom. Architecture, sculpture, painting were equally fostered by him. There was no sort of human activity which he did not seek to stimulate for the advantage and glory of his State.
Though its operations meant destruction to lesser powers, Gian Galeazzo’s brain was essentially kingly and creative. This was the moment in Italy of the formation of great States. The old faction struggles of the era of freedom had come to an end with the establishment of tyrannies, and of these the lesser were now being swallowed up by the greater. In this process Milan under the Visconti was the leader. Its natural outcome seemed to be the foundation of a great settled kingdom in the peninsula, like France and England in the North. The patriotic spirits of the time dreamed of such a kingdom as the redemption of Italy from her woes of constant dissension and warfare. The idea took practical shape in the mind of the great Matteo’s descendant and heir, in whom character and circumstance united to carry the large political thought and ambition of the Visconti nearest to its supreme fulfilment. And it was to Gian Galeazzo that the dreamers looked for the realisation of their desire, as perhaps Petrarca had looked to the earlier generation. Fazio degli Uberti, the fourteenth century Florentine poet and exile, who lived long at the Viscontean Court, in one of his canzoni makes Rome cry—
‘O figliuol mio, da quanta crudel guerra
Tutti insieme verremo a dolcie pace
Se Italia soggiace
A un solo re....’[[2]]
[2].