There were, of course, many men who attempted to become despots and failed; and others who succeeded for their lifetimes, but were not able to make their signories so strong as to become family possessions to be enjoyed by their heirs after them. Of the latter kind one must be mentioned. In Lucca Castruccio Castracane (died 1328), a very brilliant politician and soldier, became so powerful that he reduced to subjection much of the country round and nearly succeeded in conquering Florence, with whom he was long at war. Like other successful tyrants he called himself a Ghibelline, and drew what advantage he could from his profession of faith, but really only aimed to acquire a principality for himself. He died in the prime of life (to the great relief of the Florentines), and left so brilliant a reputation for the qualities which achieve success by fair means or foul, that two centuries later Machiavelli held him up as an example for princes to follow.
CHAPTER XXI
THE CLASSICAL REVIVAL (1350)
We are now well started on the fourteenth century, and it will be well to glance at the chief Italian states in order to get our bearings.
Sicily was in a state of hopeless despondency. The island was nominally subject to the House of Aragon, but its kings were not men of sufficient character to impose their authority, and the unfortunate kingdom was beginning to go down hill. The Kingdom of Naples was, for the time being, much better off, for its king, Robert, grandson of Charles of Anjou, was a man of unusual gifts and capacity, but he was succeeded by a foolish, frivolous, light-minded, light-mannered granddaughter, Joan (1343-81), who brought forty years of trouble to her kingdom, and under her Naples started rolling down that same incline on which Sicily was rolling somewhat ahead of her. The failure of Sicily and Naples to take part in the great career in matters intellectual now opening before Northern Italy is partly due to the race that populated them, a miscellaneous mixture of bloods (at least it is customary to explain unknown causes of success and failure by saying good blood and bad blood), and partly to the autocratic will of the brilliant Frederick II, who crushed out independence in his kingdom, and so deprived it of that communal life which is the only obvious factor, except "good blood," in the intellectual success of Northern Italy.
The whole pontifical state, from the fortresses of the Colonna on the Tiber to the strongholds of the Malatesta in Rimini, was in the vortex of confusion.
Florence was well off, for though the foreigners whom she had invited to be protectors against Castruccio Castracane and others were rather detrimental than useful, and though there were signs of a new struggle between the Grandi and the Burghers, her commerce prospered, her dominion spread over the towns round about, and her luxury grew so fast that the troubled elders passed all sorts of sumptuary laws to prescribe what should be worn and what not, by both fashionable and simple.
In the northwest, now Piedmont, there were, besides the Counts of Savoy, several struggling claimants who severally asserted titles to their own and other strips of territory. In the northeast, Venice, which had acquired a footing on the mainland destined to grow into the province of Venetia, was prosperous. And between Piedmont and Venice the successful Visconti of Milan, soon to receive the keys of Genoa, were likewise well satisfied. The political situation may now be dismissed, and we may turn to the distinguishing mark of the century, the classical revival.