For Rome, the income of the Curia, which was derived from all Europe, gives us no criterion; nor are statements about papal treasures and the fortunes of cardinals very trustworthy. The well-known banker Agostino Chigi left (1520) a fortune of in all 800,000 ducats (Lettere Pittoriche, i. Append. 48).
During the high prices of the year 1505 the value of the staro ferrarrese del grano, which commonly weighed from 68 to 70 pounds (German), rose to 1⅓ ducats. The semola or remolo was sold at venti soldi lo staro; in the following fruitful years the staro fetched six soldi. Bonaventura Pistofilo, p. 494. At Ferrara the rent of a house yearly in 1455 was 25 Lire; comp. Atti e memorie, Parma, vi. 250; see 265 sqq. for a documentary statement of the prices which were paid to artists and amanuenses.
From the inventory of the Medici (extracts in Muntz, Prècurseurs, 158 sqq.) it appears that the jewels were valued at 12,205 ducats; the rings at 1,792; the pearls (apparently distinguished from other jewels, S.G.C.M.) at 3,512; the medallions, cameos and mosaics at 2,579; the vases at 4,850; the reliquaries and the like at 3,600; the library at 2,700; the silver at 7,000. Giov. Rucellai reckons that in 1473(?) he has paid 60,000 gold florins in taxes, 10,000 for the dowries of his five daughters, 2,000 for the improvement of the church of Santa Maria Novella. In 1474 he lost 20,000 gold florins through the intrigues of an enemy. (Autografo dallo Tibaldone di G.R., Florence, 1872). The marriage of Barnardo Rucellai with Nannina, the sister of Lorenzo de’ Medici, cost 3,686 florins (Muntz, Précurseurs, 244, i).
[173] So far as Cosimo (1433-1465) and his grandson Lorenzo Magnifico (d. 1492) are concerned, the author refrains from any criticism on their internal policy. The exaltation of both, particularly of Lorenzo, by William Roscoe (Life of Lorenzo de’ Medici, called the Magnificent, 1st ed. Liverpool, 1795; 10th ed. London, 1851), seems to have been a principal cause of the reaction of feeling against them. This reaction appeared first in Sismondi (Hist. des Rép. Italiennes, xi.), in reply to whose strictures, sometimes unreasonably severe, Roscoe again came forward (Illustrations, Historical and Critical, of the Life of Lor. d. Med., London, 1822); later in Gino Capponi (Archiv. Stor. Ital. i. (1842), pp. 315 sqq.), who afterwards (Storia della Rep. di Firenze, 2 vols. Florence, 1875) gave further proofs and explanations of his judgment. See also the work of Von Reumont (Lor. d. Med. il Magn.), 2 vols. Leipzig, 1874, distinguished no less by the judicial calmness of its views than by the mastery it displays of the extensive materials used. See also A. Castelman: Les Medicis, 2 vols. Paris, 1879. The subject here is only casually touched upon. Comp. two works of B. Buser (Leipzig, 1879) devoted to the home and foreign policy of the Medici. (1) Die Beziehungen der Medicus zu Frankreich. 1434-1494, &c. (2) Lorenzo de’ Medici als italienischen Staatsman, &c., 2nd ed., 1883.
[174] Franc. Burlamacchi, father of the head of the Lucchese Protestants, Michele B. See Arch. Stor. Ital. ser. i. tom. x., pp. 435-599; Documenti, pp. 146 sqq.; further Carlo Minutoli, Storia di Fr. B., Lucca, 1844, and the important additions of Leone del Prete in the Giornale Storico degli Archiv. Toscani, iv. (1860), pp. 309 sqq. It is well known how Milan, by its hard treatment of the neighbouring cities from the eleventh to the thirteenth century, prepared the way for the foundation of a great despotic state. Even at the time of the extinction of the Visconti in 1447, Milan frustrated the deliverance of Upper Italy, principally through not accepting the plan of a confederation of equal cities. Comp. Corio, fol. 358 sqq.
[175] On the third Sunday in Advent, 1494, Savonarola preached as follows on the method of bringing about a new constitution: The sixteen companies of the city were each to work out a plan, the Gonfalonieri to choose the four best of these, and the Signory to name the best of all on the reduced list. Things, however, took a different turn, under the influence indeed of the preacher himself. See P. Villari, Savonarola. Besides this sermon, S. had written a remarkable Trattato circa il regimento di Ferenze (reprinted at Lucca, 1817).
[176] The latter first in 1527, after the expulsion of the Medici. See Varchi, i. 121, &c.
[177] Macchiavelli, Storie Fior. l. iii. cap. 1: ‘Un Savio dator di leggi,’ could save Florence.
[178] Varchi, Stor. Fior. i. p. 210.
[179] ‘Discorso sopra il riformar lo Stato di Firenze,’ in the Opere Minori, p. 207.