 section 42 of the Medici volume 1 this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Dean Mach the Medici volume 1 by GF Young contemporary historical events 1536 in January 1536 war again broke out between Charles and Francis while the latter brought another powerful adversary into their conflict by concluding an alliance with the Turkish Sultan Solomon the French overran the whole of Savoy and took Turin Charles then resting in Naples after his North African expedition remained there from December 1535 to March 1536 he then traveled northwards to oppose the French and in passing through Rome made arrangements with Paul III for the assembly of a council of the church as soon as a state of peace should be obtained though it was nine years before the council was able to assemble having arrived in northern Italy Charles repulsed the French and then invaded province but in September was forced to retire again to Italy Savoy remaining the prize of France and the territories of its Duke becoming reduced to the single town of Nice Alessandro whether or not Alessandro's enormities had become so pronounced before Pope Clement's death in 1534 they evidently had fully done so by June 1535 when Epolito's mission took place it therefore immeasurably lowers our esteem of the Emperor Charles V who must have been fully aware both of the abominable state of things which had caused Epolito to be sent and of the circumstances of his death to find that in April 1536 on his way northwards from Rome he stayed in Florence at the Medici Palace with Alessandro and on the 19th June in the same year Alessandro was married and San Lorenzo to the Emperor's daughter Margaret then 15 the last iniquitous step in the compact made by Clement the 7th with Charles the 5th at Bologna in 1530 but all was of no avail six months later on the night of the 5th January 1537 came the end of Alessandro's vicious life at the age of 26 and in the way in which it was bound to come sooner or later he was assassinated by his young relative and boon companion Lorenzino of the younger branch of the Medici family then age 22 assisted by a hired assassin Scoron Consolo in a room in Lorenzino's house adjoining the Medici Palace to which house Alessandro had gone late at night imagining that he would meet there a lady of whom he was enamored and who was none other than Lorenzino's own sister Laudomia the young widow of Alamano Salviati who we are told was as virtuous as she was beautiful and who had previously rejected the Duke's odious attentions with scorn Lorenzino however was merely deluding him and instead of his sister brought in the assassin Scoron Consolo and together they put an end to the detestable being who had for five years outraged Florence Lorenzino was a strange youth he was the eldest of the four children of Pier Francesco the younger and Maria Sodorini and had decided ability and character all of his specially recorded of him that he had much culture and literary talent but he is said to have acted at times as though seized with temporary madness on one occasion when in Rome he although a great admirer of antiquities and a sudden freak knocked off the heads of several fine statues of the Emperor Hadrian at which act Pope Clement was furious threatened to hang him and banished him from Rome he was 17 when Alessandro was made Duke of Florence and from that time he became the latter's constant associate and companion in all his vicious courses his devoted mother the widowed Maria Sodorini did her utmost to lead her eldest son into better ways and to get him to break off his connection with Alessandro but unsuccessfully a failure accounted for by Lorenzino and his defense by his statement that his conduct had had a deliberate object his sister Laudomia was a celebrated beauty of the time her portrait painted by Bronzino is to be seen in the Academia Deliberi Arti Florence leaving Alessandro's body where it lay Lorenzino's forthwith took horse and fled from Florence riding hard through the night for Bologna next morning the Duke's servants finding him absent suspected foul play search was secretly made for him and at evening they discovered his body lying in the room in Lorenzino's house his death was kept secret and the body hurriedly conveyed by night into the little church of San Giovanni close to the Medici Palace there it was prepared for burial and on the following night was carried by a few servants with great secrecy to the church of San Lorenzino and without any religious service was hurriedly placed in the sarcophagus containing the remains of Lorenzino Duke of Urbino either wife relative nor friend of any sort being present at this dishonored internment after halting a few hours in Bologna Lorenzino fled on to Venice where was then living Philippo Strozzi who was at this time the leading man among the Fiorositi when on reaching Venice Lorenzino burst into Strozzi's room and related what he had done Strozzi embraced him calling him the deliverer of his country in the Florentine Brutus Strozzi's delight was so great that he declared that his two sons should marry Lorenzino's two sisters which was in a short time carried out Piero Strozzi marrying La Domia and Roberto Strozzi marrying Maddalena Lorenzino's act has been the subject of much controversy by some he has been considered the liberator of his country from an intolerable state of things for which there was no other remedy since appeals to the emperor had proved useless by others he has been called a traitor and a regicide possibly it would be necessary for us to have to live under such a tyranny as Alessandro's before we could form a just opinion on the point be that as it may praises were lavished upon Lorenzino from every side in both the Florentines in exile throughout Italy and those within the city compared him to all the heroes of patriotism and history there are only three possible motives for his act personal ambition the liberation of his country and the protection of his family from insult none have considered that he was moved by the first of these motives he was it is true the rightful heir to the position in which Clement the seventh had placed Alessandro but he never seemed to care for such a position and was entirely without any family influence to enable him to profit by Alessandro's death almost his only male relative being an unknown and equally powerless youth of 17 in the detailed defense of his act which he drew up he stated that his whole course of action had been a deliberate plan in order to free his country from a monstrous tyranny which had become insupportable and this account of the matter is believed by historians to be the true one even though it involves the possession by Lorenzino of an amount of determination beyond his years but while the above motive on public grounds was that put forward by Lorenzino he had a no less powerful private one even though he naturally enough did not wish to state it for in the circumstances under which Florence was at that time this youth of 22 had certainly no other way by which he could protect the honor of his sister as a mark of ignominy cosimo the first on succeeding to the rule of Florence caused Lorenzino's house to be entirely destroyed it has in recent times often been declared that cosimo on pulling down the house opened in the place where it had stood a narrow street or alley connecting the via larga now via cavore with the via ginnori and called it the strada del traditore but this is disproved by the very rare work in the state archives the ricerci alecasi di frenzi anu 1561 a record very carefully compiled of every house in Florence at that date carried out block by block from corner to corner of the four streets enclosing each block this shows with great exactness first that there was no street or alley near the midici palace running from the via larga to the via ginnori and second that in 1561 the house of Lorenzino had been not merely spoiled but entirely destroyed this record in regard to the courtier san giovanni starting from the corner at the intersection at the via de gory with the via larga mentions first the house of Lorenzo the magnificent the midici palace and then says that the next house is a ruin that which formerly belonged to Lorenzino de midici already entirely destroyed rovinato while it mentions no street or alley running from the via larga to the via ginnori this proves that there was then at all events no strada del traditore while it also disposes of another theory which has been held vis that lorenzino's house was that which is now number five via cavore the former site of lorenzino's house is in fact covered by the northern portion of the midici palace which was added by the riccardo family when they bought the palace in 1659 part of which addition has an empty space left on the first floor in accordance with one of the conditions of the sale which in giving permission to the riccardo family to build the proposed extension of the palace on the site lay down the condition that such a space should be left above the ground floor at this spot as a memorial of the murder of alessandro which had taken place in a room similarly situated until the year 1875 though it was always known that alessandro's body had been interred in the tomb of lorenzo duke of urbino it was a debated question which of the two tombs and the new sacristy was that of lorenzo and which that of his uncle juliano in that year however the italian government authorized an investigation to settle the point and the sarcophagus over which sits the figure called el pencio rosso was opened in the presence of a representative of the government and various literary men interested it proved to contain says the account two corpses which turned to dust as soon as the air was admitted but not before the figure of alessandro had been perfectly recognized both by its mulatto type and by the marks of the wounds especially those in the face which he had received from lorenzino and the hired assassin scorn consolo another account denies the turning into dust and says that there were signs of embalment that the two bodies were lying head to foot and that lorenzo's was clothed in the usual black garment but alessandro's in an embroidered shirt mr. charles heath wilson who was present remarked that one of the cheekbones of the latter body or traces of a stab and that this corroborated varchie's account of the murder margaret when the tragedy of alessandro's murder occurred margaret not knowing what might be the consequences to herself of the removal of a husband so justly detested by every soul in florenz fled at once to the fortesa which was held by the troops of her father the emperor thence she departed first to prato and then to pisa and after a short time by the emperor's orders removed to spain there eight years later she was at the age of 24 forced to marry a boy of 13 otavio for nazi grandson of pope paul the third and became an afterlife a very capable and celebrated woman who has margaret of parma was in 1559 made regent of the netherlands by her half-brother philip the second and ruled that country well under the most difficult circumstances for eight years in 1567 she insisted on resigning that rule because she would not be a party to the inhuman measures which philip had sent the duke of alva to the netherlands to carry out her last act being to write philip begging him to temper justice with mercy amidst general expressions of regret she retired from the netherlands to her home in parma where she died in 1586 margaret was the last mistress of the family palace in the via larga contesina de bardi lucrezia tonabuoni clary sorsini alfoncina orcini madeline de la tour de overn and margaret herself had each in turn ruled as its mistress and when the last of them fled from it in terror the palace where so many momentous events in the history of florence had taken place ceased to be occupied by the head of the family giving place to a palace grander indeed in size but unable to compete with its predecessor in the magnitude of the associations which the latter gathers round it on alessandro's death clement the seventh scheme for keeping the rule of florence and the elder branch came abruptly to an end since all of that branch except catherine were dead and the succession passed to the younger branch as it should properly have done on the death of leo the tenth all the falseness and justice baseness and treachery employed in order to cede alessandro on a throne to which he had no right had produced nothing whatever so far as keeping the younger branch out of power in florence was concerned entirely defeating its own name clements action had only rendered it more easy for them both to gain that power and to make it a despotism but before we proceed to take up the history of this younger branch we have still to follow that of the third member of this group of four young people the daughter of lorenzo duke of urbino and great-granddaughter of lorenzo the magnificent with whom cosimos branch ended and who had the longest and most important history of any of the family end of section 42 end of the medici volume one by gf young