Alessandro de' Medici, Duke of Florence

Alessandro de' Medici (22 July 1510 – 6 January 1537), nicknamed "il Moro" ("the Moor") due to his dark complexion, Duke of Penne and the first Duke of the Florentine Republic (from 1532), was ruler of Florence from 1531 to his death in 1537.[1] The first Medici to rule Florence as a hereditary monarch, Alessandro was also the last Medici from the senior line of the family to lead the city. His assassination at the hands of a distant cousin, Lorenzaccio, caused the title of Duke to pass to Cosimo I de Medici, from the family's junior branch.

This article is about the first Duke of Florence. For the Alessandro de' Medici who was pope, see Pope Leo XI.
Alessandro de' Medici
Portrait by Jacopo Pontormo
Duke of Florence
Reign1 May 1532 – 6 January 1537
PredecessorIppolito de' Medici
SuccessorCosimo I de' Medici
Born(1510-07-22)22 July 1510
Florence, Republic of Florence
Died6 January 1537(1537-01-06) (aged 26)
Florence, Duchy of Florence
Spouse
​
(m. 1536)​
IssueGiulio de' Medici (illegitimate)
Giulia de' Medici (illegitimate)
Porzia de' Medici (illegitimate)
FatherLorenzo de' Medici, Duke of Urbino, or Pope Clement VII
MotherSimonetta da Collevecchio
ReligionCatholicism

Life

Born in Florence, Alessandro was recognized by the majority of his contemporaries as the only son of Lorenzo II de' Medici, grandson of Lorenzo de' Medici "the Magnificent".[2] A few believed him to be the illegitimate son of Giulio de' Medici (later Pope Clement VII), but at the time that was a minority view.[3]

Alessandro's nickname "il Moro" ("the Moor") is said to derive from his physical features.[4][5][6][7] Some historians, such as Christopher Hibbert, believe that he had been born to a servant of African descent who was working in the Medici household, identified in documents as Simonetta da Collevecchio. French author Jean Nestor, writing in the 1560s, reported that the claim of a Moorish slave origin was a false rumor first spread by Alessandro's exiled enemies in Naples.[8]

The Emblem of Alessandro de' Medici, based on Dürer's Rhinoceros, with the motto "Non buelvo sin vencer" (old Spanish for "I shall not return without victory").[9] (From Paolo Giovio's Dialogo dell'imprese militari et amorose, 1557.)

Early life

Alessandro spent his early childhood in Rome, where he received a humanist education by Valeriano, under the supervision of Pope Leo X and Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici. [10] During those years, a number of unexpected deaths occurred in the Medici family’s senior line: Giuliano, Duke of Nemours (1516); Lorenzo II, Duke of Urbino (1519); and eventually Pope Leo X (1521). This prompted Cardinal Giulio (then Gran Maestro of Florence, later Pope Clement VII), to relocate the remaining Medici heirs to Poggio a Caiano, near Florence: Alessandro; his half-sister Catherine, (later Queen Consort of France); and his cousin Ippolito, (later Vice-Chancellor of the Catholic Church). [11] In 1522, Cardinal Giulio purchased for Alessandro the title Duke of Penne from Holy Roman Emperor Charles V.[12] [13]

When Cardinal Giulio became Pope Clement VII in 1523, he left leadership of Florence to Alessandro and Ippolito, under the regency of papal representative Cardinal Silvio Passerini. Unfortunately, Alessandro and Ippolito were “alike in one respect only, their mutual hatred of each other.” [14] They openly feuded throughout their short lives. [15] Additionally, "the papal representatives sent to oversee the [boys] were extremely unpopular with the anti-Medici faction [of Florence] as well as, again, elements within the family such as Clarice Strozzi, daughter of Piero di Lorenzo ("the Unfortunate"), who railed against Alessandro as being unworthy of the Medici family name and against his papal guardians as well... The status of Alessandro as Gran Maestro of Florence was largely nominal but wider events taking place in Italy would soon see him raised to a higher status, but not before enduring quite an ordeal." [16]

During the Sack of Rome in 1527, a faction of Florentines overthrew the Medici government and installed a theocratic, Savonarola-influenced Republic. [17] [18] Both Alessandro and Ippolito de' Medici were advised to leave the city, along with Cardinal Passerini. Many of the Medicis’ main supporters fled Florence; however, eight-year-old Catherine de' Medici was left behind.[19] Alessandro lived in exile for the next three years. [20] Florentine artist Michelangelo, then occupied in creating a funerary chapel for the Medici, initially took charge of building fortifications around Florence to support the Republic. He later fled the city, fearing retribution. In the 1530s, Michelangelo reconciled with Clement, but he never returned to work in the city under the leadership of either Alessandro or his successor, Cosimo I.[21]

Duke of Florence
Portrait of Alessandro de’ Medici, by Giorgio Vasari (1534).

In 1530, after a nearly ten month siege of Florence supported by Spanish troops, Alessandro was named its head of state.[1] Pope Clement VII chose him for the position over Ippolito, who was made a cardinal. [22] Alessandro arrived in Florence to begin his rule on 5 July 1531. Nine months later he was made its hereditary Duke by Charles, as Tuscany lay outside the Papal States. This ended the Florentine Republic and started over 200 years of Medici monarchy. [23][24]

The Florentine Constitution of 1532 consolidated Duke Alessandro’s power. [25] While Clement lived, Alessandro ruled "with the advice of elected councils, trying to calm the nerves of the defeated republicans"; however, as his reign progressed, he began to exhibit authoritarian tendencies. [26] In 1534, he ordered construction of Florence’s immense Fortezza da Basso, “to secure the Medici’s control of the city following their recent return after the Siege of Florence, and to provide lodging for a massive contingent of troops.” [27]

Duke Alessandro’s government drew both praise and criticism. To his credit, Alessandro’s “common sense and his feeling for justice won his subjects’ affection”; and he “enjoyed some status as the champion of the poor and the helpless, as ballads and novelle record.” [28] [29] He was also a patron of the arts, commissioning notable works by Giorgio Vasari, Jacopo Pontormo, Benvenuto Cellini, and Antonio da Sangallo the Younger. [30] [31] Conversely, Florence’s vocal exile community judged his rule as harsh, depraved, and incompetent, an assessment debated by historians. [32] In 1535, the exiles enlisted Cardinal Ippolito to meet with Emperor Charles V, to protest Alessandro’s government; however, the former died en route. Rumors spread that Cardinal Ippolito was poisoned on Alessandro's orders. [33] After the exiles voiced their complaints to Charles, Florentine diplomat Francesco Guicciardini responded of Alessandro, “his Excellency’s virtue, his fame, the opinion of him held throughout the city, of his prudence, of his virtuous habits, are a sufficient reply". [34] Emperor Charles dismissed the exiles’ complaints.

In 1536, Emperor Charles kept a promise to Pope Clement by marrying his daughter, Margaret of Austria, to Duke Alessandro. [35] For his own inclinations, Duke Alessandro seems to have remained faithful to one mistress, Taddea Malaspina, who bore his only children: Giulio de' Medici (c. 1533/37 – 1600), who had illegitimate issue, and Giulia de' Medici.[36]

Assassination
Portrait of Alessandro de' Medici in the Uffizi.
Margaret of Austria

In 1537 Duke Alessandro's distant cousin and close friend Lorenzino de' Medici, nicknamed "Lorenzaccio" ("bad Lorenzo"), assassinated him. [37] The event is the subject of Alfred de Musset’s play “Lorenzaccio”; Alexandre Dumas’ play “Lorenzino”; and the basis for Thomas Middleton’s play “The Revenger’s Tragedy”, among other works. [38] [39]

On January 5/6, the Night of Epiphany, Lorenzino entrapped Duke Alessandro through the ruse of a promised sexual encounter with a beautiful widow [40] As Duke Alessandro waited alone and unarmed, Lorenzino and a hired assassin, Scoronconcolo, ambushed him and "stabbed Alessandro with a dagger several times while the Duke fought back to the point that he bit off a significant portion of one of Lorenzino's fingers. Eventually, Alessandro succumbed to his wounds and Lorenzino and Scoronconcolo fled from the palace — after locking the door to the chamber to prevent their crime from being discovered too quickly." [41] [42]

For fear of starting an uprising if news of his death became public, Medici officials wrapped Duke Alessandro's corpse in a carpet and secretly carried it to the cemetery of San Lorenzo, where it was hurriedly buried. [43]

In Valladolid Spain, at the imperial court of Charles V, a solemn funeral was held for Duke Alessandro.[44]

Lorenzino, in a declaration published later, said that he had killed Alessandro to preserve the Florentine Republic. When Florence's anti-Medici faction failed to rise, Lorenzino fled to Venice, where he was killed in 1548 at the direct orders of Emperor Charles V. [45] Florence's Medici supporters - called Palleschi from the balls on the Medici arms - ensured that power passed to Cosimo I de' Medici, the first of the "junior" branch of the Medici to rule Florence.[1]

Alessandro was survived by two natural children of Taddea's: a son, Giulio (aged four at the time of his father's death) married to Lucrezia Gaetani, and a daughter, Giulia, married firstly to Francesco Cantelmo, the Duke of Popoli, and then to Bernadetto de' Medici, the Prince of Ottajano.

References
  1. "Africans in Medieval & Renaissance Art: Duke Alessandro de' Medici". Victoria and Albert Museum. 13 January 2011. Archived from the original on 5 January 2019. Retrieved 6 May 2018.
  2. A. London Fell (September 1993). Origins of legislative sovereignty and the legislative state: Modern origins,developments, and perspectives against the Background of "Machiavelism".Book I: Pre-Modern "Machiavelism". Praeger. ISBN 978-0-275-93975-5. Retrieved 12 January 2012.
  3. Catherine Fletcher, The Black Prince of Florence: The Spectacular Life and Treacherous World of Alessandro de' Medici (London: Bodley Head, 2016), pp. 16, 280–81.
  4. George L. Williams (January 2004). Papal Genealogy: The Families And Descendants Of The Popes. McFarland. pp. 74–. ISBN 978-0-7864-2071-1. Retrieved 12 January 2012.
  5. Hibbert 1999, p. 236.
  6. Rogers, J. A., World's Great Men of Color, Volume 2, p. 31 (Touchstone, 1996), ISBN 0684815826
  7. Caroline P. Murphy, Murder of a Medici Princess, p. 9 (Oxford University Press, 2008), ISBN 978-0-19-531439-7
  8. Jean Nestor, Histoire des hommes illustres de la maison de Medici, 1564.
    • Bedini, Silvano A. (1997). The Pope's Elephant. Manchester: Carcanet Press. p. 192. ISBN 978-1-85754-277-6..
  10. https://hcommons.org/deposits/objects/hc:15716/datastreams/CONTENT/content?download=true
  11. https://projectalexblog.wordpress.com/alessandro-de-medici/timeline/
  12. http://madmonarchist.blogspot.com/2016/03/alessandro-de-medici-duke-of-florence.html
  13. https://hcommons.org/deposits/objects/hc:15716/datastreams/CONTENT/content?download=true
  14. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/10877/10877-h/10877-h.htm
  15. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/10877/10877-h/10877-h.htm
  16. http://madmonarchist.blogspot.com/2016/03/alessandro-de-medici-duke-of-florence.html
  17. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Alessandro
  18. http://madmonarchist.blogspot.com/2016/03/alessandro-de-medici-duke-of-florence.html
  19. https://longreads.com/2018/09/27/queens-of-infamy-the-early-trials-of-catherine-de-medici/
  20. https://tracyerobey.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Robey.Glory_and_Infamy_Making_the_Memory.pdf
  21. https://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/arts/artwork/michelangelo-biography4.htm
  22. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Alessandro
  23. Hibbert 1999, pp. 250–252.
  24. Schevill 1936, pp. 482, 513–514.
  25. http://www.historyworld.net/wrldhis/plaintexthistories.asp?historyid=aa69
  26. http://madmonarchist.blogspot.com/2016/03/alessandro-de-medici-duke-of-florence.html
  27. https://www.florencebiennale.org/en/fortezza-da-basso/
  28. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Alessandro
  29. https://hcommons.org/deposits/objects/hc:15716/datastreams/CONTENT/content?download=true
  30. http://www.themedicifamily.com/Alessandro-de-Medici.html
  31. https://www.nga.gov/collection/art-object-page.45489.html
  32. Fletcher, Catherine (2020). The Black Prince of Florence: The Spectacular Life and Treacherous World of Alessandro de' Medici. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780190092146.
  33. Hibbert 1999, p. 254.
  34. http://madmonarchist.blogspot.com/2016/03/alessandro-de-medici-duke-of-florence.html
  35. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Alessandro
  36. Langdon, Gabrielle (2006). Medici Women: Portraits of Power, Love, and Betrayal. University of Toronto Press, p. 233. ISBN 0-8020-3825-5
  37. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Lorenzino-de-Medici
  38. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/2005/01/25/lorenzaccio-murder-most-medici/d51ebaea-3cb4-411e-83ba-e2e9fa20b0a8/
  39. https://hcommons.org/deposits/objects/hc:15716/datastreams/CONTENT/content?download=true
  40. Baker, Nicholas Scott. 2010. "Power and Passion in Sixteenth-century Florence: The Sexual and Political Reputations of Alessandro and Cosimo I De' Medici". Journal of the History of Sexuality 19 (3). University of Texas Press: 432–57.
  41. https://tracyerobey.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Robey.Glory_and_Infamy_Making_the_Memory.pdf
  42. Fletcher, Catherine (2020). The Black Prince of Florence: The Spectacular Life and Treacherous World of Alessandro de' Medici. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780190092146.
  43. Fletcher, Catherine (2020). The Black Prince of Florence: The Spectacular Life and Treacherous World of Alessandro de' Medici. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780190092146.
  44. Cfr. PASCUAL MOLINA, Jesús F. (2009). "Alexander Florentiae Dux: el primer duque de Florencia y el Imperio. Muerte, política y arte" en Parrado del Olmo, J. M.ª y GUTIÉRREZ BAÑOS, F. (coords.), Estudios de historia del arte. Homenaje al profesor De la Plaza Santiago. Valladolid: Universidad de Valladolid. pp. 161–166. ISBN 978-84-8448-521-6.
  45. https://www.prlog.org/12512918-renaissance-mystery-solved-lorenzino-de-medicis-assassination-was-ordered-by-the-emperor-charles-habsburg.html

Sources
  • Hibbert, Christopher (1999). The House of Medici, Its Rise and Fall.
  • Schevill, Ferdinand (1936). History of Florence.
  • Brackett, John (2005) "Race and Rulership: Alessandro de' Medici, first Medici Duke of Florence, 1529-1537," in T.F. Earle and K.J.P. Lowe, Black Africans in Renaissance Europe.
  • Fletcher, Catherine (2016). The Black Prince of Florence: The Spectacular Life and Treacherous World of Alessandro de' Medici.
Regnal titles
Preceded by
new office		 Duke of Florence
1532–1537		 Succeeded by
Cosimo I
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