a man of stern resolve, who went straight to his end without
scruples or half-measures. Before long he was regarded by many
as the incarnation of Machiavelli’s Prince, “inasmuch as he
joined daring to talent and prudence, was capable of great
cruelty, and yet could practise mercy in due season.” Guicciardini,
who still pretended to act as mentor, and who on account
of his many services had a certain influence over him, was obliged
to withdraw from public life and busy himself with writing his
History at his villa of Arcetri. He died in this retreat in 1540,
and it was immediately rumoured that the duke had caused him
to be poisoned. This shows the estimation in which Cosimo
was now held. He punished with death all who dared to resist
his will. By 1540 sentence of death had been pronounced against
four hundred and thirty contumacious fugitives, and during his
reign one hundred and forty men and six women actually
ascended the scaffold, without counting those who perished in
foreign lands by the daggers of his assassins. He reduced the
old republican institutions to empty forms, by making the magistrates
mere creatures of his will. He issued the sternest edicts
against the rebels, particularly by the law known as the “Polverina,”
from the name of its proposer Jacopo Polverini. This
law decreed not only the confiscation of the property of exiles,
but likewise that of their heirs, even if personally acquired by
the latter. Cosimo ruled like the independent sovereign of a
great state, and always showed the capacity, firmness and
courage demanded by that station. Only, his state being small
and weak, he was forced to rely chiefly upon his personal talent
and wealth. It was necessary for him to make heavy loans to
the different European sovereigns, especially to Charles V., the
most rapacious of them all, and to give enormous bribes to their
ambassadors. Besides, he had to carry on wars for the extension
of his dominions; and neither his inherited wealth nor the
large sums gained by confiscating the estates of rebellious
subjects sufficed for all this outlay. He was accordingly compelled
to burden the people with taxes, and thus begin at once to
diminish its strength.
Cosimo bore a special grudge against the neighbouring republics of Siena and Lucca. Although the latter was small and weak, and the former garrisoned by Spaniards yet the spectacle of free institutions at the frontiers of his own state served as a continual incitement to subjects disaffected to the new régime. In factLucca and Sienna seized. Francesco Burlamacchi, a zealous Lucchese patriot, had conceived the design of re-establishing republican government in all the cities of Tuscany. Cosimo, with the emperor’s help, succeeded in having him put to death. Lucca, however, was an insignificant state making no pretence of rivalry, whereas Siena was an old and formidable foe to Florence, and had always given protection to the Florentine exiles. It was now very reluctantly submitting to the presence of a Spanish garrison, and, being stimulated by promises of prompt and efficacious assistance from France, rose in rebellion and expelled the Spaniards in 1552. Cosimo instantly wrote to the emperor in terms that appealed to his pride, asked leave to attack Siena, and begged for troops to ensure the success of his enterprise. As no immediate answer arrived, he feigned to begin negotiations with Henry II. of France, and, by thus arousing the imperial jealousy, obtained a contingent of German and Spanish infantry. Siena was besieged for fifteen months, and its inhabitants, aided by the valour of Piero Strozzi, who fought under the French flag, made a most heroic resistance, even women and children helping on the walls. But fortune was against them. Piero Strozzi sustained several defeats, and finally the Sienese, having exhausted their ammunition and being decimated by famine and the sword, were obliged to capitulate on honourable terms that were shamelessly violated. By the varied disasters of the siege and the number of fugitives the population was reduced from forty to eight thousand inhabitants. The republicans, still eager to resist, withdrew to Montalcino. Cosimo now ruled the city and territory of Siena in the name of Charles V., who always refused him its absolute possession. After the emperor’s abdication, and the succession of Philip II. to the Spanish throne, Cosimo at last obtained Siena and Porto Ferraio by giving up his claim to a sum of 200,000 ducats that he was to have received from Charles V.
In 1559 Cosimo also captured Montalcino, and thus formed the grand-duchy of Tuscany, but he continued to govern the new state—i.e. Siena and its territories—separately from the old. His rule was intelligent, skilful and despotic; but his enormous expenses drove him to raise large sums of money by special contrivances unsuitedGrand-Duchy of Tuscany formed. to the country and the people. Hence, notwithstanding the genius of its founder, the grand-duchy held from the first the elements of its future decay. Cosimo preferred to confer office upon men of humble origin in order to have pliable tools, but he also liked to be surrounded by a courtier aristocracy on the Spanish and French pattern. As no Tuscan aristocracy any longer existed, he created new nobles, and tempted foreign ones to come by the concession of various feudal privileges; and, to turn this artificial aristocracy to some account, he founded the knightly order of St Stephen, charged with the defence of the coast against pirates, which in course of time won much honour by its prowess. He also established a small standing army for the protection of his frontiers; but he generally employed German and Spanish troops for his wars, and always had a foreign bodyguard. At the commencement of his reign he opposed the popes in order to maintain the independence of his own state; but later, to obtain help, he truckled to them in many ways, even to the extent of giving up to the Inquisition his own confidant, Piero Carnesecchi, who, being accused of heresy, was beheaded and burnt in 1567. In reward for these acts of submission, the popes showed him friendship, and Pius V. granted him the title of grand-duke, conferring the patent and crown upon him in Rome, although the emperor had always withheld his consent. The measure most injurious to Tuscany was the fiscal system of taxes, of which the sole aim was to extort the greatest possible amount of money. The consequent damage to industry, commerce and agriculture was immense, and, added to the devastations caused by the Sienese War, led to their utter ruin. Otherwise Cosimo did not neglect useful measures for the interior prosperity of his state. He was no Maecenas; nevertheless he restored the Pisan university, enlarged that of Siena, had the public records classified, and also executed public works like the Santa Trinita bridge. During the great inundations of 1557 he turned his whole energy to the relief of the sufferers.
In 1539 he had espoused Eleonora of Toledo, daughter of the viceroy of Naples, by whom he had several children. Two died in 1562, and their mother soon followed them to the grave. It was said that one of these boys, Don Garcia, had murdered the other, and then been killed by the enraged father. Indeed, Cosimo was further accused of having put his own wife to death; but neither rumour had any foundation. He now showed signs of illness and failure of strength. He was not old, but worn by the cares of state and self-indulgence. Accordingly in 1564 he resigned the government to his eldest son, who was to act as his lieutenant, since he wished to have power to resume the sceptre on any emergency. In 1570, by the advice of Pope Pius V., he married Camilla Martelli, a young lady of whom he had been long enamoured. In 1574 he died, at the age of fifty-four years and ten months, after a reign of thirty-seven years, leaving three sons and one daughter besides natural children. These sons were Francesco, his successor, who was already at the head of the government, Cardinal Ferdinand, and Piero.
Francesco I., born in 1541, began to govern as his father’s lieutenant in 1564, and was married in 1565 to the archduchess Giovanna of Austria. On beginning to reign on his own account in 1574, he speedily manifested his real character. His training in the hands of a Spanish mother had made him suspicious, false and despotic. Holding every oneFrancesco I. aloof, he carried on the government with the assistance of a few devoted ministers. He compelled his step-mother to retire to a convent, and kept his brothers at a distance from Florence. He loved the privileges of power without its burdens. Cosimo had known how to maintain his independence, but Francesco cast
