Leo Africanus (51 page)

I thought of Clement VII. He had shown too much favour to François not to suffer his part of the defeat. How would he extricate himself from his false step? Was he going to make peace with Charles V to avert his wrath? Or would he make use of his authority to gather the princes of Christendom together against an emperor
who had become too powerful, too dangerous for them all? I would have given a great deal to be able to talk to the Pope. And even more so to Guicciardini, particularly after a letter from him reached me at the beginning of summer, containing this enigmatic sentence, fearful in its irony:
‘Only a miracle can save Rome now, and the Pope desires that I should accomplish it!'

932 A.H.
18 October 1525 – 7 October 1526

He was standing in front of me, a statue of flesh and iron, with a powerful laugh and enormous outbursts of rage.

‘I am the armed might of the Church.'

Men though called him the ‘great devil', and loved him for it, indomitable, intrepid, hot-headed, taking women and fortresses by storm. They were afraid of him, and prayed to God to protect him and to keep him far away.

‘My incorrigible cousin Giovanni,' Clement VII would say, with tenderness and resignation.

Condottiere and Medici, he was the epitome of all Italy. The troops he commanded were like him, venal and generous, tyrannical and lovers of justice, indifferent to death. That year, they had entered the Pope's service. They were called the Black Bands, and their leader was soon no longer known as Giovanni di Medici but Giovanni of the Black Bands.

I met him at Bologna. For my first outing I had decided to go to the palace of Master Jacopo Salviati, a venerable gentleman of the city, who had showered me with kindness all through my illness, constantly sending me money, books, clothes and presents. Guicciardini had asked him to take me under his protection, and he acquitted himself of that office with fatherly diligence, never letting a week pass without sending one of his pages to inquire after my health. This Salviati was the most prominent person in Bologna, and he lived in a luxurious manner worthy of the Medicis. It is true that his wife was none other than Pope Leo's sister, and that his daughter
Maria had married Giovanni of the Black Bands. Unfortunately for her, it must be said, since she saw him very rarely, between two campaigns, two idylls, two affairs.

That day however he had come, less for his wife's sake than for their son, aged six. I was walking towards the Palazzo Salviati, leaning on Maddalena's shoulder, when the procession came within earshot. The condottiere was accompanied by a good forty of his faithful followers on horseback. Some passers-by murmured his name, some cheered him, others hurried past. I preferred to draw back to let him pass, as my gait was still slow and uncertain. He cried from far off:

‘Cosimo.'

A child appeared in the embrasure of a window on the first floor. Giovanni set off at a trot, and then, when he was underneath the boy, drew his sword, pointed it at the boy and shouted:

‘Jump!'

Maddalena almost fainted. She covered her eyes. I myself stood rooted to the spot. However, Master Jacopo, who had come out to welcome his son-in-law, said nothing. He certainly seemed extremely annoyed, but as if at some everyday misfortune rather than at a drama. Little Cosimo seemed no more surprised nor impressed. Putting his foot on the frieze, he jumped into the air. At the last moment, his father, throwing his sword away, caught him under his arms, held him at arms' length and raised him above his head.

‘How is my prince?'

The child and the father laughed, as well as the soldiers in the escort. Jacopo Salviati forced himself to smile. Seeing me arrive, he took advantage of this to relieve the tension by introducing me formally to his son-in-law.

‘Master John-Leo, geographer, poet, diplomat at the papal court.'

The condottiere leaped to the ground. One of his men brought him back his sword, which he put back in its sheath while presenting himself to me with excessive joviality.

‘I am the armed might of the Church.'

He had short hair, a thick brown moustache cut at the sides and a look which transfixed me more surely than a lance. At the time, the man seemed to me most unpleasant. But I soon changed my mind, seduced, like so many others, by his astonishing capacity to leave his gladiatorial soul behind to become a Florentine, a Medici of astonishing sensitivity and insight as soon as he entered a salon.

‘You were at Pavia, someone told me.'

‘I stayed there only a few days, in the company of Master Francesco Guicciardini.'

‘I was far away myself. I was inspecting my troops on the road to Milan. When I returned the Ottoman envoy had left. And you too, I think.'

He had a knowing smile. To avoid betraying the secret of my mission I decided to keep silent and to turn my eyes away from his. He continued:

‘I have heard that a message left Paris recently for Constantinople asking the Turks to attack Hungary to force Charles V to divert his attention from Italy.'

‘Isn't the King of France a prisoner in Spain?'

‘That doesn't stop him from negotiating with the Pope and the sultan or from sending instructions to his mother, who is regent of the kingdom.'

‘Wasn't it said that he is on the point of death?'

‘He is no longer. Death has changed its mind.'

As I persisted in not expressing any opinion of my own, confining myself to asking questions, Giovanni asked me directly:

‘Don't you think that it seems like a very curious coalition: the Pope allied to François, who is allied to the Grand Turk?'

Was he trying to sound out my feelings for the Grand Turk? Or to find out what could have taken place with Harun Pasha?

‘I think that the Grand Turk, however powerful he may be, is not in a position to decide the outcome of a war in Italy. A hundred men taking part on the battlefield are more important than a hundred thousand men at the other side of the continent.'

‘Who is the strongest in Italy, in your opinion?'

‘There was a battle at Pavia, and we should drawn our conclusions from it.'

My reply evidently pleased him. His tone became friendly, even admiring.

‘I am happy to hear these words, because, in Rome the Pope is hesitant and your friend Guicciardini is pushing him to attack Charles and ally himself with François, at the very moment when the King of France is the emperor's prisoner. In my position I cannot express my reservations without giving the impression of fearing a confrontation with the empire, but you will soon realize that this mad Giovanni is not entirely devoid of wisdom and this great sage
Guicciardini is on the point of committing a folly and of making the Pope commit one as well.'

Thinking that he had spoken too seriously, he began to tell a succession of anecdotes about his latest wild boar hunt. Before returning abruptly to the charge:

‘You should say what you think to the Pope. Why don't you come back to Rome with me?'

I had in fact intended to put an end to my seemingly endless enforced stay in Bologna. I hastened to accept his offer, telling myself that a journey at Giovanni's side would be extremely pleasant, and without danger, since no brigand would dare to approach such a procession. And so, the very next day, I found myself on the road again with Maddalena and Giuseppe, surrounded by the fearsome warriors of the Black Bands, who became, on this occasion, the most attentive of companions.

After three days' march, we arrived at Giovanni's residence, a magnificent castle called Il Trebbio, where we spent a night. Early the next morning we reached Florence.

‘You must be the only Medici who does not know this city!' exclaimed the condottiere.

‘On the way to Pavia with Guicciardini we almost stopped here, but we had no time.'

‘He must be a real barbarian, that “time” which prevents you seeing Florence!'

And he added immediately:

‘Time presses on this occasion too, but I would not forgive myself if I did not show you around.'

I had never before visited a city with an army as a guide. All along the Via Larga to the Palazzo Medici, where we burst into the colonnaded courtyard, it was a regular morning parade. A servant came to invite us in, but Giovanni refused curtly.

‘Is Master Alessandro there?'

‘I think he is asleep.'

‘And Master Ippolito?'

‘He is asleep too. Should I wake them up?'

Giovanni shrugged his shoulders disdainfully and turned back.
Leaving the courtyard he went several paces to the right to show me a building under construction:

‘The church of San Lorenzo. This is where Michelangelo Buonarotti works now, but I don't dare to take you there because he could easily show us the door. He has little love for the Medici and besides he has an unpleasant character. Indeed, that was why he came back to Florence. Most of our great artists live in Rome. But Leo X, who gathered so many talented people around him, preferred to send Michelangelo away and give him a commission here.'

He resumed the tour in the direction of the Duomo. On both sides of the road the houses seemed to be well laid out and tastefully embellished, but there were very few as luxurious as those in Rome.

The Eternal City is full of works of art,' my guide acknowledged, ‘but Florence is itself a work of art, and it is to the Florentines that we owe the best in all disciplines.'

I thought I was listening to a Fassi talking!

When we reached the Piazza della Signoria, and when a notable of a certain age, dressed in a long robe, came up to Giovanni to exchange a few words with him, a group of people began to chant
‘Palle! Palle!'
, the rallying cry of the Medici, to which my companion replied with a salute, saying to me:

‘Don't think that all the members of my family would be acclaimed in this fashion. I am the only one who still enjoys some favour with the Florentines. If, for instance, my cousin Julius, I should say Pope Clement, were to decide to come here today, he would be booed and jostled. Moreover, he knows it very well.'

‘But isn't it your native city?'

‘Ah, my friend, Florence is a strange mistress for the Medici! When we are far off, she calls us with loud cries; when we come back, she curses us.'

‘What does she want today?'

He had a worried air. He stopped his horse in the middle of the street, at the very entrance to the Ponte Vecchio, on which the crowd had parted to let him pass through, and from which some cheers were coming.

‘Florence wants to be governed by a prince, on condition that it should be governed as a republic. Every time that our ancestors forgot this, they had cause to regret it bitterly. Today the Medici are represented in the city of their birth by that presumptuous young Alessandro. He is barely fifteen, and he thinks that because he is a
Medici and the son of the Pope, Florence belongs to him, women and goods.'

‘Son of the Pope?'

My surprise was genuine. Giovanni burst out laughing.

‘Don't tell me that you have lived seven years in Rome without knowing that Alessandro was Clement's bastard?'

I confessed my ignorance. He was delighted to enlighten me:

‘At a time when he was still neither Pope nor cardinal, my cousin knew a Moorish slavegirl in Naples, who bore him this son.'

We were going back up towards the Palazzo Pitti. Soon, we crossed the Porta Romana, where Giovanni was cheered once more. But, sunk in his thoughts, he did not reply to the crowd. I hastened to do so in his place, which amused my son Giuseppe so much that all along the road he constantly begged me to make the same gestures, bursting out with laughter each time.

The very day of our arrival in Rome, Giovanni of the Black Bands insisted that we should go to the Pope together. We found him in conclave with Guicciardini, who did not seem at all pleased at our arrival. He had probably just convinced the Holy Father to take some painful decision and feared that Giovanni might make him change his mind. To conceal his anxiety, and to sound out our intentions, he adopted, as was his wont, a jocular tone: