The House of Medici Read online

  ‘Cosimo had always felt a slight resentment at living in Oltrarno—on the wrong side of the river and in La Scala, a Bardi Gonfalone. The traditional power base of the Medici lay round his father’s houses in Via Larga and Piazza del Duomo, and he felt he ought to be there. Now that he was playing an important part in the government of the city, it was important, he said, for him to live in the Gonfalone of Leon d’Oro, within the Quartiere of Santa Maria Novella.

  ‘So a year after his return from exile, Cosimo moved the family from the Palazzo Bardi, north, across the river, to Giovanni di Bicci’s old house, on the Via Larga. His son Piero knocked it down in the end, to complete the gardens of the Palazzo Medici; but for nine years we lived there, on the Via Larga, in what the family referred to as the Casa Vecchia, and we watched and we listened as the new palazzo was being built next door.’

  ***

  PALAZZO BARDI, FLORENCE

  12th October 1435

  ‘Why don’t you put that lip away, Lotta, before you trip over it? Sulking is demeaning in a woman of quality.’

  Maddalena pauses as she passes the doorway. She knows she shouldn’t eavesdrop, but it isn’t often she hears Cosimo berating his wife like that. Rare to hear him use her real name nowadays. She allows herself a smile and begins to make her way down the steps.

  ‘This place is a dump! It’s small, it’s noisy and it’s overcrowded. And worse than that, it’s surrounded by ruffians.’ Contessina’s voice is booming along the corridor.

  ‘Via Larga is not sophisticated enough for your refined tastes?’ Cosimo’s voice turns silky smooth.

  Maddalena winces. She knows what’s coming. When Cosimo loses his temper and shouts, she can jolly him round in minutes. But when his voice starts to get cold and sarcastic, she knows it’s time to run for cover, because it means he won’t stop until he has destroyed you. It’s a rare mood and one to be avoided at all costs.

  And it only arises if you criticise the family. His family.

  Normally hidden, there is, she knows, a deep sensitivity amongst the Medici on the subject of their ‘ordinary’ roots. Giovanni di Bicci had made a virtue of it and so, on the surface, does Cosimo. But deep down, he is ashamed of not being noble; either as he once admitted, by birth, by example, or by deportment. ‘We are,’ he once said to her, when in a particularly maudlin mood, ‘street traders, by origin and by instinct. It is our strength but also our weakness.’

  No accident, then, that Giovanni di Bicci married Cosimo to a Bardi, and his brother Lorenzo to a Cavalcanti. She wonders, when the time comes, who Cosimo will choose for his sons. The girl seems to be an obvious choice. It can be no accident that little Lucrezia has been invited to live amongst the family. A Tornabuoni. Few better, they say, and by all accounts, she is one of the best. Certainly she is one of the brightest.

  ‘It’s ridiculous. This house is too small—smaller than the Palazzo Bardi, and with all the visitors we have every day, I feel crowded out in my own home.’

  Maddalena waits on the top step. She can’t miss this. What will his reply be? She knows that Cosimo hated living in Oltrarno. The Borgo Pidiglioso, Flea Lane as they used to call it, was Bardi country. They had been surrounded, Cosimo had once said, ‘smothered’ by the Bardi, and he had been delighted when the opportunity finally came to move back to his natural environment in the Leon d’Oro.

  ‘Sit down woman, and for once in your life, listen.’ The voice is seething, but controlled in its anger. ‘It is not your home, it is the Medici family home. You are married to me and as such, you are part of it and you will accept its manner of doing things.’

  Phew! Maddalena decides she has heard enough. Quietly she creeps on down the stairs. As far as she can remember, it is the only time he has ever contradicted his wife in public, within earshot of a dozen servants at least, and it makes her realise that with the move across the river, things really have changed. Being a Bardi no longer counts as much as it did in the past and it is clear the Medici family now see themselves in a new and more powerful light.

  She reaches the foot of the stairs and pauses. Come to think of it, that’s not the only sign of a parting of the ways between the Medici and the Bardi. Not only has Cosimo moved his house away from the Bardi enclave, but he has also broken the long-standing tradition of having a Bardi as his General Manager at the Bank.

  When Ilarione de’ Bardi had died in the January before Cosimo was exiled, he had replaced him with his nephew, Lipaccio di Benedetto de’ Bardi. But when they returned from exile and the contracts were renewed, Lipaccio was dispensed with and in his place, Giovanni d’Amerigo Benci and Antonio di Messer Francesco Salutati had been installed as joint General Managers.

  None of them had appreciated the fact at the time, but now she realises that that decision had been an indication of the future; that by doing what he had done, Cosimo had begun to break away from the framework of guidance with which his father had tried to surround, and instead started to shape his own future.

  Part of that future is to delegate more of the management of the bank to his professional managers and to turn his own attention towards more public involvement in the government of the city. And, she tells herself, in the process, moving the balance of his attention from Contessina, to her.

  With that significant thought in her head, she continues down the next flight of stairs. Smiling.

  ***

  ‘What was his wife’s reaction to being told off like that?’ Madonna Arcangelica seemed far more interested in the family’s private arguments than in the niceties of the management of the Bank or the politics of the city.

  Maddalena noted the limitations in her thinking; conscious that the abbess had not fully realised the significance of what she had just been told. Nevertheless, she allowed her question to lead them forward.

  ‘Contessina went red in the face at so public a rebuke and sulked for two weeks. I knew she would try to get her own back, because she was, deep down, both spoiled and petulant. Soon it became clear how she planned to do it.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘She used the only weapon she had left: the children.’

  ‘How old were they, by this time?’

  ‘Piero was nineteen. Quite grown up in his stuttering, hesitant way, and trying hard but ineffectually to emulate his father, so he was no longer considered one of the children. Giovanni was thirteen and Carlo, my boy, was coming up to his seventh birthday.’

  ‘Quite a spread. Hardly a close group, I suppose?’

  Maddalena shook her head. ‘They might not have been such good friends had not little Lucrezia Tornabuoni, who was just a year older than Carlo, started to become a regular, almost daily visitor. She and Carlo were like twins and they went everywhere together, always following Giovanni.

  ‘The Tornabuoni were a fine family; rich wool traders who did a great deal of business with the Medici and were considered close friends. Francesco di Simone Tornabuoni was descended from a long line of nobili de torri—long-standing landed nobility.

  ‘The original family name had been Tornaquinci, but Francesco’s branch of the family had changed their names in order to be able to accept positions in the government, which by this time, they did regularly. Nanna, Francesco’s wife, was of an equally old family, and their daughter Lucrezia seemed to have inherited the best of both of them. She had her father’s business brain and her mother’s sense of style and propriety, despite also having her mother’s plain looks.

  ‘They lived a short distance away from us, in the same Quartiere of Santa Maria Novella and in addition to their palazzo on the road running north from Ponte Santa Trinita, they also owned a row of fine houses beside the river, along the Lungarno, as well as a number of estates in the country. That little Lucrezia was to make a great deal of difference to all of our lives, we did not yet know; but at the time of which I speak, Contessina, who had been told to bring up Carlo as her own, tried hard to keep all three of them from me.’

  ‘And did she succ
eed?’

  Maddalena laughed. ‘Absolutely not.’

  ***

  PALAZZO BARDI, FLORENCE

  12th October 1435

  ‘Mr Ambassador, I cannot stress enough the importance of what I have just told you.’

  ‘I agree and I accept your assurances completely.’ The Milanese ambassador looks at Cosimo and nods gravely. War and the avoidance of war are as important as any subject to a diplomat.

  Maddalena sees the relief on Cosimo’s face. She knows he had expected more difficulty; prevarication certainly, and even real barriers to progress; perhaps as much as a downright refusal. This reaction is better than expected. Gently does it now.

  ‘There is one small issue . . .’ The ambassador begins, and then pauses as he sees Cosimo’s eyes stray towards the open window.

  Maddalena follows his gaze as Cosimo turns towards her for assistance.

  Just outside the window, rising and falling invitingly within reach, is a small parcel; a box, made of stiff paper, wrapped carefully in ribbon, being lowered and raised gently on a long, thin piece of twine.

  Maddalena frowns, although to Cosimo’s experienced eye it is an amused and tolerant frown. She shakes her head. ‘Ignore it.’

  But Cosimo has forgotten what he was saying and besides, the ambassador has now turned and is standing beside Maddalena, facing the window, and examining the small parcel quizzically. ‘What is it?’

  Cosimo recovers, now grinning. ‘I fear I am discovered. I suspect it is a secret message from one of my spies.’

  The ambassador steps back and before his consternation can get the better of him; Cosimo reaches through the window, and untying the twine, retrieves the box.

  Closely watched by the ambassador, he opens the box. Inside, as Maddalena expected, is a small, slightly overcooked cake. Play-acting somewhat, for the benefit of the ambassador, who is now standing close to him, Cosimo breaks the cake open and reveals a folded piece of paper. He unfolds it; one, twice, then begins to read the spidery handwriting.

  He looks furtively at the ambassador, and then hands the box, the cake and the piece of paper to Maddalena. ‘It’s for you.’

  Now she is the centre of the ambassador’s attention. She reads the note. Meet us in the loggia in one hour. (Signed) The Secret Three.

  The ambassador is craning his neck to read the words. But maintaining the play, she walks away from him, takes a pen and writes a reply on the back. I will be there. Then she signs it, puts it in the box and, walking across to the window, and ties the string again.

  She looks at the ambassador, who is watching the whole charade with silent fascination. ‘Our secret code.’ Then, slowly and ostentatiously, she tugs three times on the string and lets go. With a series of irregular jerks, the box rises from view and disappears.

  Maddalena closes the window and nods silently to Cosimo, who gives a formal half-bow to the ambassador. ‘Please excuse the interruption. Now, where was I?’

  For a moment, the Milanese ambassador, mouth agape, seems lost for words. Then he shakes his head. ‘Avoiding a war, was it?’

  ***

  ‘How long did these games continue?’ The abbess was still grinning.

  Maddalena wondered how long it would be before little Elena was enrolled in cooking lessons. Somehow, she thought, not long.

  ‘Oh, for years, although they changed later. About a year after Lucrezia began to come to us, the relationship was formalised. She became part of our family, on the understanding that she would share the Medici humanistic education, and soon after, she was joined by one of her brothers.’

  ‘Lucrezia had a brother?’

  ‘She had six. Five of them were older than she was, but little Giovanni Battista was eighteen months younger.’

  ‘Six months younger than your son Carlo, then?’

  ‘Exactly. And that’s why they all got on so well. Giovanni di Cosimo was the self-appointed leader and Lucrezia, Carlo, and Giovanni Battista formed the rest of ‘The Secret Four’ who followed him around everywhere. It was the beginning of lifelong friendships.

  ‘Did they remain close, in later years? The children?’

  Maddalena looked at the interest on the abbess’ face and thought how sad it was that the convent did not manage to attract more children. She obviously adored them and watching her with little Elena, it was clear how well children responded to her in turn.

  She nodded. ‘Yes, but not, perhaps, as we might have guessed. Giovanni Battista later joined the Medici Bank and ran the Papal branch in Rome, while Lucrezia married into the family.’

  ‘Of course! She married Giovanni, didn’t she? Tell me she did?’ Madonna Arcangelica looked delighted that it had all worked out so well.

  Maddalena shook her head. ‘Unfortunately not. It was, in my opinion, the biggest single mistake that Cosimo ever made in his life. But I can hear the bell calling us. I shall have to tell you about Lucrezia another day.’

  Outside, the clear sky had been replaced by another torn bank of purple and grey cloud, swirling in from the north. Already the ridge of the hill beside the Badia di Buonsollazzo had disappeared. There would be another snowstorm that night, and by the look of it, a heavy one.

  What a winter.

  Chapter 13

  Salutation

  13th February 1458

  Suora Maddalena stared at the pristine pages of her journal and realised that she was still afraid of them. For week after week, when she was not sitting with the abbess, she had retreated here, to her tower cell, opened her journal, and looked at it, reading the first words that she had written. But week after week she had been unable to continue.

  Now, once again she looked at the words; the first words that she had written. She had been confident then, that he would visit her very soon, and that the final stages of the plan would quickly be confirmed and put into place. But now, after four months of silence, she was not so sure.

  Yes it had been the coldest winter for twenty years, and judging by the view from their mountain top, the path between Florence and the Mugello valleys had probably been impassable for weeks. But mere weather had never stopped the Medici before, and any suggestion to Cosimo that a message sent by him had not been delivered because of a snowfall would have been treated with derision.

  But if not the weather, then what? Had he changed his mind? Had circumstances changed? Was she, indeed, still part of the arrangements at all? With every silent week that passed, her confidence slipped further, and with it, her indecision as to what to write had grown.

  She had even, on occasions, sat in front of the journal and asked herself whether Cosimo had been taken ill or was even—God protect us from the thought—dead. Everything was possible; a riding accident (improbable on that ponderous mule), poison in his food (a considered possibility for many years of his life), or, more prosaically, a bad bout of gout, confining him painfully to his bed.

  She still felt overawed, because the journal had been a present from Cosimo and, she knew, carefully chosen. She was nervous because the pages were so new, and because she had already made a mistake on the first page. But more than that, she was afraid; because she still hoped that one day Cosimo himself would read what she had written. Yet now, she was no longer sure what to write.

  She had felt she had so much to say, so much, now that she was a free woman, to tell him; things she could never have said as his slave. But now, when it came to putting pen to paper, she could not bring herself to do it. And with every passing week, the problem grew worse rather than better.

  How should she address him? She thought she had decided that, but now, after weeks of agonising, the question seemed to have become insurmountable once again. Many years ago, in their first months, she had called him ‘master’ as befitted the relationship between a slave and the man who owned her, but as time went by and as their private intimacy behind closed doors had grown, the word had come to have a different connotation: master as the partner to mistress.

  A
t first, it had been a gradual change, with little said; simply exchanges of expression, movements and mannerisms, and then, one afternoon, as he went to take her in his private bedroom in the Palazzo Bardi in Florence, she had seen him wince with pain; his manhood stolen by the stab of arthritis at the critical moment.

  She did not know to this day what had given her the courage to do it. But she had done it, and it had worked. From that moment on, but only when they were alone, he had insisted she call him Cosimo and he, a twinkle of secret satisfaction in his eye, had called her Fantinina—his little jockey.

  But that had been more than three years into their relationship, and a matter of absolute privacy between them. Maddalena looked at the page in front of her and shook her head. Such thoughts were inappropriate. Here, on the written page, such private memories would always be out of place. Here, she should surely refer to the extent to which he had changed her life. For although he had begun as her master, never once had he treated her as a slave and never once had she felt like one when in his company. Instead, from that first encounter in Venice, he had proved to be her saviour; her rescuer.

  She had certainly been afraid on their first night; afraid of the unknown. But to her surprise, he had been gentle with her, recognising her virginity and taking his time, cajoling rather than demanding; guiding her into accepting him. It was an initiation she looked back on with tingling pleasure and gratitude. He had been a good teacher and she had, without doubt, been a more than willing pupil.

  His teaching had extended beyond the bedroom, and into the studiolo. He had tested her reading and writing and made her practice daily, to improve them both. He had explained his books of account; the concepts of wealth as assets and obligations as liabilities, how the system of double-entry bookkeeping acknowledged that what was an asset to one party in a transaction automatically became a liability in the other’s eyes. Recognising that relationship, he had shown her how to set out the inter-branch ledgers in order to keep account of the separate value of each branch of the bank, and yet to calculate its overall profitability from one year to another. He had been her guide; her mentor.