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Not much need be said here of the church of São Francisco or of the chapel of São Braz, both begun at about the same time. São Francisco was long in building, for it was begun by Affonso V. in 1460 and not finished till 1501.
Cesare, being a Pope's son, had nothing to look to but the influence of his father. At first he designed to use this influence in the Church; but after murdering his elder brother, he threw aside the Cardinal's scarlet and proclaimed himself a political aspirant. His father could not make him lord of any state, unless it were a portion of the territory of the Church: and though, by creating, as he did, twelve Cardinals in one day, he got the Sacred College to sanction his investiture of the Duchy of Romagna, yet both Venice and Milan were opposed to this scheme. Again there was a difficulty to be encountered in the great baronial houses of Orsini and Colonna, who at that time headed all the mercenary troops of Italy, and who, as Roman nobles, had a natural hatred for the Pope. It was necessary to use their aid in the acquisition of Cesare's principality. It was no less needful to humor their animosity. Under these circumstances Alexander thought it best to invite the French king into Italy, bargaining with Louis that he would dissolve his marriage in return for protection awarded to Cesare. The Colonna faction meanwhile was to be crushed, and the Orsini to be flattered. Cesare, by the help of his French allies and the Orsini captains, took possession of Imola and Faenza, and thence proceeded to overrun Romagna. In this enterprise he succeeded to the full. Romagna had been, from the earliest period of Italian history, a nest of petty tyrants who governed badly and who kept no peace in their dominions. Therefore the towns were but languid in their opposition to Cesare, and were soon more than contented with a conqueror who introduced a good system for the administration of justice. But now two difficulties arose. The subjugation of Romagna had been effected by the help of the French and the Orsini. Cesare as yet had formed no militia of his own, and his allies were becoming suspicious. The Orsini had shown some slackness at Faenza; and when Cesare proceeded to make himself master of Urbino, and to place a foot in Tuscany by the capture of Piombino which conquests he completed during 1500 and 1501 Louis began to be jealous of him. The problem for the Duke was how to disembarrass himself of the two forces by which he had acquired a solid basis for his future principality. His first move was to buy over the Cardinal d'Amboise, whose influence in the French Court was supreme and thus to keep his credit for awhile afloat with Louis. His second was to neutralize the power of the Orsini, partly by pitting them against the Colonnesi, and partly by superseding them in their command as captains. For the latter purpose he became his own Condottiere, drawing to his standard by the lure of splendid pay all the minor gentry of the Roman Campagna. Thus he collected his own forces and was able to dispense with the unsafe aid of mercenary troops. At this point of his career the Orsini, finding him established in Romagna, in Urbino, and in part of Tuscany, while their own strength was on the decline, determined if possible to check the career of this formidable tyrant by assassination. The conspiracy known as the 'Diet of La Magione' was the consequence. In this conjuration the Cardinal Orsini, Paolo Orsini, his brother and head of the great house, together with Vitellozzo Vitelli, lord of Citt
There were, however, efforts from time to time to follow up the discoveries of the Cabots. The merchants of Bristol do not seem to have been disappointed with the result of the Cabot enterprises, for as early as in 1501 they sent out a new expedition across the Atlantic.
He writes disdainfully about the title, even to his Dutch friends who in former days had helped him on in his studies for the express purpose of obtaining the doctor's degree. As early as 1501, to Anna of Borselen he writes, 'Go to Italy and obtain the doctor's degree? Foolish projects, both of them.
Saraceni to Ercole, Rome, September 16th. Rome, September 23d, Saraceni. Despatch, September 25th. To this Ercole replied in reassuring terms. Letter to his orators in Rome, September 18, 1501. Despatch of Matteo Canale to Ercole, Rome, September 18, 1501. Both bulls are in the archives of Modena. The first is a copy, the second an original.
Severe cold, and a veritable river of gigantic blocks of ice prevented the expedition from going farther north, and it returned to Portugal bringing back with it fifty-seven natives. The very year of his return, on the 15th of May, 1501, Gaspard Cortereal, in pursuance of an order of the 15th of April, received provisions, and left Lisbon in the hope of extending the field of his discoveries.
Burchard, the faithful and unimpeachable chronicler of this court, describes in his diary how, one evening, in October, 1501, the Pope sent for fifty courtesans to be brought to his chamber; after supper, in the presence of Cæsar Borgia and his young sister Lucrezia, they danced with the servitors and others who were present, at first clothed, afterwards naked.
The orator Manfredo Manfredi to Ercole, Florence, November 22 and 24, 1501. The duke to his ambassadors in Rome, October 7, 1501. Ercole to Gerardo Saraceni, November 24, 1501. Other letters of like import were written by the duke to his plenipotentiaries. Ercole to Gerardo Saraceni in Rome, October 11, 1501. Despatch of the Ferrarese ambassadors to Ercole, Rome, October 31, 1501.
This is the first of the letters regarding this subject in the archives of Modena. Ercole's letter to his ambassador in Florence, Manfredo Manfredi, April 25, 1501. Archives of Modena. Ferrari to Ercole, May 1, 1501. Girolamo Saerati to Ercole, Rome, May 8, 1501. Bartolomeo de' Cavallieri, Ferrarese ambassador to France, to Ercole, Chalons, May 26, 1501.
Up from the south he had come in an age when the seas he sailed were no less strange than the land he touched from time to time; the blue waste of sky and sea as boundless then as now; the west wind drift as sure and unfailing; the waves as savage or as mild; the star by which he laid his course as far away and immutable, but he came in 1501 and his ship was alone in the trackless ocean.
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