Not many people throughout history have had a noun named in their honor. Fewer still have inspired both a noun and an adjective. One such man was Niccolò Machiavelli. To be Machiavellian is to act in a scrupulous, cunning, or underhanded manner. It’s not the most flattering legacy but there was far more to Niccolò Machiavelli than that.

Niccolò Machiavelli was born in Florence, Italy on May 3rd, 1469, the third child and first son of an aristocratic attorney named Bernardo di Niccolò Machiavelli. Family members held important political positions in Florence. However, Bernardo was among the least wealthy of the family members. In fact, during Niccolo’s youth, his father struggled with debt. Bernardo’s interest in education, however, ensured that his son had access to a good education.

Machiavelli was born at a turbulent time in Italian history. From Rome, the pope had been warring against the Italian city-states. At the same time, the Holy Roman Empire, France, and Spain contested these states, including Florence. Florence had become a key banking center under the influence of the Medici family, who, by the time of Machiavelli's birth, had become the effective rulers of the state.

An intellectual movement, known as the Renaissance, combining Christianity, with an interest in classical culture and reasoning, was developing at the time.

Machiavelli’s education included grammar, rhetoric, and Latin. Even though he lived in a city where the study of ancient Greek was prominent, he seems not to have been instructed in that language.

In 1494, the Medici family was expelled from Florence and a republic was established.
When he was 29 years of age, Machiavelli was pressed into government service in the Florentine Republic during a time of social upheaval. He was made the chair of the second chancery and then the secretary of the Dieci di Libertas e di Pace. This was a 10-man council that had the job of establishing and maintaining diplomatic relations with other states.

In his position as head of this body, Machiavelli embarked upon several international missions. In 1503 he was sent to Pistoia in the Tuscany region in an attempt to broker peace between opposing factions. When he was unable to get the two sides to come to a settlement, Machiavelli banished their leaders from the city. Over the next few years, he got a first-hand view of the brutal state-building methods employed by Italian cardinal Cesare Borgia and his father Pope Alexander VI. This, along with his observations of the corruption of the French church on occasional missions there, influenced his negative view of the church and influenced the writing of his most famous written work, The Prince.

Around 1505, Machiavelli began to build the Florentine militia. Rather than recruiting foreign mercenaries, who he considered to be unreliable, he relied on an armed citizenry. His militia consisted of four hundred farmers, who he armed with lances and small firearms.

In 1509, Machiavelli’s citizen army defeated an attack from the city-state of Pisa. Three years later, though, the Medicis, with the backing of Pope Julius II, and the assistance of Spanish forces, successfully laid siege to Florence. This brought an end to the Florentine state republic. Machiavelli was dismissed and banished from the city of his birth for 12 months. Then the Medicis accused him of hatching a conspiracy to overthrow them. He was thrown in prison. Over a period of three weeks, he was tortured to extract his confession. However, he confessed his innocence and was subsequently set free.



Credits:
Illustration - Jonathan Benbow bongwedesign.com
Script - Steve Theunissen
Voice Actor - James Fowler

Almost in F - Tranquillity by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Source: http://incompetech.com/music/royalty-free/index.html?isrc=USUAN1100394

Artist: http://incompetech.com/