La legazione di Ferrara del Cardinale Giulio Sacchetti (1627-1631) (review)

Abstract

La legazione di Ferrara del Cardinale Giulio Sacchetti (1627-1631). Edited by Irene Fosi with the coUaboration of Andrea Gardi. Two volumes. [CoUectanea Archivi Vaticani, 58.] (Vatican City:Archivio Segreto Vaticano. 2006. Pp. Ivi, 341. £75,00.) In 1598 the Duchy of Ferrara, which theoreticaEy had always been subject to papal authority, passed to direct papal rule when the last Este duke in the direct line died without heirs. The papacy left local governmental structures and elites intact, but exerted overaU control though a legate. In December I626 the papacy appointed Cardinal Giulio Sacchetti (1587-1663) to be legate to Ferrara. From a Florentine Republican family which had moved to Rome in the 1530's, Sacchetti obtained a doctorate in canon and civE law from the University of Pisa, became a priest, and entered the papal diplomatic service as a supporter and creature of the Barberini family. He was papal nuncio to Spain (I624-I626), where he developed a strong antipathy against Spanish influence in Italy, and was made a cardinal in I626. He entered Ferrara onApril 15, 1627, and left on July 12, 1 631. Legations normaUy lasted three years; the outbreak of plague caused the papacy to extend his term. Papacy and legate communicated by letter: Rome sent instructions and the legate responded on a weekly, sometimes daEy basis. These two substantial volumes contain 1,531 letters exchanged between the legate and the papacy, the latter usuaUy represented by the cardinal secretary of state, Francesco Barberini, the nephew of Pope Urban VIII. After his legation was finished, Sacchetti was legate to Bologna, 1637-1640, and might have become pope in 1644 or 1655, had Spain not vetoed his candidacy. As legate Sacchetti exercised both spiritual and temporal authority. As spiritual ruler he oversaw the bishops of the nine dioceses in the Ferrara state, heard appeals from those convicted of violating canon laws, and conceded matrimonial dispensations. But temporal government was far and away the larger part of his job. As governor of every aspect of the Ferrarese state, the legate had the power of appointing and removing public officials, punishing rebels, convoking local assemblies, and doing anything else necessary for the maintenance of public order and papal authority. In practice, he worked with communal organs, feudatories, and local elites; he often mediated. The responsibiEties were heavy; Sacchetti had to ensure that there was enough grain, oE, and wine for the people in a time of scarcity. He had to provide for the security of the state and to fend off threats. This was no easy task, as Venice continuaUy violated Ferrara's sovereignty and interfered with Ferrara's access to the Po River. The letters provide valuable information about the issues and practices of governance of a smaU state in the old regime. The legate also represented papal interests and papal diplomacy in northern Italy. The dominating crisis in Sacchetti's tenure was the War of the Mantuan Succession. On December 25, 1627, Vincenzo II Gonzaga, Duke of Mantua and Monferrato, died without heirs. Carlo Gonzaga-Nevers, of a cadet branch of the family and supported by France, dashed to Mantua and seized power in mid-January 1628. The Habsburgs, who had a long and strong connection with the Gonzaga through feudal ties, marriage aUiances, and military service, preferred a candidate from another cadet branch. The succession mattered a great deal to both France and Spain, because Mantua and Monferrato were strategic military positions in northern Italy. …