Machiavelli and Guicciardini on the Fate of Renaissance Italy

Abstract

By the early sixteenth century Italy was the richest, most prosperous and advanced country in Europe, the centre of the Catholic world. Yet, it was the scene of wars fought by neighbouring powers for dominance of the peninsula. On the one hand, paradoxically, they contributed to a sharpening of the proto-national consciousness, fuelled also by the historical memory of the former greatness of ancient Rome. On the other hand, the cultural and political situation called for a reflection on the immediate situation and the fate of the country. This problem was most clearly expressed in the writings of the Florentines Niccolò Machiavelli and Francesco Guicciardini, including their polemics on whether Italy would have benefited from unification under one of its states, what was the role of the Church in its history, and finally whether the Renaissance heyday foreshadowed the tragic events of the early modern period. Both thinkers were supporters of a republican order, yet both were forced by circumstances to collaborate with the Medici family. Machiavelli, in his famous treatise The Prince, expresses hope for the unification of Italy under the Medici; Ghicciardini, in his Maxims and Meditations (Ricordi) and in his commentaries on Machiavelli's History of Rome by Titus Livy, is more sceptical; in his view, the Renaissance prosperity of Italy owes much to her polycentrism. These texts are well known and have been evaluated in various ways and are still controversial to this day.