Beatrice d'Este (29 June 1475 – 3 January 1497), was Duchess of
Bari
Bari ( , ; nap, label= Barese, Bare ; lat, Barium) is the capital city of the Metropolitan City of Bari and of the Apulia region, on the Adriatic Sea, southern Italy. It is the second most important economic centre of mainland Southern Italy a ...
and Milan by marriage to
Ludovico Sforza (known as "il Moro"). She was one of the most important personalities of the time and, despite her short life, she was a major player in Italian politics. A woman of culture, an important
patron
Patronage is the support, encouragement, privilege, or financial aid that an organization or individual bestows on another. In the history of art, arts patronage refers to the support that kings, popes, and the wealthy have provided to artists su ...
, a
leader
Leadership, both as a research area and as a practical skill, encompasses the ability of an individual, group or organization to "lead", influence or guide other individuals, teams, or entire organizations. The word "leadership" often gets vi ...
in fashion: alongside her illustrious husband she made
Milan
Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...
one of the greatest capitals of the
European Renaissance
The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass ideas ...
. With her own determination and bellicose nature, she was the soul of the Milanese resistance against the enemy French during the
first
First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1).
First or 1st may also refer to:
*World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement
Arts and media Music
* 1$T, American rapper, singer-songwriter, DJ, and rec ...
of the
Italian Wars
The Italian Wars, also known as the Habsburg–Valois Wars, were a series of conflicts covering the period 1494 to 1559, fought mostly in the Italian peninsula, but later expanding into Flanders, the Rhineland and the Mediterranean Sea. The pr ...
, when her intervention was able to repel the threats of the
Duke of Orléans
Duke of Orléans (french: Duc d'Orléans) was a French royal title usually granted by the King of France to one of his close relatives (usually a younger brother or son), or otherwise inherited through the male line. First created in 1344 by King ...
, who was on the verge of conquering Milan.
[; ; ; ; .]
Life
Childhood
Birth
![Sperandio savelli, ercole I d'este, 1475 ca](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b5/Sperandio_savelli%2C_ercole_I_d%27este%2C_1475_ca._01.JPG)
She was born on 29 June 1475 in the
Castello Estense
The ' (‘ Este castle’) or ' (‘St. Michael's castle’) is a moated medieval castle in the center of Ferrara, northern Italy. It consists of a large block with four corner towers.
History
On 3 May 1385, the Ferrarese people, driven to des ...
of
Ferrara
Ferrara (, ; egl, Fràra ) is a city and ''comune'' in Emilia-Romagna, northern Italy, capital of the Province of Ferrara. it had 132,009 inhabitants. It is situated northeast of Bologna, on the Po di Volano, a branch channel of the main stream ...
, second child of
Ercole I d'Este
Ercole I d'Este KG (English: ''Hercules I''; 26 October 1431 – 25 January 1505) was Duke of Ferrara from 1471 until 1505. He was a member of the House of Este. He was nicknamed ''North Wind'' and ''The Diamond''.
Biography
Ercole was born i ...
and
Eleonora d'Aragona. The Duke of Ferrara longed for a male heir, so her birth was welcomed as a disgrace.
Childhood in Naples (1477-1485)
Two years later Beatrice was taken to the Aragonese court with her mother and sister on the occasion of the second marriage of
King Ferrante with Joan of Aragon. The procession, escorted by Niccolò da Correggio, arrived in
Pisa
Pisa ( , or ) is a city and ''comune'' in Tuscany, central Italy, straddling the Arno just before it empties into the Ligurian Sea. It is the capital city of the Province of Pisa. Although Pisa is known worldwide for its leaning tower, the cit ...
and from there embarked on a galley arriving in
Naples
Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...
on 1 June 1477. On 19 September, Eleonora gave birth to
Ferrante and when less than a month later she had to return to Ferrara, she decided to take her eldest daughter Isabella with her, while King Ferrante convinced her to leave both the newborn and Beatrice in Naples, with whom he had immediately shown himself to be in love.
Beatrice thus lived in the Neapolitan city for eight years, entrusted to the care of the nurse Serena and the cultured and virtuous aunt
Ippolita Maria Sforza
Ippolita Maria Sforza (18 April 1445 – 20 August 1488) was an Italian noblewoman, a member of the Sforza family which ruled the Duchy of Milan from 1450 until 1535. She was the first wife of the Duke of Calabria, who later reigned as King Alfo ...
, and grew up between the ducal residence of
Castel Capuano
Castel Capuano is a castle in Naples, southern Italy. It takes its name from the fact that it was at that point in the city walls where the road led out to the city of Capua. The castle is at the southwest end of via dei Tribunali, and until re ...
, where she lived with her younger brother and with her three cousins,
Ferrandino,
Pietro
Pietro is an Italian masculine given name. Notable people with the name include:
People
* Pietro I Candiano (c. 842–887), briefly the 16th Doge of Venice
* Pietro Tribuno (died 912), 17th Doge of Venice, from 887 to his death
* Pietro II Can ...
and
Isabella
Isabella may refer to:
People and fictional characters
* Isabella (given name), including a list of people and fictional characters
* Isabella (surname), including a list of people
Places
United States
* Isabella, Alabama, an unincorpor ...
, and the royal residence of
Castel Nuovo, where the king and queen of Naples resided. Ferrante considered it a "same thing" with the infanta
Giovannella his daughter, so much so that the Este ambassador wrote in 1479 to her mother Eleonora that the father would also return her son, now that he was older, but not Beatrice, because "his majesty wants to give her in marriage and keep her for himself". Formally adopted by her grandfather, the child in those years came to sign herself simply "donna Beatrice de Aragonia" and learned to express herself in a mixture of Catalan, Castilian and Italian, a habit that she seems not to have preserved as an adult.
[Maria Serena Mazzi, Come rose d'inverno, le signore della corte estense nel '400, Nuovecarte, 2004, pp. 44-51.]
Marriage proposals
# In 1480 the Duke of Bari
Ludovico Sforza, known as ''il Moro'', regent of the Duchy of Milan in the name of his nephew Gian Galeazzo, began negotiations with Ercole d'Este to obtain the hand of his eldest daughter
Isabella
Isabella may refer to:
People and fictional characters
* Isabella (given name), including a list of people and fictional characters
* Isabella (surname), including a list of people
Places
United States
* Isabella, Alabama, an unincorpor ...
. This was not possible because the child had already been promised to
Francesco Gonzaga. Hercules did not want to give up the relationship with the Moro, who was at the time one of the richest and most influential men of the peninsula, so he put forward the proposal of the second daughter Beatrice who, with the consent of King Ferrante, was immediately accepted. The alliance proved very useful to the Duchy of Ferrara, constantly threatened by Venetian expansionism.
# In 1484 her aunt
Beatrice of Aragon
Beatrice of Naples (16 November 1457 – 23 September 1508), also known as Beatrice of Aragon ( hu, Aragóniai Beatrix; it, Beatrice d'Aragona), was twice Queen of Hungary and of Bohemia by marriage to Matthias Corvinus and Vladislaus II. S ...
, Queen of Hungary, proposed to her sister Eleonora an exchange: the eldest daughter Isabella would marry the King of Bohemia
Ladislaus II (alleged lover, then husband, of the same Beatrice of Aragon), Beatrice Francesco Gonzaga and the Moro another Neapolitan noblewoman. Eleonora replied that this "exchange" was not possible, both because Isabella was loved by the Gonzaga, and because Beatrice was under the absolute power of her grandfather Ferrante. He proposed, however, to deal with Ferrante to secretly betroth Beatrice to Władysław, so as to guarantee her a reserve husband in case Ludovico sought a wife "more in keeping with her age".
# In 1485 the Marquis
Boniface III of Monferrato, over sixty years old, widower and without heirs, but still "viripotens", hinted at marrying Beatrice; the proposal was probably not followed, both because of the great age difference (51 years), and because it needed a wife of childbearing age.
Adolescence ferrarese (1485-1490)
![Beatrice_d'Este_di_Cosmè_Tura](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/da/Beatrice_d%27Este_di_Cosm%C3%A8_Tura.jpg)
In 1485 Ludovico persuaded his in-laws to return Beatrice to Ferrara, so that she could be educated in a court more suited to her role (the Milanese had in fact a very bad opinion of the Neapolitans) and with the excuse of being able to visit her more easily (which she never did). King Ferrante denied her with "good and living reasons", saying that she was only ten years old, that he had taken her as a daughter and that she was not ready for the wedding. Moreover, if Ludovico had died early, her father would not have been able, like him, to find her a good husband. He even offered to give her the dowry in her place, in order to convince him to desist. Despite the strong protests, he reluctantly had to agree, after months of negotiations, to part with it. Immediately after the departure of his niece, he wrote embittered to his daughter Eleonora: "God knows how much we grieved, for the singular love we had for her virtues
..that seeing her and having her at home it seemed to us that we had you".
Given the importance of the groom, the parents tried to bring the wedding forward to 1488, but Louis made his father-in-law understand that he was too busy in the affairs of state and that the bride was still too young. The date was set for May 1490 and a dowry of 40,000 ducats was arranged; From May, however, Ludovico postponed to the summer, then canceled for the umpteenth time, disconcerting the dukes of Ferrara who at this point doubted his real will to marry Beatrice. The reason for this behavior was attributed to the well-known relationship that Ludovico had with the beautiful
Cecilia Gallerani
Cecilia Gallerani (; early 1473 – 1536) was the favourite and most celebrated of the many mistresses of Ludovico Sforza, known as Lodovico il Moro, Duke of Milan. She is best known as the subject of Leonardo da Vinci's painting '' The Lady ...
. To apologize for the constant postponements, in August 1490 he offered the bride a splendid necklace as a gift.
In Milan (1491-1497)
The wedding
The official nuptials were to have taken place in January 1491 in a double wedding with Beatrice marrying Ludovico and Isabella marrying Francesco at the same time, but the Duke of Bari postponed it more than once. Finally, around a year later, they were wed in a double Sforza-Este wedding: Ludovico married Beatrice, while Beatrice's brother, Alfonso d'Este, married
Anna Sforza
Anna Maria Sforza (21 July 1476 – 30 November 1497) was Hereditary Princess of Ferrara as the first wife of Alfonso I d'Este, future Duke of Ferrara. She was the second legitimate daughter of Galeazzo Maria Sforza, Duke of Milan, and his secon ...
, the sister of
Gian Galeazzo Sforza
Gian Galeazzo Sforza (20 June 1469 – 21 October 1494), also known as Giovan Galeazzo Sforza, was the sixth Duke of Milan.
Early life
Born in Abbiategrasso, he was only seven years old when in 1476 his father, Galeazzo Maria Sforza, was assa ...
.
Leonardo da Vinci
Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci (15 April 14522 May 1519) was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance who was active as a painter, Drawing, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. While his fame initially res ...
orchestrated the wedding celebration.
[Julia Cartwright, Beatrice d'Este duchessa di Milano.] In Milan Beatrice will have two people dear in particular: the son-in-law
Galeazzo Sanseverino, her faithful companion of adventures, and Bianca Giovanna, illegitimate daughter of Ludovico and wife of the aforementioned Galeazzo, at the time of her father's wedding a nine-year-old girl, whom Beatrice immediately loved and wanted with her on every occasion.
= Late consummation
=
The marriage was immediately declared consummated, in truth it remained secretly blank for over a month. Ludovico in fact, out of respect for the innocence of the bride, did not want to force her, but waited patiently for her to be willing to give herself spontaneously. The Dukes of Ferrara instead pressed to hasten the consummation: only in this way the marriage would be considered valid, vice versa it was subject to annulment, with serious dishonor of the family. Ludovico had opted for a seductive strategy, and combined caresses and kisses with very rich daily gifts.
[Daniela Pizzagalli, La dama con l'ermellino, vita e passioni di Cecilia Gallerani nella Milano di Ludovico il Moro, Rizzoli, 1999, pp. 119-120.]
Despite the efforts made to accustom her to love games, however, Beatrice remained "in superlative ashamed" and still in mid-February Ludovico had not been able to conclude anything: he complained about it with the Este ambassador Giacomo Trotti, saying that he had been forced to vent with Cecilia. The ambassador in turn reproached Beatrice for her frigidity and invited her to put "so much shame on the other side", by saying that "men want to be well seen and caressed, as is just and honest, by their wives", but without too much success, as she showed herself to him "a little wild".
Not even the continuous pressure exerted by the father on his daughter had any effect, indeed the more the insistences, the more Beatrice dodged her husband. The situation was finally resolved spontaneously shortly after, when in March–April trotti's letters of complaint turned into praise addressed by moro to his wife. Now he declared that he no longer thought of Cecilia, but only of Beatrice, "To whom he wants all his good, and takes great pleasure from her for her customs and good manners", praising her because "she was delighted by nature ... and very pleasant and nevertheless modest".
Duchess of Milan
Birth of Hercules Maximilian
After a carefree year spent among many amusements, Beatrice found herself expecting a child. On 20 January 1493 Eleonora of Aragon returned to Milan to assist her daughter during childbirth and brought with her from Ferrara comare Frasina, the midwife of the family. Two days later at the Sala del Tesoro in the Rocchetta of the Castello Sforzesco the gifts of the Milanese nobility were exhibited on tables covered with crimson gold velvet, offered to the Moro in view of the imminent birth of his son. Among these were "two beautiful diamonds" worth 18,000 ducats and a beautiful golden cradle, donated by his father-in-law Hercules. On 23 January Beatrice gave birth to her eldest son
Hercules Maximilian, baptized after her father Hercules (''Ercole''), to whom she always had an unconditional love, and later named Maximilian in honour of the
Emperor-elect Maximilian I.
[.]
Beatrice's primary concern was from that moment to ensure her son the succession to the Duchy of Milan, which, however, legitimately belonged to the son of her cousin Isabella, for whose purpose she persuaded her husband to appoint the little Maximilian as Count of Pavia, a title belonging exclusively to the heir to the duchy. Isabella, understanding the intentions of the spouses, wrote to her father Alfonso a heartfelt request for help. King Ferrante, however, had no intention of starting a war; on the contrary, he declared that he loved both granddaughters in the same way and invited them to prudence, so that the situation remained stable while the king was alive.
Diplomatic mission to Venice
![Ritratto di una signora di profilo](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/50/Ritratto_di_una_signora_di_profilo.jpg)
In May 1493 Ludovico decided to send his wife as his ambassador to Venice, in order to obtain the support of the Serenissima for his legitimacy as Duke of Milan. He thus aimed to test the intentions of the Republic, while concluding the agreements with Emperor Maximilian of Habsburg and granting him in marriage his niece Bianca Maria Sforza, accompanied by a fabulous dowry of 300 000 gold ducats, plus 40 000 in jewels and another 100 000 for the ducal investiture. On the other hand, Beatrice would have exploited her charm, her intelligence and the pomp of her court to impress the Venetians. The couple first passed through Ferrara, where they were greeted festively by the dukes. Isabella d'Este, in order not to disfigure in comparison with her sister, left Ferrara before their arrival to go to Venice in advance. On 25 May Beatrice left for Venice accompanied by her mother Eleonora, her brother Alfonso with his wife Anna Maria and various secretaries and advisers, with a retinue of more than 1 200 people. They sailed first along the Po, then on a dangerously rough sea that aroused many fears among those present, but not in Beatrice, who enjoyed mocking the fearful of the group.
![Statua di San Vittore dal basso museo del Duomo di Milano](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/54/Statua_di_San_Vittore_dal_basso_museo_del_Duomo_di_Milano.jpg)
On the morning of May 27, the fleet reached the fort of Malamocco, where it was welcomed by a delegation of patricians. Beatrice then landed at the island of San Clemente, where she found the doge waiting for her in person. He urged her to board the Bucintoro, which headed for the Grand Canal. During the journey she was able to attend the representation on a barge of the dispute between Minerva and Neptune that led to the foundation of Athens. That evening the Duchess and her family stayed at the Fondaco dei Turchi, owned by the Este family. In the following days she was invited to a meeting of the Maggior Consigli, to a sumptuous breakfast at the Doge's Palace, visited the Arsenal, the island of Murano, St. Mark's Basilica and the Treasury.
A curious episode that took place on this occasion is contained in one of her letters to her husband, to whom Beatrice tells how, while walking through Piazza San Marco, some with the excuse of admiring her ruby had lingered too much on her neckline and how she had responded in a shrewd way: "I had a necklace of pearls and a ruby on my chest
..and there were those who put their eyes almost up to my chest to look at him and I saw so much anxiety I told him we had to come home, since I would have gladly shown it ".
Finally, on May 30, she secretly received in her chamber three oratories deputies from the Signoria and, having let out all her gentlemen and secretaries, she remained alone with them, saying that she wanted everything to remain top secret. She then presented a memorial, given to her by her husband before her departure, with which he communicated, among other things, his practices with the emperor for obtaining the investiture to the Duchy of Milan. Then she showed a second letter from her husband, just arrived from Belriguardo, saying "this is stronger now": with it she announced the firm intention of Charles VIII to carry out the enterprise against the kingdom of Naples and to appoint Ludovico head and conductor of this enterprise. He therefore wished to know the opinion of the Signoria, asking that it be communicated to his wife before his departure from Venice, otherwise to himself when he arrived in Milan. The Venetians replied that what was reported was very serious and limited themselves to vague reassurances.
The mission, however, already started with little hope of success, since from the beginning the Republic did not intend to support Ludovico.
First Italian War
On 25 January 1494, the old king
Ferrante died, who already foreshadowed the outbreak of a war that he had tried with all his might to avoid. Once ascended to the throne of Naples, his son
Alfonso II did not hesitate to rush to the aid of his daughter Isabella, declaring war on his brother-in-law Ludovico and occupying, as the first sign of hostility, the city of
Bari
Bari ( , ; nap, label= Barese, Bare ; lat, Barium) is the capital city of the Metropolitan City of Bari and of the Apulia region, on the Adriatic Sea, southern Italy. It is the second most important economic centre of mainland Southern Italy a ...
. Ludovico responded to the threats by leaving the green light to King
Charles VIII of France to go down to Italy to conquer the kingdom of Naples, which he believed to be right, having been taken from the Aragonese from the Anjou.
Gallant receptions
![School of Leonardo da Vinci woman profile](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2b/School_of_Leonardo_da_Vinci_woman_profile.jpg)
On 23 July 1494 she welcomed duke
Louis of Orléans, cousin of the King of France, to Milan, who arrived in Italy with the avant-gardes of the army French, then, on 11 September of the same year, went to
Asti to meet Charles VIII in person. The two were greeted with great riots and parties, and both claimed, according to the custom French, to kiss the duchess and all the beautiful bridesmaids of her retie on the mouth.
This custom of "kiss and touch" the women of others initially aroused some annoyance in the Italians, who never willingly got used to it. Moreover, as Baldassarre Castiglione would also say years later, Louis of Orleans used to look a little too mischievously at women, "who are said to like them very much". Nevertheless, Beatrice, through Ambassador Capilupi, also invited her sister to come and kiss Count Gilbert of Bourbon and others who would soon arrive.
King
Charles
Charles is a masculine given name predominantly found in English language, English and French language, French speaking countries. It is from the French form ''Charles'' of the Proto-Germanic, Proto-Germanic name (in runic alphabet) or ''*k ...
, in particular, was greatly fascinated: he wanted to see her dance and requested a portrait of her, personally taking care of procuring the painter (
Jean Perréal
Jean Perréal (-) -- sometimes called Peréal, Johannes Parisienus or Jean De Paris -- was a successful portraitist for French Royalty in the first half of the 16th century, as well as an architect, sculptor and limner of illuminated manuscripts ...
) and about twenty clothes to see which one was better worn by Beatrice, who was "more beautiful than ever". The relations between the Duchess and Louis of Orleans were also extremely gallant at the beginning, and the two frequently exchanged gifts with affectionate cards.
Ludovico was not jealous of her: different was the case of the handsome baron of Beauvau, much loved by women, who showed excessive "enthusiasm" towards Beatrice.
[Marg. de Lussan, Anecdotes secretes des règnes de Charles VIII et de Louis XII (Paris, 1711), p.50.] According to some historians, it was for this reason that Ludovico, offended by the assiduity of the knight, took advantage of an illness of King Charles to remove his wife from Asti, who in fact retired to
Annone, while he continued alone to go to Asti every day. A
Beauvau actually participated in the enterprise of Naples, but his identity is not clear: currently it is more plausible the identification with Bertrand de Beauvau, son of Antoine, created count of Policastro and died in 1495.
The ducal investiture
Soon, realizing that his plans had not gone as planned, Ludovico abandoned the alliance with the French and joined the Holy League, expressly formed between the various Italian powers to drive foreigners from the peninsula. Meanwhile, on October 21, 1494, the legitimate Duke
Gian Galeazzo
Gian Galeazzo Sforza (20 June 1469 – 21 October 1494), also known as Giovan Galeazzo Sforza, was the sixth Duke of Milan.
Early life
Born in Abbiategrasso, he was only seven years old when in 1476 his father, Galeazzo Maria Sforza, was assa ...
died and Ludovico obtained by acclamation of the senate that the ducal title passed to him and his legitimate descendants, thus bypassing in the succession the son that Gian Galeazzo left.
Beatrice, who was pregnant at that time, gave birth on February 4, 1495, Sforza Francesco, so named in honor of his late paternal uncle Sforza Maria, to whom Ludovico had been very fond, and of his grandfather Francesco. The newborn was baptized by his aunt Isabella d'Este with fifteen names, but was then called simply Francesco.
[.]
The official investiture by the emperor came on May 26, 1495, and was solemnized by a large public ceremony in the Duomo.
The siege of Novara
Soon, realizing that his plans had not gone as planned, Ludovico abandoned the alliance with the French and joined the Holy League, expressly formed among the various Italian powers to drive foreigners from the peninsula. While Charles, after the conquest of Naples, was still in the kingdom, in a situation of serious tension, on 11 June 1495, contravening the orders of the king,
Louis of Orléans occupied the city of
Novara
Novara (, Novarese: ) is the capital city of the province of Novara in the Piedmont region in northwest Italy, to the west of Milan. With 101,916 inhabitants (on 1 January 2021), it is the second most populous city in Piedmont after Turin. It i ...
with his men and went as far as
Vigevano
Vigevano (; lmo, label=Western Lombard, Avgevan) is a town and ''comune'' in the province of Pavia, Lombardy in northern Italy. A historic art town, it is also renowned for shoemaking and is one of the main centres of Lomellina, a rice-growing a ...
, threatening concretely to attack Milan with the intention of usurping the duchy, which he considered his right being a descendant of
Valentina Visconti.
Ludovico hastened to close himself with his wife and children in the Rocca del Castello in Milan but, not feeling equally safe, he contemplated leaving the duchy to take refuge in Spain. Only the iron opposition of his wife and some members of the council, as
Bernardino Corio
Bernardino Corio (born 1459 in Milan; died ca.1519) was an Italian humanist and historian of the Renaissance. He wrote ''Historia di Milano'' circa 1500.
Biography
Bernardino Corio came from a renowned Milanese family that had served the Sforza ...
writes, convinced him to desist from this idea.
However, due to the heavy expenses incurred for the investiture, the state was on the verge of financial collapse, and there was no money to maintain the army; a popular uprising was feared. The
Commines writes that, if the Duke of Orleans had advanced only a hundred steps, the Milanese army would have passed the Ticino, and he would have managed to enter Milan, since some noble citizens had offered to introduce it.
Ludovico did not resist the tension and was struck, it seems, by a
stroke that left him paralyzed for a short time. "The Duke of Milan has lost his feelings,"
Malipiero writes, "he abandons himself." Beatrice therefore found herself alone to face the difficult situation of war. However, he managed to juggle very well and to ensure the support and loyalty of the Milanese nobles. It was then that her husband officially appointed her governor of Milan together with her brother
Alfonso
Alphons (Latinized ''Alphonsus'', ''Adelphonsus'', or ''Adefonsus'') is a male given name recorded from the 8th century (Alfonso I of Asturias, r. 739–757) in the Christian successor states of the Visigothic kingdom in the Iberian peninsula. ...
, who soon came to their rescue. The latter, however, soon fell ill with
syphilis
Syphilis () is a sexually transmitted infection caused by the bacterium ''Treponema pallidum'' subspecies ''pallidum''. The signs and symptoms of syphilis vary depending in which of the four stages it presents (primary, secondary, latent, an ...
, also it was rumored that Duke
Ercole did not want the recovery of Novara, being in league with the French, and together with the Florentines secretly subveded the Orleans, and that , stronghold of the Sforza army, played a double game with the king of France.
Beatrice therefore decided, on June 27, to go alone to the military camp of Vigevano to supervise the order and animate the captains against the French, despite the fact that the Duke of Orleans made raids in that area all day long, while her husband remained in Milan. On this occasion she demonstrated – not unlike her male relatives – a remarkable inclination to war. This is considerable when one considers that the conduct of war operations was at that time the prerogative of men. More than the kinship with her father, whose help she asked for help in vain, the alliance with Venice proved fruitful, which sent Bernardo Contarini, provveditore of the
stratioti
The Stratioti or Stradioti ( gr, στρατιώτες ''stratiotes''; sq, Stratiotë, Stratiotët;, it, stradioti, stradiotti, stratioti, strathiotto, strathioti; french: estradiots; sh, stratioti, stradioti; es, estradiotes) were mercenary u ...
, to the rescue, with whom Beatrice became friends. On the first of July, some severed heads of the French were brought to her by the stratioti, and she rewarded them with a
ducat
The ducat () coin was used as a trade coin in Europe from the later Middle Ages from the 13th to 19th centuries. Its most familiar version, the gold ducat or sequin containing around of 98.6% fine gold, originated in Venice in 1284 and gained wi ...
for each.
Guicciardini's opinion is that if
Louis d'Orléans had attempted the assault immediately, he would have taken Milan since the defence was inconsistent, but Beatrice's demonstration of strength was perhaps worth confusing him in making him believe the defences superior to what they were so that he did not dare to try his luck and retreated into Novara. The hesitation was fatal to him, as it allowed the army to reorganize and surround him, thus forcing him to a long and exhausting siege that decimated his men due to famine and epidemics, a siege from which he was finally defeated a few months later on the imposition of King Charles who returned to France.
In early August, finally healed, Ludovico went with his wife to the Camp of Novara, where they resided for a few weeks during the siege. On the occasion of their visit was held, for the pleasure of the duchess who greatly appreciated the facts of arms, a memorable parade of the army in full. Beatrice's presence did not have to garbare much to the
Marquis of Mantua
The Marquisate or Margraviate of Mantua was a margraviate in Lombardy, Northern Italy. Constituted by the Capitani del popol, an administrative title used in Italy during the Middle Ages.
The Marquisate of Mantua began with Gianfrancesco I G ...
her brother-in-law, then captain general of the League, if at some point he invited not too kindly Ludovico to lock his wife "in coffers".
Since the Germans wanted to make "cruel revenge" against the Italians, Ludovico begged Francesco to save Beatrice, fearing that she would be raped or killed. The marquis with an intrepid spirit rode among the Germans and not without great effort managed to mediate peace. "Understanding success, Ludovico became the happiest man in the world, seeming to him that he had recovered the State and his life, and together with honor his wife, for whose safety he feared more than for everything else".
Beatrice personally participated in the council of war, as well as in the peace negotiations, as well as having participated in all the meetings held previously with the French, who did not fail to be amazed to see her actively collaborating alongside her husband.
After the
Battle of Fornovo (1495), both he and his wife took part in the peace congress of Vercelli between
Charles VIII of France
Charles VIII, called the Affable (french: l'Affable; 30 June 1470 – 7 April 1498), was King of France from 1483 to his death in 1498. He succeeded his father Louis XI at the age of 13.Paul Murray Kendall, ''Louis XI: The Universal Spider'' (Ne ...
and the Italian princes, at which Beatrice showed great political ability.
In the summer of 1496 Beatrice and the Moor met Maximilian I of Habsburg in Malles. The emperor was particularly kind to the Duchess, going so far as to personally cut the dishes on her plate, and wanted her to sit in the middle between himself and the duke. Sanuto then notes that "a contemplation di la duchessa de Milano", that is, by the will of her, or rather by the desire to see her again, Maximilian passed "that mountain so harsh" and in a completely informal way, without any pomp, came to Como, then stayed for some time in Vigevano in strictly friendly relations with the dukes. He probably admired it for its hunting skills and tenacious character, but his visit also had a political purpose: to urge the emperor to the enterprise of Pisa in an anti-French function.
Death
In recent months, however, relations between the two spouses had become very worn out due to the adulterous relationship that Ludovico had with Lucrezia Crivelli, his wife's lady-in-waiting. Despite the bad moods, Beatrice found herself pregnant for the third time, but the pregnancy was complicated both by the sorrows caused by the discovery that Lucrezia was also expecting a child from Ludovico, something for which she felt deeply humiliated, and by the premature and tragic death of the beloved Bianca Giovanna, Ludovico's illegitimate daughter and her dear friend from the first day of arrival in Milan. The birth finally took place on the night between 2 and 3 January 1497, but neither the mother nor the son survived.
In a letter written hours after her death, Ludovico informed his brother-in-law Francesco Gonzaga that his wife, "gave back her spirit to God" half an hour after midnight. Their child had been born at eleven at night and was a stillborn son. Ludovico went mad with pain and for two weeks remained locked up in the dark in his apartments, after which he shaved his head and let his beard grow, wearing from that moment on only black clothes with a torn cloak of a beggar. His only concern became the embellishment of the family mausoleum and the neglected state fell into disrepair.
With these few words on that same night he announced the departure of his wife to the Marquis of Mantua
Francesco Gonzaga, husband of his sister-in-law Isabella:]
He told the Ferrarese ambassador that "he never thought he could ever tolerate such a bitter plague", and that he had had him summoned to report to Duke Ercole that if what had ever offended her, as he knew he had done, he asks forgiveness from your ex. your and her, finding himself discontented to the soul ", since" in every prayer he had always prayed to our Lord God that she left after him, as the one in whom he had assumed all his rest, and since God did not like it, he prayed to him and would always pray to him continually, that if it is ever possible for a living person to see a dead, grant him the grace that he may see her and speak to her one last time, as the one he loved more than himself ".
Even the
Marino Sanuto the Younger, Sanuto writes that "Whose death the duke could not bear for the great love that brought her, and said that he no longer wanted to take care of either his children, or the state, or worldly things, and just wanted to live
..and since then this duke began to feel great troubles, while before he had always lived happily".
The Emperor
Maximilian
Maximilian, Maximillian or Maximiliaan (Maximilien in French) is a male given name.
The name " Max" is considered a shortening of "Maximilian" as well as of several other names.
List of people
Monarchs
*Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor (1459 ...
, in condoning with the Moro, wrote that "nothing heavier or more annoying could happen to us at this time, than to be so suddenly deprived of a joint among the other princesses dear to us, after the beginning more abundant familiarity of his virtues, and that you in truth, who are primarily loved by us, have been deprived not only of a sweet consort, but of an ally of your principality, of the relief from your troubles and occupations.
..Your most happy consort did not lack any virtue or luck or body or soul that could be desired by anyone; no dignity, no merit that could be added".
She was buried in the choir of the church of
Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan. The duke commissioned a funeral monument for himself and his wife to
Cristoforo Solari
Church of San Zaccaria Venice - bas-relief on the facade
Cristoforo Solari (c. 1460–1527), also known as il Gobbo (''the hunchbacked''), was an Italian sculptor and architect. He was the brother of the painter Andrea Solari.
Among his work, ...
, but following his death in captivity in France, he was transferred, empty, to the
Certosa di Pavia
The Certosa di Pavia is a monastery and complex in Lombardy, Northern Italy, situated near a small town of the same name in the Province of Pavia, north of Pavia. Built in 1396–1495, it was once located on the border of a large huntin ...
where he still stands today.
In 1499
Louis d'Orléans returned a second time to claim the Duchy of Milan and, since there was no longer the proud Beatrice to face him,
he had an easy game on the dejected Moro, who after an escape and a brief return ended his days as a prisoner in France.
The burial
After an impressive funeral, during which it was said that Ludovico remarried her as if she were alive, Beatrice was buried in the choir of the church of Santa Maria delle Grazie. The duke commissioned
Cristoforo Solari
Church of San Zaccaria Venice - bas-relief on the facade
Cristoforo Solari (c. 1460–1527), also known as il Gobbo (''the hunchbacked''), was an Italian sculptor and architect. He was the brother of the painter Andrea Solari.
Among his work, ...
to create a magnificent funeral monument with their two recumbent figures carved in marble, but, due to the French conquest of the duchy, it remained unfinished. Following the provisions of the
Council of Trent
The Council of Trent ( la, Concilium Tridentinum), held between 1545 and 1563 in Trento, Trent (or Trento), now in northern Italian Peninsula, Italy, was the 19th ecumenical council of the Catholic Church. Prompted by the Protestant Reformation ...
on burials (1564), it was broken up and largely dispersed. Only the lid with the funeral statues, for the mercy of the Carthusian monks, was saved, and purchased for the small sum of 38 scudi it was transferred empty to the
Certosa di Pavia
The Certosa di Pavia is a monastery and complex in Lombardy, Northern Italy, situated near a small town of the same name in the Province of Pavia, north of Pavia. Built in 1396–1495, it was once located on the border of a large huntin ...
, where it is still today.
Appearance and personality
Physical aspect
The portraits that remain of her and the descriptions of those who knew her give us the image of a curvaceous young woman, pleasant, with a small nose and slightly turned upwards, full cheeks typical of the Aragonese, short and round chin, dark eyes and long brown hair down to the waist that she always kept wrapped in a
coazzone, with a few strands left to fall on the cheeks, a costume that she had already assumed during her childhood in Naples by the will of her ancestor Ferrante, who made her approach and dress in the Castilian manner.
Francesco Muralto presents she as ''"at a young age, beautiful and of raven colors".''
We know that she was of short stature and therefore used to wear tiles to reduce the difference in height with her husband, over one meter and eighty meters tall. In the International Footwear Museum of Vigevano there is also a pianella dating back to the late fifteenth century attributed to the Duchess which, considering the size, must have had 34–35 feet.
Personality
Thanks to her young age, Beatrice was of a happy, cheerful, carefree, playful character, but, not unlike all her male brothers, she was also unreflective, violent, impulsive and easily let herself be carried away by anger. Proof of this are many episodes of the Milanese period, including a famous one that happened in April 1491 when, going with some of her ladies to the market disguised as a commoner, she was surprised by a downpour, and while returning to the castle she squabbled on the street with certain commoners who had insulted her because of the clothes with which she and the ladies had sheltered their heads from the rain, not being customary in Milan to dress in that way. On another occasion, realizing that Ludovico wanted to make her wear a dress that he had sewed the same for
Gallerani, she made a scene and demanded that Cecilia not wear it.
Proud and obstinate, despite being the least loved daughter, she was the one who most resembled her father by nature. The buffoon Frittella judged that no one should mourn her death, as she was proud and of "feline instincts". This contrasts with the judgment of Bernardino Zambotti, who says she was "a pleasant person, vertuous and much loved by all peoples, most liberal towards her servants". "The kindest lady in Italy", a contemporary calls she.
, her faithful and affectionate secretary, praised her ingenuity, affability, grace, liberality, exalted her court of gentlemen, musicians and poets. She was certainly a lover of luxury so much so that the only wardrobe in her rooms at the castle of Pavia contained 84 dresses as well as countless other valuables.
The pranks
In any case, the court of Milan was a court that loved pranks and Beatrice in particular, having evidently inherited cruelty from her Aragonese relatives, liked heavy ones, if Ludovico writes that one morning she had fun with her cousin
Isabella
Isabella may refer to:
People and fictional characters
* Isabella (given name), including a list of people and fictional characters
* Isabella (surname), including a list of people
Places
United States
* Isabella, Alabama, an unincorpor ...
to throw her ladies off her horse. Once again they played the fight and Beatrice threw her cousin to the ground. The most terrible jokes, however, were all against the serious Este ambassador , at the time seventy years old, who found himself several times the house invaded by "large quantities of foxes, wolves and wild cats", that Ludovico bought from certain villani vigevanesi and that Beatrice, having realized how much similar beasts were in "great hatred and annoyance" to the ambassador, made him throw into the house as much as she could by means of waiters and staffers who resorted to the most unthinkable expedients.
![Pala sforzesca](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ed/Pala_sforzesca.jpg)
Since the ambassador was also quite stingy, Beatrice even went so far as once to rob him of what he was wearing, however for a good cause: while in fact Ludovico held him still by the arms, she took away two golden ducats from the scarsella, the silk hat and the new oltremontano cloth cloak, then gave the two ducats to Trotti's niece, who evidently had to find it in need. The ambassador continually complained to the duchess's father, saying: "and these are my earnings, since I have the damage and insults, as well as I should waste time writing them!"
Nevertheless, Beatrice had limits and never reached the cynicism of her grandfather
Ferrante. In fact, when Isabella of Aragon was widowed by her husband Gian Galeazzo, who became aware of the fact that her cousin, although pregnant, remained for the whole time locked up in the dark rooms of the castle of Pavia, forcing even her young children to dress the mourning and to suffer with her, Beatrice had great compassion and insisted that she come to Milan and improve the conditions of the children.
The fraternal bond
With her brothers she always maintained excellent relations, especially she showed affection towards
Ferrante, with whom she had grown up in Naples, and towards
Alfonso
Alphons (Latinized ''Alphonsus'', ''Adelphonsus'', or ''Adefonsus'') is a male given name recorded from the 8th century (Alfonso I of Asturias, r. 739–757) in the Christian successor states of the Visigothic kingdom in the Iberian peninsula. ...
, who came several times to visit her in Milan. With her sister
Isabella
Isabella may refer to:
People and fictional characters
* Isabella (given name), including a list of people and fictional characters
* Isabella (surname), including a list of people
Places
United States
* Isabella, Alabama, an unincorpor ...
the relationship was already more complicated because, although the two felt a sincere affection for each other, for a certain period they moved away because of the envy of Isabella, who already from the very day of the wedding began to nourish mixed feelings towards Beatrice, to whom she envied both the lucky marriage, both the enormous wealth, and, above all, the two sons in perfect health born a short distance from each other, while she tried for years in vain to procreate an heir to her husband
Francesco. However, over time the envy subsided, and then dissolved completely at the premature death of her sister, an event for which Isabella showed a deep and sincere pain.
![Beatrice e Isabella d'Este](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c6/Beatrice_e_Isabella_d%27Este.jpg)
The two sisters were however very different, although sharing the same ambitions, in fact unlike Isabella, who nuded resentment towards her daughters for being born females and poured the blame on her husband Francesco (who was instead very proud of his daughters), Beatrice was, despite her young age, a wife and an exemplary mother, loved her children very much and dedicated to them many attentions of which are witnesses the tender letters sent to her mother Eleonora in which she described the good health and growth of the little Ercole.
Passions
Just like the grandfather Ferrante, Beatrice loved animals very much and her husband often gave them to her: among the many there are numerous horses, dogs, cats, foxes, wolves, a monkey and even sorcetti, also at the park of the castle of Milan there was a menagerie with numerous species of exotic animals. Nevertheless, Beatrice appreciated hunting just as much, especially that with the falcon, and was an excellent horseman: the French marveled to see her riding "all straight, no more and no less than a man would be".
[: "et estoit sur ce coursier en façon qu' elle estoit toute droite, ny plus ny moins que seroit un homme".] This leads us to believe that she used to mount like a man, contrary to the custom of the time which required women to proceed with both legs on one side.
She showed above all on these occasions to possess a swaggering and reckless character, so much so as to put her life in danger more than once, as when in the summer of 1491 during a hunting trip her mount was hit by a runaway deer. Ludovico tells, not without a certain admiration, that her horse impennò high "how much is a good spear ", but that Beatrice held firmly on the saddle and that when they managed to reach her they found her that "laughed and did not have a fear in the world". The deer with the horns had touched her leg but Ludovico specifies that his wife did not get hurt.
In the same way in the following year, while pregnant with her eldest son, Beatrice threw herself to the assault of an angry boar that had already wounded some greyhounds and first hit him. The hunting fatigues had to, however, on that occasion yield her a new attack of malarial fevers that had already affected her the previous year and that this time made the central months of pregnancy difficult, although without damaging the unborn child or complicating the birth. She also knew how to shoot "admirably" crossbow, in fact in 1493 he killed a wild boar with it after having inflicted five wounds on him.
Although very religious, Beatrice was not austere with regard to carnal matters: she knew well that wars are not won only with weapons and for this reason some of the bridesmaids of her retin had the task of sexually entertaining the sovereigns and foreign dignitaries guests of the court. It is in fact not without a certain surprise that historians remember how, when in 1495 she was at the camp of
Novara
Novara (, Novarese: ) is the capital city of the province of Novara in the Piedmont region in northwest Italy, to the west of Milan. With 101,916 inhabitants (on 1 January 2021), it is the second most populous city in Piedmont after Turin. It i ...
, Beatrice did not hesitate to offer to personally procure to her brother-in-law
Francesco Gonzaga, captain general of the League, a woman with which to celebrate the victory, officially to preserve him and her sister Isabella from the terrible
Malfrancese who at that time devastated the peninsula, or perhaps to win his sympathies, as she wished to receive on loan from the Marquis the treasure that he had seized from the tent of
Charles VIII following the battle
of Fornovo, when the camp French had been looted, treasure of which the most interesting object was an album containing the licentious portraits of all the mistresses of the king of France.
She liked gambling and was able to win the extraordinary sum of 3000 ducats in a single day.
[Luisa Giordano, Beatrice d'Este (1475-1497), vol. 2, ETS, 2008, pp. 55-56.] She particularly loved to dance, an art in which she excelled with singular grace: Muralto says she was able to spend the whole night uninterruptedly in dances, and the French marveled that she knew how to dance perfectly according to the fashion of France, despite saying that it was the first time.
However, she was quite modest as far as her own person was concerned, in fact she entrusted herself to the services of a single midwife, comare Frasina da Ferrara, who had introduced her mother and that Beatrice demanded that she come to assist her in Milan even during her third birth, despite the fact that the woman was sick at that time and despite the fact that her father had suggested another equally talented midwife from Ferrara. There were many insistences of the duchess and the people mobilized, who in the end comare Frasina set off on a mule to reach Milan in time.
Political role
The "damnatio memoriae"
![Grandi Casate Italiane nel 1499](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6b/Grandi_Casate_Italiane_nel_1499.png)
Celebrated by nineteenth-century historians as a sort of romantic heroine, the figure of Beatrice underwent an eclipse during the twentieth century, crushed under the weight of the praise paid to her longest-lived sister Isabella. Although a superficial analysis of historical events has led modern scholars to say that Beatrice had no voice in the politics of the duchy, or even had no interest in it, almost all previous historians agree instead in judging her as the true mastermind behind many of her husband's actions and decisions, over whom she exercised enormous influence, to such an extent that it links her presence to the prosperity and integrity of the entire Sforza state:
She owned in all respects the lands of
Cassolnovo
Cassolnovo is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Pavia in the Italy, Italian region Lombardy, located about 30 km southwest of Milan and about 35 km northwest of Pavia. As of 31 December 2004, it had a population of 6,203 and ...
, Carlotta, Monte Imperiale,
Villanova,
Sartirana, Leale,
Cusago
Cusago ( lmo, Cusagh ) is a '' comune'' (municipality) in the Metropolitan City of Milan in the Italian region Lombardy, located about west of Milan.
Cusago borders the following municipalities: Milan, Cornaredo, Settimo Milanese, Bareggio, Ci ...
,
Valenza
Valenza ( pms, Valensa) is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Alessandria in the Italian region Piedmont, located about east of Turin and about north of Alessandria.
History
A stronghold of the Ligures, it was conquered by the Ro ...
,
Galliate
Galliate is a '' comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Novara in the Italian region Piedmont, located about northeast of Turin, about northwest Milan and about northeast of Novara.
Galliate borders the following municipalities: Cameri ...
,
Mortara,
Bassignana,
San Secondo,
Felino
Felino ( Parmigiano: ) is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Parma in the Italian region Emilia-Romagna, located about west of Bologna and about southwest of Parma. As of 2011 it had a population of 8,621.
History
The town develop ...
,
Torrechiara
Torrechiara Castle ( it, Castello di Torrechiara) is a 15th-century castle near Langhirano, in the province of Parma, northern Italy. It sits atop a terraced hill south of the city of Parma, in a strategic position overlooking the Parma Rive ...
,
Castel San Giovanni
Castel San Giovanni ( Piacentino: ) is a town and ''comune'' in the province of Piacenza, Emilia-Romagna, Italy.
History
The origins of the town are probably related to an ancient '' pieve'' called ''Olubra'' and a fortress called ''Castellus ...
, Pigliola, Valle di Lugano, as well as the Sforzesca and the park of the castle of Pavia, that her husband had given her, with all the relative possessions, fortresses and
feudal rights connected to them, that is the mero et mixto imperio, any type of
jurisdiction
Jurisdiction (from Latin 'law' + 'declaration') is the legal term for the legal authority granted to a legal entity to enact justice. In federations like the United States, areas of jurisdiction apply to local, state, and federal levels.
Jur ...
, gifts,
immunities, etc., the faculty to administer them according to one's own will, to delegate
castellan
A castellan is the title used in Medieval Europe for an appointed official, a governor of a castle and its surrounding territory referred to as the castellany. The title of ''governor'' is retained in the English prison system, as a remnant o ...
s, praetors, officers, etc., as well as to benefit from the very rich rents.
[.]
As early as January 1492 Ludovico showed his intention to make her sole governor of the state during her absences, and that every day the council was held and the acts of government read in her room. Moreover, both the diplomatic mission to Venice, her constant presence in the councils of war and in meetings with the French, and, above all, her decisive stance in the excited days when
Orleans threatened Milan, in stark contrast this time to her husband's intentions to escape, as well as the actual drift of the Sforza state following his death, they show that his decision-making and political power was much more substantial than is currently thought.
Political Thought
She initially pursued the policy of her father
Ercole, who for years had been plotting to replace Ludovico to
Gian Galeazzo
Gian Galeazzo Sforza (20 June 1469 – 21 October 1494), also known as Giovan Galeazzo Sforza, was the sixth Duke of Milan.
Early life
Born in Abbiategrasso, he was only seven years old when in 1476 his father, Galeazzo Maria Sforza, was assa ...
in the actual possession of the duchy of Milan and who with this precise purpose had given her to him in marriage. It is to be believed that without the interference of his wife Ludovico would never have taken the step of usurping the duchy to his nephew in all respects and that he would have been content to continue to govern him as regent as he had been doing for more than ten years. It is no coincidence that it was Beatrice herself who said that, with the birth of the little
Ercole Massimiliano, she had given birth to a son to her husband and also to her father.
When then, with the change of alliances, Hercules, although officially neutral, continued to lean towards the French, while Louis sided with the Holy League, Beatrice felt betrayed by her father who, in a moment of maximum difficulty, that is, in the days immediately preceding the occupation of Novara by Orléans, did not want to send them the requested aid. She then abandoned her daughter's robes to assume that of head of state, with a letter that for its exceptionally harsh and authoritative tone arouses amazement: she wrote to her father that she would have expected, in such a situation, that he himself would come to their defense, and that he does not understand how he did not want to send even two hundred men of arms, worrying what would have been said in Italy when it had been known about this refusal; therefore she invites him to remedy this lack so as not to leave in her and in her husband the ill will towards her, all the more so since, if he were to be attacked, two hundred men of arms would not be enough for him to defend Ferrara without external help.
[Maria Serena Mazzi, Come rose d'inverno, le signore della corte estense nel '400, Nuovecarte, 2004, pp. 68-70.]
Perhaps also as a result of this, after Novara his attitude became more distinctly pro-Venetian. She also carried out an important work of mediation between her husband and the various leaders on the one hand – who resorted to her, as in the case of Fracasso, to obtain favors – and between her husband and the Italian lords on the other. The few surviving letters show her participating in all her husband's secrets, and her correspondence with Francesco Gonzaga is also remarkable.
According to the testimony of Sanudo, it was Beatrice who urged the coming to Italy of Emperor Maximilian in 1496, so that he would take part in the enterprise of Pisa against the Florentines, allies of the French. Since her death the Faenza people were very upset, judging that
Astorre Manfredi would have lost the favor of Milan: Faenza, pro-Venetian, was an enemy of Forlì, pro-Florentine, of which was countess
Caterina Sforza
Caterina Sforza (1463 – 28 May 1509) was an Italian noblewoman, the Countess of Forlì and Lady of Imola, firstly with her husband Girolamo Riario, and after his death as a regent of her son Ottaviano. Caterina was a noblewoman who lived a li ...
, nephew of Ludovico. Beatrice must have persuaded her husband to extend her protection to Faenza and it was feared, with his death, a reversal of alliances, which then in fact happened with the war of Pisa, when Ludovico abandoned the ally Venice for Florence, a move that then marked his ruin. Malipiero rejoiced instead, saying: "and with this death will cease so much intelligentness that son-in-law and father-in-law had together".
In Beatrice, moreover, Ludovico had placed all his hopes for the succession and for the maintenance of the state during the minority of the children, since he had always been convinced that he would die before her.
"And true, the death of Beatrice, the superb and intelligent Ferrarese, was a serious disaster for Ludovico il Moro. She was the soul of all his undertakings, she was the true queen of his heart and his court .. If the Duke of Bari ..managed to represent on the theater of Europe a scene of much superior, as was observed, to his condition, it is largely due to this woman, vain feminally, if you will, and cruel, especially with the Duchess Isabella, but of resolute and tenacious character, of ready ingenuity, of soul open to all the seductions of luxury and to all the attractions of art. When it ..failed ..it was like a great storm that came to upset the soul of Ludovico. Nor did he ever recover from it; that death was the beginning of his misfortunes. Gloomy premonitions crossed his mind; it seemed to him that he had remained alone in a great stormy sea and inclined, fearfully, to asceticism. ..the ghost of his beautiful and poor dead man was always before his spirit."
(Rodolfo Renier, Gaspare Visconti)
The ancient authors
It was the contemporary historians on the other hand, unlike the modern ones, to recognize its importance: in addition to
Marino Sanuto the Younger, Sanuto, who writes of her that although "five months pregnant" wherever her husband went "for everything she followed him",
Guicciardini also notes that Beatrice was "assiduously companion" to her husband "no less in the important things than in the pleasant ones". But if Sanudo merely shows it to us on the battlefield while supervising the troops, Alessandro Salvago clearly attributes to her the merit of having saved the state from Orléans. Even an illustrious and powerful figure such as Emperor Maximilian I called her ''principatus socia'' of her husband, that is, as the one who shared the government with the Moro.
Paolo Giovio
Paolo Giovio (also spelled ''Paulo Jovio''; Latin: ''Paulus Jovius''; 19 April 1483 – 11 December 1552) was an Italian physician, historian, biographer, and prelate.
Early life
Little is known about Giovio's youth. He was a native of Com ...
, on the other hand, paints an entirely negative picture of it, blaming Beatrice – traditionally attributed to Ludovico – for having called the French to Italy, although he is the only author to speak of it in these terms:
![7774_-_Milano_-_Casa_degli_Atellani_(1943)_-_Medaglione_sforzesco_di_Beatrice_-_Foto_Giovanni_Dall'Orto,_6-Mar-2008](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8b/7774_-_Milano_-_Casa_degli_Atellani_%281943%29_-_Medaglione_sforzesco_di_Beatrice_-_Foto_Giovanni_Dall%27Orto%2C_6-Mar-2008.jpg)
All the opposite her secretary, Vincenzo Calmeta judges the behavior worthy of praise, not of reproach, when he writes of her:
Not unlike
Baldassarre Castiglione
Baldassare Castiglione, Count of Casatico (; 6 December 1478 – 2 February 1529),Dates of birth and death, and cause of the latter, fro, ''Italica'', Rai International online. was an Italian courtier, diplomat, soldier and a prominent Renaissanc ...
remembered her, many years later, with a few but significant words in his Cortegiano: "it still hurts me that you all have not met the Duchess Beatrice of Milan
.. so that you will never again have to marvel at the ingenuity of a woman".
Ludovico Ariosto went even further, unifying Beatrice's fate with those of her husband and of the whole of Italy:
Bernardino Corio
Bernardino Corio (born 1459 in Milan; died ca.1519) was an Italian humanist and historian of the Renaissance. He wrote ''Historia di Milano'' circa 1500.
Biography
Bernardino Corio came from a renowned Milanese family that had served the Sforza ...
even claims that already at the age of thirteen, even before arriving in Milan, Beatrice together with her father Ercole had urged Ludovico to reduce entirely in his own hands the government of the city, however her real influence in that period is difficult to prove. Nevertheless, already at the time of her stay in Naples, and therefore in a still puerile age, she proved to be such as to induce Count
Diomedes Carafa to write to her father: "of her I predict that she will be a woman of great spirit and able to command ".
Modern authors
Even in the nineteenth century there are sporadic mentions of it in the works of authors almost always little known:
Ludovico Antonio Muratori
Lodovico Antonio Muratori (21 October 1672 – 23 January 1750) was an Italian historian, notable as a leading scholar of his age, and for his discovery of the Muratorian fragment, the earliest known list of New Testament books.
Biography
Born ...
says she "princess for beauty, and for high ingenuity, worthy of greater life";
Luzio and
Renier called her "the soul of all the exploits and delights of her husband"; Francesco Antonio Bianchini calls her "a woman of high feeling and of a manly soul", Anton Domenico Rossi "of soul more than manly"; Goffredo Casalis "woman of lively spirits and rare sense";
Samuele Romanin
Samuele Romanin (1808 – September 9, 1861) was an Italian historian, educator and author.
Biography
He was born of a poor Jewish family in Trieste. Being left an orphan at an early age, he provided for his younger brothers and sister by ...
"princess of great talent and perspicacity, and although young, very knowledgeable of state affairs", and elsewhere: "poured into the things of state, more than not the women
..she dominated her husband irresistibly, she was his adviser and excitator, and was seen later on the field of Novara raising his downed courage".
Jean de Préchac add that she "had a great influence on the will of Ludovico: she was the only confidant and the ruler of his thoughts. The immature of her death
..spread the days of Lodovico with bitterness; he had but disasters and ruins"; Raffaele Altavilla writes that Ludovico "used to draw every vigor of mind from the provident and strong advice of his bride", and Pier Ambrogio Curti that "our duke lacked the most effective advice, the soul of his enterprises, with the death of the unsead Beatrice d'Este, whom dominated him at her own will, and to whom he publicly flaunted an extraordinary affection, and from that hour he no longer had his propitious luck". Antonio Locatelli disagrees with many praises, saying that she "had only wickedness as a woman".
Marital bond
Love
Ludovico
Ludovico () is an Italian masculine given name. It is sometimes spelled Lodovico. The feminine equivalent is Ludovica.
Persons with the name Ludovico Given name
* Ludovico D'Aragona (1876–1961), Italian socialist politician
* Ludovico Ariosto ...
, on the other hand, was sincerely in love with his wife, although he continued to have lovers even after the wedding, like most of the lords of the time. In a letter he writes of her: "''she is more dear to me than the light of the sun''". The harmony of the couple is confirmed by the courtiers, who saw him constantly turn caresses and kisses to his wife: "S.r Ludovico hardly ever takes his eyes off the Duchess of Bari" wrote tebaldo Tebaldi in August 1492; and already a short time after the wedding Galeazzo Visconti declared: ''"there is such a love between them that I don't think two people can love each other more"''.
![Milano_-_Canonica_S](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/73/Milano_-_Canonica_S._Ambrogio_-_05_-_Beatrice_d%27Este_-_Foto_Giovanni_Dall%27Orto_25-Apr-2007.jpg)
On the other hand, Malaguzzi Valeri notes that if it is true that the love shown by Ludovico should not be nourished by any doubt, however, the extent and the real nature of the feeling with which his wife reciprocated him remains uncertain. Undoubtedly, even if at the beginning Beatrice showed herself reluctant, her husband still managed in a short time to conquer her with his generosity, affability and liberality, but above all with the very rich gifts that in the early days he brought her almost every day, so much so that already a few months after the wedding Beatrice wrote a series of letters to her father, all to thank him that he had deigned to "place me with this illustrious Lord my consort" who "who does not leave me in desire for anything that can bring me honor or pleasure", and still adds: "I am completely obliged to your lordship, because she is the cause of all the good I have". What transpires from the correspondence of that period is therefore a very young Beatrice dazzled by the wealth and importance of her husband, who was then one of the most powerful men on the peninsula, endowed with considerable charm and who did not yet show the weaknesses and contradictions of recent years.
Beyond the real feelings, the two were able to build the image of a close-knit couple united by a love that goes far beyond death, an aspect that struck all contemporaries.
Loyalty
Unlike his relatives and his sister
Isabella
Isabella may refer to:
People and fictional characters
* Isabella (given name), including a list of people and fictional characters
* Isabella (surname), including a list of people
Places
United States
* Isabella, Alabama, an unincorpor ...
, with whom Ludovico himself claimed years later to have had a secret relationship, Beatrice never fell back even the slightest suspicion of adultery. She always maintained a reputation of absolutely honesty, and this in spite of the freedoms in dressing and relating to men: the courtships of chivalrous mold entertained with the French and with the emperor are striking, where in fact the fulfillment of the sexual act was delegated to special courtesans.
[.] Precisely because he trusted her blindly, Ludovico granted her enormous freedom, and the only hint of her jealousies refers to the Baron of Beauvau.
Only Achille Dina, a twentieth-century historian, insinuates - but without any evidence - of an affair between her and
Galeazzo Sanseverino, arguing that "some intimate remorse" was due to Beatrice's deep sorrow for the death of her stepdaughter: "perhaps his conduct towards Isabella? or something in her relations with Bianca's husband, the charming Galeazzo Sanseverino, whose intrinsic and continuous commonality of pleasures with her cannot fail to strike?"
Beatrice, on the other hand, was aware of her husband's extramarital affairs, but did not give them weight because she knew they were passing distractions. The balance was drastically upset with the appearance of Lucrezia Crivelli in the ranks of the mistresses, as Beatrice had to realize that this time Ludovico had seriously fallen in love and that he had begun to dedicate to the new lover all the care and attention that he once dedicated to her. Muralto specifies that Beatrice "was honored with the greatest care by Ludovico, even though he took Lucrezia Crivelli as his concubine; because of which, although the thing gnawed at the entrails of his wife, love nevertheless did not depart from her".
Beatrice fashion leader
Beatrice is now known above all for her inventive genius in creating new clothes, which were one of her greatest passions. As long as she lived she had no rivals in any court, she dictated fashion in many cities of the time and it was following her example that numerous Italian noblewomen, even outside the Milanese court, adopted the
coazzone hairstyle, which came very much into vogue.
Francesco Muralto remembers her as ''"inventor of new clothes",''
[.] role of which she herself shows full awareness when, in a letter to her sister, she apologizes for having "little imagination to make new inventions" at that time, because of the pain for the loss of her mother. Thanks to the correspondence of the ubiquitous Trotti and the letters of Beatrice herself to her sister and husband, many descriptions of her rich clothes and inventions are preserved. An absolute novelty were, for example, striped dresses like the one she wears in the ''Pala Sforzesca'' and hers would also seem to be the idea of highlighting the waist by tightening around it a cord of large pearls that she defined in St. Francis style. The pearls of the rest were her greatest habit and since childhood she made constant use of them, both in the form of a necklace, both in hairstyles, and as a decoration of clothes. She preferred deep, square-shaped necklines and fabrics decorated with Sforza and Este exploits, especially with the motif of the Vincian knots designed by
Leonardo da Vinci
Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci (15 April 14522 May 1519) was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance who was active as a painter, Drawing, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. While his fame initially res ...
.
She sometimes wore hats jeweled with magpie feather and more extravagant uses are also known, such as the solid gold chain that she would seem to wear in the bust carved on the Portal of the room of the sink of the
Certosa di Pavia
The Certosa di Pavia is a monastery and complex in Lombardy, Northern Italy, situated near a small town of the same name in the Province of Pavia, north of Pavia. Built in 1396–1495, it was once located on the border of a large huntin ...
, which was of exclusively male use.
![Beatrice nella Pala Sforzesca](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/54/Beatrice_nella_Pala_Sforzesca.jpg)
Her taste in dress particularly struck the French courtiers following Charles VIII, who spent themselves in extensive descriptions; the poet André de la Vigne, in his work in verse Le Vergier d'honneur, remembers his excessive ostentatious luxury:
Patronage
Beatrice d'Este belonged to the best class of Renaissance women, and was one of the cultural influences of the age; to a great extent, her patronage and good taste are responsible for the splendour of the
Castello Sforzesco in Milan, the Certosa of
Pavia
Pavia (, , , ; la, Ticinum; Medieval Latin: ) is a town and comune of south-western Lombardy in northern Italy, south of Milan on the lower Ticino river near its confluence with the Po. It has a population of c. 73,086. The city was the capit ...
, and many other famous buildings in Lombardy.
Beatrice was mainly interested in poetry and gathered around her an excellent circle of poets in the vernacular, which included, among others,
Vincenzo Calmeta, Gaspare Visconti, Niccolò da Correggio,
Bernardo Bellincioni
Bernardo Bellincioni (1452–1492) was an Italian poet, who began his career in the court of Lorenzo the Magnificent in Florence. In 1483 he was at the House of Gonzaga, Gonzaga court and in 1485 he moved to Milan, where he was the court poet of Lu ...
, Antonio Cammelli and
Serafino Aquilano. According to some, this is a sign of the fact that she did not master Latin, although she had as a tutor the humanist
Battista Guarino
Battista Guarino ( la, Baptista Guarinus; 1434–1503(?)) was the youngest son of Guarino da Verona. He was one of the most significant humanists
Humanism is a philosophical stance that emphasizes the individual and social potential an ...
, in any case she favored the affirmation of vulgar literature in Milan.
![Milano,_Conca_di_Viarenna](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a0/Milano%2C_Conca_di_Viarenna.JPG)
Music was a family passion, and therefore in her travels she was always accompanied by musicians and singers. She was a player of viola, lute and clavichord, and learned dance and singing from Ambrogio da Urbino and Lorenzo Lavagnolo.
She left an epistolary of at least four hundred surviving letters, which out of habit she almost always wrote by his own hand and not by means of secretaries, as was customary at the time. Many were lost or destroyed, especially in relation to 1496, perhaps as a result of the high political content, but some appear notable for their exquisite descriptions or burlesque and irreverent tone.
She appreciated the Latin and Greek comedies and tragedies, but above all the Provençal chivalric poems and the Carolingian cycle, which in those years
Matteo Maria Boiardo
Matteo Maria Boiardo (, ; 144019/20 December 1494) was an Italian Renaissance poet, best known for his epic poem ''Orlando innamorato''.
Early life
Boiardo was born in 1440, kept alive. She especially loved to listen to the commentary on the ''Divine Comedy'' held for her by Antonio Grifo, a passion also shared by her husband who often stopped to listen to her readings.
She used her position as a lady of one of the most splendid courts in Italy to surround herself with men of culture and exceptional artists. Her court was frequented by painters such as
Leonardo da Vinci
Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci (15 April 14522 May 1519) was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance who was active as a painter, Drawing, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. While his fame initially res ...
,
Ambrogio de Predis
Giovanni Ambrogio de Predis (c. 1455 – c. 1508) was an Italian Renaissance painter, illuminator and designer of coins active in Milan. Ambrogio gained a reputation as a portraitist, including as a painter of miniatures, at the court of ...
,
Giovanni Antonio Boltraffio
Giovanni Antonio Boltraffio (or Beltraffio) (1466 or 1467 – 1516) was an Italian painter of the High Renaissance from Lombardy, who worked in the studio of Leonardo da Vinci. Boltraffio and Bernardino Luini are the strongest artistic personal ...
,
Andrea Solari, architects such as
Bramante
Donato Bramante ( , , ; 1444 – 11 April 1514), born as Donato di Pascuccio d'Antonio and also known as Bramante Lazzari, was an Italian architect and painter. He introduced Renaissance architecture to Milan and the High Renaissance style ...
and
Amadeo, sculptors such as
Gian Cristoforo Romano
Giovanni Cristoforo (or Giancristoforo) Romano (1456–1512) was an Italian Renaissance sculptor and medallist.
Born in Rome to Isaia da Pisa, he was probably a pupil of Andrea Bregno. His first known works are in the Ducal Palace of Urbino, d ...
,
Cristoforo Solari
Church of San Zaccaria Venice - bas-relief on the facade
Cristoforo Solari (c. 1460–1527), also known as il Gobbo (''the hunchbacked''), was an Italian sculptor and architect. He was the brother of the painter Andrea Solari.
Among his work, ...
and the
Caradosso
Cristoforo (known as Caradosso) Foppa (1445 – c. 1527) was an Italian goldsmith, sculptor, and die sinker.
According to some sources he was born at Mondonico]/Olgiate Molgora in the Province of Lecco, and according to others in Pavia. It i ...
, humanists such as
Baldassarre Castiglione
Baldassare Castiglione, Count of Casatico (; 6 December 1478 – 2 February 1529),Dates of birth and death, and cause of the latter, fro, ''Italica'', Rai International online. was an Italian courtier, diplomat, soldier and a prominent Renaissanc ...
, musicians and luthiers such as Franchino Gaffurio, Lorenzo Gusnasco, Jacopo di San Secondo, Antonio Testagrossa, as well as many of the most famous singers and dancers of the time.
At her death, as Vincenzo Calmeta wrote, "everything went to ruin and precipice, and from happy heaven to dark hell the court was converted, so that each virtuous was forced to take another path". Thus began the slow diaspora of Milanese poets, artists and writers, forced, especially after the definitive fall of the Moro, to seek their fortune elsewhere.
Portraits
![Ritratto di signora in rosso](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0a/Ritratto_di_signora_in_rosso.jpg)
There are many portraits of Beatrice that have come down to us, both contemporary and posthumous. Most of these are of certain identification, either because they bear the name next to it or because of the distinctive features of Beatrice, such as the
coazzone.
Famous portraits
The most famous remain the bust made by
Gian Cristoforo Romano
Giovanni Cristoforo (or Giancristoforo) Romano (1456–1512) was an Italian Renaissance sculptor and medallist.
Born in Rome to Isaia da Pisa, he was probably a pupil of Andrea Bregno. His first known works are in the Ducal Palace of Urbino, d ...
, the funeral monument of
Cristoforo Solari
Church of San Zaccaria Venice - bas-relief on the facade
Cristoforo Solari (c. 1460–1527), also known as il Gobbo (''the hunchbacked''), was an Italian sculptor and architect. He was the brother of the painter Andrea Solari.
Among his work, ...
and the ''Sforza Altarpiece.'' However, Malaguzzi Valeri notes that like Solari did not bother to reproduce the true traits of Beatrice, having to the funeral statue be placed at the top of a monument and therefore seen from below and from afar, so the unknown and coarse painter of the ''Sforza Altarpiece'' altered the physiognomy of Beatrice compared to the refined original drawings of Ambrogio de Predis, hardening the features of the face to make it almost unrecognizable: "he preferred to take care of the accessories of the dress with infinite monotony, so that the duchess, more than a living person, appears a doll too adorned".
Lesser known
# The portrait of her as a child made by
Cosmè Tura was lost in the last century.
# From
Leonardo
Leonardo is a masculine given name, the Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese equivalent of the English, German, and Dutch name, Leonard
Leonard or ''Leo'' is a common English masculine given name and a surname.
The given name and surname originate ...
it had been "divinely" portrayed, as Vasari writes, on the fresco of the Crucifixion by
Donato Montorfano in the refectory of Santa Maria delle Grazie, however the artist's dry technique deteriorated in such a way as to be barely distinguishable today.
# It is carved, together with the other duchesses of Milan, in ''the Portale del Lavabo'' of the Certosa di Pavia and in a bas-relief at the
Castello Sforzesco.
Uncertain identification
# The drawing preserved in the
Uffizi
The Uffizi Gallery (; it, Galleria degli Uffizi, italic=no, ) is a prominent art museum located adjacent to the Piazza della Signoria in the Historic Centre of Florence in the region of Tuscany, Italy. One of the most important Italian museums ...
with the number 209, executed in lapis and watercolor but hard retouched a little everywhere by a hand of the sixteenth century, was identified by Father Sebastiano Resta (17th century) as a portrait of Beatrice d'Este and attributed to Leonardo da Vinci. Karl Morgenstern (1813) and other critics noted similarities with the ''Belle Ferronnière,'' as did Dalli Regoli (1985), who considered the drawing a copy from a lost original by Leonardo and added a certain resemblance to the bust of the Louvre. Lionello Venturi (1925) refused Leonardo's attribution and instead proposed the name of
Boccaccio Boccaccino
Boccaccio Boccaccino (c. 1467 – c. 1525) was a painter of the early Italian Renaissance, belonging to the Emilian school. He is profiled in Vasari's '' Le Vite delle più eccellenti pittori, scultori, ed architettori'' (or, in English, ' ...
.
# ''The Rothschild Lady'' or ''Portrait of a Young Woman in'' ''Profile,'' from
private collection
A private collection is a privately owned collection of works (usually artworks) or valuable items. In a museum or art gallery context, the term signifies that a certain work is not owned by that institution, but is on loan from an individu ...
, considered the work of the circle of Leonardo da Vinci, and precisely of Bernardino de' Conti.
# ''Portrait of a Young Woman in Profile'' by
Ambrogio de Predis
Giovanni Ambrogio de Predis (c. 1455 – c. 1508) was an Italian Renaissance painter, illuminator and designer of coins active in Milan. Ambrogio gained a reputation as a portraitist, including as a painter of miniatures, at the court of ...
# Another ''Portrait of a Young Woman'', from the circle of Leonardo da Vinci.
# The portrait cataloged at the Uffizi as ''Portrait of Barbara Pallavicino'' by
Alessandro Araldi, which, in addition to the best known elements, shows above all a pearl necklace with pendant that fully corresponds to the description made by duchess
Eleonora
Eleanor () is a feminine given name, originally from an Old French adaptation of the Old Provençal name ''Aliénor''. It is the name of a number of women of royalty and nobility in western Europe during the High Middle Ages.
The name was introd ...
on the gift sent by Ludovico to the future bride in 1490.
# She is also one of the possible candidates for identification with the so-called ''
La Belle Ferronnière
''La Belle Ferronnière'' () is a portrait of a lady, usually attributed to Leonardo da Vinci, in the Louvre. It is also known as ''Portrait of an Unknown Woman.'' The painting's title, applied as early as the seventeenth century, identifying t ...
'' by Leonardo da Vinci.
Comparisons
File:Comparazione di quattro ritratti di Beatrice d'Este 04.jpg, Three alleged portraits compared to the certain one of the Louvre.
File:Comparazione di tre ritratti di Beatrice d'Este 01.jpg, In Carracci's engraving, the clothing and jewels are taken from the ''Pala Sforzesca'', but the expression is more similar to the alleged portrait of Predis.
File:Comparazione dei ritratti di Beatrice d'Este e Barbara Pallavicino.jpg, Comparison of the '' Portrait of Barbara Pallavicino'' with the certain ones of Barbara herself (left) and Beatrice (right).
File:Comparazione di alcuni ritratti di Beatrice d'Este con la statua di Eva in Palazzo Ducale a Venezia.jpg, Curious resemblance to the statue of Eve at the Doge's Palace in Venice, by Antonio Rizzo. Probably a coincidence. The dating varies, depending on the critics, between 1470–80 and 1490–97.
File:Comparazione di due ritratti certi di Beatrice d'Este con la dama dell'Ambrosiana.jpg, Beatrice would not be the woman portrayed in the '' Portrait of a Lady'' by Ambrogio de Predis
Giovanni Ambrogio de Predis (c. 1455 – c. 1508) was an Italian Renaissance painter, illuminator and designer of coins active in Milan. Ambrogio gained a reputation as a portraitist, including as a painter of miniatures, at the court of ...
at the Pinacoteca Ambrosiana
A pinacotheca (Latin borrowing from grc, πινακοθήκη, pinakothēkē = grc, πίναξ, pinax, (painted) board, tablet, label=none + grc, θήκη, thēkē, box, chest, label=none) was a picture gallery in either ancient Greece or an ...
in Milan'','' which for a long time was attributed to her: the facial features are very dissimilar from those of her certain portraits, nor is there the usual coazzone. Investigations between 2010 and 2013 by Martin Kemp
Martin John Kemp (born 10 October 1961) is an English musician and actor, best known as the bassist in the new wave band Spandau Ballet and for his role as Steve Owen in ''EastEnders''.
He is the younger brother of Gary Kemp, who is also ...
/ and a German researcher brought to light strong evidence that the true sitter of the painting is not Beatrice d'Este but Anna Maria Sforza
Anna may refer to:
People Surname and given name
* Anna (name)
Mononym
* Anna the Prophetess, in the Gospel of Luke
* Anna (wife of Artabasdos) (fl. 715–773)
* Anna (daughter of Boris I) (9th–10th century)
* Anna (Anisia) (fl. 1218 to 1221)
...
.
File:Comparazione fra la Bella Ferronniere e il presunto ritratto di Beatrice d'Este.jpg, Leonardo's '' Belle Ferronnière'' and the alleged portrait of Beatrice in comparison.
Posthumous portraits
# Immediately after his death, Ludovico had a head minted with his own effigy on one side and his wife's on the other. It is one of the first examples of coinage of this type, a testimony of great love and admiration for his wife.
# At the beginning of the sixteenth century it was depicted by
Bernardino Luini
Bernardino Luini (c. 1480/82 – June 1532) was a north Italian painter from Leonardo's circle during the High Renaissance. Both Luini and Giovanni Antonio Boltraffio were said to have worked with Leonardo directly; he was described as having ...
, together with the other members of the Sforza family, in one of the lunettes of the Palazzo degli Atellani in Milan, today in the museums of the Castello Sforzesco. On the façade of the same building, in the eighteenth century, was carved by
Pompeo Marchesi
Pompeo Marchesi (; 7 August 1783, in Saltrio, near Milan – 6 February 1858, in Milan) was a Lombard sculptor of the neoclassical school.
Biography
He first studied at the Brera Academy of Fine Arts in Milan. In 1804 he won a scholarship ...
a medallion depicting it.
# The face of the two sisters, Beatrice and Isabella, has been recognized in the two spectators who, tenderly embraced, are fascinated by the fresco by
Benvenuto Tisi da Garofalo in the ceiling of the ''Sala del Tesoro'' of Palazzo Costabili in Ferrara. Since it dates back to the years 1503–1506, it would constitute a tribute of the Este to the now deceased joint.
Miniatures
# The most famous miniature, the work of Giovanni Pietro Birago, is contained in the donation diploma of 28 January 1494, now preserved at the British Library in London, with which her husband enfeoffed her of numerous lands.
# There was a certain similarity between the physiognomy of Beatrice and that "a bit impertinent" of the Laura of Antonio Grifo's Canzoniere Marciano. Ludovico and Beatrice are undoubtedly the couple who, in the Canzoniere queriniano illuminated by Grifo, at folio 119 r. acts as a guide to the others. It may have been depicted, again by Grifo, also in a letter cap illuminated at folio 182 v. of the incunabulum of the Divine Comedy preserved at the House of Dante in Rome.
# Another of her miniatures can be found in the Arcimboldi Missal of the Chapter Library of the Duomo of Milan, in the scene of the ducal investiture of her husband.
More recently she has been honored along with her court in works by painters such as Giambattista Gigola (1816-1820),
Giuseppe Diotti
Giuseppe Diotti (1 March 1779 – 30 January 1846) was an Italian painter of the Neoclassic style.
Biography
He was born in Casalmaggiore. His full name was Francesco Giuseppe Antonio Diotti. He initially was apprenticed in his hometown to Paol ...
(1823),
Francesco Gonin (1845),
Francesco Podesti (1846),
Cherubino Cornienti (1840 and 1858),
Eleanor Fortescue-Brickdale (1920), and individually in Domenico Mingione's Portrait of ''Beatrice d'Este'' (2021), which faithfully reproduces Leonardo da Vinci's charcoal drawing.
File:LA CORTE DI LUDOVICO IL MORO di Giuseppe Diotti (1823).jpeg, ''The court of Ludovico il Moro'', Giuseppe Diotti
Giuseppe Diotti (1 March 1779 – 30 January 1846) was an Italian painter of the Neoclassic style.
Biography
He was born in Casalmaggiore. His full name was Francesco Giuseppe Antonio Diotti. He initially was apprenticed in his hometown to Paol ...
(1823). Starting from the left: a page opens the door to the secretary Bartolomeo Calco. At the center of the scene are seated Cardinal Ascanio
''Ascanio'' is a grand opera in five acts and seven tableaux by composer Camille Saint-Saëns. The opera's French libretto, by Louis Gallet, is based on the 1852 play ''Benvenuto Cellini'' by French playwright Paul Meurice which was in turn base ...
, Duchess Beatrice and Duke Ludovico, to whom Leonardo da Vinci shows the project for the fresco of the Last Supper. Around them are recognizable other great personalities of the court: on the left Bramante with the mathematician Fra' Luca Pacioli; on the right the musician Franchino Gaffurio
Franchinus Gaffurius (Franchino Gaffurio; 14 January 1451 – 25 June 1522) was an Italian music theorist and composer of the Renaissance. He was an almost exact contemporary of Josquin des Prez and Leonardo da Vinci, both of whom were his pers ...
, the poet Bernardo Bellincioni
Bernardo Bellincioni (1452–1492) was an Italian poet, who began his career in the court of Lorenzo the Magnificent in Florence. In 1483 he was at the House of Gonzaga, Gonzaga court and in 1485 he moved to Milan, where he was the court poet of Lu ...
and the historian Bernardino Corio
Bernardino Corio (born 1459 in Milan; died ca.1519) was an Italian humanist and historian of the Renaissance. He wrote ''Historia di Milano'' circa 1500.
Biography
Bernardino Corio came from a renowned Milanese family that had served the Sforza ...
.
File:Francesco Podesti Leonardo presenta il bozzetto dell'Ultima Cena al Duca di Milano Ludovico il Moro.jpg, Leonardo presents the sketch of the Last Supper to the Duke of Milan Ludovico il Moro, Francesco Podesti, 1846. At the center of the scene are, as elsewhere, the Duke with Duchess Beatrice and Cardinal Ascanio.
File:Dettaglio di Beatrice d'Este nel dipinto di Francesco Podesti.jpeg, Detail of Duchess Beatrice
File:Dettaglio di Ludovico il Moro nel dipinto di Francesco Podesti.jpeg, Detail of Duke Ludovico
File:Eleanor Fortescue-Brickdale - The Forerunner.jpg, ''The Forerunne''r or ''The court of Ludovico il Moro''. Eleanor Fortescue-Brickdale. On the left you can recognize the Duchess Beatrice, to whom a courtier whispers something in her ear; Fra' Savonarola
Girolamo Savonarola, OP (, , ; 21 September 1452 – 23 May 1498) or Jerome Savonarola was an Italian Dominican friar from Ferrara and preacher active in Renaissance Florence. He was known for his prophecies of civic glory, the destruction o ...
, Cecilia Gallerani
Cecilia Gallerani (; early 1473 – 1536) was the favourite and most celebrated of the many mistresses of Ludovico Sforza, known as Lodovico il Moro, Duke of Milan. She is best known as the subject of Leonardo da Vinci's painting '' The Lady ...
and Elisabetta Gonzaga
Elisabetta Gonzaga (1471–1526) was a noblewoman of the Italian Renaissance, renowned for her cultured and virtuous life. A member of the House of Gonzaga, she was a sister of Francesco II Gonzaga, Marquess of Mantua and by marriage the Duchess ...
; a page also embraces a monkey, a tribute to the one actually owned by the dukes. On the right Leonardo da Vinci shows his model flying machine to Duke Ludovico; some courtiers and the little blond Ercole Massimiliano assist amused.
File:Ludovico Il Moro in visita a Leonardo Da Vinci nel Refettorio del Convento di Santa Maria Delle Grazie Cherubino Cornienti.jpeg, Ludovico il Moro visiting Leonardo da Vinci in the Refectory of Santa Maria delle Grazie, mid-nineteenth century, Cherubino Cornienti. Behind the blond Moro, Duchess Beatrice and Cardinal Ascanio admire the work absorbed.
File:Il Moro sulla tomba della moglie.jpg, Ludovico weeps at the tomb of his wife Beatrice, Giovanni Battista Gigola, 1815 ca. The friars of S. Maria delle Grazie are present on the left, on the right the two orphans Ercole Massimiliano and Francesco
Francesco, the Italian (and original) version of the personal name " Francis", is the most common given name among males in Italy. Notable persons with that name include:
People with the given name Francesco
* Francesco I (disambiguation), sev ...
with their respective nurses, as well as Bramante and Leonardo.
File:Il duca Ludovico Maria Sforza visita la tomba della moglie, la duchessa Beatrice d'Este, nella chiesa di Santa Maria delle Grazie a Milano,.jpeg, Duke Ludovico visited the tomb of his wife in the church of Santa Maria delle Grazie, Alessandro Reati, between 1850 and 1873.
File:Calco statua funebre di Beatrice d'Este al Victoria and Albert Museum, dettaglio 3.jpg, The cenotaph: cast of the Victoria and Albert Museum
The Victoria and Albert Museum (often abbreviated as the V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.27 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and nam ...
.
File:Calco statua funebre di Beatrice d'Este al Victoria and Albert Museum, dettaglio 4.jpg, Detail of the fur muff and rhomboid embroidery
Embroidery is the craft of decorating fabric or other materials using a needle to apply thread or yarn. Embroidery may also incorporate other materials such as pearls, beads, quills, and sequins. In modern days, embroidery is usually seen ...
.
File:Calco statua funebre di Beatrice d'Este al Victoria and Albert Museum, dettaglio 6.jpg
File:Calco statua funebre di Beatrice d'Este al Victoria and Albert Museum, dettaglio 8.jpg
File:Beatrix Estensis.jpg, Beatrix Estensis, Ludovici uxor. Ancient free copy.
File:Gian cristoforo romano, beatrice d'este, 1490 ca. 2.JPG, Bust of the young Beatrice d'Este by Giovanni Cristoforo Romano, .
Issue
*
Ercole Massimiliano, (1493–1530), count of Pavia, duke of Milan 1513 – 1515;
*
Sforza Francesco, (1495–1535), Prince of Rossano and Count of Borrello 1497 – 1498, Count of Pavia and Duke of Milan 1521 – 1524 married in 1533 to Christina of Denmark (1522–1590), daughter of King Christian II of Denmark.
* The third son was born dead and, not having been baptized, could not be placed with his mother in the tomb. Ludovico, heartbroken, therefore had him buried above the door of the cloister of Santa Maria delle Grazie with this Latin epitaph: "O unhappy childbirth! I lost my life before I was born, and more unhappy, by dying I took the life of my mother and the father deprived his wife. In so much adverse fate, this alone can be of comfort to me, that divine parents bore me, Ludovico and Beatrice dukes of Milan. 1497, January 2".
Cultural influence
Literature
Contemporary poets
To Beatrice are dedicated the ''Triumphs'' of (1497), a poem in third rhyme of Petrarch and Dante's inspiration in which the poet mourns the untimely death of the duchess, "his dear companion", and invokes Death to allow him to follow her, railing against the cruel Fate and misery of the human condition, until Beatrice herself descends from Heaven to console him and to draw him out of his "past error", showing him how in truth everything happens according to divine justice.
Gaspare Visconti composed a songbook for her; among the poems contained therein, one introduced by the column "for the death of the Duchess and for the peril where this homeland is placed" already shows the awareness of the next ruin of the state caused by the despair of the Moro for the loss of his wife: "and my homeland gives me much fright , that in him is sustained, so that every building , ruin, if the foundation is lacking".
Serafino Aquilano wrote four sonnets in his death, as well as other poets, including
Niccolò da Correggio and
Cornelio Balbo.
Michele Marullo
Michele (), is an Italian male given name, akin to the English male name Michael.
Michele (pronounced ), is also an English female given name that is derived from the French Michèle. It is a variant spelling of the more common (and identically ...
composed an ''Epitaphium Beatricis Estensis''.
Later writers
Beatrice appears as the protagonist or character in various literary works:
= Tragedies
=
* ''The death of Ludovico Sforza known as the Moor'', tragedy of Pietro Ferrari (1791).
* ''Lodovico Sforza known as il Moro'', tragedy by
Giovanni Battista Niccolini
Giovanni Battista Niccolini (29 October 1782 – 20 September 1861) was an Italian poet and playwright of the Italian unification movement or Risorgimento.
Life
In 1782, Niccolini was born in Bagni San Giuliano to a family of limited means. He ...
(1833).
= Novels
=
* ''Lodovico il Moro'', by Giovanni Campiglio (1837).
*''Beatrice or La corte di Lodovico il Moro'' by Ignazio Cantù (1838)
* ''Leonardo – the Resurrection of the Gods'', by Dmitry Mereskovsky (1901).
* ''La città ardente – novel by Lodovico il Moro'', by Dino Bonardi (1933).
* ''
The Second Mrs. Giaconda'', a novel by
E. L. Konigsburg
Elaine Lobl Konigsburg (February 10, 1930 – April 19, 2013) was an American writer and illustrator of children's books and young adult fiction. She is one of six writers to win two Newbery Medals, the venerable American Library Association aw ...
(1975).
* ''Duchess of Milan'', by Michael Ennis (1992).
* ''
Leonardo's Swans'', by
Karen Essex
Karen Essex is an American historical novelist, a screenwriter, and journalist.
Early life and education
Essex was born in New Orleans, Louisiana. As a teenager, she got involved with the theatre and focused her collegiate studies on costume de ...
(2006).
* ''La misura dell'uomo'', by
Marco Malvaldi
Marco Malvaldi (born 27 January 1974, in Pisa) is an Italian crime writer.
Short biography
Marco Malvaldi is an Italian chemist and novelist, who began his writing career in 2007 with his first mystery story ''La briscola in cinque'' (''Game ...
(2018).
= Comics
=
* ''Ludovico il Moro – Signore di Milano'', comic strip of 2010.
Cinema
* In the 1971 RAI miniseries ''
The Life of Leonardo da Vinci
''La Vita di Leonardo Da Vinci'' — in English, ''The Life of Leonardo da Vinci '' — is a 1971 Italian television miniseries dramatizing the life of the Italian Renaissance genius Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519).
The Golden Globe-winning mini ...
'', Beatrice is portrayed by
Ottavia Piccolo.
* In the 2004 film ''Le grandi dame di casa d'Este by'' Diego Ronsisvalle she is played by Lucia Bendia.
* In the 2021 series ''
Leonardo
Leonardo is a masculine given name, the Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese equivalent of the English, German, and Dutch name, Leonard
Leonard or ''Leo'' is a common English masculine given name and a surname.
The given name and surname originate ...
'' she is played by Miriam Dalmazio.
Music
* The French composer
Reynaldo Hahn
Reynaldo Hahn (; 9 August 1874 – 28 January 1947) was a Venezuelan-born French composer, conductor, music critic, and singer. He is best known for his songs – ''mélodies'' – of which he wrote more than 100.
Hahn was born in Caracas b ...
evokes her court in his 1905 suite for winds, piano, winds, two harps, and percussion, ''
Le Bal de Béatrice d'Este
''Le Bal de Béatrice d'Este'' is a seven-movement suite for chamber ensemble by Reynaldo Hahn, first performed in 1905 in Paris.
History
The composer Reynaldo Hahn – born in Venezuela and long resident in Paris, though not yet, in 1905, a Fren ...
.''
Culinary
The invention of the Dolceriso del Moro, a typical dessert of
Vigevano
Vigevano (; lmo, label=Western Lombard, Avgevan) is a town and ''comune'' in the province of Pavia, Lombardy in northern Italy. A historic art town, it is also renowned for shoemaking and is one of the main centres of Lomellina, a rice-growing a ...
, is traditionally attributed to Beatrice herself, who would have conceived it in the spring of 1491 to please her illustrious consort. It is a kind of ricotta rice pudding, closed in a shortcrust pastry wrapper and enriched with candied fruit, pine nuts, almonds and rose water. This last ingredient served – as it seems – to induce harmony, harmony and fidelity in the couple.
Posthumous tributes
* The Pusterla Beatrice, one of the minor gates of the city in Brera, was dedicated by Moro to the memory of his wife;
* In modern times one of the tree-lined avenues along the ramparts of Milan, Viale Beatrice d'Este, was named after her.
Legends
It is said that in the Sforza castle of Vigevano, and precisely in the male's wing, on hot summer nights the spirits of Beatrice and her ladies continue to animate the apartments once belonged to the duchess and the so-called "loggia delle dame", which Ludovico had built specifically for his wife.
References
Notes
Bibliografia
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External links
{{DEFAULTSORT:Este, Beatrice d
1475 births
1497 deaths
Deaths in childbirth
Beatrice
Beatrice
Duchesses of Milan
15th-century Italian nobility
Renaissance women
15th-century Italian women
People from Ferrara