The Medici Popes: Leo X and Clement VII

This is a biography of the two influential popes who ruled the Vatican during the time of the Medicis in Florence, often viewed as the harbinger of the Renaissance. From the preface: “ALTHOUGH the names of the two great Popes of the House of Medici loom large in the annals of the Italian Renaissance, yet the private side of their lives and conduct has naturally been dwelt upon with less insistence by the papal historian than the leading part they took in the development of Italian politics or in the course of the Reformation throughout Europe. Even in William Roscoe's elaborate biography of Leo X., the figure of that famous pontiff is largely overshadowed by the momentous episodes of his reign both within and without Italy; "one cannot see the wood for the intervening trees! " In the present volume, therefore, I have made the attempt of presenting to the reader a purely personal study, from which I have excluded, so far as was practicable, all reference to the burning theological questions of the Reformation, and have also avoided any undue amount of dissertation on the tortuous and complicated policy pursued by these Popes of the House of Medici. For I hope that a simple account of the personal career and character of Leo X. (with whom of necessity my work chiefly deals) will prove of some value to the historical student of the Renaissance, who may thereby become better able to comprehend the varying part played by the former of the two Medicean pontiffs in the political and religious struggles during the opening decades of the sixteenth century.”