I tried to watch the HBO series The Borgias, but I didn't like it. Too much like a over-glorified soap opera with more sex and violence. meh
Today I heard news of more of the civil wars in Syria, Mexico, Greece?, Congress, the war on women here in the states, in Kansas...
and even uncovering the coverups of state sanctioned violent crackdowns in Guatemala and all over Central and South America by revealing the records of those who were disappeared.
It's like watching the edifice of civil society crumble away... and trying to reconstruct what happened after the fact. So, is there anything in the decisive Italian wars of the early 1500's that might show some of how they handled it?
The power of the Borgia clan, so effective during the reign of Alexander VI, collapsed upon his death in 1503, when Cesare Borgia's illness prevented him from retaining the territorial domain he had established in Romagna [down the eastern coast of Italy, including Ravenna].
The Venetians seized certain of these territories, an act that would eventually cost them the support of Julius II...." pp 166-7
The wiki has a map and portraits of some of the principle actors. This one has a broader map of all of Italy.
Editor's note: "The substantive political news from Rome was, of course, contained in the official diplomatic dispatches sent home by Venetian ambassadors.... the relationship with Julius II had worsened [in three short years] as the central crisis of the Venetian Republic in Sanudo's lifetime, the War of the League of Cambrai, drew near.
The hostility toward Venice engendered by its acquisitions and continuing ambitions in northern Italy during the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries had increased with its aggressive actions since the eruption of the Italian Wars.
Venice had taken advantage of the confusion of the French campaign against Naples to strengthen its holdings in Apulia [the heel of the 'boot' of Italy]. It had been siding with Pisa in its rebellion against Florence, abetting its struggle with military and naval support....
Venetian diplomacy failed to avert the formation of the hostile League of Cambrai, which began to take shape in December 1508 and eventually was made up of Pope Julius II, King Louis XII of France, Emporer Maximillian I, Ferdinand of Spain, and Hungary, plus Ferrara, Savoy, and Mantua.
In the following spring, on April 27, 1509, the pope pronounced a ban of greater excommunication against the Venetian empire unless the Venetians restored all the Romagna cities to the Holy See within twenty-four hours." pp. 172-3
Sanudo Diaries: May 8, 1509 [8:182]: [Summary of letters] from Rome of May 3 and 4. Although our ambassadors wanted to go to the pope to protest this excommunication, he refused to speak with them. Thus they are in great danger; indeed, they fear they will be taken into custody. Six hundred copies of the writ of excommunication have been printed up and distributed; the pope wants to send them to Venice and to the entire world."
Editor's footnote: "The latin text of the excommunication was copied by Sanudo (8:187-205). The excommunication would last ten months." p. 173
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Editor's note: "The following excerpt shows that the pope sought to detach from Venice its current military leaders, members of the Orsini family." p. 173
Sanudo Diaries: May 8, 1509 [8:183]: Item: a report has also come from Rome that the Orsini are serving as guarantors to the pope and thus are neither against the church nor in the employ of the Venetians. When they wished to repay the money [to the Venetians], [the pope] told them that in no way should they do so. Moreover, he gave them absolution for holding such money, since it came from excommunicates, and he absolved them from the promise they had made. They said to him, "Holy Father, we do not want to blacken our reputation." And the pope replied, "Do not in any way repay that money," etc."
Editor's footnote: "The Orsini were a distinguished Roman family. Nicolo Orsini, Count of Pitigliano and Nola, was captain general of the Venetian forces at this time, and several relatives of his were also on the Venetian military payroll, including Mario and Corrado Orsini, whom Sanudo refers to in a review of military personnel as 'conduti e non veneno,' under contract but not present (10 May 1509, 8:218)."
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Editor's note: "Meanwhile, the French forces under Louis XII (1498-1515), who had claimed and occupied Milan, were moving toward the Venetian forces on the Lombard plain ... on May 14, 1509, they met at Agnadello, where the Venetian forces [of Bartolo d'Alviano] were routed." p 174.
Sanudo Diaries, May 15, 1509 [8:247-49]: "The savi were in the midst of their meeting, consulting about a certain issue concerning the Council of Ten. I was there to look at [the nearly 6meter x 3meter map of] Italy with some other patricians. At twenty-two hours [after sunset] Piero Mazaruol, a secretary, came running in with letters in his hand from the battlefield, with many gallows drawn on them. Thereupon the doge and the savi read the letters and learned that our forces had been routed.
And there began a great weeping and lamentation and, to put it better, a sense of panic. Indeed, they were as dead men. They wanted to keep the news a secret as long as possible but were unable to, since word had already escaped via the doge's household that our army had been defeated and that signor Bartolo [Bartolomeo d'Alviano], governor general [of the army], had been either captured or killed, etc. And in a very short time, within an hour of when the news had arrived, the entire Ducal Palace and the courtyard had filled with patricians and others. The Collegio decided to convene the Senate immediately; indeed, the senators were already beginning to arrive. The call went out for the procurators, and at Rialto for the senators; the doge descended half-dead. The Senate having convened with those who could come, the letter from Brescia, with its most bitter news of our defeat, was read...."
Editor's note: "Sanudo went on to describe, over the next eight days, the city's 'foul mood', the anger and recriminations, the lack of decisive leadership, with a doge "half-dead" and the Collegio almost paralyzed with indecision...." p. 174
All quotes as Sanudo Diaries and Editor's notes and Editor's footnotes from Venice, Cita Excellentissima, Selection from the Renaissance Diaries of Marin Sanudo translated by Linda L Carroll, editors: Patricia H LaBalme and Laura Sanguineti White, published by Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008
All quotes as Sanudo Diaries and Editor's notes and Editor's footnotes from Venice, Cita Excellentissima, Selection from the Renaissance Diaries of Marin Sanudo translated by Linda L Carroll, editors: Patricia H LaBalme and Laura Sanguineti White, published by Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008
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