Motives never seem scarce for people. All over. There are the stated motives and goals and then the ones they actually believe or use. There is God and country, faith and family or ethos, or all the above, as well as for honor and justice and property or wealth. So it was a mix of motives that led people when the French army and their king marched to Italy. Not just the French, but the Italians of all the different cities, with all their alliances and patronage and commercial links to fend for, defend and maybe even benefit from. This can only be a barest of outline, as there are far too many sources and commentaries about such a watershed event, for Italy and for France, in those times. For us, it is the consequences of these disruptions that would have much greater impact. The tales of what would follow, the fallout, would reverberate and take on aspects of their own. But this adventure over the Alps is what set Europe astir in ways that it would not settle for centuries.
Modern takes tend to revolve around Milan as the instigator, the one who pulled the trigger, so to speak that gave impetus for the young French King to take his gigantic army first into Italy, and then down the length of the whole peninsula. Charles VIII didn't come to conquer the whole place, though he well could have, but to reassert an old claim as King of Naples and maybe teach the new pope a lesson. After he was done, if he got the right support, maybe he might go on a further crusade to retake Jerusalem. But the Duke of Milan, Ludovico Sforza, called 'il Moro' from his supposedly darker skin had advised, it is told, to the king he might not get a better chance, that the time was right in early 1494. But what motive did Sforza have?
The Duke of Milan, technically was merely acting as regent and had not been crowned duke in name since his brother died. Ludovico, 'il Moro' was taking care of things in Milan and her lands and protections, instead of his nephew, the rightful heir. These occupations were fine as far as this young, but now grown up, Gian Galeazzo thought (that very different younger brother of Caterina Sforza), and he would stay at the castle near Pavia. Not being bothered by affairs of state, for him, meant riding and hunting and avoiding angering his young wife. They had three children together, but his young wife, Isabella of Aragon was not happy, and seemed to want a way out.
Isabella was the granddaughter of the King of Naples, Ferrante who died, January 1494. Prior to this she had seen her husband's uncle, the regent Ludovico groom his own son for the dukedom and marry him off to another d'Este daughter, while her own husband Gian Galeazzo spent his hours with more favorite pastimes. In fact, Ludovico had married his son to the sister of his own wife, Beatrice d'Este, the opinionated and strong-willed daughter of Ercole d'Este, the duke of Ferrara. Those four, the two d'Este daughters and 'il Moro' and his son easily outshone her and her husband who was supposed to be duke.
Isabella wrote home to Naples and complained at length. But there was little her father or his father the King could do despite their relations in Spain. When the King died January 1494, her father Alfonso became king but he had no money and little more than promises of friendship with Rome and the Borja pope. By early 1494, with the new pope Alexander VI suddenly finding his Rome cool and even prickly in it's behavior toward him and 'his Spanish ways', Alfonso began hearing gossip of the French king amassing an army.
In one way, Ludovico was betting that with Naples taken by a friendly French king, that alliance could be renewed and founded on something more solid than the marriage forged years before between his nephew and Isabella of Aragon. The Kingdom of Naples had been poor and weak for some time. But the death of Ferrante and the accession of the Borja pope, signalled to many in Italy and beyond that the Spanish were making their move after building their network for decades. Venice and Florence could agree more quickly, it was thought, to French control of Naples, and Ludovico saw a way this could happen. Guicciardini seems to think this was the plan all along. Macchiavelli makes the case in stronger terms, foretelling the impending doom of Italy with 'il Moro' being the catalyst. Wanting to save Italy from Spain, Ludovico could excite the young French king of the glorious honors waiting for him in Naples, as well as the fruits of a long term Franco-Milanese alliance.
In these years, Leonardo da Vinci had found patronage with Ludovico Sforza, generating machines and wonders for festivals, holidays, parties and parades. He had spent a lot of time going back and forth between the Milanese and French courts delighting one and then the other. He would see all of these changes at close range. It would be interesting to know what he thought, if anything about them.
Of course there were still other points of view, in the prelude, in the middle of the 'action', and in the results.
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