Lives of the early Medici: As told in their correspondence

About this book

The volume presents a meticulously edited collection of private letters written by the early Medici, Cosimo, his son Piero, Lorenzo the Magnificent, and their close relatives, spanning the decades when the Florentine banking family was transforming from prosperous merchants into a dynastic power. The editor, Janet Ross, frames the work with a 19th‑century preface that explains her aim to reveal the “vie intime” of these figures, drawing on sources ranging from Fabroni’s massive biographies to obscure pamphlets and, crucially, unpublished manuscripts from the Archivio Medicei ante Principato. The opening quotation from Dr. Newman underscores the book’s premise: that contemporary correspondence offers factual insight far beyond the conjecture of later biographers. The reader is thus invited to explore domestic concerns, Contessina’s household accounts, Lucrezia’s love of bathing, a child’s plea for a promised pony, through authentic epistles, many of which appear here for the first time in translation.

Written in a scholarly yet readable style typical of early‑20th‑century historical editing, the text combines careful translation with extensive footnotes and illustrative portraits. Its tone is that of a learned antiquarian, attentive to diplomatic formulas such as “Your Magnificence” while also allowing the personalities of the correspondents to emerge. This book will appeal to readers who relish primary sources, especially those interested in Renaissance Florence, the social history of elite families, or the interplay of private life and public power. Scholars of early modern Italy, students of diplomatic correspondence, and general readers fascinated by the human side of famous patrons will find the collection both informative and engaging.

Opening lines

“_It has ever been a hobby of mine, though perhaps it is a truism, not a hobby, that the true life of a man is in his letters.... Not only for the interest of a biography, but for arriving at the inside of things the publication of letters is the true method. Biographers varnish, they assign motives, they conjecture feelings, they interpret Lord Burleigh’s nods, but contemporary letters are facts._”--Dr. Newman to his Sister, Mrs. John Mozley, May 18, 1863. …

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