1. Monastery of San Marco - Machiavelli’s Savonarola23. The Basilica of San Lorenzo - Preaching to the Women4. Piazza della Signoria - A Citizens’ Militia5. Palazzo Vecchio - Machiavelli and the Florentine Chancery6. The Loggia della Signoria (or “dei Lanzi”) - Machiavelli, the Republic and the Medicean Signoria7. The Bargello - Machiavelli and the War8. The Tabernacle of the Stinche - Machiavelli as Prisoner9. Casa Buonarroti - The Fortifications of Florence10. Santa Croce - the Death of Niccolò Machiavelli11. Palazzo Strozzi - the Fortune of Machiavelli
The First Performance of "The Mandrake" at Palazzo Medici Riccardi
Niccolò Machiavelli, after the fall of the Florentine Republic in which he had played a major role - although not always acknowledged as such - and with the return of the Medici, was dismissed from all his political offices. From then on, he was driven by the aim of resuming an active role in public affairs and serving his homeland, but to do so he would have to enter into the graces of the current (and firmly established) lords of Florence. A lucky chance was offered him by the Florentine festivities, celebrated in Palazzo Medici, for the wedding of Lorenzo di Piero de' Medici, the nephew of Pope Leo X, who had married in France Madeleine de La Tour d'Auvergne, cousin to King Francis I.
Palazzo Medici Riccardi is situated about five hundred meters from Piazza San Marco. Cosimo the Elder had commissioned its design to Michelozzo di Bartolomeo, who built it from 1444 to 1462, although the work was definitively completed only in 1543. Generally considered the prototype of the Florentine noble residence, with its imposing presence and austerity it symbolized the political and cultural role held by the Medici in Florence for at least a century.
The Florentine festivities for the wedding of Lorenzo di Piero de' Medici (6-8 September 1518) were described in detail in the chronicles of the time. It played an important symbolic/political role, so much so that even Pope Leo X, unable to attend in person, presided in effigy with a portrait by Raphael depicting him beside Giulio de' Medici, the future Pope Clement VII, a portrait now displayed at the Uffizi Gallery. On that occasion three plays were performed, which some scholars - albeit in the lack of direct documentation - tend to identify as The Mandrake (Mandragola) by Machiavelli, the Filargio by Giovanni Manetti and perhaps La Pisana by Lorenzo Strozzi. The plays were performed on platforms furnished with set designs commissioned of Franciabigio - he probably worked on The Mandrake - of Ghirlandaio and Bastiano da Sangallo.
In the Life of Bastiano da San Gallo, called Aristotile (Vita di Bastiano, detto Aristotile, da San Gallo) by Giorgio Vasari , we read that Bastiano da Sangallo was highly praised for the beautiful triumphal arch decorated "with many stories" he built for the visit to Florence of the Medici Pope, Leo X, in the year 1515. For this reason Bastiano was involved three years later in the festivities for the wedding of Lorenzo di Piero de' Medici held at Palazzo Medici, later Riccardi. Bastiano "was of great assistance" - as Vasari tells us - "in all the festive preparations, and particularly in some prospect-views for comedies, to Franciabigio and Ridolfo Ghirlandajo, who had charge of everything". In Vasari's Life of Franciabigio (Vita del Francia Bigio) the perspective sets for the plays recited at the wedding of Piero di Lorenzo de' Medici, in whose design Bastiano da Sangallo specialized, are given special praise. One of these plays was probably Machiavelli's Mandrake, although certain proof of this is still lacking. However, in the final part of the "Life of Bastiano", Vasari informs us that the artist had begun to frequent Andrea del Sarto, "from whom he learned to do many things to perfection, attending with much study to perspective", and that he worked on many festivities, including the one held at the home of Bernardino di Giordano at Canto di Monteloro. On that occasion, it was expressly The Mandrake to be performed, "a most amusing comedy", continues Vasari; for this play, Andrea del Sarto and Bastiano da Sangallo "executed the scenery, which was very beautiful".
The date of composition of The Mandrake - the famous play by Niccolò Machiavelli - has not been established with certainty. It is set in 1504 - as we learn from the prologue narrated by Callimaco - but was most likely post res perditas, that is, after the return of the Medici to Florence and Machiavelli's dismissal from public office. It is certainly no later than 1519 (according to the Florentine calendar, which runs from 25 March 1519 to 24 March 1520), since this date appears on the oldest manuscript of the work, now at the Medicean Laurentian Library in Florence; it probably indicates the time when the codex was recopied, and not when the text was first written. Although it has not been demonstrated with certainty that The Mandrake was performed at the wedding of Lorenzo di Piero de' Medici in Palazzo Medici Riccardi, the hypothesis remains entirely possible.
In the early Sixties, The Mandrake was read by Parronchi as a political allegory, where Callimaco, who aspires to the love of Lucrezia, is to be identified with Lorenzo di Piero de' Medici, who became Lord of Florence (represented by Lucrezia), while the old fool Nicia may represent Pier Soderini. Although this interpretation has often been contested, Bausi has recently noted that the allegorical/political dimension was almost compulsory in a sixteenth-century theatrical work. Accordingly, he seems to accept the pro-Medicean allegorical context, but rejects the identification of Nicia with Soderini, by now excluded from Florentine politics, and sees the foolish Nicia instead as a projection of the old oligarchical class, relegated to second place by the Medicean primacy.
