Piero di Lorenzo de'' Medici and the Crisis of Renaissance Italy

This life of Lorenzo the Magnificent's eldest son provides a portrait of an aspiring Renaissance ruler, and explains the crisis in Italy that caused his political downfall and exile. A musician, poet, sportsman, patron of the arts and exile, Piero illuminates the Renaissance at the moment of its transition from a civic to a princely culture.

Following the life of one man, Piero de'' Medici, Lorenzo the Magnificent''s son, Alison Brown sheds new light on several of the most important themes of Renaissance history and culture by combining political history, the history of ideas, and cultural history. This interdisciplinary study weaves together an understudied period of crisis in Italy which brought down three leading dynasties, the revolution that in turn led to the new political realism of writers like Machiavelli, Guicciardini and Francesco Vettori, and, finally, the transition from the civic culture of the early Renaissance to the courtly or princely culture of the Cinquecento. Focusing on Piero''s full life and colourful character, Brown grants us a unique and contextualised insight into the patronage, culture and politics of Renaissance Italy whilst grounding broader trends within the lived experience of Florence''s most famous ruling family.