Isabella d'Este

“ As a last refuge, they put terrestrial love into celestial robes and drowned themselves in illusions. Bembo wished to serve Isabella d’Este “as if she were Pope,” but he sends her quite tenderly the kiss of his soul, which she, no doubt, took gracefully and at its value. She was not a sentimental woman; a clear, vigorous intellect is a very good antidote against false sensibility. But these other vigorous intellects were so busy weaving the tissue of their dreams that they did not trouble themselves much about possible applications. ”

“ During the twenty years that the Moro reigned as Regent and Duke in Milan, the new apse built in Bramante's classical style, the central cupola, and the beautiful cloisters with their slender marble shafts and dark red terra-cotta friezes of angel-heads, all rose into being. Then Ambrogio Borgognone decorated the roof of nave and apse, and designed the elaborate intarsiatura of these very choir-stalls to which Lodovico alludes in his letter to Isabella d'Este. ”

“ George's Day, surrounded by scholars and courtiers, dwarfs and jesters, and fair ladies clad in glittering robes of cloth of silver and gold. All the pageant of court-life in old Ferrara, as it was in the days when Duke Ercole reigned and Isabella and Beatrice d'Este grew up under the good Duchess Leonora's care, passes again before our eyes, as we linger in these low halls of the little red-brick palace among the fruit trees of this deserted quarter. ”

“ Will a woman yield to her lover, or will virtue resist him? To this petty issue must these measureless words be narrowed. ’Tis not even a forse. With d’Annunzio there can be no negative in such an alternative. And so the mighty Mantuan ruin which has known so many desolations receives its last humiliation, and passes into literature as a background for lust. Sunt lachrymæ rerum.
The true Isabella d’Este has been as much rarefied by the Renaissance legend as she has been materialised by d’Annunzio. For she cannot be wholly exonerated from d’Annunzio’s panegyric. ”

“ Niccolo da Correggio, called by Isabella d'Este and Sabba da Castiglione "the most accomplished gentleman of the age, [Pg 36] the foremost man in all Italy, in the art of poetry and in courtesy," who devoted his muse to the service of gentle ladies, and composed canzoni and capitoli or set Petrarch's sonnets to music for Isabella and Beatrice's pleasure. And among Ercole's courtiers at Ferrara there was one still greater, Matteo Boiardo, Count of Scandiano, who was intimate with both duke and duchess, and held many high posts at court. ”

“ And in May, when Cecilia's son was born, the duke himself told his wife the news, repeating his determination never again to renew the old connection. His letters to Isabella d'Este abound in the same expressions of genuine love and [Pg 92] admiration for his young wife. He is never tired of dwelling on her perfections, on her courage and fine horsemanship, and looks on with an indulgent smile at her wildest freaks and escapades.
Early in March he and Beatrice went to Vigevano, accompanied as usual by Messer Galeazzo and a few courtiers and ladies. ”

“ Probably the sad deaths of Princess Maria and Duchess Lucrezia d’Este, and the tragic events in the Maremma of 1562, affected Isabella greatly, but they only tended to increase her husband’s detestation for everything Florentine. No doubt he judged that Cosimo’s hand slew both Maria and Garzia—might it not strike Isabella or himself! When a man, in an autocratic position such as that made by Cosimo I., yields to unguarded passion, reason and right alike are at a discount. ”

“ They were on the same basis as the marriage treaties which had lately been drawn up between the Marquis Mantua and Isabella d'Este and the Duke and Duchess of Milan. Lodovico was to receive 40,000 gold crowns and 2000 more in jewels as Beatrice's portion. A sum equal to three-parts of the bride's dower was to be chargeable on the goods and lands of Signor Lodovico. If the most illustrious Madonna were to die without children, this dowry was to be returned, as was stipulated in the case of the Duchess of Milan. ”

“ It is interesting to trace the change of attitude of mind toward her on the part of those who either did not care for her or were actually bitterly opposed to her. Her sister-in-law, Isabella D'Este, became a real friend, as her letters attest, though at first she did not like at all the idea of the union of the house of D'Este with that of the Borgias, and it required all her father's force of will and all his political astuteness besides to secure her presence at the marriage. ”

“ During the last twenty years the patient researches of successive students in the archives of North Italian cities have been richly rewarded. The State papers of Milan and Venice, of Ferrara and Modena, have yielded up their treasures; the correspondence of Isabella d'Este, in the Gonzaga archives at Mantua, has proved a source of inexhaustible wealth and knowledge. A flood of light has been thrown on the history of Italy in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries; public events and personages have been placed in a new aspect ”

“ Isabella d’Este, (born 1474; died 1539) , was the oldest child of Duke Ercole I of Ferrara and Eleanora of Aragon. Having had Mario Equicola as preceptor, she married the Marquess Gianfrancesco Gonzaga (see note 446) in 1490, her early betrothal to whom prevented her from becoming the wife of Ludovico Sforza, the duke of Milan, who soon afterwards married her sister Beatrice. ”

“ Both princesses held fast to the ideal of their girlhood, and, leading the same pure and spotless life, left the same gracious memory behind them, alike in the old Mantuan city on the banks of the classic Mincio, where Isabella's presence lingers like some delicate perfume about the Camerini of the ancient Castello, and in that grander and more splendid court where Beatrice reigned for a few brief years by the Moro's side at Milan. ”

“ And on the same day the Mantuan envoy, Donato de' Preti, writing to Isabella d'Este, gave her the following version of [Pg 245] affairs: "This morning a meeting was held in the Castello, at which Signor Lodovicus was proclaimed King of Milan in the presence of the gentlemen and councillors assembled in the Rocchetta, no one else being nominated. Few spoke, and very little was said, but Signor Lodovico was chosen by universal acclamation, or at least with no dissent. ”

“ Visit of Isabella d'Este to Milan—Birth of Beatrice's son, Francesco Sforza—Fêtes and comedies at the Milanese court—Works of Leonardo and of Lorenzo di Pavia—Mission of Caradosso to Florence and Rome in search of antiques—Fall of Naples—Entry of King Charles VIII. and flight of Ferrante II.—Consternation in Milan—Departure of Isabella d'Este. ”

“ Niccolo had come to Milan in Beatrice's bridal train, and remained there ever since, highly valued and beloved by Lodovico and all the ducal family, riding in jousts and tournaments, going on foreign missions, and composing songs and eclogues for that young duchess whose death was one day to inspire some of his most touching verses. But the Marchesa Isabella was the true goddess of his adoration, the mistress to whom his heart and lyre alike were pledged, who was for him, not only "la mia patrona e signora," but "la prima donna del mondo," "the first lady in all the world." ”

“ P. Litta, Le Celebri Famiglie italiane, vol. iii. (Milan, 1831) , still a valuable work; E. Noyes, The Story of Ferrara (London, 1904) ; Julia Cartwright’s Isabella d’Este (London, 1903) , and Beatrice d’Este (1899) , pleasantly written but amateurish volumes based on A. Luzio’s Mantova e Urbino (Turin, 1893) ; A. Luzio and R. Renier, “Delle relazioni di Isabella d’Este Gonzaga con Lodovico e Beatrice Sforza” (Milan, 1890, Archivio Storico Lombardo, xvii.) . (L. V.*) ”

“ Isabella d'Este—Lodovico Sforza delays his wedding—Plot against his life—Submission of Genoa—Duke Gian Galeazzo—The Sanseverini brothers—Messer Galeazzo made Captain-General of the Milanese armies—His marriage to Bianca Sforza—Marriage of Gian Galeazzo to Isabella of Aragon—Wedding festivities at Milan—Lodovico draws up his marriage contract with Beatrice d'Este. ”

“ There we may see the strongly marked features and refined expression of the great Moro, between his brother and his nephew, while above the opposite portal are the four Duchesses of Milan, Bianca Maria Visconti, Bona of Savoy, Isabella of Aragon, and Beatrice d'Este with the same soft, beautiful face, the same long coil of hair and jewelled net that we see in her portrait in the Brera or in Cristoforo Romano's bust in the Louvre. ”

“ With the pattern of this admirable mother before their eyes, with all that was choicest in art and fairest in nature around them, Leonora's daughters grew up to womanhood, and insensibly acquired that enthusiasm for beauty in all its varied forms, that fine taste and perception which distinguished them above their contemporaries, which made Isabella at the end of her long life still the most attractive woman of her day, and which caused the bravest soldiers and the wisest scholars to lament the untimely death of the youthful Duchess Beatrice. ”

“ The proud young duchess who would not wear a robe similar to that bestowed upon his mistress by her husband, may naturally enough have declined to have her portrait painted by the same artist, however excellent a master he might be. But whether or no this was the true reason of this strange omission, there was certainly no portrait of Beatrice d'Este by Leonardo's hand in Milan a year after her death, or her own sister Isabella would not have applied to Cecilia Gallerani for the loan of her picture as an example of Leonardo's art. ”

“ Those critics who for instance are shocked by the octaves on the name of "Isabella" are too exigent, or ask too much, and what they ought not to ask (this name of Isabella was destined by God to adorn beautiful, noble, courteous, chaste and wise women from this time forth, and was originally intended as homage from Ariosto to the Marchesana of Mantua, Isabella of Este) . With these octaves he concludes the narrative of the sacrifice of her life made by Isabella to keep faith with Zerbino ”

“ While Lodovico and Beatrice were pursuing these different [Pg 230] objects of their ambition, the unfortunate Duchess Isabella was eating out her heart in the Castello of Pavia. After the imperial wedding, at which she had made so brave a show, she and Gian Galeazzo retired to Pavia, and were rarely seen in public again. The duke's health and mental condition became every day more enfeebled, and his wife devoted herself wholly to him and her children. That winter she gave birth to a second daughter, who was named Ippolita after her grandmother, but died at the age of seven. ”

“ Among them was young Ariosto, the bard of the Orlando Furioso, who was to celebrate the praises of all the princely personages present at Pavia and Vigevano, in his great poem, and who on this occasion probably met Leonardo for the first time. Fêtes and hunting-parties now succeeded each other every day. Even the King of Naples' ambassadors went out hunting, and one of them succeeded in wounding a wild boar. Isabella sent her husband wonderful accounts of the thrilling adventures and splendid sport which afforded the two sisters such unfeigned delight. ”

“ By this time his fame had spread far and wide through Italy. He made an organ for Matthias Corvinus, the King of Hungary, and another which he himself took to Rome for Pope Leo X. But his relations with Duchess Beatrice were not interrupted by this change of abode. In that same year he made her that clavichord which Isabella describes as the best and most beautiful which she had ever seen, and which she never ceased to covet until, after her sister's death and Lodovico's fall, she obtained possession of the precious instrument. ”

“ From these records we learn that Isabella's ladies were as numerous and as richly dressed as those of any reigning sovereign, and that her camoras and jewels were as sumptuous as Beatrice's own. Gian Galeazzo's stables were always well filled with horses and hounds, for Lodovico was too wise to grudge his nephew anything that tended to occupy his thoughts and distract them from public affairs. ”

“ To his sister-in-law, as Isabella always repeated in her letters, the Moro showed himself the kindest and most generous of hosts, and was unwearied in providing for her amusements and gratification.
"To-day," she writes on the evening after her arrival at Milan, "Signor Lodovico showed me the treasure, which Your Highness saw when you were last here, but which has lately received the addition of two large chests full of ducats, and another full of gold quartz about two and a half feet square. Would to God that we, who are so fond of spending money, possessed as much!" ”

“ Isabella of Aragon and Beatrice d'Este—Ambrogio Borgognone and Giovanni Antonio Amadeo—Cristoforo Romano and his works at Pavia and Cremona—The Certosa of Pavia—Illness of Beatrice—Her journey to Genoa —Correspondence between Isabella and Lodovico Sforza—Visit of the Marquis of Mantua to Milan. ”

“ Wars of Venice and Ferrara—Invasion of Ferrara—Lodovico Sforza and Alfonso of Calabria come to the help of Ercole d'Este—Peace of Bagnolo—Prosperity of Ferrara, and cultivation of art and learning at Ercole's court—Guarino and Aldo Manuzio—Strozzi and Boiardo—Architecture and painting—The frescoes of the Schifanoia—Music and the drama—Education of Isabella and Beatrice d'Este. ”

“ In the frequent letters which Lodovico and Beatrice both of them addressed to the Marchioness of Mantua, as well as in those of Giacomo Trotti to the Duke of Ferrara, we find many allusions to the Duke of Milan's wife, Isabella of Aragon. This princess, who was Beatrice's first cousin and only five years older than Lodovico's wife, is mentioned not only as present with her husband at all court festivities and hunting-parties, but as her constant companion in all her occupations and amusements, both at Vigevano and Pavia. ”