The Quattrocento Project - by Sevrin de Savage [mka: Aaron D. McClelland] - is an effort to chronicle the history, arts, politics, philosophies and customs of Florence during the 15th Century.
			The Pazzi Conspiracy The Conspiracy
			by Sevrin de Savage [Aaron D. McClelland] In the late summer of 1477, Giovan Battista was summoned to the Vatican rooms of the Archbishop of Pisa, Francesco Salviati. Upon being ushered into the the Archbishop's chambers, Battista discovered another man present - a richly dressed merchant, short, pale, blond, and who appeared restless as he stood apart from the Archbishop. Battista, the Count of Montesecco, being a professional soldier in the employ of Pope Sixtus IV, did not find such a summons out of the ordinary. What he did find extraordinary and somewhat foreboding, was Salviati's demand that Battista take an oath of secrecy before he was introduced to the merchant. Once the oath was made, the Archbishop introduced Battista to the merchant; Francesco de' Pazzi, a Florentine banker currently residing in Rome. As Francesco sat in silence studying Battista, the Archbishop told the papal soldier that they were planning a forced change in government in Florence. "I would do anything for you, but that being a soldier in the pay of the Pope [Sixtus IV] and the Count [Girolamo Riario], I cannot enter your plans." Battista answered. "How can you think that we could get up to something like this without the Count's consent?" asked the Archbishop. The Archbishop and Francesco then went on to present a situation that threatened the stability of Count Riario's hold over his new states of Imola and Forli, stating that his lands "wouldn't be worth a bean, because Lorenzo de' Medici nourishes a mortal hatred against him ... and after the Pope dies, [Lorenzo] will do everything he can to hurt the Count and to take the state away from him." Skeptical, Battista asked why Lorenzo would make himself such an enemy of Count Riario. The Archbishop and Francesco de' Pazzi went into great detail about the Papal treasury, Lorenzo's opposition to Salviati's appointment as Archbishop of Pisa, and other examples of Lorenzo's interference with the Pope's desires for Italy. Battista ended the meeting by agreeing to obey Count Riario's orders in all things concerning the Count's "honour and profit" as well as their own. Next: The Second Meeting