When was machiavelli born

Over the next ten years, deprived of the political activities that were his life's work, Machiavelli turned his attention to writing. During this period, he produced a treatise on the art of war, one that draws on his experience as organizer of the militia, and a commentary on the writings of the classical Roman historian Livy.

Examining Livy's account of the Roman republic, Machiavelli discussed at length the concept of republican government. In contrast with The Prince , which supports monarchy or even tyranny, the Discourses on Livy are often cited as evidence of Machiavelli's republican sympathies.

He also wrote many poems and three comedic plays. His writing attracted the attention of Cardinal Giulio de Medici, who had for several years been in control of Florence and who commissioned him to write a history of Florence.

He worked on his Florentine History from to Reconciliation with the Medici brought about Machiavelli's brief return to public service. He was put in charge of military arrangements for Clement in Florence.

However, Clement foolishly fell for a ploy by his Roman enemies that resulted in his humiliation and the sacking of the papal palace and church of St.

Soon after, Rome fell, and the great Catholic city was terrorized and looted by mostly German Protestant armies. This debacle, and the threat posed to Florence by the advancing forces of Clement's enemies, led the Florentines to depose the Medici family in Machiavelli, a staunch supporter and lifelong defender of the Florentine republic, was on the losing side once again, now suspected by the republicans for having been in league with the Medici.

However, he did not have long to dwell on the irony of his position. He died after an illness in June Machiavelli's most famous work was not formally published during his lifetime, although it probably circulated in manuscript copies. As evidence of its popularity, it went through seven Italian editions in the next twenty years. In , all of Machiavelli's works were put on the "Index of Prohibited Books," a list of books banned by the Catholic church for heresy or immorality.

This did nothing to dampen his popularity, and The Prince was soon translated into all the major European languages. Today, Machiavelli continues to be recognized as one of the first modern political thinkers and as a shrewd commentator on the psychology of leadership. Decennali , a long poem in two parts on the contemporary history of Florence.

First Decennale , ; Second Decennale , or The Prince Il principe , treatise on leadership and political power, The Mandrake Root Mandragola , comic play, circa Mandrogola tells the story of young and beautiful Lucrezia, who is married to old and foolish Nicia.

Callimaco falls in love with Lucrezia and manages to trick Nicia into giving his full approval for their love affair. It is considered one of the best Italian comedies of this period. Discourses on Livy Discorsi sopra la prima deca ldi Tito Livio , analysis of the Roman republic, to Machiavelli thinks that other republican models such as those adopted by Sparta or Venice will produce weaker and less successful political systems, ones that are either stagnant or prone to decay when circumstances change.

Machiavelli evinces particular confidence in the capacity of the people to contribute to the promotion of communal liberty. This is not an arbitrary expression of personal preference on Machiavelli's part. He maintains that the people are more concerned about, and more willing to defend, liberty than either princes or nobles Discourses CW — In turn, when they fear the onset of such oppression, ordinary citizens are more inclined to object and to defend the common liberty.

Such an active role for the people, while necessary for the maintenance of vital public liberty, is fundamentally antithetical to the hierarchical structure of subordination-and-rule on which monarchic vivere sicuro rests. The preconditions of vivere libero simply do not favor the security that is the aim of constitutional monarchy. Machiavelli clearly views speech as the method most appropriate to the resolution of conflict in the republican public sphere; throughout the Discourses , debate is elevated as the best means for the people to determine the wisest course of action and the most qualified leaders.

The tradition of classical rhetoric, with which he was evidently familiar, directly associated public speaking with contention: the proper application of speech in the realms of forensic and deliberative genres of rhetoric is an adversarial setting, with each speaker seeking to convince his audience of the validity of his own position and the unworthiness of his opponents'. This theme was taken up, in turn, by late medieval Italian practitioners and theorists of rhetoric, who emphasized that the subject matter of the art was lite conflict.

Thus, Machiavelli's insistence upon contention as a prerequisite of liberty also reflects his rhetorical predilections Viroli By contrast, monarchic regimes—even the most secure constitutional monarchies such as France—exclude or limit public discourse, thereby placing themselves at a distinct disadvantage.

It is far easier to convince a single ruler to undertake a disastrous or ill-conceived course of action than a multitude of people. This connects to the claim in the Discourses that the popular elements within the community form the best safeguard of civic liberty as well as the most reliable source of decision-making about the public good.

Machiavelli's praise for the role of the people in securing the republic is supported by his confidence in the generally illuminating effects of public speech upon the citizen body.

Near the beginning of the first Discourses , he notes that some may object to the extensive freedom enjoyed by the Roman people to assemble, to protest, and to veto laws and policies.

But he responds that the Romans were able to. At times when ordinary Roman citizens wrongly supposed that a law or institution was designed to oppress them, they could be persuaded that their beliefs are mistaken … [through] the remedy of assemblies, in which some man of influence gets up and makes a speech showing them how they are deceiving themselves.

And as Tully says, the people, although they may be ignorant, can grasp the truth, and yield easily when told what is true by a trustworthy man Discourses CW The reference to Cicero one of the few in the Discourses confirms that Machiavelli has in mind here a key feature of classical republicanism: the competence of the people to respond to and support the words of the gifted orator when he speaks truly about the public welfare. Machiavelli returns to this theme and treats it more extensively at the end of the first Discourse.

Citing the formula vox populi, vox dei , Machiavelli insists that. With regard to its judgment, when two speakers of equal skill are heard advocating different alternatives, very rarely does one find the people failing to adopt the better view or incapable of appreciating the truth of what it hears Discourses CW Not only are the people competent to discern the best course of action when orators lay out competing plans, but they are in fact better qualified to make decisions, in Machiavelli's view, than are princes.

For example,. Likewise, should the people depart from the law-abiding path, they may readily be convinced to restore order:. For an uncontrolled and tumultuous people can be spoken to by a good man and easily led back into a good way. But no one can speak to a wicked prince, and the only remedy is steel…. To cure the malady of the people words are enough. The contrast Machiavelli draws is stark.

The republic governed by words and persuasion—in sum, ruled by public speech—is almost sure to realize the common good of its citizens; and even should it err, recourse is always open to further discourse.

Non-republican regimes, because they exclude or limit discursive practices, ultimately rest upon coercive domination and can only be corrected by violent means. The effect of the Machiavellian dichotomy between the need for flexibility and the inescapable constancy of character is to demonstrate an inherent practical limitation in single-ruler regimes. For the reader is readily led to the conclusion that, just because human conduct is rooted in a firm and invariant character, the rule of a single man is intrinsically unstable and precarious.

Machiavelli illustrates this claim by reference to the evolution of Roman military strategy against Hannibal. After the first flush of the Carthaginian general's victories in Italy, the circumstances of the Roman required a circumspect and cautious leader who would not commit the legions to aggressive military action for which they were not prepared.

Yet when a more offensive stance was demanded to defeat Hannibal, the Roman Republic was able to turn to the leadership of Scipio, whose personal qualities were more fitted to the times. If Fabius had been king of Rome, he might easily have lost this war, since he was incapable of altering his methods according as circumstance changed.

Since, however, he was born in a republic where there were diverse citizens with diverse dispositions, it came about that, just as it had a Fabius, who was the best man to keep the war going when circumstances required it, so later it had a Scipio at a time suited to its victorious consummation Discourses CW Changing events require flexibility of response, and since it is psychologically implausible for human character to change with the times, the republic offers a viable alternative: people of different qualities fit different exigencies.

The diversity characteristic of civic regimes, which was so reviled by Machiavelli's predecessors, proves to be an abiding advantage of republics over principalities. This does not mean that Machiavelli's confidence in the capacity of republican government to redress the political shortcomings of human character was unbridled. After all, he gives us no real indication of how republics manage to identify and authorize the leaders whose qualities are suited to the circumstances. It is one thing to observe that such variability has occurred within republics, quite another to demonstrate that this is a necessary or essential feature of the republican system.

At best, then, Machiavelli offers us a kind of empirical generalization, the theoretical foundations of which he leaves unexplored. And the Discourses points out that republics have their own intrinsic limitation in regard to the flexibility of response needed to conquer fortune.

For just as with individual human beings, it is difficult if not impossible to change their personal characteristics, so. If the downfall of principalities is the fixed structure of human character, then the failing of republics is a devotion to the perpetuation of institutional arrangements whose time has passed.

Whether it is any more plausible to hold out hope for the creation of more responsive republican institutions than to demand flexibility in the personal qualities of princes is not directly examined by the Discourses. Machiavelli thus seems to adhere to a genuinely republican position.

But how are we to square this with his statements in The Prince? This is contrasted with the lengthy composition process of the Discourses. Yet Machiavelli never repudiated The Prince , and indeed refers to it in the Discourses in a way that suggests he viewed the former as a companion to the latter.

Although there has been much debate about whether Machiavelli was truly a friend of princes and tyrants or of republics, and hence whether we should dismiss one or another facet of his writing as ancillary or peripheral, the questions seems irresolvable.

The body of literature debating this question, especially in connection with The Prince and Discourses , has grown to truly staggering proportions. John Pocock , for example, has traced the diffusion of Machiavelli's republican thought throughout the so-called Atlantic world and, specifically, into the ideas that guided the framers of the American constitution.

Paul Rahe argues for a similar set of influences, but with an intellectual substance and significance different than Pocock. For Pocock, Machiavelli's republicanism is of a civic humanist variety whose roots are to be found in classical antiquity; for Rahe, Machiavelli's republicanism is entirely novel and modern.

Likewise, cases have been made for Machiavelli's political morality, his conception of the state, his religious views, and many other features of his work as the distinctive basis for the originality of his contribution.

Yet few firm conclusions have emerged within scholarship. The unsettled state of play in current research on Machiavelli is well represented in Johnston et al. This historical ambiguity permits scholars to make equally convincing cases for contradictory claims about his fundamental stance without appearing to commit egregious violence to his doctrines.

Rather, salient features of the distinctively Machiavellian approach to politics should be credited to an incongruity between historical circumstance and intellectual possibility. What makes Machiavelli a troubling yet stimulating thinker is that, in his attempt to draw different conclusions from the commonplace expectations of his audience, he still incorporated important features of precisely the conventions he was challenging.

In spite of his repeated assertion of his own originality for instance, Prince CW 10, 57—58 , his careful attention to preexisting traditions meant that he was never fully able to escape his intellectual confines.

Biography 2. The Prince : Analyzing Power 3. Morality, Religion, and Politics 5. The State and the Prince: Language and Concepts 6. The Discourses on Livy : Liberty and Conflict 7. Popular Liberty and Popular Speech 8. The Character of Republican Leaders 9. Biography Relatively little is known for certain about Machiavelli's early life in comparison with many important figures of the Italian Renaissance the following section draws on Capponi ; Vivanti ; Celenza He was born 3 May in Florence and at a young age became a pupil of a renowned Latin teacher, Paolo da Ronciglione.

The Prince : Analyzing Power It has been a common view among political philosophers that there exists a special relationship between moral goodness and legitimate authority. Machiavelli observes that one can say this in general of men: they are ungrateful, disloyal, insincere and deceitful, timid of danger and avid of profit…. Prince CW 62; translation revised As a result, Machiavelli cannot really be said to have a theory of obligation separate from the imposition of power; people obey only because they fear the consequences of not doing so, whether the loss of life or of privileges.

Initially, he asserts that fortune resembles one of our destructive rivers which, when it is angry, turns the plains into lakes, throws down the trees and buildings, takes earth from one spot, puts it in another; everyone flees before the flood; everyone yields to its fury and nowhere can repel it. His own experience has taught him that it is better to be impetuous than cautious, because Fortuna is a woman and it is necessary, in order to keep her under, to beat and maul her.

The Discourses on Livy : Liberty and Conflict While The Prince is doubtless the most widely read of his works, the Discourses on the Ten Books of Titus Livy perhaps most honestly expresses Machiavelli's personal political beliefs and commitments, in particular, his republican sympathies. Discourses CW , translation revised These passages of the Discourses seem to suggest that Machiavelli has great admiration for the institutional arrangements that obtain in France.

Discussing the ability of a monarch to meet the people's wish for liberty, Machiavelli comments that as far as the … popular desire of recovering their liberty, the prince, not being able to satisfy them, must examine what the reasons are that make them desire being free. Although the king cannot give such liberty to the masses, he can provide the security that they crave: As for the rest, for whom it is enough to live securely vivere sicuro , they are easily satisfied by making orders and laws that, along with the power of the king, comprehend everyone's security.

Machiavelli then applies this general principle directly to the case of France, remarking that the people live securely vivere sicuro for no other reason than that its kings are bound to infinite laws in which the security of all their people is comprehended.

Discourses CW The law-abiding character of the French regime ensures security, but that security, while desirable, ought never to be confused with liberty. In his famous discussion of this subject in the Discourses , he remarks, To me those who condemn the tumults between the Nobles and the Plebs seem to be caviling at the very thing that was the primary cause of Rome's retention of liberty….

Hence, Enmities between the people and the Senate should, therefore, be looked upon as an inconvenience which it is necessary to put up with in order to arrive at the greatness of Rome. Discourses CW Machiavelli thinks that other republican models such as those adopted by Sparta or Venice will produce weaker and less successful political systems, ones that are either stagnant or prone to decay when circumstances change.

Popular Liberty and Popular Speech Machiavelli evinces particular confidence in the capacity of the people to contribute to the promotion of communal liberty. But he responds that the Romans were able to maintain liberty and order because of the people's ability to discern the common good when it was shown to them. Citing the formula vox populi, vox dei , Machiavelli insists that public opinion is remarkably accurate in its prognostications….

For example, the people can never be persuaded that it is good to appoint to an office a man of infamous or corrupt habits, whereas a prince may easily and in a vast variety of ways be persuaded to do this. Discourses CW Likewise, should the people depart from the law-abiding path, they may readily be convinced to restore order: For an uncontrolled and tumultuous people can be spoken to by a good man and easily led back into a good way.

Discourses CW The contrast Machiavelli draws is stark. For just as with individual human beings, it is difficult if not impossible to change their personal characteristics, so institutions in republics do not change with the times … but change very slowly because it is more painful to change them since it is necessary to wait until the whole republic is in a state of upheaval; and for this it is not enough that one man alone should change his own procedure.

The play was popular with audiences throughout much of Italy for several years. His next effort, a military treatise published in and entitled Libro della arte della guerra The Art of War , was the only historical or political work published during the author's lifetime. Meanwhile, Machiavelli had made several attempts to gain favor with the Medici including dedicating The Prince to Lorenzo.

In he was appointed official historian of Florence and was subsequently entrusted with minor governmental duties. His prodigious Istorie fiorentine History of Florence carefully dilutes his republican platform with the Medicean bias expected of him.

Two years later, the Medici were again ousted, and Machiavelli's hopes for advancement under the revived republic were frustrated, for the new government was suspicious of his ties to the Medici. Disheartened by his country's internal strife, Machiavelli fell gravely ill and died, a disillusioned man, his dream of an operational republic unrealized.

Critics have found it ironic that the fiercely republican Machiavelli should have written a handbook advising an autocratic leader how best to acquire and maintain power and security. Machiavelli was acutely aware, however, of foreign threats to Italian autonomy and thus deemed it necessary for a strong prince to thwart French and Spanish hegemony.

Hence The Prince, addressed to the ruling Medici. He believed that a shrewd head of state, exemplified by Borgia, was essential to sublimating self-interest to common welfare. Since handbooks of conduct meeting monarchal needs had become immensely popular by the s, the external form of The Prince was neither startling nor particularly remarkable to Machiavelli's contemporaries.

Yet, from its initial appearance, The Prince proved no mere manual of protocol nor, for that matter, of even conventional strategy. In its chapters, Machiavelli delineated a typology of sovereignties and the deployment of available forces military, political, or psychological to acquire and retain them.

The Prince is the first political treatise to divorce statecraft from ethics; as Machiavelli wrote: How one lives is so far removed from how one ought to live that he who abandons what one does for what one ought to do, learns rather his own ruin than his preservation.

Adding to his unflinching realism the common Renaissance belief in humanity's capacity for determining its own destiny, Machiavelli posited two fundamentals necessary for effective political leadership: virtu and fortuna.

Virtu refers to the prince's own abilities ideally a combination of leonine force and vulpine cunning ; fortuna to the unpredictable influence of fortune. In a significant departure from previous political thought, the designs of Providence play no part in Machiavelli's scheme. On issues of leadership hitherto masked by other political theorists in vague diplomatic terms, Machiavelli presented his theses in direct, candid, and often passionate speech, employing easily grasped metaphors and structuring the whole in an aphoristic vein which lends it a compelling authority.

Reaction to The Prince was initially but only briefly favorable, with Catherine de' Medici said to have enthusiastically included it, among other of Machiavelli's writings, in the educational curriculum of her children. But, within a short time the book fell into widespread disfavor, becoming viewed as a handbook for atheistic tyranny. Further denigrated toward the close of the sixteenth century in Discours sur les moyens de bien gouverner et maintenir en paix un royause, ou autre principaute.

Contre Nicolas Machiavel, florentin by Innocenzo Gentillet in France, The Prince was held responsible for French political corruption and for widespread contribution to any number of political and moral vices. Gentillet's interpretation of The Prince as advocating statecraft by ruthlessness and amoral duplicity was disseminated throughout Britain through the works of such popular, highly influential dramatists as William Shakespeare and Christopher Marlowe.

Hostile English interpreters so effectively typified Machiavelli as an amalgam of various evils, which they described with the still-used term " Machiavellian," that fact and fabrication still coexist today. Rarely, until the nineteenth century, did mention of The Prince elicit other than unfounded and largely unexamined repugnance, much less encourage objective scrutiny of its actual issues. As Fredi Chiappelli has aptly summarized: "Centuries had to elapse before the distinction between moral moment and political moment, between technical approach and moralistic generalities, and even between the subject matter of the book and the author's person were finally achieved.

Modern critics, noting these crucial distinctions, have engaged in a prolonged and animated discussion concerning Machiavelli's true intent in The Prince. An anomalous seventeenth-century commentator, philosopher Pierre Bayle, found it "strange" that "there are so many people, who believe, that Machiavel teaches princes dangerous politics; for on the contrary princes have taught Machiavel what he has written.

Was the treatise, as Bayle suggested, a faithful representation of princely conduct which might justifiably incriminate its subjects but not its chronicler?

Or had Machiavelli, in his manner of presentation, devised the volume as a vehicle for his own commentary?