‘Thoroughly researched.’ Sunday Times
‘To be devoured.’ Philip Mansel
‘This book is a treat for fans of well-told history.’ Washington Post

History is rarely kind to women of power, but few have had their reputations quite so brutally shredded as Catherine de’ Medici.

In this new biography of the most powerful woman in sixteenth-century Europe, Mary Hollingsworth uses neglected primary sources to recreate the life and times of a remarkable – and remarkably traduced – woman.
Mary Hollingsworth delves into the archives to discover deeper truths behind the persistent myths of sectarian cruelty and ruinous extravagance, and to reveal a cultured and politically astute woman who worked tirelessly to find a way for Catholics and Protestants to coexist peacefully.

History is rarely kind to women of power, but few have had their reputations quite so brutally shredded as Catherine de’ Medici, Italian-born queen of France and influential mother of three successive French kings during that country’s long sequence of sectarian wars in the second half of the sixteenth century. Thanks to the malign efforts of propagandists motivated by religious hatred, history tends to remember Catherine as a schemer who used witchcraft and poison to eradicate her rivals, as a spendthrift dilettante who wasted ruinous sums of money on building and embellishment of monuments and palaces, and most sinister of all, as instigator of the St Bartholomew’s Day massacre of 1572, in which thousands of innocent Protestants were slaughtered by Catholic mobs.

Mary Hollingsworth delves into contemporary archives to discover deeper truths behind these persistent myths. The correspondence of diplomats and Catherine’s own letters reveal a woman who worked tirelessly to find a way for Catholics and Protestants to coexist in peace (a goal for which she continued to strive until the end of her life), who was well-informed on both literary and scientific matters, and whose patronage of the arts helped bring into being glorious châteaux and gardens, priceless work of art, and magnificent festivities combining theatre, music and ballet, which display the grandeur of the French court.

‘Full of treasures to be uncovered… A chance to visit a glittering, at times rather gory, world that is different and yet dreamily familiar to our own.’ BBC History Revealed

From the late Middle Ages, the independent Italian city-states were taken over by powerful families who installed themselves as dynastic rulers. Inspired by the humanists, the princes of fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Italy immersed themselves in the culture of antiquity, commissioning palaces, villas and churches inspired by the architecture of ancient Rome, and offering patronage to artists and writers.

Many of these princes were related by blood or marriage, creating a web of alliances that held society together but whose tensions sometimes threatened to tear it apart; thus were their lives dominated as much by the waging of war as the nurture of artistic talent.

In a narrative that is as rigorous and closely researched as it is accessible and informative, Mary Hollingsworth sets the princes’ aesthetic achievements in the context of the volatile, ever-shifting politics of a tumultuous period of history.

‘Likely to become the standard work of reference on the members of the family that dominated Florence’ TLS

‘A lucid and beautifully illustrated family history’ The Times

Wealthy bankers, wise politicians, patrons of the arts, glittering dukes… so runs the traditional telling of the story of the Medici, the family that ruled Florence for two hundred years and inspired the birth of the Italian Renaissance.

In this definitive account of their rise and fall, Mary Hollingsworth argues that the idea that the Medici were wise rulers and enlightened fathers of the Renaissance is a fiction. In truth, she says, the Medici were as devious and immoral as the Borgias – tyrants loathed in the city they illegally made their own and which they beggared in their lust for power.

‘Exceptionally sumptuous… This vivid history brings to life the vices and virtues of the feuding ruling families of Italy.’ Michael Prodger, The Times
‘Full of treasures to be uncovered… A chance to visit a glittering, at times rather gory, world that is different and yet dreamily familiar to our own.’ BBC History Revealed

From the late Middle Ages, the independent Italian city-states were taken over by powerful families who installed themselves as dynastic rulers. Inspired by the humanists, the princes of fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Italy immersed themselves in the culture of antiquity, commissioning palaces, villas and churches inspired by the architecture of ancient Rome, and offering patronage to artists and writers.

Many of these princes were related by blood or marriage, creating a web of alliances that held society together but whose tensions sometimes threatened to tear it apart; thus were their lives dominated as much by the waging of war as the nurture of artistic talent.

In a narrative that is as rigorous and closely researched as it is accessible and informative, Mary Hollingsworth sets the princes’ aesthetic achievements in the context of the volatile, ever-shifting politics of a tumultuous period of history.

‘A fascinating narrative of the intermingling of secular and religious power’New Statesman

‘Brings to life not only the political dimension, but the fascinating material detail’BBC History Magazine

‘A highly enjoyable and thrilling read… Hollingsworth has peeled back the veil of secrecy surrounding papal conclaves’History Today

‘Full of lively detail and colour’Literary Review

August 1559. As the long hot Italian summer draws to its close, so does the life of a rigidly orthodox and profoundly unpopular pope. The harshly repressive papacy of Paul IV has seen the establishing of the Roman Inquisition and the Index of Prohibited Books, an unbending refusal to open dialogue with Protestants, and the ghettoization of Rome’s Jews. On 5 September 1559, as the great doors of the Vatican’s Sala Regia are ceremonially locked, the future of the Catholic Church – and the whole of Europe – hangs in the balance.

Mary Hollingsworth offers a compelling and sedulously crafted reconstruction of the longest and most taxing of sixteenth-century papal elections. Its crisscrossing fault lines divided not only moderates from conservatives, but also the adherents of three national ‘factions’ with mutually incompatible interests. France and Spain were both looking to extend their power in Italy and beyond and had very different ideas of who the new pope should be – as did the Italian cardinals. Drawing on the detailed account books left by Ippolito d’Este, one of the participating cardinals, Conclave 1559 provides remarkable insights into the daily lives and concerns of the forty-seven men locked up for some four months in the Vatican.

A beautifully illustrated history of the Renaissance told through the lives of its most important and influential patrons – the princely rulers of Italy’s dynastic states and their families.

From the late Middle Ages, the independent Italian city-states were taken over by powerful families who installed themselves as dynastic rulers. Inspired by the humanists, the princes of fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Italy immersed themselves in the culture of antiquity, commissioning palaces, villas and churches inspired by the architecture of ancient Rome, and offering patronage to artists and writers.

Many of these princes were related by blood or marriage, creating a web of alliances that held society together but whose tensions sometimes threatened to tear it apart. Thus were their lives defined as much by the waging of war as the nurturing of artistic talent. Mary Hollingsworth charts these developments in a sequence of chronological chapters, each centred on two or three main characters with a cast of minor ones – from Ludovico Sforza of Milan to Isabella d’Este of Mantua, from Pope Paul III to Emperor Charles V, and from the painters Mantegna and Titian to the architect Sansovino and the polymath Leonardo da Vinci.

Princes of the Renaissance is a vivid depiction of the lives and times of the élite whose power and patronage created the art and architecture of the Renaissance. In a narrative that is as rigorous and closely researched as it is accessible and informative, Mary Hollingsworth sets their aesthetic achievements in the context of the volatile, ever-shifting politics of a tumultuous period of history.

‘Likely to become the standard work of reference on the members of the family that dominated Florence’TLS

‘A lucid and beautifully illustrated family history’The Times

Wealthy bankers, wise politicians, patrons of the arts, glittering dukes… so runs the traditional telling of the story of the Medici, the family that ruled Florence for two hundred years and inspired the birth of the Italian Renaissance.

In this definitive account of their rise and fall, Mary Hollingsworth argues that the idea that the Medici were wise rulers and enlightened fathers of the Renaissance is a fiction. In truth, she says, the Medici were as devious and immoral as the Borgias – tyrants loathed in the city they illegally made their own and which they beggared in their lust for power.