Nicholas Machiavelli (Machiavelli, Nicholas)
13 September, 1506
Perugia

LETTER XII.

Magnificent Signori, etc.: —

I wrote to your Lordships yesterday, and enclose the letter herewith. To-day the Pope made his solemn entrance into Perugia, leaving the banished, who accompanied him, at the place indicated in my letter of yesterday, and with such hopes as I therein stated.

Monseigneur de Narbonne did not have an audience of the Pope until yesterday, having gone from here to Corciano, where the Pope had stopped. Up to the present, it is not known what Monseigneur de Narbonne communicated to his Holiness, but evidently it was not agreeable to him. Since then we learn that he dissuaded the Pope in the name of the king from the enterprise against Bologna, alleging as one of the reasons the proposed incursion of the Emperor, and pointing out to him that, inasmuch as the allegiance of the state of Milan to the king of France was but feeble and uncertain, his Majesty could not risk stripping himself for the purpose of serving his Holiness. The Pope is very much irritated by this, but has nevertheless decided to carry out this enterprise by himself, even if all other help fails him. He has to-day expedited Ramazotto with money for the troops already raised, and has written briefs to your Lordships and to the Duke of Ferrara, asking of each permission that Ramazotto as his constable may levy troops for his account in your respective dominions. And he says that before reaching Urbino he wants to have six to eight thousand infantry together, with which he intends marching towards Bologna. It is believed that the Marquis of Mantua may perhaps reach Urbino this evening, and that he will serve the Pope in person. These several reports differ, as your Lordships will observe; but when one has to write every day, one must follow them, and that must serve as my excuse.

Touching the affairs of Gianpaolo, I must refer to my enclosed; and will only add, that since the Pope is here with all these reverend prelates, and notwithstanding the fact that the troops of the Church are quartered all around these gates, whilst those of Gianpaolo are at a somewhat greater distance, yet the Pope and the Sacred College are more at the discretion of Gianpaolo than he is at theirs. And if Gianpaolo

does no harm to him who came to deprive him of his state, it must be attributed to his good nature and humanity. How these matters will end, I do not pretend to know; but we shall see within the six or eight days that the Pope remains here. Once Gianpaolo said that there had been two ways for him to save his state; the one by force, and the other by humility and by trusting the friends who counselled him to it. That he had not been willing to employ the first, but had adopted the second, and for that reason had put everything into the hands of the Duke of Urbino. It was this Duke who had induced him to come to Orvieto to see the Pope, and to do all the other things that have happened. The troops that are to guard the public square and the gates, and which, as I advised you, were to have been in Perugia before the entrance of the Pope, are not yet there, although the Pope is; this was one of the things confided to the Duke of Urbino; it is said, however, that they will be here within a couple of days. I have nothing else to communicate, but to recommend myself to your Lordships.

Servus
Niccolo Machiavelli,

Secretary.
Perugia, 13 September, 1506.