Dear citizens of Florence, the entire city is observing a period
  of mourning, for the great merchant Michelangelo de Inverno who has passed from
  this life into the next. In the year 1513, at noon in front of the Duomo Santa
  Maria del Fiore on June 15th, the great merchant was stabbed 7 times, by an
  unknown assassin in full view of the crowd of 100 citizens entering for mass.
At this time the assassin remains at large, with few reliable descriptions
despite the numerous witnesses, the one fact everyone is certain of, is that
this man was dressed as a citizen from Roma. The kind Medici family has offered
to bury Michelangelo in their own private crypt in the Medici Chapel at San
Lorenzo. Inverno, a long time business associate and friend of the family since
1495 during the early stages of the expulsion of the Medici, he had supplied
them with arms and armor for their army to fight the usurper, Savonarola’s
soldiers. For his support of the family during that trying time, and his
continued partnership of his mercantile shops and their banking houses, they
have decided to honor their good relations with Inverno, and because they also
have lost a family member at Duomo Santa Maria, they will be burying him in the
private Medici family crypt. With the absence of Michelangelo de Inverno, his
son Giovanni Inverno will take up the command of the shops when he becomes of
age. At this moment there is a dispute among the Inverno family for control of
the vast merchant stalls in Venice, the Florentine blacksmith forges, and the
fleet of trade ships coming and going from the Ottomans at Istanbul. Victoria
Inverno is fighting desperately for control of the empire but is encountering
fierce resistance from Michelangelo’s cousins. While all members swear that they
will bow down and succeed control of the expansive trade empire and control of
the mercenary forces, they continue to fight about who is the most eligible to
run the empire for the 6 years until Giovanni becomes 18. This dispute is
leaving many northern cities with a shortage of finely processed wool, causing
prices there to rise to all-time highs. Many armies are finding their hired
mercenaries uneasy because of the lack of valid contracting with Michelangelo’s
passing and the dis-organization of the records among the disputing family.
Relatedly, the private police force employed by Inverno to protect the general
area around his shops, and his associates’ shops to, encourage business by
protecting the customer’s money, is unsure whether or not they will receive
payment this month or from whom, causing many to abandon their posts. Crimes,
specifically theft and mugging in the merchant districts of Florence and Venice
have experienced a steep rise since Michelangelo’s passing. His death leaves the
streets unsafe at night and the leaders of both cities have issued a mandatory
curfew for all citizens in and around the merchant districts. The shops, once
the pride of Invero’s business, that he renovated using his own money, are
reporting expense maintenance of all degrees in both cities with the damages
adding to over 40,000 gold florins total. Also, many of the shops around
Inverno’s stalls are petitioning for money from the leaders to supply the
expense coverage needed to maintain their shop improvements. Inverno bought
these improvements to make the street more attractive and further encourage
trade, he previously maintained the improvements, which were gifts from Inverno
in the first place. With the murder of Michelangelo de Inverno, a trade empire
is left withering on the vine cutting a major mercantile artery in Florence,
Venice, Istabul, and among numerous northern European cities. Both Florence and
Venice are left in need of a larger more organized police force to fill the void
of that Inverno’s occupied, to make the streets safe for trade again. They also
are trying to fund the many shops so that they maintain their4 visual
attractiveness and because of this trade. Many mercenaries in armies all over
Europe are left confused and leaderless, as well as without the supplies of
grain they relied upon from Inverno. Citizens all over Italy who relied upon
Inverno for support and patronage find themselves alone and afraid for the
future under the control of Inverno’s so far incapable family dynamic. The
artistic stalls that once lined the market district are on the verge of collapse
due to lack of funding that Inverno once supplied. The Medici bank will be
closed at noon tomorrow for the funerary services with a small period of one day
for mourning. Truly with the amount of peace and beauty Inverno brought to the
cities as well as the amount of money he created throughout the markets have
caused citizens all over Europe to mourn the passing of a Titan.                                       

With all of my new found wealth from my budding trade business in the
Ottoman Empire, I have patronized an artist. An establish sculptor named
Donato di Niccolò di Betto Bardi, who most just call Donatello.
He is a truly gifted sculptor, with statues so life like you would swear that
they blink. I have asked him to build a grand monument to my deceased father,
who started the family on the road to success, brandishing a sword over his head
and standing proud for all to see. My father will never know death, and the city
of Florence will know how grand our family truly is! The statue is being handled
by the most competent sculptor in all of Italy. I have seen some of his earlier
monuments and was quite impressed, the statue of St. George looks as if he will
step down off the pedestal at any minute. I want the people of Florence too look
upon my family with wonder, fear, and respect. This statue will make all of
these things come true, with Donatello as my tool we can make a monument to last
for all time! I must speak with him shortly to see how it is going, I must tell
Donatello that money is no object; I want this to look as grand and impressive
as possible I will let nothing stand in the way, for how can you put a price on
the awe held over the populace? I have already purchased a spot to place it near
our palazzo on the Arno. With any luck the testimony to one of the most powerful
merchants in Florence and Venice will soon be at hand. My buildings and
renovations are already bringing in the social power that comes from excessive
patronage; however it will be nothing in comparison to what my social status
will do when all of the citizens gaze upon my family’s ancestral glory. It will
also make those who mean to cross us think twice, for how would they cause
trouble to a beloved and feared merchant family without my network of subjects
coming to my aid. The murderous scum who killed my father will be forever
looking over his shoulder with this statue standing in Florence. Donatello has
already given the name for this statue, the ‘Angelus Custos’ or the ‘Guardian
Angel’ oh, how I wish my father is looking down upon my growing success with
pride, now in some way I will know he is. However I must guard myself for delays
and setbacks, Donatello said that he was out of marble blocks the size I
required, I have been working on getting him one but I cannot find a single
artist who has one not already reserved. I refuse to let my father look like
some sort of medieval tapestry, devoid of all life and vibrancy that once filled
him, I must find a suitable chunk of marble! For too long my family has been
forced to endure the criminally uninspired works brought before us by artist
still clinging to the classical styles. No more, I will not let the first
suitable artist skilled in the ancient ways slip through my fingers over
disputes for a chunk of rock. I will have my statue, even if it means buying
every other patrons carved work and having Donatello reshape it into my father,
my Angelus Custos. Progress has benn slow to say the least, but I am confident
Donatello will find a way to use his knowledge from the ancient world to
suppress the other patrons’ works and make mine the most beautiful for years to
come.         

What important elements of the Renaissance are demonstrated by Machiavelli’s “The Prince”?

            In the Prince, Machiavelli demonstrates the renaissance characteristic of humanism, as clearly stated by Machiavelli by saying that princes have control over their actions, not God. It also shows secularism because if you were not focused on this world, you wouldn’t care if you spent all of your wealth on the public and you would only slightly care if something happened to your hold over the state if your focus was preparing for the world to come. Most importantly is the characteristic of individualism, where the princes, believes it is all because of him that the state is coming together or falling apart. All of this put together creates a feeling of skepticism in the fact that renaissance princes would question the control of a medieval God over the entire world.    

What makes “The Prince” historically significant?

            The Prince is historically significant because it tells a leader what he must do and how he must act to both lead a strong state and what the leader must do to control the people without having them rebel against him. It gives a code of conduct to cover up a leader’s short comings as well as how to spend money to improve the state and still maintain at least neutrality from the people. Machiavelli shows why being to kind and generous is dangerous, in some cases more dangerous than being cruel to the people. It shows how to keep hold of a state from invaders, and deals with the difficulty most leaders face when their people are safe but their possessions are being burned outside their protective walls.

   To what extent to you agree or disagree with Machiavelli’s advice for princes?

            Machiavelli, that brilliant mastermind, he wrote the standard for any leader in any time. Without Machiavelli where would leaders turn to for orders? This is an incredible tool, if I follow this to a certain extent, I may be able to lead the people I patronize and become the greatest merchant of all time. He makes sense when you think about it plainly, don’t recklessly spend the tax money, never endanger your state through a vice, and only give the people what they need when you think they need it. For a merchant of my size and prospective size, I need to know how to control the people while keeping my patrons, workers, and customers content and shops in good appearance. Using the Prince I can manage this while hiding my darkest secrets from the public eye and appearing to have virtues. I will look like a stand up character, while not having to be one. I can hold the respect and contentment of the people while making money. What is not to love about Machiavelli’s road for success and wealth?    

As I mentioned before, my mercenary contacts come in very handy, such as in this war between the Medici and the Savonarola. I first met the Swiss via a trade network flowing from the mighty Arno, my family had been dabbling in the transport of wool from England and Spain for some time now, although I am the first to not only transport it to merchants, but to actually transport, process, and sell it as one in the same. At times I even allow some of the smaller merchants I am affiliated with to share the costs of processing the wool and the voyage to make an even higher profit for all involved. In a particularly successful venture, the Swiss did not have enough gold florins on hand to make a full purchase of a very large shipment of our finest wool. Instead the Swiss, me and a few merchants, hired a banker back in Florence to send small payments toward the cost of the wool from the Swiss, safely into our hands back in Florence, to which the Swiss were much appreciative. We merchants were compensated in full thanks to the banker. This helpful banker even extended a line of credit toward the Swiss and later the Germans for being such prompt and eager return customers, which actually allowed us merchants to squeeze more money out of them over time, because of this pay back system to the banker. Everyone involved was thrilled with this prosperous new venture, the Swiss and Germans got their wool, us merchants our gold and the banker got a new customer. However by 1496 the trade relationship had become rather stale, and with the purchase of my house on the Arno, I needed to open more trade. I did not want my wife and children yet unborn, to live in squalor and filth. My earlier ancestors were such fools,  we as people now have the means to make a future for ourselves, we can control our destines for the lord helps those who help themselves. I would never allow my family to end up like that of my father’s, that mediocrity would kill a man as surely as a sword. I want them to live in the riches and splendor that I was denied in my youth, my children will have the finest tutors in Italy, my wife will look like a queen when she walks about. My dreams must become reality, even now with the war, and the trading of grain and wool to mercenaries; I am not at my dream. I need to expand my modest trade empire into a large network of golden calves. I need to open trade with countries farther away than those in Europe. The larger merchants have had great luck with the Ottomans in the past, so perhaps I shall give it a try as well. Very soon, when I receive payment from the arms and mercenaries I sent to the Medici army, I will send a shipment of grain to the Turks. I will hire a captain with the proper Ottoman licensing to bring my grain to the Turks, for everyone everywhere has to eat. I will establish a small but rock solid grain shipping branch to the Ottomans at Istanbul. Very slowly I will start offering more and more of my products with each shipment, if all goes well with the first shipments of grain and processed wool, and then I may start introducing my fine weapons and armor to them as well. If relations between Italy and the Ottomans hold I may even sell mercenaries down there as well, surely an empire of that size still needs mercenaries? At any rate I will have to ask an old merchant friend of mine Lorenzo il Coraggioso if I can send a shipment of grain with his Ottoman captain, maybe he will have an ‘accident’ in his trading paper work and not make it back from the wrath of the Turk. One way or the other I will come into ownership of Lorenzo’s captain and open and entire new trade artery to the Ottomans. I have recently received word from a medium sized merchant by the name of Federico de Umbra in Venice, he wants me to buy his shops and workers from him as he is having trouble controlling them and wishes to be rid of it all so that he may live his life how he wants to. I wish to purchase these businesses, which would effectively double my size as a business. The only drawback is that I would be competing with enormous merchants from both Venice and Florence. I would be pushed by wealth into the public eye with thousands of people scrutinizing my every action. I need to make the people like me, without over doing it so that rival merchants would see me as a direct threat to their power. Perhaps I will commission the construction of a statue somewhere, or upgrade the local tailor’s shop to make it shine like new. I must be careful not to do so much good as to push into dangerous territory; I will be hiring many private battalions of mercenaries to protect not just my shops and vendors, but the general area around them as to encourage safe trade all around my locations. The people will love and fear me for this; I will make it safe for them to do business which they will love, while the sheer number of militant men I wield will make any who see them think twice about crossing me in my territory. Throw in the handful of public works and financed events I will sponsor, the people will love what I have done for their cities while respecting the power I hold on them. My competitors will try and slander my name for being a threat no matter how small I try and appear, I must control my actions carefully and never indulge them as to put my business at risk, for if my competitors ever knew of these vices I shudder to think what would happen to my modest empire. However I could appear generous by repairing many of the major buildings that are falling onto disrepair in Florence and Venice, they would draw more business from their beauty making me more money, and I could show in subtle ways that I am a powerful man who can afford to do these things, albeit slowly, to the masses which would raise the family rank in social class. I will not reap the rewards from my new empire as much as my children, who will be born into a family near that of royalty, and all at the relatively small cost of repairing old shops and even building some new ones. After all if the Medici could raise themselves from squalor to rulers of Florence over the building of a dome, I certainly can become the most powerful merchant for building tens of shops in both cities. The construction of buildings and paintings show a glimpse into the financial situation of the patron behind it, the more splendid the work the more the patron had, and the more money a patron hold, the more power he can buy and wield over the other patrons. I can take it farther though, the Medici were brilliant in their manipulation of art for social power, if a can study this more, and get it to an exact formula, I can achieve the perfect balance between loved patron of the people’s city and hated arrogant rival to the other merchants.                     

My name is Michelangelo de Inverno, I was born in 1464, under the rule of Cosimo from the Medici family, only bankers could wield that kind of power in Florence, here the money buys the power and the Medici held and still hold most of the power. I come from a small Catholic family in Italy, my father was a grain merchant and we had a modest fortune, considering the diversity of Florence, from its rich bankers such as the Medici and great merchants to the lowly beggars in the street, we were closer to the top than the bottom. Until the year 1485 I was educated adequately by my mother and father who taught me to write and read from the great stories of Rome and Greece which we acquired from the printing shop from a wonderful new device called the printing press. When I took over the business upon my father’s murder in 1485, due to a dispute with another merchant over the ownership of an ass, I set out to expand our relatively small shop into new territory. I am now a great merchant for the city of Florence, the greatest city for growing piles of gold in all of Italy, who deals primarily in arms, armor, wool cloth, and mercenaries, while still dealing in grain in memoriam to my father. In the year 1490 I married my beautiful wife Victoria Simona, We now live in villa with 3 servants, facing the Arno River that cost me an arm and a leg back 1495. I acquire my arms and armor from the blacksmiths who work in my 4 buildings, they mostly come from peasant farm stock but they work cheap and are fine craftsmen, in return for allowing them to work out of my property; I pay sixth tenths of the true value on all works, instead of receiving full price rent. My mercenaries come from German and Swiss contacts I have made trading the processed fine wool so prized from our city as well as grains to feed their armies, it is a small wonder that these cold northern cities are in need of our superiorly processed wool, and grain that their barren soils could never produce in quantity. Recently I have made a purchase of 500 falchion swords, 10 of which not unlike that owned by Cosimo Medici during his rule, in preparation for an impending war between the Medici and the Savonarola,  who now hold the city. It is a wonderful time to sell arms and armor, the Medici cannot get enough of the finely crafted steel helmets and cuirasses I supply, while the Savonarola cannot throw enough gold florins at the finely honed blades my blacksmiths produce, how I love these patron family squabbles they are great for business and so often in Florence. The finely crafted steel blades make short work of the standard Spanish armor the Medici army wears, which only increases the Medici’s hunger for the steel armor I am selling them. When my mercenary contacts in Switzerland and Germany reply to my requests, I will be able to sell both armies additional troops when their original numbers dwindle, soon I will be able to buy an army and have enough gold left from these sales to equip every soldier in golden armor wielding a sword made of the purest florins.