Costabili, the Strozzi,
Saraceni, Boschetti, the Roverella, the Muzzarelli, and Pendaglia.

The Ferrarese aristocracy had long ago emerged from the state of
municipal strife and feudal dependence, and had set up their courts. The
Este, especially the warlike Niccolo III, had subjugated the barons, who
originally lived upon their estates beyond the city walls, and who were
now in the service of the ruling family, holding the most important
court and city offices; they were also commanders in the army. They took
part, probably more actively than did the nobility of the other Italian
States, in the intellectual movement of the age, which was fostered by
the princes of the house of Este. Consequently many of these great lords
won prominent places in the history of literature in Ferrara.

The university, which had flourished there since the middle of the
fifteenth century, was, excepting those of Padua and Bologna, the most
famous in Italy. Founded by the Margrave Alberto in 1391, and
subsequently remodeled by Niccolo III, it reached the zenith of its fame
in the time of Lionello and Borso. The former was a pupil of the
celebrated Guarino of Verona, and was himself acquainted with all the
sciences. The friend and idol of the humanists of his age, he collected
rare manuscripts and disseminated copies of them. He founded the
library, and Borso continued the work begun by him.

As early as 1474 the University of Ferrara had forty-five well paid
professors, and Ercole increased their number. Printing was introduced
during his reign. The earliest printer in Ferrara after 1471 was the
Frenchman Andreas, called Belforte.[178]

Like the city, the people seemed to have been of a serious cast of mind,
which led to speculation, criticism, and the cultivation of the exact
sciences. From Ferrara came Savonarola, the fanatical prophet who
appeared during the moral blight which characterized the age of the
Borgias, and Lucretia must frequently have recalled this man in whom her
father, by the executioner's hand, sought to stifle the protestations of
the faithful and upright against the immorality of his rule.

Astronomy and mathematics, and especially the natural sciences and
medicine, which at that time were part of the school of philosophy, were
extensively cultivated in Ferrara. It is stated that Savonarola himself
had studied medicine; his grandfather Michele, a famous physician of
Padua, had been called to Ferrara by Niccolo II.[