rza at
Milan.[3] The _fifth_ class includes the nephews or sons of Popes. The
Riario principality of Forli, the Della Rovere of Urbino, the Borgia of
Romagna, the Farnese of Parma, form a distinct species of despotisms;
but all these are of a comparatively late origin. Until the Papacies of
Sixtus IV. and Innocent VIII. the Popes had not bethought them of
providing in this way for their relatives. Also, it may be remarked,
there was an essential weakness in these tyrannies. Since they had to be
carved out of the States of the Church, the Pope who had established his
son, say in Romagna, died before he could see him well confirmed in a
province which the next Pope sought to wrest from his hands, in order to
bestow it on his own favorite. The fabric of the Church could not long
have stood this disgraceful wrangling between Papal families for the
dynastic possession of Church property. Luckily for the continuance of
the Papacy, the tide of counter-reformation which set in after the sack
of Rome and the great Northern Schism, put a stop to nepotism in its
most barefaced form.

[1] This classification must of necessity be imperfect, since many
of the tyrannies belong in part to two or more of the kinds which I
have mentioned.

[2] See Guicc. _Ist._ end of Book 4.

[3] John Hawkwood (died 1393), the English adventurer, held
Cotignola and Bagnacavallo from Gregory XI. In the second half of
the fifteenth century the efforts of the Condottieri to erect
tyrannies were most frequent. Braccio da Montone established himself
in Perugia in 1416, and aspired, not without good grounds for hope,
to acquiring the kingdom of Italy. Francesco Sforza, before gaining
Milan, had begun to form a despotism at Ancona. Sforza's rival,
Giacomo Piccinino, would probably have succeeded in his own attempt,
had not Ferdinand of Aragon treacherously murdered him at Naples in
1465. In the disorganization caused by Charles VIII., Vidovero of
Brescia in 1495 established himself at Cesena and Castelnuovo, and
had to be assassinated by Pandolfo Malatesta at the instigation of
Venice. After the death of Gian Galeazzo Visconti, in 1402, the
generals whom he had employed in the consolidation of his vast
dominions attempted to divide the spoil among themselves. Naples,
Venice, Milan, Rome, and Florence were in course of time made keenly
alive to the risk of suffering a captain