Final Years in Florence Under The Medici 1534-1540
In 1531 Guicciardini was assigned the governorship of Bologna, the most important city in the northern Papal States by Clement VII. Guicciardini resigned this post after the Medici pope's death in 1534, and returned to Florence, where he was enlisted as advisor to Alessandro de Medici, “whose position as duke had become less secure following the death of the pope.” Guiccardini defended him in Naples in 1535 before Charles V, contesting the exiled rebels' accusations of tyranny. He assisted in successfully negotiating the marriage of Alessandro to the emperor Charles V’s daughter Margaret of Parma in 1536 and for a short time Gucciardini was the most trusted advisor to Alessandro until the Duke's assassination in 1537.
After the murder of Duke Alessandro in 1537, Guicciardini allied himself with Cosimo de' Medici, who was just seventeen years old at the time and new to the Florentine political system. Guicciardini supported Cosimo as duke of Florence, however, Cosimo dismissed him shortly after his rise to power and Guicciardini retired to his villa in Arcetri, where he spent his last years working on the Storia d'Italia. He died in 1540 without male heirs.
His nephew, Lodovico Guicciardini, was also a historian known for his 16th-century works on the Low Countries.
Read more about this topic: Francesco Guicciardini
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