Charles V Sacks Rome

This series has five easy 5-minute installments. This first installment: Bourbon’s Army Arrives.

Introduction
Charles, Duc de Bourbon, known as the Constable de Bourbon, became famous in the wars of the emperor Charles V with Francis I, King of France. The vast estates of both branches of the Bourbon family were united in the possession of the Constable, making him a person of importance independently of his military career. He was born in 1490, and was made Constable of France for his services at the battle of Melegnano (1515), in which Francis gained a brilliant victory over the Swiss.

The attempt of powerful enemies to undermine Bourbon in the favor of the King led to the threatened loss of the Constable’s dignities and lands, and provoked him to renounce the French service. After making a secret treaty with Charles V and with his ally, Henry VIII of England, Bourbon led a force of German mercenaries into Lombardy, where in 1523 he joined Charles’ Spanish army, and next year aided in driving the French from Italy. Invading France, he marched under the Emperor’s orders to Marseilles and laid siege to the city, but failed to take it.

Bourbon contributed materially to the Emperor’s great victory at Pavia, and was rewarded by being made Duke of Milan and commander in Northern Italy. But although Charles thus honored Bourbon he did not trust him, and was not really desirous of advancing a person of such great resource and consequence. In the peace between Spain and France in 1526 Bourbon’s great interests were neglected. Notwithstanding these things, when Charles V wished to punish Pope Clement VII, who had joined a league against him, Bourbon, with George of Frundsberg, led an army of Spanish and German mercenaries to Rome.

The description of the sack which followed, written by Benvenuto Cellini, the celebrated Italian artist, shows him as an effective participant in the defense. This account of a combatant is of course only fragmentary, and is supplemented by Trollope’s critical narrative.

The selections are from:

• The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini by Benvenuto Cellini published in 1563?.
• History of the Commonwealth of Florence by T. Adolphus Trollope published in 1865.

For works benefiting from the latest research see the “More information” section at the bottom of these pages.

There’s 1.6 installments by Benvenuto Cellini and 3.4 installments by T. Adolphus Trollope.

We begin with Benvenuto Cellini (1500-1571). He was an Italian goldsmith, sculptor, and author.

Time: 1527
Place: Rome

The whole world was now in warfare. Pope Clement had sent to get some troops from Giovanni de’ Medici, and when they came they made such disturbances in Rome that it was ill living in open shops.[1] On this account I retired to a good snug house behind the Banchi, where I worked for all the friends I had acquired. Since I produced few things of much importance at that period, I need not waste time in talking about them. I took much pleasure in music and amusements of the kind.

[1: These troops entered Rome in October, 1526. They were disbanded in March, 1527.]

On the death of Giovanni de’ Medici in Lombardy, the Pope, at the advice of Messer Jacopo Salviati, dismissed the five bands he had engaged; and when the Constable of Bourbon knew there were no troops in Rome, he pushed his army with the utmost energy up to the city. The whole of Rome upon this flew to arms. I happened to be intimate with Alessandro, the son of Piero del Bene, who, at the time when the Colonnesi entered Rome, had requested me to guard his palace.[2] On this more serious occasion, therefore, he prayed me to enlist fifty comrades for the protection of the said house, appointing me their captain, as I had been when the Colonnesi came. So I selected fifty young men of the highest courage, and we took up quarters in his palace, with good pay and excellent appointments.

[2: Cellini here refers to the attack made upon Rome by the great Ghibelline house of Colonna, led by their chief captain, Pompeo, in September, 1526. They took possession of the city and drove Clement into the castle of St. Angelo, where they forced him to agree to terms favoring the Imperial cause. It was customary for Roman gentlemen to hire bravoes for the defense of their palaces when any extraordinary disturbance was expected, as, for example, upon the vacation of the papal chair.]

Bourbon’s army had now arrived before the walls of Rome, and Alessandro begged me to go with him to reconnoiter. So, we went with one of the stoutest fellows in our company; and on the way a youth called Cecchino della Casa joined himself to us. On reaching the walls by the Campo Santo, we could see that famous army, which was making every effort to enter the town. Upon the ramparts where we took our station, several young men were lying, killed by the besiegers; the battle raged there desperately, and there was the densest fog imaginable. I turned to Alessandro and said: “Let us go home as soon as we can, for there is nothing to be done here; you see the enemies are mounting, and our men are in flight.” Alessandro, in a panic, cried, “Would God that we had never come here!” and turned in maddest haste to fly. I took him up somewhat sharply with these words: “Since you have brought me here, I must perform some action worthy of a man”; and, directing my arquebuse where I saw the thickest and most serried troop of fighting men, I aimed exactly at one whom I remarked to be higher than the rest: the fog prevented me from being certain whether he was on horseback or on foot. Then I turned to Alessandro and Cecchino, and bade them discharge their arquebuses, showing them how to avoid being hit by the besiegers. When we had fired two rounds apiece, I crept cautiously up to the wall, and, observing among the enemy a most extraordinary confusion, I discovered afterward that one of our shots had killed the Constable of Bourbon; and, from what I subsequently learned, he was the man whom I had first noticed above the heads of the rest.

[All historians of the sack of Rome agree in saying that Bourbon was shot dead while placing ladders against the outworks near the shop Cellini mentions. But the honor of firing the arquebuse which brought him down cannot be assigned to anyone in particular. Very different stories were current on the subject.]

Quitting our position on the ramparts, we crossed the Campo Santo, and entered the city by St. Peter’s; then, coming out exactly at the Church of Santo Agnolo, we got with the greatest difficulty to the great gate of the castle; for the generals, Renzo di Ceri and Orazio Baglioni, were wounding and slaughtering everybody who abandoned the defense of the walls.

[Renzo di Ceri was a captain of adventurers, who had conquered Urbino for the Pope in 1515, and afterward fought for the French in the Italian wars. Orazio Baglioni, of the semiprincely Perugian family, was a distinguished _condottiere_. He subsequently obtained the captaincy of the Bande Nere, and died fighting near Naples in 1528. Orazio murdered several of his cousins in order to acquire the lordship of Perugia. His brother Malatesta undertook to defend Florence in the siege of 1530, and sold the city by treason to Clement.]

By the time we had reached the great gate, part of the foemen had already entered Rome, and we had them in our rear. The castellan had ordered the portcullis to be lowered, in order to do which they cleared a little space, and this enabled us four to get inside. On the instant that I entered, the captain Palone de’ Medici claimed me as being of the papal household and forced me to abandon Alessandro, which I had to do much against my will. I ascended to the keep, and at the same instant Pope Clement came in through the corridors into the castle; he had refused to leave the palace of St. Peter earlier, being unable to believe that his enemies would effect their entrance into Rome.

[Giovio, in his Life of the Cardinal Prospero Colonna, relates how he accompanied Clement in his flight from the Vatican to the castle. While passing some open portions of the gallery, he threw his violet mantle and cap of a monseigneur over the white stole of the Pontiff, for fear he might be shot at by the soldiers in the streets below.]

T. Adolphus Trollope begins here.

More information here and here and below.

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