Leonardo, Borgia, and Machiavelli: A Fateful Collusion

What happened when Renaissance giants Leonardo da Vinci, Cesare Borgia, and Niccolò Machiavelli met on a military campaign in northern Italy?

During the latter half of 1502, when the Italian Renaissance was at its height, three of its most distinguished yet disparate figures travelled together through the remote hilly region of the Romagna in north-eastern Italy. Cesare Borgia (1475-1507), backed by his father Pope Alexander VI (1431-1503), was leading a military campaign whose aim was to carve out his own personal princedom. He had hired Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) as his chief military engineer whose brief was to reinforce the castles and defences in the region as well as to construct a number of revolutionary new military machines, which he had designed in his notebooks. Accompanying this unlikely duo was the enigmatic figure of Niccolò Machiavelli (1469-1527), who had been despatched by the Florentine authorities as an emissary to the travelling ‘court’ with instructions to ingratiate himself with Borgia and, as far as possible, discover his intentions towards Florence whose position to the west, just across the Apennine mountains, left it particularly vulnerable to Borgia’s territorial ambitions.

In a characteristically Machiavellian situation Borgia knew perfectly well what Machiavelli was up to, and Machiavelli knew that he knew this. Machiavelli had been instructed to send regular diplomatic despatches back to Florence, reporting on all he had discovered. Machiavelli well understood that Borgia was intercepting these despatches and reading them himself, discarding those he felt should not be sent. As a result, Machiavelli would often resort to alluding in the most oblique form to what was actually taking place. Borgia, a man whose considerable intellect matched his reputation for treachery and violence, was not fooled by this. He knew that the Florentine authorities would certainly have established a simple code with Machiavelli before he had set out. Remarks about the mountains, the local people, the weather and even the state of Machiavelli's accommodation might all refer to vital intelligence.

Machiavelli's information came from a number of unlikely sources. Sometimes it even came directly from Borgia himself, but could he believe what Borgia told him? Machiavelli had to be guarded about any other sources of information, which usually came from careless remarks let drop by secretaries or high-ranking officers among Borgia's entourage whom Machiavelli had befriended. Though everyone knew Machiavelli was a spy, there was something wittily subversive in his character which seemed to appeal to them. This also appealed to Borgia himself: here was a man of some learning, whose intellect matched his own, who genuinely appeared more interested in discussing philosophical ideas than in per- forming the task of a mere envoy. Such a man was rare company among the rough and ready mercenary commanders with whom Borgia was surrounded. And, unlike his commanders, in a curious way he knew that he could trust Machiavelli, man to man: up to a point, that is. Many of Borgia's most daring and sensational plans relied upon the notion of secrecy and betrayal, elements which he was not even willing to pass on to his military commanders until the last moment, when there was no chance of such secrecy being compromised.

For obvious reasons, Machiavelli frequently made misleading remarks about the sources of his information in order to protect their identity. However, one particular source - referred to only as a 'friend' - was a combination of various informants, who observed intelligence and bits of gossip picked up here and there. Or so Machiavelli would have had us believe. It has now become clear that most of the information from this 'friend' did in fact come directly from one source and that this vital informant was none other than Machiavelli's friend and fellow Florentine Leonardo da Vinci.

Borgia's reasons for hiring Leonardo da Vinci were obvious. Besides being known as a great artist, he had already established himself as the most ingenious and talented military engineer in Italy. Yet why on earth should an artist of such refined sensibilities as Leonardo simply abandon painting to face the rigours as well as the dangers of campaign life with a man as notorious as Borgia. The evidence suggests that Leonardo was going through something of a crisis at this time. He had grown tired of painting - so much so that he had already become notorious for leaving canvases and frescoes unfinished because he had 'solved' their difficulties and they thus no longer interested him. He wished to have time to pursue his inventive and ingenious scientific pursuits, which he secretly jotted down in his coded notebooks, and perhaps felt that the freedom given to him by Borgia would let him do this. Borgia's instructions allowed Leonardo to roam the Romagna almost at will, coming up with ideas for new defences and infrastructure as he saw fit. Another quirk of Leonardo's character was that he seemed to be attracted to, and do his best work for, men of powerful and unpredictable temperament who nonetheless allowed him freedom to develop his own ideas in between his undemanding public duties. Many of Leonardo's most accomplished and ingenious creations literally disappeared into the air - intricate ice sculptures, technically sophisticated machines which would explode into fireworks, sensational dramatic stage devices which would be discarded after the night's performance.

In his time, Leonardo da Vinci would be employed by some of the most powerful and flamboyant figures of his age ranging from Lorenzo the Magnificent of Florence to Galleazzo 'il Moro' Sforza, who murdered his way to becoming Duke of Milan; from the young Francis I of France, king of the most powerful nation in Europe, and to Cesare Borgia, a man whose misdeeds were of such enormity that he has become a byword for evil.

Borgia was the illegitimate son of Pope Alexander VI, a pontiff whose notoriety placed him in a class of his own, even among the popes of the period. (Cardinal Rodrigo Borgia, as he was at the time of the papal elections, was the first man to ensure himself the papal throne by unashamedly buying - with mule trains of jewels and gold - the requisite amount of cardinals required to ensure his election.) His second son Cesare carried on the Borgia traditions to the best of his considerable abilities: he may well have murdered his older brother to ensure his place as his father's son and heir, and had a psychologically intense relationship with his notorious sister Lucrezia, which was at the very least subconsciously incestuous. (A suspicious number of her husbands and lovers met a gruesome end while he was around.) And, where treachery was concerned, he was second to none - in an age and culture where treachery was very much the norm.

We know that Borgia and Machiavelli formed a close, if somewhat wary, friendship. Leonardo's reactions to his companions are less clear: Borgia is mentioned just once, in an aside, in his notebooks. What we do know is that during the course of Leonardo's travels of inspection for Borgia he came across the mountainous landscape in the upper Arno valley that would form the mysterious background to the Mona Lisa, one of the few paintings he would keep in his possession to the end of his days, constantly returning to it, pondering its composition, emphasising or toning down details and so forth. The present somewhat podgy-faced beauty which hangs in the Louvre is now known to be a travesty of the original. Over centuries the surface of the lighter pigments of her face have developed many tiny fissures, thus broadening and rounding her cheeks, while the darker pigments which depict her more definite features have lesser fissures and have thus retained a much closer approximation to their original form. This continuous retouching of the Mona Lisa was a symptom of Leonardo's perfectionism.