Original scientific paper
The Pazzi War and Croatians in the Service of Papal Propaganda: Mato Ragnina’s Super pace Venetorum cum Magno Turco (1479)
Tobias Daniels
orcid.org/0000-0002-5560-7251
; Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität Historicum, München
Abstract
The present paper analyzes Mato Ragnina’s (ca. 1444-1499) treatise Super pace Venetorum cum Magno Turco et auxilio Florentinis contra Romanum Pontificem ab eis et duce Mediolanensi impenso libellus (Vat. lat. 4858) (spring 1479) in the context of Italian politics during the war that followed the Pazzi conspiracy (1478-1480). This paper argues that Ragnina’s text may be counted among the numerous pamphlets written during the Pazzi war. Ragnina’s principal arguments, that neither Venice’s peace with the Turks in January 1479 nor its help for Milan and Florence against Sixtus IV since 1478 was legitimate, reflect papal policies and show the way the Curia intended to influence the balances of power in that context. Moreover, the treatise reflects the way the Papacy viewed itself in Quattrocento Italy and justified its power during the establishment of what research has later described as ‘Papal Sovereignty’. Ragnina responds to the Venetian stipulation of not only an armistice but also a unilateral treaty, which questioned the role of the Papacy itself as defender of the Christian Republic. In this perspective, the pontiffs could accept neither a coalition between Venice and the Turks nor an alliance of legitimate powers such as Venice and Milan in defence of excommunicated persons like Lorenzo de’ Medici, since this would have undermined the authority of the Papacy, which was at the same time equally threatened by the call for a council.
Keywords
Pazzi conspiracy; Pazzi war; pamphlets; Lorenzo de’ Medici; Sixtus IV; Giuliano della Rovere; league of Florence; Milan and Venice (1474); Venice’s peace with the Ottomans (1479); murder of Galeazzo Maria Sforza (1476); Andrija Jamometić; Nicholas of Modruš
Hrčak ID:
180513
URI
Publication date:
21.4.2017.
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