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  • Published: 18 May 2017
  • ISBN: 9780099586944
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 368
  • RRP: $36.99
Categories:

The Black Prince of Florence

The Spectacular Life and Treacherous World of Alessandro de’ Medici





A dramatic tale of assassination, spying and betrayal in the opulent, cut-throat world of Renaissance Italy.

‘A spectacular, elegant, brilliant portrait of skulduggery, murder and sex in Renaissance Florence’ Simon Sebag Montefiore, Evening Standard, Books of the Year

1531 – after years of brutal war and political intrigue, the bastard son of a Medici Duke and a ‘half-negro’ maidservant rides into Florence. Within a year, he rules the city as its Prince. Backed by the Pope and his future father-in-law the Holy Roman Emperor, the nineteen-year-old Alessandro faces down bloody family rivalry and the scheming hostility of Italy’s oligarchs to reassert the Medicis’ faltering grip on the turbulent city-state. Six years later, as he awaits an adulterous liaison, he will be murdered by his cousin in another man’s bed.

‘Nothing in sixteenth-century history is more astonishing’ Hilary Mantel

  • Published: 18 May 2017
  • ISBN: 9780099586944
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 368
  • RRP: $36.99
Categories:

About the author

Catherine Fletcher

Catherine Fletcher is a historian of Renaissance and early modern Europe. Her previous books include The Black Prince of Florence: The Spectacular Life and Treacherous World of Alessandro de' Medici and The Divorce of Henry VIII: The Untold Story. Catherine is Professor of History at Manchester Metropolitan University and broadcasts regularly for the BBC.

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