I Medici. Una dinastia al potere
Florence, 1429. At the death of the patriarch Giovanni de’ Medici, his sons Cosimo and Lorenzo find themselves in charge of a genuine financial empire, duly surrounded, therefore, by sworn enemies like Rinaldo degli Albizzi and Palla Strozzi, exponents of the other most powerful Florentine families. Undeterred, the two brothers use their wits but very few scruples to gain political power as well, exhibiting a keen business sense that goes hand in hand with a love of art and culture. While construction of the dome of Florence’s cathedral proceeds under architect Filippo Brunelleschi, the Medici’s age-old enemies continue to plot against them, one of them a femme fatale whom men are powerless to resist. After four years spent outwitting a series of conspiracies and surviving both the plague and a war against Lucca, Cosimo winds up in prison, looking at a death sentence.
I Medici. Un uomo al potere
Florence, forty years later. Lorenzo de’ Medici, Cosimo’s grandson, is winning a tournament in honor of his bride, Clarice Orsini, who has just arrived in Florence to marry the man who will be called ‘the Magnificent’. Lorenzo has a heavy heart about this marriage, since he is hopelessly in love with Lucrezia Donati, a great beauty. Yet he will go ahead with the wedding to obey his mother’s wishes and consolidate the Medici’s alliance with a powerful Roman family. Now called upon to rule the city and play the complicated game of politics, torn between his love for Lucrezia and his love of power, Lorenzo underestimates his formidable adversaries plotting against him to seize control of Florence. Pope Sixtus IV’s nephew, Girolamo Riario, has allied himself with Francesco Salviati, the archbishop of Pisa, and enlisted Jacopo and Francesco dei Pazzi, long-standing enemies of the Medici dynasty, to carry out a plot that will have lethal consequences for Lorenzo: his brother Giuliano will be murdered before his eyes. From that moment on, few will be spared the violence Lorenzo unleashes and the revenge he will exact.
