The Tigress or Forli by Elizabeth Lev

I recently visited Florence, which you can read about on my other blog The Content Reader Goes Outdoor. Florence is one of the prominent city-states during the Italian Renaissance. I am currently reading various books about the de' Medici family and will return to the subject later on. While searching for books about this time, I happened to find a book about Caterina Riario Sforza (1463-1509). She was the illegitimate daughter of Galeazzo Maria Sforza, Duke of Milan. The story of her life is more than life itself. She was an incredible woman; mother, wife, warrior, and icon.  She met many of the important men of her time:

"Pope Sixtus IV, Caterina's benefactor and uncle by marriage, who commissioned the Sistine Chapel frescoes in which she is immortalized. 

Count Girolamo Riario, Caterina's first husband and an originator of the Pazzi conspiracy, whose corrupt ways led to their flight from Rome to Forli. 

Niccolò Machiavelli, the Florentine political theorist who as a young diplomat was humiliated by Caterina and later took revenge with his pen. 

Giacomo Feo, Caterina's secret second husband, a jumped-up family retainer whose assassination led to a bloodbath on the streets of Forli. 

Giovanni de' Medici il Popolano, Caterina's beloved third husband, who provided Caterina entrée into Florentine culture and society, and an heir worthy of her legacy. 

Cesare Borgia, nephew to the ruthless Borgia pope Alexander VI, who would bring Caterina's rule to an end with unspeakable cruelty." 

Raised in the court of Milan, she grew up in a world of intrigues. That might have been the reason for her surviving all the different ordeals she met with during her life. She was married to her first husband at the age of ten and bore him six children. She was intelligent and well-read and considered the most beautiful woman of her time. When her family was threatened she did not hesitate to take unusual measures to save them. Even if it meant to ride from Forli to Rome, eight months pregnant!


She was a true Renaissance person and a celebrity. During the renaissance, a man, or lord (they were mostly men) was expected to speak several languages, play instruments, write poetry, know their geography and be well-traveled. The era developed several polymaths, a person who excels in several areas of specialisation. They are marked by high intelligence, motivation, curiosity, and inspiration. I think for most of us Leonardo da Vinci comes into mind. These polymaths often combined didactic education and competence within different areas, and they continued their education all their life. Caterina was such a person. From an early age, her studies started, and she continued her whole life. When it comes to her practical life it was 'doing by learning'

I am full of admiration for this lady who managed to survive, sometimes on her own terms, in a male world. She mixed violent streaks, especially after her second husband was assassinated when she initiated a bloodbath, with humanitarian ones. Caring for her family and her people. Considering the situation we have today with the coronavirus, this particular paragraph caught my eyes.

"The arrival of the bubonic plague abruptly halted Caterina's pleasant summer. By the end of August, the illness was raging through Forli. The bane of the Renaissance era, this terrible disease came from a bacterium hosted by rats, traveling from the infected rodents to humans via fleas. Its onset was marked by a high fever and enlarged lymph nodes, known as buboes, which typically killed victims within three to four days. Europe's first experience of the Black Death had occurred in 1348 when it claimed a third of the population. One hundred and fifty years later, its cause remained a mystery but most well-informed rulers knew of efficacious ways to limit its spread. Caterina had seen the plague before and though she personally feared it little, she knew its capacity for devastation. This time the stakes were much higher. With Cesare Borgia and the French closing in, a plague would weaken the defenses of Romagna; the sickness would have to be defeated in Forli before it could contaminate other areas. Caterina sealed off her city. No market, no traveling shows, no large assemblies. She brought in special doctors to assist the ill and priests to console the dying. Food and necessities were distributed to the populace free of charge. The city was divided into sectors and subjected to strict rules of hygiene. Those infected were immediately isolated in the Church of San Giovanni while a confraternity of volunteers collected the dead for hasty burial outside the city walls. The clothes, belongings, and even the houses of the incurable were burned, which brought many protests. But these stringent measures saved the region; the casualty count was 179 people, much lower than expected, and the sickness did not reach any of the surrounding countryside."

Elizabeth Lev is an American-born scholar of Renaissance art and culture and a professor of art history in Rome. That she is a very competent historian is evident in the book. There are a lot of details, for some maybe a little bit too much, but it gives important and interesting background to life during the Italian Renaissance. It is a well written fascinating story of a fascinating woman. Ms. Lev warms to her subject and makes Caterina come to life. Caterina is a diverse woman, which you don't always like. One has to take into consideration the times she was living in, the necessities of harsh rules to survive. From a female perspective, this is a story of one of all the strong women in history. Women tend to be kept in the background, but here is one woman coming to the front page and deserving it.

With the marriage to her third husband Giovanni de' Medici, she became part of the cadet family of de' Medicis. Their son Giovanni married the granddaughter of Lorenzo the Magnificent, and thus connected the two branches of the de' Medici. Their son, Cosimo, was only seven years old when his father died. His father's last words to him were; "You'll be a prince. It's your destiny."

"At the age of seventeen, young Cosimo would take his place. Caterina Sforza had left one last great legacy to the world in her grandson, the first Medici head to wear the crown of the grand duke of Tuscany and the beginning of a line that would become synonymous with the great city of Florence."

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