SFORZA, FAMILY. - Originally from Cotignola (Ravenna), the main branch rose to the lordship of Milan. The family surname, belonging to well-to-do farmers, was Attendolo, but the author of their first rise to power, Muzio, preferred the nickname of S., given to him by Alberico da Barbiano for his stubborn boldness.
Muzio (Giacomuccio), b. at Cotignola on 18 May 1369, followed the company of Boldrino da Panicale at the age of 13, then became squad leader under Alberico da Barbiano; he served Gian Galeazzo Visconti and later Florence, for which he fought at Casalecchi (1402) and against Pisa. While moving to besiege L'Aquila against Braccio, he drowned on 4 January 1424 in the Pescara while saving a page. A soldier of great ability but with the mentality of a mercenary; he gave his name to a school opposed to the Bracceschi, maneuvering with prudence rather than launching sudden attacks. He had from Lucia di Marsciano, his mistress, Francesco and Alessandro, from whom the branches of Milan and Pesaro descended. From other women he had: Bosio, progenitor of the branch of Santafiora, and Carlo (an Augustinian with the name of Gabriele), archbishop of Milan (1454-57).
I. Francesco of Milan
He owed his fortunes to Francesco, b. at Santu Miniato on 23 July 1401, who followed his father from Ferrara to Naples; upon the latter’s death in 1424, he accompanied Caldora to L'Aquila, then entered the service of the Visconti and was among the defeated at Maclodo, later with Piccinino among the victors at Soncino (1431). Waging war in the Marca, he wrested from Eugenius IV the title of Marquis and Gonfalonier of the Church. He then passed to Florence, and then to Filippo Maria Visconti, whose daughter Bianca Maria he married. He became the arbiter of peace, which he defined at Cavriana in his camp and proclaimed at Cremona on 20 November 1441. Hard years followed for Sforza, beset and attacked in the Marca and Abruzzo by the malice of his father-in-law, King Alfonso of Naples, and Pope Eugenius IV, who claimed the Marca. After the death of Visconti and the end of the short-lived Ambrosian Republic, on 26 February 1460 Francesco entered Milan as duke, and after a four-year struggle against a coalition of Venice, Naples, Savoy, and the Empire, he triumphed by inducing Venice to the Peace of Lodi (9 April 1454). From that moment he was the true center of Italian politics, seeking to maintain peace and keep foreigners at bay, renouncing the aggressive Visconti policy. In Milan he is remembered for the Castle, rebuilt for the security of the dynasty and the city, and the Ospedale Maggiore; he gave the State a strong military organization that disappeared after him. D. 18 March 1466.He was succeeded in the Duchy by his eldest son Galeazzo Maria (b. 1444). In 1468, at the suggestion of Louis XI, he married Bona of Savoy, against the will of her brother, Duke Amadeus. He was killed on 26 December 1476 in the church of S. Stefano in Milan by three young men, for private grudges and humanistic fervor, and his death added another serious cause to the disorder of Italian political life. Besides the young Gian Galeazzo II, he left two daughters: Bianca Maria, who married Emperor Maximilian I in 1493, and Anna Maria, who married Alfonso I d'Este; and, illegitimately, the famous Caterina Sforza, who married Girolamo Riario, lord of Forlì. He was succeeded by the seven-year-old Gian Galeazzo II under the regency of Bona of Savoy and the effective rule of Cicco Simonetta, former secretary to the two previous dukes. In 1478, Lodovico (commonly called the Moor), the fourth son of Francesco Sforza, had Simonetta arrested and beheaded, ousted Bona, and, dominating the boy, became, upon her renunciation, regent and guardian. From his own time Lodovico was accused of having summoned Charles VIII to Italy to maintain his usurpation of the Duchy, which was contested by the King of Naples. As early as 1493 he procured from Emperor Maximilian a diploma of investiture of the Duchy for himself rather than for his nephew.
Luigi Simeoni
Ascanio, brother of the Moor, b. in 1455, followed and favored his fortunes in the Papal States. On 17 September 1579 he received in commendam the bishopric of Pavia, which he held until his death. He was created cardinal deacon of S. Vito by Sixtus IV on 17 March 1484, and after this Innocent VIII granted him in commendam the bishopric of Novara on 25 October 1484 (he left it in 1485 and resumed it in 1503), that of Cremona on 4 August 1486, which he held until his death, and that of Pesaro (from 1488 to 1491); at the same time he was legate in the Patrimonio (1484) and at Bologna (1488 and then in 1492). United in friendship with Cardinal Roderic Borgia, he favored by every means his election as pope, and from him he obtained the archbishopric of Agria (31 August 1492 – June 1497) and the office of vice-chancellor; in 1493 he arranged the ill-fated marriage of Lucrezia Borgia with Giovanni Sforza, lord of Pesaro. For political reasons he defected from Alexander VI in June 1494, spoke of deposing the Pope, and in November went over to King Charles VIII of France, following him in his expedition to Italy; he took part in the negotiations between the Pope and the King and with him entered Rome on 31 December, but on 19 January 1495 he quickly left for Milan, since the Moor had already been alarmed by Charles’s successes. He returned to Rome on 6 March and accompanied the Pope in the following months and was even suspected of complicity in the assassination of the Duke of Gandia. Following Alexander VI’s break with the Moor, he left Rome on 13–14 July 1499 for Milan and was taken prisoner in April 1500 by the Venetians, who handed him over to the French; he was unable to return to Rome until the Conclave of 10 September 1503 with aspirations to the papacy; he then adhered to Cardinal Giuliano della Rovere. D. in Rome on 27 May 1505, mourned for his lavish alms. He was the true type of the worldly and ostentatious prelate, entirely devoted to political intrigue. Julius II had a monument to him erected at S. Maria del Popolo by Andrea Sansovino.
Pio Paschini
Unhappy was the fate of the sons of Lodovico and Beatrice d'Este: Massimiliano and Francesco II. Massimiliano (1493-1530) lived in straitened circumstances at the imperial court. The victory of the Holy League and the will of the Swiss cardinal Schinner made him duke of Milan for three years in 1512. His brother Francesco II (b. 4 Feb 1495, d. 1 Nov 1535), more beloved by the Milanese than his brother, lived in security until the papal and imperial victory of 1521, which drove the French from Milan and led to his proclamation as duke, albeit from afar, through the agency of Morone, who governed in his name. At the new descent of King Francis I in October 1524, he left Milan, returning after the imperial victory at Pavia (24 Feb 1525). Suspected of involvement in the anti-Spanish intrigues of Morone, he was besieged in the Castello of Milan and, not relieved by the Venetian-papal army, had to surrender on 20 July 1526 under unkept terms. He regained the Duchy at Bologna (23 Dec 1529) through the action of the Pope and Venice, but with heavy burdens (nearly a million ducats) and the presence of the De Leyva in his household. He married in 1534 the young Christina, niece of Charles V, but already on 1 Nov 1535 he was dead without issue.
II. RAMO OF PESARO
This and that of Santa Fiora descend directly from Muzio and not from Francesco, as do the others. This branch of Pesaro was founded by Alessandro (b. at Cotignola to Lucia Terzani in 1409), who, by marrying in 1444 Costanza di Varano, niece of Galeazzo Malatesta, lord of Pesaro, obtained (consolidating his right with money) the lordship which was recognized to him in 1447 by Nicholas V. MARCIA, at Milan, in Tuscany, and for King Ferrante against John of Anjou, defeated at S. Fabiano (1460), victorious at Troia (1462), becoming Grand Constable of the Kingdom like his father. He was with Colleoni at the Riccardina against the Italian League and his nephew Galeazzo M., Duke of Milan (1467); he died on 3 April 1473 in the Ferrarese territory. From his first wife he had the legitimate daughter Battista, wife of Duke Federico of Urbino, and the illegitimate Ginevra, who was first married to Sante Bentivoglio (1454) and then to Giovanni II Bentivoglio, whose downfall she did not cause alone; his second wife, Sveva di Montefeltro, was shut up in a convent by Alessandro in 1457. He was succeeded by his son Costanzo, a good captain and lord, and then by his illegitimate son Giovanni, who married Lucrezia Borgia, later dissolving the marriage and being driven out by the Valentino in 1499; he returned with Julius II and died in 1510; in 1512 the Pope expelled his illegitimate brother Galeazzo, with whom this branch became extinct in Milan in 1519.SFRZA, FAMILY — Portrait of Muzio Attendolo S., fresco by B. Luini (16th cent.) — Milan, Castello Sforzesco.### III. BRANCH OF SANTAFIORA
This nominally existing branch descends from Bosio (1411–76), illegitimate son of Muzio Attendolo and half-brother of Francesco, Duke of Milan. A capable soldier, he was lord of Cotignola and Castelli Arquato (Piacenza). By marrying Cecilia Aldobrandeschi, he secured the fief of Santafiora for his son Guido. The family’s holdings were further enlarged by the marriage of his grandson Bosio II to Costanza, sister of Pier Luigi Farnese; their grandfather, Pope Paul III, favored his grandsons, two of whom, CAMILLO ASCANIO (d. 1565) and ALESSANDRO (d. 1585), became cardinals of great importance.
The family split into two branches: the Lombard line, which became extinct in 1644 with Sforzino, and the Tuscan line, which in 1575 inherited the estates of the Conti family, acquiring the fiefs of Valmontone and Segni (the latter with a ducal title). The family’s fortunes, which had declined in the 17th century, were revived by FEDERICO through his marriage to Livia Cesarini, heiress of that and another noble house. Segni was reacquired, and the family adopted the title of S. Cesarini. In 1832, the line ended with SALVATORE, but the Roman Rota awarded the title and inheritance to his younger brother, Lorenzo Montani. The new line divided into the ducal houses of Segni and Civitalavinia and the comital house of Santafiora.
### IV. BRANCH OF CARAVAGGIO
Founded by GIAMPAOLO, illegitimate son of Ludovico il Moro and Lucrezia Cirielli (b. 1497), who was created Marquis of Caravaggio and Count of Galliate in 1532. He died under suspicious circumstances shortly after the death of the French king Francis II in 1535. One of his sons, Muzio, died serving Charles V at the siege of Metz (1552). The family continued in Milan, becoming extinct in FRANCESCO II in 1697 and in his daughter BIANCA MARIA in
1717. Many members held high office in the Order of Malta
See plates XXIV–XXV.S. Simeoni, Le Signorie, ibid. 1950. Among specific studies:
L. G. Pèlissier, Louis XII et Ludovico S., 2 vols., Paris 1896; F. Malaguzzi Valeri, La corte di Ludovico il Moro, 4 vols., Milan 1913–23; cf. also N. Guastella, Tre pretesi delitti di Franco, 11 S., in Arch. stor. lombardo, 75–76 (1948–49), pp. 115–67. Luigi Simeoni