CHAPTER VI.

SUPREMACY OF COSIMO DE’ MEDICI UP TO LUCA PITTI’S REFORM OF THE ADMINISTRATION. THE time at which Cosimo de’ Medici attained to a position in his native town, such as a citizen had never yet held, promised neither rest nor peace to Italy. We have already mentioned how, in the decisive crisis when Rinaldo degli Albizzi sought to carry the citizens along with him, and to destroy the Medicean party with one blow, Pope Eugenius IV. was a fugitive in the same convent of Sta. Maria Novella which his predecessor had inhab…