CHAPTER VII.

LORENZO DE’ MEDICI IN ROME—PRATO AND VOLTERRA. WE must now return to the events belonging to the summer of 1471. A fortnight after the death of Pope Paul II. the Cardinal of S. Pietro in Vincoli was chosen as his successor. Francesco della Rovere, who took the name of Sixtus IV., was descended from an obscure family in the market-town of Albizzola, near Savona. Their possible relation to the Piedmontese Della Rovera, lords of Vinovi, was first claimed when the tiara had lent a splendour to the name far outshining t…