Giuliano was only a mediocre Medici. In any other family he might have been superb. But the Medicis were a flamboyant line, running to both seraphic and sulphurous extremes. Giuliano's father was Lorenzo the Magnificent, mighty patron of the arts and writer of bawdy ditties, a politically high-minded ruler whose actions were tyrannous. Giuliano's brother was Pope Leo X, a dilettante and politician who palely reflected his father's glories. Giuliano himself had the aquiline features and dark locks of his tribe. But he did not have the spouting energy. He met and married...
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