Encyclopedia of Philosophy: MACHIAVELLI

 Savonarola fell from favour and was burnt as a heretic in 1498, but the Florentine republic survived him. One of its officers and diplomats was Niccolò Machiavelli, who served in its chancellery from 1498 until 1512, when the Medici returned to power in the city. In the course of his career he became a friend and admirer of Cesare Borgia, the illegitimate son of Pope Alexander VI, a Spaniard who had succeeded to the Pontificate in 1492. Cesare, with the complaisance of his pleasure-loving father, worked by bribery and assassination to appropriate most of central Italy for the Borgia family. It was only the fact, Machiavelli believed, that Cesare was himself at death's door when Alexander died which prevented him from achieving his aim.  Upon the return of the Medici, Machiavelli was suspected of participation in a conspiracy; he was tortured and placed under house arrest. During this time he wrote The Prince, the best-known work of Renaissance political philosophy.