Living in Rome, Michelangelo risked nothing with the Florentine government.

But "La Polverina" attacked the heirs of exiles in their property and persons.

It was therefore of importance to establish his non-complicity in revolutionary intrigues.

Luckily for himself and his nephew, he could make out a good case and defend his conduct.

Though Buonarroti's sympathies and sentiments inclined him to prefer a republic in his native city, and though he threw his weight into that scale at the crisis of the siege, he did not forget his early obligations to the House of Medici.