In the duchy of Milan the power was in the hands of Ludovic Sforza, called the Moor, who, being ambitious, faithless, lawless, unscrupulous, employed it in banishing to Pavia the lawful duke, his own nephew, John Galeas Mario Sforza, of whom the Florentine ambassador said to Ludovic himself, "This young man seems to me a good young man and animated by good sentiments, but very deficient in wits." He was destined to die ere long, probably by poison.

The republic of Venice had at this period for its doge Augustin Barbarigo; and it was to the council of Ten that in respect of foreign affairs as well as of the home department the power really belonged.

Peter de' Medici, son of Lorenzo de' Medici, the father of the Muses, was feebly and stupidly, though with all the airs and pretensions of a despot, governing the republic of Florence.
Rome had for pope Alexander VI.

(Poderigo Borgia), a prince who was covetous, licentious, and brazen-facedly fickle and disloyal in his policy, and who would be regarded as one of the most utterly demoralized men of the fifteenth century, only that he had for son a Caesar Borgia.
Finally, at Naples, in 1494, three months before the day on which Charles VIII, entered Italy, King Alphonso II.

ascended the throne.