Note 1 — Chapter III

Such an act of violence, however consistent with the morality of a Cesare Borgia, a Venetian Republic, or a Duke of Milan, would have been directly opposed to the code of honor in use among Condottieri. Nothing, indeed, is more singular among the contradictions of this period than the humanity in the field displayed by hired captains. War was made less on adverse armies than on the population of provinces. The adventurers respected each other's lives, and treated each other with courtesy. They were a brotherhood who played at campaigning, rather than the representatives of forces seriously bent on crushing each other to extermination. Machiavelli says (Princ. cap. xii.) 'Aveano usato ogni industria per levar via a se e a' soldati la fatica e la paura, non s'ammazzando nelle zuffe, ma pigliandosi prigioni e senza taglia.' At the same time the license they allowed themselves against the cities and the districts they invaded is well illustrated by the pillage of Piacenza in 1447 by Francesco Sforza's troops. The anarchy of a sack lasted forty days, during which the inhabitants were indiscriminately sold as slaves, or tortured for their hidden treasure. Sism. vi. 170.