Piero de’ Medici was forty-eight when his father died. He inherited his love of letters and was of a kindly nature, “it was due to him,” writes Machiavelli, “that his partisans did not stain their hands with the blood of their fellow-citizens.” In June, 1469, his son Lorenzo married Clarice Orsini, and great festivities took place in the Medici palace, soon to be followed by sounds of mourning, for Piero died in December. “Two days later, the principal men of the city and of the State,” writes Lorenzo in his _Ricordi_, “came to us in our house to condole with us on our loss, and to encourage me to take charge of the city and of the government, as my grandfather and my father had done. This I was most unwilling to accept, on account of my youth and of the great responsibility and peril, yet for the safety of our friends and of our possessions I did so. For it is ill living for the rich in Florence unless they rule the State. Until now we have succeeded with honour and renown, which I attribute, not to prudence, but to the grace of God and the good conduct of my ancestors.” Lorenzo was then in his twenty-second year and Giuliano was sixteen. Few princes of that time had received such an education as the sons of Piero de’ Medici. Messer Gentile Becchi of Urbino, a man of great learning, pure life and high moral character, was their tutor, Landino taught them Italian literature, Argyropolos Greek, and Marsilio Ficino the philosophy of Plato. Above all Lorenzo had been well trained by his mother, a woman of strong good sense, a poetess, yet withal an excellent housewife. Niccolò Valori describes Lorenzo as “above the common stature, broad-shouldered and solidly built, robust, and second to none in agility. Although nature had been a step-mother to him with regard to his personal appearance, she had acted as a loving mother in all things connected with the mind. His complexion was dark, and although his face was not handsome it was so full of dignity as to compel respect. He was short-sighted, his nose was flattened and he had no sense of smell. This did not trouble him and he was wont to say that he was grateful to nature, disagreeable things being more common than agreeable ones to so delicate a sense.”