Lorenzo, Tommaso’s other son, passed through a stormy career. Born at Avignon, of a woman of Auvergne, he endeavoured to cover his want of legitimacy by the diplomas of a Count Palatine and of Gian Galeazzo Visconti. After having been enrolled by King Charles V. of France in an order of knighthood, and married in Florence to Ghilla Cambi, he conceived the unfortunate idea, after his father’s death, of proving the legality of his birth and his right to more wealth by means of forged documents. The severity, of the laws sentenced him to death, which he suffered in 1405. His two sons, Niccolò and Tommaso, born, the former in 1401, the latter in 1403, became eager partisans of Cosimo de’ Medici on the sole ground of hatred of their uncle, to whom they attributed a participation in the tragical end of their father, and who took the other side. Niccolò received the dignity of Gonfaloniere in 1451, Tommaso in 1449 and 1454. The latter, by far the most distinguished, filled various offices in the provincial towns at an early age; when thirty-five he sat in the magistracy of the Priori. By his marriage with Dianora Tornabuoni, Lucrezia’s sister, he was riveted to the Medicean interests, which no one supported with greater zeal and success, or with more statesmanlike ability. To no one did Piero or Lorenzo owe so much as to this man. We have already mentioned other families with whom the Medici were connected. Further mention will be made of them in the course of this history. CHAPTER II. LORENZO’S YOUTH. CONSPIRACY OF DIOTISALVI NERONI AND HIS COMPANIONS. LORENZO DE’ MEDICI grew up. He was seventeen years old when his father sent him to Pisa to welcome Don Federigo of Aragon, King Ferrante’s younger son, who set out from Naples, March 18, 1465, and having received the golden rose at Rome, was on his way to Milan with the most brilliant suite, no less than six hundred horse, to escort to Naples Francesco Sforza’s intellectual and beautiful daughter Ippolita Maria, the bride of his elder brother, Alfonso, Duke of Calabria.[117] On April 17, Don Federigo entered Florence, accompanied by the Prince of Salerno, the Duke of Amalfi, the Bishop of Gaeta, and many other lords, and was received by the Signoria on the Ringhiera of the palace, after which he rode to Sta. Maria Novella, where the Papal lodgings were prepared for him, and where, entertained at the public cost, he stayed five days amid mutual expressions of politeness. The Prince, then only thirteen years old, wore mourning, with all his suite, in consequence of the death of the Queen his mother, which had happened shortly before.[118]