Rediscovered manuscript by Ippolita Sforza at auction in Milan

A discovery of exceptional importance, if we consider that most of the volumes that the princess brought with her from the Sforzesco Castle to Naples, on the occasion of her marriage to Alfonso II of Aragon in 1465, were lost. Today only three are known with certainty. Yet, this manuscript emerges from the silence of time as a privileged witness of one of the richest and most refined princely libraries of the fifteenth century, a precious documentation of the humanistic education and sensitivity of one of the most cultured women of her time. In fact, the young Sforza did not lack a complete education, equal to that of her male brothers: she excelled in the art of falconry and studied Latin, French, Spanish and the basics of Greek, an unusual educational path for the time. But Ippolita was above all a great bibliophile: cultured and passionate, she earned this fame in a field that, even in the centuries to come, would remain almost exclusively male domain. For her, books were not mere luxury objects or symbols of prestige, but living instruments of knowledge, beauty and reflection.

From her youth she commissioned illuminated manuscripts, guided as much by the content as by the art they contained, and even when she left for Naples she wanted to take with her, alongside jewels and sumptuous clothes, numerous volumes: authentic testimonies of her passion and intellectual independence. Alongside Bibles and devotional texts, her library included several classics of Latin literature, an important cultural and moral reference for a fifteenth-century woman. The works of authors such as Titus Livy, an inexhaustible source of examples of virtue, diplomacy and good government, were particularly loved at court: it is no coincidence that his volumes often appear in the inventories of books owned by Hippolyta and Alfonso of Aragon. The princess was able to put those readings to good use: her finesse of thought and diplomatic skills emerged in the delicate political balance between Milan and Naples, as well as in the complex events of the Pazzi Conspiracy. Thanks to his intelligence and ability to mediate, he earned the esteem of Lorenzo de’ Medici, with whom he developed friendship and political collaboration. As the Medici’s attorney, she signed the Peace Treaty that put an end to the tensions following the conspiracy, confirming her reputation as a cultured and authoritative woman.