Once more, there was a sense of euphoria; peace was within reach, people said. On 25 March 1527 the Viceroy of Naples, Charles de Lannoy, the special envoy of the emperor, arrived at Rome to conclude an agreement. I was in the middle of the crowd in St Peter’s Square, to be present at this moment of deliverance. The weather was fine, a marvellous spring day, when the notable arrived, surrounded by his bodyguard. But at the very moment when he entered the gate of the Vatican, there was a flash of lightning, followed by a torrential outburst of rain which poured down on us with a noise which seemed to herald the end of the world. When the first shock had passed I ran to take shelter in a doorway, which was soon surrounded by a sea of mud.
At my side, a woman was soon wailing loudly, lamenting this evil portent. Hearing her, I remembered the flood at Granada, which I had experienced through the eyes of my mother, may God surround her with His mercy! Was this, once again, a sign from Heaven, a harbinger of disaster? However, that day there was no overflowing of the Tiber, nor ruinous floods, nor great slaughter. In fact the peace agreement was signed at the end of the afternoon. To ensure that the city should be spared, it stipulated that the Pope should hand over a substantial sum of money.
The money was indeed handed over, sixty thousand ducats, someone told me, and as a sign of his good faith, Clement VII decided to dismiss the mercenaries whom he had recruited. But this was not enough to stop the imperial army from moving forward. Officers who dared to mention retreat were threatened with death at the hands of their own troops; at the height of the quarrel, the chief of the lansquenets was brought down by a fit of apoplexy, and the command passed to the Constable of Bourbon, cousin and sworn enemy of the King of France. He was a man without much authority, who was following the imperial army rather than commanding it. No one else could control this mob any longer, not even the emperor, who was, besides, in Spain. Uncontrollable, unyielding, destroying everything before it, it was advancing towards Rome, where hopes for peace had given way to a panic becoming increasingly insane every day. The cardinals in particular could think only of hiding themselves or of running away with their riches.
The Pope persisted in believing that his agreement with the viceroy would eventually be respected, even if this were to be at the very last moment. It was only at the end of April, when the imperial troops reached the Tiber, a few miles upstream from the city, that the Holy Father resolved to organize its defence. As the papal coffers were empty, he elevated six rich merchants to the rank of cardinal, who handed over two hundred thousand ducats for the privilege. With this money, an army of eight thousand could be raised, two thousand Swiss guards, two thousand soldiers from the Black Bands, and four thousand volunteers from among the inhabitants of Rome.
At the age of forty, I did not feel capable of bearing arms. However, I volunteered to run the arms and munitions store at the Castel San Angelo. In order to fulfil satisfactorily a task which required my vigilant presence day and night, I decided to take up residence in the fortress, arranging to move Maddalena and Giuseppe in there as well. It was in fact the best-defended part of the whole city, and it soon became flooded with refugees. I had occupied my former room, which made me seem most affluent, since the newcomers were obliged to cram themselves by whole families into the corridors.
In the first days of May a strange atmosphere came over this makeshift encampment, fertile ground for the most bizarre excitements. I shall always remember the moment when a fife player in the papal orchestra arrived quite out of breath, shouting at the top of his voice:
‘I’ve killed the Bourbon! I’ve killed the Bourbon!’
It was a certain Benvenuto Cellini from Florence. One of his brothers had fought in the ranks of the Black Bands, but he himself, a medal-maker by trade, had never belonged to any army. He had gone off to fight, he said, with two of his friends near the Porta Trittone.
‘There was a thick fog,’ he declared, ‘but I could make out the silhouette of the constable on horseback. I fired my arquebus. A few minutes later the mist cleared, and I saw the Bourbon lying on the ground, evidently dead.’
Hearing this, I simply shrugged my shoulders. Others snapped at him harshly; the battle was raging on the city walls, especially near the Borgo, and the shooting had never been so heavy; a tumult of war, suffering and fear rose from the city; this was not the time for vain boasting.
However, I must say that to my greatest surprise before the end of the day the news was confirmed. The Bourbon had indeed been killed in the vicinity of the Porta Trittone. When a cardinal announced it to us, a broad smile lighting up his haggard face, there were several shouts of victory. At my side there was a man who did not express the slightest joy. He was a veteran of the Black Bands, and he was boiling with rage.
‘Is this the way wars are fought these days? With these accursed arquebuses, the most valiant of cavalrymen can be picked off from afar by a fife player! This is the end of chivalry! The end of wars of honour!’
However, the Florentine fife player became a hero in the eyes of the multitude. He was given drinks, he was begged to tell the story of his exploit again, he was carried about in triumph. The celebration was uncalled for, because the death of the Bourbon did not delay the assault of the imperial armies for a second. Quite the contrary: it could be said that the disappearance of the commander of the army had served only to arouse his troops even further. Taking advantage of the fog, which meant that the artillery installed at Castel San Angelo could not function, the lansquenets scaled the walls in several places and poured into the streets. Some survivors were still able to get to the castle, their eyes full of the tales of the first horrors. Other accounts were to follow.
By the God who caused me to traverse the wide world, by the God who has made me live through the torments of Cairo and those of Granada, I have never encountered such bestiality, such hatred, such bloody destruction, such pleasure in massacre, destruction and sacrilege!
Would anyone believe me if I were to say that nuns were raped on the altars of the churches before being strangled by laughing lansquenets? Would anyone believe me if I were to say that the monasteries were sacked, that the monks were relieved of their habits and forced under the threat of the whip to trample on the crucifix and proclaim that they worshipped the cursed Satan, that the old manuscripts from the libraries fed huge bonfires, around which drunken soldiers danced, that no sanctuary, no palace, no house, escaped being looted, that eight thousand citizens perished, mostly from among the poor, while the rich were held hostage until their ransom was paid?
Contemplating the thick columns of smoke rising up over the city in ever growing number from the wall of the castle, I could not erase the vision of Pope Leo from my memory, who had predicted this disaster at our first meeting: Rome has just been reborn, but death already stalks her! Death was there, in front of me, spreading through the body of the Eternal City.
Sometimes, a few militiamen, a few survivors from the Black Bands, tried to block access to a crossroads, but they were quickly submerged under the flood of attackers. In the Borgo quarter, and especially in the immediate neighbourhood of the Vatican palace, the Swiss guards resisted with commendable valour, sacrificing themselves in tens, in hundreds, for each street, each building, and delaying the advance of the imperial armies for several hours. But eventually they yielded through sheer force of numbers, and the lansquenets invaded St Peter’s Square, shouting: