Isabella d'Este

One of the daughters of Ercole d'Este, the master of Ferrara, (her sister being the equally famous Beatrice d'Este, Lodovico Sforza's duchess of Milan) Isabella d'Este was very well educated in her youth, as her voluminous correspondence from Mantua reveals. The Este sisters were exposed to many of the new Renaissance ideas: later Isabella became a passionate, even greedy collector of Roman sculpture and commissioned modern sculptures in the antique style. At the age of 16 she was married to Francesco Gonzaga, Marquis of Mantua. They were Ariosto's patrons while he was writing Orlando Furioso and both she and her husband were greatly influenced by Baldassare Castiglione, author of Il Cortigiano ('The Courtier') a model for aristocratic decorum for two hundred years, and it was at his suggestion that Giulio Romano was summoned to Mantua to enlarge the Castello and other buildings. Under her auspices the court of Mantua became one of the most cultured in Europe. Among the other important artists, writers and thinkers being drawn to it were Raphael and Andrea Mantegna. She was painted twice by Titian, (see illustration at right), and Leonardo da Vinci's portrait drawing of her is at the Louvre. She was a keen musician herself, who considered stringed instruments superior to winds, which were associated with vice and strife.

After the death of her husband, Isabella ruled Mantua as regent for her child. She began to play an important role in Italian politics, steadily advancing Mantua's position. Her many important accomplishments include advancing Mantua to a Duchy and also obtaining a cardinalate for her younger son. She also showed great diplomatic and political skill in her negotiations with Cesare Borgia, who had dispossessed Guidobaldo da Montefeltre, duke of Urbino, the husband of her sister-in-law and intimate friend Elisabetta Gonzaga (1502).

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