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After Rovigo (1481) and Ferrara (1484), this was the third city which, in 1489, Niccolò Ariosto moved to with his family. Niccolò in effect obtained the captaincy of Modena for three consecutive years, from 1st March 1489 to 28th February 1492. During the captaincy, between the autumn of 1491 and February of 1492, Ludovico’s younger brother Alessandro Ariosto was born, who was the dedicatory of the Satire I together with Ludovico da Bagno. The poet, only 15, stayed in Modena with his family only a short time, where his father had him taught the first rudiments of language by a well known grammar teacher. Very soon Ludovico returned to Ferrara where he was probably handed over to the care of his uncle and aunt and where, as of the end of October 1489, he was enrolled for a quinquennium at the University of Ferrara, where he received his iurisperitus. There are records that Ludovico passed through Modena in October 1503, shortly after he had entered the service of Cardinal Ippolito d’Este. The poet returned to Modena in August 1510, always as part of Cardinal Ippolito’s retinue, when he was given a new diplomatic assignment after the failure of the mission to Julius II the previous May, when the Pope did not endorse Ippolito’s claims over the abbey at Nonantola and did not allow the House of Este to the exploit the saltpans at Comacchio. Ludovico was again in Modena with other courtesans in November 1529, together with Duke Alfonso I d’Este, there to receive Emperor Charles V and escort him to the frontiers of the Pontifical state, as far as Sant’Ambrosio pass, men from Ferrara not being allowed to go further. During the papacy of Leo X, rivalry for the control of Modena, which had been occupied by the Pope despite the fact that it was not a Pontifical fief, worsened. Contention over Modena was behind the Pontifical ill-will towards Ludovico the courtesan of the House of Este in the period 1520-1521.
Madonna with child, and the Saints Francis and Quirinus, Modena, Galleria Estense
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Modena
