The Viper Of Milan

Gian Galeazzo Visconti, Count of Virtue, the most remarkable member of a remarkable family. Establishing the Ducato di Milano and swallowing up much of Northern Italy, his goal was a Kingdom of Italy and he was off to a good start. But in 1402, after taking Bologna, the Viper was besieging Florence when he caught the plague. Within a month he was dead, fifty-one years young.

WI: Gian Galeazzo does not die, but lives another twenty or so years?
WI: His brood, despicable in reality, mature beside their father and gain his talents?

Florence would fall. Genoa comes under the biscione in 1409. How would the Visconti deal with a fragile Rome during the Western Schism? How about Venice? Naples? And what about exploration... with that much coin and curiosity, could a unified Italy embrace her Genoese explorers and colonize... India, Americas?

Your opinions would be most appreciated.
 
Signore no more! Had Gian Galeazzo lived and become king *, wouldn't primogeniture be the order of succession?

* Apparently he had ordered a crown (would a Visconti be happy with anything but the Iron Crown of Lombardy?) and royal robes to be used for his coronation as King of all Italy as soon as Florence had fallen.
 
Well, I've had the Visconti family become kings of Italy in my 'Vivaldi Journeys' TL, but I think this bunch needs saving from its own genes at some point. Gian Galeazzo no doubt was a military and political genius. Do youi really think it could last, though? With France next door, Venice in automatic opposition of whoever controls Genoa and the papacy very concerned, it sounds like a multi.front war waiting to happen.
 
Well, I've had the Visconti family become kings of Italy in my 'Vivaldi Journeys' TL, but I think this bunch needs saving from its own genes at some point. Gian Galeazzo no doubt was a military and political genius. Do youi really think it could last, though? With France next door, Venice in automatic opposition of whoever controls Genoa and the papacy very concerned, it sounds like a multi.front war waiting to happen.

I dunno. France is going to be busy for the next forty years or so with the English in Paris, after all.
 
I'm guessing...

Rome would be preoccupied with Avignon - one could play pope against anti-pope.

France would be preoccupied with the English. Although, Gian Galeazzo had ties with the French royal family as his first marriage was to Isabelle de Valois, sister of Charles V, and their daughter Valentina married Louis I de Valois, brother of Charles VI. What if Gian Galeazzo's marriage to Isabella lasts - the male children he has with her survive (Azzone, Gian, and Carlo) and she doesn't die birthing the last? That would strengthen ties with France and remove the monsters he spawned from his second marriage. Would, during the Royal feud with Burgundy, the Visconti's support of their relations strengthen ties even more?

Oh, a different deviation could be that since Gian Galeazzo reacted to gossip about his daughter Valentina at the French court by threatening to declare war on France... what if he did? They were at war and in economic crisis. Milan supported Rome in the Western Schism, so would the Visconti find a friend in the Pope for an invasion of Provence/Naples? Is an alliance with England possible?

*shrugs*

As for Venice, trouble indeed. Any ideas?


...Vivaldi Journeys...
I'm there! Looks great.
 
Top