Machiavelli, Niccolò di Bernardo dei

Machiavelli, Niccolò di Bernardo dei (1469–1527), Florentine statesman and political philosopher, whose most famous work is Il principe (The Prince, 1513). Exiled from the service of the Medicis on suspicion of conspiracy, he gave some of his time and genius to writing comedies of which the best is La mandragola (The Mandrake), written between 1513 and 1520 and considered one of the masterpieces of the commedia erudita. Its sharp, precise prose contains pungent criticism of Florentine society: it portrays the gradual betrayal of its lovely heroine by her credulous husband, her ardent but unscrupulous lover, and her scheming mother, aided by the evil machinations of the corrupt priest Fra Timoteo. In a translation by Ashley Dukes this was successfully given in London in 1940, and in 1965, in a modernized Italian version, it was revived by Peppino De Filippo, who played Fra Timoteo. Machiavelli's Clizia (1525), derived from the Casina of Plautus, was more strictly neo-classical in form. Its theme of amorous dotage may have been an ironic self-criticism of the author's own feelings for the actress Barbara Salutati.