Machiavellianism (Civ6)/Civilopedia

By definition “Machiavellianism” is “the employment of cunning and duplicity in statecraft” (in psychology it is defined as one of the dark triad personalities, but that’s another thing). In his works The Art of War (1521 AD) and The Prince (1532), Machiavelli advocated that effective rulers routinely employ espionage, deception, and assassination to insure their interests … which were the interests of their state, of course. While a number of kings took his advice to heart, it was Queen Elizabeth’s “spymaster” (actually he was the Secretary of State) who developed the best Renaissance spy network, employing linguists, scholars, authors, engineers, soldiers, and diplomats to seek out and analyze secrets (both internal and external).