Lucrezia Tornabuoni

## Early life

Lucrezia Tornabouni-Medici was born to a wealthy and noble Florentine banker family in 1427. She married Piero de' Medici and had three children with him. Lucrezia was known to have a keen sense of intellect in banking affairs of the family and served as an advisory to her son Lorenzo the Magnificent after he availed the position of the head of the bank and family.

## Season 2

### Old scores

Lucrezia is shown as the head matriarch of the Medici family, where she manages all the homely affairs of the household. However, after an assassination attempt on her husband, she grows more protective of her sons. After Lorenzo confesses to killing an assassin in self-defense, she counsels him with great concern and later supports him in his decision to take his father's place in the Piori.

### Standing Alone

To seek an extension for their bank's sustenance, she and her son Lorenzo visit Rome, but after an unsuccessful attempt to persuade the papacy, Lucrezia arranges a marriage union of her son with a Roman noblewoman, Clarice Orsini, by asking her half brother-in-law Carlo di Cosimo de' Medici to persuade the lady.

### Obstacles and opportunities

Lucrezia arranges for a wedding feast for Lorenzo after the arrival of his wife Clarice to Florence. During the feast her daughter Bianca runs away with Guglielmo after which Lorenzo officially betroths the lovers to gain a vote from his rival Francesco de' Pazzi in the Priori.

### Blood with blood

At the wedding of Bianca and Guglielmo, Lucrezia invites the Venetian Doge's ambassador, Andrea Foscari, alongside his daughter Novella Foscari, to arrange a marriage union for her son Giuliano, who later rejects the proposal because of his interest in Simonetta Vespucci.

Meanwhile, Lucrezia also counsels an insecure Clarice upon her learning of Lorenzo's mistress.

### Ties that bind

After the birth of her first grandson, Piero di Lorenzo de' Medici, Lucrezia arranges for the birthing measures for her daughter Bianca, who later gives birth to a daughter named Contessina de' Pazzi.

### Alliance

Given his strained relationship with Pope Sixtus IV, Lorenzo and Lucrezia decide to form an alliance with Milan and Venice, which proves successful, leaving Pazzi enraged.

### Betrayal

While witnessing her son Giuliano grieving over his lover's death, a concerned Lucrezia counsels her son and doesn't let him attend the banquet arranged by Lorenzo in honor of Cardinal Raffaele, who had come from Rome on Pope Sixtus's behalf to negotiate peace terms. Due to Giuliano's absence, the plan to murder him and his elder brother Lorenzo got delayed to the Easter Mass.

### Mass

While the Medici family was attending the Easter Mass prayers, Giuliano and Lorenzo were attacked by Francesco de' Pazzi and other conspirators, who, after leaving an injured Lorenzo, turned to Giuliano and butchered him. After witnessing her son's assault, Lucrezia loses her senses and deliriously rushes to save him, but she is taken into the sacristy of the cathedral by her daughter-in-law Clarice along with an injured Lorenzo. After the conspirators leave, believing Lorenzo to be dead, Lucrezia attends to her dying son and thus is left with a huge amount of sorrow. Afterwards, when Lorenzo orders Guglielmo de' Pazzi be banished from Florence, Bianca abandons her family and leaves along with him thus leaving her mother in further despair.