Conspirators Attack the Medici at Mass in Florence Cathedral

On Sunday morning, 26 April 1478, members of the Pazzi family and their allies launched a coordinated assault against Lorenzo and Giuliano de' Medici during High Mass at the Duomo of Florence. Bernardo Bandini dei Baroncelli and Francesco de' Pazzi attacked Giuliano, who was slain inside the church. Lorenzo was simultaneously attacked by two priests, who had taken the place of a hired soldier who refused to kill in a church. Lorenzo survived with a wound, managed to retreat to the sanctuary of the sacristy, and subsequently fled to his residence. Rather than sparking a popular revolt, the bloodshed triggered immediate fury against the attackers.

The conspiracy had grown out of prolonged political and financial tensions pitting the Medici family against Pope Sixtus IV and their banking rivals. Following his papal election in 1471, Sixtus distributed wealth and territorial titles to his relatives. When Sixtus sought to purchase the strategic Romagna town of Imola for Girolamo Riario, Lorenzo declined to extend financing through the Medici bank. Sixtus promptly withdrew the papal account and transferred substantial portions of the transaction to the rival Pazzi bank. Ecclesiastical appointments widened the division, particularly when Sixtus named Francesco Salviati archbishop of Pisa without Florentine approval, while Lorenzo successfully installed his brother-in-law as archbishop of Florence.