page 43 note * The address of the letter was written partly on the slip of paper with which the letter was fastened. This slip, owing to the manner in which the letter is mounted, cannot be replaced in situ, consequently some doubt may exist as to the word.

page 42 note † Roscoe, Leo X. ii. 202, segq. od. Bohn.

page 43 note * xvii. 198.

page 43 note † Ibid. vi. 236.

page 44 note * Louis XI. father of Charles VIII.

page 44 note † In 1490, after a revolution against the Sforzas, followed by a counter revolution against the popularly elected doge, the Genoese called in the French as their ancient suzerains. The French Government, absorbed in the war of Britany, acquiesced in an arrangement by which the title of Doge of Genoa was restored to John Galeazzo, the reigning Duke of Milan, while the real authority was entrusted to Ludovico Sforza, his uncle, the writer of this letter.

page 44 note ‡ A castle of the Sforza family, now Vigevano, whence the present letter is dated.

page 44 note § Henry VII.'s expedition against Boulogne, ending in a sudden peace in November 1492.

page 44 note δ This was Maximilian I., elected King of the Romans 1486, succeeded his father Frederic III. in 1493. The Franche Comté was a portion of the dowry of Margaret of Austria, daughter of Maximilian, betrothed in her infancy to Charles VIII., whose repudiation of her in 1492 and consequent marriage with Anne of Bretagne, who had already gone through the ceremony of a proxy marriage with Maximilian himself, caused the latter to declare war. Against Charles; who, however, returned the Franche Comté, Artois, and other lands of Margaret's dowry, and concluded peace with the King of the Romans in 1493. In the same year the Emperor Frederic III. died, and Ludovico Sforza induced Maximilian to marry his niece Blanche, with a dowry of 400,000 ducats, obtaining in exchange a secret instrument granting him the investiture of the duchy of Milan, which the Sforzas had never hitherto been able to obtain.

page 45 note * Either his sister-in-law, mother of John Galeazzo, a princess of Savoy, or his great niece, daughter of the late duke, afterwards married to Sigismund King of Poland: probably the former.

page 46 note * He died at Pavia Oct. 21,1494, of slow poison, administered (as was believed) by his uncle, the writer of this letter.

page 47 note * See for further particulars De Commines, book viii. chapa. 18, 19, &c. and Martin, Histoire de France, vol. vii.

page 48 note * See Litta. Cel. Fam. Ital.

page 48 note † In large capitals, printed from a stamp.

page 49 note * Benefices were reserved to the disposition of the Pope which became void “apud Apostolicam Sedem,” id est, whose possessors, who were living in the Curia, on journeying towards or departing from it, died either in the place where the Court was held, or within two days journey therefrom.

page 49 note † With a monogram resembling a P struck through.

page 49 note ‡ With the same monogram.

page 51 note * Inserted by the kind permission of the Council of the Archaeological Institute.

page 52 note * Probably the same name as Bokirvill, which occurs among the witnesses to Robert de Dayvile's Charter. Proceedings, 2 S. iii. 148.

page 42 note † Vitalis de Folkeshull, Robert de Stokes, and Walter de Daiville himself, held lands under Roger de Monhalt and Cicely his wife, in 34 II. III. Dugd. Warw. i. 138.

page 53 note * Proceedings, uhi supra.

page 53 note † See also Dugd. Warw. 570; and Visit, Bucks, MSS. Harl. 1533, fol. 57 b., 58.

page 54 note * Dugdale's Warwickshire, i. 209.

page 54 note † See Herald and Genealogist, iii. 334.

page 55 note * Monasticon, iii. 183, and see Dugdale's Warwickshire, i. 13G.