Cosimo de' Medici in the context of "Medici"

Luca Pitti (1398–1472) was a Florentine banker during the period of the republic presided over by Cosimo de' Medici. He was awarded a knighthood, and received lavish presents from both the Signoria of Florence and the Medici family as a reward for helping maintain the government during the last years of Cosimo's rule when Cosimo was too old and feeble to maintain power alone.

As the head magistrate of Florence, known as "The Gonfalonier of Justice," he wielded great power and influence. In August, 1458, he staged a coup to seize control of Florentine government in the name of its existing ruler, the elderly and now frail Cosimo de' Medici. In effect he wished to strengthen the existing government, as a result many leading citizens were banished, and many other citizens were driven from power. The newly formed government was to last eight years with Cosimo as its figurehead, the reality being he was too frail to maintain power alone. Pitti's chief opponent at this time was Girolamo Machiavelli who was banished. However, he travelled the neighbouring principalities whipping up opposition to the new Florentine government. He was consequently declared a rebel, betrayed and returned to Florence where he mysteriously died in prison.

Galeazzo Maria Sforza (24 January 1444 – 26 December 1476) was the fifth Duke of Milan from 1466 until 1476. He was born to Francesco Sforza, a popular condottiero and ally of Cosimo de' Medici who would gain the Duchy of Milan in 1450, and Bianca Maria Visconti, Duchess of Milan on her own right. Sforza was betrothed into the Gonzaga family; after the engagement with Dorotea Gonzaga was called off, he married Bona of Savoy.

The Palazzo Medici, also called the Palazzo Medici Riccardi after the later family that acquired and expanded it, is a 15th-century Renaissance palace in Florence, Italy. It was built for the Medici family, who dominated the politics of the Republic of Florence. It is now the seat of the administration of the Metropolitan City of Florence and a museum.

The palace was designed by Michelozzo di Bartolomeo for Cosimo de' Medici, head of the Medici banking family, and was built between 1444 and 1484. It was well known for its stone masonry, which includes architectural elements of rustication and ashlar. The tripartite elevation used here expresses the Renaissance spirit of rationality, order, and classicism on human scale. This tripartite division is emphasized by horizontal stringcourses that divide the building into stories of decreasing height. The transition from the rusticated masonry of the ground floor to the more delicately refined stonework of the third floor makes the building seem lighter and taller as the eye moves upward to the massive cornice that caps and clearly defines the building's outline.

David is a bronze statue of the biblical hero by the Italian Early Renaissance sculptor Donatello, probably made in the 1440s, and now in the Bargello, Florence. Nude except for helmet and boots, it is famous as the first unsupported standing work of bronze cast during the Renaissance, and the first freestanding nude male sculpture made since antiquity. It depicts David with an enigmatic smile, posed with his foot on Goliath's severed head just after defeating the giant. The youth is completely naked, apart from a laurel-topped hat and boots, and holds Goliath's sword.

The creation of the work is undocumented. Most scholars assume the statue was commissioned by Cosimo de' Medici, but the date of its creation is unknown and widely disputed; suggested dates vary from the 1420s to the 1460s (Donatello died in 1466), with the majority opinion recently falling in the 1440s, when the new Medici Palace (now called the Palazzo Medici Riccardi) designed by Michelozzo was under construction.