ieve
the object of his heart's desire, where stronger men had failed, in the
foundation of a solid duchy for his heirs.

Paul's jealousy of the Spanish ascendancy in Italian affairs caused him
to waver between the Papal and Imperial, Guelf and Ghibelline, parties.
These names had lost much of their significance; but the habit of
distinction into two camps was so rooted in Italian manners, that each
city counted its antagonistic factions, maintained by various forms of
local organization and headed by the leading families.[15] Burigozzo,
under the year 1517, tells how the whole population of Milan was divided
between Guelfs and Ghibellines, wearing different costumes; and it is
not uncommon to read of petty nobles in the country at this period, who
were styled Captains of one or the other party.

[Footnote 15: See Bruno's _Cena delle Ceneri_, ed. Wagner, vol. i. p.
133, for a humorous story illustrative of the state of things ensuing
among the lower Italian classes.]

The wars between France and Spain revived the almost obsolete dispute,
which the despots of the fifteenth century and the diplomatic
confederation of the five great powers had tended in large measure to
erase. The Guelfs and Ghibellines were now partisans of France and
Spain respectively. Thus a true political importance was regained for
the time-honored factions; and in the distracted state of Italy they
were further intensified by the antagonism between exiles and the ruling
families in cities. If Cosimo de'Medici, for example, was a Ghibelline
or Spanish partisan, it followed as a matter of course that Filippo
Strozzi was a Guelf and stood for France. Paul III. managed to maintain
himself by manipulating these factions and holding the balance between
them for the advantage of his family and of the Church.

He thus succeeded in creating the Duchy of Parma and Piacenza for his
son, Pier Luigi Farnese, that outrageous representative of the worst
vices and worst violences of the Renaissance. It will be remembered that
Julius had detached these two cities from the Duchy of Milan, and
annexed them to the Papal States, on the plea that they formed part of
the old Exarchate of Ravenna. When Charles decided against this plea in
the matter of Modena and Reggio, he left the Church in occupation of
Parma and Piacenza. Paul created his son Duke of Nepi and Castro in
1537, and afterwards conferred the Duchy of Camerino on his grandson,
Ottavio, who was then marrie