1527.

Huh?

Actually, 1527 is one of the most interesting (if underated) years in history. Rome was viciously sacked by a resentful brigand army nominally loyal to Charles V. Nicolo Machiavelli died dispirited in the same year. 1527 is considered to mark the end of the Roman Renaissance.

And in what's little more than a footnote to history, the left arm of David was broken in what is often described as a riot.

I'll begin with a poem I stumbled across titled "Goliath's Revenge." Marcus Rediker (a history professor whose views are far-left) expresses wishful sympathy with whoever broke the arm:

Here is David
perfect symbolism
liberated from
the whitest marble
by the surest hand
power embodied
Renaissance
Florence
and most of all
ruthless rulers
House of Medici
patrons of the artist

But where is Goliath?
David gazes over
his left shoulder
serene of body
worried eyes searching
as imperfection approaches
not symbolic but real

A thick band of cement
reattaches the left forearm
a thinner crack
circles the left wrist
David dismembered
by a motley mob
counter-power embodied
a darker story
written on
the whitest body

Somehow, I doubt it.

The spontaneity of the "riots" certainly seems debatable. According to most sources, whoever was behind them took deliberate advantage of the invading army of Charles V when it was on its way to the sacking of Rome:

When Emperor Charles V sacked Rome in 1527, the Florentines took advantage of the turmoil in Italy to reinstall the Republic; both Alessandro and Ippolito fled, along with the rest of the Medici and their main supporters, including the Pope's regent, Cardinal Silvio Passerini, with the exception of the eight-year-old Caterina de' Medici, who was left behind. Michelangelo, then occupied in creating a funerary chapel for the Medici, initially took charge of building fortifications around Florence in support of the Republic; he later temporarily fled the city. Clement eventually made his peace with the Emperor, and with the support of Imperial troops, the Republic was overwhelmed after a lengthy siege, and the Medici were restored to power in the summer of 1530.

Whether measured in human or cultural terms, the destruction was appalling:

By the end of summer 1527, 45,000 Roman men, women, and children were gone, either fleeing as refugees or killed in the sack: no one has ever been able to determine the proportion of dead or missing. Rome's population hit rock bottom at about 10,000. Churches, shrines, monuments were looted and destroyed -- only the Sistine Chapel escaped because thatís where the Constable's body had been taken to lie in state. Contemporary witnesses were unanimous that the Catholic regular soldiers of Charles V as well as the Protestant mercenaries (and many local gang leaders -- i.e., the heads of the big families) had participated in the murder and looting.

The army of the Holy Roman Emperor defeated the French army on Italy, but funds were not available to pay the soldiers. The 34,000 Imperial troops mutinied, and forced their commander, Charles III, Duke of Bourbon and Constable of France, to lead them towards Rome. Apart from some 6,000 Spaniards under the Duke, the army included some 14,000 Landsknechts under Georg von Frundsberg, some Italian infantry led by Fabrizio Maramaldo, Sciarra Colonna and Luigi Gonzaga, and some cavalry under Ferdinando Gonzaga and Philibert, Prince of Chalons. Though Martin Luther himself was not in favor of it, some who considered themselves followers of Luther viewed the Papal capital as a target for religious reasons, and shared with the soldiers an avaricious desire for the sacking and pillage of a city that appeared to be an easy target. Numerous bandits, along with the League's deserters, joined with the army during the march.

The Duke left Arezzo on April 20, 1527, taking advantage of the chaos among the Venetians and their allies after a revolt which had broken out in Florence against the Medicis. In this way, the largely undisciplined troops sacked Acquapendente and San Lorenzo alle Grotte, and occupied Viterbo and Ronciglione, reaching the walls of Rome on May 5.

As to the artist himself, while he had carved David for the Medicis (who continued to sponsor him) he nonetheless aided in the defenses of Florence against the joint military invasion by the Medicis and the Vatican:

During all the confusion, the republican element in Florence reasserted itself and re-established the Florentine Republic.

Alessandro and Ippolito fled with their protector, the Cardinal of Florence, but they left behind their 8 year-old cousin Caterina who was studying in a convent in Florence.

The republican forces took possession of all the de' Medici property and they took Caterina de' Medici captive, keeping her locked up in the convent.

Florence was immediately hit by an epidemic that killed thousands of people. The Republic lasted only 3 years this time. Pope Clement VII signed a truce with Charles V and together they laid siege to Florence.

Michelangelo, who was in Florence during this time working on the de' Medici crypt and library, joined the republican forces and supervised defenses that helped keep out the advancing armies. His defensive earthworks meant that the city was not overrun, but put under siege, a siege that lasted nearly a year

And if it hadn't been for the Inquirer's review of Rediker's latest book, I'd have never read the man's poetry. It just so happened that a statement he made about slavery and capitalism drew me in:

I offer this study with the greatest reverence for those who suffered almost unthinkable violence, terror and death, in the firm belief we must remember that such horrors have always been, and remain, central to the making of global capitalism.

Just as corporate officers now get stock options, slave-ship officers received the extra compensation of a few "privilege" slaves they were permitted to buy, transport and sell for their own profit. Sometimes there were executive bonuses tied directly to performance, based on the number of slaves delivered. And finally, those who succeeded in the business could seamlessly make the transition to politics, the way tycoons still do: former slave-ship captains sat in both the British House of Commons and the United States Senate (James D'Wolf of Rhode Island). This complex tissue of normality makes one wonder what aspects of our own everyday business-as-usual people will, a century or two from now, be considered as horrendous as we think the slave trade was.

Regrettable that any deaths might have been, weren't such "horrors" actually made necessary because of the brutality and evil nature of the forces of global capitalism? Is it really logical to blame those who were trying to defeat capitalism for the inevitable deaths which occurred during their struggle? It would make about as much sense to blame the Allies for the deaths of the Nazis as to blame the Communists for the deaths of their enemies.

And how do we know that Goliath wasn't a brown-skinned resistance leader?