Vincenzo I Gonzaga

Vincenzo Ι Gonzaga (21 September 1562 – 9 February 1612) was the ruler of the Duchy of Mantua and the Duchy of Montferrat from 1587 to 1612.

Biography

Born 21 September 1562, Vincenzo was the only son of Guglielmo Gonzaga, Duke of Mantua, and Archduchess Eleanor of Austria. His maternal grandparents were Ferdinand I, Holy Roman Emperor, and Anna of Bohemia and Hungary.

In 1582, Vincenzo murdered in cold blood the brilliant young Scottish polymath James Crichton, an employee of his father's court, of whom Vincenzo had become crazed with jealousy.

Vincenzo was a major patron of the arts and sciences, and turned Mantua into a vibrant cultural centre. On 22 September 1587, Vincent was crowned the fourth Duke of Mantua, with a glitzy ceremony in which were present the highest authority of the duchy to pay homage to the new Duke of Mantua: he then moved with a ride through the city streets. Vincenzo employed the composer Claudio Monteverdi and the painter Peter Paul Rubens. In 1590 Monteverdi became a viol-player and cantor in the music chapel of Vincenzo; in 1602 Vincenzo appointed him master of music on the death of Benedetto Pallavicino. Vincenzo was also a friend of the poet Torquato Tasso. A small book published in Verona in 1589 describes how a comic actor named Valerini in the service of Vincenzo imagines an ideal gallery of art, in which statues of the most important art collectors are featured rather than the work of the artists themselves.