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The Prince

Niccolò Machiavelli

Copyright ©2010–2015 All rights reserved. Jonathan Bennett

[Brackets] enclose editorial explanations. Small ·dots· enclose material that has been added, but can be read as though it were part of the original text. Occasional •bullets, and also indenting of passages that are not quotations,

are meant as aids to grasping the structure of a sentence or a thought. Every four-point ellipsis . . . . indicates the omission of a brief passage that seems to present more difficulty than it is worth. Longer omissions are reported between brackets in normal-sized type.—The division into twenty-six chapters is Machiavelli’s; the division into two Parts is not.—Previous translations that have been continuously consulted are: —translated and edited by Robert Martin Adams (Norton Critical Edition, 1977). Don’t confuse this Adams (b. 1915) with the now better-known Robert Merrihew Adams (b. 1937). [borrowed from on pages 35 and 45] —translated by Russell Price and edited by Quentin Skinner (Cambridge U. P., 1988) [borrowed from on page 40] —edited and translated by Peter Constantine (Modern Library, 2007), —translated by Tim Parks (Penguin Classics, 2009). [borrowed from on page 53] Of these, the most swingingly readable version is Parks’s, though it embellishes the original more than any other version, including the present one. Each of the other three has helpful explanatory notes. Parks has a ’glossary of proper names’. The present version received many small helps from these predecessors in addition to the four acknowledged above. First launched: August 2010

The Prince

Niccolò Machiavelli

Contents

Dedication: To his Magnificence Lorenzo Di Piero De’ Medici 1 2 2 2 3 8 10 11 13 17 20 22 24 26 26 29 31

Part I: Kinds of principality; how to get and retain them

Chapter 1: Different kinds of principalities, and how to acquire them Chapter 2: Hereditary principalities Chapter 3: Mixed principalities Chapter 4: Why Darius’s kingdom,...