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The Deadly Sisterhood by Leonie Frieda Weidenfeld, £25, pp. 432, ISBN 9780297852087 Tigress of Forli by Elizabeth Lev Head of Zeus, £25, pp. 336, ISBN 9781908800176 In 1471 Galeazzo Maria Sforza, Duke of Milan, led a brash entourage of wineswilling, jewel-bedecked courtiers into Florence. It was Lent. This was not the most auspicious way to begin a diplomatic mission to settle the dispute over Imola, the tiny Romagna fiefdom that Galeazzo had offered to sell to Lorenzo de'Medici. Even Lorenzo, epitome of the parvenu, was stunned by the fanfare. But for all the wrangling, within two years the territory would fall into Papal hands with the dowry of Caterina Sforza.
The Deadly Sisterhood is a wide-ranging historical narrative about the women and power struggles that...