ITALIAN GARDENS OF THE RENAISSANCE 
Recent researches enable us to add a few more 
details to the short sad tale. Bianca Giovanna Sforza 
was born at Milan in 1482, shortly after Lodovico’s 
return from exile and appointment as Regent, during 
his nephew Gian Galeazzo’s minority. Her mother, 
Bernardina de’ Corradis, was one of the many mistresses 
for whom the Moro seems to have had a passing 
fancy. After giving birth to Bianca, she married a 
Milanese gentleman and bore him several children. 1 
But Lodovico, after his custom, treated his discarded 
mistress kindly, giving her a liberal allowance and 
letting her have frequent access to Bianca, who was 
brought up, under his own eye, in the Castello. “ In 
this country,” remarks Commines, “no difference is 
made between legitimate and illegitimate children.” 
The French chronicler’s saying was literally true of the 
Este and Sforza princes. The good Duchess Leonora 
brought up her husband’s illegitimate daughter, 
Lucrezia, with her own children, and both Isabella 
D’Este and Elizabetta Gonzaga treated the Marquis 
Francesco’s natural daughter, Margherita, with the 
utmost affection. Lodovico Sforza had already two 
illegitimate sons, Galeazzo, who died in his childhood, 
and Leone, the son of a Roman girl, who was born in 
1476. But little Bianca had the distinction of being 
his only daughter, and, from the first, was the object 
1 A. Giulini in Archivio St. Lomb., xxxix. 243. 
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