The Honour of Savelli

A soldier of fortune in the Italy of the Borgias hires his sword to the wrong side, loses his lands and his name, and gets both back by a route he would rather not describe. S. Levett Yeats wrote historical romances at the height of the fashion and knew the period's politics well. The duel in the marsh and the sack of the town are the two set pieces. Fifty-seven plates, from Caravaggio's lute player and fortune teller to Canaletto's streets, carry the knife, the road and the reckoning through the book's Italian world.