When Cosimo il Vecchio was a young man, he was given a slave girl. Despite his marriage he continued to live with her, away from his family. Their bastard son, Carlo, sought his fortune in Spain and ...

In late May 2004, thanks in part to the vigilance of several outside readers who phoned in, we discovered that some person or persons had tampered with this feature's tally. Specifically, on May 16-17 ...