In 1512, the Medicis came to power in Florence, Italy, and they expelled or murdered everyone they considered an enemy. Among their supposed enemies was a well-read and well-traveled Florentine official named Niccolo Machiavelli, who was arrested and tortured for the crime of conspiring against the Medicis. The evidence against him was weak, and he was eventually released, but he did not return to his job in government. Instead, he retired to his home in the country and turned his attention to writing. He had learned a lot while serving his country, and with lots of time to fill, he decided to write it all down. He wrote histories, plays, biographies, and a fable. But the work he is most famous for is a short book of instructions that took him six months to write and nineteen years to publish, called The Prince. Machiavelli had observed or studied many...