International Acclaim for Dorothy Dunnett’s
GEMINI AND THE HOUSE OF NICCOLÒ
“Dunnett has brought her House of Niccolò series to a triumphant end [and] has saved some of the best surprises in the series for last…. She deserves a spot on any serious reader’s short list of masters of historical fiction.”
—The Seattle Times/Post-Intelligencer
“No one who has read the first seven volumes will want to skip this one.”
—Newsday
“As a writer of historical romances, Dorothy Dunnett … epitomizes [the genre]…. She salts it with wit and intelligence and serves it with style and elegance.”
—San Francisco Chronicle
“Dunnett is a storyteller who could teach Scheherazade a thing or two about pace, suspense and imaginative invention.”
—The New York Times
“The House of Niccolò books amount to an extraordinary achievement…. Even academics, so often contemptuous of historical novels, have come to respect her comprehensive research and her exactness with documented history…. I wish this were not the end.”
—Sunday Telegraph
“Powerful, almost operatic…. The conclusion of a great work…. The publication of Gemini completes an ambitious literary circle.”
—The Times Literary Supplement
“Mistress of several languages, both ancient and modern, and of many literatures and philosophies, Dunnett produces writing that is informed, formal and flawless…. Opulent descriptions, witty repartee, gripping duels and battle scenes, ebullient practical jokes, and smoldering sexuality crowd the chapters with a life so full of color and intensity that it leaps off the pages.”
—The Times-Picayune (New Orleans)
“Dorothy Dunnett, historical novelist extraordinaire. Witty, urbane, observant…. The best writer in the genre since Sir Walter Scott.”
—Sunday Times (London)
“A stunning finale…. There are plots and counterplots, terrific fights, hairbreadth escapes and rescues and daring cliffhangers. The suspense and excitement amount to a breathless pitch of tension…. With their obliquity of references, allusions, veiled hints and sudden revelations, her books are sophisticated, closely woven gems. Elegant, scholarly, witty and fully crafted social novels, they are enhanced by Dunnett’s acute observation, basic common sense and deep knowledge of human nature.”
—Journal Extra
“Enthralling…. Fans will be reluctant to let go.”
—Booklist
“A series that will give us our fill of high Renaissance adventure and espionage…. She strings every vivid incident on a rapturously solid sense of period.”
—The Guardian
“Dunnett’s gift lies in her ability to take history’s bare bones and invest them with life. She does this by creating … characters whose humor and pathos reach across centuries…. Like a literary Pieter Breughel, she reproduces history in all its grime and glory…. Her work exemplifies the best the genre can offer.”
—The Christian Science Monitor
“Dunnett writes the most exciting historical novels around…. [She is] one of the greatest tale-spinners since Dumas.”
—The Plain Dealer
“Complex and ambitious…. Throughout the series, Dunnett has maintained her consistency of vision, presenting the Renaissance in a multilayered collage, depicting in detail a world that in many ways set the stage for the onset of modernity in Europe. Readers are accustomed to seeing this degree of world-building in science fiction and fantasy. It is refreshing to find it in a work so grounded in actual events…. Always immaculate in her research, brilliant in character descriptions, hers is a style second to none.”
—The Washington Post Book World
For Alastair
Table of Contents
Title Page
Dedication
Characters
Introduction
Acknowledgements
Part I
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Part II
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Part III
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Part IV
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Part V
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Epílogue
Reader’s Guide
About the Author
Other Books by This Author
The House of Niccolò Series by Dorothy Dunnett
Copyright
Characters
from February 1477
(Those marked * are recorded in history)
Rulers
*England: King Edward IV, House of York
*Scotland: King James III, House of Stewart
*France: King Louis XI, House of Valois
*Burgundy, Brabant and Flanders: Duchess Marie
*Pope: Sixtus IV (della Rovere)
*Florence: Lorenzo II de’ Medici (Il Magnifico)
*Venice: Doges Andrea Vendramin, Giovanni Mocenigo
*German Emperor and King of the Romans: Frederick III
*Scandinavia: Christian I of Oldenburg; John (Hans)
*Ottoman Empire: Sultan Mehmet II; Bayezid II
*Persia: Uzum Hasan
*Muscovy: Grand Duke Ivan III
House of Niccolò
PRESENT AND FORMER COMPANY MEMBERS:
Nicholas de Fleury of Bruges, merchant-founder of the now devolved European Banco di Niccolò
Egidia (Gelis) van Borselen, his wife
Jordan (Jodi) de Fleury, his son
Manoli, Jordan’s bodyguard
Captain Cuthbert, Jordan’s master-at-arms
Lowrie, steward and chamber-servant to Nicholas
Mailie and Ella, house-servants
Michael Crackbene, shipmaster
Ada, his wife
Tobias Beventini of Grado, physician
Clémence de Coulanges, his wife
John le Grant, engineer, gunner, sailing-master
IN GERMANY:
Julius of Bologna, lawyer and director
Bonne von Hanseyck, regarded as step-daughter to Julius through his late wife, Adelina de Fleury
Sister Monika, her companion
Father Moriz of Augsburg, chaplain and metallurgist
Govaerts of Brussels, manager
IN VENICE:
Gregorio of Asti, lawyer and director
Margot, his wife
Jaçon, their son
IN LOW COUNTRIES:
Diniz Vasquez, director, nephew of Simon de St Pol,
q.v.
Mathilde (Tilde) de Charetty, his wife, step-daughter of Nicholas
Catherine de Charetty, younger sister of Tilde, also step-daughter of Nicholas
Marian and Lucia, daughters of Diniz and Tilde
Duchy of Burgundy:
*Dowager Duchess Margaret of York, widow of Duke Charles of Burgundy, sister of King Edward IV of England
*Marie, Duchess of Burgundy and Brabant, Countess of Flanders, Holland, Zeeland etc., daughter of Duke Charles by a previous wife
*Bastard Anthony of Burgundy, natural brother of Duke Charles
*Philip of Burgundy, his son
*William Hugonet, lord of Saillant, Époisses et Lys, Viscount of Ypres, Chancellor of the Duchy, brother of Cardinal Philibert Hugonet in Rome, q.v.
*Hugo vander Goes, Ghent artist
BRUGES, GHENT AND LILLE:
*Anselm (Seaulme) Adorne, Baron Cortachy, ducal adviser, magistrate and burgomaster of Bruges, Conservator of Scots Privileges. Offspring include:
*Jan Adorne, oldest son, educ. Paris and Pavia; lawyer with Curia; canon of St Peter’s, Lille
*Antoon, another son, also canon in Lille
*Maarten, in Carthusian monastery of St Kruis
*Margareta, in Carthusian convent of St Andries
*Lewisje, in St Trudo Convent, Steenbrugge
*Pieter, sheriff and doctor in law in Ghent; married, with daughters
*Anselm, unmarried
*Euphemia, unmarried
*Elizabeth and *Marie, married, without sons
*Arnaud, Adorne’s second youngest son
*Agnes von Nieuenhove, his wife
*Agnes and *Aerendtken, their children
*Katelijne (Kathi) Sersanders, Adorne’s niece
*Robin of Berecrofts, of Scottish merchant family, her husband
Rankin and Margaret, her children by Robin
Mistress Cristen, her nurse
*Anselm (Saunders) Sersanders, her brother, Adorne’s nephew
*John Sersanders of Ghent, their kinsman
*Guy de Brimeu, sire de Humbercourt, military leader and adviser to the late Duke on finance
*Paul van Overtweldt of Bruges, Deputy to the Estates-General
*Jean de Baenst, seigneur de St George, former Treasurer of Bruges
*Nicholas Barbesaen, former burgomaster and Treasurer of Bruges
*Martin Purves, former Berwick trader in Lille
*Dr Andreas of Vesalia, physician and astrologer
*Andro Wodman, merchant; former Scots Archer in France; successor to Adorne as Conservator of Scots Privileges in Bruges
*Louis de Bruges, seigneur de Gruuthuse, Earl of Winchester, Governor of Holland
*Marguerite van Borselen, his wife, ‘cousin’ of Gelis van Borselen, aunt by marriage of King James III of Scotland and his brothers and sisters
*Jean de Gruuthuse, Seneschal of Anjou, their son
*Jean Breydel of Bruges, Councillor and Deputy to the Estates-General
VEERE AND MIDDLEBURG:
*Wolfaert van Borselen of Veere, Count of Grandpré, ‘cousin’ of Gelis van Borselen; once married to the late *Princess Mary, aunt of King James
*Charlotte de Bourbon, his second wife
*Anna van Borselen, his oldest child by Charlotte, contracted to marry Philip of Burgundy, q.v.
*Paul van Borselen, his bastard son
DIJON:
The Widow of Damparis, niece by marriage to Enguerrand and Yvonnet de Damparis, by Dole, friends of the late Marian de Charetty
Scotland:
ROYAL HOUSEHOLD AND OFFICERS OF STATE:
*James Stewart (Third of the Name), King of Scotland
*Margaret, daughter of Christian I of Denmark, his Queen
*James Stewart, Duke of Rothesay, their oldest child
*James and *John Stewart, younger sons
*Mary Stewart, King James’s elder sister
*James, 1st Lord Hamilton of Cadzow, her second husband
*Robert, Lord Boyd, father of her first husband
*James (Jamie) and *Margaret Boyd, slighted children of her first marriage
*James, Earl of Arran, and *Elizabeth Hamilton, children of her second marriage
*John Hamilton, Lord Hamilton’s eldest illegitimate son
*Elizabeth Hamilton, Lord Hamilton’s daughter by his first wife, married to *David, Earl of Crawford, q.v.
*Alexander Stewart (Sandy), Duke of Albany, Earl of March, lord of Annandale and Man, Admiral of Scotland, King James’s brother
*Alexander Stewart, Albany’s illegitimate son
*Andrew Stewart, one of Albany’s two legitimate sons by his first wife, *Catherine Sinclair, q.v.
*Margaret (Meg) Stewart, King James’s younger sister
*James Stewart of Auchterhouse (Hearty James), Earl of Buchan, half-uncle of King James; Chamberlain of Scotland
*John Stewart of Balvenie, 1st Earl of Atholl, Blair Castle, half-uncle of King James, married to *Eleanore Sinclair, q.v.
*Andrew Stewart, Bishop-elect of Moray, half-uncle of King James
*Joanna Stewart, deaf and dumb aunt of King James, married to *Sir James Douglas of Dalkeith, Earl of Morton, q.v.
*Annabella Stewart, aunt of King James, married to *George, 2nd Earl of Huntly, q.v.
*Andrew (Drew) Stewart, 1st Lord Avandale, Chancellor of Scotland; former Warden of the Western Marches; life-rent of earldom of Lennox
*Archibald Whitelaw, Archdeacon of Lothian; Royal Secretary; former tutor of King James; graduate of Cologne
*Colin Campbell (MacChalein Mor), 2nd Lord Campbell and 1st Earl of Argyll; King’s Justiciar and Master of the Royal Household
*William (Will) Scheves, Archbishop of St Andrews after *Patrick Graham, q.v.; former Dean of Dunkeld; medical graduate of Louvain
*Archibald (Archie) Crawford of Haining, Abbot of Holyrood; Treasurer to King James
*Alexander (Alex) Inglis, Lord Clerk Register, Edinburgh and Berwick-upon-Tweed
*Patrick (Pate) Leitch, former Rector of The University of Paris; canon of Glasgow; Clerk Register after Inglis
*John Laing, Bishop of Glasgow; former Treasurer; former Secretary to Queen Mary of Guelders; Chancellor after Avandale
*David (Davie) Lindsay, 5th Earl of Crawford; Master of the Royal Household after Argyll; sheriff of Forfar; son of Margaret Dunbar, cousin of Euphemia (Phemie) Dunbar, q.v.
*Elizabeth Hamilton, his wife, q.v.
*Alexander Lindsay, Master of Crawford, his son
*Sir David Guthrie of that Ilk, captain of the Royal Guard; former Clerk of King’s Treasury, Lord Clerk Register and Comptroller
*Master Conrad, physician; tenant of Cousland
*Thomas Smyth, royal apothecary
LANDOWNERS:
*William Sinclair, 3rd Earl of Orkney and 1st Earl of Caithness, married firstly to *Elizabeth Douglas, Countess of Buchan, and secondly to *Marjorie, daughter of the late *Alexander Sutherland of Dunbeath
*Beatrix Sinclair, his sister, married to the late *James, 7th Earl of Douglas
*Another sister, married to the late *George Dunbar, Earl of March
*Euphemia (Phemie) Dunbar, their daughter, Earl William’s niece; formerly of Haddington Priory
*Sir David of Sumburgh, Shetland, his illegitimate son; Keeper of Dingwall Castle
*Sir Oliver (Nowie) Sinclair of Roslin and Herbertshire, son of Earl William by his second wife; married firstly to *Elizabeth Borthwick, daughter of Lord Borthwick; secondly to *Isabella Livingstone; and thirdly to *Cristina Haldane; cousin of Phemie
*Elizabeth (Betha) Sinclair, Oliver’s full sister, widow of *Patrick Dunbar of Blantyre and Cumnock; former supervisor of Mary and Margaret, King James’s sisters