A Cyclopaedia of Female Biography/Sforza, Bianca Maria Visconti
SFORZA, BIANCA MARIA VISCONTI,
Was the natural child of Filippo Visconti; and, being his only daughter, she was legitimated, and apportioned with the dowry of a princess; and, in 1441, she was married to Francesco Sforza, Duke of Milan. She was then fifteen years of age, and distinguished among all the ladies of the court for beauty and elegance. The duchess, though not of a race eminent for piety, had always an inclination for promoting religious institutions; by her influence over her husband, who loved her passionately, she was now in a situation to gratify her pious wishes. She placed the first stone In the temple of St. Agnes, in Milan; and, nine years afterwards, erected the church of St. Nicolas, and founded the monastery of Corpo Cristo, in Cremona. But her most useful and greatest establishment was the grand hospital of Milan, a magnificent edifice, which she caused to be begun in 1456, but which was not completed until 1797. After the death of her husband, she was regent of her son, Galeazzo. In her administration she exhibited the utmost strictness, good sense, and political ability. Her son, when arrived at manhood, ungratefully forgetting all he owed to her care and prudence, rendered his conduct so distasteful to her, by his arrogance and rudeness, that she retired to an estate she possessed at Marignard, where she began a plan of life to be pursued in good works and pious duties; when a sudden death terminated her existence at the age of forty-two, in the year 1468.