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What makes you think it is a satire?

Exactly, it seems like a clear eyed instruction manual for the time.

I don’t necessarily think it is an obvious satire, but IIRC, at the time he wrote it he was a persona non grata at the Florentine court and was attempting to curry favour.

It was most definitely written to confirm the Medici’s biases and stroke some egos.

> It was most definitely written to confirm the Medici’s biases and stroke some egos

Yes, that is the opposite of satire.

Not necessarily. Machiavelli certainly seems the type to play to the Medicis while simultaneously showing them up in a subtle manner.

Did he believe what he wrote in the Prince was noble or just? Probably not, based on his democratic tendencies.

Imagine if you wrote a send-up of Silicon Valley VCs (for example) and tried to be subtly ridiculous about it, but they took your work extremely well and even applied it. Is that not the most successful and hilarious satire of all?

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