The historian Ex Urbe wrote a fascinating series of articles about Machiavelli and why he is such an important person in history. I found them eye-opening and very interesting; I commend them to your attention if things like medieval attitudes on morality and the birth of modern political science (and ethics) sounds at all interesting.
They are:
- Machiavelli I – S.P.Q.F.
- Machiavelli I (addendum): thoughts on this style of presenting history
- Machiavelli II: The Three Branches of Ethics
- Machilavelli III: Rise of the Borgias
- Machiavelli IV: Julius II, the Warrior Pope
- and the last one, Why We Keep Asking “Was Machiavelli an Atheist?”
(via James Nicoll , who linked to one of these and thereby got me so hooked on the whole series that I started following Ex Urbe so I could make sure not to miss any.)