Machiavelli modern or postmodern?

Postmodern condition involves an inquiry about modern history and its inheritance. The article is about a possible postmodernity of Machiavelli, whose thought is so interesting nowadays for many politicians and historians of culture as well. After considering some relevant aspects of Machiavelli's prince as an ideal politician (that justifies the surviving of Machiavellian and his political theories to the French Revolution), the author points out that, according to some Italian interpreters' suggestions, the Machiavellian virtus has to be considered as related to the alchemic tradition of post-medieval Italian physicians.
Although modern rationalism has invoked Machiavelli among its pioneers, it is easy to prove that the analysis of politics, as promoted by Machiavelli, is scientific in its perspective, but its approach does not ignore casualty. This is why the Machiavellian prince is so similar to the Nietzsche's Übermensch. Are such similarities so relevant to maintain that Machiavellian inheritance is important for postmodernism? A revival of the Nietzsche's philosophy seems to legitimate such an opinion and confirms that the question « is Machiavelli modern or postmodern? » does not consist in a joke. Maybe it is after a general evaluation of modernity.

Keywords: Machiavelli; modernity; postmodernity