or by dance, or any combination of these. There was invariably a political message, even if this was limited to general glorification of the ruling family; at times more specific messages were intended. Some thematic connection with the main play might be made, though intermedii could be repeated with different plays from the one they were written for. Numerous drawings and engravings of the stage sets survive, as well as texts of the libretti and descriptions of the music and action; the 1589 Medici intermezzi were especially well recorded, and "were to be the fount of Italian baroque scenography as well as influencing the development of the stage north of the Alps, above all the Stuart court masques designed by Inigo Jones". The actual content in terms of staging, music, instrumentation, presence of singers, actors, dancers, or mime was highly variable throughout the period, and sometimes all of these features were present. The 1589 intermedi were performed in the recently completed theatre in the Uffizi Palace before an audience of about three thousand, and three further performances were given some days after the end of the wedding festivities. Further significant sets of Medici intermedi were produced for the weddings in 1600 of Henry IV of France and Marie de' Medici, and then in 1608 of Grand Duke Cosimo II and a Habsburg princess, Maria Magdalena of Austria. However the 1600 celebrations also included a portent of things to come in the form of performances of Jacopo Peri's opera Euridice, the earliest surviving example of the form. Music of the Medici intermedi Of the various intermedi that were performed, only the music to some parts of Il commodo (1539) and, through a 1591 printed edition by Cristofano Malvezzi, an almost complete version of La Pellegrina (1589) are known to have survived. In 1539 most of the pieces are in four and five parts so much of this music is suitable for domestic playing. The 1589 music is very different being largely big set pieces for 6, 12, 18 or even 30 parts; 41 instrumentalists were required in all, some hidden around the stage as there was not room for them all in one place. Smaller scale pieces are often difficult florid monody of the Caccini new music variety. Of the surviving intermedi only two numbers were a cappella, (not counting the madrigals which were sung at the banquet in 1539 which