Ercole is equally famous as a patron of the arts, as much an expression of his conscious magnificence as his cultivated aloofness, grave and stern as befitted the new ducal rank of Ferrara (Manca 1989:524ff).
In 1503 or 1504, Ercole asked his newly hired composer Josquin des Prez to write a musical testament for him, structured on Savonarola's prison meditation Infelix ego.