By John Mariani

It may seem odd to name a restaurant after the controversial Renaissance man Niccolò Machiavelli, whose name, unfairly, has long been associated with power politics. But, then again, he was an extraordinary intellect, philosopher, poet, dramatist, historian and humanist. And it's such a mellifluous name for a trattoria.

Perhaps that's what restaurateur Nathalie De La Fontaine had in mind for her five-year-old Upper West Side trattoria, whose sumptuous décor does indeed evoke the Renaissance, not least in the series of murals taken from Paolo Uccello's 15th century masterpiece "The Battle of San Romano."

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