Editing The Prince (section)

===Timeline of composition===
There has been much debate of when Machiavelli actually composed The Prince (and his other works).<ref name=Connell/> Commentators have viewed this question to be of great importance, as some interpreters believe that Machiavelli changed his views between the composition of The Prince, and the composition of ''The Discourses''. Hans Baron is one of such commentators who argued that Machiavelli must have changed his mind dramatically in favor of free republics, after having written ''The Prince''.{{sfn|Baron|1961}} Harvey Mansfield and Nathan Tarcov, in the introduction to their translation of The Discourses on Livy, state that there are no discrepancies between The Prince and his later works, and that it "seems the safest" to see them "as a pair of works, not much different, if at all, in time of composition."<ref>{{cite book | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Km5itjMehYUC&q=if+at+all%2C+in+time+of+composition.&pg=PR43 | title=Discourses on Livy | isbn=978-0-226-50033-1 | last1=Machiavelli | first1=Niccolò | date=27 February 2009 | publisher=University of Chicago Press|quote=Translation by Harvey C. Mansfield and Nathan Tarcov}}</ref> Scholar William Connell views that the composition and development of The Prince was a lengthy process with his ideas being revised from 1513 to 1515.<ref name=Connell>{{Cite journal |last=Connell |first=William J. |title=Dating The Prince: Beginnings and Endings |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/review-of-politics/article/abs/dating-the-prince-beginnings-and-endings/C999CC6B17F223DD630CAEAF650F0835 |journal=The Review of Politics |date=2013 |language=en |volume=75 |issue=4 |pages=497–514 |doi=10.1017/S0034670513000557 |issn=0034-6705}}</ref>