The Gonzaga family played a relevant role in the Italian chessboard between the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Engaged in complicated policies to preserve and strengthen their state, the lords used many instruments to disentangle themselves from the complex relations with the powers that surrounded Mantua. Particularly important from this perspective are the pacts of adherentia (elastic bonds between asymmetrical powers), the subject of this paper: the historiography has already focused on the activities of the Gonzaga as accomandati, but more remains to be investigated on the networks of adherentes built by the princes to manage state-building processes, to define and strengthen their own position, and finally to enter into dialogue with neighbouring powers.