As the king’s private secretary, he was closely involved in the negotiations to reconcile his master with Pope Eugenius IV, who rewarded Alfonso Borgia with a cardinal’s hat and the splendid titular Church of Santi Quattro Coronati. By the time of the conclave of April 1455, he was living in Rome, an austere, modest, and increasingly gouty old man in his late seventies, in such poor health that it was doubted that he would survive the arduous ceremonies of his coronation. These involved a long service in St Peter’s during which he would receive from the cardinal archdeacon the Triple Crown and Cross, the Keys, and the Mantle of Jurisdiction. This coronation would be followed by a long procession to the Church of San Giovanni in Laterano, where, in another lengthy ceremony, the new pope would be enthroned as bishop of Rome.
The procession from St Peter’s to the Lateran, known as the
Waiting as the procession approached Monte Giordano stood a rabbi together with a crowd of his fellow Jews, who, as custom dictated, offered the pope a bejewelled copy of the Torah, the book of the Jewish laws. Calixtus III accepted it, then threw it to the ground with the traditional words, ‘This is the law we know; but we do not accept your interpretation of it.’ As he spoke, a number of onlookers scrambled to take possession of the book beneath the palfrey and the horses of the guards.
By the steps of the Church of San Giovanni in Laterano, Calixtus III knelt down submissively, as his white- and-gold vestments were removed to be replaced by a black soutane. He raised his hands in a gesture of benediction as a fight broke out, as it so often did, between the rival supporters of the constantly feuding Orsini and Colonna families.
No sooner had he been elected, the new pope now set his heart upon the organization of a crusade that would free Constantinople from the grip of the Turks, who had captured the city in May 1453. ‘He vowed to focus all his efforts against the heretic Turks,’ wrote Enea Silvio Piccolomini, whom Calixtus III created the cardinal of Siena, ‘giving absolution for the sins of all who enlisted.’ The pope’s determination surprised many; it was well known that he was suffering increasingly from painful attacks of gout, and it had been expected that he would continue to live a quiet and pious life in the Vatican, rather than embark on such an ambitious venture.
Money was raised by the imposition of taxes and by the selling of works of art, including the precious book bindings that had been bought at such expense by Nicholas V; Calixtus III went so far as to pawn his own mitre and sent numerous preachers armed with indulgences all over Europe; he also put a stop to various works of restoration and rebuilding in Rome, which had been initiated by his predecessor.
Self-willed, parsimonious, and obstinate, Calixtus III would tolerate no opposition from those cardinals who were opposed to his bellicose ambitions, and in the end he raised enough funds to finance the building of galleys and to muster troops for the conduct of a holy war. Yet while his soldiers and sailors enjoyed some minor successes, including the defeat of a Turkish army outside Belgrade in July 1456 and the partial destruction of a Turkish fleet off Lesbos in August the following year, his ambitions were not shared by all the European powers, many of whom failed to contribute either money or men to the scheme. Moreover, the favours he bestowed upon his relations and his fellow Spaniards, the hated Catalans, had begun to cause widespread resentment in Rome.
Three of his nephews received special favour. Two were created cardinals before they were thirty years old, and Calixtus III appointed one of them, Rodrigo Borgia, to the post of vice-chancellor of the Holy See, the most influential office in the papal government. The third, Pedro Luis Borgia, elder brother of Rodrigo, was given the title Duke of Spoleto and appointed captain general of the church, prefect of Rome, and governor of Rome’s great fortress, Castel Sant’Angelo.
Calixtus III’s death on August 6, 1458 — just three years after his elevation, in the small, dark bedchamber where ill health had obliged him to spend so much of his time — was greeted by riots in Rome, in protest against the detested Catalans whom he had so provocatively indulged. Once again the cardinals converged on Rome to play their part in a conclave at which, so it was hoped, a pope would be elected in whom the papacy and Rome, by now indissolubly interwoven, could take pride.
At this conclave the divisions within the college were greater than they had been three years earlier: ‘The richer and more important cardinals,’ as Enea Silvio Piccolomini, the cardinal of Siena, recalled, ‘made promises and threats, and some, shamelessly abandoning all vestiges of decency, pleaded their own cases for election.’ Guillaume d’Estouteville, the wealthy cardinal of Rouen, offered tempting prizes: ‘Not a few were won over by Rouen’s grandiose promises, caught like flies by their greed,’ and they schemed all night in the communal lavatories, ‘being a secluded and private place.’
Early the next morning, the cardinal of Siena went to visit the young Spaniard Rodrigo Borgia, the vice- chancellor, to ask him if he, too, was promised to Rouen. ‘What would you have me do?’ responded Borgia, who had been assured by d’Estouteville that he would keep the lucrative post of vice-chancellor in return for his vote: ‘The election is certain.’ Piccolomini cautioned the twenty-seven-year-old Rodrigo: ‘You young fool, will you put faith in a man who is not to be trusted? You may have the promise but it is the Cardinal of Avignon who will have the post, for what has been promised to you has also been promised to him,’ he said, adding wisely, ‘Will a Frenchman be more friendly to a Frenchman or to a Catalan?’
The next day after Mass, the cardinals assembled in the papal chapel to cast their votes, and when they had written their choices on slips of paper, they rose, one by one, in order of rank, and walked across to the altar, where they placed their votes in the gilded ceremonial chalice. The voting over, the cardinals resumed their seats and the names on each ballot paper were solemnly read out. ‘There was not a cardinal in the room who did not take note of those named, to ensure that there was no chance for trickery.’ Much to everyone’s surprise, it was found that Piccolomini had amassed nine votes, d’Estouteville had just six, and several others had one or two. As neither of the front-runners had achieved the necessary two-thirds majority, the cardinals decided to see if it would be possible to elect the new pope that morning by the method known as ‘accession.’
‘All sat in their places, silent and pale, as though they had been struck senseless. No one spoke for some time, no one so much as moved a muscle apart from his eyes which glanced first to one side, then to the other. The silence was astonishing. Suddenly the young Rodrigo Borgia stood up: “I accede to the Cardinal of Siena,” he announced.’ But after this declaration, all fell into silence once more, until two cardinals, reluctant to commit themselves, hurriedly left the others, ‘pleading the calls of nature.’
Then another cardinal rose to announce his support for Piccolomini. Yet even this did not secure the necessary two-thirds majority. One more vote was still required. No one spoke; no one moved. At length the aged Prospero Colonna rose unsteadily to his feet and ‘was about to pronounce his vote’ for the cardinal of Siena when ‘he was seized about the waist’ by the wily, ambitious Frenchman Guillaume d’Estouteville, archbishop of Rouen, and by Cardinal Bessarion, who still entertained hopes of being elected himself. They rebuked Cardinal Colonna harshly; and when he persisted in his intention to vote for Piccolomini, they tried to remove him from the room by force. Provoked by this indignity, Colonna, who had voted for d’Estouteville in the scrutiny, now called out in loud protest, ‘I also accede to Siena and I make him Pope.’
‘Your Holiness, we are thankful for your election and we have no doubts that it is of God,’ Cardinal Bessarion equivocated, after the election had been ratified according to custom. ‘The reason we did not vote for you was your illness; we thought that your gout would be a handicap for the Church which stands in much need of an active man with physical strength,’ he explained. ‘You, on the other hand, need rest.’ Piccolomini responded with dignity: ‘What is done by two-thirds of the Sacred College is surely the work of the Holy Spirit,’ he said, before removing his cardinal’s red robes and donning the ‘white tunic of Christ.’ When he was asked by what name he wished to be known, he announced ‘Pius,’ and his election was proclaimed to the crowds gathered in the piazza in front of St Peter’s.
That night of August 19, 1458, there was great rejoicing in the streets and piazzas of Rome, as men and women celebrated the news that an Italian had been chosen rather than a Frenchman or another Spaniard:
There was laughter and joy everywhere and voices crying ‘Siena! Siena! Oh, fortunate Siena! Viva Siena!’… As night fell, bonfires blazed at every crossroads… men sang in the streets; neighbour feasted neighbour; there
