when dealing with affairs of state; but these qualities were far outweighed by his vices: the most obscene manners, hypocrisy, immodesty, mendacity, infidelity, profanity, insatiable greed, unrestrained ambition, a predilection for viciousness that was worse than barbaric, and a fervent hunger to exalt his many children, among whom there were several no less repellent than the father.
Men soon learned that it was dangerous to cross Alexander VI and never to be less than wary in his presence. This was an ambitious pope, powerful, rich, politically astute, and determined to establish his own family in the ranks of Europe’s ruling elite.
— CHAPTER 5 — Marriages and Alliances
HE WOULD ‘SHOW THEM WHO WAS POPE AND… WOULD MAKE MORE CARDINALS, WHETHER THEY LIKED IT OR NOT’
LIVING IN THE LUXURIOUS surroundings of Palazzo Montegiordano, the Orsini residence in Rome, under the care of Adriana da Mila, Rodrigo’s children had grown up protected from the violence and squalor of the city beyond its walls. It seems that Lucrezia received her early education from the ladies of the household, from Spanish tutors, from a priest who presided over the children’s schoolroom, and from the nuns of a nearby convent to which she was regularly conducted. While she spoke Spanish with her brothers and her father, she was also fluent in Italian and French, as well as Latin, and knew some Greek; her syllabus had included rhetoric and humanist literature; she enjoyed reading poetry and wrote her own verses. She was also an accomplished dancer and, indeed, regularly took part in the exhibitions of Valencian dancing arranged by Rodrigo for the entertainment of himself and his guests. She was a happy, cheerful, and pretty child, adored by all her family.
Like other girls of noble birth, Lucrezia was expected to marry young, to a man of her father’s choice whose connections would be beneficial to the family. In 1490, when she was just ten years old, she was betrothed to a young Spanish nobleman, some fifteen years older than herself, Don Juan de Centelles. The proposed marriage was, however, abandoned a year later when another more desirable suitor appeared in the form of a Spanish grandee, Don Gasparo di Procida, the Count of Aversa, whose lawyers entered into negotiations with those of the cardinal. These lawyers were still negotiating the details of the marriage contract when Rodrigo was elected pope. Now he could set his sights much higher and, according to Burchard, gave the young man ‘3,000 ducats to buy his silence and break the contract’; the pope, he continued, ‘intended thus to raise the status of his daughter.’ Alexander VI’s choice of bridegroom, however, would be one who also brought significant political advantages for himself.
On February 12, 1493, in a ceremony at the Vatican, Lucrezia was formally betrothed, by proxy, to Giovanni Sforza, Lord of Pesaro, a widower twice her age but cousin to Ludovico Sforza, ruler of Milan, and to his brother Cardinal Ascanio, the vice-chancellor.
Four months later, on June 9, Giovanni Sforza arrived in Rome for the marriage, accompanied by forty pack animals and some 280 horsemen, all richly dressed. He made his official entrance into the city through the gate of Santa Maria del Popolo, welcomed by a large crowd and escorted to the Vatican, where he ceremonially kissed the pope’s foot.
The marriage took place three days later, on June 12, when, according to Burchard, ‘the illustrious Giovanni Sforza, Count of Cotignola and Lord of Pesaro, took as his legitimate wife, Lucrezia Borgia, virgin, in her tenth year, or thereabouts’ — Burchard was, unusually for him, misinformed about her age; she had in fact celebrated her thirteenth birthday a few weeks earlier. On the morning of her wedding, in obedience to the instructions of their father, Lucrezia’s brother Juan escorted the young bride from the residence of Gianbattista Zen, cardinal of Santa Maria in Porticu, where she was then living, to the Vatican Palace. Her train was carried by one black girl, while another carried that of her principal attendant, a granddaughter of Innocent VIII. They were followed by well over 150 Roman ladies, led by Giulia Farnese, aptly described by Alexander VI’s master of ceremonies, Johannes Burchard, in his account of the event, as ‘the concubine of the Pope.’
The procession of ladies entered the room where the pope sat on his throne, accompanied by ten cardinals, five seated on each side of him, as well as several priests and deacons. As the ladies filed past the papal throne, much to the annoyance of the master of ceremonies most of them failed to genuflect, despite his scolding, though he was pleased to see that Lucrezia did observe this custom. Then Juan and Lucrezia approached to kiss the pope’s foot, followed this time by all the ladies. Brother and sister remained on their knees, while the rest of the ladies moved back toward the wall. Here also stood Cesare, seemingly annoyed by the prominent role that his younger brother had been accorded in the ceremony.
Alexander VI’s trusted lawyer, Camillo Beneimbene, now stepped forward to address the twenty-four-year- old bridegroom, Giovanni Sforza, who knelt on a cushion next to his bride. ‘Most worthy Lord,’ began the notary, ‘I believe that Your Lordship has recently undertaken to marry the illustrious Donna Lucrezia Borgia, who is here present, and that your proctor has submitted the matrimonial contract in your name… Are you ready to accept, and do you promise to observe what has been contracted?’
‘I perfectly understand the terms of the contract and accept them,’ the bridegroom responded, ‘and hereby promise to observe and undertake all its obligations.’ Then Camillo asked, ‘Most worthy Lord, do you agree to take the illustrious Lucrezia Borgia here present to be your lawful spouse?’ ‘I will,’ he replied, ‘most willingly.’
The cardinals and the others present were enjoined to be witnesses to Sforza’s oath, and the bride was then asked if she was prepared to become his ‘lawful spouse.’ She also replied, ‘I will.’ The bishop of Concordia then stepped forward and placed a ring on the ring finger of the bride’s left hand and another on the second finger while Niccolo Orsini, Count of Pitigliano and captain general of the papal armies, held a drawn sword over the heads of the couple. There followed a sermon by the bishop about the sacrament of marriage.
The bride was then escorted by Juan Borgia into the Sala Reale, specially hung for the occasion with lavish silks, velvets, and tapestries, where Alexander VI and his mistress, Giulia Farnese, played host to the bridegroom and the bride’s ladies. ‘An assortment of all kinds of sweets, marzipans, crystallized fruits and wines were served,’ noted Burchard, and ‘over 200 dishes were carried in by the stewards and squires, each with a napkin over his shoulder, offering them first to the Pope and his cardinals, then to the bridal couple and lastly the guests. Finally they flung what was left out of the window to the crowds of people below in such abundance that I believe more than 100 pounds of sweetmeats were crushed and trampled underfoot.’
The party was a lively and lecherous affair. The diarist Stefano Infessura noted that in their excitement, some of the male guests ‘threw the sweetmeats into the cleavages of many ladies, especially the good-looking ones,’ and those cardinals who remained behind to dine with the pope and his mistress were each seated between two pretty girls. The guests were regaled with what Burchard described as ‘a series of entertainments,’ including a comedy performed with ‘such elegance that everyone loudly applauded’ the actors; Infessura reported that ‘lascivious comedies and tragedies were performed which provoked much laughter in the audience.’
Once dinner was over, Alexander VI himself accompanied his daughter and her husband to the palace of Santa Maria in Porticu by the grand steps leading up to the Basilica of St Peter’s. ‘There the groom took marital possession of his bride,’ reported Infessura, adding, rather enigmatically, that ‘I could tell you many other things but I will not recount them because some are not true and those that are, are anyway unbelievable.’
This marriage had been arranged in the shadow of a bitter quarrel between King Ferrante of Naples and Ludovico Sforza, ruler of Milan. Ludovico was a ‘wise man,’ in the opinion of the French chronicler Philippe de Commynes, ‘but very timorous and humble when he was in awe, and false when it was to his advantage to be so; and this opinion I do not hold by hearsay but as one that knew him well, having had much business to do with him.’ Handsome in his way, despite the ugly, massive nose to be seen in the portrait attributed to Leonardo da Vinci, he was known as Il Moro on account of his cunning and his resourceful nature, which were generally supposed to be characteristics of the Moors of North Africa. He was also greedy for power. When his brother Duke Galeazzo Maria was assassinated in 1476, leaving his seven-year-old nephew, Gian Galeazzo, as heir, Ludovico had seized control of Milan to rule in the young duke’s name. Together with his beautiful and clever wife, Beatrice d’Este, Ludovico presided over an impressively splendid court to which Leonardo was welcomed as painter and
