The Fall of the House of Borgia

by E R Chamberlin

  Throughout the long speech attributed to him, della Rovere made no direct reference to the real reason for his presence in France: the promise that through him, a leading member of the Sacred College, a blow could be delivered against Alexander Borgia that would either topple him from the throne or force him to place the crown of Naples on Charles's head. But it was this knowledge, rather than the scathing sarcasm, that restored the young king's courage; so that at last he gave the order for the march into Italy.

  It was this knowledge that emboldened his ambassador in Rome to demand audience of the pope and address an openly threatening speech to him. Alexander smiled grimly at the routine reproaches regarding his libidinous nature and the scandal of his ways; wrapped in his impermeable self-satisfaction, he allowed a remarkable freedom of speech to those around him. But he paid rather closer attention to the ambassador's threat that if he did not place the crown of Naples on the head of Charles, then a council would be called to investigate the charge that, simonaically, he had bought his high office. It was open, unabashed blackmail but nonetheless effective. No matter that this simony had been common knowledge within a few hours of the conclave, only now had della Rovere used the power of his position to threaten his enemy with the council that all popes feared. No matter that few of the cardinals who would form that council had clean hands; the issue was legal, not moral. Ascanio Sforza, who had benefited from that simony more than any other man apart from Alexander himself, piously joined his voice with those of his brethren who sought to expunge the stain. Sforza's opposition to his one-time friend and benefactor Borgia was, in a way, involuntary, for he had no choice but to follow his brother Ludovico into the opposition camp. But, incredibly, Sforza —the seller—had high hopes of following Borgia the purchaser in the chair of St. Peter.

  Few took much notice of King Charles's evident sincerity. "It's no business of his to reform the Church," Ludovico Sforza told the silent, outwardly admiring Venetian ambassador. "Speaking between ourselves, the king has more need to reform himself than setting about reforming other people." But if Alexander's simony could be used to lever him out of the throne, then a gap would be created which a large number of people would gain great profit by filling.

  The progress of the French army through Italy was not so much unopposed as virtually a triumphal procession. Alexander for once shared an opinion of della Rovere's — contempt for the Italians. "The French conquered Italy with wooden spurs and a bit of chalk," he remarked later, and certainly in city after city the only military activity was the billet master moving from lodging to lodging, placing his chalk mark upon the doors to indicate a billet. There had been some embarrassment in Milan when Isabella threw herself before the king's feet, begging him to right the injustice and restore her husband to the ducal throne. Charles, with all his faults, had a kind heart and might even have indulged in some impetuous action had not his counselors edged him aside. There was another queasy moment when he remarked curtly to Ludovico that the French had as strong a genealogical claim to Milan as they had to Naples. But that also passed, for Charles's counselors had no intention of fighting this war as preliminary to another. Florence proved a little difficult, for Charles had been stupid enough to enter the city with couched lance, the universal sign of conquest; and there had been a moment when it seemed that the great bell, La Vacca, would toll its summons to the citizens to throw out yet another enemy. But a concord was reached and the army continued its march upon Rome.

  Throughout the menacing advance of the French, Alexander had been tormented to distraction by a purely domestic problem. The beautiful Giulia Farnese had decided to remember her marriage vows and took herself off to her husband, leaving Alexander raging in Rome. Apparently he valued his mistress far higher than his tiara. The avowed purpose of the French invasion was to take that tiara from him, but he barely spared a glance to the advancing army, so furious was he with Giulia and her confidantes, so intent was he upon her return. Giulia's brother, Cardinal Farnese, threw up his hands in horror. He had been happy enough to accept his red hat through his fortunate relationship, but the matter was now an open scandal and even a Farnese could blush. Alexander ignored the cardinal's protests, thundered against Giulia, against her husband, even against the favored Adriana da Mila, who was torn between obedience to her cousin and a belated sense of guilt toward her son. Orsino Orsini himself resolved the matter. He lost his nerve and agreed that Giulia should return. At about the time that the French army was leaving Florence, she and Adriana took the road to Rome.

  They chose a bad day for traveling. Little more than three hours after setting out, they encountered a forward patrol of the French army under Yves d'Allegre. Giulia's beauty, the stateliness of Madonna Adriana and the sumptuousness of their equipment intrigued him; it was obvious they were no ordinary women. They were escorted with great politeness to d'Allegre's temporary base at Montefiascone, and there Giulia disclosed that she was, indeed, the legendary Giulia Farnese and that her duenna was none other than the pope's cousin and confidante, Adriana da Mila. A messenger was hastened to Charles with the news that ideal hostages had fallen into French hands. Charles was shocked; the French did not fight against women, he declared. But d'Allegre, though an accomplished gallant, did not share his master's high ideals of chivalry. Another messenger was dispatched this time for Rome, with the information that the freedom of the ladies could be bought for three thousand ducats.

  Alexander had been awaiting their arrival with impatience and then increasing apprehension. He wasted no time in bargaining when he learned what had happened. A papal courier was sent with a strong escort to d'Allegre, carrying the demanded ransom. Simultaneously another messenger was sent to Charles himself, bitterly upbraiding him for the action of his servants. D'Allegre kept his side of the bargain, providing Giulia and Adriana with an escort of four hundred knights to take them safely the rest of the way to Rome. So impatient was Alexander to be united with his mistress that he was actually waiting at the city gate as the party rode in at nightfall on December 1. He dressed carefully for the occasion, wearing cloak, boots, sword and dagger in the Spanish fashion. Giulia was young and impressionable, and her escort of dashing young Frenchmen might very easily eclipse an elderly ecclesiastic in her esteem.

  Rome laughed at the opera buffa, but in Milan Ludovico Sforza was indigant. "These ladies were the heart and eye of the pope: they would have been the best whip for compelling him to do everything which was wanted of him for he could not live without them. The French received only three thousand ducats as ransom although the pope would gladly have paid fifty thousand or more simply to have them back again."40

  Alexander had little time to enjoy Giulia's company. He went to bed each night with the knowledge that the French army was another fifteen miles closer to Rome. He awoke each morning with the knowledge that more of his allies would abandon him during the coming day. The city was in a ferment of fear and excitement; never within living memory had Rome been the object of an attack. Those who could leave did; all day long the slow processsion of laden oxcarts made its way through the city gates. At first Alexander also decided in favor of flight, and Burchard hurriedly organized the packing of the more portable valuables. But then his master changed his mind. If the bishop of Rome could not find safety in Rome, where could he find it? The citizen militia was called out; they responded tardily, sullenly. It was obvious that, if it came to a fight, they would not lift a hand in defense of the Borgia pope. Burchard was summoned. If the native militia would not fight could he, perhaps, persuade his fellow nationals, the local German colony, to form an emergency bodyguard? The situation was hopeless and Burchard bluntly said so. Still Alexander did not despair, for outside Rome was his first line of defense, the expensively maintained papal army under its commander, Virginio Orsini. But Virginio not only refused to fight, he actually went over to the enemy, taking all the troops with him. He and Giulia's husband were cousins, but it was not through any family feeling that Vir
ginio acted as he did. In common with most of the Orsini, he rather despised the spiritless Orsino and personally he held nothing against Alexander. But he, too, was convinced that the pope's situation was hopeless and, in the practical Italian fashion, Virginio had joined what seemed to be the stronger side. For his miscalculation he and the Orsini clan were to pay dearly.

  The French army, its monarch at its head, marched into Rome as darkness was falling on the last day of 1494. Burchard rode out to meet the king, exchanging stiff greetings with della Rovere who, with two fellow cardinals, was about to enter the city. Charles chatted eagerly with the papal master of ceremonies, the one man in Rome who could give him accurate information about the state of affairs in the Vatican. What ceremonies would he, Charles, have to go through? What precisely was the role and influence of Cardinal Cesare Borgia. Burchard answered the tumbling questions the best he could as they rode through tumultuously cheering crowds to the palace that had been set apart for the king. There, the royal bodyguard took over, drawing a ring of steel around the palace, sealing it off from the rest of Rome.

  A few hundred yards away at the Castel Sant' Angelo similar preparations were underway. At the last moment Alexander had followed the example of so many of his predecessors and set up his court in Rome's unconquered and unconquerable castle. His family were with him; even Vannozza had abandoned her comfortable house for the safety of Sant' Angelo. There might have been an embarrassing confrontation between the past and present mistresses, but Cardinal Fafnese took advantage of the situation to whisk his sister out of Rome and Alexander, for once, did not object.

  Yet, after all the frantic preparations and bloodthirsty threats came merely anticlimax. "Twice our great guns were ready to fire on Sant' Angelo but both times the king opposed it. I will not pretend to say whether he acted well or ill, but I think his best way was to compose matters amicably as he did," Comines recorded. He was in Venice at the time, struggling to keep his master afloat in the treacherous crosscurrents of peninsula politics and he, for one, was unsurprised by that anticlimax beneath the massive walls of Sant' Angelo. "He was a young man and incapable of performing so important a work as the reformation of the Church."41 In Rome the taciturn Burchard for a change displayed almost a sense of humor as he recorded the contest between pope and king; between the veteran politician toughened after forty years of running battles with his equals and the inexperienced, romantic young man bred in the mystique of monarchy, that belief that the king had only to wish and it was ordained. Alexander adopted any device that would help throw his adversary off balance: feigning faintness at a difficult moment, entangling Charles in the trivia of protocol, pretending to be unaware of his approach so that the unfortunate young king was forced to go down on his knees twice while the court looked on. The impression of Charles conveyed by Burchard is that of a lost puppy, scampering with increasing bewilderment from one chamber to another of the Vatican Palace. "They will make another pope with the intention of reforming the Church," Brigonnet had written confidently to the queen of France on the day that Charles had triumphantly entered Rome. Three weeks later that was all forgotten. Ascanio Sforza's name was raised briefly as the only possible successor to Alexander, but even Charles could not quite see how Alexander could be deposed for simony in favor of Ascanio, "the principal merchant for it was he that drove the bargain, and received most of the money." The question of a council dropped quietly into the background in favor of Charles's real ambition, the possession of the Neapolitan crown. Alexander twisted out of that problem with some skill. It did affect another party, he argued—the current wearer of the grown—but he would consult with his cardinals as early and as fully as possible. Even Charles must have been aware that Alexander intended doing nothing about the matter once; pressure had been removed, but neither was it possible for the French to remain indefinitely while the futile negotiations dragged on. The temper of the ever-fickle Romans changed, less from any affection for their bishop than from hatred of a contemptuous foreign army that looked upon itself as a conquering force. In Spain, the Catholic Majesties talked loudly of their blood relationship with Alfonso of Naples and their sudden filial reverence for Pope Alexander VI. Caught between the immediate threat of a city on the edge of open warfare, and of the distant but far more terrifying threat of a Spanish move at his rear, Charles could no nothing but complete the attack on Naples before his army's strength was expended in street battles, or before the delicately balanced alliances collapsed beneath him. He and Alexander signed a virtually meaningless pact: all past mutual offenses were to be forgotten; Charles was to be invested with Naples, when that should prove possible; a handful of castles were to change hands and Brigonnet, Charles's adviser, was to receive a cardinal's hat. Altogether it was a derisory end to a megalomanic project, and Alexander could well permit himself a feeling of deep satisfaction. The forces opposing him had been tested to their utmost and had collapsed.

  Charles left Rome on January 28, taking with him Cesare Borgia, ostensibly as papal legate, in reality as a hostage while the army was crossing papal territory. For Cesare it was undoubtedly a humiliating debut on the international stage, but he seems to have assumed his role with an impassivity which totally deceived Charles. A few days' march out of Rome Cesare disappeared. His carefully sealed and guarded wagons in the baggage train were promptly impounded—and found to be empty of any valuables. A courier was sent galloping back to Rome, bearing the king's bitter accusations to Alexander. The pope declared he knew nothing of the matter, deplored his son's breach of faith, agreed that he ought to be returned—but no one seemed to know where he was. Cesare remained discreetly out of public sight until the end of March, but when he did eventually appear openly in Rome the entire situation had altered radically. Charles, after ascending to the pinnacle of triumph—so effortlessly and undeservedly that Comines his loyal servant was convinced it was by the direct hand of God—was hurled down as swiftly.

  Alfonso of Naples seems to have been as convinced as Comines that the Neapolitan adventure was in supernatural hands. Rumors sped around the capital that the ghost of old Ferrante had appeared to his son, lamenting that the days of Aragon were over for they were paying the price of their sins. A Sibylline prophecy was discovered, foretelling the doom of the house. "Alfonso was seized with such a panic fear that in the night he would cry out he heard the French, the very stones and trees cried 'France, France.' "42 His fear was rather less likely to have been produced by messengers from the other world than from the prosaic knowledge that it was a Neapolitan tradition to contemplate, passively, the destruction of Neapolitan kings by ambitious foreigners. The Italian chroniclers sought to prove that the crimes of Alfonso and his father Ferrante had cost them the loyalty of their subjects. When Alfonso hurriedly abdicated in favor of his son, Ferrantino, the situation remained unchanged, although everybody agreed that Ferrantino was a virtuous young man, much loved by all who knew him. The Neapolitans could not find a reason, as ever, for defending one foreigner against another merely because both claimed to be kings of Naples. Ferrantino fled, Charles's army entered Naples, and the Neapolitans courteously cheered the advent of their newest monarch. Charles enjoyed himself as king in the beautiful, treacherous, wholly enigmatic city for some three months and then, rather like a sleeper awakening, turned his thoughts to the problem of getting home—only to find the path closed.

  At the other end of Italy in Venice, Comines had been watching the incredible adventure first with surprise, and then with mounting dismay as reports came to him of Charles's lotus-eating approach to Italian politics. Comines filled his journal with a reproachful catalogue of the king's stupidities. "From his first arrival at Naples to his departure, he minded nothing but his pleasure and his ministers nothing but their own advantage." He partly excused the king on the grounds of youth, laying the blame on the avaricious, incompetent ministers—they should have fortified the castles; they should have kept better discipline; they should have known that Ital
ian alliances were built on sand. But Comines himself, despite his competence and loyalty, despite the fact that he was actually resident in the city that hatched the plot against the king, knew nothing whatsoever about it until it was a fact, as he had the honesty to record. When he became aware of the constant coming and going of ambassadors—papal, Milanese, Spanish and even imperial—all of whom avoided him, he taxed the Senate with plotting against his master. "I was told that I ought not to believe all the flying reports of the town, and that in Venice people had the liberty of saying what they pleased." Experienced as he was in Italian ways, the smooth reply convinced him that a league was undoubtedly being formed against Charles and, with increasing desperation, he sent messengers hastening south to urge the king to begin his return before the Italians closed ranks. Charles delayed, an anti-French alliance came into being, and the French, after their triumphal tour of Italy, were now faced with the prospect of fighting their way back home against a briefly unified nation.

  Despite his humiliating experience in Rome in the past winter, Charles seems to have believed that a man-to-man talk with Alexander would solve all his difficulties. He returned to Rome still hopeful on June 1, to find that the pope had discreetly removed himself and his family to Siena, leaving a courteous message to the effect that he was vacating the Vatican only to provide Charles with suitable lodgings. Charles, at the head of his large army, took the road to Siena. Alexander nimbly moved the papal court to Perugia and then, circling behind the French, re-entered Rome on June 27 to the admiration and enthusiasm of the Romans. He was home in the Vatican, comfortably established with his family and court again in their familiar surroundings, when news arrived of the great battle of For- novo.