LUCRETIA'S FIRST HOME
Lucretia passed the first years of her childhood in her mother's house,
which was on the Piazza Pizzo di Merlo, only a few steps from the
cardinal's palace. The Ponte quarter, to which it belonged, was one of
the most populous of Rome, since it led to the Bridge of S. Angelo and
the Vatican. In it were to be found many merchants and the bankers from
Florence, Genoa, and Siena, while numerous papal office-holders, as well
as the most famous courtesans dwelt there. On the other hand, the number
of old, noble families in Ponte was not large, perhaps because the
Orsini faction did not permit them to thrive there. These powerful
barons had resided in this quarter for a long time in their vast palace
on Monte Giordano. Not far distant stood their old castle, the Torre di
Nona, which had originally been part of the city walls on the Tiber. At
this time it was a dungeon for prisoners of state and other
unfortunates.
It is not difficult to imagine what Vannozza's house was, for the Roman
dwelling of the Renaissance did not greatly differ from the ordinary
house of the present day, which generally is gloomy and dark. Massive
steps of cement led to the dwelling proper, which consisted of a
principal salon and adjoining rooms with bare flagstone floors, and
ceilings of beams and painted wooden paneling. The walls of the rooms
were whitewashed, and only in the wealthiest houses were they covered
with tapestries, and in these only on festal occasions. In the fifteenth
century the walls of few houses were adorned with pictures, and these
usually consisted of only a few family portraits. If Vannozza decorated
her salon with any likenesses, that of Cardinal Rodrigo certainly must
have been among the number. There was likewise a shrine with relics and
pictures of the saints and one of the Madonna, the lamp constantly
burning before it.
Heavy furniture,--great wide beds with canopies; high, brown wooden
chairs, elaborately carved, upon which cushions were placed; and massive
tables, with tops made of marble or bits of colored wood,--was ranged
around the walls. Among the great chests there was one which stood out
conspicuously in the salon, and which contained the dowry of linen. It
was in such a chest--the chest of his sister--that the unfortunate
Stefano Porcaro concealed himself when he endeavored to escape after his
unsuccessful attempt to excite an uprising on the fifth of January,
1453. His sister and another woman sat on the chest, better to protect
him, but the officers pulled him out.
Although we can only state what was then the fashion, if Vannozza had
any taste for antiquities her salon must have been adorned with them. At
that time they were being collected with the greatest eagerness. It was
the period of the first excavations; the soil of Rome was daily giving
up its treasures, and from Ostia, Tivoli, and Hadrian's Villa, from
Porto d'Anzio and Palestrina, quantities of antiquities were being
brought to the city. If Vannozza and her husband did not share this
passion with the other Romans, one would certainly not have looked in
vain in her house for the cherished productions of modern art--cups and
vases of marble and porphyry, and the gold ornaments of the jewelers.
The most essential thing in every well ordered Roman house was above all
else the _credenza_, a great chest containing gold and silver table
and drinking vessels and beautiful majolica; and care was taken always
to display these articles at banquets and on other ceremonious
occasions.
[Illustration: TRAJAN'S FORUM, ROME.]
It is not likely that Rodrigo's mistress possessed a library, for
private collections of books were at that time exceedingly rare in
bourgeois houses. A short time after this they were first made possible
in Rome by the invention of printing, which was there carried on by
Germans.
Vannozza's household doubtless was rich but not magnificent. She must
occasionally have entertained the cardinal, as well as the friends of
the family, and especially the confidants of the Borgias: the Spaniards,
Juan Lopez, Caranza, and Marades; and among the Romans, the Orsini,
Porcari, Cesarini, and Barberini. The cardinal himself was an
exceedingly abstemious man, but magnificent in everything which
concerned the pomp and ceremonial of his position. The chief requirement
of a cardinal of that day was to own a princely residence and to have a
numerous household.
Rodrigo Borgia was one of the wealthiest princes of the Church, and he
maintained the palace and pomp of a great noble. His contemporary Jacopo
of Volterra, gave the following description of him about 1486: "He is a
man of an intellect capable of everything and of great sense; he is a
ready speaker; he is of an astute nature, and has wonderful skill in
conducting affairs. He is enormously wealthy, and the favor accorded him
by numerous kings and princes lends him renown. He occupies a beautiful
and comfortable palace which he built between the Bridge of S. Angelo
and the Campo dei Fiore. His papal offices, his numerous abbeys in Italy
and Spain, and his three bishoprics of Valencia, Portus, and Carthage
yield him a vast income, and it is said that the office of
vice-chancellor alone brings him in eight thousand gold florins. His
plate, his pearls, his stuffs embroidered with silk and gold, and his
books in every department of learning are very numerous, and all are of
a magnificence worthy of a king or pope. I need not mention the
innumerable bed hangings, the trappings for his horses, and similar
things of gold, silver, and silk, nor his magnificent wardrobe, nor the
vast amount of gold coin in his possession. In fact it was believed that
he possessed more gold and riches of every sort than all the cardinals
together, with the exception of one, Estouteville."
Cardinal Rodrigo, therefore, was able to give his children the most
brilliant education, while he modestly maintained them as his nephews.
Not until he himself had attained greatness could he bring them forth
into the full light of day.
In 1482 he did not occupy his house in the Ponte quarter, perhaps
because he was having it enlarged. He spent more of his time in the
palace which Stefano Nardini had finished in 1475 in the Parione
quarter, which is now known as the Palazzo del Governo Vecchio. Rodrigo
was living here in January, 1482, as we learn from an instrument of the
notary Beneimbene,--the marriage contract of Gianandrea Cesarini and
Girolama Borgia, a natural daughter of the same Cardinal Rodrigo. This
marriage was performed in the presence of the bride's father, Cardinals
Stefano Nardini and Gianbattista Savelli, and the Roman nobles Virginius
Orsini, Giuliano Cesarini, and Antonio Porcaro.
The instrument of January, 1482, is the earliest authentic document we
possess regarding the family life of Cardinal Borgia. In it he
acknowledges himself to be the father of the "noble demoiselle
Hieronyma," and she is described as the sister of the "noble youth
Petrus Lodovicus de Borgia, and of the infant Johannes de Borgia." As
these two, plainly mentioned as the eldest sons, were natural children,
it would have been improper to name their mother. Cæsar also was passed
by, as he was a child of only six years.
Girolama was still a minor, being only thirteen years of age, and her
betrothed, Giovanni Andrea, had scarcely reached manhood. He was a son
of Gabriello Cesarini and Godina Colonna. By this marriage the noble
house of Cesarini was brought into close relations with the Borgia, and
later it derived great profit from the alliance. Their mutual friendship
dated from the time of Calixtus, for it was the prothonotary Giorgio
Cesarini who, on the death of that pope, had helped Rodrigo's brother
Don Pedro Luis when he was forced to flee from Rome. Both Girolama and
her youthful spouse died in 1483. Was she also a child of the mother of
Lucretia and Cæsar? We know not, but it is regarded as unlikely. Let us
anticipate by saying that there is only a single authentic record which
mentions Rodrigo's children and their mother together. This is the
inscription on Vannozza's tomb in S. Maria del Popolo in Rome, in which
she is named as the mother of Cæsar, Giovanni, Giuffrè, and Lucretia,
while no mention is made of their older brother, Don Pedro Luis, nor of
their sister Girolama.
Rodrigo, moreover, had a third daughter, named Isabella, who could not
have been a child of Vannozza. April 1, 1483, he married her to a Roman
nobleman, Piergiovanni Mattuzi of the Parione quarter.[7]
FOOTNOTES:
[7] Abstract of the marriage contract in the archives of the Capitol.
Cred. xiv, T. 72. From an instrument of the notary Agostino Martini.