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ezio auditore da firenze

iv λ knowledge

[Ezio is about to bust out the most intense filter work of his life. He has never done a complicated filter before, and he needs to do this right.]

----- Inventors, technology experts, mechanics, but barring those who seek power -----

[he clears his throat, then in that thick Italian accent:]

Hello... my name is Ezio Auditore, and I seek an inventor or mechanic or... esperto of some kind. I have obtained an object of great importance, but I do not know what it does, or what it is capable of.

But I need someone I can trust, someone with the right... sensitivities for this object.

-----Historians and Religious people, barring Lucrezia Borgia -----

[Still more thick Italian accent:]

I seek information about Pope Alexander VI.

-----

[And, with that done, you can find him in the kitchen, contemplating the microwave.]

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I might not be an expert, but I know my way around technology.

[that particular description gets a laugh]

Just what sorta sensitivities are you needin'?

[Wandering in, flipping through her journal. All, you know, three pages or so. Weird.]

Maybe I grabbed the wrong magical journal. Except I only have one.

[Too distracted to notice any Italians at the moment. She knows the path to the fridge by heart.]

'I'm an inventor of sorts. As for sensitivities, I suppose it depends on what kind you're looking for.'

For what purpose?

Sounds like my favorite kind of object.

[a pause]

And what would you like to know about the Pope?

[another pause]

And are those two requests connected somehow?

[And to the kitchen she will go, looking to make some coffee. It's going to be a long day and night with all this journal garbage, and she's intent on sticking around to see how it plays out.

Except good sir what are you doing?]

Don't trust it.

I'm sorry, but why do you wish to know about a Pope? [Popes tend to mean trouble man]

Interesting guy, caused quite a lot of scandal, back in the day. What do you want to know, exactly?

Pope Alexander VI! That's a name for the history books...

[he can see the other filter too, but... yeah this one is a lot simpler and Abel is lazy... laskjg]

[In very precise and neat handwriting, that goes on... and on... and on.]

Alexander VI, given name Rodrigo Borgia, Roman Catholic Pope from 1492 until his death, is the most memorable of the corrupt and secular popes of the Renaissance. He was born at Xativa, near Valencia in Spain, and his father's surname was Lanzol or Llançol; his mother's family, Borgia or Borja, was assumed by him on the elevation of his maternal uncle to the papacy as Callixtus III (April 8, 1455). He studied law at Bologna, and after his uncle's election he was created successively bishop, cardinal and vice-chancellor of the church. He served in the Curia under five popes and acquired much administrative experience, influence and wealth, although no great power. Like many other prelates of the day, his morals were far from blameless, his two dominant passions being greed of gold and love of women, and he was devotedly fond of the children whom his mistresses bore him. Although ecclesiastical corruption was then at its height, his riotous mode of life called down upon him a very severe reprimand from Pope Pius II, who succeeded Calixtus III in 1458. Of his many mistresses the one for whom his passion lasted longest was a certain Vannozza (Giovanna) dei Cattani, born in 1442, and wife of three successive husbands. The connection began in 1470, and she bore him many children whom he openly acknowledged as his own: Giovanni, afterwards Duke of Gandia (born 1474), Cesare (born 1476), Lucrezia (born 1480), and Goffredo or Giuffre (born 1481 or 1482). Before his elevation to the papacy Cardinal Borgia's passion for Vannozza somewhat diminished, and she subsequently led a very retired life. Her place in his affections was filled by the beautiful Giulia Farnese (Giulia Bella), wife of an Orsini, but his love for his children by Vannozza remained as strong as ever and proved, indeed, the determining factor of his whole career. He lavished vast sums on them and loaded them with every honor. A characteristic instance of the corruption of the papal court is the fact that Borgia's daughter Lucrezia lived with his mistress Giulia, who bore him a daughter Laura in 1492.

On the death of Pope Innocent VIII the three likely candidates for the Holy See were Cardinals Borgia, Ascanio Sforza and Giuliano della Rovere; at no previous or subsequent election were such immense sums of money spent on bribery, and Borgia by his great wealth succeeded in buying the largest number of votes, including that of Sforza, and to his intense joy he was elected on the 10th of August 1492, assuming the name of Alexander VI. Borgia's elevation did not at the time excite much alarm, except in some of the cardinals who knew him, and at first his reign was marked by a strict administration of justice and an orderly method of government in satisfactory contrast with the anarchy of the previous pontificate, as well as by great outward splendor. But it was not long before his unbridled passion for endowing his relatives at the expense of the church and of his neighbors became manifest. For this object he was ready to commit any crime and to plunge all Italy into war. Cesare, then a youth of sixteen and a student at Pisa, was made Archbishop of Valencia, his nephew Giovanni received a cardinal's hat, and for the Duke of Gandia and Giuffre the pope proposed to carve fiefs out of the papal states and the Kingdom of Naples. Among the fiefs destined for the Duke of Gandia were Cervetri and Anguillara, lately acquired by Virginio Orsini, head of that powerful and turbulent house, with the pecuniary help of Ferdinand of Aragon, king of Naples (Don Ferrante). This brought the latter into conflict with Alexander, who determined to revenge himself by making an alliance with the king's enemies, especially the Sforza family, lords of Milan. In this he was opposed by Cardinal della Rovere, whose candidature for the papacy had been backed by Ferdinand. Della Rovere, feeling that Rome was a dangerous place for him, fortified himself in his bishopric of Ostia at the Tiber's mouth, while Ferdinand allied himself with Florence, Milan, Venice, and the pope formed a league against Naples (April 25, 1493) and prepared for war. Ferdinand appealed to Spain for help; but Spain was anxious to be on good terms with the pope to obtain a title over the newly discovered continent of America and could not afford to quarrel with him.

Alexander meditated great marriages for his children. Lucrezia had been married to the Spaniard Don Gasparo de Procida, but on her father's elevation to the papacy the union was annulled, and in 1493 she was married to Giovanni Sforza, lord of Pesaro, the ceremony being celebrated at the Vatican with unparalleled magnificence. But in spite of the splendors of the court, the condition of Rome became every day more deplorable. The city swarmed with Spanish adventurers, assassins, prostitutes and informers; murder and robbery were committed with impunity, heretics and Jews were admitted to the city on payment of bribes, and the pope himself shamelessly cast aside all show of decorum, living a purely secular and immoral life, and indulging in the chase, dancing, stage plays and indecent orgies. One of his boon companions was Jem, the brother of the sultan Bayezid, detained as a hostage.

The general political outlook in Italy was of the gloomiest, and the country was on the eve of the catastrophe of foreign invasion. At Milan Lodovico Sforza (il Moro) ruled, nominally as regent for the youthful duke Gian Galeazzo, but really with a view to making himself master of the state. He made many alliances to secure his position, butfearing himself isolated he sought help from Charles VIII of France, and as the king of Naples threatened to come to the aid of Gian Galeazzo, who had married his granddaughter, he encouraged the French king in his schemes for the conquest of Naples. Alexander carried on a double policy, always ready to seize opportunities to aggrandize his family. But through the intervention of the Spanish ambassador he made peace with Naples in July 1493 and also with the Orsini; the peace was cemented by a marriage between the pope's son Giuffre and Doña Sancha, Ferdinand's granddaughter. In order to dominate the Sacred College more completely he created twelve new cardinals, among them his own son Cesare, then only eighteen years old, and Alessandro Farnese, the brother of Giulia Bella, one of the pope's mistresses, creations which caused much scandal. On the 25th of January 1494 Ferdinand died and was succeeded by his son Alphonso II. Charles of France now advanced formal claims on the kingdom, and Alexander drew him to his side and authorized him to pass through Rome ostensibly on a crusade against the Turks, without mentioning Naples. But when the French invasion became a reality he was alarmed, recognized Alphonso as king, andconcluded an alliance with him in exchange for various fiefs to his sons (July 1494). Preparations for defense were made; a Neapolitan army was to advance through the Romagna and attack Milan, while the fleet was to seize Genoa; but both expeditions were badly conducted and failed, and on the 8th of September Charles crossed the Alps and joined Lodovico il Moro at Milan. The papal states were in a turmoil, and the powerful Colonna faction seized Ostia in the name of France. Charles rapidly advanced southward, and after a short stay in Florence set out for Rome (November 1494). Alexander appealed to Ascanio Sforza for help, and even to the sultan. He tried to collect troops and put Rome in a state of defense, but his position was most insecure, and the Orsini offered to admit the French to their castles. This defection decided the pope to come to terms, and on the 31st of December Charles entered Rome with his troops and the cardinals of the French faction. Alexander now feared that the king might depose him for simony and summon a council, but he won over the bishop of St. Malo, who had much influence over the king, with a cardinal's hat, and agreed to send Cesare, as legate, to Naples with the French army, to deliver Jem to Charles and to give him Civitavecchia (January 16, 1495). On the 28th Charles departed for Naples with Jem and Cesare, but the latter escaped to Spoleto. Neapolitan resistance collapsed; Alphonso fled and abdicated in favor of his son Ferdinand II, who also had to fly abandoned by all, and the kingdom was conquered with surprising ease. But a reaction against Charles soon set in, for all the powers were alarmed at his success, and on the 31st of March a league between the pope, the emperor, Venice, Lodovico il Moro and Ferdinand of Spain was formed, ostensibly against the Turks, but in reality to expel the French from Italy. Charles had himself crowned king of Naples on the 12th of May but a few days later began his retreat northward. He encountered the allies at Fornovo, and after a drawn battle cut his way through them and was back in France by November; Ferdinand II with Spanish help was reinstated at Naples soon afterwards. The expedition, if it produced no material results, laid bare the weakness of the Italian political system and the country's incapacity for resistance.

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Ezio Auditore

Ezio

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