CHAPTER XII
Caesar's ambition was only fed by victories: scarcely was he master
of Faenza before, excited by the Mariscotti, old enemies of the
Bentivoglio family, he cast his eyes upon Bologna; but Gian di
Bentivoglio, whose ancestors had possessed this town from time
immemorial, had not only made all preparations necessary for a long
resistance, but he had also put himself under the protection of
France; so, scarcely had he learned that Caesar was crossing the
frontier of the Bolognese territory with his army, than he sent a
courier to Louis XII to claim the fulfilment of his promise. Louis
kept it with his accustomed good faith; and when Caesar arrived
before Bologna, he received an intimation from the King of France
that he was not to enter on any undertaking against his ally
Bentivoglio; Caesar, not being the man to have his plans upset for
nothing, made conditions for his retreat, to which Bentivoglio
consented, only too happy to be quit of him at this price: the
conditions were the cession of Castello Bolognese, a fortress between
Imola and Faenza, the payment of a tribute of 9000 ducats, and the
keeping for his service of a hundred men-at-arms and two thousand
infantry. In exchange for these favours, Caesar confided to
Bentivoglio that his visit had been due to the counsels of the
Mariscotti; then, reinforced by his new ally's contingent, he took
the road for Tuscany. But he was scarcely out of sight when
Bentivoglio shut the gates of Bologna, and commanded his son Hermes
to assassinate with his own hand Agamemnon Mariscotti, the head of
the family, and ordered the massacre of four-and-thirty of his near
relatives, brothers, sons, daughters, and nephews, and two hundred
other of his kindred and friends. The butchery was carried out by
the noblest youths of Bologna; whom Bentivoglio forced to bathe their
hands in this blood, so that he might attach them to himself through
their fear of reprisals.
Caesar's plans with regard to Florence were now no longer a mystery:
since the month of January he had sent to Pisa ten or twelve hundred
men under the Command of Regniero della Sassetta and Piero di Gamba
Corti, and as soon as the conquest of the Romagna was complete, he
had further despatched Oliverotto di Fermo with new detachments. His
own army he had reinforced, as we have seen, by a hundred men-at-arms
and two thousand infantry; he had just been joined by Vitellozzo
Vitelli, lord of Citta, di Castello, and by the Orsini, who had
brought him another two or three thousand men; so, without counting
the troops sent to Pisa, he had under his control seven hundred men-
at-arms and five thousand infantry.
Still, in spite of this formidable company, he entered Tuscany
declaring that his intentions were only pacific, protesting that he
only desired to pass through the territories of the republic on his
way to Rome, and offering to pay in ready money for any victual his
army might require. But when he had passed the defiles of the
mountains and arrived at Barberino, feeling that the town was in his
power and nothing could now hinder his approach, he began to put a
price on the friendship he had at first offered freely, and to impose
his own conditions instead of accepting those of others. These were
that Piero dei Medici, kinsman and ally of the Orsini, should be
reinstated in his ancient power; that six Florentine citizens, to be
chosen by Vitellozzo, should be put into his hands that they might by
their death expiate that of Paolo Vitelli, unjustly executed by the
Florentines; that the Signoria should engage to give no aid to the
lord of Piombino, whom Caesar intended to dispossess of his estates
without delay; and further, that he himself should be taken into the
service of the republic, for a pay proportionate to his deserts. But
just as Caesar had reached this point in his negotiations with
Florence, he received orders from Louis XII to get ready, so soon as
he conveniently could, to follow him with his army and help in the
conquest of Naples, which he was at last in a position to undertake.
Caesar dared not break his word to so powerful an ally; he therefore
replied that he was at the king's orders, and as the Florentines were
not aware that he was quitting them on compulsion, he sold his
retreat for the sum of 36,000 ducats per annum, in exchange for which
sum he was to hold three hundred men-at-arms always in readiness to
go to the aid of the republic at her earliest call and in any
circumstances of need.
But, hurried as he was, Caesar still hoped that he might find time to
conquer the territory of Piombino as he went by, and take the capital
by a single vigorous stroke; so he made his entry into the lands of
Jacopo IV of Appiano. The latter, he found, however, had been
beforehand with him, and, to rob him of all resource, had laid waste
his own country, burned his fodder, felled his trees, torn down his
vines, and destroyed a few fountains that produced salubrious waters.
This did not hinder Caesar from seizing in the space of a few days
Severeto, Scarlino, the isle of Elba, and La Pianosa; but he was
obliged to stop short at the castle, which opposed a serious
resistance. As Louis XII's army was continuing its way towards Rome,
and he received a fresh order to join it, he took his departure the
next day, leaving behind him, Vitellozzo and Gian Paolo Bagliani to
prosecute the siege in his absence.
Louis XII was this time advancing upon Naples, not with the
incautious ardour of Charles VIII, but, on the contrary, with that
prudence and circumspection which characterised him. Besides his
alliance with Florence and Rome, he had also signed a secret treaty
with Ferdinand the Catholic, who had similar pretensions, through the
house of Duras, to the throne of Naples to those Louis himself had
through the house of Anjou. By this treaty the two kings were
sharing their conquests beforehand: Louis would be master of Naples,
of the town of Lavore and the Abruzzi, and would bear the title of
King of Naples and Jerusalem; Ferdinand reserved for his own share
Apulia and Calabria, with the title of Duke of these provinces; both
were to receive the investiture from the pope and to hold them of
him. This partition was all the more likely to be made, in fact,
because Frederic, supposing all the time that Ferdinand was his good
and faithful friend, would open the gates of his towns, only to
receive into his fortresses conquerors and masters instead of allies.
All this perhaps was not very loyal conduct on the part of a king who
had so long desired and had just now received the surname of
Catholic, but it mattered little to Louis, who profited by
treasonable acts he did not have to share.
The French army, which the Duke of Valentinois had just joined,
consisted of 1000 lances, 4000 Swiss, and 6000 Gascons and
adventurers; further, Philip of Rabenstein was bringing by sea six
Breton and Provencal vessels, and three Genoese caracks, carrying
6500 invaders.
Against this mighty host the King of Naples had only 700 men-at-
arms, 600 light horse, and 6000 infantry under the command of the
Colonna, whom he had taken into his pay after they were exiled by the
pope from the States of the Church; but he was counting on Gonsalvo
of Cordova, who was to join him at Gaeta, and to whom he had
confidingly opened all his fortresses in Calabria.
But the feeling of safety inspired by Frederic's faithless ally was
not destined to endure long: on their arrival at Rome, the French and
Spanish ambassadors presented to the pope the treaty signed at
Grenada on the 11th of November, 1500, between Louis XII and
Ferdinand the Catholic, a treaty which up, to that time had been
secret. Alexander, foreseeing the probable future, had, by the death
of Alfonso, loosened all the bonds that attached him to the house of
Aragon, and then began by making some difficulty about it. It was
demonstrated that the arrangement had only been undertaken to provide
the Christian princes with another weapon for attacking the Ottoman
Empire, and before this consideration, one may readily suppose, all
the pope's scruples vanished; on the 25th of June, therefore, it was
decided to call a consistory which was to declare Frederic deposed
from the throne of Naples. When Frederic heard all at once that the
French army had arrived at Rome, that his ally Ferdinand had deceived
him, and that Alexander had pronounced the sentence of his downfall,
he understood that all was lost; but he did not wish it to be said
that he had abandoned his kingdom without even attempting to save it.
So he charged his two new condottieri, Fabrizio Calonna and Ranuzia
di Marciano, to check the French before Capua with 300 men-at-arms,
some light horse, and 3000 infantry; in person he occupied Aversa
with another division of his army, while Prospero Colonna was sent to
defend Naples with the rest, and make a stand against the Spaniards
on the side of Calabria.
These dispositions were scarcely made when d'Aubigny, having passed
the Volturno, approached to lay siege to Capua, and invested the town
on both sides of the river. Scarcely were the French encamped before
the ramparts than they began to set up their batteries, which were
soon in play, much to the terror of the besieged, who, poor
creatures, were almost all strangers to the town, and had fled
thither from every side, expecting to find protection beneath the
walls. So, although bravely repulsed by Fabrizio Colonna, the
French, from the moment of their first assault, inspired so great and
blind a terror that everyone began to talk of opening the gates, and
it was only with great difficulty that Calonna made this multitude
understand that at least they ought to reap some benefit from the
check the besiegers had received and obtain good terms of
capitulation. When he had brought them round to his view, he sent
out to demand a parley with d'Aubigny, and a conference was fixed for
the next day but one, in which they were to treat of the surrender of
the town.
But this was not Caesar Borgia's idea at all: he had stayed behind to
confer with the pope, and had joined the French army with some of his
troops on the very day on which the conference had been arranged for
two days later: and a capitulation of any nature would rob him of his
share of the booty and the promise of such pleasure as would come
from the capture of a city so rich and populous as Capua. So he
opened up negotiations on his own account with a captain who was on
guard at one of the gates. Such negotiations, made with cunning
supported by bribery, proved as usual more prompt and efficacious
than any others. At the very moment when Fabrizio Colonna in a
fortified outpost was discussing the conditions of capitulation with
the French captains, suddenly great cries of distress were heard.
These were caused by Borgia, who without a word to anyone had entered
the town with his faithful army from Romagna, and was beginning to
cut the throats of the garrison, which had naturally somewhat relaxed
their vigilance in the belief that the capitulation was all but
signed. The French, when they saw that the town was half taken,
rushed on the gates with such impetuosity that the besieged did not
even attempt to defend themselves any longer, and forced their way
into Capua by three separate sides: nothing more could be done then
to stop the issue. Butchery and pillage had begun, and the work of
destruction must needs be completed: in vain did Fabrizio Colonna,
Ranuzio di Marciano, and Don Ugo di Cardona attempt to make head
against the French and Spaniards with such men as they could get
together. Fabrizia Calonna and Don Ugo were made prisoners; Ranuzia,
wounded by an arrow, fell into the hands of the Duke of Valentinois;
seven thousand inhabitants were massacred in the streets among them
the traitor who had given up the gate; the churches were pillaged,
the convents of nuns forced open; and then might be seen the
spectacle of some of these holy virgins casting themselves into pits
or into the river to escape the soldiers. Three hundred of the
noblest ladies of the town took refuge in a tower. The Duke of
Valentinois broke in the doors, chased out for himself forty of the
most beautiful, and handed over the rest to his army.
The pillage continued for three days.
Capua once taken, Frederic saw that it was useless any longer to
attempt defence. So he shut himself up in Castel Nuovo and gave
permission to Gaeta and to Naples to treat with the conqueror. Gaeta
bought immunity from pillage with 60,000 ducats; and Naples with the
surrender of the castle. This surrender was made to d'Aubigny by
Frederic himself, an condition that he should be allowed to take to
the island of Ischia his money, jewels, and furniture, and there
remain with his family for six months secure from all hostile attack.
The terms of this capitulation were faithfully adhered to on both
sides: d'Aubigny entered Naples, and Frederic retired to Ischia.
Thus, by a last terrible blow, never to rise again, fell this branch
of the house of Aragon, which had now reigned for sixty-five years.
Frederic, its head, demanded and obtained a safe-conduct to pass into
France, where Louis XII gave him the duchy of Anjou and 30,000 ducats
a year, an condition that he should never quit the kingdom; and
there, in fact, he died, on the 9th of September 1504. His eldest
son, Dan Ferdinand, Duke of Calabria, retired to Spain, where he was
permitted to marry twice, but each time with a woman who was known to
be barren; and there he died in 1550. Alfonso, the second son, who
had followed his father to France, died, it is said, of poison, at
Grenoble, at the age of twenty-two; lastly Caesar, the third son,
died at Ferrara, before he had attained his eighteenth birthday.
Frederic's daughter Charlotte married in France Nicholas, Count of
Laval, governor and admiral of Brittany; a daughter was born of this
marriage, Anne de Laval, who married Francois de la Trimauille.
Through her those rights were transmitted to the house of La
Trimouille which were used later on as a claim upon the kingdom of
the Two Sicilies.
The capture of Naples gave the Duke of Valentinois his liberty again;
so he left the French army, after he had received fresh assurances on
his own account of the king's friendliness, and returned to the siege
of Piombino, which he had been forced to interrupt. During this
interval Alexander had been visiting the scenes of his son's
conquests, and traversing all the Romagna with Lucrezia, who was now
consoled for her husband's death, and had never before enjoyed quite
so much favour with His Holiness; so, when she returned to Rome she
no longer had separate rooms from him. The result of this
recrudescence of affection was the appearance of two pontifical
bulls, converting the towns of Nepi and Sermoneta into duchies: one
was bestowed on Gian Bargia, an illegitimate child of the pope, who
was not the son of either of his mistresses, Rosa Vanozza or Giulia
Farnese, the other on Don Roderigo of Aragon, son of Lucrezia and
Alfonso: the lands of the Colonna were in appanage to the two
duchies.
But Alexander was dreaming of yet another addition to his fortune;
this was to come from a marriage between Lucrezia and Don Alfonso
d'Este, son of Duke Hercules of Ferrara, in favour of which alliance
Louis XII had negotiated.
His Holiness was now having a run of good fortune, and he learned on
the same day that Piombino was taken and that Duke Hercules had given
the King of France his assent to the marriage. Both of these pieces
of news were good for Alexander, but the one could not compare in
importance with the other; and the intimation that Lucrezia was to
marry the heir presumptive to the duchy of Ferrara was received with
a joy so great that it smacked of the humble beginnings of the
Borgian house. The Duke of Valentinois was invited to return to
Rome, to take his share in the family rejoicing, and on the day when
the news was made public the governor of St. Angelo received orders
that cannon should be fired every quarter of an hour from noon to
midnight. At two o'clock, Lucrezia, attired as a fiancee, and
accompanied by her two brothers, the Dukes of Valentinois and
Squillace, issued from the Vatican, followed by all the nobility of
Rome, and proceeded to the church of the Madonna del Papalo, where
the Duke of Gandia and Cardinal Gian Borgia were buried, to render
thanks for this new favour accorded to her house by God; and in the
evening, accompanied by the same cavalcade, which shone the more
brightly under the torchlight and brilliant illuminations, she made
procession through the whale town, greeted by cries of "Long live
Pope Alexander VI! Long live the Duchess of Ferrara!" which were
shouted aloud by heralds clad in cloth of gold.
The next day an announcement was made in the town that a racecourse
for women was opened between the castle of Sant' Angelo and the
Piazza of St. Peter's; that on every third day there would be a bull-
fight in the Spanish fashion; and that from the end of the present
month, which was October, until the first day of Lent, masquerades
would be permitted in the streets of Rome.
Such was the nature of the fetes outside; the programme of those
going on within the Vatican was not presented to the people; for by
the account of Bucciardo, an eye-witness, this is what happened--
"On the last Sunday of the month of October, fifty courtesans supped
in the apostolic palace in the Duke of Valentinois' rooms, and after
supper danced with the equerries and servants, first wearing their
usual garments, afterwards in dazzling draperies; when supper was
over, the table was removed, candlesticks were set on the floor in a
symmetrical pattern, and a great quantity of chestnuts was scattered
on the ground: these the fifty women skilfully picked up, running
about gracefully, in and out between the burning lights; the pope,
the Duke of Valentinois, and his sister Lucrezia, who were looking on
at this spectacle from a gallery, encouraged the most agile and
industrious with their applause, and they received prizes of
embroidered garters, velvet boots, golden caps, and laces; then new
diversions took the place of these."
We humbly ask forgiveness of our readers, and especially of our lady
readers; but though we have found words to describe the first part of
the spectacle, we have sought them in vain for the second; suffice it
to say that just as there had been prizes for feats of adroitness,
others were given now to the dancers who were most daring and brazen.
Some days after this strange night, which calls to mind the Roman
evenings in the days of Tiberius, Nero, and Heliogabalus, Lucrezia,
clad in a robe of golden brocade, her train carried by young girls
dressed in white and crowned with roses, issued from her palace to
the sound of trumpets and clarions, and made her way over carpets
that were laid down in the streets through which she had to pass.
Accompanied by the noblest cavaliers and the loveliest women in Rome,
she betook herself to the Vatican, where in the Pauline hall the pope
awaited her, with the Duke of Valentinois, Don Ferdinand, acting as
proxy for Duke Alfonso, and his cousin, Cardinal d'Este. The pope
sat on one side of the table, while the envoys from Ferrara stood on
the other: into their midst came Lucrezia, and Don Ferdinand placed
on her finger the nuptial ring; this ceremony over, Cardinal d'Este
approached and presented to the bride four magnificent rings set with
precious stones; then a casket was placed on the table, richly inlaid
with ivory, whence the cardinal drew forth a great many trinkets,
chains, necklaces of pearls and diamonds, of workmanship as costly as
their material; these he also begged Lucrezia to accept, before she
received those the bridegroom was hoping to offer himself, which
would be more worthy of her. Lucrezia showed the utmost delight in
accepting these gifts; then she retired into the next room, leaning
on the pope's arm, and followed by the ladies of her suite, leaving
the Duke of Valentinois to do the honours of the Vatican to the men.
That evening the guests met again, and spent half the night in
dancing, while a magnificent display of fireworks lighted up the
Piazza of San Paolo.
The ceremony of betrothal over, the pope and the Duke busied
themselves with making preparations for the departure. The pope, who
wished the journey to be made with a great degree of splendour, sent
in his daughter's company, in addition to the two brothers-in-law and
the gentlemen in their suite, the Senate of Rome and all the lords
who, by virtue of their wealth, could display most magnificence in
their costumes and liveries. Among this brilliant throng might be
seen Olivero and Ramiro Mattei, sons of Piero Mattel, chancellor of
the town, and a daughter of the pope whose mother was not Rosa
Vanozza; besides these, the pope nominated in consistory Francesco
Borgia, Cardinal of Sosenza, legate a latere, to accompany his
daughter to the frontiers of the Ecclesiastical States.
Also the Duke of Valentinois sent out messengers into all the cities
of Romagna to order that Lucrezia should be received as sovereign
lady and mistress: grand preparations were at once set on foot for
the fulfilment of his orders. But the messengers reported that they
greatly feared that there would be some grumbling at Cesena, where it
will be remembered that Caesar had left Ramiro d'Orco as governor
with plenary powers, to calm the agitation of the town. Now Ramiro
d'Orco had accomplished his task so well that there was nothing more
to fear in the way of rebellion; for one-sixth of the inhabitants had
perished on the scaffold, and the result of this situation was that
it was improbable that the same demonstrations of joy could be
expected from a town plunged in mourning that were looked for from
Imala, Faenza, and Pesaro. The Duke of Valentinais averted this
inconvenience in the prompt and efficacious fashion characteristic of
him alone. One morning the inhabitants of Cesena awoke to find a
scaffold set up in the square, and upon it the four quarters of a
man, his head, severed from the trunk, stuck up on the end of a pike.
This man was Ramiro d'Orco.
No one ever knew by whose hands the scaffold had been raised by
night, nor by what executioners the terrible deed had been carried
out; but when the Florentine Republic sent to ask Macchiavelli, their
ambassador at Cesena, what he thought of it, he replied:
"MAGNIFICENT LORDS,--I can tell you nothing concerning the execution
of Ramiro d'Orco, except that Caesar Borgia is the prince who best
knows how to make and unmake men according to their deserts.
NICCOLO MACCHIAVELLI"
The Duke of Valentinois was not disappointed, and the future Duchess
of Ferrara was admirably received in every town along her route, and
particularly at Cesena.
While Lucrezia was on her way to Ferrara to meet her fourth husband,
Alexander and the Duke of Valentinois resolved to make progress in
the region of their last conquest, the duchy of Piombino. The
apparent object of this journey was that the new subjects might take
their oath to Caesar, and the real object was to form an arsenal in
Jacopo d'Appiano's capital within reach of Tuscany, a plan which
neither the pope nor his son had ever seriously abandoned. The two
accordingly started from the port of Corneto with six ships,
accompanied by a great number of cardinals and prelates, and arrived
the same evening at Piombina. The pontifical court made a stay there
of several days, partly with a view of making the duke known to the
inhabitants, and also in order to be present at certain
ecclesiastical functions, of which the most important was a service
held on the third Sunday in Lent, in which the Cardinal of Cosenza
sang a mass and the pope officiated in state with the duke and the
cardinals. After these solemn functions the customary pleasures
followed, and the pope summoned the prettiest girls of the country
and ordered them to dance their national dances before him.
Following on these dances came feasts of unheard of magnificence,
during which the pope in the sight of all men completely ignored Lent
and did not fast. The object of all these fetes was to scatter
abroad a great deal of money, and so to make the Duke of Valentinois
popular, while poor Jacopo d'Appiano was forgotten.
When they left Piombino, the pope and his son visited the island of
Elba, where they only stayed long enough to visit the old
fortifications and issue orders for the building of new ones.
Then the illustrious travellers embarked on their return journey to
Rome; but scarcely had they put out to sea when the weather became
adverse, and the pope not wishing to put in at Porto Ferrajo, they
remained five days on board, though they had only two days'
provisions. During the last three days the pope lived on fried fish
that were caught under great difficulties because of the heavy
weather. At last they arrived in sight of Corneto, and there the
duke, who was not on the same vessel as the pope, seeing that his
ship could not get in, had a boat put out, and so was taken ashore.
The pope was obliged to continue on his way towards Pontercole, where
at last he arrived, after encountering so violent a tempest that all
who were with him were utterly subdued either by sickness or by the
terror of death. The pope alone did not show one instant's fear, but
remained on the bridge during the storm, sitting on his arm-chair,
invoking the name of Jesus and making the sign of the cross. At last
his ship entered the roads of Pontercole, where he landed, and after
sending to Corneto to fetch horses, he rejoined the duke, who was
there awaiting him. They then returned by slow stages, by way of
Civita Vecchia and Palo, and reached Rome after an absence of a
month. Almost at the same time d'Albret arrived in quest of his
cardinal's hat. He was accompanied by two princes of the house of
Navarre, who were received with not only those honours which beseemed
their rank, but also as brothers-in-law to whom the duke was eager
to show in what spirit he was contracting this alliance.
