Giovanni Borgia

"Giovanni Borgia" may refer to several members of the Borgia family.

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Giovanni Borgia, 2nd Duke of Borgia (the family's home town, a title created in the Kingdom of Aragon under pressure from Roderigo Borgia, later Pope Alexander VI and Giovanni's father) was the brother of the famous Cesare Borgia. Giovanni, duke of Borgia, was assassinated the night of June 14, 1497, and his richly attired body, with 30 golden ducats untouched in the purse at his belt, was thrown into the Tiber, to the immense grief of the Pope, occasioning the heartless epigram of Sannazzaro on the Pope as "fisher of men." His few attendants were slain, so there were no witnesses (Sabatini, II.4).

Related Topics:
Pope Alexander VI - Cesare Borgia - June 14 - 1497 - Sannazzaro

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The most famous Giovanni Borgia (March 1498 – 1548), the infans Romanus ("child of Rome"), was probably the love-child of Lucrezia Borgia, though Pope Alexander VI issued two papal bulls, both dated September 1, 1501, in each of which a different father is assigned to him, the second appearing to supplement and correct the first.

Related Topics:
1498 - 1548 - Lucrezia Borgia - Pope Alexander VI - Papal bull

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The first of these Bulls, addressed to "Dilecto Filio Nobili Joanni de Borgia, Infanti Romano," declares him to be a child of three years of age, the illegitimate son of Cesare Borgia, unmarried (as Cesare was at the time of the child's birth) and of a woman (unnamed, as was usual in such cases) also unmarried.

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The second declares him, instead, to be the son of Alexander himself and runs: "Since you bear this deficiency not from the said duke, but from us and the said woman, which we for good reasons did not desire to express in the preceding writing." The pope was forbidden by canon law to publicly recognize children and did not wish that the child should suffer in his inheritance as a consequence http://www.public-domain-content.com/books/Life_of_Cesare_Borgia/C21P1.shtml. Precisely at the same date the final arrangements were made for Lucrezia's betrothal to Alfonso d'Este, duke of Ferrara.

Related Topics:
Alfonso d'Este - Duke of Ferrara

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The child Giovanni appeared as a companion of Lucrezia, who named him as her younger half-brother. Alexander, in two bulls excommunicating members of the Savelli and Colonna families and confiscating their properties, was able to name the young Giovanni as heir to the duchy of Nepi, a property important to the Borgia family, and also duke of Palestrina, September 17 1501. Giovanni was passed from guardian to guardian, eventually ending up with Lucrezia in Ferrara. He held several other titles, including the signory of Vetralla, but the unfortunate Giovanni never succeeded in possessing his titles, and, after a career serving as a minor functionary in the Papal Curia and at the court of France, failed to gain much power and eventually died relatively unknown.

Related Topics:
Bull - Excommunicating - Colonna - Nepi - Palestrina - Ferrara - Vetralla - Papal Curia

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Hella S. Haasse constructed a historical novel around the figure of Giovanni Borgia, The Scarlet City (1952).

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