§ 52. SIXTUS IV. 1471-1484. 431
of them were introduced into the college of cardinals. Two nephews in succession were appointed prefects of Rome. The nephews who achieved the rank of cardinals were Pietro Riario at 25, and Julian della Rovere at 28, in 1471, both Franciscan monks ; Jerome Basso and Christopher Rovere, in 1477 ; Dominico Rovere, Christopher's brother, in 1478; and the pope's grandnephew, Raphael Sansoni, at the age of 17, in 1477. The two nephews made prefects of Rome were Julian's brother Lionardo, who died in 1475, and his brother Giovanni, d. 1501. Lionardo was married by his uncle to the illegitimate daughter of Ferrante, king of Naples.^
Upon Peter Riario and Julian Rovere he heaped benefice after benefice. Julian, a man of rare ability, afterwards made pope under the name of Julius 11., was appointed archbishop of Avignon and then of Bologna, bishop of Lausanne, Constance, Viviers, Ostia and Velletri, and placed at the head of several abbeys. Riario, who, according to popular hearsay, was the pope's own child, was bishop of Spoleto, Seville and Valencia, Patriarch of Constantinople, and recipient of other rich places, until his income amounted to 60,000 florins or about 2,500,000 francs. He went about with a retinue of 100 horsemen. His expenditures were lavish and his estate royal. His mistresses, whom he did not attempt to conceal, were dressed in elegant fabrics, and one of them wore slippers embroidered with pearls. Dominico received one after the other the bishoprics of Corneto, Tarentaise, Geneva and Turin.
The visit of Leonora, the daughter of Ferrante, in Rome in 1473, while on her way to Ferrara to meet her husband, Hercules of Este, was perhaps the most splendid occasion the city had witnessed since the first visit of Frederick II L It furnished Riario an opportunity for the display of a magnificent hospitality. On Whitsunday, the Neapolitan princess was conducted by two cardinals to St. Peter's, where she heard mass said by the pope and then at high-noon witnessed the miracle
1 A useful genealogical tree of the Rovere is given by Creighton, III. 100. Pastor takes no pains to hide his righteous indignation at Sixtus' exhaustive provision for his relatives, — seine zahlreiche und unwurdige Verioandten, as he calls them.
432 THE MIDDLE AGES. A.D. 1204-1517.
play of Susanna and the Elders, acted by Florentine players. The next evening she sat down to a banquet which lasted 3 hours and combined all the skill which decorators and cooks could apply. The soft divans and costly curtainings, the silk costumes of the servants and the rich courses are described in detail by contemporary writers. In anticipation of modern electrical fans, 3 bellows were used to cool and freshen the atmosphere. In such things, remarks Infessura, the treasures of the Church were squandered. i
In 1474, on the death of Peter Riario, a victim of his excesses and aged only 28,^ his brother Jerome, a layman, came into supreme favor. Sixtus was ready to put all the possessions of the papal see at his disposal and, on his account, he became involved in feuds with Florence and Venice. He purchased for this favorite Imola, at a cost of 40,000 ducats, and married him to the illegitimate daughter of tlie duke of Milan, Catherine Sf orza. The purchase of Imola was resented by Florence, but Sixtus did not hesitate to further antagonize the republic and the Medici. The Medici had established a branch bankinghouse in Rome and become the papal bankers. Sixtus chose to affront the family by patronizing the Pazzi, a rival bankingfirm. At the death of Philip de' Medici, archbishop of Pisa, in 1474, Salviati was appointed his successor against the protest of the Medici. Finally, Julian de' Medici was denied the cardinalship. These events marked the stages in the progress of the rupture between the papacy and Florence. Lorenzo, called the Magnificent, and his brother Julian represented the family which the fiscal talents of Cosmo de' jNIedici had founded. In his readiness to support the ambitions of his nephew, Jerome Riario, the pope seemed willing to go to any length of violence. A conspiracy was directed against Lorenzo's life, in
1 Diario, p. 77. At the chief banquet, the menu comprised wild boarsroasted whole, bucks, goats, hares, pheasants, fish, peacocks with their feathers, storks, cranes, and countless fruits and sweetmeats. An artificial mountain of sugar was brought into the dining-chamber, from which a man stepped forth with gestures of surprise at finding himself amid such gorgeous surroundings.
2 Sixtus reared to him a splendid monument in the Church of the Apostles, Peter and his brother Jerome are represented as kneeling and praying to the Madonna. See Pastor, II. 294 sq.