IN 1484, THE ROMAN CHRONICLER Stefano Infessura recorded that a local painter was arrested for a peculiar offense. While living on retainer in the Orsini stronghold in Montegiordano, the artist had executed a large mural portraying the military exploits of Count Girolamo and the papal armies. Brightly colored camps and vivid depictions of combat made the work a visual treat. The pope, however, took such umbrage at the painting that he ordered the young man to be apprehended and executed. Some observers maintained that the pontiff was offended by the fact that the papal armies appeared ineffectual in the clashes. Others more maliciously suggested that the papal ire had been provoked by what was going on inside the commander's tent: a woman was being amorously embraced by a man who wore the tonsure and brown robe of a Franciscan friar.1 Ultimately, the offending artist was freed after ten strokes of the corda because, as everyone knew, "he was a little crazy."
Infessura slipped this little anecdote into his diaries to foment damaging gossip about the family he hated most in Rome, the Riarios. Pope Sixtus was of the Franciscan order, and Caterina was the wife of the commander of the papal armies; some would interpret the suggestive little vignette as alluding to an affair between the pope and his nephew's wife. Many contemporaries noted that the elderly pope enjoyed the young woman's company, and small wonder, for she was the most accomplished and interesting of all his nieces-in-law. Stories of the special favor that Caterina had won at the papal court even reached the ears of people who never came to Rome, one of whom noted that the most powerful princes of Europe soon learned to voice their requests through the young girl sitting by the pope's feet, for "he could deny her nothing."2 While no evidence whatsoever suggests that an affair ever transpired between nineteen-year-old Caterina and her sixty-eight-year-old uncle-in-law, the idea of the austere Franciscan friar seduced by his nephew's youthful bride was bandied about in the kind of titillating whispers that still feed gossip columns today.
The storyteller Infessura, however, had much more than amusement in mind. A staunch promoter of a republic in Rome, he despised the papacy. By hinting at and later openly making accusations of sexual misbehavior, he was making use of an ancient theme familiar to all Romans: the kidnapping of the ruler Menelaus's wife, Helen, started the Trojan War; the rape of the Roman matron Lucretia spelled doom for the Etruscan kings; and the host of Christian virgins who chose death over dishonor played a part in the downfall of the Roman Empire. Sexual scandal could topple kingdoms and almost invariably left an indelible mark. That Sixtus would come in for more than his fair share of salacious rumors was part of what it meant to sit on a throne. It didn't help that he came from an unknown family, and was scorned for it. Born Francesco della Rovere in 1414, Sixtus IV was a rarity in the Renaissance papacy: a self-made man. Malicious courtiers and political enemies would maintain that he was the son of a Ligurian fisherman. In fact he was born of a fairly well-to-do merchant family in Savona, a town on the border of the Republic of Genoa and the Duchy of Milan. The second of seven children, Francesco was destined for the church from birth, and from the moment he joined the Franciscan order in 1428, he flourished in his vocation. By the age of twenty-five, he had already acquired a reputation as a passionate and persuasive speaker. Five years later, he earned his doctorate at the prestigious University of Padua. His debating skills and excellence in teaching soon brought him to the attention of the erudite Cardinal Giovanni Bessarion, a dynamic Greek prelate who served as the right-hand man of Pope Paul II. Bessarion transferred the brilliant young Franciscan to the archbishopric of Perugia, where he served as the cardinal's personal confessor.
At the age of fifty, Francesco was made superior general of the Franciscan order. In 1467, again through the offices of Cardinal Bessarion, Pope Paul II appointed him a cardinal. Unlike many scions of noble families or wealthy merchants, Francesco did not win his red hat in exchange for cash or lands; he earned it through his abilities as a theologian and administrator. Four years after he moved to Rome, Francesco della Rovere was elected pope in 1471 and took the name Sixtus IV. Vatican pundits were amazed that an unknown Franciscan from Liguria could have risen above the numerous cardinals attached by birth and rank to the Italian nobility or those who had years of curial service under their scarlet sashes. Envious conjecture attributed his success to bribery or bizarre sexual favors—anything but merit. But Sixtus, a frugal man of austere personal habits, was guilty of neither. Many cardinal-electors seemed impressed by his abilities. Among Sixtus's strongest and most influential supporters was Caterina's father, Galeazzo Maria Sforza, the duke of Milan. In a certain sense Caterina's destiny was decided on August 9, 1471, the day of the papal coronation.
The new pope chose his name in honor of an illustrious predecessor, Saint Sixtus III, the fifth-century pope and theologian who had triumphed over the Nestorian heresy at the Council of Ephesus. Sixtus III was also a builder who constructed Rome's most elegant basilica, Saint Mary Major, and an able administrator who labored to reunite a church torn apart by heresies.
Having lived in Rome for only four years before his election, Sixtus IV found himself at a grave disadvantage. He was unacquainted with most of the ecclesiastics in Rome and knew little of the political alliances that linked local clans. To remedy this, Sixtus brought down members of his own family from Savona and raised them to high political and curial offices. Of the thirty-four clerics whom he elevated as cardinals during his reign, six were his own nephews. The important positions of governor of Rome and captain of the papal armies, moreover, were given to other family members. Most of his cardinal nephews revealed themselves to be profligate spenders, however, scandalizing Rome with lavish banquets and retinues. Pietro Riario spent 300,000 ducats in two years as cardinal—more than the amount budgeted by Sixtus for the war against the Turks! Others, like Girolamo, not only spent extravagantly but also used papal protection to bully and extort the Romans. Only Cardinal Giuliano della Rovere appeared worthy of his newfound eminence, serving his uncle as legate to Avignon and attempting to dissuade Girolamo from his plots to assassinate Lorenzo de' Medici.
Unlike most of the pope's relatives, Girolamo's young and beautiful wife lived up to expectations. Well educated, Caterina could appreciate the efforts the pope put into creating the Vatican library. After nine years of Sixtus's pontificate, the collection boasted thirty-five hundred volumes, triple the size of even the celebrated Medici library.3 Caterina read voraciously and was particularly interested in historical and devotional literature. Stories of heroes strengthened her will, while stories of saints sustained her spirit. She managed to find time for reading among her duties to her family and the court, where her principal job was to intercede with one relative or another as requested by various parties. Her intervention saved several Milanese men from capital punishment in Rome and gained important positions for Romans in Milan. On one occasion she was even able to overturn Count Girolamo's decision to hang a member of the Manfredi clan.4 Numerous letters from this period testify to the influence of the busy countess.
During most of her years in Rome, Caterina was either pregnant or recovering from childbirth. These confinements often kept her from her beloved outdoor pastimes. Particularly from 1479 to 1481, when she had three children in two years, she spent hours in the papal palace. During this period, Sixtus was working on his most ambitious decorative projects. The Sistine Chapel had just been completed, and within the forbidding fortresslike brick walls Sixtus envisioned a cycle of the most beautiful murals in the world.
Fulfillment of that dream came from a surprising quarter. In 1481, despite Girolamo's botched assassination attempt and Sixtus's warmongering, Lorenzo de' Medici offered a remarkable olive branch to his old nemesis: the finest painters from his own circle to decorate the pope's chapel. Rome was abuzz with exhilaration awaiting the arrival of the dream team of Florentine art. The elite group included Sandro Botticelli, painter of the celebrated Birth of Venus; Domenico Ghirlandaio, who would soon receive the young Michelangelo as an apprentice; and Pietro Perugino, the creator of solemn and dignified altarpieces throughout central Italy, and destined to tutor to greatness the as yet unborn Raphael. The great masters prepared their drawings and set about creating frescoes in the chapel.
The Florentine painters began with three panels around the altar in 1481. By the time the cycle was complete in late 1482, it included fourteen scenes drawn from the Old Testament, known collectively as The Stories of Moses, which were paralleled by the New Testament series, The Life of Christ; they would delight the papal court as well as future generations. Above these panels, the same artists depicted the first thirty-two Roman pontiffs, the sainted predecessors of Sixtus IV. The vault boasted golden stars against a lapis sky; twenty-eight years later, Michelangelo would transform it into The Stories of Genesis. The lowest level of the chapel was painted to resemble tapestries interwoven with the coat of arms of the della Rovere family: an oak tree and acorns. The sumptuous gilding around the rich crimson and cornflower hues echoed the magnificent liturgical vestments of the court. Other panels celebrated the achievements of Sixtus IV.
As the artists worked, this solemn liturgical space was transformed into the hottest social scene in Rome. Courtiers vied to be immortalized in one of the frescoes. From crowned heads to the endless series of Riario relatives, notables flowed through the papal chapel, eager to be included, and many were. Numerous sovereigns grace the walls of the chapel. King Ferdinand of Naples (an ally at the moment) and the papal condottiere Federico di Montefeltro have pride of place in Christ Delivers the Keys to Saint Peter,while Charlotte, queen of Cyprus, whose island state had been taken by the Turkish fleet and who was living in exile in Rome, listens to Christ in The Sermon on the Mount. Members of the Italian intelligentsia are also showcased, from the papal secretary Andrea de Trebizond to Francesco Filefo, the former tutor of Caterina and her brothers. Even the canines of the court found a place in these splendid masterworks. One courtier managed to get his lapdog depicted in The Last Supper. The little terrier frolicking on its hind legs in Cosimo Rosselli's panel was the beloved pet of one of Sixtus's nobles.
Few visitors to the chapel would have overlooked the Turkish costume worn by the pharaoh in The Crossing of the Red Sea, placed to the left of the papal throne. Terror of the Ottoman Turks and their invincible fleet had salved political rifts throughout Europe. Since the rise of Mehmed II and his expansionist policies in the mid-fifteenth century, the Turks had snatched the Holy Land, Cyprus, and, most fatefully, Constantinople from the Christians. In this dramatic image, the waters of the Red Sea engulf soldiers in Turkish attire, while men in armor stand around Moses, representing the knights who fought to defend Otranto in the terrible battle that cost twelve thousand lives. Sixtus also paid homage to the man who had helped put him on the throne of Saint Peter; he had a posthumous portrait of Cardinal Bessarion added to the picture. The snowy-bearded prelate carries a reliquary in memory of his own triumphal arrival in 1462 bearing the relic of Saint Andrew's head to Rome.
The most significant panels of the series were entrusted to the two most gifted painters, Botticelli and Perugino. The Delivery of the Keys, the image symbolizing Jesus' institution of the papacy, was assigned to Perugino, famous for the stateliness and dignity of his work. Botticelli was awarded the commission to paint the panel dearest to the pope, the one facing his throne. Although only two years earlier Botticelli had portrayed the members of the Pazzi conspiracy, including Archbishop Salviati, hanging indecently above the piazza after their execution, Sixtus now wanted the brilliant Florentine to execute the scene that would be peopled with members of his own family.
The Purification of the Leper and The Temptation of Christ was among the first four panels executed in the summer of 1481. In the background, Botticelli rendered several miniature scenes from the temptation of Christ; the foreground features the high priest accepting the sacrifice offered by the leper whom Christ had healed. This is the only panel of the series where Jesus is absent from the principal scene. The priest's deep lapis robe laced with gold and his high tiara-like hat, with a single acorn on the summit, associate this noble figure with the pope and his authority to judge whether one is cleansed of sin. Santo Spirito, the hospital complex recently completed by Sixtus, dominates the image. This great gift to the city cared for both pilgrims to Rome and Romans themselves, all spiritual children of the pope. The striking fresco alludes to the pope's desire to heal the ills of both body and soul. By including this distinctively Roman building, Botticelli transported the scene out of first-century Galilee and placed it squarely in the Eternal City. Facing the papal throne stands Cardinal Giuliano della Rovere, holding a white handkerchief to symbolize his elevated authority in the papal court. Directly behind the high priest Botticelli then placed Girolamo Riario, wearing the heavy gold chain that marked his important civic status. In this portrait, the count's fleshy face droops into the scowl fast becoming his most characteristic expression. The two papal nephews, already great rivals, face each other on either side of the high priest.5 On the right, however, Botticelli inserted a single graceful female figure. Painted in the style of his Flora of The Primavera, she approaches like a gentle breeze. This figure can be recognized as Caterina, entering the sixth month of her pregnancy with her third child, Bianca. The lovely woman of the fresco wears her swollen belly easily, walking with a light step as her golden hair trails behind her. At the time the panel was painted, Caterina was busily preparing for her trip to Forlì. Botticelli seems taken not only with the beauty of the countess but also with her vibrant energy. The figure in the painting effortlessly carries firewood over her shoulder, perhaps an allusion to Caterina's industriousness despite the summer heat and her advanced pregnancy. At her feet, an infant bearing grapes recoils as a viper winds itself around his leg. Since the viper is the symbol of the Sforzas, this child could be Cesare, the one-year-old son of the Riarios.
Botticelli and Caterina may indeed have spent more time together during his stay in Rome. Several art historians have recognized Caterina in his portrait of Saint Catherine kept in the Altenburg Staatliches Museum.6 The golden-haired woman in sharp profile represents Caterina's high position as well as her modesty as the wife of one of the most powerful men in Europe. This early portrayal of Caterina, noble, beautiful, yet turned away from the viewer, captures a young woman still dominated by her household and circumstances. Soon that phase of her life would come to an end.
Although their images in the Sistine Chapel suggest a glittering world free of cares and strife, the days of Riario glory were numbered. Sixtus was growing weaker. As the Romans realized that his papacy was drawing to a close, plans were laid to avenge Girolamo's extortions and outrages. The armed guards surrounding Caterina and her husband grew to a cumbersome and unruly number as Girolamo's fear of going out in public grew.
Girolamo exploited every minute of the waning papacy to extract as much money as possible from the College of Cardinals. Many of the churchmen capitulated to the count's demands. Joining forces with his nephew, Cardinal Raffaello Riario, who only a few years earlier had been the terrified Florentine prisoner in the wake of the Pazzi conspiracy, Girolamo ruled Rome from behind the now weak and aged pontiff. The Sienese ambassador Lorenzo Lanti warned his home republic that "the pope had put all the government in the hands of the count [Girolamo] and San Giorgio [Raffaello Riario]: temporal, spiritual, money, and everything." Lanti also noted that almost every judge in Rome was "ready to uphold their sentences."7 Girolamo sold church offices, demanded immediate payments of up to a thousand ducats from papal employees to allow them to keep their jobs, and imposed random taxes. He had torn down and burned numerous houses in the course of his extortions, and stole reliquaries and missals. Girolamo's own relative Antonio Basso della Rovere had denounced the count from his deathbed before witnesses, accusing him of having "committed crimes that had scandalized the universe" and warning that "God's justice, which no human being can escape, would soon be on him."8
Although most of Girolamo's accomplices were street thugs and ruffians, a few were brave, intelligent, and surprisingly loyal. Il Tolentino, the trusted governor of Forlì, had been recalled to Girolamo's side shortly after the Riarios returned to Rome. The count needed his acute ability to sniff out danger in the Curia, the governing body of prelates at the Vatican. A substitute for Il Tolentino in Forlì had been hastily chosen in the archbishop of Imola, a cruel and inept man who wrongfully punished the entire city for a supposed conspiracy by detaining all the citizens inside the city walls and forbidding the harvesting of grapes for wine, a major source of income to the town. The keeper of the citadel, Tommaso Feo, fearful of a full-scale revolt, sent word to Rome of the excesses of the archbishop. Il Tolentino leapt into the saddle and in three days and three nights of ceaseless riding returned to Forlì, where he was greeted with tears of joy from the grateful populace.
Girolamo's other trusted henchman was Innocenzo Codronchi, keeper of the Castel Sant'Angelo, the papal fortress of Rome. A citizen of Imola, Codronchi had proven his worth during the Battle of Campo Morto. In return, Girolamo gave him control of the most imposing building in Rome. The Castel Sant'Angelo had been built by the emperor Hadrian in the second century A.D. as a burial site for himself and future emperors. It didn't take long for the medieval Romans to realize that the building, a solid round drum of bricks and stone blocks, would make an impregnable fortress. Its strategic position across the Tiber from downtown Rome and its close proximity to the Vatican made its location decisive: the person who controlled the castle controlled Rome. The Castel Sant'Angelo (so named after the miraculous apparition of the archangel Michael in A.D. 590) protected the citizens of Rome until the eleventh century, when it was first used to detain political prisoners. In 1400, when the popes returned from Avignon, they assumed direct control of the fortress. With its high, thick walls, and its cannons trained on every part of the city, the Castel Sant'Angelo underwrote the papal insurance policy against internal revolt.
While Il Tolentino governed in Forlì and Codronchi resided in the castle, a new crony of Girolamo's appeared on Caterina's doorstep—Virgilio, lord of Bracciano, head of the power-hungry Orsini clan. The new partnership between Girolamo and Virgilio would drag Rome into civil war.
Although an international peace of sorts had been gained by 1480, in Rome the perennial tensions between the Orsini and the Colonna families—age-old rivals of the Roman aristocracy who had been feuding for centuries—were reaching the boiling point. Entire networks of Romans were tied to one or the other tribe, while the papacy teetered on a tightrope between the two. The hostilities between the Orsini and Colonna clans was one of the spurs that had goaded the popes to Avignon. Girolamo foolishly thought himself crafty enough to maneuver the situation to his advantage. In reality, Virgilio Orsini saw in the rapacious papal nephew a chance to bring about the downfall of his ancient enemy.
During the Salt War of 1482, when the duke of Calabria appeared outside Rome with his army, Sixtus called all of his Roman knights to his service. Virgilio Orsini hastened to obey but the Colonna, Savelli, and della Valle families refused, joining the duke and exploiting his military force to expropriate Orsini lands and expand Colonna holdings.
Although most of the noncombatant members of the Colonna clan took cover safely in their country estates, their allies were left to fend for themselves within the city walls. On April 3, 1482, the Santa Croce family, supporters of the Orsinis, spurred by Virgilio and assisted by Girolamo Riario's own soldiers, attacked the palace of the della Valles, staunch Colonna allies, with two hundred men. In the resulting fracas, a Colonna was killed.
Sixtus, desperately trying to restore calm, exiled the Santa Croce clan despite Girolamo's protection. He then razed their houses, hoping to eradicate the cancerous hatred of these clans by uprooting the family enclave. But Girolamo was implacable. On June 2, the count turned on members of the pope's cabinet, accusing Cardinal Giovanni Colonna, half brother to the murdered Colonna, as well as Cardinal Giovanni Battista Savelli of attempting to have him assassinated. Despite their high office as princes of the church, Girolamo insisted on their arrest. The first night of their imprisonment, they were housed in comfortable accommodations, which was Girolamo's sop to Sixtus, who protested the arrest; but as soon as the elderly pope was distracted, the count transferred his prisoners to the dank cells of the Castel Sant'Angelo.
Now when Caterina walked through the papal apartments, she no longer heard the lilting Tuscan accents of the Florentine painters, the giggles of women posing for frescoes, and the spirited discourse of theologians and philosophers. Instead, the clang of armor resounded in the halls, as did the voices of the mercenary soldiers, speaking in mixed languages. At the door of the papal palace, as the diarist Sigismondo dei Conti described it, "soldiers stood with their swords unsheathed ready for battle. All the court was filled with pain and anguish and the exasperation of the people was kept in check by force of arms."9 All of Caterina's intercessory powers were rendered useless, as the pope, failing in health, was no longer able to control his rampaging nephew. Sixtus's golden age of renewal was over. Girolamo was ushering in an age of iron.
Anticipating the pope's death and frantic to ensure the continued prosperity of his family, Girolamo purchased another house in 1483. Called "The Garden," it was deeded in the name of his four-year-old son, Ottaviano. This maneuver, Girolamo hoped, would protect the property from the many eager to retaliate once the count had lost his powerful benefactor.
In February 1483, Caterina and Girolamo hosted exceptionally flamboyant festivities for the Roman carnival. Together, she and Girolamo frequented the dances, races, and other amusements. Wine ran from fountains and tables groaned with food as the Riarios employed the ancient technique of bread and circuses to win favor in Rome. When the week of carousing was over, Caterina and Girolamo received ceremonial ashes and prepared to suffer the forty penitential days of Lent alongside their fellow Romans.
During the first sobering weeks of the season, Sixtus fell seriously ill. Convinced of the pope's imminent death, the College of Cardinals prepared to expropriate all of the Riario properties and titles while vengeful Romans made ready to sack and destroy Girolamo's home, erasing his decadelong stranglehold on the city.
The pope recovered, but Caterina and Girolamo had seen what awaited them in the absence of papal protection. Facing a formidable list of enemies, Caterina and her husband put aside their differences and stood united to protect their children's inheritance. In March, Sixtus appointed Caterina's uncle Ascanio Sforza as cardinal, giving the Sforzas another friend in the Curia. In June they left for Forlì once again, most likely bringing the rest of the most valuable Riario possessions with them. Cart after cart transported children, furniture, and cash far from the hands of the vindictive Romans and into the well-protected fortresses of their own dominions. They returned in November and Girolamo set about making his last play in Roman politics. A month later Caterina was again with child.
Despite the pope's precarious health and the Riarios' concerns for their future, Girolamo, instead of shoring up alliances, continued to provoke difficulties and divisions. In 1484 he began open war with the Colonna family, ostensibly for their treason during the Battle of Campo Morto. With the assistance of Virgilio Orsini, he occupied Colonna lands surrounding Rome, but his sights were set on Paliano and Marino, the largest of the Colonna fortresses. To that end, Girolamo demanded that the pope summon Lorenzo Colonna, lord of Marino and protonotary of the church, to answer the accusations against him. On May 30, Girolamo brought two hundred men to the Colonna house near the Piazza Venezia, where a brutal skirmish ensued, lasting two hours and leaving several dead. Wounded in the hand, Lorenzo Colonna wisely surrendered to Virgilio. According to Infessura, Girolamo, half mad with rage, tried repeatedly to stab the protonotary as he was taken to the Castel Sant'Angelo and threatened him: "Oh you traitor, you traitor, I'll hang you as soon as we get there."10 The only obstacle separating Lorenzo from Girolamo and his dagger was Virgilio Orsini, who kept the crazed count at bay.
The Colonna houses were sacked and pulled down, together with the palaces of the Savellis. Books, artworks, and other treasures of the family that had produced Pope Martin V and returned the papacy to Rome were stolen or destroyed. Dust and smoke arose at the foot of the Capitoline Hill, where the buildings lay in ruin.
An ambassador for the Colonna family sought an audience with the count to beg for the release of Lorenzo, offering in return the strongholds of Marino and Ardea. Girolamo's greed, however, would no longer be sated with only two of their properties. "I will take all of their fortresses by storm!" he declared before putting the hapless messenger to death.11
Cardinal Giuliano della Rovere, a neighbor of the Colonna family, pleaded during a family council for the pope to end this persecution. Girolamo, he warned, would "burn down God's church, and completely ruin it" by causing this strife and turmoil. Girolamo turned on his cousin, shouting that "rebels and enemies of the church are in his house!" and accusing him of treason. Cardinal Giuliano protested to their uncle, but there was nothing the ailing pope could do to keep Girolamo in check. "I'll burn you in your own house!"12 Girolamo said, threatening Giuliano before the entire court and vowing that Giuliano's property would meet the same end as that of his friends. Count Riario thus succeeded in alienating the most powerful member of his own family.
Girolamo Riario completed his revenge against the Colonnas on Rome's most important feast day, June 29, the solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul. Lorenzo Colonna, unrecognizable after a month's imprisonment, was dragged out into the courtyard of the Castel Sant'Angelo. Wrapped in a tattered cape, he nonetheless maintained his noble mien as he repudiated the confession extracted from him under torture, expressing more concern for his friends than for his own reputation. Lorenzo sent his blessings to Pope Sixtus before approaching the executioner's tripod and laying his head upon it. Then the blow was struck. Lorenzo Colonna was no more.
When his body was returned to the family, they opened the coffin and discovered the extent of Girolamo's cruelty. Lorenzo's severed head was crowned with a red beret, a cruel joke. During imprisonment he had been suspended with weights attached to his feet until his arms became dislocated, and his feet had been ripped and cut. His thighs had been sliced and his knees sprained. Girolamo had ensured that every moment of the last month of this man's life had been excruciatingly painful.
The next day Girolamo sent his henchmen to destroy the Colonna vineyard behind the wrecked palace. While the trellises were being pulled up, several beams were taken out of Cardinal Giuliano's veranda, no doubt an act of petty vengeance on the part of the count.
Although numerous chroniclers recount the horrific actions of Girolamo, they remain silent regarding the countess. Sidelined by her husband's madness and her papal protector's weakness, she remained by the side of the aged pontiff, comforting him as he helplessly watched Girolamo cast a shadow over his pontificate.
Rome suffered through the summer of 1484. Girolamo and the Orsinis were devastating the countryside, besieging all the Colonna lands. Within the city, Girolamo's reign of terror had everyone from cardinals to cobblers trembling behind closed doors. On August 7, word reached Rome of a new treaty involving Naples, Florence, Milan, Ferrara, and Venice but excluding Pope Sixtus. In response to this political humiliation, Sixtus failed fast. On August 11, the articles of the agreement were brought to Rome and the pope read with pain that not one of the stipulations he presented to the negotiators was included. The next day he died. Upon Sixtus's death, thirteen years of pent-up rage exploded. Roman mobs raced to the Riarios' house and tore it down. The elegant columns with the intricate capitals, the delicate frescoes, the wooden furniture, and even the door and shutters were removed and shattered. The rioters even took out the lead water pipes and troughs in the stables, crying, "Colonna, Colonna!" The protonotary Lorenzo was avenged. The Romans then sacked the Riarios' farmhouse at the Castel Jubileo, about ten miles outside the city, and their supplies and livestock—a hundred cows, a hundred goats, several pigs and chickens, the stock of Parmesan cheese, and a supply of Greek wine—swelled the local pantries.
Caterina was with Girolamo at the Orsini camp near Paliano. She had been moved out of the city in July to ensure her safety, should the pope die. Despite her popularity among the Romans, their wrath against Girolamo made her a potential target for revenge. But instead of cowering behind her husband's soldiers, Caterina responded to the news of Sixtus's death and the resulting reprisals with daring action. Girolamo, ostensibly obeying the order of the College of Cardinals to cease hostilities with the Colonnas at once, left Paliano and with Virgilio Orsini made his way toward the Ponte Molle, just outside Rome. The Colonnas and Savellis were pouring back into the city, and soon it would be a deathtrap for the hated Riario count. With the Colonnas influencing the College of Cardinals and Girolamo unable to enter Rome to demand his rights, the Riario family stood to lose everything gained during Sixtus's pontificate. Caterina leapt into the saddle and rode toward Rome, accompanied only by Paolo Orsini. A seven-month-pregnant noblewoman, she had a better chance of being let through the city defenses than any other member of the Riario faction. Caterina didn't go to the papal palace to find the cardinals, however. She headed straight to the papal fort of Castel Sant'Angelo. As dusk fell on August 14, Caterina marched up the ramp to the castle and assumed control of it, and thereby the city. Pointing the cannons toward all access roads to the Vatican, she cut the cardinals off from the ecclesiastical nerve center. Caterina's decisive action threw the College of Cardinals into an uproar. While they debated moving their meetings to another palace out of the reach of the castle's artillery and argued over who should talk to the countess, Caterina was girding herself for war by dismissing all the senior keepers of the castle, including Innocenzo Codronchi, who had been personally appointed by her husband as the lieutenant of the fortress. Although he was devoted to Girolamo, Caterina refused to have him within the castle walls. This gesture has perplexed historians; some speculate that she distrusted everyone and wanted to be the only person in the fort with the authority to give orders, and others surmise that perhaps she had overheard seditious words from this ostensibly faithful retainer. Another possibility is that she wanted to act free of her husband's influence. Innocenzo would have done as the count wished, and Girolamo, without the backing of the pope, might be feeble in pressing his own claims and look for a quick compromise. As things stood, Girolamo was issuing empty threats from the safety of the Orsini camp, claiming that he would intervene with his army if any of the cardinals he hated was elected pope. The cardinals could easily dismiss Girolamo, but Caterina knew they would have to take her cannons seriously. The only hope to save her family's fortunes was to force the cardinals into recognizing the Riarios' titles and properties before they elected a new pope.
On the ramparts of the castle, the vivacious darling of the court showed herself to be a fierce warrior. In response to demands that she turn over the fortress, Caterina declared that Pope Sixtus had made her husband responsible for the castle and that she would turn it over only to the next pope. Electing his successor was easier said than done, however, since Caterina's cannons kept the cardinals from crossing the bridge to reach the Sistine Chapel, the designated site of the conclave.
On August 17, a lonely funeral took place for Sixtus IV. Only eleven cardinals attended, since many of the others, including Cardinal Giuliano della Rovere, were terrified of approaching the Vatican precinct while the castle remained in Caterina's hands. As was the case when her father died, Caterina never had the chance to bid farewell to the remains of this man who had welcomed her so warmly and cherished her during her years in Rome.
The day after the funeral, a messenger came to the fort bearing a letter from Girolamo's nephew Cardinal Raffaello Riario. The frightened rabbit of the Pazzi conspiracy now held the position of camerlengo, which meant he was in charge of organizing the conclave to elect Sixtus's successor. As a close relative, he took it upon himself to soothe the feisty countess. Distrustful, Caterina allowed only one person to accompany Cardinal Riario's envoy inside to present the missive. When the go-between balked at Caterina's conditions for the meeting, she fixed her interlocutors with a fiery eye and declared, "So he wants a battle of wits with me, does he? What he doesn't understand is that I have the brains of Duke Galeazzo and I am as brilliant as he!"13 Caterina's first recorded spoken words, unlike those found in her dutiful epistles, reveal the proud Sforza warrior spirit that had long lay dormant in the Riario household. Stunned by her audacity, the cardinals retreated once again.
Anarchy was always a danger during the interregnum, the period between the death of a pope and the election of his successor. Without a reigning head of state, rioting, looting, and the settling of old scores were the norm. Adding to the general chaos of the sede vacante was the Colonna family back in Rome with two hundred soldiers and more grievances. The Orsinis were stationed near the Vatican. With the Castel Sant'Angelo in the hands of the Riarios, Rome became a battleground.
Desperate, on August 23 the College of Cardinals came to an agreement with Girolamo, offering him eight thousand ducats to pay his soldiers, provided he retreat immediately from Rome. They promised an indemnity for his lost property, an ongoing role as captain of the papal armies, and the continued lordship of Forlì and Imola. Girolamo, content with the cardinals' promises, made ready to leave. Caterina did not.
The next night, Caterina smuggled 150 more soldiers into the castle. After all her years at court she had little faith in the promises of men like Roderigo Borgia or Raffaello Riario. She planned to wait out the conclave and then deal directly with the next pope. The cardinals were infuriated by this new development and put pressure on Girolamo to end the trouble, threatening to revoke their agreement. Girolamo, having received cash and a few promises, was getting ready to leave Rome, and Caterina found herself publicly abandoned and humiliated by the husband whose property she had just saved.14 In the heat of August in the swampy area of the castle, Caterina was feeling the weight of her pregnancy and was frequently unwell. Bribes and threats could not move her, but a husband's betrayal and an impending delivery did.
On the evening of August 25, Caterina's uncle Cardinal Ascanio Sforza came to the castle accompanied by eight cardinals. They treated her with the utmost respect, promising to care for her and her family and allowing her to keep her escort of 150 men as she left Rome. They also confirmed in writing and before witnesses that the lands of Imola and Forlì belonged to the Riario family.
The next morning, the drawbridge of the Castel Sant'Angelo was lowered and Romans and visitors alike crowded around to see this extraordinary woman, who had held the College of Cardinals at bay for eleven days. The pretty little favorite of Pope Sixtus had commandeered a castle to defend her family's rights, something worthy of legend and song. Although she was pale from illness and exhaustion, and heavily pregnant, her beauty still impressed the onlookers. She wore a brown silk dress with a long train and a feathered black velvet cap. But she had added a new touch to her elegant attire. A man's belt, heavy with a coin purse and sword, hung from her hips. Surrounded by foot soldiers and cavalry and framed by a forest of lances, "she was feared, because that woman with the weapons in her hands was proud and cruel."15 Riding off to her new life in Forlì, she resembled less the delicate subject of Botticelli's portraits and more the powerful women who would appear in Michelangelo's painting in the Sistine Chapel.