THE SHOCKING NEWS of the slaughter in the cathedral of Florence spread quickly throughout Europe, and it soon became common knowledge that Pope Sixtus had been party to the sacrilegious plot.
To save face, Sixtus struck back at the Florentines. He blamed them for the abduction of Cardinal Riario and the murder of Archbishop Salviati. In a renewed effort to undo the Medicis, Sixtus approached Ferdinand I, the king of Naples, and easily secured his support in taking Florence from them, a plan that would neatly fall in with the king's expansionist designs on northern Italy. Siena was also recruited to lend a hand in the downfall of Florence, its ancient enemy. While the papal troops were mobilizing to bring this about, Sienese and Neapolitan soldiers were dispatched to join them. Florence's allies backed away one by one, and the city found itself alone, facing a powerful pincer action.
During this tumult, Girolamo revealed the vicious side of his character. As captain of the papal armies, he was privy to his uncle's maneuvers to wrest Florence from the Medicis. Yet every step that Girolamo took exposed his lack of political wisdom. As soon as he learned of the arrest and confession of Montesecco, Girolamo stormed the house of the Florentine ambassador, Donato Acciajuoli, and arrested the elderly gentleman, with the aim of exacting retribution. Only the discovery of Cardinal Raffaello Riario's detention at the hands of the Medicis saved the life of the respected Florentine. Then, stubbornly continuing in his attempt to assassinate Lorenzo, Girolamo turned to more disreputable associates and bribed an Imolese priest to enter a scheme whereby he would offer himself to Lorenzo as an assassin eager to rid the world of the pope's troublesome nephew Girolamo. The priest would then convince Lorenzo to supply him with a poison. That accomplished, the cleric would denounce the Florentine ruler for attempted murder and produce the poison as proof. The crude ploy did not fool Lorenzo, who promptly expelled the priest from Florence.
As he masterminded these desperate and haphazard plans, Girolamo incurred the displeasure of the entire papal court and the permanent enmity of his cousin Cardinal Giuliano della Rovere. The cardinal had argued against the Pazzi conspiracy, but he had been overruled. Now, in the wake of the disaster, the pope heeded Cardinal Giuliano's vehement protest against Girolamo's fruitless actions. The count desisted, but the rift within the papal family was already widening. Girolamo realized that it was time to regain the pope's favor by producing an heir.
After over two years of waiting, Caterina became pregnant with her first child over the Christmas holidays of 1478. Girolamo, in his new spirit of dedication to hearth and family, purchased a new family palace, tucked behind the Piazza Navona, in early 1479. The building needed a considerable amount of work, so between the arrival of the firstborn and the departure from the first home, there was much to prepare.
Whatever private disappointments Caterina may have felt regarding her husband's character and political failures were put aside as she dedicated herself to the role of devoted wife, whose first and foremost duty was to produce a male heir to carry on the family line. Caterina's life altered radically in the months of her pregnancy. Her long horseback rides and hunts ceased, and she spent more time in chapels, praying for a safe delivery and the arrival of a baby boy. Every year at Easter, the wax from the Paschal candle, a symbol of Christ's resurrection, was molded into little cakes, each called "Agnus Dei," or "Lamb of God," and stamped with a sacred image. The most precious of these would be personally blessed by the pope and kept in a special gold box. Almost every expectant mother would be given one, as it was believed to help protect women in childbirth. Pope Urban VI (1378–1389) had sanctioned this practice, declaring a century earlier that this object of devotion "preserves the pregnant woman and delivers her of her child."1
Caterina received her Agnus Dei from Pope Sixtus, along with his blessing. Over the next months it would provide spiritual solace as she faced the fears related to childbirth. In Caterina's age, painkillers were few, and one of every ten women died from complications of delivery.
On August 31, 1479, Caterina and Girolamo's first son was born. Caterina sent a letter, marked by joy and relief, to Bona the very next day: "It being pleasing to the great Creator and His glorious Mother on the last day of August at about the sixth hour of the night [midnight], I gave birth to a beautiful male child: God be praised."2
Indeed, her prayers had been answered: it was a boy and she was already recovering. The celebrations began, as relatives and well-wishers lined up outside the Riarios' house, bearing gifts. For Caterina they brought fruits and sweets piled high on beautifully crafted "birth trays." After the perishables were consumed, the family could keep the brightly painted platters, some of wood, some of ceramic, some painted with the family coat of arms, and some decorated with a plump and cheery image of the infant John the Baptist, cousin to Jesus and born safely to the aged Elizabeth. The proud parents hung the trays on the walls. The new mother, proud, radiant, and arrayed in special robes, welcomed her visitors while sitting up in her maternity bed, now covered with sumptuous cloths. Musicians, discreetly tucked into a corner of the room, played soothing airs on pipes and lyres to accompany the murmurs of Caterina's guests. The infant, laid like a precious pearl in his cradle, received luxurious swaddling linens and coral amulets, which were worn as protective talismans.
For families of this era, however, delivery was only the first hurdle. Half of all children died before the age of two, and another half of those remaining died before they reached sixteen years. The fear of infant death made baptism a pressing concern. More than a gift-giving party or the official entry into society, baptism offered the assurance that whatever happened during the uncertain years of childhood, the infant's soul would live forever in Heaven. The baptism of Girolamo and Caterina's firstborn was a grand affair, celebrated by the pope himself. The child was given the name Ottaviano, the birth name of the heir of Julius Caesar who became the emperor Augustus, ruled the Roman Empire, and brought peace to war-torn Rome. This auspicious name proclaimed the design of Sixtus and Girolamo to create a Riario empire.
Among the many high-ranking Romans present at the baptism, the most celebrated of all was Cardinal Roderigo Borgia, who stood as godfather to the infant Ottaviano. Born in Spain in 1431, he was made a cardinal in 1456 by his uncle Pope Callistus III, and he had been climbing curial ladders ever since. Roderigo had obtained the most lucrative position in the church, that of papal vice chancellor, and thus he headed the office responding to requests for papal favors. Any person looking for work, references, or recommendations from the pope had to apply to Cardinal Borgia, with a "gift" in hand. In this coveted role, Roderigo had amassed an enormous amount of money, much of which he spent building the most splendid palace in Rome, likened by contemporaries to the legendary Domus Aurea, the Golden House of the emperor Nero.
Roderigo's similarities to Nero did not end with domestic architecture. The handsome Borgia cardinal also fueled Rome's gossip mills. With his dark, flashing eyes and hawklike features, he was fascinating to women and made no attempt to restrain his sexual appetite. Roderigo's successes with the most beautiful women of his age were attributed to his "honeyed and choice eloquence" as well as his massive personal fortune. Already the self-indulgent cardinal had been rebuked by Pope Pius II, no stranger to excess himself, for a garden party he hosted in Siena, which, according to reports that had reached the pope's ears, could only be called an orgy. At the time of Ottaviano's baptism Roderigo already had six or seven children, and his mistress Vanozza de' Cattanei was pregnant and would give birth to a daughter, Lucrezia. This scheming, sensual prelate had great ambitions for his own offspring. The hands that tenderly cradled Caterina's son at the baptismal font would eventually work against him.
Caterina recovered quickly from the birth of her first child, due in part to her youthful good health and also to her desire to show off her firstborn to her stepmother. But her plans to visit Bona unexpectedly came to a halt. Her sunny news from Rome was met by chill winds from Milan.
Caterina's stepmother had been efficiently ruling Milan as regent for her young son, Gian Galeazzo, helped by her deceased husband's loyal secretary of state, Cicco Simonetta. Cicco had given a lifetime of service to the Sforza family, weathering the challenges posed by revolution and assassination. It would take a different sort of entanglement to end Bona and Cicco's administration.
In 1479, palace voices whispered that the thirty-year-old widowed duchess had taken a lover. His name was Antonio Tassino, a handsome young footman in her household. The infatuated duchess shared the secret deliberations of her court and other sensitive information with her new favorite, earning him the resentment of the faithful Cicco, who refused to discuss matters of state in the presence of the upstart. Soon the duchess found herself at the center of a bitter rivalry within her own intimate circle. Her brothers-in-law, especially Ludovico, known as "the Moor" because of his dark complexion, had been waiting for such a golden opportunity to reintroduce themselves into court. Their ambition and dubious loyalty had led Galeazzo Maria to keep them at arm's length, a policy followed by the regent Bona. They seized upon the naive Tassino as a path to Bona. Professing a sincere desire to make peace with his sister-in-law, Ludovico implored Tassino to convince Bona to speak with him. Under Tassino's influence, the duchess relented and agreed to meet him on September 7, 1479. The moment Cicco heard of the encounter, he solemnly foretold that because of it, he would "lose his head and the illustrious duchess would lose her reign."3 Three days later, Cicco was imprisoned for treason.
These machinations surprised Caterina, who had delivered her first child two weeks earlier. Bona's letter of congratulations was followed two days later by the news of Cicco's arrest. For the modern reader, Caterina's perfunctory letters of congratulations to Bona and to the duke's secretary upon hearing the news of Cicco's arrest are hard to interpret at first glance. Although the letter to Bona is more guarded in content, promising prayers for a peaceful reign, Caterina wrote in buoyant tones to the secretary of Duke Gian Galeazzo and his new guardian, Ludovico the Moor, claiming that "short of raising her father from the dead," nothing could please her more than the news of the arrest of the "nefarious Cicco."4 While undoubtedly the papal courtiers had explained to her that Cicco had betrayed her family and was even complicit in the murder of her father, she must have wondered how a mainstay of her childhood household, whom she had seen continually at her father's side, could have turned traitor. A further detail sheds more light on Caterina's approach to this situation. Her letters were sent on September 18, 1479, on the same day and in the same mail pouch as Pope Sixtus's response to the news. The pontiff was delighted at this change of affairs, hoping to establish an alliance with a more powerful ruler in Milan and perhaps form a league against Florence, a goal that was still foremost in his mind. Caterina's letters, echoing papal sentiments, show that she was learning the ways of diplomacy. Caterina adapted quickly, and two months after the upheaval in Milan, she was already writing Bona to ask for new hunting dogs and lamenting that Roman hounds "were no good."5 Returning to her riding regimen soothed her spirits.
Within a year, Cicco's dire prophecy came true: the man who had served three dukes of Milan was beheaded, and Bona lost her political authority. Ludovico the Moor took over the rule of Milan as regent for the young duke Gian Galeazzo.
Caterina had little time to enjoy the hunt or concern herself with Milanese affairs since by Christmas 1479 she was pregnant again, just three months after the birth of Ottaviano. Renaissance noblewomen were discouraged from breastfeeding their own children, and consequently they could become pregnant again soon after childbirth. Caterina prepared to put aside her hunting gear once more and to don the garb of an expectant mother. This time, however, sixteen-year-old Caterina's days were packed with increased responsibilities. The new palace was nearing completion, and the Riarios had to see to its decoration. Girolamo, nouveau riche that he was, had a taste for conspicuous consumption. He hired Sixtus IV's court painter, Melozzo da Forlì, to create most of the murals, and Luca Pacioli, the famous mathematician, to serve as architect. These two men had worked in many important courts and could recognize that Girolamo, unlike their more cultured patrons, knew nothing about art. He equated the most expensive and complicated with the best, and so the two men amused themselves at Girolamo's expense. As the last pilasters of the courtyard were put into place, Pacioli and Melozzo vied to invent the most intricate designs possible for the capitals. The two practical jokers plied Girolamo with the names of famous aristocratic patrons who employed this decoration, then watched as Girolamo seized upon the idea and browbeat the poor master carver into fashioning the gaudy stonework. Yet despite Girolamo's lack of taste, the Riario palace, like all those constructed for the family of Sixtus IV, grew into a magnificent structure.
Caterina's front door was situated one block from the new market in the Piazza Navona. As she and her attendants returned from the daily shopping and crossed the narrow stone entrance, the guards stationed in a room to the right leapt to attention. Her servants veered to the left to deposit the day's purchases in the kitchen while Caterina herself entered the columned courtyard at the center of the house. This area was a beehive of activity. All the little rooms facing onto it were filled with the Riarios' dependents, who were hard at work. The muffled scratch of quills on parchment came from one office, where secretaries huddled over the count's correspondence and accountants toted up the domestic expenses. Footmen were dispatched to bring staple goods from storage cellars, and a few off-duty servants would be chatting while sharing a quick snack. Under the tower, the horses were groomed in the stable and carriages received their regular maintenance. A little garden peeked through an archway, offering an oasis of fresh air and greenery in the heart of the city.
As she climbed the wide stone stair to the piano nobile, the most elegant story where the family lived and received guests, the clatter and buzz of cooking and talking would fade. A few steps from the landing, Caterina entered the relative quiet of her own apartments. Her rooms were comfortably furnished, and because the dowry of a Sforza noblewoman traditionally included magnificent textiles, expensive tapestries adorned the walls, and plush silk and velvet cushions padded the furniture. Her clothes and accessories were kept in large wooden chests called cassone, storage solutions for an era without bureaus or closets. Caterina had accumulated many such chests since her childhood, and several boasted painted panels portraying heroines of chastity, models for a young bride. Young Ottaviano's nursery was close to her room; the child was constantly tended by a servant there. Girolamo's rooms were separate but easily reached, and they were decorated with equal splendor. His courtiers occupied the outer rooms, and the count's inner sanctum consisted of three rooms and a study. A long hall with a large carved fireplace stood between the two sets of living quarters and served as a reception space for the numerous noble visitors that the nephew of the reigning pope was expected to entertain.
Melozzo da Forlì, still receiving accolades for his stunning murals in Sixtus IV's new Vatican library, executed the decorative painting for the public areas of the palace. Only one fragment survives today, but the faded fresco offers an interesting glimpse of the owner's tastes. Melozzo was renowned as a master of the avant-garde one-point-linear perspective, the technique of making a three-dimensional image on a two-dimensional surface. For the Riarios he painted an illusionistic cupboard against an elaborate tapestry background. Arrayed along the wooden shelves, he depicted an elaborate silver service, with scalloped plates and bowls. This display of finery perfectly matched the description of the arrangement of Caterina and Girolamo's wedding gifts at their marriage banquet three years earlier. It is unlikely that Caterina would have approved the commission. Though she had been raised in an extravagant court, the duke of Milan would never dream of decorating his public rooms with paintings of his possessions. But Caterina did admire the skill of the artist. Years later, when she would finally commission her own paintings, she too would hire Melozzo da Forlì.
The new year brought the dawn of a new era, both for the Riario family and for Rome. On January 8, 1480, Sixtus IV announced his ambitious plans to restore the Eternal City to its former grandeur. After the popes had abandoned Rome for most of the fourteenth century, taking up residence in the French town of Avignon, the poverty-stricken city had suffered from rampant illness and lack of clean water. The churches that had been the glory of Rome were falling to pieces. Since the papacy had returned to Rome in 1417, little had been done to alleviate the suffering of most of the inhabitants. From the moment of his election, Pope Sixtus IV had thrown himself headlong into repairs and renovations. One of his first acts was to donate five ancient Roman bronze statues to the people of Rome, housing them in the Conservator's Palace on the Capitoline Hill. When Caterina first arrived, she too had admired the colossal head of Constantine as well as the archaic bronze sculpture of the famous she-wolf—which, according to myth, had suckled Romulus and Remus, the legendary founders of Rome.
Careful study had informed the new projects aimed to return Rome to its former status as caput mundi. Sixtus demanded a complete rejuvenation of the city's once-famed engineering. The Acqua Vergine, a thirteen-mile aqueduct that had once brought fresh, pure water to Rome, was built by Emperor Augustus's heir, Agrippa, in 19 B.C.; northern invaders had destroyed it in the sixth century A.D. Sixtus rebuilt this conduit, returning clean water to a city that had long made do with the polluted flow of the Tiber River. Sixtus also rebuilt the hospital of Santo Spirito, still functioning today, a few short blocks from Saint Peter's. With its modern structure and large wards, Santo Spirito became a model for other hospitals in Italy and beyond. Wider roads and grander palaces appeared just as the Sistine Chapel, a pet project of the pope that was to replace a dilapidated structure, was nearing completion.
Through these public works, Pope Sixtus cast himself in the role of a Christian Emperor Augustus. Just as the first Roman emperor had boasted that he had "found Rome a city of brick and left it a city of marble," so Sixtus intended to transform the capital of Christendom into a center worthy of its illustrious past. "For if any city should be clean and beautiful," Sixtus declared, "it should indeed be the one which is capital of the world and holds primacy among all others because of the throne of Saint Peter."6
In the course of her daily social calls, Caterina saw busy teams of workers everywhere and witnessed the Romans' delight in these civic improvements. Although her father had also embarked on a plan to renovate Milan, Galeazzo's efforts had been erratic and mostly aimed at improving mercantile productivity. Sixtus's concern for clean water and healthful living conditions for all Romans taught Caterina that demonstrable interest in the well-being of average citizens could serve as a valuable political tool.
New churches built in an innovative yet austere style were cropping up all over town. The monumental Church of Saint Augustine was underway next door to Caterina's palace. Up on the Janiculum Hill, Sixtus built a stately church on the site where, according to contemporary belief, Saint Peter had died. But the Church of Santa Maria del Popolo, at the end of the Via Flaminia, stood out as the pope's most cherished ecclesiastical project. Situated at the northern gate of the city, through which most pilgrims entered Rome, Saint Mary of the People was the first building visitors would see in the city. The broad travertine façade recalled the great temple fronts that had adorned the Rome of old. Saint Mary of the People also served as the family church. Three of Sixtus's nephews endowed side chapels, and a steady stream of important painters and sculptors enhanced the structure with imaginative decorations in the family name. Girolamo was appointed chief warden of the newly completed church in 1480, meaning that Caterina and her family attended Mass there regularly. Every Saturday, the pope himself would cross the Tiber River to spend a little time in prayer there. Indeed, every major event of this pontificate—war, victory, thanksgiving—would see the della Roveres and the Riarios gathered at this site. This single building not only brought the diverse members of Sixtus's family together under one spiritual roof (even Caterina's uncle Cardinal Ascanio Sforza would be buried there) but also proclaimed the pope's grand dreams for the Eternal City. The art historian Lisa Passaglia Bauman has written that in this edifice, for the first time in papal history, "one pope and his family had melded an ideology of power with the rhetoric of art to create a vision of dynasty."7
The Riario-Sforza dominions were growing as fast as the family. On August 23, 1480, Pope Sixtus IV formally conferred upon Girolamo the territory of Forlì, a little town slightly less than ten miles south of Imola, thereby doubling the Riarios' realm. The papal bull of investiture lauded the count's "learned experience, circumspect wisdom, and his shining faith," charging him to "nurture concord, treat his subjects kindly, and administer justice to all persons without exception."8
On the following day Caterina gave birth to her second son, named Cesare (Caesar) for the Roman statesman who had so fatefully crossed the Rubicon River just a few short miles from Forlì. As in the case of Ottaviano, the choice of name illustrated the grand hopes of the Riario family: the count and countess of Forlì and Imola were well on their way to creating both a state and a dynasty.
Caterina wrote to her beloved stepmother, Bona of Savoy, to proudly announce the arrival of a "bellissimo figlio maschio,"9 little realizing that the rapidly changing situation in Milan was about to deprive her of regular communication with the woman who had been so important to her. Ludovico the Moor had already usurped Bona's role as regent, but he still feared her ability to influence her young son, Gian Galeazzo. One month after Caterina's letter arrived, he transferred Bona to the Abbey of Abbiategrasso, where she died twenty-three years later, never having seen any of Caterina's children. With the sequestering of Bona of Savoy, Caterina's last bond of affection to the Sforza court was severed. Caterina was fond of her brothers and sisters there, but Bona was what made Milan a home to her. Ludovico now occupied the ducal throne, and he would think of Caterina as a pawn, to be used and sacrificed at will. She would have to commit her future fortunes entirely to the Riario clan.
The close of 1480 brought an end to hostilities with Florence. On November 25, twelve Florentine ambassadors from the most famous families of the republic—the Tornabuonis (who were papal bankers), the Vespuccis (one of whom would soon make a trip of discovery to America), the Guicciardinis (one of whom would author the history of Florence), and the Soderinis (who would employ Michelangelo to sculpt the David)—came to the portico of Saint Peter's Basilica. Before the enthroned Sixtus, the noblemen dropped to their knees. The pontiff, his angular features set in his sternest expression, "with most binding words and admonitions finally absolved them and admitted them to the kissing of the feet."10 All offenses forgiven, the pope and the ambassadors entered the church together for a Mass of thanksgiving. For the time being, blessed peace settled over Italy.
The Riario clan had much to celebrate this Christmas: the Florentine feud had formally ceased, two hale and hearty baby boys ensured the continuation of the family name, and plans were in the air to visit the new Riario lands in the upcoming year. Any sadness that Caterina felt over the alienation of her stepmother would not be shared by Girolamo or his kin, nor would they indulge any dampening of the jovial mood. Caterina's only outlet for these feelings took place during whispered prayers in her chapel or vigorous rides in the Roman woods. Girolamo was confident that as long the pope stayed healthy, the run of good fortune would continue. As the yule log burned in the new Riario palace, the sweet smell of success filled the air.