The Borgias

The Borgias PDF Author: G. J. Meyer
Publisher: Bantam
ISBN: 0345526910
Category : Italy
Languages : en
Pages : 513

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Book Description
The startling truth behind one of the most notorious dynasties in history is revealed in a remarkable new account by the acclaimed author of "The Tudors" and "A World Undone." Meyer offers an unprecedented portrait of the infamous Renaissance family and their storied milieu.

The Borgias

The Borgias PDF Author: G. J. Meyer
Publisher: Bantam
ISBN: 0345526910
Category : Italy
Languages : en
Pages : 513

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Book Description
The startling truth behind one of the most notorious dynasties in history is revealed in a remarkable new account by the acclaimed author of "The Tudors" and "A World Undone." Meyer offers an unprecedented portrait of the infamous Renaissance family and their storied milieu.

BORGIA, Behind the Myth

BORGIA, Behind the Myth PDF Author: Danny Chaplin
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781726009881
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 602

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Book Description
The history of possibly the most notorious dynasty in papal history is revealed in a new narrative from the author of "The Medici: Rise of a Parvenu Dynasty, 1360-1537", "Pietro Aretino: The First Modern", and "Sengoku Jidai. Nobunaga, Hideyoshi, and Ieyasu: Three Unifiers of Japan". Danny Chaplin serves up a fresh history of the Borgia which neither flinches from their grisly deeds nor seeks to paint an unduly "revisionist" picture of what is without question one of history's most infamous papal dynasties.The Borgia were that quintessential Renaissance phenomenon, a parvenu family which emerged from relative priestly obscurity to soar to the heights of political and pontifical power in the colourful Italy of the 1400s. Established on the backs of the careers of two popes, Calixtus III and Alexander VI, the family held court initially as princes of the Church and arbiters of European clerical politics. From the abstemious, crusading Pope Calixtus to the venal, sensual and nepotistic Pope Alexander (Rodrigo Borgia), this Spanish house from Valencia quickly established itself as one of Rome's major players.Later, Cesare Borgia, the model for Niccolò Machiavelli's prototypical Renaissance prince, would be recognised as a secular lord in his own right. As "Il duco Valentino" he would blaze a trail of destruction and conquest across the length and breadth of central Italy. The Borgia brokered deals and dynastic alliances with kings, princes, and dukes, often at the point of a sword. They appropriated Church lands for their own aggrandisement. They also walked a delicate tightrope between France and Spain, two emerging superpowers which sought to enact their great rivalry on the Italian Peninsula. Their murders, assassinations, and poisonings have by now become legendary in the annals of European history.Five centuries later, the names of Rodrigo Borgia, Cesare Borgia, Juan Borgia, and their much-slandered sister Lucrezia Borgia are synonymous with everything regarded as being at fault with the Renaissance papal establishment. But is the received wisdom concerning the Borgia entirely accurate or indeed warranted? Cinematic in scope, this meticulously-researched new history of the House of Borgia re-examines their lives and their legacy with uncompromising candidness in the context of late fifteenth-century Italian power politics.

Unveiling the Myth of Lucrezia Borgia

Unveiling the Myth of Lucrezia Borgia PDF Author: Alisha West
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Not only was the Borgia family notorious for how they gained their power, but they are also well known for the actions they take once they are in power. The Borgia’s were famous for being power hungry and ruthless. They were to let nothing stand in the way of them gaining more power. For example, during Pope Alexander VI’s reign with Cesare at his side, the Borgias began to be known as evil for the rumors that they committed several acts of murder on their road to more power. This caused the Borgias to be not liked very quickly. Rumors of the Borgias being evil, murderous, and even incestuous began to float around. The Borgias became the talk of the town during Pope Alexander VI’s time and because the Pope used his daughter, Lucrezia, as a pawn in his power hungry plans. Lucrezia was at the forefront of all the talk and rumors.

The Borgias and Their Enemies, 1431–1519

The Borgias and Their Enemies, 1431–1519 PDF Author: Christopher Hibbert
Publisher: HMH
ISBN: 0547350619
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 337

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Book Description
This colorful history of a powerful family brings the world they lived in—the glittering Rome of the Italian Renaissance—to life. The name Borgia is synonymous with the corruption, nepotism, and greed that were rife in Renaissance Italy. The powerful, voracious Rodrigo Borgia, better known to history as Pope Alexander VI, was the central figure of the dynasty. Two of his seven papal offspring also rose to power and fame—Lucrezia Borgia, his daughter, whose husband was famously murdered by her brother, and that brother, Cesare, who inspired Niccolò Machiavelli’s The Prince. Notorious for seizing power, wealth, land, and titles through bribery, marriage, and murder, the dynasty’s dramatic rise from its Spanish roots to its occupation of the highest position in Renaissance society forms a gripping tale. From the author of The Rise and Fall of the House of Medici and other acclaimed works, The Borgias and Their Enemies is “a fascinating read” (Library Journal).

Lucrezia Borgia

Lucrezia Borgia PDF Author: Sarah Bradford
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 1101525347
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 448

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Book Description
The very name Lucrezia Borgia conjures up everything that was sinister and corrupt about the Renaissance—incest, political assassination, papal sexual abuse, poisonous intrigue, unscrupulous power grabs. Yet, as bestselling biographer Sarah Bradford reveals in this breathtaking new portrait, the truth is far more fascinating than the myth. Neither a vicious monster nor a seductive pawn, Lucrezia Borgia was a shrewd, determined woman who used her beauty and intelligence to secure a key role in the political struggles of her day. Drawing from a trove of contemporary documents and fascinating firsthand accounts, Bradford brings to life the art, the pageantry, and the dangerous politics of the Renaissance world Lucrezia Borgia helped to create.

Lucrezia Borgia

Lucrezia Borgia PDF Author: Ferdinand Gregorovius
Publisher: Vita Histria
ISBN: 1592110746
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 313

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Book Description
Lucrezia Borgia is among the most fascinating and controversial personalities of the Renaissance. The daughter of Pope Alexander VI, she was intensely involved in the political life of Italy during the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries. While her marriage alliances helped advance the political objectives of the papacy, she also held the office of Governor of Spoleto, a role normally reserved for Cardinals, making her one of the most powerful and dynamic female figures of the Renaissance. Among the first books to employ historical method to move beyond myth and romance that had obscured the fascinating story of Lucrezia Borgia was this biography written by the noted German historian Ferdinand Gregorovius. Ferdinand Gregorovius (1821-1891) was one of the preeminent scholars of the Italian Renaissance. His biography of Lucrezia Borgia reveals the atmosphere of the Renaissance, painting a portrait of Lucrezia and her relationships with her father Rodrigo Borgia, Pope Alexander VI, her brother Cesare, her mother Vanozza, her father’s mistress, Giulia Farnese, her husband Duke Alfonso D’Este of Ferrara, and many others, including important artists and writers of the time. All are vividly portrayed against the colorful background of Renaissance Italy. Gregorovius separates myth from documented fact and his book remains a key reference work on the life and times of the Borgia princess. This new edition of Gregorovius’s classic work Lucrezia Borgia is enhanced with an introduction by Samantha Morris, a noted expert on the history of the Borgias. Samantha studied archaeology at the University of Winchester where her interest in the history of the Italian Renaissance began. She is the author of Cesare Borgia: In a Nutshell and Girolamo Savonarola: The Renaissance Preacher. She also runs the website theborgiabull.com.

The Borgias

The Borgias PDF Author: G. J. Meyer
Publisher: Bantam
ISBN: 0345526929
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 522

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Book Description
The startling truth behind one of the most notorious dynasties in history is revealed in a remarkable new account by the acclaimed author of The Tudors and A World Undone. Sweeping aside the gossip, slander, and distortion that have shrouded the Borgias for centuries, G. J. Meyer offers an unprecedented portrait of the infamous Renaissance family and their storied milieu. They burst out of obscurity in Spain not only to capture the great prize of the papacy, but to do so twice. Throughout a tumultuous half-century—as popes, statesmen, warriors, lovers, and breathtakingly ambitious political adventurers—they held center stage in the glorious and blood-drenched pageant known to us as the Italian Renaissance, standing at the epicenter of the power games in which Europe’s kings and Italy’s warlords gambled for life-and-death stakes. Five centuries after their fall—a fall even more sudden than their rise to the heights of power—they remain immutable symbols of the depths to which humanity can descend: Rodrigo Borgia, who bought the papal crown and prostituted the Roman Church; Cesare Borgia, who became first a teenage cardinal and then the most treacherous cutthroat of a violent time; Lucrezia Borgia, who was as shockingly immoral as she was beautiful. These have long been stock figures in the dark chronicle of European villainy, their name synonymous with unspeakable evil. But did these Borgias of legend actually exist? Grounding his narrative in exhaustive research and drawing from rarely examined key sources, Meyer brings fascinating new insight to the real people within the age-encrusted myth. Equally illuminating is the light he shines on the brilliant circles in which the Borgias moved and the thrilling era they helped to shape, a time of wars and political convulsions that reverberate to the present day, when Western civilization simultaneously wallowed in appalling brutality and soared to extraordinary heights. Stunning in scope, rich in telling detail, G. J. Meyer’s The Borgias is an indelible work sure to become the new standard on a family and a world that continue to enthrall. Praise for The Borgias “A vivid and at times startling reappraisal of one of the most notorious dynasties in history . . . If you thought you knew the Borgias, this book will surprise you.”—Tracy Borman, author of Queen of the Conqueror and Elizabeth’s Women “The mention of the Borgia family often conjures up images of a ruthless drive for power via assassination, serpentine plots, and sexual debauchery. . . . [G. J. Meyer] convincingly looks past the mythology to present a more nuanced portrait.”—Booklist “Meyer brings his considerable skills to another infamous Renaissance family, the Borgias [and] a fresh look into the machinations of power in Renaissance Italy. . . . [He] makes a convincing case that the Borgias have been given a raw deal.”—Historical Novels Review “Fascinating . . . a gripping history of a tempestuous time and an infamous family.”—Shelf Awareness

The Borgias

The Borgias PDF Author: Marion Johnson
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780354047913
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 252

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Book Description
The name Borgia is synonymous with the political corruption, greed, incest and murder rife in Renaissance Italy. Rodrigo Borgia, Pope Alexander VI, the first man to have clearly bought himself the papacy, and two of his infamous illegitimate children, Cesare and Lucrezia, were the three central figures of the Borgia dynasty, seizing power, wealth, land and titles through bribery, marriage and murder. Cesare, with his political astuteness and ruthlessness, became the model for Machiavelli's "The Prince", while Lucrezia, rumoured to have been a poisoner and the lover of her father and brother, may have been as much their victim as their accomplice. Marion Johnson plots the dynasty's dramatic rise from their beginnings in Spain to their occupation of the highest position in Renaissance society, at a time when Italy was the centre of the European stage, both culturally and politically. Finally, she examines how far the myth of the Borgias is borne out by the historical facts. Behind the gaudy horrors, she concludes, lie people of great talent and achievement, possessors, even, of moderate virtues.

The Story of the Borgias

The Story of the Borgias PDF Author: John Fyvie
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 388

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Book Description


Lucrezia Borgia

Lucrezia Borgia PDF Author: John Faunce
Publisher: Crown
ISBN: 0307557634
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 290

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Book Description
“A fascinating story, rich in detail. In every case, Faunce portrays [Lucrezia] believably, with wit and sensitivity.”--Library Journal Hundreds of years after her death, Lucrezia Borgia remains one of the most enigmatic and notorious women of history, accused of incest, of poisoning her rivals, and even of murdering her own father. Born into scandal, she was the daughter of the treacherous Cardinal Roderigo Borgia, who would later be crowned Pope Alexander VI. When her father ascended the papal throne, young Lucrezia’s life changed forever. From then on, Lucrezia would be unable to escape the political ambitions of her father and her brother, the bloodthirsty Cesare Borgia. In an era when the Vatican was as decadent and violent as any royal court, Lucrezia was its crown princess. Famed for her beauty, she was a valuable pawn in the marriage game, and Alexander VI would use her to create one alliance after another. When her kindly first husband no longer suited the Pope’s needs, Lucrezia’s virginity was restored by papal decree (her new maidenhood was declared “miraculous”), and she was married off again, this time to a man she truly loved, Alfonso, Prince of Naples. But her joy was short-lived. Alfonso loathed her brother and refused to participate in the Pope’s imperial schemes, which threatened to tear apart the Vatican’s political alliances--and Lucrezia’s happy marriage. In this unforgettable debut, John Faunce perfectly captures the rotten decadence of the Borgias’ papal court and the inner steel of Lucrezia Borgia, one of history’s great survivors. “Fascinating...a searing portrait of an intelligent woman, cunning enough to shape her own bizarre destiny.”--Booklist