The Borgias - the Corleone Family of the Renaissance

Devotion to family.

Ambition.

Murder.

These are the attributes in which the Corleone family from The Godfather films share with the Borgias of Renaissance Italy, the papal ladder-climbers who made alliances through marriage and enemies through murder and mayhem. Usually, I'm pretty good at determining where last names came from. I do well at Jeopardy! because I guess where a question's subject is from just based on their name. I know that the Borgias were a Spanish-Italian family, but I'm not entirely sure which of these two the name Borgia is from. It sounds Italian, but all the Borgias, except the daughter, have Spanish names - Rodrigo, Juan, Cesare, and Lucrezia. The TV show has compared its content to a Renaissance Godfather or Sopranos - not sure which. But I can definitely see the parallels with the family Coreleone. Sometime in 2011, Showtime will be a airing a series on the Borgias (seen abovie), which is enough information in itself to make me want to subscribe to Showtime.

As for the real Borgias, Rodrigo, the patriarch, bribed his way into the position of Pope in Rome under the title/name Alexander VI. Pope was the top spot in all the Italian territories, and by doing this, he therefore controled all of Italy, which was during the Renaissance period a group of divided city-states. In the TV series, Rodrigo will be played by Jeremy Irons. Sure, he's an English actor, but he does sort of look Spanish-Italian, especially in the above picture. Rodrigo had three sons and one daughter. The two eldest sons, Juan and Cesare, and the daughter, Lucrezia, were by far the most significant. Lucrezia, golden-haired despite her ethnicity which usually boasts dark features, was Rodrigo's pawn - but one he loved very much. She was a great intrument in forming alliances with other city-states. Her first marriage was to Giovanni Sforza. When Rodrigo no longer needed the alliance with the Sforzas, he seeked to annul his daughter's marriage. Being the top Catholic, this wasn't an easy task, as Catholicism forbids divorce. Rodrigo produced a story in which he claimed Giovanni was impotent, which probably wasn't true. This was really the only way in which an annulment could be achieved, except for murder. For fear of this own life, Giovanni eventually accepted the claim that he was impotent and fled Rome before he could be murdered. One rumor is that Lucrezia had warned Giovanni that his life was in danger.

Her next marriage was to Alfonso of Aragon, whom she reportedly fell in love with at first sight. Her brother, Cesare, at first liked Alfonso (it was outside of his nature to like anyone), but this of course didn't last. Cesare was jealous of Alfonso. He had had a bout with syphilis that had left his face scarred. He reportedly began to wear black and to wear masks. This, and Lucrezia's lack of attention towards her brother, made Cesare hate the good-looking Alfonso even more. While leaving the Borgia household one night, Alfonso was attacked on the staircase by a heavily-cloaked man. Surpringly, he survived the sword attack, and later, while in recovery, he was strangled to death. These attacks were probably not performed by Cesare, but they were surely perpetuated by him. Lucrezia was heartbroken, and probably never forgave her brother.

Juan Borgia was named Generallisimo in his father's papal army, a title his younger brother, Cesare, wanted for himself. Juan had become Rodrigo's right hand man and this angered Cesare. In 1497, one night after the two had dined with their mother, Vannozza dei Cattannei, the brothers left together and disappeared down a dark alley. The following morning, Juan was dragged from the Tiber River, murdered. Cesare was and is the obvious choice for the assassin, but Alexander VI, who loved both of his sons, didn't want to believe that one son had killed the other. Cesare was subsequenly appointed to the title of Generalissimo and led his father's papal army in place of Juan. In an ironic twist of fate, Cesare was killed on the battlefield leading the army he'd murdered to command. In a final event before Martin Luther set into motion the Protestant Reformation, Alexander VI aka Rodrigo Borgia was poisoned and killed. Lucrezia is the only major Borgia player who didn't die an agonizing death.

According The Borgias director, Neil Jordan, Mario Puzo's Corleone family was based on the corrupt Renaissance family. This is something I've just come across while writing this blog, so I suppose my comparison is a pretty good one. Mario Puzo, author of The Godfather, also wrote a book called The Family, about the Borgias. This was Puzo's final book before his death and now I'm really interested in taking a peek at The Family myself.

The Corleone family had more honor than the Borgias, but all in all, the latter was a Renaissance-era crime family with ambition to rule the Catholic world (which was pretty much all of Europe at the time). Don Corleone married off his daughter in the first scenes of the The Godfather, and in one of the last, that husband, Carlo, is murdered by Michael, Don Corleone's son. In The Godfather II, Michael kills his brother, Freddo. In these instances, it comes as no surprise that Puzo based the Corleones on the Borgias.

Cesare got away with his murders, though he never left any evidence of actually committing them. Pope Alexander would have murdered Giovanni Sforza had he not fled Rome. Lucrezia was probably far from totally innocent, but she herself never plotted a murder - even though some historians suggest she wore a ring dipped in sinide and that when she offered it to be kissed, the patrons were poisoned. The Borgias did nothing for God, though they were supposed to be His greatest ambassadors at the time. They were selfish, murderous, and treacherous in every sense of the words.

But that's what makes them so interesting to people like Mario Puzo, Neil Jordan, Jeremy Irons, and me.