CULTURE SPAIN – THE BORGIAS

GANDIA - THE BORGIAS WOULD HAVE ENJOYED THE SHOW

Last weekend was the wonderful, annual Fira y Festes in Gandia and so it seemed only fitting for me to do a Blog mentioning the infamous Spanish Borgias – who came from Gandia.

Well, strictly speaking, the Bogias came from nearby Xativa but the eldest son of Pope Alexander vi was Duke of Gandia and it is Gandia that seems to have taken the Borgias to heart.  It has the Borgia Palace, statues of the Borgias at the bottom of its main shopping boulevard and, appropriately enough, a Hotel Borgia – which has an exterior so lurid that it looks as though it was based upon a design taken straight from one of Pope Alexander vi’s Vatican orgies!

Of course, the Borgias were notorious for taking the Papacy to new heights of scandal at the end of the 15^th Century.  At the time, this must have seemed virtually impossible but Pope Alexander vi was clearly determined to exceed everything that had gone on before.  In this, he was nothing if not successful, helped by his extraordinary and much loved, by him at least(!) children – of whom he had at least nine.

Perhaps as notorious as Pope Alexander vi himself was his second son Cesare Borgia who was a man of unbridled ambition matched by a ruthlessness that curdles the blood even now.  Dressed in black, his face badly marked, Cesare Borgia was Pope Alexander vi’s second son and chief ‘enforcer’.  It was upon him that Alexander vi relied, mainly through military action, as Alexander vi tried to expand the secular power of the Catholic church (and the wealth of his own family!).

Cesare Borgia was certainly not a man to be messed with!

Indeed, Cesare Borgia is thought to have murdered his own (elder) brother, the Duke of Gandia, and was responsible for brutally garrotting some of his own men when he doubted their loyalty.  He even killed his sister’s (Lucrezia Borgia) lover  – and later her second husband!  So cunning and able was Cesare that Niccolo Machiavelli based his seminal work ‘The Prince’ on him.

Cesare was not the only one of the Borgias to find fame.  His sister Lucrezia Bogia appears to have been the ultimate femme fatale.

Married three times, Lurezia was initially used a pawn for the Borgias to increase their power and influence through marriages.  However, she appears more formidable than that and gained a reputation as an effective poisoner.  Staggeringly, she was once left as Regent of the Vatican – effectively head of the Catholic church (a woman!!), whilst Pope Alexander vi was away!

The story of the Borgia family is nothing if not a terrific tale and you may want to glance at ‘Either Caesar or Nothing’ - an article I wrote about them that, I think, captures this amazingly exciting period well!

Oddly enough, in the case of the Borgias, the ‘worm’ did actually ‘turn’!

A grandson of Pope Alexander vi, Francisco Borgia, became ‘truly’ religious and a Captain General of the Jesuits.  He was later made a Saint and it was his birth 500 years ago in 1510 that Gandia has been celebrating all year.

That said, I have a distinct feeling that the celebrations I have seen in Gandia would have been admired more by Pope Alexander vi and his immediate Borgia family than the goodly saint!

Nick Snelling – Culture Spain

RELEVANT INFO:

The Borgias – Either Cesare or nothing!