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Updated: May 19, 2025
Thus this woman's vanity led her to provide for a ceremonious funeral; she wanted all Rome to talk of her on that day as the mistress of Alexander VI and the mother of so many famous children. Leo X bestowed an official character upon her funeral by having his court attend it; by doing this he recognized Vannozza either as the widow of Alexander VI or as the mother of the Duchess of Ferrara.
Paolo Giovio states that Vanotti was her patronymic, and although there was a clan of that name in Rome, he is wrong. Vannozza was probably the nickname for Giovanna thus we find in the early records of that age: Vannozza di Nardis, Vannozza di Zanobeis, di Pontianis, and others. There was a Catanei family in Rome, as there was in Ferrara, Genoa, and elsewhere.
By her confessor's order she relates her vision to the object of it; and, confounded and amazed, the unhappy man acknowledges that he was celebrating in a state of mortal sin. He repents, confesses, and amends his life. Two men pay a visit together to the Ponziano Palace; one is the nephew of Vannozza, a pious and exemplary priest; the other a young man of twenty, whom he has adopted.
It was said by Infessura, and has since been repeated by a multitude of historians, upon no better authority than that of this writer on hearsay and inveterate gossip, that, to raise Cesare to the purple, Alexander was forced to prove the legitimacy of that young man's birth, and that to this end he procured false witnesses to swear that he was "the son of Vannozza de' Catanei and her husband, Domenico d'Arignano."
The name was derived from the title, capitaneus. In a notarial document of 1502 the name of Alexander's mistress is given in its ancient form, Vanotia de Captaneis. Litta, to whom Italy is indebted for the great work on her illustrious families a wonderful work in spite of its errors and omissions ventures the opinion that Vannozza was a member of the Farnese family and a daughter of Ranuccio.
Francesca smiled sweetly as she returned their caresses; but the noise, and the gaiety, and the visiting, that attended a wedding in those days weighed heavily on her spirits; and though she never complained, Vannozza perceived that her little heart was oppressed with some secret sorrow, and tenderly inquired into its cause.
From this it appears that at the close of December Vannozza was still living in the Borgo, and under the protection of her son's own chancellor, while Cæsar himself was a prisoner in the Torre Borgia in the Vatican, and not until he left Rome forever did she remove from the Borgo.
It is uncertain at just what time she allied herself with this man, but she was living with him as his wife in 1480 in a house on the Piazzo Pizzo di Merlo, which is now called Sforza-Cesarini, near which was Cardinal Borgia's palace. Even as early as this, Vannozza was the mother of several children acknowledged by the cardinal: Giovanni, Cæsar, and Lucretia.
Francesca and Vannozza had gone to St. Peter's on an intensely hot day in July, in the year 1399. Absorbed in prayer, they had hardly noticed the lapse of time, and twelve o'clock had struck when they set out on their way home. The heat grew intolerable. The sultry air seemed on fire, and not a breath stirred it.
He was accompanied by his mother, Vannozza, his brother Giuffrè, and, doubtless, also by his little daughter Luisa and the two children Rodrigo and Giovanni, the latter of whom was Duke of Nepi. There he was safe, as the French army was camped in the neighborhood. Just as if nothing had happened, he wrote letters to the Marquis Gonzaga, who was then at his headquarters in Campagnano.
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