Lucrezia Borgia: Life, Love and Death in Renaissance Italy (22 page)

All these enthusiastic reports of his bride excited the curiosity of Alfonso d’Este who until now had held himself resolutely aloof, indeed angry, ‘
con la moscha,
’ at having to marry her. On 31 January, Lucrezia and the Este rode to Bentivoglio, intending, according to the Pope’s decision, to go by water to Ferrara, in boats to be provided by Ercole.
¹⁷
At Bentivoglio on 31 January, Alfonso arrived unannounced shortly after the arrival of Lucrezia’s party.

This evening at the 23rd hour, the Illustrious madama Duchessa having arrived shortly before, the Illustrious Don Alfonso arrived unexpectedly, so that he had already mounted the stairs of this palace before the Duchess had notice of it. The Magnificent Messer Hannibale [Annibale Bentivoglio, Ercole’s son-in-law] was the first [to know] and announced it and immediately all through the palace there was huge applause and everyone crying ‘Alfonso’. The Duchess, although she was astonished by the unexpected arrival of Don Alfonso, nonetheless received His Lordship with so much reverence and good grace that it must not have displeased her. We cannot describe the joy which all her company experienced, and Don Alfonso in person and manners could truly not have comported himself in every way with more kindness and naturalness which pleased everyone.
¹⁸

In a second letter of the same day, the envoys added that as a result of the conversations which Lucrezia and Alfonso had enjoyed together ‘on diverse and pleasing subjects’, they had commissioned Pozzi and Saraceni to say that they had decided that it would be best to travel from there to Ferrara by land, because the road was good and if they took the water route they would arrive very late. ‘This decision appeared a very necessary one to us,’ the long-suffering envoys added, ‘given that only with the greatest difficulty is it possible to get these duchesses to leave on time.’

Lucrezia was enchanted by this unexpected arrival, a romantic gesture on the part of Alfonso who hitherto had given every impression of distaste for their forthcoming marriage. He was four years older than her, born in 1476 at Ferrara, the eldest son of Ercole by Duchess Eleonora and named Alfonso after his maternal great grandfather (
bisavolo
). Alfonso was described by his contemporary biographer and secretary Bonaventura Pistofilo as tall, long-faced, ‘of a grave and lordly aspect, more melancholy and severe than happy and joyous’. From the portrait medal engraved for his wedding, he appears somewhat heavy-faced and, increasingly unusual for those days, beardless. He was a man of few words and kept his own counsel but beneath his reserved appearance he was capable of strongly emotional reactions. He was physically powerful and well-built, fit from the physical exercise in which he took great pleasure, which included boating and swimming in the lake in the castle garden at Ferrara (in winter he would put the boat on a sledge and skate over the ice) and tennis. Hunting was also a passion, as it was for most of his contemporaries, and he was a good judge of arms, birds and horses. Less articulate and courtly than his father, he was physically courageous and a skilled leader of men, qualities which were to stand him in good stead during the years of war which were soon to engulf Ferrara. He was a widower, his first wife, Anna Sforza, having died in childbirth in November 1497, when Alfonso, so the Ferrarese chronicler recorded, was so disfigured by syphilitic pustules on his face that he had been unable to attend her funeral. He liked whores and low companions but, although uninterested in letters and humanism, he had his father’s passion for music and architecture, and was a skilled player on the viola. In the years of peace he indulged his interest as a collector of antiquities and patron of Bellini and Titian. He had practical skills, learned to use a lathe and had foundries in his garden where he practised the fusion of bronze and made cannon with his own hands; he would become the most skilful deployer of artillery of his generation. His device, suitably, was an exploding grenade. He also made terracotta vases and plates which he used for his own table. He was shrewd, with knowledge and experience of foreign affairs, and proved dexterous in guiding his state through the treacherous currents of war and international politics. He was not gregarious and disliked crowds but was kind and pleasant to his household. He was not, in short, the kind of man to whom Lucrezia was naturally attracted; she would not be faithful to him, nor he to her, but over the years of their marriage a mutual respect would develop and, on Alfonso’s side at least, a deep love.

In Rome, meanwhile, Alexander was tortured about his possible mistreatment of Lucrezia. Beltrando Costabili, the Ferrarese ambassador who had remained at Rome to continue final negotiations with Alexander, reported to Ercole a disquieting conversation he had had with the Pope: ‘The Pope had heard that Don Alfonso did not sleep with his first wife; and let it be understood that he would experience the most profound displeasure if he heard that he did not share his bed with the Duchess Lucrezia

. . .
¹⁹
Since Alfonso’s first wife had died in childbirth this outburst must have been prompted by the old fear of non-consummation which had agitated him at the time of Juan Gandia’s marriage. Probably he suspected the Este might try to wriggle out of this marriage on these grounds, as indeed he himself had done with Giovanni Sforza. Concern for Lucrezia’s wellbeing in what was in truth a forced marriage was evidently still in his mind. Three days later, in discussions with Costabili over Cento and La Pieve, Alexander ‘speaking afterwards of his family links with the Estense, had declared that if they would treat Duchessa Lucrezia well, he would think of ways of making them great . . .’
²⁰

In the end, Lucrezia and the Este travelled to Ferrara not by road but along the waterways in a ship, a bucentaur
(bucintoro),
provided by Ercole. The most usual means of travelling in the region, the Val Padana, was by water. At the time a system of rivers and canals linked most of the important cities of Lombardy, the Emilia and the Veneto. Bologna, Modena, Argenta and most of the Este villas could be reached by water from Ferrara, and the Po was the most important artery for travel across northern Italy. The bucentaur was equipped with a mast and a sail as well as oars, and in shallower waters would be drawn by horses. Its superstructure contained several rooms magnificently decorated, painted by artists and hung with tapestries.

The anxious ambassadors had actually succeeded in getting the party off before dawn the next day in order to keep to the schedule planned by Ercole. At Malalbergo, Lucrezia was met by her new sister-in-law – one of the most famous and formidable women in Italy, Isabella d’Este, Marchioness of Mantua, wife of Francesco Gonzaga. Neither of the women was looking forward to the encounter. Lucrezia was intelligent enough to be aware that Isabella did not welcome her. Isabella was seething throughout these days of celebration when Lucrezia, not herself, would be the centre of attention. Indeed, she had written to her husband the previous day that ‘to my great displeasure’ she would have to get up early to go by boat to meet the bride. At twenty-eight, Isabella was six years older than Lucrezia and had already been married twelve years. She was of middle height with a tendency to plumpness and had dark eyes and an abundance of fair hair with a reddish tint. She was extremely intelligent and well informed and a passionate, even rapacious, collector of antiquities and works of art. She was cultivated and well read, sang and accompanied herself on the lute and was accustomed to praise from the great men of literature of the day. Niccolò da Correggio called her
‘la prima donna del mondo’
– the first lady of the world. She patronized the leading artists of the time – even Leonardo da Vinci sketched her. She was very conscious of her high birth, as the eldest daughter of the Duke of Ferrara and of Eleonora d’Aragona, daughter of King Ferrante of Naples, and her pride was cut to the quick at the thought of the upstart Borgia occupying the place of her royal mother as Duchess of Ferrara. Like most aristocrats of her day but more so, Isabella was a tremendous snob. An inscription round the courtyard near her
studiolo
proclaimed her status as granddaughter of a king, daughter of a duke, and wife of a marquis. She was conscious that Lucrezia as Duchess of Ferrara would outrank her. Mantua was a small and relatively unimportant state which could not be compared in territory or wealth with Ferrara; indeed, Isabella resented the fact that her revenues could not keep up with her expensive tastes. Francesco Gonzaga supplemented his income by making his name as a
condottiere
, working under contract to the various powers in Italy. Her letters to Francesco (who was not at the wedding as he had been advised not to attend by Ercole, probably because of the Pope’s loud complaints against him for harbouring Cesare’s enemies, such as Giovanni Sforza) were redolent of her distaste for the Borgia marriage.

Isabella was accompanied by Giulio, the handsomest of the Este brothers, and Ercole’s illegitimate son, born in 1478 from a relationship with one of his wife’s (married) ladies, Isabella Arduino. As Isabella described it to her husband, Francesco Gonzaga, the two sisters-in-law greeted each other with embraces and happy faces before continuing down the canal to Torre de Fossa where Ercole, with the entire court, was waiting on the river bank to greet Lucrezia. When she disembarked he took her hand and kissed her, although she attempted to kiss his hand first. Then they embarked on the great ducal bucentaur which was already crowded with the ambassadors of all the powers, among whom Isabella and Lucrezia were seated. Alfonso and Ercole were on the poop, amusing themselves by listening to the jesters who, in Ferrarese dialect and Spanish rhyme, eulogized Lucrezia and the Este. The party arrived to the sound of trumpets and artillery at the house of Ercole’s illegitimate brother, Alberto d’Este, where Lucrezia was to spend the night before making her ceremonial entry into Ferrara. ‘I will not describe her to you because I know you have seen her,’ Isabella wrote to Francesco, before then going into great detail about her clothes: Lucrezia wore a robe of drawn gold garnished with crimson satin with sleeves in the Castilian style and a cloak slashed with mulberry satin lined with sable, and a necklace of large pearls with a pendant spinel, pierced with a pendant pear-shaped pearl. She wore a gold headdress without a veil.
²¹

For Lucrezia this was the first sight of the father-in-law she had so assiduously courted. At seventy-one Ercole was tall, with strongly marked features, an aquiline nose and a thin, forbidding mouth. He was born in October 1431, the son of the Marquis Niccolò III by his third wife, Ricciarda da Saluzzo, but had spent most of his early life, from fourteen to the age of almost thirty, at the court of Naples where he and his brother Sigismondo had had a humanist education with the future King Ferrante. They had in fact been exiled by their father to keep them out of Ferrara so that their illegitimate half-brothers, Leonello and Borso, could succeed. From the time Ercole grew up he had spent his time as a leading
condottiere
, first for the Aragonese and then the Angevin factions in Naples and finally for Venice. He was devious and ruthless, having engineered his own succession as Duke in 1471 in place of the chosen heir, Niccolò, whom he then plotted unsuccessfully to have poisoned. Five years later, when Niccolò attempted to take over Ferrara, Ercole had him beheaded privately in the
cortile
of the Castello and then, for reasons of family pride, had his head sewn back on and the body dressed for burial in gold brocade. The history of the ancient Este family was as bloodstained as most of the great Italian families, a record of plot and counterplot, executions and torture, as Lucrezia herself was to discover. The plots were customarily among themselves and not takeover attempts by outsiders, a pattern of behaviour which was to repeat itself with tragic consequences early in Alfonso’s reign.

Ercole was an astute and cautious ruler but, as the historian of Ferrara has remarked, hardly one to be trusted.
²²
In Naples he betrayed the Aragonese in favour of their predecessors, the Angevins, then married Eleonora, daughter of the childhood companion, Ferrante, whom he had betrayed. He then betrayed the Venetians who had helped him secure the duchy, an act of treachery which resulted in the disastrous war of Ferrara (1482 – 4) and the loss of the Polesine of Rovigo. Ercole was absolute master of Ferrara and popular with his people, although in recent years the extravagance with which he had indulged his passions for building, music and musicians and the theatre had led to administrative abuses such as the sale of offices. His greatest achievement as ruler had been his success in involving the citizens of Ferrara in the identity of the Este, with theatrical spectacles, jousts, tournaments and religious and charitable ceremonies. Bernardino Zambotti, the not-unprejudiced author of the
Diario Ferrarese,
wrote of him: ‘. . . this Duke of Ferrara in wisdom, shrewdness, experience and goodness was the first man of Italy, and thus more faithful and discreet, and loved by all the governments of Italy, except by the Venetians, who barely wished to hear his name mentioned’.
²³
Since the death of Lorenzo the Magnificent in 1492, the defeat of Ludovico il Moro in 1500, and the destruction of the Aragonese in Naples, Ercole was indeed the preeminent prince in Italy. Altogether, despite his defects, his indecision and inattention to administration, Lucrezia’s future father-in-law, soberly dressed in black as was his wont, was an impressive figure.

The Ferrara which Lucrezia saw across the River Po from the house of Alberto d’Este on the opposite bank was a glittering city, with walls, towers and battlements frescoed with chivalric scenes or painted in the Este colours of red, white and green. In the centre of the city, the grim fourteenth-century dark red brick Castello (the Castel Vecchio, or Old Castle), with its moat, four towers, and below-ground dungeons dominated its surroundings. It was linked by a covered way with the Palazzo del Corte, the Court Palace, a graceful building with arches and loggias of white Istrian stone in the style of the Doge’s Palace in Venice, overlooking the cathedral and the main square, the theatre for public events – jousts, tournaments and, less pleasantly, executions. To the north of the Castello, a whole new quarter known as the Terra Nova was Ercole’s creation, with new streets, a piazza, palaces, gardens, churches and monasteries built over the last twenty years. The city was well defended with ramparts, redoubts and another castle, the Castel Novo, overlooking the Po. The Este dukes had created an impressive setting for the display of their power and prestige and, under their initiative, fifteenth-century Ferrara had become one of the major centres of Renaissance theatre, music and the decorative arts. The court was one of the most splendid in Italy, the palaces richly furnished with tapestries, silk hangings, oriental carpets, alabaster and painted and frescoed rooms. Its splendours rivalled Florence of the Medici, far outstripped those of the contemporary papal court, certainly the provincialism of Pesaro and even the magnificent ducal palace at Urbino. Outside the city, Este wealth and power were demonstrated by a number of magnificent villas and hunting lodges. All this was to be the state of Lucrezia Borgia, bastard daughter of a Spanish pope.