Pope Alexander VI was a naughty, naughty man.
Despite being a man of God and sworn to celibacy, Alexander — born Borgia, yes, that Borgia! — was quite unable to keep it in his pants. He maintained three “official” mistresses in his lifetime, and many more unacknowledged. He fathered at least eleven children by these women, and was heavily involved in their upbringing, arranging dynastic marriages for them and using them to cement alliances.
Among these numerous Borgia children was the beautiful Lucrezia Borgia, well-known for being stunningly gorgeous. And in 1498, Lucrezia gave birth to a little boy named Giovanni Borgia.[1] The Pope was rumored by many to be the child’s biological father. Other’s claimed it was his other son, Lucrezia’s own brother Cesare Borgia, who fathered the child by his sister. And then there were those who claimed the old dirty pope had the child by an unnamed and unknown mistress and then passed it off to Lucrezia to avoid scandal…
Thing is, we don’t know for sure it was Pope Alexander who fathered little Giovanni. Was he wild and immoral enough to do so? By all accounts, yes. The whole Borgia clan had “Game of Thrones” written all over it.
Footnotes
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