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A cardinal-nephew (;Cardinale, Hyginus Eugene. 1976. The Holy See and the International Order. Maclean-Hunter Press. p. 133. ;Burckhardt, Jacob, and Middlemore, Samuel George Chetwynd. 1892. The Civilisation of the Renaissance in Italy. Sonnenschein. p. 107. ; ; )Signorotto and Visceglia, 2002, p. 114. Modern French scholarly literature uses the term " cardinal-neveu". was a cardinal elevated by a pope who was that cardinal's relative. The practice of creating cardinal-nephews originated in the Middle Ages, and reached its apex during the 16th and 17th centuries. The last cardinal-nephew was named in 1689 and the practice was abolished in 1692.Bunson, Matthew. 1995. " Cardinal Nephew". The Pope Encyclopedia. Crown Trade Paperbacks. . The word nepotism originally referred specifically to this practice, when it appeared in the English language about 1669.Oxford English Dictionary has, as its first citation, Samuel Pepys' writing about a family reading of Gregorio Leti's Il Nipotismo di Roma, or, The History of the Popes Nephews: from the time of Sixtus IV, anno 1471, to the death of the late Pope Alexander VII, anno 1667. September 2003. " Nepotism" From the middle of the Avignon Papacy (1309–1377) until Pope Innocent XII's anti-nepotism papal bull (a papal charter), Romanum decet pontificem (1692), a pope without a cardinal-nephew was the exception to the rule.Until Innocent XII, the only other exceptions were popes who did not appoint cardinals: Pius III, Marcellus II, Urban VII, Leo XI) and Adrian VI (who appointed one cardinal). Every Renaissance pope who created cardinals appointed a relative to the College of Cardinals, and the nephew was the most common choice,Vidmar, John. 2005. The Catholic Church Through The Ages: A History. Paulist Press. . p. 170. Vidmar gives the exception of Nicholas V, who elevated his half-brother Filippo Calandrini on December 20, 1448 (see: Salvator, 1998, " 15th Century (1404–1503) "). although one of Alexander VI's creations was his own son.
The institution of the cardinal-nephew evolved over seven centuries, tracking developments in the history of the papacy and the styles of individual popes. From 1566 until 1692, a cardinal-nephew held the Roman Curia of the Superintendent of the Ecclesiastical State, known as the Cardinal Nephew, and thus the terms are sometimes used interchangeably. The curial office of the Cardinal Nephew as well as the institution of the cardinal-nephew declined as the power of the Cardinal Secretary of State increased and the temporal power of popes decreased in the 17th and 18th centuries.
The list of cardinal-nephews includes at least fifteen, and possibly as many as nineteen popesS. Miranda: Consistory of 1127 , citing some older authors such as Alphonsus Ciacconius, says that Pope Anastasius IV (Corrado della Suburra) was probably a nephew of his elevator Honorius II; however, modern scholars (Brixius, p. 36 and 78; Klewitz, p. 128; Hüls, p. 128 and 201; Zenker, pp. 46–48) are in agreement that Corrado was created cardinal by Paschalis II, and deny or do not mention his relationship with Honorius II. (Gregory IX, Alexander IV, Adrian V, Gregory XI, Boniface IX, Innocent VII, Eugene IV, Paul II, Alexander VI, Pius III, Julius II, Leo X, Clement VII, Benedict XIII, and Pius VII; perhaps also John XIX and Benedict IX, if they were really promoted cardinals; as well as Innocent III and Benedict XII, if in fact they were related to their elevators); one antipope (John XXIII); and two or three saints (Charles Borromeo, Guarinus of Palestrina, and perhaps Anselm of Lucca, if he was really a cardinal).
According to historian John Bargrave, "by the Council of Bazill, Session 21, the number of cardinals was not to be above 24, and not any nephew of the Pope or of any cardinal was to be of that number. ( Session 23.)"John Bargrave, edited by James Craigie Robertson, 1867. Pope Alexander the Seventh and the College of Cardinals. Camden Society. p. 3.
Pope Clement VI (1342–1352) created more cardinal-nephews than any other pontiff, including six on September 20, 1342, the greatest number of cardinal-nephews elevated at one time. The capitulation of the 1464 papal conclave limited the Pope it elected (Pope Paul II) to appointing one cardinal-nephew, along with other conditions designed to increase the power of the College of Cardinals and reduce the Pope's ability to dilute that power.Burke-Young, Francis A. 1998. " The election of Pope Paul II (1464)".
The Fifth Council of the Lateran declared in 1514 that the care of relatives was to be commended, and the creation of cardinal-nephews was often recommended or justified based on the need to care for indigent family members. A cardinal-nephew could usually expect profitable appointments; for example, Alessandro Farnese, cardinal-nephew of Pope Paul III (1534–1549) held 64 simultaneously in addition to the vice-chancellorship.Ekelund et al., 2004, p. 703.
Pope Paul IV (1555–1559), in his old age, was said to have "fallen almost completely under the cardinal-nephew's influence";Setton, 1984, p. 639. Paul IV's cardinal-nephew, Carlo Carafa, was accused in August 1558 by a Theatines of seducing a Roman noble woman, Plautila de' Massimi, who had come into possession of an inordinate amount of money and jewelry, but the accusations were dismissed by the pontiff.Setton, 1984, p. 711. Saint Charles Borromeo, cardinal-nephew of Pope Pius IV (1559–1565), had ensured the subordination of the secretarius intimus to the Cardinal Nephew, which came to be sometimes known as the secretarius maior.Chadwick, 1981, p. 289. Pius IV was notorious for nepotism: between 1561 and 1565 he transferred more than 350,000 scudi to his relatives.Ekelund et al., 2004, p. 702.
The Cardinal Nephew (also called cardinale padroneLaurain-Portemer, Madeleine, Levillain, ed., 2002. "Superintendent of the Ecclesiastical State", p. 1467–1469. or Secretarius Papae et superintendens status ecclesiasticæ: "Superintendent of the Ecclesiastical State", Reinhard, Wolfgang, Levillain, ed., 2002. "Nepotism", p. 1031–1033.) was an official Papal legate of the Roman Curia, approximately equivalent to the Cardinal Secretary of State, which absorbed its functions after the office of Cardinal Nephew was abolished in 1692. The office has been likened by historians to a "prime minister", " alter ego", or "vice-pope".Hsia, 2005, p. 102. The Cardinal Nephew was generally among a Pope's first cardinal creations, and his creature was traditionally accompanied by a salute from the guns of Castel Sant'Angelo.Pirie, Valérie. 1965. " The Triple Crown: An Account of the Papal Conclaves: Preliminary Chapter". Spring Books.
Following the Avignon Papacy, the Cardinal Nephew was responsible for the spiritual and temporal governance of the Comtat Venaissin, where the Avignon Popes had resided; in 1475, Pope Sixtus IV raised the Diocese of Avignon to the rank of an archbishopric, to the benefit of his nephew Giuliano della Rovere.
The terms of the office of Cardinal Nephew were established by a papal brief developed and refined by Pius V's successors to Paul V (1605–1621). The Cardinal Nephew was also the correspondence liaison for all and Papal legate, and the prefect for two congregations: the Sacra Consulta and the Congregazione del Buon Governo. The Cardinal Nephew was also the captain-general of the papal army and a "channel through which flowed benefices one way and gold the other".
However, these formal functions only came into force during the pontificates of unusually weak Popes; most Cardinal Nephews were the de facto rubber stamp of the pontiff himself.
Although Pope Leo XI (1605) died before he was able to elevate his nephew, Roberto Ubaldini, Ubaldini was elevated by Leo XI's successor, Pope Paul V in 1615.Signorotto and Visceglia, 2002, p. 144.
Some historians consider Scipione Borghese, cardinal-nephew to Pope Paul V, to be the "prototypical representative" of a cardinal-nephew, unlike those before him, created to "provide for and oversee the permanent social and economic ascent of the reigning papal family into the ranks of the high Roman aristocracy".Bireley, Robert. 2004. Book Review of Bürokratie und Nepotismus unter Paul V. (1605–1621): Studien zur frühneuzeitlichen Mikropolitik in Rom by Birgit Emich. The Catholic Historical Review. 90, 1: 127–129. For example, in 1616, 24 of the 30 abbeys belonging to Borghese were rented out, a practice the Council of Trent had attempted to eliminate. A thorough financial analysis of Borghese's cardinalate by Volker Reinhardt (based on a series of extant account books) examines the strategies Borghese used to build up wealth during his uncle's pontificate and non-ecclesiastical assets before his uncle's death, which Volker considers to be exemplary of Baroque papal families.Osheim, Duane J. "Review of Kardinal Scipione Borghese, 1605–1633: Vermögen, Finanzen und sozialer Aufstieg eines Papstnepoten". The American Historical Review. 90, 4: 971–972. It is estimated that Paul V Borghese had transferred to his family approximately 4% of the total income of the Holy See during his pontificate.Thomas Munck. Europa XVII wieku. Warszawa 1999, p. 341 Borghese's personal revenues in 1610 were 153,000 scudi compared to the mere 4,900 scudi that constituted his entire family's income in 1592.Baumgartner, 2003, p. 142.
Pope Gregory XIV (1590–1591) began the practice of creating cardinal-nephews whose formal appointment coincided de facto with their nomination, and was thus separate from the ordinal process for creating cardinals, and, when he fell ill, he authorized his cardinal-nephew, Paolo Emilio Sfondrato, to use the Fiat ut petitur, a power which was later diminished at the urging of the college.Tizon-Germe, Anne-Cécile, Levillain, ed., 2002, "Gregory XIV", p. 666. Paul V issued a motu proprio on April 30, 1618, formally bestowing on his cardinal-nephew the same authority Pope Clement VIII had given to Pietro Aldobrandini, beginning what historian Laurain-Portemer calls "l'age classique'" of nepotism.Signorotto and Visceglia, 2002, p. 144–145.
Pope Gregory XV's (1621–1623) cardinal-nephew, Ludovico Ludovisi, the first cardinal-nephew known as il cardinale padrone ("the Cardinal boss")Williams, 2004, p. 103. accumulated a vast array of benefices: the bishopric of Bologna, 23 , the directorship of the Apostolic Signatura, as well as the offices of the vice-chancellor and high-chamberlain, and was able to have most of them redistributed among 17 of his kinsmen upon his death. These benefices and offices netted Ludovisi more than 200,000 scudi annually, and he is considered to have exercised "more unlimited authority" than any previous cardinal-nephew.von Rankle, Leopold. 1848. The History of the Popes. p. 307. Notably, cardinal-nephews were allowed to create facultas testandi to will the rewards of their benefices to secular family members. Gregory XV's successor, Urban VIII (1623–1644) convened two special committees of theologians, both of whom endorsed this practice.
Not all Cardinal Nephews were cardinal-nephews in the strictest sense. In fact, papal historian Valérie Pirie considers not having a nephew a "tremendous asset for a would-be Pope" as it left the position open for an ally cardinal. For example, Pope Clement X gave the office to Cardinal Paoluzzi-Altieri, whose nephew had recently married Laura Caterina Altieri, the sole heiress of Clement X's family. Many historians consider Olimpia Maidalchini, the sister-in-law of Pope Innocent X (1644–1655), to have been a de facto Cardinal Nephew; the position was formally held by her son, Camillo Pamphili, then her nephew, Francesco Maidalchini (after Pamphili renounced his cardinalate in order to wed), and (after Francesco proved incompetent) Camillo Astalli, her cousin.Chadwick, 1981, p. 303.
Popes often had only a few choices for the creation of a Cardinal Nephew. According to papal historian Frederic Baumgartner, Pope Sixtus V's (1585–1590) reign "started badly" because Alessandro Peretti di Montalto was "his only nephew eligible for the office, but he could hardly serve the Pope as a trustworthy confidant", causing several cardinals to refuse to attend his investiture.Baumgartner, 2003, p. 130. Another papal historian Ludwig von Pastor notes that "the misfortune of Pope Pamphilj was that the only person in his family who would have had the qualities necessary to fill such a position was a woman".Boutry, Philippe, Levillain, ed., 2002, "Innocent X", p. 801–802.
Pope Innocent XI (1676–1689) despised the practice and only accepted his election as Pope after the College of Cardinals consented to his plans for reform, which included a ban on nepotism. However, Innocent XI backed down after thrice failing to achieve the support of the majority of his cardinals for a bull banning nepotism,Chadwick, 1981, p. 304. which had been tediously composed between 1677 and 1686.Rosa, Mario, Levillain, ed., 2002, "Curia", p. 468. Innocent XI refused entreaties from within the papal court to bring his only nephew, Livio Odescalchi, the prince of Sirmio, to Rome,Fr. Jeffrey Keyes. " A YOUNG MAN IN THE ROME OF PIUS VII ". p. 34. although he did elevate Carlo Stefano Anastasio Ciceri, a distant relative, cardinal on September 2, 1686.Miranda, Salvador. 1998. " Consistory of September 2, 1686 ." Innocent XI's successor, Pope Alexander VIII (1689–1691), was the last Pope to create a Cardinal Nephew. Alexander VIII also undid another reform of Innocent XI by restoring the revenues of the former Chancery to the Vice-Chancellor, who was, at the time, his cardinal-nephew, Pietro Ottoboni. Edith Standen, a consultant to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, calls Ottoboni the "last and certainly not least magnificent example" of the "splendor of an extinct species, the Cardinal-Nephew".Standen, Edith A. 1981. "Tapestries for a Cardinal-Nephew: A Roman Set Illustrating Tasso's "Gerusalemme Liberata". Metropolitan Museum Journal. 16: 147–164.
Until 1692 (and sometimes thereafter), the cardinal-nephew (or a lay nephew) would be the chief archive of the Pope, usually removing the archives to a family archive upon the death of the pontiff.Hansman, Silvia. 1999, Spring. " The Vatican Secret Archives ". Seminar on Records and Archives in Society. In particular, the archival collections of the Barberini, Farnese, Chigi-Albani, and Borghese families contain important papal documents.
However, even following Romanum decet pontificem, only three of the eight Popes of the 18th century failed to make a nephew or brother cardinal. The College of Cardinals apparently preferred rule by nephews than by favorites, which they perceived as the alternative; for example, the college urged Pope Benedict XIII (1724–1730) to appoint a cardinal-nephew, who they hoped would replace Benedict XIII's notorious lieutenant Niccolò Coscia.Chadwick, 1981, p. 305. Pope Gregory XIII (1572–1585) also had to be urged by key figures in the college to appoint his cardinal-nephew: Filippo Boncompagni.Signorotto and Visceglia, 2002, p. 142.
The cardinal-nephews of the 18th century declined in influence as the power of the Cardinal Secretary of State increased. The church of Pope Benedict XIII (1724–1730) is described by historian Eamon Duffy as "all the evils of nepotism without the nephew".Duffy, Eamon. 2006. " Saints & sinners: a history of the Popes". Neri Maria Corsini, cardinal-nephew of Pope Clement XII (1730–1740) was by far the most powerful cardinal-nephew of the 18th century, on account of his uncle's advanced age and blindness. However, Clement XII's successor, Pope Benedict XIV (1740–1758) was described by Hugh Walpole as "a priest without indolence or interest, a prince without favorites, a Pope without nephews".
Romoaldo Braschi-Onesti, cardinal-nephew of Pius VI (1775–1799), was the penultimate cardinal-nephew. Despite Pius VI's lineage to a noble Cesena family, his only sister had married a man from the poor Onesti family. Therefore, he commissioned a genealogy to discover (and inflate) some trace of nobility in the Onesti lineage, an endeavor which yielded only a circuitous connection to Saint Romualdo.Pirie, Valérie. 1965. " The Triple Crown: An Account of the Papal Conclaves: XVIIIth Century: PIUS VI (BRASCHI)". Spring Books.
After the turbulent 1800 papal conclave, Pope Pius VII (1800–1823) shunned the institution of the cardinal-nephew and instead relied on his Cardinal Secretary of State, Ercole Consalvi.Pirie, Valérie. 1965. " The Triple Crown: An Account of the Papal Conclaves: XIXth Century". Spring Books. p. 305. During the 19th century, the only nephew of a Pope created cardinal was Gabriele della Genga Sermattei, nephew of Pope Leo XII, created cardinal by Pope Gregory XVI on February 1, 1836.Miranda, Salvador. 1998. " Consistory of February 1, 1836 (VIII) ". Although the institutionalization of nepotism disappeared in the 18th century, "pietas" (duty to family) remained a theme of papal administration into the 20th century, although rarely with the overt intervention of a papal uncle. Following the example of Pius VI, Popes Leo XIII (who elevated his brother, Giuseppe Pecci, cardinal on May 12, 1879) and Pius XII (1939–1958) weakened the formal curial bureaucracy in favor of a parallel government, in which family members often figured prominently. The loss of temporal power over the Papal States ( de facto in 1870 with the "Roman Question" and de jure in 1929 with the Lateran Treaty) also eliminated the structural conditions which had figured prominently in the family politics of earlier Popes.
However, cardinal-nephews were not guaranteed the leadership of their uncle's creatures; for example, in the papal conclave, 1621, Scipione Borghese could count only twenty-nine votes (a fraction of his uncle's fifty-six cardinals), Pietro Aldobrandini controlled only nine (of his uncle's thirteen remaining cardinals), and Montalto only five of his uncle's remaining cardinals.Baumgartner, 2003, p. 143. In fact, international rivalries sometimes overwhelmed family loyalties when cardinal-nephews were relatively "poorly organized". As Pope Innocent X (1644–1655) died with the office of Cardinal Nephew vacant his faction proved divided and leaderless in the conclave, although his sister-in-law Olimpia Maidalchini was invited to address the cardinals from within the enclosure, the only woman ever so honored.Baumgartner, 2003, p. 155.
Instruzione al cardinal Padrone circa il modo come si deve procurare una fazione di cardinali con tutti i requisiti che deve avere per lo stabilimento della sua grandezza ("Instructions to the chief cardinal on how to create a faction of cardinals with all the requisites for the establishment of his grandeur"), discovered in the archive of the Santa Maria de Monserrato offers advice to cardinal-nephews for consolidating power within the College of Cardinals. Another text, the Ricordi dati da Gregorio XV al cardinale Lodovisio suo nipote ("Memoir addressed by Gregory XV to his Nephew Cardinal Lodovisio") offers advice for how to rise within the Curia.Signorotto and Visceglia, 2002, p. 93.
An analysis of the five papal conclaves between 1605 and 1644 shows that cardinal-nephews were generally unsuccessful in electing their chosen candidates, although the victor was usually a cardinal created by the deceased Pope.Signorotto and Visceglia, 2002, p. 121. in particular, when they deigned to travel to Rome for the conclave, tended to oppose the election of cardinal-nephews, although they equally opposed the election of crown-cardinals of other monarchs.Baumgartner, 2003, p. 150. In general, a cardinal-nephew had to outlive one or more successors of his uncle to become regarded as papabile, both because of their youth and their tendency to be blamed for any unpopular papal policies of their uncles.
A papal election could bring a dramatic change of fortune for a cardinal-nephew, often bringing the former favorites into conflict with the new Pope. For example, Prospero Colonna and Francisco de Borja were excommunication,Trollope, 1876, p. 138.Miranda, S. 1998. " Consistory of September 28, 1500 (IX)". Florida International University. and Carlo Carafa was executed.Miranda, S. 1998. " Consistory of June 7, 1555 (I)". Florida International University. The papal conclave, May 1605, is one example of a conclave where a candidate (Antonmaria Sauli) was defeated because enough other cardinals were convinced of the need for "a Pope willing to punish the cardinal-nephews for robbing the papacy".Baumgartner, 2003, p. 141. A cardinal-nephew was also a potential threat to any future pontiff; for example, Ludovisi came to lead the opposition against Pope Urban VIII (1623–1644), even talking about calling a council against the Pope (which never occurred as Ludovisi died in 1632) because "no one else had the standing to confront Urban's titanic temper".Baumgartner, 2003, p. 152.
The creation of relatives and known-allies as cardinals was only one way in which medieval and Renaissance Popes attempted to dilute the power of the College of Cardinals as an "ecclesiastical rival" and perpetuate their influence within the church after their death.Hsia, 2005, p. 103. The institution of the cardinal-nephew had the effect both of enriching the Pope's family with desirable and of modernizing the administration of the papacy, by allowing the pontiff to rule through a proxy which was more easily deemed fallible when necessary and provided a formal distance between the person of the pontiff and the everydayness of pontifical affairs.
Gregorio Leti's Papal Nepotism, or the True Relation of the Reasons Which Impel the Popes to make their Nephews Powerful (1667) is one example of contemporary criticism of the institution of the cardinal-nephew; Leti holds the rare distinction of having all of his publications on the Index Librorum Prohibitorum ("List of Prohibited Books").Ambrosini, Maria Luisa, and Willis, Mary. 1996. The Secret Archives of the Vatican. Barnes & Noble Publishing. . p. 138. The Catholic Encyclopedia of 1913 defended the institution of the cardinal-nephew as a necessary countermeasure to the intrigue of the old Church. According to Francis A. Burkle-Young, 15th century Popes in particular found it necessary to elevate their relatives to the College of Cardinals due to their distrust of the , Roman baronial families, and Italian princely families who also populated the college.Burkle-Young, Francis. 1998. " The Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church: Papal elections in the Fifteenth Century: The election of Pope Eugenius IV (1431)." According to Thomas Adolphus Trollope, a famed papal historian, "the evil wrought by them in and to the church has been well nigh fatal to it; and it continued to increase until increasing danger warned the Pontiffs to abstain. The worst cardinals, providing, of course, the material for the worst Popes, have been for the most part cardinal nephews, the temptation to the creation of such having been rendered too great to be resisted by the exorbitant greatness of the power, dignity, and wealth attributed to the members of the Sacred College. The value of these great "prizes" was so enormous, that the "hat" became an object of ambition to princes, and it was the primary object with a long series of Popes to bestow it on their kinsmen."
According to Baumgartner, "the rise of a centralized administration with professional bureaucrats with careers in the papal service" proved more effective than nepotism for future Popes and thus "greatly reduced the need for papal nephews".Baumgartner, 2003, p. 166. The rise of the Cardinal Secretary of State was the "most obvious element of this new approach".
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