The Borgia family originated in Spain, where the family name was spelled "Borja." When Cardinal Alfonso de Borja was unexpectedly elected Pope Calixtus III in 1455, the career of the Borgias was launched. In 1456, Calixtus made his nephew Rodrigo, then only 25 years old, a cardinal and vice-chancellor of the church. Rodrigo used his position to acquire lucrative church offices and build alliances that would eventually allow him to maneuver his own election as Pope Alexander VI in 1492. Expert at accumulating wealth both for himself and the church, Alexander would use his money to maintain a luxurious court and to advance the position of his family.
Sensuous by nature and notoriously attractive to women, Alexander openly kept a series of mistresses, most notably Vannozza Catenei, a Roman beauty who bore him four children. In all, he had nine children, including two born after he became pope. Alexander shamelessly used his children as political pawns, plotting strategic marriages to establish a Borgia dynasty. He arranged three marriages for his unfortunate daughter Lucrezia: When her first husband, a member of the Sforza family, proved no longer politically useful, Alexander annulled the marriage, publicly claiming that the groom was impotent. Alexander then married Lucrezia to a prince of Naples, who was murdered a few years later by a gang of thugs, supposedly because Borgia policy toward Naples had changed. She was then married to Alfonso d'Este of Ferrara, who agreed only after a combination of threats and bribes from Alexander. Happily for Lucrezia, she became loved and respected as the lady of Ferrara.
