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A Disturbing Compilation of the Slimiest People in History

Khalid Elhassan April 26, 2022 37 min

8. History’s Most Brazenly Corrupt Holy Father

A late fifteenth-century portrait of Rodrigo Borgia, who became Pope Alexander VI. Vatican Museums

Rodrigo Borgia (1431 – 1503) was a pope from 1492 until his death. He was perhaps history’s most slimy and brazenly corrupt Holy Father, and did not bother with even the pretense of a fig leaf to cover his venality. He openly sold church offices, as well as indulgences to the wealthy. Unconcerned about his vows of celibacy, he openly acknowledged having fathered nine illegitimate children, including four with his live-in mistress. He also reportedly had an incestuous affair with his own daughter – when she was not busy having incest with her brother.

He was born near Valencia, Spain, into the Borgia family, a powerful ecclesiastical dynasty. Nepotism was the norm in those days, so when Rodrigo Borgia’s uncle became Pope Callixtus III in 1455, he ordained his nephew a deacon, then made him a lay cardinal. Soon thereafter, he was made vice-chancellor of the Catholic Church, at the age of twenty-five. Nepotism got Rodrigo a leg up, but he was a capable man in his own right and continued rising through the Church hierarchy after his pope uncle’s death.

Related: 40 Facts About the Borgias.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.