Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    The Borgias: Power and Depravity in Renaissance Italy
    The Borgias: Power and Depravity in Renaissance Italy
    The Borgias: Power and Depravity in Renaissance Italy
    Audiobook11 hours

    The Borgias: Power and Depravity in Renaissance Italy

    Written by Paul Strathern

    Narrated by Julian Elfer

    4.5/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    The Borgia family have become a byword for evil. Corruption, incest, ruthless megalomania, avarice, and vicious cruelty-all have been associated with their name. And yet, paradoxically, this family lived when the Renaissance was coming into its full flowering in Italy. Examples of infamy flourished alongside some of the finest art produced in western history.

    This is but one of several paradoxes associated with the Borgia family. For the family which produced corrupt popes, depraved princes, and poisoners, would also produce a saint. These paradoxes which so characterize the Borgias have seldom been examined in great detail. Previously history has tended to condemn, or attempt in part to exonerate, this remarkable family. Yet in order to understand the Borgias, much more is needed than evidence for and against. The Borgias must be related to their time, together with the world which enabled them to flourish. Within this context the Renaissance itself takes on a very different aspect. Was the corruption part of the creation, or vice versa?

    The primitive psychological forces which first played out in the amphitheaters of ancient Greece are all here. Along with the final, tragic downfall.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherTantor Media, Inc
    Release dateAug 6, 2019
    ISBN9781977347381
    The Borgias: Power and Depravity in Renaissance Italy
    Author

    Paul Strathern

    Paul Strathern is a Somerset Maugham Award-winning novelist, and his nonfiction works include The Venetians, Death in Florence, The Medici, Mendeleyev's Dream, The Florentines, Empire, and The Borgias, all available from Pegasus Books. He lives in England.

    More audiobooks from Paul Strathern

    Related to The Borgias

    Related audiobooks

    History For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Grief And Desperation

      Jan 19, 2023

      Grief And Desperation
      4 min read

    • Article

      Betrayal Of The Knights Templar

      Jan 31, 2024

      Betrayal Of The Knights Templar
      11 min read

    • Article

      The (surprisingly) modern Middle Ages

      Sep 2, 2021

      In the middle of the 16th century, the historian John Foxe looked back at the great sweep of time since the birth of Christ, and decided that it could be sliced into three chunks. History, he suggested, began with the “primitive time”, when Christian

      9 min read

    • Article

      The Shadow Of Death Descends

      Jan 19, 2023

      The Shadow Of Death Descends
      5 min read

    • Article

      Greatest Popes

      Dec 31, 2020

      Born Francesco della Rovere, the Sistine Chapel was built under his papacy. He also helped found the Vatican Library. But when it came to politics, Sixtus was unlucky. He waged war to gain Ferrara for his nephew, but lost, and he piled money and titl

      3 min read

    • Article

      Inquistion In The New World

      Aug 10, 2023

      Inquistion In The New World
      7 min read

    • Article

      Interview / Simon Schama

      Jun 8, 2023

      Interview / Simon Schama
      10 min read

    • Article

      Who Were The Antipopes?

      Jan 30, 2020

      Who Were The Antipopes?
      8 min read

    • Article

      'The Pope Who Would Be King' Details The Birth Of The Modern Papacy

      Apr 17, 2018

      Pope Francis, the current supreme pontiff of the Catholic Church, wields two different kinds of authority, one vast and one minuscule. The vast one is obvious: The Pope is seen as the heir to St. Peter, the spiritual leader of the world's more than 1

      3 min read

    • Article

      Worst Pope of All Time?

      Oct 17, 2018

      Worst Pope of All Time?
      5 min read

    • Article

      Templars On Trial

      Aug 31, 2023

      They arrived with no warning, striking swiftly as a guillotine blade. As dawn broke over France on Friday 13 October 1307, hundreds of royal troops stormed the residences of Templar knights, rounded up the brethren and put them in chains. The knights

      9 min read

    • Article

      Letters

      May 12, 2022

      I feel that the article concerning Napoleon (April) was unfair to its subject. While his later career frequently saw his original ideals undermined by the reality of power, he was from the first a believer in the revolution, as his letters and genera

      3 min read

    • Article

      Going Into Lockdown

      Jan 19, 2023

      Going Into Lockdown
      5 min read

    • Article

      The Black Legend

      Oct 7, 2021

      The Black Legend
      1 min read

    • Article

      Avoid Like The Plague

      Apr 16, 2020

      Avoid Like The Plague
      3 min read

    • Article

      “England Was Seen As A Pariah State, Ruled By Regicidal Rebels Who’d Publicly Executed Their King”

      Sep 30, 2021

      ON THE HistoryExtra PODCAST Devil-Land: England Under Siege 1588-1688 by Clare Jackson (Allen Lane, 688 pages, £35) Ellie CawtHorne: Devil-Land looks at England from 1588 to 1688. Why do you think this is such a fascinating 100-year period of English

      9 min read

    • Article

      A Catalogue Of Chaos

      Jan 31, 2024

      A Catalogue Of Chaos
      7 min read

    • Article

      The Unholy Roman Empire

      Jan 31, 2024

      The Unholy Roman Empire
      3 min read

    • Article

      On The Prowl

      Mar 17, 2022

      On The Prowl
      4 min read

    • Article

      Anniversaries

      Apr 11, 2024

      Anniversaries
      5 min read

    • Article

      Elizabeth At War

      Dec 5, 2019

      Elizabeth At War
      11 min read

    • Article

      “Lord Have Merrcy On London”

      May 14, 2020

      “Lord Have Merrcy On London”
      8 min read

    • Article

      Q&A

      Feb 17, 2022

      Q&A
      3 min read

    • Article

      Tom Paine’s Bones

      Aug 14, 2022

      Tom Paine’s Bones
      4 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for The Borgias

    4.5/5

    63 ratings6 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 5/5
      It’s a great story, well told. I recommend it.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      I really loved the book! I’ve been looking for a book to read on the Borgias and this one hasn’t disappointed!!
    • 5/5
      Fascinating account about power and papacy in the 1500s. Paul Strathern, the narrator did a tremendous job bringing life to the third person characters. Enjoyable!
    • 5/5
      I bet if throughout history every Pope was investigated to the extent that Pope Alexander vi ( Borgia Pope), we would find as much letchery, simoney, adultry, and otger abuses. The fact that he was Spanish was the first straw with his incredible power over Rome being the final.
    • 4/5
      Very entertaining and non- sensational account of the three Borgias—father, brother and sister—who both were typical of a brutal period in European history and stood out for their particular brand of ambition and treachery. Excellent narrator, I’d pretty much listen to him read the phone book.
    • 5/5
      Its generally believed that the reign of Pope Alexander VI (1492-1503) represents the absolute nadir of the papacy. In fact, there have been far worse popes, however Rodrigo Borgia and his family have become infamous for their greed, violence, lust for power and insatiable sexual appetites. This was not always the view however, in the centuries afterwards many expressed admiration for Alexander as a "strong" pope, who brought glory and power to the Church. Rodrigo Borgia came from an obscure Catalan family with alleged royal links in its past. Fiercely ambitious, he chose the Church as the best vessel for improving his family fortunes, but had little time for its moral strictures. By the time he arrived in Rome and became a cardinal he had already fathered illegitimate children, and would end up with at least 8. The most famous and influential of these would be the one he produced with Vanozza de Cattanei. Cesare, Juan, Lucrezia and Joffre would become as notorious as their father. Borgia served as Vice-Chancellor to five popes while he learned the dirty secrets of the Vatican and learnt how to play its power games. Finally after the death of the spectacularly unmemorable Innocent VIII, he made his move, trumping his fierce arch rival and lifetime enemy Guiliamo della Rovere by simply bribing his way into the papacy. Once there, he turned the Holy See into purely a vessel for enriching his family and increasing the temporal power of the church. His mercurial and violent son Cesare was his main tool for achieving this, while his daughter Lucrezia became a marital pawn in his game of thrones. Over a period of just 11 years Alexander and his family became legendary for their greed, violence, lust and political machinations as they stripped the Church bare for their own aggrandizement. In the end it all came to nothing though, as after Alexander's death his bitter enemy della Rovere became Pope as Julius II and he set about vigorously destroying the Borgia legacy. This book is a searing look into the corruption and violence of Renaissance Italy, the never-ending dynastic squabbles and outbreaks of war as rival city-states fought for advantage, with periodic interventions by France and Spain. Some of it sounds completely incredible but there is no doubt it is all true. A fantastic read.