The Pope Who Kept a Mistress and Her Brother as Cardinals

 

The Pope Who Kept a Mistress and Her Brother as Cardinals

Title: The Scandal of Pope Sixtus IV and the Nepotism Empire
Date: 1471–1484

Story:
Pope Sixtus IV is best remembered today for commissioning the Sistine Chapel. But behind the religious façade, his papacy was riddled with scandal, nepotism, and accusations of sexual impropriety. Born Francesco della Rovere, he rose from humble beginnings and became a master manipulator of Church politics. Once elected pope, he quickly turned the Vatican into a playground of favoritism and corruption.

He appointed six of his nephews as cardinals—including Giuliano della Rovere (future Pope Julius II) and Pietro Riario, a 25-year-old known more for his extravagant parties than his piety. Pietro lived in stunning luxury, throwing banquets with gold utensils and employing hundreds of servants, all funded by Church money. Sixtus gave his nephew bishoprics, castles, and enormous incomes. Pietro’s sudden death in 1474 was rumored to be the result of poisoning—possibly from another jealous cardinal.

But whispers also spread about Sixtus’s relationship with Pietro and another young man, Raffaele Riario, also made cardinal at age 17. Critics, including some inside the Church, accused Sixtus of “special affection” toward these young men—allegations of homosexuality and sexual favoritism circulated in secret Roman letters. While there's no smoking gun, the combination of youth, power, and favoritism was too suspicious for many.

The pope’s biggest scandal came when he supported the Pazzi Conspiracy—a violent attempt to overthrow the Medici family in Florence. In 1478, during Mass in Florence Cathedral, assassins stabbed Giuliano de' Medici to death and wounded Lorenzo the Magnificent. Sixtus’s nephew Raffaele Riario was in the city and may have known of the plot. Florence linked the pope to the attack, sparking a bitter war between the Papal States and Florence.

Though Sixtus defended his actions as “divine judgment,” the bloodshed and corruption permanently stained his pontificate. He died in 1484, hated by many and remembered less for the Sistine Chapel and more for turning the Holy See into a mafia family.

Key Characters:

Pope Sixtus IV

Pietro and Raffaele Riario

Giuliano della Rovere (later Julius II)

Lorenzo de’ Medici

Giuliano de’ Medici

Reference:

The Bad Popes by E.R. Chamberlin

“Nepotism in the Renaissance Papacy,” Journal of Ecclesiastical History

Vatican Letters of the Riario Family, 1470s