Juan de Borja Lanzol de Romani, el Mayor (1446-1 August 1503) was the first of ten cardinal-nephews elevated by Pope Alexander VI, the cousin of his father, Galceran de Borja y Moncada. Pope Innocent VIII made him the Governor of Rome, and he became Archbishop of Monreale in 1483 before becoming Cardinal-Priest of Santa Susanna in 1492. He went on to accumulate benefices and their associated revenues, serving as administrator of the See of Olomouc, Moravia from 1493 to 1497. That year, he became Bishop of Ferrara, holding the position until his death; he was also Bishop of Melfi from 1494 to 1498. Borgia attended the coronation of Alfonso II of Naples in 1494, and Juan Borgia, Cesare Borgia, and Pope Alexander met with Alfonso to coordinate military strategy against Cardinal Ascanio Sforza and King Charles VIII of France. On 24 April 1503, he became the titular Latin Patriarch of Constantinople, and he died in August of that year.
Biography[]
1503 portrait of Juan Borgia the Elder, Old Tiber Island
Borja was the son of Galcerán de Borja y Moncada and Tecla Navarro de Alpicat, born in 1446. He was a canon of the cathedral chapter of Valencia and the paborde of Albal as well as a minor cleric. He was related to many popes, and Pope Sixtus IV made him a protonary apostolic. In 1492, when his uncle Rodrigo Borgia became Pope Alexander VI, Brogia was made the Cardinal-Priest of Saint Susanna.
In 1501, as the Pope started to lose health and power, he became one of the three generals of Captain-General and Regent Cesare Borgia, his cousin, who sought to seize power in Rome as the self-proclaimed Grand Master of the Knights Templar, while his father held that title as well as that of the Pope. Borgia funded his campaigns in Tuscany and Romagna, and was nicknamed "The Banker".
Death[]
Borgia's assassination
On the first day of August, Juan Borgia held a lavish, sexually-oriented party not far from the Pantheon at the Trastevere ruins. He was brought a chest of money owned by Senator Egidio Troche, who was indebted to him, but little did he know that the carrier was tailed by assassin Ezio Auditore da Firenze. He grabbed a chest of the 3,000 ƒ and set it aside when he heard that Cesare was making a speech, so he headed to listen, leaving his chest out for a courtesan to steal.
Borgia conversed with the courtesan, who agreed to sell her daughter for 700 ƒ, and he listened to Cesare's speech, with Cesare promising a 40-day festival when he conquered all of Italy. He then proceeded to pace around the people celebrating the party, so Ezio sat on a bench and blended in with the party-goers. Ezio awaited Juan to pass by, and he wrapped his arms around his back, and stabbed him with his hidden blades. In his last words, Juan said that he did not regret any of the sounds or tastes that he had experienced, and Ezio said that unearned pleasure consumes itself.
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