[The Life of Cesare Borgia by Raphael Sabatini]@TWC D-Link bookThe Life of Cesare Borgia CHAPTER I 9/13
This sum, as a matter of fact, represented her portion of the inheritance from her deceased mother, Francoise de Bretagne, and it was tendered subject to her renouncing all rights and succession in any property of her father's or her said deceased mother's. Thus is it set forth in the contract drawn up by Alain at Castel-Jaloux on March 23, 1499, which contract empowers his son Gabriel and one Regnault de St.Chamans to treat and conclude the marriage urged by the king between the Duke of Valentinois and Alain's daughter, Charlotte d'Albret.
But that was by no means all.
Among other conditions imposed by Alain, he stipulated that the Pope should endow his daughter with 100,000 livres Tournois, and that for his son, Amanieu d'Albret, there should be a cardinal's hat--for the fulfilment of both of which conditions Cesare took it upon himself to engage his father. On April 15 the treaty between France and Venice was signed at Blois. It was a defensive and offensive alliance directed against all, with the sole exception of the reigning Pontiff, who should have the faculty to enter into it if he so elected.
This was the first decisive step against the House of Sforza, and so secretly were the negotiations conducted that Lodovico Sforza's first intimation of them resulted from the capture in Milanese territory of a courier from the Pope with letters to Cesare in France.
From these he learnt, to his dismay, not only of the existence of the league, but that the Pope had joined it.
<<Back Index Next>> D-Link book Top TWC mobile books
|