They possess none of the grace of the ideal woman of the Umbrian school, but they have something of the magnificence of the Imperial City--Juno and Venus are united in them.

They would resemble the ideals of Titian and Paul Veronese but for their black hair and dark complexion,--blond and red hair have always been rare among the Romans.
Vannozza doubtless was of great beauty and ardent passions; for if not, how could she have inflamed a Rodrigo Borgia?
Her intellect too, although uncultivated, must have been vigorous; for if not, how could she have maintained her relations with the cardinal?
The date given above was the beginning of this liaison, if we may believe the Spanish historian Mariana, who says that Vannozza was the mother of Don Pedro Luis, Rodrigo's eldest son.

In a notarial instrument of 1482 this son of the cardinal is called a youth (_adolescens_), which signified a person fourteen or fifteen years of age.

In what circumstances Vannozza was living when Cardinal Borgia made her acquaintance we do not know.

It is not likely that she was one of the innumerable courtesans who, thanks to the liberality of their retainers, led most brilliant lives in Rome at that period; for had she been, the novelists and epigrammatists of the day would have made her famous.
The chronicler Infessura, who must have been acquainted with Vannozza, relates that Alexander VI, wishing to make his natural son Caesar a cardinal, caused it to appear, by false testimony, that he was the legitimate son of a certain Domenico of Arignano, and he adds that he had even married Vannozza to this man.