."[76] If this was the case, the
number of Alexander's children must be increased, for Ludovico Borgia
was also his son. This Borgia, who succeeded to Giovanni's benefices,
was Archbishop of Valencia and subsequently cardinal. He reported his
promotion to the Marchioness Gonzaga in a letter in which he everywhere
speaks of the deceased as "his brother," just as Caesar had done.[77]

These statements, however, do not refute the hitherto generally accepted
opinion regarding the descent of Giovanni Borgia, "the younger," and
Zambotta certainly was in error--the word _fratre_, which he uses in his
letter means merely "dear cousin," _fratello cugino_.[78]

January 14th news reached the Vatican that Caesar had taken the castle of
Forli. After a brave resistance Catarina Sforza Riario, together with
her two brothers, was compelled to surrender. The grandchild of the
great Francesco Sforza of Milan, the natural daughter of Galeazzo Maria
and the illegitimate sister of Blanca, wife of Emperor Maximilian, was
the ideal of the heroic women of Italy, who were found not only in
Bojardo's and Ariosto's poems, but also in real life. Her nature
exceeded the feminine and verged on caricature. To understand the
evolution of such personalities, in whom beauty and culture, courage and
reason, sensuality and cruelty combined to produce a strange organism,
we must be familiar with the conditions from which they sprang. Catarina
Sforza's experiences made her the amazon that she was.

At an early age she was married to the rude nephew of Sixtus IV,
Girolamo Riario, Count of Forli. Shortly afterwards her terrible father
met a tyrant's death in Milan. Then her husband fell beneath the daggers
of the conspirators, who flung his naked body from a window of the
stronghold of Forli. Catarina, however, with determined courage,
succeeded in keeping the castle for her children, and she avenged her
husband's death with ferocious cruelty. Subsequently she was known--to
quote Marino Sanuto's words--as "a courageous woman and cruel
virago."[79] Six years later she saw her brother Giangaleazzo die of
poison administered by Ludovico il Moro, while before her very eyes her
second, but not openly recognized, husband, Giacomo Feo of Savona, was
slain in Forli by conspirators. She immediately mounted her charger, and
at the head of her guard pursued the murderers to their quarter, where
she had every living being--men, women, and children--hacked to pieces.
Sh