Bernardino Spada

Italian cardinal

Bernardino Spada (21 April 1594 – 10 November 1661) was an Italian Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church and a patron of the arts whose collection is housed in the Palazzo Spada in Rome.

Spada was born in Brisighella, current province of Ravenna (Romagna). His father was the rich merchant Paolo Spada (unrelated to the Spada family of ancient nobility) who had directed him early on to a career in the church, though the generations before his had been colliers. Bernardino studied law in Bologna, Perugia and Rome and received a doctorate. He served in the Papal Curia from 1617.

On 8 December 1623, he was consecrated bishop in the church of San Luigi dei Francesi in Rome by Cardinal Guido Bentivoglio d'Aragona, assisted by Guillaume du Nozet, Titular Archbishop of Seleucia, and by François Boyvin de Péricard, Bishop of Evreux. In December 1623 he was appointed papal nuncio to the court of France, in preparation for which he was ordained titular archbishop of Tamiathis. He served as nuncio until 1627, when he became papal legate in Bologna. He was made a cardinal 19 January 1626 by Pope Urban VIII. When the plague epidemic hit Bologna in 1630/1631, he helped organize the health care system there. From 1631 he served again in Rome, filling several influential positions in the Curia. In 1632 he purchased what is now called the Palazzo Spada in the rione Regola, facing Piazza Capo di Ferro with a garden looking over the Tiber, and commissioned Francesco Borromini to modify it for him in a more Baroque style, to house his growing collections. Spada was furious and later published a manifesto detailing his version of events which, according to contemporary John Bargrave, many accepted to be the truth.

In his profile of Spada, from his own observations and those of others, Bargrave also recounts Spada's dealings with Bologna nobleman Andrea Casale. Spada was largely responsible for the publication of Musa Posthuma, a collection of Marchina's poetry, though it was first published after his death in 1662. Spada included some of his own poetry, including a dedicatory poem written in Latin, addressed to the former queen of Sweden, Christine. Several of Spada's letters to Marchina and to his brother Vergilius Spada are also included in Musa Posthuma, which are written in Italian and Latin. Several of Marchina's poems written about Spada are also included in the book.