Иннокентий VIII: Рим Папасы және оның өмірбаяны

Head of the Catholic Church from 1484 to 1492

Pope Innocent VIII (Innocentius VIII; ; 1432 – 25 July 1492), born Giovanni Battista Cybo (or Cibo), was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 29 August 1484 to his death, in July 1492. Son of the viceroy of Naples, Cybo spent his early years at the Neapolitan court. He became a priest in the retinue of Cardinal Calandrini, half brother to Pope Nicholas V (1447–55), Bishop of Savona under Pope Paul II, and with the support of Cardinal Giuliano Della Rovere. After intense politicking by Della Rovere, Cybo was elected pope in 1484. King Ferdinand I of Naples had supported Cybo's competitor, Rodrigo Borgia. The following year, Pope Innocent supported the barons in their failed revolt. During his papacy, Pope Innocent issued a papal bull on witchcraft named Summis desiderantes affectibus. In March 1489, Cem, the captive brother of Bayezid II, the sultan of the Ottoman Empire, came into Innocent's custody. Viewing his brother as a rival, the Sultan paid Pope Innocent not to set him free. The amount he paid to Pope Innocent was 120,000 crowns (an amount equal to all of the annual revenue to the Vatican) in addition to some holy relics and another sum of money to be paid annually. Any time the Sultan threatened war against the Christian Balkans, Innocent threatened to release his brother. On 28 January 1495, Cem was released by Innocent's successor, Pope Alexander VI, into the custody of King Charles's army.

Giovanni Battista Cybo was born in Genoa, the son of Arano Cybo and Teodorina de Mari. His father was from an old Genoese family of Greek ancestry, a viceroy of Naples and then a senator in Rome under Pope Calixtus III. Giovanni Battista's early years were spent at the Neapolitan court. While in Naples he was appointed a Canon of the Cathedral of Capua, and was given the Priory of S. Maria d'Arba in Genoa. After the death of King Alfonso (1458), friction between Giovanni Battista and the Archbishop of Genoa induced him to resign his canonry, and to go to Padua and then to Rome for his education.

In Rome he became a priest in the retinue of Cardinal Calandrini, half brother to Pope Nicholas V (1447–55). In 1467, he was made Bishop of Savona by Pope Paul II, but exchanged this see in 1472 for that of Molfetta in south eastern Italy. In 1473, with the support of Giuliano Della Rovere, later Pope Julius II, he was made cardinal by Pope Sixtus IV, whom he succeeded on 29 August 1484 as Pope Innocent VIII.

The papal conclave of 1484 was rife with factions, while gangs rioted in the streets. In order to prevent the election of the Venetian Cardinal Barbo, Camerlengo of the Sacred College of Cardinals, on the evening before the election, after the cardinals had retired for the night, the Dean of the College of Cardinals, Cardinal Giuliano della Rovere, nephew of the late Pope, and Cardinal Borgia, the Vice Chancellor, visited a number of cardinals and secured their votes with the promise of various benefices. It was claimed that Cardinal della Rovere met secretly with Cardinal Marco Barbo in order to secure him more votes to become pope if he was promised a residence, though Barbo refused in fear it would make the conclave invalid due to simony. Cardinal della Rovere then met with Borgia, who disliked Barbo and wished to block his election, with an offer to turn their votes over to Cibò, promising them benefits for doing so. Cem died in Capua on 25 February 1495 on a military expedition under the command of King Charles VIII of France to conquer Naples.

In 1487, Innocent confirmed Tomas de Torquemada as Grand Inquisitor of Spain. Also in 1487, Innocent issued a bull Id Nostri Cordis denouncing the views of the Waldensians (Vaudois), offering plenary indulgence to all who should engage in a Crusade against them. Alberto de' Capitanei, archdeacon of Cremona, responded to the bull by organizing a crusade to fulfill its order and launched an offensive in the provinces of Dauphiné and Piedmont. Charles I, Duke of Savoy eventually interfered to save his territories from further confusion and promised the Vaudois peace, but not before the offensive had devastated the area and many of the Vaudois fled to Provence and south to Italy. The noted Franciscan theologian Angelo Carletti di Chivasso, whom Innocent in 1491 appointed as Apostolic Nuncio and Commissary, conjointly with the Bishop of Mauriana, was involved in reaching the peaceful agreement between Catholics and Waldensians. In 1486, Innocent VIII was persuaded that at least thirteen of the 900 theses of Giovanni Pico della Mirandola were heretical, and the book containing the theses was interdicted. In Rome, he ordered the Belvedere of the Vatican to be built, intended for summer use, on an unarticulated slope above the Vatican Palace. His successor would later turn the building into the Cortile del Belvedere. In season, he hunted at Castello della Magliana, which he enlarged. Constantly confronted with a depleted treasury, he resorted to the objectionable expedient of creating new offices and granting them to the highest bidders. In the case of Innocent he permitted trade with Barbary merchants in which foodstuffs would be given in exchange for slaves who could then be converted to Christianity. The slaves of Innocent were called mori, meaning "dark skinned men", in contrast to negro slaves who were called mori neri, meaning "black moors".

The pope named two saints during his pontificate: Catherine of Vadstena (1484) and Leopold III (1485).

Innocent VIII named eight cardinals in one consistory which was held on 9 March 1489; the pope named three of those cardinals in pectore (one of whom being a successor in Giovanni de' Medici who became Pope Leo X) with two of them having their names released after the pope died to ensure that they could vote in the 1492 conclave.

By July 1492, Innocent had become very skinny. To Filippo Valori, he had become 'an inert mass of flesh, incapable of assimilating any nourishment but a few drops of milk from a young woman's breast'. He then developed a fever and died.

Innocent was first buried in the Oratory of Our Lady in Old St. Peter's Basilica. The tomb was crafted by Antonio del Pollaiuolo, who completed the work shortly before his own death in February 1498. Around 1507 it was moved to the "Shroud" aisle adjacent to the Chapel of the Holy Lance. The inscription below his tomb in Saint Peter's states: "Nel tempo del suo Pontificato, la gloria della scoperta di un nuovo mondo" (transl. "During his Pontificate, the glory of the discovery of a new world."). Writer Ruggero Marino, in his book Cristoforo Colombo e il Papa tradito (transl. Christopher Columbus and the betrayed Pope) argues that since Innocent died shortly before the departure of Christopher Columbus on his presumedly first voyage over the Atlantic, this suggests that Columbus actually traveled before the known date and re discovered the Americas for the Europeans before the supposed date of 12 October 1492. At some point the pope's coat of arms was replaced with an inscription, and the position of the two images of Innocent switched. After completion of the nave of the new basilica, in 1621 the monument was dismantled and relocated courtesy of Innocent's great nephew, Alberico Cybo Malaspina, prince of Massa, duke of Ferentillo, and marquis of Carrara.

Innocent had at least seven illegitimate children born before he entered the clergy. In 1487, he married his elder son Franceschetto Cybo (d. 1519) to Maddalena de' Medici (1473–1528), the daughter of Lorenzo de' Medici, who in return obtained the cardinal's hat for his 13 year old son Giovanni, later Pope Leo X. His daughter Teodorina Cybo married Gerardo Usodimare and had a son, Aranino Cybo (father of Gherardo Cybo), and two daughters: Battistina Usodimare, who married Luigi d'Aragona, and Peretta Usodimare (Rome, 1478 Genoa, 3 December 1550), who married firstly Alfonso I del Carretto, and secondly Andrea Doria. Savonarola chastised him for his worldly ambitions. His grandnephew Bindo Altoviti was one of the most influential bankers of his time and a notable patron of the arts, being friends with Raphael and Michelangelo.