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Speaker 1: Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of iHeartRadio and Grim

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Speaker 1: and Mild from Aaron Manky. Listener discretion advised. One brief

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Speaker 1: note before we begin. This episode contains some very sexual scenes.

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Speaker 1: October thirty, first, fifteen oh one, the sun was setting

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Speaker 1: over Vatican City and most people were preparing to celebrate

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Speaker 1: All Saints Eve, which usually involved feasting and attending church

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Speaker 1: services in honor of beloved Catholic Saints. They didn't practice

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Speaker 1: Halloween as we know it today. Sadly, there was probably

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Speaker 1: no one dressing up as a sexy bishop or sexy sacrament,

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Speaker 1: but that didn't mean everything was quiet and chaste. Deep

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Speaker 1: inside Vatican City, an epic party was about to begin

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Speaker 1: in the Pope's private residence. The host was Cesaret Borgia, notorious,

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Speaker 1: son of Pope Alexander the sixth. The guest list included

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Speaker 1: the Pope himself, as well as Chesare's sister, the equally

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Speaker 1: notorious Lucretia Borgia. The party, known today as the Banquet

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Speaker 1: of Chestnuts, for reasons that will soon become clear, has

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Speaker 1: been gossiped about and debated for centuries. It has been

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Speaker 1: depicted in pop culture with an entire episode of Showtime's

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Speaker 1: series The Borges dedicated to it. The party began fairly normally,

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Speaker 1: with a fine banquet, as you might be imagining from

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Speaker 1: the name. It wasn't until after the meal that things

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Speaker 1: got interesting. Fifty of Rome's finest cortesans were in attendance,

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Speaker 1: and after the meal they were ordered to disrobe. Servants

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Speaker 1: moved the lit candelabras to the floor, where chestnuts were

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Speaker 1: scattered about. The courtesans were then ordered to crawl around

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Speaker 1: and pick them up. As one might imagine, these provocative

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Speaker 1: actions quickly led to mass copulation, a holy orgy of sorts,

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Speaker 1: blessed by the presence of the Pope, who sat with

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Speaker 1: his illicit children and watched as the whole affair unfolded.

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Speaker 1: Sounds juicy, right, a perfect little nugget of gossip that

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Speaker 1: lasted hundreds of years and helped define the Borges as sinful, lustful,

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Speaker 1: and salacious. The banquet of chestnuts is a fascinating bit

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Speaker 1: of history, but there is one big question we have

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Speaker 1: to ask, is it history at all? Did the banquet

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Speaker 1: of chestnuts actually happen? I'm Danish sports and this is

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Speaker 1: noble blood. Ah. The Borges, the family that of Renaissance

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Speaker 1: era Italians loved to hate. If you listened to our

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Speaker 1: episode about Lucretia Borgia, you'll remember that in all likelihood,

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Speaker 1: the Borgies were probably more tame in real life than

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Speaker 1: their reputations made them out to be, or at the

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Speaker 1: very least Lucretia was. But there's no denying that they

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Speaker 1: were hugely powerful figures, making bold moves with little regard

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Speaker 1: for the fallout. Pope Alexander the sixth born Rodrigo Borgia

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Speaker 1: had many illegitimate children. This was not uncommon for a

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Speaker 1: pope at the time, even though they of course were

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Speaker 1: supposed to be celibate. But Alexander the sixth did make

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Speaker 1: waves by actually claiming the four that he had with

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Speaker 1: his favorite mistress. Two of the children from that relationship

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Speaker 1: were Chesaret and Lucretia Borgia, who quickly gained reputations of

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Speaker 1: their own as political movers and shakers. Chesaat was known

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Speaker 1: as a ruthless climber whose actions were the model for

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Speaker 1: Machiavelli's The Prince, The how To or Tongue in Cheeks

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Speaker 1: attire about acquiring power and influence. As a beautiful woman,

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Speaker 1: Lucretia was a powerful political tool. Her marriages were orchestrated

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Speaker 1: by her brother and father as a way to secure

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Speaker 1: alliances and maintain control. At the time of the banquet,

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Speaker 1: arrangements were being made for her third and final marriage

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Speaker 1: to Alfonso Ladeste, Duke of Ferrara. The Borges were infamous

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Speaker 1: for their scheming and outright villainy, with accusationtions of every

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Speaker 1: sin under the sun being thrown at the three main Borges. However,

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Speaker 1: one had to assume that rumors aside, these guys would

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Speaker 1: know how to throw one hell of a party, and

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Speaker 1: the Banquet of Chestnuts was one for the ages. The

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Speaker 1: only reason we even know about this banquet today is

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Speaker 1: thanks to the work of one dedicated man, someone with

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Speaker 1: an eye for detail and a nose for a juicy story.

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Speaker 1: Think of Truman, Capodi, Gossip Girl, Lady Whistledown. Johann Bouchard

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Speaker 1: walked so that they could run. The most detailed account

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Speaker 1: of the Banquet of Chestnuts comes from the diary of

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Speaker 1: Johann Burchard. Burchard was an Alsatian born jack of all

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Speaker 1: white collar trades who worked both as a practicing lawyer

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Speaker 1: and an ordained priest, among other things. He left home

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Speaker 1: also leaving behind some theft and trafficking accusations, and moved

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Speaker 1: to Rome in the late fifteenth century. There he began

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Speaker 1: working his way up through the ranks of the Catholic Church,

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Speaker 1: ultimately serving as Master of Ceremonies for five different popes.

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Speaker 1: Alexander the sixth fell directly in the middle of the

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Speaker 1: line of popes that Burchard served. The Master of Ceremonies

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Speaker 1: was an essential part of the Renaissance era Catholic Church,

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Speaker 1: overseeing the accuracy and precision of the sacred rituals that

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Speaker 1: were to be performed by the pope. The Master of

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Speaker 1: Ceremonies served as a liturgical watchdog, keeping a close eye

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Speaker 1: on the style and structure of religious ceremonies, as well

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Speaker 1: as advising on etiquette and protocol for all sorts of

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Speaker 1: church related matters, this one specifically also to who are

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Speaker 1: great Benefit was a devoted journal keeper. Burchard's collected diaries,

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Speaker 1: also known as the Liber Notarum, serve as both an

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Speaker 1: official record of the daily machinations of the Church and

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Speaker 1: a fascinating look at a particularly wild and decadent period

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Speaker 1: in Italian history. Here is what Burchard had to say

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Speaker 1: about this particular night in question. Quote on the evening

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Speaker 1: of the last day of October fifteen oh one, Cesare

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Speaker 1: Borgia arranged a banquet in his chambers in the Vatican

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Speaker 1: with fifty honest prostitutes called courtesans, who danced after dinner

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Speaker 1: with the attendants and others who were present, at first

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Speaker 1: in their garments, then naked end quote. The sex workers

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Speaker 1: are the only group Burchard mentioned with any specificity at all,

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Speaker 1: calling the other guests, attendants and others who were present.

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Speaker 1: This is presumably to protect the anonymity of those who

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Speaker 1: were involved. No doubt Borgia family, friends, and associates. Whoever

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Speaker 1: the other attendees were, we can assume they were both

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Speaker 1: powerful and discreet, or at the very least they didn't

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Speaker 1: keep journals that made it into the historical record. The

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Speaker 1: title of honest courtesans wasn't Burchard's way of passing judgment

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Speaker 1: on the workers. I'd argue that, with multiple confessions under

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Speaker 1: his own belt, he was in no position to weigh

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Speaker 1: in on the virtue of others, but rather, honest courtesans

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Speaker 1: was actually a class distinction, a subset of sex workers

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Speaker 1: who specifically served the nobility. They were often quite learned,

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Speaker 1: with social graces and artistic, musical, or literary talents befitting

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Speaker 1: the upper echelons of society. These honest courtesans could also

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Speaker 1: be unbelievably expensive, but their rates were gladly paid. After all,

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Speaker 1: many noblemen needed the illusion of women of their own

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Speaker 1: class and rank who would indulge their desires and find

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Speaker 1: them endlessly fascinating. We'll talk more about the sex workers

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Speaker 1: in the later part of this episode, but for now,

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Speaker 1: let's press on. When we left them in the diary,

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Speaker 1: the fifty sex workers were in the process of shedding

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Speaker 1: their clothes and dancing with the other guests, who were

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Speaker 1: presumably still clothed. Burchard continues quote. After dinner, the candelabra

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Speaker 1: with the burning candles were taken from the tables and

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Speaker 1: placed on the floor, and chestnuts were strewn around, which

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Speaker 1: the naked courtesans picked up, creeping on hands and knees

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Speaker 1: between the chandeliers while the Pope, Cessaret and his sister

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Speaker 1: Lucretia looked on. Let's pause here and unpack. Fans of

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Speaker 1: HBO's succession might have already picked up on the similarities

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Speaker 1: to bore on the floor. A dysfunctional, power hungry family

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Speaker 1: watching underlings humiliate themselves for a quick thrill. Abuse of

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Speaker 1: power is truly timeless, but questions still abound even with

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Speaker 1: this diary entry. Who threw the chestnuts? Were they already

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Speaker 1: on the table and grabbed impulsively by Cessaray or one

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Speaker 1: of his pals because someone decided the party needed to

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Speaker 1: be kicked up a notch? Or was it all planned? Frustratingly,

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Speaker 1: Burchard failed to think of future nosy readers, particularly the

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Speaker 1: more logistics oriented among us. He did, however, leave us

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Speaker 1: with another last detail quote. Finally, prizes were announced for

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Speaker 1: those who could perform the act most often with the courtesans,

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Speaker 1: such as tunics of silk, shoes, barrels, and other things.

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Speaker 1: Plenty of details here about the prizes themselves, not as

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Speaker 1: much about the parts that were actually salacious. Who won?

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Speaker 1: Are we correct to presume that only men could compete?

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Speaker 1: No doubt the revelers were up to all kinds of

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Speaker 1: kinky business, but it feels safe to infer that the

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Speaker 1: prizes were reserved for the men who copulated with the

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Speaker 1: most women. Again, how much of this was planned ahead

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Speaker 1: of time? It's unclear when the event picked up the

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Speaker 1: name Banquet of Chestnuts, but it's easy to see how

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Speaker 1: such a legendary gathering acquired an if you know, you

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Speaker 1: know nickname. The party's effects were still on display for

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Speaker 1: days afterward. Florentine ambassador Francesco Peppy reported that Pope Alexander

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Speaker 1: was a no show for mass for four days. Afterwards,

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Speaker 1: rumors swirled of a nasty hangover. The ambassador chalked this

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Speaker 1: up to the pontiff having gone out quote until the

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Speaker 1: twelfth hour with the Duke, who had brought into the

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Speaker 1: palace that night singers and courtesans, and all night they

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Speaker 1: spent in pleasure, dancing and laughter. While hangovers certainly do

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Speaker 1: get worse with age, and the eldest Borgia was seventy

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Speaker 1: years old at this time, a four day recovery still

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Speaker 1: sounds a little excessive, but it certainly adds to the

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Speaker 1: party's reputation. While Burchard is the only eye witness account

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Speaker 1: of the party, the lascivious details fall right in line

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Speaker 1: with the existing public image of the Borges. Other documents

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Speaker 1: support a party having taken place at the Apostolic Palace

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Speaker 1: that night, but none of them have the Master of

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Speaker 1: ceremonies eye for details or specifics. During this same time,

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Speaker 1: the pope came across a pamphlet that laid bare every

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Speaker 1: scrap of public opinion about his infamous family. Written in

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Speaker 1: the form of an anonymous letter to political exile Silvio Savelli,

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Speaker 1: it functions as a sort of burn book, recording in

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Speaker 1: sordid detail an exhaustive account of the borges alleged crimes.

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Speaker 1: According to the pamphlet, the Pope was quote betrayer of

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Speaker 1: the human race, Chessaret was a debaucherous murderer, and Lucretia

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Speaker 1: was an incestuous monster who slept with pretty much every

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Speaker 1: member of her family. Clearly, the pamphlet was a combination

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Speaker 1: of half truth's hyperbole and outright slander, but it was

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Speaker 1: impactful enough that Burchard included passages in his diary. In

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Speaker 1: her history book, Cesaret and Lucretia Borgia, brother and sister

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Speaker 1: of history's most vilified family. Samantha Morris paints the male

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Speaker 1: borges reactions to the pamphlet as consistent with their reputations.

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Speaker 1: Quote Alexander, as was typical of him, found the whole

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Speaker 1: thing rather amusing. Cessaret, on the other hand, was less

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Speaker 1: than impressed. Since he was a young man, he had

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Speaker 1: not dealt well with slights on his pride, and during

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Speaker 1: the December following the Savelli letter, he took action against

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Speaker 1: a masked individual who was wandering the borgo uttering insults

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Speaker 1: against the Pope's family end quote. C Cessarey had the

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Speaker 1: man's right hand cut off, as well as his tongue,

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Speaker 1: and displayed them in a local church as a cautionary tale.

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Speaker 1: A month later, Chesarey ordered the execution of a man

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Speaker 1: for simply translating a libel against his family. The Pope's

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Speaker 1: only response to his son's action was quote, the Duke

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Speaker 1: is good natured, but he has not yet learned to

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Speaker 1: bear insult end quote. Gossiping about the Borges was a

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Speaker 1: dangerous game, especially with Chessaray around, but it was a

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Speaker 1: game that few Italians seemed able to resist. It's easy

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Speaker 1: to see why something like the banquet of chestnuts would

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Speaker 1: have easily taken hold with the public. It's the perfect

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Speaker 1: kind of scandal, titillating, extravagant, strange, and best of all,

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Speaker 1: it's about people in power. Much of the rumor mill

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Speaker 1: surrounding the Borges concerned violent crimes, if not outright murder,

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Speaker 1: So we can imagine that it must have been a

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Speaker 1: little bit of a relief to be able to gossip

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Speaker 1: about something as fun as a glorified orgy. But there

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Speaker 1: has been much speculation about how true Richard's version of

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Speaker 1: events actually was. Centuries after Alexander the sixth death, Catholic

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Speaker 1: monseigneur and historian Peter Derux wrote a five volume defense

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Speaker 1: of the controversial pope, with the thesis that the Borgia

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Speaker 1: patriarch had essentially been given the villain edit by history.

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Speaker 1: It was Deroux's stance that the banquet couldn't possibly have

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Speaker 1: happened as described, because Alexander would never have participated in

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Speaker 1: behavior that was so quote truly bestial. Dereux has since

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Speaker 1: been condemned by other historians for his overly generous, if

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Speaker 1: not delusional, view of the former pope. As dubious as

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Speaker 1: Deru's argument may be, it does bear stating that it

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Speaker 1: was widely known that Johann Burchard was not a fan

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Speaker 1: of the Borges, But would that lead him to fully

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Speaker 1: fabricate a story, or did he record it exact exactly

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Speaker 1: as it occurred and let the family be judged by

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Speaker 1: their own actions. In his book The Borges, Power and

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Speaker 1: Depravity in Renaissance Italy, Paul Strathorne remarks on the quote

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Speaker 1: lurid detail of Burchard's account, as well as a report

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Speaker 1: by a contemporary from Perugia named Francesco Materazzo. According to

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Speaker 1: Moderazzo's account of the party, Pope Alexander had the lights extinguished,

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Speaker 1: then quote the men and women left their clothes and

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Speaker 1: had diversion. Still a salacious orgy, but not nearly as

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Speaker 1: memorable as the banquet of chestnuts. Strathearne sums up what

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Speaker 1: many Italians probably thought at the time. Quote. Despite the

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Speaker 1: possibility of exaggeration in these reports, some of the details

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Speaker 1: have a compelling particularity. If nothing else, the Borges certainly

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Speaker 1: seemed to be living up to their reputation. In other words,

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Speaker 1: why be worried about the truth when the details are

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Speaker 1: so fun and they could be true? And few people

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Speaker 1: have had more fun with the story than William Manchester.

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Speaker 1: In his controversial book A World Lit Only by Fire,

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Speaker 1: The Medieval Mind and the Renaissance, Manchester revels in the

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Speaker 1: lurid details, often foregoing historical accuracy for the sake of

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Speaker 1: a good story, he upgrades the courtesans from Burchard's account

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Speaker 1: to quote the city's fifty most beautiful whores end quote,

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Speaker 1: and adds some graphic details of his own. According to Manchester, quote,

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Speaker 1: servants kept score of each man's orgasms for the Pope

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Speaker 1: greatly admired virility, and measured a man's machismo by his

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Speaker 1: ejaculative capacity. After everyone was a exhausted, his holiness distributed

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Speaker 1: prizes end quote. It's plausible, but we don't get those

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Speaker 1: details in the original account. Hard to imagine what might

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Speaker 1: have been going through the minds of the Borgia household

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Speaker 1: servants as they stood by with pen and paper, jotting

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Speaker 1: down hash marks each time a sexual act was finished

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Speaker 1: to completion. But in this version of the Borgia story,

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Speaker 1: one would have to imagine that at this point in

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Speaker 1: the servant's tenure, they probably would have just considered it

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Speaker 1: part of the job. Manchester had a particular fascination with

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Speaker 1: the female Borgia, even being generous enough to question the

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Speaker 1: veracity of Lucretia's monstrous reputation. In his book, Manchester opined

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Speaker 1: that quote the Lucretia Borgia, who has come down to

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Speaker 1: us is an ad mixture of myth, fable and incontestable fact.

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Speaker 1: It is quite possible that she was to some degree

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Speaker 1: a victim of misogynistic slander. The medieval Church saw woman

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Speaker 1: as Ava Redeviva, the temptress responsible for Adam's fall, and

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Speaker 1: the illegitimate daughter of a pope. May have been an

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Speaker 1: irresistible target for gossip, particularly when she was physically attractive.

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Speaker 1: End quote. If even a fairly salacious fabuloust can spot misogyny,

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Speaker 1: then I think it's safe to say it was well

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Speaker 1: and present. On that note, let's look at Amy License's

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Speaker 1: account from her book The sixteenth Century in one Hundred Women.

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Speaker 1: In the chapter titled Unnamed Prostitute Banquet of Chestnuts, License

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Speaker 1: imagines how the night would have gone from the perspective

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Speaker 1: of two sex workers who were brought to the palace

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Speaker 1: for the evening. This version adhears fairly closely to Burchard's

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Speaker 1: account as far as details go, with the added context

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Speaker 1: of the role that sex work played in the culture,

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Speaker 1: License writes, quote, prostitution was tolerated as a necessary evil

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Speaker 1: in Renaissance Italy, following the various teachings of the Catholic

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Speaker 1: Church Saint Augustine wrote that it prevented men from corrupting

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Speaker 1: good women, and Thomas Aquinas believed that without it, the

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Speaker 1: city would overflow with sin like a sewer, and men

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Speaker 1: would turn to the greater sin of sodomy. Prostitution was

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Speaker 1: decriminalized but not respected. From that, one can imagine that

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Speaker 1: the women were at the party not as guests, but

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Speaker 1: as some combination of entertainment and party favors. Without their work,

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Speaker 1: it would have been just another drunken dinner party. License

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Speaker 1: concludes her chapter on the Banquet of Chestnuts by zooming

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Speaker 1: out and looking at the lives of sixteenth century sex

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Speaker 1: workers in general. Quote, very few were able to serve

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Speaker 1: members of the aristocracy with the commensurate rewards that could bring.

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Speaker 1: The majority had little control over their market or the

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Speaker 1: customers who approached them, exposing themselves not just to disease,

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Speaker 1: but potentially to degradation and violence at the hands of

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Speaker 1: the wrong man. The oldest profession in the world had

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Speaker 1: its risks, and its surroundings were rarely as glamorous as

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Speaker 1: the Vatican Palace. Sex might have sold as it always has,

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Speaker 1: but it paid very little, and the costs to prostitutes

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Speaker 1: were often high end quote for a family like the Borges,

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Speaker 1: the banquet of chestnuts, whether true or embellished, was a

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Speaker 1: drop in the bucket, one more shiny bit of lore

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Speaker 1: to add to an already opressive collection for the courtesan's

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Speaker 1: tasks with providing the evening's entertainment. We can only imagine

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Speaker 1: the long term effects. What would happen if any of

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Speaker 1: them became pregnant, or injured or contracted an STI Generally,

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Speaker 1: honest courtesans received better treatment than their lower class counterparts.

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Speaker 1: Some even enjoyed the same perks afforded to dedicated mistresses.

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Speaker 1: But there was certainly no code of conduct that their

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Speaker 1: patrons were forced to adhere to, so we can safely

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Speaker 1: assume that there was uncertainty and precariousness even at the

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Speaker 1: highest levels of the profession. It's hard to imagine any

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Speaker 1: member of the Borgia household giving even a glancing thought

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Speaker 1: to the long term welfare of the sex workers they

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Speaker 1: brought in once the party was over. The details of

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Speaker 1: the banquet of chestnuts might have been exaggerated, or maybe

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Speaker 1: it did happen and exactly as the Master of ceremony

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Speaker 1: wrote down. Either way, I think it's worth looking past

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Speaker 1: the salaciousness of the gossip and remembering that if it

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Speaker 1: did happen, there were fifty real life women who had

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Speaker 1: no choice but to become accessories to the Borges legend.

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Speaker 1: That's the story of the Banquet of chestnuts. But keep

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Speaker 1: listening after a brief sponsor break to hear another rumor

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Speaker 1: of impropriety at the papal palace. Christopher Hibbert gives us

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Speaker 1: an additional anecdote that serves as the perfect epilogue to

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Speaker 1: our story. In his book The Borges and their Enemies,

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Speaker 1: Hibbert details an event that happened just a few days

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Speaker 1: after the banquet, when a different kind of entertainment was

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Speaker 1: brought into the palace. Thanks to our faithful diar s

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Speaker 1: Johann Burchard. There is an account in which a farmer

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Speaker 1: delivering wood to the market was redirected by palace guards.

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Speaker 1: The guards unsaddled the farmer's mares and led them to

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Speaker 1: the courtyard inside the palace gates. According to Hibbert quote,

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Speaker 1: four stallions were then freed from their reins and harnesses

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Speaker 1: and let out of the palace stables. They immediately ran

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Speaker 1: to the mares, over whom they proceeded to fight furiously

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Speaker 1: and noisily amongst themselves, biting and kicking in their efforts

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Speaker 1: to mount them, and seriously wounding them with their hoofs.

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Speaker 1: The Pope and Lucretia, laughing with evident satisfaction, watched all

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Speaker 1: that was happening from a window above the palace gate.

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Speaker 1: End quote. Again, we must take Burchard's counts with a

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Speaker 1: grain of salt, but it's hard not to notice this

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Speaker 1: story contains certain echoes of the banquet of chestnuts. Father

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Speaker 1: and daughter taking in the spectacle, delighting in sexual exploits,

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Speaker 1: this time with the addition of physical violence. Even if

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Speaker 1: the family members never actually engaged in sexual acts with

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Speaker 1: each other, their apparent comfort with being together in the

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Speaker 1: presence of them is enough to raise eyebrows a little bit.

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Speaker 1: At best, it's strange. At worst, the Borges are never

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Speaker 1: beating those incest allegations. Noble Blood is a production of

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Speaker 1: iHeartRadio and Grimm and Mild from Aaron Mankey. Noble Blood

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Speaker 1: is hosted by me Danish Forts, with additional writing and

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Speaker 1: researching by Hannah Johnston, Hannah Zwick, Courtney Sender, Julia Milani,

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Speaker 1: and Armand Cassam. The show is edited and produced by

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Speaker 1: Noehmy Griffin and rima Il Kaali, with supervising producer Josh

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Speaker 1: Thain and executive producers Aaron Mankey, Alex Williams, and Matt Frederick.

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Speaker 1: Four more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

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Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.