Before 1566 (1309–1377) produced an
unprecedented number of cardinal-nephews. The creation of cardinal-nephews predates the hierarchical preeminence of cardinals within the
Roman Catholic Church, which grew out of the 1059 decree of
Pope Nicholas II,
In nomine Domini, which established
cardinal bishops as the sole electors of the Pope, with the consent of
cardinal deacons and
cardinal priests. The first known cardinal-nephew is Lottario (), seniore, cousin of
Pope Benedict VIII (1012–1024), elected circa 1015. The first known cardinal-nephew after 1059 is
Anselm of Lucca, the nephew or brother of
Pope Alexander II (1061–1073), However, it is beyond doubt that the promotions of papal relatives to the College of Cardinals were
common in the 13th century. According to historian John Bargrave, "by the
Council of Bazill, Session 21, the number of cardinals was not to be above 24, and not any nephew of the Pope or of any cardinal was to be of that number. (
Session 23.)"
Pope Clement VI (1342–1352) created more cardinal-nephews than any other pontiff, including six on September 20, 1342, the greatest number of cardinal-nephews elevated at one time. The
capitulation of the
1464 papal conclave limited the Pope it elected (
Pope Paul II) to appointing one cardinal-nephew, along with other conditions designed to increase the power of the
College of Cardinals and reduce the Pope's ability to dilute that power. The
Fifth Council of the Lateran declared in 1514 that the care of relatives was to be commended, and the creation of cardinal-nephews was often recommended or justified based on the need to care for indigent family members.
Pope Paul IV (1555–1559), in his old age, was said to have "fallen almost completely under the cardinal-nephew's influence"; Paul IV's cardinal-nephew,
Carlo Carafa, was accused in August 1558 by a
Theatine of seducing a Roman noble woman, Plautila de' Massimi, who had come into possession of an inordinate amount of money and jewelry, but the accusations were dismissed by the pontiff. Saint
Charles Borromeo, cardinal-nephew of
Pope Pius IV (1559–1565), had ensured the subordination of the
secretarius intimus to the Cardinal Nephew, which came to be sometimes known as the
secretarius maior. Pius IV was notorious for nepotism: between 1561 and 1565 he transferred more than 350,000
scudi to his relatives.
1566–1692 created the curial office of the Cardinal Nephew on March 14, 1566. Following the
Council of Trent (1563),
Pope Pius V (1566–1572) drew up the terms for the office of the Superintendent of the Ecclesiastical State, who was to handle the temporal affairs of the
Papal States and the foreign relations of the
Holy See. After abortively attempting to divide the duties of the Superintendent among four non-familial cardinals, Pius V acceded to the urgings of the College of Cardinals and his Spanish ambassador, and appointed his grandnephew,
Michele Bonelli, as Superintendent, demarcating his duties with a
papal bull of March 14, 1566. The Cardinal Nephew (also called
cardinale padrone or
Secretarius Papae et superintendens status ecclesiasticæ:) was an official
legate of the
Roman Curia, approximately equivalent to the
Cardinal Secretary of State, which absorbed its functions after the office of Cardinal Nephew was abolished in 1692. The Cardinal Nephew was generally among a Pope's first cardinal creations, and his
creature was traditionally accompanied by a
salute from the guns of
Castel Sant'Angelo. Following the
Avignon Papacy, the Cardinal Nephew was responsible for the spiritual and temporal governance of the
Comtat Venaissin, where the Avignon Popes had resided; in 1475,
Pope Sixtus IV raised the
Diocese of Avignon to the rank of an archbishopric, to the benefit of his nephew
Giuliano della Rovere. named the son, nephew, and cousin of his sister-in-law
Olimpia Maidalchini to the curial office of the Cardinal Nephew The terms of the office of Cardinal Nephew were established by a
papal brief developed and refined by Pius V's successors to
Paul V (1605–1621). Some historians consider
Scipione Borghese, cardinal-nephew to
Pope Paul V, to be the "prototypical representative" of a cardinal-nephew, unlike those before him, created to "provide for and oversee the permanent social and economic ascent of the reigning papal family into the ranks of the high Roman aristocracy". For example, in 1616, 24 of the 30 abbeys belonging to Borghese were rented out, a practice the
Council of Trent had attempted to eliminate. It is estimated that Paul V Borghese had transferred to his family approximately 4% of the total income of the Holy See during his pontificate. Borghese's personal revenues in 1610 were 153,000
scudi compared to the mere 4,900
scudi that constituted his entire family's income in 1592.
Pope Gregory XIV (1590–1591) began the practice of creating cardinal-nephews whose formal appointment coincided
de facto with their nomination, and was thus separate from the ordinal process for creating cardinals, Paul V issued a
motu proprio on April 30, 1618, formally bestowing on his cardinal-nephew the same authority
Pope Clement VIII had given to
Pietro Aldobrandini, beginning what historian Laurain-Portemer calls "l'age classique'" of
nepotism. with his Cardinal Nephew of unprecedented income and authority,
Ludovico Ludovisi, known as
il cardinale padrone.
Pope Gregory XV's (1621–1623) cardinal-nephew,
Ludovico Ludovisi, the first cardinal-nephew known as
il cardinale padrone ("the Cardinal boss") accumulated a vast array of benefices: the bishopric of
Bologna, 23
abbeys, the directorship of the
Apostolic Signatura, as well as the offices of the vice-chancellor and high-chamberlain, and was able to have most of them redistributed among 17 of his kinsmen upon his death. Notably, cardinal-nephews were allowed to create
facultas testandi to will the rewards of their benefices to secular family members. Not all Cardinal Nephews were cardinal-nephews in the strictest sense. In fact, papal historian Valérie Pirie considers not having a nephew a "tremendous asset for a would-be Pope" as it left the position open for an ally cardinal. Many historians consider
Olimpia Maidalchini, the sister-in-law of
Pope Innocent X (1644–1655), to have been a
de facto Cardinal Nephew; the position was formally held by her son,
Camillo Pamphili, then her nephew,
Francesco Maidalchini (after Pamphili renounced his cardinalate in order to wed), and (after Francesco proved incompetent)
Camillo Astalli, her cousin. Another papal historian
Ludwig von Pastor notes that "the misfortune of Pope Pamphilj was that the only person in his family who would have had the qualities necessary to fill such a position was a woman".
Pope Innocent XI (1676–1689) despised the practice and only accepted his election as Pope after the
College of Cardinals consented to his plans for reform, which included a ban on nepotism. which had been tediously composed between 1677 and 1686. Innocent XI refused entreaties from within the papal court to bring his only nephew,
Livio Odescalchi, the prince of
Sirmio, to Rome, although he did elevate Carlo Stefano Anastasio Ciceri, a distant relative, cardinal on September 2, 1686. Innocent XI's successor,
Pope Alexander VIII (1689–1691), was the last Pope to create a Cardinal Nephew. Edith Standen, a consultant to the
Metropolitan Museum of Art, calls Ottoboni the "last and certainly not least magnificent example" of the "splendor of an extinct species, the Cardinal-Nephew". Until 1692 (and sometimes thereafter), the cardinal-nephew (or a lay nephew) would be the chief
archivist of the Pope, usually removing the archives to a family archive upon the death of the pontiff. In particular, the archival collections of the
Barberini,
Farnese,
Chigi, and
Borghese families contain important papal documents. In 1694, Innocent XII's series of reforms was concluded with an expensive campaign to eliminate the "
venality" of offices while reimbursing their current holders.
Pope Gregory XIII (1572–1585) also had to be urged by key figures in the college to appoint his cardinal-nephew: Filippo Boncompagni. The cardinal-nephews of the 18th century declined in influence as the power of the
Cardinal Secretary of State increased.
Neri Maria Corsini, cardinal-nephew of
Pope Clement XII (1730–1740) was by far the most powerful cardinal-nephew of the 18th century, on account of his uncle's advanced age and
blindness.
Romoaldo Braschi-Onesti, cardinal-nephew of
Pius VI (1775–1799), was the penultimate cardinal-nephew. Despite Pius VI's lineage to a noble
Cesena family, his only sister had married a man from the poor Onesti family. Therefore, he commissioned a
genealogist to discover (and inflate) some trace of nobility in the Onesti lineage, an endeavor which yielded only a circuitous connection to Saint Romualdo. After the turbulent
1800 papal conclave,
Pope Pius VII (1800–1823) shunned the institution of the cardinal-nephew and instead relied on his
Cardinal Secretary of State,
Ercole Consalvi. During the 19th century, the only nephew of a Pope created cardinal was
Gabriele della Genga Sermattei, nephew of
Pope Leo XII, created cardinal by
Pope Gregory XVI on February 1, 1836. Although the institutionalization of nepotism disappeared in the 18th century, "
pietas" (duty to family) remained a theme of papal administration into the 20th century, although rarely with the overt intervention of a papal uncle. Following the example of Pius VI, Popes
Leo XIII (who elevated his brother,
Giuseppe Pecci, cardinal on May 12, 1879) and
Pius XII (1939–1958) weakened the formal curial bureaucracy in favor of a parallel government, in which family members often figured prominently. The loss of
temporal power over the
Papal States (
de facto in 1870 with the "
Roman Question" and
de jure in 1929 with the
Lateran Treaty) also eliminated the structural conditions which had figured prominently in the family politics of earlier Popes. == Role in conclaves ==