The Renaissance Popes: Statesmen, Warriors and the Great Borgia Myth [Hardcover]

Gerard Noel (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 22, 2006

Between the years of 1447 (Nicholas V) and 1572 (Pius V), the Vatican became the official home of the Church, and a succession of Renaissance Popes — who were statesmen, warriors, and patrons of the arts as well as churchmen — turned Rome into an unparalleled center for culture, and turned the Church into the world's largest bureaucracy. These mercurial popes, such as Alexander VI, the infamous Borgia patriarch, and Julius 'Il Terrible' II, contributed to cultural achievements — the Basilica of St. Peters and Michaelangelo's Sistine Chapel — through the sale of indulgences, and targeted heretics with Inquisitions and witchhunts. In the midst of this explosion of great culture and violent debasement, Alexander VI, father of the ruthless Cesare and jezebel Lucrezia, came to be seen as the embodiment of this iniquity. But Gerard Noel shows that Alexander's legacy was tainted by false confessions and historical myth. In fact, Alexander created the blueprint for reform — the first of its kind — that would eventually lead to the Counter-Reformation. In his survey of the colorful reigns of the seventeen Renaissance Popes and his examination of the great Borgia myth, Noel brings to light the true legacy — political, artistic, religious — of an extraordinary time.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

The Hon. Gerard Noel was the Editor of the Catholic Herald and is now its Editorial Director. He is the author of several books including biographies of Paul VI and Harold Wilson.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Basic Books; 1st Carrol & Graf Ed edition (November 22, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0786718412
• ISBN-13: 978-0786718412
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.2 x 1.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 1.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #736,382 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

27 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Bad Popes or Bad Scholarship?, December 28, 2006

By 

Erasmus (Boston, MA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Renaissance Popes: Statesmen, Warriors and the Great Borgia Myth (Hardcover)

Awful book. Very poorly written. This is junk scholarship at its best. Claims to dispel myths about the Renaissance Popes, and to "carefully identify...rumors and legends," but then provides only 150 footnotes in a 342 page volume, with many repetitions. Again, there are five footnotes for the last three chapters. If you want to find out the sources of the rumors, forget it. With friends like this, the Renaissance Popes don't need enemies.

20 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Renaissance Popes by Gerard Noel, May 24, 2007

By 

James L. Spence "Freelance Reviewer" (Victoria, BC Canada) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Renaissance Popes: Statesmen, Warriors and the Great Borgia Myth (Hardcover)

This is one of the worst - if not the worst - work of history that I have ever read. It is dreadfully written, often comically so. It is repetitive, contradictory in its many moralizing judgements, and highly subjective in its usually unsubstantiated (by respected historical authority) conclusions. The editors where either asleep at the wheel or non-existant. It is a shameful comment on its publishers that it ever went to press. The Da Vinci Code of non-fiction, without the commercial success. Save your money. Do not buy this book.

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Embarrassing..., July 6, 2009

By 

B. Reynolds - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Renaissance Popes: Statesmen, Warriors and the Great Borgia Myth (Hardcover)

Disjointed, repetitive, full of the embarrassing kind of parenthetical phrases used in a grade-school term paper, this is the poorest writing I have ever seen in actual, published form. I bought the book because the subject matter sounded fascinating. The author may indeed have a scholarly opinion to put forth -- in this case, regarding the spurious nature of the "Borgia myth" -- but the abysmal quality of the writing negates any credence you might give to the theory. But it's not all the author's fault -- I ask the publishing house, "Where was the editor?" Phrases such as "a threat to the instability of Italy and the papacy was no more" (hardcopy p. 145) and "nepotism had always been Paul's Achille's heel" (p. 298) should have been caught by any competent copy editor. I was SOOOO disappointed in this book! I held on until the end, hoping to glean some insight, but ultimately ended up feeling the need to write this review instead. A fascinating time in history, if you can close your eyes to the writing quality of this particular work.