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The BorgiasThe doors opened and the dean of the college of cardinals appeared to announce the conclave’s decision: вЂI proclaim to you great joy,’ he said, вЂwe have a new pope, Lord Alfonso de Borja, Bishop of Valencia; he desires to be known as Calixtus the Third.’ The Borjas, or Borgias as they were known in Italy, were a family of some consequence in Spain, descended, as they claimed, from the ancient royal House of Aragon. Alfonso, born in 1378, was the son of the owner of an estate at JГЎtiva near Valencia; he had studied and then taught law at LГ©rida and, at the age of thirty-eight, had been appointed to the prestigious post of private secretary to King Alfonso V of Aragon, in whose service he was to remain for forty-two years. He helped to arrange the abdication of the anti-pope Clement VIII, thus paving the way for the ending of the Great Schism, and was given the bishopric of Valencia as a reward for his services. In 1442 he moved to Naples, still in the service of his king, who had conquered the city to become Alfonso I of Naples ...» | Код для вставки книги в блог HTML
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