Alfonso Carafa (16 July 1540 – 29 August 1565) was a member of one of the oldest noble families of

Naples Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...

and a cardinal of the

Roman Catholic Church The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

. His father was Antonio, Marquis of Montebello, whose uncle, Gian Pietro Carafa, ascended the papal throne in 1555 as

Pope Paul IV Pope Paul IV, born Gian Pietro Carafa, C.R. ( la, Paulus IV; it, Paolo IV; 28 June 1476 – 18 August 1559) was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 23 May 1555 to his death in August 1559. While serving as pa ...

Biography

Alfonso entered the Roman Curia in the household of Gian Pietro Carafa in 1548. His great-uncle continued to show him favour as pope, appointing him as an

apostolic protonotary In the Roman Catholic Church, protonotary apostolic (PA; Latin: ''protonotarius apostolicus'') is the title for a member of the highest non-episcopal college of prelates in the Roman Curia or, outside Rome, an honorary prelate on whom the pop ...

and insisting that the young boy sleep in his own private chambers. In March 1557 he was promoted to the cardinalate and a few weeks later made archbishop of

. After the disgrace of his uncles Carlo and

Giovanni Giovanni may refer to: * Giovanni (name), an Italian male given name and surname * Giovanni (meteorology), a Web interface for users to analyze NASA's gridded data * ''Don Giovanni'', a 1787 opera by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, based on the legend of ...

in January 1559, Alfonso assumed the role of

Cardinal Nephew A cardinal-nephew ( la, cardinalis nepos; it, cardinale nipote; es, valido de su tío; pt, cardeal-sobrinho; french: prince de fortune)Signorotto and Visceglia, 2002, p. 114. Modern French scholarly literature uses the term "cardinal-neveu'". ...

for the last few months of Paul's pontificate. In June 1560 he was arrested on the instructions of the new pope

Pius IV Pope Pius IV ( it, Pio IV; 31 March 1499 – 9 December 1565), born Giovanni Angelo Medici, was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 25 December 1559 to his death in December 1565. Born in Milan, his family considered ...

and along with his two uncles was imprisoned in the Castel Sant'Angelo on charges of corruption and the theft of papal property. However, receiving considerably more sympathy than his despised uncles, Alfonso was spared the execution that was their fate. In April 1561 he was released and in 1562 returned to his archdiocese. He died of a fever on 29 August 1565 aged only twenty-five years.

References

*The Papacy And The Levant, Kenneth Meyer Setton, American Philosophical Society, 1984 * {{DEFAULTSORT:Carafa, Alfonso

Alfonso Alphons (Latinized ''Alphonsus'', ''Adelphonsus'', or ''Adefonsus'') is a male given name recorded from the 8th century (Alfonso I of Asturias, r. 739–757) in the Christian successor states of the Visigothic kingdom in the Iberian peninsula. ...

16th-century Italian cardinals Cardinal-nephews 1540 births 1565 deaths