Pier Francesco Orsini

Pier Francesco Orsini (4 July 1523 – 28 January 1583), also called Vicino Orsini, was an Italian condottiero, patron of the arts and duke of Bomarzo. He is famous as the commissioner of the Mannerist Park of the Monsters in Bomarzo (northern Lazio).

Biography

Early Years

Born in Rome, he was the son of Giovanni Corrado Orsini and Clarice Orsini di Franciotto di Monterotondo, the daughter of Cardinal Franciotto Orsini, Lord of Monterotondo, and Violante di Vicino Orsini di Foglia. Franciotto Orsini of Monterotondo married Violante Orsini di Castello, daughter of Pierfrancesco I Orsini, also known as Vicino, who was lord of Bomarzo and transmitted the rights to the fief to the daughter. Franciotto was educated with his aunt in the house of Lorenzo and a native of Giovanni de Medici who, once a pope, named the cousin who had just been widowed a cardinal. Vicino Orsini inherited the duchy of Bomarzo seven years after the death of his father, thanks to an intercession in 1542 by Alessandro Cardinal Farnese (the future Pope Paul III, after a dispute over inheritance with his younger brother, Maerbale He spent the majority of 1542 living in Venice and frequenting its intellectual circles, where he met Francesco Sansovino, with whom he became close friends.

Marriage

He married Alessandro Farnese's relative, Giulia Farnese in 1544. According to ''Casa Cesarini. Ricerche e documenti'' by Patrizia Rosini, Vicino Orsini married Giulia Farnese on the 11th of February 1545 in Rocca di Giove. According to the same book Giulia was named after her great-aunt because her mother Isabella had been raised and protected by her when she lost her mother. This book gives the year of Giulia's death as 1560, while ''Bomarzo: Ein Garten gegen Gott und die Welt'' by Renate Vergeiner gives it as 1564. According to ''Bomarzo: Ein Garten gegen Gott und die Welt'' the two married in 1541. The article ''The Collection of Corradino Orsino'' by Lothar Sickel places the wedding in January 1541.

She is not to be confused with her maternal great-aunt and the cardinal's sister Giulia Farnese, the mistress of Pope Alexander VI. His wife Giulia Farnese (d. 1564) was the daughter of Galeazzo Farnese, Duke of Latera and Isabella, daughter of Giuliano dell'Anguillara and Girolama Farnese (d. 1504). Giulia's maternal grandmother Girolama Farnese was the sister of Cardinal Alessandro Farnese, Pope Paul III, and Giulia Farnese, the mistress of Rodrigo Borgia, Pope Alexander VI.

The second Giulia Farnese's paternal great-grandfather was Bartolomeo Farnese, Count of Montalto and Canino, and the brother of Girolama, Alessandro (the future Pope Paul III) and Giulia Farnese. He was born in 1470 and married Iolanda Monaldeschi, with whom he had the son Pedro Bertodolo Farnese and the daughters Isabella and Cecilia. Bartolomeo died in 1552 and was the founder of the Duchy of Latera, which existed until 1668.

Her grandmother Girolama was born in 1466 and was murdered with a sword on the 1st of November at not forty years of age, roughly ten years after her second marriage, for alleged infidelity by her stepson Giovanni Battista dell'Anguillara in Stabiae Castle. Her first marriage had been to Puccio Pucci, whom she married on the 10th of November 1483. From her second marriage to Count Giuliano dell'Anguillara and Stabiae whom she had married on the 15th of February 1495, came the daughter Isabella (Elisabeth) della Anguillara, who later married Galeazzo Farnese, the grandson of Bartolomeo, and the children of that marriage, the daughters Violante and Giulia Farnese.

Some sources give the year of Girolama's death as 1504, some as 1505.

Puccio Pucci died in 1494, and she married her second husband the following year.

Vicino's wife Giulia Farnese was thus related to Pope Paul III two times over, as the child of the only child of his tragically murdered sister, and through the line that inherited the family title and holdings through his brother Bartolomeo as the daughter of Bartolomeo's grandson.

In a book published in 1556, ''Le Imagine del tempio della signaro Giovanna Aragona'', by Giuseppe Betussi, Giulia Farnese Orsini is referred to as amongst the most virtuous ladies of Italy, on account of her constancy, having remained faithful to Vicino during the long periods when he was absent at war.

Vicino and Giulia had several children. Their eldest son was Corradino (b.1545).After the death of his wife he dedicated the park to her memory.

Military career

Vicino's career as condottiero began in 1545 when he was called upon by Alessandro Farnese, now Pope Paul III to assist with the fortifications of the Borghi of the City of Rome. He was taken prisoner in 1546, while leading Pontifical troops assisting the army of the Holy Roman Emperor, King Charles V against the Protestant Principates. He was relasedthe following year. He was again taken prisoner until 1556, when Treaty of Cateau-Cambresis ended the French-Spanish Wars in Italy.

Children

He and his wife had five sons, Corradino, Marzio, Alessandro, Scipione and Orazio (died in the famous Battle of Lepanto in 1571), and two daughters, Faustina and Ottavia.

Faustina Orsini (1557–1594) married Fabio Mattei. Fabio inherited the Palazzo Nuovo (Palazzo Mattei di Paganica) on his father's death in 1566. He remained close to Cardinal Odoardo Farnese after the marriage. It was with Fabio Mattei that the latter commissioned Annibale Carracci to paint the Pietà installed in the Mattei family chapel in San Francesco a Ripa at Easter 1603 (even though the chapel itself was not completed for a number of years), and Fabio bequeathed some works of art to Odoardo when he died in 1612. He evidently devoted himself to charitable pursuits within the SS Trinità after the death of his wife in 1594. Her portrait was painted by Scipione Pulzone.

Ottavia married Marcantonio Marescotti, III Count of Vignanello, and became Countess of Vignanello. The couple had the children Sforza Vicino Marescotti, IV Count of Vignanello, Ginevra, Clarice ''alias'' Santa Giacinta Marescotti and Ortensia.

Pier Francesco Orsini died on 28 January 1583.

Parco Bomarzio

Orsini then retired to Bomarzo where he surrounded himself with writers and artists, and devoted himself to an Epicurean style of life, which negated any contact with religion.Here he had a family and, starting from 1547, created the famous Park, whose enigmatic constructions and sculptures are one of the most suggestive example of late Renaissance art in Italy.

Artistic tributes

*Alberto Ginastera's 1967 opera ''Bomarzo'' is based on the life of Orsini, as told in the book of the same name by Argentinian writer Manuel Mujica Láinez.
* Anna von Hausswolff's song ''Dolore di Orsini'' inspired by Pier Orsini's grief and loss after losing his wife which led him to create the garden Sacro Bosco.

References

Bibliography

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Orsini, Pier Francesco
1523 births
1583 deaths
People from the Province of Viterbo
16th-century condottieri
Pier Francesco