Girolamo Riario, commander of the papal forces, starts a conflict in 1484 with the Colonna family, whose landed property Sixtus IV wishes to take over.

In the course of this feud he has the papal protonotary, Lorenzo Colonna, arrested and tortured to death, a deed that provokes much enmity against his family in the city.

The lives of Caterina and Girolamo change abruptly with the death of Sixtus IV on August 12, 1484.

Rebellions and disorder immediately spread through Rome, including looting of his supporters' residences.

Girolamo's residence, the Orsini palace in Campo de' Fiori, is stripped of its content and almost destroyed.

In this time of anarchy, Caterina, who is in her seventh month of pregnancy, crosses the Tiber on horseback to occupy the rocca (fortress) of Castel Sant'Angelo on behalf of her husband.

From this position and with the obedience of the soldiers, Caterina can monitor the Vatican and dictate the conditions for the new conclave.

Meanwhile, the disorder in the city increases.

A militia accompanies the arrival of the Cardinals.

The latter do not want to attend the funeral of Sixtus IV and refuse to enter into conclave, for fear of coming under the fire of Caterina's artillery.

The situation is difficult because only the election of a new Pope will put an end to the violence in the Eternal City.

Unsuccessful attempts to persuade her to leave the fortress fail, as she is determined to give it only to the new Pope.

Girolamo and his army occupy a strategic position at this point, yet cannot implement an effective solution.

The Sacred College asks Girolamo to leave Rome, offering in return the confirmation of his Lordship over Imola and Forlì, the military post of Captain-General of the Church, and eight thousand ducats in compensation for the damages to his property.

Girolamo accepts.

When Caterina is informed of the decisions taken by her husband, she increases the quota of her soldiers and makes preparations for resistance in order to force the Cardinals to negotiate with her.

The Cardinals again approach Girolamo, who takes up a position counter to that of his wife.

On August 25, 1484, Caterina surrenders the fortress to the Sacred College and leaves Rome with her family.

The Sacred College are then able to meet in conclave to elect the new Pope.

Giovanni Battista Cybo (or Cibo) was born in Genoa of Greek ancestry, the son of Arano Cybo or Cibo and his wife Teodorina de Mari of an old Genoese family.

His paternal grandparents were Maurizio Cybo and his wife Seracina Marocelli.

Arano Cybo had been a senator in Rome under Pope Calixtus III.

Giovanni Battista's early years had been spent at the Neapolitan court, and subsequently he had gone to Padua and Rome for his education.

In Rome, he became a priest in the retinue of cardinal Calandrini, half-brother to Pope Nicholas V. In 1467, he had been made Bishop of Savona by Pope Paul II, but had exchanged this see in 1472 for that of Molfetta in southeastern Italy.

In 1473, with the support of Giuliano Della Rovere, later Pope Julius II, he had been made cardinal by Pope Sixtus IV, whom he succeeds on August 29, 1484, as Pope Innocent VIII.

Law and order in Forlì had been maintained by Caterina's uncle Ludovico il Moro Sforza, Duke of Milan.

The Riarios had learned on their arrival of the election of Giovanni Battista Cybo, an old opponent, as Pope Innocent VIII.

He confirms Girolamo in his lordships of Imola and Forlì and his appointment as Captain-General.

This appointment, however, is only nominal; Girolamo has no real control over the Papal army and Innocent VIII refuses to pay Girolamo for leaving Rome.

Despite the loss of income, Girolamo has not reinstated taxes on the people of Forlì.

This situation lasts until the end of 1485, when the city government completely runs out of money.

Girolamo, pressed by a member of the Council of Elders, Nicolò Pansecco, is forced to levy taxes.

The taxes are deemed excessive by the population and lead to Girolamo's increased unpopularity among all citizens of Forlì.

The tax increase, which affects mainly the artisan class and landowners, adds to the discontent that had previously been limited to the families who had suffered under Girolamo's persecution of those whom he suspected of treachery.

His enemies begin to conspire against him with a view to making Franceschetto Cybo, the illegitimate son of Pope Innocent, lord of Imola and Forlì in his stead.

Giacomo is appointed castellan of the fortress of Ravaldino in place of his brother, and is awarded with an order of chivalry from Ludovico il Moro.

All the contemporary chronicles report that Caterina is madly in love with the young Giacomo.

It is feared that she could strip her son Ottaviano of his future lordship, in order to give it to her lover and secret husband.

In April 1489, Caterina gives birth to Giacomo's son, Bernardino, later called Carlo in honor of King Charles VIII, who had made Giacomo a baron of France.

Also, she had replaced the castellans of the fortresses of her dominions with her closest relatives: the fortress of Imola has been given to Gian Piero Landriani, her stepfather, and the fortress of Forlimpopoli to Piero Landriani, her half-brother, while Tommaso Feo is married to Bianca Landriani, Caterina's half-sister.

At Tossignano, a conspiracy is formed to seize the fortress in the name of Ottaviano, and murder both Giacomo and Caterina.

The Countess discovers the plot and imprisons or executes those who are involved.

Immediately after this conspiracy is foiled, another plot is organized by Antonio Maria Ordelaffi, who had never become resigned to the loss of Forlí, but this also fails.

Giacomo's power increases, and with his cruelty and insolence he incurs the hatred of all, including Caterina's children.

The eleven-year-old Ottaviano, despite his official status, is in reality controlled by his domineering mother and her lover.

When Feo humiliates Giacomo in public by slapping him, his nominal courtiers do nothing to support him.

After this episode, the situation in Forli becomes very strained.

Ottaviano's friends plot to use the episode as an excuse to "liberate" the city from the rule of Giacomo Feo by assassinating him.

The first attempt in 1490 fails.

The eleven-year-old Ottaviano, despite his official status, is in reality controlled by his domineering mother and her lover.

When Feo humiliates Giacomo in public by slapping him, his nominal courtiers do nothing to support him.

After this episode, the situation in Forli becomes very strained.

Ottaviano's friends plot to use the episode as an excuse to "liberate" the city from the rule of Giacomo Feo by assassinating him.

The first attempt in 1490 fails.

The future Pope Alexander VI was born Roderic Llançol on January 1, 1431, in the town of Xativa near Valencia, Spain, one of the component realms of the Crown of Aragon, in what is now Spain.

His parents were Jofré Llançol i Escrivà, who died before March 24, 1437, and his Aragonese wife and distant cousin Isabel de Borja y Cavanilles, who died October 19, 146).

His family name is written Llançol in Catalan and Lanzol in Castillian Spanish.

Rodrigo adopted his mother's family name of Borja in 1455 following the elevation to the papacy of maternal uncle Alonso de Borja (Italianized to Alfonso Borgia), bishop of Valencia, as Calixtus III.

Rodrigo Borgia studied law at Bologna where he graduated, not simply as Doctor of Law, but as "the most eminent and judicious jurisprudent."

After the election of his uncle as Pope, he had been ordained deacon and created Cardinal-Deacon of San Nicola in Carcere at the age of twenty-five in 1456.

The following year, he was appointed vice-chancellor of the Holy Roman Church.

Both nepotistic appointments are characteristic of the age.

Each pope during this period inevitably finds himself surrounded by the servants and retainers of his predecessors who often owe their loyalty to the family of the pontiff who had appointed them.

In 1468, he had been ordained to the priesthood and, in 1471, had been consecrated bishop and appointed Cardinal-Bishop of Albano.

Serving in the Roman Curia under five popes—Calixtus III, Pius II, Paul II, Sixtus IV and Innocent VIII—Rodrigo Borgia has acquired considerable administrative experience, influence and wealth.

Contemporary accounts suggest that Rodrigo was "handsome, with a very cheerful countenance and genial bearing.

He was gifted with the quality of being a smooth talker and of choice eloquence.

Beautiful women were attracted to him and excited by him in quite a remarkable way, more strongly than how "iron is drawn to a magnet."

Rodrigo Borgia is also an intelligent man with an appreciation for the arts and sciences and an immense amount of respect for the Church.

He is capable and cautious, considered a "political priest" by some.

He is a gifted speaker and a great conversationalist.

Of Rodrigo Borgia’s many mistresses, the one for whom passion had lasted longest was Vannozza (Giovanna) dei Cattanei, born in 1442, and wife of three successive husbands.

The connection began in 1470, and she has had four children whom he openly acknowledges as his own: Cesare (born 1475), Giovanni, afterwards duke of Gandia (born 1476), Lucrezia (born 1480), and Goffredo or Giuffre (born 1481 or 1482).

Five other children, Girolama, Isabella, Pedro-Luiz, and Bernardo, are of uncertain maternal parentage.

A daughter, Laura, was born to his mistress, Giulia Farnese; paternity was officially attributed to Orsino Orsini, Farnese's husband.

There had been a change in the constitution of the College of Cardinals during the course of the fifteenth century-especially under Sixtus IV and Innocent VIII.

Of the twenty-seven cardinals alive in the closing months of the reign of Innocent VIII no fewer than ten are cardinal-nephews, eight are crown nominees, four are Roman nobles and one other had been given the cardinalate in recompense for his family's service to the Holy See; only four are able career churchmen.

On the death of Pope Innocent VIII on July 25, 1492, the three likely candidates for the Papacy were the sixty-one-year-old Borgia, seen as an independent candidate, Ascanio Sforza for the Milanese, and Giuliano della Rovere, seen as a pro-French candidate.

Johann Burchard, the conclave's master of ceremonies and a leading figure of the papal household under several popes, records in his diary that the 1492 conclave was a particularly expensive campaign.

Della Rovere was bankrolled to the cost of two hundred thousand gold ducats by King Charles VIII of France, with another one hundred thousand supplied by the Republic of Genoa.

Borgia is elected on August 11, 1492, assuming the name of Alexander VI (due to confusion about the status of Pope Alexander V elected by the Council of Pisa).

When his uncle was elected Pope, Rodrigo had "inherited" the former’s post of bishop of Valencia.

Sixteen days before the death of Pope Innocent VIII, he had proposed Valencia as a metropolitan see and he became the first archbishop of Valencia.

When Rodrigo de Borja is elected pope, it is the turn of his son Cesare to "inherit" the post as second archbishop of Valencia.

The third and the fourth archbishops of Valencia will be Juan de Borja and Pedro Luis de Borja, grandnephews of Alexander VI.

Charles VIII, in order to have a free hand in Italy, has made ruinous pacts with all his neighbors, so they will not interfere.

Henry VII has been given cash, Ferdinand II of Aragon has been given Roussillon and Maximillian has been given Artois and Franche-Comté.

This handing out of territory is symptomatic of Charles' lack of foresight.

Charles is willing to do this, however, in his attempt to establish his Neapolitan base for his crusade.

The fighting between the many independent towns of Italy has been done by establishing a contract, condotta in Italian, between the town leaders and the leaders of mercenary bands, who had come to be called condottieri.

This had led to the developing of fighting tactics destined to establish field supremacy, gaining wealthy prisoners to be ransomed, and minimizing casualties, as it is basically a business.

These tactics will be put to shame when the motivated armies of France and Spain descend upon the Italian peninsula.

Rapallo is occupied by four thousand Neapolitan troops on September 3, 1494, with Giulio Orsini, Obietto Fieschi and Fregosino Campofregoso in command, their plan being to force a rebellion in Genoa; however, the Neapolitan fleet is soon forced away by bad weather.

Louis d'Orleans lands on September 5 with one thousand Swiss mercenary infantry, later reinforced overland by two thousand more Swiss mercenaries and a contingent of Genoese-Milanese infantry.

A skirmish breaks out between the Swiss mercenaries and Neapolitan forces, though the terrain does not allow for the Swiss to form up their pike squares.

The battle is mainly fought, however, between the Genoese-Milanese and Neapolitan infantry.

Following concentrated artillery fire from the French fleet, the Neapolitans are routed.

The Swiss massacre Neapolitans trying to surrender, although Orsini and Campofregoso are captured in the retreat.

After the battle the Swiss mercenaries kill the enemy wounded and sack the town of Rapallo.

Though this had been a small battle, it is seen as a significant victory that halts Neapolitan-Aragonese attempts to incite a rebellion in Genoa against the French.

Ludovico Sforza, who has long controlled the Duchy of Milan, finally procures the ducal title in October 1494, after providing a hitherto unheard-of dowry to his niece, who is marrying the Holy Roman Emperor, Maximilian.

He is immediately challenged by Alfonso II, who also has a claim on Milan.

Ludovico decides to remove this threat by inciting Charles to take up Innocent's offer.

Charles is also being encouraged by his favorite, Étienne de Vesc, as well as by Cardinal Giuliano della Rovere, the future Pope Julius II, who hopes to settle a score with the incumbent Pope, Alexander VI.

A contingent of Charles' VIII's army besieges the fortress of Mordano on October 19.

After refusing to surrender, the fortress is bombarded, taken by French-Milanese forces, and the surviving inhabitants massacred.

This shocks the Italians, who are accustomed to the relatively bloodless wars of the condottieri.

Charles VIII had been on good terms with the two powers in northern Italy, Milan and Venice, and both have encouraged him to make good his claims over the Kingdom of Naples.

Thus he assumed he would have their support when he moved against Alfonso II of Naples, especially as the rival claimant is Ferdinand II of Aragon, King of Spain.

Charles had led a powerful twenty-five thousand-man French army, including an eight thousand-strong contingent of Swiss mercenaries and the first train of artillery seen in history, into Italy at the end of August 1494 Charles VIII had l

He had been granted free passage through Milan, but is vigorously opposed by Florence, Pope Alexander VI, and Naples.

Louis d'Orleans' victory at Rapallo had allowed Charles to march his army through the Republic of Genoa.

Piero de' Medici, having assumed the mantle of family power from his late father Lorenzo, had alienated the people of Florence by siding with the French when Charles VIII of France invaded Italy.

The arrival in mid-November of 1494 of Charles's army outside Florence creates fears of rape and pillage.

The Florentines are led to exile Piero de' Medici for his act of betrayal and to establish a republican government.

Bernardo Rucellai and other members of the Florentine oligarchy then act as ambassadors to negotiate a peaceful accord with Charles.

When the Medici fall from power, the Jews of Florence and Tuscany are expelled.

Reforming Dominican friar Girolamo Savonarola, interpreting the French intervention as the vengeance and punishment he had earlier prophesied, establishes a constitutional republican government that is effectively a theocracy.

Savonarola becomes a virtual dictator in the city, imposing a program of sweeping moral reforms.

He also begins to regard himself as a prophet of God sent to announce judgment on Italy and on the church.

He soon comes into conflict with Pope Alexander VI, who is desperately forging alliances against the French.

Regency and Queenship of Anne of Beaujeu and Anne of Brittany (1483–1495)

Anne of Beaujeu, who skillfully governed as regent for her brother Charles VIII from 1483 to 1491, reassumed a similar role when Charles embarked upon his Italian campaigns. Trusted and politically astute, she maintained stability within France during his prolonged absences, ensuring continuity of royal authority.

Anne of Brittany, though Queen of France, had limited political influence in both France and her native Brittany, and frequently endured separation from her children during their infancy. Her life was largely defined by her residency in royal castles such as Amboise, Loches, and Plessis, as well as in major towns including Lyon, Grenoble, and Moulins, particularly when Charles VIII conducted military operations in Italy.

At Amboise, Anne of Brittany often stayed at the nearby Clos Lucé, later famed as the residence of Leonardo da Vinci, where she commissioned the construction of her personal chapel. She attained additional titles, notably Queen Consort of Naples and Jerusalem, following Charles VIII's temporary conquest of Naples, further highlighting her prominence within European dynastic affairs of the late fifteenth century.