Borgia (Band Dessiina) — Wikipedia
Borgia is a series of comics, written by Alejandro Jodorowsky and designed by Milo Manara. She recounts the romanticized life of Pope Alexandre VI.
The series is complete in 4 volumes. It is the start of “papal trilogy” [ first ] continued by Jodorowsky with The terrible pope , telling different stages in the history of the Vatican between the end of XV It is and the start of XVI It is century.
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Volume 1 of the blood for the pope [ modifier | Modifier and code ]
At the end of XV It is century, the fanatic monk Jérôme Savonarole harangues and threatens the crowds of anger of God in a Rome delivered to debauchery, to corruption, to crime and ravaged by the plague.
For his part, Cardinal Rodrigo Borgia, of Catalan origin, to whom Pope Innocent WE Leave all these goods, intrigue to become the vicar of Christ after the upcoming death of Innocent VIII, of which he favors. For this, he must dismiss his main rivals, notably Ascanio Sforza, cardinal of Milan, and the young and beautiful cardinal of Naples, the homosexual Julien Della Rovere, as well as his enemies like the wealthy and angry Gaspare Malatesta, all powerful lord from Rimini.
While the pope is dying, not without having tried to prolong his miserable existence of vice and violence by being transfused from the blood of young people until they die, Rodrigo Borgia, assisted by his faithful Micheletto, killer Unscrupulous, puts Vanozza Catani, his mistress, mother of her four children, Lucrèce, César, Giovanni and Joffre, sheltered from the epidemic. As they all celebrate their reunion together, Giovanni fails to die poisoned by Mauro, a servant who is none other than one of the sons of Malatesta. Mauro is toothless with incredible cruelty by Borgia and his father swears to avenge him. On the eve of the Pope’s death, Borgia will embark on the race for the succession for which no less than twenty-three cardinals are in the running. To shelter her, Borgia disperses her family to the four corners of the kingdom: Lucrèce at the Saint-Sixte convent, César in Pisa, Giovanni in Bassanelle and Joffre at his cousin Adriana.
Poorly seen from the curia because he is not Italian, he knows that his task is not going to be easy. He will compensate for this handicap with deceit and brutality. He thus begins by having Gaspare Malatesta and his escort murdered by his Reader Micheletto and his archers. Then he brings, one by one, the cardinals of the conclave. Then he buys Ascanio Sforza with gold and silver stolen from Malatesta. Afterwards, it’s Juliano Della Rovere’s turn, demoralized by the massacre of his entourage with cute, to make him allegiance. Finally, he tears off the last voice he misses by convincing, against a few moments spent with Vanozza, his own mistress, the old heartless cardinal Gherardi to vote for him. And he can finally be crowned pope under the name of Alexandre VI.
Meanwhile, Lucrèce and Julia Farnèse, her fellow of debauchery at the convent, engage in sadism, stupid and fornication to deceive their boredom, until Machiavelli, the cunning advisor to his father, came to seek Lucrèce for Finally bring it back to Rome …
Volume 2 Power and incest [ modifier | Modifier and code ]
Pope Alexandre VI worries persistent disorders in the city, which harm his image. To restore his popularity, he instructs Micheletto, his terrible henchman, to murder and to crucify the whole Bertoli family who makes saints and virgins in plaster and is unanimously respected by little people. Then, he asks a poor Hère to put on this crime against an indulgence, sounding and stumbling species and a safe conduct. The naive accepts, admits and even publicly claims his alleged crime in front of the horrified crowd which requires that it be tortured, which is immediately done in an abominable manner, during a great spectacle within the Colosseum. Then, César engages in an exhibition of his know-how by killing a bull, symbol of evil, in the arena, under the cheers of a joy crowd. Thus, with an inflexible but just pope, moreover with a valiant and intrepid son, the Borgia family appears in everyone’s eyes as the essential protective of Rome.
Meanwhile, Machiavelli, the damned soul of the pope, came to get Lucrèce at the Saint-Sixte convent, because his father, who tramples a complex and subtle game of alliances, intended for Giovanni Sforza, Duke of Pesaro and Master of Milan, Marriage all the more arranged as Sforza is homosexual but where he finds his account thanks to an endow of 30,000 ducats.
While, as usual, his two sons César and Giovanni argue, the pope orders them to put an end to their quarrels by asserting them that nothing will stop Borgia as long as they remain united. Then, he intimate the order to Caesar to make love to his sister Lucrèce, thus sealing by incest an indestructible family pact.
While Savonarole, in Florence, sets up the population against this degenerate pope, this one has been looking forward to the wedding project between Lucrèce and Giovanni Sforza to make room in Florence. As this one is married to Madeleine de Gonzague, also pregnant with his squire, he had it murdered by Micheletto. His Lucrèce wedding project with Sforza is now free.
Arrives the wedding day, which is carried out with great fanfare, in the presence of foreign delegations. In the evening, while César and Lucrèce sleep together in Sforza’s indifference, only attracted by men, the suddens of his suite begin to put Rome on fire and blood until Caesar comes to put good order while earthworks One of the leaders, a drunk and brazenous giant, under the admiring and enamored gaze of his sister Lucrèce. Then, it is the orgy, the highlight of these bacchanalia being the public consumption of this union, with a simulacrum of deflowering of Lucrèce by her husband, who is very incapable of it but in which all believe thanks to a subterfuge. And the Pope can declare this marriage that seals the alliance of Rome and Milan.
It was then that Duarte, one of his advisers, told the pope that Charles VIII, the King of France comes, at the instigation of Cardinal Julien Della Rovere, to lift a colossal army to invade Italy and deposit it for the benefit of the cardinal …
Volume 3 The flames of the stake [ modifier | Modifier and code ]
The 1494 Easter Sunday, Alexandre VI Borgia has been Pope for two years. During an orgy in the Vatican, he does without knowing it – because the protagonists are masked – love with his daughter Lucrèce. At the end of this impromptu relationship and which cannot have any consequences, Lucrèce boasts him the charms of Julia Farnese, his cousin and games of games, always locked up at the Saint-Sixte convent.
The pope and lucrèce accompanied by Micheletto will seek Julia at the convent from which they extricate it not without violence and atrocities, the sisters trying to oppose it and without further delay, as soon as the return to Rome, the Pope can satisfy his passion emerging for Julia. Then, to have his hands free, he bursts with a crucifix the eye of the Borgne Orzo Orsini, the son of his cousin Adriana, fiancé promised to Julia, and makes him locked up.
Meanwhile, Savonarole continues in Florence her fiery preaching against this demon installed on the throne of Saint Peter and draws up vanity pyres where sometimes invaluable works like bootticelli paintings disappear.
While the pope induces his son César like Cardinal and Julien Della Rovere plots, the plague strikes Rome, which leads the pope to flee to the countryside with César and Lucrèce, whom he threatens to hang if they continue to bicker and have to disobey him.
Lucrèce, pregnant with César, then goes to a witch who prepares a potion to an abortion, which the Borgia need to have her husband accused of helplessness, the only admissible pretext to have a marriage that has become unnecessary.
Back in Rome, the Pope learns from his faithful Duarte that the King of France is preparing to deposit him at the instigation of Cardinal Della Rovere and Agrippa, an astripologist at his service. The pope immediately commissioned Micheletto to go to France, to Vincennes, convince this charlatan to change camps. With his usual brutality and cruelty, his henchman who is soon convincing this old -lawyer without faith or greedy. And soon after, Cardinal Della Rovere, expelled from France, had to re -embark on his country in Marseille.
The King of France invades Italy and, for lack of sufficient military resources, the Pope uses prostitutes to distract the hordes of invaders when they entered Rome. High negotiations then engage between the Pope and Charles VIII. During these, the Pope, to recover Julia Farnese, taken hostage by Charles VIII, gives him in exchange his son César who will accompany him with a considerable treasure, a guarantee of his good faith. Of bad grace, he can only follow the king, not without flattering him at each of his military conquests. Then he fled, leaving the alleged treasure on the spot which turns out to be only a few stones piled up in boxes, to the great fury of the King of France …
Volume 4 everything is vanity [ modifier | Modifier and code ]
In Pesaro, at the Château des Sforza, Lucrèce Borgia and her husband insult and are moving. Lucrèce having, thanks to Pentasilea her devoted slave, took over, he left at Giovanni Sforza only to run away at his uncle’s, one of his cute in rump.
Meanwhile, the King of France has arrived practically without incident until Naples. Drunk with pride, he intends to climb Vesuvius, where he died in an eruption of lava, symbol of eternal fire. Machiavelli teaches the good news to César, who will finally be able to get out of his hiding place, and the persuades that he could become pope in the place of his father and – who knows? – Then conquer the whole world.
César Galops immediately to the Vatican where he finds the pope in the company of his brother Giovanni, whom he hates because he knows that he is preferred to him and with whom he quarrels once again. The pope clearly takes a position in favor of Giovanni by brutally revealing to Caesar that he is not his son but that a vulgar bastard from his mother’s adulterous relationship with a servant, and entrusts the papal ring to Giovanni , which makes Caesar, already jealous of his brother, absolutely crazy with rage.
Shortly after, we find in the Tiber the body of Giovanni – who used to seek incognito good fortune with young people to spend the night – a cut hand, which plunges the pope into immense pain. It was then that Caesar arises who admits and even claims his crime by throwing his brother’s hand in the face. Pope and Caesar fight and then end up, without the other, but reason helping, by reconciling to better face their common enemies. The pope thus transmits to César the papal ring as well as the loads of Giovanni and authorizes him to finally deposit the purple cardinal, which suits him so little and weighs him.
Meanwhile, Lucrèce, at most badly, gives birth by cesarean to a two -headed monster, one resembling his brother Caesar, the other to his father the pope. And she dies after ordering the rotten fruit of her cursed bowels.
At the Château Saint Ange, César, who became Captain General of the Holy Roman Church, after having tried his tender costume with morgue, receives not without regard Leonardo da Vinci, whom he strives by all means – absolutely all – Seduce so that he can conceive new war weapons to him. First reluctant, Léonard lets himself be circumven on by Caesar’s advances. The killing machines he developed give it victory against the great rebel cities of Italy, which fall one after the other. And Caesar, drunk with glory, can finally believe the king of the world.
Three years later, in the depths of the Calabria, in Polatena, it was a slaughtered and desperate Micheletto who comes to find his mother and tell him the end of this story.
César, afflicted with poisoning, now hides under a mask half half of his face. A real scourge for the enemies of the pope, he ravages their lands and completes his triumph by bringing soap in a cage in Rome where the fanatic monk is violated on a bed of nails by the pope in person, his corpse being then transported to Florence to be burned in public places. The Borgia father and son seem to have won.
It is therefore sure of him that the Pope goes to a private mass, at the invitation of Cardinal Della Rovere. The following night, he died poisoned by mass wine that Della Rovere shared with him but from a jar with two compartments. As soon as known the death of the pope, the soldiers of Caesar disgusted themselves, the princes he had defeated are restored and Della Rovere, which in turn became pope under the name of Jules II, orders the arrest of Caesar and the confiscation of all His belongings. Caesar fled to the King of Navarre, whom he believed his friend, but who had him murdered as soon as he landed.
And Micheletto, now without prospects and hopeless, hangs himself with his mother.
Ainsi se termine cette histoire: “Vanity of vanities and all vanity.”
Characters [ modifier | Modifier and code ]
Albin Michel editions have published Borgia Until the takeover of the comic book catalog of this publisher by Glénat. Subsequently, the Drugstore label continued it and reissued the first volumes.
- Albin Michel: volumes 1 and 2 (first edition of volumes 1 and 2)
- Drugstore: volumes 1 to 4 (first edition of volumes 3 and 4)
Albums [ modifier | Modifier and code ]
- Blood for the pope ( , (ISBN 2226155252 ) )
- Power and incest ( , (ISBN 2226166785 ) )
- The flames of the stake ( , (ISBN 9782356260215 ) )
- Everything is vanity ( , (ISBN 9782723470476 ) )
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