Original subtitles

On the fourth and last Sunday in October, His Holiness attended a solemn

the Holy Spirit in St. Peter's Basilica, and following the completion of the

communion, he came thence to the steps, traditionally robed, to bless the

commander of the forces he was sending to reduce the towns, lands, and

of the Orsini, and thereby bring those disaffected and unreasonable men

to papal obedience.

The Lord Juan Borja knelt before the banners which the Holy Father had

and Lord Juan Borja swore a corporal oath taken by all captain generals of

Holy Church, that he would be the Holy Father's trusted and valorous

gonfaloniere, opposing all enemies of the papacy without favor and without

yet mindful always of the mercy and compassion required of a truly Christian

prince.

Beloved son of the church, receive this touch, receive this

standard, and know that in love and trust we have appointed you

the Lord Juan Borja, Duke of Gandia, our noble.

Captain General.

Though there was much devoicing in Rome, and quite truth, it was said by some,

yet behind their hands, in the privacy of their own houses, that his holiness

would not have dared to confer so high an honor upon his bastard son,

had not he...

had not he first...

strengthened his authority in the sacred college by the appointment of

four new cardinals all obedient to his will and wish yet

what prudent men feared soon came to pass lord juan borja would not accept

wise advice of his spanish captains and was thus several times

Outwitted by the Orsini, whose forces came once to the wall of the Holy City,

mocking his holiness and putting him at defiance.

The Orsini were driven from the country about Rome by the Lord Cesare,

Cardinal of Valencia.

But his brother, the Lord Juan, was unable to overcome them.

Mr. Burkhardt. Thus, you're disturbing me.

Go to his holiness.

I am not to be commanded by you.

And I'm not to be kept waiting by you.

I will not be commanded by a kitchen priest.

He perfumes his robes with rose water to make them acceptable to women.

And I'll not wait upon a scratch pen who howls his fleet in heat.

Thus, when the Lord, Juan Borja, finally brought the Orsinis to battle at

Surihana... His holiness has commanded your presence.

He...

was grievously defeated

by him.

Although the skill of his Spanish captains saved the day from all

yet a thousand of the Lord Juan's men were slain and all his artillery lost

to the Osiris.

He was struck about the head and sorely wounded, and being carried from the

field in great haste, was two days since brought here to Rome, where his life is

now despaired of.

Will my brother truly die?

Your eminence may have confidence in my skills.

That I may when I know their power.

Will he die?

Between physics and God's will, there's a great darkness, Your Eminence.

Will he die?

Don't, Your Eminence. I can save him. By the same token that you can, you

cannot.

Or may not.

Do you understand me, Jew?

But, Eminence.

You were too tardy in answering our summons, Mr. Booker. I was late.

No matter.

You are here now.

Mr. Booker.

I've come.

This brave and valiant soul is close to death.

No.

No, he must not die.

Therefore, dear Jochen, faithful soul, despite our grief,

you must prepare for our soonest consideration a funeral ceremony.

They will do honor to him and to the name important.

A solemn requiem, you have.

Let there be purple.

Will your holiness declare a te deum of thanks before the requiem mass?

The Spanish have driven the Orsinians from the field and into that rat hole

carcass.

Whom has forgotten?

Who gives joy to his our pain?

That he may understand and surrender to you, our beloved son.

Who was the architect of this victory?

Architect?

What architect?

A fool could have seen that one would be defeated. Am I to be told that the

triumph of greater captains was his design?

Your hand stinks of his sweat.

When grief and joy give you elbow room,

Think also of vengeance.

The Spanish took prisoners.

Virginia Orsini and his two cubs.

You do not ask for mercy.

Would you have us ask that you may take pleasure in refusing?

We would have you face God in repentance for your sins.

Since you're to arrange that meeting, I'd rather ask him why he tolerates

If your father has not already done so.

My lord.

The old fox is dead.

Have they not told you?

May God rest a noble soul.

Address your prayer to the devil.

Were the Schwarzer's party to your treason?

Your holiness.

How?

Your father died of a fever where he was held.

God pity you, power of sin.

Your holiness.

Will your son, will the Duke of Gandia live?

If God wills.

I pray for it.

There's been too much blood between our houses.

My son.

Go home.

I'm tired.

I want to rest.

What shall we do with him?

Decide. Not yet.

God give you the rest you gave our father. Close his mouth!

Take him out.

Your eminence knows I'm not begged for my life.

You remind me that we were once friends.

In our boyhood.

I've not forgotten.

So, the Schwarzers were not a party to your treason.

No, my lord.

But they sent information by letter to your father.

I saw none.

Not even from my sister's idiot husband.

Will you ask why I'm leaving?

If you wish.

Why are you leaving Rome?

Well, you know why.

Your brother plots to kill me.

You dream of plots, Giovanni.

Well, you warned me. I told you not to displease Cegare.

I breathe.

That's enough.

You'll kill me to rid your family of our marriage. Where will you go?

Why must you know?

Oh, I do know.

To your kinsmen in Milan. Will they be pleased with you, Giovanni?

Lucrezia, that I may stay here with you, will you tell His Holiness that it's a

lie? What lie?

That I'm impotent, that I've not once taken... If it's a lie, I do not know.

If it's not a lie, I do not know.

Could you not try to love me?

Why? So that we may be happy.

Under cold sheets.

Would you wish me dead and then marry again?

I would have a man.

Yes, a bourgeois, in a bourgeois bed.

Lucrezia.

Lucrezia, please.

Please, please forgive me.

Please.

If I had married a man, I would have taken his hand and walked with him

Wherever he wished.

Defying God and my family.

Whatever he wished.

Go to Milan, Giovanni.

That much I already know.

What more?

Oh, why should she tell me anything she keeps from her beloved brother? Because

women trust each other. And betray each other. So you've said.

But for that, let's object men and rule the world.

Oh, I grow tired of you.

Each time I visit you, I lighten my purse to divert your husband's silly

attention from us. This day, it was an Arab stallion with silver harness.

Thus a man betrays a man's trust.

When I no longer come, it will be because I'm tired of you.

Oh, not lack for Borgia men.

There's your father and your brother.

Do you dress as a boy to arouse little Geoffrey?

Not my husband.

Juan.

The thought of my bed will soon restore him to health.

Does that anger you?

You see too much of Lucrezia. Your intimacy is improper.

Are you offended because she's not jealous of me?

I could joyfully whip you.

If that pleases your eminence.

Serve all Borgia men.

Play nursemaid to my husband.

Counterfeit astonishment at brother one's dexterity.

Cry amen when your father pants above me. And please, for God's understanding,

so whip me your eminence, if that's your desire.

Was their marriage consummated?

Did she tell you it was done?

Was it done?

No.

Not once.

Not once in four years.

Then Cesare was right.

You sent him to discover what I would have willingly told you had you but

I've been a fool, Lucia.

Can you forgive a father's foolish error?

I had only one hope.

That the marriage would please you.

No. That it would serve you.

How?

It brought me nothing but pain.

It brought you sports of votes and won you the papal crown.

You wish to wound me.

If you ask me to believe childish lies, you wound me.

You will dissolve my marriage?

If you so desire.

As you desire to be rid of an alliance which binds the independence of your

office.

You speak, yet I hear immense thoughts.

I am a bourgeois.

Would you wait again?

If your holiness did not require that. you'd not be so eager to rid me of

Giovanni Sforza.

You are a bourgeois.

This time, let it be a man.

He may serve you as you wish, but let it be a man who'll satisfy me.

Lucia Lucrezia.

Beloved daughter.

I believe I've loved nothing in this life so much as you.

I'll come again in the morning.

Is it late?

Do I weary you?

But yeah.

Embrace me.

In forgiveness.

O merciful God, have compassion upon my frailty.

O merciful God, forgive this poor sinner.

Cesare. See?

God is good to us.

Your brother is well again.

Has been for the last two weeks.

No, Lucia, no. Hold it back.

But I may see the great pearl that hangs above my ear.

No.

Joffrey, you take it. Was I called for my duties to witness this?

We are a family again.

I would be incomplete without you.

Take joy in that.

I take joy.

It's done. Will your holiness now permit me to leave? You asked to see me.

Not here.

Not so.

But now that I am here... No.

First you must learn how I have rewarded your brother.

In Christ's name, for what? Rising from the dead?

Be generous, J. Durand.

Admit, my strategy overcame your scene. Well, I shall when I find a Spanish

captain who doesn't spit at your name.

How have you rewarded my brother?

With the duchy of Benevento. And the cities of Terracina and Pontecorvo.

But I, nothing.

We made you governor and captain.

The master of tax collectors.

Who complain of your serenity.

Would you have them purse what they should gather for you?

Holy Father, can you not soothe my intemperate brother?

He has no dispute with you.

And I wish none with him.

Take my hand.

That and that.

But more pearls on the sleeves.

And tell the rogue that if he sends me that again, he'll lose an ear.

I'm fine with this mummery. You know it's not your time with the Orsini.

I'm faint with excitement, sister.

Cool my forehead with your hand.

Enough?

We're tired of him.

He must rest. You've two Orsini hawks in a cage. How will you fly them?

Does my brother still live?

He lives.

God be thanked.

But must shortly hang.

Then grant me that mercy.

We may.

What letters did your father receive from Giovanni Sforza?

I told your eminence that I saw none.

You know they were written.

Since I saw none, I cannot say.

Is your life worth such prevarication?

It is not to be bought with dishonor.

Your honest goodness disarms me.

How can we be enemies?

Will you believe that your life is as dear to me as your brother's is to you?

Indeed, my lord, I hope I may.

Believe it.

I've interceded with his holiness, Paolo.

He's spared you.

No, my lord.

No.

Your honor again.

What will good men say of it if you accept life and your brother dies?

My lord?

Then save him, Paolo.

He will live if you will be of service to his holiness.

I know nothing of letters from your sister's husband.

That matters of no consequence to his holiness.

to tears, Paolo Sini, when you spoke so compassionately of my son and the blood

between our houses.

All doors are open to us by grief, Your Holiness.

It's a relentless visitor.

Paolo Sini, why are our minds so obtrusive?

Our ears so deaf to God's great desire.

Your Holiness, my kinsmen are masters of the Campania.

Yet when they shall report, my Spaniards defeat them.

Is that paradox not evident?

of God's desire for peace.

Holiness, if your holiness sends me to my kinsmen, what term shall I carry?

Submission to our authority.

No, holiness.

What is offered to them?

Indemnity for the prisoners they hold and the right to the castles they

You can persuade them to this?

I believe I may.

And submission to papal authority?

That too I believe. You see?

How easy God's mercy may be served.

Only does my brother ride with me.

Now, but when, if you return with

your kinsman's submission, his life may no longer be forfeited.

And thus, on Wednesday of Holy Week, having heard that there was great joy at

the conclusion of peace, the Pope ordered a day of thanksgiving, and after

solemn mass in the Sistine Chapel, did humbly and thankfully wash the feet of

twelve poor persons of the city.

My hip and cheeks are pale.

Does your eminence think she may be ill?

Yes, Clint.

And she's unhappy, perhaps, at the absence of her husband.

What does your eminence hear from your nephew?

Nothing.

The boy left Rome too soon.

Too soon?

To answer the charge laid by Paolo Orsini.

Forgive me, I thought your eminence must know.

Know what?

That your foolish nephew wrote letters to the Orsinians.

Letters?

Full of tedious gossip, perhaps, which your eminence will no doubt explain to

his holiness.

And the lady Lucrezia Borgia thus further affirmed, testifying, complained

that her husband, the Lord Giovanni Sposta, did not keep her company

as a husband should, in that manner required under the sacrament of marriage

the procreation of children, and that she is therefore a virgin still, as God

made her for this.

and other reasons she had to force that down.

She does that that her marriage be set aside, dissolved, and made null

and void.

Your nephew must sign a light paper.

Ah, it may be difficult to persuade my nephew. Ascanio, we've been pleased to

forget the letter which that foolish boy sent to the Orsini's. He doesn't show

me. And that according to the confession of Paolo Orsini, made under oath to our

son, those letters were written at your prompting.

All this we've been pleased to forget, Ascanio.

It shall be as your holiness wishes.

Remember, the boy must swear that because of his impotence, the Lady

still virgo intacta.

Virgo intacta.

Tell me why that amuses you.

Your virgin sister is with child.

You lie.

Why should I?

Who's that?

Who? You are but a bourgeois.

No, but he would.

Lucia!

Your sister is gone from Rome.

Without a farewell to me.

Gone where?

To the convent of San Sisto.

Why?

Yes.

It was her wish to retire from public life.

Until her divorce is concluded.

And her child born?

Together.

You thought I wouldn't know of it.

Not yet.

And the father?

When was I to know his name?

The child will be born in darkness and forgotten in ignorance.

You need not know his father's name.

I do know it.

Then God guide your conscience.

And yours.

And mine.

Amen.

Choose a name.

That's all you'll say.

Nothing of God's great anger against us.

Church and family are his rock. Choose a name.

Upon them we seek his salvation and understanding.

All else is shifting sand.

May I visit my sister?

She's content.

But I have not.

You will not see her.

Cedric!

Your eminence, too, will leave Rome.

I'll leg it to the new king of Naples.

And turn my back on Brother Juan.

He goes with you as our Captain General.

Remember, Cesare, I love him no less than any of you.

I'll remember.

I'll remember he's my sister's brother.

Good to you, my lord.

Run like a cat.

That's him?

Ramiro da Luca?

I told him to wait until we were alone.

He says nothing.

Only me, your eminence.

You serve my brother Juan.

I have that on your eminence.

Oh.

However he may desire your eminence.

How specific?

Specific, discreet, your eminence.

He's the Duke's pimp, my lord.

I can find an agreeable lady blindfold in the dark.

If your eminence so wishes.

If you're to serve me, what other skills do you have?

Speak up, cousin.

I can place him loose gently with a maiden's hand and quietly open his

backbone with the point of my knife.

Vanessa, we see you too rarely.

To know that you remember me is enough.

Yet you asked for this audience.

Because I wish to see Lucrezia.

She's a retreat at San Sisto.

Rodrigo, she'll be afraid.

Afraid? Your daughter?

Of what? Of the pain, the loneliness.

She's not ill.

And the good sisters keep her company.

But when the child comes... Child?

What child?

There is no child.

Rodrigo.

I asked little of your love and wanted little beyond that.

Is it too much now to... Will you deny me one small favor?

Of course.

You shame me, Vanoza.

I have not yet built you the palace I promised when the French left us.

But I am content with my villa.

Is the vineyard flourishing again?

For three years now.

And your worthy husband? In good health.

Excellent. Oh, I'm so glad you came.

I am in grievous need of your help, Vanoza.

May I rely upon it?

As your holiness commands.

Ah, how sounds perplexed, my heart.

I'm torn between indulgence and severity.

Juan.

Juan, for example.

He wishes me to hang a poor wretch who insulted him, he says.

And Cesare.

They go to Naples together.

And their hostile natures could...

Why not, sir?

Ask them to sup with you.

Persuade them to travel as friends and loving brothers.

He could betray me to my brother.

Not while he fears I'd slit his throat.

Space trade, the traffic's in fear.

Among princes, that's called government.

Prince can rule by good or evil actions.

I know that he is equally hated for both.

Your return was too slow, my lord.

I could have finished you had I wished.

If he's equally hated for both, then the prince can choose that action which

profits him foremost. True.

You plead your own cause.

Better, my lord, but the wrist was too weak.

The threat of death may serve as well as the deed itself.

Not so, my lord.

Dead men cannot think of revenge.

Others may.

A powerful prince.

Is that what we're speaking of?

Our poor prince knows that grieving hymnsmen will soon forget their dead

than lose his favor.

Ah! Now you have it now!

If I was the object of another's hatred...

I'd hope that honor obliged him to tell me he sought my life. No, my lord.

You're obliged to believe it possible without being told.

If I say... If I say to a man, pray lend me your sword.

And he does so without asking me what I intend.

He's given me leave to do whatever I will with it.

He cannot cry dishonor when I parted through his body.

You're a student of statecraft, Michelotto.

My employment depends on it.

With such princely power of a knife and noose, would you kill a man for spite?

No, my lord.

No honest man should do that.

There he was, 40 feet above me at the end of a road.

Fighting the tongue to call me bastard.

Does it take long to die?

Treasury, to hang and die?

As long as vengeance may desire. Or the hangman's skill may comprise.

Did his eyes come out like grapes on a stool? Suffering. Suffering.

Have compassion for the poor man. Suffering. Quiet, Mother. Hold your

you pimply whelp. Ask your mother's pardon. Treasury, let it pass.

Has been more wine. Did they want? And may we speak of other things?

They're Ronnie's cheeks looking down at us.

In envy, no doubt, of so noble a man.

Who's so rich and lovely? So fine a cake. So gay a... So long a sword. So

horse. And so splendid a saddle.

It's your gift to surprise me, brother. Oh, an impulse.

You do nothing by impulse.

We are Borgias.

Touch one, touch all. In the same breath, that man who calls you bastard

us all.

I know what you think.

You think I should have challenged him and killed him myself?

I told you it was impossible.

He's involved you in his scheming. There has been no scheming.

I asked you here at your father's command to persuade you both to travel

Naples in friendship.

If you cannot do that, there can be no luck for you in this house.

Then I'll leave.

Do not turn your back on me. Brother.

Are you afraid to face me, brother?

To have no love for you would be unnatural.

Well, you've shown little evidence of it. I don't deny my heart has been

poisoned with envy.

Well, now that's gone.

By what miracle?

This lady's love for us both.

Was any father ever cursed with such unruly sons?

Juan, His Holiness has ordered Cesare to love and cherish you.

Not for the first time. To my bitter shame.

I want some more wine. Victor!

Juan, take your brother's hand.

He laughed at my wounds. I was jealous of them. May God forgive him.

He opposed my generalship and mocked my campaign against the Orsinians. If I

thought, if I thought that by holding it, I would gain one -tenth of your

skill in war, I'd say, brother, lend me your sword.

My son.

My heart is full of love for you both.

Take his hand, one.

Your

lady

will be there.

My word upon him. An expectant. Panting with desire, my lord.

Later still if you delay me.

It's dangerous to ride alone.

Take my groom.

That rogue behind him looks sturdy enough.

My own groom meets me in the Fiat Giudea with my night armour.

How? From many wounds, Your Holiness.

They found your brother's groom in the Piazza Giudea.

Dead? Dying, Your Eminence.

But now dead.

His book?

No, Your Eminence.

Cheater. It's nothing.

Juan has absented himself before.

A day and a night?

Even so.

Your Holiness, the man is known to be a great liar.

But he's been put to examination and swears he saw two men carrying the body

of... An old woodseller, Your Eminence.

Amen.

He said no more?

No more, Your Eminence.

All is in order, Your Eminence. Does Your Eminence wish to see the hourbook?

saw their faces.

That is so, Eminence, but has not yet described it. Turn the wheel again. Oh,

Eminence, there is a science in these matters.

One more turn would kill him now.

Tomorrow, Eminence. Hold your tongue, you chattering magpie.

Old man.

Hear me!

Would you know those men?

If you saw them again.

Turn the wheel.

Loosen his obstinate tongue.

Eminence has killed the poor man.

Who knows? It's the force today.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Don't do that.

Your loneliness has grieved enough.

Three days are enough of this.

Where is Abel, my brother?

Where is Rodrigo Borgia, my father?

The voice of my brother's blood cries unto me from the ground.

That night, we embraced in love and left our

mother's house in friendship.

I took my grief.

In friendship, Tristan.

I swear it.

As your Pope.

If I had ten people here, I will give them all to bring him back.

He's with God.

And I, with you, fear nothing. You are Pope.

I am your son.

Together, we may straddle the world.