Beschreibung:

CARAFA, Carlo (1517-1561), Cardinal. Illuminated letters patent issued as cardinal and vicar general during the papacy of Paul IV, a grant of title as count of the Sacred Palace of Lateran to Giovanni Battista Agucchi, n.p., incompletely dated, 1556/57. In Latin. 18 lines in gold, blue and black ink on vellum, 460 x 740mm (lacking seal, a few small punctures at folds, somewhat creased and rubbed). An illuminated grant by a notorious 'cardinal nephew'. Carlo Carafa was created cardinal on the accession to the papacy of his uncle, Paul IV, having previously enjoyed a colourful career as a mercenary soldier in Italy and Germany. His morals do not seem to have reformed upon his appointment as his uncle's chief political advisor, and at the conclusion of the disastrous war against Philip II of Spain he was publicly disgraced in January 1559 and exiled from Rome. Along with a number of Carafa relatives, Carlo was arrested in January 1560 by Paul's successor, Pius IV, and he was executed in the following year on charges including murder, sodomy and the promotion of Protestantism. The recipient of the grant was a member of a prominent Bolognese noble family: the terms of his creation as count of the Sacred Palace rather surprisingly include the legitimisation of any 'bastard, spurious, natural [or] incestuous' children. The border containing grotteschi perhaps draws inspiration from one of the early instances of grotteschi motifs used as decorative elements by Filippino Lippi in the Carafa chapel in Sant Maria Sopra Minerva in Rome, influenced by the recently rediscovered Domus Aurea.