mistress of the vatican.pdf - End Time Deception

Mistress of the Vatican
from two floors of the old Teofili palace, each consisting of several
rooms, to create one imposing chamber measuring some fifty by twentyfive
feet, with twenty-five-foot ceilings. The new palace, though a great
improvement over the old, was still not quite up to cardinalatial standards.
The architect designed a false door at the end of the waiting
room so visitors believed the house extended beyond it. It didn’t. Beyond
the door was the de Rossi house.
Nor could the new house hold all the horses and carriages required
for a cardinal. Records show that from 1639 to 1644 Olimpia paid the
monthly rent for nearby stalls and a carriage-storage area at the request
of her brother-in-law. Though Gianbattista was now wealthier than he
ever had been, he was not one of the richest cardinals. He was, in fact,
on the pope’s list of “poor cardinals,” those beneath a certain income
level who received an honorarium to help them maintain the requisite
princely lifestyle. While some cardinals had a staff of two hundred servants,
Gianbattista employed only twenty-five. Records show that Pamphilio
and Olimpia had another fifteen servants between the two of
them.
In the extended palace the Pamphilis continued to rent out shops on
the ground floor. Architectural sketches show room for sixteen shops,
though some tenants might have rented two adjoining rooms. Tenants
included a fruit seller, a flax vendor, a leather-goods store, a restaurant,
a lute maker, a grocer, a barber, and a tailor.
As a cardinal, Gianbattista now trumped his brother in position and
was given the best suite of rooms, facing the Piazza Navona. Olimpia
moved to the back corner of the house, overlooking Pasquino. Pamphilio’s
suite was at the rear of the house, overlooking the narrow Via
dell’Anima. Olimpia’s rooms had inner doors opening onto the suites of
her husband on the one side and her brother-in-law on the other.
With her larger palace, Olimpia was now in a position to hold musical
events for Rome’s rich and powerful. If science was on the decline in the
1630s, theater and opera were on the upswing. The church limited theatrical
performances to the anything-goes period of Carnival each February,
but many nobles, including Olimpia, spent months preparing for
their shows. They held amateur performances in their palaces, writing
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