[Footnote 196:  Francesco Cenci e la sua Famiglia.  Per A. Bertolotti, Firenze, 1877.]

Francesco Cenci disbursed a sum of 33,000 crowns to various public offices, in order to be allowed to enter unmolested into the enjoyment of his father’s gains:  3,800 crowns of this sum went to the Chapter of S. Peter’s.[197] He showed a certain precocity; for at the age of fourteen he owned an illegitimate child, and was accused of violence to domestics.  In 1563 his family married him to Ersilia, a daughter of the noble Santa Croce house, who brought him a fair dowry.  Francesco lived for twenty-one years with this lady, by whom he had twelve children.  Upon her death he remained a widower for nine years, and in 1593 he married Lucrezia Petroni, widow of a Roman called Velli.  Francesco’s conduct during his first marriage was not without blame.  Twice, at least, he had to pay fines for acts of brutality to servants; and once he was prosecuted for an attempt to murder a cousin, also named Francesco Cenci.  On another occasion we find him outlawed from the States of the Church.  Yet these offences were but peccadilloes in a wealthy Roman baron; and Francesco used to boast that, with money in his purse, he had no dread of justice.  After the death of his wife Ersilia, his behavior grew more irregular.  Three times between 1591 and 1594 he was sued for violent attacks on servants; and in February of the latter year he remained six months in prison on multiplied charges of unnatural vice.  There was nothing even here to single Francesco Cenci out from other nobles of his age.[198] Scarcely a week passed in Rome without some affair of the sort involving outrage, being brought before the judges.  Cardinals, prelates, princes, professional men and people of the lowest rank were alike implicated.  The only difference between the culprits was that the rich bought themselves off, while the destitute were burned.  Eleven poor Spaniards and Portuguese were sent to the stake in 1578 for an offence which Francesco Cenci compounded in 1594 by the payment of 100,000 crowns.  After this warning and the loss of so much money, he grew more circumspect, married his second wife Lucrezia, and settled down to rule his family.  His sons caused him considerable anxiety.  Giacomo, the eldest, married against his father’s will, and supported himself by forging obligations and raising money.  Francesco’s displeasure showed itself in several lawsuits, one of which accused Giacomo of having plotted against his life.  The second son, Cristoforo, was assassinated by Paolo Bruno, a Corsican, in the prosecution of a love affair with the wife of a Trasteverine fisherman.  The third son, Rocco, spent his time in street adventures, and on one occasion laid his hands on all the plate and portable property that he could carry off from his father’s house.  This young ruffian, less than twenty years of age, found a devoted friend in Monsignore Querro, a cousin of the family well placed at court, who assisted him in the burglary of the Cenci palace.  Rocco was killed by Amilcare Orsini, a bastard of the Count of Pitigliano, in a brawl at night.  The young men met, Cenci attended by three armed servants, Orsini by two.  A single pass of rapiers, in which Rocco was pierced through the right eye, ended the affair.