DELLA ROVERE

Thus, the della Rovere family brings even more clout and significance to the Chigi family.

Pope Julius II della Rovere (1508-1513) was, without a doubt, the greatest Pope of the High Renaissance. He distinguished himself as a patron of the arts and his vision was to rebuild Rome to the likeness of the Caesars. Pope Alessandro Chigi VII, prior to becoming pope was as a cardinal and a close advisor to Julius II, and for this reason was allowed to add the oak tree to his family stemma. He then had the privilege to ‘sign’ his buildings with his family seal crossed with the della Rovere crest or a hybrid stemma.  

Mixing and matching or, hybrids like this can be found with many of the stemmi transforming and adding more pictorial language to their family seals. Favors, marriage, and bribery prevail in this process of transformation. In fact, thinking back to the Medici, Pope Pius IV Medici is not a Medici at all, but he was granted the right to adopt their family seal (the six palle or balls) as his stemma. These hybrid stemmi are not so difficult to decode once you become familiar with the pure family heraldry. Mix and match if you will and refer to the Papal Chart at the beginning of this essay.