great houses rise and fall swiftly, the Borgias have been used as a canvas for exaggeration, and many chroniclers are biased, so the narrative will weigh testimony and strip away calumny. The story then begins in 1455, amid the shock of Constantinople’s fall and the influx of Greek learning into Italy, contrasting Nicholas V’s cultural flowering with Rome’s alarm at the Turkish threat. Rolfe details the conclave after Nicholas’s death: factions led by Colonna and Orsini, the near-choice of Bessarion, and the compromise election of the Spanish canonist Alonso de Borja as Calixtus III. A concise genealogy introduces the Borja roots in Valencia, explains contemporary norms about legitimacy, and sketches Alonso’s service to King Alfonso of Aragon and his diplomatic skill in ending schisms. The narrative dramatizes Calixtus’s coronation and the Orsini-led riot at the Lateran, then portrays him as austere, legally minded, and focused on a crusade rather than arts—refuting the tale that he dispersed the Vatican library and illustrating his patronage through the Lorenzo Valla episode. It closes with his firm handling of Emperor Frederick’s envoys and his public vow to wage relentless war against the Turks. (This is an automatically generated summary.)