1 Fiorino di Camera - Alexander VI

Alexander VI — Rodrigo Borgia — secured his election in August 1492 through what contemporaries and most subsequent historians regard as straightforward bribery of the College of Cardinals. The Fiorino di Camera was the Apostolic Camera's principal gold denomination, used for high-value ecclesiastical transactions, benefice payments, and the kind of financial dealings that made the Borgia papacy notorious. His eleven-year pontificate coincided with the Italian Wars, the Treaty of Tordesillas, and the political maneuvering of Cesare Borgia in the Romagna — all of which ran substantially on papal gold.