With all apologies to all the great Uncle Bobs out there, growing up in my family we did not talk about “Uncle Bob.”  In fact I think I was 12 before I knew I had an Uncle Bob. His story, a sad one indeed, is for another time. But what made me think of those hidden family stories was today’s “Word of the Day” from Merriam Webster: nepotism.Pope Sixtus IV was born born Francesco della Rovere (c.1414 AD)  into a modest town near Savona, Italy, he is best remembered as the pope for whom the Sistine Chapel is named. He entered the Franciscans in his 20s, was Minister General of the Order at age 50, and was noted for his lack of concern for worldly things and had even written learned treatises entitled On the Blood of Christ and On the Power of God. At age 53 he was appointed Cardinal because of his reputation for sanctity. Four years later when Pope Paul II unexpectedly died at age 54, Cardinal Rovere was elected pope (1471 AD), largely via the backroom machinations of Cardinal Borgia (later Alexander VI). If you are known by the company you keep, people wondered what would be known about this new pope. 

For one he was a family man. Sixtus took nepotism to a new art form using all the power at his disposal to enrich his relatives with high office, papal territories, and exceptional marriages to titled lands. The first two appointments was the designation of two nephews as Cardinals – he later elevated four other nephews to the “red hat.” Another relative was Prefect of Rome; others were governors of Papal States.  And that was just the start of his practice of nepotism. I think he was the last Franciscan to be elected pope.  He is our “Uncle Bob.”

English speakers have kept nepotism in the family since the late 1600s, having adopted it from the French, who were inspired by Gregorio Leti’s 1667 book Il nipotismo di Roma (English title: The History of the Popes’ Nephews).