- published: 01 Jan 2016
- views: 27
The Colonna family is an Italian noble family. It was powerful in medieval and Renaissance Rome, supplying one Pope and many other Church and political leaders. The family is notable for its bitter feud with the Orsini family over influence in Rome, until it was stopped by Papal Bull in 1511. In 1571, the heads of both families married nieces of Pope Sixtus V. Thereafter, historians recorded that "no peace had been concluded between the princes of Christendom, in which they had not been included by name".
According to tradition, the Colonna are a branch of the Counts of Tusculum — by Peter (1099–1151) son of Gregory III, called Peter "de Columna" from his property, the Columna Castle, in Colonna, Alban Hills.
Though they claimed to descend from a branch of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, no actual genealogical connection between Caesar's family and the Counts of Tusculum have ever been found.
The first cardinal from the family was appointed in 1206 when Giovanni Colonna di Carbognano was made Cardinal Deacon of SS. Cosma e Damiano. For many years, cardinal Giovanni di San Paolo (elevated in 1193) was identified as member of the Colonna family and therefore its first representative in the College of Cardinals, but modern scholars have established that this was based on the false information from the beginning of 16th century.