Francesco Cenci in the year 1562 succeeded to the very considerable fortune amassed by his father, Monsignor Cristoforo Cenci, who had been papal treasurer in the reign of Pius V. He was not in priest’s orders, although a canon of St. Peter’s, and he had married one Beatrice Arias, who had already borne him this only son. Francesco in early youth gave signs of a vicious disposition. When only eleven years of age he had been tried for murderous assault and had been guilty of many other crimes. He was a tall, stalwart, overbearing person, both hated and feared within his own house and beyond it. He constantly oppressed his servants, who sued him in the courts. He ill-used his wife abominably, and she died early after bearing twelve children, only seven of whom survived. Five popes had come to the pontificate between Pius V and Clement VIII, in whose reign the celebrated case of the Cenci occurred. In 1593 Francesco Cenci took a second wife, by name Lucrezia Petroni, a woman of great piety, with whom he led a tempestuous life. He was a wicked and neglectful father whose family led a wretched existence, ever the prey of his unbridled passions. He pursued his eldest daughter with his ignoble attentions, but she successfully repulsed him and appealed for protection to the pope, who rescued her from her father’s violence and gave her in marriage to a gentleman of Gubbio, with a suitable dower extorted from her father. The atrocious Francesco showed ever increasing animosity toward his children, who, although full grown, he detained as close prisoners in the Cenci palace, while he transferred his attentions to Beatrice, his youngest daughter, now a maiden of eighteen, possessing many attractions, and whose beautiful face is familiar to all the world from the well known portrait by Guido still preserved in the Barberini Palace. Poor Beatrice suffered many barbarities at her inhuman father’s hands. Fearing that she would appeal, like her sister, to the pope, he kept her constantly locked up and frequently beat her. With the connivance of her stepmother, she contrived to send a petition to the pope, but the holy father declined to be friendly. About this time a young priest, Guido Guerra, who had not as yet taken the vows, fell in love with Beatrice and she returned his affection, but Francesco Cenci altogether disapproved of the attachment and drove Guido Guerra away, furiously threatening to kill him if he dared to reopen communications with the family. Guerra after this tried to carry Beatrice off, but failed and further exasperated her father, who now abruptly left Rome, removing with his family to the castle of Petrella, a remote mountain stronghold near Aquila, on the frontier of the Neapolitan states, where he held Beatrice a close prisoner in a dark dungeon. But the measure of his iniquities was nearly full, and dire retribution was at hand.