Pietro Mazzarini

Who was Pietro Mazzarini?

Pietro Mazzarini was an Italian courtier and the father of Cardinal Jules Mazarin.

Mazzarini's father, Giulio Mazzarini, was a Sicilian craftsman who was successful enough to educate his sons. Mazzarini excelled in school and became a notary. After his father's death, Mazzarini traveled to Rome and found employment in the household of Filippo I Colonna, the grand Constable of Naples. Colonna encouraged Mazzarini to marry his goddaughter, Ortensia Buffalini, a woman of a noble family of Città di Castello in Umbria with an ample dowry. They married and had six children.

Both of Mazzarini's sons entered the church; Jules as a Cardinal and advisor to French kings, and Michele as archbishop of Aix-en-Provence. Mazzarini also had four daughters, including Laura and Girolama, the mothers of the Mazarinettes.