History's Worst F*ckboys: Raphael

Summary

Podcast Summary

Betwixt The Sheets: The History of Sex, Scandal & Society

Episode: History's Worst F*ckboys: Raphael

Host: Kate Lister | Guest: Professor Jill Burke

Date: September 9, 2025

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Overview

In this lively episode, sex historian Kate Lister continues her miniseries on “history’s worst f*ckboys,” turning her sights on Renaissance painter Raphael. Joined by Renaissance expert Professor Jill Burke, author of "How to Be a Renaissance Woman," the conversation explores Raphael’s life, reputation, and whether he truly deserves his legendary womanizing status—or if he’s been unfairly maligned by history and salacious rumor.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

Introducing Raphael: The Renaissance "F*ckboy"? (03:43–07:10)

• Kate opens with playful skepticism: “If I met someone today called Raphael, my first thought would be f*ckboy. I wouldn't even need him to speak. I'd just be like, oh, I bet you write poetry. And I bet you go to India to find yourself.” (05:11)
• Professor Jill Burke admits to a “soft spot” for Raphael, describing him as “notoriously charming” compared to grumpy Michelangelo and mysterious Leonardo. (06:07)
• The episode defines “f*ckboy” via Urban Dictionary: a boy who plays with girls’ feelings for sex or personal gain. (06:48)

Raphael’s Origins & Artistic Brilliance (07:27–10:13)

• From a painter family in Urbino (“nepo baby,” jokes Kate), Raphael quickly became a prodigy, training under Perugino, moving to Florence at 21, and absorbing techniques from Michelangelo and Leonardo. (07:38–08:57)
• By 1508, Raphael was in Rome painting the Vatican Stanze for Pope Julius II, achieving widespread fame before dying young at 37. (09:00–10:08)

Renaissance Rivalries: Michelangelo vs. Raphael (10:13–12:58)

• Michelangelo “really hated” Raphael, largely out of professional jealousy, going so far as to write “sarky” letters to the pope and compare Raphael's apprentices to “capons (castrated chickens).” (10:25–11:08)
• Raphael copied elements from Michelangelo and Leonardo but innovated and personalized his style, which both annoyed and impressed peers. (11:33–12:38)

Raphael’s Reputation: Where’s the Womanizing Evidence? (12:58–15:23)

• The evidence for Raphael as a notorious womanizer is thin. Vasari suggests he died young “partly because he exhausted himself through having too many lovers,” rooted in Renaissance medical superstition. (13:13–14:19)
• Renaissance medicine believed too much sex "weakened the constitution.” Kate quips: “You can't die from too much sex, can you?” Jill explains the old beliefs regarding “evacuation.” (13:29–14:00)

The Roman Sex Culture & Courtesans (15:23–18:08)

• Rome in Raphael’s time was teeming with “single men in holy orders” and a flourishing population of sex workers (possibly 10% of the city’s population). (15:23–15:38)
• The rise of the "courtesan" in Italian culture, especially under the scandal-laden Borgia papacy. (15:54–16:04)
• Raphael was reputedly acquainted with famed courtesans, notably Imperia, for whom he allegedly painted a nude portrait displayed on her house. (16:04–17:04)
  • Kate’s astonished reaction: “That’s a hell of a move, isn’t it? Here are my tits. Behold.” (17:15–17:18)

Inventing the Female Nude: Raphael’s Artistic Legacy (18:08–19:16)

• While male nudes dominated Renaissance art, Raphael and Titian revolutionized the female nude as an artistic genre, using live female models. (18:08)
• Raphael’s workshop environment, its sexual atmosphere, and the production of “the first printed porn”—a series of erotic drawings/prints called "The Positions," ultimately banned by the Pope. (19:16–20:25)

Life Models: Professionalism or Predation? (21:09–22:52)

• Kate, reflecting on her experience as a life model, asks about power and consent for female models in Raphael’s workshop—Jill confirms that boundaries and protections were almost nonexistent in the period. (21:09–22:29)
• Evidence exists for payment to women for nude modeling, but also stories (like Cellini's memoirs) highlighting coercion and exploitation. (22:31–22:43)
• Raphael’s most famous reputed model and lover: Margarita Luti, the “Baker’s Daughter.” (22:52)

Margarita Luti and La Fornarina: Reality or Romanticism? (22:52–30:14)

• “La Fornarina,” Raphael’s sensual painting, possibly depicts Margarita Luti, though hard evidence of their relationship is scant and mostly constructed posthumously. (22:56–23:07; 27:09)
  • Kate observes: “Looking at her, he clearly fancied her. She's beautiful and erotic and charged.” (28:58–29:12)
• The portrait features a blue armlet inscribed with “Raphael of Urbino,” which Jill muses could symbolize love or possessiveness: “This is kind of like a mark of ownership.” (23:54)
  • Kate: “If you are with a man and he asks you to wear a bracelet with his name on it, I think that’s a red flag, personally.” (24:26)

Was Raphael Actually Well-Behaved? (30:14–32:24)

• The evidence indicates a respectful, perhaps long-term relationship with his model rather than serial womanizing. “From what we can see, it seems to be. I mean, it's a low bar, but he's being quite respectful.” (30:14–30:28)
• Engagement to another woman (of the Bibiena family) was likely more political than personal and repeatedly delayed. (31:03–31:48)
  • “He was just a bit of a social climber, Raphael. Right. So he's taking advantage of anything he can get in order to secure his role.” (31:03)

Salacious Rome: The Chestnut Game and Papal Parties (32:38–34:46)

• Jill explains the notorious "Chestnut Game" of 1501 at the Vatican, where courtesans crawled naked to collect chestnuts, with prizes for “those who knew the greatest number of those prostitutes carnally.” (32:43–33:47)
  • Kate quips: “When I have my friends over, we have pasta.” (33:47)
• The licentious climate of Borgia Rome may have contributed to Raphael's posthumous reputation, but direct evidence is sparse. (34:11–34:46)

Raphael’s Death & Legacy (34:46–36:38)

• The cause of Raphael’s death is unknown (speculated from disease to overwork), but his passing was mourned with a grand funeral fitting for a “massive loss to Rome.” (34:47–35:53)
• Jill’s verdict: “Raphael is great. He's a really good painter... a little bit underappreciated nowadays, I think.” (36:00–36:24)
  • Kate: “I think I probably would have shagged him if I was around at the time, honestly. Without a doubt.” (36:24)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Kate Lister (on Renaissance feuds):
  “Like a bitchy old queen, isn’t he, quite frankly. Really?” (11:08)
  On Michelangelo’s jealousy.
• Professor Jill Burke (on artistic rivalry):
  “Raphael was a bit of an intellectual magpie... he’d take whatever he thought was best, which at that time was Leonardo da Vinci, was Michelangelo, and he’d kind of incorporate it into his own style.” (11:58)
• Kate Lister (on the lack of evidence):
  “Why does he have his reputation then as this absolute dog with two dicks running around Italy, can't get enough of it? Because from what you’re saying, he sounds reasonably well behaved.” (32:24)
• Professor Jill Burke (on the licentious Vatican):
  “The Pope was watching people have sex with prostitutes and giving prizes.” (34:04)
• Kate Lister (on the verdict):
  “I think we're going to have to let Raphael off the hook. I do.” (36:00)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Show Theme & Introduction to Raphael: 03:43–06:48
• Raphael’s Origin Story & Early Career: 07:27–10:13
• Renaissance Rivalries: 10:13–12:58
• Debunking the F*ckboy Reputation (Vasari & Roman Sexual Culture): 13:05–15:23
• Courtesans, Female Nudes, and Artistic Legacy: 15:23–21:09
• The La Fornarina Mystery: 22:52–24:39
• Examining Raphael’s Relationships: 30:14–32:24
• The Chestnut Game Party: 32:38–34:46
• Raphael’s Death & Final Verdict: 34:46–36:38

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Overall Verdict

This episode strips back the myth of Raphael as an insatiable Renaissance Lothario, presenting a nuanced portrait of the artist. Despite tales of “excessive lovers” and steamy Roman society, historian Jill Burke finds little compelling evidence to brand Raphael as a “f*ckboy”—instead, he emerges as innovative, charming, maybe a touch romantic, but “well-behaved” by the wild standards of his milieu.

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Further Resources

• Professor Jill Burke: University of Edinburgh faculty page; "How To Be a Renaissance Woman"
• Artworks Discussed: “La Fornarina,” “Donna Velata,” Vatican Stanze

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For more playful, insightful looks at the sex lives of history’s scandalous figures, subscribe to “Betwixt the Sheets.” Next up: Alexander the Great, and then Nero!

Transcript

[Kate Lister]

Hello everyone, it's me, your host, Kate Lister. I'm just jumping in before the episode to ask you for a little favor. If you are enjoying betwixt, and I hope that you are, we'd love it if you could vote for us for the Listeners Choice Awards at the British Podcast Awards. If you follow the link in the show notes, it should take you to the place you need to go and it would mean the world to us. We were shortlisted last year and the one before that and the one before that. We were so close and it just made us want it even more. I think we can do it this year. Right on with the show.

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[Kate Lister]

Hello my lovely betwixters. It's me, Kate Lister. You are listening to Betwixter sheets and thank you you are quite frankly, because without you this is just nothing at all. But before we can go any further together, I do have to tell you once again and I will tell you from now until the time that we are cancelled. This is an adult podcast spoken by adults, other adults about adulty things in an adult awake of ring a range lot subjects. And you should be an adult too. We call that the fair dudes warning because if you keep listening you happen to get upset. Well, fair dues, we did tell you. Right on with the show. It's the early 16th century in Roman. I have just snuck my way into Raphael's workshop while everyone's out for lunch to see if I can find any clues about the naughty goings on that I have Heard. Go on. Here, let's see. Hmm. Hmm. Searching amongst the easels and boxes of paints. What do we have? A few nude sketches. Well, that's not too bad, I suppose. I can certainly see why Michelangelo had a bee in his bonnet about this. Raphael is talented, but still, I'm looking for something saucier. And I heard a rumor about a local baker's daughter who apparently Raphael has been having his wicked way with. If the rumors are to be believed, she was just one of many. So we're gonna have to dig a little bit deeper if we want to find out if Raphael really was a Renaissance fuckboy. But let's get out of here before they come back. What are you a funny man?

[Professor Jill Burke]

Oh, money.

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[Professor Jill Burke]

An adult speaks to you. I make perfect copies of whatever my boss needs by just turning a knob and pushing a But now era. Now, yes, social courtesy does make a difference.

[Kate Lister]

Goodness, what a beautiful diamond.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Goodness had nothing to do with it.

[Kate Lister]

Deari. Hello and welcome back to Betwixt the Sheets, History of Sex Scandal in society with me, Kate Lister. If you listened last week, you will know that Hurrah. Our miniseries on history's worst fuckboys is back, and we kicked it off by looking at Top Shagga Charles ii. And this week we have esteemed Renaissance artist Raphael. And we're gonna find out how he measures up. And joining me today is none other than the marvelous Professor Jill Burke, author of how to Be a Renaissance Woman. And she's gonna take us back to the 16th century to see if this man lived up to his reputation. And whilst I have you, you know that I have to ask this of you, so do forgive me, but please, please, please, would you vote for us for the Listeners Choice Award at this British podcast Awards? We're actually in the top 10 now. We're in the top 10. We could actually take this. I don't even want to get my hopes up. I don't think I can cope with the pressure. But my fate is in your hands, dear Lister. Right, the link is in the show notes for this episode. It takes two seconds about the amount of time that a boy would have with you. So if you could do it, I will love you forever. Now that sounds like a boy line. Right, let's get back to Raphael. Hello and welcome. Welcome back to Betwixt the Sheets. It's only Jill Burke. How are you doing?

[Professor Jill Burke]

I am so well and so happy to be here. Thank God you are, I know, inviting me back.

[Kate Lister]

I had so much fun talking to you about pubic hair and about Renaissance beauty standards, though.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah, I mean, we might get some pubic hair in this.

[Kate Lister]

We might get some pubic hair.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah. It's always a possibility.

[Kate Lister]

Let's see where we go with this, because this is another installment in our little mini series on history's worst fuckboys. And today we're looking at Raphael before we even get onto him. It occurred to me that if I met someone today called Raphael, my first thought would be Fuckboy. I wouldn't even need him to speak. I'd just be like, oh, I bet you write poetry. And I bet you go to India to find yourself. And I bet you pretend to read Simone de Beauvoir, don't you? That's.

[Professor Jill Burke]

I think there's a lot to say. I don't know. I quite like Raphael.

[Kate Lister]

It's a good name, isn't it?

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah, I mean, Raphael today it feels like someone who would be a bit.

[Kate Lister]

Like, oh, you know, hi, I'm Raphael.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Hi. Reads poetry on the tube. Really?

[Kate Lister]

Like, yes. I like to think of myself as a feminist. That's what I said. But the real Raphael, do you have a bit of a soft spot for him? Because my producer, Stu has got a bit of a soft spot for him. We were just talking before this and went, I think he's quite nice, Kate. So I don't know how this one's gonna go.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah, he was lovely. He's lovely. I mean, he was notoriously in the Renaissance. People thought of him as someone who was a bit of a shagger, that he was kind of distracted by women, but he was just really charming. People liked to be around him, you know, compared to, like the other Renaissance big boys like Leonardo and Michelangelo. I mean, Leonardo was very difficult to pin down. And he was kind of charming in his own way, but never finished anything. Was really frustrating. Michelangelo was just this incredibly grumpy, sarcastic, scary person. And you get the sense that Raphael was just utterly charming. He was really lovely.

[Kate Lister]

They always are, though, Jill. That's the problem. So let me give you a definition, because Fuckboy is not in the Oxford English Dictionary. I checked. So they need to update their terms, quite frankly. So we're gonna have to use Urban Dictionary. And they have got it. As a boy who plays with girls feelings and doesn't really like them and would say anything a girl wanted to hear in order to have sex with her or to get something from her. So that's our definition.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Well, I mean, he could be in that crowd of fuckboys, I suppose he was betrothed to someone for a very long time. So he never got married to her. And he was betrothed to her just because it was like politically expedient. So maybe, maybe, maybe before we even.

[Kate Lister]

Get to his betrothal, I want to hear a bit of an origin story about Raphael, because I honestly don't know very much about him. He just seems to have leapt fully formed onto the Renaissance stage with a paintbrush. But where did he come from?

[Professor Jill Burke]

So he was from Urbino, which was a court town, really kind of sophisticated town court culture in northern Italy. His dad was a painter.

[Kate Lister]

Nepo baby.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah, exactly. And he was one of these annoyingly kind of prodigious youths. He was like really good from a very early age, which is unnecessary, but he was. And he worked with an artist called Perugino. He does really sweet looking Madonna. He's this really charming painter. And he really painted a lot like Perugino in his youth. And then after he'd done his training and everything and done some really great paintings in vino, he moved to Florence in 1504. And this was a time when Florence was like the place if you wanted to be a painter. Michelangelo was there, Leonardo da Vinci was there. They were painting up a storm and Raphael went and he just was looking at all these sculptures and all these paintings by all these amazing Florentine artists. And he basically just absorbed everything he knew. And by the time he left Florence four years later, he was really started to be famous all over Italy. And he could basically mimic the style of Michelanger, took in those styles, he took in everything he thought was good. And then in 1508, he moved to Rome to paint a series of rooms in the Vatican, known often by the Italian name the Vatican Stanza or Pope Julius ii.

[Kate Lister]

How old was he then when he was doing this?

[Professor Jill Burke]

I'm gonna have to do maths now.

[Kate Lister]

Okay, sorry, sorry.

[Professor Jill Burke]

He was in his 20s.

[Kate Lister]

Jesus though, like, that's impressive.

[Professor Jill Burke]

He's a massively impressive person. Raphael. He really was interested in how you communicate stories in these rooms. And so he was really good at kind of telling the narrative history of things. Like the School of Athens, for example, which is a story about philosophy. It's a representation of philosophy which shows Plato and Aristotle at the centre and various philosophers arranged about them. And it's a really beautiful way of expressing ideas and the way that people communicate. And he did that all the way through the Vaticanza with a lot of different stories. And he became incredibly popular. And because of that, he ran a big workshop which seemed to be really happy working together. This is another reason why he actually seems to be quite a nice guy. He works closely with his pupils, Giulio Romano and Marcantonio Raimondi. He prints a lot of his work. And so he starts to become famous well beyond Italy, around Europe. And then he stays in Rome doing all this work, Very, very busy. And then he dies very young. So he dies in 1520, when he's only 37 years old.

[Kate Lister]

Whoa. I thought he got to be older than that.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Nope. No.

[Kate Lister]

As a Renaissance scholar, do you not ever think that it's so bizarre that Michelangelo, Raphael, and Leonardo da Vinci were all knocking around at the same time in the same city?

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And Michelangelo particularly really hated Raphael.

[Kate Lister]

Oh, did he? Give me the gas. Give me the gas. Why did he hate him?

[Professor Jill Burke]

Because he was really good at painting.

[Kate Lister]

That'll do it. So it's professional jealousy.

[Professor Jill Burke]

What can you take? So Michelangelo was a really difficult person. And after Raphael died, he was still painting these rooms in the Vatican when he died. And there was a room called the Room of Constantine that was up for grabs, really. And Michelangelo wanted to get his friend Sebastiano del Piomba to paint it. And he wrote to the Pope and he wrote a really sarky letter saying that. Basically comparing them to capons, which are like castrated chickens, the Raphael boys, and saying they're not like proper boys.

[Kate Lister]

Like a bitchy old queen, isn't he, Quite frankly. Really?

[Professor Jill Burke]

Absolutely. The Pope at that time, one of the Medici popes, says, you know, Raphael just copied everything from you. Michelangelo, don't worry about it. We know you're the better artist. But then at the same time, kind of shuffled Michelangelo off to Florence so he didn't have to deal with him anymore. It was a real tricky character.

[Kate Lister]

Is there any truth in that? That he copied some of Michelangelo's work, or was that just being said to just soothe a damaged ego?

[Professor Jill Burke]

He directly copied Michelangelo's work. Yeah. So, I mean, he copied it into drawings, but then kind of assimilated it into his own style. He went into the Sistine Chapel before he was finished and drew after figures in the Sistine Chapel ceiling that Michelanger was doing. That's 1508-12.

[Kate Lister]

See, that would piss me off. Would that piss you off if you were doing these amazing paintings and this just young kid comes along and starts just ripping off your work? Was that the done thing?

[Professor Jill Burke]

It was a done thing within workshops to copy, you know, to work in a workshop style. But Raphael was a bit of a kind of intellectual magpie. And so you take whatever he thought was best, which at that time was Leonardo da Vinci, was Michelangelo, and he'd kind of incorporate it into his own style. And I can totally see if it was like Aldi. Yeah, like Aldi. Yeah, exactly. Here's the Aldi Renaissance art. But what really annoyed Michelangelo is that he managed to incorporate this but still make it his own and still be really, really good.

[Kate Lister]

Yeah, it's much worse, isn't it, that he is copying him, but he's actually using his work and making it better. That's even more irritating.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah, it's really irritating. And he also just had the court thing down pat. He was charming, he got on well with people, he joked with people. Everyone liked him being around. So he was young, charming and talented. So you can see why people didn't like him.

[Kate Lister]

So then why has my producer suggested Raphael for this series? Because he sounds utterly delightful so far.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Well, he did do quite a lot of shagging around, probably.

[Kate Lister]

There we go. Okay, let's talk about that.

[Professor Jill Burke]

So Vasari says that the reason he died when he did so young is partly because of overwork, but partly because he exhausted himself through having too many lovers. So there is. Yeah. So it's an excess of sex.

[Kate Lister]

You can't die from too much sex, can you?

[Professor Jill Burke]

Can you think that? I mean. No, let's get that.

[Kate Lister]

No, Bonnie Blue's still going.

[Professor Jill Burke]

He'd be fine. But they used to think that it weakened your constitution. It made you. Having sex in the Renaissance, particularly for men, involved. Involved. Evacuation.

[Kate Lister]

Yeah.

[Professor Jill Burke]

And the more you evacuate, the more heat you lose from the body. So if you have too much sex, it can make you very weak.

[Kate Lister]

Yes. They did think this, didn't they?

[Professor Jill Burke]

They did think this, yes.

[Kate Lister]

Because sperm is so special and magical.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yes. Doctors would advise you not to have too much sex, not to indulge yourself in too much carnal activity, because they really did think it would make you ill. And so Raphael, I mean, Vasavi was writing in 1550. It was published in 1550. So that was 30 years after Raphael's death.

[Kate Lister]

Well, how does he know then?

[Professor Jill Burke]

Gossip. I mean, he knew people. He knew Raphael.

[Kate Lister]

30 years after you've died, people are still going, yeah, top shagger. That's. I mean, like hundreds of years after you've died. Do we know anything about his sex life?

[Professor Jill Burke]

Sex life is really hard to say directly. We do know that it was out of his workshop. So one of the things we might get back to, pubic hair, one of the things that Raphael did do was really Start having a lot of female nude models. So there were a few female naked models, like life models before Raphael. But Raphael moved to Rome. And in the Rome that Raphael moved to, there's a load of people who basically a load of men who are working for the church and want to get advancement, promotion within the church. And that means they cannot get married. Right. Because it's a Catholic church. You can't get married. Like you're not meant to. You can't get married and be in holy orders. That means that Rome is full of single men in the late 15th, early 16th centuries. That also means that Rome is full of sex workers.

[Kate Lister]

Of course it does. Supply and demand.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Supply and demand. So they reckon that there's about 10% of the population are sex workers in Rome.

[Kate Lister]

Wow, that is significant.

[Professor Jill Burke]

I mean, it's difficult to work out. Exactly. But that's the figure that's been suggested.

[Kate Lister]

And certainly even if that's not true, that that would even be suggested tells you that it was very visible and that people were prepared to believe that.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah. And it's in Rome where you first get the word courtesan used in Italian.

[Kate Lister]

Ah, okay.

[Professor Jill Burke]

In the 1490s, because this is the time. 1490s is time of the Borgia papacy and Alessandro Borgia.

[Kate Lister]

They were the naughty ones, right?

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah, they were the naughty ones. I mean, he had children who he had with his mistress, Vanazza Catanei, Lucrezia Borgia, Cesareo Borgia and others. And so it became, in the late 1490s, going into the early 16th century, it became normal for cardinals to have concubines and to have courtesans who come round in the Roman court for them. So these women weren't sex workers who'd work on the street. These were women who would have long term relationships, but in that period of time would have been thought in the same way as prostitutes and who might work in brothels or something. But these were people who would be generally with rich clients. And so Raphael was associated with some of these really famous, the very earliest, really famous courtesans. So there's a courtesan called Imperia who was active in rome in the first decade of the 16th century. And Raphael is meant to have painted her naked. And that painting was on the front of her house.

[Kate Lister]

Like when you said the front of her house, what do you mean? Like her front door?

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah, on the front wall of her house.

[Kate Lister]

Wow.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Ren was really licentious at this point in time.

[Kate Lister]

That's a hell of a move, isn't it? Just here Are my tits. Behold.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah. And there's drawings, really early life drawings of a woman in the guise of Venus. So, you know, starting with that really typical pose with one hand kind of half covering her breast, one hand covering her genitals. And they're probably portraits. And it might be connected to Imperia. It might be connected to this big naked portrait he did of Imperia at this time.

[Kate Lister]

Was it a big deal that he was painting nude women? Because one of the things that I've learned from talking to you is that there was a lot of gayness going around in the Renaissance courts and within the artists. It was a lot of man love. It was a lot of painting men. It was a lot of nude men, nude men painting other nude men. And there was just a lot of bros. Bros, bros. And it just struck me then when you said that Raphael started painting nude women, that that seemed like an unusual thing from what I know about it. Had it been done before?

[Professor Jill Burke]

A little bit. So you have some Florentine artists painting nude women, like Botticelli. So Botticelli's Birth of Venus. Botticelli starts experimenting with female nudes late 1470s, early 1480s. So you get some Florentine workshops doing that. But what Raphael does, it's like this big campaign of female nudes for his fresco series he does for Agostino Chigi. He's this massively wealthy businessman who lives in Rome for a villa that's now called the Villa Farnesina. And Raphael gets a lot of naked models. It's known that he drew after real life women, not kind of workshop boys pretending to be women or classical sculpture. And he really does it for the first time. And him and Titian, who follows up in Venice, and then they together just basically invent the female nude as an important genre in art. This all happens in the 1510s and 20s. And Raphael, in that sexual culture of Rome, where you have the availability of a lot of women who, if you pay them, they'll take their clothes off. It's really important that needed to exist and the whole kind of discussion of sexuality in a different way. Because the other thing that came out of Raphael's workshop and the other thing which will make you think of him as a fuckboy is it's a first printed pawn.

[Kate Lister]

There you go. That'll do it. Okay, tell me about that then. How did we go from frescoes in the Vatican to the first printed porn?

[Professor Jill Burke]

Well, we know that there's a lot of bawdy associations between art and sexuality. Definitely, yeah. So people talk about Your brush, Using your brush. Like, in Italian, it's Penelope. In Italian, the word for penis is penne.

[Kate Lister]

Oh, look at that.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Which can also mean little penis. Right. So there's this connection already. And they say artworks are like the conception of men. And so they start to kind of riff on this. They're also rediscovering all this classical stuff, including brothel tokens that you get from Pompeii as well, I think. You know, these spintriii. And these brothel tokens are like coins that have pictures of people having sex on them. And they have. They're in lots of different positions. And so Giulia Romano, Raphael's people, starts to draw these and to share them, like these drawings, and they're called the Positions. And then after raphael's death in 1524, they get printed. They're really the first kind of selection of porn.

[Kate Lister]

I know that.

[Professor Jill Burke]

I'm sure you know that they were.

[Kate Lister]

Connected to Raphael there.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Raphael's workshop. Yeah. They get quickly banned by the Pope, of course. Of course. You know, the prince get banned and they get destroyed, but it's too late. By the time people have seen them, they've already been copied. They get collected in various places and people sucked out to sell them in Venice, which is outside of the Papal States, so they have license to sell them. Marcantonio Raimondi gets imprisoned for a while because of his involvement. Giulio Romano just. You did the original drawings. Just goes. Goes to Mantua to work in Mantua instead of Rome. But this is all to do with the kind of ethos of Raphael's workshop. While he's there, he's had all these courtesans knocking around. He has these women knocking around. He's drawing after the female nude. And there's no sense then that female nude models aren't sexually available.

[Kate Lister]

Ah, I was just about to ask you about the models. I used to work as a life model, and there are quite clear boundaries in place and quite clear protocols that are followed. And, you know, everybody's just very careful, knows what they're doing. I'm gonna make an assumption that when Raphael was doing his thing, that that might not have been in place, given.

[Professor Jill Burke]

How careful people are generally with women's lives in this period. No, absolutely. I mean, it's really interesting talking to people who have been. And you worked on this quite a lot about nude models, because there was for a long time, amongst some types of art historians, this absolute disbelief that women would pose nude for artists in the 16th century. Because there is a lot of taboos about female nakedness. But women were also often quite impoverished and it was difficult for them to earn money. And if they're young women who are also sex workers, they would do this. And there's records from Venice, from Lorenzo Lotto's notebooks that describe like account records that describe paying women to take their clothes off to be drawn. There's also a sculptor who was in Rome at the same time as Raphael called Cellini, Benvenuto Cellini, who talks about in his diaries about his getting his female servant to pose naked for him and paying her. So it's definitely.

[Kate Lister]

Well, that was some small print.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah. I mean he treats them awfully. He's like, he really likes them. And then he goes, yeah. And then she posts me. And then I had sex with her and then she was really mean to me. She went with someone else. So I got to pose in really uncomfortable positions for hours.

[Kate Lister]

Oh, dick.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah. So it's all a bit of a mess. And Raphael has been connected particularly with one woman who people think was a model for him. And her name was Margarita Luti.

[Kate Lister]

Ah, okay, tell me about Margarita Luti.

[Professor Jill Burke]

So she was a baker's daughter. And it's very complicated the way this story starts. There's a painting by Raphael called La Fornarina.

[Kate Lister]

Yep, very beautiful, very beautiful painting. It's of a warm up, bumps are out. It's quite an erotic painting.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah. I mean definitely it's because she's half dressed. Right. It's not even a new. There's something about her just being in the process of undressing. Yeah.

[Kate Lister]

And she is squeezing a boob. Do you have a bit of like a kind of situation going on? That's not what he wanted to portray, obviously.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah, we're not over reading this painting. So she's naked, almost entirely naked from the waist up. And she's got this kind of diaphanous kind of material staphness veil over her belly and she's holding it up between her breasts and she's got one of her fingers on her breast.

[Kate Lister]

She does. I'm looking at it right now.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah, I'm looking at it now, Pete. And she's kind of looking sideways towards the viewer. She's got dark hair. She's not like a boring, typical Renaissance beauty with blonde hair and curly locks. Golden blonde hair, curly locks. She's got dark hair, she's got a pearl in her hair. She's looking very individualized, which is interesting. And round her arm there's a blue armlet and that says Raphael of Urbino on it. So this is kind of like a mark of ownership.

[Kate Lister]

See, I just would like to say here to any listeners if you are with a man and he asks you to wear a bracelet with his name on it, I think that's a red flag personally to be painted.

[Professor Jill Burke]

This isn't mine.

[Kate Lister]

I'll be back with Jill and Raphael after the short break.

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[Professor Jill Burke]

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[Professor Jill Burke]

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[Kate Lister]

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[Professor Jill Burke]

How did they meet?

[Kate Lister]

If he's this big fancy fancy pants artist and she's working down Gregg's, how does this come about?

[Professor Jill Burke]

Well, you know, we don't know. I was really sorry. I mean the evidence about Margarita Luti is really patchy and it's really uncertain. One of the problems with Raphael is that people really loved him in the late 18th and early 19th century and so they made up a lot of Stuff a lot of art historians were like, oh, yeah, we can know about his life. He loved women. Let's have a look at them. And this whole story is from. There was a tradition that we can only trace back to around the 1790s, calling this painting the Baker's Daughter, La Fornarina. And there was, in the 16th century, someone annotated a copy of Vasari's Life of Raphael, where they've talked about another painting called the Donna Velata, which is another really beautiful portrait of a woman by Raphael and someone right next to that, Margarita. So that's the two bits of primary evidence we have then. People have put this together to find baker's daughter called Margarita, who was around at the same time as Raphael and was the right age. And this is where Margarita Luti's name has come up. We don't know anything else about her or about. I know. Or about her relationship with Raphael. There's no written documentation about it. So it's all a bit patchy. And people like. With many things in these painters kind of believe whatever they want to believe. We've got more evidence about just loads of people being fascinated by sex in Raphael's workshop.

[Kate Lister]

Yes, yes.

[Professor Jill Burke]

And about, you know, things like the Chigis, Agustino Chigis images. And Vasari says about Raphael that he was very amorous. He says he was fond of women and swift to serve them. But I don't think any of this really leads to fuckboy status. It's more like she doesn't really nice man status.

[Kate Lister]

Looking at this portrait, I don't know, I'm extrapolating way too much from this. But looking at her, he clearly fancied her. She's beautiful and erotic and charged and. I don't know, maybe I'm being too hot. I just can't imagine him putting his pen down and just going, see you later then, love.

[Professor Jill Burke]

I really think that Raphael was a decent person. There's another. Right, yeah. So sorry.

[Kate Lister]

You don't have to apologize for that. That's a good thing.

[Professor Jill Burke]

No, I mean, he's particularly within the time. Right, the time period, because this is.

[Kate Lister]

Tell me about his wife, then.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Well, he was never married, so he was associated with this woman. He was betrothed to this other woman, one of the Bibiana family, who he never kind of seemed to have much contact with. But within the time period, you know, people are treating women really, really awfully. There's a lot of violence against women, just casual violence, casual, everyday violence. People are urged to chastise their Wives by beating them, you know, in marriage manuals. Right. This woman, Margarita Liszi, or whoever she may be, what we do know about her is she turns up in Raphael's paintings for several years.

[Kate Lister]

Oh, does she?

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah. So we're talking about a relationship, at least of a model and an artist that goes on for maybe six or seven years.

[Kate Lister]

No, I don't think that we can pin that one on for being a fuck boy with that weird bracelet detail aside. So he's having a relationship with his model, but from what we can see, it seems to be. I mean, it's a low bar, but he's being quite respectful.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah. And it was very common for women and this time for nude models to pose like Venus, as I said. And that little bracelet thing is something you do find on Venus statues sometimes.

[Kate Lister]

Oh, that's who's off there as well.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Right.

[Kate Lister]

Okay.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Could be just that he's saying that he wants to be. This is me romanticizing Raphael. Cause I think he's very handsome as well.

[Kate Lister]

They always are. That's the problem.

[Professor Jill Burke]

It could be just him kind of binding his name to her for eternity. Right.

[Kate Lister]

That is quite romantic. Did he meet his fiance then, this woman that he was engaged to?

[Professor Jill Burke]

Oh, God. You know, engagements in this period, particularly these kind of political engagements, are much more about the family joining together than anything to do. Particularly when you get to, like, higher levels of society. They have, like. In other places in Europe, they have, like, bundles before marriage. So, you know, you can basically sleep with the person you want to get married to before the marriage. But that tends to be for people who aren't stayed high up in society. For normal people, that would happen. But Raphael was friends with her uncle. He was a cardinal from Florence as well, and they were good friends. So this is really why it happened. He's just a bit of a social climber, Raphael. Right. So he's taking advantage of anything he can get in order to secure his role.

[Kate Lister]

Didn't he keep delaying this marriage? He kept delaying it.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Probably because he was in Rome. You know, you always hope he's working for the Pope. He might like a lot of people in Rome, he said, might be helping. Maybe I can get a job in the Vatican. If I can get in the job in the Vatican, maybe I can go into holy orders.

[Kate Lister]

Did he dump her or did he.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Die before she died?

[Kate Lister]

She died, yeah.

[Professor Jill Burke]

She died just before he died. He died young as well. Yeah. So I don't know what was going on there. So I don't think she died of having Too much sex expert.

[Kate Lister]

No. But do we know why she died?

[Professor Jill Burke]

No, we don't know very much about her. She's like on a footnote. I mean, it'd be nice to know more about her, actually, and you might be able to find out more about her, but she doesn't come through the Raphael literature.

[Kate Lister]

Why does he have his reputation then as this absolute dog with two dicks running around Italy, can't get enough of it. Because from what you're saying, he sounds reasonably well behaved.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah, I think it's just to do with Rome at the time.

[Kate Lister]

Okay.

[Professor Jill Burke]

They're having these parties at the back. You know, the chestnut game. I don't know if you know about the chestnut game.

[Kate Lister]

Well, I think. I think you better tell us.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Would you like. You would like to know about the.

[Kate Lister]

Testnet guess I think we would.

[Professor Jill Burke]

So this is the second time the word courtesan is used in Rome and it's under the Borgia, so it's going to be quite rude. There's a description of it in the papal diaries. So there's a guy called Burkhard who takes the papal diaries and he describes a game in 1501 where Duke Valentina, who's the Pope's son to ZOE Borgia, invites 50 prostitutes to the Vatican who dance with the servants and others there, first in their clothes and then naked, and then they put all candles, lampstands with candles around and they put chestnuts on the floor, which the prostitutes, I'm quoting now, naked, on their hands and knees, had to pick up the Pope, the Duke, his son and his sister, the Pope's daughter, Lucrezia Borgia, were all present and watching all these prostitutes crawling around the floor naked, picking up chestnuts. Finally, prizes were offered. Silken doublets, pairs of shoes, hats and other garments for those, and I quote, who knew the greatest number of those prostitutes carnally?

[Kate Lister]

When I have my friends over, we have pasta.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah, that's what happens. I mean, we could market at this game, sell chestnuts or something, but no, couldn't we?

[Kate Lister]

Mattel? Are you interested?

[Professor Jill Burke]

It is what the Vatican was like in Rome in the early.

[Kate Lister]

Oh, wow. I mean, wow.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah, I mean, sexy times. The Pope was watching people have sex with prostitutes and giving prizes.

[Kate Lister]

Yep.

[Professor Jill Burke]

And Raphael's coming into this environment and the reason why he's really associated is because he does so many beautiful female nudes at a time when Michael Endler is doing female nudes that really were quite butch. For example, Leonardo was doing a few female nudes, but they're all a Little bit creepy. Titian also has a reputation relating to his love of women. And he also does a lot of female nudes. And so it's these guys, Raphael and Titian together, who were associated with just having a lot of sex. But whether it's true or not, it's difficult to say. But you have to say Raphael, the evidence suggests that it possibly is true, but also probably with the same person.

[Kate Lister]

What did he die of then, do.

[Professor Jill Burke]

You think he died of? I don't know what he died of. No one knows what he died. Not too much, but possibly. I mean, venereal disease. I mean, sythmus is really rife at this time. There's a lot of kind of different illnesses that you could get. It's less exciting. But smallpox was really common and people had heart attacks and strokes and things. And obviously people just couldn't diagnose it.

[Kate Lister]

And lead paint. Maybe he was licking his paintbrush too much.

[Professor Jill Burke]

I mean, yeah, all sorts of terrible. I mean, he could be licking his paintbrush or other people's paintbrushes, but all sorts of stuff that you could get.

[Kate Lister]

Remembering what you said earlier.

[Professor Jill Burke]

I mean, who knows what goes on with paintbrushes and Raphael's workshop. All sorts of stuff was going round in Rome in a. Hygiene. He could have eaten something awful. No one really knows. But it was a massive loss to Rome and they had a massive, massive funeral. And it was very unexpected and very sudden. The only person he was probably pretty happy about it was Michelangelo. Everyone else was gut ticked. And they had a massive funeral procession and he was buried in the Pantheon. So you can still see his grave today if you go to Rome in the Pantheon.

[Kate Lister]

Well, Jill, well defended, I think. I think we're gonna have to let Raphael off the hook. I do.

[Professor Jill Burke]

And can I say, Raphael is great. He's a really good painter. And people that look at him, people think, oh, my God, you're so great. Oh, Leonardo da Vinci is so interesting. But Raphael is really. He's a little bit underappreciated nowadays, I think. So go and see the Vatican, Stanley, and just be wowed by him. The Villa Farnesina is amazing. So I am a massive fan. Massive, massive Raphael fan. And as everybody should be.

[Kate Lister]

I think I probably would have shagged.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Him if I was around at the time, honestly. Without a doubt.

[Kate Lister]

Without a doubt, yes.

[Professor Jill Burke]

I mean, I'm not talking about you, Kate. He's a nice man. He's. And he's talented and he's. Yeah, definitely.

[Kate Lister]

Okay. All right, Raphael, you are off the hook, Jill, you have been wonderful to talk to. Thank you so much. If people want to know more about you and your work, where can they find you?

[Professor Jill Burke]

Well, I'm sticking around on the University of Edinburgh website for the foreseeable future, so you can look me up there. You could read my book, how to Be a Renaissance Woman, which is mainly about cosmetics, but we do talk about women's nudity. We talk about women's relationships in there as well. And I'm about to do a series of Get Ready with Me videos for the science museum.

[Kate Lister]

Amazing.

[Professor Jill Burke]

Yeah. So if you want to know how to make Renaissance makeup and how to dress up like a Renaissance woman, I do. They'll be via Instagram.

[Kate Lister]

Will you come back and tell us more about that?

[Professor Jill Burke]

Of course, yes.

[Kate Lister]

Thank you. You have been wonderful. Thank you so much, Kate. Thank you for listening. And thank you so much to Jill for joining me. And if you like what you heard, please don't forget to like, review and follow along whatever it is that you get. Your podcasts Coming up, we've got episodes on whether or not Alexander the Great had mummy issues with none other than two Tristan Hughes from our sister podcast the Ancients and the next installment of History's Worst Boys with none other than the Roman emperor Nero. Boo. Or maybe hurrah. I'm not sure yet, but if you wanted us to explore a subject or maybe if you just wanted to say hello, then you can now email [e-mail] this podcast was edited by Tim Arstel and produced by Stuart Beckwith. The senior producer was sharp it long. Join me again Betwixt the Sheets History of Sex Scandal in Society, a podcast by History Hit. This podcast contains music from Epidemic Sound.

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[Kate Lister]

Oh come on.

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