Pope Leo X

In 1492 he was made a cardinal by Pope Innocent VIII. When his brother Piero de’ Medici (1471–1503) was expelled from Florence in 1494, Giovanni also went into exile, which he spent mainly in Città di Castello, Perugia, Urbino and Milan; in 1499 he travelled to Germany, the Netherlands and France. In 1500 he went to Rome, occupying the Palazzo di San Eustachio, later the Palazzo Madama, where he gathered around him many of the leading personalities in Rome, including the writers Tommaso Inghirami and Jacopo Sadoleto and the artist Baldassare Peruzzi. During his years as cardinal, he commissioned the rebuilding of Santa Maria in Domenica and the façade of Santa Cristina in Bolsena, Rome. He was appointed papal legate in Bologna by Pope Julius II, and in 1512, with the support of the Pope, he secured the return of the Medici to Florence. When Julius II died in 1513, the 37-year-old Giovanni was elected pope as Leo X.