Who is this man and what is he holding?

[handy]

The tip off was the connection to a pope and a video game. My son had expressed an interest in getting "Assassins Creed" so when I was researching to see if it is something my 11 year old can play (it's not) I learned about it having the Borgias as characters.

Handy can you divulge a pearl about this Cesare character? What is this man known for? How did he get mistaken for the Messiah?

To answer your question, I have come across a story that Pope Alexander ordered that all representations of Christ be destroyed and all new representations of Christ were to be based upon Cesare. However, given that many pictures of Christ that predate 1500 are still around, I think that story is highly apocryphal. Not to mention that many of the Renaissance artists have portraits of Christ that look nothing like Cesare Borgia.

What is more likely to me is that Cesare Borgia simply looked like a lot of the early representations of Christ and when a artist depicted Christ in Renaissance clothing, the resemblance is even more marked.

Pretty much all protraits of Christ, not only from the Italian Renaissance (during Pope Alexander's day) but even going back to the Byzantine empire depict Christ has having a beard, long brown hair and somewhat stern, solemn eyes.

Here's a 12th century representation:
View attachment 2231

And this one, which is now understood to be from the 4th-6th century:
View attachment 2232

Both of these representations came from long before Alexander was in power.

Having said all that...I do believe that da Vinci had some rather...shall we say, unorthodox...views. And, there is no doubt that he was employed by Cesare Borgia and also a good friend. So, that da Vinci might have used Cesare as the model for his painting...as the Mythbuster's would say, "Plausible".

As for the Orb in the first painting, I'm sure it's supposed to be a globus cruciger. In the second painting...I honestly don't know. Looks like a crystal ball.

 

[Fedusenko]

It was not the beard and long hair that I was saying looked similar to Cesare, but the facial structure, but I submit that

I suppose then, the obvious question should be where did those paintings get their model from? In the same time periods you mention I find paintings of the Messiah as a dark skinned man, not the one hanging on the walls of Christian homes. Why is there a difference? Oxidation? Children with dirty fingers?