This Saturday, October 21st, part of the Medinaceli family has gathered for a happy reason. Ignacio Medina, Duke of Segorbe, and his wife, Gloria d'Orléans and Bourbon, have travelled to Padua, Italy, near Venice, to attend the celebration of the christening of their first grandchild, Galateo, born last May, the result of the relationship between their daughter Luna, Countess of Ricla, and her partner, the Italian Giovanni Michele Rapazzini de Buzzaccarini. He was a member of one of the most important Italian aristocratic families. Legend has it that they date back to Roman times.
It was precisely they, the powerful Buzzaccarini, who were in charge of having the baptistery of the cathedral of Padua built and painted with impressive frescoes. The baptism ceremony of the little one took place there. They also had the Church of Santa Maria dei Servi erected and have a spectacular palace in the center of the city, where a reception was offered after the ceremony, in turn with frescoes by Andrea Urbani and Jacopo Guarana. Among the prominent members of this lineage are Pataro Buzzaccarini, from the fourteenth century, who fought, like Miguel de Cervantes, in the battle of Lepanto under the name of King Attila of Padua, or Fina Buzzaccarini, who married the owner of the city, Francesco I da Carrara.
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Returning to the christening, the godparents of Galateo, who received the sacrament with a family skirt, were his uncle Giulio Rapazzini de Buzzaccarini and Manuela González-Arias, a good friend of his mother. In Spain, according to the INE, "there are no inhabitants with the name consulted or its frequency is less than 20 for the national total". In Italy it is not a very popular name either, perhaps it was in the Renaissance -Galeazzo-, and it means "good manners". In fact, there is a book called so, written by Giovanni Della Casa, published in 1558 and now back on the market after the translation by M. F. Rusnak, which is a dialogue on how to treat one's neighbor with one's conscience.
What a fantastic party
Undoubtedly, Galateo will attend the best galas, because his parents move with ease in the salons of the European gotha: they are friends of Prince Jean Christophe Napoleon Bonaparte and Olympia von Arco-Zinneberg; Prince Josef-Emanuel of Liechtenstein and Claudia Echavarria; of Marie Laura of Belgium, daughter of Princess Astrid and Archduke Lawrence, and William Isvy... and many other royals and aristocrats.
Among those invited to the sacrament, naturally, were Luna's closest family, such as her parents, proud grandparents. Ignacio Medina, Duke of Segorbe, is a respected architect from Seville and the only one of the four living children of the legendary Mimi, Duchess of Medinaceli, a direct descendant of King Alfonso X the Wise. Her mother is Gloria Orleans-Braganza, great-great-granddaughter of Dom Pedro II, the last emperor of Brazil, first cousin of King Juan Carlos and a renowned interior decorator. Luna is the youngest of five siblings. His mother has three sons - Peter, Philip and Alexander - from her first marriage to Prince Alexander of Yugoslavia, head of the royal house of Serbia. Today, Felipe, Queen Sofia's godson and married to Danica Marinkovi, is the heir to the country's throne.
Another moment of Galateo's baptism, in the cathedral of Padua.
Of course, her sister Sol, Countess of Empúries, to whom she is very close and who last summer married Pedro Domínguez-Manjón in the palace of Pilatos (Seville) with the ducal tiara of the Medinaceli family and a dress by Victorio & Lucchino, could not be missing at the christening of her little one. Also present were Francesco Bergamo Rossi, director of the Venezia Heritage Foundation, the organization in charge of ensuring the artistic protection of the city of Venice, as well as other Italian aristocrats.
Luna, a Renaissance woman
Luna began studying Philosophy at the University of Comillas in Madrid, although he left to go to Parsons University in New York, where he studied Enlightenment, his true vocation. She is now very involved, along with her sister, in the management of Casas de la Judería, the impressive hotel in Seville renovated by her father. She has opened her own yoga studio and also on the terrace of this iconic establishment in the capital of Seville Luna usually teaches yoga, a discipline in which she is already an expert and which she practiced almost until the last moment of giving birth. For his part, Giovanni Michele Rapazzini de Buzzaccarini is a poet and collaborates with several Italian literary magazines.
This year has been very intense for the Medinaceli family because of the different family events, but also because of the media confrontation over the inheritance of Mimi, the late Duchess of Medinaceli. A family war that has divided the family in two: those who support the foundation Casa Ducal de Medinaceli together with the Duke of Segorbe and those who do not, among whom are Rafael and Luis Medina Abascal, sons of the Duke of Feria and Naty Abascal, or the sisters Victoria and Casilda, daughters of Luis Medina. Duke of Santisteban del Puerto. However, it seems that both the wedding of Sol Medinaceli, as well as the wedding of Victoria of Hohenlohe, current Duchess of Medinaceli, and the christening of Galateo have brought a bit of joy to a family that was once very close.