ALTIERI. - A Roman family, already known in the Middle Ages, belonging to the middle nobility, which took an active part in city life. The first to make a name for himself in the literary field was MARCO ANTONIO (1450-1532), a disciple of Pomponio Leto, a friend of Bartolomeo Platina, author of a novella, L'Amorosa, and of a curious volume, Li Nuptiali, in which, while setting out Roman customs concerning marriage, he finds occasion to recall events, families and personages of his own age. He also had the merit of restoring peace among the Roman barons in 1511; he was castellan of the Rocca of Viterbo, conservator of Rome, and envoy to the imperial camp in 1527.
After him the so-called humanistic tradition was revived by RUTILIO (d. 1600), professor and rector of the Studium, and by MARIO (d. 1613), by whom a treatise De censuris ecclesiasticis is in print; but the A. aspired to greater fortune and in the 17th century took the prelatical path. A certain LORENZO, indeed, brother-in-law of Gentile Delfino, bishop of Camerino, set two sons on that path, GIOVANNI BATTISTA and EMILIO. The first was one of the most influential cardinals of the court; the second, rising through various ranks from auditor of the Rota to nuncio, attained the pontificate under the name Clement X, at a little less than eighty years of age, but still in time to assure the family, left without direct descendants, of continuity in the Albertoni. Into this latter family, in fact, LAURA CATERINA, the last of the A., had entered, and her surname was taken by her husband Gaspare, by his father and by his uncle Paluzzo, created cardinal and Secretary of State (cardinal padrone); it was he who created the new fortunes of the house.
The A.-Albertoni, afterwards called simply A., who had already given to the Church, besides the cardinals and the Pontiff named above, also a blessed, Ludovica (v.), continued to give cardinals in the two following centuries: LORENZO (1671-1741), GIOVANNI BATTISTA (1673-1740), VINCENZO MARIA (1724-1800) and LUDOVICO (v. below).