Alessandro Albani
Alessandro Albani (October 15, 1692 – December 11, 1779) was an Italian aristocrat and cardinal, and a collector and patron of the arts.
Biography
Albani was born in Urbino. His education at La Sapienza University in Rome was towards a degree in jurisprudence. Early in life he also studied for a military career. He was made an honorary member of the military brotherhood of justice of the Knights of St. John, Rome, on August 26, 1701, at the age of nine, and a colonel of a regiment of dragoons in the pontifical troops, in 1707.
Alessandro Albani descended from the Albani family (branch of Urbino), which originated from into the Albani (family) that had established itself there from northern Albania in the 15th century.[1] Alessandro himself was the nephew of Pope Clement XI Albani,[2] who convinced him to set aside his budding military career, for which the weakness of his eyesight, that led to blindness in his advanced age, did not recommend him, and become a cardinal, an elevation effected on July 16, 1721, for which he required numerous special dispensations, not least because his brother Annibale Albani had been made a cardinal in 1711 and still sat in the Sacred College[3]

As a cardinal he participated in the conclaves of 1724, 1730, 1740, 1758, 1769, and 1774-1775. He announced the elections of Pope Clement XIII (1758), Pope Clement XIV (1769) and Pope Pius VI (1775). His consistent stand against French interests brought him closer to those of the Habsburgs; Cardinal Albani represented Habsburg Austria at the Holy See, from 1756 until his death. He was appointed Librarian of the Holy Roman Church on August 12, 1761.
From the time of the pontificate of Pope Clement XIV he realigned himself with the zelanti against the interference of the European monarchs in the diplomacy that surrounded the eventual expulsion and Suppression of the Jesuits from most Catholic countries.
He was buried in the Observant Franciscan Church of San Pietro in Urbino, Marche, Italy