Olimpia Maidalchini
Olimpia Maidalchini, who had been married to his late brother, was accounted Innocent X's mistress because her influence with him in matters of promotion and politics was so complete, a state of affairs alluded to in the Encyclopædia Britannica 9th edition (1880):
"Throughout his reign the influence exercised over him by Maidalchini, his deceased brother's wife, was very great, and such as to give rise to gross scandal, for which, however, there appears to have been no adequate ground... The avarice of his female counsellor gave to his reign a tone of oppression and sordid greed which probably it would not otherwise have shown, for personally he was not without noble and reforming impulses."Read more about this topic: Pope Innocent X