A Carthaginian general attempts to cross the Alps with an army of elephants in order to conquer Rome.
Giovanni Medici, the future leader of the Black Bands, has a last meeting in a convent with his dying mother Caterina Sforza, listening to the re-enactment of her life.
The construction of great temple dedicated to the goddess Aphrodite, followed by new and high taxes and the arrival of a plague, create discontent in the population, and threatens the love between a sculptor and a slave.
