Dear Folk,
On September 27, 1259 one of the prototypically baddest men who ever lived died. Now I know you must be thinking that I am forgetting the likes of Hitler and Stalin. Not even. I will give you that they were horrible tyrants who killed many of their citizens. Instead I want you to know about a guy who sort of wrote the book on Italian bad, Ezzelino da Romana.
Ezzelino was born on April 25, 1194 around 12 noon in Bassono del Grappa in what is now Italy. That Italy was in the umbra of the reign of rival political factions, bloody hits, and vendettas. This was an Italy of city states and communes and kings who ruled them. This was an era of Guelph and Ghibelline. You may remember from an earlier column that the Guelphs were supporters of the Pope and the Roman Catholic Church. The Ghibellines were supporters of the Emperor. The tragedy of Romeo Montecchi and Juliet Capuleti (a real life story made famous by Francis Bacon's , er Shakespeare's play) took place during this era. Montecchis were Ghibellines and the Capuletis were Guelphs.
There was even two kinds of Guelphs – Blacks (extremists, upper middle class) and Whites (moderates, lower middle class). The Ghibellines were generally nobles. Although it may have started as a class war, it quickly degenerated into thugs with clubs. Local racketeering was all the push they needed. A little protection, a little numbers running, it was good business.
In this time, northern Italy, what was called "The Kingdom of Italy," was about sixty independent city states. There was Venice as its own kingdom. Central Italy was ruled by the Pope as the "Papal States." Southern Italy and Sicily was the Kingdom of Sicily ruled by the Swabians. There was a small town Lucera which actually was an autonomous Islamic republic inside of Sicily. They were allied with the Swabians. The Swabians were murdering thugs who had killed off the Norman Altavilla ruling dynasty.
After 1232 Ezzelino became a faithful supporter of Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II against the pope. In return Frederick made sure Ezzelino held Verona, Vicenza, Padua, and other cities. Frederick became Ezzelino's tutor. There is a charming story about how Frederick took Ezzelino out into the garden to show Ezzelino how to govern his subjects. Frederick quietly unsheathed his knife and cut the heads off all the tallest plants. Ezzelino learned quickly. As soon as he took control he arrested, tortured and executed the leading citizens of each city, the tallest plants. Hey, he was as good as the USA about imprisoning folks. He kept eight prisons full to hot bunking in Padua alone. And that was with paying executioners overtime.
The absolute barbarity actually shocked the Italians, and they had folk like Caligula in their history. It got worse. After a bit, the relatives of the folk he had whacked must be angry enough, Ezzelino reasoned, so they should be executed too. The garden was getting short of any sized flowers in a hurry.
When Frederick defeated the Lombard League at Cortenuova (1237), Ezzelino became the greatest power in Northern Italy. The former Lombard League states were mostly communes who had steadfastly resisted the Emperor. Now under Ezzelino, they were ruled by his mad puppet. In 1238 he married an illegitimate daughter of Frederick. Now it was officially sealed: Ezzelino was family. Continuously at war with the Guelphs, he was excommunicated (1254) by Pope Innocent IV. Unkind folk called him "Son of the Devil" but never to his face. He even had eighteen people executed for talking with a suspicious man.
In 1258 a new power rose in the Ghibelline Party, King Manfredi I, Frederick's illegitimate son. He ruled both Southern and Northern Italy. He was supposed to be Ezzelino's ally. He had designs on getting all of Sicily away from rivals and take Germany in the bargain. Frederick's daughter was Swabian. Hmmm. Well, being the head Ghibelline might be a great bargaining chip. He let Pope Alexander VI know that he was tired of Ezzelino and maybe they could just whomp up on him together. Sure Manfredi was Ezzelino's brother-in-law but this was business, nothing personal.
The Guelphs' crusade against Ezzelino, whom they represented as a tyrant who scorned God and all human beings, was made up of the Papacy, Venice, Milan, Ferrara, Padua, Mantua and Cremona. At the Battle of Cassano d'Adda, fought on September 19, 1259, Ezzelino was wounded, defeated and arrested. He died in the prison of Soncino on September 27, 1259. His entire family was subsequently killed. That was business, too. Dante thought so much of Ezzelino's evil power, he put him in "The Inferno." All press is good press I suppose.
Ezzelino, as the first of a series of bloody despotic tyrants, was a figure of cardinal importance as Jacob Burkhardt, the great historian of the Renaissance says: "The conquest and usurpations which had hitherto taken place in the Middle Ages rested on real or pretended inheritance and other such claims... Here, for the first time the attempt was openly made to found a throne by wholesale murder and endless barbarities... None of his successors, not even Cesare Borgia, rivaled the colossal guilt of Ezzelino, but the example once set was not forgotten, and his fall led to no return of justice among the nations, and served as no warning to future transgressors."
What have we learned? If you start chopping at the top, pretty soon you have to chop the bottom, too? Business is business? Romeo and Juliet had more going on that just teenage hormones? How about never trust your brothers-in-law ?
If you are out there, overthrowing a dynasty, subverting a commune, whacking your brother-in-law or just separating love-struck kids, and you want to forward this message, please keep my name and sig. attached. Just business, you understand?
Trying not to harm any flowers,
J. Ellsworth Weaver
SCA – Sir Balthazar of Endor
AS – Polyphemus Theognis
AOL IM – GabbyBadger