VI.
Meanwhile the Pope's anxiety being stirred by the increasing agitation provoked by the Florentine exiles, throughout Romagna and the Marches, as well as in Tuscany, again began to insist upon peace. But the person charged to open negotiations to this effect was Cardinal Orsini, a man of strong party feeling and doubtful integrity. For when at Arezzo in 1307, he had called there, in addition to the Florentine exiles, many adherents of his own from the adjoining States of the Church, thus assembling a force of 1,700 cavalry and a great number of foot soldiers. It appears that he had come to terms with Corso Donati and received money from him for the undertaking in view. Messer Corso, whose ambition was still unassuaged, had married a third time, and was now related, through his wife, with the Ghibelline lord, Uguccione della Faggiuola. This circumstance naturally exposed him to much suspicion on the part of the Guelphs, and accordingly, being even more angered and discontented than before, he was again bitterly hostile to Messer Rosso della Tosa and his followers, who in their turn, and as an inevitable consequence, had again combined with the wealthier burghers. Hence, the latter, on noting the Cardinal's preparations, and Donati's new manœuvres, speedily collected an army of 3,000 horse and 15,000 foot, and without further hesitation marched towards Arezzo, ravaging the enemies' lands by the way. Thereupon, by way of displaying his military tactics, the Cardinal directed his march on Florence through the Casentino. But as the Florentines outwitted him, by doubling back and reaching the city before him, he was obliged to retreat to Arezzo in a very crestfallen mood. He then opened negotiations with the Florentines, who, feigning willingness to entertain his proposals, despatched two ambassadors to gull him with fair words. Compagni remarks that "no woman was ever more flattered and then abused by betrayers than he (the Cardinal) by those two knights."[575] So that all he could do was to go off with his tail between his legs, once more leaving the city under sentence of excommunication.[576] In revenge for this, the Florentines imposed fresh taxes on the clergy, punishing those who refused to pay.[577]
The worst sufferer was Corso Donati, for the Cardinal, after extracting money from him by promising to come to Florence to crush Della Tosa and his Black faction, had not even dared to approach the walls. But without acknowledging his defeat, Donati immediately plunged into fresh and more daring schemes. After a short absence from Florence, probably to gain funds and allies, he returned there in 1308. Increasingly blinded by party passion, counting on assistance from his father-in-law, Uguccione della Faggiuola, now lord of Arezzo, as well as from Prato and Pistoia, he called a meeting of his adherents in Florence. After explaining his hopes and vowing to do away with the Enactments of Justice, he urged them to draw their swords and make an end of those Neri, who, after receiving so much help from him and gaining victory by his means, now treated him so iniquitously. But the rumour being already abroad that he expected aid from that bitterest foe of Florence—the formidable Uguccione—the popular feeling against him was excited to the highest pitch.[578] After being repressed for some time the general fury burst out all at once, and took Donati unawares. Suddenly, on the 6th of October, 1308, the Signory sounded the alarm-bell, and the people, rising to arms, united with the Della Tosa faction, other friendly magnates, and De la Rat's Catalan troops. Donati was denounced to the Podestà, Piero della Branca of Gubbio, as a traitor to his country, and in less than an hour he was accused, tried, and condemned. Immediately afterwards, the Signory, Podestà, Captain, and Executor, with their respective familiars, the Catalan troops, knights, and citizen-trained bands, marched to St. Piero Maggiore to attack the Donati houses. But Messer Corso and his friends resisted so valiantly, that had Uguccione and the others fulfilled their promise of coming to the rescue in time, the affair might have taken an ugly turn. It is supposed that the Aretines were already on the march, when, hearing that all Florence had risen against Donati, they decided to turn back. At all events, no succour arrived, and Messer Corso soon found that even many of his Florentine friends had ceased to defend the chain barricades, and relinquished the struggle. Thereupon the people broke through, and soon demolished the houses he had been forced to abandon. Accompanied by a few devoted adherents, he fled from the town by the Croce gate, with the citizens and Catalans in hot pursuit. The first man captured on the banks of the Africo was Gherardo dei Bordoni, who was instantly slain. Next, the crowd cut off his hand and nailed it on the door of the Adimari house, because Tedici degli Adimari had first instigated the dead man to join with Donati. A few moments later the Catalans overtook Donati himself at San Salvi, and in obedience to orders killed him on the spot. According to another version of the tale, he first tried to bribe them to spare his life, but without success; so, to avoid falling into the hands of his Florentine foes, he cast himself on the ground and was dispatched by a spear-thrust in the throat. The monks of San Salvi bore away his dead body, and the following day buried him in the Badia without any pomp for fear of provoking the public wrath.[579]
The cause of this sudden and irresistible burst of popular fury is clearly explained by the letters which the Commune shortly addressed to the Lucchese, in whose territory the Bordoni had found refuge. "It is known to all Tuscany that the Donati had planned a war to the death, in order to give the city of Florence and the Guelph party into the hands of the Ghibellines, and subject to their yoke, to the utter extermination and destruction of the Guelph Government. Those rebels intended to break all bounds, and subdue the city to their rule, although Messer Corso and his followers shamelessly styled the Signory Ghibelline instead."[580] These words were written by the Signory in March, 1309. In fact, the Neri being split into Donati and Tosinghi factions, and the latter having united with the wealthier burghers, from whom could the Donati hope assistance, save from the Ghibellines? The lower class of the people was weak, and the distant Pope increasingly urged the return of the exiles. The latter had now combined with Donati's whilom allies, the nobles of the contado, standing aloof from many of the burgher Bianchi, who had been expelled at the same moment, but were gradually permitted to return; and they had also separated from all independent men, such as Dante Alighieri. The poet, in fact, being opposed to Donati, and a promoter of the Enactments of Justice, had been finally driven to adopt an individual attitude. Thus the Bianchi, though exiled for having sided with the people, were now on the side of the magnates, the Ghibellines, Uguccione, and even of Corso Donati, the only person likely to profit by so hybrid an alliance. Accordingly his death had the immediate result of giving another terrible shock to the magnates' power, both within and without the city. Speedy proof was afforded of this when, at the beginning of 1309, the proud Ubaldini came to make submission to the Florentine Commune, promising to guard the passes of the Apennines, and supporting their offer by fitting guarantees of good faith. In consequence of this they were accepted as friends, with the condition, "that in every act and deed they should behave as good subjects and citizens."[581]
Throughout the whole of its history the Florentine Commune invariably adopted this plan when admitting nobles to its midst. But it had also the effect of enabling conquered and subject magnates to gain increased strength in the city itself. Therefore, first without and then within the walls, they unceasingly combated the people and the Republic, down to the distant time when they were finally crushed by the State. If Florentine prosperity as yet showed no signs of diminution during the sanguinary struggle now described, it was for two reasons which should be duly kept in mind. The successive conflicts we have narrated, all proceeded from the constant necessity of preserving the merchant-republic from the impact of the extraneous feudal body threatening to check its natural growth. These civil wars, however, were carried by a comparatively small number of citizens, eager to gain possession of a government that had far less influence on society than is generally supposed. The true motive-power of the Republic proceeded less from the Signory, which was changed every two months, than from the commercial and political constitution of the guilds, which were firmly organised and, so far, thoroughly in unison. The conditions of an all-absorbing modern State, wherein every shock affects society at large, had not yet sprung to life in the Middle Ages. The Italian republics were miniature confederacies of separate associations, under a central government of so feeble a kind, that even when totally suppressed for a time, no great harm seemed to result from its loss.