It was a second period of transition, as Molmenti very justly says, and in the beginning of the decadence the knight had already ceased to be knightly. Those rough lordlings were neither without fear nor without reproach, says the learned Italian writer, but were altogether without remorse, and if they were ever bold it was only in breaking the law. From time
Tassini, Condanne Capitali.
to time one of them was caught perpetrating some outrageous crime, and was dragged barefooted, in a long black shirt and black cap, to the scaffold, as an awful example, there to be flogged, hanged, and quartered. Such horrors had long ceased to have any effect in an age that saw blood run in rivers. By way of increasing the disgrace of a shameful death, a gibbet was set up which was so high that the victim had to mount thirty-two steps, and it was painted scarlet. The first miscreant who adorned it was one of the chiefs of the sbirri himself, who had used his position to protect a whole gang of thieves with whom he divided the plunder.
I abridge from Signor Molmenti’s work the following story, in which more than one type of
Molmenti, Banditi e Bravi.
the sixteenth-century criminal makes his appearance.
The village of Illasi is situated in a rich valley in the territory of Verona. At the end of the sixteenth century its castle was inhabited by a certain Count Geronimo and his beautiful lady, Ginevra. From time to time the couple introduced a little variety into their solitude by receiving Virginio Orsini who, though a Roman noble, was in the service of Venice as Governor of Verona. He was, I believe, a first cousin of that Paolo Giordano Orsini who murdered his wife Isabella de’ Medici in order to marry Vittoria Accoramboni. I have told the story at length in another work.
Virginio, the Governor, fell in love with the Countess Ginevra before long; but she, though strongly attracted to him, tried hard to resist him, would not read his letters, and turned a deaf ear to his pleadings.
On a certain Saturday night, when Count Geronimo was away from home and Ginevra sat by the fire in her own chamber, having already supped and said her prayers, the curtain of the door was raised and two men came in. The one was Grifo, the man-at-arms whom the Count trusted and had left to guard her; the other was Orsini. Ginevra sprang to her feet, asking how the Governor dared to cross her threshold.
‘Madam,’ he said, coming near, ‘as you would not answer my letters, I determined to tell you face to face that if you will not hear me you will be my ruin.’