Finally, in a manner peculiar to the Perugians, they met together in council to dictate the action of the person they had called in to act for them, and it was settled that the Pope should have full power as arbitrator of peace between themselves and the Raspanti. The Pope did exactly as he was asked. He recalled the Raspanti, and they entered the city on the 17th October 1393, not merely as a body, but headed by a powerful personality—Biordo Michelotti, one of Perugia’s greatest citizens, and the first of the condottieri who ever got rule in the city.
Exiled in early youth from his native town, Biordo Michelotti had chosen the career of a condottiere, and roamed through the length and breadth of Italy, fighting the battles of different princes. Some say he had fought for the French king against the English. He was essentially a captain of adventure. His manner was kindly, he was brave, honest, frank, and popular among the people wherever he happened to go. Beloved all over Umbria, many of the towns which directly opposed Perugia’s tyrannical rule had submitted to that of Biordo. All these successes did not, however, satisfy the man in him, for the ruling ambition of his life was to get the dominion over his native city, and events were now combining to procure for him his heart’s desire. The Raspanti rallied round him in their exile, and he became their leader, and the champion of their liberty. The nobles, seeing the power of his popularity, offered him bribes to keep out of their way. But Biordo lay low in his fortress at Deruta, and when the Pope’s offers of peace arrived he hailed them with delight. A month later he entered Perugia at the head of about 2000 Raspanti, who had been exiled from their homes for years. They at once visited the Pope in token of homage and gratitude, and their new lease of power within the city was opened by the re-election of the priors, who were chosen half from the burgher faction and half from the nobility. By this means it was hoped that a lasting reconciliation might be made and an evenly balanced government established. Yet such seemed impossible. Peace endured for the space of one short month, and at the very first opportunity—on the occasion of Biordo’s absence from the city—the smouldering fires of party feuds burst out in flames as rampant as before. One of the Raspanti was murdered by the nobles, and, just as the Podestà was preparing to pass sentence on the assassin, Pandolfo dei Baglioni, “that Perugian Satan,” as Bonazzi calls him, interfered on behalf of the criminal.[16] Whereupon the Raspanti vowed vengeance, assassinated Pandolfo and Pellini Baglioni on their own threshold, and murdered sixty of their clan. The Ranieri, another noble family, with their friends, took refuge in the strong Ranieri tower, where they were forced to go without food for three days. At last the people dragged them before the Podestà, but as he refused to execute them, the unhappy noblemen were conveyed back to their tower, where they were finally butchered, and their bodies thrown out of the windows.
Horrified by these fresh atrocities, and again in search of peace, the Pope loaded his mules and retired with his Cardinals to Assisi. The tumults were just subsiding when Biordo Michelotti returned, and this time he took absolute possession of the city. He met with no sort of opposition. The ring-leader of the nobles, Pandolfo Baglioni, was dead, and the Pope for the minute encouraged the attempt towards peace. Biordo used his power well, and every year his fame and honours increased. To the delight of the Perugians, he succeeded to the command of Sir John Hawkwood over the Florentine forces, and everywhere he pushed the interests of the town, wisely concluding a treaty with Gian Galeazzo Visconti, the powerful lord of Milan (1395).
The Pope, in the meantime, began to regret the encouragement he had given to this very popular hero. His jealousy was roused, and he hired a condottiere for a month, in order to fight the Perugians. The hostilities, however, ended with the month, and nothing was accomplished beyond a demonstration of the Pontiff’s jealousy. But there was someone else beside the Pope who witnessed the honours paid to Biordo with a jealous hatred, and this was the Abbot of S. Pietro. “The wicked Abbot,” as the people called him, belonged to the noble family of the Guidalotti, and he probably felt that the power of his family was too much overshadowed by Michelotti. He had fresh cause to murmur, therefore, when Biordo married Bertolda Orsini of Rome, and the Lords of Urbino, Camerino, San Severo, Gubbio, and other towns came up to offer the happy pair rich presents, and to wish the bride-groom well. Biordo’s marriage was a splendid pageant. The city decked herself magnificently to do him honour, and all the people of the country round sent offerings of grain, and wine, and eggs, and cheese, everything which their small farms produced, to show their leader how they loved him.
The Abbot sat at his window, and with no kindly eye he watched the entry of the young bride, close by the monastery walls. Madonna Contessa Orsini came in escorted by the Florentine and Venetian ambassadors. Her dress was made of cloth of gold, she wore a garland of wild asparagus around her head, and jewels sparkled in her hair. The Abbot noted all these things, he saw the women of Perugia running out to meet her, he saw them throw flowers in her path, and then he returned to his cell to brood upon his horrid plans of vengeance. For he had determined to place the town once more beneath the sway of the Church, and in this way to gain for himself a Cardinal’s hat, as it was probably the Pope himself who urged him to the deed.
On Sunday, in the month of March 1398, while the citizens were attending a sermon at S. Lorenzo, the Abbot arrived on horseback at the Guidalotti palace on Colle Landone, to collect his fellow-conspirators, and some twenty of them proceeded to Biordo’s house on Porta Sole. Word was sent up to Michelotti that there was important news for him, and he, suspecting nothing, hurried down to meet the Abbot with a courteous greeting. The Abbot stepped forward, took his hand, and kissed Biordo, at which sign the rest of the conspirators fell upon their victim and stabbed him with their poisoned daggers, hitting him such grievous blows that soon he lay weltering in a pool of blood. The conspirators had first intended openly to announce the deed in the piazza, but their courage failed them and the Abbot merely muttered the news to the passers-by as he slunk away to S. Pietro with a few companions. Two of the braver of the assassins, however, stayed behind and, coming into the piazza, cried: “We have slain the tyrant.” The citizens, who were at mass, rose with one accord from their devotions, to avenge the death of their beloved leader, and leaving the preacher to continue his sermon to an empty church, they hurried to arms. The Abbot meanwhile hastened from his monastery at S. Pietro to a still safer refuge at Casalina. As he fled he looked back upon the city whose hero he had murdered, and he saw the flames and smoke break out from the palace of those same Guidalotti he had hoped to benefit, whilst the news of the death of his old father and many of his family in the carnage of that day was brought to him as a sorry consolation for his crime.