Buondelmonte’s corpse was placed on a bier, with its head resting in the lap of his affianced bride, the young and beautiful Donati, who hung like a lily over the pallid features of her husband; and thus united were they borne through the streets of Florence. It was the gloomy dawning of a tempestuous day, for in that bloody moment was unchained the demon of Florentine discord; the name of Guelf and Ghibelline were then for the first time assumed by noble and commoner as the cry of faction; and long after the original cause of enmity had ceased, they continued to steep all Italy in blood.
It has been shown that there were already two parties existing in the commonwealth; but it was not until after this outrage that the whole community divided under the above appellations, one part siding with the Buondelmonti, who were for the most part Guelfic chiefs and adherents of the church; the other with the Uberti, leaders of the Ghibellines and partisans of the empire. Of seventy-two powerful families mentioned by Malespini, thirty-nine joined the Buondelmonti banner and thirty-three fought under the colours of their enemies; but many more houses of distinction took part in the civil war; many afterwards changed sides through quarrels with their chiefs; many of the Buondelmonti who before were Ghibellines now became Guelfs; the former were stigmatised with the epithet of “Paterini,” and the latter with that of “Traditori.”
Nevertheless an attempt at reconciliation was made in 1239, by marrying Neri Piccolino degli Uberti to the daughter of Rinieri Zingani de’ Buondelmonti, a lady celebrated for her wisdom, beauty, and talents. Trusting to this tie the Uberti and some friends repaired with confidence to visit Bertaldi de’ Buondelmonti of Campi, but were treacherously attacked and beaten back with some bloodshed; this renewed the war with greater violence and Neri dismissed his wife to her own relatives, declaring that he disdained to become the propagator of a traitorous brood from a deceitful stock. The unfortunate lady was then compelled by her father to marry Count Pannochino de’ Pannochieschi, on whose mercy she threw herself, imploring permission to retire into a convent; for though abandoned by her husband she protested that she was still his wife and therefore never could belong to another. Her motives were respected, her prayer generously granted, and she immediately took the veil in the convent of Montecelli.
[1215-1225 A.D.]
Immediately after Buondelmonte’s death a low and angry murmur rolled sullenly through the whole Florentine population, and instinctive preparations were everywhere in progress for some dimly apprehended danger; as yet all was calm, but dark clouds were gathering around and the echo of distant thunder marked the coming storm. Each house was armed and fortified, towers were again mounted with warlike engines, serragli (barricades) were erected, the shops all closed, the people in painful doubt, and ancient citizens who remembered the troubles of other times looked on and trembled. Nor was their apprehension vain; the curse of heaven seemed to rest on this devoted city, and with but little cessation during three and thirty years did Florence reek with the blood of her children.[c]
The death of Innocent III [1216] and, two years afterwards, of Otto IV broke the unnatural alliance between a pope and the heir of a Ghibelline family. The Milanese, excommunicated by Innocent for having fought against Frederick II, did not the less persist in making war on his partisans; well convinced that the new pope, Honorius III, would soon thank them for it. They refused Frederick the iron crown of Lombardy, preserved at Monza, and contracted an alliance with the count Thomas of Savoy, and with the cities of Crema, Piacenza, Lodi, Vercelli, Novara, Tortona, Como, and Alessandria, to drive the Ghibellines from Lombardy. The Ghibellines defeated them on the 6th of June, 1218, in a great battle fought against the militias of Cremona, Parma, Reggio, and Modena, before Ghibello. This reverse of fortune calmed for some time their military ardour. The citizens of every town accused the nobles of having led them into war from family enmities and interests foreign to the city; at Milan, Piacenza, Cremona, and Modena, there were battles between the nobles and the people. Laws were proposed to divide the public magistracy in due proportions between them; finally the Milanese, in the year 1221, expelled all the nobles from their city.
FREDERICK II CROWNED EMPEROR
The young Frederick re-entered Italy; and, after some differences with Honorius III, received from him, on the 22nd of November, 1220, the crown of the empire. He afterwards occupied himself in establishing order in his kingdom of the Two Sicilies, where, during his minority, the popes had encouraged a universal insubordination. Born in the march of Ancona, at Jesi, in December, 1194, he was Italian as well by language as by affection and character. The Italian language, spoken at his court, first rose above the patois in common use throughout Italy, regarded only as a corruption of Latin; he expressed himself with elegance in this language, which, from his time, was designated by the name of lingua cortigiana; he encouraged the first poets, who employed it at his court, and he himself made verses; he loved literature and encouraged learning; he founded schools and universities; he promoted distinguished men; he spoke, with equal facility, Latin, Italian, German, French, Greek, and Arabic; he had the intellectual suppleness and finesse peculiar to the men of the south, the art of pleasing, a taste for philosophy, and great independence of opinion, with a leaning to infidelity; hence he is accused of having written a book against the three revelations of Moses, Jesus, and Mohammed, entitled De Tribus Impostoribus, which no one has ever seen, and which perhaps never existed. His want of faith in the sacred character of the Roman church, and the sanctity of popes, is less doubtful; he was suspicious of them, and he employed all his address to defend himself against their enterprises. Honorius III, desirous of engaging him to recover the Holy Land from the Saracens, made him, in 1225, marry Yolande de Lusignan, heiress of the kingdom of Jerusalem; after which, Honorius and his successor Gregory IX pressed him to pass into Palestine. A malady stopped him, in 1227, just as he was about to depart; the pope, to punish him for this delay, excommunicated him. He still pursued him with his anathema when he went to the Holy Land the year following, and haughtily testified his indignation, because Frederick, in the year 1229, recovered Jerusalem from the hands of the sultan by treaty, rather than exterminate the infidels with the sword.