DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.63447#0300
284
THE HISTORICAL PAST OF ITALY.
tions of the Courts of Rome and Arragon against feudal
revolts.
The disaffected barons therefore invited Otho into the
Kingdom of Naples ; and the latter, under pretext of
receiving the crown at Rome from the Pope, crossed the
Alps ; and, after an interval of twelve years, the north of
Italy once more saw the Imperial banners. Commerce,
manufactures, and learning had made great progress
during that time; but the higher national feelings de-
veloped in the league of Ponticla seemed for the moment
erased from recollection.
All the fury and, we must add, the folly, of intestinal
jealousies, factions, feuds, and rivalries were not only alive
again in Italy, but, as it were, conducted on a more mature
system, as if persecutions and private feuds were to grow
in intensity with the increasing education of the people.
Materially flourishing, the most wealthy cities, on the
merest excuses, would rise in tumult, and slay or exile,
without any form of trial, such of their citizens as the
caprice of the moment exposed to their wrath. The most
careful consideration of the records left to us cannot give
us any clue to the feelings that guided these frantic
mobs. It is quite certain many citizens were slain or
ruined and exiled for virtues rather than for crimes ; and
that superior wealth and beneficence proved but too often
the ruin of their possessors. The result was that fully
one-third of the citizens of every city were exiles to
other cities; and that numbers of Italians (happily
certainly for civilization) were driven beyond the Alps,
and carried with them the books and traditions and the
technical appliances of many valuable arts. Many
founded families, the descendants of which survive, and
bear still the same arms as their ancestors.
The rival factions of “Guelphs” and “Ghibellines”
had crossed the Alps, even retaining their names.
Vincenza, Ferrara, and Padua, all very flourishing cities
of that date (1209), were distracted and ensanguined by
their brawls. Some cities had selected a lord or chief. Fer-
rara had voluntarily submitted to Azzo d’Este, the Guelph.
THE HISTORICAL PAST OF ITALY.
tions of the Courts of Rome and Arragon against feudal
revolts.
The disaffected barons therefore invited Otho into the
Kingdom of Naples ; and the latter, under pretext of
receiving the crown at Rome from the Pope, crossed the
Alps ; and, after an interval of twelve years, the north of
Italy once more saw the Imperial banners. Commerce,
manufactures, and learning had made great progress
during that time; but the higher national feelings de-
veloped in the league of Ponticla seemed for the moment
erased from recollection.
All the fury and, we must add, the folly, of intestinal
jealousies, factions, feuds, and rivalries were not only alive
again in Italy, but, as it were, conducted on a more mature
system, as if persecutions and private feuds were to grow
in intensity with the increasing education of the people.
Materially flourishing, the most wealthy cities, on the
merest excuses, would rise in tumult, and slay or exile,
without any form of trial, such of their citizens as the
caprice of the moment exposed to their wrath. The most
careful consideration of the records left to us cannot give
us any clue to the feelings that guided these frantic
mobs. It is quite certain many citizens were slain or
ruined and exiled for virtues rather than for crimes ; and
that superior wealth and beneficence proved but too often
the ruin of their possessors. The result was that fully
one-third of the citizens of every city were exiles to
other cities; and that numbers of Italians (happily
certainly for civilization) were driven beyond the Alps,
and carried with them the books and traditions and the
technical appliances of many valuable arts. Many
founded families, the descendants of which survive, and
bear still the same arms as their ancestors.
The rival factions of “Guelphs” and “Ghibellines”
had crossed the Alps, even retaining their names.
Vincenza, Ferrara, and Padua, all very flourishing cities
of that date (1209), were distracted and ensanguined by
their brawls. Some cities had selected a lord or chief. Fer-
rara had voluntarily submitted to Azzo d’Este, the Guelph.