MADAM,
ONE of your correspondents having given you a most entertaining account of the fair and unfortunate Bianca Capello, give me leave to offer at your shrine, some curious anecdotes of an Italian hero, known by the name of Castruccio Castracani. I shall draw my materials from Machiavel. They begin, I believe, with a mixture of truth and romance: Machiavel never keeping strictly in the road of truth, when by going a little on one side of it, he could embellish the history of his country. In the main, the facts are true.
In the city of Lucca, capital of the little republic of that name, Dianora Castracani, an unmarried sister of Antonio Castracani, one of the prebends of the cathedral of Lucca, going one morning into her garden, to gather herbs, found secreted among some cabbages an infant boy, who at her approach held out its helpless little hands, and cried, as wanting assistance. Dianora was moved at the sight; she took up the child, and carried him into her brother’s house. The prebend, no less humane than his sister, approved of what she had done, and resolving to preserve, nourish, and adopt this foundling, immediately gave the child baptism, by the name of Castruccio.
Antonio and Dianora performed their different parts with equal care and attention, in the culture of this young sapling, which Antonio intended to plant, in a proper season, under the shade of the church. Fate, and Castruccio’s own inclinations, intended him for a more open situation. At the age of fourteen, arms were his exercise, and books on military subjects his study. The boy had discovered so many feats of courage among his play-fellows, and such an unwearied attention to all the exercises in which he saw the soldiers employed, that he had attracted the particular observation of Francisco Guinigi, a gentleman of great esteem and authority; head of that party distinguished in Lucca, by the title of the Ghibellins. Guinigi sent for the boy, and, after having exactly learnt his story, and education, very generously offered to place him, without any expence to himself or friends, in the army. Castruccio, with great eagerness, chose to mount a horse, rather than ascend a pulpit: he quitted the good priest Antonio Castracani, with all the decency of gratitude, and enlisted into the Ghibellian troops, with all the raptures of an Achilles. His person, his manners, and particularly his modesty, soon became extremely attractive. He was not only agreeable to the family of Guinigi, but to the whole people of Lucca. He had scarce been three years in the army, when, in consequence of a treaty between the Lucchese and the Pavians, the Guelfs of Pavia applied to the Ghibellins of Lucca for assistance, which was granted by the latter, notwithstanding former antipathies, the Guelfs and Ghibellines having been long at variance. Francisco Guinigi, was appointed with the number of auxiliary troops in favour of the Pavians. Among these squadrons marched Castruccio, then only eighteen years old: he distinguished himself in so remarkable a manner, and reflected such glory and success upon his countrymen, that at his return to Lucca, he was received with the most unanimous applause, and rewarded with honours seldom or ever bestowed upon so young an officer. He was raised in the army and in the state, to a rank equal with Uguccione della Fuggivola: even his personal losses became to him fresh acquisitions of power; his great patron and benefactor, Francisco Guinigi died, and left Castruccio tutor and sole director of the education and fortune of his only son Pagolo Guinigi. A trust of such importance still exalted the character of Castruccio, especially as his intentions of discharging it with honour and fidelity appeared in every step of his life.
After the death of Francisco Guinigi, whose authority had been incontestably great, Georgio Opizi attempted to grasp the same same degree of power which Francisco had enjoyed in Lucca: he was the head of a numerous family, all of whom were Guelfs. Uguccione, jealous of the Opizi, and most especially of Georgio, was advised by Castruccio, to destroy the whole race at once. The manner of putting his scheme into execution was performed with equal secrecy and dispatch. Castruccio remained at Lucca, while Uguccione went to his government at Pisa; but soon returned in the night time unsuspected to the gates of Lucca, at the head of an army of Ghibellins, whom he had brought from Pisa.
Castruccio was ready at the time appointed to open the gates, and in the slaughter of a few hours, the entire race of the Opizi, and great numbers of the chief Guelfs, were put to the sword. Not one of the Opizi survived; but, amidst the confusion and obscurity of the night, about an hundred of the Guelf families escaped, some of whom took refuge in Florence, others in Pistoia.
To this massacre, for it will bear no softer a denomination, succeeded La Battaglia de Monticatini, the battle fought upon the banks of the Nievole. Uguccione was hindered by illness from being personally present in the battle: one of his sons was killed, Castruccio was wounded, and three hundred of the Lucchese army were left dead upon the field.
Uguccione, naturally jealous, was now grown as uneasy at the established power of Castruccio Castracani as he had been at the aspiring power of Georgio Opizi. He saw the repeated victories of so young a general with envy. He acquiesced to councils, and pursued measures, which he wished rather to have given, than to have heard. He had been taught by Castruccio himself, that death was the only sure antidote against a rival. Morta la Serpe, spento it veleno. ‘The viper killed, the poison evaporates.’ In pursuance of this maxim, he sent a letter to his son, Neri Uguccione, to invite Castruccio to supper, and there, in defiance of all laws of hospitality and honour, to take an opportunity to murder him. Castruccio was invited; accepted the invitation, and in the midst of the festivity was manacled and confined as a prisoner, but not murdered. Neri Uguccione rightly judged that the forfeiture of his own life would be inherent to the destruction of so popular a man as Castruccio. The father, less considerate and more envious, was resolved to perfect the bloody work, which his son was unwilling to perform. He came to Lucca, with a considerable number of soldiers for that purpose. At his arrival, the whole people of Lucca rose in arms, delivered Castruccio from his imprisonment, and soon drove Uguccione out of Tuscany: he took refuge in Lombardy, where some years afterwards he died in little esteem, and extremely poor.
Uguccione being removed, the whole field of honorary dignities lay open to Castruccio: he was solemnly elected prince of Lucca, and lord of Pisa: he was scarce in possession of those titles, when Frederic of Austria came into Italy, where he was received as emperor; and in a personal interview with Castruccio, appointed him his lieutenant in Tuscany.
Castruccio, equally courted by Tuscans, Lombardians, and Guibellins, entertained hopes within his own breast, of becoming entire master of the whole kingdom of Tuscany. In pursuance of such intentions, he resolved to seize upon Florence; but while he was taking proper measures to fulfil these revolutions, he was called back to Lucca, on account of a conspiracy against him, concerted by the family of Poggio.
The several branches of the house of Poggio thought their merits ill rewarded by Castruccio, to whose sovereignty they had zealously contributed. Catching mutually fire from each other’s indignation, they took advantage of their prince’s absence, killed his lieutenant, and were warmly inciting the whole state of Lucca to rebel, when Stefano Poggio, an old man of great worth and weight in his family, who had kept himself free even from all thoughts of a conspiracy, stopped any farther mischief, and waited upon Castruccio, to ask his pardon for what had already past. Castruccio received him without any outward shew of resentment; and having placed soldiers upon whom he might depend, in every corner of the city, he appointed a day when Stefano Poggio at the head of his relations should come to receive an act of grace. The harmless unsuspicious old man, being deceived himself, deceived all his relations, and attended with his whole family at the day and hour appointed. They were admitted to Castruccio: they were sent by his immediate orders to prison; and soon afterwards, without any respect to age, or regard to honour, they were every one of them put to death.
More effectually to secure himself in a government, which he found capable of entertaining plots against him, Castruccio, under various pretences, destroyed either the life or fortune of every individual Lucchese, whom he suspected as his personal enemy; and having pulled down many of their castles, he turned the materials to his own service, and built a fortress at Lucca in a situation to command and terrify the inhabitants. As a farther security of his dominions, he made a league of friendship with the Florentines for two years, and then turned his thoughts towards Pistoia, in which city he knew the old party-divisions, distinguished by the names of Bianci and Neri, were not totally extinguished. With great accuteness he foresaw the consequences that must follow from those divisions, and found himself courted by both parties, separately and secretly from each other. He gave them both assurances of his protection. Bastianodi Possente was at the head of the Bianchi, Jacopo da Gia at the head of the Neri. To Jacopo he promised troops under his own conduct; to Bastiano he promised troops under the conduct of Pagolo Guinigi, whom he treated and loved as his son. The troops of both commanders marched different ways, and came into the town at different gates; but at the same time the Pistoians of each party received them as friends. Castruccio soon gave the signal, and while Guinigi cut in pieces the Bianchi, Castruccio himself slaughtered the Neri. Then, as conquerors, they seized the palace, put themselves in possession of the signory, quieted the populace, and made Pistoia their own.
Castruccio, by his continued victories, no matter how obtained, was become the idol of worship to all the states of Italy: he was entreated to come to Rome to pacify the people, who were ready to mutiny for want of provisions. Pope John the XXII. was, by the twenty seventh schism in the church, at that time driven to Avignon: and the emperor Lewis V. was in possession of the city of Rome. Castruccio hastened in person to the relief of the Romans, and sent thither great quantities of corn from Pisa: he calmed the mutiny, made himself acceptable to the emperor and the nobility, and was created a senator of Rome.
The Florentines foreseeing their danger, in the capture of a town so close to their territories as Pistoia, seized it to themselves, by the assistance and stratagems of several of the inhabitants, who were glad to be delivered from the present yoke of their servitude; and whom the Florentines, by the power of money and promises, had seduced to their own desires. Such an action was scarce justifiable, if the subsisting truce had been ratified to any other man less faithless, ambitious, or sanguinary than Castruccio: but he was to be looked upon as a wolf, and all the states of Italy as lambs destined to his voracity, unless they could find a shepherd for their own security. He hastened back from amidst his honours at Rome, and made preparations for a Florentine war. The successes of that war were various: sometimes the acquisitions were on one side, sometimes on the other; till in the year 1328, one great battle gave Castruccio a signal, but, in its consequence, a dear bought victory. As soon as the conquest was entirely compleated, by the loss of twenty thousand Florentines, and the flight of the rest, their whole army having consisted of thirty thousand foot and ten thousand horse, Castruccio placed himself in the gateway of the town of Fusechio, the head-quarters of his own residence, to review his troops at their return, and to take an opportunity of thanking the several soldiers and officers of his army, as they passed by him into the town. He was much heated and fatigued by the long and laborious combat; and whilst he staid in the passage of the gate, hot, and exposed to a very sharp nipping wind, he caught cold, and the next night a fever confined him to his bed. At first the symptoms were not dangerous, but the distemper increasing by degrees, quickly spread throughout his body, and beyond the limits of medicinal power. As soon as he found himself without the least hopes of recovery, he called Pagolo Guinigi to his bed side, and embracing him with the composure of a hero, and the affection of a father, made a very moving speech, and took a last melancholy farewell of his pupil, who had been the constant object of his care. Castruccio died September 3, 1328. No comments are requisite to illustrate the life of such a man: his actions are a continual comment upon themselves: they represent him an active, bloody, remorseless soldier; not unsusceptible to the calls of gratitude and friendship, but vindictive to a degree that makes human nature almost tremble at his name.
I am, Madam,
Your Humble Servant,
E. F.