Battle of Montaperti

Battle of Montaperti
Part of Guelphs and Ghibellines
Date September 4, 1260[1]
Location Arbia torrent near Montaperti castle[2]
(Castelnuovo Berardenga, Tuscany)
Result Decisive Ghibelline victory[1]
Belligerents
Ghibellines:[3][4][5]
Siena,Tuscan Ghibellines
Knights of King Manfred		 Guelphs:[3][4][5]
Florence,Tuscan Guelphs
Perugia and Orvieto
Commanders and leaders
Podestà Troghisio
Giordano d'Anglano
[6][7][8]		 Podestà Rangoni
Monaldo Monaldeschi
[6][7][8]
Strength
17,000 troops[6][7][9] 33,000 troops[4][6][7]
Casualties and losses
600 killed[10]
400 wounded[10]		 2,500 killed[4][7][11]
1,500 captured[4][7][11]
 
Crema - Milan - Legnano – Rudiano - Cortenuova – Brescia – Faenza – Viterbo – Parma – Fossalta – Cingoli – Montebruno – Cassano – Montaperti – Benevento – Tagliacozzo – Colle Val d'Elsa – Roccavione – Desio – Pieve al Toppo – Campaldino – Altopascio – Zappolino – Gamenario

The Battle of Montaperti was fought on September 4, 1260, between Florence and Siena in Tuscany as part of the conflict between the Guelphs and Ghibellines. It gained notoriety for an act of treachery that turned the tide of the battle, which was immortalised by Dante Alighieri in his epic poem Divine Comedy.

Contents

Prelude

The Guelphs and Ghibellines were factions at least nominally supporting the Papacy and the Holy Roman Empire respectively in Italy during the 12th and 13th centuries; in practice, the divide between these factions often had more to do with local rivalries than with the hostility between papacy and empire.

In the middle of the 13th century, the Guelphs held sway in Florence whilst the Ghibellines controlled Siena. In 1258, the Guelphs succeeded in expelling from Florence the last of the Ghibellines with any real power; they followed this with the murder of Tesauro Beccharia, Abbot of Vallombrosa, who was accused of plotting the return of the Ghibellines.

The feud came to a head two years later when the Florentines, supported by their allies from around Tuscany (Bologna, Prato, Lucca, Orvieto, San Gimignano, San Miniato, Volterra and Colle Val d'Elsa), moved an army of some 35,000 men towards Siena. The Sienese called for help from King Manfred of Sicily, who provided a contingent of German mercenary heavy cavalry. The Sienese forces were led by Farinata degli Uberti, an exiled Florentine Ghibelline. Even with these reinforcements, though, they could only raise an army of 20,000.

Battle

The two armies met at the hill of Montaperti, outside Siena, on the morning of September 4; at the head of the Sienese army was the formidable band of German mercenary cavalry. The battle raged all day, but despite their superior numbers, the Florentines were unable to make headway against the determined Sienese. As evening approached and the Florentines exhausted themselves on their opponent's defensive lines, the Sienese forces launched their counterattack, led by the Count of Arras.

Though seemingly reckless, the Sienese were confident in counterattacking with such a significant numerical disadvantage because their charge was a signal to a member of the Florentine army, Bocca degli Abati. Although Bocca fought for Florence alongside the Guelphs, he was at heart a Ghibelline.

At the sign of the counterattack he made his way across the Florentine lines towards the standard-bearer of the Florentine army and hacked off his hand, causing the Florentine flag to fall. In the military climate of the day, the standard was all important—troops did not use uniforms, so the standard served as a way of knowing where the troop leader was and that he was still safe and in command—so the loss of their standard caused the Florentine army to panic.

Seizing this opportunity within the confusion, hundreds of Florentine Ghibellines attacked their Guelph compatriots as the main Sienese army charged, and the Florentines were routed, pursued by their enemies as they fled. It is estimated that some 10,000 men died on the Guelph side.

After the battle, the German soldiers in the Sienese army used part of their pay to found the Church of San Giorgio in Pantaneto—the Germans had called on Saint George as their battle-cry during the battle.[12]

Depiction in the Divine Comedy

Dante studied under Florence's Chancellor Brunetto Latini, who was himself away from the battle scene, on embassy in Castile seeking help for Guelph Florence from Alfonso X el Sabio. Dante would have learned of the battle, its preparations (documented by Latini in the Libro di Montaperti), strategies and treachery, as well as those of the Battles of Benevento and Tagliacozzo, from the Chancellor,[13] using material also to be gleaned later by Giovanni Villani, the Florentine merchant and historian. As a result Dante reserved a place in the ninth circle of Hell for the traitor Bocca degli Abati in his Divine Comedy:

When someone yelled: "What the devil's eating you,
Bocca? Isn't it enough to chatter away
With your jaws? Do you have to bark too?"
"So!" I exclaimed. "Now there's no need for you to say
Anything, you wicked traitor! Now I can expose
The shameful truth about you to the light of day!"

The Ghibelline commander Farinata degli Uberti is also consigned to Dante's hell, not for his conduct in the battle, but for his alleged heretical adherence to the philosophy of Epicurus.

See also

Sources

  1. ^ a b Gebrüder Reichenbach (1841). Allgemeines deutsches Conversations-Lexicon: Vol.10. Leipzig. 
  2. ^ Kopisch, August (1842). Die Göttliche komödie des Dante Alighieri. Berlin. 
  3. ^ a b Johannes Fried & Rudolf Schieffer (2007). Deutsches Archiv für Erforschung des Mittelalters. Cologne. 
  4. ^ a b c d e Leo, Heinrich (1830). Geschichte der italienischen Staaten: Vom Jahre 1268 - 1492. Hamburg. 
  5. ^ a b Brockhaus (1838). Blätter für literarische Unterhaltung: Vol.2. Leipzig. 
  6. ^ a b c d Busk, Mrs. William (1856). Mediæval popes, emperors, kings, and crusaders: Vol.4. London. 
  7. ^ a b c d e f von Raumer, Friedrich (1824). Geschichte der Hohenstaufen und ihrer Zeit: Vol.4. Leipzig. 
  8. ^ a b Damberger, Joseph Ferdinand (1857). Synchronistische Geschichte der Kirche und der Welt im Mittelalter: Vol.10. Regensburg. 
  9. ^ Lau, Dr. Thaddäus (1856). Der Untergang der Hohenstaufen. Hamburg. 
  10. ^ a b Villari, Pasquale (1905). I primi due secoli della storia di Firenze. Florence. 
  11. ^ a b Trollope, Thomas Adolphus (1865). A history of the commonwealth of Florence: Vol.1. London. 
  12. ^ Parsons, Gerald (2004), Siena, Civil Religion, and the Sienese, Burlington, VT: Ashgate Press, p. 21, ISBN 0754615162 .
  13. ^ Julia Bolton Holloway, Twice-Told Tales: Brunetto Latino and Dante Alighieri

External links