Toynbee "Bonturo"
Bonturo Dati, head of the popular party in Lucca at the beginning of cent. xiv; mentioned ironically by one of the devils in Bolgia 5 of Malebolge as being the only man in Lucca who was not a barrator (he having been in reality an 'archbarrator' as Benvenuto calls him), [Inf. xxi. 41]. [Barattieri.]

B. appears to have carried on his nefarious traffic on so large a scale that nearly all the offices in Lucca were manipulated by him. Benvenuto says that once, when he was on a mission to Boniface VIII, the pope, by way of remonstrance at some piece of double-dealing shook him by the arm, whereupon B. exclaimed: 'Holy Father, you have shaken the half of Lucca':

Bonturus fuit archibaratarius, qui sagaciter ducebat et versabat illud commune totum, et dabat officia quibus volebat; similiter excludebat quos volebat. Unde dum semel ivisset legatus ad papam Bonifacium, Bonifacius, magnus marescalcus hominum, qui cognoscebat laqueos eius, cepit eum per brachium, et vibravit. Cui ille respondit: tu quassasti dimidiam Lucam.

In 1314 his insolent reply to the demand of the Pisans for the restitution of the castle of Asciano, viz. that the Lucchese kept this castle as a mirror for the Pisan ladies ({Villani. vii. 122}), led to a fierce war between Pisa and Lucca, which terminated disastrously for the latter. The Lucchese in consequence expelled Bonturo from Lucca, and he was obliged to take refuge in Florence, where he died. The Pisans, after their triumph, wrote the following lines in blood upon the gate of Lucca in mockery of Bonturo:

Or ti specchia, Bontur Dati
Che i Lucchesi hai consigliati:
Lo die di San Frediano
Alle porte di Lucca fu il Pisano.

[See C. Minutoli, 'Gentucca e gli altri Lucchesi nominati nella Divina Commedia' in Dante e il suo secolo (Firenze, 1865), pp. 211-220.]

©Oxford University Press 1968. From A Dictionary of Proper Names and Notable Matters in the Works of Dante by Paget Toynbee (1968) by permission of Oxford University Press