Toynbee "Guidi, Conti"

The following account of the Conti Guidi is given by C. S. Latham [Translation of Dante's Eleven Letters (Boston, 1892), pp. 38 ff.]

During the eleventh, twelfth and thirteenth centuries the Guidi were certainly one of the richest and most powerful families of Italy. They gradually extended their influence in every direction from their original possessions in the higher valleys of the Apennines, purchasing or conquering one castle after another, until as Villani says ({Villani iv. 1}), they were lords of nearly the whole of Romagna. In the Casentino, which is entirely watered by the Arno, they established their principal seats, in the castles of Poppi, Romena, and Porciano; several other members of the family settled on the other side of the mountains, in the strongholds of Bagno and Montegranelli, to which vast territories, watered by the Savio, were tributary. They also possessed strong castles in the country of Dovadola and Modigliana, through which flows the stream which takes its rise near San Godenzo, and from its slow and placid course is called at first Acquacheta, but in the valley of the Badia di San Benedetto in Alpe, today almost destroyed, changes its name to Montone. They possessed this ample domain with the fullest authority, as the diplomas given to them by Emperors from Barbarossa to Charles IV, which speak of valuable services rendered by them, fully testify. Their castles and strongholds were innumerable, grand and solid in construction, as the frequent ruins still to be found in the Casentino, the Val di Sieve, and Romagna testify. The monasteries and many churches tbat they endowed also confirm the reputation of the family for extraordinary power and riches.

In the thirteenth century we find the Guidi occupying important positions, such as podestà, captain of the people, imperial or papal vicar, and sometimes as Church dignitaries, not only in the Romagnolese towns of Faenza, Cesena, and Forlì, but also in the Tuscan towns of Pistoja Arezzo, Pisa, and even Florence.

At first sight it seems astonishing that such power and influence could decay, but the fact is easily explained when we learn that, on account of their Lombard origin the Guidi divided their property equally among their male children, and observed no law of primogeniture; and also that they were surrounded by growing communes who were always searching for opportunities to increase their own territories at the expense of the bordering barons, and that Florence, Siena, Arezzo, Bologna, Faenza, Forlì, Ravenna, and many other places, made themselves strong by despoiling this and that count of his estates, now by force of arms, now by treaty. Florence even went so far as to make a law by which her citizens were prohibited from intermarrying with the Guidi on pain of a fine of four thousand lire, and which furtber declared that all the children of such a union would be considered illegitimate, and thus incapable of succeeding to the property of their parents.

Like almost all the Italian nobles of that time, who were principally of Lombard or German origin, the Guidi were for a long time loyal adherents of the Empire, not because of any attachment to the Empire as an institution, --an idea which their own ambitious schemes entirely precluded-- but because their frequent quarrels among themselves very often necessitated their calling on the Emperor for protection, who invariably took the part of the weak against the strong. As early as the latter part of the eleventh century, however, we find them closely allied with the great Countess Matilda of Tuscany, and hence siding with Gregory VII against Henry IV, and in the thirteenth century we find them, especially the Romena branch of the family, constantly shifting from side to side, now Guelf, now Ghibelline. . . .

Villani says in his chronicle ({Villani iv. I}, {Villani v. 37}) that the founder of the family, whom he calls Guido, came to Italy with the Emperor Otto III at the end of the tenth century, and was made Count Palatine of Tuscany, and rewarded with Modigliana in Romagna, but nevertheless the most remote notices of the family start with Tegrimo, Count Palatine of Tuscany, about whom little is known, except that he was a Lombard. He is mentioned in documents as early as 927, and owed the countship of Modigliana to his wife Engelrada, of the house of the Onesti in Ravenna. . . .Villani goes on to relate that the Guidi became lords of almost the whole of Romagna, with their capital at Ravenna, but that on account of their tyranny the people rose up and slew them, only one being saved, a child, called Guido, who was in Modigliana with his nurse, and who afterwards took the name of Bevisangue. But there can be no doubt that the child's real name was Tegrimo, and that he was named after his grandfather, the founder of the family. The name of Bevisangue was given to him because, when he revenged himself upon the slayers of his parents, his savage hatred caused him to lick their blood from his sword.

The descent of the Conti Guidi from the original Tegrimo down to the Guido Guerra who married 'the good Gualdrada' ([Inf. xvi. 37]), is shown in Table XXIV. Their subsequent descent from the Ravignani, referred to by Cacciaguida ([Par. xvi. 97-99]), was as follows: Guido Guerra IV, called also Guido Vecchio, married Gualdrada, daughter of Bellincion Berti de' Ravignani, by whom he had five sons and two daughters [Gualdrada: Bellincion Berti]. One of these sons, Ruggero, died in Sicily in 1225; from the other four, Tegrimo, Aghinolfo, Guido, and Marcovaldo, descended the four different branches of the Guido family, which are distinguished bv the names of their respective estates. From Tegrimo descended the Counts of Modigliana and Porciano, known as the Porciano line; from Aghinolfo, the Counts of Romena; from Guido, those of Bagno and Battifolle, known as the Bagno line; and from Marcovaldo, those of Dovadola. [Table XXIV a.: Table XXIV b.: Table XXIV c.: Table XXIV d.]

[See K. Witte, 'Dante und die Grafen Guidi', in Dante-Forschungen (Heilbronn, 1869), ii, pp. 194-236; and P. Santini, 'Sui fiorentini "che fur si degni"', SD, vi (1923), 25-44.]

Villani's account of the descent of the Conti Guidi, which is somewhat confused, is as follows:

Al tempo di questo Otto [terzo] assai de' suoi baroni rimasono signori in Toscana e in Lombardia. Intra gli altri fu il cominciamento de' conti Guidi, il quale il primo ebbe nome Guido, che 'l fece conte Palatino, e diegli il contado di Modigliana in Romagna; e poi i suoi discendenti furono quasi signori di tutta Romagna, infino che furono cacciati di Ravenna, e tutti morti dai popolo di Ravenna per loro oltraggi, salvo uno picciolo fanciullo ch'ebbe nome Guido, soprannomato Sangue, per li suoi, che furono tutti in sangue morti; il quale poi per lo 'mperadore Otto quarto fu fatto signore in Casentino, e questi fu quelli che tolse per moglie in Firenze la contessa Gualdrada, figliuola che fu del buono messere Bellincione Berti de' Rovignani onorevole cittadino di Firenze. ({Villani iv. l.})

Negli anni di Cristo 1213 morì il conte Guido vecchio, del quale rimasono cinque figliuoli, ma l'uno morìo e lasciò reda della sua parte quelli ch'ebbono Poppi, perocchè di lui non rimasono figliuoli; poi de' quattro figliuoli sono discesi tutti i conti Guidi. Questo conte Guido, la sua progenia si dice che anticamente furono d'Alamagna grandi baroni, i quali passarono con Otto imperadore, il quale diede loro il contado di Modigliana in Romagna, e di là rimasono; e poi i loro discendenti per loro podere furono signori quasi di tutta Romagna, e faceano loro capo in Ravenna, ma per soperchi ch'elli usarono a' cittadini di loro donne, e d'altre tirannie, a romore di popolo furono cacciati in uno giorno, corsi, e morti in Ravenna, che nullo ne campò piccolo o grande se non uno picciolino fanciullo ch'avea nome Guido, il quale era a Modigliana a balia, il quale fu soprannomato Guido Besangue per lo molesto de' suoi.

. . .Questo Guido fu padre del detto conte Guido vecchio, onde poi tutti i conti Guidi sono discesi. Questo conte Guido vecchio prese per moglie la figliuola di messere Bellincione Berti de' Rovignani [di Firenze] . . . onde tutti i conti Guidi sono nati del detto conte e della detta donna in questo modo; che, come dice di sopra, ne rimasono quattro figluoli, che ne discesono rede; il primo ebbe nome Guiglielmo di cui nacque il conte Guido Novello e 'l conte Simone: questi furono ghibellini, ma per oltraggi che Guido Novello fece al conte Simone suo fratello per la parte del suo patrimonio , si fece guelfo e s'allegò co' guelfi di Firenze, e di questo Simone nacque il conte Guido da Battifolle: l'altro figliuolo ebbe nome Ruggeri, onde nacquero il conte Guido Guerra, e 'l conte Salvatico, e questi tennero parte guelfa: l'altro ebbe nome Guido da Romena, onde sono discesi quegli da Romena, gli qulali sono stati guelfi e ghibellini: l'altro fu il conte Tegrimo, onde sono quegli da Porciano, e sempre furono ghibellini. ({Villani v. 37.} )

[For further particulars and genealogical tables, see BSDI, vii (1899), 140-148.]