Baglioni family

“ Grifonetto's wealth, the splendid palace in which he lived with his lovely mother and Zenobia Sforza, his beautiful wife, helped to make him, young though he was, the most powerful member of the family. He and his wife dearly loved each other, and the chronicler says, "No wonder, for they were as beautiful as angels." But for evil counsellors, and the restless ambition of the Baglioni, this state of affairs might have lasted. Three of the evil and disappointed relatives clung to Grifonetto like limpets ”

“ The conquering Roman has left his sign-manual everywhere, but one is so used to him in Italy that the scantier records of later ages interest us more here. Like every other old Italian town, Perugia had its great family, the Baglioni, who lorded it over the place, sometimes harshly and cruelly enough, sometimes generously and splendidly—protectors of popular rights and patrons of art and letters. ”

“ Within the family one man was recognized as head; but deep and secret jealousy prevailed among the members of the different branches. Opposed to the Baglioni stood another aristocratic party, led by the family of the Oddi. In 1487 the city was turned into a camp, and the houses of the leading citizens swarmed with bravos; scenes of violence were of daily occurrence. At the burial of a German student, who had been assassinated, two colleges took arms against one another; sometimes the bravos of the different houses even joined battle in the public square. ”

“ The opponents of the Baglioni were partly destroyed, partly scattered in terror, and were henceforth incapable of another enterprise of the kind. After a time a partial reconciliation took place, and some of the exiles were allowed to return. But Perugia became none the safer or more tranquil: the inward discord of the ruling family broke out in frightful excesses. An opposition was formed against Guido and Ridolfo and their sons Gianpaolo, Simonetto, Astorre, Gismondo, Gentile, Marcantonio and others, by two great-nephews, Grifone and Carlo Barciglia ”

“ She put Baglioni's antidote to her lips; and, at the same moment, the figure of Rappaccini emerged from the portal and came slowly towards the marble fountain. As he drew near, the pale man of science seemed to gaze with a triumphant expression at the beautiful youth and maiden, as might an artist who should spend his life in achieving a picture or a group of statuary and finally be satisfied with his success. ”

“ Rappaccini!” whispered the professor when the stranger had passed. “Has he ever seen your face before?”
“Not that I know,” answered Giovanni, starting at the name.
“He HAS seen you! he must have seen you!” said Baglioni, hastily. “For some purpose or other, this man of science is making a study of you. I know that look of his! It is the same that coldly illuminates his face as he bends over a bird, a mouse, or a butterfly, which, in pursuance of some experiment, he has killed by the perfume of a flower; a look as deep as Nature itself, but without Nature’s warmth of love. ”

“ Bestow the vase and the precious liquid within it on your Beatrice, and hopefully await the result."
Baglioni laid a small exquisitely-wrought silver phial on the table and withdrew, leaving what he had said to produce its effects upon the young man's mind.
"We will thwart Rappaccini yet," thought he, chuckling to himself, as he descended the stairs. "But let us confess the truth of him: he is a wonderful man—a wonderful man indeed—a vile empiric, however, in his practise, and therefore not to be tolerated by those who respect the good old rules of the medical profession." ”

“ Domestic furies, like the revel descried by Cassandra above the palace of Mycenæ, seem to take possession of the fated house; and the doom which has fallen on them is worked out with pitiless exactitude to the last generation. In 1495 the heads of the Casa Baglioni were two brothers, Guido and Ridolfo, who had a numerous progeny of heroic sons. From Guido sprang Astorre, Adriano—called for his great strength Morgante—Gismondo, Marcantonio, and Gentile. Ridolfo owned Troilo, Gianpaolo, and Simonetto. ”

“ From the 121 balconies and turrets of these palaces, swarming with their bravi, they surveyed the splendid land that felt their force—a land which, even in midsummer, from sunrise to sunset keeps the light of day upon its up-turned face. And from this eyrie they issued forth to prey upon the plain, or to take their lust of love or blood within the city streets. The Baglioni spent but short time in the amusements of peace. From father to son they were warriors, and we have records of few Italian houses, except perhaps the Malatesti of Rimini, who equalled them in hardihood and fierceness. ”

“ Giovanni groaned and hid his face
"Her father," continued Baglioni, "was not restrained by natural affection from offering up his child in this horrible manner as the victim of his insane zeal for science; for, let us do him justice, he is as true a man of science as ever distilled his own heart in an alembic. What, then, will be your fate? Beyond a doubt you are selected as the material of some new experiment. Perhaps the result is to be death; perhaps a fate more awful still. Rappaccini, with what he calls the interest of science before his eyes, will hesitate at nothing." ”

“ And if a man were in prison for his head, he had no reason to fear death, provided he had some interest with a noble.' Yet the same Matarazzo in another place finds it in his heart to say: [82] 'Though the city suffered great pains for these nobles, yet the illustrious house of Baglioni brought her honour throughout Italy, by reason of the great dignity and splendour of that house, and of their pomp and name. Wherefore through them our city was often set above the rest, and notably above the commonwealths of Florence and Siena.' Pride feels no pain. ”

“ Endeavoring to recover himself, he stared forth wildly from his inner world into the outer one, and spoke like a man in a dream:
"Yes; I am Giovanni Guasconti. You are Professor Pietro Baglioni. Now let me pass."
"Not yet—not yet, Signor Giovanni Guasconti," said the professor, smiling, but at the same time scrutinizing the youth with an earnest glance. "What! Did I grow up side by side with your father, and shall his son pass me like a stranger in these old streets of Padua? Stand still, Signor Giovanni, for we must have a word or two before we part." ”

“ After killing the Papal legate, Cinzio Filonardi, in 1534, he was dislodged four years afterwards, when Paul III. took final possession of the place as an appanage of the Church, razed the houses of the Baglioni to the ground, and built upon their site the Rocca Paolina. This fortress bore an inscription: 'Ad coercendam Perusinorum audaciam.' The city was given over to the rapacity of the abominable Pier Luigi Farnese, and so bad was this tyranny of priests and bastards, that, strange to say, the Perugians regretted the troublous times of the Baglioni. ”

“ It was in vain that from time to time the people rose against them, massacring Pandolfo Baglioni on the public square in 1393, and joining with Ridolfo and Braccio of the dominant house to assassinate another Pandolfo with his son Niccolo in 1460. The more they were cut down, the more they flourished. The wealth they derived from their lordships in the duchy of Spoleto and the Umbrian hill-cities, and the treasures they accumulated in the service of the Italian republics, made them omnipotent in their native town. ”

“ Often and often have those steps of the Duomo run with blood of Baglioni, Oddi, Arcipreti, and La Staffa. Once the whole church had to be washed with wine and blessed anew before the rites of Christianity could be resumed in its desecrated aisles. It was here that within the space of two days, in 1500, the catafalque was raised for the murdered Astorre, and for his traitorous cousin Grifonetto Baglioni. Here, too, if more ancient tradition does not err, were stretched the corpses of twenty-seven members of the same great house at the end of one of their grim combats. ”

“ The Baglioni were chiefly lodged in houses on or near the Porta Marzia; Astorre and his bride, on the night of the murder, were lodged in the beautiful palace of Grifonetto, which was the wonder of Perugia, and always pointed out to strangers as a marvel of magnificence both inside and out. Among his other treasures, Grifonetto possessed a lion; Astorre and Gianpaolo, the sons of Guido and Ridolfo Baglione, each owned one of the royal beasts, and their fearful roaring at night struck terror to the hearts of belated Perugians on their way home. ”

“ This was one of those duels to the death, like that of the Visconti with the Torrensi of Milan, on which the fate of so many Italian cities in the middle ages hung. The nobles fought; the townsfolk assisted like a Greek chorus, sharing the passions of the actors, but contributing little to the 120 catastrophe. The piazza was the theatre on which the tragedy was played. In this contest the Baglioni proved the stronger, and began to sway the state of Perugia after the irregular fashion of Italian despots. ”

“ The Oddi, mad with fury, rush all armed to the piazza, striking at every Baglioni adherent whom they meet upon their way. The Baglioni are not slow to appear, as ready for the fight as anybody. The shops are closed, the citizens arm themselves, a procession wending its way to the Duomo is thrown into utter disorder, and even the women thrust their heads out of the windows and{55} throw down jugs and tiles and pitchers into the street below. The Bishop, the Priori, and the learned doctors of the law leave their houses and exhort the nobles to lay down their arms ”

“ The nobles at this period were left unhindered to brawl as they pleased. The Baglioni, a race of men so renowned for crime, strength, bravery, and beauty, that they recall the heroes of the Iliad, and one wonders whether the old pagans were not better men than those so-called Christians, were always at war with the Oddi, till at last they worsted their rivals, and drove them out of Perugia; then they fell out among themselves. During their last struggle with the Oddi they took possession of the cathedral and fortified it. ”

“ The radiant beings who tune their citherns on the clouds of Paradise, or scatter roses for elect souls, could not live and breathe in the fiery atmosphere of sensuous passions to which the Baglioni were habituated. A grave and solemn sense of beauty animates these fair male beings, clothed in voluminous drapery, with youthful faces and still earnest eyes. Their melody, like that of Milton, is severe. Nor are Signorelli's angelic beings of one uniform type like the angels of Fra Angelico. ”

“ To Beatrice,—so radically had her earthly part been wrought upon by Rappaccini’s skill,—as poison had been life, so the powerful antidote was death; and thus the poor victim of man’s ingenuity and of thwarted nature, and of the fatality that attends all such efforts of perverted wisdom, perished there, at the feet of her father and Giovanni. Just at that moment Professor Pietro Baglioni looked forth from the window, and called loudly, in a tone of triumph mixed with horror, to the thunderstricken man of science, “Rappaccini! ”

“ As they ascended from the vast plain of Umbria, so leafless, grey and desolate under that leaden wintry sky, they perceived through a gap in the hills the cluster of little townships and hamlets, on the slopes and in the eastern valley, which formed the territory and dominion of Solignola. These lay practically without defences, and they must fall an easy prey to the Duke. But Baglioni knew that the fierce old Count was not the man to allow any such considerations to weaken his resolve to resist the Borgia, and to that resolve Gianpaolo hoped to spur him. ”

“ Gianpaolo himself acquired the highest reputation throughout Italy for his courage and sagacity both as a general and a governor.”
Gianpaolo is the last member of the Baglioni brood who succeeded in ruling over his native city, maintaining the despotic traditions of his predecessors by a system of unconscionable brutality. The personality of this tyrant is strongly brought forward in Italian histories. Frolliere gives the following account of the fascination of the outward man:
“Gianpaolo during his life-time was the favoured one of{68} Heaven and of fortune. ”

“ When the Florentines rose against the tyrant, Baglioni fled and took refuge with the Albizzi while the people sacked the palace, burst open the prisons, made a bonfire of all the archives and carried off everything that was portable, even the windows. Six citizens were elected to govern the city in the place of the Podestà, and took up their abode in the palace. ”

“ Shall a mere word set up a barrier for grown men?” demanded the fierce Baglioni.
“It would not for one woman that I know of,” said the clear boyish voice of Monna Panthasilea, and so drew upon herself, with those first words she had ventured to utter in that council, the gaze of all. There was a feverish light in her dark eyes, a feverish glow in her fair cheeks. Meeting their glances she addressed them: “What my Lord Gianpaolo has said is true. While Cesare Borgia lives there is no peace for middle Italy. ”

“ But Guasconti, finding Baglioni's pertinacity intolerable, here broke away, and was gone before the professor could again seize his arm. He looked after the young man intently, and shook his head.
"This must not be," said Raglioni to himself. "The youth Is the son of my old friend, and shall not come to any harm from which the arcana of medical science can preserve him. Besides, it is too insufferable an impertinence in Rappaccini thus to snatch the lad out of my own hands, as I may say, and make use of him for his infernal experiments. ”