Thursday, May 26, 2016

Bembo on Venetian Captains In Italian Wars: Bernardo Contarini, pt 1


Another life that Bembo highlights and mentions repeatedly through the period of the French invasion of Italy is that of Bernardo Contarini. In the spring of 1495 when the Venetian Senate decreed to make Francesco Gonzaga captain general, they also put this Contarini in charge of the stradiots [ii, 40]. These were special soldiers imported from Greece and Albania, hired mercenaries, and now with a local captain. Under orders from Gonzaga they were moved with his larger army west across the Po and north Italy, as the French had moved north from Pisa. Contarini is mentioned heroically throughout this period, again and again, in Bembo's history of Venice, as an example of bravery and loyalty.

Before the battle of Fornovo, Contarini was sent with 600 stradiots to be near the forces of Ludovico Sforza, the Duke of Milan, then outside Novara. Here, the forces of Milan and the stradiots under Contarini continually repulsed the French forces sallying out from the walls of the town. After Fornovo in July, and as more allied forces hostile to the French came to Novara, those French soldiers and cavalry still there retreated behind the city walls. All summer the combined allied forces assembled outside, brought a state of siege to the Duke of Orleans, the French king's brother and those (many thousands) that stayed with him [ii, 61].

As the siege wore on numerous parties tried to escape and messengers and other attendants tried to reach the French assemblage encamped near Asti. Time and again the forces of Contarini would intervene and cut them down.

Negotiations with the Duke of Milan at this time were especially fractious and suspect. Many had accepted the idea that the Duke was playing a double-game with both his allies (Venice and the pope) and the French. And this after the peace treaty was drawn up. Discussions came to such a head that when Contarini spoke to the proveditors in the field, he argued for a plan to assassinate the Duke. He said that when the Duke came for negotiations, that he would draw the daggers himself.

In one of those rare instances where Bembo gives quotes from his subject to further his narrative, he lets Contarini speak. It shows him as a man of action with an eye to consequences of his actions.
"Today, as usual, you will be holding discussions with Ludovico [the Duke] about matters of common concern. His captains will be with him, and you will have your captain-general and officers with you. The doors will be shut, and debate will ensue. I shall make as if to address him, but will then run him through with this dagger and kill him. That done, I know for sure that none of his captains will draw his sword -- which of them is not more timid than any woman? Which of them, one or two excepted, does not regard him with the utmost loathing? And those one or two will have gone to Charles [the French King] as peace envoys and will not be present. Ludovico's army will also surrender their standards to you once he is dead, if they realize that you will accept them, especially if some prospect of largesse is held out to them. And if that happens, his duchy too will be in your hands. In this way he will pay the penalty for his crimes as he deserves, while you have taken vengeance for the wrongs done to the Republic without cost, and so keep your reputation untarnished."  [ii,65]
The proveditors and their counsellors said this plan could be used only as a last resort and would have to see if there was another way for Ludovico to be 'brought to his senses by honorable means'. Word was sent back to the Heads of the Council in Venice, Bembo tells us, of Contarini's proposal, asking if they were agreeable, in the event that situations came to such a head. They wrote back saying such a course was 'not consonant with the dignity of the Republic'.

It was in relating this story that Bembo chose to tell the physical attributes of this captain.
"Contarini had a very tall, vigorous and strongly built physique. His brute strength was immense and almost unparalleled, his mind not only intelligent but capable of any great enterprise, so that you could be confident that he would deliver what he pronised. Though the proveditors grasped this, and competed with each other to praise him to the skies for not hesitating to take on such an important task for the common good, they decided to keep the plan as a last resort...." [ii, 66]
When the siege was lifted and peace concluded, Novara itself reverted to control by the Duke of Milan. The proveditors turned to pay off the various armies and mercenaries and the Council could return their focus to other things. In these days, when the Ottoman Sultan in Istanbul heard of what Bembo calls the success of Venice in forcing the King of France out of Italy, he sent them an 'extraordinarily fine horse' as congratulations. This the senators voted on and sent it to Bernardo Contarini as a gift. [iii, 17]

Contarini would continue to have many exploits against the French but still reach an untimely demise.
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from Pietro Bembo: History of Venice; edited and translated by Robert W Ulery, Jr.; in english and latin, The I Tatti Renaissance Library; The President and Fellows of Harvard College, USA 2007


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Henry Ryck: A Dutch Devotional Life from the Fifteenth Century

As an example of a slightly different life, away from the battlefields or the pulpits of famous churches, one in particular is highlighted here. His was a simpler life, that of the procurator of a certain sort of devotional school in Emmerich, and who was eulogized after his death in 1494. Emmerich (now in Germany), lying just north of the Rhine river (and before that great river splits on it's way through Dutch lands), was a thriving town in the late fifteenth century. There, a somewhat novel type of devotional clerical school was set up and run by one Henry Ryck. After he died of the plague in the early summer of 1494, a personalizing encomium was drafted for him, a praiseworthy bio to pass on as an example of a life well lived.

This life along with thirteen others was included in a tract written and then kept at this school, or house, what they themselves called a 'convict'. This school was not exactly a school, but it also was, and it was not exactly devotional, at least, according to traditional lines. But it was. It was not a member of any clerical sect nor did they make any special pleas for external authority when conducting themselves in religious or political matters. But these devotionals followed their own set of traditional practices in their own ways, just not at the direction of, or for, any established sect or set of orders. There were dozens of various kinds of these houses throughout the north and west of Europe in the 1400's and all stayed out of external trouble without following anyone else's rules. Or not exactly. They weren't all schools either.

In these excerpts from a life written around 1500, Henry Ryck is praised as industrious and kind, always joyful in work or winning adherents, yet remaining personally humble.
"In the year of our Lord 1494 Henry Ryck died, our beloved brother from Euskirchen, a town in the land of Julich. This brother was the first procurator of our house [called a 'convict'] for clerics and students.... He was a young man of a most lively nature, wonderfully agile and able in everything he chanced to take up and very intelligent and clear-headed for his years. He was received among us in all charity already in his early years, sent here by his brother, the venerable Nicholas Euskirchen, from the house of Lord Florens and the schools in Deventer." [p. 145]
The story of the origins of these houses, starting in Deventer by the late fourteenth century, and slowly spreading through the fifteenth century will come later. But this form of devotion came naturally to him, having been brought up that way. When the head of the bakery had to do errands in town, Henry was able to take up "... these responsibilities with alacrity and care."
"He set everything in order, adjusted his time to his work, and not only completed what was expected but did it all expeditiously and well. The tools, vessels, and places assigned to his offices were kept in order as well as clean and decorous. He was cheerful at work and kindly toward the brothers assigned to help him." 

Henry worked in the bakery and brewery and in "... turning over the grain laid out in the sun room." Wet with sweat he would "... simply wipe his face with his bare hand and stick to his work in all happiness and good cheer."

He was also studious. A regimen of prayer, sacred reading and "... other spiritual exercises", completely occupied him when he was away from external work and "... in his cell". He even compiled an 'exercise' that linked psalms 'sung to our Lady', to points all along the story of Christ's life, from birth to crucifixion.
"Though he had found none of these psalms so interpreted and used by the doctors of the church, it was not contrary to the faith and in my judgement it seemed well organized for simpler folk, good for avoiding wandering thoughts and loss of attention during prayer." [p.146]

In these houses a great deal of focus was placed on prayer and study. They also emphasized fearing God, the nature of good and evil, imitating the life of Jesus Christ, and prayer concerning the crucifixion of Christ. In time, in 1482, Henry was selected to run a new boy's school that the house had begun, near St Agnes, which was away from their current house in Emmerich. It was a great success by their standards.
"He took up such an amount of work and showed such diligence and care for the young men together with their needs and progress that without his most singular and extraordinary mixture of natures and complexions, he would surely have succumbed to the burden. In a short time clerics and youths from various lands, cities, and towns were streaming to him, and he alone was their procurator, their instructor, and their provider in all things." [p. 147]

There he also began certain clerical duties, like reading the hours and their supplements. But he was also a teacher with three different exercises daily, with examinations.  Later, Henry seemed intent on building projects, including walls and more houses. He had a way of recruiting youths to these houses, or even, when it seemed necessary, to take them away by boat when the plague came.

It was one of these times of plague that he didn't leave. He started showing symptoms of the plague in late May. But he kept working saying he didn't feel that bad. On the third day he began to show lesions on his skin and he retired to bed. It was on June 11, 1494 that he died.
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translated and edited by John Van Engen: Devotio Moderna, Basic Writings ; Classics of Western Spirituality, Paulist Press New York, 1988
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Wednesday, May 11, 2016

news earlier May 2016

It's spring here and I'd like to mention something of good cheer.
The City of London elected a new mayor with, it's been said, the greatest number of votes ever tallied for a candidate.

There continues to be more analysis and release of the so-called Panama Papers leaking information about shell companies hiding tax avoidance schemes. The original leaker gave some reasons for his actions.
The President of the US and the Prime Minister of England gave some proposals on what to do.
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But disasters seem to keep happening, again.


A huge fire in Alberta causes evacuation of thousands.

The US does have troops fighting extremists in Yemen.
The US state of Kansas budget problems gets deeper,
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But, just the other day, a former presidential advisor spoke to the comedian Jon Stewart at the University of Chicago. Jon seemed to sum up the tensions in American politics in short order.

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Bembo On Venetian Captains In Italian Wars: Antonio Grimani

After the siege of Novara was dropped and Milan occupied it (late 1495), after the French King and his retinue, as well as their auxiliaries and hangers-on, all returned over the Alps early in the winter, there still remained many pockets of French troops and factions throughout the Italian peninsula. The King of Naples, now Ferrandino, after feeling a bit more secure, duly made the trek to Venice in order to thank them for their efforts.  Pietro Bembo also tells us, it was in order to ask them to increase their efforts as much work remained to be done.

Cities and towns all across Italy would ask for help in the new year of 1496, take matters into their own hands, supply troops, victuals, stradiots and cavalry, in various efforts toward reclaiming locales that were previously taken by the French. These efforts, in what seemed to be a constant trouble and tumble of turbulence, required a vast host of varied skills, (not least) in decisive leadership out in the field. In his serial fashion, with the story of the fight for Pisan independence as just one example, Bembo again and again points out the Venetian successes, their leaders, the captains, their prizes, rewards and for some, their demise.

Examples of such locales in Bembo's telling seem to be nearly falling over themselves in capitulation to Aragon and sometimes Venetian nominal rule. A miscellany of towns fall before the eyes with the names of certain captains reappearing again as well. When the French on duty in Naples heard that their King had quit Italy, those stationed to protect Castel Capuano in that city asked permission to leave. These subsequently left in sixteen boats from Naples and retreated to the island of Megaride and Castell dell'Ovo on the edge of the city in the gulf of Naples. King Ferrandino left his current fleet at anchor just off Baiae a few miles west. When Capua, Aversa and Nola heard about this, they sent word they would return to being ruled by the House of Aragon. [iii,4]

Meanwhile on the eastern edge of Italy, Antonio Grimani had arrived in Apulia where Brindisi gave themselves up to this Venetian captain. Bembo tells us the locals there were 'happy to surrender', and asked him to send the flag of the Venetian Republic up the pole. Sometimes it wasn't so easy and there was a fight. In Apulia, Grimani waited for the Senate to send and receive word from their allies and the soveriegns in Spain as they were 'preparing a fleet there'. [iii,5] Then, Grimani received word to take the French out of Monopoli twenty-five miles up the coast from Brindisi.

Twenty galleys, a merchant ship with cannon, stadiots and cavalry were under Grimani's command, and one Pietro Bembo was one of his captains. [iii,6] After a couple of days with much fierce fighting (including Bembo getting shot by an iron ball), the town was taken and the city plundered. But to show his goodwill, for those days, Grimani sold various properties that were seized back to their owners, when they could be found, 'giving them plenty of time to pay'. [iii,7]

Leaving a certain Niccolo Corner as governor in Monopoli, and sending Alessandro de Pesaro to govern Polignano, Grimani himself went to relieve Manfredonia from occupation by the French. The people there had already fought back against the French occupiers and had driven them into their strongholds. Grimani told the people they should surrender to Ferrandino but, as Bembo tells us, they said they would rather surrender to Grimani. The French agreed to submit to protection under Grimani and left, with Federico, Ferrandino's uncle, assuming control. The French in Trani, midway between Manfredonia and Bari did the same. [iii,8]

When the Senate in Venice heard that Ferrandino had retaken Naples, they sent word to Grimani to stop taking French held towns. But, on request from Pope Alexander, they asked Grimani to send ships to Naples to help reassert control there. Struck with a gastric disorder in Manfredonia, Grimani got the ships ready and putting the proveditor Girolamo Contarini in charge, ordered them to sail to Naples. He himself left to recuperate in Corfu. [iii,9]

Meanwhile, Faenza had been petitioning the Senate for protection since the heir there was under age. Faenza, just west of Ravenna and northwest of Forli, lay on the heavily trafficked eastern route and felt very insecure beset by that season's exiles. Quickly, Bernardo Contarini went and routed the insurgents and left Domenico Trevisan there to support and protect the young Manfredi heir. [iii,19]
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from Pietro Bembo: History of Venice; edited and translated by Robert W Ulery, Jr.; in english and latin, The I Tatti Renaissance Library; The President and Fellows of Harvard College, USA 2007
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