Ugolino

Ugolino, COUNT, head of a family long dominant in Pisa, which backed the people against the nobles, and as Ghibellines were the irreconcilable enemies of the Visconti, who headed the Guelphs. The most famous of this family is Count Ugolino della Gherardesca, whose name and fate have been invested with undying interest by Dante. Having resolved to usurp supreme power over Pisa, he formed an alliance with Giovanni Visconti, the head of the Guelphic party. The plot was, however, discovered, and both Giovanni and Ugolino were banished from the city. The latter, uniting himself with the Florentines and the Lucchese, forced the Pisans in 1276 to restore to him his territories, of which he had been deprived. No sooner was he reinstated in his possessions than he began to devise anew ambitious schemes. The war of the Pisans with the Genoese afforded him the opportunity he desired. In the battle fought at the island of Malora, 6th August 1284, Ugolino, by treacherously abandoning the Pisans, occasioned the complete annihilation of their fleet, together with a loss of 11,000 prisoners. When the news of this disaster spread, the Florentines, the Lucchese, the Sienses, the Pistoians, and all the other enemies of the Pisan republic gathered together to destroy it, as the stronghold of the Ghibellines in Italy. Being thus brought to the brink of ruin, the Pisans had no other resource left than to throw themselves into the arms of him whose treachery had reduced them to such misery. From the time of his election he gave free scope to his vindictive, despotic nature, persecuting and banishing all who were privately obnoxious to him, on pretext of state delinquency, till at length a conspiracy was formed against him, headed by his former supporter, the archbishop. Dragged from his palace, 1st July 1288, after a desperate defence, he was thrown into the tower of Gualandi, with his two sons and two grandsons, where they all perished amid the agonies of starvation, for which reason their dungeoneer has since borne the ominous name of the 'Tower of Hunger.' In spite of this, the family again rose into importance; and in 1329 we find a Gherardesca at the head of the republican authority in Pisa.