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boys clothing: European royalty -- Italian states Bologna
European Royalty: Italian States--Bologna
Figure 1.--Giovanni II Bentivoglio (1443-1508) was an Italian nobleman who ruled as tyrant (a term that dis not have such negative ciommotations at the time) of Bologna from 1463 - 1506.). He was onlt 20 years old when he cane to power and for a long time was very popular. He did not have formal authority, but held power as the city's first citizen'. The Bentivoglio family ruled over Bologna for an extended period (1443- ), dominating thre Signoria (governing authoity) of the city. This is a painting by Lorenzo Costa, a destinguished Renaissance arttist. He was born in Ferrara, but is most associated with Bologna and Mantua. The painting shows four of the many sons of Giovanni II Bentivoglio and his wife Ginevra. It was probably painted about 1485. It was a detail of a larger canvas depiftung the whole family. Click on the image to see it.
Bologna has a history that far predates the Romans. The area around Bologna was settled in the Bronze Age before 1,000 BC by people called the Villanovese. The Villanovese were conquered by Etruscans, the first great ancient civilization on the Italian peninsula. As other people of northern Italy, Bologna were conquered by the Celts before the move north by the Romans. Under the Romans, the city became known as Boronia. The city prospered within the Roman Empire for over 400 years. Boronia with the decline of Rome was attacked by a succession of Germanic barbarians: Visigoths, Goths, and Lombards. The most terrible of the northern invaders were the central Asian Huns led by their great chief Attila. The Lombards for a time unified Italy. After the Lombards, the papacy and German emperors stuggled to control Bologna and the rest of the Italy. The Alps wera a major factor. Bolgna was strastegically located at the north of the Italian Penisula. It was an important city with one of the first European universities (1088). The city was prosperous from craft industries in demand from the less developed countries of northern Europe. As in other important Italian cities, political factions formed around rival nobel families championing the papacy or German emperors which at times degenerated into civil war. The city was for a time dominated by the Guelfi (Guelphs), who suported the papacy. Later the Ghibellines seized control. The Bentivoglio's fomented a popular rebellion (1460s). Their palace was destroyed (1501). The papal armieswith French support subsequently added Bologna to Papal State, although papal comntrol was at times tenuous. This continued until Napoleon's invasion of Italy (1796) and the redrawing of the map of Italy. After Napoleon's defeat, the Congress of Vienna returned Bologna to the papacy. The papacy, however, found it difficult to maintain control over such a large and prosperous city where there were increasing demands for secular govrnment and Italian unification. Bologna and the rest of the region was a center of support for the new Italian kingdom in the 1860s. Bologna as an industrial city became known for its support of socialists and communists. Mussolini's Fascists seized power and supressed other political powers. Mussolini led Italy into World War II (1940), but his Government fell and the Allies invaded Italy (1943). The Germans invaded Italy to prevent the country's fall to the Allies. Bologna with the strength of the sicialists and communists became a center of resistance against the Germans. After the war the city became a centre of radical politics and voted strongly against the monarchy in the 1946 reforendum. The city strongly supports Democratici di Sinistri, the leading democratic party of the left in modern Italy.
