Guelphs and Ghibellines

The Guelphs and Ghibellines (/ɡwɛlfs/, /ˈɡɪbəliːnz/ or /ˈɡɪbəlaɪnz/; Italian: guelfi e ghibellinicode: it is deprecated ) were factions supporting the Pope and the Holy Roman Emperor, respectively, in the Italian city-states of central and northern Italy. During the 12th and 13th centuries, the split between these two parties was a particularly important aspect of the internal policy of medieval Italy. The struggle for power between the Papacy and the Holy Roman Empire had arisen with the Investiture Conflict, which began in 1075 and ended with the Concordat of Worms in 1122. The division between the Guelphs and Ghibellines in Italy, however, persisted until the 15th century.

History

Origins

Guelph (often spelled Guelf; in Italian Guelfo, plural Guelfi) is an Italian form of Welf, the family of the dukes of Bavaria (including the namesake Welf, as well as Henry the Lion). The Welfs were said to have used the name as a rallying cry during the Battle of Weinsberg in 1140, in which the rival Hohenstaufens of Swabia (led by Conrad III) used "Wibellingen", the name of a castle today known as Waiblingen, as their cry; "Wibellingen" subsequently became Ghibellino in Italian.

The names were likely introduced to Italy during the reign of Frederick Barbarossa. When Frederick conducted military campaigns in Italy to expand imperial power there, his supporters became known as Ghibellines (Ghibellini). The Lombard League and its allies were defending the liberties of the urban communes against the Emperor's encroachments and became known as Guelphs (Guelfi).

The Ghibellines were thus the imperial party, while the Guelphs supported the Pope. Broadly speaking, Guelphs tended to come from wealthy mercantile families, whereas Ghibellines were predominantly those whose wealth was based on agricultural estates. Guelph cities tended to be in areas where the Emperor was more of a threat to local interests than the Pope, and Ghibelline cities tended to be in areas where the enlargement of the Papal States was the more immediate threat. The Lombard League defeated Frederick at the Battle of Legnano in 1176. Frederick recognized the full autonomy of the cities of the Lombard league under his nominal suzerainty.

The division developed its own dynamic in the politics of medieval Italy, and it persisted long after the direct confrontation between Emperor and Pope had ceased. Smaller cities tended to be Ghibelline if the larger city nearby was Guelph, as Guelph Florence and Ghibelline Siena faced off at the Battle of Montaperti, 1260. Pisa maintained a staunch Ghibelline stance against her fiercest rivals, the Guelph Genoa and Florence. Adherence to one of the parties could therefore be motivated by local or regional political reasons. Within cities, party allegiances differed from guild to guild, rione to rione, and a city could easily change party after internal upheaval. Moreover, sometimes traditionally Ghibelline cities allied with the Papacy, while Guelph cities were even punished with Papal interdict.

Contemporaries did not use the terms Guelph and Ghibellines much until about 1250, and then only in Tuscany (where they originated), with the names "church party" and "imperial party" preferred in some areas.

13th–14th centuries

A 14th Century conflict between the militias of the Guelph and Ghibelline factions in the comune of Bologna, from the Croniche of Giovanni Sercambi of Lucca

At the beginning of the 13th century, Philip of Swabia, a Hohenstaufen, and his son-in-law Otto of Brunswick, a Welf, were rivals for the imperial throne. Philip was supported by the Ghibellines as a relative of Frederick I, while Otto was supported by the Guelphs. Philip’s heir, Frederick II, was an enemy of both Otto and the Papacy, and during Frederick’s reign the Guelphs became more strictly associated with the Papacy while the Ghibellines became supporters of the Empire, and of Frederick in particular. Frederick II also introduced this division to the Crusader States in the Levant during the Sixth Crusade.

After the death of Frederick II in 1250 the Ghibellines were supported by Conrad IV and later Manfred, while the Guelphs were supported by Charles of Anjou. The Sienese Ghibellines inflicted a noteworthy defeat on Florentine Guelphs at the Battle of Montaperti (1260). After the Hohenstaufen dynasty lost the Empire when Charles of Anjou executed Conradin in 1268, the terms Guelph and Ghibelline became associated with individual families and cities, rather than the struggle between empire and papacy. In that period the stronghold of Italian Ghibellines was the city of Forlì, in Romagna. That city remained with the Ghibelline factions, partly as a means of preserving its independence, rather than out of loyalty to the temporal power, as Forlì was nominally in the Papal States. Over the centuries, the papacy tried several times to regain control of Forlì, sometimes by violence or by allurements.

The division between Guelphs and Ghibellines was especially important in Florence, although the two sides frequently rebelled against each other and took power in many of the other northern Italian cities as well. Essentially the two sides were now fighting either against German influence (in the case of the Guelphs), or against the temporal power of the Pope (in the case of the Ghibellines). In Florence and elsewhere the Guelphs usually included merchants and burghers, while the Ghibellines tended to be noblemen. They also adopted peculiar customs such as wearing a feather on a particular side of their hats, or cutting fruit a particular way, according to their affiliation.

After the Guelphs finally defeated the Ghibellines in 1289 at Campaldino and Caprona, Guelphs began to fight among themselves. By 1300 the Florentine Guelphs had divided into the Black Guelphs and the White Guelphs. The Blacks continued to support the Papacy, while the Whites were opposed to Papal influence, specifically the influence of Pope Boniface VIII. Dante was among the supporters of the White Guelphs, and in 1302 was exiled when the Black Guelphs took control of Florence. Those who were not connected to either side, or who had no connections to either Guelphs or Ghibellines, considered both factions unworthy of support but were still affected by changes of power in their respective cities. Emperor Henry VII was disgusted by supporters of both sides when he visited Italy in 1310. In 1325, the city-states of Guelph Bologna and Ghibelline Modena fought over a civic bucket in the War of the Bucket, where the famous Battle of Zappolino was fought. Modena's victory in this battle, and therefore the war, led to a resurgence of Ghibelline fortunes. In 1334 Pope Benedict XII threatened people who used either the Guelph or Ghibelline name with excommunication.

Later history

In Milan, the Guelphs and Ghibellines cooperated in the creation of the Ambrosian Republic in 1447, but over the next few years engaged in some intense disputes. After the initial leadership of the Ghibellines, the Guelphs seized power at the election of the Captains and Defenders of the Liberty of Milan. The Guelphic government became increasingly autocratic, leading to a Ghibelline conspiracy led by Giorgio Lampugnino and Teodoro Bossi. It failed, and many Ghibellines were massacred in 1449, while others fled, including the prominent Ghibelline Vitaliano Borromeo, who was sheltered in his county of Arona. Public opinion turned against the Guelphs, and in the next elections the Ghibellines were briefly victorious, but deposed after imprisoning Guelph leaders Giovanni Appiani and Giovanni Ossona. After Francesco Sforza was made Duke by Milan's senate in 1450, many Ghibellines who had fled such as Filippo Borromeo and Luisino Bossi were restored to positions of prominence in Milan.

In the 15th century, the Guelphs supported Charles VIII of France during his invasion of Italy at the start of the Italian Wars, while the Ghibellines were supporters of emperor Maximilian I. Cities and families used the names until Emperor Charles V firmly established imperial power in Italy in 1529.

In the course of the Italian Wars of 1494 to 1559, the political landscape changed so much that the former division between Guelphs and Ghibellines became obsolete. This is evident with the election of Pope Paul V (1605), the first pope to bear the "Ghibelline" imperial eagle in chief of his coat of arms.

On 25 March 2015 the Parte Guelfa, i.e. Guelph Party, has been reconstituted as Christian order and archconfraternity to serve the Catholic Church and the Catholic Archdiocese of Florence, guided by the Captains Andrea Claudio Galluzzo, Claudio Donati Naldoni and Riccardo Mugellini under the custody of Consul Luciano Artusi. The Mayor of Florence established the headquarters of the reborn Guelph Party in the historic Palagio di Parte Guelfa (Palace of the Guelph Party) in the city.

Allegiance of the main Italian cities

Main Ghibelline cities	Main Guelph cities	Variable adherence cities
Arezzo Assisi Como Fabriano Foligno Forlì Grosseto Mantua Modena Pavia Pisa Pistoia Spoleto Terni Urbino	Alessandria Ancona Aquila Bologna Brescia Crema Cremona Faenza Florence Lecco Milan Orvieto Perugia	Asti Bergamo Ferrara Genoa Gubbio Lodi Lucca Padua Parma Piacenza Prato Siena Treviso Verona Vicenza

In heraldry

During the 12th and 13th centuries, armies of the Ghibelline communes usually adopted the war banner of the Holy Roman Empire—white cross on a red field—as their own. Guelph armies usually reversed the colors—red cross on white. These two schemes are prevalent in the civic heraldry of northern Italian towns and remain a revealing indicator of their past factional leanings. Traditionally Ghibelline towns like Pavia, Novara, Como, Treviso and Asti, continue to sport the Ghibelline cross. The Guelph cross can be found on the civic arms of traditionally Guelph towns like Milan, Vercelli, Alessandria, Padua, Reggio and Bologna.

Some individuals and families indicated their faction affiliation in their coats of arms by including an appropriate heraldic "chief" (or horizontal band at the top of the arms). Guelphs had a capo d'Angio or "chief of Anjou", containing yellow fleurs-de-lys on a blue field, with a red heraldic "label", while Ghibellines had a capo dell'impero or "chief of the empire", with a form of the black German imperial eagle on a golden background.

Families also distinguished their factional allegiance by the architecture of their palaces, towers and fortresses. Ghibelline structures had "swallow-tailed" crenellations, while those of the Guelphs were square.

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  Coat of arms of an Italian family with Ghibelline (Imperial) style heraldic chief at top

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  Coat of arms of the Roberti family of Reggio, with Guelph (Anjou) style heraldic chief at top

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  Ghibelline swallow-tailed merlons of the "Casa di Romeo", of the Montecchi family of Verona.

In literature and popular culture

In literature

• In Dante's Inferno (1300s decade), participants in the conflict are featured prominently. For example, Mosca dei Lamberti is the character suffering in hell for the schism for which he was held responsible.
• In The Decameron (1350s) by Giovanni Boccaccio, one of the ladies is a firm adherent of the Ghibellines, to the point where she will not even praise Charlemagne.
• In the notes to the poem The Shepheardes Calendar (1579), English poet Edmund Spenser's annotator E.K. claimed (incorrectly) that the words "Elfs" and "Goblins" derive etymologically from Guelphs and Ghibellines.
• Valperga: The Life and Adventures of Castruccio, Prince of Lucca (1823) is a historical novel by Mary Shelley, influenced heavily by both Dante and Boccaccio, that deals directly with the Guelph and Ghibelline conflict. Its central figure is one of the latter, while his love, the Duchess of Valperga, is a Guelph.
• In his Cantos (1915-1962), Ezra Pound makes repeated mention of both Guelfs and Ghibellines. The pro-Papal Guelfs are associated with usury and corruption while the pro-Imperial Ghibellines are associated with law and order. The famous "fascist" canto, LXXII, makes mention of Ezalino (who would appear to be the sometime Ghibelline leader Ezzelino), "who didn't believe the world was made by a jew" (i.e., he rejected papal and Christian claims and embraced the anti-Semitism of the Second World War in the fascist milieu in which the Canto was written).
• In Christ Stopped at Eboli (1945), Carlo Levi compares the peasants and gentry of Agliano to the Guelphs and Ghibellines, respectively, with the Fascist government as the Holy Roman Empire and the desire to be left alone for local rule as the Papacy.
• In the Quentaris Chronicles fantasy book series (2003-2009), the Duelphs and Nibhellines are feuding families based on the Guelphs and Ghibellines.

In movies

poster of The Flame and the Arrow (1950)

• The Flame and the Arrow (1950) starring Burt Lancaster is set in the Guelph and Ghibelline era of 12th century Lombardy.
• In The Lost Steps (2001) by Alejo Carpentier, the narrator refers to the Guelphs and Ghibellines to describe the nature of the sudden guerrilla fighting that breaks out in the streets of a Latin American city.

See also

• Royal Guelphic Order

References

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: 
•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: 

External links

• World of Dante Multimedia website that offers Italian text of Divine Comedy, Allen Mandelbaum's translation, gallery, interactive maps, timeline, musical recordings, and searchable database for students and teachers. Database allows search for Guelfs and Ghibellines in the poem.