Azzo VIII d'Este
Azzo VIII d'Este (died 31 January 1308 from 1293 until his death.
He inherited the family lands from his father,
The marriage bargain he struck with Charles II of Naples for his youngest daughter, Beatrice, was notorious in his day and among chroniclers afterwards:[2] Dante asserted that Charles "was seen to sell his own daughter and to bargain over her as corsairs do over slaves."[3] The nuptial agreement survives in the Este archives: Azzo granted his father-in-law 51,000 florins, to be invested in lands in the Regno and in appropriate places in the marquisate of Este, and promised to establish primogeniture in the Este holdings, contrary in fact to Estense traditions, and explicitly disinheriting Azzo's brother Francesco. The wedding was solemnized. Modena and Reggio rebelled in 1306 over an attempt to assign them to Beatrice as part of the bride price, a custom that had been superseded in Italy by the dowry.
Francesco d'Este left Ferrara as Beatrice arrived and joined the coalition of cities that moved against Azzo in 1306, determined that he should not make himself lord of Lombardy.
References
- ^ Menache 2003, p. 142.
- ^ Trevor Dean, "The Sovereign as Pirate: Charles II of Anjou and the Marriage of His Daughter, 1304" The English Historical Review 111 No. 441 (April 1996), pp 350-356.
- ^ Purgatorio XX.79-81.
Sources
- Menache, Sophia (2003). Clement V. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. p. 142. ISBN 978-0521521987.