While there is no question that the majority of the mendicants of Naples who embraced poverty in defiance of the pope did so for the purest of motives, Friar Robert was not among them. Cunning and manipulative, Andrew’s new tutor quickly perceived an opportunity for personal profit. Hiding his desire for power and wealth behind a facade of humble sanctity, the Franciscan, who had the advantage of being well acquainted with the subtleties of the competing interests at court, quickly gained ascendancy in Andrew’s household. Petrarch, who knew him later, was scathing in his description of the man. “Alas, what a shame, what a monster! May God remove this kind of plague from Italian skies!” the scholar wrote to his friend Cardinal Giovanni Colonna in a letter dated November 29, 1343. “I saw a terrible three footed beast [an allusion to the friar], with its feet naked, with its head bare, arrogant about its poverty, dripping with pleasures. I saw a little man plucked and ruddy, with plump haunches scarcely covered by a worn mantle and with a good portion of his body purposely uncovered. In this condition he disdains most haughtily not only your words but also those of the Pope as if from the lofty tower of his purity. Nor was I astonished that he carries his arrogance rooted in gold. As is widely known, his money boxes and his robes do not agree.”
To become a figure of intimidation and power, all Friar Robert had to do was win the confidence of the lonely, frightened, isolated boy who was married to the heir to the throne.
These years of Joanna’s later childhood and adolescence were critical to her future political development. By this time, she was old enough to understand that she would one day be queen. Like many medieval heirs to the throne, she learned her trade through the daily observation of her grandfather’s administration. Joanna’s apprenticeship was unusual, however. Because the Neapolitan line of succession had been forced to skip a generation, she was absorbing the lessons of an old man’s rule.
In fact, from a high point in 1317, at which time Robert the Wise’s realm extended throughout Guelphic Italy—when the king of Naples held the simultaneous titles of senator of Rome, imperial vicar of Romagna, and vice-general of Tuscany and the lordships of Genoa, Piedmont, and Lombardy—Robert’s influence had been in steady decline. Once, his ambition had been to rule all of Italy. In a 1314 letter to the pope, Robert had argued against the election of a German emperor as obsolete. “Who of sane mind doubts—who does not plainly perceive, that all temporal dominions, in the vicissitudes of time, undergo continual change? How senseless, then, is this idea of perpetuating a universal domination! Where is now the lordship of the Chaldeans, the despotism of the Persian, the command of the Egyptian and Hebrew peoples, the craft and wisdom of the Greek, the force and energy of the Trojans? Where, above all, the unique monarchy of the Roman, which, from world-wide dominion, is contracted to a mere handful of earth?” he wrote before advocating the selection of an Italian leader—himself—in the German’s place.
By Joanna’s childhood, however, the king of Naples had lived to see his dominions much reduced. John XXII’s death in 1334 had resulted in the election of a new pontiff who preferred to keep the governance of Rome and Campania in his own hands. By 1335, King Robert’s control over Genoa, Piedmont, and Lombardy had eroded as well.
Much of the blame for this shrinkage was attributable to Sancia. The Angevin system of government was predicated on the king’s having access to a large pool of high-ranking generals and diplomats from within his own family who could be trusted to act as surrogates of the crown throughout Italy. Until Sancia’s ascension to the throne, the royal family had had no trouble fulfilling this requirement. Robert’s father, Charles the Lame, had been one of seven children, four of whom were sons. Robert himself had been one of fourteen children, nine of whom were male. In the early days of his reign, Robert had been used to sending his brothers Philip, prince of Taranto, and John, duke of Durazzo, into Tuscany and northern Italy to ensure that his sovereignty and interests were protected, and because they were of the same bloodline as the king, his brothers were unhesitatingly accepted and respected as his intermediaries. The Florentines had offered Charles of Calabria the lordship of their commune when they needed protection from the Ghibellines because he was the king of Naples’s son. Similarly, Robert had designated Joanna’s father to be his general in the ongoing war with Sicily when the king had become too old to lead his own troops into battle.
All this changed in the waning years of Robert’s reign, and there is no escaping that responsibility for the scarcity of descendants was directly attributable to Sancia’s decision to devote herself to securing a place of honor in the next world, and not to the carnal labors of this one. That it was Sancia who rejected her husband’s sexual overtures, and not the other way around, may be deduced from the pope’s response to the queen’s 1317 request for a divorce, in which he exhorted her to be nicer to her husband. The king of Naples, on the other hand, seems to have tried to gain access to Sancia’s boudoir, but only made it as far as one of her ladies-in-waiting, by whom he had an illegitimate son, Charles of Artois.
By 1335, Robert was fifty-seven, and his wife was fifty. His son was dead, as were all but one of his brothers—the last, John, Agnes of Périgord’s husband, would succumb the following year. If he hadn’t capitulated to Carobert and the pope, Robert might one day have utilized the empress of Constantinople’s sons, having been rebuffed in her efforts to acquire the Neapolitan throne for one of her progeny, Catherine of Valois had made other plans. In 1338, the empress of Constantinople mustered a fleet, and, gathering together her entire household, sailed for Achaia, intent on fomenting revolt against the local Byzantine despot and establishing her rule in Greece.
Robert the Wise was aware of the decline in his fortunes and sought to achieve one last victory in the hopes of recovering past glory. Since the inception of his reign a quarter century before, the king of Naples’s primary ambition—to overthrow Peter of Aragon, king of Sicily—had remained maddeningly unfulfilled. To this end, Robert now committed what resources were left to him. He assembled armadas three times in a four-year period. The first attack, in 1338, was commanded by his nephew Charles of Durazzo, Agnes of Périgord’s eldest son, for Agnes wished to curry favor with the royal family. No sooner had the Neapolitans made camp in Sicily, however, than typhus set in among the infantry and they were forced to retreat. Charles of Durazzo, fifteen at the time, was lucky to escape with his life. The next year, the king’s illegitimate son, Charles of Artois, had somewhat more success; he managed to capture Messina for a short period before withdrawing. The last attempt, for which Andrew was appointed titular commander, came after the king of Sicily’s death in 1342. Although Peter of Aragon left only a helpless child as heir, Robert was unable to capitalize on this opportunity, and the island remained stubbornly beyond his control. The only tangible result of this expenditure of life, equipment, supplies, and effort was the accumulation of a large debt. By the end of this period, Robert owed one hundred thousand florins to both the Bardi and Peruzzi companies.
Reduced influence abroad and an inability to retake Sicily were not the only signs of Robert’s growing impotence. Domestically, too, the king felt his authority wane. Despite numerous proclamations mandating respect for the law, crime increased dramatically during the years of Joanna’s adolescence. Representatives of the super-companies complained of Neapolitan banditry to the new pope, Benedict XII, who sent emissaries to try to strengthen the king’s hand, but their efforts were equally ineffectual. There was simply too little protection available to ward off the inevitable poaching.
Even more serious was the Neapolitan aristocracy’s tendency toward violence. The wealth of Naples was concentrated in the hands of the royal family and a smattering of favored courtiers. The majority of the kingdom, subject to high taxes and the backbreaking labor associated with farming in hilly, arid terrain, was impoverished. For the peasants working the land during the reign of Robert the Wise, life was harsh, and for their masters, the local noble property owners, it w
as not much better. Fueled by scarcity, petty arguments between neighboring landed families over territory and privileges were pursued with a passion out of proportion to the original offense. Bands of armed noblemen roamed the countryside, striking out against perceived enemies and other hapless bystanders. These bands were then themselves struck down by the frenzied relatives of their victims, and by degrees developed a form of entrenched retribution which is still known today, seven centuries later, as the vendetta.
Robert’s response to this domestic disorder seems to have been mixed. When an outbreak of violence between noblemen of the capital city and those of Capua and Nido occurred in the 1330s, he attempted to mediate and issued a firm decree “that men of the city may not disturb its tranquility, nor carry prohibited weapons by day or night, nor congregate in crowds, nor march through a piazza with weapons, nor commit violence on peers or inferiors, openly or stealthily, in public or private places.” But his strict pronouncements against gang warfare were not supported often or quickly enough by military intervention, and by the end of the decade, his administration was openly accused of corruption. Giovanni Villani left a detailed description in his chronicle of a prolonged, particularly destructive display of domestic Neapolitan violence involving the count of Minerbino and his siblings, known as the Pipini brothers:
In 1338 there began in the kingdom of Naples, ruled by King Robert, a great disturbance and nuisance in the city of Sulmona, and also in the cities of Aquila, Gaeta, Salerno and Barletta. In each of these places factions were created, and they fought against each other, with one faction driving out the other. These towns and their environs were devastated, and consequently the countryside filled up with robbers and brigands, who robbed everywhere. Many barons of the kingdom had a hand in these disturbances, supporting one side or the other… One faction was led by the Marra family, and with them was the count of San Severino and all his followers; in the other faction was the Gatti family and the count of Minerbino, called “the Paladin,” and his followers… The king was much criticized on account of these disturbances… because of his tolerance of the devastation of his kingdom, out of his personal greed for the fines and compositions that would be paid as a result of these misdeeds… Then, only when the towns were well ruined, did the king send his troops to besiege Minerbino and the count; and the count’s brothers came to Naples and threw themselves on the king’s mercy. All of their property was confiscated to the crown and then sold, and they were held prisoner in Naples.
Frustrated in his attempts to govern, the king retreated to his sermons and books and in so doing ironically provided his administration with its one genuine achievement: the establishment of a vibrant community of scholars dedicated to the preservation and promotion of knowledge. The University of Naples, one of the oldest in Europe, was renowned for the study of law, as that of Paris was celebrated for theology, Oxford for math and science, and Salerno for medicine. Throughout his administration, Robert the Wise protected and encouraged this important center of learning and made extensive use of its faculty. Its masters filled high positions in Neapolitan government, helped codify the laws of the kingdom, and provided the extensive legal arguments on which rested the king’s sweeping interpretation of the royal prerogative.
In 1332, to promote further scholarship, Robert, with Sancia’s approval, hired the accomplished scholar Paolo of Perugia to be keeper of the King’s Library, at the munificent remuneration of 225 gold florins a year, and charged him with acquiring an extensive collection of manuscripts. Hard-to-find works by Seneca, Livy, Saint Jerome, and Saint Augustine, as well as many other volumes, were salvaged by this effort, and university clerks were employed to make copies for ease of research. “All the important additions of King Robert’s reign in the fields of history, law, and medicine, occurred during the period of his [Paolo of Perugia’s] librarianship.” The king’s interest in the Far East is confirmed by the trouble and expense he took to obtain and magnificently illuminate a copy of a relatively new work, De Mirabilibus Magni Canis (About the Extraordinary Things in the Country of the Great Khan), which described the adventures of a Venetian explorer named Marco Polo. This royal emphasis on recovering and consolidating knowledge set Naples apart from the rest of Italy and added greatly to the eminence of the kingdom. A library of more than one hundred volumes—substantial for the period—was soon amassed in the years following the appointment of Paolo. “Naples therefore in his reign became a famous emporium of learning, centered by the Castel Nuovo, a royal mine of wisdom and ‘a place of the understanding.’”
The availability of these works, in combination with the patronage of the king, drew some of the most talented scholars in Europe to Robert’s court in the latter years of his reign, and their energy and intercourse greatly enhanced interest in academic achievement. That Naples was the acknowledged center of classical study by 1340 is confirmed by Petrarch, who, having been given the choice of being crowned poet laureate under the sponsorship of King Robert or accepting an important teaching position at the University of Paris, chose to be laureate. In a letter to Cardinal Giovanni Colonna, dated September 1, 1340, Petrarch described his dilemma. “I find myself at a difficult crossroads, and do not know the best path to take,” he wrote. “It is an extraordinary but brief story. On this very day, almost at the third hour, a letter was delivered to me from the [Roman] Senate, in which I was in a most vigorous and persuasive manner invited to receive the poetic laureate at Rome. On the same day at about the tenth hour a messenger came to me with a letter from an illustrious man, the chancellor of the University of Paris, a fellow citizen of mine and well acquainted with my activities. He, with the most delightful of reasons, urges me to go to Paris. I ask you, who could ever have guessed that anything like this could possibly have happened?… The one letter calls me East, the other West; you will see with what powerful arguments I am pressed hither and yon.… The fact that in Italy there is the king of Sicily [Robert the Wise], whom among all mortals I accept as a judge of my talents, turns the scales in one direction.” Petrarch accepted Robert’s invitation to come to Naples prior to his official coronation at Rome so the king could publicly certify that the renowned scholar satisfied the qualifications for the office of poet laureate.
The examination of Petrarch, which took place in March 1341 at the Castel Nuovo, was perhaps the greatest cultural event of the century, an extravagant exhibition of erudition. For three full days, before a packed audience which included members of the court, faculty and students of the university, the ruling council, and leading members of the citizenry, Robert the Wise, dressed in full regalia, queried Europe’s leading intellectual on his knowledge of the works of biblical scholars and various Roman writers like Virgil and Seneca. The fact that Petrarch’s mastery of the subject matter far exceeded that of his interrogator, so that he had no difficulty whatsoever answering the king’s questions, took nothing away from the exhilaration of the proceedings. The local scholars were awed at the presence of so great an intellect within their midst and elated by the exaltation he brought to their profession. The illustrious man of letters himself was exceedingly gratified to have his achievements recognized in so public a manner by so august a personage as the sovereign of Naples. The king was delighted to have his own intellectual pursuits confirmed by an outside authority. The rest of the populace, while probably not following much of the actual content, nonetheless received a smattering of an education in a highly entertaining fashion. When, at the end of the third day, the poet had convinced the king of the merits of verse, there was a moment of high drama when Robert, who was too old to travel to Rome for Petrarch’s official coronation, shrugged out of his ceremonial robe and, offering it to his guest as a mark of respect, requested that he wear it when receiving the honor of the laurel. The king also named him his chaplain, a title that entailed no official duties but much honor. Armed with letters patent signed by Robert attesting to his credentials, Petrarch then went on to Rome to receive his crown. On Apri
l 8, 1341, while wearing the king of Naples’s royal mantle, Petrarch was crowned with the laurel to the sound of trumpets. “The King’s [Robert the Wise’s] hand was absent, though not his authority nor his majesty; his presence was felt not only by me but by all who were there,” Petrarch later wrote to the Neapolitan royal secretary. To Robert himself he wrote: “How much the study of the liberal and humane arts owe you, O oh glory of kings.”
Joanna was fifteen when she watched her grandfather sit in ceremonial judgment of Europe’s leading savant. The spectacle was unique and memorable; nothing like this had ever happened before. Other than his coronation as king of Naples by the pope thirty-two years before, this was the moment of Robert’s supreme glory, the zenith of his long trajectory, when his sovereign might was for once used for something other than territorial gain. For Joanna, there would have been great pride in being the granddaughter of such a man, and heir to such a legacy.
Nor was the achievement inconsequential. In this flicker of curiosity for the forgotten knowledge of the past, ignited by Petrarch, nourished at Naples, and later guarded by a devoted band of followers, lay the nascent sparks of the humanist movement, which a hundred years later would catch fire and astonish the world with the Renaissance.
The Lady Queen Page 7