The Bloody Wedding
In June 1500 the wedding between Astorre Baglioni and
Lavinia Orsini Colonna was celebrated in Perugia. This was conceived as the
crucial seal between Rome and Perugia to consolidate the power of the
descendants of the first Lord of Perugia: BRACCIO I Baglioni. The wedding
festivity, which lasted for days and days, had a sudden and tragic end. the inward discord of the ruling family blew
out in a conspiracy organized by another member of the Baglioni family, Carl
Oddo, together with Varano, Della Staffa, Della Cornia , Filippo Baglioni. He even
dragged with him Grifonetto Baglioni, the grandson of Braccio I, pumping up stories of an imaginary intrigue
of Grifonetto’s wife Zenobia with Gian
Paolo Baglioni. The plotters furious blows killed Astorre and Lavinia,
Sigismund, the old Guido, who was the patriarch of the family, and the young
Simonetto Baglioni.
After that, their bodies were thrown out of the windows and
dragged along to stain with blood the city roads. However not all the Lords of
Perugia have been killed. The brave Gian Paolo Baglioni succeeded to escape the
slaughter and came back with
his braves. When Grifonetto fell into his hands near the famous Church of Sant'
Ercolano, Gian Paolo handed him over for execution to his followers; and in a
moment, almost without loss, Gian Paolo became the new Lord of the city. The massacre impressed the people of Perugia.Atalanta Baglioni, Grifonetto’s mother, in memory of her
son’s tragic death, commissioned Raphael to paint a Deposition where the
characters of that terrible event were to be depicted. In the worldwide famous
“Entombment” by Raphael painted in 1507
she is portrayed as the heartbroken Madonna. Grifonetto is the one bearing the
dead Christ and Zenobia, Grifonetto’s wife, is represented as Magdalena.
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