tyrants.[3] The vicissitudes of the Bentivogli at Bologna present
another series of catastrophes, due less to their personal crimes than
to the fury of the civil strife that raged around them. Giovanni
Bentivoglio began the dynasty in 1400. The next year he was stabbed to
death and pounded in a wine-vat by the infuriated populace, who thought
he had betrayed their interests in battle. His son, Antonio, was
beheaded by a Papal Legate, and numerous members of the family on their
return from exile suffered the same fate. In course of time the
Bentivogli made themselves adored by the people; and when Piccinino
imprisoned the heir of their house, Annibale, in the castle of Varano,
four youths of the Marescotti family undertook his rescue at the peril
of their lives, and raised him to the Signory of Bologna. In 1445 the
Canetoli, powerful nobles, who hated the popular dynasty, invited
Annibale and all his clan to a christening feast, where they
exterminated every member of the reigning house. Not one Bentivoglio was
left alive. In revenge for this massacre, the Marescotti, aided by the
populace, hunted down the Canetoli for three whole days in Bologna, and
nailed their smoking hearts to the doors of the Bentivoglio palace. They
then drew from his obscurity in Florence the bastard Santi Bentivoglio,
who found himself suddenly lifted from a wool-factory to a throne.
Whether he was a genuine Bentivoglio or not, mattered little. The house
had become necessary to Bologna, and its popularity had been baptized in
the bloodshed of four massacres. What remains of its story can be
briefly told. When Cesare Borgia besieged Bologna, the Marescotti
intrigued with him, and eight of their number were sacrificed by the
Bentivogli in spite of their old services to the dynasty. The survivors,
by the help of Julius II., returned from exile in 1536, to witness the
final banishment of the Bentivogli and to take part in the destruction
of the palace, where their ancestors had nailed the hearts of the
Canetoli upon the walls.

[1] The family of the Prefetti fed up the murderer in their castle
and then gave him alive to be eaten by their hounds.

[2] Sforza Attendolo killed Terzi by a spear-thrust in the back.
Pandolfo Petrucci murdered Borghese, who was his father-in-law.
Raimondo Malatesta was stabbed by his two nephews disguised as
hermits. Dattiri was bound naked to a plank and killed piecemeal by
the people, who b