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Manfred was defeated and slain in a sanguinary battle at Grandella, near Benevento, and Charles soon made himself master of the kingdom. Young Conradin was still living, but was defeated at Tagliacozzo in 1268, and was beheaded at Naples by order of Charles.
In which purpose he sent for Niccola to Naples, and made him build on the field of Tagliacozzo, a church and abbey of the richest; and caused to be buried therein the infinite number of the bodies of those who died in that battle day; ordering farther, that, by many monks, prayer should be made for their souls, night and day.
The war was not actually ended until the battle of Tagliacozzo, fought in August, 1268; but you need not recollect that irregular date, or remember it only as three years after the great battle of Welcome, Benevento; which was the decisive one. Recollect, therefore, securely: 1250. The First Trades Revolt in Florence. 1260. Battle of the Arbia. 1265. Battle of Welcome.
And as I must in this place bid farewell, for a time, to Niccola and to his son, let me remind you of the large commission which the former received on the occasion of the battle of Tagliacozzo, and its subsequent massacres, when the victor, Charles, having to his own satisfaction exterminated the seed of infidelity, resolves, both in thanksgiving, and for the sake of the souls of the slain knights for whom some hope might yet be religiously entertained, to found an abbey on the battle-field.
He was induced to both these measures rather by his apprehension of fresh troubles than by his love of peace, for he perceived dissensions arising between the Colonessi and the Orsini. In the war between the king of Naples and the pope, the former had taken the district of Tagliacozzo from the Orsini, and given it to the Colonnesi, who had espoused his cause.
The boy, now fourteen years of age, was welcomed by the senator in Rome; but his forces were utterly defeated by Charles at Tagliacozzo on August 23, 1268. Conradin fled, but was captured and executed. This time it was Charles, and not the Pope, whose success was the obvious fact. Whether the Pope interceded for the last of the Hohenstaufens or approved his execution, is a matter of some doubt.
On Candlemas, if you recollect, 1251, they open their gates to the Germans; and on Easter, 1267, to the French. Remember, then, this revolution, as coming between the battles of Welcome and Tagliacozzo; and that it expresses the lower revolutionary temper of the trades, with English and French assistance.
Other disciples of Filippo were Domenico dal Lago di Lugano; Geremia da Cremona, who worked very well in bronze, together with a Sclavonian who made many works in Venice; Simone, who died at Vicovaro while executing a great work for the Count of Tagliacozzo, after having made the Madonna in Orsanmichele for the Guild of the Apothecaries; Antonio and Niccolò, both Florentines, who, working in metal at Ferrara, made a horse of bronze for Duke Borso in the year 1461; and many others, of whom it would take too long to make particular mention.
Charles marched against Manfred, routed his army, and slew him near Benevento, and then became sovereign of Sicily and Naples. Corradino, to whom, by his father's will, the state belonged, having collected a great force in Germany, marched into Italy against Charles, with whom he came to an engagement at Tagliacozzo, was taken prisoner while endeavoring to escape, and being unknown, put to death.
By this step the French and Italian cardinals together were now but an insignificant minority. They were instantly one. All must be risked or all lost. They retired into their castles and remained aloof from the schism. Orsini died before long at Tagliacozzo.
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