[Sca-cooks] Fwd: Ugolino and other Old Italians

[Laura C. Minnick]

This is absolutely fascinating! Enjoy!  -'Lainie

>Subject: Ugolino and other Old Italians
>To: CHAUCER at LISTSERV.UIC.EDU
>
> From today's Washington Post comes this further news about exumations
>of  long-dead Italians, including Congrande and Ugolino:
>
>You have been sent this message from dmosser at vt.edu as a courtesy of
>washingtonpost.com
>
>  Transfixed by Tales From the Crypt
>
>  By Daniel Williams
>
>    VERONA, Italy -- Workmen in yellow construction helmets lifted the
>shrunken cadaver from its stone tomb. Camera strobes from a clutch of
>paparazzi lit up the browned, gnarled face.
>
>   Gino Fornaciari, medical sleuth, gazed down at the remains of
>Cangrande della Scala, the most powerful man in the history of Verona.
>Was it possible that, as records say, a few drinks of foul water ended
>his life? Or was he poisoned, as the rumor went? It was high time to
>solve the mystery. The man has been dead for 675 years.
>
>   It was a scene from a scientific mania in Italy: the unearthing of
>the dead and famous. Advances in forensics have unlocked new ways to
>explore the past through the inspection of skeletal remains. The opening
>of the crypt belonging to the warrior-prince eight days ago was a
>glimpse of things to come.
>
>  The exhumation was part of a dizzying round of investigations of
>royalty, saints, popes and other ancient notables. A researcher in
>northern Italy exhumed the body of the medieval poet Petrarch last year
>in order to study his physique, the cause of death and to make a model
>of his facial features. This summer, Fornaciari will begin exhuming 49
>sets of remains belonging to the mighty Medici family in Florence.
>
>   "The body is a filing cabinet of daily life. We would be remiss not
>to see what's in there," Fornaciari said.
>
>   Such research makes big news in Italy, a place awash in bones,
>history and intrigue. For non-Italians, Italian history is largely a
>pageant of Roman conquests and Renaissance cultural achievements. For
>Italians, tales of provincial grandeur also arouse passions, a symptom
>of campanilismo, the traditional devotion to native towns.
>
>   The studies also fit well with Italian obsessions with food, fashion
>and betrayal. Chemical analyses of bones illuminate the subject's diet.
>Restorations of burial costumes reveal the styles of the time. And then
>there's the question of the manner of death. When murder is suspected,
>politics, money and marital infidelity are favorite motives. "We
>Italians have a taste for conspiracy," Fornaciari said. "There is a
>suspicion that anyone who dies suddenly is a murder victim. We can clear
>up these mysteries."
>
>   Cangrande, for instance,  had enemies. He conquered the towns of
>Vicenza, Belluno, Feltre, Padua and, just before his death, Treviso,
>where some suspect he was  slipped arsenic while he drank from a fountain.
>
>  His heirs took extraordinary steps to glorify his memory. They
>mummified him, a procedure usually reserved for saints and the
>occasional pope. His sarcophagus, adorned with an equestrian statue, was
>placed atop an arch leading into Santa Maria Antica Church so that
>anyone entering would have to pass beneath his remains. "He was
>transformed into the patron of Verona, a kind of human amulet," said
>Ettore Napione, a historian.
>
>   Verona is still nursing the trauma of Cangrande's death. "He made
>Verona great," said Mayor Paolo Zanotto, who was on hand for the
>exhumation. "For us, there is nothing to compare with him."
>
>   Cangrande, known as the Lord of Verona, was moved from his crypt on a
>blue Plexiglas slab. The workers wrapped him in plastic sheeting to keep
>dust off him. Verona museum officials tried feverishly to keep
>photographers away -- they had contracted exclusive coverage of
>Cangrande's story to documentary filmmakers.
>
>   Physical examinations to be performed on Cangrande reflect an
>explosion of technologies, many developed  to treat medical patients.
>DNA samples can pinpoint racial makeup. Chemical analysis of bones can
>detail diet and nutrition. Dental wear and tear hint at the kinds of
>food the subject ate. CAT scans show  the conditions of organs. Bone
>deformities indicate certain kinds of physical activity -- horseback
>riding, for instance -- and even fashion: Renaissance women sometimes
>exhibit compressed ribs from wearing tight corsets. Heavy armor
>sometimes compressed the spines of knights.
>
>   And, of course, wounds, broken bones and traces of poisons in
>fingernails and hair can point to a violent death or foul play. "I am in
>fact a detective of the distant past," Fornaciari said.
>
>   Fornaciari, a professor of medical history, teaches at Pisa
>University, Italy's center for study of the dead. In Italy, such
>activity began about 25 years ago when experts in Pisa inspected the
>skeleton of Saint Anthony of Padua.
>
>   A few mysteries needed elucidation. Did Saint Anthony eat only bread
>and water, as widely believed? Did he travel on foot for long distances
>spreading the Gospel? An analysis of his bone chemistry suggested he
>suffered from severe anemia, a possible indication of a meat-free diet.
>Well-developed tendons may indicate he did a lot of walking; his
>hardened knees suggest a lot of kneeling. "Biological examination
>matched tradition," said Francesco Mallegni, professor of paleontology
>at Pisa University.
>
>   The Italian media refer to Mallegni as the "professor of excellent
>cadavers" in recognition of the numerous studies he has made of defunct
>Italians.  His identification of the remains of Giotto, an early
>Renaissance fresco painter, created a sensation a few years ago.
>Examinations of the body revealed concentrations of arsenic, lead and
>aluminum, probably from long exposure to paint. The toxic metals didn't
>seem to shorten his life. He died at about 70.
>
>   Last year, Mallegni published a book about his investigation into the
>death of Count Ugolino della Gherardesca, a medieval warrior who was the
>subject of a gruesome legend. Historians say he was jailed in Pisa along
>with his two sons and a pair of grandchildren on charges of treason and
>that they probably starved to death. Dante, Italy's supreme poet,
>expanded on the tale. In "The Inferno," he placed Ugolino in hell,
>condemning him to chew on the head of his tormentor, Archbishop
>Ruggieri, for eternity. In an ambiguous phrase, Dante suggested that
>Ugolino ate his offspring before he succumbed to hunger. "Fasting had
>more power than grief," Dante has him saying.
>
>   Mallegni said Dante's insinuations are false. Chemical examination of
>Ugolino's ribs -- a portion of the body that stores information about
>diet from about five months before death -- showed traces of magnesium,
>indicating a limited cereal diet, and no zinc, meaning he was deprived
>of meat and dairy products. In short, Ugolino did not seem to have eaten
>flesh before he died. "In any case, he was also an old man with hardly
>any teeth,"  Mallegni said. "Dante's poem is beautiful, but it does not
>match the facts."
>
>   The imminent Medici family examinations have aroused a buzz due the
>resurrection of Elvis, John Lennon and Buddy Holly combined -- and
>surprisingly, very little controversy among church and other officials.
>
>  The Medici clan was the glitterati of its time and dominated the
>politics of Renaissance Florence. The 49 sets of remains to be inspected
>lie beneath a marble floor of the Medici chapels within the San Lorenzo
>Church. They are all descendants of Cosimo I, who ruled Florence in the
>mid-16th century and was the model for Machiavelli's "The Prince."
>Remains from an earlier ruling branch of the family lie in tombs
>decorated with Michelangelo sculptures and will not be exhumed.
>
>   The research aims at revealing the diets and illnesses of the
>deceased.  Renaissance documents report that many died of gout.
>Historians think that, however, is a generic description, much the way
>consumption was listed as cause of death of many Americans in the 19th
>century for lack of more precise designations.
>
>   There are plenty of juicy murder mysteries afoot. Was Francesco I
>poisoned in 1587 along with his second wife, Bianca Capello, by a rival
>Medici brother? She was a Venetian and not liked by the rest of the family.
>
>   Did the noble Paolo Giordano Orsini kill his wife and suspected
>adulteress, Isabella de Medici, in 1576 by strangling her with a silk
>ribbon?  Official records said she died of malaria.
>
>   And how about Pietro de Medici and the sudden death of his wife,
>Leonora di Toledo, in 1604? Another suspected spousal strangulation for
>-- what else? -- infidelity. That's amore.
>
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