Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of iHeartRadio and Grimm and Mild from Aaron Manky.

Listener discretion advised the feast was going to be extravagant.

The year was thirteen twenty four, and cousins Ramberto and Ferrantino and their uncle Pandolfo Malitesta were making the final preparations for the meal at Romberto's estate, a castle nestled in the rolling hills of what is now the region of Emilia Romagna in Italy, then simply called Romagna.

Their sole invitee to this party their other cousin slash nephew, Uberto, and he was making his way toward the castle, blissfully unaware that he was riding to his death.

The three hosts had planned the murder of their kinsmen perfectly, a theatrical assassination disguised as a friendly family dinner which would serve as revenge for Sin's spanning a generation.

Uberto Maltesta's death at the hands of his family members is a dramatic episode in a particularly bloody era of Italian history, but not actually the topic of today's episode.

A few decades prior to that fateful family banquet, Ramberto's father, a man named Jianchoto, actually killed Uberto's father.

Remember, Ramberto and Uberto were cousins, their fathers were brothers, and Gianchoto discovered his brother having an affair.

With his wife.

After catching them red handed, he killed them both.

The adulterous affair and subsequent murder of Jianchoto's brother Paulo and his wife Francesca would go on to be immortalized by the Italian writer Dante Aligiari as two of the damned characters he meets during his visit to Hell.

But what Dante failed to record in his Inferno were the numerous intra familial murders, political assassinations, revenge killings, and even an attempted mass family murder that plagued the Maltesta family for nearly fifty years after Paolo and Francesca's stories end.

So let's start from the beginning.

I'm Dana Schwartz, and this is noble blood.

Paulo and Jianchoto Maltesta were meant to carry on a great legacy.

Theirs was a family new to nobility, but their father's explosive rise to power had quickly carried the brothers to prominence.

Maltesta de Verruchio was a powerful condottieri, or commander of a mercy and company.

Many condottieri became the sort of military princes who served a pope or other ruler, but often had sovereignty of their own as dukes or counts.

Malitesta da Verrucchio had come into his power ruthlessly.

Northern Italy during this period was embroiled in the after effects of the Investiture Controversy, which resulted in conflicts between Pope supporting Gwelths and Holy Roman Emperor supporting Ghibelines.

Maltesta was the leader of the Guelphs in Romagna and became podesta, or chief magistrate of Rmany in twelve thirty nine.

In twelve ninety five, he would go on to kill or expel the leading members of the Gibeline faction in Rumany, making himself the city's undisputed and unchecked ruler.

Between two marriages, he had seven children, each of whom he would use to expand his power, either through warfare or marriage.

For our purposes, we'll focus on his four sons, Mala, Testino, Jianchoto, and Paolo from his first wife and Pandulfo from his second wife, Mala.

Testino and Pandulfo will be important in next week's episode, but for now, all you really need to know about them is that they would go on to inherit in succession their father's lordship of Remedy.

But for now we're focused on the brothers, Paolo and Jianchoto.

If anything in their early lives pointed to the roots of Paolo and Jianchoto's storied and eventually deadly rivalry, it would probably be the fact that Paulo was known throughout his life as Ilbello Paolo the Handsome.

The name Jianchoto was actually a diminutive of Giovanni, an emasculating nickname that Jianchoto still might well have preferred to his other nickname, Los Gancato or the Lame.

Sources, many of which were written long after the fact, describe Jianchoto variously as disabled, disfigured, or simply visually unappealing, in any case, a stark contrast to his strapping, handsome younger brother.

The lives of the sons of Condotieri were often defined by war and political intrigue, and Paolo and Jianchoto were no exception.

Apparently not content to rest on his handsome laurels, Paolo showed himself to be an astute politician, and he became an experienced military leader at just nineteen years old.

In twelve sixty five, he followed his father in fighting the Gibelines, aiding in seven viveral decisive battles.

Johnchoto, too, proved to be an asset to his father in war, becoming known as much for his bravery as for his unsavory appearance.

By around twelve seventy five, John Choto also proved a useful political chess piece when his father promised him in marriage to Francesca da Polenta.

Francesca was a young noblewoman from nearby Ravenna, the daughter of one of its two lords, Guido the First da Polenta.

Wido shared power with his relative Wuido Riccio da Polenta over Ravenna.

Their balance of power was uneasy to begin with, but they both also had to contend with the powerful Traversari family opposing them within the city, as well as various threats from without, most especially the Lord of Urbino.

Guido again, I'm sorry, another Guido the First da Montrefelto Guido da Montefeltro had recently vested Maltesta de Verrucchio in battle.

Although Ravenna and Riminy had themselves been at war, Mala Testa and Guido di Polenta were united by this common enemy, and so Guido di Polenta's daughter Francesca became at once a reward for Maltesta's support and a means of consolidating power which would allow Guido de Polenta not only the ability to fend off his enemies, but also to seize sole control of Ravenna.

Decades later, the humanist writer Giovanni Boccaccio would write that Mala Testa de Verrocchio used Paulo to trick Francesca into her marriage to Giancoto.

By this time, Paulo had actually already been married for some six years and a political match of his own.

It was not uncommon in this period for noble marriages to be executed by proxy, with someone else standing in for one or both of the marrying parties during the ceremony.

Paulo, as the married brother of the groom, would have been a perfect candidate to stand in and marry Francesca by proxy.

Boccaccio wrote that Mala Testa deliberately misled Francesca about this arrangement, and that when she walked down the aisle and laid her eyes on a handsome, charming man waiting at the end of it, she thought it was Paolo that she was going to marry.

Of course, she was wrong.

Boccaccio reasoned that Malatesta worried that she or her father would have refused the marriage had she known that her betrothed was the uglier brother.

As dramatic a tidbit, that is, there is no hard evidence that this is how Paolo and Francesca affair began.

It's quite likely that Francesca already knew who Paolo and Jianchoto were and knew that Paolo was married as well, given her family's close and long running dealings with the Malatesta family.

But however, the marriage began, and whatever Paolo's role in its beginnings were, before long, Francesca and Paolo would find themselves entangled and an affair that would rock the Malatesta family and define its legacy for centuries.

The poet Dante Aligari spent the final five years of his life living in Revenna.

Famously exiled from his native Florence in thirteen oh two, he had spent over a decade living in various parts of northern Italy, hosted by sympathetic friends and supporters.

In thirteen sixteen, he was invited to stay in Revenna by its recently crowned lawy, Guido the second da Polenta.

I'm sorry, I'm sorry, so many Guidos.

This Guido was the nephew of the now decades dead Francesco dot Polenta.

We're fast forwarding here.

Scholars believe it was during this visit to Ravenna that Dante learned of the tragic tale of Paolo and Francesca's love affair, before he would cement it in one of the most celebrated works of literature in Italian history, The Divine Comedy, completed shortly before the author's death in thirteen twenty one.

It's only because of Dante that we know any of the details of what happened next in Paolo and Francesca's story.

Knowing that he likely learned the story from a family member of Francesca's offers his version some credibility.

However, remember this was written decades later, and there is no independent history record confirming any of it, so we will never know exactly whether or where Dante took liberties.

We find Paolo and Francesca in Dante's Inferno as a pair of souls, damned to hell for their illicit romance.

As Dante and his imagined guide, the Roman poet Virgil, entered the second circle of Hell, the one reserved for those who fell prey to their lust, they find the two lovers spirits flying aimlessly through the air, blown about in an infernal storm, yet remaining inseparably entangled with one another as if they were one single spirit.

Dante calls to them as they float by, and it's Francesca who regales the visitors with their tail as her beloved Paolo weeps and wails alongside her as she tells it.

Francesca's life love story with her husband's brother started out innocently enough.

They spent time together in a friendly way, a pleasant outcome to her essentially political marriage.

Things took a turn rather suddenly, however, when one day the pair were reading the story of Lancelot and his forbidden love with Gwenevere, the story of Lancelot's brother in arms, King Arthur, describing a scene that seems to predict the modern rom com.

Francesca's spirit tells Dante how as they read, their eyes kept meeting, sparks flying between them, before they looked away, blushing.

Finally, as the story they were reading came to its own climax, the tension between the readers was too much to bear.

As Francesca put it, when of that smile we read the wish to smile rapturously kissed by one so deep in love than he who ne'er for me shall separate at once, my lips, all trembling, kissed the book and writer both were love's purveyors in its leaves.

That day we read no more.

It's certainly possible that this is actually how the affair began, although it definitely seems a little too perfectly literary to be entirely true.

We don't even really know quite when it began, although it seems to have been not long after Francesca's marriage to Gianchoto.

We also don't know the circumstances that preceded the affair.

Much has been said about Jianchoto's unsavory appearance, but did Francesca feel that way about him.

Was their marriage pleasant but passionless?

Or was he a brute?

And what of Paolo and his wife?

Both couples had children.

Of course, we could question the paternity of Francesca's children, but certainly Paolo at least fulfilled his marital duties to his wife.

We may never know these things, but however it happened.

Once the affair began, It seems that Paulo and Francesca, much like their spirits in Dante's story, could hardly be separated from one another.

The affair carried on seemingly unbeknownst to everyone, or at least unbeknownst to Jianchoto, for years, some scholars estimate over a decade, although it's impossible to know for sure.

We can imagine Janchoto carrying on in his duties, perhaps leaving for long stretches to fight on his father's behalf, leaving his wife at home and free to rendezvous with his more handsome brother.

For his part, Paulo balanced his own duties, including keeping up appearances with his own wife, with his and Francesca's passionate affair.

However, they managed it.

It worked for them for a while, but Francesca's and Paolo's days together were numbered.

Eventually, Jianchoto would discover the dual betrayal that had been going on for years right under his nose.

We don't really know how Janchoto found out.

Most retellings agree that he stumbled upon his brothers and his wife's affair some time between twelve eighty three and twelve eighty six.

Some even say he caught them in the act.

Dante doesn't offer us any details here.

Again, the juiciest version of the story, and the one we can't confirm, is offered by Boccaccio.

As he told it, Jianchoto suspected nothing until one day, while he was away on business for his father, one of his servants came to him with a confession.

The servant, apparently moved by pity for his cucoldooed employer and emboldened by distance from the rest of the household, told Janchoto that he knew his wife and brother were having an affair.

Determined to get at the truth of the matter, Jianchoto insisted upon seeing for himself, and the servant promised he would help catch them in the act.

The pair returned to rhyminy in secret.

Perhaps Jianchoto hoped he would find nothing.

Perhaps he spent the ride home imagining how silly he would feel when he arrived to find his faithful wife waiting for him.

But any hopes he may have harbored about his wife's fidelity were dashed when he got home and sneaking into his own palazzo, observed Paolo entering Francesca's bedchamber.

The affair was all but confirmed.

Jianchoto was enraged.

His loyal servant led him to the door of the bedchamber, only to find it suspiciously locked from the inside.

Janchoto's fever hit a fever pitch.

He pounded on the door, calling out to his wife, maybe calling to his brother too.

On the other side of the door.

Chaos and panic erupted.

Francesca and Paolo knew they had been found out, but they were scrambling to find some way to cover up their affair.

Suddenly, Paolo had an idea.

There was a narrow passage with a ladder leading from the bed chamber down to another room below.

If he squeezed down it, he might be able to get away before anyone noticed.

He told Francesca to let her husband in.

He would escape through the passage and Jianchoto would be none the wiser.

Unfortunately, as Francesco went to open the door and Paolo went to hide his clothes, got caught on an iron bar sticking out of one of the wooden beams at the top of the passage.

He got stuck in plain sight just as Janchoto burst into the room.

Blinded by rage at the sight of his brother, Johanchoto immediately went for the kill.

Francesca moved to stop her husband, unable to bear the thought of losing her love, but it was too late.

Right as she stood between them, Johanchoto thrust his sword forward, stabbing her in the chest instead of Paulo.

Francesca sank to the floor, dying for a moment.

John Choto stood frozen, disturbed at what he had done.

Then he saw Paulo, still caught on the iron bar, crying out in grief for Francesca, for his wife.

He saw how deeply his own brother had loved Francesca, and it quelled any thought he might have had of regret or of mercy.

Jianchoto pulled the sword from his dying wife's body and struck out again, this time landing a blow squarely on his brother's head.

His vengeance complete, he fled, sneaking out of the city quietly as he had arrived.

The lovers' bodies were discovered the next day, and Boccaccio tells us buried in a shared tomb, united eternally in both their love and their betrayal.

Is that how it happened?

Boccaccio's version of the story certainly has a theatrical air to it, though we can find many verified stories of affairs gone wrong throughout history that have all of this drama and then some.

Dante gives us the basic contours of the story and points to Jianchoto's guilt in the inferno.

Jianchoto was said to be condemned to the ninth Circle of Hell, the lowest circle reserved for traders.

Given his access to the family, we can reasonably expect the basic facts of Dante's version to be true.

Discovered them, Jianchoto killed them, but for the rest were left to fill in the blanks.

However it happened.

The bloody murder of Paolo and Francesca did little to soothe the growing rivalries among the members of the Maltesta family.

Maltesta de Verruchio had many children, who themselves had many children, and when he died in thirteen twelve, they were all left with the fractured inheritance of the lands and titles that their patriarch had once held as his own.

And as the children of Paolo Jianchoto and their brothers grew up and realized that only one of them would eventually rule Remedy, it wouldn't be long before the kinsmen turned on each other again.

That's the end of the story of the first and most famous of the many murders plaguing the Malato family.

But keep listening after a brief sponsor break to hear about the long legacy of Paolo and Francesca's story.

For Dante, the story of Paolo and Francesca was a cautionary tale.

He lived in a world where adultery was a crime punishable by death, and where desire was seen by many as the first step to damnation.

As he imagined his journey through hell, he found Francesca and Paolo's story a powerful warning to his readers about the dangers of giving in to one's passions, even as he sympathized with their love.

As with any story that endures over time, however, Paolo and Francesca's story has continued to resonate, but not necessarily for the reasons that Dante intended.

Particularly in the nineteenth century, Francesca and her lover became a focus for the imaginations of Romantic writers and artists.

As historian John Paul Hyle puts it, where in Dante's era it was important to control one's passions, the Romantics believed that quote subsuming reason to the passions was the goal of a life well lived.

They began to reimagine Dante's encounter with Paolo and Francesca in Hell no longer as symbols of the danger of succumbing to one's passions, but rather the tragedy of star crossed lovers.

Some interpretations even changed the endings of their story.

In one opera, Ambrose Thomas's eighteen eighty two Francois de Rimini, the lovers are pitied by God and their spirits allowed to ascend to Heaven, triumphing over the punishment needed out to them in Hell and in our world by Dante.

In the twentieth century, Francesca in particular, became a symbol for yet something else female agency as a character who not only made her own choices in life, disastrous as the outcome may have been, but also took control of her own story in death.

She presents a striking and complex lens through which authors and artists have wrestled with memory, pain, betrayal, and yes love.

Noble Blood is a production of iHeartRadio and Grim and Mild from Aaron Mankey.

Noble Blood is hosted by me Dana Schwartz, with additional writing and research by Hannah Johnston, Hannaswick, Courtney Sender, Amy Hit and Julia Melaney.

The show is edited and produced by Jesse Funk, with supervising producer rima Il Kayali and executive producers Aaron Manke, Trevor Young, and Matt Frederick.

For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.