Victor Amadeus I of Savoy

Duke’s French connection may have proved fatal

Victor Amadeus ruled the Duchy of Savoy
for seven years until his death

Victor Amadeus I, who during his seven-year reign over Savoy was forced to give strategic territory to France, was born on this day in 1587 in Turin.

He was the son of Charles Emmanuel I, Duke of Savoy, and Catherine Micaela of Spain, daughter of Philip II of Spain.

Victor Amadeus spent much of his childhood in Madrid at the court of his grandfather.

He became heir-apparent to the Duchy of Savoy, when his brother, Filippo Emanuele, died in 1605 and he succeeded to the Dukedom after his father’s death in 1630.

Charles Emmanuel’s policies had made relationships with France and Spain unstable and troops were needed to defend the Duchy.

But as there was no money to recruit mercenaries or train local soldiers, Victor Amadeus signed a peace treaty with Spain.

In 1619 he married Christine Marie of France, the daughter of Henry IV of France and Marie de Medici.

After war broke out amongst rival claimants to the city of Mantua, the French took the fortress of Pinerolo, part of the Duchy of Savoy, in 1630.

The Treaty of Cherasco the following year brought peace again to northern Italy. According to the treaty, France renounced its conquests in Piedmont, but it was later discovered that Victor Amadeus had surrendered Pinerolo to France.

Pinerolo sits in the shadow of the Alps about 40km
southwest of Turin, about 75m from the French border

This gave France a strategic route into the heart of Savoy territory and then into the rest of Italy. Subsequent rulers of the House of Savoy resented this loss and strived to regain the territory.

In league with the French army, Victor Amadeus defeated the Spanish forces in the Battle of Tornavento in 1636 and the Battle of Mombaldone in 1637.

The French Marquis du Crequi held a banquet on 25 September 1637 to celebrate the victories and Victor Amadeus attended.  Several guests at the banquet subsequently became ill, including the Duke of Savoy. 

Victor Amadeus was taken to Vercelli where his condition worsened and he passed away a few days later in October 1637. As it was well known that there had been friction between him and Crequi because their military strategies had been incompatible, rumours soon circulated that the Duke of Savoy had been poisoned.

His widow, Christine Marie of France, served as regent of the duchy until 1663. It was inherited in turn by her sons, Francis Hyacinth, and Charles Emmanuel II.

The Piazza Duomo in Pinerolo 

Travel tip:

Pinerolo is a town about 40km (25 miles) southwest of Turin on the River Chisone in Piedmont. It was one of the principal fortresses of the dukes of Savoy. French troops invading Piedmont in 1536 conquered Pinerolo and it stayed under French control until 1696. The Man in the Iron Mask, who was a legendary unidentified French prisoner, was held in the Fortress of Pinerolo from 1669 to 1681 when he was moved to another prison. The prisoner has been featured in various works of fiction, most famously in the novel The Vicomte de Bragelonne, by Alexandre Dumas.

Piazza Umberto I in Mombaldone

Travel tip:

The Battle of Mombaldone, where Savoy troops and French forces defeated the Spanish army, took place on September 8, 1637 at Mombaldone, a comune in the province of Asti, about 70 kilometres south east of Turin. Featured by I Borghi piu belli d’Italia - a private association that promotes small Italian towns it deems to be of "strong historical and artistic interest" - Mombaldone still has its medieval centre and part of its 13th century castle, which was badly damaged during the battle.

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Francesca Caccini – singer and composer

Court musician composed oldest surviving opera by a woman

Francesca Caccini pictured in a
cameo discovered in Pistoia

Prolific composer and talented singer Francesca Caccini was born on this day in 1587 in Florence.

Sometimes referred to by the nickname La Cecchina, she composed what is widely considered to be the oldest surviving opera by a woman composer, La Liberazione di Ruggiero, which was adapted from the epic poem, Orlando Furioso by Ludovico Ariosto.

Caccini was the daughter of the composer and musician, Giulio Caccini, and she received her early musical training from him. Like her father, she regularly sang at the Medici court.

She was part of an ensemble of singers referred to as le donne di Giulio Romano, which included her sister, Settimia, and other unnamed pupils.

After her sister married and moved to Mantua, the ensemble broke up, but Caccini continued to serve the court as a teacher, singer and composer, where she was popular because of her musical virtuosity.

She is believed to have been a quick and prolific composer but sadly very little of her music has survived. She was considered equal at the time to Jacopo Peri and Marco da Gagliano, who were also working for the court.

Caccini was considered a rival to Jacopo Peri

Caccini married a fellow singer, Giovanni Battista Signorina, in 1607 and they had a daughter, Margherita.

She wrote music for comedies written by Michelangelo Buonarotti the Younger, a great nephew of the artist of the same name, and in 1618 she published her own collection of 36 songs and duets.

In 1625 Caccini composed all the music for the opera, La liberazione di Ruggiero dall’isola d’Alcina, which was performed for the visiting crown prince of Poland at the Villa Poggio Imperiale in Florence in 1625.

The prince, Ladislaus Sigismondo, later Wladyslaw IV, was so pleased with it he asked for it to be performed again in Warsaw in 1628.

After her first husband died in 1626, Caccini arranged to marry again the following year to Tommaso Raffaelli, a nobleman from Lucca. She bore him a son and as the wife of a nobleman she turned down at least one request to perform as a singer. But once she was widowed again she tried to return to the service of the Medici.

By 1634 she was back in Florence serving as a music teacher and composing and performing music and entertainment for the women’s court.

All her music, apart from La Liberazione di Ruggiero, and a few excerpts from her other works, have been lost. But her surviving scores showed she took care over the notation of her music, focusing attention on the rhythmic placement of syllables and words.

She left the Medici court in 1637 and it is not clear when she died, but the guardianship of her son passed to his uncle, Girolamo Raffaelli, in 1645.

Caccini’s opera, La Liberazione di Ruggiero, has since been performed in Cologne, Ferrara, Stockholm and Minneapolis.

Palazzo Pitti as seen from the palace's gardens

Travel tip:

Francesca Caccini would have spent plenty of time in Palazzo Pitti in Florence teaching or performing music. The palace is on the south side of the River Arno, a short distance from the Ponte Vecchio. Palazzo Pitti was originally the home of Luca Pitti, a Florentine banker. It was bought by the Medici family in 1549, after which it became the chief residence of the ruling family of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany.

The Villa del Poggio Imperiale is about 4.5km (2.8 miles)
outside Florence, to the south

Travel tip:

The first performance of Caccini’s opera, La liberazione di Ruggiero, was given at the imposing neoclassical Villa del Poggio Imperiale, just outside Florence. It was once one of the homes of the Grand Dukes of Tuscany, having been seized from the Salviati family by the Medici. It was later given to Napoleon’s sister as a residence during French rule, before becoming a girl’s school. Some of the frescoed state rooms are open to the public by appointment.

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