SWORDS DRAWN, GIROLAMO'S assassins crowded into the chamber to find the countess embracing her children protectively; only a few tearstains betrayed her emotions. Snarling orders and spewing threats, the murderous crew lined up the little group of women and children. No one dared touch the countess, but one foolhardy ruffian grabbed Caterina's younger sister Stella and, claiming to search for hidden jewels, began to grope under her dress. She was not Caterina's sister for nothing; a crack echoed through the room as Stella replied with a stinging slap.
Surrounded by this rough escort, the family picked their way through the shambles of their home as more looters poured in. Out in the piazza, a broad crimson stain marked the spot where the body of Girolamo had lain. Mercifully, the corpse had already been removed before Caterina and family arrived there. Within minutes, they had crossed the threshold of the Orsi palace. Away from the eyes of the townspeople, Caterina knew they were completely at their captors' mercy. Yet she comforted her family, praying that the messages she had hastily dictated had arrived at their destinations.
The assassins had also sent riders off in every direction to notify neighbors and allies of their coup, counting on garnering support among the many enemies of the Riarios. The Orsis knew that they possessed neither the clout nor the might to impose their rule on the Forlivesi but hoped that a powerful state, such as Florence or Venice, might intervene to control the town, return the Ordelaffis to rule it, and ultimately reward Ludovico and Checco with high positions. Mere hours after murdering the count, the Orsi brothers convened an extraordinary meeting of the Council of Forty to discuss the next steps for the orphaned town. The representatives of the districts and guilds of Forlì gathered with trepidation in the great hall. Checco Orsi explained the reasons for his deeds, reminding the council that in that very room, Girolamo had broken his promise to abolish the dazi. Decrying the count's proclivity to violence and extortion, Checco even dared hint that Pope Innocent himself had blessed their actions, though the assassin wisely refrained from making an outright claim of papal complicity. Checco made no mention of the Ordelaffis, fearing the council might split into two factions: for and against the former ruling family. He did, however, allude repeatedly to both Venice and Florence. Forestalling any suggestion to invite any such greedy neighbors in, Niccolò Tornielli, the leader of the council and an older man who had lived through many years of Pino Ordelaffi's as well as Girolamo's rule, proposed a different course of action. He advised Forlì to put itself under the authority of the church. In this way, it could remain a relatively free ecclesiastical state, with a cardinal governor from Rome. The papal army would guarantee peace while they thrashed out the problem of succession. Tornielli, looking to the good of all the Forlivesi, expressed the hope that this equitable compromise would reduce the tension of the situation and, he added, avoid "breaking the heart of the countess any further."1
These prudent words soothed the turbulent spirits of the Forlivesi. By nightfall the council had decided. They dispatched a messenger to Cesena, where the papal governor and protonotary Bishop Giacomo Savelli was installed. The papal stronghold was only thirteen miles south on the Via Emilia and, with a fast rider, the council could expect a response within two hours. Bishop Savelli, a member of the Savelli family of Rome, loathed Girolamo, and for good reason: the count had imprisoned his relatives, torn down their houses, and destroyed their property. Savelli was delighted by the news of his enemy's death, but he viewed the city's decision to submit to papal authority with skepticism. They had, after all, just murdered a former papal nephew. Fearing an uprising from the volatile people of Forlì, Savelli decided to send a trusted set of eyes and ears to the town to report on events. His emissary ascertained that the count was indeed dead, that the Orsis had taken Caterina and her family into custody, and that the council's proposal was serious. Forlì was ready to enter the papal fold.
On April 15, 1488, Bishop Savelli rode into Forlì, accompanied by a contingent of soldiers carrying the broad banner of the Papal States. Seeing that the colorful flags contained no menacing Venetian lion or Milanese viper, the townspeople cheered in relief. Instead, the white and gold standards bore the insignia of a golden tiara above two crossed keys, symbolizing the authority of the pope. Under this ancient standard fluttered Innocent VIII's personal coat of arms: a diagonal blue-and-white-checked band set against a crimson background. Bishop Savelli's first order of business was to ensure the well-being of the sister of the duke of Milan. Whatever Savelli may have thought of Count Riario, he was well aware of Milan's importance to the Papal States. He rode straight to the Orsi palace and spent some time comforting the widowed Caterina with promises that neither she nor her family would be harmed. Before taking his leave, the bishop strictly ordered the countess's captors to treat her and her family with the utmost respect.
Savelli then remounted his horse and rode to the main square, where the excited populace was streaming in from every street and alley. Instead of the flowers, ribbons, and incense usually amassed to greet a new ruler, shards of glass and pieces of wood, plaster, and rubble from the desecrated Riario palace littered the piazza. Nevertheless, the citizens of Forlì, desperate for leadership, shouted their support as Bishop Savelli and his retinue ceremoniously rode three times around the piazza, symbolically taking possession of the town. Forlì was now in the hands of the pope, at least nominally.
The fortresses of Schiavonia and Ravaldino still lay in the hands of supporters of the Riarios; therefore Forlì remained divided. Until those in the main gates and towers submitted to papal authority, peace could not return. Bishop Savelli swiftly turned to the question of securing the defenses of Forlì, starting with the Porta San Pietro, the only tower held by supporters of the Orsis. The prudent prelate immediately dismissed them and substituted his own men, who were certain to follow his orders. He also disbanded the Council of Forty, re-forming it as the much-reduced Council of Eight—all strong supporters of the papacy and, to a lesser degree, the Orsis. This accomplished, Bishop Savelli then turned his attention to the other two strongholds.
The most expedient approach was to bring Caterina to those fortresses and order her to command the castellans to surrender. Eager to be in the forefront of the action, Ludovico Orsi and Giacomo del Ronche rushed to the Orsi palace, where they wrenched the countess away from her family. Caterina hugged her children one by one and set off, stone-faced, with her captors. They marched Caterina to the foot of Ravaldino: the exact spot where she had stood a year earlier with Innocenzo Codronchi. Tommaso Feo, the custodian she herself had conducted to the castle on that occasion, looked down at the countess, his face expressionless. Meanwhile, among the crowd stood the barber Andrea Bernardi, recording the conversation that ensued.
"My lady," Feo asked, "what do you want?"
Caterina took a deep breath and in a rush of words, broken by tears and sobs, implored him to "give the fortress to these men, so they will free me and my children!"2 Slowly and respectfully, the loyal keeper shook his head. His duty, he explained, was to hold the castle for the heir of Girolamo. Caterina, with much handwringing, wailed that not only would she be killed but all of her little children would be brutally slaughtered by these criminals, who would stop at nothing to control Forlì.
Feo played his part to perfection: his love of the Riario family was well known, he replied, but his orders were to keep the castle for Ottaviano, the son of Girolamo and the nephew of the duke of Milan. The people crowded around the fortress heard the names Sforza of Milan, Bentivoglio of Bologna, and Cardinal Raffaello Riario and realized this was no friendless widow. Caterina's connections could summon huge armies. If her captors were so rash as to hurt one of the children, terrible retribution would fall on the whole town. Watching this exchange, Giacomo del Ronche and Ludovico Orsi began to suspect that the words of the countess and Feo were staged for the benefit of the onlookers and that they had no real plan to surrender the castle. The two men hustled Caterina away.
The day was drawing to a close when Giacomo del Ronche and Ludovico Orsi marched the countess to the smaller watchtower of Schiavonia to repeat her request to give over the stronghold. The keeper, well apprised of Feo and Caterina's theatrical repartee at Ravaldino, replied shortly that he would follow Feo's lead.
Ronche was certain that the countess had tricked them. Incensed that he had wasted a whole day caught in her ruse, he snarled, "My lady Caterina, you could turn over those castles if you wanted, but you don't want to, do you?" Ronche pressed the sharp iron point of his lance against her chest and spat, "If I wanted to, I could just run this spear from one side of you to another and you would fall at my feet, dead."3 The wailing widow's demeanor abruptly changed. Caterina leaned against the hard blade, thrusting her face inches from Ronche's. "Oh, Giacomo del Ronche," she replied, with no tremor in her voice, "don't you try to frighten me." As if drawing strength from the cold metal of the lance, she locked eyes with the soldier and said, "Certainly, you can hurt me, but you can't scare me, because I am the daughter of a man who knew no fear. Do what you want: you have killed my lord, you can certainly kill me. After all, I'm just a woman!"4
The armed men in their cuirasses stepped back. At a loss for how to subdue the countess, they led her back through the streets to the Orsi palace as evening approached.
Once they had returned her to her prison, Caterina's captors thought to use her piety to break her spirit. Bishop Savelli had strictly forbidden anyone, hostile or friendly, to contact Caterina, but the Orsis smuggled a priest into her rooms. Acting as their agent, he confronted the weary Caterina with a list of her own and her husband's sins. Using even more dire threats than Ronche had, he commanded her to give up the fortresses. Count Girolamo, he warned, "was killed for his sins and through the will of Divine Justice." Caterina, who had benefited from "his destruction of churches and persecution of priests and nuns," would face the same fate later. He predicted that the punishment of death by starvation, followed by eternal hellfire, would be meted out to her and her children if she didn't surrender the castles. Horrified, Caterina banged on the door, screaming to have him removed. Later, among her followers, Caterina would confide that hearing these harsh words was more traumatic than losing her husband in a brutal murder.5
Bishop Savelli, concerned for Caterina's safety, transferred the Riario family to the tower of the Porta San Pietro, which was wholly under his control. Caterina, the children, their two nursemaids, her mother, and her sister Stella were escorted across town and placed in a small, ill-equipped cell. Soldiers bustled from town to fortress to find a crib for Sforzino, food and toys to distract the crying children, and fresh clothes for the ladies.
The comings and goings at the Porta San Pietro made it easy for Ludovico Ercolani, the trusty Riario partisan who had escaped with Caterina's messages moments before her capture, to slip into the fortress unseen. Ercolani, working with the castellans and the few others who were still loyal to the Riarios, was coordinating the defense of Caterina and her family. The guards on duty outside Caterina's cell, sympathetic to the beautiful and intrepid countess, turned a blind eye to their meeting. In whispers, the two hatched an audacious plan to turn the tables on the Orsis. At the break of dawn, Ercolani sneaked back into the Ravaldino fortress and relayed the scheme to the willing Feo.
On the morning of April 16, Ercolani presented himself before Bishop Savelli with a message from Tommaso Feo. The custodian would surrender the fort on one condition: Countess Riario would have to pay him his back wages and write him a letter of recommendation so future employers would not think that he had succumbed on ignoble terms. The countess would have to come alone, of course, as Feo could not trust the Orsis, known assassins, to accompany her safely. Relieved, Bishop Savelli leapt at such an easy resolution, but when he put the idea to the Orsis, he was astonished by the vehemence with which they rejected it. The conspirators knew that Savelli pitied Caterina as a forlorn widow, but they had seen her iron constitution under the velvet wrappings. If Feo wanted to see her alone, the two were plotting something.
The reluctant Savelli eventually compromised with the brothers and stipulated that the negotiation between the countess and her castle keeper take place in full view; Caterina would remain outside the walls. Again Caterina walked to the ramparts, trying to hide the energy in her step as she prepared for action. She called up to Feo, promising before the whole town as witness that he would have all he asked for. Standing behind the battlements, he insisted that the countess enter the fort to sign the recommendation after he had read it. As was the case with Innocenzo Codronchi, only one person, a servant, would be allowed to accompany her. The Orsi brothers protested violently, but after an impasse of several minutes, Savelli, whose dearest wish was to end these dealings, struck down the objections and sent Caterina into the castle, with a three-hour limit, to conclude her business with Feo. This time she didn't select a gentle maid with a picnic basket to accompany her. She chose a brawny young groom named Luca.6
The lances enclosing her parted and Caterina stepped away from her captors toward the drawbridge with her single escort. Having crossed the wooden planks, she paused and turned to the crowd on the bank; framed by the gaping entrance, she raised her hand, with index and ring fingers folded back and thumb tucked between them, before disappearing into the castle. Caterina had just given them the "fig," the Renaissance equivalent of "the finger."
The dumbfounded spectators blinked. Did they just see the elegant countess of Forlì gesture like a common foot soldier? The diarists depicted the scene in different ways. Cobelli gleefully repeated this story, told to him by Caterina's henchman Ludovico Ercolani, but Bernardi mentioned only that the countess entered the castle.7 In any case, her guards were left to wait out the next three hours, which ticked by slowly as various diplomats composed letters to the foreign courts they represented. Many other people, hearing of the dramatic events taking place at Ravaldino, traveled from nearby towns to witness history in the making. The Orsis tried to maintain a semblance of calm while controlling a mounting fear. Time was not on their side.
Each passing hour brought the duke of Milan and the Bentivoglios of Bologna a step closer to Forlì. Should they arrive while Caterina was still barricaded in the fortress, it would be a simple matter for their armies to reclaim the city for the Riario family. But if the strongholds had passed to the supporters of the Orsis, with papal reinforcements on the way, any aggression on the part of Caterina's relatives would be perceived as an act of war. Caterina recognized the importance of delaying as long as possible. Since the moment of her husband's murder, she had done everything in her power to slow them down, awaiting the arrival of Ludovico the Moor.
The designated three hours came and went, with no sign of the countess. Bishop Savelli called to Caterina, reminding her of the time limit, but his voice echoed ineffectually off the ramparts. To the Orsis and the embarrassed Savelli, the wait seemed interminable until finally Tommaso Feo reappeared at the battlements. He announced that he had taken Caterina captive. The clever keeper raised the stakes by offering to exchange the countess for several noble hostages, all Orsi supporters.
As the bewildered bishop struggled to understand the latest turn of events, the desperate Orsis upped the ante. They knew that Caterina and Feo had cooked up yet another lie, again to waste precious time. The moment had come to play their trump card. Ronche and the Orsis raced back to the Porta San Pietro, fury propelling their every step. They burst into the cell of Caterina's family. They seized Ottaviano, her firstborn and the Riario heir; her mother, Lucrezia; and Stella, her sister. Then Ludovico Orsi grabbed four-year-old Livio, whom he had once cradled at the baptismal font, and thrust him into the arms of his nurse, adding him to the group of hostages. The other children remained behind in their prison cell.
The Orsis led their sacrificial lambs back to Ravaldino. The chronicler Bernardi saw nine-year-old Ottaviano clinging to his grandmother's hand while Livio's nurse clasped the child close to shield him from the sight of the spears and daggers pointed at them. The men roared threats, clanging their steel weapons for emphasis. Caterina's children begged for mercy, and their shrill pleas penetrated the thick walls of the castle, summoning her to the ramparts. The anguished mother had to face her worst fear.
Caterina had hoped that Bishop Savelli would be able to protect her family, yet before she even stepped onto the drawbridge, she had realized that a moment like this one might arrive. She was a woman, and men knew where women were most vulnerable: their first duty was to their children. Tradition, custom, and religion dictated that Caterina must give in at the sight of her endangered offspring. But this descendant of warriors was able to think strategically. As she had boasted at the Castel Sant'Angelo, pregnant with Livio, she not only possessed her father's courage but also his practical reason and imagination. She knew that Bishop Savelli was well aware that her children were the nephews of the duke of Milan. If they came to any harm, Milan would retaliate with full force against the Papal States. Moreover, they were the cousins of Cardinal Raffaello Riario. Under no circumstances would Pope Innocent countenance any harm befalling these relatives of a highly placed churchman, especially in a public setting.
Also, Caterina would have recognized that surrendering the castle would give her no advantage. She would lose any leverage against the Orsis. Most likely her family would be imprisoned for a lengthy period and then discreetly poisoned to ensure that there would be no future Riario claimants to Forlì. The Orsis would rest easy only when she and her male children were dead. She had a much better chance of saving herself and her family by fighting here, as ambassadors of every major Italian state watched. In captivity, hidden from these powerful witnesses, she would be at the mercy of her enemies. So she held her position.
According to the most well-known version of the story, Caterina strode to the edge of the ramparts. With daggers drawn, the Orsis called to her, promising to kill her children, mother, and sister on the spot. Certain of imminent victory, they taunted her by making the children cry all the harder. In response, Caterina bellowed, "Do it then, you fools! I am already pregnant with another child by Count Riario and I have the means to make more!"8 Then she turned on her heel and walked back into the castle.
That retort at Ravaldino would define Caterina Sforza throughout history. The Venetian ambassador, floored by her audacity, dubbed her a "tigress," willing to eat her young to gain power.9 Galeotto Manfredi, whose own sexual proclivities had sent his wife running, passed down a particularly earthy version of the retort at Ravaldino. Writing to Lorenzo de' Medici, Manfredi claimed that Caterina, faced with these murderous threats, had brazenly raised her skirts, pointed to her genitals, and crowed that unlike the men gathered below, she had the equipment for making more.10 Although no one else included these crude details in descriptions of the spectacle, Niccolò Machiavelli chose to repeat this salacious version in his Discourses.11
In fact, based on a close analysis of the most reliable historical documents, Caterina's words and actions appear quite different. While no fewer than five letters written at the time12 and several contemporary accounts have immortalized her outrageous statement spoken from the ramparts, Cobelli and Bernardi, both eyewitnesses, do not mention a word of Caterina's retort. Bernardi claims that "she had gone to rest in a certain room far away from the ramparts"13 and was unaware of what was happening above. This seems a bit too passive a stance for a woman who certainly knew exactly what was at stake. Both local authors concur that the children were brought to the ramparts and threatened with violence, but they also claim that despite the screams of Ottaviano and Livio, Caterina never came out. Cobelli suggests that Caterina remained below intentionally, perhaps to avoid addressing the Orsis in front of her children, and that Feo, concerned that the cries would weaken Caterina's resolve, ordered several volleys of cannon fire to drown out the sound and to scare the Orsis.14 Bernardi, in his turn, confirms this discharge of artillery from the castle.
Caterina was roundly condemned by most of Renaissance society, even by the notoriously amoral Machiavelli, for gambling with the lives of her children. She never deigned to reveal the reasoning that informed her actions on that day, but by calling the Orsis' bluff, Caterina succeeded in saving her children. Furthermore, her lifetime of concern and sacrifice for all her offspring is mute testimony to the fact that she was a loving mother whose best option in this instance was to outfox her enemies.
Bishop Savelli realized that his own promise to secure the safety of the children was being undermined by his unstable allies. He reclaimed the family immediately and returned them to the Porta San Pietro under a stronger guard, forbidding anyone but himself to move them again. The Orsis went back to their palace, where Andrea Orsi, the aged sire of Ludovico and Checco, had returned from his country house, eager to hear the outcome of the plot. As Ludovico recounted the events of the past two days, Andrea, though recovering from a severe illness, rose to his feet, shaking with rage. "You have done a bad thing and done it badly," he wheezed. "Once you had killed the count you should have done away with the whole family." He prophesied a terrible end for the entire Orsi clan. Now that Caterina was in the fortress, the old man predicted, "she will fight [you] to the death" and in the end "all of you—even me, old and sick as I am—will have to bear the punishment for your lack of foresight!"
Savelli, realizing that the situation had escaped his control, wrote to Rome, asking for a contingent of soldiers to occupy the city. But Rome was slow to respond while ambassadors and advisers debated the Forlì question before the pope. The stalemate at Ravaldino had transformed the conquest of Forlì from a battle of strength into a game of endurance.
Lorenzo de' Medici was aware of everything transpiring in Forlì. Noting that Girolamo's murder occurred a few days before the tenth anniversary of the Pazzi conspiracy, which had claimed the life of Lorenzo's beloved brother Giuliano, some contemporaries hinted that the Florentine ruler instigated the assassination. Feverish correspondence poured onto Lorenzo's desk in the wake of the killing, mostly from Lorenzo's agents, but Giovanni Bentivoglio of Bologna wrote as well, repeatedly asking whether he should respond to Caterina's messages and come to the countess's aid. Lorenzo chose not to reply, and even his own ambassadors marveled at how slow Lorenzo was to respond to their correspondence.
The days stretched on. Caterina, to keep the invaders' nerves on edge, had periodic artillery blasts shot at the houses of her enemies, ensuring that property would be damaged without injuring people. Vandals, on the other hand, took advantage of the uncertain situation to steal as much as possible.
On April 18, several townsfolk defected to Ravaldino, seeking safety with the countess behind its mighty walls. First the Jewish pawnbrokers, tired of the unchecked looting of their shops, joined Caterina. Shortly thereafter, the artisans of Forlì, sensing that power was slipping away from the Orsis, smuggled themselves and their wares into the fortress.
The Orsis rounded up the wives and children of the deserters and brought them to the moat, as they had with Caterina's family, hoping to bring to heel the new allies of the Riarios. But Caterina had publicly taken the measure of the Orsis and they had proved weak, so the artisans remained within the walls, sensing it was an idle threat. And indeed, the families were returned to the city unharmed.
Bishop Savelli transferred Caterina's mother and sister to Cesena, out of reach of the Orsis, and reinforced the guard on the children and nurses in the Porta San Pietro prison. But the silence from Rome worried him. Papal armies were stationed nearby at Urbino and Rimini; they should have already arrived. Why, he wondered, was Pope Innocent stalling in sending aid? Forlì was actually at the forefront of the pope's mind, but he couldn't decide what action to take. Meeting with the ambassadors of Florence and Milan, Pope Innocent dithered, expressing concern for the safety of the Riario children, his desire not to offend either Florence or Milan, and the tempting idea of presenting Forlì to his son Francescetto as a wedding gift. Perhaps, the pope optimistically suggested, they could transfer Caterina and her children to Cesena "for their own good,"15 hoping that clearing out the Riarios would smooth the path to his takeover. But the Milanese ambassadors rushed to dispel this idea: Caterina was already in the fortress; if she was going to leave, shouldn't she retreat to Imola, which was, after all, still Riario territory? Furthermore, if the pope threw his support behind rebels and assassins, what kind of message would he be sending? Would it not incite other townships to do the same? The vacillating pope realized that Milanese troops were close to the city and sending soldiers would mean finding himself at war with a very powerful duke. The question was shelved and no papal armies departed from Rome.
To make matters worse for Savelli, Giovanni Bentivoglio interpreted Lorenzo de' Medici's silence as a green light for Bologna to rescue Forlì. With a force of eight hundred cavalrymen and a thousand infantrymen, he marched to Forlì on April 21 and set up camp outside the city gates. A herald rode into the city in the name of Bentivoglio and informed the people that Milan and Bologna both supported the Riario claim to the city.
Bishop Savelli remained cool, and his measured response calmed the Forlivesi. Forlì was under papal protection. The Riarios had forfeited Forlì by failing to pay tribute to Rome and by their ill use of their own citizens. The Riario family could move to Imola, where there were no signs of rebellion, and withdraw their claim on Forlì. The Orsis, on the other hand, made no effort to enter into diplomatic negotiations. They hurled insults at the messenger and cursed the Bentivoglio family. Two days later, menacing new messages arrived from Giovanni Bentivoglio: invasion was imminent. The townspeople, frightened, began to mutter regrets about asking assistance from the church. As the murmurs swelled into shouts, Savelli sent one of his own relatives to ride into the city with the papal standard. Posing as a messenger, Savelli's cousin bore letters promising papal support. The people saw the golden keys and tiara, heard the words of reassurance, and rebuffed the Bolognese envoy. What they didn't know was that the documents brandished by the "papal" messenger as letters from Pope Innocent himself were forgeries produced by Savelli and his cousin.16 Emboldened by the conviction that papal support was on the way, the Forlivesi kidnapped and beat the Milanese envoy and his Bolognese companion. Checco Orsi boasted that he had killed the Riario children, hoping word would trickle back to Ravaldino and devastate their worried mother. Two more Bentivoglio agents, trying to get word to Caterina that her brother's troops had arrived, were captured and hanged by the mob.
Still locked out of the fortress, with the Bentivoglio army at the gate, Ludovico and Checco Orsi tried to enlist the aid of Florence. Writing to Lorenzo de' Medici, they claimed that they had avenged not only the wrongs done to their people but also to the house of Medici. Portraying themselves as patriots who had rid Forlì of the tyrant who "sucked the blood of the poor, was untrue to his word and finally, loved no one but himself,"17 they suggested that their exploit was more "divine than human." They confided that "we hope to start the siege [of Ravaldino] today" and that the complete takeover of the city would follow shortly. Lorenzo ignored this invitation to lend his aid to the conspirators. With his archenemy dead and his brother avenged, he could afford to sit back and watch events unfold.
In the midst of this stalemate, there was one happy event. Caterina's sister Stella Landriani and Andrea Ricci, Girolamo's nephew, were married. Stella, who with a bold spirit had resisted the count's killers, and Andrea, who had been among the first to draw his sword in the defense of the Riarios, were well matched. Wounded in the fray, Andrea had been nursed back to health by the solicitous Stella. The two were married by Bishop Savelli in Cesena, who was delighted to preside over this single joyful occasion during a troubled time.
Perhaps it was this springtime awakening of love, or merely shrewd opportunism, that prompted Antonio Maria Ordelaffi to make an unexpected proposal as well. The oldest of the three brothers who claimed lordship of Forlì left his safe haven of Ravenna to test the waters of the town. With Count Girolamo Riario dead and papal support slow in coming, he hoped the Forlivesi might be ready for the return of the Ordelaffis. Unable to marshal an army himself, Antonio was disappointed by his Venetian protectors, who were not interested enough in the little town to cross their bellicose neighbor Milan. But Antonio Maria, young, handsome, and, as events showed, quite imaginative, hit upon another solution. Approaching the castle in secret, he fired two arrows into the fortress of Ravaldino. These arrows carried letters with the anonymous suggestion that the countess marry Antonio Ordelaffi and restore peace to Forlì. Caterina ignored these advances, audacious in their timing, since a mere week had passed since her husband's murder; yet the proud Antonio Maria informed both Ferrara and Florence of this amorous sally, hoping to garner their support.
Bishop Savelli wisely used the time he bought with his phony papal briefs. While pummeling the fortress walls of Schiavonia with noisy cannon fire, the worldly bishop employed a quieter technique with its castellan: a handsome bribe of twelve hundred ducats. A few days later, the keeper of the outlying fortress of Forlimpopoli gave up his charge for even less. Caterina's position was weakening, but she demonstrated extraordinary endurance while the Orsis were cracking under the strain.
The pope, in his last bid for compromise, wrote to the Forlivesi on April 24, stating that he had appointed a cardinal governor for the city, and he would be arriving soon. The new papal representative was none other than Cardinal Raffaello Riario, the nephew of the deceased count. The papal mandate gave the cardinal authority to intervene to protect the interests and well-being of the Riario children in an attempt to exclude Caterina from serving as regent for the underage Ottaviano. The pope hoped that the Riario name would be enough to appease the family's partisans while still ensuring papal dominion of the city. The elated Forlivesi assumed that together with the cardinal, the pope would send his soldiers to quiet the town. Things looked bleak for Caterina.
The tide turned abruptly on April 29, when a contingent of twelve thousand men, including cavalry, infantry, archers, and artillery, set up camp outside the gates. Trailing in the wake of the soldiers were what all city dwellers feared most: the sackers. These parasites followed the military and then perched like vultures on the sidelines, awaiting the fall of a city. Once it capitulated, they went to work. Taking apart houses with their demolition instruments, they carried away anything, from the valuable to the simply useful. At the sight of even a fragment of the Milanese army, the Forlivesi rued their folly in baiting the duke of Milan and Bentivoglio. Frantic letters from the Orsis, Savelli, and the Council of Eight coursed to Lorenzo de' Medici, whose intervention was limited to annexing the Piancaldoli castle on the Imola-Florence border.
The Milanese forces sent a ducal emissary to demand the restoration of the Riarios. While Savelli reiterated the papal position and the Orsis seethed, town criers suddenly overwhelmed the piazza with shouts of "The church is here! The church is here!" The Council of Eight, believing that the Roman army was fast approaching, put its waning hopes into this one last basket.
The Forlivesi flooded out of the Porta Cotogni just in time to see the arrival of the soldiers. Not the teeming mass of fighting men expected by the townspeople, a mere fifty horsemen came into view. To the chagrin of the Forlivesi, the cavalry rode up to Ravaldino, unrolled the standard of the Riario rose, and rode across the lowered drawbridge to join Caterina's troops in the castle. The long-awaited "papal army" had been sent by the cardinal camerlengo, Raffaello Riario, to aid his aunt Caterina. The Forlivesi now knew all was lost. All they could do was await retribution, in the form of sacking, looting, and executions.
The vengeful Orsis dashed to the Porta San Pietro, now truly intending to kill the Riario children, who were no longer a useful political tool. They hammered at the door, swearing that Bishop Savelli had ordered them to take the children for "safekeeping." The guards refused them, following the bishop's orders. Ronche and the Orsis insisted, alternating curses and pleas, until Savelli's soldiers rained stones from the tower upon the intruders and threatened to call the city with the warning bell.
Caterina heard the shouts and cheers outside the castle walls. Coming out to the ramparts, she no longer heard "Church! Church!" or "Orsi! Orsi!" but now "Duke! Duke!" to hail her uncle's troops. She strained her ears to listen for the word for which she had fought so long and hard. At last, the name "Ottaviano!" rang through the air. She had won. Her son was alive and Forlì was hers.