Tags
Adelchi, Charlemagne, Desiderius, illustration, Lombards, Manzoni, medieval, The Cross and the Dragon
Eighth-century writers can be inconsiderate to modern readers. They rarely describe what the people they’re writing about look like nor do they include images.
So the blogger often turns to later illustrations of their subjects. Such is the case with Desiderius, king of Lombardy in northern Italy and the subject of an upcoming guest post on Tinney Sue Heath’s blog, Historical Fiction Research.
Desiderius’s name may be familiar to readers of Outtakes and The Cross and the Dragon. He is King Charles’s ex-father-in-law, and in the early 770s, they fought a war. In an excellent scholarly article, “Pavia and Rome: The Lombard Monarchy and the Papacy in the Eighth Century,” Jan T. Hallenbeck analyzes the complexities that led to the war, which will be shared later.
Right now, I could use some assistance on information about the illustrations I’m considering for the post. Perhaps it is the former journalist in me, but I like to provide readers with information about the images themselves. When were they created? Who is the artist? My usual source for images, Wikimedia Commons, does a pretty good job of this most of the time.
Appearing to be from the 19th century, the images below might have illustrated Alessandro Manzoni’s 1822 tragedy Adelchi, which gets its name from Desiderius’s son Adalgis.
The first (I think) shows Adalgis after Charles’s victory. (In real life, Adalgis escaped to Byzantium during the war and tried to retake his kingdom.) The second shows Desiderius at court and the third, the Lombard camp.
If you can tell me something about any of these images, I would be most grateful.
Hello Kim.
On an Italian Wiki page here at http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adelchi_(Manzoni) the right side information under the first image you have does indeed seem to indicate it is from Manzoni’s five-act 1822 tragedy, and that it does show the wounded Adelchis and his father Desiderius.
I did see the third image you have there on an Italian page relating to Manzoni, so I would want to say that all the images are at least from there, but I could find no specific caption as to whether any figure in the third image is specifically Desiderius or Adelchis. Perhaps in some library is a print version that includes the images. I did not look for the second image but I am intrigued (especially as this period, the Lombard into Norman Italy, is on my own must-write list.
It’s troublesome, though, as the free google books version of Adelchi only contains text, no images at all
Thanks, Marie. I found the first image on Wikimedia Commons, but the only info it has in English is that it depicts Adalgis (also spelled Adelchis). The Italian page has a lot more. I don’t speak or read Italian, but I have some background in French and Spanish. I think, but am not certain, that the caption indicates Adalgis is dying in the presence of Charlemagne and Desiderius. As I said earlier, the historic Adalgis escaped.
Hi Kim, Yes that caption does say that Adalgis/Adelchis is dying in the presence of both Charlemagne and Desiderius (and yes Adelchis did escape to Constantinople acc. to the article you reference.) So the image takes a bit of poetic license
I’m not surprised. Poetic license with the stories involving Charlemagne has been going on for centuries.
Using http://www.tineye.com . . .
The first image is found (by tineye) only at Wikimedia Commons (http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Adelchis,_son_of_Desiderius.jpg), where the page shows that it is used on the following Wikipedia pages:
Adelchi (Manzoni)
Carlo Magno
Pax Nicephori
Regno longobardo
Storia della Repubblica di Venezia
Utente:Tizio X/Sandbox3
Portale:Longobardi/In primo piano/Adelchi
It’s possible one of those pages contains additional information. (I don’t read Italian).
tineye shows no results for the other two images. That doesn’t mean they don’t exist elsewhere on the Web, but it’s a good indication that they’re obscure. You could also install the Google Reverse Image Search plugin for Firefox, although there’s no reason to assume you would get better results.
Good luck.
Thanks, Dick. I found all three images online, the first at Wikimedia Commons and the other two at Lombard Leagues. The latter indicated a connection to Manzoni. I’ll look into the Google Reverse Image Search. I’m not surprised these images are obscure. Manzoni’s tragedy is not well-known in the United States.
Google Images can be handy for identifying an image too. Drag the image into the search box and then sort out the results.
Thanks, Jo Ann. I will try that and see what happens.