Page:Book of the Riviera.djvu/179

Rh out to her that had been measured to Andrew; and she was either strangled whilst at her prayers, or smothered under a feather bed, on May I2th, 1382.

She was buried first at Muro, and then her body was transferred to Naples. Opinions were divided as to her character. Angelo de Perugia qualified her as "santissima," and spoke of her as "l'onore del mundo, la luce deli Italia"; Petrarch greatly admired her; and recently, Mistral has composed a poem in which she is painted as a blameless and misrepresented personage. Her sister Maria was almost as bad as herself. She also had her husband, Robert des Baux, murdered. It is true that she had been married to him against her will. When she got the power in her hands she flung him into prison, and, entering the dungeon, along with four armed men, had him assassinated before her eyes, and the body cast out of a window and left without burial, till Joanna heard of her sister's action, when she sent and had the body decently interred.

After that Joanna had been put to death, Marie, natural daughter of Robert of Naples, and aunt of Joanna, was tried and executed as having been privy to the plot to murder Andrew. This Marie had carried on an intrigue with Boccaccio, and is believed to be the Fiammetta of the Decameron; but according toothers, Fiammetta was intended for Joanna herself. The Pope's nephew, who was to be invested with the