BENTIVOGLIO. – A Bolognese family first recorded at the beginning of the 13th century; already by the end of that century and the beginning of the next, some of its members, more or less allied with the Popoli and of Guelph allegiance, were involved in the various factions and events of the city. In 1354 they opposed the lordship of Giovanni di Oleggio and were forced into exile. They returned to Bologna with Cardinal Albornoz in 1360. In February 1401, Giovanni I proclaimed himself lord of the city, but was murdered the following year and his faction compelled to go into exile. In 1420 we find his son Anton Galeazzo again as lord, a position he held until 1435 when he was put to death by the papal legate. His son Annibale restored the family’s fortunes in 1443 but was treacherously killed in 1445 by the Canzoli faction. In 1446, however, Sante, a kinsman, became lord and in 1447 concluded with Nicholas V, on behalf of Bologna, the agreement with the Holy See that lasted until the Napoleonic invasion. Under him there developed that building renewal which reached particular splendor under Giovanni II, son of Annibale, who succeeded Sante in 1462. Giovanni, without officially assuming the lordship, governed Bologna for many years with great pomp and prestige, held in high esteem by the Italian powers. When he alienated the citizens’ affection through some acts of cruelty, Giovanni found himself isolated against the armies of Louis XII and Pope Julius II, so that in 1506 he had to leave the city with his family and died excommunicate in Milan in 1508. The family vainly attempted several times to return to Bologna and settled in Ferrara.
After their exile in Ferrara, the B. family produced prelates who brought it new distinction. The first and most illustrious of these was GUIDO, born in Ferrara on 4 Oct. 1579; he studied law at Padua, where he had Galileo Galilei as his teacher of science, as he himself attests. Elected by Clement VIII as his private chamberlain in 1587, he soon moved to Rome where he won the favor of Paul V, who sent him as nuncio to Flanders in 1607. Returning thence in 1615, he moved to the nunciature in Paris the following year and did not leave it until 1621 when he was created cardinal. He enjoyed wide credit in the Curia as protector of the kingdom of France and head of the Inquisition, until he died on 7 Sept. 1644 during the Conclave convened for the death of Urban VIII. Particularly inclined to historical studies, he wrote in 24 books the history of the war in Flanders from 1559 to 1607 (Cologne 1632–36) and the Relazioni written during his nunciatures (Antwerp 1629); finally, in 1642, his Memorie, a vivid portrayal of curial life in his time and rich in information documenting his experiences. Thanks to these writings, which were reprinted several times, B. is counted among the best writers of his age.
MARCO CORNELIO. – B. was born in Ferrara on 27 March 1668 and died in Rome on 30 Dec. 1732; after taking his degree in his native city and reforming its Studium, he held various offices in the Curia; then on 21 Oct. 1711 Clement XI sent him as nuncio to France, where he had to work hard to secure acceptance of the famous bull Unigenitus. Slandered before the Regent, he had to be recalled and was created cardinal on 29 Nov. 1719. In July 1726 he was named Spanish ambassador to the Pope and worked for the creation as cardinal of Emmanuel, Infante of Portugal.
Under the pseudonym Selvaggio Porpora, he published in Rome in 1729 his translation into blank verse of Statius’ Thebaid, which is the third Italian poetic translation from the Latin, after those of Caro and Marchetti. All the critics of the 18th century were unanimous in judging that Statius had become in B.’s translation, to use Zeno’s words, “sublime without bombast, grand without disproportion, suave without softness.” Indeed B.’s Thebaid is an 18th-century Thebaid; “remade,” as Calcaterra writes, “according to the tastes of the early 18th century by a poet who had relived it through his literary love for Tasso and Ariosto, and who wished to continue the epic tradition of his Ferrara.” It is a legend that the cardinal B. had commissioned this work from Frugoni and published it under his own name: Frugoni himself repeatedly declared to his first biographer that he had had no part whatsoever in the translation of the Thebaid.
ANNIBALE. – Archbishop, born in the first half of the 17th century, died on 21 Apr. 1663. He distinguished himself in his youth for his poetic output in the vernacular, of which only Applausi poetici in lode di Liora Barroni has survived. In 1644 he was named titular archbishop of Thebes.
DOMENICO. – Papal general, born into the noble B. family in Bologna on 3 July 1781, died in Rome on 26 Dec. 1851. Admitted in 1805 as a sub-lieutenant in the corps of the Guards of Honor of the Viceroy of Italy, Eugène de Beauharnais, and then as captain in the 2nd Italian Chasseurs Regiment, he took part in all the Napoleonic campaigns between 1808 and 1814. After the fall of the Empire and his return home, on 28 June 1815 he entered service as lieutenant colonel of the 1st Regiment of Papal Carabinieri. For his valiant defense of the town and garrison of Rieti against the column of Sercognani, he was promoted colonel and later placed at the head of the reorganized Carabinieri corps as a regiment. In the spring of 1848 he briefly held the post of Minister of War, but, a most loyal soldier, after the disturbances of the following November he retired into private life. – Vedi Tav. LXXXII.