Today, the 6th of August, in 1284 the little known naval battle of Meloria was fought between the powerful city states of Genoa and Pisa. It was a Genoese victory, which marked the end of Pisa as a power in the region and would see it absorbed in 1406 by the flourishing banking and textile rich city of Florence. A position as leading Tuscan city which she would hold for hundreds of years, under the clever and super rich Medici family.
One of the losing Pisan Admirals, Count Ugolini, can be found in the Florentine poet Dante’s Inferno.
He is in the Ninth Circle with Satan punished for treason, found forever gnawing on the Archbishop Ruggieri who betrayed, imprisoned and starved him and his family.
