Filippo da Pistoia
He was the apostolic legate in Germany between July 1246 and March 1247, in Lombardy and the Trevigiana between December 1255 and August 1258 and throughout northern Italy between 1267 and February 1270.
Educated in Spain and France, Filippo was a worldly prelate, a corpulent oenophile who kept a court of musicians and a constant bodyguard.
[1] His career can be told in detail because of the numerous documents issued by him and to him by various popes,[2] and because of his friendship with the historian Salimbene de Adam.
His friend and confidante, Salimbene de Adam, who is the main source for his youth, writes that he was related to his predecessor in the diocese of Ferrara, Garsendinus.
His army consisted of Venetians, Ferrarese exiles, the men of Azzo VII d'Este (who had been banned by the emperor in June 1239) and the Guelphs of Bologna, Mantua and Milan.
[1] Now that Filippo was in command of his diocese, the diocesan properties that had belonged as fiefs to the Torelli and Ramberti families were confiscated and granted to the Este, who distributed them to their followers.
On 21 May 1240, in obedience to an order of Pope Gregory IX, he ceded the revenues of San Pietro di Massa Nuova to the diocese of Cervia to compensate it for the damages it suffered during the war.
As bishop, he kept a court more typical of a secular lord: populated with musicians, bards and a guard of forty armed men.
Pope Innocent IV then sent him to Germany to convince Landgrave Henry Raspe to accept election as king in opposition to Frederick.
[9] After Henry was elected at Veitshöchheim on 22 May, Innocent congratulated Filippo on his successful mission and appointed him apostolic legate to Germany on 5 July.
[1] As legate and on the pope's instructions, Filippo excommunicated all of Frederick's ecclesiastical supporters who refused to appear at the Hoftag (assembly) called by Henry that month.
The emperor complained the pope about Filippo and also wrote to his own supporters demanding they bar the legate's passage.
[12] Filippo did, however, exceed the wishes of the pope when he excommunicated Otto II, Duke of Bavaria, and placed his lands under interdict in October 1246.
[1][15] When Henry died suddenly on 17 February while the siege was ongoing, the army disintegrated and Filippo was left isolated.
On 5 December, Innocent IV charged him with re-establishing peace in the archdiocese by military means and, on 25 January 1252, confirmed the interdict.
[1] An indication of the difficulty of managing more than one diocese as bishop-elect is found in the dispute between Filippo and his Ferrarese chapter in March 1252.
Between November 1254 and December 1255, Filippo was in Apulia trying to foster an alliance against King Manfred of Sicily, whose right to the crown the pope disputed.
[1] On 20 December 1255, Filippo was finally appointed legate in Lombardy and the March of Treviso by Pope Alexander IV.
[22] Following the fall of Padua, the army reinforced by Venetians, Bolognese and Chioggians under the condottiero Giovanni da Schio marched against Vicenza.
Filippo appointed his old ally Azzo VII as captain-general of the army, but as it approached Vicenza word of the imminent arrival of Ezzelino caused panic in the ranks.
He then returned to Brescia to forestall the takeover by the pro-imperial exiles led by Oberto Pelavicino and Buoso da Dovara.
After the death of Ezzelino on 1 October 1259, he passed into the control of Oberto Pelavicino, who refused all papal entreaties for his release.
On 28 March 1261, he held a provincial synod to coordinate his bishops' actions against usurpations of church rights and properties by the communes and the feudal lords during the wars.
On 17 February 1264, he took part with other regional Guelph leaders in the election of Obizzo II d'Este as lord (signore) of Ferrara.
His task was to organize an alliance to prevent Conradin, then in Germany, from making his way to Sicily, which he claimed by hereditary right.
He immediately excommunicated the Sicilian claimant and his supporters, including Oberto Pelavicino and the cities of Verona and Pavia.
Shortly after this date, Clement heard rumours of his death and on 30 July reserved the right to name his successor in Ravenna.
[1] On 19 April 1269, Filippo convoked a provincial synod to meet in the Basilica of San Vitale in Ravenna, but he did not personally attend.
In exchange for Argenta, Obizzo paid a sum of money to a certain Filippo and Francesco, who are referred to as the archbishop's nephews in the charter.
