Descendant of Dante calls for poet to be pardoned 700 years after his death

A painting of Dante from the Basilica of Santa Maria del Fiore, Florence

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As Italy commemorates the 700th anniversary of the death of Dante, a descendant of Italy’s most celebrated poet wants him to be pardoned of the heinous crimes he was accused of.

Born into a noble family in Florence in 1265, Dante Alighieri found himself on the wrong side of the bloody feud between the rival Guelph and Ghibelline factions.

He was accused of crimes that included fraud, extortion, embezzlement and perjury. When he failed to turn up to face trial, he was sentenced to be burnt at the stake.

Anxious to avoid such a fate, he fled into exile in 1302 and never saw Florence again, despite making repeated requests to be allowed to return.

He settled in Ravenna where he wrote much of his masterpiece, The Divine Comedy, and died there in 1321.

Now one of his descendants is exploring the possibility of the poet being granted a pardon – both for the initial crimes he was accused of and the death penalty that was then handed down by magistrates.

Dante is regarded as the father of the Italian language

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“They were politically-motivated trials and the exile and death penalties inflicted on my dear ancestor are unjust,” said Sperello di Serego Alighieri, who is an astrophysicist by profession.

“They have never been canceled, in contrast to what happened with Galileo Galilei. So if the law permits it, we will ask for a review.”

He has the backing of Alessandro Traversi, a law professor in Florence, who says the idea of a pardon after seven centuries is not so outlandish.

He points to the Italian penal code, which says that sentences can be revised if new evidence emerges that can demonstrate the innocence of the protagonist.

To that end, the two men are organising a conference in May that will involve jurists, judges and historians, to discuss the feasibility of a pardon.

It will involve some heavy-hitters from the Italian legal world, including a judge from the Supreme Court in Rome and a procurator-general.

“We’ll be asking ourselves if the sentences against Dante were the result of regular judicial proceedings or were they the poisoned fruit of politics, which exploited the justice system to bring down an adversary,” Prof Traversi told Corriere della Sera newspaper.

A statue of Dante in Verona in northern Italy

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Not everyone is convinced that Dante, known in Italy as Il Sommo Poeta or the Supreme Poet, needs a pardon.

“It’s lovely to think that there are still descendants of Dante, and perhaps it is right to cancel the convictions that were inflicted on him,” said Aldo Cazzullo, a journalist and commentator. “But his memory does not need it. Dante is the true father of Italy because he gave us not just our language but a sense of ourselves.”

The story of a pilgrim’s journey through Hell, Purgatory and Paradise, Dante used The Divine Comedy to satirise his enemies and lament the factionalism of Florentine politics.

Dante’s death sentence was signed by Cante de’ Gabrielli, a magistrate who originally came from Gubbio in Umbria.

Five years ago, the town asked to be forgiven for playing a part in the poet’s persecution and exile.