Jean d'Eppe

The battle of Forlì, also called the battle of Calendimaggio (1 May), was a disastrous defeat for Jean d'Eppe. His largely French army was reduced, in the words of Dante, to a "bloody heap" (sanguinoso mucchio). The scene depicted here is from a fresco by Giovanni Battista Marchetti.

Jean d'Eppe (c. 1240 – 12 November 1293), known in Italian as Giovanni d'Appia or Gianni d'Epa, was a French nobleman who served the Angevin dynasty of the Kingdom of Sicily and the Papal State as a military commander and administrator. He was heavily involved in the conflict between Guelphs, supporters of the Angevin claim to Sicily and of Papal claims in northern Italy, and the Ghibellines, supporters of the Staufer dynasty's claim to Sicily and of Imperial rights in northern Italy.

Jean did not arrive in Sicily until the early 1270s, but he quickly acquired land and castles. Between 1274 and 1281, he served the Sicilian crown as a diplomatic and judicial agent before he was loaned out to the Papacy. Through a series of military campaigns in 1281–83, Jean helped secure Papal control over the Romagna and Maritime Campania. In 1284, he returned to Sicily to assist the Angevins in the War of the Sicilian Vespers against the Aragonese, who were taking up the Staufer claim. He appears to have retired from public activities in 1285, but he returned to an active role in 1289. In 1292, he resigned abruptly and returned to France. Nothing is known of his last year, save that he died in his native village.

Move to Sicily Jean was the second son of Guillaume, lord of the village of Eppes in northern France. His older brother, Laurent, inherited the lordship from their father. In 1270, Jean joined the Eighth Crusade being organized by King Louis IX against Hafsid Tunisia. It was probably during the crusade that Jean first met Louis IX's brother, King Charles I of Sicily. By 1274 he had settled in Charles' kingdom along with his younger brother Pierre.

It is unknown when between 1270 and 1274 Jean moved to the Kingdom of Sicily, but by 1274 he had already acquired several royal fiefs. In the Terra di Lavoro on the mainland, he had been given the fiefs of Ambrisio, Castrocielo, Pescosolido and Vallecorsa and the royal castle of San Giovanni Incarico. It seems that former holders of some of these fiefs did not relinquish them willingly to Jean, since on 23 August 1275 Charles I had to issue orders to the justiciar of Terra di Lavoro to investigate the illegal retention of fiefs. In the Principato, also on the mainland, Jean held the fief of Campagna. All these fiefs earned him a total revenue of 160 oncie per year.

Papal rector of the Romagna Campaign of 1281 Jean's first task as Papal rector was to subdue the strongholds of Forlì and Cesena, which were being defended by Guido I da Montefeltro. To cover his personal expenses, Charles I authorized him to impose an extraordinary tax on his vassals in the Sicilian kingdom.

Following these failures, Jean asked Charles of Anjou to intervene with Martin IV to get him released from his command. Charles refused. On 4 September, he again attacked Forlì. On 16 September, Martin ordered Malatesta da Verucchio, lord of Rimini, to submit to Jean's authority and send him military reinforcements. On 17 September, Jean's troops plundered the villages of San Martino in Strada and Ponte di Ronco. Forlì continued to hold out against attack and on 19 September, Jean retreated again.

On 30 April, some conspirators in Forlì offered to turn the city over to Jean, who immediately marched his men from Faenza to Forlì. Arriving the following day, he found that the conspiracy had been uncovered and the traitors arrested. Nonetheless, Jean launched an assault on the city. The main troops easily breached the outer wall. While they plundered the suburbs, Guido sent a small force out a gate on the opposite side of the city. In an ambush, this force overcame Jean's rearguard and surprised the main force. After a bloody battle, Jean was forced to retreat to Faenza. Dante does not name the French leader (Jean), and although he places Guido da Montefeltro in the eighth bolgia of Hell, he was opposed to the French influence over the Papacy that came to a head under Martin IV. His lengthy Old French verse epitaph, now destroyed, read in part: En Puille fu il et en Tunes Et en autres terres aucunes, Par sa force grand nom acquit, En Calabre moult d'armes fit, Et en Abrusse et en Romaine Pour l'amour Diu souffrit grant paine; Et ses faits qui tous les diroit A recorder trop long seroit ... In Apulia he was and in Tunis And in other lands, By force he acquired a great name, In Calabria many feats of arms he did, And in Abruzzo and Romagna For the love of God he suffered great pain; And his feats all would say To record would take too long ... The epitaph goes on to compare Jean favourably with Roland and Oliver, heroes of the Matter of France. The necrology of the abbey indicates by his title, "lord of Eppes" (dominus de Appia), that he succeeded his brother at some point. He left 21 livres to the abbey for a mass to be sung on the anniversary of his death and 40 livres for an annual mass for both him and his father to be sung "in low voice" (submissa voce).