Modena. Duke Passerino’s men are in for a real shock: Raimondo da Spello, nephew of Pope Clement V, is robbed and killed. He was carrying 200,000 gold ducats to the papal seat in Avignon. The papal convoy is intercepted in Castelvetro. The French knights of the escort are slaughtered, while Raimondo’s body is taken to Bologna and buried there. On April 4, 1314, with the papal bull Flagitosumscelsus, Clement V excommunicates the culprits and interdicts the city of Modena. The Modenese are stripped of all ecclesiastical fiefs, citizens are declared infamous and unfit, the bishop, priests, and all clergy are ordered to leave the city, and the Modenese are no longer admitted to the sacraments, except baptism and extreme unction. The matter was, in reality, less serious and less lasting than it seemed: on April 14, 1314, with the death of Clement V, his successor John XXII effectively froze the sentence. And in January 1324, the Pope consented to the clergy’s return to Modena.
