Modena. Despite numerous pleas from various quarters for a commutation of the sentence, Duke Francis IV adamantly carries out the death sentence of Ciro Menotti in the Citadel, along with that of notary Vincenzo Borrelli, guilty of drafting the act of forfeiture of Francis IV after his escape from the duchy and therefore condemned to death. Menotti spends the night before the execution with a priest, to whom he delivers a noble letter for his wife. The guards confiscate the letter, and it is not until 1848 that the liberators deliver it to the widow, two years after the Duke’s death and the expulsion of the Habsburg-Este family. The death sentence is published only after the execution, to prevent potential unrest and revolts. His figure as a revolutionary and romantic hero becomes a symbol during the Risorgimento. Popular history says that when the Duke and his horse had previously stopped under his window on Corso Canal Grande in Modena to ask him to go into exile, he responded: “Va’ via te, duchín e’d merda” (also reported as a request to surrender and the response “arendet te duchin ed merda!”).
