He contrived, however, to turn the tables upon
them and to hold them in the same dungeon where he himself had been
their prisoner. He was succeeded at last by Guido Lucio, a man of some
integrity; but he too was the victim of his family, his own sons
rising up against him in his old age and in 1389 flinging him into
prison where he died.
He was followed in the lordship of Ravenna by his son Ostasio. This
man died in 1431, that is to say, in the midst of all the confusion,
here in Romagna and the Marches, of the fifteenth century, when the
condottieri were one and all looking for thrones and such ambitions as
those of the Visconti, of Francesco Sforza, of Sigismondo Malatesta,
of Federigo of Urbino and of a host of _parvenus_ were struggling for
dominion and mastery. Thus it was that Ostasio's successor, Ostasio,
in 1438 was compelled to make alliance with duke Filippo Maria of
Milan. Venice, ever watchful, saw Visconti's game, remembered Cervia,
and insisted upon Ostasio coming to Venice. While there he learned
that Venice had annexed his dominion. Nor are we surprised to learn
that he ended his days in a Franciscan convent, where he was
mysteriously assassinated, probably by order of Venice.
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