Lionel's Remaining Life 87 



progress he was living with Violante. However, his feasting in 

 Milan can hardly have been the cause of his death; and, while 

 there may have been banqueting at the Castle after his return 

 from Alba, it must be remembered that he was ill before this 

 return, that his illness seems to have been the cause of the return, 

 and that in any case he stayed at Pavia but a few days. On the 

 whole, it seems most reasonable to assume that he saw but little 

 of Violante during their married life, being called away by the 

 care of his province; that the sickness which caused his death 

 was of no very long duration, and yet not excessively sudden 

 in its operation; and that his return to Pavia would therefore 

 naturally have fallen in September, perhaps late in the month. 

 As the lingering illness which terminated in the death of the 

 Black Prince seems to have originated in digestive disorders 

 contracted during his sojourn in Spain, it is not unreasonable 

 to assume that Lionel may have indulged overmuch in eating 

 and drinking — consider his wedding-banquet ! — and that the heat 

 of a Piedmontese summer, his military exercises, and the labors 

 and perplexities incident to his rule amid an alien people, and 

 surrounded by open or secret enemies, are responsible for the 

 rest, or would even have been sufficient of themselves. As for 

 feasting, he does not seem to have been prostrated by that at 

 Paris or at Chambery ; but in both these places the weather must 

 have been cooler, and Lionel had then nothing to do but give 

 himself up to the pleasure of the moment.* 



* Knighton (2. 123; cf. Chron. Anglice 61) affirms that his death was 

 due to poison ('intoxicatus veneno interiit'), but then Knighton knows 

 Galeazzo as Golias ('filiam Goliae') — hardly a compliment, by the way — 

 and calls Milan 'Meletum.' Moreover, his statement is contradicted by 

 those of the Italian chroniclers, for Petrus Azarius and Cron. Monf. 

 say that Galeazzo and all the Lombards lamented greatly over Lionel's 

 death; and Annal. Med. that Galeazzo was beside himself ('effectus est 

 velut demens') with excessive grief. This grief was natural enough, con- 

 sidering the hopes that Galeazzo had built upon this marriage, and the 

 disorders which immediately followed (see below, pp. 104 ff.). 



Hardyng confirms, on the whole, the statements of Jovius and the 

 chronicles (p. 334) : 



In whiche meane tyme his justes & his excesse, 



His great riot and wynes delicacie, 



His ghoste exiled out [of his corps] doutlesse, 



Afore the daye set of his regence, 



For whom was made great mone through Italic. 



