Page "Beatrice Cenci" Paragraph 3

According to the legend, Francesco Cenci abused his wife and his sons and reached the point of committing incest with Beatrice.

He was jailed for other crimes, but thanks to the leniency with which the nobles were treated, he was freed early.

Beatrice tried to inform the authorities about the frequent mistreatments, but nothing happened, although everybody in Rome knew what kind of person her father was.

When he found out that his daughter reported against him, he sent Beatrice and Lucrezia away from Rome to live in the family's country castle at La Petrella del Salto in the Abruzzi mountains.

The four Cenci decided they had no alternative but to try to get rid of Francesco, and together organised a plot.

In 1598, during one of Francesco's stays at the castle, two vassals ( one of whom had become Beatrice's secret lover ) helped them to drug the man, but this failed to kill Francesco.

Following this Beatrice, her siblings and stepmother bludgeoned Francesco to death with a hammer and threw the body off a balcony to make it look like an accident.

However, no one believed the death to be accidental.