The Genoese Annals of Ottobuono Scriba, 1191 - 1194 (translation)

This unpublished translation relates to The Conquest of Southern Italy by Henry VI.

The Genoese annals were begun in 1100 by Caffaro di Rustico, then a young man of twenty who went on to have a distinguished career in the government of the city of Genoa. Caffaro continued his annals into old age, only laying down his pen in 1163. Some years earlier, in 1152, he had formerly presented his work to the consuls and commune of the city, who had a copy made and kept in the city archives. After his death his ‘annals’ were continued by others as the official history of the city of Genoa, down until 1294. The notary Ottobuono ws the second continuator after Caffaro, and wrote the section from 1174 until 1196, although he only began writing in 1189, and his account of the previous fifteen years was written retrospectively. He was however an eyewitness of the events of the 1190s, and his first-hand account reveals the anger of the Genoese at the failure of Henry VI to fulfil the promises that he made to the city in return for its naval aid, as well as the problems posed to the imperial expeditions by the continued rivalry of the Genoese and Pisans.