The Duchy of Benevento was a Lombard principality in southern Italy which existed from 571 to 1077, with Benevento serving as its capital. It was founded even before the Lombard conquest of the Po Valley was complete, with Zotto leading a band of Lombard soldiers down the coast of Campania. Like the other Lombard duchies, Benevento was essentially independent from the King, and it was expanded against the Byzantine Empire by Zotto's successors. In 758, King Desiderius of Lombardy briefly captured Spoleto and Benevento, but, in 774, Arechis II of Benevento became an independent prince following the fall of the Kingdom of the Lombards; after the Franks besieged Salerno in 787, he was forced to become a vassal of Charlemagne. Benevento had an uneasy relationship with its Frankish sovereigns over the next few centuries, and the Moors later raided Salerno and Benevento. The Byzantines reconquered much of southern Italy from the Moors at the expense of Benevento, whose power was now eclipsed by the Greeks. In 969, Benevento became a Catholic archdiocese. In 1022, Holy Roman Emperor Henry II briefly conquered both Capua and Benevento, but he returned to Germany after the failed siege of Troia. At the same time, the Normans arrived in southern Italy, and Robert Guiscard captured Benevento in 1053. Guiscard gave it to his nominal suzerain, the Pope, who gave it to a series of minor Lombard nobles before finally granting it to Guiscard in 1078. It was finally returned to the Pope in 1081, becoming part of the Papal States.
Gallery[]
