Everything about Dattus totally explained
Dattus or
Datto was a
Lombard leader from
Bari, the brother-in-law of
Melus of Bari. He joined his brother-in-law in revolt (
1009) against
Byzantine authority in
southern Italy.
In
1010, the rebels took
Ascoli and
Troina. In March
1011, the
catepan Basil Mesardonites and Leo Tornikios Kontoleon, the
strategos of
Cephalonia, disembarked with reinforcements from
Constantinople. Basil immediately besieged the rebels in Bari. The Greek citizens of the city negotiated with Basil and forced the Lombard leaders, Melus and Dattus, to flee. Basil enterred the city on
11 June 1011 and reestablished Byzantine authority. He didn't follow his victory up with any severe reactions. He simply sent the family of Melus, including his son
Argyrus, to Constantinople.
While Melus fled to
Guaimar III of Salerno, Dattus looked to the protection of the
Abbey of Montecassino, where he was aided by the Latin monks, and to
Pope Benedict VIII, who loaned him papal troops to garrison a tower on the
Garigliano, in the territory of the
Duchy of Gaeta, then ruled by the anti-Byzantine
Emilia.
In
1016, Dattus rejoined Melus and his
Norman mercenaries in
Apulia. They were moderately successful at first, but they were defeated at
Cannae (1018) and Dattus fled back to Montecassino and thence to the old tower. In 1020, while Melus was conferencing with pope and the
German king in
Bamberg, the new
catepan,
Basil Boiannes, and his new ally,
Pandulf IV of Capua, marched on the tower and, on
15 June, Dattus was tied up in a sack with a monkey, a rooster, and a snake and tossed into the sea. The atrocity prompted a quick Western response, a huge army under the
Emperor Henry II marched south to besiege the new fortress of
Troia. Dattus was never avenged, except, perhaps, by the Normans in the coming years.
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