Alboin, King of the Lombards (Germanic people who ruled the Italian peninsula) from 560 to 572, took his wife, Rosamund, as a spoil of war after he killed her father in 567. At one point, he invited her "to drink merrily with her father" by making her drink out of her own father's skull, which he had kept as a trophy and fashioned into a mug.
Plotting her revenge, Rosamund's lover,
Helmichis, suggested that "a very strong man" named Peredeo would be
best suited to murder the king. However, Peredeo did not want to get involved
and refused the job. Undeterred, Rosamund dressed as a servant and seduced
Peredeo into having sex. When she revealed herself, Peredeo agreed to kill
Alboin because he wanted to avoid being punished for committing adultery with
the queen.
One night, after a great feast, an
inebriated Alboin went to bed, and Rosamund ordered the servants that his sword
be bound to the bedpost so he would be defenseless if woken up. Alboin did wake
up and temporarily resist Peredeo using a footstool, but was ultimately killed.
Helmichis planned to marry Rosamund and
usurp the throne; however, they gained very little support and were instead
forced to flee, taking with them a large sum of the dead king's private
treasures. They married in the small coastal city of Ravenna, but soon Rosamund
took on a new lover named Longinus. Rosamund and Longinus decided to kill
Helmichis with poison so that they could get married. After Helmichis' bath,
Rosamund handed him a drink, but he forced her to drink it and then he drank
some himself, and they both died.
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