Accoramboni, Vittoria (c. 1557–1585)

Duchess of Bracciano. Name variations: Virginia; Vittoria Corombona. Pronunciation: Ah-KHO-rum-BOH-nee. Born around 1557; murdered in Padua on December 22, 1585; married Francesco Peretti, in 1573 (murdered in 1581); married Paolo or Paulo Giordano Orsini (d. 1585), duke of Bracciano (or Brachiano).

Vittoria Accoramboni's name reaches down through history because of passion, revenge, treachery, and a series of intrigues culminating in multiple murders, including her own and those of her two husbands. In 16th-century Italy, Accoramboni's first husband Francesco Peretti was murdered at the instigation of Paolo Orsini, who was already married, so that he might wed Accoramboni, a woman known for her great beauty and wit. (The death of Paolo Orsini's wife Isabella de Medici , daughter of Eleonora de Medici , is also open to questions of foul play.) Eventually, Orsini married Accoramboni. Upon his death, on November 13, 1585, she became involved in litigation with Ludovic Orsini, concerning her inheritance, and was murdered by him. These events were altered and adapted by John Webster for his play The White Devil or Vittoria Corombona, first presented around 1612. In the revenge tragedy, Isabella de Medici dies while kissing a poisoned portrait of her husband, and Francesco meets his end when pushed off a gymnasium horse vault. Accoramboni's history has also been written by Gnoli (1870), and was made the subject of a novel by L. Tieck, Vittoria Accoramboni (1840).