Feltrino Gonzaga

Feltrino Gonzaga (c. 1305–1374), third son of Mantua's first capitano del popolo Luigi I Gonzaga, founded the Gonzaga line of Novellara. In 1328 he helped drive the Bonacolsi from Mantua and married Antonia da Correggio. From 1335 he held Reggio Emilia, where he built a great citadel and in 1345 resisted Mastino della Scala.

In 1363 he led an anti-Visconti league to victory at Solara, and in 1366 Charles IV made him imperial vicar. His harsh rule had turned the Reggiani against him, and when Bernabò Visconti twice besieged the city in 1370–1371, his allies failed him.

Rather than yield to the Este, who had joined Bernabò, he surrendered to his old enemy and on 17 May 1371 sold Reggio for fifty thousand gold florins, keeping Novellara and Bagnolo. He spent his last years wandering northern Italy in poverty and died in Padua in 1374.