The social ascension of Madernini family at the late XVI century

The social ascension of Madernini family at the late XVI century, through a marriage with a member of their protector Lords family, Counts of Lodron

Many years ago, searching for familiar traces in the parish archives of Villa Lagarina, I found a relevant document that explains clearly how began the Madernini family raise, from simple officers of the lodronian administration of their fiefs in the Val Lagarina region of Trento (Castellano and Castelnuovo), to be one of the prominents families of those places.

The document is a marriage act, strangely never mentioned in any source about Madernini family, that involves a lady of the Lodron family, whose name was Virginia, with a member of the Madernini family.

 Lodronian Lion at the palace
 Lodron in Nogaredo built by 
 Count Nicolo II and Castle
 Noarna or Nuovo behind

As it is said in the act, she was a natural daughter of Count Paris (VI) (born c. 1525-1566), undoubtedly the son of Count Nicolò I (1475-1556) from his 2^nd marriage with Css. Beatrice de Castellalto. Count Paris VI was rightfully married with Barbara von Lichtenstein-Kastelkorn with whom he previously had at least five children, the elder of whom was count Nicolò II (1549-1621), who with his first wife, Dorothea von Welsperg, will be the father of the famous Prince Archbishop of Salzburg, Paris von Lodron (1586-1663), a few years after the marriage of Virginia, Nicolò's II half sister as was said, and so an aunt of the prestigious prince...

The name of Virginia's mother is never mentioned in any of the documents I had access, but was probably a lady of the lodronian environment and not a woman of low condition, as members of the family were present in the ceremony of their marriage. Many counts of Lodron had illegitimate childs, almost all socially recognized as 
that as one can see they were always protected by their fathers and relatives, and held important positions in the region... The most extended branch was that called first “de Casa Lodron de Santo Antonio”, cause of the place of Santo Antonio in Pomarolo, descendants of the priest rector of Pomarolo, Count Andrea (c. 1480-1550), one of the sons of Count Paris IV and the venetian noble Veronesa Coppo. Other was that of the descendants of Andrea's brother, the priest Count Alessandro, branch after called Rinaldi, cause of the name of his natural son Rinaldo.

For all of them it was styled to use not the nickname of “de Lodron”, but that of “de Casa Lodron” (of the House Lodron). Counts of Arco use the same way to identificate their illegitimate childs as not like “d'Arco” but as “de Casa de Arco”. There were other lines identificated also with the places of birth, like the line of “de Casa Lodron de Pedersano”, and “de casa Lodron de Villa (Lagarina)”, of whom I can not still identify precisely their origins but were certainly all descendants of Paris IV and Veronesa Coppo.

For all of them was used the honorific treatment of “Messer” or “Madonna”, and never that of Count or Countess reserved for the legitimate descendance.

The line of Villa Lagarina seems to be descendants of the early youth of Counts Felice (c.1530-1584), or Agostino II (1525-after 1574) sons of Count Agostino and the noble of Padova Maddalena Bagarotto. In the first case Messer Auxilio de Casa Lodron would have been the son of a young count Felice of about 15 years, as he may was born about 1545 and not after 1547, having himself baptized his daughter Giulia in 1562... Felice is a more probable father cause Agostino studied in Merano and after was a squire of a Bohemian king...

But let´s return to Virginia, at her marriage with Messer Giorgio Madernini were present the “Magnifico Signor Antonio de Casa Lodron de Sto. Antonio”, the most prestigious of the illegitimate members of the family as a testimony of what we told about she was considered a part of the family.

Virginia was already carrying a son of Giorgio because their first son, called Madernino as his paternal grandfather, was born only a month and a few days after the marriage... His godmother was the “Sigra. Dorothea de Lodron de Sto. Antonio” and the godfathers (more than one, what then was usual) a Messer Giovanni son of Girardo Madernini and the “Magco. Sigr. Raffaele Marchi” of Florence.

Madernino Madernini was baptized in Nogaredo on 19 april 1582. He married about 1607 the “Nobildonna Lucrezia” who was probably of a noble family of Rovereto, cause the act of marriage doesn't exist in Villa Lagarina records, and many of the godparents of their children belonged to the noble families Rosmini, Telani and Costioli of that place, appart from those from the Lodron family as Madernino's uncle Count Nicolò II, godfather of Paris Madernini on 1610, his cousin countess Barbara, godmother of Catharina Madernini in 1613, who was Nicolò's daughter and sister of the future Salzburg's Prince Archbishop Paris de Lodron, himself godfather in 1614 of my possible ancestor Francesca Madernini, Count Massimiliano (1576-1635), a half brother of Paris VI, and so granduncle of Madernino, godparents of Francesco Hieronimo Madernini in 1617 together with Css. Anna Maddalena von Thun-Bragher, the first wife of Count Alfonso de Lodron, a brother of the already mentioned Massimiliano.

The Madernini were already in the first line of the families of Villa Lagarina though another marriage will strengthen that position, that of Paris Madernini, borned in 1610, already mentioned, with the Noble Orsola Priami, also borned in Villa Lagarina in 1610, the daughter of Noble Ippolito Francesco Priami and the Noble Lucrezia de Coredo or von Coreth, granddaughter of the Captain of Villa Lagarina Alberto Priami and Noble Orsola Battaglia, greatgranddaughter of Messer Nicolò Priami, originary from Verona, Vicar of the jurisdiction of Villa Lagarina for the Counts Lodron in the middle of XVI century.

Palace Priami- Madernini in Villa Lagarina

Their son Giovanni Alberto Madernini, borned in 1644 would be Imperial Notary in Villa Lagarina from 1672 to 1720, and would marry in 1672 the Noble of Trento Claudia Particella, daughter of Gian Gaudenzio Particella, of a family of the first line of the entourage of the Princes of Trento, favorites of the Princes Madruzzo, and a nephew of another Claudia Particella who was the lover of Carlo Emanuele Madruzzo (1599-1658) the last Prince Bishop of that dinasty. His grandsons Giuseppe Alberto and Francesco Antonio would access to the Nobility of the Empire as Adels von Taubenberg. The blood of Giuseppe Alberto still remains in two branches of the family Marzani of Villa Lagarina, nobilitated as Marzani von Steinhof in 1769 and that reached to the title of Counts Marzani von Steinhof und Neuhaus in 1790, at the same time that many other powerful families of Trento. One derives from Giuseppe Alberto's son, Adamo Madernini von Taubenberg, and Bss. Maria Felicitas Ceschi de Sta. Croce (Freiherren line), whose daughter Rosina borned in 1803, married Count Agostino Marzani v. St. u. N. And the other from Giuseppe Alberto´s daughter Maria Theresia Madernini v. T. who married Count Giorgio Federico de Montalbano, and whose daughter Maria Guglielmina de Montalbano married Count Lorenzo Marzani v. St. und N., a brother of the mentioned Agostino.

Francesca Madernini, borned in 1614 and already mentioned, married a Noble Domenico____ of Brentonico, whose nickname in the marriage act dated january 25^th 1633 in the books of Villa Lagarina is missed, probably cause the marriage wasn't held there but in the Church of S. Carlo of Rovereto, what reinforces my idea that Noble Lucrezia, Francesca's mother, was of a roveretan family.

I finally found very probably that Domenico belonged to the Donati family cause they had many descendence in Brentonico in which the name Madernino appeared frecuently and other previous reasons between the relationship of both families, but that is the subject of a future article...

                                              March 11^th, 2016

                                              Edmundo Rodríguez-Fosalba Prati     


Views of Palazzo Madernini

Note : Photos taken by me in Villa Lagarina and Nogaredo in august 2016