A goodly list could be given of several other writers, many of them bishops and men of saintly lives, whose erudition added to the fame of Verona and spread her renown as a centre of learning into ever-widening circles. Nor were minstrels and troubadours excluded from the list, especially at the beginning of the twelfth century. We read of singers known in the history of minstrelsy, such as Hugues de St Cyr, Pietro Villems, and Sordello, all coming to Verona and finding a welcome there. All names however pale before that of Dante Alighieri, who, though in no sense a Veronese, found here a haven in his day of adversity and exile, and whose acknowledgment of the hospitality accorded him is of world-wide renown. The causes that brought Dante to Verona have been much discussed. It may be that the strong Ghibelline feelings which predominated in the city made the Florentine exile certain of being understood there--at least as far as his political sentiments were concerned. The renown too possessed by Verona as to the encouragement given within her walls to learning and men of letters may have attracted him. Or more probably still, the knowledge that at the court of the Scaligers he would find not a welcome only, but also a home where his talents would be recognised and appreciated, may have induced him to come to Verona. This last hypothesis may to some extent be borne out by the opening words of the “epistola” written by Dante to Cangrande della Scala at the time he dedicated the _Paradiso_ to him. This letter, whose authenticity has given rise to much discussion, but which in these latter times is generally accepted as being his, begins by saying: “I heard the praise of your celebrated magnificence; I came to Verona to assure myself of the same. There I saw your magnanimous doings; I saw, I experienced your benefactions; and while I had at first believed that the fame of them was superior to the deeds, I became convinced that the deeds were superior to the fame.” Dante’s choice of Verona was a wise one; and he found there a reception and a refuge that must have soothed to some extent the angry wounded susceptibilities of that “spirito sdegnoso.” The first of the princely house of della Scala to receive Dante was Bartolomeo, who, though he is not mentioned by name by the poet, was without doubt the “grand Lombard” spoken of by Dante’s ancestor Cacciaguida in _Paradiso_, canto xvii. 70. For Bartolomeo and Cangrande della Scala Dante has only words of praise; but some other members of their family come in for the full force of the poet’s wrath, and he speaks in scathing terms of Alberto and Alboino, the former the predecessor, the latter the successor of Bartolomeo. Nor is he less bitter against an illegitimate son of Alberto della Scala, whom his father had made abbot of S. Zeno, and who exercised that office from 1291 to 1314. Speaking of this deformed priest he says,