Ricardo—Manfred

Ricardo—Manfred is the relation at the heart of Otranto’s compromised dynasty: Ricardo is Manfred’s grandfather, and Manfred inherits the principality through the line Ricardo established after poisoning Alfonso and securing the succession with a fictitious will. The revelation at the end of the story overturns the family’s account of its title and frames Manfred’s loss of power as the consequence of Ricardo’s crime.

Kinship and Inherited Rule

Manfred describes Otranto as having passed from his father, Don Manuel, to himself, and from Ricardo to Don Manuel. In his public defense of his title, he claims that Alfonso, having died childless in the Holy Land, bequeathed his estates to Ricardo in recognition of faithful service. He also invokes Ricardo’s reputation as a valiant and pious man and points to his foundation of a church and two convents. This account presents the family’s rule as an established succession supported by service, religious favor, and generations of possession.

The hereditary connection is politically consequential because Frederic, Marquis of Vicenza, claims to be nearer in blood to Alfonso, the last rightful lord. The Herald calls Manfred a usurper and demands both the return of Isabella and the surrender of Otranto to Frederic. Manfred knows that Frederic’s claim is well founded, although his family has retained power because it was strong enough to resist the Vicenza house. His defense of inheritance thus rests not simply on descent but on a disputed account of how Ricardo first obtained the estate.

Ricardo’s Crime and the False Title

Manfred’s final confession exposes the concealed origin of the family’s claim: Alfonso did not die naturally. Ricardo, who served as Alfonso’s chamberlain, poisoned him, and a fictitious will then declared Ricardo the heir. The confession directly contradicts Manfred’s earlier version of events, in which Alfonso died childless and left his estates to Ricardo in gratitude. The supposed bequest is revealed as the instrument that made a violent seizure appear lawful.

Manfred does not treat Ricardo’s guilt as a remote family scandal. He interprets the disasters that have overtaken his own household as the price of the usurpation and says that Ricardo’s crimes pursued him. The distinction between Ricardo’s deed and Manfred’s inheritance remains clear, but the consequences cross generations: Manfred rules through the title Ricardo created and ultimately understands his descendants’ ruin as bound up with its illegitimacy.

Prophecy and the Collapse of the Line

Ricardo’s connection to the prophecy is disclosed alongside the confession. During a storm, haunted by guilt, he vowed to Saint Nicholas that he would found a church and two convents if he survived and reached Otranto. The saint appeared to him in a dream and promised that Ricardo’s posterity would reign until the rightful owner grew too large to inhabit the castle, for as long as male issue of Ricardo’s line remained to possess it. The religious foundations that Manfred had cited as evidence of Ricardo’s piety therefore also belong to an account of guilt, vow, and conditional rule.

At the end, Manfred declares that no male or female descendant of Ricardo remains except himself. He does not know how Theodore can be Alfonso’s heir, but accepts that the dominions belong to him and resigns them. The revelation that Theodore is the rightful heir, together with the prophecy’s terms and the extinction of Ricardo’s line, displaces hereditary possession founded on the false will. Manfred abdicates the next morning; he and Hippolita enter religious life, while Frederic offers Isabella to Theodore. Ricardo’s crime is thus not merely the secret behind Manfred’s title: it supplies the dynastic history that the ending exposes and brings to an end.