Ippolito from Pastina

Ippolito da Pastina is the hero of the Salerno anti-Spanish revolution of 1647, the one identified in Naples as Masaniello. And our Ippolito is the Salerno Masaniello, born in the Fornelle district, the son of a baker, against the oppressive Spanish government he took control of the city and installed his command in Fort La Carnale.
Ippolito became a peddler fishmonger because his father’s store went bankrupt, was a brawler, and was sentenced to hard labor. But on the occasion of the Neapolitan revolution, he escapes and ringing the bell tower of Sant’Andrea de Lavina, the church in his neighborhood, calls the people of Salerno to revolt.
From Fort La Carnale Ippolito commands his men, raids the city still in the hands of the pro-Spanish, commands expeditions throughout the province, becomes accredited with the government of the Republic of Naples and obtains the office – honorific – of governor of the province of Salerno and Lucania.
When the French, siding with the insurgents, arrive with their fleet, Ippolito sides with them, but in a furious battle with Spanish troops, he is beaten. The victors turned on the insurgents and hanged the popular leaders in Piazza Portanova, but not Hippolytus, who managed to escape to Rome, where he asked the French embassy for help.
But the cause of the revolution is lost, Salerno, along with the entire Vice-Realm will remain under Spanish rule for decades to come, and hopes for a Mezzogiorno free of misrule and oppression will have to be dismissed. Hippolytus would die in Rome in 1656.