Frederick II and the Sicilian School

Crowned king of Sicily as a small child in 1198, Frederick II grew up in Palermo and became Holy Roman Emperor in 1220. His court mixed Christian, Jewish and Muslim scholars, and its poets, the Sicilian School, were the first to write love lyrics in an Italian vernacular; one of them, Giacomo da Lentini, is credited with the sonnet. Frederick lies in a porphyry tomb in Palermo Cathedral.