Caffaro di Rustico da Caschifellone

Caffaro di Rustico da Caschifellone (c. 1080–c. 1164) was a Genoan crusader and chronicler. He is an important source of information on the careers of the early Embriachi.

Caffaro was born in the village of Caschifellone just outside of Genoa in either 1080 or 1081. While a teenager, he travelled to Syria as a follower of Godfrey of Bouillon in the First Crusade. He returned some time after 1101, and his first writing to receive any public notice was an account of the crusade. Shortly thereafter he began writing his history of Genoa, titled "Annales". Though Caffaro's imperfect Latin prevented the "Annales" from achieving greatness as literature, the chronicle was the first of its kind in Genoa and remains an important historical record. [See, for example, Cowdrey, H. E. J., "The Mahdia Campaign of 1087" ("The English Historical Review", Vol. 92, No. 362 [1977] , 1-29), which notes both the importance and the limitations of Caffaro's chronicle as a record.]

On the strength of his fame as crusader, Caffaro became a captain in the Genoan navy, and fought in several battles against Pisa and other Mediterranean powers. Toward the end of his long life he became a diplomat, and carried out several diplomatic missions on behalf of Pope Callixtus II, Holy Roman Emperor Frederick Barbarossa and Alfonso VII of Castile. [See Day, Gerald W., "Manuel and the Genoese: A Reappraisal of Byzantine Commercial Policy in the Late Twelfth Century" ("The Journal of Economic History", Vol. 37, No. 2 [1977] , 289-301).]

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