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Fra Dolcino was one of the early social and religious reformers in the North of Italy. His sect bore the name of “Apostles,” and its chief, if not only, heresy was a desire to bring back the Church to the simplicity of the apostolic times. In 1305 he withdrew with his followers to the mountains overlooking the Val Sesia in Piedmont, where he was pursued and besieged by the Church party, and, after various fortunes of victory and defeat, being reduced by “stress of snow” and famine, was taken prisoner, together with his companion, the beautiful Margaret of Trent. Both were burned at Vercelli on the 1st of June, 1307. This “last act of the tragedy” is thus described by Mr. Mariotti, Historical Memoir of Fra Dolcino and His Times , p. 290:⁠—