Early Life
He was the son of Theobald, Count of Arles, and Bertha of Lotharingia. By inheritance, he was Count of Arles and Vienne, which made him one of the most important and influential nobles in the Kingdom of Provence. After the Emperor Louis III, who was also King of Provence, was captured, blinded, and exiled from Italy in 905, Hugh became his chief adviser and regent. By 911, most of the royal prerogatives were exercised by Hugh and Louis ceded him the titles dux of Provence and marchio of the Viennois. He moved the capital to his family's chief seat of Arles and married Louis's possible half-sister Willa, daughter of Boso of Provence and an unknown earlier wife.
At an unknown date, a Provençal army led by Hugh, his brother Boso, and Hugh Taillefer invaded Lombardy with the support of Hugh's mother. On the basis of the account of Constantine Porphyrogenitus, this even has been dated to as late as 923–924, but the account of Liudprand of Cremona dates the event much earlier, between 917 and 920.
About 922, a sizable faction of Italian nobles revolted against the by-then Emperor Berengar and elected Rudolph II of Burgundy King of Italy. This started a civil war, which resulted in Berengar's assassination in 924.
Read more about this topic: Hugh Of Italy
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“... goodness is of a modest nature, easily discouraged, and when much elbowed in early life by unabashed vices, is apt to retire into extreme privacy, so that it is more easily believed in by those who construct a selfish old gentleman theoretically, than by those who form the narrower judgments based on his personal acquaintance.”
—George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)