Actually the girth, height and beard of Cola di Rienzo betrayed him as he tried to steal away from Campidoglio dressed as a woman. He was properly run through after being held an hour before the Roman crowd, hacked to pieces and displayed in an near-by square. When his remains were burned several days later, written testimony has it that the fire lasted days due to his considerable reserves of fat.

No one missed him, a demagogue populist, although he was later sanctified in the 18th century as some sort of noble spirit.