The Barattieri are an ancient family of Piacenza nobility. The origins of the family date back to the ancestor Nicolò Barattieri, of which we have the first news around 1198.
The Barattieri family acquired the noble title of Conte on 9 November 1466 when the fief of San Pietro in Cerro was invested by Bianca Maria Visconti, widow of Duke Francesco Sforza.
On 4 November 1466, Bianca Maria Visconti, widow of Francesco Sforza, and her son Galeazzo Maria, sold to Francesco Barattieri, son of the Bartolomeo jurisconsult, the revenue of duties that were collected in the territory of San Pietro in Cerro.Fu so invested with the feud of St. Peter and its adjacent. The fiefdom of San Pietro in Cerro and also today's municipality, bear part of the coat of arms of the Barattieri, in particular the two horizontal blue bands with the three dice set (symbol of the Family). In 1546 Patrizi Piacentini were recognized by the duke Pier Luigi Farnese. In 1674 some members of the family had received the title count "from Ferdinand Maria Duke of Bavaria and the Upper Palatinate and Elector of the Roman Sagro Imperio". On October 28, 1678, Ercole and Paolo Emilio Barattieri obtained from the Duke Ranuccio Farnese the dignity for themselves and their legitimate and natural male descendants.
The emblem of the Barattieri derives from the reasons for the birth of the Family.
Inside the emblem there are three dice; they recall the fact that Nicolò Barattieri, having erected the two columns in Piazza San Marco, obtained from the Doge of Venice Sebastiano Ziani that he could hold a gambling hall (at the time made mainly with dice) at the foot of the same.
Over the years the coat of arms of some branches of the family has diverged from the original one. In place of the three dice, three triangles have been replaced; the reason for this change is to be found in the desire to "deny" the noble origins of the family (gambling) and cover them with an aura of "sacredness".