Andreas Doria, Duke of Genoa, a venerable old man, eighty years of age, retaining the traces of a high spirit:  the chief features in this character are dignity and a rigid brevity in command.

Gianettino Doria, nephew of the former, and pretender to the ducal power, twenty-six years of age, rough and forbidding in his address, deportment, and manners, with a vulgar pride and disgusting features.

Fiesco, Count of Lavagna, chief of the conspiracy, a tall, handsome young man, twenty-three years of age; his character is that of dignified pride and majestic affability, with courtly complaisance and deceitfulness.

Verrina, a determined republican, sixty years of age; grave, austere, and inflexible:  a marked character.

Bourgognino, a conspirator, a youth of twenty; frank and high-spirited, proud, hasty, and undisguised.

Calcagno, a conspirator, a worn-out debauchee of thirty; insinuating and enterprising.

Sacco, a conspirator, forty-five years of age, with no distinguishing trait of character.

Lomellino, in the confidence of the pretender, a haggard courtier.

Romano, a painter, frank and simple, with the pride of genius.

Muley Hassan, a Moor of Tunis, an abandoned character, with a physiognomy displaying an original mixture of rascality and humor.

A German of the ducal body-guard, of an honest simplicity, and steady bravery.

Three seditious citizens.

Leonora, the wife of Fiesco, eighteen years of age, of great sensibility; her appearance pale and slender, engaging, but not dazzling; her countenance marked with melancholy; her dress black.

Julia, Countess dowager Imperiali, sister of the younger Doria, aged twenty-five; a proud coquette, in person tall and full, her beauty spoiled by affectation, with a sarcastic maliciousness in her countenance; her dress black.

Bertha, daughter of Verrina, an innocent girl.

Several Nobles, Citizens, Germans, Soldiers, Thieves.

   (Scene-Genoa.  Time-the year 1547.)