THE HISTORY OF NATIONS ITALY 5 O ft* CO fe co JO '5 O o e ^ CO CO co CQ THE HISTORY OF NATIONS HENRY CABOT LODGE ,Ph.D.,LLD. EDITOR-IN-CHIEF ITALY Including Merivale's Rome 44 B.C. -476 AD Edited by J.HIGGINSON CABOT.PhD. Department of History Wellesley College Volume IV Illustrated The H .W. Snow and Son Company C h i c a o Copyright, 1907, by JOHN D. MORRIS & COMPANY Copyright, 1910 THE H. W. SNOW & SON COMPANY THE HISTORY OF NATIONS EDITOR-IN-CHIEF HENRY CABOT LODGE, PL.D., L.L.D. Associate Editors and Authors ARCHIBALD HENRY SAYCE, LL.D., Professor of Assyriology, Oxford Uni- versity SIR ROBERT K. DOUGLAS, Professor of Chinese, King's College, Lon- don CHRISTOPHER JOHNSTON, M.D., Ph.D., Associate Professor of Oriental History and Archaeology, Johns Hopkins University C. W. C. OMAN, LL.D., Professor of History, Oxford University JEREMIAH WHIPPLE JENKS, Ph.D., LL.D., Professor of Political Economy and Pol- itics, Cornell University KANICHI ASAKAWA, Ph.D., Instructor in the History of Japanese Civilization, Yale University THEODOR MOMMSEN, Late Professor of Ancient History. Uni- versity of Berlin ARTHUR C. HOWLAND, Ph.D., Department of History, University of Penn- sylvania WILFRED HAROLD MUNRO, Ph.D., Professor of European History, Brown University G. MERCER ADAM, Historian and Editor FRED MORROW FLING, Ph.D., Professor of European History, University of Nebraska CHARLES MERIVALE, LL.D., Late Dean of Ely, formerly Lecturer in FRANCOIS AUGUSTS MARIE MIGNET, History, Cambridge University Late Member of the French Academy J. HIGGINSON CABOT, Ph.D., Department of History, Wellesley College JAMES WESTFALL THOMPSON, Ph.D., Department of History, University of Chicago SIR WILLIAM W. HUNTER, F.R.S., Late Director-General of Statistics in India SAMUEL RAWSON GARDINER, LL.D., Professor of Modern History, King's Col- lege, London GEORGE M. DUTCHER, Ph.D., Professor of History, Wesleyan University R. W. JOYCE, LL.D., Commissioner for the Publication of the Ancient Laws of Ireland ASSOCIATE EDITORS AND AUTHORS-Continued Justin McCarthy, ll.d., Author and Historian PAUL LOUIS LEGER, Professor of the Slav Languages, C611ege de France AUGUSTUS HUNT SHEARER, Ph.D.. Instructor in History. Trinity College. WILLIAM E. LINSLEBACH, Ph.D., Hartford Assistant Professor of European History, University of Pennsylvania W. HAROLD CLAFLIN, B.A., Department of History. Harvard Uni- BAYARD TAYLOR, versity Former United States Minister to Germany CHARLES DANDLIKER, LL.D.. President of Zurich University SIDNEY B. FAY, Ph.D Professor of History, Dartmouth College ELBERT JAY BENTON, Ph.D., Department of History, Western Reserve University SIR EDWARD S. CREASY, Late Professor of History, University Col- lege, London ARCHIBALD CARY COOLIDGE, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of History, Harvard University WILLIAM RICHARD MORFILL, M.A., Professor of Russian and other Slavonic Languages, Oxford University CHARLES EDMUND FRYER, Ph.D., Department of History, McGill University E. C. OTTE, Specialist on Scandinavian History J. SCOTT KELTIE, LL.D., President Royal Geographical Society ALBERT GALLOWAY KELLER, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of the Science of So- ciety, Yale University EDWARD JAMES PAYNE, M.A., Fellow of L T niversity College, Oxford PHILIP PATTERSON WELLS, Ph.D., Lecturer in History and Librarian of the Law School, Yale University FREDERICK ALBION OBER, Historian, Author and Traveler JAMES WILFORD GARNER, Ph.D., Professor of Political Science, University of Illinois EDWARD S. CORWIN, Ph.D., Instructor in History, Princeton Uni- versity JOHN BACH McMASTER, Litt.D., LL.D., Professor of History, University of Penn- sylvania JAMES LAMONT PERKINS, Managing Editor The editors and publishers desire to express their appreciation for valuable advice and suggestions received from the following: Hon. Andrew D. White, LL.D., Alfred Thayer Mahan, D.C.L., LL.D., Hon. Charles Emory Smith, LL.D., Professor Edward Gaylord Bourne, Ph.D., Charles F. Thwing, LL.D., Dr. Emil Reich, William Elliot Griffis, LL.D., Professor John Martin Vincent, Ph.D., LL.D., Melvil Dewey, LL.D., Alston Ellis, LL.D., Professor Charles H. McCarthy, Ph.D., Professor Herman V. Ames, Ph.D., Professor Walter L. Fleming, Ph.D., Professor David Y. Thomas, Ph.D., Mr. Otto Reich and Mr. O. M. Dickerson. PREFACE This volume aims to provide for English-speaking readers a con- nected account of Italian history, convenient in form and accurate in contents, covering the period from 44 b. c. to the present day. The vast majority of people have neither time nor inclination to study the many separate volumes dealing with parts of this long period, and yet would like to have some knowledge of it. It is believed that this single book, which contains the essence of the best, that has been written on Italian history, will supply a long-felt want. The editor's purpose, then, is to give a resume of this history, based on recognized authorities and diligently corrected and brought up to date by comparison with the latest and best writers. For the Roman Empire Merivale's " History of Rome " has been the founda- tion. It is unnecessary to comment on the value of Merivale's work, which is everywhere regarded as a standard. For Italian history since 476 a. d., Bosco's " Italian History " has been the foun- dation. It is one of the most satisfactory digests of the very com- plicated history of the peninsula during the centuries of disunion down to the present time. It has passed through several Italian editions, being considered in Italy a standard authority. Yet being a digest only, it compressed unduly the medieval period, which is one of the most fascinating in all Italian history, and so recourse has been made here to the excellent chapters by Hallam on " Italy in the Middle Ages," from his famous volume on the history of medieval Europe. Throughout, quotations from stand- ard authorities have been freely made, which are acknowledged in foot-notes, and will suggest to the reader further sources than those given in the bibliography. Finally, the chapter on the Renais- sance and the chapter on contemporary Italy have been written specially for this volume. A bibliography is appended, and while of course making no pretense to be anything but a bare outline, it will serve to show the way to those who wish to study more in detail the different periods. Wellesley College v -' i/U CONTENTS PART I THE ROMAN EMPIRE. 44 B. C.-476 A. D. CHAPTER PAGE I. The Death of Cesar. 44 b. c 3 II. OCTAVIUS AND THE SECOND TRIUMVIRATE. 44-42 B. C. . 10 III. The Battle of Philippi and the New Division of the Empire. 42-37 b. c 17 IV. The Battle of Actium and End of the Period of Civil War. 31-30 b. c 22 V. The Foundation of the Empire by Augustus. 29-27 b. c 29 VI. Condition of the Empire under Augustus. 31 b. c- 14 A. D 36 VII. The Reign of Tiberius Cesar. 14-37 A - D - . . 46 VIII. The Reigns of Caius Caligula and Claudius. 37-54 a.d 55 IX. The Reign of Nero. 54-68 a. d 62 X. Contest for the Empire. 68-69 A - D - .69 XI. Affairs in the Roman Provinces. 62-70 a. d. . 75 XII. The Flavian Emperors Vespasian, Titus, and Do- MITIAN. 70-96 A. D 8l XIII. Prosperity of the Empire under Nerva, Trajan, and Hadrian. 96-138 a. d 86 XIV. The Age of the Antonines. 138-180 a. d. 94 XV. Transition Period of Decline. 180-235 a.d. . . 99 XVI. Advance of the Barbarians. 235-284 a. d. . . 107 XVII. The Reforms of Diocletian and the Rise of Con- STANTINE. 284-323 A. D 113 xi xii CONTEN T S CHAPTER PAGE xviii. constantine the great and the sutremacy of Constantinople. 324-361 a. d. 121 XIX. Progress of Christianity. 355-604 a. d. . . 127 XX. Gratian and Theodosius. 375-408 a. d. . 132 XXI. The Sack of Rome by the Goths. 408-410 a. d. 140 XXII. Farther Advance of the Barbarians. 423-476 a. d. 145 XXIII. XXIV. XXV. XXVI. XXVII. XXVIII. XXIX. XXX. XXXI. XXXII. XXXIII. XXXIV. XXXV. XXXVI. PART II ITALY IN THE MIDDLE AGES. 476-1494 Odoacer, First King of Italy, and the Invasion of Theodoric. 476-526 Fall of the Goths. 526-568 . The Lombards Gregory the Great. 568-744 Rise of the Temporal Power of the Popes. 744- The Foundation of the Holy Roman Empire. 962-1152 .... Frederick Barbarossa. 1152-1189 The Lombard Cities. 1200- 1250 The Rise of Despots. 1250-1354 Florence and Pisa. 1 150-1406 Genoa and Venice. 1200-1426 The Condottieri. 1343-1513 . Naples and Florence. 1282-1494 The House of Savoy. 1 000- 1466 The Italian Renaissance 155 159 163 171 180 191 199 214 225 238 251 25/ 272 279 PART III MODERN ITALY. 1494-1906 XXXVII. Ludovico il Moro and the French in Italy. 1494-1515 . .... 289 1513-1521 . . 296 XXXVIII. The Golden Age of Leo X. CONTENTS xiii CHAPTER PAGE XXXIX. The Struggle Between Charles V. and Francis I. The Peace of Cateau-Cambresis. 15 19-1559 301 XL. The Last of Italian Liberty. 1 560-1618 . . 309 XLI. Charles Emmanuel the Great and Some Men of the Age. 1580-1700 317 XLII. Victor Amadeus and the Founding of the Italian Kingdom. 1630-1748 326 XLIII. Celebrated Men of the Middle Eighteenth Cen- tury. 1750-1800 337 XLIV. Italy and Napoleon Bonaparte. 1789-1815 . . 341 XLV. Revolution in Italian States War with Aus- tria. 1820-1849 352 XLVI. Pope Pius IX. and the Roman Republic. 1848-1859 361 XLVII. Growth of Italian Unity. 1849-1861 . . . 371 XLVIII. The Question of Rome. 1862-1866 . . . 386 XLIX. Rome Becomes the Capital of Italy. 1867-1871 . 391 L. Internal Condition of the Kingdom. 1871-1906 397 LI. Literature and Art of Modern Italy . . . 407 Bibliography 417 Index 423 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Assassination of Julius Cesar (Photogravure) . Frontispiece FACING PAGE Colossal Statue of Augustus 36 Destruction of the Roman Legions in the Teutoburg Forest 44 Tiberius Claudius Nero Cesar 50 The Death of Nero 68 Roman Mob Murders Vitellius 72 Emperor Vespasianus 76 Destruction of Pompeii and Herculaneum . . . .82 Emperor Trajanus 86 Emperor Hadrianus 90 Emperor Antoninus Pius 94 Marcus Aurelius Antoninus 98 Caracalla 102 Alaric the Goth Enters Rome 140 Cathedral of Milan 146 Rienzi Elected Tribune 222 Bravi Receiving Reward from Council of Three . . 248 Machiavelli tni ; 2 54 Benvenuto Celli Assassination of Julian de' Medici 268 ANTE I 278 Petrarca ) Savonarola Preaches in Florence 282 Campanile and Dome at Florence 284 Michael Angelo .... .... 296 Leonardo da Vinci (Colored) 298 The Sack of Rome 304 xvi LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS facing page Ariosto } 1 ASSO ) Jopin Milton Visits the Aged Galileo 322 Raphael 334 Cavour ) I 372 Garibaldi J First Meeting between Victor Emmanuel and Garibaldi 384 St. Peter's, the Plaza, and the Vatican of Rome . . 398 TEXT MAPS PAGE Roman Empire under Augustus and Tiberius. 31 b. c-37 a. d 54 Site of the Golden House of Nero 67 Jerusalem. 70 a. d 80 The Roman Empire in the Time of Diocletian . . .114 Roman Empire Prefectures of Constantine and Partition of East and West 126 The Holy Roman Empire 189 Trade Routes of Italian Cities of 13TH and 14TH Centu- ries 237 Italy in the 15TH Century 266 Central Europe in the Early i6th Century . . . 294 Italy after the Congress of Vienna 350 Garibaldi's Campaign in the Two Sicilies, i860 . . 385 The Union of Italy 395 PART I THE ROMAN EMPIRE. 44 B. C.-476 A. D. HISTORY OF ITALY Chapter I THE DEATH OF C/ESAR. 44 B.C. CESAR'S victory at Pharsalia in 48 b. c. virtually brought the Roman Republic to an end, though in so far as an exact date can be given for this event 31 b. c. is more usually chosen. Caesar " seems to have seen clearly that any government which would give order and prosperity to the Roman world must now be a monarchy. In this he was quite right." 1 Hence he had himself proclaimed dictator for life and retained the name and powers of the " Imperator," as well as the tribunician power. It may be said, although with exceptions, that Roman conquest ceased with the Republic. The work of the Empire, in which it was suc- cessful, was to transform the peoples of the West into one great Latin nation and to improve Roman law r s and institutions. The destined heir of Csesar's imperium was already in the camp at Apollonia taking lessons in arts and arms under the ablest teachers. Caius Octavius, the son of Caesar's sister's daughter, now in his nineteenth year, though delicate in health, was a youth of high promise. Qesar had shown him much favor, had advanced his family from the plebeian to the patrician class, and had allowed it to be understood that he purposed to adopt his great-nephew as his son, and to bequeath to him his patrimony and the dignities w T hich the Senate had declared hereditary in his family. The idea of a dynasty and of the hereditary succession of their rulers was unfa- miliar to the republican Romans, but it began now to be whispered, both among his friends and his foes, that Caesar would like to be hailed as king. Two or three attempts were made to give the peo- ple an opportunity of adopting the suggestion spontaneously; but these were not responded to, and Caesar cautiously pretended to deprecate such an honor. At length, on February 15. the day of the Lupercalia, a more determined effort was made to get the title conferred on him by acclamation. Caesar presided over the festival, seated on his gilded chair. The consul Antonius, who 1 G. B. Adams. " European History," p. 96. 4 ITALY 44 B. C. was taking a prominent part in the ceremonies, approached the dictator with a diadem, and offered it to him as the gift of the Roman people. Some faint applause was heard, but when Caesar put the tempting circlet from him, a loud burst of genuine cheering rent the air. On the diadem being again offered, Caesar exclaimed, " I am not king; the only king of the Romans is Jupiter," and he ordered the diadem to be suspended in the Capitol. " Few men have had their elasticity so put to the proof as Caesar the sole creative genius produced by Rome, and the last produced by the ancient world, which accordingly moved on in the path that he had marked out for it until its sun went down." 2 The dictator's prudence had baffled any attempt to excite public feeling against him ; yet among many of the nobles a bitter hostility was aroused by the bare thought that any man should presume to lord it over them as a king. A plot was formed for his destruction by sixty or eighty conspirators, among whom were some who professed the warmest devotion to him. Decimus Brutus had received the government of the Cisalpine from him. Trebonius, Casca, Cimber, and others had received various marks of his favor. C. Cassius, who was most likely the author of the plot, had recently been appointed praetor. He was a vain, vin- dictive, jealous man, whose pale looks and acrid humor had not escaped Caesar's watchful observation. The conspirators required the charm of a popular name to sanction their projected tyrannicide. M. Junius Brutus, the nephew of Cato, pretended to trace his descent from a third son of that founder of the Republic who had not scrupled to take the life of his own two eldest sons. Brutus probably represented an honest desire to restore the Republic, despite the weakness of his character. His mother was of the family of Ahala, the slayer of Spurius Maelius. His wife, Porcia, was the daughter of Cato, a woman of masculine spirit, firm and severe like her father. Brutus himself was a weak, vain, unstable man, who affected the character of a philosopher, yet clutched with sordid, even iniqui- tous, greed at the emoluments of public life. Of all the Pom- peians, he had been the last to join, the earliest to desert, the banner of the Republic. After Pharsalia, he successfully courted the favor of Caesar, who raised him to an eminence which pleased and dazzled him. The weakness of his character may be esti- - Mommsen, " History of Rome," tr., vol. v. p. 305. DEATH OF CilSAR 5 44 B.C. mated from the means employed to work upon him. A paper affixed to the statue of the ancient Brutus with the words, " Would thou wert now alive ! " billets thrust into his hand in- scribed " Brutus, thou sleepest ; thou art no longer Brutus," shook the soul of the philosopher to its center. Cassius, who had married his sister, easily drew him into the plot, and pretended to regard him as its chief support and contriver. His name struck a chord of association which insured a large measure of popular sympathy whenever the deed should be done. So long as Caesar remained in the city, opportunities would not be hard to find, for he insisted upon going about unarmed and without escort, pro- testing that it was better to die at once than to live always in fear of dying. But so soon as he should quit the city for the camp, his safety would be assured by the fidelity of the soldiers. It was ap- prehended, not without reason, that once more at the head of the legions he would not return as a citizen to Rome. Nay, it was possible that he might not choose to return to Rome at all, but transfer the seat of empire to some new site Ilium, perhaps, or, if the charms of Cleopatra should retain their power, perhaps Alexandria. Such considerations forbade delay. The imperator's depar- ture was imminent. The Senate was convened for the Ides of March, the 15th of the month, 44 b. a, and it was determined to strike the blow at the sitting of that day. Hints of impend- ing danger reached Caesar's ear; even the inauspicious day was brought to his notice; he would fain have excused himself from attending the assembly. But his fears were laughed away by Decimus, and he went. As he moved through the Forum to the theater of Pompeius in the Campus, more than one person tried to warn him of his danger. As he passed the augur Spurinna, he observed to him pleasantly, " The Ides of March are come." " Ay, Caesar," replied the sage, " but they're not gone." He en- tered the hall, his enemies closing around him, and keeping his friends at a distance, Trebonius being specially charged to detain Antonius at the door. On his taking his seat, Cimber approached with a petition for his brother's pardon. The other conspirators joined in the supplication, grasping his hands and embracing his neck. Caesar put them from him gently, but Cimber seized his toga with both hands and pulled it over his arms. Then Casca, who was behind, drew his dagger, and grazed his shoulder with 6 ITALY 44 B. C. an ill-directed stroke. Caesar disengaged one hand with a cry, and snatched at the hilt. " Help! " cried Casca, and in a moment fiftv daggers were aimed at the victim. Caesar defended himself for an instant, and wounded one man with his stylus ; but when he distinguished Brutus in the press, the steel flashing in his hand also, " What ! thou too, Brutus ! " he exclaimed, let go his grasp of Casca, and, drawing his robe over his face, made no further resistance. The assassins stabbed him through and through, and he fell dead at the foot of Pompeius's statue. But not by such means could the Republic be restored. By the time the deed was done the conspirators found them- selves alone in the hall. Senators, lictors, attendants, all had fled. Antonius had slipped away unobserved to his own house. Great consternation fell on the citizens, who expected riot and massacre to follow ; for while Decimus had armed some gladiators for his own and his friends' defense, the city was filled with Caesar's veterans, and Lepidus with a legion was just outside the walls. The assassins now marched to the Forum to seek the public approval of their deed. They shouted that they had slain a king and a tyrant, but they met with no response. Dismayed by this cold reception, they took refuge with their armed guards on the Capitol, and were joined there during the evening by Cicero and others of the republican party. Next day Brutus descended into the Forum and tried to stir the populace by a speech. He was coldly listened to, and finally driven back to his refuge on the Capitol. During the past night Antonius had not been idle; he had secretly obtained from Calpurnia, Caesar's wife, the dead man's will, and his private treasures. With the help of his brothers, he had also appropriated two million sesterces from the public treasury. Provided with these resources, he had made overtures to Lepidus, and received his promise of support. Antonius, the minister and favorite companion of Caesar, was regarded by many as his natural successor. Hitherto known chiefly for his bravery and dissipation, he was now about to dis- play the arts of a consummate intriguer. Pie opened a negotia- tion with the liberators, and with their consent, as consul, con- vened the Senate on March 1 7 near the Forum ; but the murderers dared not leave the Capitol, and the discussion of their deed was carried on in their absence. The majority of the Senate would have declared Caesar a DEATH OF CESAR 7 44 B.C. tyrant; but Antonius pointed out that this course would have the effect of annulling all his acts and appointments, and thereupon those who were interested in maintaining them resisted the proposal with all their might. At length, by the advice of Cicero, a compromise was agreed to. No judgment was pronounced either upon Caesar or his mur- derers, but an amnesty or act of oblivion was decreed, which left Caesar's acts unchallenged, and yet assured the safety of the lib- erators. The populace acquiesced, and invited the latter to de- scend from the Capitol, Antonius and Lepidus sending their children as hostages. The dictator's assignment of the provinces was then confirmed. Trebonius succeeded to Asia, Cimber to Bithynia, Decimus to the Cisalpine, while Macedonia was secured to Brutus, and Syria to Cassius, on the expiration of their term of office at home. Antonius, however, remained master of the situation. If Caesar was not a tyrant, his will must be accepted, and his remains interred with public honors. Antonius recited the will to the people, in which Caesar nominated Octavius his heir, and bequeathed his gardens by the Tiber to the Roman people, and 300 sesterces to every citizen. The liberality of their departed favorite exasperated the rage of the people against his murderers. The funeral pyre had been built in the Campus Martius, but the body lay in state in the Forum on a bier of gold and ivory. At its head hung the victim's toga hacked by the assassins' daggers; the twenty-three wounds by which his life- blood had ebbed away were represented on a wax-figure visible to all. Antonius, as chief magistrate of the Republic, now stepped forward to recite the praises of the mighty dead. The people, deeply moved by the sad spectacle before them, had been further excited by dramatic representations of the deaths of Agamemnon and Ajax by the treason of their nearest and dearest. Antonius read the decrees which had heaped honors upon Caesar, had de- clared his person inviolable, his authority supreme, himself the father of his country. Then he pointed to the bleeding corpse which neither laws nor oaths had shielded from outrage, and vowed that he would avenge the victim whom he could not save. The people, in a frenzy of enthusiasm, insisted upon burning the body where it lay in the midst of the Forum. Chairs, tables, brushwood, were hastily piled together and the body laid upon them. The temple of Castor and Pollux stood hard by, and it 8 ITALY 44 B. C. was averred that two majestic youths, armed with sword and javelin, were seen to apply the torch. As the flame rose, the veterans hurled in their arms, the matrons their ornaments, even the children's trinkets were devoted. The foreigners present in the city Gauls, Iberians, Africans, Orientals were not behind the citizens in their demonstrations of reverence and grief for the dead. The success of Antonius was complete. The people, ex- cited to fury, seized burning brands, and rushed to fire the houses of the conspirators. These attempts were repulsed, but Brutus and his associates dared not show themselves in public. Antonius now interfered to stop the rioting with armed force; he also took steps to conciliate the Senate; he passed a resolution abolishing the office of dictator; and he proposed the recall of Sextus, the last survivor of the Pompeii. He at the same time communicated with the liberators Brutus and Cassius, who were in hiding, and offered them his good offices and protection. In return for all this, he asked one favor the right to enlist a bodyguard for his own protection. The Senate weakly assented ; and in a short time he had 6000 men under arms. The Senate had confirmed Csesar's acts, and this sanction Antonius caused to be extended to those which had been merely projected. He himself possessed all Caesar's papers, and, having gained his secretary, Faberius, could forge authority for any- thing he chose. Everything lay at his feet, and things which Caesar had not dared to do, Antonius did in his name. By the sale of places, and even of provinces, he quickly amassed wealth, and proceeded to purchase senators and soldiers and tributary sovereigns even his own colleague Dolabella. Thus supported, he coolly reversed the dictator's disposition of the provinces, de- priving Brutus and Cassius of their promised governments, claim- ing Macedonia for himself, and giving Syria to Dolabella. " The tyrant is dead," murmured Cicero, " but the tyranny still lives." This was strictly true, and it might surely have been foreseen. The crime of the liberators had borne no fruits, and therefore was a blunder and a folly. Within a week Antonius had set himself up as a second tyrant hardly less powerful than the first. But another aspirant now enters upon the scene ; a third tyrant, more powerful than either Caesar or Antonius, but craftier and more fortunate, was about to seize the sovereignty, and establish the Empire of Rome. Caesar had been " monarch, but he never DEATH OF C/ESAR 9 44 B.C. played the king. Even when absolute lord of Rome, he retained the deportment of the party leader ... it seemed as if he wished to be nothing but the first among his peers. . . . From early youth . . . Csesar was a statesman in the deep- est sense of the term, and his aim was the highest which man is allowed to propose to himself the political, military, intellectual, and moral regeneration of his own deeply decayed nation, and of the still more deeply decayed Hellenic nation intimately akin to his own." 3 3 Mommsen, " History of Rome," tr., vol. v. p. 308. Chapter II OCTAVIUS AND THE SECOND TRIUMVIRATE 44-42 B. C. THE young - Octavius, busy with his martial exercises among the legions at Apollonia, was surprised by the news of Caesar's assassination. His mother's letters de- termined him to return to Rome, and before he started he re- ceived an assurance that the legions would support him. On landing in Apulia almost alone, he first learned the contents of Caesar's will, his own adoption and inheritance. He at once boldly assumed the name of Caius Julius Caesar Octavianus, and presented himself to the soldiers at Brundisium as the adopted son of the great imperator. He was received with acclamations ; the friends of Caesar began to flock around him, but the young adventurer wisely declined any display of force. In temperate language he addressed the Senate, claiming, as a private citizen, the inheritance of a deceased father. As he passed through Cumae, he visited Cicero, and gained his favorable opinion. At the end of April he entered Rome, and found that Antonius was absent from the city. Despite the warnings of his mother, this youth of eighteen years presented himself before the praetor and claimed Caesar's inheritance. He harangued the people, and pledged himself to discharge the sums bequeathed to them by his father. Before the return of Antonius in May, Octavianus had made many friends and conciliated many enemies. In a friendly tone he reproached Antonius for leaving the assassins unpunished, and demanded of him Caesar's treasures. The consul replied that none such existed; the money left had all been public treasure, and was already spent. Octavianus, undismayed by this failure of resources, proceeded to sell what remained of Caesar's prop- erty, and all his own, borrowed of his friends, and at length amassed a sufficient sum to discharge the obligation he had as- sumed. The people were delighted by this generous sacrifice, and Antonius perceived with amazement that his youthful rival was 10 SECOND TRIUMVIRATE 11 44 B.C. not to be despised; but the influence lie bad already gained with the people was too strong- to be shaken either by craft or violence. Meanwhile the conduct of the liberators was timid and un- certain. Decimus had indeed repaired to his government in the Cisalpine; Cassius, on receiving a pressing invitation from the legions in Syria, yielded to Cicero's counsel, and, in defiance of the decree which had superseded him in favor of Dolabella, set out for his province. Brutus still lingered on the coast of Cam- pania, and, only after long delay, nerved himself at last to the task of calling the patriots to arms in Greece and Macedonia. Cicero had actually embarked to join these conspirators in the East, but being driven ashore in Calabria by stress of weather, could not be persuaded to quit the soil of Italy, and turned his steps, with mournful presentiments, toward Rome. In the West, Sextus Pompeius had appeared at the head of a powerful fleet on the coast of Gaul, and encouraged the rising hopes of the re- publicans. In the city and in the Senate Antonius still reigned supreme by force of arms, balanced only by the growing authority of Octavianus. On September i the Senate was convoked, and Caesar's name was to be enrolled among the Roman divinities. Antonius seized the opportunity to attack Cicero, who had returned to Rome the day before, but was not then present, threatening to demolish his house on the Palatine. Next day, in the absence of Antonius, Cicero defended his own conduct both in leaving the city and in returning to it; and then turning to the administration of An- tonius, he burst into an eloquent invective. He denounced the consul's arbitrary exercise of power, his venality, his hypocrisy, the falsehood by which he had sheltered his own unlawful deeds behind the pretended authority of the dead imperator. The Senate listened with admiration, and their applause warmed the orator to renewed energy. In this, the first of Cicero's great orations against Antonius, known as the Philippics, in allusion to the harangues of De- mosthenes against Philip of Macedon, he confined himself to de- nouncing the policy of his enemy, and left his personal habits untouched. A few days later Antonius retorted upon Cicero with a violent tirade against the orator's entire career. All this time Octavius was silently advancing his projects, and undermining Antonius's position. By promises and largesses he was seduc- 12 I T A L Y 44B C. ing the soldiers from their allegiance. On October 3 the consul hurried off to Brundisium to stay the defection of his legions, which, he heard, had been tampered with. Octavius at the same time left the city to visit his parent's colonies in Campania, Umbria, and the Cisalpine, among which he collected 10,000 men. He also made strenuous efforts to gain Cicero, and, through him, the Senate, whose sanction he required to give le- gality to his enterprise. He loaded the pliant statesman with com- pliments and caresses, calling him his father, and promising docility and obedience. Antonius, too, was acting with energy and decision; by a combination of severe punishments and liberal promises he suc- ceeded in reclaiming some, at least, of his wavering battalions. He then returned to Rome to denounce Octavius before the Senate for levying troops without authority, but only to find that two of his legions had just passed over to his rival. His position was becoming untenable. Sulla, Marius, Csesar, Pompeius, every party leader, had in turn abandoned the city, where the Senate was paramount, to recruit his forces in the field. Antonius had received from the Senate the government of the Cisalpine, and he now summoned Decimus to withdraw from that province; but the republican proconsul would only yield to force. Antonius then raised his standard at Tibur, and marched to Ariminum at the head of four legions; Lepidus was marching from Spain to join him with four more. Pollio, with four others, remained in Spain, and Plancus, with an equal number, was in Farther Gaul. These were the forces on which it was thought Antonius might rely in his contest with the republicans, but they were widely scattered. The loyalty of the soldiers was uncertain, that of their commanders still more so. Octavius had by this time collected five legions under his command at Arretium, and occupied an in- dependent position, ready to side with either party, or to fall upon the victor. Many citizens supported his pretensions, and the Senate itself accepted him as their champion. Such was the complication of affairs in the month of Novem- ber. Cicero meanwhile was working with feverish anxiety to unite all parties against Antonius. He exhorted Decimus; he caressed Octavius; he watched eagerly for the action of Brutus and Cassius, Trebonius and Cimber, in the East. In the West, he trusted mainly to the loyalty of Hirtius and Pansa, the consuls- SECOND TRIUMVIRATE 13 44-43 B. C. elect. The moment had arrived for the publication of the second Philippic, already polished in private to the keenest edge of satire. It branded Caesar as a traitor and a tyrant, Antonius as a monster. It directed the eyes of all to Cicero himself as the mainstay of the commonwealth, and called on every citizen to arm. The effect was electrical. Both people and Senate repudiated and defied the iniquitous usurper. The consuls-elect were confirmed in their loyalty to the Republic by the outburst of public feeling. Before the end of the year Antonius had confined Decimus within the walls of Mutina. The Senate urged Octavius to attack him ; but it was not till the spring of the year 43 b. c. that he took the field, in conjunction with Hirtius and Pansa, the consuls. During their absence from the city, Cicero, though without an office, was allowed to take the helm of affairs. His eloquent harangues inspired all men with confidence and devotion. He filled the treasury with voluntary contributions from the loyal and fines levied on the disaffected. He maintained an active cor- respondence with the chiefs in the provinces, assuring each in turn of the constancy of all the others, and encouraging them with glowing accounts of the strength and resources of the party. Antonius was compelled to raise the siege of Mutina by the advance of Hirtius and Octavius. While pretending to negotiate with them, he suddenly turned upon Pansa, who was on his way to join them, defeated, and mortally wounded him. Hirtius saved the beaten force from utter rout, and a few days later, in con- junction with Octavius, inflicted a defeat on the Antonians. Hirtius lost his life in this engagement, and thus both consuls were stricken down. The Senate and people at Rome, overjoyed by the victory, carried Cicero in triumph to the Capitol, and sa- luted him as the true victor of Mutina. The contest seemed to be at an end. Decimus was pursuing Antonius; Plancus was ad- vancing to block the passes into Gaul ; Brutus and Cassius in the East, and Sextus on the sea, all sent tidings of success. Before he expired the consul Pansa warned Octavius that the Senate meditated treachery toward him, and advised him to be reconciled with Antonius. The crafty young schemer had al- ready determined on that course. He quarreled with Decimus as the murderer of his father, Caesar. He let Antonius know that he had no wish to crush him, and stood aside to allow him to effect a junction with Lepidus in the Transalpine. Plancus 14, ITALY 43 B. C. terminated his long indecision by casting in his lot with the stronger party, and thus Antonius found himself at the head of twenty-three legions. This was the dreadful reality to which the Senate now awoke from their dream of easy victory. They had thought to use Octa- vius as their tool, and then to cast him aside. He had asked for and been refused the consulship. He now crossed the Rubicon at the head of eight legions, and marched on Rome to seize the prize by force. Some feeble attempts at defense were made, but one after another the senators and consulars slipped through the gates and went over to the intruder's camp. Cicero, alarmed for his safety, made his escape. On September 22 the people pre- tended to elect Octavius to the consulship, with his kinsman Pedius for colleague. Next day the audacious stripling com- pleted his twentieth year. The first act of the new consul was to summon the murderers of Caesar before his tribunal. Judgment passed against them by default, and they were interdicted fire and water. Octavius was now in a position to make terms with Antonius on a footing of equality. Placed between two such powers, and deserted by Plancus, Decimus was lost. His troops deserted from him wholesale. He tried to escape into Macedonia, but was cap- tured and put to death by Antonius. The blood of the assas- sin cemented the union between the Caesarian leaders. Toward the end of October Antonius, Lepidus, and Octavius met near Bononia to share their conquests between them. It was agreed, after three weeks' parley, that Octavius should resign the office of consul, while, under the title of a triumvirate for the establish- ment of the commonwealth, the three chiefs should reign together over the city, the consuls, and the laws. They claimed absolute authority irrespective of Senate or people, together with the power of appointing to all the magistracies. The provinces were parti- tioned as follows: Italy was to be held in common by all three; the two Gauls fell to Antonius ; Africa and the islands fell to Oc- tavius. These two, with twenty legions each, were to carry on the war, while Lepidus, with Spain and the Xarbonensis for his province, was to control the Empire from Rome in the interest of all three. The troops were satisfied with the promise of largesses and estates, and insisted that Octavius should espouse a daughter of Fulvia, wife of Antonius, as a ratification of the compact. SECOND TRIUMVIRATE 15 43-42 B. C. The triumvirs now sent an order to Pedius to slay seventeen of their principal adversaries. The order was promptly executed, but Pedius died from horror and disgust at being made the instru- ment of such a slaughter. The triumvirs then marched into the city, and occupied the temples and towers, with their troops un- der arms. On November 27 the triumvirate was proclaimed. Before quitting Rome to combat the murderers of Csesar in the East, the triumvirs determined to leave no enemies behind them. A formal but limited proscription was decreed. Each picked out the names of the victims he personally required, and each pur- chased the right to proscribe a kinsman of his colleagues by sur- rendering one of his own. The list was headed with the names of a brother of Lepidus, an uncle of Antonius, and a cousin of Octavius. Centurions and soldiers were sent in quest of the doomed men, and a good many probably perished without war- rant. The heads of the proscribed were affixed to the rostra, but the triumvirs did not always pause to identify them. On the other hand, many of the proscribed escaped ; some to Macedonia, some to the fleet of Sextus Pompeius. Cicero him- self was not overtaken till a month later. On the first news of the proscription, Cicero took refuge with his brother in an island near Antium, and even made good his escape to sea ; but instead of proceeding in all haste to Macedonia, he twice disembarked, and at length retired to his villa near Formias. The danger of delay was imminent; his slaves placed him in a litter, and hurried him toward the shore ; but the opportunity had been lost. He was pursued and overtaken by the assassins. Cicero's party were the more numerous, and would have drawn in his defense, but he for- bade them. The litter was set down, and, fixing his eyes upon his murderers, Cicero offered his outstretched neck to the sword. The head was severed from the body and carried to Rome, where Antonius set it up with exultation in front of the rostra. Fulvia, it is said, pierced the tongue with her needle, in revenge for the sarcasms it had uttered against both her husbands. Amid such scenes of horror the year came to a close. On January 1, 42 b. c, Lepidus and Plancus became consuls. In spite of the general mourning and dismay, they insisted on celebrating the commencement of their reign with public festivities. Both of them claimed and held a triumph for victories unknown to history. " The consuls triumph,"' said the soldiers, " not over the 16 ITALY 42 B. C. Gauls, but over the Germans ! " Each of them had, in fact, sacri- ficed a brother in the proscriptions. The massacres had now ended, but funds were needed, and a period of confiscation, forced loans, and heavy requisitions ensued. The citizens were made to swear obedience to all Caesar's laws, and to accord him divine honors. Octavius undertook to drive Sextus out of Sicily, but found the straits too strongly guarded by his piratical fleet. Antonius crossed without delay to the coast of Epirus. Chapter III THE BATTLE OF PHILIPPI AND THE NEW DIVISION OF THE EMPIRE. 42-37 B.C. THE Greeks took little interest in the political struggles of their Roman masters, though they had a traditional preference for republican forms. Athens, the capital, the headquarters of philosophy, was a sort of university, fre- quented by aspiring youths of every nation. Among these was the genial satirist known to us as the poet Horace. Brutus, the philosopher, on presenting himself at Athens and claiming the government of the province, met with a hearty re- ception and ready support. The Pompeian veterans, scattered through the country since Pharsalia, flocked about him; the arsenals, the revenues, the forces of the province were placed at his disposal; and in the army which he proceeded to organize many of the Roman students at Athens received commissions: among them the young poet Horace was made a tribune. The neighboring kings and rulers sided with the new governor, who soon overpowered the partisans of the triumvirs. Cassius, who, since the Parthian campaign of Crassus, en- joyed a high reputation in the East, had established himself with equal success in his province of Syria. It seems strange that these two republican leaders, with ample forces at their disposal, made no effort to resist the usurpation of the triumvirs in Italy. Probably both of them were very much in the hands of their soldiery, who preferred marauding expeditions against weak and wealthy enemies, such as Rhodians and Lycians, to severe fight- ing against well-trained legions as poor as themselves. Both Brutus and Cassius did, in fact, devote themselves mainly to extracting booty from the regions subject to their sway. Laden with the plunder of Asia, the armies were about to pass over into Macedonia. It is related that Brutus, while watch- ing in his tent one night, beheld standing before him a terrible 17 18 I T A L Y 42 B. C. phantom, which, on being questioned, replied, " I am thy evil demon ; thou shalt see me again at Philippi." The Epicurean Cassius made light of the apparition. With 30,000 foot and 20,000 horse, well-appointed troops, he had no misgivings. The triumvirs meanwhile were advancing across Macedonia with a still more numerous host, but owing to their weakness at sea they were but ill supplied. The two armies came face to face about twelve miles east of Philippi, in 42 b. c. Antonius was opposed to Cassius next the sea ; Octavius fronted Brutus more inland. Cassius, aware of his enemy's shortness of supplies, tried to re- strain the impatience of his colleague, but in vain. On the day of battle Octavius was ill ; his division was overthrown by that of Brutus, and he was carried off in the midst of his retreating army. But Antonius had inflicted an equal defeat on Cassius, and the latter, ignorant of his colleague's success, thought the cause lost, and slew himself in despair. The effect of this fatal deed was disastrous. Cassius, accus- tomed to command, had exercised some control over the soldiers; but the mild student who survived was powerless to do so. De- spite his lavish largesses and easy discipline, numbers of them deserted his standards. Still, the army of the triumvirs, strait- ened for provisions, was in little better condition, and could Bru- tus have refrained from fighting, he might have won a blood- less victory. Instead, he renewed the battle of Philippi, after an interval of twenty days, on the same ground. This time the Coesarians broke the ranks of their opponents and assailed them in their camp. Next day Brutus found that his reserve of four legions refused to fight, and he had no recourse but to follow the example of Cassius and commit suicide. Antonius and Octavius were now completely successful, and many important opponents of their policy fell into their hands, on whom they did not scruple to wreak a cruel vengeance. Octa- vius in particular is said to have shown himself most implacable on this occasion. Some portion of the beaten army escaped with the fleet to reinforce the armament of Sextus Pompeius. The victors now made a fresh partition of the Empire, Octa- vius taking Spain and Numidia ; Antonius, Gaul beyond the Alps and Illyricum. The Cisalpine was for the first time combined with Italy itself, and the whole peninsula they held in common. Lepidus was contemptuously excluded from all share of the Em- DIVISION OF EMPIRE 19 42-41 B. C. pire, but was afterward allowed to take the small province of Africa. Octavius, still suffering - in health, returned to Italy. An- tonius remained in the East, where his own licentious nature was encouraged by the dissolute habits of the people. For- getting - the claims of his soldiers, he lavished his wealth upon himself and his parasites. Coarse and easy-tempered, he loved flattery if seasoned with wit. He had seen and admired Cleopatra in Caesar's train, and, having reached Cilicia, he summoned her to appear before him to answer for having sided with Cassius in the recent contest. Cleopatra, confident in her ready wit and per- sonal charms, sailed up the Cydnus to Tarsus in a gilded vessel, with purple sails and silver oars, to the sound of flutes and pipes. She assumed the character of Venus, and Antonius that of Bacchus. The two divinities held their gorgeous revels on board, and it was an easy matter for the wily Egyptian to gain the mas- tery over the rude soldier. Antonius cast away all thought of domestic claims and schemes of empire, and retired with her to Alexandria, to lose the world in her arms. Early in the year 41 b. c. Octavius arrived in Italy charged with the invidious task of settling the Cesarean veterans on the lands of the native proprietors. Fulvia, daring and ambitious, was virtually ruling the state through her influence over the con- suls. She resented the appearance of Octavius on the scene, and, hoping to win back her husband from his Egyptian charmer by stirring up troubles in Italy, she encouraged the Italians to resist the assignment of their lands to the veterans. A short civil war ensued ; but Agrippa, the best friend and ablest officer of Octa- vius, shut up the malcontents in Perusia, and reduced them to capitulate by stress of famine. The news of Octavius's growing ascendency in Italy, to- gether with an attack of the Parthians on Syria, at length roused Antonius from his dream of pleasure. Dispatching his lieutenant Ventidius to repel the Parthians, he started himself for Italy with some legions and a powerful fleet. At Athens he met his wife Fulvia, who upbraided him for his desertion of her : but he re- torted bitterly upon her, and she soon after died broken-hearted. Passing thence to the shores of the Adriatic he made a compact with Sextus Pompeius, who transported him across the straits, and together they proceeded to plunder the southeastern coasts of 20 ITALY 41-40 B.C. Italy. Sextus had been so long an exile from Rome that he was looked upon as no better than a foreigner or barbarian; and the man who in company with such an ally assailed the sacred soil of Italy was justly regarded as an invader. When, therefore, Octa- vius drew the sword to resist his advance, the people hailed him as the champion of their hearths and their gods. For the mo- ment, however, the soldiers were stronger than the people. They compelled their chiefs to treat, and, with the help of Cocceius Nerva, Pollio, and Maecenas, a new partition was arranged. An- tonius received the whole eastern half of the Empire from the Adriatic to the Euphrates. Octavius took the entire west, and Africa was abandoned to Lepidus. The peace was cemented by the marriage of Antonius, now a widower, with Octavia, the sister of the young Csesar; and the rivals, outwardly reconciled, hastened to Rome to celebrate their alliance with games and festivities. Octavius, to whom the government of Rome now fell by right, controlled the mutinous disposition of the soldiers, and tranquilized the people by regular distributions of grain. He had already repudiated Claudia, the daughter of Fulvia, whom he married to satisfy the soldiers, and he now wedded Scribonia, a relative of Sextus Pompeius. This led to a reconciliation with the wild sea-rover. Sicily, Sardinia, and Corsica were assigned to him as his share of the Empire ; and he was charged to clear the sea of pirates, as his father had done. The three chiefs ban- queted together, not on land, where the imperators might be too powerful, nor at sea, where the pirate chief could make himself master of his guests, but on board a vessel moored within the harbor. Maenas, an officer of Sextus, proposed to cut the cable and carry them out to sea ; but Sextus forbade it, muttering that Msenas should have done the deed, but not have asked leave to do it. Sextus still cherished some hopes of empire, and alone among the Romans based his hopes on maritime ascendency. Surrounded by foreign adventurers, he had forgotten the habits even, it is said, the speech of a Roman. He affected to be the son of Neptune, and pretended to the honors of a demi-god. The ill-assorted alliance did not long continue. Octavius repudiated Scribonia, in order to espouse Livia, whom he forced from her husband, Tiberius Nero. Sextus was the first to arm, und Antonius, at the instance of his consort Octavia. assisted DIVISION OF EMPIRE 21 40-36 B. C. Octavius against him with a fleet of 130 galleys, in return for which he demanded 20,000 legionaries for the war he was pre- paring against Parthia. Antonius then rejoined Cleopatra in the East, sending his wife home to her brother's care. Msenas proved a traitor to his own master, and with his aid Octavius soon recovered Sardinia and Corsica; but his attempts at naval warfare were unsuccessful till the command was taken by the valiant and prudent Agrippa. On January 1, 37 b. c, M. Vipsanius Agrippa became consul, and set himself to the task of wresting the command of the sea from Sextus, and in the ensuing spring he attacked Sicily at its three salient angles. Octavius in person conducted the assault on Messana, but was more than once repulsed ; Lepidus gave but little assistance. At last Agrippa completely defeated Sextus in the great sea-fight at Naulochus, and the latter collected his treas- ures and abandoned Sicily for the East. Antonius, however, would not receive him, but finally crushed him in another great naval battle. Lepidus, who had landed in Sicily, demanded this island for himself and there ventured to match himself against Octavius, but was quickly overcome. Octavius spared his life, and this most feeble scion of the great /Emilian house lingered on through more than twenty years of retirement at Circeii. Chapter IV THE BATTLE OF ACTIUM AND END OF THE PERIOD OF CIVIL WAR. 31-30 B.C. ON the deposition of Lepidus, his conqueror commanded not less than 45 legions, 25,000 horsemen, and 37,000 light troops, besides a fleet of more than 500 galleys. But he had now to reckon with his own victorious soldiers, who demanded large rewards in lands and money. To satisfy these claims, Octavius imposed severe exactions, especially on Sicily. On his return to Rome, the people, rejoicing in the abundance of corn which had followed on the clearance of the seas, received him triumphantly. The Senate would have heaped honors upon him, but he accepted only the tribunician inviolability, an ovation, and a golden statue. He declined to take from Lepidus the office of Pontifex Maximus. Deeply impressed by the fate of Caesar, Octavius was very watchful over the safety of his own life. Though in reality en- gaged upon the enterprise of raising himself above the laws, he took no step, however daring, without trying to secure for it the semblance of legality. Before reentering the city, he rendered an account of all his acts to the people, excused his proscriptions by the plea of stern necessity, and promised clemency for the future. He proceeded to restore their ancient prerogatives to the magistracies; and the wise administration of Maecenas reconciled many enmities. Life and property were secured by the institu- tion of a cohort of city guards. An active police scoured the whole peninsula, rooting out the bands of robbers, releasing many kidnaped freemen from the factories of the great proprietors, and restoring to their masters, or putting to death, multitudes of fugitive slaves who were at large. About midsummer of the year 36 b. c. Antonius had assembled 100,000 men on the Euphrates to complete the conquest of the Parthians. Cleopatra joined him on his way, but he sent her back to Egypt, promising soon to return to her there. The season 22 END OF CIVIL WAR 23 S6-33 B.C. was now so far advanced that he had to march in great haste, and on reaching Praaspa, three hundred miles beyond the Tigris, he found that the engines needed for a siege had fallen far into the rear. He tried to reduce the city by blockade, but found his own supplies cut off by the Parthian horsemen, and was soon obliged to beat a hasty retreat. The severe winter of that elevated region was imminent, and his legions suffered intense hardships during a march of twenty-seven days. Antonius hurried his weary soldiers, with great loss and suffering, back to Syria, where Cleopatra met him, and with her he returned unabashed to Alex- andria. The imperator chose to represent this shameful retreat as a victory, and Octavius humored his conceit, and so maintained a cordial understanding with him. In the following year he made an inroad into Armenia, carried off King Artavasdes in gilded chains to Alexandria, and, to the disgust of all Roman citizens, celebrated a triumph in the streets of his foreign capital. The Egyptian court now plunged into the grossest debauch- ery, the queen leading the way, and contriving a succession of new pleasures for the Roman voluptuary. If she would retain her seat upon the throne of the Ptolemies, she must keep her lover constantly amused. , If she could succeed in converting him into an Oriental despot, she might yet hope to rule supreme upon the Capitol. All her talents, which were of the most varied kind, were called into requisition, as well as the lighter artifices of her sex. Painters and sculptors grouped the illustrious pair together, and the coins of the kingdom bore the effigies and titles of both. Masques and revels followed in quick succession, and the princely lovers assumed the characters of Isis and Osiris. The rumors of these orgies caused much resentment at Rome, where Octavius was advancing in popularity, and begin- ning to fill the space in the public eye left vacant by Caesar's death. His manners were affable, his concern for the public weal un- wearied. After the reduction of Sicily, he had established a mild but firm government at Rome. He had then encountered with success some of the rudest tribes among the Alpine passes, in Dal- matia, Ulyria, and the remote Pannonia. At the end of three campaigns, in one of which he obtained the distinction of an hon- orable wound, the Senate decreed him a triumph, but he deferred its celebration. Already at the beginning of 33 b. c. the rivals had entered upon angry recriminations, Antonius objecting that he 24 I T A L Y 33-32 B. C. had not received his share of troops and provinces on the depriva- tion of Lepidus, at which time Octavins had assumed the admin- istration of Africa, while Octavius retorted by charging him with the murder of Sextus; the capture of Artavasdes, an ally of the Republic ; above all, with his scandalous connection with the Egyptian queen, and his acknowledging her child Caesario as a genuine son of the dictator. Antonius, who had been preparing an expedition against the Parthians, suddenly changed the desti- nation of his legions to Ephesus. Thither his officers were di- rected to bring numerous fresh battalions levied throughout Greece, Africa, and Asia. Thither, too, he summoned the bar- barian chiefs from the Caspian to the Syrtis to assemble with their hosts of auxiliaries. Cleopatra contributed not only a con- tingent of troops, but a squadron of the most powerful galleys ever launched upon the Mediterranean. The object of all these preparations was not avowed. Antonius pretended to be ab- sorbed in frivolities. He passed the winter at Samos, lavishing his resources upon a splendid Dionysian festival, and the new Bacchus repeated his former extravagances while the empire of the world was trembling in the balance. During the year 32 b. c. the consuls were Domitius Ahenobar- bus and Sosius, both nominees of Antonius ; but their influence was counterbalanced by the defection of some important partisans from his cause. Plancus returned from the East, charged with the testament of Antonius, which he was to deposit in the custody of the Vestal Virgins. This document he betrayed to Octavius. The Senate learned with horror that the renegade triumvir had recognized Caesario as the legitimate heir of Caesar, that he had distributed crowns and provinces among his own bastards, and directed his own body to be entombed with Cleopatra's in the mausoleum of the Ptolemies. No one could any longer doubt the truth of the rumors which asserted that he had pledged himself to subject Rome to the caprices of the Queen of Egypt, to remove to Alexandria the seat of empire, to prostrate the gods of the Capitol before the monsters of the Nile. He even presented Cleopatra with Roman territory. All eyes were turned upon Octa- vius as the designated savior of the nation and of its faith. He refrained, however, as yet from declaring Antonius a public enemy, although a popular decree deprived him of his com- mand, and contented himself with proclaiming war with Egypt. END OF CIVIL WAR 25 32-31 B. C. With the sanction of the Senate, he assumed the consulship, with Messala for his colleague, at the beginning of the year 31 B. c. At such a crisis the legitimate office was more effective, as it had always been more popular, than any extraordinary commission. To the remonstrances of his own friends, who urged him to dismiss Cleopatra, Anton ins replied by divorcing his legitimate wife. Preparations for war were pushed forward on both sides. The forces of Antonius numbered 100,000 infantry and 12,000 horse. He was supported by many kings and potentates of the East. His fleet counted 500 galleys, some of which had eight and even ten banks of oars. The infantry of Octavius was less by 20,000, his cavalry about equal, and his fleet, commanded by the skillful Agrippa, comprised no more than 150 ships, slighter but more manageable than those of his enemy. Finding the straits unguarded, Octavius carried his troops over into Epirus, and from that moment de- fection began both among the Roman and barbarian leaders on the other side. Antonius thought himself surrounded by traitors, and required Cleopatra herself to taste all the viands set before him. Both on land and at sea the Western power began to assert its superiority in the preliminary encounter. The two armies had been gradually concentrated on the shores of the Ambracian Gulf, which was occupied by the fleet of Antonius. Here Antonius challenged his rival to decide the contest by single combat, but received a contemptuous refusal. He began to despair of victory, and to meditate an inglorious escape by sea to Egypt, leaving his army to retreat as best it might into Asia. At length, in September of 31 b. c, at mid-day, with a light favoring breeze, the huge galleys of the Oriental fleet sailed forth into the open sea. Too unwieldy for attack, they were provided with ponderous defenses, and the light vessels of Octavius could make but little direct impression on them. The Liburnian tri- remes, however, were maneuvered with activity and intelligence. They rowed round and round their unwieldy adversaries, sweep- ing away their banks of oars, distracting their defenders with flights of arrows, and at last applying fire to the crippled mon- sters. In the midst of the fight Cleopatra's galley hoisted its sails, threaded the maze of combatants, and stood away for Egypt. Antonius leaped into a boat and hurried after her in disgraceful 26 ITALY 31 B. C. flight. The rage and shame of his adherents filled them with despair; yet they maintained the contest with determination till, one by one, their huge vessels took fire and burned to the water's edge. Three hundred galleys were captured. The army on shore for some time refused to believe in the faint-hearted conduct of its chief; and it was not till Canidius, the general in command, passed over to Octavius's quarters that the gallant legions could be induced to make their submission. On the point of land, the acte, which overlooked the scene of the battle, stood a little chapel of Apollo, known as the Actium. From this place the great sea-fight, which decided the fate of Rome and of the world, derived its name; and on this spot Oc- tavius instituted the festival of the Actian games, which was cele- brated every five years for many generations. The conqueror had nothing now to fear from Cleopatra and her minion ; he could allow their punishment to bide its time. Mae- cenas had been left to govern Rome, and Agrippa was now dis- patched to pacify Italy, which was still disturbed, while Octavius visited Greece, and received a glad welcome from its people. Thence he passed on to Asia, where provinces and dependent king- doms promptly submitted to him. During the winter he visited Rome for a few days, and was escorted from Brundisium by a crowd of citizens, knights, and senators. Once more he was forced to sell his own property and that of his nearest friends to satisfy the claims of his veterans; and, promising an ample largess out of the spoils of Egypt, he started in the spring to complete his victory over the fugitives. The news of Antonius's defeat at Actium, and of the submis- sion of his land army, had preceded him to Egypt ; and on his arrival there he found his authority renounced by the Roman legions. He was hardly restrained from suicide; but on rejoining Cleopatra at Alexandria he found her preparing, with masculine activity, to defend herself. One after another, however, her allies fell away from her, and then she conceived the idea of fleeing with her treasures to the utmost parts of Arabia. Some of her ships were even dragged across the Isthmus of Suez to the Red Sea, but were there destroyed by the Arabs. The project had to be aban- doned, as was also the still wilder scheme of taking flight to Spain and raising that turbulent province against the heir of Caesar. After an interval of sullen isolation, Antonius returned to his mis- END OF CIVIL WAR 27 31-30 B.C. tress and plunged with her into reckless orgies till the time should come for both to die. Meantime both the one and the other pleaded for mercy sepa- rately from the victor. Antonius received no reply. Cleopatra was encouraged to hope for favor if she would rid the world of Anto- nius. Octavius was resolved to make her kingdom his own, but he wished to exhibit her alive at his triumph, and he was most anx- ious to possess himself of the treasures of the Ptolemies, which she had it in her power to secrete or destroy. His agents suggested to her that Octavius was young, and might yield to the power of her charms; and in the hope of a last conquest she determined to betray her paramour. As the conqueror approached, Antonius, encouraged by some success in a cavalry skirmish, prepared to strike one blow for empire; but at that moment both his navy and his troops, seduced by the queen's artifices, deserted him. He was at the same time falsely informed that she had committed suicide. All was now over with Antonius, and he inflicted upon himself a mortal wound ; but before he died the queen caused him to be con- veyed to the tower in which she had taken refuge, and he expired in her arms. Octavius's first care on entering Alexandria was to secure the queen alive. This was accomplished with some difficulty; she re- turned to the palace, resumed her state, and prepared to receive the visit of Octavius. Much depended for her on her success in this interview, and she used every artifice to excite the pity, if not the love, of her young conqueror. Octavius fixed his eyes coldly on the ground, asked for a list of her treasures, and bidding her be of good courage, quitted her. Cleopatra was dismayed at her failure ; but on learning that she was certainly to be removed to Rome, made up her mind to die. She retired to the tower of her mauso- leum, where lay the body of Antonius, and was next day found dead with her two women. The manner of her death was never certainly known, but at the triumph of Octavius a wax image of her was carried in the procession, with the arms encircled by serpents ; and this confirmed the popular rumor that she perished by the bite of an asp conveyed to her for the purpose in a basket of figs. Her child by Gesar was cruelly put to death ; the dynasty of the Ptolemies ceased to reign, and Egypt became a Roman province. With the death of Antonius the period of civil wars and politi- cal strife comes to an end. The struggle so long maintained by 28 ITALY 30-29 B. C. the people against the nobles has ended in the submission of both parties alike to a supreme ruler. The hour has come, and with it has appeared the one man capable of using it for the establishment of a durable monarchy upon a firm foundation. Had Antonius tri- umphed at Actium, his profligate empire would have quickly fallen to pieces. The preeminent genius of Octavius is attested by the permanence of the edifice which he erected. The creations of his hand were rooted in the ancient ideas and habits of the people ; they stood the test of time, unlike the fabrics of Sulla's and Caesar's power, which quickly collapsed and perished. We must now ex- amine the system adopted by the real founder of the Roman Empire, which endured in its main features for more than two centuries, and continued to animate the governments of Rome and Constantinople down to the commencement of modern history, if indeed it can be said to be even yet extinguished. 1 1 To resume : In a few words, the system of imperial government, as it was instituted by Augustus, . . . may be denned as an absolute monarchy dis- guised by the forms of a commonwealth. Gibbon, " Decline and Fall of Rome," Bury's ed., vol. i. p. 68. " This new office of Imperator was nothing else than the primitive regal office reestablished. . . . There is hardly a trait of the new monarchy which was not found in the old." But, one fact is never to be forgotten: All Roman citizens regarded " the Imperator as the living and personal expression of the people." Mommsen, "History of Rome," tr. vol. v. pp. 333-334- Chapter V THE FOUNDATION OF THE EMPIRE BY AUGUSTUS 29-27 B.C. AFTER regulating his new province, Octavius made a prog- ress through his Eastern dominions, rewarding his allies L and dispossessing his enemies. He passed the winter at Samos, wishing perhaps to allow more time for his proscriptions to be forgotten, before he returned in triumph to Rome. When at last he reached the city, in the middle of 29 b. c, he was welcomed with enthusiasm. The temple of Janus was closed for the third time in Roman history, and peace prevailed everywhere. He had now to choose whether he would be a citizen of the commonwealth or its ruler. The framework of the republican government still existed; both Senate and people continued to exercise their prerogatives. Octavius himself professed to wield only a delegated authority. He had laid down the extraordinary powers of the triumvirate ; it was as consul commissioned by the state that he conquered at Actium and subjugated Egypt. His acts in Greece and Asia awaited the confirmation of the Senate. So moderate and loyal did he seem that his popularity was unbounded. As soon as the ceremony of his triple triumph was ended, Octa- vius ought by law to have disbanded his army and laid down his command. This necessity he evaded ; for the Senate, eager to flatter and caress him, conferred upon him the title of Imperator, and al- lowed him to prefix it to his name, as Julius Caesar had done, whereby he became permanent commander of the national forces. Every ordinary command ceased the moment the imperator entered the city, but Octavius, as emperor, might wear the insignia of mili- tary power even within the city. This prerogative, indeed, he never exercised, and his example was followed by his successors. They generally relinquished even the formal title of imperator in their ordinary intercourse with their subjects, and were content to appear as princes or premiers of the citizens. 30 ITALY 29-27 B. C. Having 1 thus secured to himself the army, the instrument of substantial power, Octavius sought to disguise the real foundation of his authority by raising the estimation of the Senate as the repre- sentative of the national will. Julius Caesar first, and after him the triumvirs, and especially Antonius, had degraded the Senate by swelling its numbers to a thousand, and thrusting into it foreigners and men of low condition. Octavius now assumed the powers of the censorship, by virtue of which he ejected from the Senate many who were unworthy to sit in so august an assembly, reducing the number to six hundred, and requiring strictly a property qualification. Upon the Senate thus remodeled, Octavius conferred additional dignity by placing himself at its head as Princeps, the most honor- able of all republican titles, and one which had always been held for life. The military command he soon offered to resign, and, after a long affectation of resistance, accepted it only for a term of years, but it was afterward repeatedly renewed to him. The powers both of the consul and of the censor, but without the titles, were in like manner renewed to him from time to time, and by virtue of them he occupied the highest place in the city, and was recognized as the chief of the state, the head of both its legislative and executive departments, the organ of its foreign relations. The Romans had been wont to say that their consul was, in fact, a king, checked by the presence of a colleague, and by the limited term of his office. Octavius, however, holding his authority for life, and sitting para- mount above the titular consuls, reigned under the forms of a repub- lic as real king of the Romans. " The statesmanship of Augustus appears most clearly of all in his reorganization of the provincial government of the Empire. The provinces were divided into two classes. The lower provinces, long conquered and well organized, were left under the administration of the Senate as originally, though their governors were held to a more real and strict responsibility. The more recent provinces and those on the frontiers, which were unsettled and exposed to attack, the emperor held in his own hands, that is, he governed them by officers appointed by himself and imme- diately responsible to him for their conduct. The change was one of great advantage to the provincials." * This system was called the dyarchy, or system of senatorial and imperial provinces. The prerogative of the emperor was completed by the acquisition of the 1 G. B. Adams, " European History," p. io8. FOUNDATION OF EMPIRE 31 29-27 B. C. powers of the tribunate, which were conferred on him in perpetuity. The chief value of this power lay in the, popularity of its name. The people, long accustomed to look upon the tribunes as the cham- pions of their liberties, could not imagine that they were really the slaves of one who held that title. When Octavius, after the death of Lepidus, assumed the dignity of sovereign pontiff, he combined in his single hand the most invidious instruments of patrician tyranny and plebeian independence. Nevertheless, while Octavius thus amassed one prerogative after another, he discreetly avoided drawing attention to his really sovereign power by the assumption of any distinctive title. Anto- nius had formally abolished the dictatorship. No voice was allowed to hail the new Caesar as " king." Yet the need was felt of some distinguishing name to express the new power which had arisen. Various titles 2 were discussed between the emperor and his friends, and at length the epithet " Augustus," hitherto applied only to the temples and services of the gods, was proposed and determined on. The worship of Octavius as a god was spreading tacitly in the provinces, though as yet forbidden in Italy ; the name of Augus- tus, decreed by the Senate in 27 b. c, gave a fresh impulse to the sentiment of adulation which already possessed the people. The question has often been discussed whether or no Julius Caesar had formed any definite scheme for the constitution of the Roman Empire. It may well be that, had his life been prolonged, he might have molded the whole mass of the citizens and subjects of Rome into one body politic under his own autocratic rule. Judg- ing from his treatment of the Gauls, both in Italy and beyond the Alps, it seems certain that his policy would have been to break down the barriers which divided citizens from subjects, and to fuse all the various races which peopled the Roman Empire into one vast nation on the basis of equal rights, with one language and one law for all alike. The conquests of Alexander, with the consequent wide diffusion of the Greek tongue, had familiarized the world with this idea in practice, and the speculations of every school of philos- ophy encouraged mankind to look forward with longing to such a consummation, as the greatest blessing that could be conferred upon the human race. The Epicurean philosophy and the popular traditions inherited by Julius Caesar both inclined him to favor such 2 The common titles of the Roman ruler were : Princeps, Caesar, Imperator, Augustus. 32 ITALY 29-27 B. C. ideas, which, to an old-fashioned Roman, must have seemed nothing short of revolutionary. The policy of Augustus was on this point, as on most others, diametrically opposed to that of his great-uncle. Julius had fallen j,ust as the throne had been attained; Augustus, ever studious to avoid a like fate, marked his uncle's footsteps only to avoid them. Julius had openly, and without extenuation, grasped at kingly power; his nephew strove by every means to disguise the reality of his own kingship behind the mask of republican forms. Julius had aspired to mold mankind into one great nation, and had thereby alienated the old national party in Rome. Augustus steadily op- posed these subversive notions. Resisting all the pressure brought to bear upon him, he stoutly maintained that the Romans were a peculiar people, the born sovereigns of mankind, the conquerors and rulers of the world. This statement, however, must be under- stood with discrimination. Augustus, the child of the popular party, could not altogether repudiate the doctrines as the represen- tative of which he had risen to power ; he, too, extended the Roman franchise to the provincials, but always in a cautious and temperate manner, taking care to give due effect to the opposing doctrine which asserted the privileged character of the Roman people. The exact color of his system, which had shifted its hues during his early career, seems to have been definitely fixed from the day when, arrayed against the foreign forces of his rival Antonius, he came forth at the head of the Senate, the people and the gods of Rome, as the champion of the whole nation, without respect to class or party. The extension of the Roman franchise was by no means the only matter concerning which a conflict of ideas was in progress. Roman praetors and proconsuls had carried the Roman law into every province of the Empire, but they had also been compelled to take account of the usages and principles of jurisprudence al- ready established among the conquered races, many of which were more in harmony than the hard old laws of Rome with the advanc- ing cultivation and humanity of the age. These foreign principles of law were gradually asserting themselves, and forcing their way even into the Roman Forum. There arose two schools of Roman lawyers, the conservative and the liberal. It has already been stated that Julius contemplated a codification of Roman law, and it is probable that he aimed at a large modification of the old laws of FOUNDATION OF EMPIRE S3 29-27 B. C. the Republic, so as to bring- them into harmony with the more liberal jurisprudence of other countries. Augustus threw his weight into the opposite scale, and strove to preserve the ancient laws as little changed as possible. In the realm of religion the conflict of ideas was the hottest of all. For two centuries Rome had in vain attempted to maintain her old mythology and ritual in face of the new ideas which crowded in upon her from foreign parts. Now Greeks, Egyptians, Syrians, even Jews, as subjects of the Empire, demanded the recog- nition and free exercise of their religious creeds and usages. The metropolis of the world had become the common receptacle of all existing beliefs and ceremonials. Here, too, Augustus exerted all his force to sustain and revive the old national traditions. For his own part, he seems to have been devoid of all belief in any of the speculative systems current in his time, and derided the ideologists, who were not content, as he was himself, with taking the material world as he found it, and putting it to its practical uses. But he perceived the danger of leaving the multitude to be tossed to and fro by a constant succession of new and exciting blasts of doctrine on such a subject. Augustus was engaged in constructing a fixed and enduring order of affairs. Accordingly he repaired the crum- bling temples, revived the priesthoods, and renewed the ancient ceremonials. The " Fasti " of the court poet, Ovid, were, in fact, a calendar of the ritual of the year. The Romans were given to understand that their new chief, who had once saved their country from conquest, and their gods from desecration, had now placed the one under the protection of the other, and bound them together by a pledge of mutual recognition. The policy of Augustus was on all sides essentially reaction- ary. Yet we need not suppose that he was blind to the force of circumstances prevailing around him, or that he expected ultimately to arrest the progress of ideas. It was enough for him if he could divert or moderate them ; enough, at least, if he could persuade his countrymen that he was doing more than anyone else could do to maintain their Empire on the stable foundations of the ancient ways. It is just possible that a man of greater genius and boldness might have molded his opportunity to a higher issue by guiding the revolutionary forces which he strove merely to restrain. But we must acknowledge how grand was the result which, following his own temper, and the bent of his own character, he did actually 34 ITALY 29-27 B. C. effect. The establishment of the Roman Empire was, after all, the greatest political work that any human being ever wrought. The achievement of Alexander, of Caesar, of Charlemagne, of Napo- leon, is not to be compared with it for a moment. The name of Julius Caesar was the watchword of the veterans who conquered under his nephew, and it continued dear to the mass of the citizens, as that of the man who had crushed the oligarchy and avenged the Sullan massacres. Yet the great writers of the Au- gustan Age reflect but little of this enthusiasm. Virgil and Horace have no panegyrics for the elder Caesar. We need not attribute this silence to any unworthy jealousy on the part of Augustus of the memory of his great predecessor. It was the result of political design. As soon as the rivalry of Antonius was crushed, the atti- tude of Augustus toward the aristocracy completely changed, and he thenceforth devoted to its interests all the powers he had received from the triumphant democracy. The nobles could not long refuse their support to a conqueror who carried out their own ideas of conservatism and reaction, who promoted the son of Cicero and the friend of Brutus to the highest offices, and who offered to themselves, without reserve, careers of honorable and lucrative em- ployment. At the same time the lower classes were tranquilized and amused by shows and largesses, and relieved from the burden of military service. Citizens of all ranks were set at ease by the cessation of political proscriptions, flattered by the assurance that their empire over the nations was completed and secured, com- forted by the knowledge that the favor of the gods had been pur- chased, and the stability of the state insured by the piety of the emperor. The easy acquiescence of the Romans in a regal tyranny thus slightly disguised ceases to be surprising when we consider, first, the weariness engendered by a whole century of civil strife and bloodshed; and second, the fact that the race of true old Roman citizens had to a great extent died out, and their places had been filled by a crowd of bastard citizens of miscellaneous origin. To such a mongrel nation royal rule could hardly imply degeneracy or decay. Had not Macedonia been glorious under Philip and Alex- ander? Had not Sparta, and even Rome itself, been conspicuous for heroism under a dynasty of kings? The Romans had ceased to value or understand free political life, but they could appreciate old customs, religious traditions, wise laws; and as they watched the FOUNDATION OF EMPIRE 35 29-27 B. C. revival or establishment of such institutions, they looked forward hopefully to a new career of growth and progress. In his personal habits and demeanor Augustus carefully dis- tinguished between the imperator and the princeps. He withdrew from the familiarity which Caesar had used toward his legionaries, no longer addressing them as " comrades," but always as " sol- diers." But in private life, amid all the magnificence which he encouraged on the part of his nobles, he himself was studiously simple and modest. His house on the Palatine was moderate in size and ornament. His dress was that of a plain senator, woven by the hands of Livia and her maidens in her own apartment. He traversed the streets as a private citizen, with no more than the ordinary retinue of slaves and clients, courteously addressing the acquaintances he encountered by taking them by the hand, or lean- ing on their shoulders, allowing himself to be summoned as a wit- ness in their suits, and attending at their houses on occasions of domestic interest. At table he was sober and decorous; his guests were few in number, and chosen, for the most part, for their social qualities. Augustus was specially fortunate in the poets he at- tracted to his court and person. Horace taught his contemporaries to acquiesce in the new regime securely and contentedly, while Virgil kindled their imaginations and shed over the Empire of the Caesars the halo of legendary antiquity. In the temples on days of public service, around their own hearths on every ordinary occa- sion, the Romans were taught to remember in their prayers the restorer of order, the creator of universal felicity, and to pour a libation for a blessing on themselves and on Caesar, the father of his country. This title, the proudest any Roman could obtain, had long been bestowed by the citizens in private on their hero and patron, when at last the Senate took up the voice of the nation, and con- ferred it upon him with due solemnity. The proposal was received and confirmed with eager acclamations ; and Valerius Messala, one of the noblest of the order, was deputed to offer the title in the name of the Senate and the people. " Conscript fathers," replied the emperor, "my wishes are now fulfilled, my vows are accom- plished. I have nothing more to ask of the Immortals but that I may retain to my dying day the unanimous approval you now bestow upon me." Chapter VI CONDITION OF THE EMPIRE UNDER AUGUSTUS 31 B. C.-14 A. D. ITALY, which now extended from the Alps to the Straits of Messana, was divided into eleven regions, and governed by the praetor in the city. The rest of the Empire was appor- tioned between the emperor and the Senate. The imperial prov- inces were as follows : The Tarraconensis and Lusitania, in Spain ; Gaul beyond the Alps, including Upper and Lower Germany the districts bordering upon the Rhine ; Pannonia and Macedonia ; Coelesyria and Phoenicia; Cilicia, Cyprus, and Egypt. To the Sen- ate were assigned Baetica, Numidia, Africa, Cyrenaica, Achaia, Asia, and the great islands off the coast of Italy. Dalmatia and Illyricum, at first given to the Senate, was soon afterward taken by the emperor in exchange for the Narbonensis and Cyprus. Palestine was added by Augustus to the Empire, which then in- cluded every coast and island of the Mediterranean except Maure- tania. Those parts of the Empire such as Gaul, Pannonia, and Thrace, which extended hundreds of miles away from the inland sea, were little more than wild forests. The populous and civilized parts of the Roman dominion, including all the great cities and centers of commerce, formed but a fringe along the shores of the Mediterranean. The possession of this great central waterway was most favor- able to the peaceful development of the Empire. The facility thus afforded for the interchange of commerce and of thought bound all the provinces together in the bonds of a common interest; and so secure was the peace which resulted from this cause that the Medi- terranean provinces were left almost wholly without military gar- risons. Italy, and Rome itself, were in like manner almost desti- tute of regular defenders, the emperor being content to confide his personal safety to a few cohorts of bodyguards or praetorians. It was not till the reign of his successor that these troops were col-, lected into a camp at the gates of the city. Their number never exceeded 10,000 or 20,000. The legions, which fonned the stand- 36 COLOSSAL STATUE OF CAR'S JULIUS CAESAR OCTAVIANUS AUGUSTUS (Born 63 n. c. Died 14 a. rO In the J'atican Museum, Rome EMPIRE UNDER AUGUSTUS 37 31-27 B.C. ing army of the Empire, were relegated to the frontiers or to tur- bulent provinces. Three legions occupied Spain; the banks of the Rhine were guarded by eight; two were quartered in Africa, two in Egypt; four were posted on the Euphrates, and four on the Danube; and two were held in reserve in Dalmatia, whence, if re- quired, they could easily be summoned to Rome. Each of these twenty-five legions mustered 6100 foot and 720 horse; they were recruited, for the most part, among the subject races outside Italy, and the local auxiliaries attached to each legion, and armed and drilled after their native usage, about doubled the numbers of the force, raising the total of the imperial armies to 340,000 men. The Italians claimed exemption from legionary service, and were en- listed only in the praetorian cohorts. Augustus was the first to establish a regular and permanent navy, which he stationed under the supreme command of Agrippa at Misenum, Ravenna, and Forum Julii, or Frejus, in Gaul. These fleets kept the pirates in check, secured the free transmission of grain to the capital, and convoyed the ships which brought tribute in money from the East and the West. The sources of public revenue were numerous and varied. The public domain had indeed, for the most part, lapsed into the hands of private proprietors. The land-tax had been remitted to the soil of Italy, since the conquest of Macedonia, but was levied in every other part of the Empire; no citizen or subject was free from the pressure of the poll-tax. Mines and quarries, fisheries and salt works, were public property farmed for the state. Tolls and cus- toms were levied on every road and in every city, and every sort of personal property, including slaves, paid an ad valorem duty. Augustus imposed a rate of one-twentieth upon legacies, but this experiment caused considerable murmurs. Egypt and Africa paid a special contribution in grain for the supply of Italy and Rome, and the emperors found themselves obliged to keep up the old prac- tice of doles and largesses, whereby provincial industry was taxed to support idle arrogance at home. The Empire under Augustus, bounded by the Rhine, the Danube, the Euphrates, Mount Atlas, and the Atlantic Ocean, had almost reached the farthest limits that it ever permanently retained, though the conquest of Britain had yet to be undertaken. The population of this vast region is com- puted at about 100,000,000, and during the long period of peace and prosperity which ensued, it probably continued to increase for 38 ITALY 27-21 B. C. another century. The population of Rome may be roughly reck- oned at 700,000, and though it long continued to increase, it does not seem to have ever much exceeded 1,000,000 a number which was probably approached, if not equaled, by the census both of Antioch and of Alexandria. The new ruler set about embellishing his capital by the erection of temples and public buildings, improving so greatly the city that he boasted that whereas he found a city of brick, he left one of marble. In this he was seconded by his nobles, and es- pecially by his friend Agrippa, who, having secured, by his signal services in the field, the second place in the commonwealth, loyally abstained from aiming at the first. In the year 23 b. c, when Augustus, prostrated by fever, seemed unlikely to recover, it was to Agrippa that he handed his ring a hint, as it was deemed, that it was on him he would most desire that the Empire should be conferred. To Agrippa he intrusted, on his recovery, an Eastern command, which made him almost an equal, and a possible rival, to himself. Augustus was further supported by the tact and prudence of C. Cilnius Maecenas. This man had governed Italy for him during his struggle with Antonius, and long remained his chief adviser: to his suggestions the Romans ascribed the first outlines of the im- perial system of government. The genial character of Maecenas attracted to his side the best and ablest men of the day, and secured the favor of the literary class. At his table Virgil, Horace, Varius, and Pollio discussed, in the presence of Augustus, all the various schemes of philosophy and politics, and brought them to an ami- cable settlement. The principal events of the reign of Augustus, which extended over more than forty years, were of little mark, and may be shortly enumerated. An outbreak of the Cantabrian mountaineers in Spain compelled the emperor to take the field against them. Stricken by sickness, he quitted the camp, and left his generals to complete their reduction. On the accomplishment of this conquest, he closed Janus a second time. The Pax Romana, as it was proudly designated, did not, however, remain long without dis- turbance, either on the frontier or in the interior. Neither was the old spirit of Roman aggression yet wholly pacified. The proposal to retrieve the ill success of Caesar against Britain was indeed dis- cussed, but prudently abandoned. EMPIRE UNDER AUGUSTUS 39 21-15 B. C. In the year 21 b. c. Augustus, who had just put down the abor- tive conspiracy of Murena, ventured to leave Rome on a long prog- ress through his Eastern dominions. In Sicily he planted colonies at Syracuse and elsewhere. In Greece he bestowed favors on Sparta, while he withdrew from Athens her lucrative privilege of selling her franchise. After wintering at Samos, he advanced through Asia to Syria, where he punished the people of Tyre and Sidon for their turbulence, and perhaps even as far as Palestine, where he seems to have granted some extension of territory to Herod, King of Judaea. The chief object of this proconsular tour was to recover the standards of Crassus from the Parthians. Tiberius Claudius advanced with an army into Armenia, and Phraates the Parthian at once conceded his demands. Contemporary medals represent him as doing homage at the feet of the emperor's representative and receiving the crown from his hands. The long-lost trophies, the brazen eagles, cherished objects of the soldiers' devotion, were restored by Tiberius to his father and by him transmitted to Rome, and suspended in the temple of Mars the Avenger. They were greeted by the people with acclamations, and by the poets with paeans of triumph. After receiving a renewal of his powers for a second term of five years in 18 b. c. Augustus determined to celebrate his restora- tion of the state by holding the secular games with solemn cere- mony. They were supposed to be held every hundredth or hun- dred and tenth year of the Republic; and the Sibylline books, on being consulted, sanctioned the celebration. Heralds traversed the streets, inviting every citizen to attend upon a spectacle " which none of them had ever seen, and none could ever see again." The ceremonies were very simple. Sulphur, pitch, wheat, and barley were distributed. The Aventine, the Palatine, and the Capitoline were paraded by the multitude. Sacrifices were offered ; the game of Troy was enacted; and the festival ended with the performance of a choral ode of praise and thanksgiving, probably the actual hymn included among Horace's poems as " Carmen Sceculare." In the year 15 b. c. the security of the Empire was threatened by barbarian tribes along its whole northern frontier. On the Lower Rhine the legions had been defeated by the Germans with the loss of an eagle. The mountain tribes of Switzerland were menacing the Cisalpine. The Istrian peninsula was invaded by the Pan- nonians and Noricans. The Dalmatians were in revolt. Mace- 40 ITALY 15-13 B.C. donia was ravaged by the Msesians, and Thrace by the Sarmatians. Augustus himself traveled as far as Lugdunum, in Gaul, to in- quire on the spot into the weakness of the administration of that province. At the same time, Drusus Claudius Nero, the emperor's younger step-son, overthrew the Rhsetians among the Alps near Trent, and defeated the barbarous tribes in the valley of the Inn; while Tiberius followed the course of the Rhine as far up as the Lake of Constance, and crushed the enemy in that quarter. We are entering on the career of an imperial dynasty. The consuls and tribunes of the Roman commonwealth, though the titles and offices still survive, fall henceforth into a position of minor importance. The emperors indeed, from Augustus on- ward, will commonly assume the title of consul, and invariably maintain their grasp on the tribunician power, dating the years of their reign by the intervals of its renewal. But those who are associated with them in these offices are overshadowed by the superior dignity and power of the imperial throne. On the other hand, the kindred of the emperor will occupy a prominent place in the state, for from among them the rulers of the world are to be chosen. Octavia, the sister of Augustus, and wife of Antonius, had a son by a previous marriage named M. Marcellus, who, in default of sons to his uncle, was for some time the hope of the house. This youth gave high promise of ability, as we learn from the matchless praises bestowed upon him by Virgil ; and to him Augustus gave for wife his only child Julia, the daughter of Scribonia. But Mar- cellus died in 23 b. c. at the age of twenty, leaving no offspring. Julia was soon remarried to M. Agrippa, and by him had several children, to one of whom the succession to the Empire might be reasonably expected to fall. The two eldest sons, Caius and Lucius, grew up, and were advanced in the public service; but both of them were cut off in early life the one in 4 a. d., the other in 7 a. d. A third son, Postumus, was pronounced by his grand- father unfit for public life, and was put aside, if not murdered, by his order. There were also two daughters: Julia, married to JEmilius Paulus, and Agrippina, the wife of Claudius Germanicus, of whom more remains to be told. So few and obscure were the direct descendants of the great emperor; but he had attached another branch to the stem of his house by his last marriage with Livia Drusilla. This noted matron, EMPIRE UNDER AUGUSTUS 41 13-11 B.C. the first woman who attained a public position and became a real power in the state, had been married to Tiberius Claudius Nero, and had already borne him a son, Tiberius. In the year 38 b. c, Octavius, after divorcing Scribonia, snatched Livia from her hus- band and married her himself. A few months later she bore a second son, Drusus, of whom Octavius was reputed to be the father. Livia bore no more children, but maintained her dominion over the heart of her husband, and secured for her two sons the first place in his affections. Tiberius and Drusus were both men of ability, and proved worthy of the confidence placed in them. These two step-sons of the emperor first distinguished themselves in command against the Alpine mountaineers, and were afterward intrusted with the more important task of combating the Germans and Pannonians. Augustus required of both an entire devotion to his interests and those of the state, exposing them to the hardships of a pro- longed warfare far from the pleasures of the capital. While Ti- berius was sent to quell an insurrection in Pannonia, Drusus was charged with the administration of Gaul. He signalized his gov- ernment of that disturbed province by raising an altar to Augustus at Lugdunum thus confronting the influence of the Druids by the awful associations connected with the majesty of the emperor and the fortune of Rome. The Rhine, defended by a chain of fortified posts, had long- formed the frontier of the Empire; but the impetuous youth who now commanded the legions in that quarter aspired to the conquest of Germany and the reduction of Central Europe to the same state of subjection as Gaul or Spain. Starting from the northeastern frontier of Gaul, Drusus attacked the Usipetes and Sicambri in the country of the Lippe and the Lahn, the modern provinces of West- phalia and Nassau. His aim was to penetrate as far as the Weser, and the seats of the powerful Chauci and Cherusci, now known as Hanover and Detmold. With this object he dispatched an expedi- tion by sea to the mouths of the great rivers which fall into the German Ocean, so as to surprise the enemy in flank and rear. He easily drove the Germans before him by land, but his maritime armament was shattered by the waves and shallows, and he was forced to beat an inglorious retreat. In a second campaign the eagles were advanced as far as the Weser; but the Germans retired steadily, refusing to risk a battle: 42 ITALY 11-9 B. C. and Drustts did not extricate himself without difficulty from his perilous position. An outpost was planted at Aliso, fifty miles east of the Rhine ; and for his successes the emperor granted him the triumphal ensigns and the honor of an ovation, but refused him the title of imperator. Meanwhile the exploits of Tiberius against the Pannonians were deemed worthy of a similar recogni- tion. Augustus had the satisfaction of exhibiting both his step- sons to the people in the character of national heroes. In the year ii b. c. Tiberius was married to Julia, and about the same time Octavia died. In the year 10 b. c. Augustus again visited Gaul, and, yielding to the instances of Drusus, authorized another expedition beyond the Rhine. This time the Roman army penetrated through the country of the Chatti as far as the River Elbe. But the Cherusci still retired before them. Drusus became alarmed at the perils of his situation. Unfavorable omens were reported; and after erecting a trophy to mark their farthest point, the legions re- treated; but before reaching the Rhine, the young conqueror was killed by a fall from his horse. Augustus conveyed the remains, with ample honors, to Rome, and himself pronounced an oration over the body when it was buried in his own mausoleum in the Campus Martius. The title of Germanicus, which had been conferred on the young hero, was allowed to descend to his son. Tiberius, who had succeeded in consolidating the Roman power south of the Danube, was now sent to Gaul to complete his brother's conquests. His campaigns in the years 8 and y b. c. pro- duced but little result, and he was soon withdrawn by the emperor to Rome, and made consul for a second time. After the death of Agrippa in the year I2B. c. and that of Dru- sus in the year 9 b. c, the hopes of the people and of Augustus be- came centered in Tiberius; but the union between him and Julia proving fruitless, the emperor began to look to her children by Agrippa for the future support of his power. At the time of Tibe- rius's recall, her two elder sons, Caius and Lucius, were about four- teen and ten years old respectively. Caius had already served his first campaign. But the conduct of Julia now became so scandalous that the emperor was constrained to banish her to an island. It may be that her disgrace was caused by the jealousy of Livia; but if so, the intrigue was only half successful, for the fall of the mother seemed to increase the grandfather's affection for the children. EMPIRE UNDER AUGUSTUS 43 9 B.C. -6 A. D. Tiberius retired in disgust to Rhodes, where he remained for seven years in moody and indolent seclusion. When, tired at last of his self-imposed banishment, he asked permission to return, the em- peror coldly forbade him. This prohibition was afterward with- drawn; but Tiberius was still excluded from all public affairs and made to give place to his more favored nephews, until the premature death of these princes rendered his succession im- perative. The position of the emperor had become lonely. The death of Agrippa had been followed in 8 b. c. by that of Maecenas. The need of heirs to secure a peaceful succession to the Empire was pressing. Accordingly, in 4 a. d., Augustus adopted Tiberius as his son, and invested him with tribunician power, at the same time re- quiring him to adopt the young Germanicus, together with his own child by his first consort Vipsania, who bore the name of Drusus. Tiberius now again put himself at the head of the legions in Ger- many. His campaigns of the years 4 and 5 a. d. were remarkable for their boldness and success. Tiberius in person led his army from Aliso to the Elbe, while a powerful force was sent round by sea from the Rhine, and, sailing up the Elbe, effected a junction with the land army. The Germans, indeed, still pursued their policy of refusing a battle, and thus the Roman general had no victories to boast of; yet the influence of the Empire in Central Europe was much increased by these repeated advances, and the young chiefs of the German tribes began to crowd to Rome, ac- companied by their followers, there to learn the arts of civilization. Tiberius contemplated the complete subjugation of Germany; but he lacked the military ardor of a Caesar or a Pompeius. nor was he heartily supported by the emperor. Augustus perceived the dangerous preponderance which the army was beginning to acquire in the Empire. The mercenary legions clamored for in- creased pay and privileges, and cried out against their long deten- tion on the frontiers. The citizens, content to live in idleness on the dole of public corn, grew more and more reluctant to en- dure the hardships and discipline of the camp. The soldiers of the Rhine and the Danube threatened to become Rome's direst enemies. In 6 a. d. Tiberius transferred his own command from the Rhine to the Danube. Starting from Carnuntum, the modern Presburg, he plunged with six legions westward into the great 44 ITALY 6-9 A. D. Hercynian forest, the modern Bohemia. At the same time his lieutenant Saturninus, with a like force, marched eastward from the Rhine to meet him. This was another bold and skillful com- bination which deserves unqualified admiration. It was on the point of being completed, when the reported outbreak of an insur- rection in Pannonia disconcerted the plans of Tiberius. His first duty was to secure the peace and safety of the Empire. Both ar- mies were ordered to retire upon their respective bases; and this operation was conducted without loss or dishonor. The struggle of the Pannonians, protracted through three years, was formidable enough to try the resources of the Empire and to bring discredit upon the emperor himself. Augustus had outlived the favor with which he had been so long regarded, and he was harassed by the scandals brought upon his family through the misconduct of a younger Julia as shameless as her mother. The exile of Ovid, which occurred in 8 a. d., was most likely due to a political intrigue, for which his friend Maximus suffered death, and Agrippa Postumus was disgraced and secluded. The closing years of Augustus were further clouded by a great military disaster. The government of the half-constituted provinces beyond the Rhine had been intrusted to Ouintilius Varus. This officer tried to rule the rude Germans by the subtle system of Roman law rather than by the sword. His well-meant endeav- ors irritated the Germans to the point of rebellion. Headed by their hero Arminius, they compelled the proconsul to take the field against them with three legions. The Roman army, en- tangled in the Teutoburg forest 9 a. d., was utterly routed, the proconsul slain, and three eagles captured. The Romans had suffered no such defeat except on the three fatal days of the Allia, of Cannae, and of Carrhse. Aided by Tiberius, the emperor gallantly confronted the danger of a general rising in the north and of seditions in the city. The Gauls and Germans in Rome were placed under strict control. With the utmost difficulty fresh troops were levied, and after a whole year devoted to preparations, Tiberius, accompanied by the young Germanicus, once more led the legions across the Rhine. This expedition amounted to little more than a military promenade. The Romans were now too wary to pursue the enemy into their forest fastnesses. At the end of a few weeks they retired behind the Rhine, which became once more the frontier of the Em- EMPIRE UNDER AUGUSTUS 45 9-14 A. D. pire. Tiberius now returned to Rome to celebrate his triumph over the Pannonians. The citizens were reassured by this solem- nity, and, reckless of recent losses, still believed in the in- vincibility of Roman arms. But the aged Augustus, sunk into a state of nervous despondency, was heard to exclaim, " Varus ! Varus ! give me back my legions." Germanicus now assumed the command on the Rhine, while Tiberius was detained in Rome, and seemed more than ever secure of the succession; though it was rumored that Augustus chafed at the moroseness of his temper, and formed a gloomy augury of his career in power. Conscious of his approaching end, the emperor, for the third time during his reign, ordered a census of the Empire to be taken. This was completed in 14 a. d. He spent the next few months in compiling a brief statement of his acts, which has most fortunately been preserved to modern times by its inscription on the wall of a temple still standing at Ancyra. This record extends over a period of fifty-eight years, and details with simple dignity all the under- takings he accomplished, the offices he served, the honors he en- joyed, his liberality and magnificence, his piety toward the gods, his patriotism in behalf of the city. His last summer was spent in moving gently from one villa to another, until death laid its hand upon him at Nola, 14 a. d. Tiberius hurried to his death-bed, and Livia gave out, whether truly or not, that he had arrived in time to receive his parting injunctions, and perform the last offices of filial piety. Augustus had arrived at the verge of seventy-seven, and had lived in safety with his ambitious consort for half a century. The vulgar surmise that Livia poisoned him seems hardly worth a thought, except to warn us against too easy belief in many surmises of the same sort which we shall hereafter meet with. Chapter VII THE REIGN OF TIBERIUS CiESAR. 14-37 a. d. THE Christian era, the date of the birth of Christ, has been assigned by the commonly received chronology to the year 753 of the city; but it is now ascertained that it ought to have been fixed four years earlier, that is, in the year 5 b. c, or 749 u. c, at which time Ouirinius or Cyrenius was first governor of Syria. The early Christian writers asserted that at the moment of the Divine Birth all the world was at peace. This statement can scarcely be accepted as literally true, since there hardly ever was a time when, either on the frontiers or in some one of the provinces, warlike operations were not in progress. Yet the reign of Augustus was essentially a period of peace. All civil strife was at an end, and there was no powerful nation or state with which Rome was engaged in deadly contest. The Roman peace, Pax Romana, as it was proudly called, reigned over the vast ex- tent of the Empire, and this, when contrasted with the centuries of unresting warfare which had gone before, made a deep impres- sion on the minds of the Romans. The poetry of the Augustan Age echoes with jubilant strains in honor of it. The transition of the Roman mind from aspirations of unlimited aggression to views of mere repression and control was sudden, but not the less permanent. From this time forth an attack upon any foreign power be- came the exception to the settled policy of the rulers, and the people could hardly be roused even to avenge a national dishonor. The frontiers were now well defined, fortified, and garrisoned, and still further protected in many places by zones of depopulated country, or nominally independent states in their front. For forty-four years, from the battle of Actium to the death of Augustus, the control of this vast and peaceful Empire had been wielded by a single hand. The emperor had chosen his counsel- ors from among men of the second rank; his generals from among the members of his own family. Thus, neither in the state 46 TIBERIUS CJ1SAR 47 14-16 A. D. nor in the army had any of the old nobility the opportunity of at- taining to such prominence as might have encouraged him to ad- vance his claim as a rival candidate for the throne. No attempt of the kind was made. The decease of Augustus and the accession of Tiberius were announced to, and accepted by, the soldiers. The only precaution taken was to assassinate the wretched Agrippa Postumus in his secluded exile. Tiberius at once summoned the Senate. The testament of Augustus declared him heir to all his private fortune, and this was readily accepted as a devolution of his public preeminence. The consuls and all the officers, both of the state and of the army, swore obedience to him as their imperator. All the remaining functions of imperial power were heaped upon Tiberius, and after a slight show of resistance, he consented to become the chief of the Roman people. At the same time, first funeral honors, and next divine honors, were eagerly decreed to the body and the soul of the deceased Augustus. The apotheosis of dead emperors became henceforth a recognized institution of the state. Before Tiberius was secure of his position at Rome, the dis- content of the legions on the Danube and the Rhine broke out into open mutiny. They complained of their long service, their slender pay, and the total lack of plunder. The emperor dispatched his son Drusus to Pannonia, and by the accident of an opportune eclipse he was enabled to quiet the disturbance with some slight concessions. On the Rhine, Germanicus was placed in great danger. His legions proposed to carry him in triumph to Rome and make him emperor. He with difficulty repressed their enthusiasm, and, in order to divert their thoughts, led them into the heart of Germany to recover the eagles lost by Varus. This expedition, like so many others, returned at the close of the season without the gain of any solid advantage. Tiberius remonstrated with the young Caesar, who none the less renewed the attempt in the following year with better success. On this occasion the resistance offered by Arminius was weakened by tribal dissensions. The land and sea armaments united their forces, and were able to visit the scene of the disaster in the Teuto- burg forest, where they buried the corpses of their countrymen and recovered two of the eagles lost by Varus. Next spring Germani- cus made a third campaign over the same ground, in the 48 ITALY 16-19 A. D. course of which he recovered the last of the Varian eagles, and succeeded in defeating the full force of Arminius in a pitched bat- tle. In both these campaigns heavy loss was suffered by the de- tachment of Roman troops which returned from the war by sea; and Tiberius complained, with increasing vehemence, of these ex- pensive and bootless enterprises. Germanicus had proved himself an able general, yet his recall from his northern command was determined on. The provinces of Asia needed the presence of a proconsul of more than usual dignity. Cappadocia and Commagene were to be reduced to the form of provinces. Syria and Judaea were uneasy under the weight of their taxation. The Parthians would be more loyal to their engagements if they were once more overawed by the pres- ence of a near relative of the emperor's, the vicegerent and representative of his father's majesty and power. Germanicus not unwillingly undertook this Oriental mission, visiting with interest the celebrated sites of Greece and Western Asia, and winning the good-will of everybody by his gentleness and affability. After placing the diadem on the head of the Armenian king in his own capital, and settling the affairs of Commagene and Cappadocia, he amused himself with a tour through Egypt. Throughout this prolonged journey he was ac- companied and jealously watched by Cnseus Piso, a noble of high rank, appointed by the emperor with the title of adjutor. On his return from Egypt, Germanicus sickened and died of a wasting illness. The people, who loved him as heartily as they detested Tiberius, were fully persuaded that he had been poisoned ; and when it was found that Piso had profited by the death of his su- perior to seize upon his vacant appointment, that noble was promptly summoned to appear before the Senate and justify his conduct. Piso returned to stand his trial ; but when the time came for him to make his defense, he was found dead, with his throat cut and his bloody sword beside him. There seems no reason to doubt that he committed suicide, but popular rumor asserted that Tiberius had caused him to be assassinated to silence any testimony against himself. The death of Piso points our attention to the antagonism which now began to make itself felt between the old aristocracy of the Republic and the growing power of the Empire. The number of these illustrious families had been greatly thinned by the civil TIBERIUS CESAR 49 19-23 A. D. wars; the pride and self-assertion of those who survived were only the more intensified. To an iEmilius, a Calpurnius, a Lepidus, or a Piso, the son of Octavius was no more than a plebeian imperator raised to power by the breath of the commonalty. His pretensions to legitimate right they despised and repudiated. Each of them conceived that he had as good or better right to rule than the up- start whom fortune had placed in the ascendant. Piso doubtless deemed himself at least the natural equal of Tiberius. Against the intrigues of these discontented nobles the em- perors found it necessary to defend themselves by special measures of repression. Fifty years before the foundation of the Empire a law of majesty had been enacted for the protection of the tribunes. Any attack upon the person or the dignity of the tribune was de- clared to be an assault upon the majesty of the commonwealth, and was punished as treason against the state. Of this law Augustus availed himself to prevent the publication of pasquinades against the emperor, as well as to repress more serious attempts at sedition. Under Tiberius, however, the position of the emperor came to be regarded with increasing adulation, as one altogether sacred and apart from common men as that of the gods on Olympus. Not only attempts on the life of the emperor, but any words or writings which detracted from his unapproachable dignity, were treated as heinous crimes only to be compared with sacrilege. To inquire of a soothsayer into the years of the emperor was made treasonable; to speak a disrespectful or abusive word against the emperor was equally so. When to a law of this sweeping nature was added a system of spying and informing, which was set on foot and encouraged by Tiberius, it is no matter of surprise that during his reign many of the nobles, both men and women, fell under its severe penalties. The informers were rewarded with a large share of the confiscated fortunes of their victims ; and so degraded were many of the nobles that they did not scruple to acquire wealth in this way by preying upon their own order. By such mean and crafty devices Tiberius was enabled to mask for a time, under the forms of justice, the studied cruelty with which he broke down the independence of the class he feared and hated. " Greed, hatred, enjoyment of blood- shed, in brief, all vicious and criminal passions were at their height under the early Empire." Conscious of his own lack of commanding ability, morose and 50 ITALY 23-29 A. D. reserved by temperament, the emperor was intensely jealous of all who possessed the qualities in which he was most deficient. This feeling, soothed for a time by the death of the gallant and popular Germanicus, was soon revived against his widow Agrippina, who stood no less high in popular favor. His own son Drusus, though constantly employed in military affairs, was not loved by the Ro- man people, nor did the emperor regard him with any confidence or affection. Tiberius had indeed recalled him to Rome, and by conferring on him both the consulship and the tribunician power, had virtually associated him with himself in the Empire. But it was not on Drusus that he really leaned for support. The man on whom the emperor relied as his intimate counselor and useful in- strument was yElius Sejanus, the captain of the praetorian guards, a courtier of no high distinction in birth, accomplishments, or abilities perhaps preferred for this very want of distinction. Sejanus conceived the daring ambition of securing to himself the succession to the imperial throne. To effect this object, it would be necessary to destroy all the branches of the imperial fam- ily who might have legitimate claims to it. He began by removing Drusus by poison, having first debauched his wife Livilla, whom he hoped to marry after her husband's death, and so raise himself into the line of succession. He further fomented his master's ill- feeling against Agrippina and her family, to whom he imputed a spirit of restless intrigue. Lastly, he exerted all his influence to induce the emperor to withdraw from the vexations of public life at Rome to the voluptuous retreat of Capreae, and to leave in his minister's hands the entire control of state affairs. One good influence still exercised some restraint over the mind of Tiberius, distracted by fears and jealousies that of his mother Livia. To her adroitness throughout the reign of Augus- tus, and especially at the moment of his death, he undoubtedly owed his own elevation. His obligations to her he had always acknowledged to the extent of almost allowing her to share his power. It is probably to her influence that we may attribute his one act of justice to the family of Germanicus in marrying that prince's daughter, a younger Agrippina, to Cn. Domitius Aheno- barbus. From this union sprung the future Emperor Nero. The elder Agrippina continued to live in constant fear of the tyrant, which her high spirit did not suffer her to conceal. Tiberius at length rebelled against the pretensions of his TIBERIUS CLAl'DIL'S N'ERO CAESAR ( Horn 42 r. c. Died 37 A. i>. ) fl!iA'( 111 the Xatioiial Mus.-mn, Wifl.-s TIBERIUS CJESAR 51 29-31 A. D. mother, and mustered courage to forbid her to take part in public affairs, while he withdrew himself to Caprese, and left Sejanus in sole possession of all ostensible power. At last Livia died in her eighty-second, or, as some compute, in her eighty-sixth, year. Tiberius scarcely disguised his satisfac- tion, took no part in the funeral, and forbade her deification, which the Senate had obsequiously proposed. Released from her restraining influence, he fell more than ever into the hands of his minister. The first act which marked this change for the worse was the dispatch of a harsh letter to the Senate denouncing the elder Agrippina and her son Nero, but leaving the assembly to guess what measures would be most pleas- ing to its master. The people thronged about the Senate-house, protesting that the letter was a forgery, and a foul conspiracy of Sejanus. The latter, however, profited by this movement to excite the fears of Tiberius, and induce him to command an inquiry into the political conduct of the widow and her children. Accusers were readily found ; the trial was hurried through, and both mother and son were banished to the barren islands of Pandateria and Pontia. Agrippina is said to have resisted the attempt to remove her, and to have lost an eye in the struggle. Two other of her sons. Drusus and Caius, still remained, and these Tiberius retained about his own person at Capreae; but at the suggestion of Sejanus, one of them, Drusus, was soon after dismissed from the island, and imprisoned in a dungeon at Rome. Many of Agrippina's friends now fell under proscription, while Sejanus seemed to be advancing in his audacious projects, and rising still higher in favor. He was appointed consul jointly with the emperor, and encouraged to hope for a marriage with Livilla. The people whispered that Sejanus was emperor of Rome, while Tiberius was lord of one island only. The senators crowded about the leader of their debates with every demonstration of de- votion, and when they decreed him consular powers for five years, he regarded it as a surrender of the government into his hands. Tiberius, however, was becoming afraid of a favorite who had grown too powerful, and had already determined to overthrow him. After the lapse of a few months he resigned the consulship, and required Sejanus to do the same. He then announced his in- tention to visit Rome, and so played upon the fears and ambitions of his minister as to goad him into forming a plot for the emperor's 52 ITALY 31-33 A. D. assassination. Tiberius obtained proofs of this conspiracy, and then took into his confidence Macro, an officer of his bodyguard, whom he commissioned to take command of the praetorian guard. He further directed him to confer with the consuls, and to have the Senate convened. At this sitting a long and rambling letter from the emperor was read, in the course of which he complained of the solitude of the poor old Caesar and his precarious position, and required one of the consuls to bring a military force to Capreae and escort him to the city. The letter, after wandering from one subject to another, suddenly closed with an appeal to the consul to arrest Sejanus as a traitor. The ex-minister found himself hustled and seized by the chiefs of the Senate; Macro had already taken command of the praetorian guard, and, without further delay, Sejanus was dragged to the Mamertine prison, and there strangled. His remains were afterward cast out and publicly insulted in the streets, and his family and friends shared his fate in a general massacre. Tiberius watched for the telegraphic signals from Rome in an agony of suspense. The swiftest triremes lay ready to waft him to Gaul or Syria, should his combinations be frustrated. Even when he knew that his orders had been executed, he still lingered for months upon his lonely rock, while a relentless proscription was carried on by the Senate against all who could be deemed his enemies. Early the following year, 32 a. d., Tiberius crossed the nar- row strait which divides Capreae from the mainland at Surrentum. and began his progress to Rome. The citizens joyfully prepared to welcome their emperor in their midst, but were rather astonished to learn that he had left the land, and was advancing in a galley up the Tiber, preceded by guards who rudely cleared away all spectators from the banks. In this strange fashion he arrived at Caesar's gardens; but no sooner did he find himself once more beneath the hills of Rome than he turned his prow without land- ing, and never paused in his retreat till he had regained his island. The Romans were intensely mortified by this proceeding. Their indignation and disgust broke forth in loud murmurs against the emperor. It has been conjectured with much probability that the strange conduct of Tiberius may have been due to a taint of hereditary in- sanity in the blood of the Claudii. which had been wont to break TIBERIUS CESAR 53 32-36 A. D. out in that family during many generations either in the form of extravagant pride or ungovernable violence. The ancients, how- ever, considered that the morbid ferocity and unhappiness of this emperor were simply the natural penalty of the evil and licentious life which he led. Be this as it may, Tiberius was not alone in his despairing and miserable frame of mind. Some of the noblest Romans of his time were driven to suicide by a similar feeling of degradation and despair. Cocceius Nerva, a man of the highest character and attainments, occupying a high position in the state, enjoying a flourishing fortune and perfect health, deliberately starved himself to death. Arruntius and others imitated his ex- ample. This form of death was also imposed by the tyrant upon the young Drusus, who had for some time languished in the dun- geons of the imperial palace, and was voluntarily chosen by Agrippina as the only escape from the miseries and bereavements of her life in exile. It was thus through his own perverseness and cruelty that Tiberius, as he approached the end of his life, found himself supported by only three surviving males of the lineage of Caesar, and none of these gave any promise of political ability, or had received any training in public life. Among these three princes, who all stood in the position of his adopted sons, he must choose his successor. They were as follows : ( i ) Tiberius Claudius Drusus, born 10 b. c. nephew of the emperor, and son of the elder Germanicus. He was reputed weak in mind, and had been excluded from public life by Augustus; he was, however, fond of books and literary pursuits. He afterward became the Emperor Claudius. (2) Caius, the younger son of Germanicus and Agrip- pina, born 12 a. d. a favorite with the legions for his father's sake, and nicknamed by them Caligula, from the military buskin (caliga) which he wore as a child in the Rhenish camps. During his long residence in the palace at Capreae he learned to dissemble, and by patient and obsequious service disarmed the jealousy of his great-uncle. He afterward became the Emperor Caligula. (3) Tiberius, surnamed Gemellus, born 19 a. d., son of the younger Drusus, who was starved in the vaults of the Palatine, and nephew of Caligula. He was made co-heir, with Caligula, of the emperor's property, but soon after the accession of the latter was put to death by his order. As the end of Tiberius drew near, he became more and more dependent upon Macro, the captain of his bodyguard ; but he 54 ITALY 36-37 A. D. steadily refused to nominate an heir to the Empire for fear his officers should transfer their devotion from himself to his destined successor. When at length he lay in a state of torpor resembling death, it is said that Macro made sure of the tyrant's departure by having him smothered under blankets. His death occurred on March 16, 37 a. d. The character of Tiberius was execrated by the Romans. " Not that he was especially cruel or vicious. . . . He was unsocial, tactless, and economical, qualities which would have made any emperor unpopular.'' The imperial arms, though little exercised, were everywhere respected. The embers of agitation in Africa and Gaul were quietly extinguished. The manners and arts of Rome extended their sway year by year deeper into the heart of Germany. The Parthians were overawed. Palestine was an- nexed, and the Jews found the imperial rule far more mild and equable than that of their own princes had been. In one important particular Tiberius changed the system under which the provinces of the Empire were governed. It had been the practice to change the proconsuls after two or three years of office. Tiberius left them sometimes unchanged for many years together; and to this cause, more perhaps than any other, we may attribute the exceptional felicity enjoyed by the Roman Empire during his reign. Chapter VIII THE REIGNS OF CAIUS CALIGULA AND CLAUDIUS 37-54 a. d. AT the age of twenty-five Caius Caesar, commonly known as Caligula, assumed the reins of power. Young, hand- - some, and courteous, though utterly inexperienced, he was eagerly welcomed by the Senate, the army, and the people. His weakly constitution, his liability to fits, and the feverish excitabil- ity of his brain render it probable that his Claudian blood carried with it the germs of insanity. But at the outset of his career all men were charmed by the generosity and modesty of his conduct. After promising ample largesses to the people and the soldiers, he proclaimed an amnesty to all political prisoners and exiles. He publicly burned the informations put into his hands by the spies and sycophants of the previous reign, and proscribed their vicious authors. He allowed the political writings which had been sup- pressed by the Senate to be freely circulated. He revised the roll of the Senate and the knights, bestowing his favor on those most worthy of it. Lastly, he earned the popular applause by the piety with which he conveyed the ashes of his mother and brother from their lonely resting-places to the mausoleum of Augustus. It was a relief to the citizens that he did not insist on the deification of the hated Tiberius. On assuming the consulship he promised to devote himself to public business, and during the next two months his just and lib- eral measures proved that he had redeemed his pledge. On the arrival of his birthday on August i this industry was exchanged for profuse and magnificent hospitality, at which the emperor him- self presided, with his sisters at his side. Business henceforth gave place to enjoyment. With a wild frenzy of delight he plunged into gross and voluptuous dissipation, which soon upset his weak con- stitution and laid him on a sick-bed in imminent danger of death. The interest taken in his health, the anxiety shown for his recovery, turned his weak head, and filled him with exaggerated notions 55 56 ITALY 37-39 A. D. of the importance and sacredness of his life. His first act on recovering was to put to death his nephew Tiberius. Macro, the praetorian captain, had introduced him as emperor to the army and to the Senate, and had since then steadfastly sup- ported him. Macro's wife, Ennia, had surrendered herself to his passion. These two were next executed by his order without trial of any kind. The illustrious Silanus, whose daughter the emperor had married, was recalled from Africa, arraigned on some charge, and summarily ordered to kill himself. These cruel deeds were most likely prompted by the requirements of his reckless extrava- gance. The death of his sister, Drusilla, with whom he carried on an incestuous commerce, further embittered him, and drove him on to madness. After decreeing to her divine honors by the name of Panthea, the crazy monster declared that if any man dared to mourn for her death, he should be punished, for she had become a goddess; if anyone rejoiced at her deification, he should be punished also, for she was dead. This incident illustrates the logical character of Caligula's mind, which frankly asserted itself in his system of government. Augustus and Tiberius had learned in the school of experience to indulge their subjects with a pretense of independence. Caius knew himself to be the master of a nation of slaves, and it pleased him to assert his autocracy openly, in Oriental fashion, such as he had learned from Herod Agrippa, King of Judaea, with whom he was brought up in the palace of Tiberius. It pleased him also that everything about him should be on a grand imperial scale. He completed the temple of Augustus, restored the theater of Pompey, and laid the foundations of an amphitheater of his own. He de- signed and began the noble aqueduct called Aqua Claudia, a work of manifest utility, whose ruins still bear witness to its splendor. One of his extravagant freaks was the throwing of a bridge or gallery from his own residence on the Palatine across the valley to the Capitol, in order, as he said, that he might be next neighbor to Jupiter, with whom he claimed equal divinity. A similar under- taking was the construction of a bridge across the bay of Baiae from Bauli to Puteoli. A spit of land already existed on the one side, and a mole 1200 feet long on the other. These two points were connected by a bridge of boats, and across the causeway so constructed the emperor led a body of troops in triumph. The CALIGULA AND CLAUDIUS 57 39-40 A. D. show was witnessed by a crowd of spectators, many of whom fell into the water and were drowned, the emperor, it is asserted, being delighted by the accident, and forbidding them to be rescued. Tasteless extravagance was now the order of the day, and nowhere more so than at the tables of the rich. Dishes of costly rarity were sought for, such as peacocks, nightingales, and the tongues and brains of phsenicopters (possibly flamingoes). Caius is reported to have spent as much as $400,000 on a single feast, ex- claiming, at its conclusion, " A man should be frugal except he be a Caesar." His vanity led him to aim at preeminence not only in gluttony, but also in charioteering and in oratory. Envious of the fame of the ancient heroes of the Republic, he cast down their statues, and deprived the images of illustrious houses of their dis- tinguishing marks, the Cincinnati of their ringlets, the Torquati of their golden collars. He forbade the last descendant of the great Pompeius to bear the surname of Magnus ; and he rejected with contumely the works of Virgil and Livy from the public libraries. From such unworthy acts of brutality he roused himself, in the year 39 a. d., to undertake a spirited enterprise. Lentulus Gae- tulicus, proconsul of the Rhenish provinces, had defied Tiberius, and refused to surrender his command. It is probable that he was en- gaged in a conspiracy with persons of distinction at Rome against the new emperor. Caius, however, marched into Gaul, and to the frontier of the Rhine, put down the plot, cut off the leaders of it, and banished his own sisters, whom he found to be implicated. In the following year he announced his intention of invading Britain. At Gessoriacum (Boulogne) he marshaled his legions, and reviewed them from a galley at sea ; then the trumpets sounded, and the emperor issued the absurd command to pile arms and pick up shells on the beach. These " spoils of the ocean," as Caius called them, were forwarded to the Senate at Rome, with the order to deposit them among the treasures of the Capitol. Having thus, as he pretended, reduced the ocean to submis- sion, he returned to Rome to celebrate a gorgeous triumph. As he approached the city, he learned that the Senate had failed to pass the necessary decrees ; and, filled with fury against that body, he gave up the idea of a triumph. His treatment of the nobles now became unbearably insolent. One day he threatened to make his horse a consul. Another, he laughingly suggested to the con- 58 ITALY 40-41 A. D. suls as a good joke, that with one word he could cause their heads to roll on the floor. The end of this monstrous principate was drawing near, not from general indignation of the Senate or people, but from resent- ment at a private affront. Cassius Chaerea, a tribune of the prae- torians, vowed vengeance on the emperor for some gibe with which he had lightly stung him. Associates who had grievances to avenge were soon found, and the conspirators only waited for the propitious moment to strike the blow. Four days did Caius pre- side at the theater surrounded by the men who had sworn to slay him. At last, as he was passing through a vaulted passage from the palace to the circus, Chaerea and another tribune, Sabinus, fell upon him and struck him down. Others of the party kept off the German bodyguards till he had been dispatched with thirty wounds. The assassins all escaped, and the body was hastily buried, 41 a. d. The Senate, to which the tyrant's death was promptly announced, was thrown into confusion, and undecided how to act. They could only agree to destroy the infant child of the late Caesar and its mother Caesonia, for they wanted to restore the Republic. The decision, however, was taken out of their hands. Some of the guards roaming through the palace discovered, hiding behind a curtain, a person whom they recognized as Claudius, the uncle of their murdered chief. The existence of these guards de- pended on the maintenance of the imperial regime. They led him, more dead than alive with fear, to the camp of the praetorians, and demanded a largess. He promised lavishly. Then the sol- diers bore him on their shoulders to the curia, and required the senators to accept him as the last living representative of the Caesars. All opposition quailed before the will of the soldiers ; the offices and honors of the Empire were at once heaped upon the man who, up to that day, had been deemed unfit to discharge the meanest functions of civil or military government. Any transient hope of restoring the Republic collapsed. The treasury and the granaries were empty; and if Rome did not appoint an emperor, she must accept a dictator. Claudius at once avenged his nephew's death by the execution of Chaerea and Sabinus, but his timid nature shrunk from blood- shedding, and he preferred to propitiate his nobles rather than attempt to crush them. He was careful, however, to secure his own life. Thus reassured, Claudius proclaimed an amnesty to all CALIGULA AND CLAUDIUS 59 41-43 A. D. political exiles, and displayed in many particulars a kind and gen- erous spirit. He favored the provinces and thus, like Julius Caesar, he tended to equalize the position of all his subjects. Claudius began at once to devote his time and his powers to the public service. Though his wits may have been slow, his in- dustry was untiring and his zeal sincere. In the administration of justice he would tire out his legal assessors by his unwearied application to business. If some of his measures were pedantic and old-fashioned, others displayed a breadth of view and liberal- ity of spirit unknown since the time of the great Julius. In the control of the provincial governors, and the vindication of the majesty of Rome on all the frontiers of the Empire, he was no less successful. But his most brilliant enterprise was the invasion and actual subjugation of Britain. In the year 43 a. d. Aulus Plautius landed with four legions, probably on the coast of Kent, and hav- ing overcome all resistance, crossed the Thames into the country of the Trinobantes, who occupied Essex and Hertfordshire. Here the emperor joined the army, and so active were his movements that within sixteen days he had subdued this people and planted a colony, Camulodunum (now Colchester), on the site of their capital. Claudius then returned at once to Rome, but his lieutenants continued to prosecute the conquest with success. Vespasianus reduced the western country as far as the Exe and the Severn. Ostorius Scapula advanced to the Wye and the foot of the Welsh Mountains. The Britons, headed by Caractacus, made a gallant but fruitless resistance. They were utterly routed, and their leader, who had escaped from the field, was soon after betrayed to the Romans, and carried off to Rome to figure in the triumph which Claudius had justly earned. This triumph was conducted after a new fashion. In the course of it the captive Caractacus was al- lowed to address the emperor in a speech not unworthy of a pa- triot; and the latter, to his credit, spared his prisoner's life. In the East Claudius effected a new settlement of the frontier provinces. Many suppliant princes who had thronged the court of Tiberius and Caius were sent off to govern their native realms in dependence upon the sovereign Empire. Among these was Herod Agrippa, who was not only confirmed in his sway over Galilee, but received in addition the province of Palestine. The Jews, who had been on the brink of rebellion, owing to the threat 60 ITALY 43-49 A. D. of Caius to set up his statue in their Temple, were pleased with this concession, and celebrated the return of Agrippa to Jerusalem as a national triumph. The reign of Herod was not of long dura- tion. In the following year, 44 a. d., at Csesarea, after address- ing the people, he was saluted by the Hellenizing section of them as a god. His death by a terrible disease followed within a few days ; his son was retained in Italy as a hostage, and Judaea became once more part of the proconsular province of Syria. For several generations the Jews had been accustomed to roam beyond the narrow limits of their own country. Wherever trade was active, in the great cities of the Euphrates, in Alexandria, in the ports of Greece and Asia Minor, they had settled in large numbers. It is important to observe here that the materials for the history of this period are far from trustworthy. Even the great Tacitus is not to be implicitly relied on. There is distinct reason to believe that the affairs of Claudius were studiously misrepre- sented. The most popular account of them was derived from the scandalous memoirs of Agrippina, which were greedily accepted and repeated by the ribald anecdotists of the next generation. Her aim in writing them seems to have been to blast the fame of Mes- salina (whose vacant place she filled), to discredit Claudius, and to magnify her own merits and those of her son Nero. On the death of Messalina there ensued a great struggle in the palace for the succession to the imperial couch. Claudius had allowed the management of affairs to fall, for the most part, into the hands of freedmen, all of whom were of Greek origin. Nar- cissus, Callistus, and Pallas put forth each a candidate for marriage with the emperor. Agrippina, who gained the prize, is said to have owed it even more to her own seductive arts than to the favor of her powerful advocate, Pallas. This second heroine of the name was a daughter of Germanicus, sister of Caius Caligula, and niece of the reigning emperor. The objections to the marriage of an uncle with his niece were easily overruled. Agrippina began at once to exert all her influence to secure the succession to her own son by a former husband, Domitius Ahenobarbus. She spared no pains, and probably no falsehood, to disgust her facile spouse with the memory of the wretched Mes- salina, by whom he had a son named Britannicus. Claudius con- sented to adopt the young Domitius into his family, by the name of Nero, placed him on a level with his own child, and allowed CALIGULA AND CLAUDIUS 61 49-54 A. D. him to be betrothed to Octavia, the sister of Britannicus. Agrip- pina, who had been born among the Rhenish camps, was careful to keep up her interest and popularity with the army; and for this purpose founded the military colony of Colonia Agrippinensis, now Cologne. She took her seat beside the emperor at all military spectacles, and had her image stamped with his upon the coins. By the time that Nero, now in his sixteenth year, was mar- ried to Octavia, the plans of Agrippina had ripened. The consti- tution of the emperor, weakly from the first, was beginning to break up, and his wife resolved to hasten his end. She took coun- sel with the infamous Locusta, who made a profession of the art of poisoning. During a journey taken by the emperor into Cam- pania for the benefit of his health, she found means of introducing poison into a dish of mushrooms, of which he was very fond. Per- haps the dose was too strong, for he vomited, and the drug failed of its effect. Agrippina hastily secured the services of the phy- sician in attendance, who thrust a poisoned feather down the pa- tient's throat under pretense of assisting him, and the effect was sufficiently rapid, for he died in 54 a. d. Chapter IX THE REIGN OF NERO. 54-68 a. d. THE reign of Claudius had been, on the whole, a period of general prosperity and contentment for the Empire. The machinery of government, both in the city and in the provinces, had worked smoothly and steadily. The success of the legions in Britain and in Germany had added luster to the Roman name. Both the Senate and the populace had been treated with consideration and generosity. Yet in spite of his inoffensive char- acter, the feeble dullness of Claudius, and his want of self-respect in the matter of his wives, brought upon him more contempt and odium than all the vices of the Caesars before him. This feeling was carefully encouraged by Agrippina, in order to lower the esti- mation of Britannicus, and enhance the popular expectation of her own child, Domitius Nero. Seneca, the philosopher, had been charged with the education of the prince. Burrhus, the prefect of the praetorians, had under- taken to maintain his claims to the Empire. With the help of these two men, Agrippina found no difficulty in thrusting Britanni- cus aside, and installing the upstart Nero on the imperial throne. The beauty of his person, the grace of his demeanor, and his repu- tation for rare talents and accomplishments, inclined the Romans to welcome him as their ruler. These brilliant hopes seemed for some time destined to be fulfilled. Under Seneca's guidance, aided by the manly sense of Burrhus, Nero held the balance between the Senate and the people, and gratified both. His teachers urged upon him counsels of moderation, courtesy, and clemency, which he carried out in practice. The first five years of Nero's reign, the famous " Quinquennium Neronis," were long celebrated as an era of virtuous and able government. The wise statesmen, in whose hands Nero was little more than an instrument, were content simply to protect the machinery of government from disturbance, and the Roman world enjoyed the privilege of being ruled with a " masterly inactivity." The young emperor's worst enemy was his own mother, Agrip- 62 REIGN OF NERO 63 54-59 A. D. pina. From the day of his accession she resolved to share his state and power. She was borne in the same litter with him; she stamped the coins with her own head beside his ; she received ambas- sadors, and sent dispatches to foreign courts. Finding that her influence upon her son was altogether evil, Seneca and Burrhus brought about the disgrace and dismissal of Pallas, her freedman and confidant, on a charge of treason. Agrippina threatened to use her influence with the army, and even hinted at setting up Britannicus as the rightful heir to the Empire. These threats roused Nero's jealousy against the young prince ; the services of the vile Locusta were again employed, and the innocent stripling was pois- oned at a banquet in the palace in the presence of the guilty emperor. The schism between the mother and son became now complete. Her intrigues with the chiefs of the army were disclosed to him, and he retaliated by withdrawing the guard from her house, and never paying her a formal visit without the precaution of being surrounded by soldiers. It was rumored that both mother and son entertained designs upon the life of the other. Nero at length insisted upon his mother's conduct being inquired into. She was declared innocent of conspiring against him, and she in turn had the satisfaction of bringing some of her accusers to punishment. As time went on, the young emperor sunk more and more into licentious and extravagant habits ; by the former what remained to him of natural good feeling was becoming fast extinguished; by the latter he was being entangled in necessities, which could not fail to drive him to tyrannical and bloody excesses. If he still ingratiated himself with the people by remissions of taxation, he was about to indemnify himself by the proscription of the wealthiest of the nobles, and the confiscation of many vast estates. The most beautiful woman then in Rome, and one of the most licentious, was Poppaea Sabina, wife of the dissolute Salvius Otho. She entangled Nero in an amour with her, and suffered him to send her husband to a distant government in Lusitania, while she em- ployed all her arts to obtain the divorce of Octavia, and her own elevation to the imperial couch. The great obstacle in her way was the power and influence of the empress-mother, who angrily supported Octavia in her rights. The tyrant now determined on the murder of his own mother. He contrived that as she crossed the smooth waters of the bay of Baiae her galley should founder. 64 ITALY 59-63 A. D. To the disappointment of her son, Agrippina escaped to land, and sent a message to him. He assembled his ministers, and at last extracted from them the counsel for which he was longing. Seneca and Burrhus felt that the palace must be relieved from the intrigues which had so long harassed it. They consented to complete the frustrated crime by the hand of assassins. A pretext was easily invented, the order was given, and the empress was dispatched with- out delay. As she lay prostrate before her murderers, " Strike," she cried, " the womb that bore a monster." Nero is reported to have himself inspected the corpse, and expressed his admiration of its beauty. Such were the horrors over which Roman society then shuddered and gloated. Poppaea now obtained entire sway over the tyrant, living with him openly as his mistress, and encouraging him to give himself up to the coarsest and most disgusting pleasures. It was not till three years later that she cared to obtain the divorce and exile of Octavia, her own release from Otho, and finally her marriage with Nero. Installed as empress, she bore him one child, and died soon after from the effects of a kick inflicted by her husband. The faithful Burrhus was relieved by death from the sight of his prince's increasing depravity in 62 a. d. Seneca retired from court. Nero was not sorry to be relieved of the restraint of his presence. Casting aside the stately traditions of the Roman nobility, the emperor now strove to make himself the idol of the populace, the scum of all nations with which Rome was inundated. He descended into the arena, contending with professional singers and musicians, and taking part in the games of the circus. The rabble shouted with delight, but the nobles shuddered at the degradation of their order. It was in the summer of the year 63 a. d. that the great fire broke out which consumed six out of the fourteen quarters of Rome. Springing up in the eastern portion of the city, and fanned by an east wind, it swept away all the buildings which occupied the hol- lows below the Palatine. For six days the fire burned furiously, and scarcely had it died down when another fire began in the oppo- site quarter, and consumed all the region between the Pincian and the Capitoline. Many venerable temples, works of art, and monu- ments of antiquity perished in the flames. It was asserted that incendiaries had been seen at work, and, on being questioned, had declared that they acted under orders. It was rumored that the REIGN OF NERO 65 63-65 A. D. emperor watched the fire from his palace, and amused himself with enacting the drama of the destruction of Troy in view of it. The belief gained ground that he had himself caused the conflagration as a spectacle for his own wanton enjoyment. So deep was the indignation of the people that the throne of Caesar seemed to rock upon its base. Nero hastened into the streets, distributed in aid of their present necessities all the money he had at hand ; and then, with characteristic cruelty, determined to divert public attention by a persecution which should transfer the odium from himself to his innocent victims, but his persecution was only a sudden outburst of savagery, differing greatly from the per- secution of Diocletian, for in Nero's time the Romans knew but little about the Christians. The Jews were not popular in the city ; but the new sect of Christians, which had lately arisen among them, was beginning to excite alarm by the number of conversions it had effected among the highest class of Romans. It is probable that the Jews would fan any suspicions directed against the new sect. At any rate, Nero accused the Christians of having caused the con- flagration, and commanded their execution. Numbers of victims were seized, wrapped in pitched cloth, and set on fire, so as to burn like torches. Even the refuse of the Roman mob was at last moved to pity, but their first fury had been diverted from the emperor, and it subsided into vague distrust or careless contempt. Meanwhile Nero continued from time to time to replenish his coffers by the proscription of the wealthiest nobles. In spite of the jealousy with which the Caesars had regarded them, this class had contrived to accumulate great possessions, especially in land. It is said that half the soil of the province of Africa was held in fee by no more than six proprietors. As one after another was attacked by the tyrant, the survivors became alarmed, and conspired against him. Many of the chief people in Rome joined the plot, at the head of which stood Calpurnius Piso, who hoped, in case of suc- cess, to be elevated by the Senate to the throne. Seneca and his nephew Lucan gave their adhesion to the scheme : but the combina- tion was betrayed and collapsed without ever striking a blow. Seneca and Lucan were required to take their own lives. The people seem to have had no sympathy with what was, after all, a purely aristocratic faction. They still preferred the names of Marius, of Caesar, and even of Nero, the champions of the plebs, to any which the Senate would deign to invoke. It was not until 66 ITALY 65-68 A. D. the effects of Nero's despotism reached the provinces that rebellion became successful. The ease with which this senatorial revolt had been quelled betrayed Nero still further to his ruin. He felt relieved from all restraint imposed by the opinion of Roman society. His vain exhi- bitions of himself and his supposed accomplishments disgusted even slaves and foreigners. During a tour which he made in Greece, the Romans heard with indignation of their emperor contending for prizes at the Grecian festivals. All classes were thoroughly weary of him, but it was reserved neither for the Senate nor the people of Rome to effect a change. A third force, that of the army on the distant frontiers, was preparing to assert its power. Such a catastrophe as a provincial governor marching in arms against his imperator and driving him from the throne had never yet occurred, though in more than one instance the Caesars had descended with irresistible might upon their lieutenants, and snatched from them the power which began to be too great. In the year 68 a. d. Nero returned to Rome from Greece, urged by repeated warnings from his freedman Helius, whom he had left as governor of the city. He had amused the Greeks, he had pretended to compliment them with the gift of freedom : he had at least begun the useful work of cutting through the Isthmus of Corinth. On the other hand, he had robbed them of thousands of statues and artistic treasures for the decoration of his own capital. He had also offended them by his persecution at Rome of the stoic philosophers Seneca, Barea, Thrasea, and others. The gravity and earnestness of these men, in an age which had heard the early teachings of the Gospel, began to draw men's minds away from the contemplation of the tyrant's greatness. Such a fact was sufficient to excite his jealousy against them, as against the Christians. Both philosophers and Christians were really quiet, inoffensive subjects: both submitted patiently to the emperor's ruthless edicts ; but while the sufferings of the men of science passed into oblivion, those of the men of faith left a burning memory behind them, which brought about in course of time the greatest of all social and moral revolutions. Nero returned to find his capital rebuilt and beautified in Gre- cian style, and to occupy his splendid palace, his Golden House, as it was called, which extended its luxurious precincts not only over the Palatine, but over portions of the Caelian and Esquiline as well. REIGN OF NERO 67 68 A. D. Gardens, lakes, baths, pleasure-grounds, were included in the im- perial domains, with bridges and galleries to connect the various mansions. " Now at last," said Nero, " I am lodged as a man should be," and the saying was remembered against him. Meanwhile plots were rife in the armies of Spain and Gaul, and in the city the temper of the nobles was gloomy, that of the mob uncertain. The emperor returned in excellent spirits and entered Naples, Antium, and Rome in a succession of triumphs, but only to hear the news that a revolt was imminent. Galba, the governor of Hither Spain, was in league with Vindex of Farther Gaul. In his childhood the great Augustus had let fall to him the words, " You, too, shall one day taste of empire." He was now in his seventy- third year. It was upon Vindex that Nero first fixed his attention. He called upon Virginius to lead the legions of Germania against him. The soldiers were loyal, though their general was not ; they cut the legions of Vindex to pieces, and the rebel leader perished with his troops. Then they changed their minds, and proposed to raise their own commander to the purple, but Virginius preferred to follow in the wake of Galba, and thus the two great provinces of the West prepared to march against Rome. 68 ITALY 68 A. D. Some months elapsed before the legions of Gaul and Spain could reach the heart of Italy. Nero seemed incapable of devising any serious defense, and during this period of suspense displayed the contemptible weakness of his character. When the danger became imminent, he tore his hair and robes, and cried aloud in abject terror. Abandoned by all men, he had no recourse left but suicide ; no guard or gladiator could be found to pierce his breast ; even his casket, which contained the poison supplied to him by Locusta, had been stolen. When night came on, he took horse with one or two attendants, and escaped from the city to the neigh- boring villa of his freedman Phaon. Here he lingered a few hours in utter prostration of spirit, when news arrived that the Senate, on hearing of his flight, had proclaimed him a public enemy, and sen- tenced him to a shameful death. Taking two daggers from his breast, he tried again and again to nerve himself to the fatal deed, but it was not till the sound of horses' hoofs was heard, and the messengers of death were plainly closing upon him, that he placed a weapon to his breast and bade his slave Epaphroditus drive it home, saying, " Pity that such an artist should die ! " Nero perished on June 9, 68 a. d., at the age of thirty years and six months, in the fourteenth year of his reign. His child by Poppaea had died in infancy, and a later marriage had proved unfruitful. With him the stock of the Julii, refreshed as it had been by grafts from the Octavii, the Claudii, and the Domitii, became extinct. Each of the six Caesars had married repeatedly, Claudius as often as six times ; many of these unions had been fruit- ful, yet no descendant of any survived. A large proportion of them had fallen victims to political jealousy. Such was the price paid by the emperor's family for their splendid inheritance. The Em- pire, however, had enjoyed, for a hundred years, immunity from civil discord and promiscuous bloodshed, till the secret was dis- covered that a prince could be created elsewhere than at Rome, and from this time the succession of the Roman emperors was most commonly effected by the distant legions, and seldom without vio- lence and slaughter. , a. Chapter X CONTEST FOR THE EMPIRE. 68-69 a.d. SERVIUS SULPICIUS GALBA had been proclaimed im- perator by the legions in Spain on April 13, almost two months before the actual fall of Nero. On hearing of the emperor's death, he advanced to Narbo, where he met the envoys charged by the consuls and the Senate to acknowledge his claim to empire. He entered Rome as a victorious general on January 1 of the following year. Galba was a man of ancient family, a suc- cessful soldier, and a strict disciplinarian, but he possessed no grace of manner to persuade, nor force of genius to command. He felt insecure of the obedience of the great proconsuls, with their numer- ous legions posted on the Rhine and the Euphrates. He therefore, with the help of some of the chief citizens, who went through the form of an election, associated with himself in power Piso Licinia- nus, a noble of distinction. The new Caesar, however, was as austere and unpopular as Galba himself, and the emperor's parsi- mony toward the soldiers, who expected a liberal donative, griev- ously disappointed them. No man in Rome was so mortified by Piso's elevation as Otho. This noble, whom Nero had removed to Lusitania when he took from him his wife Poppaea, had reentered Rome in Galba's train. He at once took advantage of the discontent which was rife among the troops, and as early as January 14, the fifth day after Piso's election, his intrigues had so far succeeded that the praetori- ans were prepared to carry him to their camp at nightfall, and pre- sent him to the people as the choice of the soldiers in the morn- ing. But Otho acted with more deliberation. On the morning of the 15th, Galba was sacrificing before the temple of Apollo on the Palatine, when the aruspex informed him that the signs were inauspicious, and portended a foe to his household. Otho was standing by, and accepted the words as an omen. He quitted the emperor's side, and descended into the Roman Forum. Here he was met by a handful of soldiers, who hailed him as imperator, 69 70 ITALY 68-69 A. D. and with drawn swords bore him to the praetorian camp. The revolt was at once complete. Galba had not yet finished his sacrifice when the report of the mutiny reached him. Both soldiers and people appeared to be indifferent, and indisposed to arm either for or against the impera- tor. By the time that Galba reached the Forum he was met by the tumultuous band of the praetorians advancing with Otho in their midst. A single cohort surrounded Galba, but they quickly made common cause w r ith their comrades. The emperor's litter was overturned at the Curtian pool beneath the Capitol, and there Galba was hacked to pieces. The praetorians, fully sensible of their own importance, demanded to choose their own prefects. The Empire had in fact become a military republic. The sudden fall of this unfortunate ruler must have caused great disappointment to all the more sober citizens. Such among them as were superior to the popular illusion in favor of a prince of the Julian race, to which a kind of divine right seemed already to attach, might well have imagined that one of the most able and experienced of their military chiefs would have held sway over the people and the legions with a firm and equal hand. The men who now governed the provinces, nobles by birth, senators in rank, judges and administrators as well as captains by office, represented the highest and largest training of the Roman character, for they combined a wide experience of men and affairs with the feelings of a high-born aristocracy and the education of polished gentlemen. They were conquerors, but they were also organizers. They were the true promoters of the Roman civilization which has left its impress upon Europe for so many centuries. The citizens felt assured that it must be through personal mismanagement that Galba, the representative of this class, had failed to command success. Tacitus, speaking solemnly in the name of his countrymen, after summing up his many excellent qualities, declares that all men would have pronounced him fit to rule had he but never ruled. Undoubtedly he should have condescended to bribe the soldiers at the outset; this would have given him a breathing-time, and afforded the only chance of controlling them. His successors took care not to fall into the same error. Some failed, notwithstanding, but others succeeded in consequence. Meanwhile the legions in Gaul and on the Rhine, under the command of Valens, Caecina, and Vitellius, had already refused the military oath to Galba at the CONTEST FOR EMPIRE 71 69 A. D. opening of the year. Vitellius was put forward as their candidate. The other chiefs of the army acquiesced in his superior claims, and consented to act as his lieutenants, and it was resolved at once to march upon Rome. Valens and Csecina, as bolder and better cap- tains, led the advance. Vitellius delayed his progress till he was assured of the adhesion of the Narbonensis and Aquitania to his cause. Otho, to whom the Senate had already taken the oath of fidelity, on hearing of the defection of Vitellius, offered to satisfy all his claims, and even to share the Empire with him. This offer Vitellius had the spirit to refuse. As soon as it became evident that the Empire must be decided by the sword, Otho quitted Rome at the head of all the forces he could muster. He encountered the army of Csecina as they were marching across the Cisalpine, and inflicted a severe check upon them. But when Valens, coming from the Western Alps, effected his junction with them, the two commanders assumed an attitude of defiance, and challenged Otho to a decisive battle at Bedriacum, near the confluence of the Adda and the Po. After a resolute and bloody contest, the victory remained with the Vitellians, whereupon the Othonians promptly admitted them to their camp, and made common cause with them. The position of Otho, who was sur- rounded by a band of faithful followers, might still not be desper- ate. But he determined to refrain from further resistance, and, hopeless as he was of preserving his life from his enemies, he sac- rificed it with his own hand. Vitellius was lazily descending the Saone in a barge to avoid the fatigue of marching. At Lugdunum he met Valens and Csecina, returned victorious from the Cisalpine, and thereupon he assumed the ensigns of empire. Some cruel executions followed, but not many. His edicts were moderate and popular. He waived for the present the title of Augustus, and positively refused that of Caesar. He directed the diviners, the favorites of Otho and Nero, to be expelled from Italy, and forbade the Roman knights to disgrace their order by fight- ing in the arena. It was acknowledged that his wife Galeria and his mother Sextilia conducted themselves in their high positions with noble simplicity. During his advance into Italy he associated with himself Virginius, the most generous Roman of his day, who had openly espoused his cause. Yet the Romans were slow to for- give the victor in a battle against Romans. They declared that when he reached Bedriacum he showed no remorse at the death of 72 ITALY 69 A. D. so many of his countrymen. At last he would have entered the city, cloaked and booted, in the garb of war, at the head of his con- quering troops; but from this atrocity he was dissuaded, and at the Milvian Bridge he laid down his military ensigns and traversed the streets in the civil praetexta, the soldiers following, but with sheathed swords. Thus far the armies of the East had taken no part in the con- test. Mucianus was proconsul of Syria. Second to him in com- mand, but held in no less honor by the soldiers, was T. Flavius Vespasianus, a plebeian by birth, who with his son Titus was actively employed in Palestine. Both these generals had nominally acquiesced in the claims of Galba, of Otho, of Vitellius, in succes- sion, but had given them no active support. Vespasian was inspired with a fanatical belief in his own good fortune, and under the influence of Oriental diviners became filled with the idea that he was destined for empire. Mucianus conceded to him the first place and lent him all his influence. On July i, 69 a. d., the soldiers pro- claimed him Imperator, to which the titles of Caesar and Augustus were speedily added. At the moment that the Syrian legions were proclaiming Ves- pasian, Vitellius was making his entry as emperor into Rome. So far as he took any part in public affairs, his behavior seems to have been modest and becoming. But he left the real government to be managed by Valens and C?ecina with gross oppression and extortion, while he surrendered himself wholly to the vilest debauch- ery. Within the few months of his power he spent nine hundred millions of sesterces, or about $35,000,000, in vulgar and brutal sensuality. The police of the city was neglected. The soldiers, uncontrolled, inflicted great hardships on the citizens. The freed- men Asiaticus and Polycletus became powers in the state. The degradation of Rome was complete: never before had she sunk so low in luxury and licentiousness. Three legions of Vespasian had crossed the Alps under Antonius Primus, who led the van of Mucia- nus's army. Valens and Csecina, with a powerful force, were dis- patched to oppose him. But Primus confidently challenged them to the combat, and defeated them on the plains of Bedriacum. Cre- mona fell into his hands, and was given over to plunder and burning. Vitellius was still at Rome, groveling in his beastly indul- gences, refusing to credit the account of his disasters, but wreaking his fears and jealousies upon the best of the nobles within his reach. A ROM AX MOB MURDERING THE EMPEROR VITEI.I.IC STREETS OF ROME Painting by George Rochcgrosse CONTEST FOR EMPIRE 73 69 A. D. At last he quitted the city at the head of the praetorians. Primus crossed the Apennines to encounter him, while the populations of Central Italy rose against him. The two armies confronted one another in the valley of the Nar, but the Vitellians yielded without a blow. Terms were offered by Primus, which were confirmed by Mucianus, and greedily accepted by the defenseless emperor, who consented to retire quietly into private life. But in an evil moment he was persuaded to return to Rome, and there, at the head of a desperate faction, he attacked the adherents of Vespasian under his brother Sabinus, and drove them into the Capitol. An assault fol- lowed, in the course of which fire was freely used, and the most august sanctuary of the Roman people was burned to the ground. Vitellius watched the struggle from the palace opposite, the people from the Forum, and Velabrum beneath. The citizens were keenly reminded of the sack of Rome by the Gauls, for the soldiers of Vitellius came from Gaul, and were mostly of Gaulish extraction. At length these Gauls and Germans burst in with yells of triumph, and put the Flavian defenders to the sword. But Domitian, the younger son of Vespasian, who had taken refuge in the holy pre- cincts, contrived to slip away in disguise. The Flavian legions, under Mucianus and Antonius Primus, were now steadily advancing upon the city. One last effort was made by the Vitellian soldiers and the rabble of the city to resist them, but in vain. The victors entered pell-mell with the vanquished, for the gates of Rome now stood always open, and the combat was renewed from street to street, the populace looking gayly on, applauding or hooting as in the theater and helping to drag the fugitives from the shops and taverns for slaughter. Rome had witnessed the conflicts of armed men in the streets under Sulla and Cinna, but never before such a hideous mixture of levity and ferocity. In somewhat over a year there had been four emperors proclaimed : three by the frontier armies and one by the praetorian guard. Vitellius, on the taking of the city, had escaped from the palace to a private dwelling on the Aventine, but under some restless im- pulse he returned and roamed through his deserted halls, dismayed at the solitude and silence, yet shrinking from every sound and the presence of a human being. At last he was discovered, half-hidden behind a curtain, and ignominiously dragged forth. With his hands bound, his dress torn, he was hurried along, amid the scoffs of the multitude, and exposed to the insolence of the passing 74 ITALY 69 A. D. soldiery. Wounded and bleeding, he was urged on at the point of the lance ; his head was kept erect by a sword held beneath to com- pel him to show himself, and to witness the demolition of his own statues. At last, after suffering every form of insult, he was dis- patched with many wounds at the Gemonire, to which he had been thus brutally dragged. The death of Vitellius finally cleared the way for Vespasian, to whom, though still far distant, the senators decreed all the honors and prerogatives of empire. Primus and Mucianus adhered faithfully to him, and paid their court to his son Domitian as his acknowledged representative. Vespasian and Titus were appointed consuls at the commencement of the new year, and to a civil strife of eighteen months soon succeeded a stable pacifica- tion (69 a. d.). " This military revolution had some good results : it lessened the political value of the capital, and it ended in giving the Empire an able ruler. In fact, Vespasian was the first in a line of princes trained in the camp, uncorrupted by the impure atmos- phere of Rome, able, experienced, broad-minded, who were to give the Empire its most prosperous era." 1 1 Botsford, " History of Rome," p. 233. Chapter XI AFFAIRS IN THE ROMAN PROVINCES. 62-70 a. d. OUR attention has been for some time confined to events ( whose interest centers in Rome itself. We must now make a short digression to notice three episodes of frontier fighting- the further subjugation of the Britons, the suppression of the mutiny of the Gaulish tribes, and the final conquest of Judsea. After the defeat of Caractacus, the southern part of Britain, from the Stour, in the east, to the Exe and Wye, in the west, formed a compact and organized province, the government of which was directed from Camulodunum (Colchester). Londinium (London) though neither colonized nor fortified, had already become a center of Continental trade, whence corn and cattle and handsome slaves were exported in exchange for the manufactures of the Belgian and Rhenish cities. Roads of earlier than Roman construction traversed the country from Dover and Richborough to Seaton and Brancaster, to the Severn, the Dee, and the Northern Ouse, and all of them passed through Londinium. Four legions occupied the country. The Second, which, under the command of Vespasian, had subdued the southwest, was quartered at Caerleon, on the Usk. The Ninth kept guard over the inde- pendent tribe of the Iceni at Brancaster. on the Stour. The Twen- tieth, at Chester, watched the Brig-antes, who maintained their independence in the North. The Fourteenth was engaged in carry- ing on the conquest of North Wales. Numbers of Druids, escaped from France, together with their British colleagues, retreated before the conquerors into the sacred isle of Mona (Anglesea). The Fourteenth legion, led by Suetonius Paulinus, having reached Segontium (Caernarvon), prepared rafts to carry the infan- try over the Menai Strait, while the cavalry swam their horses across the channel. The Britons made a gallant resistance in defense of their liberty and their faith, but they were massacred in numbers by the Roman soldiery, and the Druidical worship was finally abolished. 75 76 ITALY 62-69 A. D. Suetonius was suddenly recalled by news of disaster in his rear. The Iceni, headed by their queen Boadicea, who burned to avenge the insults offered by Romans to herself and her daughters, had burst in great multitudes across the Stour, had sacked and burned both Camulodunum and Verulamium, in Hertfordshire, putting the colonists to the sword; and when Suetonius appeared upon the scene he was unable to save Londinium from the like fate. The Britons vastly outnumbered the Roman legions, and, flushed with conquest, for some time harassed them severely. Suetonius, confident in the discipline of his troops, coolly watched his enemies as they encumbered themselves with plunder, and offered them bat- tle on ground of his own choosing. The event proved that his confidence was well founded. Despite the eloquence and courage of Boadicea, the barbarians wavered and broke before the steady onset of the legions ; 80,000 of them were slain, their queen com- mitted suicide, and the revolt of the Iceni was subdued. This outbreak had cost the Roman colony dear both in wealth and numbers. It is said that 70,000 of them perished. But these losses were quickly repaired. The Roman yoke, now firmly fixed, brought peace and prosperity to the country, whose wealth of flocks and mines was rapidly developed. Before the death of Nero, the Roman province extended to the Mersey and the Trent. The Britons had fought bravely for their freedom, but they were quick to perceive the advantages of a higher civilization, and submitted more readily than many other nations to their Roman conquerors. We may now turn to the mutiny of the Gaulish auxiliaries. A large portion of the upper classes of Gaul had been thoroughly incorporated into the Roman Empire, and were reckoned as Roman citizens. From among these natives and the Roman colonists the legions were recruited which garrisoned the country, and watched the frontier of the Rhine. A yet larger portion of the population were still looked upon as subjects and Gauls, and from this class auxiliary troops were levied, which were brigaded with the legions, but occupied an inferior position. During the civil wars which followed the death of Nero, both Galba and Vitellius had drawn largely on the strength of the legions in Gaul ; the aux- iliaries in consequence found themselves in a great preponderance of numbers over the regular troops. Advantage was taken of this circumstance by Civilis, a Romanized Batavian, to seduce his countrymen from their allegiance, and incite them to claim the THE EMPEROR TITUS FLAVIUS SABINTS VESPASIANUS ( Horn i) a. 11. 1 >ied 7<> a. i>.) Bust in lln- Capitoline Museum, Rome AFFAIRS IN PROVINCES 77 44-69 A. D. right of choosing an emperor for themselves. The legions on the Rhine adhered to the cause of Vitellius. Civilis and his Batavians declared for Vespasian, and the Gaulish auxiliaries throughout the Rhenish camps joined their forces to his. It soon appeared, how- ever, that the movement was in reality directed toward the libera- tion of the country. Civilis himself was put forward as the chief of an independent empire. The steadiness with which the legions, weakened and ill commanded as they were, resisted this mutiny is well worthy of notice. Outnumbered in the field, they shut them- selves up in strong camps and stood a siege. They were relieved, and before long again overmatched by the mutineers; but in the face of heavy odds they held the country bravely for Rome. As soon as Vespasian was firmly seated on the throne, he dispatched Mucianus and Domitian with supports to these brave legions, but even before the succor reached them they had mastered their enemy and driven the Gaulish hero out of his island in the Rhine into the German forests. Civilis, however, made terms, and was allowed to return and live peaceably at home. Thus ended the last national effort of the Gauls. It was strictly confined to the soldiery, and never stirred the mass of the people. Its leaders were all officers in the Roman army, whose aim was self-aggrandizement. The two great elements of Gaulish nationality, the nobility and the priesthood, had been absorbed and assimilated by the Empire. The nobles were content to become centurions and tribunes ; the Druids rejoiced in the titles and pensions of augurs and flamens. We shall hear no more either of one or of the other. Contemporary with these events in the West was the last des- perate struggle of the Jews for their national independence, which issued in its final extinction by Titus. Under the first five of the Caesars, Judaea, though subject to the Empire, generally enjoyed a semblance of independent government under its native princes of the family of Herod, passing, however, at times under the direct control of Roman officers, styled procu- rators, who represented the authority of the governor of the prov- ince of Syria. After the death of Herod Agrippa, 44 a. d., the country was permanently annexed to Syria, and was governed by a procurator, who resided at Caesarea. The Jews were at this time in a ferment of political and religious excitement. Many false Christs appeared, and drew, the people after them. The nation was pervaded by an uneasy expectation of some great impending change. 78 ITALY 44-69 A. D. Caligula nearly caused an outbreak by his command that his own statue should be erected in the Temple; his death occurred in time to avert a catastrophe. Claudius showed more respect for their religious scruples, but the violent temper of the Jews rendered the task of government a most difficult one, and many oppressions and cruelties were exercised by the local governor without the emperor's sanction. At last, under the harsher government of Nero, the spirit of disaffection grew to a head, and burst into open rebellion. The fanatical pride of the people, stimulated by their priests, asserted itself in a tone of defiance which Rome would never brook, and which required to be put down with a strong hand. Some there were, no doubt, who counseled moderation and submission, but the general feeling was one of more bitter and persistent hostility than Rome had anywhere else encountered. The resources of the Jews were more formidable than might be supposed, judging from their small extent of territory, which scarcely exceeded that of Belgium or Portugal in the present day. But the population was unusually dense, and had been exempted from the military levies which had exhausted many provinces. The flower of their youth had been trained indeed to arms, but only to serve under native leaders upon their own soil. Armed troops of brigands were at hand to swell the ranks of a national army. A sworn band of assassins, the Sicarii (the men of the dag- ger), urged their desperate measures upon the priests and nobles on peril of their lives. The names of Maccabseus, of David, and of Joshua were invoked with genuine enthusiasm. Casting aside the authority of the procurator in Judaea, and of Agrippa the younger in Ituraea, the Sanhedrim constituted itself a priestly and revolutionary government for the whole of Palestine. They divided the country into seven military districts, the com- mand in Galilee being intrusted to Josephus, the historian. He represented himself as an able commander, but his countrymen have regarded him with good reason as a traitor to their cause. Vespasian was the captain to whom the conduct of the war was intrusted by Nero. Josephus claims to have held Iotapata against him for forty-seven days, but the Jewish historian was captured in the final assault, and thenceforth became the flatterer, and perhaps the instrument, of the Romans. During two campaigns which followed the fall of Iotapata, Vespasian slowly overran and ravaged the whole of Palestine, with- AFFAIRS IN PROVINCES 79 69-70 A. D. out attempting to attack Jerusalem. During the struggle for the succession in Rome, he withdrew to Caesarea, and from the day when he was saluted emperor by the troops (69 a. d.) he ceased to direct the affairs of Palestine, which were committed to the charge of his son Titus. In the year 70 a. d., Titus advanced with four legions and numerous auxiliaries a force of 80,000 men upon the devoted city. The defenses of Jerusalem, both natural and artificial, were remarkably strong. Behind them stood 24,000 trained war- riors and a host of irregular combatants ; but the hundreds of thou- sands of worshipers assembled for the Passover, and shut up within the walls, were an element of weakness rather than of strength in the defense. A yet more potent source of weakness lay in the fierce factions by which the Jews were distracted. Hitherto the moderate party, headed by Ananus, the high-priest, had controlled the city. In this great emergency all the fierce and fanatical spirits, known as the party of the Zealots, flocked in from the country, with Eleazer at their head. They insulted and threatened all who were favor- able to a compromise with Rome, and in a short time made them- selves masters of the Temple and its strong enclosure, and forced the whole people to submit to their dictation. Titus advanced from the north, and planted his camp on the ridge of Scopus. Provided with powerful engines and siege artil- lery, he proceeded methodically to break down the successive defenses; but so energetic was the resistance offered, that he did not effect a lodgment within the first wall without heavy loss. All attempts at conciliation were savagely rejected, and the besiegers blockaded the second circuit and the fortress of Antonia. Famine soon prevailed among the Jews, who suffered the direst horrors. The terrors of the people were excited by the report of prodigies. The fanatic Hanan traversed the streets crying, " Woe to Jeru- salem ! " till at last, exclaiming, " Woe to me also ! " he fell by a blow from a Roman catapult. The Romans affirmed that the gates of the Temple had burst open of their own accord, and a voice more than human had been heard exclaiming, " Let us depart hence." The tower of Antonia fell, and the Temple became untenable. John and Simon, united in their last danger, retired into the upper city on Zion, breaking down the causeway which connected it with the Temple on Moriah. The Temple itself was stormed, and, 80 ITALY 69-70 A. D. contrary to the orders of Titus, destroyed by fire. Josephus was now sent to parley with the besieged, but was spurned by them as a renegade. Titus himself tried in vain to bring them to terms. Such clemency was unexampled; but his patience was now ex- hausted, and he vowed to destroy the entire city. The attack pro- ceeded. Thousands of Jews fell in unavailing sallies ; thousands died of famine ; the remainder were captured and sold into slavery. The two leaders endeavored to escape into the country by rock- hewn galleries underneath the city. They failed, and were cap- tured. John was imprisoned for life. Simon was reserved to grace the conqueror's triumph. Titus, whom the soldiers had saluted Tmperator, hastened to Rome for fear lest his father's jealousy might be excited against him. But Vespasian was a man of sense and feeling, and the confidence between father and son was never shaken. Chapter XII THE FLAVIAN EMPERORS VESPASIAN, TITUS AND DOMITIAN. 70-96 a.d. THE accession of Vespasian, the head of the Flavian house, marks an epoch in Roman history. The first six emperors born or adopted into the family of the Julii might boast of blue patrician blood, illustrated from ancient times by consuls and imperators and other leaders of men. Even after the death of Nero, a Sulpicius, a Salvius, or a Vitellius, if he had been per- sonally successful, might have transferred to his own family that halo of divinity by which the Julii had seemed to reign by right divine ; for they all belonged to the class to which the tradition of power attached in Rome. Vespasian, on the other hand, was a man of low birth. The Flavii were not only plebeians, but ple- beians whose gens had never been ennobled by a single distin- guished ancestor. Vespasian had risen to eminence by his own prudence and ability, and was now thrust upon the astonished Senate by the will of the soldiers. The people welcomed the choice; and the fortunate accident which made the Flavii the defenders of the Capitol when assailed by impious adversaries might seem to sanc- tify the new dynasty in the eyes of a superstitious people, and pre- pared the way for the deification of Vespasian after his death, and the ascription of divine honors to Domitian even during his lifetime. During the ten years of Vespasian's tranquil reign he applied himself to the restoration of the finances which had been squandered by Nero. Loyally supported by the legions and their officers, he compelled his troops to rest content with moderate rewards. As a tribute to the memory of Galba, the Latin right was conceded to the whole of Spain. On the other hand, Greece, which had been enfranchised by Nero, was again reduced to the condition of a taxable province. Many dependent kingdoms and republics in the East were absorbed into the Empire. It need not surprise us that Vespasian was charged with parsimony and avarice, when we learn that he estimated the needs of the public treasury at four 81 82 ITALY 70-79 A. D. myriad millions of sesterces, or about $1,600,000,000. To replace the old republican nobility, which was becoming extinct, Vespasian created new nobles, taken from the able men throughout the Empire, a nobility of merit, which on the whole was loyal to the emperor. The result was to improve morals in the Capital and incidentally education, for the new nobles employed the public teachers hired by the emperor instead of private tutors, as the old nobles had done. Vespasian knew how to spend wisely as well as how to save. His vast constructions have already been mentioned, but he deserves especial credit as the first of Roman emperors who expended public money on a system of national education. He aimed at attaching the literary class to the Empire, and the appointment of Ouintilian, the rhetorician, to the consulship marks the increased estimation in which the class of teachers was held. It is to be regretted that he found it impossible to show similar favor to the philosophers of the Stoic and Cynic schools. Resenting the brutality of the soldiers, these men intrigued against the government which rested on them for support. Vespasian revived against them the persecut- ing laws of the Republic, and drove them out of the city; and his memory must always suffer for the execution of Helvidius Priscus, the great luminary of the Stoics. At the ripe age of seventy, full of toils and honors, Vespasian died of natural decay, demanding in his last moments to be raised upright, as " an imperator ought to die standing." From the day when the legions in the East had saluted Titus by the title of im- perator, his father had wisely admitted him to a substantial share of power. Titus in return had relieved him from some of the most dangerous and invidious tasks of government; he came to the undivided sovereignty not without a character, at least among the nobles, for craft and cruelty; but he was still the darling of the soldiers and a favorite with the people. He bore the reputation of a scholar and a refined thinker, and he was, on account of his gen- eral kindliness, one of the most popular of the emperors. During his short reign Titus won the respect and affection of all classes, but especially of the nobles. To their grateful recol- lection we doubtless owe the preservation of his famous dictum that he had " lost a day " when he had let twenty-four hours pass without the performance of some beneficent action. Two years after his accession he died of premature decline, and had no choice but to nominate his unworthy brother Domitian as his successor. -Ml WVSEF* H WEISS ? . \ atS^W^jSk^Qi&BI Hull 1 1 %&3ijB .V-4*-' -r-i^Alk^ * ** ^ J>.V_ ill." >&9 Hwl&K3 SBPPK^Pk, M P9 ^ 1 ^3K "V . *jKt- 2M\,- -&* ' +*F# 14^ - I*-L f-fr 1L H'7 1 -*. v. : ^^^; -/^W^l^tf^ 1 TJ ^^43? <&* it 81 I^^B< sn^dlvv^i MBv v < * ?*^&l EmM ffiJ^&P'jFESMtL- ^jP !: gf ''-^M^q^ -. ITALY 1127-1139 cipality of Capua, established a boundary which has hardly been changed since his time (1127). The first successes of these Norman leaders were viewed un- favorably by the Popes. Leo IX. marched in person against Robert Guiscard with an army of German mercenaries, but was beaten and made prisoner in this unwise enterprise, the scandal of which noth- ing but good-fortune could have lightened. He fell, however, into the hands of a devout people, who implored his absolution for the crime of defending themselves; and, whether through gratitude or as the price of his liberation, invested them with their recent con- quests in Apulia, as fiefs of the Holy See. This investiture was repeated and enlarged as the Popes, especially in their contention with Henry IV. and Henry V., found the advantage of using the Normans as faithful auxiliaries. Finally, Innocent II., in 1139, conferred upon Roger the title of King of Sicily. It is difficult to understand by what authority these countries could be claimed by the See of Rome in sovereignty, unless by virtue of the disputed donation of Constantine, and least of all how Innocent II. could surrender the liberties of the city of Naples, whether that was con- sidered as an independent republic or as a portion of the Greek Empire. But the Normans, who had no title but their swords, were naturally glad to give an appearance of legitimacy to their con- quest, and the kingdom of Naples, even in the hands of the most powerful princes in Europe, never ceased to pay a feudal acknowl- edgment to the chair of St. Peter. The revolutions which time brought forth on the opposite side of Italy were still more interesting. It is impossible to ascertain the time at which the cities of Lombardy began to assume a republican form of government, or to trace with precision the gradations of their progress. These cities were far more populous and better defended than those of France; they had learned to stand sieges in the Hungarian invasions of the tenth century, and had acquired the right of protecting themselves by strong fortifications. Those which had been placed under the temporal government of their bishops had peculiar advantages in struggling for emancipation. This circumstance in the state of Lombardy was highly important toward explaining the subsequent revolution. Notwithstanding several exceptions an ecclesiastic was less likely to be bold and active in command than a soldier, and the sort of election which was always necessary, and sometimes more than nominal, on a vacancy of the HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE 187 1002-1139 See, kept up among the citizens a notion that the authority of their bishop and chief magistrate emanated in some degree from them- selves. In many instances, especially in the Church of Milan, the earliest, perhaps, and certainly the most famous of Lombard repub- lics, there occurred a disputed election ; two, or even three, com- petitors claimed the archiepiscopal functions, and were compelled, in the absence of the emperors, to obtain the exercise of them by means of their own faction among the citizens. These were the general causes which, operating at various times during the eleventh century, seem gradually to have produced a republican form of government in the Italian cities. But this part of history is very obscure. We perceive, however, throughout the eleventh century, that the cities were continually in warfare with each other. This, indeed, was according to the manners of that age, and no inference can absolutely be drawn from it as to their internal freedom. But it is observable that their chronicles speak, in recording these transactions, of the people, and not of their leaders, which is the true republican tone of history. Thus, in the Annals of Pisa, we read, under the years 1002 and 1004, of vic- tories gained by the Pisans over the people of Lucca; in 1006, that the Pisans and Genoese conquered Sardinia. These annals, indeed, are not by a contemporary writer, nor perhaps of much authority. But we have an original account of a war that broke out in 1057, between Pavia and Milan, in which the citizens are said to have raised armies, made alliances, hired foreign troops, and in every respect acted like independent states. There was, in fact, no power left in the Empire to control them. The two Plenrys IV. and V. were so much embarrassed during the quarrel concerning investi- tures, and the continual troubles of Germany, that they were less likely to interfere with the rising freedom of the Italian cities than to purchase their assistance by large concessions. Henry IV. granted a charter to Pisa, in 108 1, full of the most important privi- leges, promising even not to name any marquis of Tuscany with- out the people's consent, and it is possible that although the instru- ments have perished, other places might obtain similar advantages. However this may be, it is certain that before the death of Henry V., in 1 125, almost all the cities of Lombardy, and many among those of Tuscany, were accustomed to elect their own magistrates and to act as independent communities in waging war and in domes- tic government. 188 ITALY 1139-1152 The territory subjected originally to the count or bishop of these cities had been reduced by numerous concessions to the rural nobility. But the new republics, deeming themselves entitled to all which their former governors had once possessed, began to attack their nearest neighbors, and to recover the sovereignty of all their ancient territory. They besieged the castles of the rural counts, and successively reduced them into subjection. They sup- pressed some minor communities, which had been formed in imita- tion of themselves by little towns belonging to their district. Some- times they purchased feudal superiorities or territorial jurisdictions, and, according to a policy not unusual with the stronger party, converted the rights of property into those of government. Hence, at the middle of the twelfth century, we are assured by a contem- porary writer that hardly any nobleman could be found, except the Marquis of Montferrat, who had not submitted to some city. We may except also, I should presume, the families of Este and Malas- pina, as well as that of Savoy. Muratori produces many charters of mutual compact between the nobles and the neighboring cities, whereof one invariable article is that the former should reside within the walls a certain number of months in the year. The rural nobility, thus deprived of the independence which had en- deared their castles, imbibed a new ambition of directing the munici- pal government of the cities, which consequently, during this period of the republics, fell chiefly into the hands of the superior families. It was the sagacious policy of the Lombards to invite settlers by throwing open to them the privileges of citizenship, and sometimes they even bestowed them by compulsion. Sometimes a city, imita- ting the wisdom of ancient Rome, granted these privileges to all the inhabitants of another. Thus the principal cities, and especially Milan, reached, before the middle of the twelfth century, a degree of population very far beyond that of the capitals of the great kingdoms. Within their strong walls and deep trenches, and in the midst of their well-peopled streets, the industrious dwelt secure from the license of armed pillagers and the oppressions of feudal tyrants. Artisans, whom the military landholders contemned, ac- quired and deserved the right of bearing arms for their own and the public defense. Their occupations became liberal, because they were the foundation of their political franchises; the citizens were classed in companies according to their respective crafts, each of whicfi had its tribune or standard-bearer (gonfalonier), at whose HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE 189 1111-1152 command, when any tumult or enemy threatened, they rushed in arms to muster in the market-place. But, unhappily, we cannot extend the sympathy which institu- tions so full of liberty create to the national conduct of these little republics. The love of freedom was alloyed by that restless spirit, from which a democracy is seldom exempt, of tyrannizing over weaker neighbors. They played over again the tragedy of ancient Greece, with all its circumstances of inveterate hatred, unjust ambi- tion, and atrocious retaliation, though with less consummate actors upon the scene. Among all the Lombard cities, Milan was the most conspicuous, as well for power and population as for the abuse of these resources by arbitrary and ambitious conduct. Thus, in III I, they razed the town of Lodi to the ground, distributing the inhabitants among six villages, and subjecting them to an unrelent- ing despotism. Thus, in 1 1 18, they commenced a war of ten years' duration with the little city of Como; but the surprising persever- ance of its inhabitants procured for them better terms of capitula- tion, though they lost their original independence. The Cremonese treated so harshly the town of Crema that it revolted from them and put itself under the protection of Milan. Cities of equal forces 190 I T A L Y 1152 carried on interminable hostilities by wasting each other's territory, destroying the harvests, and burning the villages. The sovereignty of the emperors, meanwhile, though not very effective, was, in theory, always admitted. Their name was used in public acts and appeared upon the coin. When they came into Italy they had certain customary supplies of provisions, called fod- rum regale, at the expense of the city where they resided ; during their presence all inferior magistracies were suspended and the right of jurisdiction devolved upon them alone. But such was the jeal- ousy of the Lombards that they built the royal palaces outside their gates, a precaution to which the emperors were compelled to sub- mit. This was at a very early time a subject of contention between the inhabitants of Pavia and Conrad II., whose palace, seated in the heart of the city, they had demolished in a sedition, and were unwilling to rebuild in that situation. Such was the condition of Italy when Frederick Barbarossa, Duke of Suabia, and nephew of the last emperor, Conrad III., ascended the throne of Germany (1152). His accession forms the commencement of a new period, the duration of which is about one hundred years, and which is terminated by the death of Conrad IV., the last emperor of the house of Suabia. It is characterized, like the former, by three distinguishing features in Italian history: the victorious struggle of the Lombard and other cities for independ- ence, the final establishment of a temporal sovereignty over the mid- dle provinces by the Pope, and the union of the kingdom of Naples to the dominions of the house of Suabia. The Hohenstaufen realized the hopelessness of trying to form a strong central govern- ment in Germany, but at the same time believed that they could make effective their claims to lordship in Italy, which had for long been somewhat dormant. The problem of the Hohenstaufen " was to assert, over against this communal spirit, the right of the Empire as such, and to enforce this right, not merely with the sword, . . . but also with every weapon of legal argument which the new interest in the study of the Roman law could furnish them." G B Emerton, " Medieval Europe," p. 274. Chapter XXVIII FREDERICK BARBAROSSA. 1152-1189 IN Frederick Barbarossa the Italians found a very different sov- ereign from the two last emperors, Lothaire and Conrad III., who had seldom appeared in Italy, and with forces quite inade- quate to control such insubordinate subjects. The distinguished valor and ability of this prince rendered a severe and arbitrary temper, and a haughty conceit of his imperial rights, more formidable. He believed that, as successor of Augustus, he inherited the kingdoms of the world. In the same right, he more powerfully, if not more rationally, laid claim to the entire prerogatives of the Roman em- perors over their own subjects; and in this the professors of the civil law which was now diligently studied lent him their aid with the utmost servility. To such a disposition the self-govern- ment of the Lombard cities appeared mere rebellion. " In Italy the existence of the Holy Roman Empire, together with the policy which the Popes adopted in defense of their political independence, prevented the formation of any native national government while the Empire furnished the pretense of one. In consequence of this, the cities, when they became strong, found themselves depending upon a shadowy state whose sovereignty they recognized in form, but which was not at hand to exercise real and direct government. As a result, the cities in Italy found it easy to become little inde- pendent states. . . . Their early and rapid growth enabled them to absorb nearly all the nobles of the country, and they entrenched themselves so strongly that when the Hohenstaufen em- perors attempted to bring them under a direct control, they were able, in combination, ... to maintain and secure their inde- pendence." 1 Milan especially, the most renowned of them all, drew down upon herself Frederick's inveterate resentment. He found only too good a pretense in her behavior toward Lodi. Two natives of that ruined city threw themselves at the emperor's feet, implor- 1 Adams, " Medieval Civilization," p. 301. 191 192 ITALY 1152-1158 ing him, as the ultimate source of justice, to redress the wrongs of their country. It is a striking proof of the terror inspired by Milan that the consuls of Lodi disavowed the complaints of their country- men, and the inhabitants trembled at the danger of provoking a summary vengeance, against which the imperial arms seemed no protection. The Milanese, however, abstained from attacking the people of Lodi, though they treated with contempt the emperor's order to leave them at liberty. Frederick, meanwhile, came into Italy and held a diet at Roncaglia, where complaints poured in from many quarters against the Milanese. Pavia and Cremona, their ancient enemies, were impatient to renew hostilities under the imperial auspices. Brescia, Tortona, and Crema were allies, or rather dependents, of Milan. Frederick soon took occasion to attack the latter confederacy. Tortona was compelled to surrender, and leveled to the ground. But a feudal army was soon dissolved ; the emperor had much to demand his attention at Rome, where he was on ill terms with Adrian IV., and when the imperial troops were withdrawn from Lombardy, the Milanese rebuilt Tortona and expelled the citizens of Lodi from their dwellings. Frederick assembled a fresh army, to which almost every city of Lombardy, willingly or by force, contributed its militia. It is said to have exceeded a hundred thousand men. The Milanese shut themselves up within their walls, and perhaps might have defied the imperial forces, if their immense population, which gave them confidence in arms, had not exposed them to a different enemy. Milan was obliged by hunger to capitulate upon conditions not very severe, if a vanquished people could ever safely rely upon the convention that testifies their submission. Frederick, after the surrender of Milan, held a diet at Ron- caglia, where the effect of his victories was fatally perceived ( 1 158). The bishops, the higher nobility, the lawyers, vied with one another in exalting his prerogatives. He defined the regalian rights, as they were called, in such a manner as to exclude the cities and private proprietors from coining money, and from tolls or territorial dues, which they had for many years possessed. These, however, he permitted them to retain for a pecuniary stipulation. A more important innovation was the appointment of magistrates, with the title of podesta, to administer justice concurrently with the consuls ; but he soon proceeded to abolish the latter office in many cities, and to throw the whole government into the hands of his own magis- FREDERICK BARBAROSSA 193 1158-1162 trates. He prohibited the cities from levying war against each other. It may be presumed that he showed no favor to Milan. The capitulation was set at naught in its most express provisions; a podesta was sent to supersede the consuls and part of the territory taken away. Whatever might be the risk of resistance, and the Milanese had experienced enough not to undervalue it, they were determined rather to see their liberties at once overthrown than grad- ually destroyed by a faithless tyrant. They availed themselves of the absence of his army to renew the war. Its issue was more calamitous than that of the last. Almost all Lombardy lay patient under subjection. The small town of Crema, always the faithful ally of Milan, stood a memorable siege against the imperial army; but the inhabitants were ultimately compelled to capitulate for their lives, and the vindictive Cremonese razed their dwellings to the ground. But all smaller calamities were forgotten when the great city of Milan, worn out by famine rather than subdued by force, was reduced to surrender at discretion. Lombardy stood in anxious suspense to know the determination of Frederick respecting this ancient metropolis, the seat of the early Christian emperors, and second only to Rome in the hierarchy of the Latin church. A delay of three weeks excited fallacious hopes, but at the end of that time an order was given to the Milanese to evacuate their habitations. The deserted streets were instantly occupied by the imperial army ; the people of Pavia and Cremona, of Lodi and Como, were com- missioned to revenge themselves on the respective quarters of the city assigned to them, and in a few days the pillaged churches stood alone amid the ruins of what had been Milan (1162). There was now little left of that freedom to which Lombardy has aspired: it was gone like a pleasant dream, and she awoke to the fears and miseries of servitude. Frederick obeyed the dictates of his vindictive temper and of the policy usual among statesmen. He abrogated the consular regimen in some even of the cities which had supported him, and established his podesta in their place. This magistrate was always a stranger, frequently not even an Italian, and he came to his office with all those prejudices against the people he was to govern which cut off every hope of justice and humanity. The citizens of Lombardy, especially the Milanese, who had been dispersed in the villages adjoining their ruined capital, were unable to meet the perpetual demands of tribute. In some parts, it is said, two-thirds of the produce of their lands, the only wealth that 194 ITALY 1162-1168 remained, were extorted from them by the imperial officers. It was in vain that they, prostrated themselves at the feet of Frederick. He gave at the best only vague promises of redress; they were in his eyes, rebels; his delegates had acted as faithful officers, whom, even if they had gone a little beyond his intentions he could not be expected to punish. But there still remained at the heart of Lombardy the strong principle of national liberty, imperishable among the perishing armies of her patriots, inconsumable in the conflagration of her cities. Those whom private animosities had led to assist the Ger- man conqueror blushed at the degradation of their country, and at the share they had taken in it. A league was secretly formed, in which Cremona, one of the chief cities on the imperial side, took a prominent part. Those beyond the Adige, hitherto not much engaged in the disputes of Central Lombardy, had already formed a separate confederacy, to secure themselves from encroachments which appeared the more unjust, as they had never borne arms against the emperor. Their first successes corresponded to the justice of their cause; Frederick was repulsed from the territory of Verona a fortunate augury for the rest of Lombardy (1164). These two clusters of cities on the east and west of the Adige now united themselves into the famous Lombard league, the terms of which were settled in a general diet. Their alliance was to last twenty years, during which they pledged themselves to mutual assistance against anyone who should exact more from them than they had been used to perform from the time of Henry to the first coming of Frederick into Italy; implying in this the recovery of their elective magistracies, their rights of war and peace, and those lucrative privileges which, under the name of regalian, had been wrested from them in the diet of Roncaglia. This union of the Lombard cities was formed at a very favor- able juncture. Frederick had, almost ever since his accession, been engaged in open hostility with the See of Rome, and was pursuing the fruitless policy of Henry IV., who had endeavored to substitute an anti-pope of his own faction for the legitimate pontiff. In the prosecution of this scheme he had besieged Rome with a great army, which, the citizens resisting longer than he expected, fell a prey to the autumnal pestilence which visits the neighborhood of that capital. The flower of German nobility was cut off by this calamity, and the emperor recrossed the Alps, entirely unable for FREDERICK BARBAROSSA 195 1168-1183 the present to withstand the Lombard confederacy. Their first overt act of insurrection was the rebuilding of Milan ; the confed- erate troops all joined in this undertaking; and the Milanese, still numerous, though dispersed and persecuted, revived as a powerful republic. Lodi was compelled to enter into the league ; Pavia alone continued on the imperial side. As a check to Pavia and to the Marquis of Montferrat, the most potent of the independent nobility, the Lombards planned the erection of a new city between the confines of these two enemies in a rich plain to the south of the Po, and bestowed upon it, in compliment to the Pope, Alexander III., the name of Alessandria. Though, from its hasty construction, Alessandria was even in that age deemed rude in appearance, it rapidly became a thriving and populous city. The intrinsic energy and resources of Lombardy were now made manifest. Frederick, who had triumphed by their disunion, was unequal to contend against their league. After several years of indecisive war, the emperor invaded the Milanese territory; but the confederates gave him battle, and gained a complete victory at Legnano in 1176. Frederick escaped alone and disguised from the field, with little hope of raising a fresh army, though still reluctant, from shame, to acquiesce in the freedom of Lombardy. He was at length persuaded, through the mediation of the republic of Venice, to consent to a truce of six years, the provisional terms of which were all favorable to the league. It was weakened, however, by the defection of some of its own members; Cremona, which had never cordially united with her ancient enemies, made separate conditions with Frederick, and suffered herself to be named among the cities on the imperial side in the armistice. Tortona and even Alessandria followed the same course during the six years of its duration a fatal testimony of unsubdued animosities, and omen of the calamities of Italy. At the expiration of the truce, Frederick's anxiety to secure the crown for his son overcame his pride, and the famous Peace of Constance established the Lombard republics in real independence in 1183. By the Treaty of Constance the cities were maintained in the enjoyment of all the regalian rights, whether within their walls or in their district, which they could claim by usage. Those of levying war, of erecting fortifications, and of administering civil and criminal justice, were specially mentioned. The nomination of their consuls, or other magistrates, was left absolutely to the citizens ; but they were to receive the investiture of their office from 106 ITALY 1183-1196 an imperial legate. The customary tributes of provision during the emperor's residence in Italy were preserved ; and he was author- ized to appoint in every city a judge of appeal in civil causes. The Lombard league was confirmed, and the cities were permitted to renew it at their own discretion ; but they were to take, every ten years, an oath of fidelity to the emperor. This just compact pre- served, along with every security for the liberties and welfare of the cities, as much of the imperial prerogatives as could be exer- cised by a foreign sovereign consistently with the people's hap- piness. Frederick did not attempt to molest the cities of Lombardy in the enjoyment of those privileges conceded by the Treaty of Con- stance. His ambition was diverted to a new scheme for aggrandiz- ing the house of Suabia by the marriage of his eldest son Henry with Constance, the aunt and heiress of William II., King of Sicily. That kingdom, which the first monarch Roger had elevated to a high pitch of renown and power, fell into decay through the mis- conduct of his son William, surnamed the Bad, and did not recover much of its luster under the second William, though styled the Good. His death without issue was apparently no remote event; and Constance was the sole legitimate survivor of the royal family. It is a curious circumstance that no hereditary kingdom appears absolutely to have excluded females from its throne, except that which from its magnitude was of all the most secure from falling into the condition of a province. The Sicilians felt too late the defect of their constitution, which permitted an independent people to be transferred, as the dowry of a woman, to a foreign prince, by whose ministers they might justly expect to be insulted and oppressed. Henry, whose marriage with Constance took place in 1186, and who succeeded in her right to the throne of Sicily three years afterward, was exasperated by a courageous but unsuccessful effort of the Norman barons to preserve the crown for an illegiti- mate branch of the royal family ; and his reign is disgraced by a series of atrocious cruelties. The power of the house of Suabia was now at its zenith on each side of the Alps ; Henry received the imperial crown the year after his fathers death in the third crusade, and even prevailed upon the princes of Germany to elect his infant son Frederick as his successor. But his own premature decease clouded the prospects of his family; Constance survived him but a year; and a child but four years old was left with the inheritance FREDERICK BARBAROSSA 197 1196-1216 of a kingdom which his fathers severity had rendered disaffected, and which the leaders of German mercenaries in his service deso- lated and disputed. During the minority of Frederick II., from 1196 to 12 16, the papal chair was filled by Innocent III., a name second only, and hardly second, to that of Gregory VII. Young, noble, and in- trepid, he united with the accustomed spirit of ecclesiastical enter- prise, which no one had ever carried to so high a point, the more worldly ambition of consolidating a separate principality for the Holy See in the center of Italy. The real and the spurious donations of Constantine, Pipin, Charlemagne, and Louis had given rise to a perpetual claim on the part of the Popes to very extensive domin- ions, but little of this had been effectuated, and in Rome itself they were thwarted by the prefect an officer who swore fidelity to the emperor and by the insubordinate spirit of the people. In the very neighborhood the small cities owned no subjection to the capi- tal and were probably as much self-governed as those of Lom- bardy. One is transported back to the earliest times of the Repub- lic in reading of the desperate wars between Rome and Tibur or Tusculum, neither of which was subjugated till the latter part of the twelfth century. At a farther distance were the duchy of Spoleto, the march of Ancona, and what had been the exarchate of Ravenna, to all of which the Popes had more or less grounded pre- tensions. Early in the last-mentioned age, the famous Countess Matilda, to whose zealous protection Gregory VII. had been emi- nently indebted during his long dispute with the emperor, granted the reversion of all her possessions to the Holy See, first in the life- time of Gregory, and again under the pontificate of Paschal III. These were very extensive and held by different titles. Of her vast imperial fiefs, Mantua, Modena, and Tuscany, she certainly could not dispose. The duchy of Spoleto and march of Ancona were supposed to rest upon a different footing. These had been formerly among the great fiefs of the kingdom of Italy. They are commonly considered as her allodial or patrimonial property; yet it is not easy to see how, being herself a subject of the Empire, she could transfer even her allodial estates from its sovereignty. Nor, on the other hand, can it apparently be maintained that she was lawful sovereign of countries which had not long since been im- perial fiefs, and the suzerainty over which had never been renounced. The original title of the Holy See, therefore, does not seem incon- 108 ITALY 1196-1216 testable even as to this part of Matilda's donation. It is certain, however, that the emperors kept possession of the whole during the twelfth century, and treated both Spoleto and Ancona as parts of the Empire, notwithstanding continual remonstrances from the Roman pontiffs. Frederick Barbarossa, at the negotiations of Venice in 1 177, promised to restore the patrimony of Matilda in fifteen years; but at the close of that period Henry VI. was not disposed to execute this arrangement, and granted the county in fief to some of his Ger- man followers. Upon his death, the circumstances were favorable to Innocent III. The infant King of Sicily had been intrusted by Constance to his guardianship. A double election of Philip, brother of Henry VI., and of Otho, Duke of Brunswick, engaged the princes of Germany, who had entirely overlooked the claims of young Fred- erick, in a doubtful civil war. Neither party was in a condition to enter Italy; and the imperial dignity w r as vacant for several years, till, the death of Philip removing one competitor, Otho IV. was crowned emperor. During this interval the Italians had no su- perior, and Innocent seized the occasion to maintain the claims of the See. These he backed by the production of rather a ques- tionable document, the will of Henry VI., said to have been found among the baggage of Marquard, one of the German soldiers who had been invested with fiefs by the late emperor. The cities of what we now call the ecclesiastical state had in the twelfth century their own municipal government like those of Lombardy; but they were far less able to assert a complete independence. They gladly, there- fore, put themselves under the protection of the Holy See, which held out some prospect of securing them from Marquard and other rapacious partisans, without disturbing their internal regulations. Thus the duchy of Spoleto and march of Ancona submitted to Inno- cent III. ; but he was not strong enough to keep constant possession of such extensive territories, and some years afterward adopted the prudent course of granting Ancona in fief to the Marquis of Este. He did not, as may be supposed, neglect his authority at home ; the Prefect of Rome was now compelled to swear allegiance to the Pope, which put an end to the regular imperial supremacy over that city, and the privileges of the citizens were abridged. This is the proper era of that temporal sovereignty which the bishops of Rome possess over their own city, though still prevented by various causes, for nearly three centuries, from becoming unquestioned and unlimited. Chapter XXIX THE LOMBARD CITIES. 1200-1250 IN" the wars of Frederick Barbarossa against Milan and its allies, we have seen the cities of Lombardy divided, and a considerable number of them firmly attached to the imperial interest. The jealousies long existing between the different classes, and only sus- pended by the national struggle which terminated at Constance, gave rise to new modifications of interests, and new relations toward the empire. About the year 1200, or perhaps a little later, the two leading parties which divided the cities of Lombardy, and whose mutual animosity having no general subject of contention re- quired the association of a name to direct as well as invigorate its prejudices, became distinguished by the celebrated appellations of Guelphs and Ghibellines, the former adhering to the papal side, the latter to that of the emperor. These names were derived from Ger- many, and had been the rallying word of faction for more than half a century in that country before they were transported to a still more favorable soil. The Guelphs took their name from a very illustrious family, several of whom had successively been dukes of Bavaria in the tenth and eleventh centuries. The heiress of the last of these intermarried with a younger son of the house of Este, a noble family settled near Padua, and possessed of great estates on each bank of the lower Po. They gave birth to a second line of Guelphs, from whom the royal house of Brunswick is descended. The name of Ghibelline is supposed to have been derived from a village in Fran- conia, whence Conrad the Salic came, the progenitor, through fe- males, of the Suabian emperors. At the election of Lothaire in 1 1 25 the Suabian family were disappointed of what they considered almost an hereditary possession ; and at this time a hostility appears to have commenced between them and the house of Guelph, who were nearly related to Lothaire. Henry the Proud and his son, Henry the Lion, representatives of the latter family, were frequently persecuted by the Suabian emperors ; but their fortunes belong to the history of Germany. Meanwhile the elder branch, though not re- 199 200 ITALY 1200-1250 served for such glorious destinies as the Guelphs, continued to flour- ish in Italy ; the marquises of Este were by far the most powerful nobles in eastern Lombardy, and about the end of the twelfth cen- tury began to be considered as the heads of the church party in their neighborhood. They were frequently chosen to the office of podesta, or chief magistrate, by the cities of Romagna ; and in 1208 the people of Ferrara set the fatal example of sacrificing their freedom for tranquillity by electing Azzo VII., Marquis of Este, as their lord or sovereign. Otho IV. was the son of Henry the Lion, and consequently head of the Guelphs. On his obtaining the imperial crown in 1198, the prejudices of Italian factions were diverted out of their usual chan- nel. He was soon engaged in a quarrel with the Pope, whose hos- tility to the Empire was certain, into whatever hands it might fall. In Milan, however, and generally in the cities which had belonged to the Lombard league against Frederick I., hatred of the house of Suabia prevailed more than jealousy of the imperial prerogatives; they adhered to names rather than to principles, and supported a Guelph emperor even against the Pope. Terms of this description, having no definite relation to principles which it might be trouble- some to learn and defend, are always acceptable to mankind, and have the peculiar advantage of precluding altogether that spirit of compromise and accommodation by which it is sometimes en- deavored to obstruct their tendency to hate and injure each other. From this time, every city, and almost every citizen, gloried in one of these barbarous denominations. In several cities the imperial party predominated through hatred of their neighbors, who espoused that of the church. Thus the inveterate feuds between Pisa and Florence, Modena and Bologna, Cremona and Milan, threw them into opposite factions. But there was in every one of these a strong party against that which prevailed, and consequently a Guelph city frequently became Ghibelline, or conversely, according to the fluctuations of the time. The change to which we have adverted in the politics of the Guelph party lasted only during the reign of Otho IV. When the heir of the house of Suabia grew up to manhood, Innocent, who, though his guardian, had taken little care of his interests, as long as he flattered himself with the hope of finding a Guelph emperor obedient, placed the young Frederick at the head of an opposition composed of cities always attached to his family, and of such as THE LOMBARD CITIES 201 1200-1250 implicitly followed the See of Rome. He met with considerable success both in Italy and Germany, and, after the death of Otho, received the imperial crown in 1212. But he had no longer to expect any assistance from the Pope who conferred it. Innocent was dead, and Honorius III., his successor, could not behold without apprehension the vast power of Frederick, supported in Lombardy by a faction which balanced that of the church, and menacing the ecclesiastical territories on the other side by the possession of Naples and Sicily. This kingdom, feudatory to Rome, and long her firm- est ally, was now, by a fatal connection which she had not been able to prevent, thrown into the scale of her most dangerous enemy. Hence the temporal dominion which Innocent III. had taken so much pains to establish became a very precarious possession, ex- posed on each side to the attacks of a power that had legitimate pre- tensions to almost every province composing it. The life of Fred- erick II. was wasted in an unceasing contention with the church, and with his Italian subjects, whom she excited to rebellions against him. Without inveighing against this prince, who was cer- tainly an encourager of letters, and endowed with many eminent qualities, we may lay to his charge a good deal of dissimulation and a justifiable ambition to strengthen and extend his power. He was the first modern king, as is evidenced by his whole reign and especially by his famous legislation for his Sicilian kingdom. 1 But, perhaps, if he had been a model of virtues, such men as Honorius III., Gregory IX., and Innocent IV., the Popes with whom he had successively to contend, would not have given him respite while he remained master of Naples as well as the Empire. It was the custom of every Pope to urge princes into a crusade, which the condition of Palestine rendered indispensable, or, more properly, desperate. But this great piece of supererogatory devo- tion had never yet been raised into an absolute duty of their station, nor had even private persons been ever required to take up the cross by compulsion. Honorius III., however, exacted a vow from Frederick, before he conferred upon him the imperial crown, that he would undertake a crusade for the deliverance of Jerusalem. Fred- erick submitted to this engagement, which perhaps he never designed to keep, and certainly endeavored afterward to evade. Though he became by marriage nominal King of Jerusalem, his ex- cellent understanding was not captivated with so barren a prospect, and at length his delays in the performance of his vow provoked ^ 1 Emerton, " Medieval Europe," pp. 346-347. 202 ITALY 1200-1250 Gregory IX. to issue against him a sentence of excommunication. Such a thunderbolt was not to be lightly regarded, and Frederick sailed, the next year, for Palestine. But having disdained to solicit absolution for what he considered as no crime, the court of Rome was excited to still fiercer indignation against this profanation of a crusade by an excommunicated sovereign. Upon his arrival in Palestine he received intelligence that the papal troops had broken into the kingdom of Naples. No one could rationally have blamed Frederick, if he had quitted the Holy Land as he found it; but he made a treaty with the Saracens, which though by no means so dis- advantageous as under all the circumstances might have been ex- pected, served as a pretext for new calumnies against him in Europe. Jerusalem itself was handed over to him and in that city he was crowned King of Jerusalem in 1228. The charge of irreligion, eagerly and successfully propagated, he repelled by persecuting edicts against heresy that do no great honor to his memory, and availed him little at the time. Over his Neapolitan dominions he exercised a rigorous government, rendered perhaps necessary by the levity and insubordination characteristic of the inhabitants, but which tended, through the artful representations of Honorius and Gregory, to alarm and alienate the Italian republics. A new generation had risen up in Lombardy since the Peace of Constance, and the prerogatives reserved by that treaty to the Em- pire were so seldom called into action that few cities were disposed to recollect their existence. They denominated themselves Guelphs or Ghibellines, according to habit, and out of their mutual opposi- tion, but without much reference to the Empire. Those, however, of the former party, and especially Milan, retained their antipathy to the house of Suabia. Though Frederick II. was entitled, as far as established usage can create a right, to the sovereignty of Italy, the Milanese would never acknowledge him, nor permit his corona- tion at Monza, according to ancient ceremony, with the Iron Crown of the Lombard kings. The Pope fomented, to the utmost of his power, this disaffected spirit, and encouraged the Lombard cities to renew their former league. This, although conformable to a pro- vision in the Treaty of Constance, was manifestly hostile to Fred- erick, and may be considered as the commencement of a second con- test between the republican cities of Lombardy and the Empire. But there was a striking difference between this and the former confed- eracy against Frederick Barbarossa. In the league of 1167, almost THE LOMBARD CITIES 203 1200-1250 every city, forgetting all smaller animosities in the great cause of defending the national privileges, contributed its share of exertion to sustain that perilous conflict; and this transient unanimity in a people so distracted by internal faction as the Lombards, is the surest witness to the justice of their undertaking. Sixty years afterward their war against the second Frederick had less of provocation and less of public spirit. It was, in fact, a party struggle of Guelph and Ghibelline cities, to which the names of the Church and the Empire gave more of dignity and consistence. The republics of Italy in the thirteenth century were so numer- ous and independent, and their revolutions so frequent, that it is a difficult matter to avoid confusion in following their history. It will give more arrangement to our ideas, and at the same time illus- trate the changes that took place in these little states, if we consider them as divided into four clusters or constellations, not indeed un- connected one with another, yet each having its own center of motion and its own boundaries. ( i ) The first of these we may suppose formed of the cities in central Lombardy, between the Sessia and the Adige, the Alps and the Ligurian mountains ; it comprehends Milan, Cremona, Pavia, Brescia, Bergamo, Parma, Piacenza, Mantua, Lodi, Alessandria, and several others less distinguished. These were the original seats of Italian liberty, the great movers in the wars of the elder Frederick. Milan was at the head of this cluster of cities, and her influence gave an ascendency to the Guelph party; she had, since the Treaty of Constance, rendered Lodi and Pavia almost her subjects, and was in strict union with Brescia and Piacenza. Parma, however, and Cremona, were unshaken defend- ers of the Empire. (2) In the second class we may place the cities of the march of Verona, between the Adige and the frontiers of Germany. Of these there were but four worth mentioning: Verona, Vicenza, Padua, and Treviso. The citizens of all the four were inclined to the Guelph interests ; but a powerful body of rural nobility, who had never been compelled, like those upon the upper Po, to quit their fortresses in the hilly country, or reside within the walls, attached themselves to the opposite denomination. Some of them obtained very great authority in the civil feuds of these four republics; and especially two brothers, Eccelin and Alberic da Romano, of a rich and distinguished family, known for its devotion to the Empire. By extraordinary vigor and decision of character, by dissimulation and breach of oaths, by the intimidating effects of 204 ITALY 1200-1250 almost unparalleled cruelty, Eccelin da Romano became after some years the absolute master of three cities Padua, Verona, and Vi- cenza ; and the Guelph party, in consequence, was entirely subverted beyond the Adige during the continuance of his tyranny. (3) An- other cluster was composed of the cities in Romagna; Bologna, Imola, Faenza, Ferrara, and several others. Of these Bologna was far the most powerful, and, as no city was more steadily for the in- terests of the church, the Guelphs usually predominated in this class ; to which, also, the influence of the house of Este not little contrib- uted. Modena, though not geographically within the limits of this division, may be classed along with it from her constant wars with Bologna. (4) A fourth class will comprehend the whole of Tus- cany, separated almost entirely from the politics of Lombardy and Romagna. Florence headed the Guelph cities in this province, Pisa the Ghibelline. The Tuscan union was formed by Innocent III., and was strongly inclined to the Popes ; but gradually the Ghibelline party acquired its share of influence ; and the cities of Siena, Arezzo, and Lucca shifted their policy, according to external circumstances or the fluctuations of their internal factions. The petty cities in the region of Spoleto and Ancona hardly, perhaps, deserve the name of republics; and Genoa does not readily fall into any of our four classes, unless her wars with Pisa may be thought to connect her with Tuscany. 2 After several years of transient hostility and precarious truce, the Guelph cities of Lombardy engaged in a regular and protracted war with Frederick II., or more properly with their Ghibelline ad- versaries. Few events of this contest deserve particular notice. Neither party ever obtained such decisive advantages as had alter- nately belonged to Frederick Barbarossa and the Lombard con- federacy during the war of the preceding century. A defeat of the Milanese by the emperor, at Corte Nuova, in 1237, was balanced by his unsuccessful siege at Brescia the next year. The Pisans assisted Frederick to gain a great naval victory over the Genoese fleet, in 2 I have taken no notice of Piedmont in this division. The history of that country seems to be less elucidated by ancient or modern writers than that of other parts of Italy. It was at this time divided between the counts of Savoy and marquises of Montferrat. But Asti, Chieri, and Turin, especially the two former, appear to have had a republican form of government. They were, how- ever, not absolutely independent. The only Piedmontese city that can properly be considered as a separate state, in the thirteenth century, was Vercelli, and even there the bishop seems to have possessed a sort of temporal sovereignty. THE LOMBARD CITIES 205 1200-1250 1 24 1 ; but he was obliged to rise from the blockade of Parma, which had left the standards of Ghibellinism, in 1248. Ultimately, how- ever, the strength of the house of Suabia was exhausted by so tedi- ous a struggle; the Ghibellines of Italy had their vicissitudes of success ; but their country, and even themselves, lost more and more of the ancient connection with Germany. In this resistance to Frederick II. the Lombards were much indebted to the constant support of Gregory IX. and his successor, Innocent IV., and the Guelph or the church party were used as synonymous terms. These pontiffs bore an unquenchable hatred to the house of Suabia. No concessions mitigated their animosity ; no reconciliation was sincere. Whatever crimes were committed by Frederick, it is impossible to deny that he was severely punished. At first his crime was the inheritance of his ancestors, and the name of the house of Suabia. In 1239 he was excommunicated by Gregory IX. To this he was tolerably accustomed by former ex- perience; but the sentence was attended by an absolution of his subjects from their allegiance and a formal deposition. These sen- tences were not very effective upon men of vigorous minds, or upon those who wavered already as to their line of political conduct. In the fluctuating state of Lombardy the excommunication of Frederick undermined his interests even in cities like Parma, that had been friendly, and seemed to identify the cause of his enemies with that of religion a prejudice artfully fomented by means of calumnies propagated against himself, and which the conduct of such leading Ghibellines as Eccelin, who lived in an open defiance of God and man, did not contribute to lessen. In 1240 Gregory proceeded to publish a crusade against Frederick, as if he had been an open enemy to religion; which he revenged by putting to death all the prisoners he made who wore the cross. There was one thing want- ing to make the expulsion of the emperor from the Christian commonwealth more complete. Gregory IX. accordingly projected, and Innocent IV., after a refusal of his offers of peace, carried into effect, the convocation of a general council in 1245. This was held at Lyons, an imperial city, but over which Frederick could no longer retain his supremacy. Of the prelates who had embarked at Genoa for the council one hundred, taken by the vassals of his son Enzio, were put to death. In this assembly, where one hun- dred and forty prelates appeared, the question whether Frederick ought to be deposed was solemnly discussed ; he submitted to de- 206 ITALY 1200-1250 fend himself by his advocates: and the Pope, in the presence, though without formally collecting the suffrages of the council, pronounced a sentence, by which Frederick's excommunication was renewed, the Empire and all his kingdoms taken away, and his subjects absolved from their fidelity. This is the most pompous act of usurpation in all the records of the Popes; and the tacit appro- bation of a general council seemed to incorporate the pretended right of deposing kings, which might have passed as a mad vaunt of Gregory VII. and his successors, with the established faith of Christendom. Upon the death of Frederick II. in 1250 he left to his son Conrad a contest to maintain for every part of his inheritance, as well as for the imperial crown. But the vigor of the house of Suabia was gone ; Conrad was reduced to fight for the kingdom of Naples, the only succession which he could hope to secure against the troops of Innocent IV., who still pursued his family with impla- cable hatred, and claimed that kingdom as forfeited to its feudal superior, the Holy See. After Conrad's premature death, which happened in 1254, the throne was filled by his illegitimate brother, Manfred, who retained it by his bravery and address, in despite of the Popes, till they were compelled to call in the assistance of a more powerful arm. The death of Conrad brings to a termination that period in Italian history which we have described as nearly coextensive with the greatness of the house of Suabia. It is perhaps, upon the whole, the most honorable to Italy that in which she displayed the most of national energy and patriotism. A Florentine or Venetian may dwell with pleasure upon later times, but a Lombard will cast back his eye across the desert of centuries till it reposes on the field of Legnano. The successful resistance of the Lombard cities to such princes as both the Fredericks must astonish a reader who brings to the story of these Middle Ages notions derived from modern times. But when we consider not only the ineffectual control which could be exerted over a feudal army, bound only to a short term of service, and reluctantly kept in the field at its own cost, but the peculiar distrust and disaffection with which many German princes regarded the house of Suabia, less reason will appear for surprise. Nor did the kingdom of Naples, almost always in agitation, yield any ma- terial aid to the second Frederick. The main cause, however, of THE LOMBARD CITIES 207 1200-1250 that triumph which attended Lombardy was the intrinsic energy of a free government. From the eleventh century, when the cities be- came virtually republican, they put out those vigorous shoots which are the growth of freedom alone. Their domestic feuds, their mutual wars, their fierce assaults on their national enemies, checked not their strength, their wealth, or their population; but rather, as the limbs are nerved by labor and hardship, the republics of Italy grew in vigor and courage through the conflicts they sustained. We have few authentic testimonies as to the domestic improve- ment of the free Italian cities, while they still deserve the name. But we may perceive by history that their power and population, according to their extent of territory, were almost incredible. In Galvaneus Flamma, a Milanese writer, we find a curious statistical account of that city in 1288, which, though of a date about thirty years after its liberties had been overthrown by usurpation, must be considered as implying a high degree of previous advancement, even if we make allowance, as probably we should, for some exaggera- tion. The inhabitants are reckoned at 200,000; the private houses 13,000; the nobility alone dwelt in sixty streets; 8000 gentlemen or heavy cavalry (militcs) might be mustered from the city and its districts, and 240,000 men capable of arms a force sufficient, the writer observes, to crush all the Saracens. There were in Milan six hundred notaries, two hundred physicians, eighty school-masters, and fifty transcribers of manuscripts. In the district were one hun- dred and fifty castles with adjoining villages. At this period the ter- ritory of Milan was not, perhaps, as extensive as the State of Rhode Island ; it was bounded at a little distance, on almost every side, by Lodi, or Pavia, or Bergamo, or Como. It is possible, however, that Flamma may have meant to include some of these as depend- encies of Milan, though not strictly united with it. How flourishing must the state of cultivation have been in such a country, which not only drew no supplies from any foreign land, but exported part of her own produce! It was in the best age of their liberties, imme- diately after the battle of Legnano, that the Milanese commenced the great canal which conducts the waters of the Ticino to their capital, a work very extraordinary for that time. During the same period the cities gave proofs of internal prosperity that in many instances have descended to our own observation, in the solidity and magnifi- cence of their architecture. Ecclesiastical structures were perhaps more splendid in France and England ; but neither country could 208 ITALY 1200-1250 pretend to match the palaces and public buildings, the streets flagged with stone, the bridges of the same material, or the commodious private houses of Italy. Commerce was the foundation stone of the remarkable rise of Italian cities. " Commerce never died out. Every period of good government in any of the new German states, as under Theodoric, even if it lasted but for a moment, saw a re- vival of it. Justinian's conquests in Italy created a natural line of connection between the East and the West which continued un- broken until the crusades. Even before his invasion, the Venetians had the reputation of making long voyages and . . . their commerce was firmly established by the eighth century. Before the eleventh nearly all the Eastern goods which found their way into the West came through Italy, where Venice and Amain* were the two chief ports. . . . The crusades . . . did not origi- nate commerce, but they imparted to it a new and powerful im- pulse. . . . New commercial routes were opened up. Geo- graphical knowledge increased, and new regions appeared on the maps. . . . From the first crusade on, commerce increased with great rapidity, . . . aided the growth of manufacturing industries, multiplied the articles with which it dealt . . . and exercised a profound influence upon every department of human activity." 3 The courage of these cities was wrought sometimes to a tone of insolent defiance through the security inspired by their means of defense. From the time of the Romans to that when the use of gunpowder came to prevail, little change was made, or perhaps could be made, in that part of military science which relates to the attack and defense of fortified places. We find precisely the same engines of offense : the cumbrous towers, from which arrows were shot at the besieged, the machines from which stones were discharged, the bat- tering-rams which assailed the walls, and the basket-work covering (the vinea or testudo of the ancients, and the gattus or chatchatcil of the Middle Ages) under which those who pushed the battering- engines were protected from the enemy. On the other hand, a city was fortified with a strong wall of brick or marble, with towers raised upon it at intervals, and a deep moat in front. Sometimes the antemural or barbacan was added a rampart of less height, which impeded the approach of the hostile engines. The gates were 3 Adams, " Medieval Civilization," pp. 281-283 ; also ch. xii., " The Growth of Commerce and its Results." THE LOMBARD CITIES 209 1200-1250 guarded with a portcullis, an invention which, as well as the bar- bacan, was borrowed from the Saracens. With such advantages for defense, a numerous and intrepid body of burghers might not unreasonably stand at bay against a powerful army; and as the consequences of capture were most terrible, while the resistance was seldom hopeless, we cannot wonder at the desperate bravery of so many besieged towns. Indeed it seldom happened that one of con- siderable size was taken, except by famine or treachery. Of the government which existed in the republics of Italy during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries no definite sketch can be traced. The magistrates elected in almost all of them, when they first began to shake off the jurisdiction of their count or bishop, were styled Consuls a word very expressive to an Italian ear, since, in the darkest ages, tradition must have preserved some ac- quaintance with the republican government of Rome. The consuls were always annual; and their office comprehended the command of the national militia in war, as well as the administration of justice and preservation of public order; but their number was various two, four, six, or even twelve. In their legislative and deliberative councils the Lombards still copied the Roman constitution, or per- haps fell naturally into the form most calculated to unite sound dis- cretion with the exercise of popular sovereignty. A council of trust and secrecy (dell a credenza) was composed of a small number of persons, who took the management of public affairs, and may be called the ministers of the state. But the decision upon matters of general importance, treaties of alliance or declarations of war, the choice of consuls or ambassadors belonged to the general council. This appears not to have been uniformly constituted in every city; and according to its composition the government was more or less democratic. An ultimate sovereignty, however, was reserved to the mass of the people; and a parliament or general assembly was held to deliberate on any change in the form of constitution. About the end of the twelfth century a new and singular species of magistracy was introduced into the Lombard cities. During the tyranny of Frederick I. he had appointed officers of his own, called podestas, instead of the elective consuls. It is remarkable that this memorial of despotic power should not have excited insuperable alarm and disgust in the free republics. But, on the contrary, they almost universally, after the Peace of Constance, revived an office which had been abrogated when they first rose in rebellion against 210 ITALY 1200-1250 Frederick. From experience, as we must presume, of the partiality which their domestic factions carried into the administration of jus- tice, it became a general practice to elect, by the name of podesta, a citizen of some neighboring state as their general, their criminal judge, and preserver of the peace. The last duty was frequently arduous, and required a vigorous as well as an upright magistrate. Offenses against the laws and security of the commonwealth were during the Middle Ages as often, perhaps more often, committed by the rich and powerful as by the inferior class of society. The sentence of a magistrate against a powerful offender was not pro- nounced without danger of tumult ; it was seldom executed without force. A convicted criminal was not, as at present, the stricken deer of society, in whose disgrace his kindred shrink from participa- ting, and whose memory they strive to forget. The law was to be enforced not against an individual, but a family not against a family, but a faction not perhaps against a local faction, but the whole Guelph or Ghibelline name, which might become interested in the quarrel. The podesta was to arm the republic against her re- fractory citizen; his house was to be besieged and razed to the ground, his defenders to be quelled by violence : and thus the people, become familiar with outrage and homicide under the command of their magistrates, were more disposed to repeat such scenes at the instigation of their passions. The podesta was sometimes chosen in a general assembly, some- times by a select number of citizens. His office was annual, though prolonged in peculiar emergencies. He was invariably a man of noble family, even in those cities which excluded their own nobility from any share in the government. He received a fixed salary, and was compelled to remain in the city after the expiration of his office for the purpose of answering such charges as might be adduced against his conduct. He could neither marry a native of the city nor have any relation resident within the district, nor even, so great was their jealousy, eat or drink in the house of any citizen. The authority of these foreign magistrates was not by any means alike in all cities. In some he seems to have superseded the consuls, and commanded the armies in war. In others, as Milan and Florence, his authority was merely judicial. We find in some of the old annals the years headed by the names of the podestas, as by those of the consuls in the history of Rome. The effects of the evil spirit of discord that had so fatally THE LOMBARD CITIES 211 1200-1250 breathed upon the republics of Lombardy were by no means confined to national interests, or to the grand distinction of Guelph and Ghibelline. Dissensions glowed in the heart of every city, and as the danger of foreign war became distant, these grew more fierce and unappeasable. The feudal system had been established upon the principle of territorial aristocracy ; it maintained the authority, it encouraged the pride of rank. Hence, when the rural nobility were compelled to take up their residence in cities, they preserved the ascendency of birth and riches. From the natural respect which is shown to these advantages, all offices of trust and command were shared among them ; it is not material whether this were by positive right or continual usage. x\ limited aristocracy of this description, where the inferior citizens possess the right of selecting their magis- trates by free suffrage from a numerous body of nobles, is not among the worst forms of government, and affords no contemptible security against oppression and anarchy. This regimen appears to have prevailed in most of the Lombard cities during the eleventh and twelfth centuries; but gradually dissensions arose between the no- bility and the plebeian burgesses, which at length broke out into civil war in most of the Italian cities. About the year 1220 the question of aristocratic or popular command was tried by arms in Milan, Piacenza, Modena, Cremona, and Bologna. There is a natural preponderance in the popular scale, which, in a fair trial, invariably gains on that of the less numerous class. The artisans, who composed the bulk of the population, were arranged in companies, according to their occupations. Sometimes, as at Milan, they formed separate associations, with rules for their internal gov- ernment. The clubs, called at Milan La Motia and La Credcnza, obtained a degree of weight not at all surprising to those who con- sider the spirit of mutual attachment which belongs to such fraterni- ties; and we shall see a more striking instance of this hereafter in the republic of Florence. To so formidable and organized a democ- racy the nobles opposed their numerous families, the generous spirit that belongs to high birth, the influence of wealth and established name. The members of each distinguished family appear to have lived in the same street; their houses were fortified with square massive towers of commanding height, and wore the semblance of castles within the walls of a city. Brancaleone, the famous senator of Rome, destroyed one hundred and forty of these domestic en- trenchments, which were constantly serving the purpose of civil 212 ITALY 1200-1250 broils and outrage. Expelled, as frequently happened, from the city, it was in the power of the nobles to avail themselves of their superiority in the use of cavalry, and to lay waste the district, till weariness of an unprofitable contention reduced the citizens to terms of compromise. But when all these resources were ineffectual, they were tempted or forced to sacrifice the public liberty to their own welfare, and lent their aid to a foreign master or a domestic usurper. In all these scenes of turbulence, whether the contest was be- tween the nobles and people, or the Guelph and Ghibelline factions, no mercy was shown by the conquerors. The vanquished lost their homes and fortunes, and, retiring to other cities of their own party, waited for the opportunity of revenge. In a popular tumult the houses of the beaten side were frequently leveled to the ground not perhaps from a senseless fury, which Muratori inveighs against, but on account of the injury which these fortified houses inflicted upon the lower citizens. The most deadly hatred is that which men exasperated by proscription and forfeiture bear to their country; nor have we need to ask any other cause for the calamities of Italy than the bitterness with which an unsuccessful faction was thus pur- sued into banishment. When the Ghibellines were returning to Florence, after a defeat given to the prevailing party in 1260, it was proposed among them to demolish the city itself which had cast them out; and, but for the persuasion of one man, Farinata degl' Uberti, 4 their revenge would have thus extinguished all patriotism. It is to this that we must ascribe their proneness to call in assistance from every side, and to invite any servitude for the sake of retaliating upon their adversaries. Independently of the two leading differences which embattled the citizens of an Italian state, their form of government and their relation to the Empire, there were others more contemptible though not less mischievous. In every city the quarrels of private families became the foundation of general schism, sedition, and proscription. Sometimes these blended themselves with the grand distinctions of Guelph and Ghibelline; sometimes they were more nakedly con- spicuous. Thus an outrage committed at Pistoja in 1300 split the inhabitants into the parties of Bianchi and Neri ; and these, spread- ing to Florence, created one of the most virulent divisions which an- 4 I cannot forgive Dante for placing this patriot tra I'anime piii nere, in one of the worse regions of his Inferno. The conversation of the poet with Far- inata, cant. 10, is very tine, and illustrative of Florentine history. THE LOMBARD CITIES 213 1200-1250 noyed that republic. In one of the changes which attended this little ramification of faction, Florence expelled a young citizen who had borne offices of magistracy, and espoused the cause of the Bianchi. Dante Alighieri retired to the courts of some Ghibelline princes, where his sublime and inventive mind, in the gloom of exile, completed that original combination of vast and extravagant Conceptions with keen political satire which has given immortality to his name, and even luster to the petty contests of his time. In the earlier stages of the Lombard republics their differences, as well mutual as domestic, had been frequently appeased by the mediation of the emperors; and the loss of this salutary influence may be considered as no slight evil attached to that absolute emanci- pation which Italy attained in the thirteenth century. The Popes sometimes endeavored to interpose an authority which, though not quite so direct, was held in greater veneration ; and if their own tempers had been always pure from the selfish and vindictive pas- sions of those whom they influenced, might have produced more general and permanent good. But they considered the Ghibellines as their own peculiar enemies, and the triumph of the opposite fac- tion as the Church's best security. Gregory X. and Nicholas III., whether from benevolent motives, or because their jealousy of Charles of Anjou, while at the head of the Guelphs, suggested the revival of a Ghibelline party as a counterpoise to his power, dis- tinguished their pontificate by enforcing measures of reconciliation in all Italian cities ; but their successors returned to the ancient policy and prejudices of Rome. " One can hardly lament the failure of the Italian people to form a truly national government. . . . Had such a govern- ment been formed it would undoubtedly have saved the Italians much political misery and tyranny. . . . But if it had been done either by the earlier Lombard kings or by some of the local nobles at the fall of Charlemagne's empire, Italy would probably have failed of the peculiar glories of her history; the stimulating rivalries of the little municipal republics in the latter half of the Middle Ages would have been lacking, and the great results which seem to be in such close dependence upon these would have occurred more slowly, and very possibly in some other part of Europe. 5 5 Adams, " Medieval Civilization," p. 182. Chapter XXX THE RISE OF DESPOTS. 1250-1354 FROM the death of Frederick II., in 1250, to the invasion of Charles VIII., in 1494, a long and undistinguished period occurs which it is impossible to break into any natural di- visions. It is an age in many respects highly brilliant the age of poetry and letters, of art, and of continual improvement. Italy dis- played an intellectual superiority in this period over the transalpine nations which certainly had not appeared since the destruction of the Roman Empire. But her political history presents a labyrinth of petty facts so obscure and of so little influence as not to arrest the attention, so intricate and incapable of classification as to leave only confusion in the memory. The general events that are worthy of notice, and give a character to this long period, are the estab- lishment of small tyrannies upon the ruins of republican govern- ment in most of the cities, the gradual rise of three considerable states, Milan, Florence, and Venice, the naval and commercial riv- alry between the last city and Genoa, the final acquisition by the Popes of their later territorial sovereignty, and the revo- lutions in the kingdom of Naples under the lines of Anjou and Aragon. After the death of Frederick II. the distinctions of Guelph and Ghibelline became destitute of all rational meaning. The most odious crimes were constantly perpetrated, and the utmost miseries endured, for an echo and a shade that mocked the deluded en- thusiasts of faction. None of the Guelphs denied the nominal but indefinite sovereignty of the Empire; and beyond a name the Ghib- ellines themselves would have been little disposed to carry it. But the virulent hatreds attached to these words grew continually more implacable, till ages of ignominy and tyrannical government had extinguished every energetic passion in the bosoms of a degraded people. In the fall of the house of Suabia, Rome appeared to have 214 RISE OF DESPOTS 215 1250-1268 consummated her triumph. She gained a still further ascendency by the change of dynasty in Naples. This kingdom had been oc- cupied, after the death of Conrad, by his illegitimate brother, Man- fred, in the behalf, as he at first pretended, of young Conradin the heir, but in fact as his own acquisition. He was a prince of an active and firm mind, well fitted for his difficult post, to whom the Ghibellines looked up as their head, and as the representative of his father. It was a natural object with the Popes, independently of their ill-will toward a son of Frederick II., to see a sovereign upon whom they could better rely placed upon so neighboring a throne. Charles, Count of Anjou, brother of St. Louis, was tempted by them to lead a crusade (for as such all wars for the interest of Rome were now considered) against the Neapolitan usurper (1265). The chance of a battle decided the fate of Naples, and had a striking influence upon the history of Europe for several centuries. Man- fred was killed in the field; but there remained the legitimate heir of the Fredericks, a boy of seventeen years, Conradin, son of Conrad, who rashly, as we say at least after the event, attempted to regain his inheritance. He fell into the hands of Charles at the battle of Tagliacozzo, and the voice of those rude ages, as well as of a more enlightened posterity, has united in branding with everlasting infamy the name of that prince who did not hesitate to purchase the security of his own title by the public execution of an honorable competitor, or rather a rightful claimant of the throne he had usurped (1268). With Conradin the house of Suabia was extinguished ; but Constance, the daughter of Manfred, had transported his right to Sicily and Naples into the house of Aragon, by her marriage with Peter III. This success of a monarch selected by the Roman pontiffs as their particular champion turned the tide of faction all over Italy. He expelled the Ghibellines from Florence, of which they had a few years before obtained a complete command by means of their memorable victory upon the River Arbia. After the fall of Con- radin that party was everywhere discouraged. Germany held out small hopes of support, even when the imperial throne, which had long been vacant, should be filled by one of her princes. The popu- lace were in almost every city attached to the church and to the name of Guelph ; the kings of Naples employed their arms, and the Popes their excommunications; so that for the remainder of the thirteenth century the name of Ghibelline was a term of proscrip- 216 ITALY 1268-1277 tion in the majority of Lombard and Tuscan republics. Charles was constituted by the Pope vicar-general in Tuscany. This was a new pretension of the Roman pontiffs, to name the lieutenants of the Empire during its vacancy, which indeed could not be com- pletely filled up without their consent. It soon, however, became evi- dent that he aimed at the sovereignty of Italy. Some of the Popes themselves, Gregory X. and Nicholas IV., grew jealous of their own creature. Almost all the Lombard republics had, by force or stratagem, or free consent, already fallen under the yoke of some leading citi- zen, who became the lord (signorc), or, in the German sense, tyrant of his country. The first instance of a voluntary delegation of sovereignty was that of Ferrara, which placed itself under the lord of Este. Eccelin made himself truly the tyrant of the cities beyond the Adige; and such experience ought naturally to have inspired the Italians with more universal abhorrence of despotism. But every danger appeared trivial in the eyes of exasperated factions when compared with the ascendency of their adversaries. Weary of unceasing and useless contests, in which ruin fell with an alternate but equal hand upon either party, liberty withdrew from a people who disgraced her name; and the tumultuous, the brave, the in- tractable Lombards became eager to submit themselves to a master, and patient under the heaviest oppression. Or, if tyranny some- times overstepped the limits of forbearance, and a seditious rising expelled the reigning prince, it was only to produce a change of hands, and transfer the impotent people to a different and perhaps a worse despotism. In many cities not a conspiracy was planned, not a sigh was breathed, in favor of republican government, after once they had passed under the sway of a single person. The progress, indeed, was gradual, though sure, from limited to absolute, from temporary to hereditary power, from a just and conciliating rule to extortion and cruelty. But before the middle of the four- teenth century at the latest all those cities which had spurned at the fairest mark of submission to the emperors lost even the recol- lection of self-government, and were bequeathed, like an undoubted patrimony, among the children of their new lords. Such is the progress of usurpation, and such the vengeance that Heaven re- serves for those who waste in license and faction its first of social blessings, liberty. The city most distinguished, in both wars against the house RISE OF DESPOTS 217 1277-1313 of Suabia, for an unconquerable attachment to republican institu- tions, was the first to sacrifice them in a few years after the death of Frederick II. Milan had for a considerable time been agitated by civil dissensions between the nobility and inferior citizens. These parties were pretty equally balanced, and their success was conse- quently alternate. Each had its own podesta, as a party leader, distinct from the legitimate magistrate of the city. In consequence of the crime of a nobleman, who had murdered one of his creditors, the two parties took up arms in 1257. A civil war, of various suc- cess, and interrupted by several pacifications, which in that unhappy temper could not be durable, was terminated in about two years by the entire discomfiture of the aristocracy, and by the election of Martin della Torre as chief and lord (capitano c signore) of the people. Though the Milanese did not, probably, intend to renounce the sovereignty resident in their general assemblies, yet they soon lost the republican spirit ; five in succession of the family Delia Torre might be said to reign in Milan ; each, indeed, by a formal election, but with an implied recognition of a sort of hereditary title. Twenty years afterward the Visconti, a family of opposite interests, sup- planted the Torriani at Milan ; and the rivalry between these great houses was not at an end till the final establishment of Matteo Visconti in 13 13; but the people were not otherwise considered than as aiding by force the one or other party, and at most deciding between the pretensions of their masters. The vigor and concert infused into the Guelph party by the successes of Charles of Anjou was not very durable. The prince was soon involved in a protracted and unfortunate quarrel with the kings of Aragon, to whose protection his revolted subjects in Italy had recurred. On the other hand, several men of energetic character retrieved the Ghibelline interests in Lombardy, and even in the Tuscan cities. The Visconti were acknowledged heads of that fac- tion. A family early established as lords of Verona, the Della Scala, maintained the credit of the same denomination between the Adige and the Adriatic. The inferior tyrants were partly Guelph, partly Ghibelline, according to local revolutions ; but upon the whole, the latter acquired a gradual ascendency. Those, indeed, who cared for the independence of Italy, or for their own power, had far less to fear from the phantom of imperial prerogatives, long intermitted and incapable of being enforced, than from the new race of foreign princes whom the church had substituted for 218 ITALY 1313-1350 the house of Suabia. The Angevin kings of Naples were sovereigns of Provence, and from there easily encroached upon Piedmont and threatened the Milanese. Robert, the third of this line, almost openly aspired, like his grandfather, Charles I., to a real sovereignty over Italy. His offers of assistance to Guelph cities in war were always coupled with a demand of the sovereignty. Many yielded to his ambition, and even Florence twice bestowed upon him a tem- porary dictatorship. In 13 14 he was acknowledged lord of Lucca, Florence, Pavia, Alessandria, Bergamo, and the cities of Romagna. In 13 18 the Guelphs of Genoa found no other resource against the Ghibelline emigrants who were under their walls than to resign their liberties to the King of Naples for the term of ten years, which he procured to be renewed for six more. The Avignon Popes, especially John XXII., out of blind hatred to the Emperor Louis of Bavaria and the Visconti family, abetted all these meas- ures of ambition. But they were rendered abortive by Robert's death, and the subsequent disturbances of his kingdom. At the latter end of the thirteenth century there were almost as many princes in the north of Italy as there had been free cities in the preceding age. Their equality, and the frequent domestic revolutions which made their seat unsteady, kept them for a while from encroaching on each other. Gradually, however, they became less numerous ; a quantity of obscure tyrants were swept away from the smaller cities; and the people, careless or hopeless of liberty, were glad to change the rule of despicable petty usurpers for that of more distinguished and powerful families. About the year 1350 the central parts of Lombardy had fallen under the dominion of the Visconti. Four other houses occupied the second rank, that of Este at Ferrara and Modena ; of Scala at Verona ; of Carrara at Padua, which later than any Lombard city had resigned her lib- erty ; and of Gonzaga at Mantua, which, without ever obtaining any material extension of territory, continued, probably for that reason, to reign undisturbed till the eighteenth century. But these united were hardly a match, as they sometimes experienced, for the Vis- conti. That family, the object of every league formed in Italy for more than fifty years, in constant hostility to the church, and well inured to interdicts and excommunications, producing no one man of military talents, but fertile of tyrants detested for their per- fidiousness and cruelty, were nevertheless enabled, with almost uninterrupted success, to add city after city to the dominion of RISE OF DESPOTS 219 1272-1350 Milan, till it absorbed all the north of Italy. Under Gian Galeazzo, whose reign began in 1385, the viper (their armorial bearing) assumed indeed a menacing attitude; 1 he overturned the great family of Scala, and annexed their extensive possessions to his own ; no power intervened from Vercelli, in Piedmont, to Feltre and Bel- luno; while the free cities of Tuscany, Pisa, Siena, Perugia, and even Bologna, as if by a kind of witchcraft, voluntarily called in a dissembling tyrant as their master. At length the Visconti were tacitly admitted among the reigning princes by the erection of Milan into a duchy under letters patent of the Emperor Wenceslaus in 1395- The imperial authority over Italy was almost entirely sus- pended after the death of Frederick II. A long interregnum fol- lowed in Germany ; and when the vacancy was supplied by Rodolph of Hapsburg in 1272, he was too prudent to dissipate his moderate resources where the great house of Suabia had failed. About forty years afterward the emperor, Henry VII. of Luxemburg (1308), a prince, like Rodolph, of small hereditary possessions, but active and discreet, availed himself of the ancient respect borne to the imperial name, and the mutual jealousies of the Italians, to recover for a very short time a remarkable influence, thus arousing the ardent hopes of Dante for the restoration of order in Italy, so that he wrote a circular letter to the princes of Italy to tell them that the " compassionate Henry, glory of his people, the godlike Caesar and Augustus," was coming to Italy, there to settle all things, as the ideal universal monarch of Dante's dream. But though pro- fessing neutrality and desire of union between the Guelphs and Ghibellines, he could not succeed in removing the disgust of the former; his exigencies impelled him to large demands of money; and the Italians, when they counted his scanty German cavalry, perceived that obedience was altogether a matter of their own choice. Henry died, however, in time to save himself from any decisive re- verse. His successors, Louis of Bavaria and Charles IV., descended from the Alps with similar motives, but after some temporary good fortune were obliged to return, not "without discredit. Yet the Italians never broke that almost invisible thread which connected them with Germany; the fallacious name of Roman emperor still 1 Allusions to heraldry are very common in the Italian writers. All the historians of the fourteenth century habitually use the viper, il biscione, as a synonym for the power of Milan. 220 ITALY 1278-1355 challenged their allegiance, though conferred by seven Teutonic electors without their concurrence. Even Florence, the most in- dependent and high-spirited of republics, was induced to make a treaty with Charles IV. in 1355, which, while it confirmed all her actual liberties, not a little, by that very confirmation, affected her sovereignty. This deference to the supposed prerogatives of the Em- pire, even while they were least formidable, was partly owing to jealousy of French or Neapolitan interference, partly to the national hatred of the Popes who had seceded to Avignon, and in some degree to a misplaced respect for antiquity, to which the revival of letters had given birth. The great civilians, and the much greater poets, of the fourteenth century, taught Italy to consider her emperor as a dormant sovereign, to whom her various princi- palities and republics were subordinate, and during whose absence alone they had legitimate authority. In one part, however, of that country, the Empire had, soon after the commencement of this period, spontaneously renounced its sovereignty. From the era of Pipin's donation, confirmed and extended by many subsequent charters, the Floly See had tolerably just pretensions to the province entitled Romagna, or the exarchate of Ravenna. But the Popes, whose menaces were dreaded at the extremities of Europe, were still very weak as temporal princes. Even Innocent III. had never been able to obtain possession of this part of St. Peter's patrimony. The circumstances of Rodolph's accession inspired Nicholas III. with more confidence. That em- peror granted a confirmation of everything included in the dona- tions of Louis I., Otho, and his other predecessors, but was still reluctant or ashamed to renounce his imperial rights. Accordingly, his charter is expressed to be granted without diminution of the Empire (sine demembratione imperii) ; and his chancellor received an oath of fidelity from the cities of Romagna. But the Pope insisting firmly on his own claim, Rodolph discreetly avoided in- volving himself in a fatal quarrel, and, in 1278, absolutely released the imperial supremacy over all the dominions already granted to the Holy See. This is a leading epoch in the temporal monarchy of Rome. But she stood only in the place of the emperor; and her ultimate sovereignty was compatible with the practicable independence of the free cities, or of the usurpers who had risen up among them. Bologna, Faenza, Rimini, and Ravenna, with many others less con- RISE OF DESPOTS 221 1155-1356 siderable, took an oath, indeed, to the Pope, but continued to regu- late both their internal concerns and foreign relations at their own discretion. The first of these cities was far preeminent above the rest for population and renown, and, though not without several intermissions, preserved a republican character to the end of the fourteenth century. The rest were soon enslaved by petty tyrants, more obscure than those of Lombardy. It was not easy for the pontiffs of Avignon to reinstate themselves in a dominion which they seemed to have abandoned; but they made several attempts to recover it, sometimes with spiritual arms, sometimes with the more efficacious aid of mercenary troops. The annals of this part of Italy are peculiarly uninteresting. Rome itself was, throughout the Middle Ages, very little dis- posed to acquiesce in the government of her bishop. His rights were indefinite, and uncomfirmed by positive law ; the emperor was long sovereign ; the people always meant to be free. Besides the common causes of insubordination and anarchy among the Italians, which applied equally to the capital city, other sentiments more peculiar to Rome preserved a continual though not uniform influence for many centuries. There still remained enough in the wreck of that vast inheritance to swell the bosoms of her citizens with a conscious- ness of their own dignity. They bore the venerable name, they con- templated the monuments of art and empire, and forgot, in the illusions of national pride, that the tutelar gods of the building were departed forever. About the middle of the twelfth century these recollections were heightened by the eloquence of Arnold of Brescia, a political heretic who preached against the temporal jurisdiction of the hierarchy. In a temporary intoxication of fancy they were led to make a ridiculous show of self-importance toward Frederick Barbarossa when he came to receive the imperial crown, but the Ger- man sternly chided their ostentation, and chastised their resistance. With the Popes they could deal more securely. Several of them were expelled from Rome during that age by the seditious citizens. Lucius II. died of hurts received in a tumult. The government was vested in fifty-six senators, annually chosen by the people through the intervention of an electoral body, ten delegates from each of the thirteen districts of the city. This constitution lasted not quite fifty years. In 1192 Rome imitated the prevailing fashion by the appointment of an annual foreign magistrate. Except in name, the senator of Rome appears to have perfectly resembled the 222 ITALY 1253-1356 podesta of other cities. This magistrate superseded the representa- tive Senate, who had proved by no means adequate to control the most lawless aristocracy of Italy. I shall not repeat the story of Brancaleone's rigorous and inflexible justice, which a great historian has already drawn from obscurity. It illustrates not the annals of Rome alone, but the general state of Italian society, the nature of a podesta's duty, and the difficulties of its execution. In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries the Senate, and the senator who succeeded them, exercised one distinguishing attribute of sovereignty, that of coining gold and silver money. Some of their coins still exist, with legends in a very republican tone. Doubtless the temporal authority of the Popes varied according to their personal character. Inno- cent III. had much more than his predecessors for almost a century, or than some of his successors. He made the senator take an oath of fealty to him, which, though not very comprehensive, must have passed in those times as a recognition of his superiority. The whole subject is really somewhat doubtful, for it cannot be said just what the legal government of Rome was throughout this period. Though there was much less obedience to any legitimate power at Rome than anywhere else in Italy, even during the thirteenth century, yet, after the secession of the Popes to Avignon, their own city was left in a far worse condition than before. Disorders of every kind, tumult and robbery, prevailed in the streets. The Roman nobility were engaged in perpetual war with each other. Not content with their own fortified palaces, they turned the sacred monuments of antiquity into strongholds, and consummated the destruction of time and conquest. At no period has the city en- dured such irreparable injuries ; nor was the downfall of the West- ern Empire so fatal to its capital as the contemptible feuds of the Orsini and Colonna families. Whatever there was of government, whether administered by a legate from Avignon or by the municipal authorities, had lost all hold on these powerful barons. In the midst of this degradation and wretchedness, an obscure man, Nicola di Rienzi, conceived the project of restoring Rome, not only to good order, but even to her ancient greatness (1347). He had received an education beyond his birth, and nourished his mind with the study of the best writers. After many harangues to the people, which the nobility, blinded by their self-confidence, did not attempt to repress, Rienzi suddenly excited an insurrection, and obtained COLA DI RIEXZI ELECTED THE LAST ROMAN" TRintXE ON" HILL, ROME. 1347 A. I). THE CAHTOI.IXE RISE OF DESPOTS 223 1347-1356 complete success. He was placed at the head of a new government, with the title of Tribune, and with almost unlimited power. The first effects of this revolution were wonderful. All the nobles sub- mitted, though with great reluctance; the roads were cleared of robbers; tranquillity was restored at home; some severe examples of justice intimidated offenders; and the tribune was regarded by- all the people as the destined restorer of Rome and Italy. Though the court of Avignon could not approve of such an usurpation, it temporized enough not directly to oppose it. Most of the Italian republics, and some of the princes, sent ambassadors, and seemed to recognize pretensions which were tolerably ostentatious. The King of Hungary and Queen of Naples submitted their quarrel to the arbitration of Rienzi, who did not, however, undertake to decide upon it. But this sudden exaltation intoxicated his understanding, and exhibited failings entirely incompatible with his elevated con- dition. If Rienzi had lived in our own age, his talents, which were really great, would have found their proper orbit ; for his character was one not unusual among literary politicians a combination of knowledge, eloquence, and enthusiasm for ideal excellence, with vanity, inexperience of mankind, unsteadiness, and physical timidity. As these latter qualities became conspicuous, they eclipsed his virtues and caused his benefits to be forgotten; he was compelled to abdi- cate his government, and retire into exile. After several years, some of which he passed in the prisons of Avignon, Rienzi was brought back to Rome, with the title of senator, and under the command of the legate. It was supposed that the Romans, who had returned to their habits of insubordination, would gladly sub- mit to their favorite tribune. And this proved the case for a few months, but after that time they ceased altogether to respect a man who so little respected himself in accepting a station where he could no longer be free ; and Rienzi was killed in a sedition. 2 Once more, not long after the death of Rienzi, the freedom of Rome seems to have revived in republican institutions, though with names less calculated to inspire peculiar recollections. Magis- trates, called bannerets, chosen from the thirteen districts of the city, with a militia of three thousand citizens at their command, were placed at the head of this commonwealth. The great object 2 An illustrious female writer has drawn with a single stroke the character of Rienzi, Crescentius, and Arnold of Brescia, the fond restorers of Roman lib- erty, qui ont pris les souvenirs pour Irs esperances. (Madame de Stael, " Corinne," vol. i. p. 159.) Could Tacitus have excelled this? 224 I T A L Y 1356 of this new organization was to intimidate the Roman nobility, whose outrages, in the total absence of government, had grown intolerable. Several of them were hanged the first year by order of the bannerets. In 1435 the Romans formally took away the government from Eugenius IV., and elected seven signors, or chief magistrates, like the priors of Florence. But this revolution was not of long continuance, and the citizens soon after acknowledged the sovereignty of the Pope. Chapter XXXI FLORENCE AND PISA. 1 150-1406 THE province of Tuscany continued longer than Lombardy under imperial government. Not until about the middle of the twelfth century did the cities of Florence, Lucca, Pisa, Siena, Arezzo, Pistoja, and several less considerable, al- ready, perhaps with their own elected magistrates, become inde- pendent republics. During the reign of Frederick II. Florence became, as far as she was able, an ally of the Popes. There was, indeed, a strong Ghibelline party, comprehending many of the greatest families, but the spirit of the people was thoroughly Guelph. After several revolutions, accompanied by alternate pro- scription and demolition of houses, the Guelph party, through the assistance of Charles of Anjou, obtained a final ascendency in 1266; and after one or two unavailing schemes of accommodation it was established as a fundamental law in the Florentine constitution that no person of Ghibelline ancestry could be admitted to offices of public trust, which, in such a government, was in effect an exclusion from the privileges of citizenship. The changes of internal government and vicissitudes of suc- cess among factions were so frequent at Florence, for many years after this time, that she is compared by her great banished poet to one in sickness, who, unable to rest, gives herself momentary ease by continual change of posture in her bed. They did not become much less numerous after the age of Dante. Yet the revolutions of Florence should, perhaps, be considered as no more than a necessary price of her liberty. It was her boast and her happiness to have escaped, except for one short period, that odious rule of vile usurpers, under which so many other free cities had been crushed. A sketch of the constitution of so famous a republic ought not to be omitted in this place. Nothing else in the history of Italy after Frederick II. is so worthy of our attention. The basis of the Florentine polity was a division of the citi- 225 226 ITALY 1266-1324 zens exercising commerce into their several companies or arts. These were at first twelve, seven called the greater arts and five lesser, but the latter were gradually increased to fourteen. The seven greater arts were those of lawyers and notaries, of dealers in foreign cloth, called sometimes Calimala, of bankers or money- changers, of woolen-drapers, of physicians and druggists, of dealers in silk, and of furriers. The inferior arts were those of retailers of cloth, butchers, smiths, shoemakers, and builders. This division was fully established and rendered essential to the constitution in 1266. By the provisions made in that year each of the seven greater arts had a council of its own, a chief magistrate or consul, who administered justice in civil causes to all members of his company, and a banneret (gonfaloniere) or military officer, to whose standard they repaired when any attempt was made to disturb the peace of the city. The administration of criminal justice belonged at Florence, as at other cities, to a foreign podesta, or rather to two foreign magistrates, the podesta and the capitano del popolo, whose juris- diction appears to have been concurrent. These officers were pre- served till the innovations of the Medici. The domestic magis- tracies underwent more changes. Instead of consuls, which had been the first denomination of the chief magistrates of Florence, a college of twelve or fourteen persons called Ansiani or Buonuomini, but varying in name as well as number, according to revolutions of party, was established about the middle of the thirteenth century, to direct public affairs. This order was entirely changed in 1282, and gave place to a new form of supreme magistracy, which lasted till the extinction of the republic. Six priors, elected every two months, one from each of the six quarters of the city, and from each of the greater arts, except that of lawyers, constituted an executive magistracy. They lived during their continuance in office in a palace belonging to the city, and were maintained at the public cost The actual priors, jointly with the chiefs and councils (usually called la Capitudine) of the seven greater arts, and with certain adjuncts (arroti) named by themselves, elected by ballot their successors. Such was the practice for about forty years after this government was established. But an innovation, begun in 1324, and perfected four years afterward, gave peculiar char- acter to the constitution of Florence. A lively and ambitious peo- ple, not merely jealous of their public sovereignty, but deeming FLORENCE AND PISA 227 1266-1324 its exercise a matter of personal enjoyment, aware at the same time that the will of the whole body could neither be immediately expressed on all occasions nor even through chosen representatives, without the risk of violence and partiality, fell upon the singular idea of admitting all citizens not unworthy by their station or con- duct to offices of magistracy by rotation. Lists were separately made out by the priors, the twelve buonuomini, the chiefs and coun- cils of arts, the bannerets and other respectable persons, of all citi- zens, Guelphs by origin, turned of thirty years of age, and, in their judgment, worthy of public trust. The lists thus formed were then united, and those who had composed them, meeting together, in number ninety-seven, proceeded to ballot upon every name. Who- ever obtained sixty-eight black balls was placed upon the reformed list ; and all the names it contained being put on separate tickets into a bag or purse (imborstia), were drawn successively as the magis- tracies were renewed. As there were above fifty of these, none of which could be held for more than four months, several hundred citizens were called in rotation to bear their share in the government within two years. But at the expiration of every two years the scrutiny was renewed, and fresh names were mingled with those which still continued undrawn ; so that accident might deprive a man for life of his portion of magistracy. Four councils had been established by the constitution of 1266 for the decision of all propositions laid before them by the execu- tive magistrates, whether of a legislative nature or relating to pub- lic policy. These were now abrogated : and in their places were substituted one of 300 members, all plebeians, called consiglio di popolo, and one of 250, called consiglio di commune, into which the nobles might enter. These were changed by the same rotation as the magistracies, every four months. A parliament, or general assembly of the Florentine people, was rarely convoked; but the leading principle of a democratic republic, the ultimate sover- eignty of the multitude, was not forgotten. This constitution of 1324 was fixed by the citizens at large in a parliament; and the same sanction was given to those temporary delegations of the seigniory to a prince which occasionally took place. What is tech- nically called by their historians forsi popolo was the assembly of a parliament, or a resolution of all derivative powers into the im- mediate operation of the popular will. The ancient government of this republic appears to have been 228 ITALY 1266-1324 chiefly in the hands of its nobility. These were very numerous, and possessed large estates in the district. But by the constitution of 1266, which was nearly coincident with the triumph of the Guelph faction, the essential powers of magistracy as well as of legislation were thrown into the scale of the commons. The colleges of arts, whose functions became so eminent, were altogether commercial, and it was necessary to belong to one or other of the greater arts in order to be admitted into the executive college of the priors. Many, indeed, of the nobles enrolled themselves in these com- panies, and were among the most conspicuous merchants of Flor- ence; but the majority of the ancient families saw themselves pushed aside from the helm, which was intrusted to a class whom they had habitually held in contempt. The nobility, however, set the new constitution at defiance, and dwelling in strong and lofty houses among their kindred, and among the fellows of their rank, committed all sorts of outrages with impunity. At length in 1295, Giano della Bella, a man of ancient lineage, but attached to the popular side, introduced a series of enactments exceedingly disadvantageous to the ancient aristoc- racy. The first of these was the appointment of an executive of- ficer, the gonfalonier of justice, whose duty it was to enforce the sentences of the podesta and capitano del popolo in cases where the ordinary officers were insufficient. A thousand citizens, afterward increased to four times that number, were bound to obey his com- mands. They were distributed into companies, the gonfaloniers or captains of which became a sort of corporation or college, and a constituent part of the government. This new militia seems to have superseded that of the companies of arts. The gonfalonier of jus- tice was part of the seigniory along with the priors, of whom he was reckoned the president, and changed, like them, every two months. He was, in fact, the first magistrate of Florence. If Giano della Bella had trusted to the efficacy of this new security for justice, his fame would have been beyond reproach. But he followed it up by harsher provisions. The nobility were now made absolutely ineligi- ble to the office of prior. For an offense committed by one of a noble family, his relations were declared responsible in a penalty of $15,000. And, to obviate the difficulty arising from the frequent intimidation of witnesses, it was provided that common fame, at- tested by two credible persons, should be sufficient for the con- demnation of a nobleman. FLORENCE AND PISA 229 1324-1340 These are the famous ordinances of justice which passed at Florence for the great charter of her democracy. The nobility were soon aware of the position in which they stood. For half a century their great object was to procure the relaxation of the ordinances of justice. But they had no success with an elated enemy. The sort of proscription which attended the ancient nobles lowered their spirit; while a new aristocracy began to raise its head, the aristocracy of families, who, after filling the highest magistracies for two or three generations, obtained an hereditary importance, which answered the purpose of more un- equivocal nobility; just as in ancient Rome plebeian families, by admission to curule offices, acquired the character and appellation of nobility, and were only distinguishable by their genealogy from the original patricians. Florence had her plebeian nobles {popolani grandi) as well as Rome; the Peruzzi, the Ricci, the Albizi, the Medici, correspond to the Catos, the Pompeys, the Brutuses, and the Antonies. But at Rome the two orders, after an equal parti- tion of the highest offices, were content to respect their mutual privi- leges; at Florence the commoners preserved a rigorous monopoly, and the distinction of high birth was that it debarred men from political franchises and civil justice. This second aristocracy did not obtain much more of the pop- ular affection than that which it superseded. In order to keep the nobles under more control the governing party more than once introduced a new foreign magistrate, with the title of captain of defense {della guardia), whom they invested with an almost un- bounded criminal jurisdiction. One Gabrielli of Agobbio was twice fetched for this purpose (1336, 1340) ; and in each case he behaved in so tyrannical a manner as to occasion a tumult. His office, how- ever, was of short duration, and the title at least did not import a sovereign command. But very soon afterward Florence had to experience one taste of a cup which her neighbors had drunk off to the dregs, and to animate her magnanimous love of freedom by a knowledge of the calamities of tyranny. A war with Pisa, unsuccessfully, if not unskillfully, conducted, gave rise to such dissatisfaction in the city that the leading com- moners had recourse to an appointment something like that of Gabrielli, and from similar motives. Walter de Brienne, Duke of Athens, was descended from one of the French crusaders who had dismembered the Grecian Empire in the preceding century ; but 230 ITALY 1340-1344 his father, defeated in battle, had lost the principality along with his life, and the titular duke was an adventurer in the court of France. He had been, however, slightly known at Florence on a former occasion. There was a uniform maxim among the Italian republics that extraordinary powers should be conferred upon none but strangers. The Duke of Athens was accordingly pitched upon for the military command, which was united with domestic juris- diction. This appears to have been promoted by the governing party in order to curb the nobility; but they were soon unde- ceived in their expectations. The first act of the Duke of Athens was to bring four of the most eminent commoners to capital pun- ishment for military offenses. These sentences, whether just or otherwise, gave much pleasure to the nobles, who had so frequently been exposed to similar severity, and to the populace, who are naturally pleased with the humiliation of their superiors. Both of these were caressed by the duke, and both conspired, with blind passion, to second his ambitious views. It was proposed and car- ried in a full parliament, or assembly of the people, to bestow upon him the seigniory for life (1342). The real friends of their coun- try, as well as the oligarchy, shuddered at this measure. Through- out all the vicissitudes of party, Florence had never yet lost sight of republican institutions. But happily the reign of tyranny was very short. The Duke of Athens had neither judgment nor activity for so difficult a station. He launched out at once into excesses which it would be desirable that arbitrary power should always commit at the outset. The taxes were considerably increased ; their produce was dissipated. The honor of the state was sacrificed by an inglorious treaty with Pisa ; her territory was diminished by some towns throwing off their dependence. Severe and multiplied punishments spread terror through the city. Ten months passed in this manner, when three separate conspiracies, embracing most of the nobility and of the great commoners, were planned for the re- covery of freedom. The city was barricaded in every direction; and after a contest of some duration the Duke of Athens consented to abdicate his seigniory. Thus Florence recovered her liberty. Her constitutional laws now seemed to revive of themselves. But the nobility, who had taken a very active part in the recent liberation of their country, thought it hard to be still placed under the rigorous ordinances of justice. The populace of Florence, with its characteristic forgetful- FLORENCE AND PISA 231 1344-1357 ness of benefits, was tenacious of those prescriptive ordinances. A new civil war in the city streets decided their quarrel ; after a des- perate resistance, many of the principal houses were pillaged and burned; and the perpetual exclusion of the nobility was confirmed by fresh laws. But the people, now sure of their triumph, relaxed a little upon this occasion the ordinances of justice; and, to make some distinction in favor of merit or innocence, effaced certain families from the list of nobility. Five hundred and thirty persons were thus elevated, as we may call it, to the rank of commoners. Conversely, several unpopular commoners were ennobled, in order to disfranchise them. Nothing was more usual in subsequent times than such an arbitrary change of rank, as a penalty or a benefit. Those nobles who were rendered plebeian by favor were obliged to change their name and arms. The constitution now underwent some change. From six the priors were increased to eight; and instead of being chosen from each of the greater arts, they were taken from the four quarters of the city. The gonfaloniers of com- panies were reduced to sixteen. And these, along with the seigniory and the twelve buonuomini, formed the college, where every propo- sition was discussed before it could be offered to the councils for their legislative sanction. But it could only originate, strictly speaking, in the seigniory, that is, the gonfalonier of justice, and eight priors, the rest of the college having merely the function of advice and assistance. Several years elapsed before any material disturbance arose at Florence; but in 1357 a spring was set in motion which gave quite a different character to the domestic history of Florence. At the time when the Guelphs, with the assistance of Charles of Anjou, ac- quired an exclusive domination in the republic, the estates of the Ghibellines were confiscated. One-third of these confiscations was allotted to the state; another went to repair the losses of Guelph citizens ; but the remainder became the property of a new corporate society, denominated the Guelph party (parte Guelfa), with a regu- lar internal organization. The Guelph party had two councils, one of fourteen and one of sixty members ; three, or afterward, four, captains, elected by scrutiny every two months, a treasury, and common seal a little republic within the republic of Florence. Their primary duty was to watch over the Guelph interest ; and for this purpose they had a particular officer for the accusation of sus- pected Ghibellines. We hear not much, however, of the Guelph so- 232 ITALY 1357-1372 ciety for near a century after their establishment; but they now began to execute a preponderating influence in the state. In this society the ancient nobles retained a considerable influence. The laws of exclusion had never been applied to that corporation. Two of the captains were always noble, two were commoners. The people, in debarring the nobility from ordinary privileges, were little aware of the more dangerous channel which had been left open to their ambition. With the nobility some of the great com- moners acted in concert, and especially the family and faction of the Albizi. They carried a law by which every person accepting an office who should be convicted of Ghibellinism or of Ghibelline de- scent, upon testimony of public fame, became liable to punishment, capital or pecuniary, at the discretion of the priors. To this law they gave a retrospective effect. Many citizens who had been magistrates within a few years were charged with heavy fines on this indefinite charge. But the more usual practice was to warn (ammonire) men beforehand against undertaking public trust. If they neglected this hint, they were sure to be treated as convicted Ghibellines. Thus a very numerous class, called Ammoniti, was formed of proscribed and discontented persons, eager to throw off the intolerable yoke of the Guelph society; for the imputation of Ghibelline connections was generally an unfounded pretext for crushing the enemies of the governing faction. Men of approved Guelph principles and origin were every day warned from their natural privileges of sharing in magistracy. This spread a uni- versal alarm through the city ; but the great advantage of union and secret confederacy rendered the Guelph society, who had also the law on their side, irresistible by their opponents. Meanwhile the public honor was well supported abroad ; Florence had never before been so distinguished as during the prevalence of this oligarchy. The Guelph society had governed with more or less absolute- ness for near twenty years, when the republic became involved, through the perfidious conduct of the papal legate, in a war with the Holy See. Though the Florentines were by no means super- stitious, this hostility to the church appeared almost an absurdity to determined Guelphs, and shocked those prejudices about names which make up the politics of vulgar minds. The Guelph society, though it could not openly resist the popular indignation against Gregory XL, was not heartily inclined to this war. Its management FLORENCE AND PISA 233 1372-1378 fell, therefore, into the hands of eight commissioners, some of them not well affected to the society, whose administration was so suc- cessful and popular as to excite the utmost jealousy in the Guelphs. They began to renew their warnings, and in eight months excluded fourscore citizens. The civil dissensions which followed need not be described at length. The seven greater arts were generally attached to the Guelph society, while the fourteen lesser arts, composed of retail and mechanical traders, were eager to make Florence a democracy in fact as well as in name, by participating in the executive govern- ment. While the lesser arts were murmuring at the exclusive privi- leges of the commercial aristocracy, there was yet an inferior class of citizens who thought their own claims to equal privileges irre- fragable. The arrangement of twenty-one trading companies had still left several kinds of artisans unincorporated, and consequently unprivileged. These had been attached to the art with which their craft had most connection in a sort of dependent relation. Thus to the company of drapers, the most wealthy of all, the various occu- pations instrumental in the manufacture, as wool-combers, dyers, and weavers, were appendant. Besides the sense of political ex- clusion, these artisans alleged that they were oppressed by their em- ployers of the art. A still lower order of the community was the mere populace, who did not practice any regular trade, or who only worked for daily hire. These were called ciompi, a corruption, it is said, of the French compere. The inferior tradesmen demanded the establishment of two new arts for themselves, and one for the lower people. After various seditions, a violent insurection, in which the ciompi, or lowest populace, were alone concerned, broke out. The gates of the palace belonging to the seigniory were forced open, the priors com- pelled to fly, and no appearance of a constitutional magistracy re- mained to throw the veil of law over the excesses of anarchy. The republic seemed to rock from its foundations ; and the circumstance to which historians ascribe its salvation is not the least singular in this critical epoch. One Michel di Lando, a wool-comber, half- dressed and without shoes, happened to hold the standard of justice, wrested from the proper officer when the populace burst into the palace. Whether he was previously conspicuous in the tumult is not recorded ; but the wild, capricious mob, who had destroyed what they had no conception how to rebuild, suddenly cried out that 234 ITALY 1378-1334 Lando should be gonfalonier or signor, and reform the city at his pleasure. A choice, arising probably from wanton folly, could not have been better made by wisdom. Lando was a man of courage, moder- ation, and integrity. He gave immediate proofs of these qualities by causing his office to be respected. The eight commissioners of the war, who, though not instigators of the sedition, were well pleased to see the Guelph party so entirely prostrated, now fancied themselves masters, and began to nominate priors. But Lando sent a message to them that he was elected by the people, and that he could dispense with their assistance. He then proceeded to the choice of priors. Three were taken from the greater arts, three from the lesser, and three from the two new arts and the lower people. This eccentric college lost no time in restoring tranquillity, and compelled the populace, by threat of punishment, to return to their occupations. But the ciompi were not disposed to give up the pleasures of anarchy so readily. They were dissatisfied at the small share allotted to them in the new distribution of offices, and mur- mured at their gonfalonier as a traitor to the popular cause. Lando was aware that an insurrection was projected ; he took measures with the most respectable citizens; the insurgents, when they showed themselves, were quelled by force, and the gonfalonier re- tired from office with an approbation which all historians of Flor- ence have agreed to perpetuate. The ciompi, once checked, were soon defeated. The next gonfalonier was, like Lando, a wool- comber ; but, wanting the intrinsic merit of Lando, his mean station excited universal contempt. None of the arts could endure their low coadjutors; a short struggle was made by the populace, but they were entirely overpowered with considerable slaughter, and the government was divided between the seven greater and sixteen lesser arts in nearly equal proportions. The party of the lesser arts, or inferior tradesmen, which had begun this confusion, were left winners when it ceased. But at the end of three years the aristocratic party regained its ascendency. They did not revive the severity practiced toward the Ammoniti ; but the two new arts, created for the small trades, were abolished, and the lesser arts reduced to a third part, instead of something more than one-half, of public offices. For half a century after this time no revolution took place at Florence. The Guelph aristocracy, strong in opulence and antiquity, and rendered prudent by experi- FLORENCE AND PISA 235 1351-1384 ence, under the guidance of the Albizi family, maintained a pre- ponderating influence without much departing, the times considered, from moderation and respect for the laws. Though fertile and populous, the proper district of Florence was by no means extensive. The republic made no acquisition of territory till 135 1, when she annexed the small city of Prato, not ten miles from her walls. Pistoja, though still nominally independent, received a Florentine garrison about the same time. Several addi- tions were made to the district by fair purchase from the nobility of the Apennines, and a few by main force. The territory was still very little proportioned to the fame and power of Florence. The latter was founded upon her vast commercial opulence. Every Italian state employed mercenary troops, and the richest was, of course, the most powerful. In 1336 the revenues of Florence are reckoned by Villani at 300,000 florins, which, as he observes, is more than the king of Naples or Aragon possess. 1 The ex- penditure went at that time very much beyond the receipt, and was defrayed by loans from the principal mercantile firms, which were secured by public funds the earliest instance, I believe, of that financial resource. Her population was computed at ninety thousand souls. Villani reckons the district at eighty thousand men, I suppose those only of military age ; but this calculation must have been too large, even though he included, as we may presume, the city in his estimate. The first eminent conquest made by Florence was that of Pisa, early in the fifteenth century. Pisa had been distinguished as a commercial city ever since the age of the Othos. From her ports, and those of Genoa, the earliest naval armaments of the Western nations were fitted out against the Saracen corsairs who infested the Mediterranean coasts. In the eleventh century she undertook, and, after a pretty long struggle, completed, the important, or at least the splendid, conquest of Sardinia, an island long subject to a Moorish chieftain. Her naval prowess was supported by her com- merce. A writer of the twelfth century reproaches her with the Jews, the Arabians, and other " monsters of the sea," who thronged in her streets. The crusades poured fresh wealth into the lap of the maritime Italian cities. In some of those expeditions a great por- tion of the armament was conveyed by sea to Palestine, and 1 The gold florin was worth about $2.50 of our money. The district of Florence was then something less than three hundred square miles. 236 ITALY 1282-1384 freighted the vessels of Pisa, Genoa, and Venice. When the Christians had bought with their blood the seacoast of Syria, these republics procured the most extensive privileges in the new states that were formed out of their slender conquests, and became the conduits through which the produce of the East flowed in upon the ruder nations of Europe. Pisa maintained a large share of this commerce, as well as of maritime greatness, till near the end of the thirteenth century. In 1282 she was in great power, possessing Sardinia, Corsica, and Elba, whence the republic, as well as pri- vate persons, derived large revenues, and almost ruled the sea with their ships and merchandise, and beyond sea were very power- ful in the city of Acre, and much connected with its principal citi- zens. The prosperous era of Pisa is marked by her public edifices. She was the first Italian city that took a pride in architectural mag- nificence. Her cathedral is of the eleventh century ; the baptistery, the famous inclined tower, or belfry, the arcades that surround the Campo Santo, or cemetery of Pisa, are of the twelfth, or, at latest, of the thirteenth. It would have been no slight anomaly in the annals of Italy, or, we might say, of mankind, if two neighboring cities, com- petitors in every naval enterprise, had not been perpetual enemies to each other. One is more surprised, if the fact be true, that no war broke out between Pisa and Genoa till 11 19. From this time, at least, they continually recurred. An equality of forces and of courage kept the conflict uncertain for the greater part of two centuries. Their battles were numerous, and sometimes, taken separately, decisive ; but the public spirit and resources of each city were called out by defeat, and we generally find a new armament re- places the losses of an unsuccessful combat. In this respect the naval contest between Pisa and Genoa, though much longer protracted, resembles that of Rome and Carthage in the first Punic war. But Pisa was reserved for her ^Egades. In one fatal battle, off the little isle of Meloria, in 1284, her whole navy was destroyed. Several unfortunate and expensive armaments had almost exhausted the state, and this was the last effort, by private sacrifices, to equip one more fleet. After this defeat it was in vain to contend for empire. Eleven thousand Pisans languished for many years in prison ; it was a current saying that whoever would see Pisa should seek her at Genoa. A treacherous chief, that Count Ugolino whose guilt was so terribly avenged, by the starvation of himself and members of 1384-1406 FLORENCE AND PISA 237 his family, who were thrown into prison and left to die, is said to have purposely lost the battle, and prevented the ransom of the captives, to secure his power; accusations that obtain easy credit with an unsuccessful people. From the epoch of the battle of Meloria, Pisa ceased to be a maritime power. Forty years afterward she was stripped of her ancient colony, the island of Sardinia, which was annexed to the crown of Aragon. Her commerce now dwindled with her great- ness. During the fourteenth century Pisa almost renounced the ocean, and directed her main attention to the politics of Tuscany. Ghibelline by invariable predilection, she was in constant opposition to the Guelph cities which looked up to Florence. But in the four- teenth century the names of freeman and Ghibelline were not easily united; and a city in that interest stood insulated between the re- publics of an opposite faction and the tyrants of her own. Pisa fell several times under the yoke of usurpers; she was included in the widespreading acquisitions of Gian Galeazzo Visconti. At his death one of his family seized the dominion, and finally the Florentines purchased for 400,000 florins a rival and once equal city. The Pisans made a resistance more according to what they had been than what they were. Chapter XXXII GENOA AND VENICE. 1200-1426 THE early history of Genoa, in all her foreign relations, is involved in that of Pisa. As allies against the Saracens of Africa, Spain, and the Mediterranean islands, as co- rivals in commerce with these very Saracens or with the Christians of the East, as cooperators in the great expeditions under the ban- ner of the cross, or as engaged in deadly warfare with each other, the two republics stand in continual parallel. From the beginning of the thirteenth century Genoa was, perhaps, the more prominent and flourishing of the two. She had conquered the island of Cor- sica at the same time that Pisa reduced Sardinia ; and her acquisi- tion, though less considerable, was longer preserved. Her territory at home, the ancient Liguria, was much more extensive, and, what was most important, contained a greater range of seacoast than that of Pisa. But the commercial and maritime prosperity of Genoa may be dated from the recovery of Constantinople by the Greeks in 1 26 1. Jealous of the Venetians, by whose arms the Latin emperors had been placed, and were still maintained, on their throne, the Genoese assisted Palaeologus in overturning that usurpation. They obtained in consequence the suburb of Pera or Galata, over against Constantinople, as an exclusive settlement, where their colony was ruled by a magistrate sent from home, and frequently defied the Greek capital with its armed galleys and intrepid seamen. From this convenient station Genoa extended her commerce into the Black Sea, and established her principal factory at Caffa, in the Crimean peninsula. This commercial monopoly, for such she endeavored to render it, aggravated the animosity of Venice. As Pisa retired from the field of waters, a new enemy appeared upon the horizon to dis- pute the maritime dominion of Genoa. Her first war with Venice was in 1258, and for a hundred years, till Genoa had to retire de- feated, the struggle continued. The second was not till after the victory of Meloria had crushed her more ancient enemy. It broke out in 1293, and was prosecuted with determined fury and a great 238 GENOA AND VENICE 239 1293-1378 display of naval strength on both sides. One Genoese armament consisted of 155 galleys, each manned with from 200 to 300 sailors. It was, however, beyond any other exertion. The usual fleets of Genoa and Venice were of seventy to ninety galleys. But the most remarkable war, and that productive of the great- est consequences, was one that commenced in 1378, after several acts of hostility in the Levant. Genoa did not stand alone in this war. A formidable confederacy was raised against Venice, who had given provocation to many enemies. Of this Francis Carrara, signor of Padua, and the King of Hungary were the leaders. But the principal struggle was, as usual, upon the waves. During the winter of 1378 a Genoese fleet kept the sea, and ravaged the shores of Dalmatia. The Venetian armament had been weakened by an epidemic disease, and when Vittor Pisani, their admiral, gave battle to the enemy, he was compelled to fight with a hasty conscription of landsmen against the best sailors in the world. Entirely defeated, and taking refuge at Venice with only seven galleys, Pisani was cast into prison, as if his ill-fortune had been his crime. Meanwhile the Genoese fleet, augmented by a strong reinforcement, rode before the long natural ramparts that separate the lagoons of Venice from the Adriatic. Six passages intersect the islands which constitute this barrier, besides the broader outlets of Brondolo and Fossone, through which the waters of the Brenta and the Adige are dis- charged. The lagoon itself, as is well known, consists of extremely shallow water, unnavigable for any vessel except along the course of artificial and intricate passages. Notwithstanding the apparent difficulties of such an enterprise, Pietro Doria, the Genoese admiral, determined to reduce the city. His first successes gave him reason to hope. He forced the passage, and stormed the little town of Chioggia, built upon the inside of the isle bearing that name, about twenty-five miles south of Venice. Nearly four thousand prisoners fell here into his hands an augury, as it seemed, of a more splendid triumph. In the consternation this misfortune inspired at Venice, the first impulse was to ask for peace. The ambassadors carried with them seven Genoese prisoners, as a sort of peace-offering to the admiral, and were empowered to make large and humiliating concessions, reserving nothing but the liberty of Venice. Francis Carrara strongly urged his allies to treat for peace. But the Genoese were stimulated by long hatred, and intoxicated by this unexpected opportunity of revenge. Doria. calling the ambassadors 210 ITALY 1378-1379 into council, thus addressed them : " Ye shall obtain no peace from us, I swear to you, nor from the lord of Padua, till first we have put a curb in the mouths of those wild horses that stand upon the place of St. Mark. When they are bridled you shall have enough of peace. Take back with you your Genoese captives, for I am com- ing 1 within a few days to release both them and their companions from your prisons." When this answer was reported to the Senate, they prepared to defend themselves with the characteristic firmness of their government. Every eye was turned toward a great man unjustly punished, their admiral Vittor Pisani. He was called out of prison to defend his country amid general acclamations. Un- der his vigorous command the canals were fortified or occupied by large vessels armed with artillery; thirty-four galleys were equipped; every citizen contributed according to his power; in the entire want of commercial resources (for Venice had not a mer- chant-ship during this war) private plate was melted; and the Senate held out the promise of ennobling thirty families who should be most forward in this strife of patriotism. The new fleet was so ill provided with seamen that for some months the admiral employed them only in maneuvering along the canals. From some unaccountable supineness, or more proba- bly from the insuperable difficulties of the undertaking, the Gen- oese made no assault upon the city. They had, indeed, fair grounds to hope for its reduction by famine or despair. Every access to the continent was cut off by the troops of Padua ; and the King of Hungary had mastered almost all the Venetian towns in Istria and along the Dalmatian coast. The Doge Contarini, taking the chief command, appeared at length with his fleet near Chioggia, before the Genoese were aware. They were still less aware of his secret design. He pushed one of the large round vessels, then called cocche, into the narrow passage of Chioggia which connects the lagoon with the sea, and, mooring her athwart the channel, inter- rupted that communication. Attacked with fury by the enemy, this vessel went down on the spot, and the doge improved his advantage by sinking loads of stones until the passage became absolutely un- navigable. It was still possible for the Genoese fleet to follow the principal canal of the lagoon toward Venice and the northern passages, or to sail out of it by the harbor of Brondolo ; but, whether from confusion or from miscalculating the dangers of their position, they suffered the Venetians to close the canal upon them by the same GENOA AND VENICE 241 1379-1380 means they had used at Chioggia, and even to place their fleet in the entrance of Brondolo so near to the lagoon that the Genoese could not form their ships in line of battle. The circumstances of the two combatants were thus entirely changed. But the Genoese fleet, though besieged in Chioggia, was impregnable, and their com- mand of the land secured them from famine. Venice, notwith- standing her unexpected success, was still very far from secure: it was difficult for the doge to keep his position through the winter; and if the enemy could appear in open sea, the risks of combat were extremely hazardous. It is said that the Senate deliberated upon transporting the seat of their liberty to Candia, and that the doge had announced his intention to raise the siege of Chioggia, if expected succor did not arrive by January i, 1380. On that very day Carlo Zeno, an admiral who, ignorant of the dangers of his country, had been supporting the honor of her flag in the Levant and on the coast of Liguria, appeared with a reinforcement of eighteen galleys and a store of provisions. From that moment the confidence of Venice revived. The fleet, now superior in strength to the enemy, began to attack them with vivacity. After several months of obstinate resistance, the Genoese whom their republic had ineffectually attempted to relieve by a fresh armament blocked up in the town of Chioggia, and pressed by hunger, were obliged to surrender. Nineteen galleys only, out of forty-eight, were in good condition ; and the crews were equally diminished in the ten months of their occupation of Chioggia. The pride of Genoa was deemed to be justly humbled, and even her own historian confesses that God would not suffer so noble a city as Venice to become the spoil of a conqueror. Though the capture of Chioggia did not terminate the war, both parties were exhausted, and willing, next year, to accept the mediation of the Duke of Savoy. By the Peace of Turin, Venice surrendered most of her territorial possessions to the King of Hungary. That prince and Francis Carrara were the only gainers. Genoa obtained the isle of Tenedos, one of the original subjects of dispute a poor indemnity for her losses. Though, upon a hasty view, the result of this war appears more unfavorable to Venice, yet in fact it is the epoch of the decline of Genoa. From this time she never commanded the ocean with such navies as be- fore; her commerce gradually went into decay; and the fifteenth century the most splendid in the annals of Venice is among the 242 ITALY 1339-1380 most ignominious in those of Genoa. But this was partly owing to internal dissensions, by which her liberty, as well as glory, was for a while suspended. At Genoa, as in other cities of Lombardy, the principal magis- trates of the republic were originally styled consuls. Their number varied from four to six, annually elected by the people in their full parliament. These consuls presided over the republic, and com- manded the forces by land and sea; while another class of magis- trates, bearing the same title, were annually elected by the several companies into which the people were divided, for the administra- tion of civil justice. This was the regimen of the twelfth century ; but in the next Genoa fell into the fashion of intrusting the executive power to a foreign podesta. The podesta was assisted by a council of eight, chosen by the eight companies of nobility. This institu- tion gave not only an aristocratic, but almost an oligarchical char- acter to the constitution, since many of the nobility were not mem- bers of these eight societies. Of the Senate or Councils we hardly know more than their existence; they are very little mentioned by historians. Everything of a general nature, everything that re- quired the expression of public will, was reserved for the entire and unrepresented sovereignty of the people. In no city was the par- liament so often convened for war, for peace, for alliance, for change of government. These very dissonant elements were not likely to harmonize. The people, sufficiently accustomed to the forms of democracy to imbibe its spirit, repined at the practical in- fluence which was thrown into the scale of the nobles. Among the nobility themselves, four houses were distinguished beyond all the rest the Grimaldi, the Fieschi, the Doria, the Spinola, the two former of Guelph politics, the latter adherents of the Empire. Per- haps their equality of forces, and a jealousy which even the families of the same faction entertained of each other, prevented anyone from usurping the seigniory at Genoa. Neither the Guelph nor Ghibelline party obtaining a decided preponderance, continual rev- olutions occurred in the city. The most celebrated was in 1339, which led to the election of the first doge. A large fleet in want of pay broke out in open insurrection. Savona and the neighboring towns took arms avowedly against the aristocratic tyranny, and the capital was itself on the point of joining the insurgents. There was, by the Genoese constitution, a magistrate named the abbot of the people, acting as a kind of tribune for their protection against the GENOA AND VENICE 243 1339-1380 oppression of the nobility. This office had been abolished by the present government, and it was the first demand of the malcontents that it should be restored. This was acceded to, and twenty dele- gates were appointed to make the choice. While they delayed, and the populace was grown weary with waiting, a nameless artisan called out from an elevated station that he could direct them to a fit person. When the people, in jest, bade him speak on, he uttered the name of Simon Boccanegra. This was a man of noble birth, and well esteemed, who was then present among the crowd. The word was suddenly taken up ; a cry was heard that Boccanegra should be abbot : he was instantly brought forward, and the sword of justice forced into his hand. As soon as silence could be obtained he mod- estly thanked them for their favor, but declined an office which his nobility disqualified him from exercising. At this a single voice out of the crowd exclaimed, " Signor ! " and this title was reverber- ated from every side. Fearful of worse consequences, the actual magistrates urged him to comply with the people and accept the office of abbot. But Boccanegra, addressing the assembly, declared his readiness to become their abbot, signor, or whatever they would. The cry of " Signor! " was now louder than before; while others cried out, "Let him be duke!" The latter title was received with greater approbation ; and Boccanegra was conducted to the palace, the first duke, or doge, of Genoa. Caprice alone, or an idea of more pomp and dignity, led the populace, we may conjecture, to prefer this title to that of signor; but it produced important and highly beneficial consequences. In all neighboring cities an arbitrary government had been already es- tablished under their respective signors ; the name was associated with indefinite power, while that of doge had only been taken by the elective and very limited chief magistrate of another maritime re- public. Neither Boccanegra nor his successors ever rendered their authority unlimited or hereditary. The constitution of Genoa, from an oppressive aristocracy, became a mixture of the two other forms, with an exclusion of the nobles from power. Those four great families who had domineered alternately for almost a century lost their influence at home after the revolution of 1339. Yet, what is remarkable enough, they were still selected in preference for the highest of trusts ; their names are still identified with the glory of Genoa ; her fleets hardly sailed but under a Doria, a Spinola, or a Grimalda such confidence could the republic bestow upon their 244 ITALY 452-1380 patriotism, or that of those whom they commanded. Meanwhile two or three new families, a plebeian oligarchy, filled their place in domestic honors; the Adorni, the Fregosi, the Montalti, contended for the ascendant. From their competition ensued revolutions too numerous almost for a separate history; in four years, from 1390 to 1394, the doge was ten times changed swept away or brought back in the fluctuations of popular tumult. Antoniotto Adorno, four times Doge of Genoa, had sought the friendship of Gian Galeazzo Visconti; but that crafty tyrant meditated the subjugation of the republic, and played her factions against one another to ren- der her fall secure. Adorno perceived that there was no hope for ultimate independence but by making a temporary sacrifice of it. His own power, ambitious as he had been, he voluntarily resigned ; and placed the republic under the protection or seigniory of the King of France. Terms were stipulated very favorable to her lib- erties ; but, with a French garrison once received into the city, they were not always sure of observance. While Genoa lost even her political independence, Venice be- came more conspicuous and powerful than before. That famous republic deduces its origin, and even its liberty, from an era be- yond the commencement of the Middle Ages. The Venetians boast of a perpetual emancipation from the yoke of barbarians. From the advancing army of Attila, during his march on Rome in 452, the natives of Aquileia and neighboring towns fled to the small cluster of islands that rise amid the shoals at the mouth of the Brenta. Here they built the town of Rivoalto, the modern Venice ; but their chief settlement was, till the beginning of the ninth century, at Malamocco. Both the Western and the Eastern Empire alternately pretended to exercise dominion over her; she was conquered by Pipin, son of Charlemagne, and restored by him, as the chroniclers say, to the Greek emperor, Nicephorus. There is every appearance that the Venetians had always considered themselves as subject to the Eastern Empire, and this connection was not broken in the early part, at least, of the tenth century. But, for every essential purpose, Venice might long before be deemed an independent state. Her doge was not confirmed at Constantinople ; she paid no tribute, and lent no assistance in war. Her own navies, in the ninth century, encountered the Normans, the Saracens, and the Slavonians in the Adriatic Sea. Upon the coast of Dalmatia were several Greek cities, which the Empire had ceased to protect, and which, like Venice GENOA AND VENICE 245 850-1380 itself, became republics for want of a master. Ragusa was one of these, and, more fortunate than the rest, survived as an independent city till our own age. In return for the assistance of Venice, these little seaports put themselves under her government; the Slavo- nian parties were repressed ; and after acquiring, partly by consent, partly by arms, a large tract of maritime territory, the doge took the title of Duke of Dalmatia. Three or four centuries, however, elapsed before the republic became secure of these conquests, which were frequently wrested from her by rebellions of the inhabitants, or by her powerful neighbor, the King of Hungary. A more important source of Venetian greatness was commerce. In the darkest and most barbarous period, before Genoa or even Pisa had entered into mercantile pursuits, Venice carried on an extensive traffic both with the Greek and Saracen regions of the Levant. The crusades enriched and aggrandized Venice more, perhaps, than any other city. Her splendor may, however, be dated from the taking of Constantinople by the Latins in 1204. In this famous enterprise, which diverted a great armament destined for the recovery of Jerusalem, the French and Venetian nations were alone engaged ; but the former only as private adventurers, the latter with the whole strength of their republic under its doge, Henry Dandolo. Three-eighths of the city of Constantinople, and an equal proportion of the provinces, were allotted to them in the partition of the spoil, and the doge took the singular but accurate title, Duke of three-eighths of the Roman Empire. Their share was increased by purchases from less opulent crusaders, especially one of much importance, the island of Candia, which they retained till the middle of the seventeenth century. These foreign acquisitions were gen- erally granted out in fief to private Venetian nobles under the su- premacy of the republic. It was thus that the Ionian Islands, to adopt the vocabulary of our day, came under the dominion of Venice, and guaranteed that sovereignty which she now began to affect over the Adriatic. Those of the archipelago were lost in the sixteenth century. This political greatness was sustained by an in- creasing commerce. No Christian state preserved so considerable an intercourse with the Mohammedans. While Genoa kept the keys of the Black Sea by her colonies of Pera and Caffa, Venice directed her vessels to Acre and Alexandria. These connections, as is the natural effect of trade, deadened the sense of religious antipathy, and the Venetians were sometimes charged with obstructing all efforts 246 ITALY 697-1380 toward a new crusade, or even any partial attacks upon the Mohammedan nations. The earliest form of government at Venice, according to an epistle of Cassiodorus published in the sixteenth century, was by twelve annual tribunes. Perhaps the union of the different islanders was merely federative. However, in 697, they resolved to elect a chief magistrate by name of duke, or, in their dialect, Doge of Venice. No councils appear to have limited his power, or represented the national will. The doge was general and judge; he was sometimes permitted to associate his son with him, and thus to prepare the road for hereditary power; his government had all the prerogatives, and, as far as in such a state of manners was possible, the pomp, of a monarchy. But he acted in important matters with the concurrence of a general assembly, though, from the want of positive restraints, his executive government might be considered as nearly absolute. Time, however, demonstrated to the Venetians the imperfections of such a constitution. Limitations were accordingly imposed on the doge, so that by the fourteenth century he was practically a mere figurehead, acting only by the advice of six councilors, who formed a sort of executive cabinet for the routine work of administration. In the twelfth century the Quarantia was instituted, at first as an advisory body or select Senate, but gradually becoming the chief law court of Venice. In 1172, the Great Council was established. It was at first elective, and annually renewed ; but it became gradually, by successive changes, an exclusive hereditary aristocracy, and, in 1 3 19, all elective forms were abolished. By the constitution of Venice as it was then settled, every descendant of a member of the Great Council, on attaining twenty-five years of age, entered as of right into that body, which, of course, became unlimited in its numbers. (The S errata del Maggior Consiglio.) But an assembly so numerous as the Great Council could never have conducted the public affairs with that secrecy and steadiness which were characteristic of Venice; and without an intermediary power between the doge and the patrician multitude the constitution would have gained nothing in stability to compensate for the loss of popular freedom. The executive government was committed to a Senate, consisting of sixty members, in which the doge presided, and to which the care of the state in all domestic and foreign rela- tions, and the previous deliberation upon proposals submitted to the Great Council, was confided. It was enlarged in the fourteenth GENOA AND VENICE 247 1319-1380 century by sixty additional members; and as a great part of the magistrates also had seats in it, the whole number amounted to be- tween two and three hundred. Though the legislative power, prop- erly speaking, remained with the Great Council, the Senate used to impose taxes, and had the exclusive right of making peace and war. It was annually renewed, like almost all other councils at Venice, by the Great Council. It might be imagined that a dignity so shorn of its luster as that of doge would not excite an overweening ambition. But the Venetians were still jealous of extinguished power, and while their constitution was yet immature the Great Council planned new. methods of restricting their chief magistrate and of quelling all popular discontent as well. An oath was taken by the doge on his election so comprehensive as to embrace every possible check upon undue influence. He was bound not to correspond with foreign states, or to open their letters, except in the presence of the seign- iory; to acquire no property beyond the Venetian dominions, and to resign what he might already possess; to interpose, directly or in- directly, in no judicial process ; and not to permit any citizen to use tokens of subjection in saluting him. As a further security, they de- vised a remarkably complicated mode of supplying the vacancy of his office. As many balls as there were members of the Great Coun- cil present were placed in an urn. Thirty of these were gilt. The holders of gilt balls were reduced by a second ballot to nine. The nine elected forty, whom lot reduced to twelve. The twelve chose twenty-five by separate nomination. The twenty-five were reduced by lot to nine, and each of the nine chose five. These forty-five were reduced to eleven, as before ; the eleven elected forty-one, who were the ultimate voters for a doge. This intricacy appears useless, and consequently absurd; but the original principle of a Venetian election (for something of the same kind was applied to all their councils and magistrates) may not always be unworthy of imitation. An hereditary prince could never have remained quiet in such trammels as were imposed upon the Doge of Venice. But early prejudice accustoms men to consider restraint, even upon them- selves, as advantageous ; and the limitations of ducal power appeared to every Venetian as fundamental as the great laws of the English constitution do to the English. For life the chief magistrates of their country, her noble citizens forever, they might thank her in their own name for what she gave, and in that of their posterity for 248 ITALY 1310-1380 what she withheld. Once only a Doge of Venice was tempted to be- tray the freedom of the republic. Marino Falieri, a man far ad- vanced in life, engaged, for some petty resentment, in a wild intrigue to overturn the government. The conspiracy was soon dis- covered, and the doge avowed his guilt. An aristocracy so firm and so severe did not hesitate to order his execution in the ducal palace (1355). The commonalty, however, did not quietly acquiesce in their exclusion from the Great Council. Several commotions took place about the beginning of the fourteenth century, with the object of restoring a more popular regimen. Upon the suppression of the last, in 13 10, the aristocracy sacrificed their own individual freedom along with that of the people, to the preservation of an imaginary privilege. They established the famous Council of Ten, that most remarkable part of the Venetian constitution. They formed, in fact, a veritable committee of public safety and became a per- manent part of the constitution by 1335 1 . The proper function of the ten was to act as a court of exceptional jurisdiction, some- what like the Court of Star Chamber in England. In this capacity they served as the efficient bulwark of the Venetian aristocracy, and coerced the inferior citizens into passive acquiescence in the rule of their superiors. As time went on, the ten became more and more powerful, and began to interfere in the general conduct of affairs. So great became the passion for secrecy in the Venetian Government that in the sixteenth century the ten began to delegate their func- tions to a sub-committee the three " Inquisitors of State." This council, it should be observed, consisted in fact of seventeen, com- prising the seigniory, or the doge and his six councilors, as well as the ten properly so called. The Council of Ten had by usage, if not by right, a controlling and dictatorial power over the Senate and other magistrates, rescinding their decisions, and treating separately with foreign princes. Their vast influence strengthened the executive government, of which they formed a part, and gave a vigor to its movements which the jealousy of the councils would possibly have impeded. But they are chiefly known as an arbitrary and inquisitorial tribunal, the standing tyranny of Venice. Ex- cluding the old council of forty, to which had been intrusted the exercise of criminal justice, not only from the investigation of trea- sonable charges, but of several other crimes of magnitude, they in- quired, they judged, they punished, according to what they called 1 R. Lodge, "The Close of the Middle Ages," p. 39. * 1 ^i& -.'-s^a v%^ t Uii I *#^ 1 fKllI 1 ^ * -lift gtf GENOA AND VENICE 249 1380-1404 reason of state. The public eye never penetrated the mystery of their proceedings ; the accused was sometimes not heard, never confronted with witnesses; the condemnation was secret as the inquiry, the pun- ishment undivulged like both. The terrible and odious machinery of a police, the insidious spy, the stipendiary informer unknown to the carelessness of feudal governments, found their natural soil in the republic of Venice. Tumultuous assemblies were scarcely possi- ble in so peculiar a city ; and private conspiracies never failed to be detected by the vigilance of the Council of Ten. Compared with the Tuscan republics, the tranquillity of Venice is truly striking. The names of Guelph and Ghibelline hardly raised any emotion in her streets, though the government was considered in the first part of the fourteenth century as rather inclined toward the latter party. But the wildest excesses of faction are less dishonoring than the stillness and moral degradation of servitude. Until almost the middle of the fourteenth century Venice had been content without any territorial possessions in Italy, unless we reckon a very narrow strip of seacoast, bordering on her lagoons, called the Dogato. Neutral in the great contests between the church and the Empire, between the free cities and their sovereigns, she was respected by both parties, while neither ventured to claim her as an ally. But the rapid progress of Mastino della Scala, lord of Verona, with some particular injuries, led the Senate to form a league with Florence against him. The result of this combination was to annex the district of Treviso to the Venetian dominions. But they made no further conquests in that age. On the contrary, they lost Treviso in the unfortunate war of Chiogga, and did not regain it till 1389. Nor did they seriously attempt to withstand the progress of Gian Galeazzo Visconti, who, after overthrowing the family of Scala, stretched almost to the Adriatic, and altogether subverted for a time the balance of power in Lombardy. But upon the death of this prince, in 1404, a remarkable crisis took place in that country. He left two sons, Giovanni Maria and Filippo Maria, both young and under the care of a mother who was little fitted for her situation. Through her misconduct and the selfish ambition of some military leaders, who had commanded Gian Galeazzo's mercenaries, that extensive dominion was soon broken into fragments. Bergamo, Como, Lodi, Cremona, and other cities revolted, submitting themselves in general to the families of their former princes, the earlier race of usurpers, who had for nearly a 250 ITALY 1404-1426 century been crushed by the Visconti. A Guelph faction revived after the name had long- been proscribed in Lombardy. Francesco da Carrara, lord of Padua, availed himself of this revolution to get possession of Verona, and seemed likely to unite all the cities beyond the Adige. No family was so odious to the Venetians as that of Carrara. Though they had seemed indifferent to the more real danger in Gian Galeazzo's lifetime, they took up arms against this inferior enemy. Both Padua and Verona were reduced, and, the Duke of Milan ceding Vicenza, the republic of Venice came suddenly into the possession of an extensive territory. Francesco da Carrara, who had surrendered in his capital, was put to death in prison at Venice. Notwithstanding the deranged condition of the Milanese, no further attempts were made by the Senate of Venice for twenty years. They had not yet acquired that decided love of war and con- quest which soon began to influence them against all the rules of their ancient policy. Meantime the dukes of Milan had recovered a great part of their dominions as rapidly as they had lost them. Giovanni Maria, the elder brother, a monster of guilt even among the Visconti, having been assassinated, Filippo Maria assumed the government of Milan and Pavia, almost his only possessions. But though unwarlike himself, he was a master of intrigue and, in spite of easily aroused suspicion, profited greatly by the employment of warlike men, of whom the chief was Carmagnola, one of the greatest generals of that military age. Most of the revolted cities were tired of their new masters, and, their inclinations conspiring with Car- magnola's eminent talents and activity, the house of Visconti reas- sumed its former ascendency from the Sessia to the Adige. Its fortunes might have been still more prosperous if Filippo Maria had not rashly as well as ungratefully offended Carmagnola. That great captain retired to Venice, and inflamed a disposition toward war which the Florentines and the Duke of Savoy had already ex- cited. The Venetians had previously gained some important ad- vantages in another quarter, by reducing the country of Friuli, with part of Istria, which had for many centuries depended on the tem- poral authority of a neighboring prelate, the patriarch of Aquileia. They entered into this new alliance. No undertaking of the republic had been more successful. Carmagnola led on their armies, and in about two years Venice acquired Brescia and Bergamo, and ex- tended her boundary to the River Adda, which she was destined never to pass (1426). Chapter XXXIII THE CONDOTTIERI. 1343-1513 ONLY through the help of mercenary troops could a city so peculiarly maritime as Venice make conquests such as she had made. But, in employing them, she merely conformed to a fashion which states to whom it was less indis- pensable had long since established. A great revolution had taken place in the system of military service through most parts of Europe, but especially in Italy. During the twelfth and thir- teenth centuries, whether the Italian cities were engaged in their contest with the emperors or in less arduous and general hostili- ties among themselves, they seem to have poured out almost their whole population as an armed and loosely organized militia. This militia was of course principally composed of infantry. Gentlemen, however, were always mounted, and the superiority of a heavy cavalry must have been prodigiously great over an undisciplined and ill-armed populace. In the thirteenth and following centuries armies seem to have been considered as formidable nearly in propor- tion to the number of men-at-arms or lancers. A charge of cavalry was irresistible; battles were continually won by inferior numbers, and vast slaughter was made among the fugitives. As the comparative inefficiency of foot-soldiers became evident, a greater proportion of cavalry was employed, and armies, though better equipped and disciplined, were less numerous. This we find in the early part of the fourteenth century. The main point for a state at war was to obtain a sufficient force of men-at-arms. As few Italian cities could muster a large body of cavalry from their own population, the obvious resource was to hire mercenary troops. Many soldiers of fortune from Germany, France, and Hungary en- gaged in the service of the Italian states. Their services were anxiously solicited and abundantly repaid under leaders or profes- sional generals (the condottieri) . An unfortunate prejudice in favor of strangers prevailed among the Italians of that age. The experience of every fresh campaign now told more and 251 252 I T A L Y 1343-1353 more against the ordinary militia. It has been usual for modern writers to lament the degeneracy of martial spirit among the Italians of that age. But the contest was too unequal between an absolutely invulnerable body of cuirassiers and an infantry of peasants or citizens. It could hardly be expected that mercenary troops, chiefly com- posed of Germans, would conduct themselves without insolence and contempt of the effeminacy which courted their services. Indifferent to the cause they supported, the highest pay and the richest plunder were their constant motives. As Italy was generally the theater of war in some of her numerous states, a soldier of fortune, with his lance and charger for an inheritance, passed from one service to another without regret and without discredit. But if peace happened to be pretty universal, he might be thrown out of his only occupa- tion, and reduced to a very inferior condition, in a country of which he was not a native. It naturally occurred to men of their feelings that, if money and honor could only be had while they retained their arms, it was their own fault if they ever relinquished them. Upon this principle they first acted in 1343, when the republic of Pisa disbanded a large body of German cavalry which had been employed in the war with Florence. A partisan, whom the Italians call the Duke Guarnieri, engaged these dissatisfied mercenaries to remain united under his command. His plan was to levy contributions on all countries which he entered with his company, without aiming at any conquests. This was the first of the companies of adventure, which continued for many years to be the scourge and disgrace of Italy. Guarnieri, after some time, withdrew his troops, satiated with plunder, into Germany; but he served in the invasion of Naples by Louis, King of Hungary, in 1348, and, forming a new company, ravaged the ecclesiastical state. A still more formidable band of disciplined robbers appeared in 1353, under the command of Fra Moriale, and afterward of Conrad Lando. This was denominated the Great Company, and consisted of several thousand regular troops, besides a multitude of half-armed ruffians, who assisted as spies, pioneers, and plunderers. The rich cities of Tuscany and Romagna paid large sums that the Great Company, which was per- petually in motion, might not march through their territory. None of the foreign partisans who entered into the service of Italian states acquired such renown in that career as an Englishman whom contemporary writers call Aucud or Agutus, but to whom we THE CONDOTTIERI 253 1353-1379 may restore his national appellation of Sir John Hawkwood. This very eminent man had served in the war of Edward III., and ob- tained his knighthood from that sovereign, though originally, if we may trust common fame, bred to the trade of a tailor. After the Peace of Bretigni, France was ravaged by the disbanded troops, whose devastations Edward was accused, perhaps unjustly, of se- cretly instigating. A large body of these, under the name of the White Company, passed into the service of the Marquis of Mont- ferrat. They were some time afterward employed by the Pisans against Florence ; and during this latter war Hawkwood appears as their commander. For thirty years he was continually engaged in the service of the Visconti, of the Pope, or of the Florentines, to whom he devoted himself for the latter part of his life with more fidelity and steadiness than he had shown in his first campaigns. The republic testified her gratitude by a public funeral, and by a monument in the Duomo, which still perpetuates his memory. Hawkwood was not only the greatest, but the last of the foreign condottieri, or captains of mercenary bands. While he was yet living, a new military school had been formed in Italy, which not only superseded, but eclipsed, all the strangers. This important reform was ascribed to Alberic di Barbiano, lord of some petty ter- ritories near Bologna. He formed a company altogether of Italians about the year 1379. It is not to be supposed that natives of Italy had before been absolutely excluded from service. But this was the first trading company, if I may borrow the analogy, the first regular body of Italian mercenaries, attached only to their commander with- out any consideration of party, like the Germans and English of Lando and Hawkwood. Alberic di Barbiano, though himself no doubt a man of military talents, is principally distinguished by the school of great generals which the company of St. George under his command produced, and which may be deduced, by regular succes- sion, to the sixteenth century. Two of the most distinguished members of this school were Braccio di Montone, a noble Perugian, and Sforza Attendolo, or- iginally a peasant in the village of Cotignuola. Nearly equal in reputation, unless perhaps Braccio may be reckoned the more con- summate general, they were divided by a long rivalry, which descended to the next generation, and involved all the distinguished leaders of Italy. The distractions of Naples, and the anarchy of the ecclesiastical state, gave scope not only to their military, but political 254 ITALY 1379-1450 ambition. Sforza was invested with extensive fiefs in the kingdom of Naples, and with the office of Great Constable. Braccio aimed at independent acquisitions, and formed a sort of principality around Perugia. This, however, was entirely dissipated at his death. When Sforza and Braccio were no more, their respective parties were headed by the son of the former, Francesco Sforza, and by Nicolas Piccinino. Sforza married Bianca, the natural daughter and only child of Filippo Maria, Duke of Milan, and last of his fam- ily. But upon the death of Filippo Maria in 1447, the citizens of Milan revived their republican government. A republic in that part of Lombardy might, with the help of Venice and Florence, have with- stood any domestic or foreign usurpation. But Venice was hostile, and Florence indifferent. Sforza became the general of this new state, aware that such would be the probable means of becoming its master. In 1450 he was proclaimed duke, rather by right of elec- tion, or of conquest, than in virtue of his marriage with Bianca, whose sex, as well as illegitimacy, seemed to preclude her from in- heriting. On entering Milan, says Machiavelli, Sforza " was re- ceived with the greatest possible joy by those who, only a short time previously, had heaped on him all the slanders that hatred could inspire." x Whatever evils might be derived, and they were not trifling, from the employment of foreign or native mercenaries, it was im- possible to discontinue the system without general consent ; and too many states found their own advantage in it for such an agreement. The condottieri were, indeed, all notorious for contempt of engage- ments. Their rapacity was equal to their bad faith. Besides an enormous pay, for every private cuirassier received much more in value than a subaltern officer at present, they exacted gratifications for every success. But everything was endured by ambitious gov- ernments who wanted their aid. Florence and Venice were the two states which owed most to the companies of adventure. The one loved war without its perils ; the other could never have obtained an inch of territory without a population of sailors. But they were both almost inexhaustibly rich by commercial industry; and as the surest paymasters, were best served by those they employed. The Italian armies of the fifteenth century have been remarked for one striking peculiarity. War has never been conducted at so little personal hazard to the soldier. Combats frequently occur, in the annals of that age, wherein success, though warmly contested, 1 Machiavelli, " History of Florence," p. 286. THE CONDOTTIERI 255 1249-1450 cost very few lives even to the vanquished. This innocence of blood, which some historians turn into ridicule, was no doubt owing in a great degree to the rapacity of the companies of adventure, who, in expectation of enriching themselves by the ransom of prisoners, were anxious to save their lives. But it was rendered more practi- cable by the nature of their arms. For once, and for once only, in the history of mankind, the art of defense had outstripped that of destruction. In a charge of lancers many fell, unhorsed by the shock, and might be suffocated or bruised to death by the pressure of their own armor; but the lance's point could not penetrate the breastplate, the sword fell harmless on the helmet, the conqueror, in the first impulse of passion, could not assail any vital part of a prostrate but not exposed enemy. Still less was to be dreaded from the archers or cross-bowmen, who composed a large part of the in- fantry. The bow indeed, as drawn by an English foot-soldier, was the most formidable of arms before the invention of gunpowder. It was a peculiarly English weapon, and none of the other principal nations adopted it so generally or so successfully. The cross-bow, which brought the strong and weak to a level, was more in favor upon the Continent. Meanwhile a discovery accidentally made had prepared the way not only for a change in the military system, but for political effects still more extensive. There seems little reason to doubt that gun- powder was introduced through the means of the Saracens into Europe. Its use in engines of war, though they may seem to have been rather like our fireworks than artillery, is mentioned by an Arabic writer in the Escurial collection about the year 1249. In the first part of the fourteenth century, cannon, or rather mortars, were invented, and the applicability of gunpowder to purposes of war was understood. But its use was still not very frequent; a circumstance which will surprise us less when we consider the un- scientific construction of artillery ; the slowness with which it could be loaded ; its stone balls, of uncertain aim and imperfect force, being commonly fired at a considerable elevation ; and especially the diffi- culty of removing it from place to place during an action. In sieges and in naval engagements, as for example, in the war of Chioggia, it was more frequently employed. Gradually, however, the new artifice of evil gained ground. The French made the principal im- provement. They cast their cannon smaller, placed them on lighter carriages, and used balls of iron. They invented portable arms for 256 ITALY 1411-1513 a single soldier, which, though clumsy in comparison with their pres- ent state, gave an augury of a prodigious revolution in the military art. John, Duke of Burgundy, in 141 1, had 4000 hand-cannons, as they were called, in his army. They are found, under different names and modifications of form, in most of the wars that historians of the fifteenth century record, but less in Italy than beyond the Alps. The Milanese, in 1449, are said to have armed their militia with 20,000 muskets, which struck terror into the old generals. But these muskets, supported on a rest, and charged with great delay, did less execution than our sanguinary science would require; and, uncombined with the admirable invention of the bayonet, could not in any degree resist a charge of cavalry. The pike had a greater tendency to subvert the military system of the Middle Ages, and to demonstrate the efficiency of disciplined infantry. Two free nations had already discomfited, by the help of such infantry, those arrogant knights on whom the fate of battles had depended the Bohemians, instructed in the art of war by their great master, John Zisca; and the Swiss, who, after winning their independence inch by inch from the house of Austria, had lately established their renown by a splen- did victory over Charles of Burgundy. Louis XI. took a body of mercenaries from the United Cantons into pay. Maximilian had recourse to the same assistance. And though the importance of in- fantry was not, perhaps, decidedly established till the Milanese wars of Louis XII. and Francis I., in the sixteenth century, yet the last years of the Middle Ages indicated the commencement of that military revolution in the general employment of pikemen and musketeers. Chapter XXXIV NAPLES AND FLORENCE. 1282-1494 I HAVE not alluded for some time to the domestic history of a kingdom which bore a considerable part, during the four- teenth and fifteenth centuries, in the general combinations of Italian policy, not wishing to interrupt the reader's attention by too frequent transitions. We must return again to a more remote age in order to take up the history of Naples. Charles of Anjou, after the deaths of Manfred and Conradin had left him without a com- petitor, might be ranked in the first class of -European sovereigns. Master of Provence and Naples, and at the head of the Guelph fac- tion in Italy, he had already prepared a formidable attack on the Greek Empire, when a memorable revolution in Sicily brought humiliation on his latter years. John of Procida, a Neapolitan, whose patrimony had been confiscated for his adherence to the party of Manfred, retained, during long years of exile, an implacable resent- ment against the house of Anjou. Sicily was now treated as a con- quered country. A large body of French soldiers garrisoned the for- tified towns, and the systematic oppression was aggravated by those insults upon the honor of families which are most intolerable to an Italian temperament. John of Procida was for long regarded as the prime mover of the revolution of 1282, and is represented as visiting the Pope, the Eastern Emperor, the King of Aragon, and others, all with the object of expelling the hated Angevins; but now his part, though just what it was remains somewhat in doubt, is less emphasized and it is realized that the causes of the revolution were deep-seated in Sicily itself, needing only an occasion to break out. Finally an outrage committed upon a lady at Palermo, during a pro- cession on the vigil of Easter, provoked the people to that terrible massacre of all the French in their island which has obtained the name of the Sicilian Vespers. Unpremeditated as such an ebullition of popular fury must appear, it fell in, by the happiest coincidence, with the previous indications of discontent. The King of Aragon's 257 258 ITALY 1282-1305 fleet was at hand; the Sicilians soon called in his assistance; he sailed to Palermo, and accepted the crown in 1282. The long war that ensued upon this revolution involved or in- terested the greater part of civilized Europe. Philip III. of France adhered to his uncle, and the King of Aragon was compelled to fight for Sicily within his native dominions. This, indeed, was the more vulnerable point of attack. Upon the sea he was supreme. His Catalans, the most intrepid of Mediterranean sailors, were led to victory by a Calabrian refugee, Roger di Loria, the most illustrious and successful admiral whom Europe produced till the age of Blake and De Ruyter. In one of Loria's battles the eldest son of the King of Naples was made prisoner, and the first years of his own reign were spent in confinement. But notwithstanding these advantages, it was found impracticable for Aragon to contend against the arms of France, and latterly of Castile, sustained by the rolling thunders of the Vatican. Peter III. had bequeathed Sicily to his second son, James; Alfonso, the eldest, King of Aragon, could not fairly be ex- pected to ruin his inheritance for his brother's cause; nor were the barons of that free country disposed to carry on a war without na- tional objects. He made peace, accordingly, in 1295, and engaged to withdraw all his subjects from the Sicilian service. Upon his own death, which followed very soon, James succeeded to the king- dom of Aragon, and ratified the renunciation of Sicily. But the natives of that island had received too deeply the spirit of independ- ence to be thus assigned over by the letter of a treaty. After sol- emnly abjuring, by their ambassadors, their allegiance to the King of Aragon, they placed the crown upon the head of his brother, Frederick. They maintained the war against Charles II. of Naples, against James of Aragon, their former king, who had bound himself to enforce their submission, and even against the great Roger di Loria, who, upon some discontent with Frederick, deserted their banner, and entered into the Neapolitan service. Peace was at length made in 1300, upon condition that Frederick should retain during his life the kingdom of Sicily, which was afterward to re- vert to the crown of Naples : a condition not likely to be fulfilled. In fact the two kingdoms remained distinct till the middle of the fif- teenth century. Upon the death of Charles II., King of Naples, in 1305, a ques- tion arose as to the succession. His eldest son, Charles Martel, had been called by maternal inheritance to the throne of Hungary, and NAPLES AND FLORENCE 259 KINGS OF NAPLES OF THE HOUSE OF ANJOU. Charles I. of Anjou, son of Louis VIII., King of France, and brother of Louis IX., King of France, becomes King of Naples and Sicily, 1265 a. d. Loses Sicily, 1283, d. 1285. Charles II., m. daughter of King of Hungary, 1285-1305. Charles Martel King of Hungary d. 1296. Carobert King of Hungary d. 1342. I. Louis King of Hungary Andrew . Joanna I. strangled I34S- I Robert, I305-I343- Charles. Duke of Calabria, d. 1328. Joanna I., 1. Andrew of Hungary, and other husbands, 1343-1378. John, Duke of Durazzo. Charles. Duke of Durazzo. I Margaret, Charles III. King of Naples. Louis. Charles III., king 1382-1386. m. Margaret of Durazzo. Ladislaus, King of Naples, 1386-1414. Joanna II., 1414-1435. KINGS OF SICILY OF THE HOUSE OF ARAGON. Peter III. (King of Aragon), m. Constance, daughter of Manfred of Suabia and becomes King of Sicily after the Sicilian Vespers, 1283 a. d., d. 1285. Alfonso III., King of Aragon. James II., King of Aragon. and King of Sicily, of Charles II., abdicates in favor King of Naples, 1295. Frederick I., elected King of Sicily, 1 296- 1 336. Peter II., King of Sicily, I336-I342- Louis, King of Sicily, I342-I355. Frederick II., King of Sicily, 1355-1377- Maria, Queen of Sicily, 1377-1402. m. Martin, Prince of Aragon. TITULAR KINGS OF NAPLES OF THE SECOND HOUSE OF ANJOU. Louis I., Duke of Anjou, son of John, King of France, and uncle of Charles VL, King of France, was adopted by Joanna I. as of Louis II., King of Naples, d. 1384. Titular King of Naples, 1 384-14 1 7- Louis III., Titular King of Naples, 1417-1434. Regnier, Titular King of Naples, 1 434- 1 480. 260 ITALY 1305-1352 had left at his decease a son, Carobert, the reigning sovereign of that country. According to the laws of representative succession, which were at this time tolerably settled in private inheritance, the crown of Naples ought to have regularly devolved upon that prince. But it was contested by his uncle, Robert, eldest living son of Charles IT., and the cause was pleaded by civilians at Avignon before Pope Clement V., the feudal superior of the Neapolitan kingdom. Rea- sons of public utility, rather than of legal analogy, seem to have prevailed in the decision which was made in favor of Robert. The course of his reign evinced the wisdom of this determination. Robert, a wise and active, though not personally a martial prince, maintained the ascendency of the Guelph faction, and the papal in- fluence connected with it, against the formidable combination of Ghibelline usurpers in Lombardy, and the two emperors, Henry VII. and Louis of Bavaria. No male issue survived Robert, whose crown descended to his granddaughter Joanna. She had been espoused, while a child, to her cousin Andrew, son of Carobert, King of Hungary, who was educated with her in the court of Naples. Aus- piciously contrived as this union might seem to silence a subsisting claim upon the kingdom, it proved eventually the source of civil war and calamity for 150 years. Andrew's manners were barbarous, more worthy of his native country than of that polished court wherein he had been bred. He gave himself up to the society of Hungarians, who taught him to believe that a matrimonial crown and derivative royalty were derogatory to a prince who claimed by a paramount hereditary right. In fact, he was pressing the court of Avignon to permit his own coronation, which would have placed in a very hazardous condition the rights of the queen, with whom he was living on ill terms, when one night he was seized, strangled, and thrown out of a window. Public rumor, in the absence of no- torious proof, imputed the guilt of this mysterious assassination to Joanna. Whether historians are authorized to assume her partici- pation in it so confidently as they have generally done, may per- haps be doubted ; but the circumstances of Andrew's death were undoubtedly pregnant with strong suspicion. Louis, King of Hun- gary, his brother, a just and stern prince, invaded Naples, partly as an avenger, partly as a conquerer. The queen and her second husband, Louis of Tarentum, fled to Provence, where her acquittal, after a solemn investigation, was pronounced by Clement VI. Louis, meanwhile, found it more difficult to retain than to NAPLES AND FLORENCE 261 1352-1386 acquire the kingdom of Naples; his own dominion required his presence; and Joanna soon recovered her crown. She reigned for thirty years more without the attack of any enemy, but not inter- meddling, like her progenitors, in the general concerns of Italy. Childless by four husbands, the succession of Joanna began to excite ambitious speculations. Of all the male descendants of Charles I. none remained but the King of Hungary, and Charles, Duke of Durazzo, who had married the queen's niece, and was regarded by her as the presumptive heir to the crown. But, offended by her marriage with Otho of Brunswick, he procured the assistance of a Hungarian army to invade the kingdom, and, getting the queen into his power, took possession of the throne. In this enterprise he was seconded by Urban VI., against whom Joanna had unfortunately declared in the great schism of the Church. She was smothered with a pillow, in prison, by the order of Charles. In the extremity of Joanna's distress she had sought assist- ance from a quarter too remote to afford it in time for her relief. She adopted Louis, Duke of Anjou, eldest uncle of the young King of France, Charles VI., as her heir in the kingdom of Naples and county of Provence. This bequest took effect without difficulty in the latter country. Naples was entirely in the possession of Charles of Durazzo. Louis, however, entered Italy with a very large army, consisting of at least 30,000 cavalry, and, according to some writers, more than double that number. He was joined by many Neapolitan barons attached to the late queen. But, by a fate not unusual is so imperfect a state of military science, their armament produced no adequate effect, and moldered away through disease and want of provisions. Louis himself dying not long afterward, the government of Charles III. appeared secure, and he was tempted to accept an offer of the crown of Hungary. This enterprise, equally unjust and injudicious, terminated in his assassination. Ladislaus, his son, a child ten years old, suc- ceeded to the throne of Naples, under the guardianship of his mother, Margaret, whose exactions of money producing discontent, the party which had supported the late Duke of Anjou became powerful enough to call in his son. Louis II., as he was called, reigned at Naples, and possessed most part of the kingdom for several years; the young King Ladislaus, who retained some of the northern provinces, fixing his residence at Gaeta. If Louis had prosecuted the war with activity, it seems probable that he 262 ITALY 1386-1435 would have subdued his adversary. But his character was not very energetic; and Ladislaus, as he advanced to manhood, dis- playing many superior qualities, gained ground by degrees, till the Angevin barons, perceiving the turn of the tide, came over to his banner, and he recovered his whole dominions. The kingdom of Naples, at the close of the fourteenth cen- tury, was still altogether a feudal government. This had been in- troduced by the first Norman kings, and the system had rather been strengthened than impaired under the Angevin line. The princes of the blood, who were at one time numerous, obtained extensive domains by way of appanage. The principality of Tarentum was a large portion of the kingdom. The rest was occupied by some great families, whose strength, as well as pride, was shown in the number of men-at-arms whom they could muster under their banner. After thoroughly establishing his government at home, Ladislaus directed his powerful resources toward foreign conquests. The ecclesiastical territories had never been secure from rebellion or usurpation ; but legitimate sovereigns had hitherto respected the patrimony of the head of the church. It was reserved for Ladislaus, a feudal vassal of the Holy See, to seize upon Rome itself as his spoil. For several years, while the disordered state of the church, in consequence of the schism and the means taken to extinguish it, gave him an opportu- nity, the King of Naples occupied a great part of the papal terri- tories. He was disposed to have carried his arms farther north, and attacked the republic of Florence, if not the states of Lombardy, when his death relieved Italy of this new tyranny. An elder sister, Joanna II., reigned at Naples after Ladislaus. Under this queen, destitute of courage and understanding, and the slave of appetites which her age rendered doubly disgraceful, the kingdom relapsed into that state of anarchy from which its late sovereign had rescued it. She adopted first, as her heir and suc- cessor, Alfonso, King of Aragon and Sicily, but subsequently re- voked her adoption, and substituted in his room another, Louis of Anjou, third in descent of that unsuccessful dynasty. Upon his death, the queen, who did not long survive him, settled the king- dom on his brother Regnier. The Neapolitans were generally dis- posed to execute this bequest. But Regnier was unluckily at that time a prisoner to the Duke of Burgundy, and though his wife maintained the cause with great spirit, it was difficult for her, or even for himself, to contend against the King of Aragon, who NAPLES AND FLORENCE 263 1435-1450 immediately laid claim to the kingdom. After a contest of sev- eral years, Regnier, having experienced the treacherous and selfish abandonment of his friends, yielded the game to his adversary; and Alfonso founded the Aragonese line of sovereigns at Naples, deriving pretensions more splendid than just from Manfred, from the house of Suabia, and from Roger Guiscard. Sicily, after the reign of its deliverer, Frederick I., had un- fortunately devolved upon weak or infant princes. The marriage of Maria, Queen of Sicily, with Martin, son of the King of Ara- gon, put an end to the national independence of her country. Dying without issue, she left the crown to her husband. This was consonant, perhaps, to the received law of some European king- doms. But, upon the death of Martin, in 1409, his father, also named Martin, King of Aragon, took possession as heir to his son, without any election by the Sicilian Parliament. Thus was Sicily united to the crown of Aragon. Alfonso now enjoyed the three crowns of Aragon, Sicily, and Naples. In the first year of Alfonso's Neapolitan war he was defeated and taken prisoner by a fleet of the Genoese, who, as constant ene- mies of the Catalans in all the naval warfare of the Mediterranean, had willingly lent their aid to the Angevin party. Genoa was at this time subject to Filippo Maria, Duke of Milan, and her royal captive was transmitted to his court. But here the brilliant graces of Alfonso's character won over his conqueror, who had no reason to consider the war as his own concern. The king persuaded him, on the contrary, that a strict alliance with an Aragonese dynasty in Naples against the pretensions of any French claimant would be the true policy and best security of Milan. In the words of Machiavelli : * " Alfonso was a man of great sagacity, and as soon as an opportunity presented itself of communicating with Filippo, he proved to him how completely he contravened his own interests, by favoring Rene (Regnier) and opposing himself; for it would be the business of the former, on becoming King of Naples, to introduce the French into Milan." That city, which he had entered as a prisoner, he left as a friend and ally. From this time Filippo Maria Visconti and Alfonso were firmly united in their Italian politics and formed one weight of the balance which the republics of Venice and Florence kept in equipoise. After the succession of Sforza to the duchy of Milan the same alliance was generally preserved. Sforza had still more power- 1 Machiavelli, " History of Florence," p. 210. 264 ITALY 1450-1458 ful reasons than his predecessors for excluding the French from Italy, his own title being contested by the Duke of Orleans, who derived a claim from his mother Valentina, a daughter of Gian Galeazzo Visconti. But the two republics were no longer disposed toward war. Florence had spent a great deal without any ad- vantage in her contest with Filippo Maria ; and the new Duke of Milan had been the constant personal friend of Cosmo de' Medici, who altogether influenced that republic. At Venice, indeed, he had been at first regarded with very different sentiments ; the Sen- ate had prolonged their war against Milan with redoubled animos- ity after his elevation, deeming him a not less ambitious and more formidable neighbor than the Visconti. But they were deceived in the character of Sforza. Conscious that he had reached an emi- nence beyond his early hopes, he had no care but to secure for his family the possession of Milan, without disturbing the balance of Lombardy. Venice had little reason to expect further conquests in Lombardy; and if her ambition had inspired the hope of them, she was summoned by a stronger call, that of self-preservation, to defend her numerous and dispersed possessions in the Levant against the arms of Mohammed II. All Italy, indeed, felt the peril that impended from that side ; and these various motions occasioned a quadruple league in 1455, between the King of Naples, the Duke of Milan, and the two republics, for the preservation of peace in Italy. One object of this alliance, and the prevailing object with Alfonso, was the implied guaranty of his succession in the king- dom of Naples to his illegitimate son Ferdinand. He had no law- ful issue, and there seemed no reason why an acquisition of his own valor should pass against his will to collateral heirs. The Pope, as feudal superior of the kingdom, and the Neapolitan Par- liament, the sole competent tribunal, confirmed the inheritance of Ferdinand. Alfonso, surnamed the Magnanimous, was by far the most ac- complished sovereign whom the fifteenth century produced in Italy. The virtues of chivalry were combined in him with the patronage of letters, and with more than their patronage, a real enthusiasm for learning, seldom found in a king, and especially in one so active and ambitious. This devotion to literature was, among the Italians of that age, almost as sure a passport to general admiration as his most chivalrous perfection. Magnificence in architecture and the pageantry of a splendid court gave fresh luster to his reign. The NAPLES AND FLORENCE 265 1458-1476 Neapolitan perceived with grateful pride that he lived almost en- tirely among them, in preference to his patrimonial kingdom; and forgave the heavy taxes which faults nearly allied to his virtues, profuseness and ambition, compelled him to impose. But they remarked a very different character in his son. Ferdinand was as dark and vindictive as his father was affable and generous. The barons, who had many opportunities of ascertaining his disposition, began immediately upon Alfonso's death to cabal against his suc- cession, turning their eyes first to the legitimate branch of the family, and on finding that prospect not favorable, to John, titular Duke of Calabria, son of Regnier of Anjou, who survived to pro- test against the revolution that had dethroned him. John was easily prevailed upon to undertake an invasion of Naples, but he under- went the fate that had always attended his family in their long competition for that throne. After some brilliant successes, his want of resources, aggravated by the defection of Genoa, on whose ancient enmity of the house of Aragon he had relied, was perceived by the barons of his party, who, according to the practice of their ancestors, returned one by one to the allegiance of Ferdinand. The peace of Italy was little disturbed, except by a few do- mestic revolutions, for several years after this Neapolitan war. Even the most short-sighted politicians were sometimes withdrawn from selfish objects by the appalling progress of the Turks, though there was not energy enough in their councils to form any concerted plans for their own security. Venice maintained a long but un- successful contest with Mohammed II. for her maritime acquisi- tions in Greece and Albania ; and it was not till after his death re- lieved Italy from its immediate terror that the ambitious republic endeavored to extend its territories by encroaching on the house of Este. Nor had Milan shown much disposition toward aggran- dizement. Franceso Sforza had been succeeded such is the con- dition of despotic governments by his son Galeazzo, a tyrant more execrable than the worst of the Visconti. Flis extreme cruelties, and the insolence of a debauchery that gloried in the public dis- honor of families, excited a few daring spirits to assassinate him. The Milanese profited by a tyrannicide the perpetrators of which they had not courage or gratitude to protect. The regency of Bonne of Savoy, mother of the infant Duke Gian Galeazzo, de- served the praise of wisdom and moderation. But it was over- thrown in a few years by Ludovico Sforza, surnamed the Moor, her 266 ITALY 1382-1432 husband's brother, who, while he proclaimed his nephew's majority, and affected to treat him as a sovereign, hardly disguised in his con- duct toward foreign states that he had usurped for himself the sole direction of government. The annals of one of the few surviving republics, that of Genoa, present to us, during the fifteenth as well as the preceding century, an unceasing series of revolutions, the shortest enumeration of which would occupy several pages. Florence, the most illustrious and fortunate of Italian repub- lics, was now rapidly descending from her rank among free com- monwealths, though surrounded with more than usual luster in the eyes of Europe. We must take up the story of that city from the revolution of 1382, which restored the ancient Guelph aris- tocracy, or party of the Albizi, to the ascendency of which a popu- lar insurrection had stripped them. Fifty years elapsed during which this party retained the government in its own hands with NAPLES AND FLORENCE 267 1432-1433 few attempts at disturbance. Their principal adversaries had been exiled, according to the invariable and perhaps necessary custom of a republic; the populace and inferior artisans were dispirited by their ill-success. But, while crushing with deliberate severity their avowed adversaries, the ruling party had left one family whose prudence gave no reasonable excuse for persecuting them, and whose popularity, as well as wealth, rendered the experiment haz- ardous. The Medici were among the most considerable of the new or plebeian nobility. From the first years of the fourteenth century their name not very unfrequently occurs in the domestic and mili- tary annals of Florence. Throughout the long depression of the popular faction the house of Medici was always regarded as their consolation and their hope. That house was now represented by Giovanni, whose immense wealth, honorably acquired by commer- cial dealings, which had already rendered the name celebrated in Europe, was expended with liberality and magnificence. Of a mild temper, and averse to cabals, Giovanni de' Medici did not attempt to set up a party, and contented himself with repressing some fresh encroachments on the popular part of the constitution which the Albizi were disposed to make. They, in their turn, freely admitted him to that share in public councils to which he was entitled by his eminence and virtues : a proof that the spirit of their administra- tion was not illiberally exclusive. But. on the death of Giovanni, his son Cosmo de' Medici, inheriting his father's riches and esti- mation, with more talents and more ambition, thought it time to avail himself of the popularity belonging to his name. By exten- sive connections with the most eminent men in Italy, especially with Sforza, he came to be considered as the first citizen of Flor- ence. "Cosmo," says Machiavelli, "was one of the most prudent of men, of grave and courteous demeanor, extremely liberal and hu- mane. He never attempted anything against parties, or against rulers, but was bountiful to all, and by the unwearied generosity of his disposition made himself partisans of all ranks of the citizens." 2 The oligarchy were more than ever unpopular. Their administration since 1382 had indeed been in general eminently successful; the acquisition of Pisa and of other Tuscan cities had aggrandized the republic, while from the port of Leghorn her ships had begun to trade with Alexandria, and sometimes to con-tend with the Genoese. But an unprosperous war with Lucca diminished a reputation which was never sustained by public affection. Cosmo 2 Machiavelli, " History of Florence," p. 188. 268 ITALY 1433-1469 and his friends aggravated the errors of the government, which, having lost its wise and temperate leader, Nicola di Uzzano, had fallen into the rasher hands of Rinaldo degl' Albizi. He incurred the blame of being the first aggressor in a struggle which had be- come inevitable. Cosmo was arrested by command of a gonfal- onier devoted to the Albizi, and condemned to banishment (1433). But the oligarchy had done too much or too little. The city was full of his friends; the honors conferred upon him in his exile at- tested the sentiments of Italy. Next year he was recalled in tri- umph to Florence, and the Albizi were completely overthrown. It is vain to expect that a victorious faction will scruple to retaliate upon its enemies a still greater measure of injustice than it experienced at their hands. The Albizi had in general respected the legal forms of their free republic, which good citizens, and per- haps themselves might hope one day to see more effective. The Medici made all their government conducive to hereditary monarchy. A multitude of noble citizens were driven from their country ; some were even put to death. A balia 3 was appointed for ten years to exclude all the Albizi from magistracy, and for the. sake of this security to the ruling faction, to supersede the legitimate institu- tions of the republic. After the expiration of this period, the dic- tatorial power was renewed on pretense of fresh danger, and this was repeated constantly. Cosmo died at an advanced age, in 1464. His son, Piero de' Medici, though not deficient either in virtues or abilities, seemed too infirm in health for the administration of public affairs. A strong opposition was raised to the family preten- sions of the Medici. Like all Florentine factions, it trusted to violence ; and the chance of arms was not in its favor. From this revolution in 1466, when some of the most considerable citizens were banished, we may date an acknowledged supremacy in the house of Medici, the chief of which nominated the regular magistrates, and drew to himself the whole conduct of the republic. The two sons of Piero, Lorenzo and Julian, especially the former, though young at their father's death, assumed, by the request of their friends, the reins of government (1469). It was impossible that, among a people who had so many recollections to attach to the name of liberty, among so many citizens whom their 8 A balia was a temporary delegation of sovereignty to a number, generally a considerable number of citizens, who during the period of their dictatorship named the magistrates, instead of drawing them by lot, and banished suspected individuals. ASSASSINATION OF JULIAN DE' MEDICI DURING HOLY MASS IN THE CATHEDRAL OF FLORENCE. BY THE ADHERENTS OF THE PAZZI FAMILY, 14/8 A. I). Painting by A. Zick NAPLES AND FLORENCE 269 1409-1492 ancient constitution invited to public trust, the control of a single family should excite no dissatisfaction. But, if the people's wish to resign their freedom gives a title to accept the government of a country, the Medici were no usurpers. That family never lost the affections of the populace. The cry of " Palle, Palle" (their armorial distinction) would at any time rouse the Florentines to defend the chosen patrons of the republic. If their substantial in- fluence could before be questioned, the conspiracy of the Pazzi, wherein Julian perished, excited an enthusiasm for the surviving brother that never ceased during his life. Nor was this anything unnatural, or any severe reproach to Florence. All around, in Lom- bardy and Romagna, the lamp of liberty had long since been ex- tinguished in blood. The freedom of Siena and Genoa was dearly purchased by revolutionary proscriptions ; that of Venice was only a name. The republic which had preserved longest, and with greatest purity, that vestal fire, had at least no relative degradation to fear in surrendering herself to Lorenzo de' Medici. I need not in this place expatiate upon what the name instantly suggests the patronage of science and art, and the constellation of scholars and poets, of architects and painters, whose reflected beams cast their radiance around his head. His political reputation, though far less durable, was in his own age as conspicuous as that which he acquired in the history of letters. Equally active and sagacious, he held his way through the varying combinations of Italian policy, always with credit, and generally with success. Florence, if not enriched, was, upon the whole aggrandized during his administra- tion, which was exposed to some severe storms from the unscrupu- lous adversaries, Sixtus IV. and Ferdinand of Naples, whom he was compelled to resist. As a patriot, indeed, we never can bestow upon Lorenzo de' Medici the meed of disinterested virtue. He com- pleted that subversion of the Florentine republic which his two immediate ancestors had so well prepared. The two councils, her regular legislature, he superseded by a permanent Senate of seventy persons, while the gonfalonier and priors became a mockery and pageant to keep up the illusion of liberty, were taught that in exer- cising a legitimate authority without the sanction of their prince a name now first heard at Florence they incurred the risk of punishment for their audacity. Even the total dilapidation of his commercial wealth was repaired at the cost of the state ; and the re- public disgracefully screened the bankruptcy of the Medici by her 270 ITALY 1492-1493 own. But compared with the statesmen of his age, we can reproach Lorenzo with no heinous crime. He had many enemies ; his descend- ants had many more ; but no unequivocal charge of treachery or assassination has been substantiated against his memory. So much was Lorenzo esteemed by his contemporaries that his premature death has frequently been considered as the cause of those unhappy revolutions that speedily ensued, and which his foresight would, it is imagined, have been able to prevent, an opinion which, whether founded in probability or otherwise, attests the common sentiment about his character ( 1492). " His skill, prudence, and fortune were acknowledged with admiration, not only by the princes of Italy, but by those of distant countries. . . . Nor was there ever in Florence, or even in Italy, one so celebrated for wisdom, or for whose loss such universal regret was felt. . . . The citizens and all the princes of Italy mourned for him and sent their ambas- sadors to Florence to condole with the city on that occasion." 4 If, indeed, Lorenzo de' Medici could not have changed the destinies of Italy, however premature his death may appear if we consider the ordinary duration of human existence, it must be admitted that for his own welfare, perhaps for his glory, he had lived out the full measure of his time. An age of new and uncom- mon revolutions was about to arise, among the earliest of which the temporary downfall of his family was to be reckoned. The long-contested succession of Naples was again to involve Italy in war. The ambition of strangers was once more to desolate her plains. Ferdinand, King of Naples, had reigned for thirty years after the discomfiture of his competitor with success and ability, but with a degree of ill faith as well as tyranny toward his sub- jects that rendered his government deservedly odious. His son Alfonso, whose succession seemed now near at hand, was still more marked by these vices than himself. Meanwhile, the pretensions of the house of An j oil had legally descended, after the death of old Regnier, to Regnier, Duke of Lorraine, his grandson by a daugh- ter, whose marriage into the house of Lorraine had, however, so displeased her father that he bequeathed his Neapolitan title, along with his real patrimony, the county of Provence, to a Count of Maine, by whose testament they became vested in the crown of France. Louis XL, while he took possession of Provence, gave himself no trouble about Naples. But Charles VIII., inheriting his father's ambition without that cool sagacity which restrained it in 4 Machiavelli, "History of Florence," p. 402. NAPLES AND FLORENCE 271 1493-1494 general from impracticable attempts, and far better circumstanced at home than Louis had ever been, was ripe for an expedition to vin- dicate his pretension upon Naples, or even for more extensive pro- jects. It was now two centuries since the kings of France had begun to aim, by intervals, at conquests in Italy. The long Eng- lish wars changed all views of the court of France to self-defense. But in the fifteenth century its plans of aggrandizement beyond the Alps began to revive. Several times, as I have mentioned, the republic of Genoa put itself under the dominion of France. The dukes of Savoy, possessing most part of Piedmont, and masters of the mountain passes, were, by birth, intermarriage, and habitual policy, completely dedicated to the French interests. Ludovico Sforza, who had usurped the guardianship of his nephew, the Duke of Milan, found, as that young man advanced to maturity, that one crime required to be completed by another. To depose and murder his ward was, however, a scheme that prudence, though not con- science, bade him hesitate to execute. He had rendered Ferdinand of Naples and Piero de' Medici, Lorenzo's heir, his decided ene- mies. A revolution at Milan would be the probable result of his continuing in usurpation. In these circumstances Ludovico Sforza excited the King of France to undertake the conquest of Naples. But in relieving himself from an immediate danger, Ludovico Sforza overlooked the consideration that the presumptive heir of the King of France claimed by an ancient title that principality of Milan which he was compassing by usurpation and murder. But neither Milan nor Naples was free from other claimants than France, nor was she reserved to enjoy unmolested the spoil of Italy. A louder and a louder strain of warlike dissonance will be heard from the banks of the Danube and from the Mediterranean Gulf. The dark and wily Ferdinand, the rash and lively Maximil- ian, are preparing to hasten into the lists ; the schemes of ambition are assuming a more comprehensive aspect, and the controversy of Neapolitan succession is to expand into the long rivalry between the houses of France and Austria. In 1494 Charles VIII. of France made his famous invasion of Italy and this date may serve as indi- cating the end of the Middle Ages, as it marks the beginning of international diplomacy among the nations of Europe. Before coming to this we must once more retrace our steps, to follow up the history of Savoy, and to describe briefly the Renaissance in Italy which fitly marks the transition from medieval to modern history. Chapter XXXV THE HOUSE OF SAVOY. 1000-1466 LITTLE has yet been said about the house of Savoy. The princes of this house have, however, taken so distinguished ~d a part in the affairs of Italy that it will be proper now to devote a chapter in order to explain the origin and rise of a family to which Italy owes her present position as a nation once more united under one single head. In the ninth century Savoy, having been conquered by Rudolph, King of Burgundy, became a part of that kingdom, to which was afterward added the whole valley of Aosta. But the scepter of Bur- gundy, having come in the year 993 into the hands of another Rudolph, surnamed the Idle (as being imbecile and incapable of governing), and he having died without issue, the kingdom of Burgundy became split up into many divisions. Thus, after the death of Rudolph, the dukes who had governed the various prov- inces in the name of the king constituted themselves independent sovereigns. Among these was one Humbert, called Biancamano (the white-handed), who was a duke of Switzerland, near the lake of Geneva, and at the same time had possession of Savoy and the valley of Aosta. He accordingly now began to exercise a sov- ereign rule over the states which he had already governed as an hereditary, though subordinate, prince, and this was the primary root of the royal house of Savoy. On the death of Humbert, he was succeeded by his eldest son, Amadeus I., and he dying without issue, the kingdom came into the hands of his brother Otho. Otho married Adelaide, Princess of Susa and Turin, and through her he gradually extended his dominions beyond the Alps into Italy. Being left early a widow, she brought up with pious care her sons Peter I. and Amadeus II., both of whom reigned one after the other, and both died before their mother. The inheritance then passed into the hands of Hum- bert II., surnamed the Strong, son of Amadeus II. Humbert II. had designed to accompany the crusades for the 272 HOUSE OF SAVOY 1103-1253 conquest of the Holy Land, but was hindered by various little wars which he had to wage in order to retain his patrimony. St. Anselm, a native of Aosta and Archbishop of Canterbury, addressed a let- ter to him, in which, after praising his hereditary devotion, he begged him to remember that the churches were not put under his hereditary dominion, but under his hereditary reverence and pro- tection. Humbert the Strong died in 1103, and the crown came into the hands of Amadeus III. while yet a child under the tutelage of his mother. He also, when grown up, followed the example of many other princes, and joined the crusades, moved to compassion by the lamentable state into which the holy places had fallen under the dominion of the Turks. As regards Amadeus, after many vain efforts he was obliged to return to his country, but having arrived at the Island of Cyprus, he was overtaken by sickness, and died at Nicosia, the capital of that island. The reign of his successor, Humbert III. (called the Saint), was rendered glorious by the Christian virtues which he practiced during the whole period of his life. He lived in the times of Fred- erick Barbarossa (1146-1188), and this emperor made havoc of the states belonging to him. But Humbert succeeded in regaining the cities and lands which the emperor had taken from him. This prince is always designated in history by the title of Humbert the Saint, and in 1838 he was solemnly canonized by the Pope. While the Guelph and Ghibelline factions were carrying on sanguinary wars against each other, the power of the dukes of Savoy went on consolidating, and Thomas I. (1 188-1233) embellished and fortified the city of Chambery, in order to give to his states a capital worthy of a prince, and made several territorial acquisitions. Apparently also he was the initiator of that policy of balancing between the great powers which geography rendered necessary and thanks to which the house of Savoy slowly grew stronger. Amadeus IV. succeeded him (1233-1253), and after a reign of twenty years full of adventure, died, leaving a son only eight years of age, named Boniface. At that time Asti was an inde- pendent city, and Turin was also governed in the same manner, although subject to the dukes of Savoy. A war had broken out between these two cities ; the army of Asti marched in full force upon Moncalieri, where they discomfited the allies of Boniface, and advanced to Turin, in which city they numbered many partisans. 274 ITALY 1253-1285 His uncle went out to oppose them, but was beaten, and had to take refuge in the city, where the party favorable to Asti took him and put him into prison. When the various sovereigns of Europe, and especially Pope Alexander IV., heard of this treatment, they endeavored to set him at liberty ; but soon after he died, in the year 1259. The tutelage of Boniface then devolved on his two uncles until his death, which happened in the year 1263. In 1233 the Emperor Frederick II. erected Chablais and Aosta into a duchy and thereafter the counts of Savoy became dukes. The only suzerain of Savoy was the emperor, and this in itself tended to give the Savoyard princes a certain distinction. The dukedom next came into the hands of his uncle Peter, named the Little Charlemagne, from his valor in arms, and his prudence in the government of the state. He made conquests chiefly in Savoy, Switzerland, and Provence. The greater part of the cities on the Italian side of the Alps were now held by his cousins, through an hereditary division of rights, while some of them were invaded by the forces of Asti, and others were in full rebellion; but notwithstanding all this, Peter kept hold of many places in Italy, especially the castles of Rivoli, Avigliana, and Susa. Peter's death took place in the year 1268, when he was suc- ceeded by Philip L, who suffered a miserable life of disease, aggra- vated by the cares of government. Dying at length without issue, he was succeeded by his nephew Amadeus V., surnamed " The Great," who already possessed a considerable territory in Pied- mont (1285-1323.) He had to carry on war against the Genevese and also against the state of Dauphigny, but the most important of his wars was that which he was engaged in against William, Mar- quis of Montferrat. The counts of Savoy had been much occu- pied in their own proper dominions on the west of the Alps, and owing to the great subdivisions of hereditary rights, the cousins possessed but little land and little power in Italy. W'illiam of Casale, capital of Montferrat, had in the meantime extended his conquests over Vercelli, Tortona, Alessandria, Alba, and Ivrea, even to the very neighborhood of Turin itself. But Genoa, Asti, Chieri, and Milan stood resolutely opposed to him, and invited Count * Amadeus to join their alliance. On this invitation he came 1 Although having the legal title of duke, after 1233, yet as Savoy was still a county, the heads of the house of Savoy continued for some time to be called " count." HOUSE OF SAVOY 275 1285-1343 over into Piedmont, and having conquered William, recovered many of the lands which had been lost, and added others to his principality. But now, being greatly occupied with the affairs of Savoy and Switzerland, and wishing to make an end of the protests of his nephew Philip, a treaty was signed between them to the following effect: Philip was to give up all pretensions in respect of Savoy and the dukedom of Aosta, while Amadeus was to resign Piedmont into his hands as a feudal possession, with exception of the valley of Susa. Philip accordingly transferred his court to Pinerolo, and soon after married Isabella, who brought him as a dowry the prin- cipality of Achaia in Greece. From her descended the whole branch of the princes of Achaia, cousins of the counts of Savoy, and holding feudal tenure from the states of Piedmont. Amadeus, notwithstanding the terms of this treaty, did not renounce the idea of making new conquests in Piedmont, and actually obtained Ivrea and the territory of Canova as a gift from the Emperor Henry III. He died in the year 1323. His eldest son Edward then assumed the reins of government, and signalized himself in many wars against the enemies of Savoy, and also in favor of the King of France, displaying a valor that shrank from no trial, but which often proved too rash and impetu- ous. Generous to excess, he was often reduced to great straits, and on this account was surnamed " The Liberal." He died in 1329 without male issue, so that he was succeeded by his brother Hsemon, who made great efforts to cancel the debts which Edward had left behind him. Hsemon died in 1343, leaving the state to his eldest son Amadeus, surnamed Count Verde. Amadeus VI., when only fourteen years of age, made his ap- pearance at a solemn tournament in Chambery to give proof of his prowess and dexterity. He was clothed all in green, a color which from that time he uniformly adopted, so that the people gave him the sobriquet of Count Verde, or the green knight. Of him Bel- giojoso says : " He was one of those men who are of suffi- cient ability to found the grandeur and the power of a sovereign family and of the territory confided to them." In Piedmont he kept up the war against the Count of Montferrat and the Prince of Achaia, and recovered many of the lands which they had pre- viously taken. He instituted the order of the Collar of Savoy, now known by the name of St. Annunziata, which consisted of 276 ITALY 1343-1383 fifteen knights, in honor of the fifteen mysteries of the Rosary. The most celebrated of his undertakings was an expedition to the East. John Pateologus, who was then emperor in Constantinople, was greatly harassed by the Turks, and obliged to form a league against them. Despairing of any other aid, he sent ambassadors to Pope Urban V., supplicating his assistance, and holding out to him the prospect of restoring unity between the Catholic Church in the East and in the West. The Pope, fearing the dangers which hung over the Christian faith by reason of the continual progress of the Turks, used every effort to induce the King of France, the King of Cyprus, the German emperor, and Amadeus V., as well as some other potentates, to unite their arms in driving back the Turks, already within a short distance of Constantinople. But he met with no success. One wanted men, another money, and others courage. Amadeus VI. was the only one who came to the help of the Greek Empire. For this purpose, he got together ships, borrowed money, assembled troops, and weighed anchor from Venice with his whole army, in the year 1366. But the Turks already possessed the city of Gallipoli, which commands the Dar- danelles. Amadeus, accordingly, prepared to attack it, and making a brave assault upon the walls, took it by force. His army was thus enabled to enter the straits and reach Constantinople, where he was at once hailed as a deliverer. To preserve the memory of this honorable expedition, a statue of the count was erected in bronze at Turin, in the year 1853, in front of the municipal palace, where he is represented raising his sword on high against the Bul- garians, and trampling those already fallen under his feet. On his arrival in Italy he had to draw the sword against the Visconti of Milan. The greater part of these Visconti had to employ force and exercise oppression to maintain their power, and Galeazzo Visconti collected together a large number of soldiers with the design of getting Montferrat under his dominion, it being a territory remarkable for its fertility and for the exquisite quality of its wine. Amadeus did not delay marching against him, and after several sanguinary encounters put the Milanese to flight, remaining thus the peaceful possessor of his states. At length, in the year 1383, this great warrior, having gone with two thousand soldiers to the assistance of Louis, and having arrived in the country of the Abruzzi, was seized with a severe malady, which in a few days ended his life. He was a good prince, HOUSE OF SAVOY 277 1383-1449 and his death was lamented by all. Already the house of Savoy had given evidence of its stability and of its powers of territorial expansion. Yet, situated as it was on the frontier with part of its lands outside Italy, it maintained an attitude of aloofness from many affairs in Italy. The last Count of Savoy was Amadeus VII., called Count Rosso (or the red count), a man endowed by nature with the high- est qualities, and a worthy descendant of Count Verde, his father. He gave great assistance to the King of France against the English and Dutch. The war between Louis of Anjou and Charles of Du- razzo, then master of the maritime country of Nice, still continued during his reign. But the inhabitants of Nice, tired of these inter- minable discords, decided to shake off the yoke and place their country henceforth under the paternal government of the counts of Savoy. Amadeus VIII. in 1416 received the title of Duke of Savoy and Chablais, from the emperor, as well as those of Marquis of Aosta and Italy and Count of Piedmont and of the territory of Geneva. This wise monarch, after having greatly enlarged his states, now bent his whole mind to the subject of legislation, and compiled a codex, known by the name of the " Statuta Siibandice," or Consti- tutions of Savoy. This codex is looked upon as a masterpiece, and gained for its author the surname of Solomon. But worldly pros- perity alone cannot satisfy the mind. Amadeus, fortunate in every enterprise, and conqueror over every enemy, wished also to conquer himself. In his desire to promote the glory of God, he renounced the throne in favor of his son Louis, retired to the convent of Ri- paglia, near Geneva, and, abandoning every earthly glory, clothed himself as a hermit to pass the rest of his days in solitary devotion. A curious circumstance, however, arose to disturb the quiet of his life. The Roman Catholic Church was at that time harassed by the quarrel between the Council of Basle and Pope Eugenius IV., with the result that the council deposed Eugenius and elected Duke Amadeus as Pope. Thus, after five years of a solitary life, he was induced by the desire of quieting the discords which agitated the church to accept the proffered charge, and was saluted as Pope under the name of Felix V. In the meantime Eugenius IV. died, and Nicolas V. being elected his successor, Felix spontaneously resigned, and so put an end to a state of things which caused great harm and great affliction to the Roman Catholic Church. Having 278 ITALY 1449-1466 called together another council of prelates, he laid down the insignia of office, renounced the pontificate, keeping only the title of cardinal and apostolic legate, and returned to his loved solitude of Ripaglia. Thus he passed another year and a half, always devoted to spiritual duties, and died peaceably in the year 145 1. The reign of his son Louis was less glorious than that of his father. He held the throne for fifteen years, and suffered much, both from his subjects and from his son Louis. Nevertheless, his name is still celebrated in history, as it was during his reign that the dukes of Savoy received the title of King of Cyprus, a title which they retained down to the nineteenth century. Chapter XXXVI THE ITALIAN RENAISSANCE IN one short chapter, which is all that can be devoted to the subject, it is futile to try to present even a resume of so vast a movement as the Renaissance ; * what will be attempted, there- fore, will be to touch upon certain aspects of the period, quoting freely from some of the foremost writers, hoping - that the reader will read further for himself, in the rich and voluminous literature of the subject. 2 In the first place, what was the Renaissance? Speaking broadly, we may begin by saying that it was the movement of transition by which the medieval world grew into the modern world. Man in 1300 was medieval; in 1500 he was modern. In this sense, the Renaissance embraces all those multi- form activities of the human mind which wrought so vast a change. Taken in a more concrete sense, the Renaissance means for one man the revival of learning, for another the revival of art, for a third the revival of science, for still another the great geographical discoveries in short, the definition depends on the man's particular field. The famous phrase of Michelet 3 describes it as " the dis- covery of the world and of man." To comprehend this we must first know something about medieval man and how greatly he differed from the modern more so than the modern man differs from the classical man. The Middle Ages were neither critical nor scientific, and perhaps the chief results of the work of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries was the renaissance of criticism and scientific methods, with the consequent development of individualism and revolt against authority. In the Middle Ages, moreover, it was thought wrong to enjoy art or nature in themselves. Petrarch, 1 See " The Renaissance " in the " Cambridge Modern History " series, planned by Lord Acton, vol. i., London, 1902. 2 See, in especial, Symonds's " Short History of the Renaissance " and Schaff's "The Renaissance." 3 Michelet, " Histoire de France!' vol. vii. 279 280 ITALY really the first man of the new life, was also the first, since classic days, to climb a hill in order to enjoy the view! After him the study of nature and of mankind was taken up with avidity, and from this pursuit we have a special field of the Renaissance called Humanism. " The reason why Italy took the lead in the Renaissance was that Italy possessed a language, a favorable climate, political free- dom, and commercial prosperity at a time when other nations were still semi-barbarous." 4 It was the creation of governments and the accumulation of wealth, with the concomitant of leisure, that gave the opportunity for the Renaissance. It was in Italy that commerce first began on a large scale after the " Dark Ages," and the growth of rich city states likewise. Such states, with " their intense stimulus to individual ambition, combined to emancipate the individual and to foster in him a belief in his own powers, and an independence of judgment and action necessary as a preliminary to the revival of learning." 5 When, as was soon the case, corruption reigned nearly supreme in Italy, the cause was not far to seek : " The fundamental vice of this character, i. e., the Italian in the Renaissance, was at the same time a condition of its greatness namely, excessive indi- vidualism." 6 Turning now to glance at some of the greatest names in our period, we come first of all to Dante. 7 " Dante, Petrarca, and Boc- caccio represent the birth and glory of Italian literature, and are the fathers of the revival of letters. . . . Dante, the poet, statesman, philosopher, and theologian, the first of Italian classics and the greatest of medieval poets, has given us in his ' Divine Com- edy/ conceived in 1300 ... a poetic view of the moral uni- verse under the aspect of eternity. . . . It is a mirror of medi- eval Christianity, and at the same time a work of universal signifi- cance and perennial interest. It connects the Middle Ages with the modern world." 8 Dante's ideas were largely medieval, and in fact his real contribution to the Renaissance was his use of the vernacu- lar; he may be said to have created a literary Italian language, forming it from the elements common to the various peninsular 4 Symonds, " Age of Despots," p. 4. 5 Adams, " Mediaeval Civilization," p. 373. 6 Burckhardt, "Die Kultur der Renaissance in Italien," vol. ii. p. 246. 7 See "Dante and His Time," by K. Federn, London, 1902; and also " Menschen u. Kutist der ital. Renaissance," R. Saitchick, Berlin, 1903. 8 Schaff, " The Renaissance," p. 13. ITALIAN RENAISSANCE 281 dialects. " Dante . . . was and remained the man who first thrust antiquity into the foreground of national culture. In the ' Divine Comedy ' he treats the ancient and Christian worlds, not indeed as of equal authority, but as parallel to one another." 9 With Petrarch, that is, before his death in 1374, we may say that the Renaissance, at least in so far as we mean the revival of learning - , was in full swing. " Petrarch, who lives in the memory of most people nowadays chiefly as a great Italian poet, owed his fame among his contemporaries rather to the fact that he was a kind of living representative of antiquity " is the comment of Burckhardt, the keen German critic. He had a passion for classi- cal life and ardently pursued the task of collecting MSS. He loved and admired nature and was critical and independent in his judg- ments; and we find him consciously attacking the medieval system in many of its branches, ridiculing the universities, the astrologers, and the schoolmen. Boccaccio, a contemporary and admirer of Petrarch, was only less famous than his master. He is now known principally as the author of the " Decameron?' which he would greatly have liked to expurgate before he died. " Dante is admired, Petrarch is praised, Boccaccio is read." " Nothing is more obvious to the student who has mastered the first difficulties caused by the intricacies of Italian history than the fact that all the mental force of the nation was generated in Tuscany, and radiated thence as from a center of vital heat and life over the rest of the peninsula. This is true of the revival of learning no less than of the fine arts and of the origin of science. From the republics of Tuscany, and from Florence 10 in particular, proceeded the impulse and the energy that led to fruitful results in all these departments." 8 In Florence there was not only a large class of keen-minded and well-to-do burghers, but also an active political life. Moreover, the party leaders devoted themselves to the encouragement of the Renaissance, even before the supremacy of the Medici family. The Medici are perhaps more celebrated from their connection with this aspect of affairs than from their political prominence. Cosmo de' Medici (1389-1464), "the father of his country," 9 Burckhardt, vol. ii. p. 285. 10 See K. Brandi, "Die Renaissance in Floretiz u. Rom," Leipsic, 1900. 11 Symonds, " Short History of the Renaissance in Italy," p. 162. 282 ITALY and in all but name the ruler of Florence, was a man of vast wealth with extensive commercial relations throughout the then trade world, and he utilized his position to further learning and science by acquiring the services of Greek scholars and foreign MSS. He was an eager buyer of books, and founded a famous library in Flor- ence. He showered attentions and pensions on savants, and a coterie of scholars grew up in Florence, later much increased by his grandson, Lorenzo il Magnifico (Aretino, Poggio, Gemisthus Ple- tho among others). " He was," says Schaff, " both the Rothschild and the Maecenas of his age. . . . Cosmo encouraged scholars by gifts of money and the purchase of MSS. without the air of con- descension which spoils the gift, but with the feeling of respect and gratitude for superior merit." His grandson, the famous Lo- renzo, 12 however, is more celebrated as a patron of the Renaissance (1449-1492). " He possessed one of those natures fitted to com- prehend all knowledge and to sympathize with the most diverse forms of life. While he never for a moment relaxed his grasp on politics, among philosophers he passed for a sage, among men of letters for an original and graceful poet, among scholars for a Gre- cian sensitive to every nicety of Attic idiom, among artists for an amateur gifted with refined discernment and consummate taste." 13 The foremost men at his court were Ficino, a religious philosopher and erudite Greek scholar; and Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, who seemed to possess all the talents and graces of mind and body, an eminent and dignified scholar whose knowledge was pro- digious. Shortly after the death of Lorenzo we come to the curious and interesting episode which is connected with the rule of the monk, Girolamo Savonarola. 14 He governed the city not as had the Medici, by wealth, corruption, and influence, but by the fiery passion of his eloquence. He called upon the pleasure-loving Flor- entines to reform their immoral lives, and so great was his power that for a time he actually maintained a sort of government. Though there is no doubt that he was justified in preaching against Pope Alexander VI., they soon came into conflict. By the pontiff he was ordered to cease preaching till the sedition excited by his 12 See E. Armstrong, "Lorenzo de' Medici," New York, 1002. ("Heroes of the Nations.") 13 Symonds, " Short History of the Renaissance," p. 174. 14 See A. Gobineau, "La Renaissance-Savonarola, C. Borgia, Jules II., Leon X., et M. Ange," Paris, 1877. ITALIAN RENAISSANCE 283 eloquence had quieted down. This the monk obstinately refused to do. He was then tried and found guilty of having published false prophecies, of being a heretic and an instigator of sedition. He was next given over to the secular authority, condemned to death and executed in May, 1498. The example of the Medici was followed by nearly all the other despots of the peninsula, including the Popes, foremost among them being Ferdinand I. of the two Sicilies, and the D'Este family of Ferrara, and even the corrupt tyrants such as the Malatesta of Rimini. Accompanying the growth of Humanism, but reaching its climax later, came the Renaissance of art, 15 at first classical in form and religious in spirit, and later wholly modern and largely pagan. " Not only was each department of the fine arts practiced with singular success, not only was the national genius to a very large extent absorbed by painting, sculpture, and architecture, but the aesthetic impulse was more subtly and widely diffused than this alone would imply." 16 Moreover, not only did aesthetic feeling express itself in creation; classical works of art were eagerly searched out and when found assigned places of honor in museums. About 1500, for example, the Laocoon, the Apollo Belvedere, and the torso of Hercules were brought to light. " As in ancient Greece, so also in Renaissance Italy, the fine arts assumed the first place in the intellectual culture of the nation. . . . Painting was the art of arts for Italy. . . . Whatever painting touched became by that touch human. . . . For the painters of the full Renais- sance, Roman martyrs and Olympian deities were alike burghers of one spiritual city, the city of the beautiful and human. . . . Having coordinated the Christian and pagan traditions in its work of beauty, painting could advance no farther." 1T From Cimabue to Giotto is like the transition from Dante to Petrarch. Painting started in the fourteenth century in the cities of Siena and Florence, with Cimabue and Duccio. Following them were Giotto, Andrea Orcagna, and Fra Angelico ; from these men the transition to Titian, Veronese, and Raphael is stupendous indeed, not alone in form, method, and technique, but in the motive ideas. 15 See " Hist, de la Renaissance artistique en Italic" by C. Blanc, Paris 1889, ii. 1G Symonds, " Short History of Renaissance," p. 214; see chap. xii. for a good summary of this subject. 17 Symonds, "The Fine Arts," pp. 22 and 25. 284 ITALY Michael Angelo, " in whom the Renaissance culminated," was painter, sculptor, architect, and master in all. He " made art the vehicle of lofty and soul-shaking thought." The sixteenth century painters will be referred to again later. Architecture is at the same time one of the most expressive of arts and one which early emerges " from barbarism in the service of religion and of civic life. In no way is the characteristic diversity of Italian communities so noticeable as in their buildings." Its early start is seen in the cathedral at Pisa, begun in 1063. The strength of classical influence is shown by the prevalence of Ro- manesque forms and in the slight hold of Gothic. Also there are traces of Oriental influence, with the notable illustration of St. Mark's. Probably the finest example of early Renaissance archi- tecture is the Duomo at Florence, planned by Brunelleschi. St. Peter's is a later development, for, though begun by Bramante, it was long in being completed. Like painting, architecture finally lost most of its original grandeur, and we have the hideous baroque forms. Niccolo Pisano may be called the father of Italian sculpture. The classic influence was even stronger than in painting, and the tendency to servile imitation was very powerful. After Pisano, other famous sculptors are Lorenzo Ghiberti, whose genius pro- duced the doors of the Baptistery at Florence, said by Michael An- gelo to be worthy to serve as doors to Paradise ; Donatello, sculptor of " David," and Benvenuto Cellini. The object of the Popes, after the Council of Constance, had failed in its attempt to impose a constitution on the papal monarchy, was to build up a state in Central Italy. With the end of the Middle Ages the Pope had lost his position as temporal head of Western Europe, attained by Innocent III., and became primarily a secular Italian prince, like many others, " with certain sacerdotal addi- tions." " The Pope was a king as well as a bishop. . . . With the rise of international politics and the beginning of the modern conflict of state with state for European supremacy . . . Italy was the first battleground of nations. It was the practically unoccupied piece of ground lying first at hand in which each hoped to gain some great advantage over the others. In this struggle of armies and diplomacy the Popes had an immediate and vital inter- est. They must enter into it on the same footing and with the same weapons as Austria and Spain, and this necessity of constantly ITALIAN RENAISSANCE 285 striving to preserve the independence of their little kingdom in the turmoil of European politics, or to recover it when lost, has been a controlling element in the papal policy down to the reign of Leo XIII. (and still is to-day), a perpetually harassing and dis- abling necessity, judged from the point of view of its religious position." 18 At the outset this worldly tendency was carried to great excess, and we have the singular spectacle of Alexander VI. (Borgia) in the Vatican, surrounded by his publicly acknowl- edged children Cesare, Lucrezia, etc. 19 It was such a spectacle and more directly the profound abuses which it implied, and the consequent impossibility of effecting, as was believed, any im- provement within the old church, that led in the sixteenth century to the Protestant revolution on the Continent and to the changes in, but not revolution of, the Anglican Church. A large part of Europe was thereby severed from the Catholic communion, and before the end of the sixteenth century the Roman Church had de- fined its dogmas at the Council of Trent, and the English Church had freed itself from the papal authority and taken its place as an independent branch of the Christian Church. " We find in the Popes of the period what has been already noticed in the despots; learning, the patronage of the arts, the passion for magnificence, and the refinements of polite culture, alternating and not infrequently combined with barbarous ferocity of temper, and with savage and coarse tastes." 20 Yet although it might seem that the Italians would have been the first to revolt as being the best informed of these matters, this was not the case, for there was but one Borgia, and though Protestantism gained some few adherents for a time, it never gained the masses, and while skepticism abounded in Italy, there was no general move- ment, and the end of the century saw an increased devotion to the Pope. As we have said, the Renaissance was the period when the medieval world was transformed into the modern one. During this time we have the growth and consolidation of national govern- ments, ruling over compact peoples, of national languages and liter- atures ; we have also many inventions and discoveries ; the printing 18 Adams, " Mediaeval Civilization," pp. 414-415. 19 See "Die Borgia u. ihre Zeit," by V. von Schubert-Soldern, Dresden, 1902, and " Les Borgias, Hist, du Pape Alexandre VI., de Cesar, et de Lucrcce Borgia," by L'Abbe Clement, Paris, 1882. 20 Symonds, " Short History of Renaissance," p. 56. 286 ITALY press and gunpowder; the discovery of the Cape of Good Hope and of America, etc. In so far as any exact date has value in marking the transition from one age to another, we may say that modern times began with the famous expedition of Charles VIII. of France in 1494, when, as De Commines has it, he conquered Italy with a " piece of chalk," and inaugurated thereby the Italian wars and modern diplomacy. PART III MODERN ITALY. 1494-1906 Chapter XXXVII LUDOVICO IL MORO AND THE FRENCH IN ITALY 1494-1515 FRANCESCO SFORZA had a long and glorious reign, dur- ing which he made himself both feared and honored by his subjects. At his death he left the ducal crown to his son Galeazzo Maria, who, after a dishonorable reign of ten years, was killed by three conspirators in 1476. He was succeeded by his son, Gian Galeazzo Maria, who was eight years of age. An uncle of the young prince (called Ludovico il Moro, in consequence of his dark skin) undertook to govern the Milanese until his nephew should be of an age to assume the reins. But Ludovico was ambitious and cruel. Jealous of seeing the title of duke borne by an infant, he formed the design of seizing the throne and ascending it himself; but knowing that the Milanese loved the prince in consequence of his youth and innocence, and would not tolerate such an injury, he sought to stir up troubles in Italy. Soon after the prince had come to a mature age, he made a secret proposal to the King of France, Charles VIII., to march to the conquest of Naples, to the throne of which Charles pretended to have certain rights, derived from the house of Anjou. The policy of Ludovico has been too greatly blamed, every Italian prince called in the foreigner when it suited his own plans. Charles accepted with pleasure the offer, so much the more as Ludovico promised to aid him in conquering that kingdom, now under the rule of a prince named Ferdinand I. In a short time a disciplined army of French, bringing with them cannon in great number, and led by Charles himself, made its appearance before the gates of Milan, where it was impatiently expected (1494). Ludovico had carpets and flowers strewn along the streets through which the monarch was to pass, and went him- self to meet him at the head of the chief lords of the court. Ludovico wished to prevent his nephew from holding any communication with Charles, and to this end kept him in a certain 289 290 ITALY 1494-1495 way prisoner in Pavia, where he now lay ill; but the king went himself to visit him, and the young duke took occasion to plead with him for himself and his children, the duchess at the same time throwing herself at his feet and beseeching him to have compas- sion on her unfortunate husband and the whole family. Charles, moved by her tears, raised her up kindly and promised not to abandon them. But the king was light-minded and eager for gold, and forgot his promise as soon as he had taken his departure. On the following day news was received that Gian Galeazzo was dead, poisoned by his uncle, who at the same moment proclaimed himself Duke of Milan. The King of France on his way to Naples had to pass through Tuscany. Here he encountered great difficulties, and if the valor- ous Lorenzi de' Medici had still been living, he would probably have been worsted. But his son Piero had now succeeded him, who, terrified by the cruelties which the French exercised, gave them a large sum of money and put them in possession of all the fortresses, for which act the people drove him from the city in disgust. Thus, then, the French entered Florence victoriously. The king had no sooner arrived than he called the chief citizens together and set before them hard conditions of peace. When the Floren- tines objected, Charles said : " I shall sound my trumpets," in reply to which one of the citizens answered : " And we shall sound our bells." Impressed by this reply Charles granted easier conditions, and left the town with a few subsidies only, but the Medici were not recalled. On arriving at Naples he seized upon the throne of Ferdinand almost without a contest (February, 1495) and made himself mas- ter of the country ; but the ill conduct of the French soldiers excited universal indignation. Many Italian princes, the Pope, the Vene- tians, Maximilian, King of Germany, Ferdinand the Catholic, nay, even Ludovico himself, for he now, owing to French success, feared that Louis, Duke of Orleans, would assert his claims to Milan, claims which he derived from his grandmother, Valentina Visconti, all made the League of Venice to chase the French out of Italy. Charles VIII., when he heard this resolution, set out imme- diately on his return to France. Arriving at Fornovo, he encoun- tered the army of the allies. A fierce battle was fought, which ended disastrously for the French, who suffered heavy losses. Even the king himself scarcely managed to cut his way through the enemy, THE FRENCH IN ITALY 291 1495-1504 with a part of his troops, as far as Asti, and thence to escape into France (1495). French conquests at once melted away. After these events things remained tranquil in Italy for some time, although the Italians had not learned from Charles's expedi- tion the need of union as they ought to have done, until another king of France, Louis XII., successor to Charles VIII. , again passed the Alps with a more formidable army, to avenge the losses of his predecessor, and also to make good his own claim to Milan. He advanced into Italy almost without opposition. The Duke of Savoy could have very well hindered him, but either fearing he had not sufficient forces, or wishing to preserve peace among his sub- jects, or perhaps because the King of France had promised him a portion of Lombardy, certain it is that he left the passes of the Alps free. Moreover, Ludovico il Moro had incurred the hatred of his subjects through his treatment of Gian Galeazzo, so that he vainly attempted to defend his dukedom. Venice and Pope Alex- ander VI. had allied with France, and Ludovico had not a single ally. He was taken prisoner by the French at Novara, just as he was in the act of slipping through the hands of the enemy in the disguise of a servant. Thus the city of Milan fell into the hands of the French, and Ludovico himself was sent into France in 1500. There he remained ten years in confinement and died in prison. Thus the prince who had first invited the French into Italy, and barbarously murdered his nephew in prison, finished his days in exile, and himself died a prisoner. The French held Milan till 1512. At this time arose and fell a power which rendered itself for a while formidable in Italy. Caesar Borgia, son of Pope Alexander VI. (1492-1503), better known under the name of Duke of Valen- tino, had deliberated how he could best put down the minor princes who held power within the states of the church. He had just suc- ceeded in overcoming them all, when, on the death of the Pope and the illness of the duke himself, the new government was dissolved, and the duke, after having been taken prisoner by Pope Julius II., escaped to Naples. Captured in this city, he was sent into Spain, and there died fighting for the King of Navarre. Meanwhile Louis of France carried on war for the conquest of Naples, where he now found Ferdinand of Spain as his rival. After a desperate struggle Louis was finally beaten and by 1504 Naples passed to Spain. At the time of which we are now speaking, Venice was still 292 ITALY 1504-1511 the most powerful republic of Italy, being always governed by the chief men, and never having fallen into the hands of despots, as was the case with the republics of Florence and Genoa. But just as a man surrounded with grandeur easily becomes a victim to pride, so the Venetians, trusting to their power, were eager to make themselves masters of many of the cities which belonged to other states. They took Rimini, Faenza, Cesena, and Ravenna, which had been hitherto in the possession of the Papal See; they occupied Dalmatia, which belonged to the patriarchate of Aquileia, and they took the island of Cyprus. Venice had thus completely changed her earlier character by acquiring large territories. So long as Italy was left to itself Venice was strong enough to hold her own. She was soon to rue her mistake in calling in the French. Still further, they had united themselves with the French in making war upon Ludovico, on the agreement that part of Lombardy should be ceded to them. In a word, the Venetians threatened to extend their dominion so far as to arouse the jealousy of the other Italian states, appropriating to themselves many cities, districts, and provinces which belonged to others. For this reason, the principal potentates of Europe, the Emperor of Germany and the King of France, the King of Spain and Pope Julius II., together with the Florentines, the dukes of Mantua, of Ferrara, and of Savoy, all united in form- ing a league, and made an agreement to support each other in fight- ing against the Venetians with their united forces. The place where this agreement was signed with Cambrai (1508), in the Neth- erlands, from which circumstance it was called the Treaty of Cambrai. The Venetians, however, were not cast down when they saw themselves assailed by the forces of well-nigh the whole of Europe. Bartholomew Alviano, the general of the republic, discomfited the Germans, and went out to meet the French army led by Louis XII. The two armies met at Agnadello, a village of the Milanese near the River Adda (1509). The battle was sanguinary, but the Vene- tians were beaten. Several of the Lombard cities accordingly sub- mitted to the French, and the cities of the Romagna opened their gates to their former master, the Pope, while Apulia gave itself up to the Spanish. The French, abusing their victory, instead of relieving the Italians, only became their oppressors, robbing, killing, and sacking THE FRENCH IN ITALY 293 1511-1514 their houses. The Pope, having - recovered his lands, feeling, too, that the French were getting too strong, detached himself from the league of Cambrai, and in conjunction with the King- of Spain and some other Italian princes joined with the Venetians in the so-called Holy League (1511) against the French, who had become the common enemies of all. After various partial attacks, they came to a pitched battle near the gates of Ravenna. The French, after having suffered other losses, together with that of their gen- eral, Gaston de Fois, finally gained indeed the victory, but without reaping any real advantage ; whereas the Duke of Milan, Maximil- ian Sforza, son of Ludovico il Moro, aided by 20,000 Swiss, drove the French entirely out of Lombardy. In the meantime, the French having received new reinforcements, and the Venetians new allies, the Duke of Milan and his Swiss troops were obliged to shut them- selves up in Novara, where they were closely besieged. The Swiss were mercenaries, and fought for whoever would give them the best pay; but they were courageous, and performed prodigies of valor when they found themselves in face of the enemy. Seeing themselves thus besieged, a small detachment parted at midnight without horses or cannon, and marched silently up to the batteries of the enemy. These batteries were guarded by German soldiers, who had been enrolled into the French army. In the dead of the night the Swiss made a furious onslaught upon them, which was as furiously resisted. But in the end the Swiss made themselves masters of the artillery, and turned the fire against the French and Germans themselves, who fled in confusion across the Alps. In this way Novara was liberated, and Lombardy was again brought under the power of Maximilian Sforza in 15 13. But the French could not rest contentedly under this discom- fiture, and the successor of Louis XII., named Francis I., a bold and chivalric man, prepared a new army to recover Lombardy. On arriving, however, at the Alps, he found the most important passes all occupied by the Swiss, who boasted that they would perform great things against the French invaders. Then Giovanni Trivul- zio, a Milanese, who had served a long time in France and was well acquainted with the Alps, opened for them a passage by Mount Argentera, and descending by the valley of Stura, they arrived at Cuneo and Saluzzo, while the Swiss were guarding all the passes that led to Susa. Prospero Colonna, general of the Duke of Milan, was encamped 294 ITALY 1514-1515 quite unsuspiciously at Villafranca, near Saluzzo, and being sur- prised there by Trivulzio, was made prisoner together with his whole army. The allies then fell back upon Milan, and the king following in their rear, planted his camp near a village called Marignano, on the road to Lodi. Then the allies, thinking all delay dangerous, sallied forth from Milan and assailed the enemy. This unexpected assault gave the signal for a terrible conflict. For two whole days the fight was kept up on either side, and the night alone gave the armies some instants of repose. The battle of Marignano has been called a battle of giants, from the incredible efforts made by the two armies, which seemed to be so superior to the valor of ordinary men that the bravest French cavaliers, who had fought before at Agnadello, Ravenna, and Novara, declared that they had never seen the like before (15 15). THE FRENCH IN ITALY 295 1515 This victory, which remained at last with the French, cost the lives of 15,000 Swiss, and the relics of their army took refuge among the mountains, without the conquerors having the spirit to follow them, so exhausted were they by the fight. Some days after this splendid victory, which brought the Milanese under the power of France, Maximilian Sforza, finding it impossible to make head against the enemy, consented to evacuate the citadel of Milan, and gave himself up to the King of France. Francis, using his captive worthily, permitted him to retire to France, where he allowed him to enjoy liberty and an honorable rank as long as he lived. The battle of Marignano, justly celebrated for the valor shown by the French and the allies, was the last combat to which the league of Cambrai gave rise. A treaty of peace concluded between Fran- cis I. and Charles, successor of Ferdinand of Spain, and acceded to by the emperor in a small town of France called Noyon, put an end to the numberless calamities which the disagreement between the Pope and the Venetians had brought upon Italy for above eight years. This long and sanguinary strife produced in the end no other effect than that of giving over the Milanese for a brief time to the King of France, and restoring to the See of Rome the cities which had been wrested from it and the restoration of the Medici to Florence, which had a very important effect on Italian history. The kingdom of Naples still remained in the hands of the King of Spain; and Venice, whose prosperity and ambition had aroused the jealousy of so many sovereigns, continued to be one of the richest and most commercial republics in Europe. By means of its multi- tude of ships, of its rich arsenal, and its commercial activity, it was still enabled to import the productions of the East, and above all, its spices, and distribute them throughout the cities of Italy, Germany, and France. But already the discoveries by the Portu- guese of the route to India by the Cape of Good Hope had dealt an irreparable blow to the commerce of Venice. The Mediterranean ceased to be the center of trade, which now became oceanic. Chapter XXXVIII THE GOLDEN AGE OF LEO X. 1513-1521 SEEING that Italy had now become the scene of so many wars and such great disasters, one would naturally suppose that this beautiful country must again have fallen into barbarism similar to that which overwhelmed all Europe after the fall of the Roman Empire. Julius II. did not foresee that his successor on the papal throne would be a Medici, but on his death Giovanni de' Medici, a cardinal, only thirty-eight years old, was elected Pope as Leo X. (1513). He was pleasure-loving and represented the more superficial side of the Renaissance, but was a lover of mag- nificence and " dallied with literature and art." He was the son of Lorenzo the Magnificent. As he was a lover of learning, he encouraged artists and literary men with great liberality. A great number of famous men now arose, who rendered Italy illustrious by the fruits of their genius, and by those immortal works of art which to the present day excite our deepest admiration. This is the culmination of the Renaissance. It will be interesting accord- ingly to relate the life of some of the most celebrated personages who flourished in the age of Leo X., and we will commence with a mathematician of Brescia named Tartaglia the same man who has been so often introduced upon the stage in Italy. Young Tartaglia became as he grew up a studious and pro- foundly learned man the first man in Italy who, applying geometry to mechanics, revived these valuable sciences, which had so long languished throughout Europe, and which might have been lost had not the orphan of Brescia given new luster to them by his appli- cation and genius. Another man who reached the height of his fame at this time was Michael Angelo Buonarotti. He was born at Caprese, a village in Tuscany, of poor parents, who instructed their children in the art of working in silk and wool. Observing in Michael Angelo a particular aptitude for study, he was sent to school. Following this bent, he spent a great deal of time in sketching on paper figures 29G MICHAEL ANGELO BUOXAROTTI " The Man with Four Souls " (Born 1475. Died 1564) Ideal portrait based on one in the Ufizzi, Florence AGEOFLEOX. 297 1513-1521 of men, animals, and houses. His father at length, willing to en- courage the genius of his son, resolved to send him to Florence to study painting under a master called Ghirlandaio, the most cele- brated artist of the day. The scholar made such progess that the master himself was astonished. One day, Ghirlandaio being absent, Michael Angelo drew after nature the scaffolding upon which the painters stand to work, with the stools and instruments of art all complete. The master on his return, seeing the sketch, was as- tounded at the perfect imitation, and said, " This lad cannot learn much more from me ! " The first work which brought Michael Angelo into notice was a painting which represented the devil tempting St. Anthony. A little time after he was employed to copy a head from an old master, and Michael Angelo managed to copy it so exactly that he in a joke returned the copy to the owner as though it had been the original, and no one was aware of the deception. The great ability and extraordinary genius of Michael Angelo were soon spoken of in all parts of Italy, and at the age of only fifteen Lorenzo the Mag- nificent received him into his house, providing for him as though he had been his own son. About this time the predecessor of Pope Leo, Julius II., desir- ing to make Rome the finest city in the world, as it was already the most celebrated, determined to raise a structure of surpassing grandeur. For this purpose he invited a celebrated Florentine ar- chitect to Rome, called Bramante, and gave him the order to build near the Vatican, a basilica of such magnificence that it should be considered the vastest and grandest monument in the world. While Bramante was executing the orders of the Pope, and directing the works at the Vatican, it became evident that his advanced age would never give him time to terminate the under- taking, and he therefore begged the Pope to invite Buonarotti to Rome. As the Pope was disposed to value very highly the great merit of the youth, he instructed him to commence a mausoleum for himself ; and at the same time Michael Angelo set about painting several pictures on the walls of the papal chapel, since termed the Sistine Chapel, from the name of Pope Sixtus, by whom it was erected. He ornamented also the grand roof of the chapel with pictures taken from the Bible, and made a bronze statue of the Pope, in pontifical dress, which Julius II. presented to the city of Bologna, of which he was a native. 298 ITALY 1513-1521 While Bramante and his companion, Buonarotti, were carry- ing on their works at Rome, another artist, a man endowed with extraordinary genius, named Leonardo da Vinci, was flourishing at Milan. Leonardo da Vinci (so called because born at the castle of Vinci in Tuscany) was a poet, a painter, a geometrician, a mechan- ician, and a musician ; at the same time, he was skillful in all bodily exercises, was able to tame the wildest horses, and could make mar- ble statues as well as paint pictures in the liveliest colors. On ac- count of these rare endowments Leonardo da Vinci was sought for by all the princes of Italy. Julius II. had no rest until he had in- duced him to come to Rome to employ his genius in embellishing the Vatican, which Bramante was then engaged in repairing. He continued his labors at Rome throughout nearly the whole pontifi- cate of Leo X. ; but some differences having arisen between him and Buonarotti, he left Rome and went to France, where he knew that the king held him in great esteem. On his arrival in Paris he was honorably received by the sovereign, Francis I., and lived there to an honored old age. He died at the age of sixty-seven, with the renown of being the first to make the marvelous products of Italian genius known and honored by the French. When Buonarotti had finished the paintings in the Vatican palace, he gave his whole mind to the construction of the Roman basilica. The Emperor Constantine had as early as the year 324 raised a church in Rome in honor of the chief of the apostles. When this church was falling into ruins, Pope Nicholas V., about the middle of the fifteenth century, had it demolished and began to build another. On his death, Julius II. (about the beginning of the sixteenth century) conceived the idea of a grander structure, and appointed Bramante to carry it out. The works progressed under the pontificate of Leo X. ; but under Paul III., Buonarotti changed in great part the design, and formed the conception of that immense and lofty cupola of St. Peter's which is now held in such universal admiration. This grand basilica, being of such vast proportions, so rich in marble work, paintings, statues, and monu- ments, executed in every variety of style, required more than two centuries to bring it to a full completion. It engaged the zeal of several Popes, and employed many architects, the first of whom were Bramante and Buonarotti; it engaged also the services of many painters and sculptors, so that it may truly be called the greatest temple in all Christendom. '*:Va3l LEONARDO DA VINCI {Born 1452 Died 15 19) Exact reproduction of a red crayon sketch by himself In the Royal Library, Turin AGEOFLEOX. 299 1513-1521 Among the celebrated men patronized by Leo X., we must mention Raphael Sanctius (Rafaele Sanzio), a native of Urbino, in the territory of Rome. While yet a youth he obtained the repu- tation of being one of the first artists of his age, and was therefore invited by the Pope to adorn the galleries which surround the court of the Vatican palace, called the court of St. Damaso. Raphael de- signed on paper more than one hundred scriptural subjects, and then by the aid of some of his best scholars he executed them as frescoes on the walls, thus producing works of art which are visited to the present day with admiration. Among the pictures painted by Raphael, the last and the most celebrated is the Trans- figuration. This picture, considered to be the finest in the world, was taken with many others by the French in 1797 and transported to Paris, but was restored to Rome after the year 18 14. The Pope, who often went to visit him during his illness, or- dered that the magnificent picture of the Transfiguration should be placed opposite the bed on which he was laid out. His death was bewailed as a public calamity. But these were not the only great men who rendered the pontificate of Leo X. glorious. Cardinals Bembo and Sadoleto labored successfully for the restoration of letters in the sixteenth century, and it was just about the same age that Tommaso, Gaetano, and Lorenzo Campeggi flourished, all illustrious scholars in ecclesiastical lore. But erudition now was too often merely a servile imitation; form became all important, the underlying idea of secondary consequence, and the same thing became more and more the rule in all the arts. The great favor with which Leo re- ceived artists, and the care with which he promoted the arts and sciences, rendered this period memorable as the Age of Leo X. It was at this period also that the revolt of Luther occurred in Germany. Leo, like some of his predecessors on the papal throne, desirous of raising money for artistic and for pious purposes at home, had allowed the sale of indulgences throughout all the Cath- olic world. By these indulgences there was offered in the case of those who contributed a remission of the whole or a part of the temporal punishment due to sin. Martin Luther, scandalized by the whole system of procedure, which he believed was encouraging vice in its worst forms, preached and wrote violently against it, and maintained on the words of Scripture that God alone could forgive sins. When summoned to a council of doctors at Augsburg by 300 ITALY 1513-1521 Cardinal Cajetan, lie refused to recant what were termed his errors, and returned home resolute to proclaim a still more comprehensive war against the papacy. When summoned again to a general council at Worms, he maintained his position with unshrinking firmness, and was proclaimed an obstinate heretic, who was to be delivered over to Satan and burned. But Luther had now obtained the support of the Elector of Saxony and other German princes, and set the Pope with all his emissaries at defiance. Leo X. died in 1521. The Senate and the people of Rome, grateful for the benefits they had received at his hands, raised a statue to his memory on the Capitol, and another in the temple of Minerva. All the friends of literature and art, as well as his own subjects, bewailed his death, regarding him, as we also do to the present day, as the greatest patron of learning who has ever occupied the papal throne. Chapter XXXIX THE STRUGGLE BETWEEN CHARLES V. AND FRANCIS I. THE PEACE OF CATEAU-CAMBRESIS. 1519-1559 AT the death of the Emperor Maximilian I., the Diet of L\ Frankfort was assembled and chose a new monarch, in JL jL i 5 19. The choice fell upon a king, grandson of Ferdi- nand the Catholic and of the Emperor Maximilian, who was al- ready in possession of Spain, Naples, Sicily, the Netherlands, and of all America as far as then discovered. On receiving the im- perial crown he took the name of Charles V. By this act of the diet, Charles now became possessor of Germany as well. It was owing to the ability of this monarch that the Spanish arms rose to the highest pitch of renown, making themselves formidable (over and above the subjugation of America) to the whole of Europe, as we shall presently see. Now it is necessary to be noted that Charles V. had a rival in Francis I., King of France, who as well as himself had coveted the imperial crown. This sovereign had a passion for great enter- prises, and had already carried on wars in which many of his gen- erals had distinguished themselves. Under the reign of this king, France began to cultivate a taste for the arts and sciences; but it was also under his reign that the doctrines of Calvin began to be disseminated through his states a fact which led to many important events in the future history of that country. When, therefore, Francis received notice that Charles had been preferred to him, he was so indignant that he determined to stir up a war. Terrible preparations were made on both sides, and Italy was to be the theater of this bloody rivalship. The first en- counter of the French with the Imperialists took place near a castle called Bicocca in 1522, a place near Novara, and fatally celebrated for the battle fought between the Piedmontese and Austrians in later times. There a conflict now ensued, in which the French, overcome by numbers, were worsted and compelled to abandon Italy. After this event Charles gave the dukedom of Milan to 301 302 ITALY 1522-1525 Francisco Sforza, brother of Maximilian, of whom we have already spoken as having been a prisoner in the hands of the French. These, then, were the first trials of war between Charles V. and Francis I. They had not yet met each other personally in bat- tle ; but now the King of France, enraged by the disaster of Bicocca, resolved himself to conduct a numerous army into Lombardy in order to drive the Imperialists out of the dukedom of Milan. The French monarch, at the head of the most brave and skillful cap- tains of the country, had already come to the passage of the Alps, when he discovered that Charles, Duke of Bourbon, his nearest re- lation, had entered into a conspiracy against him Charles was constable of the kingdom, and therefore head of all the forces. This news made the king at first hesitate, and he sent a large de- tachment of his army over the Alps under the command of General Bonnivet, who soon got into difficulties and had to return to France. Upon this, therefore, Francis determined to conduct a still more numerous army in person across the Alps into Italy. The Duke of Bourbon, who had feigned illness so as not to have any appointment in the army of invasion, at once roused him- self, and managed by a secret route to join the imperial army. Soon after this, Francis arrived at Milan, where he found his army already drawn up under the order of General Bonnivet, and ready for battle. But the king, knowing that a vast quantity of arms and provisions were laid up in Pavia, resolved first to gain possession of them, and went with all his forces to besiege that city. But as Pavia was vigorously defended by the citizens, the imperial army, conducted by a general named Lanoia, and by the Duke of Bour- bon, had time to come to their succor. A battle was fought under the walls of Pavia. Prodigies of valor were exhibited, and there was great slaughter on both sides, but victory at last declared itself for the Spanish (1525). "Never since the days of Charles the Great had the idea of an Empire of the West been so nearly real- ized." Francis, seeing his bravest captains fall around him, threw himself upon the foe and fought desperately, as though determined to lose his life on the field of battle, but at last fell into the hands of his enemies. It is impossible to describe the consternation of France when the loss of the army and the imprisonment of the king came to be known. Francis remained prisoner in Spain for more than a year, and at length obtained his liberty only on condition of his resigning the duchy of Burgundy to Charles, and giving as CHARLES V. AND FRANCIS I. 303 1525-1526 hostages twelve of the chief lords of France to serve as a pledge for the maintenance of his promise. This was the Peace of Madrid (1526), which Francis immediately declared void on his return to France, being absolved by the Pope. The battles of Bicocca and of Pavia ought certainly to have humiliated the King of France and the French ; but no sooner had Francis recovered his liberty than he burned with the desire of revenge more ardently than ever, and new troubles soon arose both in Germany and in Italy. The Italians formed the League of Cognac in 1526, being joined by Francis I., to oppose the Im- perialists and free themselves from their yoke. Up to this time Charles V. had respected the Pope; but Clement VII. had joined the League of Cognac and soon was to suffer the consequences of war. The Spanish army, now that the French king was taken and all immediate danger at an end, had become relaxed in discipline, and appeared more in the character of those adventurers who, when relieved from care, fall into a thousand disorders, and dishonor the profession of arms by turning warfare into rapine and murder. The Duke of Bourbon, with a crowd of mercenary soldiers, among whom were above 13,000 Germans, marched forward to Rome. Clement was " now in such a condition that he did not know where he was." An eye-witness said Bourbon's passage through the country was marked by every kind of devastation. The cities, the villages, the poorest cottages were sacked, and the unfortunate inhabitants infamously murdered. Giovanni de' Medici, called the Knight of the Black Orders, attempted to make head against them. He was captain of an army of adventurers, and united to extraordinary strength great courage and military science. He maintained also a severe discipline in his army, which had produced many renowned captains. Giovanni de' Medici now came forward to oppose the Imperialists with all his energy, and gained many advantages over them, but in a wild skirmish he was struck in the thigh and soon after died. The armed rabble of Bourbon, freed from the watchful oppo- sition of Giovanni de' Medici, now pursued their course without delay, and soon arrived within the papal states. The Pope was taken by surprise, not imagining that a Christian prince would turn* his arms against the head of his own religion. But he was terribly undeceived when he saw the Spanish army before the gates of 30 1 ITALY 1526-1527 Rome. On that day the constable dressed himself in white armor, the better to be visible to his own people, and never ceased urging his soldiers to the combat, promising that they should enjoy the sack of that great capital. The confusion which now followed within the walls of Rome is indescribable. The Pope demanded money of all the rich citizens to make the necessary preparations for resistance, but they all, whether through folly or perfidy, re- fused any supplies for the succor of their country, and that at a moment when they ought to have sacrificed everything for it, even to the last farthing. Still the Pope ordered the gates to be shut, and a grand defense to be made. The Imperialists not being able to enter the city freely, as they wished, assailed the bastions, but were thrown back into the fosses by the Romans. Seeing this, the constable took a ladder, placed it against the wall, and courageously ascended; but being struck by a musket ball, he fell dead to the ground, expiating his perfidy with his life. This circumstance ir- ritated the enemy beyond measure, who rushed from every quarter, and having overcome a most obstinate resistance, scaled the walls, descended into the streets, occupied the city, and gave it over to be sacked (May 6, 1527). It is wholly impossible to describe the cruel rapacity of the soldiers, the murders and the horrors of that fatal day, and for three months Rome was miserably given a prey to the fury of an un- bridled soldiery. Nothing was spared, neither private houses nor churches, by those wretches who had neither country nor religion to bind them. " The Sack of Rome may well be said to close the period of the greatness of Italy. No longer was she to be the leader of the new learning and of art." * The Pope himself, after having taken refuge in the castle of St. Angelo, fell into their hands, and promised to pay the sums of money demanded, but as he had no ready money, his imprisonment threatened to be long. Charles himself, who had returned to Spain, when he was in- formed of the enormities which had been perpetrated in his name, put on mourning, and feigning to be profoundly afflicted for the indignities which the Pope had suffered, set the Pope at liberty, accepting the papal promise to pay November 26. On December 6 Clement fled from Rome to Orvieto. But Charles was really in- fluenced in his wish to conciliate the Pope only by the discords which were breaking out in different parts of his own dominions, 1 A. H. Johnson, " Europe in the 16th Century," p. 187. O <5 c <=< as C CHARLES V. AND FRANCIS I. 305 1527-1530 and finally they came to terms. In February, 1530, the Pope crowned Charles Emperor. In 1529, by the Peace of Cambrai, the French had given up all their claims to Italy, and the peninsula now passed under Spanish influence. During the long struggle between Charles V. and Francis L, Piedmont suffered greatly. At the beginning of the war it was governed by Philibert II., who maintained peace throughout his dominions. But dying in the flower of his life, aged twenty-four, he was succeeded by Charles III., a most unfortunate prince, who had the sorrow of seeing all his dominions, with the exception of Vercelli and Nice, seized upon and taken out of his hands. In these straits he retired to Nice, which sustained a long siege with admirable courage. Deeds of prowess were performed worthy of being placed by the side of those of the ancient Romans, even the women vying with each other in bravery. Charles III., having lost his wife and eight children, died of grief in the city of Vercelli, in the forty-ninth year of his reign. Ever since Count Carmagnola got possession of the city of Genoa in the name of the Duke of Milan, Philip Maria Visconti, by whom he had been appointed general, and indeed for more than a hundred years after, Genoa was subjected to many outward vicissi- tudes, and suffered greatly from internal discords, from foreign wars, and from a frequent change of the princes under whose pro- tection the people placed themselves. At one time they gave their fealty to France, at another to the Germans, and then again to the dukes of Milan. In the long hostilities which were carried on be- tween Charles V. and Francis L, the Genoese, actuated by the hope of protection, gave themselves up to the French, and intrusted the government of the republic to a very able townsman named Andrea Doria. Doria had already faced the gravest dangers, and waged many a war for the good of his country, and had well merited the office of doge. But he was not willing to accept any dignity, and contented himself with the name of first citizen, being always ready to carry out any schemes that might turn to the interest of his country. But now he soon came to see that the French, in place of defending the republic, only oppressed it, and brought it to pov- erty by excessive imposts. He besought the king, therefore, that as a reward for the long services he had rendered in the war, he would withdraw every foreign soldier, and restore to the city a free government. 306 ITALY 1530-1537 Francis rejected this petition, and Doria changing sides, en- tered into the service of Charles V. Doria accordingly, being now constituted admiral of the emperor's fleet, sailed to Genoa with his ships and raised the whole city against the French, proclaiming it once more a free republic. During the period of which we have been speaking a great misfortune happened to the city of Florence. It will be remem- bered that Piero de' Medici was driven out of Florence with all his relations in 1494. After eighteen years of exile the Medici suc- ceeded in being recalled to their country, and reassuming the reins of government. But in 1527 the Florentines again banished the Medici, and formed themselves into a republic, out of which natu- rally arose new wars and new troubles to the citizens. Charles V., after having reconciled himself with the Pope, dispatched the very same army which had sacked Rome to besiege Florence, in order to force upon the citizens the sovereign whom they had shortly before driven out from the town. The Florentines were not sufficient in numbers to make head against a disciplined army; still, trusting to the justice of their cause, they determined to resist to the last extremity. But as a government is nothing without a head, they were induced in the present confusion of things to make an election quite unparalleled in history. A man arose in the midst of the crowd, and said that, in order to render the republic invincible, they should proclaim Jesus Christ King of Florence! And, who would believe it? every- one adhered to this strange proposal, and there was immediately inscribed upon the gates of the municipal palace in large characters, " Jesus Christ, King of the Florentines, elected by decree of the people and the Senate ! " The Florentines made a heroic resistance, distinguished by the bravery of their leader, Francesco Ferruccio, but the enemy were irresistibly strong and the city finally had to yield. Ferruccio, in making a sortie, was mortally wounded at Gravignana. It then became necessary for the Florentines to come to terms, and it was agreed with Charles V. that they should rec- ognize the Medici as legitimate sovereigns, and that Alessandro de' Medici should be recognized as Duke of Tuscany, with the right of transmitting the same dignity to his heirs. Alessandro was wholly unworthy of the office to which he was raised ; he proved avaricious and cruel, and was at last murdered by one of his own relations in CHARLES V. AND FRANCIS I. 307 1537-1559 the year 1537. After him Cosmo de' Medici, son of the celebrated John of the Black Band, was created Duke of Florence, and from him originated the long series of dukes of Tuscany, who later on took the name of grand dukes. Liberty was now crushed out at Siena, Lucca, Bologna, and wherever it still existed. The Spaniards controlled everything. Shortly after the fall of the Republic of Florence that of Siena fell likewise. It had twice driven out the Spaniards with great heroism; and Cosmo, Duke of Florence, had sent 20,000 men to besiege it, but they were courageously repelled. At length, after the death of Strozzi, its gallant defender, Siena was obliged to accept the most humiliating conditions of peace. In 1540, on the death of Sforza, the emperor made his son Philip Duke of Milan. These events bring us to the year 1559, an epoch rendered im- portant by the many remarkable events which transpired, and which complete the period of sixty-seven years since the discovery of America. During this space of time, art, science, and commerce flourished in Italy, though, as far as political affairs are concerned, the country was rent asunder by the ambitious projects of France and Spain. When Charles V. retired from the empire he ceded Germany to his brother, who was elected emperor under the name of Ferdinand I. He then made over Spain, America, the Low Countries, Burgundy, Sardinia, the two Sicilies, and Milan to his son Philip II., and thus it was that Austria came to be wholly sep- arated from Spain. The King of France, Henry II., always envious of the grandeur of Spain, profited by this separation to bring about a war against the new sovereign, and Flanders became the scene of a sanguinary conflict. After many skirmishes, a pitched battle was fought near St. Quentin, in the Netherlands. The Duke of Savoy, Emmanuel Philibert, commander of the Spanish forces, performed deeds of heroic valor, and succeeded in gaining a com- plete victory over the French. The statue of this great general is now standing in the Piazza of St. Carlo at Turin. By this victory, accordingly, Philibert recovered Savoy, restored to him in the Peace of Cateau-Cambresis (1559) between France and Spain. A new period now begins for Italy, which no longer resists servitude, but resigns herself. The spirit of the Renaissance dies out and Italy becomes lethargic. Philibert, on his return to his own dominions, found them a 308 ITALY 1559 prey to great disorder; putting aside, therefore, all thoughts of war, he devoted himself entirely to the good of his country. He repaired the fortifications, put on foot a numerous militia, did away with the remains of feudalism, restored the treasury, reorganized the administration of justice, and warmly promoted the arts and sciences. He made Turin the capital of his states, transferring to that city the courts and the Senate, and founding a university for the encouragement of learning. Chapter XL THE LAST OF ITALIAN LIBERTY. 1560-1618 NO sooner had the wars in Italy come to an end than the Italians found that along- with the loss of political lib- erty they had also lost all intellectual freedom and the measures taken to prevent heresy served to suppress all literary life. To the humanistic Popes succeeded a series zealous to uphold dogma in all lands still under the sway of Rome. Between the political des- potism of the Spaniards and native princes and the diminished zeal of some succeeding Popes, all initiative died out in Italy, which slowly became apathetic. The city of Venice, by reason of the many islands it possessed, could still be considered as Queen of the Seas. But it had lost much of its former splendor, since the Spaniards had become masters of America, and opened up a new field for com- merce with those distant countries. The Turks, who had now held Constantinople for more than one hundred years, saw with regret that the Venetians possessed islands and cities in the very midst of their vast empire, and began by demanding of them the island of Cyprus. When this demand was refused, they put on foot an army of 80,000 infantry, 3000 cavalry, and a formidable artillery. With this host of barbarians the Emperor Selim II. besieged Nicosia and Famagosta, the two strongest cities in the island. Nicosia fell after a valorous defense ; Famagosta, commanded by an illustri- ous Venetian named Bragadino, repulsed the Turkish army no less than six times, and destroyed so large a number of men that it had to be continually reinforced. But as the Turkish fleet prevented the Italians from bringing succor to the besieged, Bragadino soon found himself in the most extreme want both of provisions and of men. The Venetians then sent to the Pope to beg that he would in some way come to their succor, and aid them in humbling the pride of the Ottomans, those most ferocious enemies of Christianity. The Roman pontiff, Pius V., had recourse to the King of Spain, Philip II., and to Duke Emmanuel Philibert. The King of Spain put on foot a large army, 309 310 ITALY 1570-1571 and gave the command to his younger brother, Don John of Aus- tria. The Duke of Savoy also willingly agreed to send a select number of soldiers, who, together with the rest of the forces gathered from different parts of Italy, united with the Spanish army near Messina. The soul of the whole undertaking was a Venetian named Sebastiano Veniero, and a noble Roman called Marc Antony Colonna. The latter, in consideration of his great valor, had been appointed Constable of Naples and Viceroy of Sicily. In the present expedition he commanded twelve galleys in the name of the Pope. At the sight of such a vast assembly of warriors, all animated for conflict in a holy cause, everyone con- ceived that the expedition could only end in marked success. Al- ready the sails were unfurled to proceed to Cyprus, when the sad news arrived that Bragadino had fallen into the hands of the en- emy, who against all law and faith had ordered him to be flayed alive. In the midst of these most horrid sufferings Bragadino made no lamentation, but gloried in dying for his religion and his country. The Turks, elated by this success, now with one accord di- rected their steps toward Italy, and came into conflict with the Italian fleet near the gulf of Lepanto, in Greece. The Christians, who had 264 vessels of all sizes with 26,000 soldiers, burning to avenge the death of the great Bragadino, and impatient to measure their strength with the enemies of God and man, assaulted the Turks, who had about 300 vessels, with the greatest ferocity, who on their part made a brave resistance. A terrible spectacle ensued. The armies met at close quarters ; every vessel seemed to vomit fire as though from a hundred cannons; death revealed itself in every form; the masts and the tackling of the ships, split by the cannon balls, fell upon the combatants; the cries of the wounded mingled with the roaring of the waves and the noise of the cannon (Octo- ber 7, 1571). In the midst of this fearful conflict, Veniero, perceiving that confusion began to show itself among the Turkish ships, suddenly prepared a number of small galleys, filled with men most expert in artillery, and, going round the lofty ships of the enemy, poured into them volley after volley. At this critical moment, while the con- fusion of the enemy was increasing, an eager enthusiasm was ex- cited among the hosts of the Christians, who raised on every side the cry of " Victory! Victory! " On this, the Turkish ships made LAST OF ITALIAN LIBERTY 311 1571-1576 for land, while the Venetians followed and crushed them. The battle became a slaughter; the sea was covered with garments, with splinters from the ships, with the bodies of the slain. Thirty thou- sand Turks fell in the conflict, and two hundred of their galleys were left in the hands of the enemy. The news of this victory brought universal joy into all the countries of Christendom. The Senates of Genoa and Venice de- creed that the 7th day of October should be kept in perpetuity as a day of joy and festivity. The pontiff, Pius V., when he heard of the victory achieved, could not refrain from applying to Don Giovanni of Austria the words of the gospel : " There was a man sent from God, and his name was John " (Giovanni). The next in command after Don John and Veniero was Gen- eral Colonna, who contributed with his galleys greatly to the glory of the day, and Giovanni Andrea Doria of Genoa. When the news of the victory of Lepanto came to the ears of Philip II., instead of rejoicing at the glory which accrued to his kingdom, he was only moved by jealousy against his brother, Don John of Austria. The Venetians acted very differently toward Veniero, for out of gratitude for his service they elected him doge in 1576. We must now turn for a minute to describe the terrible rav- ages of the disease, termed variously pest, pestilence, contagion, or epidemic, which, after having caused great destruction in various parts of Italy, came to a focus in Milan in the year 1576. The authors of those days speak of the plague of Milan as one of the most horrible calamities of the age. It first showed itself in the hospitals, then commenced to attack weakly persons, and especially those who gave themselves up to excesses in eating or drinking. Finally, it invaded every house without distinction. Lazaretti were established without the city, but these were soon filled to overflow- ing. It was a lamentable spectacle which everywhere presented itself. It often happened that a party of friends would set them- selves at table, and in the middle of dinner several would be struck with plague, changing their festivity into mourning; often when fathers or mothers went to call their children in the morning, they found them dead or dying. Men were seen to fall down here and there in the public streets, and those who ran to give them aid would be struck down themselves at the same instant. Husband- men were struck down at the plow. Masters who had retired over 312 ITALY 1576-1577 night in good health were found dead in the morning by the servants, and some were even found dead in their carriages when they had been out for a short drive. The terrified citizens fled wherever they could, and soon the city and the lazaretti contained only dead and dying, without there being anyone to bring aid, either temporal or spiritual. But Provi- dence, which watches over the destiny of mankind, raised up one who, by his courage, his zeal, and his charity, came to the aid of the suffering St. Carlo Borromeo. This extraordinary man had led a pure and innocent life from his infancy. His excellent education, his diligence in study, joined to great discretion, his wisdom and tact in managing great affairs, had raised him to the dignity of a cardinal at the age of twenty- three, and three years later he was consecrated Archbishop of Milan, just before the plague broke out. He had already been ex- posed to much persecution on the part of the governor of the city, because, wishing to mix himself up with affairs of the church, the bishop opposed him ; in short, he was just on the point of leaving his diocese when the pest made its appearance. The governor, though a brave general, was one of the first to abandon Milan, and took no further notice of the archbishop. Then was seen what a good shepherd of the flock can do for the relief of the wretched. Surrounded by a crowd of unfortunates who besought temporal and spiritual aid, he determined to devote his life for his people, and to enter himself into the houses in order to succor those who were plague-stricken. Accordingly, he made his will, leaving everything he had to the poor. Then he employed all he possessed gold, silver, household furniture, linen, and even his own garments for the benefit of the suffering. And when this marvelous charity failed to supply the great need under which the city and the country around were suffering, many of the nobles, urged on by his example, sent him timely succor; and even great ladies were glad to deprive themselves of their diamonds and jew- els, in order to send them to the prelate and convert them into alms. Carlo also devoted himself to reforming the churches and the clergy, where reform was greatly needed, as well as the monks and nuns; he also watched carefully over public morals, trying to restrain popular licentiousness. But his efforts, like all those of the period, were merely ecclesiastic and disciplinary. Dogma was strengthened without improving character, the spirit was tamed LAST OF ITALIAN LIBERTY 313 1577-1590 without elevating the soul. Soon after this, the disease began to abate, and after a while disappeared, having raged for more than eighteen months. Our history has now brought us down to the pontificate of Gregory XIII., 1 572-1 585, which has become memorable for the reform of the calendar which then took place. The days of the year were calculated previous to this time by the ordinary Calendar of Julius Caesar. In this calendar it was reckoned that the sun per- formed its course in 365 days and 6 hours, consequently every four years an additional day had to be added to the length of the year, and the discrepancy was supposed to be rectified. But more exact observations showed that the above calculation allowed eleven minutes too much to indicate the precise time of the earth's revolu- tion, and this difference of time produced a discrepancy of one day in every 130 years. In the revolution of the ages, accordingly, the fixed periods of the year now came ten days too soon ; and Gregory, perceiving the error thus occasioned in the time of the festivals of the church, called together an assembly of the first astronomers of his time at Rome, to consult as to what plan could be best adopted to obviate it. By their advice he decreed that in every four cen- turies there should be one leap year less, which would exactly make up one day, to counterbalance the yearly accumulation of eleven minutes. To bring the seasons now to their right place, it was agreed that in the year 1582 ten days should be taken out of the month of October. All the princes of Europe except the Emperor of Russia adopted this reform, which has taken the name of the Gregorian Calendar. To Gregory XIII. succeeded Pope Sixtus V., 1584- 1590, a man of humble birth, but who had raised himself by his merits to be considered worthy of the high dignity to which he attained. He succeeded in clearing the Roman states of the robbers which in- fested them, had water brought into the city from a great distance, raised a lofty obelisk in the Piazza of St. Peter's, and restored the exhausted treasury. He it was who removed the heads of the statues of Trajan and Antonine from their columns to replace them by those of St. Peter and St. Paul, displaying in various other ways a Christian vandalism toward the pagan monuments of Rome. His designs with regard to foreign affairs were still more important. But his death, which occurred in the year 1590, pre- vented the completion of all these designs. lill 1 T A L Y 1590-1618 We must now return to the affairs of Venice. While Europe had been engaged in religious wars, Venice had up to this time re- mained true to its ancient faith, and thus enjoyed comparative peace in the midst of the religious troubles of the time. It was nearly brought, however, to an open rupture with Rome through the influence of Paolo Sarpi, an ecclesiastic of extraordinary learn- ing and unblemished character. Sarpi had become disgusted with the intrigues of the Roman court, and had opened a correspondence with some of the leading Protestants of the day. When, therefore, the Venetian Senate, chiefly through his instrumentality, was brought into conflict with the Pope, Sarpi prevailed on them not to yield. The Pope, accordingly, issued an excommunication against the doge and Senate, and placed the whole dominion under an in- terdict. Venice was, in fact, at the very point of following in the wake of England and Germany, and separating itself definitely from the Roman See, when the King of France and the Duke of Savoy intervened, and brought about a reconciliation. Sarpi, how- ever, remained unreconciled, and labored seventeen years longer to bring about a reformation, but at length died without securing this object. No sooner were these religious discords brought to a termination than new disasters arose, caused by a band of assassins named the Uscocchi. These brigands lived among the rocks on the shore of the Adriatic in Dalmatia, whence they made terrible incursions against the Venetians, plundering and murdering all they could. When pursued, they took refuge in the Austrian states ; and the Duke of Austria, Ferdinand by name, protected them, and even went so far as to proclaim open war against the Venetians on their behalf. The Spaniards also stood by the Austrians in this matter, and the republic had to maintain a homicidal war for three years, until a treaty of peace was at length concluded, by virtue of which the duke pledged himself to remove these terrible bands of brigands to more distant quarters. While the facts above related were transpiring a more serious circumstance arose which threatened the fortune of Venice still more gravely. The Viceroy of Naples and the Governor of Milan, jealous of the continued prosperity of the republic and anxious to win credit for themselves with the Spanish king, their master, en- tered into a plot, by means of their ambassadors, against Venice, which, though doubtless exaggerated in the account long accepted of St. Real, nevertheless constituted a grave menace to the inde- LAST OF ITALIAN LIBERTY 315 1618 pendence of Venice. At the time we are now treating of, the am- bassador of Philip III., King of Spain, in Venice, was the Marquis of Bedmar, a crafty and unprincipled man. The Governor of Milan and the Viceroy of Naples agreed with the said Bedmar in the eager desire to humiliate Venice, and bring it into subjection to the Spanish crown. And inasmuch as the Republic possessed a vast number of well-armed ships, Bedmar resolved to execute his design without the King of Spain appearing to have any knowledge of it, and by the use of measures as secret as they were dangerous, re- lying on a Frenchman, Renault, as his agent. They proposed to set the city on fire, to kill the senators and the Council of Ten, who were at the head of the government, and to deluge the shores of the Adriatic with blood. In the meantime, aided by the darkness of the night and the tumult occasioned by some Spanish soldiers whom the ambassador was to introduce in disguise, they hoped to make themselves masters of the palace of the doge and the arsenal, while the other conspirators, who served in the Venetian fleet, and whom Renault had suborned, would kill the captains with their daggers and force the sailors to set fire to the ships. Everything was ready and the night fixed in which the plot was to be put into execution. Renault had arranged all the plans with so much mystery and so great art that the most zealous agents of police had not the least suspicion of it. The day preceding that fatal night, Renault, the better to strengthen his men in their reso- lutions, assembled the heads in a house apart, in order to assign to everyone the post he was to take at the decisive moment. One should force the gates of the doge's palace, another should dis- tribute arms to the prisoners, a third should set fire to the arsenal so as to throw terror over the city, while a number should sud- denly assail the senators, the Council of Ten, and the inquisitors in their respective palaces, and slay the nobles before they knew by whose hand they had perished. While this was going on others were to be sent into the most populous quarters of the city to excite the mob to plunder, and thus augment the confusion by all possible means. But among the conspirators whom Renault believed to be equally faithful and devoted was a Frenchman named Giafieri, who resolved to go to the Council of Ten and reveal the danger which hung over the city. He only wished to stipulate that his betrayal should not involve his own friends in ruin, and extorted the prom- ;,H) ITALY 1618 ise before revealing his secret that the lives of twenty persons. whom he should select, should be spared, however culpable they might be. The magistrates agreed to the whole, but no sooner was the plot made known than they put Giafieri in prison and sent to arrest Renault and his accomplices before they should have any suspicion of being discovered. Some of the conspirators, however, were warned in time, and escaped by throwing themselves into the fishermen's boats ; Renault, however, would not take to flight, but gave himself up into the hands of the men who came to seize him. At the same time all sus- pected foreigners who were concealed in various parts of the city were disarmed, imprisoned, and at once strangled, drowned, or be- headed. Renault, the promoter of the whole scheme, was strangled in prison, and his body hung up before the palace of the doge to strike terror into all the rest. Giafieri, seeing his companions put to death before his own eyes, refused to receive any recompense, and went and united him- self with the other conspirators, fighting at their head until he was struck down in the conflict. Bedmar, the real author of the rebellion, protected by his dig- nity of ambassador, was thus able to leave the city freely and return to his own country in 1618. Thus was Venice liberated from three misfortunes the interdict of the Pope, the scourge of the Uscocchi, and above all from the plot of Bedmar, by which the city was ex- posed to a greater danger than had ever happened since the signing of the Treaty of Cambrai (1508). Hereafter we find scarcely any material or moral prosperity to console Italy for its loss of freedom and for its sterile agitations. Venice ceased to be even the Queen of the Adriatic, and except for occasional gleams of better things at Florence, the peninsula presents a sad spectacle. Chapter XLI CHARLES EMMANUEL THE GREAT AND SOME MEN OF THE AGE. 1 580-1 700 DUKE EMMANUEL PHILIBERT, hero of St. Quentin, was succeeded by his son, named Charles Emmanuel, sur- named the Great, in consequence of the length of his reign (which lasted fifty years), and of the great things which he achieved, both in peace and in war. He was only seventeen years old when he began to reign, but fortunately he had good ministers and advisers, whose sagacity and prudence contributed greatly to the success of his enterprises (1 580-1630). He had first to wage a long and bloody war with the French. These had a few years before made themselves masters of the mar- quisate of Saluzzo, and now that France was agitated by the im- pending war with the Huguenots, he thought it a good opportunity to regain that part of his dominions of which his father had been despoiled. The King of France (Henry III.) would not respond to the just demands of the duke, who accordingly determined to gain by arms what he could not gain by treaty. A long and san- guinary war ensued, which ended by leaving Charles Emmanuel in tranquil possession of Saluzzo. This was arranged in a treaty con- cluded at Paris in the year 1601, by which the duke yielded some portion of his territory on the other side of the Alps. This treaty was very advantageous to the house of Savoy ; and the general of the King of France, called Ladighera, is said to have remarked that the King of France had treated like a merchant, while the Duke of Savoy had done so like a sovereign. The reason was that the territory of Saluzzo, besides being extremely fertile, com- manded also the passage over the Alps by which the French had been accustomed to pass into Italy. When these wars were over Charles Emmanuel began to be involved in other kinds of diffi- culties with the Waldenses. These were followers of Peter Waldo, a merchant of Lyons, who, leaving his commercial affairs, began to 317 318 ITALY 1580-1628 advocate zealously the doctrines of the Reformation. Being driven out of Lyons, the Waldenses went to establish themselves in the valley of Luserna, near Pinerolo. Here they were lost sight of for some time, and had leisure to build places of worship for themselves, the first of which was erected in the valley of Angrogna. But in process of time, when the numbers of the sect increased, they began to be subjected to cruel persecutions, so that they were forced to take up arms in self-defense. Duke Emmanuel Philibert had before sent an army to put them down, and had caused much bloodshed, and now Charles Emmanuel also appealed to force, and endeavored to drive them away from his states. By the decree of 1602, however, he at length defined the limits of their abode, and forbade them under heavy penalties to pass beyond. These affairs being now settled, Charles began to wage war in foreign countries. He fought first as an ally of the King of France, then of the King of Spain, and signalized himself in each case by his valor and feats of arms. He next planned to take Lombardy from the Spaniards, and for this purpose joined Henry IV., King of France. But just as the armies were about to march, Henry was murdered, whereupon Venice interposed between the two hostile powers, and peace was concluded. Francesco Gonzaga, Duke of Mantua and Montferrat, having lately died, the Duke of Savoy laid claim to the latter province by virtue of blood affinity, but after two years of useless negotiations the duke made open war to effect his purpose, and before his rivals had time to raise any opposition he made himself master of the ter- ritory of Montferrat, with exception of Casale and Ponte-Stura. The King of Spain, who wished to be considered the arbiter in Italy, because he possessed so many of the provinces, laid claim to Montferrat. The Spaniards, thinking the matter of little im- portance, entered with light heart into the contest with the Duke of Savoy ; but when they saw their soldiers put to flight and fall in great numbers on the field of battle, they knew that they had to do with a most formidable rival. They got together, accordingly, so large a force of infantry and cavalry that it seemed as though the whole of Spain was going to precipitate itself upon Montferrat. But Charles Emmanuel, who had so often led his soldiers to victory in foreign countries, did not shrink for a moment from maintaining his own cause in this particular instance. Five battles were fought, p -^ CHARLES EMMANUEL 319 1628-1637 in each of which the duke came off victorious, and after having al- most entirely destroyed the Spanish army, he united Montferrat definitely to Piedmont. These glorious victories of the Duke of Savoy excited envy in the minds of the French under Richelieu, who accordingly determined to try the fortune of battle with the purpose of conquering Montferrat. They marched with a numer- ous army to attack the duke just at the moment when he thought he had concluded with them a permanent peace, and being thus taken unawares, was forced to retire from Montferrat. A battle was fought at Rivoli, in which he was again worsted. It is highly probable that the duke would have repaired his losses if a terrible pestilence had not just then broken out, which ravaged both France and Italy. The duke himself was at length struck down by the disease, and died at Savigliano in the year 1630. He died, leaving his duchy a prey to pestilence and war, but also consoled with the thought of having given his life to defend his states, and with the glory of having ever labored for the benefit of his subjects. He was accustomed to say, " The brightest prerogatives of a prince are to give and to forgive." Victor Amadeus now succeeded to the duchy. In the midst of so many evils, caused by pestilence and war, a truce was necessary, so that the people might recover their strength, resume the cultiva- tion of their fields, and replenish their treasury. For this purpose the French, the Spanish, and the principal Italian princes held an assembly in Cherasco, and concluded a treaty by virtue of which Italy was enabled to breathe again, and provide for its own safety. Victor Amadeus having now brought the internal affairs of his country into order, was urged by Richelieu to form an alliance with France. These two powers in unison then made war upon Spain, and a sanguinary battle was fought on the borders of Montferrat in which the victory declared for the allies. But soon after the battle Victor Amadeus died. In the midst of the wars and the pestilence which afflicted Piedmont and the other provinces of Italy, several illustrious per- sons flourished, who attained a high degree of renown in science, letters, and art. We must first mention an illustrious poet named Ariosto, born in the city of Reggio. From a child Ariosto was studious, and showed at an early age a remarkable poetical talent. Having cultivated this talent by the study of the ancient authors, 320 ITALY 1580-1590 he composed a poem entitled " Orlando Furioso," which is held in high esteem to the present day. He was born in 1474 and died in the year 1532. Another illustrious poet was Torquato Tasso, celebrated for his poem entitled " Gerusalemme Liberata," in which he portrays the acts of courage and prowess shown by the crusaders in their efforts to take the Holy City. He was endowed with a lofty genius, but had one great defect of character, that of not being able to restrain his outbursts of anger. In consequence of this he was once thrown into prison, where he had to remain many years, until the Pope, having heard of his misfortune, persuaded the Duke of Ferrara to set him at liberty. The literati and many of the princes of Italy then voted him a crown of honor, as had been done in the case of Petrarch. For this purpose he was invited to Rome, and was there received by the Pope with great solemnity. Everything was prepared for this great ceremony, but Providence ordered it otherwise. Feeling himself grievously ill, he begged to be taken to the monastery of St. Onofrius, where he expired peaceably at the age of fifty-one years, and on the very eve of his destined triumph. Richly clothed, and his hair decked with laurels, he was carried in solemn pomp through the streets of Rome to the sepulcher. Another man who will always cast a halo of glory over Italy was Galileo Galilei. He was a native of Pisa (born in 1564), and studied music, painting, science, letters, and more especially physics, with great success. Ferdinand I., Grand Duke of Tuscany, was at that time a great promoter of science and literature. The govern- ment of the grand dukes was for the most part mild. Abstaining from all interference with their neighbors, they managed to secure for Tuscany all the benefits of peace. They more especially pro- moted the cultivation of science, and the very progress which Gali- leo made in scientific discovery was in great part owing to the gen- erosity of these princes. He was nominated by Ferdinand I. professor in the university of Pisa at the age of twenty-six years. As Galileo was one day standing in the cathedral and observ- ing the oscillation of a lamp suspended there, he perceived that it oscillated backward and forward through a considerable space, then after a time through a less space, and finally through a very small space ; but in every instance the lamp performed its oscilla- tions in exactly the same duration of time. Returning home, he CHARLES EMMANUEL 321 1590-1633 made the same experiment with a string and a piece of lead, con- structed in the form of a pendulum. On making- it oscillate, he again found that the varied movements were always completed in equal spaces of time. From this circumstance Galileo concluded that the pendulum would prove a valuable instrument to append to a clock in order to regulate the motion of the wheels, and give to give them a regular and invariable movement. He next went as professor of philosophy to Padua, where he invented the telescope. With this instrument he began to make observations on the moon, and was the first to see that the spots which we see with our naked eye on the lunar disc are no other than valleys and mountains, of which he could even measure the magnitude. He discovered also many stars, hitherto unknown, and was the first to declare that the Milky Way is a space studded with stars at an enormous distance from the earth. The fame of Galileo's genius was so widely extended that the grand duke and the Florentines desired him to return to his own country. This he accordingly did, and the grand duke assigned him five thousand francs a year, with full leisure to pursue his studies. Galileo, like Tasso, was a man of irascible temper, but knew better how to bridle his tongue. He was both religious and charitable, and delighted in instructing young men if only they would devote themselves to study. He often assisted poor scholars, so that they might pursue their course of learning, and was on their part regarded as a father and a benefactor. The most remarkable event in the life of Galileo was the publication of a book on the motion of the earth. He showed that the sun did not move round the earth, as was then generally sup- posed, but that the earth moved round its own axis every twenty- four hours, and completed its full revolution round the sun in a year. This theory had been brought forward by Copernicus one hundred years before, but was not yet fully established. But Galileo had now such abundant evidence in his hands that he felt justified in affirming that this was the thought and design of the Creator in framing the whole solar system. The Pope, Paul V., was scandalized at a philosopher pronouncing such an idea, and bringing it forward as a dogma that challenged every man's belief. Galileo, on the other hand, insisted that the church should acknowl- edge a truth now established with scientific certitude. In 1633 he was summoned to Rome to appear before the ( M2 I T A L Y 1633-1640 Inquisition, which condemned him, on his refusing to recant, to perpetual imprisonment, a sentence somewhat softened owing to the intervention of the Grand Duke of Tuscany. Galileo made a kind of formal recantation to save himself from the pains which would otherwise have been inflicted on him, but according to a not wholly authentic tradition he could not help saying as he left the tribunal, E pare si muovc ("The earth does move, though, after all"). He made many other discoveries, and died in his seventy-eighth year, with the repute of being a wise man and a good Christian. After the Peace of Cateau-Cambresis, and still more after the Treaty of Cherasco, the Spaniards remained masters of many of the Italian states. Lombardy, Sicily, Sardinia, Naples, were all gov- erned by a viceroy of the King of Spain. As Spain at that time figured as one of the first powers in Europe, we may say that what with its own dominions in Italy, and what with the influence it exerted upon the other states, Italy had almost become Spanish ; and, in fact, many Spanish customs still exist in Italy which have come down from that epoch. For one hundred and forty years, i. e., from 1560 to 1700, Italy suffered greatly under the dominion of these foreign rulers. The King of Spain, indeed, sent able men to govern the Italian provinces, but they were for the most part only intent on widening their dominion and acquiring riches to send to Spain. Among these we may especially mention Leganez, Governor of Milan. He took a great part in the wars which agitated Piedmont from 1630 to 1644, for he had been sent with a large army to Montferrat to conquer these countries for his sovereign, and had closely besieged the city of Casale. This latter city belonged to Charles Emmanuel II., Duke of Savoy, whose states were governed during his minority by his mother, Maria Christina. This princess had the grief of seeing her own brothers-in-law make alliance with the Spanish ; and when she found herself unable to resist them, she made a treaty with the King of France, by virtue of which she ceded to him Cherasco, Sa- vigliano, and Carmagnola; From this circumstance her brothers- in-law took occasion to excite the people to rebel against her authority, and she was forced to take flight from Turin. The King of France sent a famous general named Artour with troops to assist the Piedmontese. The two captains made first trial of their valor under the walls of Casale, where the Spanish suffered CHARLES EMMANUEL 323 1640-1646 a terrible defeat. After the battle of Casale, Leganez got the re- mains of his army together, and, making a fresh levy, went to besiege Turin (1640). But after many fruitless efforts to make himself master of the capital, he gave up the hope of conquering Piedmont and retired with his army to Milan. The duchess upon this returned to Turin and got back many of the cities which had been wrested from her hands. On her regency coming to a termina- tion she consigned the reigns of government into the hands of her son, Charles Emmanuel II. This prince's first effort was to allay a rebellion which the Waldenses had excited against him, and then soon after he had to carry on war for a time against the Genoese. After this he enjoyed perfect peace during the whole of his reign, and devoted himself to the prosperity of his people, reorganizing the army, constructing roads, and completing many magnificent works. The condition of Piedmont was bad enough while the country was occupied by French or Spanish armies, . but the situation of Naples and Sicily was still worse, in consequence of the greed of the viceroys and their eagerness to send money into Spain. The sums wrested from the kingdom of Naples alone amounted in a few years to over 500,000,000 of francs. To accumulate these sums, heavy imposts were indispensable. Houses, fields, furniture, persons, animals of every kind, and all comestibles were so weighed down with taxes that well-nigh the whole produce of the land came into the hands of the tax-gatherers. In those times many families, not being able to procure for themselves the necessaries of life, left their native country to seek hospitality on a foreign shore. Thus the population of Naples was reduced so that many tracts of country remained uncultivated for want of hands, and commerce was de- prived of all enterprise. The discontent became universal, and it only needed a head for an open rebellion to break out. A certain Alexis of Palermo, a goldbeater by profession, at- tempted to throw off the heavy yoke, and had got the people and the nobles to proclaim him first captain and King of Sicily. But he was surprised by the Spanish, and executed along with his accom- plices. Uproars took place in Naples which could not be so easily appeased, and which drew after them fatal consequences. The Viceroy of Naples, Count Arcos, nominated viceroy in 1646, a most avaricious man, not knowing what other tax to levy, laid a particular duty upon fruit, which is there the chief food of the poor people. A 324 ITALY 1646-1647 certain Thomas Aniello of Amalfi, commonly called Masaniello, 1 a fisherman, not being able to live by his trade, had come to establish himself as a fruit seller in Naples. He and all his companions of the piazza remained thunderstruck at the new imposts. Discontent in- creased more and more in consequence of the rigor and the villainous methods with which the tax-gatherers made their exactions. On Sunday morning, July 7, 1647, a tumult arose in the piazza, and this was the spark which lighted up the fire of rebellion. Cries resounded from every side, and men and women, old and young, all gathered around Masaniello. He was a handsome young fellow, brave, moreover, and so strong that he could knock down the most powerful man with his fist. The tax-gatherers ran to put down the tumult, but were received with blows and forced to retire. A com- pany of soldiers was then called up, but too late, because the number of the insurgents had become enormous, and on every side they proclaimed Masaniello their leader, and having driven off the sol- diers, now took possession of the whole city. This Masaniello was without learning or any knowledge either of warfare or govern- ment; yet by his probity, his disinterestedness, and his desire to behave well toward all, he was led to act the part of a chief, and to manage with marvelous tact the most weighty affairs. The viceroy attempted to put down Masaniello by force, but seeing every effort to be useless, he thought it best to come to an agreement with him. Constituting him captain-general of Naples, he promised the abolition of all the imposts, offered him a rich collar of gold and a handsome pension. Masaniello, distrusting the good faith of the viceroy, refused all these offers, and continued to main- tain his place as defender of the people ; but in consequence of the honors done to him by the king, who to a certain degree yielded to his will, and of the universal applause of the people, he was so elated with pride that he forgot his natural modesty, and in place of con- tinuing to be the benefactor of his country, he at once opposed the king and despised his former companions. All this rendered him hateful in the eyes of all true patriots, and some of the most daring, urged on by the promise of a rich reward on the part of the viceroy, stabbed him with their poniards. Upon this Naples fell into general confusion, some taking part with the king, some with Masaniello. The citizens no longer knew 1 See J. Zeller, " Les Tribuns et les Revolutions en Italic," Paris. 1874. chapter on " Masaniello." CHARLES EMMANUEL 325 1647-1700 whom to obey, and in the midst of the turmoil a republic was pro- claimed. Meantime several other leaders of the people sought to take the place of Masaniello, until some malcontents called in the assistance of the Duke of Guise, a celebrated French captain, de- scendant of Charles of Anjou, sent by Cardinal Mazarin to embar- rass Spain. He soon made his appearance, and was already virtually master of the city, when a powerful Spanish army arrived, which entered Naples and took complete possession of it. Many of the citizens, abhorring a foreign yoke, obstinately refused to submit, and were either put to death or driven into banishment. Thus the rebellion of Masaniello in the end produced nothing but bloodshed, tyranny, death, and exile. In the midst of all these events Genoa was subjected to a grievous misfortune. The King of France, Louis XIV., vexed that this republic should show greater friendship to Spain than to him- self, sent a general named Duquesne at the head of a large fleet to order four of their galleys, lately put to sea, to be disarmed. The Genoese would not respond to this demand, and the hostile fleet com- menced a bombardment which lasted several days without inter- mission. After they had thus reduced the city well-nigh to ruins, it was obliged to give in, and accept the rule of the French with many hard conditions. While the events above related were taking place in different parts of Italy, Venice had to sustain assaults which only redounded to its glory. For some years past the Turks had attempted to take the Island of Candia out of their hands. The Venetians resisted, and, fighting under good leaders, gained several victories. But the Turks having greatly augmented their forces, the Venetians were obliged to yield the island to the enemy, notwithstanding that they received aid from various powers of Europe. Fifteen years after, hostilities having been renewed, Francesco Morosini made himself master of Athens and the Morea, in 1687, which Venice held till 1 71 8, when the Turks again regained them. But having been cre- ated doge, and having returned to Greece to renew the struggle, he unfortunately lost his life (1694). Chapter XLII VICTOR AMADEUS AND THE FOUNDING OF THE ITALIAN KINGDOM. 1 630-1 748 A FTER the Peace of the Pyrenees, which terminated a long /\ war in 1659, France and Spain stood for some years in X JL friendly relation to each other. But each of these nations possessed certain lands in Piedmont, and the French, wishing to have possessions in other parts of Italy also, always attempted to thwart the Spaniards, and came to the aid of Piedmont whenever it was attacked by them. In the midst of these events the King of France, Louis XIV., following evil counsels, determined to drive all the Protestants out of the country, and applied to Victor Amadeus to induce him to follow the same course. Amadeus, though not openly refusing to do so, yet took his measures in so half-hearted a manner that the king was greatly offended, and sought an occasion of declaring war against him. The Duke of Savoy was a good prince, and aimed in every- thing at the good of his people, by whom in turn he was greatly be- loved. Nevertheless he could not hinder the French from invading his states and doing immense damage, being badly defeated by the French General Catinat at Staffarde in 1690 and again at Marsaglia in 1693. All Italy was involved in this war of the League of Augsburg, 1 689- 1 697, which comprised the chief powers of Europe. It is related that, gazing from Turin upon the castle of Rivoli, re- duced to ashes by the French, Victor Amadeus exclaimed : " Would to heaven that every one of my palaces were burned, provided the cottages of my peasants were safe ! " On another occasion some peasants, whose houses had been burned by the French, came to him, and casting themselves at his feet, related to him all their misfor- tunes. Victor distributed all the money he had in his possession, and taking from his neck a collar studded with gems, tore it in pieces and distributed it to the poor husbandmen. The duke, see- ing the wretched condition of Piedmont, signed a peace with Louis XIV. in 1696, which by the Treaty of Ryswick in 1697 became a general pacification. 326 FOUNDING OF KINGDOM 327 1697-1704 But the death of Charles II., King of Spain, came to disturb the tranquillity of Europe. That king had bequeathed his throne to a French prince named Philip, grandson of the King of France. Louis XIV. accepted the will and placed Philip in possession of the throne. But Leopold I., Emperor of Germany, being related to the late king, also laid claim to the crown of Spain, and even the Duke of Savoy put in some right to the same crown. On this ground he entered into a league with the Emperor of Germany, as being the strongest, and at the same time the one who made him the largest promises. In 1701 a war broke out, which was called the War of Succession of Spain, because it originated in the pretension of dif- ferent monarchs to the throne of that country. On this there followed a complete perturbation through all Europe. On the one side stood France, Spain, and that part of Italy which belonged to Spain. On the other side was Germany, Eng- land, Portugal, and the Duke of Savoy, together with the other princes of Germany. To recount the history of this war would take us too far from our purpose, which aims only at giving the most important events in the history of Italy. But now when it was known that the Duke of Savoy had joined himself to the Emperor of Germany, a numerous army, composed of French and Spaniards, attacked his states. Victor Amadeus put the whole country on a war footing, and prepared a resolute resistance. But he could not prevent Savoy, Nice, Susa, Aosta, Ivrea. and Vercelli from falling into the hands of the enemy. They encountered, however, a stout resistance at the fortress of Verrua, which repelled the attacks of the enemy for six months, and then only surrendered from the failure of food and ammunition (1704). The fortress of Verrua, however, being at length taken, the enemy turned his steps toward Turin. Victor Amadeus had concentrated his forces in the capital, which he had already well supplied with the munitions of war. The besiegers numbered above 60,000 men, and were provided with all the instruments of destruction then in use. To prosecute the siege with certainty of success, they had surrounded the citadel with two trenches, one of which served to defend them from the attacks of the besieged, the other to keep off any allies that might wish to bring aid to them. They labored silently week after week at these trenches, getting nearer and nearer to the fortifications. Then, as soon as they were sufficiently advanced, they attempted to J3S28 I T A L Y 1704-1705 make a fierce assault, accompanied with powerful artillery and the explosion of mines. The besieged, however, did not lose heart at these terrible attacks. There were in the city 8500 Piedmontese soldiers and 1500 Germans. A renowned engineer named Bertola superintended the works for the defense, and Count Solaro directed the artillery. At this critical moment four hundred persons of all ages and both sexes labored to bring earth and faggots to the walls. All the citizens became soldiers, and all were prepared for a des- perate resistance. Large receptacles of water were placed here and there to put out the fires; the pavement in the roads was torn up, and the houses were bridged over and covered with earth, in order to sustain the bombardment. Duke Victor, when he saw the immense superiority of the en- emy, and that they had invested the city and the citadel on the side of the gate of Susa, resolved to leave Turin, in order to solicit aid, to get together all the soldiers he possibly could, and thus to surprise the enemy while intent on the siege. He arranged everything before his departure, encouraged all to stand firm and obey his orders, and went off with a small company of brave follow- ers. With these he hovered round, attacking the French here and there, and skillfully eluding their attempts to surprise and capture him. Still, in spite of the activity and circumspection of the duke, and the courage of the besieged, things had arrived at a lamentable pass. Many of the houses were leveled to the ground, many of the citizens had already perished, the munitions of war began to fail, and famine was staring them in the face. The sole hope of the citizens and of the duke rested on the expectation that his cousin Eugene, a prince of great valor, would come to his succor at the head of a German army. Prince Eugene had in early life become a priest. The read- ing of the history of the wars of antiquity inflamed his mind with the love of military glory, and for this purpose he presented himself to the King of France, Louis XIV., begging to have the command of a regiment. The king smiled at the request, and calling him " the good little abbot," sent him away, "to read his breviary." Eugene, deeply offended, went away, and took service with Austria as a simple volunteer. There he made such rapid progress that, at the age of thirty-four, he was appointed general at the head of an army which was to march against the Turks. The old soldiers, seeing him small of stature, and dressed in a simple tunic without any other FOUNDING OF KINGDOM 329 1705-1706 trimming than metal buttons, said to one another, " This little capuchin will not pull many hairs out of the Turks' beards." But after he had gained a great battle, fought near the city of Zeuta, they began to love him as a father, and believed themselves to be in- vincible when under his leadership. The King of France repented too late of his refusal, and to induce him to come under his banner offered to make him a marshal, with the governorship of Champagne. But Eugene, who had a generous nature, would not be induced to betray his sovereign or pass over to the enemy, and consequently he remained from that time faithful to the house of Austria. Whether it was to revenge the affront which he had received from the King of France, or whether it was from a desire to assist his cousin Victor Amadeus, at the appeal made to him he hastened by forced marches to Turin. The King of France sent to oppose him, first a general named Cati- nat, then another named Villeroi, and finally the Duke of Vendome all three reputed to be the most valiant generals of their time. Eugene engaged and conquered them in three separate battles one on the Adige, another on the Mincio, and the third on the Po. Having accomplished these victories, he then marched rapidly upon Turin. Victor went out to join him at Carmagnola with 6000 horse and 1000 infantry. They met for a parley in a meadow near that city in the presence of all the soldiers. Hearing from there the continued roar of the artillery which was directed against Turin, and thinking sadly of the straits to which the defenders were re- duced, they took all the necessary steps to meet so formidable a foe. The duke went in company with Prince Eugene to head the forces, passed the Po, and, making a wide turn toward Dora, managed to take the French in the rear. While these things were passing the citadel was on the point of falling into the hands of the besiegers, and already a host of the enemy had succeeded during the night in opening a passage through the fosse of the citadel without being observed or seen. Gradually they approached the gate of a subterranean passage, which gave en- trance into the middle of the citadel. Not a single soldier was there, but only a single miner by name Peter Micca, who stood at his post with an officer preparing to spring a mine. Not being able to resist the entrance of the enemy, he determined in his heart to perform a most magnanimous action. The mine was already laid, and he determined to fire it, although the apparatus which would iMO I T A L Y 1706-1714 enable the miner to escape to a place of safety was not yet attached. But Peter, regarding it as a case in which he ought to sacrifice his life for his country, recommended his family to the protection of the officer, and begged him to run and save himself. " I give my life," said he, " with the hope of saving my country." Taking hold then of a match, he fired the mine, and remained buried in the ruins together with the French grenadiers. This happened on the night of August 29, 1706. On the morning of September 7, Eugene and Victor assailed the French, who on their side fought with prodigious bravery. Notwithstanding their immense numbers, however, and that the places near to the city and the citadel were already taken, they were compelled to a hand-to-hand encounter. The besieged, see- ing that assistance had already reached them, made a sortie, and joining themselves with their allies, completely defeated the French. The duke and the brave Prince Eugene entered the city amid the acclamations of the people, and proceeded to the cathe- dral, where a solemn Te Daim was sung as thanksgiving for the victory achieved. Thus the French were driven out of the country, and Piedmont rose anew from its ruins. The duke established September 8 as a yearly day of thanksgiving, and built the mag- nificent temple at Superga. After the battle of Turin the dissensions arising out of the Spanish succession lasted seven years longer, but had no effect upon Italy. At length the nations of Europe, being weary of the horrors of war, held a congress at Utrecht, when a treaty of peace was sketched out, which was afterward agreed on and signed in Rastadt and Baden in 1713-1714. By virtue of this treaty the kingdom of Spain was conceded to Philip V., grandson of the King of France, while Lombardy, Naples, and Sardinia were united to the empire of Austria ; the whole peninsula became virtually Austrian. In 1714 the Turks declared war against Venice. But Venice, largely owing to the irreparable blows to her commerce as a result of the geographical discoveries, was now no longer the flourishing and formidable power which it had been in past ages. In the times of which we now speak, effeminacy and corruption had become in- troduced among the citizens. The government, instead of rousing up the people to arms in case of war, preferred to call in foreign soldiers, and to confide the command of them to strangers. Just as these things had been the cause of the fall of the Roman Empire, FOUNDING OF KINGDOM 331 1714-1733 so was it also with this republic. The Venetians, feeling themselves to be weak, called in the aid of the Christian powers, even before they had begun to suffer any discomforts. Finally, having obtained aid from the Emperor of Austria, from the Pope, from TuScany, and from the Knights of Malta, they were enabled to confront the Turks, who were soon constrained to beg for peace. This was conceded to them on condition that they should yield up the Morea, captured at the end of the seventeenth century. And thus the war came to an end in 171 8. The victory at Turin brought peace to Piedmont, and we may say, indeed, to the whole of Italy. By virtue of the Treaty of Rastadt the states of the Duke of Savoy were greatly enlarged. The whole of Montferrat, Alessandria, Valenza, Lomellina, the valley of Sessia, and all that the French possessed on that side of the Alps were added to them. By virtue of the same treaty, Sicily * was also ceded to Victor Amadeus, with the title of king, which title we shall now give to him and his successors in the subsequent portion of our history. Victor Amadeus, having now become the tranquil possessor of these new states, occupied himself with parental solicitude in repairing the losses caused by long-continued war, and took many useful measures to promote the arts and sciences. He established anew the university in Turin, and enlarged the cathedral. He reorganized the methods of public secondary education, and confided them to the care of a body of learned men, which was called the Magistracy of Reforms. From 1 718 to 1730 he devoted his energies also to improving the laws and administration of his states, having a tedious quarrel with the Pope. He likewise improved the finances and aided agriculture and sheep-raising. By insisting on the equality of all classes before the law he dealt a severe blow to feudalism. As a sovereign he was remarkable for his valor and his political sagacity. Finally he abdicated on September 30, 1730, and was succeeded by his son, Charles Emmanuel, who ruled till 1773. Victor had firmly laid the foundations of an Italian kingdom, and his work was to have an important effect in encouraging a national Italian sentiment. About this time two illustrious families became extinct which for many years had held authority in Italy that of the Medici in Florence, and that of the Farnesi, which for a long period had held the sovereignty in Parma and Piacenza. Both of these dukedoms 1 Exchanged with Austria in 1720 for Sardinia, also with the royal title. 332 ITALY 1733-1735 passed first of all to a Spanish prince called Don Carlos; but on his going soon after to take possession of the kingdom of Naples and Sicily forming the kingdom of the Two Sicilies, a Spanish Bourbon secundogeniture, Tuscany came under the power of the Duke of Lorraine. This duke was called Francis, and by his marriage with Maria Theresa, daughter of the Emperor Charles VI., became the ancestor of the grand dukes who governed Tuscany for so long a period. 2 The government of Parma and Piacenza passed into the hands of Philip, brother of Don Carlos in 1735. Charles Emmanuel on his accession to the throne gave his spe- cial attention to the reorganization of the army. He founded schools of artillery, completed the building of two large fortresses, one at Alessandria, the other at Brunetta; he built the arsenal and greatly ameliorated the condition of the Island of Sardinia, so that the population rapidly increased. He desired to abolish feudalism, but could not entirely succeed in doing so, though he did away with a great part of its claims. While Charles Emmanuel was thus carrying on his reforms in Piedmont, Leopold I., Grand Duke of Tuscany and second son of Francis and Maria Theresa, did the same in his own states. He abolished many privileges, forbade the use of torture, and did away with many other abuses in the administration of justice. He dis- solved the guilds, reorganized the studies of the university, and founded schools and hospitals. During the reign of Charles Emmanuel two events happened which lighted up commotion throughout Europe as well as Italy, namely, the Polish war and the War of the Succession of Austria. In Poland the king was always chosen by election that is, at the death of any sovereign, the son did not succeed his deceased father ; but the principal nobles of the kingdom, termed electors, held an assembly, and elected the person whom they considered most capa- ble of holding the reins of government, even though a foreigner. In the year 1733 the King of Poland, by name Frederick, died, and the nobles of the kingdom were in disagreement as to the choice of a successor. France favored a certain Stanislaus, who had al- ready been king in the early part of that century. But Austria and Russia wished Augustus of Saxony, son of the deceased monarch, to be chosen. This led to a war on the part of France and Spain 2 This was due to the Peace of Vienna between France and Austria. Tus- cany became a secundogeniture of the Austrian house. FOUNDING OF KINGDOM 333 1735-1743 against Russia and Austria. The theater of this war was for the most part in Italy, and the King of Sardinia took part, now on one side and now on the other, employing both courage and circum- spection for the preservation of his own states. 3 The other event which had much to do with the contemporary history of Italy was the War of Succession of Austria. Charles VI., Holy Roman Emperor, died in 1740 without leaving any other heir than Maria Theresa, wife of Francis, Duke of Tuscany. By force of a law called the Pragmatic Sanction, she was now heir to the Hapsburg lands. But Prussia, France, and Spain declared against Maria Theresa, so that they might have the chance of dividing the Austrian territories among themselves. England and Sardinia, on the other hand, opposed them, and out of this arose a great European war which lasted nine years. Charles Emmanuel throughout the strife showed himself a true hero, and signalized himself in many battles both in Italy and abroad. A powerful army of Austrians and Piedmontese routed on several occasions the allied French and Spanish forces, and at length succeeded in driving them wholly out of Italy. The con- querors, rendered confident by these successes, divided themselves into two portions. The main army, composed of Germans, marched toward Genoa, while Charles Emmanuel followed the French along the Riviera and the shores of the Mediterranean toward France. Here he gained several victories over the French army, until, that army being reinforced, he suffered a defeat, and was obliged to return to Piedmont. A numerous army of French now attempted to descend into Piedmont on the side of Monginevro. Up to that time there had only been two practicable roads from France into Piedmont one which passed close by the fortress of Fenestrelle, and then descended toward Pinerolo, while the other followed the route through Susa and had to pass the fortress of Exilles. The French, to avoid these two fortresses, attempted to pass by the Col of Assietta, which di- vides the mountain on which these two fortresses are situated. To defend the Col of Assietta, four battalions of Austrians were posted there, and ten battalions of Piedmontese, under the command of Count Bricherasio. The French to the number of forty battalions, 3 He wished to eat the artichoke, i. c, Lombard, leaf by leaf, he said, and he proceeded carefully, bargaining with both sides, to secure the most possible of his coveted artichoke. !334 I T A L Y 1743-1745 guided by General Belleisle, a brave but inexpert leader, commenced their descent by the rocks and precipices. At the sight of these un- expected assailants, who climbed down among the fragments and crevices of the mountains, the defenders were struck with terror, the more so as the enemy were so much more numerous than themselves, and covered well-nigh the whole mountain. Notwithstanding this, considering their favorable position, and thinking that the safety of the whole country depended on the safety of that fort, they de- termined to make a bold resistance. The French made many desperate attacks, which were repelled with equal boldness by the besieged. Belleisle, wishing to make a last attempt, took the flag, invited his companions to follow him, and climbed up, determined to take the fort or die. The besieged, seeing themselves assailed with so much impetuosity, redoubled their efforts. Lances, swords, artil- lery, everything was brought to bear ; rocks and stones were hurled down upon the enemy, until they were at last forced to give way, and victory declared itself on the side of the Piedmontese. The French general fell ; five thousand French, among whom were three hundred officers belonging to the first nobility, remained dead or were taken prisoners. The others, struck with terror, returned and took refuge in France. But the Germans who had marched upon Genoa, not knowing how to use their victories with moderation, met with a sad reverse. To understand this, it must be noted that the Genoese had allied themselves with the French, and had given them great help in the war against the Piedmontese and Austrians. But now the French being worsted, and compelled to retire in haste, a general named Botta, a native of Pavia, marched upon Genoa to take his revenge. The Genoese having been obliged to supply arms, soldiers, money, and other aid to the French, were not now in a position to make a vigorous defense, and therefore sued for peace, offering to agree to any conditions he might make. Botta, profiting by the panic of the citizens, imposed very hard conditions ; among others, that the gates of the city should be thrown open, the artillery and munitions of war given up, the doge sent to Vienna, and a large sum of money paid down for the expenses of the war. These conditions were extremely hard, virtually despoiling the republic and making slaves of the citizens. The Genoese begged in the most abject RAPHAEL SANCTIUS (RAFAELE SAXZIO) OF URH1XO (Horn 1483. Died 1520) Portrait by Scbastiano del Piombo vi 485-1 547) in the Xational Gallery at Budapest. In the Scarpia collection at La Motta di Li:en:a this picture passed for years as a portrait by Raphael of Antonio Tebaldco, the Ferrarese courtier-poet. On purely intrinsic evidence both Morelli and Bercnson identify it as a portrait of Raphael at the age of twenty-six or tzcentx-sc'ccn rears. FOUNDING OF KINGDOM 335 1745-1748 manner that the victorious general would mitigate his conditions, but without effect, for hardly had Botta made his entrance than he imposed another tribute of eighteen million francs, six million of which were to be paid within six days, six million more in eight days, and the balance within fifteen days. To these oppressions they added barbarous threats and continual robberies. The Genoese sent a deputation, which the general turned back, saying, " You are unworthy of consideration. We mean to despoil you of all you have, and leave you nothing but your eyes to weep." They were obliged, therefore, to sell all the treasure in the churches, and the public funds ; and thus, by dint of great efforts, the eighteen million francs were paid. But what was their surprise when the Germans made demand for another six million francs, then other sums, besides threatening to sack the city in case of refusal. On this the indignation of the citizens was aroused, and it only needed an occasion for a general rebellion to break out. An occasion soon presented itself. While the Germans were dragging a great mortar through the city, the street sank in, and the cavalcade was stopped. They ac- cordingly attempted to force the people to lend them aid, and those who refused had to receive blows with sticks. At the sight of this brutal oppression, a young man named Ballilla, boiling over with indignation and desperation, took up a stone, and saying, " It is high time to finish this," threw it at one of the Germans. Instantly men of every age and condition began to pelt the soldiers with stones and pieces of rock. Some of them were killed, while others, leaving the mortar in the road, took to flight. The tumult, however, went on increasing; night came on, and the people, arming themselves with everything they could lay hold of, assailed the Germans even up to the mouth of the cannon. Botta then knew that he had com- mitted a great mistake in abusing his victory, and after some hours of fierce combat, offered favorable terms to the Genoese, who refused them, saying, " We want no more alms from you." Nothing remained then to the Germans but a hasty flight, the Genoese following at their heels, crying, " Viva Genoa! Viva Maria!" So precipitous was the flight that they left behind them all the munitions of war and the provisions of the army. The fight at Assietta and the liberation of Genoa are the last events in the W r ar of the Austrian Succession. All the people of Italy were tired of war. and the powers, to make an end of it, held a 336 ITALY 1748 conference at Aix-la-Chapelle. Thus in the year 1748 peace was established, and Francis I., husband of Maria Theresa, was recog- nized Emperor of Germany. Charles Emmanuel received by the peace the upper part of Novara and Vigerano, thus realizing some at least of his territorial ambitions ; Don Philip was given Parma, Piacenza, and Guastalla as an independent duchy ; Don Carlos was confirmed in the Two Sicilies. From this date, 1748, till 1796. Italy was undisturbed by invasion. Chapter XLIII CELEBRATED MEN OF THE MIDDLE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. 1 750- 1 800 A FTER the victory of Assietta, the liberation of Genoa, and L\ the peace concluded at Aix-la-Chapelle, nearly half a cen- X JLtury passed over without any remarkable political events affecting - the condition of Italy. The Seven Years' War, with France, Austria, and Russia on the one side, Prussia and England on the other, occupied the whole attention, and taxed all the re- sources, of the greater powers of Europe. But Italy took no part in these conflicts, and their narration cannot, therefore, properly find any place in Italian history. While these events are transpiring, we can therefore give some account of a few of the remark- able men who lived in Italy about the middle of the eighteenth century. The first we shall mention is Julius Alberoni, son of a gardener in Piacenza. Showing in early life great aptitude for learning, his father procured for him the means of prosecuting his studies, in which he made marvelous progress. He then embraced the eccle- siastical profession. His great ability and aptitude for managing affairs of state afterward led him to take a conspicuous part in the most important political affairs of Europe. He was first a parish priest, then a canon, and secretary to the Bishop of St. Donnino, and after a time became minister to the King of Spain. In this capacity he was mixed up with many important events. Among other things he caused a powerful fleet to be got ready with the utmost secrecy in Spain, sailed with it to Italy, and made himself master of the islands of Sicily and Sardinia. But as it was by means of political in- trigues that he was brought to the apex of power, so it was through them also that he was destined to be brought low. After having been for many years arbiter of affairs in Spain, he was, as a result of his Italian plans, at the instance of France, England, and Sar- dinia, deposed from his high position and sent into exile. Among 337 338 ITALY 1750-1800 the things, however, which render the memory of Alberoni remark- able, we ought to mention the college founded at Piacenza, at his expense, where sixty poor youths enjoy free education. In this college he terminated his days in the year 1752. " One man of genius, Vittorio Alfieri, the creater of Italian tragedy, . . . taught to the Italians the lesson of respect for themselves and for their country (a lesson) . . . which Italy most of all required to learn; and the appearance of this manly and energetic spirit in its literature gave hope that the Ital- ian nation would not long be content to remain without polit- ical being." x Ludovico Antonio Muratori ranks as one of the most learned men whom Europe produced during the eighteenth century. He was born at Vignola, a village near Modena, and made his first studies in that city. He early signalized himself by the astonishing progress which he made in the ancient languages, in philosophy, in jurispru- dence, and in theology. He was sober and diligent, ate only what was sufficient to sustain life, allowed himself only five hours' rest in the day, and took care never to lose a moment of time from morning to night. At the age of twenty, Muratori was reckoned one of the most learned men of his time. He became a priest, and was ap- pointed to one of the principal churches in Modena. But being invited by the duke to become his librarian, he renounced his ecclesiastical office, and buried himself in his favorite studies. The works he published amount to the number of sixty-four volumes in folio. They relate chiefly to the history of Italy. He first collected and published the most important documents, and then wrote the annals of the country based upon these most trustworthy reports. He also published works on religion and theology. He died at the age of seventy-seven, in the year 1750. To the present day the works of Muratori are one of the main sources from which the materials of Italian history are drawn. Another celebrated author and poet flourished at this time, namely, Pietro Bonaventura Trapassi, commonly termed Metas- tasio. He was the son of a poor tradesman in Rome, who for want of means could not send his son to school to be educated ; but a cer- tain advocate named Gravina, hearing him one day recite some verses extempore, took him into favor, and had him instructed in Latin and Greek. By the advice of his teacher he composed a 1 Fyffe, " Modern Europe," p. 76. MIDDLE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 339 1750-1800 tragedy entitled " Guistino " when only fourteen years of age, in which the genius of the youth first began to manifest itself. At the age of twenty he lost his benefactor, who left him, however, a con- siderable fortune. As the reputation of his dramas began to be widely extended, he was invited to Vienna, the imperial city, and a salary was given him, with the title of Imperial Poet. Metastasio composed many famous poems, and showed a most generous and disinterested character. He was greatly honored by the Empress Maria Theresa, and died at a good old age amid the regrets of the wise and the great. We shall mention one other man of note who lived somewhat later than Metastasio, namely, Giuseppe Parini. 2 He was born at Bosisio, a village in Lombardy, also of poor parents. The father perceiving the great ability of his son, and his extraordinary dili- gence in study, not being able otherwise to aid his progress, sold his farm and went to live at Milan. There they soon became reduced to great straits, and the lad had to occupy his time in copying briefs for advocates, the proceeds of which he carried home to his parents. On the death of his father, he made over all that was left of the paternal inheritance to his mother, and labored for his own sub- sistence. By dint of industry and study he became an excellent poet, and was nominated public professor of literature by the Gov- ernor of Milan. Parini labored assiduously for the good of his fellow-citizens, and filled many important posts in the municipality. In 1796, when General Bonaparte made his victorious entrance into Milan, Parini was selected from among the members of the municipal body to confer with him, and succeeded by his firmness and sagacity in warding off many evils. He possessed an ardent temperament, but held it always under control, and never bore enmity against anyone, not even his personal enemies. He died at Milan at the age of seventy, in the year 1799, a year big with important events for the future of Italy. In other directions, we have Galvani of Bologna and Volta of Como, whose works on electricity rendered them fa- mous. Beccaria wrote his famous book on " Crimes and Punish- ments," advocating a due relation between them ; and Filangieri of Naples wrote on the " Science of Legislation," an admirable work. In the drama we find the celebrated Goldoni. At this time also 2 See "Die italienisclie Einheitsidcc in Hirer litterarischen Entwicklung vo>i Parini bis Manzoni," by O. Bulle, Berlin, 1893. 340 I T A L Y 1750-1800 several of the princes deserve by their attempts at reform to be numbered among the princes eclaires of the century. Notable among - them was the Bourbon Charles of Naples, aided by his min- ister, Tanucci. In Parma, Duke Philip, guided by Dutillot, carried through extensive reforms ; and the same was true in Tuscany under the Grand Dukes Francis and Leopold; and finally Charles Em- manuel I. of Sardinia proved himself a reformer. Chapter XLIV ITALY AND NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 1789-1815. IN the various states of Italy the form of government which had existed in the time of Charles V. had with few exceptions remained unaltered down to 1796. Piedmont belonged to the house of Savoy, and had taken the title of the kingdom of Sar- dinia. Lombardy was under the government of the Emperor of Germany. The two republics of Genoa and Venice continued to exist, but in a degenerate form ; for since the discovery of America they had ceased to be the great centers of commerce and the queens of the ocean, which they had been for centuries before. In the Two Sicilies and the dukedom of Parma princes were still reigning who were descended from the Spanish Bourbons. Lucca was a republic. In Tuscany there was a grand duke, brother of the Roman emperor. Rome and the Romagna formed the states of the church, and in the middle of the Roman states was the little republic of San Marino, which still exists in the center of Italy. Moreover, for fifty years there had been peace in Italy, and for the most part throughout Europe also. Despite the reforms and works of literature and science referred to above, Italy as a whole, that is, the mass of the people, was sunk in a hopeless lethargy, un- disturbed from within or without and superstitiously devout. As Quinet says, " Roman Catholicism had become the patrie of the lower classes," through lack of any other. The disputes be- tween the Roman See and the temporal princes of Italy had been allayed, and Clement XIV. had embellished Rome itself during his pontificate, having formed there a museum of antiquities, and in various ways promoted the fine arts. Meanwhile, in France, a great-grandson of Louis XIV. had succeeded to the throne under the title of Louis XV. This prince had at first excited great ex- pectations; but, surrounded by evil company, he became soon en- gulfed in a life of mere pleasure, neglecting the affairs of the state, and shutting his eyes to the misery of the people. After a long and useless reign he was succeeded by his grandson, Louis XVI. When 341 342 I T A L Y 1789-1796 this prince came to the throne the offices and revenues of the state were wretchedly mismanaged, grievous burdens were pressing upon the people, justice was badly administered, and famine was stalking through the land. Louis attempted to stem these evils, but his efforts proved in vain. The facts of the French Revolution are too extraneous to require any other than the briefest record. Un- heard-of barbarities were committed, religion was persecuted, the nobility were driven into exile and their lands confiscated, the king and queen were brought to the scaffold, and the whole framework of society was subverted. The abettors of this revolution now began to propagate their principles throughout Italy, where on the whole, till 1796, they met with little sympathy and long found the priests to be their worst enemies, owing to the French irreligion. A French army had already found the way across the Alps, with the aim of making themselves masters of Italy by force of arms, aided by sympathizers in that country. The King of Sardinia, Victor Amadeus II., gave a vigorous opposition to this movement, which in fact made but little way until the republican government in France placed General Napoleon Bonaparte at the head of the army of invasion. This general was a native of Ajaccio in Corsica, his family having or- iginally gone from Tuscany to settle in that island. He was placed while almost a child in a military college in France, and soon showed great aptitude in all military affairs. When his scholastic career was completed, he entered the French army as a sub-lieutenant, but rose rapidly in the ranks until he was then intrusted with the com- mand of the army in Italy. The news that the French were on their way, led by Napoleon, struck terror into the minds of the Italian princes, who conferred together to invite aid from the English, the Austrians, and the Russians. But these powers were at a distance from the scene of conflict, and their help was long in coming; moreover, the republics of Genoa and Venice and the Grand Duke of Tuscany refused to join the alliance, and thus rendered the efforts of the defenders of Italy almost useless. Napoleon now managed with marvelous rapidity to penetrate into Italy. The Piedmontese resisted for some time; but then feel- ing themselves too weak to hold front against the enemy any longer, they attempted to make terms. Accordingly an armistice was con- cluded in Cherasco between Bonaparte and the king's ministers, ITALY AND NAPOLEON 343 1796-1798 and later a treaty of peace was concluded in Paris. By virtue of this treaty the annexation of Savoy and Nice to France, which had taken place in 1792, was confirmed; the fortresses of Ceva, Cuneo, Tortona, and Alessandria were occupied by French soldiers, while those of Exilles, Brunetta, and Susa were demolished; in a word, everything was taken which could serve as a future defense to the country. Thus, then, the Piedmontese were the first to bear the foreign yoke. Napoleon, it is true, was not one of those who aimed at the destruction of the people and their religion; but in order to satisfy his soldiers and to strike terror into the minds of the people he subdued, he imposed heavy contributions of money and of works of art on friend and foe alike and crushed all opposition to his rule with an unsparing hand. Napoleon did all he could to spread revolutionary ideas through the country, and encouraged the people to rise in opposition to their sovereigns. Milan became the capital of the Cisalpine republic, and thus the French army, making its progress through Italy, ar- rived near to Rome. Napoleon sent a message to the Pope, saying that he would content himself with the cession of Ferrara and Bologna, and would not do anything to disturb the rest of his states, provided he furnished him with a large sum of money. Pope Pius VI., who was powerless to resist, consented to the demands of Na- poleon, and paid him the required sum of money, selling many sacred objects from the churches to raise it. But when the French, commanded by General Berthier, entered Rome, they at once an- nounced that the Pope was dethroned from his temporal sovereignty, removed the Roman guards, and put French soldiers in their place. Not content with this, the French general now proceeded to add insult to injury, and insisted on clothing the Pope in a tri- colored scarf. But Pius VI. answered : " I know nothing of any device but that of the church. You have power over my body, but my mind is superior to any such attempt. You may burn the dwellings of the living and desecrate the tombs of the dead, but religion itself is eternal. It will exist after you, as it existed before, and its reign will last forever." While this colloquy was passing, soldiers were sent to sack the pontifical palace. They made their entrance into the most venerable cabinets, and sold many of the precious volumes from the Vatican library. There was not a thing, however sacred, which was not seized upon to turn into money. 344 ITALY 1798-1799 The Pope was now obliged to leave Rome, and took refuge in a convent at Florence, where he was visited by many of the unfortu- nate princes, and among others by Charles Emmanuel II., King of Sardinia. This unhappy prince, after having held out manfully against the republicans, had been forced to abandon his throne on the mainland and take refuge in the island of Sardinia. Arriving at Florence, he had an interview with Pius VI. ; and when he and his family saw him, they threw themselves at his feet, overcome by their mutual misfortunes. Charles Emmanuel continued his voyage to Sardinia, and the venerable pontiff was taken prisoner to France, where he died after a month's confinement on August 29, 1799. In the meantime, two formidable armies had come from Ger- many to the relief of Italy, marching along the banks of the Adige, between Venice and Verona. Napoleon was at this time occupied with the siege of Mantua, and not feeling himself strong enough to continue the siege and at the same time hold front against these two armies, he left Mantua and marched against the first army as it descended from the Alps, and put it to flight ; then he hastened to meet the second army, and routed it also. Then returning to the siege of Mantua, he forced it to surrender. The Italians, how- ever, did not everywhere rest content with this state of things. Discontent showed itself in Verona, and a French vessel entering Venice was assailed by the Venetians. Napoleon, making a pre- text of these things, attacked Venice, and making himself master of the city, abolished the old government and shortly handed over Venice and its territory to Austria. He afterward did the same thing at Genoa. Thus these two republics, after a glorious career of fifteen centuries, fell like a man weighed down with years and toil, without any hope of a revival. All Italy, except Naples and Venice, accordingly, had now become French (1797). In this year a treaty of peace was concluded between France and Austria, called the Treaty of Campoformio. By virtue of this treaty the River Rhine was made the limit of France, and the Ionian Islands were ceded to it. By the same treaty, also, the Cisal- pine republic was extended to the River Adige. In relating, as we have just done, the victories of the French, it is not to be supposed that they met with no difficulties from the resistance of the Italians. Difficulties, in fact, soon made their appearance, when Napoleon, imagining that he had well consoli- dated the dominion of the French in Italy, left the country, and ITALY AND NAPOLEON 345 1799-1800 went on an expedition into Egypt, in order to make himself master of more distant countries. The Russians and Austrians also, with some other of the European sovereigns, mustered their forces to oppose the conquerors, who threatened to overrun the whole of Europe. The French, indeed, exhibited marvelous valor, but as the results of a war depend mainly upon the skill of the general, and as Napoleon was no longer at the head of the French forces, they met with several reverses, until they were at length driven wholly out of Italy, and pursued to the very frontiers of France. The governments set up by Napoleon in Italy at once fell and the old rulers returned (1798- 1799). When Napoleon returned from Egypt and heard of the defeat in Italy he determined to regain possession of the peninsula. He got together, at once, as large a force as he was able, and marched with the utmost celerity upon Italy, making a passage over the Great St. Bernard. In crossing the Alps the army had to overcome enormous difficulties, particularly in transporting the artillery and the cavalry, in consequence of the glaciers and the precipices they had to pass over. The news of the approach of Napoleon at first terrified the allies, but when they came to know that their own forces were far superior to those of the enemy, they decided upon resisting him at whatever cost. For this purpose they concentrated the flower of the allied army in the plain of Marengo, a small village of Piedmont, near to Alessandria. Napoleon went boldly to con- front the enemy, and determined to fight a pitched battle on the spot. This battle was to decide the fate of Napoleon, of Italy, perhaps of the whole of Europe. Both sides, accordingly, fought with the utmost courage and fury. At the beginning the Austrians pre- vailed, and Napoleon was already meditating a retreat. But sud- denly fortune again smiled upon him, and the timely arrival of one of his generals, named Dessaix, gained him the victory. The plains of Marengo were covered with the slain. Nineteen thousand Ger- mans and eight thousand French were left dead on the field (1800). In consequence of this battle, the Germans retired over the Mincio, and the French regained Piedmont, Genoa, and Lombardy. After this deed of arms no one could any longer arrest the progress of Napoleon. Victory attended him wherever he went. First, Naples fell under his dominion, so that all Italy became subject to the French, while Belgium, Holland, and Egypt were occupied by the armies of the conqueror. 346 I T A L Y 1800-1804 But he, the very man who had hitherto served the French re- public, now began to hate all republican government, and aimed at making himself absolute master both of France and of the other kingdoms he had conquered. First, he had himself created consul with two other colleagues; then first consul for life, and in this char- acter he introduced many reforms. He abolished the laws which the republic had passed against the nobility and the priests ; by the concordat with Pope Pius VII. in 1801, friendly relations between France and Rome were once more resumed, and Bonaparte recog- nized the Catholic, Apostolic, and Roman religion as that of the majority of the French people, and reorganized the government of France; he favored public education, and made roads to facilitate commerce. In Italy he opened a national institution for the pro- motion of science, and created the most celebrated men of the time members of it. After the victory of Marengo, Napoleon pursued the war again against Austria, from which he took several of the German prov- inces. In fact, he now aimed at the same kind of universal domin- ion which Charlemagne had formerly exercised, and had himself solemnly crowned by the Pope. In the meantime Pius VI. had died in 1799, and a successor had to be appointed. At the death of Pius the French were occupying all Italy. The cardinals and many of the bishops were dispersed, so that it seemed impossible for the Sacred College to assemble to elect a new Pope. But just at this moment the Austrians and Russians were successful in Italy and thus the cardinals were enabled to assemble and elect a new pontiff, under the name of Pius VII. The new Pope went at once to take possession of his pontifical throne, but was soon called by Napoleon to Paris, in order to crown him emperor. Pius hesitated at first to go at the request of the French monarch, because he knew he only wished to use him for his own political purposes. Nevertheless, with the desire of render- ing himself friendly to so formidable a personage, to ward off the evils which would be brought upon the church by his refusal, and also to make known that he did not desire to refuse the great favor which Napoleon promised to confer upon the church, he determined, finally, to accept the invitation. Pius VII., accordingly, started from Rome, passed through a large portion of France, entered Paris amid the acclamations of the people, and anointed Napoleon on December 2, 1804. ITALY AND NAPOLEON 347 1804-1805 The year after this, Napoleon conquered the Austrian army at Ulm, and just after the first anniversary of his coronation he fought the battle of Austerlitz in Bohemia, and gained a great vic- tory over the two emperors of Russia and Austria. After this battle a treaty was signed at Presburg, by virtue of which Venice and Dalmatia were ceded to the empire of France. In the midst of these victories Napoleon was always considering how he could strike a blow at the prosperity of England. Seeing that it would be difficult, if not impossible, to subject England by force of arms, he determined to try the plan of crushing her commerce. For this purpose, he forbade all the friendly powers of Europe to admit English produce and manufacture, which decree he termed the Continental System. In accordance with this system, he wished to bind over the King of Portugal to close all his ports to English merchandise, and gave orders that all subjects of Great Britain found within his states should be arrested and their goods confis- cated. The King of Portugal not being willing to consent to these measures, Napoleon determined to invade Portugal with a mixed French and Spanish army. Aspiring now after glory and dominion like that of Charle- magne, he went to Italy and had himself crowned King of Italy at Milan with the Iron Crown with which the ancient Lombards were accustomed to crown their sovereigns. It is said that as Napoleon placed the crown on his own head, he exclaimed, " God has given it me, and woe be to him who touches it ! " As soon as Napoleon had gained what he desired from the hands of the Pope, he no longer thought of maintaining his prom- ises, but planned making himself master of all the states then under the power of the Papal See. To give a specious pretext for doing this, he made demands which the Pope could not possibly grant that is, he demanded an offensive and defensive alliance; that one- third of the cardinals should be Frenchmen ; that the whole temporal power, in fact, should be virtually conceded to him. As the pontiff could not make these concessions, Napoleon commenced to lay an impost of several millions upon the country, in order to pay which the Pope had to part with many of the objects employed in the sacred rites of the churches. But soon Napoleon showed his real design. and ordered one of his generals to take possession of the pontifical states and the city of Rome itself. These were then declared to be annexed to France, and the Pope was conducted as a prisoner to 348 I T A L Y 1805-1812 Fontainbleati. Thus the whole of the Italian peninsula fell under the empire of France, but it still consisted of several states, the kingdom of Italy ruled by a viceroy, the kingdom of Naples ruled by Murat, though the Bourbons still held Sicily and the kingdom of Sardinia, which was reduced to that island, all the rest of its terri- tory being annexed to France. Rome was declared the second city in the empire, being next to Paris. Napoleon now being master of a great part of Europe, parti- tioned the different kingdoms among his own relations. He ap- pointed first his brother Joseph, but afterward his brother-in-law Joachim Murat, King of Naples. Murat was a man of obscure birth, but by his great courage had gained favor with Napoleon. who now raised him to the regal dignity. At the beginning of his reign Murat took the Island of Capri, which had been occupied by the English. Next he abolished feudalism, and freed the whole country from the hordes of brigands which infested it. He then tried to take possession of Sicily, but did not succeed. In a word, he endeavored to render himself wholly independent of France, but only succeeded so far as to remove the French soldiers away from his territory. Another brother-in-law of Napoleon, the Prince Borghese, was made Governor of Piedmont, and to his sister Eliza he gave Tuscany. In 181 1 he constituted his own son born of Maria Louisa, daughter of the Emperor of Austria King of Rome. To his brother Louis he gave the kingdom of Holland, to Joseph Bonaparte, Spain, and to the youngest brother Jerome, the kingdom of Westphalia. These arbitrary appointments showed the people of Europe that he had no desire for their liberty, but only wished to impose new masters upon them ; and this gave rise to many wars and out- breaks, and among others an especially sanguinary one in Spain. Italy, in fact, was divided by him into three parts, of which one only bore the name of the Italian kingdom. This kingdom extended from the River Sessia to the River Isonza, and from the Alps to the Po. Beyond the Po it comprehended the territories of Modena and Guastalla, with some few other provinces, the population being about six and a half millions. With the eager desires of subjecting the whole world to his power, Napoleon next conceived the extraordinary design of con- quering the great empire of Russia, embracing as it does all the vast countries to the north of Europe and Asia. Napoleon did not dis- ITALY AND NAPOLEON 349 1812-1814 guise from himself that the enterprise was one of great difficulty, and he therefore put on foot an army of more than four hundred thousand men. With this army he traversed the whole of Germany, and advanced into the heart of the colossal Russian empire. The great forces employed, and the renown of the general, carried such terror before them that the countries through which they had to pass were turned into one vast desert. After several skirmishes and one sanguinary battle, he arrived at Moscow, and took possession of it ; but on arriving he found that the Russian governor had set fire to the city, so that it should not serve as a refuge to the French during the winter that was then coming on. Napoleon remained there one whole month, hoping to force the Russians to accept the conditions of peace which he chose to offer. But they refused to respond to any of his propositions, foreseeing that winter would surprise him in the midst of a desolated country. Then Napoleon at last saw that he had penetrated too far into those northern regions without the resources which were indispensa- ble for so numerous an army. The winter came, and proved their most invincible enemy. The rivers were frozen, the fields covered with snow. Warm clothing was indispensable to the soldiers, and of this he had none. The horrors of the retreat are a matter of history. Some gave themselves up as prisoners, others died frozen on the plains, and those who still lived threw away their arms, which they could no longer carry. Few survived the terrible disaster, and even Napoleon himself with difficulty succeeded in escaping into France (1812-1813). This grand army being now destroyed, Napoleon lost the sup- port on which his power relied, and all the nations whom he had oppressed rose up against him. The allies gave him battle near Leipsic and gained the advantage. Napoleon fled to Paris and was followed up by the enemy. At length he retired to Fontaine- bleau and there deposed the imperial crown (1814). The allied powers exiled him to Elba, an island lying between Corsica and Tuscany. Austria was now T in a position to reoccupy Italy, and the allied sovereigns, holding a congress at Vienna, deliberated as to the future government of the different provinces which they had re- taken by force of arms. The " legitimate " princes were for the most part restored, and the pristine forms of government were again es- tablished, so that Italy in form returned to its condition prior to 1796, but "the old fixity of confusion which passed for govern- 350 ITALY 1814-1815 rnent " had been too rudely shaken to be as strong as ever. The form might be the same, the spirit was soon seen to be different. During the sitting of this congress Napoleon succeeded in escaping from Elba, and reassuming the reins of government in France, March, 1815. He disembarked on the shores of France, where many of his old soldiers received him with transports of joy ; at every step he took the remains of the great army gathered round him; he entered Paris in triumph, and reestablished the imperial power. At this unexpected news the allies again armed themselves for the conflict, and reassembled their forces on the frontiers of France. fS ^\, ^-( } U SW'lTZERt^ V s f** rS TRANCE -Aland \r-'\ / ^ r % \ V^ SARDINIA ' ! ^ \ l K. f \ ' 1 f J^"Nb^5?^/A x 7 / / f\ ff\ ^X / i 7 / SARDINIA ( / V X^C/VS. ~v*v 2 \ _J ^"X "N'^u. \_ \ J ^s " ? r "^v*5? ITALY 21 Metastasio (Pietro Bonaventura Tra- passi) : sketch of, 338 Micca, Peter : heroism of, at the siege of Turin, 329 Milan: as a republic, 189; surrenders to Frederick Barbarossa, 192; second siege and destruction, 193; statisti- cal statement of, 207; internal strife (1220), 211 ; (1257), 217; conquered by the French, 291 ; the plague of 1576, 311; made capital of the Cisalpine republic, 343 Milan, Edict of: issued, 116 Milvian Bridge: battle of, 118 Mincio: battle of the, 329 Modena: internal strife, 211 Mohammed II: threatens Italy, 264 Montebello: battle of, 373 Monte Rotondo: battle of, 392 Monti, Vincenzo: sketch of, 409 Moriale, Fra: leader of band of rob- bers, 252 Morosini, Francesco: his campaign against the Turks, 325 Mortara: battle of, 174 Mucianus : proconsul of Syria, 72 Murat, Joachim : appointed King of Naples, 348 Muratori, Ludovico Antonio : sketch of, 338 Mursa: battle of, 124 Mutina: siege of (44 b. c), 13 N Naissus: battle of (269 a. d.), ho Naples : invaded by Louis, King of Hungary, 254; history of, in the Middle Ages, 257; passes to Spain, 291 ; under Spanish rule, 323 ; sur- renders to Napoleon, 345; revolu- tion of 1820, 352; Austrians enter (1821), 354; surrenders to Gari- baldi, 380 436 INDEX Napoleon (I) Bonaparte: invasion of Italy, 342 Napoleon III, Emperor of France: joins Piedmont against Austria, 372 Narses : defeats Totila, 161 ; governor general of Italy, 162 Naulochus : battle of, 21 Nepos, Julius : reign, 150 Neri : rise of, 212 Nero Claudius Caesar Drusus Germani- cus: adopted by Claudius, 60; reign of, 62; death, 68 Nerva, Cocceius : influences a new divi- sion of territory among the trium- virs, 20 Nerva, Cocceius, death of, 53 Nerva, Marcus Cocceius: reign of, 86 Nicaea, Council of, 121 Nice: siege of, 305 Nicholas III, Pope; enforces measures of reconciliation in all Italian cities, 213; progress of temporal power of Papacy under, 220 Nicholas V, Pope: accession, 277 Nicosia: siege of, 309 Niger, Caius Pescennius: proclaimed emperor by his troops, 100 Novara: siege of (1511), 293; battles of (1522), 301; (1849), 359 Noviomagus: battle of, 117 Octavia, sister of Octavius: death, 42 Octavius, Caius : see Augustus Caesar Odenathus : assumes the title of em- peror, no Odessa: battle of (260 a. d.), no Odoacer: defeats Orestes, 151; reign of, 155 Olybrius, Flavius Anicius: reign of, 150 Orcagna, Andrea: his effect on the Renaissance, 283 Orestes: his influence in the Western Empire, 151 Ostia: seized by Alaric, 141 Ostrogoths: see Goths Otho, Marcus Salvius, Emperor of Rome: sent to Lusitania, 63; plots to obtain the throne, 69; proclaimed emperor, 70; death, 71 Otho (I) the Great, Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire: invades Italy, 181 Otho III, Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire: Italy under, 183 Otho IV, Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire: crowned, 198; quarrel with the Pope, 200 Otho, Count of Savoy: reign of, 272 Oudinot: restores Pius IX to his throne, 368 Ovid: exiled, 44 Padua: conquered by Venice, 250 Palermo: siege of (i860), 378 Palestine: ravaged by Roman forces, 78 Palestrina, Giovanni Pierluigi da : sketch of, 414 Palestro : battle of, 373 Pannonia: insurrection of, 44 Pansa, Caius Vibius: consul-elect, 12; death, 13 Papinian, yEmilius: rules Rome, 101; death, 102 Parini, Giuseppe: sketch of, 339 Parthamasiris, king of Armenia : sub- mits to Trajan, 89 Paul V, Pope: hostility of, toward Galileo, 321 Paulinus, Suetonius : his campaigns in Britain, 75 Pavia: conquered by the Lombards (568 a. d.), 163; siege of, 302 Pax Romana: reigns over all the em- pire, 46 Pedius, Quintius: elected consul, 14; death, 15 Pellico, Silvio : work of, 409 Pepe : heads Italian revolution, 352 Pertinax, Publius Helvius: reign of, 99 Peschiera, Fortress of: siege of, 358 Peter III, King of Aragon: marries Constance, 215 Peter I, Count of Savoy: reign of, 272 Peter II, Count of Savoy: reign of, 274 Petrarch, Francesco : sketch of, 281 Philibert II, Duke of Savoy: reign of, 305 Philip III, King of France: at war with Aragon, 258 INDEX 437 Philip II, King of Spain: accession of, 307; aids Venice against Turks, 309 Philip V, King of Spain: reign of, 327 Philip, Duke of Milan: given duchy, 307 Philip, Marquis of Montferrat : reign of, 275 Philip I, Count of Savoy: reign of, 274 Philippi: battle of (42 B.C.), 18 Philippus the Arabian : reign, 109 Piacenza: internal strife, 211 Piccinino, Nicolas : leader of the con- dottieri, 254 Piedmont: invasion of Napoleon (1796), 342; revolution of the Car- bonari, 354; arms against Austria (1859), 372 Pipin the Short, King of the Franks: aids Pope, 173 Pipin, son of Charlemagne: made King of Italy, 177 Pisa: receives charter, 187; history of, in the Middle Ages, 225 Pisano, Niccola: father of Italian sculpture, 284 Pisani, Vittor: defeated by the Genoese, 239; at the siege of Venice, 240 Piso, Caius Calpurnius: conspires against Nero, 65 Piso, Cnaeus Calpurnius: career of, 48 Piso, Licinianus: associated in power with Galba, 69 Pistoja: rise of the Bianchi and Neri, 212 Pius V, Pope: aids Venetians against Turks, 309 Pius VI, Pope: insulted by Napoleon, 343 Pius VII, Pope: pontificate of, 346 Pius IX, Pope: reforms of, 357, 361; loses his temporal territories, 306 Pius X, Pope: makes overtures to King of Italy, 405 Placida, daughter of Theodosius: mar- ries Ataulphus, 145; marries Con- stantius, 146; assumes regency of the Empire of the West, 147 Plancus, Lucius Munatius : commands troops in Farther Gaul, 12; made consul, 15 Plautius, Aulus : invades Britain, 59 Plebiscite of i860, The, 376 Pliny the Younger: persecutes the Christians, 00 Po: battle of the, 329 Podesta: office and duties of, 210 Polish War, 332 Pollentia: battle of, 138 Pollio, Caius Asinius: commands troops in Spain, 12; aids in making a new division of territory among the tri- umvirs, 20 Polycletus : becomes a power in Rome, 72 Pompeii: destroyed, 83 Pompeius, Magnus Sextus: his recall proposed, 8; brings a fleet to the coast of Gaul, n; makes a com- pact with Antonius, 19; his alliance and rupture with Octavius, 20; de- feat of, 21 Popes: rise of the temporal power of, 171 Poppaea Sabina, wife of Salvius Otho: intrigues with Nero, 63; marries Nero, 64 Pragmatic Sanction, The, 333 Presburg, Treaty of, 347 Pretextatus, Vettius: leader of Roman sentiment, 131 Primus Antonius: at battle of Bedria- cum, 71 Probus, Marcus Aurelius: reign of, 111 Q Quadratus: attempts to convert Ha- drian to Christianity, 92 R Rachis, King of Italy: reign of, 172 Radagaesus : invades Italy, 138 Raphael Sanctius (Rafaele Sanzio) : sketch of, 209 Rastadt, Treaty of, 330 Ravenna: siege of, 156; battle of, 293 Reggio: battle of, 378 Regnier of Anjou: claims throne of Naples, 263 Renaissance, The Italian, 279 Renault: joins conspiracy against Ven- ice, 315 438 INDEX Ricimer: expels Avitus from Rome, 149; rules Western Empire, 150 Rienzi, Nicola di : leads revolution in Rome, 222 Rivoli: battle of, 319 Robert of Anjou, King of Naples: his aspirations for Italy, 218; reign of, 260 Robert Guiscard: career of, 185 Rodwald, King of Italy: reign of, 108 Roger Guiscard : conquers Sicily, 185 Rollo : followers of, become Christians, 185 Romano, Alberic da: power of, 203 Romano, Eccelin da: power of, 203 Roman Republic: formed, 366 Rome: burned, 64; sacked by Goths, 140; sacked by Genseric, 149; pil- laged by the barbarians (472 a. d.), 150; besieged by Frederick Bar- barossa, 194; revolution of Rienzi, 222; siege of (1527), 304; siege of (1849), 367; becomes the capital of Italy, 391 Romulus Augustulus : reign of, 151 Roncaglia, Diet of, 192 Rosamund, wife of Alboin : poisons Al- boin, 164 Rosmini, Carlo de' : work of, 409 Rossi, Count Pellegrino : appointed president of the Papal States, 362; assassination of, 364 Rossini, Gioacchino Antonio : sketch of, 415 Rubatino Navigation Company : cedes its coaling station in the Bay of Assab to the government, 404 Rudini, Antonio di, Marquis of: suc- ceeds Crispi, 404 Rudolph, King of Burgundy: conquers Savoy, 272 Rufinus : proves a traitor to the in- terest of Arcadians, 137 Ryswick, Treaty of (1697), 326 Sabinus, Cornelius : assassinates Calig- ula, 58 Sacra di San Michele: battle of, 174 Sadoleto, Cardinal : labors for the res- toration of letters, 299 Sadowa : battle of, 390 St. Annunziata, Order of: founded, 275 St. Quentin : battle of (1559), 307 San Martino: battle of (1859), 2>72 Saracens : invade Italy, 179 Sarpi, Paolo : attempts to bring about a reformation in Venice, 314 Saturninus, Claudius Sentius : his cam- paign in Gaul, 44 Saturninus, Lucius Antonius : rebellion of, 84 Savonarola, Girolamo : sketch of, 282 Savoy, House of: history of, during the Middle Ages, 272 Scala, Mastino della : Venice joins Florence against, 249 Scapula, Ostorius : his campaign in Britain, 59 Scarlatti, Alexander: sketch of, 414 Scribonia, wife of Octavius : marriage, 20 Sejanus, ^Elius: influence over Ti- berius, 50; death, 52 Seleucia : destroyed, 89 Selim II, Emperor: at war with Ven- ice, 309 Seneca, Lucius Annaeus : charged with education of Nero, 62; retires from court, 64; joins conspiracy against Nero, 65 Severus, Flavins Valerius: becomes Caesar for Constantius, 116 Severus, Libius : reign of, 149 Severus, Lucius Septimius : reign, 100 ; death, 101 Severus, Marcus Aurelius Alexander : reign of, 105 Sforza, Altendolo : leader of the con- dottieri, 253 Sforza, Francesco : leader of the con- dottieri. 254 Sforza, Galeazzo : career of, 265 Sforza, Galeazzo Maria, Duke of Milan : reign of, 289 Sforza, Gian Galeazzo Maria, Duke of Milan : reign of, 289 Sforza, Ludovico, surnamed the Moor (II Moro) : usurps duchy of Milan, 265, 271 ; attempts to gain the throne of Milan, 289 Sforza, Maximilian, Duke of Milan: drives French out of Lombardy, 293 INDEX 439 Sicilian Vespers, 257 Sicily : united with Aragon, 263 ; con- dition under Spanish rule, 323; re- volts against the King of Naples, 353; insurrection in (i860), 377; condition under the kingdom of Italy, 400 Siena : siege and fall of, 307 Silanus, Marcus Junius : death of, 56 Siscia: battle of (389 a. d.), 135 Sixtus V, Pope : pontificate of, 313 Sixtus VI, Pope : contention with Lo- renzo de' Medici, 268 Solaro, Count : at siege of Turin (1704), 328 Solferino: battle of (1859), 373 Sosius (consul 32 b. c.) : nominee of Antonius, 24 Spain : receives the Latin rights, 81 ; overrun by barbarians, 139; Goths found kingdom in, 145 ; leads movement to restore Pius IX to the Pontifical throne, 367 Spauro, Count : aids Pius IX to escape from Rome, 365 Spurinna : attempts to warn Caesar, 5 Staff arde: battle of (1690), 326 Stephanus : assassinates Domitian, 85 Stephen II, Pope: makes treaty with Astolphus, 172 Stilicho: career of, 137; death, 139 Strozzi : defends Siena, 307 Succession, War of Austrian, 333 Succession, War of Spanish, 327 Symmachus : leader of Roman senti- ment, 131 Tacitus, Marcus Claudius : reign of, in Tagliacozzo: battle of, 215 Tartaglia of Brescia : revives the mathe- matical sciences, 296 Tasso, Torquato : sketch of, 320 Teias : elected king, 161 Tertullus : made consul, 141 Theodatus : reign of, 159 Theodolinda, daughter of Garibaldus, Duke of Bavaria : marries Au- thoris, 166; chooses Agilulph as ruler of Italy, 167; rules Italy, 168 Theodora, the Elder: her influence over the Papacy, 182 Theodoric the Great : invasion of, 155 ; death of, 157 Theodosius (I) the Great, Emperor of the East : placed on the throne of Constantinople, 133 Theodosius II, Emperor of the East: recognizes Valentinian III as Em- peror of the West, 147 Thomas I, Count of Savoy: reign of, 273 Tiberius (I) Claudius Nero Caesar: in- vades Armenia, 39 ; sketch of, 41 ; campaigns of, in Gaul, 42; dis- graced, 43 ; adopted by Augustus as his son, 43 ; celebrates his tri- umph over the Pannonians, 45 ; reign of, 46; death, 54 Tiberius Gemellus : sketch of, 53 ; death of, 56 Tiltoni, Minister : ably manages for- eign relations, 406 Titus Flavius Sabinus Vespasianus: ap- pointed consul, 74 Titus : besieges Jerusalem, 79 ; reign of, 82 Tommaso : illustrious scholar, 299 Torre, Baron della : reestablishes regal power in Turin, 356 Torre, Martin della: chief of Milan, 217 Tortona : surrenders to Frederick Bar- barossa, 192 Totila: reign of, 160 Trajan (Marcus Ulpius Trajanus) : adopted by Nerva, 87; reign of, 87; death, 89 Trebonius, Caius : plots against Caesar, 4 Trent, Council of, 285 Triumvirate, The Second, 10 Trivulzio, Giovanni : leads French forces into Italy, 293 Turin: battle of (312 a. d.). 118; sieges of (1640), 323, (1704) 327; revolu- tion of the Carbonari, 354 Turin, Peace of, 241 Tuscany: republic declared, 366 U Uberti, Farinata degl' : saves Florence from destruction, 212 440 INDEX Ugolino, Count of the Gherardesca: treachery and fate of, 236 Ulm: battle of, 347 Ulphilas (Ulfilas, Wulfila) : missionary to the Goths, 136 Urban V, Pope: preaches crusade against the Turks, 276 Urban VI, Pope: sanctions dethrone- ment of Joanna of Naples, 261 Uscocchi: attack Venice, 314 Valens, Fabius: supports claims of Vitellius, 71 Valens, Roman and Byzantine Em- peror: reign of, 130; death of, 133 Valentinian I (Flavius Valentinianus) : reign of, 130 Valentinian II : associated with Gratian in the Empire, 133 Valentinian III (Flavius Placidus Val- entinianus) : birth, 146; accession of, 147 Valerian (Publius Aurelius Licinius Valerianus) : reign of, no Varus, Quintilius : defeat of, 44 Venice: founded, 148; sketch, 177; his- tory in the Middle Ages, 238; acquisition of territory, 292; at- tempted reformation of Sarpi, 314; fall of her power, 330; surrender to Napoleon, 344; part of Italian kingdom, 390 Venice, League of: formed, 290 Veniero, Sebastiano : leader of expedi- tion against Turks, 310; elected Doge of Venice, 311 Ventidius Bassus, Publius : his cam- paign against the Parthians, 19 Verdun, Treaty of, 179 Verona: battles of (249 A. D.)> 109; (312 A. D.), Il8; (403 A. D.), 138; (489 A. d.), 156; conquered by Ven- ice, 250 Verrua: siege of, 327 Verus, Caius Commodus: associated with the Emperor Hadrian, 93 Verus Caesar, Lucius jEHus: adoption by Antoninus, 93 ; raised to the pur- ple, 96; death, 97 Vespasian (Titus Flavius Sabinus Ves- pasianus) : his campaign in Britain, 59; proclaimed imperator, 72; his early campaigns in the East, 78; reign of, 81 ; death, 82 Vesuvius: eruptions of (79 a. d.), 83; (1906) 406 Vetranio: proclaimed emperor, 124 Victor Amadeus I, King of Sardinia (II, Duke of Savoy) : reign of, 326 Victor Amadeus I, Duke of Savoy: reign of, 319 Victor Emmanuel I, King of Sardinia: abdicates, 355 Victor Emmanuel II, King of Italy: accession to Sardinian throne, 359; accession to Italian throne, 376; accession to throne of the Two Sici- lies, 384 Victor Emmanuel III, King of Italy: reign of, 397, 405 Victorinus, Marcus Piavvonius: con- version of, 128 Vienna, Congress of, 350 Villafranca: battles of (1515), 294; (1866), 390 Villafranca, Armistice of: concluded, 374 Vindex, Caius Julius: conspires against Nero, 67 Virginius : conspires against Nero, 67 Visconti, House of: power of, 218 Visconti, Matteo: becomes chief of Milan, 217 Visigoths : see Goths Vitellius, Aulus : becomes emperor, 71 ; death, 74 Vitiges: reign of, 159 Volta of Como, Count Alessandro : sketch of, 339 W, X, Y Wallia: rules the Gothic kingdom, 146 Waldenses: persecutions of, 317 Walter de Brienne: given military com- mand in Florence, 229 Waterloo: battle of, 350 Wenceslaus, Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire: creates duchy of Milan, 219 White Company: in Italian wars, 253 INDEX 441 William the Bad, King of Sicily: reign of, 196 William the Good, King of Sicily: reign of, 196 William, Marquis of Montferrat: war with Amadeus V of Savoy, 274 Zacharias, Pope: reproves Rachis, 172 Zanardelli, Giuseppe: ministry of, 405 Zeno, Emperor of the East: gives Theo- doric permission to conquer Italy, 155 Zeno, Carlo : comes to the relief of Ven- ice, 241 Zenobia, Queen of Palmyra: captured by Aurelian, 111 Zisca, John: instructs Bohemians in the art of war, 256 Zurich, Peace of, 374