The Civilisation of the Renaissance in Italy

364

The ‘Araldo’ of the Florentine Signoria. One instance among many, Commissioni di Rinaldo degli Albizzi, iii. 651, 669. The fool as necessary to enliven the company after dinner; Alcyonius, De Exilio, ed. Mencken, p. 129.

365

Sacchetti, nov. 48. And yet, according to nov. 67, there was an impression that a Romagnole was superior to the worst Florentine.

366

L. B. Alberti, Del Governo della Famiglia, Opere, ed. Bonucci, v. 171. Comp. above, p. 132, note 1.

367

Franco Sacchetti, nov. 156; comp. 24 for Dolcibene and the Jews. (For Charles IV. and the fools, Friedjung, o.c. p. 109.) The Facetiæ of Poggio resemble Sacchetti’s in substance—practical jokes, impertinences, refined indecency misunderstood by simple folk; the philologist is betrayed by the large number of verbal jokes. On L. A. Alberti, see pp. 136, sqq.

368

And consequently in those novels of the Italians whose subject is taken from them.

369

According to Bandello, iv. nov. 2, Gonnella could twist his features into the likeness of other people, and mimic all the dialects of Italy.

370

Paul. Jov. Vita Leonis X.

371

‘Erat enim Bibiena mirus artifex hominibus ætate vel professione gravibus ad insaniam impellendis.’ We are here reminded of the jests of Christine of Sweden with her philologists. Comp. the remarkable passage of Jovian. Pontanus, De Sermone, lib. ii. cap. 9: ‘Ferdinandus Alfonsi filius, Neapolitanorum rex magnus et ipse fuit artifex et vultus componendi et orationes in quem ipse usus vellet. Nam ætatis nostri Pontifices maximi fingendis vultibus ac verbis vel histriones ipsos anteveniunt.

372

The eye-glass I not only infer from Rafael’s portrait, where it can be explained as a magnifier for looking at the miniatures in the prayer-book, but from a statement of Pellicanus, according to which Leo views an advancing procession of monks through a ‘specillum’ (comp. Züricher Taschenbuch for 1858, p. 177), and from the ‘cristallus concava,’ which, according to Giovio, he used when hunting. (Comp. ‘Leonis X. vita auctore anon, conscripta’ in the Appendix to Roscoe.) In Attilius Alessius (Baluz. Miscell. iv. 518) we read, ‘Oculari ex gemina (gemma?) utebatur quam manu gestans, signando aliquid videndum esset, oculis admovebat.’ The shortsightedness in the family of the Medici was hereditary. Lorenzo was shortsighted, and replied to the Sienese Bartolommeo Soccini, who said that the air of Florence was bad for the eyes: ‘E quella di Siena al cervello.’ The bad sight of Leo X. was proverbial. After his election, the Roman wits explained the number MCCCCXL. engraved in the Vatican as follows: ‘Multi cæci Cardinales creaverunt cæcum decimum Leonem.’ Comp. Shepherd-Tonelli, Vita del Poggio, ii. 23, sqq., and the passages there quoted.

373

We find it also in plastic art, e.g., in the famous plate parodying the group of the Laöcoon as three monkeys. But here parody seldom went beyond sketches and the like, though much, it is true, may have been destroyed. Caricature, again, is something different. Lionardo, in the grotesque faces in the Biblioteca Ambrosiana, represents what is hideous when and because it is comical, and exaggerates the ludicrous element at pleasure.

374

Jovian. Pontan. De Sermone, libri v. He attributes a special gift of wit to the Sienese and Peruginese, as well as to the Florentines, adding the Spanish court as a matter of politeness.

375

Il Cortigiano, lib. ii. cap. 4 sqq., ed. Baude di Vesme, Florence, 1854, pp. 124 sqq. For the explanation of wit as the effect of contrast, though not clearly put, see ibid. cap. lxxiii. p. 136.

376

Pontanus, De Sermone, lib. iv. cap. 3, also advises people to abstain from using ‘ridicula’ either against the miserable or the strong.

377

Galateo del Casa, ed. Venez. 1789, p. 26 sqq. 48.

378

Lettere Pittoriche, i. p. 71, in a letter of Vinc. Borghini, 1577. Macchiavelli (Stor. Fior. vii. cap. 28) says of the young gentlemen in Florence soon after the middle of the fifteenth century: ‘Gli studî loro erano apparire col vestire splendidi, e col parlare sagaci ed astuti, e quello che più destramente mordeva gli altri, era più savio e da più stimato.’

379

Comp. Fedra Inghirami’s funeral oration on Ludovico Podocataro (d. Aug. 25, 1504) in the Anecd. Litt. i. p. 319. The scandal-monger Massaino is mentioned in Paul. Jov. Dialogues de Viris Litt. Illustr. (Tiraboschi, tom. vii. parte iv. p. 1631).

380

This was the plan followed by Leo X., and his calculations were not disappointed. Fearfully as his reputation was mangled after his death by the satirists, they were unable to modify the general estimate formed of him.

381

This was probably the case with Cardinal Ardicino della Porta, who in 1491 wished to resign his dignity and take refuge in a monastery. See Infessura, in Eccard. ii. col. 2000.

382

See his funeral oration in the Anecd. Litt. iv. p. 315. He assembled an army of peasants in the March of Aneona, which was only hindered from acting by the treason of the Duke of Urbino. For his graceful and hopeless love-poems, see Trucchi, Poesie Inedite, iii. 123.

383

How he used his tongue at the table of Clement VII. is told in Giraldi, Hecatomithi, vii. nov. 5.

384

The charge of taking into consideration the proposal to drown Pasquino (in Paul. Jov. Vita Hadriani), is transferred from Sixtus IV. to Hadrian. Comp. Lettere dei Principi, i. 114 sqq., letter of Negro, dated April 7, 1523. On St. Mark’s Day Pasquino had a special celebration, which the Pope forbade.

385

In the passages collected in Gregorovius, viii. 380 note, 381 sqq. 393 sqq.

386

Comp. Pier. Valer. De Infel. Lit. ed. Mencken, p. 178. ‘Pestilentia quæ cum Adriano VI. invecta Romam invasit.’

387

E.g. Firenzuola, Opera (Milano 1802), vol. i. p. 116, in the Discorsi degli Animali.

388

Comp. the names in Höfler, Sitzungsberichte der Wiener Academie (1876), vol. 82, p. 435.

389

The words of Pier. Valerian, De Infel. Lit. ed. Mencken, p. 382, are most characteristic of the public feeling at Rome: ‘Ecce adest Musarum et eloquentiæ totiusque nitoris hostis acerrimis, qui literatis omnibus inimicitias minitaretur, quoniam, ut ipse dictitabat, Terentiani essent, quos quum odisse atque etiam persequi cœpisset voluntarium alii exilium, alias atque alias alii latebras quærentes tam diu latuere quoad Deo beneficio altero imperii anno decessit, qui si aliquanto diutius vixisset, Gothica illa tempora adversus bonas literas videbatur suscitaturus.’ The general hatred of Adrian was also due partly to the fact that in the great pecuniary difficulties in which he found himself he adopted the expedient of a direct tax. Ranke, Päpste, i. 411. It may here be mentioned that there were, nevertheless, poets to be found who praised Adrian. Comp. various passages in the Coryciana (ed. Rome, 1524), esp. J. J. 2b sqq.

390

To the Duke of Ferrara, January 1, 1536 (Lettere, ed. 1539, fol. 39): ‘You will now journey from Rome to Naples,’ ‘ricreando la vista avvilita nel mirar le miserie pontificali con la contemplazione delle eccellenze imperiali.’

391

The fear which he caused to men of mark, especially artists, by these means, cannot be here described. The publicistic weapon of the German Reformation was chiefly the pamphlet dealing with events as they occurred; Aretino is a journalist in the sense that he has within himself a perpetual occasion for writing.

392

E.g. in the Capitolo on Albicante, a bad poet; unfortunately the passages are unfit for quotation.

393

Lettere, ed. Venez. 1539, fol. 12, dated May 31, 1527.

394

In the first Capitolo to Cosimo.

395

Gaye, Carteggio, ii. 332.

396

See the insolent letter of 1536 in the Lettere Pittor. i. Append. 34. See above, p. 142, for the house where Petrarch was born in Arezzo.

397

L’Aretin, per Deo grazia, è vivo e sano,Ma’l mostaccio ha fregiato nobilmente,E più colpi ha, che dita in una mano.’(Mauro, ‘Capitolo in lode delle bugie.’)

398

See e.g. the letter to the Cardinal of Lorraine, Lettere, ed. Venez. fol. 29, dated Nov. 21, 1534, and the letters to Charles V., in which he says that no man stands nearer to God than Charles.

399

For what follows, see Gaye, Carteggio, ii. 336, 337, 345.

400

Lettere, ed. Venez. 1539, fol. 15, dated June 16, 1529. Comp. another remarkable letter to M. A., dated April 15, 1528, fol. 212.

401

He may have done so either in the hope of obtaining the red hat or from fear of the new activity of the Inquisition, which he had ventured to attack bitterly in 1535 (l. c. fol. 37), but which, after the reorganisation of the institution in 1542, suddenly took a fresh start, and soon silenced every opposing voice.

402

[Carmina Burana, in the Bibliothek des literarischen Vereins in Stuttgart, vol. xvi. (Stuttg. 1847). The stay in Pavia (p. 68 bis), the Italian local references in general, the scene with the ‘pastorella’ under the olive-tree (p. 146), the mention of the ‘pinus’ as a shady field tree (p. 156), the frequent use of the word ‘bravium’ (pp. 137, 144), and particularly the form Madii for Maji (p. 141), all speak in favour of our assumption.]

The conjecture of Dr. Burckhardt that the best pieces of the Carmina Burana were written by an Italian, is not tenable. The grounds brought forward in its support have little weight (e.g. the mention of Pavia: ‘Quis Paviæ demorans castus habeatur?’ which can be explained as a proverbial expression, or referred to a short stay of the writer at Pavia), cannot, further, hold their own against the reasons on the other side, and finally lose all their force in view of the probable identification of the author. The arguments of O. Hubatsch Die lateinischen Vagantenlieder des Mittelalters, Görlitz, 1870, p. 87) against the Italian origin of these poems are, among others, the attacks on the Italian and praise of the German clergy, the rebukes of the southerners as a ‘gens proterva,’ and the reference to the poet as ‘transmontanus.’ Who he actually was, however, is not clearly made out. That he bore the name of Walther throws no light upon his origin. He was formerly identified with Gualterus de Mapes, a canon of Salisbury and chaplain to the English kings at the end of the twelfth century; since, by Giesebrecht (Die Vaganten oder Goliarden und ihre Lieder, Allgemeine Monatschrift, 1855), with Walther of Lille or Chatillon, who passed from France into England and Germany, and thence possibly with the Archbishop Reinhold of Köln (1164 and 75) to Italy (Pavia, &c.). If this hypothesis, against which Hubatsch (l. c.) has brought forward certain objections, must be abandoned, it remains beyond a doubt that the origin of nearly all these songs is to be looked for in France, from whence they were diffused through the regular school which here existed for them over Germany, and there expanded and mixed with German phrases; while Italy, as Giesebrecht has shown, remained almost unaffected by this class of poetry. The Italian translator of Dr. Burckhardt’s work, Prof. D. Valbusa, in a note to this passage (i. 235), also contests the Italian origin of the poem. [L. G.]

403

Carm. Bur. p. 155, only a fragment: the whole in Wright, Walter Mapes (1841), p. 258. Comp. Hubatsch, p. 27 sqq., who points to the fact that a story often treated of in France is at the foundation. Æst. Inter. Carm. Bur. p. 67; Dum Dianæ, Carm. Bur. p. 124. Additional instances: ‘Cor patet Jovi;’ classical names for the loved one; once, when he calls her Blanciflor, he adds, as if to make up for it, the name of Helena.

404

In what way antiquity could serve as guide and teacher in all the higher regions of life, is briefly sketched by Æneas Sylvius (Opera, p. 603, in the Epist. 105, to the Archduke Sigismund).

405

For particulars we must refer the reader to Roscoe, Lorenzo Mag. and Leo X., as well as to Voigt, Enea Silvio (Berlin, 1856-63); to the works of Reumont and to Gregorovius, Geschichte der Stadt Rom im Mittelalter.

To form a conception of the extent which studies at the beginning of the sixteenth century had reached, we cannot do better than turn to the Commentarii Urbani of Raphael Volatterranus (ed. Basil, 1544, fol. 16, &c.). Here we see how antiquity formed the introduction and the chief matter of study in every branch of knowledge, from geography and local history, the lives of great and famous men, popular philosophy, morals and the special sciences, down to the analysis of the whole of Aristotle with which the work closes. To understand its significance as an authority for the history of culture, we must compare it with all the earlier encyclopædias. A complete and circumstantial account of the matter is given in Voigt’s admirable work, Die Wiederbelebung des classischen Alterthums oder Das erste Jahrhundert der Humanismus, Berlin, 1859.

406

In William of Malmesbury, Gesta Regum Anglor. l. ii. § 169, 170, 205, 206 (ed. Lond. 1840, vol. i. p. 277 sqq. and p. 354 sqq.), we meet with the dreams of treasure-hunters, Venus as ghostly love, and the discovery of the gigantic body of Pallas, son of Evander, about the middle of the eleventh century. Comp. Jac. ab Aquis Imago Mundi (Hist. Patr. Monum. Script. t. iii. col. 1603), on the origin of the House of Colonna, with reference to the discovery of hidden treasure. Besides the tales of the treasure-seekers, William of Malmesbury mentions the elegy of Hildebert of Mans, Bishop of Tours, one of the most singular examples of humanistic enthusiasm in the first half of the twelfth century.

407

Dante, Convito, tratt. iv. cap. v.

408

Epp. Familiares, vi. 2; references to Rome before he had seen it, and expressions of his longing for the city, Epp. Fam. ed. Fracass. vol. i. pp. 125, 213; vol. ii. pp. 336 sqq. See also the collected references in L. Geiger, Petrarca, p. 272, note 3. In Petrarch we already find complaints of the many ruined and neglected buildings, which he enumerates one by one (De Rem. Utriusque Fort. lib. i. dial. 118), adding the remark that many statues were left from antiquity, but no paintings (l. c. 41).

409

Dittamondo, ii. cap. 3. The procession reminds one at times of the three kings and their suite in the old pictures. The description of the city (ii. cap. 31) is not without archæological value (Gregorovius, vi. 697, note 1). According to Polistoro (Murat. xxiv. col. 845), Niccolò and Ugo of Este journeyed in 1366 to Rome, ‘per vedere quelle magnificenze antiche, che al presente sipossono vedere in Roma.’

410

Gregorovius, v. 316 sqq. Parenthetically we may quote foreign evidence that Rome in the Middle Ages was looked upon as a quarry. The famous Abbot Sugerius, who about 1140 was in search of lofty pillars for the rebuilding of St. Denis, thought at first of nothing less then getting hold of the granite monoliths of the Baths of Diocletian, but afterwards changed his mind. See ‘Sugerii Libellus Alter,’ in Duchesne, Hist. Franc. Scriptores, iv. p. 352.

411

Poggii Opera, fol. 50 sqq. ‘Ruinarum Urbis Romæ Descriptio,’ written about 1430, shortly before the death of Martin V. The Baths of Caracalla and Diocletian had then their pillars and coating of marble. See Gregorovius, vi. 700-705.

412

Poggio appears as one of the earliest collectors of inscriptions, in his letter in the Vita Poggii, Muratori, xx. col. 177, and as collector of busts, (col. 183, and letter in Shepherd-Tonelli, i. 258). See also Ambros. Traversarii Epistolæ, xxv. 42. A little book which Poggio wrote on inscriptions seems to have been lost. Shepherd, Life of Poggio, trad. Tonelli, i. 154 sqq.

413

Fabroni, Cosmus, Adnot. 86. From a letter of Alberto degli Alberti to Giovanni Medici. See also Gregorovius, vii. 557. For the condition of Rome under Martin V., see Platina, p. 227; and during the absence of Eugenius IV., see Vespasiano Fiorent., p. 21.

414

Roma Instaurata, written in 1447, and dedicated to the Pope; first printed, Rome, 1474.

415

See, nevertheless, his distichs in Voigt, Wiederbelebung des Alterthums, p. 275, note 2. He was the first Pope who published a Bull for the protection of old monuments (4 Kal. Maj. 1462), with penalties in case of disobedience. But these measures were ineffective. Comp. Gregorovius, vii. pp. 558 sqq.

416

What follows is from Jo. Ant. Campanus, Vita Pii II., in Muratori, iii. ii. col. 980 sqq. Pii II. Commentarii, pp. 48, 72 sqq., 206, 248 sqq., 501, and elsewhere.

417

First dated edition, Brixen, 1482.

418

Boccaccio, Fiammetta, cap. 5. Opere, ed. Montier, vi. 91.

419

His work, Cyriaci Anconitani Itinerarium, ed. Mehus, Florence, 1742. Comp. Leandro Alberti, Descriz. di tutta l’Italia, fol. 285.

420

Two instances out of many: the fabulous origin of Milan in Manipulus (Murat. xl. col. 552), and that of Florence in Gio. Villani (who here, as elsewhere, enlarges on the forged chronicle of Ricardo Malespini), according to which Florence, being loyally Roman in its sentiments, is always in the right against the anti-Roman rebellious Fiesole (i. 9, 38, 41; ii. 2). Dante, Inf. xv. 76.

421

Commentarii, p. 206, in the fourth book.

422

Mich. Cannesius, Vita Pauli II., in Murat. iii. ii. col. 993. Towards even Nero, son of Domitius Ahenobarbus, the author will not be impolite, on account of his connection with the Pope. He only says of him, ‘De quo verum Scriptores multa ac diversa commemorant.’ The family of Plato in Milan went still farther, and nattered itself on its descent from the great Athenian. Filelfo in a wedding speech, and in an encomium on the jurist Teodoro Plato, ventured to make this assertion; and a Giovanantonio Plato put the inscription on a portrait in relief carved by him in 1478 (in the court of the Pal. Magenta at Milan): ‘Platonem suum, a quo originem et ingenium refert.’

423

See on this point, Nangiporto, in Murat. iii. ii. col. 1094; Infessura, in Eccard, Scriptores, ii. col. 1951; Matarazzo, in the Arch. Stor. xvi. ii. p. 180. Nangiporto, however, admits that it was no longer possible to decide whether the corpse was male or female.

424

As early as Julius II. excavations were made in the hope of finding statues. Vasari, xi. p. 302, V. di Gio. da Udine. Comp. Gregorovius, viii. 186.

425

The letter was first attributed to Castiglione, Lettere di Negozi del Conte Bald. Castiglione, Padua, 1736 and 1769, but proved to be from the hand of Raphael by Daniele Francesconi in 1799. It is printed from a Munich MS. in Passavant, Leben Raphael’s, iii. p. 44. Comp. Gruyer Raphael et l’Antiquité, 1864, i. 435-457.

426

Lettere Pittoriche, ii. 1, Tolomei to Landi, 14 Nov., 1542.

427

He tried ‘curis animique doloribus quacunque ratione aditum intercludere;’ music and lively conversation charmed him, and he hoped by their means to live longer. Leonis X. Vita Anonyma, in Roscoe, ed. Bossi, xii. p. 169.

428

This point is referred to in the Satires of Ariosto. See the first (‘Perc’ ho molto,’ &c.), and the fourth ‘Poiche, Annibale’).

429

Ranke, Päpste, i. 408 sqq. ‘Lettere dei Principi, p. 107. Letter of Negri, September 1, 1522 … ‘tutti questi cortigiani esausti da Papa Leone e falliti.’ They avenged themselves after the death of Leo by satirical verses and inscriptions.

430

Pii II. Commentarii, p. 251 in the 5th book. Comp. Sannazaro’s elegy, ‘Ad Ruinas Cumarum urbis vetustissimæ’ (Opera, fol. 236 sqq.).

431

Polifilo (i.e. Franciscus Columna) ‘Hypnerotomachia, ubi humana omnia non nisi somnum esse docet atque obiter plurima scita sane quam digna commemorat,’ Venice, Aldus Manutius, 1499. Comp. on this remarkable book and others, A. Didot, Alde Manuce, Paris, 1875, pp. 132-142; and Gruyer, Raphael et l’Antiquité, i. pp. 191 sqq.; J. Burckhardt, Geschichte der Renaissance in Italien, pp. 43 sqq., and the work of A. Ilg, Vienna, 1872.

432

While all the Fathers of the Church and all the pilgrims speak only of a cave. The poets, too, do without the palace. Comp. Sannazaro, De Partu Virginis, l. ii.

433

Chiefly from Vespasiano Fiorentine, in the first vol. of the Spicileg. Romanum, by Mai, from which edition the quotations in this book are made. New edition by Bartoli, Florence, 1859. The author was a Florentine bookseller and copying agent, about and after the middle of the fifteenth century.

434

Comp. Petr. Epist. Fam. ed. Fracass. l. xviii. 2, xxiv. 12, var. 25, with the notes of Fracassetti in the Italian translation, vol. iv. 92-101, v. 196 sqq., where the fragment of a translation of Homer before the time of Pilato is also given.

435

Forgeries, by which the passion for antiquity was turned to the profit or amusement of rogues, are well known to have been not uncommon. See the articles in the literary histories on Annius of Viterbo.

436

Vespas. Fiorent. p. 31. ‘Tommaso da Serezana usava dire, che dua cosa farebbe, se egli potesse mai spendere, ch’era in libri e murare. E l’una e l’altra fece nel suo pontificato.’ With respect to his translation, see Æen. Sylvius, De Europa, cap. 58, p. 459, and Papencordt, Ges. der Stadt Rom. p. 502. See esp. Voigt, op. cit. book v.

437

Vespas. Fior. pp. 48 and 658, 665. Comp. J. Manetti, Vita Nicolai V., in Murat. iii. ii. col. 925 sqq. On the question whether and how Calixtus III. partly dispersed the library again, see Vespas. Fiorent. p. 284, with Mai’s note.

438

Vespas. Fior. pp. 617 sqq.

439

Vespas. Fior. pp. 457 sqq.

440

Vespas. Fiorent, p. 193. Comp. Marin Sanudo, in Murat. xxii. col. 1185 sqq.

441

How the matter was provisionally treated is related in Malipiero, Ann. Veneti, Arch. Stor. vii. ii. pp. 653, 655.

442

Vespas. Fior. pp. 124 sqq., and ‘Inventario della Libreria Urbinata compilata nel Secolo XV. da Federigo Veterano, bibliotecario di Federigo I. da Montefeltro Duca d’Urbino,’ given by C. Guasti in tbe Giornale Storico degli Archivi Toscani, vi. (1862), 127-147 and vii. (1863) 46-55, 130-154. For contemporary opinions on the library, see Favre, Mélanges d’Hist. Lit. i. 127, note 6. The following is the substance of Dr. Geiger’s remarks on the subject of the old authors:—