The Civilisation of the Renaissance in Italy

1077

A remarkable contrast to the Sienese who in 1483 solemnly dedicated their distracted city to the Madonna. Allegretto, in Murat. xxiii. col. 815.

1078

He says of the ‘impii astrologi’: ‘non è dar disputar (con loro) altrimenti che col fuoco.’

1079

See Villari on this point.

1080

See the passage in the fourteenth sermon on Ezechiel, in Perrens, o. c. vol. i. 30 note.

1081

With the title, De Rusticorum Religione. See above p. 352.

1082

Franco Sacchetti, nov. 109, where there is more of the same kind.

1083

Bapt. Mantuan. De Sacris Diebus, l. ii. exclaims:—

Ista superstitio, ducens a Manibus ortumTartareis, sancta de religione facessatChristigenûm! vivis epulas date, sacra sepultis.

A century earlier, when the army of John XXII. entered the Marches to attack the Ghibellines, the pretext was avowedly ‘eresia’ and ‘idolatria.’ Recanti, which surrendered voluntarily, was nevertheless burnt, ‘because idols had been worshipped there,’ in reality, as a revenge for those whom the citizens had killed. Giov. Villani, ix. 139, 141. Under Pius II. we read of an obstinate sun-worshipper, born at Urbino. Æn. Sylv. Opera, p. 289. Hist. Rer. ubique Gestar. c. 12. More wonderful still was what happened in the Forum in Rome under Leo X. (more properly in the interregnum between Hadrian and Leo. June 1522, Gregorovius, viii. 388). To stay the plague, a bull was solemnly offered up with pagan rites. Paul. Jov. Hist. xxi. 8.

1084

See Sabellico, De Situ Venetae Urbis. He mentions the names of the saints, after the manner of many philologists, without the addition of ‘sanctus’ or ‘divus,’ but speaks frequently of different relics, and in the most respectful tone, and even boasts that he kissed several of them.

1085

De Laudibus Patavii, in Murat. xxiv. col. 1149 to 1151.

1086

Prato, Arch. Stor. iii. pp. 408 sqq. Though he is by no means a freethinker, he still protests against the causal nexus.

1087

Pii II. Comment. l. viii. pp. 352 sqq. ‘Verebatur Pontifex, ne in honore tanti apostoli diminute agere videretur,’ &c.

1088

Jac. Volaterran. in Murat. xxiii. col. 187. The Pope excused himself on the ground of Louis’ great services to the Church, and by the example of other Popes, e.g. St. Gregory, who had done the like. Louis was able to pay his devotion to the relic, but died after all. The Catacombs were at that time forgotten, yet even Savonarola (l. c. col. 1150) says of Rome: ‘Velut ager Aceldama Sanctorum habita est.’

1089

Bursellis, Annal. Bonon. in Murat. xxiii. col. 905. It was one of the sixteen patricians, Bartol. della Volta, d. 1485 or 1486.

1090

Vasari, iii. 111 sqq. note. Vita di Ghiberti.

1091

Matteo Villani, iii. 15 and 16.

1092

We must make a further distinction between the Italian cultus of the bodies of historical saints of recent date, and the northern practice of collecting bones and relics of a sacred antiquity. Such remains were preserved in great abundance in the Lateran, which, for that reason, was of special importance for pilgrims. But on the tombs of St. Dominic and St. Anthony of Padua rested, not only the halo of sanctity, but the splendour of historical fame.

1093

The remarkable judgment in his De Sacris Diebus, the work of his later years, refers both to sacred and profane art (l. i.). Among the Jews, he says, there was a good reason for prohibiting all graven images, else they would have relapsed into the idolatry or devil-worship of the nations around them:

Nunc autem, postquam penitus natura SatanumCognita, et antiqua sine majestate relicta est,Nulla ferunt nobis statuae discrimina, nullosFert pictura dolos; jam sunt innoxia signa;Sunt modo virtutum testes monimentaque laudumMarmora, et aeternae decora immortalia famae.

1094

Battista Mantovano complains of certain ‘nebulones’ (De Sacris Diebus, l. v.) who would not believe in the genuineness of the Sacred Blood at Mantua. The same criticism which called in question the Donation of Constantine was also, though indirectly, hostile to the belief in relics.

1095

Especially the famous prayer of St. Bernard, Paradiso, xxxiii. 1, ‘Vergine madre, figlia del tuo figlio.’

1096

Perhaps we may add Pius II., whose elegy on the Virgin is printed in the Opera, p. 964, and who from his youth believed himself to be under her special protection. Jac. Card. Papiens. ‘De Morte Pii,’ Opp. p. 656.

1097

That is, at the time when Sixtus IV. was so zealous for the Immaculate Conception. Extravag. Commun. l. iii. tit. xii. He founded, too, the Feast of the Presentation of the Virgin in the Temple, and the Feasts of St. Anne and St. Joseph. See Trithem. Ann. Hirsaug. ii. p. 518.

1098

The few frigid sonnets of Vittoria on the Madonna are most instructive in this respect (n. 85 sqq. ed. P. Visconti, Rome, 1840).

1099

Bapt. Mantuan. De Sacris Diebus, l. v., and especially the speech of the younger Pico, which was intended for the Lateran Council, in Roscoe, Leone X. ed. Bossi, viii. p. 115. Comp. p. 121, note 3.

1100

Monach. Paduani Chron. l. iii. at the beginning. We there read of this revival: ‘Invasit primitus Perusinos, Romanes postmodum, deinde fere Italiæ populos universos.’ Guil. Ventura (Fragmenta de Gestis Astensium in Mon. Hist. Patr. SS. tom. iii. col. 701) calls the Flagellant pilgrimage ‘admirabilis Lombardorum commotio;’ hermits came forth from their cells and summoned the cities to repent.

1101

G. Villani, viii. 122, xi. 23. The former were not received in Florence, the latter were welcomed all the more readily.

1102

Corio, fol. 281. Leon. Aretinus, Hist. Flor. lib. xii. (at the beginning) mentions a sudden revival called forth by the processions of the ‘dealbati’ from the Alps to Lucca, Florence, and still farther.

1103

Pilgrimages to distant places had already become very rare. Those of the princes of the House of Este to Jerusalem, St. Jago, and Vienne are enumerated in Murat. xxiv. col. 182, 187, 190, 279. For that of Rinaldo Albizzi to the Holy Land, see Macchiavelli, Stor. Fior. l. v. Here, too, the desire of fame is sometimes the motive. The chronicler Giov. Cavalcanti (Ist. Fiorentine, ed. Polidori, ii. 478) says of Lionardo Fescobaldi, who wanted to go with a companion (about the year 1400) to the Holy Sepulchre: ‘Stimarono di eternarsi nella mente degli uomini futuri.’

1104

Bursellis, Annal. Bon. in Murat. xxiii. col. 890.

1105

Allegretto, in Murat. xxiii. col. 855 sqq. The report had got about that it had rained blood outside the gate. All rushed forth, yet ‘gli uomini di guidizio non lo credono.’

1106

Burigozzo, Arch. Stor. iii. 486. For the misery which then prevailed in Lombardy, Galeazzo Capello (De Rebus nuper in Italia Gestis) is the best authority. Milan suffered hardly less than Rome did in the sack of 1527.

1107

It was also called ‘l’arca del testimonio,’ and people told how it was ‘conzado’ (constructed) ‘con gran misterio.’

1108

Diario Ferrarese, in Murat. xxiv. col. 317, 322, 323, 326, 386, 401.

1109

‘Ad uno santo homo o santa donna,’ says the chronicle. Married men were forbidden to keep concubines.

1110

The sermon was especially addressed to them; after it a Jew was baptised, ‘ma non di quelli’ adds the annalist, ‘che erano stati a udire la predica.’

1111

‘Per buono rispetto a lui noto e perchè sempre è buono a star bene con Iddio,’ says the annalist. After describing the arrangements, he adds resignedly: ‘La cagione perchè sia fatto et si habbia a fare non s’intende, basta che ogni bene è bene.’

1112

He is called ‘Messo del Cancellieri del Duca.’ The whole thing was evidently intended to appear the work of the court only, and not of any ecclesiastical authority.

1113

See the quotations from Pico’s Discourse on the Dignity of Man above, pp. 354-5.

1114

Not to speak of the fact that a similar tolerance or indifference was not uncommon among the Arabians themselves.

1115

So in the Decameron. Sultans without name in Massuccio nov. 46, 48, 49; one called ‘Rè di Fes,’ another ‘Rè di Tunisi.’ In Dittamondo, ii. 25, we read, ‘il buono Saladin.’ For the Venetian alliance with the Sultan of Egypt in the year 1202, see G. Hanotaux in the Revue Historique iv. (1877) pp. 74-102. There were naturally also many attacks on Mohammedanism. For the Turkish woman baptized first in Venice and again in Rome, see Cechetti i. 487.

1116

Philelphi Epistolae, Venet. 1502 fol. 90 b. sqq.

1117

Decamerone i. nov. 3. Boccaccio is the first to name the Christian religion, which the others do not. For an old French authority of the thirteenth century, see Tobler, Li di dou Vrai Aniel, Leipzig, 1871. For the Hebrew story of Abr. Abulafia (b. 1241 in Spain, came to Italy about 1290 in the hope of converting the Pope to Judaism), in which two servants claim each to hold the jewel buried for the son, see Steinschneider, Polem. und Apol. Lit. der Arab. Sprache, pp. 319 and 360. From these and other sources we conclude that the story originally was less definite than as we now have it (in Abul. e.g. it is used polemically against the Christians), and that the doctrine of the equality of the three religions is a later addition. Comp. Reuter, Gesch. der Relig. Aufklärung im M. A. (Berlin, 1877), iii. 302 sqq. 390.

1118

De Tribus Impostoribus, the name of a work attributed to Frederick II. among many other people, and which by no means answers the expectations raised by the title. Latest ed. by Weller, Heilbronn, 1876. The nationality of the author and the date of composition are both disputed. See Reuter, op. cit. ii. 273-302.

1119

In the mouth, nevertheless, of the fiend Astarotte, canto xxv. str. 231 sqq. Comp. str. 141 sqq.

1120

Canto xxviii. str. 38 sqq.

1121

Canto xviii. str. 112 to the end.

1122

Pulci touches, though hastily, on a similar conception in his Prince Chiaristante (canto xxi. str. 101 sqq., 121 sqq., 145 sqq., 163 sqq.), who believes nothing and causes himself and his wife to be worshipped. We are reminded of Sigismondo Malatesta (p. 245).

1123

Giov. Villani, iv. 29, vi. 46. The name occurs as early as 1150 in Northern countries. It is defined by William of Malmesbury (iii. 237, ed. Londin, 1840): ‘Epicureorum … qui opinantur animam corpore solutam in aerem evanescere, in auras effluere.’

1124

See the argument in the third book of Lucretius. The name of Epicurean was afterwards used as synonymous with freethinker. Lorenzo Valla (Opp. 795 sqq.) speaks as follows of Epicurus: ‘Quis eo parcior, quis contentior, quis modestior, et quidem in nullo philosophorum omnium minus invenio fuisse vitiorum, plurimique honesti viri cum Graecorum, tum Romanorum, Epicurei fuerunt.’ Valla was defending himself to Eugenius IV. against the attacks of Fra Antonio da Bitonto and others.

1125

Inferno, vii. 67-96.

1126

Purgatorio, xvi. 73. Compare the theory of the influence of the planets in the Convito. Even the fiend Astarotte in Pulci (Morgante, xxv. str. 150) attests the freedom of the human will and the justice of God.

1127

Comp. Voigt, Wiederbelebung, 165-170.

1128

Vespasiano Fiorent. pp. 26, 320, 435, 626, 651. Murat. xx. col. 532.

1129

In Platina’s introd. to his Life of Christ the religious influence of the Renaissance is curiously exemplified (Vitæ Paparum, at the beginning): Christ, he says, fully attained the fourfold Platonic ‘nobilitas’ according to his ‘genus’: ‘quem enim ex gentilibus habemus qui gloria et nomine cum David et Salomone, quique sapientia et doctrina cum Christo ipso conferri merito debeat et possit?’ Judaism, like classical antiquity, was also explained on a Christian hypothesis. Pico and Pietro Galatino endeavoured to show that Christian doctrine was foreshadowed in the Talmud and other Jewish writings.

1130

On Pomponazzo, see the special works; among others, Bitter, Geschichte der Philosophie, bd. ix.

1131

Paul. Jovii, Elog. Lit. p. 90. G. M. was, however, compelled to recant publicly. His letter to Lorenzo (May 17, 1478) begging him to intercede with the Pope, ‘satis enim poenarum dedi,’ is given by Malagola, Codro Urceo, p. 433.

1132

Codri Urcei Opera, with his life by Bart. Bianchini; and in his philological lectures, pp. 65, 151, 278, &c.

1133

On one occasion he says, ‘In Laudem Christi:’

Phoebum alii vates musasque Jovemque sequuntur,At mihi pro vero nomine Christus erit.

He also (fol. x. b) attacks the Bohemians. Huss and Jerome of Prague are defended by Poggio in his famous letter to Lion. Aretino, and placed on a level with Mucius Scaevola and Socrates.

1134

‘Audi virgo ea quae tibi mentis compos et ex animo dicam. Si forte cum ad ultimum vitae finem pervenero supplex accedam ad te spem oratum, ne me audias neve inter tuos accipias oro; cum infernis diis in aeternum vitam degere decrevi.’

1135

‘Animum meum seu animam’—a distinction by which philology used then to perplex theology.

1136

Platina, Vitae Pontiff. p. 311: ‘Christianam fidem si miraculis non esset confirmata, honestate sua recipi debuisse.’ It may be questioned whether all that Platina attributes to the Pope is in fact authentic.

1137

Preface to the Historia Ferdinandi I. (Hist. Ztschr. xxxiii. 61) and Antid. in Pogg. lib. iv. Opp. p. 256 sqq. Pontanus (De Sermone, i. 18) says that Valla did not hesitate ‘dicere profiterique palam habere se quoque in Christum spicula.’ Pontano, however, was a friend of Valla’s enemies at Naples.

1138

Especially when the monks improvised them in the pulpit. But the old and recognised miracles did not remain unassailed. Firenzuola (Opere, vol. ii. p. 208, in the tenth novel) ridicules the Franciscans of Novara, who wanted to spend money which they had embezzled, in adding a chapel to their church, ‘dove fusse dipinta quella bella storia, quando S. Francesco predicava agli uccelli nel deserto; e quando ei fece la santa zuppa, e che l’agnolo Gabriello gli portò i zoccoli.’

1139

Some facts about him are to be found in Bapt. Mantuan. De Patientia, l. iii. cap. 13.

1140

Bursellis, Ann. Bonon. in Murat. xxiii. col. 915.

1141

How far these blasphemous utterances sometimes went, has been shown by Gieseler (Kirchengeschichte, ii. iv. § 154, anm.) who quotes several striking instances.

1142

Voigt, Enea Silvio, iii. 581. It is not known what happened to the Bishop Petro of Aranda who (1500) denied the Divinity of Christ and the existence of Hell and Purgatory, and denounced indulgences as a device of the popes invented for their private advantage. For him, see Burchardi Diarium, ed. Leibnitz, p. 63 sqq.

1143

Jov. Pontanus, De Fortuna, Opp. i. 792-921. Comp. Opp. ii. 286.

1144

Æn. Sylvii, Opera, p. 611.

1145

Poggius, De Miseriis Humanae Conditionis.

1146

Caracciolo, De Varietate Fortunae, in Murat. xxii., one of the most valuable writings of a period rich in such works. On Fortune in public processions, see p. 421.

1147

Leonis X. Vita Anonyma, in Roscoe, ed. Bossi, xii. p. 153.

1148

Bursellis, Ann. Bonon. in Murat. xxiii. col. 909: ‘Monimentum hoc conditum a Joanne Bentivolo secundo patriae rectore, cui virtus et fortuna cuncta quæ optari possunt affatim praestiterunt.’ It is still not quite certain whether this inscription was outside, and visible to everybody, or, like another mentioned just before, hidden on one of the foundation stones. In the latter case, a fresh idea is involved. By this secret inscription, which perhaps only the chronicler knew of, Fortune is to be magically bound to the building.

[According to the words of the chronicle, the inscription cannot have stood on the walls of the newly built tower. The exact spot is uncertain.—L.G.]

1149

‘Quod nimium gentilitatis amatores essemus.’ Paganism, at least in externals, certainly went rather far. Inscriptions lately found in the Catacombs show that the members of the Academy described themselves as ‘sacerdotes,’ and called Pomponius Lætus ‘pontifex maximus;’ the latter once addressed Platina as ‘pater sanctissimus.’ Gregorovius, vii. 578.

1150

While the plastic arts at all events distinguished between angels and ‘putti,’ and used the former for all serious purposes. In the Annal. Estens. Murat. xx. col. 468, the ‘amorino’ is naively called ‘instar Cupidinis angelus.’ Comp. the speech made before Leo X. (1521), in which the passage occurs: ‘Quare et te non jam Juppiter, sed Virgo Capitolina Dei parens quæ hujus urbis et collis reliquis præsides, Romamque et Capitolium tutaris.’ Greg. viii. 294.

1151

Della Valle, Lettere Sanesi, iii. 18.

1152

Macrob. Saturnal. iii. 9. Doubtless the canon did not omit the gestures there prescribed. Comp. Gregorovius, viii. 294, for Bembo. For the paganism thus prevalent in Rome, see also Ranke, Päpste, i. 73 sqq. Comp. also Gregorovius, viii. 268.

1153

Monachus Paduan. l. ii. ap. Urstisius, Scriptt. i. pp. 598, 599, 602, 607. The last Visconti (p. 37) had also a number of these men in his service (Comp. Decembrio, in Murat. xx. col. 1017): he undertook nothing without their advice. Among them was a Jew named Helias. Gasparino da Barzizzi once addressed him: ‘Magna vi astrorum fortuna tuas res reget.’ G. B. Opera, ed. Furietto, p. 38.

1154

E.g. Florence, where Bonatto filled the office for a long period. See too Matteo Villani, xi. 3, where the city astrologer is evidently meant.

1155

Libri, Hist. des Sciences Mathém. ii. 52, 193. At Bologna this professorship is said to have existed in 1125. Comp. the list of professors at Pavia, in Corio, fol. 290. For the professorship at the Sapienza under Leo X., see Roscoe, Leone X. ed. Bossi, v. p. 283.

1156

J. A. Campanus lays stress on the value and importance of astrology, and concludes with the words: ‘Quamquam Augustinus sanctissimus ille vir quidem ac doctissimus, sed fortassis ad fidem religionemque propensior negat quicquam vel boni vel mali astrorum necessitate contingere.’ ‘Oratio initio studii Perugiæ habita,’ compare Opera, Rome, 1495.

1157

About 1260 Pope Alexander IV. compelled a Cardinal (and shamefaced astrologer) Bianco to bring out a number of political prophecies. Giov. Villani, vi. 81.

1158

De Dictis, &c. Alfonsi, Opera, p. 493. He held it to be ‘pulchrius quam utile.’ Platina, Vitae Pontiff. p. 310. For Sixtus IV. comp. Jac. Volaterran. in Murat. xxiii. col. 173, 186. He caused the hours for audiences, receptions, and the like, to be fixed by the ‘planetarii.’ In the Europa, c. 49, Pius II. mentions that Baptista Blasius, an astronomer from Cremona, had prophesied the misfortunes of Fr. Foscaro ‘tanquam prævidisset.’

1159

Brosch, Julius II. (Gotha, 1878), pp. 97 and 323.

1160

P. Valeriano, De Infel. Lit. (318-324) speaks of Fr. Friuli, who wrote on Leo’s horoscope, and ‘abditissima quæque anteactæ ætatis et uni ipsi cognita principi explicuerat quæque incumberent quæque futura essent ad unguem ut eventus postmodum comprobavit, in singulos fere dies prædixerat.’

1161

Ranke, Päpste, i. 247.

1162

Vespas. Fiorent. p. 660, comp. 341. Ibid. p. 121, another Pagolo is mentioned as court mathematician and astrologer of Federigo of Montefeltro. Curiously enough, he was a German.

1163

Firmicus Maternus, Matheseos Libri viii. at the end of the second book.

1164

In Bandello, iii. nov. 60, the astrologer of Alessandro Bentivoglio, in Milan, confessed himself a poor devil before the whole company.

1165

It was in such a moment of resolution that Ludovico Moro had the cross with this inscription made, which is now in the Minster at Chur. Sixtus IV. too once said that he would try if the proverb was true. On this saying of the astrologer Ptolemæus, which B. Fazio took to be Virgilian, see Laur. Valla, Opera, p. 461.

1166

The father of Piero Capponi, himself an astrologer, put his son into trade lest he should get the dangerous wound in the head which threatened him. Vita di P. Capponi, Arch. Stor. iv. ii. 15. For an instance in the life of Cardanus, see p. 334. The physician and astrologer Pierleoni of Spoleto believed that he would be drowned, avoided in consequence all watery places, and refused brilliant positions offered him at Venice and Padua. Paul. Jov. Elog. Liter. pp. 67 sqq. Finally he threw himself into the water, in despair at the charge brought against him of complicity in Lorenzo’s death, and was actually drowned. Hier. Aliottus had been told to be careful in his sixty-second year, as his life would then be in danger. He lived with great circumspection, kept clear of the doctors, and the year passed safely. H. A. Opuscula (Arezzo, 1769), ii. 72. Marsilio Ficino, who despised astrology (Opp. p. 772) was written to by a friend (Epist. lib. 17): ‘Praeterea me memini a duobus vestrorum astrologis audivisse, te ex quadam siderum positione antiquas revocaturum philosophorum sententias.’

1167