Pagan and Christian Rome

ISTE LOCVS MVNDI SILVESTRI MEMBRA SEPVLTIVENTVRO DOMINO CONFERET AD SONITVM

We are ready to forgive the originators of the legend about the rattling of the bones; the verses are so bad and distorted that it is no wonder they were wrongly understood. Their author wanted to express the readiness of the deceased to appear before the Lord at His coming; but, not being particularly successful in the choice of his language, his simple-minded contemporaries, so inclined towards the supernatural, saw in the words venturo domino an allusion to the coming, not of the Sovereign Judge, but of the future Pope; and they thought the expression ad sonitum referred not to the trumpet of the last judgment, but to the rattling of the bones whenever a dominus venturus might appear on the scene.

This popular interpretation soon became official. John the Deacon has accepted it blindly in his description of the Lateran. "In the same aisle (the last on the left, near the Cappella Corsini) lies Gerbert, archbishop of Reims, who took the name of Sylvester after his election to the pontificate. His tomb, although in a dry place, sends forth drops of water even in clear and dry weather," etc. The tomb was opened and destroyed in 1648. Rasponi, an eye-witness, describes the event in his book "De Basilica et Patriarchio Lateranensi" (Rome, 1656, p. 76): "In the year 1648, while new foundations were being laid for the left wing of the church, the corpse of Sylvester II. was found in a marble sarcophagus, twelve feet below the ground. The body was well composed and dressed in state robes; the arms were crossed on the breast; the head crowned with the tiara. It fell into dust at the touch of our hands, while a pleasant odor filled the air, owing to the rare substances in which it had been embalmed. Nothing was saved but a silver cross and the signet ring."

The church of S. John Lateran has passed through the same vicissitudes as that of S. Croce in Gerusalemme, but with less detriment. Clement VIII., who reconstructed the transept; Sixtus V., who rebuilt the north portico; Innocent X., Pius IX., and Leo XIII. have all been more merciful than Benedict XIV. At all events, if the sight of the church itself in its present state is distasteful to the true lover of ancient and mediæval Rome, nothing could delight him more than the cloisters of Vassalectus which open at the south end of the transept. I speak of the building as well as of its contents. The cloisters have just been restored to their original appearance by Leo XIII. and by his architect, conte Francesco Vespignani, and a museum of works of art from the old basilica has been formed under its arcades.

THE CLOISTERS OF THE LATERAN, AS NOW RESTORED

Inscription of Vassalectus.

Candelabrum in the Church of S. Paolo fuori le Mura.

There are three or four details regarding it which deserve notice. The design of this exquisite structure has been attributed, as usual, to one of the Cosmatis; but it belongs to Pietro Vassalletto and his son. In demolishing one of the clumsy buttresses, which were built two centuries ago against the colonnade of the south side, count Vespignani discovered (1887) the authentic signatures of both artists, in the inscription which is here reproduced. It is thus translated: "I, Vassalectus, a noble and skilful master in my profession, have finished alone this work which I began in company with my father."114 Their school lasted for four generations, from 1153 to the middle of the following century, and ranks next in importance to that of the Cosmatis. Many of their productions are signed, as for example the episcopal chair in the church of S. Andrea at Anagni, dated 1263; a screen in the cathedral of Segni, dated 1185; the candelabra in S. Paolo fuori le Mura; the lion in the porch of SS. Apostoli; the canopy in SS. Cosma e Damiano, dated 1153; fragments of an inlaid screen in the studio of the illustrious artist, Señor Villegas, etc. We are in the habit of asserting that only the Renaissance masters studied and were inspired by the antique; but the fascination of ancient art was equally felt by their early precursors of the twelfth century. The archway in the middle of the south side of these cloisters (opposite the one represented in our illustration) rests on sphinxes, one of which is bearded. The human-headed monsters, wearing the claft or nemes, images of Egyptian Pharaohs, were obviously modelled in imitation of ancient originals. Nor is this the only case. The gate of S. Antonio on the Esquiline is also supported by crouching sphinxes (a. d. 1269). It has been suggested that such works were inspired by crusaders who had seen the wonders of Egypt. But if the reader remembers what I said about the Temple of Isis in the Campus Martius, in chapter ii., p. 92, he will at once perceive how the Vassalletti were able to draw their Egyptian models from a much nearer source. A fact mentioned by Winckelmann115 proves that one of them owned and studied a statue of Æsculapius, in the plinth of which he actually engraved his own name, [V]ASSALECTVS. The statue was seen by Winckelmann in the Verospi palace, but I have not been able to ascertain its present location. In these same cloisters are some delightful figures of saints, in high relief, from an old ciborium. One of them, representing S. John the Baptist, is obviously modelled on the type of an Antinous, with the same abundance of curly hair, the same profile and characteristic eyebrows. In October, 1886, I actually saw a mediæval stonecutter's shop, dating perhaps from the eleventh or twelfth century, in which the place of honor was given to a statue of Antinous. The fact is so remarkable for an age in which statues were sought, not as models, but as material for the limekiln, that I beg leave to describe it.

The Antinous of the Banca Nazionale.

The site of the Palazzo della Banca Nazionale, in the street of the same name, was occupied in old times by the house of Tiberius Julius Frugi, a member of the college of the Arvales. This house shared the fate of all ancient buildings: it was allowed to fall to ruin, and later became the property of whoever chose to occupy it. Among these mediæval occupants was a stonecutter who collected in the half-ruined halls fragments, blocks of columns, and marbles of various kinds, some of which had already been re-cut for new uses. There was also a deposit of the fine sand which is even now employed for sawing stones. We can judge of the approximate age in which the stonecutter lived, by the fact that in his time the pavements of the Roman house were already covered with a stratum of rubbish six feet thick.

A statue of Antinous, the favorite of Hadrian, deified after his death and worshipped in the form of a Bacchus, was found standing against the rear wall of the workshop. It is cut in Greek marble, and the style of sculpture is excellent. None of the prominent portions of the body have been separated from the trunk, so that the only injuries wrought by time are slight, and confined to the nose and hands. A patient study of this figure has enabled me to reconstruct its story. First of all, we are sure that, from the knees down, the statue had been immersed in a stream of water for a very long period, because the surface of the marble is corroded and full of small holes, caused by the action of running water. It also bears visible traces of having been scraped with a piece of iron and scoured to get rid of the mud and calcareous carbonates with which it must have been incrusted when taken out of the stream. These facts concur to prove that the Antinous, having been thrown into the water, or having fallen in by accident, was found or bought after the lapse of centuries, by our stonecutter. An attempt was then made to clean the statue, and, with the intention of preserving it as a work of art and a model, it was placed in the best room of the workshop. Both were buried for a second time, to be brought to light again in 1886. The statue can now be seen in the vestibule of the Banca Nazionale.

As representative specimens of later art and later glories I venture to suggest the tombs of Innocent VIII. (1484-1492) by Antonio Pollaiuolo, of Paul III. (1524-1549) by Guglielmo della Porta, and of Clement XIII. (1758-1769) by Antonio Canova.

TOMB OF INNOCENT VIII

The Tomb of Innocent VIII. This noble work, by Antonio Pollaiuolo, is set against the second pilaster of the nave of S. Peter's on the left side, opposite the "Porta dei Musici." If we reflect that, besides its importance in the history of art, this monument brings back to our memory the fall of Constantinople and Granada, the discovery of the new world, the figures of Bayazid, Ferdinand, and Christopher Columbus, we have a subject for meditation, as well as æsthetic enjoyment. Innocent VIII., Giovanni Battista Cibo, of Genoa, is represented on his sarcophagus sleeping the sleep of the just, while above it he appears again in the full power of life, seated on the pontifical throne, with the right hand raised in the act of blessing the multitude, and the left holding the lance with which Longinus had pierced the side of the Saviour on the cross. This holy relic was a gift from the infidels, who had just taken possession of the capital of the Greek empire, and had raised the crescent on the pinnacles of S. Sophia. It seems that while Bayazid II. was besieging Broussa, his rebellious brother Zem or Zizim, who had already been defeated in the battle of June 20, 1481, succeeded in making his escape to Egypt, and ultimately to the island of Rhodes. The grand master of the Knights of S. John, d'Aubusson, received him cordially and sent him first to France, and later to Rome. Here he was received with royal honors; he rode through the streets on a charger, escorted by Francesco Cibo, a relative of the Pope, and count d'Aubusson, brother of the grand master. He is described as a man fond of sight-seeing, about forty years old, of a fierce and cruel countenance, tall, erect, well proportioned, with shaggy eyebrows, and aquiline nose. His brother Bayazid, fearing that he might be induced to try another rebellion with the help of the knights, the Pope, and the Venetians, treated him generously with a yearly allowance of forty thousand scudi; and secured the good grace of Innocent VIII. with the present of the holy lance.116

To this extraordinary gift of Bayazid we owe one of the masterpieces of the Renaissance, the ciborio della santa lancia, begun by Innocent VIII. and finished by the executors of his will, Lorenzo Cibo and Antoniotto Pallavicino, in 1495. Unfortunately we have now only a drawing of it by the unskilful hand of Giacomo Grimaldi;117 it was taken to pieces in 1606, and a few of its panels, medallions, and statues, which were of the school of Mino da Fiesole, were removed to the Sacred Grottos, where no one is allowed to see them. Grimaldi, who wrote the procès-verbal of the demolition of the ciborium, says that the desecration and the removal of the relics took place on Septuagesima Sunday, January 22, about seven in the evening; at nine o'clock lightning struck the unfinished roof of the basilica; heavy pieces of masonry fell with a crash; mosaics were wrenched from their sockets, and fissures and rents produced in various parts of the building. In the same night the Tiber overflowed its banks, and the turbulent waters rushed as far as the palace of Cardinal Rusticucci in the direction of the Vatican.

The inscription on the tomb of Innocent VIII. mentions, among the glories of his pontificate, the discovery of a new world. Thirty years before his election Constantinople had been taken by the infidels; but the conquests made in the West brought a compensation for the losses sustained on the shores of the Bosphorus. Innocent lived to hear of the capture of Granada and of the conquest of Ferdinand of Aragon, in the Moorish provinces of southern Spain; and just at that time the Hispano-Portuguese branch of the great Latin family seems to have burst forth with renewed vitality and religious enthusiasm, destined to give Rome new victories and new worlds. Bartolomeo Diaz had already doubled the Cape of Good Hope; the sea route to India was opened. The Pope could once again consider himself the master of the world, and was able to present John II. of Portugal with "the lands of Africa, whether known or unknown." Death overtook the gentle and peaceful pontiff on July 26, 1492. Eight days after his demise another Genoese,118 another worthy representative of the strong Ligurian race, set sail from the harbor of Palos to discover another continent, and begin a third era in the history of mankind.

The Tomb of Paul III. Historians and artists alike agree in placing the monument of Paul III. at the head of this class of artistic creations. In a niche on the left of the high altar of S. Peter's the figure of the noble old pontiff is seated on a bronze throne. With his head bent upon his breast, he seems absorbed in thought. Great events, to be sure, had taken place during his administration, which were more or less connected with the affairs of his own family: such as the foundation of the duchy of Parma in favor of his son, Pierluigi, the marriage of his grandson Ottavio to Marguerite, daughter of Charles V., and the creation of the order of the Jesuits; and as some of these events had resulted differently from what he had expected, no wonder his countenance betrays a feeling of disappointment. Two female figures of marble are seen reclining against the sarcophagus: one old, representing Prudence, the other young, representing Justice; the one holds a mirror, the other a bundle of rods. It seems that Guglielmo della Porta modelled them according to a sketch proposed by Michelangelo; in fact, they bear a strong resemblance to the figures of Night and Day on the tomb of Lorenzo de' Medici, at Florence. The Prudence is said to be a portrait of Giovannella Caetani da Sermoneta, the mother of the Pope, while Justice represents his sister-in-law, Giulia Farnese, according to Martinelli, or his daughter Constance, the wife of Bosio Sforza, according to Rotti. The elder woman's profile is exactly that of Dante,—so much so that Maes speaks of her as the "Dantessa di S. Pietro." Her younger companion is, or rather was, of marvellous beauty, before Bernini draped her form with a leaden tunic. During my lifetime, this has been removed once, for the benefit of a Frenchman who was collecting materials for the life of della Porta; but I have not been able to obtain a copy of the photograph taken at the time. Formerly the statue was miscalled Truth, which gave rise to the saying that, although Truth as a rule is not pleasing, this pleased too much. The strange infatuation of a Spanish gentleman for her is described by Sprenger, Caylus, and Cancellieri.119

The original design of the monument required four statues, because it was intended to stand alone in the middle of the church, and not half concealed in a niche. The other two statues were actually modelled, one as Abundance, the other Tenderness; they are now preserved in one of the halls of the Farnese palace.

TOMB OF PAUL III

Paul III., Alessandro Farnese, was the first Roman elevated to the supreme pontificate after Martin V., Colonna (1417-1424). Pomponio Leto, his preceptor, had imbued him with the spirit of the humanists. His conversation was gay and spirituelle; he seemed to bring back with him the fine old times of Leo III. He died beloved and worshipped by his subjects. We may well share a little of these sentiments, if we remember how much art is indebted to him.

The Palazzo Madama, now used as the Senate-house, and the Villa Madama, on the eastern slope of Monte Mario, still belonging to the descendants of the Farnese family, were given by him to Marguerite of Spain, after her marriage with his grandson Ottavio. The Farnesina, which he bought at auction in 1586, associates his memory with that of the Chigis, of Raphael, Michelangelo, and Baldassarre Peruzzi. Then comes his share in the construction of S. Peter's; in the painting of the "Last Judgment," and in the finishing of the "Sala Regia," the richest hall in the Vatican. But no other work, in my estimation, gives us as true an idea of his taste and delicate sentiment as the apartments which he caused to be built and decorated, on the summit of Hadrian's Mole. I am writing these lines in the loggia or vestibule which opens from the great hall. Paul himself placed on the lintel a record of his work, of which Raffaello da Montelupo and Antonio da Sangallo were the architects; Marco da Siena, Pierin del Vaga, and Giulio Romano, the decorators. The ceilings of the bedroom and dining-hall, carved in wood, and those of the reception-room, in gilt and painted stucco, are things of beauty which no visitor to Rome should fail to see. The bath-room, a work of his predecessor, Clement VII., is copied from the antique. In 1538, while the building of this artistic gem was in progress, Benvenuto Cellini was thrown into one of the dungeons below, as a prisoner of state. He was accused of having stolen jewels belonging to the apostolic treasury; but the true reason seems to have been an offence against the Pope, which he had committed in 1527, while the hosts of the constable de Bourbon were besieging the castle. The offence is described by Benvenuto himself in the following words:—

"While I was performing this duty [of keeping guard on the ramparts] some of the cardinals who were in the castle used to come up to see me, and most of all cardinal Ravenna and cardinal de' Gaddi, to whom I often said that I wished they would not come any more, because their red caps could be seen a long way off, and made it mighty dangerous for both them and me from those palaces which were near by, like the Torre de' Bini; so that, finally, I shut them out altogether, and gained thereby their ill-will quite decidedly. Signor Orazio Baglioni, who was my very good friend, also used to come and chat with me. While he was talking with me one day, he noticed a kind of a demonstration in a certain tavern, which was outside the Porta di Castello, at a place called Baccanello. This tavern had for a sign a red sun, painted between two windows. The windows being closed, Signor Orazio guessed that just behind the sun between them, there was a company of soldiers having a good time. So he said to me, 'Benvenuto, if you had a mind to fire your cannon near that sun, I believe you would do a good piece of work, because there is a good deal of noise there, and they must be men of importance.' I replied to the gentleman, 'It is enough for me to see that sun to be able to fire into the middle of it; but if I do, the noise of the gun and the shock it will make will knock over that barrel of stones which is standing near its mouth.' To which the gentleman answered, 'Don't wait to talk about it, Benvenuto, for, in the first place, in the way in which the barrel is standing, the shock of the cannon could not knock it over; but even if it did, and the Pope himself were under it, it would not be as bad as you think; so shoot, shoot!' So I, thinking no more about it, fired right into the middle of the sun, exactly as I had promised I would. The barrel fell, just as I said, and struck the ground between cardinal Farnese and messer Jacopo Salviati. It would have crushed both of them had it not happened that they were quarrelling, because the cardinal had just accused messer Jacopo of being the cause of the sacking of Rome, and had separated to give more room to the insults they were flinging at each other."120 The cardinal never forgot his narrow escape.

From the point of view of archæological interests Paul III. will always be remembered as long as the Museo Nazionale of Naples and the Baths of Caracalla of Rome continue to hold the admiration of students. In reading the account of his excavation of the Baths, we seem to be transported to dreamland. No one before him had laid hands on the immeasurable treasures which the building contained. Statues were found in their niches or lying in front of them; the columns were standing on their pedestals; the walls were still incrusted with rare marbles and richly carved panels; the swimming-basins were still ready for use. Pietro Sante Bartoli says: "The excavation of the Baths of Caracalla, which took place in the time of Paul III. (1546) is the most successful ever accomplished. It yielded such a mass of statues, columns, bas-reliefs, marbles, cameos, intaglios, bronze figures, medals, and lamps, that no more room could be found for them in the Farnese palace." The collection comprises the Farnese Bull, the two statues of Herakles, the Flora, the Athletes, the Venus Callipyge, the Diana, the "Atreus and Thyestes," the so-called "Tuccia," and a hundred more masterpieces, which were, unfortunately, removed to Naples towards the end of the last century.

The Tomb of Clement XIII. From the golden age of Guglielmo della Porta to the barocco art of the eighteenth century; from the tomb of Alessandro Farnese to that of Prospero Lambertini (Benedict XIV., 1740-1758), we can follow, stage by stage, the pernicious influence exercised on Roman art by the school of Bernini. The richness and magnificence of papal mausolea increased in proportion to the decline in taste. The sculptors seem to have had but one ambition, to produce a theatrical effect; their abuse of polychromy is incredible; the grouping of their figures conventional; the contortions to which they submit their Hopes and Charities, their Liberalities and Benevolences, their Justices and Prudences are simply absurd.

Pietro Bracci, the artist of the monument of Benedict XIV., by pushing mannerism to the extreme point, caused a wholesome reaction in art. The tomb of Clement XIII., Carlo Rezzonico of Venice (1758-1769), was intrusted to Canova. There is the difference of a few years only between the two, but it seems as if there were centuries. This monument, which marks a prodigious reaction towards the pure ideals of classical art, was uncovered on April 4, 1795, before an immense assembly of people. The whole of Rome was there, and the defeat of the partisans of Bernini's style could not have been more complete.

FIGURE FROM THE TOMB OF CLEMENT XIII

Disguised in ecclesiastical robes, Canova mixed with the crowd, and was able to hear for himself that the reign of a false taste in art was once more over, so unanimous was the admiration and approval of the multitudes for his bold attempt. The tomb of Clement XIII. rests on a high basement of grayish marble, in the middle of which opens a door of the Doric style, giving access to the vault. The two world-renowned marble lions crouch upon the steps, watching the sarcophagus; Religion stands on the left, holding a cross in the right hand; while the Genius of Death, with an inverted torch, is seen reclining on the opposite side. It is a graceful, but slightly conventional figure. One can easily perceive the influence of the study of the antique in the head of this Genius, which Canova considered one of his best productions. It is the Apollo Belvedere of modern times, the "Catholic Apollo," as Forsyth calls the archangel of Guido in the church of the Capuchins. The Pope is represented kneeling and praying, with hands clasped, and a face full of sentiment and thought. When, seated before this monument, we turn our eyes towards the tombs of Clement X. and Benedict XIV., and other similar productions of the eighteenth century, we can hardly realize that Canova was a contemporary of Pietro Bracci and Carlo Monaldi.

The tomb is also historically interesting. It was under Clement XIII. that the order of the Jesuits was tried before the tribunal of Europe. The kingdom of Portugal, where they had made their first advance towards greatness and fame, was the first to attack them. The marquess of Pombal, prime minister of Joseph I., taking advantage of the uneasiness caused by the earthquake of 1755 and by a murderous attempt against the king, expelled the order from the country and the colonies (January 9-September 3, 1759). One hundred and twenty-four were put in irons; one, named Malagrida, executed; thirty-seven allowed to die in prison; and the rest were embarked on seven ships and transported to foreign lands. Charles III. of Spain, and his minister, count d'Aranda, followed the example of Portugal. The Jesuits were banished from Spain, February 28, 1767; and in the night between April 2 and 3, they were put, five thousand in number, on transport vessels, and sent to Rome. King Louis XV. and the duc de Choiseul used the same process in France. The attempt of Damiens, January 5, 1757, and an alleged scandal in the administration of the property of the order at la Martinique were taken up as pretexts for punishment, and the order was banished in 1764. King Ferdinand IV. of Naples, the grand master of Malta, the duke of Parma, and other potentates took their share also in the crusade. Whatever may be the sentiment which we personally feel towards this brotherhood, the figures of Lorenzo Ricci, the general who so bravely contested every inch of the battlefield, and of Clement XIII., who died before signing the decree of suppression so loudly demanded by Portugal, Spain, France, Parma, Naples and Malta, will always be remembered with respect. The pressure brought on the old Pope by half the kingdoms of Europe, which were governed directly or indirectly by the Bourbons, was not merely that of diplomacy. He was deprived of Avignon and the comté Venoisin in France, of Benevento in southern Italy; but to no purpose. The decree suppressing the order was only signed by his successor Clement XIV., Ganganelli, on July 21, 1773. Lorenzo Ricci died the following year, a state prisoner in the castle of S. Angelo.