LXIX. feuds. an early abuse of nepotism: the estates of St. Peter CHAP. were alienated in their favour by the liberal Celestin106; and Nicholas was ambitious for their sake to solicit the alliance of monarchs; to found new kingdoms in Lombardy and Tuscany; and to invest them with the perpetual office of senators of Rome. All that has been observed of the greatness of the Colonna, will likewise redound to the glory of the Ursini, their constant and equal antagonists in the long hereditary feud, which distracted above two hundred and fifty years the ecclesiastical state. The jealousy of pre-eminence and power Their he. was the true ground of their quarrel; but as a specious reditary badge of distinction, the Colonna embraced the name of Ghibelines and the party of the empire; the Ursini espoused the title of Guelphs and the cause of the church. The eagle and the keys were displayed in their adverse banners; and the two factions of Italy most furiously raged when the origin and nature of the dispute were long since forgotten. After the retreat of the popes to Avignon, they disputed in arms the vacant republic: and the mischiefs of discord were perpetuated by the wretched compromise of electing each year two rival senators. By their private hostilities, the city and country were desolated, and the fluctuating balance inclined with their alternate success. But none of either family had fallen by the sword, till the most renowned champion of the Ursini was surprised and slain by the younger Stephen Colonna 108. His triumph is stained with the reproach of violating the truce; their defeat was basely avenged by the assassination, before the church door, of -genuit quem nobilis Ursæ (Ursi?) Progenies, Romana domus, veterataque magnis Papatûs iterata tenens. Muratori (Dissert. lii. tom. xiii.) observes, that the first Ursini pontificate of Celestine III. was unknown: he is inclined to read Ursi progenies. 106 Filii Ursi quondiam Cœlestini papæ nepotes, de bonis ecclesiæ Romanæ ditati (Vit. Innocent III. in Muratori, Script. tom. iii. P. i) The partial prodigality of Nicholas III. is more conspicuous in Villani and Muratori. Yet the Ursini would disdain the nephews of a modern pope. 107 In his 51st Dissertation on the Italian Antiquities, Muratori explains the factions of the Guelphs and Ghibelines. 108 Petrarch (tom. i. p. 222-230.) has celebrated this victory according to the Colonna; but two contemporaries, a Florentine (Giovanni Villani, I. x. c. 220), and a Roman (Ludovico Monaldeschi, p. 533, 534), are less favourable to their arms. CHAP. an innocent boy and his two servants. Yet the vietoriLXIX ous Colonna, with an annual colleague, was declared senator of Rome during the term of five years. And the muse of Petrarch inspired a wish, a hope, a predietion, that the generous youth, the son of his venerable hero, would restore Rome and Italy to their pristine glory; that his justice would extirpate the wolves and lions, the serpents and bears, who laboured to subvert the eternal basis of the marble COLUMN 109. 109 The abbé de Sade (tom. i. Notes, p 61-66.) has applied the sixth CHAP. A.D. 1374, CHAPTER LXX. Character and Coronation of Petrarch.-Restoration of the Freedom and Government of Rome by the Tribune Rienzi.—His Virtues and Vices, his Expulsion and Death.-Return of the Popes from Avignon.-Great Schism of the West.-Re-union of the Latin Church.-Last Struggles of Roman Liberty.-Statutes of Rome.-Final Settlement of the Ecclesiastical State. IN the apprehension of modern times, Petrarch1 is LXX. the Italian songster of Laura and love. In the harmony of his Tuscan rhymes, Italy applauds, or rather adores, Petrarch, A.D. 1304, the father of her lyric poetry and his verse, or at least June 19 his name, is repeated by the enthusiasm, or affectation, July 19. of amorous sensibility. Whatever may be the private taste of a stranger, his slight and superficial knowledge should humbly acquiesce in the judgment of a learned nation: yet I may hope or presume, that the Italians do not compare the tedious uniformity of sonnets and elegies, with the sublime compositions of their epic muse, the original wildness of Dante, the regular beauties of Tasso, and the boundless variety of the incomparable Ariosto. The merits of the lover, I am still less 1 The Memoires sur la Vie de Francois Petrarque (Amsterdam, 1764, 1767. 3 vols. in 4to), form a copious, original, and entertaining work, a labour of love, composed from the accurate study of Petrarch and his contemporaries; but the hero is too often lost in the general history of the age, and the author too often languishes in the affectation of politeness and gallantry. In the preface to his first volume, he enumerates and weighs twenty Italian biographers, who have professedly treated of the same subject. LXX. qualified to appreciate: nor am I deeply interested in a CHAP. metaphysical passion for a nymph so shadowy, that her existence has been questioned'; for a matron so prolific3, that she was delivered of eleven legitimate children, while her amorous swain sighed and sung at the fountain of Vaucluse. But in the eyes of Petrarch, and those of his graver contemporaries, his love was a sin, and Italian verse a frivolous amusement. His Latin works of philosophy, poetry, and eloquence, established his serious reputation, which was soon diffused from Avignon over France and Italy: his friends and disciples were multiplied in every city; and if the ponderous volume of his writings" be now abandoned to a long repose, our gratitude must applaud the man, who by precept and example revived the spirit and study of the Augustan age. From his earliest youth, Petrarch aspired to the poetic crown. The academical honours of the three faculties had introduced a royal degree of master or doctor in the art of poetry"; and the title of poet-laureat, which custom, rather than vanity, perpetuates in the English courts, was first invented by the 2 The allegorical interpretation prevailed in the xvth century; but the wise commentators were not agreed whether they should understand by Laura, religion, or virtue, or the blessed Virgin, or See the prefaces to the first and second volumes. 3 Laure de Noves, born about the year 1307, was married in January 1325 to Hugues de Sade, a noble citizen of Avignon, whose jealousy was not the effect of love, since he married a second wife within seven months of her death, which happened the 6th of April 1348, precisely one-and-twenty years after Petrarch had seen and loved her. 4 Corpus crebris partubus exhaustum; from one of these is issued in the tenth degree, the abbé de Sade, the fond and grateful biographer of Petrarch; and this domestic motive most probably suggested the idea of his work, and urged him to inquire into every circumstance that could affect the history and character of his grandmother. See particularly, tom. i. p. 122-133. notes, p. 7-58. tom. ii. p. 455–495. not. p. 76–82. 5 Vaucluse, so familiar to our English travellers, is described from the writings of Petrarch, and the local knowledge of his biographer (Memoires, tom. i. p. 340-359). It was, in truth, the retreat of an hermit, and the moderns are much mistaken, if they place Laura and an happy lover in the grotto. 6 of 1250 pages, in a close print, at Basil in the xvith century, but without the date of the year. The abbé de Sade calls aloud for a new edition of Petrarch's Latin works; but I much doubt whether it would redound to the profit of the bookseller, or the amusement of the public. 7 Consult Selden's Titles of Honour, in his works (vol. iii. p. 457-466). An hundred years before Petrarch, St. Francis received the visit of a poet, qui ab imperatore fuerat coronatus et exinde rex versuum dictus. 8 From Augustus to Louis, the muse has too often been false and venal : but I much doubt whether any age or court can produce a similar establishment of a stipendiary poet, who in every reign, and at all events, is bound to furnish twice a year a measure of praise and verse, such as may be sung in the chapel, and, I believe, in the presence, of the sovereign. I speak the CHAP. Cæsars of Germany. In the musical games of antiquity, LXX. a prize was bestowed on the victor: the belief that Vir gil and Horace had been crowned in the Capitol, inflamed the emulation of a Latin bard10; and the laurel" was endeared to the lover by a verbal resemblance with the name of his mistress. The value of either object was enhanced by the difficulties of the pursuit; and if the virtue or prudence of Laura was inexorable1, he enjoyed, and might boast of enjoying, the nymph of poetry. His vanity was not of the most delicate kind, since he applauds the success of his own labours; his name was popular; his friends were active; the open or secret opposition of envy and prejudice, was surmounted by the dexterity of patient merit. In the thirty-sixth year of his age, he was solicited to accept the object of his wishes and on the same day, in the solitude of Vaucluse, he received a similar and solemn invitation from the senate of Rome and the university of Paris. The learning of a theological school, and the ignorance of a lawless city, were alike unqualified to bestow the ideal though immortal wreath which gepius may obtain from the free applause of the public and of posterity: but the candidate dismissed this troublesome reflection, and, after some moments of complacency and suspense, preferred the summons of the metropolis of the world. more freely, as the best time for abolishing this ridiculous custom, is while the prince is a man of virtue, and the poet a man of genius. 9 Isocrates (in Panegyrico, tom. i. p. 116, 117. edit. Battie, Cantab. 1729) claims for his native Athens the glory of first instituting and recommending the αγώνας και τα άλλα μέγισα μη μόνον τάχες και ρωμης, αλλά και λόγων και yous. The example of the Panathenæa was imitated at Delphi: but the Olympic games were ignorant of a musical crown, till it was extorted by the vain tyranny of Nero (Sueton. in Nerone, c. 23; Philostrat. apud Casaubon ad locum; Dion Cassius, or Xiphilin, 1. lxiii. p. 1032. 101. Potter's Greek Antiquities, vol. i. p. 445. 450). 10 The Capitoline games (certamen quinquenale, musicum, equestre, gymnicum), were instituted by Domitian (Sueton. c 4.) in the year of Christ 86 (Censorin. de Die Natali, c. 18. p. 100. edit. Havercamp), and were not abolished in the fourth century (Ausonius de Professoribus Burdegal. V). If the crown were given to superior merit, the exclusion of Statius (Capitolia nostræ inficiata lyræ, Silv. 1. iii. v. 31.) may do honour to the games of the Capitol; but the Latin poets who lived before Domitian, were crowned only in the public opinion. 11 Petrarch and the senators of Rome were ignorant that the laurel was not the Capitoline, but the Delphic, crown (Plin. Hist. Natur. xv. 39. Hist. Critique de la Republique des Lettres, tom. i. p. 150-220). The victors in the Capitol were crowned with a garland of oak leaves. Martial, 1. iv. epigram 54. 12 The pions grandson of Laura has laboured, and not without success, to vindicate her immaculate chastity against the censures of the grave and the sneers of the profane (tom. ii. notes, p. 76-82). LXX. Rome, The ceremony of his coronation's was performed in CHAP. the Capitol, by his friend and patron the supreme magistrate of the republic. Twelve patrician youths were His poetic arrayed in scarlet; six representatives of the most illus. corona trious families, in green robes, with garlands and flow- tion at ers, accompanied the procession; in the midst of the A.D.1341, princes and nobles, the senator, count of Anguillara, a April 8. kinsman of the Colonna, assumed his throne: and at the voice of an herald Petrarch arose. After discoursing on a text of Virgil, and thrice repeating his vows for the prosperity of Rome, he knelt before the throne and received from the senator a laurel crown, with a more precious declaration, "This is the reward of merit." The people shouted, "Long life to the Capitol and the poet!" A sonnet in praise of Rome was accepted as the effusion of genius and gratitude; and after the whole procession had visited the Vatican, the profane wreath was suspended before the shrine of St. Peter. In the act of diploma which was presented to Petrarch, the 'title and prerogatives of poet-laureat are revived in the Capitol, after the lapse of thirteen hundred years; and he receives the perpetual privilege of wearing, at his choice, a crown of laurel, ivy, or myrtle, of assuming the poetic habit, and of teaching, disputing, interpreting, and composing in all places whatsoever, and on all subjects of literature. The grant was ratified by the authority of the senate and people; and the character of citizen was the recompense of his affection for the Roman name. They did him honour, but they did him justice. In the familiar society of Cicero and Livy, he had imbibed the ideas of an ancient patriot; and his ardent fancy kindled every idea to a sentiment, and every sentiment to a passion. The aspect of the seven hills and their majestic ruins, confirmed these lively impressions; and he loved a country by whose liberal spirit he had been crowned and adopted. The poverty and debasement of Rome excited the indignation and pity of her grateful son he dissembled the faults of his fellow-citizens; applauded with partial fondness the last of their heroes 13 The whole process of Petrarch's coronation is accurately described by the abbé de Sade (tom. i. p. 425-435. tom. ii. p. 1-6. notes, p. 1-13.) from his own writings, and the Roman Diary of Ludovico Monaldeschi, without mixing in this authentic narrative the more recent fables of Sannuccio Delbene. 14 The original act is printed among the Pieces Justificatives in the Me. moires sur Petrarque, tom. iii. p. 50-53. |