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Title: How to see the Vatican
Author: Douglas Brooke Wheelton Sladen
Release date: October 24, 2026 [eBook #79854]
Language: English
Original publication: London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner, & Co. Ltd, 1914
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/79854
Credits: deaurider and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HOW TO SEE THE VATICAN ***
[Illustration: The Grotte Nuove of St Peter’s, showing the Confessio of
Matteo Pollaiuolo on the right and the light shining from St. Peter’s
Tomb upon the Sarcophagus of Junius Bassus.]
HOW TO SEE THE
VATICAN
BY
DOUGLAS SLADEN
AUTHOR OF
“HOW TO SEE ITALY” “ORIENTAL CAIRO”
“SICILY, THE NEW WINTER RESORT”
“QUEER THINGS ABOUT JAPAN” ETC. ETC.
WITH SIXTY HALF-TONE PLATES AND A MAP
LONDON:
KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRÜBNER, & CO. LTD
NEW YORK: JAMES POTT AND COMPANY
1914
PUBLISHERS’ NOTE
This volume gives the only description in English of the Vatican,
considered, not as a collection of museums, but as the Royal Palace
of the Popes, since Mr. Sladen’s well-known book, _The Secrets of the
Vatican_, is now completely out of print, and can never be published
again, part of it remaining in the hands of the original publishers,
Messrs. Hurst & Blackett, and part having been transferred to ourselves.
This was because the chapters of the book which related to the
home-life of the Pope necessarily need changing much oftener than the
parts which describe the Vatican Palace itself. Those portions have
been brought up to date, and are published, with some very interesting
new matter included, by Messrs. Hurst & Blackett, under the title of
_The Pope at Home_. The remainder of the book, likewise brought up to
date, and with certain interesting additions, constitutes _How to See
the Vatican_.
The illustrations are taken from photographs of parts of the Vatican
not usually shown to visitors, reproductions of prints of Old St.
Peter’s and the treasures of the Crypt; and various plans of the
Vatican and the Crypt to explain the gradual growth of the Palace and
Cathedral of the Popes from the date of St. Peter’s Martyrdom--A.D.
67--to our own day.
It will be noted also that the museums, picture galleries, and the
like, for the reason mentioned above, and to keep the book within
handbook limits, are only alluded to incidentally.
PREFACE
The word _Vatican_ is familiar to travellers in the signification of a
place with museums of matchless sculpture, and a gallery of paintings,
and a chapel whose paintings are yet more famous. This does not help
them to understand the first signification. The number of English
people who have visited the Vatican Collections without giving any
thought to the Vatican beyond them is very great. This is excusable
because there is no guide-book in English, and no adequate guide-book
in any language, _to the Vatican as a Palace_.
The reason is not hard to discover. In the days before the cataclysm of
1870, when Pius IX. was on the Papal Throne reigning like an Augustus,
the insatiable curiosity which characterizes readers pampered by the
gossip-loving periodicals of the twentieth century had not demanded
what we call _books of travel_, meaning books of sight-seeing, which
are so popular now. And since 1870 the Vatican has been in mourning.
For reasons pointed out in the Publishers’ Note, _How to See the
Vatican_ excludes those parts of the Palace with which every visitor is
familiar, viz. the Sculpture Galleries, the Sistine Chapel, the Stanze
and Loggie of Raffaelle, and the Pinacoteca. They are merely catalogued
in the opening chapter, in which I give the category of the various
chapels, chambers, courtyards, and gardens which make up the Vatican. I
take it for granted that everyone is familiar with them, and devote my
space to introducing the British and American publics to the neglected
or usually closed parts of the Palace, with the necessary historical
allusions.
I open with the story of the Vatican and the Quintian Meadows from
the days when the curly-haired Cincinnatus left his plough to head
the armies of the Republic as Dictator. Then I tell the story of the
building of the world’s most famous palace from the time of Pope
Saint Symmachus to the times of the three Popes of exile who bore the
devoted name of Pius--Pius VI., Pius VII., and Pius IX.; and give two
chapters to the reconstruction of Old St. Peter’s, built by Constantine
the Great, which lasted for more than a dozen centuries; and three
chapters to that wonderful charnel-house of Gothic art in Rome, the
Crypt of St. Peter’s, whose pavement is the actual floor of the Church
of Constantine, and whose vaults are strewn with the shattered tombs of
eighty-six Mediæval Popes.
It is into these chapters and the chapters on Nicholas V., the Father
of the Vatican Library, the Mæcenas of the Papacy, the Apostle of
Learning, that history enters so much.
After these I deal with the Vatican Libraries,--old and new,--the
glowing hall and marvellous manuscripts and antiques of the Library
of Sixtus V., and the Leonine Library, below it, by which Leo XIII.
fulfilled Nicholas V.’s ambition of making the Vatican enlighten the
world. I give a glimpse of Montaigne in the Vatican Library. I say
what I know about the Archives from the time of Pope Saint Damasus;
and dwell on the beauty and romance of the Vatican Gardens--the
Pope’s kingdom of this world. That is followed by a number of shorter
chapters on the byways of the Vatican trodden by few feet--the Paoline
and Leonine Chapels, the Treasury of the Sistine Chapel, the Pope’s
private tapestry rooms and personal apartments, the Sala Regia, the
Sala Ducale, the Loggia of Giovanni da Udine, the Pope’s Coach-house,
the Gallery of Raffaelle’s tapestries, the Gallery of the _Candelabri_,
the Gallery of the Maps, the mysteries of the Sacristy and the Dome
of St. Peter’s; and I wind up with the little-known Etruscan Museum
and the Borgia Apartments. The few who have crossed the threshold of
the Etruscan Museum may be glad to cross it again with one who has
visited most of the Etruscan cities, half-buried in flowers and turf,
on hills in hidden valleys, which are the delight and despair of the
antiquarian. The Borgia Rooms, now not so difficult to visit, are
included, not to give a detailed criticism of their pictures, already
so superbly treated by Ehrle and Stevenson, and Ricci, but partly to
convey their effect as the most typically palatial part of the royal
Palace of the Popes, and partly to give a number of interesting facts
about them which have never before appeared in English.
From the above it will be seen that I have aimed at giving the
traveller who goes to Rome for sight-seeing, and the stay-at-home who
has to do his sight-seeing in books of travel, some idea of the parts
of the Vatican which are not generally seen; either because the visitor
does not know where to look for them, or because they are only shown as
a special favour.
I am myself a Protestant, a member of the Church of England. My idea of
patriotism makes it impossible that I should ever leave the Church of
my forefathers. But it is only upon the Rights and the Independence of
the Church that I have strong feelings; the differences of dogma which
have grown up since it parted from the Church of Rome do not concern
me. I feel towards the Church of Rome as an Anglophile American feels
towards England: I feel that I sprang from it. I do not forget that
I belonged to it, until the Middle Ages, which are my special study
and delight, were ended. Its history and antiquities occupy a great
part of my thoughts, for I spend half my life in Italy, and the days I
have passed in Italy have mostly been devoted to Church antiquities. I
regard the venerable Church, which has been going like a clock since
the days of the Apostles, with the utmost affection and interest. Not
having been brought up in the Church of Rome, and having a feeling of
repulsion to all dogma, I cannot hope to penetrate deeper than the
outer shell of that ancient and glorious institution. But I hope that
those who are members of the Church of Rome will recognize the pleasure
and enthusiasm with which I study their antiquities and monuments; and
accept my assurance that, if I have written anything which hurts their
feelings, I have not written it with any outspokenness or levity that I
might not have used in writing of England. And England is my religion.
Before closing this foreword I have to make various acknowledgments.
There are many books to which I have to acknowledge my indebtedness.
First among these comes Gregorovius’s great _History of Rome in the
Middle Ages_, translated by Mrs. Gustavus W. Hamilton, and published
by George Bell & Sons (8 vols. in 13, £3 3s. nett). This book is a
fountain of inspiration to anyone who essays to write about Rome in
the Middle Ages. Not only are its springs inexhaustible: the fountain
itself is so clear and beautiful that to take draughts from it is a
perpetual delight. The smaller volume of Gregorovius, from which I have
made several quotations--the _Tombs of the Popes_, translated by Mr. R.
W. Seton Watson, and published by Archibald Constable & Co. (with whose
permission these quotations have been made)--I should not have used
so much but for the admirable English of the translation. Other books
of Messrs. Bell, to which I have referred a few times, are Miss Mary
Knight Potter’s _The Art of the Vatican_, and Roscoe’s _Life of Leo X_.
Mr. John Murray has published several books which I have constantly
before me. Besides Murray’s _Handbook to Rome_, which has always
been recognized as one of the best in any language, there are Sir A.
H. Layard’s _Handbook to the Italian Schools of Painting_, based on
Kugler’s handbook, sixth edition (2 vols., 24s. nett); Dennis’s _Cities
and Cemeteries of Etruria_ (2 vols., 36s. nett); Nielsen’s _History of
the Papacy in the Nineteenth Century_, 1907 (2 vols., 24s. nett); and
Mr. W. G. Waters’s _Translation of the Journal of Montaigne’s Travels_,
which contains some interesting passages about the Vatican Library.
Dean Milman’s _History of Latin Christianity_, published by the same
firm, I have found of very little use; it is too concentrated.
Messrs. Macmillan & Co. have brought out valuable books on the subject.
Lanciani’s four earlier volumes, _Pagan and Christian Rome_, _Ancient
Rome_, the _Destruction of Ancient Rome_, and _Ruins and Excavations
of Ancient Rome_, all of them published by this firm, are never off my
writing-table. Macmillan’s _Handbook to Italy and Sicily_ has a special
value because in it the towns are arranged alphabetically in gazetteer
fashion. Other books of this firm to which I have occasionally to refer
are Mr. Walter Lowrie’s _Christian Art and Archæology_, Professor
Bryce’s phenomenal book, _The Holy Roman Empire_, and those delightful
books, Mrs. Oliphant’s _Makers of Modern Rome_, and Mr. Marion
Crawford’s _Ave Roma Immortalis_. The essay entitled _A Survey of the
Thirteenth Century_, in Mr. Frederic Harrison’s volume of essays, _The
Meaning of History_, which I keep on a shelf beside my volumes of John
Addington Symonds, I have found very suggestive.
There are few publishers to whom I am more indebted in the preparation
of this work than Messrs. A. & C. Black, who publish the admirable
_Handbook to Christian and Ecclesiastical Rome_, by Misses Tuker and
Malleson, which I have used throughout for checking the information
given in French and Italian works. I have also referred a few times to
the large book on Rome by the same ladies, which is one of the best
illustrated volumes in Messrs. Black’s colour series; and Professor
Middleton’s classic _Remains of Ancient Rome_. Messrs. Black have also
a two-and-sixpenny guide-book to Rome, with coloured illustrations,
written by Mr. E. A. Reynolds-Ball in 1906.
Mr. T. Fisher Unwin has four volumes in his _Story of the Nations_
series (price 5s. nett per vol.): _Rome_, by Mr. Arthur Gilman, M.A.
(6th imp., 3rd ed.); _The Papal Monarchy_, by Dr. William Barry;
_Mediæval Rome_, by Mr. William Miller; and _Modern Rome_, by Professor
Pietro Orsi--all of them useful for facts.
I have had constant occasion to refer to that valuable book, Hare’s
_Walks in Rome_, brought up to date like Hare’s _Days round Rome_,
by Mr. St. Clair Baddeley, who has the responsible position of
representing the English subscribers interested in the Excavation
of the Forum. Both these books are published by Messrs. Kegan Paul,
Trench, & Co. One of the best books dealing incidentally with the
Vatican is Klaczko’s _Rome and the Renaissance_, translated by Mr. John
Dennie, very beautifully brought out by G. P. Putnam’s Sons.
For one period of the Vatican Messrs. Duckworth & Co.’s beautifully
produced edition of Mrs. Ady’s _Raffaelle_ is useful.
There is a little about the Vatican Library in Helbig’s _Guide to
the Public Collections of Classical Antiquities in Rome_, published
by Baedeker. Baedeker’s _Central Italy_ is indispensable; it is so
extremely well arranged, so sure to mention salient facts, like dates
and measurements, which one has occasion to check.
For the purpose of this volume I have not had occasion to use much that
very picturesque book, Father Chandlery’s _Pilgrim Walks in Rome_,
published by the Manresa Press, though I have found it most useful
in the larger work I am preparing about Rome. I understand that much
information about Old St. Peter’s is scattered through Father Barnes’s
large work on _St. Peter in Rome_, which I have not seen.
One of the best accounts of the Pope’s apartments to be found anywhere
is in Zola’s _Rome_, of which the English edition is published by
Messrs. Chatto & Windus, who are likewise the publishers of the cheap
editions of Charles Reade’s _The Cloister and the Hearth_, into which
Nicholas V. comes; and Wilkie Collins’s _Antonina_.
Far the most interesting volume of gossip about the Popes is Silvagni’s
_La Corte e la Società Romana nei XVIII. e XIX. secoli_, of which
a most spirited translation has been published by Mrs. Frances
Maclaughlin (Elliot Stock).
A rather similar book is the late W. W. Story’s famous _Roba di Roma_,
sixth edition, published by Messrs. Chapman & Hall, who are also the
publishers of Mr. Frederic Harrison’s novel, _Theophano_, which has
a great deal about Rome and the Popes in the age of the Ottos. As
interesting as _Roba di Roma_, if not as Silvagni, but, of course,
written from a very different standpoint, is Cardinal Wiseman’s
_Recollections of the Last Four Popes and of Rome in their Times_,
published by Messrs. Hurst & Blackett.
Last in the list of English books I may mention the translation of Dr.
Ludwig Pastor’s _History of the Popes_, published by Mr. John Hodges,
in the Catholic Standard Library, a book as picturesque and packed with
learning as Gregorovius’s, if less succinct.
Finally, I may say that for all recent special information on my
subject I have had to go to French and Italian books.
First, I must naturally mention the superb works written by Messrs.
Ehrle and Stevenson on the Borgia Rooms, and Corrado Ricci on
Pinturicchio, in which much space is devoted to the Borgia Rooms. Both
of these noble works, which cost five or six guineas apiece, were
written in Italian, but of the latter Mr. Heinemann has brought out a
superbly illustrated translation with glorious coloured plates.
The house of Firmin-Didot et Cie have brought out, at 3 frs. 50
centimes each, two most valuable volumes containing contributions by
M. Georges Goyau, M. Paul Fabre, M. Pératé, and the Vicomte Melchior
de Vogüé, under the titles of _La Gouvernement de l’Église_, and _La
Papauté et la Civilization_. The former is indispensable to anyone who
wishes to form a succinct idea of the personnel of the Vatican; it is
most lucidly and attractively written; and it and the _Vie Intime de
Pie X._, by the Abbé Cigala, who is by birth a noble of Turin, are the
two most interesting books on the Vatican which I have read.
The _Vie Intime_ is even more up to date than the _Gouvernement de
l’Eglise_; it is published by Lethielleux et Cie, who also are the
publishers of M. Lector’s _Le Conclave_.
For the information about the Vatican and St. Peter’s Crypt, which
form a _pièce de résistance_ in my book, I am most indebted to the
_Éléments d’Archéologie Chrétienne_ of Professor Marucchi, the Pope’s
archæologist, the de Rossi of the day, and the _Cryptes Vaticanes_ of
Père Dufresne, which was, until I brought out _Old St. Peter’s and
St. Peter’s Crypt_, the only book on the subject, and is a mine of
information.
I have left to the end Pistolesi’s magnificent work, _Il Vaticano_,
published eighty years ago in eight huge folios, at the expense, I
believe, of a former Earl of Shrewsbury. Half my illustrations are
reproductions of the hundreds of superb plans and plates in this book.
Pistolesi is what Americans would call the bed-rock, upon which many of
the later books about the Vatican are founded, and its value is much
enhanced by the fact that, unlike most large Italian works, it is well
indexed.
I hope that I have not omitted any of the works which have been
valuable to me in the prolonged studies which preceded the writing
of my book. If I have, I tender my most sincere apologies to their
authors and publishers. I must conclude with a word of thanks to Miss
Heath Wilson, of the English Library in the Piazza di Spagna at Rome, a
valued friend, who has given me much help by procuring for me various
materials not procurable in England.
DOUGLAS SLADEN.
THE AVENUE HOUSE,
RICHMOND, SURREY.
CONTENTS
Publishers’ Note v
Preface vii
A List of the Popes, with their Dates, Places of Birth, and
Family Names at end
ABOUT THE VATICAN IN GENERAL.
I. Introduction 1
II. What the Vatican consists of. Being a specific 14
classification and explanation, with a numbered
plan, for the first time given in English, of all
the vast building--the largest in the world--
known as the Vatican, which comprises the Palace
of the Popes, six chapels, a dozen courts, many
museums, sculpture galleries, and loggie; the
Borgia Apartments; Guard-rooms, factories,
libraries, gardens, etc. etc.; the famous Vatican
Picture Gallery, tapestries, crypts, etc. etc.
PARTS OF THE VATICAN NOT GENERALLY SHOWN TO THE PUBLIC.
III. The Story of the Vatican Hill in ancient Roman 45
times, when it was the farm from which Cincinnatus
was called to be Dictator, and contained the
Garden of Agrippina, the mother of Nero; and the
Circus where St. Peter and other Christians
suffered martyrdom
IV. The Story of the Building of the Vatican at various 56
epochs
V. A Description of Old St. Peter’s, the great basilica 86
founded by Constantine the Great, which existed
for a thousand years before it was destroyed to
make room for the present St. Peter’s. _Never
before fully described in any English book_
VI. On the Remains of Old St. Peter’s still preserved in 117
Rome
VII. The Grotte Vaticane, or Crypt of St. Peter’s; which 138
contain the Tomb of St. Peter and the Tombs of the
Popes, and Shrines from Old St. Peter’s. The
Grotte Nuove, North Portion
VIII. The Grotte Vecchie--The eastern part of the Crypt 158
IX. The Grotte Nuove, south side 182
X. Nicholas V. and the Vatican: the Chapel of 190
Nicholas V.
XI. The Vatican Library, with its thirty-five thousand 213
manuscripts: Picture Gallery, Ancient Roman
Frescoes, Christian and Profane Museums
XII. The Visits of Montaigne and Misson to the Vatican 242
Library
XIII. Leo XIII. and the foundation of the New 253
Leonine Library where the printed books are now
kept
XIV. The Vatican Archives and the work of Cardinal Mai 266
XV. The Private Gardens of the Pope 278
XVI. The Pope’s Coach-house: an Account of the old 294
Cavalcata: the Vatican Workshops of Mosaics and
Tapestries
XVII. Raffaelle’s Tapestries 309
XVIII. The Paoline and Leonine Chapels and the Pope’s 317
Private Tapestry Rooms
XIX. The Sistine Treasury 329
XX. The Sacristy of St. Peter’s 339
XXI. The Dome of St. Peter’s 345
XXII. The Borgia Apartments 353
XXIII. The Etruscan Museum 386
INDEX 407
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
The Grotte Nuove of St. Peter’s. Showing the
Confessio of Matteo Pollaiuolo on the right, and _Frontispiece_
the light shining from St. Peter’s Tomb upon the
Sarcophagus of Junius Bassus
The Court of the Casino of Pius IV. in the 2
Vatican Gardens
The Dalmatic of Charlemagne in the Sacristy of St. 8
Peter’s
Map of the Vatican 10
Ground Plan of the Vatican 14
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano Descritto
ed Illustrato_.
Charity. Carved by Mino da Fiesole for Paul 16
II.’s Mausoleum, now in the Grotte Nuove
of St. Peter’s Crypt
Faith. By Mino da Fiesole, in the Grotte Nuove in 17
St. Peter’s Crypt
Giovanni da Udine’s Loggia before it was glazed 24
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
The Fire in the Borgo, from the painting by 30
Raffaelle in his Stanze. Showing the exterior of
Old St. Peter’s
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
The Scala Regia of the Vatican. Designed by Bernini 32
The famous Aldobrandini Wedding in the Vatican 36
Library. The finest picture which has survived
from Classical times
St. Peter’s and the Vatican. The top wing on the 44
right hand contains the apartments of the Pope
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
The Piazza of St. Peter’s as it is to-day; on the 45
right, above the Colonnade, is the Palace of the
Vatican, the right wing of which contains the
apartments of the Pope
Panvinio’s Plan showing the relation of Nero’s 48
Circus to St. Peter’s, and Hadrian’s Circus to his
Tomb, now the Castle of Sant’ Angelo
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
The Circus of Nero, where St. Peter was executed, as 49
reconstructed by G. Fontana
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
The Crucifixion of St. Peter--by Giotto--now in the 52
Sacristy of St. Peter’s. The earliest known work
of art in which the Tomb of Romulus and the Tomb
of Caius Cestius are shown as the Duae Metae
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
Sarcophagus of Nicolas V. in the Grotte 62
Vecchie of St. Peter’s Crypt. The carvings of Mino
da Fiesole in the Crypt belonged to the Mausoleum
over it
The Courtyard of S. Damaso before the arcades were 64
glazed by Pius IX. Drawn and engraved by
G. Fontana. The apartments of the Pope occupy the
right wing
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
The Court of S. Damaso--since Pius IX. 65
glazed its arcades. The Pope’s apartments are to
the right, where the carriage is standing
The Pavilion of the Casino of Pius IV. in 72
the Vatican Gardens
The Ceiling of the Sala Regia 74
Giampietro Chattard’s Plan of St. Peter’s and its 78
Portico
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
Exterior of Old St. Peter’s, Rome. Reproduced by 84
permission from the British Museum Guide to the
Early Christian and Byzantine Antiquities
The Grotte Vecchie of St. Peter’s Crypt. Showing the 90
Sarcophagus of the Old Pretender on the extreme
right, and the urn containing the præcordia of
Pius IX. next to it
Filippo Bonanni’s reconstruction of the Basilica of 96
Constantine
The Porch of St. Peter’s 102
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
The Donation of Constantine, by Giulio Romano and 110
other pupils of Raffaelle, in the Stanze. Showing
the interior of Old St. Peter’s
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
Old St. Peter’s, with the procession transporting 112
the body of St. Gregory the Great in the
foreground, and the dome of the present church
rising behind. Painted by P. Brill
Giotto’s (much restored) Mosaic, called the 118
Navicella, in the Porch of St. Peter’s
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
The bronze doors removed from Old St. Peter’s to the 120
present Church. They were made by Filarete and
Ghini, and the bottom right panel shows the Tomb
of Caius Cestius and Tomb of Romulus at the Duae
Metae
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
The Tomb of Sixtus IV. in the Chapel of the 126
Holy Sacrament. This is the chapel where the dead
Pope lies in state
The Statue of St. Peter in St. Peter’s. It dates 130
from the sixth century
The Execution of St. Peter. Carved by Matteo 132
Pollaiuolo for the Confessio of Old St. Peter’s,
now in the Grotte Nuove of St. Peter’s Crypt
The Tabernacle of the Holy Lance in Old St. Peter’s. 136
From the fresco in the Crypt
The Tabernacle of the Volto Santo in Old St. 136
Peter’s. From the fresco in the Crypt
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
Plan of the Crypt of St. Peter’s 138
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
The Temptation. Carved by Mino da Fiesole for Paul 142
II.’s Mausoleum, now in the Grotte Nuove
of St. Peter’s Crypt
Chapel of the Tomb of St. Peter, in the Crypt. The 146
altar is almost over the Tomb
The Sarcophagus of Junius Bassus in the Grotte Nuove 150
of St. Peter’s Crypt
The Creation of Woman. Carved by Mino da Fiesole for 154
Paul II.’s Mausoleum, now in the Grotte
Nuove of St. Peter’s Crypt
The marble Shrine of the Virgin now in the Crypt of 158
St. Peter’s
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
The Mausoleum of Boniface VIII. in Old St. 162
Peter’s
The Mausoleum of Paul II. in Old St. 162
Peter’s, from which the Mino da Fiesole sculptures
in the Crypt were taken
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
The Tomb of Hadrian IV., the only English 172
Pope, behind; the Tomb of the Borgia Popes,
Calixtus III. and Alexander VI.,
in front. The effigy is that of Calixtus
III.
The interior of St. Peter’s. Showing Canova’s 178
monument to the last three Stuarts, erected by
George IV. when Prince Regent
The Statue of St. Peter, from the Old Basilica, 182
seated on the throne of Benedict XII. in
the Chapel of S. M. della Bocciata in the Crypt of
St. Peter’s
Pope Benedict XII. and a fresco of Old St. 188
Peter’s on a wall in St. Peter’s Crypt
Alfarano’s Plan, showing how Old St. Peter’s and the 192
present Cathedral rest upon the Circus of Nero
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
St. Lawrence. By Fra Angelico; in the Chapel of 210
Nicholas V.
The Sala Sistina, or Grand Hall, of the Vatican 232
Library
This is a Bull of Pope Clement VIII., dated 270
“Rome at St. Peter’s in the year of the
Incarnation of Our Lord, one thousand and five
hundred and ninety-two on the Kalends of January
in the first year of our Pontificate”
The Pope’s Classical Garden 280
Giardino della Pigna. Showing the Niccio of Bramante 292
and the Pigna (pine-cone) and Peacocks which came
from the Atrium of Old St. Peter’s
The Sistine Chapel, where the election of the Pope 310
takes place when it is held in the Vatican
The Paoline Chapel, used by the Cardinals when they 318
are in Conclave
The Leonine Chapel, called also the Loggia of Paul 322
V. and Sala della Beatificazione, from
which the Pope goes into the Gallery of St.
Peter’s to bless the people after his election;
used also for Canonizations
The Sala Ducale of Bernini in the Vatican. Drawn by 324
G. Fontana
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
Miniatures by Giotto in a manuscript in the Library 344
of the Canons of St. Peter’s
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
St. Peter’s. Plan showing how the Dome and the 350
Shrine Galleries of its piers are ascended
From PISTOLESI’S _Il Vaticano_.
David standing on the Head of Goliath. On the 354
ceiling of the Borgia Rooms
Ancient Bronze Chariot in the Etruscan Museum 388
Etruscan Museum in the Vatican. Showing the armour 392
worn by a Roman soldier, and Etruscan shields,
mirrors, and cauldrons
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
In this book I have traced the story of the Vatican Hill and the
Vatican Palace from their earliest days. I have endeavoured to
reconstruct Old St. Peter’s out of the fragments that survive, and have
lingered long in the Crypt of St. Peter’s, which, with its memories and
remains of the ancient basilica, is both as a monument and in history
the most important part of the Vatican. My purpose in this volume has
been to initiate the British and American public in the sights of the
Vatican which visitors do not generally see.
I shall not take up their time by describing again in detail the parts
of the palace which are already adequately described in a score of good
books. We shall need all our space for the particular object we have in
view.
Of all the secret places of the Vatican there is none which fires the
imagination of the visitor more than the Garden of the Pope, so often
called his Eden. The allusion is inevitable--for at the very gates
of the Vatican, on the pinnacle of the Castle of Sant’ Angelo, is
the great Bronze Angel with the drawn sword, whom the Pope will not
pass, because the tomb of the heathen Emperor below is filled with the
soldiers of the re-born Rome, which dispossessed the Church of the
kingdom of this world. Once past this cordon, he would be out of his
dominions.
But the simile is incomplete, because the World without, and not the
Garden within, is the Eden to which the Angel bars the way. Yet the
garden must be a very Paradise to the Popes, because it is the only
spot where they may listen, as Numa Pompilius listened on this very
hill, to the vaticinations of Nature, the wise counsellor of the weary
brain.
In these narrow limits are wood and vineyard--a classic garden buried
from the wind and open to the sun; the voices of falling waters; and
the garden-pavilion of the fourth Pius, with its haunting beauty in
the image of a Roman Emperor’s pleasure-house. It is full of memories
of the saintly Carlo Borromeo--but it is easier to credit it with the
Meditations of Marcus Aurelius.
How thankful must he be, whose feet never pass beyond his gates, that
in Italy the flowers of the field assert their right-of-way to every
nook uncumbered with masonry. The shady groves, where he walks, when
the heat of the summer day is a burden, have, in the bright leafless
days of Spring, a joyous carpet of violets and anemones, squills as
blue as Roman skies, and crimson cyclamens which embalm the breeze.
[Illustration: The Court of the Casino of Pius IV. in the Vatican
Gardens. ]
But more than all these must he prize, as he stands on the towered
wall, built a thousand years ago by the fourth Leo to guard the Holy
Hill from the heathen Saracen, the view of the open road, of the
spacious Campagna, and the distant sea, which is to him the world--the
Vineyard where there is no cold shadow of Italian Monarchy falling, as
the shadow of Elijah fell upon the sunshine of King Ahab.
Prosaic as may be the suggestions of the word coach-house in unlovely
London, romance lurked till lately in the coach-house of the Popes,
shadowed by the stately stone-pines of his Garden. For here were
shown the trappings with which the successor of St. Peter rode on his
white mule down the Sacred Way, climbed by the Scipios and Cæsars in
their Triumphs, to take seisin of the Lateran, the chief Church of
Christendom, the proto-palace of the Papacy. That great coach, all
scarlet and gold, with the flying and trumpeting cherubs, carried Pius
IX., the last of the Pope-Kings, in his royal processions, surrounded
by all the Papal Court on foot, on the four great days of the year.
Six huge white horses drew it, and one of their postilions lived to
tell the tale among the relics of the former grandeur.
In these days, when the Pope never drives from the Vatican Gates,
the coach-house has surrendered its unneeded chambers to the Pope’s
pictures and the swelling Archives of the Vatican, many of which made
the lorn pilgrimage to Avignon, in the years of the First Captivity;
and have only come back in these latter days.
From the archive rooms you step into the noble Leonine Library,
which Leo XIII. established to receive all the printed books of the
Biblioteca Vaticana.
There is a pathos haunting the Leonine Library, like that which stalks
in the deserted halls of Holyrood, for here the first of the Popes to
wear no earthly crown strove to carry on with undiminished dignity
the more than royal ambition of the immortal Nicholas V., to make the
Vatican the light of the world, to maintain on its hill a city that
could not be hid.
He laid the foundation of not one new hall, he added few books that
were not printed in his own Papal presses, but he turned the famous and
immemorial Library from a stagnant pool into a stream of living waters,
which should flow to the ends of the earth. For he made the springs
of learning--the innumerable Archives--the priceless manuscripts,
the half-million of printed books gathered in his own halls of study,
mingle their currents for every scholar, of whatever country or creed,
who thirsted for the river of learning, strewn with golden sands for
discoverers.
The new halls in which Pope Leo stored the printed books are, in
architecture, as they are in virtue, the foundations of the noble Sala
Sistina, which is the outward and visible glory of the Vatican Library.
This vast hall, over two hundred feet in length, frescoed with gay
arabesques perpetuating the designs which Raffaelle and Giovanni
da Udine copied from Nero’s Golden House,[1] when it was first
rescued from the earth of jealous centuries, is at once the most
brilliant and the most dignified, though not the best in art, of the
imperial Chambers of Rome. In it, cased in glass, are the most famous
manuscripts in the world. It is still the most princely of libraries
as it was in the days before the Spanish Armada, when the superb
Sixtus founded it. But when you are in it you have no heed for him;
your thoughts go back another four generations to the fairy changeling
who was turned from a humble scholar--from a poor priest who tolled
bells--into the most brilliant monarch who ever sat on the throne of
St. Peter. In that same year, 1447, when the little Ligurian of Sarzana
was turned by chance into the head of Christendom, and burst upon an
astonished world as a rose opens in the night, the great Ligurian city
of Genoa gave birth to the greatest of all the sailors and citizens who
sprang from the Republic of the Dorias.
Christopher Columbus was born just as Nicholas V. became Pontiff.
Truly the world was promised, if not a Renaissance, a fresh dawn, in
which the clouds of Papal Schisms and Italian Wars should lift for a
day of matchless brilliance, wherein the ships of Europe were to swim
to Africa, India, and America, and the writers of Greece to come back
across the Styx.
Few of the nine thousand manuscripts collected for the most magnificent
and munificent of the patrons of learning by the great scholars of the
Mid Quattrocento, like Poggio Bracciolini, the forerunner of Angelo
Mai, but have gone the way of all the earth like the eight resplendent
chests which contained his choicest treasures. Splendour was the
language in which Nicholas would have the Vatican proclaim its message
to the world. And even of the buildings with which he sought to make
the Vatican Hill the rival of the Palatine, only one cell remains in
the glory with which he clothed it--the tiny chapel which glows with
the masterpieces of Fra Angelico, though it was Nicholas who built the
walls of the Appartamenti which Pinturicchio frescoed for the Borgias,
and of the Stanze which Raffaelle immortalized for Julius II.
Of the thousands of marvellous manuscripts, and the paintings of the
Classic Age, gathered in the Library, of the Vatican Codex and the
Nozze Aldobrandini, and the bits of Old Roman life from the Catacombs,
I speak in their place.
The immortal grace of Raffaelle in the Stanze and Loggie, the
magnificence of Michel Angelo in the Sistine Chapel, the masterpieces
of the Vatican Picture Gallery, even the visions of Greece in her
glory, which people the Sculpture Halls of the transformed Villa of
Innocent VIII., I pass by in silent wonder, for they are not in the
_secret_ places of the Vatican.
But it is not everyone who can effect a visit to the Borgia Rooms which
Leo XIII. rescued from the tall bookcases of the library, and restored
to apartments for Princes. Here till recently, like his forerunners
when their high office was first created, dwelt the Cardinal Secretary
of State amid the almost matchless splendour of the halls which
Alexander VI. caused to be frescoed by Pinturicchio. The Borgia
Apartments are the most sparkling gem in the Vatican’s golden crown of
art.
Apart from the duty or the curiosity which takes you to attend a
reception of the Cardinal Secretary, or the Maggiordomo in his
apartments, it is well to pay the visit to appreciate the atmosphere
of the Papal Court, its dignity, tempered with approachability; its
simplicity, tempered by quiet richness; its unmistakable air of a Royal
presence.
Though it may be visited without leave, it is only on one day in the
week, and therefore, where a hundred see the Apollo Belvedere, barely
one sees the storied arras richly dight, which Raffaelle designed
for Leo X. to hang under the frescoes of the Sistine Chapel. These
tapestries, woven in the looms of Flanders four hundred years ago,
suffered from fire and sword in the evil days of the Constable of
Bourbon and his Protestant Landsknechts, but they are still the world’s
premier tapestries: their colours still glow: their genius is such
that we can only think of the Apostles in the forms in which Raffaelle
created them: and in the Gallery of the Candelabri, which you visit
with them, is a collection of masterpieces.
Nor are these the only tapestries in the Vatican, for there are two
other rooms where the Pope and his Cardinals robe, and State banquets
are held, and the officers of the Swiss Guard have their mess, which
are hung with the noblest tapestries of the sixteenth century, some
of them woven for the profuse Farnese Pope, some from the Gobelins
looms, given by the Roi Soleil to commemorate his betrothal--all
reputed to be priceless. Priceless, too, are some of the Papal
treasures in the sacristies of St. Peter’s and the Sistine.
[Illustration: The Dalmatic of Charlemagne in the Sacristy of St.
Peter’s.]
The chief treasures in the Tesoro of St. Peter’s are the dalmatic worn
by Charlemagne when he came to Rome a thousand years ago to be crowned;
and the candlesticks wrought by Benvenuto Cellini to grace the High
Altar when the Pope is celebrating Mass. In the Sistine Treasury are
preserved the lace robe worn by Boniface VIII. at the first Jubilee,
six centuries ago, and the first Golden Rose from which have sprung all
the Golden Roses conferred by the Papacy on its benefactors. But here
the special treasures are lost in the marvellous richness of the suites
of robes worn by the Pope and the Cardinals in functions of special
state, such as the black robes woven on gold in which the officiating
Cardinals stand round the catafalque of the dead Pope, and the trailing
robes, as rich and white as snow, in which the Pope is borne into St.
Peter’s like a saint in glory, on his Sedia Gestatoria.
Every visitor must needs enter the Vatican by one of three entrances:
by whichever he may enter he must be dead of soul whose imagination is
not fired.
If it is the gate in the little pavilion, as graceful as a Classical
temple, which admits the unprivileged to the Pope’s Garden, the Vatican
Library and the Museum of Sculpture, the Sistine Chapel and Raffaelle’s
Stanze and Loggia, he will be met by a procession of the gods of
Greece, chiselled out of fair white marble in the workshops of two
thousand years ago.
If he stops and enters at the _Portone di Ferro_--the iron gate at the
foot of the hill--he is in the oldest part of the palace, whose dark
and frowning towers, more in keeping with the fortress of Avignon, rose
in the age of the Borgias and della Roveres; the tall, dour Swiss,
who guard them, still wear the motley liveries, and, on occasion, the
pikemen’s armour of the Middle Ages. On either side, as he passes in,
rise the Sistine Chapel and the Palace of the Borgias--all of the
fifteenth century; and this is the way by which, in the old days of the
temporal power and pomp, the Papal _cortège_ issued.
To the stranger in the gates the chief entrance of the Vatican must
always be the great _Portone di Bronzo_--the Bronze Gate, which opens
on the stupendous Piazza of St. Peter’s, and the temple-like colonnade
of Bernini.
Here, too, are the picturesque Swiss, and a vista, more regal if
not so ancient or historical. The stranger will not heed the closely
guarded staircase on his right until he knows that it is the Jacob’s
ladder to the apartments of the Pontiff himself. His eyes will be taken
up with the Scala Regia (the giant staircase, royal in name as well as
in magnificence), which leads up through a stately colonnade to the
Sala Regia--the Royal Hall--where, surrounded by vast frescoed triumphs
of the Catholic Faith, beneath a fretted ceiling as rich in gold as the
waters of Pactolus, the Pope-King was wont to receive the Ambassadors
of his brother Kings. The very passage which leads off it is of such
dimensions and ambitions that it is called the Ducal Hall.
[Illustration: Map of the Vatican.]
The Vatican is full of chambers with lofty and romantic names--such as
the Hall of the Beatifications, where saints on earth are canonized;
the Gallery of Inscriptions; the Christian and Profane Museums; the
Hall of the Popes; the Hall of the Madonna; the Hall of the Lives of
the Saints; the Hall of the Credo; the Hall of the Sibyls (the last
five in the Borgia Apartments)--not one of which but is worth seeing,
not one of which but can be seen.
The Vatican, like Janus, the God of Rome, has two faces. Seen from the
one side it is the Pope’s Kingdom; seen from the other it is his home.
On the first you may gaze on any weekday morning; the second none may
behold but those who are bidden.
Who shall complain? There is little to observe in the Pope’s apartments
but his private life--and that he who lives the life of the man with
the iron mask has a right to keep sealed from observation.
Apart from the aura of Sanctity, apart from venerable associations,
this portion of the palace has nothing to show within which would
compare with the work of the Borgias and della Roveres. It is only
three hundred years old, and recent Popes have returned to Apostolic
simplicity.
But it contains a few noble chambers, like the Hall of the Consistory,
and is rendered impressive by the atmosphere and the velvet-liveried
retainers of a Court.
What the Vatican lacks is architectural nobility. When you gaze on
the glowing vaults of Raffaelle’s Loggia, the triple tier of arcades
which surround the superb Court of Saint Damasus, even when you move
in the gorgeous baroque immensity of chambers like the Sala Regia,
you feel their majesty. But the Vatican has neither the romantic
splendour of Windsor, nor the grandeur of the Louvre. It looks more
like a Parliament House than a Palace. Everyone, who lifts his eyes to
it, must wish that Nicholas V. had lived to accomplish his gorgeous
visions, and had crowned the royal and holy hill with ramparts and
towers and soaring white palaces till it rivalled the Palatine groaning
under the palaces of the Cæsars.
[Illustration: Ground Plan of the Vatican. _From Pistolesi’s “Il
Vaticano Descritto ed Illustrato.”_
_a._ }
_b._ } See under 3.
_c._ }
_d._ }
_e._ Courtyard in the centre of the Pope’s apartments. }
_f._ Sala Clementina. }
_g._ Hall of the Palafrenieri. }
_h._ First Anticamera. } Comprised
_i._ Pope’s private apartments. } in 6.
_j._ _m._ Omitted in plan. }
_k._ Room of the Swiss Guard. }
_l._ Hall of the Secret Consistories. }
_n._ _o._ Passage from the Loggia of Giovanni da Udine to the Sala
Ducale.
_p._ Cabinet of the Boxers (Canova’s). }
_q._ Cabinet of the Antinous. } In the Sculpture Museum.
_r._ Cabinet of the Laocoön. }
_s._ Cabinet of the Apollo Belvedere. }
1. Scala Pia, leading from the Bronze Door to the Pope’s apartments.
2. Apartments of the Maggiordomo.
3. (_a._ _b._ _c._ _d._) Various small courts on the south side of
the Papal Palace.
4. Cortile di San Damaso.
5. State entrance to the Pope’s apartments.
6. Actual palace of the Pope (_e. f. g. h. i. k. l._)
7. Algardi s Fountain.
8. Passage leading to the Mosaic Factory.
9. Stairs.
10. Cortile del Pappagallo.
11. Cortile del Portone di Ferro.
12. Cortile della Sentinella.
13. Passage and stair to upper floor and library.
14. Courtyard of the Maresciallo of the Conclave.
15. Courtyard of the Maggiordomo.
16. Stairs to the Courtyard of the Maresciallo.
17. Pedestal of the statue of Constantine the Great.
18. Stairs from the Courtyard of the Maresciallo to the Sala Regia.
19. Entrance to the first tier of the Loggie.
20. Bramante’s arcades. (Raffaelle’s Loggie).
21. Bramante’s arcades. (Raffaelle’s Loggie).
22. Bramante’s arcades. (Raffaelle’s Loggie).
23. Hall of the Paramenti.
24. Sala Ducale.
25. Sala Ducale.
26. Sala Regia.
27. Stairs leading to the Sala Regia.
28. Stairs leading to the Vestibule of the Sistine.
29. Sistine Chapel.
30. Sistine Chapel.
31. Treasury of the Sistine Chapel.
32. Staircase leading from the Vatican to St. Peter’s.
33. Entrance to the Cappella Leonina (Sala della Beatificazione).
34. Cappella Paolina.
35. (Long room.) Galleriola. Now the smoking-room of the Cardinals.
(Square room.) Spogliatoio or Sala del Pappagallo.
36. Borgia Rooms. Sala dei Pontifici. (Hall of the Popes.)
37. Borgia Rooms. Sala dei Misteri. (Hall of the Mysteries.)
38. Borgia Rooms. Camera della Vita dei Santi. (Hall of the Life of
the Saints.)
39. Borgia Rooms. Camera delle Arti e Scienze. (Hall of the Arts and
Sciences.)
40. Torre Borgia, containing the Hall of the Credo and the Hall of
the Sibyls.
41. Entrance to the Gallery of the Inscriptions from the Loggia of
Giovanni da Udine.
42. Gallery of Inscriptions.
43. Entrance to the Library.
44. The Writers’ Room.
45. Small Reading Room.
46. Room of the Papiri.
47. Librarian’s Room.
48. 49. Sala Sistina. The Great Hall of the Vatican Library.
50. Salla della Bonaventura.
51. Salla del Obelisco.
52. Salla del Aristide.
53. Museo Cristiano. (Christian Museum.)
54. Hall of the Papiri.
55. Hall of the Nozze Aldobrandini.
56. Chapel of Pius V.
57. Terra Cotta Room.
58. Cortile del Belvedere.
59. Fountain of the Cortile del Belvedere.
60. Esedra or Niccio of Bramante.
61. Hall of the Vatican Manuscripts.
62. Libraries of the Alexandrine Collection.
63. The Archivio.
64. The Vatican Printing Office.
65. The Ottoboni Collection. The Capponi Collection.
66. Borghigiana Collection. First two halls of the Vatican Library.
67. Museo Profano. (Museum of Heathen Antiquities.)
68. Visitors’ entrance to the Library.
69. 70. Doors between the Chiaramonti Museum and the Gallery of
Inscriptions.
71. Entrance to the Braccio Nuovo from the Chiaramonti Museum.
72-76. Braccio Nuovo.
77. Chiaramonti Museum.
78. Entrance to the Giardino della Pigna from the Chiaramonti Museum.
79. Giardino della Pigna.
80. The Esedra behind the Pigna.
81. The Pigna or Bronze pine-cone from the atrium of Old St. Peter’s.
82. Staircase from the Museo Chiaramonti to the Museo Pio-Clementino.
(Sculpture Museum.)
83. Entrance at the head of these stairs.
84-86. Egyptian Museum. The Etruscan Museum is, roughly
speaking, above it.
87. Vestibule of the Torso.
88. Vestibule of the Vase.
89. Vestibule of the Meleager.
90. Cortile del Belvedere (here signifying the Sculpture Gallery).
91. Porticos of the Cortile del Belvedere.
92. Sala degli Animali.
93. Galleria delle Statue.
94. Statue of Ariadne in the Galleria delle Statue.
95. Sala dei Busti.
96. Balcony outside of the Sculpture Galleries (closed).
97. Gabinetto delle Maschere.
98. Hall of the Muses.
99. Sala Rotonda.
100. Sala a Croce Greca.
101. Il Padiglione. (The Pavilion Gate of the Sculpture Gallery.)
The Galleria dei Candelabri (leading into the Galleria degli Arazzi
and Galleria Geografica) has an entrance near the Sala della Biga, and
these three form the upper floor of the long gallery of the Vatican
Library.
The Coach-house of the Popes and the new rooms of the Archivio are
under the long gallery of the Library. The Vatican Gardens face this
gallery.
The Vatican Mosaic manufactory is under the Gallery of Inscriptions.
The Leonine Library is under the Sala Sistina and Reading Rooms of the
Vatican Library.]
CHAPTER II
WHAT THE VATICAN CONSISTS OF
[_The numbers in brackets refer to Plan_]
The Vatican, says Hare, in his _Walks in Rome_, is the largest palace
in the world. He gives its measurements as one thousand one hundred
and fifty-one English feet long, and seven hundred and sixty-seven
broad. These measurements are, with slight variations, repeated in
other guide-books, with the exception that in Baedeker’s _Central
Italy_ it is further stated that the total extent covered by the
palace is thirteen and a half acres, while in Baedeker’s _Paris_ it
is stated that the Louvre and the fragment of the Tuileries together
cover forty-eight acres. And in any case you have to ask to what these
measurements of length and breadth refer. From the left-hand edge of
the Sistine Chapel to the extreme point of the Sculpture Museum, built
out of Innocent’s VIII.’s Villa Belvedere, the length must be very much
greater than eleven hundred and fifty-one feet. For the long Gallery
of the Library alone measures a thousand and twenty feet. But
if the width be taken to refer to the stretch from the back of the
sacristies of the Sistine Chapel to the back of the Papal apartments,
that may be approximately correct. It is to be noted also that whereas
Hare and Murray each concede eleven thousand apartments, Baedeker says
that the number of halls, chapels, saloons, and private apartments is
more likely to come to one thousand than to eleven thousand, while
Misson, who visited the Vatican intelligently, in the reign of Queen
Anne, says twelve thousand five hundred. Be this as it may, all of them
concede twenty courts and eight grand staircases, and Murray puts down
the minor staircases at about two hundred.
We must now consider the principal buildings of which the Vatican
Palace consists. The first of the twenty courtyards is the Cortile di
San Damaso (4), standing at the head of the Scala Pia (1), the Pope’s
staircase, which leads up on the right directly you enter the bronze
gates. It is the grand courtyard of the Vatican, officially, for the
apartments of the Pope, the apartments of the Cardinal Secretary of
State, and the entrance to the library used by members of the Household
open off it.
A second courtyard (e) is in the centre of the apartments actually
occupied by the Pope. A third, just to the south of the Papal
apartments, is called the Courtyard of the Grooms, _Cortile dei
Palafrenieri_ (c). The fourth is the Court of the Parrot (_Cortile del
Pappagallo_) (10). It is situated between the Sala Ducale (24, 25) and
the Borgia Rooms (36, 37, 38, 39), in the oldest part of the Vatican
Palace proper, built in the fifteenth century by Nicholas V., Sixtus
IV., and Alexander VI. It is connected by a narrow passage with the
Court of the Iron Gate, the _Cortile del Portone di Ferro_ (11), which
stands between the Sala Regia (26) and the ante-chapel of the Sistine
Chapel (29) on one side and the Torre Borgia (40) on the other. This
again opens out of the _Cortile della Sentinella_ (12)--Court of the
Guard--the place where you always see a little knot of the Swiss Guards
in their picturesque uniforms as you begin to climb the hill past the
entrance of the Picture Gallery to the Pavilion (100), which admits you
to the Sculpture Galleries, the Library, and the Pope’s Garden, and all
the other parts of the Vatican to which admission can be secured by
payment.
As far as the exterior is concerned, this is by far the most
interesting part of the Vatican Palace. Its lofty gateway and towers,
with their beetling machicoles, the heavy, overhanging balconies,
reminding one, with their forbidding strength, of the rock-like Papal
Palace of Avignon, are full of the atmosphere of the fifteenth
century. There is a grimness in the very colour of the old brown walls.
The whole aspect gives you an idea of the many-towered castle which
bore the name of the Vatican in the days of the Old St. Peter’s--the
one actual fragment of the gigantic _enceinte_ with which Nicholas V.
proposed to surround the Vatican Hill, filling its interior with the
Holy and Royal city which was to exceed the Palatine of the Cæsars
in the vastness and splendour of its buildings, and to contain such
a library as would make it the focus of light and learning for all
Christendom, for all the civilized world. Thomas Parentucelli, the
little man of Sarzana, did not live and work and dream in vain, though
the Popes are no longer kings of the Earth, and of all his buildings
on the Vatican Hill only one tiny chapel, made heavenly by the genius
of Fra Angelico, remains perfect--though even of his books but a
handful are left. For the Vatican Library is still the library of
libraries, where the originals that have given us our copies of the
classic writers of Greece and Rome almost all lie. That is the outward
and visible sign, and added to that is the inward and spiritual grace
of learning and scholarship which has rarely ceased to illuminate the
Papal Court since Nicholas V. gave it birth. He might well have been
figured as Moses drawing the waters of learning from the dry rock with
a stroke of his rod--the pastoral staff.
Only separated from this old brown bit of the Vatican by the building
of Nicholas, which was converted into the Borgia Apartments, is the
seventh courtyard (58), the Cortile del Belvedere, which is divided
from the ninth, the Giardino della Pigna (39), by the Vatican Library,
and the Braccio Nuovo (72) of the Sculpture Galleries, and the little
court of the Vatican printing-office (64), which must be counted the
eighth.
The entire space occupied by the seventh, eighth, and ninth courtyards,
the Cortile del Belvedere, the Giardino della Pigna, and the Giardino
della Stamperia, and the buildings which divide them, formed one
superb courtyard in the building designed by Bramante at the command
of Pope Julius II., to connect the Vatican Palace of his enemies the
Borgias with the villa or garden palace of Pope Innocent VIII., which
received its name of the Belvedere from its beautiful view. There is
another little garden or court, the tenth, in the centre of the Villa
of Innocent VIII., which now forms the principal Sculpture Museum. This
also is called the Cortile del Belvedere. Of the remaining courtyards,
those of the Maresciallo of the Conclave (14), and the Maggiordomo
(15), abut on the Sala Ducale, and that of the Archivi is on the
far side of the Pavilion by which you enter the Sculpture Museum.
But neither these nor the Court of the Falegnami behind the Papal
apartments concern the general public--nor do any other of the courts
except the Cortile del Forno, which lies at the back of St. Peter’s
where you turn up to the Sculpture Gallery.
[Illustration: Charity. Carved by Mino de Fiesole for Paul II.’s
Mausoleum, now in the Grotte Nuove of St. Peter’s Crypt.]
[Illustration: Faith. By Mino de Fiesole, in the Grotte Nuove in St.
Peter’s Crypt.]
The principal staircases of the Vatican are the Scala Pia (1), the
Scala Regia; the Scala Nobile, which leads up to the Hall of the Biga
and the Etruscan Museum; the staircase to the Museo Pio-Clementino; the
great staircase on the north side of the Courtyard of San Damaso; the
staircase which leads from the Sistine Chapel down to St. Peter’s, and
the staircase leading to the Pope’s apartments up from the Courtyard of
San Damaso.
The great Scala Pia which sweeps up from the Bronze Doors to the
Courtyard of S. Damaso (and consequently to the Pope’s apartments),
receives its name from Pius IX., who converted it from an open
staircase at the same time as he enclosed the south side of the
Courtyard of S. Damaso. Half-way up it is the office of the Pope’s
Maestro di Camera, and at the top are the apartments of the
Maggiordomo, consisting of a large cloak-room, fitted with tables on
which visitors lay their coats and hats, leading into a luxurious
apartment of the dimensions of a hall, where the visitors wait and
the principal secretaries have their tables, and thence into the
Maggiordomo’s office itself.
The Scala Regia is a mountain of stone, claimed by ardent Roman
Catholics to be the finest interior staircase in the world. It was
designed, like the glorious colonnades of the Piazza of St. Peter’s, by
Bernini. It was ordered by the Barberini Pope (Urban VIII.), but not
finished till the time of the Chigi Pope (Alexander VII.), whose arms
it bears.
It furnishes a magnificent prospect as it mounts up from the Bronze
Doors, the public entrance to the Vatican, stretching away in a long
vista, commencing with a superb Ionic colonnade; and it must not be
forgotten that Bernini also designed enormous gilt consoles for the
further decoration, and for the illumination of his great staircase,
which still exist but are kept stored away; I allude to them elsewhere.
The stucco ornamentations above the arches and on the ceilings which
bear the arms of Alexander VII. are the work of the sculptor Algardi
and have considerable beauty and elegance, though they are not at all
comparable to the work of the Sicilian Giacomo Serpotta, who lived
a hundred years later, and, of course, may have been inspired by
Algardi. The other staircases will be described as they come into the
topographical plan.
At the top of the Scala Pia, as I have said, is the beautiful Cortile
di S. Damaso (4), the royal court of the Vatican, which, in its
conception, was one of the masterpieces of Bramante, though it has been
altered so considerably--particularly under Pius IX.--that much of its
original grace is lost. Good old Pio Nono was, it must be confessed,
on the horns of a dilemma: on the one hand he had Bramante’s most
elegant arcades (20, 21, 22) to consider, on the other hand there were
the frescoes of Raffaelle and Giovanni da Udine, which were feeling
the effects of four centuries of semi-exposure to the weather. As in
the case of St. Peter’s and the Cortile del Belvedere, Bramante was
sacrificed to later ideas. The airy and soaring effect of the triple
arcades with which he had surrounded the Courtyard of S. Damaso was
lost in the glass screens with which the arches were filled. But the
frescoes benefited by the conversion of the loggias into a sort of
winter garden. The right hand, or east side, of this court is taken up
with the apartments, said to be only twenty-two in number, which Sixtus
V. built round a minor courtyard for the actual use of the Popes. Of
these the Pope’s library, study and bedroom, private reception-room,
and a sort of antechamber to it (i, h, g), look south
across the Piazza of St. Peter’s over. Rome. The throneroom, the
private chapel and its anteroom, the anteroom which leads into them and
the second public anteroom, occupy the east side of the quadrangle. The
Hall of the Grooms and the first public anteroom occupy the north side,
and most of the west side is taken up with the state entrance and the
staircase and the fine Sala Clementina (f), in which one of the three
pickets of Swiss Guards on duty at the Vatican is stationed.
Out of this opens the Hall of the Bussolanti. This is the name given
to the lay attendants, dressed in crimson velvet, who mount guard over
the Bussola--the door for keeping out draughts--which gives access to
the Pope’s private antechambers. There are thirty-six Bussolanti. In
their hall, the laity who are admitted to an audience with the Pope
leave their hats and coats and umbrellas. After passing the Bussola
you thread a series of antechambers, says Goyau. “The first is guarded
by gendarmes, and the secretaries of Cardinals await here the return
of their masters. The second is in charge of the Palatine Guards.
Turning off to the right the visitor, by a third hall decorated with
tapestries, reaches a fourth, in charge of the Noble Guards. To the
right a door which can be opened wide gives access to the Chapel of the
Holy Father. And it is in this hall that you are stationed when you
are present at the Pope’s Mass. A fifth room, called the Anticamera
d’Onore, is adorned with the Papal Throne. When you are granted a
private audience you attend in this room. It is here that the Pope
takes up his position to receive important bodies of visitors; to
receive, at the New Year, or on the anniversary of his coronation, the
congratulations of the Prelates and Cardinals; and to hear during Lent
and Advent the _preachings_ intended for the Papal Court. Two Camerieri
d’Onore, one in a violet habit, the other with _spada e cappa_, are on
duty in this antechamber. Before a door at the bottom a Noble Guard
is on duty. This door admits to the Anticamera Segreta, reserved for
prelates who are at least Camerieri Segreti, and for Cardinals. From
this point you have only a threshold to cross and you are at the feet
of the Pope.”
This is the easternmost portion of the Vatican Palace, and under its
shadow on the south side are the Court of the Grooms, etc. The other
two sides of the Court of S. Damaso, which is the next portion of the
palace westwards, are taken up with the Loggie of Raffaelle (20, 21,
22), completed by him as the architect from the design of Bramante.
Only a limited number of the panels, called Raffaelle’s Bible, because
they are taken from Bible history, are from Raffaelle’s hand; but
of great interest also are the _stucchi_ and arabesques executed by
Giovanni da Udine, who was the sole artist employed in the first-floor
gallery on the west side. I have told in another chapter how he copied
these arabesques from the newly discovered baths of Titus; they have
the double merit of reproducing an ancient Roman monument and being
extremely graceful and spirited. The Loggie of Raffaelle do not fall
within the scope of this book, for they are one of the parts of the
palace which everybody visits. It is through Giovanni da Udine’s loggia
that the students who have the privilege of reading in the Vatican
Library, as well as the privileged inhabitants of the Vatican, enter
the Library, passing along the Gallery of the Inscriptions (Galleria
Lapidaria), which is nearly seven hundred feet in length and covered
with five thousand fragments of pagan and early Christian inscriptions,
sarcophagi and cippi, collected mainly by Pius VII. when Napoleon had
carried off all the prizes of sculpture from the Vatican galleries,
though a few of them were collected by Clement XIV. and Pius VI.
Underneath this is the _atelier_ in which the famous Vatican mosaics,
upon which I have said a few words in another chapter, are made. The
Gallery of Inscriptions (42) leads into the Chiaramonti Museum (77),
which I shall leave until I am speaking of the Sculpture Galleries,
to which it belongs. It also received its present designation and use
from Pius VII.--the Chiaramonti Pope--and the two together fill one of
the two great wings, nearly four hundred yards long, which Pope Julius
II. commissioned Bramante to build to unite the palaces which stood in
his day with the Villa of Pope Innocent VIII. on the northern edge of
the Vatican Hill.
[Illustration: Giovanni da Udine’s Loggia before it was glazed.
_From Pistolesi’s “Il Vaticano.”_]
It is best to retrace our steps to the Loggia of Giovanni da Udine, at
the back of which are four interesting rooms; the first and largest
of the Borgia Apartments, the smoking-room of the Cardinals, called
also the Galleriola, (35), or the audience-room; the Spogliatoio, or
Hall of the Pappagallo (35), and the Hall of the Paramenti (23). I
have mentioned these in order from north to south, but I will take the
last, which is entered through the Sala Ducale (24, 25), first. It is
singularly well named, for the term Sala dei Paramenti might be applied
with equal fidelity to its being the room where the Cardinals put on
their sacerdotal robes for great functions, or its being the room with
the tapestry hangings with the arms of the Farnese Pope, Paul III.,
1534-1549, which are said to be so priceless.
A door from the Sala dei Paramenti admits into the Sala del Pappagallo,
or Hall of the Parrot, which contains the nuptial tapestries of Louis
XIV. and is the room set apart for the Pope to robe in before he goes
to functions in St. Peter’s. Here the Cardinal Secretary of State
gives his state dinners, and here, in ordinary life, the officers of
the Swiss Guard dine. The long gallery opening out of the end of this
room, with reclining benches along its side, after the manner of the
guard-rooms of Tunis, is the Galleriola, now the smoking-room of the
Cardinals.
The Borgia Apartments are now approached through the Sculpture
Galleries, but they have a separate staircase in the north-west corner
of the Courtyard of S. Damaso. They formed for some years the official
residence of the present Pope’s Prime Minister, the Cardinal Secretary
of State, and are the subject of a separate chapter. The first of
them--known as the Sala dei Pontefici, or Hall of the Popes (36)--is
much the largest. Leo X. had the ceiling decorated with mythological
emblems by Giovanni da Udine and Pierino del Vaga, pupils of Raffaelle.
It is impossible to believe that the lost Hours of Raffaelle lie, as
some have said, under these frescoes, because Leo X. was far too great
an admirer of the work of Raffaelle to have allowed a jot or tittle of
it to be hidden.
This room is hung with magnificent French tapestries of the sixteenth
century, mostly representing the story of Cephalus and Procris.
Here I must warn readers that all guide-books, except the latest,
are incorrect in the information which they give about the Borgia
Apartments, as they have been subjected to so many changes. Even Hare’s
_Walks in Rome_, brought up to date by a man who knows his Rome so
well as Mr. St. Clair Baddeley, states that they have been opened as a
kind of “Mediæval museum of the Papacy,” _Museo di Leone XIII._ (Hare,
1905), while in Black’s _Guide to Rome_ (1906), it is repeated that
they are the “Mediæval museum of the Papacy,” and that Room I. serves
as the anteroom of the Swiss Guard, while another guide-book places the
armoury in them. Until twenty years ago all the printed books of the
Vatican Library were kept in them.
Coats and hats and umbrellas are left in the Sala dei Pontefici (36),
which leads into the second of the Borgia Apartments, where the
celebrated frescoes by Pinturicchio, which rival his frescoes in the
Library of Siena, begin. This is called the Hall of the Mysteries, or
the Hall of the Madonna (37). Here except in the hours during which the
public were admitted, one of the Cardinal’s secretaries used to sit who
received the cards of visitors admitted for an audience. The regular
reception hours were after the Angelus. The exquisite Annunciation is
in this room.
From the _Camera della Vita della Madonna_ opens the _Camera della
Vita dei Santi_ (38), in which the frescoes are glorious. For here
are the story of Santa Barbara; the infinitely lovely picture of St.
Catherine (Lucrezia Borgia) disputing with the philosophers before the
Emperor; the San Sebastian; the Santa Susanna, and the Isis and Osiris
ceiling, selected to give the legend of the bull Apis, the ox being the
Borgia arms. This is the waiting-room in which visitors used to remain
after the secretary has passed them until the Cardinal sent for them,
or more ordinarily, came in person to call them; for the courtesy and
courtliness of the great Vatican officials is exquisite.
The fourth room opening out of these is called the _Camera delle Arti e
Scienze_ (39), where the Cardinal held his audiences. This, again, has
superb Pinturicchio frescoes, representing the Seven Liberal Arts.
From there a staircase of about a dozen steps leads up into the _Torre
Borgia_ (40), where there are two rooms, the first of which, with large
oriel windows, was the Cardinal Secretary’s study. Just below the
ceiling runs a fresco of the Apostles, each holding his special portion
of the Creed, whence its name, “The Hall of the Credo.” The celebrated
Nozze Aldobrandini, the finest antique fresco known before the grand
discoveries at Pompeii, is no longer in this room, as stated in Hare’s
_Walks in Rome_, 1905. It is now in the Vatican Library, where anyone
can see it, whereas these two rooms in the Torre Borgia were till
recently never shown to the public. The other room in the tower, known
as the _Sala del Sibylle_, has an elaborately frescoed ceiling, and I
believe some fine tapestries, but I have not seen this room.
I am told that not even the Cardinal Secretary has seen the bathroom in
the suite of rooms higher up in this tower, once occupied by Cardinal
Bibiena, the patron of Raffaelle, whose niece was betrothed to the
painter, and lies buried by his side in the Pantheon; this was painted
by Raffaelle with mythological subjects. Something in these beautiful
frescoes offended the prudery of Gregory XIV.’s advisers, and the bath
was taken away; and the pictures, which were spared as being some of
Raffaelle’s good work, were covered up with wooden panelling to turn
the offending bathroom into a chapel. It is said that the panelling has
now been removed, but I have not heard of anyone having been allowed to
see the pictures.
Over the Borgia Apartments are Raffaelle’s Stanze. Admittance to them
is by a staircase turning off the Scala Regia of Bernini. After passing
through an anteroom and two small rooms hung with modern pictures
of miracles and martyrdoms, you enter the _Sala della Immacolata_,
adorned with huge pictures of the promulgation of the Immaculate
Conception by Pius IX., which contains in the centre the superb gilt
ark, presented to Pius IX. by the French clergy, one of the finest
pieces of modern cabinet-making.
[Illustration: The Fire in the Borgo, from the painting by Raffaelle in
his Stanze. Showing the Exterior of Old St. Peter’s.
_From Pistolesi’s “Il Vaticano.”_]
From this you enter the Stanze, which represent the highest triumph
of Raffaelle. For Sodoma, Perugino, Luca Signorelli, and other great
fifteenth-century masters had all but completed the frescoing of these
rooms when Julius II. decided to have them re-frescoed by Raffaelle.
You cannot help wondering what became of their feelings, if not of
their work. The first Stanza contains the Fire in the Borgo, the
Coronation of Charlemagne, the Defeat of the Saracens at Ostia, and Leo
III. justifying himself before Charlemagne. These are all by Raffaelle.
Perugino’s pictures remain on the ceiling, and the mosaics on the floor
come from an ancient Roman villa. This is called _Stanza del Incendio_.
In the second room, called the _Stanza della Segnatura_, the arabesques
of the ceiling are by Raffaelle. The walls are covered by some of
Raffaelle’s greatest frescoes: the School of Athens, the Disputa,
and the Parnassus are in this room. The third room, the _Stanza
d’Eliodoro_, was (except the ceiling, which was probably by Giulio
Romano) entirely by Raffaelle’s own hand. Here are the Liberation of
St. Peter, the Mass of Bolsena, the Expulsion of Heliodorus, and the
Repulse of Attila. The fourth room, called the _Sala di Costantino_,
is by the pupils of Raffaelle, though preliminary sketches had been
made by Raffaelle for the Battle between Constantine and Maxentius.
The ceiling is a great deal later; it was completed under Sixtus V.
(1585-1590). A door at the end of this room leads into the old hall
of the Pope’s grooms (_palafrenieri_), which, according to Tuker and
Malleson, was entirely decorated in chiaroscuro by Raffaelle, though
the paintings have been retouched and spoilt by Carlo Maratta and
Zucchero. Doors at the end to the left and right lead into Raffaelle’s
Loggie and the Chapel of Nicholas V., which is one of the gems of
the Vatican, decorated with the masterpieces of Fra Angelico. They
were his last and most matured work, executed 1450-1455, and can only
be compared to the brilliant Riccardi Chapel of Benozzo Gozzoli at
Florence.
After seeing Raffaelle’s Stanze and the Chapel of Nicholas V., it is
usual to proceed to the second floor of the Loggie, which enclose the
Cortile of S. Damaso, known as Raffaelle’s Loggie, alluded to above.
After leaving them, more stairs are ascended to the upper tier of the
Loggie, which were decorated with maps under Clement VII. by Antonio da
Varese. From this you entered the anteroom of the former Pinacoteca.
The new Pinacoteca is on the road up to the Sculpture Galleries; it was
adapted from the disused stables of the Pope. The pictures are not very
numerous, but include one or two of the most famous paintings in the
world, such as Raffaelle’s Transfiguration.
I will suppose you to have finished your first day’s perambulation of
the Vatican by descending from the picture gallery to the Bronze Doors,
though, unless accompanied by a very high official of the Vatican
Household, you would never have been allowed to have seen all these
things one after another as convenience dictated, or to descend this
way.
On your way down you would have passed the entrance to the Sala Regia
and the famous apartments which lead off it. It would have been better
to have passed them in any case, even if you had had time to devote to
them, for the right way by which to approach the Sala Regia is to enter
the Bronze Gate and mount Bernini’s magnificent staircase, the Scala
Regia, so that you may get a true impression of its magnificence.
[Illustration: The Scala Regia of the Vatican. Designed by Bernini.]
The Sala Regia (26), called also the _Aula Magna_, i.e. the Grand Hall,
was built by Antonio Sangallo the younger, for that rather baroque
Pope, Paul III., for the reception of the Ambassadors of foreign
Sovereigns. It is very large and has a very ornate stucco ceiling by
Pierino del Vaga, though the _stucchi_ over the door are by Daniele
da Volterra. The frescoes of the Triumphs of the Popes are by Vasari,
the Zuccheri, and others. The room is over a hundred feet long, fifty
feet wide, and seventy feet high. The door on the left admits to the
Sistine Chapel (30), which I need not describe, as it is one of the
parts of the Vatican usually visited by sightseers.
The door opposite admits to the Sala Ducale (24, 25), a very long,
narrow low room, constructed by Bernini, known as the _Aula Minor_; it
is divided into two parts by an arch in the most degraded style of art,
composed of curtains and cupids, also by Bernini. Through it the Pope
and his Cardinals go to functions at St. Peter’s after robing in the
Sala del Pappagallo and the Sala dei Paramenti. And visitors who are
lucky enough to get permission to see these two rooms have to approach
them through the Sala Ducale. Another door on the same side of the Sala
Regia as the Sala Ducale, leads down to the court of the Maresciallo of
the Papal Conclave (14).
Opposite this is the door which admits to the Leonine Chapel in the
Gallery, which runs over the porch of St Peter’s, built by Carlo
Maderno, and hardly mentioned in any guide-book, although it is of very
great importance, as it gives on to the gallery of St. Peter’s, from
which the newly-elected Pope blesses the people, and contains the
window over the Piazza from which he used to bless the people before
the loss of the temporal power in 1870. It was converted into a chapel
by Leo XIII.
Between it and the Cappella Paolina (34), which is entered by a door at
the south-west end of the Sala Regia, are a number of small chambers,
in which are stored the gilt consoles, and other portable decorations
designed by Bernini for St. Peter’s.
The Cappella Paolina (34) is chiefly famous for having two huge
frescoes by Michel Angelo, much restored by his pupils. It was built
by the same architect as the Sala Regia, and has some of the best late
_stucchi_ in the Vatican.
Though the Sistine Chapel, being so well-known, does not fall within
the compass of this work, it is necessary to traverse it, and pass
through a little door under Michel Angelo’s fresco of the Last
Judgment, to enter the succession of small chambers (31) which form its
treasury, where the Pope’s vestments, the vestments for the Cardinals
on special occasions, the Popes’ tiaras, the Golden Rose, and other
objects of the highest interest are kept. At the back of the Sistine
Chapel a staircase (32) leads down from the Vatican to St. Peter’s.
To see the remaining parts of the Vatican, which include all the
Museums and the Library, the ordinary visitor has to cross the great
Piazza of St. Peter’s, and walk round three-quarters of the Church,
until he finds himself in the Cortile del Forno, a quadrangular court,
with a fountain in the middle of it, which has St. Peter’s on the one
side and the Mint on the other. The Mint, standing on a kind of a
terrace, is territorially not part of the Vatican: it is the one spot
on the Vatican Hill of which the Italian Government took possession.
The road which passes between the two is the Via delle Fondamenta,
along which Pope Leo XIII. took that memorable drive which was taken to
mean coming out of his captivity, referred to in another chapter.
Before passing under the arch to go up the Vialone di Belvedere
to the Sculpture Gallery, glance to your right, where a group of
fifteenth-century buildings, tower and gateway and balcony, brown and
feudal-looking, arrest your attention. At the entrance are sentries
in the half-mediæval dress of the Swiss Guard. That embattled gateway
admits to the Cortile della Sentinella (12); one of the three places
in the Vatican which has a _corps-de-garde_, the state entrance to the
palace by which Kings and Cardinals and Ambassadors enter to visit the
Pope. This court, as I have said, is bounded by the Sistine Chapel (30)
on the south, and on the north by the Chapel of Pius V. (56), and the
end of the Museo Cristiano. It opens into a second court, known as the
Cortile del Portone di Ferro (11); bounded by the Sistine Ante-chapel
(29) and the Sala Regia (26) on the south, and the Torre Borgia (40)
on the north. This is divided from the Cortile del Pappagallo (10)
by a wing containing two small halls--the halls of the Noble Guard.
The ground floor rooms round these quadrangles are devoted to various
humble and prosaic uses. The chamber on the first floor at the angle
of the Vialone and the Cortile della Sentinella is the Chapel of Pius
V., with the Room of Small Cabinets beside it. Then follow various
rooms of the Christian Museum of the Vatican Library; the Hall of the
Christian Paintings (55), the Hall of the Papiri (54), with the Hall of
the Nozze Aldobrandini (55) at right angles to them, spanning the road,
which has the Room of the Terra-cottas leading off it, the Christian
Museum (53), properly so called, the Hall of Aristides (52), the Hall
of the Obelisk (51), the Hall of the Bonaventura (50), the Hall of the
Vatican Manuscripts (61), the Libraries of the Alexandrine Collection
(62), the Ottoboni Collection (65), the Capponi Collection (65), the
Borghigiana Collection (66), the first two halls of the Library (66),
and the Museo Profano (67). The whole of these, from the Chapel of Pius
V. northwards, form the western long wing from the old parts of the
Palace to Innocent VIII.’s Villa, and they are confronted all the way
along by the Pope’s private garden, separated from them by the Vialone
di Belvedere. In the whole of this portion of the Vatican Library,
nearly four hundred yards long, you do not see a single book: they are
all manuscripts, and put away in presses in the ancient Roman fashion;
but you see a good many museum objects. As far as it goes, the Vatican
Library would be one of the most interesting museums in Rome if they
only let you stop an instant to take anything in. The rooms underneath
were constructed for coach-houses and stables. Part of them has been
converted into the new Pinacoteca for the Pope’s pictures, and some of
the stables have been turned into new chambers for the Archivio, or
archive office.
[Illustration: The famous Aldobrandini Wedding in the Vatican Library.
The finest picture which has survived from Classical times.]
I have spoken elsewhere of the enormous Cortile,[2] between three and
four hundred yards long, which Bramante designed to fill the entire
space between the two long wings from the old Palace to the Villa of
Innocent VIII., of which I have been describing the westernmost. It
was to have had a triple tier of the classic arcades in which Bramante
delighted; and would, without doubt, have been the finest Cortile
in Europe. Tournaments and races were to have been held in it. One
could see in it the pagan mind of Pope Julius II., purposing to match
the Circus of Caligula and Nero, out of which, owing to the execution
of St. Peter, the Vatican grew. At the Palace end there was what the
ancient Romans called an _esedra_, a sort of open-air apse (60), in
which the Roman Emperors were wont to ensconce themselves like gods in
niches. There is one in the Stadium of Domitian on the Palatine, and
another in the Baths of Trajan on the Esquiline. Bramante designed his
_esedra_ to be a sort of theatre. It is to be noted that bull-fights
have been held here. Jousting went on in the Court of the Tournaments
until the time of Sixtus V., as long, in fact, as it went on anywhere.
The name applied to the arcades when they were first built was the
Porticus Julii. The northern half, now the Giardino della Pigna, was
always the height of a terrace above the southern half.
Sixtus V. spoiled for ever the conception of Bramante by building the
Sala Sistina (48) (his magnificent new hall which was to receive the
Vatican Library) right across the middle of the vast quadrangle; it
is the Sala Sistina, two hundred and twenty feet long, forty-eight
feet wide, and twenty-nine feet high, gorgeously arabesqued, in which
the visitor sees, in glass cases, the most precious manuscripts of
the Vatican, and an alarming number of Sèvres vases, presented to
Pius IX. The rooms underneath the Sala Sistina have at various times
been given up to armouries and stables, but Leo XIII., who loved to
ennoble his palace like the old Popes before him, inaugurated the most
sweeping and effective changes in the Vatican Library since the days
of Sixtus himself. He was desirous of taking the books out of the
Borgia Apartments, which, when he was elected to the Papacy, formed
the library of printed books. But he was even more desirous to fulfil
the aspiration of Nicholas V., by making the splendid Library of the
Vatican a light of the world, “a city set upon an hill.” He gave the
order for the rooms under the Sala Sistina to be converted into a
library to receive all the printed books. The change was effected with
astonishing celerity, and when it was ready, the whole two hundred and
fifty thousand books stored in the Borgia Apartments were transferred
to it in fourteen days by fifteen workmen. You go down into the new
library close to the entrance of the Sala Sistina from the Gallery
of Inscriptions. I should have mentioned that before you enter the
Sala Sistina you cross the first of a range of four small rooms. It
is called the writer’s room (44), but is chiefly used for sticks and
umbrellas, which must be left there. Out of it open in succession the
small Reading Room, the Room of the Papiri (46), and the Librarian’s
Room (47).
At the far end of the New Library, adjoining the Archives (the new
rooms of which are on the ground floor facing the Vatican Gardens), is
Cardinal Mai’s Library; and between the two are three reading-rooms
facing the Cortile del Belvedere, and the Palatina, Aracœli, and Zelada
Libraries, facing the Cortile of the Stamperia, or printing-office of
the Vatican, which divides it from the Braccio Nuovo; a new Sculpture
Gallery, which Pius VII. had built by Raffaelle Stern in 1821, and
which contains some of the gems of the Vatican Collection. The Braccio
Nuovo forms the south side of the Giardino della Pigna, the north side
of which is the old Belvedere, the Villa of Innocent VIII., which has
been converted into the Vatican Sculpture Museum. To many people this
is their favourite spot in the whole Vatican, for it is here that
the treasures are amassed for which it is hardest to find a parallel
anywhere in the world--the inimitable marble copies, executed in the
first days of the Christian Era, of bronze masterpieces of the most
glorious of the great sculptors, except Phidias. Praxiteles, Myron and
Polycletus are all represented by superb copies.
You enter the Sculpture Galleries through the gateway of the gracious
little pavilion, called il Padiglione (101), and ascend the first
flight of the beautiful and well-named Scala Nobile, which takes you
into the Sala a Croce Greca (100). As everyone visits the Sculpture
Galleries, I shall say little of the contents of its various chambers.
From this you pass through the Sala Rotonda (99) into the Hall of the
Muses (98), and thence into the Sala degli Animali, the Hall of the
Animals (92). So far you have no choice, but here you can either walk
straight into the court of the Belvedere, in whose portico are four
little cabinets (p, q, r, and s), containing the Apollo Belvedere, the
Laocoön, the so-called Antinous, and Canova’s immeasurably inferior
statues: or you can turn to your left into the Galleria delle Statue,
Gallery of the Statues, which contains, among its other priceless
treasures, the Ariadne, the Torso of Hercules, the Apollo Sauroctonus,
and the Genius of the Vatican; and the Cabinetto delle Maschere,
Cabinet of the Masks (97), which has a balcony to which the public
are not admitted outside; it opens off the Gallery of the Statues
(93); the Sala dei Busti, the Hall of the Busts (95), is at the end.
From thence you pass to three little chambers called the Vestibule of
the Torso (87), the Vestibule of the Vase (88), and the Vestibule of
the Meleager (89); and the Museo Chiaramonti, a hall of interminable
length, stocked with the worst statues in the Vatican Museum--those, in
fact, with which poor Pius VII. had to console himself when Napoleon
took all the best ones away. Near the entrance is the door which admits
to the Giardino della Pigna (79), which is now entirely closed to the
public; but is interesting as containing the bronze fir-cone or Pigna,
and the bronze peacocks which adorned the fountain of the _atrium_ of
Old St. Peter’s. In the small rooms running along the north side of the
Garden of the Pigna are the Egyptian Museum, formed almost entirely of
Egyptian objects found in Rome.
When you regain the entrance to the Sculpture Gallery, or rather, when
you come back to the landing of the Scala Nobile, you ascend higher.
First you will want to look into the delightful little Sala della Biga,
which occupies the upper half of the pavilion through which you enter.
It gets its name from the beautiful, though so much restored, marble
chariot which stands in the centre. All round this room are exquisitely
beautiful statues, several of them amongst the finest in the collection.
A side-door admits to the Etruscan Museum, the celebrated Museo
Gregoriano, founded by Gregory XVI., which contains the most precious
collection of ancient Etruscan remains in the world. It is mainly
over the Egyptian Museum; and its display of Greek vases, mostly from
the tombs of the perished Etruscan city of Vulci, is unrivalled. It
had the choice over other museums: in drinking bowls especially it is
unapproachable.
Between the Hall of the Biga and the Etruscan Museum is the entrance to
the _Galleria dei Candelabri_: a series of six halls, opening into the
_Galleria degli Arazzi_, which terminates in the _Galleria Geografica_
(the Gallery of the Maps), which is five hundred feet long. The
_Arazzi_ are, of course, the tapestries manufactured in Flanders from
the designs of Raffaelle and his pupils, and the _Galleria Geografica_
is part of the Pope’s own apartments, to which it is very difficult to
gain admission. It leads, in fact, into the “Hall of Papal Audiences”;
and these galleries between them constitute the upper story which
covers the whole length of the Long Gallery of the Vatican Library--the
whole length from Innocent VIII.’s Villa to the Palace.
I have now mentioned all the most important chapels, courts,
staircases, halls and chambers in the Vatican which the public has
any reasonable hope of visiting, or any object in visiting. The rest
of the rooms which go to make up the thousand rooms of Baedeker, or
the seven thousand of Tuker and Malleson, or the eleven thousand of
Murray and Hare, are occupied by the large population, estimated at
two thousand and odd persons, inhabiting the Vatican, and having for
a parish church the Cappella Paolina. There still remain, however,
a few buildings outside the actual gates of the palace, but within
the Vatican precincts: such as the Palace of the Holy Office (the
Inquisition), and the Armeria, which, with Castel Gandolfo and a few
palaces and churches in Rome, constitute the Pope’s kingdom.
The Mint, or Zecca, which, as I have said, was taken possession of by
the Italian Government, is not difficult to see; it is open daily, but
to see the workshops one must apply to the Director for an order.
[Illustration: St. Peter’s and the Vatican. The top wing on the right
hand contains the apartments of the Pope. _From Pistolesi’s “Il
Vaticano.”_]
[Illustration: The Piazza of St. Peter’s as it is to-day; on the right,
above the Colonnade, is the Palace of the Vatican, the right wing of
which contains the apartments of the Pope.]
CHAPTER III
THE ORIGIN OF THE VATICAN
The Vatican is not one of the seven hills of Rome, and, as Mr. Dyer
points out in the _Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography_, it was
even less a part of the city than the Janiculum; it was not included
in the walls of Aurelian. The origin of the name itself is uncertain.
One theory is that it was derived from _Vates_, a seer or prophet,
because the Romans gained possession of it from the Etruscans through
an oracular response--_Vatum responso expulsis Etruscis_; another from
_Vaticinia_, which means prophecies or oracles. Mr. Dyer, a very great
authority, has even less confidence in Niebuhr’s assumption that there
was an ancient Etruscan city there called Vatica or Vaticum. The flat
ground round it was called the _Campus Vaticanus_; and it was here that
the great dictator Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus had his farm of four
acres, the Prata Quinctia, which have impressed their name on that
portion of the city.
As it is the first legend connected with this famous site, I
will quote the passage from Livy which tells how the envoys found
Cincinnatus when they went to tell him that he had been chosen Dictator
in the crisis of the war with the Sabines. “They sent for the consul
Nautius, yet not supposing him capable of affording them sufficient
protection, resolved that a Dictator should be chosen to extricate them
from this distress, and Lucius Quintius Cincinnatus was accordingly
appointed with unanimous approbation. Here they may receive instruction
who despise every quality that men can boast, in comparison with
riches; and who think that those who possess them can alone have merit,
and to such alone honours and distinctions belong. Lucius Quintius, the
now sole hope of the people, and of the Empire of Rome, cultivated a
farm of four acres on the other side of the Tiber, at this time called
the Quintian meadows, opposite to the very spot where the duck-pond
stands. There he was found by the deputies, either leaning on a stake,
in a ditch which he was making, or ploughing; in some work of husbandry
he was certainly employed. After mutual salutations, and wishes on
the part of the commissioners ‘that it might be happy both to him and
the commonwealth,’ he was requested to ‘put on his gown, and hear a
message from the senate.’ Surprised, and asking if ‘all was well?’ he
bade his wife, Racilia, bring out his gown quickly from the cottage.
When he had put it on, after wiping the sweat and dust from his brow,
he came forward, when the deputies congratulated him, and saluted him
Dictator; requested his presence in the city, and informed him of the
alarming situation of the army. A vessel had been prepared for Quintius
by order of government, and on his landing on the other side, he was
received by his three sons, who came out to meet him; then by his
other relations and friends, and afterwards by the greater part of the
patricians. Surrounded by this numerous attendance, and the lictors
marching before him, he was conducted to his residence.” After he
conquered the Æquians, and on the sixteenth day, Cincinnatus resigned
the Dictatorship, which he had received for the term of six months.
Dyer points out that there were no buildings in this quarter before the
time of the Emperors; and that almost the only one of any note in all
antiquity was a sepulchre--the tomb of Hadrian.
The second important mention we get of the hill is that of Caligula
building a Circus here for racing in the gardens of his mother
Agrippina. The Circus in which St. Peter was crucified should be called
the Circus of Caligula, and not that of Nero, who merely adopted it;
though its ruins in the Middle Ages were called the Palace of Nero.
Tacitus tells us in his history that the district was noted for its
unhealthy air; while Cicero says that its soil was unfruitful; and
Martial execrated its wine in an epigram: “_Vaticana bibis, bibis
venenum_” (“If you drink Vatican wine you drink poison”).
At this point we must go to Lanciani, who informs us that two roads
issued from the bridge called indifferently Vaticanus, Neronianus, or
Triumphalis, which spanned the river between S. Giovanni dei Fiorentini
and the hospital of Santo Spirito. The Via Triumphalis, which
corresponds to the modern Strada di Monte Mario, and the Via Cornelia,
led to the woodlands west of the city between the Via Aurelia Nova and
the Via Triumphalis.
[Illustration: Panvinio’s Plan showing the relation of Nero’s Circus to
St. Peter’s, and Hadrian’s Circus to his Tomb, now the Castle of Sant’
Angelo.
_From Pistolesi’s “Il Vaticano.”_]
[Illustration: The Circus of Nero, where St. Peter was executed, as
reconstructed by G. Fontana. _From Pistolesi’s “Il Vaticano.”_]
When the Apostles came to Rome, in the reign of Nero, the topography of
the Vatican district, which was crossed by the Via Cornelia, was, says
Lanciani, as follows:
“On the left of the road was a circus, begun by Caligula, and finished
by Nero; on the right, a line of tombs built against the clay cliffs
of the Vatican. The Circus was the scene of the first sufferings of
the Christians, described by Tacitus in the well-known passage of
the _Annals_, XV. 45. Some of the Christians were covered with the
skins of wild beasts, so that savage dogs might tear them to
pieces; others were besmeared with tar and tallow, and burnt at the
stake; others were crucified (_crucibus adfixi_); while Nero, in the
attire of a vulgar _Auriga_, ran his races round the goals. This took
place 65 A.D. Two years later the leader of the Christians shared the
same fate in the same place. He was affixed to a cross like the others,
and we know exactly where. A tradition current in Rome from time
immemorial says that St. Peter was executed _inter duas metas_ (between
the two metae).”
_Inter duas metas_ is considered by scientific historians to signify
the spot marked by a square stone just outside the Sacristy of St.
Peter’s. It was formerly marked by the obelisk,[3] which now stands in
the Piazza of St. Peter’s, and was removed to its present position for
Sixtus V. by the architect Fontana in 1586.
This obelisk, says Lanciani, is the only relic left of the famous
Gardens of Agrippina, the mother of Caligula. It is a monolith of red
granite, brought over from Heliopolis, and is the only one which has
not been thrown down since the fall of the Empire. It is first called
the _guglia_, or needle, in a Bull of Leo IX., 1053, who also calls it
the tomb of Julius Cæsar, thinking that the bronze globe at the top
held his ashes.
Leo XIII. allowed a tablet to be put up on the wall close by, declaring
this to be the scene of the execution; but he had not reckoned on the
clamour that would be provoked. There was a tradition a few centuries
old that it had taken place on the spot marked by the Tempietto of
Bramante, in the cloister of the Church of S. Pietro in Montorio on the
hill called the Janiculum in the time of Lars Porsena of Clusium, and
now called the Passeggiata Margherita, and by other names. The monks
of S. Pietro in Montorio make a respectable income out of selling dust
from the sacred spot, and did not relish the idea of losing it. S.
Pietro in Montorio is under the protection of Spain; and the Spanish
Ambassador to the Vatican was instructed to demand the removal of the
obnoxious tablet. The Pope yielded, but scientific opinion has been too
strong, and the Vatican is soon to make a pronouncement on the subject.
The whole controversy hangs upon the words, “_Inter duas metas_.” St.
Peter is recorded to have been buried _inter duas metas_: common sense
would apply the words to the two goals of Nero’s Circus in which he
was executed; but the contention of the monks of S. Pietro in Montorio
can best be understood from Professor Marucchi’s lucid summarization,
which I here translate: “According to the Apocryphal Acts of St. Peter,
which may date as far back as the third or fourth century, St. Peter
was crucified ‘near the Palace of Nero--near the Obelisk of Nero,’ and
tradition adds, ‘_Inter duas metas_.’ Now there was no obelisk on the
Janiculum, but there was a celebrated obelisk in the Gardens of Nero,
not far from the Temple of Apollo, and exactly between the two metae of
the Circus. Later on it was pretended that the two metae must be looked
for in the two pyramids called the tombs of Romulus and Remus; one was
by the Porta S. Paolo (this was what we now call the pyramid of Caius
Cestius), the other, which was destroyed in the time of Alexander VI.,
stood near S. Maria Traspontina.
“According to the _Liber Pontificalis_, St. Peter was buried in the
place of his martyrdom, that is to say, at the Vatican. It was there,
as we know from other authorities, that the first victims of Nero were
buried in the year 64 A.D. Monsignor Lugari pretends that the Janiculum
was the place especially set apart for crucifixion.”
It is in vain that the partisans of the Janiculum seek a proof in the
direction _near the Naumachia_; for, though it is true that there was a
Naumachia at the foot of the Janiculum, there was another actually in
the Gardens of Nero. Marucchi says that the tradition in favour of S.
Pietro in Montorio was due to scholars who misinterpreted documents,
and that up to the fourteenth century there was no important tradition
of St. Peter here.[4]
He has the great authority of Lanciani to support him, who tells us
that for many years after the peace of Constantine, the exact spot of
St. Peter’s execution was marked by a chapel, called the Chapel of
the Crucifixion; that the meaning of the name and its origin, as well
as the topographical details connected with the event, were lost in
the darkness of the Middle Ages; that the memorial chapel lost its
identity, and was believed to belong to Him who was crucified--that is,
to Christ Himself; and that it disappeared seven or eight centuries
ago, about the time when the words _inter duas metas_, by which the
spot was so exactly located, lost their proper interpretation and began
to be applied to the tomb of pyramidal shape for which the Latin word
also is _meta_--the meta of Remus being that which we now call the
Pyramid of Caius Cestius, and the meta of Romulus, a pyramidal tower
which once stood near the Church of S. Maria Traspontina. There is a
curious monumental evidence of this on the stone screens (preserved in
the crypt) of the Confessio of Old St. Peter’s, which Matteo Pollaiuolo
executed for Pope Sixtus IV. in the middle of the fifteenth century.
Père Dufresne, in his _Les Cryptes Vaticanes_, says, “The Apostle was
put to death, according to ancient documents, _inter duas metas_.
Abandoning the natural interpretation, one would see in these _metae_,
namely, that they are those of the Circus of Nero; it was believed at
the end of the Middle Ages and during the Renaissance that they were
the Pyramid of Caius Cestius and a sort of tower constructed near S.
Maria Traspontina. These two monuments are represented in the panel of
the martyrdom of St. Peter on each side of the cross. The relatively
modern tradition to which they refer has no lack of partisans, but it
is otherwise difficult to sustain.” Dufresne adds that there is the
same confusion on the old Bronze Doors of St. Peter’s with regard to
St. Peter’s martyrdom. These were made in 1445, by Filarete and Simone
Ghini, for Eugenius IV., whose reign was about forty years earlier than
that of Sixtus IV.
Lanciani goes on to show how the line of the Via Cornelia can be
traced by the classical tombs discovered at various times along its
borders; and gives a very clear plan showing how the Via Cornelia,
in passing along the north edge of the Circus of Nero and Caligula,
cut right through Old St. Peter’s east and west, intersecting the
Confessio just at the south of St. Peter’s tomb. It must, in fact, have
intersected the site occupied by the chapel of St. Peter’s tomb in
the crypt to-day. The old tombs destroyed by the Emperor Elagabalus,
in fact, were on the site of the nave of Old St. Peter’s, and were
rediscovered in the time of Paul V. scattered all round the tomb of
St. Peter. We need not here enter into the disputed question whether
Linus, the second of the Popes, was buried near St. Peter, though
Lanciani accepts the evidence. “It seems hardly possible for anyone
to doubt that St. Peter was buried here by Linus and Anacletus,
successively second and third Popes.” Even Mr. Bernard W. Henderson,
in his great _Life and Principate of the Emperor Nero_, published by
Methuen & Co., allows that he was executed on this spot; for he says
that “the Church of S. Pietro crowns the site of his martyrdom, as, in
Catholic belief, it enshrines, not the memory alone, but also his holy
relics. Tradition--and in this respect it is absolutely worthy of all
credence--never varies in choosing Rome as the city where he ended his
life by his triumphant death. Thither he had come but a few months
perhaps before his end. Thence he had written his great Catholic
Epistle, bearing undismayed witness to the peril which threatened all
the Christians.” Mr. Henderson’s opinion is of great value, because
he can be most iconoclastic. A few pages earlier he is ruthless in
disposing of the idea that St. Peter went to Rome in 42 A.D. “Saint
Peter, who vanishes from the Scripture records between the years 42
and 51 A.D., going, says St. Luke simply, ‘to another place,’ is held
to have proceeded from Jerusalem to Rome, there to have preached the
Gospel and founded the Roman Church some fifteen years before his
greater colleague St. Paul addressed his epistle to that Church. None
of these traditions can be accepted as even probabilities.”
One thing must be remembered: that there is no inherent improbability
in the tomb having survived. The Romans spared the tombs even of
Carthage, and, as Lanciani says, the privileges which the Roman law
allowed the sepulchres, even of criminals, made it possible for the
Christians to keep these graves in good order with impunity. Of the
successive buildings which grew up round the tomb of the Apostle I
shall speak in another chapter.
[Illustration:
The Crucifixion of St. Peter--by Giotto--now in the Sacristy of St.
Peter’s. The earliest known work of art in which the Tomb of Romulus
and the Tomb of Caius Cestius are shown as the Duae Metae.
_From Pistolesi’s “Il Vaticano.”_
]
CHAPTER IV
THE STORY OF THE BUILDING OF THE VATICAN
The beginnings of the Vatican Palace are almost lost in antiquity.
But they may be traced back historically to the Episcopia which
Pope Symmachus (498-514) erected. The buildings were much enlarged
by Innocent III. (1198-1216), and, of course, by Nicholas III.
(1277-1280), who, Gregorovius says, may be regarded as “the earliest
founder of the Vatican residence in its historic form.” As early as
the beginning of the sixth century the Vatican basilica was surrounded
by a mass of buildings, chiefly chapels and mausoleums, but including
one or two monasteries. In the time of Stephen II. (752) these were
largely increased, and mingled with houses for pilgrims and a multitude
of people who made a living by ministering to their wants. As early as
the days of S. Gregory III. (731-741) there were three monasteries;
and Stephen II., in 752, added a fourth, and built the bell-tower of
the _atrium_ of the basilica, which he overlaid with gold and silver.
Gregorovius considers that the belfry towers which form such a feature
of the basilicas of Rome began in the eighth century. Stephen also
restored the ruined tomb of the wives of the Emperor Honorius, which
stood outside St. Peter’s by the present Sacristy, into a chapel
which he dedicated to S. Petronilla, who is supposed to have been
the daughter of St. Peter. He left at any rate one of the graves
undisturbed, of which the contents were discovered and ruthlessly
destroyed under Paul III., as related elsewhere. Innocent III., one
of the greatest men who ever sat on the throne of St. Peter, and who
reigned from 1198-1216, continued the buildings at the Vatican begun by
his predecessor, Celestine III. He not only enlarged it, but surrounded
it with walls and gate towers.
The Vatican, standing on a hill beside the Tiber, and within strong
walls erected by S. Leo IV. (a magnificent fragment of which still
remains in the Vatican Gardens), was a much safer residence for the
Popes, when rioting was going on, than the Lateran. So the Popes,
from this time onwards, made the Vatican their principal residence.
Innocent IV. (1243-1254), the arch-enemy of the Emperor Frederick
II., also enlarged the Vatican. But the conception of the Vatican,
as we have it, must be attributed to Nicholas III., Gian Gaetani
Orsini (1277-1280), and Nicholas V., Thomas of Sarzana (1447-1455).
The Orsini’s architects were two Florentines named Fra Sisto and Fra
Ristori. Gregorovius tells us how “he made the approach to the Vatican
free, and planned the gardens, surrounding them with walls and towers.
His foundation was called the _Viridarium Novum_, from which the
gate beside St. Peter’s received the name of the _Porta Viridaria_.
The feeling for nature thus again woke, and for the first time for
centuries the Romans saw a park laid out.”
Soon after the removal of the Popes to Avignon in 1308, the Lateran,
which has always been considered the Mother Church of the Papacy, was
destroyed by fire. Consequently, when the Popes returned from their
seventy years’ exile at Avignon they took up their residence at the
Vatican, which has been their principal residence ever since. Gregory
XII. (1406-1409), who had fortified himself in the Vatican against
Louis of Anjou and John XXIII., united the Vatican with Sant’ Angelo by
a walled-in passage. In the same year five large wolves were killed in
the Vatican Gardens.
Nicholas V., the simple scholar of humble birth, who founded the
Vatican Library and was the first of all the Popes to appreciate and
try and preserve the glorious buildings which they had inherited from
ancient Rome, also conceived the magnificent idea of making the Vatican
Hill rival the Palatine with its Imperial Palaces and gardens. “The
ruinous Borgo,” says Gregorovius, “was to become a gigantic Papal city.
From a piazza in front of Sant’ Angelo, three streets forming the
_Vicus Curialis_ were to lead to the Piazza of St. Peter’s, with six
great porticoes, covered markets, workshops for artists, and banks of
exchange. He contemplated the Pope and the entire Curia dwelling in the
most magnificent of palaces, a combination of sumptuous buildings and
parks. The palace was not to have its equal on the earth. He would even
construct a theatre for the Imperial coronations, a hall of Conclave,
and a theatre for spectacles. The Papal fortress was to be entered
through a splendid triumphal gate. A new cathedral with a lofty cupola,
in the form of a Latin cross, with two towers in front of the vestibule
and spacious buildings at each side for the clergy, was to be erected
in the place of the ancient basilica.”
It is difficult to gather from the documents hitherto available how
much Nicholas actually built. None of his buildings remain except the
exquisite little chapel frescoed by Fra Angelico with the story of S.
Lorenzo, and part of the wing which now bears the name of the Borgias.
The buildings of Paul II. (1464-1471), the magnificent Venetian Pope
who erected the Palazzo di Venezia, have entirely disappeared. But
Sixtus IV. (1471-1484), the first of the two della Rovere Popes, whose
conceptions were smaller, immortalized himself by his contributions
to the Vatican, for he built the Sistine Chapel, whose walls he had
frescoed by the greatest masters of his day, Perugino, Pinturicchio,
Ghirlandajo, Botticelli, Cosimo Rosselli, and Luca Signorelli.
It must be borne in mind that the end wall over the High Altar now
occupied by Michel Angelo’s Last Judgment was originally filled with
three frescoes by Perugino. The Last Judgment was not painted till
more than half a century after Pope Sixtus’s death, and Michel Angelo
did not begin the ceiling to which the chapel owes its fame until
twenty-four years after that Pope’s death. But the exquisite screen
by Bregno, in the manner of Mino da Fiesole, was executed for him.
Gregorovius is right in saying that this chapel, built in 1473, is
“more a hall than a chapel; simple to barrenness, it seems nothing
more than the beautifully decorated scene for Papal functions. It
breathes no air of religious feeling. And only to its purpose, and to
Michel Angelo’s paintings, does the Sistina owe the fact that it has
become the most celebrated chapel in the world.” Raffaelle designed the
tapestries, which bear his name, to fill the bare spaces on the walls
below the Fifteenth-Century frescoes. When these, the most impressive
of all tapestries, were in their places, the _tout ensemble_ must have
been almost beyond rivalry. Sixtus IV. also built under his chapel a
library which was afterwards converted into a storehouse, though it was
considered, when he built it, the most sumptuous in the world. Innocent
VIII. (1484-1492) had a beautiful villa constructed for his use in the
Vatican Gardens, as Pius IV. and Leo XIII. did after him. Their casinos
are still used for their original purpose: this, which was called the
Villa Belvedere, was constructed for him by Antonio Pollaiuolo about
1490, and decorated with frescoes by Mantegna, which have perished.
It was about a quarter of a mile from the Vatican Palace until Julius
II. connected them. Gregorovius calls it Innocent’s finest work, and
Innocent was a man of taste, and built a good deal. His successor, the
execrated Borgia Pope, Alexander VI. (1492-1503), in the midst of all
his ambitions and excesses, found the time and money to embellish the
Vatican with one of its greatest glories, the _Appartamenti Borgia_,
the suite of rooms embellished by Pinturicchio with frescoes, which,
as chamber decorations, have no superiors, except the same artist’s
glorious frescoes illustrating the career of Pius II. in the library
of the Cathedral of Siena. His successor, Pius III., survived his
elevation for less than a month, and then came the magnificent
megalomaniac, Julius II. (1503-1513), who packed all the gigantic works
of his Pontificate into a brief ten years.
[Illustration: Sarcophagus of Nicolas V. in the Grotte Vecchie of St.
Peter’s Crypt. The carvings of Mino da Fiesole in the Crypt belonged to
the Mausoleum over it.]
In the period from the accession of Nicholas V. to the death of Leo X.
(1447-1521), a space of seventy-four years, there were ten Popes, and
all except three of them had generous ambitions for the extension and
embellishment of the Vatican. Pius III., Francesco Piccolomini, who
was only Pope for twenty-six days, cannot be counted. Calixtus III.,
the first Borgia Pope, and Pius II., Æneas Sylvius Piccolomini, had an
honourable reason for suspending their building operations, for the
capture of Constantinople by the Turk under Mahomet II. a few years
before filled them with apprehensions for the fate of Christendom,
unless fresh crusades could be organized by leaguing all the Christian
Princes. But the spectre soon diminished when the Papacy entered into
a not very honourable treaty with the Sultan Bajazet II. for detaining
his brother and rival for the throne, Prince Djem, as a sort of state
captive in the Vatican, in consideration of a huge annual sum. Djem,
when he was defeated by Bajazet, fled to the Knights of St. John at
Rhodes, who had distinguished themselves by defying the assaults of his
brother. The crafty Knights would not surrender him, but undertook
to keep him a prisoner if the Sultan paid thirty-five thousand ducats
a year and promised to maintain a lasting peace with Christendom.
For greater safety the Knights sent him to France, where he remained
imprisoned for nearly seven years, when Innocent VIII. secured the
custody of his person and the money paid by his brother, in return for
facilitating the marriage of the King of France with the heiress of
Brittany, which did not up till then belong to the French Crown, and
by making the Grand Master of the Knights a Cardinal. The Sultan also
presented to the Pope the Lance (head) which claimed to be the actual
weapon with which the Side of Our Lord was pierced, and was considered
to be the genuine relic rather than those previously shown at Paris and
Nüremberg.
For the moment I am not speaking of St. Peter’s, but of the Vatican
Palace; but Julius II., Giuliano della Rovere, was responsible for
the gigantic features of both. It was he who joined Innocent VIII.’s
Villa Belvedere to the Vatican by the Cortile of the Belvedere, which,
before it was intersected by the Library and the Braccio Nuovo, was
twelve hundred feet long. Bramante was the architect: he designed the
upper part for a garden terrace, the lower for a tournament ground. One
cannot help being reminded of the neighbouring Circus of Caligula and
Nero, out of which, as the place of St. Peter’s execution, the whole
Vatican group of buildings grew. “The Piazza,” says Gregorovius, “was
to be surrounded with a beautiful portico with three rows of pilasters,
one above the other, and to end in huge niches, an upper one for the
Belvedere, and a lower one with rows of seats for the spectators of
the games. Nicholas V. had already entertained the idea of a secular
theatre in the Vatican, and would have had classic comedies represented
there. Julius II. would probably instead have given the Romans combats
with animals and tournaments. Even later Popes had games of chivalry
celebrated in the courtyard of the Belvedere, although not in the
theatre, as Julius II. had intended.”
Julius was so impatient to see this magnificent conception carried out
that he ordered the work to be continued day and night, but he died
when only one portico was finished. And the masonry had been so badly
executed that in less than thirty years the walls required a support,
and, half a century after that, the completion of Bramante’s idea was
rendered impossible by Sixtus V. building the great hall of his library
right across the quadrangle.
But Julius also commissioned, and Bramante built, the Cortile of S.
Damaso, one of the most wonderful in the world, for it is of vast
size and is surrounded on three sides by the triple arcades of the
Loggie, which Gregorovius calls the “most successful imitation of the
antique ... an unequalled example of vigour, lightness, and grace.”
Some of them were frescoed by Raffaelle, and he was the architect
who completed them after Bramante’s death. Julius II. is hailed as
the founder of the Vatican Museum; for not only did he commence the
collection in the Belvedere, the converted Villa of Innocent VIII.,
but he enriched it with his own statue of Apollo, named after the
Belvedere, with the Laocoön, with the Torso of Hercules, and with the
Ariadne. It was for Julius that Michel Angelo executed his immortal
paintings on the roof of the Sistine Chapel, which made it the most
celebrated chapel in the world. This was a task of almost filial piety,
for it put a finishing touch on the chapel of the uncle, born Francesco
della Rovere, to whom Julius owed his elevation.
[Illustration: The Courtyard of S. Damaso before the arcades were
glazed by Pius IX. Drawn and engraved by G. Fontana. The apartments of
the Pope occupy the right wing. _From Pistolesi’s “Il Vaticano.”_]
[Illustration: The Court of S. Damaso--since Pius IX. glazed its
arcades. The Pope’s apartments are to the right, where the carriage is
standing.]
Leo X., Giovanni de’ Medici, had the same magnificent and Mæcenatic
tastes; it was he who completed the Loggie of S. Damaso under the
direction of Raffaelle. It was he who had ten of the designs intended
for these Loggie not executed in the Loggie, but in the Vatican
tapestries woven at Arras in 1514. They were to hang on the walls
of the Sistine Chapel below the frescoes: they are now kept in the
Galleria degli Arazzi. Of them Gregorovius wrote: “In these Raffaelle
ascends from the idyl to the drama in its loftiest and most exalted
conception. In artistic unity of treatment and vigour of action, these
designs surpass any of his works in the Stanze, and are his most
consummate and grandest creations.” Raffaelle’s Stanze were originally
commissioned by Julius II., and completed under Leo X. Raffaelle
himself did not live to complete his task.
Leo X. appointed Raffaelle architect of St. Peter’s, and custodian of
all the antiquities of Rome and the city territory. It was in these
capacities that Raffaelle, who had a passion for the monuments of
antiquity, conceived the famous scheme for making an illustrated plan
of the city, in which he was engaged at the time of his death. He
sets it forth in the letter long attributed to that Conte Baldassare
Castiglione whose portrait painted by him is one of the _chefs d’œuvre_
of the Louvre. “There are many persons,” says he, “Holy Father, who,
estimating great things by their own narrow judgment, esteem the
military exploits of the ancient Romans, and the skill which they have
displayed in their buildings, so spacious, and so richly ornamented, as
rather fabulous than true. With me, however, it is widely different;
for when I perceive, in what yet remains of Rome, the divinity of
mind which the ancients possessed, it seems to me not unreasonable
to conclude that many things were to them easy which to us appear
impossible. Having, therefore, under this conviction, always been
studious of the remains of antiquity, and having with no small labour
investigated and accurately measured such as have occurred to me, and
compared them with the writings of the best authors on this subject, I
conceive that I have obtained some acquaintance with the architecture
of the ancients. This acquisition, whilst it gives me great pleasure,
has also affected me with no small concern, in observing the inanimate
remains, as it were, of this once noble city, the queen of the
universe, thus lacerated and dispersed. As there is a duty from every
child towards his parents and his country, so I find myself called upon
to exert what little ability I possess, in perpetuating somewhat of the
image, or rather the shadow, of that which is in fact the universal
country of all Christians, and at one time was so elevated and so
powerful, that mankind began to believe that she was raised beyond
the efforts of fortune and destined to perpetual duration. Hence it
would seem that time, envious of the glory of mortals, but not fully
confiding in his own strength, had combined with fortune, and with
the profane and unsparing barbarians, that to his corroding file and
consuming tooth they might add their destructive fury; and by fire, by
sword, and every other mode of devastation, might complete the ruin of
Rome. Thus those famous works, which might otherwise have remained to
the present day in full splendour and beauty, were, by the rage and
ferocity of these merciless men, or rather wild beasts, overthrown and
destroyed; yet not so entirely as not to leave a sort of mechanism of
the whole, without ornament indeed; or, so to express it, the skeleton
of the body without the flesh. But why should we complain of the Goths,
the Vandals, or other perfidious enemies, whilst they who ought, like
fathers and guardians, to have protected the defenceless remains of
Rome, have themselves contributed towards their destruction. How many
have there been, who having enjoyed the same office as your Holiness,
but not the same knowledge, nor the same greatness of mind, nor that
clemency in which you resemble the Deity; how many have there been
who have employed themselves in the demolition of ancient temples,
statues, arches, and other glorious works! How many who have allowed
these edifices to be undermined, for the sole purpose of obtaining
the _pozzolana_ from their foundations; in consequence of which they
have fallen in ruins! What materials for building have been formed
from statues and other antique sculptures! Insomuch, that I might
venture to assert that the new Rome which we now see, as large as it
may appear, so beautiful and so ornamented with palaces, churches, and
other buildings, is wholly composed of the remains of ancient marble.
Nor can I reflect without sorrow, that even since I have been in Rome,
which is not yet eleven years, so many beautiful monuments have been
destroyed; as the obelisk which stood in the Alexandrian road, the
unfortunate arch, and so many columns and temples, chiefly demolished
by M. Bartolommeo della Rovere. It ought not, therefore, Holy Father,
to be the last object of your attention, to take care that the little
which now remains of this the ancient mother of Italian glory and
magnificence, be not, by means of the ignorant and malicious, wholly
extirpated and destroyed; but may be preserved as a testimony of the
worth and excellence of those divine minds, by whose example we of
the present day are incited to great and laudable undertakings. Your
object, however, is rather to leave the examples of the ancients to
speak for themselves, and to equal or surpass them by the erection of
splendid edifices, by the encouragement and remuneration of talents
and of genius, and by dispensing among the Princes of Christendom the
blessed seeds of peace. For as the ruin of all discipline and of all
arts is the consequence of the calamities of war, so from peace and
public tranquillity is derived that desirable leisure, which carries
them to the highest pitch of excellence.” After this introduction, the
author proceeds: “Having, then, been commanded by your Holiness to make
a design of ancient Rome, as far as it can be discovered from what now
remains, with all the edifices of which such ruins yet appear as may
enable us infallibly to ascertain what they originally were, and to
supply such parts as are wholly destroyed by making them correspond
with those that yet exist, I have used every possible exertion, that
I might give you full satisfaction, and convey a perfect idea of the
subject.”
Hadrian VI. (1522-1523), who succeeded Leo X., was not an Italian at
all; but he only lived a year, and was succeeded by another Medici,
Clement VII. (1523-1534). It was in his reign that the devastating sack
of Rome under the command of the Duc du Bourbon took place, which did
more damage to the precious monuments of art and antiquity than any
other catastrophe which ever befell the city. For the invading army
included many Protestants. “The Protestant Germans, under Fründesberg,
considered the smashing of images, the ransacking of churches,
the tearing of priestly vestments, and the razing of convent and
monastery as part of their religious duty. They felt to the elaborate
paraphernalia of the Roman Church much as the Early Christians did to
the stone and marble gods and temples of the heathen. In each case the
loss to art has been the same.”
When the Imperial army withdrew, Clement VII. came out of the Castle
of Sant’ Angelo, behind whose impregnable walls he had taken refuge,
and had Raffaelle’s Stanze finished by his pupils. Clement VII.
was succeeded by Paul III., Alessandro Farnese (1534-1549), who
commissioned Michel Angelo to paint the Last Judgment in the Sistine
Chapel, for which three famous frescoes by Perugino were destroyed.
This was unveiled in 1541. For the same Pontiff Michel Angelo also
painted the two great frescoes in the Paoline Chapel, which, like that
noble but baroquely painted chamber, the Sala Regia, was built for Paul
by Antonio da Sangallo. Julius III. (1550-1555) had a stately flight
of steps made for the Belvedere by Michel Angelo. Marcellus II. was
elected and died in that same year, 1555. Paul IV. (1555-1559), Gian
Pietro Caraffa, notorious as the Pope who took the most active part in
the cruelties of the Inquisition, is also notorious for having had
clothes painted round the figures of Michel Angelo’s Last Judgment
during Michel Angelo’s lifetime. In delightful contrast to him was
his successor, Pius IV., Giovanni Angelo de’ Medici (1559-1565); he
ordered the great Court of the Belvedere to be finished after the plans
of Bramante by Michel Angelo, who loathed the very name of Bramante;
for him was built the exquisite garden-house of the Vatican, Pirro
Ligorio’s masterpiece, the Villa Pia, the nearest to a classical
building of any work of the Renaissance.
[Illustration: The Pavilion of the Casino of Pius IV. in the Vatican
Gardens.]
Pius V. was the last Pope canonized as a saint; he was too much taken
up with the Turks to build much. It was in his reign that the great
battle of Lepanto was fought, which so pervades the Gargantuan frescoes
of sixteenth-century Rome. In it the Venetian and Spanish fleet,
commanded by Don John of Austria, and the Papal fleet, commanded by
Mark Antonio Colonna, sank ninety Turkish galleys and captured one
hundred and eighty, killed thirty thousand Turks, and took ten thousand
prisoners, and freed fifteen thousand Christian slaves, with the loss
of only fifteen galleys and eight thousand men. Gregory XIII., the
Buoncompagni Pope (1572-1585), was more than a maker of Calendars,
though it is for the Gregorian Calendar, which we still use, more than
three centuries later, that his name is a household word. He built the
Loggie which connect the Loggie of Raffaelle with the apartments
occupied by the Pope, and was a great patron of painters--Federigo
Zucchero, whom he employed on the Paoline Chapel; Vasari, whom he
employed on the Sala Regia, and others. But his fame as an embellisher
of the Vatican is utterly eclipsed by that of his successor, the famous
Sixtus V., Felice Peretti (1585-1590), the building Pope, with whom, in
his brief reign of five years, the Romans thought that the Renaissance
was beginning again. Nothing pleased Sixtus V.; he wished to move the
obelisk near the Sacristy of St. Peter’s which marked the site where
St. Peter was crucified into the centre of the Piazza in front of St.
Peter’s. It weighed nearly a million Roman pounds, but Fontana, the
architect, was given _carte blanche_, and set about his task with eight
hundred men, one hundred and fifty horses, and forty-six cranes. The
story of its removal is one of the most famous passages in Hare: “The
obelisk was first exorcised as a pagan idol, and then dedicated to the
Cross. Its removal was preceded by High Mass in St. Peter’s, after
which Pope Sixtus bestowed a solemn benediction upon Fontana and his
workmen, and ordered that none should speak, on pain of death, during
the raising of the obelisk. The immense mass was slowly rising upon its
base, when suddenly it ceased to move, and it became suspected that
the ropes were giving way. An awful moment of suspense ensued, when the
breathless silence was broken by a cry of ‘_Acqua alle funi!_’ (‘Wet
the ropes!’), and the workmen, acting upon the advice so unexpectedly
received, again saw the monster move, and gradually settle on to its
base. The man who saved the obelisk was Bresca, a sailor of Bordighera,
a village of the Riviera di Ponente, and Sixtus V., in his gratitude,
promised him that his native village should ever henceforth have the
privilege of furnishing the Easter palms to St. Peter’s. A vessel laden
with palm-branches, which abound in Bordighera, is annually sent to
the Tiber in the week before Palm Sunday, and the palms, after being
prepared and plaited by the nuns of S. Antonio Abbate, are used in the
ceremonial in St. Peter’s. The obelisk was formerly called ‘St. Peter’s
Needle’ (‘_Aguglia di S. Pietro_’). In the Middle Ages it was believed
that the bronze globe on the summit contained the ashes of Julius
Cæsar.”
[Illustration: The Ceiling of the Sala Regia.]
It was Sixtus who built the wing of the Courtyard of S. Damaso, which
has been the residence of the Popes ever since. It was Sixtus who
built the great hall of the Vatican Library, two hundred and twenty
feet long, which, with its brilliant decorations in Pompeian style,
is one of the finest chambers in Rome. But it destroyed the finest
cortile in the world, the Courtyard of the Belvedere built by Bramante
to connect the Villa Belvedere with the Vatican, which it cut clean in
half. It is the actual palace of the Popes, built by Sixtus, though
finally completed by Clement VIII., Ippolito Aldobrandini (1592-1605)
(who condemned poor Beatrice Cenci to death), and succeeded him after
the brief reigns of Urban VII. (1590), Gregory XIV. (1590-1591), and
Innocent IX. (1591)--it is that palace which dominates the attention
of the spectator as he lifts up his eyes to the hill of the Vatican
from the Piazza of St. Peter’s. Clement VIII. was also the Pontiff
whose chance it was to gaze upon the tomb of the Apostle when its
vaulting fell in while they were building the New St. Peter’s. It was
he who built the chapel in the crypt in front of the tomb in the form
of an inverted cross, and erected the altar in that most sacred place.
He was succeeded for a few months by another Medici, Leo XI. (1605),
and then by Paul V., Camillo Borghese (1605-1621), who built the two
great fountains in the Vatican Gardens and cared for the fortunes of
his family in a more than usually open way. His successor, Gregory
XV., Alessandro Ludovisi (1621-1623), did nothing for the Vatican; he
devoted his energies to promoting the Order of Jesus. He canonized St.
Ignatius Loyola and St. Francis Xavier, and founded the Propaganda,
which Gregorovius, in his _Tombs of the Popes_, calls the largest
institution in the world. His name has been given to the mushroom
quarter of Rome, in which new hotels and boarding-houses spring up
every day. But it was called, not after him, but his nephew, Cardinal
Ludovico Ludovisi. It was he who founded the Ludovisi collection,
including the famous Juno, which has found its way to the National
Museum in the Baths of Diocletian. Nor did he, as might have been
imagined, found the Università Gregoriana in the Collegio Romano. That
was founded by Gregory XIII. in 1582. The next two Popes, Urban VIII.
and Innocent X., distanced all their predecessors in their zeal for the
endowment of their families. Urban VIII., Maffeo Barberini (1623-1644),
was not only a nepotist; he was such a vandal in tearing down ancient
buildings to use their materials in his own constructions, that
Roman wit coined the proverb, “_Quod non fecerunt Barbari, fecerunt
Barberini_,” which may roughly be translated, “What the barbarians
would not do, the Barberini did.” But Urban VIII. may be forgiven
something for the magnificence of his ideas. For he built the Barberini
Palace, the greatest ornament to Rome of all the vast buildings erected
by Popes or Cardinals, except St. Peter’s itself. And he repaired
the walls of Rome, especially that part which surrounds the Vatican
Hill, with tremendous bastions, more like the rocks of nature than the
works of man. And it was he who gave the original commission for that
hill of stone, the Scala Regia, the enormous State staircase designed
by Bernini for the Vatican. Also the Barberini Library, collected
principally by his nephew, Cardinal Francesco Barberini, purchased
by Leo XIII. for the Vatican Library, is worthy of mention among the
greatest collections which have gone to form the Vatican Library. It
was Urban VIII., too, not Clement VIII., according to some, who put the
finishing touches on the apartments founded by Sixtus V., which are the
residence of the Popes. At all events, he added to Sixtus V.’s great
work, the Vatican Library, in order to house the Biblioteca Palatina,
which had lately been bequeathed to it. And it was he who established
the armoury in the rooms above the library to keep his army properly
fitted out, just as he restored the walls of his capital against
invaders.
His successor, Innocent X., Giambattista Pamfili (1644-1655),
did little for the Vatican; his designing sister-in-law, Olimpia
Maldaichini, who founded the gigantic wealth of the Pamfili family, saw
to that. His successor, Alexander VII., the Chigi Pope (1655-1667),
was public-spirited enough. He will always be remembered as the
patron for whom Bernini erected the glorious colonnade of the Piazza
of St. Peter’s, one of the very few works with which the megalomaniac
Popes succeeded in rivalling the megalomaniac Emperors of Rome. It was
he, too, who completed the superb Scala Regia, where he re-erected
the famous bronze doors of Innocent VIII., which had already been
adapted by Paul V. Another commission which he gave to Bernini, the
Sala Ducale, cannot be accorded equal commendation--it is vulgar even
for its age. Clement IX., Giulio Rospigliosi, reigned from 1667-1669;
Clement X., Emilio Altieri (1670-1676), Innocent XI., Benedetto
Odescalchi (1676-1689), Alexander VIII., Pietro Ottoboni (1689-1691),
Innocent XII., Antonio Pignatelli (1691-1700), Clement XI., Giovanni
Francesco Albani (1700-1721), Innocent XIII., Michel Angelo de’ Conti
(1721-1724), Benedict XIII., Vincenzo Maria Orsini (1724-1730), Clement
XII., Lorenzo Corsini (1730-1740), Benedict XIV., Prospero Lambertini
(1740-1758), Clement XIII., Carlo Rezzonico (1758-1769); though these
and others of the Popes added to the Vatican collections, none of them
made any substantial additions to the buildings till Clement XIV.,
Lorenzo Francesco Ganganelli (1769-1774), who with his successor, Pius
VI., Angelo Braschi (1775-1799), converted the gardens of Innocent
VIII.’s Belvedere Villa into the Museo Pio-Clementino.
[Illustration: Giampietro Chattard’s Plan of St. Peter’s and its
Portico.
_From Pistolesi’s “Il Vaticano.”_]
Pius VI. built from their foundations the Sala degli Animali, the
Galleria delle Muse, the Rotonda, the Sala a Croce Greca, the Sala
della Biga, and the superb staircase that leads up to it. Gregorovius,
in his _Tombs of the Popes_, draws dramatic attention to the tragic
ends of these two Popes: “In the year 1773 he (Clement XIV.) annulled
the Order of Jesus. As men hinted, this was as good as if he had taken
poison. Soon afterwards his appearance altered, he complained of
pains in his vitals, he wasted away like a shadow. ‘I am passing into
eternity,’ he said, ‘and I know the reason why.’ On September 22, 1774,
he died at the age of sixty-nine. His body became black immediately,
and decayed so rapidly that it was impossible to lay out the body for
the ceremony of kissing his feet. And yet he had possessed an iron
constitution, such as seemed capable of lasting till a hundred.
“But still more unfortunate than Clement XIV. was his successor, Pius
VI., Braschi. In his reign occurred the dreadful catastrophe of the
French Revolution.
“Pius VI. reigned twenty-four years, from 1775 to 1799, seeing many
changes and enduring much. He has no tomb in St. Peter’s. His body
rests in the Grotte Vaticane, his heart at Valence, where Napoleon
raised a monument to his memory. Only his statue--by Canova--kneels
upon the floor of the ‘Confession,’ and will kneel there so long as St.
Peter’s dome endures above it. Gazing into its sombre depths beyond
the circle of ever-burning lamps, one beholds in vague outline the
figure of this luckless old man. Who does not know how Pius VI., in
the days of the Franco-Roman Republic, was carried off forcibly from
the Vatican, how place after place received the friendless exile, and
how at length he died in a foreign land? And of the many who wander
to-day through the gorgeous halls of the Museum Pio-Clementinum how
few remember, amid the endless profusion of ancient masterpieces, the
tragic fate of the two Popes who reared it there as an eternal delight
for mankind!
“Thus the eighteenth century closed upon the Papacy in exile and
despair.”
It is for poetical outbursts like this, as well as for his vast
erudition, that one haunts the beloved pages of Gregorovius.
A much later writer, Mr. J. E. C. Bodley, in his able little book on
the great Vatican question of our own day, _The Church in France_,
talking of this Pope, says: “The constitution was never accepted by
the Holy See. It was repudiated by Pius VI., who was destined to die on
French soil, the victim of the Revolution. At Valence, a picturesque
city on the Rhone, which thousands of English people rush past every
winter without stopping, the register of his death may still be seen
in the municipal archives, where it is inscribed, after the manner of
the time, as of one, ‘Jean Braschi,’ who followed the profession of
‘Pontiff.’”
Pius VI. not only established new ideals with these beautiful halls
of the Vatican Sculpture Gallery, which were designed by Sermonetti;
he enriched them with two thousand fine specimens. Hardly, Miss
Mary Knight Potter reminds us, had Pius got his collection into his
museum before the Treaty of Tolentino, 1797, gave Napoleon the right
of carrying them off to France, where they were deposited in the
Louvre. And just a year later, on his refusal to renounce his temporal
authority, when General Berthier entered Rome, he was taken prisoner
and carried to Siena, Florence, Parma, Piacenza, Turin, Grenoble, and
Valence, where he died a year and a half after his deposition. Pius
VII., the Chiaramonti Pope (1800-1823), was also one of the great
embellishers of the Vatican. He founded the vast Museo Chiaramonti, in
one of the two great galleries which connect the transformed Villa
Belvedere with the original Vatican Palace.
Here we have a vista, seemingly unending, of statuary; the statues
are not equal to those of the Museo Pio-Clementino, but they are a
monument of his courage and love of art, for they are what he collected
to replace the depredations of Napoleon. His also is the Gallery of
Inscriptions and the Egyptian Museum. It was he who gave ten thousand
scudi for the famous antique fresco called the Nozze Aldobrandini, now
shown in the Vatican Library. And it was for him that Raffael Stern
built, in 1817, the Braccio Nuovo, the plain gallery, more than two
hundred feet long, so admirably designed for its purpose, which houses
some of the best statuary in the Vatican.
Like his predecessor, Pius VII. was carried off a prisoner to France:
he had asserted the independence and neutrality of his dominions, when
ordered to expel the enemies of France from his territory and their
ships from his ports. He refused to resign, and excommunicated the
invaders sent to compel him. He was taken prisoner on July 5, 1809,
and kept in France till the 2nd of January 1814. He had already, in
1804, visited France, under strong pressure, to crown Napoleon. After
the French armies had been driven from Germany, Napoleon endeavoured
to purchase a new Concordat, offering the Pope the Papal possessions
south of the Apennines, but Pius refused to treat with him except from
Rome, which he entered on the 24th of May 1814. It must have been with
peculiar satisfaction that, owing to the firmness of the English, he
saw all the magnificent statuary taken from the Vatican to the Louvre
by Napoleon restored with the exception of a few minor statues, the
value of which was more than compensated by the magnificent pictures
which were sent back from Paris to him, though they had been taken not
from him, but from various Italian churches. With them he founded the
famous Vatican Gallery.
Pius VII. was succeeded by Leo XII., Annibale della Genga (1823-1829),
and Pius VIII., Francesco Saverio Castiglione (1829-1831). Gregory
XVI., Mauro Capellari (1831-1846), distinguished his reign by two
great works. He saved the ancient town and monuments of Tivoli by
creating a tunnel and the most majestic of artificial waterfalls to
divert the waters of the Anio, which threatened the Tibur of Horace
with destruction, and, by his patronage of the brothers Campanari, and
his establishment of the _Museo Etrusco_ in the Vatican, he did much
for preserving the memory of one of the most extraordinary peoples who
have perished off the face of the earth--the Etruscans. Gregory was
succeeded by Pius IX., Giovanni Maria Mastai-Ferretti, who reigned
longer than any other Pope, and was the first “to pass the years of St.
Peter.”
No Pope has impressed himself more on the imagination of the Romans,
for he loved the splendid pageants which passed away with the temporal
power nearly forty years ago. And he loved his capital, and did much
for its monuments, though he restored sometimes not wisely but too
well. His principal addition to the Vatican was the completion of the
Cortile of S. Damaso, and the magnificent Scala Pia, which leads up to
the actual palace of the Pope.
Leo XIII., Gioacchino Pecci (1878-1903), made one supreme contribution
to the glories of the Vatican by restoring the Borgia Apartments,
whose frescoes are, after those of the Cathedral Library at Siena, the
masterpieces of Pinturicchio. These had for many years been almost
invisible owing to the tall bookcases in which the whole of the printed
books of the Vatican Library were crowded. Leo XIII., as related in
the chapter on the subject, cleared out and entirely reconstituted the
apartments under the great hall of the Vatican Library and various
adjoining rooms to form the new Leonine Library, which now contains all
the printed books. In conjunction with this work he had the Borgia
Apartments restored by the art director of the Vatican, Commendatore
Ludovico Seitz, who must be allowed to have carried out the work with
singular success. He showed such good taste, such a laudable desire to
alter as little as possible, so much knowledge and delicacy in removing
whitewash and re-backing the frescoes. Pope Leo also converted the Hall
of Canonizations into a chapel, and spent a great deal of money on
beautifying the floors and ceilings of the _Galleria degli Arazzi_ and
the _Galleria dei Candelabri_.
The present Pope succeeded too recently for his work to show much,
but his broad-minded and enlightened régime is certain to result in
important and permanent improvements, among which he is contemplating a
Museum of Old St. Peter’s.
[Illustration: Exterior of Old St. Peter’s, Rome. Reproduced by
permission from the British Museum Guide to the Early Christian and
Byzantine Antiquities.]
CHAPTER V
OLD ST. PETER’S
“From the Ælian bridge over the Tiber they traversed the long colonnade
which led to the _atrium_ of St. Peter’s, with its fountain and its
tombs of the Popes. There they witnessed the Pope, John XIII., and
his Cardinals receive the Imperial party on the thirty-five steps
of the entrance. With martial surroundings and sacerdotal pomp, the
mighty Otto, his wife and son, were conducted into the basilica of
Constantine, which had then been the venerated temple of Rome for six
centuries and a half.
“The Vatican Basilica of the tenth century was, of course, wholly
unlike the St. Peter’s we see to-day. It was quite similar to the
restored Church of St. Paul’s _fuori le Murà_, as we now see it,
but it was some twenty feet longer and a little wider, and had five
naves divided off by four rows of vast monolith columns. There were
ninety-six in all, of various marbles, different in style and even in
size, for they had been the first hasty spoils of antique palaces and
temples. The walls, above the order of columns, were decorated with
mosaics, such as no Roman hand could then produce or ever restore. A
grand arch, such as we see at the older basilicas to-day, enriched with
silver plates and adorned with mosaic, separated the nave from the
chancel, below which was the tribune, an inheritance from the prætor’s
court of old. It now contained the high altar and the _sedile_ of the
Vicar of Christ. Before the high altar stood the _Confessio_, the vault
wherein lay the bones of St. Peter, with a screen of silver such as the
Greeks called _iconostasis_, crowded with silver images of saints and
virgins. And the whole was illuminated by a gigantic candelabra holding
more than a thousand lighted tapers.
“The Byzantine visitors were amazed to find the Cathedral of Old Rome
so utterly different from their own Hagia Sophia at home. It was nearly
one hundred feet longer and not much less in width. Its mosaics, its
monoliths, and its tribune resembled those of the great temple of
Justinian; but its flat roof, long aisles, rude workmanship, and want
of symmetry roused contempt and pity from the cultivated taste of the
Greek artist. The basilica of St. Peter’s was, indeed, but a crude
adaptation of the law courts of the Cæsars, whilst the Church of the
Holy Wisdom was one of the most original creations in the whole record
of human art” (Frederic Harrison in _Theophano: The Crusade of the
Tenth Century: a Romantic Monograph_).
* * * * *
I have it on the authority of the most influential of the Cardinals
that the Pope is thinking of establishing a St. Peter’s Museum, like
the Opera del Duomo at Florence and Siena. As this Museum must consist
chiefly of the remains of Old St. Peter’s, I shall endeavour to recall
all that is known of Old St. Peter’s, and to give the best list I
can of the remains of it which are to be found in the crypt of the
present church and elsewhere. The most important paintings of it are
preserved in a little German capital, where a Royal Abbess, who was
too infirm to make the pilgrimage to Rome, was accorded the privilege
of substituting visits to the church or convent embellished with these
paintings. Various pictures of it, of course, exist in Rome; and there
is a contemporary model of it preserved in the Vatican. But the chief
recruiting-ground we have for ideas for a Museum of Old St. Peter’s is
the crypt of the present church.
Until the present Pope’s reign the crypt of St. Peter’s was to the
ordinary traveller _terra incognita_. It was as difficult to see as
the museum of the Torlonias, who, unlike the old Roman nobility,
rigidly exclude the public from studying their art treasures. Leo XIII.
for a long time would allow no one to visit it without his personal
permission. He believed that dynamiters wished to blow up St. Peter’s,
though it is difficult to think that so holy a place would not be
sacred even to a criminal in search of advertisement. And a criminal,
though regardless of sacrilege, might be deterred by the superstition,
universally accredited, that some stupendous misfortune would happen to
him who disturbed the grave of St. Peter.[5]
So firm is the belief, that no attempt has ever been made to restore
to public view the glorious cross, weighing one hundred and fifty
pounds, and of the height of a man, made of pure gold, which the
Empress Helena, mother of Constantine the Great, erected at the head
of the tomb, and which Clement VIII. (died 1605) saw lying there, when
a portion of the vault fell in. Accompanied by Cardinals Bellarmin
and Antoniano, he examined it. He found that it bore the inscription:
“_Constantinus Aug. et Helena Aug. hanc domum regalem (auro decorant
quam) simili fulgore coruscans aula circumdat._” He entertained at
first the idea of clearing away the ruins and exposing the tomb, but
was deterred, possibly by the superstition which is now so universal at
Rome, that even if the Pope were to order the cross to be removed into
the projected Museum, no Roman would take part in the work. Clement had
the opening hurriedly closed and covered with a thick layer of masonry.
This cross is the most valuable example of its kind known to survive.
In Leo XIII.’s day the crypt could only be seen by torchlight, and
it would have been easy for a miscreant to have concealed himself in
its dark recesses; but the Vatican authorities have now very wisely
had it illuminated with electric light, like the ancient Roman house
of S. Cecilia, preserved under her church, and one, at least, of the
catacombs. Only, though proper persons are allowed to visit it, the
regulations are so puzzling that few people ever achieve admission
except under the wing of a high ecclesiastic or a guide who lectures on
the crypt.[6]
[Illustration: The Grotte Vecchie of St. Peter’s Crypt, showing the
Sarcophagus of the Old Pretender on the extreme right and the urn
containing the præcordia of Pius IX. next to it.]
The crypt of St. Peter’s (known to Italians as the _Grotte Vaticane_)
is amazingly interesting, for the _Grotte Vecchie_ (old crypt), which
extend below St. Peter’s from the tomb to the entrance, are actually
part of the original basilica of Constantine. You stand on the very
pavement trodden by the feet of Popes and Kings, and millions of the
faithful, for a thousand years. In it are preserved the grand old
Gothic tombs of some of the greatest of the Popes, and in it, fragrant
with white roses laid on them by the adherents of the lost cause,
are the tombs of the last three Stuart Kings,--James III., better
known as the Old Pretender; Charles III., better known as the Young
Pretender, or Bonnie Prince Charlie; and Henry IX., better known as
the Cardinal of York,--unwieldy sarcophagi of painted plaster. These
unhappy and--with the exception of the Cardinal of York--unworthy
princes rest here, and not beneath the elegant monument by Canova of an
angel with tired wings, which George IV. had the good grace to erect
to their memory on the first pier of the nave of St. Peter’s. When I
say unworthy, I must record this in James III.’s favour, that had he
seen fit to change his religion for the Crown of England, he would
have reigned longer than any of our Sovereigns, not excepting Queen
Victoria, for he survived his father by more than sixty-four years. Not
many in the history of the world have given up so much for their faith.
The _Grotte Vecchie_, which fill the space between the floor of Old
St. Peter’s and the present church, will hardly allow a tall man to
stand upright. Here are buried the brilliant young Emperor Otto II.,
and such famous Popes as Boniface VIII. (died 1303), Hadrian IV. (died
1159), Nicholas V. (died 1455), and Paul II. (died 1471). The fine
sarcophagi of Pius II. (Æneas Sylvius Piccolomini), the most courtly
of the Popes (died 1464), and of Alexander VI., the fierce Borgia Pope
(died 1503), do not hold their bones; the latter never did. Hadrian
IV. (died 1159), the only Englishman who ever grasped the keys of St.
Peter, lies in a mighty sarcophagus of Oriental granite. Paul II.,
who had the finest tomb of all the Middle Ages, fragments of which,
carved with incomparable grace by Mino da Fiesole, fill up half the
_Grotte Nuove_ (new crypt), lies in a plain sarcophagus, with its front
quite overwhelmed by the recumbent effigy on its lid, and covered by
an inscription as close as a column of a newspaper. A very simple
grave holds the greatest of the patrons of literature, Nicholas V. The
Emperor Otto II. lies in a plaster leviathan. Christina of Sweden, who
gave up her crown to be converted, and Charlotte of Cyprus, who had
been spoiled by the Egyptians and an unnatural natural brother, and
naïvely asked the Pope to make them disgorge her kingdom, lie under
plain incised slabs. Only one woman not a queen rests in Old St.
Peter’s, Madame Agnes, the Colonna who married a Caetani.
The _Grotte Nuove_ form the substructures of the dome, and are more
in the nature of a museum than a cemetery. Most important in them are
the frescoes of the old basilica, and some of its glories, like the
shrine of the Holy Lance. But there is a statue of St. Peter, older and
more beautiful than the statue worshipped above. Its body was a Roman
Consul, and its head was changed in the early days of Christianity.
Near by are a beautiful inscription of Pope Saint Damasus about the
drainage of the Vatican Hill;[7] and the exquisite bas-reliefs from
Nero’s Garden, which may have been the inspiration of Mino da Fiesole,
whose glorious sculptures, executed for the vast mausoleum of Paul II.,
fill, with the screen made by Matteo Pollaiuolo for the Old Confessio,
half these _Grotte Nuove_. Mino never excelled his figure of Faith,
holding a chalice on Paul II.’s tomb. Matteo, in his inspired moments,
approached Mino; in his uninspired moments he was no better than his
baroque successors. Beautiful, too, are the mosaics on Otto’s tomb, and
the noble throne on which St. Peter sits in the chapel of S. Maria
della Bocciata.
What you can see of the tomb of St. Peter in the crypt requires scant
mention. You look upon nothing ancient, hardly anything mediæval, or
worth remembering. It was inevitable that all its ancient features
should be sacrificed to wealth and piety. Pope Clement VIII., to whom
it had been vouchsafed to see the Apostolic tomb, lavished both upon
the chapel which he built over it in his gratitude.
I must say no more, till a later chapter, about this rich museum of Old
St. Peter’s; I must now try and draw a picture of the basilica itself.
Like the Lateran, St. Paul’s Without the Walls, S. Lorenzo Without the
Walls, S. Agnese Without the Walls, and SS. Pietro e Marcellino, it was
one of the six basilicas attributed to Constantine the Great. No one
of them has been suffered to continue in anything like its original
state, and Gregorovius will not admit that the evidence in favour of
any of them except the Lateran is more than presumptive. He says, in
vol. i. pp. 92-93 (Hamilton’s Translation): “It is entirely unknown
under what Pope and Emperor the Church of St. Peter was founded; but
besides the unanimous voice of tradition, all that can be gathered on
the subject from the Acts of the Church, added to the testimony of
the oldest chroniclers, lead us to the conclusion that it dates from
the time of Constantine. The _Liber Pontificalis_ states that at the
request of Bishop Sylvester the Emperor erected a basilica to St.
Peter in the Temple of Apollo, and enclosed the body of the Apostle
in an irremovable coffin of bronze of Cyprus. _The Temple of Apollo
in Vatican Territory_ is certainly only known to legend; but later
excavations have shown that the Church of St. Peter was founded near
a sanctuary dedicated to Cybele, whose rites were long celebrated
in Rome, and survived even after the time when Theodosius knelt at
the grave of the Apostle. Legend relates that Constantine himself
inaugurated the foundation by turning the first _spadeful of soil_,
of which, moreover, he carried _twelve basketfuls_, in honour of the
twelve Apostles. Whether the Circus of Caligula was already destroyed,
or whether this occurred during the construction, we do not know; it
is, at least, certain that the basilica was built _on one side of the
Circus and out of its materials_. This site was especially chosen
for the Church of the Prince of the Apostles as having, according to
tradition, been the _scene of his crucifixion_, and further sanctified
to Christianity by the martyrdoms which it had witnessed under Nero.”
Constantine, in 324 A.D., made Christianity the official religion of
the world, and his basilica lasted with ever-increasing splendour till
after the Reformation. Eighty-six of the two hundred and fifty-eight
Popes were buried in it, and one of them, Paul II., had the most
glorious tomb in all Italy. I can hardly conceive a supreme artist like
Bramante destroying it, but destroy it he did. He deserves his nickname
of “the ruiner” (_il Rovinante_).
[Illustration: Filippo Bonanni’s reconstruction of the Basilica of
Constantine.
A.--Exterior. B.--Interior.
]
The church at Rome which gives us the best idea of Old St. Peter’s
would be San Clemente, if the Irish College kept the _atrium_ open;
but San Clemente, for all its beauty and immense antiquity, is a small
affair. We can understand Old St. Peter’s better by comparing it to
the basilica of S. Ambrogio at Milan. Gregorovius has told us of “the
broad flight of marble steps leading up to the _atrium_, upon which was
the platform where St. Peter’s successor received the successors of
Constantine, when the latter came to pray at the grave of the Apostle,
or at the later date to receive the Imperial Crown at the hands of the
Pope.” These admitted to a superb _atrium_ or fore-court, one hundred
and seventy feet long, and almost as wide, which was encircled by a
colonnade and opened into a huge basilica over three hundred and thirty
feet long, consisting of a lofty nave terminating in an apse, four
aisles, and a transept, which projected slightly beyond the aisles and
divided the nave from its apse. This transept was probably raised above
the level of the nave like the transept of the great friar’s church
of Santa Croce at Florence, and made the church a “T” shape, instead
of cruciform, like our cathedrals. The nave was enormously high, one
hundred and twenty-five feet, and lighted with a clerestory above the
architrave, which rested on nearly a hundred monolith columns of the
most precious marbles taken from heathen temples. A double aisle on
each side was divided by a row of columns: the roofs were of wood.
Of the original Constantinian Church Gregorovius gives as unflattering
a picture as Mr. Frederic Harrison in his _Theophano_ quoted above:
“The great church was erected in haste. The execution and the
workmanship were bad, and the style from the first barbarous; the apse
and outer walls were built from materials collected at random; the
architrave, which rested upon the columns within, was pieced out of
antique fragments, and even the ancient pillars of marble or granite,
ninety-six in number, did not correspond in either capitals or bases.
Slabs of marble from the Circus, on which the original inscriptions
or Pagan sculptures still remained, served for the threshold. We
are surprised to find in the earliest basilica of St. Peter the
characteristic peculiar to so many of the present churches in Rome,
namely, the presence of Pagan relics in the shape of fragments, and
patchwork of ancient marbles. The interior, which was entered by five
doors opening into five naves, was large and of imposing dimensions.
The light descended into the lofty central nave through small arched
windows disclosing the rough rafters of the roof, and flickered, now on
a pavement formed of a patchwork of ancient marbles, now on high walls
as yet unrelieved by mosaics.”
But in process of time the interior became a glory of mosaics and
marbles, and in the preciousness of its materials, the flash of
gold and mellowness of colour, must have rivalled the two gems of
Christendom--St. Mark’s and the Royal Chapel at Palermo. Its façade was
decorated with a mosaic representing the Lamb of God, between animals
symbolizing the Evangelists, and at each end of its gable was a huge
bronze peacock, the emblem of immortality. According to Klaczko, the
_atrium_ was filled with a profusion of flowers and trees--palms,
cypresses, olives, and rose trees--and ornamented on all sides with a
handsome Corinthian portico. At the right of the church door rose a
slender and lofty bell-tower, of the age of Charlemagne, with a queer
little pointed steeple. But the great feature of the _atrium_ was the
famous Cantharus, or fountain of lustration, in the centre. “It was
a magnificent fountain, surrounded by eight porphyry columns, and
protected by a gilded roof, with a great display of dolphins, peacocks,
and dragons on it. A colossal pine-cone in bronze, reputed to have been
brought from Hadrian’s mausoleum, formed the core of the fountain....
Dante, to give a measure of the formidable Nimrod, the founder of
Babylon, whom he encounters in the lowest circle of the Inferno, says
that the giant’s head appeared to him ‘long and large as the pine-cone
of St. Peter’s in Rome, and the rest of him to correspond.’” This
pine-cone and the peacocks are still preserved in the Garden of the
Pigna, which is surrounded by the Sculpture Galleries of the Vatican.
It was of this fountain that S. Paulinus of Nola, quoted by Gregorovius
(Hamilton’s Translation), wrote: “Where the _atrium_ expands into an
entrance hall, adorned by the fountain which, refreshing our hands and
lips with its welcome flow, gurgles under the shadow of the massive
bronze cupola with its four pillars, forming a mystic circle round the
gushing waters. Could there be any ornament more befitting the entrance
to the church, preparing, as it does, all who come in for the sacred
mysteries that await them?”
Pope Saint Damasus added a Baptistery to the _atrium_ in 366; we
know from a poem of Prudentius that it had very fine mosaics. In it
was placed the famous chair of St. Peter, which has, since the time
of Alexander VII. (1655-1667), been preserved in the Tribune of St.
Peter’s.
Another building outside the main basilica was the famous _Templum
Probi_, which occupied approximately the site of the present sacristy,
and was the mortuary chapel of the Anicii, “the celebrated senatorial
family which had embraced Christianity earlier than any other in Rome,”
and which numbered among its heads Gregory the Great himself. Anicius
Probus, four times Prefect of Rome, who shared the Consulship with
the Emperor Gratian, the last great Mæcenas of Rome, was buried in it
in the beautiful sarcophagus which is now preserved in the Cappella
della Pietà of St. Peter’s. Junius Bassus, whose glorious sarcophagus
is in the crypt of the great basilica beside the tomb of the Apostle,
was also a member of the family. Near this was the imperial mausoleum
built by the Emperor Honorius for his wives Maria and Thermantia,
the daughters of Stilicho, which was turned by Pope Stephen II. into
a circular chapel in honour of S. Petronilla. I have referred to it
in the chapter on the Sistine Treasure. “In the time of Honorius
the ancient basilica of St. Peter was a large and elongated brick
building, the gable of which, surmounted by a cross, rose over the
pillared, cloister-like vestibule” (Gregorovius). It was Honorius who
persuaded the Emperor Heraclius to bestow upon St. Peter’s the famous
gilt bronze tiles of the finest temple Rome ever had--that Temple of
Venus and Rome, of which the remains at the end of the Forum still
fill us with astonishment, and which even the Vandals had spared. This
was the death-warrant of the Temple. “Its tiles were removed to cover
the roof of St. Peter’s, and scarcely a Roman but rejoiced, scarcely
one who bewailed the ruin of one of the finest monuments of antiquity”
(Gregorovius).
Another great building Pope was Hadrian I. (772-795), the friend whose
name is inseparably linked with that of the mighty Charlemagne, by
the famous epitaph preserved in the porch of the present St. Peter’s:
the Emperor aided him generously in his benefactions. But he was a
restorer and embellisher rather than an originator. His principal
work was the restoration of what must have been one of the finest
architectural ornaments of Rome--the great portico which led from the
Ælian bridge--remains of which are still embodied in the Bridge of
Sant’ Angelo--up to Old St. Peter’s. It was he who restored the mosaics
of Old St. Peter’s, and covered the floor of the shrine with heavy
tiles of silver and the walls of the inner shrine with plates of gold
embossed with scenes from the Bible; overlaid the altar with wrought
gold; and erected statues in massive gold to Our Saviour and the
Virgin, St. Peter, St. Paul, and St. Andrew. “Everything else,” says
Gregorovius, “was done with the same lavish splendour. Tapestries of
purple and gold were hung between the columns of the nave at festivals.
At Christmas and Easter, on the feast of each of the two Apostles, and
on that of the Pope, the huge lamp, known as the _great Pharos_, or
lighthouse, was lit. This lamp, which hung suspended from the silver
cross-beams of the Arch of Triumph above the shrine, was also the gift
of Hadrian, and with its one thousand three hundred and seventy lights
well deserved the name bestowed upon it.”
[Illustration: The Porch of St. Peter’s. _From Pistolesi’s “Il
Vaticano.”_]
The place of Pope Hadrian’s great portico as an architectural
link between the Tiber and St. Peter’s is taken by the noble
fifteenth-century Archi-Ospedale di Santo Spirito, erected for Sixtus
IV. by Caprina--mellow old brickwork filling the site of the inn for
pilgrims which the King of the West Saxons had erected for pilgrims
from England in 717, and which was burnt twice, first by the Saracens,
and afterwards by Frederick Barbarossa. Vast numbers of Anglo-Saxon
pilgrims came to Rome: at least three Saxon Kings died there.
The heroic but barbarous Cadwalla, King of the West Saxons, in 689,
after covering himself with glory in war, determined to go to Rome and
be baptized by the Pope; he was baptized under the name of Peter on
Easter Eve, clad in white and with a lighted taper in his hand, and
was buried in the _atrium_ of St. Peter’s. His epitaph is still in
existence, and does not at all tally with Professor Freeman’s judgment
of him. The example was contagious: only twenty years later two other
English Kings, Coenred of Mercia, and Offa, King of the East Saxons,
went to Rome, not only to be baptized, but to give up their crowns and
possessions and become monks. “Their long waving hair was cut off and
dedicated to St. Peter; their royal youth was buried in the white frock
of monasticism, and the princes from Arthur’s heroic island deemed
themselves fortunate in being permitted to disappear from sight, amid a
swarm of obscure monks, in one of the convents near St. Peter’s, with
the prospect of a grave in the _atrium_ of the basilica, and a place
among the blessed in Heaven” (Gregorovius).
But these monarchs are of small importance compared with the great
Alfred and the mighty Canute, the most famous respectively of our
Saxon and of our Danish Kings, both of whom visited Rome. Indeed,
Alfred was there twice. When he was four years old, his father,
Ethelwulf, sent him, it is thought in charge of St. Swithin, the
masterful Bishop and rainy Saint of Winchester, to the Warrior Pope, S.
Leo IV., who built the vast walls round the Vatican, which still tower
above the gardens of the Popes. Leo not only took him for “Bishop’s
son” or godchild, but hallowed him as a King (which, as Freeman says,
was a curious proceeding, considering that England had nothing to do
with Rome, and that Alfred was the younger son; nor did it prevent
three of his brothers occupying the throne before him). Alfred returned
to England, but two years later, when Ethelwulf, having made his
country secure against the Danes and given a tenth of his goods to the
Church, himself made a pilgrimage to Rome, he took Alfred with him.
Ethelwulf allowed the Pope to crown him, and determined, “for the
welfare of his soul, to send yearly to Rome, out of his private income,
the sum of three hundred marks, one hundred of which were destined to
fill the lamps of St. Peter’s with oil on Easter Eve and the morning
of Easter Day, one hundred for the same service at St. Paul’s, and one
hundred were a present to the Holy Father himself. From this annual
donation proceeded the so-called Peter’s penny, or Romescot”[8]
(Pauli).
He also rebuilt the “Saxon Schools,” which had, as mentioned, twice
been destroyed by fire, and gave enormous gifts to St. Peter’s. Both on
his way there and his way back he stopped at the Court of Charles the
Bald, grandson of Charlemagne, whose beautiful young daughter Judith he
married on the second occasion. Who knows what seeds of greatness may
not have been planted in the mind of the child Alfred by that double
visit to Rome, and that double visit to the Imperial Court? In Rome he
stayed for more than a year.
Rome seems at any rate to have had a profound influence on Canute, who,
as ruler of England and the Scandinavian kingdoms, was a more powerful
monarch than either Pope or Emperor. This was in the year 1027, when
the Emperor Conrad was crowned at St. Peter’s at Easter, and walked
from the church to his palace between two Kings, Canute and Rudolph of
Burgundy, who were present at the coronation.
Canute, who was liberal in his gifts, showed his influence by inducing
the Pope to free the English School at Rome from all taxes. But the
most remarkable feature about his visit to Rome was the famous letter
to the English from Rome, which is one of the greatest letters in all
literature, and can only be compared to the last testament of St.
Louis, as he lay dying of the plague at Carthage. From it we know that
Canute visited the tomb of St. Peter, and was moved to the vow of
repentance which changed him to such a just King in the latter part of
his reign.
The coffers of the Pope were overflowing with the offerings of the
pilgrims. The Saxons had a church, Santa Maria, on the site of S.
Spirito, and the church of S. Michele in Sassia, though entirely
rebuilt, is the church of the Frisians.
In the eleventh and twelfth centuries St. Peter’s, like the Pantheon,
was often used as a fortress. The great Pope Alexander III. stood a
siege of eight days in it from Frederick Barbarossa. The _atrium_
and the tower of Santa Maria in Turri at the head of the staircase
were fortified. At the close of eight days the fortifications were
so battered down by Frederick and his allies from Viterbo, that the
garrison laid down its arms to save St. Peter’s from destruction. Then
Frederick installed his Anti-Pope, Paschal III.
The _atrium_ and narthex were used for those who were not full members
of the Church--catechumens, penitents, and others; the fountain was for
ablutions, like the fountains in the courtyard of Turkish mosques and
Japanese temples. The nave and aisles were occupied at services by the
laity who were full members of the Church; the raised transept by the
clergy and persons of distinction; the presbyters of the Church sat on
a circular bench running round the wall of the apse; half to the right
and half to the left of the Bishop’s throne, which occupied the exact
centre, as it still does in more than one of the Roman basilicas.
The Confessio, containing the tomb of the martyr, generally sunk
several feet below the level of the floor, here as in S. Giorgio in
Velabro, and other primitive basilicas, stood just in front of the
apse. This is important, because the tomb of St. Peter is, with the
exception of the floor of the basilica of Constantine, the only part of
Old St. Peter’s which exists undisturbed.
One must not imagine that the gold lamps (nearly a hundred in number)
which burn in front of the burial-place of Peter, the rock upon whom
the Church is founded, or the glittering oriental alabaster to be
seen to-day, go back to the times of the old basilica, much less of
Constantine, but the grille in front of the tomb, though not Ancient
Roman, is of respectable antiquity, for it was put up by the last great
Pope but one, Innocent III. (died 1216), who imposed his tyrannical
will, not only on our weak King John, but on the mighty Philip Augustus
of France, whom he separated from his lovely and beloved Agnes of
Méran: so was the _Fenestella Confessionis_. Of the actual tomb of St.
Peter one can see nothing. It is more than ever concealed since Clement
VIII. had it walled over. It occupies approximately the spot beneath
the Papal altar. Constantine had the remains enclosed in a great coffin
of gold-plated bronze, and placed in a vault lined with gold, beneath
lamps which, like the lamps hung round the Confessio of the present
church, were never extinguished. There was an altar above the shrine,
and over it rose a little temple on six porphyry columns. This kind of
temple over the altar is a feature of most of the old basilicas which
have survived.
The word basilica is only properly applied to the ancient Roman
churches whose distinguishing mark is the altar in the centre of the
church, at which the celebrant stands facing the people, like the Papal
altar in St. Peter’s. As a consequence, basilicas have their High
Altar at the west end. In the Middle Ages, Klaczko tells us, people
were never weary of endowing this tomb and altar with every imaginable
splendour of gold and gems; the numerous spoliations they suffered
from Saracen, and even Christian, invaders, could not discourage the
generous piety of the faithful.
After the Saracen sack of the ninth century S. Leo IV. covered the
High Altar with plates of gold set with precious stones and enamelled
portraits like the paliotto of S. Ambrose at Milan, gave golden tables,
one of which alone weighed two hundredweight, a silver crucifix
set with diamonds and amethysts, weighing seventy pounds, a silver
ciborium, with columns weighing three-quarters of a ton, and a cross of
gold encrusted with pearls, emeralds, and opals, which weighed half a
ton: not to mention vases, censers, lamps of gold and silver, jewelled
chalices, lecterns of wrought silver, silver doors, rare tapestries and
hangings, robes and altar-cloths of silk and velvet set with pearls and
precious stones and covered with golden embroideries. It was nothing
particular to have a golden ciborium set with the most precious stones.
We know that Ethelwulf, the father of King Alfred, bestowed gifts,
consisting of a gold crown of four pounds’ weight, two dishes of the
purest gold, a sword richly set in gold, two gold images, silver-gilt
Saxon urns, stoles bordered with gold and purple stripes, white silken
garments for celebrating the Mass, decorated with figures, and other
costly articles of clothing required for the services of the Church.
Narratives of the period never cease dilating upon the immense
treasures gathered there--tabernacles, ciboria, crosses, vases,
candelabra, cherubs, and statues. There was a porphyry balustrade,
surmounted by alabaster columns with an architrave of silver, decorated
with chalices, _fleur-de-lys_, and translucent vases; in the centre
there was an arcade surmounted by a golden Christ, attended by tall
silver angels. The alabaster columns were spiral, and were surrounded
by carved vine sprays; according to tradition they came from the Temple
of Solomon. It was these, says Klaczko, which gave Bernini the idea of
his frightful baldacchino (three of them are preserved in the present
basilica). He believes that Giulio Romano’s fresco in the Vatican
Stanze, known as the Donation of Constantine, is a representation of
the Old St. Peter’s. “The scene takes place in the old basilica. In the
background, in front of the High Altar, there are visible the twisted
columns standing upon a stylobate, and supporting an architrave from
which are suspended lamps. Is the production exact at every point?
This I should not dare to affirm; but it is the work of Giulio
Romano and his companions; it dates from a time when the chancel was
yet standing.” Raffaelle evidently had this balustrade in his mind in
his tapestry of the beautiful Gate of the Temple of Jerusalem.
[Illustration: The Donation of Constantine, by Giulio Romano and other
pupils of Raffaelle, in the Stanze. Showing the interior of Old St.
Peter’s. _From Pistolesi’s “Il Vaticano.”_]
Old St. Peter’s consisted then of a great court, with a splendid
fountain in its centre, surrounded by a rich mass of vegetation, as
sad as cypresses and as gay as roses, in its cloister garth; and with
the cloister itself, like the narthex, filled with the tombs of early
Popes and Kings. More than fourscore Popes were buried in Sylvester’s
basilica, and it was only after the lapse of centuries that they were
allowed to crowd into the church. The early Christians considered it
irreverent to erect tombs in the churches themselves: the ancient
Romans did not allow burials in the city bounds at all. St. Peter
himself was buried in the ancient Roman fashion, alongside of one of
the great roads leading out of Rome, the Via Cornelia, selected as the
scene of his martyrdom.
The façades of both _atrium_ and church glittered with mosaics like
the façade of Santa Maria in Trastevere to-day. Against the exterior
there was an agglomeration of convents, minor churches, hospitals, and
houses, clinging to it like barnacles to a rock which is submerged
at high tide. As this hive of buildings stood on its lofty terrace,
approached by marble steps and backed by the towered and battlemented
castle of the Popes, in the fifteenth century, it was an Italian
Nüremberg.
Inside the church the number of mosaics is inconceivable to those who
have not seen St. Mark’s or the Royal Chapel at Palermo, especially
noteworthy, as we know from the paintings preserved of it in the crypt
of St. Peter’s, being those of the Holy Lance. The mosaics of the
great Triumphal Arch went back to Constantine, who placed upon it the
inscription which recited the supremacy of St. Peter.
Five gates gave access to the nave and the four aisles; the outside
gate on the left was called the _Porta_ or _Janua Judicii_, by which
the dead were carried into the church. The massive gate in the centre
was called the _Porta Argentea_, which was covered with silver plates.
Next to it on the right was the _Porta Romana_, which was reserved
for the Roman people; and on the left the _Porta Ravignana_, or
_Ravennata_, because it was reserved for the inhabitants of Trastevere
descended from the garrison sent from Ravenna by one of the Exarchs.
The outside gate on the right, the _Porta Guidonea_, was used by the
pilgrims.[9]
[Illustration: Old St. Peter’s, with the procession transporting the
body of St. Gregory the Great in the foreground, and the dome of the
present Church rising behind. Painted by P. Brill.]
Old St. Peter’s, with its _atrium_, was as long as the great church of
to-day, and its width was not greatly less. It was venerable beyond
all other churches in the world, not only for its hoary architecture,
rich with the velvet touch of a thousand years, and its avenues of
tombs of the great of the earth in mosaics and marbles; it was rich
beyond all other churches in relics of martyrs and apostles, yes, even
of the Saviour Himself; and the gold and silver offerings of the loyal
and devout, which had accumulated in the centuries since the last sack
of Rome. It was richest in sentiment and association, for it had been
Christianity’s Holy of Holies, where the successors of St. Peter had
been enthroned, and had issued their messages to the world from the
time--almost the hour--that Constantine made Christianity the religion
of the Empire over which he ruled. In it Gregory the Great (died 604)
was borne to the tomb inscribed with the Conversion of England. In it
Boniface VIII. (died 1303), who died with unbeaten pride, was laid in
the incomparable sarcophagus by Arnolfo di Lapo, which is still the
glory of the crypt, though the actual sarcophagus is all that remains
of his magnificent mortuary chapel: and in it Innocent III. (died
1216), while smiting Europe with a rod of iron, found time to leave
noble monuments in bronze and mosaic.
Old St. Peter’s was the outward and visible sign of the Apostolic
Succession. Here people could tread the stones trodden by the
Christians in the day of Constantine, who exulted in the fulfilment of
the prophecy that the earth should be the Lord’s.
It looked as if it had not been built by the hands of men, but moulded
by time. The holiness which had accumulated in this building exceeded
even the holiness of the Temple of Jerusalem. So many years, so many
sacrifices, so many memories, so many remains, of what was most sacred
or most famous had been garnered into it. It is hard to believe that
any Christian man would have dared to lay his hand on the church where
nearly a hundred of the successors of St. Peter had been laid in the
expectation that there they would rest till the Last Trump. But in the
fifteenth century, the melting-pot of the Middle Ages, it began to be
whispered that the old church was worn out and must come down. The
best that can be said for those who repeated it is that Nicholas V.
(died 1455), the founder of archæology, the first of all the Popes to
love and try and save the treasures of antiquity, of which they were
the heedless heirs, was convinced by the arguments of the Florentine
architect Alberti,[10] and began to build a new church round the old.
He broke off his work. Was it because his heart failed him?
Julius II. (died 1513) took up the work. To him nothing was sacred but
the prestige of the Popes. He was, like Nero, consumed with a desire to
rebuild Rome on an unprecedented scale, and by a curious coincidence
St. Peter’s stands on the site of the Gardens and Circus of Nero.
Nero was accused of burning Rome to secure a site for his building
operations. Julius II. did not go so far; he only broke up the church,
which had been the cradle of Christendom for nearly twelve hundred
years, in such indecent haste that the tombs of eighty-six of his
predecessors were reduced to rubbish heaps. He could not even spare
the masterpiece of Mino da Fiesole, the mausoleum of Paul II.
With the destruction of Old St. Peter’s the misfortunes predicted by
the ancient superstition for anyone who disturbed the tomb of St. Peter
seem to have overtaken the Papacy. Old St. Peter’s was the tabernacle
of all Christendom, the present church is hardly more than the
tabernacle of Southern Christendom.
CHAPTER VI
REMAINS OF OLD ST. PETER’S STILL SURVIVING IN ROME
Most of the remains of Old St. Peter’s are to be found in the crypt of
the present church, the greater part of which, called by the Romans
the _Grotte Vecchie_, preserves the actual floor of the old church
intact. Another piece--a mosaic--belonging to the chapel which John
VII. (705-707) built in his short reign to receive the Volto Santo--one
of the major relics of the present church--is in the sacristy of S.
Maria in Cosmedin. Coarse as it may seem in its present position, it
nevertheless represents the most considerable artistic achievement of
the age.
[Illustration: Giotto’s (much restored) Mosaic, called the Navicella,
in the Porch of St. Peter’s.
_From Pistolesi’s “Il Vaticano.”_]
The remaining fragments are mostly in the present basilica. Important
among them is a part of the mosaic called the Navicella, designed by
Giotto in 1298, but restored out of all recognition. It represented
St. Peter walking on the waters; and stood over the eastern entrance
of the _atrium_ in front of the old basilica. There are also three
inscriptions which stood in front of the old basilica--one of which
is a grant of indulgences by the strenuous old Pope, Boniface VIII.,
on the occasion of the first jubilee, 1300; another, six hundred years
earlier, records the grant of certain olive gardens for supplying the
oil of the cathedral lamps by Gregory II.; and the third--far the
most interesting of the three--is that erected by Charlemagne over
the tomb of Hadrian I., 772-795, which is thus Englished by Mr. R.
W. Seton Watson in his translation of Gregorovius’s _Tombs of the
Popes_, published by Archibald Constable & Co., with whose permission I
reproduce it.
“Here has Pope Adrian found his rest--the Father of the Church,
The ornament of Rome, the immortal writer.
For him, to live was God; Piety was his law, his glory, Christ;
He was an apostolic shepherd, ready for every good deed.
He was noble by birth, and sprung from an ancient race;
Yet nobler far by reason of his holy merits.
The devout soul of this good Shepherd burned ever and in all places
To adorn the temples dedicated to God.
He heaped gifts upon the churches, and embued the people with the sacred dogmas;
To all he opened the narrow way to Heaven.
Generous to the poor, unequalled in piety, and instant in devout prayers for all men,
He was the glory of the City and the World;
By his doctrines, by his treasures, by the walls he built,
He raised thy citadels to honour, O noble Rome!
Death has not harmed him, since Death was conquered by the Saviour’s death--
Nay rather, Death has become the gate of a better life.
I, Charles, have writ these lines, in tears over my father.
O my father, my sweet love, for thee I mourn.
O forget me not! My thoughts are ever with thee.
Mayst thou abide with Christ in the blissful realms of Heaven!
Clergy and People alike loved thee with ardent love;
Thou alone wert loved of all, O best of Pontiffs.
Most illustrious of men, I link thy name and titles with my own--
I, Charles the King, thou, Adrian the Pope.
Ye who may chance to read these lines, say, with devout and suppliant heart,
‘Have pity upon them both, most merciful God!’
May this thy body rest in peace, beloved Father,
And may thy gentle soul joy with the saints of God--
Yea, till the last trump shall sound in thine ears.
Then rise with Peter, Prince of the Apostles, to behold thy God.
Thou wilt hear, I know, thy Judge’s clement voice,
‘Enter thou upon the great joys of thy Lord!’
Then most loving Father, be mindful, I beseech thee, of thy son!
And say, ‘Let this my son gain entrance with his father!’
O blessed Father, seek Christ’s heavenly Kingdom,
And thence aid with thy prayers thine earthly flock!
While yet the ruddy sun shines forth from his flaming chariot,
Thy praise, Holy Father, shall never cease on earth.
Pope Adrian, of blessed memory, reigned twenty-three years ten months
seventeen days, and died on the seventh of the Kalends of January.”
It is needless to say that Charlemagne did not write it himself,
because he could not write. It is generally assigned to the famous
English scholar, Alcuin, the most distinguished scholar of the eighth
century, who, from being master of the cloister school at York, became
the friend of Charlemagne, and made his court a school of culture for
the hitherto barbarous Frankish Empire.
The great bronze doors of the central entrance of St. Peter’s, which
are only open for grand ceremonies, also belong to the old basilica.
They were completed by Antonio Filarete and Simone Ghini in 1445; and,
of course, refer to the martyrdom of St. Peter and St. Paul. They
are chiefly interesting as portraying several classical buildings
which were then perfect, but have since been destroyed, including the
so-called tomb of Romulus (Meta Romuli), one of the landmarks on which
the erroneous location of St. Peter’s martyrdom was founded. From this,
called also, in the Middle Ages, the tomb of Scipio--perhaps in order
to connect the great hero of Republican Rome with the chief of the
Apostles--were taken the vast blocks of white marble with which Pope
Donus paved the _atrium_ of St. Peter’s.
[Illustration:
The Bronze Doors removed from Old St. Peter’s to the present Church.
They were made by Filarete and Ghini, and the bottom right panel
shows the Tomb of Caius Cestius and Tomb of Romulus at the Duae
Metae. _From Pistolesi’s “Il Vaticano.”_
]
Inside the Cathedral the bronze statue of St. Peter, whose foot is
kissed by the faithful, is of high antiquity. By its style it cannot
have been the actual statue, as has been so often asserted, of Jupiter
Capitolinus; though it may have been cast from it, as another legend
asserts, by S. Leo the Great, 440-461, since it is possibly of the
fifth century, as Platner and Bunsen are ready to admit, though it is
more like work of the sixth century. Marucchi thinks that Leo may have
had the statue made out of gratitude for his repulse of Attila. The
statue stood formerly in the oratory of St. Martin, afterwards in
the Chapel of SS. Processus and Martinian. Paul V. erected it in its
present position. It is supposed to be the statue about which Pope
Gregory II. wrote to Leo the Isaurian, who had threatened to destroy
it, “That the people would know how to defend it, and that he would not
be answerable for the blood that might be shed.”
The bronze grille of the Confessio was given by the great Pope Innocent
III., who also ordered the mosaics lining the little chamber behind,
which is right over the tomb of St. Peter, and contains the golden
casket made by Benvenuto Cellini, used for the consecration of the
_pallium_.
The great relics of the church, such as the Volto Santo, or S.
Veronica’s Handkerchief; the Lance of S. Longinus, which pierced Our
Saviour’s side; the piece of the True Cross; and the Head of St.
Andrew, not to mention the relics of St. Peter and St. Paul, were, of
course, transferred from the old basilica.
The story of S. Veronica’s Handkerchief is best told by Gregorovius
(Hamilton’s Translation), vol. II. p. 198.
“Tiberius, afflicted with incurable leprosy, one day informed the
senators that, being beyond the aid of man, he must have recourse to
Heaven. He had been told that a divine magician, named Jesus, dwelt in
Jerusalem, and he ordered the patrician Volusian immediately to repair
thither and implore the renowned physician to accompany him back to
the Imperial court. Storms delayed the arrival of the messenger for a
whole year; and on reaching Jerusalem, Volusian was met by Pilate with
regrets that the Emperor had not sooner made known his desires, as
the magician had already been crucified by the Jews. Volusian, unable
to execute his commission, thought himself fortunate in obtaining a
portrait of Jesus. Veronica, a pious matron, had wiped the face of the
Saviour as he passed, overpowered by the weight of the cross, and the
Saviour, in return, had allowed the cloth to retain the impress of
His features. Volusian conducted Veronica, and with her the portrait,
back to Rome, bringing Pilate in chains on board the same vessel. When
they arrived in the presence of the Emperor, Tiberius sentenced the
ex-governor to lifelong exile in the town of Ameria. The handkerchief
he ordered to be brought before him, and hardly had he set eyes on
it when he burst into tears, fell on his knees in adoration, and
immediately recovered of his leprosy. He heaped wealth upon Veronica,
and had the handkerchief set in gold and precious stones, and preserved
in his palace. He survived his recovery only nine months--an interval
which he spent in constant prayer to the Saviour and in adoration of
His portrait.”
* * * * *
Gregorovius adds in a footnote, that the Jesuit Landsberg assures us
that the portrait is true to life, and even discovers the print of
the blow inflicted by an impious soldier on the face of Christ. He
says that the legend is one of a number which bring the Pagan Emperors
into Christianity, and attributes to the twelfth century the legend
which relates that Tiberius, in consequence of his miraculous cure,
ordered Christ to be enrolled among the Gods, but admits that Bishop
Orosius, who lived seven centuries earlier and who knew nothing of the
Handkerchief, informs us that Tiberius, on the refusal of the Senate
to enroll Christ among the Gods, became suddenly transformed from an
amiable prince into a cruel tyrant.
Roman Catholic hagiologists recognize that Veronica is a corruption of
_Vera Icon_ (the True Likeness), and do not claim that the devout woman
was called Veronica. She is said to have lived to be a hundred, and
bequeathed the Handkerchief at her death to Pope Clement, the fourth
Pope, who was elected 91 A.D. The Popes kept it in their treasury till
the time of Boniface IV., at the beginning of the seventh century.
He gave it a shrine in the Pantheon, where a chest is still shown
with a Latin inscription to this effect: “In this chest the Cloth of
the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ was brought from Jerusalem to
the Emperor Tiberius,” though it obviously has no pretensions to the
necessary antiquity. John VII., about a century later, built the chapel
for it at St. Peter’s mentioned above. The S. Veronica of the Hagiology
is a fifteenth-century saint.
At the west end of the right aisle, in the chapel of the Pietà, are
several most ancient objects. The first is the white marble column
called the Colonna Santa, one of the twelve which ornamented the
Confessio of the old basilica. It is said, writes the Rev. H. W.
Pullen, to have been brought from the Temple of Solomon at Jerusalem;
and to be the one against which the Saviour leaned when He disputed
with the Doctors. It is highly ornamented with wreaths and spiral
flutings, and is enclosed in a pyramidal cage of ironwork. The marble
well-mouth which surrounds the base was added by Cardinal Orsini in
1438.
On the opposite side of the chapel is a sarcophagus of the same
century as the famous sarcophagus of Junius Bassus, which is one of
the chief glories of the crypt. It belonged to Anicius Probus, who was
also Prefect of Rome, and was a member of the Anicii, the greatest
family in Rome at that period. This sarcophagus was formerly used as
a pedestal for the baptismal font, and came from the mortuary chapel,
called the Templum Probi, which stood on the site of the present
Sacristy.
The monument of the Countess Matilda of Tuscany, who was the chief
founder of the temporal power of the Popes, is on the pier just by the
next chapel--that of S. Sebastian. It belongs, however, not to the
date of her death in 1115, but to that of the removal of her remains
from Mantua to St. Peter’s in 1635 by Urban VIII. It is the work of
Bernini. In the next chapel, that of the Holy Sacrament, through which
the Pope enters St. Peter’s from the Vatican, is the gorgeous mediæval
tomb of Sixtus IV., executed by Antonio Pollaiuolo in 1493, which, in
spite of its rather decadent and quite irreverent character, is one of
the finest bronze monuments in Italy. A little plain slab beside it
marks the tomb of the ambitious Julius II., the real founder of the
New St. Peter’s. The tomb of Sixtus, who built the Sistine Chapel,
though rich and beautiful, is neither elegant nor good art. The two
spiral columns of Tyrian marble in this chapel are like that in the
chapel of the Pietà, from the Confessio of Old St. Peter’s. In the next
chapel, the Cappella Gregoriana, is an ancient image of the Madonna
di Soccorso, dating from 1118, which was in Old St. Peter’s. Opposite
the left aisle of the tribune is the Madonna della Colonna, consisting
of a picture of the Madonna and Child, painted on a column of Porta
Santa marble. I leave for fuller treatment below one of the earliest
and most precious monuments preserved in the Cathedral,--the ancient
Chair of St. Peter, which is kept either in the costly but hopelessly
baroque monument, erected to receive it by Alexander VII., or else, as
some say, in a safe in the wall behind. In any case it occupies the
centre of the tribune wall. The Cappella Clementina, near the entrance
to the Sacristy, contains whatever remains there are, after so many
removals, of the body of St. Gregory the Great. On a pier opposite the
place where the body of the late Pope is always laid, until its new
monument is ready, between the Chapel of the Presentation and the Choir
of the Canons, is the tomb of Innocent VIII., erected in 1492, which is
really the finest mediæval monument in St. Peter’s. Like that of Sixtus
IV., it is by Antonio Pollaiuolo. But his brother, Pietro, collaborated
in this monument, which is in far better taste. It was Innocent VIII.
who built the villa in the Vatican gardens which is now the Sculpture
Museum. Gregorovius, translated by Mr. Seton Watson, is perhaps a
little too hard on this sculpture. “Like the Tomb of Sixtus,
it is paltry and full of affectation. The Pope lies upon a bronze
sarcophagus, resting on the pier. Above the tomb he is represented once
more, as in life, enthroned and raising his right hand in blessing,
while he holds in his left the Holy Lance which came as a present from
the Sultan Bajazet. On either side the niches of the pillars are filled
with theological and moral virtues--Faith, Love and Hope, Justice,
Courage, Moderation, and Wisdom. The inscription acclaims Innocent as
the unwearied preserver of peace in Italy, and as the glory of the new
world which was discovered in his reign.”
[Illustration: The Tomb of Sixtus IV. in the Chapel of the Holy
Sacrament. This is the Chapel where the dead Pope lies in state.]
In the Baptistery close by is the font, a magnificent piece of porphyry
which is wrongly claimed to have been the cover of the sarcophagus of
the Emperor Otto II., who died in 983. It is also claimed to have been
the lid of the sarcophagus in which Hadrian was buried in the Castle
of Sant’ Angelo; but it is now considered to have formed part of the
sarcophagus of the famous, or infamous, Crescentius, who was put to
death by Otto III. in 996. Crescentius, calling himself Consul or
Senator of Rome, on the plea of freeing the Romans from the usurpations
of Pope and Emperor, and giving them local self-government, seized the
power himself. Otto, who was sixteen, had him executed in the Castle
of Sant’ Angelo and subjected his dead body to all manner of ignominy
and contempt. But _the wonder of the world_, as his own generation
calls him, says Bryce in his _Holy Roman Empire_, died childless on
the threshold of manhood; the victim, if we may trust the story of
the times, of the revenge of Stephania, the widow of Crescentius, who
ensnared him by her beauty, and killed him with lingering poison. Otto
III. was not, as one guide-book states, buried in the crypt of St.
Peter’s; he is buried in the choir of the Cathedral at Aix-la-Chapelle,
where Charlemagne lies.
The Sacristy contains some remains of Old St. Peter’s, such as the
three panels from the _Confessio_ of Old St. Peter’s which were painted
by Giotto on both sides for Cardinal Stefaneschi. The frescoes, by
Melozzo da Forli, are not, of course, from Old St. Peter’s, but from
the church of SS. Apostoli. In the Treasury of the Sacristy is the
celebrated Vatican Cross which bears the name of the Emperor Justin
II., 565-578, for whom it was made; the wooden panelling, representing
Our Lord sitting between St. Peter and St. Paul, cannot, as Marucchi,
the de Rossi of the day, points out, have been presented by Constantine
the Great, as the legend on it claims, for it is clearly a work of
the ninth century; and the Slavonic inscription upon it has now been
deciphered, and declares it to have been presented to the tomb of St.
Peter’s by S. Cyril and S. Methodius: Cyril was the church name adopted
by a noble Roman of Thessalonica, named Constantine.
Of the famous relic of the Volto Santo, Marucchi says that, although it
is certainly very ancient, there is no mention of it before Bernard of
Soracte in the eleventh century. He adds that the reproductions of it
are all imaginary; on the original you can only see a few faint traces.
I suppose that the most of the general public imagine that the chair
of St. Peter is the chair in which his statue sits in the nave of his
cathedral for the faithful to kiss his foot, as the faithful have
kissed the foot of this venerable image for twelve hundred years. This
is not the chair of St. Peter. Only once in a hundred years do human
eyes behold the chair which tradition claims to have been used by the
Apostle in the meetings of the Earliest Church. Popular tradition
believes it to be enclosed in the bronze chair, weighing, with its
accessories, a hundred and nine tons, constructed at a cost of £24,000
by Bernini, for the rich Chigi Pope, Alexander VII. (1655-1667),
a miracle of bad taste, one of the most vulgar monuments in the
cathedral, which stands in the centre of the tribunal at the east
end. It is not there, but in a cupboard behind, high up in the wall,
locked with three separate keys, each kept by a different functionary.
I append the description given of it by the chief ecclesiastical
antiquary of Rome, Professor Marucchi, _Éléments d’Archéologie
Chrétienne_. Professor Marucchi had the information from Signor de
Rossi, one of the most famous of all Italian antiquaries, who was
permitted by Pius IX. to examine the precious relic.
[Illustration: The Statue of St. Peter in St. Peter’s. It dates from
the 6th Century.]
“The chair of St. Peter is the most important relic of the Apostle
after his tomb. Several ancient testimonies make allusion to this
monument. Thus we have the words of St. Optatus of Milevum, ‘_Numquid
potest dicere in Cathedra Petri? quam nescio si vel oculis novit, et ad
cujus memoriam non accedit quasi schismaticus._’ And for the seventh
century at least we have the directions of the Itineraries. ‘There also
near the same road (the Cornelian) is the seat of the Apostles.’ We
do not know where this chair was originally. I have shown in a recent
study entitled ‘_Sedes ubi prius sedit S. Petrus_’ that we have reasons
to place it in the catacomb of S. Priscilla, from which it might have
been transported to the Vatican in the seventh century. It has been
supposed that it is the same seat which served St. Peter in the House
of Pudens, the magisterial chair of Pudens; it is an idea given
for the first time in the seventeenth century by Febeo. Altogether
imaginary things have also been said on the other side. It has been
pretended, for example, that this chair was pagan. Lady Morgan has even
affirmed that the inscription carved on it is Arabic, and contains a
profession of the Mahometan faith. Signor de Rossi was able to study it
at his leisure in 1867, when Pius IX. had it taken out of the monument
constructed to receive it by Alexander VII. and had it exhibited in
the chapel of the Holy Sacrament. It is agreed that the actual chair
is not in the form of the ancient curule chairs; it is Byzantine, and
seems to have been made towards the end of the sixth century. Four
or five little pieces much eaten away are let into it--doubtless all
that remains of the primitive chair. The decorations are of ivory and
classic in character. They represent the Labours of Hercules. They
would not have been allowed if the chair had been original, or even if
it had dated back to the third or fourth century A.D. In the sixth they
could no longer have had any pagan significance. I have discovered no
trace elsewhere of the Arabic inscription.”
Gregorovius, vol. i. p. 98 (Hamilton’s Translation), says:--
“Bishop Damasus placed in the Baptistery the chair which tradition,
from the second century onwards, had alleged to have been the actual
chair and seat of Peter. This remarkable seat, the most ancient throne
in the world, first occupied by simple, unpretending bishops, then by
ambitious Popes, ruling nations and peoples, still survives.... It is
in reality an ancient sedan chair (_Sedia Gestatoria_), to the now
worm-eaten oak of which additions have from time to time been made in
acacia wood.”
After taking the same view of the ornamentation as Marucchi, he adds:--
“Beyond doubt this celebrated chair, if not belonging to Apostolic
times, is of very great antiquity, though the suggestion that it may be
the _Sedia Curulis_ of the Senator Pudens is altogether untrustworthy.”
The most important remains of Old St. Peter’s are to be seen in the
crypt, most of which, as I have said, formed part of the old basilica.
The most remarkable exception is the so-called tomb of the Apostle to
which I have devoted much space in Chapter VII. You can see nothing
of the tomb; all you see is the decadent altar which Clement VIII.,
who did see the tomb (the only person, except two of his Cardinals
and a few of his workmen, who had seen it for nearly eight hundred
years), erected between it and the eyes of future generations.
There is nothing in the Chapel of the Tomb to detain you one moment,
except the infinite sanctity of the spot which was the second cradle
of Christianity. But the crypts abound in fragments of the grand old
basilica, which was for more than a thousand years to Christendom
what the Temple of Jerusalem was to the Jews. Right at the threshold
of the Chapel of the Tomb is the sarcophagus of Junius Bassus, the
young prefect of Rome who embraced Christianity, and died in his year
of grace, fifteen hundred and fifty years ago, the one Christian
sarcophagus in St. Peter’s, if not in Rome, which still holds the bones
that were laid in it by the mourners.
[Illustration: The Execution of St. Peter. Carved by Matteo Pollaiuolo
for the Confessio of Old St. Peter’s, now in the Grotte Nuove of St.
Peter’s Crypt.]
And all round this side of the tomb, occupying perhaps almost the
identical spot they occupied in Old St. Peter’s, are the panels made to
ornament the Confessio by Matteo Pollaiuolo for Pope Sixtus IV. These
tell the story of the martyrdom of St. Peter and St. Paul; for the old
basilica was dedicated to both saints.
On the opposite side of the semicircular passage which constitutes
this boundary of the new crypt, are precious fragments of the High
Altar which Sixtus IV. erected over the _Confessio_; twelve quaintly
carved Apostles from the _atelier_ of Giovanni Dalmata, carved with the
mediæval suggestiveness the Japanese use in portraying their sages.
Between the sarcophagus of Junius Bassus and the entrance to the old
crypt are the gems of Old St. Peter’s, the masterpieces of Mino da
Fiesole carved to decorate the magnificent tomb of the superb Venetian
Pope, Paul II., including the exquisite representations of Faith,
Charity, and the Original Sin.
Beyond that in the old crypt lie the tombs of the Colonna-Caetani
Princess and all the Popes who were buried in Old St. Peter’s except
Gregory V., and one of the Borgias (seemingly Calixtus III. rather than
the terrible Alexander VI.), whose uses we are beginning to discover.
Young Otto’s tomb close by, though it may hold the bones of one who
was the first figure in the world nearly a thousand years ago, has no
value for us; it is as clumsy as a plaster whale. The mosaics of the
old church, saved in the old crypt, are mostly of the coarsest kind;
but there is the stone, if its identity can be established, on which
the bodies of the martyrs St. Peter and St. Paul were divided; and
the tombstone of Charlotte of Cyprus, who succeeded to the kingdom
of the Lusignans in 1458, just too late to be associated with the
immortal discovery of printing in the Thirty-One-Line and Thirty-Line
Indulgences of Pope Nicholas V. Here, too, is the epitaph of Amory de
Montfort, the weakling son of Simon de Montfort, who was once dictator
of England. He gave up the heritage of the Counts of Toulouse to
France; he was taken prisoner by the Saracens in the Holy Land; but he
warred mightily against the Albigenses, the defenceless heretics on his
own lands, making us feel how good was that day at Evesham when the
tall young Prince of England, who was to be the conqueror of Scotland
and Wales, and to establish the manner of institutions under which all
the civilized world was to come in the fulness of time, struck down his
father’s haughty and rebellious subjects, the party of Montfort. The
next inscription is almost the most interesting heirloom we have in the
crypt of the Old St. Peter’s, the celebrated copy, carved in marble, of
the donation of the Countess Matilda.
Few women have ever played so great a part in the world as the
Countess of Tuscany, who founded the temporal power of the Popes by
supporting them with all her forces during her life, and bequeathing
her dominions to the Holy See when she died. If she had held her
hand, even Gregory VII., the mighty Pontiff who had been Hildebrand,
must have gone down before the violence of the Emperor Henry IV., who
did penance to him at Canossa. But for her, the Popes would have
been no more than patriarchs, with no force but those of sanctity
and righteousness--moral powers, awed by violence, maintained by a
willingness for martyrdom.
[Illustration:
The Tabernacle of the Holy Lance in Old St. Peter’s. From the Fresco
in the Crypt.
_From Pistolesi’s “Il Vaticano.”_ ]
[Illustration:
The Tabernacle of the Volto Santo in Old St. Peter’s. From the Fresco
in the Crypt.
_From Pistolesi’s “Il Vaticano.”_]
In the south arm of the new crypt, close by other precious memorials
of the old church, fragments, for example, of the ciborium in which
Innocent VIII. enclosed the prize of his life, the Holy Lance sent to
him by the Turkish Sultan, are the mosaics from young Otto’s tomb,
bas-reliefs of exquisite beauty from the Gardens of Nero, in whose
Circus St. Peter was martyred; and sketches of the old church itself
and of its various shrines, by those who had seen them in their glory.
The finest of the inscriptions here tells us that Pope Saint Damasus
drained the Vatican Hill to provide the water for his Baptistery;
his drain is still perfect under the courtyard of the palace which
bears his name beneath the windows of the Pope. Here, too, are the
inscriptions of the first four Leos, all saints, and a portrait in
mosaic of John VII., executed in his lifetime, and another panel of
the mosaics which made his chapel of the Volto Santo the most famous
building of his time. Here, above all, is the beautiful throne of the
Avignon Pope, Benedict XII., who adopted the triple crown to show the
threefold nature of the sovereignty of the Popes. His image is
there, strong, phlegmatic, almost Egyptian in its massive strength.
There is no throne in all Rome as beautiful and majestic as his. On it
is seated an old, old statue of St. Peter a Roman Consul presented with
the Apostle’s head and hands. Here is even the great stone cross which
stood upon the façade of the elder church; and the exquisite bust of
the eighth Boniface, by Arnolfo himself. The statues of the Apostles
come from the tomb of Nicholas V., the founder of the greatness of the
Vatican.
And they all, as it were, lead up to that most holy image of the
Virgin, who stood in the portico of the old church, and when she was
struck on the cheek with a stone, bled like a human being. The stones
where the blood fell are here too, protected by iron bars, for the lips
and fingers of the faithful, if not the blood-drops themselves, had
worn the spots into holes which threatened to consume the entire stones.
Truly Old St. Peter’s is in the crypt. When we have permission to
wander there we are surrounded by the faith, as well as the monuments,
of the Middle Ages.
[Illustration: Plan of the Crypt of St. Peter’s. _From Pistolesi’s “Il
Vaticano.”_
_A._ Pilone (Pier) and Cappella (Chapel) of S. Veronica; it is
here that visitors descend into the Crypt. _B._ Southern Corridor
of the Grotte Nuove leading to the Cappella di S. Maria della
Bocciata. _C._ Cappella del Salvatorino. _D._ Cappella di S. Maria
della Bocciata. _E._ South Corridor leading into the Confessio.
_F._ Cappella di S. Maria detta delle Partorienti. _G._ Southern
Corridor leading to the Grotte Vecchie. _H._ Pilone e Cappella di
S. Andrea (Pier and Chapel of St. Andrew). _J._ The Colonna-Caetani
Chapel. _I_, _K_, _L_. The three Naves of the Grotte Vecchie.
_M._ The Pier and Chapel of S. Longinus. _N._ The North Corridor
of the Grotte Nuove, leading to the Grotte Vecchie. _O._ The North
Corridor of the Grotte Nuove, leading to the Confessio of St.
Peter’s. _P._ The portion of the North Corridor of the Grotte Nuove
which contains the masterpieces of Mino da Fiesole. _Q._ Pier and
Chapel of St. Helena. _R._ Portion of the North Corridor, the Grotte
Nuove, which contains the northern portion of the Confessio of Matteo
Pollaiuolo. _S._ The Chapel of the Tomb of St. Peter, with the
Sarcophagus of Junius Bassus opposite its entrance. _T._ The portion
of the South Corridor of the Grotte Nuove which contains the southern
part of the Confessio of Matteo Pollaiuolo.
]
CHAPTER VII
THE CRYPT OF ST. PETER’S
In theory, anyone can obtain permission to visit the crypt of St.
Peter’s nowadays. Still, to get the permission involves a good deal of
delay and difficulty. For first you must catch the Pope’s Maggiordomo
at the Vatican, and obtain his permission, and then you have to get
the further permission of another Monsignor at the Secretariat of the
Reverenda Fabbrica di S. Pietro, in the Via di Aracœli, more than
a mile off; and they are both at home only at rather inconvenient
hours. If you are short of time it is an economy to take a ticket for
a lecture on the Crypt of St. Peter’s. A lecturer is allowed to stay
longer in the crypt than a person with an ordinary _permesso_; when you
are with a lecturer you do not waste time in hunting out the principal
objects yourself; you are taken straight to them: and there is so
much to see that there is not a minute to spare. The heads of various
colleges for priests also give lectures, but not often in English,
and admission to them is a favour. Unless you are a privileged person
you are only allowed to remain in the crypt for half an hour.
There are several entrances to the crypt; that by which the public are
now admitted is at the foot of the pier in which the precious relic of
S. Veronica’s handkerchief is kept. In the time of Misson, who visited
St. Peter’s in the reign of Queen Anne, the public were admitted
through the Confessio itself. He says: “Under this altar (_i.e._ the
High Altar) there is a pair of stairs which leads to the chapel where
St. Peter’s body is pretended to be kept, and to the other Holy Places
in the vaults of this church.
“At the entry to these grottoes I observed a Bull engraved with
marble (_huc mulieribus ingredi non licet, nisi unico die Lunae post
Pentecosten_), by which women are forbidden to enter the place, save
only on Whit Monday, on which day it is declared unlawful for any man
to come there; and whosoever shall act contrary to either of these
prohibitions is anathema. These places are dark, and the sexton told us
that the order was occasioned by a certain amorous adventure. There is
an Indulgence of seven years for every step of the stairs that lead to
St. Peter’s Chapel, granted to such as descend them with due devotion.”
THE GROTTE NUOVE. NORTH SIDE
NOTE.--It was inevitable that, in the writing of this chapter, I
should constantly have to refer to Gregorovius’s _Tombs of the
Popes_ and _History of the City of Rome in the Middle Ages_. In the
former I have always used the translation by R. W. Seton Watson, of
Ayton, published by Archibald Constable & Co., and in the latter the
translation by Annie Hamilton, published by George Bell & Sons. You
do not know Rome till you have read Gregorovius.
If tradition may be respected, the invisible tomb of St. Peter,
on which the whole mighty edifice rests, was erected by Linus and
Anacletus, the second and third Popes, less than a hundred years
after the birth of Christ, not far from the spot where the Apostle
was crucified in the Gardens of Nero. His tomb was erected as the law
ordained, on one of the roads which led up to the city gate--the Via
Cornelia. About two centuries after, in 306 A.D., according to a not
very easily verifiable tradition, Constantine the Great, who was not
at all great in the opinion of scientific historians, erected round
the Apostle’s tomb the great basilica which was to be St. Peter’s, and
the centre of Christendom for more than a thousand years. This we now
speak of as Old St. Peter’s. The tomb, as was usual with the tombs of
martyrs in basilicas, was a good deal below the level of the church;
stairs led down to it. But at an early period, to protect the body of
the Apostle from the risk of being carried off by the barbarians, who
waxed bolder and bolder in their assaults on Rome, the tomb was walled
over.
About the year 1450, in the reign of Nicholas V., it began to be
rumoured that the church was dangerous, probably because Nicholas, who
was the first of the Popes to appreciate the treasures of antiquity
which the Papal See had inherited, was making a careful survey of his
inheritance. Nicholas was such a keen lover of antiquities that much
pressure must have been brought to bear upon him before he consented
to the rebuilding of St. Peter’s. When he had given his consent, plans
were obtained from two great Florentines, Leon Battista Alberti and
Bernardo Rossellino, brother of Antonio, the heavenly sculptor: and
Nicholas began to build a new cathedral round the old. Not much was
done to it after his time until the accession of Julius II. Julius
II. was a great monarch, if an indifferent priest; he suffered from
megalomania as badly as Caracalla or Diocletian. Their gigantic baths
may well have inspired him with the idea of the New St. Peter’s, which
he entrusted to Bramante as architect. The old building was torn down
in such haste that no care was taken to preserve the ancient monuments.
It is to be hoped for the sake of art that Bramante yielded to _force
majeure_. The Romans nicknamed him “_il Rovinante_.” The scanty remains
of the tombs of the eighty-six Popes who were buried in the old
basilica show the ruthless haste with which the work of demolition was
carried out.
[Illustration: The Temptation. Carved by Mino da Fiesole for Paul II.’s
Mausoleum, now in the Grotte Nuove of St. Peter’s Crypt.]
With the building of the New and the demolition of the Old St. Peter’s
we are not much further concerned here, for we have arrived at the
point at which we can understand the plan of the celebrated _Grotte
Vaticane_--the _Grotte Vecchie e Nuove_, the old and new crypts of St.
Peter’s. The old crypt is, roughly speaking, Old St. Peter’s to the
height of six or seven feet from the pavement, for Bramante, with a
sublime impertinence borrowed from the ancient Romans (Did not Augustus
build his house on the top of the mansion of the silver-tongued
Hortensius?), made the old basilica the foundation for his new church
as far as it would serve. But it was not broad enough for the vast
Greek cross which formed the ground plan of his design, so he had to
extend the foundations right and left, and he made them in the form
of crypts to ensure dryness, since St. Peter’s is very little above
the level of the Tiber. These form the New Crypts. You enter by the
pier of S. Veronica, where Julius II. laid the foundation of the New S.
Peter’s. At the bottom of the steps galleries lead right and left; it
is usual to take the right-hand passage, but much better to take the
left, for the left brings you almost directly to the chapel of the tomb
of St. Peter. Of the tomb itself you see nothing, because it is walled
over with masonry; the obstruction is now much thicker than it was when
erected to baffle the barbarians if they tried to find St. Peter’s
body. In the year 1602 or 1603, when they were making the foundations
for the new church, the vault over the tomb gave way and the workmen
saw it below them. It was easy to recognize, because on it lay the
old richly chased cross of pure gold, one hundred and fifty pounds in
weight, deposited there by the pious hands of the Empress Helena, the
mother of Constantine, who founded the original church. As mentioned
above, the Pope, Clement VIII., was summoned hastily, and came with
Cardinals Bellarmin and Antoniano. His first idea, very wisely, was
to clear away the obstacles which prevented so blessed an object
being seen now that the advance of civilization made it impossible to
contemplate any risk of the profanation of the shrine. He found himself
confronted by a superstition of unknown antiquity--the universal
belief at Rome that anyone who touched St. Peter’s tomb would be
struck dead. Yielding to this, after making a careful examination, he
ordered the aperture to be closed, and a thick layer of masonry to be
built over it.
Père Dufresne, the chief authority on the Vatican Crypt, says: “The
tomb of the Apostle occupies almost the centre of the space surrounded
by the new crypt. When approached from the cathedral above, just inside
the double bronze door which faces the statue of Pius VI., is a little
oblong chamber in an apse. In the floor of this chamber is a hollow
in which are laid the pallia before they are sent to the Archbishops.
The paving of the chamber has always been very rich. The _Liber
Pontificalis_ speaks of the silver plates of which it was formed; at
the present time it is made of gilt bronze. The chasings represent a
raying cross surrounded by the tiara, the keys, and a dove. One of the
squares made by the arms of the cross, the upper one on the right,
is the door which covers the opening of the cavity. In the time of
St. Gregory the Great the respect inspired by the Apostle’s tomb was
so profound that people hardly dared approach it to pray or make the
necessary repairs. Not allowing himself to be stopped by tradition
so disquieting, Père Grisar made a detailed examination of the tomb,
his report having been summarized as follows: The cavity is made in
masonry at the depth of little over a foot; it communicates with a
chamber, of which the ceiling is formed by a slab of marble; this is
filled with the débris thrown into it by the order of Clement VIII.,
when, in constructing the present basilica, the sarcophagus of St.
Peter is believed to have been seen. A long rod of iron thrust into
the débris did not penetrate more than half a yard. The slab of marble
is pierced by a square hole corresponding to the opening in the cavity
above. It has sagged; it is broken in two parts which sink towards
the middle, the sides being secured with the masonry; the opening is
not of perfect regularity: only one angle has its edges square, the
others having been damaged. All these details are difficult to explain
on the basis of accident; one is compelled to think that violence has
been used--for example, on the part of the Saracens, when in 846 they
occupied the Vatican basilica for several days. However, this violence
was manifestly without success, since the slab is still fastened to the
walls to which it was originally fixed.”
Behind the chamber of the pallia there is a chapel to which one has
access through the crypts: this occupies the exact position of the
ancient oratory called,
“Ad Caput Beati Petri.”
One may add that the little apse which faces the statue of Pius VI.
down in the _Confessio_, has a thirteenth-century mosaic of Our Lord
and a seventeenth-century mosaic of St. Peter and St. Paul; the
former was erected by the great Pope Innocent III., who also gave the
beautiful bronze grille. Formerly the Pope left a censer in the cavity
every year, and when the old one was taken out distributed its contents
among the pious people who wished to have mementoes of the Apostle,
and objects which they brought with them were sometimes permitted to
be lowered into the cavity so that they might be blessed by touching
the tomb of the Apostle. The bronze door was given by the Pamfili Pope,
Innocent X., whose portrait by Velasquez in the Doria Gallery is one of
the finest portraits in the world. The altar in the crypt was erected
by Clement VIII., the last person who saw the tomb of St. Peter.
The sarcophagus is under the Papal altar, and instead of corresponding
to the exact centre of the basilica, it is a little to the right, which
goes to prove that the architect of the Constantinian basilica had
to take into account a more ancient monument with which he could not
interfere.
[Illustration: Chapel of the Tomb of St. Peter, in the Crypt.
The altar is almost over the Tomb.]
The altar of Clement VIII. in the Chapel of the Tomb in the crypt has
the same ornamentation as the floor of the little chamber above,
the reversed raying cross flanked by tiaras and keys on each side,
though I do not remember that the dove is here: but other emblems are
introduced, such as lilies and a sword, laid obliquely over the cross.
Above the altar is a mosaic of St. Peter and St. Paul, the remainder of
the lunette on each side being filled up with gilt plaster reliefs of
their respective executions. The carpet in front of the altar has woven
upon it the inscription, “_Principi Apost_”; though none of the details
are good, the effect is rather rich, as you come upon it through the
sixteenth-century arch which admits you into the chapel. The chapel is
in the form of a reversed cross to commemorate the Apostle’s humility
in praying to be crucified head downwards, because he, who denied His
Lord, was not worthy of the honour of crucifixion--crucifixion which
with the Romans was reserved for the worst criminals, like our hanging.
The chapel has a poor seventeenth-century stucco roof, with panels
representing various miracles; its entrance is exactly opposite the
sarcophagus of Junius Bassus. The altar is approached by three steps,
and two _prie-dieux_ stand in front of it. Pilgrims and others with
special claims are occasionally permitted to hold services here.
But when you leave this place, so infinitely holy by its associations,
you pass at once into the kingdom of art. You find yourself in a narrow
gallery brilliantly lit by electricity, with the panels of Matteo
Pollaiuolo’s Confessio on one hand, and the sarcophagus of Junius
Bassus and the fragments of Paul II.’s tomb on the other. The memorial
sculpture of ancient Rome bequeathed nothing superior to the reliefs on
that sarcophagus; the bas-reliefs on the tomb of the Venetian Pope are
the masterpieces of Mino da Fiesole--the Raffaelle of the sculptors of
the Middle Ages. Matteo Pollaiuolo is not to be confused with the far
better known Antonio and Pietro; he is not even mentioned in the great
five-volume _Dizionario Biografico Universale_. His work is hardly
known outside of St. Peter’s. At his best, in his low reliefs, he
approaches Mino, but much of his work is very inferior. His Confessio,
several feet high and many feet long (the most important, as being
the largest of the complete monuments preserved in the crypt), once
encircled the approach to the Apostle’s tomb in the old basilica. It
deals with the trials and the martyrdoms of St. Peter and St. Paul,
but makes no attempt to reproduce their traditional portraits. The
St. Paul of the late Roman frescoes and the Byzantine mosaics has a
narrow egg-shaped face, with a very high forehead and a parrot nose,
and is quite bald. The St. Paul of Pollaiuolo has a snub nose, a broad
face, and bushy hair and beard. But his St. Peter is reasonably near
to the Byzantine portrait, which represents the chief of the Apostles
as a man with bluff features, a red face, and thick curly white hair
and beard. Two of the best panels are those which represent their
executions. In the one St. Paul kneels bound before Nero, while a
soldier prepares to strike off his head; in the other, St. Peter is
being crucified head downwards. Both have beautiful backgrounds in very
low relief. The horsemen and trumpet-blowers behind the former are most
delicately carved; while the silhouette of a woman’s head, and the two
heralds blowing horns under an oak tree in the latter, are even finer.
Indeed, that woman’s profile might well become a favourite subject for
reproduction.
The sarcophagus of Junius Bassus (numbered 231), opposite to the
entrance to this chapel, is considered the finest Christian Roman
sarcophagus which has come down to us. It is of great beauty, though
the figures are not very well proportioned, the heads being too large.
It is, in fact, low art, but the grouping and draperies have no little
spirit and charm. It is curiously Roman: there is not a particle of
Greek feeling about it. It is the more human for that: the Greeks
idealized; the Romans were realistic. The Greeks have left us many
exquisite sculptures, but hardly any real portraits. Roman portrait
busts, on the other hand, are almost innumerable.
[Illustration: The Sarcophagus of Junius Bassus in the Grotte Nuove of
St. Peter’s Crypt.]
For the moment I will not mention the sculpture on the top of the
sarcophagus shown in the smaller reproduction; it does not belong to
it, but the exquisite cornice at the top of the large reproduction is
shown to belong to it by the inscription even if it were not proved by
its homogeneity. It is supported by delightful little sculptured shafts
with very ornate capitals. The first tableau shows the sacrifice of
Abraham, with Isaac bound on one side and the ram on the other; the
angel touching Abraham’s shoulder stands behind Isaac. In the second
tableau St. Peter is denying Christ. In the third, Our Lord is seated
between two figures, who may be St. Peter and St. Paul. In the fourth,
He is being led away to prison between two Roman soldiers. It should
be noticed that Our Lord is represented as a young and beardless man.
In the fifth tableau, Pilate is washing his hands. The upper range
of tableaux is divided from the lower by a truly remarkable device.
Over each of the lower tableaux is a very ornate and debased arch,
and the triangle over the capital of each of the four centre columns
contains an allegorical representation of a miracle. Two of them are
Old Testament miracles; two of them belong to the New Testament, not
reckoning the representation of the Baptism of Christ. Two remarkable
features have to be noticed in these allegorical sculptures. All the
miracles, those of the Old Testament as well as the New, are performed
by Our Lord; and all the figures are allegorized as sheep or lambs
instead of being human. In the baptism John is a sheep and Our Lord
a lamb. The scenes represent respectively the passage of the Red
Sea; the water bursting from the rock at the touch of Moses’ rod;
the Multiplication of the Loaves; the Baptism of Our Lord; and the
Resurrection of Lazarus.
The lower range of tableaux represent Job’s wife offering her husband a
loaf at the end of a stick; Adam and Eve and the serpent in Paradise;
Jesus riding on the ass into Jerusalem; Daniel between two lions in the
lions’ den; and St. Peter bound, being led away to prison.
Above the sarcophagus of Junius Bassus may be seen two monuments in
the form of a pyramid and a globe, surmounted by a cross; they had,
of course, no connection with it. They formerly decorated the top of
the ciborium erected by Innocent VIII. for the Volto Santo--_i.e._
the handkerchief of S. Veronica on which the features of Our Lord
were impressed, which is one of the most precious relics preserved
at St. Peter’s. The little cross is, however, modern; it replaced a
bronze crucifix carried off by Innocent XI. The ends of the sarcophagus
are, as works of art, superior to the front; their subjects are taken
from real life, and represent the four seasons. The genii amid the
grapes, the olives, and the corn, are executed with great spirit. The
sarcophagus exhibits the naïve touch so often found in sculptures of
the Middle Ages: Job’s wife is holding her nose; John the Baptist is
represented as a sheep with a paw on the lamb’s head.
There are comparatively few Early Christian remains in the crypt which
go back to the days of the Roman Empire.
Far the most notable of these is this tomb of Junius Bassus. It is
of the fourth century A.D., and is a noble sarcophagus in the finest
state of preservation; it is, I think, the only tomb of Early Christian
times which still contains the bones of the original occupant. The
other early sarcophagi--such as that which still contains the bones of
Hadrian IV., and those which once contained the bones of Pius II. and
Pius III.--are Early Christian sarcophagi used a second time. There
are many examples of them in Rome, and even pagan sarcophagi were
often used in the same way; the emblems sometimes being converted and
sometimes not. In Sicily I have seen a sarcophagus which had been used
three times: first, for a Greek pagan, then for a Christian martyr,
and then for a Norman Marquis of Geracé, who expected contact with the
bones of the Saint to help him to a resurrection with the just, as the
bones of Elisha brought the body of the dead man to life when they
touched him.
Junius Bassus was Prefect of Rome, A.D. 359. The pious author, and
the only author who has written about the whole of the crypt of St.
Peter’s--a priest of S. Sulpice at Paris--calls him “the illustrious
personage.” But though twenty-one of his name come into Smith’s
_Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography_, he is not one of them.
During his prefecture he was converted, as one is informed by an
inscription engraved on his sarcophagus, and he died the same year. His
inscription runs: IVN . BASSVS . V . C . QVI VIXIT ANNIS . XLII MEN .
II . IN IPSA PRAEFECTVRA VRBI NEOFITVS IIT AD DEVM . VIII . KAL . SEPT
EVSEBIO ET YPATIO COSS.
The important words are those which tell that he lived forty-two years
and two months, and went to his God a neophyte while he was holding
office as Praefectus Urbi.
Next to the tomb of Junius Bassus comes a series of panels from the
masterpiece of Mino da Fiesole, the huge and gloriously beautiful
Mausoleum of Paul II., the brilliant Venetian Pope who built the great
Palazzo di Venezia. It is to be hoped that the municipality of Venice
will show their appreciation of the honour done their city by the
present Pope (who was Patriarch of Venice before his elevation to the
Papacy), by undertaking the re-erection of the tomb of Paul II. in one
of the chapels of the New St. Peter’s, where it would be shown off to
perfection. A great number of its pieces have been preserved, and the
men who restored the exterior of St. Mark’s could be trusted to insert
the missing parts to the complete satisfaction of art lovers. The most
beautiful of the figures is that of Faith, numbered 215, holding a
chalice, and a cross now broken. One could not easily conceive a face
of more heavenly beauty; but Charity, numbered 219, with an infant
on her knees, is hardly less exquisite. Besides the beautiful single
figures there are groups, one of which represents the Resurrection of
Our Saviour, numbered 217, and another, the Last Judgment, numbered
218, where Our Lord, seated between St. Peter and St. Paul, and the
other Apostles, raises His right hand to pronounce sentence. At His
feet stands St. Michael, with sword and scales, waiting to deliver
judgment. Two angels are sounding the Last Trump to summon the dead
from their tombs. On the right of Our Saviour are the innocent; on
His left the guilty are conducted to Eternal Fire by a demon. As fine
as anything from the tomb is the exquisite panel of the Temptation in
the Garden of Eden, numbered 209, in which the figures of Adam and
Eve have disappeared, though one can trace their outlines; but the
serpent twined round the tree has the head of a lovely human being. The
group, numbered 205, of God the Father borne up on a cloak surrounded
by cherub-like angels, is, with the exception of the central figure,
so inferior that Mino obviously must have left its execution to his
pupils; this is acknowledged to be the case. The Creation of Woman,
on the other hand, numbered 208, is considered to be the work of Mino
himself, though it is not at all equal in beauty to the statue of
Faith, or the group of the Temptation in the Garden of Eden. In any
case, if this is the work of Mino, it is possible that the figure of
the Eternal Father in number 205 is also from his hand. The statues
of St. Luke and St. John the Evangelist, numbered 212 and 213, are
also assigned to this tomb. The figure of Hope, numbered 216, which
had wings to fly to Heaven, and also belongs to the tomb, is not so
beautiful as the Faith or Charity, though it is a noble piece of work:
it is not by Mino da Fiesole, but by Giovanni Dalmata. Père Dufresne
says that the group representing the Resurrection of Our Lord, numbered
217, belongs also to the tomb of Paul II., and not, as a modern
inscription states, to that of Calixtus III. This group has much more
of the charm of Mino da Fiesole than the Last Judgment, numbered 218,
but experts pronounce it to be the work of a little-known sculptor,
named Argenti. Père Dufresne points out that Mary being represented
in the attitude of weeping in the adjoining mosaic is remarkable, as
originally she was not represented in this attitude.
[Illustration: The Creation of Woman. Carved by Mino da Fiesole for
Paul II.’s Mausoleum, now in the Grotte Nuove of St. Peter’s Crypt.]
The piece of sculpture, numbered 214, which Dufresne assigned to
this tomb, is now considered to be a part of the ciborium erected by
Innocent VIII. for the Holy Lance. It is pronounced to be the work
of Bramante and the celebrated sculptor, Paolo Romano, who has such
beautiful works in the Church of S. Maria in Trastevere. The exquisite
alto-relievo in marble which came from the ancient chapel of St.
Blaise, numbered 204, one of the most beautiful objects in the crypts,
is also from the _atelier_ of Paolo Romano. The bas-reliefs, numbered
206 and 207, belonging to the tomb of Cardinal Eroli, are by Giovanni
Dalmata. I mention this because there are not many opportunities of
studying this sculptor. The statues of the Apostles, numbered 220, 225,
226, 227, 228, 230, 233, 234, 236, 237, and 238, which are considered
very fine, all came from the ciborium erected at the back of the tomb
of St. Peter by Sixtus IV.
CHAPTER VIII
THE GROTTE VECCHIE. EASTERN SIDE
As you step on to the floor of the old crypt you are overwhelmed with a
rush of emotion, for you find yourself standing on the actual floor of
the basilica of Constantine. Almost immediately on your left you enter
a little three-cornered chapel, which contains the remains of the only
woman of less than royal rank who is buried in St. Peter’s--that of
Madame Agnes, who was born a Colonna and became by marriage a Caetani,
thus uniting two of the most princely families in Rome; for while a
Colonna is one of the two Principi Assistenti al Soglio--the Princes
in attendance on the throne of the Pope--the Caetani are, since the
extinction of the Conti, the premier family of the Roman nobility.
Women are only allowed in this chapel on the day after Pentecost. When
Misson visited Rome in his celebrated voyage in the reign of Queen Anne
this was the only day on which they were allowed into any part of the
crypt. The old crypt, which extends the whole length of the nave,
is extremely low, only six or seven feet high, covered over by broad,
round-barrelled vaults, painted white.
[Illustration: The Marble Shrine of the Virgin now in the Crypt of St.
Peter’s. _From Pistolesi’s “Il Vaticano.”_]
If you walk straight past the Colonna-Caetani chapel to the end, you
will pass nearly all the principal tombs which were saved from Old St.
Peter’s.
The first that you come to is that of Cardinal Eroli, which bears his
effigy and arms. Only the sarcophagus remains here, but other portions
of his mausoleum are preserved in the crypt, the most important of
which is the relief of Our Saviour in the act of blessing, which is
alluded to below. Cardinal Fonseca’s tomb is not important.
Eighty-six Popes were buried in the old basilica, but nearly all their
tombs were destroyed by Bramante when he took down the old church in
that wild haste. I will allude to them in the order in which you pass
them. The Facchinetti Pope (Innocent IX.) only reigned two months,
and died in 1591. The Cervini Pope (Marcellus II.), a distinguished
diplomatist, died in 1555, after having been keeper of the Vatican
Library and one of the Presidents of the Council of Trent. He was
Pope only twenty-two days, and is buried in a sarcophagus of the
fourth century, decorated with the figure of Our Saviour between St.
Peter and St. Paul. Innocent VII., the Migliorati Pope, also had a
brief reign, only a couple of years (1404-1406); his ambition was to
restore the Roman University founded by Boniface VIII. The sarcophagus
of Urban VI., the Prignano Pope (1378-1389), has passed through more
vicissitudes than any in the crypt. It was hard that his body should
not rest after such a stormy life. His bones are no longer in it;
they were emptied out by the workmen who were building the dome when
they needed a trough for water. The lions which formerly adorned the
sarcophagus now adorn the throne of St. Peter in the chapel of S.
Maria della Bocciata in the crypt. Gregorovius, in _The Tombs of the
Popes_, done into English by Mr. Seton Watson so admirably, says: “That
the tomb of Urban VI., despite its absurd and barbarous inscription,
must have been truly magnificent, is proved by the drawings of it made
before it was destroyed to make way for the new church.”
Hare, page 526, says: “Next follows the sarcophagus of Urban VI.,
Bartolommeo Prignano (1378-1389), the sole relic of the magnificent
tomb of this cruel Pope, who is credited with having walled up two
or three of his Cardinals while at Genoa during the Schism, and is
believed to have died of poison. It bears his figure, and, in front,
a bas-relief of him receiving the keys from St. Peter.... Its epitaph
runs thus:--
‘Here rests the just, wise, and noble prince,
Urban VI., a native of Naples.
He, full of zeal, gave a safe refuge to the teachers of the faith,
That gained for him, noble one, a fatal poison cup at the end of the repast.
Great was the schism, but great was his courage in opposing it,
And in the presence of this mighty Pope Simony sat dumb.
But it is needless to reiterate his praises upon earth,
While heaven is shining with his immortal glory.’”
This is the epitaph which Platina stigmatized as “_satis rustico et
inepto_”--uncouth and foolish.
Nicholas III., who died in 1280, the Orsini Pope, was the rebuilder of
the Vatican and the chapel of the Sancta Sanctorum at the top of the
Scala Santa as it now is. Julius III., died 1555, the del Monte Pope,
who has a plain altar tomb bearing only his name, was the founder of
the charming Villa Papa Giulio near the Ponte Molle, which is now the
Etruscan Museum. He was notorious for his nepotism; he created no less
than five of his family Cardinals. The tomb of Paul II., the Barbo
Pope, who died in 1471, formed part of one of the most remarkable
monuments of the Middle Ages. His noble mausoleum was the masterpiece
of Mino da Fiesole; the glorious fragments of it which remain in the
crypt have already been described. If he was vain and luxurious, he
was also noted for his love of art and antiquities and the prestige
of the Papacy. In his Palazzo di Venezia he made a magnificent
collection of classical and mediæval antiquities. When he died, his
relative, Marco Barbo, Patriarch of Aquileia, commissioned Mino da
Fiesole to execute his famous monument, which included, according to
Père Dufresne, besides the sarcophagus, statues of the Evangelists,
the theological virtues, and four Biblical scenes: the Creation of
Woman, the Original Sin, the Resurrection of Our Lord, and the Last
Judgment. Paul II., for whom Mino da Fiesole carved one of the most
beautiful tombs of all time, rests in a comparatively low sarcophagus
with a very long inscription on it, flanked with two rather charming
little angels. The recumbent figure on the top entirely overwhelms the
tomb: it shows a very tall and handsome man with statuesque features.
He is reputed to have been the handsomest of all the Popes, and a
malicious tradition relates that his Cardinals had great difficulty
in preventing him taking the name of Formosus, the Beautiful, as his
new name when he was elected Pope. “But,” says Gregorovius (_Tombs
of the Popes_, Seton Watson’s Translation), “the Cardinals pointed
out to him that the assumption of such a title would seem a mere idle
allusion to his handsome figure. Men mocked at his vanity, because he
loved nothing better than to show himself in processions, where he
towered above the heads of other men. He decked himself out like a
conceited woman before he went to attend the solemn functions of the
Church. He squandered vast sums upon the adornment of his person. He
had sapphires, chrysolites, smaragdi, diamonds, and pearls sent to him
from all parts of the world, that he might adorn his mitre, and then
displayed himself in it before the populace as the handsomest of all
the Popes. Nicholas V. had collected manuscripts for his library with
the passion of a humanist and an antiquary; Paul II., with equal zeal,
collected antique gems, medals, statues, and works of art of every
kind.”
[Illustration:
The Mausoleum of Boniface VIII. in Old St. Peter’s.
_From Pistolesi’s “Il Vaticano.”_]
[Illustration:
The Mausoleum of Paul II. in Old St. Peter’s, from which the Mino da
Fiesole sculptures in the Crypt were taken.
_From Pistolesi’s “Il Vaticano.”_]
Paul II. was buried in this sarcophagus against his own wishes, for
he had had the gigantic sarcophagus of S. Constantia, the daughter of
Constantine the Great, one of the two finest pieces of porphyry in
the world, removed from the church at S. Costanza (a still uninjured
building, erected by Constantine himself in the grounds of S. Agnese
fuori le Murà) to his palace of San Marco (now the Palazzo di Venezia),
and ordered that he should be buried in it.
Nicholas V., the Parentucelli Pope, who died in 1455, the little plain
scholar from Sarzana, was the first of all the Popes to appreciate the
antiquities of ancient Rome. For the revival of literature and art his
was the most glorious reign of the brilliant fifteenth century. His
death-bed speech, quoted by Père Dufresne, is an index to the character
of the Scholar-Pope who founded the Vatican Library: “I found the Holy
Church desolated with wars and choked with debts; I have reformed it
and made it strong; I have delivered it from schism; I have reconquered
its cities and castles; I have not only freed it from its debts, but
I have raised for its defence splendid fortresses, such as those of
Gualdo, Assisi, Fabriano, Civita-Castellana, Narni, Orvieto, Spoleto,
and Viterbo. I have embellished it by raising imposing monuments, upon
which I have lavished all the resources of art, aided by the glitter of
gold and jewels. I have enriched it with books and tapestries, vases
of gold and silver and magnificent ornaments, destined for Religion.
And though I have amassed all these treasures I have not to reproach
myself with cupidity or simony, or love of presents, or avarice; on
the contrary, I have shown in every respect a noble liberality, both
in building and in my numerous purchases of books, and in the impetus
I have given to the copying of Greek and Latin manuscripts, and in
pensions granted to learned men. That I have been able to do all this
I owe to the favour of the Divine Creator and the state of peace
which the Church has enjoyed uninterruptedly during my Pontificate.”
Of Nicholas V., Gregorovius (_Tombs of the Popes_, Seton Watson’s
Translation) says: “With Nicholas V., Thomas of Sarzana (1447-1455),
the most liberal of all promoters of knowledge, the humanism of the
century actually mounted the Papal throne.... Nicholas V., during whose
reign Byzantium fell into the power of the Turks, rescued the treasures
of classic literature by transporting them from thence to Rome, gave
a fresh impulse to Greek studies, and gathered round him such men as
Poggio Bracciolini, Gregory of Trebizond, Nicola Perotto, Lorenzo
Valla, Theodore of Gaza, and Cardinal Bessarion. In the last year of
his Pontificate the art of printing made its appearance in Rome, where
it was hospitably received by the noble family of the Massimi.
“It was the same Pope who founded the Vatican Library, by despatching
agents into every country, charged with the purchase of manuscripts.
Lastly, he conceived the project--worthy of the Flavian Emperors--of
enlarging the Vatican Palace into a Papal City, an Apostolic Palatine
Hill, and of converting St. Peter’s into the mightiest temple of the
world. The realization of this scheme was reserved for the daring mind
of Julius II. But the latter, though he inherited his colossal ideas
from Nicholas V., had no respect for the monument of so honourable a
predecessor. He allowed it to perish during the demolition of the
ancient church, and thus only a few remnants have been preserved in
the Grotte Vaticane--statues of the Apostles Matthew, James, and John,
figures of angels and other fragments.”
The founder of the noble study of archæology rests in a beautiful altar
tomb, though not equal to that of Boniface VIII., which stands nearly
opposite to it. At the very end of the aisle is the finest perfect
tomb in the crypt--that of the great Pope, Boniface VIII. (died 1303),
the last of the great Pontiffs like Gregory VII., Alexander III., and
Innocent III., who tried to rule the world. This, too, is an altar tomb
by the incomparable Arnolfo di Lapo,[11] with a recumbent portrait
figure which has hardly a superior anywhere, and an exquisitely carved
pall. The face shows superb strength, and the draperies of the tomb are
beautiful. It is the best tomb of the period in Rome in attitude and
in effect, down to the smallest detail, such as the jewellery in his
tiara. A shapely chapel rose over it, of which fragments (including a
portion of the ciborium) are preserved close by. One bears the arms of
the Caetani, the premier family of the Italian nobility, to which this
Pope belonged.
The legend that he had died mad, biting his hands and arms, is
disproved by the condition of his body, which was discovered in the
time of Paul V. when the new Cathedral was being built. More than
three hundred years after his death, the body was found quite perfect,
with only the nose and lips decayed. It was opened again in 1835, but
only the skeleton remained in full Pontifical costume. The inscription
on his coffin recorded the state of preservation when the body was
examined in 1835. Boniface was the Pope who canonized St. Louis and
instituted the Jubilee to take place every hundred years: he was a
great patron of art and literature. Boniface was the lifelong enemy of
the Colonna; his motto might have been “_Delenda est Columna_.”[12]
In his anxiety to root them out, he destroyed the glorious old town
of Palestrina and its great Temple of Fortune, which had survived in
an almost perfect state from ancient times--the finest temple in all
Italy. The Colonna bided their time, and when Philip le Bel of France
sent an army into Italy, they made a dash at the grand old man of
Anagni, who had fortified himself in his native city. The citizens were
sullen and offered no resistance; then Sciarra Colonna, the fiercest
of the clan, subjected the captive Pope to the humiliation of a mock
crucifixion between two thieves. Boniface maintained his courage
unshaken: he had refused to fly or to disguise himself. “If I die,” he
said, “I will die a Pope.” The citizens rallied to him; a truce was
patched up; but the shock had been too much for the old man, and soon
brought down his grey hairs to the grave. Dante alluded to the incident
in the twentieth canto of his _Purgatory_.
“I in Alagna see the _fleur-de-lys_,
Christ, in His Vicar, captive to the foe.
Him once again as mocked and scorned I see,
I see once more the vinegar and gall,
And slain between two robbers hangeth He.”
_Purgatory_, Canto XX., 86-90.
Upon which Dean Plumtre gives the following note: “The mockery and
scorn, the wormwood and the gall, of the Crucifixion were reproduced by
this new Pilate when he gave Boniface into the hands of his enemies of
the House of Colonna.”
We know the features of the great and turbulent and worldly Pope as
well as any in the long line of the successors of St. Peter; for we
have not only the noble effigy on his tomb, but two erect contemporary
portraits representing him in his pride and prime. He sits still
enthroned in a stately esedra below the roof of his Cathedral of
Anagni. And in the Lateran we have a portrait of him by Giotto himself,
between two Cardinals, proclaiming the first Jubilee.
Gregorovius, in his _Tombs of the Popes_ (Seton Watson’s Translation),
sums up Boniface VIII. thus: “He stood at the death-bed of the
thirteenth century, and saw the fourteenth born; he is one of the great
representatives of the age of Dante. The mighty poet once appeared
before him as Florentine Ambassador; and in the first Jubilee year
of Rome, Giovanni Villani conceived the plan of his chronicle, the
greatest triumph of Italian historical genius. It was in the year 1300
that Boniface proclaimed this festival, and we are still reminded of it
to-day by a precious memorial,--a picture of Giotto, which is preserved
under glass in the right aisle of the Lateran. It represents Boniface
standing between two Cardinals, in the act of announcing the Year of
Jubilee. This Pope was daring enough to renew once more the mighty
struggle between Church and State. In the Bull _Unum Sanctum_, in which
he laid claim to an over-lordship above all Kings and countries, he
rashly bade defiance to the forces of nationality hitherto latent, but
invincible when once awakened. In excommunicating Philip the Fair, King
of France, he raised up an enemy who eventually worked his ruin.”
Following in immediate succession to the tomb of Boniface come four
others of the highest interest. The first is that which should have
contained the bones of the gifted Pius II., who died 1464, the most
accomplished of all the Popes, that Æneas Sylvius Piccolomini of Siena,
whose career fills the walls of the Library of Siena Cathedral with
that series of frescoes by Pinturicchio which has no equal for beauty
and brightness. The tomb in which his bones were to have been laid is
a sarcophagus of the age of the foundation of the old basilica. The
carvings, which are rather coarsely executed, according to Dufresne,
represent various Biblical subjects. In the centre is Our Lord on a
little hill from which pour four rivers. At His feet are miniature
figures in the act of prayer, without doubt the deceased persons for
whom the sarcophagus was originally intended; at the side are the
Delivery of Our Lord, and Our Lord before Pilate. This sarcophagus was
found during the rebuilding in the foundations of the older church.
“Æneas Sylvius,” says Gregorovius, in _The Tombs of the Popes_ (Seton
Watson’s Translation), “was the son of a poor nobleman of the family
of Piccolomini in Siena, which owed its greatness to his genius. His
brilliant talents alike as poet, courtier, and man of the world,
rapidly transformed him from a literary adventurer into a man of wide
fame and popularity. In early life he was Secretary to the Anti-Pope
Felix V., and ambassador to the Emperor Frederick III., who solemnly
invested him with the poet’s laurel crown, and whose history Æneas
wrote. At the Council of Basel he eloquently championed the rights
of General Councils as opposed to those of the Roman Pontiffs, but
afterwards seceded to the party of Eugenius IV., and laid the final
foundations of his good fortune as Secretary to three successive Popes,
while Calixtus III. raised him to the rank of Cardinal. When eventually
he succeeded the latter on the Papal throne he renounced all the
traditions of his past life. During an all too brief reign the cause
that lay nearest to his heart was the destruction of the Turkish power.
His ardent desire was to place himself at the head of a crusading
army, and he died with his weapon already in his hand, full of warlike
enthusiasm, amid the din of arming hosts assembled at the seaport of
Ancona.”
Pius III., his nephew, who died in 1503, and was the last Pope buried
in Old St. Peter’s (for his successor was Julius II., who demolished
the old basilica), had chosen for his tomb a magnificent sarcophagus
of the fifth century, not sculptured like his uncle’s, but of majestic
solidity and simplicity. He reigned only twenty-six days, but few
Popes ever accomplished so much in a month. His body rested here for a
hundred years, then his remains, and those of his uncle, Pius II., were
transferred to the pretentious tombs in the Church of S. Andrea della
Valle. It was hard that Æneas Sylvius, the humanist, should be the prey
of vulgarity.
But there was appropriateness in the transference, for the head of St.
Andrew was brought from Byzantium to Rome by Thomas Palæologus during
the reign of Pius II., and received with ceremonies of extraordinary
fervour and splendour. [Illustration: The Tomb of Hadrian IV., the
only English Pope, behind; the Tomb of the Borgia Popes, Calixtus III.
and Alexander VI., in front. The effigy is that of Calixtus III.]
The next tomb has special interest for the English, for it is that of
Hadrian IV., who died in 1159, the only Englishman who ever sat on the
throne of St. Peter. He was born Nicholas Breakspear, of poor parents,
at St. Albans. He showed the courage and capacity of his race, for he
put down the disturbances caused by Arnold of Brescia with a firm hand,
and adhered to his refusal to crown the great Frederick Barbarossa
until the Emperor had done homage to him by holding his stirrup like
King Pepin the Short. He was the first of the score of Popes who held
Court at Orvieto, and Orvieto is full of grand old Romanesque houses
of his day. He is buried in a gigantic sarcophagus of red Egyptian
granite, majestic in its simplicity, which must have been the coffin
of an ancient Roman, as is shown by the skulls of oxen which are
carved upon it. The sole inscription is “Hadrianus Papa IV.” Not so
very far from his tomb, but in the centre aisle, is that attributed to
the extraordinary Alexander VI. (died 1503), the wicked Borgia Pope,
whose crimes to secure the aggrandizement of his children, Lucrezia and
Cesare, fill so many pages of history and fiction. If one may trust
the kneeling portrait in those exquisite Borgia Apartments which he
employed Pinturicchio to fresco, he was a splendid specimen of manhood,
physically. But that portrait does not tally with the pious face of
the recumbent effigy on the tomb which he is supposed to have occupied.
Perhaps this belonged to the uncle who paved the way for his greatness,
Calixtus III. (died 1458). Gregorovius, in _The Tombs of the Popes_
(Seton Watson’s Translation), says: “The Borgia Pope has no monument,
not even a grave.... The sarcophagus in the Vatican crypt, which is
shown as that of Alexander, also belongs to his uncle, Calixtus III.,
whose full-length figure lies above.... Throughout life he was favoured
by a boundless fortune. Nature had endowed him with a majestic presence
and a lively understanding. The motives of his fearful crimes are to
be found, not so much in his ambition, as in his sensuality and love
for his bastard children. His reign brought with it universal ruin; it
was the curse of Italy, which he delivered over to the mercy of French
and Spanish armies, and the curse of the Church, in whose eyes his
Pontificate must remain an eternal disgrace. And, indeed, a dreadful
Nemesis was at hand. The voice of Savonarola, it is true, was stifled
in the flames of the stake; but Luther still lived, and no succeeding
Pope has ever availed to undo his mighty work.”
The bones of both of them lie in the church of the Spaniards, S. Maria
di Montserrato. So universally was Alexander VI. execrated, that no
monument was erected over them until the late Pope’s time, when there
was an ebullition of Spanish _amour propre_, which partly took the
shape of monumentalizing the notorious Borgia, partly of insisting on
the removal of the tablet which showed the real place where St. Peter
was executed; because it injured the other Spanish church of S. Pietro
in Montorio, to have doubts cast on the spot under the Tempietto of
Bramante, where, without any proper authority, the monks maintained
the execution to have taken place. Both the Borgia Popes were buried,
until 1610, in the Chapel of S. Maria delle Febbri. In a line with
this tomb is that of the great young Emperor, Otto II., an enormous
plaster erection, which one might almost call a tumulus, painted to
resemble porphyry; it is about twelve feet long and four feet high,
and is said to contain an ancient sarcophagus, for which the present
font of St. Peter’s is wrongly supposed to have formed the cover. It
really belonged to the tomb of the famous Crescentius, Prefect of
Rome, alluded to below. But Klaczko says: “Stranger still were the
destinies of the tomb of the Emperor Otho II. The ancient sarcophagus
which held the mortal remains of the young monarch until 1609--the year
when the last part of the old basilica was torn down--was afterwards
changed into a fountain to adorn the Cortile of the Quirinale Palace;
and its superb lid, a colossal mass of red porphyry, now inverted, is
the baptismal font of St. Peter’s, in the first chapel on the left of
the entrance. Let it be noted that this same porphyry lid came from
Hadrian’s mausoleum, and had probably sheltered the ashes of that
Ultra-Pagan Prince!”
Between the two at the end of the central aisle is the tomb of Raymond
Zacosta, the Grand Master of the Knights of St. John of Malta. Close by
the tomb of Otto is that of Gregory V., who was made Pope at the age of
twenty-three by his cousin, the Emperor Otto III. He died after a brief
reign, made strong by the opposition of the famous Crescentius and the
Anti-Pope John XVI. He is buried in a costly sarcophagus of the fifth
century.
Gregorovius, in his _Tombs of the Popes_ (Seton Watson’s Translation),
says: “Not far from the grave of Otto stands the sarcophagus of
the first Pope of German origin--Gregory V.--Bruno (996-999). It
was erected by his cousin Otto III. With him the Dark Ages came to
an end, and the era of the Hildebrandine reforms begins to dawn. A
fortunate accident has preserved his coffin and its inscription; and
its time-worn characters, in barbarous Latin, make the past live once
more before us. It was an age full of glory for the German nation, but
dismal enough in the history of the Eternal City. On April 29, 998, the
Castle of Sant’ Angelo fell into the power of the young Emperor, and
with it Crescentius, the forerunner of Arnold of Brescia and Cola di
Rienzi. For this daring Roman, sprung from a noble Latian family, was
the first in the long series of patriots who sought to free the city of
their fathers from the tyranny alike of Pope and German Emperor. He had
succeeded in expelling Gregory V., but Otto III. ere long restored his
favourite to power; and the luckless champion of liberty was beheaded
in Sant’ Angelo, and his corpse hurled with savage insults from the
battlements.”
Gregory V. died young, like his kinsmen the Ottos, after a troubled
reign of less than two years and a half; he was only twenty-seven or
twenty-eight. Otto III., who had loved him with youthful enthusiasm,
and had received from his hands the Imperial Crown, had the dead Pope
interred close to Gregory the Great in a white marble sarcophagus,
covered with rudely executed reliefs representing scenes from Scripture.
“He who rests here, of noble eyes and countenance,
Was once called Gregory, fifth of the name.
His early name was Bruno, of the royal Frankish race,
The son of Otto and of Judith his spouse.
A German in speech, he was brought up in the city of Worms;
He yet mounted the Apostolic Throne, when young in years.
He reigned two years and almost eight months,
Dying when February had numbered thrice six days.
Generous to the poor, each Sunday he gave out vestments among them.
Careful to observe the Apostolic number.”
(Translated by R. W. Seton Watson in Gregorovius’s _Tombs of the
Popes_.)
All epitaphs and epigraphs make stiff reading for a book which aims at
interesting the ordinary mortal; so I shall pass them by with the less
important pieces of sculpture and fragments of mosaics.
Many people will recognize a strange coincidence, if not an intention
or an omen, in the fact that the _præcordia_ of Pius IX. repose in the
left aisle close to the tombs--enormous and hideous arks of painted
plaster--which contain the bones of the last three Stuarts,--James, the
Old Pretender, Charles Edward, the Young Pretender, and Henry, Cardinal
of York. These unhappy and luckless Princes rest here and not beneath
the elegant monument, by Canova, which George IV. had the good grace to
erect to their memory on the first pier of the nave of St. Peter’s.
[Illustration: The interior of St. Peter’s. Showing Canova’s monument
to the last three Stuarts, erected by George IV. when Prince Regent.]
As I have mentioned, had James seen fit to change his religion for
the Crown of Britain, he would have reigned longer than any of our
Sovereigns, not even excepting Queen Victoria. For James II. died
in 1701, and James III. just lived into 1766. But though few in the
history of the world have given up so much for their faith, he can
hardly be canonized; Rome knows him too well. For he spent the last
half-century of what Chambers calls his “fainéant, dissolute, prayerful
life” there. Charles Edward was born at Rome in 1720, and died there
in 1788. His youth was chivalrous and splendid, but for the last forty
years of his life he was a miserable drunkard.
Henry, created by his father Duke of York, and by Benedict XIV.,
Cardinal, was the best of the three. He was much loved at Frascati,
where he was Bishop, and celebrated for his charity. While he enjoyed
the revenues of the two rich abbeys bestowed upon him through the
favour of the French Court he was wealthy. When Charles Edward died, in
1788, he had a medal struck, bearing this legend in Latin: “Henry IX.,
King of England, by the Grace of God, but not by the will of men.”
He lost his income from France by the French Revolution, but relieved
the necessities of Pius VI. by selling his family jewels. In the last
years of his life, George IV., then Prince Regent, and he, exchanged
various amenities. George gave him a pension of £4000 a year, and when
he died, an old, old man, in 1807, he bequeathed to George the Crown
jewels, carried off by his grandfather from England a hundred and
nineteen years before--a record in the annals of longevity. In 1819 the
Prince Regent commissioned Canova to erect the famous monument. Charles
Edward was buried first at Frascati, where the Cardinal lived, but his
remains were translated to St. Peter’s. It is down in the crypt that
the adherents of the lost cause, the protesting subjects of the fallen
Stuarts, come to lay their white roses; not on the tomb of him who
sacrificed so much and so long, but on that of the graceless, graceful
Charles Edward.
The Cardinal of York--was there ever a more beautiful title?--was
Arch-Priest of St. Peter’s for fifty-six years.
Near the Stuart tombs is that of another nomad, who gave up a throne
for the Roman Catholic religion, Christina of Sweden, the daughter
of the champion of the Protestants in the Thirty Years’ War. She
bequeathed to the Vatican the splendid library her father had acquired
by the capture of Prague and other cities.
Almost in a line with the tombs of the Stuarts, let into the opposite
pier, is a porphyry slab, on which tradition declares that Pope S.
Silvester, in 319, divided the bodies of St. Peter and St. Paul to
give part to each of the two basilicas of the Vatican and the Ostian
Way. But Professor Marucchi, the antiquary to the Holy See, rejects
the tradition. Next to it is another marble slab, called the accursed
stone, on which many martyrs are said to have suffered.
It was transferred from a church outside the Leonine city to the Old
St. Peter’s, where it was placed by the side of the Chapel of the
Volto Santo. Near here also are a fine fragment of the pavement of the
basilica of Constantine (proving that the floor of the crypt was the
floor of Old St. Peter’s), and the famous marble copy of the donation
of the Countess Matilda, giving all her dominions to the Papacy. She
made the formal gift to a Legate of Pascal II. in 1120, and this
marble copy was erected close to the tomb of St. Peter. The Countess
is buried in St. Peter’s, on the right side opposite the Chapel of the
Holy Sacrament. It was the support of Matilda that enabled Gregory VII.
to humiliate the Emperor Henry IV. at Canossa. The Castle of Canossa
belonged to her.
In the floor close by is the tomb of Charlotte, Queen of Cyprus and
Jerusalem, who was dethroned in 1458, and came to implore the Pope’s
aid in recovering her crown. Pius II. had the good sense to recognize
the impossibility, and gave her a pension and a palace instead. There
are still in the Vatican Library books presented to her.
CHAPTER IX
THE GROTTE NUOVE. SOUTH SIDE
Here you enter the new crypt. Just at the entrance there is a
representation of the head of St. Andrew, carried on a cloth by two
angels, erected to commemorate the acquisition of the head of the
Apostle from Constantinople by Pius II. Gregorovius gives a wonderful
description of its reception in the seventh volume of his history:
“Rodrigo Borgia, afterwards Alexander VI., covered his palace with the
most costly draperies, and transformed the surrounding quarter into
a paradise resonant with music. The Pope made a Latin speech to the
head, in which he said, ‘So thou comest at last, O most holy head of an
Apostle driven from thine abode by the fury of the Turk. Like an exile,
thou takest refuge with thy brother, the Prince of the Apostles. This
is Alma Roma which thou seest before thee, and which is dedicated to
the most precious blood of thy brother in the flesh. The Romans, who
are thy brother’s family, greet thee as their uncle and father.’”
[Illustration: The Statue of St. Peter, from the Old Basilica, seated
on the throne of Benedict XII. in the Chapel of S. M. della Bocciata in
the Crypt of St. Peter’s.]
When the head was finally deposited near St. Peter’s tomb, Cardinal
Bessarion addressed a discourse to St. Peter, in which he expressed his
conviction that the Prince of the Apostles would avenge the outrages
his brother had received from the Turks, and that Andrew, as a new
protector to Rome, would unite the Kings in a crusade. The head of St.
Andrew is now preserved in one of the piers of the dome.
All round here are fifteenth-century sculptures belonging to the tombs
of Nicholas V. and Innocent VIII., and the famous altar and ciborium
which Innocent erected to receive the head of the Holy Lance with which
Our Lord’s side was pierced, when it was sent to him by the Sultan
Bajazet. They consist of statues and medallions. The lovely statues of
the four doctors of the Latin Church--St. Ambrose, St. Gregory, St.
Jerome, and St. Augustine--are said to have belonged to the tomb of
Calixtus III. Charming, too, are the fifteenth-century medallions of
the Evangelists, which belonged to the ciborium of the Holy Lance.
Just opposite the Chapel of S. Mary of the Women with Child, is the
famous inscription of Pope S. Damasus, which gives its name to the
principal court of the Vatican. It is the most beautiful inscription
in the crypts. It is disappointing to find that this stately epigraph
only refers to the drainage, which the saint, with saving common
sense, diverted from the tombs to a place where it could be used for a
baptistery. S. Damasus lived in the first century of the old basilica.
The fine ancient mosaics on the pier between the entrance to this
chapel and the adjoining chapel of S. Maria della Bocciata came from
the tomb of poor young Otto II., who had such high hopes of living to
see the Millennium, and died a mere boy in 983. The figure of Christ
reminds you of the great mosaic Christs of Palermo, Monreale, and
Cefalù, especially in the action of the hand. Père Dufresne says that
St. Peter’s holding three keys is significant, without doubt typifying
the fact that the Sovereign Pontiff exercises authority over the
Church, triumphant, militant, and suffering.
The Chapel of S. Maria Pregnantium is the largest chapel in the crypt.
Close to its door is a beautiful bas-relief of Our Saviour blessing
the Innocents; a fragment of the tomb of Cardinal Eroli, by Giovanni
Dalmata, a sculptor of ability who flourished about 1470-1480,
concerning whom, like Paolo Romano and Francesco Laurana (who were
approximately his contemporaries, and the latter of whom executed
busts of conspicuous beauty and European fame), one can practically
find no details in works of reference. The group by the Dalmatian is
interesting, because the head of Our Lord has the hair raying out like
sunbeams, as you have it on the handkerchief of S. Veronica.
Opposite this is a fine inscription of Pope Hormisdas, the Pontiff who
reunited the Eastern and Western Churches after they had been separated
for thirty-five years. The mosaic angel by Giotto on the same wall is
very lovely, but it looks as if it had been restored by Guido Reni or
Carlo Dolce: it came from the wall of the nave of Old St. Peter’s.
Between it and the window is another fragment of Matteo Pollaiuolo’s
screen, which went round the Confessio of Old St. Peter’s; the piece
which represents Nero condemning the Apostles formed the paliotto
of the High Altar. As a representation of Nero it is worthless. The
sculptor tried to make him finicking and comical, as a concession to
the religious prejudices of the times. Opposite this is a beautiful
inscription of the twelfth century, a panegyric of S. Boniface IV.,
the Pope who had the satisfaction of extorting from the worthless
Emperor, Phocas, a grant of the Pantheon, which after due purification
he consecrated as S. Maria ad Martyres, transferring to it thirty
waggon-loads of the bones of the martyrs from the Catacombs. From here
a low stair leads up into a smaller chapel, which contains some most
interesting objects: such as the mosaic portrait of John VII., very
like the Ravenna mosaics; possibly also like its subject, because the
square nimbus shows that it was executed in his lifetime. John holds a
representation of the oratory from which this mosaic came in his hand.
This is the oratory which stood on the extreme left of the west front
of Old St. Peter’s, and was built in the eighth century in honour of
the Virgin. It was also called the Oratory of the SS. Sudarium, and
the Oratory of S. Veronica, because the celebrated relic of the Holy
Face, which we call S. Veronica’s handkerchief, and the Italians call
the Volto Santo, was kept there. It was destroyed in the seventeenth
century. Near this is a marble tablet engraved with three prayers for
the soul of Gregory III., who died in 741, which were written on marble
after his death and placed on his tomb. Opposite to this is a very holy
spot, where once reposed in the same tomb S. Leo I., S. Leo II., S.
Leo III., and S. Leo IV. The first S. Leo, the Great, stayed the hand
of Attila; the third crowned Charlemagne; the fourth was the builder
of the Leonine city. They all lie in one of the transepts of the New
St. Peter’s, under the altar of St. Mary of the Column. Near this is a
twelfth-century picture of the Virgin, which was in the old basilica.
The head is charming, but far more important is the painting beside
it of the façade, and the portico of the old basilica, and of the Old
Vatican.
Separated from the Chapel of S. Maria Pregnantium by a wall is the
Chapel of S. Maria della Bocciata. On the right hand, as you enter
it, are some lovely arabesque bas-reliefs from the Garden of Nero,
which equal in loveliness anything of the kind which has survived
from classical times. Who knows if they may not have been preserved
as having stood by the spot where St. Peter met his death? Who knows
that Mino da Fiesole, who worked so much for Old St. Peter’s, did not
draw the inspiration for his delicious bas-reliefs from them? In the
vault above them we have frescoes of some of the most precious objects
in Old St. Peter’s, such as the shrine of the Holy Lance, erected by
Pope Innocent VIII., of which fine fragments remain scattered about
his crypt. Its splendour was brief, for the Lance Head, with which
tradition said the side of the Saviour was pierced, was only brought
to Rome in 1492, the gift of the Sultan, Bajazet II., sent as a
diplomatic offering to the Pope, who was very obligingly keeping his
brother and rival, Prince Djem, out of Turkey in honourable captivity.
The Prince is one of the most notable figures in the frescoes of the
Borgia Apartments. There are also pictures of the baldachin which was
over the Volto Santo, and the ciborium which contained the shroud that
wrapped Our Lord’s body; and some of the most famous mosaics of the old
church. Underneath them is a thirteenth-century mosaic which came from
the Oratory of John VII. Opposite this is one of the finest statues
in the crypt--that of Benedict XII., who died 1342. The style and
execution are noble; the sculptor had quite an Egyptian inspiration. It
is so majestic, though it is not of full length, that it is worthy of
the Pope who founded the Palace of Avignon, which, of all the work of
human hands, comes nearest to the rocks of God. Between it and the door
is a singularly beautiful monument, a statue of St. Peter seated on a
throne designed for Benedict XII., with the lions at his feet which
once adorned the tomb of Urban VI. The throne is the most beautiful in
Rome. It consists of a sort of triptych of three gables. The centre is
occupied by the seat, while in each of the sides is the figure of an
angel between two elegant little spiral columns with ribbons of mosaic
twined round them. The base is inlaid with porphyry discs and scrolls
of the school of the Cosmati. The statue, which is much older than the
statue exhibited in the church above for the adoration of the faithful,
was once a Roman Consul, but was given a new head with a halo, and a
new hand with keys.
[Illustration: Pope Benedict XII. and a fresco of Old St. Peter’s on a
wall in St. Peter’s Crypt.]
The Chapel of S. Maria della Bocciata, which contains some of the gems
of all the crypts, takes its name from an image of the Virgin which
used to stand in the portico, whose face bled when it was struck by
pebbles. The two stones, worn into holes, protected by bars underneath
it, are by some thought to have been worn by the fall of the blood; but
others say by the fingers of the faithful touching the sacred spot. The
image now stands at the end of the chapel, which contains such noble
monuments. Opposite the entrance is a little chapel dedicated to Our
Saviour, called the Salvatorino. On the pier at the entrance of this
chapel is the great marble cross which crowned the façade of Old St.
Peter’s in the Middle Ages. Almost opposite its entrance is a statue
of St. James the Less, which belonged to the magnificent ciborium
erected by Sixtus IV. at the back of the High Altar of Old St. Peter’s.
The other eleven Apostles are all preserved in the Grotte Nuove. This
statue stands just by the entrance into the crypt from St. Veronica’s
pier.
It is well to leave these two chapels to the end, because they are _par
excellence_ the museums of Old St. Peter’s. And the reason why the
crypts are holy ground is because they are all we have of the Old St.
Peter’s, which was the Temple of Christianity.
CHAPTER X
NICHOLAS V. AND THE VATICAN
“Dans son règne trop bref de huit années il dépassa par l’ampleur
inouïe de ses plans tout ce que les imaginations les plus ardentes
avaient pu concevoir.... Nicolas V. voulut égaler la Rome papale
à la Rome des empereurs; il la voulut reine du monde. _Roma caput
mundi regit orbis frena rotundi._ Il fallait que cette fière devise
inscrite, deux siècles auparavant, par Louis de Bavière en exergue
de sa bulle d’or, fût enfin pleinement réalisée: _Rome centre de la
Renaissance, et mère de toute civilization!_ Seul peutêtre des papes
du quinzième siècle, Nicolas V. fut poussé à ce puissant dessein par
autre chose que l’immensité d’un orgueil cherchant à se combler, le
désir effréné d’une gloire qui se veut immortelle; il regarda plus
loin et plus haut” (André Pératé, _Les Papes et les Arts_).
The Vatican, like Florence, played a protagonist’s part in the
Renaissance. It cannot be denied, I think, that it had its inspiration
from Florence, for Thomas of Sarzana, Tommaso Parentucelli, the
wizened little scholar born in the last years of the fourteenth
century, who found himself at forty-nine, in the year of grace 1447,
the head of a liberal Christendom, had, as he was climbing the ladder
to the pinnacle of earthly greatness, himself been a librarian and
copyist of manuscripts in Florence. While he was climbing the ladder
his eyes had ever rested on the same rung as his hands instead of
gazing at the top. He had done the work of the day without a thought
above it, and when the mutual jealousies of others had, to his utter
astonishment, lifted him to the throne of St. Peter as Nicholas V., he
fulfilled a scholar’s ambitions and ladled out with both hands to other
scholars the wealth which seemed as bottomless as the sea.
He gave a thousand crowns to Guarino for executing a translation of
Strabo for him. He offered ten thousand gold ducats for a translation
of Homer; five thousand gold ducats for a MS. of St. Matthew in the
original Greek; while he paid the greatest painters of his day from
seven to fifteen ducats a month. Scholarship has never had such a
Mæcenas as Nicholas V. When scholars did not come to him of their own
accord he wrote to them to ask why.
Supreme events happened in the short reign (it only lasted from
1447-1455) of the Little Man of Sarzana. For in 1453 Mahomet II.
accomplished the long purpose of the Falcon of the Prophet in
conquering Constantinople; and in 1454 Europe at length achieved what
Corea, a century before, and China perhaps many centuries before, had
achieved, in the printing of books from movable types.
Nicholas has left eternally recorded his wish to help the cause of
scholarship, for the first two documents printed in Europe, bearing the
very date of that year--1454--were the Thirty-Line and Thirty-One-Line
Indulgences printed at Mainz, by the order of the Pope on behalf of the
Kingdom of Cyprus against the Turks.
Unfortunately for the printers they did not wend their way to Rome for
another ten years, when Nicholas had long lain in the stately tomb
of which the fragments are gathered up in the crypt of St. Peter’s.
Calixtus III., his successor, was a man of a very different stamp; he
could only think of crusades. Pius II., who succeeded him, had been,
as Æneas Sylvius, one of the greatest humanists of his age; but he,
like Calixtus, thought that everything should give way to the paramount
necessity of organizing a Christian League against the Turks. Paul II.,
the luxurious Venetian who was elected in 1464, was more interested in
forming a museum. To their eternal honour, the Massimi, who claim to
be the oldest family in Rome, and the lineal descendants of Fabius
Maximus, who saved the city from Hannibal, though they are not ranked
as the oldest of the Roman nobility, received the wandering printers
into their grim ancient palace, which still stands unchanged nearly
opposite the Church of S. Andrea della Valle. Pius II., the humanist,
lies buried in S. Andrea, for the chief glory of his Papacy was the
reception of the head of the Apostle Andrew, which the wily Greek,
Thomas Palæologus, brought with him, as a peace offering, when he
arrived in Rome as a refugee from the conquering Turk.
[Illustration: Alfarano’s Plan, showing how Old St. Peter’s and the
present Cathedral rest upon the Circus of Nero.--_From Pistolesi’s “Il
Vaticano.”_]
Nicholas V. tried to raise Christendom against the Turks with
indulgences, but he saw more clearly another aspect of the case--the
importance of collecting the manuscripts carried away by Greek refugees
from Constantinople and other conquered cities. He had two soaring
ideas: the Renaissance of the world by learning, and the turning of the
eyes of Christendom to a Vatican which should outshine in magnificence
the Palatine of the Emperors. He once said that his wish was to spend
all that he possessed on books and buildings: he did not dream then
that he would ever have anything to spend except his health and his
time; but when he was unexpectedly elevated to the Papacy he was as
good as his word, and his ruling passion was strong even in death.
On his very death-bed he addressed a Latin speech to his Cardinals,
which his biographer, Manetti, preserved, and the historian, Pastor,
has picked out for us. “Only the learned,” says the Pope, “who have
studied the origin and development of the authority of the Roman
Church, can really understand its greatness. Thus, to create solid and
stable convictions in the minds of the uncultured masses, there must
be something that appeals to the eye; a popular faith, sustained only
on doctrines, will never be anything but feeble and vacillating. But
if the authority of the Holy See were visibly displayed in majestic
buildings, imperishable memorials, and witnesses seemingly planted
by the Hand of God Himself, belief would grow and strengthen like a
tradition from one generation to another, and all the world would
accept and revere it. Noble edifices, combining taste and beauty with
imposing proportions, would immensely conduce to the exaltation of
the chair of St. Peter.” ... “If,” said Nicholas, “we had been able to
accomplish all that We wished, Our successors would find themselves
more respected by all Christian nations, and would be able to dwell in
Rome with greater security, both from external and internal foes. Thus
it is not out of ostentation, or ambition, or a vainglorious desire
of immortalizing Our name, that We have conceived and commenced all
these great works, but for the exaltation of the power of the Holy See
throughout Christendom, and in order that future Popes should no longer
be in danger of being driven away, taken prisoners, besieged, and
otherwise oppressed.”
Pastor quotes this to show the falsity of the idea that love of fame
guided Nicholas in all his actions and was the true explanation of the
splendour of his court--his buildings, his library, and his liberality
to learned men and artists.
Gregorovius says that all Nicholas undertook was directed towards
exaltation; the one object of his ambition was to increase his dignity
and authority by the visible splendour of its monuments, and the
intellectual influence it would exert if it became the centre of the
learning of the world. I must quote the summary of Nicholas’s plans
which Pastor takes from Manetti. “The tomb of St. Peter, actually
situated at the one extremity, was to be the ideal centre of this
grandiose plan. The opposite extremity was to be formed, by a large
square in front of the Castle and Bridge of Sant’ Angelo. From this
square three straight and broad avenues were to start, and terminate
in another vast open space at the foot of the Vatican Hill; the
central avenue was to lead to the basilica; the one on the right to
the Vatican Palace, that on the left to the buildings facing it.
These streets were to be flanked with spacious colonnades to serve
as a protection against sun and rain, and the lower stories of the
houses were to be shops, the whole street being divided into sections,
each section assigned to a separate craft or trade. The upper stories
were to serve as dwelling-houses for the members of the Papal Court;
architectural effects and salubrity were to be equally considered in
their construction.
“The principal square, into which these three streets were to run, and
of which the right side was to be formed by the entrance to the Papal
Palace, and the left by the houses of the clergy, was to measure five
hundred and fifty feet in length and two hundred and seventy-five in
breadth. In its centre there was to be a group of colossal figures
representing the four Evangelists, which was to support the obelisk
of Nero; and this again was to be surmounted by a bronze statue of
the Saviour, holding a golden cross in His right hand. At the end of
the square,” continues Manetti, “where the ground begins to rise,
broad steps ascend to a high platform, with a handsome belfry, adorned
with splendid marbles, on the right hand and on the left. Between and
behind these is a double portico having five portals, of which the
three central ones correspond with the principal avenue coming from
the Bridge of Sant’ Angelo, and the two side ones with the two other
streets. This quasi-triumphal arch leads into a court surrounded with
pillars and having a fountain in the centre, and finally through this
into the church itself.
“All that the progress of art and science had achieved in the way of
beauty and magnificence was to be displayed in the new St. Peter’s.
The plan of the church was that of a basilica with nave and double
aisles, divided by pillars, and having a row of chapels along each of
the outermost aisles. Its length was to be six hundred and forty feet,
the breadth of the nave three hundred and twenty, the height of the
dome inside two hundred and twenty; this was to be richly decorated,
and the upper part of the wall was to be pierced with large circular
windows, freely admitting the light. The high altar was to be placed at
the intersection of the nave and transepts, and the Papal Throne and
the stalls for the Cardinals and the Court within the apse. The roof
was to be of lead, the pavement of coloured marbles, and behind the
church was to be a Campo Santo, where the Popes and prelates should be
interred, ‘in order that a temple, so glorious and beautiful that it
seemed rather a divine than a human creation, should not be polluted by
the presence of the dead.’ An immense pile of buildings at the side
was destined for the accommodation of the clergy.
“The Papal city, which, by its natural site, was detached from the rest
of Rome, was to be fortified in such a manner,” says Manetti, “that no
living thing but a bird could get into it. The new Vatican was to be a
citadel, but at the same time to contain all the elegance and splendour
of a palace of the Renaissance. A magnificent triumphal arch was to
adorn the entrance. The ground floors, with spacious halls, corridors,
and pavilions, surrounding a garden traversed by cool rivulets and
filled with fruit trees and flowers of all sorts, was to be the summer
habitation. The first floor was to be furnished with all that was
required to make winter agreeable; while the airy upper story was to
serve as a spring and autumn residence. The Papal Palace was also to
include quarters for the College of Cardinals, accommodation for all
the various offices and requirements of the Papal Court, a sumptuous
hall for the coronations of the Popes and the reception of Emperors,
Princes, and Ambassadors, suitable apartments for the Conclave, and for
keeping the treasures of the Church, several Chapels, and a magnificent
library.”
Pastor does not blame Nicholas for his share in the destruction of Old
St. Peter’s as much as most writers--he quotes architectural evidence
to show that it had become unsatisfactory; but surely it would have
been a simple matter for an architectural genius like Alberti to take
down the unsafe portions and rebuild them, if measures less drastic
were unavailing. I fear that we must acknowledge that the glamour of
the Renaissance and the theories of Alberti had fascinated Nicholas.
Of all the vast architectural works executed for Nicholas only one, and
that the smallest, attracts the attention of most people--the little
chapel, built, according to one interpretation of the documents, as
his study, which is still called the Chapel of Nicholas V., and was
decorated with the masterpieces of Fra Angelico, the frescoes of the
stories of St. Lawrence and St. Stephen. Of all the pictures painted
for him by the greatest artists of his day, we have practically nothing
else left. And of the stained glass, with which he so liberally
embellished the Vatican, doubtless in memory of the great Florentine
churches, I do not know of one inch in existence. Not only St. Peter’s,
but all the rooms in the Vatican had painted windows. The minor arts
were equally recognized by this Pope. “For many hundred years,” says a
contemporary writer, “so much silken apparel and so many jewels and
precious stones had not been seen in Rome.”
Nicholas founded the first manufactory of tapestries in Rome. The
goldsmiths and gold embroiderers, not only of Rome, but of Florence,
Venice, and Paris, were unable to keep pace with his orders. The
splendid vestments and Church jewels and the superb magnificence of the
Church service were for the same purpose as his architectural grandeur.
Even in all the lesser details of its accessories and details, says
Pastor, the Church was to reflect the splendour of the heavenly
Jerusalem.
It is significant of the character of Nicholas that we so constantly
meet the name of his bookseller, Vespasiano da Bisticci. It was to
him that, when he was elected Pope, Thomas of Sarzana said: “It will
disturb the pride of many that a priest who was only good for ringing
bells has been made Pope, and would the Florentines have believed it?”
This Vespasiano not only sold books and took orders for them to be
copied in these last days before printing burst upon the Western world,
but wrote little biographies of the famous men of his time, chief among
them Pope Nicholas. The forty-five copyists produced two thousand
volumes in twenty-two months. Gregorovius gives some of the prices of
them:--
“A Bible costs from twenty-five to forty gold ducats; a small copy
of Cicero’s Letters ‘ad Familiares’ costs ten ducats; while Poggio
Bracciolini made Lionel of Este pay a hundred gold florins for a copy
of the ‘Letters of Jerome,’ and made the poet Beccadelli pay a hundred
and twenty ducats for a Livy which he had copied himself.”
Poggio Bracciolini was one of the most extraordinary figures of his
time. For nearly fifty years he was in the service of the Roman
Court, but he was hardly ever in Rome; he held various ecclesiastical
offices, but remained a layman and seems to have taken no interest in
ecclesiastical affairs, though his duties as Secretary made him take
part in some of the greatest events of ecclesiastical history, such
as the Council of Constance in 1414-1418, and the Council of Basle in
1431-1443. When his duties called him to Constance, says John Addington
Symonds, he employed his leisure in exploring the libraries of Swiss
and Swabian convents, especially St. Gall. He recovered the hitherto
lost Quintilian and part of Valerius Flaccus at St. Gall, and unearthed
manuscripts of Lucretius, Columella, Silius Italicus, and Vitruvius,
all of which he copied out with his own hand and communicated to the
learned. Resolute in recognizing erudition as the chief concern of
man, he sighed over the follies of Popes and Princes, who spent their
time in wars and ecclesiastical disputes when they might have been
more profitably employed in reviving the lost learning of antiquity.
“This point of view is eminently characteristic of the earlier Italian
Renaissance. The men of that nation and of that epoch were bent on
creating a new intellectual atmosphere for Europe by means of vital
contact with antiquity.”
It is small wonder that Nicholas V. determined to get hold of him, and
in spite of his merciless attacks on the Church, recalled him to Rome,
where he employed him to write a scurrilous attack on the Anti-Pope
Felix. But Symonds tells us that his most scurrilous attacks were
made on rival scholars like Filelfo and Valla, that he used all the
resources of a copious and unclean Latin vocabulary to degrade the
objects of his satire, and ascribed to them without discrimination
every crime of which humanity is capable. The most decent action of
his life was his generous tribute to Jerome of Prague, the heretic at
whose condemnation he was present. Gregorovius sums him up in a few
brief sentences: “Poggio is the chief representative of humanism; a
man of many sides, he lacked depth, and made Cicero his model. To his
contemporaries he seemed a genius of eloquence; knowledge of art was
alone wanting to make him complete.” He also tells us that one of the
most widely circulated of his books was his celebrated _Facetiæ_, a
collection of indecent anecdotes.
Nicholas was equally ready to be the patron of Filelfo and Valla.
Gregorovius has given us a still more scathing portrait of Filelfo,
“whose life forms a true mirror of the period of humanistic vagrance; a
genuine type of the sophist, egotist, and boaster, a vulgar courtier, a
marvellous slanderer, an insatiable pleasure-seeker, but nevertheless
an enthusiastic student and an untiringly active virtuoso in the
Professor’s chair.”
Before he was twenty-two he was a Professor at Venice, and at that age
went to Constantinople as the Secretary to the Venetian Legation. It
was there that he became equally great as a Latin and Greek scholar.
Seven years later, after various diplomatic employments, he returned to
Venice with a beautiful Greek wife and a valuable collection of Greek
books. After being a Professor at Bologna for two years he went to
Florence, and narrowly escaped assassination from some people whom he
had lampooned. Being banished, he attempted to murder Cosimo de’ Medici
by the hands of a hired assassin. He was a Professor at Bologna again
for the next ten years, then went to the court of Milan for fourteen
years, and in 1453, while on his way to Naples to be crowned as poet by
King Alfonso, he passed through Rome.
Gregorovius says that he determined not to visit Nicholas, whom he had
assailed with impudent demands for preferment in the Church and the
request to be made a Cardinal. But he was sent for by the Pope and
spent several days with him reading scurrilous attacks on Nicholas’s
best friends. Nevertheless, Nicholas appointed him a Papal secretary,
and with his own hand presented him with a purse containing five
hundred ducats. More than twenty years after he took up a post at Rome
under Sixtus IV., and was so charmed “by the city, its climate, the
wealth and beauty of life, and the freedom, that he lamented that he
had only come to inhabit it at the end of his life.” Gregorovius tells
us how the world resounded with Filelfo’s fame, and the important part
played by his innumerable writings in the sphere of Latin learning.
But he concludes with another of his scathing summarizations:
“Nevertheless, they were able to secure him--who deemed himself a
demi-god--nothing more than the ‘paper-immortality’ of the library.”
The ablest of all these scholars was Lorenzo Valla, who, if Paul IV.
had been Pope instead of Nicholas V., would have ended his days as a
heretic at the stake instead of as a Canon of the Lateran. It was he
who established the spuriousness of the Donation of Constantine which
gave the Popes their temporal power. He added that “if the donation
were genuine it would be already rendered null by the crimes of the
Papacy alone.” He said that the Popes possessed no rights over Rome
or the secular state. He called the Papal Government “the source of
all evil, a rule of executioners and enemies,” and called on Eugenius
IV. to abdicate. When Valla wished for a reconciliation Eugenius would
not forgive him, but Nicholas V., the successor of Eugenius IV., was
wise and generous; he made him an apostolic secretary, although he had
attacked the Papacy with greater violence than Wyclif, and reduced
him to silence in a characteristic way by keeping him hard at work
translating Herodotus and Thucydides, for which no man living was more
admirably fitted.
Nicholas, though, fine scholar as he was, he knew no Greek, was
nevertheless a patron of Greek scholars. His liberal patronage
of Manetti, the famous Hebrew scholar, was rewarded by Manetti’s
enthusiastic biography, which has made us so familiar with the
greatness and generosity of this remarkable Pontiff. Unfortunately
his chief Greek protégé was the charlatan, George of Trebizond, who
executed various inferior translations for him. It was not Nicholas,
but his predecessor, Eugenius IV., who made the famous Bessarion a
Cardinal.
Bessarion was a Greek, created Archbishop of Nicæa in 1437 by John
Palæologus, whom he accompanied to Italy to bring about a union between
the Greek and Latin Churches. Failing in this he passed over to the
Latin Church. He held various Italian archbishoprics, and was titular
Patriarch of Constantinople. He is honourably immortal for making his
Palace near the Church of SS. Apostoli a court and refuge for the Greek
scholars exiled by the fall of Constantinople.
Theodore of Gaza, to whom Gregorovius is unwontedly gentle, as “the
first scholar of his time, as a model of humanism, and unblemished
virtue,” was a friend of Bessarion, who entered the service of Nicholas
V.
Nicholas--one of whose dreams in the foundation of the Vatican Library
was to render all the treasures of Greek literature accessible to
Latin scholars--kept, says Pastor, the most eminent humanists of the
day--Poggio, Guarino, Decembrio, Filelfo, Valla--labouring at these
tasks. I have mentioned his extreme liberality to scholars. He paid
Valla five hundred gold scudi for his translation of Thucydides, and
Perotti five hundred Papal ducats as a first instalment for his
translation of Polybius. He paid Manetti, the Hebrew scholar, six
hundred ducats a year, but Fra Angelico only fifteen ducats a month for
painting his chapel, and Benozzo Gozzoli only seven ducats a month.
“Nicholas,” says Pastor, “was the most generous man of a lavish age.”
Nicholas commissioned Manetti to translate the whole Bible from the
original Hebrew and Greek, but his death prevented his plan being
carried out.
Nicholas, when he was a poor priest, was always in debt with his
purchases of manuscripts. When he became Pope his tastes and
enthusiasms remained unchanged.
“A noble library,” says Pastor, “was to form the crowning glory of the
new Vatican.” The idea of this library, by means of which Nicholas
hoped to make Rome the centre of learning for all ages to come, was
perhaps the grandest thought of this great Pope, who was “as admirable
for his genuine piety and virtue as for his many-sided culture. He
wished to place all the glorious monuments of Greek and Roman intellect
under the immediate protection of the Holy See, and thus to hand them
down intact for future generations.”
Nicholas’s manuscripts, we are told, were nearly all of them made on
parchment and bound in crimson velvet with silver clasps.
Besides the library he collected at the Vatican, which is estimated
at from 5000 to 9000 manuscripts, he had a private library, mostly of
profane authors, of which one catalogue still exists.
We know from this catalogue that Nicholas V. had over eight hundred
Latin manuscripts kept in eight great chests. The manuscripts in the
first were Biblical; in the second were of “The Fathers”; in the
third and fourth, those of the great mediæval Doctors of the Church,
like Thomas Aquinas; in the fifth, of heathen classics, as well as
theological and historical works, for here was kept Valla’s translation
of Thucydides mentioned above; in the sixth, of works on Theology and
the Canon Law; in the seventh, chiefly of classical authors--among them
Livy, Cicero, Juvenal, Quintilian, Virgil, Catullus, Terence, Pliny,
Sallust, Horace, Ovid, and a translation of Homer. The contents of the
eighth were mixed.
Voigt, quoted by Pastor, has given us a charming picture of the little
Scholar of Sarzana in the days when he had become Pope. “It was his
greatest joy to walk about his library arranging the books and glancing
through their pages, admiring the handsome bindings and contemplating
his own arms stamped on those that had been dedicated to him, and
dwelling in thought on the gratitude that future generations of
scholars would entertain towards their benefactor.”
Nicholas was very particular as to the legibility and accuracy of his
copies, for he had himself been a copyist in his Florentine days.
Of all the works of Nicholas V. there is only one tittle which strikes
the eye of the casual visitor to the Vatican. Or, perhaps I should say,
one tiny gem, for, though minute in proportions, it is in quality as
perfect as anything in the Vatican. I refer to the Chapel of Nicholas
V., which is thought also to have been the study mentioned in the
Vatican account books of 1449, decorated with intarsia wood, and gilt
friezes and cornices, and some paintings executed by Fra Giovanni da
Firenze (Fiesole) and his pupils, and with two windows executed by Fra
Giovanni da Roma, a painter on glass, representing the Blessed Virgin
and SS. Stephen and Lawrence. Pastor sees in these “almost a certainty
that this celebrated chapel and the study mentioned in those books
are identical, the latter having been afterwards converted into a
private chapel for the Pope.” This Chapel of Nicholas V. may, without
injustice, be mentioned in the same breath with the Riccardi Chapel at
Florence, the Borgia Rooms, and the Cathedral Library at Siena, as one
of the few frescoed chambers of which the _tout ensemble_ is as perfect
as a single picture. And apart from the perfection and harmoniousness
of the whole, we are confronted, as no one can help acknowledging,
by the fact, that here Fra Angelico, then an old man of sixty, rose
superior to all his previous efforts in making his figures more human
and full of character, while his colouring remained as delightful as
ever. It is said that one of the pupils who assisted him was Benozzo
Gozzoli, the painter of the Riccardi Chapel at Florence. Certainly the
two chapels leave rather a similar impression upon one. The frescoes
deal with the lives of St. Stephen and St. Lawrence, the two saints
who have a common grave in the Church of S. Lorenzo fuori le Mura.
“This chapel,” says Kugler, “was for centuries consigned to oblivion,
so that Bottari, in the last century, the door not being discoverable,
made his entrance by a window. Here the story of the two saints is seen
in a series on three of the walls, that of St. Stephen occupying the
upper course. A Descent from the Cross by the master, above the altar,
is still covered with whitewash. These remarkable frescoes evince a
dramatic power and a skill in composition and drawing hardly shown by
the master before, and prove that in his sixty-first year he was in the
vigour of his art.” [Illustration: St. Lawrence. By Fra Angelico; in
the Chapel of Nicholas V.]
The painter has left us a portrait of his patron, in the fresco of the
Ordination of St. Lawrence by Sixtus II. The humanist Pope, who wears
his own triple-crowned tiara in the place of the crownless tiara Sixtus
would have worn, breathes an air of benignity which you feel must have
belonged to one who so generously carried out the aspirations of his
youth when the power came to him.
Pératé, who sees in the “frescoes” of this chapel the influence of
the frescoes of Masaccio in the Carmine of Florence, considers that
Nicholas V. was the builder of the Stanze, which Raffaelle was to cover
with his famous frescoes; and points out that one of the last acts of
Nicholas’s life was to compose an epitaph which was to go on the tomb
of the gentle painter, Fra Angelico, with whom he had been so closely
associated in the church of his order, the famous Dominican Church of
S. Maria sopra Minerva.
“Non mihi sit laudi quod eram velut alter Apelles,
Sed quod lucra tuis omnia, Christe, dabam,
Altera nam terris opera extant, altera caelo,
Urbs me Iohannem _Flos tulit Etruriae_.”
Fra Angelico came from Fiesole, three miles outside Florence, but
could any name fit Florence so perfectly as that death-bed phrase of
the humanist Pope, who owed both his humanism and his pontificate to
Florence: _Flos Etruriae_--the flower of Etruria.
Nicholas has been blamed for the unprecedented magnitude of his
projects. A modern historian said: “The lives of twenty Popes, and
the treasures of Rhampsinitus (_i.e._ Rameses) would be required to
carry them out.” Pératé retorted that he only wanted twenty years and
an architect of genius; and that since Alberti was the forerunner of
Leonardo da Vinci, he had the genius, he only lacked the years.
CHAPTER XI
THE VATICAN LIBRARY
The Vatican Library is the most famous in the world on account of its
ancient manuscripts, of which it possesses about thirty-five thousand.
It owes its character, if not its inception, to Nicholas V., who was
as impressed with a veneration for books as he was for the glories
of Rome. We have seen that he was the first of the Popes to show any
appreciation or care for the monuments which he had inherited from the
Emperors.
The world owes much to Nicholas V. But for him we might have
been without the classical masterpieces of Rome, which were the
inspirations of the builders of the Renaissance. He gave printing its
first recognition in 1454, the year before he died, by issuing the
Thirty-Line Indulgence and the Thirty-One-Line Indulgence, on behalf
of the Kingdom of Cyprus; and he founded the Vatican Library almost
simultaneously with the first printing done in Europe by the use of
movable metal types--in other words, simultaneously with the invention
of printing. The Vatican Library, which, as it is, contains no less
than four thousand five hundred books published in the fifteenth
century, might have had a complete set of early printed books if it
had not been for the sack of Rome by the Constable Charles de Bourbon
in 1527. It is impossible to exaggerate the importance of this. It
meant that there was a library belonging to the wealthiest Monarch in
Europe, intelligent from the very nature of his office, started in time
to receive the first printed books. Historians have not said enough of
Thomas of Sarzana, elected Pope as Nicholas V., who with his private
collection of nine thousand manuscripts[13] founded the public library
of the Popes.
His successors themselves thought so little of him that they allowed
his tomb, which was only second in splendour to that of Paul II., to
be broken up when Old St. Peter’s was demolished to make room for the
new. He was only left in the enjoyment of his sarcophagus. The crypts
are full of the fragments of his mausoleum. His immediate successor,
Calixtus III., though he made some additions to his books out of the
volumes saved from the Turks at the fall of Constantinople, allowed
many of them to be dispersed. And Pius II., learned humanist though
he was, did nothing much, in his short reign of six years, for the
library. From the handsome Paul II. nothing would be expected; nothing
came. But Sixtus IV. (the first della Rovere Pope) included it in his
magnificent ambitions, and located it in the suite under the Borgia
Rooms. He appointed the celebrated Platina, the historian of the
Popes, director, and gave the library a definite endowment for its
maintenance. Platina’s appointment is the more remarkable because at
the time of it he was still in the prison to which Sixtus’s predecessor
had consigned him for attacking him in his writings.
Mrs. Oliphant, quoting the chronicler Panvinio, whom she presumes to
have worked from Platina’s notes, speaks of Sixtus IV.’s “making under
his _chapel_ a library, which was the finest thing of all, for he there
reinstated Platina, who had been kept under so profound a shadow in the
time of Paul II., and called back the learned man whom his predecessor
had discouraged, sending far and near through all Europe for books,
and thus enlarging the library begun by Pope Nicholas, which is one of
the most celebrated the world possesses, and to which he secured a
revenue, ‘enough to enable those who had the care of it to live, and
even to buy more books.’” This provision still exists, though it is no
longer sufficient for the purpose for which it was dedicated.
All writers on the Vatican Library allude to Melozzo da Forli’s famous
fresco[14] in the Vatican Picture Gallery (which is now transferred to
canvas), of Sixtus IV. founding the Vatican Library, which, as we have
seen, he did not do; he was only the re-founder. Bishop Creighton, in
his _History of the Popes_, describes the picture with his customary
brevity and point: “The Pope, with a face characterized by mingled
strength and coarseness, his hands grasping the arms of his chair, sits
looking at Platina, who kneels before him, a man whose face is that
of a scholar, with square jaw, thin lips, finely-cut mouth, and keen
glancing eye. Cardinal Giuliano stands like an official who is about
to give a message to the Pope, by whose side is Pietro Riario, with
aquiline nose and sensual chin, red-cheeked and supercilious. Behind
Platina is Count Girolamo, with a shock of black hair falling over
large black eyes, his look contemptuous and his mien imperious.” Mrs.
Oliphant points out that Cardinal Giuliano della Rovere, afterwards the
great Pope Julius II., Cardinal Riario, and Count Girolamo, who was the
Pope’s son or nephew, “a predatory baron, working out a fortune for
himself with a sword,” were the three men for whom Sixtus IV. fought
and struggled and soiled his hands with blood, and sold his favour
to the highest bidder. “They were all young, intoxicated with their
wonderful success, and with every kind of extravagance to be provided
for; they made Rome glitter and glow with pageants.” Cardinal Riario
covered in the whole of the vast Piazza of the SS. Apostoli, and hung
it with tapestry for the reception of Donna Leonora, the daughter of
King Ferrante; the Cardinal gave every one of her ladies a washing
basin of gold. The next year he died, only twenty-eight years old,
“poisoned,” Infessura says; “and this was the end of all our fine
festa.”
Even Nicholas V. might be denied the title of founder, for Paul Fabre
tells us that Pope Saint Damasus had a library, which was dispersed in
the persecutions of Diocletian, though his books were not kept in the
Vatican, but in a vast edifice built to house them and the archives
near the Theatre of Pompey, which the Pope dedicated to San Lorenzo.
The name, and probably the site, is still preserved in the Church
of S. Lorenzo in Damaso, which forms part of the great Palace of the
Cancelleria.
The present splendid building was erected by Fontana for Sixtus V., who
considerably augmented the library in the year of the Spanish Armada,
1588; it runs right across the gigantic quadrangle of the Belvedere.
It has grown, not only by the purchases of successive Popes, but by the
absorption of various libraries. In 1621, for instance, Duke Maximilian
of Bavaria presented Gregory XV. with the Biblioteca Palatina, captured
at the fall of Heidelberg by his general, Tilly, in the Thirty Years’
War. In 1658, the Chigi Pope, Alexander VII., purchased for it, at the
price of ten thousand scudi, the Biblioteca Urbina founded by the Duke
Frederick of Montefeltro; and some of the famous palimpsests from the
Benedictine Abbey of Bobbio; and, in 1690, the Biblioteca Alexandrina,
bequeathed to the Ottoboni Library by the convert Queen Christina of
Sweden, which included the famous manuscripts of the Abbey of Fleury
and other important French abbeys, as well as all the books taken by
her father, the great Gustavus Adolphus, at Prague, Würzburg, and
Bremen, amongst them over two thousand Latin and nearly two hundred
Greek manuscripts. In 1746, under Benedict XIV., it received a still
greater number of manuscripts by the acquisition of the Biblioteca
Ottoboniana, which included the famous Altemps Library, purchased by
Alexander VIII., the Ottoboni Pope, in which there were three thousand
three hundred and ninety-one Latin manuscripts, and four hundred and
seventy-four Greek. And in the same reign the Marchese Alessandro
Capponi bequeathed his priceless manuscripts to it. Clement XIII.,
1758, Clement XIV., 1769, and Pius VI., in 1775, were also important
benefactors. In 1798, the French carried off nearly five hundred
manuscripts, including the choicest artistic specimens. But they were
restored seventeen years later, with the exception of a few from the
Palatine Library, which were returned to Heidelberg. Two years after
that, on the application of the King of Prussia, at the request of
Humboldt, the Pope restored to Heidelberg no less than eight hundred
and forty-eight manuscripts in German, which were of great value to
German historians. Pius VII. acquired for the Vatican the library of
Cardinal Zelada, in 1800; Leo XII., the noble collection of fine art
literature of Count Cicognara, in 1823; and Gregory XVI. also largely
augmented the library. Pius IX., in 1856, added forty thousand books,
etc., belonging to Cardinal Mai. Lastly, in 1902, Leo XIII. purchased
the celebrated library in the Palazzo Barberini for twenty thousand
pounds. Everything about the purchase redounds to the honour of the
late Pope; the library had been founded by the family of a former Pope,
the ambitious Urban VIII. (Barberini), and the impoverished Barberini
family were no longer the right people to have it. So Leo bought it.
But there was a difficulty in the shape of the aged librarian, a
priest; it was hard to deprive him of his office. Leo took him over
with the books, and engaged to continue his salary as long as he lived.
More than that, he transplanted all the bookcases, and the coats of
arms which had hung over them, and re-erected them in the Vatican,
where they still remain. The aged priest has survived his patron.
The Vatican Library can be divided, roughly speaking, into the old
library on the first floor and the new Leonine Library on the ground
floor, under the Sala Sistina. The upper floor comprises, besides the
Sala Sistina, a group of rooms adjoining the Gallery of Inscriptions,
and the whole of the Long Gallery under the Galleria dei Candelabri,
degli Arazzi, and Geografica. The rooms adjoining the Gallery of
Inscriptions are used for the librarian and reading-rooms; the Sala
Sistina and the Long Gallery are used for show cases and the presses
in which the manuscripts are stored. Practically all the printed books
are now kept in the Leonine Library, which adjoins the new rooms of the
_Archivio_, and was made out of rooms which were originally an armoury
and rough magazine, and afterwards a stable, sixteen years ago. So I
was informed by Monsignor Ugolini, the delightful, accomplished, and
erudite prelate who is the senior _Scrittore_ of the Vatican Library.
Under Count Vespignani, the architect, and Comm. Ludovico Seitz, the
art director of the Vatican, it was converted into a library in a
matter of months, and opened in November 1898.
From the new library, which forms the subject of a separate chapter,
a door admits to the Library of the Archives, which are under another
Cardinal and another administration. The archives look like the
Venetian archives preserved in the convent of the Frari at Venice.
Before 1890, those who wished to consult the archives had to make a
_giro_ of a kilometre to get to them. Five years ago carriages and
horses passed through the Cortile of the Belvedere. Before you leave
the new library you have to examine the facsimiles which have been
printed of some of the most famous manuscripts of the Sistine Library.
And do not omit to have a look at the Barberini Library, where the dear
old priest, who was taken over with the library by Leo XIII., will
show you the books and the triple coat of arms, and explain why Urban
VIII., the Barberini Pope, had _bees_. They were not bees at all, he
explained, but I forget what he said they were.
It is a rude shock after this to be taken over the Sistine
Library--that is, the Vatican Library proper--by one of the _custodi_
who conduct parties round the Vatican in the usual brisk way, quite
devoid of intelligence. Try and get an order to be taken round
alone; it is both humiliating and unsatisfactory to be trotted round
the galleries as a member of the general public, for they form a
highly important museum. If you are obliged to go as a member of the
many-headed, you will have to wait for a party to collect outside the
door of the Museo Profano, by the entrance to the Sculpture Galleries.
When the guide thinks there are enough of you--far too many to have
any chance of seeing things properly--he lets you through. You find
yourself in the Museo Profano, established by Pius VI., at the northern
end of the long arm of the library in the Hall of the Porphyry Columns,
to correspond with the Museo Cristiano, established by Benedict XIV.
at the other end. It contains the jewels, and other precious pagan
antiquities, such as cameos, ivories, bronze candlesticks, fibulae,
and bracelets, of the celebrated Carpegna collection. The prime
curiosity in one of the glass cases near the door is the hair of a
lady of the second century, preserved by _amianto_--_i.e._ asbestos
cloth, which for some reason or other has wonderful powers of arresting
decay. There are also some dolls from the Catacombs--such a human and
unexpected touch; and a vase cut out of amber.
The Museo Profano is the northern end of the Long Gallery of the
Vatican Library, which is between three and four hundred yards long,
and terminates at the far end in the Chapel of S. Pius V. Before
proceeding further, I will point out the extreme simplicity of the
ground plan of the library. It is in the shape of a “T,” with its foot
starting from the Gallery of Inscriptions, its trunk crossing the
courtyard of the Belvedere, while its enormously long arms are formed
by the Long Gallery terminating in the Museo Cristiano and S. Pius
V.’s Chapel on the south, and the Museo Profano and the entrance to
the Sculpture Gallery on the north. The trunk on this floor consists
of the Sala Sistina, and underneath it is the new Leonine Library
which contains all the printed books. Sundry smaller rooms are grouped
round both floors at each end of the trunk. And where the trunk joins
the arms is the Archivio, which also has rooms underneath the Long
Gallery. When you leave the Museo Profano to traverse the half of the
Long Gallery which brings you to the west door of the Sala Sistina, you
pass through, in succession, the Capponi, Ottoboni, Alessandrine, and
other collections of manuscripts, the last being the so-called Hall
of the Vatican Manuscripts. The entire walls are lined with painted
presses, in which the manuscripts are kept hidden away from sight,
as the ancient Romans kept theirs. You are now at the Sala Sistina,
the superb main hall of the Vatican described below. It is perhaps
just as well to go round once with the crowd to have an opportunity
of observing the idiotic and perfunctory way in which the public are
conducted over what should be one of the most interesting sights in
the world--the great Vatican Library. I should not like to say that
the official guides who show you over it have no more knowledge of
the subject, or interest in it, than shopwalkers would have, but
they remind you of them all the time, and draw your attention to the
kind of things that would appeal to shopwalkers most. Certain books
they are perforce obliged to show you, because they are mentioned in
Baedeker; but they show far more animation when they are pointing
out the various enormous vases from the French and German national
potteries, with rich grounds of green or blue, round a light panel
with some illustration connected with the giver or the receiver; a
view of Paris or Sans Souci, or a portrait of Pius IX., or Leo XIII.
These “presents-from-Brighton” are altogether out of place in the
Vatican Library; or if they must be there, should be passed over in
tolerant silence. The depth of the blue and the green or the sheen
of the enamel may be triumphs of the potter’s art, but they are the
kind of things which stupid people would give to show that so much
money had been spent, and are nothing but a nuisance when they take up
valuable minutes in the half-hour or so which the authorities consider
sufficient for racing you round the Vatican Library. They are varied
with the Sèvres china and silver font used for baptizing the poor
Prince Imperial, which was presented by his father. You forget the
vulgarity and meretriciousness of that in thinking of the undeserved
fall, the pathetic close, of the dynasty of the Third Napoleon.
These are varied by a large Oriental alabaster vase, presented by
the Khedive Ibrahim Pasha; two granite tables, supported with bronze
figures of Hercules; a malachite cross, presented by Prince Demidoff;
a malachite vase, presented by Czar Nicholas I., and a basin of Scotch
granite, presented by the Duke of Northumberland to Cardinal Antonelli.
Among the wilderness of French and German public porcelain are a Sèvres
candelabra, presented by Napoleon I. to Pius VII., whom he carried off
a prisoner to France; three Sèvres vases given by Maréchal MacMahon to
Pius IX.; Berlin vases presented by Wilhelm I. of Prussia, afterwards
Emperor of Germany; and vases presented by Charles X., President Grévy,
and President Carnot. The most enviable possession of them all is the
huge block of virgin malachite, given by the Grand Duke Constantine.
But there are two notable vases of red Russian quartz, presented by the
Czar Alexander.
The hall in which these Royal mantelpiece vases, only valuable, are
exhibited has a singular magnificence of effect. It is over two hundred
feet long, nearly fifty feet wide, and thirty feet high, and is divided
up the middle by six piers. It was constructed by Domenico Fontana for
Sixtus V. in 1588, and paved with marble in the time of Pius IX. These
pillars and the roof are decorated with frescoes in the Pompeian style,
by Scipione Gaetani and others; and its rich light colouring and airy
proportions make the Sala Sistina one of the finest chambers in Rome.
But the walls have frescoes representing scenes which introduce views
of the various buildings erected by that ambitious Pontiff, Sixtus
V., which have little artistic merit. The room contains a number
of horizontal cases, with glass tops and locked shutters to go over
them, in which are exhibited the principal manuscript treasures of the
Vatican. These include:--
The palimpsest of Cicero’s _Republic_, discovered by Cardinal Mai,
under a manuscript of St. Augustine’s version of the Psalms, after that
famous work had been lost for many centuries.[15]
The celebrated Codex Vaticanus, a Bible of the early part of the fourth
century, containing the oldest of the Septuagint versions of the
Scriptures.
The celebrated _Virgil of the Vatican_, of the fourth century, which
belonged to Cardinal Bembo, and has fifty-nine miniatures.
A Terence of the ninth century, with miniatures, which belonged to
Cardinal Bembo.
A Terence of the fourth century, the oldest known.
A Plutarch, with notes by Grotius, from Queen Christina’s Library.
The Breviary of Matthias Corvinus, King of Hungary in the fifteenth
century.
A Pliny, “with interesting figures of animals” (Murray).
The Pontifical of Cardinal Ottoboni, with illustrations by Perugino.
Autographs of Petrarch and Tasso.
A wonderful Dante, with miniatures by Giulio Clovio, who was the pupil
of Giulio Romano, and a renowned miniature painter.
A palimpsest of Livy, Book IX., from Queen Christina’s Library.
A Seneca of the fourteenth century, with commentaries by the English
Dominican Triveth.
The Menologium Grecum, or Greek Calendar, tenth century, executed
for the Emperor Basil. “A fine example of Byzantine art, brilliantly
illuminated with representations of basilicas, monasteries, and
martyrdoms of various saints of the Greek Church” (Murray).
A Byzantine manuscript of the four Gospels, executed in 1128.
A Hebrew Bible from the Library of the Dukes of Urbino. “The Jews of
Venice offered for this Bible its weight in gold” (Murray).
A Sketch of three Cantos of Tasso’s _Gerusalemme Liberata_, and several
of his essays and dialogues in his own handwriting.
A Manuscript of Dante in the beautiful writing of Boccaccio, which is
signed Johannes di Certaldo.[16]
A Latin poem, by Donizo, in praise of the Countess Matilda, “with
a full-length portrait of that celebrated personage, and several
historical miniatures of great interest: among which are the Repentance
of the Emperor Henry IV. and his Absolution by Gregory VII.” (Murray).
The Homilies of S. Gregory Nazianzen (1063).
Three autographs of Henry VIII.
Several manuscripts of Martin Luther.
To these Tuker and Malleson add the following:--
A Bible, with miniatures by Pinturicchio, from the Montefeltro Library.
The Acts of the Apostles, with beautiful miniatures of the Apostles,
presented to Innocent VIII., by Charlotte, Queen of Cyprus, who is
buried in the crypt of St. Peter’s.
Part of a very ancient Bible, known as the _Codex Purpureus_, written
in silver upon purple parchment, but with the name of Jesus always
written in gold.
The enormous Mexican Calendar, recently published in facsimile.
The Autograph and some miniatures of Michel Angelo.
A History of Dion Cassius.
A Life of the Fathers of the Rule of St. Benedict, twelfth century,
with miniatures.
A Sacramentary of the fifth or sixth century.
A Sacramentary of Boniface IX. (1389).
An Autograph of S. Thomas Aquinas, the writing of which Montaigne
laughingly compared to his own.
The sixth-century Virgil known as the _Romano_.
The seventh-century Virgil known as the _Palatino_.
A History of the Dukes of Urbino, with miniatures by Giulio Clovio.
An Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary, with miniatures by Giulio Clovio.
A Letter from the Emperor of Burmah to Pius IX., enclosed in an
elephant’s tooth.
The famous Vatican Library Book of Joshua, according to Kugler
(_Italian Schools of Painting_, revised by A. H. Layard, third
impression of sixth edition, John Murray. 1902), is a parchment roll of
more than thirty feet long, entirely covered with historical scenes.
According to an inscription upon it, it is not earlier than the seventh
or eighth century in date, though doubtless copied from some work of
the best Christian time. It has the appearance of a carefully, but
boldly and freely, drawn sketch executed in few colours. It differs
greatly from the highly finished splendour of the later Byzantine
miniatures. The whole is so spirited in its composition, so beautiful
in some of its motives, so rich in invention, that Kugler assigns it
the highest place among the properly historical representations of
Early Christian times. He pronounces the colours and weapons as still
perfectly unique. Joshua, he says, is always distinguished by the
nimbus, as are also the fine symbolical female forms, with sceptres
and mural crowns, which represent the besieged and conquered cities.
For here, as in so many classical frescoes, the whole landscape
is expressed by symbols, such as mountain and river deities. “The
wildest action is often most happily portrayed, though the artist,
of course, shows little knowledge either of perspective or of the
relative proportion of the figures. The copyist of the later period is
discernible, almost solely, by his obvious ignorance of the drawing of
joints and extremities.”
The celebrated _Virgil of the Vatican_, No. 3225, on the other hand,
says Kugler, as an original work of the fourth or fifth century,
appears to greater advantage, though in composition it does not equal
the Book of Joshua. “The drawing displays a superabundance of motives
from the antique, though in the action of the figures it is already
very inanimate.”
The famous ancient Greek Calendar, called the _Vatican Menologium_,
says Kugler, “with its four hundred and thirty splendid miniatures on
a gold ground (executed for the Emperor Basil, the conqueror of the
Bulgarians, 989-1025 A.D.), is essentially a work of that period,
and decidedly one of the best known. Eight artists, whose names recur
from time to time, decorated the separate days of this most costly
of all Calendars (extending, however, only to the half of the year)
with scenes from the Life of Christ, the Saints, and the history of
the Church--the latter in the form of Synods. In the Biblical scenes,
traces of earlier motives occur, but the martyrdoms of the Saints are
really the work of the tenth century, and, horrible as many of them
are, they do that century great credit; for though, in the single
figures, we discern a great want of life, yet the composition is, upon
the whole, well understood, and here and there very animated. The
Saints are seen suffering martyrdom in various ways--dragged to death
by horses, burnt in the red-hot effigy of a bull, crucified, drowned,
scourged to death, torn by wild beasts in the amphitheatre, suspended
by the feet, and so on, by which a tolerably correct knowledge of
action is shown, though all idea of anatomy is absent. The drapery
and heads are somewhat stiff and conventional, and the nude somewhat
meagre, and, moreover, disfigured by an ugly brick-red colour--the
result, perhaps, of an improper vehicle, which has also lowered the
colours. Far inferior to these miniatures are those of the Dogmatica
Panoplia, in the Vatican, executed for Alexis Commenus (1081-1118
A.D.), which are only remarkable for stiff, gold-embroidered garments,
and weak decrepit heads. On the other hand, a collection of sermons
for the Feast of the Virgin (in the Vatican), belonging to the twelfth
century, in which the initials consist chiefly of animals, contains
excellent compositions, not only of an early character, but also of
that belonging to that century, and is remarkable for great beauty of
decorative ornament. Another important manuscript of the time of the
Commeni, the Klimax of Johannes Klimakus (in the Vatican), exhibits
in small, highly delicate, and clearly drawn compositions, on a
gold ground, the well-known allegories of the Virtues as the steps
leading to Heaven, and of the Vices as those which lead to Hell. It
is interesting here to observe the new treatment in the frequently
recurring personifications of these abstract subjects, which were
formerly characterized by form and attribute, and generally represented
looking on in silent dignity, while here they appear only as small
male and female figures, explained by marginal inscriptions--the bad
qualities, however, being represented as negroes. The actions are
mostly expressed in a very awkward manner, according to some prescribed
system.”
The poem of Donizo in praise of Countess Matilda of Tuscany, whose
donation of her lands to the Papacy allowed it to exist in its
present form instead of sinking to the level of the Archbishoprics of
Cologne or Treves, is pronounced by Kugler to be chiefly of historical
interest, the execution being so very inferior.
The famous Urbino Bible of 1478 is, says Kugler, obviously by some
Florentine hand.
Of the Dante of Giulio Clovio, Kugler says that “the paltry conceits of
the allegories disturb the otherwise excellent execution.”
But none of the manuscripts exhibited are so rich in the personality
of the writer as those of our English King, Henry VIII. For here are
shown two letters of the King to Anne Boleyn; and a dedication copy of
the pamphlet against Luther, which won him from Leo X., in 1521, the
title of Fidei Defensor--Defender of the Faith--which is still borne
by the Kings of England on their coins. It was confirmed by Clement
VII., and indignantly taken away in the light of subsequent events. The
pamphlet is entitled: “_Assertio Septem Sacramentorum adversus Martinum
Lutherum_,” by Henry VIII., printed on vellum at London in 1521, with
the King’s signature and the autograph inscription on the last page but
one,
“_Finis, Henry Rex.
Anglorum Rex, Henricus, Leo Decimo, mittit
hoc opus et fidei testem et amicitiæ._”
That they should so prominently exhibit these writings of our Henry
VIII. and Martin Luther as treasures shows how broad-minded the Vatican
authorities now are.
Besides the manuscripts and Sèvres and Berlin vases, there are many
notable objects exhibited in the room, mostly offerings for Leo XIII.’s
Jubilee, such as the gold rock given by the Emperor Francis Joseph
of Austria, and a beautiful Crucifixion, in which the crosses are
surrounded by a number of figures in white glazed china, made at the
Royal Saxon factories. At the other end of the great hall you will
enter a room which reminds me strongly of the Bodleian Library in
general arrangement, colour, and decoration. A number of interesting
objects are exhibited in it, and the portrait of Cardinal Mai; but it
is principally used for students and the man who has charge of the
umbrellas. It is connected by the Long Gallery, which has Pius VII.’s
famous collection of ancient Roman, Christian, and Pagan Inscriptions
affixed to its walls, with the Loggia of Giovanni da Udine under
Raffaelle’s Loggie. This gallery inspired Fabre with one of his
highest flights of enthusiasm: “Toute la partie antérieure, depuis le
portique de Jean d’Udine, sur le cour Saint-Damase jusqu’ à l’entrée
de la Vaticane, devint pour la Bibliothèque la plus royale avenue que
Sixte-Quint eût jamais pu rêver pour elle.”
[Illustration: The Sala Sistina, or Grand Hall, of the Vatican Library.]
You will then retrace your steps through the Grand Hall (Sala Sistina)
to the Long Gallery. At the end you will turn to the left and reach
the Museo Cristiano, passing through the three rooms marked on the
Tuker and Malleson plan as the Hall of the Bonaventura, the Hall of
the Obelisk, and the Hall of Aristides. The Vatican Library statue of
Aristides is very much admired.
The _Museo Cristiano_ contains, in Room I., a number of objects from
the Catacombs, such as lamps, gems, crosses, rings, bas-reliefs, in
ivory and wood and metal; diptychs and triptychs of the twelfth and
thirteenth centuries, and works by Benvenuto Cellini. Room II. is the
Cabinet of the Papiri, dating from the fifth to the eighth century, and
mostly from Ravenna. Room III. is full of valuable little paintings
of the Middle Ages, kept in glass cases, including works of the
thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries, by Pietro Lorenzetti,
Simone Martini, Taddeo Bartoli, Capanna, Mainardi, Nuzi, Sano di
Pietro, Pinturicchio, Margaritone, etc. The small altarpiece, with
the Virgin and Child, and numerous attendant figures, by Allegretto
Nuzi of Fabriano, dated 1365, is of special interest, because this
rare painter was the master of Gentile da Fabriano, who painted the
celebrated picture of the Three Magi in the Accademia delle Belle
Arti at Florence, a picture of world-wide fame alike for its beauty
and for its introduction of goldsmith’s work. On the right of the
entrance is a Russian Calendar in the shape of a cross of cedar wood,
with miniatures (1650). These are not only valuable little pictures
by great masters, but extremely interesting and beautiful, and ought
to be exhibited in the Vatican Picture Gallery. Kugler mentions also
one of them as the best specimen of the Otranto school. He says: “The
best specimen--Christ in the Garden with the Magdalen--in the Museo
Cristiano in the Vatican, bears the inscription, ‘_Donatus Bizamanus
pinxit in Hotranto_,’” and in describing the Museo Cristiano, draws
attention to “A very ancient and much-restored mosaic, in the Museo
Cristiano in the Vatican, belonging possibly to the third century, as
giving us some idea of the style of physiognomy which the heathens
attributed to Christ. It is a bearded head in profile, agreeing pretty
much with the type of countenance given to the philosophers of that
period.”
Here they are thrown away; the shopwalker-guide does not deign so
much as a glance to them; he is fully occupied with silver models of
cathedrals and monuments like the Lion of Lucerne, and other totally
useless but costly objects given by mayors and corporations to Leo
XIII. for his Jubilee, in which the town of Quito, in South America,
took the lead. The whole of these put together are not so interesting
as the toothcombs and fish counters for playing games which came from
the Catacombs. And imagine the interest that would have attached to a
toothbrush from the Catacombs. Who knows but what the Early Christians
used them? They are rather perishable things. The Early Christians
certainly had glass plaques, because there are some in this museum.
If you let the guide have his way you would hardly get a peep at the
two rooms at the end of the Museo Cristiano, which contain the frescoes
that until about a century ago, when Herculaneum and Pompeii began to
be opened up, were the most important pictures that had come down to
us from the ancient world. The most famous of these frescoes is the
so-called Nozze Aldobrandini, which was found on the Esquiline Hill,
near the Arch of Gallienus, in the first years of the seventeenth
century. Cardinal Aldobrandini bought it, and it was for many years in
his villa. It was finally bought by Pius VII. two hundred years later
for the sum of ten thousand scudi (crowns). The fresco is supposed to
have been a kind of frieze imitated from an original of the time of
Alexander the Great. Helbig sees in it a peculiar charm, through its
simplicity, clearness, and grace, and a reflection of the fine feeling
of restraint that obtained in the best Greek period.
To me the figures in it are like the figures in almost every other
classical picture that has come down to us; they remind me of the
silhouettes cut out of black paper and touched up with a few lines
of white or gilt paint, which satisfied our grandparents in the
days before the dire and positive efforts of early photography. It
is difficult to believe that Zeuxis painted better than a primitive
Japanese. Classical paintings have little beauty, even of colour--even
from the wall-paper point of view. We love to look at them for the
glimpses they give us of the life of the world when B.C. was passing
into A.D. Why has nothing survived to show us if there were painters
in Greece who could depict men and women like the sculptors of Tanagra
and Myrina? These have told us more about the human side of ancient
Greece with their little clay statuettes than we can glean even from
the immortal literature of the Greeks. We are driven to the conclusion
that every decent painting must have perished, and that our museums
contain nothing better than the work of artisan decorators employed by
house-builders.
There are two or three other fine groups of ancient Roman frescoes in
the same suite: such as the wall paintings found in an ancient villa at
Tor Marancia, which Helbig calls a “Gallery of ‘Mythical Fair Women,’
prominent for their crimes and misfortunes in love.” He considers them
copies of good originals of stereotyped subjects of Alexandrian art.
Among them are Pasiphaë; Scylla, the daughter of Nisos, King of Megara,
whose life depended on a purple or golden lock in the midst of his
hair. When Minos was besieging Megara, Scylla, of course, fell in love
with him, and gave the lock to him, with the result that Megara was
captured and Nisos slain. Among the other heroines are Canace, who fell
in love with her brother; Myrrha, who fell in love with her father;
and Phaedra. Here, too, are the famous scenes from the Odyssey, which
adorned a large room in a palace discovered in 1848; “along with other
paintings, now lost,” says Helbig, “they formed a kind of frieze above
the dado on the walls; and they represent the adventures of Ulysses
among the Laestrygonians, in Circe’s Island, and in Hades.” Besides
these, the frescoes from Ostia are also well worthy of study.
The Library of the Vatican must have been an enchanting place when
the Popes were in all their glory. To-day the parts generally shown
to strangers give you more the idea of a beautifully arranged and
uncrowded museum than a library. The windows command views of the
various gardens of the Vatican--the sylvan scenery of the Observatory
Hill, and the formality of the garden of the Pigna, whose vast bronze
pine-cone came from the _atrium_, or garden court, that gave entrance
to the Old St. Peter’s.
Visitors and readers (who require the permission of the Cardinal
Secretary) are admitted from Easter to June 20, from eight to twelve
o’clock, and from October to Easter, from nine to one o’clock, on any
day on which the library is open. At present it is closed on Mondays,
Thursdays, and holidays. The library is closed to the public between
June and October.
CHAPTER XII
THE VISITS OF MONTAIGNE AND MISSON TO THE VATICAN LIBRARY
The great essayist, Montaigne, when he made his famous journey into
Italy by way of Switzerland and Germany in 1580 and 1581, kept a
journal of his travels, part of it dictated to his secretary-valet,
expressed now in the first, now in the third person; part of it written
with his own hand.
He visited Rome, it will be observed, a few years before the accession
of Sixtus V., which took place in 1585: the great Hall of the Vatican
Library built by that Pope, and called after him, the Sala Sistina, in
which the most valuable manuscripts are now exhibited, was not erected
till three years after Sixtus’s accession, in the year of the Spanish
Armada, 1588.
I give here the few hundred words in which Montaigne wrote his
impressions of the Vatican Library, as translated by Mr. W. G. Waters,
in the scholarly and delightfully illustrated edition published in
three volumes in 1903, by Mr. Murray, under the title of _The Journal
of Montaigne’s Travels_.
“On the 6th of March I went to see the Library of the Vatican, which
is contained in five or six rooms, all communicating one with the
other. There are many rows of desks, each desk having a great number
of books chained thereto. Also, in the chests, which were all opened
for my inspection, I saw many manuscripts, of which I chiefly remarked
a Seneca and the _Opuscula_ of Plutarch. Amongst the noteworthy sights
I saw was the statue of the good Aristides, with a fine head, bald and
thickly bearded, a grand forehead, and an expression full of sweetness
and majesty. The base is very ancient, and has his name written
thereupon. I saw likewise a Chinese book writ in strange characters,
on leaves made of a certain stuff much more tender and transparent
than the paper we use, and because this fabric is not thick enough to
bear the stain of ink, they write on only one side of the sheet, and
the sheets are all doubled and folded at the outside edges by which
they are held together. It is said that these sheets are the bark of a
certain tree, as is a fragment of ancient papyrus which I saw covered
with unknown characters. I saw also the Breviary of Saint Gregory in
manuscript, which has no date, but the account they give of it states
that it has come down from one hand to another from Saint Gregory’s
time. It is a missal not unlike our own, and it was taken to a recent
Council at Trent as an authority for the ceremonies of our Church.
Next, a book by Saint Thomas Aquinas, containing corrections made by
the author himself, who wrote badly, using a small character worse even
than my own. Next, a Bible printed on parchment, one of those which
Plantin has recently printed in four languages, which book King Philip
presented to the Pope, according to an inscription on the cover. Next,
the original manuscript of the book which King Henry of England wrote
against Luther, and sent fifty years ago to Pope Leo X. It contains a
subscription and a graceful Latin distich, both written by his own hand:
“‘Anglorum Rex, Henricus, Leo decime, mittit
Hoc opus, & fidei testem & amicitie.’
“I read both prefaces, one to the Pope and the other to the reader.
The King claims indulgence for any literary shortcomings on the score
of his military occupations, but the style is good scholastic Latin. I
inspected the Library without any difficulty; indeed, anyone may visit
it and make what extracts he likes; it is open almost every morning. I
was taken to every part thereof by a gentleman, who invited me to make
use of it as often as I might desire.
“Our ambassador quitted Rome just at this time without having ever
seen the Library, and he complained because pressure had been put upon
him to beg this favour of Cardinal Charlet, and that he had never been
allowed to inspect the manuscript Seneca, which he desired greatly to
see. It was my good luck which carried me on to success, for, having
heard of the ambassador’s failure, I was in despair. Thus it seems all
things come easily to men of a certain temper, and are unattainable to
others. Right occasion and opportunity have their privileges, and often
hold out to ordinary folk what they deny to kings. Curiosity often
stands in its own way, and the like may be affirmed of greatness and
power. In the Library I saw also a manuscript Virgil in an exceedingly
large handwriting, of that long and narrow character which we see in
Rome in inscriptions of the age of the Emperors somewhere about the
reign of Constantine, a character which takes somewhat of Gothic form
and misses that square proportion which the old Latin inscriptions
possess. The sight of this Virgil confirmed a belief which I have
always held, to wit, that the four lines usually put at the opening of
the Æneid are borrowed, since this copy has them not. Also, a copy of
the Acts of the Apostles, written in very fair Greek golden character.
The lettering is massive, solid in substance, and raised upon the
paper, so that anyone who may pass his finger over the same will detect
the thickness thereof. We have, I believe, lost all knowledge of this
method.”
As he speaks of the Library being in five or six rooms opening out
of each other, it was probably still in the rooms under the Sistine
Chapel, where it was placed by Sixtus IV. We know that the manuscripts
collected by Nicholas V. were kept in chests, and that he had a Seneca
of which he was proud. Montaigne may have seen some of his chests. The
Aristides is still considered one of the gems of the Vatican Library
collections. The papyri of the Library are famous. The Saint Gregory is
not Gregory the Great, but St. Gregory Nazianzen: that extraordinary
compromise between a hermit and a man of action, who, when he was at
college at Athens, was the intimate friend both of Basil the Great
and Julian, afterwards branded as the Apostate: who was in his time
both Archbishop of Constantinople and a hermit in the desert: whose
writings at some times rose to such sublime flights of poetry, such
classical eloquence, that he is in his inspired moments, in the words
of Chambers, “one of the first orators and most accomplished and
thoughtful writers of all times,” though the mass of the enormous
number of writings he has left behind him are redundant, pedantic,
and heavy with far-fetched similes. He was born in Cappadocia about
330 A.D., and belonged originally to that extraordinary sect the
“Hypsistarians, worshippers of the Most High, but also of the Fire,
like the Persians, and keepers of the Jewish Sabbath, and the law of
the purity of meats.”
St. Gregory comes prominently into Gaetano Negri’s great _Life of
Julian the Apostate_ (Fisher Unwin. Translated 1906).
The Council of Trent, to which Montaigne refers, sat with certain
interruptions from December 13, 1545, to December 4, 1563.
Before I had read Montaigne’s description of his visit to the Library,
I had, in a preceding chapter, drawn attention to the remarkable
prominence of Henry VIII.’s autographs among the manuscripts chosen for
exhibition in the glass cases in the Sala Sistina.
The three famous Vatican manuscripts of Virgil have been referred to in
the last chapter.
I have not been able to find out anything about Maximilian Misson
beyond the fact that he wrote _A New Voyage to Italy, with curious
Observations on Several other Countries: as Germany, Switzerland,
Savoy, Geneva, Flanders, and Holland: together with useful instructions
for those who shall travel thither_, which was published by Tonson
and others in the reign of Queen Anne, and dedicated to “The Right
Honourable Charles, Earl of Arran; Viscount Tullo; Baron of Weston; and
Claghernan, Captain of a Troop of Guards: Lieutenant-General in the
Armies of Her Majesty.”
I quote from the fifth edition, published in 1739. Misson had more to
say about the Library than the rest of the Vatican and St. Peter’s put
together. He mentions the bequest by Alexander VIII., the Ottoboni
Pope, of nineteen hundred manuscripts, which had belonged to Christina,
Queen of Sweden, who was given the name Alessandra by Alexander VII.
when she declared herself Roman Catholic. He mentions the pictures with
which it (the Library) is filled by various hands, representing “the
Sciences, Counsels, most celebrated Libraries, _Inventors_ of Letters,
and some passages of the Life of Sixtus V.” Father Norris, presumably
an Englishman or Irishman, was chief library keeper when he was there,
and became a Cardinal. He examined the famous Codex of the Septuagint
very closely, and has left us an interesting note about it:
“As it was not long since I had much observed the famous _Septuagint_
Manuscript that was then in the hands of Mr. Justel, Keeper of the
Royal Library in London, and which was given, or rather sold, by the
poor Patriarch Cyrillus, etc., I was extremely desirous to see the
_Codex Romanus_ (of the Vatican) which has been printed, and with which
the Alexandrian contends, both for value and antiquity. I was extremely
surprised to find the Aspirates and the Accents distinctly marked
everywhere through the whole Book, and even upon the Initial Letters.
But the Abbot _Laur. Zacagna_, Library Keeper under F. Norris, and a
person of great merit, told me that he was inclinable to believe that
those Accents were added by a modern hand; and that this very Hand had
taken the Pains, as he believed, to run over all the Characters through
the whole Manuscript with a Pen, _atramento super imposito_. I remember
his very words, to make the Accents and the Letters appear to be of the
same Ink.” What has modern criticism to say to this?
Misson was a very sceptical person: he doubted the authenticity of the
ninth-century manuscripts of Terence and Virgil, which are among the
treasures of the Vatican, and of which the much-improved scholarship of
the present day entertains no doubts. To him, also, as to Montaigne, a
hundred years before, they showed the manuscripts of King Henry VIII.,
as among the most interesting things in the collection. They also
showed him a German Bible, pretended to be in Luther’s own hand, which
has a scurrilous prayer in the same hand which convinced him of its
unauthenticity.
“I observed among the Manuscripts of the last Age, written by, and to
Cardinals, that in them they style one another Messer Pietro, Messer
Julio. They also showed us, as they do to all Englishmen, a little
volume of fourteen Letters from Henry VIII. to Anne of Bollen. One is
easily induced to believe what these Gentlemen say, that these Letters
are of the King’s Own Hand, for the Writing is not fair. I read two or
three of ’em in French, and as many in English. They are Love-Letters,
full of _Dear Heart_, _Cruel Absence_, and such Expressions, but
without any of what we call wit; not that the King wanted it, but he
did not write those Letters with a Design to have them plac’d among
the curiosities of the _Vatican_ Library; no more than _Scaliger_
ventur’d in familiar Discourse, a Thousand things Uncertain; sometimes
ridiculous; which they have printed as so many Oracles, in the
little Book called _Scaligeriana_. Next to the Love-Letters, they
have placed the King’s printed Book, the Title of which is _Assertio
septem Sacramentorum_, against _Martin Luther_: an admirable Subject
indeed, for a King, or even any Body else to write on! But _Henry_
VIII. compos’d this book no more than _Cæsar_ did his Commentaries, or
_James I._ his _Demonology_. You may see what _Theod. de Beza_ has
said of the pretended Book of K. _Henry_, in his Life of _Calvin_. The
Volume I speak of, is the very same that was sent to the Pope; and it
is also sign’d and mark’d with a flourish, by the King’s own Hand. This
Prince obtain’d of his Holiness by that holy Book, as a Reward, or a
Congratulation, the glorious and well-deserv’d Title which cost him
little, of DEFENDER OF THE FAITH.
“_Si quid Roma dabit, nugas dabit. Accipit Aurum. Verba dat. et._
“They shewed me the _German_ Bible which you mention; which they
pretend was translated by _Luther_, and _Written by his own Hand_.
But the Credit of that story is destroyed by the extraordinary prayer
at the End of the Book, which is of the same Hand with the Rest, and
cannot be the language of Luther. Thus it is in the Original:--
“O Gott, durch deine gute,
Bescher uns Kleider und hute,
Auch mentel und rocke,
Fette Kalber und bocke,
Ochsen, Schafe, und Rinder
Viele weiber, wenig kinder
Schlette speis und trank
Machem einen das jahr lang.
“_That is, O God, be graciously pleas’d to grant us Clothes and Hats,
Cloaks, and Gowns, fat Calves and Goats, Oxen, Sheep, and Bulls, many
Wives, and few Children. Bad Meat and ill Drink make Life uneasy._ It
must be acknowledged, that they who would persuade us that _Luther_ was
the Author of this Prayer, must have had an earnest desire to make him
pass for a _Debauchee_, but not to be believed.”
CHAPTER XIII
THE NEW LEONINE LIBRARY OF THE PRINTED BOOKS OF THE VATICAN
Leo XIII. was a very thorough man. More than willing to restore to the
Vatican, under proper conditions, one of its greatest art treasures,
he determined at the same time to house the books removed from the
Borgia Apartments in a manner more worthy of the premier library of the
world. At the same time he formed the really magnificent conception of
carrying out Nicholas V.’s project of making the Vatican Library the
focus of European scholarship. No collection of ancient manuscripts
can compare with that of the Vatican; and its archives have a value
which can hardly be exaggerated as materials for the history of the
Middle Ages. Pope Leo determined to place both the manuscripts and the
archives at the disposal of scholars, and to arrange the printed books
in whatever way was most convenient for reference to those who were
working at the manuscripts and archives.
He set a connoisseur to work to suggest the most suitable sites to
him, and as soon as the present site was suggested saw its points. It
lies, roughly speaking, under the Sala Sistina, the superb hall of
Sixtus V., which cuts Bramante’s vast Belvedere court in half. Ordinary
visitors who are going over the Vatican Library spend most of their
time in this magnificent chamber, brilliantly arabesqued, and filled
with glass cases which contain the most famous manuscript treasures of
the Vatican. But only students, or those specially privileged, descend
to the Leonine Library below it, which consists of eight fine chambers,
six under the Sala Sistina, one in a room at the east end taken from
the Vatican Mosaic Factory, and one in the corresponding room at the
other end adjoining the Archivio.
Hardly any of the guide-books deign to notice the existence of this
new Leonine Library, which contains all the printed books of the most
famous library in the world. And those which do mention it, with one
exception, practically ignore it.
The six chambers are so lofty and so admirably suited to their purpose
that you wonder how Pope Leo had to his hand such a heaven-sent suite
for a library. But they present a very different appearance now to
that which they presented when he chose them to receive the Library of
Printed Books from the Borgia Rooms. They were at the time an armoury,
though prior to this some books had been stored here; they had been
stables; they were paved in the way you would expect from such uses;
and on the north side the walls were, up to a considerable height,
below the level of the ground. In May 1889, the Conte Vespignani,
the architect of the Vatican, set to work to convert these rather
unpromising premises into an ideal library. First he attacked the
Giardino della Stamperia, which divided this large building from the
Stamperia, or printing-house, where the Vatican Press still does its
printing. He lowered the level of the earth by a good many feet; then
he tore up the pavement of the future library, and built what the
Italians call Vespai (literally, wasps’-nests--a cellular flooring),
under it to allow the air free circulation between the floor and the
soil. And this he re-covered with the style of paving called _alla
Veneziana_, which is very close and compact, to prevent any possibility
of the damp rising from the ground. The walls were then carefully
plastered and decorated with paintings which harmonized with those of
the Sala Sistina above. The result was a complete success, and within
two years every printed book in the Vatican had been transferred to the
new Leonine Library.
The whole bears the impress of the personality of this great Pope.
At one end, where you descend from the Vatican Library above, you
pass the noble statue of the late Pope’s favourite Saint, S. Thomas
Aquinas, which was sculptured by Cesare Aurelio, and presented to
Leo XIII., on the occasion of his Jubilee, by a subscription from
all the Roman Catholic seminaries in the world. At the other end is
an admirable statue of the Pope himself. Quite close to the statue
of S. Thomas Aquinas, the greatest ecclesiastical philosopher of the
Middle Ages (remembered by Englishmen chiefly as the most eminent of
the Nominalists, the rival of Duns Scotus, the Realist), is the new
Reference Library of Biblical Commentaries, Protestant as well as
Catholic, which is to be the armoury of the future Aquinas against
heresy, and is already much used. The priests are encouraged to come
and study here. I saw them studying, and was much struck by the
proportion of young men. The great room at this end, transverse to the
main building, contains the latest acquisitions--the Terza Raccolta,
and the Ruland Library, which was bequeathed by the famous bibliophile
Canon, Antonio Ruland, Librarian of Würzburg. The Prima, Seconda, and
Terza Raccolta are the three ancient collections formed at various
times in the Vatican. In this library the students can go to the
shelves themselves.
The main building under the Sala Sistina is one vast chamber divided
into six bays by jutting-out bookcases, which do not, however,
interfere with the vista extending from the statue of the Pope to the
statue of Aquinas. The three bays to the south, which are naturally
the most cheerful, are used for a reference library; the three bays to
the north contain the famous Palatine Library, captured by Piccolomini
at Heidelberg, and presented to the Vatican in 1623; the books from
the Aracœli Library and the Library of Cardinal Zelada, acquired in
the Pontificate of Pius VII., with the books comprised in the Prima
Raccolta and Seconda Raccolta. The other transverse chamber, between
the statue of Leo XIII. and the Archivio, contains the library of
the famous Cardinal Mai. If not luxurious, the rooms embody the very
latest improvements in the arrangement of libraries. The bookcases are
of iron, whilst the shelves are lined with fragrant pine to keep away
moths and bookworms. One room is devoted to a Library of Catalogues.
For its own catalogue the Library uses a card system, managed in the
latest way, in which the cards are locked in, so that their order
cannot be disturbed without unlocking the case, though they can be
consulted with perfect ease.
In the days before the new Leonine Library was formed, those who were
studying the Vatican archives had to walk about half a mile to get
to the Library of Printed Books if they wished to refer to anything;
and even the students in the reading-room of the manuscripts had a
good long way to go before they could get from the Library to the
Borgia Rooms. Leo XIII., in looking about for a location for his new
library, had it in his mind, above all things, to find a site equally
convenient as a reference library for the students of the archives and
the students of the manuscripts. It forms an actual passage between the
two. No other site of anything like equal claims could have been found
except in the great Sala Sistina itself; and to have blocked that up
with bookcases would almost have been robbing Paul to pay Peter.
In the reference room, called the _Biblioteca_ or _Sala di
Consultazione_, are kept the works which are most likely to be
consulted by the students of the archives and the manuscripts, and it
is a most notable collection. An offer was made by the authorities to
the various Governments and learned bodies in all civilized countries
to exchange for their official publications copies of the valuable
Vatican documents which Leo XIII. was having printed. Many of them
disclaimed all idea of exchange, and hastened to present all their
publications to the Pope, partly as a compliment to that great man on
the completion of his great project, and partly out of gratitude for
the throwing open of the Vatican archives and manuscripts to scholars
of all nations and creeds. The Government of England, for instance,
presented superbly bound copies of all the volumes in the Chronicles
and Memorials of Great Britain and Ireland; the Calendar of State
Papers; the Calendar of Documents of Scotland; the Register of the
Council of Scotland; the Exchequer Rolls of Scotland, and Rymer’s
Fœdera. The University of Oxford followed suit. The Grand Duke of Baden
has been specially liberal, and the Czar, the Emperor William, and the
Emperor of Austria have all contributed handsome donations. All the
English Catholic books published during the reign of Leo XIII. have
been presented to it. It is said that all the English books published
in Leo XIII.’s Jubilee year were presented. I do not know if all the
good books were presented, but an unconscionable number of bad ones
seemed to be there. I saw many which appeared to me below the dignity
of a library like this.
Among the finest works contained in this library are the splendid
work on the Sistine Chapel prepared by Steinmann, by order of the
Emperor Wilhelm of Germany, to commemorate his visit to Rome. A high
staging was erected to take the photographs, from which the plates
were prepared, from the most favourable positions. Another magnificent
reprint is the reproduction of the Virgil of the Fourth Century, which
is one of the most celebrated manuscripts in the Vatican Library. This
is published in a wooden box.
One of the most interesting departments is that entitled “Popes,
Cardinals, and Rome,” which is a collection of biographies of the
first and topographies on the antiquities, churches, institutions,
and civil and ecclesiastical offices of the Eternal City. Especially
noteworthy are the two bookcases which deal with Italian inscriptions,
geography, heraldry, genealogy, chronology, and palæography--such as
the _Inscriptiones Christianæ_ of G. B. de Rossi.
Beyond Cardinal Mai’s Library is the Archivio, the new rooms of which
face the Vatican Gardens and adjoin the Pope’s coach-house. The
_Biblioteca di Consultazione_ is divided from the Palatine, Aracœli,
and Zelada Libraries by the massive wall supporting the great piers
which divide the Sala above.
The work of transporting the quarter of a million printed volumes
which were housed in the Borgia Apartments is described in _La Nuova
Biblioteca Leonina nel Vaticano_, by Monsignor Ugolini, the senior
_Scrittore_ of the Vatican Library.
The Borgia Apartments are on the first floor of the north side
of the two inner courtyards which open out of the Cortile della
Sentinella--the courtyard in which the sentinels stand under the wall
of the Sistine Chapel, where the road turns round from the back of
St. Peter’s to ascend to the entrance of the Sculpture Galleries. The
Leonine Library is, as I have said, under the great Hall of the Vatican
Library, which is known as the Sala Sistina, and goes right across
the middle of the two long wings which unite the part of the Vatican
containing the Borgia Rooms to the principal apartments in the Museum
of Sculpture. Between it and the road which leads up to the Sculpture
Galleries is the Archivio, which has several new rooms opening on to
that road. It was decided to lower the books from the windows of the
Borgia Apartments into the Cortile del Portone di Ferro, and take them
through the Cortile della Sentinella; then to turn round and go up
the Stradone del Giardino, which divides the Vatican Gardens from the
Belvedere, till they reached the Archivio, through which they were
transported to the Leonine Library.
In the Cortile del Portone di Ferro a solid staging in wood was
constructed, which was built right up to the window of one of the
rooms in the Borgia Apartments which were to be emptied. From above
was fixed a crane to lower the books gently into the courtyard below,
from which they could easily be transported on a trolley to their
destination. Twenty-seven strong wooden cases made their appearance;
they were each of them about thirty inches long, sixteen inches broad,
and twenty inches high, and easily moved by two handles fastened to the
sides. Their measurements were chosen so that they could easily contain
folio volumes on the one hand, and could be easily moved and taken out
on the other. The number twenty-seven was decided on after calculating
the space in the rooms, the capacity of the trolley, the distance that
had to be traversed, and the time necessary for each workman to do the
handling. It was calculated that there would be nine at a time in the
Borgia Apartments to be filled, nine in the new Library to be emptied,
while the trolley was carrying the other nine alternately full and
empty from one place to the other. In order that the arrangement of the
books in the old Library should not be disturbed, orders were given
that, except in the case of folios, all the books which came together
in a shelf, up to a certain measure, should be bound with numbered
straps, and laid in order in the boxes, following the respective
number preceding that with which each one was marked. The boxes were
locked, and, in order to avoid any danger of injury to the books, the
insides of the boxes were made soft with quilting; and the straps,
which are generally made of leather, were made of cloth, three or four
inches wide, in order not to damage the bindings of the works, some
of which were very valuable. The work was carried out with marvellous
regularity, and with singular rapidity, as well as with mathematical
precision; in such a way that, after only fourteen days’ work, which
fell between the 25th of May and the 11th of June, performed by only
fifteen workmen, with the assistance of the _scrivente_ and the other
employees of the library, the quarter of a million of volumes which
were stored in the Borgia Apartments found themselves in the new
Library arranged in exactly the same order as they had been before,
without one book being damaged. Since the printed books have been in
the new Library their number has about doubled.
Monsignor Ugolini was very broad-minded in his remarks upon the
Protestant books in the Library of Biblical Studies. He pointed me out
quite a number; from Sir William Smith’s _Dictionary of the Bible_ and
_Christian Dictionary_, to the works of Bishop Ellicott and Bishop
Lightfoot. He replied freely to all the questions I asked him, and
showed much dignity and humour in the excellent English in which he
couched his answers. An English Roman Catholic lady, who was with me,
pressed him to show her the _Index Expurgatorius_, which, as everyone
knows, is the list of books which Roman Catholics are forbidden to
read. “No, my dear lady,” he said. “It is much better for you not to
see it, then you can read whatever your own judgment permits you to
read, without committing any offence.” Poor, dear lady, she did not
want such broad-mindedness; she wished to mortify the mind as, in the
Middle Ages, she would have mortified the flesh!
In the new Library is preserved a writing-table bought and bequeathed
by the antiquary de Rossi, one of the most celebrated explorers of the
Forum and Catacombs. On this table Cardinal Mai, the most famous of the
librarians of the Vatican, transcribed from a palimpsest, discovered
by himself, on which St. Augustine’s _Commentary on the Psalms_ had
been written, the long-lost _Republic_ of Cicero--not the only one
of Cicero’s works which he discovered. Mai, who was born of poor
parents in a village near Bergamo, in 1782, was librarian of the great
Ambrosian Library at Milan before he was appointed to the Vatican. He
died Cardinal Librarian of the Roman Catholic Church, in 1854. An
account of his work will be found in the next chapter.
Some idea of the size of Cardinal Mai’s library may be formed from the
fact that the first of the Borgia Rooms in which it was housed required
forty thousand tiles to cover its floor.
It is well for it to be under the guardianship, in marble, of the
greatest scholar of the Middle Ages, the Angelic Doctor, who wrote the
_Summa Theologiæ_.
CHAPTER XIV
THE ARCHIVIO
Paul V. must be regarded as the founder of the Archivio of the Vatican,
for it was he who turned the suite of apartments which Sixtus V., when
he was building the Vatican Library, designed for the residence of the
librarian, into the Archivio.
The Popes began the systematic storage of their archives as far back as
Pope S. Damasus (366-384), whose Archivio, roughly speaking, occupied
the site of the Cancelleria.
M. Paul Fabre, the great authority on the subject, informs us that the
Archives were soon moved to the Lateran, because it was more convenient
to have the documents necessary for deciding questions in the place
where the discussions were held, and the Lateran is between a mile and
two miles from the Archivio of Pope S. Damasus. From the beginning of
the seventh century, when one speaks of the Library of the Lateran
it includes the Archives. M. Fabre tells us that the Library at this
time was often called the _Scrinium_, a word which means a convenient
locked chest in which one could put important documents--what we should
call deed-boxes--though from the allusions of contemporaries the
documents never seem to have been kept locked. It is to this Library
of the Lateran that the _Liber Pontificalis_ refers. M. Fabre shows
from the accounts of the Council held in Rome in 649, that the Library
must have been very well arranged and catalogued, for it is recorded
that the chief of the notaries was able to produce at once any document
or volume which was asked for. The name of this first of the great
Pontifical librarians was Theophylactus.
The departure of the Popes to Avignon broke up the Lateran Library
and Archives. They were taken at first to Assisi for safety, but in
1339 the masterful Benedict XII. had the Pontifical registers of the
thirteenth century and a large quantity of the archives taken to
Avignon. The rest of them were left in the Convent of Assisi, where
the bulk of them were gradually and irredeemably lost. M. Fabre tells
us that Sixtus IV. transferred the most important charters of the Holy
See to the Castle of Sant’ Angelo, and that Leo X. transferred others
taken from the _Biblioteca Segreta_ of the Vatican there. “But the
collection of documents, enclosed at that time in bags of silk of
various colours, was small in comparison with those which had been left
at Avignon, and all that had been produced by the daily business of
the Curia since the end of the Grand Schism, which were dispersed in
many places.” Without mentioning the _Biblioteca Segreta_, supposed to
include the letters of Luther, there were the Archives of the _Camera
Apostolica_, of the _Gardaroba_, of the Cancelleria, of the Apostolical
Secretaries, and of the Nuncios.
It was the ambition of Pius IV., and the dream of S. Pius V., to
bring them together in a single institution; and Clement VIII., as a
preliminary of the execution of this grand design, had a very fine
circular hall in the top of the Castle of Sant’ Angelo fitted with
handsome presses, elaborately decorated, which Marini saw destroyed in
1799. Here he gathered all the scattered collections and transferred
a certain number from the Vatican Archives. Paul V. (1605-1621)
ordered the fitting up of the Archivio of the Vatican, mentioned in
the beginning of the chapter, and, from that time forward, no fresh
archives were sent to Sant’ Angelo. The documents in the _Biblioteca
Segreta_ naturally formed the kernel of the new Archivio. Michel
Lonigo, who had charge of the transfer to the new Archivio, has left
a detailed account of the documents which form the basis of the new
Vatican Archivio. Gradually the Archivio of the Vatican became the
chief repository of the Papal Archives.
Urban VIII., says M. Fabre, caused the Bulls registered “_par voie
sécrète_” from Sixtus IV. (1471-1484) to Pius V. (1565-1572), to be
transported there from the Archives of the Secretaries-Apostolical; and
also from the Archives of the Secretariat of the Briefs, registers,
and minutes of Briefs from Alexander VI. (1492-1503) to 1567; and
added a certain number of volumes which came from Avignon, and the
correspondence of the Nuncios of the sixteenth century, which had
lain till then in the Archives of the _Gardaroba_; and Alexander VII.
added the papers of the Secretariat of State. Under Alexander VII.
the documents of the Nunciatures were arranged in the upper floor in
special presses, and near them was formed another series with the
letters of Cardinals, Princes, etc. Clement XI. instituted in the same
room a series of _Varia Politicorum_; and in Benedict XIII.’s time the
Canon de Pretis made an inventory of all these various collections.
Pius VI. enriched the Archives with five hundred large volumes
recovered from Avignon, and finally, in the month of May 1798, the
Archivist, Gaetano Marini, when he was ordered by the French to give
up the keys of the Castle of Sant’ Angelo, obtained their permission
to transfer all the documents preserved there to the Vatican Archives;
this, thanks to the aid and energy of the French soldiers, was effected
in a single day. Marini gave a further proof of his capacity and
intelligence by preserving at the Vatican the exact order in which the
documents had been arranged at Sant’ Angelo. But all this was upset
by Napoleon’s transfer of the Vatican documents to Paris in 1810, and
their restitution, owing to the good offices of the English in 1817.
After the death of Marini the Archives, like the Library, were not
kept in a way that could be considered satisfactory, until that great
Pope Leo XIII., in his comprehensive scheme to set his house in order,
turned his attention to them. He made immense additions, including two
thousand volumes of Papal Briefs, added in 1883, and all the Archives
of the Dataria in 1888.
Leo also extended the accommodation of the Archives by adding five
rooms adjoining the old Sala da Studio of the Archives. They face the
Vatican Gardens on the ground floor of the street which leads up to
the Sculpture Galleries, in a line with the Pope’s coach-house. Two of
these look on and communicate with the room devoted to Cardinal Mai’s
library in the new _Biblioteca Leonina_.
[Illustration:
This is a Bull of Pope Clement VIII., dated “Rome at St. Peter’s in
the year of the Incarnation of Our Lord one thousand and five hundred
and ninety-two on the Kalends of January in the first year of our
Pontificate.”
It is, a widow and her son having complained that some inhuman sons
of iniquity were detaining part of the property of their husband and
father to the value of fifty ducats, the Pope commands the Bishops of
the district to order that within a fixed time the detainers of such
property should appear before them; and failing such appearance to
give sentence against the unlawful detainers and concealers.
(This Bull is now in the possession of the Author.)]
Father Angelo Mai was appointed Chief-Assistant of the Vatican Library
when he was thirty-seven. He held at the time a similar position in
the great Ambrosian Library at Milan. “But whatever he had till now
performed,” says Cardinal Wiseman, in his _Last Four Popes_, published
by Hurst & Blackett, in 1858, “was eclipsed by the most fortunate and
brilliant of his discoveries, that of Cicero’s long-coveted treatise
_De Republicâ_. Petrarca, Poggio, and Bessarion, with a host of elegant
scholars, had desired and sought in vain to see this treatise. It had
eluded every research. Under a copy of St. Augustine’s _Commentary on
the Psalms_ Mai discovered it, in large, bold characters, with its
title legible. I can well remember the commotion which the announcement
of this success excited through the literary world in Rome. Of course,
it took some time to prepare the work for publication. Indeed, I
have heard from the learned discoverer himself, that while new types
were being cast, and arrangements made for publishing it through all
Europe, he was busily engaged in hunting out all the quotations of
Cicero’s work dispersed through the ponderous tomes of subsequent
writers--especially Fathers. The very one whose own lucubrations
had shielded it from destruction, and covered it with a patina or
antiquarian crust such as often saves a valuable medal, yielded no
small number of extracts, which either were found in the discovered
portions and so verified their genuineness, or were absent from them
and so filled up lacunæ.
“How often have I had that precious volume in my hand, with the man
whose fame it crowned explaining to friends around him the entire
process of discovery, and the manner in which he drew out order from
the chaotic confusion of its leaves. Indeed, seldom was it my lot
to lead any party to visit the Vatican Library, while Monsignor Mai
was librarian, without his leaving his own pursuit to show us its
treasures, and not the least valuable of them, himself.”
Gregory XVI., wishing to employ his extraordinary abilities in the
service of religion, made him secretary of the Congregation of the
Propaganda, but he was allowed to have the MSS. of the Library at his
house. “He did not confine his industry to palimpsests, but drew from
the shelves of the Vatican, histories, poems, medical and mathematical
treatises, acts of Councils, Biblical commentaries--in fine, works of
every age and of every class, classical, patristic, mediæval, and even
modern, not only in Greek and Latin, but in Arabic, Syro-Chaldaic,
and Armenian. He re-established, under the auspices of Gregory, the
celebrated Vatican press, which had formerly published the splendid St.
Ephrem; he had cast for it new sets of types, for various alphabets,
from the best models in old manuscripts; and especially employed it in
the printing of the great Codex Vaticanus, which he transcribed.”
Out of the manuscripts which he discovered, he published between 1827
and 1838 “(1) _Scriptorum veterum nova collectio_--a collection, in ten
huge quarto volumes, of writers, sacred and profane, of every age.
“(2) _Classici scriptores ex codicibus Vaticanis editi_, in ten volumes
of smaller dimensions. These two series closely followed one another.
The first began to be published in 1827, and the second was closed in
1838.
“(3) _Spicilegium Romanum_, another series in ten volumes, which he
finished in 1844.
“(4) _Nova Patrum Bibliotheca_, of which only six of the twelve volumes
had appeared when death brought his labours prematurely to a close.”
He was appointed a Cardinal in 1838, at the same time as Cardinal
Mezzofanti, one of the most famous linguists in history. He became
Cardinal-Librarian in 1853, a year before his death.
Our Royal Society of Literature, in awarding the gold medal in 1824
to this gentle scholar, the most famous in the great roll of the
librarians of the Vatican, hailed him as “the Discoverer and Restorer
of Palimpsests.”
Cardinal Wiseman, who was his colleague in the Sacred College for four
years, has left us a vivid picture of Mai’s labours.
“To drop figures, the peculiarity of Mai’s wonderful discovery
consisted in the reading of manuscripts twice written; or, as they are
more scientifically called, palimpsests. A book, for instance, may have
been very properly catalogued as containing the commentaries or sermons
of some abbot of the eleventh or twelfth century, works of which there
may be several other transcripts in the library. Edited or not, it is
improbable that the volume has been, or will be, looked into during a
generation. But the lens-like eye of a Don Angelo peers into it, and it
becomes a treasure-trove. The writer of the Middle Ages had taken down
from the shelves a work which he considered of small value--perhaps
there were duplicates of it--some letters, for instance, of a heathen
Emperor to his tutor, and scrubbed, as he thought, the parchment clean,
both of its inky and of its moral denigration, and then had written
over it the recent production of some favourite author. It is this
underwriting that Mai scanned with a sagacious eye; perhaps it was
like the lines of a repainted canvas, which, in course of time, came
through the more evanescent tints superadded, a leg or arm cropping
out through the mouth of an impassioned head by the second artist; and
he could trace clearly the large forms of uncial letters of the fourth
or fifth century, sprawling through two lines of a neatly written
brevier. Or the scouring had been more thoroughly done; and then a wash
of gallic acid revived the pallid reed-strokes of the earlier scribe.
“Ingenuity, patience, learning, and immense perseverance were requisite
for the process. Often only the unconnected passages were found, half
a sentence in one page, which the next did not continue, but the rest
of which might perhaps be found in another manuscript three hundred
numbers off; sometimes portions of various works were jumbled together
under one later production, upside down, back to back, like shuffled
cards, while perhaps not one page contained the ‘Incipit,’ or the
‘Explicit feliciter liber 1, de----’ so as to give a clue to what
these fragments contained. Learning was then, indeed, necessary; for
conjecture often gave the first intimation of what had been discovered,
from the style, or from the sentence having been fortunately embalmed,
or petrified, by quotation in some later author.
“In this way did Mai labour on, looking through the tangled mass of
confused materials, catching up the ends of different threads, and
pursuing them with patient diligence, till he had drawn each, broken
or perfect as it happened to exist. After one minor publication of a
translation, he began in 1813, and continued till 1819, to pour out
an unintermitting stream of volumes, containing works or portions
of works, lost, as it had been supposed, irrecoverably. Various
orations of Cicero; the lost writings of Julius Fronto; unpublished
letters of Marcus Aurelius, Antoninus Pius, Lucius Verus, and
Appian; fragments of speeches by Aurelius Symmachus; the History of
Dionysius of Halicarnassus from the twelfth to the twentieth books;
inedited fragments of Philo; ancient commentaries on Virgil; two
books of Eusebius’s Chronicles; the Itineraries of Alexander, and of
Constantius Augustus, son of the Emperor Constantine; three books of
Julius Valerius on the actions of Alexander the Great; the sixth and
fourteenth Sibylline books; finally, the celebrated Gothic version,
by Ulphilas, of St. Paul and other parts of Scripture; such were
the principal works recovered and published, with notes, prefaces,
and translations, by this indefatigable scholar, in the period just
mentioned of six years. It was a work in which he could have little or
no assistance from others; in fact, it was an art exclusively his own.”
His library he wished to bequeath to the Roman clergy. But as he could
not afford to provide a building or endowment he gave orders for it to
be valued and sold, stipulating that the Pope was to have first offer
at half the valuation. He was anxious that his collection should be
kept separate and bear his name. He stipulated that every book should
bear his arms. His manuscripts were all bequeathed to the Vatican. Pius
IX. at once gave orders for the Library to be purchased, and it was
kept in the first of the Borgia Apartments, the Sala dei Pontefici,
until it was removed to the chamber which it now occupies in the end of
the Leonine Library--the link with the Archivio.
CHAPTER XV
THE VATICAN GARDENS
I suppose there are moments when the Vatican Gardens look as beautiful
as you would expect. I have not seen them at such a time. If I were
Pope and confined by my policy to a park of a few acres, and a palace
of eleven thousand rooms, I should do my best to make that park an
earthly paradise; and one could do a great deal with the Hill of Evil
Repute, the Mons Vaticanus. It is all ups and downs, and its crest
commands on the one side one of the finest views of St. Peter’s and
the Palace of the Pope, and on the other looks far away into the
open country where the road runs down to Viterbo under an avenue of
monumental stone-pines.
The Vatican Gardens, known as the Boscareccio, have little of the
architectural nobility which endears the gardens of so many dead
and gone Cardinals to us. The Fountain Garden in the Villa Lante,
beyond Viterbo, which was the pleasure-house of the famous Cardinal
Riario, recalls the Book of the Revelation. It is such a vision of
water spread like a glassy sea, divided up into jewels by flourishes
of hoary masonry. The Villa d’Este at Tivoli, built for Cardinal
Ippolito d’Este, the grandson of Pope Alexander VI., and son of the
beautiful Lucrezia Borgia, might be the entrance to Paradise, with its
magnificent sweeps of broad and ancient steps from terrace to terrace,
green with the shade of leaves that never fall, and glittering with the
crystal arcs of leaping water.
The sentiment of an earlier and more liberal age allowed the society
of fair women to the Princes of the Church. Else, maybe, the Este
and Aldobrandini Cardinals had never built those stairways of the
gods which grace the slopes of Tivoli and Frascati. The garden of the
Vatican lacks the pagan beauty born of a desire to emulate the fairy
temple of the blind goddess Fortuna, piled up the hill of Palestrina,
the Præneste which rivalled Rome, till it was sacrificed, not to the
righteousness, but to the revenge of Pope Boniface VIII., thirteen
turbulent centuries after Our Lord had preached His Gospel of Peace.
But here, too, are the footprints of the Classics, for the Popes have
loved to remember that they sat on the throne, not only of St. Peter,
but of the Cæsars. The twenty-first of April, the birthday of Romulus,
the first King of Rome, or, at any rate, of his city, is observed now
as it was two thousand years ago.
The Pope’s classical garden is frigid in design, though sunny in
aspect. Its chief ornaments are orange trees in tubs; royally prolific
of fragrant white blossom and golden orbs of fruit; they are ranged
along the lower terrace. The garden itself looks like a puzzle put
together with gravel paths, box borders, and patterns of flower-beds.
The larger beds have emblems and inscriptions executed in box--a tiara,
for example, with “Pio X.” on one side and “Pont. Max.” on the other;
or a Cardinal’s hat with tassels and cords, or tortured lions. Here
and there is a small aloe or palmetto; here and there a cluster of
narcissus looking as if it had been lost, and in one corner one palm
tree as solitary as the Pope. Really it is only the oranges which light
up the Pope’s garden, as the oranges plucked from sunny groves, and
carried over the seas to be piled on a coster’s barrow, illuminate the
sad winter streets of the poor people’s London on a Saturday night.
[Illustration: The Pope’s Classical Garden.]
This is the bosom of the garden: it is embraced by more beautiful
surroundings. You walk out from the Sculpture Gallery, for instance,
on to a fine terrace which looks across this Chinese puzzle to the
grandest view of St. Peter’s, where you have the whole figure of
the giant dome, down to the bottom of its skirts, instead of just its
umbrella. That is all you see from the Piazza, owing to the senseless
and tasteless gallery which some Pope, looking about for an addition
to his cathedral by which he might immortalize himself, employed Carlo
Maderna to build over the noble porch which should have been the climax
of the superb colonnade of Bernini.
Through the Sculpture Gallery and along that terrace walks the Pope to
the few green acres which are all he has left of the kingdom of this
world, except certain sacred buildings in Rome, and one pale villa on
the Alban Hills, which looks across the Alban Lake at Alba Longa, the
long white town whose inhabitants, flying in terror from the dying
volcano above it, were the founders of Rome.
They say that if he has a mind the Pope can walk a mile through his
palace before ever he sets foot in the open air. He would have to
follow the windings of the paths to walk a mile in his garden kingdom.
Along the wall of the classical garden which faces the Vatican are
three shrine-like niches with appropriate statues; and there are more
statues on the wall silhouetted against the close well-trimmed laurel
hedge enclosing the boschetto, the little wood which is the only place
where he who has the spiritual charge of Christendom can see the works
of God, undistracted by the sight of the works of man. The hedges are
grand; the wood is old, but not open enough to show the glory of the
wild spring flowers of Italy. Who is there who has walked in April
through the woods of the Aldobrandini Villa from Frascati to Tusculum,
that can ever forget the fragrant cyclamens spread like palls of
crimson velvet, the violets, the anemones, and the shyer peonies?
The Mons Vaticanus has many memories. If it did not derive its name
from that Vaticinium or prophecy of Numa Pompilius, Cincinnatus
certainly was ploughing the _prata_ below when he was called to lead
the armies of his country as Dictator. Though the ashes of Julius
Cæsar were never in the bronze globe at the top of the Obelisk, the
profuse Caracalla had a palace here. The road which led out of the city
and over its crest was bordered on either side with the sepulchral
monuments of dead citizens; and among them rose the monument of St.
Peter himself (when he had been executed in the Circus at the foot of
the hill which formed part of the Gardens of Nero), and the Mausoleum
of the daughters of Stilicho. Many a moral has been drawn from the fact
that Nero had his pleasaunce on the accursed hill--for as such was
the Mons Vaticanus regarded for many centuries. It was a favourite
resort also of Nero’s predecessor in the science of outrage, Caligula,
and the madman Elagabalus, who, on one occasion, released thousands
of poisonous snakes among an audience assembled in the Circus on the
Vatican Hill.
On the most conspicuous part of the hill rests a splendid fragment
of the Leonine Wall, built by S. Leo IV. in the middle of the ninth
century for the protection of the Leonine City from the threatened
invasion of the Saracens. The magnificent towers are as fine in their
way as the vast circular keep built by the great Lord Talbot of the
Hundred Years’ War in the Castle of Falaise. One of them is rather
spoiled by having Leo XIII.’s sham fifteenth-century casino built
against it. The casino is not shown at all, though I understand that
the interior has been dismantled. Leo XIII. had a new window inserted
in the first story of the old tower, and a tiny lift fitted to take
him up into it. It is said that he used the chamber for a chapel. The
wildest part of the garden is round here, but it is not wilder than the
Bois de Boulogne.
The other tower is crowned by the Vatican Observatory. “It stands one
hundred and eighty-seven feet above the sea,” says Lanciani, “and
commands an unlimited view over the Campagna and the road; and is
therefore described as the ‘Turris unde mare prospicitur,’ in the early
representations of the Vatican group. It is now used as an observatory
for photographing the section of the heavens which was allotted to the
Holy See by the International Astronomical Congress.”
The mighty bastions of Urban VIII.’s wall recall the Spanish
fortifications of Palermo. Far below is a gigantic brick-field, so
enormous, with clay cliffs so towering, that it reminded me of nothing
so much as the yawning abyss from which slate is hewn at the Delabole
Quarries in Cornwall. All the Vatican, and, if tradition may be
believed, the greater part of ancient Rome, came from these colossal
brick-fields. Beyond them you see the open country.
Almost as noticeable as the fragment of the Leonine Wall, which still
crowns the crest of the Vatican Hill, is the beautiful monument put
up by the French Catholics over a grotto cut to imitate the Grotto
at Lourdes. Over it they have erected a charmingly elegant tower and
terrace; inside the cave is a blue-gowned image of the Virgin, with
three jets of water in front of her. Pilgrims are invited to rest
and drink here. Leo XIII. granted the signal favour of allowing this
monument to be erected because of the devotion of the authorities of
Lourdes to the Holy See. It is said that their offerings to the Pope
amount to a hundred thousand pounds annually.
Leo XIII. had been a sportsman in his mountain home. He kept a few
deer, a pair of ostriches, and a pelican (described as having pink
wings), to remind him of it. Pius X. has banished them; it is alleged
that they reminded him too keenly of his own captivity, and that he
often gazes out of his windows with the expression of an exile. A witty
Cardinal, who speaks English perfectly, informed me that the only
animals kept at the Vatican now are the Papal Bulls.
It is a great shock to turn from the thousand-year-old towers and
wall of S. Leo IV., and the tremendous rampart of Urban VIII., whose
vast height you can descry by peeping through the loopholes, to the
relics of that other Leo’s long pontificate. He was rightly held in a
veneration seldom accorded to any human being. Even Queen Victoria was
less venerated; but their standards of taste were about the same. His
little kingdom in the Boscareccio of the Vatican was further from the
kingdom of art than any in Italy. The posts of his _pergola_ were of
cast-iron, painted red; his favourite summer-house was made of deal
with a corrugated iron roof which Mr. Humphreys would disown. In the
summer-house, behind a dilapidated curtain, was a red velvet chair--an
undress throne. The Romans used to say that his wine was so sour that
it kept up the old tradition about the wine of the Vatican Hill being
poisonous. One thing he had good, and that was the view of St. Peter’s.
He was high up, and he was close, and he was on the best side--the dome
seems to fill the sky.
If it is too early for the fairest of the spring flowers, you will see
an undulating line of snow running along the peaks of the pale blue
Sabine and Alban Hills. These form the background of the monstrous
dome, which is the hive of Christendom--a hive with the bee-cells,
those thousands of chambers which form the Vatican Palace, outside.
Every queen-bee is a type of the white-robed Pope who dwells in that
Palace.
The Pope wears white: when he is being elected three white Papal
_soutanes_ are made: of a large size, a small size, and a middle size.
So of whatever size the new Pope is he can be temporarily fitted
while the Papal tailor is making his clothes. These are much-prized
perquisites, and fall to the highest Cardinals.
At the end of the wild part of the gardens are two great fountains;
both of them the work of Paul V., the Borghese Pope, who took the
marble from the Temple of Minerva in the Forum of Nerva and the great
columns of the vestibule of Old St. Peter’s, to decorate his famous
Acqua Paola Fountain, the finest head of water in Rome, which you
pass on the way to the Villa Doria. Paul V.’s mind seemed to run to
fountains.
The upper of his two fountains in the Vatican Gardens, the Fontana
dell’ Aquila, gets its name from the Borghese crest, the great eagle
of plaster which perches on the top. Everything about it is a sham
except the water: the rocks are as shamelessly made of stucco as the
dragons which peep out of their caves and the statues which stand up
to their necks in water. All the plaster is beginning to disintegrate,
half hidden in decayed masses of maidenhair. The whole thing looks like
a wreck of the scenery of a Wagnerian opera except the water; that is
deep enough to be blue. And, perhaps, once upon a time on hot summer
days, when the cheeks of the nymphs were still round and young, and the
composition of the caves told no secrets, the fountain may have been
attractive from other points of view than that of the bather. It is, in
truth, a _chef d’œuvre_ of vulgarity. The lower fountain, built in what
Paul V. believed to be mediæval style--the Fontana delle Torri--is not
so bad. The towers which gave it its name have, at any rate, the merit
of solidity, but are spoiled by the kind of _esedra_ in the typical
Cardinal’s style of architecture behind.
One gem there is in the Vatican Gardens, a source of unfailing delight,
the casino erected for Pius IV., by Pirro Ligorio, in 1560. And that is
because nearly all the materials are ancient Roman. The description of
it forms one of the best passages in Hare’s _Walks in Rome_.
“The Casino del Papa, or Villa Pia, built by Pius IV., with material
taken from the Stadium of Domitian (Piazza Navona), in the lower and
more cultivated portion of the ground, is the _chef d’œuvre_ of the
architect, Pirro Ligorio, and is decorated with paintings by Baroccio,
Zucchero, and Santi di Tito, and a set of terra-cotta reliefs collected
by Agincourt and Canova. The shell decorations are pretty and curious.
This villa gives an admirable idea of a small country house under the
Roman Empire.
“During the hours which he spent daily in this Villa, its founder, Pius
IV., enjoyed that easy and simple life for which he was far better
fitted than for the affairs of government; but here, also, he received
the counsels of his nephew, S. Carlo Borromeo, who, summoned by him to
Rome in 1560, became for several succeeding years the real ruler of the
state. Here he assembled around him all those who were distinguished
by their virtues or their talents, and held many of the meetings which
received the name of Notti Vaticane--at first employed in the pursuit
of philosophy and poetry, but after the necessity of Church reform
became apparent both to the Pope and S. Carlo, entirely devoted to the
discussion of sacred subjects. In this Villa Pius VIII. and Gregory
XVI. used frequently to give their audiences.
“The sixteenth century was the golden age for the Vatican, though a
leaden one for the Forum. Then the luxurious court of Leo X. was the
centre of artistic and literary life, and the witty and pleasure-loving
Pope made these gardens the scene of his banquets and concerts; and
beneath the shadow of these cypresses in a circle, to which ladies were
admitted, as in a secular court, he listened to the recitations of the
artificial poets who sprang up, like truffles, under his protection.”
Lanciani calls it “a perfect image of an ancient Roman country house.”
For those who are not privileged to enter the Pope’s Garden, I may
say that the Casino Borromeo, or Casino di Pio Quarto, stands on an
exquisite little amphitheatre, with an inlaid pavement and a graceful
fountain in the centre, oval like itself. It is surrounded by a low
parapet whose inner face has stone benches, like the presbytery of
a basilica. Its oval form may have been suggested by the Stadium of
Domitian, whence the beautiful masonry of which it is composed was
taken. On the top of the parapet stand charming vases filled with fine
aloes. The whole face of the casino and the alcove opposite are covered
with sculpture and other decorations. The only building in Rome whose
façade shows such beauty is the garden front of the great Villa Medici
on the Pincian Hill, built for Cardinal Ricci da Montepulciano, twenty
years earlier--soon likewise to pass into Medici hands; Pius IV. was
a Medici. The whole conception of this casino of Pius IV. (which has
just the right vegetation round it--solemn stone-pines, half-tropical
shrubs) is exquisitely poetical and beautiful, but Leo XIII. considered
it malarious, and built himself the new casino attached to the Leonine
Tower, which I have described above. Mr. Marion Crawford, a Roman
Catholic, and a resident in Italy for many years, writes thus of the
old Pope in his garden: “At the last, opposite the iron turnstile by
which visitors are counted, there is the closed gate of the garden. It
is very hard to get admission to it now, for the Pope himself is often
there when the weather is fine. In the Italian manner of gardening the
grounds are well laid out, and produce the effect of being much larger
than they really are. They are not, perhaps, very remarkable, and Leo
XIII. must sometimes long for the hills of Carpineto and the freer air
of the mountains as he drives round and round in the narrow limits of
his small domain, or walks a little under the shade of the ilex trees,
conversing with his gardener or his architect. Yet those who love Italy
love its old-fashioned gardens, the shady walks, the deep box hedges,
the stiff little summer-houses, the fragments of old statues at the
corners, and even the ‘scherzi d’acqua,’ which are little surprises
of fine water-jets, that unexpectedly send a shower of spray into the
faces of the unwary. There was always an element of childishness in the
practical jesting of the eighteenth century.”
The Giardino della Pigna, which forms the northern half of the vast
courtyard projected by Bramante, which Sixtus V. cut in half with
his building for the Vatican Library, is a cortile rather than a
garden, though it contains some flower-beds. It is more interesting as
containing the celebrated _Niccio_ or _esedra_ of Bramante, in front
of which is mounted the great bronze Pigna, which gives the garden
its name, and was the top of the fountain in the _atrium_ of Old St.
Peter’s. The bronze peacocks, which flank it, either came from the
same fountain or from the western façade of the church. Professor
Middleton, who is a very sound guide, gives this latter origin for the
peacocks, and says: “This bronze fir cone was placed by Pope Symmachus
(498-514) in the centre of a very handsome fountain which he had made
to stand in the middle of the open _atrium_ in front of the main
entrances into Constantine’s Vatican Basilica of S. Peter. It is shown
in this position in one of the frescoes in the Church of S. Martino ai
Monti, and probably remained there till the old Basilica was destroyed
by Pope Julius II., when he determined to build a new church of still
greater magnificence to hold his tomb by Michel Angelo.”
There is no sufficient authority for the fresco which represents the
Pigna inside the church. Hare says that Pope Symmachus removed it to
the _atrium_ from the Lake of Agrippa in the Campus Martius.
Here, too, is the Garden or Terrace of the Navicella, so called from
the bronze ship which stands in it.
With this I must take leave of the Vatican Gardens. I cannot quite
echo the enthusiasm of Hare when he wrote: “It is a most delightful
retreat for the hot days of May and June, and, before that time, its
woods are carpeted with wild violets, anemones, and squills. No one
who has not visited them can form an idea of these ancient groves,
interspersed with fountains and statues, but otherwise left to nature,
and exemplifying sylvan scenery, quite unassociated with the English
idea of a garden.” It may be that the gardens have been denaturalizing
since his time, or that there was a certain baroquity in his taste,
which made him a little undiscriminative.
But I can conceive that the Giardini Vaticani have been allowed to
put off beauty from them like a garment since the days when Pius IX.
rode on his white mule between these walls of clipped laurel under the
canopy of stone-pines.
[Illustration: Giardino della Pigna. Showing the Niccio of Bramante and
the Pigna (pine-cone) and peacocks which came from the Atrium of Old
St. Peter’s.]
CHAPTER XVI
A VISIT TO THE COACH-HOUSE OF THE POPE:[17] PAPAL PROCESSIONS AND PAPAL
MOSAICS
One feature of interest in the Vatican which practically all
guide-books omit, is the Pope’s coach-house, underneath the long
gallery of the Library, which faces the Vatican Gardens and connects
the Sculpture Galleries in the converted Villa Belvedere of Innocent
VIII. with the old part of the Vatican proper in which the Borgia Rooms
are situated. The visitor passes it on his right as he ascends the
hill to the Sculpture Gallery. Only once since Pius IX. was deprived
of temporal power and shut himself up in the Vatican has one of these
carriages been seen, with the Pope inside it, by the outside world, and
that was on July 15, 1890, when Leo XIII. took a turn in his carriage
on the road which divides St. Peter’s from the Zecca (Mint). The
Mint is the one spot in the Vatican which was seized by the Italian
Government, and, as I have explained elsewhere, Leo XIII. took this
_giro_ to show that this road was part of the Vatican precincts to
which he limited himself.
There are a large number of Papal carriages, all of which have had the
arms--first of Leo XIII. and then of Pius X., duly placed on their
panels, though neither of these Pontiffs has ever used them. It has
always been the custom for each succeeding Pope to have the arms of
his predecessor removed from the coaches and his own substituted. Very
few of the carriages go back beyond Pius IX., who liked to keep the
fittings of his position at a high pitch of dignity and splendour.
Probably many interesting old carriages were taken away in his time
as shabby, or superannuated. A few of the carriages there belonged to
the splendour-loving Cardinal Bonaparte, but all the others, which
I saw, were Papal. The cicerone who shows the coach-house to the
privileged persons who obtain the special order necessary to visit
it, is admirably suited for the purpose. He is a portly, dignified,
intelligent man, who was one of Pius IX.’s postillions, and has, I
believe, the privilege of driving the present Pope.
He began by pointing out with special pride a plain black carriage,
which looked like a station brougham with a stamped gilt luggage-tray
on its roof. For this was the carriage which Leo XIII. always used.
All Pius IX.’s carriages have the same peculiarity--a pair of gilt
throne arms fixed on the middle of the back seat, so that this seat
could only be used by one person. Their floors are almost as high above
the ground as the floors of railway carriages. And as this Pope lived
to be eighty-five, they have an elaborate arrangement for helping him
to climb into the carriage: a sort of folding ladder of four steps,
leather above and carpet below.
One or two of Pius IX.’s carriages are black; the rest rise in an
increasing scale of splendour, chiefly achieved by scarlet and gold,
to the _mezzo-gala_ and the _grand-gala_ coach. The last is a superb
affair adorned with a couple of cherubs of the Bernini family in the
attitude of running forward, and holding a tiara between them as
if they were dancing Sir Roger de Coverley. The roof above them is
decorated with eight golden pines. The carriage itself was covered
with crimson velvet encircled with ormolu ornaments; it has olive
branches in front. This carriage has no coach-box; its six horses had
postillions.
On the occasions of state for which Pius IX. used his _gala_ coach he
was surrounded by his whole court of Cardinals and Noble Guards walking
on foot. On the most ordinary occasions he drove out with two Cardinals
sitting facing him. By his right hand was a sort of box which his
ex-postillion, who was showing us round, told us he used for tobacco
and so on.
This coachman quite saw the humour of the situation when he began
to tell us about a Sultan of Turkey who wished to confer a splendid
decoration upon the Pope for diplomatic reasons, as the Sultan Bajazet
II. had presented the Pope of his time with one of the most precious
relics in St. Peter’s--the Holy Lance. In the intervening centuries
opinion had grown stricter; at the same time there was no wish to repel
the Sultan’s advances, so a compromise was made, and the Grand Turk
was allowed to confer a decoration upon the Pope’s mule. He sent his
muleship a gorgeous crimson velvet saddle and a caparison covered with
diamonds. There was further humour in the situation, for, although
the Sultan was only allowed to confer the diamonds on the mule, the
then Pope saw no harm in borrowing the diamonds from the mule for the
decoration of his chalices, and replacing them with paste. It was
certainly better for the grooms, who might have been tempted to try the
same expedient without using the diamonds for chalices.
In a large glass case at the end are the gorgeous crimson velvet and
ormolu trappings used for the six horses of the _grand-gala_ coach.
Here, too, is the superb saddle of crimson velvet and silver which was
used for the white mule on which the Pope rode in state to take formal
possession of the Lateran after his coronation. This, as the postillion
declared, was to typify Our Lord’s entry into Jerusalem. Clement
XIV. (1769-1774) was the last Pope who went through the ceremony on
horseback, though Pius IX. had a _cavalcata_. Contrary to the usual
custom he rode from the Quirinal and not the Vatican. He took the route
by the Piazza of the SS. Apostoli, which was, and is still, surrounded
by the palaces of the great nobles. Silvagni lays equal emphasis on the
beauty and importance of Felicia Barberini, wife of Prince Corsini,
the Princess Santa Croce, and Donna Ippolita Boncompagni Ludovisi, the
eighteen-year-old wife of Prince Rezzonico, brother of the late Pope.
He notes that the populace were very discontented because the Egyptian
lions of the Capitol on this occasion did not pour wine instead of
water, and because money was not thrown among them, though these
practices always led to disorders and deaths. That sixty-six thousand
orders for ten loaves of bread each fluttered among them did not at all
compensate. Starvation they did not mind; dissipation they craved for.
The decorations of the Capitol sound curiously like those of to-day,
except that there was a throne covered with crimson damask, and a
baldacchino containing a portrait of the Pope, for they consisted
chiefly of the banners of the fourteen Rioni and the crimson standards
of the Senate, bearing the armorial device of the city of Rome--the
S.P.Q.R. in heavy letters of gold. While from all the windows of the
three palaces round the Capitol hung superb tapestries and precious
pieces of brocade and gold embroidery. You may see the same on any
twenty-first of April still.
The route lay over the Capitol and along the Forum, practically
reversing the order of a Roman Triumph along the Sacred Way. The Forum,
then called the Campo Vacchino, with its broken elevations, was the
principal point for the crowd to see the spectacle, and even there
accidents occurred from crushing, in spite of the proverbial gentleness
and good nature of an Italian crowd. Had they known that the spectacle
would never be seen in all its splendour again what might not have
happened? There are no such pageants nowadays.
First came the horsemen with brass helmets and gilt lances, dressed
in crimson velvet and gold lace, who were supposed to clear the way;
then came four gorgeous Lancie Spezzati, or Knights of the Guard,
two of whom marshalled the procession while the other two patrolled
it; then came two great Nobles, the Grand Herald and the Master of
the Horse, followed by the valets and mace-bearers of the Cardinals,
in scarlet cloaks embroidered with their masters’ arms in gold and
silver, followed by their gentlemen-in-waiting and other members
of their households, and the head-servants of the Quirinal in red
cassocks. All of these were in front of the Papal litter, which was
covered with gorgeous draperies of scarlet and gold, and drawn by
ten white mules in trappings flashing with the same costly metal,
attended by grooms in red coats with folded hoods. After the litter
came four mounted trumpeters heading a procession of Chamberlains and
Assistant-Chamberlains, and Honorary Chamberlains of various kinds
(of whom there are hundreds), but all of them in scarlet cloaks and
hoods, conspicuous among whom was the Maestro di Camera. Then came the
great Roman Nobles, the heads of the princely houses of Odescalchi,
Albani, Giustiniani, Mattei, Altemps, Fiano, Caffarelli, Salviati, and
Anguillara, with their pages and servants in gala dress. These were
separated from the Swiss Guard in their helmets and cuirasses, armed
with great two-handed swords, by the four oldest Camerieri Segreti,
who each carried a Papal hat of crimson velvet on a little spear with
a velvet-covered shaft. A long train of dignitaries of the Church
preceded Prince Colonna, _Principe Assistente_ to the Papal Throne and
Grand Constable of the Kingdom of Naples, who rode in flashing armour
on a superb Andalusian charger. He was followed by the three Masters of
Ceremonies in long mantles on mules with purple Papal trappings, and
one of the Uditori of the Rota, carrying the Papal Cross, leading a
double line of Papal grooms in red cassocks, armed with swords, between
a double line of Swiss Guards in helmets and cuirasses and breeches and
stockings of purple silk, some of them armed with their halberds and
some with their two-handed swords.
This was to keep off the crowd, for here rode the Pope upon his white
palfrey, covered with the gold-embroidered crimson velvet saddle cloth
which was shown us in the Pope’s coach-house. The Pope wore a white
cassock and rochet, and a _mozzetta_ of crimson velvet edged with
ermine. His stole was of gold bullion ornamented with huge pearls,
and he wore his Papal hat over his skull-cap. He was attended by
twenty-four pages dressed in cloth of silver with long white feathers
drooping from their little skull-caps, and white silk stockings. Their
hair fell in curls upon the shoulders; they were selected for their
beauty and their birth; they carried various things for the use of
the Pope, such as an extra Papal hat, which the Pope might well have
required, as his horse fell with him just by the Arch of Septimus
Severus; they were followed by masters of the streets in black gowns;
by more Lancie Spezzati, and mace-bearers on horseback, and by the
processional Papal umbrella.
Immediately behind them came the Cardinal Camerlengo, the famous Scipio
Borghese, who built the Villa Borghese, riding on a mule with the
purple Papal trappings, and wearing his Cardinal’s hat; followed by
a throne for the Pope, carried by two splendid horses, and a _Sedia
Gestatoria_ borne on the shoulders of the Sediarii in their splendid
scarlet liveries.
Then came the Cardinals riding two and two, gorgeous in their scarlet
gowns, but their mules had scarlet trappings instead of purple; and
they wore their caps instead of their Cardinal’s hats. Each of them
was surrounded by gorgeous lackeys, two a little in advance of the
others carrying gilt staves and the arms of their masters. The most
interesting figure among them was the English Prince known as the
Cardinal of York--and, after his death, called Henry IX. of England.
After the Cardinals came the Patriarchs, Archbishops, Bishops, and
the great officers of the Papal Curia; and after them came the Papal
carriage, all scarlet and gold, drawn by six great white horses
ridden by postillions; followed by the great Nobles who were the
Pope’s Captains of the Guard and Standard Bearer, and three companies
of cavalry and cuirassiers; the procession was closed by another
detachment of the Swiss Guard, with their glittering helmets and
cuirasses.
A stately pageant, consisting of the entire chapter and clergy of the
Lateran, with grand processional cross and canopies, was awaiting them
in the Piazza of the Lateran, and a throne had been erected in its
vestibule.
In Italy vestments and liveries are faithfully preserved; and if the
Pope were to decide to come forth into the world and signalize it by
a _cavalcata_ to take possession of the Lateran, the pageant could be
reproduced almost identically, though it is nearly a century and a half
since that day.
Clement XIV.’s fall, which was considered very unlucky at the time, in
spite of the witticism with which he turned it off, seemed prophetic,
for only six years afterwards he died a terrible death, poisoned by
some mysterious drug, the effects of which are thus described by
Silvagni, translated by Mrs. Maclaughlin.
“Monsignor Caracciolo bears witness that, some few days before his
end, his bones wasted and crumbled like the branches of a tree, which,
attacked at its roots, dry up, and fall off. Doctor Derossi, and other
medical men who assisted to embalm the body, found it--these are their
exact words--‘with the face livid, the lips black, the abdomen swollen,
and all the skin covered with purple blotches, the size of the heart
greatly diminished, and the muscles about the backbone lacerated and
decomposed.’ They used vast quantities of perfumes and aromatics, but
could not subdue the unpleasant odours proceeding from the corpse. The
entrails, which were enclosed in a casket, burst it open; and when the
dead man, after lying in state, was divested of his Pontifical robes,
great pieces of flesh adhered to them, his hair remained fixed on the
cushion which supported his head, and all his nails dropped off.”
Before 1870, when the Pope was deprived of his temporal power and
retired into the Vatican, he used to make state progresses to the
Church of S. Carlo Borromeo on the fifteenth of November; to the Church
of S. Filippo Neri on the twenty-sixth of May, which is the day of that
saint, called the Apostle of Rome; to the Church of Santa Maria del
Popolo on the eighth of September, which is the feast of the Nativity
of the Virgin Mary; and to the Church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva on
the twenty-fifth of March, which is the feast of the Annunciation of
the Virgin Mary--our Lady-Day. The arms of Pius X., which appear on
all the carriages, are an adaptation of the Lion of St. Mark’s, with
a background of sea. He had no arms of his own, as he was of humble
birth, and when he was told that he must use a coat of arms, wished it
to be adapted from the arms of his beloved Venice. At the time of his
election to the Papacy he was Patriarch of Venice.
Yet more difficult to see than the Pope’s coach-house is the Chapel of
S. Pius V., which is behind the hall of the Christian paintings in the
Vatican Library. I have not seen that.
* * * * *
Visitors are admitted to the Studio del Mosaico, where the famous
mosaics of the Vatican are made, by an order. It is situated in the
basement of the other long hall which leads from the Belvedere to the
Borgia wing. Between it and the Pope’s coach-house, enclosed with these
long arms, is the vast Cortile of Bramante, which Sixtus V. spoiled
irremediably by building the Vatican Library across it. The Mosaic
Factory of the Vatican, in which it is said that nearly thirty thousand
different shades of the vitreous composition used are stored, has a
unique place in the history of art. The lighting of the great oven used
for manufacturing these mosaics is quite a function in the Vatican. It
is not often lit, because enormous quantities of the various mosaics
required are kept in store.
The artist stands in front of a frame on an easel and inserts a mosaic
here and a mosaic there, in the portion of the picture he is executing,
as a printer inserts a type. He has the picture he is copying by
his side, and consults it very carefully all the time. The Pope is
constantly having one or other of the Vatican masterpieces copied for
presentation, say to a cathedral in Brazil. In the _atelier_ they
show you marvellously fine designs in mosaics, especially of flowers
and fruit, which are hardly to be matched even by the famous Doves of
the Capitol Museum. The mosaics in use are kept in desks with glass
lids, but otherwise very like the trays in which printers keep their
type. You have more respect for a mosaic picture when you have seen
one manufactured; you realize the enormous labour and artistic skill
required.
As is well known, most of the great Italian churches have some glorious
paintings by the great masters; but all the great pictures in Rome
would not be too many for decorating the altars of St. Peter’s, and
even with the pictures which belong to various other churches, but were
sent to the Pope by mistake when the sculptures which Napoleon had
taken from him were restored from the Louvre by the pressure of the
English after the battle of Waterloo, there were not nearly enough of
the highest class and largest size for the adequate decoration of St.
Peter’s. So the walls above the altars of St. Peter’s are not decorated
with oil-paintings, but with the finest possible mosaic copies of them,
each of which has taken from five to twenty years to make. The mosaic
copies as pictures could not hope to rival the originals by painters
like Raffaelle, but in some ways they are superior for the purpose
they fulfil. In the first place they can be left open to the light:
instead of the sunshine injuring them, in a matter of five hundred
years or upwards, it improves them; and so St. Peter’s has none of the
unsightly curtains which disfigure other churches. Instead, all its
great pictures enter into the general scheme of decoration; and though
isolated panels of mosaics cannot, like those of Monreale and S. Sofia
at Constantinople, give the effect of the jewelled paradise described
in the _Revelation_, the glitter of the mosaics of St. Peter’s is the
crowning note in that pageant of flashing marbles.
In St. Peter’s also, thanks to the mosaics, one has, not only
reproductions of the world’s greatest pictures which belong to the
Pope, and could have been used in the absence of mosaics, but also of
the world’s masterpieces in other cities, notably Florence.
The most ambitious work of the Mosaic Factory of the Vatican is the
mosaic-lined chapel under the choir of S. Lorenzo fuori le Mura, where
Pius IX. lies buried. But I have always thought that the deficiencies
of the modern mosaicists, compared with the great mosaic masters of the
Middle Ages, are more apparent where they are working from independent
designs in this chapel than where they are making incredibly perfect
copies of oil-paintings. The Mosaic Factory is entered from the far
left-hand corner of the courtyard of S. Damaso, which you approach by
the State Staircase on the right as you enter the Bronze Door. The
_permessi_ for entering it are obtained from the Maggiordomo, Monsignor
Bisleti, or his secretary, whose office is at the top of these steps,
before eleven in the morning. The factory takes commissions from
outside; many churches have pictures from it. Those who have orders are
allowed to see all the very interesting processes of the manufacture.
* * * * *
Another Vatican industry is the weaving of tapestries. Here, also, the
_atelier_ is allowed to take commissions from outside.
CHAPTER XVII
RAFFAELLE’S TAPESTRIES
The so-called tapestries of Raffaelle are by some considered to be
his masterpieces. Not by any means all of the tapestries hung in the
Galleria degli Arazzi were designed by him. It is said that the designs
which come from his hand were originally intended for the Scriptural
panels in his Loggie, but that Leo X. had ten of them converted to this
use.
Of the ten cartoons drawn by Raffaelle in 1515 and 1516, and executed
in tapestry at Brussels, seven were purchased in Flanders by Charles
the First of England, and are now in the South Kensington Museum.
Baedeker says that the cost of weaving the whole ten tapestries came to
seven hundred pounds,[18] though before they were injured they must
have been amongst the most beautiful tapestries ever executed. It is
not surprising that they are damaged, for they have had more than their
share of vicissitudes. They have been unlucky from the very beginning.
They were first hung on the walls of the Sistine Chapel below the
paintings of the great fifteenth-century masters in 1519; and had only
been there eight years before they were torn off the walls in the
sack of Rome by the Imperial Army under the Constable de Bourbon, and
carried away. They were not recovered for twenty-six years. In 1798 the
French seized them and sold them to a Genoese Jew, and it was another
ten years before they were repurchased by Pius VII.
[Illustration: The Sistine Chapel, where the election of the Pope takes
place when it is held in the Vatican.]
They are now hung in a gallery adjoining the Galleria dei Candelabri
and are shown on Wednesdays. No order is necessary, but as those who
are only in Rome for a short time have not always a Wednesday left
free, these glorious tapestries are a good deal neglected.
And glorious they are beyond dispute; even now, when they are injured,
their colouring is rich and exquisite, and in them Raffaelle reached
his highest point in combining dignity with simplicity--sublimity with
obviousness.
Their dignity, their majesty, their beauty, are beyond dispute, and
if we except the beards which were, I suppose, ordinary in that
fantastic age, the figures are as natural as if they had been taken by
instantaneous photography.
The figure of Our Lord in the tapestry of the Calling of St. Peter
must be reckoned with His figure in Masaccio’s Render unto Cæsar, in
the Carmine at Florence, and His figure in Leonardo da Vinci’s Last
Supper, at Milan, as the three noblest conceptions in painting of the
Son of God. Marvellous are the pathos, the humanity, and the wisdom in
the Divine Countenance. It is hard to dispute the dictum of those who
pronounce this wonderfully beautiful and majestically meditative figure
Raffaelle’s masterpiece. The truthfulness of type in the disciples must
also be acknowledged. They would be Salvationists to-day. You can see
their goodness, their sympathy, their ardour, and in the background all
the gentle picturesqueness, not of Palestine, but of Umbria.
In the Miraculous Draught of Fishes, the absurdities are miraculous.
The cranes stand almost touching the boats; the boats are full of
sea-fishes: they are not large enough to hold one man, let alone
three. Your taste is not offended; it is not a real fishing scene: the
accessories are a mere stage for the six figures, five of which are
sublime.
Hardly any of the tapestries appeal more widely to the world than that
of St. Peter healing the paralytic at the beautiful gate of the Temple.
But the exquisite architectural conception of this picture is said to
portray no gate and no temple, but the porch of the Old St. Peter’s,
founded by Constantine the Great, which Raffaelle, the lover of
antiquities, was privileged to predecease. He died before it was torn
down by ruthless hands, after he had, in one of the finest and most
poetical of his works, caught its immortal grace and imprisoned it in
art. This is perhaps the most beautiful of the tapestries, though not
the best.
If there be any more beautiful it is the utterly pagan Sacrifice of
Lystra, with its vista of the world when it was young. As we look into
it, if we have a spark of imagination, we are fellow-citizens of the
Romans ere the old religion had begun to pass, giving place to new.
If the ruins of Pompeii were suddenly recalled into existence as the
dry bones in the Vision of Ezekiel were clothed with flesh, scenes
such as these would be before our eyes. And there must be added the
Areopagus, unconvincing in its architecture, but with the most devout
figure in the whole of art claiming our attention in the centre. In the
corner is that wonderful fair woman whose image is so stamped upon his
masterpieces that we know, without any superscription of biographers,
what she must have been in his life.
The Death of Ananias; St. Paul in Prison at Philippi during an
earthquake; the Stoning of Stephen; the Massacre of the Innocents (with
its wonderful woman’s head); and the Conversion of St. Paul, are the
other tapestries from designs completed by Raffaelle. Tradition has
it that the designs of his pupils for the other tapestries were in
part due to him, but it is difficult to believe this. That the Christ
personating a gardener, whose divinity is shown by the halo behind His
hat, should be a conception of Raffaelle is incredible, though the
gorgeous background and the charming Etruscan tomb might have been due
to his suggestion. The Adoration of the Magi, however--especially in
its treatment of the Virgin--is so beautiful that Raffaelle may well
have inspired it. In most of the other tapestries there is some feature
which jars, such as the grotesqueness in the Ascension, of which the
colours are lovely; or the jumpiness and gaudiness of the figure in
the Resurrection, which has such a beautiful city background. But I
must not criticize in detail; indeed, I am not competent to do so. I
only call upon the visitor to Rome not to miss this gallery--so seldom
open--where he passes down between walls hung with some of the most
majestic and human of the figures of Raffaelle. It is delightful to
let one’s eyes rest on walls so mellow with the gentle fading of rich
colours, and to picture the Sistine Chapel when these arrases hung down
to the marble pavement from the frescoes of Ghirlandajo, Pinturicchio,
Perugino, and Sandro Botticelli, while they were as fresh and perfect
as the frescoes in the Library of the Cathedral of Siena. It is
wonderful how the figures of Raffaelle stand out in these tapestries;
they are almost like friends who come up and speak to one as one enters
the gallery.
A word must be said for an art whose significance we are only just
beginning to grasp: that of the designer of the little pictures which
border great pictures, or, tangled in arabesques, are the sole ornament
of a wall. We call these Pompeian, denying that Rome was the mother
of any art but that of mosaic inlayers like the Cosmati. But when we
look at the little tapestry pictures woven from the designs of Giovanni
da Udine here, and his little frescoes and his reliefs in stucco in
the Loggie of the Vatican and the vaults of the Villa Madama, we must
allow them to be among the most beautiful productions of the art of
his period, and since his inspiration came from the newly unearthed
and yet undimmed arabesques in the Baths of Titus, we must allow the
inspiration taken from ancient Rome to be Roman. The miniature art of
Giovanni da Udine in painting is suggestive of the miniature art which
Mino da Fiesole showed in his borders of sculpture. This Gallery of
the Arazzi gives us delightful glimpses of this too little appreciated
painter, who died in the same year as Michel Angelo and survived
Raffaelle by half a century.
* * * * *
Adjoining the Galleria degli Arazzi is the Galleria dei Candelabri.
This is a beautiful chamber, appropriately named, appropriately
decorated, appropriately arranged. Leo XIII. had it newly decorated.
There are many beautiful pieces of statuary in it, but I shall not
attempt to discriminate between them here. I only pause to say that
this is a gallery which no one should miss. The beautiful _candelabri_,
with their exquisite bas-reliefs--many of them dating from ancient
Roman times--are so charmingly displayed; and the room has wonderful
vases of the choicest marbles and forms. The room has evidently been
as much considered as the precious objects stored in it. In many ways
it reminds one of some of the halls in the Villa Borghese, which do
not look like portions of a museum at all, but like chambers in a rich
man’s house, in which the pieces have been chosen from the point of
view of decorativeness. The ceiling is painted with incidents in the
Pontificate of Leo XIII. and his favourite St. Thomas Aquinas, by the
hands of the artist Seitz, who restored the famous Borgia Apartments;
and the pavement is also due to the late Pope’s munificence.
* * * * *
Out of this gallery opens the Galleria Geografica, the Gallery of the
Maps, a hundred and sixty yards long, covered with maps of Italy and
its islands, designed by a Bishop of Alatri in the days when he was a
Dominican friar, Ignazio Dante, and painted by his brother, Antonio.
The ceiling was painted by Tempesta, but neither it nor the maps are of
a character to make you regret very much that you are unlikely to get
leave to go into it.
CHAPTER XVIII
THE PAOLINE AND LEONINE CHAPELS
The ordinary entrance to the Vatican is that known as the Bronze Doors
at the end of the right-hand colonnade round the Piazza of St. Peter’s.
This colonnade was the masterpiece of Bernini, one of the few classical
works of the baroque period which really achieved their purpose of
rivalling the glories of ancient Rome. The megalomania from which
Bernini and his master suffered could not ruin this as it ruined most
of his other works, for immensity is the chief element in its majestic
beauty.
Worthy of proceeding from such a temple of the gods is the hill of
stone called the Scala Regia--the Royal Staircase, which leads from the
entrance to the Sala Regia, the Royal Hall. The staircase, too (one of
the finest in the world), is Bernini’s work, and when carpeted and hung
with crimson and lit with the huge gilt wall-piece _candelabri_, which
can still be seen as you go to the Leonine Chapel, it formed a most
appropriate setting to the brilliant pageants which used to pass up it
when the Pope was holding high court.
The Sala Regia, from which you enter the Sistine Chapel, the Sala
Ducale, the Paoline Chapel, and the Leonine Chapel, is a fine,
well-proportioned, brilliantly coloured chamber built by Antonio da
Sangallo, one of the architects of St. Peter’s. But its gigantic
pictures do not rise above the level of good wall-paper. They represent
various triumphs of the Catholic Faith, such as the Battle of Lepanto,
by Vasari; the Absolution of the Emperor Henry IV., by Gregory VII.,
after his submission at Canossa, the work of the Zuccheri; the Triumph
of the Church in the Massacre of St. Bartholomew, by Vasari; the
Benediction of Frederick Barbarossa, by Alexander III. at Venice,
painted by Giuseppe della Porta; and the removal of the Papacy from
Avignon under Gregory XI. The ceiling was painted by Pierino del Vaga.
The Sala Regia derives its name from being used by the Pope to receive
the ambassadors of foreign Kings.
[Illustration: The Paoline Chapel, used by the Cardinals when they are
in Conclave.]
At one end of the Sala Regia is the Cappella Paolina, built in 1540,
also by Antonio da Sangallo; it, too, contains frescoes by Federigo
Zucchero--good examples of that master. It is used for great ceremonies
like those of Holy Week. It is very difficult for the tourist to get
admission to this chapel; it can only be done through one of the
priests attached to it, or by attending one of the lectures which
are occasionally allowed by the Vatican authorities to be given on
this group of chapels. And the Paoline Chapel is well worth visiting,
because it contains two undoubted frescoes by Michel Angelo, of which
Kugler, quoted by Hare, says: “Two excellent frescoes, executed by
Michel Angelo on the side wall of the Paoline Chapel, are little cared
for, and are so much blackened by the smoke of lamps that they are
seldom mentioned. The Crucifixion of St. Peter, under the large window,
is in a most unfavourable light, but is distinguished for its grand,
severe composition. That on the opposite wall--the Conversion of St.
Paul--is still tolerably distinct. The long train of his soldiers is
seen ascending in the background. Christ, surrounded by a host of
angels, bursts upon his sight from the storm-flash. Paul lies stretched
on the ground, a noble and finely developed form. His followers fly
on all sides or are struck motionless by the thunder. The arrangement
of the groups is excellent, and some of the single figures are very
dignified; the composition has, moreover, a principle of order and
repose, which, in comparison with the Last Judgment, places the picture
in a very favourable light. If there are any traces of old age to be
found in these works, they are at most discoverable in the execution of
details.” And Sir A. H. Layard, in the revised edition of Kugler, says:
“In 1549-50, when seventy-five years old, Michael Angelo executed two
frescoes in the Paoline Chapel in the Vatican. They have been utterly
neglected, and so much effaced by the smoke of candles as to be almost
forgotten. The Crucifixion of St. Peter under the window, though seen
with difficulty, is a grand and stern composition. The Conversion of
St. Paul on the opposite wall is better seen.” The ordinary visitor is
not inspired with the same enthusiasm about these frescoes. Daniele di
Volterra, the pupil of Michel Angelo who finished them, in touching
up St. Paul’s face forgot that he must have been a young man at his
conversion, and gave him the grey beard and narrow forehead of Michel
Angelo’s Moses--a too sincere form of flattery. But the upper part
of the Conversion of St. Paul is magnificent. The long narrow chapel
is gracefully proportioned, and the plaster reliefs are unusually
elegant for Rome, though not at all equal to the exquisite reliefs
of the Sicilian Serpotta, the prince of workers in plaster. There is
a pathetic little passage about these frescoes in Duppa’s _Life of
Michael Angelo_:
“Near to the Chapel of Sixtus, in the Vatican, Antonio da San Gallo
built another, by the order of Paul III., which in like manner is
called after its founder, the Chapel Paolina; and the Pope, being
solicitous to render it more honourable to his name, commissioned
Michel Angelo to paint the walls in fresco. Although he now began
to feel he was an old man, he undertook the commission, and on the
sides opposite to each other painted two large pictures, representing
the Conversion of St. Paul and the Crucifixion of St. Peter. These
pictures, he said, cost him great fatigue, and in their process
declared himself sorry to find that fresco-painting was not an
employment for his years; he therefore petitioned His Holiness that
Perino del Vaga might finish the ceiling from his designs, which was
to be decorated with painting and stucco ornaments; but this part of
the work was not afterwards carried into execution.”
On the way up to the Leonine Chapel one passes through various
lumber-rooms, in which are kept the sumptuous gold candle-brackets
designed by Bernini for the Scala Regia, and various tabernacles and
so on, for use in processions, designed by him, all rather florid and
baroque, but good for large effects. The Leonine Chapel, called also
the Cappella della Beatificazione, and the Aula Dei, was converted
into a chapel by Leo XIII.; it adjoins the Gallery of St. Peter’s,
into which it opens on the right-hand side, while the windows on the
left-hand side look out on to the Piazza. It was the custom of the
Popes, until they lost their temporal sovereignty and ceased to appear
outside the Vatican, to bless the people from one of the windows of
this chapel on their election. The blessing is now delivered from the
gallery to the people assembled in St. Peter’s. This Chapel of the
Beatification has for its special functions the canonizations and
beatifications of Saints. The decorations of the chapel are commonplace
and not very high art. Most of the room is white, but the pilasters
and ceiling are picked out richly with gilt. The whole effect is more
that of a hall in a nobleman’s palace than of a chapel. Do not look at
the gilt and white cornice and gilt and white ceiling of St. Peter’s
from the gallery, although they are said to have been designed by
Raffaelle. The cherubs, especially, need to be seen from the floor of
the basilica, where distance gives them the requisite enchantment.
[Illustration: The Leonine Chapel, called also the Loggia of Paul
V., and Sala della Beatificazione, from which the Pope goes into the
Gallery of St. Peter’s to bless the people after his election; used
also for Canonizations.]
One does not regret the shortcomings of this chapel, which is the
interior of the gallery over the portico of St. Peter’s, and hides all
the beauty of the dome when you are in the Piazza (an architectural
excrescence, erected by Maderna for Paul V., that should never
have been permitted), because it will save an artistic Pope, who has
the courage of his convictions, any qualms about taking it down and
allowing the glorious dome to be properly seen.
The Sistine Chapel, which leads off from the Sala Regia, need not be
described here: it is one of the first places visited by everyone who
goes to Rome.
Opposite to the entrance of the Sistine Chapel is the entrance to the
Sala Ducale--a low narrow corridor through which the Pope is carried in
his Sedia Gestatoria for the great ceremonies in the Sistine Chapel,
and formerly used for audiences to foreign princes. Once when I was
passing through it there were Papal Guards being drilled in it. Its
decorations are among the worst in the Vatican. Its ceiling is divided
half-way up the room by an arch, designed by Bernini out of the bodies
of two overgrown cherubs, and plaster curtains; and just under the
ceiling the walls are decorated with a series of frescoes by a Fleming,
called Paul Brill or Bril, who flourished in the last part of the
sixteenth and the first part of the seventeenth century.
In the Sala Ducale we get a couple of familiar glimpses of the great
Montaigne. In the _Journal of his Travels_, translated by Mr. W. G.
Waters for Mr. John Murray, we read: “Thence he went down to the
Vatican to inspect the statues set in the niches of the Belvedere, and
the fine gallery, now almost completed, which the Pope is adorning with
paintings of all parts of Italy. He lost his purse and all therein,
and deemed this must have happened while he was giving alms--as he
did twice or thrice; the weather was very rainy and unpleasant, and,
instead of returning his purse to his pocket, he must have thrust
it into the slashings of his hose. At this time he diverted himself
entirely in studying Rome. He had at first engaged a Frenchman as
guide, but this fellow took himself off in some ridiculous humour,
whereupon M. de Montaigne prided himself on mastering by his own
efforts the art of a guide. In the evening he would study certain books
and maps, and next day repair to the spot and put in practice his
apprenticeship, so that in a few days he could have shown his guide the
way.”
It is to be noted that though the journal of Montaigne speaks of him in
the third person, it was dictated by himself to his valet. Other parts
of the journal are written in the first person.
[Illustration: The Scala Ducale of Bernini in the Vatican. Drawn by G.
Fontana.
_From Pistolesi’s “Il Vaticano.”_]
At the end of the Sala Ducale you come to the Pope’s private tapestry
rooms, which are back to back with the Borgia Apartments. There are
two rooms, and the tapestries in the first are claimed by the Vatican
authorities to be among the most valuable in the world. They fall
into three lots. There are four large pieces with the arms of Paul
III., the Farnese Pope (1534-1549), which have glorious colouring
almost as rich as a picture of Ghirlandajo. Their subjects are “Esther
and Ahasuerus”; “The Judgment of Solomon”; “The Story of Susannah”; and
“Joseph and his Brethren.” Their titles are written under them. The
richness of the tapestries is almost inconceivable.
On the window wall there are two tapestries not so good, one of them an
Annunciation, which reminds you of a picture of Federigo Baroccio in
the Vatican Gallery; the other is an Assumption.
On the wall to the right of the doorway where you go in is a tapestry
which the _custode_ claims to be the finest in the world. But to me
it did not seem so good as the large Farnese tapestries mentioned
above; it is mounted on a frame, because the late Pope always had it
placed over the altar while he was saying Mass. It is executed from a
Crucifixion, rather in the manner of Perugino, but spoilt by a touch
of modernity. However, one must not be too critical over a work of art
which was the inspiration of so great a man as Leo XIII.
Over the doors hang other tapestries which, the _custode_ says, have
been valued at over a million francs each--that is, £40,000. To me
they did not appear so good as the tapestries of the same period which
Mr. Joseph Whitaker, of Palermo, bought for less than a tenth of the
price less than ten years ago. The _custode_ did not seem to understand
much about the tapestries, and I think he was more influenced by pride
in his charge than by knowledge of it.
A door at the end of the chamber admits you into a second chamber, of
which the walls are covered with the tapestries of his betrothal and
marriage, presented by Louis XIV. of France to the then Pope. Here
dine the fourteen officers of the Swiss Guard, and here Cardinal Merry
del Val, the Pope’s Secretary of State, gives his state dinners. All
the dinners are given on that long green baize table with a red silk
valence, which makes such an effective feature in the room’s scheme
of colour. Privates and non-commissioned officers dine below in the
Belvedere.
The marriage tapestry bears the inscription: “The ceremony of the
marriage of Louis XIV., King of France and Navarre, with the Most
Serene Infante, Marie Thérèse of Austria, eldest daughter of Philip
IV. of Spain.” Louis and his wife are almost smothered in blue robes
powdered with _fleur-de-lys_.
Smaller tapestries separate this and the betrothal tapestry from the
great tapestry on the end wall, representing the Baptism of Our Lord
by John the Baptist. It has a lovely high, rich colouring, though the
drawing is rather banal. In this room the Pope vests himself when he
is going to officiate in a ceremony, under the baldachin, with all the
Cardinals round him. The room is really a sort of annexe of the Borgia
Apartments.
The ceiling of 1576 has in its centre a picture of the Pentecost, by
Domenichino. Over the door is the name of Urban VIII., the Barberini
Pope, in whose time, I suppose, the apartment was decorated. The whole
effect of both these rooms is very rich. The room opens out into the
long, crimson-upholstered smoking-room of the Cardinals, which has
lounges along its walls like a Tunisian guard-room. Zola says that the
Louis Quatorze tapestries are from designs by Audran.
If you have one of the Vatican servants with you, ask him to take you
out through the Loggia of Giovanni da Udine, instead of returning the
same way. Udine, a fellow-worker with Raffaelle, lived 1487-1564, and
he derived the inspiration for the decoration of the Loggia from the
then newly discovered Baths of Titus, which were wonderfully fresh and
bright when they were first exhumed.
They are chiefly arabesques of the style we call Pompeian; and
constantly repeated in them you have the curious figure which occurs
again and again in the glorious stuccoes of the tombs of the Valerii on
the Latin Way--that of a woman riding a sea-serpent or dragon with a
horse’s head.
The Loggia of Giovanni da Udine is below Raffaelle’s Loggie and brings
you out into the Court of S. Damaso, almost opposite to the entrance of
the Pope’s private apartments.
CHAPTER XIX
THE SISTINE TREASURY
The Vatican is full of treasures unsuspected by the sightseer, such
as the Farnese Tapestries and the Treasury of the Sistine Chapel. So
little is the latter known, that neither Baedeker, Murray, Macmillan,
nor Chandlery mention it. But it is more interesting than the Treasury
of St. Peter’s, because it is far more intimately connected with the
Pope. The reason for the silence is that so few people have been
permitted to see it. Its existence is practically a secret. You are
shown over it by Don Giacomo, one of the Augustinian brothers who have
charge of the Paoline Chapel, and from whom the Pope’s Sacrist is
always taken. Leave having been obtained from the Papal authorities,
you go to summon him in the little house occupied by the brothers at
the back of the Loggia, frescoed by Giovanni da Udine, which is under
Raffaelle’s Loggia. The door is always shut, but over it there is a
square hatch about twelve or fifteen feet from the ground, and when you
knock a smiling person puts his head out of it and talks in the Roman
dialect to you. This is the cook of the brothers, who, after proper
explanations, summons Don Giacomo.
Then you pass through the Sala Ducale, with its poor Pompeian frescoes
by a painter named Bril or Brill--Paul Brill, a Fleming, who died in
1626--and its still poorer plaster arch by Bernini, into the Sala
Regia. Bernini’s arch is made of the bodies of cherubs. The Sala
Regia is huge and has huge frescoes of such subjects as the Battle of
Lepanto. The colouring reminds you of the Duchess who is an artist and
goes in for high living and high thinking--it is high rather than rich,
and the painters have failed to invest the frescoes with any elegance.
Rome abounds with vast sixteenth-century buildings, and their principal
halls are apt to be given up to the Battle of Lepanto. One can see how
the Battle of Lepanto woke Europe from the nightmare of a conquest by
the Turks. The door opposite to the Sala Ducale admits to the Sistine
Chapel. You pass through the exquisite white marble screen of Mino
da Fiesole without looking at its lovely arabesques or gilded bars;
you do not raise your eyes to the ceiling of Michel Angelo, though it
is one of the wonders of the world. You do not glance right or left
at the frescoes of Pinturicchio and Perugino, Sandro Botticelli and
Ghirlandajo, though you thread your way between a hundred people who
are straining their eyes over the faded glories. You may cast an eye on
the tumultuous assemblage which Michel Angelo conceived for the Last
Judgment, and which Daniele da Volterra was commissioned to provide
with clothes, because you are admitted through a hole in its bottom
blocked by a door which is kept always locked. Then, after a ramble
through various anterooms and upstairs, you arrive at the Treasury,
which fills several rooms. In the first is kept one of the greatest
treasures, the grand old linen lace robe, overpoweringly heavy, worn
in 1298 by Boniface VIII., the Caetani Pope. Though this is the oldest
object in the collection, the Caetani are still the premier family in
the Roman nobility. In the same case is kept a gold brooch several
inches in diameter, with three golden and pearl bosses, made in the
shape of a Papal tiara, presented to the Pope in 1888 to hold his cope
together. All round this room, at the backs of the treasure cases, are
hung the splendid gold embroideries which the Grand Duke of Tuscany
gave to Clement VIII. In a drawer below are kept Pius IX.’s white
full-dress shoes, heavily embroidered with gold, with four diamonds and
a large emerald in the centre. They seem to be copied from the Rostrum
in the Forum. Here, too, you see the exquisite collection of robes of
all the famous kinds of lace, Genoese, Venetian, English, Irish, and so
on, one of the most superb being the robe of Venetian point worn by the
Pope for the first time at the recent consecration of fifteen French
Bishops.
The most extraordinary object in the room is the tall hat of red
velvet, edged with gold brocade, shaped like a Japanese Daimio’s hat,
which the Pope used to send to favoured individuals, though none have
been sent since 1837--the Cappello Ducale. It has a pearl and gold
tiara at the top. In this chamber or the next is the tiara worn by
Pius VII. in his captivity, when Napoleon had deprived him of all
his jewels. It is made of cloth of silver stretched over paper or
leather, like all the other tiaras, but instead of being encrusted
with magnificent gems, it is decorated with films of precious stones
as thin as paper, with a backing of tinsel. Don Giacomo calls it all
paper, so as to make the most of the rigours of the captivity at Savona
and Fontainebleau. The whole room is given up to gorgeous robes for
Mass, some of the crimson robes, heavily embroidered with bullion,
being absolutely lovely. In each case is kept a suite for the Cardinals
who assist the Pope at the Mass, as well as for the Pope himself. The
most peculiar objects are the Pope’s stockings, which look like the
loose beef-boots worn by the French Canadians in the backwoods, only
that they are made of crimson silk embroidered with gold. If Popes
wore trousers they would go inside their stockings easily. Perhaps I
should convey my meaning more clearly if I said that these full-dress
Papal stockings were as wide as the mackintosh bottoms which London
policemen wear over their trousers in wet weather. The Pope has red
shoes to match, made like Pius IX.’s, but about two inches longer. They
cannot fit, because the gloves of the suite, which are exactly like
ladies’ riding gauntlets, also of crimson and gold, only look about
six-and-a-halfs. Some zealots from Spain have also sent the Pope pairs
of marvellously embroidered green satin shoes, and white satin shoes,
quite irrespective of size. They would have done for Goliath, but are
very gorgeous. It is a very odd thing that the shoes of the Pope and
of Hadrian’s courtiers on the Rostrum in the Forum are of the same
rude latchet pattern which were worn by working-men in England right
into the nineteenth century. The likeness is, of course, accidental;
the one being due to coarseness and cheapness, and the other to the
preservation of an archaic type. In the case adjoining are two robes
presented to Leo XIII. for his Jubilee--one of a lace of very fine silk
braid, the other of fine silver and gold net. There is yet another of
crimson silk, embroidered with real pearls, given by the Roman ladies,
but the pearls are of the _nouveau art_ grade.
Here, too, is the beautiful altar-front, of cloth of silver embroidered
with gold, which is always laid on the altar in front of the Pope when
he is celebrating at great functions.
The most peculiar things of all are the Cardinals’ robes, made of cloth
of gold and black silk, which look like shot-brown silk. These they
wear at a Mass for a dead Pope. The living Pope, for the time being,
wears crimson; it would not be right for him to wear mourning. One
large armoire is full of gorgeous cushions, mostly of rich white silk
embroidered with gold, for the Pope to kneel on.
Then you go into another room, and, passing a large collection of
stoles enriched with beautifully painted miniatures of Saints, come to
the glass case which contains the famous Golden Rose. The Golden Rose
is a complete rose-bush, a foot and a half high, with about a dozen
blossoms of heavy, clumsy, not very well-made or natural roses; but
the foliage is of thin gold leaf, like the garlands found in Etruscan
tombs. The bush stands in a rich, odd-shaped, silver-gilt vase, as
quaint as the vases of Tunis, two feet high. It is always kept here
as the sample from which the Pope can order a copy on the very rare
occasions when he wishes to bestow “the Golden Rose,” as our King
bestows the Order of “the Garter.” The last person who received it is
said to have been an American woman who had given two million dollars
to the Pope.
The queer little silver boxes, mostly with conical tops, inscribed
ol., like chemists’ jars, contain the chrism for (1) the sick; (2)
catechumens; and (3) confirmation.
The Pope’s tiaras[19] are made of cloth of silver stretched over some
stiff substance. They are twelve or fifteen inches high, surrounded
by three crowns of golden leaves rather like arum leaves, each with a
costly gem in the centre, coming out of a band three-quarters of an
inch wide, thickly studded with magnificent gems. There are two visible
here, the present Pope’s and Pio Nono’s. Each is surmounted by a blue
enamelled ball, like the ball of St. Peter’s, and a little diamond
cross. Tiaras have strings like Glengarry caps. Here is kept the
Venetian point robe given to Leo XII. for his Jubilee.
In this room is kept the faded scarlet hat worn by Pius VII. at
Fontainebleau in his captivity, which has a long inscription devoted to
it.
The first object which strikes you in the next room is a magnificent
processional cross, seven feet high, made of silver gilt, adorned with
figures, enamelling, etc., presented by the late Marquess of Bute.
Here, too, is kept the magnificent silver-gilt altar service given by
Queen Victoria to Leo XIII. for his Jubilee. Close by is a model of
the famous Cellini brooch of gold, five inches in diameter, with a
large diamond in the centre--a cope brooch. A Princess Corsini gave
her wedding train, made of crimson velvet with gold embroidery, to the
Pope for his exhibition. You live in an atmosphere of crimson silk and
gold embroidery here. In this room are some wonderful pictures woven in
silk. In an alcove opposite, fourteen feet by ten, are about twenty of
the robes worn by the Pope on his Throne on the Sedia Gestatoria; each
contains twenty-five metres of silk. They are about seven feet long, so
they have to hang very high, but they are quite light compared with the
embroidered copes.
There are said to be seventy rooms of plate. Everything here is plate,
except Boniface VIII.’s lace robe. This is because Napoleon carried off
all the Vatican treasures and only returned the church plate. The gems
and gold and other jewellery disappeared.
Here I must point out the finger of Fate. When Paul III. was building
the Sacristy, he came across the tomb of the Empresses Maria and
Thermantia, the two wives of Honorius; their bodies were intact, and
they still wore their pearl robes, and were surrounded by many costly
feminine trinkets. Paul, one of the least saintly of the Popes, was
feverishly building St. Peter’s to take the place of children as his
posterity. He was vulgar enough to melt down the gold, forty pounds in
weight, which he applied to the building, but he kept the gems and put
them in his tiara. Napoleon cared nothing for Paul III.’s tiara; it was
broken up too, whereas if they had been left in the Empress’s jewels,
Napoleon would certainly have preserved them as wonders of the world,
and they would have found their way back to the Vatican. Paul’s own
tomb, too, in St. Peter’s--as if in retribution--has felt the hand of
the spoiler; two of its statues are gone. There is nothing by Benvenuto
Cellini in the Sistine Treasury, and there are very few other grand
monstrances or crosses, but some of those in the Pitti Palace may have
come from here, because the Papal plate there is so very splendid. It
is a curious change to pass from this silent treasury of the dead Popes
back into the Sistine Chapel, where you see a Roman crowd without a
Roman in it, and are deafened by earth’s many languages.
CHAPTER XX
THE SACRISTY OF ST. PETER’S
I am not going to give a detailed account of the magnificent and
imposing Sacristy of St. Peter’s, because it is open to anyone who
cares to give the Sacristan a small fee. Nothing is more surprising
to the untravelled Englishman than the way in which anyone who is
not absolutely disreputable is allowed to stray into the sacristies
of Italian churches and cathedrals, even when they are being used by
robing and unrobing priests. The sacristy is almost as open to the
public as the church itself. But I should be wrong if I did not point
out briefly certain objects in the Sacristy of St. Peter’s which no
one should omit to see. It is entered by a door in the left aisle;
you go along an important-looking passage, where you imagine that you
must be trespassing, until you reach the splendid octagonal Sagrestia
Commune, embellished with fluted marble columns from Hadrian’s Villa.
Four minor chambers lead off this: the Sagrestia dei Canonici, leading
into the Stanza Capitolare--that is, the Chapter House, on the left;
and on the right the Sagrestia dei Beneficiati, leading into the
Treasury. In the Chapter House are the only valuable paintings left in
St. Peter’s--namely, the panels executed by Giotto for the Confessio
of Old St. Peter’s, and fourteen pieces of the celebrated frescoes by
Melozzo da Forli, which were formerly, with some other pieces now in
the Quirinal, in the cupola of the Church of SS. Apostoli. It must be
remembered that until the loss of their temporal power the Popes had
the Quirinal for their summer palace, so there is nothing unnatural in
their sending to each palace part of the frescoes taken down in the
rebuilding of the Church of SS. Apostoli. These frescoes of Melozzo da
Forli[20] consist of angels playing musical instruments, and heads of
the Apostles. The angels are perhaps the most beautiful figures among
all the paintings of Rome. They are very spirited and exquisitely
lovely, and Melozzo is such a rare and magnificent master that no
opportunity should be lost of examining his work. There are also a few
pictures of later painters of note. The traveller should not fail to
note the glorious Oriental alabaster in the Sacristy; hardly anywhere
will he see pieces of such singular beauty. The Treasury of St. Peter’s
is not so interesting as the Treasury of the Sistine Chapel, for the
Popes, since 1870, have used the latter so much more intimately than
the former; but there are certain objects of great beauty and interest
in the St. Peter’s Treasury. The most beautiful, perhaps, are the
silver-gilt candlesticks sculptured by Benvenuto Cellini, which are
used for the Papal Altar of St. Peter’s upon great occasions. They
are not examples of Cellini’s most delicate handiwork, of which there
are far finer examples in the Pitti Palace at Florence; but one does
not know how much of the best Cellini work at the Pitti ought not
by rights to be in the Vatican. Michel Angelo, also, is said to be
responsible for the designs of the candelabra in the Treasury. Here,
too, notice the beautiful chalice decorated with precious stones, which
was given by the last of the Stuarts, the Cardinal of York, who was
Cardinal Priest of St. Peter’s for more than half a century. What is
vulgarly called the Dalmatic of Charlemagne, and should be called the
Dalmatic of San Leone, _i.e._ St. Leo III., who crowned this monarch,
is, writes Hare, said to have been embroidered at Constantinople for
the coronation of Charlemagne as Emperor of the West. But it is a
production, in any case, of the Byzantine artists in their best period.
The Holy Roman Emperors used to wear it while serving as deacons at
the Pope’s Altar during their Coronation Mass. “It was,” says Lord
Lindsay, in his _Christian Art_, “in this dalmatic--then _semée_ all
over with pearls and glittering with freshness--that Cola di Rienzi
robed himself over his armour in the Sacristy of St. Peter’s, and then
ascended to the Palace of the Popes, after the manner of the Cæsars,
with sounding trumpets and his horsemen following him--his truncheon
in his hand, and his crown on his head.” According to Lord Lindsay,
the Saviour in glory is represented on the breast; the Transfiguration
on the back, and Christ administering the Eucharist to the Apostles on
the shoulders. It is quite stiff, almost like the hauberk of a knight,
and not by any means so rusty or threadbare as one would expect. Here,
too, are a ciborium by Donatello, and the Cross of the Emperor Justin,
with whom Pope Hormisdas had the dramatic scene at the gates of Old
St. Peter’s. The tiara of dull silver kept here belongs, not to the
Pope, but to the miraculous image of St. Peter, whose foot is kissed by
so many thousands annually in the nave of the cathedral. I have been
unable to obtain definite information as to which tiara is alluded to
by Hare in the following passage: “In the Papal tiara are set some
of the jewels robbed in 1544 from the tomb and person of Maria, the
wife of Honorius, daughter of Stilicho. Originally the Popes were
only crowned with a low Phrygian mitre decorated with two peacock’s
feathers, to which was added a single circlet of gold. Benedict XI.
[_sic_][21] (at Avignon) (perhaps Boniface VIII.) added a second
circlet, and Urban V. a third. The peacock’s feathers are of good omen,
the flesh of this bird, according to S. Augustine, being held to be
incorruptible.”
The attendants say that these jewels were carried off by the French and
never returned. Paul III.’s treatment of the mausoleum of the wives of
Honorius, when it was discovered in extending the foundations for the
new cathedral, moves the indignation of even an ardent Roman Catholic
like Mr. Marion Crawford: “In extending the foundations of the church,
Paul the Third came upon the bodies of Maria and Hermania [_sic_],
the two wives of Honorius, the Emperor who ‘disestablished’ paganism
in favour of Christianity. They were sisters, daughters of Stilicho,
and had been buried in their imperial robes, with many rich objects
and feminine trinkets; and they were found intact, as they had been
buried, in the month of February 1543. Forty pounds of fine gold were
taken from their robes alone, says Baracconi, without counting all the
jewels and trinkets, among which was a very beautiful lamp, besides a
great number of precious stones. The Pope melted down the gold for the
expenses of the building, and set the gems in a tiara, where, if they
could be identified, they certainly exist to-day--the very stones worn
by Empresses of ancient Rome.
“Then, as if in retribution, the Pope’s own tomb was moved from its
place.”
The archives of St. Peter’s are kept above the Sacristy. All
guide-books note, among many other manuscripts, the life of St. George,
with admirable miniatures by Giotto, of which one is reproduced in this
volume (see List of Illustrations).
I have only touched lightly on the Sacristy and the Treasury, and their
principal objects of interest, because sightseers so often omit to
visit them; not a few because they are unaware of the courtesy with
which sacristies are shown.
[Illustration: Miniatures by Giotto in a manuscript in the Library of
the Canons of St. Peter’s.
_From Pistolesi’s “Il Vaticano.”_]
CHAPTER XXI
THE DOME OF ST. PETER’S
Comparatively few people realize how easy it is to ascend the dome of
St. Peter’s, and to obtain the necessary order for the ascent, which
is given at the office of the works (Reverenda Fabbrica di San Pietro,
via della Sagrestia, No. 8, on the first floor). There seems to be
no reason for the formality of getting an order; it is given to any
respectable person as a matter of course, for himself and party, not
exceeding so many persons. The dome can only be visited from eight to
eleven in the morning. You enter through a door by the tomb of Maria
Clementina Sobieska, wife of the Pretender, which is almost opposite
the monument of the last three Stuart Princes, and close to where
you enter St. Peter’s. The first part of the ascent is up a spiral
inclined plane, and it is very easy until you get to quite the end of
the ascent. Indeed, it is easy to the extent of uninterestingness until
you reach the roof of the church and that part of the ascent which is
performed between the outer and inner shells of the dome. The dome
rises three hundred and eight feet above the roof. It is four hundred
and four feet from the ground to the top of the lantern; four hundred
and thirty-five feet to the top of the cross. Its diameter is slightly
less than that of the Pantheon; and the spire of Rouen Cathedral is
seventy feet higher.
I made the ascent very early, so as to linger a long time upon the roof
of the great church, with its bird’s-eye view of the Vatican and its
superb panorama of Rome.
There was a lady with me who firmly believed in the San Pietrini--the
children of St. Peter’s, who are supposed to live in houses on the
roof, and who supply the steeple-jacks and the men who swing themselves
about the ceiling cornices of St. Peter’s, making shots at the places
they want to repair until they hang on to them like birds--a sight
which makes you quite dizzy. These people are said to live on the roof
of St. Peter’s all their lives, and hardly ever to leave it, except
when they go to do their marketing and when they are plying their
perilous trade. I have the highest authority for declaring the whole
thing to be a myth. Moreover, there are no houses on the roof of St.
Peter’s. I made a close examination when I was there last year. In
fact, there is hardly a single building on the roof which is not an
essential part of the church. That these steeple-jacks, and the men who
work at a great height in the interior of St. Peter’s, are the sons and
grandsons and great-grandsons of men who have served St. Peter’s in
the same way is pretty sure to be true. For it is a business to which
no one would be likely to aspire if it was not in his family and in
his blood. And most of the people employed about the Vatican are apt
to have a hereditary connection with it. But there are no San Pietrini
living on the roof.
The roof of St. Peter’s makes quite a huge Piazza; and the views from
it over Rome are very fine, especially that which carries the eye
across the Piazza of St. Peter’s between Bernini’s superb colonnades
to the Tiber and the Castle of Sant’ Angelo, and the crowded roofs of
the great city, and the blue mountains behind. Yet how this view would
be enhanced if, in place of the three mean streets which lead from the
Tiber to the Cathedral, we still had the colonnade, many yards long,
which led up to Old St. Peter’s. Perhaps some day the municipality of
Rome will drive an avenue the whole width of the three streets from the
river to the Piazza.
The plan of the Vatican itself is better seen from the gallery of the
cupola. From it you realize the majestic size of the Pontifical Palace;
the vastness of the original Cortile of the Belvedere; the magnificent
proportions of the Cortile of San Damaso.
It is most eerie as you make the ascent to step into the gallery which
runs all round the dome; unless you have a strong head you hardly
dare to look over the railings into the abyss below, where Bernini’s
swollen baldachin, which is nearly a hundred feet high, looks like a
drawing-room clock. The mosaics of the dome look far better from the
floor of the Cathedral, for which their effect was designed. Seen close
to, they are coarse and flabby; but it is easier, of course, up here
to study the way in which they fit in with the vast conception of St.
Peter’s.
In one part of the ascent you climb straight up the inner dome--like
a hill--up steps, of course. When you come out on the gallery
from which you enter the staircase up to the cupola it is highly
interesting to look out on the metalled surface of the dome, which
has rows of knobs used in supporting scaffolding and illuminations.
The great illuminations of the old days seem to have been erected by
steeple-jacks without any thought of the risks arising from the immense
height. There was, indeed, need of a hereditary caste of San Pietrini.
Only twenty people at a time are admitted into the cupola, which is
a sort of hollow copper globe approached by a ladder-like staircase.
When you are inside you feel as if you are in a great copper football
with the seams showing, which sways about quite disagreeably. It
requires strong nerves to stand on the floor of the cupola; you feel as
if you were going to topple it over. Most people are quite glad when
they get back to the little outside gallery from which they made the
final ascent--seen from which the exterior of the Sistine Chapel looks
as plain as a packing-case.
As is well known, Michel Angelo did not conceive the dome in quite
its present form; he completed its drum and left the drawings and
models for carrying it up to the lantern. The dome was actually
finished thirty-six years later by Giacomo della Porta; he changed the
design of Michel Angelo, which was much lower, flatter, and heavier,
like the dome of the Pantheon, to something more after the style of
Brunelleschi’s beautiful dome on the Cathedral of Florence. It is
considered the finest of all domes; not only for its gigantic size, but
for its perfect proportions. And it is hardly less remarkable for the
feverish haste with which it was built to gratify the restless ambition
of Sixtus V. “The actual dome,” says Murray, “was begun on July 15,
1588, and completed in twenty-two months. The Pope was so anxious
to see it finished that he devoted a hundred thousand gold crowns
annually to the work; and employed eight hundred workmen upon it night
and day.”
In that same month of July 1588, while the Pope was inaugurating the
apex of his mighty Cathedral, Philip II. of Spain was inaugurating the
parallel mighty project to restore heretic England to the Catholic
Church. The Spanish Armada left Ferrol for the conquest of England
within a week of the commencement of the dome of St. Peter’s. Sixtus
and Philip were working together.
It was in the workmen’s haste to complete the building that the tomb
of Urban VI. was violated, as told in another chapter. They wanted a
receptacle to hold water, and blandly emptied his sarcophagus.
The ascent of the dome of St. Peter’s is a thing which no visitor to
Rome, whose health allows of it, should omit. It is so gradual that it
is no great physical effort; and the experience it has to offer one
is unique. Though the first part of the ascent is ordinary, the last
part is as curious as going down a mine: the views are astonishing, and
those who are insensible to vertigo could not want a finer opportunity
of testing their nerves than by looking down on the floor of the
Cathedral from the highest point at which they can get a peep of the
inside. Before 1870 the illumination of St. Peter’s at the close of
Lent used to be one of the most splendid and animated spectacles in
Rome. Story has immortalized it in his _Roba di Roma_.[22]
[Illustration: St. Peter’s. Plan showing how the Dome and the Shrine
Galleries of its piers are ascended. _From Pistolesi’s “Il Vaticano.”_]
CHAPTER XXII
THE BORGIA APARTMENTS
There are, as I have said, few parts of the Vatican about which the
information to be found in English books is so incomplete and incorrect
as the Borgia Apartments; most of them describe this splendid suite,
which is the official residence of the Cardinal Secretary of State, as
the Mediæval Museum of the Papacy, or the Armoury, or the Guard-Room
of the Swiss Guard. What is more curious, hardly any of them make any
allusion to its having been a library, though, from the days of Gregory
XVI. to well on into the reign of Leo XIII., it was the Vatican Library
as far as the printed books were concerned. The whole two hundred and
fifty thousand of them were crowded into its narrow limits, and were so
inconveniently crowded that students could not work at them properly.
The walls up to the ceilings were blocked with bookcases, and the
books of the various Collections, from which the great library was
formed, had got hopelessly mixed as far as their source of origin was
concerned, though they were arranged according to their contents.
It is difficult for anyone who visits these apartments in their present
stately condition to realize that, up to May 1891, the printed books of
the Vatican were all here.
Leo XIII., the most brilliant writer in Latin of the two hundred and
sixty-four Popes, was a great lover of books, and wished to vie with
his predecessors’ achievements in adding to the artistic glories of
his palace. He listened eagerly to the petitions which reached him
from art lovers begging for a restoration of the Borgia Apartments.
The paintings of Pinturicchio, which had made their ceilings a blaze
of beauty, had, since the days of Gregory XVI., experienced a great
revival in popularity; in the last years of the nineteenth century his
fame had almost rivalled that of Perugino.
These glorious works of art were completed, though there is such an
incredible amount, not only of painting, but of stucco and papier-mâché
work in them (papier-mâché four hundred years ago was turned to more
architectural account than it is now), in less than three years,
1492-1494. And this, though Pinturicchio was under a contract at the
time to the Canons of Orvieto Cathedral.
[Illustration: David standing on the head of Goliath. On the ceiling of
the Borgia rooms.]
Alexander VI. was most anxious to occupy the rooms which he had
chosen for his apartments in the old Papal Palace on the north side of
the quadrangle framed by the Sistine Chapel on the south, and to which
he was building a most important addition, the Borgia Tower, where the
Hall of the Credo and the Hall of the Sibyls are situated. This was, of
course, to be his place of refuge in case of the wars into which his
imperious and outrageous acts hurried him. It was Alexander VI. who put
the passage between the Vatican and the Castle of Sant’ Angelo into its
present fortified condition, and, indeed, who converted the Castle of
Sant’ Angelo into a first-class mediæval fortress.
But at the same time, says Ricci, he wished everything to be of
unparalleled grandeur and brilliance. In which he succeeded, for
Charles VIII., King of France, a monarch of extravagant notions, who
dined with the Pope in these rooms immediately after their opening,
said he had never seen their equal in palace or castle.
Of course, Pinturicchio, accustomed as he was to working with feverish
enthusiasm, could never have accomplished such a _magnum opus_ with
his own hands in two or three years. But he was assisted by a number
of pupils, including the unidentified disciple of Perugino, who, after
himself, did the best work. Also, he did nothing to the first and
largest room, and is only partly responsible for the fifth and sixth,
the two tower rooms. But the second, third, and fourth, which present
some of the most glorious masses of colour in Italy, were entirely
of his conception and design, from the cornice upwards, and the most
beautiful of the great pictures, which fill the lunettes, were painted
by his hand. The Dispute of St. Catherine with the Philosophers is
declared to be Pinturicchio’s masterpiece.
The beauty and gorgeousness of these rooms completely satisfied the
splendour-loving Pope, as he himself acknowledged in the grant of lands
he made Pinturicchio in payment for them. He gave him to understand,
says Ricci, that he was to consider the Apostolic Camera not a little
in his debt for the paintings in the Palace and the Castle of Sant’
Angelo. “_Industria et maximo sumptu factis._”
But they proved an ill-omened acquisition, for they were of the era
when the French King, Charles VIII., who alone could have checkmated
the ambitions of the vigorous Borgia, was invading Italy. And the
crowning tragedies of the reign were interwoven with them, for it was
here that the pleasure-loving Pontiff heard of the murder of his eldest
son, Giovanni, by a younger son, the monster Cesare Borgia; and it was
here that he heard of the savage attacks of Savonarola; and it was
here, says Ricci, that they must have trembled at his death-rattle,
when, poisoned, perhaps dying, he measured in his heart the abyss that
was to swallow up his evil house. It was here certainly that the old
legend of the devil coming for his soul was located.
In the centuries following the Middle Ages at Rome, people seemed to
have had no reverence for monuments, however splendid, unless they had
built them themselves. Everyone knows how Julius II. tore down Old
St. Peter’s, and half a hundred Cardinals tore down old basilicas to
replace them with baroque monstrosities. Considering all things, it was
a mercy that Julius II. did not reduce the Borgia Rooms to a scrap-heap
the moment he came to the throne, so bitter was his hatred of the
Borgia Pontiff who meant to encompass his death and had driven him into
exile.
Their neglect and abuse must have set in early, for Alexander VI.
only died in 1503, and we find Pius IV., when he was elected in 1559,
rescuing the Borgia Rooms, which had been terribly knocked about; the
Popes were using Raffaelle’s Stanze on the floor above to get more
light and air, and these rooms were given up to the Cardinal Nephews.
After Sixtus V. had completed the suite of apartments at the eastern
end of the Vatican, which are now occupied by the Pope, the Borgia
Rooms were abandoned altogether except for emergencies. They suffered
still more in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, when they were
used for erecting the cells in which Cardinals were confined when they
were in Conclave to elect a new Pope. And they were also used for the
meals of the various officials assembled in the Vatican for the great
ceremonies of Holy Week.
In 1816 they suffered fresh violence when Pius VII. drove nails into
their walls to hang the pictures returned from Paris, which had no
proper places of their own, because they did not belong to him, but
to various Italian churches. He did not, of course, touch the great
frescoes; since they were painted on vaults of the ceiling they were,
fortunately, of no use for his purpose. The rooms were of little enough
use as it was, they were so dark, although the marble Guelph crosses
and bars were removed from the windows. After five years the pictures
were removed and the apartments became a museum of statuary; the walls
again suffered, for brackets were nailed up on them. But the most
mischief was done when the apartments were turned into the Vatican
Library, to receive all the printed books, by Gregory XVI.
Monsignor Ugolini, senior _Scrittore_ of the Vatican Library, who
wrote the excellent monograph on the transference of the books from
the Borgia Apartments to the Leonine Library, to which the books have
been taken, gives this date for the turning the Borgia Rooms into a
library, and he must be better informed than Ricci on such a point.
Ricci says that it was Pius IX. who turned the rooms into a library to
receive the books of Cardinal Mai. When Leo XIII. had the rooms cleared
of the books and their shelves, he found that the room was “greatly
damaged by old scratches, by the fastening up of pictures in 1816, by
the insertion of brackets supporting busts and statuettes in 1821, by
the fastening up of the bookcases put up by Pius IX., by the opening up
of new doors, and by the closing up of old ones” (Ricci).
The architect employed in the restoration was the Conte Francesco
Vespignani. The painter was Commendatore Ludovico Seitz, the art
director of the Vatican Galleries. Nothing was done that was not
necessary; the repairs were chiefly confined to the injuries on the
walls, the plaster, the frescoes, and the stucco. Former renovations
were allowed to stand. In some parts of the roofs of Rooms V. and VI.
the painting was detached, the wall and plaster restored, and the
painting put on again with such accuracy as to leave no mark except
a faint white line, “which at once disappeared at a light touch of
the brush.” No other retouching was allowed, so as not to interfere
with the authenticity of the work. Most of the earlier retouching,
according to Ehrle and Stevenson, was done in the time of Pius VII.,
though some was done when the rooms were occupied by the Cardinal
Nephews, especially in the time of Pius IV. and Gregory XIII. Ehrle and
Stevenson claim that it is better to have such restoration, because it
covers the worst damages in the original frescoes; for to take them
away would damage the frescoes still further, and leave bare places;
because, being so old, they have their place in the artistic records
of the frescoes in the rooms, and because they are recognizable at a
glance, and, therefore, do not interfere with the authenticity of the
pictures. The only considerable alteration of the pictures in Seitz’s
restoration was the painting over the scratch on the Pope’s chin in the
magnificent portrait of Alexander VI., in the Sala dei Misteri, which
changed the whole character and effect of the portrait.
Ricci strongly disagrees with most of their opinions, though he admits
the skill with which Seitz executed his work.
In his superb book on Pinturicchio, published by Heinemann at five
and a half guineas, he gives a most interesting account, translated
from Ehrle and Stevenson, of the way in which the restorers got over
the most difficult part of their work, in making the lower walls,
which had sustained all the damage, decorative enough to allow the
apartments to be used for State purposes. They are now occupied by the
Cardinal Secretary of State, as they were occupied in the sixteenth
century by the Cardinal Nephews who performed the duties of that high
office. Their side walls had not only been knocked about, but had been
covered with whitewash, which had to be removed throughout. When it was
removed, it was discovered that, while in the first four rooms there
were considerable remains of the old decorations, in the fifth and
sixth there were no outlines of any kind except the slightest possible
trace by the north window of the former. In the third room there were
only slight traces of decorations, just enough to enable the main
portions of the design and colouring to be distinguished. In the first
room the remaining fragments were not in a condition to be completed,
nor to be left _in situ_ as they were found, without disturbing the
whole effect. In the second and fourth rooms the ornaments of the walls
were in moderately good condition and afforded sufficient scope for the
completion of the missing portions.
In these two rooms, known as the _Sala dei Misteri_ and the _Sala delle
Arti Liberali_ respectively, the bare walls have been restored with the
original designs throughout. But in order to distinguish between the
original and the restored parts, the latter have been sketched in much
more brightly, or in neutral tints.
In the third room the remaining parts of the old decorations, say these
authors, sufficed for the restoration of the principal parts of the
design and colouring, while the secondary parts were left entirely to
the restorer; the lower part was throughout covered with panels of
intarsia work, almost contemporary with Pinturicchio, and made for
the rooms immediately below the Borgia Rooms (said to have been used
for the Vatican Library by Sixtus IV.); the upper part was covered
with canvases, on which what was left of the original decorations was
imitated and completed as well as could possibly have been done.
In the first room canvases were employed in the same way, and by a
brilliant conception the huge expanses of its walls were relieved by
hanging them with a superb series of large tapestries. The walls of
the fifth and sixth rooms were also covered with canvases of the same
description, but here the painters had a more formidable task before
them, for all the original decorations had perished; they had to devise
designs in harmony with the ceilings, with the few remnants of painting
round the north window, and with the splendid old tiles left here and
there on the floor, made in the Spanish style so common in Sicily,
with the Borgia arms--the ox and raying crown, for the motives.
It is not my intention in describing the Palace rooms, which are among
the most delightfully gay and gorgeous of the world’s monuments, to
pause to inquire if Pinturicchio painted the whole of the Pope’s mantle
in that wonderful kneeling figure of Alexander VI., or to discuss
technicalities at all. That is for artists to propound to artists, a
very small and depreciative audience. I am not capable of writing for
them, and I do not wish to write for them; most of them go through
galleries looking out for faults, not beauties, and though the chance
of the humblest living depends on it, they nearly always fail to
remember that art was made for mankind, not for rival artists. I have
a melancholy example before me of the dangers of a little knowledge of
art. Writing about the Borgia Rooms, which form admittedly one of the
most beautiful _ensembles_ in the whole of art, it is only occasionally
that the author vouchsafes a saltspoonful of praise; he is afraid of
devoting one word to enthusiasm.
That is not the way to write about the Borgia Rooms. The ordinary
visitors who go there do not want to know if Pinturicchio and his
school drew hands well; they want to rise on stepping-stones to higher
things.
_Sala I_
The first room, it must be admitted, leaves you a little cold: but
then it is not by Pinturicchio; the designs on the roof are little
mythological plaques by two pupils of Raffaelle--Pierino del Vaga and
Giovanni da Udine, both good humanists, however, who in other places
had delightful inspirations from the Classic world with which they
created late-born and lovely visions of “Olympus’ faded hierarchy.”
The large noble tapestries round the walls, with trophies of shining
armour hanging between, I take to be of the sixteenth century; they
are very fine and delicate, both in design and colouring; they
have just the faded reds and blues which you get in the wonderful
fifteenth-century tapestries in the Musée Cluny, which have established
them as the tints _par excellence_ for tapestry. The faces are a little
fuller than you get in pictures and tapestries of the true Gothic
feeling. They have more of beauty and less of romance in them, and, of
course, have no suggestion at all of the atmosphere of the story of
Cephalus and Procris, which they represent. But they have the sumptuous
beauty of their great century, and play their part well in making the
first of the Borgia Rooms look essentially the antechamber of a palace.
Then you step through a door into a second room, the fine applicability
of whose title you recognize before your foot is off the threshold:
the Sala dei Misteri--the Hall of the Mysteries. You are in Aladdin’s
cave. There is nothing like it in Rome outside of these precincts. The
Garden of Paradise in the ancient basilica of S. Prassede is likewise
all gold and colour, with its mosaics of a thousand years ago, but it
is small, and its figures are cramped, almost grotesque; the roof of
the Farnesina, with Raffaelle’s Cupid and Psyche spread over it, lacks
the richness of setting which these great frescoes of Pinturicchio
have in the moulding and gilding of the Gothic ribs of the Borgias’
pleasure-house. There may be this or the other fault to find with the
work of Pinturicchio; the faults need little finding in the work of
most of his pupils; but the fact remains that, if one suddenly became
a fairy prince and had the choice of all the frescoes in the world
for the decoration of one’s pleasure-house, these are the frescoes
one would choose,--before the more serious frescoes of the Library of
Siena; before the nobler frescoes of Raffaelle in the rooms exactly
above (the Stanze), which contain the School of Athens, and the other
tableaux of that glorious suite; before the frescoes of the Farnesina,
more perfect, but with less to nourish the eyes.
The frescoes in the second, third, and fourth Borgia Rooms are not
even rivalled by those which make gems of the Chapel of Nicholas V.,
painted by Fra Angelico for the Vatican, and the chapel painted for the
Riccardi Palace at Florence, by Benozzo Gozzoli. These, perhaps, come
nearest the Borgia Rooms among paintings, but they are small, and lack
the splendour of the setting which the magnificent Borgia gave to the
frescoes of Pinturicchio. Perhaps a better parallel could be found in
the mosaics of St. Mark’s, Venice, or the Royal Chapel at Palermo.
For here in these Borgia Rooms I had, when I visited him there, an
overpowering feeling of sensuous beauty curiously mingled with the
atmosphere of awe which emanated from the residence of the highest
personage but one in Roman Catholic Christendom. I used to wonder what
the effect must be on his mind of constantly regarding such wonderful
beauty. One day I met him and asked him. He parried the question with
equal simplicity or skill: “I never have any time to look up.”
_Sala II_
To imagine this second room, the _Sala dei Misteri_, you must picture
to yourself a room of fair size, almost square, with a tiled floor and
a rich cornice running round it at about half its height. Below the
cornice the walls are decorated with skilfully restored arabesques,
and their conventional patterns in fresco are broken by sculptured
Renaissance ornaments. From the cornice springs an elaborate system of
intersecting vaults whose lunettes are filled with glorious frescoes by
Pinturicchio; the ribs are moulded in gilt, with wonderful richness,
and the intervening spaces have little pictures, together forming a
blaze of gold and colour. The large frescoes in this room are the
Annunciation, the Nativity, the Adoration, the Resurrection, the
Ascension, the Descent of the Holy Spirit, and the Assumption of the
Virgin. The finest of them all is the Resurrection, in which there is
a superb figure of Alexander VI., the wicked Borgia Pope, for whom
these rooms were decorated, regarding the Resurrection, a topic upon
which you would not have expected him, of all men, to dwell with much
satisfaction.
The portrait is a marvellous one; the very hands speak. They are folded
in the attitude of prayer, but not of meekness; the whole anatomy of
the figure speaks, though it is swathed in a great cloak stiff with
gold and gems; and though the head is bald and the face fat, with
double chin, long upper lip, and parrot-like nose, the impression you
get is of calm strength, of a man who saw his end clearly and grasped
it without allowing his attention to be drawn off by any conventions
or excuses. In his portrait the man who flung conventionalities to
the winds, and brooked no obstacle to his projects for providing for
his children, does not look bad or merciless; it is true that to
represent him as such might not have been pleasant for Pinturicchio.
Here he looks only a man not to be deterred. He was at all events a
wise patron of the arts, and he steered his ship in the troubled sea
of Italian civil wars and intrigues with a manfulness which any civil
Prince of his time might have envied. After all, he was quite up to the
moral standard of the gods of Greece--was very much the Jupiter of the
Vatican.
Were it only for this portrait of Alexander VI., a visit to the Borgia
Rooms would be worth making. But the three charming, youthful figures
kneeling below the broken marble sarcophagus from which Our Lord rises,
are of the highest interest, for they are believed to represent the
three sons of Alexander VI., Jofre, born in 1481, being the exquisite
sleeping figure in front. As Ricci points out, the halberd head with
the broken point beside him, and the gash in the cuirass, broken across
the chest, containing the figure of a youth with a cap on his head
and his garments fastened with lacets, must typify one of the many
mysteries of the Borgias. Pier Luigi, the eldest of the Pope’s sons,
had been dead for some years, so Ricci suggests that it may signify
that Jofre was broken-hearted for his loss, and that the Pope wished
all four of his sons to come into the picture. The beautiful boy with
long golden hair who kneels, holding a halberd, on the opposite side
of the sarcophagus to balance the figure of the Pope, is the terrible
Cesare Borgia, who had not yet begun his murderous career. The even
more beautiful figure in ancient Roman dress turning round is Giovanni
Borgia, whom Cesare murdered in 1497.
After the great portrait of Alexander VI., the most notable feature in
the _Sala dei Misteri_ is the Annunciation. Notice in it the exquisite
peace and humility in which Pinturicchio excelled, and the wonderfully
rich and elegant Renaissance archway which encloses the vista behind.
The few technical faults the picture may have do not detract from
the main fact that here you have a picture full and typical of the
loveliness of fifteenth-century Italy.
The figures in the Nativity, which, with singular inappropriateness,
is divided by the Borgia Bull from the Annunciation, are to me less
beautiful. The Virgin has not to such a high degree the wonderful
grace of anatomy which Pinturicchio contrives to suggest through the
rich clothing of his figures. But it has one of his beautiful Umbrian
landscapes behind the classic porch with a thatched roof, which is his
conventional way of expressing the stable.
The Adoration of the Magi is not the work of Pinturicchio. In the
lunette of the Coming of the Holy Ghost, though it is condemned by art
critics, and though much of it is the work of another hand, is one of
Pinturicchio’s purely lovely conceptions. I do not venture to criticize
the art; I look for the beauty in these rooms. And in the group to the
spectator’s left are two perfectly exquisite figures: the boy just
appearing in the centre and the boy with the outstretched left hand;
and what grace, what lovely repose there are in the background!
In the lunette of the Assumption, beside the empty sarcophagus full
of flowers, which Pinturicchio, Perugino, and Raffaelle used almost
identically, is a beautiful figure by the unidentified disciple of
Perugino. The Madonna, seated in a mandorla, is surrounded by charming
Pinturicchio angels.
_Sala III_
This room, which is called the _Sala delle Vite dei Santi_, is even
more glorious than the preceding, for it contains the Disputa of St.
Catherine, which Ricci, with Italian cynicism, suggests may have been
selected by the Pope because she was the protectress of illegitimate
children, and, as such, of great importance to him. It is more certain
that the subject was chosen because St. Catherine came from Alexandria,
and his name was Alexander. The Pope had the ceiling of this very room
decorated with the superbly painted story of Isis and Osiris, because
it pleased him to identify the Bull Apis with the ox of the Borgias.
This wonderful ceiling is so rich and beautiful that it is almost
impossible to look into it properly. Your eyes lose themselves in the
richness of the general effect, as they do when you are inspecting
a rich Byzantine _paliotto_. But the details are exquisite; the
child-figures especially are purely lovely. All sorts of scenes will
be recognized, from the marriage of Isis and Osiris, in the orthodox
Christian fashion, to David and Goliath, and Judith and Holofernes.
Ricci draws attention to the beautiful figure of a _putto_ riding a
swan, and to the representation of little field industries, such as
ploughing and the culture of apples, which Osiris taught, given at the
sides of his temple. The most striking subject is the hewing of Osiris
to pieces. The ox in a litter, shaped like a temple, and carried upon
the shoulders of four men, is the triumph of Osiris changed into the
God Apis. Very much of this glorification of the Borgia ox is from
the hand of the great master himself, and its splendour is almost
inconceivable; in fact, some of the little pictures contained in it are
among the most beautiful creations of Pinturicchio, who was one of the
most prodigal creators of beauty.
I will leave the St. Catherine to the end; it would be an anticlimax to
talk of the other pictures after that.
I will commence with St. Sebastian, because it is to me the most
unattractive picture in the room, with an interest chiefly antiquarian.
It has a beautiful background, remarkable as giving a picture of the
Colosseum, very much out of drawing, but in much more its present
condition than one would have imagined. The oddest thing about it
is that, to make it “group” better, Pinturicchio makes it appear to
be standing upon the Palatine, which he has introduced so as to
include the Church of St. Sebastian on the Palatine. The picture has a
beautiful background, and artists point out that Pinturicchio was more
careful than usual of the rules of composition.
The first picture you notice when you enter is the Susanna and the
Elders. This is a most beautiful picture. The figure of Susanna
is chaste, humble, graceful, shrinking; and behind the charming
fifteenth-century Renaissance fountain by which she stands is an
equally charming landscape. The monkey and the rabbit sitting up in
front give a little cynical touch. The group in the background on one
side represent Susanna pinioned, being led to execution; and, on the
other side, the Elders bound back to back being stoned. The landscape
is perfectly beautiful. The next picture to the Susanna is the famous
Santa Barbara escaping from the tower in which she had been imprisoned
by her father. Here again is one of Pinturicchio’s lovely backgrounds,
with a river running through it like the Thames below Richmond Hill.
The whole centre of the picture is occupied by a tower in the style of
the Venetian Renaissance. The treatment of the picture is allegorical.
There is a split in the tower to show how Barbara escaped; and though
she and her father are apparently only a yard or two apart, their
attitudes tell us that she has already escaped, and that he is going,
sword in hand, on the wrong track. The delightful young soldier in
front of the tower is likewise symbolic. The ordinary visitor does not
trouble about the symbolism: he is content that the fleeing figure
of Santa Barbara is one of exquisite beauty and grace, and full of
motion; and that the landscape behind, in which she appears again at
a distance, is so beautiful. The Visitation, in this room, is another
delightful fresco; the Virgin is one of his most beautiful figures, and
the background is incomparably lovely; for in it we have an ancient
Roman house, made up of loggias, and from the little terrace on the
top of one of them an old woman and a fair-haired girl are looking
down upon the scene. In the distance, throwing up the extraordinary
richness of the architecture, is one of those fair Umbrian backgrounds;
but after taking in all these distant beauties one harks back to the
grace and exquisite humility of the Virgin. There are few more gracious
pictures in existence. The child, in the corner behind Elisabeth and
the maidens, gives fresh proofs, which were not needed, of the absolute
lovableness of Pinturicchio at his best. This picture is considered
to be wholly his own work. The Temptation of St. Anthony, which comes
between this and the great picture, cannot be compared with this as a
whole; though the figures of the two hermits and the three beautiful
she-devils are all considered to be by Pinturicchio. Of these last
Ricci says: “But we believe that Pinturicchio is responsible for these
three--at all events for the design, if not for the execution--so
clearly are they creations of the master, alike in attitude, costume,
and arrangement of the hair. It is true that the technical details,
from the hook-like curves in the folds to the tone of the colours,
differ from his, and are more in the manner of Perugino. The three
demon-women have gentle and beautiful faces, with lips tight shut and
pouting as if to dart out kisses, dresses varied and vivid of colour
and rich in ornament, the delicate hands of fine ladies, stretched out
with grace, one holding a little box; but instead of feet they have
the talons of birds of prey; from their heads spring twisted horns;
from their shoulders green bats’ wings (the emblem of vice ever since
the time of Giotto). They come, fawning and alluring, taking counsel
together as to their mode of attack, while St. Anthony, turning his
back upon them, calmly talks of divine things with his companion.”
We now come to the great Disputa of St. Catherine, which is considered
Pinturicchio’s masterpiece. I do not propose to enter into the
controversy as to which figure is supposed to represent Prince Djem,
the brother of the Sultan Bajazet II., whom the Pope obligingly, and in
consideration of a large annual subscription, kept a sort of prisoner
in the Vatican, though I should like to believe that he is the superb
figure on the white horse, as striking as the figure of Aeneas Sylvius
on the white horse in the first of Pinturicchio’s frescoes in the
Library of Siena, and Benozzo Gozzoli’s figure of Lorenzo de’ Medici
in the Riccardi Chapel. Few ordinary visitors will be interested in
the argument whether the other Greeks and Turks are or are not derived
from Gentile Bellini’s studies: they will be satisfied with the
magnificent grouping of the picture; the gorgeous Renaissance arch,
adapted from the Arch of Constantine, which fills the centre, and the
very peaceful and soft outlines of the landscape. The colouring of
the picture is immeasurably rich; it is a regular feast of beauty.
In front of the Royal figure of the Emperor Maximian is the youthful
figure of Catherine, modest, but fortified with innocence, making the
points against the fifty philosophers on the fingers of her hands,
which have much-faded golden fetters linking them together. She is said
to represent the Pope’s daughter, the lovely Lucrezia Borgia, though
Lucrezia was very young at the time for a figure on the borderland of
girlhood and womanhood, which has hardly any superior in the whole of
Italian painting.
Over the door by which you enter this room from the third room, is the
Madonna with the Child, which is supposed to represent Giulia Farnese,
the mother of Alexander VI.’s youngest son. The attitudes of mother and
child have rather a Byzantine stiffness, but their faces, like those
of the cherubs round them, are sweet and gracious. The frame is of
the gilded papier-mâché, which so offended Vasari’s sense of fitness.
Ricci calls it one of the most lovely Madonnas which Pinturicchio ever
painted. With regard to the question of the identity, Ricci says: “Was
Vasari alluding to this Virgin when he said that Pinturicchio painted
Giulia Farnese over the door of a room, in the form of Our Lady? Some
are of that opinion. But in this case, where is ‘the head of Alexander
adoring her’? And if the Madonna really represents the fair friend
of the Pope, how easy it must have been for the painter to portray
a face which is one of the most usual types of Umbrian beauty, and
particularly characteristic of his own art.”
The _Sala dei Santi_ is a noble room: the designs of the canvas
screens, painted to cover its perished walls, and the fifteenth-century
intarsia work brought up from Sixtus IV.’s Library, harmonize well
with the superb frescoes and the gorgeous ceiling, from which they are
divided by a cornice of white marble, conventionalizing the Borgia
ox; which is supposed, like the other white marble work of these
apartments, to have come from the _atelier_ of Andrea Bregno.
No reproduction of the pictures in these apartments, unless they are
coloured like Ricci’s great work, can do them justice; for it is the
glow of the gold, and the rich red raiment, and the flowers on the
sward, and the sky, which constitute their chief marvel.
_Sala IV_
This room is known as the _Sala delle Arti Liberali_, or the _Sala
delle Arti e Scienze_, and I cannot say that it is as attractive
to me as the second and third rooms for its frescoes; though its
wall-decorations are remarkable, alike for their intrinsic beauty and
the large amount of the original decorations which are retained. But
the great old fifteenth-century mantelpiece which decorates them did
not originally belong to this room; it came from the Castle of Sant’
Angelo, and was executed by Simon Mosca, although it was designed by
the great Sansovino. This handsome room has rightly a palatial effect,
for it is here that the Cardinal Secretary of State used to receive
the ambassadors of the Princes twice a week. The left-hand corner of
the room farthest from the window is where the Cardinal sat, with his
visitors seated along the two walls of the angle.
Some of the old tiles of the floor are exhibited in the cabinet of
choice pottery in the right-hand corner; the blocked-up door in the
corner beside it is said to lead to the room in which Alexander VI.
died, and which is now occupied by the Noble Guard. The ceiling of
this room is not to be compared with that of the last in richness: its
decorations are conventional, but the frescoes contain some lovely
figures. Cut on the walls by some servant is “W. Paulus III. Pont.
Max. e W. Farnesia Proles.” V V is the Italian way of writing _Viva_
(Long life); and Ricci points out that the inscription must have been
cut by some member of the Conclave of October 1534, which elected
Paul III., the Farnese Pope. There is a rich stucco cornice. In this
room, more than any other, the critics engage in a battle royal as
to the authorship of the various frescoes. The reader will not thank
me for attempting to judge between them, nor have I the audacity
to attempt it. I shall only point out some of the features which I
have enjoyed in the various lunettes which derive their subjects
from the Trivium, _i.e._ Grammar, Rhetoric, and Dialectics; and the
Quadrivium--Astronomy, Arithmetic, Geometry, and Music, which were
the foundations of learning in the Middle Ages. The _Dialectics_ have
a very rich architectural background; notice the lovely figures,
especially on the left-hand side. _Geometry_ has exquisite figures on
her right hand of the kind which give Pinturicchio such a place in our
affections. And _Rhetoric_, which holds a sword in the right hand and
a glove in the left, has, as Ricci points out, the best and the most
delicate figure, by virtue both of the beauty of her face with its
opaline and roseate colours and the grandiose simplicity of her pose.
One can see Pinturicchio’s hand here. _Arithmetic_ is very youthful and
lovable; she has such a pathetic droop of the mouth that she looks like
a sorrowful child. Is this to typify that arithmetic is the science
which we take at the earliest age? She holds in her hand an elegant
Renaissance slate with figures, which is well worthy of imitation for
our own writing-tablets. She is surrounded by fine groups of figures,
though not so fine as Ghirlandajo would have made them; and is seated
on a remarkable throne with a sounding-board above it and a landscape
behind. The _Grammar_ is not so good as the others; it is supposed
to be by the same hand as the lunettes in the Hall of the Sibyls,
the sixth apartment. To me the other three lunettes are still more
striking. _Astronomy_, much attacked by the critics, will appear to the
ordinary visitor a very noble conception. She is enthroned on a little
hill, which might well be the outside of our globe; on either side of
which, situated against a bright landscape and sky, are tall pines
and cypresses. The youthful figures on each side are of remarkable
beauty, and like the figures of Raffaelle in the School of Athens. The
_Music_ is another delightful fresco. The figure of the harper on her
right must linger in the memory; it is so graceful and romantic. But
the background is not good. _Astrology_, the remaining lunette, has
charming and sumptuous figures.
_Sala V and Sala VI_
The fifth and sixth rooms are in the Torre Borgia, the tower built
by Alexander VI., doubtless as a refuge. Number V., which is
approached from Number IV. by a flight of about a dozen steps, was
used by Cardinal Merry del Val as his study, and, as I have said
above, is entirely redecorated with skilfully made canvas screens,
so that the original walls have not been interfered with in case a
fresh examination of their perished decorations should appear to be
desirable. These two rooms were not shown except by the Cardinal
himself to an occasional privileged visitor. On the floor are some
well-preserved specimens of the old Borgia tiles with the ox and the
raying crown. Here, too, the ceiling has conventional decorations as in
the second room. “In the tower room,” says Ricci, “Bernardino (_i.e._
Pinturicchio) is only seen as a directing influence.” In each lunette,
with its yellow border and many-coloured ornaments, is the half-length
figure of a Prophet or an Apostle.
According to a mediæval legend, the Creed was composed by the Apostles
before they separated to preach the Gospel throughout all the world,
each writing an article. So to each is attributed his own verse, which
is inscribed on broad, fluttering streamers. Ricci says that they were
painted by the same hand as the Grammar and the Sibyls.
Sala VI. has a richer ceiling. Two of the Sibyls have considerable
charm, but they are obviously not the work of Pinturicchio, and the
visitors are not likely to care for them.
In the story of the Torre Borgia above them is the famous bathroom of
Cardinal Bibiena, wrongly called, says Layard, “_Il Retiro del Giulio
II._” A former Pope is understood to have had it bricked up on account
of the amatory nature of its charming mythological compositions;
and though they are said to have been opened again under the more
liberal régime of the present Pontiff, certainly no visitor has been
permitted to see them; and it is said that not even have any of the
Cardinals seen them. But Kugler had evidently seen it, for he gives
this description of it: “This room was decorated in the antique
taste--the walls of a dark red ground, and with seven gracefully
designed compartments, each containing subjects alluding to the power
of Love. These were designed by Raffaelle and executed by his scholars.
The birth of Venus, Venus and Cupid on dolphins, and Cupid complaining
to Venus of his wound, are the most graceful. Beneath them, on a black
ground, are figures of Amorini, exemplifying the various devices and
varying progress of Love--one, in a shell, drawn by butterflies;
another in a shell drawn by tortoises; a third harnessing a pair of
snakes; a fourth drawn by snails, etc. On the ceiling are numerous
designs, most of them so injured as to be hardly visible. Cupid
wrestling with Pan, a charming conceit, is still seen. Repetitions of
these designs are found in a villa erected on the ruins of the Palace
of the Cæsars, known as the Villa Spada (also as the Villa called
Santini, Magnani, Mills, etc., according to its successive owners).”
There are paintings by Raffaelle in the Vatican yet more invisible,
for all trace of them has been lost. I refer to the famous Hours of
Raffaelle, of which garbled copies are sold on postcards. No tenable
theory has been advanced as to where they may be.
The Borgia Apartments of the Vatican, for so many years the library of
the Vatican printed books, are the chief rival of that other library
frescoed by Pinturicchio, the immortal Library of Siena.
The Borgia Rooms are among the brightest gems in the tiara of art
which encircles the Vatican, of which the Sculpture Gallery, with its
masterpieces of antiquity, the Sistine Chapel, with its frescoes by
Michel Angelo, and the rooms which contain the frescoes of Raffaelle
may claim to be the three crowns.
Certainly none of these latter made such a royal impression on my
senses, as I entered them, as the late official residence of the
Cardinal Secretary of State. It breathed the air of a presence. Only
five of us were admitted at a time, and we were frozen into court
manners by chilling servants, who did not take our wraps, but motioned
us to deposit them in a corner. Then we moved gently round, drinking in
the superb proportions of the room, examining its noble tapestries, the
elegant scholarship and manipulation of its ceiling; this was the _Sala
dei Pontefici_--the Hall of the Popes.
Amazing as was the _coup d’œil_ when I entered the second room
with its superb ceiling and frescoes, I still had only an adequate
conception of the full effect of the ceiling when I had been at one of
the Cardinal’s receptions, where the curtains are drawn and the whole
blaze of electric light is thrown upon the ceiling, bringing out every
facet of that jewel-like decoration.
Certainly the Borgia Rooms are the most Royal in the Vatican; they were
the fine flower of the Pagan Renaissance in Rome.
NOTE BY PROFESSOR TANI, THE PRINCIPAL ITALIAN AUTHORITY ON THE
ANTIQUITIES OF ROME.
_22nd November 1913._
Corrado Ricci, in the Italian edition of his _Pinturicchio_,
demonstrates that Antonio del Massaro da Viterbo, better known by the
name of Il Pastura, was the principal _collaborateur_ of Pinturicchio
in the frescoes of the Borgia Apartments, and the following are the
noteworthy parts of the frescoes due to Il Pastura (Il Pattura): “The
Descent of the Holy Ghost,” in the Hall of Mysteries; “The Assumption
of the Virgin” and the allegorical figures of Music and Rhetoric, in
the Hall of the Liberal Arts.
The armour of Julius II. and of the Bourbon have been removed to
other places in the Vatican, and neither is on view. No furniture
is left in the Borgia Apartments, but in the first room there is a
marble bust of Leo XIII., and in the second, a bronze gilt bust of
Pinturicchio.
CHAPTER XXIII
THE ETRUSCAN MUSEUM
The Etruscan Museum of the Vatican is not a forbidden land to which
access can only be had by influence; but as it is only open once or
twice a week, and is entered by an inconspicuous side-door at the top
of the stairs near the Sala della Biga, it is to most people a _terra
incognita_.
A vast pity this, for the Etruscan cities are to Rome what Pompeii is
to Naples. The Etruscans themselves lost their separate existence in
some unmarked century between the reigns of Romulus and Augustus; as
the Celts lost their separate existence in England at some unknown
period since the Norman Conquest: they melted into Latins, and the
Latins melted into Italians. But in the hills, where nothing quite
dies, the genius of the race lived long and flowered in the artists of
Umbria and Tuscany; not only must those who were born in Fiesole, like
Fra Angelico and the sculptor Mino, be accredited to Etruscan Fæsulæ,
but those who were born on the hills around, or in the City of the
Lilies in the Arno Valley below--immortal Florence. Michel Angelo was
an Etruscan, if ever there was one; his gloomy imagination, his love of
the immense, were essentially Etruscan. Etruscans would have revelled
in the Last Judgment. He was almost as fond of Sibyls and Prophets as
they were of genii and augurs. Long after Etruscan nationality was
dead we find the augur who bade Cæsar beware of the Ides of March
bearing the pure Etruscan name of Spurina; Perusia (Perugia), Arretium
(Arezzo), Cortona (always Cortona), and Volaterræ (Volterra), all
reflowered in art, especially the first; illuminated by the great names
of Perugino and his pupil Raffaelle, and Pinturicchio.
And if the Etruscan genius failed to reflower at places like Tarquinii
(Corneto), Caere (Cerveteri), and other cities in the Roman Maremma,
and the cities of Etruscan birth round Viterbo, it is because they were
cities of the plain exposed to the invasions of change.
It is the Etruscan Museum of the Vatican which corresponds more than
anything in Rome to the Pompeian Museum at Naples. And the numerous
Etruscan cities round Rome can be visited with very little more effort
than Pompeii.
There are few cities in southern Etruria which the railway service
does not permit you to visit in the day from Rome, and most of them
make delightful picnics. Veii is only a walk from La Storta Fornella
Station, twelve miles from Rome. Caere, which gives us our word
_ceremonies_, is about an hour’s drive from the Palo Station, between
Rome and Civita Vecchia. Tarquinii is less than an hour’s drive from
the Corneto Station, just beyond Civita Vecchia. Vulci is near the
next station, Montalto di Castro. Norchia and Bieda, though nearer
Vetralla, must, like Castel d’Asso, be visited from Viterbo; each is
within a drive. There are three Etruscan cemeteries within a walk of
Orvieto, but it is unnecessary to multiply examples. Norchia, Bieda,
and Castel d’Asso have their cliffs cut into temple-like tombs; and
Norchia has, unlike most of the cities, considerable Etruscan remains
other than tombs and city walls. Many of the cities in the Maremma have
fine Etruscan walls, some with gates; but the best Etruscan tombs are
at Tarquinii and Cerveteri, and it is to their subterranean tombs that
we have to go for an intimate acquaintance with the Etruscans. In Rome
there are other Etruscan Museums besides the Museo Gregoriano at the
Vatican--the Museo Kircheriano and the Museum of the Capitol both have
fine Etruscan pieces; and the Villa Papa Giulio is entirely devoted to
an Etruscan Museum. But the Museo Gregoriano is the best and the
most complete in Rome. And outside Rome there are splendid Etruscan
Museums at Florence, Corneto, Volterra, and Chiusi, the Volterra Museum
being an especially interesting one, for the light that its alabaster
sarcophagi throw upon the religion of the Etruscans. The Etruscans
seem to have been a far more serious people than the Romans and the
Greeks; their minds ran much on the lot that awaited the dead. Devils
and angels seem to have received from them the forms they have retained
through the subsequent stages of art. Death, with his hammer, is
frequently portrayed on the tombs of Volterra: the dead are often being
conducted by a black or red genius with wings and human limbs ending
in claws: sometimes he has an eagle beak. There are also good genii,
with wings; doubtless the originals of our angels, though the supreme
beauty of the Winged Victory of the Greeks eventually made it the
standard type of angel. The Etruscans had their Charon ferrying souls
across the river of death. One very curious feature of their sarcophagi
is that the presence of a horse or a cart shows the passage of a soul.
Hooded carts, almost exactly like the carriers’ carts that ply in
out-of-the-way parts of England, still appear in the funeral scenes.
[Illustration: Ancient bronze chariot in the Etruscan Museum.]
The Roman Museums are not so rich in Etruscan sarcophagi as those,
for example, of Corneto and Volterra; but they have sufficient to
show the essential peculiarity, that the tombs were bought ready-made
except their lids. The ready-made part seems to have been imported from
Greece, as London imports ready-made tombstones from Tuscany nowadays.
These are frequently of beautiful execution, and more often than not
represent scenes from Greek mythology or history. They are not, of
course, so interesting as the sarcophagi carved by native workmen from
the native designs, which deal mostly with Etruscan religious subjects,
such as the after life, or funeral ceremonies, and tell us much about
the customs of that dead mysterious race. The lids are, as a rule, of
very inferior workmanship: the head is sometimes almost as big as the
body; and they seldom have any sort of elegance. Nor do they look like
portraits, though they were executed as such; so many of them have the
same round, expressionless face and goggle eyes. There are, of course,
some splendid portrait effigies on Etruscan tombs, of life size,
as suggestive of portraiture as a photograph, minute in details of
costume; but they are rare. Nearly all are suggestive to us of levity,
for the dead Lucumo will either be petting his wife, or holding out a
wine-bowl, or sleeping off the drowsiness of a feast, with an air of
gorged content. The figures are nearly always reclining on their elbows
in the attitude in which the ancients reclined at their feasts; they
used couches, not chairs.
Etruscan sarcophagi are generally made of the brown volcanic stone
called Nenfro, or of alabaster, or of terra-cotta, the last two being
most frequent at Volterra and Toscanella respectively. There is a
laundry at Toscanella which has about twenty splendid terra-cotta
sarcophagi, with life-size figures, lying about its yard. This was the
famous garden of the Campanari, the excavators and dealers who supplied
most of the objects which are in the Etruscan Museum in the Vatican.
The Campanari are dead, and their heir did not take the trouble to
remove the sarcophagi before he let the property for its present homely
use. The gardens of Toscanella are full of Etruscan tombs, brought to
them as ornaments from the cemeteries outside.
But to return to the Gregorian Museum. One of its most interesting
exhibits is the model of an Etruscan tomb which contains three of the
stone couches characteristic of them; generally about eighteen inches
high, two or three feet wide, and six or seven feet long. Where a tomb
has not been disturbed, armour, jewels, even the soles of shoes, which
are made of wood with bronze casings, are found, lying just as they
have sunk when the body they contained mouldered away. Sometimes the
bones are left. All sorts of articles of domestic use are found either
on the couch or on the ground within reach of it, or suspended by nails
from the walls and roof, as we hang articles from a kitchen dresser.
There was a tomb belonging to Signor Mancini at Orvieto, which has been
left with everything lying and hanging just as it was found, as an
exhibit to make money out of tourists. Signor Mancini owned an Etruscan
cemetery, and whenever he made five hundred francs out of admissions,
or selling Etruscan curios, he excavated another tomb. He had turned
his curious little palace into a curio shop, though, like the best
ladies’ hat shops, there was nothing to reveal its business outside.
The Etruscans might have given the Early Victorian builder his idea for
pretentious imitations in stucco. One of the finest tombs at Cerveteri
has imitations of shields, and caps, and various utensils, on its
walls, which on examination proved to be stucco. This was, perhaps, the
_dernier cri_ at Cerveteri before the Etruscans left off being a nation.
The tombs of Norchia and Castel d’Asso have noble exteriors; their
façades are like Egyptian temples cut out of the cliff, but their
interiors are of minor interest and importance compared to those of
Cerveteri and Corneto, the former relying chiefly upon sculpture and
architectural ornaments, the latter upon painting. It is computed that
there yet remain more than a hundred thousand tombs of the city of the
Tarquins, the noble Etruscan family which gave kings to Rome. A vast
number of them remain undisturbed and unexplored. The tombs of Caere
and Tarquinii (Cerveteri and Corneto) are not easy to find unless they
have tumuli over them, for they are deep down in the earth, and the
stairways cut in the rock which lead down to them have long since been
filled with earth by the elements, if, indeed, they were not filled in
by their owners, like the tombs of Carthage. The Etruscans, like the
Romans, seem to have buried their dead outside their cities.
[Illustration: Etruscan Museum in the Vatican, showing the armour worn
by a Roman soldier, and Etruscan shields, mirrors, and cauldrons.]
The tombs of Cerveteri concern us here, because one of them, the
famous Regulini-Galassi tomb, yielded the golden treasures which are
the glory of the Gregorian Museum; they are, some of them, extremely
fine and among the most striking monuments of prehistoric Italy.
When I say prehistoric I do not mean that they antedate the history
of Rome, but that no history has survived about them. Except for the
absence of paintings, they are far more imposing than the tombs of
Corneto, both within and without. Above the soil many of them have
well-marked tumuli, here and there with their bases encased in low
walls. Underground they frequently have more than one chamber. Some
have columns and arches cut in the rock like the wonderful gallery of
tombs at Palazzolo Acreide in Sicily. Others have regular houses in
them, with rooms and door-holes, and window-holes cut in the rock. Some
have more than one story; some are surrounded by tiers or niches like a
theatre, on which fine sarcophagi are still standing to show the uses
to which they were put. One tomb contains beautiful sarcophagi; one
described above has its walls covered with stucco reliefs of the bronze
articles used to furnish earlier tombs. Some are like chapels in the
Catacombs. There is a marked likeness between the pagan rock tombs of
Sicily and the rock tombs of Etruria.
The painted tombs of Corneto give us the most interesting pictures
which have come down to us in Italy or Greece, for they are not only
mythological, but the best of them are taken up with the life of
the Etruscans. It is conjectured that the banqueting and dancing,
and horse races and athletic sports, all of them, formed part of
funeral ceremonies. If this is so, it increases the impression of the
Etruscan levity about death to which I alluded above. But there are
also fishing and hunting scenes, from one of which we know that the
Etruscans used birds in fishing as the Chinese use cormorants to-day.
Some of the most famous paintings in the Corneto tombs have fortunately
been reproduced on the walls of the Gregorian Museum; I say
fortunately, because they have begun to fade since they have been freed
from the soil.
At least twenty of the painted tombs of Corneto (Tarquinii) have
been cleared out; they have the stones which used to close them in
Biblical fashion replaced by a locked iron door, whose key is kept by
a Government _custode_: there are innumerable others which have not
been cleared out. It is only the earth which has been cleared out; the
scorpions and serpents remain. I counted thirty scorpions, looking
like black, baby land-lobsters, in one tomb; they were hibernating in
sight--serpents hibernate out of sight. But the _custode_ told us that
they always take refuge in the tombs from the heat of the summer days.
He described the tombs as being alive with them. Timid people can avoid
this by visiting the tombs in winter, which is really the best time, as
the grass is short; in the early summer it comes up past your knees,
thickly spangled with the most glorious wild flowers; and then, if it
rains, nothing can keep you dry.
When you go down into a Corneto tomb there are steps which lead you
twenty or thirty feet underground. The _custode_ unlocks the door and
lights an acetylene flare: it does not look so well in keeping with the
tombs as the torches or tapers, or Pompeian lamps, employed in other
tombs, but it is much more effective, for by its glare you can see
every inch of these long, low, oblong chambers in which you can barely
stand upright.
They are cut out of the rock with slightly concave ceilings, down the
centre of which a ridge in the shape of a beam is left. Only a few of
the Corneto tombs have any other attempt at architectural ornaments,
such as piers or arches. For the most part the walls are left perfectly
flat and covered with frescoes like Giotto’s chapels. The banqueting
scenes are the most interesting, for they have more of a concerted
picture about them; besides the warrior who reclines on a couch
caressing a beautiful woman, there may be various attendants, and all
the paraphernalia of a feast. The women have white flesh, the men red.
You are left in no doubt that women entered much more publicly into the
lives of the Etruscans than into the lives of the Greeks.
Here in the museum you see a sick man being waited upon, and
the ceremonies being paid to a corpse, with boxers, wrestlers,
horse-racers, and many men and women. But the splendid figures of gods
in the Grotto del Orco, the finest of all Etruscan frescoes, are not
reproduced. The best of these Etruscan pictures show the beauty of the
women as the Pompeian frescoes never succeed in doing.
There is one point at which the Etruscans fire the most commonplace
imagination--their working in gold: there is no jewellery so beautiful,
apart from the effects produced by costly gems, like diamonds,
emeralds, rubies, and pearls, as the typical Roman jewellery, which is
a direct imitation of the Etruscan. The stones it employs are usually
opaque stones of moderate value, like lapis-lazuli, malachite, and
coral; it relies for its effects on fine, bright gold with Etruscan
chasing, and encrusted ornamentation of roses, and so on, each made
separately, and delicately soldered on. Or it sometimes abandons stones
altogether, and reproduces, with exquisite art, natural objects like
rams’ heads, crawling snails, or oak leaves and acorns.
The golden objects in the centre case of the Gregorian Museum, like
many of the finest bronzes in the room, came from the Regulini-Galassi
tomb at Cerveteri, which Dennis, in his _Cities and Cemeteries of
Etruria_,[23] calls the remarkable Pelasgic tomb at Cerveteri. The most
striking object in the case is a large gold breastplate embossed with
twelve bands of figures--sphinxes, goats, flying horses, panthers,
deer, and winged demons; it suggests the sacred breastplate of Aaron,
the High Priest, described in the Bible, which was to be “four square,
measuring a span each way.” It is an exquisite piece of antique work
in beaten gold. Its low reliefs belong to the earlier Pelasgic, or
Tyrrhene style of Etruscan jewellery, which Signor Castellani would
not allow to be Etruscan, because it was also found at Palestrina,
Cumae, and elsewhere in Italy, and in Egypt, Assyria, Phœnicia, and
the Crimea. Dennis, in his immortal book on Etruria, says: “The
materials employed in this ‘Tyrrhene’ style are gold, silver, bronze,
amber, ivory, and variegated glass. The style is easily recognized
by its elegant form, the harmony of its parts, and the purity of its
design, but chiefly by the marvellous fineness and elaboration of its
workmanship. The patterns, which are always simple yet most elegant,
and admirably harmonious, are wrought by soldering together globules
or particles of gold, so minute as hardly to be perceptible to the
naked eye, and by the interweaving of extremely delicate threads of
gold; and are sometimes, but sparingly, interspersed with enamels. Tiny
figures of men, animals, or chimeras, exquisitely chased in relief or
in the round, form another and favourite feature in the ornamentation.
On a close inspection, this jewellery astonishes and confounds by its
wonderful elaboration; at a little distance it charms the eye by its
exquisite taste and the graceful character and harmony of its outlines.
In fact, it is the perfection of jewellery, far transcending all that
the most expert artists of subsequent ages have been able to produce.
“To this style belongs the most beautiful jewellery discovered in
Etruria, and elsewhere in Italy, such as the gold ornaments from the
Regulini-Galassi tomb, now in the Museo Gregoriano, and those, still
more beautiful, recently found at Palestrina, and now exhibited at the
Kircherian Museum at Rome.
“Signor Castellani points out that the Hindoo jewellery, even of the
present day, bears no slight resemblance to this ancient style. Though
inferior in execution, and betraying a decline of taste, the method of
soldering minute grains or fine threads of gold, mixed with enamels, to
the object, is precisely that employed by the Tyrrhenes of old.
“The genuine Etruscan jewellery, says Signor Castellani, is very
inferior both in taste and execution to that of the Tyrrhene style, of
which it is a corruption. There is the same sort of relation between
these styles that the works of the great painters of the _cinquecento_
bear to those of the following centuries. The mode of workmanship is
the same, yet the style is so degenerated that it may be pronounced
_barocco_. No longer are there the minute granulations, the delicate
thread work, the charming simplicity in form and design which mark the
earlier style. These are exchanged for forms of greater breadth and
fulness; the purity of the lines gives place to the artificial and
turgid, and the whole, though it makes a more striking appearance, has
far less elegance, harmony, and elaboration.
“Etruscan jewellery is of two descriptions, domestic and sepulchral:
the former most substantial and durable, the latter very light and
flimsy--witness the wreaths of gold leaves found encircling the
helmets of illustrious warriors. The amber, coloured glass, enamel,
and ivory used in the preceding style are rare in this, and give place
to gems--chiefly garnet, onyx, and cornelian. Among the ornaments for
personal use are ear-rings of various forms and dimensions, large
_fibulae_ and brooches, massive gold rings, lentoid or vase-shaped
_bullae_, agate _scarabæi_; but in all these productions an inflated
and artificial style, marking the decline of the art, is conspicuous.”
He mentions a curious fact, that the manufacture of this jewellery has
never ceased to go on in a little town of the Umbrian Marshes, called
S. Angelo in Vado. Its manufacture in Rome probably had not begun in
Dennis’s day; but now it is one of the chief minor industries of Rome,
and in the last year or two the manufacture of Etruscan tiaras of
golden oak leaves, or rose leaves, has, at any rate, spread to England
and America, and become quite a feature of the season’s fashions. In
this very treasure there is a remarkable head-dress composed of two
oval plates united by broad bands, richly embossed, and decorated with
minute _appliqué_ figures of birds and lions. There are also massive
gold chains, necklaces, bracelets, ear-rings, and _fibulae_, decorated
with extraordinarily delicate Tyrrhenian work; many rings, and a
portion of a gold veil or dress. Most of the _fibulae_ on brooches
are in the form of gliding snails. Rings with revolving scarabæi of
engraved cornelian were popular among the Etruscans. Marvellous is
the glitter of this treasure buried for two or three thousand years.
Here, too, are many silver cups, saucers, and bowls from the same
tomb; some of them are gilt inside, some are quite plain; others have
relief in _repoussé_ work of processions and hunting, pronounced
to be a Phœnician imitation of Egyptian work, but bearing Etruscan
inscriptions. From the same tomb came the bronze couch near the door,
doubtless used for a corpse; four tripods, each supporting a huge
caldron of bronze with dragon’s head handles; six large and four
smaller shields, embossed with reliefs; a huge incense burner, and
other objects.
I do not remember if any of the splendid mirrors preserved in the
museum were found in this tomb. Roughly speaking, they are almost
identical with the mirrors of silvered bronze used by the ancient
Greeks, Romans, and Carthaginians, and the modern Japanese. In other
words, they are like circular hand-glasses with a long handle at the
bottom. Some of them still retain traces of their silvering, but in
most cases the bronze is too much eaten away to show it. The backs
and edges are more important than the fronts. The edges are generally
embossed in some way, or surrounded with reliefs; the backs have either
an incised decoration of pictures cut in outline, like those of the
famous Præneste casket in the Kircherian Museum at Rome, or reliefs;
some, of course, are plain. In one instance in this museum the handle
consists of a nymph who is holding a smaller glass in her hand.
The mirror ornamented with a relief of Aurora carrying the body of her
son Memnon is interesting, because some take it to be the original of
the Pietà of the Virgin holding the Body of Our Lord.
But the crowning glory of Gregory XVI.’s museum for the real antiquary
lies in its matchless collection of Greek vases and bowls. The wealthy
Etruscans, especially those of Vulci, seem to have spent immense
sums on importing the finest products of the potteries of Athens and
Corinth. There are unique Corinthian pieces here, and many gems from
the potteries of the Ceramicus. I shall not attempt to catalogue
even the most famous of them: I will only say that for the study of
Greek painting one can find no more wonderful treasure-trove than the
vessels for water and wine of the Museo Gregoriano; while for the
study of forms of perfect grace created by the potter, the Cylices, or
drinking-cups, in this collection are absolutely matchless.
There are, of course, many vases of Etruscan manufacture, imitating the
Greek both in form and decoration, but singularly inferior in grace.
I must confess that I have never been able to properly appreciate
Greek vase-paintings. But of their importance what student could be
insensible? For, until the discovery of the hoards of terra-cotta
statuary at Tanagra and Myrina, vase-paintings and a few reliefs in
marble were all we had to go upon for our knowledge of Greek domestic
life. Painting is not like literature: in books the good writer
omits the obvious; in painting the good artist must introduce the
obvious or his picture is untrue. The artist has to present the whole
picture: the author often only mentions exceptions. The Greeks were
especially liable to ignore domestic details, because the men were so
undomesticated; they spent their entire day in public. They lived at
their gymnasium and dined at their club; they were almost as averse
as Arabs to talking about the women of their family. Except those of
the Homeric age, you might study all the Greek authors necessary for
public school and Oxford examinations without coming across a single
description of the plan or etiquette of a Greek home. Nor did the
vase-painters consciously portray the domestic life around them; but
they constantly represented the domestic life of their gods, and they
drew it from their own. I should have mentioned the cinerary urns,
some of which in bronze, a foot or two long and high, give faithful
representations of Etruscan temples and houses, especially interesting
because those who are familiar with Japan cannot fail to be struck
with the resemblance of the Etruscan temples to those Shinto temples,
which preserve the primitive type, while one urn in the form of an
Etruscan house found at Chiusi might stand for the representation of a
Japanese residence of to-day.
LIST OF POPES
* indicates Martyr
Date, Italian Name. Usually known as Place of Family Name.
A.D. Origin.
Died 67 *S. Peter[A] Bethsaida.
67-76 *S. Lino S. Linus Volterra.
76-88 *S. Cleto I. S. Cletus I. Rome.
88-97 *S. Clemente I. S. Clement I. Rome.
97-105 *S. Evaristo S. Evaristus Syria.
105-115 *S. Alessandro I. S. Alexander I. Rome.
115-125 *S. Sisto I. S. Sixtus I. Rome Of the Elvidian Gens.
125-136 *S. Telesforo S. Telesphorus Greece.
136-140 *S. Igino S. Hyginus Greece.
140-155 *S. Pio I. S. Pius I. Aquileia.
155-166 *S. Aniceto S. Anicetus Syria.
166-175 *S. Sotero S. Soter Campania.
175-189 *S. Eleuterio S. Eleutherius Epirus.
189-199 *S. Vittore I. S. Victor I. Africa.
199-217 *S. Zefirino S. Zephyrinus Rome.
217-222 *S. Calisto I. S. Calixtus I. Rome Of the Domitian Gens.
217-235 _Anti-Pope _S. Hippolytus_ _Rome._
Ippolito_
222-230 *S. Urbano I. S. Urban I. Rome.
230-235 *S. Ponziano S. Pontianus Rome Of the Calpurnian Gens.
235-236 *S. Antero S. Anteros Greece.
236-250 *S. Fabiano S. Fabian Rome.
251-253 *S. Cornelio S. Cornelius Rome.
251 _Anti-Pope _Novatian_ (_Anti-
Novanziano_ Pope to
Cornelio_).
253-254 *S. Lucio I. S. Lucius I. Rome.
254-257 *S. Stefano I. S. Stephen I. Rome Of the Julian Gens.
257-258 *S. Sisto II. S. Sixtus II. Athens.
259-268 *S. Dionisio S. Dionysius Tyre.
269-274 *S. Felice I. S. Felix I. Rome.
275-283 *S. Eutichiano S. Eutychianus Lucca.
283-296 *S. Caio S. Caius Dalmatia.
296-304 *S. Marcellino S. Marcellinus Rome.
308-309 *S. Marcello I. S. Marcellus I. Rome.
309-311 *S. Eusebio S. Eusebius Calabria.
311-314 S. Melciade S. Melchiades Africa.
314-335 S. Silvestro I. S. Sylvester I. Rome.
336 S. Marco S. Marcus Rome.
337-352 S. Giulio I. S. Julius I. Rome.
352-366 *Liberio Liberius Rome Savelli.
355-365 *_Anti-Pope S. _Felix II. Pope
Felice II._ during the exile
of Pope
Liberius._
366-384 S. Damas I. S. Damasus I. Spain.
366-367 _Anti-Pope Ursino._
384-399 S. Siricio S. Siricius. Rome.
399-401 S. Anastasio I. S. Anastasius I. Rome Massimi.
401-417 S. Innocenzo I. S. Innocent I. Albano.
417-418 S. Zosimo S. Zosimus Greece.
418-422 S. Bonifacio I. S. Boniface I. Rome.
418-419 _Anti-Pope Eulalio_ _Eulalius._
422-432 S. Celestino I. S. Celestine I. Campania.
432-440 S. Sisto III. S. Sixtus III. Rome.
440-461 S. Leone I. S. Leo the Great Tuscany.
461-468 S. Ilario S. Hilarius Sardinia.
468-483 S. Simplicio S. Simplicius Tivoli.
483-492 S. Felice III. S. Felix III. Rome Of the Anician Gens.
492-496 S. Gelasio I. S. Gelasius I. Africa.
496-498 S. Anastasio II. S. Anastasius II. Rome.
498-514 S. Simmaco S. Symmachus Sardinia.
498-505 _Anti-Pope Lorenzo_ _Laurence._
514-523 S. Ormisda S. Hormisdas Frosinone.
523-526 *S. Giovanni I. S. John I. Siena.
526-530 S. Felice IV. S. Felix IV. Benevento dei Fimbri.
530-532 Bonifacio II. Boniface II. Rome.
530 _Anti-Pope _Dioscorus._
Dioscoro_
532-535 Giovanni II. John II. Rome Dei Mercuri.
535-536 S. Agapito S. Agapetus Rome.
536-538 *S. Silverio S. Silverius Frosinone.
538-555 Vigilio Vigilius Rome.
555-561 Pelagio I. Pelagius I. Rome dei Vicariani.
561-573 Giovanni III. John III. Rome dei Catelini.
575-579 Benedetto I. Benedict I. Rome dei Bonosi.
579-590 Pelagio II. Pelagius II. Rome A Goth.
590-604 S. Gregorio I. S. Gregory I. (The Rome Of the Anician Gens.
Great).
604-606 Sabiniano Sabinianus Volterra.
607-607 Bonifacio III. Boniface III. Rome Dei Caladioci.
608-615 S. Bonifacio IV. S. Boniface IV. Valeria in the
Abruzzi.
615-618 S. Adeodato I. S. Adeodatus I. Rome.
619-625 Bonifacio V. Boniface V. Naples dei Fummini.
625-638 Onorio I. Honorius I. Campania.
640-640 Severino Severinus Rome.
640-642 Giovanni IV. John IV. Zara in
Dalmatia.
642-649 Teodoro I. Theodore I. Greece.
649-655 *S. Martino I.[B] S. Martin I. Todi.
655-657 S. Eugenio I. S. Eugenius I. Rome.
657-672 S. Vitaliano S. Vitalian Segni.
672-676 Adeodato II. Adeodatus II. Rome.
676-678 Dono I. Donus I. Rome.
678-681 S. Agatome S. Agatho Reggio
Calabria.
682-683 S. Leone II. S. Leo II. Sicily.
684-685 S. Benedetto II. S. Benedict II. Rome Savelli.
685-686 Giovanni V. John V. Antioch.
686-687 Conone Conon Thrace.
687. _Anti-Pope Teodoro Theodore or Peter._
or _Pietro._
687-692 _Anti-Pope _Paschal._
Pasquale_
687-701 S. Sergio I. S. Sergius I. Palermo.
701-705 Giovanni VI. John VI. Greece.
705-707 Giovanni VII. John VII. Rossano.
708-708 Sisinnio Sisinnius Syria.
708-715 Costantino Constantine Syria.
715-731 S. Gregorio II. S. Gregory II. Rome Savelli.
731-741 S. Gregorio III. S. Gregory III. Syria.
741-752 S. Zaccaria S. Zacharias S. Severino.
752-752 S. Stefano II. S. Stephen II. Rome.
752-757 Stefano III. Stephen III. Rome.
757-767 S. Paolo I. S. Paul I. Rome.
767-768 _Anti-Pope _Constantine II._
Costantino II._
768 _Anti-Pope _Philip._
Filippo._
768-772 Stefano IV. Stephen IV. Syracuse.
772-795 Adriano I. Hadrian I. Rome Colonna.
795-816 S. Leone III. S. Leo III. Rome.
816-817 S. Stefano V. S. Stephen V. Rome.
817-824 S. Pasquale I. S. Paschal I. Rome Massimi.
824-827 Eugenio II. Eugenius II. Rome.
827-827 Valentino Valentine Rome Leonzi.
828-844 Gregorio IV. Gregory IV. Rome.
844 _Anti-Pope _John._
Giovanni_
844-847 Sergio II. Sergius II. Rome.
847-855 S. Leone IV. S. Leo IV. Rome.
855 _Anti-Pope _Anastasius._
Anastasio_
856 _Anti-Pope Sergio _Sergius III._
III._
855-858 Benedetto III. Benedict III. Rome.
858-867 S. Niccolo I. S. Nicholas I. (The Rome.
Great).
867-872 Adriano II. Hadrian II. Rome.
872-882 Giovanni VIII. John VIII. Rome.
882-884 Marino I. Marinus I. Gallese.
884-885 S. Adriano III. S. Hadrian III. Rome.
885-891 Stefano VI. Stephen VI. Rome.
891-896 Formoso Formosus Corsica.
896-896 Bonifacio VI. Boniface VI. Rome.
896-897 Stefano VII. Stephen VII. Rome.
897-897 Romano Romanus Gallese.
898-898 Teodoro II. Theodore II. Rome.
898-900 Giovanni IX. John IX. Tivoli.
900-903 Benedetto IV. Benedict IV. Rome.
903-903 Leone V. Leo V. Ardea.
903 _Anti-Pope _Christopher_ _Rome._
Cristoforo_
904-911 Sergio III. Sergius III. Rome.
911-913 Anastasio III. Anastasius III. Rome.
913-914 Landone Lando Sabine.
914-928 Giovanni X. John X. Ravenna.
928-928 Leone VI. Leo VI. Rome.
929-931 Stefano VIII. Stephen VIII. Rome.
931-936 Giovanni XI. John XI. Rome dei Conti Toscolani.
936-939 Leone VII. Leo VII. Rome.
939-942 Stefano IX. Stephen IX. Rome.
942-946 Marino II. Marinus II. Rome.
946-955 Agapito II. Agapetus II. Rome.
955-964 Giovanni XII. John XII. Rome dei Conti Toscolani.
963-965 Leone VIII. Leo VIII. Rome.
964-966 Benedetto V. Benedict V. Rome.
966-972 Giovanni XIII. John XIII. Rome.
973-974 Benedetto VI. Benedict VI. Rome.
974-985 _Anti-Pope _Boniface VII._ _Rome._
Bonifacio VII._
974-983 Benedetto VII. Benedict VII. Rome dei Conti Toscolani.
983-984 Giovanni XIV. John XIV. Pavia.
985-996 Giovanni XV. John XV. Rome.
997-998 _Anti-Pope Giovanni _John XVI._ _Greek._
XVI._
996-999 Gregorio V. Gregory V. Germany Bruno.
999-1003 Silvestro II. Sylvester II. France dei Cesi.
1003-1003 Giovanni XVII. John XVII. Rome Secco.
1004-1009 Giovanni XVIII. John XVIII. Rome.
1009-1012 Sergio IV. Sergius IV. Rome.
1012-1024 Benedetto VIII. Benedict VIII. Rome dei Conti Toscolani.
1012 _Anti-Pope _Gregory._
Gregorio_
1024-1032 Giovanni XIX. John XIX. Rome dei Conti Toscolani.
1032-1044 Benedetto IX. Benedict IX. Rome dei Conti Toscolani.
1045-1045 Silvestro III. Sylvester III.
[Now counted as the 147th Pope for part of the year 1045; between two
Papacies of Benedict IX., who abdicated in 1044 and reigned
again for a short time in 1045, and in 1047-1048.]
1045-1046 Gregorio VI. Gregory VI. Rome Graziani.
1046-1047 Clemente II. Clement II. Saxon (Suidger) dei Signor dii
Moresleve ed
Horneburg.
1048-1048 Damaso II. Damasus II. Bavaria (Boppo) dei Curagnari.
1049-1054 S. Leone IX. S. Leo IX. Germany (Bruno) dei Conti di
Eggesheim- Dagsbourg.
1055-1057 Vittorio II. Victor II. Swabia (Gebhard) dei Conti di
Dollenstein-
Hirschberg.
1057-1058 Stefano X. Stephen X. Germany dei Duchi di Lorena.
1058-1059 _Anti-Pope _Benedict X._ _Rome_ _dei Conti Toscolani._
Benedetto X._
1059-1061 Niccolò II. Nicholas II. France (Gerhard).
1061-1073 Alessandro II. Alexander II. Milan.
1061-1072 _Anti-Pope Onorio _Honorius II._
II._
1073-1085 S. Gregorio VII. S. Gregory VII. Sovana (Hildebrand)
Aldobrandeschi.
1080-1100 _Anti-Pope Clemente _Clement III._
III._
1087-1087 B. Vittore III. B. Victor III. Benevento Epifani.
1088-1099 B. Urbano II. B. Urban II. Rheims Of the Sieurs de
Chatillon.
1099-1118 Pasquale II. Paschal II. Bieda Ranieri.
1100 _Anti-Pope _Theodoric._
Teodorico_
1102 _Anti-Pope Alberto_ _Albert._
1105-1111 _Anti-Pope _Sylvester IV._
Silvestro IV._
1118-1119 Gelasio II. Gelasius II. Gaeta Caetani.
1118-1121 _Anti-Pope Gregorio _Gregory VIII._
VIII._
1119-1124 Calisto II. Calixtus II. Burgundy Of the Counts of
Burgundy.
1124-1130 Onorio II. Honorius II. Fagnano.
1124 _Anti-Pope _Celestine II._
Celestino II._
1124 _Anti-Pope _Theobald._
Teobaldo_
1130-1143 Innocenzo II. Innocent II. Rome Papareschi.
1130-1138 _Anti-Pope _Anacletus II._
Anacleto_
1138 _Anti-Pope Vittore _Victor IV._
IV._
1143-1144 Celestino II. Celestine II. Citta di (Guido).
Castello
1144-1145 Lucio II. Lucius II. Bologna Caccianemici del Orso.
1145-1153 B. Eugenio III. B. Eugenius III. Monte Magno Pagnanelli.
(Pisa)
1153-1154 Anastasio IV. Anastasius IV. Rome della Suburra.
1154-1159 Adriano IV. Hadrian IV. England Breakspear.
1159-1181 Alessandro III. Alexander III. Siena Bandinelli.
1159-1164 _Anti-Pope Vittore _Victor IV._
IV._
1164-1168 _Anti-Pope Pasquale _Paschal III._
III._
1168-1178 _Anti-Pope Calisto _Calixtus III._
III._
1179-1180 _Anti-Pope _Innocent III._
Innocenzo III._
1181-1185 Lucio III. Lucius III. Lucca Allucingoli.
1185-1187 Urbano III. Urban III. Milan Crivelli.
1187-1187 Gregorio VIII. Gregory VIII. Benevento de Morra.
1187-1191 Clemente III. Clement III. Rome Scolari.
1191-1198 Celestino III. Celestine III. Rome Bobone.
1198-1216 Innocenzo III. Innocent III. Anagni dei Conti di Segni.
1216-1227 Onorio III. Honorius III. Rome Savelli.
1227-1241 Gregorio IX. Gregory IX. Anagni dei Conti di Segni.
1241-1241 Celestino IV. Celestine IV. Milan Castiglioni.
1243-1254 Innocenzo IV. Innocent IV. Genoa Fieschi.
1254-1261 Alessandro IV. Alexander IV. Anagni dei Conti di Segni.
1261-1264 Urbano IV. Urban IV. Troyes Pantaleon.
1265-1268 Clemente IV. Clement IV. France Le Gros.
1271-1276 B. Gregorio X. B. Gregory X. Piacenza Visconti.
1276-1276 B. Innocenzo V. B. Innocent V. Savoy de Tarentasia.
1276-1276 Adriano V. Hadrian V. Genoa Fieschi.
1276-1277 Giovanni XXI. John XXI. Lisbon Giuliano.
1277-1280 Niccolò III. Nicholas III. Rome Orsini.
1281-1285 Martino IV. Martin IV. France Mompitiè de Brie.
1285-1287 Onorio IV. Honorius IV. Rome Savelli.
1288-1292 Niccolò IV. Nicholas IV. Ascoli Masci.
1294 [C]S. Celestino V. S. Celestine V. Isernia Angeleri dal Murrone.
1294-1303 Bonifacio VIII. Boniface VIII. Anagni Caetani.
1303-1304 B. Benedetto XI. B. Benedict XI. Treviso Boccasini.
THE SEVEN POPES AT AVIGNON.
1305-1314 [D]Clemente V. Clement V. France de Goth.
1316-1334 Giovanni XXII. John XXII. France d’Euse.
1328-1330 _Anti-Pope Niccolò _Nicholas V._
V._
1334-1342 Benedetto XII. Benedict XII. France Fournier.
1342-1352 Clemente VI. Clement VI. France Roger.
1352-1362 Innocenzo VI. Innocent VI. France Aubert.
1362-1370 B. Urbano V. B. Urban V. France Grimoard.
1370-1378 [E]Gregorio XI. Gregory XI. France Roger.
1378-1389 Urbano VI. Urban VI. Naples Bartoloméo Prignano.
1389-1404 Bonifacio IX. Boniface IX. Naples Pietro Tomacelli.
1404-1406 Innocenzo VII. Innocent VII. Sulmona dei Migliorati.
1406-1409 [F]Gregorio XII. Gregory XII. Venice Angelo Correr.
THE ANTI-POPES OF AVIGNON.
1378-1394 _Clemente VII._ _Clement VII._ _dei Conti di Savoia._
1394-1423 _Benedetto XIII._ _Benedict XIII._ _Aragon_
1423-1429 _Clemente VIII._ _Clement VIII._ _Spain_ _Muñoz._
1425-1430 _Benedetto XIV._ _Benedict XIV._ _Garner._
THE ANTI-POPES OF PISA.
1409-1410 _Alessandro V._ _Alexander V._ _Crete_ _Pietro Filargo._
1410-1415 [G]_Giovanni _John XXIII._ _Naples_ _Baldassare Gossa._
XXIII._
1417-1431 Martino V. Martin V. Rome Oddo Colonna.
1431-1447 Eugenio IV. Eugenius IV. Venice Gabriele Condulmer.
1439-1449 _Anti-Pope Felice _Felix V._
V._
[Abdicated 1449; died 1451. Was Amadeus, Duke of Savoy. He was the last
Anti-Pope, and with him the Great Schism ended.]
1447-1455 Niccolò V. Nicholas V. Sarzana Tommaso Parentucelli.
1455-1458 Calisto III. Calixtus III. Spain Alfonso Borgia.
(Valencia)
1458-1464 Pio II. Pius II. Siena Æneas Sylvius
Piccolomini.
1464-1471 Paolo II. Paul II. Venice Pietro Barbo.
1471-1484 Sisto IV. Sixtus IV. Savona Francesco della Rovere.
1484-1492 Innocenzo VIII. Innocent VIII. Genoa Cibò.
1492-1503 Allessandro VI. Alexander VI. Spain Rodrigo Lenzoli Borgia.
(Valencia)
1503-1503 Pio III. Pius III. Siena Todeschini-Piccolomini.
1503-1513 Giulio II. Julius II. Savona Giuliano della Rovere.
1513-1521 Leone X. Leo X. Florence Giovanni de’ Medici.
1522-1523 Adriano VI. Hadrian VI. Utrecht Adriano (Florent)
Dedel.
1523-1534 Clemente VII. Clement VII. Florence Giulio de’ Medici.
1534-1549 Paolo III. Paul III. Rome Allessandro Farnese.
1550-1555 Giulio III. Julius III. Rome Ciocchi del Monte.
1555-1555 Marcello II. Marcellus II. Montepulciano Marcello Cervini.
1555-1559 Paolo IV. Paul IV. Naples Giovanni Pietro
Caraffa.
1559-1565 Pio IV. Pius IV. Milan Giovanni Angelo de’
Medici.
1566-1572 S. Pio V. S. Pius V. Bosco (in Michele Ghislieri.
Piedmont)
1572-1585 [H]Gregorio XIII. Gregory XIII. Bologna Ugo Boncompagni.
1585-1590 Sisto V. Sixtus V. Grottamare (in Felice Peretti.
the March of
Ancona)
1590-1590 Urbano VII. Urban VII. Rome Giambattista Castagna.
1590-1591 Gregorio XIV. Gregory XIV. Cremona Niccolò Sfondrati.
1591-1591 Innocenzo IX. Innocent IX. Bologna Gianantonio
Facchinetti.
1592-1605 Clemente VIII. Clement VIII. Florence Ippolito Aldobrandini.
1605-1605 Leone XI. Leo XI. Florence Allessandro de’ Medici.
1605-1621 Paolo V. Paul V. Rome Camillo Borghese.
1621-1623 Gregorio XV. Gregory XV. Bologna Allessandro Ludovisi.
1623-1644 Urbano VIII. Urban VIII. Florence Maffeo Barberini.
1644-1655 Innocenzo X. Innocent X. Rome Giambattista Pamfili.
1655-1667 Allessandro VII. Alexander VII. Siena Fabio Chigi.
1667-1669 Clemente IX. Clement IX. Pistoja Giulio Rospigliosi.
1670-1676 Clemente X. Clement X. Rome Emilio Altieri.
1676-1689 Innocenzo XI. Innocent XI. Como Benedetto Odescalchi.
1689-1691 Allessandro VIII. Alexander VIII. Venice Pietro Ottoboni.
1691-1700 Innocenzo XII. Innocent XII. Naples Antonio Pignatelli.
1700-1721 Clemente XI. Clement XI. Urbino Giovanni Francesco
Albani.
1721-1724 Innocenzo XIII. Innocent XIII. Rome Michel Angelo Conti.
1724-1730 Benedetto XIII. Benedict XIII. Rome Vincenzo Maria Orsini.
1730-1740 Clemente XII. Clement XII. Florence Lorenzo Corsini.
1740-1758 Benedetto XIV. Benedict XIV. Bologna Prospero Lambertini.
1758-1769 Clemente XIII. Clement XIII. Venice Carlo Rezzonico.
1769-1774 Clemente XIV. Clement XIV. S. Angelo in Lorenzo Francesco
Vado Ganganelli.
1775-1799 Pio VI. Pius VI. Cesena Angelo Braschi.
1800-1823 Pio VII. Pius VII. Cesena Chiaramonti.
1823-1829 Leone XII. Leo XII. Spoleto della Genga.
1829-1830 Pio VIII. Pius VIII. Cingoli Castiglione.
1831-1846 Gregorio XVI. Gregory XVI. Belluno Capellari.
1846-1878 Pio IX. Pius IX. Senigalia Giovanni Mastai-
Ferretti.
1878-1903 Leone XIII. Leo XIII. Carpineto (near Gioacchino Pecci.
Anagni).
1903- Pio X. Pius X. Riese (near Giuseppe Sarto.
Asolo)
NOTES TO LIST OF POPES:
A In the register of the patriarchal basilica of St. Paul’s Without
the Walls we find: “St. Peter of Bethsaida in Galilee, Chief of the
Apostles; who received from Jesus Christ the Supreme Pontifical Power,
to transmit it to his successors, resided first in Antioch, then at
Rome, where he met with his martyrdom on the 29th of June, in the year
67 of our era.”
B Martyr in the Crimea.
C Abdicated, d. 1296.
D Took the Papacy to Avignon.
E Took the Papacy back to Rome.
F Deposed 1409; abdicated 1415; d. 1417
G Deposed 1415; d. 1419.
H Gave the world the Gregorian Calendar.
FOOTNOTES TO MAIN TEXT:
[1] Called by scholars now, The Baths of Titus.
[2] This is the large rectangle which fills up almost the entire plan
from (60) to (81).
[3] See illustration facing page 84.
[4] In the last year of the thirteenth century Giotto painted for
Cardinal Stefaneschi a panel of the Crucifixion of St. Peter, which is
now preserved in the Sacristy of St. Peter’s, and reproduced in this
book on the opposite page. On it the Apostle is represented as being
crucified midway between the Meta Romuli and the tomb of Caius Cestius
(Meta Remi).
[5] Since writing these words the impossible has happened--an
anarchist, for no imaginable reason, threw a bomb at the venerable
and godly Pope who now occupies St. Peter’s Throne, while he was
celebrating at the Papal Altar.
[6] Information about these lectures can be obtained at Miss Wilson’s
English Library, 22 Piazza di Spagna, Rome.
[7] This is still in working order under the Court of the Vatican,
which bears his name. The Pope-Saint used it to supply his Baptistery.
[8] In the time of Pope Marinus II., 942-946, a treasure of Peter’s
Pence--830 silver Anglo-Saxon pennies of Alfred, Edward the Elder,
Athelstan, Edmund Ironsides, etc.--was buried in the Atrium Vestæ,
doubtless then a portion of the Palatine, which was occupied
occasionally by the Popes for another six hundred years after that
time. This treasure was dug up in 1883, and some of the actual coins
are still to be purchased at Rome.
[9] “Honorius covered the middle door of entrance with plates of
silver, 975 pounds in weight. This door was called the _Janua regia
major_ or _mediana_, and from henceforward, also, on account of its
adornment, _argentea_. An ancient inscription in verse, stating that
Honorius had put an end to the Istrian schism, was fastened to it,
whence it follows that the work would not have been executed until
after the year 630. The inscription simply speaks of the Pope as Duke
of the people, _Dux Plebis_. The silver covering of the door may
probably have been adorned with chased workmanship, since we can hardly
suppose it to have been a plating of simple metal” (Gregorovius).
[10] It is difficult not to execrate the memory of Alberti. In
technical knowledge of his profession he was a great architect: he
showed both restraint and originality in the style which he evolved
from a study of classical monuments, but like too many other Italians,
he was ready to sacrifice the most precious monuments of antiquity to
provide a platform upon which he could strut. He wanted Old St. Peter’s
to be destroyed, so that he might have the building of the New St.
Peter’s. “Here in 1457,” says Gregorovius, “Alberti showed him his book
on architecture, the first of the kind since Vitruvius, and his views
on art, hostile as they were to Gothic architecture and Mediævalism,
inaugurated a new age in architecture, which began with Nicholas V.”
[11] Gregorovius must have confused the sarcophagus with another, for
in his _The Tombs of the Popes_ he says: “In the crypt of the Vatican,
upon the lid of an ancient marble coffin, tasteless and defaced by age,
we may still trace the features of the celebrated Boniface VIII. of
Anagni,” but lower down he says (_Tombs of the Popes_, Seton Watson’s
Translation): “He was interred in a chapel which he had himself
designed and adorned with mosaics, and a handsome tomb was erected to
him there. When this chapel was destroyed owing to the building of the
new basilica, by a strange stroke of fate, his corpse, still in good
preservation, was discovered on the 302nd anniversary of his death. The
dead Pope was clothed in pallium and planeta, and wore white gloves
embroidered with pearls, and a small white mitre of woollen material;
a sapphire upon his finger was not worth thirty scudi. Boniface
VIII. must have been unusually tall, for his body measured seven and
three-quarters palms; according to the opinion of the doctors he was
bald and beardless. His coffin stands to this day in the crypt of the
Vatican, and above it he himself is represented in the attitude of
death. The head is handsome, severe, and noble in its outlines; it
agrees thoroughly with his portrait from the hand of Giotto, which
also shows a beardless face, finely ovalled. The head is covered with
a long mitre shaped like a sugar-loaf, on which two crowns are to be
observed. For this arrogant priest was the first to assume a double
crown, all previous Popes having borne only a single-crowned mitre.
Afterwards Urban V. added yet a third crown, thus producing the famous
triple tiara.” But Silvagni (_La Corte e la Società Romana nei XVIII.
e XIX. secoli_), and others, attribute the third crown to the haughty
Frenchman, Benedict XII., 1334-1342.
[12] The Latin form of the name of the House of Colonna.
[13] Hare says five thousand. “The Public Library was begun by Nicholas
V., who collected five thousand MSS., the largest collection which
had existed up to that time since the dispersion of the library at
Alexandria. This Pope offered a reward of five thousand ducats to
anyone who would bring him the Gospel of St. Matthew in the original
tongue. And in his last moments, characteristically thanked God for
having given him a taste for letters, and the faculties necessary for
cultivating it with success.”
[14] “Melozzo’s fresco was transferred to canvas early in the last
century. Up to that time it had remained in its original place in
the Latin Hall of Sixtus IV.’s Vatican Library (now the Floreria)”
(Klaczko’s _Rome and the Renaissance_).
[15] A palimpsest is a parchment which has had its first writing
scraped off it, so that it can be used again. Murray says that this is
the oldest Latin manuscript in existence.
[16] Certaldo is a beautiful and interesting old town in Tuscany, where
Boccaccio lived; it forms the subject (with S. Gimignano) of one of the
monographs in Corrado Ricci’s Italia Artistica Series.
[17] Now converted into the Vatican Picture Gallery.
[18] But a note of Prof. Lanciani, inferior to no one as an authority
upon Rome, in his recently published work, _The Golden Days of the
Renaissance in Rome_, entirely dispels this picture:--
“A MS. volume in Prince Chigi’s library, marked H. ii. 22, containing
notes on the reconstruction of St. Peter’s, collected by order of Pope
Alexander VII., shows the following entry under the date, June 15,
1515: ‘The Reverenda Fabbrica di San Pietro to pay 300 ducats by order
of Bernardo Bibbiena, Cardinal of Santa Maria in Portico, to Raffaele
da Urbino, on account of the Cartoons for the Tapestries, which are to
be forwarded to Flanders.’ Another sum of 134 ducats is registered on
December 20, 1516, to the same purpose. The drawing of the cartoons
must have required at least nineteen months of work, and yet the artist
received only 434 ducats in remuneration. As regards the tapestries
themselves, Vasari and Baldinucci pretend to establish their cost at
seventy thousand scudi; the author of the _Vita di Raffaele_ at sixty;
Cardinal Pallavicino at fifty: all quite wide of the truth, because
Paride de’ Grassi, the Pope’s diarist, on the first day they were
exhibited in the Sistine Chapel, entered their cost at two thousand
scudi each.”
[19] “Now they built the Vatican for their habitation, and speedily
launched out into all the magnificence of the most magnificent earthly
court. Their temporal territory was very small, it is true; but in
the palmy days of the Middle Ages they held undisputed spiritual sway
over the whole of Europe; they drew their enormous revenues from every
Christian land under the sun, and they made Kings to tremble beneath
their frown, and nations to quake under their excommunication. Thus it
came to pass that the Pontifical tiara was surrounded by a royal crown
sparkling with the most precious gems, to which Boniface the Superb
(1294-1303) added a second, and the haughty Frenchman, Benedict XII.
(1334-1342), a third, until the triple mitre, or ‘_Triregno_,’ became
the symbol of the greatest power the world has ever seen” (Silvagni,
_La Corte e la Società Romana nei XVIII. e XIX. secoli_; translated by
Frances Maclaughlin).
[20] There are others of these Melozzos at Loreto.
[21] Silvagni gives a different account of the tiara. See footnote 19
above.
[22] “The first illumination is by means of paper lanterns, distributed
everywhere along the architectural lines of the church, from the steps
beneath its portico to the cross above its dome. These are lighted
before sunset, and against the blaze of the western light are for some
time completely invisible; but as twilight thickens, and the shadows
deepen, and a grey pearly veil is drawn over the sky, the distant
basilica begins to show against it with a dull furnace-glow, as of a
wondrous coal fanned by a constant wind, looking not so much lighted
from without as reddening from an interior fire. Slowly this splendour
grows, and the mighty building at last stands outlined against the
dying twilight as if etched there with a fiery burin. As the sky
darkens into intense blue behind it, the material part of the basilica
seems to vanish, until nothing is left to the eye but a wondrous,
magical, visionary structure of fire. This is the silver illumination:
watch it well, for it does not last long. At the first hour of night,
when the bells sound all over Rome, a sudden change takes place.
From the lofty cross a burst of flame is seen, and instantly a flash
of light whirls over the dome and drum, climbs the smaller cupolas,
descends like a rain of fire down the façade, and before the great
bell of St. Peter’s has ceased to toll twelve peals, the golden
illumination has succeeded to the silver. For my own part, I prefer
the first illumination; it is more delicate, airy, and refined, though
the second is more brilliant and dazzling. One is like the Bride of
the Church, the other like the Empress of the World. In the second
lighting, the Church becomes more material; the flames are like jewels,
and the dome seems a gigantic triple crown of St. Peter’s. One effect,
however, is very striking. The outline of fire, which before was firm
and motionless, now wavers and shakes as if it would pass away, as the
wind blows the flame back and forth from the great cup by which it is
lighted. From near and far the world looks on--from the Piazza beneath,
where carriages drive to and fro in its splendour, and the band plays
and the bells toll--from the windows and _loggias_ of the city,
wherever a view can be caught of this superb spectacle--and from the
Campagna and mountain towns, where far away, alone and towering above
everything, the dome is seen to blaze. Everywhere are ejaculations
of delight, and thousands of groups are playing the game of ‘What is
it like?’ One says, it is like a hive covered by a swarm of burning
bees; others, that it is the enchanted palace in the gardens of Gul
in the depths of the Arabian Nights--like a gigantic tiara set with
wonderful diamonds, larger than those which Sinbad found in the roc’s
valley--like the palace of the fairies in the dreams of childhood--like
the stately pleasure-dome of Kubla Khan in Xanadu--and twenty other
whimsical things. At nearly midnight, ere we go to bed, we take a last
look at it. It is a ruin, like the Colosseum--great gaps of darkness
are there, with broken rows of splendour. The lights are gone on one
side of the dome--they struggle fitfully here and there down the other
and over the façade--fading even as we look” (from Story’s _Roba di
Roma_, 6th edition, Chapman & Hall, 1871).
[23] Published by John Murray, 2 vols.
INDEX
Ablutions, 107.
Abraham, sacrifice of, 150.
“_Acqua alle Funi!_”, 74.
Acqua Paola Fountain, 287.
Acts of the Apostles, 229.
Acts of the Church, 94.
Adam and Eve and the Serpent in Paradise, 155.
“Ad Caput Beati Petri,” 145.
Adolphus, Gustavus, library of, 180, 218.
Adoration of the Magi, The (fresco), not the work of Pinturicchio,
367, 370.
Ælian Bridge, 86, 101.
Agrippa, Lake of, in the Campus Martius, 292.
Agrippina, 47, 49.
Alagna (Anagni), 168.
Alatri, Bishop of, 316.
Alba Longa, 281.
Alban Lake, 281.
Albani Giovanni Francesco (Pope Clement XI.), 78.
Albani, Prince, 300.
S. Albano, 173.
Alberti, Leon Battista, Florentine architect, 115, 141, 199, 212;
his book on Florentine architecture, 115;
why he wished Nicholas V. to destroy Old St. Peter’s, 115.
Albigenses, 135.
Alcuin, 119.
Aldobrandini, Cardinal Cinzio, 238;
garden of the Villa, 279, 282;
Ippolito (Pope Clement VIII.), 75.
Alexander, Czar, 226.
Alexander the Great, 239.
Alexander III., 106, 166, 318.
Alexander VI. (Rodrigo Borgia), 7, 16, 51, 61, 92, 134, 173, 175,
182, 269, 279, 354, 367, 377;
death of, 357;
letter to Pinturicchio, 355;
portrait by Pinturicchio, 173, 360, 363;
room in which he died, 379;
portraits of his sons Giovanni, Cesare, and Jofre in the Sala dei
Misteri, 368.
Alexander VII. (Chigi), 20, 77, 100, 126, 129, 218, 269, 309;
patron of Bernini, 77;
monument to contain St. Peter’s Chair, 126.
Alexander VIII. (Pietro Ottoboni), 78, 219, 248.
Alexandrine art, 240.
Alexandrine collection, 36, 224.
Alfred the Great of England, 103, 109;
the effect of Rome on his child’s mind, 104;
in Rome twice, 103.
Algardi, 20.
Alla Veneziana, 255.
Alma Roma, 182.
Aloes, 290.
Altar of Clement VIII. in the Chapel of St. Peter’s Tomb in the
Crypt, 132.
Altar front for Papal functions, 334.
Altemps, Prince, 300.
Altieri, Emilio (Pope Clement X.), 78.
Ambassadors to the Holy See, 11, 35, 318;
Spanish, 50.
S. Ambrogio at Milan, Paliotto of, 109.
Ambrosian Library of Milan, 271.
Amianto, 223.
Anacletus, Pope, 54, 140.
Anagni, Cathedral of, 168.
Anagni, Grand Old Man of, 168.
Ancona, 172.
S. Andrea delle Valle, 193.
S. Andrew, head of, 121, 183, 193;
preserved in one of the piers of the dome, 183;
its reception when brought to Rome, 183;
a new protector to Rome, 183.
Anemones, 3, 293.
Angelico, Fra, 6, 17, 31, 59, 199, 207, 210, 386;
his masterpiece, 210;
his tomb in S. Maria sopra Minerva, 211;
Michel Angelo, Mino da Fiesole, all from Etruscan cities, 386.
Angelo, Michel, 7, 34, 60, 65, 71, 229, 292, 315, 319, 320, 330, 331,
349, 384, 387;
conversion of St. Paul by, 320;
crucifixion of St. Peter, 320;
Etruscans would have revelled in his Last Judgment, 387;
Etruscan in his gloomy imagination, 387;
Etruscan in his love of the immense, 387;
as fond of Sibyls and Prophets as the Etruscans of genii and
augurs, 387;
Last Judgment of, 34, 65, 229, 331, 387;
says he is too old to fresco, 321.
Angelo, Sant’, castle of (_see_ SANT’ ANGELO).
S. Angelo in Vado, 401.
Anguillara, Prince, 300.
Anicii the first senatorial family to embrace Christianity, 100, 125;
sarcophagus of, 100, 125.
Anicius Probus, four times Prefect of Rome, 100, 125.
“Annunciation” of the Borgia Rooms, The, 27, 367, 369.
St. Anthony, temptation of, 374.
Anticamera d’Onore, 23;
of the Pope, 23;
Segreta, 23.
Antinous, 41.
Antonelli, Cardinal, 225.
Antoniano, Cardinal, 89, 148.
_Antonina_, novel of Rome, by Wilkie Collins, xv.
Apollo Belvedere, 8, 41, 65.
Apollo Sauroctonus, 41.
Apollo, temple of, 51, 95.
Apostle, body of the, 141.
Apostle of Learning (Nicholas V.), ix.
Apostles, miniatures of the, 229.
Apostles’ Creed, legend of the, painted in the Borgia Rooms, 382.
Apostles, Prince of the, 183;
statue of, 137.
Apostle’s tomb, 143, 144, 148;
objects blessed by touching the, 146.
SS. XII. Apostoli, 128, 340;
piazza of, 217.
Apostolic simplicity, 12.
Appartamenti Borgia. _See_ BORGIA APARTMENTS.
Aquila, Fontana dell’, 287.
Aquileia, Patriarch of, 162.
Aquinas, S. Thomas, 230, 265, 316;
“Angelic Doctor,” 265;
statue of, 256.
Aracœli Library. _See_ LIBRARIES.
Arazzi, 43.
Arazzi, Galleria degli. _See_ GALLERIES.
Arcades, Bramante’s, 21.
Arch of Gallienus, 238.
Archi-Ospedale di Santo Spirito, 102.
Archives, 4, 37, 40, 217, 221, 223, 253, 257, 259, 261, 266, 267,
269, ix;
of the Apostolical Secretaries, 268, 269;
left at Assisi, 267;
taken to Avignon, 267;
of the Camera Apostolica, 268;
of the Cancelleria, 268;
of Clement VIII., 268;
of the Dataria, 270;
of the Gardaroba, 268, 269;
of the Lateran, 266;
Leo XIII.’s addition to the, 270;
of the letters of Cardinals, Princes, etc., 269;
of the Nuncios, 269;
order preserved by Marini of the, 270;
of St. Peter’s, 344;
recovered from Avignon by Pius VI., 269;
restored through England, 270;
at Sant’ Angelo, 267, 268, 270;
none sent to Sant’ Angelo after Paul V.’s time, 268;
of the Secretariat of the Briefs, 269;
of the Secretariat of State, 269;
transfer by Napoleon to Paris of the, 270.
Archivio. _See_ ARCHIVES.
Argenti, 156.
Ariadne, 41, 65.
Aristide. _See_ ARISTIDES.
Aristides, 243, 246;
statue of, 236.
“Arithmetic,” 380.
Ark presented to Pius IX. by French clergy, 30.
Armeria, 44.
Armouries, 221, 254, 353.
Arnold of Brescia, 173, 177.
Arnolfo di Lapo or Arnolfo di Cambio. _See_ LAPO.
Arretium (Arezzo), 387.
_Art of the Vatican, The_, by Mary Knight Potter, xii.
Artists as critics, 363.
“Ascension, The” (fresco), 367.
_Assertio Septem Sacramentorum adversus Martinum Lutherum_, 234.
Assisi, one of Nicholas V.’s fortresses, 164, 267.
“Assumption of the Virgin,” The (fresco), 367, 370.
Assyria, 398.
“Astrology,” 381.
“Astronomy,” 381.
Athens, pottery of, 403.
Atrium of Old St. Peter’s. _See_ OLD ST. PETER’S.
Atrium Vestæ, Peter’s Pence found in the, 105.
Attila, repulse of, 31, 120.
Audience, Papal, 23.
Audience Room. _See_ GALLERIOLA.
S. Augustine’s _Commentary on the Psalms_, 271.
Augustinians, 329.
Augustus, 142.
Aula della Beatificazione, 33.
Aula Dei, 321.
Aula Magna, 32.
Aula Minor, 33.
Aurelio, Cesare, 256.
Aurelius, Marcus. _See_ MARCUS.
Austria, Emperor of, 235, 259;
Francis Joseph of, 235;
Maria Thérèse of, 326.
Author, the, his attitude to the Church of Rome, x;
the Middle Ages his favourite study, xi;
not a Roman Catholic, x.
Autograph of Henry VIII., 229, 234, 244.
Autographs of Petrarch and Tasso, 228;
of S. Thomas Aquinas, 228, 230.
Avignon, 4, 58, 136, 267, 269, 318;
palace of, 10, 16, 188.
Avignon Popes, _see list of popes_.
Baden, Duke of, 259.
Bajazet II., Sultan, 62, 127, 182, 187, 297, 376.
Balcony, 41.
Baldachin, 348.
Baldachin of St. Peter’s. _See_ ST. PETER’S BALDACHIN.
Baldachin over the Volto Santo, 188.
Baptism of Our Lord, 151.
Baracconi, 343.
S. Barbara of the Borgia Rooms, 28, 373.
Barbarians, The, 141.
Barbarossa, Frederick, 102, 106, 173, 318.
Barberini bees, 222.
Barberini, Cardinal Francesco, 77.
Barberini, librarian, 220, 222.
Barberini Library, 77, 220, 221.
Barberini, Maffeo (Urban VIII.), 76.
Barberini Palace, 76, 220.
Barbo, Marco, Patriarch of Aquileia, 162.
Barbo Pope, The. _See_ PAUL II.
Baroccio, Federigo, 288, 325.
Bartholomew, massacre of, 318.
Bartoli, Taddeo, 236.
Basil, Emperor, 228, 246;
conqueror of the Bulgarians, 231.
Basilicas, ciborium a feature of, 108;
what constitutes a, 108;
have high altars at the west end, 108;
Roman, destroyed by the Cardinals, 357.
Basle, Council of, 171, 201.
Bas-reliefs from the Garden of Nero, 136;
of Our Saviour blessing the Innocents, 184.
Bassus, Junius, the family of, 153;
sarcophagus of (_see_ JUNIUS BASSUS).
Bathroom of Cardinal Bibiena, 29, 382.
Baths of Titus. _See_ TITUS.
Baths of Trajan. _See_ TRAJAN.
Bavaria, Duke Maximilian of, 218.
Bavaria, Louis of, 190.
Beatifications, 322.
Beccadelli’s Livy cost 120 ducats, 201.
Bellarmin, Cardinal, 89, 148.
Bellini, Gentile, 376.
Belvedere, Bramante’s, 63, 324;
Cortile del (_see_ CORTILE);
of Innocent VIII., 37, 40;
why so called, 18.
Bembo, Cardinal, 227.
Benedict XII., 136, 267;
founded the Palace of Avignon, 188;
statue of, 137, 188;
and Urban V. add a crown to the Papal tiara, 167, 343;
throne the most beautiful in Rome, 137, 188.
Benedict XIII. (Vincenzo Maria Orsini), 78, 269.
Benedict XIV. (Prospero Lambertini), 78, 179, 219, 222.
Benediction of Frederick Barbarossa by Alexander III. at Venice,
painted by Giuseppe della Porta, 318.
Berlin, pottery of, 226.
Bernardino. _See_ PINTURICCHIO.
Bernini, 10, 20, 29, 32, 77, 78, 110, 129, 317, 323, 330, 347;
baldachin of, 348;
candelabri of, 317, 321;
colonnade of, 10, 77, 281, 317, 348.
Berthier, General, 81.
Bessarion, Cardinal, 165, 183, 206, 271;
career of, 206;
palace, a refuge for Greek scholars exiled by the fall of
Constantinople, 206.
Beza, Theodore de, 251.
Bibiena, Cardinal, patron of Raffaelle, 29, 309;
bathroom of, 29, 382.
Bible, German, assumed to be in Luther’s own hand, 249, 251;
discredited by its scurrilous prayer, 153.
Bible, Hebrew, from the Library of the Dukes of Urbino, 228, 234.
Bible (manuscript), 25 to 40 gold ducats for, 201.
Bible, with miniatures by Pinturicchio, 229.
Biblioteca, or Sala di Consultazione, 258, 260;
Alexandrina, 218;
Leonina (_see_ LEONINE LIBRARY);
Palatina (_see_ PALATINE LIBRARY);
Segreta at Sant’ Angelo, 267;
Vaticana (_see_ VATICAN LIBRARY);
Urbina, founded by the Duke Frederick of Montefeltro, 218.
Bieda, 388.
Bisleti, Monsignor, 138, 308.
Bizamanus, 237.
Blessing, the Papal (Urbi et Orbi), 322.
Bodleian Library, 235.
Boleyn, Anne, 234.
Bolsena, Mass of, 30.
Bonaparte, Cardinal, 295.
Boniface IV., 185;
gives S. Veronica’s handkerchief a shrine in the Pantheon, 123.
Boniface VIII., 9, 92, 137, 160, 166, 167, 169, 279;
a Caetani, 167, 331;
captured at Anagni by the Colonna, 168;
Chapel of, 113;
adds second crown to the Papal tiara, 167, 343;
Bull of _Unum Sanctum_, 170;
Dante’s allusion to his indignity at the hands of the Colonna, 168;
destroys Palestrina, 168;
discovery of his body in the reign of Paul V., 167;
enemy of the Colonna, 168;
excommunicates Philip the Fair of France, 170;
Gregorovius’ mistake about tomb of, 166;
instituted the Jubilee, 168, 169;
mausoleum of, 166;
mock crucifixion of, 168;
patron of art and literature, 168;
picture of, by Giotto, 167, 169;
Pope who canonized St. Louis, 168;
portraits of, several, 169;
representative of the age of Dante, 169;
revives the struggle between the Church and State, 170;
said, “If I die, I will die a Pope,” 168;
sarcophagus of, 166;
statue of, in the cathedral at Anagni, 169;
tomb of, 113, 166, 169.
Boniface IX., Sacramentary of, 229.
Books, price of, 201.
Bordighera provides Easter palms, 74.
Borghese, Camillo (Pope Paul V.), 75;
Scipio, 302;
Villa, 302, 316.
Borgia Apartments (Rooms), 7, 11, 16, 18, 25, 26, 29, 39, 61, 84,
173, 187, 209, 260, 261, 262, 277, 294, 316, 327, 353-385;
among the brightest gems in the Vatican, 384;
the armoury, 353;
built by Nicholas V., 59;
canvas used in restoration of, 362, 381;
character of the restoration of, 360;
cleared by Leo XIII., 359;
compared to the Chapel of Nicholas V., Riccardi Chapel, St. Mark’s,
and Cappella Reale, 366;
damage done to them, 361;
the difficulties of a library in, 258, 353;
the fine flower of the Pagan Renaissance in Rome, 385;
full effect only seen at night, 385;
the Guard-Room of the Swiss Guard, 353;
given up to the Cardinal Nephews, 360;
how the books were removed from, 260, 261, 262;
in the seventeenth and eighteenth century, 358;
information very incorrect about the, 353;
Mediæval Museum of the Papacy, 353;
the most royal in the Vatican, 384;
neglected very early, 357;
panels of intarsia work almost contemporary with Pinturicchio, 362;
pictures blocked up--books hopelessly choked and confused, 353;
official residence of the Cardinal Secretary of State, 353, 361,
384;
restoration of the, 253, 360, 362;
restoration under Pius VII., 360;
restored by architect Vespignani and the painter Seitz, 359;
Spanish tiles, old, 379, 382;
condition when bookcases were first removed, 359;
stucco and papier-mâché work, 354;
too dark for picture gallery, 358;
used for meals of officials in Holy Week, 358;
used by Pius VII. for picture gallery, 358;
used for museum of statuary, 358;
used for Vatican Library of Printed Books by Gregory XVI., 358;
used to receive books of Cardinal Mai, 359;
Vatican Library of Sixtus IV., 362;
formerly Vatican Library, 27, 84, 258, 353, 384.
Borgia arms, 28.
Borgia bull, 370, 371, 378.
Borgia, Cesare, 173, 356, 369.
Borgia, Giovanni, 356, 369;
murder of, 356.
Borgia, Jofre, 368.
Borgia, Lucrezia, 173, 279, 376.
Borgia, Palace of the, 10.
Borgia, Pier Luigi, 369.
Borgia Popes, 7, 10, 12, 61, 92, 134, 173, 175, 182, 356;
Popes buried in S. Maria di Montserrato, 175.
Borgia tomb, 173.
Borgia tower. _See_ TORRE BORGIA.
Borgo to become a gigantic Papal city, 59.
Borgo, fire in the, 30.
Borromeo, S. Carlo. _See_ CARLO.
Boscareccio, 278, 285.
Bottari, 210.
Botticelli, Sandro, 60, 314, 330.
Bourbon, Constable of, 8, 70, 214, 310;
sack of Rome by, 70, 214, 310.
Box hedges, 291.
Braccio Nuovo, 18, 40, 63, 82.
Bracciolini, Poggio, 6, 165, 201, 202, 206;
career of, 201;
Facetiæ of, 203;
tribute to Jerome of Prague of, 202.
Bramante, 21, 25, 37, 63, 72, 75, 96, 142, 156, 254, 291;
cortile of, 305;
death of, 26;
Niccio, or esedra of, 291;
Tempietto of, 50, 175.
Braschi, Angelo (Pope Pius VI.), 78.
Braschi, Jean, who followed the profession of “Pontiff,” 79, 81.
Breakspear, Nicholas, of St. Albans (Hadrian IV.), 173.
Bregno, 60;
screen of, 378.
Bresca, a sailor from Bordighera, 74.
Brescia, 173, 177.
Breviary of Matthias Corvinus, King of Hungary, 227.
Briefs, 269.
Brill, or Bril, Paul, 323, 330.
Brittany, Anne of, 63.
Bronze gate. _See_ PORTONE DI BRONZO.
Bruno (Gregory V.), 176.
Bull, 139.
Bull Apis, 28, 371.
Bull, registered, “par voie sécrète,” 269.
Bunsen, 120.
Buoncompagni Pope (_see_ GREGORY XIII.), 72.
Bussola, 22.
Bussolanti, 22.
Busts, Hall of the. _See_ SALA DEI BUSTI.
Bute, Marquess of, 336.
Byzantine embroideries, 341;
manuscript, 228.
Byzantium, 165, 172.
Cabinet of the Papiri, 236.
Cadwalla, King of the West Saxons, baptized at Old St. Peter’s, 103.
Caere (Cerveteri), 387.
Caere, tombs deep in the earth, 393.
Cæsar, Julius, 49, 387;
tomb of, 74, 282.
Caetani, 158, 331.
Caffarelli, Prince, 300.
Calendar, 72, 228, 229, 237.
Caligula, circus of, 38, 47, 48, 54, 64, 95.
Caligula and the Vatican, 283.
Calixtus III., 62, 134, 156, 171, 174, 183, 214;
and the Vatican Library, 214;
not Alexander VI., the effigy on the Borgia Tomb, 174;
lovely fragments of tomb of, 183.
Camera Apostolica, archives of, 268.
Camera delle Arti e Scienze, 28, 378, 379, 380.
Camera della Vita della Madonna, 27.
Camera della Vita dei Santi, 27.
Camerieri d’Onore, 23.
Camerieri Segreti, 23, 300.
Campanari Brothers, 33, 391;
supplied most objects in Etruscan Museum in the Vatican, 391;
garden, 391.
Campo Vacchino, the old name for the Forum, 299.
Cancelleria, Archives of the, 268.
Candelabri, Galleria dei. _See_ GALLERIA CANDELABRI.
Candelabri, exquisiteness of, 315.
Canonization, 322.
Canossa, 135;
Castle of, 181.
Canova, statues of, 41.
Canova’s Stuart monument, 91, 180.
Canute, 103, 105;
visits St. Peter’s, 105.
Capanna, 236.
Capellari, Cardinal Mauro (became Gregory XVI.), 83.
Capitol, decorations, the same as to-day, 299.
Cappella della Beatificazione, 321.
Cappella Clementina, 126.
Cappella Gregoriana, 125.
Cappella Leonina. _See_ CHAPEL, LEONINE.
Cappella di Niccolò V. See CHAPEL OF NICHOLAS V.
Cappella Paolina. _See_ CHAPEL, PAOLINE.
Cappella della Pietà of St. Peter’s, 100.
Cappella Reale. _See_ PALERMO, ROYAL CHAPEL OF.
Cappella Sistina. _See_ CHAPEL, SISTINE.
Cappello Ducale, 332.
Capponi Collection, 36, 219, 224.
Caprina, 102.
Caracalla, 141, 282;
baths of, 141.
Caracciolo, Monsignor, 303.
Caraffa, Pope, 71.
Cardinal Camerlengo, 302.
Cardinal Nephews, 357, 360.
Cardinals, 22, 23;
destruction of the Roman basilicas, 357;
gardens of, 278, 279;
robes for Mass for dead Pope, 334;
smoking-room of, 25;
style of architecture, 288.
Cardinals’ hat, 302.
S. Carlo Borromeo, 2, 288, 304.
Carmine of Florence, 211, 311.
Carnot, President, 226.
Carpegna Collection, 223.
Carthage, 106;
tombs of (tombs spared by the Romans), 55, 393.
Casino Borromeo. _See_ PIUS IV. (Casino of).
Casino of Leo XIII., 61, 283.
Casino del Papa, 288.
Casino Pio. _See_ PIUS IV.
Castel d’Asso, 388;
tombs at, 392.
Castel Gandolfo, 44.
Castellani, Signor, 398, 399.
Castiglione, Conte Baldassare, 66.
Castiglione, Francesco Saverio (afterwards Pius VIII.), 83.
Castle of Sant’ Angelo. _See_ SANT’ ANGELO, CASTLE OF.
Catacombs, antiquities from, 7, 236.
St. Catherine, came from Alexandria, 371;
of the Borgia Rooms, 28, 372;
the Disputa of, 28, 356, 371, 375;
lovely figure of, 375.
St. Catherine, Lucrezia Borgia, 376.
Cavalcata, 298, 303;
description of a, 299, 303;
the last, 299.
S. Cecilia, 90.
Cefalù, 184.
Celestine III., 57.
Cellini, Benvenuto, 9, 236, 341;
brooch of gold, 336;
candlesticks of, 341;
casket of, 121.
Cenci, Beatrice, 75.
Censer, 146.
Cephalus and Procris, 26, 364.
Ceramicus, potteries of, 403.
Certaldo, Johannes di, 228.
Cerveteri, 387, 388;
tombs at, 388, 393;
tombs of, their characteristics, 393;
remarkable Pelasgic tomb at, 398.
Cervini, Pope (Marcellus II.), 159.
Cestius, pyramid of Caius, 51, 52.
Chamberlains, 300;
assistant, 300;
honorary, 300.
Chandlery, Father, _Pilgrims’ Walks in Rome_, xv.
Chapel of the Anicii, mortuary, 100.
Chapel of St. Blaise, 156.
Chapel, Colonna-Caetani, in the Crypt of St. Peter’s, 158.
Chapel of the Holy Sacrament, 125, 131, 181.
Chapel of John VII., mosaic in, 117.
Chapel, Leonine, 33, 309, 321, ix.
Chapel of S. Maria della Bocciata, 94, 184, 187, 189.
Chapel of S. Mary of the Women with Child (S. Maria Pregnantium),
184, 187.
Chapel of Nicholas V., 6, 18, 31, 58, 190-212, 366.
Chapel, Paoline (built by Antonio da Sangallo), 34, 44, 71, 73, 317,
318, 319, 320, 321;
what used for, 318.
Chapel of St. Peter’s Tomb, 54, 75, 94, 133, 140, 143.
Chapel of the Tomb of St. Peter, the second cradle of Christianity,
133.
Chapel of St. Petronilla, 57, 100.
Chapel of the Pietà, 125.
Chapel of S. Pius V., 35, 223, 305.
Chapel of the Pope, private, 22.
Chapel of the Presentation, 126.
Chapel of SS. Processus and Martinian, 121.
Chapel Riccardi at Florence, 210, 366, 376.
Chapel Salvatorino, 189.
Chapel, Sistine, 8, 10, 14, 33, 34, 35, 60, 65, 125, 215, 246, 259,
261, 310, 314, 318, 323, 338, 355, 384, viii;
exterior as plain as a packing-case, 349;
Last Judgment in the, 34, 60, 71;
photographing the, 260;
Steinmann’s work on the, 259;
treasury of (_see_ SISTINE TREASURY).
Chapel of the Tomb in the Crypt, 144, 145;
description of, 146.
Chapel of the Volto Santo, 117, 181;
mosaic in, 117.
Chapter House, 340.
Charlemagne, 30, 101, 118, 119;
coronation of, 30, 341;
epitaph on Hadrian I. of, 101, 118, 119.
Charles VIII., King of France, on the Borgia Rooms, 356.
Charles the Bald, 105.
Charles Edward, born at Rome, 179;
buried first at Frascati, 180;
a drunkard for forty years, 179;
remains of, transferred to St. Peter’s, 180;
White Rose Society keeps fresh flowers on his grave, 180.
Charles III. (Young Pretender), 91, 178.
Charles X., 226.
Charlet, Cardinal, 245.
Charlie, Bonnie Prince, 91.
Charlotte of Cyprus, 92, 134, 181, 229.
Chiaramonti, Pope (_see_ PIUS VII.), 25, 81.
Chigi (_see_ ALEXANDER VII.), 20, 77.
Chigi, Prince, 309.
Chiusi, Etruscan house at, 405;
museum of, 389.
Choir of the Canons, 126.
Christ represented as a young and beardless man, 150.
Christian, paintings in the Vatican Library, 305;
remains in the Crypt, Early, 152;
sufferings of, 48.
Christians, Early, did not erect tombs in the churches themselves,
111.
Christianity’s Holy of Holies, 113.
Christina of Sweden, 92, 180, 218, 248;
bequeathed Gustavus Adolphus’s library to the Vatican, 180, 227,
248;
buried in the Crypt of St. Peter’s, 180.
Ciborium of Innocent VIII. for the Holy Lance, 156;
for Volto Santo, 136, 151.
Ciborium of Sixtus IV., 157.
Ciborium which contained the shroud that wrapped Our Lord’s Body, 188.
Cicero, 48, 201;
Letters _Ad Familiares_ of, cost ten ducats, 201.
Cicero’s _Republic_, palimpsest of, 227, 264, 271.
Cigala, Abbé, a noble of Turin, xvii.
Cincinnatus, Lucius Quinctius, 45, 47, 282, viii.
Circus of Caligula. _See_ CALIGULA.
Circus of Nero. _See_ NERO.
Civita-Castellana, fortress of, 64.
Classic Ages, paintings of, 7.
Classical authors, original manuscripts of, 17.
_Classici Scriptores ex codicibus Vaticanis editi_, 273.
Clement I., 123.
Clement VII., 31, 70, 234.
Clement VIII. (Ippolito Aldobrandini), 75, 77, 89, 94, 132, 146.
Clement VIII., altar of, 146;
Archivio of, 268.
Clement IX. (Giulio Rospigliosi), 78.
Clement X. (Emilio Altieri), 78.
Clement XI. (Giovanni Francesco Albani), 78, 269.
Clement XII. (Lorenzo Corsini), 78.
Clement XIII. (Carlo Rezzonico), 78, 219.
Clement XIV. (Lorenzo Ganganelli), 24, 78, 79, 219, 303;
was he poisoned? 79, 303;
body after death, 79, 303;
last Pope who rode in Cavalcata, 298;
falls in his Cavalcata, 303.
_Cloister and the Hearth_, Nicholas V. in the, xv.
Clovio, Giulio, 228, 230, 234.
Coach-house of the Popes. _See_ POPES’ COACH-HOUSE.
Codex Purpureus, 229.
Codex Romanus of the Vatican Library, has it been inked over? 249.
Codex Septuagint, 248.
Codex Vatican, 7, 227, 273.
Collegio Romano, 76.
Cologne, Archbishop of, 234.
Colonna family, 168.
Colonna, Mark Antonio, 72.
Colonna, Prince, 300.
Colonna, Santa, 124.
Colonna-Caetani, Donna Agata, the only woman not a sovereign buried
in St. Peter’s, 93, 134, 158.
Colosseum, 372.
Columbus, Christopher, 6.
Columella, 201.
_Conclave, Le_, book by Lector, xvii.
S. Congregazione de Propaganda Fide, 272.
Conrad, Emperor, 105.
Constance, Council of, 201.
Constantine, Basilica of, 86, 94, 107, 158, 181, 292, viii;
lasts till Reformation, 96.
Constantine the Great, 89, 112, 128, 143, 163, 312, viii;
carried twelve basketsful of earth at foundation of his basilica,
94;
battle between Maxentius and, 31;
decree on the peace of the Church of, 52;
donation of, 110, 205;
the six basilicas attributed to, 94;
inscription on the supremacy of St. Peter of, 112;
makes Christianity the official religion of the world in 324 A.D.,
96, 113;
turns first sod of Old St. Peter’s, 94.
Constantine, Grand Duke, 226.
Constantinople captured by the Turks under Mahomet II., 62;
Patriarch of, 206.
Conti, Michel Angelo de’ (Pope Innocent XIII.), 78.
Corinth, pottery of, 403.
Corinthian vases, 403.
Corneto, 387.
Corneto (station for Tarquinii), 387;
painted tombs of, 393, 394, 395;
painted tombs of, how they are kept, 395;
painted tombs of, their characteristics and subjects, 396;
Etruscan museum of, 389.
Cornwall, Delabole, quarries at, 284.
Corps-de-garde, 35.
Corsini, Lorenzo (_see_ CLEMENT XII.), 78.
Corsini, Prince, 298.
Corsini, Princess, 336.
_Corte e Società Romana XVIII e XIX Secoli_, xvi.
Cortile del Archivio, 18.
Cortile del Belvedere, 18, 21, 37, 40, 63, 75, 218, 221, 223, 254,
291, 305, 347.
Cortile di S. Damaso, 15, 19, 23, 26, 31, 63, 84, 308, 328, 348.
Cortile dei Falegnami, 19.
Cortile del Forno, 19, 35.
Cortile (Giardino) della Stamperia, 40, 261.
Cortile del Maggiordomo, 18.
Cortile del Maresciallo di Conclave, 18, 33.
Cortile dei Palafrenieri, 16.
Cortile del Pappagallo, 16, 36.
Cortile del Portone di Ferro, 16, 36, 261.
Cortile della Sentinella, 16, 35, 261.
Cortona, 387.
Corvinus, Breviary of Matthias (King of Hungary), 227.
Cosmati, art of the, not the only Roman art, 315.
S. Costanza, church of, 163.
Council of Trent. _See_ TRENT.
Councils, General, 171.
Court of the Tournaments. _See_ TOURNAMENTS.
Courts and courtyards. _See_ CORTILE.
Crawford, Mr. Marion, 290.
Creighton, Bishop, 216.
Crescentius, 127, 176, 177;
consul or senator of Rome, 127;
expels Gregory V., 177;
the font of St. Peter’s is part of sarcophagus of, 127, 176;
put to death by Otto III., 127, 177.
Crimea, 398.
Cross, processional, presented by Marquess of Bute, 336.
Crusades, 62.
Crux hastata. _See_ PAPAL CROSS.
Crypt of St. Peter’s. _See_ ST. PETER’S CRYPT.
Crypt, New. _See_ GROTTE NUOVE.
Crypt, Old. _See_ GROTTE VECCHIE.
Cryptes Vaticanes, xviii.
Cumae, 398.
Curia, 59, 268.
Curia, Papal. _See_ PAPAL COURT.
Cyclamens, 3, 282.
Cylices or drinking-cups in Gregorian Museum, 403.
Cyprus, Charlotte of. _See_ CHARLOTTE OF CYPRUS.
S. Cyril, 129.
Cyrillus, Patriarch, 249.
Dalmata, Giovanni, 133, 156, 184;
“Hope” of, 156.
Dalmatic worn by Charlemagne, 9, 341;
of San Leone, 341.
S. Damaso (S. Damasus), Archives of, near Theatre of Pompey, 217,
266;
baptistery of, 93, 100, 132;
court of (_see_ CORTILE);
date of, 183;
his drain under the Cortile di S. Damaso, 93;
under the Cortile di S. Damaso still in use, 93;
his inscription the most beautiful in the crypts, 93, 136, 183;
library of, 217, ix;
loggie of, 65.
Daniel between the lions, 151.
Daniele da Volterra. _See_ VOLTERRA.
Dante, Ignazio, afterwards Bishop of Alatri, 316.
Dante’s _Divine Comedy_, with miniatures by Giulio Clovio, 228, 234.
Dante’s MS., writing of Boccaccio, 228.
Dark Ages, 176.
Dataria, Archives of the, 270.
Death with his hammer on the Etruscan tombs at Volterra, 389.
Decembrio, 206.
Defender of the Faith. _See_ FIDEI DEFENSOR.
“_Delenda est Columna_,” 168.
Demidoff, Prince, 225.
Dennis’s _Cities and Cemeteries of Etruria_, 397, 398, xii.
Descent of the Holy Spirit, The, 367, 370.
Devils and Angels on Etruscan tombs, 389.
“Dialectics,” 380.
Diocletian, baths of, 76, 141.
Disputa of St. Catherine, The. _See_ S. CATHERINE.
Djem, Prince, 62, 187, 376;
one of the most notable figures in the frescoes of the Borgia
Apartments, 187.
Dogmatica Panoplia, 232.
Dome of the Cathedral at Florence, 349;
of Michel Angelo, 349;
of the Pantheon, 349;
of St. Peter’s (_see_ ST. PETER’S).
Domenichino’s “Pentecost,” 327.
Domitian, Stadium of, 38, 288, 290.
Donatello, ciborium by, 342.
Donizo, 228, 233.
Donus, Pope who paved the Atrium of St. Peter’s with marble from Meta
Romuli, 120.
Doria Gallery, 146.
Doria Villa, 287.
“_Duae Metae_,” in a picture by Giotto, 50.
Dufresne, Père, 144, 156, 162, xviii.
Duns Scotus, the Realist, 256.
Duppa’s _Life of Michel Angelo_, 320.
Dux Plebis, 113.
Edward I. of England, 135.
Egypt, 398.
Egyptian Museum. _See_ MUSEUM.
Ehrle and Stevenson, 359, 360, x;
on Seitz’s restoration of the Borgia Rooms, 360, xvi.
Eighteenth century, practical jokes of the, 291.
Elagabalus releases thousands of poisonous snakes on the Vatican
Hill, 54, 283.
_Éléments d’Archéologie Chrétienne_, xvii.
Emperor, the Holy Roman, 341.
Emperors, the successors of Constantine, 96.
England, pilgrims from, 102;
tomb inscribed with the Conversion of, 113.
English Catholic books, 259.
English Library at Rome, 138.
English School at Rome, 105.
Episcopia, 56.
Eroli, fragments of the mausoleum of Cardinal, 159, 184;
tomb of, 156, 159.
Esedra, 38, 291.
Ethelwulf, King, 104, 109;
crowned by the Pope, 104.
Etruria, likeness between rock tombs and pagan rock tombs of Sicily,
394.
Etruscan augur who bade Cæsar beware the Ides of March, 387.
Etruscan bronzes in Gregorian Museum, 403.
Etruscan cemeteries near Orvieto, 388.
Etruscan cities, ix;
are to Rome what Pompeii is to Naples, 386;
in the Roman Maremma, 387;
round Rome, which can be visited with very little more
effort than Pompeii, 387;
round Viterbo, 388;
South, can mostly be visited by rail in one day from Rome, 387;
which reflowered in art, 387.
Etruscan frescoes, the best show beauty of the women as the Pompeian
never do, 397.
Etruscan funeral scenes, 390, 394.
Etruscan genii, 387, 389;
good--with wings--doubtless the origin of our angels, 389.
Etruscan house found at Chiusi, like a Japanese house, 405.
Etruscan imitations in stucco, 392.
Etruscan inscriptions, 402.
Etruscan jewellery, domestic and sepulchral, 400;
genuine, inferior in taste and execution to Tyrrhene style, 400;
in Gregorian Museum, 403;
manufacture has never ceased to go on of, at S. Angelo in Vado, 401;
carried on in Rome now, 401;
Pelasgic or Tyrrhene style of, 398;
style of, 397-402;
tiaras coming in again, 401.
Etruscan mirrors like Greek, Roman, Carthaginian, Egyptian, and
Japanese, 402.
Etruscan museums in Rome, 389.
Etruscan race flowered in artists of Umbria and Tuscany, 387.
Etruscan sarcophagi, carved by native workmen from native designs,
deal mostly with religious subjects, 389.
Etruscan sporting, scenes of, 395.
Etruscan temples, faithful representation on cinerary urns, 404;
like the temples of Japan, 404.
Etruscan tombs, banqueting scenes on, 396;
best at Tarquinii and Cerveteri, 388;
characteristics of, 391;
levity of their general subjects, 394;
lids often of inferior workmanship, 390;
model of, 391;
portrait effigies on, 390;
presence of a horse and cart marks the passage of a soul, 389;
ready-made, 390;
scenes from Greek mythology or history, 390;
subterranean, give an intimate acquaintance with the race, 388;
tell us much of the customs of that dead mysterious race, 390;
views of Future State on the, 390;
to visit, winter the best time, 395.
Etruscan or Tyrrhene treasures in the Gregorian Museum, 398.
Etruscans, women entered more publicly into the lives of the, than
into the lives of the Greeks, 396.
Etruscans, 83, 386-405;
had their Charon ferrying souls across the river of Death, 389;
melted into Latins: Latins melted into Italians, 386;
more serious people than the Romans and Greeks, 389;
like Romans, seem to have buried their dead outside their cities,
393;
used birds in fishing, like the Chinese of to-day, 395;
vases imitated from the Greek by the, 403;
when wealthy, imported potteries of Athens and Corinth, 403.
Eugenius IV., 53, 171, 205;
made Bessarion a Cardinal, 206.
Exarchs, 112.
Fabriano, Fortress of, 164.
Fabriano, Gentile da, 237.
Fabriano, Nuzi of, 236.
Facchinetti, Pope (Innocent IX.), 159.
Farnese, Alessandro (Paul III.), 9, 25, 71, 325.
Farnese, Giulia, 377.
Farnese tapestries, 329.
Farnesina, roof of the, 365.
Feast of the Virgin, collection of sermons for, 233.
Felix V., Anti-pope, 171.
Fenestella Confessionis, 108.
Ferrante, King, 217.
Fiano, Prince, 300.
Fibulae, 400.
_Fidei Defensor_ (“Defender of the Faith”), 234, 251.
Fiesole, 211.
Fifteenth-century parts of the Vatican, 16, 35, 377.
Filarete, 53, 120.
Filelfo, 202, 204;
career of, 203, 204;
determines not to visit Nicholas V., 204;
at Rome under Sixtus IV., 204.
S. Filippo Neri, 304.
Fleury, MSS. of the Library of, 218.
Florence, Carmine at, 211, 311.
Florence, Cathedral of, 349;
Etruscan Museum of, 389;
Riccardi Chapel at (_see_ CHAPELS);
Santa Croce at, 97.
Flos Etruriae--flower of Etruria (Florence), 211.
Fonseca, Cardinal, his tomb, 159.
Font used for baptizing the Prince Imperial, 225.
Fontainebleau, captivity of, 332.
Fontana, architect, 49, 73, 218, 226.
Forli, Melozzo da, 128, 216, 340;
frescoes of, 216 (_note 14_), 340;
fresco of the Vatican Library by, 216.
Forum, The, 299.
Frari, The, at Venice, 221.
Frascati, 179, 279, 282.
Frascati, Cardinal York, Bishop of, 179.
French Revolution, 79.
French tapestries, 25.
Frescoes, 292, 379;
in the Borgia Rooms, authorship of various, 379;
from Ostia, 240;
of shrines of Old St. Peter’s, 187.
Frisians, Church of the (S. Michel in Sassia), 106.
Fronto, Julius, 276.
Gabinetto delle Maschere, 41.
Gaetani, Scipione, 226.
Gall, St., 201.
Galleria degli Arazzi, 43, 66, 220, 309, 315;
dei Candelabri, 8, 43, 220, 310, 315;
Geografica, by Ignazio Dante and his brother, 43, 220, 316.
Galleria Lapidaria. _See_ GALLERY OF INSCRIPTIONS.
Galleria delle Muse, 79;
delle Statue, 41.
Galleriola, 25, 327.
Gallery of Inscriptions, 11, 24, 39, 82, 220, 223, 235.
Gallienus, Arch of, 238.
Gandolfo, Castel, 281.
Ganganelli, Lorenzo (Clement XIV.), 78.
Gardaroba, Archives of the, 268, 269.
Garden, or terrace, of the Navicella, 292;
of the Pope, 1, 10, 16, 37, 278, 280.
Garden, Vatican. _See_ VATICAN GARDENS.
Garden of the Villa Lante, fountain in the, 278.
Gaza, Theodore of, 165, 206.
Genga, Annibale della (Pope Leo XII.), 83.
Genius of the Vatican, The, 41.
Genoa, 6.
“Geometry,” 380.
St. George, life of, with miniatures by Giotto, 344.
George IV., 91.
Geracé, Marquis of, 153.
German MSS. in Vatican Library, 219.
Ghini, Simone, 53, 120.
Ghirlandajo, 60, 314, 325, 330, 380.
Giardino della Pigna, 18, 38, 40, 42, 99, 291;
della Stamperia, 18, 255;
Vaticano (_see_ VATICAN GARDENS).
S. Giorgio in Velabro, 107.
Giotto, 117, 128, 169, 185, 340, 344, 396;
mosaic angel by, 185;
Navicella of, 117.
S. Giovanni dei Fiorentini, 48.
Fra Giovanni da Firenze (Fiesole). _See_ ANGELICO, FRA.
Fra Giovanni da Roma, 209.
Giulio Clovio, 228, 230, 234.
Giustiniani, Prince, 300.
Gobelins, 8.
Gods of Greece, moral standard of the, 368.
Gold breastplates, 398.
Golden Rose, 9, 34, 334.
Gothic tombs in St. Peter’s Crypt, 214.
_Gouvernement de l’Église_, xvii.
Goyau, xvii.
Gozzoli, Benozzo, 31, 207, 210;
his figure of Lorenzo de’ Medici in the Riccardi Chapel, 378.
“Grammar,” 380.
Grand gala coach, 296, 297.
Grand Herald, 299.
Gratian, Emperor, 100.
Greece, ancient clay statuettes of, 239;
ancient paintings of, 239;
writers of, 6.
Greek Calendar. _See_ MENOLOGIUM GRECUM.
Greek home, 404;
MSS., 218;
vases, 42, 403.
Greeks as averse as Arabs to talking about the women of their family,
404;
have left us hardly any real portraits, 404;
undomesticated, 404;
liable to ignore domestic details, 404.
Gregorian Calendar, 72.
Gregorian Museum, matchless collection of Greek vases and bowls of,
403.
Gregorovius’ _History of Rome in the Middle Ages_, xi;
_Tombs of the Popes_, xii.
S. Gregory the Great, 113, 144;
tomb of, 126.
Gregory II., 121.
S. Gregory III., 56, 186.
Gregory V., 134, 177;
epitaph of, 177;
tomb of, 176, 177.
Gregory VII., 135, 166, 181, 229, 318.
Gregory XI., 318.
Gregory XII. fortified himself in the Vatican against Louis of Anjou,
58.
Gregory XIII., 72, 76.
Gregory XIV., 29, 75.
Gregory XV. (Alessandro Ludovisi), 75.
Gregory XVI. (Mauro Capellari), 42, 83, 219, 272, 289, 353, 358;
founds the Museo Etrusco, 83, 403;
makes a new waterfall at Tivoli, 83.
S. Gregory Nazianzen, 229, 246;
his career, 246.
Gregory of Trebizond, 165.
Grévy, President, 226.
Grisar, Père, 144.
Grotte Nuove, 93, 132, 136, 140, 142, 182;
corridor of, 148.
Grotte Vaticane, 80, 90, 142, 166.
Grotte Vecchie, 90, 91, 117, 134, 142, 158;
is Old St. Peter’s, 142.
Grotto dell’ Orco, splendid figures of gods in (finest of all
Etruscan frescoes), 397.
Gualdo, fortress of, 164.
Guarino, 206.
Guglia, 49.
Hadrian I., 101, 118, 119.
Hadrian IV., 92, 152, 173;
first Pope to hold court at Orvieto, 173;
name was Nicholas Breakspear, 173;
only English Pope, 92, 173;
put down Arnold of Brescia, 173;
refused to crown Frederick Barbarossa, 173;
his sarcophagus, 173.
Hadrian VI., 70;
not an Italian at all, 70.
Hadrian, Emperor, the font of St. Peter’s not the lid of his
sarcophagus, 127;
tomb of, 47, 99;
villa of, 339.
Hall of Aristides, 36, 236.
Hall of the Beatifications (_see_ SALA DELLA BEATIFICAZIONE), 11.
Hall of the Bonaventura, 36, 236.
Hall of the Bussolanti, 22.
Hall of the Busts, 41.
Hall of the Christian Paintings, 36.
Hall of the Conclave, 59.
Hall of the Consistory, 12.
Hall of the Credo, 11, 28, 355, 382.
Hall of the Grooms, 22, 31.
Hall of the Lives of the Saints, 11, 371, 372, 377.
Hall of the Madonna, 11, 27.
Hall of the Mysteries, 27, 360, 365, 367, 368, 369, 370.
Hall of the Obelisk, 36, 236.
Hall of the Papal Audiences, 43.
Hall of the Papiri, 36, 40.
Hall of the Paramenti, 25, 33.
Hall of the Parrot, 25, 33.
Hall of the Popes, 11, 26, 27, 355, 381, 382, 384.
Hall of the Porphyry Columns, 222.
Hall of the Sibyls, 11, 29, 355, 380, 382.
Hall of the Vatican Manuscripts, 36, 224.
Hamilton, Mrs. Gustavus W., xi.
_Handbook to Christian and Ecclesiastical Rome_, xiii.
Hare’s _Walks in Rome_, xiv.
Harrison’s, Frederic, _Theophano_, xvi.
Head of St. Andrew. _See_ ANDREW.
Head of Our Lord from Eroli’s tomb, 185.
Heidelberg, 218, 219, 257;
MSS. restored to, 219.
Helena, gold cross of the Empress, 89, 143.
Heliodorus, expulsion of, 30.
Henry IV., Emperor, 135, 181;
absolution of, by Gregory VII., 229;
at Canossa, by Zuccheri, 318;
repentance of, 229.
Henry VIII. of England, 229, 250;
autograph inscription to Leo X., 234;
letters to Anne Boleyn by, 234, 250;
pamphlet against Luther, 234, 244.
Henry IX. (Stuart) (Cardinal of York), 91, 178, 302;
archpriest of St. Peter’s for fifty-six years, 180;
bequeathed Crown jewels to the Prince Regent (afterwards George
IV.), 180;
Bishop of Frascati, 179;
created Cardinal by Benedict XIV., 179;
created Duke of York by his father, 179;
“King of England by the grace of God, but not by the will of men,”
179;
Cardinal of York pensioned by the Prince Regent, 179;
record of longevity, 180;
relieved the necessities of Pius VI., 179.
Heraclius, Emperor, 101.
Herculaneum, 238.
Hercules, labours of, 131.
Hermania. _See_ THERMANTIA.
Hildebrand (Gregory VII.), 135.
Hildebrandine reforms, era of the, 176.
Holy Lance, 63, 121, 136.
Holy Office, Palace of the, 44.
Holy See, 135, 194.
Honorius, mausoleum of the wives of the Emperor, 100, 342.
Honorius, Pope, 112.
Hormisdas, Pope, 185, 342;
inscription of, 185;
united Eastern and Western Churches, 185.
Hortensius, 142.
Humboldt, 219.
Hypsistarians, sect of the, 247.
Ilex trees, 291.
Illuminations, 348, 351.
Immaculate Conception, 30.
_Index Expurgatorius_, 264.
Infessura, 217.
Innocent III., 56, 108, 114, 121, 146, 166;
monuments in bronze and mosaics, 114.
Innocent IV., 57.
Innocent VII. (Migliorati Pope), 159.
Innocent VIII. (Cibò Pope), Belvedere of (_see_ BELVEDERE);
ciborium for the Holy Lance of, 156, 183, 187;
ciborium for the Volto Santo, 136, 151;
tomb of, 126, 183;
villa of, 7, 14, 18, 25, 37, 40, 43, 61, 63, 75, 126, 229, 294.
Innocent IX. (Facchinetti), 75, 159.
Innocent X. (Giambattista Pamfili), 77, 146;
portrait by Velasquez in the Doria Gallery, 146.
Innocent XI. (Benedetto Odescalchi), 78, 152.
Innocent XII. (Antonio Pignatelli), 78.
Innocent XIII. (Michel Angelo de’ Conte), 78.
Inquisition, the Holy Roman and Universal, 44, 71.
Inscriptions, Gallery of (_see_ GALLERIES);
of the twelfth century, 184.
_Inscriptiones Christianæ_ of G. B. de Rossi, 260.
Intarsia work, 209, 377.
_Inter duas Metas_, 50, 51, 52, 53.
Ippolito d’Este, Cardinal, his garden, 279.
Isis and Osiris ceiling of the Borgia Rooms, 28, 371.
Isis and Osiris, marriage of, 371.
St. James the Less, 189.
James II., 178.
James III. of England, 91;
fainéant, dissolute, prayerful life at Rome of, 179;
had the longest reign in English history--sixty-four years, 91, 178;
what he gave up for his faith, 178.
Janiculum, 50, 51.
Janus, 11.
Jerome of Prague, 202;
his letters cost one hundred gold ducats, 201.
Jerusalem, 151, 181.
Jesuits, 75, 79.
Jesus, magician named, 122.
“Jesus riding on an ass,” 151.
John of Austria, Don, 72.
John VII., 124, 136;
his chapel of the Volto Santo, 136, 186;
mosaic portrait of, 186;
oratory of, 188.
John XIII., 86.
John XVI., Anti-pope, 176.
John XXIII., united the Vatican with Sant’ Angelo by walled-in
passage, 58.
Joshua, Vatican Library Book of, 231.
Jousting, 38.
Jubilee, 9.
Judith and Holofernes, 371.
Julian the Apostate, 246, 247.
Julii, Porticus. _See_ PORTICUS.
Julius II. (Juliano della Rovere), 7, 25, 30, 38, 61, 63, 64, 65,
141, 165, 292, 357;
abolished the old basilica, 172;
founder of the Vatican Museum, 65;
his hatred of Alexander VI., 357;
like Caracalla and Diocletian in his megalomania, 141;
like Nero in his megalomania, 115;
the real founder of the New St. Peter’s, 125, 141;
the tomb of, 125.
Julius III. (the del Monte Pope), 161.
Junius Bassus, inscription of, 153;
a Prefect of Rome, 153.
Junius Bassus, sarcophagus of, 100, 124, 133, 148, 149, 150, 152;
its ends, 152;
figures allegorized as sheep or lambs on, 151;
Job’s wife on, 151, 152;
Job’s wife is holding her nose, 152;
John the Baptist is represented as a sheep on, 152;
is the only tomb which contains bones of the original occupant,
152;
subjects on, 150.
Jupiter of the Vatican, 368.
Justel, Mr., of the Royal Library in London, 248.
Justin II., Emperor, 128;
cross of, 342.
Khedive Ibrahim Pasha, 225.
Klimax of Johannes Klimakus, 233.
Knights of the Guard. _See_ LANCIE SPEZZATI.
Kugler, 210, 230, 237, 319, 383.
Lace in the Sistine Treasury, 331.
Laestrygonians, 240.
Lambertini, Prospero (Pope Benedict XIV.), 78.
Lanciani, xiii.
Lancie Spezzati, or Knights of the Guard, 299.
Landsberg (Jesuit) maintains that the portrait of Christ on St.
Veronica’s handkerchief is true to life, 123.
Laocoön, The, 41, 65.
Lapo, Arnolfo di, 114, 137, 166.
Last Judgment, The, of Michel Angelo, 34, 60, 71, 331, 387;
of Mino da Fiesole, 154, 156.
Lateran, The, 3, 94, 205, 298;
the library of the, 266;
the Mother Church of the Papacy, 58.
Latin MSS., 218.
Latin Way, tombs of the, 328;
genius of the tombs of the, 328.
Laurana, Francesco, 184.
Laurel, clipped, 293.
Layard, Sir A. H. (revised edition of Kugler), 230, 320, 382.
Lazarus, resurrection of, 151.
Lector, M., xvii.
St. Leo the Great, 120.
Leo the Isaurian, 121.
St. Leo’s repulse of Attila, 31, 120, 186.
St. Leo I., St. Leo II., St. Leo III., St. Leo IV., 186.
St. Leo III., justifying himself before Charlemagne, 30;
his dalmatic, 341;
crowns Charlemagne, 341.
St. Leo IV., 57, 104, 109, 186, 285;
builder of the Leonine City, 186;
old towers and walls of, 285.
Leo IX., Bull of, 49.
Leo X. (Giovanni de’ Medici), 8, 26, 62, 65, 234, 244, 267, 309;
a Mæcenas, 65.
Leo XI. (Alessandro de’ Medici), 75.
Leo XII. (della Genga), 83, 219;
jubilee robe of, 336.
Leo XIII. (Gioacchino Pecci), 7, 34, 39, 50, 77, 84, 88, 219, 222,
225, 253, 255, 257, 258, 259, 270, 284, 285, 291, 315, 322,
325, 354;
his aim in choosing a site for his library, 258;
brougham of, 294;
buildings in the Vatican gardens of, 284;
Casino of, 61, 283, 290;
carried out Nicholas V.’s plans for making the Vatican Library the
focus of European scholarship, 253;
converted the Hall of Canonizations into a chapel, 85;
defines the Vatican precincts, 294;
did he go outside the Vatican in July 1890? 294;
favourite tapestry of, 325;
founded the Leonine Library, 84;
in his garden, 291;
in the old Tower, 285;
jubilee of, 235;
jubilee presents of, 238, 336;
most brilliant writer in Latin of all the Popes, 354;
opens the Vatican MSS. and Archives to the world, 253;
pergola of, 285;
restores the Borgia Apartments, 84, 253, 354, 359;
restores the Galleria degli Arazzi, 85;
restores the Galleria dei Candelabri, 85;
robe presented for his jubilee to, 333;
statue of, 256;
villa of, 61.
Leonine City, 186.
Leonine Library. _See_ LIBRARY, NEW LEONINE.
Leonine Wall, 283, 284.
Lepanto, battle of, 72, 330;
frescoes by Vasari of, 72, 318, 330;
awakened Europe from the nightmare of the Turks, 330.
_Liber Pontificalis_, 51, 95, 267.
Liberal Arts, The Seven, 28.
Librarian’s room, Vatican Library, 40.
Library, Aracœli, 40, 257, 260.
Library, Barberini. _See_ BARBERINI.
Library of Biblical Studies, 256, 263.
Library, Bodleian, 235.
Library of the Canons of St. Peter’s, 344.
Library of Cardinal Mai, 257, 260, 264, 271, 277.
Library of Christina of Sweden. _See_ CHRISTINA.
Library of the Dukes of Urbino, 228.
Library, New Leonine, 4, 40, 220, 221, 223, 253, 254-265, 270, 277,
ix;
all printed books in the Vatican transferred to the, 255, 358;
books of Italian antiquities in the, 260;
books of Popes, Cardinals, and Rome in the, 260;
books, special boxes for transporting them, 262;
building alterations for the, 254, 255;
card catalogue system, 257;
foreign governments send books to the, 258;
formation of the, 254;
modern arrangement of, 256;
order of books preserved, 262, 263;
reference library, 258;
reference room in the, 258;
route to, from the Borgia Rooms, 261;
transporting of books from the Borgia Rooms, 262;
transporting of books from the Borgia Rooms takes only a fortnight,
263;
under the Sala Sistina, 254.
Library, long gallery of, 14.
Library, Montefeltro, 229.
Library, Palatine, 40, 257, 260.
Library of Printed Books, 39, 258.
Library, Ruland, 256.
Library of Siena. _See_ SIENA.
Library of Sixtus IV., 61.
Library, Vatican. _See_ VATICAN.
Library, visit of Montaigne and Misson, 242-252.
Library, Zelada, 40, 257, 260.
Ligorio, Pirro, 72, 288.
Lindsey, Lord, in his _Christian Art_, 342.
Linus, 54, 140.
Livy, palimpsest of Book IX. from Christina of Sweden’s library, 228.
Loggie. _See_ RAFFAELLE and UDINE.
Lonigo, Michel, 268.
Lorenzetti, Pietro, 236.
S. Lorenzo in Damaso, the site of Pope Damaso’s library, 217.
S. Lorenzo fuori le Mura, 94, 210, 308.
Louis XIV., 8, 26;
tapestry of his betrothal and marriage, 326.
St. Louis of France, last testament of, 106.
Lourdes’ offering to the Pope, 285.
Louvre, 306.
Loyola, S. Ignatius, 75.
Lucretius, 201.
Lucumo, 390.
Ludovisi, Alessandro (Pope Gregory XV.), 75.
Ludovisi, Cardinal Ludovico, 76.
Ludovisi, Donna Ippolita Boncompagni, 298.
Ludovisi, Juno, 76.
Lugari, Monsignor, 51.
Lusignans, 134.
Luther, Martin, 174, 229, 234, 244, 250, 251, 268;
letters of, 268;
prayer a forgery, 251.
Maclaughlin, Mrs. Frances, xvi.
MacMahon, Maréchal, 226.
Maderna, Carlo, 33, 281, 322.
Madonna with the Child, 377.
Madonna della Colonna from Old St. Peter’s, 126.
Madonna di Soccorso from Old St. Peter’s, 126.
Maestro della Camera, 300.
Maestro, office of the Pope’s, 19.
Maggiordomo, 8, 138;
office of the, 19.
Mai, Cardinal Angelo, 6, 40, 219, 227, 235, 257, 260, 271, 274, 275,
277, 359;
career of, 264, 271;
decorated by our Royal Society of Literature, 273;
discovers Cicero’s _Republic_, 271;
“the discoverer and restorer of Palimpsests,” 274;
how he discovered ancient classics, 277;
his library, how he bequeathed it, 277;
librarian of the Vatican, 271, 273;
MSS. all bequeathed to the Vatican, 277;
prints Codex Vaticanus, 273;
reestablishes the Vatican Press, 272;
secretary of the Congregation of the Propaganda, 272;
his table bequeathed by de Rossi to the Vatican Library, 264;
Wiseman’s description of, as librarian, 271, 272, 273.
Mainardi, 236.
Maldaichini, Olimpia, 77.
Mancini of Orvieto, Signor, 392.
Mancini’s excavations and shop at Orvieto, 392.
Manetti, 194, 195, 196, 198.
Mantegna, 61.
Manuscripts of the Vatican. _See_ VATICAN MANUSCRIPTS.
Maps, Gallery of the. _See_ GALLERIA GEOGRAFICA.
Maratta, Carlo, 30.
SS. Marcellino e Pietro, 94.
Marcellus II. (Cervini), 71, 159;
keeper of the Vatican Library, 159;
one of the presidents of the Council of Trent, 159.
S. Marco, palace of (now Palazzo di Venezia), 161, 163.
Marcus Aurelius, 2, 276;
discovery of letters of, 276.
Maremma, Roman, Etruscan cities in the, 387;
some have fine Etruscan walls, some gates, 388.
Margaritone, 236.
Maria (wife of Honorius), 100.
S. Maria della Bocciata, miraculous image of, 137, 187, 189.
S. Maria in Cosmedin, 117;
mosaics in, 117.
S. Maria delle Febbri, 175.
S. Maria sopra Minerva, 211, 304.
S. Maria di Montserrato, 174.
S. Maria del Popolo, 304.
S. Maria Traspontina, 51, 53.
S. Maria in Trastevere, 111, 156.
S. Maria in Turri, 106.
Marie Thérèse of Austria, 326.
Marini, 268, 269.
Marinus II., 105 (_note 8_).
St. Mark’s, Venice, 98, 112, 305, 366.
Martial, 48.
St. Martin, oratory of, 121.
Martini, Simone, 236.
S. Martino ai Monti, frescoes of Old St. Peter’s in, 292.
Martyrdom of St. Peter and St. Paul, 134, 148.
Martyrdom of St. Peter and St. Paul on the Bronze Doors, 120.
Marucchi, Commendatore Orazio, 50, 120, 128, 130, 132, 181, xvii.
Masaccio, 211.
Masaccio’s “Render unto Cæsar” in the Carmine at Florence, 311.
Maschere, Cabinetto delle, 41.
Massacre of St. Bartholomew by Vasari. _See_ BARTHOLOMEW.
Massimi claim to be the oldest family in Rome, descended from Fabius
Maximus, 192.
Massimi, first patrons of printing in Rome, 165, 193.
Mastai-Ferretti (Pope Pius IX.), 84.
Master of the Horse, 299.
Masters of Ceremonies, Papal, 301.
Matilda of Tuscany, Castle of Canossa belonged to, 181;
donation of, 135, 181;
fate of monument of Countess, 125;
remains removed to St. Peter’s by Urban VIII., 125;
and the Papacy, 135, 181;
poem in praise of, 228, 233.
Mattei, Prince, 300.
Maximilian, Duke of Bavaria, 218.
Medici, Giovanni de’ (Leo X.), 65.
Medici Popes, 75, 290.
Medici, Villa, 290.
Megalomaniac Popes, 76.
Meleager, Vestibule of the. _See_ VESTIBULE.
Melozzo. _See_ FORLI.
Menologium Grecum, or Greek Calendar (tenth century, executed for the
Emperor Basil), 228, 231.
Menologium of the Vatican, 231.
Mercia, Coenred of, 103.
Merry del Val, Cardinal Raffaele, Secretary of State. _See under_
SECRETARY OF STATE.
S. Methodius, 129.
Mexican Calendar, 229.
Mezzofanti, Cardinal, 273.
_Mezzo-gala_ coach, 296.
Michel Angelo. _See under_ ANGELO.
St. Michele in Sassia, 106.
Migliorati, Pope (_see_ INNOCENT VII.), 159.
Milan, 311;
Ambrosian Library at (_see_ LIBRARIES), 271.
Minerva, Temple of, 287.
Mino da Fiesole, 60, 92, 116, 134, 148, 154, 161, 162, 315, 386.
Mino da Fiesole’s “Charity,” 134, 154;
“Creation of Woman,” 155;
“Faith,” 93, 134, 154, 155;
“God the Father,” 155;
“Last Judgment,” 154, 155, 162;
masterpiece, 154, 161;
“Original Sin,” 134;
the Raffaelle of the Sculptors of the Middle Ages, 148;
“Resurrection of Our Saviour,” 154, 162;
“Temptation in the Garden,” 155.
Mint, The, 35, 44, 294;
the only spot in the Vatican seized by the Italian Government, 294.
Mirror with Relief of Aurora carrying the body of her son, the
original of the Pietà of the Virgin with the Body of Our Lord,
403.
Misson, author of _The New Voyage to Italy_, 15, 139, 158, 247, 249;
impressions of, 249;
his visit to the Vatican Library, 248.
Monreale, 184.
Mons Vaticanus, 278, 282.
Montaigne, 242, 246;
criticizes Henry VIII.’s book, 244;
describes Vatican Library of his day--probably under Sistine
Chapel, 243;
his journey to Italy, 243;
his _Journal of Travels_, 243, 323;
and the MSS. of gold letters, 246;
and the Sculpture Galleries, 324;
sees a Chinese book, 243;
sees Henry VIII.’s book against Luther, 244;
studying guide-books and maps, 324;
treated with courtesy at the Vatican Library, 244;
what he saw in the Vatican Library, 243, 245;
on the Vatican Virgil, 245;
visited Rome in 1585, 242.
Montalto di Castro (station for Vulci), 388.
Monte, del (_see_ JULIUS III.), 161.
Montefeltro, Duke Frederick, 218.
Montefeltro Library, 229.
Montepulciano, Cardinal Ricci da, 290.
Montfort, Amory de, 135.
Montfort, Simon de, 135.
Monuments, destruction by Romans in the Middle Ages, 357.
Morgan, Lady, says the inscription on St. Peter’s Chair is Arabic,
131.
Mosaic Chapel over tomb of Pius IX. at S. Lorenzo fuori le Mura made
by Vatican Factory, 308.
Mosaic Christs of Palermo, Monreale, and Cefalù, 184.
Mosaic pictures required for Altar of St. Peter’s, 307.
Mosaic of the Weeping Virgin, 156.
Mosaics, 24, 117, 121, 134, 136, 146, 178, 184, 185, 305;
Byzantine, 148.
Mosaics on Otto’s tomb, 93.
Mosaics of St. Peter’s contrasted with those of Sicily and S. Sofia,
307;
of St. Peter and St. Paul in the Chapel of the Tomb, 147.
Mosaics which came from the Oratory of St. John VII., 186.
Mosaics, Vatican Factory of. _See_ STUDIO DEL MOSAICO.
Mozzetta, 301.
“Multiplication of the Loaves,” 151.
Museo Chiaramonti. _See_ MUSEUM, CHIARAMONTI.
Museo Cristiano, 11, 36, 222, 223, 236, 237.
Museo Egiziano, 42.
Museo Etrusco-Gregoriano. _See_ MUSEUM, ETRUSCAN.
Museo Kircheriano, 388, 402.
Museo di Leone XIII., 27.
Museo Pio-Clementino, 79, 80, 82.
Museo Profano, 11, 36, 222, 223.
Museum of the Capitol, 388.
Museum, Chiaramonti, 24, 41, 81.
Museum of Christian Antiquities. _See_ MUSEO CRISTIANO.
Museum, Egyptian, 42, 82.
Museum, Etruscan, 19, 42, 161, 386, 387, 404.
Museums, Etruscan, at Florence, Corneto, Volterra, Chiusi, 389, ix.
Museum, Mediæval, of the Papacy. _See_ MUSEO DI LEONE XIII.
Museum, Sculpture, 7, 10, 14, 16, 18, 35, 40, 42, 99, 126, 261, 270,
280, 294, 384, viii.
“Music,” 381.
Myrina, sculptors of, 240;
terra-cotta statuettes of, 404.
Myron, 40.
Napoleon, 42, 337;
depredations of, 82;
tried to purchase a new Concordat, 82.
Napoleon I., 226.
Napoleon III., 225.
Narni, fortress of, 164.
National Museum, 76.
“Nativity” (fresco), 367, 370.
Naumachia, near the, 51.
Navicella of Giotto, 117;
garden or terrace of the, 292.
Nazianzen, S. Gregory. _See_ GREGORY.
Negri, Gaetani, 247.
Nenfro, 391.
Neri, S. Filippo, 304.
Nero, bas-reliefs from the garden of, 93, 187;
are they from the site of St. Peter’s execution? 187;
were they the inspiration of Mino da Fiesole? 187.
Nero, 95;
Christianity under, 95;
circus of, 38, 47, 48, 50, 53, 54, 64, 95, 115, 282;
condemning the Apostles, 185;
gardens of, 51, 115, 136, 140, 282;
Golden House of, 5;
Palace of, 48.
Nerva, Forum of, 287.
Nicholas I. (Czar), 225.
Nicholas III. (Gian Gaetani Orsini), 56, 161.
Nicholas V., Thomas of Sarzana (Parentucelli), 4, 5, 6, 16, 17, 31,
39, 58, 59, 62, 64, 92, 134, 190, 212, 213, ix;
absence of scheming or intrigue, 191;
“Apostle of Learning,” ix;
appointed Filelfo Papal Secretory, 204;
begins New St. Peter’s, 115, 141;
blamed for his ambition, 212;
books of, 17, 207;
bookseller of, 200;
chapel of (_see_ CHAPELS);
collection of manuscripts of, 214;
conception of making the Vatican Hill rival the Palatine, 58, 165;
his court, true explanation of the splendours of, 194, 198, 200;
death-bed speech of, 164, 194;
his destruction of Old St. Peter’s, 199;
epitaph by, on Fra Angelico, 211;
famous as a lover of art and antiquities, 163;
father of the Vatican Library, 57, 163, 165, 206, 214, 217, ix;
first of all the Popes to appreciate the antiquities of Rome, 163;
founder of archæology, 115, 166;
founder of first manufactory of tapestries, 200;
fragments of his tomb in St. Peter’s Crypt, 165, 214;
had been a librarian and copyist of manuscripts, 191, 209;
how he silenced Valla, 204;
his idea of the Renaissance of the world by learning, 190;
a keen lover of antiquities, 141;
kept staff of translators, 206;
knew no Greek, 205;
liberality to scholars of, 191, 206;
library of, 163, 208;
library chests, 246;
“little scholar of Sarzana,” 208;
the Mæcenas of the Papacy, ix;
the magnificence of his Church services, 200;
offers five thousand gold ducats for MS. of St. Matthew in the
original Greek, 191;
offers ten thousand gold ducats for translation of Homer, 191;
palace of, 16, 59;
paid Fra Angelico only fifteen ducats a month, 207;
paid Guarino one thousand crowns for translation of Strabo, 191;
paid Perotti five hundred ducats for translation of Polybius, 207;
paid Valla five hundred gold scudi for translation of Thucydides,
206;
paid greatest painters from seven to fifteen ducats a month, 191;
particular about his manuscripts, 209;
a patron of great artists, 199;
a patron of the minor arts, 199;
peace during his Pontificate, 164;
plan for rebuilding the Leonine City, 195, 196;
plan for fortifying the Vatican, 198;
portrait by Fra Angelico, 211;
printers did not _come to Rome_ till after his death, 192;
printing made its appearance in his time, 165;
his reign, supreme events happened in it, such as the Fall of
Constantinople, and the invention of printing, 191;
said he wished to spend all he possessed on books and buildings,
193;
said “A priest who was only good for ringing bells has been made
Pope,” 200;
sarcophagus of, 166, 214;
his scheme for a Papal city, 59, 165, 195, 197;
his scheme for a new St. Peter’s, 59;
the scholar Pope, 164;
scholarship never had such a Mæcenas as, 191;
sends for Poggio Bracciolini, 202;
splendid vestments and church jewels of, 200;
stained glass of, 199, 209;
study of, 199, 209;
thinks of a secular theatre in the Vatican, 64;
Thirty-Line Indulgence of, 134, 192, 213;
Thirty-One-Line Indulgence of, 134, 192, 213;
tried to preserve the ancient buildings, 58;
tried to raise Christendom against the Turks by Indulgences, 193;
tomb of, 137, 166, 183, 214;
unexpectedly raised to the Papacy, 193;
when a poor priest always in debt for manuscripts, 207;
wished to make St. Peter’s the mightiest temple in the world, 165;
wished to make Rome the centre of learning, 207;
wished to make the Vatican the astonishment of the world, and the
Holy See secure from enemies, 193, 194, 198;
world owes much to, 213.
Nielsen’s _History of the Papacy in the Nineteenth Century_, xii.
Noble Guards, 22, 23, 36, 323.
Nola, S. Paulinus of, 99.
Nominalists, 256.
Norchia, 388, 392;
had other Etruscan remains besides tombs and city walls, 388.
Norris, Father, 248.
Northumberland, Duke of, 225.
_Nova Patrum Bibliotheca_, 273.
Nozze Aldobrandini, 7, 28, 36, 82.
Numa Pompilius, 2.
Nuncios, Archives of, 268, 269.
_La Nuova Biblioteca Leonina nel Vaticano_, 260.
Nuzi of Fabriano, Allegretto, 236.
Obelisk, 49, 73.
Odescalchi, Benedetto (Pope Innocent XI.), 78.
Odyssey, paintings from the, 240.
Offa, King of the East Saxons, 103.
Office of the Pope’s Maestro de Camera, 19;
Maggiordomo, 19.
Old St. Peter’s, 1, 17, 42, 53, 86-116, 125, 126, 128, 132, 133,
134, 137, 140, 148, 181, 185, 189, 214, 340, viii;
aggregating buildings round it, 111;
arch of triumph of, 102, 112;
atrium of, 96, 98, 99, 103, 106, 107, 111, 113, 117, 120, 292;
atrium of, colonnade leading to the, 86;
atrium of, paved with marble from Meta Romuli by Pope Donus, 120;
atrium of, use of, 107;
basilica of, 86, 96, 100, 148;
basilica, what it was like, 96;
Bishop’s throne of, 107;
built out of and on Nero’s Circus, 95;
its bronze doors still used, 119;
Campanile of, 56, 98;
Cantharus of, 99;
the Cathedral of Old Rome, 87;
ciborium of, 109;
ciborium of Sixtus IV., 189;
cloister of, 111;
colonnades of, 347;
column from Confessio, 124;
condemned by Nicholas V., 115;
Confessio of, 53, 87, 93, 107, 121, 124, 125, 128, 133, 185, 340;
cradle of Christendom for twelve hundred years, 113, 115, 140;
cross from the gable of, 137, 189;
Crypt of, 138-189;
in the Crypt of St. Peter’s, 137, 181;
dedicated to St. Paul as well as St. Peter, 133;
destroyed by Julius II., 115, 172, 357;
destruction of, 115, 142, 199;
eighty-six Popes buried in, 96, 142, 159;
eighty-six tombs of the Popes destroyed by Bramante, 142, 159;
epitaph of Charlemagne over the tomb of Hadrian I., 118, 119;
epitaph of Hadrian I., not written by Charlemagne, 119;
erected by Constantine the Great, 140;
the façade of, 98, 187;
the façade of, painting of, 187;
its floor intact in Grotte Vecchie, 117, 181;
first rumoured to be dangerous under Nicholas V., 141;
foundation of the present church, 142;
the fountain (Cantharus), 86, 99, 107, 111;
frescoes of the old basilica, 93;
frescoes of, in S. Martino ai Monte, 292;
frescoes of shrines preserved in the Crypt of, 136, 187;
its garden, 111;
gold and silver treasures given by Hadrian I. in, 101;
had five gates, 112;
incongruity of its materials, 97;
interior as indicated by Giulio Romano’s “Donation of Constantine,”
110;
inscriptions from, 117;
inscriptions of Boniface VIII. on the occasion of the first jubilee
(1300 A.D.), 118;
inscriptions of Gregory II., 118;
like S. Clemente, 96;
the Madonna della Colonna from, 126;
the Madonna di Soccorso, from, 126;
the model of, 88;
more like St. Ambrogio at Milan, 96;
mosaics of, 98, 111, 113, 134, 188;
the most important remains are to be seen in the Crypt, 132;
the museum of, 88;
the museum is the Crypt of the present church, 88;
narthex, use of, 107, 111;
the only undisturbed remains, 107;
an original Constantinian church, 97;
the outward and visible sign of the Apostolic Succession, 114;
paintings of, 88;
the peacocks of, 98, 291;
the Pigna, 99;
the Pigna, compared by Dante to Nimrod’s head, 99;
porch of, 312;
Porta Argentea, 112;
Porta Guidonea, 112;
Porta Judicii or Janua Judicii, 112;
Porta Romana, 112;
Porta Ravignana, or Ravennata, 112;
its portico from the Ælian Bridge, 101;
portico from the Tiber to, 102;
its precious marbles, 97;
in Raffaelle’s tapestries, 111;
its relics, 113, 121;
its great relics--Head of St. Andrew, Holy Lance, relics of St.
Peter and St. Paul, Volto Santo, 121;
remains of, 117;
its sanctity, 114;
on the site of the execution of St. Peter, 95;
the Tabernacle of Christendom, 116;
Temple of Christianity, 189;
tombs of the Popes, 159;
its treasures, 105, 109, 113;
treasures given by Pope Honorius, 113;
treasures given by Leo IV., 109;
its venerableness, 113, 114;
vestibule of, 287.
Old St. Peter’s and St. Peter’s Crypt, 88.
Oliphant, Mrs., 215, 217.
S. Optatus of Milevum, 130.
Oratory of SS. Sudario. _See_ JOHN VII.’S CHAPEL OF THE VOLTO SANTO.
Oratory of S. Veronica. _See_ JOHN VII.’S CHAPEL OF THE VOLTO SANTO.
Oriental alabaster, 340.
Orosius, Bishop, 123.
Orsini, Cardinal, 124.
Orsini, Gian Gaetani (Pope Nicholas III.), 57, 161.
Orsini, Vincenzo Maria (_see_ BENEDICT XIII.), 78.
Orvieto, 164, 173;
Cathedral of, 354;
Etruscan tomb, with all its properties untouched, 392;
fortress of, 164;
full of old Romanesque houses, 173.
Osiris changed into the god Apis, 372.
Ostia and Velletri, frescoes from castle of, 240.
Otranto School, 237.
Otto, 86.
Otto II., Emperor, 92, 93, 134, 175, 176, 184;
font not the cover of the sarcophagus of, 127, 175;
tomb of, 127, 175, 176, 184;
tomb said to be a fountain at the Quirinale, 176.
Otto III., Emperor, 127, 176;
buried in Cathedral of Aix-la-Chapelle, 128.
Ottoboni, Cardinal, 227.
Ottoboni Collection, 36, 219, 224.
Ottoboni, Pietro (Pope Alexander VIII.), 78.
Pagan Emperors, legends connecting Christianity with, 123.
Pagan sarcophagi, often used for Christians, 152.
Painting is not like literature, 404;
the three noblest conceptions of the Son of God in, 311.
Paintings, ancient, 239;
from the Odyssey, 240;
from Villa at Tor Marancia, 240.
Palæologus, Thomas, 172, 193.
Palafrenieri, 301.
Palatina, Biblioteca, 77, 218, 219.
Palatine, The, 6, 13, 17, 38, 39, 105, 372.
Palatine Guards, 22.
Palatine Library. _See_ BIBLIOTECA PALATINA.
Palatine MS. of Seventh-Century Virgil, 230.
Palazzo di Venezia, 60, 154, 161.
Palazzolo Acreide in Sicily, 394.
Palermo, Royal Chapel of, 98, 112, 184, 366;
Spanish fortifications at, 284.
Palestrina, 168, 279, 399.
Palimpsests, 218, 227, 228, 264, 271, 272;
from the Benedictine Library of Bobbio, 218.
Paliotto, 109;
of the high altar, 185.
Pallavicino, Cardinal, 310.
Pallium, 121, 144, 145.
Palo (station for Caere), 388.
Pamfili, family of, 77, 146;
Giambattista (Pope Innocent X.), 77.
Pantheon, The, 106, 185, 346, 349;
granted by Phocas to Boniface
IV., 185;
consecrated to S. Maria ad Martyres, 185;
spurious chest of S. Veronica’s Handkerchief, 124;
thirty waggon-loads of martyrs’ bones brought here from the
Catacombs, 185.
Panvinio, 215.
Papal carriages, arms of the new Pope placed on all the, 295;
very few of them go back beyond Pius IX., 295.
Papal Court, 3, 8, 23, 268, 302.
Papal Cross, 301.
Papal Curia. _See_ PAPAL COURT.
Papal Gendarmes, 323.
Papal Guards. _See_ NOBLE GUARDS, SWISS GUARD, PAPAL GENSDARMES.
Papal grooms. _See_ PALAFRENIERI.
Papal hat, 300, 301.
Papal litter, 300.
Papal pages, 301.
Papal Palace, old, 355.
Papal printing-press. _See_ VATICAN PRESS.
Papal States, 335.
Papal territory, 281.
Papal umbrella, 302.
_La Papauté et la Civilization_, xvii.
Papier-mâché work, 354.
Papiri, Cabinet of the, 236.
Papiri of the Vatican Library, 246.
Papyrus, 243.
Paradise, Adam and Eve and the Serpent in, 151.
Parentucelli, Tommaso (Pope Nicholas V.), 13, 163, 191.
Paride de Grassi, 310.
“Parnassus,” The, 30.
Paschal II., 181.
Paschal III., 107.
Pasha, Khedive Ibrahim. _See_ KHEDIVE.
Passeggiata Margherita, 50.
St. Paul, execution of, 148;
of the late Roman frescoes and Byzantine mosaics, 148;
martyrdom of, 133;
of Pollaiuolo, 148;
traditional portrait of, 148.
Paul II. (Barbo), 59, 92, 96, 148, 161, 214;
collection of classical and mediæval antiquities of, 163;
desired to be buried in the sarcophagus of S. Costanza, which he
had removed to the Palazzo di Venezia, 163;
had the finest tomb of the Middle Ages, 92, 134, 154, 161;
the handsomest of the Popes, 162;
sarcophagus of, 92, 163;
mausoleum of, 134, 154, 161, 163;
re-creating tomb of, 154, 155, 162;
wishes to take the name of Formosus (The Beautiful), 162;
taste for dress and jewels, 163;
vanity of, 162.
Paul III. (Alessandro Farnese), 9, 32, 57, 71, 321, 325, 337, 343,
344, 379;
and the building of St. Peter’s, 337;
melts the ancient jewels of Thermantia, 337, 343;
tomb of, destroyed, 337.
Paul IV. (Giovanni Pietro Caraffa), 71, 204;
has clothes painted round figures in Michel Angelo’s “Last
Judgment,” 72.
Paul V. (Camillo Borghese), 75, 78, 121, 167, 266, 268, 286, 323;
fountains in the Vatican Gardens of, 286.
St. Paul’s Without the Walls, 94.
S. Paulinus of Nola on the Fountain of Old St. Peter’s, 99.
Pavilion, Hill of the, 16.
Pavilion of Pius IV. _See_ PIUS IV., CASINO OF.
Pecci, Cardinal Joachim (Pope Leo XIII.), _q.v._
Pelasgic style of Etruscan jewellery, 398.
Pentecost by Domenichino, 327.
Peonies, wild, 282.
Pepin the Short, King, 173.
Peretti, Felice (Pope Sixtus V.), 73.
Perotti, 207.
Perotto, Nicola (same as above), 165.
Perugino, 30, 60, 314, 325, 330, 370, 375, 387;
his frescoes over altar of Sistine Chapel, 60, 71, 314, 330, 370;
unidentified disciple of, 355.
Perusia (Perugia), 387.
St. Peter, buried in the place of his martyrdom, 50;
denying Christ, 150;
epistle of, 55;
execution of, 38, 47, 133, 136, 148;
site of execution of, 47-55, 64, 73, 148, 175, 282;
execution of, site of, not at S. Pietro in Montorio, 50, 175;
founds the Roman Church, 55;
holding three keys is significant of Church triumphant, militant,
and suffering, 184;
liberation of, 30;
martyrdom of (_see_ ST. PETER, execution of);
sarcophagus under the Papal altar, 146;
sarcophagus not under the exact centre of the basilica, 146;
shrine of, in the crypt, 94, 102;
superstition about disturbing the grave of, 89, 116, 144;
throne of, 160.
St. Peter, chair of, 100, 126, 129, 130, 131, 132;
bronze, made by Bernini for Alexander VII., 131;
description of, 131 et seq.;
exhibited by Pius IX. in the Chapel of the Holy Sacrament, 131;
in the baptistery, 132;
Labours of Hercules on, 131;
not the Sedia Curulis, 132;
not his seat in the House of Pudens, 130;
not in the form of a curule chair, but Byzantine, 131;
sixth century, 131;
where his original chair is kept, 130.
St. Peter, statue of, 120, 129, 342;
afterwards in the Chapel of SS. Processus and Martinian, 121;
in crypt once a Consul, 137, 155, 188;
stood formerly in the Oratory of St. Martin, 121.
St. Peter, tomb of, 89, 94, 95, 96, 109, 121, 130, 132, 140, 146;
below level of Old St. Peter’s, 141;
Clement VIII. thinks of opening it, 90, 143;
closed by Clement VIII., 90, 108, 144, 145;
erected by Linus and Anacletus, 140;
examined by Père Grisar, 144;
in the Via Cornelia, 140;
its gold cross
given by the Empress Helena, 89, 143;
not sacked by the Saracens, 145;
present condition of, 145;
seen by Clement VIII., 89, 143, 146;
walled over, 141, 144.
St. Peter in mosaics, 148.
St. Peter and St. Paul, 148, 150;
relics of, 121;
traditional portraits of, 148.
Peter’s Pence, institution of, 104.
St. Peter’s tomb as arranged by Constantine the Great, 108.
St. Peter’s, 9, 19, 33, 101, 102, 140, 141, 261, 294, 322, 337, 339;
altar of, 102, 306;
altar of S. Mary of the Column, 186;
anarchist outrage in, 89;
archives of, 344;
baldachin of, 348;
baldachini, 110;
baptistery of, 127;
basilica of Constantine in, 146;
Confessio of, 107, 133, 139, 144, 145;
Confessio of, paving of chamber of, 144;
seventeenth-century mosaic in Confessio of, 146;
thirteenth-century mosaic in Confessio of, 146;
date of founding, 94;
in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, 106;
Ethelwulf’s gifts to, 104;
font of, 127, 175, 176;
Klaczko wrong about font of, 175;
finest mediæval monument in, 126;
gallery of, 33, 322;
high altar of, 110;
high altar erected by Sixtus IV. over the Confessio, 133;
the hive of Christendom, 286;
Illumination of, 351;
little above the level of the Tiber, 142;
nave of, 91;
Needle (“Aguglia di S. Pietro”), 74;
New, 141, 154;
New, foundation laid by Julius, 11, 141;
Old (_see_ OLD ST. PETER’S);
Papal altar of, 102, 109, 110, 341;
Papal entrance from the Vatican to, 125;
Piazza of, 10, 20, 49, 59, 73, 75, 78, 281, 317, 322, 347;
view of, from the Piazza of St. Peter’s, 281;
porch of, 33, 102; roof of, 346;
roof of, makes a huge Piazza, 347;
no houses on roof of, 346;
sacristy of, 9, 52, 57, 73, 125, 339, 340, 342, 344, ix;
sacristy contains celebrated Vatican cross, 128;
site of, 115;
Tesoro of (treasure) (_see_ TREASURY);
tomb, chamber of, 144;
tomb of Innocent VIII., 126;
tribune of, 100, 126;
view of, from garden of Pope, 280, 286.
St. Peter’s, bronze statue of St. Peter in, 129;
not the statue of Jupiter of Capitolinus, 120;
may have been made from Jupiter’s statue, 120;
may be fifth-century, but more probably sixth-century work, 120;
is twelve hundred years old, 129.
St. Peter’s, Crypt of, 1, 88, 90, 92, 93, 117, 132, 133, 134, 136,
137, 138-189, viii;
early Christian remains in the, 152;
entrances to, 139;
faith as well as monuments in the, 137;
lectures on, 90, 138;
part of the old basilica, 132;
seen by torchlight till Pius X.’s time, 90.
St. Peter’s, dome of, 345-352, ix;
ascent of, by spiral plane, 345, 348;
ascent should not be missed, 350;
cost and number of people employed on, 349;
cupola of, 349;
diameter of, 346;
exterior of, 348;
height of, 346;
finished by Giacomo della Porta, 349;
finished in twenty-two months, 349;
gallery running round the, 349;
Michel Angelo’s dome, 349;
mosaics of, 348;
permission to ascend, 345;
must be visited between 8 a.m. and 11 a.m., 345;
and Spanish Armada begun almost simultaneously, 350;
view of mountains from, 347.
Petrarca, 271.
Petrarch, autograph of, 228.
Pharos, Great, 102.
Phidias, 40.
Philip le Bel of France, 168, 170.
Philip IV., of Spain, 326.
Phocas grants the Pantheon to Boniface IV., 185.
Phœnicia, 398.
Piccolomini, Æneas Sylvius (Pius II.), 61, 92, 170, 376.
Piccolomini, Francesco (Pius III.), 62.
Picture gallery, 7.
Pictures, mediæval, in the Vatican Library, 236.
Pier, 139.
San Pietrini, or steeple-jacks of St. Peter’s, 346, 347;
do not live on roof of St. Peter’s, 347.
S. Pietro, Church of, 54.
S. Pietro e Marcellino, 94.
S. Pietro in Montorio, 50, 175;
is under the protection of Spain, 50.
Pigna, 42, 99, 291, 292.
Pigna, Giardino della. _See_ GIARDINO.
Pignatelli, Antonio (Pope Innocent XII.), 78.
Pilate, 122, 150.
Pilgrims, 56, 147, 284;
sometimes hold special services in the Chapel of the Tomb in the
Crypt, 147;
offerings of the, 106.
Pinacoteca, 31, viii.
Pincian Hill, 290.
Pinturicchio, 7, 27, 28, 60, 61, 84, 170, 229, 236, 314, 330, 354,
362, 363, 365-383, 385;
Alexander VI.’s letter to, 356;
beautiful backgrounds of, 369, 373, 374;
frescoes by, 170, 173, 314, 330;
frescoes in the library of Siena by, 170, 314, 376;
his increasing popularity, 354;
his pupils, 355;
masterpiece by, 355, 375;
paintings in the Castle of S. Angelo by, 356;
paintings in the Vatican by, 355;
school of, 363;
splendour of his Borgia Apartments’ paintings, 356.
Pistolesi’s _Il Vaticano Descritto ed Illustrato_, xviii.
Pitti Palace at Florence, 341;
monstrances in the, 338.
Pius II. (Æneas Sylvius Piccolomini), 61, 92, 152, 170, 171, 172,
192, 376;
and Pius III., their bodies transferred to S. Andrea della Valle,
172;
his career, 171, 172;
did nothing to the Vatican
Library, 215;
in his reign the Head of St. Andrew brought to Rome, 172, 182;
has an ancient sarcophagus, decorations on it, 170;
his passion to destroy Turkish power, 172.
Pius III. (Francesco Piccolomini), 62, 152, 172;
the last Pope buried in Old St. Peter’s, 172;
sarcophagus of, 172;
his work as a Pope, 172.
Pius IV. (Giovanni Angelo de’ Medici), 268, 288, 357;
Casino of, 2, 61, 72, 288, 289, 290;
brilliant soirées in the Casino of, 289;
description of Casino of, 289;
rescued the Borgia Rooms, 357.
S. Pius V. (Michele Ghislieri), 72, 268.
Pius VI. (Angelo Braschi), 24, 78, 79, 81, 179, 219, 222, 269, viii;
builds the Vatican Sculpture Gallery, 79;
no tomb in St. Peter’s, 80;
a prisoner, 80;
statue of, in Confessio of Vatican, 80, 144, 146.
Pius VII. (Chiaramonti Pope), 24, 25, 40, 42, 81, 82, 219, 226, 235,
238, 310, 332, 358, 360, viii;
founder of the Egyptian Museum, 82;
founder of the Gallery of Inscriptions, 82, 235;
founder of the Museo Chiaramonti, 81;
a great embellisher of the Vatican, 81;
a prisoner in France, 82, 332;
visits France in 1804 to crown Napoleon, 82.
Pius VIII. (Francesco Saverio Castiglione), 83, 289.
Pius IX. (Giovanni Maria Mastai-Ferretti), 3, 19, 21, 30, 39, 84,
130, 219, 226, 277, 293, 294, 295, 296, 297, 298, 308, 359,
viii;
all his carriages have the same peculiarity, 295;
beloved of the Romans, 84;
buys library of Cardinal Mai, 277;
driving out in state, 296;
drove in a _cavalcata_, 298;
first Pope to “pass the years of St. Peter,” 84;
his postillion the cicerone of the coach-house, 295;
Sultan confers a diamond order on the mule of, 297;
his use of tobacco, 296;
præcordia of, 178;
præcordia of, buried near the three Stuarts, 178;
tiara of, 335.
Pius X., 88, 89, 280, 285;
arms of, 304;
tiara of, 335.
Plantin printing-press at Antwerp, 244.
Platina, the famous librarian of the Vatican, 161, 215, 216.
Platner, 120.
Pliny, illustrated MS. of, 227.
Plutarch, with notes by Grotius, from Queen Christina’s library, 227.
Poggio Bracciolini. _See_ BRACCIOLINI.
Pollaiuolo, Antonio, 61, 125, 126.
Pollaiuolo, Matteo, 53, 93, 133, 148, 149, 185;
and the screen for the old Confessio, 93, 185;
as an artist, 93;
Confessio of, 93, 133, 148;
his “St. Paul,” 148;
not to be confused with Antonio and Pietro, 148.
Pollaiuolo, Pietro, 126.
Polycletus, 44.
Pompeii, 238, 314.
Pompey, Theatre of, 217.
Pompilius, Numa, 2, 282.
Pons Neronianus, 48.
Pons Triumphalis, 48.
Pons Vaticanus, 48.
Ponte Molle, 161.
Pontifical of Cardinal Ottoboni, 227.
Pontifical registers, 267.
_Pontificalis, Liber_, 51, 95, 267.
Pope, the, 22;
apartments of, 12, 19, 21, 43, 73, 74, 328, 357;
apartments of, founded by Urban VIII., 77;
chrism boxes of, 335;
coach-house of, 4, 37, 294-308;
garden of the, 1, 10, 16, 37;
classical garden of the, 280, 281;
garden, oranges in, 280;
who saw St. Peter’s tomb (_see_ CLEMENT VIII.), 89, 94;
private tapestries of, 8, 325, ix;
riding in the _cavalcata_, the, 298;
Sacrist of, 329;
shoes of, 331;
stockings of, 332;
vesting chamber of, 327;
temporary tomb of the late, 126;
tiara of (_see_ TIARA).
Pope-King, 11.
Popes, list of, xix-xxiv;
English, 92, 173;
departure of to Avignon, 267;
in exile, viii;
of fifteenth and sixteenth century, generous embellishers of the
Vatican, 62;
palace of (_see_ VATICAN);
tombs from Old St. Peter’s, 159, viii;
white mule, harness for, 297;
triple crown of the, 136, 335, 343.
Pope’s entrance to St. Peter’s from the Vatican, 125;
four state progresses before 1870, 304;
Mass, 23;
palace at Castel Gandolfo, 281;
Secretary of State, Cardinal Merry del Val (_see_ SECRETARY OF
STATE and MERRY DEL VAL).
Porphyry, 127, 180.
Porta, Giuseppe della, 318.
Porta, S. Paolo, 51.
Porta Viridaria, 58.
Porticus Julii, 38.
Portone di Bronzo, 10, 15, 20, 32, 119, 308, 317.
Portone di Ferro, 10.
Potter, Miss Mary Knight, xii.
Pottery, Berlin, 226;
Swiss, 224, 226.
Pozzolana, Romans destroyed ancient buildings for their, 68.
Præneste casket, 402.
Præneste, collection in the Museo Kircheriano, 402.
Prague, 218.
Praxiteles, 40.
Preachings, 23.
Pretender, Old, 91, 345.
Pretender, Young, 91.
Prignano, Bartolommeo (Urban VI.), 160, 161.
Prime Minister, Pope’s, 26.
Principe Assistente al Soglio, 158.
Principi Assistenti of the Papal Throne, 301.
Printed Books, Library of. _See_ LIBRARY.
Printing, discovery of, 134.
S. Priscilla, Catacomb of, 130.
Propaganda, 76.
Protestant Germans in 1527, destruction done by, 70.
Prudentius, poem of, 100.
Pudens, House of, 131;
magisterial chair of, 131.
Pyramid of Caius Cestius, 51.
Quadrivium, 380.
Quintian meadows, viii, 46.
Quintilian, 201.
Quirinale, 176, 300, 340.
“Quod non fecerunt Barbari, fecerunt Barberini,” 76.
Raccolta, Prima, Seconda, Terza, 256.
Raffaelle, 5, 21, 26, 29, 43, 60, 309-316, 327, 328, 370, 381, 387;
appointed architect of St. Peter’s by Leo X., 66;
Apostles of the type of the Salvationists of to-day, 311;
Bible of, 23;
calls the Romans more destructive than the Goths, 68;
“Hours” of, 26, 384;
laments destruction of ancient Rome, 68, 69;
and his pupils, charming frescoes by them in the bathroom of
Cardinal Bibiena, 29, 382.
Raffaelle’s cartoons bought by Charles I., in Flanders, 309;
“Cupid and Psyche,” 365;
illustrated plan of Rome, 66;
letter to Leo X., 66, 67;
Loggie, 7, 12, 23, 31, 65, 73, 235, 328, ix;
masterpiece, 66, 311;
“Miraculous Draught of Fishes,” 312;
pupils, 31, 364, 383;
“School of Athens,” 365, 381;
Stanze, 7, 30, 31, 71, 357, 365, 384;
“St. Peter healing the Paralytic at the Beautiful Gate of the
Temple,” 312.
Raffaelle’s tapestries, 60, 65, 111, 309-316, ix;
“The Adoration of the Magi,” 313;
bought by Pius VII., 310;
of the “Calling of St. Peter,” 311;
the cartoons originally intended for the Loggie, 309;
“Conversion of St. Paul,” 313;
cost of, according to Lanciani, 309;
“Death of Ananias,” 313;
first hung in the Sistine Chapel, 60, 310;
glorious in colour and dignity, 311;
inferiority of those designed by his pupils, 313;
injured in the Constable of Bourbon’s sack of Rome, 310;
“Massacre of the Innocents,” 313;
the most beautiful, 312;
not to be missed, 314;
“The Sacrifice of Lystra,” 312;
sold by the French to a Genoese Jew, 310;
“The Stoning of Stephen,” 313;
“St. Paul in Prison at Philippi,” 313.
Raffaelle’s “Transfiguration,” 32.
Ravenna, 236;
inhabitants of Trastevere sprung from, 112.
Reading-rooms, 39.
Red Sea, passage of, 151.
Regulini-Galassi tomb yielded the golden treasures which are the
glory of the Gregorian Museum, 393, 397, 399.
Remus, Meta of, 51.
Renaissance, 72, 190;
most classical work of, 72;
object of the Earlier Italian, 202.
“Resurrection, The” (fresco), 367.
“_Il Retiro del Giulio II._,” 382.
Reverenda Fabbrica di S. Pietro, 309, 345.
Rezzonico, Carlo (Pope Clement XIII.), 78.
Rezzonico, Prince, 298.
Rhampsinitus (Rameses), 212.
“Rhetoric,” 380.
Rhodes, Knights of St. John at, 62.
Riario, Cardinal, 216, 217;
extravagance of, 217;
garden of, 278.
Riccardi Chapel. _See_ CHAPELS.
Ricci, Corrado, 355, 356, 359, 360, 377, 378, 379, 380, x;
admits the skill with which Seitz worked, 360;
his book on Pinturicchio, 360, xvi;
his coloured reproductions of Pinturicchio, 378;
disagrees with Ehrle, 360.
Rienzi, Cola di, 177, 342.
Ristori, Fra, 58.
Robes of Popes and Cardinals, 332.
Robes presented to Leo XIII. for his Jubilee, 333;
worn by the Pope on his throne on the Sedia Gestatoria, 336.
Robing-rooms, Cardinals’, 8, 25;
Pope’s, 8, 26, 327.
Rochet, 301.
“Roma caput mundi regit orbis frena rotundi,” 190.
Roman art, little pictures which border great pictures, 314.
Roman frescoes, 148.
Roman portrait busts, 150.
Roman Triumph, 299.
Romano, Giulio, 30, 228.
Romano, MS. sixth-century Virgil, 230.
Romano, Paulo, 156, 184.
Romans, ancient, did not allow burials in the city grounds, 111;
tombs spared by the, 55.
“Rome centre de la Renaissance, et mère de toute civilization!” 190.
Rome, decorations for birthday of, 298;
founders of, 281;
panorama of, from the dome of St. Peter’s, 346;
sack of, 113;
sack of, by the Constable of Bourbon, in 1527, 70, 214.
Romescot, 105.
Romulus, birthday of, 280;
meta of, 52, 120;
and Remus, tombs of, 51, 120.
Room of the Papiri. _See_ HALL OF THE PAPIRI.
Rospigliosi, Giulio (Pope Clement IX.), 78.
Rosselli, Cosimo, 60.
Rossellino, Antonio, the heavenly sculptor, 141.
Rossellino, Bernardo, 141.
De Rossi, 130, 260, 264;
of the day, xvii, 128;
permitted by Pius IX. to see the Chair of St. Peter, 130.
Rotonda, 79.
Rouen Cathedral, spire of, 346.
Rovere, M. Bartolommeo della, 69.
Rovere, Count Girolamo, 216, 217.
Rovere, Cardinal Giuliano della, 216, 217.
Rovere, Francesco della, 65.
Roveres, della, 10, 12, 60.
“Il Rovinante,” 96, 142.
Rudolf of Burgundy, 105.
Ruland, bibliophile Canon, Antonio, 256.
Russian Calendar, 237.
Sacramentary of Boniface IX., 229.
Sacred Way, 3, 299.
Sacristan, 339.
Sacristies, their accessibility, 339, 344.
Sacristy of St. Peter’s. _See_ ST. PETER’S, SACRISTY OF.
Sacristy, Sistine, 9.
Sagrestia Commune, 339.
Sagrestia dei Beneficiati, 340.
Sagrestia dei Canonici, 339.
Sala degli Animali, 41, 79.
Sala delle Arti Liberali, 361, 378.
Sala delle Arti e Scienze, 28, 378, 379, 380, 381.
Sala della Beatificazione, 11.
Sala della Biga, 19, 42, 79, 386.
Sala dei Bussolanti, 22.
Sala dei Busti, 41.
Sala Clementina, 22.
Sala del Concistorio, 12.
Sala di Consultazione, 258, 260.
Sala di Costantino, 31.
Sala del Credo, 11, 28, 355, 382.
Sala a Croce Greca, 41, 79.
Sala Ducale, 11, 16, 18, 25, 33, 78, 323, 324, 330, ix;
arch of, 339.
Sala dell’ Immacolata, 29.
Sala dei Misteri, 27, 360, 361, 365, 367, 368, 369, 370;
its frescoes, 365.
Sala delle Muse, 41, 79.
Sala dei Palafrenieri, 22, 31.
Sala del Pappagallo, 25, 33.
Sala dei Paramenti, 25, 33.
Sala dei Pontefici, 11, 26, 27, 277, 355, 381, 382, 384;
its tapestries, 384.
Sala Regia, built by Antonio di Sangallo, 11, 12, 16, 32, 71, 73,
317, 318, 330, ix.
Sala Rotonda, 41, 79.
Sala delle Sibylle, 11, 29, 355, 380, 382;
not the work of Pinturicchio, 382.
Sala Sistina, 5, 38, 39, 220, 223, 236, 254, 255, 256, 258, 260, 261.
Sala della Vita Madonna, 11, 27.
Sala delle Vite dei Santi, 11, 27, 371, 372, 377.
Salviati, Prince, 300.
Sancta Sanctorum, 161.
Sangallo, Antonio da, 32, 71, 318, 321.
Sano di Pietro, 236.
Sansovino, 378.
Sant’ Angelo, Bridge of, 101, 197.
Sant’ Angelo, Castle of, 2, 71, 177, 267, 355, 356, 378;
converted into a first-class mediæval fortress, 355;
passage from the Vatican to, 355.
Santa Croce, Princess, 298.
Santi di Tito, 288.
Santo Spirito, 48.
Saracens, 102, 109, 283;
defeat of at Ostia, 30;
sack of the ninth century, 109.
Sarcophagus, the finest Christian Roman, 152;
open, full of flowers--design used by Pinturicchio, Perugino,
Raffaelle, 370.
Sarzana, 6, 17, 57, 163, 165, 191, 200, 214.
Sarzana, Thomas of, 57, 165, 191, 200, 214.
Savonarola, 174, 356.
Saxon china, 235.
Saxon kings, 103;
become monks, 103;
urns of, 110.
Saxon schools, 105.
Saxons had a church, the, 106.
Scala Nobile, 19, 41, 42, 79.
Scala Pia, 15, 19, 21.
Scala Regia, by Bernini, 11, 19, 29, 32, 77, 78, 317, 321.
Scala Santa, 161.
Scarabæi, agate, 400;
revolving, 401.
“Scherzi d’acqua,” 291.
Schism, Great, 268.
“School of Athens,” 30, 365, 381.
Scipio, tomb of, 120.
Scorpions and serpents in Cerveteri tombs, 395.
Scrinium, 267.
_Scriptorum veterum nova collectio_, 273.
Scrittori, 221, 358.
Sculpture, fragments of pagan, 97, 98.
Sculpture Gallery. _See_ MUSEUM OF SCULPTURE.
San Sebastian of the Borgia Rooms, 28, 372.
S. Sebastian, Church of, on the Palatine, 373.
Secretary of State, Cardinal, 7, 15, 26, 27, 28, 326, 379;
reception rooms of, 8, 379.
Sedia Curulis, 132.
Sedia Gestatoria, 9, 132, 302, 323, 336.
Segretario della Reverenda Fabbrica di S. Pietro, 138.
Seitz, Commendatore Ludivico, art director of the Vatican, 221, 316,
359, 360;
his restoration of the Borgia Rooms, only one considerable
alteration of the pictures in, 360.
Seneca, 228.
Sermonetti, 81.
Serpotta, Giacomo, 320;
exquisite stucchi of, 320.
Sèvres vases, 39, 225.
Sicily, a sarcophagus used three times in, 153.
Siena, 170.
Siena, Cathedral Library of, frescoes of, 27, 61, 84, 170, 210, 314,
365, 384.
Signorelli, Luca, 30, 60.
Silius Italicus, 201.
Silvagni, 343 (_note 21_), xvi.
S. Silvester, Pope, 180.
Sistine Chapel. _See_ CHAPELS.
Sistine Treasury. _See_ TREASURY, SISTINE.
Sisto, Fra, 58.
Sixte-Quint, 236.
Sixtus, 11, 211.
Sixtus IV. (della Rovere), builder of the Sistine Chapel, 16, 53, 60,
102, 125, 133, 204, 215, 216, 267, 269, 362, 378;
appointed Platina director of the Vatican Library, 215;
ciborium of, 157, 189;
ciborium of, all its Twelve Apostles preserved, 189;
nephews of, 217;
his Vatican Library (now the Floreria), 216 (_note 14_).
Sixtus V. (Felice Peretti), 31, 38, 49, 73, 74, 218, 226, 242, 248,
266, 305, 349, 357;
builds Library of Vatican across Cortile del Belvedere, 64;
Library of, ix.
Small Cabinets, Room of, 36.
Sobieska, tomb of Maria Clementina, 345.
Sodoma, 30.
Solomon, Temple of, 124.
Sophia, Hagia, 87.
Soracte, Bernard of, 129.
Soutane, kept ready for the new Pope, 286.
_Spada e cappa_, 23.
_Spicilegium Romanum_, 273.
S. Spirito, 106.
Spogliatoio, 25.
Spoleto, fortress of, 164.
S.P.Q.R., 299.
Spurina, 387.
Squills, 3, 293.
Stables, 37.
Stadium of Domitian. _See_ DOMITIAN.
Staircase to the Museo Pio-Clementino, 19.
Staircase from the Vatican to St. Peter’s, 34.
Staircases, 15, 19.
Stamperia, or printing-house, 255.
Stanza Capitolare. _See_ CHAPTER HOUSE.
Stanza d’Eliodoro, 30.
Stanza dell’ Incendio, 30.
Stanza dei Papiri, 36, 236.
Stanza della Segnatura, 30.
Stanze. _See_ RAFFAELLE.
State banquets, 326.
Statue, Galleria delle. _See_ GALLERIA.
Steeplejacks. _See_ PIETRINI, SAN.
Stefaneschi, Cardinal, 128.
Steinmann, 259.
Stephania, widow of Crescentius, kills Otto, 128.
Stephen II., 100.
Stilicho, 100, 282, 343.
Stone on which the bodies of St. Peter and St. Paul were divided,
134, 180.
Stone-pines, 3, 290, 293.
La Storta Fornella (station for Veii), 388.
Story, Mr. W. W., xvi.
St. Peter’s. _See_ PETER’S, ST.
Strada di Monte Mario, 48.
Stuart Princes, last three, 91;
monument of the, 345;
tomb of the, 91.
Stucchi, 24, 33, 34, 321, 328.
Students, 24, 254.
Studio del Mosaico (Mosaic Factory of the Vatican), 254, 305, 306,
307, 308;
_permessi_ required to see it, 308.
_Summa Theologiæ_, 265.
S. Susanna and the Elders, 373.
Sweden, Christina of. _See_ CHRISTINA.
Swiss Guard, 8, 10, 16, 22, 26, 35, 300, 303, 323, 326, 353.
S. Swithin, 104.
Sylvester, Bishop, 95.
Symmachus, Pope, 56, 292, viii.
Symonds, John Addington, 201.
Tacitus, 48.
Tanagra, sculptors of, 239.
Tanagra and Myrina, terra-cotta statuary of, 404.
Tapestries, 8, 324, 326, 329;
Pope’s private, 8, 324;
in the Sala dei Pontefici, 362, 364;
of Mr. Joseph Whitaker, of Palermo, 326.
Tarquinii (Corneto), 387, 393;
acetylene flare at tombs of, 396;
more than a hundred thousand tombs deep down in the earth, 393.
Tasso, autograph of, 228;
MSS. of _Gerusalemme Liberata_, 228.
Tempesta, 316.
Temple of Fortune, 168, 279.
Temple of Venus and Rome, gilt tiles, 101.
Templum Probi, 100, 125.
Temporal power, 10, 17, 34, 135, 304, 340;
its abolition, vii.
Temporal sovereignty, 322.
Terence of the ninth century, 227.
Terence of the fourth century, the oldest known, 227.
Terra-cottas, Room of the, 36.
Terza Raccolta, 256.
Tesoro of St. Peter’s. _See_ TREASURY.
Theodore de Beza, 251.
Theodore de Gaza, 165, 206.
Theodosius, 95.
Theophylactus, first great Pontifical Librarian, 267.
Thermantia (wife of Honorius), 100, 337, 343;
treasure in her tomb, 337, 343.
Thirty-Line Indulgence. _See_ under NICHOLAS V.
Thirty-One-Line Indulgence. _See_ under NICHOLAS V.
Thirty Years’ War, 180, 218.
Throne, Papal, 23.
Throne in the Chapel of S. Maria della Bocciata, 94.
Tiara, the Papal, 167, 211, 335;
how the three crowns were added, 335, 343;
origin of the Papal, 342.
Tiara of the Popes, 34, 335.
Tiara of Paul III., 337.
Tiara of St. Peter’s statue, 342.
Tiara worn by Pius VII. in his captivity, 332.
Tiara, triple-crowned, 211, 343.
Tiber, 347.
Tiberius, 121, 122;
becomes a tyrant on refusal of Senate to enroll Christ among the
gods, 123;
miraculous cure of, 122.
Tibur of Horace, 83.
Tiles, old Borgia, 382.
Tilly, 218.
Titus, Baths of, 315, 327.
Tivoli, Villa d’Este at, 279.
Tolentino, Treaty of, 81.
Tomb of Maria Clementina Sobieska, 345.
Tomb paintings, 393 _et seq._
Tomb of Popes, temporary. _See_ POPES, TEMPORARY TOMB OF.
Tomb of St. Stephen and St. Lawrence, 210.
Tomb of the wives of the Emperor Honorius, 57, 337, 342.
Tombs, classical, 53.
Tombs of Popes destroyed by Julius II., 115.
Tor Marancia, paintings from Villa at, 240.
Torre Borgia, 16, 29, 36, 355, 381, 382.
Torri, Fontana della, 287.
Torso of Hercules, 41, 65;
Vestibule of the (_see_ VESTIBULE).
Toscanella, Etruscan terra-cotta sarcophagi, 391;
gardens are full of Etruscan tombs, 391.
Tournament ground, 63.
Tournaments, 64.
Tournaments, courts of, 38.
Trajan, Baths of, 38.
Treasury of St. Peter’s, 9, 329, 340, 344.
Treasury, Sistine, 9, 34, 100, 329, 331-338, 340, ix;
seventy rooms of plate in the, 337.
Trebizond, Gregory of, 165, 204.
Trent, Council of, 244, 247.
Treves, Archbishopric of, 234.
Triregno. _See_ TIARA, TRIPLE.
Triveth, English Dominican, 228.
Trivium, 379.
Tuker and Malleson, xiii.
Turks, 72, 182, 183, 192, 330.
“Turris unde mare prospicitur,” 284.
Tuscany, 386;
London imports ready-made tombs from, 390.
Tusculum, 282.
Tyrrhene style of Etruscan jewellery, 398.
Tyrrhene treasures in the Gregorian Museum, 399.
Udine, Giovanni da, 5, 21, 24, 25, 315, 327, 364;
arabesques of, 327;
Loggia of, 25, 235, 315, 327, 329, ix;
Pompeian paintings of, 315;
stuccoes of, 315.
Uditori of the Rota, 301.
Ugolini, Monsignor, Scrittore of the Vatican Library, 221, 261, 263,
358.
Ulphilas, Gothic version by, 276.
Umbria, artists of, 386.
Università Gregoriana, 76.
University, Roman, 160.
Urban V., or Benedict XII. adds third crown to the Papal Tiara, 167,
343.
Urban VI. (Prignano Pope), 350;
cruelty of, 160;
epitaph of, 161;
sarcophagus of, 160;
lions from his tomb adorn the Throne of St. Peter, 160, 188;
sarcophagus emptied by the workmen building the Dome, 160, 350.
Urban VII., 75.
Urban VIII. (Maffeo Barberini), 20, 76, 125, 220, 222, 269, 284, 327;
ramparts of, 284.
“Urbi et orbi.” _See_ BLESSING OF THE POPES.
Urbino Bible, 234.
“Urbino, A History of the Dukes of,” with miniatures by Giulio
Clovio, 230.
Urbino Library. _See_ LIBRARY.
Vaga, Pierino del, 26, 33, 318, 321, 364.
Valence, 80, 81.
Valerii, tombs of the, on the Latin Way, 328.
Valerius Flaccus, 201.
Valla calls on Eugenius IV. to abdicate, 205.
Valla, Lorenzo, 165, 202, 204;
establishes the spuriousness of the Donation of Constantine, 205;
his strictures on the Papacy, 205.
Vandals, 165.
Varese, Antonio da, 31.
_Varia Politicorum_, 269.
Vasari, 33, 73, 310, 318, 377.
Vase paintings, their value in study of Ancient Greek life, 403.
Vase, Vestibule of the. _See_ VESTIBULE.
Vases, collection of, 39;
Greek, 42, 403.
Vatican, armoury founded by Urban VIII., 77;
astronomers, work allotted to, 284;
banquets, 326;
basilica in the sixth century, 56;
basilica in the tenth century, what it was like, 86;
bird’s-eye view of, from Dome of St. Peter’s, 346;
builders of the: Popes Symmachus, Innocent III. and Nicholas III.,
135;
brick-fields, 284;
Codex, 7;
collections of the, 78;
compared to a beehive, 286;
the conception due to Nicholas III. and Nicholas V., 57;
Crypt, 80, 90, 142, 143, 166;
easternmost portion, 23;
entrance to the, 19;
entrance (ordinary) to the, 317;
genius of the, 41;
Golden Age of the, 289;
had its inspiration of the Renaissance from Florence, 190;
Hall of Conclave, 59;
to have Imperial Coronations, 59;
to have Triumphal Gate, 59;
the Italian Nüremberg, 112;
the “Light of the World,” 4, 17, 39;
Loggie of the, 315;
and the Louvre, dimensions of, 14;
manuscripts, 38, 234;
manuscripts, reprints of, 221;
measurements of the, 14;
Menologium of the, 231;
Mosaic Factory (_see_ STUDIO DEL MOSAICO);
mosaics: how they are made, 305;
nomenclature, 11;
not like a Palace, 12;
not one of the hills of Rome, 47;
officials, 28;
old castle of the Popes, 112;
oldest part of the, 16;
origin of name, 282; as a Palace, vii;
Papal Palace of the, 15, 61, 63, 342, vii;
Papal residence taken up there after the return from Avignon, 58;
patronage of scholarship, 17;
pictures restored by France by mistake to the, 306;
plan of the, 347;
Press, 4, 40, 255;
principal residence of the Popes since thirteenth century, 58;
quarter, no building in till time of the Emperors, 47;
sacristy of the, 57;
sculptures, 82;
secret places of the, 7;
statues and pictures taken by Napoleon to Paris, 24, 81;
tapestries, atelier of, 308;
treasures returned by the good offices of the English, 83;
wine, 48, 286.
_Vatican, Art of the_, xii.
Vatican Cross, 128;
not given by Constantine the Great, 128;
is Slavonic, presented by S. Cyril and S. Methodius, 129.
Vatican Gardens, 40, 57, 241, 260, 261, 270, 282, 294, viii;
audiences in the, 289;
birds in the, 285;
boschetto in the, 281;
characteristics of the, 290;
fountain in the, 75;
gem of the, 288;
general description of the, 278;
garden-house of the, 72;
known as the Boscareccio, 278;
in May and June, 292;
not wilder than the Bois de Boulogne, 283;
restrictions of the, 281;
sylvan, 293;
wolves killed in the, 58.
Vatican Hill, 6, 17, 25, 35, 75, 284;
drainage of the, 93;
tombs of the, 282.
Vatican Library, 5, 7, 10, 16, 17, 24, 29, 36, 38, 43, 58, 77, 181,
213 _et seq._, 242, 253, 256, 257, 266, 305, 358, ix;
Calixtus III. and the, 214;
closed season of the, 241;
Christian paintings in the, 305;
English books in the, 259;
founded by Nicholas V., 214, 215;
Great Hall of the, 74, 242;
ground plan of the, 223;
long gallery of the, 14, 220, 223, 236, 294;
most famous in the world, 213;
MSS. of, 227, 234, 249;
MSS. of gold letters described by Montaigne, 245;
MSS. kept in presses, 224;
MSS. published by Cardinal Mai, 276;
not founded by Sixtus IV., 216;
Paul II. did nothing to the, 215;
Pius II. did nothing to the, 215;
proper, 223;
readers, 258;
reading-room, 258;
Sixtus IV. located it under the Sistine Chapel, 215;
Sixtus IV.’s, now the Floreria, 216;
started in time to receive first printed books, 214;
unsatisfactory way in which people are shown over it, 224;
view of garden from the windows of, 241;
visitors to, 241;
what it consists of, 218;
when open, 241.
Vatican Palace, the beginnings almost lost in antiquity, 56;
the largest in the world, 14, 281, 347;
origin of, 63;
size of the, 348.
Vatican Picture Gallery, 216;
founded out of pictures returned by the French which did not belong
to the Pope, 306.
Vaticane, Notti, 289.
Vaticinium, 282.
Velasquez, 146.
Venetian Archives, 221.
Venezia, Palazzo di. _See_ PALAZZO.
Venice, Patriarch of, 305.
S. Veronica, 123;
a corruption of Vera Icon, 123;
of the Hagiology, 124;
handkerchief first mentioned by Bernard of Soracte in eleventh
century, 129;
pier of, 139, 189.
S. Veronica’s handkerchief (_see_ VOLTO SANTO), 121-124, 139, 151,
185, 186;
John VII. builds a shrine for it in St. Peter’s, 124;
story of, 121.
Vespai, 255.
Vespasiano da Bisticci (Nicholas V.’s bookseller), 200;
Nicholas V.’s biographer, 200.
Vespignani, Count, architect of the Vatican, 221, 255, 359.
Vestibule of the Meleager, 41.
Vestibule of the Torso, 41.
Vestibule of the Vase, 41.
Vestments, Cardinals’, 34;
Pope’s, 34.
Vetralla, 388.
Via di Aracœli, 138.
Via Aurelia Nova, 48.
Via Cornelia, 48, 53, 111, 130.
Via delle Fondamenta, 35.
Via Triumphalis, 48.
Vialone di Belvedere, 35, 36.
Victoria, Queen, gave Leo XIII. altar service for his Jubilee, 336.
Vicus Curialis, 59.
_Vie Intime de Pie X._, xvii.
Villa Aldobrandini at Frascati, garden of, 279, 282.
Villa Belvedere, 61, 75, 82.
Villa Borghese, 302, 316.
Villa Doria, 287.
Villa d’Este at Tivoli, 279.
Villa Innocent VIII. _See_ INNOCENT VIII.
Villa Lante, beyond Viterbo, fountain garden in, 278.
Villa of Leo XIII. _See_ LEO XIII.
Villa Madama, 315.
Villa Medici, 290.
Villa Mills, 383.
Villa Papa Giulio, 161, 388.
Villa Pia, a perfect image of an ancient Roman country house, 289.
Villa Pius IV. _See_ PIUS IV.
Villani, Giovanni, 169.
Vinci, Leonardo da, 212, 311;
“Last Supper” at Milan of, 311.
Violets, 3, 293.
Virgil of the fourth century, reproduction of the, 260.
Virgil of the Vatican, 227, 231, 245.
Virgil, Palatino, MS. of, 230.
Virgil, Romano, MS. of, 230.
Virgin, collection of sermons for the feast of the, 233;
mosaic of the Weeping, 156.
Viridarium Novum, 58.
“Visitation, The” (fresco), 374.
Viterbo, 106, 164, 278, 387;
fortress of, 164;
station for Castel d’Asso, Norchia, Bieda, 387.
Vitruvius, 201.
Vogüé, xvii.
Volaterræ (_see_ VOLTERRA), 387.
Volterra, Daniele da (a pupil of Michel Angelo’s), 33, 320, 331.
Volterra, Etruscan Museum at, 389;
interesting for its alabaster sarcophagi, 389.
Volterra, Etruscan tombs at, 390, 391;
alabaster, Etruscan, tombs at, 389.
Volto Santo, 121-124, 129, 136.
Volusian, 122;
sends portrait of Jesus to Tiberius, 122.
Vulci, 43, 388, 403.
Walls of Rome repaired by Urban VIII., 76, 77.
Waters, Mr. W. G., 323.
Watson, Mr. R. W. Seton, 118, 126, 140, 160, 162, 165, 169, 171, 174,
178, xii.
West Saxons, King of the, 103.
Whitaker, Mr. Joseph, of Palermo, 326.
Wilhelm I. of Prussia, 226.
William, Emperor, 259.
Wilson, Miss Heath, her library, xviii.
Winged “Victory” of the Greeks made the standard of our angels
through its beauty, 389.
Wiseman, Cardinal, _Recollections of the Last Five Popes and of Rome
in their Time_, xvi.
“Wonder of the World, The,” 128.
“W. Paulus III. Pont. Max. e W. Farnesia Proles,” 379.
Writers of Greece, 6.
Writers’ Room (Vatican Library), 39.
Würzburg, 218, 256.
Xavier, St. Francis, 75.
York, Cardinal of. _See_ HENRY STUART.
Zacagna, Abbot Laur., 249.
Zacosta, Raymond, 176.
Zecca, 44, 294.
Zelada, Cardinal, Library of (_see_ LIBRARIES), 40, 220, 257.
Zeuxis, 239.
Zola’s _Rome_, xv.
Zuccheri, 33.
Zucchero, 31, 73, 288, 318.
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