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Title: The Story of Assisi
Author: Lina Duff Gordon
Illustrator: Nelly Erichsen
M. Helen James
Release Date: January 12, 2012 [EBook #38559]
Language: English
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The Story of Assisi
"Between Tupino, and the wave that falls
From blest Ubaldo's chosen hill, there hangs
Rich slope of mountain high, whence heat and cold
Are wafted through Perugia's eastern gate:
And Nocera with Gualdo, in its rear,
Mourn for their heavy yoke. Upon that side,
Where it doth break its steepness most, arose
A sun upon the world, as duly this
From Ganges doth: therefore let none who speak
Of that place, say Ascesi; for its name
Were lamely so deliver'd; but the East,
To call things rightly, be it henceforth styled."
DANTE, _Paradiso_, xi. (Cary's translation).
[Illustration: _P. Lunghi. Photo._
_Statue of St. Francis._
_by Andrea della Robbia in Sta. Maria degli Angeli._]
The Story of Assisi
by Lina Duff Gordon
Illustrated by Nelly Erichsen
and M. Helen James
London: J. M. Dent & Co.
Aldine House, 29 and 30 Bedford Street
Covent Garden, W.C. 1901
_First Edition, December 1900_
_Second Edition, October 1901_
_All rights reserved_
_To
Margaret Vaughan_
_this small book is affectionately dedicated
in remembrance of days spent together
in the Umbrian country_
NOTE
My sincerest thanks are due to my aunt Mrs Ross, to Mrs Vaughan, Dr E.
Percival Wright, M. Paul Sabatier, Mr Sidney Colvin, Sir William
Markby and Mr Pearsall Smith, for the help rendered me in various ways
during the writing of this book. I wish further to acknowledge the
kindness of Mr Roger Fry who allowed me to quote from his lectures on
Art delivered this year in London, before they were published in the
_New Monthly Review_; and also the generous permission of Mr Anderson
(Rome), and Signor Lunghi (Assisi), for allowing me to use their
photographs. For the loan of old Italian books I am indebted to Cav.
Bruschi, Librarian of the Marucelliana at Florence, to Professor
Bellucci, Professor of the University of Perugia, and to Signor Rossi,
proprietor of the Hotel Subasio at Assisi, whose intimate knowledge of
his native town has been of great service to me.
L. D. G.
POGGIO GHERARDO,
FLORENCE, _October 1900_.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I
PAGE
_War and Strife_ 1
CHAPTER II
_The Umbrian Prophet_ 39
CHAPTER III
_The Carceri, Rivo-Torto and Life at the
Portiuncula_ 81
CHAPTER IV
_The building of the Basilica and Convent of
San Francesco. The Story of Brother
Elias_ 117
CHAPTER V
_Cimabue and his School at San Francesco_ 149
CHAPTER VI
_The Paintings of Giotto and his School in the
Lower Church_ 168
CHAPTER VII
_The Sienese Masters in the Lower Church.
The Convent_ 198
CHAPTER VIII
_Giotto's Legend of St. Francis in the Upper
Church_ 228
CHAPTER IX
_St. Clare at San Damiano. The Church of
Santa Chiara_ 258
CHAPTER X
_Other Buildings in the Town_ 289
CHAPTER XI
_The Church of Santa Maria degli Angeli. The
Feast of the Pardon of St. Francis or
the "Perdono d'Assisi"_ 335
ILLUSTRATIONS
_Statue of St. Francis by Andrea della Robbia in
Sta. Maria degli Angeli_
(_P. Lunghi--photo_) _Photogravure-Frontispiece_
PAGE
_The Temple of Minerva_ 3
_The Eastern Slope of Assisi with the Castle,
from the Porta Cappucini_ 10
_The Guelph Lion of Assisi_ 22
_The Arms of Assisi_ 37
_Assisi in the time of St. Francis_ 38
_Via di S. Maria delle Rose_ 58
_The Arms of the Franciscans_ 80
_Hermitage of the Carceri_ 82
_The Carceri with a View of the Bridge_ 89
_Side Door of the Portiuncula built by St. Benedict_ 99
_The Portiuncula in the time of St. Francis, from
the "Collis Paradisi"_ 107
_Assisi from the Plain_ 113
_Church and Convent of San Francesco_ 127
_San Francesco from the Plain_ 147
_The Lower Church_ 150
_Looking through the doors of the Upper Church
towards the Porta S. Giacomo and the
Castle_ 157
_Plan of the Lower Church and Monastery of
San Francesco at Assisi_ (_facing_) 168
_Choir and Transepts of the Lower Church_ 172
_The Marriage of St. Francis with Poverty_
(_D. Anderson--photo_) 179
_The Old Cemetery of San Francesco_ 194
_The Knighthood of St. Martin by Simone Martini_
(_D. Anderson--photo_) 201
_Bird's Eye View of the Basilica and Convent
of San Francesco, from a drawing made in
1820_ 213
_San Francesco from the Tescio_ 217
_Staircase leading from the Upper to the Lower
Piazza of San Francesco_ 220
_San Francesco from the Ponte S. Vittorino_ 222
_A Friar of the Minor Conventual Order of St.
Francis_ 225
_St. Francis Renounces the World_
(_D. Anderson--photo_) 233
_Death of the Knight of Celano_
(_D. Anderson--photo_) 247
_Arms of the Franciscans from the Intarsia of
the Stalls_ 257
_Door through which St. Clare left the Palazzo
Scifi_ 262
_San Damiano, showing the Window with the
Ledge whence St. Claire routed the Saracens_ 268
_Santa Chiara_ 282
_Santa Chiara from near the Porta Mojano_ 287
_Campanile of San Rufino_ 290
_Door of San Rufino_ 295
_The Dome and Apse of San Rufino from the
Canon's Garden_ 298
_Campanile of Sta. Maria Maggiore_ 309
_Church of Sta. Maria Maggiore_ 310
_Church of S. Pietro_ 313
_Confraternity of San Francescuccio in Via
Garibaldi_ 315
_Monte Frumentorio in the Via Principe di
Napoli_ 320
_House of the Comacine Builders in the Via
Principe di Napole_ 322
_Looking across the Assisan roofs towards the
East_ 325
_View of San Francesco from beneath the Castle
Walls_ 332
_The Garden of the Roses at Sta. Maria degli
Angeli_ 339
_The Fonte Marcella by Galeazzo Alessi_ 346
_An Assisan Garden in Via Garibaldi_ 347
_Umbrian Oxen_ 349
_Women from the Basilicata_ 351
_San Francesco_ 356
_Plan of Assisi_ 372
The Story of Assisi
CHAPTER I
_War and Strife_
"C'était le temps des guerres sans pitié et des inimitiés
mortelles." H. TAINE. _Voyage en Italie._ _Perouse et Assise._
All who ascend the hill of the Seraphic City must feel its
indescribable charm--intangible, mysterious, and quite distinct from
the beauty of the Umbrian valley. "Why," we ask ourselves, "this
stillness and sense of marvellous peace in every church and every
street?" And, as though conscious of our thoughts, a young Assisan,
with a gesture of infinite sadness towards the large, desolate palaces
and broad deserted streets, said, as we lingered on our way: "Ah!
Signore mie, our city is a city of the dead--of memories only." As he
spoke a long procession of a grey-clothed confraternity, bearing on
their breasts the franciscan badge, preceded by a priest who walked
beneath a baldachino, streamed out of a small church. Slowly they
passed down the road, and then the priest turned into a wayside
cottage where lay a dying woman, while the others waited outside under
the olive trees. But the sound of their chanting and the tinkling of
the small bell came to us as we leaned over the city walls. Of a truth
we felt the religious life of the town was not dead: perchance, down
those streets, now so still, men had passed along to battle during
the sad turmoil of the middle ages, had hated and loved as well as
prayed, with all the fervour of their southern nature. We must turn to
the early chroniclers to find in their fascinating pages that Assisi
has had her passionate past and her hours of deepest trial.
Her origin goes back to the days when the Umbrians, one of the most
ancient people of Italy, inhabited the country north and south of the
Tiber, and lived a wild life in caves. But the past is very dim; some
Umbrian inscriptions, a few flint arrow heads, and some hatchets made
of jade found on the shore of lake Thrasymene are the only records we
possess of these early settlers.
If written history of their ways and origin is lacking, the later
chroniclers of Assisi endeavour to supply with their gossip, what is
missing. Rambling and strange as their legends often seem to us,
nevertheless they contain a germ of truth, an image, faint but partly
true of a time so infinitely far away. Most of the local Umbrian
historians have awarded the honour of the foundation of their own
particular town to the earliest heroes whom they happen to know of,
and these are invariably Noah and his family. It is, therefore,
curious to note that the Assisan chroniclers have departed from this
custom and have woven for themselves a legend so different from the
usual friar's tale: "Various are the opinions," says one of them,
"concerning the first building of our city; but the most probable, and
the most universally accepted by serious writers, is the one which
gives Dardanus as her founder. In the year 713 after the Deluge, and
865 years before the foundation of Rome, the first civil war in Italy
broke out between the brothers Jasius and Dardanus, both sons of
Electra; but the father of Jasius was Jupiter, while Dardanus was the
son of Corythus, King of Cortona." The people of Umbria took sides,
as some would have it that Jasius ought to be king in the place of the
dead prince Corythus. Now it happened that Dardanus had pitched his
tent on the slope of Mount Subasio, when a dream came to him that
Jupiter and Minerva were preparing to assail the enemy, and that
Jasius would be vanquished. On waking he determined, should his dream
be true, to raise a temple to the goddess on the spot where he had
slept. He went forth to battle, and with the help of the goddess drove
the enemy back with great slaughter; Jasius was killed and they buried
him on the field of battle. "Full well did Dardanus keep his vow, for
in a few months there arose a wonderful building, now known as the
sacred temple, dedicated to the true Minerva of Heaven, under the name
of Santa Maria Sopra Minerva. Thus it is that the country round Assisi
has been called _Palladios agros_, the fields of Pallas."[1]
[Illustration: THE TEMPLE OF MINERVA]
And thus the monk dreams on about the Seraphic Province of Umbria; and
we dream with him of the Umbrians who forsook the chase and their
shepherd huts on the heights about Subasio, to gather round the
marvellous temple built by the hero ere he went forth to found the
city of Troy. People came from afar to look at the six-fluted columns,
and while marvelling at a thing so fair, they resolved to build their
homes within sight and under the shadow of the sacred walls. Here was
the nucleus of a future town. The simple shelters of cane and
brushwood were soon replaced by huts of a neater pattern made of
wattle and clay, with earthen floors, rounded porches and pent roofs.
The dwellers by the temple throve and prospered, and all was peace for
a while, until the van-guard of that mysterious people, the Etruscans,
appeared on the Umbrian horizon. We are told how Dardanus, while
visiting the King of Lydia on his way to Troy, drew such a
highly-coloured picture of the loveliness of Tuscany, the fruitful
qualities of the soil, and the lightness of the air, that Tyrrhenus,
the king's son, was immediately sent with a large army to take
possession of so rich a province. Then came a struggle, and the
Umbrian tribes were driven back south of the Tiber, which henceforth
strictly defined the boundary between Umbria and Etruria.
Immediately to the west of Assisi, and on the longest spur of hills
which juts out into the valley of the Tiber, stood the now Etruscan
city of Perugia, to which a band of Etruscans had lately immigrated.
The huge, grim walls which grew up round it after the advent of the
new settlers, the narrow pointed gateways, some guarded by heads of
stern and unknown deities, the general menacing and ferocious aspect
of its buildings, soon warned the smaller Umbrian cities of what they
might in coming ages expect from her inhabitants. It is probable that
skirmishes were frequent between the neighbouring towns of Assisi and
Perugia, and to judge from the subterranean passages which still exist
beneath the streets of the former place, we may gather that she was
open to constant attacks, and that her inhabitants found it more
prudent to disappear underground at the approach of enemies than to
meet them in open battle. These subterranean galleries, cut in the
soft tufa, extend for miles under the present city: branching out in
all directions they form a veritable labyrinth of secret passages.
Here swiftly and silently as the foe advanced, men and women with
their children would disappear into the bowels of the earth, some
being occasionally buried beneath masses of soil shaken down by the
tramp of many feet above them. Repeated dangers of this sort at last
decided the Assisans to meet their enemies in more war-like fashion,
and to surround themselves--as Perugia had done--with stones and
mortar. Soon the town bristled with towers and turreted gateways, and
the houses, no longer built of wattle and mud, began to foreshadow the
strongly fortified palaces of a later date. None too soon did Assisi
prepare for war. In the year 309 B.C. the shrill sound of the Roman
clarion echoed through the Cimminian forest. It roused Etruria to
arms, proclaiming the fact that the Romans had dared to penetrate
beyond this dangerous barrier which hitherto had been deemed
impassable. The Etruscans and Umbrians, forgetting all their former
strifes, now joined against the new power which threatened to crush
their liberties. The battles which followed beneath the walls of
Perugia, and by Bevagna in the plain of the Clitumnus, brought all
Umbria, in the space of a single year, under the yoke of Rome.
And now, although we leave the fields of legend and enter those of
history, we find but little mention of Assisi: this is, however,
easily accounted for. Built upon the unfrequented slopes of Mount
Subasio, like a flower gradually opening to the sun's rays, she was
far more secure than her neighbour Perugia who, commanding and
commanded by the road from Rome to Ravenna, along which an army
passed, stood in haughty and uncompromising pre-eminence. The
comparatively obscure position of Assisi therefore gave her long
periods of peace, and these she employed in building innumerable
temples, a theatre, and a circus. It is impossible to excavate in any
part of Assisi without coming upon relics of that time. Statues and
busts of the Cæsars, of gods and of consuls, are lying in dark corners
of the communal palace, and broken fragments of delicately-wrought
friezes and heads of goddesses, half buried in bushes of oleander,
adorn the Assisan gardens. Beneath the foundations of the more modern
houses, mosaic floors and frescoed walls have been found, showing that
Assisi had her years of early splendour. But full of life and action
as this Roman period was, it is as completely hidden from us as are
the temples now buried beneath the present town. It passed rapidly
away, and yet is of some importance in the history of the world as
having witnessed the birth of Sex. Aurelius Propertius, great among
the poets even at a time when Virgil, Horace, and a host of others
were filling Italy with their song.
Many an Umbrian town prides itself on being the birthplace of
Propertius. The people of Spello have even placed a tablet in their
walls to claim him as her son; but the Assisans, ignoring the rivalry
of others, very quietly point to the many inscriptions of the
Propertius' family collected beneath the portico of the Temple of
Minerva. One may be noticed referring to C. Passennus Sergius Paullus
Propertius Blaesus, said to be a lineal descendant of the poet, who is
supposed to have married after the death of the fair Cynthia, and
returned to his native valley to pass his last days in domestic
tranquillity. Angelo Poliziano, on the margin of an early edition of
the poet's works now in the Laurentian Library of Florence, has made a
note to the effect that Propertius, as well as St. Francis, was born
at Assisi; and certainly modern writers assign the honour to Assisi.
The somewhat vague utterances of Propertius as to his native town seem
to show that the position of Assisi, with regard to Perugia and the
plain, more nearly coincides with his description than that of any
other city in the valley or on the hills. To one inquisitive friend he
answers: "Tullus, thou art ever entreating me in the name of our
friendship to tell thee my country and my descent. If thou knowest
Perusia, which gave a field of death and a sepulchre to our father and
in Italy's hour of affliction, when domestic discord drove Rome's own
citizens one against the other--(Ah! hills of Etruria, to me beyond
measure have ye given sorrow, for ye suffered the limbs of my kinsman
to be cast aside unburied, and denied the handful of dust to cover his
bones)--there it was that, close above the margin of her plain spread
below, Umbria, rich in fertile domains, gave me birth."[2] The kinsman
spoken of here is a certain Gallus, who lost his life in B.C. 41, when
Lucius Antonius was besieged in Perugia by Augustus. The horrors of
the general massacre which followed the fall of the city left sad
memories in the mind of Propertius, then a mere child. In the general
confiscation of property after the battle of Philippi his family lost
their estates. But poor as they were, Propertius was sent to Rome to
study, where, recognised as the leader of a new school of poetry, he
remained until shortly before his death, at the age of thirty-five.
His paternal estates having been restored to him, he forsook the
splendour of the Augustan court, the patronage of Maecenas, the
friendship of Virgil, and returned to the Umbrian country where his
first inspirations had been awakened. The contrast between a house and
garden on the Palatine hill, in the midst of the stir of Roman life,
and a farm by the silent stream flowing through the stillest of
valleys, must have been great. But, judging from his description of
the country, he seems to have fallen readily into rural ways, and
loved to watch the herds of white oxen, dedicated to the service of
the goddesses, grazing close to the banks of the Clitumnus. We may
infer that he hunted the "timorous hare and birds" in the thick oak
forest of the Spoletan valley, but, as he playfully tells us, he left
"the hazardous boar alone," for physical courage was not one of his
characteristics.
From the plain his eyes were often raised in the direction of Assisi,
and to his familiarity with her towers we owe this exquisite
description of his birthplace, which, perhaps out of modesty, as he
alludes to his own fame, he places in the mouth of a soothsayer:
"Ancient Umbria gave thee birth from a noted household. Do I mistake,
or do I touch rightly the region of your home, where misty Mevania
stands among the dews of the hill-girt plain, and the waters of the
Umbrian lake grow warm the summer through, and where on the summit of
mounting Asis rise the walls to which your genius has added glory."[3]
Nothing happens, or at least nothing is mentioned in Assisan
chronicles until Christianity stealthily worked its way up from Rome
about the third century. Then bloodshed followed during a period of
darkness when Christians and pagans divided the town into factions by
their bitter fights for religion. At first the Christians suffered,
and many were martyred in the Umbrian rivers, but only to triumph
later when Roman Assisi soon vanished and Christian basilicas were
built on the site of pagan temples. Although, after the Roman period,
we find Assisi more nearly linked with the general history of Italy,
she appears uninfluenced by outside events, and her atmosphere of
remoteness remains unimpaired. Thus we may say that Huns, Franks, and
Lombards merely passed by and left no lasting mark upon the city. For
a moment she was suddenly aroused by the tempestuous arrival of one or
other of their leaders, but once the danger was past she returned to
her calm sleep upon the mountain side.
In 545 Totila, on his march to Rome, arrived before the walls of
Assisi which were gallantly defended for the Emperor Justinian by
Siegfried the Goth, but unfortunately he being killed in a skirmish
with the Huns, the disheartened citizens reluctantly opened their
gates to the enemy. For the first time in her annals (the Roman
occupation had been peaceful enough) a foreigner--a tyrant set foot in
her streets as master. But the restless Totila soon began to scan the
country round for other cities to attack. Becoming aware of the large
and wealthy city of Perugia perched upon the western hill, he sallied
forth to capture a bigger prey, and Assisi enjoyed a further spell of
peace.
[Illustration: THE EASTERN SLOPE OF ASSISI WITH THE CASTLE, FROM THE
PORTA CAPPUCCINI]
In reading the long-winded chronicles it is often difficult to gather
to which power the various small towns at this time belonged. One
point is, however, clear, that during endless contentions between the
Popes and the Greek, and later the German Emperors, the Umbrian
cities were often left to manage their own affairs, and because of the
periods of rest which they thus enjoyed and used in their individual
ways, we are inclined to speak of them as republics. For a long time
Assisi remained annexed to the Duchy of Spoleto, then under the rule
of the Lombard Dukes whose advent had filled the different cities in
the valley with Arian Christians, unfriendly to the Papacy. Assisi,
together with other towns swerved from her allegiance to the Pope, and
it is perhaps on this account that Charlemagne in 773 with his
"terrible and fierce followers" came to besiege her. They laid the
country waste, and made many attacks upon Assisi which met with stout
resistance; but while prowling round the walls one night they found
the main drain, and stealing through it they were able to discover the
weakest part of the town. Next night they returned well armed, slew
the guards who were keeping watch by the midnight fires, and before
the citizens could rush to arms, the gates were opened to Charlemagne.
The army passed in, her citizens were put to the sword, and the town
razed to the ground.
"Thus," says a chronicler, "Assisi bereft of her inhabitants, found
herself an unhappy widow. Then was the most clement emperor grieved,
and ordering that the city should be rebuilt, he placed therein a new
colony of Christians of the Roman faith, and the city was restored,
and in it the Divine Worship."[4]
A small arched doorway ornamented with a delicate frieze of foliage
still remains as a record of the rebuilding of the city by
Charlemagne's Lombard workmen. The stone is blackened, the tracery
worn away. Few find this dark corner in the Piazza delle Rose, and the
people wonder at those who stop to look, for "it is ugly and very
old," they say.
It was probably at this time, towards the end of the eighth century,
that the Rocca d'Assisi was built. This made her a more important
factor in Umbrian politics; and leaders of armies, who hitherto had
paid her but a hurried visit, now vied with each other to possess a
city with so fair a crown. The citizens had chosen for the site of the
castle the part where the hill rises in a sudden peak above the town,
looking to the north across a deep ravine towards the mountains of
Gualdo and Nocera. Above the main building and the four crenelated
towers soared the castle keep; from the ramparts started two lines of
walls which, going east and west, gathered the town as it were within
a nest. At intervals rose forts connected by a covered passage, and
tall towers guarded the walls where they joined the city gates. The
Rocca d'Assisi with this chain of walls bristling with iron spikes and
towers, complete in strength and perfect in architecture, looked down
upon the town like some guarding deity, and was the pride of every
citizen. It was no gloomy stronghold such as the French kings erected
in the woods of Tourraine, but built of the yellow Subasian stone it
seemed more like a mighty palace with windows large and square, whence
many a _condottiere_ and many a noble prisoner leant out to look upon
the splendid sweep of country from Perugia to Spoleto.
Proud as the citizens were of their new-born importance they soon
regretted the calmer days of their obscurity. By the twelfth
century they were torn between the Pope, the Emperor, and their own
turbulent factions, for even in the smaller towns the cries of Guelph
and Ghibelline were beginning to be heard. Whenever German
potentates--"the abhorred Germans" as the chroniclers call them--had
their hands well clenched upon an Umbrian town, the citizens turned
imploring eyes towards Rome. The promise of municipal liberty was the
bait which every pontiff knew well how to use for his own profit. The
German, on the other hand, troubled not to use diplomacy as a means
to gain his ends, but brought an army to storm the town, and took up
his residence in the castle, whence he could hear the murmurings of
the citizens below planning to drive him out of their gates. The first
distinguished but unwelcome guest in the Rocca d'Assisi was Frederick
Barbarossa. He was, however, too much occupied in his career of
conquest to waste more than a few weeks in Umbria, and in 1195 we find
Conrad of Suabia, who in the annals of the time is known by the
nickname of "the whimsical one," in charge of the castle, with the
title of Count of Assisi. Conrad was also Duke of Spoleto, but he
preferred the fortress of Assisi as a residence and spent some two
years there to the annoyance of the citizens, who were constrained to
be more or less on their good behaviour. With him in those days was a
small but important person, who, at the age of two, had been elected
King of Germany and Italy. This was Frederick II, and the legend
recounts how he was born in the Piazza Minerva beneath a tent hastily
erected for the occasion, and in his third year was baptised in the
Cathedral of San Rufino, amidst a throng of cardinals, bishops,
Assisan priors and nobles. It would, indeed, be strange that he, who
later was to prove a thorn in the side of many a Pope, should have
been born and nurtured in the Seraphic City.
The Assisans soon wearied of the German yoke, but unaided they could
not throw it off and it needed the timely intervention of Innocent
III, to rid them of Conrad's presence. The Pope, who had been quietly
waiting an opportunity to regain his lost Umbrian towns, felt himself
powerful enough now that the Emperor Henry VI, was dead, to send
haughty commands to Conrad. He was bidden to meet Innocent at Narni
where he solemnly made over his possessions to the Church. Thus left
to themselves, the Assisans, with cries of "Liberty and the Pope,"
rushed on the castle to tear it down. Built to be their safeguard, it
proved their greatest danger, and they determined that no other tyrant
should find shelter within its walls. While the Assisans were
rejoicing in their freedom, and endeavouring to guard against the
constant attacks of the Perugians, the big world outside was being
torn and rent by a medley of events which was carrying men's thoughts
forward in the swift current of a fresh era. Everywhere a new spirit
was spreading--"the fraternising spirit" it has been called. In the
cities men were joining together in guilds, heralding the
commonwealths; while, in the country, bands of people, under the names
of Patarins, Albergenses, Poor Men of Lyons, etc., raised the standard
of revolt yet higher against their feudal and spiritual lords. A
contemporary writer speaks of thirty-two heresies as being rampant in
Italy at this time. Men were eager and full of energy, finding relief
through many channels that set all Italy in a ferment. But amidst the
confusion of wars and heresies the Papal power grew ever stronger,
until, with the accession of Innocent III, the claims of a temporal
ruler were blended with spiritual rights. The Marches of Ancona,
Umbria, and the seven hills of Rome belonged alike to him, while he
was powerful enough to excommunicate cities, kingdoms, and emperors at
his pleasure, and rule all with a rod of iron. The magnificent designs
planned by Hildebrand seemed to triumph under Innocent, and yet the
papal horizon was not without its clouds.
"Ah Constantine! of how much ill was cause,
Not thy conversion, but those rich domains
That the first wealthy Pope received of thee,"[5]
groans Dante, in writing of the condition of the Church, and his cry
reaches back to the time of which we write. Jacques de Vitry, who was
often at the court of Innocent, also speaks with bitterness of the
depravity of the priests. They were, he tells us, "deceiving as foxes,
proud as bulls, avaricious and insatiable as the minotaur."
Innocent III, though scheming and ambitious, was a man of lofty
character, and no one watched with so much anguish the rising storms
which threatened to shake the mighty fabric of the Papacy. In a moment
of discouragement he is said to have exclaimed that fire and sword
were needed to heal the wounds made by the simoniacal priests, and for
a long time he in vain sought a remedy for those ills. But salvation
was at hand, and it came from the Umbrian mountains, as the fresh
breeze comes which suddenly breaks upon the budding trees in
springtime.
Within the narrow circuit of the Assisan walls arose a figure of
magical power who drew men to him by the charm of his mysticism and
the spell of his ardent nature. It is the sweet-souled saint of
mediæval Italy--St. Francis of Assisi--who now illuminates this quiet
corner of the world.
Francis Bernardone was born in the year 1182, when, as we have seen,
the Church was harrowed by a hundred ills. He passed a gay youth, free
from every care, and tested all the pleasures that riches could
procure. Though the son of a merchant he consorted with the noblest of
the Assisan youths, who, partly on account of his father's wealth,
partly because of his gaiety and love of splendour, were glad to
accept him as an equal. All looked to the high-spirited, gifted
Francis as the leader at every feast, the organiser of every
entertainment, and when Perugia blew her war-trumpet he rode out to
battle side by side with the Assisan cavaliers. Such, in a few words,
was his position in Assisi when in his twenty-second year, after a
severe illness which brought him to the brink of the grave, he
resolved to follow to the letter the precept of the Gospel and lead
the life of the first apostles. So complete was his conversion that
he, the rich merchant's son, was to be seen walking through the
streets with bricks on his back for the repair of the ruined churches
of Assisi, while his former companions drew back and laughed as he
passed them. But their derision was of short duration, for the charm
they had felt in former days had by no means passed away. Holiness
could never make him sad, and in the human tenderness and joyousness
of his nature lay the secret of that power which was strong enough,
the Assisans soon discovered, to lead them where he would--though it
was now by a new road he travelled.
The great movement, which began at Assisi and spread throughout Europe
in a very few years, can only be likened to that witnessed by the lake
of Galilee. Rich citizens gave all to the poor; the peasants left the
vintage and sold their oxen, to join the ever-swelling crowd of
bare-footed disciples who wandered through cities and into distant
lands bringing comfort and words of peace to all they met. Like a ray
of brilliant sunshine St. Francis dispersed the gloom of the middle
ages, teaching men that the qualities of mercy and love were to be
looked for from God instead of the inflexible justice that had
overshadowed a religion intended to be all light. He walked the earth
with joyous steps, inviting all to come with him and see how beautiful
was the world; he looked upwards, praising God in bursts of eloquent
song for the rain that fed the flowers, the birds that sang to him in
the woods, and the blueness of his Umbrian sky. How different from the
stern, orthodox saints who passed through the loveliest valleys with
downcast eyes for fear of some hidden temptation or of some
interruption to their prayers! With such a founder it is hardly
surprising that the order of St. Francis spread and multiplied,
becoming a great world force, as great and perhaps greater than that
of St. Dominic. We get an interesting picture of the change he wrought
throughout Italy and of the enthusiasm he kindled among his followers
in a letter of Jacques de Vitry; from this we quote at length, for,
being written by a contemporary of the saint, its value is very great.
"While I was at the pontifical court I saw many things which grieved
me to the heart. Everyone is so preoccupied with secular and temporal
things, with matters concerning kings and kingdoms, litigations and
lawsuits, that it is almost impossible to talk on religious matters.
"Yet I found one subject for consolation in those lands: in that many
persons of either sex, rich, and living in the great world, leave all
for the love of Christ and renounce the world. They are called the
Friars Minor, and are held in great respect by the Pope and the
Cardinals. They, on their part, care nought for things temporal, and
strive hard every day to tear perishing souls from the vanities of
this world and to entice them into their ranks. Thanks be to God,
their labour has already borne fruit, and they have gained many souls:
inasmuch as he who listens to them brings others, and thus one
audience creates another.
"They live according to the rule of the primitive church, of which it
is written: 'The multitude of believers were as one heart and one
soul.' In the day they go into the cities and the villages to gain
over souls and to work; in the night they betake themselves to
hermitages and solitary places and give themselves up to
contemplation.
"The women live together near to cities in divers convents; they
accept nought, but live by the labour of their hands. They are much
disturbed to find themselves held in greater esteem, both by the
clergy and the laity, than they themselves desire.
"The men of this order meet once a year in some pre-arranged place, to
their great profit, and rejoice together in the Lord and eat in
company; and then, with the help of good and honest men, they adopt
and promulgate holy institutions, approved by the Pope. After this
they disperse, going about in Lombardy, Tuscany, and even in Apulia
and Sicily, for the rest of the year.... I think it is to put the
prelates to shame, who are like dogs unable to bark, that the Lord
wills to save many souls before the end of the world, by means of
these poor simple friars."[6]
Certainly one of the most remarkable events in mediæval history was
the result of the teaching of St. Francis upon his own and future
generations. In his native city the strength of his personal influence
and the love and veneration which he excited was extraordinary. But we
notice even a stranger fact; with his death this holy influence
apparently vanished, and it is possible that the memory of the saint
is dearer to the hearts of the Assisans in what we are inclined to
call the prosaic tedium of our trafficking nineteenth century, than it
was in the years immediately following his death. Later centuries have
shown us that his teaching and his presence there were not in vain.
Assisi, down to our own times, has continued to be the Mecca of
thousands of pilgrims. Her churches bear the record of infinite early
piety, for when art was in its early prime the most famous masters
from Tuscany were called upon to decorate the Franciscan Basilica and
leave their choicest treasures there as tributes to the immortal glory
of the saint. But the note of war rings louder than the song of praise
and love for many years to come in all the Assisan chronicles, and
grass and weeds grow up to choke, though not to kill, the blessed seed
that Francis sowed and did not live to tend. No sooner did the gates
of death close upon that sweet and genial spirit, than war, lust,
strife and pestilence burst upon the very people he had so tenderly
loved. The story of Assisi becomes, as it had never been before, a
list of murders--of struggles to the death for individual power, and
of wars which made the fair Umbrian country a desolate and cruel waste
for months and even years.
Each town looked with hatred upon its powerful rival, and the communal
armies were for ever meeting in the plain by the Tiber to match their
strength and see if some small portion at least of a city's domains
could not be wrested from her. The bitterest and most pronounced
enemies in the valley were undoubtedly Assisi and Perugia. Their feuds
date back to the twelfth century; but even before the Christian era
these two cities of the hills had marked each other as a foe for the
one was Umbrian, the other Etruscan, and they merely continued the
rivalry of their founders. It is often difficult to discover the cause
of each separate war, but it may, as a general rule, be traced to
Perugia's inborn love of fighting, and to her restless spirit which
led her to storm each town in turn. From her eyrie she looked straight
down upon half the Umbrian country, and gazing daily on so fair a land
the desire for possession grew ever stronger. Many towns were forced
to submit to her sway, and by the thirteenth century she was the
acknowledged mistress of Umbria. It is, therefore, with surprise and
admiration that we watch the undaunted struggle of Assisi against a
tyrant whom she hated with a hatred quite Dantesque in its bitterness
and strength. Many menacing towers were built on either side of the
valley, and heralds were continually sent between the two towns with
insulting messages to goad the citizens forward into battle. When
Perugia was known to be preparing for an attack upon Assisi, the
castles and villages around hastened to break their allegiance to the
weaker city and ally themselves with the Perugian griffin. Assisi was
thus often obliged to defend herself unaided against the Umbrian
tyrant. When, in 1321 Perugia declared war against "this most wicked
city of Assisi" whose crime consisted in having fallen under the rule
of the Ghibelline party of her citizens,[7] both communes were in need
of money as their bellicose habits had proved expensive. Busily,
therefore, they set to work about procuring it, and in a highly
characteristic manner Perugia sold her right of fishing in Thrasymene
for five years, while the citizens of the Seraphic City entered by
force into the sacristy of San Francesco and carried off a quantity of
sacred spoils. Gold ornaments, censers, chalices, crucifixes of rare
workmanship and precious stuffs, were divided into lots and sold,
partly to Arezzo for 14,000 golden florins, and partly to Florence for
a larger sum. Now these things did not even belong to the Franciscans,
but had been carefully stored in the sacristy by the Pope and his
cardinals during their last visit to the town. Great, therefore, was
the wrath at the Papal Court when news came of the sacrilegious
robbery, and without a moment's delay a bull of excommunication was
fulminated from Avignon. For thirty-eight years Assisi lay under the
heavy sentence of an interdict, and, except for the feast of the
"Pardon of St. Francis," the church doors were closed and the church
bells were silent. But not a whit did the people care for the anger of
a distant Pope, and it is related that when the two friars brought the
bull of excommunication to Ser Muzio di Francesco, the leader of the
robbers, they were flogged within an inch of their lives, and further,
they were made to swallow the seals of lead which hung from the Papal
document.
The Assisans, having obtained the necessary funds, set to work to
defend themselves against the enemy who were to be seen rolling their
heavy catapults along the dusty roads. A proud historian says, "they
saw without flinching 500 horsemen galloping round their walls," and
with a heroism worthy of so good a cause, determined to be buried in
the ruins of their city sooner than cede one step to their abhorred
enemies the Perugians. They closed the shops, barred the houses and
threw the chains across the streets to stop advancing cavalry; every
artisan turned soldier, every noble watched from the tower of his
palace. Not only were they guarding their own liberties, but they
feared for the safety of the body of St. Francis, which the Perugians,
ever prowling day and night about the walls, were anxious to carry
off. The siege, it is said, lasted a year, when the Assisans were
forced to give way and open their gates to the enemy, who sacked the
town, "killing more than one hundred of the most wicked citizens, to
wit, all those who fought against the city of Perugia." Then came a
perilous moment, for many, not content with a barbarous pillage,
wished to destroy Assisi altogether. Fortunately a wily Perugian,
Massiolo di Buonante, stood up in her defence, arguing that "Assisi
being now in their power, it were better to possess her fortified, and
well provided against any new attack of the Ghibelline party."[8] His
words had due effect, but still the town suffered horribly, and her
walls only lately built were in greater part razed to the ground. The
chains that guarded the streets together with the bars and keys of the
gates were taken back to Perugia, where, until a century ago, they
hung "as glorious trophies" from the claws of the bronze griffon
outside the Palazzo Pubblico. Before leaving, the Perugians gave their
orders to the now submissive city. The Guelphs were to live within the
ancient circle of walls in the upper and more fortified part of the
town, while the Ghibellines were left in the undefended suburbs.
[Illustration: THE GUELPH LION OF ASSISI]
They further commanded that each year, on the feast of St. Ercolano,
the Assisans should bring them a banner "worth at least 25 golden
florins, _in signum subjectionis_." This was the greatest ignominy of
all, and rankled even more deeply in the hearts of the citizens of
Assisi than the fact of their being governed by Perugian officials.
The delivery of the yearly tribute was performed in a manner highly
characteristic of the times and of the love of petty tyranny and
display peculiar to the mediæval towns. An Assisan horseman mounted on
a splendidly caparisoned charger brought the hated emblem to lay
before the Priors of Perugia, who robed in crimson, with heavy golden
chains about their necks, waited at the foot of the campanile of San
Lorenzo. Close to them stood four mace bearers and trumpeters with
white griffins painted on the red satin streamers which hung from the
silver trumpets. Nothing was neglected that would impress her subjects
with the dignity of her hill-set city. All the Perugians were
assembled, and in their name the Priors promised to defend Assisi
against her enemies and to preserve her from the yoke of tyrants.
Having uttered this solemn mockery, they gave the Podestà of Assisi a
sealed book wherein were written the laws to be observed in return for
the inestimable favours granted; the book was not to be opened until
he and his retinue had returned to their own city. The spirit of the
Assisans was by no means crushed by their misfortunes, and shortly
after the events we have just narrated they issued an edict with a
pomp worthy of Perugia herself which fairly puzzled the Priors of that
city. All Perugians holding land in Assisi were herein ordered to pay
the taxes usually demanded of "strangers" possessing property in the
territory; further, the Assisans proclaimed their firm determination
no longer to observe any orders given to them by the Commune of
Perugia. This audacity was, however, soon checked. Perugia issued an
order to the effect that these statutes, and these alone, which were
decreed by herself were to be valid in Assisi, all others were
worthless. Assisi therefore remained subject to Perugia till 1367,
when Cardinal Albornoz who was engaged in recovering the allegiance of
the Papal States, entered her gates. He was received with wild
enthusiasm by the citizens, for they hailed him as their deliverer
from the hated yoke of the Perugians. The Assisans had every reason to
rejoice in this change of masters, as the Cardinal allowed them to
govern their town like a free republic; he rebuilt the walls
destroyed during the last siege, and the castle which had also
suffered much from the Perugian soldiery. The people were delighted,
and their artists were soon busily employed in painting the gilded
arms of the church on gateways and on palaces.
During his brief sojourn in Assisi the war-like Cardinal had found
such peace as he had probably not often known before, and such was his
love for the church of San Francesco that he added to it several
chapels and chose a place for his tomb within its walls. He died at
Viterbo; and only five months after the Assisans had welcomed him with
such rejoicing, they went with torches and candles, to bear his dead
body back to San Francesco, the Priors, says a chronicler, spending
145 florins upon the crimson gowns they bought for this occasion.
Days of peace and liberty were short, and the Assisans were soon
groaning beneath the enormous taxes laid upon them by the zealous
ministers of the Pope. In 1376 their indignation rose to such a pitch
that they broke into open rebellion, and joined in the war-cry against
the Church, which was to be heard in other towns of Tuscany and
Umbria. The citizens besieged the Legates in their palaces and ordered
them with haughty words to depart; so seeing it was safer to obey,
they returned to Rome without a word. "Because of their love for the
holy Pontiff, whose servants they were, the Assisans used no violence
towards them," but having got their way with polite bows accompanied
them safely beyond the city gates. But at this time, when all was war
and conspiracy, there seemed no chance of a free life again for the
people. No sooner had one tyrant been disposed of than another rose to
take his place. When news of these events reached the Perugians they
thought it a good opportunity to try and again get possession of the
town, accordingly envoys were sent "just to put things in order" as
they expressed it; but the Assisans shut the gates of the city in
their faces and informed them that in future they intended to manage
their own affairs. We cannot say that their endeavours were crowned
with success, the nobles fought among themselves, while the mob was
ever ready for any kind of novelty. It is related how in the year 1398
the Assisans changed their mind three times in one day as to who
should be their lord. "_Evviva_ the Church" was the first cry; the
second, "_Evviva_ the people of Perugia"; and lastly, "_Evviva_ Messer
Imbroglia," a roving adventurer who alternately fought for the Duke of
Milan and the Pope, and finally entered Assisi at the head of a large
cavalcade as Captain and Gonfalonier of the city.
In the early centuries Assisi had bravely fought for her independence
and held her own fairly well; but in the fourteenth century a sudden
whirlwind swept across the country threatening to destroy the last
remnant of her freedom. At this time the _condottieri_ were busy
carving out principalities for themselves, and one after another they
marched through the land forcing the towns to bear their yoke. Assisi,
not without a sharp struggle, fell a prey to Biordo Michelotti and
Braccio Fortebraccio, successive despots of Perugia; and the citizens
found themselves for the next twenty years in turn the vassals of
Guidantonio of Montefeltro, of Sforza, and of the Pope. In 1442
Perugia was governed, in the name of the Pope, by Niccolò Piccinino,
successor to Fortebraccio as the leader of the Bracceschi troops, and
consequently a successor to the rivalry with Francesco Sforza, Duke of
Milan. Assisi, therefore, who had spontaneously given herself to
Sforza, preferring the tyranny of strangers to the yoke of Perugia,
was not likely to be favourably looked on by Piccinino, and sooner or
later he determined to besiege her. But just at this time Perugia had
made peace with all the world, and, delighted with this novel state of
things, she rang the great bell of the Commune, lit beacon fires on
the hills, and sent a special messenger to Assisi to proclaim the
fact. The Assisans, with more courage than discretion, cursed the
messenger and those who sent him, saying they had half a mind to kill
him. "Return with this message," they cried, "say unto those who sent
thee, that they try to wipe us from the face of the earth and then
send words of peace. But we will have war and only war." This
insulting message was duly delivered to the astonished priors, and
that night the beacon fires were extinguished. When news reached
Assisi of the vast preparations in Perugia for war, these hasty words
were regretted. Luckily Francesco Sforza sent the Assisans a good
supply of troops, and every day they hoped for the arrival of his
brother Alessandro.
The month that followed was disastrous to Assisi, and the account of
the war given us by the Perugian chronicler Graziani who took part in
the siege, brings before us vividly the many stages she had to pass
through before arriving at the calm, seraphic days of later years.
By the end of October 1442, Niccolò Piccinino, alluded to always as
_el Capitano_, arrived in the plain below Assisi with some 20,000 men,
and took up his quarters in the Franciscan monastery of San Damiano.
His first intention was to take the town by assault, but on surveying
the fortifications and walls and the impregnable castle, he deemed it
wiser to wait quietly until hunger should have damped the valour of
the citizens. Help, however, came to him from another quarter. It is
believed that a Franciscan friar, perhaps one of those with whom he
lodged at San Damiano, betrayed to him a way into the town by means
of an unused drain.
"On Wednesday, being the 28th day of November, the Captain's people
entered Assisi by an underground drain, which, beginning below the
smaller fortress towards the Carceri, enters Assisi near the
market-place below the castle. There Pazaglia, Riccio da Castello, and
Nicolo Brunoro, with more than 300 men-at-arms, had seen to clearing
the said sewer and cutting through some iron bars at the exit placed
by the Assisans so that none might enter; and Pazaglia and his
companions worked so well that they entered with all their people one
by one. And when they had entered they emerged inside the walls, and
advanced without any noise, holding close to the side of the said
walls so as not to be seen, although the darkness of the night was
great and drizzling rain was falling. But it happened that one of
those within passed by with a lighted torch in his hand, and, hearing
and seeing people, said several times: 'Who goes there.' At last
answer was made to him: 'Friends, friends.' The bearer of the torch
went but a little farther before he began to cry out: 'To arms, to
arms. Awake, awake, for the enemy is within.' So a great tumult arose
throughout the town. Then Pazaglia and his companions, finding they
were discovered, mounted the walls and shouted to those outside:
'Ladders, ladders. Enter, enter.'"[9]
With cries of "Braccio, Braccio," the captain led his men rapidly
through the town, burning the gate, killing the citizens, and
pillaging every palace as they passed along. When Alessandro Sforza
who had stolen into Assisi the night before, "to comfort and encourage
the citizens," found that the enemy was within he hurried with a few
Assisan notables to take refuge in the castle. From the tower-girt
hill he looked down upon the scene of carnage--and what a sight it was
as pictured by Graziani!
"The anguish, the noise, and the screams of women and children! God
alone knows how fearful a thing it was to see them all dishevelled;
some tearing their faces, some beating their breasts, one weeping for
a father, one for a son, another for a brother, as, crying with loud
voices, they prayed to God for death.... But, in truth, these same
Assisans did themselves much injury, greatly adding to their own
trouble. They might have saved many more of their chattels had they
trusted the Perugians, but rather did they trust the strangers, and
this to their undoing, for the said strangers deceived them. Thus was
proved the truth of that proverb which says: 'The offender never
pardons.' Often aforetime had they offended the Commune of Perugia as
we have seen. Even at this moment, when its forces were encamped
outside Assisi, they constantly stood on their walls and hurled
insulting and menacing words at the Perugians, defying and threatening
them, whom for this reason peradventure they did not trust.... Also on
the same day, while the city was being sacked, a multitude of women
with their children and goods, took sanctuary in Santa Chiara; and
when the captain passed and saw so many women and children sheltered
there, he said to the women, especially to the nuns of Santa Chiara,
that it was no longer a safe refuge for them, and if they would choose
where they wished to go he would send them thither in safety. Then,
naming to them all the neighbouring towns, he lastly offered to place
them in safety in the city of Perugia. But when they heard the name of
Perugia, first the nuns and then the other women replied, 'May Perugia
be destroyed by fire.' And when the captain heard this answer, he
immediately cried, 'Pillage, pillage!' Thus was everything plundered
and ruined--the convent with the nuns, the women and the children, and
much booty was there...."[10]
Assisi, now the shell of her former self, seemed indeed a city of the
dead. Through her deserted streets, running with the blood of the
slain, echoed the sound of falling rafters and crumbling palaces,
while bon-fires flamed on the piazza fed with the public archives by
the destroying Perugians. Across the Tiber were to be seen the unhappy
citizens being driven like droves of cattle by their captors up the
hill to the city they hated. There the women, with their children
clinging round their necks, were sold in the market-place as slaves,
and exposed to the cruellest treatment by their masters. Even tiny
children of four and five years old were sold; a maiden, we are told,
fetched fifteen ducats, and many were bought, sometimes for the love
of God, and sometimes as maidservants. Every day fresh booty was
brought in, and the Perugians fought over the gold chalices, missals,
and other treasures robbed from churches and convents; but these
brought lower prices, for even Perugian consciences seem to have been
troubled with scruples, and superstitious fear kept them from buying
stolen church property. While the slave market was proceeding amidst
the clanging of bells proclaiming the victory, the Priors of Perugia
sat in their council hall of the great Palazzo Pubblico discussing how
they could bring about the total annihilation of Assisi. The following
curious letter was finally written, sealed, and sent to Niccolò
Piccinino by five ambassadors who were to tempt him to do the deed
with a bribe of 15,000 ducats:
"Your illustrious Signory being well aware how that city has ever
been the scandal of this one, and that now the time has come to take
this beam from out of our eyes, we pray and supplicate your
illustrious Signory, in the name of this city and of the State, that
it may please you to act in such wise that this your city shall never
again have reason to fear her; and so, as appears good to all the
community, it will be well to raze her to the ground, saving only the
churches. And this will be the most singular among other favours that
your illustrious Signory has ever done to us."[11]
"Trust in my words and trust in my deeds," replied Piccinino to the
bearers of this truly mediæval letter; but, adds the chronicler, he
refused his consent to their cowardly scheme for the destruction of
the town. It is believed that he was acting upon orders received from
Eugenius IV, who appears as the benevolent genius of Assisi, until, as
the local historians tell us with rage, the Pope offered to sell them
to the Commune of Perugia, when his clemency seems due solely to the
fact that the papal coffers were sadly empty. Luckily the Perugians,
somewhat in debt owing to the late war, were unable to pay the price,
and Assisi thus escaped being given "like a lamb to the butcher,"
while her enemy missed the chance "of removing that beam from out of
her eye."
From this time onward Assisi remained in the possession of the Church,
and many of the Popes, touched by the miserable condition of the town,
supplied money to rebuild its ruined walls and palaces, and thus
induce the citizens to return and inhabit the desolate city. But
hardly had the Assisans succeeded in getting back some kind of order
and prosperity than new wars appeared to ruffle the onward flow of
things. This time the danger came from within, and in Assisi, as in
so many of the cities of Italy, it was the feud between the nobles
themselves that drenched the streets with blood and crushed the
struggles of a people whose cries for liberty were now only faintly
heard. All sank beneath the heavy hand of the despot. The Perugian
citizens were being tyrannised over by the powerful family of the
Baglioni, whose name brings up a picture of crime and bloodshed that
has hardly been equalled in any town in Italy.[12] In Assisi the
balance of power lay between the two families of Fiumi and Nepis, who,
in the irregular fashion of the time, alternately ruled the city in
opposition to the legal sovereignty of the Papacy. The city was
sharply divided into the Upper town, where the Nepis had their palaces
near the castle and San Rufino, and the Lower town, inhabited entirely
by the Fiumi and their adherents, which clustered round the church of
Santa Chiara and down to San Francesco. These two families sought
perpetually to outshine each other, and such was the reputation they
gained among the people in the country round that even the Perugian
chroniclers speak of them as "most cultured and splendid citizens,"
praising their horsemanship and the magnificence of their dress. So
great was the rivalry between the members of the two families Fiumi
and Nepis that, when they met in the piazza of Assisi where the nobles
often walked in the evening, they would provoke each other with
scornful looks and words, and often this was a signal for a skirmish.
The _bravi_ would gather round them, and in an instant the whole town
be roused to arms. After a sharp fight one party was driven to retire
to its strongholds in the open country, while the victorious nobles
seized the reins of government, and the weary citizens sank beneath
the rule of the despots. Assisi presented a most melancholy spectacle
at the end of one of these encounters. Most of the dwellings of the
exiled nobles lay in ruins, the churches were shut in consequence of
the perpetual bloodshed, and the palaces, barred and chained, with the
gratings drawn up before the entrance, seemed to be inhabited by no
living being. Franciscan friars stole along the streets on their
errands of mercy among the distressed citizens, who, besides the
horrors of the city feuds, suffered from the pestilence and famine
which decimated nearly all the towns of Italy at this period. But this
death-like silence within the town was never of long duration. The
exiled party, ever on the alert to regain possession of their homes,
would creep into the town at some unguarded moment and once more stir
a people to fight who were beginning to chafe beneath the irksome rule
of the rival despots.
A climax of evils came when, in addition to a hundred other ills, the
Baglioni of Perugia took upon themselves to interfere.
In 1494 we find the Fiumi and the Nepis living peaceably in their
palaces, dividing the power in Assisi, until at last the hot-headed
Fiumi grew weary of the even balance of things, and determined at one
stroke to rid themselves of every foe. In open combat they had
attempted this and failed, so a treacherous plot was hatched. Jacopo
Fiumi, head of the house, and his brother Alessandro, persuaded their
friends, the Priors of the city, to prepare a great banquet in the
Communal Palace and invite all the members of the rival family to be
present. Unarmed, and not dreaming of danger, the Nepis entered the
big hall. No sooner had they thrown off their cloaks than the Fiumi
rushed upon them with drawn swords and knives. Angered by such wanton
treachery, the citizens drove the murderers from the city; and the
Priors, protected by the darkness of the night, fled into the open
country to seek a refuge in some neighbouring town.
Now this event, like many others, might have subsided and been
followed by a period of peace, only it happened that the Baglioni were
allies of the Nepis and ready to avenge them in Assisi. They had,
moreover, old scores to settle with Jacopo Fiumi, who, Matarazzo tells
us, in pained surprise, "was a most cruel enemy of the house of
Baglioni and of every Perugian, and studied day and night how he might
injure those of Perugia, so that he was the cause of much trouble to
the magnificent house of Baglioni."[13] This was therefore a good
opportunity for the Baglioni to lay siege to Assisi, and perpetual
skirmishes took place in the plain, which sapped the life-blood of the
citizens and laid waste the Umbrian country for many miles around. The
peasants, whose grain had been trampled down by the Baglioni, were
driven half-naked into the woods, and watched the high roads from the
heights above Assisi like birds of prey, swooping down to rob or kill
travellers passing by. Badgers, wolves, and foxes roamed unmolested in
the plain, and fed upon the unburied bodies of the murdered travellers
and of those who fell in battle; while, in the dead of night, the
friars of the Portiuncula stole out to bury what bones the wild beasts
had left. Things had come to such a pass that the Assisans, as we are
told, knew not what to say or do, so many of their number were dead or
taken captive and the enemy was ever at their gates. Giovan Paolo,
mounted on his black charger, "which did not run but flew," led the
Perugians to storm the town and draw the citizens out to battle. He
was one of the fiercest of the Baglioni brood and a famous soldier,
and yet it was in vain he sought to inspire the Assisans with fear.
"Indeed," says Matarazzo, "each one proved himself valiant on either
side; for the Assisans had become warlike and inured to arms, and they
were all iniquitous and desperate."[14] The foes were of equal
strength and courage, and the war, which had already lasted three
years, seemed likely to have no end. But one day the Assisans,
watching from their ramparts, saw a large squadron of soldiers
hurrying from Perugia to the aid of the Baglioni, and they began to
ring the city bells as a signal that the moment had come for the final
stand. Those who were skirmishing in the plain against Giovan Paolo
began to lose heart when they heard the clanging of the bells, and the
Perugians, perceiving their advantage, took new courage, so that "each
one became as a lion." More than sixty Assisans were slain that day,
while the prisoners suffered cruelly under the vengeance of those who
took this opportunity of remembering offences of past years. "And thus
did his lordship, the magnificent Giovan Paolo, return victorious and
joyful from this great and dangerous battle."[15]
Once the gates of Assisi were forced open, the Baglioni and their
_bravi_ scoured the streets from end to end, killing all they
encountered, and dragging from the churches the poor women who sought
shelter and protection. The blood-thirsty brood did not even respect
the Church of San Francesco; and the friars, in a letter to their
patron Guidobaldo, Duke of Urbino, complain most bitterly of the
crimes committed within the sacred edifice, even on the very steps of
the altar. "The poor city of Assisi," the letter says, "has known only
sorrow through the perpetual raids of the Baglioni, whose many crimes
would be condemned even by the infidel Turks. They rebel against the
holy Pontiff, and such is their ferocity that they have set fire to
the gates of the city--even unto that of the Basilica of San
Francesco. They do not shudder to murder men, cook their flesh, and
give it to the relations of the slain to eat in their prison
dungeons."[16] Matarazzo also dwells on the sad conditions of Assisi
during her final struggle for independence. "So great was the
pestilence and the famine within the walls that human tongue could not
describe it, for great woe there was, and such scarcity and penury in
Assisi as had never been known. I myself have talked to men who were
in Assisi at that time, and who, on remembering those days of famine,
pestilence, and war were bathed in tears; and, if the subject had come
up a thousand times in a day, a thousand times would they have wept
bitterly, so dark was the memory thereof. Not only did they weep, but
those also who listened to them, for they would recount how they
wandered by the walls of the town, and down to the hamlets, and in
every place searching for herbs to eat; and how, forced by hunger,
they ate all manner of cooked herbs, and many people sustained
themselves with three or four cooked nuts dipped in wine, and with
this they made good cheer."[17]
In reading the terrible chronicle of these years, one asks, "How did
any life survive in the face of such ghastly suffering?" The strange
fact remains that life not only survived, but that the Assisans even
flourished during the period, and, like half-drowned birds, who,
rising to the surface, bask for a while in the sunshine and then
spread their wings for a fresh flight, they too arose and prospered.
But the time was drawing near when these continual efforts were no
longer needed. The rival factions had reached the summit of their
savage strength, and the city despots were soon to be swept from the
land by the whirlwind they themselves had raised.
In the year 1500, during one awful night of carnage at Perugia, the
Baglioni were nearly all murdered through the treachery of some of
their own family. The manner in which the clansmen sought out their
victims and stabbed them in their sleep, driving their teeth into
their hearts in savage fury, sent a thrill of horror throughout Italy.
The downfall of this powerful house affected the destiny of Assisi,
for Perugia was brought under the immediate dominion of the church,
and with the advent of Paul III, she lost her independence, which she
never again recovered. A mighty fortress was erected on the site of
the Baglioni palaces, and the significant words "_Ad coercendam
Perusinorum audacam_" were inscribed upon its walls. The Farnese Pope
meant to warn, not only the citizens of that proud city which he had
brought so successfully within his net, but also the Assisans and the
other Umbrians who, with anxious eyes, were watching the storms that
wrecked Perugia.
With this new order of things the last flicker of mediæval liberty was
being extinguished, and when Paul III, ordered the cannons from the
castle of Assisi to be transferred to his new fortress at Perugia, the
Assisans felt that a crisis had been reached and that henceforth they
must be guided by the menacing finger of an indomitable pontiff. One
last effort she did indeed make to save her dignity: she begged to be
governed independently of her old rival Perugia. To this the Pope
agreed, and a Papal Legate came with great pomp and was met outside
the gates by the Priors, nobles, and citizens of Assisi. With that
great Farnese fortress looming in the distance they were forced to
make some show of gladness as they followed him in solemn procession
through the town and up the steep hill to the Rocca Maggiore. Here the
Legate walked round the ramparts and through the spacious halls of the
castle, taking possession of all in the name of the Church of Rome.
Then the Castellano knelt down before him, and as he handed the keys
over to his keeping, the history of war and strife in Assisi abruptly
closed.
[Illustration: THE ARMS OF ASSISI]
[Illustration: ASSISI IN THE TIME OF ST. FRANCIS]
FOOTNOTES:
[1] The legend may have arisen from the fact that Minerva had a temple
near Miletos under the title of Assesia and the legend-weavers have
caught at the similarity of sound to that of their own Umbrian town.
[2] _Carmina_, i. 22, translated by R. C. Trevelyan.
[3] _Carmina_, IV. i. 121; translated by R. C. Trevelyan. In another
place Propertius gives bolder utterance to his pride: "Whosoever
beholds the town climbing the valley side, let him measure the fame of
their walls by my genius" (_Carmina_, iv. 5).
[4] See Cristofani, _Storia d'Assisi_, p. 42 for text of the MS.
[5] Dante, _Inferno_, xix. p. 115. Translated by John Milton.
[6] See _Les Nouveaux Mémoires de l'Academie de Bruxelles_ (t. xxiii.
pp. 29, 33); also _Un nouveau Chapitre de la Vie de S. François
d'Assise_, par Paul Sabatier.
[7] Perugia was, on the whole, faithful to the Guelph cause. She was
patronised by the Popes on account of her strong position overlooking
the Tiber, and when inclined she freely acknowledged them as her
masters but at the same time she was careful to guard her
independence.
[8] _Cronaca Graziani_, p. 522.
[9] _Cronaca Graziani_, pp. 512 and 513.
[10] _Cronaca Graziani_, p. 513.
[11] _Cronaca Graziani_, p. 514, note 1.
[12] For a full account of the Baglioni see the sixteenth-century
chronicle of Matarazzo (_Archivio Storico Italiano_, vol. xvi. part
ii.), who has immortalised their crimes in classic language; and also
_The Story of Perugia_ (Mediæval Towns Series, J. M. Dent & Co.).
[13] _Cronaca Matarazzo_, p. 75.
[14] _Cronaca Matarazzo_, p. 75.
[15] _Ibid._
[16] Fratini, _Storia della Basilica di San Francesco_, p. 287.
[17] _Cronaca di Matarazzo_, p. 75.
CHAPTER II
_The Umbrian Prophet_
"Fra santi il pui santo, e tra i peccatori quasi uno di
loro."--Celano. _Vita_ I. cap. xxix.
Often while reading the Italian chroniclers we forget that a life of
chivalry, song, tournament, and pagan pleasure-making was passed in a
mediæval town even while war, pestilence, and famine cast a settled
gloom on every home. Lazar-houses stood at the gates of the city while
sumptuous feasts were spread in the banqueting halls of palaces. Men
rebelled against the ugliness and squalor produced by a hundred ills
that swept over Italy during the twelfth century,[18] and so it came
about that in the darkest hours of a city's history, scenes of maddest
revelry were enacted. At this period were founded the Brigate Amorose,
or Companies of young nobles, whose one aim in life was amusement.
There were few towns in Italy, however small, in which these gay
youths did not organise magnificent sports and tournaments[19] to
which the ladies came in gowns of rich brocades or "fair velvet,"
their tresses garlanded with precious jewels and flowers. Or knights,
ladies, and other folk would meet in the piazzas and pass the summer
evenings with
"Provençal songs and dances that surpass;
And quaint French mummings: and through hollow brass
A sound of German music in the air."[20]
Late at night after a splendid banquet, the nobles wandered through
the streets singing as they followed the lead of one chosen by
themselves, whom they called the Lord of Love. Sometimes their ranks
were swelled by passing troubadours from Provence who sang of the
feats of Charlemagne and of King Arthur and his knights. For it was
the time when Bernard de Ventadour was singing some of his sweetest
love lyrics, and people were alternately laughing at the
whimsicalities of Pierre Vidal and weeping at the tender pathos of his
poems.[21] Those who listened to these songsters were, for the moment,
deceived into thinking life was full of love and mirth, and sorrow
only touched them when their lady frowned. The music of Provence found
a way across the Alps to the feudal courts of Este and Ferrara, to
Verona, and later, southwards to Sicily, where Frederick the Great was
king. It came even to the towns which lay hidden in the folds of the
Umbrian mountains, and some of its sweetest strains were echoed back
again from Assisi. Her troubadour was Francis Bernardone, the rich
merchant's son, leader of the young nobles who, in their carousals,
named him Lord of Love, and placed the kingly sceptre in his hand as
he walked at their head through the streets at night, rousing the
sleepy Assisan burghers with wild bursts of song.
Francis had learned the Provençal language from his mother, Madonna
Pica, whom Pietro Bernardone[22] is said to have met while journeying
from castle to castle in Provence, tempting the ladies to buy his
merchandise as he told them news of Italy. The early writers do not
mention her nationality, they only allude to her as _Madonna_, which
might imply that she was of noble birth; the later legend, which says
that she was of the family of the counts of Bourlemont, is without
foundation. We know she was a good and tender mother to Francis, who
was left mostly in her charge, as Pietro Bernardone was so often
absent in France. She taught him to love the world of romance and
chivalry peopled by the heroes of the troubadours, and there he found
an escape from the gloom that enveloped Assisi during those early days
of warfare which were enough to sadden that joyous nature rarely found
among saints. Celano gives a graphic picture of the temptations to
which the youths of the middle ages were exposed, even in infancy in
their own homes. This danger Francis escaped, but the companions with
whom he spent the first twenty years of his life in gay living had not
been so well guarded, and Francis was not slow to feel the influence
of his time. We must remember that the accounts we have of him were
written under the papal eye, and it is patent that both as sinner and
as saint he took a leading part.
"He was always first among his equals in all vanities," says Celano,
"the first instigator of evil, and behind none in foolishness, so that
he drew upon himself the attention of the public by vain-glorious
extravagance, in which he stood foremost. He was not chary of jokes,
ridicule, light sayings, evil-speaking, singing, and in the wearing of
soft and fine clothes; being very rich he spent freely, being less
desirous of accumulating wealth than of dissipating his substance;
clever at trafficking, but too vain to prevent others from spending
what was his: withal a man of pleasant manners, facile and courteous
even to his own disadvantage; for this reason, therefore, many,
through his fault, became evil-doers and promoters of scandal. Thus,
surrounded by many worthless companions, triumphantly and scornfully
he went upon his way."[23]
His early years passed away in feasting and singing with an occasional
journey to a neighbouring town to sell the Bernardone wares, until
1202 when war broke out between Perugia and Assisi, and the big bell
of the cathedral called the citizens to arms in the Piazza della
Minerva. Men gathered round their captain, while from the windows of
every house women gesticulated wildly, almost drowning the clank of
armour and the tramp of horses by their shrill screams. Francis, on a
magnificent charger, rode out of the city gates abreast with the
nobles of Assisi, filling the bourgeois heart of Pietro with delight,
that a son of his should be thus honoured. It was a beautiful sight to
see the communal armies winding down to the plain, one coming from the
western hill, the other from the southern, to match their strength by
the Tiber. They were "troops of knights, noble in face and form,
dazzling in crest and shield; horse and man one labyrinth of quaint
colour and gleaming light--the purple, and silver, and scarlet fringes
flowing over the strong limbs and clashing mail like sea waves over
rocks at sunset."[24]
The Assisans were vanquished: no details of the fight have come down
to us, but we know that the nobles lay in a Perugian prison for a year
and that it was Francis who cheered them, often astonishing them with
his wild spirits. They told him he was mad to dance so gaily in a
prison, but nothing saddened him in those days.
When peace was at last made, with hard terms for Assisi, the prisoners
returned home and threw themselves with renewed vigour into their
former pursuit of pleasure, and soon afterwards Francis fell ill of a
fever which brought him near the grave. Face to face with death he
stood a while, and the result of the danger he had passed through
worked an extraordinary change in his nature. His recovery was in
reality a return to a new life, both of body and soul. Celano tells us
that Francis "being somewhat stronger and able to walk about the house
leaning on a stick, in order to complete his restoration to health one
day went forth and with unusual eagerness gazed at the vast extent of
country which lay before him; yet neither the charm of the vineyards
or of aught that is pleasant to look on, were of any consolation to
him."[25]
It was probably from the Porta Nuova, close to where the church of
Santa Chiara now stands, that he looked out on the Umbrian country he
loved so well. Here Mount Subasio rises grey and bleak above the olive
groves which slope gradually down to the valley where a white road
leads past Spello to Foligno in the plain and on to Spoleto high up in
the mountain gorge which brings the valley to a close. All these towns
were dear and familiar to Francis. He had watched them in spring time
when the young corn was ripening near their walls and the children
came out to look for the sweet scented narcissi. While wandering on
the hill sides at dawn he had seen the brown roofs warmed by the first
rays of the sun and each window twinkle like so many eyes across the
plain in answer to the light. But as he looked now upon the same scene
a great sadness came over him, and we are told he wondered at the
sudden inward change. That hour in the smiling Umbrian landscape was
the most solitary he ever experienced; ill and weak he awoke to the
emptiness of the life he had hitherto led, and in the bitterness of
his soul he did not know where to turn for comfort.[26]
It is a remarkable fact that Celano does not from this moment picture
Francis as an aureoled saint, but allows us to realise the many
difficulties he had to overcome before he stands once more among the
vineyards with a song of praise upon his lips, and a look of victory
in his eyes.
Although Francis began to "despise those things he had formerly held
dear," he was not altogether freed from the bonds of vanity, nor had
he "thrown off the yoke of servitude"; for when restored to health he
was full of ambitious projects to make a great career for himself in
the world. The realisation of his dreams seemed indeed near, as it
happened at this time that a noble knight of Assisi was preparing to
join the army of Gauthier de Brienne, then fighting the battles of
Pope Innocent III, in Apulia. Francis, "greedy of glory," determined
to accompany the knight to the wars, and began to prepare for the
journey with more than usual magnificence. He was all impatience to
start, and his mind was full of the expedition when he had a dream
which filled him with hope. In lieu of the bales of silk in his
father's warehouse, stood saddles, shields, and lances, all marked
with the red cross, and as he marvelled at the sight a voice told him
those arms were intended for himself and his soldiers. Rising next
morning full of ambitious plans after such an omen of good fortune, he
mounted his charger and rode through the town bidding farewell to his
friends. He smiled on all and seemed so light of heart that they
pressed round asking what made him so merry. "I shall yet be a great
prince," he answered, and he passed out of the Porta Nuova, where but
a short while before he had stood looking down so sadly on the valley
he was now to traverse as an armoured knight. At Spoleto he had a
return of intermittent fever, and while chafing at the delay a voice
called to him: "Francis, who can do the most good, the master or the
servant?"
"The master," answered Francis, not in the least astonished by the
mysterious question.
"Why then dost thou leave the master for the servant, and the prince
for the follower? Return to thy country, there shalt thou be told what
to do; for thou hast mistaken the meaning and wrongly interpreted the
vision sent thee by God."
Next morning, leaving the knight to continue the journey alone, he
mounted his horse and returned to Assisi, where he was doubtless
received with disappointment by his parents, and with gibes by the
citizens who had listened to his boasts of future greatness. Once
again he went back to work in his father's shop, but now when the
young nobles called to him to join in their revels he went listlessly,
often escaping from their midst to wander alone in the fields or pass
long hours praying in a grotto near the city. One day his friends, in
despair at his frequent absences, gave a grand banquet, making him
"King of the feast." He delighted them all with fitful bursts of merry
wit, but at last when the revellers rushed out into the night to roam
about the town till dawn, Francis fell back from the gay throng, and
stood gazing up at the calm Umbrian sky decked in all its splendour of
myriad stars. When the others returned in search of their leader,
they, wondering at the change that had come over the wildest spirit of
Assisi, assailed him with questions. "Are you thinking of marrying,
Francis," cried one jester, and amidst the laughter of all came his
quiet answer: "Yes, a wife more noble and more beautiful than ye have
ever seen; she will outshine all others in beauty and in wisdom."
Already the image of the Lady Poverty had visited him, and enamoured
like a very troubadour he composed songs in her honour as he walked in
the woods near Assisi.
The kind heart of Francis had always been touched at the sight of the
poor lepers, who, exiled from the companionship of their fellow
creatures, lived in a lazar-house on the plain, about a mile from the
town. But his compassion for their misery was mingled with a strong
feeling of repugnance, so that he had always shunned these wretched
outcasts. "When I was in the bondage of sin," he tells us in his will,
"it was bitter to me, and loathsome to see, and loke uppon persouny
enfect with leopre; but that blessed Lord broughte me amonge them, and
I did mercy with them, and departing from them, what before semyd
bittre and lothesomme was turned and changed to me in great sweetnesse
and comfort both of body and of soule, and afterwards in this state I
stode and abode a lytle while, and then I lefte and forsooke the
worldly lyf."[27]
Pietro Bernardone now saw his son, clothed in rags, his face pinched
and white from long vigils spent in prayer, going forth on errands of
mercy, jeered at by the citizens, pelted with stones and filth by the
children. There were many storms in the Bernardone household which the
gentle Pica was unable to quell; and when finally Francis began to
throw his father's money among the poor in the same regal manner in
which he had once spent it among his boon companions, Bernardone could
bear it no longer, and drove his son from the house. When they met he
cursed him, and the family bonds thus severed were never again
renewed.
Francis was still like a pilgrim uncertain of his goal, or like a man
standing before a heavy burden which he feels unable to lift. What was
he to do with his life--how could he help the poor and suffering--were
questions he asked himself over and over again as he vainly sought for
an anchor in the troubled seas. The answer came to him one day as he
was attending mass at the chapel of the Portiuncula on the feast of
St. Matthew the apostle, in the year 1209.
"And as ye go, preach, saying, The kingdom of heaven is at hand. Heal
the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils: freely
ye have received, freely give. Provide neither gold, nor silver, nor
brass in your purses, nor scrip for your journey, neither two coats,
neither shoes, nor yet staves" ... read the priest from the gospel of
the day. Those simple words were a revelation to Francis, who, when
mass was over, ran out into the woods, and, with only the birds in
the oak trees to witness his strange interpretation of the gospel,
threw away his shoes, wallet, staff and well-filled purse. "This is
what I desired; behold, here is what I searched for and am burning to
perform," he cried, in the delirium of his new-found joy.
If the Assisans had been astonished at his former eccentricities, as
they termed his deeds of charity, they were yet more amazed to see him
now, clothed in a coarse habit, with a knotted cord round his waist,
and with bare feet, begging his bread from door to door. After a
little while they grew accustomed to the hurrying figure of the young
mendicant as he passed rapidly down the street greeting all he met
with the salutation of "Our Lord give thee His peace." The words
brought something new and strange into men's hearts, and those who had
scoffed at him most drew near to learn the secret of their charm. The
first to be touched by the simplicity and joyous saintliness of
Francis was Bernardo di Quintevalle, a wealthy noble of Assisi, who
had known him as King among the young Assisan revellers, and watched
with astonishment his complete renouncement of the world. He
determined to join Francis in ministering to the lepers, and began his
new mode of life by selling all his possessions for the benefit of the
poor. His conversion created a considerable stir in the town; and
people had not ceased to gossip on the subject when another well-known
citizen, Pietro de Catanio, a canon of the cathedral, also offered his
services at the lazar-house. A few days later a labourer named Egidio
"beholding how those noble knights of Assisi despised the world, so
that the whole country stood amazed," came in search of Francis to beg
him to take him as one of his companions. Francis met him at the
entrance of the wood by the lazar hospital, and gazing on the devout
aspect of Egidio, answered and said: "Brother most dear, God has shown
Himself exceeding gracious unto thee. If the Emperor were to come to
Assisi and desire to make a certain citizen his knight or private
chamberlain, ought not such a one to be exceeding glad? How much more
oughtest thou not to rejoice that God hath chosen thee out to be His
knight and well-beloved servant, to observe the perfection of the Holy
Gospel"?[28] and, taking him by the hand, he brought him to the hut
which was their home. Here a merchant's son, a learned churchman, and
a rich nobleman, welcomed an Assisan labourer in their midst with the
simple brotherly love which was to be the keynote of the franciscan
order. After the reception of Egidio we are told that Francis went
with him to the Marches of Ancona, "singing glorious praises of the
Lord of heaven and earth" as they travelled along the dusty roads.
Albeit Francis did not preach publicly to the people, yet as he went
by the way he admonished and corrected the men-folk and the
women-folk, saying lovingly to them these simple words: "Love and fear
God, and do fit penance for your sins." And Egidio would say: "Do what
this my spiritual Father saith unto you, for he speaketh right well."
It was not long before the fame of Francis drew quite a little
community of brethren to the tiny hut in the plain, and the question
naturally occurs--Did Francis plan out the creation of an order when
he gathered men around him? It was so natural a thing for disciples to
follow him that his biographers simply note it as a fact, and, not
being given to speculation in those days, pass on to other events. We
may be allowed to conjecture that the same ambition which some years
before had stirred his longing to be a great prince was not dead,
only his dreams were to be realised in another sphere of action. The
qualities which made him the brilliant leader among the gay nobles of
Assisi were now turned into another channel--he became a prince among
saints, a controller of men's destinies.
Varied indeed was the band of Francis' disciples, and it is
interesting to see how each one was allowed to follow the bent of his
nature. In this complete sympathy with character lay one of the
secrets of his power. Egidio, who in the world had been a labourer,
was encouraged by his master to continue his life in the open country.
He gathered in the olives for the peasants, helped them with their
vintage, and when the corn was being cut would glean the ears; but if
anyone offered him a handful of grain, he remarked: "My brother, I
have no granary wherein to store it." Usually he gave away what he had
gleaned to the poor, so that he brought little food back to the
convent. Always ready to turn his hand to every job, one day we find
Egidio beating a walnut tree for a proprietor who could find none to
do the work because the tree was so tall. But he set himself gaily to
the task, and having made the sign of the Cross, "with great fear
climbed up the walnut tree and beat it. The share that fell to him was
so large that he could not carry it in his tunic, so taking off his
habit he tied the sleeves and the hood together and made a sack of
it."[29] With this load on his back he returned towards the convent,
but on the way distributed all the nuts to the poor. Egidio remains
the ideal type of the franciscan friar. "He is a Knight of my Round
Table," said Francis one day as he recounted some new adventure which
had befallen the intrepid brother, who was always journeying to some
southern town, and is said even to have visited the Holy Land.[30]
A very different man, drawn by the magic influence of Francis into the
Order at the beginning of its fame in 1211, was Elias Buonbarone, the
son of a Bolognese mattress-maker who had for some time been settled
in Assisi. He is always represented by the biographers as haughty,
overbearing, and fond of controlling the actions of others; in fact a
strong contrast to the meek brother Leo whom Francis lovingly named
the little lamb of God. But if lacking in saintly qualities, Elias
possessed a remarkable mind and determination of character which
enabled him afterwards to play a considerable part in the history of
his times. He embodies the later franciscan spirit which grew up after
the saint's death, and of which we shall treat in another chapter.
When Francis found himself surrounded by some dozen followers, all
anxious to obey his wishes to the very letter and waiting only to be
sent hither and thither as he commanded, it became necessary to write
down some rule of life. In simple words he enjoined all to live
according to the precepts of the Gospel, "and they that came to
reseyve this forme or manner of lyvynge departyd and distributed that
they had and myght haue too powre people. And we were content with
oone coote pesyd bothe within forthe and without forthe with oone
corde and a femorall, and we wolde not haue ony more. Our dyvyne
servyse the clerkis saide as other clerkis, and the lay bretherne said
ther Pater noster. And we fulle gladly dwelt and taried in pour
deserte and desolat churchys, and we were contente to be taken as
ideotis and foolys of every man, and I did exercyse my self in bodily
laboure. And I wille laboure, and yt ys my wille surely and
steadfastely that alle the bretherne occupie and exercyse themself in
laboure, and in such occupation and laboure as belongeth to honeste.
And those that have no occupation to exercyse themself with alle,
shall lerne not for covetis to resceyve the price or hier for their
laboure, but for to give good example and eschewe and put away
idlenesse. When we wer not satisfied nor recompensied for our laboure,
we went and had recourse to the lord of oure Lorde, askynge almes from
dore to dore. Our Lorde by reualation tawghte me to say this maner of
salutation, 'Our Lorde give to thee His peace.'"[31]
The first rule which Francis and his companions took in the summer of
1210 to be confirmed by Innocent III, has not come down to us. In Rome
they fortunately met the bishop of Assisi, who promised to obtain for
them, through one of the Cardinals, an interview with the Pope. A
legend tells us how Innocent, wrapt in deep meditation, was pacing
with solemn step the terrace of the Lateran, when this strange company
of ragged, bare-footed, dusty men was ushered into his presence. He
looked at them in surprise, his lip curling in disdain as Francis
stepped forward to make his request. From an Umbrian pilgrim he heard
for the first time that power was not the greatest good in life while
in poverty lay both peace and joy, and the great pope stood amazed at
the new doctrine. "Who can live without temporal possessions,"
sarcastically asked the Cardinals who had been trained in the spirit
of Innocent, and the "Penitents of Assisi" bowed their heads, and
drawing their hoods forward, went sorrowfully out of the pope's
presence amid the jeers of his court. That night Innocent had a dream
in which he saw the church of St John Lateran about to fall, and its
tottering walls were supported on the shoulders of a man whom he
recognised as the spokesman of the band of Umbrians he had so hastily
dismissed. Full of strange visions the pope sent for Francis, who
repeated his desire to have his rule confirmed. "My son," said
Innocent, "your rule of life seems to us most hard and bitter, but
although we do not doubt your fervour we must consider whether the
road is not too hard a one for those who are to follow thee." Francis,
with ready wit, answered these objections by a tale he invented for
the purpose. "A beautiful but poor girl lived in a desert, and a great
king, seeing her beauty, wished to take her to wife, thinking by her
to have fine children. The marriage having taken place, many sons were
born, and when they were grown up their mother thus spoke to them: 'My
sons be not ashamed, for you are sons of the king; go therefore to his
court and he will cause all that is needful to be given to you.' And
when they came, the king, observing their beauty and seeing in them
his own likeness and image, said: 'Whose sons are you?' And they
answered; 'sons of a poor woman who lived in the desert.' So with
great joy the king embraced them, saying: 'Be not afraid, for you are
my sons, and when strangers eat at my table how much more right have
you to eat who are my legitimate sons?' The king then ordered the said
woman to send all sons born of her to be nourished at his court." "Oh,
Messer," cried Francis, "I am that poor woman, beloved of God, and
made beautiful through His mercy, by whom he was pleased to generate
legitimate sons. And the King said to me that he will feed all the
sons born of me, for as He feeds strangers so He may well feed His
own."
Thus did Francis describe his Lady Poverty, and boldly hint that the
crimson-robed princes of the Church and the prelates of the Papal
Court had strayed from the teaching of the Gospel.
Who can say whether Innocent, watching with keen eyes the earnest face
of the Umbrian teacher, began to realise the power such a man might
have in restoring to the church some of its lost purity, and was
planning how to yoke him to his service. This at least we know, that
before Francis and his companions left Rome they received the tonsure
which marked them as the Church's own, and with blessings and promises
of protection Innocent sent this new and strange militia throughout
the length and breadth of Italy to fight his spiritual battles. The
simplicity and the love of Francis had conquered the Pope, and to the
end continued to triumph over every difficulty.
Such was the desire of Francis and his companions to return to Assisi
with the good news, that they forgot to eat on the way and arrived
exhausted in the valley of Spoleto, though still singing aloud for the
joy in their hearts. Somewhere near Orte they found an Etruscan
tomb--a delightful retreat for prayer. It so pleased Francis that a
strong temptation came over him to abandon all idea of preaching and
lead a hermit's life. For there was that in his nature which drew him
into the deep solitude of the woods, and might have kept him away from
men and the work that was before him. The battle in his soul waged
fiercely as he stood upon the mountain side looking up the valley
towards Assisi, but his heart went out to the people who dwelt there,
and the strong impulse he had to help those who suffered and needed
him won the day. The die was cast; he left his Etruscan retreat to
take up once more the burden, and thus it was that, in the words of
Matthew Arnold: "He brought religion to the people. He founded the
most popular body of ministers of religion that has ever existed in
the church. He transformed monachism by uprooting the stationary monk,
delivering him from the bondage of property, and sending him, as a
mendicant friar, to be a stranger and sojourner; not in the
wilderness, but in the most crowded haunts of men, to console them,
and to do them good."
When Francis began his mission among the people of Italy it was the
custom for only the bishops to preach; but as they lived in baronial
splendour, enjoying the present, and amassing money which they
extorted from their poor parishioners to leave to their families, they
had little time to attend to spiritual duties. The people being
therefore left much to their own devices, sank ever deeper into
ignorance, sin, and superstition. They saw religion only from afar
until Francis appeared "like a star shining in the darkness of the
night" to bring to them the messages of peace and love. He came as one
of themselves, poor, reviled and persecuted, and the wonder of it made
the people throng in crowds to hear one who seemed indeed inspired.
Those simple words from the depths of a great and noble heart filled
all who listened with wonder. They were like the sharp cries of some
wild bird calling to its mate--the people heard and understood them.
When the citizens of an Umbrian town looked from their walls across
the valley and saw the grey cloaked figure hurrying along the dusty
road, they rang the bells to spread the good news, and bearing
branches of olive went out singing to meet him. All turned out of
their houses to run to the market-place where Francis, standing on
steps, or upon a low wall, for he was short of stature, would speak
to them as one friend does to another; sometimes charming them by his
eloquence, often moving the whole multitude to bitter tears by his
preaching on the passion of Christ. With his eyes looking up to the
heavens, and his hands outstretched as though imploring them to
repent, he seemed to belong to another world and "not to this
century." They not only repented, but many left the world to follow
him and spread the gospel of peace and love. The first woman who
begged him to receive her vows of renunciation was Chiara Sciffi, of a
noble Assisan house. Several members of the family, besides others
from near and far, followed her into the cloister until she became the
abbess of a numerous sisterhood, the foundress of the Poor Clares or
Second Order of St. Francis.
The first inspired messages of Francis were brought to the Assisans,
and then he left them for awhile to journey further afield into other
parts of Italy, where he always met with the same marvellous success.
In the following account of his visit to Bologna we get a vivid idea
of his manner of appeal to the people; and of their enthusiasm and
astonishment that this poor and seemingly illiterate man, the very
antithesis of the pedantic clergy, should have the power to hold and
sway an audience by the magic of his words. "I, Thomas, citizen of
Spalato, and archdeacon of the cathedral church of the same city,
studying at Bologna in the year 1220, on the day of the assumption of
the Mother of God, saw St. Francis preach in the square before the
little palace, where nearly the whole town was assembled. He spoke
first of angels, of men, and of devils. He explained the spiritual
natures with such exactness and eloquence that his hearers were
astonished that such words could come from the mouth of a man so
simple as he was. Nor did he follow the usual course of preachers.
His discourse resembled rather one of those harangues that are made by
popular orators. At the conclusion, he spoke only of the extinction of
hatred, and the urgency of concluding treaties of peace, and compacts
of union. His garments were soiled and torn, his person thin, his face
pale, but God gave his words unheard-of power. He converted even men
of rank, whose unrestrained fury and cruelty had bathed the country in
blood; many who were enemies were reconciled. Love and veneration for
the saint were universal; men and women thronged around him, and happy
were those who could so much as touch the hem of his habit."[32]
Young knights and students stepped out of the crowd after one of these
burning discourses, resolved to don the grey habit and renounce the
world. The ranks of the followers of St. Francis were swelled at every
town through which he passed; and he left some of his own sweetness
and gentleness among those who had listened to his preaching, so that
party feuds lay dormant for awhile, enemies were reconciled, and all
tried to lead more Christian lives. _Pax et bonum_ was the Franciscan
war-cry which fell indeed strangely on the air in a mediæval town.
Whenever Francis heard of tension and ill-will between the nobles and
the people he hurried with his message of peace to quell the storm.
But at Perugia he failed. Brother Leo tells us that, "Once upon a
time, when the Blessed Francis was preaching to a great multitude of
people gathered together in the Piazza of Perugia, some cavaliers of
the city began to joust and play on their horses in the piazza, thus
interrupting his sermon; and, although rebuked by those present, they
would not desist. Then the blessed Francis, in the fervour of his
soul, turned towards them and said, 'Listen and understand what the
Lord announces to you by me, his little servant, and refrain from
jeering at him, and saying, He is an Assisan.' This he said because of
the ancient hatred which still exists between the Perugians and the
Assisans...."[33] Rebuking the citizens for their pride, he predicted
that if they did not shortly repent civil war would break out in the
city. But the Perugians, who fought ever better than they prayed,
continued in their evil ways until at length the words of St. Francis
were verified. A tumult arose between the people of Perugia, and the
soldiers were thrust out of the city gates into the country, which
they devastated, destroying trees, vineyards, and corn-fields, so that
the misery in the land was great.
[Illustration: VIA DI S. MARIA DELLE ROSE]
In the course of a single day Francis often preached at five different
towns or villages; sometimes he went up to a feudal castle, attracted
by the sound of music and laughter. "Let us go up unto this feast,"
he would say to his companion, "for, with the help of God, we may win
some good harvest of souls." Knights and ladies left the banqueting
hall when they heard of his arrival, and Francis standing on a low
parapet of the courtyard preached so "devoutly and sublimely to them
that all stood with their eyes and their minds turned on him as though
an angel of God were speaking." And then the gay company returned to
their feast and the two friars went on their way singing aloud from
the joy in their hearts, and passed the night praying in some deserted
church or rested under the olive trees on the hill-side. At dawn they
rose and "went according to their rule, begging bread for the love of
God, St. Francis going by one street and Brother Masseo by another.
But St. Francis, being contemptible to look upon and small of stature,
was accounted but a vile beggar by those who knew him not, and only
received some mouthfuls of food and small scraps of stale bread; but
to Brother Masseo, because he was tall and finely made, were given
tit-bits in large pieces and in plenty and whole slices of bread. When
they had done begging they met together outside the town to eat in a
place where was a fair spring, and near by a fine broad stone whereon
each placed the alms they had gathered, and St. Francis seeing the
pieces of bread given to Brother Masseo to be more numerous, better,
and far larger than his own rejoiced greatly...."[34]
Masseo on one occasion wishing to try the humility of Francis mocked
him saying, "Why doth all the world come after thee, and why is it
that all men long to see thee, and hear thee, and obey thee? Thou art
not a comely man, thou art not possessed of much wisdom, thou art not
of noble birth; whence comes it then that the whole world doth run
after thee?"
It is easy to see the naive wonder of the practical Masseo in these
words, a wonder doubtless shared by others who looked on from the same
standpoint, at the extraordinary influence Francis obtained through
his preaching. Their astonishment must have reached its height when
Francis came to a little town near Bevagna (perhaps Cannara) where he
preached with such fervour that the whole population wished to take
the franciscan habit. Husbands, wives, nobles, labourers, young and
old, rich and poor, rose up with one accord, ready to leave their
homes and follow him to the end of the earth. Such an awakening by the
simple words of a road-side preacher had never before been seen, and
was the precursor of other popular demonstrations a few years
later.[35] Francis, with extraordinary diplomacy, held the
enthusiastic crowd in check without extinguishing their piety. He
calmly viewed the situation and solved the difficulty where another,
with less knowledge of human nature, might have been carried away by
the opening of the flood-gates. It is not without amusement that one
thinks of Francis coming to convert sinners, and then finding he had
called into being an order of Religious who absolutely refused to
separate from him. He calmed the weeping crowd, and with caution said
to them: "'Be not in a hurry, neither leave your homes, and I will
order that which ye are to do for the salvation of your souls:' and he
then decided to create the Third Order for the universal salvation of
all, and thus, leaving them much consoled and well disposed to
penitence, he departed...."
At a time when war, party feuds, and the unlawful seizure of property
brought misery into the land, the Tertiaries, united by solemn vows to
keep the commandments of God, to be reconciled to their enemies, and
to restore what was not rightfully theirs, became a power which had to
be reckoned with. The rule forbidding them to fight, save in defence
of the Church or of their country, dealt a severe blow at the feudal
system, and therefore met with much opposition among the great barons.
Persecution only increased their power, for so early as 1227 Gregory
IX, protected the Brothers of Penitence by a special Bull. The enemies
of the Church soon discovered that they had a powerful antagonist in
an Order which comprised the faithful of every age, rank, and
profession, and whose religious practices, whilst creating a great
bond of union among them, were not severe enough to take them away
from social life in the very heart of the great cities. They formed a
second vanguard to the papacy, and Frederick II, was heard to complain
that this Third Order impeded the execution of his plans against the
Holy See; while his chancellor Pier delle Vigne in one of his letters
exclaims that the whole of Christendom seems to have entered its
ranks.[36]
Thus both from within and from without the world was being moulded as
Francis willed; all Italy responded to his call, and everywhere rose
songs of praise to God from a people no longer oppressed by the
squalor of their evil living. His energy and desire to gain souls drew
him still further afield into the wilds of Slavonia, into Spain,
Syria, Morocco, and later into Egypt, for the purpose of converting
the Soldan. So great was his eagerness to arrive at his destination
and begin to preach that, often leaving his companions far behind, he
literally ran along the roads. He was "inebriated by the excessive
fervour of his spirit," and on fire with divine love, and yet he
failed on these missions in foreign lands. The reason probably lay in
his total ignorance of any language except Italian and Provençal, so
that his words must have lost all their eloquence and power when
delivered through the medium of an interpreter, and we know that
Francis never made use of miracles to enforce his teaching.[37]
He returned to Assisi bitterly disappointed, and so despondent that
for a while he was tempted to give up all idea of preaching. In this
uncertainty he turned for council to Brother Sylvester and to St.
Clare, who both urged him to continue his mission to the people; God,
they said, had not elected him to work out his salvation in the
solitude of a cell but for the salvation of all. He left the hermitage
(perhaps the Carcere) and filled with new courage by their words,
started on a fresh pilgrimage by "cities and castles," but this time
among the Umbrians who knew and loved him. As he came near Bevagna in
the plain a new crowd of listeners awaited him--troops of fluttering
birds--bullfinches, rooks, doves, "a great company of creatures
without number." Leaving his companions in a state of wonder on the
road, he ran into the field saying, "I would preach to my little
brothers the birds," and as he drew near, those that were on the
ground did not attempt to fly away, while those perched on the trees
flew down to listen to his sermon.
"My little brethren birds," he said, after saluting them as was his
custom, "ye ought greatly to praise and love the Lord who created
you, for He provideth all that is necessary, giving unto you feathers
for raiment and wings to fly with. The Most High God has placed you
among His creatures, and given you the pure air for your abode; ye do
not sow neither do ye reap, but He keeps and feeds you."[38]
Stretching out their necks, opening their beaks, and spreading their
wings, the birds listened while they fixed their eyes upon the saint
and never moved even when he walked in their midst touching them with
his habit, until he made the sign of the Cross and allowed them to
depart. He often related this episode which had made such a happy day
in his life and had been of good augury at a time when he was sad.
The love of Francis for his "little brethren the birds," and indeed
for all creatures however small, was one of the most beautiful traits
in a character which stands out in such strong relief in the history
of the middle ages. It was not only a poetical sentiment but the very
essence of his being; a power felt by every living thing, from the
brigand who left his haunts in the forests to follow him, to the
half-frozen bees which crawled in winter to be fed with wine and honey
from his hands. An understanding so complete with Nature was unknown
until Francis stretched out his arms in yearning towards her shrines
and drew the people, plunged in the gloom of Catharist doctrines,
towards what was a religion in itself--the worship of the beautiful.
"Le treizième siècle était prêt pour comprendre la voix du poète de
l'Ombrie; le sermon aux oiseaux clôt le règne de l'art byzantin et de
la pensée dont il était l'image. C'est la fin du dogmatisme et de
l'autorité; c'est l'avenement de l'individualisme et de
l'inspiration,"[39] says M. Paul Sabatier. No one mocked at the
sermon to the birds; no one wondered that leverets, loosed from the
snare of the huntsman, should run to Francis for protection, or
pheasants forsake the woods to seek a shelter in his cell; for so
great an awakening had taken place in Italy that all understood the
deep vein of poetry in their saint.
His biographers have transmitted these various anecdotes with a
tenderness and simplicity which cannot fail to impress us with the
belief that Francis, like many in our own time, possessed a marked
attraction for all animals, a magnetism felt with equal strength by
man and beast. Love was the Orphean lute he played upon, sending such
sweet melody into the world that its strains have not yet died away.
Besides the feeling he had for the beautiful, the small, or the weak,
there was another influence at work that made him walk with reverence
over the stones, gather up the worms from the path to save them from
being crushed, and buy the lambs that were being carried to market
with their poor feet tied together. He saw in all things a symbol of
some great truth which carried his thoughts straight to God. One day
near Ancona he noticed a lamb following slowly and disconsolately a
large herd of goats which made him think of Christ among the
Pharisees. In pity he bought it from the goat-herd, and in triumph
carried it to a neighbouring town where he preached a parable to an
admiring crowd, even edifying the bishop by his piety.
Speaking of his favourite birds he would say, "Sister lark hath a hood
like the Religious ... and her raiment--to wit her feathers--resemble
the earth.... And when she soars she praises God most sweetly." Such
was his desire to protect them that he once said if he could only have
speech with the Emperor he would entreat him to pass a special edict
for the preservation of his sisters the larks, and command the "Mayors
of the cities and the Lord of the castles to throw grain on the roads
by the walled towns" on the feast of the Nativity, so that all the
birds should rejoice with man on that day. He found great joy in the
open fields, the vineyards, the rocky ravines, and the forests which
gave shelter to his feathered brethren; running water and the
greenness of the orchards, earth, fire, air, and the winds so invited
him to divine love that often he passed the whole day praising the
marvels of creation. No wonder he turned his steps more willingly up
the mountain paths to the hermitage of the Carceri than towards the
crowded cities. Nature was his companion, his breviary the mirror
wherein he saw reflected the face of the Creator. In the song of the
nightingales, in the sound of their wings, in the petals of a tiny
flower, in the ever changing glory of his own Umbrian valley he was
always reminded of God, and for this he has been rightly called a
"Pan-Christian."
There is not a corner in Umbria, one might almost say in Italy, which
does not bear some record of the passage of the saint. The sick were
brought to him and cured, those in trouble laid their sorrows before
him and went away comforted. When anything went wrong, a hasty message
was sent to Francis, and all with child-like simplicity trusted in him
to set things right. We even hear that the people of Gubbio, being
persecuted by a fierce wolf, had recourse to him, for they failed to
protect themselves though the men sallied forth "as if going to
battle." The saint had little difficulty in persuading Brother Wolf to
lead a respectable life; and he, seeing the advantage of a peaceful
existence, bowed his head and placed his paw, as a solemn seal to the
compact, in the hand of Francis amid the joyful cries of the people
who marvelled greatly at the "novelty of the miracle." After this he
could be seen walking gently through the streets of Gubbio to receive
his daily ration at every door, cared for by the citizens "and not a
dog would wag even his tongue against him." When Brother Wolf died
there was bitter mourning in the city, for all felt as if a friend had
passed away, and there was none left to remind them of the kindly
saint who had helped them in their need. "Am I expected to believe
these fairy tales?" some may ask with a sneer. The exact events
related--no--but the spirit of these legends is more necessary to a
true conception of the saint and the times in which he lived than all
the histories that can ever be written about him. The Umbrians
pictured him as they saw and understood him, and tradition going from
mouth to mouth found finally its perfect expression in the "Little
Flowers of St. Francis." Wonders and miracles are in every page, it is
true, but then the peasants will tell you all things are possible in
Umbria; the taming of wild beasts, the silencing of garrulous swallows
who chattered so loudly while he preached, do not seem stranger to
them than the conversion of brigands and murderers, for did not the
very angels obey his wishes and play and sing to him one night when he
lay ill in a lonely hermitage, longing for the sound of sweet strains
to break the awful stillness round him?
Francis would have been sorely troubled had he foreseen the numberless
miracles his biographers were going to attribute to him, for no saint
was ever humbler. Even in his lifetime, oppressed by the homage paid
him, he would say to his adorers with a touch of quaint humour: "do
not be in such haste to proclaim me a saint, for I may still be the
father of children." He was always fearful lest people should
overrate his good actions, and his horror of hypocrisy drove him to
confess aloud to the people gathered round to listen to a sermon, in
what manner he had given way to the desires of "Brother Body." Upon
one occasion having used lard in lieu of the less wholesome oil when
he was ill, he began his sermon by saying: "Ye come to me with great
devoutness believing me to be a saint, but I do confess unto God and
unto you that this Lent I have eaten cakes made with lard." Another
time, after a severe chill, his companions sewed some fox-skin inside
his habit to keep him somewhat warmer during the bitter cold, but he
was not happy until a piece had been sewn also on the outside so that
all might see the luxury he allowed himself.
It may at first seem strange that one so simple should have exercised
such extraordinary influence on men and women of all ranks, an
influence which has lasted with undiminished force for seven hundred
years. But we must remember that a people, however ready to listen to
the words of a reformer (especially an Italian crowd), will hardly be
moved by calmness or sense; only when one like Francis stirs their
imagination by a peculiar way of announcing God's word, and by acts
sometimes bordering on insanity, can he completely succeed in winning
them. The Assisans, at first shocked by some of the spectacles they
witnessed in their sleepy town, jeered and murmured, until at last the
saint literally took them by storm; and the more he risked their good
opinion the louder they applauded him and wept for their sins.
Astonishment was at its height when on the way to some service at the
cathedral, the citizens saw Francis approaching them "naked save for
his breeches," while Brother Leo carried his habit. He has gone mad
through too much penance, some thought. The truth was that Francis had
imposed this same penance on Brother Ruffino who was then preaching to
the people in the cathedral, and his conscience smote him so that he
began to chide himself, saying: "Why art thou so presumptuous, son of
Bernardone, vile little man, as to command Fra Ruffino, who is one of
the noblest of the Assisans, to go and preach to the people as though
he were mad."... So when Ruffino's sermon was ended Francis went up
into the pulpit and preached with such eloquence on his Lady Poverty
and on the nakedness and shame of the Passion suffered by Our Lord
Jesus Christ "that the whole church was filled with the sound of
weeping and wailing such as had never before been heard in Assisi."
Thus did the force of originality win the people, and all those who
had jeered but a few minutes before were much "edified and comforted
by this act of St. Francis and Brother Ruffino; and St. Francis having
reclad Brother Ruffino and himself, returned to the Portiuncula
praising and glorifying God, who had given them grace to abase
themselves to the edification of Christ's little sheep."
By word and example Francis taught his disciples to be especially
humble towards the clergy. "If ye be sons of peace," he often said,
"ye shall win both clergy and people, and this is more acceptable to
God than to win the people only and to scandalise the clergy. Cover
their backslidings and supply their many defects, and when ye have
done this be ye the more humble." He had to struggle against much
opposition among the bishops, who looked upon him and his friars as
intruders encroaching upon their rights. People had often advised him
to obtain a Bull from Rome, to enable him to preach without asking
permission, but it was through the power of persistent meekness that
he wished to win his way to every heart, and the only weapons he used
were those of love. St. Bonaventura tells us that the Bishop of Imola
absolutely refused to let Francis call the citizens together and
preach to them. "It suffices, friar, that I preach to the people
myself," was the cross reply, and Francis, drawing his cowl over his
head, humbly went his way. But after the short space of an hour he
retraced his steps, and the bishop inquired with some anger why he had
returned. He made answer in all humility of heart and speech: "My
lord, if a father sends his son out at one door there is nothing left
for him but to return by another." Then the bishop, vanquished by his
humility, embraced him with a joyful countenance, saying: "Thou and
all thy brethren shall have a general licence to preach throughout my
diocese, as the reward of thy holy humility."[40]
This was the saint, gentle and sweet among men, who won the friendship
of Ugolino, Bishop of Ostia (afterwards Pope Gregory IX). The bishop
often spent quiet hours at the Portiuncula, trying perhaps to find, in
the companionship of the saint and his poor friars, a peace he in vain
sought amid the luxury of the Papal Court. Celano,[41] who may have
been present during one of these meetings, tells us how he delighted
in throwing off his rich robes and clothing himself in the Franciscan
habit. In these moments of humility he would reverently bend the knee
to Francis and kiss his hands. Besides his great admiration and love
for the personality of the saint, he was not slow to perceive the
services Francis had rendered in endeavouring to restore something of
the pristine purity to Christianity, and further, the Order was fast
becoming of political importance. The work of organising a community,
no longer a handful of Assisan knights and yeomen following in the
footsteps of their leader, was by no means an easy task; and Ugolino
saw his way to bring it more closely into the service of the Church.
Francis, whether willingly or not we cannot say, begged the Pope to
name Ugolino Patron and Father of his Order. This was readily
accorded, for it was felt in the papal circle that Francis was not so
easy to drive as became a submissive child of the Church. They could
not complain of actual disobedience, but he liked doing things his own
way. By some at Rome it was suggested to him that he should adopt the
Benedictine rule, by others that he might join his Order to that of St
Dominic, but the saint smiled sweetly, and though so dove-like none
succeeded in entangling him in their diplomatic nets. Indeed he
puzzled Ugolino many times, and both Innocent III and Honorius III
were never quite sure whether they had to do with a simpleton or a
saint. The Roman prelates, completely out of sympathy with his
doctrine of poverty, were only too ready to thwart him, and Ugolino
knowing this advised him "not to go beyond the mountains" but remain
in Italy to protect the interests of his order. He further persuaded
him to come to Rome and preach before the Pope and cardinals, thinking
that the personality of the saint might perchance win their favour.
Anxious to do honour to his patron, Francis composed a sermon and
committed it to memory with great care. When the slight, grey figure,
the dust of the Umbrian roads still clinging to his sandals, stood up
in the spacious hall of the Lateran before Honorius and the venerable
cardinals, Ugolino watched with anxious eyes the course of events. In
mortal fear "he supplicated God with all his being that the simplicity
of the holy man should not become an object of ridicule," and
resigning himself to Providence he waited. There was a moment of
suspense, of awful silence, for Francis had completely forgotten the
sermon he had so carefully learned by heart. But his humility
befriended him; stepping forward a few paces with a gesture of regret
he quietly confessed what had happened, and then, as if indeed
inspired, he broke forth into one of his most eloquent sermons. "He
preached with such fervour of spirit," says Celano, "that being unable
to contain himself for joy whilst proclaiming the Word of God, he
moved even his feet in the manner of one dancing, not for play, but
driven thereto by the strength of the divine love that burnt within
him: therefore he incited none to laughter but drew tears of sorrow
from all."[42]
When Francis had been preaching for some time a certain weariness
seems to have possessed him, and he would then, "leaving behind him
the tumult of the multitude," retire to some secret place to dwell in
constant prayer and heavenly contemplation. There were many of these
refuges, but none so isolated from the world as the lofty mountain of
La Vernia, which had been given to him by Count Orlando Cattani of
Chiusi, whose ruined castle can still be seen on a spur of the
Apennines just below. The "Sacred Mount" rises clear above the valley
of the Casentino to the height of 4000 feet, between the sources of
the Tiber and the Arno, and looks straight down upon one of the
perfect views in Tuscany which Dante speaks of:
"The rills that glitter down the grassy slopes
Of Casentino, making fresh and soft
The banks whereby they glide to Arno's stream."
Range upon range of splendid hills falling away gradually to the south
gather in their folds the pale-tinted mists of early summer, and seem
to guard the valley from other lands, so intense is the feeling of
remoteness. From the white towns gleaming like pearls on their green
slopes above the young Arno cradled by poplars, is seen the sharp
outline of La Vernia against the sky, always black, gloomy, and
defiant above the cornfields and vineyards. Its summit, covered with
fir-trees, straight and close together, appears like a great whale
that has rested there since the days of the flood. Below the forest
lie huge boulders of rock and yawning chasms, upheaved, says the
legend, during the earthquake at the time of the Crucifixion. To this
solitary place came Francis in the year 1224 to celebrate by forty
days of fasting and prayer the feast of St. Michael the Archangel,
accompanied by Fra Leo "the little sheep of God," Fra Angelo "the
gentle knight," Fra Illuminato, and Fra Masseo. On former visits he
had been content to stay in a cell beneath a "fair beech tree" built
for him by Count Orlando close to where the brethren lived; but this
time he chose a spot on the loneliest side of the mountain where no
sound could be heard. To reach it the brethren had to throw a bridge
across a "horrible and fearful cleft in a huge rock," and after they
had fashioned him a rough shelter they left him in utter solitude;
only once in the day and once at night Fra Leo was permitted to bring
a little bread and water which he left by the bridge, stealing
silently away unless called by Francis. Near this lonely retreat a
falcon had built a nest and used to wake him regularly a little before
matins with his cry, beating his wings at his cell until the saint
rose to recite his orations. Francis, charmed with so exact a clock,
obeyed the summons, and such was the sympathy between the friends
that the falcon always knew when he was weary or ill, and would then
"gently, and like a discreet and compassionate person, utter his cry
later ... and besides this, in the day would sometimes stay quite
tamely with him." The birds, which had shown joy on his arrival,
filled the woods with their sweetest song while the angels visited
him, sometimes playing such beautiful music on the viol that "his soul
almost melted away." But Francis, honoured as he was by celestial
spirits, and by man and beast, had still to receive the greatest sign
of grace ever accorded to a saint, and the story has been gravely
related by ancient and modern writers for seven centuries.
The moment had certainly arrived for accomplishing the high designs of
Providence, for Francis through prayer, fasting, and constant
contemplation on the Passion of Christ, had become like some spiritual
being untrammelled by the bonds of the flesh. It was on the feast of
the Exaltation of the Cross while praying on the mountain side, that
the marvellous vision was vouchsafed to him. The dawn had hardly
broken when "he beheld a Seraph who had six wings, which shone with
such splendour that they seemed on fire, and with swift flight he came
above the face of the Blessed Francis who was gazing upwards to the
sky, and from the midst of the wings of the Seraph appeared suddenly
the likeness of a man crucified with hands and feet stretched out in
the manner of a cross, and they were marked with wounds like those of
Our Lord Jesus Christ, and two wings of the said Seraph were above the
head, two were spread as though flying, and two veiled the whole
body."[43] Flames of fire lit up the mountains and the valley during
the vision, and some muleteers seeing "the bright light shining
through the windows of the inn where they slept, saddled and loaded
their beasts thinking the day had broke." When Francis rose from his
knees and looked up to the sky where the seraph had been and where now
the sun was rising over the Casentino and her steepled towns, he bore
on his body the marks of the Crucified. His hands and feet appeared as
though pierced through with nails, the heads being on the inside of
the hands and on the upper part of the feet, while blood flowed from
the wound in his side. Thus transformed by his surpassing love for
Christ, Francis returned to his four companions and recounted to them
his vision, trying all the while out of his deep humility to hide from
them the signs of the Stigmata. Before returning to Assisi he bade
them a final farewell, for he knew this was the last time he would
come with them to La Vernia. The scene is beautifully pictured in a
letter of Fra Masseo, which, as far as we know, is here translated for
the first time.
JESUS, MARY MY HOPE.
"Brother Masseo, sinner, and unworthy servant of Jesus Christ,
companion of Brother Francis of Assisi, man most dear unto God, peace
and greetings to all brethren and sons of the great patriarch Francis,
standard-bearer of Christ.
"The great patriarch having determined to bid a last farewell to this
sacred mount on the 30th of September 1224, day of the feast of St
Jerome, the Count Orlando of Chiusi sent to him an ass in order that
he might ride thereon, forasmuch as he could not put his feet to the
ground by reason of their being sore wounded and pierced with nails.
In the morning early having heard mass, according to his wont, in
Sta. Maria degli Angeli,[44] he called all the brethren into the
chapel, and bade them in holy obedience to live together in charity,
to be diligent in prayer, always to tend the said place carefully, and
to officiate therein day and night. Moreover he commended the whole of
the sacred mount to all his brethren present, as well as to those to
come, exhorting them to have a care that the said place should not be
profaned, but always reverenced and respected, and he gave his
benediction to all inhabitants thereof, and to all who bore thereunto
reverence and respect. On the other hand, he said: 'Let them be
confounded who are wanting in respect to the said place, and from God
let them expect a well-merited chastisement.' To me he said: 'Know,
Brother Masseo, that my intention is that on this mount shall live
friars having the fear of God before their eyes, and chosen among the
best of my order, let therefore the superiors strive to send here the
worthiest friars; ah! ah! ah! Brother Masseo, I will say no more.'
"He then commanded and ordered me, Brother Masseo, and Brother Angelo,
Brother Silvestro and Brother Illuminato, to have a special care of
the place where that great miracle of the holy Stigmata occurred.[45]
Having said that, he exclaimed 'Farewell, farewell, farewell, Brother
Masseo.' Then turning to Brother Angelo, he said: 'Farewell,
farewell,' and the same to Brother Silvestro and Brother Illuminato:
'Remain in peace, most dear sons, farewell, I depart from you in the
body, but I leave my heart with you; I depart with Brother Lamb of
God, and am going to Sta. Maria degli Angeli[46] never to return here
more; I am going, farewell, farewell, farewell to all! Farewell,
sacred mount. Farewell, mount Alvernia. Farewell, mount of the angels.
Farewell, beloved Brother Falcon, I thank thee for the charity thou
didst show me, farewell! Farewell, Sasso Spicco,[47] never more shall
I come to visit thee, farewell, farewell, farewell, oh rock which
didst receive me within thine entrails, the devil being cheated by
thee, never more shall we behold one another![48] Farewell, Sta.
Maria degli Angeli, mother of the eternal Word. I commend to thee
these my sons.'
"Whilst our beloved father was speaking these words, our eyes poured
forth torrents of tears, so that he also wept as he turned to go,
taking with him our hearts, and we remained orphans because of the
departure of such a father.
"I, Brother Masseo, have written this with tears. May God bless us."
For two years after his return from La Vernia, Francis, bearing the
marks of the Seraph, continued to preach and visit the lazar houses,
although he was so ill and worn by fasts and vigils that his
companions marvelled how the spirit could still survive in so frail a
body. Moreover he had become nearly blind, remaining sometimes sixty
days and more unable to see the light of day or even the light of
fire. It was to him a martyrdom that while walking in the woods led by
one of the brethren, the scenes he loved so well should be hidden by
this awful darkness. He could only dream of the past when he had
journeyed from one walled town to another through the valley of
Spoleto; sometimes rejoicing in the brilliant sunshine, often watching
the storms sweeping so gloriously over the land in summer when the
rocky beds of torrents were filled with rushing water and clouds cast
purple shadows across the plain. Now those wanderings were over, and
the spirit imprisoned within him found more than ever an outlet in
music, and "the strain of divine murmurs which fell upon his ears,
broke out in Gallic songs."
He went on his way singing to meet death, and the greater his
sufferings the sweeter were the melodies he composed. It was during an
access of his infirmities and blindness that St. Clare induced him to
take some days of rest in a small wattle hut she had built in the
olive grove close to her convent of San Damiano. After nights of
bitter tribulation, of bodily suffering, passed in earnest prayer, he
arose one morning with his heart full of new praises to the Creator.
Meditating for a while he exclaimed, "Altissimo, omnipotente bono
Signore," and then composed a chaunt thereon, and taught it to his
companions so that they might proclaim and sing it. His soul was so
comforted and full of joy that he desired to send for Brother
Pacifico, who in the world had borne the title of King of Verse and
had been a most renowned troubadour, and to give to him as companions
some of the brethren to go about the world preaching and singing
praises to the Lord ... he willed also that when the preaching was
ended all together should as minstrels of God sing lauds unto Him. And
at the close of the singing he ordered that the preacher should say to
the people: "We are the minstrels of the Lord God wherefore we desire
to be rewarded by you, to wit, that you persevere in true
repentance."[49]
It was the Canticle of the Sun which Francis composed in his days of
blindness, leaving it as an undying message to the world, an appeal
that they should not cease to love the things he had brought to their
knowledge during those earlier days of his ministry among them. He
poured the teaching of a life-time into a song of passionate praise to
the Creator of a world he had loved and found so beautiful; and the
sustained melody of the long, rolling lines charm our fancy like the
sound of waves during calm nights breaking upon the beach. The poem,
though rough and unhewn, still remains one of the marvels of early
literature, and to Francis belongs the honour of setting his seal on
the religious poetry of his country. His was the first glow of colour
proclaiming the dawn--the first notes of song which, coming from
Assisi, passed along the ranks of Italian poets to be taken up by
Dante in "full-throated ease." We give the Canticle of the Sun in the
exquisite version of Matthew Arnold.
"O most high, almighty, good Lord God, to Thee belong praise, glory,
honour, and all blessing!
"Praised be my Lord God with all His creatures; and specially our
brother the sun, who brings us the day, and who brings us the light;
fair is he, and shining with a very great splendour: O Lord, he
signifies to us Thee!
"Praised be my Lord for our sister the moon, and for the stars, the
which he has set clear and lovely in heaven.
"Praised be our Lord for our brother the wind, and for air and cloud,
calms and all weather, by the which thou upholdest in life all
creatures.
"Praised be my Lord for our sister water, who is very serviceable unto
us, and humble, and precious, and clean.
"Praised be my Lord for our brother fire, through whom thou givest us
light in the darkness; and he is bright, and pleasant, and very
mighty, and strong.
"Praised be my Lord for our mother the earth, the which doth sustain
us and keep us, and bringeth forth divers fruits and flowers of many
colours, and grass.
"Praised be my Lord for all those who pardon one another for his
love's sake, and who endure weakness and tribulation; blessed are they
who peaceably shall endure, for Thou, O most Highest, shalt give them
a crown![50]
"Praised be my Lord for our sister, the death of the body, from whom
no man escapeth. Woe to him who dieth in mortal sin! Blessed are they
who are found walking by Thy most holy will, for the second death
shall have no power to do them harm.
"Praise ye and bless ye the Lord, and give thanks unto Him, and serve
Him with great humility."
[Illustration: THE ARMS OF THE FRANCISCANS.]
FOOTNOTES:
[18] For a true picture of the condition of Italian towns, torn by
strife, decimated by famine, and suffering from leprosy brought by the
crusaders, see Brewer's admirable preface in vol. iv. of the
_Monumenta Franciscana_.
[19] The first tournament took place at Bologna in 1147.
[20] Folgore di San Gimignano, translated by D. G. Rossetti.
[21] These were the first troubadours to visit the Italian courts,
driven from Provence by the crusades against the Albigenses.
[22] A certain Bernardo Moriconi, leaving his brother to carry on the
business at Lucca, then famous for its manufacture of silk stuffs,
came and settled at Assisi where he got the nickname Bernardone--the
big Bernard. Whether in allusion to his person or to his prosperity,
we cannot say, but the family name was lost sight of and his son was
known as Pietro Bernardone.
[23] Celano. _Vita_ I. cap. 1.
[24] Ruskin. _The two paths_: Lecture III.
[25] Celano. _Vita_ I. cap. 2.
[26] "Le vide lamentable de sa vie lui était tout à coup apparu; il
était effrayé de cette solitude d'une grande âme, dans laquelle il n'y
a point d'autel." Paul Sabatier. _Vie de S. François d'Assise_, p. 17.
[27] From a 15th century translation of the will of St. Francis. See
_Monumenta Franciscana_. Chronicles edited by J. S. Brewer vol. iv. p.
562.
[28] Life of Beato Egidio in the _Little Flowers of St. Francis_.
[29] Life of Beato Egidio in the _Little Flowers of St. Francis_.
[30] One of the most beautiful stories in the _Fioretti_ (chapter
xxxiv.) recounts how St. Louis, King of France, visited Beato Egidio
at Perugia. The king and the poor friar kneeling together in the
courtyard of the convent, embracing each other like familiar friends,
is a picture such as only Umbrian literature could have left us. There
was absolute silence between the two, yet we are told St. Louis
returned to his kingdom and Egidio to his cell with "marvellous
content and consolation" in their souls.
[31] See _Suprà_, p. 47.
[32] Quoted by Sigonius in his work on the Bishops of Bologna. _Opera
omnia_, v. iii., translated by Canon Knox Little. _Life of St. Francis
of Assisi_, p. 179.
[33] _Speculum Perfectionis_, cap. cv., edited by Paul Sabatier.
[34] _Fioretti_, cap. xiii.
[35] To franciscan influence must surely be traced the rise of the
Flagellants at Perugia in 1265.
[36] See _Histoire de Sainte Elizabeth_, Comte de Montalembert, pp.
71, 72.
[37] It is related that when in 1216 some Franciscans went on a
mission to Germany the only word they knew was "Ja," which they used
upon every occasion. In one town they were asked if they were heretics
preaching a rival faith to catholicism, and as they continued to say
"Ja, Ja," the citizens threw them into prison, and after beating them
cruelly drove them ignominiously from the country. The account they
gave of their experience to the other friars at Assisi created such a
panic that they were often heard in their prayers to implore God to
deliver them from the barbarity of the Teutons.
[38] Celano. _Vita_ I. cap. xxi.
[39] Paul Sabatier. _Vie de S. Francis d'Assise_, p. 205.
[40] _Vita di S. Francesco_, p. 76. Edizione Amoni (1888. Roma).
[41] Celano, a learned nobleman from Celano in the Abruzzi, joined the
Order in 1215, and gives by far the most charming and vivid account of
St Francis, for besides knowing him well he had the gift of writing in
no ordinary degree.
[42] _Vita_ I. cap. xxvii.
[43] _Vita di S. Francesco_, da S. Bonaventura, p. 148, Edizione
Amoni.
[44] This was a small chapel built for St. Francis by Count Orlando,
and must not be confounded with the church of the same name near
Assisi.
[45] The earnest wishes of the saint are to this day carried out by
faithful friars who, even through the terrible winter months, live at
La Vernia, suffering privation and cold with cheerfulness. At midnight
a bell calls them to sing matins in the chapel of the Stigmata
connected with the convent by an open colonnade, down which the
procession files, following a crucifix and lanterns. When the service
has ceased, the monks flit like ghosts behind the altar while the
lights are extinguished and in the gloom comes the sound of clashing
chains. For an hour they chastise themselves: then the torches are
relit, the chanting is resumed, and calmly they pass down the corridor
towards their cells. Moonlight may stream into the colonnade across
the dark forms, or gusts of wind drive the snow in heaps before them,
but the chanting is to be heard, and the monotonous cries of _ora pro
nobis_ break the awful solitude of night throughout the year upon the
mountain of La Vernia.
[46] Here reference is made to the Portiuncula, near Assisi.
[47] The Sasso Spicco, which still can be seen at La Vernia, is a
block of rock rising high above the mountain ridge, and seems to hang
suspended in the air. It forms a roof over dark and cavernous places
where St. Francis loved to pray, often spending his nights there with
stones for his bed.
[48] The _Fioretti_ relates that once while St. Francis was praying on
the edge of a precipice, not far from the spot where he had received
the Stigmata, suddenly the devil appeared in terrible form amidst the
loud roar of a furious tempest. St. Francis, unable to flee or to
endure the ferocious aspect of the devil, turned his face and whole
body to the rock to which he clung; and the rock, as though it had
been soft wax, received the impress of the saint and sheltered him.
Thus by the aid of God he escaped.
[49] _Speculum Perfectionis_, cap. c., edited by Paul Sabatier.
[50] St. Francis composed this verse later on the occasion of a
quarrel which arose between the Bishop of Assisi and the Podestà. The
last couplet was added at the Portiuncula while he was on his
death-bed.
CHAPTER III
_The Carceri, Rivo-Torto and Life at the Portiuncula_
"O beata solitudo,
O sola beatudine."
These three places near Assisi, so intimately associated with St.
Francis, were in a way emblematic of the various stages in the rise
and growth of his young community, and we shall see that the saint
went from one to the other, not by chance, but with a settled purpose
in his mind. The Carceri he kept as a something apart from, and
outside his daily life; it was a hermitage in the strict sense of the
word, where, far from the sound of any human voice, he could come and
live a short time in isolated communion with God. As his followers
increased, and the Order he had founded with but a few brethren
developed even in its first years into a great army, we can easily
understand the longing for solitude which at times became too strong
to be resisted, for his nature was well fitted for the hermit's life,
and it called him with such persistence to the woods among the flowers
and the birds he loved, that had he been less tender for the
sufferings of others, more blind to the ills of the Church, it is
possible that the whole course of events might have been altered.
Giotto would not have been called to Assisi, or if he had been, the
legends told to him by the friars might not have inspired him to paint
such master-pieces as he has left us in the Franciscan Basilica; and
we should now be the poorer because St. Francis had chosen seven
hundred years ago to live in an Etruscan tomb at Orte, or in a grotto
on Mount Subasio. So much depended, not only upon what St. Francis
achieved, but on the way in which he chose to work. Who therefore can
tell how much we owe to the little mountain retreat of the Carceri,
where, spending such hours of wondrous peace surrounded by all that he
most cherished in nature, the saint could refresh himself and gain new
strength for long periods of arduous labour among men.
[Illustration: HERMITAGE OF THE CARCERI]
The Carceri came into the possession of St. Francis through the
generosity of the Benedictines who, until his advent, had held
unlimited sway in Umbria. Many churches, and we may say, almost all
the hermitages of the surrounding country belonged to them. But their
principal stronghold, built in the eleventh century, stood on the
higher slopes of Mount Subasio, while the Carceri, lying a little to
the west, was used by them probably as a place of retreat when wearied
of monastic life. Both monastery and hermitage seem to have been
quiet enough, and we only occasionally hear of the Benedictine monks
starting off on a visit to some hermit of renowned sanctity, or going
upon some errand of mercy among the peasants in the valley, whom they
often surprised by marvellous though somewhat aimless miracles wrought
for their edification. Then early in the fourteenth century these
hermit monks of Mount Subasio suddenly found themselves in the midst
of the fighting of a mediæval populace, for the Assisans, not slow to
discover the great military importance of the Benedictine Abbey,
wished to possess it. When the struggle between Guelph and Ghibelline
was at its height, the monks were driven to take refuge in the town,
while their home was taken possession of by the exiled party who used
it as a fortress whence they could sally forth and harass the eastern
approach to Assisi. Perpetual skirmishes took place beneath its walls
until the roving adventurer Broglia di Trino, who had made himself
master of the town in 1399, in a solemn council held at the Rocca
Maggiore issued an edict that the Monastery of St. Benedict was to be
razed to the ground, determining thus to deprive the turbulent nobles
and their party of so sure a refuge in times of civil war.
The solid walls and fine byzantine columns of what once was the most
celebrated abbey in Umbria now remain much as in the mediæval days of
their wreckage, and, until a few years ago when some repairs were
made, the church was open for the mountain birds to nest in, and wild
animals used it as their lair.
But both church and monastery stood proudly upon the mountain height
above the plain when St. Francis, then the young mendicant looked upon
by many as a madman, would knock at the gates, and the abbot followed
by his monks, came out to listen to the humble requests he so often
had to make. These prosperous religious most generously patronised St.
Francis in the time of his obscurity, giving him the chapel of the
Portiuncula, and later (the date is uncertain but some say in 1215)
they allowed him to take possession of the still humbler chapel and
huts of the Carceri. Even to call such shelters huts is giving them
too grand a name, for they were but caverns excavated in the rock,
scattered here and there in a deep mountain gorge. They can still be
seen, unchanged since the days of St. Francis save for the tresses of
ivy growing thick, like a curtain, across the entrance, for now there
are none to pass in and out to pray there.
Even the attempt to describe the loneliness and discomfort of this
hermitage seems to strike terror into the hearts of later franciscan
writers, who no longer caring to live in caves, only saw Dantesque
visions when they thought of these arid, sunburnt rocks, rushing
torrents and wild wastes of mountains which even shepherds never
reached. But luckily in those days there was one Umbrian who loved
such isolated spots; and the charm of that silence, born of the very
soul of Francis and guarded jealously by nature herself during long
centuries in memory of him, now tempts us up the mountain side upon a
pilgrimage to the one place where his spirit still lives in all its
primitive vigour and purity.
The road leading to the Carceri[51] from the Porta Cappucini passes
first through rich corn fields and olive groves, but as it skirts
round Mount Subasio towards the ravine it becomes a mere mountain
track. Only here and there, where peasants have patiently scraped away
the stones, grows a little struggling corn, while small hill flowers
nestle between the rocks unshaded even by olive trees; the colour of a
stray Judas tree, or a lilac bush in bloom, only makes the landscape
seem more barren and forlorn. Looking upon the road to Spello, winding
down the hill through luxuriant fields of indian corn and olive
groves, with the oak trees spreading their still fresher green over
the vineyards of the plain, we feel that this pathway to the Carceri
is something novel and unlike anything at Assisi which we have
hitherto explored. Just as we are marvelling at its loveliness, a
sudden turn brings Assisi once more in view, and the sight we get of
it from here carries us straight back to the days of St. Francis; for
the great basilica and convent are hidden by the brow of the hill, and
what we now see is exactly what he looked upon so often as he hastened
from Assisi to his hermitage, or left it when he was ready to take up
the burden of men's lives once more. The old walls, looking now much
as they did after a stormy battle with Perugia, stretch round the same
rose-tinted town, which, strangely enough, time has altered but
slightly--it is only a little more toned in colour, the Subasian stone
streaked here and there with deeper shades of yellow and pink, while
the castle is more ruined, rearing itself less proudly from its green
hill-top than in earlier days of splendour. But charming as the view
of the town is, we quickly leave it to watch the changes of light and
colour in the valley and on the wide-bedded Tescio as it twists and
turns in countless sharp zig-zags till we lose it where it joins the
Tiber--there where the mist rises. We might travel far and not find so
fascinating a river as the Tescio; only a trickle of water it is true,
but sparkling in the sunshine like a long flash of lightning which
has fallen to earth and can find no escape from a tangle of fields and
vineyards.[52] Then our road turns away again from the glowing valley
shimmering in the haze of a late May afternoon, and mounting ever
higher we plunge into the very heart of the Assisan mountain,
uncultivated, wild, colourless and yet how strangely beautiful.
Another half mile brings us round the mountain side to a narrow gorge,
and the only thing in sight except the ilex trees is an arched doorway
with a glimpse, caught through the half open gate, of a tiny
courtyard. A step further on and we find ourselves standing amidst a
cluster of cells and chapels seeming as if they hung from the bare
rocks with nothing to prevent them falling straight into the depths of
the ravine; and the silence around is stranger far than the mountain
solitude. Surely none live here, we think, when suddenly a
brown-clothed friar looks round the corner of a door, and without
waste of time or asking of questions beckons us to follow, telling
rapidly as he goes the story of each tree, rock, cell and shrine.
Crossing two or three chapels and passing through a trap-door and down
a ladder, we reach a narrow cave-like cell where St. Francis used to
sleep during those rare moments when he was not engaged in prayer. As
at La Vernia this "bed" was scooped out of the rock, and a piece of
wood served him as a pillow. Adjoining is an oratory where the
crucifix the saint always carried with him is preserved. The doors are
so narrow and so low that the smallest person must stoop and edge in
sideways. From these underground caves it is a joy to emerge once
more into the sunlight, and one of the delightful surprises of the
place is to step straight out of the oppressive darkness of the cells
into the ilex wood, with the banks above and around us glowing with
sweet-scented cyclamen, yellow orchids, and long-stemmed violets. It
is not surprising that St. Francis often left his cell to wander
further into these woods when the birds, as though they had waited for
his coming, would gather from all sides and intercept him just as he
reached the bridge close to the hermitage. While they perched upon an
ilex tree (which is still to be seen), he stood beneath and talked to
them as only St. Francis knew how. His first sermon to the birds took
place at Bevagna, but at the Carceri he was continually holding
conversations with his little feathered brethren. This perhaps was
also where he held his nocturnal duet with the nightingale, which was
singing with especial sweetness just outside his cell. St. Francis
called Brother Leo to come also and sing and see which would tire
first, but the "little Lamb of God" replied that he had no voice,
refusing even to try. So the saint went forth alone to the strange
contest, and he and the bird sang the praises of God all through the
darkest hours of the night until, quite worn out, the saint was forced
to acknowledge the victory of Brother Nightingale.
Very different is the story of his encounter with the tempting devil
whom he precipitated by his prayers into the ravine below; the hole
through which the unwelcome visitor departed is still shown outside
the saint's cell. Devils do not play a very prominent part in the
story of the first franciscans, but this mountain solitude seems to
have so excited the imaginations of later chroniclers that yet another
story of a devil belongs to the Carceri, and is quaintly recounted in
the _Fioretti_. This time he appeared to Brother Rufino in the form
of Christ to tempt him from his life of holiness. "O Brother Rufino,"
said the devil, "have I not told thee that thou shouldst not believe
the son of Pietro Bernardone?... And straightway Brother Rufino made
answer: 'Open thy mouth that I may cast into it filth.' Whereat the
devil, being exceeding wroth, forthwith departed with so furious a
tempest and shaking of the rocks of Mount Subasio, which was hard by,
that the noise of the falling rocks lasted a great while; and so
furiously did they strike one against the other in rolling down that
they flashed sparks of terrific fire in all the valley, and at the
terrible noise they made St. Francis and his companions came out of
the house in amazement to see what strange thing was this; and still
is to be seen that exceeding great ruin of rocks."
Close to the spot rendered famous by the devil's visits a bridge
crosses the gorge of a great torrent, which, threatening once to
destroy the hermitage, was miraculously dried up by St. Francis, and
now only fills its rocky bed when any public calamity is near. From it
a good view is obtained of the hermitage, but perhaps a still better
is to be had from under the avenue of trees a little beyond, on the
opposite side of the deep ravine whence the groups of hovels are seen
to hang like a honeycomb against the mountain side, so tightly set
together that one can hardly distinguish where the buildings begin and
the rock ends.
The ilex trees grow in a semicircle round this cluster of cells and
caverns, and high above it all rises a peak of Mount Subasio, grey as
St. Francis' habit, with a line of jagged rocks on the summit which
looks more like the remains of some Umbrian temple of almost
prehistoric days than the work of nature.
The sides of this mountain ravine approach so near together that only
a narrow vista of the plain is obtained, blue in the summer haze, with
no village or even house in sight. It would be difficult to find a
place with the feeling of utter solitude so unbroken, and as we
realised that these friars lived here nearly all their life, many not
even going to Assisi more than once in five years, we said to one of
them: "How lonely you must be," and he, as though recalling a time of
struggle in the world, answered: "Doubtless there are better things in
the town, but here, at the Carceri, there is peace."
[Illustration: THE CARCERI WITH A VIEW OF THE BRIDGE]
It is the hermit's answer; but now the need of such lives has long
since passed away, and even St. Francis, living at the time when the
strain of perpetual warfare, famine, pestilence and crime, created a
fierce craving for solitude in the lives of many, realised that a
hermitage must only be a place to rest in for a while--not to live
in. His anxiety to keep his Order from becoming a contemplative one is
shown in the following rule he carefully thought out for his
disciples. "Those religious who desire to sojourn in a hermitage are
to be at the most three or four. Two are to be like mothers having a
son. Two are to follow the life of a Martha, the other the life of a
Mary." Then they were to go forth again strenuously to their work
abroad and give place to others in search of rest and peace.
But after the death of St. Francis the Carceri gradually lost its
primitive use, and the principal person who entirely changed its
character was St. Bernardine of Siena who in 1320 made many
alterations and additions, building a larger chapel, adding cells and
a kitchen, but so small, remarks a discontented franciscan chronicler,
that it barely held the cooking utensils. Although we can no longer
call it a hermitage, the Carceri became the type of an ideal
franciscan convent such as Francis dreamed of for his followers when
he went to live at the Portiuncula, and such it has remained to this
day. For certainly the place, as left by St. Bernardine, would have
been approved of by the first franciscans as a dwelling-place, but
those of later years can only tell us of its discomforts. Here is a
graphic description of its primeval simplicity which very nearly
corresponds to its present state: "It were better called a grotto with
six lairs; one sees but the naked rock untouched by the chisel, all
rough and full of holes as left by nature; those who see it for the
first time are seized with extraordinary fear on climbing the ladder
leading to the dormitory, at each end of which are other poor
buildings, added by the religious according as need arose for the use
of the friars, who do not care to live as hermits did in the olden
times. The refectory is small, and can contain but few friars; a
brother guardian made an excavation, of sufficient height and breadth
in the rock, and added thereto a table around which can sit other six
religious, so that those who take their places at this new table are
huddled up in the arched niche which forms a baldaquin above their
heads. There is also a little common room which horrifies all
beholders, wherein is lit a fire, for besides being far inside the
rocky mass it is gloomy beyond description by reason of the dense
smoke always enclosed therein, this is a lively cause to the religious
of reflection on the hideousness and obscurity of the darkness of
hell; in lieu of receiving comfort from the fire the poor friars
generally come out with tears in their eyes." To somewhat atone for
these discomforts they possessed a fountain, raised, as we are told,
by the prayers of St. Francis, which never ran dry, "a miracle God has
wished to perpetuate for the glory of His faithful servants and the
continual comfort of the monks."
The crucifixion in the chapel built by St. Bernardine adjoining the
choir, is said to have been painted by his orders. The artistic merits
of the fresco are questionable, but connected with it is a legend
possibly invented by some humorous member of the franciscan
brotherhood in order to point a moral to his companions. "Here," says
a chronicler, "is adored that most marvellous crucifixion, so famous
in religion; it is well known to have spoken several times to the
devout Sister Diomira Bini of the Third Order of St. Francis and a
citizen of Assisi; and in our own times, in the last century (the
seventeenth) it was seen by Brother Silvestro dello Spedalicchio to
detach itself from the cross, and with most gentle slaps on the face,
warn a worshipper to be reverent and vigilant while praying in this
His Sacred Oratory."
In a small wooden cupboard in the chapel, according to an inventory
made two hundred years ago, are preserved some relics, a few of which
we have unfortunately not been able to identify. Part of the wooden
pillow used by St. Francis, and a piece of the Golden Gate through
which our Lord passed into Jerusalem, are still here, but the hair of
the Virgin, and, strangest of all, some of the earth out of which God
created Adam, are no longer to be found!
* * * * *
Ten or twelve friars continued to live at the Carceri for a few years
after the death of St. Bernardine; some begged their daily bread from
the villagers in the valley, others dug in the tiny garden at the foot
of the ravine where a few vegetables grew, and two always remained at
the convent to spin the wool for the habits of the religious. But soon
wearying of the life they went to live at other convents, and the
place passed away from the franciscans into the possession of various
sects, among others to the excommunicated Fraticelli. In 1415 it was
given back to the Observants, and Paolo Trinci, who had done much to
reform the Order, persuaded some friars to live once more at the
deserted hermitage. Again the Carceri became such an ideal franciscan
convent that many came from afar to visit it, and there is a strange
story of how a "woman monk" found a home and died here in the middle
of the fifteenth century.
"Beata Anonima," a chronicler recounts, "being already a Cistercian
nun in the convent of S. Cerbone of Lucca at the time of the siege of
that city by the Florentines, when the said nuns, for valid reasons,
were transferred to the convent of Sta. Christina inside the city. Now
this most fervent servant of God took this opportune time and fled by
stealth, disguised as a man, and went, or rather flew, to Assisi;
there, fired with an ardent desire to fight under the seraphic
standard, she breathlessly climbed the steep slopes of Mount Subasio,
and having found the horrible cavern of Santa Maria delle Carceri
fervently entreated those good Fathers to admit her amongst them and
to bestow on her their sacred habit, for which her longing was
extreme. At length, having overcome all resistance, believing her to
be a man as appeared from her dress, and not a woman which in reality
she was, they admitted her to the convent and gave her the habit of
religion." She edified all by the holiness of her life and the rigid
penances she performed, but her health soon suffered and only upon her
death-bed, surrounded by the friars chanting the psalms for the dying,
the Blessed Anonima confessed to the fraud she had practised in order
to dwell in the hermitage rendered so dear because of the memory of
the Poverello d'Assisi.
RIVO-TORTO[53]
A straight and stony road, the old Roman one, now overgrown in many
parts with grass and trails of ivy and bordered by mulberry and oak
trees, leads out of the Porta Mojano to two little chapels in the
plain. Set back from the main road in the midst of the fields few
people find them, and the peasants know nothing of their story and can
only tell of a miraculous well in which a youthful saint met his
death. When his body was brought to the surface a lily had grown from
his mouth and upon its petals was written in letters of gold the one
word, _Veritas_, for he had died in the cause of truth. Since then, as
the peasants recount with pride, many come from afar to drink of the
waters of this well for it cures every ill. It is over-grown with
ferns and close by stands an ancient sarcophagus where the children
sit to eat their midday meal. A piece of old worn sculpture still
ornaments the chapel of the young martyr, and the feeling of the place
is very charming, but the pilgrim who comes to Assisi to visit St.
Francis, has a different picture to recall with another kind of beauty
belonging to it than that of holy wells and flowering banks and
meadows.
It is difficult, when looking on San Rufino d'Arce, with its cluster
of vine-shaded peasant houses, and then on Santa Maria Maddalena,
narrow windowed, the small apse marking it as a primitive Umbrian
chapel of the fields, to realise that in the Middle Ages this was a
leper village separated from Assisi by a little more than a mile of
open country. And yet here, without doubt, we have Rivo-Torto where,
even before his famous interview with Innocent III, St. Francis had
stayed with those three first Assisan companions, Bernard di
Quintavalle, Peter Cataneo and Egidio. Then in the autumn of 1210,
when he returned from Rome after the rule of poverty had been
sanctioned by the Church, but before he was ready to begin his mission
as preacher, he came to live among the lepers, forming with his
disciples a little family which we may call the beginning of a first
franciscan settlement.
The leper village was divided according to the social rank of the
outcasts, the richer living together near the chapel of Sta. Maria
Maddalena and forming quite a community with the right of freely
administering their own goods. As M. Sabatier observes, it was
therefore not "only a hospital, but almost a little town near the city
with the same social distinctions of classes."
Those tended by St. Francis were the poorest of the lepers, whose
wretched hovels lay near the chapel of San Rufino d'Arce; and Celano
must be referring to this settlement when he tells us how Francis in
his early days, even if he chanced to look down from Assisi upon the
houses of the lepers in the plain, would hold his nostrils with his
hand, because his horror of them was so great.
But as the grace of God touched his heart, making him take pity upon
all things weak and suffering, he turned the force of his strong
nature to overcoming this repugnance, and there is a beautiful story
telling of the first victory gained shortly after his conversion.
While riding one day near Assisi he met a leper, and filled with
disgust and even fear at the sight, his first impulse was to turn his
horse round, but, remembering his new resolutions to follow the
teaching of Christ, he went forward to meet the poor man, and even
kissed the hand extended to him for alms. "Then," says St.
Bonaventure, "having mounted his horse, he looked around him over the
wide and open plain, but the leper was nowhere to be seen. And Francis
being filled with wonder and gladness, devoutly gave thanks to God,
purposing within himself to proceed to still greater things than
this." Certainly the event heralded a life of holiness, and was the
means of rousing his latent energies and the feelings for
self-sacrifice which drove him from the wild and solitary places he
loved into the very midst of the world, there to work strenuously, in
every part of Italy, at first among lepers and then among the wealthy,
the ignorant and the sorrowful.
For the life at Rivo-Torto led by "these valiant despisers of the
great and good things of this world" we cannot do better than turn to
the Three Companions (Brothers Masseo, Ruffino and Leo) who knew by
personal experience the hardships and roughness of the place.
Feelingly they describe: "a hovel, or rather a cavern abandoned by
man; the which place was so confined that they could hardly sit down
to repose themselves. Many a time they had no bread, and ate nought
but turnips which they begged for here and there in travail and in
anguish. On the beams of the poor hut the man of God wrote the names
of the brethren, so that whoso would repose or pray might know his
place and not disturb, by reason of the cramped and limited space in
the small hovel, the quietude of the night." Even the appearance of
Otto IV, close to their hut seems in no way to have disturbed the
peaceful course of their lives, but only gave St. Francis the
opportunity of bestowing a timely warning upon the Emperor. Celano,
ever delighting in the picturesque details of ceremonies and pageants,
tells us how "there came at that time with much noise and pomp the
great Emperor on his way to take the terrestrial crown of the Empire;
now the most holy father with his companions being in the said house
near the road where the cavalcade was passing, would neither go out to
see it, nor permit his brethren to go, save one, whom he commanded
fearlessly to announce to Otto that his glory would be short-lived."
Thus, if the tale be true, a German Emperor was the first to listen to
Francis' message to a mediæval world sunk in the love of earthly
things, and who knows whether the saint's words did not come back to
Otto again in after years.
The Penitents of Assisi only remained until the spring at Rivo-Torto,
for even during those few months' sojourn among the lepers their
numbers had so increased that it became necessary to think of some
surer abode. One day St. Francis called the brethren to tell them how
he had thought of obtaining from one of his various kind friends in
Assisi, a small chapel where they could peacefully say their Hours,
having some poor little houses for shelter close by built of wattle
and mud.
His speech was pleasing to the brethren, and so, following the master
they loved and trusted, all went to dwell at the Portiuncula, where,
as we shall see, a new life was to begin for them.
THE PORTIUNCULA
"Holy of Holies is this Place of Places,
Meetly held worthy of surpassing honour!
Happy thereof the surname, 'Of the Angels,'
Happier yet the name, 'The Blessed Mary.'
Now, a true omen, the third name conferreth
'The Little Portion' on the Little Brethren,
Here, where by night a presence oft of Angels
Singing sweet hymns illumineth the watches."
(_The Mirror of Perfection_, translated by Sebastian Evans.)
Those who want to realise the charm of the Portiuncula and of the
memories that cling about it, must try to forget the great church
which shuts out from it the sunlight, and with the early chroniclers
as their guides, call up the image of St. Francis with his first
disciples who in an age of unrest came here to seek for peace.
Make your pilgrimage in the springtime or in the early summer, when
pink hawthorn and dogroses are flowering in every hedge and the vines
fill the valley with a delicate green light. Looking at cities and
villages so purely Umbrian, some spread among cornfields close to a
swift clear river, others set upon heights which nearly touch the sky
on stormy days, we forget that beyond these hills and mountains
encircling the big valley of Umbria stretch other lands as fair. We
forget, because it is a little world which during long centuries has
been set apart from all else, and where man has but completed the work
of nature herself. During the long hours of a summer's day, when the
sense of remoteness in the still plain is most intense, it brings to
us, as nothing else can ever do, some feeling of that early time when
four hermits came from Palestine and found a quiet retreat in the oak
forests of Assisi.
It was in the year 352, as St. Cyril, Patriarch of Jerusalem, relates,
when a cross had been seen stretched from Calvary to the Mount of
Olives and to shine more brightly than the sun, that four holy men,
impelled by a feeling that some great crisis was at hand, determined
to visit the shrines of Rome. Having performed their devotions and
offered many precious relics to Pope Liberius, they expressed a great
desire to find some hermitage where, each in a silent cell, they could
meditate upon the marvellous things they had seen in the Eternal City.
The Pope gave them most excellent advice when he told them to go to
the Spoletan valley. With his sanction to choose any part of it they
liked, they passed over the mountains dividing Umbria from the
Campagna, and by many towns until, when about a mile from Assisi, they
determined to build their dwellings in the plain, thinking, as indeed
they might, to find no other spot so suited for a quiet retreat. Close
to four huts of rough hewn stone and brushwood they erected a tiny
chapel with a pent roof and narrow window which, perhaps in memory of
their native valley, they dedicated to St. Mary of Jehosaphat. But
after a few years, forsaking the life of hermits, they again took up
their staves and returned home to Palestine by way of the Romagna,
leaving beneath the altar of the chapel they had built a relic of the
Virgin's sepulchre.
[Illustration: SIDE DOOR OF THE PORTIUNCULA BUILT BY ST. BENEDICT]
At different times other devout hermits, charmed by the lonely chapel,
took possession of it for a time, but it was often deserted for many
years. Its preservation is due to St. Benedict who, passing through
Umbria during the early part of the sixth century, was inspired to
restore the ruined chapel and dwell near it for awhile. He not only
repaired the walls, but built the two large round arched doors we see
to this day, and which many declare to be quite out of proportion to
the rest of the building, but their unusual size is accounted for by
a charming legend. Once when St. Benedict was praying in the chapel he
saw a marvellous vision as he knelt wrapt in ecstasy. A crowd of
people were praying around him to St. Francis, singing hymns of praise
and calling for mercy on their souls, while outside still greater
multitudes waited for their turn to come and pray before the shrine.
St. Benedict, understanding from this that a great saint would one day
be honoured here, made the two doors in the chapel, and made them
large enough for many to pass in and out at a time. Thus was the feast
of the "Pardon of St. Francis" prepared for some seven hundred years
too soon.
St. Benedict obtained from the Assisans the gift of a small plot of
ground near the sanctuary, which suggested to him the name of St. Mary
of the Little Portion--Sta. Maria della Portiuncula. When a few years
later St. Benedict founded his famous order at Monte Cassino, he did
not forget the Umbrian chapel he had saved from ruin, and sent some of
his monks to live there and to minister among the people. Like the
first hermits they lived in poor huts, saying their Hours in the
little chapel, until in the eleventh century they built a large
monastery and church upon the higher slopes of Mount Subasio to the
east of Assisi, and the Portiuncula was again deserted. But although
no one lived near, and mass was never celebrated there, it still
remained in the keeping of the benedictines who occasionally must have
seen to its repair, and thus preserved it for the coming of St.
Francis.
* * * * *
It has been suggested to me that the spot selected by the four holy
pilgrims in the fourth century may have been even then the site of a
sacred shrine, for the custom of erecting tabernacles over the graves
of distinguished persons reaches back to very early times. Originally
designed as a mortuary cell such a structure might, being duly
oriented, come to be used as a chapel for service.
The subject of "Sepulchral Cellæ" will be found treated of by the late
Sir Samuel Fergusson[54] in a memoir in which he figures some of the
burial vaults and early oratories of Ireland, some of which are in
shape identical with Sta. Maria della Portiuncula, with the same pent
roof, round arched door, and perfectly plain walls. A building thus
erected over a grave was called _Porticulus_, and any who pillaged "a
house made in form of a basilica over a dead person" had to pay a
fine.
From an archæological point of view there is much to be desired in the
published descriptions of the Portiuncula. A great part of its
exterior walls is now covered with frescoes which hide all detail, but
perhaps a minute examination of the interior walls might reveal
portions of the foundations built upon by St. Benedict, and we
sincerely hope that these few words may attract attention to so
interesting a subject.
But even if the shrine said to have been built by the hermits from
Palestine for Our Lady's Girdle turns out to have been an ancient
tomb, the later legends are by no means destroyed. It is not unlikely
that St. Benedict, attracted as much by lonely places as St. Francis,
took possession of the Umbrian tomb, and perhaps little thinking what
it was, rebuilt and used it as a chapel. Whatever may be the true
story, it is very certain that the Portiuncula, from earliest times,
has possessed a strange attraction for all who passed by, each one
thinking a tiny chapel situated so charmingly in the woods, within
sight, though not within sound, of the Umbrian towns, to be a perfect
spot for prayer.
The country people treasure the legend that Madonna Pica often came to
pray at the Portiuncula, and through the intercession of the Blessed
Virgin obtained a son after seven years of waiting, and this son of
prayer and patience was St. Francis of Assisi.
Half ruined and neglected as the chapel was, Francis learned, even as
quite a child, to love it, and kneeling therein by his mother's side
would pray with all the fervour of his childish faith. Later in life
when he had turned from the mad follies of his youth to follow in the
footsteps of Christ, he remembered the shrine he had loved in
childhood, and would pass many nights there in prayer and bitter
meditation upon the Passion. At last touched by the sight of its
crumbling walls, he set himself the task of repairing them, working so
busily with stones and mortar that the chapel soon regained its former
simple beauty. The Benedictines of Mount Subasio, touched by his
ungrudging labour and piety, arranged with an Assisan priest to
celebrate mass at the Portiuncula from time to time, and this fact
drew the young saint there still oftener.
Then followed his time of ministry among the lepers of San Rufino
d'Arce, when day by day so many disciples came to enlist in this new
army of working beggars that the little hut in the leper-village could
no longer hold them, and Francis had to think of some means of housing
the brethren, and obtaining, what he had often desired, a chapel
wherein they could say the Hours. (The saint, we may be sure, always
said his office in the woods.) But evidently he had no particular
place in his mind, not even his beloved Portiuncula, for he went first
to his friend Guido, Bishop of Assisi, and then to the canons of San
Rufino to ask if they could help him. They only answered that they had
no church to dispose of, and could offer no advice upon the subject.
Then sorrowfully, like a man begging from door to door, St. Francis
climbed Mount Subasio to lay his request in piteous terms before the
benedictine abbot, where he met with more success. Brother Leo tells
us that the abbot was "moved to pity, and after taking counsel with
his monks, being inspired by divine grace and will, granted unto the
Blessed Francis and his brethren the church of St. Mary of the Little
Portion, as being the smallest and poorest church they possessed. And
the abbot said to the Blessed Francis, 'Behold Brother, we grant what
thou desirest. But should the Lord multiply thy brotherhood we will
that this place shall be the mother-house of thy Order.'"[55]
With a willing heart Francis promised what the abbot asked, and
further insisted upon paying rent for the Portiuncula, because he
wished his followers always to bear in mind the point of his rule,
which he so often dwelt upon, namely, that they owned no property
whatever, but were only in this world as pilgrims. So every year two
of his brethren brought to the gate of the benedictine monastery a
basket full of roach caught in the Chiaggio which flows at no great
distance from the Portiuncula, and the abbot, smiling at the
simplicity of Francis, who had imagined yet another device for
humility, gave back a vessel full of oil in exchange for the gift of
fish.[56]
With great rejoicing St. Francis set to work building cells of a most
simple pattern, with walls of wattle and dab, and thatched with straw,
each brother inscribing his name upon a portion of the mud floor set
apart for him to rest in. "And no sooner had they come to live here,"
writes Brother Leo, "than the Lord multiplied their number day by day,
and the sweet scent of their good name spread marvellously abroad
throughout all the Spoletan valley, and in many parts of the world."
It was thus that St. Mary of the Little Portion, henceforth to be the
nucleus of the franciscan order, and a place familiar to pilgrims from
far and near for many succeeding centuries, came into the keeping of
St. Francis in the year 1211, about nine months after Innocent III had
sanctioned his work among the people of Italy.
St. Francis and the brethren had been but a year in their new abode
when a figure passed in among them for a moment and then was gone,
leaving, as a vision to haunt them to their dying day, the memory of
her beauty and soul's purity.
Never in the history of any saint has there been so touching and
wondrous a scene as when the young Clare left her father's palace in
Assisi to take the vows of perpetual and voluntary poverty at the
altar of the Portiuncula. Followed by two trembling women, she passed
swiftly through the town in the dead of night, across the fields by
the slumbering village of Valecchio, and through dark woods made more
sombre by the starry Umbrian sky which at intervals gleamed between
the wide-spreading branches of the oak trees. The hurrying figure of
the young girl, swathed in a long mantle, seemed like some spirit
driven by winds towards an unknown future. One thing alone was clear
to her, she was nearing the abode of Francis Bernardone whose
preaching at San Giorgio only a month before had so thrilled her,
inspiring her in this strange way to seek the life he had described in
such fiery words. And just as she came in sight of the Portiuncula the
chanting of the brethren, which had reached her in the wood, suddenly
ceased, and they came out with lighted torches in expectation of her
coming. Swiftly and without a word she passed in to attend the
midnight mass which Francis was to serve.
The ceremony was simple, wherein lies the charm of all things
franciscan. The service over and the last blessing given, St. Francis
led Clare towards the altar and with his own hands cut off her long
fair hair and unclasped the jewels from her neck. But a few minutes
more and a daughter of the proud house of Scifi stood clothed in the
brown habit of the order, the black veil of religion falling about her
shoulders, lovelier far in this nun-like severity than she had been
when decked out in all her former luxury of silken gowns and precious
gems.
It was arranged that Clare was to go afterwards to the benedictine
nuns of San Paolo near Bastia, about an hour's walk further on in the
plain. So when the final vows had been taken, St. Francis took her by
the hand and they passed out of the chapel together just as dawn was
breaking, while the brethren returned to their cells gazing half sadly
as they passed, at the coils of golden hair and the little heap of
jewels which still lay upon the altar cloth.
* * * * *
Those early days at the Portiuncula were among the most important of
Francis' life; dreams which had come to him while he spent long hours
in the caves and woods near Assisi were to be fully realised, and the
work he felt inspired to perform was to be carried out in the busy
villages and cities of Italy and even further afield. All this was now
very clear to Francis, and more than ever anxious to keep the
simplicity of his order untouched, he taught his followers, in words
which fell so gently yet so earnestly from his lips, that they were to
toil without ceasing, and restlessly and without pause to wander from
castle to castle, from city to city, in search of those who needed
help. It may therefore at first seem strange that the "Penitents of
Assisi" owning nothing but the peace within their hearts, desiring no
better place for prayer than a cavern in some mountain gorge, should
establish themselves near a chapel which, if not nominally their own,
was practically regarded as the property of the Friars Minor. But in
this again we feel the wisdom and tenderness of the saint for his
little community. With all the fervour and fire of enthusiasm which
impelled him like a living force to seek his end, he well knew that
without some place in which to meet together and rest awhile, his
followers, who however much imbued with his ardent spirit were but
mortal men, would very likely fall away from the high ideal he had set
before them.
Thus the Portiuncula became to the brethren as a nest, where like
tired birds that long had been upon the wing, they could return after
much wandering to peaceful thoughts, to prayer and quiet labour.
[Illustration: THE PORTIUNCULA IN THE TIME OF ST. FRANCIS (FROM THE
"COLLIS PARADISI").]
It is not very difficult, with the print from the "Collis
Paradisi"[57] before us, and the remembrance of the large oaks
which still mark the ancient Roman roads leading from Assisi to the
plain, to call up the picture of the strange franciscan hamlet
clustering round a pent-roofed chapel, and with only trees for a
convent wall. What a life of peace in the mud huts! what a life of
turmoil and angry strife raging in the city just in sight!
The spirit of those days, when monachism meant all that was purely
ideal and beautiful, seems to live again. Then, day and night, each
brother strove to fit himself for the work he had in view, drawing
into his soul the peace and love he learned from nature herself as the
forest leaves rustled above his cell or the nightingales accompanied
the midnight office with their song. And when his turn came to take up
the pilgrim's staff and follow the lead of Francis, he went with
cheerfulness to bring to the people some of that child-like joy and
lightness of heart which marked the Little Brethren through whatever
land they wandered as the disciples of St. Francis.
Let us for a moment leave the Umbrian valley for the country near
Oxford, where on a bitter Christmas Day, two friars were journeying
upon their first mission to England.
"Going into a neighbouring wood they picked their way along a rugged
path over the frozen mud and hard snow, whilst blood stained the track
of their naked feet without their perceiving it. The younger friar
said to the elder: 'Father, shall I sing and lighten our journey?' and
on receiving permission he thundered forth a Salve Regina
misericordiæ.... Now, when the hymn was concluded ... he who had been
the consoler said, with a kind of self congratulation to his
companion: 'Brother, was not that antiphonal well sung?'"
In this simple story, told us in the chronicle of Lanercost, how true
rings the franciscan note struck by Francis in those early days at the
Portiuncula. He was for ever telling the brethren not to show
sorrowful faces to one another, saying, as recorded by Brother Leo:
"Let this sadness remain between God and thyself, and pray to Him that
of His mercy He may forgive thee, and restore to thy soul His healthy
joyance whereof He deprived thee as a punishment for thy sins."
It is all so long ago, and yet in reading those ancient chronicles the
big church of the Angeli is for a time forgotten, and only the vision
of the Portiuncula and the mud huts, with the brethren ever to and fro
upon the road, remains with us as a strange picture in our modern
hurried life.
But although the brethren lived so quietly in this retreat of still
repose, St. Francis, ever watching over the welfare of his flock, was
careful that prayer and meditation should never be an excuse for
idleness, which of all vices he most abhorred. Therefore he encouraged
each friar who in the world had followed some trade, to continue it
here; so we hear of Beato Egidio, on his return from one of his long
journeys, seated at the door of his hut busily employed in making rush
baskets, while Brother Juniper, in those rare moments when he was out
of mischief, would pass his time in mending sandals with an awl he
kept up his sleeve for the purpose. Besides these individual
occupations there was much to attend to even in such humble dwellings
as those round the Portiuncula. Sometimes there were sick friars to
nurse, or vegetables had to be planted in the orchard and provisions
to be obtained, while the office of doorkeeper, as "Angels" came
perpetually to ask pertinent questions of the brethren, became quite a
laborious task. When it fell to Brother Masseo to answer the door he
had little peace. Upon one occasion he went in haste to see who was
making such a noise and found a "fair youth clothed as though for a
journey," so he spoke somewhat roughly, and the youth enquired how
knocking should be done. "Give three knocks," quoth Brother Masseo,
little dreaming he was instructing an angel in the art of knocking,
"with a brief space between each knock, then wait until the brother
has time to say a paternoster and to come unto thee; and if at the end
of that time he does not come knock once again."
Things went smoothly enough when left to the management of such friars
as Leo, Masseo or Rufino, but when one day the office of cook fell to
Juniper, that dear jester of the brotherhood, we get a humorous
picture of what his companions sometimes had to endure, and of the
kindness with which they pardoned all shortcomings. The brethren had
gone out, and Juniper being left alone devised an excellent plan
whereby the convent might be supplied with food for a fortnight, and
thus the cook have more time for prayer. "With all diligence," it is
related in the _Fioretti_, "he went into the village and begged for
several large cooking-pots, obtained fresh meat and bacon, fowls, eggs
and herbs, also he begged a quantity of firewood, and placed all these
upon the fire, to wit, the fowls with their feathers on, the eggs in
their shells, and the rest in like fashion." When the brethren came
home, one that was well acquainted with the simplicity of Brother
Juniper went into the kitchen, and seeing so many and such large pots
on a great fire, sat down amazed without saying a word, and watched
with what anxious care Brother Juniper did this cooking. Because of
the fierceness of the fire he could not well get near to skim the
pots, so he took a plank and tied it with a rope tight to his body and
sprang from one pot to the other, so that it was a joy to see him.
Contemplating all with great delight, this brother went forth from the
kitchen and finding the other brothers, said: "In sooth I tell you,
Brother Juniper is making a marriage feast."
Then in hurried Juniper, all red with his exertions and the heat of
the fire, explaining the excellent plan he had devised; and as he set
his mess upon the table he praised it, saying: "Now these fowls are
nourishing to the brain, this stew will refresh the body, it is so
good"; but the stew remained untasted, for, says the _Fioretti_,
"there is no pig in the land of Rome so famished that he would eat of
it."
At the end of any foolish adventure Brother Juniper would always ask
pardon with such humility that he edified his companions and all the
people he came in contact with, instead of annoying them with his
childish pranks. His goodness was manifest, and St. Francis was often
heard to say to those who wished to reprove him after one of his
wildest frolics, "would that I had a whole forest of these junipers."
Between the men who lived at the Portiuncula with the saint, and those
who in later times ruled large convents in the cities, the contrast
is so great that we would wish to draw still further from these
inexhaustible chronicles which reveal so charmingly the life of these
Umbrian friars. But to tell of all the events connected with the
Portiuncula would mean recounting the history of the whole franciscan
brotherhood, and we must now pass over many years to that saddest year
of all, when St. Francis was brought to die in the place he had so
carefully tended.
[Illustration: ASSISI FROM THE PLAIN]
Knowing that he had but a few more weeks of life, he begged the
brethren to find some means to carry him away from the Bishop's Palace
at Assisi where he had been staying some time. "Verily," he told them
pathetically, "because of my very infirmity I cannot go afoot"; so
they carried him in their arms down the hill to the plain, and when
they came to the hospital of San Salvatore dei Crociferi they laid him
gently down upon the ground with his face towards Assisi, because he
desired to bless the town for the last time before he died.
The blind saint, lifting his hand in blessing, pronounced these words
dear to the hearts of the Assisans to this day: "Blessed be thou of
the Lord, O city, faithful to God, because through thee many souls
shall be saved. The servants of the Most High shall dwell in great
numbers within thy walls, and many of thy sons shall be chosen for the
realms of heaven."
Then they carried him to the hut nearest the Portiuncula which was the
infirmary, and here his last days were passed.[58] Although he
suffered acutely, they were days of marvellous peace and joy. It is
beautiful to read how, with his usual tenderness, he thought of the
brethren he was leaving to carry on the work without him, encouraging
them all as they stood weeping round his bed. Like Isaac of old, the
Umbrian patriarch blessed his first born, Bernard of Quintavalle,
saying: "Come my little son that my soul may bless thee before I die,"
while he enjoined upon all to love and honour Bernard, who had been
the first to listen to his words now so many years ago. With all his
sons near him St. Francis dictated his will, wherein he describes the
way of life they were to lead, and which, coming from him at this
solemn moment, must always remain as a precious message from the
saint, in many ways of more importance than the Rule approved in his
life-time by Pope Honorius. When this was done he commended once again
to their special care the chapel of the Portiuncula. "I will," he said
to them, "that for all times it be the mirror and good example of all
religion, and as it were a lamp ever burning and resplendent before
the throne of God and before the Blessed Virgin."
The farewells to those of his immediate circle had been made and a
letter written to St. Clare, and now he wished to bid "the most noble
Roman matron, Madonna Giacoma dei Settesoli," one of his most devoted
followers, to come and take leave of him at Assisi. The letter had
only just been written when knocking at the door and the sound of
horses trampling was heard outside, and the brethren going out to
discover the cause of such unwonted noise found that Madonna Giacoma,
accompanied by her sons, two Roman senators, had been inspired to come
and visit the dying saint.
The brethren, somewhat averse to allow a woman, even one so renowned
for holiness as Madonna Giacoma, to enter their sacred precincts,
called to St. Francis in their doubt: "Father, what shall be done?
Shall we let her enter and come unto thee?" And the Blessed Francis
said: "The regulation is to be set aside in respect to this lady whose
great faith and devotion hath brought her hither from such far-off
parts." So Madonna Giacoma came into the presence of the Blessed
Francis weeping bitterly, and she brought with her the shroud-cloth,
incense, and a great quantity of wax for the candles which were to
burn before his body after death. She had even thought of some cakes
made of almonds and sugar, known in Rome by the name of _mostaccioli_,
which she had often made for him when he visited her. But the saint
was fast failing, and could eat but little of the cakes.
As the end came nearer his thoughts were drawn away from earth, and
true to the last to his Lady Poverty, he caused himself to be laid
naked on the ground as a token of his complete renouncement of the
world. His face radiant with happiness, he kept asking his companions
to recite the Canticle of the Sun, often joining in it himself or
breaking forth into his favourite psalm _Voce mea ad Dominum Clamavi_.
With words of praise and gladness the Blessed Francis of Assisi, the
spouse of Poverty, died in a mud hut close to the shrine he loved, on
the 3rd of October of 1226 in the forty-fifth year of his age.
His soul was seen to ascend to heaven under the semblance of a star,
but brilliant as the sun, upon clouds as white as snow. It was sunset,
the hour when in Umbria after the stillness of a warm autumn day an
unusual tremor passes through the land and all things in the valley
and upon the hill-sides are stirred by it, when a flight of larks
circled above the roof of the hut where the saint lay at rest. And
these birds of light and gladness "seemed by their sweet singing to be
in company with Francis praising the Lord God."
FOOTNOTES:
[51] It has sometimes happened that visitors, who have not read their
Murray with sufficient care, thinking "Le Carceri" are prisons where
convicts are kept, leave Assisi without visiting this charming spot.
"Carceri" certainly now means "prisons," but the original meaning of
the word in old Italian is a place surrounded by a fence and often
remote from human habitation.
[52] It is perhaps an insult to the Tescio to leave the traveller in
Umbria under the impression that this mountain torrent is always dry.
Certainly that is its usual condition, but we have seen it during the
storms that break upon the land in August and September overflow its
banks and inundate the country on either side; but with this wealth of
water its beauty goes.
[53] The large modern church of Rivo-Torto, on the road from Sta.
Maria degli Angeli to Spello, built to enclose the huts that St.
Francis and his companions are supposed to have lived in while tending
the lepers, has been proved without doubt by M. Paul Sabatier to have
no connection whatever with the Saint. In these few pages we have
followed the information given in a pamphlet which is to be found in
the Italian translation of his _Vie de S. François d'Assise_. It is
impossible here to enter into all the arguments relating to this
disputed point, but I think the authority of the best, and by far the
most vivid of the biographers of St. Francis can be trusted without
further comment, and that we may safely believe the hut of St.
Francis, known as Rivo-Torto, lay close to the present chapels of San
Rufino d'Arce and Sta. Maria Maddalena. See Appendix for information
as to their exact position in the plain and the nearest road to them.
_Disertazione sul primo luogo abitato dai Frati Minori su Rivo-Torto e
nell'Ospedale dei Lebbrosi di Assisi._ di Paul Sabatier (Roma, Ermanno
Loescher and Co., 1896).
[54] See _The Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy_, vol. xxvii.
Nov. 1882.
[55] _Speculum Perfectionis_, cap. lv., edited by Paul Sabatier.
[56] This custom ceased in the fifteenth century; but in the year
1899, through the piety of the Rev. Father Bernardine Ibald, it was
revived. Once again the franciscans take a small basket of fish to the
abbot and his monks who now live at S. Pietro in Assisi, where the
benedictines went when their mountain retreat was destroyed by order
of the Assisan despot, Broglia di Trino.
[57] This illustration is from a print to be seen in the somewhat rare
edition of the _Collis Paradisi Amoenitas, seu Sacri Conventus
Assisiensis Historiæ_, published in 1704 at Montefalco by Padre
Angeli, and it may even have been taken from an earlier drawing. In it
there is the true feeling of a franciscan convent, such as the saint
hoped would continue for all time, and though there are some points
which are incorrect (the Church of Sta. Chiara, though curiously
enough not the convent, is represented, which was built several years
later than San Francesco), we get a clear idea of both Assisi and its
immediate neighbourhood. All the ancient gates of the town can be made
out, the Roman road from Porta Mojano to San Rufino d'Arce, a faint
indication of the path to the Carceri, and also the old road from
Assisi to the plain out of the gate of S. Giacomo, passing not very
far from the Ponte S. Vittorino. The wall round the Portiuncula and
the huts did not exist in the time of St. Francis, which, together
with the wooden gate, may have been added by Brother Elias. The
largest hut a little to the right of the chapel was the infirmary
where St. Francis died (now called the Chapel of St. Francis), and the
one behind it was his cell (now known as the Chapel of the Roses, see
chapter xi. for its story), whence he could easily pass out through
the woods to San Rufino d'Arce hard by.
[58] For fuller account see _The Mirror of Perfection_, translated by
Sebastian Evans, caps. 107, 108, 112, and _The Little Flowers of St.
Francis_, translated by J. W. Arnold (Temple Classics), chap. vi.
CHAPTER IV
_The building of the Basilica and Convent of San Francesco. The Story
of Brother Elias_
"O brother mine, O beautiful brother, O brother of love, build me
a castle which shall have neither stone nor iron. O beautiful
brother, build me a city which shall have neither wood nor
stone."--BEATO EGIDIO.
One of the strangest characteristics of mediæval Italy was the rivalry
between different towns to gain possession of the bodies of holy
people. They did not even wait for the bull of canonisation to arrive
from Rome, but often of their own accord placed the favoured being in
the Calendar of Saints, and papal decrees merely ratified the choice
of popular devotion. We have an example of this with the Perugians.
Ever on the alert to increase the glory of their city, they hovered
near the road St. Francis was to follow during his last illness when
borne from Cortona to Assisi, meaning to carry him off by force so
that he might die in Perugia.[59] Never at a loss for a way out of any
difficulty Elias hastily changed the itinerary for the journey, and
instead of the short way by lake Thrasymene he took the much longer
and more difficult road by Gualdo and Nocera, far back in the
mountains to the north of Assisi. He warned the Assisans of the peril
run by the little company of friars with their sick father, and
soldiers were immediately sent to escort them safely to the Bishop's
Palace where St. Francis stayed until carried to the Portiuncula when
he knew that he was dying.
They were sad days at Assisi when St. Francis was borne through the
city blind and ill; and as he stretched out his hands to bless the
people they bowed their heads and wept at the sight of so much
suffering. Now that the end had come and they knew he lay safely in
the little shrine of the Portiuncula, their mourning was changed into
rejoicing, and as though they were preparing for a great festival,
strange sounds of busy talk, of laughter and of singing were heard in
the streets. Had a stranger found himself at Assisi that Sunday
morning he might well have asked: "What victory have you gained to
merit all this show of gladness, or what emperor are you going forth
to greet?" And the answer would have been: "Francis, our saint, the
son of Bernardone, returned to us when he was nigh to death, and now
that he is dead we possess his body which will bring great honour and
fame to our city by reason of the many miracles to be wrought at his
tomb."
The sun had not yet risen when the Assisans left their houses and
thronged down the hill to the Portiuncula to bring the precious burden
to rest within the more certain refuge of their walled town. "Blessed
and praised be the Lord our God who has entrusted to us, though
unworthy, so great a gift. Praise and glory to the ineffable Trinity,"
they sang as they hurried along in the cold dawn. Trumpeters blew loud
and discordant notes, nearly drowning the voices of the priests who
vainly in the din tried to intone the canticles and psalms. The nobles
came from their castles with lighted torches to join the procession,
the peasants from the hills brought sprigs of olive, and those from
the forests stripped the oaks of their finest branches which they
waved above their heads, while children strewed the ground with
flowers.
Amidst all this stirring show of joy a kindly thought had been taken
of St. Clare and her nuns, so that when the body of St. Francis had
been laid in a coffin, and the long line of friars, priests and
townsmen turned to climb the hill, they took a path skirting just
below the town, through the vineyards and olive groves, to the convent
of San Damiano. The sound of chanting must have warned the watchers of
their approach long before they came in sight. An artist has pictured
the nuns like a flock of timid sheep in his fresco, trooping out of an
exquisitely marbled chapel, with St. Clare endeavouring to suppress
her grief as she bends over the dead Francis, while the sisters press
close behind her. This is how it ought to have been; but, alas, only
an iron lattice, through which the nuns were wont to receive the Holy
Communion, was opened for them, and the friars lifting the body of St.
Francis from the coffin, held it in their arms at the opening as one
by one the nuns came to kiss the pierced hands. "Madonna Chiara's"
tears fell fast as she gazed on him who had brought such joy into her
cloistered solitude. "Oh father, father," she murmured, "what are we
to do now that thou hast abandoned us unhappy ones? With thee departs
all consolation, for buried here away from the world there is none to
console us." Restraining the lamentations which filled her heart she
passed like a shadow out of sight to her cell, and when all the
sisters had bidden farewell to St. Francis, the small window was
closed "never again to open upon so sad a scene."
The people, who until now had wept bitterly, began to sing again as
the procession went on its way up the hill towards the Porta Mojano.
The trumpets sounded louder than ever, and "with jubilation and great
exultation" the sacred body was brought to the church of San Giorgio,
where it was carefully laid in a marble urn covered with an iron
grating, and guarded day and night from the prying eyes of the
Perugians. If Francis had worked miracles during his life, those
chronicled at his tomb are even more marvellous; in recounting some
which read like fairy tales, a biographer recounts with pride that,
"even from heaven, the Saint showed his courtesy to all."
Devotion to St. Francis was not confined to Umbria or even to Italy,
for we read how his fame spread throughout France, and how the King
and Queen with all the barons of the land, came to Paris to kiss one
of his relics. "People journeyed from the east and from the west,"
enthusiastically exclaims Celano with a total disregard of detail,
"they came from the north and from the south, even the learned and the
lettered who abounded in Paris at that time."
But while France was being stirred by the news of perpetual miracles
and prodigies wrought through the intercession of the saint, and
Assisi in consequence was fast growing into a place of great
importance in the world, Pope Gregory IX, who had been lately elected
upon the death of Honorius III, spent many hours in the Cannonica at
Perugia wrestling with his doubts concerning the truth of the greatest
miracle of all, the miracle of the Stigmata. While in this state of
uncertainty and perplexity St. Francis, the _Fioretti_ relates,
appeared to him one night, and showed him the five wounds inflicted by
the Seraph upon his hands, feet and side. The vision, it seems,
dispelled all doubt from the mind of Pope Gregory, for in conclave
with the cardinals he proclaimed the sanctity of his friend, the
Poverello d'Assisi, and determined to set the final seal of the church
upon his miracles and fame.
This vision was the prelude of a great ceremony held a few days later
in San Giorgio for the canonisation of Francis, at which all Umbria
seems to have been present. Pope Gregory, clothed in vestments of
cloth of gold embroidered with precious stones, his tiara "almost as
an aureole of sanctity about his head," sat stiffly on his pontifical
throne like some carved image, surrounded by cardinals in crimson
garments and bishops in white stoles. All eyes were fixed upon this
splendid group, and it is not improbable that among the spectators
stood Pietro Bernardone and Madonna Pica, and many who had reviled
Francis in his early days of sanctity, and now, within two years of
his death, witnessed him placed among the greatest of the saints.
Gregory had prepared an eloquent address, which he delivered in a
sonorous voice occasionally broken by sobs of emotion. Becoming more
and more enthusiastic as he proceeded, he compared Francis to a full
moon, a refulgent sun, a star rising above the morning mists, and when
he had finished the pious homily, a sub-deacon read out a list of the
saint's miracles, and a learned cardinal, "not without copious
weeping," discoursed thereon, while the Pope listened, shedding
"rivers of tears," and breaking forth every now and then into
deep-drawn sighs. The prelates wept so devoutly that their vestments
were in great part wet, and the ground was drenched with their tears.
The ceremony ended when the Pope rose to bless the people, and intoned
the _Te Deum_, in which all joined with such good will that the "earth
resounded in great jubilee."
Had St. Francis foreseen how his humility would be rewarded? This we
know, that he in part had realised how his order would slip away from
his ideal, and there is a deep note of sadness in many pages of his
life, showing us how fully he realised the pitfalls his disciples were
likely to fall into when he was no longer there to watch over them
with tender care. Often while he was absent for only a little time the
brethren forgot his simple rule, building cells and houses too
spacious and pretentious for the home of the Lady Poverty. This had
been one of the signs to him that his earnest prayers to God, his
example and admonitions to his followers, which come to us through his
letters and the pages of Brother Leo like the cry of one who bravely
fought against the inevitable, were all to be in vain. It is a tragic
story, and rendered still more so by the fact that the Saint's last
years should have been saddened by this knowledge of coming events.
Only a little while and the teaching of poverty and obscurity which he
had so deeply implanted in the hearts of his followers was to be
completely swept away; upon the ruins of that first franciscan order,
guarded jealously for a time by a faithful few, arose the new
franciscan spirit which Elias Buonbarone, inspired by the will of
Gregory IX, brought into being almost before the echo of his master's
words had died away. It is not for us in this small space to trace
the many changes that crept into the young community, but we simply
note as a fact, what to some may appear exaggerated, that the order
St. Francis founded, and prayed would continue as he left it, ceased
at his death, while the order that grew up afterwards bore the
unmistakable stamp of Elias and the Vatican.
* * * * *
The extraordinary humility of St. Francis gave rise to the myth that
when he lay dying at the Portiuncula he expressed a strong desire to
be buried in the most despised spot near Assisi, which, because
criminals were said to have been executed there, bore the name of
Colle del Inferno. It seems unlike him to have been concerned with
what might become of "brother body" after death, and it was probably
not until Gregory IX conceived the idea of building a church in honour
of his friend, that a suitable burial-place was searched for near the
walls of the town, if not actually within them, where the citizens
could safely guard the precious relics. Everything favoured the
designs of Gregory, for not only was he fortunate in finding a man
like Elias, capable, prompt and energetic, but the one place suited
for the erection of a great church, happened to be in the possession
of a generous citizen of Assisi. No sooner were the wishes of the
Pontiff made known than Simon Puzzarelli offered his land on the
Collis Inferni, which from this time forward Gregory ordered to be
called Collis Paradisi, the Hill of Paradise.[60]
A document, duly sealed and signed, is still in the Assisan archives,
in which we read how the site for the building of "an oratory or
church for the most holy body of St. Francis" was given over, in words
that admitted of no withdrawal, to Elias as representative of the Lord
Pope Gregory IX--"dedit, tradedit, cesset, delegavit et donavit
simpliciter et irrevocabiliter." Now the use of the word _oratory_ is
a remarkable fact as suggesting that at the beginning the Assisans
little dreamed of the erection of a great basilica which would cast
their cathedral entirely into the shade.
A few days after the ceremony of the canonisation of St. Francis, Pope
Gregory, amid the usual crowd of Umbrian spectators, laid the
foundation-stone of the franciscan basilica. Then being recalled by
his Roman subjects, whom Assisan chroniclers describe as "a race of
men most seditious and fierce," he was obliged to hurry south, leaving
Elias to carry out his wishes as he thought best.
So far the task left to Elias was easy enough, for money was not
lacking, and countless workmen were ready to begin the great
enterprise; but the question of who should design a church upon the
site chosen was a more difficult matter to settle, as Vasari tells us:
"There was a great scarcity of good architects at this time, and the
church, having to be built upon a very high hill, at the base of which
flows a torrent called the Tescio, an excellent artist was required
for the work. After much deliberation a certain Maestro Jacopo Tedesco
was called to Assisi as being the best architect then to be found, and
having examined the site, and consulted the wishes of the fathers, who
were holding a Chapter in Assisi to discuss the matter, he designed
the plan of a very beautiful church and convent."[61]
"Jacopo" is said to have come to Italy in the retinue of the Emperor
Frederick II. Vasari recounts that the fame he gained all over Italy
by his work at Assisi was so great that the Florentines summoned him
to build them bridges and palaces, and "Jacopo," charmed with the
Tuscan city, married and dwelt there. The citizens, following a custom
which still continues in every Italian town, changed his name to Lapo,
and he is revealed to us as father of the famous Arnolfo di Lapo,
architect of the Florentine cathedral and of the Palazzo della
Signoria. In the seductive pages of Vasari the account reads so
pleasantly that it seems a pity later writers should have discovered
that the story rests upon uncertain dates and legends. Vasari's
endeavour to amalgamate three artists into one person, have forced
many to the opposite extreme, until even the existence of "Jacopo
Tedesco" is denied, and they are reduced to speak of _an_ architect
who designed the church and convent of San Francesco.[62]
Such is the irony of fate, that while numerous documents remain giving
the names of contractors and minor masons employed in the building
there is absolutely no evidence or clue of any kind as to the
architect employed by Elias. We can only suppose that the document
relating to this and other interesting points in connection with the
decoration of the church, must have been destroyed by the Perugians
when they sacked Assisi under Jacopo Piccinino and burnt so many
treasures in the archives. We are consequently at the mercy of local
legends, which were no doubt recounted to Vasari by the Assisans
themselves when he visited the town in the middle of the sixteenth
century. But there is still the evidence of our own eye to help us to
know something of the builder of San Francesco, the builder of the
first Gothic church in Italy. We are told he was a German; but then we
know from Mr Fergusson's Handbook of Architecture that Germans were
only just awakening to the Gothic influences at the time of St.
Francis's death, and, when they wished to build churches in the new
style they called in French masons to help them. Was it therefore
likely that Germany should have given the mysterious architect to
Assisi? A church recalling the Assisan Basilica may be vainly searched
for in Germany or in Lombardy and this further fact inclines us to
believe in the theory of M. Edouard Corroyer.
[Illustration: CHURCH AND CONVENT OF SAN FRANCESCO]
Whether the man who conceived the original idea of raising one church
above another flanked by a colonnaded convent on the spur of a great
mountain was called Philip or James, or whether he came from a Lombard
or a German province seems of small importance compared with the
country where he learned his art. Even supposing "Jacopo" to have been
a northern Italian from the home of the Comacine Guild of master
masons, which is extremely likely, everything goes to prove that he
must have drawn his inspiration for the Assisan Basilica straight
from the south of France. What establishes the French parentage of
San Francesco is the mode of construction, especially visible in the
Upper Church, and which, as M. Corroyer says, "possesses all the
characteristics peculiar to the French architecture in the south of
France at the close of the thirteenth and the beginning of the
fourteenth century, of which the Cathedral of Albi [in Aquitaine] is
the most perfect type. The single nave, its buttresses projecting
externally in the form of half turrets, add to the likeness of the
Italian church of Assisi with that of Albi in France."[63] A glance at
the illustrations of the two churches will bear this theory out better
than many words; and it will be seen at once that had the half turrets
between the bay windows of San Francesco been completed with pointed
roofs and small lancet windows, as no doubt was the intention, the
likeness would be even more striking.
Although "Jacopo" left a very substantial mark of his genius upon the
Umbrian hill-side, he came and went like a shadow, leaving his designs
and plans to be carried on by his young disciple Fra Filippo Campello,
whom we shall meet with again in the chapter on Santa Chiara. Little,
therefore, as we know of this earlier portion of its history, San
Francesco at least remains to us in all its first prime and glory to
tell its own tale, and endless should be the hymn of praise sung by
the Assisans for the chance which brought so beautiful a creation
within their walls.
It seems indeed strange that a style so new and so admired, was not
more faithfully adhered to at a time when cathedrals and churches were
being erected in every Italian city. Perhaps the Romanesque and
Byzantine influences from the south so tempered the Gothic tendencies
of Lombard architects, that they were unable to attain the true ideal,
and succeeded only in creating a style of their own, to be found at
Florence, Siena and Orvieto, known as Italian Gothic. Thus it happens
that the Assisans are the proud possessors, not only of the first
Gothic church built in Italy during the dawn of the new era, but of a
church which is unique, as recalling less dimly than those of other
cities the splendour of the northern cathedrals.
* * * * *
The rapidity with which the Assisan Basilica progressed is one of the
most wonderful results of the love inspired by St. Francis among
mediæval Christians. The generosity of the Catholic world was so
stirred that donations poured in without ceasing from Germany and
France, and even from Jerusalem and Morocco. "Cardinals, bishops,
dukes, princes, counts and barons," write the chroniclers, helped
Elias in his work, while the people of Umbria, too poor to give money,
came in numbers, out of the reverence they bore the Saint, to work for
small and often for no wages. It was a busy time; and Assisi awoke to
a sense of her importance. Under the vigilant eye of Elias, armies of
masons and labourers worked as unremittingly as ants at a nest, while
processions of carts drawn by white oxen, went ever to and fro upon
the road leading to the quarries, bringing creamy-white, rose and
golden-coloured blocks of Subasian stone.
This universal enthusiasm enabled Elias to complete the Lower Church
in twenty-two months, while the Upper Church was roofed in six years
later, and finished in all essential details by 1253. But while Elias
was applauded by most people, a few of the franciscans, headed by Fra
Leo, still clung to the letter of the franciscan rule, and bitterly
disapproved of these innovations. They sorrowfully looked on at the
army of workers, raising, as if by magic, walls and colonnades upon
the hill-side and towers ever higher against the sky. They watched
blocks of marble and stone being chiselled into cornices, friezes and
capitals ornamented with foliage and flowers, until, with despair in
their hearts, they slowly returned to their mud huts in the plain. The
dreams of Francis were vanishing fast as the allegiance to the Lady
Poverty diminished. Now her shrine existed only in the Carceri, in San
Damiano and in the Portiuncula, where few sought her company, for all
eyes were turned towards the new Basilica. The words of the Master,
recorded faithfully in Leo's biography, were ever ringing in his ears:
"Set a good hedge round in lieu of a wall, as a sign of holy poverty
and humility ... build poor little cells of mud and wood, and other
cells where at times the brethren may pray and work to the gain of
virtue and the avoidance of sloth. Also cause small churches to be
built; they ought not to raise great churches for the sake of
preaching to the people, or for any other reason, for they will show
greater humility and give a better example by going to preach in other
churches. And if by chance prelates, clerics, religious or seculars
should come to these abodes, the poor houses, the little cells and
small churches will be better sermons and cause greater edification to
them than many words."[64]
No wonder that Leo and his friends watched Elias at his work with no
friendly eye, for between the mud huts which Francis had planned with
so much simplicity, and the massive Basilica and palatial convent,
stretched an infinite chasm, separating the old order from the new.
They were still more unhappy and scandalised when Elias, who had the
full permission of Gregory IX. for this innovation, placed a marble
vase outside San Francesco to receive the contributions of those
anxious to see the church quickly finished. A curious account is given
by a latin chronicler of the warfare which ensued between the
standard-bearers of the new and the old franciscan spirit: "Some
brothers of marvellous sanctity and purity went to Perugia to consult
Brother Egidio, a good and pious man, concerning the erection of so
large a building and the manner of collecting money, which seemed to
be expressly against the rule. And Brother Egidio answered them: "If
that building were to reach from Assisi to here [to Perugia] a little
corner would suffice for me to dwell in." And they having asked him
what he thought about the vase, he said, turning to Brother Leo: "If
thou considerest thyself already dead [to the world and its
persecutions] go and break it. But if thou livest, stay thy hand, for
perchance thou mayest not be able to bear the persecution of that
Brother Elias."[65] Hearing this, Brother Leo went with his companions
and broke the vase to pieces. Then Brother Elias, hearing this, had
them severely beaten by his servants, and drove them from Assisi in
great confusion. For this reason a great tumult arose among the
brethren. Because of these aforesaid excesses, and because Brother
Elias threatened the complete destruction of the rule, when the
brethren met in general Chapter they deprived him of the office of
Vicar General, and unanimously elected Brother John of Florence
[Giovanni Parenti]."[66]
But these murmurs were drowned in the din of public applause which
enabled Elias to work in his own way, unscrupulously dispersing every
difficulty without any reference to the rule of St. Francis.
He continued to be the presiding spirit at Assisi, and such was the
success of his untiring energy that by the month of May 1230, the
Lower Church of the Basilica was ready to receive the "most sacred
body" of the Saint, while the magnificent quarters in the adjoining
convent were ready for those friars who belonged to the moderate
party, and approved of the new order of things.
Pope Gregory was unable to visit Assisi at this time owing to
difficulties with his unruly Roman subjects, but he sent innumerable
indulgences, golden crosses studded with precious stones containing
relics of the true cross, vases of silver and gold, and a large sum of
money for the further advancement of the building. These generous
gifts were followed by a Brief, which in calmer moments the monks
might have viewed with irritation, declaring both Basilica and convent
to be immediately subject to the Holy See. The franciscan order was
fast becoming a Papal institution, to be patronised and ruled by
succeeding Pontiffs.
While Giovanni Parenti was preparing for the Conclave to be held in
the spacious rooms of the new convent, the wily Elias was holding
secret councils with the magistrates of the town as to ensuring the
safe conduct of the body of St. Francis to the Basilica. The number of
people continually arriving in anticipation of the coming ceremony
made them somewhat uneasy, and their doubts were carefully discussed
in the Communal Palace. They came to the conclusion that if the exact
place of the saint's sepulchre was known, there would always be the
danger of its being rifled by the citizens of neighbouring towns,
especially by the Perugians, whose partiality for relics was well
known. So a stratagem, most likely invented by the fertile brain of
Elias, was decided upon and succeeded admirably.
The friars and citizens, unconscious of the plot hatched in their
midst, were all eager for the day of the Translation. The Umbrians
left their towns empty to assist at the great spectacle, and their
number was so great, that, failing to find room within the walls of
Assisi, they wandered like droves of cattle on the hills above trying
to obtain a sight of the procession. It was a great day in the annals
of Assisi; outside the little church of San Giorgio a triumphal car,
drawn by a pair of magnificent oxen, their whiteness almost hidden
beneath purple draperies and their horns wreathed and garlanded with
flowers, stood waiting for the holy burden. Three Papal Legates and
Elias placed the heavy sarcophagus with their own hands upon the car,
covering it over with a piece of rich brocaded silk sent for the
occasion by the mother of King Louis of France. They kept close to the
car all the time, while the brethren, holding palms and torches,
formed a long procession followed by the bishops and their clergy, and
the Podestà with his retinue of crimson-robed priors. It was the month
of May, and from every garden and terrace the nobles and their ladies
showered flowers over the "sacred ark" as it was borne slowly up the
street amidst the deafening sound of trumpets and the cheers of the
populace. All that could be done to honour St. Francis had been
thought of; Gregory IX. had even composed a hymn to be sung on that
day in which the "Poverello" was compared to Christ. They were in the
midst of the hymn of praise and quite close to the new Basilica when
the heavy tramp of numerous armed men was suddenly heard; swiftly a
passage was made through the crowd, who for the moment fell back
amazed and powerless, while the soldiers hurried with the sarcophagus
into the church, closely followed by Elias, who promptly shut and
barred the door. After the first moment of surprise, a wild burst of
indignation arose from the thousands who were thus deprived of a
spectacle which they had come miles to see. They howled like wild
beasts baulked of their prey, banging at the doors of the church in
their fury; but silence reigned within, for Elias and his accomplices
were stealthily engaged in hiding the body of St. Francis in the very
bowels of the mountain, where for five centuries it remained unseen
and undisturbed.
Till far into the night the people continued to murmur; the bewildered
friars asked each other what this strange behaviour of Elias meant,
and the only people who preserved any appearance of calmness were
Messer il Podestà of Assisi and his priors, who smiled to see how well
the plot had worked. It was not long before the scandal reached the
ears of Pope Gregory. The enemies of Elias painted the story in
glowing colours, and the Pope expressed himself greatly shocked at
sacrilegious hands having been laid upon the holy body of the saint.
He blamed the magistrates for allowing such a tumult to arise, and
called upon them to give due explanation of their conduct within a
fortnight at the court of Rome under pain of their city being laid
under an interdict. The Pope's Brief caused consternation, and his
accusations of their ingratitude for past favour rankled deeply. We
are not told how the anger of the Pope was pacified, but no doubt both
Elias and the Podestà explained satisfactorily the reasons for so
strange a burial, as Assisi continued to enjoy the patronage of the
Holy See. The efforts of Elias to ensure the safety of the body of St.
Francis had been eminently successful, and Gregory could hardly fail
to pardon the unusual manner in which this had been obtained.
Out of the mysterious events of that day of tumult grew a legend which
lasted until the body of St. Francis was finally discovered five
centuries later. It was believed that a church far surpassing the
other two in grandeur and beauty had been built beneath them by Elias,
and that St. Francis risen from his tomb stood in the midst, his hands
crossed upon his breast, his head thrown back, gazing eternally
towards the sky. The Umbrians, refusing to believe that their saint
could suffer the common lot of mortals, loved to think of him as
"almost alive," waiting for the last call, surrounded by the glorious
beauty of a hidden church which they had never seen and only dimly
pictured to themselves. Vasari refers to this "invisible church"
described to him by the awe-struck citizens, when he mentions that
"the tomb containing the body of the glorious saint is in the lowest
church where no one enters, and whose doors are walled up"; and in the
beginning of his description of the Basilica, he speaks of three
ranges of buildings placed one above the other, the lowest of all
being subterranean, which is curious as showing how closely he
followed tradition regarding the Assisan church. Padre Angeli so
unhesitatingly accepted the story that in his "Collis Paradisi" he
drew from imagination a plan, together with a picture of the
"invisible church." It represents a long vaulted hall somewhat
recalling the architecture of the Upper Church, at the end of which is
St. Francis standing upon his tomb in a recess corresponding to a kind
of choir; the vaulted roof is supported by slender columns with
chiselled capitals, and the walls and floor are ornamented with
marbles and mosaic of different colours.
* * * * *
To close this chapter without touching upon the career of Elias, who
is at once the black sheep of the franciscan order and one of the
greatest citizens of Assisi, would be impossible. Few have written
calmly about him, trying either to exculpate him or blaming his
actions too severely, so that it is difficult to obtain any just idea
of the real motives which guided him in an ill-starred life. Elias was
neither devil nor saint, though he possessed the energy of both and
his marked and domineering character would have fitted him better for
the world than for the cloister. Ambition seems to have been his chief
fault, together with a certain proud reserve which kept him aloof from
his companions. From the various references to him in the early
biographies of St. Francis we feel the writers failed ever to come
quite in touch with one so outside their lives, and whom they
considered as a kind of Judas--for did he not betray the interests of
the Master?
"Elias is an altogether different type of man from the simple-minded
Francis," writes Mrs Oliphant, echoing the general opinion. "He is an
ambitious and ascetic churchman, of the class which has pushed Rome
into much power and many abuses--an almost conventional development of
the intellectual monk, making up for compulsory humbleness in external
matters by the highest strain of ecclesiastical ambition and spiritual
pride."
But while all abused him, none doubted his very exceptional talents,
and even in the _Fioretti_ he was accounted "one of the most learned
men in the world," and St. Francis showed the great confidence he had
in him by naming him Vicar-General after the death of Peter Cataneo.
It was at a Chapter held in the wood by the Portiuncula that the saint
expressed his desire to again resign the government of the order to
another, and while Elias discoursed to the assembled friars St.
Francis sat at his feet listening attentively to every word.[67] On
the other hand, the saint was quite aware of his faults, and from the
_Fioretti_, where Elias is pictured for artistic effect in strong
colours as the wicked friar, we seem to realize the strain that often
must have come between these two very different men. Thus we read that
it being revealed to St. Francis that Elias was destined to lose his
soul and bring dishonour on the order, he conceived such an antipathy
towards him that he would even avoid meeting him, although at the time
they were living in the same convent. The scene when Elias,
discovering the reason of his displeasure, threw himself at the feet
of the saint to implore his intercession with heaven reveals in the
most touching way the great belief and reverence inspired by St.
Francis in the heart of the least docile of his followers. "I have so
great a faith in thy prayers," said Elias, "that were I in the midst
of hell, and thou wert to pray to God for me, I should feel some
relief; therefore again I pray thee to commend me, a sinner, unto God
who came to save sinners that He may receive me into His mercy." And
this did Brother Elias say with much devotion and many tears, so that
St. Francis, like a pitying father, promised to pray to God for him.
It will be seen how far the revelation of St. Francis came true, and
the manner in which his prayer was answered.
So long as Elias remained under the influence of Francis his pride was
tempered, and his ambition curbed, but when cast upon his own
resources he gave full rein to the ideas which had no doubt been
forming in his mind for some years past. Elias thought the franciscan
order, if faithful to the Lady Poverty, would prove of small
importance; and he therefore willingly leagued with Gregory IX. to
mould it so that it should become a visible power upon the earth. The
vision he conjured up with the sceptre in his own hand was very fair;
and he failed to see why religion should not be served quite as well
within the massive convent walls he had helped to rear, as when
dwelling in a mud hut. He had too broad a mind to look closely to the
detail of his rule; he only saw the broad outline of his master's
teaching; and who can say whether after all he was not right? This we
know, the mud huts have long since vanished, while thousands come each
year to pray at the tomb of Francis within sight of Giotto's
master-pieces. They sing aloud his praises, and as they pray and sing
throw coppers and silver in heaps upon the altar steps, and pass out
of the church into the sunlight again, knowing little of the lessons
St. Francis spent his life in teaching.
But we must return again to Elias and his many troubles with the
franciscan world. While patronized by Pope Gregory, he also seems to
have had a strong party of monks on his side, probably those who had
joined the Order during the last few years. Their names have not come
down to us, and their personalities have merged in that of Elias who
thus led them forward on a somewhat perilous way. They began by
attempting to depose Giovanni Parenti while he was holding a Chapter
in the new convent, a few days after the ceremony of the Translation
of the body of St. Francis to the Basilica. His friars were gathered
round him discussing the various missions to be undertaken, and the
work that had been done during the past year, when the door was thrown
open and a crowd of excited friars with Elias at their head appeared
upon the threshold. Before anyone could realize what this strange
apparition meant, Elias was borne rapidly along by his companions and
installed in the seat of Giovanni Parenti, while a scene of
indescribable tumult arose among those whose indignation had not yet
cooled down after the events of the past week. It is said that St.
Anthony of Padua was present at this conclave, and vainly tried to
calm the excitement, but his voice was drowned in the clamour. At
last, driven to despair, Giovanni Parenti began to cry aloud and tear
his garments as one distraught; he could not have hit upon a better
plan, for where words had failed this piece of dramatic acting
produced an instantaneous effect. His friars formed a vanguard round
him, acclaiming him Vicar-General as they beat back the intruders with
hard blows and angry scowls. Elias, seeing the game was lost, threw
himself on the ground, and with expressions of deep contrition
implored forgiveness. He was pardoned, but banished to a distant
hermitage, where humbled and sad he pondered for many months upon his
next move. He allowed his hair and beard to grow to such a length that
even his enemies began to believe his repentance was sincere, and only
two years after his misconduct we find him elected Vicar-General in
the place of his former rival, and, under the title of Guardian and
Master of the Basilica and Convent, in full command of the works at
San Francesco.
He now enjoyed a season of peace and plenty in the comfortable
quarters of the franciscan convent, and is said to have gathered a
household about him surpassing the splendour of a cardinal's court.
Fra Illuminato di Rieti (afterwards Bishop of Assisi) acted as his
secretary, writing numberless letters to "the Pope and the Princes of
the World," for Elias was in correspondence with more than one crowned
head and paid many visits to distant courts in quest of money for the
Assisan Church. On these journeys he always went on horseback, and
even when going from one church to another in Umbria, he was well
mounted on a "fat and stout palfrey," to the intense scandal of some
of the friars. "He also had secular servants," writes an indignant
chronicler, "all dressed in divers colours like to those of bishops,
who ministered to him in all things." His food was always good, and he
had the reputation of keeping an excellent cook.
This peaceful and successful period of his life was of short duration,
for he soon fell into dire trouble and disgrace. It was his misfortune
to be sent by Pope Gregory, who trusted implicitly in his discretion
and ability, on a mission to Frederic II, in the hopes of bringing the
Emperor to a sense of his misdoings. A disciple of St. Francis seemed
to be the right person to send as an emissary of peace; but instead of
the orthodox humble and barefooted friar, we read of him as a very
haughty personage, quite at his ease in the political world, then
ringing with the angry cries of Guelph and Ghibelline.
No sooner had Elias reached the franciscan convent at Parma than the
magnates of the city, aware of the errand he had come upon, assembled
to do him honour. Fra Salimbene, who was present at the interview,
describes how Elias waited for his visitors, his head swathed in an
Armenian turban, and comfortably seated upon a soft chair drawn close
to a huge fire. When Gherardo da Correggio, known as "Messer il
Podestà of the big teeth," entered the room, Elias remained seated,
and to the astonishment of all in no way disturbed himself for his
illustrious guest. The Podestà very sensibly took no offence, but
passed the matter over by expressing his wonder that the Vicar-General
should have chosen so cold a season for his visit to Lombardy--a
glance at the fire had told him that this franciscan friar liked
comfort as much as most people.
There is no detailed account of the interview of Elias with the
Emperor to inform us whether he behaved at it with the same easy
familiarity; all we know is that Frederic, "the wonder of the world,"
and Elias, the Assisan friar, formed a friendship which lasted during
the remainder of their lives, linking them together in a common fate.
Whether Elias was won over from the first by the charm of so
fascinating a personality, or simply baffled by a mind more subtle
than his own, it is difficult to say, as the chroniclers have drawn
too thick a veil over this unfortunate meeting for anyone to judge
with fairness. His failure certainly gave a good opportunity to his
many enemies to commence a very satisfactory scheme of blackening his
character with the Pope; and the rumour flew to Rome that he was a
traitor to his church. Branded with the abhorred name of Ghibelline
there was now little hope for Elias, whose friendship with the
arch-enemy of Holy Church grew always stronger. The Lombards becoming
uneasy, accused Gregory of favouring the Emperor, while the latter
bitterly complained that the Pope listened too much to the cause of
the Lombards, and thought too little of the imperial dignity. At last
a Chapter was called to enquire into the conduct of the Vicar-General,
and as he was not present, his misdeeds lost nothing by the telling.
Although Elias was deposed, and his place filled by a Pisan, he still
held the title of Guardian and Master of the Assisan Basilica, but in
a city of such strong Guelph sympathies as Assisi, it was unlikely he
would be left in peace, especially as the Pope no longer favoured him.
Life soon became impossible there, and of his own free will he retired
to a hermitage in the woods of Cortona, followed by some dozen
faithful friars, "not excepting," adds a spiteful chronicler, "Fra
Bartolomeo da Padova, his most excellent cook." Thence he wrote to the
Pope explaining his conduct, and humbly entreating to be pardoned, but
the letter was found years afterwards in the pocket of the Pisan
Vicar-General, who had promised to deliver it safely at Rome. Whether
the letter was wilfully laid aside or only forgotten, none have been
able to decide, but the incident had disastrous effects upon Elias. He
waited anxiously for the pardon which never came, until embittered by
finding himself deserted by nearly everyone, he openly joined the
party of Frederic II. He went a step further, and abused Pope Gregory
in caustic language, taunting him with injustice and avarice, and with
being a simonist, which of course ended in his excommunication "to the
great scandal of the Church." The news of his disgrace spread quickly
through Italy, and the children sang a couplet, invented on the spur
of the moment, under the windows of franciscan convents:
"Or'e attorno Frat'Elia
Che pres'ha la mala via."
It was the cry which met the friars in every street they passed, so
that the name of their former Vicar-General became hateful to them.
And yet even now Elias must have had some friends in the Order, as at
a council held at Genoa in 1244 there were a few who wished to
reinstate him. The Pope commanded him to appear, but as the papal
brief never arrived he was thus again debarred from clearing his much
damaged character. The consequence of these efforts in his behalf only
ended in his falling still deeper into disgrace; and for the second
time he was excommunicated. We next hear of him roaming about the
country with Frederic II, who found him useful on more than one
occasion as a diplomatic agent. Elias was sent with strong letters of
recommendation from Pier delle Vigne to Baldwin II, Emperor of
Constantinople, and to Hugo I, King of Cyprus, and he was even charged
to arrange a marriage for a daughter of Frederic. Among his various
talents Elias seems to have been able to accommodate himself to a
military life. We hear of him, both at the siege of Faenza and of
Ravenna, riding out to battle on a magnificent charger. At other times
he found a peaceful asylum at the Emperor's court, presenting a
strange contrast to the "strolling minstrels, troubadours, poets,
warriors, jugglers and artists of every grade" who frequented it. Upon
the Emperor's death Elias returned to Cortona where the citizens
received him kindly as he had obtained privileges for them at various
times from his patron. Here, at the small hermitage in the ilex wood,
he passed the last few years of his life in building a Franciscan
church and convent, aided by the citizens who gave the ground for the
site.
While the last touch was being put to the building of the great
Assisan Basilica and it was about to be consecrated by Innocent IV, in
1253, Elias lay dying in his little cell at Cortona. His loneliness
touched the heart of a lay brother, who with gentle words expressed
his sorrow at seeing him an outcast from the Order and offered him
help. Elias, no longer the proud ambitious churchman, answered very
gently: "My brother, I see no other way save that thou shouldst go to
the Pope and beg him for the love of God and of St. Francis His
servant, through whose teaching I quitted the world, to absolve me
from his excommunication and to give me back again the habit of
religion." The lay brother hastened to Rome and pleaded so humbly that
Innocent "permitted him to go back, and if he found Brother Elias
alive he was to absolve him in his name from the excommunication and
restore unto him the habit; so full of joy the friar departed and
returned in hot haste to Brother Elias, and finding him yet alive but
nigh unto death he absolved him from the excommunication and put on
him again the habit, and Brother Elias quitted this life and his soul
was saved by the merits of St. Francis and by his prayers in which
Brother Elias had reposed such great faith."
Some say that even at the last fate pursued Elias, for the city of
Cortona being at that time under an interdict no blessed oil could be
found for the sacrament of extreme unction. Certainly his body was not
allowed to rest in the church he had built for the brethren. A zealous
friar dug it up and flung it on a dunghill, saying that no Ghibelline
should be permitted to lie in consecrated ground.
Thus it was that Elias left a name hated among the franciscans as
bitterly as the Emperor Frederic's always has been by Guelph
historians. But while the war against the latter still rages as
fiercely as ever, Elias, save for the gratitude felt by the citizens
of Assisi, rests almost forgotten and his story hidden in the pages of
old chronicles. Few even remember that owing to the untiring energy of
this man Assisi owns one of the most beautiful monuments of mediæval
art. It is possible that had Fra Leo, Bernard of Quintavalle and his
companions succeeded in those first days of struggle, the Basilica of
San Francesco might never have attained its present magnificence or
the art of Giotto been born in this Umbrian corner of Italy. Chi lo
sa? It is a question one hardly even likes to think of. But the danger
passed away, and who cares now whether the franciscans grumbled at the
time, or said the church and convent with its buttresses and towers
looked more like the feudal fortress of some mighty baron than the
tomb of the Preacher of Poverty? The San Francesco we love rises
golden and rose-tinted above the olive groves and the vineyards, above
the plain with its young corn and the white villages lying among the
fruit-trees, above a rushing torrent which circles round the base of
the Subasian mountain on its way to the Tiber; and all day the varied
group of church, arcaded convent and terraced gardens, is showing its
beauty to the sun.
In every light it is beautiful, in every mood we recall it, together
with the choicest things we have seen in travel, haunting us like the
charm of a living person. When the winter mists at early morning wrap
round it like a mantle, or the stars form crowns above its roof and
bell tower, there is always some new loveliness which thrills us, some
fresh note of colour we have not noticed there before, making us again
and again feel grateful that Elias forgot or ignored the teaching of
his master.
[Illustration: SAN FRANCESCO FROM THE PLAIN]
FOOTNOTES:
[59] In the same way when Beato Egidio, ill and nigh his end, wished
to return to the Portiuncula to die in the place he loved so well, the
Perugians refused their consent and even placed soldiers round the
monastery of Monte Ripido to prevent his escape.
[60] In the illustrations on p. 38 and p. 107 is shown the gallows
erected where now stands the franciscan basilica, but it is unlikely
that the property of a private individual should have been used for
such a purpose, and Collis Inferni may simply have meant the spur of
hill beneath the upper portion of Assisi upon which the castle stood.
[61] See Vasari, _Life of Arnolfo di Lapo_.
[62] It would be a thankless task to follow the bewildering maze of
contradictory evidence which has enveloped the question as to who
built San Francesco. Those who are eager to do so, however, can
consult Henry Thode's exhaustive work, _Franz von Assisi_ (beginning
p. 187), which deals most thoroughly with the subject. Leader Scott
also, in her learned book upon _The Cathedral Builders_, gives some
ingenious theories with regard to "Jacopo" and his supposed
relationship with Arnolfo, p. 315-316.
Another book is _I Maestri Comacini_, by Professore Marzario, whose
statements about "Jacopo's" nationality are interesting and probable.
But, following Vasari a little too blindly, he gives us the startling
fact that "Jacopo" died in 1310, this, even supposing him to have been
only twenty-five when he was at Assisi as chief architect, would make
him one hundred and fifteen years of age at the time of his death.
[63] _L'Architecture Gothique_ par M. Edouard Corroyer. See pp. 96 and
105.
[64] _Speculum Perfectionis._ Edited by Paul Sabatier, cap. x.
[65] For the Latin text see p. c. of M. Paul Sabatier's introduction
to his edition of the _Speculum Perfectionis_.
[66] Giovanni Parenti, who does not stand out very clearly in the
history of the Order, was a Florentine magistrate of Città di
Castello, one of the first towns to feel the influence of St. Francis.
There he heard of the new movement which so rapidly was spreading
throughout Western Europe, and, together with many of the citizens,
became converted through the teaching of the Umbrian saint.
[67] It is impossible in this small book to give any idea of the
various influences at work upon the young franciscan order during the
life of the saint. I can only refer my readers to the charming pages
of M. Paul Sabatier, who gives us a vivid picture of these early days
in _La Vie de Saint François_, and in his introduction to the
_Speculum Perfectionis_.
CHAPTER V
_Cimabue and his School at San Francesco_
"Il semble au premier coup d'oeil que le rève de François
d'Assise a dû amener la fin de tout l'art et de toute noble vie.
Chose étrange! ce sordide mendiant fut le père de l'art
italien."--E. RENAN. _Nouvelles Études d'Histoire Religieuse._
THE LOWER CHURCH
So rarely in Italy is a church perfect both within and without that it
is with amazement we find at Assisi not one but two churches, choir
and nave piled above each other, and covered from roof to floor with
frescoes, as perfect of their kind as the buildings which they
decorate. Wars in every town, trouble, dissension and jealousies among
men, raged like a storm over the land, but all this turmoil of a
fevered age was unable to check the steady, rapid progress of at least
this monument to a dead saint's memory; and we perceive yet another
proof of the extraordinary influence of St. Francis, who was able by
the devotion and admiration he excited, to inspire all with some of
his own love of the beautiful, which has lasted in Italy, from the
days of his ministry, through centuries of both faith and unbelief
down to modern times. But from this arose a strange event; this lover
of solitude, who during his life sought only for humiliation and
obscurity and loved best the poor and deserted way-side sanctuaries,
was laid to rest in one of the most beautiful Italian churches of that
time.
[Illustration: THE LOWER CHURCH]
While wandering through the Lower Church, marvelling at the delicate
friezes of tiny heads, flowers and winged horses, which frame every
fresco; at the great spreading arches--built for strength; the vaulted
roof of deep azure blue with dull golden stars upon its surface,
looming above the paintings and dimming their brilliancy by the
shadows which lurk in its depth, we feel that within the shelter of
its perpetual twilight this is a place to pray in. It is truly the
home of St. Francis, and notwithstanding its richness and vast
splendour his spirit is here, the certainty that he once had dwelt
upon the earth is felt.
Few ever stop to look at the walls of the nave, and indeed, upon
coming out of the sunlight, the darkness and gloom for some minutes is
oppressive and but little can be distinguished in the gloom. It was
almost by chance that we one day noticed some frescoes, ruined and
faded, just outside the Chapel of St. Martin. They are of no beauty as
works of art, indeed they are rather ugly, but their interest lies in
showing us that from the very beginning artists had endeavoured,
however feebly, to depict the legend of St. Francis.[68] On the left
wall of the nave, outside the Chapel of St. Martin, is a fresco
representing the Sermon to the Birds with the same idea of composition
which was adopted later by Giotto; the saint slightly bends towards
the birds upon the ground, his companion stands behind, while the
single tree adds a certain solemnity to the scene. The figures are
large and ungainly, with feet terrible to behold, the lines are hard,
and there is little feeling of movement or life; yet we look at it
with reverence and hope, for we know that, with all the ugliness and
stiffness of workmanship, the artist was vehemently striving in this
dark church to shake off the hampering chains of worn-out traditions,
and find for himself something nearer to the truth. And as we look at
this one and at the next, representing St. Francis receiving the
Stigmata, our thoughts are carried to other renderings of these
scenes, and we say with light hearts: "After this poor craftsman comes
Giotto, King of Tuscan painters."
These are the only two frescoes illustrating the life of the saint,
though there may have been others which were destroyed when the walls
of the nave were broken down in order to form entrances to the
chapels, added to the main building about 1300. But on the right side,
beginning outside the Chapel of San Stefano, are parts of several
scenes from the New Testament; a crowd of women and men standing round
the cross, a group of women, the Descent from the Cross, a Pietà, a
landscape with houses and a decoration of circular ornaments outside
the Capella di Sta. Maria Maddalena, generally attributed to Giunta
Pisano, thus giving them too early a date.[69]
To us their interest seems rather to lie in that they plainly show how
the earliest masters, whilst endeavouring to illustrate the franciscan
legend, failed so completely to satisfy their employers that they were
bidden to stay their hand and continue to paint the well-worn theme of
the history of the world's redemption, which required less invention
than the legend of St. Francis, where a new out-look on life had to be
acquired. So the franciscans, failing to find a painter who could
illustrate their founder's life to their satisfaction, contented
themselves with other things, perhaps hoping that in course of time
one might arise who could do justice to the theme. Well it was that
they waited.
Shortly after these frescoes had been completed in the Lower Church,
art received a new impulse (one likes to think that the struggles of
the first artist towards something better and more true to life had to
do with this); others came, with Giotto at their head, and painted
over some of these early efforts, leaving us only Cimabue's great
Madonna, a few ruined frescoes, a Byzantine pattern, and stray touches
of colour in dark corners of the church to remind us of these first
decorators of San Francesco.
We get a melancholy picture from Vasari of the depths to which art had
sunk, and of the degenerate artists still following a worn-out
tradition until it became as a dead thing in their hands deprived of
all inspiration, when "in the year 1240, by the will of God, Giovanni
Cimabue ... was born in the city of Florence to give the first light
to the art of painting."
Cimabue is rightly called the Father of Italian art, as he represented
a new era among Italian masters who were awakening to their country's
needs; when men, filled with strange restless energy, grew tired of
the Byzantine Madonna with her court of stiff, lifeless saints, and
looked for something in closer touch with their mood and aspirations.
Round the name of Cimabue are grouped many charming legends belonging
to a time when the people, anxious to possess the new thing their
hearts craved for, looked eagerly and critically at an artist's work.
There is the story of how when he had finished the picture of the
Virgin Mary, the Florentines came to his workshop, and, expecting much
from him, yet were amazed at the wonderful beauty of the grand
Madonna, and carried the picture with rejoicing, to the sound of
music, to the Church of Sta. Maria Novella, where it still hangs in
the dark chapel of the Ruccellai; a street in Florence down which the
picture passed being called Borgo Allegri, because of the gladness of
that day. It is only a legend, and one that has been oft repeated, and
as often doubted. Now the existence of Cimabue is even questioned by
some, but whoever invented the story understood the great change which
had come among the people and into art. It was only right that in the
church of the saint who personified the feeling of the age, caught its
spirit, and sent the impulse of the people even further, should centre
all the first efforts towards this awakening and revival, until, step
by step, the masterpieces of Giotto were reached. When we remember
this, the large fresco of Cimabue in the right transept of the Lower
Church becomes more full of beauty and meaning.[70] The great spirit
of her presence fills the church, her majesty and nobility is that of
the ideal Madonna, grave to sadness, thinking, as her eyes look
steadily out upon the world, what future years would bring to the
Child seated on her lap, who stretches out a baby hand to clasp her
veil. All the angels round the throne sway towards her; in their heavy
plaits of hair shines a dull red light, and in their wings and on the
Madonna's gown are mauve and russet shades like the colours of
autumnal oaks.... "To this day," says Mr Ruskin, "among all the Mater
Dolorosas of Christianity, Cimabue's at Assisi is the noblest; nor did
any painter after him add one link to the chain of thought with which
he summed the creation of the earth, and preached its redemption."
St. Francis has not been forgotten in this fresco, but Cimabue having
given all his art to make the Virgin and her choir of angels
beautiful, his figure is not quite one's idea of the ethereal Umbrian
preacher, and his being there at all spoils the symmetry of the
grouping. It is not improbable that the figure of St. Clare stood on
the other side, and was erased when the Chapel of Sta. Maria Maddalena
was built, and the ornamental border painted round this fresco, which
cut off part of the wings of the two angels on the left of the Virgin.
Vasari vaguely tells us of some frescoes from the lives of Jesus
Christ and of St. Francis, painted by Cimabue in the Lower Church, and
later writers have thought these must have been destroyed to make
room for Giotto's work. If paintings were there at all they were more
likely to have been the work of inferior artists, for it seems
improbable that Giotto, coming to Assisi for the first time when he
was quite a youth, should destroy any work of his master, who was
still alive, in order to substitute his own early efforts.
THE UPPER CHURCH
Not only was the Upper Church essentially fitted for fresco painting,
but it required an elaborate scheme of decoration, just as a setting,
however perfect, needs a gem to complete it; and it almost seems as
though "Jacopo" had stayed his hand, with the intention that here, at
least, architecture should be subservient to wall decoration, and had
foreseen the need of large spaces to be covered with paintings, as
brightly coloured, as clear, and as closely set together as are the
colours upon a butterfly's wings.
"It was here, in the Upper Church of Assisi," says Mr Roger Fry, "that
the Italian genius first attained to self-expression in the language
of monumental painting, a language which no other European nation,
except the Greeks, has ever mastered." But the question as to who were
the predecessors of Giotto, and when exactly they came, can never, we
think, be answered; for the time is not far off when these splendid
ruins of early art will have totally faded away, or, what is
infinitely worse, be covered with still thicker layers of paint than
the "restorer" has already laid upon them.
[Illustration: LOOKING THROUGH THE DOORS OF THE UPPER CHURCH TOWARDS
THE PORTA S. GIACOMO AND THE CASTLE]
Vasari finds no difficulty about the matter, declaring, to his own
satisfaction and for the instruction of future generations, that every
fresco in the apse and transepts, together with the series relating to
the history of the Jews and the life of Christ, are by Cimabue. But
then Cimabue was a Tuscan, and Vasari, the painter of Tuscan Arezzo,
was determined to give as much glory to his fatherland as he could. We
too would give all possible honour to Cimabue, but are bound to follow
the opinion of later critics, who less prejudiced and hasty in their
criticisms than Vasari, see the work of many hands in all these
frescoes; so we have gathered together a few notes concerning them
from various authorities to help the traveller to form his own ideas
upon the subject. The theme is too endless to attempt in a small space
to give more than a very brief summary of the chief facts.
_Frescoes of the Choir and Transepts._--These may be divided into two
distinct classes, those of the north transept, which are older and
inferior to those of the south transept and choir. Herr Thode
attributes their difference to the fact that while all are the work of
Cimabue, the frescoes in the north transept were painted when he was
quite young, while the rest belong to a later period, when he had
attained his full powers. The Crucifixion of the north transept, one
of the most ruined, reminds us somewhat of works by Margaritone which
may be studied, without much pleasure, in most Italian galleries. The
figures standing round the Cross are short, with small heads and large
hands, and not even in the fainting Madonna is there the slightest
charm. In the Martyrdom of St. Peter, on the next wall, it is curious
to note the similarity of treatment to Giotto's fresco at Rome of the
same subject. The Saint, head downwards upon the Cross without any
group of people would have made but a dull composition; so both
artists added an obelisk on either side to relieve the monotony of
line.
Then follows the scene of Simon Magus being borne upwards by demons
with bat-like wings; and upon the next wall, beneath the triforium, is
represented the death of Ananias and Sapphira, and St. Peter curing
the lame before the Temple, where the figures are certainly more
majestic and, according to Herr Thode, distinctly show the hand of
Cimabue.
Behind the papal throne are medallions of the friend and patron of
St. Francis, Gregory IX, and of Innocent IV, who consecrated the
Basilica. The frescoes represent the life of the Virgin, but they are
all too faded to be enjoyed, save that of the Coronation on the right
wall, just above the choir stalls; the Virgin is seated upon a wooden
throne with Christ by her side and a group of apostles and spectators
beneath. There is a striking resemblance in the drawing and form of
the standing figures to those in the Crucifixion of the south
transept. This, though very ruined and blackened in parts, showing no
other trace of colour than a faint film of golden yellow, has still
the power to make us feel that once, long ago, it was a fine work,
worthy of a great master. Weeping angels fly above the Cross, some
with outstretched hands, while others veil their eyes from the sight
of the suffering Saviour; the Magdalen, her arms thrown up above her
head, is seen in strong relief against the sky, and contrasting with
this dramatic gesture, is the figure of the Virgin, erect and still,
her hand clasped in that of St. John. The whole conception is
dignified, replete with dramatic feeling of the nobler kind, and has
been thought worthy, by Herr Thode, to be put down as the finest of
Cimabue's creations.
The remaining frescoes deal with scenes from the Apocalypse, but they
are so ruined that it is a thankless task for any, except the student,
to try and distinguish each separately. Indeed after a minute
examination of so many ruined works of art, a certain sadness and
weariness is felt, but if the pilgrim has time to rest awhile in a
quiet corner of the stalls and look at choir and transepts solely for
their colour, he will gain for himself many beautiful memories not
easily forgotten. It is a vision of youthful saints, of men with
lances hurrying down a rocky mountain side, of angels trumpeting to
the four ends of the earth, and out of this medley of shadowy forms
in fading frescoes, like sunlight breaking through a mist with golden
light, loom the mighty angels of Cimabue. Their heads are crowned by a
heavy mass of auburn hair, their wings slightly lifted, as though they
were on earth but for a short space, and they seem as remote from
mortals as the Sphynx herself in their dignity and calm repose. To
Cimabue belongs the conception of such grave and strangely beautiful
creations, winged messengers of strength, who come midway between the
stiff Byzantine figures, and the swift-moving angels of Giotto and the
cherub children forms of later Umbrian and Venetian schools.
_The Nave._--All writers upon the subject agree that here the frescoes
show no trace of Cimabue's style, but are from the hand of his
contemporaries and pupils, who worked together in unfolding the
history of the Jews and the world's redemption. If it is impossible to
hint even at the names of these artists, the most hurried traveller
must notice the different character which marks the legend of the New
Testament from that of the Old, where the work of talented copyists of
classical works of art differ from that of others who kept nearer to
the style of Cimabue, instilling into it more or less life, as their
individual powers permitted. Herein lies much of the history of early
Italian art, but the few remaining frescoes, especially on the left
wall, have been so terribly over-painted that the work of the critic
is rendered well-nigh hopeless.
Beginning at the right wall by the High Altar we have probably
the work of a fine Byzantine master, or at least of one who must
have copied a Greek masterpiece. In the Creation of the World,
God, represented as a young man seated on a globe of fire, is,
with a gesture of his hand, casting upon the earth his last
creation--man--who, still suffused with celestial colour, is borne
across the sea towards the land. A ram, a bull and a lion besport
themselves upon the shore, enormous birds sit on the bushes, and the
sea is already full of every kind of fish; slender pink clouds are in
the sky, and the distant hills on the horizon have faded into shades
of blue-green, like the landscape of an Umbrian picture.
The nude figures of Adam and Eve in the Expulsion from Paradise are
wonderfully good for the time, and the manner in which the angels are
kicking them out of the garden of Eden is somewhat unusual.
Beginning again at the first bay window but on the lower row of
frescoes, in the Building of the Ark Noah is seated, an obelisk-shaped
rock rising behind him, and gives his directions with a majestic air
to his sons as to the sawing and placing of the great beams. A man,
standing by his side, completes the composition, which has much
dignity and finish.
The fresco of the Sacrifice of Isaac, with Abraham raising his sword
above him his body slightly thrown back, is perhaps one of the most
striking of the series. The wind has caught his yellow robe, which
unfurls itself against a landscape of sandy hills.
All that remains of the next are three angels, whose grandeur can only
be compared to those of Cimabue in the south transept. The remaining
subjects on this side are by a different master, who followed closely
the best classical traditions, and succeeds in giving extraordinary
repose to his compositions as well as meaning to the various figures.
In Jacob before Isaac, Isaac is waiting for his dish of venison, and
Jacob's attitude denotes uncertainty as to the reception he is likely
to receive, while his mother, lifting the curtain of her husband's
bed, seems to encourage her son.
The next fresco is similar in composition, but better preserved. Here
we feel the blindness of Isaac, the perplexity of Esau, who cannot
understand why his father refuses to bless him, and the fear of
Rebecca, who has stepped back, knowing that her fraud must now be
discovered. In this composition the artist has strictly kept to rules
laid down by his predecessors, and the result, if a little stiff and
wanting in originality, is yet pleasing and restful to look at,
presenting a great contrast to the somewhat exaggerated movements
expressed in the preceding ones.
The last of the series is the steward finding the cup in Benjamin's
sack, though greatly ruined it still shows much beauty of composition.
Upon the opposite wall, by the altar, is depicted the life of Christ
by followers of Cimabue, but the few frescoes that remain are so
mutilated and repainted, that it is impossible to say much about them,
or even to imagine what they may once have been.
"In the Capture," writes Messrs Crowe and Cavacaselle, "the Saviour is
of a superior size to the rest of those around him, and of a stern but
serene bearing. Trivial conception marks the scene of the Saviour
carrying the Cross."
The Pietà, one of the last, is evidently by a finer scholar of
Cimabue, and the woman coming round the rocks resembles slightly the
figure of Rebecca in the two frescoes on the opposite side. "The
composition," write the same authors, "is more like that which Giotto
afterwards conceived than any other before or since"; but the colossal
figure of Christ destroys the harmony of the scene.
The arch at the end of the nave is painted to represent a series of
niches, in each of which stands the figure of a saint, all are much
repainted, as are the medallions of St. Peter and St. Paul by the
door. The Descent of the Holy Spirit is greatly ruined, and in the
Ascension the _intonaco_ has peeled off, showing the bricks, so that
the apostles have the appearance of looking over a wall.
The ceiling is frescoed in three different places by other masters,
whose names have not come down to us. Between the transepts and nave
the four Evangelists, seated outside the gates of towns, are so
utterly ruined and blackened by time and damp that it is barely worth
craning one's neck to look at them.[71] But the four medallions of
Christ, the Madonna, St. John the Baptist and St. Francis, which
ornament the centre of the nave, are among the most beautiful things
in the church, and quite perfect as decoration. At each corner of the
spandrels stands an angel upon a globe, with wings uplifted, delicate
in outline and brilliantly coloured, while the whole is bordered by
the most exquisite design of blossoms and green foliage rising out of
slender vases, which mingle with cupids, angels, winged horses and
rabbits on a dull red ground. It must have been painted by one who had
learned his art from the same source whence the decorative painters of
Pompeii drew their inspiration.
It is not an easy thing to fit entire figures seated on large marble
thrones into triangular spaces, and so the artist found, who in the
groined ceiling nearest the door had to paint the Doctors of the
Church, Sts. Jerome, Gregory, Ambrose and Augustin, dictating their
epistles to busy clerks. But there is much that is charming in them,
though as decoration they partly fail, and a resemblance may be found
to the frescoes of Isaac and his sons, which seem to have influenced
Giotto in his paintings of old men.
Vasari's enthusiasm was roused when he looked upon these endless
paintings, and he tells us that: "This work, truly grand and rich, and
admirably well executed, must, I conceive, in those times have
astonished the world, the more so that painting had for so long been
sunk in such obscurity: and to me, who saw it once more in 1563, it
appeared most beautiful, as I thought how Cimabue, in such darkness
could have discovered so much light."
* * * * *
It would be well, before leaving, to look at the windows of the Upper
Church, which are among the oldest in Italy, and, according to Herr
Burckhardt, the most beautiful. As of most things connected with San
Francesco, little is known about them; Vasari says they were designed
by the painters of the frescoes; an opinion partly held by Herr Thode,
who sees a great resemblance to the style of Cimabue in the right-hand
window of the choir (the centre one is modern) with scenes from the
lives of Abraham, David and Christ, of most beautiful colour and
design. The left window, belonging to the same period, contains naïve
scenes from the Old Testament, amongst which (the sixth from the top
of the left half) is Jonah emerging from a blue-green whale the colour
of the waves, and possessed of large white eyes.
Those of the transepts of the same date are even finer and more
beautifully coloured. Medallions of geometrical patterns of exquisite
design and hue ornament the left-hand window of the north transept,
while that on the right contains scenes from the Old Testament and the
life of Christ; in both of these, according to Herr Thode, the
influence of Cimabue is apparent.
The left window of the south transept contains seven scenes from the
Creation and seven from the lives of Adam and Eve, who (in the last
two divisions of the right half) are being driven out of Eden, and,
spade in hand, are working at the foot of a tree. The eight saints of
the right window, seated majestically on gothic thrones ornamented
with spires, and dressed in rose-coloured, red and green garments,
have certainly the appearance of being, as Herr Thode suggests, of a
style even anterior to Cimabue.
Half of the bay window on the left, looking towards the altar, is the
work of the Umbrian school of the time of Fiorenzo di Lorenzo (there
is a Madonna in a blue mantle, and St. Onofrio clothed in
vine-leaves), while the left half, with medallions composed of very
small pieces of glass representing scenes from the early life of
Christ, are perhaps the most beautiful, and certainly the oldest, in
the church, and can even be compared to the stained glass of French
cathedrals. The third window (the second has suffered considerably,
and what is left of the original belongs to the fifteenth century) has
been a good deal restored, but the large angels with blue and purple
wings standing in an arch, behind which a little town is seen, are
very fine, and below them is a curious small figure of St. Francis
floating in front of a colossal Christ, belonging also to the
fifteenth century.
Very beautiful are the two saints beneath gothic arches in the last
window, and the priests in their rose-coloured stoles, the bishops in
crimson and gold, and the other figures of warriors and saints.
The right half of the bay window near the door upon the opposite
side, belonging also to the Umbrian school, contains some charming
scenes from the life of St. Anthony, while on the left are incidents
of the life of St. Francis. The whole is remarkable for delicate rose
colours, greens and pale blues, and a total absence of the strong deep
tones of the older and finer windows; but they are very beautiful of
their kind, like patches of pale sunshine in the church.
The next two windows betray a more ancient style in the fine figures
of the apostles (their heads, alas, are modern), and in the scenes
from their lives, which are of a deeper tone than the former one; but
even more beautiful is the last window, which does not seem to have
been restored within the last three centuries, and where the colours
standing out from a creamy background are very lovely. The two large
and grand figures of two apostles are believed by Herr Thode to be
from drawings by Cimabue.
Both Francesco di Terranuova and Valentino da Udine were employed to
repair all the windows about 1476, large sums being expended,
principally by the Popes who never ceased to patronise the franciscan
Basilica. A most comical appearance is given by the distressing
additions made in our own time of modern heads upon bodies of the
thirteenth or fourteenth century. Until very lately an exquisite rose
window was to be seen over the eastern door, now replaced by white
glass; one would like to know how it so mysteriously disappeared and
where it now is.
No pains had been spared to make San Francesco as lovely in every
detail as the brain of man could devise, and it is most remarkable how
the frescoes belong to the general idea of the building as though
every artist had thought as much of this unity as of the individual
perfection of his work. The beautiful papal throne in the choir, of
white marble encrusted in mosaic with its frieze of strange animals
in low relief, its arms supported by red marble lions, is almost a
replica of the Soldan's throne in Giotto's fresco, and was designed by
Fuccio Fiorentino in 1347, when the architecture that Giotto delighted
in was still the recognised style in Italy.[72] The marble and mosaic
altar is of the same date, and the octagonal pulpit of sculptured
stone, with saints in small tabernacles, spiral columns and designs of
leaves slightly tinted, supposed also to be by Fuccio, is placed at
the corner of the wall of the nave looking as if it had grown there.
The columns supporting the arched gallery round the church have each
been painted to represent mauve and rose-coloured marbles, and there
is not a single space in all the building which has not been decorated
to harmonise with the frescoes, giving a perfect sense of infinite
completeness and beauty, to which time has added by mellowing
everything into a pale orange colour--the colour of Assisi.
FOOTNOTES:
[68] It is difficult to say how free a hand the artists were allowed
when called in to execute work for any church, but probably, in the
case of San Francesco, they were obliged to illustrate precisely the
scenes and events chosen by the friars, who in the case of the saint's
legend would be very severe judges, requiring quite the best that the
artist could produce.
[69] Later documents of the convent speak of a crucifix painted in
1236 by Giunta Pisano with a portrait of Brother Elias "taken from
life" and the following inscription:
Frater Elias fieri fecit
Jesu Christe pie
Misere pecantis Helie
Giunta Pisanus me pinxit. A.D.M. MCCXXXVI.
It hung from a beam in the Upper Church until 1624 when it suddenly
disappeared, and it seems to have inspired Padre Angeli (author of the
"Collis Paradisi") with the theory that Giunta Pisano was the first to
paint in San Francesco, ascribing to him, as some have continued to
do, the frescoes in the choir and transept of the Upper Church. Messrs
Crowe and Cavacaselle say, on what authority it is impossible to
discover, that the middle aisle of the Lower Church "seems to have
been painted between 1225 and 1250," ignoring the fact that Pope
Gregory only laid the foundation stone of the Basilica in 1228.
Without trying to find such early dates for the history of art at
Assisi, it appears to us quite wonderful enough that some fifty or
sixty years after the ceremony of the consecration in 1253, Cimabue
and his contemporaries--Giotto and his Tuscan followers--had completed
their work in both churches.
[70] _Right_ transept is always synonymous with _South_ transept, but
in this case, as San Francesco is built with the altar facing to the
west because it was necessary to have the entrance away from the
precipitous side of the hill, the _Right_ transept looks to the
_North_, the _Left_ to the _South_, and we have thought it easier to
keep to the actual position of the church in describing the different
frescoes. Herr Thode in his book has done this, but it may be well to
observe that Messrs Crowe and Cavacaselle refer to the transepts and
chapels as if they faced the parts of the compass in the usual way.
[71] To facilitate seeing the paintings of the ceiling, both here and
in the Lower Church, it would be well to use a hand-glass, a simple
and most effectual addition to the comfort of the traveller.
[72] Mr Ruskin says that the gable of the bishop's throne is "of the
exact period when the mosaic workers of the thirteenth century at Rome
adopted rudely the masonry of the north. Briefly this is a Greek
temple pediment, in which, doubtful of their power to carve figures
beautiful enough, they cut a trefoiled hold for ornament, and bordered
the edge with a harlequinade of mosaic. They then call to their aid
the Greek sea waves, and let the surf of the Ægean climb along the
slopes, and toss itself at the top into a fleur-de-lys."
CHAPTER VI
_The Paintings of Giotto and his School in the Lower Church_
"... Cimabue thought
To lord it over painting's field; and now
The cry is Giotto's, and his name eclipsed."
DANTE, _Purgatory_, xi., Cary's translation.
The work of Cimabue, grand and noble as it is, yet gives the
impression of belonging to remote times, between which and that of
Giotto, his pupil, a great gulf is set. In both churches at Assisi we
pass from the early efforts of an awakening age to the work of one,
who, if not the first to see the light, was the first to discover the
true principles of art, to give it life, and to found a school whence
a long series of painters came to carry on for generations the lessons
he had taught. Cimabue did wonders for the century in which he lived;
of Giotto, even granting that his drawing was sometimes faulty, and
the types of faces he painted were not always beautiful, it would be
an insult to express such condescending praise; and even a hasty study
of his frescoes in San Francesco must soon explain the everlasting
sway he holds, now, as in those first years when his work seemed
little short of miraculous to the wondering Florentines.
[Illustration: PLAN OF THE LOWER CHURCH AND MONASTERY OF SAN FRANCESCO
AT ASSISI]
Some fourteen miles to the north of Florence, among the hills of the
Mugello, lies the scattered hamlet of Vespignano where Giotto Bondone
was born of a poor peasant family in the year 1265. Even at an
early age, Vasari says, the boy was remarkable for the vivacity and
quick intelligence which endeared him not only to his parents, but to
all who knew him in the village and country round. He passed his
childhood among them, knowing nothing of the city just across the
hills, but learning much, during the long days while he wandered forth
to tend his father's sheep, which was helpful to him in after years to
preserve his straightforward outlook upon life and the strength and
freshness of a nature that loved the sunburnt valleys and the freedom
of the shepherd's existence.
When Giotto was ten years old it happened that Cimabue, on his way
from Florence to Vespignano upon a matter of business, found him
seated by the roadside, his flock gathered near, busily employed in
drawing the outline of a sheep from life upon a smooth piece of rock.
Struck by the boy's industry in the pursuit of art and his evident
cleverness, Cimabue hastened to obtain the father's consent to adopt
and make an artist of him. Leaving the old life in the peasant's
cottage for ever, Giotto now turned south along new roads, and with
Cimabue by his side, saw for the first time the city of Florence,
beautiful as she lay upon the banks of the Arno in a setting of wooded
hills.
The progress he made under Cimabue's guidance, who taught him all he
knew, was marvellous indeed. At ten years of age a shepherd tracing
idle fancies on the stones, then for a few years an apprentice in a
Florentine workshop grinding colours with the others for his master's
big Madonnas; while ten years later he had already gained the title of
Master and was a famous painter, courted by popes and kings, and
leaving masterpieces upon the walls of churches throughout Italy,
that people of all times and countries have come and paused awhile to
see.
Let us suppose it was the air of Florence, which, according to Vasari,
"generates a desire for glory and honour and gives a natural quickness
to the perceptions of men," that made Giotto a perfect Florentine,
alert, witty, and ever ready with a caustic repartee to anyone who
bandied words with him. But though other influences were at work
around him, and new images crowded upon his active brain, he kept
undimmed the vision of his mountain valley, of the fields, of the days
spent in his native village, and, with the eyes of a shepherd he
continued to look on all the incidents of human life; he saw the
grandeur, the tragedy, the weaknesses, aye, and the humour too, in
everything that surrounded him, setting it all down in his frescoes in
his own simple and original way. In a few words Mr Ruskin has touched
upon the keynotes of Giotto's character when he says: ... "his mind
was one of the most healthy, kind and active that ever informed a
human frame. His love of beauty was entirely free from weakness; his
love of truth untinged by severity; his industry constant without
impatience; his workmanship accurate without formalism; his temper
serene and yet playful; his imagination exhaustive without
extravagance; and his faith firm without superstition. I do not know,
in the annals of art, such another example of happy, practical,
unerring, and benevolent power."
Such was the man who came to Assisi to take up the work left
uncompleted by Cimabue and his contemporaries. Giotto was then almost
unknown, not having executed any of those great works upon which his
fame now rests, and it is not unlikely that the recommendation by
Cimabue of his promising pupil to the friars of San Francesco led to
his being called there when barely twenty years of age.[73] Opinions
differ as to which were his first works and whether he began in the
Lower or in the Upper Church, and as there are absolutely no documents
relating to the subject, and Vasari is of no help in the matter of
dates or precise details, the only way to come to any conclusion is to
group these frescoes according to their style. We do not wish to force
any arbitrary opinions on this matter, and have simply placed Giotto's
work in the order that it seems to us more likely to have been
executed. Those who disagree have only to transpose the chapters as
they think fit. The chief thing is to enjoy the frescoes and speculate
as little as possible on all the contradictory volumes written about
them.
_Right Transept._--According to Messrs. Crowe and Cavalcaselle these
frescoes are by Giotto, and Mr Bernhard Berenson is of the opinion
that they belong to his early period, and were executed by him before
the franciscans knew what his powers were, and whether they could
entrust to him the more difficult task of illustrating the legend of
St. Francis. The subjects are taken from the early life of Christ
which had been depicted many times in preceding centuries, but
although Giotto attempted no very elaborate or original manner of
treatment, his style was rapidly developing, and we have in some of
the scenes little traits of nature which only belong to him. On the
outside of the Chapel del Sacramento, over the arch, he painted the
Annunciation with such charm, dignity and harmony of outline that it
would be difficult to find a more perfect conception of religious
feeling even among the pictures of Angelico. Unfortunately it can only
be seen in the early afternoon when the light comes in through the
windows of S. Giovanni; the Madonna rising with queenly grace and the
angel hastening forward with his message then stand out from their
dark background like living people, and show how, from the first,
Giotto attained the power of giving vitality to his figures. His
Madonna is not like a graven image to be worshipped from afar; she is
essentially the earthly mother of the Saviour, and Giotto, while
treating her story with dignity and a certain sense of remoteness,
tells it by the simplest means, endowing her with the maternal
tenderness of a young peasant girl whom we meet upon the roads
carrying her child to lay beneath the shadow of a tree while she goes
to her work in the fields close by.
[Illustration: CHOIR AND TRANSEPTS OF THE LOWER CHURCH]
The Visitation (on the same wall as Cimabue's Madonna) is one of those
frescoes that we remember like a scene we have witnessed, so naturally
does the Virgin move forward, followed by a group of handmaidens, and
hold out her arms to greet Elizabeth who is bending with such
reverence to salute her cousin. They stand at the entrance of a dainty
house inlaid with mosaic which is set among the bare rocks with only a
stunted tree here and there. But Giotto does not forget to place a
flowering plant in the balcony just as the peasants have always done
in his mountain home.
It is interesting to compare the next fresco of the Nativity with the
same subject in the Upper Church, treated by a follower of Cimabue
where the same idea is depicted, but with what a difference. Though
two episodes are placed in one picture, Giotto succeeds in giving a
harmonious composition, which, if a little stiff and over symmetrical,
is full of charm and beauty. The angels singing to the new-born Infant
and those apprising the shepherds of the news hover like a flight of
birds above the barn. They are in truth the winged spirits of the air,
"birds of God" Dante calls them, and thus Giotto paints them. As
though to accentuate the sadness and poverty of Christ's birthplace,
the barn, all open and exposed to the night breezes, is laid in a
lonely landscape with a high rock rising behind it. Beyond in the
valley, a leafless tree grows upon the bank of a calm stream where the
heavenly light from the angels is seen to play like moonbeams in its
waters.
Messrs. Crowe and Cavalcaselle hold that the Visit of the Magi was
"never painted with more feeling, more naturally or beautifully
composed than here"; and Giotto must have felt he could add little to
the perfection of the scene when in later years he painted the same
subject at Padua. All interest is centred on the Child, who, bending
forward from the Virgin's arms, lays a tiny hand in blessing upon the
head of the aged king. Curiously enough St. Joseph has been forgotten,
and instead an angel stands upon either side to receive the offerings
of the Magi.
But to us the Purification seems even more beautiful in sentiment,
composition and the perfection of religious feeling. Giotto was the
first to conceive the idea of the Infant Jesus turning from Simeon
towards the Virgin Mary as if anxious to come back to her, while she
holds out her arms to invite him with a naïve attitude of gentle
motherhood.
From charming frescoes like these we come to the grand and powerful
scene of the Crucifixion. Every figure tells a different tale of
sorrow; of tender pity, as in the group of women round the fainting
Virgin; of wonder that Christ should be allowed to suffer, as in the
gesture of the woman with arms thrown back and St. John who wrings his
hands almost fiercely; of sympathy expressed by the Magdalene, as she
kisses the pierced feet; and of hope and prayer, in the kneeling
figures of St. Francis and his brethren. Even more vehement in their
grief are the angels, who rending their garments fly away with arms
stretched out as if unable to bear the sight of so much pain. How
rapidly they turn and circle in the air; they are not borne along by
the winds, but trusting to their wings they rise with the swift, sure
flight of a swallow.[74]
Upon the opposite wall the early life of the Virgin is continued with
the Flight into Egypt, which bears a strong resemblance to the fresco
at Padua. There is the same sense that St. Joseph, his bundle slung on
a stick over his shoulder like a pilgrim, is really walking along and
in a moment must disappear from sight; a palm tree bends sideways to
the breeze, and above two angels seem to cleave the air as they
hurriedly lead on the travellers to exile and safety. Only the Virgin
sits calm and unruffled. In the Massacre of the Innocents Giotto has
happily not painted the full horror of the scene, but has aimed rather
at suggesting the tragedy than at giving its actual representation.
Very beautiful are the women to the left mourning for their dead
children. One rocks her child in her arms and tries to awaken him with
her kisses, whilst another raises her hands in despair as she gazes
upon the dead child upon her knees.
The Return of the Holy Family from Egypt, though only showing a group
of houses within surrounding walls and a gateway and a group of
people, suggests better than a more complicated composition would have
done the scene of a home-coming after long absence.
The Preaching of the Child in the Temple completes the series, and
like the one at Padua, it is the least interesting of Giotto's
paintings.
There are three other frescoes in the Transept which most people, with
reason, attribute to Giotto, representing miracles of St. Francis.
The first refers to a child of the Spini family of Florence who fell
from a tower of the Palazzo Spini (now Feroni), and was being carried
to the grave, when the intercession of St. Francis was invoked and he
appeared among them to restore the child to life. Part of the fresco
has been lost owing to the ruthless way in which the walls were cut
into for the purpose of erecting an organ--a barbarous act difficult
to understand. But the principal group of people are seen outside an
exquisite basilica of marble and mosaic, and each figure can be
studied with pleasure as they have not been mutilated by the
"restorer's" usual layers of thick paint. Seldom has Giotto painted
lovelier women than those kneeling in the foreground, their profiles
of delicate and pure outline recalling a border of white flowers. Near
them is a figure bearing so strong a resemblance to Dante, that we
would fain believe that Giotto meant to represent the type of a true
Florentine in a portrait of the poet. Above the staircase is a fine
picture of St. Francis resting his hand upon the shoulder of a crowned
skeleton "in which," says Messrs. Crowe and Cavalcaselle, "a much
deeper study of anatomy is revealed than has ever been conceded to
Giotto." The oval face of the saint, with clear brown colouring, is
very beautiful, strongly resembling the St. Francis in glory in the
fresco above the high altar. By him also is the half-length figure of
Christ in the vaulting of the window.
Although the two remaining frescoes deal with the death and
resurrection of a child, they probably have nothing to do with the
Spini miracle; the one where the dead child is lying in the arms of
two men has unfortunately been so repainted as to take all character
away from the faces, and we can only admire the general grouping, the
fine gestures of the weeping women, and the grand modelling of the
figures. Only a great artist could make one feel, by such simple
means, the strain of the dead weight upon the men's arms. The man to
the left (the second from the one holding his finger to his chin) is
believed to be the portrait of Giotto; if it is, the painter has not
flattered himself, and we can believe Dante's tale that he was
remarkably ugly, and had six hideous children. On the other side of
the arch the legend continues; a procession of white-robed monks and
sorrowing friends approach the house to which the child has been
taken, but in the meantime St. Francis has called him back to life,
and a man, evidently in great excitement over the miracle, is hurrying
down the steps to announce what has occurred. The story is so well and
simply told that, although we have failed to find any account of it,
it is easy to understand the sequence of the two frescoes, and the
events they relate.
_Allegories by Giotto in the ceiling over the High Altar._--The task
was now given to Giotto to depict by the medium of allegory the three
virtues of the franciscan order and St. Francis in glory. These
virtues, the rocks upon which the franciscan order was so securely
founded, had been preached by St. Francis to the people of Italy with
the extraordinary results we have seen, and now Giotto came to take up
the theme and, by means of his immortal art, perpetuate it as long as
the great basilica lasts, and pilgrims come to pray and read upon the
walls, in a language even the unlettered can understand, the lessons
taught by the Umbrian preacher seven centuries ago. Apart from the
fact of his genius, it was a fortunate thing that he should have been
chosen for the task. A man of weaker and more impressionable
temperament might have been led into such exaggerations of feeling and
sentiment as we find in the Lorenzetti frescoes of the transept.
Giotto came not many years after the Flagellants, roaming in hordes
through the land calling for mercy and beating their half-naked bodies
with leathern thongs, had spread a spirit of fanaticism which
threatened to destroy the healthy influence of the teaching of St.
Francis. But the mountain-born painter, impervious to such influences,
kept his faith pure amidst the turmoil and unrest; and much as he
admired the saint (it is said he belonged to the Third order), he
looked upon his teaching from the practical point of view and was by
no means carried away by the poetical manner in which it had been
presented to the people. Nothing shows the mind and character of
Giotto so plainly as some lines he wrote on poverty, most likely after
painting his famous Allegories when he had an opportunity to observe
how little the manners and customs of mediæval monks corresponded with
the spirit of their founder. Every line of the poem is full of common
sense and knowledge of human frailty. Many, Giotto remarks somewhat
sarcastically, praise poverty; but he does not himself recommend it as
virtue is seldom co-existent with extremes; and voluntary poverty,
upon which he touches in a few caustic lines, is the cause of many
ills, and rarely brings peace to those who have chosen her as a mate
and who too often study how to avoid her company; thus it happens that
under the false mantle of the gentlest of lambs appears the fiercest
wolf, and by such hypocrisy is the world corrupted.[75]
[Illustration: THE MARRIAGE OF ST. FRANCIS WITH POVERTY
(D. ANDERSON--_photo_)]
Giotto, an artist before he was a moralist, undertook to carry out the
wishes of his patrons, and thought only how he could best fill the
triangular spaces of the ceiling with the figures of saints and
angels. It was by no means an easy task, but Giotto succeeded so well
that these four frescoes are reckoned among his masterpieces and
the wonders of the thirteenth century. They certainly show a marked
advance upon the earlier works in the Transept, but they lack the
power and assurance of those in the Upper Church, where the youthful
painter all but reached the zenith of his fame.
_The Marriage of St. Francis and Poverty._[76]--In this fresco Giotto
has represented three incidents, but just as they all refer to one
subject, so do the figures form a perfect harmony, faultless as
decoration and beautiful as a picture. A youth, imitating the charity
of St. Francis to whom his guardian angel is pointing, is seen on the
left giving his cloak to a beggar, while upon the other side, a miser
clutching his money-bag and a youth with a falcon on his gloved hand
refuse to listen to the good suggestions of an angel and of the friar
who stands between them. The lines of decoration are further carried
out by the two angels who fly up carrying a temple with an enclosed
garden, perhaps symbolising Charity, and a franciscan habit, which may
be the symbol of Obedience. But these are details and the eye does not
rest upon them, but rather is carried straight into the midst of a
court of attendant angels where Christ, standing upon a rock, gives
the hand of St. Francis to the Lady Poverty, who slightly draws away
as if in warning of the hardships and disillusions in store for him
who links his life with hers. Cold and white, her garments torn by a
network of accacia thorns, she is indeed the true widow of Christ,
who, after His death as Dante says,
"... slighted and obscure
Thousand and hundred years and more, remain'd
Without a single suitor, till he came."[77]
The bridesmaids, Hope pointing to the sky, and Charity holding a heart
and crowned with flowers that start into tiny flames, come floating
out of the choir of angels towards the pale bride whose veil is
bounded only by her hair. Heedless of the children of earth, who
encouraged by the barking of a dog, press the thorns still deeper into
her flesh, she gazes at St. Francis, and shows him the pink and white
roses of paradise and the Madonna lilies which are flowering behind
her wings.
_Chastity._--The different stages of perfection in the religious life
are portrayed in this allegory. To the left St. Francis welcomes three
aspirants to the order--Bernard of Quintavalle--typifying the
franciscans; St. Clare--the Second Order; and one, who is said to be
the poet Dante, in the near foreground in a florentine dress of the
period--the Third Order. Two angels in the central group impose hands
and pour the purifying water upon the head of a youth standing naked
in a font, and two other angels bend forward with the franciscan
habits in their hands, while leaning over the wall of the fortress are
two figures, one presenting the banner of purity the other the shield
of fortitude to the novice. On either side stands a grey-bearded,
mail-clad warrior, lash and shield in hand to denote the perpetual
warfare and self-mortification of those who follow St. Francis. To the
right three youthful warrior-monks, beautiful of feature, bearing the
signs of the Passion in their hands, aided by one in the garb of a
Penitent with angels' wings, are chasing away the tempting spirits of
the flesh from the rocks about the fortress into the abyss below. The
winged boar falls backwards, followed by a demon and a winged skeleton
emblematic of the perpetual death of the wicked, while poor
blindfolded Love writhes beneath the lash of Penitence. But just as he
is about to spring down with the rest, his string of human hearts
still slung across his shoulders, he snatches up a sprig of roses from
the rocks.
Above, out of a walled enclosure guarded at each end by towers like
every mediæval castle on the hills about Italian towns, rises a
crenulated fortress. At the open window of the magnificent central
tower is seen Chastity, veiled and in prayer as if unconscious of the
scene below, her vigilance typified by the bell o'erhead. She appears
to be reading, by the light of a taper, from the open book held before
her by an angel, while another is bringing her the palm of sanctity.
They are no longer Giotto's bird-like creations, but stately
messengers with splendid human forms uplifted by outstretched wings
their garments brought into long curved lines by the rapidity of their
flight.
_Obedience._--Under an open _loggia_ sits the winged figure of
Obedience in the habit of a franciscan, holding his finger to his lips
as he places a wooden yoke (symbol of obedience) upon the neck of a
kneeling friar. Prudence, with double face, holding a glass mirror and
a compass, and Humility, with her lighted taper to illumine the path
to paradise, are seated on either side, perhaps to show that he who
imposes obedience upon others must be prudent and humble himself. An
angel upon the right is pointing these virtues out to a centaur
(symbolizing pride, envy and avarice), who, thrown back upon his
haunches by a ray of light from the mirror of Prudence, is thus
stopped from tempting away the young novice kneeling on the opposite
side, encouraged in his act of renunciation by the angel who holds him
firmly by the wrist. Two divine hands appear from the clouds above and
are holding St. Francis by his yoke, while two angels unroll the rules
of his order.
_The Glory of St. Francis._--The throng of fair-haired angels, seem,
as they move towards the throne of the saint and press around it, to
be intoning a hymn of perpetual praise and jubilation. Their figures,
against the dull gold background, are seen white and strong, with here
and there a touch of mauve or pale blue in their garments bringing out
more distinctly the feeling of light and joyousness. The perpetual
movement of the heavenly choir, some blowing long trumpets, others
playing on flutes and tambourines, while many gaze upwards in silent
prayer as they float upon the clouds, contrasts strangely with the
stiff and silent figure of St. Francis, who in his robe of gold and
black brocade, a brilliant light behind him, looks like some
marvellous eastern deity, recalling Dante's words of how he
"... arose
A sun upon the world, as duly this
From Ganges doth: ..."
In the dimness of the cave-like church built to serve the purpose of a
tomb and keep men's ideas familiar with the thought of death, these
frescoes are glimpses into the heaven of the blest. Watch them at all
hours of the day and there will be some new wonder to be noted, a face
among the crowd which seems fairer than the rest, or, as the sunshine
moves across, a flash of colours in an angel's wing like the sudden
coming of a rainbow in a cloudy sky. And who shall forget the strange
play of fancy as the candle light, during an afternoon service,
mingles with the strong sunshine upon the white figures of saints and
the whiter figure of the Lady Poverty, who appear to move towards us
from amidst a blaze of golden clouds, until gradually as the evening
closes in and the candles go out one by one, they are set once more in
the shadow of their backgrounds like so many images of snow.
_La Capella del Sacramento, or the Chapel of St. Nicholas._--Giotto
left one scholar at Assisi whose work it is easy to discover, but who,
as far as name and personality are concerned, is unknown, and shares
in the general mystery which surrounds both the builders and painters
of San Francesco. All we know is that he followed his master's style
and great laws of composition even more closely than Taddeo Gaddi, and
that he possessed much charm and originality. By the kind help of Mr
Bernhard Berenson we have been able to group together some of the
works of this interesting artist, who was evidently working at Assisi
between 1300 and 1310 when he executed the last nine frescoes of the
Upper Church illustrating the death and the miracles of St. Francis,
decorated the Capella del Sacramento in the Lower Church with the
legend of St. Nicholas, and painted a fine Crucifixion in the
Confraternity of San Rufinuccio (see chap. x). There is a very
delightful panel picture also by him in the corridor of the Uffizzi
(No. 20 in the corridor), with eight small scenes from the life of St.
Cecilia.
In a fresco over the arch on the inside of the Capella del Sacramento
are portraits of the donors of the chapel, Cardinal Napoleone Orsini,
who is being presented to Christ by St. Francis, and his younger
brother Giovanni (below him is written Dñs Joñs Gaetanus frater ejus),
presented by St. Nicholas. It helps to date the decoration of the
chapel, for we know that Giovanni Orsini received the cardinal's hat
in 1316, while here he is represented in the white dress of a deacon
confirming the general opinion that these frescoes must have been
painted before that date.[78]
St. Nicholas of Myra, generally known as St. Nicholas of Bari, both
during his life and after his death was forever coming to the
assistance of the oppressed; he did not even object to be the patron
saint of drunkards and thieves, as well as of maiden virtue. He can
easily be recognised in art by the three purses or golden balls which
are always placed at his feet, in reference to the first kind action
he performed when a wealthy young noble. This incident is charmingly
recorded in the chapel upon the right wall near the entrance. Three
sleeping maidens are lying by their father's side, and St. Nicholas,
who has heard of their poverty, throws in three bags of gold as he
passes by the open window. This charitable deed has made him a famous
saint; when Dante is in Purgatory he hears the spirit of Hugh Capet
recounting various acts of virtuous poverty and generosity, among
which
"... it spake the gift
Of Nicholas, which on the maidens he
Bounteous bestow'd, to save their youthful prime
Unblemish'd...."
Below (the picture immediately beneath is entirely obliterated) is a
very beautiful composition, recalling the same artist's treatment of
St. Clare and her nuns in the Upper Church. In front of a Gothic
chapel of white and black marble stands St. Nicholas, between two
placid and portly friars, listening to the petition of a despairing
father who implores his protection for his three sons, unjustly
condemned to death by a wicked consul. The figures of the prisoners,
with halters round their necks, followed by sympathising friends, are
full of movement and life; St. Nicholas is particularly charming,
dressed in his episcopal robes, slightly bending forward and listening
attentively to the doleful tale.[79]
The legend is continued upon the opposite side, where he arrives just
in time to save the youths. The figure of the kneeling victim
expecting the blow every moment to fall upon his neck and the majestic
attitude of the saint in the act of seizing the sword, are finely
rendered, but Giotto would hardly have approved of the complicated
building decked with much superfluous decoration which is supposed to
represent the city gate.
The fresco below relates a vision of the Emperor Constantine who had
ordered his three generals, unjustly accused of treason, to be put to
death. St. Nicholas appears and commands him to release the prisoners,
who are in a wooden cage by the bed.
High up in the lunette of this wall is an interesting fresco referring
to a humorous incident of one of the saint's miracles. It appears that
a Jew, hearing that St. Nicholas gave special protection to property,
placed a statue of him in his house; but it must be remembered that
St. Nicholas was also the patron of thieves, and one day all the Jew's
possessions disappeared. Enraged by the failure of his plan he
administered a sound thrashing to the statue, which stands in a
beautiful niche with spiral columns, behaving much in the same way as
the childish sons of faith in Southern Italy who turn the Madonna's
picture to the wall when their prayers have not been effectual. In
this case St. Nicholas was so deeply offended that he appeared in a
vision to the thieves, who kindly restored the goods of the irate Jew.
There are dim remains of frescoes on this wall, but it is impossible
to make out what they represent. Other wonderful miracles are related
upon the opposite side, beginning high up in the lunette, where, with
some difficulty, we distinguished St. Nicholas restoring a child to
life who has been taken from his parents and killed by evil spirits.
Below is a scene in a banqueting hall, where a king, seated at table,
takes a goblet of wine from the hand of a slave boy. St. Nicholas, in
full episcopals, performs one of his many ærial flights, lays his hand
upon the boy's head and carries him back to his parents. In the scene
beneath St. Nicholas is restoring to his people another youth, who, it
seems, was nearly drowned while filling a goblet with water for the
altar of St. Nicholas; or it may be the continuation of the preceding
legend, and show the home-coming of the captive boy from the king's
palace. It is one of the most charmingly rendered of the series; the
impetuous action of the mother rising with outstretched arms to
welcome her son, and the calm dignity of the father's embrace, are
almost worthy of Giotto himself. A small dog bounds forward to add his
welcome to the others, while St. Nicholas surveys the scene with great
gravity, every line of his figure denoting dignity, power and repose.
On one side of the arched entrance to the chapel is a fresco of St.
Mary Magdalen, on the opposite side is St. John the Baptist, and in
the vaulting of the arch, on the right, are St. Anthony of Padua with
St. Francis; St. Albino with St. George; St. Agnes holding a lamb,
perhaps the most graceful of the figures, with St. Cecilia crowned
with roses. Opposite are St. Rufino and St. Nicholas holding a book;
St. Sabino and St. Vittorino, both Assisan martyrs; and St. Claire
with St. Catherine of Alexandria. But the quality of this artist will
be only half realised if the single figures of the apostles on the
walls below the scenes from the life of Nicholas are overlooked. Very
grave and reposeful they lend an air of great solemnity to the chapel,
and as Messrs. Crowe and Cavalcaselle remark, they are "after those of
Giotto in the Ciborium of Rome, the most admirable that were produced
in the early times of the revival...."
It is as difficult to explain why the Chapel of St. Nicholas possesses
so much charm, as it is to understand why people seldom spend more
than sufficient time to read the few lines in their guide-book about
it and verify for themselves that the frescoes are there; but perhaps
when some fifty frescoes by Giotto have to be realised in about an
hour, which is the time usually devoted to them by the visitor to
Assisi, it is not surprising that Giotto's follower, the closest and
the best he ever had, should be neglected.
The stained glass windows, remarkable rather for their harmony than
for their depth of tone, belong also to the early part of the
fourteenth century, and are decorated with the Orsini arms. On the
left side of the central window is a charming design of St. Francis in
a rose-coloured mantle, recommending to Christ the young Giovanni
Gaetano Orsini, who is said to be buried in the chapel. His monument
behind the altar, erected soon after his death in 1347, is, according
to Vasari, the work of Agostino da Siena, a pupil of Giovanni Pisano.
Very calm and youthful-looking the Cardinal lies at full length in
long folded robes while two angels guard his slumbers.
There is yet another treasure in St. Nicholas' Chapel; a lovely
picture on panel of the Virgin and saints (rather difficult to see as
it is against the light over the altar), by a Sienese artist who
possesses some of Simone Martini's talent of depicting ethereal and
serene Madonnas.
_The Chapel of St. Maria Maddalena._--According to a legend given by
Padre Angeli the chapel was built and consecrated by St. Bonaventure
while General of the franciscan order towards the end of the
thirteenth century. The three frescoes on the left wall certainly
belong to Giotto's time, and if not actually painted by him they
appear to be from his designs, and not merely copies of the Paduan
frescoes which they resemble. Above the frescoes of the Raising of
Lazarus and the Anointing of Christ's feet is the Communion of the
Magdalen, rendered with such simplicity yet with so much religious
feeling and solemnity that we realise it is indeed the last communion
of the saint on earth. The attitude of the priest, the splendid
drapery of the man in orange-coloured garments, and the way in which
the figure of the saint being carried by angels to heaven completes
the composition, bear unmistakably the impress of Giotto's style
before the Paduan period (1206).
The "Noli mi Tangere" upon the opposite wall may also have been
designed by him, but the type of the faces are heavier than his, and
the angels are no longer swift spirits of the heavens ending in flame
and cloud.
The painter, as if wishing to remind the faithful of the new life
symbolised in the resurrection of Christ, has covered the rocks and
ground with flowering rosebushes and exquisitely designed tufts of
ferns and leaves.
The story of the Prince and Princess of Marseilles is a favourite
subject with the Giottesque school. The legend tells that when Mary
Magdalen arrived at Marseilles with Lazarus and Martha, she met a
prince and his wife who were praying to the gods for a son, and she
persuaded them to pray instead to the God of the Christians. Their
desire was granted, and they were converted, but evidently being of a
cautious turn of mind, they resolved to sail at once for Jerusalem and
find out if St. Peter's teaching agreed with that of the Magdalen. On
the way a terrible storm arose, and during the tempest the princess
gave birth to a son, and died. The sailors insisted that her body must
be thrown overboard or the storm, they said, would not abate; at last
the prince was forced to lay the body of his wife upon a rocky island
in the midst of the ocean, and calling upon Mary Magdalen for help, he
left the child wrapt in the cloak of its dead mother by her side and
continued the journey to the Holy Land. His visit to St. Peter ended
in his complete conversion, and upon his return to France he stopped
at the rocky island where he found his wife and son alive and well,
thanks to the prayers of St. Mary Magdalen. They returned to
Marseilles, the vessel being guided by angels, and the whole town
became Christian.
Above the arch facing the altar is a very charming fresco of the
Magdalen standing at the entrance of a cave, her hair falling like a
mantle of cloth of gold about her, to receive the gift of a garment
from a charitable hermit who had heard of her life of austerity and
privation among the mountains of Provence.
The single figures of St. Clare, St. Mary Magdalen and St. Rufino, as
well as the saints in the vaulting opposite the altar, no longer
follow Giotto's designs and are far inferior to the other frescoes.
Teobaldo Pontano, Bishop of Assisi between 1314 and 1329, is supposed
to be the kneeling figure at the feet of St. Rufino as donor of the
chapel. It is so unlikely Giotto should have repeated his later Paduan
designs in a feebler manner, as seen here, or that a pupil should
have slavishly copied them, that it seems more probable the chapel
dates from the time of St. Bonaventure, when its decoration may have
been begun by Giotto and completed by some later Florentine follower
called in by the bishop who desired to be buried here. The Pontano
arms decorate the beautiful stained glass windows, which certainly
date from the first half of the fourteenth century, and are the finest
in the Lower Church with the exception of those in St. Martin's
chapel. Each figure has a claim on our admiration, but especially
lovely is the figure of the Magdalen whose hair falls to her feet in
heavy waves of deepest gold. In the last division of the right window
is the death of the saint, with the lions at her feet which are
supposed to have dug her grave.
_The Chapel of St. Antonio di Padova._--Built by the Assisan family of
Lelli in the fourteenth century, it was once ornamented by Florentine
frescoes of the same date which were destroyed when the roof fell in,
and it has now nothing of interest save the windows. These contain
some naïve scenes from the life of St. Anthony; among them may be
noticed his preaching to the fish which raise their heads above the
water to listen.
_Chapel of San Stefano._--This like the last, has only very decadent
frescoes by Adone Doni and is solely interesting for its windows
(second half of fourteenth century), where below the symbols of the
Evangelists are single figures of saints, among them King Louis and
the royal Bishop of Toulouse. Cardinal Gentile di Montefiore, founder
of the chapel of S. Martino, was also the donor of this one and is
represented in the right window with his crest, a tree growing out of
a blue mound against an orange background.
_The Chapel of St. Catherine, or Capella del Crocifisso._--This
chapel was built by order of Cardinal Albornoz towards the end of the
fourteenth century when on his passage through Umbria to reconquer the
rebellious cities for the Roman Pontiff. He conceived at Assisi so
great a love for the memory of St. Francis that he desired to be
buried there; but though his body was brought to Assisi from Viterbo
where he died in 1367, it was afterwards carried to his bishopric at
Toledo "at small expense," writes an economical chronicler, "upon
men's shoulders"; only a cardinal's hat, suspended from the roof of
the chapel, now remains to remind us of the warlike Spanish prelate.
The frescoes here have been assigned to that mythical person
Buffalmaco, of whom Vasari relates such humorous tales. All we can say
is that they belong to the second half of the fourteenth century and
are not very pleasing scenes from the life and martyrdom of St.
Catherine of Alexandria, with a fresco of Cardinal Albornoz receiving
consecration from a pope under the auspices of St. Francis. The
windows are the first things to shine out amidst the gloom as one
enters the Lower Church. Especially attractive are the figures of St.
Francis and St. Clare, their cloaks of the colour of a tea-rose, and
of the other saints in green and russet-brown standing in a frame of
twisted ribbons tied in bows above their heads. Unfortunately the
glass has been repaired in some places by careless modern workers and
we see such strange results as the large head of a bearded man upon
the body of St. Catherine, high up in the left hand window.
[Illustration: THE OLD CEMETERY OF SAN FRANCESCO]
_The Chapel of St. Anthony the Abbot._[80]--About 1367 two monuments
were erected in this chapel over the sepulchres of two murdered
princes--Messer Ferdinando Blasco, nephew of the Cardinal Albornoz,
and his son Garzia. Some say they met their death at Spoleto where the
father was vice-governor, others that they were killed at Assisi close
to the convent of S. Appolinare by the citizens before they submitted
to the kindly rule of the Cardinal. The chapel had been built by a
liberal Assisan gentleman who also left money for its decoration; but
if there were paintings (Vasari mentions some by Pace di Fænza)
nothing now remains but a rather feeble picture by a scholar of
Pinturicchio. The white stone monuments, the white-washed walls and
the total absence of colour gives an uncared-for look to this
out-of-the way corner of the church. A much brighter spot is the old
cemetery opening out of this chapel, which was built in the fourteenth
century with the intention of adorning it with frescoes in imitation
of the Campo Santo at Pisa. The double cloister seen against a
background of cypresses and firs, above which rises the northern side
of the Basilica, form a pretty group of buildings, and can be better
enjoyed now than in former days, when the bones of Assisan nobles and
franciscan friars were piled in the open galleries.
The Basilica of San Francesco became the burial place, not only of
some of the saint's immediate followers, but also of many
distinguished personages. The large stone tomb at the end of the
church is always pointed out as that of "Ecuba," Queen of Cyprus, who
is said to have come to Assisi in 1229 to give thanks for having been
cured of an illness by the intercession of St. Francis, when she gave
the porphyry vase full of ultramarine which is still to be seen,
though now empty of its precious contents. She is said to have died in
1240, and to have been buried in San Francesco. But this "Ecuba" is a
mysterious person not to be found in the history of her country, which
has led some writers to say that it is Iolanthe, the second wife of
Frederick II, who lies here. It is one of those tombs common in the
time of Giovanni Pisani, but bearing only a faint resemblance to his
masterpiece in the Church of San Domenico in Perugia. "On one side,"
says Vasari, in surprise at the novelty of the style, "the Queen,
seated upon a chair, places her right leg over the left in a singular
and modern manner, which position for a lady is ungraceful, and
cannot be regarded as a suitable action for a royal monument."
The tomb to the right was erected soon after 1479 in memory of Niccolò
Specchi, an Assisan physician of renown attached to the persons of
Eugenius IV, and Niccolò V.
_Tomb of St. Francis._--Although it had always been supposed that St.
Francis lay beneath the high altar, no one knew precisely the spot
where Elias had hidden him. In the last centuries many attempts were
made to find the tomb by driving galleries in every direction into the
bed of rock on which the Basilica stands;[81] but all failed, until
more energetic measures were taken in 1818. And after fifty nights of
hard work, conducted with the greatest secrecy (it would seem as
though the spirit of Elias still presided over the workers), below the
high altar, encased in blocks of travertine taken from the Roman wall
near the temple of Minerva, and fitted together neatly as those of an
Etruscan wall, was found the sepulchral urn of St. Francis. It was
evidently the same in which he had been laid in the Church of San
Giorgio, untouched till that day. Round the skeleton were found
various objects, placed, perhaps, by the Assisans, who in this seem to
have followed the custom of their earliest ancestors, as offerings to
the dead. There were several silver coins, amongst them some of Lucca
of 1181 and 1208, and a Roman ring of the second century, with the
figure of Pallas holding a Victory in her right hand engraved on a red
cornelian. Five Umbrian bishops, four cardinals, numberless priests
and archæologists visited the spot to verify the truth of the
discovery, and finally published the tidings far and wide, which
brought greater crowds than ever to Assisi, and among them no less a
personage than the Emperor Francis I, of Austria. Donations poured in
for building a chapel beneath the Lower Church round the saint's tomb,
and in six months the work was completed by Giuseppe Brizzi of Assisi.
The citizens, in their zeal, decorated it with marble altars and
statues, until the tradition treasured by the people of a hidden
chapel below the Basilica and rivalling it in richness was almost
realised, and they flocked down the dark staircases with lighted
torches to witness the accomplishment of the legends weaved by their
forefathers (see p. 136). It is a most impressive sight to attend mass
here with the peasants in early morning ere they go forth to their
work in the fields. Silently they kneel with bowed heads near the
tomb, touching it now and again through the grating with their
rosaries; the acolytes move slowly about the altar and the voices of
the priests are hushed, for here at least all feel the solemnity of a
religious rite. The candles burn dimly with a smoky flame, the
sanctuary lamps cast a flickering red light upon the marble pavement
and the walls cut out of the living rock, and with the darkness which
seems to press around is the damp smell, reminding us that we are
indeed in the very bowels of the Assisan mountain.
FOOTNOTES:
[73] There are only the most meagre scraps of information to rely upon
as to the dates of Giotto's works at San Francesco, and it is needless
here to enter into the endless discussion. One thing is obvious; the
Assisan frescoes must have been executed before those at Padua which
have always been assigned to 1306. In these pages we have sometimes
followed the view held by Messrs. Crowe and Cavalcaselle, sometimes
that of Herr Thode, who appears to have studied the question with open
eyes, but our final authority is M. Bernhard Berenson, who in a visit
paid lately to Assisi was kind enough to point out many things which
we should otherwise have passed by, and in the sequence of the
frescoes by Giotto at San Francesco we have entirely followed his
opinion.
[74] For Simone Martini's Madonna and Saints between the two chapels
of this transept, see p. 212. The portraits (?) of some of the first
companions of St. Francis, painted beneath Cimabue's fresco, belong to
the Florentine school. It would be vain to try and name them.
[75] See Vasari, ed. Milanesi, vol. i. p. 426. (Sansoni Firenze.)
[76] It is often supposed that Giotto took the theme of this fresco
from the well-known lines of Dante referring to the mystical marriage
of St. Francis to Poverty. But Dante wrote the xi. canto of the
_Paradiso_ long after Giotto had left Assisi; both painter and poet
really only followed the legend recounted by St. Bonaventure of how
St. Francis met three women who saluted him on the plain of S. Quirico
near Siena. These were Poverty, Charity and Obedience.
[77] _Paradiso_, xi., Cary's translation.
[78] This fact alone would disprove the idea that Giottino, who was
born in 1324, could have been the author of these frescoes. Everything
that cannot be attributed to other painters is put down as his work,
so that we have many pictures and frescoes of totally different styles
assigned to Giottino.
[79] Some say this fresco represents the three youths begging St.
Nicholas to pardon the consul who had condemned them to death, in
which case it would come after the scene of the execution on the
opposite wall.
[80] The tabernacle on the altar is the work of Giulio Danti, after a
design by Galeazzo Alessi, both Perugians, in 1570.
[81] How right Elias was to hide the body of St. Francis in so secure
a place is shown by the various endeavours made by the Perugians to
secure the holy relics for their town. In the fifteenth century they
attempted, while at war with Assisi, to carry off the body by force,
and failing, had recourse to diplomacy. They represented to Eugenius
IV, that it would be far safer at Perugia, and begged him to entrust
them with it. He denied his "dear sons'" request on the plea that the
Assisans would be brought to the verge of despair and their city to
ruin.
CHAPTER VII
_The Sienese Masters in the Lower Church. The Convent_
... "Je donnerais pour ce caveau toutes les églises de Rome."--H.
TAINE. _Voyages en Italie. Pérouse et Assisi._
THE CHAPEL OF ST. MARTIN[82]
The best masters of Tuscany having, by the beginning of the thirteenth
century, covered most of the walls of San Francesco with choice work,
it now remained for Siena to send artists to complete their loveliness
by effigies of calmly sweet Madonnas and saints whose gentle beauty
seemed rightly fitted for their Umbrian surroundings.
The first to come, probably very few years after Giotto had left, was
Simone Martini, "the most lovable," Mr Berenson calls him, "of all the
artists before the Renaissance."[83] He married Giovanna Memmi, a
Sienese, whose brother Lippo Memmi often helped him in minor works;
this may account for the confusion between the two, and why he is so
often called by his brother-in-law's surname. One of the artist's
claims to immortality, the highest, according to Vasari who was not
partial to the Sienese, was the praise he won from Petrarch for the
portraits he painted on more than one occasion of Madonna Laura.
Simone's talents were sung by the "love-devoted" Tuscan poet who calls
him "mio Simon," and in one perfect sonnet tells how he must surely
have been in paradise and seen the loveliness of Madonna Laura, as he
has drawn her features with such fidelity that all on earth must
perforce acknowledge her beauty.
The Chapel of St. Martin at Assisi is filled with such faces as
Petrarch describes. It possesses, too, all the varied colour of a
garden, only a garden not inhabited by earthly mortals, but by gentle
knights and fairy kings wearing wonderful crowns of beaten gold, with
cherubs' heads, flowers and moons upon their surface, and women who
hold their lilies with caressing fingers. All gives way before his
sense of the beautiful, the ornate and the charming, so that he
creates a world apart of saints and angels with a feeling of
remoteness about them which is one of the most striking features of
his art. He loved all that was joyous; he depicted no tragic scenes;
his saints have already won their crowns in heaven, his kings are
conquerors, and around a death-bed the angels sing. He may sometimes
fail as a story-teller, and his compositions do not always give the
same sense of perfection as those of other stronger artists, but his
very faults are lovable, and all can be forgiven for the exquisite
finish of his paintings, which, in their brilliant colouring, are like
a piece of old embroidery where design and hues have been woven in by
patient fingers. "To convey his feeling for beauty and grace and
splendour," says Mr Berenson, "Simone possessed means more than
sufficient. He was a master of colour as few have been before him or
after him. He had a feeling for line always remarkable, and once, at
least, attaining to a degree of perfection not to be surpassed. He
understood decorative effects as a great musician understands his
instruments."[84]
It is a little difficult to find out where Simone begins his legend of
St. Martin, as he seems to have fitted in the different scenes just
where he could, thinking, as was only right, more of the effect of
decoration than of the sequence of the story. The two frescoes on the
left wall refer to the well-known act of charity, when St. Martin, a
young Lombard soldier serving in the army of the Emperor Constantine
in Gaul, met, on a bitter winter's day, a beggar outside the gates of
Amiens, and having nothing but the clothes he wore divided his cloak
with the poor man. It is not one of Simone's pleasing compositions;
far better is the next where Christ appears to the saint in a dream,
wearing the cloak he had given in charity and saying to the angels who
surround him: "Know ye who hath thus arrayed me? My servant Martin,
though yet unbaptised, hath done this." The face of the young saint is
very calm and palely outlined against his golden aureole as he lies
asleep, clasping his throat gently with one hand. With what patience
has Simone drawn the open-work of the sheets, the pattern on the
counterpane, the curtain about the bed; no detail has been passed
over. And who can forget his angels, the profile of one, the thick
waving hair of another, and the grand pose of the standing figure, a
little behind Christ, whose head is poised so stately upon a
well-moulded neck.
[Illustration: THE KNIGHTHOOD OF ST. MARTIN BY SIMONE MARTINI
(D. ANDERSON--_photo_)]
Exactly opposite are two scenes belonging to the early times of the
saint's life when he was yet a soldier. In one the Emperor Constantine
is giving him his sword, while an attendant buckles on the spurs of
knighthood; here also, as in most of the frescoes, we pick out single
figures to dwell on, such as the youth with a falcon on his wrist,
whose profile is clearly outlined yet tender, with that pale
red-golden tinge over the face by which Simone always charms us.
Remarkable for grace and motion is the man playing on the mandoline,
with a sad dreamy face, who seems to sway to the sounds of his own
music; whilst almost comic is the player on the double pipes, with his
curious headgear and tartan cloak.
The next scene is divided by a rocky ridge, behind which is seen the
army of the Gauls, who, by the way, have Assisan lions on their
shields. St. Martin, after refusing to accept his share of the
donations to the soldiers, declares his intention of leaving the army
to become a priest, and when accused of cowardice by the Emperor, he
offers to go forth and meet the enemy without sword or shield. Simone
pictures him as he steps forth upon the perilous enterprise, holding
the cross and pointing to the sky, as he refuses the helmet held out
to him by the Emperor. Next day, says the legend, the Gauls laid down
their arms, having submitted to the word of St. Martin who was then
allowed to quit the world for the religious life.
On the opposite wall, above the apparition of Christ with the cloak,
we see St. Martin no longer in soldier's garb, but as the holy Bishop
of Tours. The saint has fallen into a reverie whilst saying mass, and
in vain a priest tries to rouse him by laying a hand upon his shoulder
for his eyes remain closed, and the kneeling priest waits patiently
with the book of the Gospels upon his knee. Simone never surpassed the
dignity, the religious feeling, the quiet repose and ease expressed in
the figure of St. Martin; while he has kept the scene as simple as one
of Giotto's frescoes, thus making it the most perfect among these
compositions. To the left is a much ruined picture of the restoration
of a child to life through the prayers of the saint, who was preaching
at Chartres. Among a crowd of people one figure, with a Florentine
headgear such as Andrea del Castagno paints, stands clearly out; below
a small child can be discerned stretching out little hands towards the
kneeling bishop.
Above this again, almost too high to be clearly seen, is the death of
St. Hilary of Poitiers, at which St. Martin assisted. One of the
mourners has a mantle of turquoise blue, a beautiful piece of colour
like the sky seen through the arches of the Gothic windows.
On the other wall, over the fresco where St. Martin receives
knighthood, is recorded the legend of how "as he went to the church on
a certain day, meeting a poor man naked, he gave him his inner robe,
and covered himself as he best might with his cope. And the
archdeacon, indignant, offering him a short and narrow vestment, he
received it humbly, and went up to celebrate mass. And a globe of fire
appeared above his head, and when he elevated the host, his arms being
exposed by the shortness of the sleeves, they were miraculously
covered with chains of gold and silver, suspended on them by
angels."[85]
The next picture, which is very ruined, represents the visit of St.
Martin to the Emperor Valentinian, who, because he had rudely kept his
seat in his presence, suddenly found it to be on fire, and, as the
legend says, "he burnt that part of his body upon which he sat,
whereupon, being compelled to rise, contrite and ashamed, he embraced
Martin, and granted all that he required of him."
Above this is the death of St. Martin, with a graceful flight of
angels hovering over the bier singing as they prepare to carry his
soul to heaven. Very fine is the fresco in the lunette of the
entrance, where Cardinal Gentile, in his franciscan habit, is kneeling
before the saint who bends forward to raise him from so humble a
position. But in the single figures of saints, in the arch of this
chapel, standing like guardian deities within their Gothic niches,
Simone rivals greater artists in grace and strange beauty. In honour
of the franciscan donor the chief franciscan saints are depicted
beside two others of universal fame. St. Francis and St. Anthony of
Padua, and below them St. Catherine of Alexandria and St. Mary
Magdalen; on the other side, St. Louis, King of France and St. Louis,
Bishop of Toulouse, and below them St. Clare and St. Elisabeth of
Hungary. Nowhere has St. Clare received so true an interpretation of
her gentle saintliness as in this painting by Simone, and he has
surpassed his other works in the exquisite drawing of the hand which
holds her habit to one side. It would seem as though in these saints
he had attained the limits of his power of expressing types of pure
beauty, were it not for the half figures in the embrasures of the
window of such finish and subtle charm as to haunt us like some strain
of long remembered music. There is a bishop in a cope of creamy white
with gold embroidery, a hermit with a long brown beard, and saints who
calmly pray with clasped hands. The broad white band of pale shadowed
fur is low enough to show the graceful line of the neck of the young
saint in the left hand window, his hair tinged with pale red and his
face so fair as to seem a shadow upon the wall, coming and going in
the play of light.
So enthralling is the study of the frescoes that it is possible to
leave the chapel without noticing the stained-glass windows, perhaps
the loveliest in the church where all are lovely. They seem to belong
to the same epoch as the paintings, and in one or two instances a
figure may have been inspired by them, such as the angels with sword
and shield who resemble Simone's angels in the upper part of the
fresco of St. Martin's death. Cardinal Gentile was in all probability
the donor of these as well as of the chapel, for he is represented in
the central window kneeling before St. Martin, who is in full
episcopals. These windows are dazzling; there are warriors in red and
green, saints standing against circles of cream-tinted leaves, St.
Jerome in magenta-coloured vestments harmonising strangely with the
crimson of his cardinal's hat; and St. Anthony of Padua in violet
shaded with paler lights as on the petals of a Florentine iris. A
saint in white is placed against a scarlet background, another in pale
china blue against a sky of deep Madonna blue, and all these colours
lie side by side like masses of jewels of every shade.
On leaving we find to the left of the papal throne a small chapel
ornamented only by a window which has an apostle standing in a plain
Gothic niche, the ruby red and tawny yellow of his mantle making a
brilliant patch of colour in this dark corner of the church. The head
is modern, but the figure, the circular pattern beneath, and the right
half of the window with five medallions, are, according to Herr Thode,
the oldest pieces of coloured glass in the lower church.
Just above the papal throne is a handsomely worked ambo in red marble
and mosaic, forming a kind of pulpit from which many illustrious
people have preached, among them St. Bonaventure and St. Bernardine of
Siena. In the recess a Florentine artist of the fourteenth century has
painted the Coronation of the Virgin, a fresco worthy of its beautiful
setting; and there is a crucifixion and scenes from the martyrdom of
St. Stanislaus of Poland by a follower of Pietro Lorenzetti, pupil of
Simone Martini. St. Stanislaus was canonised in 1253 when Innocent IV,
came to consecrate the Basilica, and upon this occasion a miracle took
place which redounds to the honour of the saint. While Cardinal de
Conti (afterwards Alexander IV,) was preaching, one of the capitals of
a pillar above the pulpit fell upon the head of a woman in the
congregation, and thinking she was dead, as she had sunk down without
a groan, her neighbours covered her over with a cloak "so as not to
disturb the solemnity of the occasion." But to their amazement when
the sermon ended the woman rose up and gave thanks to St. Stanislaus,
for the blow, far from doing her harm, had cured her of headaches to
which she had been subject. The legend would long since have been
forgotten, were it not that the capital which fell on that memorable
day is still suspended by chains in the opposite corner of the nave,
and often puzzles the visitor who does not know its history.
Below the pulpit is a slab of red marble let into the wall with these
simple words inscribed: "Hic jacet Jacoba sancta nobilisque romana,"
by which the Assisans commemorated the burial place of Madonna Giacoma
da Settesoli the friend of St. Francis, who after his death lived at
Assisi and followed the rule of the Third order until she died in 1239
(see p. 114).
_Left Transept._--To Pietro Lorenzetti was given the work of
decorating these walls with scenes from the Passion, and so far as
completing the rich colour of the church be succeeded. But when
studied as separate compositions they betray the weakness of an artist
who, as Mr. Berenson remarks, "carries Duccio's themes to the utmost
pitch of frantic feeling." Great prominence is given to the subject
of the crucifixion where the vehement actions of the figures rather
than the nobility of the types are pre-eminent. It may be of interest
to some that the man on the white horse is said to be Gualtieri, Duke
of Athens, the tyrant of Florence, whose arms Vasari says he
discovered in the fresco which he describes as the work of Pietro
Cavallini.
A curious composition is that on the opposite wall where the disciples
sit in awkward attitudes and the servants in the kitchen are seen
cleaning the dishes while a dog hastily licks up the scraps. It would
be difficult to know this represented a religious scene were it not
for the large aureoles of the apostles. Nor has Pietro succeeded in
giving solemnity to the scene of the Stigmata, where the strained
position of St. Francis and the agitated movement of the Seraph
partake of the general characteristics of these frescoes. But in his
Madonna, St. Francis and St. John the Evangelist, below the
crucifixion, Pietro Lorenzetti gives his very best and their faces we
remember together with the saints of Simone Martini. Referring to this
fresco M. Berenson says: "At Assisi, in a fresco by Pietro, of such
relief and such enamel as to seem contrived of ivory and gold rather
than painted, the Madonna holds back heart-broken tears as she looks
fixedly at her child, who, Babe though he is, addresses her earnestly;
but she remains unconsoled."[86]
_Chapel of S. Giovanni Battista._[87]--Another lovely work by Pietro
Lorenzetti is the triptych over the altar, the Madonna, St. Francis
and St. John the Baptist, but here the action of the child leaning
towards the Virgin and holding the end of her veil, is more caressing
and suggestive of babyhood. Above are small heads of angels like those
Pietro places in medallions round the frescoes in the south transept.
This, and the panel picture over the altar in the opposite chapel,
complete the works of the Sienese school in Assisi. The Umbrian school
is represented by a large and unsympathetic picture by Lo Spagna
(dated 1526), which is however considered by local admirers of the
painter to be his masterpiece. It is a relief to turn from his
yellow-eyed saints and hard colouring to the windows of this chapel
which are remarkable for their harmony and depth of tone.[88] The
figures of the central window date from the second half of the
thirteenth century, those of the left window are at least two
centuries later.
_The Sacristies._--These open out of St. Giovanni's Chapel. Both are
ornamented with handsomely carved cupboards of the sixteenth century
where the friars store their vestments and costly lace, and which once
were full of gold and silver vessels amassed during many centuries.
But often during mediæval times of warfare the friars had to stand
aside and see the sacristies sacked by the Perugians, or even the
Assisans, when they must have envied the peace of mind of the first
franciscans who, possessing nothing, could have no fear of
robbers.[89]
Devoted as the citizens were to the memory of St. Francis they do not
seem to have hesitated, when in want of money, to help themselves
liberally to the things in his church. At one time when the Baglioni
were besieging Assisi, her despot Jacopo Fiumi gathered the citizens
about him, and in an eloquent harangue called upon them to rob the
church at once before the enemy had entered the gates, lest the
treasure should fall into the hands of the Perugians. So the
sacristies were rifled, and with the proceeds Jacopo Fiumi rebuilt the
walls and the palaces which had fallen to ruin during the incessant
fighting of past years. The next plunderers were the soldiers of
Napoleon, and it is a marvel that so many things still remain. A
cupboard in the inner sacristy contains a beautiful cross of
rock-crystal ornamented with miniatures in blue enamel brought by St.
Bonaventure as a gift from St. Louis of France; there is also the
second rule of St. Francis which was sanctioned by Honorius III. Even
more precious is a small and crumpled piece of parchment, with a
blessing written in the big child-like writing of St. Francis, which
he gave to Brother Leo at La Vernia after he had received the
Stigmata. On one side he wrote part of the Laudes Creatoris, upon the
other the biblical blessing:
"_Benedicat tibi Dominus et custodiat te_:
_Ostendat faciem suam tibi et misereatur tui_:
_Convertat vultum suam ad te et de tibi pacem_":
and then below:
"_Dominus benedicat te, Frate Leo._"
Instead of the Latin, the saint signs with the Thau cross, which is of
the shape of the mediæval gallows, and may have been yet another way
of showing his humility by humbling himself even to the level of
malefactors. Many pages have been written about this relic; the line
by Brother Leo in explanation below the signature of St. Francis:
"_Simili modo fecit istud signum Thau cum capite manu sua,_"
has puzzled many people, but in a pamphlet by Mr Montgomery
Carmichael[90] it has received a plausible translation. He thinks that
_cum capite_ refers to the small knob at the top of the Thau, by which
St. Francis meant to represent a malefactor's head; the line would
read thus: "in like manner with his own hand he made a cross with a
head," and not "with his own head," as some believe. Mr Carmichael
thinks the curious mound out of which the cross rises is a rough
drawing of La Vernia. Above the benediction, in neatly formed letters,
Brother Leo has written a short account of the sojourn at the Sacred
Mount and of the Vision of the Seraph. This relic has been mentioned
in the archives of the convent since 1348, and is always carried in
procession at the commencement of the feast of the "Perdono" on July
31st.
Almost more honoured by the faithful is the "Sacred Veil of the most
Holy Virgin," which can only be exposed to the public in the presence
of the Bishop of Assisi, and is shown in times of pilgrimage when the
sacristy and church are full of men and women waiting for their turn
to kiss the holy relic.
The picture over the door, painted by Giunta Pisano (?) is always
pointed out as a portrait of St. Francis, but as the painter's first
visit to Assisi was in 1230 he can only have seen the body of the
saint borne to its last resting-place in the Basilica, and even that
is doubtful when we remember with what secrecy the burial was
performed. Here the face is pointed and emaciated, with a curious look
in the eyes as though Giunta had desired to record his blindness. The
figure is surrounded by small scenes from the miracles of St. Francis,
performed during his lifetime and at his tomb in San Giorgio. But
though in the so-called portraits of the saint, the artists think more
of representing him as the symbol of asceticism and sanctity than of
aiming at giving a true likeness, both this picture and a fresco
painted in 1216 at Subiaco when the saint stayed there on his way to
Spain, are not very dissimilar from the graphic description left us by
Celano. He tells us that St. Francis "was rather below the middle stature
with a small round head and a long pinched face, a full but narrow
forehead and candid black eyes of medium size, his hair likewise was
black; the brows were straight, the nose well-proportioned, thin and
straight, the ears erect but small, and the temples flat; his speech
was kindly, yet ardent and incisive; his voice powerful, sweet, clear
and sonorous; his teeth were regular, white and set close; his lips
thin and mobile, his beard was black and scant, his neck thin, his
shoulders square; the arms were short, the hands small with long
fingers and almond-shaped nails, his legs were thin, his feet small,
his skin delicate, and he was very thin...."
[Illustration: BIRD'S EYE VIEW OF THE BASILICA AND CONVENT OF SAN
FRANCESCO, FROM A DRAWING MADE IN 1820]
_Right Transept._[91]--On the walls between the Chapels of the
Sacramento and of St. Maria Maddalena, Simone Martini has left some of
his loveliest work in the half figures of franciscan saints he places
near the Madonna. These are St. Francis, St. Louis of Toulouse, St.
Elizabeth of Hungary, St. Clare clothed in the habit of her order,
always to be recognised when painted by Simone by her heavy plaits of
hair, St. Anthony of Padua with the lily, St. Louis of France with a
crown of _fleur-de-lis_, and upon the right of the Virgin, a noble
saint who may be Helen the mother of King Louis, as she too holds a
sceptre with the lily of France on the top. Never had saints so
majestic a queen as Simone's Madonna. The subdued greens and tawny
reds of their mantles and their auburn hair look most beautiful
against the gold ground which shines with dull light about them. Each
of their aureoles bears a different pattern in raised _gesso_; a
garland of flowers, a circle of human heads, suns, a tracery of roses
and ivy, or yet again another of oak leaves. After Giotto's Allegories
and the frescoes in San Martino, these saints are by far the loveliest
things in San Francesco, and as they look towards us, ethereal, like a
faint moon on a misty night, they seem the very incarnation of
mediæval faith. Dante created women such as Matilda, who sings to him
in Purgatory as she is picking flowers on a woodland river's edge, and
Simone paints them and conveys their spirit in the faces of St. Clare
and St. Elizabeth.
_The Convent_
It is natural to think that the Basilica and Convent built under the
guidance of Elias was as we see it now in its full magnificence of
chapels, porch, colonnades and cloisters. Certainly the essential form
of the building has not been altered, but in the early days it stood
isolated from the town, surrounded by such rocks as jut out among the
grass in the ravine outside Porta S. Pietro, and approached by a
drawbridge which made it resemble, even more than it does now, a
feudal stronghold guarding the Umbrian valley. Later on, as the life
of the place centred ever more round the church of the saint, the
citizens no longer built their houses near San Rufino or below the
castle, but close to San Francesco, until a second town sprang up
where once were only rough mountain pastures. It is still possible to
form an idea of how it looked by following round the base of the hill
by the Tescio, whence a wonderful and unique view of the northern side
of church and convent is obtained (see Appendix). Assisi lies hidden,
and standing high above us, shutting out the view of the valley, is
San Francesco; not the building with great arches we are familiar
with, rising high above the vineyards, but a castle, seen clearly
defined and strong against the sky, whose bastions clasp the hill top
as powerfully as a good rider bestrides his horse. Oak copses cover
the slopes from the convent wall straight down to the banks of the
Tescio, where little mills are set above deep pools of emerald green
water and narrow canals fringed by poplar trees. The minute detail of
the landscape in this deep ravine gives a curious feeling that we are
walking in the background of one of Pier della Francesca's
pictures--even to the distant view of low-lying hills where the
torrent makes the sudden bend round the mountain edge; and the
contrast is strange between it and the fortress-church upon the dark
hill, where deep shadows lie across it and lurk within the crannies of
its traceries in the bay windows of the chapels and in the depths of
jutting stones. Such was the massive building "Jacopo" planned to
stand upon the mountain ridge, as much a part of the rocks and the red
earth as the cypresses which crown the summit. And in the midst, but
on the southern side, he placed, as if to balance the rest, a square
and boldly conceived bell-tower rising high above the church.[92]
At the time it was the wonder of the Assisans, who boasted that for
beauty as well as for solidity it could be counted among the first,
not in Italy only, but in Europe. Bartolomeo of Pisa, came to cast one
of the big bells, and together with his own name he inscribed those of
Elias, Gregory IX, and Frederick II. On another bell, which has been
recast, was graven a delightful couplet informing the faithful of the
many services which consecrated bronze could render to the country
round.
[Illustration: SAN FRANCESCO FROM THE TESCIO]
"Sabbatha pango, funera plango, fulgura frango:
Excito lentos, domo cruentos, dissipo ventos."
("I ring in Sunday, I lament for the dead, the lightning I break,
I hurry the sluggards, I vanquish the wicked, the winds I disperse.")
To the time of Elias also belongs the fine entrance to the Upper
Church, where the Guelph lion and the eagle of Frederick II, record
the liberality of both parties towards the building of the church,
while the four animals round the wheel window seem to show that
"Jacopo," notwithstanding his marked love for pure Gothic
architecture, could not quite forget the strange but fascinating
beasts of Lombard façades.
[Illustration: STAIRCASE LEADING FROM THE UPPER TO THE LOWER PIAZZA OF
SAN FRANCESCO]
One friar in the fifteenth century inherited some of the enthusiasm of
Elias for the basilica; this was Francesco Nani, the General of the
franciscans, known as Francesco Sansone because his patron, Sixtus IV,
is said to have addressed him with these words in allusion to his
energy and strength of character, "Tu es fortissimus Samson." His
name is found upon the beautiful stalls of the Upper Church, and it
was he who superintended the laying out of the upper piazza, connected
with the lower one by a long flight of stairs. It may also have been
at this time that the _loggie_ of San Francesco were built for the
purpose of erecting booths during the festival of the "Pardon of St.
Francis." Certainly it was chiefly at his expense that Baccio Pintelli
(1478) built the handsome entrance door and porch to the Lower Church,
which in olden times was entered by a small door close to the
campanile. The architect fitted his work admirably into a corner of
the building, completing with clustered columns of pink marble, wheel
window, trefoiled arches and stone traceries, the scheme of colour and
the perfect proportions for which San Francesco is so remarkable. The
doors of carved wood, darkened now and of such massive workmanship as
to resemble bronze, were made in 1546 by Niccolò da Gubbio, who has
carefully commemorated the legend of St. Francis and the wolf of
Gubbio in one of the panels to the left. Sansone also commissioned
the doorway of what is now the entrance to the friars' convent a year
after the porch was finished, then it was only a small chapel, built
by the members of the Third order when St. Bernardine of Siena revived
the religious enthusiasm of the people. The Assisan artist placed a
bas-relief of the saint in the arch above the door, and it is still
called "la porta di San Bernardino."
None should leave Assisi, not even those who only hurry over for the
day, without visiting the convent, which recalls an eastern building
from the whiteness of its great vaulted rooms, long corridors and
arcaded courtyards when seen against the bluest of summer skies.[93]
Then from the cool and spacious convent, a place to linger in upon a
hot day in August, we step out into the open colonnade which skirts
the building to the south, makes a sharp turn west, and then juts out
at the end, facing south again. This last portion was added by
Cardinal Albornoz in 1368, and goes by the name of the _Calcio_. But
two centuries later the foundations were found to be insecure, and
Sixtus IV, strengthened it by a bastion, which looks solid enough to
resist even the havoc of an earthquake. The Pope was a great
benefactor of the convent, and the friars placed his statue in a niche
in the bastion, where he sits, his hand raised in benediction, on a
papal throne overlooking the valley. From the rounded arches of rough
stone, turned by storm and sunshine to russet-red, pink and yellow, we
look out upon one of the most beautiful and extensive views in Umbria.
To the right is Perugia standing out almost aggressively on the hill
top; opposite, on a separate spur which divides the valley of Spoleto
from that of the Tiber, Bettona and Montefalco hang upon peaks like
the nests of birds in trees, and beyond are Spoleto, Trevi and Narni,
nearer again Spello, and the domes of Foligno in the plain, with a
host of small villages near. All the Umbrian world lies before us from
the convent of San Francesco.
[Illustration: SAN FRANCESCO FROM THE PONTE S. VITTORINO]
Many weary people besides the popes came to rest here in early times,
and one mediæval warrior, Count Guido of Montefeltro, the great leader
of the Ghibellines, laid down his arms and left his castle at Urbino
in the year 1296, to pass his last days as a friar doing penance
within the peaceful shelter of San Francesco for a long life of
intrigue and bloodshed. He prayed by day, for at night they say he
stood gazing out of his window, one of those we see above the walled
orchard of the monks, watching the stars and attempting to divine the
mysteries and destinies he read there, exceeding even the superstition
of the age by his faith in the laws of astrology. But his meditations
and careful preparation for a holy death were suddenly disturbed, and
he found himself once more plunged into the whirl of Italian politics
and intrigue. War raged between Pope Boniface VIII, a Gaetani, and the
powerful family of the Colonna who braved his excommunications, and,
when their Roman palaces were burnt, fled to their strongholds in the
country. Many of these fell into the hands of the papal troops, but
Penestrino, their principal fief, resisted all attacks and the Pope
was nearly defeated when, remembering the old soldier Count Guido
known to be "more cunning than any Italian of his time, masterly alike
in war and in diplomacy," he hastened to ask his counsel. The story is
recounted by Dante, who could not forgive the Ghibelline chieftain for
coming to the assistance of the Pope.
Boniface, seeking to silence the scruples of the friar, promised to
absolve him from all sin, even before committal, if only he would tell
him how to act so "that Penestrino cumber earth no more." Guido, whose
subtlety had not deserted him in the cloister, gave an answer which,
while it ensured success to the papal arms, stamped him as a man of
such deceit and treachery that Dante placed him in the eighth gulf of
hell, among the evil counsellors eternally surrounded by flaming
tongues of fire.
"Then, yielding to the forced arguments,
Of silence as more perilous I deem'd,
And answer'd: 'Father! since thou washest me
Clear of that guilt wherein I now must fall,
Large promise with performance scant, be sure
Shall make thee triumph in thy lofty seat.'"[94]
Besides Count Guido and the popes who, finding the large and airy
rooms of the convent a convenient summer resort, were constant
visitors at Assisi, it can show a fine list of royal visitors. Among
them is the Queen of Sweden who, in 1655, came escorted by Papal
Nuncios, foreign ambassadors and cavalry, to pray at the tomb of St.
Francis. The Assisans sent out their best carriages with horses ridden
by postillions to meet her, adorned their palaces with flags and
damask hangings, and rang all the bells as she approached the
Basilica. "The Queen is called Christina," a chronicler tells us; "she
is aged twenty-nine, is very learned, being able to write in eleven
languages; she is small but very comely.... One hundred and fifty beds
were prepared in the convent and beautiful it was to see the numerous
suite and the pages of the nobles."
[Illustration: A FRIAR OF THE MINOR CONVENTUAL ORDER OF ST. FRANCIS]
* * * * *
It strikes the visitor to Assisi as strange that the black-robed
friars in charge of the Basilica are so unlike the franciscans with
whom everyone is familiar, and it may be well to give a few facts
relating to the many divisions in the Order which, as we have seen,
began already to change in the time of Elias. In 1517 a portion of the
brethren, desiring a mitigation of their rule, obtained from Leo X, a
dispensation and received the title of Friars Minor Conventuals
with the permission to choose their own Minister General. Their dress
is shown in the illustration. Those who kept to the rule more nearly
approaching to that of St. Francis, like those of Sta. Maria degli
Angeli, the Carceri and San Damiano, were called Friars Minor of the
Observance, or Observants, and take precedence over the others,
enjoying the privilege of electing the "Minister General of the whole
order of the Friars Minor and successor of St. Francis." In 1528,
Matteo Baschi, an observant, instituted a new branch called the
Capucins, because of their long pointed capuce, whom he inspired with
the desire to lead a hermit's life in solitary places, preaching to
the people but once in the year. They have deserted their hermitages
and are a very popular order in Italy, devoting themselves especially
to preaching and hearing confessions, and form quite a distinct family
from the rest. The Basilica at Assisi no longer belongs to the
Conventuals, as after the union of Italy it was declared to be a
national monument. The Government also took possession of the convent
as a school for boys, leaving only a small portion for the reduced
number of friars to inhabit. They went to law, and the judge
pronounced the convent to be the property of the Holy See which had
never ceased to exercise jurisdiction over it; but a proviso was made
that the school was to remain in its present quarters until the Pope
or the franciscans should erect a suitable building for it in another
part of the town. As much money is required for so large an edifice
and sites are not so easily procured, it seems probable that for many
years the sound of boys at play will be heard in the convent walls
instead of the slow footsteps of silent friars.
FOOTNOTES:
[82] The donor of this chapel was Gentile de Monteflori, a franciscan,
created cardinal in 1298 by Boniface VIII.
[83] Simone was born at Siena in 1283, and died at Avignon in 1344. He
belonged to the school of Duccio, though influenced to some degree by
his contemporary Giotto, whose work at Assisi he had full opportunity
to study.
[84] _Central Italian Painters of the Renaissance_, B. Berenson, p.
47.
[85] _Sketches of the History of Christian Art_, by Lord Lindsay, p.
134, vol. i.
[86] _The Central Italian Painters of the Renaissance._ Bernhard
Berenson, p. 48.
[87] Built by the Orsini brothers, the founders of the Chapel del
Sacramento, in the beginning of the fourteenth century.
[88] It is curious that the early Umbrian painters had so little share
in the decoration of the franciscan Basilica, the only other picture
of the school is the one in the Chapel of St. Anthony the Abbot, and a
fresco by some scholar of Ottaviano Nelli on the wall near the
entrance of the Lower Church.
[89] Not only had the friars to guard their own things, but also the
vast treasures of the Popes who, especially during their sojourn at
Avignon, found San Francesco a convenient store-house. See on p. 20
for the story of how these goods were stolen by the citizens and the
penalty this brought upon the town.
[90] _La Benedizione di San Francesco_, Livorno, 1900.
[91] See chapter vi. p. 171 for description of the frescoes here, and
of those above the altar. For Cimabue's Madonna on the right wall of
the Transept see chapter v. p. 155.
[92] In 1529 the campanile, which rather gives the impression of a
watch-tower, was used by Captain Bernardino da Sassoferrato, as a sure
place of refuge when the Prince of Orange entered Assisi with his
victorious army. From its heights he kept his enemy at bay for three
days, and finally escaped to Spello leaving the city a prey to another
despot.
[93] Open to visitors at two o'clock.
[94] Cary's translation. Dante, _Inferno_, canto xxvii.
CHAPTER VIII
_Giotto's Legend of St. Francis in the Upper Church_
"What, therefore, Giotto gave to art was, before all things,
vitality."--J. A. SYMONDS. _Renaissance in Italy._
Giotto in the Lower Church had felt his way towards the full
expression of his genius; succeeding so well in the four Allegories
that he was chosen to illustrate the life of St. Francis, withheld, as
we have seen, from all former artists, while Cimabue was to hear the
poet's praise of his pupil, "Ora ha Giotto il grido." The task
undertaken by the young painter, already a master at twenty-five, was
almost superhuman, and certainly unique in the career of any artist;
for whereas the pictorial treatment of the New Testament had been
attempted by many during several centuries, Giotto was destined to
invent forms for the whole franciscan cycle with such perfection that
no succeeding artist has varied his formula. It remains a wonderful
achievement, and the noble manner of its accomplishment proved him to
be, as Mr Roger Fry expresses it, "the supreme epic painter of the
world."
If St. Francis was fortunate in having his life related by so
admirable a story-teller, Giotto also owed something to the early
chroniclers who seeing, perhaps unconsciously, the extraordinary
poetry and the dramatic incidents in the saint's career, had
faithfully recorded them in simple and beautiful language. So far the
work was ready for Giotto, even the exact scenes were chosen for him
to illustrate, but the problem how to unfold and make them familiar to
the faithful by simple means, and yet not to lose the dignity and
charm of the theme, remained for him to solve; and the representation,
by a few figures, of a whole dramatic incident in so vivid a manner
could only have succeeded in the hands of a great master of the
fourteenth century. It is nearly certain that Giotto used St.
Bonaventure's _Life of St. Francis_, finished in 1263 and founded,
with but few additions, upon _The Three Companions_ and Celano's first
and second _Life of St. Francis_. Though written with a certain charm
of style and though it lacks the ring of those early pages, in which
St. Francis becomes known to us in such a way that we forget he lived
seven hundred years ago; and although the various incidents of his
life are presented like so many beautiful pictures, there is the
feeling always that St. Bonaventure was writing about a saint already
honoured upon earth and in heaven, and not of the man whom all loved
as the "Poverello d'Assisi." But this legend served Giotto's purpose;
and a knowledge of the words he followed being necessary in order to
see where he simply kept to the franciscan legend, and where he
penetrated the true spirit of the saint's life and its dramatic
interest, we quote from it at some length, although many of the main
facts have already been treated of in a preceding chapter.[95]
I. _St. Francis honoured by the Simpleton._--(We begin on the right
wall by the High Altar, and follow straight on to the opposite side,
the legend unfolding as in the pages of a book.)
"A certain man of great simplicity dwelt in those days in Assisi,
who, by virtue of knowledge divinely infused, whenever he met
Francis in the street, would take off his mantle, and spread it
upon the ground before him, declaring that he did so because he
was a man worthy of all honour and reverence, who should shortly
perform great works and marvellous deeds...."[96]
The bare facts are here narrated which Giotto does not alter, but he
puts such life into the scene that we feel he might have been present
when the simpleton cast himself at Francis' feet and astonished the
Assisans by his words. Attention is fixed upon the six people in the
foreground. Two worthy citizens have just arrived in time to see the
cloak being spread on the ground before Francis, and to hear the
prophetic words; and as they turn to each other, one pointing to the
scene, the other raising his hand with a movement of surprise, we seem
to hear their carping criticisms upon the brilliant youth who,
although he spent his time in singing and carousals, was one day to
bring renown to their city. The young Francis, ever heedless of
worldly comment, is stepping lightly on to the cloak, with a movement
of surprise that he should receive such honour. All have the
Florentine headgear, but the head of St. Francis is covered by a small
white cap fitting close behind the ears, just showing his hair in
front, and we feel that Giotto would have left him so, but the
franciscans, ever to and fro in the church to see that the story was
painted as they liked, insisted upon an aureole being added. As much
glory for St. Francis they cried, as gold and money can give him. So
Giotto, who disliked unnecessary decorations, was made to put an
aureole above the white cap, larger than any we have ever seen. But
take away the halo and we should yet know which of the figures is the
saint, for he stands a little apart from his two noble friends with
ermine lined cloaks who talk with hands clasped together, and is
perhaps already wondering about the destiny which awaits him and of
which he was unaware, "for as yet he understood not the great purposes
of God towards him."
Besides the human interest of the frescoes it is a delightful task to
study the architecture in each scene, for here, in the Upper Church,
Giotto has built a whole city of little pink houses with balconies,
towers and turrets, of exquisite Gothic basilicas, of temples and
gabled thrones. His priests sit within palaces full of lancet windows
and pointed arches, the groined roofs, as in the Assisan Church,
ablaze with myriads of stars. What love he had for dainty ornaments,
simple, nay almost severe in outline, but perfectly finished; and he
always likes to show the blue sky overhead, or at least peeping
through one of the windows, making the marble seem more lustrous and
creamy white. Would that all Florence had been built by him.
2. _St. Francis giving his cloak to a poor Knight._
"Going forth one day, as was his wont, in apparel suited to his
state, he met a certain soldier of honour and courage, but poor
and vilely clad; of whose poverty, feeling a tender and sorrowful
compassion, he took off his new clothes and gave them to the poor
man-at-arms."
None are there to witness the kind action of the young saint who, like
another St. Martin, has dismounted to give his mantle to the poor man
in a ravine near a little town enclosed by walls, a church spire
rising upon the opposite hill. Giotto must have been thinking of the
small rock-set towns, with stunted trees growing outside their walls,
in his Tuscan home in the Mugello when he painted this, instead of
the Umbrian town, standing amid vineyards and cornfields above an open
valley with winding rivers, whose church he was decorating. It is the
only one of the series in which the landscape is an important part of
the picture, in the others it is a mere accessory.
3. _The Vision of St. Francis._
"On the following night, when he was asleep, the divine mercy
showed him a spacious and beautiful palace filled with arms and
military ensigns, all marked with the Cross of Christ to make
known to him that his charitable deed done to the poor soldier
for the love of the great King of heaven should receive an
unspeakable reward."
It will be remembered that after this dream St. Francis started to
join the army of Walter de Brienne, having wrongly interpreted the
vision, which in reality symbolised the army he was eventually to lead
in the service of the Pope (see p. 44). This is, perhaps, the least
successful of the frescoes; probably the subject did not appeal
strongly to the painter (he only seems to have enjoyed inventing the
colonnaded palace with its trefoil windows) and also, as Mr Ruskin
explains: "Giotto never succeeded, to the end of his days, in
representing a figure lying down, and at ease. It is one of the most
curious points in all his character. Just the thing which he could
study from nature without the smallest hindrance, is the thing he
never can paint; while subtleties of form and gesture, which depend
absolutely on their momentariness, and actions in which no model can
stay an instant, he seizes with infallible accuracy."[97]
4. _St. Francis praying before the Crucifix in San Damiano._
"As he lay prostrate before a crucifix he was filled with great
spiritual consolation, and gazing with tearful eyes upon the
holy cross of the Lord, he heard with his bodily ears a voice
from the crucifix, which said thrice to him: 'Francis, go and
build up My house, which as thou seest, is falling into ruin.'"
Unfortunately this fresco is much faded and in parts peeled off; this,
combined with the representation of a ruined church, gives a curious
effect of total destruction, as if an earthquake had passed over the
land. The figure of the saint, just visible, and his attitude of
earnest prayer is very charming.
[Illustration: ST. FRANCIS RENOUNCES THE WORLD
(D. ANDERSON--_photo_)]
5. _St. Francis renounces the world._
"And now his father, ... brought this son, ... before the Bishop
of Assisi to compel him to renounce in his hands all his
inheritance.... As soon, therefore, as he came into the Bishop's
presence, without a moment's delay, neither waiting for his
father's demand nor uttering a word himself, he laid aside all
his clothes, and gave them back to his father.... With marvellous
fervour he then turned to his father, and spoke thus to him in
the presence of all: 'Until this hour I have called thee my
father on earth; from henceforth, I may say confidently, my
Father Who art in heaven.'"
This, perhaps the most interesting of Giotto's frescoes, can be
compared with the one in Sta. Croce at Florence on the same subject,
painted when time and labour had given greater strength to his
genius. The Assisan scene is treated with more simplicity, and, if
less perfect as a decorative scheme, possesses quite as much
dramatic interest and vitality. A little block of pink houses on
either side reminds us that we are outside the Bishop's palace in
the Piazza S. Maria Maggiore, where the scene is said to have
occurred. Of course all the Assisans have turned out to see how the
quarrel between Bernardone and his son will end. They stand behind
the irate father like a Greek chorus, while one, evidently a citizen
of distinction from his ermine lined cloak and tippet, restrains
Messer Pietro, who is throwing back his arm with the evident
intention of striking his son. Francis' passion for repairing
Assisan churches and ministering to the wants of the poor had proved
a costly business to the thrifty merchant, who loved his money and
had little sympathy with Assisan beggars (sojourners in Assisi may
agree with him). Delightful are the two tiny children who with one
hand clutch up their garments, full of stones to throw at St.
Francis. The bishop is the calmest person there, turning to his
priests he seems to say: "All is well, there is God the Father's
hand in the sky (with a little patience it can be distinguished in
the fresco), and we are sure to gain the day, spite of Pietro's
angry words." And so he quietly folds his episcopal mantle around
St. Francis, who from this moment becomes indeed the Child of
heaven. It may seem strange, as Mr Ruskin truly observes, that St.
Francis, one of whose virtues was obedience, should begin life by
disobeying his father, but Giotto means to show that the young saint
was casting off all worldly restraint in order to obey the Supreme
Power, and the scene is a counterpart to Dante's lines referring to
his marriage with the Lady Poverty.
"A dame, to whom none openeth pleasure's gate
More than to death, was, 'gainst his father's will,
His stripling choice: and he did make her his,
Before the spiritual court, by nuptial bonds,
And in his father's sight: from day to day,
Then loved her more devoutly."[98]
6. _The dream of Innocent III._
"He saw in a dream the Lateran Basilica, now falling into ruin,
supported by the shoulders of a poor, despised, and feeble man.
'Truly,' said he, 'this is he who by his works and his teaching
shall sustain the Church of Christ.'"
In the representations of this vision painted for Dominican churches,
the Lateran is always supported by the two great founders, Francis and
Dominic, who, in their different ways, helped Innocent in his
difficult task of reforming the Church. Giotto shows his power and the
advance art is making under his hand, in the figure of St. Francis,
who with body slightly bent back and one hand on his hip, seems to
support the great weight, while his feet are so firmly planted that
there is no uncomfortable feeling of strain and only a sense of
strength and security. Two men are seated by the bedside of the Pope,
one is asleep while the other keeps watch, and in his slightly wearied
attitude and the reposeful figure of the sleeper, Giotto's keen
observation of the ordinary incidents of every day life is very
apparent.
7. _Innocent III, sanctions the Rule of St. Francis._
"He was filled with a great and special devotion and love for the
servant of God. He granted all his petitions, and promised to
grant him still greater things. He approved the Rule, gave him a
mission to preach penance, and granted to all the lay brothers in
the company of the servant of God to wear a tonsure smaller than
that worn by priests, and freely to preach the Word of God."
Giotto, in his fresco, has to represent the most important event in
the life of the saint--his arrival at the papal court when he comes
face to face with one of the greatest of the Roman Pontiffs; and by
the simplest possible means the scene is brought before us. Here are
no crimson-robed cardinals, no gilded papal throne; the bishops
grouped behind Innocent are hardly noticed, or even the brethren who,
with hands clasped as though in prayer, press closely to their leader
like a flock of sheep round their shepherd. The eye is so fixed upon
the two central figures, that all else fades away. Giotto has seized
the supreme moment when the Pope, having overcome his fear lest St.
Francis should falter in a life of poverty and prove to be only
another heretical leader of which Italy had already too many, is, with
kingly gesture, giving the Umbrian penitent authority to preach
throughout the land. St. Francis, holding out his hand to receive his
simple Rule, now bearing the papal seals, looks up with steady gaze;
he is the most humble among men kneeling at the feet of Rome's
sovereign, but strong in love, in faith and in knowledge of the
righteousness of his mission. M. Paul Sabatier has beautifully
illustrated the meaning of Giotto when he writes: "On pourrait croire
que le peintre avait trempé ses lèvres dans la coupe du Voyant
Calabrais [Joachim de Flore] et qu'il a voulu symboliser dans
l'attitude de ces deux hommes la rencontre des représentants de deux
âges de l'humanité, celui de la Loi et celui de l'Amour."
8. _Vision of the Friars at Rivo-Torto._
"Now while the brethren abode in the place aforesaid, the holy
man went on a certain Saturday into the city of Assisi, for he
was to preach on the Sunday morning in the Cathedral Church. And
being thus absent in body from his children, and engaged in
devout prayer to God (as was his custom throughout the night), in
a certain hut in the canon's garden, about midnight, whilst some
of the brethren were asleep and others watching in prayer, a
chariot of fire, of marvellous splendour, was seen to enter the
door, and thrice to pass hither and thither through the house;
..."
Giotto's was not a nature to find much enjoyment in the portrayal of
such events as saints being carried aloft in fiery chariots, and in
dealing with this miracle he dedicated all his power to representing
the astonishment of the brethren who witness the vision at Rivo-Torto.
Two talk together and point to St. Francis being borne across the
heavens by crimson horses, one hastens to awaken his companions who
are huddled together in their hut like tired dogs asleep, and another
starts from his slumbers to hear the wondrous news.
9. _Vision of Brother Pacifico._
"This friar being in company with the holy man, entered with him
into a certain deserted church, and there, as he was praying
fervently he fell into an ecstacy, and amid many thrones in
heaven he saw one more glorious than all the rest, adorned with
precious stones of most glorious brightness. And marvelling at
the surpassing brightness of that throne, he began anxiously to
consider within himself who should be found worthy to fill it.
Then he heard a voice saying to him: 'This was the throne of one
of the fallen angels, and now it is reserved for the humble
Francis.'"
With what devotion St. Francis, his hands crossed upon his breast,
prays upon the steps of the altar, while the friar behind is intent on
asking questions about the marvellous thrones he sees poised above his
head. Nothing can exceed the grace of the wide-winged angel floating
down to earth to record the humility of Francis, his garments slightly
spread by his movement through the air.
10. _St. Francis chases the Devils away from Arezzo._
"In order to disperse these seditious powers of the air, he sent
as his herald Brother Sylvester, a man simple as a dove, saying
to him: 'Go to the gates of the city, and there in the Name of
Almighty God command the demons by virtue of holy obedience, that
without delay they depart from that place....'"
The main facts of the legend are followed closely in this fresco, but
St. Bonaventure does not tell us how the miracle was performed, while
Giotto, understanding the soul of Francis, paints him kneeling outside
the gates of Arezzo praying with intense fervour for the salvation of
the city. His faith is so strong that he does not even look up like
Brother Sylvester, to see the demons flee away; some springing from
off the chimneys, others circling above the towers, their bat-like
wings outspread. The figure of Brother Sylvester is very fine, and the
way he is lifting his tunic and stepping forward, as he stretches out
one arm with a gesture of command towards the demons, could not be
rendered with more ease and truth.
11. _St. Francis and Brother Illuminatus before the Sultan of Egypt._
"When they had gone a little further, they met with a band of
Saracens, who, quickly falling upon them, like wolves upon a
flock of sheep, cruelly seized and bound the servants of God ...
having in many ways afflicted and oppressed them, they were ...
according to the holy man's desire, brought into the presence of
the Sultan. And being questioned by that prince whence and for
what purpose they had come ... the servant of Christ, being
enlightened from on high, answered him thus: 'If thou and thy
people will be converted to Christ I will willingly abide with
thee. But if thou art doubtful whether or not to forsake the law
of Mohamed for the faith of Christ, command a great fire to be
lighted, and I will go into it with thy priests, that it may be
known which faith should be held to be the most certain and the
most holy.' To whom the Sultan made answer: 'I do not believe
that any of my priests would be willing to expose himself to the
fire or to endure any manner of torment in defence of his faith.'
Then said the holy man: 'If thou wilt promise me for thyself and
thy people that thou wilt embrace the worship of Christ if I come
forth unharmed, I will enter the fire alone.' ... But the Sultan
answered that he dared not accept this challenge, because he
feared a sedition of the people."
This subject, from its dramatic interest, appealed to Giotto, giving
full scope to his powers, both as a story-teller, and as a painter
with such genius for portraying dignity and nobility of character. The
principal persons, the Sultan and St. Francis, are here clearly placed
before us as Giotto wished us to conceive them, and how correctly he
realised their characters we learn from the chronicles of the time.
"We saw," writes Jacques de Vitry in one of his letters, "Brother
Francis arrive, who is the founder of the Minorite Order; he was a
simple man, without letters, but very lovable and dear to God as well
as to men. He came while the army of the Crusaders was under
Damietta, and was much respected by all." This is indeed the man
depicted by Giotto in the slight figure of the preacher standing at
the foot of the marble throne, so humble, yet full of that secret
power which won even the Sultan's admiration. But though the story
centres in St. Francis, the person Giotto wishes all to notice is the
Sultan, who, far from being an ignorant heathen to be converted,
conveys the idea of a most noble and kingly person, Malek Camel in
short, known throughout the East as the "Perfect Prince." His mollahs
had wished to kill St. Francis and his companion, and the fine answer
he made was worthy of his high character. "Seigneurs," he said,
addressing his visitors, "they have commanded me by Mahomet and by the
law to have your heads cut off. For thus the law commands; but I will
go against the order, or else I should render you bad guerdon for
having risked death to save my soul."
Giotto has chosen the most dramatic moment when St. Francis offers to
go through the ordeal by fire with the mahommedan priests, to prove
the power of the Christian God. With one look back upon the fire the
mollahs gather their robes around them and hurriedly leave the
Sultan's presence; St. Francis points towards the flames as though he
were assuring the Sultan that they will not hurt him, while the friar
behind gazes contemptuously after the retreating figures of the
mollahs.
Dante and Milton in their different ways were able to give us a vivid
idea of fire, flame and heat, and so would Giotto have done had he
expressed his ideas by words instead of in painting; but he was wise
enough not to attempt it in his fresco, and so in lieu of a blaze of
crimson flames we have only what looks like a stunted red cypress,
realistic enough to make us understand the story without drawing our
attention away from the main interest of the scene. In this fresco we
are again reminded of the simple methods, grand and impressive by
their very straightforwardness, by which he brings before us so
strange a scene and accentuates the importance of an event in his own
individual way.
12. _Ecstasy of St. Francis._
This legend is not recounted by St. Bonaventure, Celano, or in _The
Three Companions_, but there is a tradition of how St. Francis one day
in divine communion with God, was wrapt in ecstasy and his companions
saw him raised from the ground in a cloud. All that is human in the
scene Giotto has done as well as possible, but he evidently found it
hard to realise how St. Francis would have looked rising up in a
cloud, so he has devoted himself to rendering truthfully the
astonishment of the disciples who witness the miracle.
13. _The Institution of the Feast at Greccio._
"... in order to excite the inhabitants of Greccio to commemorate
the nativity of the Infant Jesus with great devotion, he
determined to keep it with all possible solemnity; and lest he
should be accused of lightness or novelty, he asked and obtained
the permission of the sovereign Pontiff. Then he prepared a
manger, and brought hay, an ox and an ass to the place appointed.
The brethren were summoned, the people ran together, the forest
resounded with their voices, and that venerable night was made
glorious by many brilliant lights and sonorous psalms of praise.
The man of God stood before the manger, full of devotion and
piety, bathed in tears and radiant with joy; many masses were
said before it, and the Holy Gospel was chanted by Francis, the
Levite of Christ.... A certain valiant and veracious soldier,
Master John of Greccio, who, for the love of Christ, had left the
warfare of this world, and become a dear friend of the holy man,
affirmed that he beheld an Infant marvellously beautiful sleeping
in that manger, whom the blessed Father Francis embraced with
both his arms, as if he would awake him from sleep."
Besides the wonderful way in which Giotto has succeeded, to use the
words of Mr Roger Fry, "in making visible, as it were, the sudden
thrill which penetrates an assembly at a moment of supreme
significance," there is the further interest of knowing that the scene
of the Nativity arranged by St. Francis at Greccio, was the first of
the mystery plays represented in Italy which were the beginning of the
Italian drama. Giotto makes not only Master John of Greccio see the
miracle of the Holy Child lying in the saint's arms and smiling up
into his face, but also those who accompany him and some of the
friars, while the other brethren, singing with mouths wide open like
young birds awaiting their food, are much too occupied to notice what
passes around them. A group of women, their heads swathed in white
veils, are entering at the door, and the whole scene is one of
animation and festivity. The marble canopy, with tall marble columns
and gabled towers, over the altar is one of Giotto's most exquisite
and graceful designs. But Giotto the shepherd has not succeeded so
happily in depicting an ox which lies at the saint's feet like a
purring cat.
14. _The Miracle of the Water._
"Another time, when the man of God wished to go to a certain
desert place, that he might give himself the more freely to
contemplation, being very weak, he rode upon an ass belonging to
a poor man. It being a hot summer's day, the poor man, as he
followed the servant of Christ, became weary with the long way
and the steep ascent, and beginning to faint with fatigue and
burning thirst, he called after the saint: 'Behold,' he said, 'I
shall die of thirst unless I can find a little water at once to
refresh me.' Then without delay the man of God got off the ass,
and kneeling down with his hands stretched out to heaven, he
ceased not to pray till he knew he was heard."
Giotto has here rendered the aridity of the summit of La Vernia, its
pinnacles of rocks with stunted trees. Two friars, by now quite
accustomed to miracles, converse together as they lead the donkey from
which St. Francis has dismounted to pray that the thirsty man's wishes
may be gratified. The grouping of the figures repeat the pointed lines
of the landscape, and the whole is harmonious and of great charm of
composition. It was justly admired by Vasari, who thought the peasant
drinking was worthy of "perpetual praise." Florentine writers were
continually harping on what they considered to be Giotto's claim to
immortality, his genius for portraying nature so that his copy seemed
as real as life, an opinion shared by Vasari when he gives his reason
for admiring this particular fresco. "The eager desire," he says,
"with which the man bends down to the water is portrayed with such
marvellous effect, that one could almost believe him to be a living
man actually drinking."
Over the door is a medallion of the Madonna and Child which once was
by Giotto, but now, alas, the eyes of faith must see his handiwork
through several layers of paint with which restorers have been allowed
to cover it. A slightly sardonic smile has been added to the Madonna,
and to appreciate what is left of her charm it is necessary to look at
her from the other end of the church, where the beauty of line and
composition can still be discerned notwithstanding the barbarous
treatment she has undergone.
15. _St. Francis Preaching to the Birds at Bevagna._
"When he drew near to Bevagna, he came to a place where a great
multitude of birds of different kinds were assembled together,
which, when they saw the holy man, came swiftly to the place, and
saluted him as if they had the use of reason. They all turned
towards him and welcomed him; those which were on the trees bowed
their heads in an unaccustomed manner, and all looked earnestly
at him, until he went to them and seriously admonished them to
listen to the Word of the Lord.... While he spoke these and
other such words to them, the birds rejoiced in a marvellous
manner, swelling their throats, spreading their wings, opening
their beaks, and looking at him with great attention."
This theme has been treated by another artist in the Lower Church,
with little success as we have seen; it is also sometimes introduced
in the predellas of big pictures of the school of Cimabue; but it
remained for Giotto to give us a picture as beautiful in colour as
those left by the early chroniclers in words. He never painted it
again on a large scale, and the small representation in the predella
of the picture in the Louvre follows the Assisan fresco in every
detail. Two friars whose brown habits are tinted with mauve, one tree,
a blue, uncertain landscape and some dozen birds, are all he thought
necessary to explain the story, and yet the whole poetry of St.
Francis' life is here, the keynote of his character, which has made
him the most beloved among saints, and the man who though poor,
unlettered and often reviled, was to herald the coming of a new age in
religion, art and literature. With what love he bends towards his
little feathered brethren as he beckons them to him, and they gather
fearlessly round him while he points to the skies and tells them in
simple words their duties towards their Creator.
Another Florentine, Benozzo Gozzoli, painted this subject; there
across the Assisan valley at Montefalco we can see it. His birds are
certainly better drawn, there are more of them too, and we can even
amuse ourselves by distinguishing among them golden orioles,
blackbirds, doves and wood pigeons, but no one would hesitate to say
that real charm and poetry are missing. Giotto's fresco, painted 600
years ago, is somewhat faded and many of the birds are partly effaced,
but we do not feel it matters much what they are--we only love the
fact that St. Francis called the Umbrian birds around him and preached
them a sermon with the same care as if he had been in the presence of
a pope, and that Giotto believed the legend and took pains with his
work, intending that we also should believe and understand something
of the sweetness of this Umbrian scene.
16. _Death of the Knight of Celano._
"When the holy man came into the soldier's house all the family
rejoiced greatly to receive this poor one of the Lord. And before
he began to eat, according to his custom, the holy man offered
his usual prayers and praises to God, with his eyes raised to
heaven. When he had finished his prayer, he familiarly called his
kind host aside, and said to him: 'Behold, my host and brother,
in compliance with thy prayers I have come to eat in thy house.
But now attend to that which I say to thee, for thou shalt eat no
more here, but elsewhere. Therefore, confess thy sins with truly
penitent contrition; let nothing remain in thee unrevealed by
true confession, for the Lord will requite thee to-day for the
kindness with which thou hast received His poor servant.' The
good man believed these holy words, and disclosing all his sins
in confession to the companion of St. Francis, he set all his
house in order, making himself ready for death, and preparing
himself for it to the best of his power. They then sat down to
table, and the others began to eat, but the spirit of the host
immediately departed, according to the words of the man of God,
which foretold his sudden death."
This is one of the most characteristic of Giotto's works, showing his
power, unique at that time, of touching upon human sorrow with
simplicity, truth and restraint. Here is no exaggerated gesture of
grief, no feigned expression of surprise or false note to make us
doubt the truth of the tragedy that has befallen the house of Celano.
But the movement of the crowd of sorrowing people, the men gazing down
on the dead knight, the women weeping, their fair hair falling
about their shoulders, tell better than any restless movement the
awful grief which fills their hearts. It has happened so suddenly that
the friar still sits at table with his fork in his hand, while St.
Francis hast just risen to go to the people's assistance, while a man
in the Florentine dress turns to him seeming, from the gesture of his
hand, to say: "See, your prophecy has been fulfilled but too soon."
[Illustration: DEATH OF THE KNIGHT OF CELANO
(D. ANDERSON--_photo_)]
17. _St. Francis preaches before Honorius III._
"Having to preach on a certain day before the Pope and the
cardinals, at the suggestion of the Cardinal of Ostia he learned
a sermon by heart, which he had carefully prepared; when he was
about to speak it for their edification he wholly forgot
everything he had to say, so that he could not utter a word. He
related with true humility what had befallen him, and then,
having invoked the aid of the Holy Spirit, he began at once to
move the hearts of these great men...."
In this fine fresco Giotto has represented St. Francis holding his
audience as though spell-bound by the power of his eloquence, and the
contrast is great between the charming figure of the saint and that of
the stern and earnest Pope, who, deep in thought, is leaning his chin
on his hand, perhaps wondering at the strange chance which has brought
the slight brown figure, so dusty and so poorly clad, so ethereal and
so eloquent, into the midst of the papal court. It is delightful to
study the faces and gestures of the listeners; some are all enthusiasm
and interest, like the charming young cardinal in an orange-tinted
robe, whose thoughts seem to be far away following where St. Francis'
burning words are leading them; but the older man gazes critically at
the saint, perhaps saying within himself: "What is this I hear, we
must give up all, our fat benefices, our comfortable Roman palaces, to
follow Christ"; and the cardinal on the right of the Pope also seems
surprised at the new doctrines of love, poverty and sacrifice. Four
others lean their heads on their hands; but how varied are the
gestures, from the Pope, all eagerness and keen attention, to the
cardinal bowing his head sadly thinking, like the man of great
possessions, how pleasant it would be to become perfect, but how
impossible it is to leave the goods of this world. St. Francis'
companion is seated at his master's feet as though affirming, "I
follow his teaching, and all he says is right."
18. _The Apparition of St. Francis._
"For when the illustrious preacher and glorious Confessor,
Anthony, who is now with Christ, was preaching to the brethren in
the chapel at Arles on the title upon the Cross--'Jesus of
Nazareth, the King of the Jews'--a certain friar of approved
virtue named Monaldus, casting his eyes by divine inspiration
upon the door of the chapter-house, beheld, with his bodily eyes,
the blessed Francis raised in the air, blessing the brethren,
with his arms outstretched in the form of a Cross."
The friars sit in various attitudes of somewhat fatigued attention
before St. Anthony who is standing, and none seem as yet to be aware
of the apparition of St. Francis, who appears at the open door under a
Gothic archway, the blue sky behind him. There is a strange feeling of
peace about the scene.
19. _The Stigmata._
"... On the hard rock,
'Twixt Arno and the Tiber, he from Christ
Took the last signet, which his limbs two years
Did carry...."[99]
This fresco is unhappily much ruined; enough however remains to trace
a close resemblance to Giotto's predella of the same subject now in
the Louvre, but where the solemnity of the scene is increased by the
saint being alone with the Seraph upon La Vernia.
* * * * *
It may be well here to give some of the various opinions as to the
authorship of these frescoes, though in this small book it is
impossible to go at all deeply into the subject. Some, following Baron
von Rumohr, hold that the only paintings in the Upper Church by
Giotto, are the two by the door, the _Miracle of the Water_ and the
_Sermon to the Birds_, while Messrs. Crowe and Cavalcaselle give also
the first of the series and the last five to him, but while "youthful
and feeling his way," and all the rest to Gaddo Gaddi, or maybe
Filippo Rusutti. Lastly, Mr Bernhard Berenson is of opinion that
Giotto's style is to be clearly traced from the first fresco, _St.
Francis honoured by the Simpleton_, to the nineteenth, _The Stigmata_;
and they show so much affinity to the work of the great Florentine in
Sta. Croce and elsewhere, that it is impossible not to agree with him.
In the remaining frescoes, representing the death and miracles of St.
Francis, he sees a close resemblance to the work of the artist who
painted in the chapel of St. Nicholas (Lower Church), and who may have
aided Giotto in the Upper Church before being chosen to continue his
master's work.
20. _Death of St. Francis._
"The hour of his departure being at hand, he commanded all the
brethren who were in that place to be called to him, and
comforted them with consoling words concerning his death,
exhorting them with fatherly affection to the divine love....
When he had finished these loving admonitions, this man, most
dear to God, commanded that the Book of the Gospels should be
brought to him, and ... his most holy soul being set free and
absorbed in the abyss of the divine glory, the blessed man slept
in the Lord."
This fresco has suffered from the damp and all that clearly remains
are the angels, in whom the artist's feeling for graceful movement is
shown, their flight down towards the dead recalling the rush of the
swallows' wings as they circle in the evening above the towers of San
Francesco.
21. _The Apparitions of St. Francis._
"... Brother Augustine, a holy and just man, was minister of the
Friars at Lavoro: he being at the point of death, and having for
a long time lost the use of speech, exclaimed suddenly, in the
hearing of all who stood around: 'Wait for me, Father, wait for
me; I am coming with thee....'
"At the same time the Bishop of Assisi was making a devout
pilgrimage to the church of St. Michael, on Mount Gargano. To him
the Blessed Francis appeared on the very night of his departure,
saying: 'Behold I leave the world and go to Heaven.'"
In one fresco the artist has represented two different scenes, the
greater prominence being given to the dying friar surrounded by many
brethren. In neither is shown the figure of St. Francis, as the artist
probably thought that it would have been difficult to introduce the
apparition twice. But while the gesture of the friar stretching out
his arms and the arrangement of the others explain the story, it would
be difficult, without St. Bonaventure's legend, to know the feelings
of the bishop who is so calmly sleeping in the background.
22. _The Incredulous Knight of Assisi._
"... when the holy man had departed from this life, and his
sacred spirit had entered its eternal house ... many of the
citizens of Assisi were admitted to see and kiss the Sacred
Stigmata. Among these was a certain soldier, a learned and
prudent man, named Jerome, held in high estimation in the city,
who, doubting the miracle of the Sacred Stigmata, and being
incredulous like another Thomas, more boldly and eagerly than the
rest moved the nails in the presence of his fellow-citizens, and
touched with his own hands the hands and feet of the holy man;
and while he thus touched these palpable signs of the wounds of
Christ, his heart was healed and freed from every wound of
doubt."
This fresco is so much ruined that it is difficult to enjoy it as a
whole, but some of the figures of the young acolytes bearing lighted
torches, and the priests reading the service and sprinkling the body
with holy water, are very life-like.
23. _The Mourning of the Nuns of San Damiano._
"Passing by the church of St. Damian, where that noble virgin,
Clare, now glorious in heaven, abode with the virgins her
sisters, the holy body, adorned with celestial jewels [the marks
of the Stigmata], remained there awhile, till those holy virgins
could see and kiss them."
This, the loveliest of the last nine frescoes, recalls the one in St.
Nicholas' Chapel of the three prisoners imploring the saint's
protection; even to the basilica which forms the background of both.
Considering that it is the last farewell of St. Clare and her
companions to St. Francis the artist might have given a more tragic
touch to the scene, but all is made subservient to the rendering of
graceful figures, like the charming nuns who talk together as they
hasten out of San Damiano, whose humble façade of stone the artist has
transformed into a building of marble and mosaic almost rivalling the
glories of such cathedrals as Siena and Orvieto. St. Clare stoops to
kiss the saint while priests and citizens wait to resume their hymns
of praise, and a small child climbs up a tree and tears down branches
to strew upon the road in front of the bier.[100]
24. _The Canonisation of St. Francis._
"The Sovereign Pontiff, Gregory IX, ... determined with pious
counsel and holy consideration to pay to the holy man that
veneration and honour of which he knew him to be most worthy ...
and coming himself in person to the city of Assisi in the year of
our Lord's Incarnation, 1228, on Sunday the 6th of July, with
many ceremonies and great solemnity, he inscribed the Blessed
Father in the catalogue of the saints."
This fresco is so ruined that it is impossible to form any idea of its
composition; about the only object clearly to be seen is the
sepulchral urn of St. Francis, represented beneath an iron grating in
the church of San Giorgio.
25. _The Dream of Gregory IX, at Perugia._
"On a certain night, then, as the Pontiff was afterwards wont to
relate with many tears, the Blessed Francis appeared to him in a
dream, and with unwonted severity in his countenance, reproving
him for the doubt which lurked in his heart, raised his right
arm, discovered the wound, and commanded that a vessel should be
brought to receive the blood which issued from his side. The
Supreme Pontiff still in vision, brought him the vessel, which
seemed to be filled even to the brim with the blood which flowed
from his side."
We are here left with an impression that the artist was hampered by
not having enough figures for his composition, and the four men seated
on the ground and guarding the Pope, compare unfavourably with
Giotto's fresco of the three grand watchers by Innocent III, upon the
opposite wall.
16. _St. Francis cures the Wounded Man._
"It happened in the city of Ilerda, in Catalonia, that a good
man, named John, who was very devout to St. Francis, had to pass
through a street, in which certain men were lying in wait to kill
him and ... wounded him with so many dagger-strokes as to leave
him without hope of life.... The poor man's cure was considered
impossible by all the physicians.... And, behold, as the sufferer
lay alone on his bed, frequently calling on the name of Francis
... one stood by him in the habit of a Friar Minor, who, as it
seemed to him, came in by a window, and calling him by his name,
said, 'Because thou hast trusted in me, behold, the Lord will
deliver thee.'"
The artist having here an incident less difficult to deal with than
visions and dreams, betrays a certain humour in the stout figure of
the doctor, who, as he leaves the room, turns to the two women as
though saying, "He has begun to pray, as if that can help him when I
have failed to cure him." Meantime St. Francis, escorted by two tall
and graceful angels with great wings, is laying his hands upon the
wounded man. Here, as in most of these latter frescoes, a single scene
is divided into more than one episode; this seems to us to be the
great difference between them and the works of Giotto, where the eye
is immediately attracted towards the principal figure or figures, the
others only serving to complete the composition.
27. _The last Confession of the Woman of Benevento._
"... a certain woman who had a special devotion to St. Francis,
went the way of all flesh. Now, all the clergy being assembled
round the corpse to keep the accustomed vigils, and say the usual
psalms and prayers, suddenly that woman rose on her feet, in
presence of them all, on the bier where she lay, and calling to
her one of the priests ... 'Father,' she said, 'I wish to
confess. As soon as I was dead, I was sent to a dreadful dungeon,
because I had never confessed a certain sin which I will now make
known to you. But St. Francis, whom I have ever devoutly served,
having prayed for me, I have been suffered to return to the body,
that having revealed that sin, I may be made worthy of eternal
life.' ... She made her confession, therefore, trembling to the
priest, and having received absolution, quietly lay down on the
bier, and slept peacefully in the Lord."
The legend is dramatic and the artist has not failed to make us feel
the great sadness and solemnity of the scene. A moment more, and the
group of people to the left will come forward to carry the woman away
for burial while the relations weep most bitterly; they stand aside
with heads bowed in grief, for already the presence of death is felt.
Only the sorrow of the child, who stretches out his arms, has passed
away upon seeing her rise to speak with the priest. Very tall and
slender are the figures of the women, bending and swaying together
like flowers in a gentle breeze.
28. _St. Francis releases Peter of Alesia from Prison._
"When Pope Gregory IX, was sitting in the chair of St. Peter, a
certain man named Peter, of the city of Alesia, on an accusation
of heresy, was carried to Rome, and, by command of the same
Pontiff, was given in custody to the Bishop of Tivoli. He, having
been charged to keep him in safety ... bound him with heavy
chains and imprisoned him in a dark dungeon.... This man began to
call with many prayers and tears upon St. Francis ... beseeching
him to have mercy upon him.... About twilight on the vigil of his
feast, St. Francis mercifully appeared to him in prison, and,
calling him by his name, commanded him immediately to arise....
Then, by the power of the presence of the holy man, he beheld the
fetters fall broken from his feet, and the doors of the prison
were unlocked without anyone to open them, so that he could go
forth unbound and free."
Everything here gives the impression of height; the tall slim figures,
the high doorway, and the slender tower and arches. St. Francis is
seen flying up to the skies with the same swift motion the artist has
given to the figure of St. Nicholas in the Lower Church, and the
"Greek Chorus" to the left serves to show surprise at the unusual
occurrence of a prisoner suddenly emerging from his prison with broken
fetters in his hands.
* * * * *
None should leave the church without looking at the stalls in the
choir; they are by Domenico da San Severino, made in 1501, by order,
as an inscription tells us, of Francesco Sansone, General of the
franciscan order, and friend of Sixtus IV. The artist only took ten
years to execute this really wonderful work; the intarsia figures of
the stalls in pale yellow wood, most of them fancy portraits of the
companions of St. Francis, are remarkable for their form and
character. They betray, in the opinion of Mr Berenson, Venetian
influences of Crivelli and of the school of the Vivarini.
[Illustration: ARMS OF THE FRANCISCANS FROM THE INTARSIA OF THE
STALLS]
FOOTNOTES:
[95] St. Bonaventure was born in 1221 at Bagnora in Umbria, and became
General of the franciscan order. Dante, in canto xii. of the
_Paradiso_, leaves him to sing the praises of St. Dominic, just as the
dominican divine St. Thomas Aquinas had related the story of St.
Francis in the preceding canto.
[96] We have used Miss Lockhart's translation of St. Bonaventure's
_Legenda Santa Francisci_.
[97] J. Ruskin, _Mornings in Florence_, iii. Before the Soldan.
[98] xi. _Paradiso_, Cary's translation.
[99] Dante, _Paradiso_, xi., Cary's translation.
[100] A comparison may be made between the long and slender body of
the saint here with that in the death of St. Francis in Sta. Croce,
where the body is firmly drawn and of more massive proportions.
CHAPTER IX
_St. Clare at San Damiano. The Church of Santa Chiara._
"Comme les fleurs, les âmes ont leur parfum qui ne trompe
jamais."--P. SABATIER. _Vie de S. François d'Assise_.
The days of St. Clare from the age of eighteen until her death in 1253
were passed within the convent walls of San Damiano, and though
peaceful enough, for a mediæval lady, they were full of events and
varied interest.
She was born on the 10th of July 1194 in Assisi of noble parents, her
father being Count Favorino Scifi (spelt also Scefi) the descendant of
an ancient Roman family who owned a large palace in the town, and a
castle on the slope of Mount Subasio to the east of the ravine where
the Carceri lie among the ilex woods. The castle gave the title of
Count of Sasso Rosso to its owners, and was the cause of much
skirmishing between the Scifi and the Ghislerio who were continually
wresting it from each other, until in 1300, during one of these
struggles, the walls were razed to the ground and no one sought
afterwards to repair its ruins. Of Sasso Rosso a few stones still
remain, which, as they catch the morning light, are seen from Assisi
like a grey crag projecting from the mountain, high above the road to
Spello. When not fighting beneath the walls of his castle Count
Favorino was generally away on some skirmishing expedition, and during
his absences, his wife, the Lady Ortolana of the noble family of the
Fiumi, would depart upon a pilgrimage to the south of Italy or even to
the Holy Land.[101] An old writer remarks that her name "Ortolana
(market gardener) was very appropriate, because from her, as from a
well-tended orchard, sprang most noble plants." After her return from
Palestine she one night heard a voice speaking these prophetic words
to which she listened with great awe. "Be not afraid Ortolana, for
from thee shall arise a light so bright and clear that the darkness of
the earth shall be illuminated thereby." So the daughter who was born
soon after was called Chiara in memory of the divine message. With so
pious a mother it is not surprising that Clare should have grown up
thoughtful and fond of praying; we even hear of her seeking solitary
corners in the palace where she would be found saying her rosary,
using pebbles like the hermits of old instead of beads upon a chain.
But her evident inclination for a religious life in no way alarmed
Count Favorino, who had made up his mind that she should marry a
wealthy young Assisan noble, for even at an early age she showed great
promise of beauty. "Her face was oval," says a chronicler, "her
forehead spacious, her complexion brilliant, and her eyebrows and hair
very fair. A celestial smile played in her eyes and around her mouth;
her nose was well-proportioned and slightly aquiline; of good stature
she was rather inclined to stoutness, but not to excess." A little
while and her fate in life would have been sealed in the ordinary way,
and she would have continued to look out upon the world through the
barred windows of some old Assisan palace; but great changes were
being wrought in the town even when Clare had just passed into
girlhood. With the rest of her fellow-citizens, rich and poor, she was
destined to feel the potent influence of one who suddenly appeared in
their midst like an inspired prophet of old, calling on all to repent,
and picturing higher ideals in life than any had hitherto dreamed of.
Although her first meeting with St. Francis has not been recorded by
any early biographer, we may be sure that from the age of fourteen,
and perhaps even before, the story of his doings had been familiar to
her, for the stir his conversion made among the people, his quarrels
with his father, and the many followers he gained, even among the
nobles, were of too extraordinary a nature to pass without comment in
the family of the Scifi.[102] Their palace being near the Porta Nuova
it is certain that Clare and her younger sister Agnes must have often
seen St. Francis pass on his way to San Damiano, carrying the bricks
which he had begged from door to door to repair its crumbling walls,
and heard him scoffed at by the children and cursed by his angry
father. As his fame as a preacher grew the Scifi family hurried with
the rest to listen to his sermons in the cathedral, or perhaps even in
the market-place, where he would stand upon the steps of the old
temple and gather the peasants around him on a market day. But the
decisive time arrived in the year 1212, when St. Francis, by then the
acknowledged founder of a new order sanctioned by the Pope, and no
longer jeered at as a mad enthusiast, came to preach during Lent in
the church of San Giorgio. It was the parish church of the Scifi, and
the whole family attended every service. Clare was then eighteen,
young enough to be carried away by the words of the franciscan and
build for herself a life outside her present existence; old enough to
have felt unbearable the trammels of a degraded age, and to long,
during those years of warfare to which all the cities of the valley
were subjected, for an escape to where peace and purity could be
found. Only dimly she saw her way to a perfect love of Christ. The
preacher's words were addressed to all, but she felt them as an
especial call to herself, and unhesitatingly she resolved to seek out
the friar at the Portiuncula and ask his help and counsel in what was
no easy task. Instinctively knowing her mother could be of no aid,
even if she sympathised in her cravings for a more spiritual life, she
gained the confidence of her aunt, Bianca Guelfucci, who all through
played her part regardless of Count Favorino's possible revenge.
Even during the first two years of his mission St. Francis was
accustomed to receive many men who wished to leave home and comforts,
and tramp along the country roads with him, but when the young Chiara
Scifi threw herself at his feet imploring him to help her to enter
upon a new way of life, his heart was troubled, and, reflecting on
what wide results his preaching was taking, fear even may have formed
part of his surprise. Bernard of Quintavalle he had bidden sell all
that he had, distribute it to the poor, and join him at the leper
houses; but before allowing Clare to take the veil he sought to prove
her vocation beyond a doubt, and bade her go from door to door through
the town begging her bread, clad in rough sack-cloth with a hood drawn
about her face. Her piety only increased until St. Francis, believing
that he was called upon to help her, resolved to act the part of the
spiritual knight errant.
[Illustration: DOOR THROUGH WHICH ST. CLARE LEFT THE PALAZZO SCIFI]
On Palm Sunday, arrayed in their richest clothes, the members of the
Scifi and the Fiumi families attended high mass in the cathedral, and
with the rest of the citizens went up to receive the branches of
palms. But to the astonishment of all Clare remained kneeling as if
wrapt in a dream, and in vain the bishop waited for her to follow the
procession to the altar. All eyes were upon her as the bishop, with
paternal tenderness, came down from the altar steps to where the young
girl knelt and placed the palm in her hand. That night Clare left her
father's house for ever. A small door in the Scifi palace is still
shown through which she is said to have escaped. It had been walled up
for some time, but the fragile girl gifted that night with superhuman
strength and courage, tore down timber and stones and joined Bianca
Guelfucci, who was waiting with some trembling maidservants where the
arch spans the street, to accompany her to the Portiuncula (see p.
104). Great was the consternation in the family when next morning her
flight was discovered, and news came that she had found shelter in the
benedictine convent near Bastia. Count Favorino and his wife lost no
time in following her, fully persuaded that by threats or entreaties
they would be able to induce her to return home and marry the man of
her father's choice; but they knew little of the strength of character
which lay hidden beneath the gentle nature of the eldest and hitherto
most docile of their daughters. The violent words of her father and
the tears of her mother in no way shook Clare's determination;
approaching the altar she placed one hand upon it while with the other
she raised her veil, and facing her parents showed them the close cut
hair which marked her as the bride of Jesus Christ. No earthly power,
she said, should sever her from the life she had chosen of her own
free will, and crest-fallen they left the convent without another
word. It was hardly surprising that Agnes, the second sister, who
sometimes went to see St. Clare at Bastia, should wish to take the
veil. At this the fury of Count Favorino knew no bounds, and he sent
his brother Monaldo with several armed followers, among whom may have
been Clare's slighted lover, to force Agnes, if persuasion failed, to
abandon her vocation. She was at their mercy but refused to leave the
convent, so they caught her by her long fair hair and dragged her
across the fields towards the town, kicking her as they went; her
cries filled the air, "Clare, my sister, help, so that I may not be
taken from my heavenly spouse." The prayers of Clare were heard, for
suddenly the slight form of the girl became as lead in the arms of the
soldiers, and in vain they tried to lift her. Monaldo, beside himself
with rage, drew his sword to strike her when his arm dropt withered
and useless by his side. Clare, who had by this time come upon the
scene, begged them to desist from their cruel acts, and cowed by what
had happened they slunk away, leaving the sisters to return to the
convent.
St. Francis seeing the devotion and steady vocation of both Clare and
Agnes, and doubtless foreseeing that many would follow their example,
began to seek for some shelter where they could lead a life of prayer
and labour. Again the Benedictines of Mount Subasio came forward with
a gift, offering another humble sanctuary which the saint had repaired
some years before. This was San Damiano, a chapel so old that none
could tell its origin; the vague legend that it stands on the site of
a pagan necropolis seems confirmed by a lofty fragment of Roman
masonry which juts up on the roadside between the Porta Nuova and San
Damiano. With his own hands St. Francis built a few rude cells near
the chapel, resembling the cluster of huts by the Portiuncula, and
here the "Poor Ladies" were to pass their days in prayer and manual
labour. The little humble grey stone building among the olive trees
with the pomgranates flowering against its walls, so different to a
convent of the present day, must have seemed to Clare the realisation
of a freer life than ever she had known before. Others felt its charm
and before long several friends had joined her besides Bianca
Guelfucci, while upon the death of Count Favorino, Madonna Ortolana
received the habit from the hands of St. Francis together with her
youngest daughter Beatrice. The fame of the order spread far and wide,
gaining so many novices that several new houses were founded in Italy
even during the first few years. In those early days St. Clare was
given no written law to follow, but like the brethren she and her nuns
learnt all the perfection of a religious life from St. Francis, who
would often stop at San Damiano on his way to and from the town. He
did not allow them to go beyond their boundaries, but a busy life was
to be passed in their cells; owning nothing, they were to depend
entirely upon what the brothers could beg for them in the town and
country round, and when provisions were scarce they fasted. In return
the nuns spun the grey stuff for the habits of the friars and the
linen for their altars; and after St. Francis received the Stigmata,
St. Clare fashioned sandals for him with space for the nails so that
he might walk with more ease. Often the poor came to seek help at her
hands, and many times the sick were tended in a little mud hut near
her cell which she used as a hospital. Silently her life was passed,
and to those who looked on from the outside perhaps it might have
seemed of small avail compared with the very apparent results of St.
Francis' endeavours to help his fellow creatures. But very quietly she
was guiding the women of mediæval Italy towards higher aims, for even
those who could not follow her into the cloister were aided in their
lives at home by the thought of the pure-souled gentle nun of San
Damiano. Not the least important part of her work was the womanly
sympathy and help which she gave to St. Francis. He turned to her when
in trouble, and it was she who encouraged him to continue preaching to
the people when, at one time he thought that his vocation was to be a
life of solitary prayer and not of constant contact with mankind. He
counted on her prayers, and trusting in her counsel went forward once
more to preach the words of redemption. From her lonely cell she
watched his work with tender solicitude, and when blind and ill he
came for the last time to San Damiano she tended to his wants in a
little hut she erected for him not far from the convent whence, across
the vineyard and olive grove which separated them, the first strains
of his glorious Canticle to the Sun came to her one morning. Her
gentle influence played an important part in his life, giving him a
friendship which is one of the most beautiful things to dwell on in
their lives. Some have sneered at its purity, and compared so ideal a
connection to a commonplace mediæval tale of monk and nun; but it is
degrading even to hint at such an ending to the love of these two for
each other, and impossible to believe it after reading M. Sabatier's
beautiful chapter on St. Clare, where he touches, in some of his most
charming pages, upon a side of St. Francis' character that most
biographers have but little understood.
A beautiful story in the _Fioretti_ relates how once St. Clare,
desiring greatly to eat with St. Francis, a boon he had never accorded
her, was granted the request at the earnest prayer of the brethren,
"and that she may be the more consoled," he said, "I will that this
breaking of bread take place in St. Mary of the Angels; for she has
been so long shut up in S. Damian that it will rejoice her to see
again the House of Mary, where her hair was shorn off, and she became
the bride of Christ." Once more St. Clare came to the plain of the
Portiuncula, and the saint spoke so sweetly and eloquently of heavenly
things that all remained wrapped in ecstacy, oblivious of the food
which was spread before them on the floor and, as Clare dwelt in
divine contemplation, a great flame sprang up and shrouded them in
celestial light. The Assisans and the people of Bettona, looking down
from their walls upon the plain, thought that the Portiuncula was on
fire, and hurried to the assistance of their beloved saint. "But
coming close to the House," says the _Fioretti_, "they entered within,
and found St. Francis and St. Clare with all their company in
contemplation wrapt in God as they sat round the humble board."
Comforted by this spiritual feast St. Clare returned to San Damiano,
where she was expected with great anxiety, as it had been imagined
that St. Francis might have sent her to rule some other convent,
"wherefore the sisters rejoiced exceedingly when they saw her face
again." Those were peaceful and happy days, but sorrow came when news
reached her that St. Francis was near his end; "she wept most
bitterly, and refused to be comforted," for she too was ill, and
feared to die before she could see his face again. This fear she
signified through a brother unto the Blessed Francis, and when the
saint, who loved her with a singular and paternal affection, heard it,
he had pity on her; and considering that her desire to see him once
more could not be fulfilled in the future, he sent her a letter with
his benediction and absolving her from every fault.... "Go and tell
sister Clare to lay aside all sadness and sorrow, for now she cannot
see me, but of a truth before her death both she and her sisters shall
see me and be greatly comforted." But the last she saw of him was
through a lattice window, when they brought his dead body for the nuns
to see and kiss the pierced hands and feet (see p. 119).
* * * * *
[Illustration: SAN DAMIANO, SHOWING THE WINDOW WITH THE LEDGE WHENCE
ST. CLARE ROUTED THE SARACENS]
A strange thing happened to disturb the peaceful serenity of their
lives at San Damiano in the year 1234, when the army of Frederic II,
was fighting in the north of Italy, and a detachment of Saracen troops
under one of his generals, Vitale d'Anversa, came through Umbria,
pillaging the country as they passed. Assisi was a desirable prey, as
it had been to many before them, and coming to the convent of San
Damiano they scaled its walls, preparatory to a final rush upon the
town. The terror of the nuns may be imagined, and running to the cell
where Clare lay ill in bed they cowered round her "like frightened
doves when the hawk has stooped upon their dovecote." Taking the
Blessed Sacrament, which she was allowed to keep in a little chapel
next to her cell, she proceeded to face the whole army, trusting like
St. Martin in the power of prayer and personal courage. As she walked
towards the window overlooking the small courtyard a voice spoke to
her from the ciborium saying, "Assisi will have much to suffer, but my
arm shall defend her." Raising the Blessed Sacrament on high she stood
at the open window, against which the soldiers had already placed a
ladder; those who were ascending, as they looked up towards her, fell
back blinded, while the others took to flight, and thus cloister and
city were saved through the intercession of the gentle saint. Vitale
d'Anversa, who had not been present at the prodigy, probably thinking
the soldiers had failed in their enterprise through lack of valour,
came with a still larger company of men, and led them in person to
storm the town. St. Clare, hearing what peril encompassed Assisi, and
being asked by the citizens to intercede with Heaven as the enemy had
sworn to bury them beneath their city walls, gathered all her nuns
about her, and knelt in prayer with them. At dawn the next morning a
furious tempest arose, scattering the tents of the Saracens in every
direction, and causing such a panic that they took refuge in hasty
flight. The gratitude of the citizens increased their love for St.
Clare, as all attributed their release to her prayers, and to this day
she is regarded as the deliverer of her country.
One cannot help regretting that while so many contemporary chroniclers
have left detailed and varied accounts of St. Francis, they only
casually allude to St. Clare, calling her "a sweet spring blossom," or
"the chief rival of the Blessed Francis in the observance of Gospel
perfection," but leaving later writers to form their own pictures of
the saint. And the picture they give is always of a silent and
prayerful nun, beautiful of feature, sweet and gentle of disposition,
coming ever to the help of those who needed it, and acting the part of
a guardian angel to the Assisans. Her horizon was bounded by the
mountains of the Spoletan valley; and from the outside world, on which
her influence worked so surely during her life and for long centuries
after her death, only faint echoes reached her when a pope or a
cardinal came to see her, or a princess wrote her a letter from some
distant country. Among the many royal and noble people who had entered
a Poor Clare sisterhood, or like St. Elizabeth of Hungary had joined
the Third Order, was the Blessed Agnes, daughter of the King of
Bohemia, who, kindled with a desire for a religious life upon hearing
the story of St. Clare, refused the hand of Frederick II, and passed
her life in a convent. Often she wrote to the Assisan abbess getting
in reply most charming letters, beginning "To her who is dearer to me
than any other mortal," or "To the daughter of the King of Kings, to
the Queen of Virgins, to the worthy spouse of Jesus Christ; the
unworthy servant of the poor nuns of San Damiano sends greetings and
rejoicings in the good fortune of living always in the extremest
poverty." These two never met, but their friendship was a close one,
and their correspondence, of which many letters are preserved, ceased
only with their death.
St. Clare survived St. Francis twenty-seven years, and they were sad
years for one, who, like her clung so devoutly to his rule and
teaching. She lived to see the first divisions among the franciscans,
and before she died the corner-stone of the great Basilica had been
raised, filling her with dismay for the future, for in its very
grandeur and beauty she saw the downfall of the franciscan ideal. Not
only did she witness all these changes, but in her own convent she had
many battles to fight for the preservation of the rule she loved, she
even courageously opposed the commands of the Pope himself who wished
to mould the nuns to his wishes as he had done the friars. Even during
the lifetime of St. Francis, while he was absent on a distant
pilgrimage, Gregory IX, then Cardinal Ugolino, persuaded St. Clare of
the necessity of having a written rule, and gave her that of the
Benedictine nuns. But when she found that, although it was strict
enough, it allowed the holding of property in community, which was
entirely against the spirit of her order, she refused to agree to the
innovation. So upon the saint's return he composed a written rule for
the sisters, so strict, it is said, that its perusal drew tears from
the eyes of the Cardinal Ugolino. Still she had to fight the battle of
loyalty to a dead saint's memory; for the very year that Gregory came
to Assisi for the canonisation of St. Francis he paid a visit to St.
Clare, and with earnest words endeavoured to persuade her to mitigate
her rule. She held so firmly to her way that the Pope thought she
might perhaps be thinking of the vow of poverty which she had made at
the Portiuncula, and told her he could absolve her from it through the
powers of his papal keys. Then Clare summoned all her courage as she
faced the Pontiff, and said to him these simple words which showed
him he need try no more to tempt her from duty, "Ah holy father," she
cried, "I crave for the absolution of my sins, but I desire not to be
absolved from following Jesus Christ."
Gregory had often been puzzled by the unique unworldliness of St.
Francis; his admiration for St. Clare was even more profound, and in
reading his letters after leaving the franciscan abbess one forgets
that he was over eighty at the time. With him she had gained her point
once and for all, but upon his death she had to oppose the wishes of
Innocent IV, who did all in his power to merge the franciscan order of
Poor Clares into an ordinary Benedictine community. Again it ended in
the triumph of St. Clare, and the day before her death she had the joy
of receiving the news that the Pope had issued a papal bull
sanctioning the rule for which both St. Francis and she had fought;
namely, that they were to live absolutely poor without any worldly
possession of any kind. "N'est-ce pas," says M. Sabatier, "un des plus
beaux tableaux de l'histoire religieuse, que celui de cette femme qui,
pendant plus d'un quart de siècle, soutient contre les papes qui se
succèdent sur le trône pontifical une lutte de tous les instants; qui
demeure également respectueuse et inébranlable, et ne consent à mourir
qu'après avoir remporté la victoire?"
St. Clare during the remaining years of her life suffered continually
from ill-health, and it was from a bed of infirmity that she so
ardently prayed the Pope to sanction her rule of poverty, and enjoined
the sisterhood to keep its tenets faithfully. Like St. Francis, brave
and cheerful to the last, she called her weeping companions around her
to give them her final blessing and farewell. Among them knelt the
Blessed Agnes, who had come from her nunnery in Florence to assist her
sister, and the three holy brethren Leo, Angelo and Juniper. On the
11th of August 1253, the feast of St. Rufino, as she was preparing to
leave the world they heard her speak, but so softly that the words
were lost to them. "Mother, with whom are you conversing?" asked one
of the nuns, and she answered: "Sister, I am speaking with this little
soul of mine, now blessed, to whom the glory of paradise is already
opening."
Then as the evening closed in and they were still watching, a great
light was seen to fill the doorway leading from the oratory of St.
Clare to her cell; and from out of it came a long procession of
white-robed virgins led by the Queen of Heaven, whose head was crowned
with a diadem of shining gold, and whose eyes sent forth such
splendour as might have changed the night into the brightest day. And
as each of the celestial visitors stooped to kiss St. Clare, the
watching nuns knew that her soul had already reached its home.
* * * * *
Once the little chapel of San Damiano has been seen there can be no
fear of ever forgetting the charm attached to the memory of St. Clare,
for she has left there something of her own character and personality,
which we feel instinctively without being able quite to explain its
presence. So near the town, only just outside its walls, this little
sanctuary yet remains as in the olden times, one of the most peaceful
spots that could have been chosen for a nunnery; but the silence which
falls upon one while resting on the stone seats before entering the
courtyard, has this difference with the silence of such a piazza as
that of San Rufino or of some of the Assisan streets; that there the
buildings tell of an age which is dead whose memories raise no
responsive echoes in our hearts, whereas San Damiano is filled with
the associations of those who, living so long ago, yet have left the
atmosphere of their presence as a living influence among us. As we
look at the steep paths below us leading through the fields and the
oak trees down to the plain, to Rivo-Torto and the Portiuncula, we
think how often St. Francis went up and down it whenever he passed to
see St. Clare and her sisters. And how many times did Brother Bernard
come with messages when he lay dying, and news was anxiously awaited
at San Damiano; then along the grass path skirting the hill from Porta
Mojano were seen the crowds of nobles, townsfolk, peasants and friars
bearing the dead body of the saint to San Giorgio, and pausing awhile
at the convent for the love of St. Clare. A pope with all his
cardinals next passes, on a visit to the young abbess; St. Bonaventure
stops to ask her prayers; while the poor and the ill were ever
knocking at the convent door to obtain her help or a word of kindly
sympathy. In the Umbrian land it is so easy to realise these things,
they are more than simply memories for those who have time to pause
and dream awhile; and sometimes it has seemed, while reading the
_Fioretti_ or Brother Leo's chronicle beneath the olive trees of San
Damiano, that we have slipped back through the ages, and looking up we
half expect to see the hurrying figure of St. Francis moving quickly
in and out among the trees. Suddenly the low sound of chanting comes
through the open door of the convent reaching us like the incessant
drone of a swarm of bees in the sunshine, until it dies away, and
brown-clothed, sandalled brethren pass out across the courtyard, and
two by two disappear down the hill on their way to the Portiuncula.
They bring a whole gallery of portraits before our eyes, of brethren
we read of, the companions of St. Francis; but when we look along the
path they have taken and see the church of the Angeli standing high in
the midst of the broad valley, its dome showing dark purple against
the afternoon light, where we had thought to catch a glimpse of the
Portiuncula and a circle of mud huts, the dream of the olden time
fades suddenly away. As we turn to enter the little church of San
Damiano with the image of the great church of the plain still in our
thoughts, we feel how much we owe to the reverence of the people and
the friars who have kept it so simple and unadorned, its big stones
left rough and weather-beaten as when St. Francis came to prepare a
dwelling-house for sister Clare. Truly says M. Sabatier, "ce petit
coin de terre ombrienne sera, pour nos descendants, comme ce puits de
Jacob où Jésus s'assit un instant, un des parvis préférés du culte en
esprit et en vérité."
The church is very small and dim, with no frescoed walls or altar
pictures to arouse the visitor's interest, and only its connection
with the names of Francis and Clare bring the crowds who come to pray
here. Even the crucifix which spoke to St. Francis, telling him to
rebuild the ruined sanctuary, no longer hangs in the choir, but is now
in the keeping of the nuns in Santa Chiara. A few relics are kept in
the cupboard--a pectoral cross given by St. Bonaventure, the bell with
which St. Clare called the sisters to office, her breviary written by
Brother Leo in his neat, small writing, and the tabernacle of
alabaster which she held up before the invading host of Saracens upon
that memorable occasion. There is also a small loaf of bread which
recalls the well-known story recounted in the _Fioretti_ (cap.
xxxiii.) of how Pope Innocent IV, came to see St. Clare, "to hear her
speak of things celestial and divine; and as they were thus
discoursing together on diverse matters, St. Clare ordered dinner to
be made ready, and the bread to be laid on the table so that the Holy
Father might bless it; and when their spiritual conference was
finished, St. Clare, kneeling most reverently, prayed him to bless the
bread which was on the table. The Holy Father replied: 'Most faithful
Sister Clare, I will that thou shouldst bless this bread and make upon
it the sign of the most blessed Cross of Christ, to whom thou hast so
entirely given thyself.' St. Clare said: 'Holy Father, pardon me, for
I should be guilty of too great a presumption if in the presence of
the Vicar of Christ, I, who am but a miserable woman, should presume
to give such a benediction.' And the Pope answered: 'That this should
not be ascribed to presumption, but to the merit of obedience, I
command thee by holy obedience to make the sign of the Holy Cross on
this bread, and to bless it in the name of God.' Then St. Clare, as a
true daughter of obedience, most devoutly blessed that bread with the
sign of the Holy Cross. And marvellous to say, incontinently on all
the loaves the sign of the Holy Cross appeared most fairly impressed;
then of that bread part was eaten and part kept for the miracle's
sake."
A ring belonging to St. Clare was also kept here, until in the year
1615 a Spanish franciscan vicar-general with his secretary came to
visit San Damiano, and such was his devotion for anything that had
belonged to the saintly abbess that when a few months later the relics
were being shown to some other visitors, the precious ring was
missing. A great disturbance arose in the city, and angry letters were
speedily sent after the Spanish priest as suspicion had fallen upon
him at once; he did not deny that he had piously stolen the ring, but
as it was now well upon its way to Spain where, he assured the irate
Assisans, it would be much honoured and well cared for, he refused to
return it. The citizens and friars still regret the day that the
Spanish dignitary and his secretary called at San Damiano.
The small chapel out of the nave was built in the middle of the
seventeenth century to contain the large Crucifix which is still
there, and whose story is very famous. In 1634 Brother Innocenzo of
Palermo was sent to the convent to carve a crucifix for the friars,
his sanctity and the talent he possessed as an artist being well
known. After nine days he completed all except the head, and on
returning next morning after early mass he found that mysterious hands
had fashioned it during the night; not only was it of wonderful
workmanship, but looking at it from three different points of view
three different expressions were seen--of peace, of agony, and of
death. The fame of the Crucifix spread throughout Umbria, and people
flocked to San Damiano. "Now, the devil," says a chronicler, "very
wrath to see such devotion in so many hearts, turned his mind to
finding out some means of sowing seeds of discord. Through his doing
there arose in Assisi a whisper that owing to the rapidly growing fame
of this Crucifix, the ancient one of the cathedral would lose the
veneration in which it had hitherto been held."
Now before placing the Crucifix of San Damiano in its place over the
high altar the monks settled that it should be carried in solemn
procession through Assisi. "But," writes the angry chronicler, "those
who had joined this diabolical conspiracy against our Crucifix were
not slow to prevent this, and had recourse to the Inquisitor of
Perugia, who was induced to send his vicar to stop the procession, and
bid the monks of San Damiano to keep their Crucifix hidden and allow
no one to see it." There arose a terrible storm in the troubled
community of Assisi, between those who took the part of the
"persecuted Crucifix" and those who sided with the jealous canons of
the cathedral. Finally, the case was placed before the Pope himself,
and all waited anxiously the result of his investigations. A duplicate
of the Crucifix of San Damiano was sent to Rome that it might be well
examined by the Pope and the whole college of cardinals, and they not
finding in the pious Brother Innocenzio's work anything contrary to
the teaching of the gospel, it was unanimously decreed that the
Crucifix of San Damiano might receive all the homage and love of the
friars and citizens. So on a burning Sunday in August solemn high mass
was sung at the altar of St. Clare in San Damiano and, although the
friars were defrauded of their procession, such was the concourse of
people who came to gain the plenary indulgence granted by His Holiness
that the good friars rejoiced, and were comforted for all the
persecution they had suffered on account of this marvellous Crucifix.
What must have been the feelings of Brother Innocenzo as he stood by
the high altar and watched the crowd of worshippers and the women
lifting up their streaming eyes to the crucifix he had fashioned in
his cell? The devotion to it grew as the years passed on, and we read
that a century later the monks were obliged "for their greater quiet
to transfer it from the choir to the chapel," where it now is, after
which the monks could say their office in peace. Now we see it
surrounded with votive offerings, and our guide pours forth an
incessant stream of praise, and recounts at length numberless
miracles.
Through the chapel of the Crucifix we reach the choir of St. Clare,
left as when she used it, with the old worm-eaten stalls against the
wall. It is probable that originally this was part of the house of the
priest who had the keeping of San Damiano before the benedictines gave
it to the Poor Clares; for here is shown the recess in the wall where
St. Francis hid when his father came to seek for him, and where he is
supposed to have lived in hiding for a whole month until the storm
should have blown over. It was for the rebuilding of the chapel that
he had taken bales of costly stuffs from the Bernardone warehouse in
Assisi to sell at the fair of Foligno, and thus called forth the wrath
of Messer Pietro. The good priest of San Damiano was so much
astonished at this sudden conversion of Francis, that thinking he
mocked him he refused to accept the purse of gold, which Francis
finally threw on to a dusty window-sill. But the priest soon became
his friend, allowing him to remain at San Damiano and partake of such
humble fare as he could give, joining him in repairing of the poor
ruined chapel.
An artist of the sixteenth century had sought to adorn the altar with
a fresco of the Crucifixion which was only discovered a few months
ago, but the whitewashed walls and severe simplicity of the rest seem
more in keeping with the place than this crude attempt at decoration.
By a rough flight of stairs we reach the small private oratory of St.
Clare, which communicated with her cell and where, in her latter days
of illness, she was permitted to keep the Blessed Sacrament. The rest
of the convent being strict "clausura," ever since the Marquess of
Ripon bought San Damiano from the Italian Government and gave it into
the keeping of the franciscan friars, can only be seen by men. Within
is the refectory of St. Clare where Innocent IV, dined with her and
witnessed the miracle of the loaves, and Eusebio di San Giorgio (1507)
has painted in the cloister two fine frescoes of the Annunciation and
St. Francis receiving the Stigmata.
But anyone may step out into the small and charming garden of St.
Clare which is on a level with her oratory. Walls rising on either
side leave only a narrow vista of the valley where Bevagna, and
Montefalco on her hill, can just be seen. Within this small enclosed
space the saint is said to have taken her daily exercise and carefully
attended to the flowers, and the friars to this day keep a row of
flowers there in memory of her. It will be well on leaving the chapel
of San Damiano to look at the open chapel in the courtyard where
Tiberio d'Assisi has painted one of his most pleasing compositions.
The Madonna is seated in an Umbrian valley, low lines of hills fade
away in the distance, and franciscan saints, among whom St. Jerome
with his lion seems curiously out of place, surround her, while at her
feet is placed the kneeling figure of the nun who succeeded St. Clare
as abbess. It is signed and dated 1517, while the fresco on the
side-wall of St. Sebastian and St. Roch was painted five years later.
In another corner of the courtyard, near the entrance, is a painting
in a niche of the Madonna and saints by some Umbrian artist who felt
the influence of both Giotto and Simone Martini, so that we have a
curious, if pleasing result.
SANTA CHIARA
St. Clare was no sooner dead than the people, as they had done with
St. Francis, sought to honour her memory, but in this case, Innocent
IV, being in Assisi for the consecration of the Franciscan Basilica,
the funeral service was conducted by the Pope and cardinals. Such a
gathering of church dignitaries, Assisan nobles, priors and people had
certainly never been seen in the humble convent of San Damiano; their
presence, though honouring the saint, filled the hearts of the nuns
with sorrow for they knew they had come to take the body of St. Clare
to Assisi. With tears they consented to its being placed in safety in
San Giorgio, but only on the condition that they might eventually be
allowed to live near her tomb in some humble shelter. San Damiano
without her, alive or dead, meant little to them, and they were ready
to abandon a home of so many memories to go where they and their
successors could guard her body to the end of time. Devotion to her
memory and belief in her sanctity was not solely confined to them;
when the friars rose to intone the service of the dead, Pope Innocent
signified that there should be silence, and to the wonder of all
ordered high mass to be sung and the funeral service to be changed
into one of triumph, in honour of her who he believed was already with
the Virgins in heaven. It was a kind of canonisation, but could not be
regarded as valid without the usual preliminaries being performed, and
the cardinals, more cautious and less enthusiastic than His Holiness,
persuaded him to wait and in the meanwhile allow the ordinary service
to proceed. To this he consented, and then amidst music and singing
the Pope led the people up the hill where years before another saint
had been borne to the same church of San Giorgio, and as on that day a
funeral ceremony became a triumphal procession.
Innocent IV, died soon after, and it was Alexander IV, who in
September 1255, two years after her death, canonized St. Clare in a
Bull replete with magnificent eulogy in which there is a constant play
upon her name: "Clara claris præclara meritis, magnæ in coelo
claritate gloriæ, ac in terra miraculorum sublimum clare gaudet ... O
admiranda Claræ beatæ claritas." Another two years were allowed to
elapse before they began to erect a building to her memory; besides
the readiness shown by every town to honour their saints, the Assisans
had especial cause to remember St. Clare, as she had twice saved them
from the Saracen army of Frederic II. Willingly the magistrates and
nobles, besides many strangers who had heard of the saint's renown,
contributed money for the new building, and Fra Filippo Campello the
minorite was chosen as the architect. Fine as his new work proved to
be it was rather the copy of a masterpiece than the inspiration of a
great architect, which makes it more probable that he was only
employed in completing the church of San Francesco from the designs of
that first mysterious architect, and not, as some have said, its sole
builder.
The canons of San Rufino offered the church and hospital of San
Giorgio which belonged to them. A more fitting site for the church to
be raised in honour of St. Clare could not have been chosen, for it
was here that St. Francis had learnt to read and write as a child
under the guidance of the parish priest; here he preached his first
sermon, and later touched the heart of Clare by his words during the
lenten services; and here both of them were laid in their stone urns
until their last resting places were ready. So around the little old
parish church with its many memories, and within sight of the Scifi
palace, arose "as if by magic" the new temple with its tall and
slender campanile. The hospital enlarged and improved became the
convent, and the church was used by the nuns as a choir, the rest of
the large building, which they could only see through iron gratings,
being for the use of the congregation. With its alternate layers of
pink and cream-coloured stone, wheel window and finely modelled door,
the church fits well into its sunny piazza, and is a beautiful ending
to the eastern side of Assisi. But in building it Fra Filippo forgot
the crumbling nature of the soil, and failed to overcome the
difficulty of position as had been done so admirably at San Francesco,
so that in 1351 it became necessary to prop up the sides by strong
flying buttresses, which, while serving as an imposing arched entrance
to the side of the church, sadly detract from the feeling of solidity
of the main building. A darker stone with no rosy tints was used for
the convent, which makes it look very grim and old as it rises out of
a soft and silvery setting of olive trees on the hillside, with
orchards near of peaches and almonds. There is a great charm in the
brown, weather-beaten convent, though a certain sadness when we
remember, in looking at its tiny windows like holes in the wall
through which only narrow vistas of the beautiful valley can be seen,
how changed must be the lives of these cloistered nuns from those of
the Poor Ladies of San Damiano in the time of St. Clare. They are now
an order of the orthodox type, an order given to prayer and not to
labour, and seeing no human face from the outside world except through
an iron grating. So early as 1267 their connection with the franciscan
brotherhood ceased; the brethren no longer heard their confessions or
begged for them through the land as St. Francis had decreed; they
lived under the patronage of the Pope, who declared their convent to
be under the especial jurisdiction of the Holy See, and on the feast
of St. Francis called upon the nuns to send a pound of wax candles in
sign of tribute. As the Pope had often in olden times become master of
Assisi so now he obtained the rule over her monastic institutions,
gaining the temporal allegiance of the religious, as he had gained
that of the citizens.
[Illustration: SANTA CHIARA]
Upon entering the church of Santa Chiara out of the sunshine, we are
struck with a sense of the coldness of its scant ornamentation, a want
of colour, and a general idea that artists in first directing their
steps to San Francesco had not had time to give much thought to the
church of the gentle saint. Giottino is said by Vasari to have painted
frescoes here, and they may be those ruined bits of colour in the
right transept where it is only possible to distinguish a few heads or
parts of figures here and there in what seems to be a procession,
perhaps the Translation of St. Clare from San Damiano to San Giorgio.
It is said that their present condition of ruin is due to the German
bishop Spader who, fearing that the nuns might see too much of the
world through the narrow grating because of the number of people who
came to see the frescoes, had them whitewashed in the seventeenth
century. The people came less, the nuns were safer, but Giottino's (?)
frescoes are lost to us and we do not bless the memory of the German
bishop of Assisi. The frescoes of the ceiling he did not touch, and
we have in them some interesting work of an artist of the fourteenth
century whose name is unknown, but who undoubtedly followed the
Giottesque traditions, though not with the fidelity or the genius of
the artist who painted the legend of St. Nicholas in San Francesco. In
decorating the four spandrels he has been influenced by the allegories
of Giotto, and the angels are grouped round the principal figures in
much the same manner; they kneel, some with hands crossed upon their
breasts, but they are silent worshippers with not a single instrument
among them. The saints who stand in the midst of the angels in Gothic
tabernacles are the Madonna with a charming Infant Jesus who grasps
her mantle, and St. Clare; St. Cecilia crowned with roses, and St.
Lucy; St. Agnes holding a lamb, and St. Rose of Viterbo; St.
Catherine, and St. Margaret with a book in her hand. The artist has
used such soft harmonious colours and bordered his frescoes with such
pretty medallions of saints' heads and designs of foliage that one
wishes he had been given the whole church to decorate and thus saved
it from its present desolate appearance.
The large crucifix behind the altar, a characteristic work of that
time, has been ascribed to Margaritone, Giunta Pisano, or Cimabue. It
was painted, as the inscription says, by the order of the abbess
Benedicta, who succeeded St. Clare and was the first to rule in the
new convent, but the artist did not sign his name. The chapel of St.
Agnes contains a Madonna which Herr Thode with far-seeing eyes
recognises through all its layers of modern paint as Cimabue's work.
There is also a much retouched, but rather charming picture of St.
Clare, painted according to its inscription in 1283. She stands in her
heavy brown dress and mantle, a thick cord round her waist, and on
either side are scenes from her life. The small triptych of the
Crucifixion on a gold ground is an interesting work by the artist of
the four frescoes of the ceiling, and a nearer view of some of the
peculiarities of his style is obtained. It is impossible to mistake
the long slender necks, the curiously shaped ears with the upper part
very long, the narrow eyes, straight noses and small mouths, sometimes
drooping slightly at the corners, which he gives his figures. He is
another of those nameless painters who came to Assisi in the wake of
the great Florentine.
The visitor would leave Santa Chiara with a feeling of disappointment
were it not for the chapel of San Giorgio, the original place so often
mentioned in connection with St. Francis and now open to the public.
The crucifix of the tenth century, so famous for having bowed its head
to St. Francis in the church of San Damiano bidding him to repair the
ruined churches of Assisi, is to be removed from the parlour, where it
is temporarily kept, and placed behind the altar. The chapel, with a
groined roof, is square, small and of perfect form, and ornamented
with several frescoes. On the left wall is a delightful St. George
fighting the dragon in the presence of a tall princess, her face
showing very white against her red hair. There is a naïve scene of the
Magi, whose sleeves are as long and whose hands are as spidery as
those of the princess; and above is an Annunciation. Behind the
curtain in the fresco a small child is standing who is evidently the
donor, but some people believe he represents the Infant Jesus, which
certainly would account for the surprised attitude of the Virgin. This
wall was painted in the sixteenth century by some artist of the Gubbio
school, but his name we have been unable to discover. Quite a
different character marks the frescoes upon the next wall, which would
seem to be the work of an Umbrian scholar of Simone Martini, or at
least by one more influenced by the Sienese than the Florentine
masters. There is a softness and an ivory tone in the paintings of the
saints, a languid look in their eyes, a sweetness about the mouth
peculiar to the Umbrian followers of Simone, who like him succeed less
well with male than with female saints. Here the Madonna, seated on a
Gothic throne against a crimson dais, with a broad forehead and blue
eyes, her soft veil falling in graceful folds about her slender neck,
is unusually charming. The St. George with his shield is perhaps less
disappointing than St. Francis, but then Simone fails to quite express
the nature of the Seraphic Preacher. We turn to St. Clare of the oval
face and clear brown eyes, and feel that the painter had a subject
which appealed to him, even to the brown habit and black veil which
makes the face seem more delicate and fair. Above are the Crucifixion,
Entombment and Resurrection, suggesting in the strained attitudes of
the figures a follower of Pietro Lorenzetti. Some remains of frescoes
upon the next wall resemble those in the nave of the Lower Church, and
probably also belong to the second half of the thirteenth century.
Indeed the architecture of the chapel bears a striking resemblance to
San Francesco, so that although this is the original building of San
Giorgio which existed long before the Franciscan Basilica, it was in
all probability remodelled by Fra Campello, who may have given it the
pretty groined roof.
But above all the works of art and all the views of church or convent,
the pious pilgrim treasures the privilege of being able to gaze upon
the body of the saint in the crypt below the high altar reached by a
broad flight of marble stairs. St. Clare had been buried so far out of
sight and reach that her tomb was only found in the year 1850, after
much search had been made. Five bishops, with Cardinal Pecci, now
Pope Leo XIII, and the magistrates of the town, were present at the
opening of the sepulchre; the iron bars which bound it were filed
asunder, and the body of the saint was found lying clad in her brown
habit as if buried but a little while since; the wild thyme which her
companions had sprinkled round her six hundred years ago, withered as
it was, still sent up a sweet fragrance, while a few green and tender
leaves are said to have been clinging to her veil. So great was the
joy at discovering this precious relic that a procession was organised
"with pomp impossible to describe."
[Illustration: SANTA CHIARA FROM NEAR THE PORTA MOJANO]
On the Sunday at dawn every bell commenced to ring calling the people
to high mass, and never, says a proud chronicler, were so many bishops
and such a crowd seen as upon that day. At the elevation of the Host
the bells pealed forth again announcing the solemn moment to the
neighbouring villages; soon after the procession was formed of lay
confraternities, priests and friars, and little children dressed as
angels strewed the way with flowers. The peasants, with tears raining
down their cheeks, pressed near the coffin, and had to be kept back by
some of the Austrian soldiers then quartered in Assisi. First they
went to the Cathedral, then to San Francesco, "the body of St. Clare
thus going to salute the body of her great master. Oh admirable
disposition of God." It was evening before they returned to the church
of Santa Chiara, where the nuns anxiously awaited them at the entrance
of their cloister to place the body of their foundress in the chapel
of San Giorgio until a sanctuary should be built beneath the high
altar. It was soon finished, ornamented with Egyptian alabaster and
Italian marbles, and the body of St. Clare was laid there to be
venerated by the faithful.
As pilgrims stand before a grating in the dimly lighted crypt the
gentle rustle of a nun's dress is heard; slowly invisible hands draw
the curtain aside, and St. Clare is seen lying in a glass case upon a
satin bed, her face clearly outlined against her black and white
veils, whilst her brown habit is drawn in straight folds about her
body. She clasps the book of her Rule in one hand, and in the other
holds a lily with small diamonds shining on the stamens. The silence
is unbroken save for the gentle clicking of the rosary beads slipping
through the fingers of the invisible nun who keeps watch, and as she
lets the curtain down again and blows out the lights there is a
feeling that we have intruded upon the calm sleep of the "Seraphic
Mother."
FOOTNOTES:
[101] As the hated enemies of the Baglioni the Fiumi are often
mentioned in the chronicles of Matarazzo, and they played an important
part in the history of their native city. They were Counts of
Sterpeto, and the village of that name on the hill to the west of
Assisi above the banks of the Chiaggio still belongs to the family.
[102] One of the first of the franciscans was Rufino, a nephew of
Count Favorino's, whose holiness was such that in speaking of him to
the other brethren St. Francis would call him St. Rufino.
CHAPTER X
_Other Buildings in the Town_
The Cathedral of San Rufino. Roman Assisi. The Palazzo Pubblico.
The Chiesa Nuova. S. Paolo. Sta. Maria Maggiore. S. Quirico. S.
Appolinare. S. Pietro. The Confraternities (Chiesa dei
Pellegrini, etc.). The Castle.
Assisi is the only town we know of in Italy where the interest does
not centre round its cathedral and a certain sadness is felt, which
perhaps is not difficult to explain; St. Francis holds all in his
spell now just as he held the people long ago, so that the saints who
first preached Christianity to the Assisans, were martyred and brought
honour to the city, are almost forgotten and their churches deserted.
The citizens, though proud of their Duomo, with its beautiful brown
façade, hardly appear to love it, and we have often thought that they
too feel the sense of gloom and isolation in the small piazza, which
makes it a place ill-fitted to linger in for long. Men come and go so
silently, women fill their pitchers at the fountain but only the
splashing of water is heard, and they quickly disappear down a street;
even the houses have no life, for while the windows are open no one
looks out, and the total absence of flowers gives them a further look
of desolation. This part of the town was already old in mediæval
times, and the far away mystery of an age which has few records still
lives around the cathedral and its bell tower. San Rufino stands in
the very centre of Roman Assisi and its history begins very soon
after the Roman era, one might say was contemporary with it, as the
saint whose name it bears, was martyred in the reign of Diocletian.
All the details of his death, together with the charming legend about
the building of the cathedral, come down to us in a hymn by St. Peter
Damian, who, although writing in 1052 of things which it is true
happened long before, had very likely learnt the traditions about it
from the Assisans while he lived in his mountain hermitage near
Gubbio. The story goes back to the time when the Roman consul of
Assisi received orders to stamp out the fast-spreading roots of
Christianity, and began his work by putting to death St. Rufino, the
pastor of the tiny flock. The soldiers hurried the Bishop down to the
river Chiaggio and, after torturing him in horrible fashion, flung him
into the water with a heavy stone round his neck. Some say that the
Emperor Diocletian came in person to see his orders carried out. That
night the Assisan Christians stole down to the valley to rescue the
body of their Bishop and place it in safety within the castle of
Costano, which still stands in the fields close to the river but
almost hidden by the peasant houses built around it. Here, in a marble
sarcophagus he rested, cared for and protected by each succeeding
generation of Christians who had learned from tradition to love his
memory, and secretly they visited the castle in the plain to pray by
the tomb of the martyred saint. Their vigilance continued until the
fifth century, when the Christians had already begun to burn the Pagan
temples and build churches of their own. Christianity, indeed, spread
so rapidly throughout Umbria that other towns cultivated a love for
relics, and fearing that the body of St. Rufino might be stolen from
the castle in the open country, the Assisans took the first
opportunity of bringing it within the town. In the year 412 Bishop
Basileo, with his clergy and congregation met at Costano, to seek
through prayer some inspiration so that they might know where to take
the body of their saint. As they knelt by his tomb an old man of
venerable aspect suddenly appeared among them, and spoke these words
in the Lord's name: "Take," he said, "two heifers which have not felt
the yoke, and harness them to a car whereon you shall lay the body of
St. Rufino. Follow the road taken by the heifers and where they stop,
there, in his honour shall ye build a church." These words were
faithfully obeyed: the heifers, knowing what they were to do, turned
towards Assisi, and brought the relics, through what is now the Porta
S. Pietro, to that portion of the old town known as the "Good Mother"
because the goddess Ceres is said to be buried there. The heifers then
turned slowly round, faced the Bishop and his people, and refused to
move. For some obscure reason the place did not please the Assisans,
and they began to build a church further up the hill; but every
morning they found the walls, which had been erected during the
preceding day, pulled down, until discouraged, they submitted to the
augury, and returned to the spot chosen by the heifers. Before long,
over the tomb of the Roman goddess, arose the first Christian church
of Assisi, dedicated to San Rufino.
[Illustration: CAMPANILE OF SAN RUFINO]
A few years ago the late Canon Elisei who has written many interesting
pamphlets on the cathedral, obtained permission from the government to
clear away the rubble beneath the present church; masses of Roman
inscriptions and pieces of sculpture were brought to light, together
with part of the primitive church of Bishop Basileo, and the whole of
what is known as the Chiesa Ugonia, from the Bishop of that name who
built it in 1028. With lighted torches the visitor can descend to the
primitive basilica and realise what a peaceful spot had been chosen
for this early place of worship, while picturing the Christians as
they knelt round the body of their Bishop, the light falling dimly
upon them through the narrow Lombard windows. The six columns, with
their varied capitals rising straight from the ground without the
support of bases, give a somewhat funereal aspect, recalling a crypt
rather than a church. The few vestiges of frescoes in the apse--St.
Mark and his lion, and St. Costanso, Bishop of Perugia--are said to
be, with the paintings in S. Celso at Verona, the oldest in Italy
after those in the catacombs at Rome. Ruins of other frescoes, perhaps
of the same date, can be traced above the door of the first basilica,
together with some stone-work in low relief of vine leaves and grapes,
but it is difficult to see them without going behind a column built in
total disregard of this lower building. The Roman sarcophagus is still
in the apse where the altar once stood, but open and neglected, for
the body of St. Rufino now lies beneath the altar of the present
cathedral. It is ornamented in rough high relief with the story of
Endymion; Diana steps from her chariot towards the sleeping shepherd,
Pomona has her arms full of fruit and flowers, and there are nymphs
and little gods of love and sleep. "It appeared to us," remarks one
prudish chronicler of the church, "the first time we beheld it, that
it was indecent to have present before the eyes of the faithful so
unseemly a fable; our scruples we however laid aside in remembering
that Holy Church is endowed with the power of purging from temples,
altars and urns, all pagan abominations, and from superstition to turn
them to the true service of God." No such scruples existed during the
early times, and there is an amusing story of how the people wishing
to place the marble sarcophagus, which had been left at Costano five
centuries before, in the Chiesa Ugonia, were prevented by the Bishop
who admired it, and had given orders that it should be brought to his
palace at Sta. Maria Maggiore. A great tumult arose in the town, but
although the people came to blows and the fight was serious on both
sides, no blood was shed. A further miracle took place when the
Bishop, determined to have his way, sent sixty men down to Costano who
were unable to move the sarcophagus which remained as though rooted in
the earth; and the event was the more remarkable as seven men
afterwards brought it at a run up the hill to the church of San
Rufino, where it remains to this day.
Already two basilicas had been built in honour of the saint, but the
Assisans dissatisfied with their size and magnificence, in the year
1134 called in the most famous architect of the day, Maestro Giovanni
of Gubbio, who before his death in 1210 had all but completed the
present cathedral and campanile. It is a great surprise when, emerging
from the narrow street leading from the Piazza Minerva thinking to
have seen all that is loveliest in Assisi, we suddenly catch sight of
the cathedral and its bell-tower. The rough brown stone which Maestro
Giovanni has so beautifully worked into delicately rounded columns,
cornices, rose-windows and doors with fantastic beasts, sometimes
looks as dark as a capucin's habit, but there are moments in the late
afternoon when all the warmth of the sun's rays sinks into it,
radiating hues of golden orange which as suddenly deepen to dark brown
again as the light dies away behind the Perugian hills.
All three doors are fine with their quaint ornaments of birds and
beasts and flowers, but upon the central one Giovanni expended all his
art. It is framed in by a double pattern of water-lilies and leaves,
of human faces, beasts, penguins and other birds with a colour in
their wings like tarnished gold. The red marble lions which guard the
entrance, with long arched necks and symmetrical curls, a human figure
between their paws, may belong to an even earlier period, and perhaps
were taken by Giovanni da Gubbio from the Chiesa Ugonia to decorate
his façade, together with the etruscan-looking figures of God the
Father, the Virgin and St. Rufino in the lunette above. Just below the
windows a long row of animals, such pre-historic beasts as may have
walked upon Subasio when no man was there to interrupt their passage,
seem to move in endless procession, and look down with faces one has
seen in dreams.
[Illustration: DOOR OF SAN RUFINO]
The interior of the cathedral is a disappointment; at first we accuse
the great Maestro Giovanni for this painful collection of truncated
lines and inharmonious shapes, until we find how utterly his work was
ruined in the sixteenth century by Galeazzo Alessi of Perugia. To
understand what the church was five centuries before Alessi came, it
is necessary to climb the campanile (only those who are attracted by
ricketty ladders and dizzy heights are advised to make the trial), and
when nearly half way up step out on to Alessi's roof, whence we can
view the havoc he has made. But he could not spoil Giovanni's
rose-windows, and through one of them we see the castle on its green
hill and the town below, cut into sections as though we were looking
at the Umbrian world through a kaleidoscope.
The outside of San Rufino is so lovely that we should be inclined to
advise none to enter, and thus spoil the impression it makes, were it
not for the triptych by Niccolò da Foligno, "the first painter in whom
the emotional, now passionate and violent, now mystic and estatic,
temperament of St. Francis' countrymen was revealed."[103] Here we
find a dreamy Madonna with flaxen hair, surrounded by tiny angels even
fairer than herself in crimson and golden garments folded about their
hips. The lunettes above are studded with patches of jewel-colour,
angels spreading their pointed wings upwards as they seem to be wafted
to and fro by a breeze. Four tall and serious saints stand round the
Virgin like columns; to the right St. Peter Damian busily writing in a
book, and St. Marcello, an Assisan martyr of the fourth century who
might pass for a typical Italian priest of the present day. On the
left is St. Rufino in the act of giving his pastoral blessing, and
St. Esuberanzio, another of Assisi's early martyrs, holding a missal.
They stand in a meadow thickly overgrown with flowers drawn with all
Niccolò's firm outline and love of detail. Fine as the picture is, it
cannot compare with the charming predella where the artist has worked
with the delicacy of a miniature painter. It represents the martyrdom
of St. Rufino; in the first small compartment the Roman soldiers on
horseback, their lances held high in the air, followed by a group of
prying boys, watch the Bishop's tortures as the flames shoot up around
him; and in the distance are two small hill-towns with the towers of
Costano in the plain. Then follows the scene where two young Assisan
Christians have come down to the Chiaggio to rescue the body of their
saint from the river. He lies stiffly in their arms, attired in his
episcopal vestments, and the water has sucked the long folds of his
cope below its surface. The last represents the procession of citizens
led by Bishop Basileo bringing St. Rufino's body from Costano, and is
one of the most exquisite bits of Umbrian painting. Niccolò has placed
the scene in early morning, the air is keen among the mountains, the
sun has just reached Assisi, seen against the white slopes of Subasio,
and turns its houses to a rosy hue, while the tiny wood in the plain
is still in deepest shadow. The white-robed acolytes mount the hill in
the sunlight followed by the people and the heifers which ought,
Niccolò has forgotten, according to the legend, to have led the way.
The picture is signed Opus Nicholai De Fuligneo MCCCCLX.
The only other fine things in the cathedral are the stalls of intarsia
work of carved wood, by Giovanni di Pier Giacomo da San Severino
(1520), a pupil of the man who executed the far finer stalls in San
Francesco. In the chapel of the Madonna del Pianto is a curious
wooden statue of the Pietà, how old and whether of the Italian or
French school it is difficult to say. A tablet records that in 1494
because of the great dissensions in the town this Madonna was seen to
weep, for which she has been much honoured, as is shown by the
innumerable ex-votos hung by the faithful round her altar.
[Illustration: THE DOME AND APSE OF SAN RUFINO FROM THE CANON'S
GARDEN]
The marble statue of St. Francis is by the French artist, M. Dupré (a
replica in bronze stands in the Piazza), while that of St. Clare is by
his daughter, who both generously gave their work to Assisi in 1882.
The statue of St. Rufino is by another Frenchman, M. Lemoyne.
The proudest possession of San Rufino is the font in which St.
Francis, St. Clare, St. Agnes and Frederick II, were baptised, and the
stone is shown upon which the angel knelt, who in the disguise of a
pilgrim assisted at the baptism of Assisi's saint. Often did Francis
come to San Rufino to preach when the small church of S. Giorgio could
no longer hold the crowds who flocked to hear him, and the hut where
the saint spent his nights in prayer and meditation before he preached
in the cathedral is now a chapel. This was the place of the miracle
when his companions at Rivo-Torto saw him descend towards them in a
chariot of fire (see p. 238). In the time of the saint it was the
cottage of a market-gardener and still stands amidst a vineyard, one
of the prettiest and sunniest spots in the town, where vines, onions,
wild flowers and cherry trees grow in happy confusion, and birds and
peasants sing all day long.
The charm of the Cathedral is best realised after witnessing one of
its many ceremonies, when the canons in crimson and purple,
processions of scarlet clothed boys swinging censers, and the Bishop
seated beneath a canopy of yellow damask his cope drawn stiffly to the
ground by a fussing acolyte, recall some of the magnificence of the
middle ages. The young priests bow low before the Bishop on their way
to the altar, return to their seats and bow again; incense fills the
church; the organ peals half drown the tenor's song, and through it
all, from the stalls, drone the voices of the canons reciting their
office. It is a gorgeous service but without a congregation, for even
the beggars have not stolen in; and Niccolò's Madonna looks out upon
the scene with big soft eyes which seem to follow us into the darkest
corners of the aisles.
ROMAN ASSISI.
Assisi is so much a place of one idea--of one interest--around which
everything has grown, that it is difficult to remember that a fairly
important town existed in Roman times, and that the Roman buildings,
still to be seen are, in the opinion of Mr Freeman, worth a visit even
if the church of San Francesco had never arisen. Some pleasant hours
may be passed finding the sites of pagan monuments, the remains of
ancient walls, and tracing the outline of the original town. In every
case we see how Roman Assisi has, in a very marked way, become part of
Mediæval Assisi, palaces having been erected upon the foundations of
Roman houses and Christian churches upon the sites of ancient temples.
The Temple of Hercules stood at the bend of Via S. Quirico (now Via
Garibaldi) where it turns up to the ancient palace of the Scifi; while
the Porta Mojano, near which old walls and part of an aqueduct can be
seen, took its name from a temple of Janus which stood between it and
the Vescovado. Standing a little off the Piazza Nuova, in a part of
the town known as the "Gorga," are the remains of the amphitheatre. It
would be difficult to find much of the original edifice, but houses
having been built exactly on the ancient site its shape has been
preserved, and this strange medley of old and new was thought worthy
of a doric entrance gate by Galeazzo Alessi. Much the same thing has
happened with many of the castles in the country near Assisi, where
the peasant houses are grouped round them in such a way that only by
penetrating into the midst of a tangled mass of dwellings can the
vestige of a tower be here and there discerned to remind us of its
former state. Assisi, though of no military importance at that time,
aspired to become a little Roman town even more perfect than her
neighbours on the hills. The broad and strongly built drain which
extends from near the Porta Perlici beneath the Piazza Nuova to the
garden behind San Rufino, is said to have been used to carry off the
water from the amphitheatre after the mimic sea-fights which in Roman
times were so popular. A use was found for all things, and in time of
war a Roman drain proved a most efficient means of escape, especially
when the Baglioni were raiding the town and putting to death all they
met upon their road.
Some small remains of a Roman theatre are to be seen near the
cathedral but so buried amidst a wild garden that it is difficult to
form any just idea of its extent. The most splendid piece of masonry,
a Roman cistern, lies beneath the campanile of the cathedral and can
be easily looked into by the light of a torch, the sacristan even
suggests a descent into its dark depths by means of a rickety ladder.
An inscription recording the proud fact that Assisi possessed an
amphitheatre has been removed to the cathedral where it is placed
above the side entrance to the left. Other large portions of Roman
walls are to be found at the back of a shop in the Via Portica and
also in the Via San Paolo; both are marked upon the map. In those days
the town seems to have been identical with what we now call old
Assisi, namely the quarter round San Rufino extending to the portion
round San Francescuccio where are noticed the arched Lombard windows.
But by far the most interesting record of this early age is the Temple
of Minerva, which in spite of the damage done when it was turned into
a church, and the way in which the mediæval buildings are crowded
round it, yet remains one of the most beautiful of ancient monuments.
The raising of the Piazza makes it difficult to realise, without going
below ground, how imposing the temple must have been when its steps
led straight down to the Forum. This can be reached by descending from
the Piazza into the "scavi," or excavations, where stands the great
altar with drains for the blood of the victims; the long inscription
giving the name of the donor of the Temple runs:
GAL. TETTIENVS PARDALAS ET TETTIENA GALENE TETTRASTILVM SVA PECVNIA
FECERVNT, ITEM SIMVLACRA CASTORIS ET POLLVCIS. MVNICIPIBVS
ASISINATIBVS DONO DEDER. ET DEDICATIONE EPVLVM DECVRIONIBVS SING. XV.
SEVIR. XIII. PLEBI X. DEDERVNT. S.C.L.D.
It is well known that Goethe went to Assisi solely to see the Temple,
and surprised the citizens by going straight down the hill again
without stopping to visit San Francesco. He wished to keep unimpaired
the impression this perfect piece of classical architecture had made
upon his mind, and we cannot refrain from translating his enthusiastic
description of it for these pages.
"From Palladio and Volkmann I had gathered that a beautiful temple of
Minerva, of the time of Augustus, was still standing and perfectly
preserved. Asking a good-looking youth where Maria della Minerva was,
he led me up through the city which stands on a hill. At length we
reached the oldest part of the town, and I beheld the noble building
standing before me, the first complete monument of ancient days that I
had seen. A modest temple as befitted so small a town, yet so perfect,
so finely conceived, that its beauty would strike one anywhere. But
above all its position! Since reading in Vitruvius and Palladio how
cities ought to be built and temples and other public edifices
situated, I have a great respect for these things.... The temple
stands half way up the mountain, just where two hills meet together,
on a piazza which to this day is called the Piazza.... In old times
there were probably no houses opposite to prevent the view. Abolish
them in imagination, and one would look towards the south over a most
fertile land, whilst the sanctuary of Minerva would be visible from
everywhere. Probably the plan of the streets dates from long ago as
they follow the conformation and sinuosities of the mountain. The
temple is not in the centre of the Piazza, but is so placed that a
striking, though fore-shortened, view of it is obtained by the
traveller coming from Rome. Not only should the building itself be
drawn but also its fine position. I could not gaze my full of the
façade; how harmonious and genial is the conception of the artist....
Unwillingly I tore myself away, and determined to draw the attention
of all architects to it so that correct drawings may be made; for once
again have I been convinced that tradition is untrustworthy. Palladio,
on whom I relied, gives us, it is true, a picture of this temple, but
he cannot have seen it, as he actually places pedestals on the level
whereby the columns are thrown up too high, and we have an ugly
Palmyrian monstrosity instead of what is a tranquil, charming object,
satisfying to both the eye and the understanding. It is impossible to
describe the deep impression I received from the contemplation of this
edifice, and it will produce everlasting fruit."[104]
S. PAOLO[105]
A little off the Piazza della Minerva is the old Benedictine church
dedicated to St. Paolo, erected in 1074, when it probably stood alone
with its monastery and not, as now, wedged in with other houses.
Built in the very heart of Roman Assisi, its foundations rest upon
solid walls of travertine, where a secret passage reaches to the
castle. In this part of the town there are several underground
passages spreading out in various directions, reminding us of the
insecurity of life in the early times when Pagan consuls persecuted
the weaker Christian sect. Just within the doorway of the church, now
alas thickly coated with whitewash, is an ionic column belonging to
some building of importance which must have stood within the Forum.
Few people visit S. Paolo as it is only mentioned in local
guide-books, and the passing stranger is generally told that there is
nothing to see which is borne out by the modesty of its exterior; but
no lover of the early Umbrian school who has the time to spare should
fail to step in, if only for a moment, as on a wall to the left of the
entrance is a large fresco by Matteo da Gualdo. He has signed the date
in the corner--1475--though not his name, but it would be difficult to
mistake so characteristic a work of this delightful painter. The
Virgin, tall and stately, is accompanied by St. Lucy, who holds her
eyes upon a dish and is clothed in a richly coloured orange gown
falling in heavy folds about her; on the other side is St. Ansano, the
patron of the Sienese, looking in his elegant green jacket, trimmed
with fur, more like a courtier than a holy martyr. He holds his lungs
in one hand, because he is a patron of people suffering from
consumption, but why we know not, as there was nothing in the way he
met his death in the river Arbia by the order of Diocletian to explain
the presence of this strange symbol. He stands in Matteo's fresco very
daintily by the Madonna's side, pointing her out to the small donor
who is seen kneeling in a doorway. The colour is deep, perhaps a
little crude, and if the figures may seem somewhat stiff and their
draperies angular, all such defects are amply redeemed by the small
angels on the arch above, who composedly gaze down upon the Madonna as
they sing and play to her.
PALAZZO PUBBLICO OR PALAZZO COMMUNALE
In the beginning of the thirteenth century the civil affairs of Assisi
had assumed such large proportions that it was found impossible to
transact business in unsheltered quarters of the piazza as had
hitherto been done, and the citizens determined to build a Palazzo
Pubblico. Other towns were rising to municipal importance, notably
Perugia whose palace for her priors proved a beautiful example of a
gothic building, while Assisi was directing all efforts to adorn her
churches. A house was bought belonging to the same Benedictine abbot
of Mount Subasio, who had given the humble dwellings to St. Francis,
and on its site they erected the present municipal palace, which was
enlarged in 1275 and again in the fifteenth century, but it always
remained a humble building with little pretensions to fine
architecture. Here the priors and the consuls ruled the citizens in
the absence of a despot, while in the palace of the Capitano del
Popolo (now the residence of the Carabinieri), whose tower dates from
1276, the council of the citizens met to check the tyranny of the
governing faction. These municipal magnates lived upon opposite sides
of the Piazza, and acted as a drag upon each other in civil matters.
The many small towns, villages and castles which were beneath the yoke
of Assisi in mediæval times have been represented by a modern artist
in the entrance hall of the Palazzo Pubblico, and are a happy record
of her days of conquest and prosperity, which are duly remembered by
the citizens. There is also a picture by Sermei of St. Francis
blessing Assisi from the plain which, painted in the sixteenth
century, is interesting as a likeness of the town at that time. There
is also a picture of Elias hung upon the wall, intended as a portrait
and not as an object for popular devotion. An effort has been made to
adapt one of the rooms as a gallery of Umbrian art, and a few frescoes
taken from walls and convents and transferred to canvas are preserved
here, giving some idea, notwithstanding their ruined condition, of the
liberal way in which Umbrian artists distributed their work in every
corner of the town. The gateway of S. Giacomo exposed to constant sun,
wind and rain, was yet thought a fitting place for Fiorenzo di Lorenzo
to paint a fresco of a beautiful Madonna. It now looks sadly out of
place in this room of the Municipio with a little paper ticket on the
corner of the canvas marking it as No. 17. The half figures of angels,
No. 23 and No. 24, by Matteo da Gualdo, were taken from the
Confraternity of S. Crispino together with No. 21. From the Chiesa dei
Pellegrini came No. 5, the Madonna and Saints by Ottaviano Nelli of
Gubbio; while No. 6, a Madonna, with angels holding a red damask
curtain behind her, was found at the fountain of Mojano and is
attributed to Tiberio d'Assisi. That mysterious painter L'Ingegno
d'Assisi may be the author of No. 12. Vasari recounts how he learnt
his art in the workshop of Perugino in company with Raphael, and even
helped his master in the Cambio frescoes. His real name was Andrea
Aloisi, the nickname of Ingegno arising from the fact that he was
looked up to by his fellow citizens as a very remarkable man, for not
only could he paint beautiful Madonnas but he was a distinguished
Procurator, Arbitrator, Syndic and Camerlingo Apostolico. But to try
and trace his work is like following a will-o'-the-wisp, for no sooner
do we hear of a fresco by him than it eventually turns out to be by
Fiorenzo di Lorenzo or by Adone Doni, and this fresco in the Municipio
is the only one in Assisi which may be by him. If it is, Tiberio
d'Assisi would seem to have been his master and not Perugino.
In the same room is a small but interesting painting in fresco (No.
87), the figure of a winged Mercury, which was excavated a few years
ago in the Casa Rocchi, via Cristofani. In another room is the head of
a saint which some believe to be also of Roman times, but a good
authority attributes it to a late follower of Raphael. The saint's
head is seen against a shadowy blue landscape, and like all Umbrian
things has an indescribable charm, a feeling that the artist loved the
valleys in spring-time, and tried to convey some of the soft colour of
the young corn and budding trees into the picture he was painting.
THE CHIESA NUOVA
A little below the Piazza della Minerva is the Chiesa Nuova, built at
the expense of Philip III, of Spain in 1615 by the Assisan artist
Giorgetti and finished in seven years. Few people come to Assisi
without visiting it, for although containing nothing of artistic
value, it stands upon the site of the Casa Bernardone, and recalls
many incidents of St. Francis' life. The small door is shown through
which Madonna Pica passed when the angel disguised as a pilgrim told
her that her son was to be born in a stable, and we see part of the
cell where St. Francis endured such cruel imprisonment from his
father, until his mother in the absence of Messer Pietro let him out
to return to his haunts at San Damiano and the Carceri.[106] Other
places preserve more of the charm of the saint than the Chiesa Nuova.
Two buildings in the town are intimately connected with St. Francis,
his father's shop in the Via Portica the entrance of which the
sculptor of St. Bernardino's door at the franciscan convent has
adorned with a beautiful pattern of flowers, shields and cupids; and
the house of Bernard of Quintavalle which is reached from this street
by the Via S. Gregorio. It is now the Palazzo Sbaraglini and has no
doubt been much enlarged since the thirteenth century, but the little
old door above a flight of steps bears the unmistakable stamp of age;
it leads into a long vaulted room, now a chapel, which there seems
every reason to believe was the one where Bernard, the rich noble,
invited St. Francis to stay with him at a time when he doubted his
sanctity. The story is too long to quote and extracts would only spoil
it, but the pilgrim to Assisi should read it as related in that
franciscan testament, the _Fioretti_ (chap. iii.). Popular devotion
has happily not tampered with this corner of the town as it has with
the house of the Bernardone.
[Illustration: CAMPANILE OF STA. MARIA MAGGIORE]
STA. MARIA MAGGIORE
This romanesque church stands above a Roman building whose columns and
mosaic floor can easily be seen from the garden behind the apse, and
for many centuries it was the cathedral of Assisi as is testified by
its close proximity to the Bishop's palace. But there is now little to
remind us of any pretensions to splendour which it may once have
possessed, only vestiges of the frescoes destroyed by the great
earthquake of 1832 can be seen on its walls, and an Annunciation in a
cupboard of the sacristy--in such strange places do we find an ancient
fresco in Assisi. The church was already an old building in the
twelfth century, for we hear of its being restored and enlarged after
a fire by Giovanni da Gubbio, and finished later by the help of St.
Francis who is said to have rebuilt the apse. One gladly hurries out
of it into the little piazza which, though the humblest looking in
Assisi, is very famous for the scenes it has witnessed. Here St.
Francis renounced the world in the presence of his angry father, and
received protection from Bishop Guido; (see p. 235). Many years later
the dying saint was brought to rest at the Bishop's palace near the
church, and edified those who guarded the gates by singing so gaily in
the midst of terrible suffering. Then again when a quarrel arose
between Guido and the Podestà of Assisi, two friars came up with a
message of peace from St. Francis, then on his deathbed at the
Portiuncula, who had heard with grief of the dissension. The story,
and it is a true one we may be sure, has been faithfully recorded by
Brother Leo, who tells us how "when all were assembled together in the
piazza by the Bishop's palace the two brethren rose up and said: "The
blessed Francis in his illness has composed a canticle to the Lord
concerning His creatures, to the praise of the Lord Himself and for
the edification of the people." It was the verse beginning "Praised be
my Lord for all those who pardon one another for His love's sake,"
which he had added to his Hymn to the Sun (see p. 79). All listened
intently to the message which so touched the heart of the Podestà that
he flung himself at the Bishop's feet and promised to make amends for
his offence for the love of Christ and the Blessed Francis. The Bishop
lifting him from the ground spoke words of forgiveness and peace, and
then "with great kindness and love they embraced and kissed one
another.""
[Illustration: EAST FRONT OF SAN FRANCESCO]
CONVENTS OF S. QUIRICO AND S. APPOLINARE
Every church and convent wall in Assisi was once adorned by frescoes,
and even now, when time and ill-usage have done their best to ruin
them, it is still possible to come upon delightful specimens of
Umbrian art. But they are so stowed away in out of the way corners
that one hardly likes to pass a door, however poor and uninviting,
without glancing in to see what treasure may be hidden away behind it.
Curiosity was amply rewarded one day while visiting the convent of S.
Quirico which we pass on the way from Sta. Maria Maggiore to S.
Pietro, attracted there by the small fresco of the Virgin and St. Anne
by Matteo da Gualdo over the door. The whitewashed parlour contained
nothing of interest, not even a nun peered through the iron grating,
but a murmur from the attendant about frescoes drew us to a window
where, above the brown-tiled roof under a rough pent ledge, exposed to
rain and wind, was a fresco of Christ rising from the tomb, and four
small angels. It is not perhaps one of Matteo da Gualdo's most
pleasing compositions and might be passed unnoticed in a gallery, but
the thought of the wealth of Umbrian art, when masters left their
paintings over gateways upon city walls, and above a roof where even
the nuns can scarcely see it as they walk in the cloister below, give
it a peculiarly Assisan charm which we cannot easily forget. A few
steps further on, down the Borgo San Pietro, is the large convent of
S. Appolinare, remarkable for its pretty campanile of brick, and a
wheel window above the door. It once possessed many frescoes of the
fourteenth and fifteenth century, but now it is not worth while to
seek admittance for they are much destroyed; some have been ruthlessly
cut in two by lowering the ceiling of the rooms, and only here and
there, where the whitewash has peeled off, faces of Madonnas and
saints look out like ghosts imprisoned in a convent wall.
S. PIETRO
The church of S. Pietro stands upon a grass piazza surrounded by
mulberry trees, with a broad outlook upon the valley. The central
door, supported by two lions, has a twisted design of water-plants and
birds which formerly were coloured, but now only show here and there
traces of green stalks on a dark red background. A finely carved
inscription above it records that in the year 1218 the cistercian
Abbot Rustico built the façade, but its proud historians believe the
church itself to have existed in the second century, thus claiming for
it the honour of being the first church erected in Assisi. The present
building cannot be older than 1253 when it was rebuilt after a great
fire, and consecrated by Innocent IV. The interior is finely
proportioned, and the remains of ancient frescoes discovered upon the
walls show the zeal of the Assisans in making all their churches, as
well as San Francesco, as beautiful as they could.
[Illustration: CHURCH OF S. PIETRO]
In the small chapel to the left of the high altar are four stencilled
medallions of a hunter with his dogs chasing a stag, besides
symmetrical patterns like those of the nave of the Lower Church of San
Francesco. Over the altar is a signed picture by Matteo da Gualdo (he
was at Assisi in 1458, but the date here is partly effaced), of a
Madonna with a choir of angels, and upon either side St. Peter and the
Assisan martyr St. Vittorino. By standing on the altar steps a fresco
of the Annunciation of the fifteenth century may be seen on the wall
of the sacristy, discovered beneath the usual layer of whitewash some
fifty years ago. The angel's profile, the hair turned back in waves
from the face over the shoulders, is clearly outlined, and shows pale
against the golden light of his wings. But the real treasures of this
church, according to a pious author, are the bones of St. Vittorino,
an Assisan Christian who was the second Bishop of Assisi, and died a
martyr's death in the third century. In 1642 these relics were
deposited in a more suitable marble urn than the one that had
contained them before, during a grand ceremony presided over by a
Baglioni, Bishop of Perugia. Other bones and ashes of some Roman
martyrs were afterwards added which were taken from the cemetery at
Rome by the Abbot of San Pietro "to further enrich his church."
THE CONFRATERNITIES
An enduring mark of St. Francis' influence is seen in the number of
confraternities established in Assisi which, if they have lost many of
their primitive customs, still retain a hold upon the people and are
the great feature of the town. Hardly a day passes without seeing
members either preparing for a service in one of their chapels, or
following a church procession, or carrying the dead along the cypress
walk from Porta S. Giacomo to the cemetery. Clothed in long grey
hooded cloaks, holding lanterns and candles and singing their mediæval
hymns, these citizens of the nineteenth century belong to Assisi of
the past as much as all her frescoes and early buildings. Their origin
goes back to the middle of the thirteenth century when, out of the
great devotional movement due to St. Francis, arose that strange body
of penitents the Flagellants, who are said to have first appeared in
Perugia, and thence spread throughout Italy.[107] "The movement," says
Dr Creighton, "passed away; but it left its dress as a distinctive
badge to the confraternities of mercy which are familiar to the
traveller in the streets of many cities of Italy." Assisi was among
the first to witness the hordes of fanatics who roamed from town to
town increasing as they passed like a swarm of locusts through the
land, and often at night going forth into the streets clothed in white
garments to dance a dance of the dead, clanging bones together as they
sang. It was inevitable that their passage through Assisi should have
its results, and many brotherhoods were founded; those who had no
chapels of their own met in S. Pietro or S. Maria delle Rose, where
they performed their penances, sometimes, as in the case of the
Battuti (Flagellants), beating themselves as they sang the wild,
love-inspired hymns of Jacopone da Todi, the franciscan poet of
Umbria. Since those days their fervour has taken a more practical
form, and very simple are their services.
[Illustration: CONFRATERNITY OF SAN FRANCESCUCCIO IN VIA GARIBALDI]
The members of _San Francescuccio_, or _Delle Stimate_, ever to and
fro upon some errand of mercy, belong to the most important
confraternity, and own one of the most picturesque chapels in the
towns. When its doors are open during early Mass or Benediction the
sound of prayer and chanting comes across the quiet road, and in the
blaze of candle-light is seen the great Crucifixion of Ottaviano Nelli
(?) in the lunette of the wall above the altar. At other times, the
chapel being so sunk below the level of the road with no windows to
light it, both fresco and the charming groined roof, blue as that of
San Francesco, can with difficulty be seen. The pent roof outside
overshadows some Umbrian frescoes by Matteo da Gualdo recording the
famous miracle of the roses which flowered for St. Francis in the
snow, and which he offered to the Virgin at the Altar of the
Portiuncula. On the wall to the right are some ruined frescoes in
terra-verde by a scholar of Matteo.
Another confraternity in this street is _San Crispino_, which once
possessed a picture by Niccolò Alunno, but that has long since
disappeared, and only faint patches of colour remain above its
gateway. There are many other confraternities, but as they do not all
possess pictures of interest, we only mention three others; and first
of these, the _Oratory of St. Anthony the Abbot_, or _Chiesa dei
Pellegrini_, which every visitor to Assisi ought to visit.[108] After
the Church of San Francesco it is by far the most important sight of
the town; a Lombard façade, a Roman temple, or a mediæval castle,
delightful and beautiful as they are, may be seen elsewhere, but we
know nothing with such individual charm as the little chapel of St.
Anthony, in the Via Superba. So often a hundred vicissitudes arrested
the adornment of a building during those troubled times of the middle
ages, but here we find a small and perfectly proportioned oratory
decorated with frescoes upon the ceiling and upon every wall, by two
Umbrian masters who have sought to make it a complete and perfect
sanctuary of Umbrian art.
Built in 1431 by the piety of the brotherhood of St. Anthony the
Abbot, it served as a private chapel to the adjoining hospital, where
pilgrims coming to pray at the shrine of St. Francis found food and
shelter for three days. The liberal donations given by Guidantonio,
Duke of Urbino and sometime Lord of Assisi, whose devotion to the
saint was great, may have enabled the confraternity to adorn it with
its many frescoes. Outside, in the arched niche above the door, are
the patrons of the chapel, St. Anthony and St. James of Campostello,
that great saint of pilgrims, with a frieze of small angels above them
playing upon various instruments, also by Matteo da Gualdo. To him we
owe the fair Madonna over the altar who gazes so dreamily before her,
and sits so straight upon her throne. Angels gather round bending
towards their instruments with earnest faces; Matteo's angels can
never only calmly pray, they must sing or else play on tambourines,
viole d'amore, cymbals and organs. Less pleasing are the large figures
of St. James and St. Anthony, while in contrast to them are the
slender winged figures on either side bearing tall candelabra, and
moving forward with such stately step, their white garments sweeping
in long folds behind them, their fair curls just ruffled by the air.
Surely Matteo must have been thinking of a group of babies at play in
the cornfields, or under the hedges near his own Umbrian town, when he
painted that frieze of laughing children, with little caps fitting so
closely round their heads, who are tossing the branches of red and
white roses up into the air. Each one is different, and all are full
of graceful movement. They divide the frescoes below from that of the
Annunciation, which recalls the manner of Boccatis da Camerino, the
master of Matteo. He paints a swallow, the bird of returning spring,
perched outside the Virgin's bedroom, to symbolise the promise of
redemption, and a lion cub meant to represent the lion of Judah walks
leisurely towards the Madonna.
Matteo da Gualdo, as the inscription tells, worked here in 1468, and
Pier Antonio da Foligno, known as Mezzastris, came in 1482 to paint
the rest of the chapel, and upon the right wall he related the most
famous of St. James' miracles in a naïve and delightful manner. The
legends tell how in the time of Pope Calixtus II, a certain German
with his wife and son on their way to the saint's Spanish shrine of
Campostello lodged at Tolosa, where their host's daughter fell in love
with the fair young German. But he, being a cautious youth, resisted
every advance of the Spanish maiden, who sought to avenge herself by
hiding a silver drinking cup belonging to her father in his wallet.
The theft was discovered, and the judge of Tolosa condemned the young
pilgrim to be hanged. Pier Antonio has painted the scene when the
father and mother, after visiting Campostello, return to take a last
look at the place where their son was executed and find him well: "O
my mother! O my father!" he says, "do not lament for me, as I have
never been in better cheer, the blessed Apostle James is at my side,
sustaining me and filling me with celestial joy and comfort." In the
fresco near the altar the story is continued; the judge, stout and
imposing as one of Benozzo Gozzoli's Florentine merchants, is seated
at a table in crimson and ermine robes surrounded by his friends, when
the pilgrim and his wife arrive and beg him to release their son.
Somewhat bored at being interrupted at his banquet he mocks them,
saying: "What meanest thou, good woman? Thou art beside thyself. If
thy son lives so do these fowls before me." No sooner had he spoken
than, to the astonishment of all, the cock and hen stood up on the
dish and the cock began to crow, as we see in Mezzastris' fresco. On
the opposite wall are miracles of St. Anthony. In the fresco near the
door he is sitting in the porch of the church surrounded by his
companion hermits; they are watching the arrival of camels which, in
answer to the saint's prayer, have brought a supply of food neatly
corded on their backs. The artist has pictured the desert with sandy
mountains, little flowers growing in the burning sand and thick grass
in the wood by the convent. In the second fresco St. Anthony, beneath
a portico of lapis lazzuli and green serpentine, is distributing the
food brought by the friendly camels, to the beggars, who appear as
suddenly upon the scene as the beggars do in an Assisan street.
The four figures in the ceiling, Pope Leo III, St. Bonaventure, St.
Isidor of Seville and St. Augustine, and the angels with shield-shaped
wings, are also by Mezzastris. A graceful piece of his work is the
Christ above the door, in a glory of angels who form a wreath around
Him with their wings like sheaves of yellow wheat. Delightful, but
very different from Matteo's, are the cupid-angels flying across the
sky on clouds, and the two seated playing with a shield upon which is
painted the pilgrim's scallop-shell.
[Illustration: MONTE FRUMENTARIO IN THE VIA PRINCIPE DI NAPOLI]
The figure of St. James near the door is of small interest, being a
much restored work of a pupil of Perugino; but in the dark corner on
the other side is, says Mr Berenson, a youthful work of Fiorenzo di
Lorenzo. It is the young St. Ansano holding his lungs suspended
daintily from one finger as in the fresco of S. Paolo, and looking so
charming in his page's dress, his fair curls falling about his
shoulders. He stands at the entrance of a cave with pointed rocks
above, and saxifrage and ferns delicately drawn are growing in their
crevices. Would that Mezzastris had given his pupil a larger space of
wall to work on, so that we might have had more saints and landscapes
like these. We leave the chapel with regret, giving one last look at
Matteo's Madonna and his frieze of child-angels, and then go out into
the long broad Via Principe di Napole. Its fine palaces, once the
abode of some of the richest nobles of the town, have now been turned
into schools and hospitals, and our thoughts once more revert to the
past days of prosperity and magnificence as we walk along this grand
but silent street where the grass grows unmolested between the stones.
A little way further on to the right is the fine _loggia_ of the
_Monte Frumentario_ which in olden times was an agricultural Monte di
Pietà, where the peasants who had no other possessions than the
produce of the fields would come to pawn their grain in time of need.
The door is finely sculptured, and the delicate chiselling of the
capitals of the pillars of the _loggia_ mark it as a work of the
fourteenth century. Not far from the Chiesa dei Pellegrini, but to the
left, stands one of the oldest Assisan houses which does not seem to
have suffered much alteration since it was built. It was the lodge of
the Comacine guild of workers, who have left their sign of the rose
between the compass over the entrance, and two pieces of sculpture,
showing that those to whom the house belonged were people who worked
at some trade. It does not appear to have been a dwelling-house, but
only a place where the members of the guild, employed in building the
different civil and religious buildings for the Assisans, could meet
together to discuss their interests, draw out their plans and execute
different pieces of their work. They probably did not build the house,
but perhaps in the year 1485, which is the date above the door,
adapted for their use one already standing.[109] It is always pointed
out as the _Casa di Metastasio_, but his paternal dwelling is a less
interesting house, standing at the angle of Via S. Giacomo and Via S.
Croce, which can be reached from the Comacine Lodge by the steep
by-street of S. Andrea. Metastasio, though the Trapassi were Assisans,
had little to do with the town as his family were engaged in trade at
Rome, where he was born in 1698. There he was found improvising songs
to a crowd of wondering people by the celebrated Vincenzo Gravina, who
adopted and educated him. When set to music, Metastasio's poetry
brought all Rome to his feet and earned him the title of Cæsarean poet
from the Emperor Charles VI; he ended his life at the court of Vienna
as the favourite of Maria Theresa, honoured by all the great musicians
of the day. Truly he has little to do with Assisi, yet he must be
added to the list of her numerous illustrious citizens.
[Illustration: HOUSE OF THE COMACINE BUILDERS IN THE VIA PRINCIPE DI
NAPOLE]
Following the street by the Casa di Metastasio, we get into
delightful lanes above the town and reach another little
confraternity, the oldest of all, _San Rufinuccio_.[110] Its small
chapel, built of alternate layers of pink and white Subasian stone, is
a very characteristic example of an Umbrian way-side sanctuary, always
open in the olden days for the peasants to come into for rest and
prayer. It is worth a visit, not only because the way there is
beautiful, but also for the grand Crucifixion painted above the altar
by the decorator of St. Nicholas' Chapel in San Francesco. It is a
strong and splendid composition, which even much repainting has been
unable to destroy. Unfortunately the scenes at the sides can only just
be seen. Below, the half-length Madonna and angels by another artist
recall the Annunciation of S. Pietro, in the marked outline of their
pale faces and the rainbow colour of clothes and wings.
Turning off from the Via Nuova to the left we mount still higher
through the olive groves along a path possessing no name, but which is
the nicest way to the heights above the town. We come in a few minutes
to the confraternity of _San Lorenzo_, standing somewhat below the
level of the castle. It has nothing of interest inside, but behind the
wooden covering of the gateway at the side is a fresco by an unknown
Umbrian artist, an Assisan perhaps, who above the Virgin's throne
signs himself "Chola Pictor." He paints the faces of his saints with a
smooth surface, betraying the influence of Simone Martini which he
felt together with many of his fellow Umbrian artists. The Virgin's
throne is full of wonderful ornaments; unfortunately the fresco has
suffered from a large crack across the wall. Very quaint is a group of
hooded members of the confraternity at her feet, and there is a
charming figure of St. Rufino, young, with an oval face and brown
eyes, but to be seen only from the top of a ladder as he is painted in
a corner of the arch. It has been suggested to remove this much-ruined
painting to the safer custody of the Municipio, but we hope this will
not occur, for, taken away from its gateway on the hillside, where the
redstarts build their nests and the evening sun lights up the colour
in the Virgin's face, its interest and charm would be lost.
THE CASTLE OR "LA ROCCA D'ASSISI"
Within her city walls Assisi possesses nothing wilder or more
beautiful than the undulating slopes which rise from the city up to
the Castle, where wild orchises grow among the grass, and the hedges
of acacia wind around the hill. The town lies so directly below, that
by stepping to the edge and looking across the white acacias, we can
only see a mass of brown roofs all purple at sundown, the tops of
towers and the battlements of gateways. Then there are places where
the grassy hillocks stand up so high that they hide the town
altogether, and we seem to be looking out upon the broad vista of the
valley from an isolated peak. At all times it is beautiful; but choose
a stormy day in springtime, when the clouds are driving upwards from
the plain only lately covered with mist, and the nearer hills are dark
their cities catching the late evening sunshine as it breaks through
the storm, while wind-swept Subasio looks bleak in the white light
showing here and there patches of palest green. And behind us,
cresting the hill, so near the town yet seen absolutely alone and
clear against the sky, rise the tower and the vast walls of the Rocca
d'Assisi, looking, not like a ruin crumbling beneath the constant
driving of wind and rain, but as though torn down in war-time, grand
in its destruction. It stands upon the site of an ancient burial
ground, where in remote times the Umbrian augurs came to watch for
omens from the heights of a tower that is said to have crowned the
summit. The legend of this building gave rise to the belief that a
castle stood here in very early times which was taken by Totila when
he besieged Assisi. But it is more probable that when Charlemagne
rebuilt the town in 733 after it had been destroyed by his army, he
also erected a castle to enable the Papal emissaries to keep the
people in subjection; or perhaps the citizens themselves may have
wished to protect themselves more securely from passing armies (see p.
16). It ended by becoming, much to the displeasure of the people the
residence of whoever held Assisi for the time, and in the twelfth
century they experienced the despotic rule of Conrad of Suabia, who
lived here with his young charge, Frederic II. When, by the superior
power of the Pope, Conrad was driven out of Umbria, the citizens did
their best to destroy the walls which had harboured a tyrant, and to
avoid further tyranny they obtained an edict forbidding the erection
of another fortress. But promises such as these were vain indeed, for
when, in 1367, escaping from the hated yoke of the Perugians Assisi
welcomed Cardinal Albornoz in the Pope's name as her ruler, she lent a
willing ear to his plans for rebuilding the castle. The people were
well satisfied as they watched the improvements he made in the town,
and two centuries had so dimmed the remembrances of Conrad's tyranny,
that they gladly assisted him, little deeming that they were giving
away their liberty. Albornoz, not slow to perceive what a valuable
possession it would prove to the rulers of Assisi, spared neither
money nor efforts to make it large and strong. By his orders the
castle keep, which we see to this day, called the "maschio," and the
squarely-set walls enclosing it were erected, and in a very few years
the Rocca again rose proudly on its hill, warning the Umbrian people
of its newly-found importance, and enticing passing _condottieri_ to
lay siege to a town that offered so fine a prize. Albornoz also
rebuilt most of the city walls which had been so battered during the
Perugian wars; we can trace them from gateway to gateway encircling
the city, and it is curious to see how in the upper portion near San
Rufino large open spaces exist, as if in those active days when the
Assisans had hopes of becoming powerful, they purposely set the walls
far back to provide for a large and flourishing town. The feeling of
arrested growth is one of the most mournful spectacles, and we half
wonder if the great castle dominating the heights was not in part the
cause of it. There was war enough at the time, inevitable among the
restless factions of a people groping towards freedom and power, but
here above the town was placed a fresh cause of dissension and
struggle against perpetual bondage through varied tyrannies.
Albornoz, in planning out the city walls, discovered that the part
between Porta Cappuccini and Porta Perlici, where the hill descends
towards the ravine, needed protection, so he built the strong fortress
of San Antonio known as the Rocca Minore. It had a separate governor
or Castellano, and though of minor importance, proved very efficient
in repelling the attacks of besieging armies. The principal tower,
though somewhat ruined, still looks very fine within its square
enclosure of massive walls, now covered in places with heavy curtains
of ivy, the home of countless birds. A pious Castellano in the
fifteenth century left a fresco of the Crucifixion in the chapel with
his portrait at the foot of the Cross, and as we look at it through
the wooden gateway we are reminded of what otherwise from the deserted
look of the place it is easy to forget, that people once lived and
prayed at the Rocca as well as fought.
[Illustration: LOOKING ACROSS THE ASSISAN ROOFS TOWARDS THE EAST]
Cardinal Albornoz left the castle in charge of two Assisan captains,
but from 1376 an uninterrupted line of governors received their
salaries from whoever was master of Assisi at the time. Always chosen
from other towns their privileges were quite distinct from those of
the civil governors; but in the fifteenth century, owing to the
weakness of the Priors, who failed to keep order among the lawless
nobles of the town, their power increased. The Papal Legate then gave
into the hands of the Castellano authority to issue edicts which the
Priors had to obey, and in 1515 he was invested with the title of
Podestà and Pretor of Assisi. But none of these governors seems to
have misused their power over the town, probably because their rule
was of too short a duration to carry out any ambitious scheme. And
when the despot for the time being of Assisi came to stay, he took up
his quarters in the castle, ruling governors, magistrates and people
alike. In the time of the despot Broglia di Trino, we hear of the
Priors wearily toiling up the steep ascent to place before him the
acts they had passed in the municipal palace. He received them always
in the open air, holding his councils either in the first enclosure by
the well, or in the second by the castle keep, where many important
conclusions were arrived at, and plans for the city's dominion laid
out.
So perfect is the harmony of the castle from wherever it is seen, that
it is difficult to realise how many hands have formed it, how many
times its walls have been battered down and rebuilt at different
periods by popes, cardinals, and passing _condottieri_, who have
nearly all left their arms upon its walls as a record of their
munificence. After Albornoz had built the principal mass of
fortifications little was done until 1458, when Jacopo Piccinino, the
son of the great general, entered Assisi as master, and obtained
immediate possession of the Rocca. His reign was short, but with the
quick eye of a soldier he soon discovered the weakness of the western
slope, and seeing that it might be carried by assault from Porta San
Giacomo, he laid the foundations of a polygonal tower and a long wall
connecting it with the main building. The Comacine builders
established in Assisi were employed and left their sign, the rose
between the compass and the mason's square, upon its lower walls. But
long before the work was half completed Piccinino sold the city to the
Pope, and it was Æneas Piccolomini, Pius II, who, when he visited
Assisi in 1459, ordered it to be brought to a termination; within a
year the wall was raised to its full height, the tower received its
battlements and the arms of the Piccolomini were placed above those of
Piccinino. The covered gallery, running along the top of the wall from
the castle, still leads the visitor to the giddy heights of the tower
whence he obtains truly a bird's-eye view of all the country round,
from Spoleto to Perugia, across range upon range of hills towards
Tuscany, and from Bettona to the wild tract of mountainous country
leading to Nocera, Gualdo and Gubbio.
To recount the full history of the castle needs a book to itself, and
would include not only the history of Assisi but almost of all
Umbria.[111] The possession of the Rocco Maggiore entailed that of the
Rocca Minore and gave undisputed sway over Assisi, so that the
desperate efforts made to hold it can be understood. During the
intervals when Papal authority was relaxed, we find the names of many
famous people whose armies fought for this much contested prize.
Biordo Michelotti, Count Guido of Montefeltro, the two Piccininos,
Francesco Sforza and Gian Galeazzo Visconti, were in succession its
owners. Cosmo de' Medici obtained it from Pope Eugenius IV, in payment
of a bad debt, and a Florentine governor ruled over it for a year. It
even, together with the town of Assisi, became the property of
Lucrezia Borgia, who received it from Alexander VI, as part of her
dower on her marriage with Giovanni Sforza, Lord of Pesaro. Sometimes
it happened that a private citizen of Perugia conceived the ambitious
scheme of making himself master of the castle, and by fraud the
Castellano would be enticed outside the gates and murdered with his
family. But it always ended by Perugia, fearing the wrath of the Pope,
or not liking one of their own citizens to gain so much power, sending
an army to dislodge the tyrant, who soon lost his head. Sometimes
criminals were kept imprisoned in the castle; we can still see the
room in the keep where they scratched their names upon the wall, with
many references to their horror of the place, and a roughly traced
heart pierced with an arrow. Ordinary malefactors were shut up in a
dark cell on the stairs. When their crimes merited death they were
executed on the Piazza della Minerva, or if time pressed, the
Castellano hanged them from the battlements of the fortress or threw
them out of a window into the ravine below. The governors had a
difficult and not a very peaceful time, for they had not only to guard
against outside foes, but occasionally against a faction who attempted
to get possession of the castle, and great on those occasions was the
fight outside its walls. It was in vain that they took every
precaution for the general safety, that a night guard walked up and
down the Assisan streets playing his castanets to warn off all
evil-doers, or that men-at-arms watched incessantly from the castle
battlements. In the sixteenth century the castle became a prey to the
rival families of the Nepis and the Fiumi who divided Assisi between
them. First it fell into the hands of Jacopo Fiumi and the Pope,
Alexander VI, furious when he heard of this citizen's audacious act,
wrote that "by love or by force" he would have his fortress back
again; but Jacopo remained impervious to threats or promises and held
out for another year, until the Priors fearing the anger of the Pope
came to an agreement with him. Some thirty years later the Nepis
obtained possession of it by treachery and violence, and it required
all the astuteness of Malatesta Baglione, who was fighting for Clement
VII, to dislodge them, while the Pope branded them and their adherents
as "sons of iniquity" for having dared to wrest from the Papacy the
castle of Assisi.
[Illustration: VIEW OF SAN FRANCESCO FROM BENEATH THE CASTLE WALLS]
But the days of the great military importance of the Rocca were fast
drawing to a close; Assisi, no longer oppressed by the nobles,
harassed by the armies of Perugia, or alarmed by the coming of the
despots whose power was on the wane all over Italy, lost her character
of individuality as a fighting and turbulent city, and sank beneath
the wise and beneficent government of the Papacy. With the arrival of
Paul III, in 1535, the final blow was given to mediæval usages of war
and scheming in Umbria. The great Farnese Pope was building his
fortress at Perugia to finally crush that hitherto indomitable people,
and fearing the Assisans might yet give trouble in the future to his
legates as they had so often done in the past, he gave orders that the
fortress should be repaired, and a bastion suitable for the more
modern methods of warfare be built to the right of the castle keep.
This is now the best preserved portion of the building. For some time
a Castellano still remained in command of the castle but his title was
purely a nominal one, and his chief duty seems to have consisted in
guarding prisoners. Its political need having disappeared the popes
thought less of their Assisan fortress, the one lately erected at
Perugia being more efficient as a safeguard of their interests, and
gradually its walls showed signs of decay, but no papal legates were
sent to see to their repair. So terribly did it suffer during the
years that followed the reign of Paul III, that in 1726 we read of the
governor of the city sending an earnest supplication to the Pope that
"this strong and ancient castle of Assisi, which had always been the
chief fortress of Umbria, should be saved from ruin." The Pope, he
tells us in another letter, had already sent Count Aureli, the
military governor of Umbria, to inspect it, who declared it was "one
of the strongest and most splendid fortresses of the ecclesiastical
states, and as fine as any he had seen in France or in Flanders, when
as head page he had accompanied Louis XIV." In the same document there
is mention also of beautiful paintings in the chief rooms, and of a
miraculous Crucifixion in the chapel, but these decorations, needless
to say, have long since disappeared. Entreaties were vainly sent to
Rome; the castle was so utterly abandoned that its gates stood open
for all to roam in and out as they pleased, pulling down the ancient
arms of the popes, and vying with the storms to complete its ruin and
destruction. Such was its strength that it endured the ill-treatment
of seasons and of men, and people now alive remember in their youth to
have seen it still roofed in and possessing much of its former
magnificence. A little money might have restored it to its pristine
state, but during those years of struggle for the Unity of Italy the
general fever of excitement invaded the quiet town, and as if
remembering all the tyrants their castle walls had harboured, and the
skirmishes their ancestors had fought beneath them, the citizens
continued its destruction with renewed vigour. It was no uncommon
thing to see cartloads of stones being taken down the hill for the
construction of some modern dwelling, or boys amusing themselves by
throwing down portions of the walls, and trying who could succeed in
making great blocks of masonry reach the bed of the torrent below.
Luckily the government gave it over to the commune of Assisi in 1883
and they did something towards its repair, though within certain
limits, for a large sum would have been necessary to complete its
restoration.
But it still remains a very wonderful corner of Assisi, and delightful
hours may be passed sitting in the castle keep and looking out of the
large windows upon a land so strangely peaceful, with little cities
gathered on the hills or lying by some river in the plain. We see the
battered walls around us bearing traces of ancient warfare, and wonder
at the power which made the mediæval turmoil so suddenly subside. In
vain we scan the valley for the coming of a warlike cardinal with
glittering horsemen in his rear, or look for Gian Paolo Baglione
riding hastily through the town upon his swift black charger. The
communal armies met for the last time by the Tiber many centuries ago;
popes, emperors, _condottieri_ and saints have passed like pageants
across Umbria, and as if touched by a magician's wand have as suddenly
vanished, leaving her cities with only the memories of an active and
glorious past. Thus Assisi, with the rest of the smaller towns,
gradually sank as a prosperous and governing city though decidedly not
as a place of pilgrimage and prayer, into that deep sleep from which
she has never again awakened.
FOOTNOTES:
[103] Bernhard Berenson, "Central Italian painters of the
Renaissance," p. 86.
[104] Goethe's Werke, _Italiänische Reise_, I., vol. 27, pp. 184, _et
seq._, J. G. Cotta, 1829.
[105] The key is obtained from the Canonico Modestini's house, No. 27a
Via S. Paolo.
[106] The legend that St. Francis was born in a stable only dates from
the fifteenth century and arose out of the desire of the franciscans
to make his life resemble that of Christ. The site of this stable,
which is now a chapel, is of no interest whatever.
[107] See _Story of Perugia_ (mediæval series), p. 211, for the legend
of their origin in that town.
[108] The chapel is also called the _Chiesa di S. Caterina_ because
the members of that confraternity have charge of it. It is often open,
but should it be closed, there is always some one about ready to
obtain the key from the house in the same street Via Superba, now Via
Principe di Napoli, No. 12, opposite Palazzo Bernabei.
[109] See Signor Alfonso Brizi's _Loggia dei Maestri Comacini in
Assisi_, No. 1, April 185, of the _Atti dell' Accademia Properziana
del Subasio in Assisi_.
[110] Both the key of _San Rufinuccio_ and _San Lorenzo_ can be
obtained through the sacristan of the Cathedral.
[111] This work has been admirably done by Signor Alfonso Brizi. In
his _Rocca d'Assisi_, published in 1898, he has given a very
interesting account of its many rulers and vicissitudes, and a full
description of the building, together with all the documents relating
to it.
CHAPTER XI
_Church of Santa Maria degli Angeli. The Feast of the Pardon of St.
Francis or "il Perdono d'Assisi"_
The sanctuary of the Portiuncula has, in its present surroundings,
rightly been called a jewel within a casket--a casket indeed too large
for so small a gem. But the great Church of Santa Maria degli Angeli
was the best the Umbrians could procure for the object they loved best
after their Basilica in the town, and the famous architects of the day
were called in to build it.[112] A smaller shelter would have served
the purpose in earlier times but the ever increasing flow of pilgrims
who came in thousands for the "Perdono" rendered it necessary to think
about a church large enough to contain them; and it was the dominican
Pope Pius V, who enabled the work to be commenced in 1569, giving
large sums to the vast enterprise. Jacopo Barozio da Vignola gave the
ground-plan, leaving the execution of it, at his death in 1573, to be
carried out by the well-known Perugian architect and sculptor, Giulio
Danti, and his fellow-citizen Galeazzo Alessi, who designed the fine
cupola and arches. The church was built in the doric style, divided
into nave and aisles with numberless side chapels; and certainly they
succeeded in giving it a great feeling of space and loftiness, which
if less charming than the mysterious gloom of other churches yet seems
to belong better to the open and sunlit Umbrian plain, where it rises
as a beacon to the people for many miles round. The earthquake in
1832, which laid the villages near Ponte San Giovanni in almost total
ruin, shook down the nave and choir of the Angeli creating havoc
impossible to describe. By supreme good fortune, shall we say by a
miracle, the cupola of Danti and Alessi remained intact above the
Portiuncula, which otherwise would have been utterly destroyed. In
rebuilding the church, Poletti, the Roman architect employed, deviated
slightly from Vignola's original plan, and further he erected a more
elaborate and far less elegant façade than the first one, but baroque
as it is we may be thankful that the niches for statues of the saints
have remained empty. There have been other earthquakes since that of
1832, and when they occurred a pyramid of faggots was carefully piled
upon the Portiuncula for protection in case a miracle might not
intervene a second time to save it from destruction.
The friars took an active part in the work, building the campanile and
carving the handsome pulpit and the cupboards in the sacristy. The
marble altar was given in 1782 by Mehemet Ali, the ruler of Egypt, and
many noble Italian families contributed towards the erection of the
chapels containing decadent paintings which it would be useless to
describe or to look at. One priceless treasure ornaments the chapel of
San Giuseppe (in the left transept), a work of Andrea della Robbia in
terra-cotta of blue and white which is like a portion of the sky seen
through the cool branches of a vine on a glaring summer's day. Andrea
is truly the sculptor of the franciscans, for there are but few of his
works where an incident from St. Francis' life is not introduced, and
with what feeling they are realised. On one side of the beautiful
Madonna who bends to receive her crown from the hands of the Saviour,
is represented with great dignity and simplicity St. Francis receiving
the Stigmata, on the other St. Jerome and his lion. Beneath is a
predella divided into three compartments, the Annunciation, Christ in
the manger, and the Adoration of the Magi; and Andrea has framed in
the whole with a slightly raised garland of apples, fir-cones and
Japanese medlars, which suits the delicacy of the workmanship of the
small scenes better than a heavier wreath of fruit and leaves. In the
Capella delle Reliquie (in the right transept) is a Crucifixion
painted on panel by Giunta Pisano (?) with medallion half figures of
the Virgin and St. John; below are kneeling angels by an Umbrian
artist, whose work contrasts most strangely with the ancient painting
belonging to the dark years before Giotto.
In a preceding chapter we lamented the efforts that have been made to
decorate the Portiuncula, now alas no longer the shrine among the oak
trees; not only in earlier centuries did Umbrian artists cover its
rough stones in many parts with frescoes, but the German artist
Overbeck has added another superfluous decoration to the façade,
severely, but justly criticised by M. Taine, and a German lady has
painted the Annunciation on the apse. A very small picture by Sano di
Pietro of the Madonna and Child hangs above, a very charming example
of the master's work. Very little remains of Pietro Perugino's
Crucifixion, and what there is has been well covered over with modern
paint. The choir of the monks built outside the Portiuncula having
been removed in the eighteenth century half of Perugino's fresco was
destroyed, leaving only the groups of people at the foot of the Cross,
amongst whom we recognise St. Francis.
A naïve legend is recalled to us by the stone slab let into the wall
close to the side entrance, recording the spot where Pietro Cataneo,
the first vicar of the Order during the life of the saint, is buried.
He was as holy as the rest of those first enthusiasts, and after death
so many miracles were wrought at his tomb that the peace of the friars
was disturbed. The case becoming serious they had recourse to St.
Francis who, seeing the danger that their lonely abode would become a
place of pilgrimage, addressed an admonition to Pietro Cataneo, saying
that as he had ever been obedient in life so must he be in death and
cease to perform such marvellous miracles. After this when peasants
came to pray for some favour at his tomb no answer was vouchsafed, so
that gradually their faith in his intercession ceased and peace again
reigned at the Portiuncula.
The extent of the present church is so immense that the site of all
the scattered huts of the brethren and the little orchard so carefully
tended by the saint, are contained within its walls. Over what was the
infirmary where St. Francis died St. Bonaventure built a chapel which
Lo Spagna decorated with portraits (?) of the first franciscans, now
seen very dimly like shadows on its walls by the flickering light of
the tapers. Out of the half gloom stands strongly outlined in a niche
above the altar, a beautiful terra-cotta statue of St. Francis by
Andrea della Robbia. The hood is thrown back, the head slightly
raised, and in the sad but calm expression of the exquisitely modelled
face Andrea conveys a truer feeling of the suffering Poverello than
all the so-called portraits. One of these, said to be painted on the
lid of the saint's coffin by Giunta Pisano, hangs outside the chapel,
but it looks more like a bad copy of Cimabue's St. Francis in the
Lower Church, and we would fain leave with the remembrance unspoilt
of Andrea's fine conception. Passing through the sacristy containing a
head of Christ by an unknown follower of Perugino and a small Guido
Reni (?), we reach the chapel of St. Charles Borromeo where an ancient
and much restored portrait of St. Francis, said to be painted on part
of his bed, hangs above the altar; it is in every way less interesting
than the one in the sacristy of the Lower Church. From here an open
colonnade leads past a little plot of ground, which in the days of the
Little Brethren was the orchard of the convent. One day as the saint
left his cell he stopped a moment to speak with the friar who attended
to the land, "begging him not to cultivate only vegetables, but to
leave a little portion for those plants which in due time would bring
forth brother flowers, for the love of Him who is called 'flower of
the field and lily of the valley.'" Accordingly a "fair little garden"
was made, and often while St. Francis caressingly touched the flowers,
his spirit seemed to those who watched him to be no longer upon earth
but to have already reached its home. On the other side, carefully
preserved within wire netting, is the famous Garden of Roses, and
standing in the midst, like ruins of some temple, are the four pillars
which in olden times supported a roof above the Portiuncula. In the
days when St. Francis had his hut close by, this cultivated garden was
only a wilderness of brambles in the forest, and the legend tells how
the saint being assailed by terrible temptation as he knelt at prayer
through the watches of the night, ran out into the snow and rolled
naked among the brambles and thorns to quiet the fierce battle within
his soul. The moonlight suddenly broke through the clouds shining upon
clusters of white and red roses, their leaves stained with the saint's
blood which had fallen upon the brambles and produced these thornless
flowers, while celestial spirits filled the air with hymns of praise.
Throwing a silken garment over him and flooding his pathway with
heavenly radiance, the angel led him to the Portiuncula where the
Madonna and Child appeared to him in a vision. The legend has been
often illustrated, Overbeck's fresco on the façade of the chapel
records it yet again where St. Francis is represented as offering to
the Virgin the roses he had gathered.
[Illustration: THE GARDEN OF THE ROSES AT STA. MARIA DEGLI ANGELI]
A few steps beyond the Garden of the Roses lies the Chapel of the
Roses built by St. Bonaventure over the hut of St. Francis, which was
afterwards enlarged by St. Bernardine. The place where he spent his
few moments of repose and so many hours of prayer, can be seen through
the grating on a level with the chapel floor, and resembles more the
lair of a wild animal than an ordinary abode of man; but such places
were dear to him, and he rejoiced in having the open forest outside
his cell into which he wandered at all times of the day and night, and
where the brethren, ever curious to watch their beloved and holy
master, could see him on moonlight nights holding sweet converse with
heavenly spirits. The choir of the chapel is frescoed by Lo Spagna who
repeated again the figures of the first franciscans, adding those of
St. Bonaventure, St. Bernardine of Siena, St. Louis of Toulouse, and
St. Anthony of Padua on the left wall, and St. Clare and St. Elisabeth
of Hungary on the right wall. The fresco on the ceiling is said to be
by Pinturricchio. The paintings in the nave by Tiberio d'Assisi are
faintly coloured and a poor example of Umbrian art; only the last
scene is interesting, where St. Francis publishes the indulgence in
the presence of the seven bishops, as it gives an accurate
representation of the Portiuncula in the fifteenth century with
Niccolò da Foligno's fresco still upon the façade. It tells the legend
of the "Perdono" which even to the present day plays so important a
part in the religious life of Assisi, bringing crowds every year to
the Portiuncula for whom the Angeli was finally built. Disentangling
the story from the legend by no means diminishes its charm, while we
get a very striking historical scene showing us St. Francis in yet
another light. Once when the saint was praying at the Portiuncula,
Christ and his Mother appeared to him to ask what favour he desired,
for it would be granted by reason of his great faith. The salvation of
souls being ever the burden of his prayers he begged for a plenary
indulgence, to be earned by all who should enter the Portiuncula on a
special day. "What thou askest, O Francis," replied Christ, "is very
great; but thou art worthy of still greater favours. I grant thy
prayer; but go and find my Vicar, the Sovereign Pontiff Honorius III,
at Perugia, and ask him in my name for this indulgence." Early next
morning St. Francis, accompanied by Peter Cataneo and Angelo da Rieti,
started along the road to Perugia where Innocent III, had but lately
died and the pious Honorius been immediately elected as his successor.
It was in the early summer of 1216 that the little band of friars were
led into the presence of the Pope in the old Canonica, but not for the
first time did St. Francis find himself in the presence of Rome's
sovereign, gaining his cause now as before through the great love that
made his words and actions seem inspired. At first the Pope murmured
at the immensity of the favour asked but finally, his heart being
touched by the fervour of the saint, he said: "For how many years do
you desire this indulgence. Perchance for one or two, or will you that
I grant it to you for seven?" The Pope had still to learn the depths
of love in the saint's heart who stood before him pleading so
earnestly for the souls of men, not during his life only, but during
centuries to come. "O Messer il Papa," cried St. Francis in accents
almost of despair, "why speakest thou of years and of time? I ask thee
not for years, but I ask thee for souls." "It is not the custom of the
Roman Curia," answered the Pope, "to grant such an indulgence."
"Your Holiness," said the saint, "it is not I who ask for it, but He
who has sent me, the Lord Jesus Christ."
The Pope conquered by these words and driven by a sudden impulse said,
"We accord thee the indulgence." The Cardinals who had remained silent
now began to murmur and reminded the Pope, like cautious guardians of
the Papal interests, that this plenary indulgence would greatly
interfere with those granted for pilgrimages to the Holy Land, and for
visiting the tombs of the Blessed Apostles.
"We have given and granted it to him," answered Honorius. "What has
been done we cannot undo, but we will modify it so that the indulgence
will be but for one full day." And motioning the saint to approach he
said: "From henceforth we grant that whoso comes to and enters this
church, being sincerely repentant and having received absolution,
shall be absolved from all punishment and all faults, and we will that
this indulgence be valid every year in perpetuity, but for one day
only from the first vesper of the one day until the first vesper of
the next." Hardly had the Pope ceased speaking when St. Francis
radiant with joy turned to depart.
"_O semplicione quo vadis?_ O simple child without guile, whither
goest thou? Whither goest thou without the document ratifying so great
a favour?" quoth the Pope.
"If this indulgence," answered the saint, "is the work of God, I have
no need of any document, let the chart be the Blessed Virgin Mary, the
notary Christ and my witnesses the angels."
Round this historical interview the legend makers wove the pretty
story of the roses which flowered in mid-winter among the snow,
relating that after the concession of the indulgence in the summer of
1216 occurred this rose miracle, and Christ in a vision bade the saint
go to Rome in order that the day might be fixed for the gaining of the
indulgence, and to convince Honorius of the truth of his revelation he
was to carry some of the roses with him. But having already obtained
the Pope's sanction at Perugia, it was unlikely that the saint would
wait another year before proclaiming the glad tidings to all the
country-side, and we may be sure that no sooner had he returned to the
Portiuncula from Perugia than he made speedy preparations for the
arrival of a great concourse of people. On the afternoon of the first
of August the plain about the Portiuncula was filled with pilgrims
from far and near, and many friars hastened from distant parts to
listen to their master's wonderful message. He mounted the wooden
pulpit which had been erected beneath an oak tree close to the chapel,
followed by the seven Umbrian bishops who were to ratify his
proclamation of the indulgence. St. Francis discoursed most eloquently
to the assembled multitude and then in the fullness of his joy cried
out to them, "I desire to send you all to Paradise," and announced the
great favour he had obtained for them from the Holy Pontiff. When the
bishops heard him proclaim the indulgence as "perpetual" they murmured
among themselves, and finally exclaimed that he had misunderstood the
words of the Pope, and that they intended to do only what was right
and ratify the indulgence for ten years. Full of righteous feeling the
bishop of Assisi stepped forward to correct the error into which the
saint had fallen, but to the astonishment of his companions he
declared the indulgence to have been granted for all time. Then the
others murmured still more, saying he had done this because he was an
Assisan and wished to bring great honour to his diocese; so the bishop
of Perugia, determining to set the mistake right, began to speak, but
he found himself forced by a supernatural power to proclaim the
indulgence in the very words of St. Francis. The same thing happened
to the other five bishops, and St. Francis then saw his dearest wishes
realised.
Daily the fame of the Portiuncula increased, and the year 1219
witnessed another immense gathering of people, but this time it was
the meeting of the five thousand franciscan friars who came from
distant parts to attend the Easter Chapter held by St. Francis in the
plain. One of the most vivid and interesting chapters (the xiii) in
the _Fioretti_, pictures for us "the camp and army of the knights of
God," all busily employed in holy converse about the affairs of the
Order. It relates how "in that camp were shelters, roofed with lattice
and mat, arranged in separate groups according to the diverse
provinces whence came the friars; therefore was this Chapter called
the Chapter of the Lattices or of the Mats; their bed was the bare
earth, though some had a little straw, their pillows were stones or
billets of wood. For which reason the devotion of those who heard or
saw them was so great, and so great was the fame of their sanctity,
that from the court of the Pope who was then at Perugia, and from
other towns in the vale of Spoleto, came many counts, barons and
knights, and other men of gentle birth, and much people, and cardinals
and bishops and abbots with many other clerics, to see so holy and
great a congregation and so humble, the like had never yet been in the
world of so many saintly men assembled together: and principally they
came to see the head and most holy father of all these holy
men...."[113]
[Illustration: THE FONTE MARCELLA BY GALEAZZO ALESSI]
THE PARDON OF ST. FRANCIS OR "IL PERDONO D'ASSISI."
We cannot study the story of any Umbrian town without experiencing the
feeling that it belongs to the past and was built in an age, which can
only dimly be realised in the pages of old chronicles, by a people who
were ever hurrying to battle, bent on glory and conquest for their
cities. The character of the inhabitants has changed, and though the
wonderful little cities they built upon the hills remain much as in
mediæval times, they have a peaceful and quiet loveliness of their own
which could not have existed in those days of fevered struggle and
unrest. The word Assisi brings up, even to those who have seen the
town but for a day, a host of sunlit memories; of way-side shrines
with fading frescoes, whence Umbrian Madonnas smile down upon the
worshippers; of ravines and forest trees; of vineyards where the
peasants greeted you; of convent and Basilica glowing golden and
crimson in the sudden changes from afternoon to sun-down, as they lie
bathed in the last rays of light upon the hill above the darkness of
the valley. All these things and many more pass through our minds, but
the picture would be incomplete if we fail to recall two days in
August when the undying power of St. Francis once more reaches across
the centuries, arousing the people to a sudden return to mediæval
times of expiation, prayer and strong belief in the power of a great
saint's intercession.
[Illustration: AN ASSISAN GARDEN IN VIA GARIBALDI]
The very mention of a feast savours in Italy of delightful things, of
songs, of crowds of happy-looking people bent on the pleasures of a
holiday as well as on praying for the good of their souls, and as a
feast at Assisi sounded fairer than any other, we determined to become
for the moment pilgrims and seek with them for the "Pardon of St.
Francis." So as the days drew near to August we stood once more on the
terrace of the Hotel Subasio, and as we felt the cool air of the early
morning coming from the mountains, long days of interminable heat at
Florence were forgotten, and Assisi, with her gardens full of
sweet-scented summer flowers, her streets resounding only with the
plash of the water of many fountains, seemed to us indeed to possess
more beauty, variety and brilliancy of colour than we had realised
before. Never had the nights been so still as in that late July, when
the peasants had gathered in their harvest and were waiting for the
time of vintage; only the shrill notes of the crickets answered each
other occasionally along the valley, and the frogs croaked on the
margin of the rills below the town. But soon this calmness ceased as
the country roused itself for the annual spell of madness; there were
voices in the vineyards during the night, bonfires in the plains, and
a general tremor of excitement filled men and animals, setting the
thin Assisan cocks crowing at unearthly hours in the morning. A night
of sounds and wakefulness preceded a day when the people of all the
cities and villages near appeared to have arrived in Assisi, not for
the feast--for it was only the 29th of July--but for the fair. We
followed them to the Piazza della Minerva, no longer the quiet place
of former visits when only a few citizens sat sipping their cups of
coffee, or talked together as they walked leisurely up and down.
Temples, buildings and frescoes were forgotten as we watched the
peasants gather round the booths to purchase articles of apparel and
household wares, bargaining in shrill voices to the delight of
purchaser, seller and onlooker. All the people of the country seemed
to be here, and the Umbrian sellers had decked their stalls with a
dazzling mass of coloured stuffs as attractive to us as to the
Umbrian women. We bought large kerchiefs with red roses on a yellow
ground to wear over our heads at the feast, and enormous hats with
flapping brims, which the peasants, always interested in a neighbour's
purchase, helped us to choose, saying, "take this one for no rain will
come through it, and you need never use an umbrella." So a sun-bonnet
was bought for rain and we went away convinced that no more delightful
shopping could be done than during a fair day at Assisi, when a
passing farmer and his family were ready to help us to choose the
goods and to bargain, and moreover comforted us in the end by the
assurance that in their opinion the money had been well spent. Later
we strolled up to the Piazza Nuova, where an immense fair of oxen was
being held, transforming another sleepy corner of the town into a
busy, bustling thoroughfare. They were quiet beasts enough and we
walked in among them stroking their soft noses as we watched the
groups of excited peasants performing the various rites of selling and
buying. When an ox was sold the broker joined the hands of vendor and
purchaser by dint of much pulling, and then shook them up and down,
shouting all the while, until our joints ached at the sight of this
energetic signing of a treaty. The bargaining causes enormous
amusement, the discussion on either side bringing a current of eager
talk through the crowd; only the oxen were thoroughly weary of the
whole affair as they gazed pensively at their owners. They were large
milk-white creatures, the whole place was one white shimmering mass
seen against the old walls of the town and the blocks of Roman
masonry, calling up idle fancies of Clitumnus down in the valley just
in sight, whose fields had given pasture to the oxen of the gods.
The whole of that day Assisi was full of Umbrian men and women greatly
concerned in buying and selling; but on the next the streets began to
fill with people from distant parts of Italy, whose only thought was
for St. Francis. At a very early hour of the 30th we were roused by
the sound of many voices in the distance; going out on the terrace we
saw a crowd of pilgrims coming across the plain, and others moving
with slow steps up the hill. When near the Porta S. Francesco they
knelt outside in the road and sang their hymn of praise before
entering the Seraphic City. From dawn to evening a steady stream of
pilgrims passed into the town, and the chanting, rising and falling
like a fitful summer breeze, was the only sound to be heard throughout
the day. Such different groups of people knelt together in the church,
with nothing in common but the love for the franciscan saint whose
name was for ever on their lips. They came from distant corners of
Southern Italy generally in carts drawn by mules or oxen, for few
could afford the luxury of coming by train. The Neapolitan women and
those from the Abruzzi wore spotlessly white head-kerchiefs which fell
round their shoulders like a nun's coif, a white blouse and generally
a brilliant red or yellow skirt gathered thickly round the hips; the
men were even more picturesque, with their waistcoats and
knickerbockers of scarlet cloth, their white shirt sleeves showing,
and their stockings bound round with leathern thongs. Some of the
women from the Basilicata wore wonderful necklaces of old workmanship,
and gold embroidered bands laid across their linen blouses, while long
pins with huge knobs of beaten silver fastened their headgear of black
and white cloth. There were two women from the mountains of the
Basilicata who wore thick cloth turbans, and blue braid plaited in and
out of their hair at one side, giving them a coquettish air; they
suffered beneath the burden of their thick stuff dresses made with
straight short jackets and skirts and big loose sleeves. Their felt
boots were ill-fitted for Umbrian roads, and altogether they were
attired for a winter climate and not for a burning August day in mid
Italy. "Ah, it is cool among our mountains," they said with a sigh
gazing wearily down at the plain which sent up hot vapours to mingle
with the dust. Many of them had been three weeks on their journey and
they look upon it as a great holiday, an event in their lives which
cannot be often repeated for they are poor and depend for their
livelihood upon the produce of their fields; but even the poorest
brings enough to have a mass said at the Portiuncula and to drop some
coppers on the altar steps. A few wandered through the Upper Church
looking at Giotto's frescoes, but unable to read the story for
themselves turned to us for an explanation when we happened to be
there. They patted our faces, saying _carina_ by way of thanks, but
realised little or nothing about the saint they had come so far to
honour, only being certain that his intercession was all powerful.
Several peasants sat in turn upon the beautiful Papal throne in the
choir, both as a cure and as a preventive against possible ailments,
and thinking there was some legend as to its miraculous qualities we
asked them to tell us about it. They looked up surprised and very
simply said, "It stands in the church of San Francesco," this was
enough in their eyes to explain all miracles and wonders. A favourite
occupation was kneeling by the entrance door of the Lower Church and
listening for mysterious sounds which are said to come from the small
column fixed in the ground. "What are you doing," we asked, cruelly
disturbing the devotion of an old man in our desire for information.
"I am listening to the voice of St. Francis," he answered, telling us
that we might hear it too, but as he was in no hurry to cede his place
to others we had no chance of verifying his strange assertion. The
priests had a double function to perform, for while hearing
confessions they held a long rod in their hands with which they tapped
the heads of the peasants passing down the church; it was a blessing,
which by the ignorant might be mistaken for some mysterious kind of
fishing in invisible waters. At first the northern mind was surprised
at the familiar way the pilgrims used the churches as their home, many
being too poor to afford a lodging in the town. Especially at the
Angeli we saw the strange uses side altars were put to; a family,
having heard several masses and duly performed all their spiritual
duties, would settle themselves comfortably on the broad steps of an
altar, unfasten their bundles and proceed to breakfast off large
hunches of bread and a mug of water; what remained of the water was
employed in washing their feet. One man who had tramped for many days
along dusty roads and wished to change his clothes, conceived the
novel idea of retiring into a confessional box for the purpose. His
wife handed him in the clean things and presently he drew aside the
curtain, and emerged in spotless festive apparel with his travelling
suit tied up in a large red handkerchief.
[Illustration: WOMEN FROM THE BASILICATA]
Late in the evening of the 30th we happened to be at the Angeli when a
new batch of pilgrims arrived, and for a long time we watched them
reverently approach the Portiuncula on their knees, singing all the
time the pilgrim's hymn with the ever-recurring refrain, "Evviva Maria
e Chi la creò," which resounded through the church in long drawn nasal
notes ending in a kind of stifled cry. There was something soothing in
the plaintive, monotonous cadence as it reached us at the Garden of
the Roses, where we had gone to breathe the cool air which blows
across the open colonnade even on the hottest of summer days. We were
listening to Father Bernardine's peaceful talk about St. Francis and
the cicala which sang to him in the fig tree, and the lamb which
followed the brethren to office, when suddenly we were startled by
shrieks and screams in the church. "It is nothing, only the
Neapolitans," said Father Bernardine, smiling at our distress. But
unable longer to bear what sounded like the moanings of the wind which
always fills one with uneasy feelings, half of fear, half of
expectation that something unusual is going to happen, we hurried once
again into the church. There a sight met our eyes which we shall never
forget. Lying full length on the ground, their faces prone upon the
pavement, were women crawling slowly, so slowly that the torture
seemed interminable, from the entrance of the great church to the
Portiuncula, and as they crawled they licked the floor with their
tongues leaving behind them a mark like the trail of a slug. As we
watched these poor penitents dragging themselves along, unconscious of
aught around them and only overwhelmed by the consciousness that they
must make atonement for past sins, a terrible sense of compassion,
misery and disgust came over us. Who could restrain their tears,
though they may have been tears of anger that people should be allowed
to practise such ignoble acts of self-abasement. One girl especially
called forth all our sympathy. She came running in out of the
sunlight, and after standing for a moment at the entrance with her
eager face uplifted towards the holy shrine, her eyes alight with the
strange look of one bent upon some great resolve, she threw herself
down full length upon the ground and commenced the terrible penance
which she had come all the way from the Abruzzi mountains to
perform.[114] She was very slight and her black skirt fell round her
like a veil, showing the delicate outline of her figure against the
marble pavement. Resting her naked feet against the knees of a man
kneeling behind her, she pushed herself forward with the movement of a
caterpillar. Another man tapped his pilgrim's staff sharply on the
floor in front of her face to direct her towards the chapel, whilst
her mother ever now and then bent down to smooth away the tangle of
dark hair which fell round the girl like a shroud. Though prematurely
aged by toil and suffering, the elder woman had a beautiful face,
reminding one of a Mater Dolorosa as with bitter tears she assisted at
her daughter's deep humiliation. Just as this sad little group neared
the Portiuncula the girl stopped as though her strength were
exhausted, when the mother, choked by sobs, lifted the heavy masses of
her daughter's hair and tried to raise her from the ground. The
pilgrims pressed round singing "Evviva Maria e Chi la creò" until the
sound became deafening, while the men struck the ground almost angrily
with their sticks, and at last the girl still licking the ground
crawled forward once again. When she reached the altar of the
Portiuncula she stretched out one hand and touched the iron gates, and
then like a worm rearing itself in the air and turning from side to
side, she dragged herself on to her knees. As consciousness returned
and the Southern blood coursed again like fire through her veins, she
started to her feet and with wild cries entreated San Francesco to
hear her, beating the gates with her hands and swaying from side to
side. The cry of a wounded animal might recall to one's memory the
prayer of that young girl, storming heaven with notes of passionate
entreaty wrung from a soul in great mental agony. Other penitents came
up to take her place almost pushing her out of the chapel. We last saw
her fast asleep on the steps of a side altar curled up like a tired
dog, but on her face was an expression of great calm as though she had
indeed found the peace sought in so repulsive and terrible a manner.
Silently we left the church and turned towards Assisi, breathing with
joy the pure air and looking long at the hills lying so calm and clear
around us. Next day, the 31st of July, there was an excited feeling in
the town, not among the Umbrians, for they take the annual feast of
the "Perdono" quietly enough, but among the pilgrims, who having now
arrived in hundreds and paid their first visit to the franciscan
churches of the hill and of the plain, stood about in the lower piazza
of San Francesco waiting with evident impatience for the opening of
the feast of the afternoon. We caught their feeling of expectation and
found it impossible to do aught else than watch the people from the
balcony, and then we went down and wandered about among them. There
were such tired groups of women under the _loggie_ of the piazza,
leaning back in the shadow of the arches with their shawls drawn
across their faces to shut out the glare of the August sun. A crowd of
girls rested on the little patch of grass near the church, some
eating their bread, others sleepily watching the constant passage of
people in and out of the church; for long spaces they sat silent,
listlessly waiting, then suddenly one among them would rise and sing a
southern song, sounding so strange in Umbria. Her companions, casting
off the desire to sleep, joined in the chorus until the song was ended
and they once more became silent watchers. The shadows began to deepen
round the church, the feeling of expectation increased, and the hours
of waiting seemed long to the crowd and to us, when about four o'clock
the dense mass of people in front of the church divided. A procession
of priests in yellow copes filed out of the Basilica, one among them
carrying the autograph benediction of St. Francis (see p. 210), and
went to the little chapel near the Chiesa Nuova built over the stable
where the saint is said to have been born. Here the holy relic is
raised for the faithful to venerate, and the procession returns to San
Francesco. It is a small but important ceremony, the prelude to the
granting of the indulgence. We had reached the chapel before the
procession, through side streets, but soon returned to the lower
church for the crowd was intolerable, and we had been warned that once
the blessing had been given a mad rush might be made to reach San
Francesco and that sometimes people were trampled under foot. Out of
the burning heat we entered the cool dark church where Umbrian
peasants had already taken their places, as spectators, but not as
actors in the feast. Seated on low benches against the wall they
formed wondrous groups of colour, like clumps of cyclamen and
primroses we have seen flowering in a wood upon an Italian roadside.
The gates across the church had been shut, and were guarded by
gendarmes; we had arrived too late. But presently Fra Luigi appeared
at the gate of St. Martin's chapel, and hurriedly we followed him down
the dark, narrow passage leading to the sacristy; we had only just
time to run across the church and take our places outside the chapel
of St. Mary Magdalen, when the great crowd surged into the church. The
excitement became intense, and the pilgrims who had followed in the
procession as docile as lambs now could restrain themselves no longer,
and hustled the priests forward, pressing them against the iron gates
in their efforts to approach the altar. There was a moment of tension
as the whole of the iron screen bent beneath the weight of the crowd
when the gendarmes half opened the gate to allow the priests to pass
through. With the relic swaying above their heads, they slipped in
from among the pilgrims, who, finding the gates once more barred
against them, began to moan and shout with deafening fury. The organ
pealed forth mad music, the incense rose in clouds around the altar,
and eager faces peered through the gates, which were battered with
angry fists as the people pushed against each other so that the whole
crowd rocked from side to side. Through it all stood the quiet figure
of the priest, raising the relic high above the heads of the people
whose voices were for the moment hushed, as the words of benediction
were pronounced. Rapidly crossing the church, followed by his
attendants, he entered the sacristy and shut the door, while four
gendarmes stationed themselves at the corners of the altar to prevent
people from mounting the steps, and others went to unbar the gates.
There was a great creaking of bolts and hinges and in a moment the
pilgrims rushed forward, afraid of losing even a single moment of the
precious hours of indulgence, and cries of "San Francesco" almost
drowned the sound of hurrying footsteps. Families caught each other by
the arms and swept wildly round the altar, often knocking people down
in their wild career, old women gathered up their skirts and ran, the
Abruzzesi in their scarlet jackets, whom we had seen so calmly walking
down the streets, stepped eagerly forward with outstretched arms and
clasped hands calling loudly on the saint. Round they went in a
perpetual circle, first past the altar, then through the Maddalena
chapel out into the Piazza, and back again without a single pause.
Each time they entered the church they gained a new plenary
indulgence. From the walls the frescoed saints leant towards us, and
never had they seemed so full of peace and beauty, as on that day of
hurry and strange excitement. We saw them through a mist of dust, but
they were more real to us than the fanatics streaming past in mad
career, and we greeted them as friends. Then as the sun went down in a
crimson sky behind the Perugian hills, a great stillness fell upon the
people, the gaining of indulgences for that day had ceased, and
quietly those who had no shelters went into the country lanes to pass
the night, or rested beneath a gateway of the town. Already Assisi was
returning to her long spell of silence, for next morning at dawn the
pilgrims would be on their road to Sta. Maria degli Angeli for the
early morning mass.
[Illustration: SAN FRANCESCO AND THE LOWER PIAZZA]
Rashly we left the quietness of the town to join the crowd again down
in the plain late the next afternoon when the feast was nearly over.
The press of people was felt more at the Angeli than at San Francesco,
as they gained the indulgence by simply walking round the church and
through the Portiuncula without going outside. It was useless to
struggle, or to attempt to go the way we wanted, for we were simply
carried off our feet and borne round the church in breathless haste in
the temperature of a Turkish bath. There were moments of suspense when
we doubted, as the crowd bore us swiftly forward, whether we should
pass the confessional boxes without being crushed against the sharp
corners. The cries of "Evviva Maria, Evviva San Francesco," became
deafening as we neared the Portiuncula, and the people surged through
the doors, throwing handfuls of coppers and silver coins upon the
altar steps, and even at the picture of the Madonna above the altar in
their extraordinary enthusiasm. How tired they looked, but in their
eyes was a fixed look showing the feelings which spurred them on to
gain as much grace as time would allow. They never paused, they never
rested. With a last glance back upon the people and the names of Mary
and Frances ringing in our ears we left the stifling atmosphere for
the burning, but pure air outside.
How peaceful it all seemed in comparison to the scene we had just
witnessed. The Piazza was full of booths as on a market day, with rows
of coloured handkerchiefs, sea-green dresses such as the peasants
like, and endless toys and religious objects; old women sat under
large green umbrellas selling cakes, and cooks, in white aprons and
caps, stood by their pots and pans ready to serve you an excellent
meal. From under a tree a man sprang up as we passed with something of
the pilgrim's eagerness about him, saying, "See, I will sing you a
song and dance for you," shaking his companions from their sleep and
snatching up his accordion, he began a wild, warlike dance upon the
grass, while the others accompanied him with an endless chant. And so
the hours crept on, until once again as the sun went down the pilgrims
streamed quietly out of the church, but this time they gathered up
their bundles and walked to the ox waggons which were standing ready
in the road, and quite silently without delay they seated themselves,
fifteen or twenty in a cart, to start upon their long journey home.
Never had the town been so deadly still as on the 2nd of August, when
the inhabitants had gone down the hill to the church of the Angeli
where they sought to obtain their indulgences now the pilgrims had
departed. Very quietly they knelt on the marble floor during the High
Mass, silently they prayed, and with slow reverent steps they passed
in and out of the Portiuncula until the Vesper hour, and the
beautiful, calm evening then found them gathered round the altar of
their saint. "Pray, ye poor people, chant and pray. If all be but a
dream to wake from this were loss for you indeed."
FOOTNOTES:
[112] St. Francis called the Portiuncula Santa Maria degli Angeli, but
now the name is more connected with the large church. See p. 97.
[113] St. Dominic was present at this famous gathering, and the
_Fioretti_ gives a curious account of the way in which he watched the
doings of a brother saint, at first a little inclined to criticise his
methods, so different to his own, but finally being won over by the
franciscan doctrine of absolute poverty.
[114] Those who know the teaching of St. Francis (see _Fioretti_,
chap. xiii.) will feel how the saint would have fought against this
device for the expiation of sins, invented by the priests of Southern
Italy. No Umbrian has ever sunk to such depths of self-abasement, and
during all the first days of the "Perdono" festival they keep aloof,
waiting till the pilgrims' departure before obtaining their
indulgences.
APPENDIX
To visitors who stay at Assisi for more than the usual hurried day,
the following notes of walks and excursions may be of some use. A few
of them have been already indicated by M. Paul Sabatier, in a paper
printed at Assisi, to explain the sixteenth century map of the town
found by him in the Palazzo Pubblico, of which a copy hangs in a room
in the Hotel Subasio.
_In the Town._--The public garden on the slope of the hill above the
Via Metastasio is a delightful place. It was the ilex wood of the
Cappucine convent until the present garden was laid out in 1882 by
Sig. Alfonso Brizzi, when the friars' convent became a home for the
aged poor.
_From Porta S. Giacomo._--(_a_) A new idea of Assisi is obtained by
following the mountain track from the Campo Santo round by the
quarries and below the Castle to Porta Perlici. Looking across the
ravine of the Tescio and up the valley of Gualdo and Nocera is a
vision of Umbrian country in its austerest mood. Even if the whole of
this walk cannot be taken we recommend all to follow the broad smooth
road leading to the Campo Santo for a little, as the view of San
Francesco and the valley beyond is very beautiful. (_b_) By taking the
Via di Fontanella (see map), straight down the hillside, the
picturesque bridge of S. Croce is reached in about twenty minutes. M.
Sabatier recommends the ascent of Col Caprile just opposite for the
fine view of Assisi, but those who do not care for an hour's climb
would do well, having seen the old bridge and its charming
surroundings, to retrace their steps, and after about two minutes turn
off to the right through the fields along a narrow footpath leading to
a bridge over the Tescio and a farmhouse. Following the right bank of
the torrent we reach the Ponte S. Vittorino (see map), and return to
the town by the old road skirting the walls of the franciscan convent
and emerging opposite the Porta S. Francesco. Want of space prevents
more being said than to urge all visitors to go this walk, which is
little known and will be found one of the loveliest they have ever
seen. Every step brings something new; banks of orchis and cyclamen,
glimpses of crimson and yellow rock in the brushwood by the hillside,
the soft blue distance of the valley beyond, and above all,
innumerable views of San Francesco, seen now with a bridge in the
foreground, now framed in by the curved and spreading branches of an
oak, and at every turn carrying our thoughts away to valleys of
Southern France and fortress-churches crowning the wooded hills (see
illustrations, pp. 215, 220). To realise the variety of scenery to be
found in Umbria we must come to Assisi and hunt out her hidden lanes
and byways.
_From Porta Perlici._--(_a_) Out of this gate, turning to the left by
the city walls, is one of the roads leading to the Castle; the others
are clearly marked on the map. (_b_) The carriage road to Gualdo and
Nocera goes for some miles along the valley, but is not completed.
_From Porta Cappucini._--(_a_) The Rocca Minore is reached by a grass
path going up the hill just inside the walls. A fine view of the
eastern slope of Assisi is obtained (see illustration, p. 10). (_b_)
The Carceri is about an hour's walk from this gate, donkeys are to be
had in the town for the excursion, or a small carriage drawn by a
horse and a pair of oxen can get there, but it is the least pleasant
way of going.
_From Porta Nuova._--(_a_) A pleasant though not the shortest way back
to the town, is the one which skirts round the hill inside the
mediæval walls from this gate to Porta Mojano, and then outside the
walls through the fields past the Portaccia to the carriage road just
below Porta S. Pietro. (_b_) The ascent of Monte Subasio occupies
about two hours and a half, though quick walkers will do it in less
time. There are several paths which anyone will indicate to the
traveller. The easiest, though the longest (about four hours), is the
one mentioned by M. Sabatier, the road to Gabbiano and Satriano, which
branches off to the left from the Foligno road not far from the Porta
Nuova. After walking along the Gabbiano road for an hour, a lane leads
up the hill for another hour to the ruined abbey of San Benedetto (p.
82). The path skirts the mountain to Sasso Rosso, three quarters of an
hour, the site of the fortress of the family of St. Clare, and then
one hour and a half brings us to the southern slope of Mount Subasio
called the Civitelle, where the craters of the extinct volcano are to
be seen. The highest point (1290 metres), is reached in another half
hour. The view is very fine; Nocera and Gualdo lie to the north, Monte
Amiata to the west, a range of snowy mountains to the south, Mount
Terminillo, the Sabine Appenines and the mountains of the Abruzzi, and
Mount Sibella to the east. The return to Assisi, without passing the
Carceri, takes two hours. (_c_) The road to San Damiano is marked on
the map; it is good but very steep, requiring oxen to draw the
carriage up the hill on the return. On foot it is only a quarter of an
hour from the gate. (_d_) A long day's drive will take the traveller
to Spello, Foligno and Montefalco, but it is a tiring excursion and
only a faint idea can be obtained of these beautiful Umbrian towns. It
is better, if possible, to give a day to each, and to see Bevagna,
with her two exquisite romanesque buildings, on the way to Montefalco.
_From Porta Mojano._--(_a_) To follow the path taken by St. Francis,
when carried from the bishop's palace to the Portiuncula (p. 111),
just before his death, we must take the road leading from the gateway
to a small chapel, and turn to the right down a lane marked Valecchio
on the map. St. Francis either passed through Porta Mojano or the
Portaccia (now closed), but from here we follow in his footsteps
straight down the hill to the hamlet of Valecchio, set so charmingly
on a grass plot among the walnut trees, with part of its watch tower
still standing (p. 104). In the plain we come to cross roads; the one
on the left leads to San Damiano in about forty minutes, that to the
right to the leper hospital (now known as S. Agostino), whence St.
Francis blessed Assisi for the last time (p. 111). (_b_) From the gate
a few minutes brings us to a path crossing the fields to the left, to
the old church of S. Masseo built in 1081 by Lupone Count of Assisi to
serve as a chapel to the monastery, now the dwelling place of peasant
families. (_c_) From Porta Mojano a lane leads straight down to the
plain, and just before reaching the high road where it crosses the
railway at right angles, the chapel of S. Rufino d'Arce--the real
Rivo-Torto--is seen in the fields to the left (see pp. 93-95). By the
side of the lane close to the railway line is the chapel of Sta. Maria
Maddalena (see pp. 93-95). This is about half an hour's walk.
_From Porta S. Francesco._--There are several drives. (_a_) Perugia.
(_b_) Bastia, the first station on the railway between Assisi and
Perugia, possessing a triptych by Niccolò da Foligno. A beautiful view
of the river Chiaggio is obtained at the bridge of Bastiola. (_c_) A
road from the Angeli branches off to Torre d'Andrea, where there is a
picture by a scholar of Pinturicchio. But more delightful is the
chapel of S. Simone a little further on, built right in the midst of
the cornfields, whose walls are covered with frescoes of the fifteenth
and sixteenth centuries. (_d_) A beautiful drive is to the Rocca di
Petrignano, a hill-set village above the Chiaggio. To fully recount
its story, the picturesqueness of its rock-cut streets and the charm
of the chapel upon the heights, whose walls are covered from floor to
roof with votive Madonnas and saints, would need a chapter to itself.
It has been enthusiastically described by M. Broussolle in his
_Pélerinages Ombriens_, but it may be well to remark that he calls the
Rocca di Petrignano, for some unknown reason, the Rocca d'Assisi.
(_e_) It is an hour and a half's walk to the church of S. Fortunato,
across the bridge of S. Vittorino, recommended by M. Sabatier in his
list of excursions. The way side chapel of S. Bartolo, with its
interesting apse is passed on the way.
It would be well to get the Italian military map, Fo. 123 (either at
Seeber, Via Tornabuoni, Florence, or at D. Terese, Perugia), if the
pilgrim to Assisi wishes to explore the country round Assisi.
INDEX
A
AGNES, Blessed, persecution of, 263; enters convent of San
Damiano, 264; assists at death-bed of St. Clare, 271.
AGOSTINO DA SIENA, tomb by, 189.
ALBI, Cathedral of, 129.
ALBORNOZ, Cardinal, takes Assisi, 23; rebuilds castle, 24, 326;
builds chapel in San Francesco, 24, 193; builds portion of
colonnade of convent, 221; 327.
ALESSI, Galeazzo, _note [80]_ 193; remodels San Rufino, 296;
designs cupola of the Angeli, 335.
ALEXANDER IV, Pope, 207; canonizes St. Clare, 280.
---- VI, Pope, 330; 331.
ALUNNO, _see_ Niccolò da Foligno.
ANGELO, Brother, 72; 271.
ANGELI, Padre, book by, _note [57]_ 106, 152.
ANTHONY, St., of Padua, at Assisi, 140; 166; 192; 250.
ANSANO, St., 304; 320.
AREZZO, 20; 239.
ARLES, Apparition of St. Francis at, 250.
ARNO, 72; 250.
ARNOLD, Matthew, quoted, 55.
ASSISI, passim.
AVIGNON, Popes at, 21; _note [89]_ 209.
B
_Baglioni_, The, besiege and take Assisi, 33, 34, 210; feud with
the Fiumi, 33; _note [101]_ 259; downfall of, 36.
---- Gian Paolo, 34, 334.
---- Malatesta, 331.
_Bagnora_, St. Bonaventure born at, _note [95]_ 229.
_Basileo_, Bishop, builds first church of San Rufino, 292.
_Bastia_, Benedictine convent at, 105, 262, 263.
_Benedict_, St., repairs the Portiuncula, 99, 100.
BENEDICTINES, Abbey of, on Mount Subasio, 82, 83; gifts of, to St.
Francis, 84, 103, 264.
BERENSON, Bernhard, 171; quoted, 198, 199, 207, 208; 251; 257.
BERNARD of Quintavalle, 48; 94; 114; 182; 273; house of, 308.
BERNARDINE, St., of Siena, 206; 221; 340.
BERNARDONE, Pietro, family of, _note [22]_ 41; quarrels with St.
Francis, 47, 235, 278, 309; house of, 307; shop of, 308.
BEVAGNA, Roman battles near., 5; St. Francis preaches to the birds
at, 62, 244.
BLASCO, Ferdinando, tomb of, 194.
---- Garzia, tomb of, 194.
BOLOGNA, St. Francis preaches at, 56.
BONAVENTURE, St., quoted, 69, 229-256; _note [76]_ 181; 206; 210;
273; 274; 338.
BONIFACE VIII, Pope, seeks counsel of Guido of Montefeltro, 223.
BORGIA, Lucrezia, 330.
BRIENNE, Gauthier de, 45; 232.
BROGLIA di TRINO, 25; 83; 328.
BRIZI, Alfonso, _note [109]_ 322; _note [111]_ 329.
----, Giuseppe, 197.
BURCKHARDT, J., 164.
C
CAMPELLO, Fra Filippo, aids in building San Francesco, 129; builds
Santa Chiara, 281.
CARCERI, Hermitage of the, 27; 81; given to St. Francis by the
Benedictines, 84; road to, 84, 85; story of, 86-93.
CARMICHAEL, W. Montgomery, 211.
CASTLE, The, of Assisi (ROCCA D'ASSISI), building of, 11, 326;
Frederick II, stays at, 13, 326; destruction of, 14, 326; rebuilt
by Albornoz, 24, 326; story of, 325-334.
CELANO, quoted, 42, 43, 44; _note [41]_ 69; his description of St.
Francis, 212; 229.
---- Knight of, 246.
CHARLEMAGNE, Emperor, besieges Assisi, 11; rebuilds Assisi, 11,
326.
CHIAGGIO, River, 103; _note [101]_ 259; St. Rufino martyred in
the, 291.
CIMABUE, Giovanni, 153; legends about, 154; Madonna by, in San
Francesco (Lower Church), 155; frescoes in San Francesco (Upper
Church), 156-160; Giotto adopted by, 169; Giotto completes works
of, at Assisi, 170; 228; 284.
CHURCH OF SANTA CHIARA, sacked by Niccolò Piccinino, 28, 29;
building of, 281, 282; frescoes in, 283; portrait of St. Clare in,
284; church of San Giorgio in, 285, 286; tomb of St. Clare found
in, 287; body of St. Clare in, 288.
---- SAN DAMIANO, Niccolò Piccinino stays at, 26; body of St.
Francis brought to, 119, 253, 267; St. Clare and her nuns live at,
264, _et seq._; attacked by army of Frederick II, 267, 268;
Innocent IV, at, 274, 278; relics at, 274, 275; crucifix of, 276,
277; choir of St. Clare at, 277; bought by the Marquess of Ripon,
278; frescoes in, 278, 279; funeral service of St. Clare held at,
279, 280; miraculous crucifix of, 274, 285.
---- SAN FRANCESCO, building of, 123, _et seq._; architect of,
124, 125; convent of, 124; 133; 139; 221; 223; 227; resemblance to
cathedral of Albi, 129; St. Francis buried in, 133, 135; legend
about, 136; 144; 146; in the first years, 215, 216; campanile of,
216; _note [92]_ 219; bells of, 219; feast of the "Perdono" in,
351, 352, 357-359.
---- ---- LOWER CHURCH, The, 149, 150; pre-Giottesque frescoes in,
151, 152, 153; Madonna by Cimabue in, 155; Giotto's frescoes of
the early life of Christ in, 171, _et seq._; Giotto's frescoes of
the miracles of St. Francis in, 174; Giotto's allegories in 177,
_et seq._; Chapel del Sacramento or of St. Nicholas in,185, _et
seq._; stained glass windows in, 189; 192; 193; 205; 206; 209;
frescoes by Giotto in chapel of St. Maria Maddalena in, 190, _et
seq._; chapel of St. Antonio da Padova in, 192; chapel of San
Stefano in, 192; chapel of St. Catherine or del Crocifisso in,
193; chapel of St. Antonio in, 193; cemetery of, 195; tomb of
Ecuba in, 195; tomb of St. Francis in, 196, 197; chapel of St.
Martin in, 198; legend of St. Martin, frescoes by Simone Martini
in, 199, _et seq._; frescoes by Simone Martini in, 212, 215;
frescoes above the papal throne in, 206, 207; frescoes by Pietro
Lorenzetti in, 207, 208; chapel of St. Giovanno Battista in, 208;
sacristies in, 209, _et seq._; portrait of St Francis in, 211;
porch of, 220.
---- ---- UPPER CHURCH, The, _note [69]_ 152; 156; frescoes by
Cimabue in, 158-160; frescoes by contemporaries of Cimabue in,
160, _et seq._; stained glass windows in, 164, _et seq._; papal
throne, pulpit and altar in, 166, 167; door of, 219; Giotto's
frescoes of the legend of St. Francis in, 229-250; frescoes by a
follower of Giotto in, 254-256; intarsia stalls in, 256.
---- SAN GIORGIO, St. Francis canonized in, 121; 273; body of St.
Clare brought to, 279, 280; church of Santa Chiara built over,
281; frescoes in, 285.
---- SANTA MARIA degli ANGELI, building of, 335; rebuilt after
earthquake, 336; works of Andrea della Robbia in, 336, 338; works
of Giunta Pisano in, 337, 338; the Portiuncula in, 337 (_see_
Portiuncula); fresco by Perugino in, 337; garden and chapel of the
Roses in, 339, 340; frescoes by Lo Spagna in, 338, 341; frescoes
by Tiberio d'Assisi at, 341; feast of the "Perdono" at, 353-355,
359-361.
---- SANTA MARIA MAGGIORE, franciscan legend connected with, 235,
308, 309, 310.
---- CHIESA NUOVA, 307; 308.
---- SAN PAOLO, 303; fresco by Matteo da Gualdo in, 304.
CHURCH OF SAN PIETRO, 312; triptych by Matteo da Gualdo in, 313;
fresco in, 313.
---- PELLEGRINI, _see_ Confraternity.
---- SAN RUFINO (Cathedral), Frederick II, baptised in, 13; 289;
church beneath, 292; building of, 294; bell-tower of, 290, 294,
301; doors of, 294, 295; interior of, 296; triptych by Niccolò da
Foligno in, 296, 297; connection with St. Francis, 238, 299.
CLARE, St., parentage of, 258; description of, 259; founds order
of Poor Clares, 104, 262; delivers her sister Agnes from her
persecutors, 263; goes to live at San Damiano, 264; friendship
with St. Francis, 62, 77, 265; last farewell to St. Francis, 119,
267; saves her convent and Assisi from the Saracens, 267, 268; her
struggle with the Papacy, 270, 271; death of, 272; miracle of the
bread by, 274, 275; canonization and funeral of, 280; church of,
281; early picture of, 284; body of, 288.
CLEMENT VII, Pope, 331.
CLITUMNUS, river, 5; Propertius lived near, 8; 350.
COMACINE builders, Guild of, 321; house of, in Assisi, 322.
CONFRATERNITY of SAN CRISPINO, 316.
---- SAN FRANCESCUCCIO, 315; frescoes at, 316.
---- SAN LORENZO, fresco at, 323.
---- DEI PELLEGRINI, 316; frescoes by Matteo da Gualdo in, 317,
318; frescoes by Mezzastris in, 318-320; fresco by Fiorenzo di
Lorenzo in, 320.
---- SAN RUFINUCCIO, frescoes in, 185, 323.
CONRAD of SUABIA, 13; 326.
CONVENT of SANTA CHIARA, 281; 282.
---- of SAN FRANCESCO, 124; 133; 139; 221; Guido of Montefeltro
lives in, 223; 227.
CORROYER, E., quoted, 129.
CORTONA, 117; 144.
CORYTHUS, King of Cortona, 2.
COSTANO, 291; 297.
CHRISTINE, Queen of Sweden, 222.
CROWE & CAVALCASELLE, Messrs, quoted, 162, 174, 176, 187; 171;
251.
D
DAMIANO, San, _see_ Church.
DANTE, quoted, 14, 71, 168, 182, 184, 186, 224, 236, 250; portrait
of, by Giotto, 176, 182.
DANTI, GIULIO, _note [80]_ 193; designs cupola of the Angeli, 335.
DARDANUS, 2; 3; 4.
DOMENICO da SAN SEVERINO, designs stalls for San Francesco, 256.
DOMINIC, St., 17; _note [95]_ 229; _note [113]_ 345.
DONI ADONE, 192; 307.
E
ECUBA, Queen of Cyprus, tomb of, 195.
EGIDIO, Brother, 48; 50; 94; 111; quoted, 117; _note [59]_ 118;
132.
ELIAS, Brother, 51; influence of, on the franciscan order, 122,
130, 132; superintends building of San Francesco, 124, _et seq._;
character of, 137; hides body of St. Francis, 135; _note [81]_
196; account of, 137-146; _note [69]_ 152; 306.
ELISEI, Canon, 292.
ETRUSCANS, The, found Perugia, 4; 5.
EUSEBIO di SAN GIORGIO, fresco by, 278.
F
FIORENZO di LORENZO, 165; frescoes by, in Assisi, 306, 307, 320.
FIORETTI, The, quoted, 49, 50, 59, 68, 88, 111, 137, 138, 266,
345; charm of, 66.
FIUMI, Jacopo, murders the Nepis, 32; 33; robs sacristy of San
Francesco, 210; despot of Assisi, 331.
FIUMI, The, their rivalry with the Nepis, 31, 32; mother of St.
Clare belongs to family of, 259.
FLAGELLANTS, The, _note [35]_ 60; 178; 314.
FORTEBRACCIO, Braccio, 25.
FRANCIS, St., birth of, 15; teaching of, 16, 18; childhood of, 41;
description of, by Celano, 42, 212; imprisoned at Perugia, 43;
conversion of, 44; dream of, at Spoleto, 45, 232; his symbol of
the Lady Poverty, 46, 53; succours the lepers, 46, 95; first
foundation of the Order, 48, 49; interview of, with Innocent III,
52, 53; rule sanctioned by Innocent III, 54, 237; eloquent
preaching of, 55, 56, 57, 59; gives St. Clare the veil, 56, 105,
262; founds Third Order, 60; preaches before the Sultan of Egypt,
61, 240; sermon of, to the birds at Bevagna, 62, 244; love of
nature, 63, 64, 65; converts the wolf of Gubbio, 65; friendship
with Gregory IX (Bishop Ugolino), 69; preaches before Honorius
III, 71, 249; stays at La Vernia, 71, 72; receives the Stigmata at
La Vernia, 73, 74; farewell to La Vernia, 75; blindness of, 76,
116; composes the Canticle to the Sun, 78; elects the Carceri as
his hermitage, 81-83; cell of, at the Carceri, 86; challenges the
nightingale to sing the praises of God at the Carceri, 87; dries
up the torrent, 88; causes a miraculous fountain to appear at the
Carceri, 91; prophecy of, to Otto IV, 96; goes to the Portiuncula
with his brethren, 97; visits the Portiuncula as a child, 102;
obtains the Portiuncula as a gift, 103, 104; hut of, _note [57]_
106, 340; blesses Assisi, 113; dictates his will, 114; death of,
115, 116; funeral of, 119, 120; canonisation of, 121, 153; church
built in honour of, 123, _et seq._; secret burial of, 134-136;
influence of, on Elias, 138, 139; miracles of, 176, 239, 243, 254,
255, 256; fresco of marriage with the Lady Poverty, 181; tomb of,
196, 197; autograph of, 210, 211; portrait of, by Giunta Pisano,
211; legends of, illustrated by Giotto and a follower, 229-256;
obtains San Damiano as a gift, 264; friendship of, with St Clare,
265, 266; statue of, by Andrea della Robbia, 338; garden of, 339,
340; roses flower in the snow for, 340; obtains the indulgence of
the Portiuncula, 342, 343; proclaims the indulgence, 344.
FREDERICK I., Emperor, at Assisi, 13.
---- II, Emperor, at Assisi, 13; 61; befriends Elias, 142; 143;
144; 217; army of, besieges Assisi, 267-269; 326.
FRY, Roger, quoted, 156, 228, 243.
FOLIGNO, 222; 278.
---- Niccolò da, _see_ Niccolò.
G
GENTILE de MONTEFLORI, Cardinal, founds chapel in San Francesco,
192, _note [82]_ 198; 205.
GIACOMA da SETTESOLI, friendship of, with St. Francis, 114; tomb
of, 207.
GIOTTINO, _note [78]_ 186; 283.
GIOTTO, birth of, 108; adopted by Cimabue, 169; character of, 170,
178; first early frescoes of, at Assisi, 171-177; poem of, on
poverty, 178; Allegories by, 181-184; frescoes by, in chapel of
Sta. Maria Maddalena, 188; genius of, 228; illustrates legend of
St. Francis, 229-250; characteristics of, 229, 232, 255;
architecture of, 231; contemporary opinion on, 244; follower of,
at Assisi, 185, 251.
GIOVANNI da GUBBIO, builds San Rufino, 294; 309.
GIUNTA PISANO, crucifix by, _note [69]_ 152; portraits by, of St.
Francis, 211, 284; 337; 338.
GOETHE, Wolfgang von, description of the Temple of Minerva, 302,
303.
GOZZOLI, Benozzo, 245.
GREGORY IX., Pope, friendship with St. Francis, 69; dream of, 121,
254; canonises St. Francis, 121, 253; founds San Francesco, 123,
_note [69]_ 152; portrait of, 159; 219; wishes to give St. Clare
the Benedictine rule, 270.
GUALDO, 12; 118; 329.
---- Matteo da, _see_ Matteo.
GUALTIERI, Duke of Athens, portrait of, 208.
GUELFUCCI, Bianca, 261; aids St. Clare in her flight, 262; enters
convent of San Damiano, 264.
GUBBIO, wolf of, 65, 221; 291; 329.
GUIDANTONIO da MONTEFELTRO, owns Assisi, 25, 317.
GUIDO da MONTEFELTRO, a monk in San Francesco, 223; treacherous
counsel of, to Boniface VIII, 224.
GRECCIO, feast of, 242.
H
HONORIUS III., Pope, St. Francis preaches before, 70, 249; rule of
St. Francis sanctioned by, 114, 210; grants St. Francis the
indulgence of the Portiuncula, 342.
I
IBALD, Rev. Father Bernardine, _note [56]_ 103.
ILLUMINATUS, Brother, 141; 240.
INGEGNO, L', 306; fresco by, 307.
INNOCENT III., Pope, 13; power of, 14; court of, 15; 45; meeting
of, with St. Francis, 52, 53; dream of, 53, 236; confirms rule of
St. Francis, 54, 70; 237; 342.
---- IV., Pope, sanctions rule of St. Clare, 271; at funeral of
St. Clare, 279, 280.
J
JACOPO TEDESCO, architect of San Francesco, 124; 125; 129; 156;
216.
JASIUS, 2; 3.
JUNIPER, Brother, 111; 112; 271.
L
LEO X., Pope, mitigates franciscan rule, 224.
---- XIII., Pope, 287.
---- Brother, 51; 72; quoted, 103, 104, 114, 131, 310; quarrel
with Elias, 132; receives autograph benediction from St. Francis,
210.
LIBERIUS, Pope, 98.
LORENZETTI, Pietro, frescoes by, in San Francesco, 207, 208.
LOUIS, St., of France, _note [30]_ 51; 210.
M
MARGARITONE, 158; 284.
MARTIN, St., chapel and legend of, in San Francesco, 198, _et
seq._
MARTINI, Simone, 198; friendship with Petrarch, 199;
characteristics of, 199; legend by, of St. Martin, 200, _et seq._;
other frescoes by, 212, 215.
MARY MAGDALEN, St., legend and chapel of, 190, 191.
MARZARIO, Professor, _note [62]_ 125.
MASSEO, Brother, 59; 72; letter of, 74; 111.
MATARAZZO, _note [12]_ 31; quoted, 33, 35; _note [101]_ 259.
MATTEO da GUALDO, frescoes by, in Assisi, 304, 306, 311, 313, 317,
318.
METASTASIO, house of, at Assisi, 322.
MICHELOTTI, Biordo, 25; 329.
MILTON, John, 14; 241.
MINERVA, The Temple of, its legend, 3; 301; description of, by
Goethe, 302, 303.
MONTEFELTRO, _see_ Guido.
MONTEFALCO, 221; 245.
MONTE FRUMENTARIO, 321.
N
NARNI, 13; 221.
NEPIS, the family of, rivalry with the Fiumi, 31, 32, 330, 331.
NICCOLÒ da FOLIGNO, triptych by, in San Rufino, 296, 297; 341.
---- da GUBBIO, carves doors for San Francesco, 220.
NICHOLAS, St., chapel and legend of, 185, _et seq._
NOCERA, 12; 118; 329.
O
ORSINI, Giovanni Gaetano, portrait of, 185; tomb of, 189.
---- Napoleone, 185.
---- The family of, _note [87]_ 208.
ORTOLANA, Madonna, 259; 264.
OTTO IV., Emperor, at Rivo-Torto, 96.
OXFORD, 110.
P
PACIFICO, Brother, vision of, 239.
PALAZZO PUBBLICO, 32; 305; frescoes in, 306.
---- SBARAGLINI, 308.
---- SCIFI, 258; 260; 262; 281.
PARENTI, Giovanni, 132; 133; 139; 140.
PAUL III, Pope, 36; 331; 332.
PERUGIA, 4; 9; wars with Assisi, 5, 19, 20, 21, 43; governs
Assisi, 22, 23; 29; 36; tries to steal body of St. Francis, 21;
_note [81]_ 196; St. Francis mocked in, 57; 221; 342.
PERUGINO, Pietro, fresco by, 337.
PIAZZA, di Sta. Maria Maggiore, encounter of St. Francis with his
father in, 235, 309; 310.
---- di San Francesco, 220.
---- della Minerva, 13; 31; 302; 330; 348.
---- Nuova, 300; 349.
---- di San Rufino, 289.
PICA, Madonna, 41; 102; 119; 307.
PICCININO, Niccolò, besieges Assisi, 25, 26; 27; 30; 126.
---- Jacopo, 329.
PIETRO _Cataneo_, Brother, 48; 138; 342.
PINTELLI, Baccio, 220.
PINTURICCHIO, 337.
PIUS II, Pope, 329.
---- V, Pope, 335.
PORTIUNCULA, The, early connection with St. Francis, 47, 102;
repaired by St. Benedict, 99; given to St. Francis, 103; cradle of
franciscan order, 104; St. Clare comes to, 104, 273; St. Francis
dies at, 114, 115, 337; 338; indulgence of, 344; chapter of the
lattices at, 345; 353; 355; 359.
PUZZARELLI, Simone, 123.
PONTANO, Teobaldo, 191.
PROPERTIUS, born at Assisi, 6; describes Assisi, 7, 8.
R
RENAN, E., quoted, 149.
RENI, Guido, 339.
RIVO-TORTO, 93; leper hospitals at, 95; description of, 96 vision
of friars at, 238, 299.
ROBBIA, Andrea della, his work in the Angeli, 336-338.
ROCCA D'ASSISI, _see_ Castle.
RUFINO D'ARCE, San, 94; St. Francis ministers to lepers at, 95.
RUFINO, Brother, 68; _note [102]_ 260.
---- St., legend of, 291, 292, 293, 297; 299.
RUMOHR, von, B., 251.
RUSKIN, John, quoted, 155, 170, 232; 236.
S
SABATIER, Paul, quoted, _note [26]_ 44, 63, 238, 258, 266, 271,
274; _note [67]_ 138.
SANSONE, Francesco, 219; 256.
SCIFI, Chiara, _see_ St. Clare.
---- Count Favorino, 258; 259; 261; 263; 264.
SCOTT, Leader, _note [62]_ 125.
SEVERINO, _see_ Domenico.
SFORZA, Alessandro, 27; 28.
---- Francesco, Duke of Milan, 25; 26; 328.
SIXTUS IV, Pope, 219; statue of, 221; 257.
SPAGNA, Lo, 207; 338; 341.
SPOLETO, 44; 45.
STANISLAUS, St., 207.
SUBASIO, Mount, 84; 258; ways to 363.
SYLVESTER, Brother, 239.
T
TAINE, H., quoted, 1, 198.
TESCIO River, 85; _note [52]_ 86; 124; 214.
THODE, Henry, _note [62]_ 125; 158; 164; 165; _note [73]_ 171;
206.
THREE COMPANIONS, legend of, 96; 229; 242.
TIBERIO D'ASSISI, frescoes at Assisi, 279, 306, 341.
TOTILA, 9; 325.
TREVELYAN, R. C., 7; 8.
U
UGOLINO, Bishop of Ostia, _see_ Gregory IX.
V
VASARI, Giorgio, quoted, 124, 153, 164, 170, 195, 244; 155, 156, 306.
VERNIA, LA, 71; _note [45]_ 75; St. Francis receives the Stigmata
at, 72; 210; 211; 243; 250.
VESPIGNANO, Giotto, born at, 168; 169.
VITRY, Jacques de, 15; quoted, 17, 240.
TURNBULL AND SPEARS, PRINTERS. EDINBURGH
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