waterworks, should leave the Falls of Terni unnoticed.
[139] L’Angeloni, in his _Storia di Terni_ (Pisa, 1878), describes a
figure of Neptune found in some excavations near Lago Velino with the
following inscription:--
Neptuno Sacrum
L. Valerius Nigri Lib. Menander
Portitor Ocrisiva.
He also gives the inscription mentioned by Montaigne:--
A. Pompejo A. F.
Clu. Q. Patrono
Municipi Interamnat.
Nahartis quod ejus
Opera universum
Municipium ex summis
Periculis et Difficultatibus
expeditum
et conservatum est ex
Testamento L. Licini T. F.
Statua statuta est.
[140] Petrino was one of the most celebrated brigands of the
cinquecento. He began his career about 1577, and for several years
afterwards kept in terror the duchy of Spoleto and the south of
Umbria. He was active in these parts as late as 1581. His death and
capture were several times reported, but he seems to have escaped to
Spain, where he lived until 1640, and returned under the favour of the
Farnesi. He died at an advanced age in 1650.
Brigandage was rife throughout the papal territories at this time.
Gregory XIII. was on bad terms with all his neighbours on account of
his arrogance and extortions, and the Florentines and Venetians allowed
the bandits to take refuge in their dominions when pressed by the papal
forces. It is strange that Montaigne should have had so little to say
about it.
[141] Sainte Foix, in Périgord, close to Montaigne’s home.
[142] Now the department of Lot-et-Garonne. Matteo Bandello had held
the bishopric of Agen until a few years before this time.
[143] The Palazzo dei Diamanti, now the Pinacoteca, built for
Sigismondo d’Este in 1493. The building alluded to by Montaigne is
probably the Palazzo Mignardi.
[144] In the time of Leo X. the neighbouring city of Recanati had been
burnt by the Turks.
[145] The Santa Casa is built of stone and not of brick.
[146] Montaigne’s offering had probably disappeared before the shrine
was pillaged by the French, as there is no mention of it in a catalogue
of the _ex votos_ by Murri, printed in 1792.
In 1802 Eustace visited Loreto and found the treasury empty. “No
vestige now remains of this celebrated collection of everything that
was valuable; rows of empty shelves and numberless cases only enable
the treasurer to enlarge on its immensity and curse the banditti that
plundered it. ‘Galli,’ he adds, ‘semper rapaces, crudeles, barbarorum
omnium Italis infestissimi.’”--_Classical Tour_, i. 166.
[147] The marble casing of the Santa Casa was designed by Bramante and
the sculptures executed by Sansovino, Girolamo Lombardo, Bandinelli,
Giovanni da Bologna, Guglielmo della Porta, Raffaele da Montelupo,
Sangallo, and others. It was begun under Leo X. and finished under Paul
III.
[148] Louis d’Amboise was born in 1479, and made cardinal by Julius II.
He died at Ancona in 1517.
[149] Georges d’Armagnac was born in Gascony in 1500, and became a
Spanish ecclesiastic. He subsequently was made archbishop of Toulouse,
and died at Avignon in 1585.
[150] The principal works now in the church are by Luca Signorelli,
and Melozzo da Forli. Montaigne does not notice the bronze doors by
Girolamo Lombardo, which rival Ghiberti’s at Florence. The church was
begun in 1468 on the site of an ancient one which, according to Vasari,
was adorned with frescoes by Domenico Veneziano and his pupil Piero
della Francesca.
[151] According to Querlon, there is no record of any such person
in the _Nomenclature alphabétique des nobles de Paris et provinces
voisines_, a list made at the end of the sixteenth century. Neither
does the Abbé Lebœuf, in his _Histoire de la ville et du diocese de
Paris_, find the name of Marteau in connection with any one of the four
places called La Chapelle described in his book.
Transcriber’s Notes
Obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected. Variations
in hyphenation and accents have been standardised but all other
spelling and punctuation remains unchanged.
Italics are represented thus _italic_.