thoroughfare that runs north and south from the Porta Serrata to the
Porta Nuova. Very little, if anything, remains of the first-named
building. And judging from the Romanesque features of a brick colonnade
and the portion of a sometime large dwelling that stands behind it, it
is very doubtful whether any of the original palace exists. We have it
on record, too, that Charles the Great carried off the marble columns of
Theodoric's building to adorn his own palace in Aachen; and, as he did
this, there is every probability that he took other material as well.
But, if we have nothing left of the Gothic king's residence, we have his
grand Arian basilica intact. Theodoric dedicated his church to S.
Martin, but when the body of S. Apollinaris was deposited in it, a
rededication to him took place. S. Apollinare Nuovo, as it has since
been called in contradistinction to the other basilica at Classis, is
famous throughout Christendom; famous for the finest mosaic in the
world. On the north wall, in the blank space where the triforium might
be, facing the sun, the Virgin is seen seated on an orange coloured
cushion which rests upon a throne. She holds in her lap the Child. Two
angels stand on either side. Their robes are white, hers is deep purple
fringed with gold and sparkling jewels. Advancing towards her are the
Three Kings of the East, whose names appear above each, Melchior, Gaspar
and Balthassar. In their hands are silver vessels. The first angel holds
his out to receive them. Beyond the kings, in a row, twenty-two virgins
come bearing crowns. They are garbed in light purple with white veils;
round their waists are bejewelled belts. The expression on the face of
each is different, and each is in a slightly different attitude; one is
accompanied by a little white dog. They tread lightly on the green sward
from which many little flowers lift their humble heads. Between each a
palm-tree grows with spreading leaves and clustering dates. It is a
wonderful procession. The eagerness and haste of the Three Kings, the
dignified and stately rhythm of the slowly pacing Virgins are so well
realised, that, although there is no idea of anything but flat
decoration in the rendering, a feeling of continuous motion holds one
throughout. In the darkened corner at the west end of the mosaic
are the walls of the City of Classis. The golden _tesseræ_ of these
walls are so dark and frowning that they might almost be called brown.
Brown they appear to be, but this is because, through an arched opening,
three ships with white sails come gliding into port over the cærulean
blue of the sea. The eye is thus carried along the whole length of the
mosaic without a single jarring note. From the white angels at one end
to the white sails at the other, it travels along with a consciousness
of repose, and one feels instinctively that one is in the presence of a
masterpiece.
[Illustration: S. APOLLINARE NUOVO, RAVENNA]
On the opposite wall, occupying the same position as Classis, are the
city of Ravenna and the palace of Theodoric. Corresponding with the two
and twenty virgins are figures of twenty-five saints clad in white--save
one--and all bearing crowns. Our Saviour, seated between four angels,
gives His benediction to the saints, who advance towards Him. The first,
in a violet robe, is S. Martinus, the patron of the Church when the
sound of the Arian creed filled its aisles. Above both these mosaics are
round-headed clerestory windows with saints and prophets in the panels
between. The ancient marble throne of the Arian bishops still exists in
a little chapel in the north aisle; and here also are some relics of S.
Apollinaris.
One of the architectural features of Ravenna's churches may be seen in
the double capitals of the columns, which give them a sort of stilt, a
peculiarity which does not prevail in churches elsewhere of the same
date--the fifth and sixth centuries. Into these two centuries were
crowded the great architectural works and their interior decorations
that have made Ravenna famous. But it is sad to think that the names of
those whose genius found scope on their walls, if ever recorded, have
been lost.
The other great basilica, dedicated to S. Apollinaris, S. Apollinare in
Classe, stands in solemn loneliness some three miles south of the city.
Of Augustus' great port this church, emblem of stability, alone remains.
Its round _campanile_ towers up over the swampy meadows and uninhabited
district that seem given up entirely to the sky and winds. An atrium,
now reduced to a portico, stood at one time in front of the façade, but
there is nothing to attract one in the barn-like exterior of the
building save the glamour attached to its history, which is accentuated
by the dreary desolation around.
Inside, the nave is divided by twelve round arches on each side; these
are supported by columns of _cipollino_ marble. The Byzantine capitals,
as in S. Apollinare in Nuovo, are surmounted by an impost with a cross
in relief. A fine flight of steps leads up to the High Altar, Choir and
Tribune. The crypt is beneath. The floor of the nave, which slopes
upwards towards the east, is four feet above the original, which was
partly covered with mosaic. A temple of Apollo stood on the site before
the church was erected in the year 534, and this older floor may be part
of the pagan building.
The mosaics of the Choir and Tribune were undergoing restoration at the
time when this was written, but although partly covered up enough was
visible to show that in the semi-dome of the apse a large golden cross,
with a representation of the Almighty's Head in the centre, occupied the
middle of a very brilliant blue circle. The soffit of the arch of the
Choir has a blue ground covered with multi-coloured birds and
arabesques.
Amongst other of Ravenna's churches the modernised basilica of S.
Francesco, the church contiguous to Dante's tomb, contains some ancient
sarcophagi and the finest tomb slab in Italy. This is now out of danger
and has been placed on the west wall of the nave. It originally covered
the remains of Ostasio da Polenta, Lord of Ravenna. He is represented in
the garb of a Franciscan friar and lies outstretched, with beautifully
modelled hands and face, under a very rich Gothic canopy. The Polenta
family were the first to befriend the great poet when he sought refuge
here from Florence.
Adjoining the back premises of one of the hotels is the old Arian
baptistery, now the oratory of Sta. Maria in Cosmedin. It was here that
the first Christian baptism in Ravenna took place. The church of S.
Spirito built by Theodoric opens on to the same courtyard; but, next to
the Gothic king's great basilica, the most interesting building
connected with his name is that which is situated half a mile outside
the Porta Serrata.
A pleasant avenue with well-kept rose beds leads one on towards a
circular building of grey Istrian limestone, which is covered with a
dome of the same material, and we are in the presence of the tomb which
Theodoric erected as the resting-place for his mortal remains. We do not
see it now as it was when the great king's bones reposed in a
sarcophagus within. To the Church of Rome Theodoric was a heretic, and
when the Goths were driven out of Ravenna and the Arian ritual was heard
no more, the Church ordered the sarcophagus to be broken up, and the
ashes of him who was tolerant to all creeds to be scattered to the
winds. The tomb was despoiled of its ornaments, and consecrated and used
as a chapel. Even now it is sublime in its simplicity, and grand in its
massive construction. Its plan is a rotunda resting on a decagonal lower
chamber, each side of which is recessed and arched by great blocks of
limestone set as the Etruscans set the roofs of their tombs. Rising in
two storeys from the ground, which is six feet below the present level
of the surrounding orchards, its dome is barely visible above the tops
of the fruit trees. The lower storey rests on a platform of stone. Its
pavement is always under a few inches of water. The upper storey is
reached by two flights of steps which, built outside, give entrance to
the sepulchral chamber from a gallery or platform that circulates round
the exterior. This gallery formed at one time a portico. The shafts and
bases of the colonnade were found buried in the ground when the last
restoration took place in 1857. A massive cornice with a circular
pattern is on the wall above, and the empty sockets placed at regular
intervals, which one sees below it, presumably held the stone that
formed the roof. The dome is one huge block of stone estimated to weigh
two hundred tons. On its exterior, close to the edge, are a dozen
perforated projections. It is thought that these were used as handles
when the mass was put into position. The summit is flat, and on it at
one time a statue may have stood. Simplicity is almost always one of the
characteristics of the great, and the mausoleum which he erected was
worthy, in its strength and plainness, of Theodoric the Goth.
BOLOGNA
The traveller in Italy must often have noticed the difference in the
shape of the battlements that nowadays add so much to the
picturesqueness of old towers and half-ruined fortress walls. No doubt
he has heard the term "Guelph" or "Ghibelline" applied to them. It is
supposed that "Welf" and "Waiblingen" were first used in Germany as
battle-cries at the conflict of Weinsberg in 1140. When the struggle for
the imperial throne between Philip of Swabia and Otto of Brunswick was
hanging in the balance, the sympathies of Brescia, Milan, and other
Lombard cities were enlisted on the side of Otto the Welf. In the
subsequent feuds between the Pope's party and the Emperor's it became a
necessity for the inhabitants of the cities of the northern part of the
peninsula, if they wished to exist at all, to favour either one side or
the other. The Guelph party were for the Pope, and the Ghibelline were
partisans of the Emperor. And thus we find in the history of most of
these towns an espousal, as policy dictated, of the Pope's cause at one
time, and of the Emperor's some decades later. This apparent
inconsistency was the outcome of family feuds within the city walls. For
a term of years the Guelphic nobles might be in the ascendant, until, on
the death or murder of a leading member, they succumbed to the prowess
of the imperial party. The great families that pinned their faith to the
ascendency of the latter adopted the swallow-tailed battlement on the
towers of their castle walls, to distinguish them from the square-shaped
that were already in existence. Italy throughout the middle ages was
torn by internecine strife which was reflected throughout every class of
society, and the subject of this chapter was no exception. Owning
allegiance to the Pope, the Bolognese overran Romagna and forced the
towns of that province to declare for the Church. In 1249 they defeated
the Modenese at Fossalto and took King Enzio prisoner. For
two-and-twenty years--in fact, for the rest of his life--they kept the
unhappy man confined in the Palace of the Podestà, treated however, as
we should treat a first-class misdemeanant, and according to his rank.
The long-drawn-out feuds of the Lambertazzi and Gieremei families, and
later on those between the great Visconti and Bentivoglio, kept the
Bolognese in a perpetual state of faction fights, which lasted until the
warlike Pontiff Julius II. annexed the city to the States of the
Church.
To go back to its earliest days, we learn that the Etruscan king,
Felsina, founded a city in 984 B.C. where Bologna now stands. He gave it
his own name, and made it the chief of his twelve Etruscan cities.
Bologna can thus, with legitimate pride, point to a history approaching
three thousand years. We find it to-day a typical modern place, with
just enough of the middle ages left to make it one of the most desirable
of all North Italian cities. It possesses hardly a street which is not
arcaded; and the thought arises: "How admirably adapted for street
fighting were these sheltered walks in the days when one half of the
town was at strife with the other!" In the oldest parts of the city the
streets are tortuous and narrow. Arcades in such streets would be just
the very best cover for raiders to steal along at night; and such must
have been the terror of the inhabitants during centuries of discord that
there is scarcely a house which has any windows opening into the
arcades, and those that do are heavily barred. Walking through these
streets, silent witnesses of bloody feuds and severe fights, one cannot
suppress the feeling that the old quarters of Bologna are full of
mystery, and it does not require much imagination to see the Visconti
party creeping along in the shadowed ways for an attack on their
hereditary foes, the Bentivoglio.
So much for the thoughts awakened by Bologna's narrow thoroughfares.
Its chief open square is the Piazza Maggiore, as fine an old Italian
square as can be found anywhere. The celebrated Fontana de Nettuno is in
the centre. A nude bronze statue of the god by Giovanni da Bologna
stands eight feet high, in a somewhat repellent attitude, above the
pedestal and basin. It is always the centre of a lounging crowd which
throngs the square throughout the day. On the west side of the Piazza is
the Palazzo Pubblico, with a façade that still retains, despite
restoration, traces of eight elegant pointed windows. A figure of the
Virgin in terra-cotta, once gilded, stands under a good canopy high up
on the empty space of the great wall of the façade. These comparatively
empty wall spaces are a feature of Bolognese architecture of the
thirteenth century. Pierced by a few windows, they give a great idea of
solidity and strength; and though one finds the same character in the
palaces of Tuscan cities, it is not so prominent there as in the big
buildings of Bologna. An immense entrance gateway opens into a
courtyard, and from this a very fine staircase by Bramante leads up to
the interior. In a smaller court beyond is a very beautiful cistern by
Terribilia. The Hall of Hercules, so called from the colossal statue by
Alfonso Lombardo, vies with the Sala Farnese in splendour. Up to the
year 1848 the palace was the residence of the Legate and the Senator.
The lower portion is now the chief post office of the city.
On the north side of the Piazza is the Palazzo del Podestà. It is a
building that was begun at the commencement of the thirteenth century,
but not until the year 1485 was the façade erected. Of magnificent
proportions, it is chiefly famous as the prison of King Enzio. The great
saloon is still called the Sala del Re Enzio, and among other
vicissitudes was at one time a theatre, and at another the court in
which the national game of _pallone_ was played. A solid-looking and
lofty tower, the Torrazzo dell' Aringo, rises at one end of the façade
above the arcades. On the piers which carry the arches of these may
still be seen the huge wrought-iron brackets, the rings, and the sockets
for supporting banner poles and holding lighted torches.
Along the east side of this part of the Piazza which is =L=-shaped, is the
Portico de' Banchi, a continuous arcade, extending beyond the limits of
the square the whole length of Bologna's great church. This, the church
that the Bolognese in their pride intended should be the largest in
Italy, has not been completed beyond the commencement of the transepts.
The nave and aisles alone are finished; they are three hundred and
eighty-four feet long, and the width, including the chapels, measures
one hundred and fifty. The building is proportionately high, and, as
will be seen in the illustration, is very spacious. It was commenced in
1390 and dedicated to S. Petronio. The architect, Antonio Vincenzi, was
one of the celebrated _Riformati_, and went as ambassador to the
Venetian Republic in 1396.
The Piazza Maggiore slopes downwards from the south. S. Petronio is
situated at its southern end, and orientates south by west. The façade
therefore faces north-east, and for the construction of a level floor
the great church is placed at this end some dozen steps above the
sloping Piazza. In the museum attached to S. Petronio there may be seen
the original designs, elevations, and a model of the finished structure.
Had funds permitted, this façade, placed so well, and with such
magnificent buildings surrounding it, would have been one of the best
Italian attempts to realise a Gothic church. As it is, it is a grand
scheme unfulfilled.
The lower portion of the façade is extremely good, the three canopied
doorways being pure Italian Gothic. They are adorned with bas-reliefs
which represent different scriptural events from the Creation onwards.
Tribolo, an intimate friend of Benvenuto Cellini, was responsible for
the beautiful angels and sibyls round the arch of that on the left
hand. The fine bas-relief of the Resurrection in the lunette, where
Christ is seen among sleeping soldiers, is by Alfonso Lombardi. The
central portal is considered the masterpiece of Jacopo della Quercia,
who was not overpaid by the three thousand golden florins he received
for the work, considering that it took him twelve years to complete. His
noble figure of the Almighty, surrounded by thirty-two patriarchs and
prophets, is extremely fine. The right-hand doorway is another example
of Tribolo's purity of style. The brickwork of the exterior is covered,
round the whole church at the base, by a very fine base-table of white
marble with good mouldings. In the model the entire brick surface is
hidden by the same material. The buttresses are good, and so are the
pointed windows of the aisles, some of which, by the way, contain good
glass.
The interior is very lofty and expansive. Twelve immense piers carry the
arches of the nave, twenty-four smaller ones those of the aisles. The
height of all these may be judged from the illustration, wherein also
the peculiar Italian Gothic capital is seen. Milan's great cathedral and
S. Anastasia in Verona are other specimens of the same style of capital.
They appear to be stuck on to the columns, of which they seem to form a
part, rather than a separate cap for the arches to rest on. One hardly
knows how this particular style grew or where it emanated, but it is not
unlike the palm-leaf capital of an Egyptian column. The aisles are
rather shallow for the width of the nave. The side chapels are shut off
from them by good metal grilles or beautiful marble screens. Four very
ancient black pillars with crosses engraved stand against four of the
aisle piers. They are supposed to have been placed at the gates of old
Bologna by S. Petronio himself, and are much venerated by the Bolognese.
On the floor of the church is traced the celebrated meridian line of
Gian Domenico Cassini. Under the immense canopy which stands over the
high altar Charles V. was crowned in 1530 by Pope Clement VII. The
Emperor had been invited to Italy by the last of the Ducal House of
Sforza, and with his coronation commenced the foreign occupation of
North Italy.
Bologna's cathedral is dedicated to S. Pietro. It is situated in the Via
dell' Indipendenza, but is so wedged in between the high buildings which
adjoin it on both sides that it is difficult to find. S. Pietro is a
huge barn-like edifice commenced in the bad period of 1605. It is a very
ancient foundation with no redeeming architectural features. The most
interesting thing it contains is Ludovico Carracci's celebrated
"Annunciation." After the scaffolding had been removed on the
completion of the work which is over the arch above the high altar,
Carracci discovered some bad drawing in one of the figures. He died soon
after this--from grief, so the story goes, as the authorities would not
permit him to re-erect it at his own cost and remedy the defect.
[Illustration: INTERIOR OF S. PETRONIO, BOLOGNA]
The church of S. Stefano, or rather the seven different edifices which
are thus named, occupies the site of a temple of Isis. It stands below
the level of the little Piazza de S. Stefano, and on its exterior wall
is one of the open-air pulpits not uncommon in Italy. The first church,
called Il Crocifisso, is of the sixteenth century and not interesting.
From a door in the north wall one goes down half a dozen steps into the
second church of the Santo Sepolcro. This is a circular building,
supposed to have been the old baptistery. Twelve columns, brick and
marble alternating, support a good Romanesque gallery under the dome.
The six marble shafts came from the pagan temple. In the centre is a
grand altar-pulpit, which has a stairway leading up on either side.
Under the altar is an urn which at one time held the remains of S.
Petronio. On the stone floor a shutter of iron covers the well that
possesses miraculous properties, these having been imparted to it by the
saint. The church dates from the tenth century. An iron grille in one of
the walls shuts off the oldest church of all, a basilica of the fourth
century. It is dedicated to SS. Paolo e Pietro. Forty-eight columns with
Byzantine and Greek capitals support the brick barrel vault of the nave.
This is dimly lighted by small round clerestory windows. The altar
stands in the tribune at the top of much-worn limestone steps. This also
has a brick vault. At the end of the narrow aisles are the sarcophagi of
S. Agricola and S. Vitalis--Bologna's S. Vitalis. The next church, if it
may be so called, is formed by the small court known as the Atrio di
Pilato. It has never been touched since the eleventh century, and
contains a very ancient font. Down more steps is the church of the
Confessio. This old crypt must be a good twenty feet below the level
outside. The quadripartite vaulting is borne by thick stunted columns
that are barely five feet high, though one is said to be the exact
height of Christ. It is very dark, and dates from the tenth century. The
sixth church is the passage which leads to the seventh and last, that of
the Trinity. Four rows of columns with Byzantine and Romanesque capitals
support the roof of this square building. In one of the chapels, in a
galleried niche, there is an extraordinary life-sized wooden group of
the Adoration of the Magi. Mary wears a crown of brass studded with
uncut stones. On the Child's head is a mitre of the same. The
expressive faces of the Three Kings, who bring offerings, are extremely
naïve. The first wears the conical hat of the ancient shepherds of the
hills of Venetia that one still comes across in out-of-the-way
districts.
The adjoining cloisters of the suppressed Celestine monastery are
remarkable in the solidity of the short pillars, not four feet high,
which form the lower colonnade. These are in absolute contradistinction
to the elegant double shafts of the upper gallery. The brickwork
throughout the whole of S. Stefano is very good. Concentric patterns,
squares, chequer work where small squares of marble and glazed tiles
have been introduced, diamonds, and oblongs are arranged in a perfect
harmony of design the like of which one cannot find in Italy. The
exterior of S. Sepolcro is, in this respect, unsurpassed.