round the Punta S. Andrea, and, passing the Lloyd-Arsenal, cross the
bay, the Vallone di Muggia. The boat was full of belated _contadini_,
for the most part rugged and picturesque, among whom was an old woman
with a few long candles, which she vainly offered for sale to every
person on the boat; a boy with nuts and sweets was more fortunate, and
lessened his stock considerably. The deck was lumbered up with baskets,
milk-cans, &c., which had been full in the early morning, and most of
the passengers had bundles and parcels containing their purchases. Some
thirty minutes were sufficient in the fine weather with which we were
favoured to take us across, and, passing the smoky iron-works which are
the principal industry of modern Muggia, we disembarked at the little
quay, and immediately became objects of interest to a small crowd of
impertinent boys. Our principal objective was the ancient church on the
hill where Muggia Vecchia once stood. We found on inquiry that it was
closed as being in a dangerous state. This entailed visits to the
_municipio_ and to the parish priest, under escort of a uniformed
official, who then conducted us by a steep and stony path up the hill
Monte Michele, towards the summit of which, higher than the church,
prehistoric graves have been found, consisting of stone slabs set
roughly together, making a kind of chest which opens on to the hillside.
The church stands amid fragments of ruined walls, the remains of the
town destroyed by the Genoese in 1354. To the west is a stony space
where wild irises grow and bloom profusely in the crevices of the rocks,
and from which there is a fine view over the sea northwards to the
highlands of the Karst. Between this flowery wilderness and the church
is an open grassy space enclosed by a wall, and with a few trees round
its edges, which was probably the atrium. Opening upon this is the
narthex, an open portico level with the tower which stands at the west
end of the north aisle, with a stone seat running round the wall. Two
steps lead _down_ into the nave, and there is a door in the south aisle,
which has two windows, the clerestory having four; though on the north
side, where the graveyard lies, there are none. The building consists of
a nave and aisles divided by an arcade of five round arches upon
rectangular piers without caps, the two eastern bays being enclosed by
dwarf walls with framings of marble slabs upon which interlacing
patterns of the ninth century are carved. They return across the ends of
the aisles, in each of which is an altar beneath a wagon vault, though
there is no apse. The central apse is vaulted with a semi-dome, but does
not show externally. The choir is raised two steps above the nave, and
the altar is approached by a third. The ambo or pulpit stands outside
the screen on four columns, approached by steep steps from within; an
octagonal column of coloured marble supports a slab for a book-rest,
facing eastwards at the foot of the steps. In plan the ambo somewhat
resembles that at Grado, with six half-colonnettes projecting from the
curved form, two of them terminating in heads on each side of the
book-rest, itself supported on an octagonal shaft which dies into its
underside with very flat vine or oak leaves spread over the surface. The
whole has been so plentifully whitewashed that detail is nearly
obliterated, but there is sufficient difference between the styles of
various parts to make it probable that a reconstruction took place at
some period, older material being employed to a great extent. The fact
that two of the bases have angle claws and are manifestly not in their
original position supports this theory. The altar to the left is part of
a Roman sarcophagus with a funerary inscription in letters of the
Imperial period:
C. IVLIO
NICOSTRATO
FILIO · PIISSIMO
ANN · XVIII · M · VIIII · D · XII
IVLIVS · NICOSTRATVS.
[Illustration: PLAN OF PULPIT, MUGGIA VECCHIA]
Upon the piers and walls are remains of paintings of various dates. On
the first pier to the left is S. Catherine, vested as a Byzantine
empress. Further to the east are the Madonna "Blacherniotissa" and S.
Dominic, and near the ambo figures of the four Evangelists; the last
apparently of the period of the foundation of the church, the ninth or
early tenth century. On the last pier, which is broader than the others,
and suggests a later addition (perhaps in the thirteenth century), is a
gigantic S. Christopher, roughly painted, and with the well-known
inscription stating that whoso looks at it will not die a sudden death
that day. The aisles have lean-to roofs, and the nave roof we found
shored up, the supporting timbers being wreathed with garlands of
artificial flowers. The dedication is to SS. Peter and Paul.
As we descended the hill our guide, observing that flowers interested
us, made a sudden dive through the gate of a garden full of wallflowers
and picked a bunch for us, presenting it with as much grace as if they
had been his own! a proceeding to which the rightful owners appeared to
have no objection. The more modern town lay below us with its walls and
towers, some of them ruinous and some restored, and looked picturesque
enough except for the ancient castle which has been turned into a modern
house by its latest purchaser, who has tried with more zeal than
judgment to copy the style of the older portions. Through the postern by
which we had left the town a number of workmen from the iron-works
straggled, grimy and weary; in their modern dress and employment marking
a contrast with their surroundings. Muggia Nuova first appears in
history in 1235. When Paganino Doria destroyed Monticula (Muggia
Vecchia) in 1354, the port Vicuna Lauri (now Muggia) increased, and
twenty years later was surrounded with walls by the Patriarch Marquand
da Randeck after his triumphal entry. It had nine square towers, a
bastioned keep on the east, and a barbican with unequal sides, which
covered the Porta a Mare, or of S. Rocco. Three other gates, the Porta
Grande, which faced to the country, the Porta S. Francesco or Del
Castello, and the Portizza, which joined the Imperial road of Zaule with
a drawbridge, added to the defences, and a chain closed the port.
The nave of the church is of the eighteenth century, the apse twelfth,
and the façade of the fifteenth century, with a wheel window of 1467
above the west door, and a gable of an ogee-trefoil shape. In the
centre of the rose of sixteen rays is a little relief of the Virgin and
Child; the tracery is like that of the cathedral at Trieste. The door is
square-headed, with a cable moulding on the inner and a dentil on the
outer edge, and with a slightly ogee tympanum above, in which are an
enthroned God the Father with Christ in His lap, two kneeling figures
with palms at the sides, and two little angels on the uprights of the
throne. On the architrave is an Agnus Dei. Two windows, slightly
ogee-headed, flank the door. Coats of arms and inscriptions give the
date. The treasury contains a late Gothic ostensory with Renaissance
patterns on the foot, a chalice which has portions of several dates, and
a seventeenth-century processional cross. The contemporary municipal
palace is now made into dwelling-houses, though the lion of S. Mark,
with closed book and the date 1444, still looks down from the wall, and
the shapes of the windows reveal a mediæval building.
While we were on the hill the few children had become a crowd, and our
proceedings were much hampered, although our friendly guard adopted very
rough measures more than once to keep them in order. The people have
always been turbulent and unruly, and no doubt there is still an
hereditary disposition among them to resist authority, though one must
acknowledge that it was only among the young that we ourselves observed
it.
Muggia Vecchia is first mentioned in a diploma of Ugo and Lothair, king
of Italy, in 971, by which the Castello was given to the church of
Aquileia. In 1202, when the Venetians were on their way to the Holy
Land, they subjected the coast towns under the pretext of enforcing the
patriarch's rights. Doge Enrico Dandolo disembarked at Muggia with part
of his troops, and was received by clergy and people with the ringing of
bells. The citizens being collected swore fealty and subjection to the
Republic, promising not to help pirates, and to pay each S. Martin's Day
twenty-five "orne" of good wine. From this date till 1420 the city was
ruled by a podestà elected every six months by the council and confirmed
by the patriarch. There were three judges and several "anziani," who
formed the lesser council, to attend to daily business. In the
thirteenth century it had its own statute, and at that time the commune
paid a doctor, a surgeon, and a schoolmaster. The crest is a turreted
castle, seen on the campanile of the old church borne by two figures. It
was sometimes under Venice and sometimes under the patriarch till 1420.
At one time four noble hostages were confined for the latter in
Cividale, who were obliged to prove their presence every day; at another
the procurator swore fealty to Venice and received the standard of S.
Mark with much pomp. In 1371 the council decided to elect every year two
upright men who should do their best to settle disputes and quarrels
among the citizens, and in case of failure to report to the council,
when extraordinary measures were to be taken. The next year Raffaello
Steno attacked the city at the head of the exiles and killed many
supporters of the patriarch, sacking their houses and proscribing his
followers; and it was only at the end of 1374 that he succeeded in
retaking the town, coming in person to do so. After his triumphal entry
in that year a castle was built to keep the people in subjection, and a
castellan with a garrison was left in it; but the town rebelled again in
1377.
Capodistria is at the head of the next bay to the south-west, on rising
ground which was once an island, though now joined to the mainland. From
the sea the most conspicuous building is a great yellow prison. There
is also a naval school there, the cadets from which have to endure a
certain amount of chaff when they acknowledge having spent five years at
Capodistria. According to Dandolo the city was founded on the island of
Capraria, and named in honour of Justin II. (565-578) Justinopolis; the
fact of its having been free of money taxes during the Byzantine
dominion makes some such origin probable; but it occupies the site of
the Roman colony of Ægida, founded in 128 B.C., and a few antique
fragments have been found, such as the restored statue of Justice on the
communal palace, a Roman work of the Lower Empire, and the reliefs of an
ox and a female dancer encrusted in the wall of a garden. In the church
of S. Clemente there is also a little round antique altar, used as a
holy-water basin.
Under Pietro Orseolo a treaty was made between Venice and Capodistria in
977, under which the hundred amphoras of wine (which had been sent since
932 as an annual present to the doge, and handed by him to the Patriarch
of Grado) were made obligatory and a perpetual tribute, while a Venetian
officer resided in Capodistria to look after it. Another stipulation was
that the city should always be at peace with Venice, even if the rest of
Istria were at war. The Venetian representative or consul had the right
to sit with the Capodistrian judges whenever a Venetian had cause to
appear before them. In 1145, envoys had to go to Venice to swear on the
Gospels true and loyal fidelity to S. Mark, the Doge Polano, and all his
successors, and to the commune of Venice, undertaking to renew the oath
on the election of each new doge. In 1186 the commune was represented by
a podestà and four consuls, the year in which the bishopric was founded
on the strength of their promise to provide sufficient income. Eight
years later they were obliged to decree that if any one did not pay his
dues by the usual time he should have his vineyard taken away, and if
the tithe of oil was not paid by the Purification, it should be doubled.
It was the first Istrian city with a fully formed commune, and the
notice of the meeting of the council on July 5, 1186, is the earliest
notice preserved of such a meeting. The first statute appears in
1238-1239.
When Venice had acquired the city the senate commanded Tommaso Gritti
and Piero Gradenigo to build Castel Leone; it was constructed astride
the road which crossed the marshes, so that all travellers and vehicles
entering or leaving the city had to pass through it. The walls, for
which the Patriarch Gregorio Montelungo was responsible, were damaged in
1278, when the city swore fealty to Venice, and were thrown down on the
sea side after the insurrection of 1348. They were not completely
repaired till the sixteenth century. In 1550 Michele Sanmicheli, and
subsequently his nephew Alvise Brignoli and others were sent by the
senate to report, and finally the repair of the walls of many of the
Istrian towns was committed to Constantine and Francesco Capi. A hundred
years later they were in such a state that Stefano Capello reported that
it was useless to guard the gates, for entrance was easy through the
ruinous part of the walls. The only portion now remaining is the Porta
della Muda, built by Sebastian Contarini in the seventeenth century. It
bears an inscription of 1701 stating that the sea then no longer flowed
round it.
The Palazzo Comunale was burnt after the revolt of 1348, when the city
had to surrender unconditionally, the clergy carrying crosses, and the
citizens in procession, followed by the soldiers and the other
foreigners, meeting the army outside the gates. Fifty of the persons
most compromised were sent to Venice for trial, and the city was
punished by increase of taxation and modification of some of the
chapters of the statute. A few years after it rebelled again, and was
then deprived of all municipal rights. The burnt portion of the palace
was ordered to be restored in 1353, but it had to be pulled down
afterwards, and in 1385 the senate gave orders to the Podesti Leonardo
Bembo to level it and rebuild. It bears resemblance in some of its
details to palaces of the Bembo family in Venice. It was not completed
till 1447, under Domenico Diedo. The right wing was altered in 1481, and
further damaging alterations were made in 1664 by Vincenzo Bembo, who
was so proud of his work that he put up a pompous inscription. There are
numerous coats of arms of podestàs and busts on the façade, the earliest
of which is dated 1432. Under the portico were the "bocche del leone"
for secret denunciations, and, though the masks are gone, the chests
within are still in position.
At right angles to the Palazzo Comunale is the cathedral, with the
campanile projecting and flanking the façade to the south. It has a
ground story of Gothic, three pointed arches, the central one pierced by
a doorway with clustered pillars, and figures beneath niches above them,
and an upper story with classic pilasters and cornice, the central space
pierced by a circular window. These are somewhat the characteristics of
the cathedral at Cividale, of which two Capodistrians, Bartolommeo Costa
and Giovanni Sedula, were architects. It was reconsecrated in 1445, but
the upper part was not finished till 1598. The side doors, with
beautiful arabesques carved on the jambs, were constructed with material
from the tribune in which the big Carpaccio was housed. It was destroyed
in 1714 during the restoration of the cathedral. There is a terra-cotta
medallion of Constantino Copronymus on the façade. The present campanile
is of 1480. The great bell was cast in 1333 by two sons of the
celebrated bell-founder, Jacopo da Venezia. Under the bell-chamber of
the older campanile was an iron cage in which ecclesiastics guilty of
grievous crime were exposed, a punishment abolished in 1497.
The interior of the church, considered the finest of the period in
Istria, was recast in 1741 by the Venetian engineer Giorgio Massari.
Under the last arch of the nave to the right is a picture by Vittore
Carpaccio, signed and dated 1516--a Madonna and Child enthroned upon a
damask-hung seat raised on five steps, which are covered with an
Oriental carpet. Upon the steps saints are ranged, SS. Jerome, Roch, and
an old man to the left--perhaps Zacchariah or Joseph; SS. Sebastian,
George, and a bishop to the right--probably S. Louis of Toulouse: at the
bottom a little lute-playing angel sits, flanked by two amorini on a
lower level with white drapery. The Virgin is seated in an arched
vestibule with a flat ceiling through which the sky and trees are seen.
It was restored in 1829. Another picture from S. Nicolò near the port
shows the Virgin with SS. Nicholas of Bari and John the Baptist. The
organ wings were painted by Vittore's son Benedetto in 1538, and two
other pictures of his are affixed to the west wall. The subjects are the
Slaughter of the Innocents and the Presentation in the Temple. Other
pictures by him are a Coronation of the Virgin, in the communal palace,
signed and dated 1537, his earliest known picture; the Virgin between
SS. James and Bartholomew, 1538; and the town damaged by a sea-storm. In
Santa Anna is a picture of the Name of Jesus adored by SS. Paul, John
the Baptist, Francis, and Bernardino, and surrounded by cherubs' heads.
In the communal palace an indifferent picture of the entrance of a
podestà escorted by the councillors (dated 1517) is ascribed to Vittore
Carpaccio, who has been claimed as a Capodistrian, as his son Benedetto
certainly was. He lived in the Largo di Porta S. Martino, in an old
house of two stories. In 1500 it was inhabited by the Scarpaza family,
and before that they possessed a little farm in the locality called San
Vittore; but the Capodistrian tradition as to Vittore's birthplace is
erroneous, since he was born at Venice of a family of Mazzorbo, record
of which has been found by Signor Molmenti. Lazzaro Sebastiani is also
claimed as Capodistrian, and memorials of two other painters exist,
Cleriginus de Justinopoli, who was living in 1471, and Giorgio Vincenti.
A Mag. Domenico di Capodistria began the pretty octagonal chapel at
Vicovaro above Tivoli.
In the choir of the church of Santa Anna is a picture by Cima da
Conegliano in the original frame made by Vittore da Feltre. In the
central arched compartment the Virgin sits enthroned with the Child on
her knees and angels at her sides; on the steps below are two child
angels with mandoline and fiddle. The lower range of panels has
full-length figures of SS. Anna, Mary Magdalene, Joachim, and Catherine.
In the upper are half-lengths of SS. Chiara, Francis, Jerome, and
Nazario, with Christ between SS. Peter and Andrew in the centre. It has
been restored. There is also an altar-frontal of cut and gilded leather.
The lions from the ancient cathedral doors are now in the atrium of the
high-school. The ancient baptistery is close to the north side of the
cathedral; it has suffered Renaissance alteration inside, but outside
still shows the early arrangement of pilaster-strips and corbel-tables.
It is circular in plan, and has several round-headed, unmoulded windows
built up, as well as a pointed-arched door with fourteenth-century
shields in the tympanum.
[Illustration: THE "FONTICO" AND S. GIACOMO, CAPODISTRIA
_To face page 90_]
In the large piazza which stretches to the south-east of the cathedral
are two well-heads and the "fontico" or place where corn was sold
cheaply to the poor, a building of 1432, restored in 1529, plentifully
studded with coats of arms. Opposite the Palazzo Comunalelis the
Loggia, now a café, built in 1464 for a literary academy. It has seven
pointed and traceried arches in front and two at the side, a Madonna and
Child decorates the south-west angle, and coats of arms are between the
windows of the upper story. Here the Compagnia della Calza was
instituted in 1478 in imitation of that of Venice. A few houses have
remains of late Gothic painting, and in others something of the mediæval
arrangement may still be seen. Upon the Palazzo Tacco is a very
beautiful knocker, ascribed to Sansovino, now happily the property of
the commune; and the Casa del Bello has a fine negro's head as handle,
rather worn by use, and an elaborate knocker, probably of German work.
The Casa Borisi also has a handle with the head and shoulders of a child
emergent from leaves, and a knocker of similar design.
[Illustration: KNOCKER ON PALAZZO TACCO, CAPODISTRIA]
In the cathedral treasury is a late fifteenth-century silver-gilt
chalice with elaborately worked knop and stem; on the knop are saints
under canopies, and angels with outspread wings emerge from scroll-work
round the base of the cup. Also a monstrance of the same period with
very elaborate and beautiful architectural ornament and figures of
angels in adoration. In two elaborate silver-gilt crosses of the
sixteenth century there is a curious mixture of Gothic and Renaissance
details.
There is also a Byzantine civil casket at Capodistria, with traces of
ancient gilding upon it. It has the usual rosettes in the borders, and
small plaques with figure subjects. On the front there are three gods
and goddesses, separated by a repetition of the border pattern. The
handle and fastenings are later in date.
Just inside the Porta della Muda is the Piazza da Ponte, so called after
the Podestà Lorenzo da Ponte, who in 1666 had the very curious fountain
erected, in which he imagined a further memorial of himself by the
punning design of the bridge, so unsuitable for its position. In front
of the Palazzo Tacco is a column with a statue of S. Giustina, set up to
commemorate the battle of Lepanto, at which Domenico di Tacco commanded
a ship fitted out at his own expense.
[Illustration: THE PIAZZA DA PONTE, CAPODISTRIA
_To face page 92_]
In the churches on Good Friday a crucifix was laid on the chancel steps.
Women and children knelt round and kissed it. In one or two of them a
dead Christ, life-size and painted, was exhibited behind glass. There
was also the "tomba," a custom to which one is used in Italy. A few men
joined in the devotion. The Good Friday procession is over half a mile
long, and takes two hours to get round the town, starting from the
cathedral west door at twilight. It is formed in great part of the
ancient confraternities (among which that of S. Maria is mentioned as
early as 1082), who carry some 200 implements and standards, torches,
candelabra, wax tapers, figures of saints, and lanterns. At the end of
the procession a rich baldacchino is borne aloft above the priest who
carries the Host. "Mazzieri" (from the mace which they carry as sign
of authority) keep order. Other processions by daylight take place on
Corpus Domini and S. Nazario (June 19). The people have always been fond
of such displays, and till the seventeenth century there was a great
function at the departure of the rector, who was solemnly bidden
farewell by one of the syndics or nobles in the cathedral. These Istrian
coast towns have always shown enlightenment in the matter of education.
In 1699 a school was opened in Capodistria for the sons of citizens and
patricians, in which Latin, Greek, Italian, mathematics, rhetoric, and
physics were taught. And, in order that poor and talented young men
should not be cut off from the possibility of learning, this town, and,
after its example, Isola, Muggia, Parenzo, Pola, and Trieste established
scholarships at the University of Padua, where Istrian professors became
rectors. But, even in the fourteenth century, there were already school
teachers in Pirano, Muggia, and Capodistria.