[1] So Irenaeus. According to Hippolytus and Epiphanius it was the
Holy Ghost that thus descended.
CERIUM (symbol Ce, atomic weight 140.25), a metallic chemical element
which occurs with the rare earths in the minerals cerite, samarskite,
euxenite, monazite, parisite and many yttrium minerals. The particular
earth containing cerium was discovered by M.H. Klaproth in 1803, whilst
J. Berzelius at about the same time also examined it and came to the
conclusion that it was the oxide of a new metal, which he termed
cerium. The crude oxide of the metal is obtained from cerite, by
evaporating the mineral with strong sulphuric acid, removing excess of
acid and dissolving the residue in ice-cold water; sulphuretted hydrogen
is passed through the solution, which is then filtered, acidified with
hydrochloric acid, and precipitated as oxalate by oxalic acid; the
oxalate is then converted into oxide by ignition. From the crude oxide
so obtained (which contains lanthanum and didymium oxides) the cerium
may be separated by conversion into its double sulphate on the addition
of potassium sulphate, the sulphates of the cerium group being insoluble
in a saturated solution of potassium sulphate. The sulphate is
subsequently boiled with water, when a basic sulphate is precipitated.
For the preparation of pure cerium compounds see Auer v. Welsbach,
_Monatshefte_, 1884, v. 508.
The metal was first obtained, in an impure state, by C.G. Mosander, by
fusing its chloride with sodium. W.F. Hillebrand and T. Norton have
prepared it by the electrolysis of the melted chloride (_Pogg. Ann._,
1875, 156, p. 466); and C. Winkler (_Berichte_, 1891, xxiv. 884)
obtained it by heating the dioxide with magnesium powder. The metal has
somewhat the appearance of iron, and has a specific gravity of 6.628,
which, after melting, is increased to 6.728. Its specific heat is
0.04479 (W.F. Hillebrand). It is permanent in dry air, but tarnishes in
moist air; it can be hammered and rolled; it melts at 623 deg. C. It
burns readily on heating, with a brilliant flame; and it also combines
with chlorine, bromine, iodine, sulphur, phosphorus and cyanogen. In the
case of the two former elements the combination is accompanied by
combustion of the metal. With water it is slowly converted into the
dioxide. Cold concentrated nitric and sulphuric acids are without action
on the metal, but it reacts rapidly with dilute nitric and hydrochloric
acids. The dioxide is used in incandescent gas mantles (see LIGHTING).
Three oxides of cerium are known. The sesquioxide, Ce2O3, is obtained
by heating the carbonate in a current of hydrogen. It is a
bluish-green powder, which on exposure rapidly combines with the
oxygen of the air. By the addition of caustic soda to cerous salts, a
white precipitate of cerous hydroxide is formed. Cerium dioxide, CeO2,
is produced when cerium carbonate, nitrate, sulphate or oxalate is
heated in air. It is a white or pale yellow compound, which becomes
reddish on heating. Its specific gravity is 6.739, and its specific
heat 0.0877. It is not reduced to the metallic condition on heating
with carbon. Concentrated sulphuric acid dissolves this oxide, forming
a yellowish solution and ozone. By suspending the precipitated cerous
hydroxide in water and passing chlorine through the solution, a
hydrated form of the dioxide, 2CeO2.3H2O, is obtained, which is
readily soluble in nitric and sulphuric acids, forming ceric salts,
and in hydrochloric acid, where it forms cerous chloride, with
liberation of chlorine. A higher hydrated oxide, CeO3.xH2O, is formed
by the interaction of cerous sulphate with sodium acetate and hydrogen
peroxide (Lecoq de Boisbaudran, _Comptes rendus_, 1885, 100, p. 605).
Cerous chloride, CeCl3, is obtained when the metal is burned in
chlorine; when a mixture of cerous oxide and carbon is heated in
chlorine; or by rapid heating of the dioxide in a stream of carbon
monoxide and chlorine. It is a colourless substance, which is easily
fusible. A hydrated chloride of composition 2CeCl3.15H2O is also
known, and is obtained when a solution of cerous oxide in hydrochloric
acid is evaporated over sulphuric acid. Double salts of cerous
chloride with stannic chloride, mercuric chloride, and platinic
chloride are also known. Cerous bromide, 2CeBr3.3H2O, and iodide,
CeI3.9H2O, are known. Cerous sulphide, Ce2S3, results on heating
cerium with sulphur or cerium oxide in carbon bisulphide vapour. It is
a red infusible mass of specific gravity 5.1, and is slowly decomposed
by warm water. The sulphate, Ce2(SO4)3, is formed on dissolving the
carbonate in sulphuric acid, or on dissolving the basic sulphate in
sulphuric acid, in the presence of sulphur dioxide, evaporating the
solution, and drying the product obtained, at high temperature (B.
Brauner, _Monatshefte_, 1885, vi. 793). It is a white powder of
specific gravity 3.912, easily soluble in cold water. Many hydrated
forms of the sulphate are known, as are also double salts of the
sulphate with potassium, sodium, ammonium, thallium and cadmium
sulphates. Ceric fluoride, CeF4.H2O, is obtained when the hydrated
dioxide is dissolved in hydrofluoric acid and the solution evaporated
on the water bath (B. Brauner). The sulphate, Ce(SO4)2.4H2O, is formed
when the basic sulphate is dissolved in sulphuric acid; or when the
dioxide is dissolved in dilute sulphuric acid, and evaporated _in
vacuo_ over sulphuric acid. It forms yellow crystals soluble in water;
the aqueous solution on standing gradually depositing a basic salt.
Double sulphates of composition 2Ce(SO4)2.2K2SO4.2H2O,
Ce(SO4)2.3(NH4)2SO4.4H2O are known. Nitrates of cerium have been
described, as have also phosphates, carbonates and a carbide.
Cerium compounds may be recognized by the red precipitate of ceric
hydroxide, which is formed when sodium hypochlorite is added to a
colourless cerous salt. For the quantitative determination of the
metal, the salts are precipitated by caustic potash, the precipitate
washed, dried and heated, and finally weighed as the dioxide.
The atomic weight of cerium has been determined by B. Brauner (_Chem.
News_, 1895, lxxi. 283) from the analysis of the oxalate; the values
obtained varying from 140.07 to 140.35.
CERNUSCHI, HENRI (1821-1896), Italian politician and economist, was born
of wealthy parents at Milan in 1821, and was destined for the legal
profession. During his studies he became involved in the revolutionary
movement. He played a conspicuous part in the insurrection at Milan in
1848, and also at Rome in 1849, where he had a seat in the National
Assembly. On the collapse of the revolutionary government he was
arrested (1850), but managed to escape to France, where he engaged in
commerce and banking, became naturalized, and acquired a large fortune.
He took a prominent part in opposing the Socialist movement, and in
April 1870, having subscribed a large sum to the funds of a committee
formed to combat the Napoleonic plebiscite, had to leave the country. In
September the formation of the Third Republic enabled him to return, but
he soon left Paris to travel in the East, whence he returned with a fine
art collection, particularly of Japanese objects. Cernuschi is best
known for his publications on financial questions, more especially
bimetallism. Of the latter he was an ardent champion, and the word
itself is commonly supposed to have originated with him--at least in its
English form it is first found in his _Silver Vindicated_ (1876). Among
his other works may be mentioned: _Mecanique de l'echange_ (1861);
_Illusion des societes cooperatives_ (1886); _Le Bimetallisme en
Angleterre_ (1879); _Le Grand Proces de l'Union latine_ (1884). He died
at Mentone on the 12th of May 1896.
CEROGRAPHY (from the Gr. [Greek: keros], wax, and [Greek: graphein], to
write), the art of painting in wax. (See ENCAUSTIC PAINTING.)
CERRO DE PASCO, or PASCO, a mining town of Peru, capital of the
department of Junin, 107 m. (221 m. by rail, via Oroya) N.E. of Lima.
Pop. (1907 est.) 10,000. It is situated on the plateau of Bombon, 14,280
ft. above sea-level, and in the midst of one of the oldest and richest
silver-mining districts of Peru. There were 342 silver mines in this
district in 1890, and at the end of the 19th century the average annual
output since the discovery of the mines in 1630 was estimated at
1,600,000 oz. A decline in the silver production having set in, the
American company which had become owners of three-fourths of the mining
properties in the district turned its attention to the extensive copper
deposits there, built a railway to Oroya 83 m. distant, another, 25 m.
long, to the coal-fields of Gollarisquisga, north of Pasco, and then
erected large smelting works (in which 2500 men were regularly employed
in 1907) 8 m. out of town and 4 m. from limestone beds. The railway to
Oroya was completed in 1903, the coal mine branch and smelter later on,
and in 1907 the copper output was 20,152,000 lb. The town of Pasco is
badly built and unattractive, and is inhabited chiefly by mining
labourers and their families. Its population is increased 50% in times
of great mining activity. The name Cerro de Pasco is that of a "knot" of
mountains uniting the two great ranges of the Andes at this point.
CERTALDO, a town of Tuscany, Italy, in the province of Florence, 35 m.
S.S.W. by rail and 18 m. direct from the town of Florence. Pop. (1901)
town, 4552; commune, 9120. It was the home of the family of Giovanni
Boccaccio, who died and was buried here in 1375. His house (of red
brick, like the other old houses of the town) was restored in 1823 and
fitted up with old furniture. A statue of him was erected in the
principal square in 1875. The Palazzo Pretorio, or Vicariale, the
residence of the Florentine governors, recently restored to its original
condition, has a picturesque facade and court adorned with coats of
arms, and in the interior are various frescoes dating from the 13th to
the 16th century. The town as a whole is picturesque, and lies on a hill
426 ft. above sea-level.
See R. Pantini, _S. Gimignano e Certaldo_ (Bergamo, 1904), p. 101 seq.
CERUSSITE, a mineral consisting of lead carbonate (PbCO3), and an
important ore of lead. The name (sometimes erroneously spelt cerusite)
is from the Lat. _cerussa_, "white lead." "Cerussa nativa" was mentioned
by K. Gesner in 1565, and in 1832 F.S. Beudant applied the name ceruse
to the mineral, whilst the present form, cerussite, is due to W.
Haidinger (1845). Popular names in early use were lead-spar and
white-lead-ore.
[Illustration: FIG. 1]
Cerussite crystallizes in the orthorhombic system and is isomorphous
with aragonite. Like aragonite it is very frequently twinned, the
compound crystals being pseudo-hexagonal in form. Three crystals are
usually twinned together on two faces of the prism m{110}, producing
six-rayed stellate groups (figs, 1 and 2) with the individual crystals
intercrossing at angles of nearly 60 deg. Twinning on the faces of the
prism r{130}, the angles of which are also nearly 60 deg., produces a
similar kind of grouping, but is much less common. Crystals are of
frequent occurrence, and they usually have very bright and smooth faces.
The mineral also occurs in compact granular masses, and sometimes in
fibrous forms. It is usually colourless or white, sometimes grey or
greenish in tint; it varies from transparent to translucent, and has an
adamantine lustre. It is very brittle, and has a conchoidal fracture.
Hardness 3-3-1/2; sp. gr. 6.5. A variety containing 7% of zinc
carbonate, replacing lead carbonate, is known as iglesiasite, from
Iglesias in Sardinia, where it is found.
[Illustration: FIG. 2.]
The mineral may be readily recognized by its characteristic twinning, in
conjunction with the adamantine lustre and high specific gravity. It
dissolves with effervescence in dilute nitric acid. Before the blow-pipe
it fuses very readily, and gives reactions for lead. Cerussite occurs in
metalliferous veins in association with galena, and has been formed by
the action of carbonated waters on the galena; it is therefore found in
the upper parts of the lodes together with other secondary minerals,
such as limonite. Finely crystallized specimens have been obtained from
the Friedrichssegen mine near Ems in Nassau, Johanngeorgenstadt in
Saxony, Mies in Bohemia, Phenixville in Pennsylvania, Broken Hill in New
South Wales, and several other localities. Delicate acicular crystals of
considerable length were found long ago in the Pentire Glaze mine near
St Minver in Cornwall. It is often found in considerable quantities, and
contains as much as 77-1/2% of lead. (L. J. S.)
CERUTTI, GIUSEPPE ANTONIO GIACHIMO (1738-1792), French author and
politician, was born at Turin on the 13th of June 1738. He joined the
Society of Jesus and became professor at the Jesuit college at Lyons. In
1762, in reply to the attacks on his order, he published an _Apologie
generale de l'institut et de la doctrine des Jesuites_, which won him
much fame and some exalted patronage; notably that of the ex-king
Stanislaus of Poland and of his grandson the dauphin. During the
agitations that preceded the Revolution Cerutti took the popular side,
and in 1788 published a pamphlet, _Memoire pour le peuple francais_, in
which in a clear and trenchant style he advocated the claims of the
_tiers etat_. In May 1789 he presided over the electors of Paris, by
whom in January 1791 he was chosen member of the administration of the
department and afterwards deputy to the Legislative Assembly. He was a
friend of Mirabeau, whose policy he supported and whose funeral oration
he pronounced. He himself died on the 3rd of February 1792. Of Cerutti's
literary enterprises the most interesting, and probably the most
influential, was the popular newspaper founded by him, on the 30th of
September 1790, in collaboration with Rabaut Saint-Etienne and Philippe
Antoine Grouvelle. Its character and objects are explained by its
title: _La Feuille villageoise, adressee chaque semaine a tous les
villages de France pour les instruire des lois, des evenements, des
decouvertes qui interessent tout ban citoyen, &c._ It was continued by
Grouvelle after Cerutti's death, the last number appearing on the 2nd of
August 1795.
Cerutti's works were published in 1793 in 3 volumes. On the _Memoire
pour le peuple francais_, see F.A. Aulard in _La Revolution
francaise_, tom. xv. (1888).
CERVANTES SAAVEDRA, MIGUEL DE (1547-1616), Spanish novelist, playwright
and poet, was born at Alcala de Henares in 1547. The attempts of
biographers to provide him with an illustrious genealogy are
unsuccessful. The family history begins with the author's grandfather,
Juan de Cervantes (b. 1490), a lawyer who at one time (1545-6)
administered the estates of the duke de Osuna, and resided later at
Cordova, where he died about 1555. Cervantes' father was Rodrigo de
Cervantes, an apothecary-surgeon, who married Leonor de Cortinas in 1540
or 1541. The children of this marriage were Andres (b. 1543), Andrea (b.
1544), Luisa (b. 1546), Miguel, Rodrigo (b. 1550), Magdalena (b. 1554)
and Juan (of whom nothing is known beyond the mention of him in his
father's will).
The exact date of Cervantes' birth is not recorded: he was baptized on
the 9th of October 1547, in the church of Santa Maria la Mayor at
Alcala. There are indications that Rodrigo de Cervantes resided at
Valladolid in 1554, at Madrid in 1561, at Seville in 1564-1565, and at
Madrid from 1566 onwards. It may be assumed that his family accompanied
him, and it seems likely that either at Valladolid or at Madrid
Cervantes saw the famous actor-manager and dramatist, Lope de Rueda, of
whose performances he speaks enthusiastically in the preface to his
plays. In 1569 a Madrid schoolmaster, Juan Lopez de Hoyos, issued a work
commemorative of Philip II.'s third wife, Isabel de Valois, who had died
on the 3rd of October 1568. This volume, entitled _Historia y relacion
verdadera de la enfermedad, felicisimo transito y sumptuosas exequias
funebres de la Serenisima Reyna de Espania Dona Isabel de Valoys_,
contains six contributions by Cervantes: a sonnet, four _redondillas_,
and an elegy. Lopez de Hoyos introduces Cervantes as "our dear and
beloved pupil," and the elegy is dedicated to Cardinal Espinosa "in the
name of the whole school." It has been inferred that Cervantes was
educated by Lopez de Hoyos, but this conclusion is untenable, for Lopez
de Hoyos' school was not opened till 1567. On the 13th of October 1568,
Giulio Acquaviva reached Madrid charged with a special mission to Philip
II.; he left for Rome on the 2nd of December, and Cervantes is supposed
to have accompanied him. This conjecture is based solely on a passage in
the dedication of the _Galatea_, where the writer speaks of having been
"_camarero_ to Cardinal Acquaviva at Rome." There is, however, no reason
to think that Cervantes met Acquaviva in Madrid; the probability is that
he enlisted as a supernumerary towards the end of 1568, that he served
in Italy, and there entered the household of Acquaviva, who had been
raised to the cardinalate on the 17th of May 1570. There exists a
warrant (dated September 15, 1569) for the arrest of one Miguel de
Cervantes, who had wounded Antonio de Sigura, and had been condemned in
absence to have his right hand cut off and to be exiled from the capital
for ten years; and it has been sought to identify the offender with the
future author of _Don Quixote_. No evidence is available. All that is
known with certainty is that Cervantes was in Rome at the end of 1569,
for on the 22nd of December of that year the fact was recorded in an
official information lodged by Rodrigo de Cervantes with a view to
proving his son's legitimacy and untainted Christian descent.
If it is difficult to say precisely when Cervantes was in Acquaviva's
service, it is no less difficult to say when he left it to join the
regular army. There is evidence, more or less satisfactory, that his
enlistment took place in 1570; in 1571 he was serving as a private in
the company commanded by Captain Diego de Urbina which formed part of
Miguel de Moncada's famous regiment, and on the 16th of September he
sailed from Messina on board the "Marquesa," which formed part of the
armada under Don John of Austria. At the battle of Lepanto (October 7,
1571) the "Marquesa" was in the thickest of the conflict. As the fleet
came into action Cervantes lay below, ill with fever; but, despite the
remonstrances of his comrades, he vehemently insisted on rising to take
his share in the fighting, and was posted with twelve men under him in a
boat by the galley's side. He received three gunshot wounds, two in the
chest, and one which permanently maimed his right hand--"for the greater
glory of the right," in his own phrase. On the 30th of October the fleet
returned to Messina, where Cervantes went into hospital, and during his
convalescence received grants-in-aid amounting to eighty-two ducats. On
the 29th of April 1572 he was transferred to Captain Manuel Ponce de
Leon's company in Lope de Figueroa's regiment; he shared in the
indecisive naval engagement off Navarino on the 7th of October 1572, in
the capture of Tunis on the 10th of October 1573, and in the
unsuccessful expedition to relieve the Goletta in the autumn of 1574.
The rest of his military service was spent in garrison at Palermo and
Naples, and shortly after the arrival of Don John at Naples on the 18th
of June 1575, Cervantes was granted leave to return to Spain; he
received a recommendatory letter from Don John to Philip II., and a
similar testimonial from the duke de Sessa, viceroy of Sicily. Armed
with these credentials, Cervantes embarked on the "Sol" to push his
claim for promotion in Spain.
On the 26th of September 1575, near Les Trois Maries off the coast of
Marseilles, the "Sol" and its companion ships the "Mendoza" and the
"Higuera" encountered a squadron of Barbary corsairs under Arnaut Mami;
Cervantes, his brother Rodrigo and other Spaniards were captured, and
were taken as prisoners to Algiers. Cervantes became the slave of a
Greek renegade named Dali Mami, and, as the letters found on him were
taken to prove that he was a man of importance in a position to pay a
high ransom, he was put under special surveillance. With undaunted
courage and persistence he organized plans of escape. In 1576 he induced
a Moor to guide him and other Christian captives to Oran; the Moor
deserted them on the road, the baffled fugitives returned to Algiers,
and Cervantes was treated with additional severity. In the spring of
1577 two priests of the Order of Mercy arrived in Algiers with a sum of
three hundred crowns entrusted to them by Cervantes' parents; the amount
was insufficient to free him, and was spent in ransoming his brother
Rodrigo. Cervantes made another attempt to escape in September 1577, but
was betrayed by the renegade whose services he had enlisted. On being
brought before Hassan Pasha, the viceroy of Algiers, he took the blame
on himself, and was threatened with death; struck, however, by the
heroic bearing of the prisoner, Hassan remitted the sentence, and bought
Cervantes from Dali Mami for five hundred crowns. In 1577 the captive
addressed to the Spanish secretary of state, Mateo Vazquez, a versified
letter suggesting that an expedition should be fitted out to seize
Algiers; the project, though practicable, was not entertained. In 1578
Cervantes was sentenced to two thousand strokes for sending a letter
begging help from Martin de Cordoba, governor of Oran; the punishment
was not, however, inflicted on him. Meanwhile his family were not idle.
In March 1578 his father presented a petition to the king setting forth
Cervantes' services; the duke de Sessa repeated his testimony to the
captive's merits; in the spring of 1579 Cervantes' mother applied for
leave to export two thousand ducats' worth of goods from Valencia to
Algiers, and on the 31st of July 1579 she gave the Trinitarian monks,
Juan Gil and Anton de la Bella, a sum of two hundred and fifty ducats to
be applied to her son's ransom. On his side Cervantes was indefatigable,
and towards the end of 1579 he arranged to secure a frigate; but the
plot was revealed to Hassan by Juan Blanco de Paz, a Dominican monk, who
appears to have conceived an unaccountable hatred of Cervantes. Once
more the conspirator's life was spared by Hassan who, it is recorded,
declared that "so long as he had the maimed Spaniard in safe keeping,
his Christians, ships and city were secure." On the 29th of May 1580 the
two Trinitarians arrived in Algiers: they were barely in time, for
Hassan's term of office was drawing to a close, and the arrangement of
any ransom was a slow process, involving much patient bargaining. Hassan
refused to accept less than five hundred gold ducats for his slave; the
available funds fell short of this amount, and the balance was collected
from the Christian traders of Algiers. Cervantes was already embarked
for Constantinople when the money was paid on the 19th of September
1580. The first use that he made of his liberty was to cause affidavits
of his proceedings at Algiers to be drawn up; he sailed for Spain
towards the end of October, landed at Denia in November, and made his
way to Madrid. He signed an information before a notary in that city on
the 18th of December 1580.
These dates prove that he cannot, as is often alleged, have served under
Alva in the Portuguese campaign of 1580: that campaign ended with the
battle of Alcantara on the 25th of August 1580. It seems certain,
however, that he visited Portugal soon after his return from Algiers,
and in May 1581 he was sent from Thomar on a mission to Oran. Construed
literally, a formal statement of his services, signed by Cervantes on
the 21st of May 1590, makes it appear that he served in the Azores
campaigns of 1582-83; but the wording of the document is involved, the
claims of Cervantes are confused with those of his brother Rodrigo (who
was promoted ensign at the Azores), and on the whole it is doubtful if
he took part in either of the expeditions under Santa Cruz. In any case,
the stories of his residence in Portugal, and of his love affairs with a
noble Portuguese lady who bore him a daughter, are simple inventions.
From 1582-3 to 1587 Cervantes seems to have written copiously for the
stage, and in the _Adjunta al Parnaso_ he mentions several of his plays
as "worthy of praise"; these were _Los Tratos de Argel, La Numancia, La
Gran Turquesa, La Batalla naval, La Jerusalem, La Amaranta o la de Mayo,
El Bosque amoroso, La Unica y Bizarra Arsinda_--"and many others which I
do not remember, but that which I most prize and pique myself on was,
and is, one called _La Confusa_ which, with all respect to as many
sword-and-cloak plays as have been staged up to the present, may take a
prominent place as being good among the best." Of these only _Los Tratos
de Argel_ (or _El Trato de Argel_) and _La Numancia_ have survived, and,
though _La Numancia_ contains many fine rhetorical passages, both plays
go to prove that the author's genius was not essentially dramatic. In
February 1584 he obtained a licence to print a pastoral novel entitled
_Primera parte de la Galatea_, the copyright of which he sold on the
14th of June to Blas de Robles, a bookseller at Alcala de Henares, for
1336 _reales_. On the 12th of December he married Catalina de Palacios
Salazar y Vozmediano of Esquivias, eighteen years his junior. The
_Galatea_ was published in the spring of 1585, and is frequently said to
relate the story of Cervantes' courtship, and to introduce various
distinguished writers under pastoral names. These assertions must be
received with great reserve. The birth of an illegitimate daughter,
borne to Cervantes by a certain Ana Francisca de Rojas, is referred to
1584, and earlier in that same year the _Galatea_ had passed the censor;
with few exceptions, the identifications of the characters in the book
with personages in real life are purely conjectural. These
circumstances, together with the internal evidence of the work, point to
the conclusion that the _Galatea_ was begun and completed before 1583.
It was only twice reprinted--once at Lisbon (1590), and once at Paris
(1611)--during the author's lifetime; but it won him a measure of
repute, it was his favourite among his books, and during the thirty
years that remained to him he repeatedly announced the second part which
is promised conditionally in the text. However, it is not greatly to be
regretted that the continuation was never published; though the
_Galatea_ is interesting as the first deliberate bid for fame on the
part of a great genius, it is an exercise in the pseudo-classic
literature introduced into Italy by Sannazaro, and transplanted to Spain
by the Portuguese Montemor; and, ingenious or eloquent as the
Renaissance prose-pastoral may be, its innate artificiality stifles
Cervantes' rich and glowing realism. He himself recognized its defects;
with all his weakness for the _Galatea_, he ruefully allows that "it
proposes something and concludes nothing." Its comparative failure was
a serious matter for Cervantes who had no other resource but his pen;
his plays were probably less successful than his account of them would
imply, and at any rate play-writing was not at this time a lucrative
occupation in Spain. No doubt the death of his father on the 13th of
June 1585 increased the burden of Cervantes' responsibilities; and the
dowry of his wife, as appears from a document dated the 9th of August
1586, consisted of nothing more valuable than five vines, an orchard,
some household furniture, four beehives, forty-five hens and chickens,
one cock and a crucible.
It had become evident that Cervantes could not gain his bread by
literature, and in 1587 he went to Seville to seek employment in
connexion with the provisioning of the Invincible Armada. He was placed
under the orders of Antonio de Guevara, and before the 24th of February
was excommunicated for excessive zeal in collecting wheat at Ecija.
During the next few months he was engaged in gathering stores at Seville
and the adjacent district, and after the defeat of the Armada he was
retained as commissary to the galleys. Tired of the drudgery, and
without any prospect of advancement, on the 21st of May 1590 Cervantes
drew up a petition to the king, recording his services and applying for
one of four posts then vacant in the American colonies: a place in the
department of public accounts in New Granada, the governorship of
Soconusco in Guatemala, the position of auditor to the galleys at
Cartagena, or that of _corregidor_ in the city of La Paz. The petition
was referred to the Council of the Indies, and was annotated with the
words:--"Let him look for something nearer home." Cervantes perforce
remained at his post; the work was hard, uncongenial and ill-paid, and
the salary was in constant arrears. In November 1590 he was in such
straits that he borrowed money to buy himself a suit of clothes, and in
August 1592 his sureties were called upon to make good a deficiency of
795 _reales_ in his accounts. His thoughts turned to literature once
more, and on the 5th of September 1592, he signed a contract with
Rodrigo Osorio undertaking to write six plays at fifty ducats each, no
payment to be made unless Osorio considered that each of these pieces
was "one of the best ever produced in Spain." Nothing came of this
agreement, and it appears that, between the date of signing it and the
19th of September, Cervantes was imprisoned (for reasons unknown to us)
at Castro del Rio. He was speedily released, and continued to
perquisition as before in Andalusia; but his literary ambitions were not
dead, and in May 1595 he won the first prize--three silver spoons--at a
poetical tourney held in honour of St Hyacinth at Saragossa. Shortly
afterwards Cervantes found himself in difficulties with the exchequer
officials. He entrusted a sum of 7400 _reales_ to a merchant named Simon
Freire de Lima with instructions to pay the amount into the treasury at
Madrid; the agent became bankrupt and absconded, leaving Cervantes
responsible for the deficit. By some means the money was raised, and the
debt was liquidated on the 21st of January 1597. But Cervantes' position
was shaken, and his unbusinesslike habits lent themselves to
misinterpretation. On the 6th of September 1597 he was ordered to find
sureties that he would present himself at Madrid within twenty days, and
there submit to the exchequer vouchers for all official moneys collected
by him in Granada and elsewhere. No such sureties being available, he
was committed to Seville jail, but was released on the 1st of December
on condition that he complied with the original order of the court
within thirty days. He was apparently unable to find bail, was dismissed
from the public service, and sank into extreme poverty. During a
momentary absence from Seville in February 1590, he was again summoned
to Madrid by the treasury, but does not appear to have obeyed: it is
only too likely that he had not the money to pay for the journey. There
is some reason to think that he was imprisoned at Seville in 1602, but
nothing positive is known of his existence between 1600 and the 8th of
February 1603: at the latter date he seems to have been at Valladolid,
to which city Philip III. had removed the court in 1601.
Since the publication of the _Galatea_ in 1585 Cervantes' contributions
to literature had been limited to occasional poems. In 1591 he published
a ballad in Andres de Villalta's _Flor de varios y nuevos romances_; in
1595 he composed a poem, already mentioned, to celebrate the
canonization of St Hyacinth; in 1596 he wrote a sonnet ridiculing Medina
Sidonia's tardy entry into Cadiz after the English invaders had retired,
and in the same year his sonnet lauding Santa Cruz was printed in
Cristobal. Mosquera de Figueroa's _Comentario en breve compendio de
disciplina militar_; to 1597 is assigned a sonnet (the authenticity of
which is disputed) commemorative of the poet Herrera; in 1598 he wrote
two sonnets and a copy of _quintillas_ on the death of Philip II.; and
in 1602 a complimentary sonnet from his pen appeared in the second
edition of Lope de Vega's _Dragontea_. Curiously enough, it is by Lope
de Vega that _Don Quixote_ is first mentioned. Writing to an unknown
correspondent (apparently a physician) on the 14th of August 1604, Lope
de Vega says that "no poet is as bad as Cervantes, nor so foolish as to
praise _Don Quixote_," and he goes on to speak of his own plays as being
odious to Cervantes. It is obvious that the two men had quarrelled since
1602, and that Lope de Vega smarted under the satire of himself and his
works in Cervantes' forthcoming book; _Don Quixote_ may have been
circulated in manuscript, or may even have been printed before the
official licence was granted on the 26th of September 1604. It was
published early in 1605, and was dedicated to the seventh duke de Bejar
in phrases largely borrowed from the dedication in Herrera's edition
(1580) of Garcilaso de la Vega, and from Francisco de Medina's preface
to that work.
The mention of Bernardo de la Vega's _Pastor de Iberia_ shows that the
sixth chapter of _Don Quixote_ cannot have been written before 1591. In
the prologue Cervantes describes his masterpiece as being "just what
might be begotten in a jail"; on the strength of this passage, it has
been thought that he conceived the story, and perhaps began writing it,
during one of his terms of imprisonment at Seville between 1597 and
1602. Within a few weeks of its publication at Madrid, three pirated
editions of _Don Quixote_ were issued at Lisbon; a second authorized
edition, imperfectly revised, was hurried out at Madrid; and another
reprint appeared at Valencia with an _aprobacion_ dated 18th July 1605.
With the exception of Aleman's _Guzman de Alfarache_, no Spanish book of
the period was more successful. Modern criticism is prone to regard _Don
Quixote_ as a symbolic, didactic or controversial work intended to bring
about radical reforms in church and state. Such interpretations did not
occur to Cervantes' contemporaries, nor to Cervantes himself. There is
no reason for rejecting his plain statement that his main object was to
ridicule the romances of chivalry, which in their latest developments
had become a tissue of tiresome absurdities. It seems clear that his
first intention was merely to parody these extravagances in a short
story; but as he proceeded the immense possibilities of the subject
became more evident to him, and he ended by expanding his work into a
brilliant panorama of Spanish society as it existed during the 16th
century. Nobles, knights, poets, courtly gentlemen, priests, traders,
farmers, barbers, muleteers, scullions and convicts; accomplished
ladies, impassioned damsels, Moorish beauties, simple-hearted
country-girls and kindly kitchen-wenches of questionable morals--all
these are presented with the genial fidelity which comes of sympathetic
insight. The immediate vogue of _Don Quixote_ was due chiefly to its
variety of incident, to its wealth of comedy bordering on farce, and
perhaps also to its keen thrusts at eminent contemporaries; its reticent
pathos, its large humanity, and its penetrating criticism of life were
less speedily appreciated.
Meanwhile, on the 12th of April 1605, Cervantes authorized his publisher
to proceed against the Lisbon booksellers who threatened to introduce
their piratical reprints into Castile. By June the citizens of
Valladolid already regarded Don Quixote and Sancho Panza as proverbial
types. Less gratifying experiences awaited the popular author. On the
27th of June 1605 Gaspar de Ezpeleta, a Navarrese gentleman of dissolute
life, was wounded outside the lodging-house in which Cervantes and his
family lived; he was taken indoors, was nursed by Cervantes' sister
Magdalena, and died on the 29th of June. That same day Cervantes, his
natural daughter (Isabel de Saavedra), his sister Andrea and her
daughter were lodged in jail on suspicion of being indirectly concerned
in Ezpeleta's death; one of the witnesses made damaging charges against
Cervantes' daughter, but no substantial evidence was produced, and the
prisoners were released. Little is known of Cervantes' life between 1605
and 1608. A _Relacion_ of the festivities held to celebrate the birth of
Philip IV., and a certain _Carta a don Diego Astudillo Carrillo_ have
been erroneously ascribed to him; during these three years he apparently
wrote nothing beyond three sonnets, and one of these is of doubtful
authenticity. The depositions of the Valladolid enquiry show that he was
living in poverty five months after the appearance of _Don Quixote_, and
the fact that he borrowed 450 _reales_ from his publisher before
November 1607 would convey the idea that his position improved slowly,
if at all. But it is difficult to reconcile this view of his
circumstances with the details concerning his illegitimate daughter
revealed in documents recently discovered. Isabel de Saavedra was stated
to be a spinster when arrested at Valladolid in June 1605; the
settlement of her marriage with Luis de Molina in 1608 describes her as
the widow of Diego Sanz, as the mother of a daughter eight months old,
and as owning house-property of some value. These particulars are
perplexing, and the situation is further complicated by the publication
of a deed in which Cervantes declares that he himself is the real owner
of this house-property, and that his daughter has merely a life-interest
in it. This claim may be regarded as a legal fiction; it cannot easily
be reconciled with Cervantes' statement towards the end of his life,
that he was dependent on the bounty of the count de Lemos and of
Bernardo de Sandoval, cardinal-archbishop of Toledo. In 1609 he joined
the newly founded confraternity of the Slaves of the Most Blessed
Sacrament; in 1610 Lemos was appointed viceroy of Naples, and Cervantes
was keenly disappointed at not being chosen to accompany his patron. In
1611 he lost his sister Magdalena, who was buried by the charity of the
Tertiaries of Saint Francis; in 1612 he joined the Academia Selvaje, and
there appears to have renewed his former friendly relations with Lope de
Vega; in 1613 he dedicated his _Novelas exemplares_ to the count de
Lemos, and disposed of his rights for 1600 _reales_ and twenty-four
copies of the book. The twelve tales in this volume, some of them
written very much later than others, are of unequal merit, but they
contain some of the writer's best work, and the two picaresque
stories--_Rinconete y Cortadillo_ and the _Coloquio de los perros_--are
superb examples of their kind, and would alone entitle Cervantes to take
rank with the greatest masters of Spanish prose. In 1614 he published
the _Viage del Parnaso_, a burlesque poem suggested by the _Viaggio in
Parnaso_ (1582) of the Perugian poet Cesare Caporali. It contains some
interesting autobiographical passages, much flattery of contemporary
poetasters, and a few happy satirical touches; but, though it is
Cervantes' most serious bid for fame as a poet, it has seldom been
reprinted, and would probably have been forgotten but for an admirably
humorous postscript in prose which is worthy of the author at his best.
In the preface to his _Ocho comedias y ocho entremeses nuevos_ (1615) he
good-humouredly admits that his dramatic works found no favour with
managers, and, when this collection was first reprinted (1749), the
editor advanced the fantastic theory that the _comedias_ were deliberate
exercises in absurdity, intended to parody the popular dramas of the
day. This view cannot be maintained, but a sharp distinction must be
drawn between the eight set plays and the eight interludes; with one or
two exceptions, the _comedias_ or set plays are unsuccessful experiments
in Lope de Vega's manner, while the _entremeses_ or _interludes_,
particularly those in prose, are models of spontaneous gaiety and
ingenious wit.
In the preface to the _Novelas exemplares_ Cervantes had announced the
speedy appearance of the sequel to _Don Quixote_ which he had vaguely
promised at the end of the first part. He was at work on the fifty-ninth
chapter of his continuation when he learned that he had been anticipated
by Alonso Fernandez de Avellaneda of Tordesillas, whose _Segunde tamo
del ingenioso hidalgo don Quixote de la Mancha_ was published at
Tarragona in 1614. On the assumption that Fernandez de Avellaneda is a
pseudonym, this spurious sequel has been ascribed to the king's
confessor, Luis de Aliaga, to Cervantes' old enemy, Blanco de Paz, to
his old friend, Bartolome Leonardo de Argensola, to the three great
dramatists, Lope de Vega, Tirso de Molina and Ruiz de Alarcon, to Alonso
Fernandez, to Juan Jose Marti, to Alfonso Lamberto, to Luis de Granada,
and probably to others. Some of these attributions are manifestly
absurd--for example, Luis de Granada died seventeen years before the
first part of _Don Quixote_ was published--and all of them are
improbable conjectures; if Avellaneda be not the real name of the
author, his identity is still undiscovered. His book is not devoid of
literary talent and robust humour, and possibly he began it under the
impression that Cervantes was no more likely to finish _Don Quixote_
than to finish the _Galatea_. He should, however, have abandoned his
project on reading the announcement in the preface to the _Novelas
exemplares_; what he actually did was to disgrace himself by writing an
insolent preface taunting Cervantes with his physical defects, his moral
infirmities, his age, loneliness and experiences in jail. He was too
intelligent to imagine that his continuation could hold its own against
the authentic sequel, and malignantly avowed his intention of being
first in the field and so spoiling Cervantes' market. It is quite
possible that _Don Quixote_ might have been left incomplete but for this
insulting intrusion; Cervantes was a leisurely writer and was, as he
states, engaged on _El Engano a los ojos, Las Semanas del Jardin_ and
_El Famoso Bernardo_, none of which have been preserved. Avellaneda
forced him to concentrate his attention on his masterpiece, and the
authentic second part of _Don Quixote_ appeared towards the end of 1615.
No book more signally contradicts the maxim, quoted by the Bachelor
Carrasco, that "no second part was ever good." It is true that the last
fourteen chapters are damaged by undignified denunciations of
Avellaneda; but, apart from this, the second part of _Don Quixote_ is an
improvement on the first. The humour is more subtle and mature; the
style is of more even excellence; and the characters of the bachelor and
of the physician, Pedro Recio de Aguero, are presented with a more vivid
effect than any of the secondary characters in the first part. Cervantes
had clearly profited by the criticism of those who objected to "the
countless cudgellings inflicted on Senor Don Quixote," and to the
irrelevant interpolation of extraneous stories in the text. Don Quixote
moves through the second part with unruffled dignity; Sancho Panza loses
something of his rustic cunning, but he gains in wit, sense and manners.
The original conception is unchanged in essentials, but it is more
logically developed, and there is a notable progress in construction.
Cervantes had grown to love his knight and squire, and he understood his
own creations better than at the outset; more completely master of his
craft, he wrote his sequel with the unfaltering confidence of a renowned
artist bent on sustaining his reputation.
The first part of _Don Quixote_ had been reprinted at Madrid in 1608; it
had been produced at Brussels in 1607 and 1611, and at Milan in 1610; it
had been translated into English in 1612 and into French in 1614.
Cervantes was celebrated in and out of Spain, but his celebrity had not
brought him wealth. The members of the French special embassy, sent to
Madrid in February 1615, under the Commandeur de Sillery, heard with
amazement that the author of the _Galatea_, the _Novelas exemplares_ and
_Don Quixote_ was "old, a soldier, a gentleman and poor." But his trials
were almost at an end. Though failing in health, he worked assiduously
at _Los Trabajos de Persiles y Sigismunda_, which, as he had jocosely
prophesied in the preface to the second part of _Don Quixote_, would be
"either the worst or the best book ever written in our tongue." It is
the most carefully written of his prose works, and the least animated or
attractive of them; signs of fatigue and of waning powers are
unmistakably visible. Cervantes was not destined to see it in print. He
was attacked by dropsy, and, on the 18th of April 1616, received the
sacrament of extreme unction; next day he wrote the dedication of
_Persiles y Sigismunda_ to the count de Lemos--the most moving and
gallant of farewells. He died at Madrid in the Calle del Leon on the
23rd of April; he was borne from his house "with his face uncovered,"
according to the rule of the Tertiaries of St Francis, and on the 24th
of April was buried in the church attached to the convent of the
Trinitarian nuns in the Calle de Cantarranas. There he rests--the story
of his remains being removed in 1633 to the Calle del Humilladero has no
foundation in fact--but the exact position of his grave is unknown.
Early in 1617 _Persiles y Sigismunda_ was published, and passed through
eight editions within two years; but the interest in it soon died away,
and it was not reprinted between 1625 and 1719. Cervantes' wife died
without issue on the 31st of October 1626; his natural daughter, who
survived both the child of her first marriage and her second husband,
died on the 20th of September 1652. Cervantes is represented solely by
his works. The _Novelas exemplares_ alone would give him the foremost
place among Spanish novelists; _Don Quixote_ entitles him to rank with
the greatest writers of all time: "children turn its leaves, young
people read it, grown men understand it, old folk praise it." It has
outlived all changes of literary taste, and is even more popular to-day
than it was three centuries ago.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--Leopold Rius, _Bibliografia critica de las obras de
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra_ (Madrid, 1895-1905, 3 vols.); _Obras
completas_ (Madrid, 1863-1864, 12 vols.), edited by Juan Eugenio
Hartzenbusch; _Complete Works_ (Glasgow, 1901-1906, 8 vols. in
progress), edited by James Fitzmaurice-Kelly; _Don Quijote_ (Madrid,
1833-1839, 6 vols.), edited by Diego Clemenciu; _Don Quixote_ (London,
1899-1900, 2 vols.), edited by James Fitzmaurice-Kelly and John
Ormsby; _Don Quijote_ (Madrid, 1905-1906, 2 vols. in progress), edited
by Clemente Cortejon; _Rinconete y Cortadillo_ (Sevilla, 1905), edited
by Francisco Rodriguez Marin; _Epistola a Mateo Vazquez_ (Madrid,
1905), edited by E[milio] C[otarelo]; Julian Apraiz, _Estudio
historico-critico sobre las Novelas ejemplares de Cervantes_ (Madrid,
1901); Francisco A. de Icaza, _Las Novelas ejemplares de Cervantes_
(Madrid, 1901); Francisco Rodriguez Marin, _El Loaysa de "El Celoso
Extremeno"_ (Sevilla, 1901); Narciso Diaz de Escovar, _Apuntes
escenicos cervantinos_ (Madrid, 1905); Manuel Jose Garcia, _Estudio
critico acerca del entremes "El Vizcaino fingido"_ (Madrid, 1905);
Alfred Morel-Fatio, _L'Espagne de Don Quichotte_ in _Etudes sur
l'Espagne_ (Paris, 1895, 2me serie); Julio Puyol y Alonso, _Estado
social que refleja "El Quijote"_ (Madrid, 1905); James
Fitzmaurice-Kelly, _Cervantes in England_ (London, 1905); Raymond
Foulche-Delbose, _Etude sur "La tia fingida,"_ in the _Revue
hispanique_ (Paris, 1899), vol. vi. pp. 256-306; Benedetto Croce, _Due
illustrazioni al "Viage del Parnaso,"_ in the _Homenaje a Menendez y
Pelayo_ (Madrid, 1899), vol. i. pp. 161-193; Paul Groussac, _Une
Enigme litteraire: le Don Quichotte d'Avellaneda_ (Paris, 1903);
Alonso Fernandez de Avellaneda, _El ingenioso hidalgo Don Quixote de
la Mancha_ (Barcelona, [1905]), edited by Marcelino Menendez y Pelayo;
Julio Cejador y Franca, _La Lengua de Cervantes_ (Madrid, 1905, &c.);
Martin Fernandez de Navarrete, _Vida de Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra_
(Madrid, 1819); Cristobal Perez Pastor, _Documentos Cervantinos hasta
ahora ineditos_ (Madrid, 1897-1902, 2 vols.); Emilio Cotardo y Mori,
_Efemerides Cervantinas_ (Madrid, 1905); Francisco Rodriguez Marin,
_Cervantes estudio en Sevilla, 1564-1565_ (Seville, 1905).
(J. F.-K.)
CERVERA, PASCUAL CERVERA Y TOPETE (1839-1909), Spanish admiral, was born
at Medina Sidonia on the 18th of February 1839. He showed an early
inclination for the sea, and his family sent him to the naval cadet
school at the age of twelve. As a sub-lieutenant he took part in the
naval operations on the coast of Morocco during the campaign of 1859-60.
Then he was for some time engaged in operations in the Sulu Islands and
the Philippines. Afterwards he was on the West Indian station during the
early part of the first Cuban War (1868-78), returning to Spain in 1873
to serve on the Basque coast against the Carlists. He distinguished
himself in defending the Carraca arsenal near Cadiz against the Federals
in 1873. He won each step in his promotion up to flag-rank through his
steadiness and brilliant conduct in action, and was awarded the crosses
of the Orders of Military and Naval Merit, Isabella the Catholic, and St
Hermengilde, besides several medals. Cervera had a great reputation for
decision, unbending temper and honesty, before he was placed at the head
of the Bilbao building-yards. This post he resigned after a few months
in order to become minister of marine in 1892, in a cabinet presided
over by Sagasta. He withdrew from the cabinet when he found that his
colleagues, from political motives, declined to support him in making
reforms and, on the other hand, unwisely cut down the naval estimates.
When in 1898 the Spanish-American War (q.v.) broke out, he was chosen to
command a squadron composed of four first-class cruisers, the "Maria
Theresa," his flagship, "Oquendo," "Vizcaya," and "Columbus," and
several destroyers. This ill-fated squadron only started upon its
reckless cruise across the ocean after its gallant commander had
repeatedly warned both the minister of marine and the prime minister,
Sagasta, in despatches from Cadiz and from the Canary and Cape Verde
Islands, that the ships were insufficiently provided with coal and
ammunition. Some of them, indeed, even lacked proper guns. In compliance
with the instructions of the government, Admiral Cervera made for the
landlocked harbour of Santiago de Cuba, where he co-operated in the
defence, landing some guns and a naval brigade. In spite of his
energetic representations, Cervera received an order from Madrid,
dictated by political considerations, to sally forth. It meant certain
destruction. The gallant squadron met forces trebly superior to it, and
was totally destroyed. The admiral, three of his captains, and 1800
sailors and marines were taken by the victors to Portsmouth, New
Hampshire, U.S.A. After the war, Cervera and his captains were tried
before the supreme naval and military court of the realm, which
honourably acquitted them all. In 1901 he became vice-admiral, in 1902
was appointed chief of staff of the Spanish navy, and in 1903 was made
life senator. He died at Puerto Real on the 3rd of April 1909.
CESAREVICH, or more properly TSESAREVICH, the title of the heir-apparent
to the Russian throne. The full official title is _Nasliednik
Tsesarevich_, i.e. "heir of Caesar," and in Russia the heir to the
throne is commonly called simply _Nasliednik_, the word _Tsesarevich_
never being used alone. _Tsarevich_, a form now much used in England,
means simply any "king's son"; it is an antiquated term now out of use
in Russia, and was last borne as heir to the throne by the unfortunate
Alexius, son of Peter the Great. The style of the wife of the
tsesarevich is _Tsesarevna_. The Cesarewitch handicap race at Newmarket,
founded in 1839, was named after the prince who was afterwards Alexander
II. of Russia, who paid a state visit to England that year.
CESARI, GIUSEPPE, called Il Cavaliere d' Arpino (born in or about 1568
and created a "Cavaliere di Cristo" by Pope Clement VIII.), also named
Il Giuseppino, an Italian painter, much encouraged at Rome and
munificently rewarded. His father had been a native of Arpino, but
Giuseppe himself was born in Rome. Cesari is stigmatized by Lanzi as not
less the corrupter of taste in painting than Marino was in poetry;
indeed, another of the nicknames of Cesari is "Il Marino de' Pittori"
(the pictorial Marino). There was spirit in Cesari's heads of men and
horses, and his frescoes in the Capitol (story of Romulus and Remus,
&c.), which occupied him at intervals during forty years, are well
coloured; but he drew the human form ill. His perspective is faulty, his
extremities monotonous, and his chiaroscuro defective. He died in 1640,
at the age of seventy-two, or perhaps of eighty, at Rome. Cesari ranks
as the head of the "Idealists" of his period, as opposed to the
"Naturalists," of whom Michelangelo da Caravaggio was the leading
champion,--the so-called "idealism" consisting more in reckless
facility, and disregard of the common facts and common-sense of nature,
than in anything to which so lofty a name could be properly accorded. He
was a man of touchy and irascible character, and rose from penury to the
height of opulence. His brother Bernardino assisted in many of his
works.
CESAROTTI, MELCHIORE (1730-1808), Italian poet, was born at Padua in
1730, of a noble but impoverished family. At the university of his
native place his literary progress procured for him at a very early age
the chair of rhetoric, and in 1768 the professorship of Greek and
Hebrew. On the invasion of Italy by the French, he gave his pen to their
cause, received a pension, and was made knight of the iron crown by
Napoleon I., to whom, in consequence, he addressed a bombastic and
extravagantly flattering poem called _Pronea_. Cesarotti is best known
as the translator of Homer and Ossian. Much praise cannot be given to
his version of the _Iliad_, for he has not scrupled to add, omit and
modernize. Ossian, which he held to be the finest of poems, he has, on
the other hand, considerably improved in translation; and the appearance
of his version attracted much attention in Italy and France, and raised
up many imitators of the Ossianic style. Cesarotti also produced a
number of works in prose, including a _Course of Greek Literature_, and
essays _On the Origin and Progress of the Poetic Art_, _On the Sources
of the Pleasure derived from Tragedy_, _On the Philosophy of Language_
and _On the Philosophy of Taste_, the last being a defence of his own
great eccentricities in criticism. His weakness was a straining after
novelty. His style is forcible, but full of Gallicisms.
A complete edition of his works, in 42 vols. 8vo. began to appear at
Pisa in 1800, and was completed in 1813, after his death. See
_Memoirs_, by Barbieri (Padua, 1810), and _Un Filosofo delle lettere_,
by Alemanni (Turin, 1894).
CESENA (anc. _Caesena_), a town and episcopal see of Emilia, Italy, in
the province of Forli, 12 m. S.E. by rail from the town of Forli, on the
line between Bologna and Rimini, 144 ft. above sea-level. Pop. (1905)
12,245 (town); 43,468 (commune). The town is picturesquely situated at
the foot of the slopes of the Apennines, and is crowned by a medieval
fortress (Rocca), begun by the emperor Frederick I. (Barbarossa)
probably, but altered and added to later. The cathedral has two fine
marble altars by the Lombardi of Venice (or their school). The library,
built for Domenico Malatesta in 1452 by Matteo Nuzio, is a fine early
Renaissance building, and its internal arrangements, with the original
desks to which the books are still chained, are especially well
preserved (see J.W. Clark, _The Care of Books_, Cambridge, 1901, p.
199). In it are valuable MSS., many of which were used by Aldus
Manutius. It also contains a picture gallery with a good "Presentation
in the Temple" by Francesco Francia. There are some fine palaces in the
town. Three-quarters of a mile south-east on the hill stands the
handsome church of S. Maria del Monte, after the style of Bramante, with
carved stalls of the 16th century. Wine, hemp and silk are the main
articles of trade. About the ancient Caesena little is said in classical
authors: it is mentioned as a station on the Via Aemilia and as a
fortress in the wars of Theodoric and Narses. During the middle ages it
was at first independent. In 1357 it was unsuccessfully defended by the
wife of Francesco Ordelaffi, lord of Forli, against the papal troops
under Albornoz. In 1377 it was sacked by Cardinal Robert of Geneva
(afterwards Clement VII., antipope). It was then held by the Malatesta
of Rimini until 1465, when it came under the dominion of the church.
Both Pius VI. (1717) and Pius VII. (1742) were born at Cesena.
(T. As.)
CESNOLA, LUIGI PALMA DI (1832-1904), Italian-American soldier and
archaeologist, was born near Turin on the 29th of July 1832. Having
served in the Austrian and Crimean Wars, in 1860 he went to New York,
where he taught Italian and French and founded a military school for
officers. He took part in the American Civil War as colonel of a cavalry
regiment, and at Aldie (June 1863) was wounded and taken prisoner. He
was released from Libby prison early in 1864, served in the Wilderness
and Petersburg campaigns (1864-65) as a brigadier of cavalry, and at the
close of the war was breveted brigadier-general. He was then appointed
United States consul at Larnaca in Cyprus (1865-1877). During his stay
in the island he carried on excavations, which resulted in the discovery
of a large number of antiquities. The collection was purchased by the
Metropolitan Museum of New York, and Cesnola became director in 1879.
Doubt having been thrown by Gaston L. Feuerdant, in an article in the
New York _Herald_ (August 1880), upon the genuineness of his
restorations, the matter was referred to a special committee, which
pronounced in his favour.[1] He is the author of _Cyprus, its ancient
Cities, Tombs and Temples_ (1877), an interesting book of travel and of
considerable service to the practical antiquary; and of a _Descriptive
Atlas of the Cesnola Collection of Cypriote Antiquities_ (3 vols.,
1884-6). He died in New York on the 21st of November 1904. He was a
member of several learned societies in Europe and America, and in 1897
he received a Congressional medal of honour for conspicuous military
services.
His brother, ALESSANDRO PALMA DI CESNOLA, born in 1839, conducted
excavations at Paphos (where he was U.S. vice-consul) and Salamis on
behalf of the British government. The results of these are described in
_Salaminia_ (1882).