derived from _lentes_ ("lentils"), which its oldest members were fond of
cultivating (according to Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ xviii. 3, 10). The word
_Lentulitas_ ("Lentulism"; cf. _Appietas_) is coined by Cicero (_Ad
Fam._ iii. 7, 5) to express the attributes of a pronounced aristocrat.
The three first of the name were L. Cornelius Lentulus (consul 327
B.C.), Servius Cornelius Lentulus (consul 303) and L. Cornelius Lentulus
Caudinus (consul 275). Their connexion with the later Lentuli
(especially those of the Ciceronian period) is very obscure and
difficult to establish. The following members of the family deserve
mention.
PUBLIUS CORNELIUS LENTULUS, nicknamed SURA, one of the chief figures in
the Catilinarian conspiracy. When accused by Sulla (to whom he had been
quaestor in 81 B.C.) of having squandered the public money, he refused
to render any account, but insolently held out the calf of his leg
(_sura_), on which part of the person boys were punished when they made
mistakes in playing ball. He was praetor in 75, governor of Sicily 74,
consul 71. In 70, being expelled from the senate with a number of others
for immorality, he joined Catiline. Relying upon a Sibylline oracle that
three Cornelii should be rulers of Rome, Lentulus regarded himself as
the destined successor of Cornelius Sulla and Cornelius Cinna. When
Catiline left Rome after Cicero's first speech _In Catilinam_, Lentulus
took his place as chief of the conspirators in the city. In conjunction
with C. Cornelius Cethegus, he undertook to murder Cicero and set fire
to Rome, but the plot failed owing to his timidity and indiscretion.
Ambassadors from the Allobroges being at the time in Rome, the bearers
of a complaint against the oppressions of provincial governors, Lentulus
made overtures to them, with the object of obtaining armed assistance.
Pretending to fall in with his views, the ambassadors obtained a written
agreement signed by the chief conspirators, and informed Q. Fabius
Sanga, their "patron" in Rome, who in his turn acquainted Cicero. The
conspirators were arrested and forced to admit their guilt. Lentulus was
compelled to abdicate his praetorship, and, as it was feared that there
might be an attempt to rescue him, he was put to death in the Tullianum
on the 5th of December 63.
See Dio Cassius xxxvii. 30, xlvi. 20; Plutarch, _Cicero_, 17; Sallust,
_Catilina_; Cicero, _In Catilinam_, iii., iv.; _Pro Sulla_, 25; also
CATILINE.
PUBLIUS CORNELIUS LENTULUS, called SPINTHER from his likeness to an
actor of that name, one of the chief adherents of the Pompeian party. In
63 B.C. he was curule aedile, assisted Cicero in the suppression of the
Catilinarian conspiracy, and distinguished himself by the splendour of
the games he provided. Praetor in 60, he obtained the governorship of
Hispania Citerior (59) through the support of Caesar, to whom he was
also indebted for his election to the consulship (57). Lentulus played a
prominent part in the recall of Cicero from exile, and although a
temporary coolness seems to have arisen between them, Cicero speaks of
him in most grateful terms. From 56-53 Lentulus was governor of the
province of Cilicia (with Cyprus) and during that time was commissioned
by the senate to restore Ptolemy XI. Auletes to his kingdom (see
PTOLEMIES). The Sibylline books, however, declared that the king must
not be restored by force of arms, at the risk of peril to Rome. As a
provincial governor, Lentulus appears to have looked after the interests
of his subjects, and did not enrich himself at their expense. In spite
of his indebtedness to Caesar, Lentulus joined the Pompeians on the
outbreak of civil war (49). The generosity with which he was treated by
Caesar after the capitulation of Corfinium made him hesitate, but he
finally decided in favour of Pompey. After the battle of Pharsalus,
Lentulus escaped to Rhodes, where he was at first refused admission,
although he subsequently found an asylum there (Cicero, _Ad Att._ xi.
13. 1). According to Aurelius Victor (_De vir. ill._ lxxviii., 9, if the
reading be correct), he subsequently fell into Caesar's hands and was
put to death.
See Caesar, _Bell. Civ._ i. 15-23, iii. 102; Plutarch, _Pomp._ 49;
Valerius Maximus ix. 14, 4; many letters of Cicero, especially _Ad
Fam._ i. 1-9.
LUCIUS CORNELIUS LENTULUS, surnamed CRUS or CRUSCELLO (for what reason
is unknown), member of the anti-Caesarian party. In 61 B.C. he was the
chief accuser of P. Clodius (q.v.) in the affair of the festival of Bona
Dea. When consul (49) he advised the rejection of all peace terms
offered by Caesar, and declared that, if the senate did not at once
decide upon opposing him by force of arms, he would act upon his own
responsibility. There seems no reason to doubt that Lentulus was mainly
inspired by selfish motives, and hoped to find in civil war an
opportunity for his own aggrandizement. But in spite of his brave words
he fled in haste from Rome as soon as he heard of Caesar's advance, and
crossed over to Greece. After Pharsalus, he made his way to Rhodes (but
was refused admission), thence, by way of Cyprus, to Egypt. He landed at
Pelusium the day after the murder of Pompey, was immediately seized by
Ptolemy, imprisoned, and put to death.
See Caesar, _Bell. Civ._ i. 4, iii. 104; Plutarch, _Pompey_, 80.
A full account of the different Cornelii Lentuli, with genealogical
table, will be found in Pauly-Wissowa's _Realencyclopädie_, iv. pt. 1,
p. 1355 (1900) (s.v. "Cornelius"); see also V. de Vit, _Onomasticon_,
ii. 433.
LENZ, JAKOB MICHAEL REINHOLD (1751-1792), German poet, was born at
Sesswegen in Livonia, the son of the village pastor, on the 12th of
January 1751. He removed with his parents to Dorpat in 1759, and soon
began to compose sacred odes, in the manner of Klopstock. In 1768 he
entered the university of Königsberg as a student of theology, and in
1771 accompanied, as tutor, two young German nobles, named von Kleist,
to Strassburg, where they were to enter the French army. In Strassburg
Lenz was received into the literary circle that gathered round Friedrich
Rudolf Salzmann (1749-1821) and became acquainted with Goethe, at that
time a student at the university. In order to be close to his young
pupils, Lenz had to remove to Fort Louis in the neighbourhood, and while
here became deeply enamoured of Goethe's friend, Friederike Elisabeth
Brion (1752-1813), daughter of the pastor of Sesenheim. Lenz
endeavoured, after Goethe's departure from Strassburg, to replace the
great poet in her affections, and to her he poured out songs and poems
(_Die Liebe auf dem Lande_) which were long attributed to Goethe
himself, as was also Lenz's first drama, the comedy, _Der Hofmeister,
oder Vorteile der Privaterziehung_ (1774). In 1776 he visited Weimar and
was most kindly received by the duke; but his rude, overbearing manner
and vicious habits led to his expulsion. In 1777 he became insane, and
in 1779 was removed from Emmendingen, where J. G. Schlosser (1739-1799),
Goethe's brother-in-law, had given him a home, to his native village.
Here he lived in great poverty for several years, and then was given,
more out of charity than on account of his merits, the appointment of
tutor in a pension school near Moscow, where he died on the 24th of May
1792. Lenz, though one of the most talented poets of the _Sturm und
Drang_ period, presented a strange medley of genius and childishness.
His great, though neglected and distorted, abilities found vent in
ill-conceived imitations of Shakespeare. His comedies, _Der Hofmeister_;
_Der neue Menoza_ (1774); _Die Soldaten_ (1776); _Die Freunde machen den
Philosophen_ (1776), though accounted the best of his works, are
characterized by unnatural situations and an incongruous mixture of
tragedy and comedy.
Lenz's _Gesammelte Schriften_ were published by L. Tieck in three
volumes (1828); supplementary to these volumes are E. Dorer-Egloff,
_J. M. R. Lenz und seine Schriften_ (1857) and K. Weinhold,
_Dramatischer Nachlass von J. M. R. Lenz_ (1884); a selection of
Lenz's writings will be found in A. Sauer, _Stürmer und Dränger_, ii.;
Kürschner's _Deutsche Nationalliteratur_, vol. lxxx., (1883). See
further E. Schmidt, _Lenz und Klinger_ (1878); J. Froitzheim, _Lenz
und Goethe_ (1891); H. Rauch, _Lenz und Shakespeare_ (1892); F.
Waldmann, _Lenz in Briefen_ (1894).
LEO, the name of thirteen popes.
LEO I., who alone of Roman pontiffs shares with Gregory I. the surname
of THE GREAT, pope from 440 to 461, was a native of Rome, or, according
to a less probable account, of Volterra in Tuscany. Of his family or
early life nothing is known; that he was highly cultivated according to
the standards of his time is obvious, but it does not appear that he
could write Greek, or even that he understood that language. In one of
the letters (_Ep._ 104) of Augustine, an acolyte named Leo is mentioned
as having been in 418 the bearer of a communication from Sixtus of Rome
(afterwards pope) to Aurelius of Carthage against the Pelagians. In 429,
when the first unmistakable reference to Pope Leo occurs, he was still
only a deacon, but already a man of commanding influence; it was at his
suggestion that the _De incarnatione_ of the aged Cassianus, having
reference to the Nestorian heresy, was composed in that year, and about
431 we find Cyril of Alexandria writing to him that he might prevent the
Roman Church from lending its support in any way to the ambitious
schemes of Juvenal of Jerusalem. In 440, while Leo was in Gaul, whither
he had been sent to compose some differences between Aetius and another
general named Albinus, Pope Sixtus III. died. The absent deacon, or
rather archdeacon, was unanimously chosen to succeed him, and received
consecration on his return six weeks afterwards (September 29). In 443
he began to take measures against the Manichaeans (who since the capture
of Carthage by Genseric in 439 had become very numerous at Rome), and in
the following year he was able to report to the Italian bishops that
some of the heretics had returned to Catholicism, while a large number
had been sentenced to perpetual banishment "in accordance with the
constitutions of the Christian emperors," and others had fled; in
seeking these out the help of the provincial clergy was sought. It was
during the earlier years of Leo's pontificate that the events in Gaul
occurred which resulted in this triumph over Hilarius of Arles,
signalized by the edict of Valentinian III. (445), denouncing the
contumacy of the Gallic bishop, and enacting "that nothing should be
done in Gaul, contrary to ancient usage, without the authority of the
bishop of Rome, and that the decree of the apostolic see should
henceforth be law." In 447 Leo held the correspondence with Turribus of
Astorga which led to the condemnation of the Priscillianists by the
Spanish national church. In 448 he received with commendation a letter
from Eutyches, the Constantinopolitan monk, complaining of the revival
of the Nestorian heresy there; and in the following year Eutyches wrote
his circular, appealing against the sentence which at the instance of
Eusebius of Dorylaeum had been passed against him at a synod held in
Constantinople under the presidency of the patriarch Flavian, and asking
papal support at the oecumenical council at that time under summons to
meet at Ephesus. The result of a correspondence was that Leo by his
legates sent to Flavian that famous epistle in which he sets forth with
great fulness of detail the doctrine ever since recognized as orthodox
regarding the union of the two natures in the one person of Jesus
Christ. The events at the "robber" synod at Ephesus belong to general
church history rather than to the biography of Leo; his letter, though
submitted, was not read by the assembled fathers, and the papal legates
had some difficulty in escaping with their lives from the violence of
the theologians who, not content with deposing Flavian and Eusebius,
shouted for the dividing of those who divided Christ. When the news of
the result of this oecumenical council (oecumenical in every
circumstance except that it was not presided over by the pope) reached
Rome, Leo wrote to Theodosius "with groanings and tears," requesting the
emperor to sanction another council, to be held this time, however, in
Italy. In this petition he was supported by Valentinian III., by the
empress-mother Galla Placidia and by the empress Eudoxia, but the appeal
was made in vain. A change, however, was brought about by the accession
in the following year of Marcian, who three days after coming to the
throne published an edict bringing within the scope of the penal laws
against heretics the supporters of the dogmas of Apollinaris and
Eutyches. To convoke a synod in which greater orthodoxy might reasonably
be expected was in these circumstances no longer difficult, but all
Leo's efforts to secure that the meeting should take place on Italian
soil were unavailing. When the synod of Chalcedon assembled in 451, the
papal legates were treated with great respect, and Leo's former letter
to Flavian was adopted by acclamation as formulating the creed of the
universal church on the subject of the person of Christ. Among the
reasons urged by Leo for holding this council in Italy had been the
threatening attitude of the Huns; the dreaded irruption took place in
the following year (452). After Aquileia had succumbed to Attila's long
siege, the conqueror set out for Rome. Near the confluence of the Mincio
and the Po he was met by Leo, whose eloquence persuaded him to turn
back. Legend has sought to enhance the impressiveness of the occurrence
by an unnecessarily imagined miracle. The pope was less successful with
Genseric when the Vandal chief arrived under the walls of Rome in 455,
but he secured a promise that there should be no incendiarism or murder,
and that three of the oldest basilicas should be exempt from plunder--a
promise which seems to have been faithfully observed. Leo died on the
10th of November 461, the liturgical anniversary being the 11th of
April. His successor was Hilarius or Hilarus, who had been one of the
papal legates at the "robber" synod in 449.
The title of _doctor ecclesiae_ was given to Leo by Benedict XIV. As
bishop of the diocese of Rome, Leo distinguished himself above all his
predecessors by his preaching, to which he devoted himself with great
zeal and success. From his short and pithy _Sermones_ many of the
lessons now to be found in the Roman breviary have been taken. Viewed in
conjunction with his voluminous correspondence, the sermons sufficiently
explain the secret of his greatness, which chiefly lay in the
extraordinary strength and purity of his convictions as to the primacy
of the successors of St Peter at a time when the civil and
ecclesiastical troubles of the civilized world made men willing enough
to submit themselves to any authority whatsoever that could establish
its right to exist by courage, honesty and knowledge of affairs.
The works of Leo I. were first collectively edited by Quesnel (Lyons,
1700), and again, on the basis of this, in what is now the standard
edition by Ballerini (Venice, 1753-1756). Ninety-three Sermones and
one hundred and seventy-three _Epistolae_ occupy the first volume; the
second contains the _Liber Sacramentorum_, usually attributed to Leo,
and the _De Vocatione Omnium Gentium_, also ascribed, by Quesnel and
others, to him, but more probably the production of a certain Prosper,
of whom nothing further is known. The works of Hilary of Arles are
appended.
LEO II., pope from August 682 to July 683, was a Sicilian by birth, and
succeeded Agatho I. Agatho had been represented at the sixth oecumenical
council (that of Constantinople in 681), where Pope Honorius I. was
anathematized for his views in the Monothelite controversy as a favourer
of heresy, and the only fact of permanent historical interest with
regard to Leo is that he wrote once and again in approbation of the
decision of the council and in condemnation of Honorius, whom he
regarded as one who _profana proditione immaculatam fidem subvertere
conatus est_. In their bearing upon the question of papal infallibility
these words have excited considerable attention and controversy, and
prominence is given to the circumstance that in the Greek text of the
letter to the emperor in which the phrase occurs the milder expression
[Greek: parechôrêsen] (_subverti permisit_) is used for subvertere
conatus est. This Hefele in his _Conciliengeschichte_ (iii. 294) regards
as alone expressing the true meaning of Leo. It was during Leo's
pontificate that the dependence of the see of Ravenna upon that of Rome
was finally settled by imperial edict. Benedict II. succeeded him.
LEO III., whose pontificate (795-816) covered the last eighteen years of
the reign of Charlemagne, was a native of Rome, and having been chosen
successor of Adrian I. on the 26th of December 795, was consecrated to
the office on the following day. His first act was to send to Charles as
patrician the standard of Rome along with the keys of the sepulchre of
St Peter and of the city; a gracious and condescending letter in reply
made it still more clear where all real power at that moment lay. For
more than three years his term of office was uneventful; but at the end
of that period the feelings of disappointment which had secretly been
rankling in the breasts of Paschalis and Campulus, nephews of Adrian I.,
who had received from him the offices of _primicerius_ and _sacellarius_
respectively, suddenly manifested themselves in an organized attack upon
Leo as he was riding in procession through the city on the day of the
Greater Litany (25th April 799); the object of his assailants was, by
depriving him of his eyes and tongue, to disqualify him for the papal
office, and, although they were unsuccessful in this attempt, he found
it necessary to accept the protection of Winegis, the Frankish duke of
Spoleto, who came to the rescue. Having vainly requested the presence of
Charles in Rome, Leo went beyond the Alps to meet the king at Paderborn;
he was received with much ceremony and respect, but his enemies having
sent in serious written charges, of which the character is not now
known, Charles decided to appoint both the pope and his accusers to
appear as parties before him when he should have arrived in Rome. Leo
returned in great state to his diocese, and was received with honour;
Charles, who did not arrive until November in the following year, lost
no time in assuming the office of a judge, and the result of his
investigation was the acquittal of the pope, who at the same time,
however, was permitted or rather required to clear himself by the oath
of compurgation. The coronation of the emperor followed two days
afterwards; its effect was to bring out with increased clearness the
personally subordinate position of Leo. The decision of the emperor,
however, secured for Leo's pontificate an external peace which was only
broken after the accession of Louis the Pious. His enemies began to
renew their attacks; the violent repression of a conspiracy led to an
open rebellion at Rome; serious charges were once more brought against
him, when he was overtaken by death in 816. It was under this
pontificate that Felix of Urgel, the adoptianist, was anathematized
(798) by a Roman synod. Leo at another synod held in Rome in 810
admitted the dogmatic correctness of the _filioque_, but deprecated its
introduction into the creed. On this point, however, the Frankish Church
persevered in the course it had already initiated. Leo's successor was
Stephen IV.
LEO IV., pope from 847 to 855, was a Roman by birth, and succeeded
Sergius II. His pontificate was chiefly distinguished by his efforts to
repair the damage done by the Saracens during the reign of his
predecessor to various churches of the city, especially those of St
Peter and St Paul. It was he who built and fortified the suburb on the
right bank of the Tiber still known as the Civitas Leonina. A frightful
conflagration, which he is said to have extinguished by his prayers, is
the subject of Raphael's great work in the Sala dell' Incendio of the
Vatican. He held three synods, one of them (in 850) distinguished by the
presence of Louis II., who was crowned emperor on the occasion, but none
of them otherwise of importance. The history of the papal struggle with
Hincmar of Reims, which began during Leo's pontificate, belongs rather
to that of Nicholas I. Benedict III. was Leo's immediate successor.
LEO V., a native of Ardea, was pope for two months in 903 after the
death of Benedict IV. He was overthrown and cast into prison by the
priest Christopher, who installed himself in his place.
LEO VI. succeeded John X. in 928, and reigned seven months and a few
days. He was succeeded by Stephen VIII.
LEO VII., pope from 936 to 939, was preceded by John XI., and followed
by Stephen IX.
LEO VIII., pope from 963 to 965, a Roman by birth, held the lay office
of _protoscrinius_ when he was elected to the papal chair at the
instance of Otto the Great by the Roman synod which deposed John XII. in
December 963. Having been hurried with unseemly haste through all the
intermediate orders, he received consecration two days after his
election, which was unacceptable to the people. In February 964, the
emperor having withdrawn from the city, Leo found it necessary to seek
safety in flight, whereupon he was deposed by a synod held under the
presidency of John XII. On the sudden death of the latter, the populace
chose Benedict V. as his successor; but Otto, returning and laying siege
to the city, compelled their acceptance of Leo. It is usually said that,
at the synod which deposed Benedict, Leo conceded to the emperor and his
successors as sovereign of Italy full rights of investiture, but the
genuineness of the document on which this allegation rests is more than
doubtful. Leo VIII. was succeeded by John XIII.
LEO IX., pope from 1049 to 1054, was a native of Upper Alsace, where he
was born on the 21st of June 1002. His proper name was Bruno; the family
to which he belonged was of noble rank, and through his father he was
related to the emperor Conrad II. He was educated at Toul, where he
successively became canon and (1026) bishop; in the latter capacity he
rendered important political services to his relative Conrad II., and
afterwards to Henry III., and at the same time he became widely known as
an earnest and reforming ecclesiastic by the zeal he showed in spreading
the rule of the order of Cluny. On the death of Damasus II., Bruno was
in December 1048, with the concurrence both of the emperor and of the
Roman delegates, selected his successor by an assembly at Worms; he
stipulated, however, as a condition of his acceptance that he should
first proceed to Rome and be canonically elected by the voice of clergy
and people. Setting out shortly after Christmas, he had a meeting with
abbot Hugo of Cluny at Besançon, where he was joined by the young monk
Hildebrand, who afterwards became Pope Gregory VII.; arriving in pilgrim
garb at Rome in the following February, he was received with much
cordiality, and at his consecration assumed the name of Leo IX. One of
his first public acts was to hold the well-known Easter synod of 1049,
at which celibacy of the clergy (down to the rank of subdeacon) was anew
enjoined, and where he at least succeeded in making clear his own
convictions against every kind of simony. The greater part of the year
that followed was occupied in one of those progresses through Italy,
Germany and France which form a marked feature in Leo's pontificate.
After presiding over a synod at Pavia, he joined the emperor Henry III.
in Saxony, and accompanied him to Cologne and Aix-la-Chapelle; to Reims
he also summoned a meeting of the higher clergy, by which several
important reforming decrees were passed. At Mainz also he held a
council, at which the Italian and French as well as the German clergy
were represented, and ambassadors of the Greek emperor were present;
here too simony and the marriage of the clergy were the principal
matters dealt with. After his return to Rome he held (29th April 1050)
another Easter synod, which was occupied largely with the controversy
about the teachings of Berengarius of Tours; in the same year he
presided over provincial synods at Salerno, Siponto and Vercelli, and in
September revisited Germany, returning to Rome in time for a third
Easter synod, at which the question of the reordination of those who had
been ordained by simonists was considered. In 1052 he joined the emperor
at Pressburg, and vainly sought to secure the submission of the
Hungarians; and at Regensburg, Bamberg and Worms the papal presence was
marked by various ecclesiastical solemnities. After a fourth Easter
synod in 1053 Leo set out against the Normans in the south with an army
of Italians and German volunteers, but his forces sustained a total
defeat at Astagnum near Civitella (18th June 1053); on going out,
however, from the city to meet the enemy he was received with every
token of submission, relief from the pressure of his ban was implored
and fidelity and homage were sworn. From June 1053 to March 1054 he was
nevertheless detained at Benevento in honourable captivity; he did not
long survive his return to Rome, where he died on the 19th of April
1054. He was succeeded by Victor II.
LEO X. [Giovanni de' Medici] (1475-1521), pope from the 11th of March
1513 to the 1st of December 1521, was the second son of Lorenzo de'
Medici, called the Magnificent, and was born at Florence on the 11th of
December 1475. Destined from his birth for the church, he received the
tonsure at the age of seven and was soon loaded with rich benefices and
preferments. His father prevailed on Innocent VIII. to name him
cardinal-deacon of Sta Maria in Dominica in March 1489, although he was
not allowed to wear the insignia or share in the deliberations of the
college until three years later. Meanwhile he received a careful
education at Lorenzo's brilliant humanistic court under such men as
Angelo Poliziano, the classical scholar, Pico della Mirandola, the
philosopher and theologian, the pious Marsilio Ficino who endeavoured to
unite the Platonic cult with Christianity and the poet Bernardo Dovizio
Bibbiena. From 1489 to 1491 he studied theology and canon law at Pisa
under Filippo Decio and Bartolomeo Sozzini. On the 23rd of March 1492 he
was formally admitted into the sacred college and took up his residence
at Rome, receiving a letter of advice from his father which ranks among
the wisest of its kind. The death of Lorenzo on the 8th of April,
however, called the seventeen-year-old cardinal to Florence. He
participated in the conclave which followed the death of Innocent VIII.
in July 1492 and opposed the election of Cardinal Borgia. He made his
home with his elder brother Piero at Florence throughout the agitation
of Savonarola and the invasion of Charles VIII. of France, until the
uprising of the Florentines and the expulsion of the Medici in November
1494. While Piero found refuge at Venice and Urbino, Cardinal Giovanni
travelled in Germany, in the Netherlands and in France. In May 1500 he
returned to Rome, where he was received with outward cordiality by
Alexander VI., and where he lived for several years immersed in art and
literature. In 1503 he welcomed the accession of Julius II. to the
pontificate; the death of Piero de' Medici in the same year made
Giovanni head of his family. On the 1st of October 1511 he was appointed
papal legate of Bologna and the Romagna, and when the Florentine
republic declared in favour of the schismatic Pisans Julius II. sent him
against his native city at the head of the papal army. This and other
attempts to regain political control of Florence were frustrated, until
a bloodless revolution permitted the return of the Medici on the 14th of
September 1512. Giovanni's younger brother Giuliano was placed at the
head of the republic, but the cardinal actually managed the government.
Julius II. died in February 1513, and the conclave, after a stormy seven
day's session, united on Cardinal de' Medici as the candidate of the
younger cardinals. He was ordained to the priesthood on the 15th of
March, consecrated bishop on the 17th, and enthroned with the name of
Leo X. on the 19th. There is no evidence of simony in the conclave, and
Leo's election was hailed with delight by the Romans on account of his
reputation for liberality, kindliness and love of peace. Following the
example of many of his predecessors, he promptly repudiated his election
"capitulation" as an infringement on the divinely bestowed prerogatives
of the Holy See.
Many problems confronted Leo X. on his accession. He must preserve the
papal conquests which he had inherited from Alexander VI. and Julius II.
He must minimize foreign influence, whether French, Spanish or German,
in Italy. He must put an end to the Pisan schism and settle the other
troubles incident to the French invasion. He must restore the French
Church to Catholic unity, abolish the pragmatic sanction of Bourges, and
bring to a successful close the Lateran council convoked by his
predecessor. He must stay the victorious advance of the Turks. He must
quiet the disagreeable wranglings of the German humanists. Other
problems connected with his family interests served to complicate the
situation and eventually to prevent the successful consummation of many
of his plans. At the very time of Leo's accession Louis XII. of France,
in alliance with Venice, was making a determined effort to regain the
duchy of Milan, and the pope, after fruitless endeavours to maintain
peace, joined the league of Mechlin on the 5th of April 1513 with the
emperor Maximilian I., Ferdinand I. of Spain and Henry VIII. of England.
The French and Venetians were at first successful, but on the 6th of
June met overwhelming defeat at Novara. The Venetians continued the
struggle until October. On the 19th of December the fifth Lateran
council, which had been reopened by Leo in April, ratified the peace
with Louis XII. and registered the conclusion of the Pisan schism. While
the council was engaged in planning a crusade and in considering the
reform of the clergy, a new crisis occurred between the pope and the
king of France. Francis I., who succeeded Louis XII. on the 1st of
January 1515, was an enthusiastic young prince, dominated by the
ambition of recovering Milan and Naples. Leo at once formed a new league
with the emperor and the king of Spain, and to ensure English support
made Wolsey a cardinal. Francis entered Italy in August and on the 14th
of September won the battle of Marignano. The pope in October signed an
agreement binding him to withdraw his troops from Parma and Piacenza,
which had been previously gained at the expense of the duchy of Milan,
on condition of French protection at Rome and Florence. The king of
Spain wrote to his ambassador at Rome "that His Holiness had hitherto
played a double game and that all his zeal to drive the French from
Italy had been only a mask"; this reproach seemed to receive some
confirmation when Leo X. held a secret conference with Francis at
Bologna in December 1515. The ostensible subjects under consideration
were the establishment of peace between France, Venice and the Empire,
with a view to an expedition against the Turks, and the ecclesiastical
affairs of France. Precisely what was arranged is unknown. During these
two or three years of incessant political intrigue and warfare it was
not to be expected that the Lateran council should accomplish much. Its
three main objects, the peace of Christendom, the crusade and the reform
of the church, could be secured only by general agreement among the
powers, and Leo or the council failed to secure such agreement. Its most
important achievements were the registration at its eleventh sitting
(19th December 1516) of the abolition of the pragmatic sanction, which
the popes since Pius II. had unanimously condemned, and the confirmation
of the concordat between Leo X. and Francis I., which was destined to
regulate the relations between the French Church and the Holy See until
the Revolution. Leo closed the council on the 16th of March 1517. It had
ended the schism, ratified the censorship of books introduced by
Alexander VI. and imposed tithes for a war against the Turks. It raised
no voice against the primacy of the pope.
The year which marked the close of the Lateran council was also
signalized by Leo's unholy war against the duke of Urbino. The pope was
naturally proud of his family and had practised nepotism from the
outset. His cousin Giulio, who subsequently became Clement VII., he had
made the most influential man in the curia, naming him archbishop of
Florence, cardinal and vice-chancellor of the Holy See. Leo had intended
his younger brother Giuliano and his nephew Lorenzo for brilliant
secular careers. He had named them Roman patricians; the latter he had
placed in charge of Florence; the former, for whom he planned to carve
out a kingdom in central Italy of Parma, Piacenza, Ferrara and Urbino,
he had taken with himself to Rome and married to Filiberta of Savoy. The
death of Giuliano in March 1516, however, caused the pope to transfer
his ambitions to Lorenzo. At the very time (December 1516) that peace
between France, Spain, Venice and the Empire seemed to give some promise
of a Christendom united against the Turk, Leo was preparing an
enterprise as unscrupulous as any of the similar exploits of Cesare
Borgia. He obtained 150,000 ducats towards the expenses of the
expedition from Henry VIII. of England, in return for which he entered
the imperial league of Spain and England against France. The war lasted
from February to September 1517 and ended with the expulsion of the duke
and the triumph of Lorenzo; but it revived the nefarious policy of
Alexander VI., increased brigandage and anarchy in the States of the
Church, hindered the preparations for a crusade and wrecked the papal
finances. Guicciardini reckoned the cost of the war to Leo at the
prodigious sum of 800,000 ducats. The new duke of Urbino was the Lorenzo
de' Medici to whom Machiavelli addressed _The Prince_. His marriage in
March 1518 was arranged by the pope with Madeleine la Tour d'Auvergne, a
royal princess of France, whose daughter was the Catherine de' Medici
celebrated in French history. The war of Urbino was further marked by a
crisis in the relations between pope and cardinals. The sacred college
had grown especially worldly and troublesome since the time of Sixtus
IV., and Leo took advantage of a plot of several of its members to
poison him, not only to inflict exemplary punishments by executing one
and imprisoning several others, but also to make a radical change in the
college. On the 3rd of July 1517 he published the names of thirty-one
new cardinals, a number almost unprecedented in the history of the
papacy. Some of the nominations were excellent, such as Lorenzo
Campeggio, Giambattista Pallavicini, Adrian of Utrecht, Cajetan,
Cristoforo Numai and Egidio Canisio. The naming of seven members of
prominent Roman families, however, reversed the wise policy of his
predecessor which had kept the dangerous factions of the city out of the
curia. Other promotions were for political or family considerations or
to secure money for the war against Urbino. The pope was accused of
having exaggerated the conspiracy of the cardinals for purposes of
financial gain, but most of such accusations appear to be
unsubstantiated.
Leo, meanwhile, felt the need of staying the advance of the warlike
sultan, Selim I., who was threatening western Europe, and made elaborate
plans for a crusade. A truce was to be proclaimed throughout
Christendom; the pope was to be the arbiter of disputes; the emperor and
the king of France were to lead the army; England, Spain and Portugal
were to furnish the fleet; and the combined forces were to be directed
against Constantinople. Papal diplomacy in the interests of peace
failed, however; Cardinal Wolsey made England, not the pope, the arbiter
between France and the Empire; and much of the money collected for the
crusade from tithes and indulgences was spent in other ways. In 1519
Hungary concluded a three years' truce with Selim I., but the succeeding
sultan, Suliman the Magnificent, renewed the war in June 1521 and on the
28th of August captured the citadel of Belgrade. The pope was greatly
alarmed, and although he was then involved in war with France he sent
about 30,000 ducats to the Hungarians. Leo treated the Uniate Greeks
with great loyalty, and by bull of the 18th of May 1521 forbade Latin
clergy to celebrate mass in Greek churches and Latin bishops to ordain
Greek clergy. These provisions were later strengthened by Clement VII.
and Paul III. and went far to settle the chronic disputes between the
Latins and Uniate Greeks.
Leo was disturbed throughout his pontificate by heresy and schism. The
dispute between Reuchlin and Pfefferkorn relative to the Talmud and
other Jewish books was referred to the pope in September 1513. He in
turn referred it to the bishops of Spires and Worms, who gave decision
in March 1514 in favour of Reuchlin. After the appeal of the
inquisitor-general, Hochstraten, and the appearance of the _Epistolae
obscurorum virorum_, however, Leo annulled the decision (June 1520) and
imposed silence on Reuchlin. The pope had already authorized the
extensive grant of indulgences in order to secure funds for the crusade
and more particularly for the rebuilding of St Peter's at Rome. Against
the attendant abuses the Augustinian monk Martin Luther (q.v.) posted
(31st October 1517) on the church door at Wittenberg his famous
ninety-five theses, which were the signal for widespread revolt against
the church. Although Leo did not fully comprehend the import of the
movement, he directed (3rd February 1518) the vicar-general of the
Augustinians to impose silence on the monks. On the 30th of May Luther
sent an explanation of his theses to the pope; on the 7th of August he
was cited to appear at Rome. An arrangement was effected, however,
whereby that citation was cancelled, and Luther betook himself in
October 1518 to Augsburg to meet the papal legate, Cardinal Cajetan, who
was attending the imperial diet convened by the emperor Maximilian to
impose the tithes for the Turkish war and to elect a king of the Romans;
but neither the arguments of the learned cardinal, nor the dogmatic
papal bull of the 9th of November to the effect that all Christians must
believe in the pope's power to grant indulgences, moved Luther to
retract. A year of fruitless negotiation followed, during which the
pamphlets of the reformer set all Germany on fire. A papal bull of the
15th of June 1520, which condemned forty-one propositions extracted from
Luther's teachings, was taken to Germany by Eck in his capacity of
apostolic nuncio, published by him and the legates Alexander and
Caracciola, and burned by Luther on the 10th of December at Wittenberg.
Leo then formally excommunicated Luther by bull of the 3rd of January
1521; and in a brief directed the emperor to take energetic measures
against heresy. On the 26th of May 1521 the emperor signed the edict of
the diet of Worms, which placed Luther under the ban of the Empire; on
the 21st of the same month Henry VIII. of England sent to Leo his book
against Luther on the seven sacraments. The pope, after careful
consideration, conferred on the king of England the title "Defender of
the Faith" by bull of the 11th of October 1521. Neither the imperial
edict nor the work of Henry VIII. stayed the Lutheran movement, and
Luther himself, safe in the solitude of the Wartburg, survived Leo X. It
was under Leo X. also that the Protestant movement had its beginning in
Scandinavia. The pope had repeatedly used the rich northern benefices to
reward members of the Roman curia, and towards the close of the year
1516 he sent the grasping and impolitic Arcimboldi as papal nuncio to
Denmark to collect money for St Peter's. King Christian II. took
advantage of the growing dissatisfaction on the part of the native
clergy toward the papal government, and of Arcimboldi's interference in
the Swedish revolt, in order to expel the nuncio and summon (1520)
Lutheran theologians to Copenhagen. Christian approved a plan by which a
formal state church should be established in Denmark, all appeals to
Rome should be abolished, and the king and diet should have final
jurisdiction in ecclesiastical causes. Leo sent a new nuncio to
Copenhagen (1521) in the person of the Minorite Francesco de Potentia,
who readily absolved the king and received the rich bishopric of Skara.
The pope or his legate, however, took no steps to remove abuses or
otherwise reform the Scandinavian churches.
That Leo did not do more to check the tendency toward heresy and schism
in Germany and Scandinavia is to be partially explained by the political
complications of the time, and by his own preoccupation with schemes of
papal and Medicean aggrandizement in Italy. The death of the emperor
Maximilian on the 12th of January 1519 had seriously affected the
situation. Leo vacillated between the powerful candidates for the
succession, allowing it to appear at first that he favoured Francis I.
while really working for the election of some minor German prince. He
finally accepted Charles I. of Spain as inevitable, and the election of
Charles (28th of June 1519) revealed Leo's desertion of his French
alliance, a step facilitated by the death at about the same time of
Lorenzo de' Medici and his French wife. Leo was now anxious to unite
Ferrara, Parma and Piacenza to the States of the Church. An attempt late
in 1519 to seize Ferrara failed, and the pope recognized the need of
foreign aid. In May 1521 a treaty of alliance was signed at Rome between
him and the emperor. Milan and Genoa were to be taken from France and
restored to the Empire, and Parma and Piacenza were to be given to the
Church on the expulsion of the French. The expense of enlisting 10,000
Swiss was to be borne equally by pope and emperor. Charles took Florence
and the Medici family under his protection and promised to punish all
enemies of the Catholic faith. Leo agreed to invest Charles with Naples,
to crown him emperor, and to aid in a war against Venice. It was
provided that England and the Swiss might join the league. Henry VIII.
announced his adherence in August. Francis I. had already begun war with
Charles in Navarre, and in Italy, too, the French made the first hostile
movement (23rd June 1521). Leo at once announced that he would
excommunicate the king of France and release his subjects from their
allegiance unless Francis laid down his arms and surrendered Parma and
Piacenza. The pope lived to hear the joyful news of the capture of Milan
from the French and of the occupation by papal troops of the
long-coveted provinces (November 1521). Leo X. died on the 1st of
December 1521, so suddenly that the last sacraments could not be
administered; but the contemporary suspicions of poison were unfounded.
His successor was Adrian VI.
Several minor events of Leo's pontificate are worthy of mention. He was
particularly friendly with King Emmanuel of Portugal on account of the
latter's missionary enterprises in Asia and Africa. His concordat with
Florence (1516) guaranteed the free election of the clergy in that city.
His constitution of the 1st of March 1519 condemned the king of Spain's
claim to refuse the publication of papal bulls. He maintained close
relations with Poland because of the Turkish advance and the Polish
contest with the Teutonic Knights. His bull of the 1st of July 1519,
which regulated the discipline of the Polish Church, was later
transformed into a concordat by Clement VII. Leo showed special favours
to the Jews and permitted them to erect a Hebrew printing-press at Rome.
He approved the formation of the Oratory of Divine Love, a group of
pious men at Rome which later became the Theatine Order, and he
canonized Francesco di Paola.
As patron of learning Leo X. deserves a prominent place among the popes.
He raised the church to a high rank as the friend of whatever seemed to
extend knowledge or to refine and embellish life. He made the capital of
Christendom the centre of culture. Every Italian artist and man of
letters in an age of singular intellectual brilliancy tasted or hoped to
taste of his bounty, while yet a cardinal, he had restored the church of
Sta Maria in Domnica after Raphael's designs; and as pope he built S.
Giovanni on the Via Giulia after designs by Jacopo Sansovino and pressed
forward the work on St Peter's and the Vatican under Raphael and Chigi.
His constitution of the 5th of November 1513 reformed the Roman
university, which had been neglected by Julius II. He restored all its
faculties, gave larger salaries to the professors, and summoned
distinguished teachers from afar; and, although it never attained to the
importance of Padua or Bologna, it nevertheless possessed in 1514 an
excellent faculty of eighty-eight professors. Leo called Theodore
Lascaris to Rome to give instruction in Greek, and established a Greek
printing-press from which the first Greek book printed at Rome appeared
in 1515. He made Raphael custodian of the classical antiquities of Rome
and the vicinity. The distinguished Latinists Pietro Bembo (1470-1547)
and Jacopo Sadoleto (1477-1547) were papal secretaries, as well as the
famous poet Bernardo Accolti (d. 1534). Writers of poetry like Vida
(1490-1566), Trissino (1478-1550), and Bibbiena (1470-1520), writers of
_novelle_ like Bandello, and a hundred other _literati_ of the time were
bishops, or papal scriptors or abbreviators, or in other papal employ.
Leo's lively interest in art and literature, to say nothing of his
natural liberality, his nepotism, his political ambitions and
necessities, and his immoderate personal luxury, exhausted within two
years the hard savings of Julius II., and precipitated a financial
crisis from which he never emerged and which was a direct cause of most
of the calamities of his pontificate. He created many new offices and
shamelessly sold them. He sold cardinals' hats. He sold membership in
the "Knights of Peter." He borrowed large sums from bankers, curials,
princes and Jews. The Venetian ambassador Gradenigo estimated the paying
number of offices on Leo's death at 2150, with a capital value of nearly
3,000,000 ducats and a yearly income of 328,000 ducats. Marino Giorgi
reckoned the ordinary income of the pope for the year 1517 at about
580,000 ducats, of which 420,000 came from the States of the Church,
100,000 from annates, and 60,000 from the composition tax instituted by
Sixtus IV. These sums, together with the considerable amounts accruing
from indulgences, jubilees, and special fees, vanished as quickly as
they were received. Then the pope resorted to pawning palace furniture,
table plate, jewels, even statues of the apostles. Several banking firms
and many individual creditors were ruined by the death of the pope.
In the past many conflicting estimates were made of the character and
achievements of the pope during whose pontificate Protestantism first
took form. More recent studies have served to produce a fairer and more
honest opinion of Leo X. A report of the Venetian ambassador Marino
Giorgi bearing date of March 1517 indicates some of his predominant
characteristics:--"The pope is a good-natured and extremely free-hearted
man, who avoids every difficult situation and above all wants peace; he
would not undertake a war himself unless his own personal interests were
involved; he loves learning; of canon law and literature he possesses
remarkable knowledge; he is, moreover, a very excellent musician." Leo
was dignified in appearance and elegant in speech, manners and writing.
He enjoyed music and the theatre, art and poetry, the masterpieces of
the ancients and the wonderful creations of his contemporaries, the
spiritual and the witty--life in every form. It is by no means certain
that he made the remark often attributed to him, "Let us enjoy the
papacy since God has given it to us," but there is little doubt that he
was by nature devoid of moral earnestness or deep religious feeling. On
the other hand, in spite of his worldliness, Leo was not an unbeliever;
he prayed, fasted, and participated in the services of the church with
conscientiousness. To the virtues of liberality, charity and clemency he
added the Machiavellian qualities of falsehood and shrewdness, so highly
esteemed by the princes of his time. Leo was deemed fortunate by his
contemporaries, but an incurable malady, wars, enemies, a conspiracy of
cardinals, and the loss of all his nearest relations darkened his days;
and he failed entirely in his general policy of expelling foreigners
from Italy, of restoring peace throughout Europe, and of prosecuting war
against the Turks. He failed to recognize the pressing need of reform
within the church and the tremendous dangers which threatened the papal
monarchy; and he unpardonably neglected the spiritual needs of the time.
He was, however, zealous in firmly establishing the political power of
the Holy See; he made it unquestionably supreme in Italy; he
successfully restored the papal power in France; and he secured a
prominent place in the history of culture.
AUTHORITIES.--The life of Leo X. was written shortly after his death
by Paolo Giovio, bishop of Nocera, who had known him intimately. Other
important contemporary sources are the Italian _History_ of the
Florentine writer Guicciardini, covering the period 1492-1530 (4
vols., Milan, 1884); the reports of the Venetian ambassadors, Marino
Giorgi (1517), Marco Minio (1520) and Luigi Gradenigo (1523), in vol.
iii. of the 2nd series of _Le Relazioni degli ambasciatori Veneti_,
edited by Alberi (Florence, 1846); and the _Diarii_ of the Venetian
Marino Sanuto (58 vols., 1879-1903). Other materials for the biography
are to be found in the incomplete _Regesta_ edited by Joseph Cardinal
Hergenröther (Freiburg-i-B., 1884 ff.); in the Turin collection of
papal bulls (1859, &c.); in _Il Diario di Leone X. dai volumi
manoscritti degli archivi Vaticani della S. Sede connote di M.
Armellini_ (Rome, 1884); and in "Documenti risguardanti Giovanni de'
Medici e il pontifice Leone X.," appendix to vol. 1 of the _Archivio
storico Italiano_ (Florence, 1842).
See L. Pastor, _Geschichte der Päpste im Zeitalter der Renaissance u.
der Glaubensspaltung von der Wahl Leos X. bis zum Tode Klemens VII._
part 1 (Freiburg-i.-B., 1906); M. Creighton, _History of the Papacy_,
vol. 6 (1901); F. Gregorovius, _Rome in the Middle Ages_, trans. by
Mrs G. W. Hamilton, vol. viii., part 1 (1902); L. von Ranke, _History
of the Popes_, vol. i., trans. by E. Foster in the Bohn Library;
_Histoire de France_, ed. by E. Lavisse, vol. 5, part 1 (1903); Walter
Friedensburg, "Ein rotulus familiae Papst Leos X.," in _Quellen u.
Forschungen aus italienischen Archiven u. Bibliotheken_, vol. vi.
(1904); W. Roscoe, _Life and Pontificate of Leo X._ (6th ed., 2 vols.,
1853), a celebrated biography but considerably out of date in spite of
the valuable notes of the German and Italian translators, Henke and
Bossi; F. S. Nitti, _Leone X. e la sua politica secondo documenti e
carteggi inediti_ (Florence, 1892); A. Schulte, _Die Fugger in Rom
1495-1523_ (2 vols., Leipzig, 1906); and H. M. Vaughan, _The Medici
Popes_ (1908). (C. H. Ha.)
LEO XI. (Alessandro de' Medici) was elected pope on the 1st of April
1605, at the age of seventy. He had long been archbishop of Florence and
nuncio to Tuscany; and was entirely pro-French in his sympathies. He
died on the 27th day of his pontificate, and was succeeded by Paul V.
See the contemporary life by Vitorelli, continuator of Ciaconius,
_Vitae et res gestae summorum Pontiff. Rom._; Ranke, _Popes_ (Eng.
trans., Austin), ii. 330; v. Reumont, _Gesch. der Stadt Rom._ iii. 2,
604; Brosch, _Gesch. des Kirchenstaates_ (1880), i. 350.
LEO XII. (Annibale della Genga), pope from 1823 to 1829, was born of a
noble family, near Spoleto, on the 22nd of August 1760. Educated at the
Accademia dei Nobili ecclesiastici at Rome, he was ordained priest in
1783, and in 1790 attracted favourable attention by a tactful sermon
commemorative of the emperor Joseph II. In 1792 Pius VI. made him his
private secretary, in 1793 creating him titular archbishop of Tyre and
despatching him to Lucerne as nuncio. In 1794 he was transferred to the
nunciature at Cologne, but owing to the war had to make his residence in
Augsburg. During the dozen or more years he spent in Germany he was
entrusted with several honourable and difficult missions, which brought
him into contact with the courts of Dresden, Vienna, Munich and
Württemberg, as well as with Napoleon. It is, however, charged at one
time during this period that his finances were disordered, and his
private life not above suspicion. After the abolition of the States of
the Church, he was treated by the French as a state prisoner, and lived
for some years at the abbey of Monticelli, solacing himself with music
and with bird-shooting, pastimes which he did not eschew even after his
election as pope. In 1814 he was chosen to carry the pope's
congratulations to Louis XVIII.; in 1816 he was created cardinal-priest
of Santa Maria Maggiore, and appointed to the see of Sinigaglia, which
he resigned in 1818. In 1820 Pius VII. gave him the distinguished post
of cardinal vicar. In the conclave of 1823, in spite of the active
opposition of France, he was elected pope by the _zelanti_ on the 28th
of September. His election had been facilitated because he was thought
to be on the edge of the grave; but he unexpectedly rallied. His foreign
policy, entrusted at first to Della Somaglia and then to the more able
Bernetti, moved in general along lines laid down by Consalvi; and he
negotiated certain concordats very advantageous to the papacy.
Personally most frugal, Leo reduced taxes, made justice less costly, and
was able to find money for certain public improvements; yet he left the
finances more confused than he had found them, and even the elaborate
jubilee of 1825 did not really mend matters. His domestic policy was one
of extreme reaction. He condemned the Bible societies, and under Jesuit
influence reorganized the educational system. Severe ghetto laws led
many of the Jews to emigrate. He hunted down the _Carbonari_ and the
Freemasons; he took the strongest measures against political agitation
in theatres. A well-nigh ubiquitous system of espionage, perhaps most
fruitful when directed against official corruption, sapped the
foundations of public confidence. Leo, temperamentally stern,
hard-working in spite of bodily infirmity, died at Rome on the 10th of
February 1829. The news was received by the populace with unconcealed
joy. He was succeeded by Pius VIII.
AUTHORITIES.--Artaud de Montor, _Histoire du Pape Léon XII._ (2 vols.,
1843; by the secretary of the French embassy in Rome); Brück, "Leo
XII.," in Wetzer and Welte's _Kirchenlexikon_, vol. vii. (Freiburg,
1891); F. Nippold, _The Papacy in the 19th Century_ (New York, 1900),
chap. 5; Benrath, "Leo XII.," in Herzog-Hauck, _Realencyklopädie_,
vol. xi.-(Leipzig, 1902), 390-393, with bibliography; F. Nielsen, _The
History of the Papacy in the 19th century_ (1906), vol. ii. 1-30; Lady
Blennerhassett, in the _Cambridge Modern History_, vol. x. (1907),
151-154. (W. W. R.*)
LEO XIII. (Gioacchino Pecci) (1810-1903), pope from 1878 to 1903,
reckoned the 257th successor of St Peter, was born at Carpineto on the
2nd of March 1810. His family was Sienese in origin, and his father,
Colonel Domenico Pecci, had served in the army of Napoleon. His mother,
Anna Prosperi, is said to have been a descendant of Rienzi, and was a
member of the third order of St Francis. He and his elder brother
Giuseppe (known as Cardinal Pecci) received their earliest education
from the Jesuits at Viterbo, and completed their education in Rome. In
the jubilee year 1825 he was selected by his fellow-students at the
Collegium Romanum to head a deputation to Pope Leo XII., whose memory he
subsequently cherished and whose name he assumed in 1878. Weak health,
consequent on over-study, prevented him from obtaining the highest
academical honours, but he graduated as doctor in theology at the age of
twenty-two, and then entered the Accademia dei Nobili ecclesiastici, a
college in which clergy of aristocratic birth are trained for the
diplomatic service of the Roman Church. Two years later Gregory XVI.
appointed him a domestic prelate, and bestowed on him, by way of
apprenticeship, various minor administrative offices. He was ordained
priest on the 31st of December 1837, and a few weeks later was made
apostolic delegate of the small papal territory of Benevento, where he
had to deal with brigands and smugglers, who enjoyed the protection of
some of the noble families of the district. His success here led to his
appointment in 1841 as delegate of Perugia, which was at that time a
centre of anti-papal secret societies. This post he held for eighteen
months only, but in that brief period he obtained a reputation as a
social and municipal reformer. In 1843 he was sent as nuncio to
Brussels, being first consecrated a bishop (19th February), with the
title of archbishop of Damietta. During his three years' residence at
the Belgian capital he found ample scope for his gifts as a diplomatist
in the education controversy then raging, and as mediator between the
Jesuits and the Catholic university of Louvain. He gained the esteem of
Leopold I., and was presented to Queen Victoria of England and the
Prince Consort. He also made the acquaintance of many Englishmen,
Archbishop Whately among them. In January 1846, at the request of the
magistrates and people of Perugia, he was appointed bishop of that city
with the rank of archbishop; but before returning to Italy he spent
February in London, and March and April in Paris. On his arrival in Rome
he would, at the request of King Leopold, have been created cardinal but
for the death of Gregory XVI. Seven years later, 19th December 1853, he
received the red hat from Pius IX. Meanwhile, and throughout his long
episcopate of thirty-two years, he foreshadowed the zeal and the
enlightened policy later to be displayed in the prolonged period of his
pontificate, building and restoring many churches, striving to elevate
the intellectual as well as the spiritual tone of his clergy, and
showing in his pastoral letters an unusual regard for learning and for
social reform. His position in Italy was similar to that of Bishop
Dupanloup in France; and, as but a moderate supporter of the policy
enunciated in the Syllabus, he was not altogether _persona grata_ to
Pius IX. But he protested energetically against the loss of the pope's
temporal power in 1870, against the confiscation of the property of the
religious orders, and against the law of civil marriage established by
the Italian government, and he refused to welcome Victor Emmanuel in his
diocese. Nevertheless, he remained in the comparative obscurity of his
episcopal see until the death of Cardinal Antonelli; but in 1877, when
the important papal office of _camerlengo_ became vacant, Pius IX.
appointed to it Cardinal Pecci, who thus returned to reside in Rome,
with the prospect of having shortly responsible functions to perform
during the vacancy of the Holy See, though the _camerlengo_ was
traditionally regarded as disqualified by his office from succeeding to
the papal throne.
When Pius IX. died (7th February 1878) Cardinal Pecci was elected pope
at the subsequent conclave with comparative unanimity, obtaining at the
third scrutiny (20th February) forty-four out of sixty-one votes, or
more than the requisite two-thirds majority. The conclave was remarkably
free from political influences, the attention of Europe being at the
time engrossed by the presence of a Russian army at the gates of
Constantinople. It was said that the long pontificate of Pius IX. led
some of the cardinals to vote for Pecci, since his age (within a few
days of sixty-eight) and health warranted the expectation that his reign
would be comparatively brief; but he had for years been known as one of
the few "papable" cardinals; and although his long seclusion at Perugia
had caused his name to be little known outside Italy, there was a
general belief that the conclave had selected a man who was a prudent
statesman as well as a devout churchman; and Newman (whom he created a
cardinal in the year following) is reported to have said, "In the
successor of Pius I recognize a depth of thought, a tenderness of heart,
a winning simplicity, and a power answering to the name of Leo, which
prevent me from lamenting that Pius is no longer here."
The second day after his election Pope Leo XIII. crossed the Tiber
_incognito_ to his former residence in the Falconieri Palace to collect
his papers, returning at once to the Vatican, where he continued to
regard himself as "imprisoned" so long as the Italian government
occupied the city of Rome. He was crowned in the Sistine Chapel 3rd
March 1878, and at once began a reform of the papal household on austere
and economic lines which found little favour with the _entourage_ of the
former pope. To fill posts near his own person he summoned certain of
the Perugian clergy who had been trained under his own eye, and from the
first he was less accessible than his predecessor had been, either in
public or private audience. Externally uneventful as his life henceforth
necessarily was, it was marked chiefly by the reception of distinguished
personages and of numerous pilgrimages, often on a large scale, from all
parts of the world, and by the issue of encyclical letters. The stricter
theological training of the Roman Catholic clergy throughout the world
on the lines laid down by St Thomas Aquinas was his first care, and to
this end he founded in Rome and endowed an academy bearing the great
schoolman's name, further devoting about £12,000 to the publication of a
new and splendid edition of his works, the idea being that on this basis
the later teaching of Catholic theologians and many of the speculations
of modern thinkers could best be harmonized and brought into line. The
study of Church history was next encouraged, and in August 1883 the pope
addressed a letter to Cardinals de Luca, Pitra and Hergenröther, in
which he made the remarkable concession that the Vatican archives and
library might be placed at the disposal of persons qualified to compile
manuals of history. His belief was that the Church would not suffer by
the publication of documents. A man of literary taste and culture,
familiar with the classics, a facile writer of Latin verses[1] as well
as of Ciceronian prose, he was as anxious that the Roman clergy should
unite human science and literature with their theological studies as
that the laity should be educated in the principles of religion; and to
this end he established in Rome a kind of voluntary school board, with
members both lay and clerical; and the rivalry of the schools thus
founded ultimately obliged the state to include religious teaching in
its curriculum. The numerous encyclicals by which the pontificate of Leo
XIII. will always be distinguished were prepared and written by himself,
but were submitted to the customary revision. The encyclical _Aeterni
Patris_ (4th August 1879) was written in the defence of the philosophy
of St Thomas Aquinas. In later ones, working on the principle that the
Christian Church should superintend and direct every form of civil life,
he dealt with the Christian constitution of states (_Immortale Dei_, 1st
November 1885), with human liberty (_Libertas_, 20th June 1888), and
with the condition of the working classes (_Rerum novarum_, 15th May
1891). This last was slightly tinged with modern socialism; it was
described as "the social Magna Carta of Catholicism," and it won for Leo
the name of "the working-man's pope." Translated into the chief modern
languages, many thousands of copies were circulated among the working
classes in Catholic countries. Other encyclicals, such as those on
Christian marriage (_Arcanum divinae sapientiae_, 10th February 1880),
on the Rosary (_Supremi apostolatus officii_, 1st September 1883, and
_Superiore anno_, 5th September 1898), and on Freemasonry (_Humanum
genus_, 20th April 1884), dealt with subjects on which his predecessor
had been accustomed to pronounce allocutions, and were on similar lines.
It was the knowledge that in all points of religious faith and practice
Leo XIII. stood precisely where Pius IX. had stood that served to render
ineffectual others of his encyclicals, in which he dealt earnestly and
effectively with matters in which orthodox Protestants had a sympathetic
interest with him and might otherwise have lent an ear to his counsels.
Such were the letters on the study of Holy Scripture (18th November
1893), and on the reunion of Christendom (20th June 1894). He showed
special anxiety for the return of England to the Roman Catholic fold,
and addressed a letter _ad Anglos_, dated 14th April 1895. This he
followed up by an encyclical on the unity of the Church (_Satis
cognitum_, 29th June 1896); and the question of the validity of Anglican
ordinations from the Roman Catholic point of view having been raised in
Rome by Viscount Halifax, with whom the abbé Louis Duchesne and one or
two other French priests were in sympathy, a commission was appointed to
consider the subject, and on the 15th of September 1896 a condemnation
of the Anglican form as theologically insufficient was issued, and was
directed to be taken as final.
The establishment of a diocesan hierarchy in Scotland had been decided
upon before the death of Pius IX., but the actual announcement of it was
made by Leo XIII. On the 25th of July 1898 he addressed to the Scottish
Catholic bishops a letter, in the course of which he said that "many of
the Scottish people who do not agree with us in faith sincerely love the
name of Christ and strive to ascertain His doctrine and to imitate His
most holy example." The Irish and American bishops he summoned to Rome
to confer with him on the subjects of Home Rule and of "Americanism"
respectively. In India he established a diocesan hierarchy, with seven
archbishoprics, the archbishop of Goa taking precedence with the rank of
patriarch.
With the government of Italy his general policy was to be as
conciliatory as was consistent with his oath as pope never to surrender
the "patrimony of St Peter"; but a moderate attitude was rendered
difficult by partisans on either side in the press, each of whom claimed
to represent his views. In 1879, addressing a congress of Catholic
journalists in Rome, he exhorted them to uphold the necessity of the
temporal power, and to proclaim to the world that the affairs of Italy
would never prosper until it was restored; in 1887 he found it necessary
to deprecate the violence with which this doctrine was advocated in
certain journals. A similar counsel of moderation was given to the
Canadian press in connexion with the Manitoba school question in
December 1897. The less conciliatory attitude towards the Italian
government was resumed in an encyclical addressed to the Italian clergy
(5th August 1898), in which he insisted on the duty of Italian Catholics
to abstain from political life while the papacy remained in its
"painful, precarious and intolerable position." And in January 1902,
reversing the policy which had its inception in the encyclical, _Rerum
novarum_, of 1891, and had further been developed ten years later in a
letter to the Italian bishops entitled _Graves de communi_, the "Sacred
Congregation of Extraordinary Ecclesiastical Affairs" issued
instructions concerning "Christian Democracy in Italy," directing that
the popular Christian movement, which embraced in its programme a number
of social reforms, such as factory laws for children, old-age pensions,
a minimum wage in agricultural industries, an eight-hours' day, the
revival of trade gilds, and the encouragement of Sunday rest, should
divert its attention from all such things as savoured of novelty and
devote its energies to the restoration of the temporal power. The
reactionary policy thus indicated gave the impression that a similar aim
underlay the appointment about the same date of a commission to inquire
into Biblical studies; and in other minor matters Leo XIII. disappointed
those who had looked to him for certain reforms in the devotional system
of the Church. A revision of the breviary, which would have involved the
omission of some of the less credible legends, came to nothing, while
the recitation of the office in honour of the Santa Casa at Loreto was
imposed on all the clergy. The worship of Mary, largely developed during
the reign of Pius IX., received further stimulus from Leo; nor did he do
anything during his pontificate to correct the superstitions connected
with popular beliefs concerning relics and indulgences.
His policy towards all governments outside Italy was to support them
wherever they represented social order; and it was with difficulty that
he persuaded French Catholics to be united in defence of the republic.
The German _Kulturkampf_ was ended by his exertions. In 1885 he
successfully arbitrated between Germany and Spain in a dispute
concerning the Caroline Islands. In Ireland he condemned the "Plan of
Campaign" in 1888, but he conciliated the Nationalists by appointing Dr
Walsh archbishop of Dublin. His hope that his support of the British
government in Ireland would be followed by the establishment of formal
diplomatic relations between the court of St James's and the Vatican was
disappointed. But the jubilee of Queen Victoria in 1887 and the pope's
priestly jubilee a few months later were the occasion of friendly
intercourse between Rome and Windsor, Mgr. Ruffo Scilla coming to London
as special papal envoy, and the duke of Norfolk being received at the
Vatican as the bearer of the congratulations of the queen of England.
Similar courtesies were exchanged during the jubilee of 1897, and again
in March 1902, when Edward VII. sent the earl of Denbigh to Rome to
congratulate Leo XIII. on reaching his ninety-third year and the
twenty-fifth year of his pontificate. The visit of Edward VII. to Leo
XIII. in April 1903 was a further proof of the friendliness between the
English court and the Vatican.
The elevation of Newman to the college of Cardinals in 1879 was regarded
with approval throughout the English-speaking world, both on Newman's
account and also as evidence that Leo XIII. had a wider horizon than his
predecessor; and his similar recognition of two of the most
distinguished "inopportunist" members of the Vatican council, Haynald,
archbishop of Kalocsa, and Prince Fürstenberg, archbishop of Olmütz, was
even more noteworthy. Dupanloup would doubtless have received the same
honour had he not died shortly after Leo's accession. Döllinger the pope
attempted to reconcile, but failed. He laboured much to bring about the
reunion of the Oriental Churches with the see of Rome, establishing
Catholic educational centres in Athens and in Constantinople with that
end in view. He used his influence with the emperor of Russia, as also
with the emperors of China and Japan and with the shah of Persia, to
secure the free practice of their religion for Roman Catholics within
their respective dominions. Among the canonizations and beatifications
of his pontificate that of Sir Thomas More, author of _Utopia_, is
memorable. His encyclical issued at Easter 1902, and described by
himself as a kind of will, was mainly a reiteration of earlier
condemnations of the Reformation, and of modern philosophical systems,
which for their atheism and materialism he makes responsible for all
existing moral and political disorders. Society, he earnestly pleaded,
can only find salvation by a return to Christianity and to the fold of
the Roman Catholic Church.
Grave and serious in manner, speaking slowly, but with energetic
gestures, simple and abstemious in his life--his daily bill of fare
being reckoned as hardly costing a couple of francs--Leo XIII.
distributed large sums in charity, and at his own charges placed costly
astronomical instruments in the Vatican observatory, providing also
accommodation and endowment for a staff of officials. He always showed
the greatest interest in science and in literature, and he would have
taken a position as a statesman of the first rank had he held office in
any secular government. He may be reckoned the most illustrious pope
since Benedict XIV., and under him the papacy acquired a prestige
unknown since the middle ages. On the 3rd of March 1903 he celebrated
his jubilee in St Peter's with more than usual pomp and splendour; he
died on the 20th of July following. His successor was Pius X.
See _Scelta di atti episcopali del cardinale G. Pecci ..._ (Rome,
1879); _Leonis XIII. Pont. Max. acta_ (17 vols., Rome, 1881-1898);
_Sanctissimi Domini N. Leonis XIII. allocutiones, epistolae, &c._
(Bruges and Lille, 1887, &c.); the encyclicals (_Sämtliche
Rundschreiben_) with a German translation (6 vols., Freiburg,
1878-1904); _Discorsi del Sommo Pontefice Leone XIII. 1878-1882_
(Rome, 1882). There are lives of Leo XIII. by B. O'Reilly (new ed.,
Chicago, 1903), H. des Houx (pseudonym of Durand Morimbeau) (Paris,
1900), by W. Meynell (1887), by J. McCarthy (1896), by Boyer d'Agen,
(_Jeunesse de Léon XIII._ (1896); _La Prélature_, 1900), by M. Spahn
(Munich, 1905), by L. K. Goetz (Gotha, 1899), &c. A life of Leo XIII.
(4 vols.) was undertaken by F. Marion Crawford, Count Edoardo Soderini
and Professor Giuseppe Clementi. (A. W. Hu.; M. Br.)
FOOTNOTE:
[1] _Leonis XIII. Pont. Maximi carmina_, ed. Brunelli (Udine, 1883);
_Leonis XIII. carmina, inscriptiones, numismata_, ed. J. Bach
(Cologne, 1903).
LEO, the name of six emperors of the East.
LEO I., variously surnamed THRAX, MAGNUS and MAKELLES, emperor of the
East, 457-474, was born in Thrace about 400. From his position as
military tribune he was raised to the throne by the soldiery and
recognized both by senate and clergy; his coronation by the patriarch of
Constantinople is said to have been the earliest instance of such a
ceremony. Leo owed his elevation mainly to Aspar, the commander of the
guards, who was debarred by his Arianism from becoming emperor in his
own person, but hoped to exercise a virtual autocracy through his former
steward and dependant. But Leo, following the traditions of his
predecessor Marcian, set himself to curtail the domination of the great
nobles and repeatedly acted in defiance of Aspar. Thus he vigorously
suppressed the Eutychian heresy in Egypt, and by exchanging his Germanic
bodyguard for Isaurians removed the chief basis of Aspar's power. With
the help of his generals Anthemius and Anagastus, he repelled invasions
of the Huns into Dacia (466 and 468). In 467 Leo had Anthemius elected
emperor of the West, and in concert with him equipped an armament of
more than 1100 ships and 100,000 men against the pirate empire of the
Vandals in Africa. Through the remissness of Leo's brother-in-law
Basiliscus, who commanded the expedition, the fleet was surprised by the
Vandal king, Genseric, and half of its vessels sunk or burnt (468). This
failure was made a pretext by Leo for killing Aspar as a traitor (471),
and Aspar's murder served the Goths in turn as an excuse for ravaging
Thrace up to the walls of the capital. In 473 the emperor associated
with himself his infant grandson, LEO II., who, however, survived him by
only a few months. His surnames Magnus (Great) and Makelles (butcher)
respectively reflect the attitude of the Orthodox and the Arians towards
his religious policy.
See E. Gibbon, _The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire_ (ed. Bury,
1896), iv. 29-37; J. B. Bury, _The Later Roman Empire_ (1889), i.
227-233.
LEO III. (c. 680-740), surnamed THE ISAURIAN, emperor of the East,
717-740. Born about 680 in the Syrian province of Commagene, he rose to
distinction in the military service, and under Anastasius II. was
invested with the command of the eastern army. In 717 he revolted
against the usurper Theodosius III. and, marching upon Constantinople,
was elected emperor in his stead. The first year of Leo's reign saw a
memorable siege of his capital by the Saracens, who had taken advantage
of the civil discord in the Roman empire to bring up a force of 80,000
men to the Bosporus. By his stubborn defence the new ruler wore out the
invaders who, after a twelve months' investment, withdrew their forces.
An important factor in the victory of the Romans was their use of Greek
fire. Having thus preserved the empire from extinction, Leo proceeded to
consolidate its administration, which in the previous years of anarchy
had become completely disorganized. He secured its frontiers by inviting
Slavonic settlers into the depopulated districts and by restoring the
army to efficiency; when the Arabs renewed their invasions in 726 and
739 they were decisively beaten. His civil reforms include the abolition
of the system of prepaying taxes which had weighed heavily upon the
wealthier proprietors, the elevation of the serfs into a class of free
tenants, the remodelling of family and of maritime law. These measures,
which were embodied in a new code published in 740, met with some
opposition on the part of the nobles and higher clergy. But Leo's most
striking legislative reforms dealt with religious matters. After an
apparently successful attempt to enforce the baptism of all Jews and
Montanists in his realm (722), he issued a series of edicts against the
worship of images (726-729). This prohibition of a custom which had
undoubtedly given rise to grave abuses seems to have been inspired by a
genuine desire to improve public morality, and received the support of
the official aristocracy and a section of the clergy. But a majority of
the theologians and all the monks opposed these measures with
uncompromising hostility, and in the western parts of the empire the
people refused to obey the edict. A revolt which broke out in Greece,
mainly on religious grounds, was crushed by the imperial fleet (727),
and two years later, by deposing the patriarch of Constantinople, Leo
suppressed the overt opposition of the capital. In Italy the defiant
attitude of Popes Gregory II. and III. on behalf of image-worship led to
a fierce quarrel with the emperor. The former summoned councils in Rome
to anathematize and excommunicate the image-breakers (730, 732); Leo
retaliated by transferring southern Italy and Greece from the papal
diocese to that of the patriarch. The struggle was accompanied by an
armed outbreak in the exarchate of Ravenna (727), which Leo finally
endeavoured to subdue by means of a large fleet. But the destruction of
the armament by a storm decided the issue against him; his south Italian
subjects successfully defied his religious edicts, and the province of
Ravenna became detached from the empire. In spite of this partial
failure Leo must be reckoned as one of the greatest of the later Roman
emperors. By his resolute stand against the Saracens he delivered all
eastern Europe from a great danger, and by his thorough-going reforms he
not only saved the empire from collapse, but invested it with a
stability which enabled it to survive all further shocks for a space of
five centuries.
See E. Gibbon, _The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire_ (ed. Bury,
1896), v. 185 seq., 251 seq. and appendices, vi. 6-12; J. B. Bury,
_The Later Roman Empire_ (1889), ii. 401-449; K. Schenk, _Kaiser Leo
III._ (Halle, 1880), and in _Byzantinische Zeitschrift_ (1896), v.
257-301; T. Hodgkin, _Italy and her Invaders_ (1892, &c.), bk. vii.,
chs. 11, 12. See also ICONOCLASTS.
LEO IV., called CHOZAR, succeeded his father, Constantine V., as emperor
of the East in 775. In 776 he associated his young son, Constantine,
with himself in the empire, and suppressed a rising led by his five
step-brothers which broke out as a result of this proceeding. Leo was
largely under the influence of his wife Irene (q.v.), and when he died
in 780 he left her as the guardian of his successor, Constantine VI.
LEO V., surnamed THE ARMENIAN, emperor of the East, 813-820, was a
distinguished general of Nicephorus I. and Michael I. After rendering
good service on behalf of the latter in a war with the Arabs (812), he
was summoned in 813 to co-operate in a campaign against the Bulgarians.
Taking advantage of the disaffection prevalent among the troops, he left
Michael in the lurch at the battle of Adrianople and subsequently led a
successful revolution against him. Leo justified his usurpation by
repeatedly defeating the Bulgarians who had been contemplating the siege
of Constantinople (814-817). By his vigorous measures of repression
against the Paulicians and image-worshippers he roused considerable
opposition, and after a conspiracy under his friend Michael Psellus had
been foiled by the imprisonment of its leader, he was assassinated in
the palace chapel on Christmas Eve, 820.
See E. Gibbon, _The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire_ (ed. Bury,
1896), v. 193-195. (M. O. B. C.)
LEO VI., surnamed THE WISE and THE PHILOSOPHER, Byzantine emperor,
886-911. He was a weak-minded ruler, chiefly occupied with unimportant
wars with barbarians and struggles with churchmen. The chief event of
his reign was the capture of Thessalonica (904) by Mahommedan pirates
(described in _The Capture of Thessalonica_ by John Cameniata) under the
renegade Leo of Tripolis. In Sicily and Lower Italy the imperial arms
were unsuccessful, and the Bulgarian Symeon, who assumed the title of
"Czar of the Bulgarians and autocrat of the Romaei" secured the
independence of his church by the establishment of a patriarchate. Leo's
somewhat absurd surname may be explained by the facts that he "was less
ignorant than the greater part of his contemporaries in church and
state, that his education had been directed by the learned Photius, and
that several books of profane and ecclesiastical science were composed
by the pen, or in the name, of the imperial philosopher" (Gibbon). His
works include seventeen _Oracula_, in iambic verse, on the destinies of
future emperors and patriarchs of Constantinople; thirty-three
_Orations_, chiefly on theological subjects (such as church festivals);
_Basilica_, the completion of the digest of the laws of Justinian, begun
by Basil I., the father of Leo; some epigrams in the Greek _Anthology_;
an iambic lament on the melancholy condition of the empire; and some
palindromic verses, curiously called [Greek: karkinoi] (crabs). The
treatise on military tactics, attributed to him, is probably by Leo
III., the Isaurian.
Complete edition in Migne, _Patrologia Graeca_, cvii.; for the
literature of individual works see C. Krumbacher, _Geschichte der
byzantinischen Litteratur_ (1897). (J. H. F.)
LEO, BROTHER (d. c. 1270), the favourite disciple, secretary and
confessor of St Francis of Assisi. The dates of his birth and of his
becoming a Franciscan are not known; but he was one of the small group
of most trusted companions of the saint during his last years. After
Francis's death Leo took a leading part in the opposition to Elias: he
it was who broke in pieces the marble box which Elias had set up for
offertories for the completion of the basilica at Assisi. For this Elias
had him scourged, and this outrage on St Francis's dearest disciple
consolidated the opposition to Elias and brought about his deposition.
Leo was the leader in the early stages of the struggle in the order for
the maintenance of St Francis's ideas on strict poverty, and the chief
inspirer of the tradition of the Spirituals on St Francis's life and
teaching. The claim that he wrote the so-called _Speculum perfectionis_
cannot be allowed, but portions of it no doubt go back to him. A little
volume of his writings has been published by Lemmeus (_Scripta Iratris
Leonis_, 1901). Leo assisted at St Clara's death-bed, 1253; after
suffering many persecutions from the dominant party in the order he died
at the Portiuncula in extreme old age.
All that is known concerning him is collected by Paul Sabatier in the
"Introduction" to the _Speculum perfectionis_ (1898). See ST FRANCIS
and FRANCISCANS. (E. C. B.)
LEO, HEINRICH (1799-1878), German historian, was born at Rudolstadt on
the 19th of March 1799, his father being chaplain to the garrison there.
His family, not of Italian origin--as he himself was inclined to believe
on the strength of family tradition--but established in Lower Saxony so
early as the 16th century, was typical of the German upper middle
classes, and this fact, together with the strongly religious atmosphere
in which he was brought up and his early enthusiasm for nature, largely
determined the bent of his mind. The taste for historical study was,
moreover, early instilled into him by the eminent philologist Karl
Wilhelm Göttling (1793-1869), who in 1816 became a master at the
Rudolstadt gymnasium. From 1816 to 1819 Leo studied at the universities
of Breslau, Jena and Göttingen, devoting himself more especially to
history, philology and theology. At this time the universities were
still agitated by the Liberal and patriotic aspirations aroused by the
War of Liberation; at Breslau Leo fell under the influence of Jahn, and
joined the political gymnastic association (_Turnverein_); at Jena he
attached himself to the radical wing of the German _Burschenschaft_, the
so-called "Black Band," under the leadership of Karl Follen. The murder
of Kotzebue by Karl Sand, however, shocked him out of his extreme
revolutionary views, and from this time he tended, under the influence
of the writings of Hamann and Herder, more and more in the direction of
conservatism and romanticism, until at last he ended, in a mood almost
of pessimism, by attaching himself to the extreme right wing of the
forces of reaction. So early as April 1819, at Göttingen, he had fallen
under the influence of Karl Ludwig von Haller's _Handbuch der
allgemeinen Staatenkunde_ (1808), a text-book of the counter-Revolution.
On the 11th of May 1820 he took his doctor's degree; in the same year he
qualified as _Privatdozent_ at the university of Erlangen. For this
latter purpose he had chosen as his thesis the constitution of the free
Lombard cities in the middle ages, the province in which he was destined
to do most for the scientific study of history. His interest in it was
greatly stimulated by a journey to Italy in 1823; in 1824 he returned to
the subject, and, as the result, published in five volumes a history of
the Italian states (1829-1832). Meanwhile he had been established
(1822-1827) as _Dozent_ at Berlin, where he came in contact with the
leaders of German thought and was somewhat spoilt by the flattering
attentions of the highest Prussian society. Here, too, it was that
Hegel's philosophy of history made a deep impression upon him. It was at
Halle, however, where he remained for forty years (1828-1868), that he
acquired his fame as an academical teacher. His wonderful power of
exposition, aided by a remarkable memory, is attested by the most
various witnesses. In 1830 he became ordinary professor.
In addition to his lecturing, Leo found time for much literary and
political work. He collaborated in the _Jahrbücher für Wissenschaftliche
Kritik_ from its foundation in 1827 until the publication was stopped in
1846. As a critic of independent views he won the approval of Goethe; on
the other hand, he fell into violent controversy with Ranke about
questions connected with Italian history. Up to the revolutionary year
1830 his religious views had remained strongly tinged with rationalism,
Hegel remaining his guide in religion as in practical politics and the
treatment of history. It was not till 1838 that Leo's polemical work
_Die Hegelingen_ proclaimed his breach with the radical developments of
the philosopher's later disciples; a breach which developed into
opposition to the philosopher himself. Under the impression of the July
revolution in Paris and of the orthodox and pietistic influences at
Halle, Leo's political convictions were henceforth dominated by
reactionary principles. As a friend of the Prussian "Camarilla" and of
King Frederick William IV. he collaborated especially in the high
conservative _Politisches Wochenblatt_, which first appeared in 1831, as
well as in the _Evangelische Kirchenzeitung_, the _Kreuzzeitung_ and the
_Volksblatt für Stadt und Land_. In all this his critics scented an
inclination towards Catholicism; and Leo did actually glorify the
counter-Reformation, e.g. in his _History of the Netherlands_ (2 vols.
1832-1835). His other historical works also, notably his
_Universalgeschichte_ (6 vols., 1835-1844), display a very one-sided
point of view. When, however, in connexion with the quarrel about the
archbishopric of Cologne (1837), political Catholicism raised its head
menacingly, Leo turned against it with extreme violence in his open
letter (1838) to Goerres, its foremost champion. On the other hand, he
took a lively part in the politico-religious controversies within the
fold of Prussian Protestantism.
Leo was by nature highly excitable and almost insanely passionate,
though at the same time strictly honourable, unselfish, and in private
intercourse even gentle. During the last year of his life his mind
suffered rapid decay, of which signs had been apparent so early as 1868.
He died at Halle on the 24th of April 1878. In addition to the works
already mentioned, he left behind an account of his early life (_Meine
Jugendzeit_, Gotha, 1880) which is of interest.
See Lord Acton, _English Historical Review_, i. (1886); H. Haupt,
_Karl Follen und die Giessener Schwarzen_ (Giessen, 1907); W. Herbst,
_Deutsch-Evangelische Blätter_, Bd. 3; P. Krägelin, _H. Leo_, vol. i.
(1779-1844) (Leipzig, 1908); P. Kraus, _Allgemeine Konservative
Monatsschrift_, Bd. 50 u. 51; R. M. Meyer, _Gestalten und Probleme_
(1904); W. Schrader, _Geschichte der Friedrichs-Universität in Halle_
(Berlin, 1894); C. Varrentrapp, _Historische Zeitschrift_, Bd. 92; F.
X. Wegele, _Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie_, Bd. 18 (1883);
_Geschichte der deutschen Historiographie_ (1885); G. Wolf,
_Einführung in das Studium der neueren Geschichte_ (1910). Leo's
_Rectitudines singularum personarum nebst einer einleitenden
Abhandlung über Landsiedelung, Landbau, gutsherrliche und bäuerliche
Verhältnisse der Angelsachsen_, was translated into English by Lord
Acton (1852). (J. Hn.)
LEO, JOHANNES (c. 1494-1552), in Italian GIOVANNI LEO or LEONE, usually
called LEO AFRICANUS, sometimes ELIBERITANUS (i.e. of Granada), and
properly known among the Moors as Al Hassan Ibn Mahommed Al Wezaz Al
Fasi, was the author of a _Descrizione dell' Affrica_, or _Africae
descriptio_, which long ranked as the best authority on Mahommedan
Africa. Born probably at Granada of a noble Moorish stock (his father
was a landowner; an uncle of his appears as an envoy from Fez to
Timbuktu), he received a great part of his education at Fez, and while
still very young began to travel widely in the Barbary States. In 1512
we trace him at Morocco, Tunis, Bugia and Constantine; in 1513 we find
him returning from Tunis to Morocco; and before the close of the latter
year he seems to have started on his famous Sudan and Sahara journeys
(1513-1515) which brought him to Timbuktu, to many other regions of the
Great Desert and the Niger basin (Guinea, Melli, Gago, Walata, Aghadez,
Wangara, Katsena, &c.), and apparently to Bornu and Lake Chad. In
1516-1517 he travelled to Constantinople, probably visiting Egypt on the
way; it is more uncertain when he visited the three Arabias (_Deserta_,
_Felix_ and _Petraea_), Armenia and "Tartary" (the last term is perhaps
satisfied by his stay at Tabriz). His three Egyptian journeys,
immediately after the Turkish conquest, all probably fell between 1517
and 1520; on one of these he ascended the Nile from Cairo to Assuan. As
he was returning from Egypt about 1520 he was captured by pirates near
the island of Gerba, and was ultimately presented as a slave to Leo X.
The pope discovered his merit, assigned him a pension, and having
persuaded him to profess the Christian faith, stood sponsor at his
baptism, and bestowed on him (as Ramusio says) his own names, Johannes
and Leo. The new convert, having made himself acquainted with Latin and
Italian, taught Arabic (among his pupils was Cardinal Egidio Antonini,
bishop of Viterbo); he also wrote books in both the Christian tongues he
had acquired. His _Description of Africa_ was first, apparently, written
in Arabic, but the primary text now remaining is that of the Italian
version, issued by the author at Rome, on the 10th of March 1526, three
years after Pope Leo's death, though originally undertaken at the
latter's suggestion. The Moor seems to have lived on Rome for some time
longer, but he returned to Africa some time before his death at Tunis in
1552; according to some, he renounced his Christianity and returned to
Islam; but the later part of his career is obscure.
The _Descrizione dell' Affrica_ in its original Arabic MS. is said to
have existed for some time in the library of Vincenzo Pinelli
(1535-1601); the Italian text, though issued in 1526, was first
printed by Giovanni Battista Ramusio in his _Navigationi et Viaggi_
(vol. i.) of 1550. This was reprinted in 1554, 1563, 1588, &c. In 1556
Jean Temporal executed at Lyons an admirable French version from the
Italian (_Historiale description de l'Afrique_); and in the same year
appeared at Antwerp both Christopher Plantin's and Jean Bellere's
pirated issues of Temporal's translation, and a new (very inaccurate)
Latin version by Joannes Florianus, _Joannis Leonis Africani de totius
Africae descriptione libri i.-ix._ The latter was reprinted in 1558,
1559 (Zürich), and 1632 (Leiden), and served as the basis of John
Pory's Elizabethan English translation, made at the suggestion of
Richard Hakluyt (_A Geographical Historie of Africa_, London, 1600).
Pory's version was reissued, with notes, maps, &c., by Robert Brown,
E. G. Ravenstein, &c. (3 vols., Hakluyt Society, London, 1896). An
excellent German translation was made by Lorsbach, from the Italian,
in 1805 (_Johann Leos des Afrikaners Beschreibung von Afrika_,
Herborn). See also Francis Moore's _Travels into the inland parts of
Africa_ (1738), containing a translation of Leo's account of negro
kingdoms. Heinrich Barth intended to have made a fresh version, with a
commentary, but was prevented by death; as it is, his own great works
on the Sudan are the best elucidation of the _Descrizione dell'
Affrica_.
Leo also wrote lives of the Arab physicians and philosophers (_De
viris quibusdam illustribus apud Arabes_; see J. A. Fabricius,
_Bibliotheca Graeca_, Hamburg, 1726, xiii. 259-298); a Spanish-Arabic
vocabulary, now lost, but noticed by Ramusio as having been consulted
by the famous Hebrew physician, Jacob Mantino; a collection of Arabic
epitaphs in and near Fez (the MS. of this Leo presented, it is said,
to the brother of the king); and poems, also lost. It is stated,
moreover, that Leo intended writing a history of the Mahommedan
religion, an epitome of Mahommedan chronicles, and an account of his
travels in Asia and Egypt. (C. R. B.)
LEO, LEONARDO (1694-1744), more correctly LIONARDO ORONZO SALVATORE DE
LEO, Italian musical composer, was born on the 5th of August 1694 at S.
Vito dei Normanni, near Brindisi. He became a student at the
Conservatorio della Piètà dei Turchini at Naples in 1703, and was a
pupil first of Provenzale and later of Nicola Fago. It has been supposed
that he was a pupil of Pitoni and Alessandro Scarlatti, but he could not
possibly have studied with either of these composers, although he was
undoubtedly influenced by their compositions. His earliest known work
was a sacred drama, _L'Infedeltà abbattuta_, performed by his
fellow-students in 1712. In 1714 he produced, at the court theatre, an
opera, _Pisistrato_, which was much admired. He held various posts at
the royal chapel, and continued to write for the stage, besides teaching
at the conservatorio. After adding comic scenes to Gasparini's
_Bajazette_ in 1722 for performance at Naples, he composed a comic
opera, _La Mpeca scoperta_, in Neapolitan dialect, in 1723. His most
famous comic opera was _Amor vuol sofferenze_ (1739), better known as
_La Finta Frascatana_, highly praised by Des Brosses. He was equally
distinguished as a composer of serious opera, _Demofoonte_ (1735),
_Farnace_ (1737) and _L'Olimpiade_ (1737) being his most famous works in
this branch, and is still better known as a composer of sacred music. He
died of apoplexy on the 31st of October 1744 while engaged in the
composition of new airs for a revival of _La Finta Frascatana_.
Leo was the first of the Neapolitan school to obtain a complete mastery
over modern harmonic counterpoint. His sacred music is masterly and
dignified, logical rather than passionate, and free from the
sentimentality which disfigures the work of F. Durante and G. B.
Pergolesi. His serious operas suffer from a coldness and severity of
style, but in his comic operas he shows a keen sense of humour. His
_ensemble_ movements are spirited, but never worked up to a strong
climax.
A fine and characteristic example of his sacred music is the _Dixit
Dominus_ in C, edited by C. V. Stanford and published by Novello. A
number of songs from operas are accessible in modern editions.
(E. J. D.)
LEO (THE LION), in astronomy, the fifth sign of the zodiac (q.v.),
denoted by the symbol [Omega]. It is also a constellation, mentioned by
Eudoxus (4th century B.C.) and Aratus (3rd century B.C.). According to
Greek mythology this constellation is the Nemean lion, which, after
being killed by Hercules, was raised to the heavens by Jupiter in honour
of Hercules. A part of Ptolemy's Leo is now known as Coma Berenices
(q.v.). [alpha] Leonis, also known as Cor Leonis or the Lion's Heart,
Regulus, Basilicus, &c., is a very bright star of magnitude 1.23, and
parallax 0.02´´, and proper motion 0.27´´ per annum. [gamma] Leonis is a
very fine orange-yellow binary star, of magnitudes 2 and 4, and period
400 years. [iota] Leonis is a binary, composed of a 4th magnitude pale
yellow star, and a 7th magnitude blue star. The Leonids are a meteoric
swarm, appearing in November and radiating from this constellation (see
METEOR).
LEOBEN, a town in Styria, Austria, 44 m. N.W. of Graz by rail. Pop.
(1900) 10,204. It is situated on the Mur, and part of its old walls and
towers still remain. It has a well-known academy of mining and a number
of technical schools. Its extensive iron-works and trade in iron are a
consequence of its position on the verge of the important lignite
deposits of Upper Styria and in the neighbourhood of the iron mines and
furnaces of Vordernberg and Eisenerz. On the 18th of April 1797 a
preliminary peace was concluded here between Austria and France, which
led to the treaty of Campo-Formio.
LEOBSCHÜTZ (Bohemian _Lubczyce_), a town of Germany, in the Prussian
province of Silesia, on the Zinna, about 20 m. to the N.W. of Ratibor by
rail. Pop. (1905) 12,700. It has a large trade in wool, flax and grain,
its markets for these commodities being very numerously attended. The
principal industries are malting, carriage-building, wool-spinning and
glass-making. The town contains three Roman Catholic churches, a
Protestant church, a synagogue, a new town-hall and a gymnasium.
Leobschütz existed in the 10th century, and from 1524 to 1623 was the
capital of the principality of Jägerndorf.
See F. Troska, _Geschichte der Stadt Leobschütz_ (Leobschütz, 1892).
LEOCHARES, a Greek sculptor who worked with Scopas on the Mausoleum
about 350 B.C. He executed statues of the family of Philip of Macedon,
in gold and ivory, which were set up by that king in the Philippeum at
Olympia. He also with Lysippus made a group in bronze at Delphi
representing a lion-hunt of Alexander. Of this the base with an
inscription was recently found. We hear of other statues by Leochares of
Zeus, Apollo and Ares. The statuette in the Vatican, representing
Ganymede being carried away by an eagle, though considerably restored
and poor in execution, so closely corresponds with Pliny's description
of a group by Leochares that we are justified in considering it a copy
of that group, especially as the Vatican statue shows all the
characteristics of Attic 4th-century art. Pliny (_N.H._ 34. 79) writes:
"Leochares made a group of an eagle aware whom it is carrying off in
Ganymede and to whom it is bearing him; holding the boy delicately in
its claws, with his garment between." (For engraving see GREEK ART,
Plate I. fig. 53.) The tree stem is skilfully used as a support; and the
upward strain of the group is ably rendered. The close likeness both in
head and pose between the Ganymede and the well-known Apollo Belvidere
has caused some modern archaeologists to assign the latter also to
Leochares. With somewhat more confidence we may regard the fine statue
of Alexander the Great at Munich as a copy of his gold and ivory
portrait at Olympia. (P. G.)
LEOFRIC (d. 1057), earl of Mercia, was a son of Leofwine, earl of
Mercia, and became earl at some date previous to 1032. Henceforth, being
one of the three great earls of the realm, he took a leading part in
public affairs. On the death of King Canute in 1035 he supported the
claim of his son Harold to the throne against that of Hardicanute; and
during the quarrel between Edward the Confessor and Earl Godwine in 1051
he played the part of a mediator. Through his efforts civil war was
averted, and in accordance with his advice the settlement of the dispute
was referred to the Witan. When he became earl of Mercia his direct rule
seems to have been confined to Cheshire, Staffordshire, Shropshire and
the borders of north Wales, but afterwards he extended the area of his
earldom. As Chester was his principal residence and the seat of his
government, he is sometimes called earl of Chester. Leofric died at
Bromley in Staffordshire on the 31st of August 1057. His wife was
Godgifu, famous in legend as Lady Godiva. Both husband and wife were
noted as liberal benefactors to the church, among their foundations
being the famous Benedictine monastery at Coventry. Leofric's son,
Ælfgar, succeeded him as earl of Mercia.
See E. A. Freeman, _The Norman Conquest_, vols. i. and ii. (1877).
LEOMINSTER, a market-town and municipal borough in the Leominster
parliamentary division of Herefordshire, England, in a rich agricultural
country on the Lugg, 157 m. W.N.W. of London and 12½ N. of Hereford on
the Great Western and London & North-Western railways. Pop. (1901) 5826.
Area, 8728 acres. Some fine old timber houses lend picturesqueness to
the wide streets. The parish church, of mixed architecture, including
the Norman nave of the old priory church, and containing some of the
most beautiful examples of window tracery in England, was restored in
1866, and enlarged by the addition of a south nave in 1879. The Butter
Cross, a beautiful example of timber work of the date 1633, was removed
when the town-hall was building, and re-erected in the pleasure ground
of the Grange. Trade is chiefly in agricultural produce, wool and cider,
as the district is rich in orchards. Brewing (from the produce of local
hop-gardens) and the manufacture of agricultural implements are also
carried on. The town is under a mayor, four aldermen and twelve
councillors.
Merewald, king of Mercia, is said to have founded a religious house in
Leominster (Llanlieni, Leofminstre, Lempster) in 660, and a nunnery
existed here until the Conquest, when the place became a royal demesne.
It was granted by Henry I. to the monks of Reading, who built in it a
cell of their abbey, and under whose protection the town grew up and was
exempted from the sphere of the county and hundred courts. In 1539 it
reverted to the crown; and in 1554 was incorporated, by a charter
renewed in 1562, 1563, 1605, 1666, 1685 and 1786. The borough returned
two members to the parliament of 1295 and to other parliaments, until by
the Representation Act 1867 it lost one representative, and by the
Redistribution of Seats Act 1885 separate representation. A fair was
granted in the time of Henry II., and fairs in the seasons of Michaelmas
and the feasts of St Philip and St James and of Edward the Confessor, in
1265, 1281 and 1290 respectively. Charters to the burghers authorized
fairs on the days of St Peter and of St Simon and St Jude in 1554, on St
Bartholomew's day in 1605, in Mid-lent week in 1665, and on the feast of
the Purification and on the 2nd of May in 1685; these fairs have modern
representatives. A market was held by the abbey by a grant of Henry I.;
Friday is now market day. Leominster was famous for wool from the 13th
to the 18th century. There were gilds of mercers, tailors, drapers,
dyers and glovers in the 16th century. In 1835 the wool trade was said
to be dead; and that of glove-making, which had been important, was
diminishing. Hops and apples were grown in 1715.
See G. Townsend, _The Town and Borough of Leominster_ (1863), and John
Price, _An Historical and Topographical Account of Leominster and its
Vicinity_ (Ludlow, 1715).
LEOMINSTER, a township of Worcester county, Massachusetts, U.S.A., about
45 m. N.W. of Boston and about 20 m. N. by E. of Worcester. Pop. (1890)
7269; (1900) 12,392, of whom 2827 were foreign-born; (1910 census)
17,580. It is a broken, hilly district, 26.48 sq. m. in area, traversed
by the Nashua river, crossed by the Northern Division of the New York,
New Haven & Hartford railroad, and by the Fitchburg Division of the
Boston & Maine, and connected with Boston, Worcester and other cities by
interurban electric lines. Along the N.E. border and mostly in the
township of Lunenburg are Whalom Lake and Whalom Park, popular pleasure
resorts. The principal villages are Leominster, 5 m. S.E. of Fitchburg,
and North Leominster; the two adjoin and are virtually one. According to
the Special U.S. Census of Manufactures of 1905 the township had in that
year a greater diversity of important manufacturing industries than any
place of its size in the state, or, probably, in the United States; its
65 manufactories, with a capital of $4,572,726 and with a product for
the year valued at $7,501,720 (39% more than in 1900), produced
celluloid and horn work (the manufacture of which is a more important
industry here than elsewhere in the United States), celluloid combs,
furniture, paper, buttons, pianos and piano-cases, children's carriages
and sleds, stationery, leatherboard, worsted, woollen and cotton goods,
shirts, paper boxes, &c. Leominster owns and operates its water-works.
The township was formed from a part of Lancaster township in 1740.
LEÓN, LUIS PONCE DE (1527-1591), Spanish poet and mystic, was born at
Belmonte de Cuenca, entered the university of Salamanca at the age of
fourteen, and in 1544 joined the Augustinian order. In 1561 he obtained
a theological chair at Salamanca, to which in 1571 was added that of
sacred literature. He was denounced to the Inquisition for translating
the book of Canticles, and for criticizing the text of the Vulgate. He
was consequently imprisoned at Valladolid from March 1572 till December
1576; the charges against him were then abandoned, and he was released
with an admonition. He returned to Salamanca as professor of Biblical
exegesis, and was again reported to the Inquisition in 1582, but without
result. In 1583-1585 he published the three books of a celebrated mystic
treatise, _Los Nombres de Cristo_, which he had written in prison. In
1583 also appeared the most popular of his prose works, a treatise
entitled _La Perfecta Casada_, for the use of a lady newly married. Ten
days before his death, which occurred at Madrigal on the 23rd of August
1591, he was elected vicar general of the Augustinian order. Luis de
León is not only the greatest of Spanish mystics; he is among the
greatest of Spanish lyrical poets. His translations of Euripides,
Pindar, Virgil and Horace are singularly happy; his original pieces,
whether devout like the ode _De la vida del cielo_, or secular like the
ode _A Salinas_, are instinct with a serene sublimity unsurpassed in any
literature, and their form is impeccable. Absorbed by less worldly
interests, Fray Luis de León refrained from printing his poems, which
were not issued till 1631, when Quevedo published them as a counterblast
to _culteranismo_.
The best edition of Luis de León's works is that of Merino (6 vols.,
Madrid, 1816); the reprint (Madrid, 1885) by C. Muñoz Saenz is
incorrect. The text of _La Perfecta Casada_ has been well edited by
Miss Elizabeth Wallace (Chicago, 1903). See _Coleccion de documentos
inéditos para la historia de España_, vols. x.-xi.; F. H. Reusch,
_Luis de León und die spanische Inquisition_ (Bonn, 1873); M.
Gutiérrez, _Fray Luis de León y la filosofía española_ (Madrid, 1885);
M. Menendez y Pelayo, _Estudios de crítica literaria_ (Madrid, 1893),
Primera série, pp. 1-72.
LEON, MOSES [BEN SHEM-TOB] DE (d. 1305), Jewish scholar, was born in
Leon (Spain) in the middle of the 13th century and died at Arevalo. His
fame is due to his authorship of the most influential Kabbalist work,
the _Zohar_ (see KABBALA), which was attributed to Simon b. Yohai, a
Rabbi of the 2nd century. In modern times the discovery of the modernity
of the _Zohar_ has led to injustice to the author. Moses de Leon
undoubtedly used old materials and out of them constructed a work of
genius. The discredit into which he fell was due partly to the
unedifying incidents of his personal career. He led a wandering life,
and was more or less of an adventurer. But as to the greatness of his
work, the profundity of his philosophy and the brilliance of his
religious idealism, there can be no question.
See Graetz, _History of the Jews_, vol. iv. ch. i.; Geiger, _Leon de
Modena_. (I. A.)
LEON OF MODENA (1571-1648), Jewish scholar, was born in Venice, of a
notable French family which had migrated to Italy after the expulsion of
the Jews from France. He was a precocious child, but, as Graetz points
out, his lack of stable character prevented his gifts from maturing. "He
pursued all sorts of occupations to support himself, viz. those of
preacher, teacher of Jews and Christians, reader of prayers,
interpreter, writer, proof-reader, bookseller, broker, merchant, rabbi,
musician, matchmaker and manufacturer of amulets." Though he failed to
rise to real distinction he earned a place by his criticism of the
Talmud among those who prepared the way for the new learning in Judaism.
One of Leon's most effective works was his attack on the Kabbala (_'Ari
Nohem_, first published in 1840), for in it he demonstrated that the
"Bible of the Kabbalists" (the _Zohar_) was a modern composition. He
became best known, however, as the interpreter of Judaism to the
Christian world. At the instance of an English nobleman he prepared an
account of the religious customs of the Synagogue, _Riti Ebraici_
(1637). This book was widely read by Christians; it was rendered into
various languages, and in 1650 was translated into English by Edward
Chilmead. At the time the Jewish question was coming to the fore in
London, and Leon of Modena's book did much to stimulate popular
interest. He died at Venice.
See Graetz, _History of the Jews_ (Eng. trans.), vol. v. ch. iii.;
_Jewish Encyclopedia_, viii. 6; Geiger, _Leon de Modena_. (I. A.)
LEÓN, or LEÓN DE LAS ALDAMAS, a city of the state of Guanajuato, Mexico,
209 m. N.W. of the federal capital and 30 m. W. by N. of the city of
Guanajuato. Pop. (1895) 90,978; (1900) 62,623, León ranking fourth in
the latter year among the cities of Mexico. The Mexican Central gives it
railway connexion with the national capital and other prominent cities
of the Republic. León stands in a fertile plain on the banks of the
Turbio, a tributary of the Rio Grande de Lerma, at an elevation of 5862
ft. above sea-level and in the midst of very attractive surroundings.
The country about León is considered to be one of the richest
cereal-producing districts of Mexico. The city itself is subject to
disastrous floods, sometimes leading to loss of life as well as damage
to property, as in the great flood of 1889. León is essentially a
manufacturing and commercial city; it has a cathedral and a theatre,
the latter one of the largest and finest in the republic. The city is
regularly built, with wide streets and numerous shady parks and gardens.
It manufactures saddlery and other leather work, gold and silver
embroideries, cotton and woollen goods, especially _rebozos_ (long
shawls), soap and cutlery. There are also tanneries and flour mills. The
city has a considerable trade in wheat and flour. The first settlement
of León occurred in 1552, but its formal foundation was in 1576, and it
did not reach the dignity of a city until 1836.
LEON, the capital of the department of Leon, Nicaragua, an episcopal
see, and the largest city in the republic, situated midway between Lake
Managua and the Pacific Ocean, 50 m. N.W. of Managua, on the railway
from that city to the Pacific port of Corinto. Pop. (1905) about 45,000,
including the Indian town of Subtiaba. Leon covers a very wide area,
owing to its gardens and plantations. Its houses are usually
one-storeyed, built of adobe and roofed with red tiles; its public
buildings are among the finest in Central America. The massive and
elaborately ornamented cathedral was built in the Renaissance style
between 1746 and 1774; a Dominican church in Subtiaba is little less
striking. The old (1678) and new (1873) episcopal palaces, the hospital,
the university and the barracks (formerly a Franciscan monastery) are
noteworthy examples of Spanish colonial architecture. Leon has a large
general trade, and manufactures cotton and woollen fabrics, ice, cigars,
boots, shoes and saddlery; its tanneries supply large quantities of
cheap leather for export. But its population (about 60,000 in 1850)
tends to decrease.
At the time of the Spanish conquest Subtiaba was the residence of the
great cacique of Nagrando, and contained an important Indian temple. The
city of Leon, founded by Francisco Hernandez de Cordova in 1523, was
originally situated at the head of the western bay of Lake Managua, and
was not removed to its present position till 1610. Thomas Gage, who
visited it in 1665, describes it as a splendid city; and in 1685 it
yielded rich booty to William Dampier (q.v.). Until 1855 Leon was the
capital of Nicaragua, although its great commercial rival Granada
contested its claim to that position, and the jealousy between the two
cities often resulted in bloodshed. Leon was identified with the
interests of the democracy of Nicaragua, Granada with the clerical and
aristocratic parties.
See NICARAGUA; E. G. Squier, _Central America_, vol. i. (1856); and T.
Gage, _Through Mexico_, &c. (1665).
LEON, the name of a modern province and of an ancient kingdom,
captaincy-general and province in north-western Spain. The modern
province, founded in 1833, is bounded on the N. by Oviedo, N.E. by
Santander, E. by Palencia, S. by Valladolid and Zamora and W. by Orense
and Lugo. Pop. (1900) 386,083. Area, 5986 sq. m. The boundaries of the
province on the north and west, formed respectively by the central ridge
and southerly offshoots of the Cantabrian Mountains (q.v.), are strongly
marked; towards the south-east the surface merges imperceptibly into the
Castilian plateau, the line of demarcation being for the most part
merely conventional. Leon belongs partly to the river system of the Miño
(see SPAIN), partly to that of the Duero or Douro (q.v.), these being
separated by the Montañas de Leon, which extend in a continuous wall
(with passes at Manzanal and Poncebadon) from north to south-west. To
the north-west of the Montañas de Leon is the richly wooded pastoral and
highland district known as the Vierzo, which in its lower valleys
produces grain, fruit, and wine in abundance. The Tierra del Campo in
the west of the province is fairly productive, but in need of
irrigation. The whole province is sparsely peopled. Apart from
agriculture, stock-raising and mining, its commerce and industries are
unimportant. Cattle, mules, butter, leather, coal and iron are exported.
The hills of Leon were worked for gold in the time of the Romans; iron
is still obtained, and coal-mining developed considerably towards the
close of the 19th century. The only towns with more than 5000
inhabitants in 1900 were Leon (15,580) and Astorga (5573) (q.v.). The
main railway from Madrid to Corunna passes through the province, and
there are branches from the city of Leon to Vierzo, Oviedo, and the
Biscayan port of Gijón.
At the time of the Roman conquest, the province was inhabited by the
Vettones and Callaici; it afterwards formed part of Hispania
Tarraconensis. Among the Christian kingdoms which arose in Spain as the
Moorish invasion of the 8th century receded, Leon was one of the oldest.
The title of king of Leon was first assumed by Ordoño in 913. Ferdinand
I. (the Great) of Castile united the crowns of Castile and Leon in the
11th century; the two were again separated in the 12th, until a final
union took place (1230) in the person of St Ferdinand. The limits of the
kingdom varied with the vicissitudes of war, but roughly speaking it may
be said to have embraced what are now the provinces of Leon, Palencia,
Valladolid, Zamora and Salamanca. For a detailed account of this
kingdom, see SPAIN: _History_. The captaincy-general of the province of
Leon before 1833 included Leon, Zamora and Salamanca. The Leonese, or
inhabitants of these three provinces, have less individuality, in
character and physique, than the people of Galicia, Catalonia or
Andalusia, who are quite distinct from what is usually regarded as the
central or national Spanish type, i.e. the Castilian. The Leonese belong
partly to the Castilian section of the Spaniards, partly to the
north-western section which includes the Galicians and Asturians. They
have comparatively few of the Moorish traits which are so marked in the
south and east of Spain. Near Astorga there dwells a curious tribe, the
Maragatos, sometimes considered to be a remnant of the original
Celtiberian inhabitants. As a rule the Maragatos earn their living as
muleteers or carriers; they wear a distinctive costume, mix as little as
possible with their neighbours and do not marry outside their own tribe.