We who believe in no authentic Pallas, child of Zeus, may yet pause
awhile, when we contemplate Athens, to ponder whether those old
mythologic systems, which ascribed to godhead the foundation of states
and the patronage of peoples, had not some glimpse of truth beyond a
mere blind guess. Is not, in fact, this Athenian land the promised and
predestined home of a peculiar people, in the same sense as that 343 in
which Palestine was the heritage by faith of a tribe set apart by
Jehovah for His own?
Unlike Rome, Athens leaves upon the memory one simple and ineffaceable
impression. There is here no conflict between Paganism and
Christianity, no statues of Hellas baptised by popes into the company
of saints, no blending of the classical and mediæval and Renaissance
influences in a bewilderment of vast antiquity. Rome, true to her
historical vocation, embraces in her ruins all ages, all creeds, all
nations. Her life has never stood still, but has submitted to many
transformations, of which the traces are still visible. Athens, like
the Greeks of history, is isolated in a sort of self-completion: she is
a thing of the past, which still exists, because the spirit never dies,
because beauty is a joy for ever. What is truly remarkable about the
city is just this, that while the modern town is an insignificant
mushroom of the present century, the monuments of Greek art in the best
period—the masterpieces of Ictinus and Mnesicles, and the theatre on
which the plays of the tragedians were produced—survive in comparative
perfection, and are so far unencumbered with subsequent edifices that
the actual Athens of Pericles absorbs our attention. There is nothing
of any consequence intermediate between us and the fourth century B.C..
Seen from a distance the Acropolis presents nearly the same appearance
as it offered to Spartan guardsmen when they paced the ramparts of
Deceleia. Nature around is all unaltered. Except that more villages,
enclosed with olive-groves and vineyards, were sprinkled over those
bare hills in classic days, no essential change in the landscape has
taken place, no transformation, for example, of equal magnitude with
that which converted the Campagna of Rome from a plain of cities to a
poisonous solitude. All through the centuries which divide us from the
age of Hadrian—centuries unfilled, as far as Athens is concerned, 344
with memorable deeds or national activity—the Acropolis has stood
uncovered to the sun. The tones of the marble of Pentelicus have daily
grown more golden; decay has here and there invaded frieze and capital;
war too has done its work, shattering the Parthenon in 1687 by the
explosion of a powder magazine, and the Propylæa in 1656 by a similar
accident, and seaming the colonnades that still remain with
cannon-balls in 1827. Yet in spite of time and violence the Acropolis
survives, a miracle of beauty: like an everlasting flower, through all
that lapse of years it has spread its coronal of marbles to the air,
unheeded. And now, more than ever, its temples seem to be incorporate
with the rock they crown. The slabs of column and basement have grown
together by long pressure or molecular adhesion into a coherent whole.
Nor have weeds or creeping ivy invaded the glittering fragments that
strew the sacred hill. The sun's kiss alone has caused a change from
white to amber-hued or russet. Meanwhile, the exquisite adaptation of
Greek building to Greek landscape has been enhanced rather than
impaired by that 'unimaginable touch of time,' which has broken the
regularity of outline, softened the chisel-work of the sculptor, and
confounded the painter's fretwork in one tint of glowing gold. The
Parthenon, the Erechtheum, and the Propylæa have become one with the
hill on which they cluster, as needful to the scenery around them as
the everlasting mountains, as sympathetic as the rest of nature to the
successions of morning and evening, which waken them to passionate life
by the magic touch of colour.
Thus there is no intrusive element in Athens to distract the mind from
memories of its most glorious past. Walk into the theatre of Dionysus.
The sculptures that support the stage—Sileni bending beneath the weight
of cornices, and lines of graceful youths and maidens—are still in
their 345 ancient station.[125] The pavement of the orchestra, once
trodden by Athenian choruses, presents its tessellated marbles to our
feet; and we may choose the seat of priest or archon or herald or
thesmothetes, when we wish to summon before our mind's eye the pomp of
the 'Agamemnon' or the dances of the 'Birds' and 'Clouds.' Each seat
still bears some carven name—ΙΕΡΕΩΣ ΤΩΝ ΜΟΥΣΩΝ or ΙΕΡΕΩΣ ΑΣΚΛΗΠΙΟΥ—and
that of the priest of Dionysus is beautifully wrought with Bacchic
basreliefs. One of them, inscribed ΙΕΡΕΩΣ ΑΝΤΙΝΟΟΥ, proves indeed that
the extant chairs were placed here in the age of Hadrian, who completed
the vast temple of Zeus Olympius, and filled its precincts with statues
of his favourite, and named a new Athens after his own name.[126] Yet
we need not doubt that their position round the orchestra is
traditional, and that even in their form they do not differ from those
which the priests and officers of Athens used from the time of Æschylus
downward. Probably a slave brought cushion and footstool to complete
the comfort of these stately armchairs. Nothing else is wanted to
render them fit now for their august occupants; and we may imagine the
long-stoled greybearded men throned in state, each with his wand and
with appropriate fillets on his head. As we rest here in the light of
the full moon, which simplifies all outlines and heals with tender
touch the wounds of ages, it is easy enough to dream ourselves into the
belief that the ghosts of dead actors may once more glide across the
stage. 346 Fiery-hearted Medea, statuesque Antigone, Prometheus silent
beneath the hammer-strokes of Force and Strength, Orestes hounded by
his mother's Furies, Cassandra aghast before the palace of Mycenæ,
pure-souled Hippolytus, ruthful Alcestis, the divine youth of Helen,
and Clytemnestra in her queenliness, emerge like faint grey films
against the bluish background of Hymettus. The night air seems vocal
with echoes of old Greek, more felt than heard, like voices wafted to
our sense in sleep, the sound whereof we do not seize, though the
burden lingers in our memory.
[125] It is true, however, that these sculptures belong to a
comparatively late period, and that the theatre underwent some
alterations in Roman days, so that the stage is now probably a few
yards farther from the seats than in the time of Sophocles.
[126] It is not a little surprising to come upon this relic of the
worship of the young Bithynian at Athens in the theatre still
consecrated by the memories of Æschylus and Sophocles.
In like manner, when moonlight, falling aslant upon the Propylæa,
restores the marble masonry to its original whiteness, and the
shattered heaps of ruined colonnades are veiled in shadow, and every
form seems larger, grander, and more perfect than by day, it is well to
sit upon the lowest steps, and looking upwards, to remember what
processions passed along this way bearing the sacred peplus to Athene.
The Panathenaic pomp, which Pheidias and his pupils carved upon the
friezes of the Parthenon, took place once in five years, on one of the
last days of July.[127] All the citizens joined in the honour paid to
their patroness. Old men bearing olive-branches, young men clothed in
bronze, chapleted youths singing the praise of Pallas in prosodial
hymns, maidens carrying holy vessels, aliens bending beneath the weight
of urns, servants of the temple leading oxen crowned with fillets,
troops of horsemen reining in impetuous steeds: all these pass before
us in the frieze of Pheidias. But to our imagination must be left what
he has refrained from sculpturing, the chariot formed like a ship, in
which the most illustrious nobles of Athens sat, splendidly arrayed,
beneath the crocus-coloured curtain or 347 peplus outspread upon a
mast. Some concealed machinery caused this car to move; but whether it
passed through the Propylæa, and entered the Acropolis, admits of
doubt. It is, however, certain that the procession which ascended those
steep slabs, and before whom the vast gates of the Propylæa swang open
with the clangour of resounding bronze, included not only the citizens
of Athens and their attendant aliens, but also troops of cavalry and
chariots; for the mark of chariot-wheels can still be traced upon the
rock. The ascent is so abrupt that this multitude moved but slowly.
Splendid indeed, beyond any pomp of modern ceremonial, must have been
the spectacle of the well-ordered procession, advancing through those
giant colonnades to the sound of flutes and solemn chants—the shrill
clear voices of boys in antiphonal chorus rising above the confused
murmurs of such a crowd, the chafing of horses' hoofs upon the stone,
and the lowing of bewildered oxen.
[127] My purpose being merely picturesque, I have ignored the grave
antiquarian difficulties which beset the interpretation of this
frieze.
To realise by fancy the many-coloured radiance of the temples, and the
rich dresses of the votaries illuminated by that sharp light of a Greek
sun, which defines outline and shadow and gives value to the faintest
hue, would be impossible. All we can know for positive about the
chromatic decoration of the Greeks is, that whiteness artificially
subdued to the tone of ivory prevailed throughout the stonework of the
buildings, while blue and red and green in distinct, yet interwoven
patterns, added richness to the fretwork and the sculpture of pediment
and frieze. The sacramental robes of the worshippers accorded doubtless
with this harmony, wherein colour was subordinate to light, and light
was toned to softness.
Musing thus upon the staircase of the Propylæa, we may say with truth
that all our modern art is but child's play to that of the Greeks. Very
soul-subduing is the gloom of a 348 cathedral like the Milanese Duomo,
when the incense rises in blue clouds athwart the bands of sunlight
falling from the dome, and the crying of choirs upborne upon the wings
of organ music fills the whole vast space with a mystery of melody. Yet
such ceremonial pomps as this are as dreams and the shapes of visions,
when compared with the clearly defined splendours of a Greek procession
through marble peristyles in open air beneath the sun and sky. That
spectacle combined the harmonies of perfect human forms in movement
with the divine shapes of statues, the radiance of carefully selected
vestments with hues inwrought upon pure marble. The rhythms and the
melodies of the Doric mood were sympathetic to the proportions of the
Doric colonnades. The grove of pillars through which the pageant passed
grew from the living rock into shapes of beauty, fulfilling by the
inbreathed spirit of man Nature's blind yearning after absolute
completion. The sun himself—not thwarted by artificial gloom, or
tricked with alien colours of stained glass—was made to minister in all
his strength to a pomp, the pride of which was the display of form in
manifold magnificence. The ritual of the Greeks was the ritual of a
race at one with Nature, glorying in its affiliation to the mighty
mother of all life, and striving to add by human art the coping-stone
and final touch to her achievement. The ritual of the Catholic Church
is the ritual of a race shut out from Nature, holding no communion with
the powers of earth and air, but turning the spirit inwards and aiming
at the concentration of the whole soul upon an unseen God. The temple
of the Greeks was the house of a present deity; its cell his chamber;
its statue his reality. The Christian cathedral is the fane where God
who is a spirit is worshipped; no statue fills the choir from wall to
wall and lifts its forehead to the roof; but the vacant aisles, with
their convergent arches soaring upwards 349 to the dome, are made to
suggest the brooding of infinite and omnipresent Godhead. It was the
object of the Greek artist to preserve a just proportion between the
god's statue and his house, in order that the worshipper might approach
him as a subject draws near to his monarch's throne. The Christian
architect seeks to affect the emotions of the votary with a sense of
vastness filled with unseen power. Our cathedrals are symbols of the
universe where God is everywhere pavilioned and invisible. The Greek
temple was a practical, utilitarian dwelling-house, made beautiful
enough to suit divinity. The modern church is an idea expressed in
stone, an aspiration of the spirit, shooting up from arch and pinnacle
and spire into illimitable fields of air.
It follows from these differences between the religious aims of Pagan
and Christian architecture, that the former was far more favourable to
the plastic arts. No beautiful or simple incident of human life was an
inappropriate subject for the sculptor, in adorning the houses of gods
who were themselves but human on a higher level; and the ritual whereby
the gods were honoured was merely an exhibition, in its strength and
joyfulness, of mortal beauty. Therefore the Panathenaic procession
furnished Pheidias with a series of sculptural motives, which he had
only to express according to the principles of his art. The frieze,
three feet and four inches in height, raised forty feet above the
pavement of the peristyle, ran for five hundred and twenty-four
continuous feet round the outside wall of the cella of the Parthenon.
The whole of this long line was wrought with carving of exquisite
delicacy and supreme vigour, in such low relief as its peculiar
position, far above the heads of the spectators, and only illuminated
by light reflected from below, required. Each figure, each attitude,
and each fold of drapery in its countless groups is a study; yet the
whole was a transcript from actual contemporary 350 Athenian life.
Truly in matters of art we are but infants to the Greeks.
The topographical certainty which invests the ruins of the Acropolis
with such peculiar interest, belongs in a less degree to the whole of
Athens. Although the most recent researches have thrown fresh doubt
upon the exact site of the Pnyx, and though no traces of the agora
remain, yet we may be sure that the Bema from which Pericles sustained
the courage of the Athenians during the Peloponnesian war, was placed
upon the northern slope looking towards the Propylæa, while the wide
irregular space between this hill, the Acropolis, the Areopagus, and
the Theseum, must have formed the meeting-ground for amusement and
discussion of the citizens at leisure. About Areopagus, with its
tribunal hollowed in the native rock, and the deep cleft beneath, where
the shrine of the Eumenides was built, there is no question. The
extreme insignificance of this little mound may at first indeed excite
incredulity and wonder; but a few hours in Athens accustom the
traveller to a smallness of scale which at first sight seemed
ridiculous. Colonus, for example, the Colonus which every student of
Sophocles has pictured to himself in the solitude of unshorn meadows,
where groves of cypresses and olives bent unpruned above wild tangles
of narcissus flowers and crocuses, and where the nightingale sang
undisturbed by city noise or labour of the husbandman, turns out to be
a scarcely appreciable mound, gently swelling from the cultivated land
of the Cephissus. The Cephissus even in a rainy season may be crossed
dryshod by an active jumper; and the Ilissus, where it flows beneath
the walls of the Olympieion, is now dedicated to washerwomen instead of
water-nymphs. Nature herself remains, on the whole, unaltered. Most
notable are still the white poplars dedicated of old to Herakles, and
the spreading planes which whisper to the 351 limes in spring. In the
midst of so arid and bare a landscape, these umbrageous trees are
singularly grateful to the eye and to the sense oppressed with heat and
splendour. Nightingales have not ceased to crowd the gardens in such
numbers as to justify the tradition of their Attic origin, nor have the
bees of Hymettus forgotten their labours: the honey of Athens can still
boast a quality superior to that of Hybla or any other famous haunt of
hives.
Tradition points out one spot which commands a beautiful distant view
of Athens and the hills, as the garden of the Academy. The place is not
unworthy of Plato and his companions. Very old olives grow in
abundance, to remind us of those sacred trees beneath which the boys of
Aristophanes ran races; and reeds with which they might crown their
foreheads are thickly scattered through the grass. Abeles interlace
their murmuring branches overhead, and the planes are as leafy as that
which invited Socrates and Phædrus on the morning when they talked of
love. In such a place we comprehend how philosophy went hand in hand at
Athens with gymnastics, and why the poplar and the plane were dedicated
to athletic gods. For the wrestling-grounds were built in groves like
these, and their cool peristyles, the meeting-places of young men and
boys, supplied the sages not only with an eager audience, but also with
the leisure and the shade that learning loves.
It was very characteristic of Greek life that speculative philosophy
should not have chosen 'to walk the studious cloister pale,' but should
rather have sought out places where 'the busy hum of men' was loudest,
and where youthful voices echoed. The Athenian transacted no business,
and pursued but few pleasures, under a private roof. He conversed and
bargained in the agora, debated on the open rocks of the Pnyx, and
enjoyed discussion in the courts of the 352 gymnasium. It is also far
from difficult to understand beneath this over-vaulted and grateful
gloom of bee-laden branches, what part love played in the haunts of
runners and of wrestlers, why near the statue of Hermes stood that of
Erôs, and wherefore Socrates surnamed his philosophy the Science of
Love. Φιλοσοφουμεν ανευ μαλακίας is the boast of Pericles in his
description of the Athenian spirit. Φιλοσοφία μετα παιδεραστίας is
Plato's formula for the virtues of the most distinguished soul. These
two mottoes, apparently so contradictory, found their point of meeting
and their harmony in the gymnasium.
The mere contemplation of these luxuriant groves, set in the luminous
Attic landscape, and within sight of Athens, explains a hundred
passages of poets and philosophers. Turn to the opening scenes of the
'Lysis' and the 'Charmides.' The action of the latter dialogue is laid
in the palæstra of Taureas. Socrates has just returned from the camp at
Potidæa, and after answering the questions of his friends, has begun to
satisfy his own curiosity:[128]—
When there had been enough of this, I, in my turn, began to make
inquiries about matters at home—about the present state of philosophy,
and about the youth. I asked whether any of them were remarkable for
beauty or sense—or both. Critias, glancing at the door, invited my
attention to some youths who were coming in, and talking noisily to one
another, followed by a crowd. 'Of the beauties, Socrates,' he said, 'I
fancy that you will soon be able to form a judgment. For those who are
just entering are the advanced guard of the great beauty of the day—and
he is likely not to be far off himself.'
'Who is he?' I said; 'and who is his father?'
'Charmides,' he replied, 'is his name; he is my cousin, and the son of
my uncle Glaucon: I rather think that you know him, although he was not
grown up at the time of your departure.'
'Certainly I know him,' I said; 'for he was remarkable even 353 then
when he was still a child, and now I should imagine that he must be
almost a young man.'
'You will see,' he said, 'in a moment what progress he has made, and
what he is like.' He had scarcely said the word, when Charmides
entered.
Now you know, my friend, that I cannot measure anything, and of the
beautiful, I am simply such a measure as a white line is of chalk; for
almost all young persons are alike beautiful in my eyes. But at that
moment, when I saw him coming in, I must admit that I was quite
astonished at his beauty and stature; all the world seemed to be
enamoured of him; amazement and confusion reigned when he entered; and
a troop of lovers followed him. That grown-up men like ourselves should
have been affected in this way was not surprising, but I observed that
there was the same feeling among the boys; all of them, down to the
very least child, turned and looked at him as if he had been a statue.
Chaerephon called me and said: 'What do you think of him, Socrates? Has
he not a beautiful face?'
'That he has indeed,' I said.
'But you would think nothing of his face,' he replied, 'if you could
see his naked form: he is absolutely perfect.'
[128] I quote from Professor Jowett's translation.
This Charmides is a true Greek of the perfect type. Not only is he the
most beautiful of Athenian youths; he is also temperate, modest, and
subject to the laws of moral health. His very beauty is a harmony of
well-developed faculties in which the mind and body are at one. How a
young Greek managed to preserve this balance in the midst of the
admiring crowds described by Socrates is a marvel. Modern conventions
unfit our minds for realising the conditions under which he had to
live. Yet it is indisputable that Plato has strained no point in the
animated picture he presents of the palæstra. Aristophanes and Xenophon
bear him out in all the details of the scene. We have to imagine a
totally different system of social morality from ours, with virtues and
vices, temptations and triumphs, unknown to our young men. The next
scene from the 'Lysis' introduces us to another wrestling-ground 354 in
the neighbourhood of Athens. Here Socrates meets with Hippothales, who
is a devoted lover but a bad poet. Hippothales asks the philosopher's
advice as to the best method of pleasing the boy Lysis:—
'Will you tell me by what words or actions I may become endeared to my
love?'
'That is not easy to determine,' I said; 'but if you will bring your
love to me, and will let me talk with him, I may perhaps be able to
show you how to converse with him, instead of singing and reciting in
the fashion of which you are accused.'
'There will be no difficulty in bringing him,' he replied; 'if you will
only go into the house with Ctesippus, and sit down and talk, he will
come of himself; for he is fond of listening, Socrates. And as this is
the festival of the Hermæa, there is no separation of young men and
boys, but they are all mixed up together. He will be sure to come. But
if he does not come, Ctesippus, with whom he is familiar, and whose
relation Menexenus is, his great friend, shall call him.'
'That will be the way,' I said. Thereupon I and Ctesippus went towards
the Palæstra, and the rest followed.
Upon entering we found that the boys had just been sacrificing; and
this part of the festival was nearly come to an end. They were all in
white array, and games at dice were going on among them. Most of them
were in the outer court amusing themselves; but some were in a corner
of the Apodyterium playing at odd-and-even with a number of dice, which
they took out of little wicker baskets. There was also a circle of
lookers-on, one of whom was Lysis. He was standing among the other boys
and youths, having a crown upon his head, like a fair vision, and not
less worthy of praise for his goodness than for his beauty. We left
them, and went over to the opposite side of the room, where we found a
quiet place, and sat down; and then we began to talk. This attracted
Lysis, who was constantly turning round to look at us—he was evidently
wanting to come to us. For a time he hesitated and had not the courage
to come alone; but first of all, his friend Menexenus came in out of
the court in the interval of his play, and when he saw Ctesippus and
myself, came and sat by us; and then Lysis, seeing him, followed and
sat down with him; and the other boys joined. I should observe that
Hippothales, when he saw the 355 crowd, got behind them, where he
thought that he would be out of sight of Lysis, lest he should anger
him; and there he stood and listened.
Enough has been quoted to show that beneath the porches of a Greek
palæstra, among the youths of Athens, who wrote no exercises in dead
languages, and thought chiefly of attaining to perfect manhood by the
harmonious exercise of mind and body in temperate leisure, divine
philosophy must indeed have been charming both to teachers and to
learners:—
Not harsh and crabbed, as dull fools suppose,
But musical as is Apollo's lute,
And a perpetual feast of nectared sweets
Where no crude surfeit reigns.
There are no remains above ground of the buildings which made the Attic
gymnasia splendid. Nor are there in Athens itself many statues of the
noble human beings who paced their porches and reclined beneath their
shade. The galleries of Italy and the verses of the poets can alone
help us to repeople the Academy with its mixed multitude of athletes
and of sages. The language of Simætha, in Theocritus, brings the
younger men before us: their cheeks are yellower than helichrysus with
the down of youth, and their breasts shine brighter far than the moon,
as though they had but lately left the 'fair toils of the
wrestling-ground.' Upon some of the monumental tablets exposed in the
burying-ground of Cerameicus and in the Theseum may be seen portraits
of Athenian citizens. A young man holding a bird, with a boy beside him
who carries a lamp or strigil; a youth, naked, and scraping himself
after the games; a boy taking leave with clasped hands of his mother,
while a dog leaps up to fawn upon his knee; a wine-party; a soul in
Charon's boat; a husband parting from his wife: such are the simple 356
subjects of these monuments; and under each is written ΧΡΗΣΤΕ
ΧΑΙΡΕ—Friend, farewell! The tombs of the women are equally plain in
character: a nurse brings a baby to its mother, or a slave helps her
mistress at the toilette table. There is nothing to suggest either the
gloom of the grave or the hope of heaven in any of these sculptures.
Their symbolism, if it at all exist, is of the least mysterious kind.
Our attention is rather fixed upon the commonest affairs of life than
on the secrets of death.
As we wander through the ruins of Athens, among temples which are all
but perfect, and gardens which still keep their ancient greenery, we
must perforce reflect how all true knowledge of Greek life has passed
away. To picture to ourselves its details, so as to become quite
familiar with the way in which an Athenian thought and felt and
occupied his time, is impossible. Such books as the 'Charicles' of
Becker or Wieland's 'Agathon' only increase our sense of hopelessness,
by showing that neither a scholar's learning nor a poet's fancy can
pierce the mists of antiquity. We know that it was a strange and
fascinating life, passed for the most part beneath the public eye, at
leisure, without the society of free women, without what we call a
home, in constant exercise of body and mind, in the duties of the
law-courts and the assembly, in the toils of the camp and the perils of
the sea, in the amusements of the wrestling-ground and the theatre, in
sportful study and strenuous play. We also know that the citizens of
Athens, bred up under the peculiar conditions of this artificial life,
became impassioned lovers of their city;[129] that the greatest
generals, statesmen, poets, orators, artists, historians, and
philosophers that the world can boast, were produced in the short space
of a century and a half by a city 357 numbering about 20,000 burghers.
It is scarcely an exaggeration to say with the author of 'Hereditary
Genius,' that the population of Athens, taken as a whole, was as
superior to us as we are to the Australian savages. Long and earnest,
therefore, should be our hesitation before we condemn as pernicious or
unprofitable the instincts and the customs of such a race.
[129] Την της πόλεως δύναμιν καθ' εμεραν εργω θεωμένους και εραστας
γιγνομένους αυτης.—Thuc. ii. 43.
The permanence of strongly marked features in of Greece, and the small
scale of the whole country, add a vivid charm to the scenery of its
great events. In the harbour of Peiræus we can scarcely fail to picture
to ourselves the pomp which went forth to Sicily that solemn morning,
when the whole host prayed together and made libations at the signal of
the herald's trumpet. The nation of athletes and artists and
philosophers were embarked on what seemed to some a holiday excursion,
and for others bid fair to realise unbounded dreams of ambition or
avarice. Only a few were heavy-hearted; but the heaviest of all was the
general who had vainly dissuaded his countrymen from the endeavour, and
fruitlessly refused the command thrust upon him. That was 'the morning
of a mighty day, a day of crisis' for the destinies of Athens. Of all
that multitude, how few would come again; of the empire which they made
so manifest in its pride of men and arms, how little but a shadow would
be left, when war and fever and the quarries of Syracuse had done their
fore-appointed work! Yet no commotion of the elements, no eclipse or
authentic oracle from heaven, was interposed between the arrogance of
Athens and sure-coming Nemesis. The sun shone, and the waves laughed,
smitten by the oars of galleys racing to Ægina. Meanwhile Zeus from the
watchtower of the world held up the scales of fate, and the balance of
Athens was wavering to its fall.
A few strokes of the oar carry us away from Peiræus to a 358 scene
fraught with far more thrilling memories. That little point of rock
emergent from the water between Salamis and the mainland, bare,
insignificant, and void of honour among islands to the natural eye, is
Psyttaleia. A strange tightening at the heart assails us when we
approach the centre-point of the most memorable battlefield of history.
It was again 'the morning of a mighty day, a day of crisis' for the
destinies, not of Athens alone, but of humanity, when the Persian
fleet, after rowing all night up and down the channel between Salamis
and the shore, beheld the face of Phoebus flash from behind Pentelicus
and flood the Acropolis of Athens with fire. The Peiræius recalls a
crisis in the world's drama whereof the great actors were unconscious:
fair winds and sunny waves bore light hearts to Sicily. But Psyttaleia
brings before us the heroism of a handful of men, who knew that the
supreme hour of ruin or of victory for their nation and themselves had
come. Terrible therefore was the energy with which they prayed and
joined their pæan to the trumpet-blast of dawn that blazed upon them
from the Attic hills. And this time Zeus, when he heard their cry, saw
the scale of Hellas mount to the stars. Let Æschylus tell the tale; for
he was there. A Persian is giving an account of the defeat of Salamis
to Atossa:—
The whole disaster, O my queen, began
With some fell fiend or devil,—I know not whence:
For thus it was; from the Athenian host
A man of Hellas came to thy son, Xerxes,
Saying that when black night shall fall in gloom,
The Hellenes would no longer stay, but leap
Each on the benches of his bark, and save
Hither and thither by stolen flight their lives.
He, when he heard thereof, discerning not
The Hellene's craft, no, nor the spite of heaven,
To all his captains gives this edict forth:
When as the sun doth cease to light the world,
359 And darkness holds the precincts of the sky,
They should dispose the fleet in three close ranks,
To guard the outlets and the water-ways;
Others should compass Ajax' isle around:
Seeing that if the Hellenes 'scaped grim death
By finding for their ships some privy exit,
It was ordained that all should lose their heads.
So spake he, led by a mad mind astray,
Nor knew what should be by the will of heaven.
They, like well-ordered vassals, with assent
Straightway prepared their food, and every sailor
Fitted his oar-blade to the steady rowlock.
But when the sunlight waned and night apace
Descended, every man who swayed an oar
Went to the boats with him who wielded armour.
Then through the ship's length rank cheered rank in concert,
Sailing as each was set in order due:
And all night long the tyrants of the ships
Kept the whole navy cruising to and fro.
Night passed: yet never did the host of Hellene
At any point attempt their stolen sally;
Until at length, when day with her white steeds
Forth shining, held the whole world under sway.
First from the Hellenes with a loud clear cry
Song-like, a shout made music, and therewith
The echo of the rocky isle rang back
Shrill triumph: but the vast barbarian host
Shorn of their hope trembled; for not for flight
The Hellenes hymned their solemn pæan then—
Nay, rather as for battle with stout heart.
Then too the trumpet speaking fired our foes,
And with a sudden rush of oars in time
They smote the deep sea at that clarion cry;
And in a moment you might see them all.
The right wing in due order well arrayed
First took the lead; then came the serried squadron
Swelling against us, and from many voices
One cry arose: Ho! sons of Hellenes, up!
Now free your fatherland, now free your sons,
Your wives, the fanes of your ancestral gods,
360 Your fathers' tombs! Now fight you for your all.
Yea, and from our side brake an answering hum
Of Persian voices. Then, no more delay,
Ship upon ship her beak of biting brass
Struck stoutly. 'Twas a bark, I ween, of Hellas
First charged, dashing from a Tyrrhenian galleon
Her prow-gear; then ran hull on hull pell-mell.
At first the torrent of the Persian navy
Bore up: but when the multitude of ships
Were straitly jammed, and none could help another,
Huddling with brazen-mouthed beaks they clashed
And brake their serried banks of oars together;
Nor were the Hellenes slow or slack to muster
And pound them in a circle. Then ships' hulks
Floated keel upwards, and the sea was covered
With shipwreck multitudinous and with slaughter.
The shores and jutting reefs were full of corpses.
In indiscriminate rout, with straining oar,
The whole barbarian navy turned and fled.
Our foes, like men 'mid tunnies, draughts of fishes,
With splintered oars and spokes of shattered spars
Kept striking, grinding, smashing us: shrill shrieks
With groanings mingled held the hollow deep,
Till night's dark eye set limit to the slaughter.
But for our mass of miseries, could I speak
Straight on for ten days, I should never sum it:
For know this well, never in one day died
Of men so many multitudes before.
After a pause he resumes his narrative by describing Psyttaleia:—
There lies an island before Salamis,
Small, with scant harbour, which dance-loving Pan
Is wont to tread, haunting the salt sea-beaches.
There Xerxes placed his chiefs, that when the foes
Chased from their ships should seek the sheltering isle,
They might with ease destroy the host of Hellas,
Saving their own friends from the briny straits.
Ill had he learned what was to hap; for when
God gave the glory to the Greeks at sea,
361 That same day, having fenced their flesh with brass,
They leaped from out their ships; and in a circle
Enclosed the whole girth of the isle, that so
None knew where he should turn; but many fell
Crushed with sharp stones in conflict, and swift arrows
Flew from the quivering bowstrings winged with murder.
At last in one fierce onset with one shout
They strike, hack, hew the wretches' limbs asunder,
Till every man alive had fallen beneath them.
Then Xerxes groaned, seeing the gulf unclose
Of grief below him; for his throne was raised
High in the sight of all by the sea-shore.
Rending his robes, and shrieking a shrill shriek,
He hurriedly gave orders to his host;
Then headlong rushed in rout and heedless ruin.
Atossa makes appropriate exclamations of despair and horror. Then the
messenger proceeds:—
The captains of the ships that were not shattered,
Set speedy sail in flight as the winds blew.
The remnant of the host died miserably,
Some in Boeotia round the glimmering springs
Tired out with thirst; some of us scant of breath
Escaped, with bare life to the Phocian bounds,
And land of Doris, and the Melian Gulf,
Where with kind draughts Spercheius soaks the soil.
Thence in our flight Achaia's ancient plain
And Thessaly's stronghold received us worn
For want of food. Most died in that fell place
Of thirst and famine; for both deaths were there.
Yet to Magnesia came we and the coast
Of Macedonia, to the ford of Axius,
And Bolbe's canebrakes and the Pangæan range,
Edonian borders. Then in that grim night
God sent unseasonable frost, and froze
The stream of holy Strymon. He who erst
Recked nought of gods, now prayed with supplication,
Bowing before the powers of earth and sky.
But when the hosts from lengthy orisons
Surceased, it crossed the ice-incrusted ford.
362 And he among us who set forth before
The sun-god's rays were scattered, now was saved.
For blazing with sharp beams the sun's bright circle
Pierced the mid-stream, dissolving it with fire.
There were they huddled. Happy then was he
Who soonest cut the breath of life asunder.
Such as survived and had the luck of living,
Crossed Thrace with pain and peril manifold,
'Scaping mischance, a miserable remnant,
Into the dear land of their homes. Wherefore
Persia may wail, wanting in vain her darlings.
This is the truth. Much I omit to tell
Of woes by God wrought on the Persian race.
Upon this triumphal note it were well, perhaps, to pause. Yet since the
sojourner in Athens must needs depart by sea, let us advance a little
way farther beyond Salamis. The low shore of the isthmus soon appears;
and there is the hill of Corinth and the site of the city, as desolate
now as when Antipater of Sidon made the sea-waves utter a threnos over
her ruins. 'The deathless Nereids, daughters of Oceanus,' still lament
by the shore, and the Isthmian pines are as green as when their boughs
were plucked to bind a victor's forehead. Feathering the grey rock now
as then, they bear witness to the wisdom and the moderation of the
Greeks, who gave to the conquerors in sacred games no wreath of gold,
or title of nobility, or land, or jewels, but the honour of an
illustrious name, the guerdon of a mighty deed, and branches taken from
the wild pine of Corinth, or the olive of Olympia, or the bay that
flourished like a weed at Delphi. What was indigenous and
characteristic of his native soil, not rare and costly things from
foreign lands, was precious to the Greek. This piety, after the lapse
of centuries and the passing away of mighty cities, still bears fruit.
Oblivion cannot wholly efface the memory of those great games while the
fir-trees rustle to the sea-wind as of old. Down the gulf we pass,
between mountain 363 range and mountain. On one hand, two peaked
Parnassus rears his cope of snow aloft over Delphi; on the other,
Erymanthus and Hermes' home, Cyllene, bar the pastoral glades of
Arcady. Greece is the land of mountains, not of rivers or of plains.
The titles of the hills of Hellas smite our ears with echoes of ancient
music—Olympus and Cithæron, Taygetus, Othrys, Helicon, and Ida. The
headlands of the mainland are mountains, and the islands are mountain
summits of a submerged continent. Austerely beautiful, not wild with an
Italian luxuriance, nor mournful with Sicilian monotony of outline, nor
yet again overwhelming with the sublimity of Alps, they seem the proper
home of a race which sought its ideal of beauty in distinction of shape
and not in multiplicity of detail, in light and not in richness of
colouring, in form and not in size.
At length the open sea is reached. Past Zante and Cephalonia we glide
'under a roof of blue Ionian weather;' or, if the sky has been troubled
with storm, we watch the moulding of long glittering cloud-lines,
processions and pomps of silvery vapour, fretwork and frieze of
alabaster piled above the islands, pearled promontories and domes of
rounded snow. Soon Santa Maura comes in sight:—
Leucatæ nimbosa cacumina montis,
Et formidatus nautis aperitur Apollo.
Here Sappho leapt into the waves to cure love-longing, according to the
ancient story; and he who sees the white cliffs chafed with breakers
and burning with fierce light, as it was once my luck to see them, may
well with Childe Harold 'feel or deem he feels no common glow.' All
through the afternoon it had been raining, and the sea was running high
beneath a petulant west wind. But just before evening, while yet there
remained a hand's-breadth between the sea and the 364 sinking sun, the
clouds were rent and blown in masses about the sky. Rain still fell
fretfully in scuds and fleeces; but where for hours there had been
nothing but a monotone of greyness, suddenly fire broke and radiance
and storm-clouds in commotion. Then, as if built up by music, a rainbow
rose and grew above Leucadia, planting one foot on Actium and the other
on Ithaca, and spanning with a horseshoe arch that touched the zenith,
the long line of roseate cliffs. The clouds upon which this bow was
woven were steel-blue beneath and crimson above; and the bow itself was
bathed in fire—its violets and greens and yellows visibly ignited by
the liquid flame on which it rested. The sea beneath, stormily dancing,
flashed back from all its crest the same red glow, shining like a
ridged lava-torrent in its first combustion. Then as the sun sank, the
crags burned deeper with scarlet blushes as of blood, and with
passionate bloom as of pomegranate or oleander flowers. Could Turner
rise from the grave to paint a picture that should bear the name of
'Sappho's Leap,' he might strive to paint it thus: and the world would
complain that he had dreamed the poetry of his picture. But who could
_dream_ anything so wild and yet so definite? Only the passion of
orchestras, the fire-flight of the last movement of the C minor
symphony, can in the realms of art give utterance to the spirit of
scenes like this.
INDEX
Aar, the, i. 20
Abano, ii. 98
Abruzzi, the, ii. 34; iii. 230, 235, 236
Acciaiuoli, Agnolo, ii. 226
Acciauoli, the, iii. 98
Accolti, Bernardo, ii. 83
Accona, iii. 72, 74
Accoramboni, Camillo, ii. 91:
Claudio, ii. 89:
Flaminio, ii. 91, 99, 100, 103 foll., 118 foll., 126:
Marcello, ii. 91 foll., 99, 102, 103, 105:
Mario, ii. 91:
Ottavio, ii. 91:
Scipione, ii. 91:
Tarquinia, ii. 89, 92, 103:
Vittoria, ii. 89-125
Achilles, iii. 286
Achradina, iii. 321, 324
Aci, iii. 287
Aci Castello, iii. 284
Acis and Galatea, iii. 284, 285
Acropolis, the, iii. 339, 344, 347
Actium, iii. 364
Adda, the, i. 50, 51, 62, 63, 174
Addison, i. 3
Adelaide, Queen of Lothair, King of Italy, ii. 169, 178
Adelaisie (wife of Berald des Baux), i. 80
Adrian VI. (Pope), ii. 251
Adriatic, the, ii. 1, 3, 56, 59
Æ, iii. 319
Æschylus, iii. 162, 271, 345, 358-362
Affò, Padre Ireneo, ii. 363 _note_
Agrigentines, the, iii. 335
Agrigentum, iii. 266
Ajaccio, i. 104-120
Alamanni, Antonio, ii. 328
Alban Hills, ii. 32
Albany, Countess of, i. 352
Alberti, house of the, ii. 213
Alberti, Leo Battista, i. 216; ii. 14, 18, 21-29; iii. 102
Albizzi, the, ii. 50, 209, 213 foll., 221, 224
Albizzi, Maso degli, ii. 213-215
Albizzi, Rinaldo degli, ii. 215, 218, 220, 221, 256
Albula, ii. 127, 128;
Pass of, i. 53
Aleotti, Giambattista, ii. 180
Alexander the Great, iii. 262
Alexander VI., ii. 47, 74, 184, 191, 193, 237, 363 _note_
Alexandria, ii. 19; iii. 189, 190, 201, 253
Alfieri, i. 342, 345-359
Alfonso of Aragon, i. 195, 203; ii. 189, 235
Alps, the, i. 1-67, 122, 123, 126, 133, 209, 258; ii. 8, 129, 168 _et
passim_
Amadeo, Gian Antonio, i. 146, 150, 151, 191-193, 243
Amalasuntha, daughter of Theodoric the Ostrogoth, ii. 2, 13
Amalfi, i. 103 _note_; iii. 250-261
Ambrogini family, iii. 101
Ambrogini, Angelo. (_See_ Poliziano, Angelo)
Ambrogini, Benedetto, iii. 101, 102
Ampezzo, the, i. 268
Ana-Capri, iii. 231, 232, 271
Anapus, the, iii. 326, 328
Anchises, iii. 319
Ancona, i. 196, 198; ii. 14, 38, 45, 55, 102, 199; iii. 111
Ancona, Professor d', ii. 276 _note_
Andrea, Giovann', i. 318
Andreini, ii. 269
Angeli, Niccolo, iii. 151
Angelico, Fra, i. 100, 240; ii. 49; iii. 35, 61, 147-149, 151, 248
Angelo, S., ii. 96
Angelo, Giovan. (_See_ Pius IV.)
Angiolieri, Cecco, iii. 1 2
Anguillara, Deifobo, Count of, i. 202
Anjou, house of, ii. 188
Ansano, S., iii. 70
Anselmi, ii. 158
Antegnate, i. 197
Antelao, i. 268, 283
Antibes, i. 102
Antinoë, iii. 191, 205
Antinoopolis, iii. 191, 205
Antinous, iii. 184-197, 200-229
Antipater, iii. 322, 362
Antiquari, Jacobo, iii. 126 _note_
Antonio da Venafro, ii. 47
Aosta, i. 2
Apennines, the, i. 45, 99, 133; ii. 7, 8, 37, 45, 56, 62, 65, 66, 132
foll., 145, 168; iii. 91 _et passim_
Apollonius of Tyana, iii. 216
Apulia, i. 87 _note_; iii. 305
Aquaviva, Dominico d', ii. 94
Aquila, i. 196
Aragazzi, Bartolommeo, iii. 95-100
Aragon, Kings of, i. 79
Arausio, i. 68
Archimedes, iii. 325
Arcipreti family, the, iii. 113
Ardoin of Milan, iii. 299, 300
Aretine, the, ii. 83
Aretino, Pietro, ii. 91
Aretino, Spinello, iii. 304
Aretusi, Cesare, ii. 149 _note_
Arezzo, ii. 214; iii. 7, 91, 96, 151 _note_;
Bishop of, iii. 74
Ariosto, i. 71; ii. 66, 160, 168, 261, 264, 265, 267, 269, 273, 280,
336, 343
Aristides, iii. 196
Aristophanes, i. 84 _note_; iii. 161, 341, 351, 353
Aristotle, i. 249; ii. 74; iii. 309
Aristoxenus, iii. 262, 263
Arles, i. 76-81;
King of, i. 79
Arno, the, iii. 91;
valley of, iii. 41
Arosa, valley of, i. 33
Arqua, i. 167, 168
Arrian, iii. 205
Aruns, iii. 94
Ascham, Roger, ii. 265, 266
Asciano, iii. 86, 87
Asinarus, iii. 327
Assisi, i. 137; ii. 35, 39, 43, 44, 46; iii. 35, 68, 111, 114, 140
Asso, the, iii. 108
Asti, i. 347, 348; ii. 193, 197
Astolphus, ii. 2
Athens, i. 243; iii. 156, 169, 182, 188, 207, 323, 339-364
Athens, Duke of, ii. 207, 208, 233 _note_
Atrani, iii. 251, 254
Attendolo, Sforza, i. 195; ii. 71
Atti, Isotta degli, ii. 17 and _note_, 20
Augustine, S., i. 232
Augustus, Emperor, ii. 1, 14; iii. 215
Aurelius, Marcus, iii. 164, 200
Ausonias, iii. 268
Aversa, iii. 253, 299, 300
Avignon, i. 69-71, 77, 81, 86; ii. 136; iii. 51, 74
Azzo (progenitor of Este and Brunswick), ii. 175
Azzo (son of Sigifredo), ii. 169
Badrutt, Herr Caspar, i. 55
Baffo, i. 259, 260
Baganza, the, ii. 184
Baglioni, the, ii. 16, 47, 71, 236; iii. 81, 113-115, 119-136
Baglioni, Annibale, iii. 132:
Astorre, iii. 113, 114, 121, 122, 125, 126:
Atalanta, iii. 116, 124, 127-129:
Braccio, iii. 134:
Carlo Barciglia, iii. 124:
Constantino, iii. 131:
Eusebio, iii. 131:
Filene, iii. 132:
Galeotto, iii. 124, 132:
Gentile, ii. 42, iii. 122, 132:
Gian-Paolo, ii. 47, 220, iii. 116, 117, 122, 125, 127, 128, 130-132:
Gismondo, iii. 122, 126, 127:
Grifone, iii. 124:
Grifonetto, ii. 47, iii. 113, 114, 124-129:
Guido, iii. 121, 126, 127:
Ippolita, iii. 131:
Malatesta, ii. 253, 254, iii. 127, 132:
Marcantonio, iii. 122, 125, 130:
Morgante, iii. 119 _note_ 2:
Niccolo, iii. 120:
Orazio, iii. 127, 132:
Pandolfo, iii. 120:
Pietro Paolo, ii. 41:
Ridolfo (1), iii. 120, 121:
Ridolfo (2), iii. 133, 134:
Simonetto, iii. 123, 124, 126:
Taddeo, iii. 131:
Troilo, iii. 122, 127
Baiæ, iii. 242
Balzac, ii. 160
Bandello, i. 155, 157, 158, 270; ii. 116, 265, 271, 277
Bandinelli, Messer Francesco, iii. 10-12
Barano, the, ii. 56-58
Barbarossa, Frederick, ii. 69, 201; iii. 7, 271, 290, 306 _note_ 2
Bari, Duke of. (_See_ Sforza, Lodovico)
Bartolo, San, iii. 59
Bartolommeo, Fra, iii. 63, 99
Basaiti, i. 269
Basella, i. 193
Basinio, ii. 18
Basle, i. 1, 2
Bassano, i. 340
Bastelica, i. 109, 113, 115
Bastia, Matteo di, i. 216
Battagli, Gian Battista, i. 216
Battifolle, Count Simone da, iii. 11
Baudelaire, iii. 280
Baveno, i. 19
Bayard, i. 113
Bazzi, Giovannantonio. (_See_ Sodoma)
Beatrice, Countess, iii. 144
Beatrice, Dante's, ii. 6
Beatrice of Lorraine, ii. 170
Beaumarchais, i. 228, 229, 234
Beaumont and Fletcher, ii. 267, 269
Becchi, Gentile, ii. 192
Beethoven, i. 10, 249; ii. 160
Belcari, Feo, ii. 305
Belcaro, iii. 66, 68
Belisarius, ii. 2; iii. 290
Bellagio, i. 186
Bellano, i. 186
Belleforest, ii. 116
Bellini, Gentile, i. 269, 270
Bellini, Gian, i. 263, 269; ii. 55, 135
Bellinzona, i. 180
Bembo, Pietro, ii. 82, 85
Benci, Spinello, iii. 94
Benedict, S., iii. 73, 81, 85, 248
Benevento, iii. 251, 252, 299
Benincasa, Jacopo (father of S. Catherine of Siena), iii. 50
Benivieni, ii. 305
Bentivogli, the, ii. 47, 178, 224
Bentivogli, Alessandro de', i. 155, 156
Bentivogli, Ercole de', ii. 224
Bentivoglio, Ermes, ii. 47
Benzone, Giorgio, i. 194
Beral des Baux, i. 79, 80
Berangère des Baux, i. 80
Berceto, ii. 131, 133
Berenger, King of Italy, ii. 169
Berenger, Raymond, i. 80
Bergamo, i. 190-207; ii. 82
Bernardino, S., iii. 69, 113
Bernardo, iii. 69-75
Bernardo da Campo, i. 61
Berne, i. 20
Bernhardt, Madame, ii. 108
Berni, ii. 270
Bernina, the, i. 37, 55-57, 60, 64, 126; ii. 128
Bernini, ii. 159
Bersaglio, i. 268
Bervic, ii. 149
Besa, iii. 190, 191, 205
Besozzi, Francesco, i. 156
Bevagna, ii. 35, 38
Beyle, Henri, ii. 102
Bianco, Bernardo, i. 177
Bibbiena, Cardinal, ii. 82, 83
Bibboni, Francesco, or Cecco, i. 327-341
Bion, i. 152; ii. 303
Biondo, Flavio, ii. 28
Bisola, Lodovico, ii. 150
Bithynia, iii. 208
Bithynium, iii. 187, 208
Blacas (a knight of Provence), i. 80
Blake, the poet, i. 101, 265; ii. 273; iii. 166, 260
Boccaccio, ii. 7, 160, 208, 260, 261, 265, 270, 272, 273, 277, 334;
iii. 16, 50, 248, 293
Bocognano, i. 109-111, 115
Bohemond, Prince of Tarentum, iii. 297, 298
Boiardo, Matteo Maria, ii. 30, 66, 269, 343
Boldoni, Polidoro, i. 183
Bologna, i. 121, 155, 192, 196, 326; ii. 29, 47, 85, 185, 224
Bologna, Gian, ii. 86
Bolsena, iii. 140, 141;
Lake of, iii. 22
Bona of Savoy (wife of Galeazzo Maria Sforza), ii. 230
Bondeno de' Roncori, ii. 178
Bonifazio (of Canossa), ii. 169, 170
Bordighera, i. 102, 103
Bordone, Paris, ii. 109
Borgia family, ii. 66, 117, 363 _note_
Borgia, Cesare, ii. 47, 48, 73, 74, 80, 83, 126, 363 _note_; iii. 131
Borgia, Lucrezia, ii. 363 _note_
Borgia, Roderigo, i. 220. (_See also_ Alexander VI.)
Borgognone, Ambrogio, i. 146-148; iii. 64
Bormio, i. 61, 180
Borromeo family, iii. 14
Borromeo, Carlo, i. 182
Borromeo, Count Giberto, i. 182
Boscoli, i. 341; ii. 246
Bosola, i. 149
Botticelli, Sandro, i. 266; ii. 29, 30; iii. 180 _note_
Bötticher, Charles, iii. 225
Bourbon, Duke of, i. 158;
Constable of, ii. 252
Bracciano, Duke of, ii. 91 foll., 104
Bracciano, second Duke of, ii. 93, 99, 101
Braccio, i. 195, 197, 204, 207; ii. 47; iii. 81
Braccio, Filippo da, iii. 124-126
Bracciolini, Poggio, iii. 96, 336
Bragadin, Aloisio, ii. 101
Bramante, i. 216, 243
Brancacci, Cardinal, iii. 96
Brancaleone, Senator, iii. 336
Brancaleoni family, ii. 66, 69
Bregaglia, i. 35;
valley of, i. 184
Brenner, the, ii. 168
Brenta, the, i. 258
Brescia, i. 63, 200; ii. 103, 169
Brest, Anna Maria, ii. 149
Brianza, the, i. 185, 186
Brolio, iii. 94
Bronte, iii. 279
Browne, Sir Thomas, i. 44; iii. 337
Browning, Robert, ii. 102, 270, 273, 281; iii. 173
Browning, Mrs., ii. 270, 271; iii. 173
Bruni, Lionardo, iii. 96, 98, 99
Buol family, the, i. 35, 36, 40, 41, 49, 61
Buol, Herr, i. 34-36
Buonaparte family, the, i. 119, 120
Buonarroti, Michel Angelo, i. 176, 193, 221, 236, 243, 326; ii. 21, 30,
40, 152, 158, 160, 161, 178, 253, 332; iii. 20, 22, 145, 146, 150, 154,
161
Buonconvento, iii. 72, 76
Burano, i. 258
Burgundy, Duke of, i. 202, 203
Burne-Jones, ii. 29
Busti, Agostino, i. 159, 161, 193
Byron, i. 280; ii. 7, 13, 15, 146, 162, 270, 271
Cadenabbia, i. 121, 173
Cadore, i. 267
Cæsarea, ii. 1
Cagli, ii. 56, 69, 74
Cajano, ii. 221
Calabria, iii. 305;
mountains of, iii.? 288
Calabria, Duke of, iii. 11
Calascibetta, iii. 302
Caldora, Giovanni Antonio, i. 202
Caldora, Jacopo, i. 196
Caligula, i. 134-136; iii. 2, 156, 163, 197, 273, 274
Calles (Cagli), ii. 57
Camargue, the, i. 78, 81
Camerino, Duchy of, i. 185; ii. 47, 73
Campagna, the, ii. 32
Campaldino, ii. 206
Campanella, iii. 20, 270
Campèll (or Campbèll) family, the i. 61, 62 and _note_
Campione, i. 175
Canale, Messer Carlo, ii. 363 _note_
Cannaregio, i. 268, 269, 339
Cannes, i. 103 _note_; ii. 143
Canonge, Jules, i. 81
Canossa, ii. 163-179
Cantù, i. 340
Cap S. Martin, i. 90
Capello, Bianca, ii. 93, 126
Capponi, Agostino, ii. 246
Capponi, Niccolo, ii. 253
Capri, ii. 58; iii. 242, 256, 269-276
Caracalla, i. 135; iii. 197
Cardona, Viceroy, ii. 244
Carducci, Francesco, ii. 253, 325
Carini, Baronessa di, ii. 276
Carlyle (quoted), i. 72
Carmagnola, i. 197, 200, 208; ii. 71
Carmagnuola, Bussoni di, ii. 17 and _note_
Carpaccio, Vittore, i. 269, 270; ii. 42
Carpegna, ii. 64
Carpi, Duchy of, i. 185; ii. 168
Carpi, the princes of, i. 202
Carrara range, the, ii. 134, 146, 218, 238
Casamicciola, iii. 234, 239
Casanova, i. 259, 260
Cascese, Santi da, ii. 224
Casentino, iii. 92
Cassinesi, the, iii. 248
Cassius, Dion, iii. 191, 193, 195-197, 219
Castagniccia, i. 110
Castagno, Andrea del, ii. 233
Castellammare, i. 103 _note_; iii. 232, 250, 276
Casti, Abbé, ii. 270
Castiglione, i. 144, 145; ii. 68, 80, 82; iii. 106, 108
Castro Giovanni, mountains of, iii. 279, 302, 304, 320
Catania, i. 87 _note_; iii. 279, 280, 288, 302, 304, 325
Catherine, S. (of Alexandria), i. 136, 142, 153, 155-157, 178; iii. 55,
61
Catherine, S. (of Sienna), i. 70; iii. 48-65
Catria, iii. 73
Catullus, iii. 180
Cavalcanti, Guido, ii. 261, 308, 325, 343
Cavicciuoli, Messer Guerra, iii. 2
Cavro, i. 109
Cécile (Passe Rose), i. 81
Cefalú, iii. 291
Cellant, Contessa di, i. 157-159
Cellant, Count of, i. 158
Cellini, Benvenuto, i. 2, 189, 240, 241, 328; ii. 25
Celsano, i. 329
Celsus, iii. 211, 219, 220
Cenci, the, ii. 17, 89
Cenci, Beatrice, ii. 102, 270
Ceno, the, ii. 183, 195
Centorbi, iii. 302
Cephalonia, iii. 363
Cephissus, the, iii. 350
Cerami, iii. 304
Cervantes, ii. 160
Cesena, ii. 15, 62
Cetona, iii. 103
Chalcedon, iii. 212
Châlons, the, i. 79
Chapman, George, ii. 268
Charles IV., iii. 6
Charles V., i. 184, 185, 187, 188, 319, 338, 339; ii. 75, 202, 255, 257
Charles VIII., ii. 67, 132, 183, 189 and _note_, 191-197, 238, 328
Charles of Anjou, iii. 315 _note_
Charles the Bold, i. 202
Charles Martel, i. 75
Charles of Valois, ii. 207
Chartres, i. 243
Chateaubriand, ii. 13
Chatterton, ii. 273
Chaucer, ii. 258, 260, 261, 270, 272
Chiana, the, iii. 91; valley of, iii. 90, 97
Chianti, iii. 94
Chiara, S., ii. 36, 37
Chiarelli, the, of Fabriano, ii. 236
Chiavari, iii. 256
Chiavenna, i. 35, 53, 63, 180, 184; ii. 130, 131
Chioggia, i. 257-261
Chiozzia, i. 350, 351
Chiusi, i. 86; ii. 50, 51, 52; iii. 22, 90, 92;
Lake of, iii. 91, 94, 101
Chiusure, iii. 77, 78, 80
Chivasso, i. 19
Christiern of Denmark, i. 205
Chur, i. 49, 65
Cicero, iii. 321
Ciclopidi rocks, iii. 284
Cima, i. 263
Cimabue, iii. 35, 144
Ciminian Hills, ii. 88; iii. 22
Cini family. (_See_ Ambrogini)
Cinthio, ii. 265, 272, 277
Ciompi, the, ii. 208, 209
Cisa, i. 340
Città della Pieve, ii. 51
Città di Castello, ii. 47, 71
Ciuffagni, Bernardo, ii. 30
Clair, S., ii. 37 and _note_
Clairvaux, Abbot of, iii. 70
Claudian, ii. 57, 343, 344
Clemens Alexandrinus, iii. 204, 217, 219
Clement VI., iii. 74, 132
Clement VII., i. 221, 316, 317, 321; ii. 233, 239, 247 foll.; iii. 138
_note_, 247
Climmnus, the, ii. 35, 39
Cloanthus, iii. 319
Clough, the poet, ii. 273
Clusium, iii. 93, 94
Coire, i. 183
Col de Checruit, the, i. 15
Coleridge, S.T., ii. 273; iii. 173
Colico, i. 64, 183
Collalto, Count Salici da, i. 337
Colleoni family, the, i. 194
Colleoni, Bartolommeo, i. 192-208; ii. 71
Colleoni, Medea, i. 193, 204
Collona family, ii. 187
Colma, the, i. 18
Colombini, iii. 69
Colonna, Francesco, iii. 103
Colonna, Giovanni, iii. 125, 254
Colonus, the, iii. 350
Columbus, i. 97; ii. 237
Commodus, i. 135; iii. 164
Comnena, Anna, iii. 297
Como, i. 136, 174-189
Como, Lake of, i. 50, 64, 122, 173, 174, 179, 181, 183-186
Conrad (of Canossa), ii. 178
Conrad, King of Italy, iii. 305
Conradin, iii. 298
Constance, daughter of King Roger of Sicily, iii. 297, 318
Constance of Aragon, wife of Frederick II., iii. 307 _note_
Constantinople, ii. 186; iii. 311
Contado, iii. 90
Copton, iii. 205
Corfu, i. 87 _note_, 103 _note_
Corgna, Bernardo da, iii. 125
Corinth, iii. 212, 322, 342, 362
Cormayeur, valley of, i. 9, 14-16
Correggio, i. 137, 140, 163; ii. 126, 147-162
Corsica, i. 85, 102-120; ii. 286
Corte, i. 110, 111
Corte Savella, ii. 96
Cortina, i. 268
Cortona, ii. 48-51, 214; iii. 90, 92, 151 _note_
Cortusi, the, iii. 6
Corviolo, ii. 170, 178
Coryat, Tom, i. 49
Costa (of Venice), Antonio, ii. 150
Costa (of Rome), ii. 33, 146
Courthezon, i. 81
Covo, i. 197
Cramont, the, i. 15
Credi, Lorenzo di, iii. 35
Crema, i. 194, 209-222
Cremona, i. 209, 213, 215; iii. 6
Crimisus, the, iii. 304, 319
Crotona, iii. 319
Crowne, the dramatist, ii. 159
Cuma, iii. 212
Curtius, Lancinus, i. 159, 193
Cyane, the, iii. 328
Cybo, Franceschetto, ii. 239
Dalcò, Antonio, ii. 150
Dandolo, Gherardo, i. 198
Dandolo, Matteo, iii. 133
Daniel, Samuel (the poet), ii. 263
Dante, i. 29, 80; ii. 5, 6, 13, 15, 23, 65, 70, 136, 137, 160, 170,
206, 207, 261, 262, 269, 273, 277, 305, 343; iii. 2, 19, 25, 36, 43
_note_, 67, 69, 73, 111, 144, 149, 173, 241, 317
D'Arcello, Filippo, i. 195
Davenant, Sir William, ii. 267
David, Jacques Louis, i. 71, 72
Davos, i. 20, 28-47, 49, 53, 58, 65, 183
Davos Dörfli, i. 53
De Comines, Philippe, ii. 190, 193-197; iii. 45 _note_, 69
De Gié, Maréchal, ii. 199
De Musset, iii. 163, 235
De Quincey, ii. 113; iii. 273 _note_
De Rosset, ii. 103
Dekker, Thomas, ii. 267
Del Corvo, ii. 136
Della Casa, Giovanni, i. 331, 333
Della Porta, i. 193
Della Quercia, i. 192
Della Rocca, Giudice, i. 112, 113
Della Rovere family, ii. 66 (_see also_ Rovere)
Della Seta, Galeazzo, i. 329
Demetrius, iii. 113
Demosthenes, iii. 323, 324, 326, 327
Desenzano, i. 173
Dickens, Charles, iii. 39
Dionysius, iii. 322, 325
Dischma-Thal, the, i. 49
Dolce Acqua, ii. 136
Dolcebono, Gian Giacomo, i. 153
Domenico da Leccio, Fra, iii. 83
Dominic, S., i. 221; iii. 61
Donatello, i. 150, 178; ii. 29, 30, 41; iii. 96, 97, 100
Doni, Adone, iii. 114
Doré, Gustave, i. 264; ii. 15
Doria, Pietro, i. 260
Doria, Stephen, i. 113
Dorias, the, i. 97
Dossi, Dosso, i. 166, 170, 172
Drayton, Michael, ii. 263
Druids, the, iii. 29
Drummond, William (the poet), ii. 263
Dryden, i. 2, 6; ii. 7, 270
Duccio, iii. 144, 145
Dürer, Albert, i. 345; ii. 275; iii. 260
Eckermann, ii. 157, 162
Edolo, i. 63
Edrisi, iii. 308, 309
Egypt, iii. 189, 190, 192, 210 foll.
Eichens, Edward, ii. 150
Eiger, the, i. 12
Electra, ii. 135
'Eliot, George,' ii. 270
Emilia, ii. 16
Emilia Pia, ii. 82
Empedocles, i. 87; iii. 172, 173, 174, 181, 337
Empoli, iii. 41, 87
Engadine, the, i. 48, 55, 56, 61, 183; ii. 128
Enna, iii. 302, 303 and _note_
Ennius, iii. 173, 181
Enza, the, ii. 166
Enzio, King, iii. 298
Epicurus, iii. 173, 174, 181
Eridanus, ii. 131
Eryx (Lerici), ii. 142
Este, i. 167
Este family, the, i. 166; ii. 68, 251, 268
Este, Azzo d', iii. 6:
Beatrice d', i. 150:
Cardinal d', ii. 91:
Ercole d', i. 202, ii. 236:
Guelfo d', ii. 177:
Guinipera d', ii. 17;
Lucrezia d', ii. 77, 83:
Niccolo d', ii. 236
Estrelles, the, i. 102
Etna, iii. 93, 103, 198, 279-287, 319, 325, 327
Etruscans, the, i. 49
Euganeans, the, i. 258, 281, 282; ii. 168
Eugénie, Empress, i. 119
Eugenius IV., i. 199; ii. 70, 220
Euhemerus, iii. 173
Euripides, ii. 142, 159 _note_, 335; iii. 89, 215, 340
Eusebius, iii. 197, 219
Everelina, ii. 166
Fabretti, Raffaello, iii. 209
Faenza, ii. 47
Fairfax, Edward, translator of Tasso, ii. 265
Fano, ii. 57, 59, 69
Fanum Fortunæ (Fano), ii. 57
Farnese, Alessandro, i. 317:
Julia, i. 193:
Odoardo, ii. 180:
Pier Luigi, iii. 133:
Ranunzio, ii. 180:
Vittoria, ii. 76
Farnesi family, ii. 75, 90, 117, 180; iii. 336
Faro, the, iii. 301, 320
Favara, iii. 309
Federighi, Antonio, iii. 62
Federigo of Urbino. (_See_ Urbino)
Feltre, Vittorino da, ii. 70
Ferdinand, Grand Duke of Tuscany, ii. 78
Ferdinand of Aragon, ii. 189, 191, 192, 193, 234; iii. 274, 276
Fermo, ii. 47, 90
Ferrara, i. 166, 167, 171; ii. 67, 68, 168, 169, 185, 221; iii. 6
Ferrara, Duke of, i. 206
Ferrari, Gaudenzio, i. 137-139, 141, 162-164, 177
Ferretti, Professor, ii. 179
Ferrucci, Francesco, i. 343; ii. 254
Fesch, Cardinal, i. 118
Fiesole, i. 86
Filelfo, Francesco, ii. 25
Filibert of Savoy, ii. 91
Filiberta, Princess of Savoy, ii. 247
Filippo, i. 149
Filonardi, Cinzio, iii. 133
Fina, Santa, iii. 59
Finiguerra, Maso, i. 218
Finsteraarhorn, the, ii. 130
Fiorenzuola, ii. 197, 284
Flaminian Way, ii. 55, 57
Flaxman, ii. 15
Fletcher, the dramatist, i. 358; ii. 267
Florence, i. 121, 316, 318, 319; ii. 5, 50, 145, 185, 187, 198,
201-257, 259, 305, 306; iii. 7, 10, 21, 132, 151 _note_, 317 _note_,
_et passim_
Florence, Duke of, i. 187
Fluela, the, i. 29, 37, 54
Fluela Bernina Pass, the, i. 53
Fluela Hospice, i. 59
Foglia, the, ii. 65
Foiano, ii. 50
Folcioni, Signor, i. 217
Folengo, ii. 270
Folgore da San Gemignano, ii. 53; iii. 1-20, 67, 70
Foligno, ii. 37-41, 45, 46, 52
Fondi, i. 318
Ford, John (the dramatist), ii, 267, 277
Forio, iii. 236, 237
Fornovo, ii. 132, 180-200
Fortini, iii. 68
Forulus (Furlo), ii. 57
Forum Sempronii (Fossombrone), ii. 57
Foscari, the, ii. 98
Fosdinovo, ii. 134-137
Fossato, ii. 52
Fossombrone, ii. 57, 58, 69, 85, 91
Fouquet, i. 80
Francesco, Fra, i. 269
Francesco da Carrara, iii. 6
Francesco Maria I. of Urbino. (_See_ Urbino)
Francesco Maria II. of Urbino. (_See_ Urbino)
Francia, Francesco, ii. 33
Francis I. of France, i. 113, 183, 184
Francis of Assisi, S., i. 99, 100; ii. 23, 44; iii. 57, 58, 61, 113
François des Baux, i. 81
Frederick, Emperor, i. 80
Frederick II., Emperor, iii. 297, 315 and _note_, 316-318
Frere, J.H., ii. 270
Friedrichs, ----, iii. 224
Frisingensis, Otto, iii. 7
Friuli, i. 351
Furka, ii. 130
Furlo, ii. 55
Furlo Pass, ii. 57, 58
Fusina, i. 281
Gaeta, i. 318; iii. 235
Galatea, i. 91
Galileo, ii. 27
Galli Islands, iii. 270
Gallio, Marchese Giacomo, i. 179
Gallo, Antonio di San, iii. 90, 102
Gallo, Francesco da San, ii. 253; iii. 247
Garda, i. 173;
Lake of, ii. 98, 169
Gardon, the, valley of, i. 75
Garfagnana, ii. 168
Garigliano, iii. 247
Gaston de Foix, i. 160, 161, 193; ii. 2, 10
Gattamelata (Erasmo da Narni), i. 197; ii. 41, 71
Gellias, iii. 337
Gelon, iii. 290, 304
Genoa, i. 97, 105, 113, 259; ii. 185; iii. 250, 253, 317 _note_
Gentile, Girolamo, ii. 236
George of Antioch, iii. 307, 311
Gérard, ii. 149
Gerardo da Camino, iii. 6
Ghiacciuolo, ii. 15
Ghibellines, ii. 15, 54, 69, 202 foll.; iii. 17, 43 _note_, 73, 110
Ghiberti, Lorenzo di Cino, ii. 30; iii. 145, 146
Giannandrea, bravo of Verona, ii. 85
Giardini, iii. 287
Giarre, iii. 279
Gibbon, Edward (cited), i. 346
Ginori, Caterina, i. 323, 324
Ginori, Lionardo, i. 323
Giordani, i. 326
Giorgione, i. 345; iii. 247
Giottino, ii. 233 _note_
Giotto, i. 152; ii. 43, 206; iii. 35, 145, 248
Giovanni da Fogliani, ii. 47
Giovenone, i. 139
Giovio, i. 322
Girgenti, iii. 266, 291, 302, 304, 320, 321, 332-338
Giulio Romano, i. 140, 152