Soon after the Palazzo Gazzalo, which boasted a fine garden now only kept as a nursery garden, is the old church of the Cappucines, with traces here and there of Roman masonry. It is now given up to the manufacture of torpedo boats. A few paces further on (going always towards the town) we come to a large enclosure where a horse fair is held twice a year, and where a brisk trade is done in that line, horses to the number of about a thousand coming from Italy, Hungary and other countries to be bought and sold. Through this modern commercial part of Verona we pass to the garden of the Orfanotrofio, where the made-up tomb of Romeo and Juliet has been placed. The tomb is of red Verona marble, but before it was put to this use it served as a washing-trough. A feeling of pity and disdain cannot but be felt over the fraud here practised to arouse false sentimentality. The story of the two lovers, as is well known, had no foundation, and was taken by Shakespeare from one of the tales of Luigi di Porto, a novelist of the sixteenth century. The enmity between the two houses of Montagu and Capulet was indeed a fact historically true, and a fact also whose effect made itself felt in the civil wars and dissensions that had so often disturbed the internal life of Verona. This enmity has also been noticed by Dante, who speaks of it in the Purg. vi. 107. But the very silence maintained by the great Tuscan over the story of the lovers is proof enough that so touching a romance had no foundation. Had there been one we may be sure that the master-hand at whose touch Paolo and Francesca have been endowed with immortal fame, and who in six short lines has sketched for us the tragedy of La Pia, would not have left “unwept, unhonoured and unsung” the memory of the lovers of Verona. Romeo and Juliet lived only in the imagination of our great dramatist, who has bestowed on them a fame and immortality which they could never have gained for themselves, and which has endeared them to every heart.
The bridge called “Rofiolo” leads into the wide Via Pallone, and close beside it is to be seen a tablet with some heads carved on it in high relief. The story of this tablet and of the strange name of “Rofiolo” has been explained as follows: some “guilty sons” (rei figli, hence rofiolo) murdered their parents and threw them into the canal which flows hard by. The name of these “guilty sons” has consequently been affixed to the spot where their iniquity was perpetrated, and their effigies have been placed near at hand. Such at least is the tradition, into whose absolute veracity it were perhaps well not to inquire too closely.
The Via Pallone leads into the Piazza Vittorio Emanuele, or Piazza Brà (from Preatum, a meadow) where on one side is an equestrian statue of Victor Emanuel by Borghi, placed there in 1883. The Arena on the east side of the Square forms naturally enough the chief object of interest, but there are also some buildings and palaces around for which a moment’s notice may be claimed. The double archway which leads out of the Piazza into the Corso Vittorio Emanuele dates from the epoch of the Scaligers, or more probably from that of the Visconti, as does also the pentagonal tower beside it. Close to this again is the Palazzo della Gran Guardia Vecchia, a huge massive building ascribed to one Curtoni (1609), a pupil of San Micheli. It was built for public meetings, concerts, lectures and the like, and serves for such purposes still. On the other side of the archway, or as it is called, the Portone della Brà, is the Museo Lapidario, which stands inside the courtyard of the Philharmonic Theatre. It was founded and organised by the historian Scipione Maffei, and contains a large amount of precious lapidary relics among which are to be discovered runic, Latin, Greek, Arabic, Egyptian, Persian and Hebrew inscriptions. The most fashionable cafés are also to be found in this Piazza, and in hot weather those inhabitants of Verona who cannot escape for change of air and scene to the country wend their way thither to court the fresh breeze of the wide open square at even-time.
CHAPTER XII
San Zeno
THE road to S. Zeno leads straight past the Castel Vecchio; and away from the noise and bustle of the town we approach one of the finest examples of a Romanesque church to be found in the whole of Northern Italy. A quiet dignity and simplicity may be said to be the characteristics of this glorious basilica both within and without; while the blending of pagan antiquity and Christian feeling has brought about a harmony in expression and construction that is very impressive. Tradition has it that King Pepin, Charlemagne’s son, was the founder, but no document exists to prove this, though the belief that it was begun about the year 900, and that its erection was gone on with for two succeeding centuries, has much to support it. It is certain that the Emperor Otho I. of Germany on his way to Rome through Verona sojourned for a while at the monastery of S. Zeno, and left a large sum of money with the Bishop Rathold towards the fund for the completion of the church. There is not a corner of S. Zeno that is not of interest, and this begins with the west front, with the portals, and with the doors, each one claiming in turn its meed of praise and admiration. The church has been enlarged and restored, but nevertheless it retains its noble proportions intact, and modern works have done little to injure the plan and construction of the building. The façade is embellished with bas-reliefs, carved in the yellow stone of the country, and taken from legendary and sacred subjects. In the right hand corner the legend of King Theodoric is represented, for it is supposed that he is the warrior here at the chase, pursuing the stag which cannot be caught, and in whose pursuit the hunter rides on till he reaches the gates of hell. The sculptures are rough and uncouth, but full of life and movement, and were executed in the year 1139 by Wiligelmus and Nicolaus, this latter being the same artist whose work has already been noticed at the Duomo. The round window above the portal stands for the wheel of fortune, with figures in different attitudes to express the moods of the changeable goddess. On the outer circle is engraved in leonine lines:—
“En ego Fortuna moderor mortalibus una,
Elevo, depono, bona cunctis vel mala dono.”
which may be loosely rendered—
“Behold, I, Fortune, I alone bestow on mortals,
I raise, depose; to all I give or good or evil gifts.”
On the inner circle is written:—
“Induo nudatos, denudo veste paratos,
In me confidit si quis, derisus abibit.”