Walks in Rome

by Augustus J. C. Hare

At the entrance of the left aisle is a fine bas-relief of St. Peter throned, delivering his keys to an angel, who acknowledges his supremacy by receiving them on his knees. This work was executed in 1465, and serves as a monument to the Cardinal de Cusa, Bishop of Brixen, whose incised gravestone lies beneath.

Over the second altar is a most interesting mosaic of 680, representing, in old age, the St. Sebastian whom we are accustomed to see as a beautiful youth, wounded with arrows,—which he survived:—

"A single figure in mosaic exists as an altar-piece in S. Pietro in Vincoli. It is intended for St. Sebastian, who was removed to the church by Pope Agathon, on occasion of the plague in 680, and doubtless executed soon after this date. As a specimen of its kind it is very remarkable. There is no analogy between this figure and the usual youthful type of St. Sebastian which was subsequently adopted. On the contrary, the saint is represented here as an old man with white hair and beard, carrying the crown of martyrdom in his hand, and dressed from head to foot in true Byzantine style. In his countenance there is still some life and dignity. The more careful shadowing also of the drapery shows that, in a work intended to be so much exposed to the gaze of the pious, more pains were bestowed than usual; nevertheless, the figure, upon the whole, is very inanimate; the ground is blue."—Kugler.

The first altar in the right aisle has a picture of St. Augustine by Guercino; then come tombs of Cardinals Margotti and Agucci, from designs of Domenichino, who has introduced a portrait of the former in his monument. At the end of this aisle is the beautiful picture of St. Margaret and the Dragon by Guercino; the saint is inspired, and displaying no sign of fear,—an earthly impulse only appearing in the motion of her hand, which seems pushing back the dragon.

"St. Margaret was daughter of a priest of Antioch named Theodosius, and was brought up as a Christian by her nurse, whose sheep she watched upon the hills, while meditating upon the mysteries of the gospel. The governor of Antioch fell in love with her and wished to marry her, but she refused, and declared herself a Christian. Her friends thereupon deserted her, and the governor tried to subdue her by submitting her to horrible tortures, amid which her faith did not fail. She was then dragged to a dungeon, where Satan, in the form of a terrible dragon, came upon her with his inflamed and hideous mouth wide open, and sought to terrify and confound her; but she held up the cross of the Redeemer, and he fled before it. She finally suffered death by decapitation. Her legend was certainly known in the fifth century: in the fourteenth century she was one of the favourite saints, and was specially invoked by women against the pains of child-birth.

"'Mild Margarete, that was God's maide;
Maid Margarete, that was so meeke and milde.'"
See Jameson's Sacred and Legendary Art, v. I.

Here is the glory of the church—the famous Moses of Michael Angelo, forming part of the decorations of the unfinished monument of Julius II.

"This pope, whom nature had intended for a conqueror, and destiny clothed with the robe of a priest, takes his place by the side of the great warriors of the sixteenth century, by the side of Charles V., of Francis I., of Gonsalvo, of Cortes, of Alba, of Bayard, and of Doria. It is difficult to imagine Julius II. murmuring prayers, or saying mass in pontifical robes, and performing, in the midst of all those unmanly functions and thousand passive forms, the spirit-deadening part which is assigned to the popes, while his soul was on fire with great-hearted designs, and while in the music of the psalms he seemed to hear the thunder of cannon. He wished to be a prince of the Church; and with the political instinct of a prince he founded his state in the midst of the most difficult wars against France, and unhesitatingly conquered and took possession of Bologna, Piacenza, Parma, Reggio, and Urbino....

The greatest pope since Innocent III., and the creator of a new political spirit in the papacy, he wished, as a second Augustus, to glorify himself and his creation. He took up again the projects of Nicholas V. Rome should become his monument. To carry out his designs he found the genius of Bramante and Raphael, and, above all, that of Michael Angelo, who belonged to him like an organ of his being. St. Peter's, of which he laid the foundation-stone, the paintings of the Sistine, the loggie of Bramante, the stanze of Raphael, are memorials of Julius the Second."—Gregorovius, Grabmaler der Papste.

Most of all Julius II. sought immortality in his tomb, for which the original design was absolutely gigantic. Eighteen feet high, and twelve wide, it was intended to contain more than forty statues, which were to include Moses, St. Peter and St. Paul, Rachel and Leah, and chained figures of the Provinces, while those of the Heaven and the Earth were to support the sarcophagus of the pope. This project was cut short by the death of Julius in 1513, when only four of the statues were finished, and eight designed.[261] Of those which were finished, three statues, the Moses, the Rachel, and the Leah, were afterwards used for the existing memorial, which was put together under Paul III. by the Duke of Urbino, heir of Julius II.—in this church of which his uncle had been a cardinal.