History for ready reference, Volume 3, Greece to Nibelungen

by J. N. Larned

Cromwell's deportation of Girls to Jamaica.
See JAMAICA: A. D. 1655.
IRELAND: A. D. 1660-1665.
The restored Stuarts and their Act of Settlement.
"On the fall of Richard Cromwell, a council of officers was
established in Dublin; these summoned a convention of deputies
from the protestant proprietors; and the convention tendered
to Charles the obedience of his ancient kingdom of Ireland.
… To secure the royal protection, they made the king an
offer of a considerable sum of money, assured him, though
falsely, that the Irish Catholics meditated a general
insurrection, and prayed him to summon a protestant parliament
in Ireland, which might confirm the existing proprietors in
the undisturbed possession of their estates. The present was
graciously accepted, and the penal laws against the Irish
Catholics were ordered to be strictly enforced; but Charles
was unwilling to call a parliament, because it would
necessarily consist of men whose principles, both civil and
religious, he had been taught to distrust. The first measure
recommended to him by his English advisers, with respect to
Ireland, was the re-establishment of episcopacy. For this no
legislative enactment was requisite. His return had given to
the ancient laws their pristine authority. … In a short time
the episcopal hierarchy was quietly restored to the enjoyment
of its former rights, and the exercise of its former
jurisdiction. To this, a work of easy accomplishment,
succeeded a much more difficult attempt,—the settlement of
landed property in Ireland. The military, whom it was
dangerous to disoblige, and the adventurers, whose pretensions
had been sanctioned by Charles I., demanded the royal
confirmation of the titles by which they held their estates;
and the demand was opposed by a multitude of petitioners
claiming restitution or compensation [protestant royalists,
loyal Catholics, &c.]. … Humanity, gratitude, and justice,
called on the king to listen to many of these claims. … From
an estimate delivered to the king, it appeared that there
still remained at his disposal forfeited lands of the yearly
rental of from eighty to one hundred thousand pounds; a fund
sufficiently ample, it was contended, to 'reprize' or
compensate all the Irish really deserving of the royal favour.
Under this impression, Charles published his celebrated
declaration for the settlement of Ireland. It provided that no
person deriving his title from the adventurers under the
parliament, or the soldiers under the commonwealth, should be
disturbed in the possession of his lands, without receiving an
equivalent from the fund for reprisals; that all innocents,
whether protestants or Catholics, that is, persons who had
never adhered either to the parliament or the confederates,
should be restored to their rightful estates." After much
contention between deputations from both sides sent to the
king, an act was passed through the Irish parliament
substantially according to the royal declaration. "But to
execute this act was found to be a task of considerable
difficulty. By improvident grants of lands to the church, the
dukes of York, Ormond, and Albemarle, the earls of Orrery,
Montrath, Kingston, Massarene, and several others, the fund
for reprisals had been almost exhausted." New controversies
and agitations arose, which finally induced the soldiers,
adventurers, and grantees of the crown to surrender one third
of their acquisitions, for the augmenting of the fund for
reprisals. "The king, by this measure, was placed in a
situation [August, 1665], not indeed to do justice, but to
silence the most importunate or most deserving among the
petitioners. … But when compensation had thus been made to a
few of the sufferers, what, it may be asked, became of the
officers who had followed the royal fortune abroad, or of the
3,000 Catholics who had entered their claims of innocence? To
all these, the promises which had been made by the act of
settlement were broken; the unfortunate claimants were
deprived of their rights, and debarred from all hope of future
relief. A measure of such sweeping and appalling oppression is
perhaps without a parallel in the history of civilized
nations. Its injustice could not be denied; and the only
apology offered in its behalf was the stern necessity of
quieting the fears and jealousies of the Cromwellian settlers,
and of establishing on a permanent basis the protestant
ascendancy in Ireland. … The following is the general
result. The protestants were previously [i. e., before the
Cromwellian Settlement] in possession of about one moiety of
all the profitable lands in the island; of the second moiety,
which had been forfeited under the commonwealth, something
less than two-thirds was by the act confirmed to the
protestants; and of the remainder a portion almost equal in
quantity, but not in quality, to one-third, was appropriated
to the Catholics."
J. Lingard,
History of England,
volume 11, chapter 4.
ALSO IN:
J. A. Froude,
The English in Ireland,
book 1, chapter 3 (volume 1).
T. Carte,
Life of James Duke of Ormond,
book 6 (volume 4).
IRELAND: A. D. 1685-1688.
The reign of James II.
Domination of Tyrconnel and the Catholics.
"At the accession of James II., in 1685, he found the native
Irish, all of whom were Roman Catholics, opposed to the
English rule, as to that of a conquering minority. … Of the
settlers, the Scotch Presbyterians shared the feelings of
their brethren in their native country, and hated
Episcopalians with the true religious fury. In the Irish
Parliament the Presbyterians and Episcopalians were nearly
balanced, whilst the Protestant Nonconformists, in numbers
almost equalling the other two parties, had but few seats in
the Parliament. The Episcopalians alone were hearty supporters
of the house of Stuart; the Presbyterians and Nonconformists
were Whigs. James was in a most favourable position for
tranquilising Ireland, for, as a Roman Catholic, he was much
more acceptable to the native Irish than his predecessors had
been.
{1771}
Had he followed his true interests, he would have endeavoured,
firstly, to unite together, as firmly as possible, the English
settlers in Ireland, and secondly, by wise acts of mediation,
to bridge over the differences between the English and Irish.
Thus he might have welded them into one people. James,
however, followed a directly opposite policy, and the results
of this misgovernment of Ireland are visible at the present
day. The Duke of Ormond was at the time of the death of
Charles II. both lord lieutenant and commander of the forces.
… Soon after his accession James recalled him, and the
office of lord lieutenant was bestowed on his own
brother-in-law, Lord Clarendon, whilst the post of general of
the troops was given to Richard Talbot, Earl of Tyrconnel.
Talbot … was a coarse, vulgar, truculent ruffian, greedy and
unprincipled; but in the eyes of James he had great virtues,
for he was devoted to the Romish Church and to his sovereign.
'Lying Dick Talbot,' as he was called, was raised by James to
the peerage as Earl of Tyrconnel. Lord Clarendon was, from the
time of his appointment, hampered by his associate," who,
finally, in 1687, supplanted him, gathering the reins of
government into his own hands, "not indeed as lord lieutenant,
but with the power which Ormond had formerly held, although
under a new title, that of lord deputy. The rule of Tyrconnel
entirely subverted the old order of things. Protestants were
disarmed and Protestant soldiers were disbanded. The militia
was composed wholly of Roman Catholics. The dispensing power
in the royal prerogative set aside the statutes of the
kingdom, and the bench and privy council were occupied by
Roman Catholics. Vacant bishoprics of the Established Church
remained unfilled, and their revenues were devoted to Romish
priests. Tithes were with impunity withheld from the clergy of
the Establishment. … The hatred of the Irish Roman Catholics
towards the Protestant settlers was excited to the utmost
under Tyrconnel's rule. The former now hoped to mete out to
the latter a full measure of retaliation. The breach was
widened owing to the fear and distrust openly showed by the
Protestants, and has never since been effectually repaired."
Before the occurrence of the Revolution which drove James from
his throne, in 1688, "Tyrconnel had disarmed all the
Protestants, except those in the North. He had a large force
of 20,000 men under arms, and of this force all the officers
were trustworthy and Papists. He had filled the corporations
of the towns with adherents of James. He had shown himself to
be, as ever, tyrannical and unscrupulous. It was universally
believed by the Protestants that a general massacre, a second
St. Bartholomew, was intended. Even a day, December 9, was,
they thought, fixed for the expected outbreak. The garrison of
Londonderry had been temporarily withdrawn. On December 8,
Lord Antrim arrived in command of 12,000 [1,200?] soldiers to
form the new garrison. Without any warning, the Protestant
apprentices ('the prentice boys of Derry') shut the gates of
the city in his face. The inhabitants, in spite of the
entreaties of the bishop and of the town council, refused to
allow them to be opened. Antrim was compelled to withdraw.
Thus one rallying-point was gained for the opponents of James.
Another was found in Enniskillen, sixty miles south of
Londonderry. Into these two towns poured all the Protestants
from the surrounding districts. With these two exceptions, the
boast of Tyrconnel that Ireland was true, was well founded."
E. Hale,
The Fall of the Stuarts,
chapters 10 and 13.
"He [James II.] deliberately resolved, not merely to give to
the aboriginal inhabitants of Ireland the entire dominion of
their own country, but also to use them as his instruments for
setting up arbitrary government in England. The event was such
as might have been foreseen. The colonists turned to bay with
the stubborn hardihood of their race. The mother country
justly regarded their cause as her own. Then came a desperate
struggle for a tremendous stake. … The contest was terrible
but short. The weaker went down. His fate was cruel; and yet
for the cruelty with which he was treated there was, not
indeed a defence, but an excuse: for though he suffered all
that tyranny could inflict, he suffered nothing that he would
not himself have inflicted. The effect of the insane attempt
to subjugate England by means of Ireland was that the Irish
became hewers of wood and drawers of water to the English. …
The momentary ascendency of Popery produced such a series of
barbarous laws against Popery as made the statute book of
Ireland a proverb of infamy throughout Christendom. Such were
the bitter fruits of the policy of James."
Lord Macaulay,
History of England,
chapter 6 (volume 2).
ALSO IN:
J. R. O'Flanagan,
Lives of the Lord Chancellors of Ireland,
chapter 28 (volume 1).
IRELAND: A. D. 1688-1689.
Enniskillen and the Battle of Newton Butler.
Enniskillen, then a village, surrounding an ancient castle,
was, in 1688-89, one of the two rallying points of the
Protestant colonists in Ireland, who supported the Revolution
by which James II. was dethroned and William and Mary were
crowned. The chief stronghold of their cause was Londonderry;
but Enniskillen bore a scarcely less important part. "In
December, 1688, Tyrconnel's troops, being two companies of
Popish infantry, advanced upon Enniskillen. The inhabitants,
reinforced by 200 foot and 150 horse, contributed by the
neighbouring gentry, marched out to oppose them. Tyrconnel's
men fled to Cavan. The Enniskilleners, then, arming themselves
as well as they could, and converting all the country-houses
round Lough Erne into garrisons, appointed Gustavus Hamilton
their governor and resolved upon defence. … Early in May,
1689, the Enniskilleners routed Tyrconnel's troops, sent from
Connaught into Donegal. They next drove 1,500 men out of the
County Cavan—destroyed the Castle of Ballincarrig—and then
entered the County Meath, whence they carried off oxen and
sheep. Colonel Hugh Sutherland was sent with a regiment of
dragoons and two regiments of foot against the Enniskilleners,
who, however, defeated them, and took Belturbet, where they
found muskets, gunpowder, and provisions; but unfortunately
they were unable to relieve Derry, then beleaguered and sorely
distressed. The Enniskilleners held out against all attacks,
and refused all terms of surrender. They were now assailed
from various points; by Macarthy (then by James created
Viscount Mountcashel) from the east, by another body from the
west, and by the Duke of Berwick from the north.
{1772}
The Enniskilleners sent to Colonel Kirke [commanding the
English forces first sent to Ireland by William of Orange] who
had arrived in Lough Foyle, and received from him some arms
and ammunition; and Colonel Wolseley and Lieutenant-Colonel
Berry came from him to their assistance. Colonel Wolseley took
the command." Under Wolseley, the men of Enniskillen, 3,000
strong, encountered 5,000 of the enemy, under Mountcashel,
near the town of Newton Butler, on the 31st of July, three
days after Derry had been relieved. Their victory was
complete. "The whole Irish force was totally and hopelessly
routed. Their slaughter was dreadful—l,500 killed, and 500
drowned in Lough Erne, whither they were driven. Mountcashel
was wounded and taken prisoner. The Enniskilleners lost only
twenty killed and fifty wounded. They took 400 prisoners, some
cannons, fourteen barrels of gunpowder, and all the colours
and drums. … The victory became known at Strabane to the
Irish army retreating from Derry, which thereupon broke up in
confusion and fled to Omagh, and thence to Charlemont."
W. H. Torriano,
William the Third,
chapter 21.
ALSO IN:
Lord Macaulay,
History of England,
chapter 12 (volume 3).
IRELAND: A. D. 1689-1691.
The War of the Revolution.
The Orange conquest.
Supported by a French fleet, supplied moderately with French
gold, and accompanied by a picked body of French officers, for
the organizing and disciplining of raw Irish troops, James II.
landed in Ireland, at Kinsale, on the 12th of March, 1689, to
take personal possession of the government still maintained
there in his name. From Kinsale he hastened to Dublin, "and
summoned a Parliament, which met on May 7, 1689, and sat until
July 18. This Parliament of James has been described as a
Parliament of Irish Celts, yet out of the 228 members of the
House of Commons about one-fourth only belonged to the native
race, and even including members of families Anglicized or of
doubtful origin, not one-third of the House of Commons
belonged to the so-called Celts. Of the thirty-two lay peers
who attended, not more than two or three bore old Irish names.
The four spiritual peers were Protestant bishops."
W. K. Sullivan,
part 1, of Two Centuries of Irish History
chapter 1.
"The members of the House of Commons were almost all new men,
completely inexperienced in public business and animated by
the resentment of the bitterest wrongs. Many of them were sons
of some of the 3,000 proprietors who without trial and without
compensation had been deprived by the Act of Settlement of the
estates of their ancestors. To all of them the confiscations
of Ulster, the fraud of Strafford, the long train of
calamities that followed were recent and vivid events. … It
will hardly appear surprising to candid men that a Parliament
so constituted and called together amid the excitement of a
civil war, should have displayed much violence, much disregard
for vested interests. Its measures, indeed, were not all
criminal. By one Act which was far in advance of the age, it
established perfect religious liberty in Ireland. … By
another Act, repealing Poynings' law, and asserting its own
legislative independence, it anticipated the doctrine of
Molyneux, Swift, and Grattan. … A third measure abolished
the payments to Protestant clergy in the corporate towns,
while a fourth ordered that the Catholics throughout Ireland
should henceforth pay their tithes and other ecclesiastical
dues to their own priests and not to the Protestant clergy.
The Protestants were still to pay their tithes to their own
clergy. … Several other measures—most of them now only
known by their titles—were passed for developing the
resources of the country or remedying some great abuse. … If
these had been the only measures of the Irish Parliament it
would have left an eminently honourable reputation. But,
unfortunately, one of its main objects was to re-establish at
all costs the descendants of the old proprietors in their
land, and to annul by measures of sweeping violence the
grievous wrongs and spoliations their fathers and their
grandfathers had undergone. The first and most important
measure with this object was the repeal of the Acts of
Settlement and Explanation. … The preamble asserts that the
outbreak of 1641 had been solely due to the intolerable
oppression and to the disloyal conduct of the Lords Justices
and Puritan party, that the Catholics of Ireland before the
struggle had concluded had been fully reconciled to the
sovereign, that they had received from the sovereign a full
and formal pardon, and that the royal word had been in
consequence pledged to the restitution of their properties.
This pledge by the Act of Settlement had been to a great
extent broken, and the Irish legislators maintained that the
twenty-four years which had elapsed since that Act had not
annulled the rights of the old proprietors or their
descendants. They maintained that these claims were not only
valid but were prior to all others, and they accordingly
enacted that the heirs of all persons who had possessed landed
property in Ireland on October 22, 1641, and who had been
deprived of their inheritance by the Act of Settlement, should
enter at once into possession of their old properties. … The
long succession of confiscations of Irish land which had taken
place from the days of Mary to the Act of Settlement had been
mainly based upon real or pretended plots of the owners of the
soil, which enabled the Government, on the plea of high
treason, to appropriate the land which they desired. In 1689
the great bulk of the English proprietors of Irish soil were
in actual correspondence with William, and were therefore
legally guilty of high treason. The Irish legislators now
proceeded to follow the example of the British Governments,
and by a clause of extreme severity they pronounced the real
estates of all Irish proprietors who dwelt in any part of the
three kingdoms which did not acknowledge King James, or who
aided, abetted or corresponded with the rebels, to be
forfeited and vested in the Crown, and from this source they
proposed to compensate the purchasers under the Act of
Settlement. … The measure of repeal, however, was speedily
followed by another Act of much more sweeping and violent
injustice. The Act of Attainder, which was introduced in the
latter part of June, aimed at nothing less than a complete
overthrow of the existing land system in Ireland. A list
divided into several groups, but containing in all more than
2,000 names, was drawn up of landowners who were to be
attainted of high treason. …
{1773}
Few persons will question the tyranny of an Act which in this
manner made a very large proportion of the Irish landlords
liable to the penalties of high treason, unless they could
prove their innocence, even though the only crime that could
be alleged against them was that of living out of Ireland in a
time of civil war. … It is … a curious illustration of the
carelessness or partiality with which Irish history is
written, that no popular historian has noticed that five days
before this Act, which has been described as 'without a
parallel in the history of civilised countries,' was
introduced into the Irish Parliament, a Bill which appears, in
its essential characteristics, to have been precisely similar
was introduced into the Parliament of England; that it passed
the English House of Commons; that it passed, with slight
amendments, the English House of Lords; and that it was only
lost, in its last stage, by a prorogation. … These facts
will show how far the Irish Act of Attainder was from having
the unique character that has been ascribed to it. It is not
possible to say how that Act would have been executed, for the
days of Jacobite ascendency were now few and evil. The
Parliament was prorogued on the 20th of July, one of its last
Acts being to vest in the King the property of those who were
still absentees."
W. E. H. Lecky,
History of England in the 18th Century,
chapter 6 (volume 2).
While James' Irish Parliament sat, "sufficient men had
presented themselves to form fifty regiments of infantry and a
proportionate number of cavalry. But … these levies were
undisciplined, and their officers, with few exceptions, were
without military training and experience. There were no
arsenals, and in the government stores only about 1,000
serviceable firearms were found; there was no artillery and no
supply of ammunition. … What coin was in circulation was
small in quantity and debased in quality. James's Government
issued a brass coinage, which had no currency outside the
kingdom, and even within it practically circulated only among
the partisans of James, and could not consequently help in
purchasing arms, ammunition, and military stores, which had to
be imported from without. Under such unfavourable
circumstances the war began. The first campaign comprised the
siege, or rather blockade, of Derry—for the Irish, having no
artillery, could not undertake a regular siege—which was
gallantly defended by the Scoto-English colonists; the check
of Mountcashel by the Enniskilleners, who had followed the
example of Derry; the landing of Schomberg with an army of
Dutch, French Protestants, and English, who went into winter
quarters near Dundalk, where he lost nearly half his troops
from sickness; and, lastly, the military parade of James, who
marched out from Dublin, and, failing to force Schomberg to
fight, went into winter quarters himself. The result of the
campaign was the successful defence of Derry, and the signal
exhibition of James's incapacity as a general. At the opening
of the second campaign, an exchange of troops was made between
James and Louis XIV., with the view of giving prestige to the
cause of the former. Six thousand French troops, under a
drawing-room general, the well-known Comte de Lauzun, arrived
in Ireland, and the same ships carried back an equal number of
Irish troops—the brigade of Mountcashel, the best-trained and
best-equipped body of troops in the Irish army. … The wasted
army of Schomberg was strengthened by the arrival of William
himself on June 14, 1690, with a considerable force. The
united armies, composed of the most heterogeneous materials,
one-half being foreigners of various nationalities, amounted
to between 36,000 and 48,000 men. … To meet William, James
set out from Dublin with an army of about 23,000 men. The
French troops and the Irish cavalry were good, but the
infantry was not well trained, and the artillery consisted
only of twelve field-pieces. The battle took place on July 1,
1690, at the passage of the River Boyne, a few miles above
Drogheda the rout of James's army being complete and its loss
about 1,500 men. William lost but 500; but the number included
Schomberg, one of the great soldiers of his age. James was
among the first in the flight, and he scarcely paused until he
had put himself on board of a French frigate and quitted
Ireland forever]. The Irish fell back on Dublin and thence
retired behind the line of the Shannon. About 20,000
half-armed infantry and about 3,500 horse concentrated at
Limerick. The English having failed in taking Athlone, the key
of the upper Shannon, William gathered together about 38,000
men in the neighbourhood of Limerick. Lauzun having declared
that Limerick could not be defended, and might be taken with
roasted apples, withdrew with the whole of the French troops
to Galway, to await the first opportunity of returning to
France. On August 9, 1690, William moved his whole army close
to the town and summoned the garrison to surrender; but having
failed, with a loss of 2,000 men, to carry the town by
assault, he raised the siege and went to England. The third
and last campaign began late in 1691. The Irish received many
promises of assistance from Louis XIV., but his ministers
fulfilled few or none of them. With scarcely any loss of men,
and with a small expenditure of stores and money, the Irish
war enabled Louis to keep William and a veteran army of 40,000
men out of his way. … The campaign opened in the beginning
of June with the advance of Ginkel [William's general] on
Athlone. The chief defence of the place was the River Shannon,
the works being weak, and mounting only a few field-pieces;
yet so obstinately was the place defended that, but for the
discovery of a ford, and some neglect on the part of D'Usson,
who commanded, it is probable that the siege would have been
raised. As it was, Ginkel became master of the heap of ruins.
… St. Ruth [the French officer commanding the Irish] moved
his camp to Aughrim [or Aghrim], and there was fought the
final battle of the war on Sunday, July 12, 1691. … St. Ruth
was killed at a critical moment, and his army defeated, with a
loss of about 4,000 men, the English loss being about half
that number. Part of the defeated Irish infantry retreated to
Galway; but the bulk of the troops, including the whole of the
cavalry, fell back on Limerick, which surrendered, after a
gallant resistance, in October, 1691."
W. K. Sullivan,
part 1 of Two Centuries of Irish History,
chapter 1.
ALSO IN:
Lord Macaulay,
History of England,
chapters 12, 16 and 17.
W. H. Torriano,
William the Third,
chapters 5 and 21-23.
J. A. Froude,
The English in Ireland,
chapter 3 (volume 1).
W. A. O'Conor,
History of the Irish People,
book 3, chapter 3 (volume 2).
Sir J. Dalrymple,
Memoirs of Great Britain and Ireland,
part 2, books 2-5 (volume 2).
{1774}
IRELAND: A. D. 1691.
The Treaty of Limerick and its violation.
The surrender of Limerick was under the terms of a treaty—or
of two treaties, one military, the other civil—formally
negotiated for the terminating of the war. This Treaty of
Limerick was signed, October 3, 1691, by Baron De Ginkel,
William's general, and by the lords justices of Ireland, on
behalf of the English, and by Sarsfield and other chieftains
on behalf of the Irish. "Its chief provisions were: 'The Roman
Catholics of this kingdom shall enjoy such privileges in the
exercise of their religion as are consistent with the laws of
Ireland; or as they did enjoy in the reign of King Charles
II.; and their Majesties, as soon as their affairs will permit
them to summon a Parliament in this kingdom, will endeavour to
procure the said Roman Catholics such further security in that
particular as may preserve them from any disturbance upon the
account of their said religion. All the inhabitants or
residents of Limerick, or any other garrison now in the
possession of the Irish, and all officers and soldiers now in
arms under any commission of King James, or those authorized
by him to grant the same in the several counties of Limerick,
Clare, Kerry, Cork, and Mayo, or any of them, and all the
commissioned officers in their Majesties' quarters that belong
to the Irish regiments now in being that are treated with and
who are not prisoners of war, or having taken protection, and
who shall return and submit to their Majesties' obedience, and
their and every of their heirs shall hold, possess, and enjoy
all and every their estates of freehold and inheritance; and
all the rights, titles, and interest, privileges and
immunities, which they, or every or any of them, held,
enjoyed, and were rightfully and lawfully entitled to in the
reign of King Charles II.' … A general pardon was to be
granted to all persons comprised within the treaty, and the
Lords Justices and the generals commanding King William's army
were to use their best endeavours to get the attainders of any
of them attainted repealed. … In the copy of the rough draft
engrossed for signature the following words, 'and all such as
are under their protection in the said counties,' which
immediately followed the enumeration of the several counties
in the second article, were omitted. This omission, whether
the result of design or accident, was, however, rectified by
King William when confirming the treaty in February, 1692. The
confirming instrument stated that the words had been casually
omitted; that the omission was not discovered till the
articles were signed, but was taken notice of before the town
was surrendered; and that the Lords Justices or General
Ginkel, or one of them, had promised that the clause should be
made good, since it was within the intention of the
capitulation, and had been inserted in the rough draft.
William then for himself did 'ratify and confirm the said
omitted words.' The colonists, or at all events the 'new
interests'—that is, those who shared or expected to share in
the confiscations—were indignant at the concessions made to
the native race."
W. K. Sullivan,
part 1 of Two Centuries of Irish History,
chapter 1.
"The advantages secured to Catholics by the Treaty of Limerick
were moderate. But when the flower of the Irish army had
withdrawn to France, and the remnant could be hanged without
ceremony, they began to look inordinate. The parliament of
Cromwellian settlers and Government officials in Dublin having
excluded Catholic members, by requiring from them an oath of
abjuration, in direct infringement of one of the articles of
surrender, were free to proceed at their discretion. They
first passed a stringent statute depriving Catholics of arms,
and another ordering all 'Popish archbishops, bishops,
vicars-general, deans, Jesuits, monks, friars, and regulars of
whatever condition to depart from the kingdom on pain of
transportation,' and then proceeded to consider the treaty.
They … resolved by a decisive majority not to keep the
conditions affecting the Catholics. William … struggled for
a time to preserve his honour; but it is not convenient for a
new king to be in conflict with his friends, and after a time
he gave way. … In Ireland the Treaty of Limerick can never
be forgotten; it is one of the title deeds of the Irish race
to their inheritance in their native land. For more than a
century its sordid and shameless violation was as common a
reproach to England on the Continent as the partition of
Poland has been a reproach to Russia in our own day."
Sir C. G. Duffy,
Bird's-Eye View of Irish History, revised edition,
pages 155-156
(or book 1, chapter 4, of "Young Ireland").
"The Protestant rancour of parliament was more powerful than
the good will of the prince. The most vital articles of the
capitulation were ignored, especially in all cases where the
Catholic religion and the liberties granted to its professors
were concerned; and 4,000 Irish were denounced as traitors and
rebels,—by which declamation a fresh confiscation of
1,060,000 acres was immediately effected. … It has been
calculated that in 1692 the Irish Catholics, who quadrupled
the Protestants in number, owned only one-eleventh of the
soil, and that the most wretched and unproductive portion."
A. Perraud,
Ireland under English Rule,
introduction, section 8.
IRELAND: A. D. 1691-1782.
The peace of despair.
A century of national death.
Oppression of the Penal Laws.
"By the military treaty [of Limerick], those of Sarsfield's
soldiers who would were suffered to follow him to France; and
10,000 men, the whole of his force, chose exile rather than
life in a land where all hope of national freedom was lost.
When the wild cry of the women who stood watching their
departure was hushed, the silence of death settled down upon
Ireland. For a hundred years the country remained at peace,
but the peace was a peace of despair. The most terrible legal
tyranny under which a nation has ever groaned avenged the
rising under Tyrconnell. The conquered people, in Swift's
bitter words of contempt, became 'hewers of wood and drawers
of water' to their conquerors; but till the very eve of the
French Revolution Ireland ceased to be a source of terror and
anxiety to England."
J. H. Green,
Short History of England,
chapter 9, section 8.
"In Ireland there was peace. The domination of the colonists
was absolute. The native population was tranquil with the
ghastly tranquillity of exhaustion and of despair. There were
indeed outrages, robberies, fireraisings, assassinations. But
more than a century passed away without one general
insurrection. During that century, two rebellions were raised
in Great Britain by the adherents of the House of Stuart. But
neither when the elder Pretender was crowned at Scone, nor
when the younger held his court at Holyrood, was the standard
of that House set up in Connaught or Munster.
{1775}
In 1745, indeed, when the Highlanders were marching towards
London, the Roman Catholics of Ireland were so quiet that the
Lord Lieutenant could, without the smallest risk, send several
regiments across Saint George's Channel to reinforce the army
of the Duke of Cumberland. Nor was this submission the effect
of content, but of mere stupefaction and brokenness of heart.
The iron had entered into the soul. The memory of past
defeats, the habit of daily enduring insult and oppression,
had cowed the spirits of the unhappy nation. There were indeed
Irish Roman Catholics of great ability, energy and ambition;
but they were to be found everywhere except in Ireland,—at
Versailles and at Saint lldefonso, in the armies of Frederic
and in the armies of Maria Theresa. One exile became a Marshal
of France. Another became Prime Minister of Spain. If he had
staid in his native land he would have been regarded as an
inferior by all the ignorant and worthless squireens who had
signed the Declaration against Transubstantiation. …
Scattered over all Europe were to be found brave Irish
generals, dexterous Irish diplomatists, Irish Counts, Irish
Barons, Irish Knights … who, if they had remained in the
house of bondage, could not have been ensigns of marching
regiments or freemen of petty corporations. These men, the
natural chiefs of their race, having been withdrawn, what
remained was utterly helpless and passive. A rising of the
Irishry against the Englishry was no more to be apprehended
than a rising of the women and children against the men."
Lord Macaulay,
History of England,
chapter 17.
"An act of 1695 'deprived the Roman Catholics of the means of
educating their children, either at home or abroad, and of the
privilege of being guardians either of their own or of any
other person's children.' Another Act of the same year
deprived the Roman Catholics of the right of bearing arms, or
of keeping any horse which was worth more than £5. An Act of
1697 ordered the expulsion of every Roman Catholic priest from
Ireland. The Parliament, which had imposed these disabilities
on Irish Roman Catholics, proceeded to confirm the Articles of
Limerick, or 'so much of them as may consist with the safety
and welfare of your Majesty's subjects of this kingdom,' and
by a gross act of injustice omitted the whole of the first of
these articles, and the important paragraph in the second
article which had been accidentally omitted from the original
copy of the Treaty, and subsequently restored to it by letters
patent under the Great Seal. Reasonable men may differ on the
propriety or impropriety of the conditions on which the
surrender of Limerick was secured; but it is difficult to read
the story of their repudiation without a deep sense of shame.
Three other acts relating to the Roman Catholics were passed
during the reign of William. An Act of 1697 forbade the
intermarriage of Protestants and Papists. An Act of 1698
prevented Papists from being solicitors. Another Act of the
same year stopped their employment as gamekeepers. William
died; and the breach of faith which he had countenanced was
forgotten amidst the pressure of the legislation which
disgraced the reign of his successor. Two Acts passed in this
reign, for preventing the further growth of Popery, were
styled by Burke the 'ferocious Acts of Anne.' By the first of
these Acts a Papist having a Protestant son was debarred from
selling, mortgaging, or devising any portion of his estate:
however young the son might be, he was to be taken from his
father's hands and confided to the care of a Protestant
relation. The estate of a Papist who had no Protestant heir
was to be divided equally among his sons. The Papist was
declared incapable of purchasing real estate or of taking land
on lease for more than thirty-one years. A Papist was declared
incapable of inheriting real estate from a Protestant. He was
disqualified from holding any office, civil or military. With
twenty exceptions, a Papist was forbidden to reside in
Limerick or Galway. Advowsons the property of Papists were
vested in the Crown. Religious intolerance had now apparently
done its uttermost. … But the laws failed. Their severity
insured their failure. … The first of the ferocious Acts of
Anne was almost openly disregarded. … Its failure only
induced the intolerant advisers of Anne to supplement it with
harsher legislation. The Act of 1704 had deprived the Papist
of the guardianship of his apostate child. An Act of 1709
empowered the Court of Chancery to oblige the Papist to
discover his estate, and authorized the Court to make an order
for the maintenance of the apostate child out of the proceeds
of it. The Act of 1704 had made it illegal for a Papist to
take lands on lease; the Act of 1709 disabled him from
receiving a life annuity. An Act of 1704 had compelled the
registry of priests. The Act of 1709 forbade their officiating
in any parish except that in which they were registered.
These, however, were the least reprehensible features in the
Act of 1709. Its worst features were the encouragement which
it gave to the meaner vices of human nature. The wife of a
Papist, if she became a Protestant, was to receive a jointure
out of her husband's estate. A Popish priest abandoning his
religion was to receive an annuity of £30 a year. Rewards were
to be paid for 'discovering' Popish prelates, priests, and
schoolmasters. Two justices might compel any Papist to state
on oath where and when he had heard mass, who had officiated
at it, and who had been present at it. Encouragement was thus
given to informers; bribes were thus held out to apostates;
and Parliament trusted to the combined effects of bribery and
intimidation to stamp out the last remnant of Popery. The
penal code, however, was not yet complete. The armoury of
intolerance was not yet exhausted. An Act of George I.
disabled Papists from serving in the Irish militia, but
compelled them to find Protestant substitutes; to pay double
towards the support of the militia, and rendered their horses
liable to seizure for militia purposes. By Acts of George II.
the Papists were disfranchised; barristers or solicitors
marrying Papists were deemed Papists; all marriages between
Protestants and Papists were annulled; and Popish priests
celebrating any illegal marriages were condemned to be hanged.
By an Act of George III. Papists refusing to deliver up or
declare their arms were liable to be placed in the pillory or
to be whipped, as the Court should think proper. Such were the
laws which the intolerance of a minority imposed on the
majority of their fellow-subjects. Utterly unjust, they had
not even the bare merit of success. …
{1776}
'The great body of the people,' wrote Arthur Young [1780],
'stripped of their all, were more enraged than converted: they
adhered to the persuasion of their forefathers with the
steadiest and the most determined zeal; while the priests,
actuated by the spirit of a thousand inducements, made
proselytes among the common Protestants in defiance of every
danger. … Those laws have crushed all the industry and
wrested most of the property from the Catholics; but the
religion triumphs; it is thought to increase.'"
S. Walpole,
History of England from 1815,
chapter 8 (volume 2).
ALSO IN:
R. R. Madden,
Historical Notice of Penal Laws against Roman Catholics.
A. Perraud,
Ireland under English Rule: introduction.
E. Burke,
Letter to a Peer of Ireland on the Penal Laws
(Works, volume 4).
E. Burke,
Fragments of a Tract on the Popery Laws
(Works, volume 6).
A. J. Thébaud,
The Irish Race,
chapter 12.
IRELAND: A. D, 1710.
Colonization of Palatines in Munster.
See PALATINES.
IRELAND: A. D. 1722-1724.
Wood's halfpence.
The Drapier's Letters.
"A patent had been given [1722, by the Walpole administration]
to a certain William Wood for supplying Ireland with a copper
coinage. Many complaints had been made, and in September,
1723, addresses were voted by the Irish Houses of Parliament,
declaring that the patent had been obtained by clandestine and
false representations; that it was mischievous to the country;
and that Wood had been guilty of frauds in his coinage. They
were pacified by vague promises; but Walpole went on with the
scheme on the strength of a favourable report of a committee
of the Privy Council; and the excitement was already serious
when (in 1724) Swift published the Drapier's Letters, which
give him his chief title to eminence as a patriotic agitator.
Swift either shared or took advantage of the general belief
that the mysteries of the currency are unfathomable to the
human intelligence. … There is, however, no real mystery
about the halfpence. The small coins which do not form part of
the legal-tender may be considered primarily as counters. A
penny is a penny, so long as twelve are change for a shilling.
It is not in the least necessary for this purpose that the
copper contained in the twelve penny pieces should be worth or
nearly worth a shilling. … At the present day bronze worth
only twopence is coined into twelve penny pieces. … The
effect of Wood's patent was that a mass of copper worth about
£60,000 became worth £100,800 in the shape of halfpenny
pieces. There was, therefore, a balance of about £40,000, to
pay for the expenses of coinage. It would have been waste to
get rid of this by putting more copper in the coins; but if so
large a profit arose from the transaction, it would go to
somebody. At the present day it would be brought into the
national treasury. This was not the way in which business was
done in Ireland. Wood was to pay £1,000 a year for fourteen
years to the Crown. But £14,000 still leaves a large margin
for profit. 'What was to become of it. According to the
admiring biographer of Sir R. Walpole the patent had been
originally given by Lord Sunderland to the Duchess of Kendal,
a lady whom the King delighted to honour. … It was right and
proper that a profit should be made on the transaction, but
shameful that it should be divided between the King's mistress
and William Wood, and that the bargain should be struck
without consulting the Irish representatives, and maintained
in, spite of their protests. The Duchess of Kendal was to be
allowed to take a share of the wretched halfpence in the
pocket of every Irish beggar. A more disgraceful transaction
could hardly be imagined, or one more calculated to justify
Swift's view of the selfishness and corruption of the English
rulers. Swift saw his chance and went to work in
characteristic fashion, with unscrupulous audacity of
statement, guided by the keenest strategical instinct. … The
patent was surrendered, and Swift might congratulate himself
upon a complete victory. … The Irish succeeded in rejecting
a real benefit at the cost of paying Wood the profit which he
would have made, had he been allowed to confer it."
L. Stephen,
Swift (English Men of Letters),
chapter 7.
ALSO IN:
Dean Swift,
Works (Scott's edition),
volume 6.
Lord Mahon (Earl Stanhope),
History of England, 1713-1783,
chapter 13 (volume 2).
J. McCarthy,
History of the Four Georges,
chapter 15.
IRELAND: A. D. 1760-1798.
Whiteboys.
Oak Boys.
Steel Boys.
Peep of Day Boys.
Catholic Defenders.
"The peasantry continued to regard the land as their own; and
with the general faith that wrong cannot last forever, they
waited for the time when they would once more have possession
of it. 'The lineal descendants of the old families,' wrote
Arthur Young in 1774, 'are now to be found all over the
kingdom, working as cottiers on the lands which were once
their own.' … With the growth of what was called
civilization, absenteeism, the worst disorder of the country,
had increased. … The rise in prices, the demand for salt
beef and salt butter for exportation and for the fleets, were
revolutionizing the agriculture of Munster. The great
limestone pastures of Limerick and Tipperary, the fertile
meadow universally, was falling into the hands of capitalist
graziers, in whose favour the landlords, or the landlords'
agents, were evicting the smaller tenants. … To the
peasantry these men were a curse. Common lands, where their
own cows had been fed, were inclosed and taken from them. The
change from tillage to grazing destroyed their employment.
Their sole subsistence was from their potato gardens, the
rents of which were heavily raised, while, by a curious
mockery of justice, the grass lands were exempt from tithe,
and the burden of maintaining the rectors and vicars of the
Established Church was cast exclusively on the Catholic poor.
Among a people who are suffering under a common wrong there is
a sympathy of resentment which links them together without
visible or discoverable bond. In the spring of 1760 Tipperary
was suddenly overrun by bands of midnight marauders. Who they
were was a mystery. Rumours reached England of insurgent
regiments drilling in the moonlight; of French officers
observed passing and repassing the Channel; but no French
officer could be detected in Munster. The most rigid search
discovered no stands of arms, such as soldiers use or could
use. This only was certain, that white figures were seen in
vast numbers, like moving clouds, flitting silently at night
over field and moor, leaving behind them the tracks of where
they had passed in levelled fences and houghed and moaning
cattle; where the owners were specially hateful, in blazing
homesteads, and the inmates' bodies blackening in the ashes.
Arrests were generally useless. The country was sworn to
secrecy.
{1777}
Through the entire central plains of Ireland the people were
bound by the most solemn oaths never to reveal the name of a
confederate, or give evidence in a court of justice. … Thus
it was long uncertain how the movement originated, who were
its leaders, and whether there was one or many. Letters
signed by Captain Dwyer or Joanna Meskell were left at the
doors of obnoxious persons, ordering lands to be abandoned
under penalties. If the commands were uncomplied with, the
penalties were inexorably inflicted. … Torture usually being
preferred to murder, male offenders against the Whiteboys were
houghed like their cattle, or their tongues were torn out by
the roots."
J. A. Froude,
The English in Ireland,
book 5, chapter 1 (volume 2).
The Whiteboys took their name from the practice of wearing a
white shirt drawn over their other clothing, when they were
out upon their nocturnal expeditions. "The Oak Boy movement
took place about 1761-2. … The injustice which led to the
formation of the 'Oak Boys,' one of the best known of the
colonial societies, was duty work on roads. Every householder
was bound to give six days' labour in making and repairing the
public roads; and if he had a horse, six days' labour of his
horse. It was complained that this duty work was only levied
on the poor, and that they were compelled to work on private
job roads, and even upon what were the avenues and farm roads
of the gentry. The name Oak Boys, or Hearts of Oak Boys, was
derived from the members in their raids wearing an oak branch
in their hats. The organization spread rapidly over the
greater part of Ulster. Although the grievances were common to
Protestant and Catholic workmen, and there was nothing
religious in the objects or constitution of the Oak Boys, the
society was an exclusively Protestant body, owing to the total
absence at the period of any association between the
Protestants and Catholics. … The Steel Boys, or Hearts of
Steel Boys, followed the Oak Boys [about 1771]. They also were
exclusively Protestant; the origin of this organization was
the extravagance and profligacy of a bad landlord, the
representative of the great land thief, Chichester, of the
Plantation of King James I. … The Oak Boys and Steel Boys
did not last long."
W. K. Sullivan,
part 1 of Two Centuries of Irish History,
chapter 5, with foot-note.
The landlord here referred to, as having provoked the
organization of the Steel Boys, was the Marquis of Donegal.
"Many of his Antrim leases having fallen in simultaneously, he
demanded £100,000 in fines for the renewal of them. The
tenants, all Protestants, offered the interest of the money in
addition to the rent.' It could not be. Speculative Belfast
capitalists paid the fine and took the lands over the heads of
the tenants, to sublet. … The most substantial of the
expelled tenantry gathered their effects together and sailed
to join their countrymen in the New World. … Between those
who were too poor to emigrate, and the Catholics who were in
possession of their homes, there grew a protracted feud, which
took form at last in the conspiracy of the Peep of Day Boys;
in the fierce and savage expulsion of the intruders, who were
bidden to go to hell or Connaught; and in the
counter-organization of the Catholic Defenders, which spread
over the whole island, and made the army of insurrection in
1798."
J. A. Froude,
The English in Ireland,
book 5, chapter 2, section 6 (volume 2).
IRELAND: A. D. 1778-1794.
Concession of Legislative independence by the
so-called Constitution of 1782.
"England's difficulty was Ireland's opportunity. Over in the
American colonies Mr. Washington and his rebels were pressing
hard upon the troops of King George. More than one garrison
had been compelled to surrender, more than one general had
given up his bright sword to a revolutionary leader. On the
hither side of the Atlantic the American flag was scarcely
less dreaded than at Yorktown and Saratoga. … Ireland,
drained of troops, lay open to invasion. The terrible Paul
Jones was drifting about the seas; descents upon Ireland were
dreaded; if such descents had been made the island was
practically defenceless. An alarmed Mayor of Belfast,
appealing to the Government for military aid, was informed
that no more serious and more formidable assistance could be
rendered to the chief city of the North than might be given by
half a troop of dismounted cavalry and half a troop of
invalids. If the French-American enemy would consent to be
scared by such a muster, well and good; if not Belfast, and
for the matter of that, all Ireland, must look to itself.
Thereupon Ireland, very promptly and decisively, did look to
itself. A Militia Act was passed empowering the formation of
volunteer corps—consisting, of course, solely of
Protestants—for the defence of the island. A fever of
military enthusiasm swept over the country; north and south
and east and west men caught up arms, nominally to resist the
French, really, though they knew it not, to effect one of the
greatest constitutional revolutions in history. Before a
startled Government could realise what was occurring 60,000
men were under arms. For the first time since the surrender of
Limerick there was an armed force in Ireland able and willing
to support a national cause. Suddenly, almost in the twinkling
of an eye, Ireland found herself for the first time for
generations in the possession of a well-armed,
well-disciplined, and well-generalled military force. The
armament that was organised to insure the safety of England
was destined to achieve the liberties of Ireland. … All talk
of organisation to resist foreign invasion was silenced; in
its place the voice of the nation was heard loudly calling for
the redress of its domestic grievances. Their leader was
Charlemont; Grattan and Flood were their principal colonels."
J. H. McCarthy,
Ireland Since the Union,
chapter 3.
"When the Parliament met, Grattan moved as an amendment to the
Address, 'that it was by free export and import only that the
Nation was to be saved from impending ruin'; and a corps of
Volunteers, commanded by the Duke of Leinster, lined Dame
Street as the Speaker and the Commons walked in procession to
the Castle. Another demonstration of Volunteers in College
Green excited Dublin a little later on, and (15th November,
1779) a riotous mob clamoured for Free Trade at the very doors
of the House. … These events resulted in immediate success.
Lord North proposed in the British Parliament three articles
of relief to Irish trade—
(1) to allow free export of wool, woollens, and wool-flocks;
(2) to allow a free export of glass;
(3) to allow, under certain conditions, a free trade to all
the British colonies.
{1778}
When the news reached Ireland excessive joy prevailed. … But
this was only a beginning. Poynings' Law, and the 6th of
George I., required to be swept away too, so that Ireland
might enjoy not only Free Trade, but also Self-government.
Grattan moved his two famous resolutions:—
1. That the King, with the consent of the Lords and Commons of
Ireland, is alone competent to enact laws to bind Ireland.
2. That Great Britain and Ireland are inseparably united under
one Sovereign.

In supporting these resolutions, Grattan cited England's
dealings with America, to show what Ireland too might effect
by claiming her just rights. … The Earl of Carlisle became
Viceroy in 1781, with Mr. Eden as Secretary. Viewing England's
embroilment in war—in America, in India, with France, and
Spain, and Holland—the Irish Volunteers, whose numbers had
swelled, Grattan said, to well-nigh 100,000 men, held meetings
and reviews in various parts of the country. … The 16th of
April, 1782, was a memorable day for Dublin. On that date, in
a city thronged with Volunteers, with bands playing, and
banners blazoned with gilded harps fluttering in the wind,
Grattan, in an amendment to the Address which was always
presented to the King at the opening of Parliament, moved,
'That Ireland is a distinct Kingdom, with a separate
Parliament, and that this Parliament alone has a right to make
laws for her.' On the 17th of May, the two Secretaries of
State, Lord Shelburne in the Lords, and Charles James Fox in
the Commons of Great Britain—proposed the repeal of the 6th
of George I., a statute which declared the right of the
English Parliament to make laws for Ireland. The English
Government frankly and fully acceded to the demands of
Ireland. Four points were granted—
(1) an Independent Irish Parliament;
(2) the abrogation of Poynings' Law, empowering the English
Privy Council to alter Irish Bills;
(3) the introduction of a Biennial Mutiny Bill;
(4) the abolition of the right of appeal to England from the
Irish law courts.
These concessions were announced to the Irish Parliament at
once: in their joy the Irish Houses voted £100,000, and 20,000
men to the navy of Great Britain. Ireland had at last achieved
political freedom. Peace and prosperity seemed about to bless
the land. … That there might be no misunderstanding as to
the deliberate intention of the English Parliament in granting
Irish legislative independence, Lord Shelburne had passed an
Act of Renunciation, declaring that 'the Right claimed by the
people of Ireland, to be bound only by laws enacted by His
Majesty and the Parliament of that Kingdom, is hereby declared
to be established and ascertained for ever, and shall at no
time hereafter be questioned or questionable.' During the same
session (1782), the two Catholic Relief Bills proposed by Luke
Gardiner, who afterwards became Viscount Mountjoy, were
passed. These measures gave Catholics the right to buy
freeholds, to teach schools, and to educate their children as
they pleased. The Habeas Corpus Act was now extended to
Ireland; and marriages by presbyterian ministers were made
legal."
W. F. Collier,
History of Ireland for Schools,
period 5, chapter 3.
"Had the Irish demanded a complete separation it would have
been yielded without resistance. It would have been better had
it been. The two countries would have immediately joined on
terms of equality and of mutual confidence and respect. But
the more the English Cabinet gave way the less were the Irish
disposed to press their advantage. A feeling of warm
attachment to England rapidly took the place of distrust.
There never existed in Ireland so sincere and friendly a
spirit of spontaneous union with England as at this moment,
when the formal bond of union was almost wholly dissolved.
From the moment when England made a formal surrender of her
claim to govern Ireland a series of inroads commenced on the
various interests supposed to be left to their own free
development by that surrender. Ireland had not, like England,
a body of Cabinet Ministers responsible to her Parliament. The
Lord Lieutenant and the Irish Secretary held their offices and
received their instructions from the English minister. There
was greater need than ever before for a bribed majority in the
Irish Commons, and the machinery for securing and managing it
remained intact."
W. A. O'Conor,
History of the Irish People,
book 4, chapter 2, section 2 (volume 2).
"The history of these memorable eighteen years [1782-1800] has
never been written, and yet these years are the … key to
Irish political opinion in the 19th [century]. The Government
which granted the constitution of 1782 began to conspire
against it immediately. They had taken Poynings' Act away from
the beginning of its proceedings, and they clapped it on to
the end of its proceedings, as effectually as if the change
had not been made. They developed in the Irish mind that
distrust of all government which has made it so turbulent and
so docile—turbulent to its administrators, docile to its
popular leaders."
J. E. Thorold Rogers,
Ireland
(A. Reid, editor), p. 25.
ALSO IN:
W. E. H. Lecky,
Leaders of Public Opinion in Ireland: Henry Grattan.
J. G. MacCarthy,
Henry Grattan.
IRELAND: A. D. 1784.
Peep-o'-Day Boys and Defenders.
"Disturbances … commenced in the north between two parties
called Peep-o'-Day Boys and Defenders. They originated in 1784
among some country people, who appear to have been all
Protestants or Presbyterians; but Catholics having sided with
one of the parties, the quarrel quickly grew into a religious
feud, and spread from the county of Armagh, where it
commenced, to the neighbouring districts of Tyrone and Down.
Both parties belonged to the humblest classes of the
community. The Protestant party were well armed, and
assembling in numbers, attacked the houses of Catholics under
pretence of searching for arms; insulting their persons, and
breaking their furniture. These wanton outrages were usually
committed at an early hour in the morning, whence the name of
Peep-o'-Day Boys; but the faction was also known as
'Protestant Boys,' and 'wreckers,' and ultimately merged in
the Orange Society."
M. Haverty,
History of Ireland,
p. 722.
IRELAND: A. D. 1793.
Passage of the Catholic Relief Bill.
"On February 4 (1793) Hobart [Chief Secretary] moved for leave
to bring in his Catholic Relief Bill, and stated the nature of
its provisions. It was of a kind which only a year before
would have appeared utterly impossible, and which was in the
most glaring opposition to all the doctrines which the
Government and its partisans had of late been urging. … This
great measure was before Parliament, with several
intermissions, for rather more than five weeks. …
{1779}
The vast preponderance of speakers were in favour of relief to
Catholics, though there were grave differences as to the degree,
and speakers of the highest authority represented the genuine
Protestant feeling of the country as being in its favour. …
Few things in Irish parliamentary history are more remarkable
than the facility with which this great measure was carried,
though it was in all its aspects thoroughly debated. It passed
its second reading in the House of Commons with only a single
negative. It was committed with only three negatives, and in
the critical divisions on its clauses the majorities were at
least two to one. The qualification required to authorise a
Catholic to bear arms was raised in committee on the motion of
the Chancellor, and in addition to the oath of allegiance of
1774, a new oath was incorporated in the Bill, copied from one
of the declarations of the Catholics, and abjuring certain
tenets which had been ascribed to them, among others the
assertion that the infallibility of the Pope was an article of
their faith. For the rest the Bill became law almost exactly
in the form in which it was originally designed. It swept away
the few remaining disabilities relating to property which grew
out of the penal code. It enabled Catholics to vote like
Protestants for members of Parliament and magistrates in
cities or boroughs; to become elected members of all
corporations except Trinity College; to keep arms subject to
some specified conditions; to hold all civil and military
offices in the kingdom from which they were not specifically
excluded; to hold the medical professorships on the foundation
of Sir Patrick Dun; to take degrees and hold offices in any
mixed college connected with the University of Dublin that
might hereafter be founded. It also threw open to them the
degrees of the University, enabling the King to alter its
statutes to that effect. A long clause enumerated the prizes
which were still withheld. Catholics might not sit in either
House of Parliament; they were excluded from almost all
Government and judicial positions; they could not be Privy
Councillors, King's Counsel, Fellows of Trinity College,
sheriffs or sub-sheriffs, or generals of the staff. Nearly
every post of ambition was still reserved for Protestants, and
the restrictions weighed most heavily on the Catholics who
were most educated and most able. In the House of Lords as in
the House of Commons the Bill passed with little open
opposition, but a protest, signed among other peers by
Charlemont, was drawn up against it. … The Catholic Relief
Bill received the royal assent in April, 1793, and in the same
month the Catholic Convention dissolved itself. Before doing
so it passed a resolution recommending the Catholics 'to
co-operate in all loyal and constitutional means' to obtain
parliamentary reform. … The Catholic prelates in their
pastorals expressed their gratitude for the Relief Bill. The
United Irishmen on their side issued a proclamation warmly
congratulating the Catholics on the measure for their relief,
but also urging in passionate strains that parliamentary
reform was the first of needs."
W. E. H. Lecky,
History of England in the 18th Century,
chapter 25 (volume 6).
IRELAND: A. D. 1793-1798.
Organization of the United Irishmen.
Attempted French invasions.
The rising of '98.
"Nothing could be less sinister than the original aims and
methods of the Society of United Irishmen, which was conceived
in the idea of uniting Catholics and Protestants 'in pursuit
of the same object—a repeal of the penal laws, and a
(parliamentary) reform including in itself an extension of the
right of suffrage.' This union was founded at Belfast, in
1791, by Theobald Wolfe Tone, a young barrister of English
descent, and, like the majority of the United Irishmen, a
Protestant. Some months later a Dublin branch was founded, the
chairman being the hon. Simon Butler, a Protestant gentleman
of high character, and the secretary a tradesman named James
Napper Tandy. The society grew rapidly, and branches were
formed throughout Ulster and Leinster. The religious strife of
the Orange boys and Defenders was a great trouble to the
United men, who felt that these creed animosities among
Irishmen were more ruinous to the national cause than any
corruption of parliament or coercion of government could
possibly be. Ireland, united, would be quite capable of
fighting her own battles, but these party factions rendered
her contemptible and weak. The society accordingly set itself
the impossible task of drawing together the Defenders and the
Orange men. Catholic emancipation—one of the great objects of
the union—naturally appealed very differently to the rival
parties: it was the great wish of the Defenders, the chief
dread of the Orangemen. Both factions were composed of the
poorest and most ignorant peasantry in Ireland, men whose
political views did not soar above the idea that 'something
should be done for old Ireland.' The United Irishmen devoted
themselves to the regeneration of both parties, but the
Orangemen would have none of them, and the Protestant United
men found themselves drifting into partnership with the
Catholic Defenders. To gain influence with this party, Tandy
took the Defenders' oath. He was informed against; and, as to
take an illegal oath was then a capital offence in Ireland, he
had to fly for his life to America. This adventure made Tandy
the hero of the Defenders, who now joined the union in great
numbers; but the whole business brought the society into
disrepute, and connected it with the Defenders, who, like the
Orange boys, were merely a party of outrage. … One night in
the May of '94 a government raid was made upon the premises of
the union. The officers of the society were arrested, their
papers seized, the type of their newspaper destroyed, and the
United Irish Society was proclaimed as an illegal
organisation. Towards the close of this year all need for a
reform society seemed to have passed. Fitzwilliam was made
viceroy, and emancipation and reform seemed assured. His
sudden recall, the reversal of his appointments, the rejection
of Grattan's Reform Bill, and the renewal of the old coercive
system, convinced the United men of the powerlessness of
peaceful agitation to check the growth of the system of
government by corruption. They accordingly reorganised the
union, but as a secret society, and with the avowed aim of
separating Ireland from the British empire. The Fitzwilliam
affair had greatly strengthened the union, which was joined by
many men of high birth and position, among them lord Edward
Fitzgerald, brother of the duke of Leinster, and Arthur
O'Connor, nephew to lord Longueville, both of whom had been
members of the House of Commons. … But the ablest man of the
party was Thomas Addis Emmet, a barrister, and the elder
brother of Robert Emmet.
{1780}
The society gradually swelled to the number of 5,000 members,
but throughout its existence it was perfectly riddled with
spies and informers, by whom government was supplied with a
thorough knowledge of its doings. It became known to Pitt that
the French government had sent an Englishman, named Jackson,
as an emissary to Ireland. Jackson was convicted of treason,
and hanged, and Wolfe Tone was sufficiently implicated in his
guilt … to find it prudent to fly to America. But before
leaving Ireland he arranged with the directors of the union to
go from America to France, and to try to persuade the French
government to assist Ireland in a struggle for separation.
While Tone was taking his circuitous route to Paris,
government, to meet the military development of the society,
placed Ulster and Leinster under a stringent Insurrection Act;
torture was employed to wring confession from suspected
persons, and the Protestant militia and yeomanry were drafted
at free quarters on the wretched Catholic peasantry. The
barbarity of the soldiers lashed the people of the northern
provinces into a state of fury. … In the meantime the
indomitable Tone—unknown, without credentials, without
influence, and ignorant of the French language—had persuaded
the French government to lend him a fleet, 10,000 men, and
40,000 stand of arms, which armament left Brest for Bantry Bay
on the 16th December, 1796. Ireland was now in the same
position as England had been when William of Orange had
appeared outside Torbay. Injustice, corruption, and oppression
had in both cases goaded the people into rebellion. A calm sea
and a fierce gale made the difference between the English
patriot of 1688 and the Irish traitor of 1796. Had the sea
been calm in the Christmas week of '96, nothing could have
stopped the French from marching on to Dublin, but just as the
ships put in to Bantry Bay, so wild a wind sprang up that they
were driven out to sea, and blown and buffetted about. For a
month they tossed about within sight of land, but the storm
did not subside, and, all chance of landing seeming as far off
as ever, they put back into the French port."
Wm. S. Gregg,
Irish History for English Readers,
chapter 23.
"After the failure of Hoche's expedition, another great
armament was fitted out in the Texel, where it long lay ready
to come forth, while the English fleet, the only safeguard of
our coasts, was crippled by the mutiny at the Nore. But the
wind once more fought for England, and the Batavian fleet came
out at last only to be destroyed at Camperdown. Tone was
personally engaged in both expeditions, and his lively Diary,
the image of his character, gives us vivid accounts of both.
The third effort of the French Government was feeble, and
ended in the futile landing of a small force under Humbert.
… In the last expedition Tone himself was taken prisoner,
and, having been condemned to death, committed suicide in
prison. … It was well for Ireland, as well as for England,
that Tone failed in his enterprise. Had he succeeded, his
country would for a time have been treated as Switzerland and
the Batavian Republic were treated by their French
regenerators, and, in the end, it would have been surely
reconquered and punished by the power which was mistress of
the sea. … But now that all is over, we can afford to say
that Tone gallantly ventured his life in what naturally
appeared to him, and would to a high-spirited Englishman under
the same circumstances have appeared, a good cause. One of his
race had but too much reason then to 'hate the very name of
England,' and to look forward to the burning of her cities
with feelings in which pity struggled with revenge for
mastery, but revenge prevailed. … From the Republicans the
disturbance spread, as in 1641, to that mass of blind
disaffection and hatred, national, social, agrarian, and
religious, which was always smouldering among the Catholic
peasantry. With these sufferers the political theories of the
French Revolutionists had no influence; they looked to French
invasion, as well as to domestic insurrection, merely as a
deliverance from the oppression under which they groaned. …
The leading Roman Catholics, both clerical and lay, were on
the side of the government. The mass of the Catholic
priesthood were well inclined to take the same side, They
could have no sympathy with an Atheist Republic, red with the
blood of priests, as well as with the blood of a son of St.
Louis. If some of the order were concerned in the movement, it
was as demagogues, sympathizing with their peasant brethren,
not as priests. Yet the Protestants insisted on treating the
Catholic clergy as rebels by nature. They had assuredly done
their best to make them so. … No sooner did the Catholic
peasantry begin to move and organize themselves than the
Protestant gentry and yeomanry as one man became Cromwellians
again. Then commenced a Reign of Terror scarcely less savage
than that of the Jacobins, against whom Europe was in arms, as
a hideous and portentous brood of evil, the scourge and horror
of the whole human race. The suspected conspirators were
intimidated, and confessions, or pretended confessions, were
extorted by loosing upon the homes of the peasantry the
license and barbarity of an irregular soldiery more cruel than
a regular invader. Flogging, half-hanging, pitch-capping,
picketing, went on over a large district, and the most
barbarous scourgings, without trial, were inflicted in the
Riding-house at Dublin, in the very seat of government and
justice. This was styled, 'exerting a vigour beyond the law;'
and to become the object of such vigour, it was enough, as
under Robespierre, to be suspected of being suspect. No one
has yet fairly undertaken the revolting but salutary task of
writing a faithful and impartial history of that period; but
from the accounts we have, it appears not unlikely that the
peasantry, though undoubtedly in a disturbed state, and to a
great extent secretly organized, might have been kept quiet by
measures of lenity and firmness; and that they were
gratuitously scourged and tortured into open rebellion. When
they did rebel, they shewed, as they had shewn in 1641, what
the galley-slave is when, having long toiled under the lash,
he contrives in a storm to slip his chains and become master
of the vessel. The atrocities of Wexford and Vinegar-Hill
rivalled the atrocities of Portnadown. Nor when the rebellion
was vanquished did the victors fail to renew the famous feats
of Sir Charles Coote and of the regiment of Cole. We now
possess terrible and overwhelming evidence of their sanguinary
ferocity in the correspondence of Lord Cornwallis, who was
certainly no friend to rebels, having fought against them in
America, but who was a man of sense and heart, most wisely
sent over to quench the insurrection, and pacify the country.
…
{1781}
The murders and other atrocities committed by the Jacobins
were more numerous than those committed by the Orangemen, and
as the victims were of higher rank they excited more
indignation and pity; but in the use of torture the Orangemen
seem to have reached a pitch of fiendish cruelty which was
scarcely attained by the Jacobins. … The Jacobin party was
almost entirely composed of men taken from the lowest of the
people, whereas among the Irish terrorists were found men of
high social position and good education."
Goldwin Smith,
Irish History and Irish Character,
pages 166-175.
ALSO IN:
R. R. Madden,
The United Irishmen, their Lives and Times.
Theobald Wolfe Tone,
Memoirs.
Marquis Cornwallis,
Correspondence,
chapter 19 (volume 2).
A. Griffiths,
French Revolutionary Generals,
chapter 16.
Viscount Castlereagh,
Memoirs and Correspondence,
volume 1.
W. H. Maxwell,
History of the Irish Rebellion in 1798.
IRELAND: A. D. 1795-1796.
Formation of the Orange Society.
Battle of the Diamond.
Persecution of Catholics by Protestant mobs.
"The year 1795 is very memorable in Irish history, as the year
of the formation of the Orange Society, and the beginning of
the most serious disturbances in the county of Armagh. … The
old popular feud between the lower ranks of Papists and
Presbyterians in the northern counties is easy to understand,
and it is not less easy to see how the recent course of Irish
politics had increased it. A class which had enjoyed and
gloried in uncontested ascendency, found this ascendency
passing from its hands. A class which had formerly been in
subjection, was elated by new privileges, and looked forward
to a complete abolition of political disabilities. Catholic
and Protestant tenants came into a new competition, and the
demeanour of Catholics towards Protestants was sensibly
changed. There were boasts in taverns and at fairs, that the
Protestants would speedily be swept away from the land and the
descendants of the old proprietors restored, and it was soon
known that Catholics all over the country were forming
themselves into committees or societies, and were electing
representatives for a great Catholic convention at Dublin. The
riots and outrages of the Peep of Day Boys and Defenders had
embittered the feeling on both sides. … Members of one or
other creed were attacked and insulted as they went to their
places of worship. There were fights on the high roads, at
fairs, wakes, markets, and country sports, and there were
occasionally crimes of a much deeper dye. … In September
1795 riots broke out in this county [Armagh], which continued
for some days, but at length the parish priest on the one
side, and a gentleman named Atkinson on the other, succeeded
in so far appeasing the quarrel that the combatants formally
agreed to a truce, and were about to retire to their homes,
when a new party of Defenders, who had marched from the
adjoining counties to the assistance of their brethren,
appeared upon the scene, and on September 21 they attacked the
Protestants at a place called the Diamond. The Catholics on
this occasion were certainly the aggressors, and they appear
to have considerably outnumbered their antagonists, but the
Protestants were better posted, better armed, and better
organised. A serious conflict ensued, and the Catholics were
completely defeated, leaving a large number—probably twenty
or thirty—dead upon the field. It was on the evening of the
day on which the battle of the Diamond was fought, that the
Orange Society was formed. It was at first a league of mutual
defence, binding its members to maintain the laws and the
peace of the country, and also the Protestant Constitution. No
Catholic was to be admitted into the society, and the members
were bound by oath not to reveal its secrets. The doctrine of
Fitzgibbon, that the King, by assenting to Catholic
emancipation, would invalidate his title to the throne, was
remarkably reflected in the oath of the Orangemen, which bound
them to defend the King and his heirs, 'so long as he or they
support the Protestant ascendency.' The society took its name
from William of Orange, the conqueror of the Catholics, and it
agreed to celebrate annually the battle of the Boyne. In this
respect there was nothing in it particularly novel. Protestant
associations, for the purpose of commemorating the events and
maintaining the principles of the Revolution, had long been
known. … A very different spirit, however, animated the
early Orangemen. The upper classes at first generally held
aloof from the society; for a considerable time it appears to
have been almost confined to the Protestant peasantry of
Ulster, and the title of Orangemen was probably assumed by
numbers who had never joined the organisation, who were simply
Peep of Day Boys taking a new name, and whose conduct was
certainly not such as those who instituted the society had
intended. A terrible persecution of the Catholics immediately
followed. The animosities between the lower orders of the two
religions, which had long been little bridled, burst out
afresh, and after the battle of the Diamond, the Protestant
rabble of the county of Armagh, and of part of the adjoining
counties, determined by continuous outrages to drive the
Catholics from the country. Their cabins were placarded, or,
as it was termed, 'papered,' with the words, 'To hell or
Connaught,' and if the occupants did not at once abandon them,
they were attacked at night by an armed mob. The webs and
looms of the poor Catholic weavers were cut and destroyed.
Every article of furniture was shattered or burnt. The houses
were often set on fire, and the inmates were driven homeless
into the world. The rioters met with scarcely any resistance
or disturbance. Twelve or fourteen houses were sometimes
wrecked in a single night. Several Catholic chapels were
burnt, and the persecution, which began in the county of
Armagh, soon extended over a wide area in the counties of
Tyrone, Down, Antrim, and Derry. … The outrages continued
with little abatement through a great part of the following
year. As might have been expected, there were widely differing
estimates of the number of the victims. According to some
reports, which were no doubt grossly exaggerated, no less than
1,400 families, or about 7,000 persons, were driven out of the
county of Armagh alone. Another, and much more probable
account, spoke of 700 families, while a certain party among
the gentry did their utmost to minimise the persecutions."
W. E. H. Lecky,
History of England in the 18th Century,
chapter 27 (volume 7).
{1782}
IRELAND: A. D. 1798-1800.
The Legislative Union with Great Britain.
"No sooner had the rebellion been suppressed than the
Government proposed, to the Parliament of each country, the
union of Great Britain and Ireland under a common legislature.
This was no new idea. It had frequently been in the minds of
successive generations of statesmen on both sides of the
Channel; but had not yet been seriously discussed with a view
to immediate action. Nothing could have been more safely
predicted than that Ireland must, sooner or later, follow the
precedent of Scotland, and yield her pretensions to a separate
legislation. The measures of 1782, which appeared to establish
the legislative independence of Ireland, really proved the
vanity of such a pretension. … On the assembling of the
British Parliament at the commencement of the year [1799], the
question of the Union was recommended by a message from the
Crown; and the address, after some opposition, was carried
without a division. Pitt, at this, the earliest stage,
pronounced the decision at which the Government had arrived to
be positive and irrevocable. … Lord Cornwallis [then Lord
Lieutenant of Ireland] also expressed his conviction that
union was the only measure which could preserve the country.
… The day before the intended Union was signified by a royal
message to the English Parliament, the Irish Houses assembled;
and the Viceroy's speech, of course, contained a paragraph
relative to the project. The House of Lords, completely under
the control of the Castle, agreed to an address in conformity
with the speech, after a short and languid debate, by a large
majority; but the Commons were violently agitated. … An
amendment to the address pledging the House to maintain the
Union was lost by one vote, after the House had sat twenty-one
hours; but, on the report, the amendment to omit the paragraph
referring to the Union was carried by a majority of four. …
When it was understood that the Government was in earnest …
there was little difficulty in alarming a people among whom
the machinery of political agitation had, for some years, been
extensively organised. The bar of Dublin took the lead, and it
at once became evident that the policy of the Government had
effected a union among Irishmen far more formidable than that
which all the efforts of sedition had been able to accomplish.
The meeting of the bar included not merely men of different
religious persuasions, but, what was of more importance in
Ireland, men of different sides in politics. … However
conclusive the argument in favour of Union may appear to
Englishmen, it was difficult for an Irishman to regard the
Union in any other view than as a measure to deprive his
country of her independent constitution, and to extinguish her
national existence. Mr. Foster, the Speaker, took this view.
… Sir John Parnell, the Chancellor of the Exchequer,
followed the Speaker. Mr. Fitzgerald, the Prime Serjeant, a
law officer of the Crown, was on the same side. Ponsonby, the
leader of the Whigs, was vehement against the scheme; so was
Grattan; so was Curran. Great efforts were made by the
Government to quiet the Protestants, and to engage the
Catholics to support the Union. These efforts were so far
successful that most of the Orange lodges were persuaded to
refrain from expressing any opinion on the subject. The
Catholic hierarchy were conciliated by the promise of a
provision for the clergy, and of an adjustment of the Tithe
question. Hopes were held out, if promises were not actually
made, to the Catholic community, that their civil disabilities
would be removed. … If the Union was to be accomplished by
constitutional means, it could be effected only by a vote of
the Irish Parliament, concurring with a vote of the English
Parliament; and if the Irish assembly were to pronounce an
unbiased judgment on the question of its extinction, it is
certain that a very small minority, possibly not a single
vote, would be found to support the measure. … The vote on
the address was followed, in a few days, by an address to the
Crown, in which the Commons pledged themselves to maintain the
constitution of 1782. The majority in favour of national
independence had already increased from five to twenty. …
The votes of the Irish Commons had disposed of the question
for the current session; but preparations were immediately
made for its future passage through the Irish Houses. The
foremost men in Ireland … had first been tempted, but had
indignantly refused every offer to betray the independence of
their country. Another class of leading persons was then
tried, and from these, for the most part, evasive answers were
received. The minister understood the meaning of these dubious
utterances. There was one mode of carrying the Union, and one
mode only. Bribery of every kind must be employed without
hesitation and without stint."
W. Massey,
History of England: Reign of George. III.,
chapter 38 (volume 4).
"Lord Cornwallis had to work the system of 'negotiating and
jobbing,' by promising an Irish Peerage, or a lift in that
Peerage, or even an English Peerage, to a crowd of eager
competitors for honours. The other specific for making
converts was not yet in complete operation. Lord Castlereagh
[the Irish Chief Secretary] had the plan in his
portfolio:—borough proprietors to be compensated; … fifty
barristers in parliament, who always considered a seat as the
road to preferment, to be compensated; the purchasers of seats
to be compensated; individuals connected either by residence
or property with Dublin to be compensated. 'Lord Castlereagh
considered that £1,500,000 would be required to effect all
these compensations.' The sum actually paid to the
borough-mongers alone was £1,260,000. Fifteen thousand pounds
were allotted to each borough; and 'was apportioned amongst
the various patrons.' … It had become a contest of bribery
on both sides. There was an 'Opposition stock-purse,' as Lord
Castlereagh describes the fund against which he was to
struggle with the deeper purse at Whitehall. … During the
administration of Lord Cornwallis, 29 Irish Peerages were
created; of which seven only were unconnected with the
question of Union. Six English Peerages were granted on
account of Irish services; and there were 19 promotions in the
Irish Peerage, earned by similar assistance." The question of
Union was virtually decided in the Irish House of Commons on
the 6th of February, 1800. Lord Castlereagh, on the previous
day, had read a message from the Lord Lieutenant,
communicating resolutions adopted by the parliament of Great
Britain in the previous year. "The question was debated from
four o'clock in the afternoon of the 5th to one o'clock in the
afternoon of the 6th.
{1783}
During that time the streets of Dublin were the scene of a
great riot, and the peace of the city was maintained only by
troops of cavalry. … On the division of the 6th there was a
majority of 43 in favour of the Union." It was not, however,
until the 7th of June, that the final legislative
enactment—the Union Bill—was passed in the Irish House of
Commons. The first article provided "that the kingdoms of
Great Britain and Ireland should, upon the 1st of January,
1801, be united into one kingdom, by the name of The United
Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. The United Kingdom was
to be represented in one and the same parliament. In the
United Parliament there were to be 28 temporal Peers, elected
for life by the Irish Peerage; and four spiritual Peers,
taking their places in rotation. There were to be 100 members
of the Lower House; each county returning two, as well as the
cities of Dublin and Cork. The University returned one, and 31
boroughs each returned one. Of these boroughs 23 remained
close boroughs till the Reform Bill of 1831. … The Churches
of England and Ireland were to be united. The proportion of
Revenue to be levied was fixed at fifteen for Great Britain
and two for Ireland, for the succeeding twenty years.
Countervailing duties upon imports to each country were fixed
by a minute tariff, but some commercial restrictions were to
be removed."
C. Knight,
Popular History of England,
volume 7, chapter 21.
"If the Irish Parliament had consisted mainly, or to any
appreciable extent, of men who were disloyal to the
connection, and whose sympathies were on the side of rebellion
or with the enemies of England, the English Ministers would, I
think, have been amply justified in employing almost any means
to abolish it. … But it cannot be too clearly understood or
too emphatically stated, that the legislative Union was not an
act of this nature. The Parliament which was abolished was a
Parliament of the most unqualified loyalists; it had shown
itself ready to make every sacrifice in its power for the
maintenance of the Empire, and from the time when Arthur
O'Connor and Lord Edward Fitzgerald passed beyond its walls,
it probably did not contain a single man who was really
disaffected. … It must be added, that it was becoming
evident that the relation between the two countries
established by the Constitution of 1782 could not have
continued unchanged. … Even with the best dispositions, the
Constitution of 1782 involved many and grave probabilities of
difference. … Sooner or later the corrupt borough ascendency
must have broken down, and it was a grave question what was to
succeed it. … An enormous increase of disloyalty and
religious animosity had taken place during the last years of
the century, and it added immensely to the danger of the
democratic Catholic suffrage, which the Act of 1793 had called
into existence. This was the strongest argument for hurrying
on the Union; but when all due weight is assigned to it, it
does not appear to me to have justified the policy of Pitt."
W. E. H. Lecky,
History of England in the 18th Century,
chapter 32 (volume 8).
ALSO IN:
T. D. Ingram,
History of the Legislative Union.
R. Hassencamp,
History of Ireland,
chapter 14.
Marquis Cornwallis,
Correspondence,
chapters 19-21 (volumes 2-3).
Viscount Castlereagh,
Memoirs and Correspondence,
volumes 2-3.
IRELAND: A. D. 1801.
Pitt's promise of Catholic Emancipation broken by the king.
See ENGLAND: A. D. 1801-1806.
IRELAND: A. D. 1801-1803.
The Emmet insurrection.
"Lord Hardwicke succeeded Lord Cornwallis as viceroy in May
[1801]; and for two years, so far as the British public knew,
Ireland was undisturbed. The harvest of 1801 was abundant. The
island was occupied by a military force of 125,000 men.
Distant rumours of disturbances in Limerick, Tipperary, and
Waterford were faintly audible. Imports and exports increased.
The debt increased likewise, but, as it was met by loans and
uncontrolled by any public assembly, no one protested, and few
were aware of the fact. Landlords and middlemen throve on high
rents, and peasants as yet could live. … Early in 1803 the
murmurs in the southwest became louder. Visions of a fixed
price for potatoes began to shape themselves, and the invasion
of 'strangers' ready to take land from which tenants had been
ejected was resisted. The magistrates urged the viceroy to
obtain and exercise the powers of the Insurrection Act; but
the evil was not thought of sufficient magnitude, and their
request was refused: Amidst the general calm, the insurrection
of Robert Emmett in July broke like a bolt from the blue. A
young republican visionary, whose brother had taken an active
part in the rebellion, he had inspired a few score comrades
with the quixotic hope of rekindling Irish nationality by
setting up a factory of pikes in a back street of Dublin. On
the eve of St. James's Day, Quigley, one of his associates,
who had been sowing vague hopes among the villages of Kildare,
brought a mixed crowd into Dublin. When the evening fell, a
sky-rocket was fired. Emmett and his little band sallied from
Marshalsea Lane into St. James's Street, and distributed pikes
to all who would take them. The disorderly mob thus armed
proceeded to the debtors' prison, which they attacked, killing
the officer who defended it. Emmett urged them on to the
Castle. They followed, in a confused column, utterly beyond
his power to control. On their war they fell in with the
carriage of the Chief Justice, Lord Kilwarden, dragged him
out, and killed him. By this time a few handfuls of troops had
been collected. In half an hour two subalterns, with fifty
soldiers each, had dispersed the whole gathering. By ten
o'clock all was over, with the loss of 20 soldiers and 50
insurgents. Emmett and Russell, another of the leaders who had
undertaken the agitation of Down and Antrim, were shortly
afterwards taken and executed; Quigley escaped. Such was the
last reverberation of the rebellion of 1798, or rather of the
revolutionary fervour that led the way to that rebellion,
before it had been tainted with religious animosity. Emmett
died as Shelley would have died, a martyr and an enthusiast;
but he knew little of his countrymen's condition, little of
their aspirations, nothing of their needs. He had no
successors."
J. H. Bridges,
Two Centuries of Irish History,
part 3, chapter 2.
"Emmet might easily have escaped to France if he had chosen,
but he delayed till too late. Emmet was a young man, and Emmet
was in love. 'The idol of his heart,' as he calls her in his
dying speech, was Sarah Curran, the daughter of John Philpot
Curran. … Emmet was determined to see her before he went. He
placed his life upon the cast and lost it. … The White
Terror which followed upon the failure of Emmet's rising was
accompanied by almost all the horrors which marked the hours
of repression after the rebellion of '98. … The old devil's
dance of spies and informers went merrily forward; the prisons
were choked with prisoners."
J. H. McCarthy,
Ireland Since the Union,
chapters 5-6.
ALSO IN:
R. R. Madden,
The United Irishmen, their Lives and Times,
volume 3.
J. Wills,
History of Ireland in the Lives of Irishmen,
volume 6, pages 68-80.
{1784}
IRELAND: A. D. 1811-1829.
O'Connell and the agitation for Catholic Emancipation
and the Repeal of the Union.
Catholic disabilities removed.
"There is much reason to believe that almost from the
commencement of his career" Daniel O'Connell, the great Irish
agitator, "formed one vast scheme of policy which he pursued
through life with little deviation, and, it must be added,
with little scruple. This scheme was to create and lead a
public spirit among the Roman Catholics; to wrest emancipation
by this means from the Government; to perpetuate the agitation
created for that purpose till the Irish Parliament had been
restored; to disendow the Established Church; and thus to open
in Ireland a new era, with a separate and independent
Parliament and perfect religious equality. It would be
difficult to conceive a scheme of policy exhibiting more
daring than this. The Roman Catholics had hitherto shown
themselves absolutely incompetent to take any decisive part in
politics. … O'Connell, however, perceived that it was
possible to bring the whole mass of the people into the
struggle, and to give them an almost unexampled momentum and
unanimity by applying to politics a great power that lay
dormant in Ireland—the power of the Catholic priesthood. To
make the priests the rulers of the country, and himself the
ruler of the priests, was his first great object. … There
was a party supported by Keogh, the leader in '93, who
recommended what was called 'a dignified silence'—in other
words, a complete abstinence from petitioning and agitation.
With this party O'Connell successfully grappled. His advice on
every occasion was, 'Agitate, agitate, agitate!' and Keogh was
so irritated by the defeat that he retired from the society."
O'Connell's leadership of the movement for Catholic
Emancipation became virtually established about the beginning
of 1811. "He avowed himself repeatedly to be an agitator with
an 'ulterior object,' and declared that that object was the
repeal of the Union. 'Desiring, as I do, the repeal of the
Union,' he said in one of his speeches, in 1813, 'I rejoice to
see how our enemies promote that great object. … They delay
the liberties of the Catholics, but they compensate us most
amply because they advance the restoration of Ireland. By
leaving one cause of agitation, they have created, and they
will embody and give shape and form to, a public mind and a
public spirit.' … Nothing can be more untrue than to
represent the Repeal agitation as a mere afterthought designed
to sustain his flagging popularity. Nor can it be said that
the project was first started by him. The deep indignation
that the Union had produced in Ireland was fermenting among
all classes, and assuming the form, sometimes of a French
party, sometimes of a social war, and sometimes of a
constitutional agitation. … It would be tedious to follow
into minute detail the difficulties and the mistakes that
obstructed the Catholic movement, and were finally overcome by
the energy or the tact of O'Connell. … Several times the
movement was menaced by Government proclamations and
prosecutions. Its great difficulty was to bring the public
opinion of the whole body of the Roman Catholics actively and
habitually into the question. … All preceding movements
since the Revolution (except the passing excitement about
Wood's halfpence) had been chiefly among the Protestants or
among the higher order of the Catholics. The mass of the
people had taken no real interest in politics, had felt no
real pain at their disabilities, and were politically the
willing slaves of their landlords. For the first time, under
the influence of O'Connell, the great swell of a really
democratic movement was felt. The simplest way of
concentrating the new enthusiasm would have been by a system
of delegates, but this had been rendered illegal by the
Convention Act. On the other hand, the right of petitioning
was one of the fundamental privileges of the constitution. By
availing himself of this right O'Connell contrived, with the
dexterity of a practised lawyer, to violate continually the
spirit of the Convention Act, while keeping within the letter
of the law. Proclamation after proclamation was launched
against his society, but by continually changing its name and
its form he generally succeeded in evading the prosecutions of
the Government. These early societies, however, all sink into
insignificance compared with that great Catholic Association
which was formed in 1824. The avowed objects of this society
were to promote religious education, to ascertain the
numerical strength of the different religions, and to answer
the charges against the Roman Catholics embodied in the
hostile petitions. It also 'recommended' petitions
(unconnected with the society) from every parish, and
aggregate meetings in every county. The real object was to
form a gigantic system of organisation, ramifying over the
entire country, and directed in every parish by the priests,
for the purpose of petitioning and in every other way
agitating in favour of emancipation. The Catholic Rent [a
system of small subscriptions—as small as a penny a
month—collected from the poorest contributors, throughout
Ireland] was instituted at this time, and it formed at once a
powerful instrument of cohesion and a faithful barometer of
the popular feeling. … The success of the Catholic
Association became every week more striking. The rent rose
with an extraordinary rapidity [from £350 a week in October to
£700 a week in December, 1824]. The meetings in every county
grew more and more enthusiastic, the triumph of priestly
influence more and more certain. The Government made a feeble
and abortive effort to arrest the storm by threatening both
O'Connell and Sheil [Richard Lalor] with prosecution for
certain passages in their speeches. … The formation of the
Wellington Ministry [Wellington and Peel, 1828] seemed
effectually to crush the present hopes of the Catholics, for
the stubborn resolution of its leader was as well known as his
Tory opinions. Yet this Ministry was destined to terminate the
contest by establishing the principle of religious equality.
… On the accession of the Wellington Ministry to power the
Catholic Association passed a resolution to the effect that
they would oppose with their whole energy any Irish member who
consented to accept office under it. …
{1785}
An opportunity for carrying the resolution into effect soon
occurred. Mr. Fitzgerald, the member for Clare, accepted the
office of President of the Board of Trade, and was
consequently obliged to go to his constituents for
re-election." O'Connell entered the lists against him. "The
excitement at this announcement rose at once to fever height.
It extended over every part of Ireland, and penetrated every
class of society. The whole mass of the Roman Catholics
prepared to support him, and the vast system of organisation
which he had framed acted effectually in every direction." For
the first time, the landlords found that the voting of their
tenants could not be controlled. Fitzgerald withdrew from the
contest and O'Connell was elected. "Ireland was now on the
very verge of revolution. The whole mass of the people had
been organised like a regular army, and taught to act with the
most perfect unanimity. … The Ministers, feeling further
resistance to be hopeless, brought in the Emancipation Bill,
confessedly because to withhold it would be to kindle a
rebellion that would extend over the length and breadth of the
land."
W. E. H. Lecky,
Leaders of Public Opinion in Ireland: O'Connell.
"Peel introduced the Relief Bill on the 5th March [1829]. The
king had given to it a reluctant assent. At the last hour, the
intrigues of Eldon and the Duke of Cumberland had so far
influenced his weak and disingenuous mind that he withdrew his
assent to his ministers' policy, on the pretence that he had
not expected, and could not sanction, any modification of the
Oath of Supremacy. He parted from his ministers with kisses
and courtesy, and, for a few hours their resignation was in
his hands. But with night his discretion waxed as his courage
waned; his ministers were recalled, and their measure
proceeded. In its main provisions it was thorough and
far-reaching. It admitted the Roman Catholic to Parliament,
and to all lay offices under the Crown, except those of
Regent, Lord Chancellor, whether of England or of Ireland, and
Lord Lieutenant. It repealed the oath of abjuration, it
modified the oath of supremacy. … It approximated the Irish
to the English county franchise by abolishing the
forty-shilling freeholder, and raising the voters'
qualifications to £10. All monasteries and institutions of
Jesuits were suppressed; and Roman Catholic bishops were
forbidden to assume titles of sees already held by bishops of
the Church of Ireland. Municipal and other officials were
forbidden to wear the insignia of their office at Roman
Catholic ceremonies. Lastly, the new Oath of Supremacy was
available only for persons thereafter to be elected to
Parliament"—which nullified O'Connell's election at Clare.
This petty stroke of malice is said to have been introduced in
the bill for the gratification of the king. The vote in the
Commons on the Bill was 353 against 180, and in the Lords 217
to 112. It received the Royal assent on the 13th of April.
J. A. Hamilton,
Life of Daniel O'Connell,
chapter 5.
ALSO IN:
J. McCarthy,
Sir Robert Peel,
chapters 2-7.
W. J. Fitzpatrick,
Correspondence of Daniel O'Connell,
with notices of his Life and Times,
volume 1, chapters 1-5.
W. J. Amherst,
History of Catholic Emancipation.
W. C. Taylor,
Life and Times of Sir Robert Peel,
volume 1, chapters 16-18
and volume 2, chapters 1-2.
IRELAND: A. D. 1820-1826.
Rise of the Ribbon Society.
"Throughout the half-century extending from 1820 to 1870, a
secret oath-bound agrarian confederacy, known as the 'Ribbon
Society,' was the constant affliction and recurring terror of
the landed classes of Ireland. The Vehmgericht itself was not
more dreaded. … It is assuredly strange—indeed, almost
incredible—that although the existence of this organisation
was, in a general way, as well and as widely known as the fact
that Queen Victoria reigned, or that Daniel O'Connell was once
a living man; although the story of its crimes has thrilled
judge and jury, and parliamentary committees have filled
ponderous blue-books with evidence of its proceedings, there
is to this hour the widest conflict of assertion and
conclusion as to what exactly were its real aims, its origin,
structure, character, and purpose. … I long ago satisfied
myself that the Ribbonism of one period was not the Ribbonism
of another; that the version of its aims and character
prevalent amongst its own members in one county or district
differed widely from that existing elsewhere. In Ulster it
professed to be a defensive or retaliatory league against
Orangeism. In Munster it was at first a combination against
tithe-proctors. In Connaught it was an organisation against
rack-renting and evictions. In Leinster it often was mere
trade-unionism. … The Ribbon Society seems to have been
wholly confined to small farmers, cottiers, labourers, and, in
the towns, petty shopkeepers, in whose houses the 'lodges'
were held. … Although from the inception, or first
appearance, of Ribbonism the Catholic clergy waged a
determined war upon it … the society was exclusively
Catholic. Under no circumstances would a Protestant be
admitted to membership. … The name 'Ribbon Society' was not
attached to it until about 1826. It was previously known as
'Liberty Men'; the 'Religious Liberty System'; the 'United
Sons of Irish Freedom'; 'Sons of the Shamrock'; and by other
names. … It has been said, and probably with some truth,
that it has been too much the habit to attribute erroneously
to the Ribbon organisation every atrocity committed in the
country, every deed of blood apparently arising out of
agrarian combination or conspiracy. … But vain is all
pretence that the Ribbon Society did not become, whatever the
original design or intention of its members may have been, a
hideous organisation of outrage and murder. … There was a
period when Ribbon outrages had, at all events, a conceivable
provocation; but there came a time when they sickened the
public conscience by their wantonness. The vengeance of the
society was ruthless and terrible. … From 1835 to 1855 the
Ribbon organisation was at its greatest strength. … With the
emigration of the labouring classes it was carried abroad, to
England and to America. At one time the most formidable lodges
were in Lancashire."
A. M. Sullivan,
New Ireland,
chapter 4.
IRELAND: A. D. 1831.
Establishment of National Schools.
See EDUCATION, MODERN: EUROPEAN COUNTRIES.—IRELAND.
IRELAND: A. D. 1832.
Parliamentary Representation increased by the Reform Bill.
See ENGLAND: A. D. 1830-1832.
{1786}
IRELAND: A. D. 1840-1841.
Discontent with the results of the Union.
Condition of the people.
O'Connell's revival of agitation for Repeal.
"The Catholics were at length emancipated in 1829; and now,
surely, their enemies suggested, they must be contented and
grateful for evermore? Perverse must the people be who, having

got what they asked, are not satisfied. Let us see. What they
asked was to be admitted to their just share, or, at any rate
to some share, of the government of their native country, from
which they had been excluded for five generations. But on the
passing of the Emancipation Act not a single Catholic was
admitted to an office of authority, great or small. The door
was opened, indeed, but not a soul was permitted to pass in.
There were murmurs of discontent, and the class who still
enjoyed all the patronage of the State, the Church, the army,
the magistracy, and the public service, demanded if there was
any use in attempting to conciliate a people so intractable
and unreasonable? The Catholic Association, which had won the
victory, was rewarded for its public spirit by being dissolved
by Act of Parliament. Its leader, who had been elected to the
House of Commons, had his election declared void by a phrase
imported into the Emancipation Act for this special purpose.
The forty-shilling freeholders, whose courage and magnanimity
had made the cause irresistible, were immediately deprived of
the franchise. By means of a high qualification and an
ingeniously complicated system of registry, the electors in
twelve counties were reduced from upwards of 100,000 to less
than 10,000. Englishmen cannot comprehend our dissatisfaction.
… Emancipation was speedily followed by a Reform of the
House of Commons. In England a sweeping and salutary change
was made both in the franchise, and in the distribution of
seats; but Ireland did not obtain either the number of
representatives she was demonstrably entitled to by population
and resources, or such a reduction of the franchise as had
been conceded to England. The Whigs were in power, and Ireland
was well-disposed to the party. … But the idea of treating
Ireland on perfectly equal terms, and giving her the full
advantage of the Union which had been forced on her, did not
exist in the mind of a single statesman of that epoch. After
Emancipation and Reform, O'Connell had a fierce quarrel with
the Whigs, during which he raised the question of Ireland's
right to be governed exclusively by her own Parliament. The
people responded passionately to his appeal. The party of
Protestant Ascendancy had demanded the Repeal of the Union
before Emancipation, but that disturbing event altered their
policy, and they withheld all aid from O'Connell. After a
brief time he abandoned the experiment, to substitute for it
an attempt to obtain what was called 'justice to Ireland.' In
furtherance of this project he made a compact with the Whigs
that the Irish Party under his lead should support them in
parliament. The Whigs in return made fairer appointments to
judicial and other public employments, restrained jury
packing, and established an unsectarian system of public
education; but the national question was thrown back for more
than a generation. In 1840-1 O'Connell revived the question of
Repeal, on the ground that the Union had wholly failed to
accomplish the end for which it was said to be designed.
Instead of bringing Ireland prosperity, it had brought her
ruin. The social condition of the country during the
half-century, then drawing to a close was, indeed, without
parallel in Europe. The whole population were dependent on
agriculture. There were minerals, but none found in what
miners call 'paying quantities.' There was no manufacture
except linen, and the remnant of a woollen trade, slowly dying
out before the pitiless competition of Yorkshire. What the
island chiefly produced was food; which was exported to richer
countries to enable the cultivator to pay an inordinate rent.
Foreign travellers saw with amazement an island possessing all
the natural conditions of a great commerce, as bare of
commerce as if it lay in some byeway of the world where
enterprise had not yet penetrated. … The great proprietors
were two or three hundred—the heirs of the Undertakers, for
the most part, and Absentees; the mass of the country was
owned by a couple of thousand others, who lived in splendour,
and even profusion; and for these the peasant ploughed, sowed,
tended, and reaped a harvest which he never shared. Rent, in
other countries, means the surplus after the farmer has been
liberally paid for his skill and labour; in Ireland it meant
the whole produce of the soil except a potato-pit. If a farmer
strove for more, his master knew how to bring him to speedy
submission. He could carry away his implements of trade by the
law of distress, or rob him of his sole pursuit in life by the
law of eviction. He could, and habitually did, seize the
growing crop, the stools and pots in his miserable cabin, the
blanket that sheltered his children, the cow that gave them
nourishment. There were just and humane landlords, men who
performed the duties which their position imposed, and did not
exaggerate its rights; but they were a small minority. …
Famines were frequent, and every other year destitution killed
a crowd of peasants. For a hundred and fifty years before,
whoever has described the condition of Ireland—English
official, foreign visitor, or Irish patriot—described a
famine more or less acute. Sometimes the tortured serfs rose
in nocturnal jacquerie against the system; and then a cry of
'rebellion' was raised, and England was assured that these
intractable barbarians were again (as the indictment always
charged) 'levying war against the King's majesty.' There were
indeed causes enough for national disaffection, but of these
the poor peasant knew nothing; he was contending for so much
miserable food as would save his children from starvation.
There were sometimes barbarous agrarian murders—murders of
agents and bailiffs chiefly, but occasionally of landlords. It
would be shameful to forget that these savage crimes were
often the result of savage provocation. … The country was
naked of timber, the cabins of the peasantry were squalid and
unfurnished. Mr. Carlyle reproves a lazy, thriftless people,
who would not perform the simple operation of planting trees;
and Mr. Froude frowns upon cottages whose naked walls are
never draped by climbing roses or flowering creepers. But how
much more eloquent is fact than rhetoric? The Irish landlords
made a law that when the tenant planted a tree it became not
his own property but his master's; and the established
practice of four-fifths of the Irish landlords, when a tenant
exhibited such signs of prosperity as a garden, or a
white-washed cabin, was to reward his industry by increasing
his rent.
{1787}
Peasants will not plant or make improvements on these
conditions, nor, I fancy, would philosophers. … It was
sometimes made a boast in those days that rank, property,
station, and professional success distinguished the minority
in Ireland who were imperialists and Protestants. It was not
an amazing phenomenon, that those upon whom the law had
bestowed a monopoly of rank, property, and station, for a
hundred and fifty years, should have still maintained the
advantage a dozen years after Emancipation. It was a subject
of scornful reproach that the districts inhabited by
Protestants were peaceful and prosperous, while the Catholic
districts were often poor and disorderly. There is no doubt of
the facts; the contrast certainly existed. But the mystery
disappears when one comes to reflect that in Down and Antrim
the Squire regarded his tenantry with as much sympathy and
confidence as a Squire in Devon or Essex, that their sons were
trained to bear arms, and taught from the pulpit and platform
that they belonged to a superior race, that all the local
employments, paid out of the public purse, were distributed
among them, that they had certain well understood rights over
their holdings on which no landlord could safely trench, and
that they met their masters, from time to time, in the
friendly equality of an Orange lodge; while in Tipperary, the
farmer was a tenant at will who never saw his landlord except
when he followed the hounds across his corn, or frowned at him
from the bench; whose rent could be raised, or his tenancy
terminated at the pleasure of his master; who, on the smallest
complaint, was carried before a bench of magistrates, where he
had no expectation, and little chance, of justice; and who
wanted the essential stimulus to thrift and industry, the
secure enjoyment of his earnings. As a set-off to this long
catalogue of discouragements, there were two facts of happy
augury. In 1842 half a million of children were receiving
education in the National Schools under a system designed to
establish religious equality, and administered by Catholic and
Protestant Commissioners. And the Teetotal movement was at its
height. Thousands were accepting every week a pledge of total
abstinence from Father Mathew, a young priest whom the gifts
of nature and the accidents of fortune combined to qualify for
the mission of a Reformer. … There was the beginning of
political reforms also. The Whigs sent a Lord Lieutenant and
Chief Secretary to Ireland who, for the first time since the
fall of Limerick, treated the bulk of the nation as the social
and political equals of the minority. The minority had been so
long accustomed to make and administer the laws, and to occupy
the places of authority and distinction, that they regarded
the change as a revolt; and Lord Mulgrave and Thomas Drummond
as the successors of Tyrconnel and Nugent. In the interval,
since Emancipation, a few Catholics were elected to
Parliament, two Catholic lawyers were raised to the bench, and
smaller appointments distributed among laymen. … The
exclusion of Catholics from juries was restrained, and the
practice of appointing partisans of too shameful antecedents
to public functions was interrupted. … It was under these
circumstances that O'Connell for the second time summoned the
Irish people to demand a Repeal of the Union."
Sir C. G. Duffy,
A Bird's-Eye View of Irish History, revised edition,
pages 242-275.
ALSO IN:
Lord E. Fitzmaurice and J. R. Thursfield,
Two Centuries of Irish History,
part 4, chapters 1-2.
R. M. Martin,
Ireland before and after the Union.
IRELAND: A. D. 1841-1848.
O'Connell's last agitation.
His trial, imprisonment and release.
His death.
The "Young Ireland" Party and its rebellion.
In 1841, O'Connell "left England and went to Ireland, and
devoted himself there to the work of organization. A
succession of monster meetings were held all over the country,
the far-famed one on Tara Hill being, as is credibly asserted,
attended by no less than a quarter of a million of people.
Over this vast multitude gathered together around him the
magic tones of the great orator's voice swept triumphantly;
awakening anger, grief, passion, delight, laughter, tears, at
its own pleasure. They were astonishing triumphs, but they
were dearly bought. The position was, in fact, an impossible
one to maintain long. O'Connell had carried the whole mass of
the people with him up to the very brink of the precipice, but
how to bring them safely and successfully down again was more
than even he could accomplish. Resistance he had always
steadily denounced, yet every day his own words seemed to be
bringing the inevitable moment of collision nearer and nearer.
The crisis came on October the 5th. A meeting had been
summoned to meet at Clontarf, near Dublin, and on the
afternoon of the 4th the Government suddenly came to the
resolution of issuing a proclamation forbidding it to
assemble. The risk was a formidable one for responsible men to
run. Many of the people were already on their way, and only
O'Connell's own rapid and vigorous measures in sending out in
all directions to intercept them hindered the actual shedding
of blood. His prosecution and that of some of his principal
adherents was the next important event. By a Dublin jury he
was found guilty, sentenced to two years' imprisonment, and
conveyed to prison, still earnestly entreating the people to
remain quiet, an order which they strictly obeyed. The jury by
which he had been condemned was known to be strongly biassed
against him, and an appeal had been forwarded against his
sentence to the House of Lords. So strong there, too, was the
feeling against O'Connell, that little expectation was
entertained of its being favourably received. Greatly to its
honour, however, the sentence was reversed and he was set
free. … The enthusiasm shown at his release was frantic and
delirious. None the less those months in Richmond prison
proved the death-knell of his power. He was an old man by this
time; he was already weakened in health, and that buoyancy
which had hitherto carried him over any and every obstacle
never again revived. The 'Young Ireland' party, the members of
which had in the first instance been his allies and
lieutenants, had now formed a distinct section, and upon the
vital question of resistance were in fierce hostility to all
his most cherished principles. The state of the country, too,
preyed visibly upon his mind. By 1846 had begun that
succession of disastrous seasons which, by destroying the
feeble barrier which stood between the peasant and a cruel
death, brought about a national tragedy, the most terrible
perhaps with which modern Europe has been confronted. This
tragedy, though he did not live to see the whole of it,
O'Connell—himself the incarnation of the people—felt
acutely.
{1788}
Deep despondency took hold of him. He retired, to a great
degree, from public life, leaving the conduct of his
organization in the hands of others. … In 1847 he resolved
to leave Ireland, and to end his days in Rome. His last public
appearance was in the House of Commons, where an attentive and
deeply respectful audience hung upon the faltering and barely
articulate accents which fell from his lips. In a few deeply
moving words he appealed for aid and sympathy for his
suffering countrymen, and left the House. … The camp and
council chamber of the 'Young Ireland' party was the editor's
room of 'The Nation' newspaper. There it found its
inspiration, and there its plans were matured—so far, that
is, as they can be said to have been ever matured. For an
eminently readable and all things considered a wonderfully
impartial account of this movement, the reader cannot do
better than consult Sir Charles Gavan Duffy's 'Four Years of
Irish History,' which has the immense advantage of being
history taken at first hand, written that is by one who
himself took a prominent part in the scenes which he
describes. The most interesting figure in the party had,
however, died before those memorable four years began. Thomas
Davis, who was only thirty at the time of his death in 1845,
was a man of large gifts, nay, might fairly be called a man of
genius. … The whole movement in fact was, in the first
instance; a literary quite as much as a political one. Nearly
all who took part in it Gavan Duffy, John Mitchell, Meagher,
Dillon, Davis himself—were very young men, many fresh from
college, all filled with zeal for the cause of liberty and
nationality. The graver side of the movement only showed
itself when the struggle with O'Connell began. At first no
idea of deposing, or even seriously opposing the great leader
seems to have been intended. The attempt on O'Connell's part
to carry a formal declaration against the employment under any
circumstances of physical force was, the origin of that
division, and what the younger spirits considered 'truckling
to the Whigs' helped to widen the breach. When, too, O'Connell
had partially retired into the background, his place was
filled by his son, John O'Connell, the 'Head conciliator,'
between whom and the 'Young Irelanders' there waged a fierce
war, which in the end led to the indignant withdrawal of the
latter from the Repeal council. Before matters reached this
point, the younger camp had been strengthened by the adhesion
of Smith O'Brien, who, though not a man of much intellectual
calibre, carried no little weight in Ireland. … Early in
January, 1847, O'Connell left on that journey of his which was
never completed, and by the middle of May Ireland was suddenly
startled by the news that her great leader was dead. The
effect of his death was to produce a sudden and immense
reaction. A vast revulsion of love and reverence sprang up all
over the country; an immense sense of his incomparable
services, and with it a vehement anger against all who had
opposed him. Upon the 'Young Ireland' party, as was
inevitable, the weight of that anger fell chiefly, and from
the moment of O'Connell's death whatever claim they had to
call themselves a national party vanished utterly. The men
'who killed the Liberator' could never again hope to carry
with them the suffrages of any number of their countrymen.
This contumely, to a great degree undeserved, naturally
reacted upon the subjects of it. The taunt of treachery and
ingratitude flung at them wherever they went stung and
nettled. In the general reaction of gratitude and affection
for O'Connell, his son John succeeded easily to the position
of leader. The older members of the Repeal Association
thereupon rallied about him, and the split between them and
the younger men grew deeper and wider. A wild, impracticable
visionary now came to play a part in the movement. A deformed
misanthrope, called James Lalor, endowed with a considerable
command of vague, passionate rhetoric, began to write
incentives to revolt in 'The Nation.' These growing more and
more violent were by the editor at length prudently
suppressed. The seed, however, had already sown itself in
another mind. John Mitchell is described by Mr. Justin
McCarthy as 'the one formidable man amongst the rebels of '48;
the one man who distinctly knew what he wanted, and was
prepared to run any risk to get it.' … To him it was
intolerable that any human being should be willing to go
further and to dare more in the cause of Ireland than himself,
and the result was that after awhile he broke away from his
connection with The Nation,' and started a new organ under
the name of 'The United Irishmen,' one definitely pledged from
the first to the policy of action. From this point matters
gathered speedily to a head. Mitchell's newspaper proceeded to
fling out challenge after challenge to the Government, calling
upon the people to gather and to 'sweep-this island clear of
the English name and nation.' For some months these challenges
remained unanswered. It was now, however, '48,' and nearly all
Europe was in revolution. The necessity of taking some step
began to be evident, and a Bill making all written incitement
of insurrection felony was hurried through the House of
Commons, and almost immediately after Mitchell was arrested.
Even then he seems to have believed that the country would
rise to liberate him. The country, however, showed no
disposition to do anything of the sort. He was tried in
Dublin, found guilty, sentenced to fourteen years'
transportation, and a few days afterwards put on board a
vessel in the harbour and conveyed to Spike Island, whence he
was sent to Bermuda, and the following April in a convict
vessel to the Cape, and finally to Tasmania. The other 'Young
Irelanders,' stung apparently by their own previous inaction,
thereupon rushed frantically into rebellion. The
leaders—Smith O'Brien, Meagher, Dillon, and others—went
about the country holding reviews of 'Confederates,' as they
now called themselves, a proceeding which caused the
Government to suspend the Habeas Corpus Act, and to issue a
warrant for their arrest. A few more gatherings took place in
different parts of the country, a few more ineffectual
attempts were made to induce the people to rise, one very
small collision with the police occurred, and then the whole
thing was over. All the leaders in the course of a few days
were arrested and Smith O'Brien and Meagher were sentenced to
death, a sentence which was speedily changed into
transportation. Gavan Duffy was arrested and several times
tried, but the jury always disagreed, and in the end his
prosecution was abandoned. The 'Young Ireland' movement,
however, was dead, and never again revived."
E. Lawless,
The Story of Ireland,
chapters 55-56.
ALSO IN:
Sir C. G. Duffy,
Young Ireland.
Sir C. G. Duffy,
Four Years of Irish History, 1845-1849.
Sir C. G. Duffy,
Thomas Davis: Memoirs of an Irish Patriot, 1840-1846.
{1789}
IRELAND: A. D. 1843-1848.
The Devon Commission.
The Encumbered Estates Act.
In 1843, Mr. Sharman Crawford "succeeded in obtaining the
appointment of a Royal Commission to investigate the
'occupation of land in Ireland.' This Commission, known from
its chairman, Lord Devon, as the Devon Commission, marks a
great epoch in the Irish land question. The Commissioners, in
their Report, brought out strongly the facts that great misery
existed in Ireland, and that the cause of the misery was the
system of land tenure. The following extract from the Report
indicates the general nature of its conclusions: 'A reference
to the evidence of most of the witnesses will show that the
agricultural labourer of Ireland continues to suffer the
greatest privations and hardships; that he continues to depend
upon casual and precarious employment for subsistence; that he
is badly housed, badly fed, badly clothed, and badly paid for
his labour. Our personal experience and observations during
our enquiry have afforded us a melancholy confirmation of
these statements, and we cannot forbear expressing our strong
sense of the patient endurance which the labouring classes
have generally exhibited under sufferings greater, we believe,
than the people of any other country in Europe have to
sustain.' And the remedy for the evil is to be found,
continues the Report, in 'an increased and improved
cultivation of the soil,' to be gained by securing for the
tenant' fair remuneration for the outlay of his capital and
labour.' No sooner was this Report issued than great numbers
of petitions were presented to the House of Lords, and
supported by Lord Devon, praying for legislative reform of the
land evils; and in June, 1845, a bill was introduced into the
House of Lords by Lord Stanley, on behalf of the government of
Sir Robert Peel, for 'the purpose of providing compensation to
tenants in Ireland, in certain cases, on being dispossessed of
their holdings, for such improvements as they may have made
during their tenancy.' By the selfish opposition of the Irish
landlords this bill was thrown out. Two days after its
rejection in the House of Lords Mr. Sharman Crawford brought
into the House of Commons a Tenant Right Bill, and met with as
little success. In 1846 a government bill was introduced,
bearing a strong resemblance to that of Lord Stanley; but the
ministry was overthrown, and the bill was dropped. A Liberal
ministry under Lord John Russell came into power in July,
1846, and Irish hopes again began to rise. In 1847 the
indefatigable Mr. Crawford brought in a bill, whose purpose
was to extend the Ulster custom to the whole of Ireland; it
was thrown out. A well-meant but in the end unsuccessful
attempt to relieve the burdens of embarrassed landlords
without redressing the grievances of rack-rented tenants, was
made in 1848 by the measure well known as the Encumbered
Estates Act. This Act had for its object to restore capital to
the land; but with capital it brought in a class of
proprietors who lacked the virtues as well as the vices of
their predecessors, and were even more oppressive to the
tenantry."
E. Thursfield,
England and Ireland,
chapter 10.
ALSO IN:
H. L. Jephson,
Notes on Irish Questions,
chapter 15.
D. B. King,
The Irish Question,
chapter 9.
IRELAND: A. D. 1844.
The Maynooth Grant.
Towards the close of the session of Parliament in 1844, Sir
Robert Peel undertook a measure "dealing with higher education
in Ireland. Means were to be found, in some way, for the
education of the upper classes of the Irish, and for the more
efficient education of candidates for the Roman Catholic
priesthood. Some provision already existed for the education
of the Irish people. Trinity College, with its considerable
endowments, afforded opportunities to wealthy Irish. The
National Board, which Stanley had instituted, had under its
control 3,153 schools, and 395,000 scholars. But Trinity
College retained most of its advantages for the benefit of its
Protestant students, and the 395,000 scholars, whom the
National Board was educating, did not, after all, include one
person in every twenty alive in Ireland. The Roman Catholic,
since 1793, had been allowed to graduate at Trinity; but he
could hold neither scholarship nor professorship. … Some
steps had, indeed, been taken for the education of the Roman
Catholic priesthood. In 1795, Fitzwilliam had proposed, and
his successor, Camden, had approved, the appropriation of an
annual sum of money to a college formed at Maynooth for the
education of Roman Catholic priests. The Irish parliament had
readily sanctioned the scheme; the payment of the grant had
been continued, after the Union, by the Parliament of the
United Kingdom, and, though the sums voted had been reduced to
£9,000 a year in 1808, this amount had been thenceforward
regularly allotted to Maynooth. In some respects the grant was
actually disadvantageous to the college; it was too small to
maintain the institution; it was large enough to discourage
voluntary contributions. The surroundings of the college were
squalid; its professors were wretchedly paid; it was even
impossible to assign to each of the 440 students a separate
room; it was dubbed by Macaulay, in a memorable speech, a
'miserable Dotheboys' Hall,' and it was Peel's deliberate
opinion that the absolute withdrawal of the grant would be
better than the continuance of the niggardly allowance." The
Government "asked Parliament to vote a sum of £30,000 to
improve the buildings at Maynooth; it proposed that the Board
of Works should in future be responsible for keeping them in
repair; it suggested that the salaries of professors should be
more than doubled; that the position of the students should be
improved; that the annual grant should be raised from about
£9,000 to about £26,000, and that this sum, instead of being
subject to the approval of the legislature once a year, should
be placed on the Consolidated Fund. Then arose a series of
debates which have no parallel in the history of the British
Parliament. … 'The Orangeman raises his howl,' said
Macaulay, 'and Exeter Hall sets up its bray, and Mr. MacNeile
is horrified to think that a still larger grant is intended
for the priests of Baal at the table of Jezebel, and the
Protestant operatives of Dublin call for the impeachment of
Ministers in exceedingly bad English.'
{1790}
A few years later a man, who was both a Christian and a
gentleman, declared the Irish famine to be a dispensation of
Providence in return for the Maynooth grant. … Night after
night it rained petitions; 298 petitions against the bill were
presented on the 3rd of April, when Peel explained his scheme;
148 on the 8th; 254 on the 9th; 552 on the 10th; 2,262 on the
11th, when the bill was put down for a second reading; 662 on
the 14th; 581 on the 15th; 420 on the 16th; 335 on the 17th;
371 on the 18th. The petitions hardly allowed a doubt to
remain as to the opinion of the country. Peel, indeed, was
again exposed to the full force of the strongest power which
any British Minister can encounter. The Mussulman, driven to
his last defence, raises the standard of the Prophet, and
proclaims a holy war. But the Englishman, if Protestantism be
in danger, shouts, 'No Popery!' and creates equal enthusiasm.
… Yet, vast as was the storm which the Minister had
provoked, the issues which he had directly raised were of the
smallest proportions. Hardly anyone ventured to propose that
the original vote to Maynooth should be withdrawn. A grant,
indeed, which had been sanctioned by George III., which had
been fixed by Perceval, which had been voted in an unreformed
Parliament, almost without debate, and which had been
continued for fifty years, could not be withdrawn. Peel's
opponents, therefore, were compelled to argue that there was
no harm in sacrificing £9,000 a year to Baal, but that a
sacrifice of £26,000 was full of harm. … They debated the
second reading of the bill for six nights, the third reading
for three nights, and they seized other opportunities for
protracting the discussion. Even the Lords forgot their
customary habits and sat up till a late hour on three
successive evenings to discuss an amendment for inquiring into
the class of books used at Maynooth. But this unusual display
of zeal proved useless. A majority in both Houses steadily
supported the Minister, and zealous Protestants and
old-fashioned Tories were unable to defeat a scheme which was
proposed by Peel and supported by Russell."
S. Walpole,
History of England from 1815,
chapter 19 (volume 4).
ALSO IN;
H. Martineau,
History of the Thirty Years' Peace,
book 6, chapter 8.
IRELAND: A. D. 1845-1847.
The Famine.
"In 1841 the population of Ireland was 8,175,124 souls. By
1845 it had probably reached to nearly nine millions. … To
anyone looking beneath the surface the condition of the
country was painfully precarious. Nine millions of a
population living at best in a light-hearted and hopeful
hand-to-mouth contentment, totally dependent on the hazards of
one crop, destitute of manufacturing industries, and utterly
without reserve or resource to fall back upon in time of
reverse; what did all this mean but a state of things critical
and alarming in the extreme? Yet no one seemed conscious of
danger. The potato crop had been abundant for four or five
years, and respite from dearth and distress was comparative
happiness and prosperity. Moreover, the temperance movement
[of Father Mathew] had come to make the 'good times' still
better. Everything looked bright. No one concerned himself to
discover how slender and treacherous was the foundation for
this general hopefulness and confidence. Yet signs of the
coming storm had been given. Partial famine caused by failing
harvests had indeed been intermittent in Ireland, and, quite
recently, warnings that ought not to have been mistaken or
neglected had given notice that the esculent which formed the
sole dependence of the peasant millions was subject to some
mysterious blight. In 1844 it was stricken in America, but in
Ireland the yield was healthy and plentiful as ever. The
harvest of 1845 promised to be the richest gathered for many
years. Suddenly, in one short month, in one week it might be
said, the withering breath of a simoom seemed to sweep the
land, blasting all in its path. I myself saw whole tracts of
potato growth changed in one night from smiling luxuriance to
a shrivelled and blackened waste. A shout of alarm arose. But
the buoyant nature of the Celtic peasant did not yet give way.
The crop was so profuse that it was expected the healthy
portion would reach an average result. Winter revealed the
alarming fact that the tubers had rotted in pit and
store-house. Nevertheless the farmers, like hapless men who
double their stakes to recover losses, made only the more
strenuous exertions to till a larger breadth in 1846. Although
already feeling the pinch of sore distress, if not actual
famine, they worked as if for dear life; they begged and
borrowed on any terms the means whereby to crop the land once
more. The pawn-offices were choked with the humble finery that
had shone at the village dance or the christening feast; the
banks and local money-lenders were besieged with appeals for
credit. Meals were stinted, backs were bared. Anything,
anything to tide over the interval to the harvest of
'Forty-six.' O God, it is a dreadful thought that all this
effort was but more surely leading them to ruin! It was this
harvest of Forty-six that sealed their doom. Not partially but
completely, utterly, hopelessly, it perished. As in the
previous year, all promised brightly up to the close of July.
Then, suddenly, in a night, whole areas were blighted; and
this time, alas! no portion of the crop escaped. A cry of
agony and despair went up all over the land. The last
desperate stake for life had been played, and all was lost.
The doomed people realised but too well what was before them.
Last year's premonitory sufferings had exhausted them, and
now?—they must die! My native district figures largely in the
gloomy record of that dreadful time. I saw the horrible
phantasmagoria—would God it were but that!—pass before my
eyes. Blank stolid dismay, a sort of stupor, fell upon the
people, contrasting remarkably with the fierce energy put
forth a year before. It was no uncommon sight to see the
cottier and his little family seated on the garden fence
gazing all day long in moody silence at the blighted plot that
had been their last hope. Nothing could arouse them. You
spoke; they answered not. You tried to cheer them; they shook
their heads. I never saw so sudden and so terrible a
transformation. When first in the autumn of 1845 the partial
blight appeared, wise voices were raised in warning to the
Government that a frightful catastrophe was at hand; yet even
then began that fatal circumlocution and inaptness which it
maddens one to think of. It would be utter injustice to deny
that the Government made exertions which judged by ordinary
emergencies would be prompt and considerable.
{1791}
But judged by the awful magnitude of the evil then at hand or
actually befallen, they were fatally tardy and inadequate.
When at length the executive did hurry, the blunders of
precipitancy outdid the disasters of excessive deliberation.
… In October 1845 the Irish Mansion House Relief Committee
implored the Government to call Parliament together and throw
open the ports. The Government refused. Again and again the
terrible urgency of the case, the magnitude of the disaster at
hand, was pressed on the executive. It was the obstinate
refusal of Lord John Russell to listen to these remonstrances
and entreaties, and the sad verification subsequently of these
apprehensions, that implanted in the Irish mind the bitter
memories which still occasionally find vent in passionate
accusation of 'England.' Not but the Government had many and
weighty arguments in behalf of the course they took. … The
situation bristled with difficulties. … At first the
establishment of public soup-kitchens under local relief
committees, subsidised by Government, was relied upon to
arrest the famine. I doubt if the world ever saw so huge a
demoralisation, so great a degradation, visited upon a once
high-spirited and sensitive people. All over the country large
iron boilers were set up, in which what was called 'soup' was
concocted; later on Indian-meal stirabout was boiled. Around
these boilers on the roadside there daily moaned and shrieked
and fought and scuffled crowds of gaunt, cadaverous creatures
that once had been men and women made in the image of God. The
feeding of dogs in a kennel was far more decent and orderly.
… I frequently stood and watched the scene till tears
blinded me and I almost choked with grief and passion. … The
conduct of the Irish landlords throughout the famine period
has been variously described, and has been, I believe,
generally condemned. I consider the censure visited on them
too sweeping. … On many of them no blame too heavy could
possibly fall. A large number were permanent absentees; their
ranks were swelled by several who early fled the post of duty
at home—cowardly and selfish deserters of a brave and
faithful people. Of those who remained, some may have grown
callous; it is impossible to contest authentic instances of
brutal heartlessness here and there. But … the overwhelming
balance is the other way. The bulk of the resident Irish
landlords manfully did their best in that dread hour. … In
the autumn of 1846 relief works were set on foot, the
Government having received parliamentary authority to grant
baronial loans for such undertakings. There might have been
found many ways of applying these funds in reproductive
employment, but the modes decided on were draining and
road-making. … The result was in every sense deplorable
failure. The wretched people were by this time too wasted and
emaciated to work. The endeavour to do so under an inclement
winter sky only hastened death. They tottered at day-break to
the roll-call; vainly tried to wheel the barrow or ply the
pick, but fainted away on the 'cutting,' or lay down on the
wayside to rise no more. As for the roads on which so much
money was wasted, and on which so many lives were sacrificed,
hardly any of them were finished. Miles of grass-grown earth
works throughout the country now mark their course and
commemorate for posterity one of the gigantic blunders of the
famine time. The first remarkable sign of the havoc which
death was making was the decline, and disappearance of
funerals. … Soon, alas! neither coffin nor shroud could be
supplied. Daily in the street and on the footway some poor
creature lay down as if to sleep, and presently was stiff and
stark. In our district it was a common occurrence to find, on
opening the front door in early morning, leaning against it,
the corpse of some victim who in the night-time had 'rested'
in its shelter. We raised a public subscription, and employed
two men with horse and cart to go around each day and gather
up the dead. One by one they were taken to a great pit at
Ardnabrahair Abbey and dropped through the hinged bottom of a
'trap-coffin' into a common grave below. In the remoter rural
districts even this rude sepulture was impossible. In the
field and by the ditchside the victims lay as they fell, till
some charitable hand was found to cover them with the adjacent
soil. It was the fever which supervened on the famine that
wrought the greatest slaughter and spread the greatest terror.
… To come within the reach of this contagion was certain
death. Whole families perished unvisited and unassisted. By
levelling above their corpses the sheeling in which they died,
the neighbours gave them a grave."
A. M. Sullivan,
New Ireland,
chapter 6.
"In July 1847 as many as three millions of persons were
actually receiving separate rations. A loan of £8,000,000 was
contracted by the Government, expressly to supply such wants,
and every step was taken by two successive administrations,
Sir Robert Peel's and Lord John Russell's, to alleviate the
sufferings of the people. Nor was private benevolence lacking.
The Society of Friends, always ready in acts of charity and
love, was foremost in the good work. A British Association was
formed for the relief of Ireland, including Jones Lloyd (Lord
Overstone), Thomas Baring, and Baron Rothschild. A Queen's
letter was issued. … Subscriptions were received from almost
every quarter of the world. The Queen's letter alone produced
£171,533. The British Association collected £263,000; the
Society of Friends £43,000; and £168,000 more were entrusted
to the Dublin Society of Friends. The Sultan of Turkey sent
£1,000. The Queen gave £2,000, and £500 more to the British
Ladies' Clothing Fund. Prince Albert gave £500. The National
Club collected £17,930. America sent two ships of war, the
'Jamestown' and the 'Macedonian,' full of provisions; and the
Irish residents in the United States sent upwards of £200,000
to their relatives, to allow them to emigrate."
L. Levi,
History of British Commerce,
part 4, chapter 4.
"By the end of 1847 cheap supplies of food began to be brought
into the country by the ordinary operation of the laws of
supply and demand, at far cheaper rates, owing to an abundant
harvest abroad, than if the Government had tried to constitute
itself the sole distributor. The potato harvest of 1847, if
not bountiful, was at least comparatively good. … By March,
1848, the third and last period of the famine may be said to
have terminated. But, though the direct period of distress was
over, the economic problems which remained for solution were
of overwhelming magnitude. … A million and a half of the
people had disappeared. The land was devastated with fever and
the diseases which dog the steps of famine. … The waters of the
great deep were indeed going down, but the land was seen to be
without form and void."
Lord E. Fitzmaurice and J. R. Thursfield,
Two Centuries of Irish History,
part 4, chapter 4.
{1792}
"The famine and plague of 1846-47 was accompanied, and
succeeded, by a wholesale clearance of congested districts and
by cruel evictions. The new landlords [who had acquired
property under the Encumbered Estates Act], bent on
consolidating their property, turned out their tenants by
regiments, and in the autumn of 1847 enormous numbers were
deported. It is absolutely necessary to bear this strictly in
mind, if we would judge of the intense hatred which prevails
amongst the Irish in America to Great Britain. The children of
many of those who were exiled then have raised themselves to
positions of affluence and prosperity in the United States.
But they have often heard from their fathers, and some of them
may perhaps recall, the circumstances under which they were
driven from their old homes in Ireland. … But there is a
further and awful memory connected with that time. The people
who had been suffering from fever carried the plague with them
on board, and the vessels sometimes became floating
charnel-houses. During the year 1847, out of 106,000 emigrants
who crossed the Atlantic for Canada and New Brunswick, 6,100
perished on the ocean, 4,100 immediately on landing, 5,200
subsequently in the hospitals, and 1,900 in the towns to which
they repaired. … Undoubtedly, historical circumstances have
… had much to do with the political hatred to Great Britain;
but its newly acquired intensity is owing to the still fresh
remembrances of what took place after the famine, and to the
fact that the wholesale clearances of Irish estates were, to
say the least, not discouraged in the writings and speeches of
English lawgivers, economists and statesmen."
Sir R. Blennerhassett,
Ireland ("Reign of Queen Victoria,"
edited by T. H. Ward,
volume 1, pages 563-565).
"The deaths from fever in the year 1846 were 17,145, in the
following year 57,000, to which 27,000 by dysentery must be
added."
J. F. Bright,
History of England,
period 4, page 164.
"Between the years 1847 and 1851 (both inclusive) the almost
incredible number of over one million Irish—men, women, and
children—were conveyed in emigrant ships to America—a
whole population. In 1847, 215,444 emigrated; in 1849,
218,842, and in 1851, 249,721."
H. L. Jephson,
Notes on Irish Questions,
page 298.
"The population of Ireland by March 30, 1851, at the same
ratio of increase as held in England and Wales, would have
been 9,018,799—it was 6,552,385. It was the calculation of
the Census Commissioners that the deficit, independently of
the emigration, represented by the mortality in the five
famine years, was 985,366."
T. P. O'Connor,
The Parnell Movement,
page 125.
IRELAND: A. D. 1846.
Defeat of Peel's Coercion Bill.
See ENGLAND: A. D. 1846.
IRELAND: A. D. 1848-1852.
Tenant organizations.
The Ulster Tenant Right.
The Tenant League.
"The famine … and the evictions that followed it made the
people more discontented than ever with the land system. The
Democratic Association, organized about this time, adopted as
its rallying cry, 'the land for the people.' … This
association, whose aims are said to have been 'largely
communistic and revolutionary,' opposed the Irish Alliance,
the Nationalist Society organized by Charles Gavan Duffy. …
During the years '49 and '50 numerous Tenant Protection
Societies were formed throughout the country, the
Presbyterians of Ulster taking quite as active a part as the
Celtic Catholics of the other provinces. In May, 1850, the
Presbyterian Synod of Ulster … resolved, against the
protest, it is true, of the more conservative men, to petition
Parliament to extend to the rest of Ireland the benefits of
rights and securities similar to those of the Ulster custom.
… The Ulster tenant right … has occupied an important
place in the Irish land question for a long time. … The
right differs much on different estates. On no two does it
seem to be precisely the same. It is therefore not a right
capable of being strictly defined. Nor did it have any legal
sanction until the year 1870. The law did not recognize it.
One of its chief incidents was that the tenant was entitled to
live on his farm from year to year indefinitely on condition
of acting properly, and paying his rent, which the landlord
might raise from time to time to a reasonable extent, but not
so as to extinguish the tenant's interest. In the second
place, if the tenant got in debt, and could not pay the rent,
or wished for any other reason to leave the holding, he could
sell his interest, but the landlord had a right to be
consulted, and could object to the purchaser. In the third
place, the landlord, if he wanted to take the land for his own
purposes, must pay the tenant a fair sum for his tenant-right.
In the fourth place, all arrears of rent must be paid before
the interest was transferred. These are said to be universal
characteristics of every Ulster tenant-right custom. There
were often additional restrictions or provisions, usually in
limitation of the tenant's right to sell, or of the landlord's
right to raise the rent, veto the sale of land, or take it for
his own use. There were commonly established usages in
reference to fixing a fair rent. Valuators were generally
employed, and on their estimates, and not on competition in
open market, the rent was fixed. … The Irish Tenant League
was organized August 6, 1850, in Dublin. Among the resolutions
adopted was one, calling for 'a fair valuation of rent between
landlord and tenant in Ireland,' and another, 'that the tenant
should not be disturbed in his holding as long as he paid his
rent.' The question of arrears received a great deal of
attention. The great majority of the tenants of Ireland were
in arrears, owing to the successive failures of the crops, and
were of course liable to eviction. … The Tenant League was a
very popular one and spread throughout the country. There was
much agitation, and in the general election in 1852, when the
excitement was at its height, fifty-eight Tenant Leaguers were
elected to Parliament. The Tenant League members resolved to
hold themselves 'independent of and in opposition to all
governments which do not make it a part of their policy' to
give the tenants a measure of relief such as the League
desired. It looked as though the party would hold the balance
of power and be able to secure its objects. When however
Sadlier and Keogh, two of the most prominent men in the party
and men of great influence, accepted positions in the new
government, 'bribed by office,' it has always been charged by
the Irish, 'to betray the cause to which they had been most
solemnly pledged,' the party was broken up without
accomplishing its purpose."
D. B. King,
The Irish Question,
chapters 5 and 9.
ALSO IN:
Sir C. G. Duffy,
League of the North and South.
A. M. Sullivan,
New Ireland,
chapter 13.
J. Godkin,
The Land War in Ireland,
chapter 17.
{1793}
IRELAND: A. D. 1858-1867.
The Fenian Movement.
"The Fenian movement differed from nearly all previous
movements of the same kind in Ireland, in the fact that it
arose and grew into strength without the patronage or the help
of any of those who might be called the natural leaders of the
people. … Its leaders were not men of high position, or
distinguished name, or proved ability. They were not of
aristocratic birth; they were not orators; they were not
powerful writers. It was not the impulse of the American Civil
War that engendered Fenianism; although that war had great
influence on the manner in which Fenianism shaped its course.
Fenianism had been in existence, in fact, although it had not
got its peculiar name, long before the American War created a
new race of Irishmen—the Irish-American soldiers—to turn
their energies and their military inclination to a new
purpose. … The suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act, in
consequence of the 1848 movement, led, as a matter of course,
to secret association. Before the trials of the Irish leaders
were well over in that year, a secret association was formed
by a large number of young Irishmen in cities and towns. …
After two or three attempts to arrange for a simultaneous
rising had failed, or had ended only in little abortive and
isolated ebullitions, the young men became discouraged. Some
of the leaders went to France, some to the United States, some
actually to England; and the association melted away. … Some
years after this, the 'Phœnix' clubs began to be formed in
Ireland. They were for the most part associations of the
peasant class, and were on that account, perhaps, the more
formidable and earnest. … The Phœnix clubs led to some of
the ordinary prosecutions and convictions; and that was all.
… After the Phœnix associations came the Fenians. 'This is a
serious business now,' said a clever English literary man when
he heard of the Fenian organisation; 'the Irish have got hold
of a good name this time; the Fenians will last.' The Fenians
are said to have been the ancient Irish militia. … There was
an air of Celtic antiquity and of mystery about the name of
Fenian which merited the artistic approval given to it by the
impartial English writer whose observation has just been
quoted. The Fenian agitation began about 1858, and it came to
perfection about the middle of the American Civil War. It was
ingeniously arranged on a system by which all authority
converged towards one centre [called the Head-Centre], and
those farthest away from the seat of direction knew
proportionately less and less about the nature of the plans.
They had to obey instructions only, and it was hoped that by
this means weak or doubtful men would not have it in their
power prematurely to reveal, to betray, or to thwart the
purposes of their leaders. A convention was held in America,
and the Fenian Association was resolved into a regular
organised institution. A provisional government was
established in the neighbourhood of Union Square, New York,
with all the array and the mechanism of an actual working
administration. … The Civil War had introduced a new figure
to the world's stage. This was the Irish-American soldier. …
Many of these men—thousands of them—were as sincerely
patriotic in their way as they were simple and brave. It is
needless to say that they were fastened on in some instances
by adventurers, who fomented the Fenian movement out of the
merest and the meanest self-seeking. … Some were making a
living out of the organisation—out of that, and apparently
nothing else. The contributions given by poor Irish
hack-drivers and servant girls, in the sincere belief that
they were helping to man the ranks of an Irish army of
independence, enabled some of these self-appointed leaders to
wear fine clothes and to order expensive dinners. … But in
the main it is only fair to say that the Fenian movement in
the United States was got up, organised and manned by persons
who … were single-hearted, unselfish, and faithfully devoted
to their cause. … After a while things went so far that the
Fenian leaders in the United States issued an address,
announcing that their officers were going to Ireland to raise
an army there for the recovery of the country's independence.
Of course the Government here were soon quite prepared to
receive them; and indeed the authorities easily managed to
keep themselves informed by means of spies of all that was
going on in Ireland. … Meanwhile the Head Centre of
Fenianism in America, James Stephens, who had borne a part in
the movement of 1848, arrived in Ireland. He was arrested …
[and] committed to Richmond Prison, Dublin, early in November,
1865; but before many days had passed the country was startled
by the news that he had contrived to make his escape. The
escape was planned with skill and daring. For a time it helped
to strengthen the impression on the mind of the Irish
peasantry that in Stephens there had at last been found an
insurgent leader of adequate courage, craft, and good fortune.
Stephens disappeared for a moment from the stage. In the
meantime disputes and dissensions had arisen among the Fenians
in America. The schism had gone so far as to lead to the
setting up of two separate associations. There were of course
distracted plans. One party was for an invasion of Canada;
another pressed for operations in Ireland itself. The Canadian
attempt actually was made. …
See CANADA: A. D. 1866-1871.
Then Stephens came to the front again. It was only for a
moment. He had returned to New York, and he now announced that
he was determined to strike a blow in Ireland. Before long the
impression was spread abroad that he had actually left the
States to return to the scene of his proposed insurrection.
The American-Irish kept streaming across the Atlantic, even in
the stormy winter months, in the firm belief that before the
winter had passed away, or at the farthest while the spring
was yet young, Stephens would appear in Ireland at the head of
an insurgent army. … Stephens did not reappear in Ireland.
He made no attempt to keep his warlike promise. He may be said
to have disappeared from the history of Fenianism. But the
preparations had gone too far to be suddenly stopped. … It
was hastily decided that something should be done. One venture
was a scheme for the capture of Chester Castle [and the arms
it contained]. … The Government were fully informed of the
plot in advance; the police were actually on the look-out for
the arrival of strangers in Chester, and the enterprise melted
away.
{1794}
In March, 1867, an attempt at a general rising was made in
Ireland. It was a total failure; the one thing on which the
country had to be congratulated was that it failed so
completely and so quickly as to cause little bloodshed. Every
influence combined to minimise the waste of life. The snow
fell that spring as it had scarcely ever fallen before in the
soft, mild climate of Ireland. … It made the gorges of the
mountains untenable, and the gorges of the mountains were to
be the encampments and the retreats of the Fenian insurgents.
The snow fell for many days and nights, and when it ceased
falling the insurrectionary movement was over. The
insurrection was literally buried in that unlooked-for snow.
There were some attacks on police barracks in various places
—in Cork, in Kerry, in Limerick, in Tipperary, in Louth;

there were some conflicts with the police; there were some
shots fired, many captures made, a few lives lost; and then
for the time at least all was over. The Fenian attempt thus
made had not from the beginning a shadow of hope to excuse
it." Some months afterwards a daring rescue of Fenian
prisoners at Manchester stirred up a fresh excitement in
Fenian circles. A policeman was killed in the affair, and
three of the rescuers were hanged for his murder. On the 13th
of December, 1867, an attempt was made to blow up the
Clerkenwell House of Detention, where two Fenian prisoners
were confined. "Six persons were killed on the spot; about six
more died from the effects of the injuries they received; some
120 persons were wounded. … It is not necessary to follow
out the steps of the Fenian movement any further. There were
many isolated attempts; there were many arrests, trials,
imprisonments, banishments. The effect of all this, it must be
stated as a mere historical fact, was only to increase the
intensity of dissatisfaction and discontent among the Irish
peasantry. … There were some public men who saw that the
time had come when mere repression must no longer be relied
upon as a cure for Irish discontent."
J. McCarthy,
History of Our Own Times,
chapter 53 (volume 4).
ALSO IN:
T. P. O'Connor,
The Parnell Movement,
chapters 7.
G. P. Macdonell,
Fenianism,
Two Centuries of Irish History,
part 5, chapter 4.
IRELAND: A. D. 1868.
Parliamentary Reform.
See ENGLAND: A. D. 1865-1868.
IRELAND: A. D. 1868-1870.
Disestablishment of the Irish Church.
Mr. Gladstone's Land Bill.
See ENGLAND: A. D. 1868-1870.
IRELAND: A. D. 1870-1894.
The land question and the recent land laws.
"The reason for exceptional legislation in Ireland rested
chiefly on the essential difference between the landlord and
tenant systems in England and in Ireland. In 1845 the Devon
Royal Commission reported that the introduction of the English
system would be extremely difficult, if not impracticable. The
difference, it said, between the English and Irish systems
'consisted in this, that in Ireland the landlord builds
neither dwelling-house nor farm offices, nor puts fences,
gates, etc., into good order before he lets his land. In most
cases, whatever is done in the way of building or fencing is
done by the tenant; and, in the ordinary language of the
country, houses, farm buildings, and even the making of fences
are described by the general word "improvements," which is
thus employed to denote the necessary adjuncts to a farm
without which in England or Scotland no tenant would be found
to rent it.' Thirty years later, John Bright summarized the
matter by saying that if the land of Ireland were stripped of
the improvements made upon it by the labor of the occupier,
the face of the country would be 'as bare and naked as an
American prairie.' This fundamental difference between the
English and Irish land systems has never been fully
appreciated in England, where the landlord's expenditure on
buildings, fences, drainage, farm roads, etc., and on
maintenance absorbs a large part of the rental. Reform of the
Irish system began in 1870. Before that time little had been
done to protect the Irish tenant except to forbid evictions at
night, on Christmas Day, on Good Friday, and the pulling off
the roofs of houses until the inmates had been removed. The
Land Act of 1870 recognized, in principle, the tenant's
property in his improvements by giving him a right to claim
compensation if disturbed or evicted. This was not what the
tenants wanted, viz., security of tenure. The results of
compensation suits by 'disturbed' tenants were uncertain;
compensation for improvements was limited in various ways, and
the animus of the courts administering the act was distinctly
hostile to the tenants. Many works necessary to the existence
of tenants on small farms were not improvements in the eyes of
the landlord, of the law, or of the judges; it was often
impossible to adduce legal evidence of costly works done
little by little, and at intervals, representing the savings
of labor embodied in drainage, reclamation, or fencing.
Buildings and other works of a superior character might be
adjudged 'unsuitable' to small farms, and therefore not the
subject of any compensation; moreover, it was expressly laid
down that the use and enjoyment by the tenant of works
effected wholly at his expense were to be accounted
compensation to him by the landlord, and that, therefore, by
lapse of time, the tenant's improvements became the landlord's
property. The act of 1870 tended to make capricious and
heartless evictions expensive and therefore less common; but
it gave no security of tenure, and left the landlord still at
liberty to raise the rent of improving tenants. It left the
tenant still in a state of dependence and servility; it gave
him no security for his expenditure, for the landlord's right
to keep the rent continually rising was freely exercised. Even
if the act had been liberally administered, it would have
failed to give contentment, satisfy the demands of justice, or
encourage the expenditure of capital by tenant farmers.
Measure after measure proposed by Irish members for further
reforms were rejected by Parliament between 1870 and 1880, and
discontent continued to increase. … The Land Law Act of 1881
was based on the Report in 1880 of the Bessborough Royal
Commission, but many of the most useful suggestions made were
disregarded. This act purported to give the Irish yearly
tenants
(1) the right to sell their tenancies and improvements;
(2) the right to have a 'fair' rent fixed by the land courts
at intervals of fifteen years;
(3) security of tenure arising from this right to have the
rent fixed by the court instead of by the landlord.
{1795}
… No definition of what constituted a fair rent was embodied
in the act, but what is known as the Healy clause provided that
'no rent shall be allowed or made payable in respect of
improvements made by a tenant or his predecessors.' … When
the Irish courts came to interpret it, they held that the term
improvements' meant only that interest in his improvements for
which the tenant might have obtained compensation under the
Land Act of 1870 if he had been disturbed or evicted, and that
the time during which the tenant had had the use and enjoyment
of his own expenditure was still to be accounted compensation
made to him by his landlord, so that by mere lapse of time the
tenant's improvements became the landlord's property. … In
view of the continually falling prices of agricultural produce
and diminishing farm profits, the operation of the land laws
has not brought about peace between landlords and tenants. …
In 1887 the Cowper Commission reported that the 200,000 rents
which had been fixed were too high in consequence of the
continued fall in prices. As a result of the report of this
commission the fair-rent provisions of the law were extended
to leaseholders holding for less than sixty years; but the
courts still adhering to their former methods of
interpretation, numbers of leaseholders who had made and
maintained all the buildings, improvements, and equipments of
their farms found themselves either excluded on narrow and
technical points, or expressly rented on their own
expenditure. In 1891 the fair-rent provisions were further
extended to leaseholders holding for more than sixty years by
the Redemption of Rent Act, under which long leasehold tenants
could compel their landlords either to sell to them, or allow
a fair rent to be fixed on their farms. … Concurrently with
these attempts to place the relations of landlord and tenant
on a peaceful and equitable basis, a system of State loans to
enable tenants to buy their farms has been in operation. …
It is now proposed to have an inquiry by a select committee of
the House of Commons into
(1) the principles adopted in fixing fair rents, particularly
with respect to tenants' improvements;
(2) the system of purchase and security offered for the loans
of public money;
(3) the organization and administrative work of the Land
Commission
—a department which has cost the country about £100,000 a
year since 1881. The popular demand for inquiry and reform
comes as much from the Protestant North as from the Catholic
South."
The Nation,
February 15, 1894.
IRELAND: A. D. 1873-1879.
The Home Rule Movement.
Organization of the Land League.
"For some years after the failure of the Fenian insurrection
there was no political agitation in Ireland; but in 1873 a new
national movement began to make itself felt; this was the Home
Rule Movement. It had been gradually formed since 1870 by one
or two leading Irishmen, who thought the time was ripe for a
new constitutional effort; chief among them was Mr. Isaac
Butt, a Protestant, an eminent lawyer, and an earnest
politician. The movement spread rapidly, and took a firm hold
of the popular mind. After the General Election of 1874, some
sixty Irish Members were returned who had stood before their
constituencies as Home Rulers. The Home Rule demand is clear
and simple enough; it asks for Ireland a separate Government,
still allied with the Imperial Government, on the principles
which regulate the alliance between the United States of
America. The proposed Irish Parliament in College Green would
bear just the same relation to the Parliament at Westminster
that the Legislature and Senate of every American State bear
to the head authority of the Congress in the Capitol at
Washington. All that relates to local business it was proposed
to delegate to the Irish Assembly; all questions of imperial
policy were still to be left to the Imperial Government. There
was nothing very startling, very daringly innovating, in the
scheme. In most of the dependencies of Great Britain, Home
Rule systems of some kind were already established. In Canada,
in the Australasian Colonies, the principle might be seen at
work upon a large scale; upon a small scale it was to be
studied nearer home in the neighbouring Island of Man. … At
first the Home Rule Party was not very active. Mr. Butt used
to have a regular Home Rule debate once every Session, when he
and his followers stated their views, and a division was taken
and the Home Rulers were of course defeated. Yet, while the
English House of Commons was thus steadily rejecting year
after year the demand made for Home Rule by the large majority
of the Irish Members, it was affording a strong argument in
favour of some system of local Government, by consistently
outvoting every proposition brought forward by the bulk of the
Irish Members relating to Irish Questions. … Mr. Butt and
his followers had proved the force of the desire for some sort
of National Government in Ireland, but the strength of the
movement they had created now called for stronger leaders. A
new man was coming into Irish political life who was destined
to be the most remarkable Irish leader since O'Connell. Mr.
Charles Stuart Parnell, who entered the House of Commons in
1875 as Member for Meath, was a descendant of the English poet
Parnell, and of the two Parnells, father and son, John and
Henry, who stood by Grattan to the last in the struggle
against the Union. He was a grand-nephew of Sir Henry Parnell,
the first Lord Congleton, the advanced Reformer and friend of,
Lord Grey and Lord Melbourne. He was Protestant, and a member
of the Protestant Synod. Mr. Parnell set himself to form a
party of Irishmen in the House of Commons who should be
absolutely independent of any English political party, and who
would go their own way with only the cause of Ireland to
influence them. Mr. Parnell had all the qualities that go to
make a good political leader, and he succeeded in his purpose.
The more advanced men in and out of Parliament began to look
up to him as the real representative of the popular voice. In
1878 Mr. Butt died. … The leadership of the Irish
Parliamentary Party was given to Mr. William Shaw, Member for
Cork County, an able, intelligent man, who proved himself in
many ways a good leader. In quieter times his authority might
have remained unquestioned, but these were unquiet, times. The
decorous and demure attitude of the early Home Rule Party was
to be changed into a more aggressive action, and Mr. Parnell
was the champion of the change. It was soon obvious that he
was the real leader recognised by the majority of the Irish
Home Rule Members, and by the country behind them. Mr. Parnell
and his following have been bitterly denounced for pursuing an
obstructive policy.
{1796}
They are often written about as if they had invented
obstruction; as if obstruction of the most audacious kind had
never been practised in the House of Commons before Mr.
Parnell entered it. It may perhaps be admitted that the Irish
Members made more use of obstruction than had been done before
their time. … The times undoubtedly were unquiet; the policy
which was called in England obstructive and in Ireland active
was obviously popular with the vast majority of the Irish
people. The Land Question, too, was coming up again, and in a
stronger form than ever. Mr. Butt, not very long before his
death, had warned the House of Commons that the old land war
was going to break out anew, and he was laughed at for his
vivid fancy by the English Press and by English public
opinion; but he proved a true prophet. Mr. Parnell had
carefully studied the condition of the Irish tenant, and he
saw that the Land Act of 1870 was not the last word of
legislation on his behalf. Mr. Parnell was at first an ardent
advocate of what came to be known as the Three F's, fair rent,
fixity of tenure, and free sale. But the Three F's were soon
to be put aside in favour of more advanced ideas. Outside
Parliament a strenuous and earnest man was preparing to
inaugurate the greatest land agitation ever seen in Ireland.
Mr. Michael Davitt was the son of an evicted tenant. … When
he grew to be a young man he joined the Fenians, and in 1870,
on the evidence of an informer, he was arrested and sentenced
to fifteen years' penal servitude; seven years later he was
let out on ticket-of-leave. In his long imprisonment he had
thought deeply upon the political and social condition of
Ireland and the best means of improving it; when he came out
he had abandoned his dreams of armed rebellion, and he went in
for constitutional agitation to reform the Irish land system.
The land system needed reforming; the condition of the tenant
was only humanly endurable in years of good harvest. The three
years from 1876 to 1879 were years of successive bad harvests.
… Mr. Davitt had been in America, planning out a land
organization, and had returned to Ireland to carry out his
plan. Land meetings were held in many parts of Ireland, and in
October Mr. Parnell, Mr. Davitt, Mr. Patrick Egan, and Mr.
Thomas Brennan founded the Irish National Land League, the
most powerful political organization that had been formed in
Ireland since the Union. The objects of the Land League were
the abolition of the existing landlord system and the
introduction of peasant proprietorship."
J. H. McCarthy,
Outline of Irish History,
chapter 11.
ALSO IN:
T. P. O'Connor,
The Parnell Movement,
chapters 8-10.
A. V. Dicey,
England's Case against Home Rule.
G. Baden-Powell, editor,
The Truth about Home Rule.
IRELAND: A. D. 1880.
The breach between the Irish Party and the English Liberals.
"The new Irish party which followed the lead of Mr. Parnell
has been often represented by the humourist as a sort of
Falstaffian 'ragged regiment.' … From dint of repetition
this has come to be almost an article of faith in some
quarters. Yet it is curiously without foundation. A large
proportion of Mr. Parnell's followers were journalists. …
Those who were not journalists in the Irish party were
generally what is called well-to-do. … At first there seemed
no reason to expect any serious disunion between the Irish
members and the Liberal' party. … The Irish vote in England
had been given to the Liberal cause. The Liberal speakers and
statesmen, without committing themselves to any definite line
of policy, had manifested friendly sentiments towards Ireland;
and though indeed nothing was said which could be construed
into a recognition of the Home Rule claim, still the new
Ministry was known to contain men favourable to that claim.
The Irish members hoped for much from the new Government; and,
on the other hand, the new Government expected to find cordial
allies in all sections of the Irish party. The appointment of
Mr. Forster to the Irish Secretaryship was regarded by many
Irishmen, especially those allied to Mr. Shaw and his
following, as a marked sign of the good intentions of the
Government towards Ireland. … The Queen's Speech announced
that the Peace Preservation Act would not be renewed. This was
a very important announcement. Since the Union Ireland had
hardly been governed by the ordinary law for a single year.
… Now the Government was going to make the bold experiment
of trying to rule Ireland without the assistance of coercive
and exceptional law. The Queen's Speech, however, contained
only one other reference to Ireland, in a promise that a
measure would be introduced for the extension of the Irish
borough franchise. This was in itself an important promise.
… But extension of the borough franchise did not seem, to
the Irish members in 1880 the most important form that
legislation for Ireland could take just then. The country was
greatly depressed by its recent suffering; the number of
evictions was beginning to rise enormously. The Irish members
thought that the Government should have made some promise to
consider the land question, and above all should have done
something to stay the alarming increase of evictions.
Evictions had increased from 463 families in 1877 to 980 in
1878, to 1,238 in 1879; and they were still on the increase,
as was shown at the end of 1880, when it was found that 2,110
families were evicted. An amendment to the Address was at once
brought forward by the Irish party, and debated at some
length. The Irish party called for some immediate legislation
on behalf of the land question. Mr. Forster replied, admitting
the necessity for some legislation, but declaring that there
would not be time for the introduction of any such measure
that session. Then the Irish members asked for some temporary
measure to prevent the evictions … ; but the Chief Secretary
answered that while the law existed it was necessary to carry
it out, and he could only appeal to both sides to be moderate.
Matters slowly drifted on in this way for a short time. …
Evictions steadily increased, and Mr. O'Connor Power brought
in a Bill for the purpose of staying evictions. Then the
Government, while refusing to accept the Irish measure,
brought in a Compensation for Disturbance Bill, which adopted
some of the Irish suggestions. … On Friday, June 25, the
second reading of the Bill was moved by Mr. Forster, who
denied that it was a concession to the anti-rent agitation,
and strongly denounced the outrages which were taking place in
Ireland. … This was the point at which difference between
the Irish party and the Government first became marked.
{1797}
The increase of evictions in Ireland, following as it did upon
the widespread misery caused by the failure of the harvests
and the partial famine, had generated—as famine and hunger
have always generated—a certain amount of lawlessness.
Evictions were occasionally resisted with violence; here and
there outrages were committed upon bailiffs, process-servers,
and agents. In different places, too, injuries had been
inflicted upon the cattle and horses of landowners and land
agents. … There is no need, there should be no attempt, to
justify these crimes. But, while condemning all acts of
violence, whether upon man or beast, it must be remembered
that these acts were committed by ignorant peasants of the
lowest class, maddened by hunger, want, and eviction, driven
to despair by the sufferings of their wives and children,
convinced of the utter hopelessness of redress, and longing
for revenge. … The Compensation for Disturbance Bill was
carried in the Commons after long debates in which the Irish
party strove to make its principles stronger. … It was sent
up to the Lords, where it was rejected on Tuesday, August 3,
by a majority of 231. The Government answered the appeals of
Irish members by refusing to take any steps to make the Lords
retract their decision, or to introduce any similar measure
that session. From that point the agitation and struggle of
the past four years [1880-1884] may be said to date."
J. H. McCarthy,
England under Gladstone, 1880-1884,
chapter 6.
ALSO IN:
T. W. Reid,
Life of William Edward Forster,
volume 2, chapter 6-7.
IRELAND: A. D, 1881-1882.
The Coercion Bill and the Land Act.
Arrest of the Irish leaders.
Suppression of the Land League.
The alleged Kilmainham Treaty, and release of Mr. Parnell and
others.
Early in 1881, the Government armed itself with new powers for
suppressing the increased lawlessness which showed itself in
Ireland, and for resisting the systematic policy of
intimidation which the Nationalists appeared to have planned,
by the passage of a measure known as the Coercion Bill. This
was followed, in April, by the introduction of a Land Bill,
intended to redress the most conspicuous Irish grievance by
establishing an authoritative tribunal for the determination
of rents, and by aiding and facilitating the purchase of small
holdings by the peasants. The Land Bill became law in August;
but it failed to satisfy the demands of the Land League or to
produce a more orderly state of feeling in Ireland. Severe
proceedings were then decided upon by the Government. "The
Prime Minister, during his visit to Leeds in the first week of
October, had used language which could bear only one meaning.
The question, he said, had come to be simply this, 'whether
law or lawlessness must rule in Ireland;' the Irish people
must not be deprived of the means of taking advantage of the
Land Act by force or fear of force. He warned the party of
disorder that 'the resources of civilisation were not yet
exhausted.' A few days later Mr. Gladstone, speaking at the
Guildhall, amid enthusiastic cheers, was able to announce that
the long-delayed blow had fallen. Mr. Parnell was arrested in
Dublin under the Coercion Act, and his arrest was followed by
those of Mr. Sexton, Mr. Dillon, Mr. O'Kelly, and other
prominent leaders of the agitation. The warnings of the
Government had been met at first with derision and defiance,
and the earlier arrests were furiously denounced; but the
energy and persistence of the Government soon began to make an
impression. … A Parthian shot was fired in the issue of a
manifesto, purporting to be signed, not only by the 'suspects'
in Kilmainham, but also by [Michael] Davitt, … in Portland
Prison, which adjured the tenantry to pay no rent whatever
until the Government had done penance for its tyranny and
released the victims of British despotism. This open
incitement to defiance of legal authority and repudiation of
legal right was instantly met by the Irish Executive in a
resolute spirit. On the 20th of October a proclamation was
issued declaring the League to be 'an illegal and criminal
association, intent on destroying the obligation of contracts
and subverting law,' and announcing that its operations would
thenceforward be forcibly suppressed, and those taking part in
them held responsible."
Annual Summaries reprinted from The Times,
volume 2, page 155.
"In the month of April [1882] Mr. Parnell was released from
Kilmainham on parole—urgent business demanding his presence
in Paris. This parole the Irish National leader faithfully
kept. Whether the sweets of liberty had special charms for Mr.
Parnell does not appear; but certain it is that after his
return to Kilmainham, the Member for Cork wrote to Captain
O'Shea, one of the Irish Members, and indirectly to the
Government, intimating that if the question of arrears could
be introduced in Parliament by way of relieving the tenants of
holdings and lessening greatly the number of evictions in the
country for non-payment of rent, and providing the purchase
clauses of the Land Bill were discussed, steps might be taken
to lessen the number of outrages. The Government had the
intimation conveyed to them, in short, which gave to their
minds the conviction that Messrs. Parnell, Dillon, and
O'Kelly, once released, and having in view the reforms
indicated to them, would range themselves on the side of law
and order in Ireland. Without any contract with the three
members the release of Messrs. Parnell, Dillon, and O'Kelly
was ordered, after they had been confined for a period
bordering on three months. Michael Davitt had been released,
likewise, and had been elected for Meath; but the seat was
declared vacant again, owing to the conditions of his
ticket-of-leave not permitting his return. Much has been said,
and much has been written with regard to the release of the
three Irish M. P.'s. The 'Kilmainham Treaty' has been … a
term of scorn addressed to Mr. Gladstone and his colleagues.
… As a fact … there was no Kilmainham Treaty. … Mr.
Forster [the Secretary for Ireland] resigned because he did
not think it right to share the responsibility of the release
of Messrs. Parnell, Dillon, and O'Kelly. The Government had
detained the Queen's subjects in prison without trial for the
purpose of preventing crime, not for punishment, Mr. Forster
said in vindication. Mr. Forster contended that the unwritten
law, as promulgated by them, had worked the ruin and the
injury of the Queen's subjects by instructions of one kind and
another—biddings carried out to such a degree that no power
on earth could have allowed it to continue without becoming a
Government not merely in name but in shame.
{1798}
Mr. Forster would have given the question of the release of
the three consideration, if they had pledged themselves not to
set their law up against the law of the land, or if Ireland
had been quiet, or if there had been an accession of fresh
powers on behalf of the Government: but these conditions were
wanting. What Mr. Forster desired was an avowal of a change of
purpose. He entreated his colleagues 'not to try to buy
obedience,' as he termed it, and not to rely on appearances.
The Government did rely on the intimation of Mr. Parnell … ;
there was no treaty."
W. W. Pimblett,
English Political History, 1880-1885,
chapter 10.
IRELAND: A. D. 1882.
The Phœnix Park murders.
Mr. Forster, Chief Secretary for Ireland, resigned in April,
1882, and was succeeded by Lord Frederick Cavendish, brother
of the Marquis of Hartington and son of the Duke of
Devonshire. Earl Spencer at the same time became Viceroy, in
place of Lord Cowper, resigned. "On the night of Friday, May
5th, Earl Spencer and Lord Frederick Cavendish crossed over to
Ireland, and arrived in Dublin on the following day. The
official entry was made in the morning, when the reception
accorded by the populace to the new officials was described as
having been very fairly favourable. Events seemed to have
taken an entirely prosperous turn, and it was hoped that at
last the long winter of Irish discontent had come to an end.
On Sunday morning there spread through the United Kingdom the
intelligence that the insane hatred of English rule had been
the cause of a crime, even more brutal and unprovoked than any
of the numerous outrages that had, during the last three
years, sullied the annals of Ireland. It appeared that Lord
Frederick Cavendish, having taken the oaths at the Castle,
took a car about half-past seven in order to drive to the
Viceregal Lodge. On the way he met Mr. Burke, the Permanent
Under-Secretary, who, though his life had been repeatedly
threatened, was walking along, according to his usual custom,
without any police escort. Lord Frederick dismissed his car,
and walked with him through the Phœnix Park. There, in broad
daylight—for it was a fine summer evening—and in the middle
of a public recreation ground, crowded with people, they were
surrounded and murdered. More than one spectator witnessed
what they imagined to be a drunken brawl, saw six men
struggling together, and four of them drive off outside a car,
painted red, which had been waiting for them the while, the
carman sitting still and never turning his head. The bodies of
the two officials were first discovered by two shop-boys on
bicycles who had previously passed them alive. Lord Frederick
Cavendish had six wounds, and Mr. Burke eleven, dealt
evidently with daggers used by men of considerable strength.
Lord Spencer himself had witnessed the struggle from the
windows of the Viceregal Lodge, and thinking that some
pickpockets had been at work sent a servant to make inquiries.
A reward of £10,000, together with full pardon to anyone who
was not one of the actual murderers, was promptly offered, but
for many long months the telegrams from Dublin closed with the
significant information—'No definite clue in the hands of the
police.' All parties in Ireland at once united to express
their horror and detestation at this dastardly crime."
Cassell's Illustrated History of England,
volume 10, chapter 50.
ALSO IN:
Sir C. Russell,
The Parnell Commission: Opening Speech,
pages 282-291.
IRELAND: A. D. 1884.
Enlargement of the Suffrage.
Representation of the People Act.
See ENGLAND: A. D. 1884-1885.
IRELAND: A. D. 1885-1886.
Change of opinion in England.
Mr. Gladstone's first Home Rule Bill and Irish Land Bill and
their defeat.
"All through the Parliament which sat from 1880 till 1885, the
Nationalists' party, led by Mr. Parnell, and including at
first less than half, ultimately about half, of the Irish
members, was in constant and generally bitter opposition to
the Government of Mr. Gladstone. But during these five years a
steady, although silent and often unconscious, process of
change was passing in the minds of English and Scotch members,
especially Liberal members, due to their growing sense of the
mistakes which Parliament committed in handling Irish
questions, and of the hopelessness of the efforts which the
Executive was making to pacify the country on the old methods.
First, they came to feel that the present system was
indefensible. Then, while still disliking the notion of an
Irish Legislature, they began to think it deserved
consideration. Next they admitted, though usually in
confidence to one another, that although Home Rule might be a
bad solution, it was a probable one, toward which events
pointed. Last of all, and not till 1884, they asked themselves
whether, after all, it would be a bad solution, provided a
workable scheme could be found. But as no workable scheme had
been proposed, they still kept their views, perhaps unwisely,
to themselves, and although the language held at the general
election of 1885 showed a great advance in the direction of
favoring Irish self-government, beyond the attitude of 1880,
it was still vague and hesitating, and could the more easily
remain so because the constituencies had not (strange as it
may now seem) realized the supreme importance of the Irish
question. Few questions were put to candidates on the subject,
for both candidates and electors wished to avoid it. It was
disagreeable; it was perplexing; so they agreed to leave it on
one side. But when the result of the Irish elections showed,
in December, 1885, an overwhelming majority in favor of the
Home Rule party, and when they showed, also, that this party
held the balance of power in Parliament, no one could longer
ignore the urgency of the issue. There took place what
chemists call a precipitation of substance held in solution.
Public opinion on the Irish question had been in a fluid
state. It now began to crystallize, and the advocates and
opponents of Irish self-government fell asunder into two
masses, which soon solidified. This process was hastened by
the fact that Mr. Gladstone's view, the indications of which,
given by himself some months before, had been largely
overlooked, now became generally understood. … In the spring
of 1886 the question could be no longer evaded or postponed.
It was necessary to choose between … two courses: the
refusal of the demand for self-government, coupled with the
introduction of a severe Coercion Bill, or the concession of
it by the introduction of a Home Rule Bill. …
{1799}
How the Government of Ireland Bill was brought into the House
of Commons on April 8th, amid circumstances of curiosity and
excitement unparalleled since 1832: how, after debates of
almost unprecedented length, it was defeated in June, by a
majority of thirty; how the policy it embodied was brought
before the country at the general election, and failed to win
approval; how the Liberal party has been rent in twain upon
the question; how Mr. Gladstone resigned, and has been
succeeded by a Tory Ministry, which the dissentient Liberals,
who condemn Home Rule, are now supporting—all this is …
well known.
See ENGLAND: A. D. 1885-1886.
… But the causes of the disaster may not be equally
understood. … First, and most obvious, although not most
important, was the weight of authority arrayed against the
scheme. … The two most eminent leaders of the moderate
Liberal, or, as it is often called, Whig, party, Lord
Hartington and Mr. Goschen, both declared against the bill,
and put forth all their oratory and influence against it. At
the opposite extremity of the party, Mr. John Bright, the
veteran and honored leader of the Radicals, Mr. Chamberlain,
the younger and latterly more active and prominent chief of
that large section, took up the same position of hostility.
Scarcely less important was the attitude of the social
magnates of the Liberal party all over the country. … As, at
the preceding general election, in December, 1885, the
Liberals had obtained a majority of less than a hundred over
the Tories, a defection such as this was quite enough to
involve their defeat. Probably the name of Mr. Bright alone
turned the issue in some twenty constituencies, which might
otherwise have cast a Home Rule vote. The mention of this
cause, however, throws us back on the further question, Why
was there such a weight of authority against the scheme
proposed by Mr. Gladstone? How came so many of his former
colleagues, friends, supporters, to differ and depart from him
on this occasion? Besides some circumstances attending the
production of the bill, … which told heavily against it,
there were three feelings which worked upon men's minds,
disposing them to reject it. The first of these was dislike
and fear of the Irish Nationalist members. In the previous
House of Commons this party had been uniformly and bitterly
hostile to the Liberal Government. Measures intended for the
good of Ireland, like the Land Act of 1881, had been
ungraciously received, treated as concessions extorted, for
which no thanks were due—inadequate concessions, which must
be made the starting-point for fresh demands. Obstruction had
been freely practised to defeat not only bills restraining the
liberty of the subject in Ireland, but many other measures.
Some members of the Irish party, apparently with the approval
of the rest, had systematically sought to delay all English
and Scotch legislation, and, in fact, to bring the work of
Parliament to a dead stop. … There could be no doubt as to
the hostility which they, still less as to that which their
fellow-countrymen in the United States, had expressed toward
England, for they had openly wished success to Russia while
war seemed impending with her, and the so-called Mahdi of the
Sudan was vociferously cheered at many a Nationalist meeting.
… To many Englishmen, the proposal to create an Irish
Parliament seemed nothing more or less than a proposal to hand
over to these men the government of Ireland, with all the
opportunities thence arising to oppress the opposite party in
Ireland and to worry England herself. It was all very well to
urge that the tactics which the Nationalists had pursued when
their object was to extort Home Rule would be dropped, because
superfluous, when Home Rule had been granted; or to point out
that an Irish Parliament would probably contain different men
from those who had been sent to Westminster as Mr. Parnell's
nominees. Neither of these arguments could overcome the
suspicious antipathy which many Englishmen felt. … The
internal condition of Ireland supplied more substantial
grounds for alarm. … Three-fourths of the people are Roman
Catholics, one-fourth Protestants, and this Protestant fourth
sub-divided into bodies not fond of one another, who have
little community of sentiment. Besides the Scottish colony in
Ulster, many English families have settled here and there
through the country. They have been regarded as intruders by
the aboriginal Celtic population, and many of them, although
hundreds of years may have passed since they came, still look
on themselves as rather English than Irish. … Many people in
England assumed that an Irish Parliament would be under the
control of the tenants and the humbler class generally, and
would therefore be hostile to the landlords. They went
farther, and made the much bolder assumption that as such a
Parliament would be chosen by electors, most of whom were
Roman Catholics, it would be under the control of the Catholic
priesthood, and hostile to Protestants. Thus they supposed
that the grant of self-government to Ireland would mean the
abandonment of the upper and wealthier class, the landlords
and the Protestants, to the tender mercies of their enemies.
… The fact stood out that in Ireland two hostile factions
had been contending for the last sixty years, and that the
gift of self-government might enable one of them to tyrannize
over the other. True, that party was the majority, and,
according to the principles of democratic government,
therefore entitled to prevail. But it is one thing to admit a
principle and another to consent to its application. The
minority had the sympathy of the upper classes in England,
because the minority contained the landlords. It had the
sympathy of a large part of the middle class, because it
contained the Protestants. … There was another anticipation,
another forecast of evils to follow, which told most of all
upon English opinion. This was the notion that Home Rule was
only a stage in the road to the complete separation of the two
islands."
J. Bryce,
Past and Future of the Irish Question
(New Princeton Review, Jan., 1887).
IRELAND: A. D. 1886.
The "Plan of Campaign."
On the 11th of September Mr. Parnell had introduced in the
House of Commons a bill to make temporary provision for the
relief of suffering tenants in Ireland, and it had been
defeated after a sharp debate by a majority of 95. The chief
argument for the bill had been that "something must be done to
stay evictions during the approaching winter. The rents would
be due in November, and the fall in agricultural prices had
been so great, that the sale of their whole produce by the
tenants would not, it was contended, bring in money enough to
enable them to pay in full. … The greatest public interest
in the subject was roused by Lord Clanricarde's evictions at
Woodford in Galway. … His quarrel with his Woodford tenants
was of old standing.
{1800}
When the Home Rule Bill was before Parliament the National
League urged them not to bring matters to a crisis, but their
sufferings were too great to be borne, and they set the
National League at defiance, and established a Plan of
Campaign of their own. Lord Clanricarde would grant them no
reduction, and they leagued themselves together, 316 in
number, and when the November rent day came round in 1885 they
resolved not to pay any rent at all if twenty-five per cent.
reduction was refused. This was refused, and they withheld
their rent. … The eviction of four of these tenants, in
August, 1886, attracted general attention by the long fight
the people made for their homes. Each house was besieged and
defended like some mediæval city. One stone house, built by a
tenant at a cost of £200, got the name of Saunders's fort. It
was held by a garrison of 24, who threw boiling water on their
assailants, and in one part of the fight threw out among them
a hive of bees. … To evict these four men the whole
available forces of the Crown in Galway were employed from
Thursday the 19th of August to Friday the 27th. Seven hundred
policemen and soldiers were present to protect the emergency
men who carried out the evictions, and 60 peasants were taken
to Galway gaol. It was to meet cases of this kind that, after
the rejection of Mr. Parnell's Tenants' Relief Bill, the Plan
of Campaign was started. In a speech at Woodford on the 17th
of October Mr. John Dillon gave an outline of the scheme on
which he thought a tenants' campaign against unjust rents
might be started and carried on all over the country. … On
the 23rd of October the 'Plan of Campaign' was published in
full detail in 'United Ireland.' The first question to be
answered, said the 'Plan,' was, How to meet the November
demand for rent? On every estate the tenantry were to come
together and decide whether to combine or not in resistance to
exorbitant rent. When they were assembled, if the priest were
not with them, they were to 'appoint an intelligent and sturdy
member of their body as chairman, and after consulting, decide
by resolution on the amount of abatement they will demand.' A
committee of six or more and the chairman were then to be
elected, to be called a Managing Committee, to take charge of
the half year's rent of each tenant should the landlord refuse
it. Everyone present was to pledge himself
(1) To abide by the decision of the majority;
(2) To hold no communication with the landlord or his agents,
except in presence of the body of the tenantry;
(3) To accept no settlement for himself that was not given to
every tenant on the estate.
Having thus pledged themselves each to the others they were to
go to the rent office in a body on the rent day, or the gale
day, as it is called in Ireland, and if the agent refused to
see them in a body they were to depute the chairman to act as
their spokesman and tender the reduced rent. If the agent
refused to accept it, then the money was to be handed to the
Managing Committee 'to fight the landlord with.' The fund thus
got together was to be employed in supporting tenants who were
dispossessed by sale or ejectment. The National League was to
guarantee the continuance of the grants if needful after the
fund was expended, or as long as the majority of the tenants
held out."
P. W. Clayden,
England under the Coalition,
chapter. 8.
IRELAND: A. D. 1888-1889.
The Parnell Commission.
Early in 1887, certain letters appeared in "The Times"
newspaper, of London, one of which, printed in facsimile,
"implied Mr. Parnell's sanction to the Park murders of 1882."
It created a great sensation, and, "after many bitter debates
in Parliament, a commission was appointed (1888) consisting of
three judges to inquire not only into the authenticity of this
and other letters attributed to several persons as their
authors, but into the whole course of conduct pursued by many
of the Irish Members of Parliament, in reference to the
previous agitation in Ireland and their connexion with an
extreme faction in America, who tried to intimidate this
country by dastardly attempts to blow up our public buildings
on several occasions between the years 1884 and 1887. The
court sat from the winter months of 1888 until the summer of
the following year, and examined dozens of witnesses,
including Mr. Parnell and most of the other accused members,
as well as dozens of the Irish peasantry who could give
evidence as to outrages in their several districts. One of the
witnesses, a mean and discarded Dublin journalist named
Pigott, turned out to be the forger of the letters; and,
having fled from the avenging hand of justice to Madrid, there
put an end to his life by means of a revolver. Meantime, the
interest in the investigation had flagged, and the report of
the Commission, which deeply implicated many of the Irish
members as to their connexion with the Fenian Society previous
to their entrance to Parliament, on their own acknowledgment,
fell rather flat on the public ear, wearied out in reiteration
of Irish crime from the introduction of the Land League until
the attempt to blow up London Bridge by American filibusters
(1886). The unfortunate man Pigott had sold his forged letters
to the over credulous Times newspaper at a fabulous price; and
even experts in handwriting, so dexterously had they been
manipulated, were ready to testify in open court to the
genuineness of the letters before the tragic end of their
luckless author left not a particle of doubt as to their
origin."
R. Johnston,
Short History of the Queen's Reign,
page 65.
ALSO IN:
Sir C. Russell,
The Parnell Commission: Opening Speech for the Defence.
M. Davitt, Speech in Defence.
IRELAND: A. D. 1889-1891.
Political fall and death of Mr. Parnell.
On the 28th of December, 1889, Captain O'Shea, one of the
Irish Nationalist Members of Parliament, filed a petition for
divorce from his wife on the ground of adultery with Mr.
Parnell. The Irish leader tacitly confessed his guilt by
making no answer, and in November, 1890, the divorce was
granted to Captain O'Shea. In the following June Mr. Parnell
and Mrs. O'Shea were married. The stigma which this affair put
upon Mr. Parnell caused Mr. Gladstone, on behalf of the
English Liberals, to demand his retirement from the leadership
of the Home Rule Party. He refused to give way, and was
supported in the refusal by a minority of his party. The
majority, however, took action to depose him, and the party
was torn asunder. A sudden illness ended Mr. Parnell's life on
the 6th of October, 1891; but his death failed to restore
peace, and the Irish Nationalists are still divided.
IRELAND: A. D. 1893.
Passage of the Home Rule Bill by the British House of Commons.
Its defeat by the House of Lords.
See ENGLAND: A. D. 1892-1893.
----------IRELAND: End--------
{1801}
IRENE, Empress in the East (Byzantine, or Greek), A. D. 797-802.
IRISH NIGHT, The.
See LONDON: A. D. 1688.
IRMINSUL, The.
See SAXONS: A. D. 772-804.
IRON AGE.
See STONE AGE.
IRON CROSS, Order of the.
A Prussian order of knighthood instituted in 1815 by Frederick
William III.
IRON CROWN, The Order of the,
See FRANCE: A. D. 1804-1805.
IRON CROWN OF LOMBARDY, The.
See LOMBARDY, THE IRON CROWN OF.
IRON MASK, The Man in the.
"It is known that a masked and unknown prisoner, the object of
extraordinary surveillance, died, in 1703, in the Bastille, to
which he had been taken from the St. Marguerite Isles in 1698;
he had remained about ten years incarcerated in these isles,
and traces of him are with certainty found in the fort of
Exilles, and at Pignerol, as far back as about 1681. This
singular fact, which began to be vaguely bruited a little
before the middle of the 18th century, excited immense
curiosity after Voltaire had availed himself of it in his
'Siècle de Louis XIV.', wherein he exhibited it in the most
touching and tragic light. A thousand conjectures circulated:
no great personage had disappeared in Europe about 1680. What
interest so powerful had the government of Louis XIV. for
concealing this mysterious visage from every human eye? Many
explanations more or less plausible, more or less chimerical,
have been attempted in regard to the 'man with the iron mask'
(an erroneous designation that has prevailed; the mask was not
of iron, but of black velvet; it was probably one of those
'loups' so long in use), when, in 1837, the bibliophile Jacob
(M. Paul Lacroix) published a very ingenious book on this
subject, in which he discussed all the hypotheses, and
skilfully commented on all the facts and dates, in order to
establish that, in 1680, Fouquet was represented as dead; that
he was masked, sequestered anew, and dragged from fortress to
fortress till his real death in 1703. It is impossible for us
to admit this solution of the problem; the authenticity of the
minister Louvois' correspondence with the governor of the
prison of Pignerol, on the subject of Fouquet's death, in
March, 1680, appears to us incontestable; and did this
material proof not exist, we still could not believe in a
return of rigor so strange, so barbarous, and so unaccountable
on the part of Louis XIV., when all the official documents
attest that his resentment had gradually been appeased, and
that an old man who asked nothing more than a little free air
before dying had ceased to be feared. There are many more
presumptions in favor of Baron Heiss' opinion, reproduced by
several writers, and, in the last instance, by M. Delort
('Histoire de l'homme au masque de fer'; 1825),—the opinion
that the 'man with a mask' was a secretary of the Duke of
Mantua, named Mattioli, carried off by order of Louis XIV. in
1679, for having deceived the French government, and having
sought to form a coalition of the Italian princes against it.
But however striking, in certain respects, may be the
resemblances between Mattioli and the 'iron mask,' equally
guarded by the governor St. Mars at Pignerol and at Exilles,
however grave may be the testimony according to which Mattioli
was transferred to the St. Marguerite Isles, the subaltern
position of Mattioli, whom Catinat and Louvois, in their
letters, characterize as a 'knave' and St. Mars threatens with
a cudgel, ill accords, we do not say with the traditions
relating to the profound respect shown the prisoner by the
keepers, the governor, and even the minister,—these
traditions may be contested,—but with the authentic details
and documents given by the learned and judicious Father
Griffet in regard to the extreme mystery in which the prisoner
at the Bastille was enveloped, more than twenty years after
the abduction of the obscure Mattioli, in regard to the mask
that he never put off, in regard to the precautions taken
after his death to annihilate the traces of his sojourn at the
Bastille, which explains why nothing was found concerning him
after the taking of that fortress. Many minds will always
persist in seeking, under this impenetrable mask, a more
dangerous secret, a mysterious accusing resemblance; and the
most popular opinion, although the most void of an proof, will
always doubtless be that suffered to transpire by Voltaire,
under cover of his publisher, in the eighth edition of his
'Dictionnaire philosophique' (1771). According to this
opinion, the honor of the royal household was involved in the
secret, and the unknown victim was an illegitimate son of Anne
of Austria. The only private crime of which Louis XIV. was
perhaps capable, was a crime inspired by fanaticism for
monarchical honor. However this may be, history has no right
to pronounce upon what will never emerge from the domain of
conjecture."
H. Martin,
History of France: Age of Louis XIV.,
volume 1, page 40, foot-note.
"The Paris correspondent of the 'Daily Telegraph' records a
fact which, if it is correctly reported, goes a long way
towards clearing up one of the problems of modern history. A
letter to Louvois by Louis XIV., written in cipher, has been
long in the archives of the Ministry of War, and has at length
been deciphered. In it the King orders Louvois to arrest
General de Burlonde for having raised the siege of Conti
without permission, to send him to Pignerol, and to conceal
his features under a 'loup' or black-velvet mask. The order
was executed, and the presumption is therefore violent that
the 'Man in the Iron Mask'—it was a black-velvet one with
iron springs—was General de Burlonde. The story tallies with
the known fact that the prisoner made repeated attempts to
communicate his name to soldiers, that he was treated with
respect by his military jailors, and that Louis XV., who knew
the truth of the whole affair, declared it to be a matter of
no importance. The difficulty is to discover the King's motive
for such a precaution; but he may have feared discontent among
his great officers, or the soldiery."
The Spectator,
October 14, 1893.
The cipher despatch above referred to, and the whole subject
of the imprisonment of General de Burlonde, are discussed at
length, in the light of official records and correspondence,
by M. Émile Burgaud and Commandant Bazeries (the latter of
whom discovered the key to the cipher), in a book entitled "Le
Masque de Fer: Révélation de la correspondance chiffrée de
Louis XIV.," published at Paris in 1893. It seems to leave
small doubt that the mysteriously masked prisoner was no other
than General de Burlonde,
ALSO IN:
G. A. Ellis,
True History of the State Prisoner commonly called
the Iron Mask.
E. Lawrence,
The Man in the Iron Mask
(Harper's Magazine, volume 43, page 98).
M. Topin,
The Man in the Iron Mask
(Cornhill Magazine, volume 21, page 333).
Quarterly Review,
volume 34, page 19.
{1802}
IRONCLAD OATH.
An oath popularly styled the "Ironclad oath" was prescribed by
the Congress of the United States, during the War of the
Rebellion, in July, 1862, to be taken by every person elected
or appointed to any office under the Government of the United
States, the President only excepted. He was required to swear

that he had "never voluntarily borne arms against the United
States"; that he had "voluntarily given no aid, countenance,
counsel, or encouragement to persons engaged in armed
hostility to the National Government"; that he had "neither
sought nor accepted, nor attempted to exercise the functions
of any office whatever under authority or pretended authority
in hostility to the United States"; that he had "never yielded
a voluntary support to any pretended Government within the
United States, hostile or inimical thereto."
J. G. Blaine,
Twenty Years of Congress,
volume 2, page 88.
IRONSIDES, Cromwell's.
See ENGLAND: A. D. 1643 (MAY).
"IRONSIDES, Old."
A name popularly given to the American frigate "Constitution."
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1814.
IROQUOIS CONFEDERACY, The.
According to their traditions, the founder of the League or
confederacy which united the five nations of the Iroquois—the
Mohawks, the Onondagas, the Oneidas, the Cayugas, and the
Senecas, was Hiawatha, the hero of Iroquois legend.
See AMERICAN ABORIGINES: IROQUOIS CONFEDERACY.
He was an Onondaga chief, and is supposed to have lived about
the middle of the 15th century. "Hiawatha had long beheld with
grief the evils which afflicted not only his own nation, but
all the other tribes about them, through the continual wars in
which they were engaged, and the misgovernment and miseries at
home which these wars produced. With much meditation he had
elaborated in his mind the scheme of a vast confederation
which would ensure universal peace. In the mere plan of a
confederation there was nothing new. There are probably few,
if any, Indian tribes which have not, at one time or another,
been members of a league or confederacy. It may almost be said
to be their normal condition. But the plan which Hiawatha had
evolved differed from all others in two particulars. The
system which he devised was to be not a loose and transitory
league, but a permanent government. While each nation was to
retain its own council and its management of local affairs,
the general control was to be lodged in a federal senate,
composed of representatives elected by each nation, holding
office during good behavior, and acknowledged as ruling chiefs
throughout the whole confederacy. Still further, and more
remarkably, the confederation was not to be a limited one. It
was to be indefinitely expansible. The avowed design of its
proposer was to abolish war altogether. He wished the
federation to extend until all the tribes of men should be
included in it, and peace should everywhere reign. Such is the
positive testimony of the Iroquois themselves: and their
statement, as will be seen, is supported by historical
evidence. … His conceptions were beyond his time, and beyond
ours; but their effect, within a limited sphere, was very
great. For more than three centuries the bond which he devised
held together the Iroquois nations in perfect amity. It
proved, moreover, as he intended, elastic. The territory of
the Iroquois, constantly extending as their united strength
made itself felt, became the 'Great Asylum' of the Indian
tribes. … Among the interminable stories with which the
common people [of the Five Nations] beguile their winter
nights, the traditions of Atotarho and Hiawatha became
intermingled with the legends of their mythology. An
accidental similarity, in the Onondaga dialect, between the
name of Hiawatha and that of one of their ancient divinities,
led to a confusion between the two, which has misled some
investigators. This deity bears, in the sonorous Canienga
tongue, the name of Taronhiawagon, meaning 'the Holder of the
Heavens.' The Jesuit missionaries style him 'the great god of
the Iroquois.' Among the Onondagas of the present day, the
name is abridged to Taonhiawagi, or Tahiawagi. The confusion
between this name and that of Hiawatha (which, in another
form, is pronounced Tahionwatha) seems to have begun more than
a century ago. … Mr. J. V. H. Clark, in his interesting
History of Onondaga, makes the name to have been originally
Ta-own-ya-wat-ha, and describes the bearer as 'the deity who
presides over fisheries and hunting-grounds.' He came down
from heaven in a white canoe, and after sundry adventures,
which remind one of the labors of Hercules, assumed the name
of Hiawatha (signifying, we are told, 'a very wise man'), and
dwelt for a time as an ordinary mortal among men, occupied in
works of benevolence. Finally, after founding the confederacy
and bestowing many prudent counsels upon the people, he
returned to the skies by the same conveyance in which he had
descended. This legend, or, rather, congeries of intermingled
legends, was communicated by Clark to Schoolcraft, when the
latter was compiling his 'Notes on the Iroquois.' Mr.
Schoolcraft, pleased with the poetical cast of the story, and
the euphonious name, made confusion worse confounded by
transferring the hero to a distant region and identifying him
with Manabozho, a fantastic divinity of the Ojibways.
Schoolcraft's volume, which he chose to entitle 'The Hiawatha
Legends,' has not in it a single fact or fiction relating
either to Hiawatha himself or to the Iroquois deity
Taronhiawagon. Wild Ojibway stories concerning Manabozho and
his comrades form the staple of its contents. But it is to
this collection that we owe the charming poem of Longfellow;
and thus, by an extraordinary fortune, a grave Iroquois
lawgiver of the fifteenth century has become, in modern
literature, an Ojibway demigod, son of the West Wind, and
companion of the tricksy Paupukkeewis, the boastful Iagoo, and
the strong Kwasind. If a Chinese traveler, during the middle
ages, inquiring into the history and religion of the western
nations, had confounded King Alfred with King Arthur, and both
with Odin, he would not have made a more preposterous
confusion of names and characters than that which has hitherto
disguised the genuine personality of the great Onondaga
reformer."
H. Hale, editor,
The Iroquois Book of Rites
(Brinton's Library of Aboriginal American Literature,
number 2, pages 21-36).
{1803}
IRREDENTISTS.
"This is the name given to a political organisation formed in
1878, with the avowed object of freeing all Italians from
foreign rule, and of reuniting to the Italian kingdom all
those portions of the Italy of old which have passed under
foreign dominion. The operations of the 'Italia Irredenta'
party are chiefly carried on against Austria, in consequence
of the retention by that Empire of Trieste and the Southern
Tyrol. Until these territories have been relinquished, Italy,
or at least a certain part of it, will remain unsatisfied."
J. S. Jeans,
Italy (National Life and Thought, chapter 8).
ISAAC II. (Comnenus),
Emperor in the East (Byzantine, or Greek), A. D. 1057-1059.
Isaac II. (Angelus), Emperor in the East (Byzantine, or
Greek), 1185-1195.
ISABELLA,
Queen of Castile
(wife of Ferdinand II., King of Aragon), A. D. 1474-1504.
Isabella I., Queen of Spain, 1833-1868.
ISABELLA.
The city founded by Columbus on the island of Hispaniola, or
Hayti.
See AMERICA: A. D. 1493-1496.
ISANDLANA, The English disaster at (1879).
See SOUTH AFRICA: A. D. 1877-1879.
ISASZEG, Battle of (1849).
See AUSTRIA: A. D. 1848-1849.
ISAURIAN DYNASTY, The.
See BYZANTINE EMPIRE: A. D. 717-797.
ISAURIANS, The.
The Isaurians were a fierce and savage race of mountaineers,
who occupied anciently a district in Asia Minor, between
Cilicia and Pamphylia on the south and Phrygia on the north.
They were persistently a nation of robbers, living upon the
spoils taken from their neighbors, who were never able to
punish them justly in their mountain fastnesses. Even the iron
hand of the Romans failed to reduce the Isaurians to order,
although P. Servilius, in 78 B. C., destroyed most of their
strongholds, and Pompey, eleven years later, in his great
campaign against the pirates, put an end to the lawless
depredations on sea and land of the Cilicians, who had become
confederated with the Isaurians. Five centuries afterwards, in
the days of the Eastern Empire, the Isaurians were the best
soldiers of its army, and even gave an emperor to the throne
at Constantinople in the person of Zeno or Zenon.
E. W. Brooks,
The Emperor Zenon and the Isaurians
(English Historical Review, April, 1893).
ISCA.
The name of two towns in Roman Britain, one of which is
identified with modern Exeter and the other with
Caerleon-on-Usk. The latter was the station of the 2d legion.
T. Mommsen,
History of Rome,
book 8, chapter 5.
See EXETER, ORIGIN OF;
also, CAERLEON.
ISHMAELIANS, The.
See MAHOMETAN CONQUEST: A. D. 908-1171;
also, ASSASSINS;
and CARMATHIANS.
ISIDORE, The False Decretals of.
See PAPACY: A. D. 829-847.
ISINÆ.
See CAUSENNÆ.
ISLAM.
"The religion founded by Mahomet is called Islam, a word
meaning 'the entire surrender of the will to God'; its
professors are called Mussulmans—'those who have surrendered
themselves,' or 'Believers,' as opposed to the 'Rejectors' of
the Divine messengers, who are named 'Kafirs,' or 'Mushrikin,'
that is, 'those who associate, are [not?] companions or
sharers with the Deity.' Islam is sometimes divided under the
two heads of Faith and Practical Religion.
I. Faith (Iman) includes a belief in one God, omnipotent,
omniscient, all-merciful, the author of all good; and in
Mahomet as his prophet, expressed in the formula 'There is no
God but God, and Mahomet is the Prophet of God.' It includes,
also, a belief in the authority and sufficiency of the Koran,
in angels, genii, and the devil, in the immortality of the
soul, the resurrection, the day of judgment and in God's
absolute decree for good and evil.
II. Practical religion (Din) consists of five observances:
(1) Recital of the formula of Belief,
(2) Prayer with Ablution,
(3) Fasting,
(4) Almsgiving,
(5) the Pilgrimage.
… The standard of Moslem orthodoxy is essentially the Koran
and to it primary reference is made; but … some more
extended and discriminating code became necessary. The
deficiency was supplied by the compilation of the 'Sunnah,' or
Traditional Law, which is built upon the sayings and practices
of Mahomet, and, in the opinion of the orthodox, is invested
with the force of law, and with some of the authority of
inspiration. … In cases where both the Koran and the Sunnah
afford no exact precept, the 'Rule of Faith' in their dogmatic
belief, as well as the decisions of their secular courts, is
based upon the teaching of one of the four great Imams, or
founders of the orthodox sects, according as one or another of
these prevails in any particular country. … The great Sunni
sect is divided among the orthodox schools mentioned above,
and is so called from its reception of the 'Sunnah,' as having
authority concurrent with and supplementary to the Koran. In
this respect it differs essentially from the Shias, or
partisans of the house of Ali [the nephew of Mahomet and
husband of his daughter Fatima] who, adhering to their own
traditions, reject the authority of the 'Sunnah.' These two
sects, moreover, have certain observances and matters of
belief peculiar to themselves, the chief of which is the Shia
doctrine, that the sovereign Imamat, or temporal and spiritual
lordship over the faithful, was by divine right vested in Ali
and in his descendants, through Hasan and Hosein, the children
of Fatima, the daughter of the prophet. And thus the Persian
Shias add to the formula of belief the confession, 'Ali is the
Caliph of God.' In Persia the Shia doctrines prevail, and
formerly so intense was sectarian hatred that the Sunni
Mahometans paid a higher capitation tax there than the
infidels. In Turkey the great majority are Sunni. In India the
Shias number about one in twenty. The Shias, who reject this
name, and call themselves Adliyah, or the 'Society of the
Just,' are subdivided into a great variety of minor sects; but
these … are united in asserting that the first three
Caliphs, Abu Bekr, Omar, and Othman were usurpers, who had
possessed themselves of the rightful and inalienable
inheritance of Ali."
J. W. H. Stobart,
Islam and its Founder,
chapter 10.
"The twelve Imams, or pontiffs, of the Persian creed, are Ali,
Hassan, Hosein, and the lineal descendants of Hosein to the ninth
generation. Without arms, or treasures, or subjects, they
successively enjoyed the veneration of the people and provoked
the jealousy of the reigning caliphs. … The twelfth and last
of the Imams, conspicuous by the title of Mahadi, or the
Guide, surpassed the solitude and sanctity of his
predecessors. He concealed himself in a cavern near Bagdad:
the time and place of his death are unknown; and his votaries
pretend that he still lives and will appear before the day of
judgment."
E. Gibbon,
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
chapter 50.
ALSO IN:
E. Sell,
The Faith of Islam.
S. Lane-Poole,
Studies in a Mosque,
chapters 3 and 7.
R. D. Osborn,
Islam under the Arabs,
part 2, chapter 1.
W. C. Taylor,
History of Mohammedanism,
chapters 5-13.
R. Bosworth Smith,
Mohammed and Mohammedanism
T. Nöldeke,
Sketches from Eastern History,
chapter 3.
See, also,
MAHOMETAN CONQUEST.
{1804}
ISLAM, Dar-ul-, and Dar-ul-harb.
See DAR-UL-ISLAM.
ISLAND NUMBER TEN, The capture of.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1862
(MARCH-APRIL: ON THE MISSISSIPPI).
ISLE OF FRANCE.
The old French province containing Paris. Also the French name
of Mauritius island, taken by England in 1810.
ISLE ROYALE.
See CAPE BRETON: A. D. 1720-1745.
ISLES, Lords of the.
See HEBRIDES: A. D. 1346-1504,
and HARLAW, BATTLE OF.
ISLES OF THE BLESSED.
See CANARY ISLANDS.
ISLY, Battle of (1843).
See BARBARY STATES: A. D. 1830-1846.
ISMAIL, Khedive of Egypt, The reign and the fall of.
See EGYPT: A. D. 1840-1869; 1870-1883;
and 1875-1882.
Ismail I., Shah of Persia, A. D. 1502-1523.
Ismail II., Shah of Persia, 1576-1577.
ISMAIL, Siege and capture of (1790).
See TURKS: A. D. 1776-1792.
ISMAILEANS, OR ISHMAELIANS.
See MAHOMETAN CONQUEST: A. D. 908-1171;
also, ASSASSINS;
and CARMATHIANS.
ISONOMY.
ISOTIMY.
ISAGORIA.
"The principle underlying democracy is the struggle for a
legalised equality which was usually described [by the ancient
Greeks] by the expressions Isonomy, or equality of law for
all,—Isotimy, or proportionate regard paid to all,
—Isagoria, or equal freedom of speech, with special reference
to courts of justice and popular assemblies."
G. F. Schömann,
Antiquity of Greece: The State,
part 2, chapter 12.
ISONZO, Battle of the (A. D. 489).
See ROME: A. D. 488-526.
ISOPOLITY.
"Under Sp. Cassius [B. C. 493], Rome concluded a treaty with
the Latins, in which the right of isopolity or the 'jus
municipi' was conceded to them. The idea of isopolity changed
in the course of time, but its essential features in early
times were these: between the Romans and Latins and between
the Romans and Caerites there existed this arrangement, that
any citizen of the one state who wished to settle in the
other, might forthwith be able to exercise there the rights of
a citizen."
B. G. Niebuhr,
Lectures on the History of Rome,
lecture 13 (volume 1).
ISRAEL.
See JEWS.
ISRAEL, Lost Ten Tribes of.
See JEWS: THE KINGDOMS OF ISRAEL AND JUDAH.
ISSUS, Battle of (B. C. 333).
See MACEDONIA: B. C. 334-330.
ISTÆVONES, The.
See GERMANY: AS KNOWN TO TACITUS.
ISTAKR, OR STAKR.
The native name under the later, or Sassanian, Persian empire,
of the ancient capital, Persepolis.
G. Rawlinson,
Seventh Great Oriental Monarchy,
chapter 3, footnote.
ISTER, The.
The ancient Greek name of the Danube, below the junction of
the Theiss and the Save.
ISTHMIAN GAMES.
See NEMEAN.
----------ISTRIA: Start--------
ISTRIA:
Slavonic Occupation of.
See SLAVONIC PEOPLES: SIXTH AND SEVENTH CENTURIES.
ISTRIA: A. D. 1797.
Acquisition by Austria.
See FRANCE: A. D. 1797 (MAY-OCTOBER).
----------ISTRIA: End--------
ISTRIANS, The.
See ILLYRIANS.
ISURIUM.
A Roman town in Britain, which had previously been the chief
town of the British tribe of the Brigantes. It is identified
with Aldborough, Yorkshire, "where the excavator meets
continually with the tessellated floors of the Roman houses."
T. Wright,
Celt, Roman and Saxon,
chapter 5.
ITALI, The.
See ŒNOTRIANS.
ITALIAN WAR, The.
See ROME: B. C. 90-88.
ITALIOTES.
See SICELIOTEB.
----------ITALY: Start--------

ITALY:
Ancient.
Early Italians.
"It was not till the close of the Republic, or rather the
beginning of the Empire, that the name of Italy was employed,
as we now employ it, to designate the whole Peninsula, from
the Alps to the Straits of Messina.
See ROME: B. C. 275.
The term Italia, borrowed from the name of a primæval tribe
who occupied the southern portion of the land, was gradually
adopted as a generic title in the same obscure manner in which
most of the countries of Europe, or (we may say) the
Continents of the world, have received their appellations. In
the remotest times the name only included Lower Calabria: from
these narrow limits it gradually spread upwards, till about
the time of the Punic Wars, its northern boundary ascended the
little river Rubicon (between Umbria and Cisalpine Gaul), then
followed the ridge of the Appennines westward to the source of
the Macra, and was carried down the bed of that small stream
to the Gulf of Genoa. When we speak of Italy, therefore, in
the Roman sense of the word, we must dismiss from our thoughts
all that fertile country which was at Rome entitled the
provincial district of Gallia Cisalpina, and Liguria."
H. G. Liddell,
History of Rome,
introduction, section. 2.
"Philological research teaches us to distinguish three
primitive Italian stocks, the Iapygian, the Etruscan, and that
which we shall call the Italian. The last is divided into two
main branches,—the Latin branch, and that to which the
dialects of the Umbri, Marsi, Volsci and Samnites belong. As
to the Iapygian stock, we have but little information.
{1805}
At the southeastern extremity of Italy, in the Messapian or
Calabrian peninsula, inscriptions in a peculiar extinct
language have been found in considerable numbers; undoubtedly
remains of the dialect of the Iapygians, who are very
distinctly pronounced by tradition also to have been different
from the Latin and Samnite stocks. … With the recognition of
… a general family relationship or peculiar affinity between
the Iapygians and Hellenes (a recognition, however, which by
no means goes so far as to warrant our taking the Iapygian
language to be a rude dialect of Greek), investigation must
rest content. … The middle of the peninsula was inhabited,
as far back as reliable tradition reaches, by two peoples or
rather two branches of the same people, whose position in the
Indo-Germanic family admits of being determined with greater
precision than that of the Iapygian nation. We may with
propriety call this people the Italian, since upon it rests
the historical significance of the peninsula. It is divided
into the two branch-stocks of the Latins and the Umbrians; the
latter including their southern off-shoots, the Marsians and
Samnites, and the colonies sent forth by the Samnites in
historical times. … These examples [philological examples,
given in the work, but omitted from this quotation], selected
from a great abundance of analogous phenomena, suffice to
establish the individuality of the Italian stock as
distinguished from the other members of the Indo-Germanic
family, and at the same time show it to be linguistically the
nearest relative, as it is geographically the next neighbour,
of the Greek. The Greek and the Italian are brothers; the
Celt, the German and the Slavonian are their cousins. …
Among the languages of the Italian stock, again, the Latin
stands in marked contrast with the Umbro-Samnite dialects. It
is true that of these only two, the Umbrian and the Samnite or
Oscan, are in some degree known to us. … A conjoint view,
however, of the facts of language and of history leaves no
doubt that all these dialects belonged to the Umbro-Samnite
branch of the great Italian stock. … It may … be regarded
as certain that the Italians, like the Indians, migrated into
their peninsula from the north. The advance of the
Umbro-Sabellian stock along the central mountain-ridge of
Italy, in a direction from north to south, can still be
clearly traced; indeed its last phases belong to purely
historical times. Less is known regarding the route which the
Latin migration followed. Probably it proceeded in a similar
direction along the west coast, long, in all likelihood,
before the first Sabellian stocks began to move."
T. Mommsen,
History of Rome,
book 1, chapters 2-3.
See, also,
ETRUSCANS; LATIUM; SABINES; SAMNITES;
UMBRIANS; MAGNA GRÆCIA;
also, ROME: B. C. 343-290, and 339-338.
"In the February number of the 'Civiltà Cattolica,' Padre de
Cara pleads for a national effort on the part of Italian
archaeologists to solve the question of the origin of their
country's civilisation by the systematic exploration and
excavation of Pelasgic Italy. … In a series of articles,
extending over several years, the learned father has contended
for the identity of the Hittites and Proto-Pelasgians on
archaeological, etymological, and historical grounds; and he
here repeats that, if 'Italic' means Aryan, then it is among
the peoples speaking Oscan, Umbrian, Latin, and other dialects
of the Indo-European family that the parentage of Italian
civilisation must be sought; but that 'Italy' meant in the
first place the country of the Hittites (Hethei), and hence of
the Pelasgians, and that name and civilisation are alike
Pelasgic. Those who hold it to have been Aryan have not only
the testimony of Greek and Roman writers against them, but
also the facts that there were Pelasgians in Italy whose stone
constructions are standing to this day, and that the Etruscan
language and culture had no Aryan affinities. The writer
further points out that the walls of Pelasgic cities, whether
in Italy, Greece, or Asia Minor, all resemble each other, and
that the origin of Greek civilisation was also Pelasgian. In
Greece, as in Italy, the Aryans followed centuries after the
Hittite-Pelasgians, and Aryan Greece carried the arts of
Pelasgic Greece to perfection. He believes that, of two
migratory bands of Hittites, one invaded Greece and the other
Italy, about the same time. He also draws attention to the
coincidence that it is not very long since Greece, like Italy
at the present time, could date its civilisation no further
back than 700 or 800 B. C. Schliemann recovered centuries for
Greece, but 'Italy still remains imprisoned in the iron circle
of the seventh century.' To break it, she must follow
Schliemann's plan; and as he had steady faith in the
excavation of the Pelasgic cities and cemeteries of Greece, so
will like faith and conduct on the part of Italian
archaeologists let in light upon this once dark problem."
Academy,
March 31, 1894, page 273.
ITALY:
Under the dominion of Rome.
See ROME.
ITALY:
Invasions Repelled by Rome.
See ROME: B. C. 390-347, 282-275; PUNIC WARS;
CIMBRI AND TEUTONES; ALEMANNI; and RADAGAISUS.
ITALY: A. D. 400-410.
Alaric's invasions.
See GOTHS (VISIGOTHS): A. D. 400-403;
and ROME: A. D. 408-410.
ITALY: A. D. 452.
Attila's invasion.
The origin of Venice.
See HUNS: A. D. 452; and VENICE: A. D. 452.
ITALY: A. D. 476-553.
The fall of the Western Roman Empire.
The Ostrogothic kingdom of Theodoric, and its fall.
Recovery of Italy by Justinian.
See ROME: A. D. 455-476, to 535-553.
ITALY: A. D. 539-553.
Frank invasions.
See FRANKS: A. D. 539-553.
ITALY: A. D. 554-800.
Rule of the Exarchs of Ravenna.
See ROME: A. D. 554-800;
and PAPACY: A. D. 728-774.
ITALY: A. D. 568-800.
Lombard conquests and kingdom.
Rise of the Papal power at Rome.
Alliance of the Papacy with the sovereigns of the Franks.
Revival of the Roman Empire under Charlemagne.
"Since the invasion of Alboin, Italy had groaned under a
complication of evils. The Lombards who had entered along with
that chief in A. D. 568 [see LOMBARDS: A. D. 568-573, and
after] had settled in considerable numbers in the valley of
the Po, and founded the duchies of Spoleto and Benevento,
leaving the rest of the country to be governed by the exarch
of Ravenna as viceroy of the Eastern crown. This subjection
was, however, little better than nominal. Although too few to
occupy the whole peninsula, the invaders were yet strong
enough to harass every part of it by inroads which met with no
resistance from a population unused to arms, and without the
spirit to use them in self-defence. … Tormented by their
repeated attacks, Rome sought help in vain from Byzantium,
whose forces, scarce able to repel from their walls the Avars
and Saracens, could give no support to the distant exarch of
Ravenna.
{1806}
The Popes were the Emperor's subjects; they it waited his
confirmation, like other bishops; they had more than once been
the victims of his anger. But as the city became more
accustomed in independence, and the Pope rose to a
predominance, real if not yet legal [see ROME: A. D. 590-640,
and PAPACY: A. D. 728-774], his tone grew bolder than that of
the Eastern patriarchs. In the controversies that had raged in
the Church, he had had the wisdom or good fortune to espouse
(though not always from the first) the orthodox side: it was
now by another quarrel of religion that his deliverance from
an unwelcome yoke was accomplished. The Emperor Leo, born
among the Isaurian mountains, where a purer faith may yet have
lingered, and stung by the Mohammedan taunt of idolatry,
determined to abolish the worship of images, which seemed fast
obscuring the more spiritual part of Christianity. An attempt
sufficient to cause tumults among the submissive Greeks,
excited in Italy a fiercer commotion. The populace rose with
one heart in defence of what had become to them more than a
symbol: the exarch was slain: the Pope, though unwilling to
sever himself from the lawful head and protector of the
Church, must yet excommunicate the prince whom he could not
reclaim from so hateful a heresy.
See ICONOCLASTIC CONTROVERSY.
Liudprand, king of the Lombards, improved his opportunity:
falling on the exarchate as the champion of images, on Rome as
the minister of the Greek Emperor, he overran the one, and all
but succeeded in capturing the other. The Pope escaped for the
moment, but saw his peril: placed between a heretic and a
robber, he turned his gaze beyond the Alps, to a Catholic
chief who had just achieved a signal deliverance for
Christendom on the field of Poitiers. Gregory II. had already
opened communications with Charles Martel, mayor of the
palace, and virtual ruler of the Frankish realm. As the crisis
becomes more pressing, Gregory III. finds in the same quarter
his only hope, and appeals to him in urgent letters, to haste
to the succour of Holy Church. … Charles died before he
could obey the call; but his son Pipin (surnamed the Short)
made good use of the new friendship with Rome. He was the
third of his family who had ruled the Franks with a monarch's
full power [see FRANKS: A. D. 511-752]: it seemed time to
abolish the pageant of Merovingian royalty; yet a departure
from the ancient line might shock the feelings of the people.
A course was taken whose dangers no one then foresaw: the Holy
See, now for the first time invoked as an international power,
pronounced the deposition of Childric, and gave to the royal
office of his successor Pipin a sanctity hitherto unknown. …
The compact between the chair of Peter and the Teutonic throne
was hardly sealed, when the latter was summoned to discharge
its share of the duties. Twice did Aistulf the Lombard assail
Rome, twice did Pipin descend to the rescue: the second time
at the bidding of a letter written in the name of St. Peter
himself. Aistulf could make no resistance; and the Frank
bestowed on the Papal chair all that belonged to the exarchate
in North Italy, receiving as the meed of his services the
title of Patrician [754]. … When on Pipin's death the
restless Lombards again took up arms and menaced the
possessions of the Church, Pipin's son Charles or Charlemagne
swept down like a whirlwind from the Alps at the call of Pope
Hadrian, seized king Desiderius in his capital, assumed
himself the Lombard crown, and made northern Italy
thenceforward an integral part of the Frankish empire [see
GERMANY: A. D. 68-800]. … For the next twenty-four years
Italy remained quiet. The government of Rome was carried on in
the name of the Patrician Charles, although it does not appear
that he sent thither any official representative; while at the
same time both the city and the exarchate continued to admit
the nominal supremacy of the Eastern Emperor, employing the
years of his reign to date documents."
J. Bryce,
The Holy Roman Empire,
chapter 4.
"Thus, by German hands, the internal ascendancy of the German
race in Italy, which had lasted, first under the Goths, and
then under the Lombards, for 281 years, was finally broken. A
German was still king over Italy, as for ages Germans were
still to be. But Roman and native influence reconquered its
supremacy in Italy, under the management and leadership of the
bishops of Rome. The Lombards, already becoming Italianized,
melted into provincial Italians. The Teutonic language
disappeared, leaving a number of words to Italian dialects,
and a number of names to Italian families. The last king of
the Lombards bore an Italian name, Desiderius. The latest of
Italian national heroes bears the Bavarian and Lombard name of
Garibaldi. But the overthrow of the Lombards, and the gift of
provinces and cities to St. Peter had even more eventful
results. The alliance between the king of the Franks and the
bishop of Rome had become one of the closest kind. … The
German king and the Italian pope found themselves together at
the head of the modern world of the West. But the fascination
of the name of Rome still, as it had done for centuries, held
sway over the Teutonic mind. … It was not unnatural that the
idea should recommend itself, both to the king and the pope,
of reviving in the West, in close connexion with the Roman
primacy, that great name which still filled the imagination of
the world, and which in Roman judgments, Greek Byzantium had
wrongfully stolen away—the name of Cæsar Augustus, the claim
to govern the world. There was a longing in the West for the
restoration of the name and authority, 'lest,' as the
contemporary writers express it, 'the heathen should mock at
the Christian if the name of Emperor had ceased among them.'
And at this moment, the government at Constantinople was in
the hands of a woman, the Empress Irene. Charles's services to
the pope were recompensed, and his victorious career of more
than thirty years crowned, by the restoration at Rome, in his
person, of the Roman empire and the imperial dignity. The same
authority which had made him 'patrician,' and consecrated him
king, now created him Emperor of the Romans. On Christmas day,
800, when Charles came to pay his devotions before the altar
of St. Peter's, Pope Leo III.—without Charles's knowledge or
wish, so Charles declared to his biographer, Einhard, and, it
may be, prematurely, as regards Charles's own feeling—placed
a golden crown on his head, while all the people shouted, 'to
Charles, the most pious Augustus, crowned of God, the great
and peace-giving Emperor of the Romans, life and victory.' …
{1807}
Thus a new power arose in Europe, new in reality and in its
relations to society, though old in name. It was formally but
the carrying on the line of the successors of Augustus and
Constantine. But substantially it was something very
different. Its authors could little foresee its destinies; but
it was to last, in some sort the political centre of the world
which was to be, for 1,000 years. And the Roman Church, which
had done such great things, which had consecrated the new and
mighty kings of the Franks, and had created for the mightiest
of them the imperial claim to universal dominion, rose with
them to a new attitude in the world. … The coronation of
Charles at Rome, in the face of an imperial line at
Constantinople, finally determined, though it did not at once
accomplish, the separation of East and West, of Greek and
Latin Christianity. This separation had long been impending,
perhaps, becoming inevitable. … One Roman empire was still
the only received theory. But one Roman empire, with its seat
in the West, or one Roman empire, governed in partnership by
two emperors of East and West, had become impossible in fact.
The theory of its unity continued for ages; but whether the
true successor of Augustus and Theodosius sat at
Constantinople, or somewhere in the West, remained in dispute,
till the dispute was ended by the extinction of the Eastern
empire by the Turks on May 29, 1453."
R. W. Church,
The Beginning of the Middle Ages,
chapter 7.
See, also, FRANKS: A. D. 768-814.
ITALY: A. D. 685-1014.
The founding of the duchy of Tuscany.
See TUSCANY: A. D. 685-1115.
ITALY: A. D. 781.
Erected into a separate kingdom by Charlemagne.
In the year 781 Charlemagne erected Italy and Aquitaine into
two separate kingdoms, placing his infant sons Pipin and
Ludwig on the thrones.
P. Godwin,
History of France: Ancient Gaul,
chapter 16.
ITALY: (Southern): A. D. 800-1016.
Conflict of Greeks, Saracens and Franks.
"The southern provinces [of Italy], which now compose the
kingdom of Naples, were subject, for the most part [in the 8th
and 9th centuries], to the Lombard dukes and princes of
Beneventum—so powerful in war that they checked for a moment
the genius of Charlemagne—so liberal in peace that they
maintained in their capital an academy of thirty-two
philosophers and grammarians. The division of this flourishing
state produced the rival principalities of Benevento, Salerno,
and Capua; and the thoughtless ambition or revenge of the
competitors invited the Saracens to the ruin of their common
inheritance. During a calamitous period of two hundred years,
Italy was exposed to a repetition of wounds which the invaders
were not capable of healing by the union and tranquillity of a
perfect conquest. Their frequent and almost annual squadrons
issued from the port of Palermo and were entertained with too
much indulgence by the Christians of Naples: the more
formidable fleets were prepared on the African coasts. … A
colony of Saracens had been planted at Bari, which commands
the entrance of the Adriatic Gulf; and their impartial
depredations provoked the resentment and conciliated the union
of the two emperors. An offensive alliance was concluded
between Basil the Macedonian [of the Byzantine Empire], the
first of his race, and Lewis, the great grandson of
Charlemagne; and each party Supplied the deficiencies of his
associate. … The fortress of Bari was invested by the
infantry of the Franks and by the cavalry and galleys of the
Greeks; and, after a defence of four years, the Arabian emir
submitted [A. D. 871] to the clemency of Lewis, who commanded
in person the operations of the siege. This important conquest
had been achieved by the concord of the East and West; but
their recent amity was soon embittered by the mutual
complaints of jealousy and pride. … Whoever might deserve
the honour, the Greek emperors, Basil and his son Leo, secured
the advantage of the reduction of Bari. The Italians of Apulia
and Calabria were persuaded or compelled to acknowledge their
supremacy, and an ideal line from Mount Garganus to the Bay of
Salerno leaves the far greater part of the [modern] kingdom of
Naples under the dominion of the Eastern empire. Beyond that
line the dukes or republics of Amalfi and Naples, who had
never forfeited their voluntary allegiance, rejoiced in the
neighbourhood of their lawful sovereign; and Amalfi was
enriched by supplying Europe with the produce and manufactures
of Asia. But the Lombard princes of Benevento, Salerno, and
Capua, were reluctantly torn from the communion of the Latin
world, and too often violated their oaths of servitude and
tribute. The city of Bari rose to dignity and wealth as the
metropolis of the new theme or province of Lombardy; the title
of Patrician, and afterwards the singular name of Catapan, was
assigned to the supreme governor. … As long as the sceptre
was disputed by the princes of Italy, their efforts were
feeble and adverse; and the Greeks resisted or eluded the
forces of Germany which descended from the Alps under the
imperial standard of the Othos. The first and greatest of
those Saxon princes was compelled to relinquish the siege of
Bari: the second, after the loss of his stoutest bishops and
barons, escaped with honour from the bloody field of Crotona
(A. D. 983). On that day the scale of war was turned against
the Franks by the valour of the Saracens. … The Caliph of
Egypt had transported 40,000 Moslems to the aid of his
Christian ally. The successors of Basil amused themselves with
the belief that the conquest of Lombardy had been achieved,
and was still preserved, by the justice of their laws, the
virtues of their ministers, and the gratitude of a people whom
they had rescued from anarchy and oppression. A series of
rebellions might dart a ray of truth into the palace of
Constantinople; and the illusions of flattery were dispelled
by the easy and rapid success of the Norman adventurers."
E. Gibbon,
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
chapter 56.
ITALY: A. D. 803-810.
Charlemagne's boundary treaties with the Byzantine Emperor.
Attempts of Pipin against the Venetians.
The founding of Modern Venice.
See VENICE: A. D. 697-810.
ITALY: A. D. 810-961.
Spread of Venetian commerce and naval prowess.
See VENICE: A. D. 810-961.
{1808}
ITALY: A. D. 843-951.
In the breaking up of Charlemagne's Empire.
The founding of the Holy Roman Empire.
In the partition of Charlemagne's Empire among his three
grandsons, by the treaty of Verdun, A. D. 843, Italy, together
with the new kingdom called Lotharingia, or Lorraine, was
assigned to the elder, Lothar, who bore the title of Emperor.
Lothar, who died in 855, redivided his dominions among three
sons, and Lorraine, separated from Italy, was soon dismembered
and shared between Germany and France. The Italian kingdom
fell to Louis or Ludwig II., who was crowned Emperor, and on
his death without issue, A. D. 875, it was seized, together
with the imperial title, by the French Carlovingian king,
Charles the Bald. Two years afterwards he died, and Italy,
together with the imperial crown, was acquired by the last
legitimate survivor of the German Carlovingian line, Charles
the Fat, who died in 888. "At that memorable era (A. D. 888)
the four kingdoms which this prince [Charles the Fat] had
united fell asunder: West France, where Odo or Eudes [Duke of
Paris, ancestor of the royal line of Capet] then began to
reign, was never again united to Germany; East France
(Germany) chose Arnulf; Burgundy split up into two
principalities, in one of which (Transjurane) Rudolf
proclaimed himself king, while the other (Cisjurune with
Provence) submitted to Boso; while Italy was divided between
the parties of Berengar of Friuli and Guido of Spoleto. The
former was chosen king by the estates of Lombardy; the latter,
and on his speedy death his son Lambert, was crowned Emperor
by the Pope. Arnulf's [the German king's] descent chased them
away and vindicated the claims of the Franks, but on his
flight Italy and the anti-German faction at Rome became again
free. Berengar was made king of Italy, and afterwards Emperor.
Lewis of Burgundy, son of Boso, renounced his fealty to
Arnulf, and procured the imperial dignity, whose vain title he
retained through years of misery and exile, till A. D. 928.
None of these Emperors were strong enough to rule well even in
Italy; beyond it they were not so much as recognized. … In
A. D. 924 died Berengar, the last of these phantom Emperors.
After him Hugh of Burgundy and Lothar his son reigned as kings
of Italy, if puppets in the hands of a riotous aristocracy can
be so called. Rome was meanwhile ruled by the consul or
senator Alberic [called variously senator, consul, patrician,
and prince of the Romans], who had renewed her never quite
extinct republican institutions, and in the degradation of the
papacy was almost absolute in the city." Affairs in Italy were
at this stage when Otto or Otho, the vigorous and chivalrous
German king of the new line, came in 951 to re-establish and
reconstitute the Roman Empire of Charlemagne and to make it a
lasting entity in European politics—the "Holy Roman Empire"
of modern history.
J. Bryce,
The Holy Roman Empire,
chapter 6.
See GERMANY: A. D. 936-973.
ALSO IN:
F. Guizot,
History of Civilization,
lecture 24.
E. Gibbon,
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
chapter 49.
See, also,
ROME: A. D. 903-964;
and ROMAN EMPIRE, THE HOLY: A. D. 963.
ITALY: A. D. 900-924.
Ravaged by the Hungarians.
"The vicinity of Italy had tempted their early inroads; but
from their camp on the Brenta they beheld with some terror the
apparent strength and populousness of the new-discovered
country. They requested leave to retire; their request was
proudly rejected by the Italian king; and the lives of 20,000
Christians paid the forfeit of his obstinacy and rashness.
Among the cities of the West the royal Pavia was conspicuous
in fame and splendour; and the pre-eminence of Rome itself was
only derived from the relies of the apostles. The Hungarians
appeared; Pavia was in flames; forty-three churches were
consumed; and, after the massacre of the people, they spared
about 200 wretches who had gathered some bushels of gold and
silver (a vague exaggeration) from the smoking ruins of their
country. In these annual excursions from the Alps to the
neighbourhood of Rome and Capua, the churches that yet escaped
resounded with a fearful litany: 'Oh! save and deliver us from
the arrows of the Hungarians!' But the saints were deaf or
inexorable; and the torrent rolled forward, till it was
stopped by the extreme land of Calabria."
E. Gibbon,
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
chapter 55.
ITALY: A. D. 961-1039.
Subjection to Germany.
"Otho I., his son Otho II., and his grandson Otho III., were
successively acknowledged emperors and kings of Italy, from
961 to 1002. When this branch of the house of Saxony became
extinct, Henry II. of Bavaria, and Conrad the Salic of
Franconia, filled the throne from 1004 to 1039. During this
period of nearly eighty years, the German emperors twelve
times entered Italy at the head of their armies, which they
always drew up in the plains of Roncaglia near Placentia;
there they held the states of Lombardy, received homage from
their Italian feudatories, caused the rents due to be paid,
and promulgated laws for the government of Italy. A foreign
sovereign, however, almost always absent, known only by his
incursions at the head of a barbarous army, could not
efficaciously govern a country which he hardly knew, and where
his yoke was detested. … The emperors were too happy to
acknowledge the local authorities, whatever they were,
whenever they could obtain from them their pecuniary dues:
sometimes they were dukes or marquises, whose dignities had
survived the disasters of various invasions and of civil wars;
sometimes the archbishops and bishops of great cities, whom
Charlemagne and his successors had frequently invested with
duchies and counties escheated to the crown, reckoning that
lords elected for life would remain more dependent than
hereditary lords; sometimes, finally, they were the
magistrates themselves, who, although elected by the people,
received from the monarch the title of imperial vicars, and
took part with the nobles and prelates in the Plaids
(placita), or diets of Roncaglia. After a stay of some months,
the emperor returned with his army into Germany; the nobles
retired to their castles, the prelates and magistrates to
their cities: neither of these last acknowledged a superior
authority to their own, nor reckoned on any other force than
what they could themselves employ to assert what they called
their rights. Opposite interests could not fail to produce
collision, and the war was universal."
J. C. L. de Sismondi,
History of the Italian Republics,
chapter 1.
{1809}
During the reign of Henry II. (A. D. 1002-1024), against whom
a rival king of Italy was set up by the Italians, "there was
hardly any recognised government, and the Lombards became more
and more accustomed, through necessity, to protect themselves,
and to provide for their own internal police. Meanwhile the
German nation had become odious to the Italians. The rude
soldiery, insolent and addicted to intoxication, were engaged
in frequent disputes with the citizens, wherein the latter, as
is usual in similar cases, were exposed first to the summary
vengeance of the troops, and afterwards to penal chastisement
for sedition. In one of these tumults, at the entry of Henry
II. in 1004, the city of Pavia was burned to the ground, which
inspired its inhabitants with a constant animosity against
that emperor. Upon his death, in 1024, the Italians were
disposed to break once more their connexion with Germany,
which had elected as sovereign Conrad duke of Franconia. They
offered their crown to Robert king of France and to William
duke of Guienne." But neither of these princes would accept
the troublesome diadem; and, in the end, the archbishop of
Milan and other Lombard lords "repaired to Constance and
tendered the crown to Conrad, which he was already disposed to
claim as a sort of dependency upon Germany. It does not appear
that either Conrad or his successors were ever regularly
elected to reign over Italy; but whether this ceremony took
place or not, we may certainly date from that time the
subjection of Italy to the Germanic body. It became an
unquestionable maxim, that the votes of a few German princes
conferred a right to the sovereignty of a country which had
never been conquered, and which had never formally recognised
this superiority."
H. Hallam,
The Middle Ages,
chapter 3, part 1 (volume 1).
"The Italian Kingdom of the Karlings, the kingdom which was
reunited to Germany under Otto the Great, was … a
continuation of the old Lombard kingdom. It consisted of that
kingdom, enlarged by the Italian lands which fell off from the
Eastern Empire in the eighth century; that is by the Exarchate
and the adjoining Pentapolis, and the immediate territory of
Rome itself."
E. A. Freeman,
Historical Geography of Europe,
chapter 8, section 3.
ITALY: (Southern): A. D. 1000-1090.
Conquests and settlement of the Normans.
"A pilgrimage first took the Normans to Southern Italy, where
they were to found a kingdom. Here there were, if I may so
speak, three wrecks, three ruins of nations—Lombards in the
mountains, Greeks in the ports, Sicilian and African Saracens
rambling over the coasts. About the year 1000, some Norman
pilgrims assist the inhabitants of Salerno to drive out a
party of Arabs, who were holding them to ransom. Being well
paid for the service, these Normans attract others of their
countrymen hither. A Greek of Bari, named Melo or Meles, takes
them into pay to free his city from the Greeks of Byzantium.
Next they are settled by the Greek republic of Naples at the
fort of Aversa, which lay between that city and her enemies,
the Lombards of Capua (A. D. 1026). Finally, the sons of a
poor gentleman of the Cotentin, Tancred of Hauteville, seek
their fortune here. Tancred had twelve children; seven by the
same mother. It was during William's [the Conqueror's]
minority, when numbers of the barons endeavoured to withdraw
themselves from the Bastard's yoke, that these sons of
Tancred's directed their steps towards Italy, where it was
said that a simple Norman knight had become count of Aversa.
They set off penniless, and defrayed the expenses of their
journey by the sword (A. D. 1037?). The Byzantine governor, or
Katapan, engaged their services, and led them against the
Arabs. But their countrymen beginning to flock to them, they
no sooner saw themselves strong enough than they turned
against their paymasters, seized Apulia [A. D. 1042], and
divided it into twelve countships. This republic of
Condottieri held its assemblies at Melphi. The Greeks
endeavoured to defend themselves, but fruitlessly. They
collected an army of 60,000 Italians; to be routed by the
Normans, who amounted to several hundreds of well-armed men.
The Byzantines then summoned their enemies, the Germans, to
their aid; and the two empires, of the East and West,
confederated against the sons of the gentleman of Coutances.
The all-powerful emperor, Henry the Black (Henry III.),
charged Leo IX., who had been nominated pope by him, and who
was a German and kin to the imperial family, to exterminate
these brigands. The pope led some Germans and a swarm of
Italians against them [1053]; but the latter took to flight at
the very beginning of the battle, and left the warlike pontiff
in the hands of the enemy. Too wary to ill-treat him, the
Normans piously cast themselves at their prisoner's feet, and
compelled him to grant them, as a fief of the Church, all that
they had taken or might take possession of in Apulia,
Calabria, and on the other side of the strait; so that, in
spite of himself, the pope became the suzerain of the kingdom
of the Two Sicilies (A. D. 1052-1053)."
J. Michelet,
History of France,
book 4, chapter 2.
The two elder of the sons of Tancred were now dead, and the
third son, Humphrey, died not long after. A fourth brother,
Robert, surnamed Guiscard, who had lately arrived from
Normandy with reinforcements, then established himself (A. D.
1057) with some difficulty in the leadership and succession.
"He accomplished the reduction of almost all the country which
composes the present kingdom of Naples, and, extinguishing the
long dominion of the Beneventine Lombards and of the eastern
empire in Italy [see BENEVENTUM, and AMALFI], finally received
from Pope Nicholas II. the confirmation of the titles which he
had assumed, of duke of Calabria and Apulia [A. D. 1080]. …
While Robert Guiscard was perfecting his dominion on the
continent, his younger brother Roger engaged in the
astonishing design of conquering the large and beautiful
island of Sicily from the Saracens with a few Norman
volunteers. An air of romantic extravagance breathes over all
the enterprises of the Normans in Italy; and, even if we
discard the incredible tales which the legends and chronicles
of the times have preserved of the valour and corporeal
strength of these northern warriors, enough will remain in the
authentic results of their expeditions to stagger the reason
and warm the imagination with attractive visions of chivalrous
achievement. … We are assured that 300 Christian knights
were the greatest number which Roger could for many years
bring into the field; and that 136 routed a prodigious host of
Saracens at the battle of Ceramio. … But the Saracens were
embroiled in internal discord, and their island was broken up
into numerous petty states; we may, therefore, attribute to
their dissensions a great part of the success which the
chroniclers of the Normans have assigned to their good swords
alone. Roger had, however, embarked in an arduous and
laborious undertaking, which it required the unbending
perseverance and patient valour of thirty years [A. D.
1060-1090] to accomplish. … At length, all Sicily bowed to
his sway; Norman barons were infeuded over its surface; and
Roger, with the title of great count, held the island as a
fief of his brother's duchy."
G. Proctor,
History of Italy,
chapter 2, part 2.
ALSO IN:
E. Gibbon,
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
chapter 56.
J. W. Barlow,
Short History of the Normans in South Europe,
chapters 1-7.
{1810}
ITALY: A. D. 1056-1122.
Beginning of the conflict of the Popes with the Emperors.
Hildebrand and Henry IV.
The War of Investitures.
See PAPACY: A. D. 1056-1122;
and GERMANY: A. D. 973-1122.
ITALY: A. D. 1056-1152.
The rise of the republican cities.
"The war of investitures, which lasted more than sixty years,
accomplished the dissolution of every tie between the
different members of the kingdom of Italy. Civil wars have at
least this advantage,—that they force the rulers of the
people to consult the wishes of their subjects, oblige them to
gain affections which constitute their strength, and to
compensate, by the granting of new privileges, the services
which they require. The prelates, nobles, and cities of Italy
obeyed, some the emperor, others the pope; not from a blind
fear, but from choice, from affection, from conscience,
according as the political or religious sentiment was
predominant in each. The war was general, but everywhere waged
with the national forces. Every city armed its militia, which,
headed by the magistrates, attacked the neighbouring nobles or
towns of a contrary party. While each city imagined it was
fighting either for the pope or the emperor, it was habitually
impelled exclusively by its own sentiments: every town
considered itself as a whole, as an independent state, which
had its own allies and enemies; each citizen felt an ardent
patriotism, not for the kingdom of Italy, or for the empire,
but for his own city. At the period when either kings or
emperors had granted to towns the right of raising
fortifications, that of assembling the citizens at the sound
of a great bell, to concert together the means of their common
defence, had been also conceded. This meeting of all the men
of the state capable of bearing arms was called a parliament.
It assembled in the great square, and elected annually two
consuls, charged with the administration of justice at home,
and the command of the army abroad. … The parliament, which
named the consuls, appointed also a secret council, called a
Consilio di Credenza, to assist the government, composed of a
few members taken from each division; besides a grand council
of the people, who prepared the decisions to be submitted to
the parliament. … As industry had rapidly increased, and had
preceded luxury,—as domestic life was sober, and the produce
of labour considerable,—wealth had greatly augmented. The
citizens allowed themselves no other use of their riches than
that of defending or embellishing their country. It was from
the year 900 to the year 1200 that the most prodigious works
were undertaken and accomplished by the towns of Italy. …
These three regenerating centuries gave an impulse to
architecture, which soon awakened the other fine arts. The
republican spirit which now fermented in every city, and gave
to each of them constitutions so wise, magistrates so zealous,
and citizens so patriotic, and so capable of great
achievements, had found in Italy itself the models which had
contributed to its formation. The war of investitures had
given wing to this universal spirit of liberty and patriotism
in all the municipalities of Lombardy, in Piedmont, Venetia,
Romagna, and Tuscany. But there existed already in Italy other
free cities. … Venice, … Ravenna, … Genoa, … Pisa, …
Rome, Gaëta, Naples, Amalfi, Bari, were either never conquered
by the Lombards, or in subjection too short a time to have
lost their ancient walls, and the habit of guarding them.
These cities served as the refuge of Roman civilization. …
Those cities which had accumulated the most wealth, whose
walls inclosed the greatest population, attempted, from the
first half of the twelfth century, to secure by force of arms
the obedience of such of the neighbouring towns as did not
appear sufficiently strong to resist them, … to force them
in to a perpetual alliance, so as to share their good or evil
fortune, and always place their armed force under the standard
of the dominant city. … Two great towns in the plains of
Lombardy surpassed every other in power and wealth: Milan,
which habitually directed the party of the church; and Pavia,
which directed that of the empire. Both towns, however, seem
to have changed parties during the reigns of Lothario III. and
Conrad II., who, from the year 1125 to 1152 placed in
opposition the two houses of Guelphs and Ghibelines in
Germany. … Among the towns of Piedmont, Turin took the lead,
and disputed the authority of the counts of Savoy, who called
themselves imperial vicars in that country. … The family of
the Veronese marquises, … who from the time of the Lombard
kings had to defend the frontier against the Germans, were
extinct; and the great cities of Verona, Padua, Vicenza,
Treviso, and Mantua, nearly equal in power, maintained their
independence. Bologna held the first rank among the towns
south of the Po. … Tuscany, which had also had its powerful
marquises, saw their family become extinct with the countess
Matilda, the contemporary and friend of Gregory VII. Florence
had since risen in power, destroyed Fiesole, and … was
considered the head of the Tuscan league; and the more so that
Pisa at this period thought only of her maritime expeditions.
… Such was the state of Italy, when the Germanic diet,
assembled at Frankfort in 1152, conferred the crown on
Frederick Barbarossa, duke of Swabia, and of the house of
Hohenstaufen."
J. C. L. de Sismondi,
History of the Italian Republics,
chapters 1-2.
ALSO IN:
E. A. Freeman,
Historical Geography of Europe,
chapter 8, section 3.
W. K. Williams,
The Communes of Lombardy
(Johns Hopkins University Studies, 9th series, 5-6).
H. Hallam,
The Middle Ages,
chapter 3, part 1 (volume 1).
Europe during the Middle Ages
(Lardner's Cabinet Cyclop.,
volume 1, chapter 1).
See, also,
FLORENCE: 12TH CENTURY.
ITALY: A. D. 1063.
Birth of Pisan architecture.
See PISA: A. D. 1063-1293.
ITALY: A. D. 1077-1102.
Countess Matilda's donation to the Holy See.
See PAPACY: A. D. 1077-1102.
{1811}
ITALY: (Southern): A. D. 1081-1194.
Robert Guiscard's invasions of the Eastern Empire.
Union of Sicily with Apulia, and creation of the Kingdom of
the Two Sicilies, or Naples.
"The success of his brother [Roger, in Sicily—see above:
A. D. 1000-1090] furnished another spur to the ambition of
Robert Guiscard. Taking advantage of a dynastic revolution at
Constantinople, he and his son Bohemund commenced a series of
invasions of the Eastern Empire [see BYZANTINE EMPIRE: A. D.
1081-1085] which only ended with his death. These, though
unsuccessful in their ultimate result, were influential causes
of the first crusade, and deeply affected the relations of East
and West for years to come. Meanwhile in Sicily Roger had been
succeeded by his son [Roger II.], and, in 1127, this heir of
the destinies of his race added the dukedom of Apulia to that
of Sicily, obtained from Pope Anacletus the title of king, and
finally established the Norman kingdom of Naples [also called
the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies]. His character is thus
described by a contemporary chronicler: 'He was a lover of
justice and most severe avenger of crime. He abhorred lying;
did everything by rule, and never promised what he did not
mean to perform. He never persecuted his private enemies; and
in war endeavoured on all occasions to gain his point without
shedding of blood. Justice and peace were universally observed
throughout his dominions.' During his reign the intercourse
between England and Sicily was close. The government was
organized on principles very similar to that of England. …
Under his wise rule and that of his immediate successors, the
south of Italy and Sicily enjoyed a transient gleam of
prosperity and happiness. Their equal and tolerant government,
far surpassing anything at that day in Europe, enabled the
Saracen, the Greek, and the Italian to live together in
harmony elsewhere unknown. Trade and industry flourished, the
manufacture of silk enriched the inhabitants, and the kingdom
of Naples was at peace until she was crushed under the iron
heel of a Teutonic conqueror."
A. H. Johnson,
The Normans in Europe,
chapter 6.
ALSO IN:
E. A. Freeman,
The Normans at Palermo
(Historical Essays, 3d series).
J. W. Barlow,
Short History of the Normans in South Europe,
chapters 8-11.
ITALY: A. D. 1096-1102.
The First Crusades.
See CRUSADES: A. D. 1096-1099; and 1101-1102.
ITALY: A. D. 1138.
The accession of the Hohenstaufens to the Imperial throne, and
the origin, in Germany, of the Guelf and Ghibelline factions.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1138-1268.
ITALY: A. D. 1154-1162.
The first and second expeditions of Frederick Barbarossa.
Frederick I., the second of the emperors of the Hohenstaufen
line, called by the Italians Frederick Barbarossa (Red beard),
was elected king at Frankfort in March, 1152. In October,
1154, he crossed the Alps and entered Italy with a strong
German army, having two purposes in view:
1. To receive the imperial crown, from the hands of the Pope,
and to place on his own head, at Pavia, the iron crown of
Lombardy or Italy.
2. To reduce to order and submission the rising city-republics
of Lombardy and Tuscany, which had been growing rapidly in
independence and power during the last four troubled imperial
reigns.
At Roncaglia, he held the diet of the kingdom, and listened to
many complaints, especially against Milan, which had undoubtedly
oppressed the weaker towns of its neighbourhood and abused its
strength. Then he moved through the country, making a personal
inspection of affairs, and giving a taste of his temper by
burning the villages which failed to supply provisions to his
troops with satisfactory promptitude. At Tortona he ordered
the inhabitants to renounce their alliance with the Milanese.
They refused, and endured in the upper portion of the city a
siege of two months. Forced by want of water to surrender, at
last, they were permitted to go free, but their town was
sacked and burned. Asti, Chieri, Rosate, and other places of
more or less importance, were destroyed. Frederick did not
venture yet to attack Milan, but proceeded to Rome, demanding
the imperial crown. The pope (Adrian IV.) and the Romans were
alike distrustful of him, and he was not permitted to bring
his army into the city. After no little wrangling over
ceremonious details, and after being compelled to lead the
horse and to hold the stirrup of the haughty pontiff,
Barbarossa was finally crowned at St. Peter's, in the Vatican
suburb. The Romans attempted to interrupt the coronation, and
a terrible tumult occurred in which a thousand of the citizens
were slain. But the Germans made no attempt to take possession
of the city. On the contrary, they withdrew with haste, and
the emperor led his army back to Germany, burning Spoleto on
the way, because it failed in submissiveness, and marking a
wide track of ruin and desolation through Italy as he went.
This was in the summer of 1155. Three years passed, during
which the Italian cities grew more determined in their
independence, the emperor and his German subjects more bitter
in hostility to them, and the pope and the emperor more
antagonistic in their ambitions. In 1158 Frederick led a
second expedition into Italy, especially determined to make an
end of the contumacy of Milan. He began operations by creating
a desert of blackened country around the offending city, being
resolved to reduce it by famine. Mediators, however, appeared,
who brought about a treaty of pacification, which interrupted
hostilities for a few weeks. Then the Milanese found occasion
to accuse the emperor of a treacherous violation of the terms
of the treaty and again took up arms. The war was now to the
death. But, before settling to the siege of Milan, Frederick
gave himself the pleasure, first, of reducing the lesser city
of Crema, which continued to be faithful among the allies of
the Milanese. He held some children of the town in his hands,
as hostages, and he bound them to the towers which he moved
against the walls, compelling the wretched citizens to kill
their own offspring in the act of their self-defense. By such
atrocities as this, Crema was taken, at the end of seven
months, and destroyed. Then Milan was assailed and
beleaguered, harassed and blockaded, until, at the beginning
of March, 1162, the starved inhabitants gave up their town.
Frederick ordered the doomed city "to be completely evacuated,
so that there should not be left in it a single living being.
On the 25th of March, he summoned the militias of the rival
and Ghibeline cities, and gave them orders to rase to the
earth the houses as well as the walls of the town, so as not
to leave one stone upon another. Those of the inhabitants of
Milan whom their poverty, labour and industry attached to the
soil, were divided into four open villages, built at a
distance of at least two miles from the walls of their former
city. Others sought hospitality in the neighbouring towns of
Italy. …
{1812}
Their sufferings, the extent of their sacrifices, the
recollection of their valour, and the example of their noble
sentiments, made proselytes to the cause of liberty in every
city into which they were received." Meantime Frederick
Barbarossa returned to Germany, with his fame as a puissant
monarch much augmented.
J. C. L. de Sismondi,
History of the Italian Republics,
chapter 2.
ALSO IN:
U. Balzani,
The Popes and the Hohenstaufen,
chapters 3-5.
G. B. Testa,
History of the War of Frederick I.
against the Communes of Lombardy,
books 1-6.
E. A. Freeman,
Frederick the First, King of Italy
(Historical Essays, 1st series).
ITALY: A. D. 1163-1164.
Third visitation of Frederick Barbarossa.
The rival Popes.
Frederick Barbarossa entered Italy for the third time in 1163,
without an army, but imposingly escorted by his German nobles.
He imagined that the country had been terrorized sufficiently
by the savage measures of his previous visitation to need no
more military repression. But he found the Lombard cities
undismayed in the assertion of their rights, and drawing
together in unions which had never been possible among them
before. The hostility of his relations with the Papacy and
with the greater part of the Church gave encouragement to
political revolt. His quarrel with Pope Hadrian had been ended
by the death of the latter, in 1159, but only to give rise to
new and more disturbing contentions. It had grown so bitter
before Hadrian died that the Pope had allied himself by treaty
with Milan, Crema, and other cities resisting Frederick, and
had promised to excommunicate the emperor within forty days.
Sudden death frustrated the combination. At the election of
Hadrian's successor there was a struggle of factions, each
determined to put its representative in the papal chair, and
each claiming success. Two rival popes were proclaimed and
consecrated, one under the name of Alexander III., the other
as Victor IV. Frederick recognized the latter, who made
himself the emperor's creature. The greater part of
Christendom soon gave its recognition to the former, although
he had been driven to take refuge in France. Pope Alexander
excommunicated Frederick and Frederick's pope, and Pope Victor
retorted like anathemas. Whether the curses of Alexander were
more effectual, or for other reasons, the authority of Victor
dwindled, and he himself presently died (April 1164), while
Frederick was making his third inspection of affairs in Italy.
The emperor found it impossible to execute his unbending will
without an army. Verona, Vicenza, Padua, and Treviso held a
congress and openly associated themselves for common defense.
Frederick attempted to make use of the militia forces of
Pavia, Cremona, and other Ghibelline towns against them; but
he found even these citizen-soldiers so mutinous with
disaffection that he dared not pursue the undertaking. He
returned to Germany for an army more in sympathy with his
obstinate designs against Italian liberty.
U. Balzani,
The Popes and the Hohenstaufen,
chapters 4-5.
ALSO IN:
H. H. Milman,
History of Latin Christianity,
book 8, chapters 7-8.
G. B. Testa,
History of the War of Frederick I. against
the Communes of Lombardy,
book 7.
ITALY: A. D. 1166-1167.
The fourth expedition of Frederick Barbarossa.
The League of Lombardy.
"When Frederick, in the month of October, 1166, descended the
mountains of the Grisons to enter Italy [for the fourth time]
by the territory of Brescia, he marched his army directly to
Lodi, without permitting any act of hostility on the way. At

Lodi, he assembled, towards the end of November, a diet of the
kingdom of Italy, at which he promised the Lombards to redress
the grievances occasioned by the abuses of power by his
podestas, and to respect their just liberties; he was desirous
of separating their cause from that of the pope and the king
of Sicily; and to give greater weight to his negotiation, he
marched his army into central Italy. … The towns of the
Veronese marches, seeing the emperor and his army pass without
daring to attack them, became bolder: they assembled a new
diet, in the beginning of April, at the convent of Pontida,
between Milan and Bergamo. The consuls of Cremona, of Bergamo,
of Brescia, of Mantua and Ferrara met there and joined those
of the marches. The union of the Guelphs and Ghibellines, for
the common liberty, was hailed with universal joy. The
deputies of the Cremonese, who had lent their aid to the
destruction of Milan, seconded those of the Milanese villages
in imploring aid of the confederated towns to rebuild the city
of Milan. This confederation was called the League of
Lombardy. The consuls took the oath, and their constituents
afterwards repeated it, that every Lombard should unite for
the recovery of the common liberty; that the league for this
purpose should last twenty years; and, finally, that they
should aid each other in repairing in common any damage
experienced in this sacred cause, by anyone member of the
confederation: extending even to the past this contract for
reciprocal security, the league resolved to rebuild Milan. The
militias of Bergamo, Brescia, Cremona, Mantua, Verona, and
Treviso, arrived the 27th of April, 1167, on the ground
covered by the ruins of this great city. They apportioned
among themselves the labour of restoring the inclosing walls;
all the Milanese of the four villages, as well as those who
had taken refuge in the more distant towns, came in crowds to
take part in this pious work; and in a few weeks the new-grown
city was in a state to repel the insults of its enemies. Lodi
was soon afterwards compelled, by force of arms, to take the
oath to the league; while the towns of Venice, Placentia,
Parma, Modena, and Bologna voluntarily and gladly joined the
association."
J. C. L. de Sismondi,
History of the Italian Republics,
chapter 2.
Meantime Frederick Barbarossa had made himself master of the
city of Rome. The Roman citizens had boldly ventured out to
meet his German army and its allies on the Tusculan hills and
had suffered a frightful defeat. Then some part of the walls
of the Leonine City were carried by assault and the
castellated church of St. Peter's was entered with ax and
sword. Two German archbishops were among the leaders of the
force which took the altars of the temple by storm and which
polluted its floors with blood. Frederick's new 'anti-pope,
Paschal III., successor to Victor IV., was now enthroned, and
the empress was formally crowned in the apostolic basilica.
Pope Alexander, who had been in possession of the city,
withdrew, and the victorious emperor appeared to have the
great objects of his burning ambition within his grasp.
"Destiny willed otherwise. It was now August; the sun was
burning the arid Campagna and oppressing the weary German
troops. A slight rain came to refresh them, but the following
day sudden destruction fell upon the camp.
{1813}
Deadly fever attacked the army with terrible violence and
reduced it daily. The men fell in heaps, and when struck down
in the morning were dead by night. The disease took stronger
hold owing to the superstitious fears of the army and the idea
of divine vengeance, for the soldiers remembered in terror the
profanation of St. Peter's, and they felt the keen edge of the
destroying angel's sword. Decimated, dismayed, demoralised,
the imperial army was hopelessly defeated, and Frederick was
compelled to strike his tents and fly before the in visible
destroyer. … The flower of his troops lay unburied in the
furrows, and with difficulty could he manage to carry back to
their native land the bodies of his noblest and trustiest
knights. Never perhaps before had Frederick given proofs of
such unshaken strength of mind. … He returned to Germany
alone and almost a fugitive, his bravest knights dead, his
army destroyed, and leaving behind him a whole nation of proud
and watchful enemies. He returned alone, but his spirit was
undaunted and dreamt of future victory and of final revenge."
U. Balzani,
The Popes and the Hohenstaufen,
chapter 5.
ALSO IN:
J. Miley,
History of the Papal States,
book 6, chapter 2.
H. H. Milman,
History of Latin Christianity,
book 8, chapter 10.
G. B. Testa,
History of the War of Frederick I.,
books 8-9.
ITALY: A. D. 1174-1183.
The last expedition of Frederick Barbarossa.
The Battle of Legnano, and the Peace of Constance.
It was not until 1174—seven years after his flight from the
Roman pestilence—that Barbarossa was able to return to Italy
and resume his struggle with Pope Alexander and the Lombard
cities. He had been detained by troubles in Germany—the
growing quarrel with his most powerful vassal, Henry the Lion,
of Saxony, more particularly. Meantime, the League of the
Lombard cities had spread and gained strength, and Pope
Alexander III. was in active co-operation with it. To better
fortify the frontiers of Lombardy, the League had built a
strong new city, at the junction of the Tanaro and Bormida,
had given it an immediate population of 15,000 people and had
named it Alessandria, after the Pope. "The Emperor, whose
arrival in Italy was urgently implored, was retained in
Germany by his mistrust of Henry the Lion, who, in order to
furnish himself with a pretext for refusing his assistance in
the intended campaign without coming to an open breach,
undertook a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, A. D. 1171; whence, after
performing his devotions at the holy sepulchre, without
unsheathing his sword in its defence, he returned to his
native country. … At length, in 1174, Frederick Barbarossa
persuaded the sullen duke to perform his duty in the field,
and for the fourth time [with an army] crossed the Alps. A
terrible revenge was taken upon Susa, which was burnt to the
ground. Alexandria [Alessandria] withstood the siege. The
military science of the age, every 'ruse de guerre,' was
exhausted by both the besiegers and the besieged, and the
whole of the winter was fruitlessly expended without any
signal success on either side. The Lombard league meanwhile
assembled an immense army in order to oppose Frederick in the
open field, whilst treason threatened him on another side. …
Henry also at length acted with open disloyalty, and declared
to the emperor, who lay sick at Chiavenna, on the lake of
Como, his intention of abandoning him; and, unshaken by
Frederick's exhortation in the name of duty and honour to
renounce his perfidious plans, offered to provide him with
money on condition of receiving considerable additions to his
power in Germany, and the free imperial town of Goslar in
gift. … Frederick, reduced to the alternative of either
following his insolent vassal, or of exposing himself and his
weakened forces to total destruction by remaining in his
present position, courageously resolved to abide the hazard,
and to await the arrival of fresh reinforcements from Germany;
the Lombards, however, saw their advantage, and attacked him
at Legnano, on the 29th of May, 1176. The Swabians (the
southern Germans still remaining true to their allegiance)
fought with all the courage of despair, but Berthold von
Zähringen was taken prisoner, the emperor's horse fell in the
thickest of the fight, his banner was won by the 'Legion of
Death,' a chosen Lombard troop, and he was given up as dead.
He escaped almost by a miracle, whilst his little army was
entirely overwhelmed."
W. Menzel,
History of Germany,
chapter 151.
After the disastrous battle of Legnano, Frederic "was at
length persuaded, through the mediation of the republic of
Venice, to consent to a truce of six years, the provisional
terms of which were all favourable to the league. … At the
expiration of the truce Frederic's anxiety to secure the crown
for his son overcame his pride, and the famous Peace of
Constance [A. D. 1183] established the Lombard republics in
real independence. By the treaty of Constance the cities were
maintained in the enjoyment of all the regalian rights,
whether within their walls or in their district, which they
could claim by usage. Those of levying war, of erecting
fortifications, and of administering civil and criminal
justice, were specially mentioned. The nomination of their
consuls, or other magistrates, was left absolutely to the
citizens; but they were to receive the investiture of their
office from an imperial legate. The customary tributes of
provision during the emperor's residence in Italy were
preserved; and he was authorized to appoint in every city a
judge of appeal in civil causes. The Lombard league was
confirmed, and the cities were permitted to renew it at their
own discretion; but they were to take every ten years an oath
of fidelity to the emperor. This just compact preserved, along
with every security for the liberties and welfare of the
cities, as much of the imperial prerogatives as could be
exercised by a foreign sovereign consistently with the
people's happiness. … The Peace of Constance presented a
noble opportunity to the Lombards of establishing a permanent
federal union of small republics. … But dark, long-cherished
hatreds, and that implacable vindictiveness which, at least in
former ages, distinguished the private manners of Italy,
deformed her national character. … For revenge she threw
away the pearl of great price, and sacrificed even the
recollection of that liberty which had stalked like a majestic
spirit among the ruins of Milan."
H. Hallam,
The Middle Ages,
chapter 3, part 1 (volume 1).
ALSO IN:
U. Balzani,
The Popes and the Hohenstaufen,
chapter 6.
G. B. Testa,
History of the War of Frederick I.,
book 10.
See, also,
VENICE: A.D. 1177.
{1814}
A. D. 1183-1250.
Frederick II. and the end of the Hohenstaufen struggles.
After the settlement of the Peace of Constance, Frederick
Barbarossa made no further attempt to destroy the now well
established liberties of the north Italian cities. On the
contrary, he devoted himself, with considerable success, to
the regaining of their confidence and good-will, as against
the papacy, with which his relations were not improved. In
southern Italy, he acquired an important footing by the
marriage of his son Henry (already crowned King of Rome, as
Henry VI.), to Constance, the sole heiress of the Norman
kingdom of the Two Sicilies. Soon after which he went
crusading to the Holy Land, and perished in Asia Minor (A. D.
1190). His son and successor, Henry VI., who survived him but
seven years, was occupied so much in securing the Kingdom of
the Two Sicilies, already fallen to his wife (1194) by the
death of the last of the Norman kings, that he had little time
to trouble the peace of Lombardy or Germany. He was one of the
meanest of kings, faithless and cold-blooded,—brutal to the
Normans of the Sicilies and contemptible in his treatment of
the English King Richard, when his vassal of Austria made a
chance captive of the lion-hearted prince. He died in 1197,
leaving as his heir a son but four years old—the Frederick
II. of later years. There was war at once. Two rival kings
were elected in Germany, by the two factions, Guelf and
Ghibelline. The next year, one of them, Philip I., the
Ghibelline, a younger son of Frederick Barbarossa, was
assassinated; the other, Otho IV., a son of Henry the Lion,
was recognized by his opponents, and went to Rome to claim the
imperial crown. He received it, but soon quarrelled, as all
his predecessors had done, with the pope (the great pope
Innocent III. being now on the throne), and, Guelf as he was,
began to put himself in alliance with the Ghibellines of
Italy. Meantime, the boy Frederick had become king of the Two
Sicilies by the death of his mother, and Pope Innocent was his
guardian. He was now brought forward by the latter as a
claimant of the Germanic crown, against Otho, and was sent
into Germany to maintain his claim. The civil war which
followed was practically ended by the battle of Bouvines (July
27, 1214—see BOUVINES) in which Otho's cause was lost. Four
years after, the latter died, and Frederick reigned in
Germany, Italy and the Two Sicilies, without a rival, holding
the three separate crowns for five years before he received
the imperial crown, in 1220. Meantime Innocent III. died, and
Frederick became involved, even more bitterly than his father
or his grandfather had been, in quarrels with the succeeding
popes. He was a man far beyond his age in intellectual
independence (see GERMANY: A. D. 1138-1268) and freedom from
superstitious servility to the priesthood. His tastes were
cultivated, his accomplishments were many. He welcomed the
refinements which Europe at that time could borrow from the
Saracens, and his court was one of gaiety and splendor. His
papal enemies execrated him as a heretic, a blasphemer and an
"apocalyptic beast." His greatest original offenses had grown
out of two promises which he made in his youth:
1. To lead a crusade for the recovery of Jerusalem,—which he
was slow in fulfilling;
2. To resign his Italian possessions to his son, retaining
only the sovereignty of Germany for himself,—which promise he
did not fulfil at all.
The war of the Church against him was implacable, and he was
under its ban when he died. The pope even pursued him with
maledictions when he went, at last, upon his crusade, in 1228,
and when he did, by negotiations, free Jerusalem for a time
from the Moslems (see CRUSADES: A. D. 1216-1229). He was
involved, moreover, in conflicts with the Lombard cities (see
FEDERAL GOVERNMENT: MEDIÆVAL LEAGUE) which the papacy
encouraged and stimulated, and, in 1236, he won a great
victory over the League, at Cortenuova, capturing the famous
"Carroccio" of the Milanese and sending it as a gift to the
Roman Senate. But, attempting to use his victory too
inflexibly, he lost the fruits of it, and all his later years
were years of trouble and disastrous war—disastrous to Italy
and to himself. He died on the 13th of December 1250. "Out of
the long array of the Germanic successors of Charles, he
[Frederick II.] is, with Otto III., the only one who comes
before us with a genius and a frame of character that are not
those of a Northern or a Teuton. There dwelt in him, it is
true, all the energy and knightly valour of his father Henry
and his grandfather Barbarossa. But along with these, and
changing their direction, were other gifts, inherited perhaps
from his Italian mother and fostered by his education among
the orange-groves of Palermo—a love of luxury and beauty, an
intellect refined, subtle, philosophical. Through the mist of
calumny and fable it is but dimly that the truth of the man
can be discerned, and the outlines that appear serve to
quicken rather than appease the curiosity with which we regard
one of the most extraordinary personages in history. A
sensualist, yet also a warrior and a politician; a profound
lawgiver and an impassioned poet; in his youth fired by
crusading fervour, in later life persecuting heretics while
himself accused of blasphemy and unbelief; of winning manners
and ardently beloved by his followers, but with the stain of
more than one cruel deed upon his name, he was the marvel of
his own generation, and succeeding ages looked back with awe,
not unmingled with pity, upon the inscrutable figure of the
last Emperor who had braved all the terrors of the Church and
died beneath her ban, the last who had ruled from the sands of
the ocean to the shores of the Sicilian sea. But while they
pitied they condemned. The undying hatred of the Papacy threw
round his memory a lurid light; him and him alone of all the
imperial line, Dante, the worshipper of the Empire, must
perforce deliver to the flames of hell."
J. Bryce,
The Holy Roman Empire,
chapter 13.
"The Emperor Frederick was a poet who could not only celebrate
the charms of his sovereign lady, 'the flower of all flowers,
the rose of May,' but could also exhibit his appreciation for
the beauties of nature. … Frederick also delighted in
sculpture, painting, and architecture. … Under his fostering
influence every branch of learning was starting into life
after the slumber of ages. Frederick's age can only be
compared to that glorious era of the Renaissance, when the sun
of learning, no longer shorn of his beams, poured a flood of
light over the dark places of Europe. Frederick was not only
distinguished for his love of polite literature, but also for
his ardour in the pursuit of scientific knowledge. He was
himself an author on medical subjects.
{1815}
He was a great patron of natural history. He used his friendly
relations with eastern kings to form a collection of animals
not often seen in Europe—the elephant, camel, giraffe, and
camelopard. He also wrote a treatise on Hawking, which is
still cited with respect. He classifies birds, and treats
generally of their habits. … But poetry and science were
very far from occupying all the thoughts of this distinguished
monarch. His great concern was the internal regulation of the
kingdom committed to his charge. His code in Sicily and Naples
was framed with the special view of securing equal rights to
all classes of his subjects, and of delivering them from the
yoke of the feudal oppressor. He stripped the nobles and
prelates of their jurisdiction in criminal cases. He also
decreed that any count or baron, carrying on war on his own
account, should lose his head and his goods. These were
amazing strides in the right direction, but the former was
quite unprecedented in feudal kingdoms. Many justiciaries were
appointed throughout the kingdom. No one might hold this
office without the authorisation of the crown. He strove to
make his officials as righteous as he was himself. He himself
came before his courts. So great was his love of justice, that
he would rather lose his cause than win it if he were in the
wrong. No advocates were allowed to practise without an
examination by the judicial bench. They were obliged to take
an oath that they would allege nothing against their
conscience. The court furnished widows, orphans, and the poor
with champions free of expense. The law, by which it was
guided, endeavoured to secure an even-handed administration of
justice."
A. B. Pennington,
The Emperor Frederick II.
(Royal Historical Society, Transactions, new series,
volume 1).
Although arbitrary and despotic in temper, the political
intelligence of Frederick led him to practical ideas of
government which were extraordinarily liberal for his age. In
his Sicilian kingdom "the towns were shorn to a great extent
of their local privileges, but were taught to unite their
strength for the common good. Twice, at least, in the course
of his reign, in 1232 and in 1240, Frederick summoned their
deputies to a conference or Parliament, 'for the weal of the
Kingdom and the general advantage of the State.' Forty-seven
cities, all belonging to the Imperial domain, sent two
deputies each to the Assembly convoked, which must not be
confounded with the Solemn Courts held by the Sovereign and
his Barons for the purpose Of revising charters, enacting
Constitutions, and regulating the government. We should be
mistaken in supposing that the Sicilian Parliament enjoyed
much of the power implied by the name. There is no trace of
any clamour against grievances, of any complaints against
officials, or of any refusal to grant supplies. The only
function of the deputies summoned seems to have been the
assessing of the public burdens. The Emperor demanded a
certain sum of money, and the deputies, meekly complying,
regulated the ways and means of raising it. 'Send your
messengers,' thus runs the writ, 'to see the Serenity of our
face on your behalf, and to bring you back our will.' Later in
the century, the Assembly acquired greater authority. It is
just possible that Simon de Montfort, who is known to have
visited the Imperial Court, may have borrowed his famous
improvement on the old English constitution from an Apulian
source; the gathering of the Commons at Foggia certainly
preceded their first meeting at Westminster by thirty years.
Other countries besides our own were indebted to Frederick for
a better mode of legislation. Shortly after his death, many of
his innovations were borrowed by his cousin Alonzo the Wise,
and were inserted in Las Siete Partidas, the new Code of
Castile. The ideas of the Suabian Emperor were evidently the
model followed by St. Louis and his successors; in France, as
well as in Southern Italy, the lawyer was feeling his way
towards the enjoyment of the power wielded of old by the
knight and the churchman; Philip the Fair was able to carry
out the projects which Frederick had merely been able to
sketch. The world made rapid strides between 1230 and 1300.
The Northern half of Italy, distracted by endless struggles,
was not insensible to the improvements introduced into the
South by her mighty son. But in the North two fatal obstacles
existed, the Papal power and the municipal spirit of the
various States, which marred all Frederick's efforts in behalf
of Italian unity." Frederick's court was the most brilliant
and refined in Europe. Mr. Kington, his historian, introduces
us to one of the Emperor's banquets, in the following
description: "A great variety of strangers meet at the
banqueting hour. Ambassadors from the Greek Monarch arrive
with a present of falcons. Some clerical visitors from Germany
are astounded to find themselves seated close to the turbaned
men of the East, and shudder on hearing that these are envoys
from the Sultan of Cairo and the Old Man of the Mountain. The
honest Germans whisper among themselves some remarks on the
late end of the Duke of Bavaria, who was stabbed at Kelheim by
a man, suspected to be an assassin, employed by the mysterious
Old Man on Frederick's behalf. The Emperor himself eats and
drinks very little. He is the very model of a host. … The
Emperor, it must be allowed, is rather loose in his talk.
Speaking of his late Crusade, he remarks: 'If the God of the
Jews had seen my Kingdom, the Terra di Lavoro, Calabria,
Sicily, and Apulia, he would not have so often praised that
land which he promised to the Jews and bestowed upon them.'
The Bishops treasure up this unlucky speech, which will one
day be noised abroad all over Italy. When the meal is over,
the company are amused by the feats of some of the Almehs,
brought from the East. Two young Arab girls of rare beauty
place themselves each upon two balls in the middle of the flat
pavement. On these they move backwards and forwards, singing
and beating time with cymbals and castanets, while throwing
themselves into intricate postures. Games and musical
instruments, procured for the Empress, form part of the
entertainment. We hear moreover of a Saracen dancer from
Aquitaine. Such sports are relished by the guests quite as
much as the Greek wine and the viands prepared by Berard the
Court cook, who is famous for his scapece; this dish,
consisting of fish boiled in salt water and sprinkled with
saffron, popular to this day in the province of Lecce, has
been derived from Apicius. … The Emperor now shows his
guests the wild beasts, which he has brought from Africa and
the East. There is the huge elephant, soon to be sent to
Cremona, the bearer of the Imperial banner, guarded by a troop
of Saracens.
{1816}
There is the female camelopard, called Seraph by the Arabs and
Italians. Next come the camels and dromedaries which carry the
Emperor's treasures when he is on the march. Lions, leopards,
panthers, and rare birds form part of the collection, and are
tended by Saracen keepers. Frederick perhaps wishes to show
his friends some sport in the Apulian plains; he has hawks of
all breeds, each of which has its name; but what most
astonishes strangers is his method of bringing down the deer.
The cheetahs, or hunting leopards of the East, are mounted on
horseback behind their keepers; these animals, as the Emperor
says, 'know how to ride.' He is a strict preserver of game; he
gives orders that the wolves and foxes, which prey upon the
small animals in his warren at Melazzo, be destroyed by means
of a poison called wolf's powder. He has many parks and
fishponds, to which he contrives to attend, even in the midst
of Lombard wars. He directs the plantation of woods, and when
a storm blows down his trees, the timber is to be sold at
Naples. … The treasures, with which Frederick dazzles the
eyes of his visitors, rival those of Solomon. The Sultan of
Egypt has given his Christian brother a tent of wonderful
workmanship, displaying the movements of the sun and moon, and
telling the hours of the day and night. This prodigy, valued
at 20,000 marks, is kept at Venosa. There is also a throne of
gold, decked with pearls and precious stones, doomed to become
the prey of Charles of Anjou and Pope Clement. There are
purple robes embroidered with gold, silks from Tripoli, and
the choicest works of the Eastern loom. Frederick charms the
ears of his guests with melodies played on silver trumpets by
black slaves, whom he has had trained. He himself knows how to
sing. Travellers, jesters, poets, philosophers, knights,
lawyers, all find a hearty welcome at the Apulian Court; if
they are natives of the Kingdom they address its Lord in the
customary second person singular, 'Tu, Messer.' He can well
appreciate the pretensions of each guest, since he is able to
converse with all his many subjects, each in his own tongue.
The Arab from Palestine, the Greek from Calabria, the Italian
from Tuscany, the Frenchman from Lorraine, the German from
Thuringia, find that Cæsar understands them all. With Latin,
of course, he is familiar. Very different is Frederick from
his Northern grandsire, who could speak nothing but German and
very bad Latin. Troubadour, Crusader, Lawgiver; German by
blood, Italian by birth, Arab by training; the pupil, the
tyrant, the victim of Rome; accused by the world of being by
turns a Catholic persecutor, a Mohammedan convert, an Infidel
freethinker; such is Frederick the Second. His character has
been sketched for us by two men of opposite politics,
Salimbene the Guelf and Jamsilla the Ghibelline, both of whom
knew him well. Each does justice to the wonderful genius of
the Emperor, and to the rapid development of the arts and
commerce under his fostering care. But all is not fair,
whatever appearances may be. Every generation of the
Hohenstaufen Kaisers seemed to add a vice to the shame of
their house. Cruelty is the one dark stain in the character of
Barbarossa; cruelty and treachery mar the soaring genius of
Henry the Sixth; cruelty, treachery, and lewdness are the
three blots that can never be wiped away from the memory of
Frederick the Second. He has painted his likeness with his own
hand. His Registers with their varied entries throw more light
upon his nature than any panegyrics or diatribes can do. One
example will be enough. If he wishes to get an impregnable
castle into his hands, he thus writes to his
general:—'Pretend some business, and warily call the
Castellan to you; seize on him if you can, and keep him till
he cause the castle to be surrendered to you.' … Frederick's
cruelty is indisputable. His leaden copes, which weighed down
the victims of his wrath until death came to the rescue, were
long the talk of Italy and are mentioned by Dante."
T. L. Kington,
History of Frederick the Second, Emperor of the Romans,
volume 1, chapter 9.
"After the death of Frederick II., an interval of twenty-three
years passed without the appointment of a king of the Romans
[the Great Interregnum—see GERMANY: A. D. 1250-1272], and an
interval of sixty years without the recognition of an emperor
in Italy." Frederick's son Conrad, whom he had caused to be
crowned, was driven out of Germany and died in 1254. Another
son, Manfred, acquired the crown of Sicily and reigned for a
time; but the unrelenting pope persuaded Charles of Anjou to
make a conquest of the kingdom, and Manfred was slain in
battle (A. D. 1266). Conrad's young son, Conradin, then
attempted to recover the Sicilian throne, but was defeated,
taken prisoner, and perished on the scaffold (1268). He was
the last of the Hohenstaufen.
O. Browning,
Guelfs and Ghibellines,
chapters 2-3.
ALSO IN:
J. Bryce,
The Holy Roman Empire,
chapters 11-13.
E. A. Freeman,
The Emperor Frederick the Second
(Historical Essays, volume 1, Essay 10).
Mrs. W. Busk,
Mediæval Popes, Emperors, Kings, and Crusaders,
book 4 (volumes 3-4).
ITALY: A. D. 1198-1216.
The establishing of Papal Sovereignty in the
States of the Church.
See PAPACY: A. D. 1198-1216.
ITALY: 13th Century.
Political conditions which prepared the way for the despots.
"The struggle between the Popes and the Hohenstaufen left
Italy in a political condition which differed essentially from
that of the other countries of the West. While in France,
Spain, and England the feudal system was so organised that, at
the close of its existence, it was naturally transformed into
a unified monarchy, and while in Germany it helped to
maintain, at least outwardly, the unity of the empire, Italy
had shaken it off almost entirely. The Emperors of the
fourteenth century, even in the most favourable case, were no
longer received and respected as feudal lords, but as possible
leaders and supporters of powers already in existence; while
the Papacy, with its creatures and allies, was strong enough
to hinder national unity in the future, not strong enough
itself to bring about that unity. Between the two lay a
multitude of political units—republics and despots—in part
of long standing, in part of recent origin, whose existence
was founded simply on their power to maintain it. In them for
the first time we detect the modern political spirit of
Europe, surrendered freely to its own instincts, often
displaying the worst features of an unbridled egoism,
outraging every right, and killing every germ of a healthier
culture.
{1817}
But, wherever this vicious tendency is overcome or in any way
compensated, a new fact appears in history—the state as the
outcome of reflection and calculation, the state as a work of
art. This new life displays itself in a hundred forms, both in
the republican and in the despotic states, and determines
their inward constitution, no less than their foreign policy.
… The internal condition of the despotically governed states
had a memorable counterpart in the Norman Empire of Lower
Italy and Sicily, after its transformation by the Emperor
Frederick II. Bred amid treason and peril in the neighbourhood
of the Saracens, Frederick, the first ruler of the modern type
who sat upon a throne, had early accustomed himself, both in
criticism and action, to a thoroughly objective treatment of
affairs. His acquaintance with the internal condition and
administration of the Saracenic states was close and intimate;
and the mortal struggle in which he was engaged with the
Papacy compelled him, no less than his adversaries, to bring
into the field all the resources at his command. Frederick's
measures (especially after the year 1231) are aimed at the
complete destruction of the feudal state, at the
transformation of the people into a multitude destitute of
will and of the means of resistance, but profitable in the
utmost degree to the exchequer. He centralised, in a manner
hitherto unknown in the West, the whole judicial and political
administration by establishing the right of appeal from the
feudal courts, which he did not, however, abolish, to the
imperial judges. No office was henceforth to be filled by
popular election, under penalty of the devastation of the
offending district and of the enslavement of its inhabitants.
Excise duties were introduced; the taxes, based on a
comprehensive assessment, and distributed in accordance with
Mohammedan usages, were collected by those cruel and vexatious
methods without which, it is true, it is impossible to obtain
any money from Orientals. Here, in short, we find, not a
people, but simply a disciplined multitude of subjects. …
The internal police, and the kernel of the army for foreign
service, was composed of Saracens who had been brought over
from Sicily to Nocera and Luceria—men who were deaf to the
cry of misery and careless of the ban of the Church. At a
later period the subjects, by whom the use of weapons had long
been forgotten, were passive witnesses of the fall of Manfred
and of the seizure of the government by Charles of Anjou; the
latter continued to use the system which he found already at
work. At the side of the centralising Emperor appeared an
usurper of the most peculiar kind: his vicar and son-in-law,
Ezzelino da Romano. … The conquests and usurpations which
had hitherto taken place in the Middle Ages rested on real or
pretended inheritance and other such claims, or else were
effected against unbelievers and excommunicated persons. Here
for the first time the attempt was openly made to found a
throne by wholesale murder and endless barbarities, by the
adoption, in short, of any means with a view to nothing but
the end pursued. None of his successors, not even Cæsar
Borgia, rivalled the colossal guilt of Ezzelino; but the
example once set was not forgotten. … Immediately after the
fall of Frederick and Ezzelino, a crowd of tyrants appeared
upon the scene. The struggle between Guelph and Ghibelline was
their opportunity. They came forward in general as Ghibelline
leaders, but at times and under conditions so various, that it
is impossible not to recognise in the fact a law of supreme
and universal necessity."
J. Burckhardt,
The Renaissance in Italy,
part 1, chapter 1, (volume 1).
ITALY: A. D. 1215.
The beginning, at Florence, the causes and the meaning of the
strife of the Guelfs and Ghibellines.
"In the year 1215 it chanced that a quarrel occurred at a
festival between some young nobles of Florence. It was an
event of as frivolous, and apparently unimportant, a character
as thousands of other such broils; but this obscure quarrel
has been treated by the whole body of Florentine historians as
the origin and starting point of that series of civil wars
which shaped the entire future fortunes of the community, and
shook to its centre the whole fabric of society throughout
central Italy. The story of it has become memorable therefore
in Florentine annals, and has been rendered famous not only by
the writers of history, but by many generations of poets,
painters, novelists, and sculptors." Briefly sketched, the
story is this: A handsome youth of the Buondelmonti family,
mixing in a quarrel at the festival alluded to, struck one
Oddo Arringhi dei Fifanti with his poniard. Common friends of
the two brought about a reconciliation, by means of an
arrangement of marriage between Buondelmonte and a niece of
the injured man. But the lady was plain, and Buondelmonte,
falling madly in love with another, more charming, whom evil
chance and a scheming mother threw temptingly in his way, did
not scruple to break his engagement, and to do it with insult.
He wedded his new love, who was of the Donati family, on
Easter Day, and on that same day he was slain by the Amidei,
whose house he had so grossly affronted. "The assassins
retired to their fortress houses, and left the bridal party to
form itself as it might into a funeral procession. 'Great was
the uproar in the city. He was placed on a bier; and his wife
took her station on the bier also, and held his head in her
lap, violently weeping; and in that manner they carried him
through the whole of the city; and on that day began the ruin
of Florence.' The last phrase of the above citation marks the
significance which the Tuscan historians have attributed to
this incident, and the important place that has always been
assigned to it in Florentine history. We are told by all the
earliest historians, especially by Malispini, in whose
childhood these events must have happened, and whom Villani
copies almost word for word, that from this quarrel began the
great, fatal, and world-famous division of Florence into the
parties of Guelph and Ghibelline. Dante goes so far as to
consider the conduct of Buondelmonte in this affair so
entirely the cause of the evils that arose from the Guelph and
Ghibelline wars, that, had that cause not existed, no such
misfortunes would have arisen. … Yet the historians admit
that the party names of Guelph and Ghibelline were known in
Florence long before; but they say that not till then did the
city divide itself into two hostile camps under those rallying
cries. It is curiously clear, from the accounts of Malispini
and Villani, that, as usual in such matters, the Florentines
had but a very hazy notion as to the meaning and origin of the
two names [see GUELFS AND GHIBELLINES, and GERMANY: A. D.
1138-1268], for the sake of which they were prepared to cut
each other's throats.
{1818}
Any name or watchword is good enough for a party rallying cry,
when once passions have been connected with it; but the
Florentines understood that Ghibelline meant attachment to the
Empire in opposition to the Church, and Guelph attachment to
the Church in opposition to the Empire. … But the quarrel of
Guelph with Ghibelline in Florence was the expression of a
still wider spread and more perennial conflict. … The
Ghibellines were the old Imperial nobles, who, whether more
anciently or more recently incorporated into the body of
Florentine citizens, formed the aristocracy of the social
body, and were naturally Imperialist in their sympathies.
These Ghibellines were the high Tories of the Florentine
community. The body of the people were Guelphs, naming
themselves after the party professing attachment to the Church
only because the Papacy was in opposition to the Empire. The
Guelphs were the Whigs of Florence. The Radicals appeared on
the scene in due time and normal sequence." From Florence, as
its center, the strife of the two factions spread throughout
Italy. "Ghibellinism was nearly universal in the north of
Italy, divided among a number of more or less well known great
families, of whom the principal were the Visconti at Milan,
and the Della Scala at Verona. Naples and the States of the
Church were Guelph; the former, as need hardly be suggested,
from political circumstances, from opposition to the Empire,
and from connection, rather than from principle. Tuscany and
the whole of Central Italy were divided between the two,
although the real strength and stronghold of genuine Guelphism
was there. Without Florence, there would have been no Guelph
party. Had those stout sandalled and leather-jerkined
Florentine burghers of the 13th century not undertaken and
persevered in that crusade against the feudal nobles and the
Ghibelline principle, which … was the leading occupation and
idea of the Commonwealth during all that century, Ghibellinism
and Imperialism would have long since possessed and ruled
Italy from the Alps to the toe of the boot."
T. A. Trollope,
History of the Commonwealth of Florence,
book 1, chapter 3,
and book 3, chapter 1 (volume 1).
"One party called themselves the Emperor's liegemen, and their
watchword was authority and law; the other side were the
liegemen of Holy Church, and their cry was liberty; and the
distinction as a broad one is true. But a democracy would
become Ghibelline, without scruple, if its neighbour town was
Guelf; and among the Guelf liegemen of the Church and liberty,
the pride of blood and love of power were not a whit inferior
to that of their opponents. Yet … it is not impossible to
trace in the two factions differences of temper, of moral and
political inclinations, which, though visible only on a large
scale and in the mass, were quite sufficient to give meaning
and reality to their mutual opposition. … The Ghibellines as
a body reflected the worldliness, the license, the irreligion,
the reckless selfishness, the daring insolence, and at the
same time the gaiety and pomp, the princely magnificence and
generosity and largeness of mind of the House of Swabia [the
Hohenstaufen]; they were the men of the court and camp. …
The Guelfs, on the other hand, were the party of the middle
classes; they rose out of and held to the people; they were
strong by their compactness, their organisation in cities,
their commercial relations and interests, their command of
money. Further, they were professedly the party of strictness
and religion. … The genuine Guelf spirit was austere,
frugal, independent, earnest, religious; fond of its home and
Church, and of those celebrations which bound together Church
and home; … in its higher form intolerant of evil, but
intolerant always of whatever displeased it. Yet there was a
grave and noble manliness about it which long kept it alive in
Florence."
R. W. Church,
Dante and other Essays,
pages 15-18.
See, also,
FLORENCE: A. D. 1215-1250.
ITALY: A. D. 1236-1259.
The tyranny of Eccelino di Romano in the Veronese or Trevisan
Marches, and the crusade against him.
See VERONA: A. D. 1236-1259.
ITALY: A. D. 1248-1278.
The wars of a generation of the Guelfs and Ghibellines in
Tuscany.
See FLORENCE: A. D. 1248-1278.
ITALY: (Southern): A. D. 1250-1268.
Invasion and conquest of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies by
Charles of Anjou, on the invitation of the Pope.
"The death of the Emperor Frederic II., in 1250, had been
followed in less than four years by that of his son and
successor Conrad IV., from whose son Conradin, at that time an
infant, the Crown of the Two Sicilies was usurped by his uncle
Manfred, a natural child of the deceased Frederic. The hatred
of the See of Rome, notwithstanding the frequent changes which
had occurred in the Papal Chair, still pursued the Line of
Hohenstauffen, even in this illegitimate branch, and it was
transmitted as an hereditary possession from Innocent IV.
through Alexander IV. and Urban IV., to Clement IV.
Interference in Germany itself was forbidden by the
independence of the Electoral Princes: and when it was found
impossible to obtain the nomination of an Emperor decidedly in
the Guelph interest, Alexander contented himself by
endeavouring to separate the Throne of the Two Sicilies from
that of Germany, and to establish upon the former a Feudatory,
and therefore a Champion, of the Church. Various alliances for
this purpose were projected by Alexander, and by his
successors who adopted a similar policy; and the Crown, which
was in truth to be conquered from Manfred, was offered as an
investiture which Rome had a full right to bestow." After long
negotiations with Henry III. of England, who coveted the
Sicilian prize for his second son, Edmund, and who paid large
sums to the papal treasury by way of earnest money, but who
showed little ability to oust the possessor, Pope Urban, at
length, closed a bargain with that ambitious speculator in
royal claims and titles, Charles of Anjou, brother of St.
Louis, king of France. The honesty of Louis was somewhat
troubled by the unscrupulous transaction; but his conscience
submitted itself to the instructions of the Holy Father, and
he permitted his brother to embark in the evil enterprise.
"Charles, accordingly, having first accepted the Senator-ship
of Rome, with which high magistracy he was invested by her
citizens, negotiated with the Holy See, most ably and much to
his advantage, for the loftier dignity of Kingship. In little
more than a month after he had received his Crown from the
hands of Clement IV., who had become Pope, he totally defeated
and killed his opponent Manfred, in the battle of Grandella
[near Benevento, February, 1266].
{1819}
Conradin, who had now arrived at years of discretion, was
still his rival; but the capture of the young Prince at
Tagliacozzo [1268], and his speedy committal to the
executioner, confirmed Charles of Anjou in his Kingdom, at the
everlasting ex-pense of his good name. Few incidents in
History are more calculated to awaken just indignation than
the untimely end of the brave, wronged, and gallant Conradin.
Charles of Anjou thus founded the first dynasty of his House
which reigned over the Sicilies. The pretensions which Aragon
afterwards advanced to the Crown of that Kingdom rested on a
marriage between Pedro, the eldest son of King James, and
Constance, a daughter of Manfred."
E. Smedley,
History of France,
part 1, chapter 6.
ALSO IN:
J. Michelet,
History of France,
book 4, chapter 8.
H. H. Milman,
History of Latin Christianity,
book 11, chapter 3 (volume 5).
Mrs. W. Busk,
Mediæval Popes, Emperors, Kings, and Crusaders,
book 5 (volume 4).
ITALY: A. D. 1250-1293.
Development of the popular Constitution of the Florentine
Commonwealth.
See FLORENCE: A. D. 1250-1293.
ITALY: A. D. 1250-1520.
The Age of the Despots.
The rise of Principalities.
"From the death of Frederick the Second [A. D. 1250] … all
practical power of an imperial kingdom in Italy may be said to
have passed away. Presently begins the gradual change of the
commonwealths into tyrannies, and the grouping together of
many of them into larger states. We also see the beginning of
more definite claims of temporal dominion on behalf of the
Popes. In the course of the 300 years between Frederick the
Second and Charles the Fifth, these processes gradually
changed the face of the Italian kingdom. It became in the end
a collection of principalities, broken only by the survival of
a few oligarchic commonwealths and by the anomalous dominion
of Venice on the mainland. Between Frederick the Second and
Charles the Fifth, we may look on the Empire as practically in
abeyance in Italy. The coming of an Emperor always caused a
great stir for the time, but it was only for the time. After
the grant of Rudolf of Habsburg to the Popes, a distinction
was drawn between Imperial and papal territory in Italy. While
certain princes and commonwealths still acknowledged at least
the nominal superiority of the Emperor, others were now held
to stand in the same relation of vassalage to the Pope."
E. A. Freeman,
Historical Geography of Europe,
chapter 8, section 3.
"During the 14th and 15th centuries we find, roughly speaking,
six sorts of despots in Italian cities. Of these the First
class, which is a very small one, had a dynastic or hereditary
right accruing from long seignorial possession, of their
several districts. The most eminent are the houses of
Montferrat and Savoy, the Marquises of Ferrara, the Princes of
Urbino. … The Second class comprise those nobles who
obtained the title of Vicars of the Empire, and built an
illegal power upon the basis of imperial right in Lombardy. Of
these, the Della Scala and Visconti families are illustrious
instances. … The Third class is important. Nobles charged
with military or judicial power, as Capitani or Podestas, by
the free burghs, used their authority to enslave the cities
they were chosen to administer. It was thus that almost all
the numerous tyrants of Lombardy, Carraresi at Padua, Gonzaghi
at Mantua, Rossi and Correggi at Parma, Torrensi and Visconti
at Milan, Scotti at Piacenza, and so forth, erected their
despotic dynasties. … In the Fourth class we find the
principle of force still more openly at work. To it may be
assigned those Condottieri who made a prey of cities at their
pleasure. The illustrious Uguccione della Faggiuola, who
neglected to follow up his victory over the Guelfs at Monte
Catini, in order that he might cement his power in Lucca and
Pisa, is an early instance of this kind of tyrant. His
successor, Castruccio Castracane, the hero of Machiavelli's
romance, is another. But it was not until the first half of
the 15th century that professional Condottieri became powerful
enough to found such kingdoms as that, for example, of
Francesco Sforza at Milan. The Fifth class includes the
nephews or sons of Popes. The Riario principality of Forli,
the Della Rovere of Urbino, the Borgia of Romagna, the Farnese
of Parma, form a distinct species of despotisms; but all these
are of a comparatively late origin. Until the papacy of Sixtus
IV. and Innocent VIII. the Popes had not bethought them of
providing in this way for their relatives. … There remains
the Sixth and last class of despots to be mentioned. This
again is large and of the first importance. Citizens of
eminence, like the Medici at Florence, the Bentivogli at
Bologna, the Baglioni of Perugia, the Gambacorti of Pisa, like
Pandolfo Petrucci in Siena (1502), Romeo Pepoli, the usurer of
Bologna (1323), the plebeian Alticlinio and Agolanti of Padua
(1313), acquired more than their due weight in the conduct of
affairs, and gradually tended to tyranny. In most of these
cases great wealth was the original source of despotic
ascendancy. It was not uncommon to buy cities together with
their Signory. … But personal qualities and nobility of
blood might also produce despots of the Sixth class."
J. A. Symonds,
Renaissance in Italy: The Age of the Despots,
chapter 2.
ITALY: A. D. 1261-1264.
The supplanting of the Venetians by the Genoese at
Constantinople and in the Black Sea.
War between the Republics.
See GENOA: A. D. 1261-1299.
ITALY: A. D. 1273-1291.
Indifference of Rodolph of Hapsburg to his Italian dominions.
His neglect to claim the imperial crown.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1273-1308.
ITALY: A. D. 1277-1447.
Tyranny of the Visconti at Milan.
Their domination in Lombardy and their fall.
See MILAN: A. D. 1277-1447.
ITALY: A. D. 1282-1293.
War between Genoa and Pisa.
Battle of Meloria.
War of Florence and Lucca against Pisa.
See PISA: A. D. 1063-1293.
ITALY: (Southern): A. D. 1282-1300.
The Sicilian Vespers.
Severance of the Two Sicilies.
End of the House of Anjou in the insular kingdom.
"Peter, King of Aragon, had married Constance, the daughter of
Manfred, and laid claim to the kingdom of Sicily in her right.
He sent for help to Michael Palaiologos, the restorer of the
Eastern Empire. The Emperor agreed to his proposals, for his
Empire was threatened by Charles of Anjou. These negotiations
were, it is said, carried on through Giovanni di Procida, a
Sicilian exile, who, as the story goes, had suffered cruel
wrongs from the French. Charles knew something of the plans of
the allies, and both parties were preparing for war, but
affairs were brought to a crisis by a chance occurrence.
{1820}
On March 30, 1282, a brutal insult was offered by a French
soldier to a bride in the presence of her friends and
neighbours outside the walls of Palermo, and the smothered
hatred of the people broke out into open violence. The cry
'Death to the French' was raised, and all who belonged to that
nation in Palermo were slain without mercy. This massacre,
which is called 'The Sicilian Vespers,' spread through the
whole island; the yoke of the oppressor was broken and the
land was delivered. Charles laid siege to Messina, but he was
forced to retire by Peter of Aragon, who landed and was
received as King. Pope Martin in vain excommunicated the
rebels and their allies, and, in 1284, Charles received a
great blow, for his son was defeated and taken prisoner by
Roger of Loria, the Admiral of the Catalan fleet. Charles of
Anjou died in 1286, and two years later his son, also called
Charles, ransomed himself from prison."
W. Hunt,
History of Italy,
chapter 4.
Charles of Anjou "died of grief, leaving his son, the prince
of Salerno, a prisoner, and Martin followed him, before he
could proclaim a general crusade against the invader of the
apostolic fief. Pedro, having enjoyed his two crowns to the
day of his death, left them to his sons, Alphonso and James
respectively, and both were excommunicated by Honorius IV. for
their accession. The prince of Salerno, obtaining his release
by the mediation of Edward of England, was absolved by
Nicholas IV. from the conditions to which he had sworn, and
crowned at Rome king of Apulia (i. e., Naples) and Sicily, A.
D. 1289. His hopes of regaining the island were constantly
disappointed. James, having succeeded to the crown of Arragon
by the death of Alphonso, was persuaded to resign Sicily to
Charles on condition of receiving his daughter in marriage,
with an ample dowry. Boniface VIII. also graciously gave him
leave to conquer the islands of Corsica and Sardinia, from the
republics of Pisa and Genoa. The Sicilians, however, declining
to be so bartered, bestowed their crown on James's brother
Frederic [1295]; and though James contributed his fleet to
reduce him, he retained the island throne [1300], while
Charles and the pope were obliged to rest content with the
continental kingdom. Their only satisfaction was to persist in
calling Naples by the name of Sicily, and to stigmatise their
rival as king of 'Trinacria.'"
G. Trevor,
Rome: from the Fall of the Western Empire,
page 240.
ALSO IN:
S. A. Dunham,
History of Spain and Portugal,
book 3, section 2, chapter 4.
ITALY: A. D. 1294-1299.
War between Venice and Genoa.
See GENOA: A. D. 1261-1299.
ITALY: A. D. 1297-1319.
The perfected aristocratic Constitution of Venice.
See VENICE: A. D. 1032-1319.
ITALY: A. D. 1300-1313.
New factions of Florence and Tuscany.
Bianchi and Neri.
See FLORENCE: A. D. 1295-1300, and 1301-1313.
ITALY: 14th Century.

The Renaissance in its beginning.
"It was not the revival of antiquity alone, but its union with
the genius of the Italian people, which achieved the conquest
of the Western world. … The civilisation of Greece and Rome,
which, ever since the fourteenth century, obtained so powerful
a hold on Italian life, as the source and basis of culture, as
the object and ideal of existence, partly also as an avowed
reaction against preceding tendencies—this civilisation had
long been exerting a partial influence on mediæval Europe,
even beyond the boundaries of Italy. The culture of which
Charles the Great was a representative was, in face of the
barbarism of the seventh and eighth centuries, essentially a
Renaissance, and could appear under no other form. … But the
resuscitation of antiquity took a different form in Italy from
that which it assumed in the North. The wave of barbarism had
scarcely gone by before the people, in whom the former life
was but half effaced, showed a consciousness of its past and a
wish to reproduce it. Elsewhere in Europe men deliberately and
with reflection borrowed this or the other element of
classical civilisation; in Italy the sympathies both of the
learned and of the people were naturally engaged on the side
of antiquity as a whole, which stood to them as a symbol of
past greatness. The Latin language, too, was easy to an
Italian, and the numerous monuments and documents in which the
country abounded facilitated a return to the past. With this
tendency other elements—the popular character which time had
now greatly modified, the political institutions imported by
the Lombards from Germany, chivalry and other northern forms
of civilisation, and the influence of religion and the
Church—combined to produce the modern Italian spirit, which
was destined to serve as a model and ideal for the whole
western world. How antiquity began to work in plastic art, as
soon as the flood of barbarism had subsided, is clearly shown
in the Tuscan buildings of the twelfth and in the sculptures
of the thirteenth centuries. … But the great and general
enthusiasm of the Italians for classical antiquity did not
display itself before the fourteenth century. For this a
development of civic life was required, which took place only
in Italy, and there not till then. It was needful that noble
and burgher should first learn to dwell together on equal
terms, and that a social world should arise which felt the
want of culture, and had the leisure and the means to obtain
it. But culture, as soon as it freed itself from the fantastic
bonds of the Middle Ages, could not at once and without help
find its way to the understanding of the physical and
intellectual world. It needed a guide, and found one in the
ancient civilisation, with its wealth of truth and knowledge
in every spiritual interest. Both the form and the substance
of this civilisation were adopted with admiring gratitude; it
became the chief part of the culture of the age."
J. Burckhardt,
The Renaissance in Italy,
part 3, chapter 1 (volume 1).
ALSO IN:
J. A. Symonds,
Renaissance in Italy: Age of the Despots,
chapter 1.
See RENAISSANCE.
ITALY: A. D. 1305-1309.
Removal of the Papal Court to Lyons and then to Avignon.
The "Babylonish Captivity."
See PAPACY: A. D. 1294-1348.
ITALY: A. D. 1310-1313.
Visitation of the Emperor Henry VII.
Hostility of Florence and siege of the city.
Repulse from Rome.
The Emperor's death.
"No Emperor had come into Italy since the death of Frederic
II. [1250]. Neither Rudolf nor his two successors [see
GERMANY: A. D. 1273-1308] had been crowned Emperor, but on the
death of Albert of Austria, the King of the Romans, in 1308,
the electors chose Henry, Count of Luxemburg [Henry VII.]. In
1310 he entered Italy with a small German army. Unlike most of
these Imperial expeditions, this was approved of by the Pope.
{1821}
The French King Philip IV. was really master of Pope Clement
V., who did not live in Italy, but sometimes within the French
kingdom, or in the English territory of Bordeaux, or in
Avignon, a city of the Empire. But Clement did not like
bearing the French yoke, and was fearful lest some one of
greater talents than Charles of Valois should make an attempt
on Italy, and make it impossible for the Pope to get free from
the power of the French. He therefore favoured the expedition
of King Henry, and hoped that it would revive the Ghibelin
party and counteract the influence of the Guelfs, who were on
the side of France. Dante tells us the feelings which were
roused by the coming of the King. He seemed to come as God's
vicegerent, to change the fortunes of men and bring the exiled
home; by the majesty of his presence to bring the peace for
which the banished poet longed, and to administer to all men
justice; judgment and equity. Henry was worthy of these high
hopes; for he was wise, just, and gracious, courageous in
fight and honourable in council: but the task was too hard for
him. At first all seemed to go well with him. The Ghibelins
were ready to receive him as their natural lord; the Guelfs
were inclined towards him by the Pope. In Milan the chief
power was in the hands of Guido della Torre, the descendant of
Pagano della Torre, who had done good service to the city
after the battle of Corte Nuova. He was a strong Guelf, and
was at the head of a large number of troops; for he was very
rich. His great enemy was the Ghibelin Matteo Visconti, who
continually struggled with Guido for the mastery. The king was
willingly received by the Milanese, and Guido was not
behindhand in bidding him welcome. While he was at Milan, on
Christmas Day, 1310, he was crowned with the iron crown of the
Italian kingdom, which was made of steel in the shape of
laurel leaves, and studded with gems. He made both parties
enter into an outward reconciliation, and the chiefs of both
vied with one another in making him large presents. The King's
need of money soon tired out the Milanese, and an insurrection
was made in which both Matteo and Guido joined; but Matteo
betrayed his rival, and Guido and all the Guelfs were driven
out of Milan, which henceforth remained in the power of the
Ghibelin Visconti [see MILAN: A. D. 1277-1447]. The King's
demands for money made him unpopular, and each city, as he
left it, rose against him. Pisa, and the other Tuscan enemies
of Florence, received him with joy. But the great Guelfic city
shut her gates against him, and made alliance with Robert, the
Angevin King of Naples, the grandson of Charles of Anjou, and
afterwards gave him [Robert] the signoria. Rome received a
garrison from Naples, and the Imperial coronation had to be
performed in the Church of St. John Lateran,"—Henry being
repulsed in an attempt to force his entrance to the quarter of
the Vatican.
W. Hunt,
History of Italy,
chapter 4.
"The city [of Rome] was divided in feeling, and the emperor's
position so precarious that he retired to Tivoli at the end of
August, and moved towards Tuscany, ravaging the Perugian
territory on his way, being determined to bring Florence and
all her allies to submission." By rapid movements he reached
Florence and invested the city before his intentions were
understood. "A sudden assault would probably have carried the
city, for the inhabitants were taken by surprise, were in a
state of consternation, and could scarcely believe that the
emperor was there in person: their natural energy soon
returned, the Gonfaloniers assembled their companies, the
whole population armed themselves, even to the bishop and
clergy; a camp was formed within the walls, the outer ditch
palisaded, the gates closed, and thus for two days they
remained hourly expecting an assault. At last their cavalry
[which had been cut off by the emperor's movement] were seen
returning by various ways and in small detachments; succours
also poured in from Lucca, Prato, Pistoia, Volterra, Colle,
and San Gimignano; and even Bologna, Rimini, Ravenna, Faenza,
Cesina, Agobbio, Città di Castello with several other places
rendered their assistance: indeed so great and extensive was
Florentine influence and so rapid the communication, that
within eight days after the investment 4,000 men at arms and
innumerable infantry were assembled at Florence! As this was
about double the imperial cavalry and four times its infantry,
the city gates were thrown open and business proceeded as
usual, except through that entrance immediately opposite to
the enemy. For two and forty days did the emperor remain
within a mile of Florence, ravaging all the country, but
making no impression on the town; after which he raised the
siege and moved to San Casciano, eight miles south." Later,
the Imperialist army was withdrawn to Poggibonzi, and in
March, 1313, it was moved to Pisa, to prepare for a new
campaign. "The Florentines had thus from the first, without
much military skill or enterprise, proved themselves the
boldest and bitterest enemies of Henry; their opposition had
never ceased; by letters, promises, and money, they corrupted
all Lombardy. … Yet party quarrels did not cease. … The
emperor now turned all his energies to the conquest of Naples,
as the first step towards that of Italy itself. For this he
formed a league with Sicily and Genoa; assembled troops from
Germany and Lombardy; filled his treasury in various ways, and
soon found himself at the head of 2,500 German cavalry and
1,500 Italian men-at-arms, besides a Genoese fleet of 70
galleys under Lamba Doria and 50 more supplied by the King of
Sicily, who with 1,000 men-at-arms had already invaded
Calabria by capturing Reggio and other places." On the 5th of
August, the emperor left Pisa upon his expedition against
Naples; on the 24th of the same month he died at Buonconvento
—not without suspicions of poison, although his illness began
before his departure from Pisa. "The intelligence of this
event spread joy and consternation amongst his friends and
enemies; the army soon separated, and his own immediate
followers with the Pisan auxiliaries carried his body back to
Pisa where it was magnificently interred."
H. E. Napier,
Florentine History,
book 1, chapter 15 (volume 1).
ALSO IN:
T. A. Trollope,
History of the Commonwealth of Florence,
book 2, chapter 7 (volume 1).
ITALY: A. D. 1312-1338.
The rising power and the reverses of the Scaligeri of Verona.
Mastino's war with Florence and Venice.
See VERONA: A. D. 1260-1338:
{1822}
ITALY: A. D. 1313-1330.
Guelf leadership of King Robert of Naples.
Wars of Pisa and Florence.
The rise and threatening power of Castruccio Castracani.
Siege of Genoa.
Visit of the Emperor Louis of Bavaria.
Subjection and deliverance of Pisa.
"While the unexpected death of Henry VII. deprived the
Ghibelin party of its leader, and long wars between rival
candidates for the succession to the German throne placed the
imperial authority over Italy in abeyance [see GERMANY: A. D.
1314-1347], Robert, king of Naples, the chief of the Guelf
party, the possessor of Provence, and the favourite of the
church, began to aspire to the general sovereignty of Italy.
He had succeeded to the crowns of Naples and Provence on the
death of his father, Charles II., in opposition to the
recognized laws of inheritance (A. D. 1309). His elder
brother, Charles Martel, by his marriage with the heiress of
Hungary, had been called to the throne of that kingdom, and
had died before his father. His son, Carobert, the reigning
king of Hungary, on the death of his grandfather, Charles II.,
asserted his just rights to all the dominions of that monarch;
but Robert, hastening to Avignon, whither Clement V. had now
removed his court, obtained from the pope, as feudal superior
of the royal fief of Naples, a sentence which set aside the
claims of his nephew in his own favour. The king of Hungary
did not seriously attempt to oppose this decision, and Robert,
a prince of wisdom and address, though devoid of military
talents, soon extended his ambitious views beyond the kingdom
over which he reigned undisturbed." The death of Henry VII.
"left him every opportunity both to attempt the subjugation of
the Ghibelin states, and to convert his alliance with the
Guelfs into the relation of sovereign and subject. … It was
in Tuscany that the storm first broke over the Ghibelins after
the loss of their imperial chief, and that the first ray of
success unexpectedly beamed on their cause. Florence and the
other Guelf cities of the province were no sooner delivered
from the fear of Henry VII. than they prepared to wreak their
vengeance against Pisa for the succours which she had
furnished to the emperor. But that republic, in consternation
at her danger, had taken into pay 1,000 German cavalry, the
only part of the imperial army which could be prevailed upon
to remain in Italy, and had chosen for her general Uguccione
della Faggiuola, a celebrated Ghibelin captain. The ability of
this commander, and the confidence with which he inspired the
Pisans, turned the tide of fortune. … The vigour of his arms
reduced the Guelf people of Lucca to sue for peace; they were
compelled to restore their Ghibelin exiles; and then
Uguccione, fomenting the dissensions which were thus created
within the walls, easily subjected one of the most wealthy and
flourishing cities of Tuscany to his sword (A. D. 1314). The
loss of so valuable an ally as Lucca alarmed the Florentines,
and the whole Guelf party. … King Robert sent two of his
brothers into Tuscany with a body of gens-d'armerie; the
Florentines and all the Tuscan Guelfs uniting their forces to
this succour formed a large army; and the confederates
advanced to relieve the castle of Montecatini which Uguccione
was besieging." The Ghibelin commander had a much smaller
force to resist them with; but he gained, notwithstanding, "a
memorable victory, near Montecatini, in which both a brother
and a nephew of the king of Naples were numbered with the
slain (A. D. 1315). This triumph rendered Uguccione more
formidable than ever; but his tyranny became insupportable
both to the Pisans and Lucchese, and a conspiracy was formed
in concert in both cities. … Excluded from both places and
deserted by his troops, he retired to the court of the Scala
at Verona (A. D. 1316). So Pisa recovered her liberty, but
Lucca was less fortunate or wise, for her citizens only
transferred the power which Uguccione had usurped to the chief
of the Ghibelins. Castruccio Castracani degl' Interminelli,
one of the most celebrated names in Italian history. This
extraordinary man … had early in life shared the common fate
of exile with the White Guelfs or Ghibelins of Lucca. Passing
ten years of banishment in England, France, and the Ghibelin
cities of Lombardy, he had served a long apprenticeship to
arms under the best generals of the age. … He had no sooner
returned to Lucca with the Ghibelin exiles, who were restored
by the terms of the peace with Pisa, than he became the first
citizen of the state. His skill and courage mainly contributed
to the subsequent victory of Montecatini, and endeared him to
the Lucchese; his influence and intrigues excited the
jealousy of Uguccione, and caused his imprisonment; and the
insurrection which delivered Lucca from that chief, liberated
Castruccio from chains and impending death to sovereign
command. Chosen annual captain of the people at three
successive, elections, he at length demanded and obtained the
suffrages of the senate and citizens for his elevation to the
dignity of signor (A. D. 1320): … Under his government Lucca
enjoyed repose for some years. … During these transactions
in Tuscany, the Lombard plains were still desolated by
incessant and unsparing warfare. The efforts of the Neapolitan
king were mainly directed to crush Matteo Visconti [see MILAN:
A. D. 1277-1447] and the Ghibelins in this part of Italy;" but
the power of the latter was continually spreading. "In this
prosperous state of the Ghibelin interests the domestic feuds
of Genoa attracted the tide of war to her gates. The ambitious
rivalry of her four great families, of the Grimaldi, the
Fieschi, the Spinola, and the Doria, had long agitated the
bosom of the republic; and at the period before us the two
former, who headed the Guelf party, had, after various
convulsions, gained possession of the government. The Spinola
and Doria, retiring from the city, fortified themselves in the
smaller towns of the Genoese territory, and immediately
invited the Ghibelin chiefs of Lombardy to their aid. The
lords of Milan and Verona promptly complied with the demand,
… and laid siege to the capital. The rulers of Genoa could
then resort in their terror to no other protection than that
of the Neapolitan king. Robert, conscious of the importance of
preserving the republic from subjection to his enemies,
hastened by sea to its defence, and obtained the absolute
cession of the Genoese liberties into his hands for ten years
as the price of his services. … After the possession of the
suburbs and outworks of Genoa had been obstinately contested
during ten months, the Ghibelins were compelled to raise the
siege. But Robert had scarcely quitted the city to pass into
Provence, when the exiles with aid from Lombardy again
approached Genoa, and during four years continued a war of
posts in its vicinity.
{1823}
But neither the Lombard signors nor Robert engaged in this
fruitless contest, and Lombardy again became the great theatre
of warfare." But the power which Matteo Visconti was steadily
building at Milan, for his family, could not be shaken, even
though an invasion from France (1320), and a second from
Germany (1322), was brought about through papal influence. At
the same time Castruccio Castracani, having consolidated his
despotism at Lucca, was making war upon the Florentines. When,
in 1325, he succeeded in gaining possession of the Guelf city
of Pistoia, "this acquisition, which was highly dangerous to
Florence, produced such alarm in that republic that she called
out her whole native force for the more vigorous prosecution
of the war." Castruccio was heavily outnumbered in the
campaign, but he gained, nevertheless, a great victory over
the Florentines near the castle of Altopascio (November 23,
1325). "The whole Florentine territory was ravaged and
plundered, and the conqueror carried his insults to the gates
of the capital. … In the ruin which threatened the Guelf
party in Tuscany, the Florentines had recourse to King Robert
of Naples, with entreaties for aid," which he brought to them
in 1326, but only on the condition "that his absolute command
over the republic, which had expired in 1321, should be
renewed for ten years in favour of his son Charles, duke of
Calabria." But now a new danger to the Guelf interests
appeared, in the approach of the emperor, Louis IV. of
Bavaria. "After a long contest for the crown of Henry VII.,
Louis of Bavaria had triumphed over his rival, Frederic of
Austria, and taken him prisoner at the sanguinary battle of
Muhldorf, in 1322. Having since passed five years in
confirming his authority in Germany, Louis was now tempted by
ambition and cupidity to undertake an expedition into Italy
(A. D. 1327)." Halting for some time at Milan, where he
received the iron crown of Lombardy, and where he deposed and
imprisoned Galeazzo Visconti, he proceeded into Tuscany "on
his march to Rome, where he intended to receive the imperial
crown. He was welcomed with joy by the signor of Lucca, and
the superior genius of Castruccio at once acquired the entire
ascendant over the weaker mind of Louis. Against the united
forces of the emperor and of Castruccio, the duke of Calabria
and his Guelf army cautiously maintained themselves on the
defensive; but the passage of Louis through Tuscany was
attended with disastrous consequences to the most famous
Ghibelin city of that province." Pisa, notwithstanding the
long fidelity of that republic to the Ghibelin cause, was
sacrificed by the emperor to the covetous ambition of
Castruccio. The forces of the two were joined in a siege to
which the unfortunate city submitted after a month. "She thus
fell in reality into the hands of Castruccio, who shortly
established his absolute authority over her capital and
territory. After extorting a heavy contribution from the
Pisans, and rewarding the services of Castruccio by erecting
the state of Lucca into an imperial duchy in his favour, the
rapacious emperor pursued his march to Rome. There he consumed
in the frivolous ceremony of his coronation [January 17,
1328], and in the vain endeavour to establish an antipope, the
time which he might have employed, with the forces at his
command, and in conjunction with Frederic, king of Sicily, in
crushing for ever the power of Robert of Naples and of all the
Guelfs of Italy who depended on that monarch." In August of
the same year Castruccio, who "had now attained an elevation
which seemed to threaten … the total subjugation of all
Italy," died suddenly of a fever. "Florence breathed again
from impending oppression, Pisa recovered her freedom, and
Lucca sank from ephemeral splendour into lasting obscurity. By
the death of Castruccio the emperor had lost his best
counsellor and firmest support, and he soon ceased to be
formidable to the Guelfs. … Hastily returning into Tuscany,
he plundered the infant orphans of Castruccio of their
inheritance to sell Lucca to a new signor, and to impose
ruinous contributions upon the Pisans, before his return into
Lombardy delivered them from tyranny. … The first proceeding
of Louis in Lombardy had been to ruin the Visconti, and to
drain their states of money: almost his last act in the
province was to make the restoration of this family to power a
new source of profit." In 1330 the emperor returned to
Germany, recalled by troubles in that part of his dominions.
G. Procter,
History of Italy,
chapter 4, part 2.
ALSO IN:
N. Machiavelli,
The Florentine Histories,
book 2.
H. E. Napier,
Florentine History,
book 1, chapters 15-18 (volume 1).
ITALY: A. D. 1314-1327.
The election and contest of rival emperors, Louis of Bavaria
and Frederick of Austria.
See GERMANY: A. D. 1314-1347.
ITALY: A. D. 1341-1343.
Defeat of the Florentines by the Pisans, before Lucca.
Brief tyranny of the Duke of Athens at Florence.
See FLORENCE: A. D. 1341-1343.
ITALY: (Southern): A. D. 1343-1389.
Troubled reign of Joanna I. in Naples.
Murder of her husband, Andrew of Hungary.
Political effects of the great Schism in the Church.
The war of Charles of Durazzo and Louis of Anjou.
Violent course of Pope Urban VI.
"In Naples itself the house of Anjou fell into disunion.
Charles II. of Naples gained by marriage the dowry of Hungary
[see HUNGARY: A. D. 1301-1342], which passed to his eldest son
Charles Martel, while his second son, Robert, ruled in Naples.
But Robert survived his only son, and left as heiress of the
kingdom [1343] his grand-daughter Giovanna [better known as
Joan, or Joanna]. The attempt to give stability to the rule of
a female by marriage with her cousin, Andrew of Hungary, only
aroused the jealousy of the Neapolitan nobles and raised up a
strong party in opposition to Hungarian influence. Charles II.
of Naples, Giovanna's great-grand-father, had left many sons
and daughters, whose descendants of the great houses of
Durazzo and Tarento, like those of the sons of Edward III. in
England, hoped to exercise the royal power. When, in 1845,
Pope Clement VI. was on the point of recognising Andrew as
King of Naples, a conspiracy was formed against him, and he
was murdered, with the connivance, as it was currently
believed, of the Queen. Hereon the feuds in the kingdom blazed
forth more violently than before; the party of Durazzo ranged
itself against that of Tarento, and demanded punishment of the
murderers; Giovanna I., to protect herself, married Lewis of
Tarento in 1347. King Lewis of Hungary, aided by the party of
Durazzo, entered Naples to avenge his brother's death, and for
a while all was confusion. On the death of Lewis of Tarento
(1362), Giovanna I. married James, King of Majorca, and on his
death (1374), Otto, Duke of Brunswick.
{1824}
Giovanna I. was childless, and the slight lull which in the
last years had come over the war of factions in Naples was
only owing to the fact that all were preparing for the
inevitable conflict which her death would bring." Neapolitan
affairs were at this stage when the great schism occurred (see
PAPACY; A. D. 1377-1417), which enthroned two rival popes, one
(Urban VI.) at Rome, and one (Clement VII.) at Avignon. Queen
Giovanna had inclined first to Urban, but was repelled, and
gave her adhesion to Clement. Thereupon, Urban, on the 21st of
April, 1380, "declared her deposed from her throne as a
heretic, schismatic, and traitor to the Pope. He looked for
help in carrying out his decree to King Lewis of Hungary, who
had for a time laid aside his desire for vengeance against
Giovanna, but was ready to resume his plans of aggrandisement
when a favourable opportunity offered. … Lewis was not
himself disposed to leave his kingdom; but he had at his court
the son of his relative, Lewis of Durazzo, whom he had put to
death in his Neapolitan campaign for complicity in Andrew's
murder. Yet he felt compassion for his young son Charles,
brought him to Hungary, and educated him at his court. As
Giovanna was childless, Charles of Durazzo, or Carlo della
Pace, as he was called in Italy, had a strong claim to the
Neapolitan throne at her death." Charles of Durazzo was
accordingly furnished with Hungarian troops for an expedition
against Naples, and reached Rome in November, 1380. "Clement
VII. on his side bestirred himself in behalf of his ally
Giovanna, and for this purpose could count on the help of
France. Failing the house of Durazzo, the house of Valois
could put forward a claim to the Neapolitan throne, as being
descended from the daughter of Charles II. The helpless
Giovanna I. in her need adopted as her heir and successor
Louis, Duke of Anjou, brother of the French king, and called
him to her aid. Clement VII. hastened to confer on Louis
everything that he could; he even formed the States of the
Church into a kingdom of Adria, and bestowed them on Louis;
only Rome itself, and the adjacent lands in Tuscany, Campania
Maritima, and Sabina were reserved for the Pope. The
Avignonese pretender was resolved to show how little he cared
for Italy or for the old traditions of the Italian greatness
of his office. Charles of Durazzo was first in the field, for
Louis of Anjou was detained in France by the death of Charles
V. in September, 1380. The accession of Charles VI. at the age
of twelve threw the government of the kingdom upon the Council
of Regency, of which Louis of Anjou was the chief member. He
used his position to gratify his chief failing, avarice, and
gathered large sums of money for his Neapolitan campaign.
Meanwhile Charles of Durazzo was in Rome, where Urban VI.
equipped him for his undertaking." In June, 1381, Charles
marched against Naples, defeated Otto, the husband of
Giovanna, at San Germano, and had the gates of Naples opened
to him by a rising within the city on the 16th of July.
Giovanna took refuge in the Castel Nuovo, but surrendered it
on the 26th of August. After nine months of captivity, the
unfortunate queen was "strangled in her prison on May 12,
1382, and her corpse was exposed for six days before burial
that the certainty of her death might be known to all.
Thenceforth the question between Charles III. and Louis was
not complicated by any considerations of Giovanna's rights. It
was a struggle of two dynasties for the Neapolitan crown, a
struggle which was to continue for the next century. Crowned
King of Naples by Clement VII., Louis of Anjou quitted Avignon
at the end of May, accompanied by a brilliant array of French
barons and knights. He hastened through North Italy, and
disappointed the hopes of the fervent partisans of Clement
VII. by pursuing his course over Aquila, through the Abruzzi,
and refusing to turn aside to Rome, which, they said, he might
have occupied, seized Urban VI., and so ended the Schism. When
he entered the territory of Naples he soon received large
accessions to his forces from discontented barons, while 22
galleys from Provence occupied Ischia and threatened Naples."
Charles, having inferior forces, could not meet his adversary
in the field, but showed great tactical skill, acting on the
defensive, "cutting off supplies, and harassing his enemy by
unexpected sallies. The French troops perished miserably from
the effects of the climate; … Louis saw his splendid army
rapidly dwindling away." But quarrels now arose between
Charles and Pope Urban; the latter went to Naples to interfere
in affairs; the King made him practically a prisoner and
extorted from him agreements which were not to his liking. But
Urban, on the 1st of January, 1384, "proclaimed a crusade
against Louis as a heretic and schismatic, and Charles
unfurled the banner of the Cross." In May the Pope withdrew
from Naples to Nocera, and there began a series of
interferences which convinced Charles "that Urban was a more
serious adversary than Louis." With the summer came attacks of
the plague upon both armies; but that of Louis suffered most,
and Louis himself died, in September, bequeathing his claims
on Naples to his eldest son. "On the death of Louis the
remnant of his army dispersed, and Charles was free from one
antagonist. … War was now declared between the Pope and the
King. … Charles found adherents amongst Urban's Cardinals."
Urban discovered the plots of the latter and threw six of them
into a dungeon, where he tortured them with brutality. Charles
attacked Nocera and took the town, but the castle in which the
Pope had fortified himself resisted a long siege. "Three or
four times a day the dauntless Pope appeared at a window, and
with bell and torch cursed and excommunicated the besieging
army." In August, 1385, Urban was rescued by some of his
partisans, who broke through the camp of the besiegers and
carried him off, still clinging to his captive cardinals, all
but one of whom he subsequently put to death. He made his way
to Trani and was there met by Genoese galleys which conveyed
him and his party to Genoa. He resided in Genoa rather more
than a year, very much to the discomfort and expense of the
Genoese, and then, after much difficulty, found shelter at
Lucca until September, 1387. Meantime Charles III. had left
Naples, returning to Hungary to head a revolt against the
widowed queen and young daughter of Lewis, who died in 1382.
There he was assassinated in February, 1386. "The death of
Charles III. again plunged the kingdom of Naples into
confusion. The Angevin party, which had been powerless against
Charles, raised against his son Ladislas, a boy of twelve
years old, the claims of Louis II. of Anjou.
{1825}
The exactions of the Queen Regent Margaret awoke
dissatisfaction, and led to the appointment in Naples of a new
civic magistracy, called the Otto di Buono Stato, who were at
variance with Margaret. The Angevins rallied under Tommaso of
Sanseverino, and were reinforced by the arrival of Otto of
Brunswick. The cause of Louis was still identified with that
of Clement VII., who, in May 1385, had solemnly invested him
with the kingdom of Naples. Urban VI., however, refused to
recognise the claims of the son of Charles, though Margaret
tried to propitiate him … and though Florence warmly
supported her prayers for help." The Pope continued obstinate
in this refusal until his death. He declared that the kingdom
of Naples had lapsed to the Holy See, and he tried to gather
money and troops for an expedition to secure it. As a means to
that end, he ordered that the year 1390 should be a year of
jubilee—a decade before the end of the century. It was his
last desperate measure to obtain money. On the 15th of October
1389 he died and one of the most disastrous pontificates in
the history of the Papacy came to an end.
M. Creighton,
History of the Papacy during the Period of the Reformation,
book 1, chapter 1 (volume 1).
ALSO IN:
Historical Life of Joanna of Sicily.
Mrs. Jameson,
Memoirs of Celebrated Female Sovereigns,
volume 1, chapter 4.
St. C. Baddeley,
Charles III. of Naples and Urban VI.
ITALY: A. D. 1343-1393.
The "Free Companies."
Their depredations and the wars employing them.
The Great Company.
The Company of Sir John Hawkwood.
"The practice of hiring troops to fight the battles of the
Commonwealth [of Florence—but in other Italian states no
less] had for some time past been continually on the increase.
… The demand for these mercenary troops,—a demand which …
preferred strangers from beyond the Alps,—had filled Italy
with bands of free lances, ready to take service with any
tyrant, or any free city that was willing to pay them. They
passed from one service to another, and from one side of a
quarrel to the other, with the utmost indifference and
impartiality. But from this manner of life to setting up for
themselves and warring for their own behoof there was but one
step. And no prudent man could have doubted that this step
would ere long be taken. Every circumstance of the age and
country combined to invite and facilitate it. … Already,
immediately after the fall of the Duke of Athens [at Florence,
1343], a German adventurer, one Werner, known in Italian
history as the Duke Guarnieri, had induced a large number of
the hired troops, who were then 'unattached' in Italy, mainly
those dismissed at that time from the service of Pisa, to form
themselves into an independent company and recognize him as
their leader. With equal effrontery and accuracy this ruffian
styled himself 'The enemy of God, of Pity, and of Mercy.' …
This gang of bandits numbered more than 2,000 horsemen. Their
first exploit was to threaten the city of Siena. Advancing
through the Sienese territory towards the city, plundering,
killing, and burning indiscriminately as they went, they
inspired so sudden and universal a terror that the city was
glad to buy them off with a sum of 12,000 florins. From the
Sienese territory they passed to that of Arezzo, and thence to
the district around Perugia; and then turning towards the
Adriatic, overran Romagna, and the Rimini country, then
governed by the Malatesat family. It is difficult adequately
to describe, or even to conceive the sufferings, the
destruction, the panic, the horror, which marked the track of
such a body of miscreants." Finally, by the skilful management
of the Lord of Bologna, the company was bought up and sent
across the Alps, out of Italy, in detachments. "The relief was
obtained in a manner which was sure to operate as an
encouragement to the formation of other similar bands. And
now, after the proclamation of the peace between Florence and
the Visconti, on the 1st of April, 1353, … the experiment
which had answered so well in the hands of the German 'Enemy
to God and to Mercy,' was repeated on a larger scale by a
French Knight Hospitaller of the name of Montreal, known in
Italian history as Frà Moriale. … Being out of place, it
occurred to him to collect all the fighting men in Italy who
were similarly circumstanced, and form an independent company
after the example of Guarnieri, with the avowed purpose of
living by plunder and brigandage. He was so successful that he
collected in a very short time 1,500 men-at-arms and 2,000
foot soldiers; who were subsequently increased to 5,000
cavaliers and 7,000 infantry; and this band was known as 'the
Great Company.'" There was an attempt made, at first, to
combine Florence, Siena and Perugia, with the Romagna, in
resistance to the marauders; but it failed. "The result was
that the Florentines were obliged to buy off the terrible Frà
Moriale with a bribe of 28,000 florins, and Pisa with one of
16,000. … The chief … after Frà Moriale himself, was one
Conrad, Count of Lando; and under him the Company marched
towards Lombardy in search of fresh booty, while Moriale
himself, remaining temporarily behind, went to Rome to confer
privately, as it was believed, with the Colonna chiefs,
respecting a project of employing his band against Rienzi, the
tribune. But whether such was the object of his journey to
Rome or not, it was fatal to the brigand chief. For Rienzi no
sooner knew that the notorious Frà Moriale was within his
jurisdiction than he arrested him, and summarily ordered him
to execution as a common malefactor. The death of the chief,
however, did not put an end to 'the Great Company'; for Conrad
of Lando remained, and succeeded to the command of it." From
1356 to 1359, Italy in different parts was preyed upon by 'the
Great Company,' sometimes in the service of the league of the
lesser Lombard princes against the Visconti of Milan, and once
in the employ of Siena against Perugia; but generally
marauding on their own account, independently. Florence,
alone, stood out in resistance to their exactions, and finally
sent into the field against them 2,000 men-at-arms, all tried
troops, 500 Hungarians: and 2,500 cross-bowmen, besides the
native troops of the city. Subsequently the Florentine forces
were joined by others from Milan, Padua, and elsewhere. The
bandits marched all around the Florentine frontier, with much
bluster, making great threats, but constantly evading an
engagement. At length, on the 20th of July, 1359, the two
armies were in such a position that "it was thought in the
Florentine camp that a decisive battle would be fought on the
morrow. But when that July morning dawned, Lando and his
bandit host were already in full march northwards towards
Genoa, with a precipitation that had all the appearance of
flight. … 'The Great Company never again dared to show its
face in Tuscany.'"
T. A. Trollope,
History of the Commonwealth of Florence,
book 3, chapter 6 (volume 2).
{1826}
"Another company, consisting principally of Englishmen [lately
turned loose in France by the Peace of Bretigny, 1360, which
terminated the invasion of Edward III.], was brought into
Italy at a somewhat later period by the Marquis of Montferrat.
… About the same time another, composed principally of
Germans, and commanded by Amichino Baumgarten, was raised by
Galeazzo Visconti, and afterwards employed by the Pisans.
Another, entitled that of St. George, was formed by Ambrose,
the natural son of Bernabos Visconti, and let loose by him on
the territories of Perugia and Sienna. Thus, at the end of the
14th century, Italy was devastated at one and the same time by
these four companies of adventurers, or, as they might more
justly be called, professional robbers. … Of all these
companies, the military reputation of the English was
undoubtedly the greatest—a circumstance which may be
ascribed, in some degree, to the physical superiority of the
men, but still more to the talents of Sir John Hawkwood, by
whom they were commanded."
W. P. Urquhart,
Life and Times of Francesco Sforza,
book 2, chapter 1 (volume 1).
One of the marauding companies left in France after the Peace
of Bretigny, and which afflicted that wretched country so
sorely (see FRANCE: A. D. 1360-1380), was called the White
Company, and Sir John Hawkwood was one of its commanders. "The
White Company crossed into Lombardy, under the command of one
Albaret, and took service under the Marquis of Montferrat,
then at war with the Duke of Milan. Hawkwood [called Giovanni
Aguto by the Italians] entered the Pisan service, and next
year, when the marquis, being unable to maintain his English
troops, disbanded them, the Pisans engaged them, and gave
Hawkwood the command." Hawkwood and his company served Pisa,
in war with Florence, until 1364, when they experienced a
great defeat, which led to peace and their discharge. During
the next three years they lived as independent freebooters,
the territories of Siena suffering most from their
depredations. Then they took service with Bernabo Visconti,
Lord of Milan, making war for him on Florence and its allies;
but very soon their arms were turned against Milan, and they
were fighting in the pay of Florence and the Pope. "Within the
next five years he changed sides twice. He served Galeazzo
Visconti against the Papal States; and then, brought back to
fight for Holy Church, defeated his late employer in two
pitched battles." After this, when the league against an
aggressive and ambitious pontiff extended, and Florence,
Bologna and other cities joined Milan, Hawkwood took money
from both at the same time, and cheated both, preliminarily to
fighting each in turn. While serving the Pope his ruffians
wantonly destroyed the captured town of Casena, massacring
between 4,000 and 5,000 people, women and children included.
In 1378, when Gregory XI. died, peace followed, and Hawkwood's
company resumed its old freebooting. In 1381 he was engaged in
the Neapolitan civil war. In 1387 he seems to have become
permanently engaged in the service of Florence against the
Duke of Milan. "In 1391, Florence concluded a general peace
with all her enemies. Her foreign auxiliaries were dismissed,
with the exception or Sir John Hawkwood and 1,000 men.
Hawkwood henceforth remained in her service till his death,
which took place on the 6th of March, 1393. He was buried at
the public expense, as a valiant servant of the State."
Sir John Hawkwood
(Bentley's Miscellany,
volume 54, pages 284-291).
ALSO IN:
O. Browning,
Guelphs and Ghibellines,
chapter 12.
ITALY: A. D. 1347-1354.
Rienzi's Revolution at Rome.
See ROME: A. D. 1347-1354.
ITALY: A. D. 1348-1355.
War of Genoa against Venice, the Greeks and Aragonese.
See CONSTANTINOPLE: A. D. 1348-1355.
ITALY: A. D. 1352-1378.
Subjugation and revolt of the States of the Church.
War of the Pope with Florence.
See PAPACY: A. D. 1352-1378.
ITALY: A. D. 1378-1427.
The democratizing of Florence.
Tumult of the Ciompi.
First appearance of the Medici.
See FLORENCE: A. D. 1378-1427.
ITALY: A. D. 1379-1381.
Final triumph of Venice over Genoa in the War of Chioggia.
See VENICE: A. D. 1379-1381.
ITALY: (Southern): A. D. 1386-1414.
Renewed Civil War in Naples.
Defeat of the Angevins and triumph of Ladislas.
His ambitious career.
His capture and recapture of Rome.
"The death of Charles III. involved the kingdom of Naples in
the most ruinous anarchy; and delivered it for many years a
prey to all the disorders of a long minority and a disputed
throne. Charles had left two children, Ladislaus, a boy of ten
years old, and a daughter, Joanna; and his widow Margaret
acted as regent for her son. On the other hand, the
Sanseverini and other baronial families, rallying the Angevin
party, proclaimed the young son of the late duke of Anjou
king,—also under the guardianship of his mother, Maria,—by
the title of Louis II. Thus Naples was disturbed by the rival
pretensions of two boys, placed beneath the guidance of
ambitious and intriguing mothers, and severally protected by
two popes, who excommunicated each other, and laboured to
crush the minors whom they respectively opposed, only that
they might establish their own authority over the party which
they supported. … For several years the Angevin party seemed
to maintain the ascendancy. Louis II. was withheld in Provence
from the scene of danger by his mother; but the barons who had
raised his standard, forcing Margaret of Durazzo and the
adherents of her son to retire to Greta, possessed themselves
of the capital and great part of the kingdom. When Louis II.,
therefore, was at length suffered by his mother to appear at
Naples, attended by a powerful fleet and a numerous train of
the warlike nobles of France (A. D. 1390), he disembarked at
the capital amidst the acclamations of his people, and would
probably have overpowered the party of Durazzo with ease, if,
as he advanced towards manhood, he had displayed any energy of
character. But he proved very unequal, by his indolence and
love of pleasure, to contend with the son of Charles III.
Educated in the midst of alarms and danger, and surrounded
from his infancy by civil wars and conspiracies, Ladislaus had
early been exercised in courageous enterprise, and trained to
intrigue and dissimulation.
{1827}
At the age of 16, his mother Margaret committed him to the
barons of her party to make his first essay in arms; and from
this period he was ever at the head of his troops. … A
fortunate marriage, which his mother had effected for him with
Constance di Clermont, the heiress of the most opulent noble
of Sicily, increased his resources by an immense dowry; and
while he made an able use of these riches [meanly and
heartlessly divorcing the wife who brought them to him, when
they had been spent], the new Italian pope, Boniface IX., the
successor of Urban VI., recognized him for the legitimate son
and vassal of the church, because Louis was supported by the
Avignon pontiff. This decision gained him many partizans; …
his talents and valour hourly advanced his success; and at
last the Sanseverini and all the barons of the Angevin party,
following the tide of fortune, went over to his standards, and
opened to him the gates of Naples (A. D. 1399). Louis …
retired by sea to his Provençal dominions, and finally
abandoned the kingdom of Naples. Ladislaus, having thus
triumphed over his sluggish antagonist, had leisure to
consolidate his stern authority over the licentious and
turbulent feudal aristocracy of his kingdom. … He …
crushed the Sanseverini and other great families, whose power
might make them dangerous; and having rooted out the seeds of
all resistance to his sway in his own dominions, he prepared
to direct his vigorous ambition to schemes of foreign
conquest."
G. Procter,
History of Italy,
chapter 5, part 3.
Until the death of Pope Boniface IX., Ladislas supported that
pontiff through the hard struggle in which he crushed the
rebellious Colonna and made himself master of the city of
Rome. But when Boniface died, in 1404, the Neapolitan king
began to scheme for bringing the ancient capital and the
possessions of the Church under his own control. "His plan was
to set the Pope [the newly elected Innocent, VII.] and the
Roman people against one another, and by helping now one and
now the other to get them both into his power. … He trusted
that the rebellious Romans would drive the Pope from the city,
and would then be compelled to submit to himself." He had
entered Rome, four days after the papal election, ostensibly
as a mediator between the rival factions, and between the Pope
and the Roman people; and he was easily able to bring about an
arrangement which gave him every opportunity for interference
and for turning circumstances to his own advantage. Events
soon followed as he had expected them, and as he helped,
through his agents, to guide them. The turbulence of the
people increased, until, in 1405, the Pope was driven to
flight. "No sooner had the Pope left Rome than Giovanni
Colonna, at the head of his troops, burst into the Vatican,
where he took up his quarters. … The Vatican was sacked;
even the Papal archives were pillaged, and Bulls, letters and
registers were scattered about the streets. Many of these were
afterwards restored, but the loss of historic documents must
have been great." Ladislas now thought his time for seizing
Rome was come; but when he sent 5,000 horse to join the
Colonna, the Romans took alarm, repelled the Neapolitan
troops, and called back the Pope, who returned in January,
1406, but who died in the following November. Under the next
Pope, Gregory XII., there were negotiations with Avignon for
the ending of the great schism; and all the craft of Ladislas
was exerted to defeat that purpose; because a reunion of
western Christendom would not be favorable to his designs. At
last, a conference of the rival popes was arranged, to take
place at Savona, near Genoa, and in August, 1407, Gregory XII.
left Rome, moving slowly northwards, but finding reasons,
equally with his competitor, for never presenting himself at
the appointed meeting-place. In his absence the disorders of
Rome increased, and when Ladislas, in April, 1408; appeared
before the city with an army of 12,000 horse and as many foot,
it was surrendered to him without resistance. "The craft of
Ladislas had gained its end, and the temporal power of the
Papacy had passed into his hands. … So utterly had the
prestige of Rome, the memories of her glories, passed away
from men's minds, that her sister republic of Florence could
send and congratulate Ladislas on the triumphal victory which
God and his own manhood had given him in the city of Rome."
When, in 1408, the disgusted cardinals of both papal courts
joined in calling a general Council of the Church, to meet at
Pisa the following year, Ladislas threatened to prevent it. By
this time "Gregory had sank to the lowest pitch of
degradation: he sold to Ladislas for the small sum of 25,000
florins the entire States of the Church, and even Rome itself.
After this bargain Ladislas set out for Rome, intending to
proceed into Tuscany and break up the Council." Early in
April, 1409, he marched northwards and threatened Siena. But
Florence had now undertaken the defense of the Council, and
resisted him so effectually that the meeting at Pisa was
undisturbed. The immediate result of the Council was the
election of a third claimant of the Papacy, Alexander V. (see
PAPACY: A. D. 1377-1417). Around the new Pope a league was now
formed which embraced Florence, Siena, and Louis of Anjou,
whose claim upon Naples was revived. The league made an
attempt on Rome in the autumn of 1409, and failed; but the
following January the Neapolitans were expelled and the city
was occupied by the papal forces. In May, 1410, Alexander V.
died, and was succeeded by Baldassare Cossa, who took the name
of John XXIII. The new Pope hastened to identify his cause
with Louis of Anjou, and succeeded, by his energy, in putting
into the field an army which comprised the four chief
"condottieri" in Italy, with their veteran followers. Ladislas
was attacked and routed completely at Rocca Secca, on the 19th
of May, 1411. But the worthlessness of Louis and the mercenary
character of his generals made the victory of no effect.
Ladislas bought over the best of the troops and their leaders,
and before the end of summer Louis was back in Provence, again
abandoning his Neapolitan claims. Ladislas made peace, first,
with Florence, by selling Cortona to that city, and then with
the Pope, who recognized him as king, not only of Naples, but
of Sicily as well. But Ladislas was only gaining time by these
treaties. In June, 1413, he drove the Pope from Rome, and his
troops again occupied the city. He seemed to be now well
prepared for realizing his ambition to found an extended
Italian kingdom; but his career was cut short by a mortal
disease, which ended his life on the 6th of August, 1414.
M. Creighton,
History of the Papacy during the Period of the Reformation,
book 1, chapters 3-8 (volume 1).
{1828}
ITALY: A. D. 1390-1402.
Resistance of Florence to the spreading tyranny of the Duke of
Milan.
See FLORENCE: A. D. 1390-1402.
ITALY: A. D. 1391-1451.
Extension of the Italian dominions of the House of Savoy.
See SAVOY: 11TH-15TH CENTURIES.
ITALY: A. D. 1396-1409.
The sovereignty of Genoa yielded to the King of France.
See GENOA: A. D. 1381-1422.
ITALY: A. D. 1402-1406.
The crumbling of the Visconti dominion.
Aggrandizement of Venice.
Florentine purchase and conquest of Pisa.
Decline of that city.
"The little states of Romagna, which had for the most part
been conquered by Gian-Galeazzo [Visconti, Duke of Milan],
were at his death [1402] overrun by the Count of Barbiano, who
with his famous company entered the service of Pope Boniface
IX. … The Count of Savoy, the Marquess of Montferrat, and
the lords of Padua, Ferrara, and Mantua, were the only
independent Sovereigns in North Italy in 1402. Of these
Francesco, lord of Padua, was soon to fall. On the death of
Gian-Galeazzo he seized on Verona. Venice would not allow her
old enemy to gain this advantage, and made alliance with
Francesco di Gonzaga, lord of Mantua, and with his help took
Verona, and closely besieged Padua. After a gallant resistance
Francesco da Carrara was forced to yield, and he and his two
sons were taken prisoners to Venice, and were there strangled
by order of the Council of Ten. This war gave the Venetians
great power on the mainland. They reconquered Treviso, and
gained Feltro, Verona [1405], Vicenza, and Padua [1405], and
from this time Venice became an Italian power. In Tuscany, the
death of her great enemy delivered Florence from her distress,
and Siena, which now regained her liberty, placed herself
under her protection. Pisa [which had been betrayed to
Gian-Galeazzo in 1399] had been left to Gabriello Visconti, a
bastard son of the late Duke. He put himself under the
protection of Jean Boucicault, who governed Genoa for Charles
VI., King of France, and with his consent he sold Pisa to the
Florentines. The Pisans resisted this sacrifice of their
freedom, and the war lasted a year, but in 1406 the city was
forced to surrender. Many of the people left their homes; for,
though Florence acted fairly towards her old enemy and new
subject, yet the Pisans could not bear the yoke, and the
greatness of the city, its trade and its wealth, vanished
away."
W. Hunt,
History of Italy,
chapter 6.
"From that day to this it [Pisa] has never recovered,—not its
former greatness, wealth, and energy,—but even sufficient
vitality to arrest it on the downward course. … Of the two
great political tendencies which were then disputing the world
between them it made itself the champion and the symbol of the
losing one. Pisa went down in the world together with the
feudalism and Ghibellinism with which it was identified."
T. A. Trollope,
History of the Commonwealth of Florence,
book 4, chapter 6 (volume 2).
The City in the Sea,
chapter 16.
ALSO IN:

W. C. Hazlitt,
History of the Venetian Republic,
chapter 21 (volume 3).
A. M. F. Robinson,
The End of the Middle Ages,
pages 340-367.
ITALY: A. D. 1409.
The Council of Pisa.
See PAPACY: A. D. 1377-1417.
ITALY: A. D. 1412-1447.
Renewed civil war in Naples.
Defeat of the Angevins by Alfonso of Aragon and Sicily.
Reconquest of Lombardy by Filippo Maria Visconti, and his
wars with Florence, Venice and Naples.
On the death of Ladislaus, king of Naples (1414), "his sister,
Joan II., widow of the son of the duke of Austria, succeeded
him. She was 40 years of age; and, like her brother, abandoned
to the most unrestrained libertinism. She left the government
of her kingdom to her lovers, who disputed power by arms: they
called into her service, or into that of her second husband,
or of the rival princes whom she in turn adopted, the two
armies of Sforza and Braccio [the two great mercenary captains
of that time]. The consequence was the ruin of the kingdom of
Naples, which ceased to menace the rest of Italy. The moment
Ladislaus disappeared, a new enemy arose to disturb the
Florentines—Filippo Maria Visconti [duke of Milan, second son
of Gian Galeazzo Visconti, and successor to his elder brother
Gian Maria, on the assassination of the latter, in 1412]. …
Filippo … married the widow of Facino Cane, the powerful
condottiere who had retained Gian Maria in 'his dependence,
and who died the same day that Gian Maria was assassinated. By
this sudden marriage he secured the army of Facino Cane,—
which was, in fact, master of the greater part of the
Milanese: with its aid he undertook, without delay, to recover
the rest of his states from the hands of those tyrants who had
divided amongst them the dominions of his father. … During
the first year of his reign, which was to decide his existence
as prince or subject, he fought with determined courage; but
from that time, though he continually made war, he never
showed himself to his armies. … In the battle of Monza, by
which he acquired his brother's inheritance, and the only
battle in which he was ever present, he remarked the brilliant
courage of Francesco Carmagnola, a Piedmontese soldier of
fortune, and immediately gave him a command. Carmagnola soon
justified the duke's choice by the most distinguished talents
for war, the most brilliant victories, and the most noble
character. Francesco Carmagnola was, after a few years, placed
at the head of the duke's armies; and, from the year 1412 to
that of 1422, successively attacked all the tyrants who had
divided the heritage of Gian Galeazzo, and brought those small
states again under the dominion of the duke of Milan. Even the
republic of Genoa submitted to him, in 1421, on the same
conditions as those on which it had before submitted to the
king of France,—reserving all its liberties; and granting the
duke's lieutenant, who was Carmagnola himself, only those
prerogatives which the constitution yielded to the doge. As
soon as Filippo Maria had accomplished the conquest of
Lombardy, he resumed the projects of his father against
Romagna and Tuscany. He … renewed his intrigues against the
republic of Florence, and combined them with those which he at
the same time carried on in the kingdom of Naples. Joan, who
had sent back to France her second husband, Jaques, count de
la Marche, and who had no children, was persuaded, in 1420, by
one of her lovers, to adopt Alphonso the Magnanimous, king of
Aragon and Sicily, to whom she intrusted some of the
fortresses of Naples. She revoked this adoption in 1423; and
substituted in his place Louis III. of Anjou, son of Louis II.
The former put himself at the head of the ancient party of
Durazzo; the latter, of that of Anjou.
{1829}
The consequence was a civil war, in which the two great
captains, Sforza and Braccio, were opposed to each other, and
acquired new titles to glory. The duke of Milan made alliance
with Joan II. and Louis III. of Anjou: Sforza, named great
constable of the kingdom, was their general. The Florentines
remained constant to Braccio, whom Alphonso had made governor
of the Abruzzi; and who had seized, at the same time, the
signoria of Perugia, his native city. … But Sforza and
Braccio both perished, as Italy awaited with anxiety the
result of the struggle about to be commenced. Sforza was
drowned at the passage of the Pescara, on the 4th of January,
1424; Braccio was mortally wounded at the battle of Aquila, on
the 2d of June of the same year. Francesco, son of the former,
succeeded to his father's name and the command of his army,
both of which he was destined to render still more
illustrious. The son of Braccio, on the contrary, lost the
sovereignty of Perugia, which resumed its freedom on the 29th
of July of the same year; and the remnant of the army formed
by this great captain elected for his chief his most able
lieutenant, Nicolo Piccinino. This was the moment which
Filippo Maria chose to push on his army to Romagna, and
vigorously attack the Florentines. … The Florentines, having
no tried general at the heart of their troops, experienced,
from the 6th of September, 1423, to the 17th of October, 1425,
no less than six successive defeats, either in Liguria or
Romagna [at Forli, 1423, Zagonara, 1424, Lamone, Rapallo,
Anghiari and Faggiola, 1425]. Undismayed by defeat, they
reassembled their army for the seventh time: the patriotism of
their rich merchants made up for the penury of their exhausted
treasury. They, at the same time, sent their most
distinguished statesmen as ambassadors to Venice, to represent
to that republic that, if it did not join them while they
still stood, the liberty of Italy was lost forever. … An
illustrious fugitive, Francesco Carmagnola, who arrived about
this time at Venice, accomplished what Florence had nearly
failed in, by discovering to the Venetians the project of the
duke of Milan to subjugate them." Carmagnola had been
disgraced and discharged from employment by Filippo Maria,
whose jealousy was alarmed by his great reputation, and he now
took service against his late patron. "A league, formed
between Florence and Venice, was successively joined by the
marquis of Ferrara, the lord of Mantua, the Siennese, the duke
Amadeus VIII. of Savoy, and the king Alphonso of Naples, who
jointly declared war against Filippo Maria Visconti, on the
27th of January, 1426. … The good fortune of Carmagnola in
war still attended him in the campaign of 1426. He was as
successful against the duke of Milan as he had been for him:
he took from him the city and whole province of Brescia. The
duke ceded this conquest to the Venetians by treaty on the
30th of December; but he employed the winter in assembling his
forces; and in the beginning of spring renewed the war." An
indecisive engagement occurred at Casalsecco, July 12, 1427,
and on the 11th of October following, in a marsh near Macalo,
Carmagnola completely defeated the Milanese army commanded by
Carlo Malatesta. A new peace was signed on the 18th of April,
1428; but war recommenced in the latter part of 1430. Fortune
now abandoned Carmagnola. He suffered a surprise and defeat at
Soncino, May 17, 1431, and the suspicious senate of Venice
caused him to be arrested, tortured and put to death. "During
the remainder of the reign of Filippo Maria he was habitually
at war with the two republics of Venice and Florence. He …
almost always lost ground by his distrust of his own generals,
his versatility, his taste for contradictory intrigues, his
eagerness to sign peace every year, and to recommence
hostilities a few weeks afterwards." In 1441, on making peace
with the two republics, he granted his daughter Bianca in
marriage to their general, Francesco Sforza, with two
lordships for her dowry. But he was soon intriguing against
his son-in-law, soon at war again with Florence and Venice,
and Sforza was again in the service of the latter. But in 1447
he made offers of reconciliation which were accepted, and
Sforza was on his way to Milan when news came to him of the
death of the duke, which occurred August 13. "The war of
Lombardy was complicated by its connexion with another war
which at the same time ravaged the kingdom of Naples. The
queen, Joan II., had died there, on the 2d of February, 1435;
three months after the death of her adopted son, Louis III. of
Anjou: by her will she had substituted for that prince his
brother René, duke of Lorraine. But Alphonso, king of Aragon
and Sicily, whom she had primarily adopted, … claimed the
succession, on the ground of this first adoption, as well as
of the ancient rights of Manfred, to whom he had succeeded in
the female line. The kingdom of Naples was divided between the
parties of Aragon and Anjou. The Genoese, who had voluntarily
ranged themselves under the protection of the duke of Milan,
offered their assistance to the duke of Anjou. … On the 5th
of August, 1435, their fleet met that of Alphonso, before the
island of Ponza. They defeated it in a great battle, in which
Alphonso had been made prisoner." Delivered to the duke of
Milan, Alphonso soon convinced the latter that his alliance
with the French interest at Naples was a mistake and a danger
to him, and was set at liberty, with promises of aid. The
Genoese were indignant at this and drove the Milanese garrison
from their city, in December, 1435, recovering their freedom.
"Alphonso, seconded by the duke of Milan, recommenced the war
against René of Anjou with greater advantage. On the 2d of
June, 1442, he took from him the city of Naples; from that
time peace was re-established in that kingdom, and Alphonso
… established himself amidst a people which he had
conquered, but whose hearts he gained; and returned no more
either to Sicily or Aragon. He died at Naples, on the 27th of
June, 1458."
J. C. L. de Sismondi,
History of the Italian Republics,
chapters 9-10.
ALSO IN:
W. P. Urquhart,
Life and Times of Francesco Sforza,
books 3-4 (volume 1).
Mrs. Jameson,
Memoirs of Celebrated Female Sovereigns,
volume 1, chapter 5.
M. A. Hookham,
Life and Times of Margaret of Anjou,
volume 1, introduction and chapter 1.
ITALY: A. D. 1433-1464.
The ascendancy of Cosimo de' Medici at Florence.
See FLORENCE: A. D. 1433-1464.
{1830}
ITALY: A. D. 1447-1454.
End of the Visconti in the duchy of Milan.
Disputed succession.
Francesco Sforza in possession.
War of Venice, Naples and other states
against Milan and Florence.
See MILAN: A. D. 1447-1454.
ITALY: A. D. 1447-1480.
The Pontificate of Nicolas V.
Regeneration of the Papacy.
Revival of letters and art.
Threatening advance of the Turks.
Fresh troubles in Naples.
Expulsion of the French from Genoa.
"The failure of the Council of Basel [see PAPACY: A. D.
1431-1448] restored the position of the Papacy, and set it
free from control. The character and ability of Pope Nicolas
[V., 1447-1455] made him respected, and the part which he took
in politics made him rank amongst the great temporal powers in
Italy. From this time onwards to the end of our history we
shall see the Popes the undisputed Princes of Rome, and the
lords of all that part of Italy which they claimed from the
gift of Kings and Emperors, and not least from the will of the
Countess Matilda. Pope Nicolas used this power better than any
of those who came after him, for he used it in the cause of
peace, and to forward learning and artistic taste. He applied
himself to the general pacification of Italy, and brought
about the Peace of Lodi in 1454, which was signed by Venice
and Milan and by King Alfonso. Christendom had great need of
peace, for, in 1453, Constantinople had been taken by the
Infidels and Mahomet the Second was spreading his conquest
over the East of Europe. Before the fall of the city a great
many Greeks had come to Italy, on different missions, and
especially to attend a Council at Florence, where terms of
union were made between the Greek and Latin Churches. Their
coming revived the taste for Greek learning, which had been so
powerfully felt by Petrarca and Boccaccio. Pope Nicolas made
Rome the centre of this literature, and others followed his
example. Theodore of Gaza, George of Trebizond, and many more,
found enlightened patrons in the Pope, the King of Naples,
Cosmo de'Medici, and Federigo, Count of Urbino. The Pope was a
lover and patron of art as well as of literature. He rebuilt
the churches, palaces, and fortifications of Rome and the
Roman States, and formed the scheme of raising a church worthy
of the memory of St. Peter, and left behind him the Vatican
Palace as a worthy residence for the Apostle's successors. The
Papal Library had been scattered during the Captivity and the
Schism, but Pope Nicolas made a large collection of
manuscripts, and thus founded the Library of the Vatican. The
introduction of printing into Italy about this time gave great
strength to the revival of learning. In 1452 the Pope crowned
Frederic the Third Emperor at Rome with great magnificence.
But he was not without danger in his city, for the next year a
wild plot was made against him. A large number of Romans were
displeased at the great power of the Pope. They were headed by
Stefano Porcaro, who declared that he would free the city
which had once been mistress of the world from the yoke of
priests. The rising was to be ushered in by the slaughter of
the Papal Court and the plunder of its treasures. The plot was
discovered, and was punished with great severity. This was the
last and most unworthy of the various attempts of the Romans
to set up self-government. The advance of the Ottoman Turks
during the latter part of the 15th century [see TURKS: A. D.
1451-1481] caused the greatest alarm in Italy. Venice, from
her possessions and her trade in the Levant, was most exposed
to the attacks of the Infidels, and she became the great
champion against them. The learned Æneas Sylvius was chosen
Pope, in 1458, and took the title of Pius the Second. He
caused a crusade to be preached against the Turks, but he died
in 1464, while the forces were gathering. The Venetians were
constantly defeated in the Archipelago, and lost Eubœa,
Lesbos, and other islands [see GREECE: A. D. 1454-1479]. In
1477 a large Turkish army entered Italy by Friuli, defeated
the Venetians, and crossed the Tagliamento. They laid waste
the country as far as the Piave, and their destroying fires
could be seen from the Campanile of St. Mark's. In 1480
Mahomet's great general, Ahmed Keduk, took the strong city of
Otranto, and massacred its inhabitants. This expedition was
secretly favoured by the Venetians to spite the King of
Naples. The danger to all Italy was very great, for the Sultan
eagerly longed to conquer the older Rome, but the death of
Mahomet the Second, and a disputed succession to his throne,
fortunately checked the further advance of the invaders. When
Alfonso, King of Aragon, Naples, and Sicily, died in 1458, he
left Aragon and Sicily, which he had inherited, to his
legitimate son John; but the crown of Naples, which he had won
for himself, he left to Ferdinand, his illegitimate son.
Ferdinand was a cruel and suspicious man, and the barons
invited John of Calabria to come and help them against him.
John of Calabria was the son of Réné, who had been adopted by
Queen Joanna, and who called himself King. He was the French
Governor of Genoa, and so already had a footing in Italy. He
applied to Sforza to help him, but the Duke of Milan was
firmly attached to the Peace of Lodi, and was too justly
fearful of the French power to do so. Lewis the Eleventh, King
of France, was too wise to meddle in Italian politics.
Florence, which was usually on the French side, was now under
the influence of Cosmo de' Medici, and Cosmo was under the
influence of Francesco Sforza, so that the Duke of Calabria
found no allies. The Archbishop of Genoa, Paola Fregoso,
excited the people to drive out the French [see GENOA: A. D.
1458-1464] and the Doge Prospero Adorno, who belonged to their
party. He then defeated King Réné, and the Duke of Calabria
was forced to give up his attempt on Naples [1464]. The new
government of Genoa was so oppressive that the Genoese put
themselves under the protection of Francesco; Lewis the
Eleventh ceded all his rights to him, and the city thus became
part of the Duchy of Milan. The hopes of the French party in
Italy were thus for the present entirely crushed."
W. Hunt,
History of Italy,
chapter 6.
ALSO IN:
M. Creighton,
History of the Papacy,
book 4, chapters 3-4 (volume 2).
W. P. Urquhart,
Life and Times of Francesco Sforza,
book 7 (volume 2).
L. Pastor,
History of the Popes,
volume 2.
ITALY: A. D. 1466-1469.
Florence under the five agents of Piero de' Medici.
See FLORENCE: 1458-1469.
ITALY: A. D. 1469-1492.
The government of Lorenzo de' Medici, the Magnificent, at
Florence.
See FLORENCE: A. D. 1469-1492.
ITALY: A. D. 1490-1498.
Savonarola at Florence.
See FLORENCE: A. D. 1490-1498.
{1831}
ITALY: A. D. 1492-1494.
Charles VIII. of France invited across the Alps to possess
Naples.
The hostile disunion of the Italian states.
With the death of Lorenzo de Medici, which occurred at
Florence in the spring of 1492, "the power vanished which had
hitherto kept Naples and Milan quiet, and which, with subtle
diplomatic skill, had postponed the breach of the peace in
Italy. We find the comparison used, that Florence with Lorenzo
at her head stood like a rocky dam between two stormy seas.
Italy was at that time a free land and independent of foreign
policy. Venice, with her well-established nobles at her head;
Naples under the Aragonese, a branch of the family ruling in
Spain; Milan, with Genoa, under Sforza—all three able powers
by land and sea—counterbalanced each other. Lorenzo ruled
central Italy; the small lords of the Romagna were in his pay,
and the pope was on the best terms of relationship with him.
But in Milan the mischief lay hidden. Ludovico Sforza, the
guardian of his nephew Gian Galeazzo, had completely usurped
the power. He allowed his ward to pine away mentally and
bodily; he was bringing the young prince slowly to death. But
his consort, a Neapolitan princess, saw through the treachery,
and urged her father to change by force their insufferable
position. Sforza could not alone have resisted Naples. No
dependence was to be placed on the friendship of Venice;
Lorenzo mediated as long as he lived, but now, on his death,
Naples was no longer to be restrained. The first thing that
happened was [Piero de Medici's] alliance with this power, and
at the same time Ludovico's appeal for help to France, where a
young and ambitious king had ascended the throne. The death of
Innocent VIII., and the election of Alexander Borgia to the
papacy, completed the confusion which was impending. Long
diplomatic campaigns took place before war actually broke out.
The matter in question was not the interests of nations—of
this there was no thought—nor even the caprices of princes
alone. The nobles of Italy took a passionate concern in these
disputes. The contests of corresponding intrigues were fought
out at the French court. France had been robbed of Naples by
the Aragonese. The exiled Neapolitan barons, French in their
interests, whose possessions the Arngonese had given to their
own adherents, ardently seized the idea of returning
victoriously to their country; the cardinals, hostile to
Borgia—foremost among these stood the Cardinal of San Piero
in Vincula, a nephew of the old Sixtus, and the Cardinal
Ascanio Sforza, Ludovico's brother—urged for war against
Alexander VI.; the Florentine nobles, anticipating Piero's
violent measures, hoped for deliverance through the French,
and advocated the matter at Lyons, where the court was
stationed, and a whole colony of Florentine families had in
time settled. Sforza held out the bait of glory and his just
claims to the old legitimate possession. The Aragonese, on the
other hand, proposed an accommodation. Spain, who would not
forsake her belongings, stood at their side; the pope and
Piero dei Medici adhered to Naples, and the French nobility
were not in favour of an expedition to Italy. Venice remained
neutral; still she might gain by the war, and she did not
dissuade from it; and this opinion, that something was to be
gained, gradually took possession of all parties, even of
those who had at first wished to preserve peace. Spain was a
direct gainer from the first. France ceded to King Ferdinand a
disputed province, on the condition that he would afford no
support to his Neapolitan cousins. Sforza, as lord of Genoa,
wished to have Lucca and Pisa again, with all that belonged to
them; the Visconti had possessed them of old, and he raised
their claims afresh. We have said what were the hopes of Piero
dei Medici [that he should be able to make himself Duke of
Florence]. Pisa hoped to become free. The pope hoped by his
alliance with Naples to make the first step towards the
attainment of the great plans which he cherished for himself
and his sons; he thought one day of dividing Italy among them.
The French hoped to conquer Naples, and then to drive away the
Turks in a vast crusade. As if for a crusade, the king raised
the loan in his own country, which he required for the
campaign. The Venetians hoped to bring the coast cities of the
Adriatic Sea as much as possible under their authority. In the
autumn of 1494, Charles of France placed himself at the head
of his knights and mercenary troops, and crossed the Alps;
whilst his fleet and artillery, the most fearful weapon of the
French, went by sea from Marseilles to Genoa."
H. Grimm,
Life of Michael Angelo,
chapter 3, section 2 (volume 1).
ALSO IN:
T. A. Trollope,
History of the Commonwealth of Florence,
book 8, chapter 5.
ITALY: A. D. 1492-1503.
The Papacy in the hands of the Borgias.
See PAPACY: A. D. 1471-1513.
ITALY: A. D. 1494-1496.
The invasion by Charles VIII.
His triumphant march, his easy conquest of Naples,
and the speedy retreat.
Effects of the expedition on France and Europe.
"On the 1st of March [1494] Charles VIII. made his state entry
into Lyons, to assume the command of the expedition; an
advanced guard under the Scotchman d'Aubigny was already
pushing towards the Neapolitan frontier, and the Duke of
Orleans was at Genoa. The Neapolitans on their side sent the
Prince of Altamura with 30 galleys towards Genoa, while the
Duke of Calabria, an inexperienced youth, entered the
Pontifical States, under the guidance of tried generals. …
The Pope seemed to have lost his head, and no longer knew what
course to adopt. … Charles the VIII., having passed the
Monginevra, entered Asti in the first days of September. He
soon received intelligence that Don Federico and the
Neapolitan fleet had been repulsed with heavy losses before
Porto Venere, and that the Duke of Orleans and his Swiss had
entered Rapallo, sacked the place, and put all the
inhabitants, even the sick in the hospital, to the sword,
thereby striking terror into the Italians, who were
unaccustomed to carry on war in so sanguinary a fashion. On
reaching Piacenza, the king learnt that Gio. Galeazzo, whom he
had recently seen at Pavia, had just died there, poisoned, as
all men said, by the Moor [Lodovico, the usurping uncle of
Gio. Galeazzo the young Duke of Milan, was so called], who,
after celebrating his obsequies at Milan, had entered St.
Ambrogio, at the hour indicated by his astrologer, to
consecrate the investiture already granted to him by
Maximilian, King of the Romans. All this filled the minds of
the French with suspicion, almost with terror; they were
beginning to understand the nature of their closest ally's
good faith.
{1832}
In fact, while Ludovico with one hand collected men and money
for their cause, with the other he wove the threads of a
league intended to drive them from Italy, when the moment
should arrive. … Nevertheless the fortunes of the French
prospered rapidly. The Duke of Calabria, having entered
Romagna, withdrew across the Neapolitan frontier at the first
glimpse of D'Aubigny's forces; and the bulk of the French
army, commanded by the King in person, marched through the
Lunigiana without encountering obstacles of any kind. After
taking Fivizanno, sacking it, and putting to the sword the
hundred soldiers who defended it, and part of the inhabitants,
they pushed on towards Sarzana, through a barren district,
between the mountains and the sea, where the slightest
resistance might have proved fatal to them. But the small
castles, intended for the defence of these valleys, yielded
one after the other, without any attempt to resist the
invaders; and hardly had the siege of Sarzana commenced than
Piero dei Medici arrived, frightened out of his senses,
surrendered at discretion, and even promised to pay 200,000
ducats. But on Piero's return to Florence, on the 8th of
November, he found that the city had risen in revolt, and sent
ambassadors to the French King on its own account to offer him
an honourable reception; but that at the same time it was
making preparations for defence in case of need [see FLORENCE:
A. D. 1490-1498]. So great was the public indignation that
Piero took flight to Venice, where his own ambassador,
Soderini, hardly deigned to look at him, having meanwhile
declared for the republican government just proclaimed in
Florence, where everything had been rapidly changed. The
houses of the Medici and their garden at St. Mark had been
pillaged, exiles had been recalled and acquitted; a price put
on Piero's head and that of his brother, the Cardinal. … The
fabric, so long and so carefully built up by the Medici, was
now suddenly crumbling into dust. On the 17th November Charles
VIII., at the head of his formidable army, rode into Florence
with his lance in rest, believing that that fact sufficed to
make him master of the city. But the Florentines were armed,
they had collected 6,000 soldiers within the walls, and they
knew perfectly well that, from the vantage posts of towers and
houses, they could easily worst an army scattered through the
streets. They therefore repulsed the King's insolent
proposals, and when he threatened to sound his trumpets, Piero
Capponi, tearing up the offered treaty, replied that the
Florentines were more ready to ring their bells. Through this
firmness equitable terms were arranged. The Republic was to
pay 120,000 florins in three quotas; the fortresses, however,
were to be speedily restored to her. On the 28th November the
French left the city, but not without stealing all that
remained of the collection of antiquities in the Medici
Palace. … Nevertheless the citizens were thankful to be
finally delivered alike from old tyrants and new invaders.
Having reached Rome, Charles VIII., in order to have done with
the Pope, who now seemed inclined for resistance, pointed his
guns against the Castle of St. Angelo, and thus matters were
soon settled. … Scarcely encountering any obstacles, Charles
led his army on to Naples." Ferdinand I., or Ferrante, had
died on the 25th of January, 1494, and had been succeeded by
his son Alfonso II, a prince more cruel and more hated than
himself. The latter now renounced the throne in favor of his
son, Ferdinand II., and fled to Sicily. "Ferdinand II., or
Ferrandino, as he was called, after vainly seeking aid from
all, even from the Turk, made a fruitless stand at Monte San
Giovanni, which was taken, destroyed, and all its population
put to the sword. … Naples rebelled in favour of the French,
who marched in on the 22d of February [1495]. The following
day Ferrandino fled to Ischia, then to Messina. And shortly
the ambassadors of the Italian States appeared to offer
congratulations to the conqueror. Now at last the Venetians
were aroused, and having sent their envoys to Milan to know if
Ludovico were disposed to take up arms to drive out the
French, they found him not only ready to do so, but full of
indignation. … He advised that money should be sent to Spain
and to Maximilian, to induce them to attack France; but added
that care must be taken not to call them into Italy; 'since
having already one fever here, we should then have two.' A
league was in fact concluded between the Venetians, Ludovico,
the Pope, Spain and Maximilian. … The Neapolitans, soon
wearied of bad government, had risen in revolt, and Charles
VIII. after a stay of only 50 days in Naples had to make his
departure with excessive haste, before every avenue of retreat
should be cut off, leaving hardly more than 6,000 men in the
kingdom, and taking with him a numerous army, which however
only numbered 10,000 real combatants. On the 6th of July a
pitched battle took place at Fornuovo near the river Taro. The
allies had assembled about 30,000 men, three-fourths of whom
were Venetians, the rest composed of Ludovico's soldiers and a
few Germans sent by Maximilian. … The battle was bloody, and
it was a disputed question which side obtained the victory;
but although the Italians were not repulsed, remaining indeed
masters of the field, the French succeeded in cutting their
way through, which was the chief object they had in view. …
Ludovico, taking advantage of the situation, soon made an
agreement with the French on his own account, without
concerning himself about the Venetians. … The fortunes of
the French now declined rapidly in Italy, and all the more
speedily owing to their bad government in the Neapolitan
kingdom, and their abominable behaviour towards the few
friends who had remained faithful to them. … Ferdinand II.,
with the aid of the Spaniards under Consalvo di Cordova,
advanced triumphantly through Calabria and entered Naples on
the 7th of July, 1496. In a short time all the Neapolitan
fortresses capitulated, and the French who had held them
returned to their own country, more than decimated and in an
altogether deplorable condition. On the 6th of October
Ferdinand II. breathed his last, worn out by the agitation and
fatigues of the war, and was succeeded by his uncle Don
Federico, the fifth King [counting Charles VIII. of France]
who had ascended the Neapolitan throne within the last five
years. … Naples was now in the absolute power of the
Spaniards, who were already maturing their iniquitous designs
upon the kingdom; these, however, were only discovered at a
later period."
P. Villari,
Machiavelli and his Times,
volume 1, chapter 4, section 2.
{1833}
"In spite of its transitory character the invasion of Charles
VIII. … was a great fact in the history of the
Renaissance. It was, to use the pregnant phrase of Michelet,
no less than the revelation of Italy to the nations of the
North. Like a gale sweeping across a forest of trees in
blossom, and bearing their fertilizing pollen, after it has
broken and deflowered their branches, to far distant trees
that hitherto have bloomed in barrenness, the storm of
Charles's army carried far and wide through Europe
thought-dust, imperceptible, but potent to enrich the nations.
The French, alone, says Michelet, understood Italy. … From
the Italians the French communicated to the rest of Europe
what we call the movement of the Renaissance. There is some
truth in this panegyric of Michelet's. The passage of the army
of Charles VIII. marks a turning point in modern history, and
from this epoch dates the diffusion of a spirit of culture
over Europe."
J. A. Symonds,
Renaissance in Italy: The Age of the Despots,
chapter 9.
ALSO IN:
P. Villari,
History of Savonarola and his Times,
book 2, chapters 1-3 (volume 1).
J. Dennistoun,
Memoirs of the Dukes of Urbino,
chapters 14-15 (volume 1).
P. de Commines,
Memoirs,
books 7-8.
L. von Ranke,
History of the Latin and Teutonic Nations
from 1494 to 1514,
book 1, chapter 1.
See, also, FRANCE: A. D. 1492-1515.
ITALY: A. D. 1494-1503.
The growing power of Venice and the jealousies excited by it. See
VENICE: A. D. 1494-1503.
ITALY: A. D. 1424-1509.
The French deliverance of Pisa.
The long struggle and the Florentine reconquest.
See PISA: A. D. 1494-1509.
ITALY: A. D. 1499-1500.
Invasion and conquest of the Milanese by Louis XII. of France.
His claim in right of Valentine Visconti.
Charles VIII. died in April, 1498, and was succeeded by Louis
of Orleans, who ascended the throne as Louis XII. On his
coronation, Louis XII. "assumed, besides his title of King of
France, the titles of King of Naples and of Jerusalem, and
Duke of Milan. This was as much as to say that he would pursue
… a warlike and adventurous policy abroad. … By his policy
at home Louis XII. deserved and obtained the name of 'Father
of the People;' by his enterprises and wars abroad he involved
France still more deeply than Charles VIII. had in that mad
course of distant, reckless, and incoherent conquests for
which his successor, Francis I., was destined to pay by
capture at Pavia and by the lamentable treaty of Madrid, in
1526, as the price of his release. … Outside of France,
Milaness (the Milanese district) was Louis XII.'s first
thought, at his accession, and the first object of his desire.
He looked upon it as his patrimony: His grandmother, Valentine
Visconti, widow of that Duke of Orleans who had been
assassinated at Paris in 1407 by order of John the Fearless,
Duke of Burgundy, had been the last to inherit the duchy of
Milan, which the Sforzas, in 1450, had seized. When Charles
VIII. invaded Italy in 1494, 'Now is the time,' said Louis,
'to enforce the rights of Valentine Visconti, my grandmother,
to Milaness.' And he, in fact, asserted them openly, and
proclaimed his intention of vindicating them so soon as he
found the moment propitious. When he became king, his chance
of success was great. The Duke of Milan, Ludovic, the Moor,
had by his sagacity and fertile mind, by his taste for arts
and sciences and the intelligent patronage he bestowed upon
them, by his ability in speaking, and by his facile character,
obtained in Italy a position far beyond his real power. …
Ludovic was, nevertheless, a turbulent rascal and a greedy
tyrant. … He had, moreover, embroiled himself with his
neighbours, the Venetians, who were watching for an
opportunity of aggrandizing themselves at his expense." Louis
XII. promptly concluded a treaty with Venice, which provided
for the making of war in common upon the Duke of Milan, to
recover the patrimony of the king—the Venetians to receive
Cremona and certain forts and territory adjacent as their
share of the expected spoils. "In the month of August, 1499,
the French army, with a strength of from 20,000 to 25,000 men,
of whom 5,000 were Swiss, invaded Milaness. Duke Ludovic
Sforza opposed to it a force pretty near equal in number, but
far less full of confidence and of far less valour. In less
than three weeks the duchy was conquered; in only two cases
was any assault necessary; all the other places were given up
by traitors or surrendered without a show of resistance. The
Venetians had the same success on the eastern frontier of the
duchy. … Louis was at Lyons when he heard of his army's
victory in Milaness and of Ludovic Sforza's flight. He was
eager to go and take possession of his conquest, and, on the
6th of October, 1499, he made his triumphal entry into Milan
amidst cries of 'Hurrah! for France.' He reduced the heavy
imposts established by the Sforzas, revoked the vexatious
game-laws, instituted at Milan a court of justice analogous to
the French parliaments, loaded with favours the scholars and
artists who were the honour of Lombardy, and recrossed the
Alps at the end of some weeks, leaving as governor of Milaness
John James Trivulzio, the valiant Condottiere, who, four years
before, had quitted the service of Ferdinand II., King of
Naples, for that of Charles VIII. Unfortunately Trivulzio was
himself a Milanese and of the faction of the Guelphs. He had
the passions of a partisan and the habits of a man of war; and
he soon became as tyrannical and as much detested in Milaness
as Ludovic the Moor had but lately been. A plot was formed in
favour of the fallen tyrant, who was in Germany expecting it,
and was recruiting, during expectancy, amongst the Germans and
Swiss, in order to take advantage of it. On the 25th of
January, 1500, the insurrection broke out; and two months
later Ludovic Sforza had once more became master of Milaness,
where the French possessed nothing but the castle of Milan.
… Louis XII., so soon as he heard of the Milanese
insurrection, sent into Italy Louis de la Trémoille, the best
of his captains, and the Cardinal d' Amboise, his privy
councillor and his friend. … The campaign did not last long.
The Swiss who had been recruited by Ludovic and those who were
in Louis XII.'s service had no mind to fight one another; and
the former capitulated, surrendered the strong place of
Novara, and promised to evacuate the country on condition of a
safe-conduct for themselves and their booty." Ludovic
attempted flight in disguise, but fell into the hands of the
French and remained in captivity, at the castle of Loches, in
Touraine, during the remainder of his life,—eight years.
"And 'thus was the duchy of Milan, within seven months and a
half, twice conquered by the French,' says John d' Auton in
his 'Chronique,' 'and for the nonce was ended the war in
Lombardy, and the authors thereof were captives and exiles.'"
F. P. Guizot,
Popular History of France,
chapter 27.
ALSO IN:
A. M. F. Robinson,
The End of the Middle Ages:
Valentine Visconti; The French claim to Milan.
E. Walford,
Story of the Chevalier Bayard,
chapters 3-4.
{1834}
ITALY: 15-16th Centuries.
Renaissance.
Intellectual advance and moral decline.
"At the end of the fifteenth century, Italy was the centre of
European civilization: while the other nations were still
plunged in a feudal barbarism which seems almost as far
removed from all our sympathies as is the condition of some
American or Polynesian savages, the Italians appear to us as
possessing habits of thought, a mode of life, political,
social, and literary institutions, not unlike those of to-day;
as men whom we can thoroughly understand, whose ideas and
aims, whose general views, resemble our own in that main,
indefinable characteristic of being modern. They had shaken
off the morbid monastic ways of feeling, they had thrown aside
the crooked scholastic modes of thinking, they had trampled
under foot the feudal institutions of the Middle Ages; no
symbolical mists made them see things vague, strange, and
distorted; their intellectual atmosphere was as clear as our
own, and, if they saw less than we do, what they did see
appeared to them in its true shape and proportions. Almost for
the first time since the ruin of antique civilization; they
could show well-organized, well-defined States; artistically
disciplined armies; rationally devised laws; scientifically
conducted agriculture; and widely extended, intelligently
undertaken commerce. For the first time, also, they showed
regularly built, healthy, and commodious towns; well-drained
fields; and, more important than all, hundreds of miles of
country owned not by feudal lords, but by citizens; cultivated
not by serfs, but by free peasants. While in the rest of
Europe men were floundering among the stagnant ideas and
crumbling institutions of the effete Middle Ages, with but
vague half-consciousness of their own nature, the Italians
walked calmly through a life as well arranged as their great
towns, bold, inquisitive, and sceptical; modern
administrators, modern soldiers, modern politicians, modern
financiers, scholars, and thinkers. Towards the end of the
fifteenth century, Italy seemed to have obtained the
philosophic, literary, and artistic inheritance of Greece; the
administrative, legal, and military inheritance of Rome,
increased threefold by her own strong, original, essentially
modern activities. Yet, at that very time, and almost in
proportion as all these advantages developed, the moral
vitality of the Italians was rapidly decreasing, and a
horrible moral gangrene beginning to spread: liberty was
extinguished; public good faith seemed to be dying out; even
private morality flickered ominously; every free State became
subject to a despot, always unscrupulous and often infamous;
warfare became a mere pretext for the rapine and extortions of
mercenaries; diplomacy grew to be a mere swindle; the
humanists inoculated literature with the filthiest refuse cast
up by antiquity; nay, even civic and family ties were
loosened; assassinations and fratricides began to abound, and
all law, human and divine, to be set at defiance. … The men
of the Renaissance had to pay a heavy price for …
intellectual freedom and self-cognizance, which they not only
enjoyed themselves, but transmitted to the rest of the world;
the price was the loss of all moral standard, of all fixed
public feeling. They had thrown aside all accepted rules and
criteria, they had cast away all faith in traditional
institutions, they had destroyed and could not yet rebuild. In
their instinctive and universal disbelief in all that had been
taught them, they lost all respect for opinion, for rule, for
what had been called right and wrong. Could it be otherwise?
Had they not discovered that what had been called right had
often been unnatural, and what had been called wrong often
natural? Moral teachings, remonstrances, and judgments
belonged to that dogmatism from which they had broken loose;
to those schools and churches where the foolish and the
unnatural had been taught and worshiped; to those priests and
monks who themselves most shamefully violated their teachings.
To profess morality was to be a hypocrite; to reprobate others
was to be narrow-minded. There was so much error mixed up with
truth that truth had to share the discredit of error."
Vernon Lee,
Euphorion,
volume 1, pages 27-29, 47-48.
"The conditions under which the Italians performed their task
in the Renaissance were such as seem at first sight
unfavourable to any great achievement. Yet it is probable
that, the end in view being the stimulation of mental
activity; no better circumstances than they enjoyed could have
been provided. Owing to a series of adverse accidents, and
owing also to their own instinctive preference for local
institutions, they failed to attain the coherence and the
centralised organisation which are necessary to a nation as we
understand that word. Their dismemberment among rival
communities proved a fatal source of political and military
weakness, but it developed all their intellectual energies by
competition to the utmost. At the middle of the fifteenth
century their communes had lost political liberty, and were
ruled by despots. Martial spirit declined. Wars were carried
on by mercenaries; and the people found itself in a state of
practical disarmament, when the neighboring nations quarrelled
for the prize of those rich provinces. At the same time
society underwent a rapid moral deterioration. When
Machiavelli called Italy 'the corruption of the world,' he did
not speak rhetorically. An impure and worldly clergy; an
irreligious, though superstitious, laity; a self-indulgent and
materialistic middle class; an idle aristocracy, excluded from
politics and unused to arms; a public given up to pleasure and
money-getting; a multitude of scholars, devoted to trifles,
and vitiated by studies which clashed with the ideals of
Christianity—from such elements in the nation proceeded a
widely-spread and ever-increasing degeneracy. Public energy,
exhausted by the civil wars and debilitated by the arts of the
tyrants, sank deep and deeper into the lassitude of
acquiescent lethargy. Religion expired in laughter, irony and
licence. Domestic simplicity yielded to vice, whereof the
records are precise and unmistakable. The virile virtues
disappeared. What survived of courage assumed the forms of
ruffianism, ferocity and treasonable daring. Still,
simultaneously with this decline in all the moral qualities
which constitute a powerful people, the Italians brought their
arts and some departments of their literature to a perfection
that can only be paralleled by ancient Greece. The anomaly
implied in this statement is striking; but it is revealed to
us by evidence too overwhelming to be rejected. … It was
through art that the creative instincts of the people found
their true and adequate channel of expression.
{1835}
Paramount over all other manifestations of the epoch,
fundamental beneath all, penetrative to the core of all, is
the artistic impulse. The slowly self-consolidating life of a
great kingdom, concentrating all elements of national
existence by the centripetal force of organic unity, was
wanting. Commonwealths and despotisms, representing a more
imperfect stage of political growth, achieved completion and
decayed. But art survived this disintegration of the medieval
fabric; and in art the Italians found the cohesion denied them
as a nation. While speaking thus of art, it is necessary to
give a wide extension to that word. It must be understood to
include literature. … We are justified in regarding the
literary masterpieces of the sixteenth century as the fullest
and most representative expression of the Italian temperament
at the climax of its growth. The literature of the golden age
implies humanism, implies painting. … It is not only
possible but right to speak of Italy collectively when we
review her work in the Renaissance. Yet it should not be
forgotten that Italy at this time was a federation, presenting
upon a miniature scale the same diversities in her component
parts as the nations of Europe do now. … At the beginning of
such a review, we cannot fail to be struck with the
predominance of Florence. The superiority of the Tuscans was
threefold. In the first place, they determined the development
of art in all its branches. In the second place, they gave a
language to Italy, which, without obliterating the local
dialects, superseded them in literature when the right moment
for intellectual community arrived. That moment, in the third
place, was rendered possible by the humanistic movement, which
began at Florence. … What the Lombards and Venetians
produced in fine art and literature was of a later birth. Yet
the novelists of Lombardy, the Latin lyrists of Garda, the
school of romantic and dramatic poets at Ferrara, the group of
sculptors and painters assembled in Milan by the Sforza
dynasty, the maccaronic Muse of Mantua, the unrivalled
magnificence of painting at Venice, the transient splendour of
the Parmese masters, the wit of Modena, the learning of the
princes of Mirandola and Carpi, must be catalogued among the
most brilliant and characteristic manifestations of Italian
genius. In pure literature Venice contributed but little. …
Her place, as the home of Aldo's Greek press, and as the
refuge for adventurers like Aretino and Folengo, when the rest
of Italy was yielding to reactionary despotism, has to be
commemorated. … The Romans who advanced Italian culture,
were singularly few. The work of Rome was done almost
exclusively by aliens, drawn for the most part from Tuscany
and Lombardy. After Frederick II.'s brilliant reign, the
Sicilians shared but little in the intellectual activity of
the nation."
J. A. Symonds,
Renaissance in Italy: Italian Literature,
chapter 17.
ITALY: A. D. 1501-1504.
Perfidious treaty for the partition of Naples between Louis
XII. of France and Ferdinand of Aragon.
Their joint conquest.
Their quarrel and war.
The French expelled.
The Spaniards in possession.
"In the spring of 1501, the French army was ready to pursue
its march to Naples. King Frederick, alarmed at the storm
which was gathering round his head, had some months before
renewed the propositions formerly made by his father Ferdinand
to Charles VIII.; namely, to acknowledge himself a feudatory
of France, to pay an annual tribute, and to pledge several
maritime towns as security for the fulfilment of these
conditions. Louis, however, would not hear of these liberal
offers, although Ferdinand the Catholic [of Aragon] undertook
to guarantee the payment of the tribute proffered by
Frederick, and strongly remonstrated against the contemplated
expedition of the French King. Ferdinand finding that he could
not divert Louis from his project, proposed to him to divide
Naples between them, and a partition was arranged by a treaty
concluded between the two monarchs at Granada, November 11th,
1500. Naples, the Terra di Lavoro, and the Abruzzi were
assigned to Louis, with the title of King of Naples and
Jerusalem; while Ferdinand was to have Calabria and Apulia
with the title of Duke." This perfidious arrangement was kept
secret, of course, from Frederick. "Meanwhile the forces of
Ferdinand, under Gonsalvo of Cordova [the 'Great Captain,' as
he was styled after his Italian campaign], were admitted as
friends into the Neapolitan fortresses, which they afterwards
held as enemies. Frederick opened to them without suspicion
his ports and towns, and thus became the instrument of his own
ruin. The unhappy Frederick had in vain looked around for
assistance. He had paid the Emperor Maximilian 40,000 ducats
to make a diversion in his favour by attacking Milan, but
Maximilian was detached from the Neapolitan alliance by a
counter bribe, and consented to prolong the truce with France.
Frederick had then had recourse to Sultan Bajazet II., with as
little effect; and this application only served to throw an
odium on his cause. … The French army, which did not exceed
13,000 men, began its march towards Naples about the end of
May, 1501, under the command of Stuart d'Aubigny, with Cæsar
Borgia [son of Pope Alexander VI.] for his lieutenant. When it
arrived before Rome, June 25th, the French and Spanish
ambassadors acquainted the Pope with the treaty of Granada,
and the contemplated partition of Naples, in which the
suzerainty of this kingdom was guaranteed to the Holy See; a
communication which Alexander received with more surprise than
displeasure, and he proceeded at once to invest the Kings of
France and Aragon with the provinces which they respectively
claimed. Attacked in front by the French, in the rear by
Gonsalvo, Frederick did not venture to take the field. He
cantoned his troops in Naples, Averso, and Capua, of which the
last alone made any attempt at defence. It was surprised by
the French while in the act of treating for a capitulation
(July 24th), and was subjected to the most revolting cruelty;
7,000 of the male inhabitants were massacred in the streets;
the women were outraged; and forty of the handsomest reserved
for Borgia's harem at Rome; where they were in readiness to
amuse the Court at the extraordinary and disgusting fete given
at the fourth marriage of Lucretia. Rather than expose his
subjects to the horrors of a useless war, Frederick entered
into negociations with d'Aubigny, with the view of
surrendering himself to Louis XII. … In October, 1501, he
sailed for France with a small squadron, which remained to him.
{1836}
In return for his abandonment of the provinces assigned to the
French King, he was invested with the county of Maine, and a
life pension of 30,000 ducats, on condition that he should not
attempt to quit France; a guard was set over him to enforce
the latter proviso, and this excellent prince died in
captivity in 1504. Meanwhile Gonsalvo of Cordova was
proceeding with the reduction of Calabria and Apulia. … The
Spaniards entered Taranto March 1st, 1502; the other towns of
southern Italy were soon reduced, and the Neapolitan branch of
the House of Aragon fell for ever, after reigning 65 years. In
the autumn of 1501, Louis had entered into negociations with
the Emperor, in order to obtain formal investiture of the
Duchy of Milan. With this view, Louis's daughter Claude, then
only two years of age, was affianced to Charles [afterwards
the Emperor, Charles V.], grandson of Maximilian, the infant
child of the Archduke Philip and Joanna of Aragon. A treaty
was subsequently signed at Trent, October 13th, 1501, by
Maximilian and the Cardinal d'Amboise, to which the Spanish
sovereigns find the Archduke Philip were also parties. By this
instrument Louis engaged, in return for the investiture of
Milan, to recognise the pretensions of the House of Austria to
Hungary and Bohemia, and to second Maximilian in an expedition
which he contemplated against the Turks. It was at this
conference that those schemes against Venice began to be
agitated, which ultimately produced the League of Cambray. The
treaty between Louis and Ferdinand for the partition of Naples
was so loosely drawn, that it seemed purposely intended to
produce the quarrels which occurred." Disputes arose as to the
possession of a couple of provinces, and the Spaniards were
driven out. "In the course of 1502 the Spaniards were deprived
of everything, except Barletta and a few towns on the coast of
Bari. It was in the combats round this place that Bayard, by
his deeds of courage and generosity, won his reputation as the
model of chivalry, and became the idol of the French
soldiery." The crafty and unscrupulous king of Aragon now
amused Louis with the negotiation of a treaty for the
relinquishment of the whole Neapolitan domain to the lately
affianced infants, Charles of Austria and Claude of France,
while he diligently reinforced the "Great Captain." Then
"Gonsalvo suddenly resumed the offensive with extraordinary
vigour and rapidity, and within a week two decisive battles
were fought"—at Seminara, in Calabria, April 21, 1503, and at
Cerignola, near Barletta, April 28. In the last named battle
the French army was dispersed and almost destroyed. On the
14th of May, Gonsalvo entered Naples, and by the end of July
the French had completely evacuated the Neapolitan territory.
The king of France made prompt preparations for vigorous war,
not only in Naples but in Spain itself, sending two armies to
the Pyrenees and one across the Alps. The campaign of the
latter was ruined by Cardinal d'Amboise, who stopped its march
near Rome, to support his candidacy for the papal chair, just
vacated by the death of Alexander VI. Malaria made havoc in
the ranks of the French, and they were badly commanded. They
advanced to the seat of war in October, and forced the passage