[666] On the zoological garden at Palermo under Henry VI., see Otto de S. Blasio ad a. 1194. That of Henry I. of England in the park of Woodstock (Guliel. Malmes. p. 638) contained lions, leopards, camels, and a porcupine, all gifts of foreign princes.
[667] As such he was called, whether painted or carved in stone, ‘Marzocco.’ At Pisa eagles were kept. See the commentators on Dante, Inf. xxxiii. 22. The falcon in Boccaccio, Decam. v. 9. See for the whole subject: Due trattati del governo e delle infermità degli uccelli, testi di lingua inediti. Rome, 1864. They are works of the fourteenth century, possibly translated from the Persian.
[668] See the extract from Ægid. Viterb. in Papencordt, Gesch. der Stadt Rom im Mittelalter, p. 367, note, with an incident of the year 1328. Combats of wild animals among themselves and with dogs served to amuse the people on great occasions. At the reception of Pius II. and of Galeazzo Maria Sforza at Florence, in 1459, in an enclosed space on the Piazza della Signoria, bulls, horses, boars, dogs, lions, and a giraffe were turned out together, but the lions lay down and refused to attack the other animals. Comp. Ricordi di Firenze, Rer. Ital. script. ex Florent. codd. tom. ii. col. 741. A different account in Vita Pii II. Murat. iii. ii. col. 976. A second giraffe was presented to Lorenzo the Magnificent by the Mameluke Sultan Kaytbey. Comp. Paul. Jov. Vita Leonis X. l. i. In Lorenzo’s menagerie one magnificent lion was especially famous, and his destruction by the other lions was reckoned a presage of the death of his owner.
[669] Gio. Villani, x. 185, xi. 66. Matteo Villani, iii. 90, v. 68. It was a bad omen if the lions fought, and worse still if they killed one another. Com. Varchi, Stor. fiorent. iii. p. 143. Matt. V. devotes the first of the two chapters quoted to prove (1) that lions were born in Italy, and (2) that they came into the world alive.
[670] Cron. di Perugia, Arch. Stor. xvi. ii. p. 77, year 1497. A pair of lions once escaped from Perugia; ibid. xvi. i. p. 382, year 1434. Florence, for example, sent to King Wladislaw of Poland (May, 1406), a pair of lions ut utriusque sexus animalia ad procreandos catulos haberetis. The accompanying statement is amusing in a diplomatic document: ‘Sunt equidem hi leones Florentini, et satis quantum natura promittere potuit mansueti, depositâ feritate, quam insitam habent, hique in Gætulorum regionibus nascuntur et Indorum, in quibus multitudo dictorum animalium evalescit, sicuti prohibent naturales. Et cum leonum complexio sit frigoribus inimica, quod natura sagax ostendit, natura in regionibus aestu ferventibus generantur, necessarium est, quod vostra serenitas, si dictorum animalium vitam et sobolis propagationem, ut remur, desiderat, faciat provideri, quod in locis calidis educentur et maneant. Conveniunt nempe cum regia majestate leones quoniam leo græce latine rex dicitur. Sicut enim rex dignitate potentia, magnanimitate ceteros homines antecellit, sic leonis generositas et vigor imperterritus animalia cuncta praesit. Et sicut rex, sic leo adversus imbecilles et timidos clementissimum se ostendit, et adversus inquietos et tumidos terribilem se offert animadversione justissima.’ (Cod. epistolaris sæculi. Mon. med. ævi hist. res gestas Poloniæ illustr. Krakau, 1876, p. 25.)
[671] Gage, Carteggio, i. p. 422, year 1291. The Visconti used trained leopards for hunting hares, which were started by little dogs. See v. Kobel, Wildanger, p. 247, where later instances of hunting with leopards are mentioned.
[672] Strozzii poetae, p. 146: De leone Borsii Ducis. The lion spares the hare and the small dog, imitating (so says the poet) his master. Comp. the words fol. 188, ‘et inclusis condita septa feris,’ and fol. 193, an epigram of fourteen lines, ‘in leporarii ingressu quam maximi;’ see ibid. for the hunting-park.
[673] Cron. di Perugia, l. c. xvi. ii. p. 199. Something of the same kind is to be found in Petrarch, De remed. utriusque fortunae, but less clearly expressed. Here Gaudium, in the conversation with Ratio, boasts of owning monkeys and ‘ludicra animalia.’
[674] Jovian. Pontan. De magnificentia. In the zoological garden of the Cardinal of Aquileja, at Albano, there were, in 1463, peacocks and Indian fowls and Syrian goats with long ears. Pii II. Comment. l. xi. p. 562 sqq.
[675] Decembrio, ap. Muratori, xx. col. 1012.