CIENFUEGOS (originally Fernandina De Jagua), one of the principal cities of Cuba, in Santa Clara province, near the central portion of the S. coast, 195 m. E.S.E. of Havana. Pop. (1907) 30,100. Cienfuegos is served by the United railways and by steamers connecting with Santiago, Batabanó, Trinidad and the Isle of Pines. It lies about 6 m. from the sea on a peninsula in the magnificent landlocked bay of Jagua. Vessels drawing 16 ft. have direct access to the wharves. A circular railway about the water-front, wharves and warehouses facilitates the loading and unloading of vessels. The city streets are broad and regularly laid out. There is a handsome cathedral; and the Tomas Terry theatre (given to the city by the heirs of one of the millionaire sugar planters of the jurisdiction), the governor’s house (1841-1844), the military and government hospitals, market place and railway station are worthy of note. In the Cathedral Square (Plaza de Armas), embracing two city-squares, and shaded—like all the plazas of the island—with laurels and royal palms, are a statue of Isabel the Catholic, and two marble lions given by Queen Isabel II.; elsewhere there are statues of General Clouet and Marshal Serrano, once captain-general. The city is lighted by gas and electricity, has an abundant water-supply, and cable connexion with Europe, the United States, other Antilles and South America. The surrounding country is one of the prettiest and most fertile regions in Cuba, varied with woods, rivers, rocky gulches, beautiful cascades and charming tropic vegetation. Several of the largest and finest sugar estates in the world are situated in the vicinity, including the Soledad (with a botanical experiment station maintained by Harvard University), the Terry and others—most of them connected with the city by good driveways. Cienfuegos is a centre of the sugar trade on the south coast; tobacco too is exported.
The bay of Jagua was visited by Columbus. The city was founded in 1819, with the aid of the Spanish government, by a Louisianian, General Luis de Clouet; it was destroyed by a hurricane and was rebuilt in 1825. Many naturalized foreign Catholics, including Americans, were among the original settlers. The settlement was first named in honour of Ferdinand VII., and later in honour of Captain-General José Cienfuegos Jovellanos. The harbour was known from the earliest times, and has been declared by Mahan to be the most important of the Caribbean Sea for strategic purposes. In 1740-1745 a fortification called Nuestra Señora de los Angeles was erected at the entrance; it is still standing, on a steep bluff overlooking the sea, and is one of the most picturesque of the old fortifications of the island. On the 11th of May 1898 a force from two vessels of the United States fleet under Admiral Schley, searching for Cervera and blockading the port, cut two of the three cables here (at Point Colorado, at the entrance of the harbour), and for the first time in the Spanish-American War the American troops were under fire.
CIEZA, a town of south-eastern Spain, in the province of Murcia, on the right bank of the river Segura, and on the Madrid-Cartagena railway. Pop. (1900) 13,626. Cieza is built in a narrow bend of the Segura valley, which is enclosed on the north by mountains, and on the south broadens into a fertile plain, producing grain, wine, olives, raisins, oranges and esparto grass. In the town itself there are flour and paper mills, sawmills and brandy distilleries. Between 1870 and 1900 local trade and population increased rapidly, owing partly to improved means of communication; and the appearance of Cieza is thoroughly modern.
CIGAR, the common term for tobacco-leaf prepared for smoking by being rolled into a short cylinder tapering to a point at the end which is placed in the mouth, the other end, which is lighted, being usually cut square (see [Tobacco]). The Spanish cigarro is of doubtful origin, possibly connected with cigarra, a cicada, from its resemblance to the body of that insect, or with cigarral, a word of Arabic origin meaning a pleasure garden. The explanation that it comes from a Cuban word for a certain species of tobacco is probably erroneous, since no native word of the kind is known. The diminutive, cigarette, denotes a roll of cut tobacco enclosed usually in thin paper, but sometimes also in tobacco-leaf or the husk of Indian corn.
CIGNANI, CARLO (1628-1719), Italian painter, was born of a noble family at Bologna, where he studied under Battista Cairo, and afterwards under Francesco Albani. Though an intimate friend of the latter, and his most famous disciple, Cignani was yet strongly and deeply influenced by the genius of Correggio. His greatest work, moreover, the “Assumption of the Virgin,” round the cupola of the church of the Madonna della Fuoca at Forli, which occupied him some twenty years, and is in some respects one of the most remarkable works of art of the 17th century, is obviously inspired from the more renowned fresco of Correggio in the cupola of the cathedral of Parma. Cignani had some of the defects of his masters; his elaborate finish, his audacious artificiality in the use of colour and in composition, mark the disciple of Albani; but he imparted to his work a more intellectual character than either of his models, and is not without other remarkable merits of his own. As a man Cignani was eminently amiable, unassuming and generous. His success, however, made him many enemies; and the envy of some of these is said to have impelled them to deface certain of his works. He accepted none of the honours offered him by the duke of Parma and other princes, but lived and died an artist. On his removal to Forli, where he died, the school he had founded at Bologna was fain in some sort to follow its master. His most famous pictures, in addition to the Assumption already cited, are—the “Entry of Paul III. into Bologna”; the “François I. Touching for King’s Evil”; a “Power of Love,” painted under a fine ceiling by Agostino Carracci, on the walls of a room in the ducal palace at Parma; an “Adam and Eve” (at the Hague); and two of “Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife” (at Dresden and Copenhagen). His son Felice (1660-1724) and nephew Paolo (1709-1764) were also painters.