CHAP. feeble and disorderly government of Rome was Aunequal to the task of curbing her rebellious sons, LXIX. who scorned the authority of the magistrate within and without the walls. It was no longer a civil contention between the nobles and the plebeians for the government of the state; the barons asserted in arms their personal independence; their palaces and castles were fortified against a siege; and their private quarrels were maintained by the numbers of their vassals and retainers. In origin and affection, they were aliens to their country; and a genuine Roman, could such have been produced, might have renounced these haughty strangers, who disdained the appellation of citizens, and proudly styled themselves the Princes of Romet. After a dark series of revolutions, all records of pedigree were lost; the distinction of surnames was abolished; the blood of the nations was mingled in a thousand channels; and the Goths and Lombards, the Greeks and Franks, the Germans and Normans, had obtained the fairest Padua, Genoa, &c. the analogy of the rest, the evidence of Otho of Frisingen, (de Gest. Fred. I. 1. ii. c. 13.), and the submission of the Marquis of Este. *As early as the year 824, the Emperor Lothaire I. found it expedient to interrogate the Roman people, to learn from each individual by what national law he chose to be governed, (Muratori, Dissert. xxii.). + Petrarch attacks these foreigners, the tyrants of Rome, in a declamation or epistle, full of bold truths and absurd pedantry, in which he applies the maxims, and even prejudices, of the old republic, to the state of the 14th century, (Memoires, tom. iii. p. 157—169.). LXIX. Family of Leo the fairest possessions by royal bounty, or the preroga. CHA P. tive of valour. These examples might be readily presumed; but the elevation of an Hebrew race to the rank of senators and consuls, is an event without a parallel in the long captivity of these miserable exiles. In the time of Leo the Ninth, a wealthy and learned Jew was converted to Christianity; and honoured at his baptism with the name of his godfather, the reigning Pope. The zeal and courage of Peter, the son of Leo, were signalised Jew. in the cause of Gregory the Seventh, who entrusted his faithful adherent with the government of Adrian's mole, the tower of Crescentius, or, as it is now called, the castle of St Angelo. Both the father and the son were the parents of a numerous progeny; their riches, the fruits of usury, were shared with the noblest families of the city; and so extensive was their alliance, that the grandson of the proselyte was exalted, by the weight of his kindred, to the throne of St Peter. A majority of the clergy and people supported his cause; he reigned several years in the Vatican, and it is only the eloquence of St Bernard, and the final triumph of Innocent the Second, that has branded Anacletus with the epithet of Antipope. After his defeat and death, the posterity of Leo is no longer conspicuous; and none will be found of the modern nobles ambitious * The origin and adventures of this Jewish family are noticed by Pagi, (Critica, tom. iv. p. 435. A. D. 1124, No. 3. 4.), who draws his information from the Chronographus Maurig-. niacensis, and Arnulphus Sagiensis de Schismate, (in Muratori Script. Ital. tom. iii. p. i. p. 423-432.). The fact must in some degree be true; yet I could wish that it had been coolly related, before it was turned into a reproach against the antipope. CHAP. bitious of descending from a Jewish stock. It is my design to enumerate the Roman families, LXIX. which have failed at different periods, or those which are continued in different degrees of splendour to the present time *. The old consular line of the Frangipani discover their name in the generous act of breaking or dividing bread in a time of famine; and such benevolence is more truly glorious than to have inclosed, with their allies the Corsi, a spacious quarter of the city in the chains of their fortifications; the Savelli, as it should seem a Sabine race, have maintained their original dignity; the obsolete surname of the Capizucchi is inscribed on the coins of the first senators; the Conti preserve the honour, without the estate, of the Counts of Signia; and the Annibaldi must have been very ignorant, or very modest, if they had not descended from the Carthaginian hero t. But among, perhaps above, the peers and princes of the city, I distinguish the rival houses of Muratori has given two dissertations (xli. and xlii.) to the names, surnames, and families of Italy. Some nobles, who glory in their domestic fables, may be offended with his firm and temperate criticism; yet surely some ounces of pure gold are of more value than many pounds of base metal. The cardinal of St George, in his poetical, or rather metrical, history of the election aud coronation of Boniface VIII. (Muratori, Script. Ital. tom. iii. p. i. p. 641. &c.), describes the state and families of Rome at the coronation of Boniface VIII. (A. D. 1295): Interea titulis redimiti sanguini et armis LXIX. of COLONNA and URSINI, whose private story is CHAP. an essential part of the annals of modern Rome. I. The name and arms of Colonna have been the theme of much doubtful etymology; nor have the orators and antiquarians overlooked either Trajan's pillar, or the columns of Hercules, or the pillar of Christ's flagellation, or the luminous column that guided the Issraelites in the desart. Their first historical appearance in the year eleven hundred and four, attests the power and antiquity, while it explains the simple meaning of the name. By the usurpation of Cave, the Colonna provoked the arms of Paschal the Second; but they lawfully held in the Campagna of Rome, the hereditary fiefs of Zagarola and Colonna; and the latter of these towns was probably adorned with some lofty pillar, the relic of a villa or temple t. They likewise possessed one moiety of the neighbouring city of Tusculum; a strong presumption of their descent from the Counts Ex ipsis devota domus præstantis ab Ursa of (1. ii. c. 5. 100. p. 647, 648.). The ancient statutes of Rome (1. iii. c. 59. p. 174, 175.) distinguish eleven families of barons, who are obliged to swear in concilio communi, before the senator, that they would not harbour or protect any malefactors, outlaws, &c.-a feeble security! It is pity that the Colonna themselves have not favoured the world with a complete and critical history of their illustrious house. I adhere to Muratori, (Dissert. xlii. tom. iii. p. 647, 648.). Pandulph. Pisan. in Vit. Paschal. II. in Muratori, Script. Ital. tom. iii. p. i. p. 335. The family has still great possessions in the Campagna of Rome; but they have alienated to the Rospigliosi this original fief of Colonna, (Eschinard, p. 258, 259.). LXIX. CHAP. of Tusculum, who in the tenth century were the tyrants of the apostolic see. According to their own and the public opinion, the primitive and remote source was derived from the banks of the Rhine * ; and the sovereigns of Germany were not ashamed of a real or fabulous affinity with a noble race, which in the revolutions of seven hundred years has been often illustrated by merit, and always by fortune f. About the end of the thirteenth century, the most powerful branch was composed of an uncle and six brothers, all conspicuous in arms, or in the honours of the church. Of these, Peter was elected senator of Rome, introduced to the Capitol in a triumphant car, and hailed in some vain acclamations with the title of Cæsar, while John and Stephen were declared Marquis of Ancona and Count of Romagna, by Nicholas the Fourth, a patron so partial to their family, that he has been delineated in satirical portraits, imprisoned as it were in a hollow pillar. After his decease, their haughty behaviour Te longinqua dedit tellus et pascua Rheni, says Petrarch; and, in 1417, a Duke of Guelders and Juliers acknowledges (l'Enfant, Hist. du Concile de Constance, tom. ii. p. 539.) his descent from the ancestors of Martin V. (Otho Colonna): but the royal author of the Memoirs of Brandenburg observes, that the sceptre in his arms has been confounded with the column. To maintain the Roman origin of the Colonna, it was ingeniously supposed, (Diario di Monaldeschi, in the Script. Ital. tom. xii. p. 533.), that a cousin of the Em peror Nero escaped from the city, and founded Mentz in Ger many. + I cannot overlook the Roman triumph or ovation of Marco Antonio Colonna, who had commanded the Pope's gallies at the naval victory of Lepanto, (Thuan. Hist. 1. vii. tom. iii. P. 55, 56. Muret. Oratio x. Opp. tom. i. p. 180-190.). Muratori, Annali d'Italia, tom. x. p. 216. 220. |