Chapter C: Ivlio (6)

Beyond the cathedral, and not far from the walls, is the church and convent of S. Francesco, consecrated in 1282 by Archbishop Lorenzo Periandro, according to an inscription on a pilaster in the choir. The choir contains a very fine set of stalls, made in 1394 by "Maestro Giovanni quondam Giacomo da Borgo San Sepolcro in Venezia," at a cost of 456 ducats of gold. They used to be in front of the altar, but were moved in 1808 when the new altar was put up. In the Cappella del Crocifisso is a large Carpaccio, an allegory of the militant and triumphant Church, with a row of portrait figures. It is in rather a bad state, painted in tempera on panel. In the sky is a pretty Madonna and Child in a vesica surrounded by angels. The rest of the sky has rows of angels in it, and below, on the earth, kneeling bishops, potentates, and others, with some nice little children in front. Between the two divisions is a landscape with a shrine in the centre, and the whole composition is contained in an upright oval, the corners being filled up with later painting. The usual white dog appears with a red collar-ribbon. The frame is well carved, but not architectural. In a side chapel is a S. Francis by Palma Giovane. The chapel of S. Carlo, once called degli Innocenti, can be entered either from the cloister or the church. In it is an enormous painted crucifix of wood in relief, with the Virgin and S. John half-length painted at the ends of the cross, and an angel above. It bears inscriptions in Greek and Latin, "ICTAVPOCIC" and "Rex Ivdeorvm," and, below the arms of Christ, "In me credentes ad me concvrrite gentes." It is believed to be of the tenth century, or even earlier. In the sacristy is a picture of 1430 on a gold ground in the original frame, restored at the emperor's expense. In the centre is the Madonna with the Child and little angels; on one side are SS. Jerome, Simeon, and James; on the other, SS. Peter Martyr, Nicholas, and Francis. A predella shows the twelve Apostles, with Christ in the centre. Above, in the centre, is Christ half-length, flanked by smaller nearly full-lengths of the Virgin and S. John; at each side three half-lengths of saints--left, SS, Martin, Stephen, and John the Baptist; right, a warrior, a bishop, and a man with green robe, and hat turned up in four pieces. The frame is fine, a blue ground and gilded arabesques. The church possesses four chalices of silver-gilt of the fourteenth or early fifteenth century. Two of them have elaborate knops with crocketed niches with figures, and one has the symbols of the Evangelists in high relief on the foot, with leaf-scrolls and big stars, the plan being octofoil. The finest has a sexfoil foot, and there are angular projections in both between the foils, and a pierced perpendicular band below. Upon the foot are six roundels, with Christ and saints in low relief, as if for _basse-taille_ enamel. The third has a knop with window tracery, pinnacles, and flying buttresses; on the foot, of a later date, are graceful leaf-arabesques, rather like the work of Aldegrever. The fourth is smaller and less elaborate. There are also some fifteenth-century psalters and antiphonaries. One of the three bells in the modern campanile is the oldest in Zara, dated 1328, and signed "Magister Beloa Viccentius." The tradition runs that S. Francis, going to or returning from the Holy Land in 1212, visited Dalmatia, and founded this monastery among others.

The church of S. Domenico (anciently S. Michele) has a pointed Venetian door, with a relief in the tympanum of S. Michael weighing souls, with the Devil pulling the scale down, an armed angel at one side, and a woman with a lighted taper at the other. On the lintel are a Virgin and Child, and several saints in little panels also spreading beyond on to the wall.

The Greek church, S. Elia, which the Servian orthodox Christians have had since the French invasion, is nearly opposite the cathedral. One year we were at Zara at the time when they were preparing to keep Easter. In front of the iconostasis was an "Entombment," surrounded with young grass amid which little lamps shone. The whole was covered with a canopy similar to that carried over the Host. It was delicate and pretty, and a great contrast to "Tombe," which we had seen in years gone by in Italy, and a few days before at Capodistria.

There were thirty churches in Zara, fifteen of which have been destroyed or given to different bodies. Seven are now Catholic, and four preserve their outward shape, but are secularised.

The Loggia, the open hall of justice, ascribed to Sanmichele in its original form, was restored shortly before the end of the Venetian rule. It is now the Paravia library. It has three arches between coupled Doric columns, and is still quite well preserved. The Palace of the Priors, the former rulers of the town, was enlarged by the addition of private houses for the residencas of the Venetian Count and the _provveditore_; while the commune had to be content with the corn-magazine, near S. Simeone, which is still the communal palace. When the Austrian governor followed the Venetian _provveditore_ the palace was restored and modernised. It is a Venetian building of 1562, with a clock-tower which was restored in 1798; the clock itself was put up in 1807.

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Nona is some hour-and-a-half's drive from Zara, for the greater part of the way over stony uplands with very little vegetation, but with extensive views over land and sea when the weather is fine. We were troubled by showers and a bitter wind, against which our overcoats were an insufficient protection; and we looked with some wonder at the herd boys and girls and other peasants whom we met, many of them barefoot and with no additional clothing to what they had found sufficient in the market the day before when the sun shone strongly. The town is now a mere village of some 500 inhabitants, and, though a few antique fragments may be seen, and the ruins of several churches of different periods, it is difficult to realise that it was once one of the most important towns in Dalmatia. It appears to have been a Roman port, and the head of one of the roads to Byzantium across Dalmatia--an ancient Liburnian city, the great prosperity of which, at the end of the first century A.D., is attested by the coins found here. It was called Ænona and Ænonium by Pliny and Ptolemy, Nona by Porphyrogenitus. Destroyed by the Slavs in the seventh century, re-occupied and restored by another branch, the dukes and kings of Croatia made it one of the thirteen Dalmatian "zupanje." Later it belonged at intervals to the King of Hungary and to Venice, and after 1409 remained in the power of the latter. In 1357 Count Giustiniani valiantly but vainly defended it against the Hungarians, when the garrison was reduced to such straits by famine that they had to eat their horses. It was twice burnt to prevent it from falling into Turkish hands and being utilised as an outpost, in 1571 and 1646. The harbour has silted up, and only a small piece of the walls is traceable. Of the Venetian dominion the only remains are the entrance gateway, with the lion of S. Mark above it, and the "Stabilimento," founded in 1786 by Girolamo Manfrin for the cultivation of tobacco, but ruined by a fire, and no longer used for that purpose.

The Christian Church in Nona is said to have been founded by S. Anselm in 117 A.D. Under the Croats it had a bishop and a chapter. The ancient church of S. Croce was the cathedral, a small cruciform church with three apses in the eastward wall, and a dome over the crossing. It is 30 ft. long, and each arm of the cross is 10 ft. wide. The dome has a flat-pointed vault and windows, while the nave and transepts have wagon vaults terminating in half-cupolas. To the west is a lintelled door, with consecration crosses on the jambs and carving of the ninth century on the lintel. A Slavonic inscription upon it (inside) has been read "Godeslav Juppano Ch[risto] Domo Co[nservat]." The breaking of the upper angles of the carved portion, and the difference in the character of the crosses on lintel and jambs indicate the use of early material in a later rebuilding; but the church is considered one of the oldest in Dalmatia. From 1697 it served as an oratory to the Count of Nona, being near his palace. Its bell (hung in the gable above the west door) served to call the people together for public meetings, &c. The eastern apse has a blank arcading on its exterior, which is square, and the same kind of ornament occurs on the drum which conceals the dome. There are three windows in the west wall, and others in the transept walls and gable. The church was restored some seven or eight years ago, as well as the somewhat similar church of S. Nicolò outside the town.

The parish church of S. Anselmo was the mediæval cathedral, rebuilt during the eighteenth century. Close to it is another church, once dedicated to S. Ambrogio, and now to the Madonna. In the treasury are various interesting pieces of goldsmith's work kept in a marble chest with glazed front and gilded metal door. When we were there the priest was enjoying his siesta, and, though we were in charge of an official from the town-hall, we were unsuccessful in rousing him from his slumbers. I therefore take the description of them from Bianchi, as I was not able to examine them critically. There are two caskets of silver-gilt with the heads of S. Anselm and his sister, S. Marcella, made by the same goldsmith. On the front are Christ, the Virgin, and S. John in relief, with a frieze of a hunting subject, the figures beneath trefoiled arches on twisted columns; on the back, SS. Anselm, Ambrose, and Marcella; on the ends, SS. Peter and Paul, and a king and queen. Bianchi says these are thirteenth century; Mr. T.G. Jackson says fifteenth, which is more likely. On the lids are the symbols of the Evangelists. Two other reliquaries contain the shoulder-blades of S. Anselm. On the front are figures of the three protectors full-length. An arm reliquary has pagan subjects in relief, and is set with precious stones. An inscription gives the name of Simeon the goldsmith, and the Bano Paolo (Lord of Bosnia also at the end of the thirteenth and beginning of the fourteenth centuries). Two reliquaries of the feet of S. Anselm, given by Radoslav Utusano, chancellor of the Bano Paolo, and _zupan_ of the church of Nona, are dated 1309. There are two other reliquaries: one of SS. Giacomo and Orontius, with three medallions of saints; and the other with the Evangelists' symbols. Mr. T.G. Jackson also saw two crosses and a sixteenth-century chalice. I particularly regretted being unable to see the wooden area of S. Marcella, which is a very remarkable example of early Christian art. Bianchi says that it is varnished, and has eleven compartments, with figures in high relief. One is entitled S. Barbara--the first on the left. Then come a king with a double cross, S. Luke's ox, S. Marcella, S. Matthew's angel, the Virgin and Child, S. Mark's lion, S. Ambrose, S. John's eagle, and a queen with a lily in her hand. The eleventh compartment is not recognisable.

North of the parish church are remains of a Roman temple, and an antique cap or two may be seen. In a private house are remains of a bath and a mosaic pavement. The ruined church of S. Michele stands on the site of the Roman arena. Antique fragments are also recognisable in the walls of S. Nicolò. There are several ruined churches which appear to be of the thirteenth or fourteenth centuries. Some of them have been altered at a later period, but they contain nothing of first-rate interest. Nona had sixteen in the Middle Ages. We walked out to S. Nicolò, an early church, which crowns a hillock thickly sown with asphodels in blossom, some little distance from the road and a mile or so from Nona. It is cruciform in plan, with apsidal terminations to three arms, the west being square, and having a door with a semicircular tympanum above it internally. Squinches in the angles serve as transition to the semi-dome which covers each arm. From the pilasters between the apses cross arches spring beneath a domical vault with a pendant at their intersection; in the left pilaster by the apse is a recess. The central tower is octagonal and turreted; beneath the apse eaves are rough corbels, the door has a semicircular tympanum externally, little brackets supporting nothing, and the jambs and lintel are put together rather as if the material were wood. The church is probably of the eleventh century.

Borgo Erizzo, an Albanian village, lies but a short distance from Zara. In the eighteenth century the atrocities of Mehmed Begovich, pasha of Albania, perpetrated on the Catholics, being very great, some of them emigrated, seeking the protection of Vincenzo Zmajevich, bishop of Antivari, who was living at his native city of Perasto. A little later (1726) he became archbishop of Zara, and brought twenty-seven families of Albanians with him, recommending them to the protection of Count Erizzo, commandant of the fortress, who assigned them land near the city, where they flourished and increased. There are now about 3,000 of them. The church, which appears to be in a dangerous condition, was built for them by Zmajevich. The girls work in the factories till they marry, after which they remain at home. The men are agriculturists, and some own fields and vineyards seven or eight miles away, to which they walk or go in carts. The village is dirty and not very picturesque. They get their drinking-water from the Kaiser Brunnen, a spring covered with a dome close to the sea, said to be a Roman erection. Sailors also water there. Before the aqueduct was restored, in years of drought Zara had to import water, and in 1828, 1834, and 1835 it was brought from the Kerka by Scardona.

Zara Vecchia, formerly Alba or Belgrad, is some eighteen miles down the coast. Here Coloman of Hungary, nephew of S. Ladislas, was crowned in 1102. The "porto d'oro" is all that remains of a palace built by Bishop Valaresso, with its foundations in the sea. Mention of the place is infrequent. Towards the middle of the eleventh century Crescimeno Pietro, third king of Croatia, assigned a prebend to the Benedictines of Zara Vecchia. In 1092 Busita, daughter of Roger I., Count of Sicily and Durazzo, and wife of Coloman, king of Hungary, came here accompanied by Geoffrey Malaterra. In 1114 Ordelaffo Faliero took it, and in 1115 it was destroyed to the foundations by Domenico Michieli. Some of the inhabitants, with the bishop and clergy, fled to Scardona; the rest, with the notables, to Sebenico. The nuns escaped to Zara, and the Benedictines crossed to Tkon in the island of Pasman, where they still are.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: Mgr. Bianchi has found the names of Madius and Zella in documents of 1067 and 1096, and that of "Sergius tribunus" in one of 1091.]

XIX

SEBENICO

Sebenico lies within a fine harbour at the mouth of the Kerka, some six hours from Zara. The entrance to the bay is defended by the strong fort S. Nicolò, which bears the lion of S. Mark upon the landward side, showing that Venice ruled when it was built in 1540 (according to tradition, from Sanmichele's designs), though the actual sculpture is a replacement of 1824 of the original thrown into the sea by the French in 1813. During the Italian struggle for freedom and unity many patriots were shut up in the damp dungeons of this fort by the Austrians. Within the strait, the Canale di S. Antonio, there is shelter for a large fleet; and it is reported that the Austrian Government intends to make it into a naval arsenal (of which the commencement may be seen in some very ugly buildings to the left of the town). Sebenico is commanded by three castles, from the highest of which, that of S. Giovanni, constructed in 1646, a splendid view over town, bay, and islands rewards the labour of the climb. The next is Fort Barone, so named after Baron Degenfeldt, the gallant defender of the city against 20,000 Turks in 1647. It is now abandoned and in ruins. The third is Fort S. Anna, which crowns the hill just above the houses. This is thought to occupy the site of a king's castle mentioned in 1066. Fort S. Giovanni and the walls, of which a great portion of the circuit still remains, were restored in 1837. These walls are for the most part the work of kings of Hungary, though the Venetians added to them. The sea suburb the Borgo di Mare is probably the oldest portion of the place; that on the land side, the Borgo di Terra, grew up with the need for the shelter of the fortress during the Turkish wars.

In 1117 the town was taken and destroyed by Ordelaffo Faliero; but in 1127, when Zara Vecchia was razed to the ground by Domenico Michieli, and the bishop and clergy were removed to Scardona, the bulk of the population took refuge at Sebenico. It was a pirate city, and there was continual strife between it and Traù. Until 1167 it was only a small place, but in that year Stephen III. of Hungary gave it the title of "city." Lago, however, says that it was only a "castello" till 1298, when the bishopric was established by Boniface VIII. in consequence of the representations of the archbishops of Zara and Spalato, and of Queen Maria of Hungary. The first bishop was Martin of Arbe. When he was consecrated, the ceremony took place in the piazza, because the church was not large enough. In 1412 the chapter was allowed to choose its own bishop; and the town and church authorities became responsible for law and order throughout certain defined territories. The city seals bear either an angel with nimbus standing on a dragon, and holding in his right hand an upright sword, and in his left an orb, or a half-length of a similar angel, holding an orb in his left hand and a sloping sceptre in his right, with the sun on one side, and a crescent moon on the other; above a city with a central gate and two side towers, with windows on each side.

Sebenico owes its chief celebrity perhaps to its cathedral, the _chef d'oeuvre_ of Giorgio Orsini, known as George of Sebenico, an architect of exceptional genius, whose work may also be seen at Spalato, Ragusa, probably at Ossero, and at Ancona on the other side of the Adriatic. His father was known as Matteo of Zara, and was also a stonemason, as George proudly announced himself to be when he carved upon the door of his house a mallet and chisels hung with garlands which are supported in the centre of the lintel by the bear, the cognizance of the noble house which acknowledged his grandson as a relation.

When it was determined to rebuild the cathedral on a larger scale in 1402, the bishop and council of forty-five nobles made provision in various ways for the work. The territory of Vodizze was assigned for the purpose, the bishop gave half of the tithes, fines inflicted were to go to the fund, notaries were charged to remind testators to leave something to the fabric, &c. If the community of Sebenico went back from their promises they were to be fined 1,000 golden ducats. When the towers protecting the mouth of the port were rebuilt in 1409 the Venetians seized the stone prepared for the cathedral, but subsequently paid 80 ducats of gold as compensation. The city became Venetian in 1412. In 1430, after some wavering, it was decided to add the bishop's palace and the street between it and the church to the cathedral site. The building was commenced in 1431, under Antonio, son of Pietro Paolo Massegna, in the Gothic style as understood by the Venetians; but in 1441 he was superseded by Giorgio Orsini with a six years' engagement, on the strength of a design which he had made showing how he proposed to complete the building. The west door with its scroll-work of exaggerated curvature, its pinnacled canopies supported on twisted columns, and figures of various degrees of excellence, shows Antonio's capacity and his limitations. The side door, which is rather simpler and in better proportion, is in much the same style, but has foolish-looking lions on brackets beneath the columns outside the door, with figures of Adam and Eve interposed between the columns and the canopied tabernacles above, which bear great resemblance to those in a similar position at Traù. The pointed and cusped cornice of interlacing arches, surmounted by a cable moulding, which continues to the end of the transept wall, seems to show that the building had advanced as far as this point when Giorgio appeared upon the scene in 1441. The arms of the Venetian rectors also afford indications of the progress and intermissions of the work.

In the tracery of the windows of the central apse a modification of a graceful Gothic pattern has been employed, resembling patterns used in the campanile at Traù, combined with classic pilasters and colonnette forms, but the greater part of the rest of the building is early Renaissance. The aisles are roofed with a half-wagon vault above the quadripartite pointed vaulting, forming a kind of triforium, which is, however, inaccessible; the chapels at the sides of the choir have the semicircular form of the roof of the nave and choir, perhaps suggested by the temple at Spalato, now known as the baptistery; and the east end is tri-apsidal, the apses being polygonal, but roofed with a semi-dome. All these forms are evident externally, the joints of the roofing slabs being covered by an ornamented band answering to the internal supporting rib. The external sculpture is in the main restrained and delicate, and the general proportions are excellent. The angle pier at the north-east of the north transept has the simplicity of its outline destroyed to provide place for figure sculpture and the dedicatory inscription, and the string dividing the stylobate from the principal stage bears a curious decoration of heads in the round; but these are slight blemishes amid much beauty. The heads have a good deal of character, and some may be portraits of the architect's assistants. The same _motif_ occurs round the square-headed door of S. Francesco alle Scale, Ancona. The construction of the semi-domes and of the roofs shows that Giorgio was a competent constructor; but the inventive and beautiful treatment of the decoration of the choir shows him as something more. The graceful singing-galleries at each side, terminating in the curved ambos attached to the main piers of the dome, are very delicate and beautiful; the lofty proportions of the nave and choir are impressive; and the little baptistery, with its curious mingling of Gothic and Renaissance forms, is quaint and ingenious, if not very pure in style.

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In 1444 Giorgio went to Spalato to build the chapel of S. Ranier in the church of S. Benedetto, which was to have been finished in two years, but it was nearly four before the donor was satisfied. The price was 306 ducats of gold. It no longer exists. After his first contract expired at Sebenico, where the work apparently progressed very slowly, he went again to Spalato in 1448 to make the chapel of S. Anastasius in the cathedral. Here he had to compete with the work of Gaspare Bonino of Milan, who had made the corresponding chapel on the other side in 1427. They are both rather late Gothic in style. In 1449 he returned to Sebenico, his contract with the chapter having been renewed in 1446 for ten years at an advance of five ducats. The first contract was for six years, at a salary of 115 ducats. In a notice of 1450 from Zara, he is thus referred to: "Mistro Zorzi, taglia pietra, proto alia fabbrica della chiesa di S. Giacomo di Sebenico." The contract for the sacristy is dated March I, 1452. It cost 600 ducats. He was at Ancona in 1451, when he undertook the façade of the Loggia de' Mercanti, an ornate work, which took eight years to build, and has several details resembling those parts of the cathedral, Sebenico, which are ascribed to Massegna. In 1556 it was burnt, and was restored by Tipaldi. Barnabei, a contemporary writer, states that Giorgio also built the adjoining Palazzo Benincasa. He must have gone backwards and forwards between Italy and Dalmatia, for in 1455, while he was under contract with the Sebenico authorities, he completed the fine façade of S. Francesco alle Scale, Ancona, receiving a bonus of 70 ducats above the price, according to Lando Feretti. The church was built in 1323. The monastery is now half barracks and half hospital. Between 1455 and 1459, the façade of S. Agostino in the same town was built as an addition to a church of 1338, which also is now a barrack. The foliage, twisted columns, and canopies are a good deal like the earlier work at Sebenico. In 1460, Giorgio returned to Sebenico, but in 1464 and 1465 was at Ragusa, where he helped in building the Torre Menze, and in restoring the palace of the Rectors. The next year he was at Pago, improving and enlarging the courtyard of the bishop's palace. It was the Bishop of Ossero, who thought he was going to obtain the removal of the see to Pago, but failed to do so. The façade of the cathedral at Ossero has been ascribed to him, and there is nothing in its design to make his authorship impossible. In the next year he undertook work on the façade of the Cappella Grande of the parish church at Pago. In 1470 he went to Rome, where his compatriot Giovanni Dalmato, the sculptor, of Traù, was at work on the monument of Paul II. He went as representative of the procurators to Paul II., in reference to certain charities left by Bishop Vignacco, who died at Porto, near Rome. In 1472 it is stated that he had let all the houses which he had in the Venetian dominions. In this year he commenced the façade of S. Maria, Cittanova, in the Marche. During his frequent absences from home, his Venetian wife Elizabeth looked after his affairs, apparently having a power of attorney. He had many pupils, some of whom continued to work on the cathedral at Sebenico after his death in 1476.

The cost of the building is stated to have been 80,000 Venetian ducats of gold. It was thoroughly restored between 1843 and 1860; seven out of the fourteen caps of the nave arcade have been replaced, and a good deal of the framing of the panelling of red marble above. At each side of the west door are monuments to bishops, and also at each side of the choir steps. The slabs are sloping, and bear figures in relief. That on the right of the door is Bishop Sisgoreo's, made under Giorgio's direction, with an inscription added in 1874 by a descendant. The tomb of Lucio Stafileo ([Symbol: cross]1557). under whom the cathedral was reconsecrated, is to the north. Those at the entrance to the choir are Luca Spignaroli ([Symbol: cross]1589) to the left, and Domenico Calegari ([Symbol: cross]1722) to the right. The choir is raised six steps above the level of the nave, and the sanctuary seven steps higher still.

At the time of Giorgio's death the work had progressed as far as the roofing in of the apses, if one may trust the arms of Bishop de Tollentis (elected in 1468), placed above the upper arch of the transept; while upon the external arch to the north are those of Count Captain Piero Canal, who left in 1470; and on the arch of the central apse inside, behind the sculptured bust representing God the Father, are those of Count Captain Girolamo Pesaro, who began to rule in 1476. At that time, therefore, the nave and cupola remained to be completed. Upon the cupola there are no arms. Those of Count Nicolò Mulla on the clerestory north wall show that it was finished to the cornice in 1491-1493. Those of Nicolò Navager, who died 1489, fastened with iron clamps in the same place, suggest that it was not completed at his death, though it was probably in course of construction. The arms of Count Andrea Gritti, captain in 1534-1537, on the summit of the façade, show that the western end of the vault was completed by Giovanni Masticevich in 1536. The western rose (at which Giacomo, son of Matteo da Mestre, capo mastro, 1528-1535, was working in 1531) has Gothic cusped arches to the radiating bars, but the mouldings round are Renaissance, as are the angle pilasters to the nave wall and the pateræ decorating the quarter-circles of the aisles. The fluted pilasters of the dome are in harmony with the pilasters of the open gallery above the nave arcade. The pointed arches, which were certainly finished in 1444, are probably Massegna's work, though the leafy cornice above bears great resemblance to carving for which Giorgio was responsible at Ancona.

The baptistery is a queer little building at the eastern end of the south aisle, and one of the entrances to the cathedral is through it. The font has a bowl and base of variegated marble, like that used at Veglia, very flat in shape and unmoulded, supported by three _amorini_, carved in Istrian stone, who stand round the supporting stem. The plan of the building is cruciform, the arms of the cross being semicircular niches which have shell-heads. The wall above them has Gothic tracery, on the eastern side pierced to give light. The ribs at the angles are supported on engaged columns, above which are Gothic figures beneath canopies, of which two, David and Simeon, remain; the other two were destroyed or stolen, I understand, by thieves who broke into the building. The figures bend forward awkwardly beneath the curve of the vault, which becomes domical, with angels and cherubs upon it. The boss in the centre bears a head of God the Father and the Holy Dove, with an inscription round the edge: "Hic est filius meus," &c.

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The question of the part played by Giorgio in the construction of the cathedral is difficult to decide, being complicated by the mixture of styles and the possibly later insertion of several of the coats of arms of the rectors and bishops. The western piers of the crossing are considered to be part of the earlier work, because of the close resemblance of the carved foliage to Venetian-Gothic ornament; but it must be remembered that Giorgio was trained in Venice, just as Massegna was, and would be familiar with such work. Foliage of similar style occurs in domestic work at Traù, and in other places along the coast, so that it is scarcely safe to consider it the sign-manual of any one sculptor. The time from 1441, when he signed a contract for six years, to 1443 was spent in widening the street to allow of the eastward extension of the church. On June 16, 1442, the demand for the rebuilding of the façade of the count's palace (which was on the other side) was formally made for the bishop, procurators, and chapter. This additional space was necessitated by the design of the apse, &c., as laid down in Giorgio's plan, and still existing.[2] The Gothic character of the domestic doorway illustrated, with the late form of shield in the tympanum, shows that such forms lingered late in Dalmatia. The same may be said of the design of the rose-window, finished in 1531, and of similar details which occur in undoubted work by Giorgio in Ancona.

The door of the lions in the north aisle is quite Gothic in character, yet the arms above it are those of Leonardo Vernier (1453-1454), Bishop George Sisgoreo ([Symbol: cross]1453), and of Bishop Vignacco (elected 1454), apparently fixing its date thirteen years after Massegna had received his _congé_. If it be contended that these arms are a later insertion, which the arrangement of the masonry makes possible, the value of all the coats of arms as fixing the dates of the portions of the building on which they occur must be discounted. The design of the lowest portions of the shafts in the right-hand jamb is different and apparently later than the rest of the work, and the foliage on the brackets beneath the lions also is very different from the fine caps to the west of the crossing, so that one scarcely likes to assume that they are by the same hand. Upon the pier, above one of the capitals attributed to Giorgio, which has been compared disparagingly with the caps last named, is the date 1524. This is below the level of the door of the sacristy, which we know Giorgio built, and one would assume that the pier must be anterior to the door, as the construction of the sacristy would scarcely precede the roofing in of the aisle from which it is entered. Moreover, the baptistery is beneath the apse which terminates this aisle, and it was certainly completed in 1452, since it is mentioned in the contract for the sacristy. The mixture of Gothic and Renaissance forms is characteristic of Giorgio's work throughout; and it is difficult to agree wholly either with Mgr. Fosco or Mr. T.G. Jackson in the different conclusions on this subject which they draw from the same data. The fact of Massegna having been dismissed on the definite ground of errors made and defects discovered, with the additional complaint of the throwing away of money upon ornament, suggests that the earlier portion was not left as we now see it by the first architect, of whom Mr. Jackson says: "To us there seems no fault in the design of Antonio." The design of the western pair of caps of the piers at the crossing is as different from that of the nave caps, which are certainly Massegna's, as from that of the two eastern piers. Mr. Jackson says, probably quite rightly, that the torus moulding decorated with the laurel above the leaf cornice of the nave marks the commencement of Giorgio's work in that part; the same moulding occurs in the same relative position in the ambos to which he assigns the date of 1547: and one does not quite understand why the same detail should not have the same origin in both places. The only contract of 1547, quoted by Mgr. Fosco, is one with "Checcus" of Padua for 350 squared paving-stones and for laying them.

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Whatever part George of Sebenico had in the construction he must be classed with the great architectural designers. Leo Battista Alberti commenced the recasing of S. Francesco, Rimini, which is generally quoted as the earliest Renaissance work in Italy, in 1446, and the stone for the work was imported from Istria. In that year Giorgio's first contract was renewed for ten years. The Lombardi were then only commencing their work. S. Zaccaria at Venice was built by Martino in 1456, and the Scuola di S. Marco in 1485. Pietro was engaged on the Madonna dei Miracoli in 1483. So that Giorgio's work antedates theirs by some years. He had numerous pupils, whose names have been recorded; the other workmen came from Durazzo, Curzola, and Spalato. The best known of them, Andrea Alexis, the Albanian of Durazzo, was much employed in Spalato, Arbe, and Traù.

The votive church of S. Salvatore, just inside the Porta Pile, Ragusa, built in 1522 after the earthquake of 1520, and designed by Bartolommeo da Mestre, master mason at Sebenico in 1528, bears considerable resemblance to the cathedral.

The door of Giorgio's house is beyond that of the sacristan, in a narrow street, the Contrada S. Gregorio. To reach it, one leaves the piazza by a slope beyond the Loggia, the ancient palace of the council of the Nobles, a building of 1522, now a social club. The slope affords a view of the enclosure in which the "vere" of the communal wells still remain, four circular well-heads, with the symbols of the Evangelists and coats of arms in roundels upon them, surrounded by cable mouldings, four on each. Sebenico now has a fine water-supply brought from the Kerka, twelve miles away, and they are no longer in use. The aqueduct--the first constructed in Dalmatia in modern times--is named the Lott-Brunnen, in commemoration of the clever engineer who designed it.

Near the cathedral is the little church of S. Barbara; the bell-turret on the wall is used as its campanile. In the north wall is an ogee-headed window, deeply splayed and with pretty tracery; below it a little shrine to the Virgin is set most oddly, with an arch projecting up into the window space. A little higher up the street is the fine Venetian door illustrated a few pages back, with columns and pinnacles, and returning wall with elaborately shaped battlements. At the church of S. Giovanni Battista is a fine external stair of fourteenth-century Venetian type, a double flight returning on itself, with a landing at the change of direction. The balustrade is continued round the side of the church and the tower, but with square unmoulded shafts in place of the colonnettes. The trefoiled heads are cut in the rail with the carved spandrils between. There are many pieces of sculpture of the Venetian period, windows, balconies, &c., in the walls here and there, and wheel-windows occur with quatrefoils filling the heads of the spaces next the circumference.

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There are also a few pictures to be seen. In the cathedral is an Andrea Schiavone (who died here in 1582), "The Adoration of the Three Kings." In S. Domenico alla Marina there are said to be fine Renaissance altars, and pictures by Lorenzo Lotto, Palma Giovane, and Marco Vecellio. We did not see them, as, on the occasion of both our visits to Sebenico, the church was being restored or rebuilt. The interior of S. Francesco is harmonious. It was in the archives of this convent that Mgr. Bulic discovered a gradual written on parchment of the ninth or tenth century, which had been brought from S. Maria di Bribir in 1527.

The Greek church has a very interesting belfry of late Renaissance style in the gable; two arches with projecting semicircular pierced balustrades for the ringers, and the bells (which are clappered) hanging in the free space beneath the arch above. A third bell is in a higher arch without the balustrading. The Greek Christians celebrate the Church festivals with processions about the town, treated with great respect by their Roman Catholic fellow-citizens, of which one held on the Assumption may be described as typical. Boys and girls with garlands led the way, followed by women with coloured aprons and voluminous draperies. Then came a band in gay uniforms and plumed head-gear, then priests in vestments of cloth of gold, swinging silver censers, or bearing holy pictures; they were big men of fine appearance, with religious earnestness in their faces. In the middle, under a silken canopy with gold fringes, a higher ecclesiastic walked, a venerable figure, with long silver hair and beard, bearing the most holy object and looking like a high-priest, surrounded as he was with clouds of incense. After the priests came a long line of men in country costume, powerful figures with flashing eyes, and faces full of character. They held themselves upright like soldiers, and bore large white tapers fastened four together. The sides of the narrow streets were lined with Roman Catholics who looked on with sympathetic interest at the religious ceremonies of their fellow-citizens of a different creed, an example which might be commended to sects nearer home.

The people are hospitable, and very generous, but proud, and, like the Spaniards, easily moved both to acts of violence and kindness. There is no nobility, the patrician families being either extinct or impoverished, partly owing to a severe epidemic of smallpox which smote the town in 1872. The men wear a ridiculous small red cap, like that worn at Zara, but smaller, often requiring an elastic round the back of the head to keep it on, and waistcoats and coats ornamented with large silver buttons of filigree work (older examples of which are works of art, but the modern mere articles of commerce). The collar is curious, with a facing of red or black worsted, apparently intended to imitate fur (shown in the drawing of the costume). The trousers are dark blue, with a slit towards the ankle, laced up with silver wire, and strong shoes are worn with turned-up toes covered with hide lacings. The women have a white head-dress, a cloth twisted round and fastened to the hair in the manner of that worn at Lussin Piccolo. One of the waiters at the restaurant who came from Spalato, but whose side-whiskers stamped him as an Austrian, told us he had been in Glasgow and other British towns--a rather unusual thing with the men of his class, though many of the sailors are acquainted with British ports. The dustmen reminded one of the days of one's childhood when in England; they went round ringing a bell and calling "Dust-ooh!" At the sound all kinds of refuse were brought out to the cart, which went slowly along the narrow street.

Sebenico was the birthplace of the celebrated Nicolò Tommaseo, to whom a statue has been erected in the public garden below the piazza, where Sanmichele's gate stands. He was born in 1802, and was philologist, philosopher, historian, poet, novelist, critic, psychologist, statist, politician, and orator, leaving behind him, when he died in 1874, some two hundred works. In its time of prosperity the city owned several islands, of which Zlarin is the most populous and the richest.

Sebenico is the usual starting-point for the excursion to the Kerka falls; and, on the arrival of the boat, tourists make arrangements to share carriages. It is a drive of about twelve miles, through a barren, stony land, till one reaches the park-like country along the banks of the river. The falls can also easily be reached from Scardona, to which a little steamboat runs in the morning; but there is none back in the afternoon, so those who are pressed for time generally drive. Scardona is an ancient city mentioned by Pliny as a principal market-town of Liburnia. The ruins which remain are late Roman. In the Middle Ages, Venice, Hungary, and Turkey all coveted it, and it suffered accordingly. In 1411 it became Venetian, in 1522 was sacked by the Turks, and retaken by the Venetians in 1537. The fortifications were destroyed, and the town abandoned and afterwards burnt; but the Turks held it till 1684, when they finally evacuated it. The falls are about three-quarters of an hour's walk away up the river, which was the ancient boundary between Liburnia and Dalmatia. They form its final plunge to sea level, for two tributaries join it, one on each side of Scardona, where it virtually becomes an estuary. The water precipitates itself over five terraces some 300 ft. wide, a magnified artificial cascade with a fall of 150 ft. The main fall occupies the centre of the stream, and is slightly horseshoe in shape; to the right and left are numerous smaller cascades with a little island between. Many partly artificial channels conduct the water to flour and fulling mills on both sides of the stream, of which there are some fifty, the sound of the mill-wheels and the fulling-hammers mingling with the rush of the waters. On the Sebenico side are a mill for insect-powder made from the pyrethrum, and the pumping-house for the water-supply of the city, the power for the electric lighting being also generated here. The mills are not so busy as they used to be, for the Hungarian and Russian flour is driving the home product out of the market. The spray from the falls rises high in the air, and bathes the overhanging trees and reeds, keeping the neighbouring rocks clothed with ferns.

After dinner we strolled along the quay to the south of Sebenico. There was no moon, and the stars were not as brilliant as they sometimes are in these southerly latitudes, making it rather difficult to pick one's way among the mysterious darknesses, which meant obstacles of one kind or another. As we rounded a corner a lamp or two flashed in our eyes from the other side of a little cove, and sparkled in broken lights upon the uneasy wavelets which splashed and tinkled against the sides of several coasting-vessels moored near at hand. The semi-silence of the night was broken by musical sounds, scarcely melody, but an uneven kind of chant, commencing in unison, and dying away in a prolonged melancholy, wailing chord, swelling and falling, almost like the notes produced by an Æolian harp as the wind sweeps over its strings. The glow of light which showed the door of a wine-shop across the water marked where the singers were enjoying their melancholy music, which, in its formlessness and dying cadences, was in strange harmony with the shapeless undulating dark masses, which by day were rocky islands sparsely clad with trees, now only relieved by the glimmer of the paler water, whose lapping formed an undertone to the stronger notes of the voices.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 2: Mgr. Fosco states that Giorgio submitted a plan of his proposed work, with cupola, apses, and transepts, with the little choirs--possibly a model, such as we know he prepared at the time the contract for the sacristy was signed.]

XX

TRAÙ AND THE RIVIERA DEI SETTE CASTELLI

From Sebenico, Spalato can be reached either by boat or by rail. On our first visit we chose the train, since it gave us greater choice of times for making the journey. The railway stations are generally far away from the piers; we had observed this at Pola and Parenzo, and the same thing occurs at Sebenico. The hotel porters are not allowed to carry baggage to and from the steamers or the station; we were told there was a law against it, which a man sitting by said was just enough, for the odd-job men must live! The retrospect from the railway is fine. The southern end of the inlet is in the foreground, with a training-ship upon it; the city on its hill lies to the right, crowned by Fort S. Anna, and higher still the Fort S. Giovanni; while to the left is the other portion of the inlet which stretches towards Scardona and to the entrance, dotted with islands and terminated by low hills. A bright sun illumined the whole scene, increasing the lustre of the rocks and buildings, which contrasted sharply with the colour of the sea, blue as the luminous over-arching sky it reflected.

The line climbs slowly up the slopes of Monte Dinara, towards Perkovic-Slivno, the junction for Knin through a rather stony landscape above rich and well-cultivated valleys. The hills in the middle-distance look barren, but the foreground is interesting on account of the variety of broken forms caused by projecting rocks and stones. It is starred with green humps, and there are trees in places. The humps are stunted growths of juniper, sloe, bramble, hawthorn, or a trifoliate plant, with grass growing in the shadow. The trees are hawthorns, ilex, olive, fig, almond, chestnut, mountain ash, hornbeam, or elm, and I thought I saw oak, though it is said that it does not grow in Dalmatia. Colour was added by many flowers, orchids, iris, yellow daisies, asphodel, and fields of pink pyrethrum; while the dresses of groups of peasants on their way to or from Mass gave brilliant patches of reds and blues. Vines grew in pockets of earth among the rocks from which loose stones had been collected to build rough terrace walls.

At Perkovic-Slivno, the song ol nightingales beguiled the tedium of waiting, shut within a barrier, for the train from Knin, for one is not allowed to stray about until the train arrives. After a little further climbing, the summit of the range was pierced, and the lovely Riviera of the Castelli lay spread before us far below. The long island of Bua stretched towards the strait, by which the ancient port of Salona was approached; a land-locked bay, from the other side of which above the peninsula of Monte Marjan rose the campanile of the cathedral of Spalato, swathed in the scaffolding of its long-continuing restoration; beyond was the sea, with the southern islands in the distance, and the littoral chain growing pale in aerial perspective. It formed an enchanting whole, equalling views which have a world-wide reputation, opalescent in the morning sunlight, with pale purples, blues, and greens thrown like a veil over the rich soil and the grey limestone of the mountains. The line descends rapidly, too rapidly for one's desires, and approaches the shore near the fourth of the castelli, rounds the bay in which Vranjic lies, passing beneath Salona, and, crossing the Jader, arrives at the Spalato station through cuttings which prevent one from seeing anything of the palace wall.

On other occasions we went by boat, reaching Spalato in the evening. After the Punta Planka, the ancient Promontorium Syrtis is passed, where the water is often rough, since there is no protecting screen of islands, the campanili and towers of Traù come into sight, between which and Bua there is a swing bridge across the channel. Beyond this the boat passes under the lee of Bua, on the shore of which is a solitary white monastery; whilst on the opposite shore the buildings of the Castelli throw long tremulous reflections across the water, and boats with sails painted in various colours and patterns pass to right and left, flushed with the rays of the setting sun, and leaving trails of light or dark behind them according as the water reflects the land or the sky. As the sun sinks lower, leaving the sea in shadow, the glow upon the hills becomes more and more roseate, till at last it fades, as the strait is passed and the harbour opens. The smoke from a cement factory hangs in the air like evening mists in an English valley; and, as we approach still nearer, the long line of buildings upon the quays, dominated by the great campanile and the colonnade of Diocletian's palace, gradually grows more impressive in the failing light.

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It is distinctly asserted by Strabo that Traù, the ancient Tragurium, was founded in the fourth century B.C.. by Greek Sicilians from Lissa. At a later date it was certainly a Roman colony. After the fall of the Western empire it was subject to the emperors of Byzantium, and for forty years or so in the ninth century to the Franks, after which Hungarians, Byzantines, Genoese, and Croats struggled for it, till in 1420 it was taken by Venice. Its first privilege was granted by Coloman of Hungary in 1108, renewed and amplified by Stephen in 1124, Geysa III. in 1151, and Bela III. in 1182. Bela IV., with his family, treasures, and a brilliant following, took refuge here in 1241 from the Tartar hordes. He was received with due honours, and conceded in return the confirmation of ancient privileges, &c. The city was mainly Slav during the Middle Ages, and, on the whole, was happy and peaceful under Hungarian rule, though sacked by the Saracens in 1123, and by the Venetians in 1194, under the leadership of Vitale Michiele. Between 1322 and 1358 it belonged to the Venetians.