Alexander Farnese, Duke of Parma

“ Julius, who was anxious to be on good terms with Charles on account of the council of Trent which was then sitting, ordered Farnese to hand Parma over to the papal authorities once more, and on his refusal hurled censures and admonitions at his head, and deprived him of his Roman fiefs, while Charles did the same with regard to those in Lombardy. A French army came to protect Parma, war broke out, and Gonzaga at once laid siege to the city. But the duke came to an arrangement with his father-in-law, by which he regained Piacenza and his other fiefs. ”

“ Moreover, the accession to the throne of France of Henry of Navarre had altogether altered the situation of affairs, and relieved the pressure upon the Dutch by creating a diversion, and placing Parma and his army between hostile forces. The ruinous expenditure upon the Great Armada had also depleted the Spanish treasury and Philip found himself virtually bankrupt. In 1590 the condition of the Spanish troops had become intolerable. Farnese could get no regular supplies of money from the king for the payment of the soldiery, and he had to pledge his own jewels to meet the demand. ”

“ Charles of Austria, now emperor, took Milan, Mantua, Naples and Sardinia for his portion of the Italian spoil. Philip founded the Bourbon line of Spanish kings, renouncing in Italy all that his Habsburg predecessors had gained. Discontented with this diminution 43 of the Spanish heritage, Philip V. married Elisabetta Farnese, heiress to the last duke of Parma, in 1714. He hoped to secure this duchy for his son, Don Carlos; and Elisabetta further brought with her a claim to the grand-duchy of Tuscany, which would soon become vacant by the death of Gian Gastone de’ Medici. ”

“ Her affinity to the crown occasioned her many troubles, and was the cause of her almost perpetual confinement. It appears, that she was under a kind of durance in the latter end of Queen Elizabeth's reign. But be this as it may, it is certain that many were forming accusations against her, of which she greatly complained in her letters to her friends.
About this time the pope had a design to raise Arabella to the throne of England, by marrying her to cardinal Farnese, brother to the duke of Parma. ”

“ Pier Luigi Farnese, Paul III’s bastard, was successively created Gonfaloniere of the Church, Duke of Castro, Marquis of Novara, and finally Duke of Parma and Piacenza in 1545. He was murdered at Parma by his own courtiers in 1547. He was a man of infamous habits, quite unfit for the high dignities conferred on him. ”

“ The family derived further advantages at the time of Pope Alexander VI., who was the lover of the beautiful Giulia Farnese, known as Giulia Bella, and created her brother Alessandro a cardinal (1493) . The latter was elected pope as Paul III. in 1534, and it is from that moment that the great importance of the family dates. An unblushing nepotist, he alienated immense fiefs belonging to the Holy See in favour of his natural children. Of these the most famous was Pierluigi Farnese (1503–1547) , who served in the papal army in various campaigns, but also took part in the sack of Rome in 1527. ”

“ Giannettino was murdered, but the conspirators were defeated, and Andrea showed great vindictiveness in punishing them. Many of their fiefs he seized for himself, and he was implicated in the murder of Pier Luigi Farnese, duke of Parma (see Farnese) , who had helped Fiesco. ”

“ Annibale Caro was born in 1507 at Civitanuova in the March of Ancona. Being poor and of humble origin, he entered the family of Luigi Gaddi at Florence, in the quality of tutor to his children. This patron died in 1541, and Caro then took service under Pier Luigi Farnese, one of the worst princelings of the period. When the Duke was murdered in 1547, he transferred himself to Parma, still following the fortunes of the Farnesi. Employed as secretary by the Cardinal Ranuccio and afterwards by the Cardinal Alessandro of that house, he lived at ease until his death in 1566. ”

“ But what they had suffered hitherto would be as nothing to what they must suffer if the Pope now had his way and if Pier Luigi Farnese were to become their duke—an independent prince. He would break the nobles utterly, to remain undisputed master of the territory. ”

“ Her blonde beauty is of the most ethereal kind, and her dainty person is distinguished by so much aristocratic elegance that no one to look at her would ever dream that her father had begun his career as a mere stable-boy, who, in the service of the last reigning Duke of Parma, was promoted from one post to another until he blossomed forth as a general, a baron, and as Prime Minister of the Duchy of Parma, besides being decorated with the grand crosses of most of the orders of chivalry of Europe. ”

“ These summits, always covered in snow, even in the month of August which it then was, give one as it were a reminder of coolness in the midst of these scorching plains; the eye can follow them in the minutest detail, and yet they are more than thirty leagues from the citadel of Parma. This expansive view from the governor's charming palazzo is broken at one corner towards the south by the Torre Farnese, in which a room was being hastily prepared for Fabrizio. ”

“ On almost every Italian town, whatever succession of masters it may have known, some one family has left its dominant mark; and Parma is distinctively the city of the Farnesi. Late-comers though they were, their lilies are everywhere, over gateways, on palace-fronts and in the aisles of churches; and they have bequeathed to the town a number of its most characteristic buildings, from the immense unfinished Palazzo della Pilotta to the baroque fountain of parti-coloured marbles which enlivens with its graceful nymphs and river-gods the grassy solitude of the palace-square. ”

“ Morone, a decided Imperialist, was proposed next, and proposed by Pole himself; but the French were able to keep out Morone, though unable to carry their own candidate Salviati; and, in the end, Farnese brought forward the president of the council at Bologna, Cardinal del Monte; del Monte having privately promised that, if elected, he would forsake France, no longer oppose the Emperor, restore Parma to Octavio, and reunite the council at Trent.
Easy, timid, and self-indulgent, Cardinal del Monte was a neutral character on which opposing factions could agree. On him the choice fell at last ”

“ Here for the most part were the noble French and Roman volunteers; hardly a great house of Italy but had its representative among the combatants: two of the Colonnas; Paul Orsini, the chief of his name, with his brothers, Horace and Virginius; Antonio Carrafa, Michel Bonelli, and Paul Ghislieri, nephews of the Pope; and Farnese, prince of Parma, who played a very hero’s part in the flag-ship of the Genoese republic. The battle in the centre, led on by such men, and met with equal valour and determination on the part of their adversaries, lasted more than two hours. ”

“ The Flemings replied, however, to these two checks by naming the Prince of Orange governor-general of Brabant.
Don John died in his turn, and Alexander Farnese succeeded him. He was a clever prince, charming in his manners, which were at once gentle and firm; a skillful politician, and a good general. Flanders trembled at hearing that soft Italian voice call her friend, instead of treating her as a rebel. William knew that Farnese would do more for Spain with his promises than the Duc d'Alva with his punishments. ”

“ The interior is an extremely fine early Renaissance work. The frescoes on the cupola representing the vision of S. John are by Correggio, and the arabesques on the vault of the nave by Anselmi. The Madonna della Steccata (Our Lady of the Palisade) , a fine church in the form of a Greek cross, erected between 1521 and 1539 after Zaccagni’s designs, contai'ns the tombs and monuments of many of the Bourbon and Farnese dukes of Parma, and preserves its pictures, Parmigiano’s “Moses Breaking the Tables of the Law” and Anselmi’s “Coronation of the Virgin.” ”

“ A man named Alessandro Farnese—the one who was pope 1534-49, and who undertook to regulate the morals of various persons, besides Henry VIII., with indifferent success—once made a discovery so astonishing that he must have been inspired. ”

“ It would, indeed, be his care; for it was a maxim of Italian politics that no man willingly stirs after dinner.
The situation was still pretty delicate; he had done little more than win foothold. In the late struggles with Parma he had intrigued with great address; sold himself and his Centaurs to Farnese, brought that thick-necked hero up to the very walls of Nona, then (in the nick of time) resold himself at double the price to the city he was besieging, and routed his yesterday's master by an attack in flank just as the Nonesi were carrying the trenches in front. ”

“ Parma was thus governed for several years by Moreau de Saint-Mery and by Junot. At the congress of Vienna, Parma, Piacenza and Guastalla were assigned to Marie Louise (daughter of Francis I. of Austria and Napoleon’s second consort) , and on her death they passed in 1847 to Charles II. (son of Louis of Etruria and Marie Louise, daughter of Charles IV., king of Spain) . The new duke, unwilling to yield to the wishes of his people for greater political liberty, was soon compelled to take flight, and the duchy was for a time ruled by a provisional government and by Charles Albert of Sardinia ”

“ When on the outbreak of the war of 1859 Francis V., duke of Modena, was expelled and a provisional government set up, Farini was sent as Piedmontese commissioner to that city; but although recalled after the peace of Villafranca he was determined on the annexation of central Italy to Piedmont and remained behind, becoming a Modenese citizen and dictator of the state. He negotiated an alliance with Parma, Romagna and Tuscany, when other provisional governments had been established, and entrusted the task of organizing an army for this central Italian league to General Fanti (q.v.) ”

“ The worthy Don Cesare allowed Fabrizio to walk for half an hour every Thursday, in the daytime, on the terrace of the Farnese Tower. But on the other days his exercise, which might have been observed by all the dwellers in and around Parma, and thus seriously compromised the governor, was taken after nightfall. The only staircase by which the terrace of the Farnese Tower could be reached was that in the little bell tower of the chapel, with its gloomy black and white marble decorations, of which my reader may retain some recollection. ”

“ It was remembered that Ottavio Farnese—Pier Luigi's son—was married to Margaret of Austria, the Emperor's daughter, and that if a Farnese dominion there was to be in Parma and Piacenza, the Emperor would prefer that it should be that of his own son-in-law, who would hold the duchy as a fief of the Empire. Further was it known that Ottavio was intriguing with Pope and Emperor to gain the investiture in his own father's stead. ”

“ The Duchess, too, travels always, but in a different direction, and the people complain loudly of the desertion. For many years they have now been both absent and parted. The Duke is a member of the royal family of Spain, and at the death of Maria Louisa of 268 Parma, he becomes Duke of Parma, and the duchy goes to Tuscany.
From Lucca we crossed the Appenines, by a road seldom travelled, performing the hundred miles to Modena in three days. We suffered, as all must who leave the high roads in continental countries, more privations than the novelty was worth. ”

“ In the town of Parma there is one surpassingly strange relic of the past. The palace of the Farnesi, like many a haunt of upstart tyranny and beggared pride on these Italian plains, rises misshapen and disconsolate above the stream that bears the city's name. The squalor of this grey-brown edifice of formless brick, left naked like the palace of the same Farnesi at Piacenza, has something even horrid in it now that only vague memory survives of its former uses. ”

“ But, good heavens, when one has to deal with such people—those monsters of vanity and spite known as the Farnese—one takes what one can get.”
At the thought, the anger of the duchess blazed up afresh. “The prince deceived me,” she said, “and how basely!... There is no excuse for that man. He has intellect, he has cleverness, he has logic; the only mean things in him are his passions. We have remarked it a score of times, the count and I. He is never vulgar-minded, except when he thinks there has been an intention to insult him. Well, Fabrizio’s crime has nothing to do with politics ”

“ The Pope precipitated the final catastrophe by a further act of imprudence. The young Duke of Parma, a prince of the house of Bourbon, had excluded the Jesuits from his duchy, and had published certain ecclesiastical regulations detrimental to the ancient pretensions of the Roman See. Clement XIII., reviving an antiquated title in virtue of which Parma was claimed as a dependent fief of the Papacy, was rash enough to launch a bull of excommunication against the Duke, and deprived him of his dominions as a rebellious vassal. ”

“ Oxford and Cambridge Club.
Allow me to correct the statement made by your correspondent, that the Duke of Parma represented the Royal House of Stuart. The mother of the late Duke of Parma had an elder sister, Maria Beatrice, who married Francis IV., late Duke of Modena, and upon her death, in 1840, the representation devolved upon her son, Francis V., the present Duke of Modena, who was born in 1819.
P. V.
Allow me to remark on the article of E. S. S. W. (Vol. ix., p. 417.) ”