Pisans

“ At least it seems clear that Entragues had sworn to yield his position only to the French.
These three months Entragues and his men had lived as the saviours of Pisa with the Pisans, feted by the citizens, lodged not only in the citadel but in the palace of the Medici upon Lung’ Arno; no longer an insignificant portion of the motley hosts of France, but the beloved guests and masters of this exquisite Southern city. They had the advantage of the port from which to ship a succour to or from the armies in the South; they enjoyed the great pine-woods of the sea, full of game for hunting ”

“ The Lombard Masters placed there did their work, and then moved to other cities, but the natives remained uninfluenced. In Pisa, art first took root. The Pisans, whose artistic faculties had been awakened by the classic spoils they had gathered together in their conquests, found a practical outlet for them in the teaching of the laborerium set up in their midst by Buschetto and his assistants and followers. Pisans joined the lodge, and from it great teachers arose. Siena was the next lodge that took root, and drew native artists into it; then followed Venice and Florence ”

“ Besides different sorts of merchant vessels bearing a common resemblance to those of the Venetians, the Pisans constructed ships of war with towers of wood, and machines for attacking an enemy, which they managed with a skill that rendered them most formidable opponents. Their expeditions against the Moors of the Balearic Islands, and their conquests in Corsica and Sardinia conferred on them a high military as well as naval reputation. ”

“ The Pisans, further excited by their jealousy of the Genoese, promised Frederick that they would brave for him all the thunders of the church, and assured him they knew well how to hinder the meeting of the council. A considerable number of French prelates had embarked at Nice for Ostia, on board Genoese galleys. Ugolino Buzzacherino de Sismondi, admiral of the Pisans, lay in wait with a powerful fleet before Meloria, attacked them on the 3rd of May, 1241, sunk three vessels, took nineteen, and made prisoners all the French prelates who were to join the council at Pisa. ”

“ For about a hundred years, the Pisans kept possession of it, or at least parts of it, never wholly subduing the warlike and determined inhabitants; and, during this time they governed wisely and well, building towns and making roads, and encouraging, as far as they were able in the disturbed condition of the island, industry and agriculture. But the moderate government of Pisa was not long to remain unmolested. The Genoese were beginning to cast covetous eyes upon Corsica ”

“ Such patience as theirs, ceaselessly labouring underground, never wearied, militant but not aggressive, does not fail to meet an opportunity. At last a favourable chance was offered to the Pisans. The King of France who in 1483 had disregarded the invitation of the Venetians, accepted, ten years later, the persuasions of Lodovico of Milan; and in the autumn of 1494, the armies of Charles VIII. poured into Italy. ”

“ When the Genoese appeared off Meloria the Pisans were lying in the river Arno at the mouth of which lay Porto Pisano the port of the city. The Pisan fleet represented the whole power of the city, and carried members of every family of mark and most of the great officers of state. The Genoese, desiring to draw their enemy out to battle, and to make the action decisive, arranged their fleet in two lines abreast. The first was composed according to Agostino Giustiniani of fifty-eight galleys, and eight panfili, a class of light galleys of eastern origin named after the province of Pamphylia. ”

“ But he must mean the subjugation of Messenia after the 30th Olympiad, after which time the Lacedæmonians perhaps assisted the Eleans in gradually weakening Pisa, until in the 50th Olympiad it became completely subject. A more precise date for the distinction of Pisa may be gathered from the strange statement of the catalogue of the Olympiad in Eusebius according to Africanus, that the Pisans celebrated the 30th and the 22 following Olympiads (vid. ad Ol. 30) ; if we understand it to mean that the Pisans had a share in the celebration of the Olympiads until their destruction. ”

“ But in the autumn of 1494, Piero de’ Medici who forgot everything, who had forgotten to garrison his frontier, forgot to call the Pisan hostages to Florence, although the French were steadily advancing on Tuscany and the Pisans eager to rebel. Every Pisan household was intact at home on that memorable 30th of October when, in the snowy camp of the French outside Sarzana, Piero de’ Medici handed to 363the King of France the keys of the Tuscan fortresses. ”

“ It was interesting to learn that the Pisans had expelled the Saracens from Sardinia in 1025, and destroyed their fleet in 1063 near Palermo, that once they were the most powerful adherents of the Ghibellines, and how terribly they were defeated by the Genoese near Leghorn in 1284. ”

“ A man raised his harquebuss and shot her through the heart. Her son was absent in Genoa. For the moment the Pisans were quit of the Visconti.
The news of the revolt of Pisa flew swiftly to Genoa. The bereaved Tiranetto dispossessed and orphaned, repaired to Boucicaut as to the Lieutenant of his liege-lord, the King of France, asking aid because, as the Chronicle reminds us, “seigneur doibt au besoing secourir son vassal qui le requiert à son aide.” ”

“ There were pusiones, or Pisans, not made at Pisa, but defences, as Mr. Hudson Turner well observes, for the pis, or breast. For the thighs of the collegiate guard there was small protection, the harness for one leg only having a quisshew, or cuissart. ”

“ In the meanwhile the Pisan war dragged on without much headway being made. In 1503 both Piero de’ Medici and Alexander VI. had died, eliminating two dangers to the republic. Spain, who was at war with France over the partition of Naples, helped the Pisans as the enemies of Florence, France’s ally (1501–1504) , but when the war was over the Florentines were able to lay siege to Pisa (1507) , and in 1509 the city was driven by famine to surrender and became a dependency of Florence once more. ”

“ True policy, however, ought to have counselled them to support a power, by the ruin of which, their determined enemies, the Genoese, increased so much in strength; and they had reason enough afterwards to perceive their error. The last misfortune, instead of discouraging the Pisans, inflamed them still more with a desire for vengeance; they made one of their greatest efforts by [116] arming seventy-two galleys, the command of which was given to Count Ugolino, already very powerful in Pisa; the flower of the nobility and Pisan citizens accompanied it, to which were added other smaller vessels. ”

“ The Pisans at first refused entrance to the emperor, but yielded after he had besieged them a few days. Louis then visited Lucca, where he erected a dutchy composed of the towns and territory of Lucca, Pistoia, Volterra and Lunigiana, and created Castruccio duke, honouring and exalting him as his best friend, and the firmest support of the imperial power. ”

“ The Emperor at Rome—The Florentines refuse to purchase Lucca, and repent of it—Enterprises of the Florentines—Conspiracy of the Bardi and the Frescobaldi—The conspiracy discovered and checked—Maffeo da Marradi appeases the tumult—Lucca is purchased by the Florentines and taken by the Pisans—The duke of Athens at Florence—The nobility determine to make him prince of the city. ”

“ As he found a greater spirit of pride and independence in the Pisans, he caused to be thrown into a dungeon their consuls, who had presented themselves at the diet of the Tuscan towns convoked by him at San Ginasio, in the month of July, 1173; he arrested, at the same time, the consuls of the Florentines, their allies, while he studiously flattered those of Lucca, of Siena, of Pistoia, and the nobles of Tuscany, Romagna, and Umbria; promising to avenge them on their enemies: but, said he, “to do so more effectually, you must first co-operate with me in crushing the enemies of the emperor.” ”

“ Besides, the death of the Emperor had thrown his party everywhere into discouragement; and what was the use of a flag which flew no farther than over the new palazzo?
116. Accordingly, in the next year, the pacific Florentines began by ravaging the territory of Pistoja; then attacked the Pisans at Pontadera, and took 3000 prisoners; and finished by traversing, and eating up all that could be ate in, the country of Siena; besides beating the Sienese under the castle of Montalcino. ”

“ The Roman fleet however did not venture upon a regular sea-battle with the Pisans, but made a series of swift, irregular attacks upon them. Landulph himself, first of all, drew close to the Pisan ships and threw fire at them, but aimed badly and thus accomplished nothing but wasting his fire. Then the man called Count Eleemon very boldly attacked the largest vessel at the stern, but got entangled in its rudders, and as he could not free himself easily he would have been taken, had he not with great presence of mind had recourse to his machine and poured fire upon the enemy very successfully. ”

“ Thus, their common interests being promoted no less by the energy of individuals than by that of their government, these merchants continued to make advance in the East, and336 stir the Pisans to greater envy. In fact, the latter decided in 1343 to reduce the exemptions allowed on Florentine merchandise, decreeing that goods only to the value of 200,000 florins might pass untaxed through their city; all the rest being charged two soldi the lira—i.e., at the rate of 10 per cent. This left the Florentines no choice save to make war, or find some mode of avoiding the Pisan highway. ”

“ As for Pisa at large, although it is not exactly what one would call a mouldering city--for it has a certain well-aired cleanness and brightness, even in its supreme tranquillity--it affects the imagination very much in the same way as the Campo Santo. And, in truth, a city so ancient and deeply historic as Pisa is at every step but the burial-ground of a larger life than its present one. ”

“ I never knew how beautiful marble could be until I came to Pisa and Rome. Somehow I had associated Pisa with the Leaning Tower, and not with the Baptistry. I knew it existed, and, vaguely, that it was worth seeing; but Pisa meant the Leaning Tower to me. Now I couldn't tell you which has left the deeper impression. I'm not at all the same girl that I was before I put Pisa and Rome into the gallery of my mind. I must make myself a worthy frame for such pictures as I am storing up now. ”

“ Niccolò Pisano was from Apulia. He may well have seen the beautiful fragments of Greek and Roman art scattered over the South before he came to Pisa, yet there may, too, be more truth in Vasari's tale than we are sometimes willing to admit, so that in the northern city beside Arno it may well have been with a sort of delight he came upon the art of the ancients, asleep in the beautiful Campo Santo of Pisa, and awakened it, yes, almost with a kiss. ”

“ The glory of Pisa is the end of the Middle Age and the early dawn of the Renaissance. There, amid all the hurly-burly and terror of invasion and civil wars, she shines like a beacon beside the sea, proud, brave, and full of hope, almost the only city not altogether enslaved in a country in the grip of the barbarian, almost overwhelmed by the Lombards. And indeed, she was one of the first cities of Italy to fling off the Lombard yoke. Favoured by her position on the shores of the Tyrrhenian Sea, yet not so near the coast as to invite piracy, she waged incessant war on Greek and Saracen. ”

“ Pisa is the real parent of Pistoja, as indeed she is of Florence-Dante's Florence. Pisa's magnificent building repeats to itself here: Gothic with a touch of Latin sanity, a touch of the genuine Paganism which loves the dædal earth and cannot bring itself to be out of touch with it. San Giovanni fuoricivitas, what a rock-hewn church it is! A rigid oblong, dark as the twilight, running with the street without belfry or window or façade. Three tiers of shallow arcades on spiral columns, never a window to be seen, and the whole of solemn black marble narrowly striped with white. ”

“ But the same Corsican face is so plentiful in some parts of Italy at this day, that a more commonplace solution of the coincidence is unavoidable.
If Pisa be the seventh wonder of the world in right of its Tower, it may claim to be, at least, the second or third in right of its beggars. They waylay the unhappy visiter at every turn, escort him to every door he enters at, and lie in wait for him, with strong reinforcements, at every door by which they know he must come out. ”

“ On returning, we had a fine view of Pisa. In the distance it appears like a city of white marble, with its tower leaning at one end, and the blue mountains far away in the background, looking, however, much nearer than is actually the case. Distance is almost annihilated in this clear, dry, Italian atmosphere, which also to a great extent prevents decay, the most ancient buildings looking often singularly fresh. "Antiquity refuses to look ancient in Italy; it insists on retaining its youthful aspect." ”

“ For to this affection I was to return again still oftener than to the strong call of Siena my eventual frequentations of Pisa, all merely impressionistic and amateurish as they might be--and I pretended, up and down the length of the land, to none other--leave me at the hither end of time with little more than a confused consciousness of exquisite quality on the part of the small sweet scrap of a place of ancient glory; a consciousness so pleadingly content to be general and vague that I shrink from pulling it to pieces. ”