CASTLE OF BRACCIANO. 149 family still occasionally come here in summer, when the vast chambers must be delightfully cool, and the views over lake and town and mountains most enjoyable. On the upper floor is the Hall of Justice, where the Orsini barons, who had the right of appointing magistrates, and being judges in their own persons, used for several centuries to sit in judgment upon their dependants. The Great Hall on the ground floor has some rapidly-vanishing frescoes of Zucchero, and looks like a place where ten thousand ghosts might hold carnival, only perhaps their revels would be hindered by the tiny chapel which opens out of it. In the living apartments are some fine old chairs and carved modern furniture, splendid beds and wardrobes, and infinitesimal washing-apparatus. One room has family portraits from old times down to the present possessors. These are very proud of their home, though they are not often here. Some years ago, poverty obliged them to sell their castle, but they did so with aching hearts, and when it was bought by Prince Torlonia, a reservation was made, that if the wheel of their fortunes should revolve within a limited space of years, they should be allowed to buy it back again at the same price which he had given. Torlonia felt secure, spent much time and money at Bracciano, and was devoted to his new purchase. As the time was drawing to a conclusion, all doubt as to the future vanished from his mind, but, just in time, the fortune of the Princess-mother Odescalchi enabled the family to redeem their pledge, and the former possessors returned, to their own triumph and the delight of the inhabitants. The Princess Odescalchi, whose fortune redeemed Bracciano, is almost a historical character in Rome. She has been one of the strongest supporters of the Pope, which is not unnatural, for in a great illness, the physicians had given up her case as hopeless, and declared that nothing short of a miracle could save her. At this juncture, when all her family were assembled to see her die, the Pope, from the Vatican, sent her his absolution and blessing, and with it a very tiny loaf of bread-" panetella,”* which he desired her to swallow, he had prayed over it and blessed it, and perhaps it would save her life. She did swallow it, recovered, and the next day went in person to the Vatican to return thanks to the Holy Father! But it was only in the last century that the Odescalchi purchased Bracciano from the Orsini, who were then beginning to fall into decadence, after a splendid historical career of more than six hundred years. Pope Celestin III. (1191 -98) was an Orsini, and Pope Nicholas III. (1277—81), whom Dante sees in hell, among the Simonists. "Sappi ch'io fui vestito del gran manto. E veramente fui figliuol dell' Orsa Cupido si per avanzar gli Orsatti, Che su l'avere, e qui me misi in borsa." Inferno, xix. But having bestowed two popes upon the Church is the least of the glories of the Orsini, and it is their ceaseless contests with the Colonnas, in which they were alternately victorious and defeated, which gives them their chief historical consequence. "Orsi, lupi, leone, aquile e serpi Petrarca, Canz. vi. "Panetelle di San Nicolo" are still eaten by the lower classes in and near Rome on the festival of that popular saint-the Bishop of Myra-" per divozione," in remembrance of the little loaves of this kind which he used to distribute to the poor. "The Ursini migrated from Spoleto: the sons of Ursus, as they are styled in the twelfth century, from some eminent person, who is only known as the father of their race. But they were soon distinguished among the nobles of Rome, by the number and bravery of their kinsmen, the strength of their towers, the honours of the senate and sacred college, and the elevation of two popes, Celestin III. and Nicholas III., of their name and lineage. Their riches may be accused as an early abuse of nepotism; the estates of S. Peter were alienated in their favour by the liberal Celestin; and Nicholas was ambitious for their sakes to solicit the alliance of monarchs; to found new kingdoms in Lombardy and Tuscany; and to invest them with the perpetual office of senators of Rome. All that has been observed of the greatness of the Colonna, will likewise redound to the glory of the Ursini, their constant and equal antagonists in the long hereditary feud, which distracted above two hundred and fifty years the ecclesiastical state. The jealousy of pre-eminence and power was the true ground of their quarrel; but as a specious badge of distinction, the Colonna embraced the name of Ghibellines and the party of the Empire; the Ursini espoused the title of Guelphs and the cause of the Church. The eagle and the keys were displayed in their adverse banners; and the two factions of Italy most furiously raged when the origin and nature of the dispute were long since forgotAfter the retreat of the popes to Avignon, they disputed in arms the vacant republic; and the mischiefs of discord were perpetuated by the wretched compromise of electing each year two rival senators. By their private hostilities, the city and country were desolated, and the fluctuating balance inclined with their alternate success. But none of either family had fallen by the sword, till the most renowned champion of the Ursini was surprised and slain by the younger Stephen Colonna. His triumph is stained with the reproach of violating the truce; their defeat was basely avenged by the assassination, before the church door, of an innocent boy and his two servants. Yet the victorious Colonna, with an annual colleague, was declared senator of Rome during the term of five years. And the muse of Petrarch inspired a wish, a hope, a prediction, that the generous youth, the son of his venerable hero, would restore Rome and Italy to their pristine glory; that his justice would extirpate the wolves and lions, the serpents and bears, who laboured to subvert the eternal basis of the marble Column."-Gibbon's Roman Empire, ch. Ixix. ten. -"genuit quem nobilis Ursæ Progenies, Romana domus, veterataque magnis Cardineos apices, necnon fastigia dudum Cardinal St. George on Celestin V. The broad terrace immediately under the castle looks down upon the great Lake of Bracciano, which in ancient times was called the Lacus Sabatinus, and is mentioned by Festus. Near the site of Bracciano, says tradition, stood the city of Sabate, which was overwhelmed by the lake long ago, though its houses, its temples, and statues, may still be seen, on a clear day, standing intact beneath the glassy waters. The silvery expanse is backed by distant snow mountains, and here and there a little feudal town crowns the hill-sides or stands on the shore and is reflected in the lake. Oriolo has a villa of the Altieri, and its church-porch bears an inscription, which shows that it occupies the site of Pausilypon, built by Metia, wife of Titus Metius Herdonius. Vicarello (from Vicus Aurelia) has the ruins of a Roman villa, and is still celebrated for the baths so useful in cutaneous disorders, which were well known in old times as Aquæ Aureliæ. Many curious Roman coins and vases have been found there. Beyond Vicarello is Trevignano, another Orsini stronghold, picturesquely crowned by their old castle. Lastly we must notice Anguillara, with a fine machicolated castle, bearing the celebrated 'crossed eels' of the famous Counts of Anguillara, of whom were Pandolfo d'Anguillara who built the church of S. Francesco a Ripa at Rome, Everso d'Anguillara, celebrated as a robber chief of the fifteenth century, and Orso d'Anguillara, the senator who crowned Petrarch upon the Capitol, and lived in the old palace which still remains in the Trastevere. Their country castle, which successfully withstood a siege from the Duke of Calabria in LAKE OF BRACCIANO. 153 1486, overhangs the quiet lake, which indeed at one time bore its name, and the town, which is 20 miles from Rome, is well worth visiting, by a road which turns off on the right not far from Galera. As we stood on the terrace, looking down upon all these historical scenes, the violet sky suddenly opened, a rainbow arched across the expanse of waters, and rays of light flitting along the green encircling slopes, lit up one old fortress after another, as with a golden glory, which lasted for an instant, and faded again into the purple mist. It was a beautiful effort of Nature, cheering the monotony of a cloudy, misty day. |