Page:A Biographical Dictionary of the Celebrated Women of Every Age and Country (1804).djvu/699

Rh the hands of an unskilful gladiator, but she guided his trembling hand to her throat. .

of a most illustrious house, and admired in the 16th century, for her courage, learning and conjugal fidelity. Daughter of Fabricius Colonna, a Roman nobleman, she was married to the marquis of Pescara, one of the most famous generals of the age. After the victory of Pavia, the pope and Italian princes, who wished to shake off the yoke of the emperor Charles V. offered to the marquis, who had a great part in the above victory, the kingdom of Naples; but Victoria wisely persuaded him to refuse the dangerous but dazzling offer, and keep in the bounds of prudence and moderation. After his death, which happened in the flower of her age, she refused every offer of marriage, saying, "that her husband yet lived, and would ever live, in her heart." In fact, she never ceased regretting him, and her most beautiful poems are written to his memory. Towards the latter end of her life, she retired into a monastery, at Milan, where she died about 1541.

herself to his art, but on different materials; he worked in marble, and she in wax made portraits excessively like, and mixed colours with the wax so that she succeeded in giving each tint its natural hue.

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