Page:American Historical Review, Volume 12.djvu/634

 624 Reviews of Books period when the popes were resident at Avignon. It preserved the tradition that where the tablet stood a wolf had once been killed — and this in the very heart of the city. By 1377, when Gregory XI. left the banks of the Rhone for the Lateran, the population had sunk to 17,000. Such, at least, is Cancellieri's estimate of those who dwelt within the walls of Aurelian, and Papencordt's figures are but a little higher. Other particulars still more distressful will be found by the curious in Mencacci's L'ltalia sensa II Papa. On the title-page Lanciani defines his " Golden Days of the Renais- sance " as extending from Julius II. to Paul III., but in reality he begins at the sad and ruinous period of the Great Schism. The fact is worth mentioning since by a glance cast backward to the last years of the fourteenth century he secures a useful standard of contrast. One not unreasonably might expect that in a book so called and beginning with Urban VI., pontiffs like Martin V., Nicholas V., and Sixtus IV. would receive much notice, and indeed all three are used to register certain stages of advance. But Lanciani's real enthusiasm is reserved for Paul III. " The memory of this great pontiff ", he says, " will always be dear to us Romans. Pomponio Leto, his preceptor, had imbued him with the spirit of humanism, and imparted to him the gift of a gay and bright conversation. He seemed to have brought back with his advent to the pontificate the fine old days of Leo X, with a higher standard of morals" (pp. 143-144). In 1534, when Alessandro Farnese became the successor of Clement VII., there had been no Roman pope for over a hundred years, and popular rejoicing at his election was unexampled. He rewarded the de- votion of his townsfolk by transforming into a modern capital the city which Bourbon's troops had just sacked. Here we have Lanciani's central theme — the co-operation of Paul HI. and Latino Mannetti in the rebuilding of Rome. No other pontiff is made the subject of a whole chapter, though this compliment is paid to Michelangelo, Vittoria Colonna, Raphael, and Agostino Chigi. The rest of the volume falls under two main heads: an account of the city, which is largely topo- graphical, and a very interesting study of social life in Rome during the Cinque-cento. From this brief statement regarding contents we hasten on to say a word about the method of treatment which Lanciani adopts in the present volume. His great love of topography and archaeological detail leads him somewhat to overburden his pages with the minutiae of scholarship. Otherwise his arrangement is excellent. Writing for those who are not specialists, he is orderly without being rigorous. Where he wishes to introduce a little excursus he does so, and the digression is justified by its intrinsic interest. One of the subjects which he introduces to save his text from becoming overloaded with the names of buildings is that of Raphael's relations with La Fornarina, and in his chapter on Vittoria Colonna he turns aside to vindicate