Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 4.djvu/544

CREMONA Romanesque architecture, dates from the beginning of the twelfth century, and is noted for its facade in alternate courses of red and white marble. It possesses many famous paintings and sculptures. Its two marble pulpits were brought thither from the suppressed church of the Olivetans. Near the cathedral is the baptistery (1167), surrounded by ranges of narrow Lombard arches, and bearing aloft an octagonal cupola. The famous brick campanile, known as the Torrazzo, built in 1283 as a peace monument, is 396 feet high and is said to be the tallest in Italy. An ancient saying runs: Unus Petrus in Roma, una turris in Cremona (One Peter in Rome, one Tower in Cremona). Other noteworthy churches are those of Sant'Agata and Sant'Agostino, the latter externally Gothic, while its interior is Renaissance. San Pietro and San Michele are believed to date from the time of the Lombard Queen Theodolinda (c. 590). There are many industries at Cremona, especially silk manufactures; in the history of music it is known as the birthplace of four famous makers of violins: Amati, Guarneri, Stradivari, and Malpighi.

The population of the diocese is 350,000; it has 345 parishes, 530 churches and chapels, 536 secular and 38 regular clergy, 9 houses of religious men, and 77 of women. It has also 15 educational institutions.

, Chiese d'Italia, XII, 125-239; Annuario Ecclesiastico (Rome, 1907), 433-39,, ''Memorie di storia eccl. Cremonese (Rome, 1835-37);, Topo-bibliogr. (Paris, 1894-99), 824-26; , Cities of Northern Italy'' (London, 1896), II, 231-40.



 Cremona,. See.

 Crépieul,, Jesuit missionary in Canada and vicar Apostolic for the Montagnais Indians; b. at Arras, France, 16 March, 1638; d. at Quebec in 1702. As a youth he studied in the Jesuit college of his native town and in that of Douai, becoming a member of the order at Tournay in 1659. He continued his studies at Lille and Douai, taught at Lille and Cambrai, and in 1670 sailed for Canada. Upon the completion of his theological studies in the college of Quebec, he was assigned in October, 1671, to the Tadousac region, where, with untiring devotion and great success he toiled among the Montagnais and Algonquin tribes for twenty-eight years. Writing to his brethren he tells them that the life of a Montagnais missionary is a tedious and prolonged martyrdom, and that his journeys and the cabins of the savages are truly schools of patience, penance, and resignation. For the benefit of his fellow missionaries Crépieul wrote a series of instructions embodying the results of his long service among the Indians, which are interesting and practical. These observations are given in the sixty-third volume of Thwaites' "Relations". In 1696 or 1697 he was appointed vicar Apostolic for the Montagnais and, on the discontinuance of the mission a few years later, repaired to Quebec, where he spent the rest of his life. Dablon, Superior of all the missions in Canada, styles him "a veritable apostle".

, Les Jésuites et la Nouvelle-France au XVIIe siècle (Paris, 1895-96), a most interesting account of this devoted and successful missionary;, Relations, LVI, 301. 302;, ''Bibl. de la c. de J., II, 1652, I;, Bibliography of the Algonquian Languages'' (Washington, 1891), 98, 99.



 Crescens, a companion of St. Paul during his second Roman captivity, appears but once in the New Testament, when he is mentioned as having left the Apostle to go into Galatia: "Make haste to come to me quickly", St. Paul writes to Timothy, "for Demas hath left me, loving this world, and is gone to Thessalonica, Crescens into Galatia, Titus into Dalmatia" (II Tim., iv, 8-10). All commentators agree in ranking Crescens with Titus rather than with Demas, and in seeing here, therefore, a reference to a missionary journey into Galatia. This term, in New Testament times, might mean either Gaul or the Roman province of Galatia in Asia Minor, where St. Paul had laboured so much; and here it has been interpreted in either sense. In the other passages where it occurs in the New Testament, however, it denotes Galatia, and most probably it would be so understood here by Timothy, especially as the other regions mentioned are likewise to the east of Rome. Moreover, St. Paul might easily have a reason for sending a disciple to visit his old Churches in Galatia, while there is no proof that he had an active interest in Gaul. Accordingly, the earliest tradition (Apost. Constit., VII, 46) represents Crescens as a bishop of the Churches in Galatia. Later traditions, on the other hand, locate him as Bishop of Vienne in Gaul, also at Mainz on the Rhine. But the earliest traditions of Gaul itself know nothing of this disciple of the Apostle as a founder of their Churches, and the belief seems to have arisen later from the desire of an Apostolic origin. The claims of Vienne have been most strongly urged; but they are based upon the mistaken identification of its first bishop, Crescens, who lived in the third century, with the disciple of St. Paul. As little can be said for Mainz. The reading of certain manuscripts (Sinaiticus, Ephræmi), which have Gallia instead of Galatia, has also been advanced in favour of Gaul; but the traditional reading is supported by the great mass of manuscript evidence. Crescens is mentioned as one of the Seventy Disciples of Christ by the Pseudo-Dorotheus, which has no authority. His martyrdom in Galatia, under Trajan, commemorated on 27 June by the Roman Martyrology, lacks the confirmation of older Martyrologies. The Greek Church honours him on 30 July.

, Mémoires pour servir à l'histoire ecclésiastique (Paris, 1701), I,312,584-587;, Les fastes épiscopaux de l'ancienne Gaule (Paris, 1894), I, 151-155.



 Crescentius, the name of several leaders of the Roman aristocracy in the tenth century, during their opposition to the imperial government of the time.

— With the disappearance of the Carlovingian dynasty the papal government of Rome lost its most powerful protector, and the Romans took matters into their own hands. Out of the local aristocracy there arose a powerful family, which assumed the practical charge of all governmental affairs in Rome, controlled the nominations to the papal throne, and held the power for many years. At the beginning of the tenth century the family was represented by Theophylactus, vestararius or high dignitary of the papal palace and the pontifical government, by his wife Theodora, and their two daughters Marozia and Theodora. Theophylactus had the titles of Consul and Senator of the Romans. Crescentius the Elder was a descendant of this family, being a son of Theodora, the daughter of Theophylactus. According to the records, he took a hand in Roman affairs for the first time in 974. At the death of Pope John XIII (965-72), who was a brother of Crescentius, the Emperor Otto I (936-73) designated as his successor the Cardinal-Deacon Benedict, who took the name Benedict VI (972-74). The Romans bore the constant interference of the emperor in the papal elections with ill-concealed indignation. About a year after the death of Otto I, when his successor Otto II (973-83) was engaged in wars at home, they rebelled against the imperial regime under the headship of Crescentius. The unfortunate Pope Benedict VI was dethroned, thrown into the Castle of Sant' Angelo, and strangled there in July, 974. The deacon Franco, a Roman, son of Ferrucius, was chosen to succeed, and took the name of Boniface VII (974). The protests of the imperial envoy Sicco were of no avail against this manifestation of national aspirations on the part of the Romans. Soon, however, the imperial party