Page:EB1911 - Volume 21.djvu/606

Rh Figlzuola, an opera bufa which attained a European success Six years after this Piccinni was invited by Queen Maiie Antoinette to Paris. He had married in 1756 his pupil Vincenna Sibilla, a singer, whom he never allowed after her marriage to appear on the stage All his next works were successful, but, unhappily, the directors of the Grand Opera conceived the mad idea of deliberately opposing him to Gluck, by persuading the two composers to treat the same subject-Iplzzgénie en Taurzde—simultaneously. The Parisian public now divided itself into two rival parties, which, under the names of Gluckists and Piccinnists, carried on an unworthy and disgraceful war. Gluck's masterly I phigénze was first produced on the 18th of May 1779. Piccinni's Iphzgénze followed on the 23rd of January 1781, and, though performed seventeen times, was afterw aids consigned to obhvion. The fury of the rival parties continued unabated, even after (Jluck's departure from Paris in 1780, and an attempt was afterwards made to inaugurate a new rivalry with Sacchini. Still, Piccinni held a good position, and on the death of GlucL, in 1787, proposed that a public monument should be erected to his memory-a suggestion which the Gluckists themselves declined to support. In 1784 Piccinni was professor at the Royal School of Music, one of the institutions from which the Conservatoire was formed in 1794. On the breaking out of the Revolution in 1789 Piccinni returned to Naples, where he was at first well received by Ring Ferdinand IN, but the marriage of his daughter to a I rench democrat brought him into irretrievable disgrace. For nine years after this he maintained a precarious existence in enice, laples and Rome, but he returned in 1798 to Paris, where the nckle public received him with enthusiasm, but left lnm to starve He died at Passy, near Paris, on the 7th of May ISOO After his death a memorial tablet was set up in the house in which he was born at Bari.

The most complete list of his works is that given in the Rzznsta muszcate ztaltana, viii. 75. He produced over eighty operas, but although his later work shows the influence of the French and German stage, he belongs to the conventional Italian school of the 18th century.

See also P L Ginguené, Nome sur la tie et les ouvrages de Niccolo Pumnnz (Parls, 1801), E. Demolresterres, La 1Mus1que frangaue au 188 siecte Glnrk et P1ccznm 1774-1800 (Paris, 1872).

PICCOLO (Fr. petite flûte octave; Ger. Pickelflöte; Ital. flauto piccolo or ottavino), a small flute of less than half the dimensions of the large concert flute and pitched an octave higher. The principles of construction and the acoustic properties are the same for the piccolo as for the flute, with the exception that the piccolo does not contain the additional tail-piece with the extra low keys, which give the flute its extended compass. As the pitch of the piccolo is so high, the highest of all orchestral instruments with the exception of a few harmonics on the violin, the music for it is written an octave lower than the real sounds in order to avoid the ledger lines. The piccolo has been used with good effect in imitating the whistling of the wind in storms, as in Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony, Wagner's Flying Dutchman, and in conjunction with the violins in tremolo to depict the rustling of the leaves in the breeze, as in the &ldquo;Waldweben&rdquo; in Siegfried. Verdi employed it to advantage in Falstaff as a comic agent in humorous situations. The piccolo is generally in D, sometimes in E♭ or F.

 PICCOLOMINI, the name of an Italian noble family, which was prominent in Siena (q.v.) from the beginning of the 13th century onwards. In 1220 Enghelberto d'Ugo Piccolomini received the fief of Montertari in Val d'Orcia from the emperor Frederick II. as a reward for services rendered. The family acquired houses and towers in Siena and castles in the republic's territory, including Montone and Castiglione; the latter they sold to the commune in 1321. They obtained great wealth through trade, and established counting-houses in Genoa, Venice, Aquileia, Trieste, and in various cities of France and Germany. Supporters of the Guelph cause in the civil broils by which Siena was torn, they were driven from the city in the time of Manfred and their houses demolished; they returned in triumph after the Angevin victories, were expelled once more during the brief

reign of Conradin, and again returned to Siena with the help of Charles of Anjou. But through their riotous political activity the Piccolomini lost their commercial influence, which passed into the hands of the Florentines, although they retained their palaces, castles and about twenty fiefs, some of which were in the territory of Amalfi and of great extent. Many members of the house were distinguished ecclesiastics, generals and statesmen in Siena and elsewhere; two of them were popes, viz. Aeneas Silvius Piccolomini (Pius II., q.v.) and Francesco Piccolomini (Pius III., q.v.).

PICCOLOMINI, OCTAVIO, (1509-1656), duke of Amalfi, Austrian general, was born on the 11th of November 1599 in Florence, and carried a pike in the Spanish service at the age of sixteen. Two years later, on the outbreak of the Thirty Years' War in Bohemia, he was appointed a captain in a cavalry regiment sent by the grand duke of Tuscany to the emperor's army, and he fought with some distinction under Bucquoy at the Weisser Berg and in Hungary. In 1624 he served for a short time in the Spanish army and then as lieutenant-colonel of Pappenheim's cuirassier regiment in the war in the Milanese. In 1627 he re-entered the Imperial service as colonel and captain of the lifeguard of Wallenstein, duke of Friedland. In this capacity he soon fell into disgrace for practising extortion at Stargard in Pomerania, but his adroitness secured him, after no long interval, the rank of “ colonel of horse and foot.” About this time the appointment of his younger brother to the archbishopric of Siena secured him a position of influence in the diplomatic world. Diplomatic talent was indeed almost the birthright of a member of an Italian family, that had seen two of its members occupying the papal chair, and Wallenstein freely made use of his subordinate's capacity for negotiation and intrigue. In the events of the Mantuan War Piccolomini took a prominent part in the dual role of the subtle diplomatist and the plundering soldier of fortune. At this moment came the invasion of Germany by Gustavus Adolphus Piccolomini was interned at Ferrara as a hostage for the ratincation of a treaty, but he added his voice to the general call for Wallenstein's reappointment as commander-in-chief. He was not, however, included in the list of promotions that followed the duke's reappearance, and he served under General Holk, an officer brought in from the Danish service, in the preliminary operations and in the battle of Lutzen. His ambition was gratified when, on reading the official report of the battle, the emperor made him a generalfeldwaclzhnezster. At the same time, however, Holk was created a field marshal at Wallenstein's instance, much to his rival's chagrin In the campaign of 1633 Piccolomini held the command of an important detachment posted at Koniggratz to bar the enemy's advance from Silesia into Bohemia History repeated itself on the same ground in 1756, 1778 and 1866, in the first of these cases it was a Piccolomini, grand-nephew of Octavio, who commanded the Austiians, in the last the victorious Prussians passed over the estate of Nachod, which after 1635 was a hereditary possession of the family. In May Wallenstein entered Silesia with the main army with the unavowed object of compelling or persuading the electors of Brandenburg and Saxony to make common cause with the emperor against the Swedes Piccolomini was with him, and, disapproving of the duke's policy, joined in a military conspiracy, out of which grew the drama that ended with the murder of Wallenstein on the 25th of February 1634. Piccol0mini's own part in the tragedy has been set forth for all time in the pages of Scluller's Wallenstein. His reward was his marshal's baton, 100,000 gulden and the beautiful estate of Nachod in the Riesengebirge.

He was Wallenstein's pupil as well as his slayer, and had learned the art of war from that master On the 5th-6th of September in the same year he distinguished himself amongst the foremost in the great victory of Nordlingen. He soon saw the necessity for following out the lines of military policy laid