Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 13.djvu/497

 1300-1342.] ITALY 477 tyrants in their grasp upon free cities. Growing up out of the captain of the people or signore of the commune, the tyrant annihilated both parties for his own profit and for the peace of the state. He used the dictatorial powers with which he was invested, to place himself above the law, resuming in his person the state-machinery which had preceded him. In him, for the first time, the city attained self-consciousness ; the blindly working forces of previous revolutions were combined in the will of a ruler. The tyrant s general policy was to favour the multitude at the expense of his own caste. He won favour by these means, and completed the levelling down of classes, which had been proceeding ever since the emergence of the com munes. In 1309 Robert, grandson of Charles, the first Angevine sovereign, succeeded to the throne of Naples, and became the leader of the Guelfs in Italy. In the next year Henry VII. of Luxembourg crossed the Alps soon after his election to the empire, and raised the hopes of the Ghibellines. Dante from his mountain solitudes passionately called upon him to play the part of a Messiah. But it was now im possible for any German to control the &quot; Garden of the Empire.&quot; Italy had entered on a new phase of her exist ence, and the great poet s De Monarchic! represented a dream of the past which could not be realized. Henry established imperial vicars in the Lombard .towns, confirm ing the tyrants, but gaining nothing for the empire in ex change for the titles he conferred. After receiving the crown in Rome, he died at Buonconvento, a little walled town south of Siena, on his backward journey in 1313. The profits of his inroad were reaped by despots, who used the Ghibelline prestige for the consolidation of their own power. It is from this epoch that the supremacy of the Visconti, hitherto the unsuccessful rivals of the Guelfic Torriani for the sigtiory of Milan, dates. The Scaligers in Verona and the Carraresi in Padua were strengthened; and in Tuscany Castruccio Castracane, Uguccione s successor at Lucca, became formidable. In 1325 he defeated the Florentines at Alto Pascio, and carried home their carroccio as a trophy of his victory over the Guelfs. Louis of Bavaria, the next emperor, made a similar excursion in the year 1327, with even greater loss of imperial prestige. He deposed Galeazzo Visconti on his downward journey, and offered Milan for a sum of money to his son Azzo upon his return. Castruccio Castracane was nominated by him duke of Lucca ; and this is the first instance of a dynastic title conferred upon an Italian adventurer by the emperor. Castruccio dominated Tuscany, where the Guelf cause, in the weakness of King Robert, languished. But the adventurer s death in 1328 saved the stronghold of republican institu tions, and Florence breathed freely for a while again. Can Grande della Scala s death in the next year inflicted on the Lombard Ghibellines a loss hardly inferior to that of Cast- ruccio s on their Tuscan allies. Equally contemptible in its political results and void of historical interest was the brief visit of John of Bohemia, son of Henry VII., whom the Ghibellines next invited to assume their leadership. He sold a few privileges, conferred a few titles, and re- crossed the Alps in 1333. It is clear that at this time the fury of the civil wars was spent. In spite of repeated efforts on the part of the Ghibellines, in spite of King Robert s supine incapacity, the imperialists gained no permanent advantage. The Italians were tired of fighting, and the leaders of both factions looked exclusively to their own interests. Each city which had been the cradle of freedom thankfully accepted a master, to quench the con flagration of party strife, encourage trade, and make the handicraftsmen comfortable. Even the Florentines in 1342 submitted for a few months to the despotism of the duke of Athens. They conferred the signory upon him adven ture. for life ; and, had he not mismanaged matters, he might have held the city in his grasp. Italy was settling down and turning her attention to home comforts, arts, and liter ature. Boccaccio, the contented bourgeois, succeeded to Dante, the fierce aristocrat. The most marked; proof of the change which came over Corn- Italy towards the middle of the 14th century is furnished panies c by the companies of adventure. It was with their own militia that the burghers won freedom in the war of inde pendence, subdued the nobles, and fought the battles of the parties. But from this time forward they laid down their arms, and played the game of warfare by the aid of mercenaries. Ecclesiastical overlords, interfering from a distance in Italian politics ; prosperous republics, with plenty of money to spend but no leisure or inclination for camp-life ; cautious tyrants, glad of every pretext to emasculate their subjects, and courting popularity by ex changing conscription for taxation, all combined to favour the new system. Mercenary troops are said to have been first levied from disbanded Germans, together with Breton and English adventurers, whom the Visconti and Castruccio took into their pay. They soon appeared under their own captains, who hired them out to the highest bidder, or marched them on marauding expeditions up and down the less protected districts. The names of some of these earliest captains of adventure, Fra Moriale, Count Lando, and Duke Werner, who styled himself the &quot; Enemy of God and Mercy,&quot; have been preserved to us. As the companies grew in size and improved their discipline, it was seen by the Italian nobles that this kind of service offered a good career for men of spirit, who had learned the use of arms. To leave so powerful and profitable a calling in the hands of foreigners seemed both dangerous and uneconomical. Therefore, after the middle of the century, this profession fell into the hands of natives. The first Italian who formed an exclusively Italian company was Alberico da Barbiano, a nobleman of Romagna, and founder of the Milanese house of Belgiojoso. In his school the great condottieri Braccio da Montone and Sforza Attendolo were formed ; and hence forth the battles of Italy were fought by Italian generals commanding native troops. This was better in some respects than if the mercenaries had been foreigners. Yet it must not be forgotten that the new companies of adven ture, who decided Italian affairs for the next century, were in no sense patriotic. They sold themselves for money, irrespective of the cause which they upheld; and, while changing masters, they had no care for any interests but their own. The name condottiero, derived from condotta, a paid contract to supply so many fighting men in service able order, sufficiently indicates the nature of the business. In the hands of able captains, like Francesco Sforza or Piccinino, these mercenary troops became moving de spotisms, draining the country of its wealth, and always eager to fasten and found tyrannies upon the provinces they had been summoned to defend. Their generals sub stituted heavy-armed cavalry for the old militia, and intro duced systems of campaigning which reduced the art of war to a game of skill. Battles became all but bloodless ; diplomacy and tactics superseded feats of arms and hard blows in pitched fields. In this way the Italians lost their military vigour, and wars were waged by despots from their cabinets, who pulled the strings of puppet captains in their pay. Nor were the people only enfeebled for resistance to a real foe ; the whole political spirit of the race was demoralized. The purely selfish bond between condottieri and their employers, whether princes or republics, involved intrigues and treachery, checks and counterchecks, secret terror on the one hand and treasonable practice on the other, which ended by making statecraft in Italy synony mous with perfidy.