Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 20.djvu/572

Rh 552 R I E R I E south-east, the Riesengebirge proper run south-east and north-west between the sources of the Zacken and the Bober, for a distance of 23 miles, with a breadth of 14 miles. They cover an area of about 425 square miles, three- fourths of which is in Austrian and the remainder in Prussian territory. The boundary line follows the crest of the principal chain or ridge (Riesenkamm), with the highest summits, which stretches along the northern side of the group, with an average height of over 4000 feet. Its principal peaks are the Reiftrager (4430 feet), the Hohe Rad (4968 feet), the Great Sturnihaube (4862 feet), the Little Sturmhaube (4646 feet), and, near the east extremity, the Schneekoppe or Riesenkoppe (5266 feet), the loftiest mountain in northern or central Germany. Roughly parallel to this northern ridge, and separated from it by a long narrow valley known as the Sieben- griinde, there extends on the south a second and lower chain, of broad massive " saddles," with comparatively few peaks. The chief heights here are the Kesselkoppe (4708 feet), the Krkonose (4849 feet), the Ziegenriicken, and the Brunnenberg (5072 feet). From both ridges spurs of greater or less length are sent off at various angles, those from the Bohemian ridge being longer, broader, and less abrupt than those from the Riesenkamm. On its northern side this mountain group rises ruggedly and precipitously from the Hirschberg valley ; but on its southern side its slope towards Bohemia is very much more gradual. The scenery is in general bold and wild, the projecting crags and deep rocky gorges and precipices often presenting striking, sometimes even sublime, land- scapes. The Bohemian ridge is cleft about the middle by a deep gorge through which pour the headwaters of the river Elbe, which finds its source in the Siebengriinde. The Iser, Bober, Aupa, Zacken, Queiss, and a great number of smaller streams also rise among these mountains or on their skirts ; and small lakes and tarns are not unfrequent in the valleys. The Great and Little Schneegruben, two deep rocky gorge-like valleys in which snow remains all the year round lie to the north of the Hohe Rad. Nearly the whole of the Riesenkamm and the western portion of the southern chain are granite ; the eastern extremity of the main ridge and several mountains to the south-east are formed of a species of gneiss ; and the greater part of the Bohemian chain, especially its summits, consists of mica-slate. Blocks of these minerals lie scattered on the sides and ridges of the mountains and in the beds of the streams ; and extensive turf moors occupy many of the mountain slopes and valleys. The lower parts of the Riesengebirge are clad with forests of oak, beech, pine, and fir; above 1600 feet only the last two kinds of trees are found, and beyond about 3950 feet only the dwarf pine (Pinus Pumilio). Various alpine plants are found on the Riesengebirge, some having been artificially introduced* on the Schneekoppe. Wheat is grown at an elevation of 1800 feet above the sea-level, and oats as high as 2700 feet. The inhabitants of this mountain region, who are tolerably numerous, especially on the Bohemian side, live for the most part, not in villages, but in scattered huts called "Bauden." They support themselves by the rearing of cattle, tillage, glass-making, and linen-weaving. Mining is carried on only to a small extent for arsenic, although there are traces of former more extensive workings for other metals. Several spots in the Riesengebirge are a good deal frequented as summer resorts ; and the Schnee- koppe and other summits are annually visited by a con- siderable number of travellers, who find shelter in the Bauden. The Riesengebirge is the legendary home of Number Nip (Riibezahl), a half -mischievous half-friendly goblin of German folklore; and various localities in the group are more or less directly associated with his name. RIETI, a city of Italy, in the province of Perugia, 18| miles south-east of Terni, which is 69 miles by rail from Rome. It occupies a fine position 1 396 feet above the sea on the right bank of the Velino (a torrent sub-tributary to the Tiber), which at this point issues from the limestone plateau ; the old town occupies the declivity and the new town spreads out on the level. While with its quaint red- roofed houses, its old town walls (restored about 1250), its castle, its cathedral (13th and 15th centuries), its episcopal palace (1283, Andrea Pisano), and its various churches and convents Rieti has no small amount of mediaeval pictur- esqueness, it also displays a good deal of modern activity in wine-growing, cattle-breeding, and sugar-boiling. The fertility of the neighbourhood is celebrated both by Virgil and by Cicero. A Roman bridge over the Velino, Thorwaldsen's monument to Isabella Alfani, and a statue of St Barbara by Berdini, both in the cathedral, and the Palazzo Vincentini by Vignola deserve to be mentioned. The population was 7875 in 1871, and 9618 (with suburbs, 13,679; in the commune, 16,822) in 1881. According to Tcrentius Varro (himself perhaps of Reatine birth) and others who have followed him, the people who founded Cures, and afterwards settled on the Palatine at Rome, were natives of the Reatine territory ; but this is of somewhat the same questionable character as the other story about the companion of Hercules who was buried at this point near the Via Salaria. About the Via Salaria itself, there is no doubt it led from the sea to Reate and onwards towards Ancona, and was from a very early date the great route for the conveyance of salt to the Sabine country. While hardly mentioned in connexion with the Punic or Civil Wars, Reate is described by Strabo as exhausted by those long contests. Its inhabitants received the Roman franchise at the same time with the rest of the Sabines (290 B.C.), but it appears as a pnefectura and not as a municipium down to the beginning of the empire. It was never made a colonia, though veterans of the Praetorian and of the legions Octava and Decima Augusta were settled there by Vespasian, who belonged to a Eeatine family and was born in the neighbourhood. For the contests of the Reatines with the people of Interamna see TERNI. About the middle of the 12th century the town was besieged and captured by Roger I. of Sicily. In the struggle between church and empire it always held with the former ; and it defied the forces of Frederick II. and Otho IV. Pope Nicholas IV. long resided at Reati, and it was there he crowned Charles II. of Anjou king of the Two Sicilies. In the 14th century Robert, and afterwards Joanna, of Naples managed to keep possession of Reati for many years, but it returned to the States of the Church tinder Gregory IX. About the year 1500 the liberties of the town, long defended against the encroachments of the popes, were entirely abolished. An earthquake in 1785 was in 1799 followed by the much more disastrous pillage of Reati by the papal troops for a space of fourteen days. See Aldus Manutiiis, "Dissert, epistolica de Reati," in Nor. Thet. Antiq. Rom., . ; Angelottl, Descrizione, 1635 ; Schenardi, Antic/ie lapidi, 1820 ; and Michaeli, Note per la storia di Rieti, 1868, 1870. RIETSCHEL, ERNST FKIEDEICH AUGUST (1804-1861), one of the most distinguished of modern German sculp- tors. Born at Pulsnitz in Saxony in 1804, at an early age he became an art student at Dresden, and subsequently a pupil of Rauch in Berlin. He there gained an art studentship, and studied in Rome in 1827-28. After returning to Saxony he soon brought himself into notice by a colossal statue of Frederick Augustus, king of Saxony, was elected a member of the academy of Dres- den, and thenceforth became one of the chief sculptors of his country. In 1832 he was elected to the Dresden professorship of sculpture, and had many foreign orders of merit conferred on him by the Governments of different countries. His death occurred at Dresden in 1861. Rietschel's style was very varied ; he produced works imbued with much religious feeling, and to some extent occupied the same place as a sculptor that Overbeck did in painting. Other import- ant works l>y Rietschel were purely classical in style. He was specially famed for his portrait figures of eminent men, treated with much idealism and dramatic vigour ; among the latter class his chief works were colossal statues of Goethe and Schiller for the town of Weimar, of Weber for Dresden, and of Lessing for Bruns-