Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 5.djvu/135

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Church writers may represent the excesses of carnival as abhorrent to the church, and may point to the various ordinances of mortification and repentance which she has appointed as a means for atoning for the guilt then con tracted by the city. But nothing is more certain than that many of the popes were great patrons and promoters of carnival keeping. Paul II., the Venetian Barbo, was one of the most notable in this respect. In his time the Jews of Rome were compelled to pay yearly a sum of 1 130 golden florins (the thirty being added as a special memorial of Judas and the thirty pieces of silver), which was expended on the carnival. And we have a decree of Paul II. minutely providing for, and arranging the diversions which were to take place in it. Among other things his Holiness orders that four rings of silver gilt should be provided, two in the Piazza Navona, and two at the Monte Testaccio, one at each place for the burghers and the other for the retainers of the nobles to practise riding at the ring. The Pope also orders a great variety of races, the expense of which are to be paid from the Papal exchequer, one to be run by the Jews, another for Christian children, another for Christian young men, another for sexagenarians, a fifth for asses, and a sixth for buffaloes. Under Julius III. we have long accounts of bull-hunts bull-baits we should rather say in the Forum, with gorgeous descriptions of the magnificence of the dresses, and enormous suppers in the palace of the Conservator! in the Capitol, where seven cardinals, together with the Duke Orazio Farnese, supped at one table, and all the ladies by themselves at another. After the supper the whole party went into the court-yard of the palace, which was turned into the semblance of a theatre, &quot;to see a most charming comedy which was admirably played, and lasted so long that it was not over till ten o clock ! &quot; Even the austere and rigid Caraffa, Paul IV. (ob. 1559), used to keep carnival by inviting all the Sacred College to dine with him. The vigorous and terrible Sixtus V., who was elected in 1585, set himself to the keeping of carnival after a different fashion. Finding that the licence then customary and permitted gave rise to much abuse and no few crimes, he prepared for carnival, to the no small dismay and terror of the Romans, by setting up sundry gibbets in several conspicuous places of the town, as well as whipping posts, the former as a hint to robbers and cut-throats, the latter in store for minor offenders. We find, further, from the provisions made at the time, that Sixtus reformed the evil custom of throwing dirt and dust and flour at passengers, permitting only flowers or sweetmeats to be thrown. The barberi (riderless horses) had by this time begun to run regularly every carnival in the Corso; and Sixtus caused a lane to be enclosed with palisades in the centre of the street, along which the horses might run without the danger of causing the accidents which, it seems then, as now, were frequently the result of this sport. He also compelled the people to desist from the old practice of using every kind of violence and trick to impede the barberi in their course, for the purpose of favouring this or the other among the competi tors. It was formerly the custom, especially in the 16th and 17th centuries, to suspend all carnival observances during the Anno Santo or jubilee year. Gregory XIII., when he celebrated the eleventh jubilee in 1575, forbade any of the usual carnival celebrations, and ordered that all the money usually expended for the purpose by the Apostolic Chamber should be used for the assistance of poor pilgrims. Clement X., just a hundred years later, on the occasion of the jubilee of 1C75, prohibited all carnival celebration, and granted to the Archconfraternity of Pilgrims of the Holy Trinity the GOOO crowns which the Apostolic Chamber was at that period in the habit of spending on the carnival rejoicings, at the same time compelling the Jews to pay over to the same purpose the sums they annually furnished for the barberi and the prizes of the races. The carnival celebra tions have also been frequently suspended on account of the appointed day or days for them having fallen on the date of some church festival. When in the pontificate of Innocent XII. the Wednesday in the last week of carnival chanced to fall on the festival of the Purification of the Virgin, the race of the barberi which ought to have taken place on the vigil of that festival, was changed to the previous Sunday. On many subsequent occasions the days of the sports have from similar causes been sometimes postponed, sometimes anticipated, and sometimes sup pressed. In 1808 Pius VII. forbade all carnival manifesta tions on account of the French invasion, nor would he permit any to take place in 1809, notwithstanding that the French in the occupation of the city had proclaimed the celebration of the carnival. Of course the Pope had no power to enforce his wish that no sort of carnival rejoicing should take place. But it is remarkable, as indicating the feeling of the population at the time, that the Corso remained entirely deserted and all the shops shut.

