Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 3.djvu/199

 12 S. III. MARCH 10, 1917.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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so young, adding that some will be disposed to believe that it was not struck until he was king. However, in ' Italian Medals,' by Cornelius von Fabriczy, translated by Mrs. Gustavus W. Hamilton, 1904, p. 165, is the following :

"We have even five medals from Candida's hand belonging to the last years of his life, among them those of the later King Francis I., his mother, and his sister ( dated 1504). The first (PI. xxxiii., 5) is not only of importance as the earliest portrait of the prince, at this time ten years of age, but also on account of the reverse, the Salamander in flames, the well-known impresa of the King, which now appears for the first time, and was therefore probably designed by Candida."

The dates of Giovanni Candida given on p. 162 are " born before 1450, died after 1504." After a short account of Candida and the offices which he held, the author mentions as

" his latest work the medal of Giovanni Francesco Rovere, Bishop of Turin and Prefect of the City of Rome. Since Rovere acquired this dignity in 1504, it follows that his medal, the inscription of which shows that he already possessed it, was cast, at the earliest, during the same year. Candida must have died soon afterwards, as we lack further information concerning him."

In ' La France Metallique,' after that of 1504, are the reverses of many medals of Francis. King of France, of which four have the device of the salamander surrounded by flames :

1. The salamander ; above which is a crown. Inscription " Nutrico et extinguo." No date.

2. From behind the salamander rises a large F, above which is a crown. Inscrip- tion " Magna opera Domini." No date.

3. The salamander crowned ; on the field are six fleurs-de-lis and five F's. In- scription " Extinguo nutrior." No date.

4. The salamander ; above is a crown. Inscription " Discutit hanc flammam Fran- ciscus robore mentis Omnia pervincit rerum immersabilis undis." As to the date, the ' Explication ' (p. 165) says that the figure 43 which follows the inscription may be supplemented by the omitted thousandth year and the century of the reign. This makes 1543.

There is no trace of 43 on the print of the medal, p. 54, but these reproductions have many errors, for the correction of which one refers to the ' Explication,' published a year later than ' La France Metallique ' itself. The last-given inscription on the medal has " haec " for " hanc," and " per- vicit " for " pervincit."

The meaning of the salamander and the application of the first inscription, viz., " Notrisco al buono stingo el reo," are not perfectly clear.

The ' Biographic Universelle ' under " Boisy (Artus)," quoting, I think, from Mezeray, says that to Artus de Gouffier, seigneur de Boisy, comte d'fitampes, et grand-maitre de la maison du roi, was entrusted

" the education of Francis I., then due d'Angou- lme. Boisy found in his pupil a character full of fire, capable of all virtues and all passions ; he had difficulty in managing this fire, dangerous as- well as useful, and it is this which he wished to- signify by the device which he caused the young: prince to take ; this was a salamander in the fire, with these words : Nutrisco et extinguo."

(These words are practically those of the second inscription given above, being ap- parently an abbreviation of the first.)

This quotation from the ' Biographie Universelle,' or from Mezeray, appears to- indicate that de Boisy invented the quaint conceit of representing the boy of fiery passions by the flames of fire, and himself, the tutor, as the salamander, nourishing what was good in his pupil, extinguishing what was bad, the salamander being, accord- ing to Pliny (' Natural History,' x. 86), so intensely cold as to extinguish fire by its contact. The salamander and the original inscription, " I cherish that which is good, I quench that which is bad," as I translate it, have no apparent application to the boy, aged nine or ten, but they fit de Boisy and his duties towards his fiery pupil very well.

Perhaps Francis as king, after using the badge of the salamander for eleven years, having no desire to give it up, satisfied himself by changing the old inscription into i " Nutrico (or Nutrisco) et extinguo " ; " Magna opera Domini " ; " Extinguo nu- trior," &c.

Apart from the medals of Francis, I may add that in ' La France Metallique,' p. 54, is the reverse of a medal, dated 1514, in. honour of Queen Claude, his wife. It represents a moon taking such light from the sun, and sending forth such rays, that it seems to be another sun by the purity and clearness of its light ('Explication,' p. 165). The inscription is "Candida candidis. ' Outside the compliment to Queen Claude, can this be a punning reference to Candida, statesman, diplomatist, and medallist, who, if he was living ten or eleven years after 1 504, may have produced the medal ? Such evi- dence as appears above as to his dying soon, after 1504 is purely negative. It should be noted that, although the date on the