Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume VII.djvu/808

 792 GHERARDESCA GHIBERTI alternately in the hands of both contending par- ties. It was also taken by the French in the war of the Austrian succession, and twice in the campaigns of the revolution, when it be- came the capital of the French department of the Scheldt. After the downfall of Napoleon in 1814 it was attached to the kingdom of the Netherlands. During the hundred days Louis XVIII. took refuge in Ghent. The revolution of 1830 made Ghent, with Flanders, a part of the new kingdom of Belgium. Ghent is asso- ciated with American history by the treaty concluded there, Dec. 24, 1814, which ter- minated the second war between Great Britain and the United States. GHERARDESCA, Ugolino della, an Italian parti- san leader, died in Pisa in 1289. His ances- tors originally came from Tuscany and removed to Pisa as prominent Ghibellines. In order to secure his supremacy in Pisa, he induced the Guelph leader Giovanni Visconti to marry his sister, but he and his brother-in-law were ex- pelled. Aided by the forces of Florence and Lucca, he soon gained victories over the op- posing faction, and was recalled to Pisa in 1276. In the warfare between Pisa and Genoa in 1284 he contrived the defeat and capture of the Pisan squadron near "the island of Me- loria (Aug. 6). The Pisans, unaware of his perfidy, continued to accord him their confi- dence, and he again betrayed them by ceding a number of castles and forts to the enemies of the republic, who thereupon established a protectorate over Pisa with his connivance. His grandson Nino de Gallura led an unsuc- cessful revolt against him in concert with both Ghibelline and Guelph leaders; and Ugolino wreaked unsparing vengeance on his oppo- nents. Ruggiero Ubaldini, the archbishop, whose nephew had been one of the victims, subsequently headed a general rising against Ugolino, who was at last (July 1, 1288) arrested, together with his sons, Gaddo and Uguccione, and three grandsons. At the instigation of the archbishop they were doomed to starva- tion in the Gualandi tower, hence called torre di fame. Dante describes their terrible death in the 33d canto of the Inferno. GHERIAH, or Viziadroog, a town and fort of the province of Bombay, British India, in the collectorate of Rutnagherry, South Concan, 170 m. S. of Bombay. It has a safe harbor at the mouth of the river Kunvee, unobstructed by a bar and with a depth of three or four fathoms. The fort, built by the Mahratta chief Sevajee in 1662, stands on a bold promontory on the coast of the Indian ocean. It received the name of Gheriah from the Mohammedans, while by the Mahrattas it was commonly known as Viziadroog. During the maritime contests of the latter people with the Mogul emperors in the 17th century, one of t^ieir chieftains, named Conajee Angria, revolted against the Mahrattas with part of the fleet, and made himself master of the coast from Tanna to Ra- japoor. Under this adventurer and his suc- cessors, who all bore the family name of Angria, Gheriah became the centre of a vast system of piracy, which infested the adjacent seas for upward of 50 years. Several attempts were made to disperse the corsairs. The Portuguese and English attacked them in 1719, and the English again in 1722; the Dutch in 1724. In March, 1755, a British fleet, followed by some Mahratta vessels, attacked the Angria's fleet at Severndroog. The pirates escaped by fast sailing, but the town was bombarded and partly burned. Toward the end of the same year reinforcements arrived from Eng- land, and the reduction of Gheriah was at once determined upon. On Feb. 11, 1756, Admiral Watson, with 800 Europeans and 1,000 sepoys commanded by Col. Olive, arrived off the pro- montory, while a Mahratta army approached on the land side. The pirate fleet was soon burned ; a furious bombardment silenced the guns from the fort; the troops were landed, and on the 13th the place was taken. It was given up to the peishwa under a treaty con- cluded with the Mahrattas the same year, and passed with the rest of his dominions into the hands of the East India company in 1818. GHIBELLINES. See GUELPHS AND GHIBEL- LINES. GHIBERTI, Lorenzo, an Italian sculptor, archi- tect, and painter, born in Florence about 1380, died there about 1455. The son of a goldsmith, he early learned to imitate ancient medals, and began to exercise himself in painting. The seignory and merchants of Florence determined in 1401 to procure for the baptistery of San Giovanni a bronze folding door to correspond with that already made by Andrea Pisano, for which a prize was offered. Each artist was allowed a year in which to execute a panel in bronze representing in bass relief the " Sacrifice of Isaac." Ghiberti was proclaimed victor even by his most eminent rivals, Donatello and Bru- nelleschi. Intrusted therefore with this im- mense labor, he devoted 21 years to its accom- plishment, dividing each half of the door into ten panels, each of which contains a bass re- lief representing a subject taken from the New Testament. In 1424 this door was placed in one of the side entrances of the baptistery, and its success led to his being commissioned to ex- ecute another. This was commenced in 1428, was divided into ten panels filled with subjects from the Old Testament, occupied him nearly as long as the other, and was superior to it, being declared by Michel Angelo worthy to be the gate of paradise. During the 40 years that he was engaged upon these doors he executed several other works in bronze, among which were a statue of John the Baptist, two bass reliefs for the cathedral of Siena, a "St. Mat- thew " and " St. Stephen," and the reliquary of St. Zenobius surmounted by six angels. The last, and the " St. Matthew " and the second door of San Giovanni, are the masterpieces of modelling in the 15th century, and the door is perhaps still unrivalled. As an architect,