Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XIII.djvu/557

 PISA PISCATAQUIS 541 cular edifice 160 ft. in diameter and 179 ft. high, with mosaic pavement and carved col- ums. The celebrated leaning tower or cam- panile is 179 ft. high and 50 ft. in diameter, and divided into eight stories, each having an out- side gallery projecting 7 ft. (See CAMPANILE.) The Campo Santo (see CEMETERY) became the model of other cemeteries in Italy, and con- tains frescoes which developed the genius of Raphael and Michel Angelo. The university, one of the most famous in the middle ages, and attended in 1875 by about 500 students, has a library of nearly 60,000 volumes. There is an academy of fine arts, a museum of natural his- tory, and a botanic garden. The Uppezinghi, Lanfranchi, and Pesciolini palaces are imposing buildings. The aqueduct connecting with the valle d'Asciano, built in the 17th century, is 4 m. long, and has 1,000 arches and 8 reservoirs. Oil and marble are exported, but the commer- cial and industrial activity is limited. Pisa is of remote and contested origin. The Etrus- cans had early settlements here. In the 2d century B. 0. it became a Roman colony and a fashionable resort. In the 9th century A. D. it had fully recovered from the vicissitudes which had overtaken it after the fall of the Roman empire, and became a free town and one of the most powerful maritime republics of the middle ages. Its glory reached a climax in the llth century by the conquest of Sar- dinia, Corsica, Elba, and afterward of the Ba- learic islands and other territories, and by re- peated victories over the Saracens, whose fleet was destroyed by the Pisans at Palermo, which city they captured (1063). But the warfare with the rival republic of Genoa began about the same period, and became the source of great disasters. Nevertheless the Pisans ex- tended their trade in the Levant, where by joining in the crusades they had obtained great privileges, which they retained for a consider- able period. But their devotion to the Ghi- bellines resulted in a league of the Guelphic cities against Pisa. In 1284, owing to the per- nicious influence of Ugolino della Gherardesca (see GHEKARDESCA), they were overwhelmed by the Genoese in the naval battle of Meloria, and before the close of the century they had lost Corsica and most other possessions. Under Uguccione, early in the 14th century, there was a momentary revival of national prosper- ity; but a downward course began shortly af- ter, owing to party strifes and the interven- tion of the emperor Charles IV. In 1392 they fell under the sway of the Appiani, and in 1399 through Gherardo Appiano were subjected to the tyranny of the Visconti of Milan, who in their turn surrendered them in 1406 to the Florentines. But to the latter the Pisans made a heroic resistance, and after a long siege yield- ed only to famine. In 1494 they regained their independence under the leadership of Simone Orlandi and with the assistance of Charles VIII. of France. The Florentines again laid siege to Pisa July 31, 1499 ; but the city gal- 665 VOL. xiii. 35 lantly resisted this as well as subsequent at- tacks by the Florentines and by Louis XII. of France till June 8, 1509, when they sur- rendered to the former on condition of a full amnesty. From that period Pisa remained part of the territories of Florence, and sub- sequently of Tuscany. The numerous Latin inscriptions in Pisa have been described by Paganini, Tantani, and Lupi (Pisa, 1872-'5). PISANO. I. Nicola, an Italian sculptor, born in Pisa about 1200, died about 1278. He was the son of a notary, and seems to have derived his art chiefly from the models of antiquity. He was the first to inaugurate the renaissance period in Italian statuary. Among his most celebrated works are the marble urn of St. Dominic at Bologna (1225-'31), which he finished only in part, the pulpit in the bap- tistery of Pisa (1260), which was placed under the special guardianship of the law, and a still finer one for the cathedral of Siena (1266). His architectural works comprise the magnificent basilica of St. Anthony (il Santo) at Padua (1231, completed in 1407), the Frari church at Venice, and Santa Trinita at Florence (about 1250), and subsequently the campanile for the church of San Nicola at Pisa, which served as a model for that of Bramante in the Belvedere of the Vatican and for Sangallo's enclosure of "St. Patrick's well" at Orvieto. II. Giovanni, an Italian architect, son of the preceding, born in Pisa about 1240, died in 1320. He studied under his father, imitated many of his works, and executed with his assistance or alone the fountain near the cathedral of Perugia and the church of Santa Maria della Spina at Pisa. He attained world-wide celebrity by designing $he Campo Santo in the latter city (see CEME- TERY), at which he worked from 1278 to 1283, when he constructed the Castel Nuovo at Naples, the model of the Paris Bastile. His sculptures are inferior to his father's; among the best of them are the marble shrine for the high altar at the cathedral of Arezzo and the mausoleums of several popes. There was an- other Giovanni Pisano, who was a pupil and colaborer of Donatello. III. Andrea. See AN- DREA PISANO. PISCATAQUA, a river flowing between New Hampshire and Maine. It rises in East pond, between the towns of Wakefield, N. H., and Newfield, Me. ; thence to Berwick Lower falls it is called Salmon Falls river, after which un- til its junction with the Cocheco it is some- times called the Newichawannoc ; thence to the ocean, which it enters about 3 m. below Portsmouth, it has the name Piscataqua. ^ The harbor, from Portsmouth to the sea, owing to the strong tides, is never obstructed by ice, and is one of the best in the United States. PISCATAQUIS, a N. county of Maine, drained by the Piscataquis and the west branch of the Penobscot and their tributaries; area, 3,780 sq. m.; pop. in 1870, 14,403. Its surface is dotted over with hills and mountains, the high- est of which is Mt. Katahdin, and contains a