120 times has delineated the misfortunes of his country: 137 the ambition and fall of the ungrateful Majo; the revolt and pun ishment of his assassins; the imprisonment and deliverance of the king himself; the private feuds that arose from the public confusion; and the various forms of calamity and discord which afflicted Palermo, the island, and the continent, during the reign of William the First, and the minority of his son. The youth, innocence, and beauty of William the Sec înd, " endeared him to the nation: the factions were recontiled; the laws were revived; and from the manhood to the premature death of that amiable prince, Sicily enjoyed a short season of peace, justice, and happiness, whose value was enhanced by the remembrance of the past and the dread of futurity. The legitimate male posterity of Tancred of Hauteville was extinct in the person of the second William; but his aunt, the daughter of Roger, had married the most powerful prince of the age; and Henry the Sixth, the son of Frederic Barbarossa, descended from the Alps to claim the Imperial crown and the inheritance of his wife. Against the unanimous wish of a free people, this inheritance could only be 126 The Historia Sicula of Hugo Falcandus, which properly extends from 1154 to 1169, is inserted in the viiith volume of Muratori's Collection, (tom. vii. p. 259-344.) and preceded by a eloquent preface or epistle, (p. 251-258, de Calamitatibus Siciliæ.) Falcandus has been styled the Tacitus of Sicily: and, after a just, but immense, abatement, from the ist to the xiith century, from a senator to a monk, I would not strip him of his title: his narrative is rapid and perspicuous, his style bold and elegant, his observation keen; he had studied mankind, and feels like a man. I can only regret the narrow and barren field on which his labors have been cast. 127 The laborious Benedictines (l'Art de vérifier les Dates, p. 896 are of opinion, that the true name of Falcandus is Fulcandus, or Fou cault. According to them, Hugues Foucalt, a Frenchman by birth, and at length abbot of St. Denys, had followed into Sicily his patron Stephen de la Perche, uncle to the mother of William II., archbishop of Palermo, and great chancellor of the kingdom. Yet Falcandus has all the feelings of a Sicilian; and the title of Alumnus (which he be tows on himself) appears to indicate that he was born, or at least educated, in the island. 126 Falcand. p. 303. Richard de St. Germano begins his history from the death and praises of William II. After some unmeaning apithets, he thus continues: Legis et justitiæ cultus tempore suo vige bat in regno; suâ erat quilibet sorte contentus; (were they mortals }; abique pax, ubique securitas, nec latronum metuebat viator insidias nec maris nauta offendicula piratar m, (Script. Rerum Ital. tom. vii p 989.) acquired by arms; and I am pleased to transcribe the style and sense of the historian Falcandus, who writes at the moment, and on the spot, with the feelings of a patriot, and the prophetic eye of a statesman. "Constantia, the daughter of Sicily, nursed from her cradle in the pleasures and plenty, and educated in the arts and manners, of this fortunate isle, departed long since to enrich the Barbarians with our treasures, and now returns, with her savage allies, to contaminate the beauties of her venerable parent. Already I behold the swarms of angry Barbarians: our opulent cities, the places flourishing in a long peace, are shaken with fear, desolated by slaughter, consumed by rapine, and polluted by intemperance and lust. I see the massacre or captivity of our citizens, the rapes of our virgins and matrons. In this extremity (he interrogates a friend) how must the Sicilians act? By the unanimous election of a king of valor and experience, Sicily and Calabria might yet be preserved; for in the levity of the Apulians, ever eager for new revolutions, I can repose neither confidence nor hope. Should Calabria be lost, the lofty towers, the numerous youth, and the naval strength, of Messina, might guard the passage against a foreign invader. If the savage Germans coalesce with the pirates of Messina; if they destroy with fire the fruitful region, so often wasted by the fires of Mount Etna,13 what resource will be left for the interior parts of the island, these noble cities which should never be violated by the hostile 192 191 129 Constantia, primis a cunabulis in deliciarun tuarum affluentiâ diutius educata, tuisque institutis, doctrinus et moribus informata, tandem opibus tuis Barbaros delatura discessit: et nunc cum imgenti bus copiis revertitur, ut pulcherrima nutricis ornamenta barbaric feditate contaminet. . . . Intuari mihi jam videor turbulentas bar barorum acies. . . . civitates opulentas et loca diuturnâ pace floren tia, metû concutere, cæde vastare, râpinis atterere, et fœdare luxuriâ hinc cives aut gladiis intercepti, aut servitute depressi, virgines con stuprata, matronæ, &c. 130 Certe si regem non dubiæ virtutis elegerint, nec a Saracenis Christiani dissentiant, poterit rex creatus rebus licet quasi desperatis et perditis subvenire, et incursus hostium, si prudenter egerit, propulsare. 131 In Apulis, qui, semper novitate gaudentes, novarum rerum studiis aguntur, nihil arbitror spei aut fiducia reponendum. 182 Si civium tuorum virtutem et audaciam attendas, . um etiam ambitum densis turribus circumseptum. mur Cum erudelitate piraticâ Thet tonum confligat atrocitas, et inter an bustos lapides, et Ethnæ flagrant's incendia, &c. footsteps of a Barbarian ? 194 Catana has again been overwhelmed by an earthquake: the ancient virtue of Syracuse expires in poverty and solitude; 15 but Palermo is still crowned with a diadem, and her triple walls enclose the active multitudes of Christians and Saracens. If the two nations, under one king, can unite for their common safety, they may rush on the Barbarians with invincible arms. But if the Saracens, atigued by a repetition of injuries, should now retire and rebel; if they should occupy the castles of the mountains and sea-coast, the unfortunate Christians, exposed to a double attack, and placed as it were between the hammer and the anvil, must resign themselves to hopeless and inevitable servitude." 136 We must not forget, that a priest here prefers his country to his religion; and that the Moslems, whose alliance he seeks, were still numerous and powerful in the state of Sicily. The hopes, or at least the wishes, of Falcandus were at first gratified by the free and unanimous election of Tancred, the grandson of the first king, whose birth was illegitimate, but whose civil and military virtues shone without a blemish. During four years, the term of his life and reign, he stood in arms on the farthest verge of the Apulian frontier, against the powers of Germany; and the restitution of a royal captive, of Constantia herself, without injury or ransom, may appear to surpass the most liberal measure of policy or reason. After his decease, the kingdom of his widow and infant son 131 Eam partem, quam nobilissimarum civitatum fulgor illustrat, quæ et toti regno singulari meruit privilegio præminere, nefarium esset... vel barbarorum ingressû pollui. I wish to transcribe his florid, but curious, description, of the palace, city, and luxuriant plain f Palermo. 135 Vires non suppetunt, et conatus tuos tam inopia civium, quara paucitas bellatorum elidunt. 136 At vero, quia difficile est Christianos in tanto rerum turbiae, sub lato regis timore Saracenos non opprimere, si Saraceni injuriis fatigat. ab eis coeperint dissidere, et castella forte maritima vel montanas munitiones occupaverint; ut hinc cum Theutonicis summâ virtute pugnandum, illinc Saracenis crebris insultibus occurrendum, quid puta acturi sunt Siculi inter has depressi angustias, et velut inter malleur et incudem multo cum discrimine constituti? hoc utique agent quod poterunt, at se Barbaris miserabili conditione dedentes, in eorum se potestatem. O utinam plebis et procerum, Christianorum et orum vota conveniant; ut regem sibi concorditer eligentes totis viribus, toto conamine, totisque desideriis proturbare & The Normans and Sicilians appear to be confounded. ant fell without a struggle; and Henry pursued his victorious march from Capua to Palermo. The political balance of Italy was destroyed by his success; and if the pope and the free cities had consulted their obvious and real interest, they would have combined the powers of earth and heaven to prevent the dangerous union of the German empire with the kingdom of Sicily. But the subtle policy, for which the Vatican has so often been praised or arraigned, was on this occasion blind and inactive; and if it were true that Celestine the Third had kicked away the Imperial crown from the head of the prostrate Henry,137 such an act of impotent pride could serve only to cancel an obligation and provoke an enemy. The Genoese, who enjoyed a beneficial trade and establishment in Sicily, listened to the promise of his boundless gratitude and speedy departure: 198 their fleet commanded the straits of Messina, and opened the harbor of Palermo; and the first act of his government was to abolish the privileges, and to seize the property, of these imprudent allies. The last hope of Falcandus was defeated by the discord of the Christians and Mahometans: they fought in the capital; several thousands of the latter were slain; but their surviving brethren fortified the mountains, and disturbed above thirty years the peace of the island. By the policy of Frederic the Second, sixty thousand Saracens were transplanted to Nocera in Apulia. In their wars against the Roman church, the emperor and his son Mainfroy were strengthened and disgraced by the service of the enemies of Christ; and this national colony maintained their religion and manners in the heart of Italy, till they were extirpated, at the end of the thirteenth century, by the zeal and revenge of the house of Anjou.' 139 137 The testimony of an Englishman, of Roger le Hoveden, (p. 689,) will lightly weigh against the silence of German and Italian history, (Muratori, Annali d' Italia, tom. x. p. 156.) The priests and pilgrims, who returned from Rome, exalted, by every tale, the omnipotence of the holy father. 138 Ego enim in eo cum Teutonicis manere non debeo, (Caffari, An nal. Genuenses, in Muratori, Script. Rerum Italicarum, tom vi. p. 367, 168.) 19 For the Saracens of Sicily and Nocera, see the Annals of Mura tori, (tom. x. p. 149, and A. D. 1223, 1247,) Giannone, (tom ii. p 885,) and of the originals, in Muratori's Collection, Richard de St Germano, (tom. vii. p. 996,) Matteo Spinelli de Giovenazzo, (toru. vii p. 1064,) Nicholas de Jamsilla, (tom. x. p. 494,) and Matreo Villani, (tom xiv L vii. p. 103.) The last of these insir uates hat, in re 140 All the calamities which the prophetic orator had deplored were surpassed by the cruelty and avarice of the German con queror. He violated the royal sepulchres,* and explored the secret treasures of the palace, Palermo, and the whole kingdom the pearls and jewels, however precious, might be easily removed; but one hundred and sixty horses were laden with the gold and silver of Sicily. The young king, his mother and sisters, and the nobles of both sexes, were separately confined in the fortresses of the Alps; and, on the slightest rumor of rebellion, the captives were deprived of life, of their eyes, or of the hope of posterity. Constantia herself was touched with sympathy for the miseries of her country; and the heiress of the Norman line might struggle to check her despotic husband, and to save the patrimony of her new-born son, of an emperor so famous in the next age under the name of Frederic the Second. Ten years after this revolution, the French monarchs annexed to their crown the duchy of Normandy: the sceptre of her ancient dukes had been transmitted, by a granddaughter of William the Conqueror, to the house of Plantagenet; and the adventurous Normans, who had raised so many trophies in France, England, and Ireland, in Apulia, Sicily, and the East, were lost, either in victory or servitude, among the vanquished nations. ducing the Saracens of Nocera, Charles II. of Anjou employed rather artifice than violence. 140 Muratori quotes a passage from Arnold of Lubec, (1. iv. c. 20:) Reperit thesauros absconditos, et omnem lapidum pretiosorum et gemmarum gloriam, ita ut oneratis 160 somariis, gloriose ad terram suam redierit. Roger de Hoveden, who mentions the violation of the royal tombs and corpses, computes the spoil of Salerno at 200,000 ounces of gold, (p. 746.) On these occasions, I am almost tempted to exclaim with the listening maid in La Fontaine, "Je voudrois bien avoir ce qui manque." * It is remarkable that at the same time the tombs of the Roman empe rors, even of Constantine himself, were violated and ransacked by their de generate successor Alexius Comnenus, in order to enable him to pay the "German" tribute exacted by the menaces of the emperor Henry. See the and of the first book of the Life of Alexius, in Nicetas, p. 632, edit. Bonn -M |