253 



CINNA, LUCIUS CORNELIUS. 



CISNEROS, FRANCIS XIMENEZ DE. 



254 



pontifices; or that he made his calculation by changing the lunar 

 years of the early Roman kings, which were of ten months, into years 

 of twelve months, according to the reckoning of the period when he 

 wrote. Now if we admit, as Junius Gracchanus states, that the old 

 calendar was in use to the time of the first Tarquin, which will give 

 a period of 132 years from the foundation of the city, we may adopt 

 the following solution of Niebuhr : " If Cincius took these to be 

 cyclical years, he got exactly a secle (110 years) for the first four 

 kings ; and if he subtracted the difference, twenty-two years, from the 

 era of Polybius, the result for the building of the city would be the 

 very date, OL 12, 4." (Niebuhr, 'Roman History,' Transl. L 280). 



(The fragments of Cincius are printed in Krause's Vita; et Fragments. 

 Veterum Biitoricorum Xomanorum, Berlin, 1 833.) 



CINNA, LU'CIUS CORNE'LIUS, a Roman patrician, who belonged 

 to the party of Marius. In B.C. 86 he obtained the consulship with 

 Octavius, who made a strenuous opposition to his proposal for recalling 

 Marius and his party from banishment. A dispute followed between 

 the consuls, which was attended with bloodshed. Cinna, unable 

 to make head against his opponents in Rome, withdrew to Tibur, 

 Prseneste, and other neighbouring towns, to seek for aid. By thus 

 leaving his post he resigned his office, and the senate took an early 

 opportunity to appoint another consul, L. C. Merula, in his room. 

 Cinna, now in concert with Marius, Carbo, and Sertorius, advanced to 

 Rome, and laying siege to the city, the senate were forced to propose 

 a treaty, which was at last concluded. Cinna was reinstated in the 

 consulship, and Marius was readmitted as a Roman citizen. Marius 

 however refused to enter the city until the sentence of banishment 

 was formally repealed. Accordingly an assembly of the people was 

 held ; but while the votes were taking, Marius entered Rome with 

 armed men, and forthwith proceeded to take vengeance on his 

 opponent*. Sulla's house was destroyed, and every quarter of the 

 city wa the scene of robbery and murder. Octavius, the colleague of 

 Cinna, with many senators, fell in the massacre. The partisans of 

 Marius were as reckless as their leader. At last Cinna and Marius 

 themselves became desirous of putting an end to these revolting pro- 

 ceedings, and among other measures they seized on the consulship 

 together. Marius died at the age of seventy years, on the first day of 

 his entering on the office. Cinna continued the usurpation which he 

 had begun, and chose for his colleague Valerius Flaccus, to whom he 

 assigned the province of Asia. 



When Sulla had brought the Mithridatic war to a close, he contem- 

 plated returning to Italy, in order to punish his enemies. Previously 

 however to setting sail, he sent the senate a statement of the services 

 lie had rendered and the wrongs he had suffered, at the same time 

 threatening his enemies with his vengeance. The senate endeavoured 

 to appease Sulla. They also attempted to moderate the fury of Cinna, 

 but he persisted in prosecuting the war. He made himself consul, 

 B.C. 83, with Papirius Carbo [CARBO], to whom he gave the command 

 in Gaul. Cinna now prepared to oppose Sulla, and intended to meet 

 him in Thessaly, by which route it was supposed he would return to 

 Italy. The troops however were reluctant to embark, and an attempt 

 to force them ended in a mutiny, in which Cinna was killed. C. Julius 

 Caesar married China's daughter Cornelia. 



(Appian, de Sell. Civ., I, 389-97; Living, Epit. Ixxix., Ixxx., Ixxxiii.; 

 Floras, iii., 21 ; Velleius Paterculus, ii, 19-24 ; Dion Cassius in Fraym. ; 

 Plutarch, Lira of Mariui and Sulla.) 



CORNELIUS CINNA, a grandson of Pompey, headed a conspiracy 

 against Augustus, who however generously pardoned him and made 

 him consul. Their friendship remained afterwards unbroken. 

 ( IONE, ANDREA DI. [ORCAGNA.] 



CIPRIA'NI, GIOVANNI BATISTA, descended from an ancient 

 family of Pistoia, was born at Florence in 1727. He received his first 

 instructions from Heckford, an English artist* He afterwards studied 

 under Gabbiani ; or, according to Lanzi, he studied from a collection 

 of drawings by Gabbiani, upon which he formed his style. In 1755 

 he came to England, and eubsequently married an English lady of 

 moderate fortune, by whom he had three children. He was one of 

 the original members of the Royal Academy, and was presented with a 

 silver cup by that body in return for the design for their diploma, 

 which he furnished. He died, much esteemed, December 14, 1785, 

 and was buried at Chelsea, Cipriani executed few paintings. Lanzi 

 mentions two, in the Abbey of St. Michael on the Sea. He employed 

 himself chiefly in drawing designs, of which Bartolozzi engraved a 

 great number. His designs exhibit skill in drawing, and a kind of 

 meretricious grace, but they belong to an essentially corrupt school, 

 and the influence of Cipriani upon English art was as far as it extended 

 certainly mischievous. 



CISNEROS, FRANCIS XIMENEZ DE (by the Spaniards generally 

 called Cardinal Cianeros ; but in biographical and other works he goes 

 under the name of Ximenez), a celebrated statesman and patron of 

 literature, a cardinal and primate of Spain, was born in 1437 at Torre- 

 lagnna in New Castile. He studied at a school at Alcala de Henares 

 and at the university of Salamanca, and afterwards went to Rome, 

 where he acquired such reputation, that Sixtus IV. promised him the 

 first vacant prebend in the cathedral of Toledo; but the Archbishop 

 of Toledo, vexed at this inroad on his patronage, and at the firmnes 

 with which CUneros demanded it as his right, threw him into a 

 dungeon. Being released at the end of six years, Cisneros went to 



Siguenza, where Cardinal Mendoza appointed him his grand vicar. In 

 1482, abandoning hia brilliant prospects, he embraced the Franciscan 

 rule. In 1492 Queen Isabella took him for her confessor, and in 1495 

 nominated him Archbishop of Toledo. This honour he declined with 

 a firmness which nothing but the commands of the pope could over- 

 come. In this exalted station he retained all his monastic severity. 

 He constantly wore under the pontifical robes the coarse frock of St. 

 Francis. In his travels he always endeavoured to lodge at some 

 convent of his order, and he conformed to all the rules like an ordinary 

 member. He set apart half of his enormous revenue (at that time 

 amounting to 200,000 ducats) for the relief of the necessitous ; and 

 he made a daily distribution of provisions to thirty poor. He also 

 expended considerable sums in the ransom of captives. 



In 1498 Cisneros founded the University of Alcala de Henares, in 

 which he provided for poor students, appointed a fund for prizes, and 

 invited distinguished men from Paris, Bologna, Salamanca, and Valla- 

 dolid. He instituted also a seminary for young ladies of respectable 

 families who were destitute of fortune. Adjoining it he established a 

 nunnery for those among them who chose to retire from the world : 

 to the rest he allotted portions, and disposed of them in marriage 

 suitably to their condition. 



In 1 502 he undertook, assisted by eminent scholars, his Compluten- 

 sian Polyglot, the type and the model of all subsequent ones. He 

 sent to every quarter for manuscripts, and Leo X. obliged him with a 

 communication of what he possessed. He collected seven copies in 

 Hebrew at the expense of 4000 ducats, besides procuring from Rome 

 a Greek manuscript, and from other quarters many Latin manuscripts : 

 not a single manuscript of this collection was of less antiquity than 

 800 years. The whole charge of the undertaking, which was com- 

 pleted in fifteen years, amounted to the immense sum of 50,000 

 ducats. 



On the death of Queen Isabella in 1504, as all parties strove to 

 attach Cisneros to their interest, he became the arbitrator between 

 King Ferdinand and the Archduke Philip, the husband of Joanna, 

 heiress of the crown. On the death of Philip, two years after, 

 Cisneros was appointed regent on account of the incapacity of Joanna 

 and the absence of Ferdinand. This was a critical moment for him, 

 but his prudence overcame all difficulties, and kept all parties in 

 check. He levied troops at the public expense, totally independent 

 of the grandees, from whose hands he succeeded at last in rescuing 

 the crown. He thus began, perhaps unconsciously, to vindicate the 

 rights of the people against the nobility in Europe. By the feudal 

 system, the military power was lodged in the hands of the nobles, 

 and men of inferior condition were called into the field as their 

 vassals. A king with scanty revenues therefore depended on them in 

 all bis operations. In 1507 Julius II. gave Cisneros the cardinal's hat. 

 In 1508 the septuagenarian cardinal set off from Malaga at the head of 

 10,000 foot and 4000 horse for the conquest of Oran, on the coast of 

 Africa, which he added to the Spanish dominions at his own expense. 



When Leo X., in order to raise money to complete the church of 

 St. Peter, proposed to sell dispensations, Cisneros opposed the intro- 

 duction of the pope's bulls into his diocese. On another occasion, as 

 a primate of Spain, he prevailed on the king to exclude all bulls but 

 what had received the sanction of the royal council; and ever since 

 that time this salutary advice has been acted upon in Spain. At 

 another time he opposed a claim of the same pope to the tenth of 

 ecclesiastical benefices, and obliged him to be content with a tax of a 

 tenth upon the clergy of the States of the Church. 



Ferdinand at his death, 23rd of January 1516, left Cardinal Cisneros 

 regent till the arrival of his grandson, Charles I. of Spain, afterwards 

 Charles V. of Germany. The Dean of Louvain (afterwards Pope 

 Adrian VI.), opposed this nomination. Cisneros however consented 

 to admit him into the administration, and chose Madrid for his 

 residence, that he might be more independent of the nobility, :<:,<{ 

 better able to control their factions. The grandees objected to the 

 power of Ferdinand to confer the regency, himself being only a regent, 

 as the widower of Isabella ; and the letter of Charles, which Cisneros 

 showed them in ratification of Ferdinand's will, they treated as a mere 

 matter of form. To satisfy their objections at once, the cardinal coolly 

 requested them to wait upon him. From a balcony he showed them 

 2000 men in array, with a formidable train of artillery, which he 

 ordered to be discharged. " There," said he, raising his voice, " are 

 the powers which I have received from his Majesty, and in a word 

 hcec ett ultima ratio regum." 



John Albret, the dispossessed king of Navarre, supported by some 

 of the grandees, was forming a scheme to recover his kingdom. Cis- 

 neros, who had foreseen the danger long before, ordered a powerful 

 body of troops to enter Navarre, and completely frustrated the 

 attempt. To secure Navarre, he caused its numerous and expensive 

 fortresses to be demolished, except Pampeluna, which he strengthened. 

 To this precaution Spain was not only then but often since indebted 

 for the preservation of Navarre. In order to pay the debts of Ferdi- 

 nand and the officers of his new militia, and to establish numerous 

 aud well-furnished magazines, Cisneros boldly undertook the abolition 

 of unnecessary pensions, and enforced the restitution of many ex- 

 tensive crown demesnes, which had been alienated chiefly to the 

 nobility in the late reign. He did not spare his dearest frieuds, nor 

 even men of learning. The historian Peter Martyr of Anghierra and 



