T I F 



435 



T I F 



another to make some provision in their declining years 

 for meritorious writers who may have fallen into adversity 

 in consequence of age and infirmities^ 



(df t L,:r:con ; Wolff's Encyclopadie ; Mor- 



genblatt, 1842; Litteraturblatt, 1842.) 

 ~ TIEL. [THIEL.] 



TIETOLO, GIOVANNI BATTISTA, a celebrated 

 Italian painter of the eighteenth century, was born of a 

 good family at Venice in 1003. Tiepolo, says Lanzi, was 

 the last of the Venetians who acquired a European fame ; 

 celebrated in Italy, in Germany, and in Spain. He studied 

 as a boy under Gregorio Lazzarini, painted at first in his 

 manner, then imitated the style of Piazzetta, but attached 

 himself eventually to that of Paul Veronese. Already at 

 the age of sixteen he was known even out of Venice, 

 and when still young he received invitations from various 

 Italian cities to decorate their churches and their pub- 

 lic buildings. His works in the north of Italy, both 

 in oil and in fresco, are numerous : one of his first works 

 of note was the Shipwreck of San Satiro, in the church of 

 St. Ambrose, at Milan : he excelled chiefly in fresco, and 

 his colouring and the folds of his draperies bear great re- 

 semblance to those of Paul Veronese. In Germany also 

 Tiepolo executed several works : at Wiirzburg he painted 

 the staircase and the saloon of the bishop's palace and two 

 altar-pieces. He was afterwards invited by Charles III. 

 to Spain, where, in .Madrid, he painted the ceiling of the 

 saloon in the new palace of the king, and the hall of the 

 rojal guard, by winch he is said to have excited the 

 jeahx igs: he executed also the chief altar-piece 



in oil for the convent church of St. Paschal, at Aranjuez. 

 He died in Madrid in 1709 or 1770. 



Tit-polo's style was slight and brilliant, yet his colouring 

 was not glaring : the effect of his paintings was not pio- 

 duced by a recourse to bright colours, but by a judicious 

 contrast of tints: his drawing was however feeble, yet 

 this weakness was nearly concealed by the gracefulness of 

 liis attitudes. One of his best pictures in oil is the Mar- 

 tyrdom of St. Agatha, in the church of St. Antonio, at 

 Padua. He etched several plates in a very free and 

 spirited manner. He left two sons, Giovanni Domenico 

 ami Lorenzo, who were both painters: the elder etched 

 some of his lath. ; 



ictli, Itrllit I'ltliir/i I '/ m:/,'n,i. Sar. ; Lanzi, fiturin 

 1'itt'irirn. tec.; Kiorillo, Getchichte der Mnhlerry, vol. li.) 



TIFLIS. orTKFI.lS. the capital of the Rus-ian province 

 of Georgia, is in about, 41 43' N. lat., according to (.'apt. 

 Monteith. In 182!) Mr. Federof, who accompanied Pro- 

 i his \isit to Mount Ararat, found the lati- 

 tude of the cathedral church to be 41 41'. The longitude, 

 according to Birdin, is 02 34' E. from Ferro, or 44 50' 

 E. of London. Professor Parrot fixes the elevation of the 

 stone bridge over the river Kur at exactly 1100 feet above 

 the level of the Hlack Sea, and 31 feet above the mean 

 level of the river. The Kur flows throim-h a valley confined 

 between two ranges of lofty mountains. The river i 

 the valley on the north, and ' at the extremity of the defile,' 

 says Sir K. K. Porter, we saw the capital of Georgia, the 

 Tiflis rising on the precipitous and sub- 

 lime hanks of the Kur. lint the effect, produced here is 

 of a deeper tinge. The town itself stands at the foot of a 

 line of dark and barren hills, whose high and caverned 

 sides irlooun'ly overshadow it. Every house, every build- 

 ing within its walls, seems to share the dismal hue of the 

 surrounding heights ; for a deep blackness rests on all. 

 The heavy battlcmc-i. 1 ml the still majestic towers 



of the ancient citadel, the spires of Christian churches, and 

 other marks of European residence, could not for some time 

 the horrible dungeon impression of Asiatic dirt and 

 barbarism received at first view of the town.' Th: 

 i in 1K17. 



The town is liuilt on both sides of the river; but the 

 larger portion, which is on the ritrht or west bank, contains 

 ttie houses of th; wealthiest inhabitants, the great bazar, 

 the principal squares, the finest churches, the public offices, 

 the residence of the military governor, and of the com- 

 niander-in-cbief. This is the city properly so called, which 

 again is divided into two parts, the old and new town. 

 The limits of the old 'own are distinctly marked by the 

 ruins of tin- antient fortifications. The new town extends 

 to the north and w.>t beyond these walls, and is distin- 



d from the old knvii by its new buildings in tli 

 ropean style and broader streets. The greater part of it 



is called by the Georgians Goretuban, that is, the street 

 out of the city. On the left bank is the extensive suburb 

 Awlabar, a large caravansary, the barracks, a long icw 

 of houses inhabited by colonists from Southern Gem 

 and the fortress or citadel, built by the Turks in 1570. 

 Toward the south the town leans against the chain of 

 hills running from the south-west, on the summit of which 

 are extensive ruins of a veiy antient fortress ; its highest 

 point at the western end of the old wall is 392 feet above 

 the bridge ; towards the west it rises higher, and from 

 thence a small stream of water is conducted to the city 

 the bed of which however is generally quite dry, except 

 immediately after rain. 



There are in Tiflis 15 Greek churches, 20 Armenian, and 

 2 Roman Catholic, some of which are very handsome. At 

 A. point where the river in its course through the town is 

 hemmed in by rocks, a bridge of a single arch connects 

 the town with the suburb of Awlabar. Here also are 

 the ruins of an antient fort, church and houses, and about 

 two miles farther from this side of the city stand the re- 

 mains of another sacred edifice, on the summit of a lofty 

 hill. 



The houses in Tiflis are ill-built, and the streets so nar- 

 row that only one carriage can pass through the widest, 

 and in the smaller streets there is scarcely room for a 

 horseman. \Ve must not however derive our ideas from 

 the description of travellers, before or for a few years after 

 the incorporation of Georgia with the Russian empire in 

 JSOl. The letters on the Caucasus and Georgia in 1812, 

 written by the wife of a Russian envoy, speak of Tiflis as 

 'a mass of nuns, melancholy monuments of the ravages of 

 Aura Mahomet and the Persians.' Sir Robert Ker Porter, 

 in 1817, says that the governor was making great, improve- 

 ments, ordering all ruinous houses to be repaired, or en- 

 tirely pulled down to make way for the erection of new 

 ones. Among these improvements are the alterations in 

 the great bazar, along narrow \\indiugstreet with shops 

 on both sides, which he had caused to be entirely roofed in, 

 with circular apertures to admit air and light. Professor 

 Kichwald, who visited Tiflis in 1825 and 1820, and gives 

 some particulars as late as 1829, says, 'Since the year 1801 

 tranquillity and security have returned, and are now firmly 

 established in Georgia ; civilization and commerce increase 

 every year; since that time Tiflis has been improving in 

 its appearance, is continually enlarged by new buildinsls, 

 and its inhabitants have easily become familiar with all the 

 comforts and even the luxuries of European life.' Profes- 

 sor Parrot, who was there in 1K29, speaks in similar terms 

 of the improvements introduced by the Russian govern- 

 ment, but does not appear to be so .satisfied with the intro- 

 duction of European fashions. 



One of the worst effects of the habitual intercourse with 

 Europeans is the change that has been made in the 

 manners of the women, who have thrown off their former 

 Asiatic restraint, without adopting the reserve and de- 

 corum of European manners. This effect is much more 

 decided among the lower orders, because the troops arc 

 quartered in the houses of the inhabitants, so that the 

 customary line of separation between the women and the 

 men could no longer be preserved. This circumstance 

 greatly disgusts the Georgians, and they accordingly 

 hailed with delight the judicious ukase of 182i>, by which 

 the proprietors of newly-built, houses are exempted from 

 receiving soldiers into tlieir houses for six years. 



Tiflis has been chiefly indebted for its celebrity to its 

 warm baths, and its Georgian name, Tphilisk Alaki, is 

 equivalent to ' warm town.' Parrot says, its name is derived 

 from the Georgian word tbili, warm, which may have 

 "i\en il either on account of the warm springs, or 

 from the contrast of the great warmth of the climate of 

 Tiflis, with the preceding residence of the Georgian Kin. 

 ul Mx.rhct, which lies on the declivity of the Caucasus, 

 and has a much cooler temperature. The building of Tiflis 

 and the transferring of the royal residence to this place 

 were effected about the year 455, by king Waktang I., 

 Gork-Aslan. (Klaproth, Ri-iw, i. 715; ii. 104.) The 

 mineral springs rise in considerable numbers at the south 

 end of the city, between the strata of limestone, whence 

 they are conducted into the cavern excavated in the solid 

 rock, under one immense roof, divided into different apart - 

 ui'-nis for the men and the women, into which not a ray 

 of day-light is admitted, and which are merely rescued 

 from total daikness by the faint glimmerings of a few 



3K2 



