COR TON A CORVEY. 



4*3 



diminution of power. A viceroy had charge of the 

 civil administration, and Cortez was intrusted only 

 with the military command ami the privilege of 

 prosecuting his discoveries. M he division of powers 

 proved a constant source of dissension ; and, though 

 lie discovered the peninsula of California in I53:i, 

 most of his enterprises were frustrated, his life im- 

 bittered, and he returned again to Spain, where he 

 was coldly received and neglected. One day, hav- 

 ing forced his way through a crowd round the, car- 

 riage of his king, and put his foot on the step to ob- 

 tain an audience, Charles coldly inquired who he 

 was. "I am a man," replied Cortez, "who has 

 gained you more provinces than your father left 

 you towns." lie passed the remainder of his days 

 in solitude, and died, December, 1554, near Seville, 

 in the sixty-ninth year of his age, leaving a character 

 eminent for bravery and ability, but infamous for 

 perfidy and cruelty. 



GORTON A, a fortified town of Tuscany, contains 

 seven churches (including the cathedral), and twelve 

 convents. It is a place of great antiquity. Popula- 

 tion, 4000. It lies forty-five miles S. E. Florence. 



CORTONA. properly Pietro Berretint, a painter 

 mid architect,, wz's born in 1596. He was common- 

 ly called Pietro di Cortona, from the name of his 

 native town. Cortona in Tuscny. He acquired the 

 first rudiments of his art under his father, Giovanni, 

 who was also a painter and architect, and afterwards 

 studied with Andreas CommodJ and SJaccio Ciarpi at 

 Home. At the commencement of his studies, his 

 awkwardness was so remarkable, that his fellow 

 students called him ass's head. Nevertheless, he 

 devoted himself to the study of the antiques, and of 

 the great masters, Raphael, Caravaggio, and Mi- 

 chael Angelo, and unexpectedly made his appear- 

 ance as an artist, with the Rape of the Sabines. The 

 Birth of Christ, in the church of Our Lady of Lo- 

 retto, established his reputation. His painting, 

 on the ceiling of the large saloon in the Barberini 

 palace, representing the Triumph of Honour, is a 

 very happy effort. Mengs declares it one of the 

 grandest compositions ever executed by a painter. 

 He afterwards travelled through Lombardy, the Ve- 

 netian states, and Tuscany, where lie painted the 

 ceilings of the Palazzo Pitti in Florence, and thence 

 returned to Rome. During this journey, he was 

 constantly employed as a painter and architect. He 

 was subsequently attacked by the gout, and could 

 not, in consequence, ascend the stagings: he there- 

 fore employed himself in the execution of easel pic- 

 tures, which, although of less value than his larger 

 works, are held in great estimation : they are very 

 i-are. Alexander VII. made him a knight of the 

 order of the golden spur, as a reward for the embel- 

 lishment of the colonnade of the church Delia Pace. 

 He died in 166J, and obtained an honourable burial 

 in the church dedicated to St Luke, at Rome, where 

 he had immortalized himself by the design of the altar 

 of St Martina. Cortona sacrificed truth to pleasing 

 effect. This object, however, he did not attain. 

 The defects of his drawing, which is rather heavy, 

 were redeemed by the fertility of invention, the at- 

 tractive .charms of his young female figures (although 

 it is objected to them that tliey are too uniform), and 

 the fresh colouring of his harmonious tints. This 

 last quality is an excellence peculiar to him, and 

 which no other artist has attained in an equal degree 

 either before or since his time. 



CORUNDUM, sometimes called also, from its 

 hardness and peculiar lustre, adamantine spar, is of 

 a grayish, greenish tint, occasionally reddish ; more 

 rarely blue, yellow, and black. It is translucent or 

 opaque. Its specific gravity varies from .'',-975 to 

 4'10l. Inhardness.it ranks next to the diamond. 



It occurs, crystallised, in the form of the regular six- 

 sided prism, and also in acute and obtuse hexaedral 

 pyramids. It is also found granular and compact. 

 It consists almost wholly of pure clay, or alumine, 

 sometimes containing four or five per cent, of silex 

 or lime. The blue variety, when transparent, goes 

 by the name of the sapphire; the rose red or the 

 violet, which is sometimes chatoyant, is called the 

 Oriental ruby. Both of these rank, as gems, next to 

 the diamond. They are found in the sands of rivers, 

 and among alluvial matter in Ceylon. The common 

 corundum is found in a granite rock in India, also at 

 mont St Gothard, and in Piedmont. A granular 

 variety of corundum, containing considerable iron, is 

 called emery. It is found in the island of Naxos, in 

 rolled masses, at the foot of primitive mountains. Its 

 powder is well known in commerce, and greatly 

 valued as a polishing substance. 



CORUNNA, a seaport of Spain, in the province 

 of Galicia, on the north-west coast, on a peninsula 

 at the entrance of the bay of Betanzos. The streets 

 of the upper town are narrow and ill paved. The 

 lower town stands on a small tongue of land, and 

 has tolerably broad and clean streets. The chief 

 objects of interest are the royal arsenal, and an an- 

 cient tower, admired for its elevation and solidity. 

 The harl our is spacious and secure, and is protected 

 by two castles. About three miles from the harbour 

 is a light-house. In January, 1809, the British army 

 was attacked at this place, previous to embarking, 

 by the French, under Marshal Soult. The French 

 were gallantly repulsed, but the British lost their 

 brave commander, Sir John Moore, who was in- 

 terred, on the evening of the action, in the citadel of 

 Corunna, where the enemy afterwards raised a monu- 

 ment to his memory. Population, 4000. 30 miles 

 N. Vt'. Lago. Lon. 8" 2& 2:>" U . ; lat. 43 34' 3,J'' 

 N. 



CORVEE (French, from cura vice, care of the 

 road) ; the obligation of the inhabitants of a certain 

 district to do certain labour, for the feudal lord or the 

 sovereign, gratis or for pay. As the name shows, 

 corvee originally meant compulsory labour on roads, 

 bridges, &c., but it is applied also to other feudal 

 services. Generally, of course, the payment for such 

 services is much below the wages of ordinary labour. 

 In some cases, however, the corvees have been con- 

 sidered as a privilege, and people have insisted on 

 their right to perform the services, and to receive the 

 pay for them ; as the tenth part, for threshing, ike. 

 In some parts of Germany, they still exist. In Prus- 

 sia, they were abolished under Mardenberg's admi- 

 nistration. In France, the first Revolution extirpated 

 this relic of the feudal times. 



CORVETTE (French) ; a vessel of war having 

 fewer then twenty guns. 



CORVEY, in the Prussian province of Westphali ' , 

 15 leagues S. E. of Minden, famous, in former times, 

 as Corbeia Nova ; a Benedictine convent on the 

 Weser, which, with the convent of Fulda, was one 

 of the first centres of civilization in Germany. It 

 was built in the sixth century. The history of this 

 interesting convent is important with reference to the 

 history ot the civilization of the middle ages. (See 

 Theatrum illnstr.Viror. Corbeia Sat.'Oniete,Jeto& r l686 

 4to; and Leibnitz's Introduct. ad Script. Brunsvic. 

 vol. i. page 26 et seq.) Wittekind, the historiogra- 

 pher of the convent, and many other learned men, 

 were educated here. From Corvey proceeded Ans- 

 gar, " the apostle of the North." In 1794, Corvey 

 was made a bishopric. In 1802 the bishopric was 

 abolished, and Corvey given to the prince of Nassau 

 and Orange; in 1807, it was assigned to Westphalia; 

 in 1815 to Prussia ; in 1822, it was made a mediatised 

 principality (106 square miles, 10,000 inhabitants). 



