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ITALY. 



ITALY. 



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party bad b««n m jrat •ocorMful : tha Pop« wa* a fugitive, and t)ia 

 aUta waa Roramad m a pranrinoial oonoeil, to be aoon eiiccevtled by a 

 tiiumTirnte at tha bead of whidi waa Mauioi, the acknowledged 

 leader of the eauaa of Italian rreeneration and unity. Uootilitiea 

 lyMommaoeed in aameat among the aereral partiea early in the new 

 year; and every where with aimilar resulta. So long aa the r»Uying 

 cry had been ftu edom from the forvign yoke there had been auooeae 

 CO tlie popular aide. But the patriot leaders were too much under 

 the influence of peraonal and local jealouaiea, too much divided by 

 political diifereaoea, to keep that before them aa their first object. 

 Uefora iiidependeoce waa aeonred, they disputed aa to the supremacy 

 of particular citiea and provincea, and individuals. While the foreign 

 yoke waa atill unbroken they quam-llt'd whether republicanism or 

 monarchy should be the rule of the future. The other side was 

 ]>cr)>lexe<l by no divided councils or political theories. The Austrian 

 commund<T, lUuletsky, was a man of iron nerve and great military 

 genius, and he was now waiting with a large and well orgiinised force 

 10 bring matters to an isaue. There could be little doubt that on the 

 fiite of this campaign the final result would depend. Home and 

 Naplea were aubordinate actors in the drama. 



Hoatilitirs were reaume'l by Sardinia early in March. On the 21et 

 of that month the two armies met : the Sardinians were defouted on 

 that day ; and agnin and thoroughly on the 'iSnl, at Novara. Aa far 

 na Sardinia waa concerned the struggle was at an cud. Poor Carlo 

 Alberto abdicated his throne in favour of his son, and retired to 

 Oporto, where he died four months after. His son concluded n peace 

 with Austria; and Kadeteky turned towards the cities which had 

 ejected the Austrian garrisons, and re<luced them in succession, 

 though sometimes only after a severe bombardment 



In Naples there had been an active resumption of hostilities, but 

 the British and French governments oSen-d their mediation, advising 

 the king to yield assent to the princi|ial claims of his subjects and 

 grant an amnesty. The king nt first refu8<>d to comply, and when be 

 was wilUog, the Sicilians in their turn rr'jected the ultimatum of the 

 allied powers. The Neapolitan troops then bombardc<l and captured 

 Catania anti Syracuse ; and the king of Naples was able to turn his 

 attention to I'apal affairs. We need not follow the outbreaks in 

 Oenoa and elsewhere, as they were soon suppressed. 



In Rome a national aarembly was called, which (February 8th) 

 declared the Pope divested of all temporal power, and Rome a republic. 

 The Pope, who was at Uacta, published a protest against the pro- 

 cee<lings of the assembly. And calle<l upon the Catholic powers to 

 interfere by an armed intervention in his behalf. The French govern- 

 ment responded to his appeal; and the French National Aitsembly 

 reeolvid by a large majority in favour of the prupoBition of the 

 government to send an army to restore the papal authority in Rome. 

 The first army was repulsed in its attack on tho city ; but a aecond 

 and much latter force under General Uudinot commenced a formal 

 siege of Rome ou the 3rd of June. The defence was conducted under 

 Oaribaldi with eminent but tiuavailing skill and bravery ; and the 

 French having made |iracticable breaches in the walls, sent storming 

 parties through tliem on the 2l8t. Un tho 3rd of July the city sur- 

 rendered unconditionally ; and the Austrians having been everywhere 

 ■uooaaaful, the Italian rising was at an end. What might be called tlie 

 official declaration of its suppression was made by the publication, by 

 the Austrian authorities, of tlie amnesty for all political offences at 

 ililan on the 18th of August 1849. There have been occasional and 

 disconnected popular outbreaka in some of the Aiistro-Itoliau cities 

 since then, but they have been always easily suppressed, and have 

 only been the occasion of calling forth additional confiscatioua and 

 military severities. The only apparent gain to the popular party 

 from the revolt of 1848-9 is the retention by Sanlinia of her liberal 

 constitution. On the other side is a terrible account of confiscation, 

 banishment, and loss of life; while the govemmeuta have relapsed 

 into the old bard and dcpreaaing despotism. 



Italian Lanijuaye ami Literature. — The language called Italian is 

 tho written language of Italy, and bears the some analogy to the 

 aiwken Isuguage of Tuscany and Rome as the written languages of 

 France and England bear to the oral language apoken in the towns 

 and provinces of those reiipective kingdoms in which dialects do not 

 prevail But while in France and England the use of dialects is 

 confined in great measure to the peasantry of districts remote from 

 the capitala or to mountoinoua parta, most of the Italian statea have 

 each a living diaUct, which is the oral language of the people, and 

 spoken aven by educated people among tbemielves, although all 

 educated people speak also the Italian or common written Unguage, 

 which they learn as a branch of education. The dialect* of Italy are 

 numerous, and most of them contain written and printed works, 

 eapacially plays ar\<\ other poems. The principal dialects are the fol- 

 lowiD|: — 1. Tho Milanese ia spoken at Hdan and its territory, with 

 some variationa according to tha different districts. It haa been 

 cultivated by aararal writers of real poetical genius, such as Haggi, 

 Parini, and in our times tnr Oroaai and Porta. 2. The Venetian is one of 

 the moat graceful of the Italian dialects, and under the republic waa 

 tha laofuage of the senate and of the court* of justice. There are 

 numeroua writers in this dialect ; among others, Uritti, Laniberti, 

 Uuldoni, and, in our time, IJuralti. 8. The Maotuan dialect has been 

 illustrated by the writings of the eccentric wayward uiouk Folengo. 



4. The Pie<lmontas* baa oouaiderable affinity with the Lauguedooiaa 

 and other liomanoe dialacta. Calvo has written in the Piedmunteae, 

 and Alfieri has given a abort vocabulary of it, with the oomaponding 

 words in Tuscan. 6. Qenoeae : FogUetta and Cavalli are two of the 

 best writacB in this dialect 6. The Bolognese is one of the most 

 uncouth dialects of Italy, but it baa aome poeta, ainoni; others Qiulio 

 Ceaara Crooa. These are the principal dialects of North Italy, besides 

 which there are many other local onea, such as Bresciano, Bergomoaco, 

 that of Padua, which resembles the Venetian, and that of the Friuli. 

 In South Italy the principal dialects are the following : — 7. The 

 Nea|>olitan, or Apulian, was the laugusge spoken at the court of 

 Frederick II. in the 13th centui-y, and in whicli tlie hinlory of that 

 prince by the contemporary chronicler Matteo .Spiuello is written. It 

 was afterwards spoken at the court of the Aujou and Arag.iuesi) kings 

 of Naples, and haa been in fact used within our owu times by King 

 Ferdinand and his courtiers. It is very copious, abouuda with dimi- 

 nutives and vituperative terms, and is well suited fur broad humour 

 and for tlie purpose of imitative harmony. Tho Neapolitan among 

 all other Italian dialects bos been perhaps the most cultivated by 

 writers. The other South Itnliau dialect is, S. Tho Sicilian, which 

 can boast of Giovanni Heli, who ranks umoug the first lyric |M>et« of 

 Italy. Between the Neapolitan aud Sicilian is the Calabrian dialect, 

 which participates more of the latter, aud in which there is a spirited 

 version of Tasao'a ' Gorusalemme.' Lastly, 9. The dialect of the 

 Island of Sardinia has a great resemblance to the Cataloniau and 

 Volencian and other dialecti of the Romance or Provencal laugiiago. 

 The Sardinian is also a written dialect 



The Italian dialecta must not be considered aa oomiptions of the 

 written Italian, but as languages which have an affinity to aud ora 

 anterior to it, and derived from the corrupt dialects of the familiar 

 Latin or Roman which were apoken iu the proviuces of Italy remote 

 from Rome, and perhaps also iu part from the older languogetof Italy 

 existing previous to the Roman conquest The iuflux of the northern 

 nations eSected a total corruptiou of the spoken Latin ; articles aud 

 auxiliaries were introduced ; terminations were altered or neglected ; 

 some, though not a great many, words of Teutonic origin were intro- 

 duced ; and various dialecta resulted from these varioua combinations, 

 which were called by the general name of Romauc, Romanic, or 

 Komanoe language, like those sjrakeu iu the south of France. The 

 dialects spoken iu Ceutral Italy retained a greater affiuity to one 

 another, as well as to their common Latin parent If we look at the 

 old chronicles and other documents of the 13th century, writteu in a 

 familiar style, whether nt Naples, Rome, Bologna, or Tuiicany, we see 

 a great similarity in their syntax and etymology. The orid dialect 

 of Tuscany seems to have attained a considerable degree of polish and 

 grammatical regularity sooner than the others ; probably it bad never 

 been so corrupt as the rest, owing to the local position of Tuscany, 

 which was not exteusively or permanently colonised by the northern 

 tribes, and also owing to the early independence of the Tuscan cities^ 

 aud their prosperity and civilisation. In tho rest of Italy a few man 

 of education used also an oral language more refined than tha 

 generality of the people, which was uUled Lingua Aulico, or Corti- 

 Kiaiia, and thus the early versifiers, including princes aud courtiers, 

 Frederick II. and his chancellor Pietro delle Vigue at Naples, Guido 

 Guiuicelli and Frik Guidotto at Bologna, Guido delle Culonne, a 

 Sicilian, Can della Soala at Verona, Guido da Polenta, prince of 

 Ravenna, wrote in a language which differs little from that of liruoetto 

 Latiui, Guitton d'Arezzo, Guido Cavalcanti, and other Tuscan poeta 

 of tho same age. But Tuscany ha<i this advantage over the reat, 

 that its familiar spoken language was more generally polished, so as 

 to resemble the poetical and select language of the other Italians, and 

 the Tuscan poets had the benefit of writing in a liting dialect, ' lingua 

 volgore,' and their poems were understood by the generality of their 

 couutrymen. The writers of tho 1 Jth century, Dante, Uino Compagui, 

 Petrarch, Boccaccio, Ciuo da Pistojo, Sacchetti, Villaui, Paudolfini, 

 were all Tuscans, and they pcruiouently impi'essed on the written 

 language of Italy the stamp of Tuscan spirit aud idiom. As |>eople 

 of education in every part of Italy applied themselves to write in the 

 ' lingua volgare,' the use of writing in Latin being gradually drop|>od, 

 this ' lingua volgare,' or written Italian, began to form an essential 

 part of education, and all those who received school instruction learned 

 to speak it mora or less correctly. It came aft.-rwords to be adopted 

 iu many placea as the language of the government, of the courta of 

 jtutioe, of the pulpit and of the stage , and thus it haa been styled 

 emphatically the Italian language, because it is used as the general 

 medium of communication, written and oral, all over the pemuaula. 

 But it is nowhere, except in Tuscany aud in part of the Roman states, 

 the language of the lower orders, the language of the nursery, of the 

 markets, of convivial familiarity, of every-day life. Its general 

 adoption is however strongly urged of late yean by tho various 

 governments, and particularly attended to in all elementary achoola. 



The writers of the 14th century are called by the Tuscans the 

 ' Treoentixti,' and they are considered by many aa the pureat modeU 

 of Italian composition. In tho 15th century there was a retrograde 

 movement in tho cultivation of the Italian language. The Latin again 

 resumed the ascendancy as a written lan|{Uttgo, and the 'lingua 

 volgare' was left to the vulgar, or employed merely for familiar 

 piu-poscs. The discovery of the ancient clasiic^, the r.'vival of tha 



