VOL 



VOL 



he is near the end of this line, or neai' one of the corners of 

 the volte, he changes hands, to return by a femicircle. 



Volte, Reverted, or Ini-erted, is a track of two treads, 

 which the horfe makes with his head to the centre, and his 

 croup out ; going liJeways upon a walk, trot, or gallop ; 

 and tracing out a larger circumference with his (houlders, 

 and a fmaller with his eroup. See on this fubjeft Berenger's 

 Art of Horfemanfhip, vol. ii. p. 8,3, &c. 



Volte, in Fencing, denotes a fudden movement or leap, 

 which is made to avoid the thruit of an antagonift. 



VOLTERRA, Daniele dI, in Biography, the cogno- 

 men of an artift of great renown, whofe real name was 

 Daniele Ricciarelli. He was a native of Volterra, and born 

 in 1509, and was firll a difciple of Giovanni Antonio Razzi, 

 Called II Sodoma, and afterwards of Baldaflare Peruzzi. 

 Unemployed in his native city, and without means of im- 

 provement, he went to Rome, and wrought fome time for 

 cardinal Trivulzi, to whom a pifture of the Flagellation he 

 had brought with him ferved as a recommendation. He af- 

 terwards affifted Pierino del Vaga in the capella Maflimi at 

 the Trinita da Monti : and in San Marcello, where he 

 fini(hed, from the defigns of del Vaga, the four Evangehfts, 

 with various other figures, and ornamental enrichments. 

 From defigns of the fame mafter he alfo painted a frieze in 

 the hall of the palazzo Maflimi, and thefe works combined 

 gave him fo much renown, that fignora Elena Orfina was 

 induced to employ him to adorn her family chapel in the 

 church of the Trinita da Monti. 



He had in the mean time cultivated the friendfhip of Mi- 

 chel Angiolo and Sebaftian del Piombo, and by their com- 

 munion, and the ftudy of their works, aggrandized his ftyle 

 and formed his manner ; and the work which he produced in 

 the capella Orfini, the Defcent from the Crofs, teftified how 

 worthy he was of fuch fociety. The work of this chapel, 

 wluch was adorned not only with an altar-piece, but alfo 

 with various other defigns hiftorical and ornamental, and all 

 in frefco, occupied him feven years. The merit of the 

 principal pifture above-mentioned, has placed it, in public 

 eftimation, on a level with the Transfiguration by Raffaelle, 

 and the Communion of S. Jerome by Dominichino ; and in- 

 duced the French, in their rage for fpohation,to attempt the 

 removal of it from the wall. And they effefted it, though 

 they never tranfported it to France, but in doing fo, they 

 cut away fo much of the angles of the chapel that the roof 

 fell in, but not till the pifture had been removed out of 

 danger. It was afterwards turned, fo that its face was made 

 vifible, and an attempt was made by fome ignorant pretender 

 to enliven the colours by mea^s of oil or varnifh : the con- 

 fequence has been, that the furface is become black, and the 

 figures fcarcely difcernible ; and thus this grand work, one 

 of the principal features of modern Rome, one of the 

 greateft monuments of human ingenuity, and the fupport 

 of the well-earned renown of an artift ranked among the 

 belt, has been facrificed to ambition, vanity, and folly. 

 Happily the compofition is preferved by Dorigny's print, 

 and there is a great number of copies of it. Lanzi is of opi- 

 nion, that M. Angelo muft have aided Volterra in this great 

 work, particularly in the compofition, as the other parts in 

 the chapel are fo far inferior to it. He is known to have 

 been partial to him, and on terms of intimacy. One day 

 calling in his abfence at his ftudy, he left behind a (lietch of 

 a coloffal head, which Volterra never would permit to be 

 removed, and which remains to this day. And when Pierino 

 ,del Vaga died, and Angelo had the works of the Vatican 

 iffigned to him, he interefted himfclf for and procured the 

 appointment of Volterra to fupply his place. To him alfo, 

 with ih^ confent of Angelo, pope Paul III. intrufted the 



flight clotliing which is thrown over the nudities in the 

 Lail Judgment in the Siftini chapel, for which fervice how- 

 ever he was branded with the ludicrous name of // Brachet- 

 tone, the breeches-maker. 



After his appointment in the Vatican, he was ordered to 

 compleat the paintings in the Sala Regia begun by his pre- 

 deceflbr, which he did, but not, as Vafari fays, with flcill 

 equal to that he had exhibited in the chapel Orfini. 



When Julius III. mounted the papal throne, he diTmified 

 Volterra from his fuperintendance, but afterwards afligned 

 to him one lialf of a hall to paint, of which Salviati had 

 the other part, but Volterra did little or nothing in it, hav- 

 ing been difappointed in not finding the whole intrufted to 

 him. 



He added, by means of his difciples, feveral other defigns 

 to the works in the Trinita da Monti, but turned his own 

 mind principally to fculpture, and painted but little after this 

 time. He died at Rome in 1566, aged 57. 



Volterra, in Geography, a town of Etruria. This was 

 one of the ancient twelve cities, now a lonely, mean place, 

 though it reckons 25 churches, chapels, and oratories, and 

 about 20 convents and rchgious fraternities. It ftands on a 

 mountain, but the air is unwholefome : entire villages in the 

 neighbourhood lie in ruins, and uninhabited, and the coun- 

 try all round is overrun with weeds and bufties, which un- 

 queftionably contribute to render the abode unhealthful. 

 It has rich copper-mines, but not worked ; 29 miles E.S.E. 

 of Leghorn. N. lat. 43° 23'. E. long. io°52'. 



VOLTOEGA, a town of Spain, in the province of 

 Catalonia ; 5 miles W. of Vique. 



VOLTORE, a mountain of Naples, in Capitanata, E. 

 of Monteverde. 



VOLTRI, a town of the Ligurian Republic ; 6 miles 

 W. of Genoa. 



VOLTUMNA, or Volturna, in Mythology, a rural 

 divinity of the Tufcans. Livy frequently mentions a temple 

 belonging to her near the lake Ciminius, where the people 

 debated concerning their aff^airs. 



VOLTURARA, in Geography, a town of Naples, in 

 Principato Ultra ; 15 miles W. of Conza. 



Volturara, or Vulturara, a town of Naples, in Capi- 

 tanata, the fee of a bifl^op, fuffragan of Benevento ; 38 

 miles W.S.W. of Manfredonia. N. lat. 41° 28'. E. long. 



VOLTURENA, a town of the Grifons, on the lake 

 of Como. 



VOLTURNALIA, among the Romans, a feftival kept 

 in honour of the god Volturnus, on the fixth of the calends 

 of September, or 26th of Auguft. 



VOLTURNO, in Geography, a town of Naples, in 

 Lavora, on a river of the fame name, near its mouth ; 12 

 miles W. of Capua. — Alfo, a river of Naples, which runs 

 into the gulf of Gaeta, near Caftel a Mare. 



VOLTZHEIM, a town of Saxony, in the principality 

 of Rueflen, near Gera, where Henry IV. gained a viftory 

 over Rodolphus, duke of Swabia, in the year 1080. 



VOLVA, in Botany, the Wrapper, or covering, of the 

 Fungus tribe, is ufed in two fenfes by Linnseus. In its ori- 

 ginal and moft legitimate meaning, as explained in the Philo- 

 fophia Botanica, p. 52, this term is appropriated to the mem- 

 branous web, which conceals the unexpanded gills of an 

 Agaric ; and in many fpecies, as the Common Mufliroom, 

 Agaricus eampejlris, feparatcs at length from the margin of 

 the head, and forms a permanent ring round the ftalk. This 

 fort of Volva is enumerated among the kinds of Calyx, 

 and perhaps not improperly ; fee that article. The more 

 ufual idea of a Volva is that of an external covering, wlwch 



enfolds 



