Nor was the enthusiasm for the classical past of Italy confined at this period to the capital.Boccaccio had already called the vast ruins of Baia 'old walls, yet new for modern spirits'; and since his time they were held to be the most interesting sight near Naples.Collections of antiquities of all sorts now became common.Ciriaco of Ancona (d.1457)travelled not only through Italy, but through other countries of the old Orbis terrarum, and brought back countless inscriptions and sketches.When asked why he took all this trouble, he replied, 'To wake the dead.' The histories of the various cities of Italy had from the earliest times laid claim to some true or imagined connection with Rome, had alleged some settlement or colonization which started from the capital; and the obliging manufacturers of pedigrees seem constantly to have derived various families from the oldest and most famous blood of Rome.So highly was the distinction valued, that men clung to it even in the light of the dawning criticism of the fifteenth century.When Pius II was at Viterbo he said frankly to the Roman deputies who begged him to return, 'Rome is as much my home as Siena, for my House, the Piccolomini, came in early times from the capital to Siena, as is proved by the constant use of the names 'neas and Sylvius in my family.' He would probably have had no objection to be held a descendant of the Julii.Paul II, a Barbo of Venice, found his vanity flattered by deducing his House, notwithstanding an adverse pedigree, according to which it came from Germany, from the Roman Ahenobarbus, who had led a colony to Parma, and whose successors had been driven by party conflicts to migrate to Venice.That the Massimi claimed descent from Q.Fabius Maximus, and the Cornaro from the Cornelii, cannot surprise us.On the other hand, it is a strikingly exceptional fact for the sixteenth century that the novelist Bandello tried to connect his blood with a noble family of Ostrogoths.
To return to Rome.The inhabitants, 'who then called themselves Romans,' accepted greedily the homage which was offered them by the rest of Italy.Under Paul II, Sixtus IV and Alexander VI, magnificent processions formed part of the Carnival, representing the scene most attractive to the imagination of the time- -the triumph of the Roman Imperator.The sentiment of the people expressed itself naturally in this shape and others like it.In this mood of public feeling, a report arose on April 18, 1485, that the corpse of a young Roman lady of the classical period--wonderfully beautiful and in perfect preservation--had been discovered.Some Lombard masons digging out an ancient tomb on an estate of the convent of Santa Maria Nuova, on the Appian Way, beyond the tomb of Caecilia Metella, were said to have found a marble sarcophagus with the inscription: 'Julia, daughter of Claudius.' On this basis the following story was built.The Lombards disappeared with the jewels and treasure which were found with the corpse in the sarcophagus.The body had been coated with an antiseptic essence, and was as fresh and flexible as that of a girl of fifteen the hour after death.It was said that she still kept the colors of life, with eyes and mouth half open.She was taken to the palace of the 'Conservatori'
on the Capitol; and then a pilgrimage to see her began.Among the crowd were many who came to paint her; 'for she was more beautiful than can be said or written, and, were it said or written, it would not be believed by those who had not seen her.' By order of Innocent VIII she was secretly buried one night outside the Pincian Gate; the empty sarcophagus remained in the court of the 'Conservatori.' Probably a colored mask of wax or some other material was modelled in the classical style on the face of the corpse, with which the gilded hair of which we read would harmonize admirably.The touching point in the story is not the fact itself, but the firm belief that an ancient body, which was now thought to be at last really before men's eyes, must of necessity be far more beautiful than anything of modern date.
Meanwhile the material knowledge of old Rome was increased by excavations.Under Alexander VI the so-called 'Grotesques,' that is, the mural decorations of the ancients, were discovered, and the Apollo of the Belvedere was found at Porto d'Anzio.Under Julius II followed the memorable discoveries of the Laocoon, of the Venus of the Vatican, of the Torso of the Cleopatra.The palaces of the nobles and the cardinals began to be filled with ancient statues and fragments.
Raphael undertook for Leo X that ideal restoration of the whole ancient city which his (or Castiglione's) celebrated letter (1518 or 1519)speaks of.After a bitter complaint over the devastations which had not even then ceased, and which had been particularly frequent under Julius II, he beseeches the Pope to protect the few relics which were left to testify to the power and greatness of that divine soul of antiquity whose memory was inspiration to all who were capable of higher things.
