Pasquin And Marforio

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Title:     Pasquin And Marforio
Author: Isaac Disraeli [More Titles by Disraeli]

All the world have heard of these _statues_: they have served as vehicles for the keenest satire in a land of the most uncontrolled despotism. The _statue of Pasquin_ (from whence the word _pasquinade_) and that of _Marforio_ are placed in Rome in two different quarters. _Marforio_ is an ancient _statue_ of _Mars_, found in the _Forum_, which the people have corrupted into _Marforio_. _Pasquin_ is a marble _statue_, greatly mutilated, supposed to be the figure of a gladiator.[1] To one or other of these _statues_, during the concealment of the night, are affixed those satires or lampoons which the authors wish should be dispersed about Rome without any danger to themselves. When _Marforio_ is attacked, _Pasquin_ comes to his succour; and when _Pasquin_ is the sufferer, he finds in _Marforio_ a constant defender. Thus, by a thrust and a parry, the most serious matters are disclosed: and the most illustrious personages are attacked by their enemies, and defended by their friends.

Misson, in his Travels in Italy, gives the following account of the origin of the name of the statue of _Pasquin_:--

A satirical tailor, who lived at Rome, and whose name was _Pasquin_, amused himself by severe raillery, liberally bestowed on those who passed by his shop; which in time became the lounge of the newsmongers. The tailor had precisely the talents to head a regiment of satirical wits; and had he had time to _publish_, he would have been the Peter Pindar of his day; but his genius seems to have been satisfied to rest cross-legged on his shopboard. When any lampoons or amusing bon-mots were current at Rome, they were usually called, from his shop, _pasquinades_. After his death, this statue of an ancient gladiator was found under the pavement of his shop. It was soon set up, and by universal consent was inscribed with his name; and they still attempt to raise him from the dead, and keep the caustic tailor alive, in the marble gladiator of wit.

There is a very rare work, with this title:--"Pasquillorum Tomi Duo;" the first containing the verse, and the second the prose pasquinades, published at Basle, 1544. The rarity of this collection of satirical pieces is entirely owing to the arts of suppression practised by the papal government. Sallengre, in his literary Memoirs, has given an account of this work; his own copy had formerly belonged to Daniel Heinsius, who, in verses written in his hand, describes its rarity and the price it too cost:--

Roma meos fratres igni dedit, unica Phoenix
Vivo, aureisque venio centum Heinsio.

"Rome gave my brothers to the flames, but I survive a solitary
Phoenix. Heinsius bought me for a hundred golden ducats."

This collection contains a great number of pieces composed at different times, against the popes, cardinals, &c. They are not, indeed, materials for the historian, and they must be taken with grains of allowance. We find sarcastic epigrams on Leo X., and the infamous Lucretia, daughter of Alexander VI.: even the corrupt Romans of the day were capable of expressing themselves with the utmost freedom. Of Alexander VI. we have an apology for his conduct:

Vendit Alexander claves, altaria, Christum;
Emerat ille prius, vendere jure potest.

"Alexander _sells_ the keys, the altars, and Christ;
As he _bought_ them first, he had a right to _sell them_!"

On Lucretia:--

Hoc tumulo dormit Lucretia nomine, sed re
Thais; Alexandri filia, sponsa, nurus!

"Beneath this stone sleeps Lucretia by name, but by nature Thais;
the daughter, the wife, and the daughter-in-law of Alexander!"

Leo X. was a frequent butt for the arrows of Pasquin:--

Sacra sub extrema, si forte requiritis, hora
Cur Leo non potuit sumere; vendiderat.

"Do you ask why Leo did not take the sacrament on his
death-bed?--How could he? He had sold it!"

Many of these satirical touches depend on puns. Urban VII., one of the _Barberini_ family, pillaged the Pantheon of brass to make cannon,[2] on which occasion Pasquin was made to say:--

Quod non fecerunt _Barbari_ Romae, fecit _Barberini_.

On Clement VII., whose death was said to be occasioned by the prescriptions of his physician:--

Curtius occidit Clementem; Curtius auro
Donandus, per quem publica parta salus.

"Dr. Curtius has killed the pope by his remedies;
he ought to be remunerated as a man who has cured the state."

The following, on Paul III., are singular conceptions:--

Papa Medusaeum caput est, coma turba Nepotum;
Perseu caede caput, Caesaries periit.

"The pope is the head of Medusa; the horrid tresses
are his nephews; Perseus, cut off the head, and then
we shall be rid of these serpent-locks."

Another is sarcastic--

Ut canerent data multa olim sunt Vatibus aera:
Ut taceam, quantum tu mihi, Paule, dabis?

"Heretofore money was given to poets that they might sing:
how much will you give me, Paul, to be silent?"

This collection contains, among other classes, passages from the Scriptures which have been applied to the court of Rome; to different nations and persons; and one of "_Sortes Virgilianae per Pasquillum collectae_,"--passages from Virgil frequently happily applied; and those who are curious in the history of those times will find this portion interesting. The work itself is not quite so rare as Daniel Heinsius imagined; the price might now reach from five to ten guineas.[3]

These satirical statues are placed at opposite ends of the town, so that there is always sufficient time to make Marforio reply to the gibes and jeers of Pasquin in walking from one to the other. They are an ingenious substitute for publishing to the world, what no Roman newspaper would dare to print.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: The description of these two famous statues is not correctly given in the text. The statue called _Marforio_ is the figure of a recumbent river god of colossal proportions, found near the arch of Septimius Severus. When the museum of the capitol was completed, the Pope moved the figure into the court-yard; there it is still to be seen. He also wished to move that of _Pasquin_, but the Duke de Braschi refused to allow it; and it still stands on its pedestal, at the angle of the Braschi Palace, in the small square that takes the name of Piazza del Pasquino from that circumstance. It is much mutilated, but is the ruin of a very fine work; Bernini expressed great admiration for it. It is considered by Count Maffei to represent Ajax supporting Menelaus. The torso of the latter figure only is left, the arms of the former are broken away; but enough remains of both to conjecture what the original might have been in design. The _pose_ of both figures is similar to the fine group known as Ajax and Telamon, in the Loggia of the Pitti Palace at Florence.]

[Footnote 2: The cannon were to supply the castle of St. Angelo, but a large portion of the metal (which formerly covered the roof of the temple) was used to construct the canopy and pillars which still stand over the tomb of St. Peter, in the great cathedral at Rome.]

[Footnote 3: This vehicle for satire was introduced early into England; thus, in 1589, was published "The return of the renowned Cavaliero Pasquill to England from the other side of the seas, and his meeting with Marforio at London, upon the Royall Exchange."]

[The end]
Isaac D'Israeli's essay: Pasquin And Marforio

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