A lady's gown.
Word of the Day: Catachrestical
1. A superior kind of rich silk formerly exported from Mantua in Italy.
Mantua
Encyclopedia Britannica
MANTUA (Italian, Mantova), a fortified city of Italy, the chief town of a province, the see of a bishop, and the centre of a military district, lies 95 miles east-south-east of Milan, and 25 miles by rail south of Verona on the way to Modena, occupying, at the height of 88 feet above the level of the Adriatic, an almost insular site in the midst of the swampy lagoons of the Mincio, with their vast reaches of reeds and bulrushes. As the belt of marshy ground along the south side can be laid under water at pleasure, the site of the city proper, exclusive of the considerable suburbs of Borgo di Fortezza to the north and Borgo di San Giorgio to the east, may still be said to consist, as it formerly did mo’e distinctly, of two islands separated by a narrow channel and united by a number of bridges. On the west side lies Lago Superiore, on the east side Lago Inferiore —the boundary between the two being marked by the Argine del Mulino, a long covered wooden bridge stretching northward from the north-west angle of the city. As approached from the north by the old road, Mantua presents a beautiful prospect with its “towers and walls and waters.” On the highest ground in the city rises the cathedral, built after his death according to the plans of Giulio Romano on the site of the ancient church of Sts Peter and Paul; it has double aisles, a dome-covered transept, and a large tower, popularly assigned to the Roman governor Arius. Architecturally much more important is the church of St Andrew, built towards the close of the 15th century, after plans by Leon Battista Alberti, and consisting of a single barrel-vaulted nave 350 feet long by 62 feet wide. It has a noble façade, with a deeply recessed portico, and a brick campanile of earlier date than the main building. The ...interior is richly decorated with 18th century frescos. S. Maria delle Grazie, consecrated in 1399 as an act of thanksgiving for the cessation of the plague, has a curious collection of ex voto pictures and the tombs of the Gonzaga family. The old ducal palace—one of the largest buildings of its kind in Europe—was commenced in 1302 for Guido Bonaccolsi, and. probably completed in 1328 for Ludovico Gonzaga; but many of the accessory apartments are of much later date, and the interior decorations are for the most part the work of Giulio Romano and his pupils. Outside of the city, to the south of Porta Pusterla, stands the Palazzo del Te, Giulio’s architectural masterpiece, erected for Frederick Gonzaga; of the numerous fresco-covered chambers which it contains, perhaps the most celebrated is the Sala dei Giganti, where, by a combination of mechanical with artistic devices, the rout of the Titans still contending with artillery of uptorn rocks against the pursuit and thunderbolts of Jove appears to rush downwards on the spectator. Among the educational institutions in Mantua are an academy of arts and sciences (Accademia Vergiliana) occupying a fine building erected by Piermarini, a public library founded in 1780 by Maria Theresa, a museum of antiquities dating from 1779, a good botanical garden, and an observatory. The Monte di Pietà was established in 1484, the civil hospital in 1449, Oil, beer, leather, and playing cards are the chief products of the limited local industry. The population increased from 26,687 in 1871 to 28,048 in 1881. Asa fortress Mantua was long one of the most formidable in Europe, a force of thirty to forty thousand men finding accommodation within its walls; but it had two serious defects—the marshy climate told heavily on the health of the garrison, and effective sorties were almost impossible.
Mantua was originally an Etruscan town, and had still a strong Etruscan element in its population during the Boman period. It was a Roman municipium; but Martial calls it little Mantua, and, had it not been for Virgil’s interest in his native place and in the expulsion of a number of the Mantuana from their lands in favour of Octavian’s soldiers, we should probably have heard almost nothing of its existence. In 568 the Lombards found Mantua a walled town of some strength; recovered from their grasp in 590 by the exarch of Ravenna, it was again captured by Λgilulf in 601. The 9th century was the period of episcopal supremacy, and in the 11th the cityformed part of the vast possessions of Bonifacio, marquis of Canossa. From him it passed to Geoffrey, duke of Lorraine, and afterwards to the Countess Matilda, whose support of the pope led to the conquest of Mantua by the emperor Henry IV. in 1090. Reduced to obedience by Matilda in 1113, the city obtained its liberty on her death, and instituted a communal government of its own, salva imperiali justitia. It afterwards joined the Lombard League; and the unsuccessful attack made by Frederick II. in 1236 brought it a confirmation of its privileges. But after a period of internal discord Ludovico Gonzaga attained to power (1328), and was recognized as imperial vicar (1329); and from that time till the death of Ferdinando Carbo in 1708 the Gonzagas were masters of Mantua (see Gonzaga, vol. x. p. 772). Under Gian Francesco II., Ludovico, and Federico II., the first duke of Mantua, the city rose rapidly into importance as a seat of industry and culture. Claimed in 1708 as a fief of the empire by Joseph I., it was governed for the greater part of the century by the Austrians. In June 1796 it was besieged by Napoleon; but in spite of terrific bombardments it held out till February 1797. A three days’ bombardment in 1799 again placed Mantua in the hands of the Austrians; and, though restored to the French by the peace of Lunéville (1801), it became Austrian once more from 1814 till 1866. In the years between 1849 and 1859 the city was the scene of violent political persecution.
Besides Virgil, Mantua counts among its celebrities Sordello the Provençal poet, Castiglioni, Folengo the writer of macaronies, and Pomponazzi the philosopher; and it has a long roll of local historians—Donesmondi (ecclesiastical affairs), Possevino, Daino, Amedei, Visi, Tonelli, and Count Carlo d’Arco.
Gaet. Susani, Nuovoprosj>etto delle pittvre. <t<∙., di Mantova, Mantua, 1830; Carlo d'Arco, Delie arti e degli aιtejlci di Mantova, Mantua, 1857, and Storia di Mantova, Mantua, 1874.
9th ed. Encyclopædia Britannica, vol. 15, p. 504
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[1,089 words — estimated reading time: 7 minutes]
One who makes gowns for ladies.
One who makes dresses, cloaks, etc., for women; a dressmaker.
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