Part 19 (1/2)
La Colleggiata is the ancient church of S. Maria Infunara, which Andreacci Saracenis founded, but was rebuilt in 1221, during the Servian period. It has a nave two bays in length, the first cross-vaulted, and the second with a dome enclosed within an octagonal drum, and with a barrel-vaulted presbytery before the apse. An aisle to the north, continued to the tower as a sacristy, is later. The apse has shallow pilasters dividing the exterior surface into three, in the centre of which is a walled-up east window of two lights, with a cross within a circle in the tympanum beneath the enclosing arch. The arch of the south door is perhaps a fragment of the original building, and the west door also looks early. In the aisle is a Virgin and Child, with painted faces, and the hands and feet added in relief and painted. The draperies are silver and silver-gilt, patterned, and each figure has a nimbus formed of a gilded patterned roll. The background is of silver, with little angels supporting the Virgin's nimbus, and there is a curious frame of filigree arabesques of tinsel set in wire and standing free.
[Ill.u.s.tration: S. LUKA, CATTARO
_To face page 385_]
S. Luka, the Greek church, of nearly the same period and plan as the cathedral, was built in 1195 by Marco di Andrea Casa Franci, and Bona, daughter of Basilio, prior of Cattaro, The dome is pointed, and rests on four pointed Romanesque arches with rough pendentives. The apse is divided by pilaster strips into three portions externally, and in the central one is a two-light round-headed window with central colonnette.
The roof is continued over the chapel of S. Spiridion to the north (which has an apse, but no window, except the little rose over the external door), and this makes the church look square from the south-east. The west side has one clerestory window beneath a great unmoulded arch, and a circular-headed door below, the jambs of which are made of earlier fragments; the late belfry is of three arches, two and one; beneath is an unusual curved ornamentation, a curious presage of the ”New Art” of a few years ago. The church appears to have been restored in the fourteenth century, since a consecration by Bishop Doimo II. is recorded in 1368; but it has been a Greek church since 1689, was enlarged in 1747, and the structure shows signs of considerable rebuilding. The iconostasis is of the seventeenth century; the paintings are covered with silver plates. There is a huge cross with wings at the base and paintings. Through the central arch the _arca_ and a little cross are seen. The chapel of S. Spiridion also has its iconostasis. At Easter time two processional crosses of silver and a Resurrection banner decorate the church outside the iconostasis. The Cattarine silversmiths have also executed work away from their own sh.o.r.es. It will be remembered that Stephen IV. of Servia gave a silver altar to the church of S. Nicola, Bari, in 1322, the work of Abrado of Cattaro.
There are a few interesting doors and windows in the town, of various periods. The Palazzo Drago, near the cathedral, has a pretty window of something the same style as the east window of the cathedral; the great doorway of the provincial tribunal has some fine heraldry in the tympanum (a helmeted lion, with another lion for the crest) and angels in the spandrils, while upon the caps beneath the lintel are other lions, with s.h.i.+elds flying from their necks. These are of the late Venetian period. The facade of the Nautical School, ill.u.s.trated, displays a bold and unusual treatment, and there is a well near the hotel with elaborate and ma.s.sive iron-work about the pump connected with it. The streets and alleys are all of the same width, and badly lighted, and it is a difficult place to find one's way about after dark. The only amus.e.m.e.nt available is usually the large cafe on the Riva, which appears to be open at all hours of the day and night--at least, we had coffee there before leaving by boat at 4.15 a.m. The gates are shut at 9 p.m., except the Porta Marina. Over this gate the Venetian lion still appears, a rather late example, but in refres.h.i.+ng contrast with the griffins supporting the Austrian arms above, a work of 1814. Outside are gigantic oleander-trees, and, to the right, the market, where many Montenegrins may be seen in their striking costumes. Beyond the Porta Gordicchio is the wood market, and one for horses and forage is outside the Porta Fiumara, where the barrack for belated Montenegrins stands, for they are not admitted within the walls.
[Ill.u.s.tration: THE SCUOLA NAUTICA, CATTARO
_To face page 386_]
Just outside the Porta Marina we found a shooting-saloon established on our second visit, with a number of moving figures, which performed on the marksman hitting a certain point, the most diverting of which were an old woman with a kicking donkey, and two fighting goats. Several soldiers tried their hands, but with very indifferent success. Great excitement was evoked by an accident while the mails were being unloaded one afternoon; a post-van fell into the water, many large postal parcels being damaged, and part of the top of the van ripped off by the measures adopted for its recovery. This ”Riva” was the scene of the murder of Danilo II. in 1860.
The walls, which are 28 ft. high, were built in 1667, after the older ones had been thrown down by an earthquake. These must have been strong, since the city was blockaded in vain by a Venetian fleet in 1378, and attacked by the Turks equally vainly in 1539, 1569, 1572, and 1657. The present walls zigzag up the mountain to the Fort S. Giovanni, which dominates the roads leading into Montenegro. From the fort one looks down upon the first house beyond the frontier. A little below the fort is a threatening ma.s.s of rock, which has been bound with iron to prevent it from falling upon the city below. The Montenegrin road climbs the mountain with no less than sixty-six zigzags.
At a little chapel with an early Renaissance facade some way outside the town, the Angelus bell hung outside just below the gable termination, without any visible means of being rung, and we wondered how this was done, until we happened one day to be within sight at the Angelus hour, when we saw a man bring out a ladder and ascend to within reach of a short cord hanging from the clapper, which he seized and agitated!
[Ill.u.s.tration: A CORNER OF THE WALLS, CATTARO]
The military are on the look-out for spies, and our camera occasioned two or three very searching inquiries. I congratulated myself upon having obtained authority to photograph from headquarters, without which we should certainly have been stopped. After taking the group of the Albanian horsedealers (who crossed with us to Bari with their merchandise) we wished to have a separate figure of the villain to the left; but the next man, who was master of the gang, thought time enough had been lost, and, taking the halter from a horse, twisted it round his neck by way of explaining that he was his servant, and that he objected to any further interruption to business. As we were walking between Perzagino and Mula an old man addressed us, asking if we were English, and, on our replying that we were, said he had been twenty times in London, and called our attention to his house, which he said had been inhabited by Prince Nikita during the troubles at Cattaro.
[Ill.u.s.tration: ALBANIAN HORSE-DEALERS, CATTARO
_To face page 388_]
We saw very few English on our second trip. From the time we pa.s.sed Cologne to the time we arrived at Cattaro we did not hear a word of our own language, though the boat in which we travelled from Spalato to Cattaro was entirely of English make, with Liberty chintzes in the cabins, and panels of coloured plaster in the saloon. It had cost 70,000, the captain said, and was certainly extremely rapid and comfortable. In the early morning we saw the sardine boats coming in.
They carry on the bow an apparatus with a number of jets connected with an acetylene plant, producing at night a most vivid light. The Bocchese is a born seaman, beginning at the age of twelve, and often going on till he is seventy. In the Bocche scarcely a third of the land is fruitful, yet 40,000 people lived in the district, mainly, of course, by the sea. From their childhood the boys have always longed for the day when they might accompany their fathers into the world beyond the sea.
They were always ready to fight, and expected to have to do so, for, until the second half of the eighteenth century, it was unusual good fortune to make a sea or land trip to Albania without being attacked.
The ancient houses, with loopholes and little windows, still look more like citadels than convenient dwellings. The women had to protect their children and their own honour when the men were away, and this had its effect upon their character. In many villages it was the custom for a bride to go out some morning before she was married into a lonely place and sing the death-wail, so that she might know it if she became a widow!
The introduction of the steamboat has reduced the employment of sailing craft, and the Bocchesi have become poor, but they provided the best sailors for the Venetian fleet, and their seamans.h.i.+p has not decayed.
There were certain variations among the Bocchesi from the religious customs of the Morlacchi, which are perhaps worth noting. The great fast before Easter lasted for fifty days, and during that time even fish was allowed but twice to the sick, on the Annunciation and on Palm Sunday.
During fasts the people do not sing, a custom observed strictly on the islands. Three days before Ascension Day the crosses are taken out of the churches and fastened to poles ten or twelve feet high, with fluttering banners; these days are therefore called ”Cross” days. The village girls make garlands to hang from the ends of the crosses. They are then carried in procession round the village and over the fields; when a spring is reached it is surrounded, the priest reads the gospel, and blesses the water and the people with the cross. On Ascension Day, or the day before, a procession with the cross goes through the village, and every house is blessed. In the coast-strip, on the eve of ”Cross Day,” there is a frugal supper; on the day itself, a dinner. Before both, the master of the house cuts a piece of bread from the ”Kreuzlaib”
(a large round loaf with a cross marked in the centre), and sticks in it a taper which he has lighted with a brand from the hearth. All pray before it for their dead, cross themselves, and sit down to table. Later in the meal the master rises with a gla.s.s of wine, soaks a bit of bread in it, and, with the traditional formula, ”I to thee, bread and wine; thou to me, health and joy,” extinguishes the taper with the morsel.
Then he drinks to all, and they to him. The great piece of bread, into which the taper was stuck, is given to the first beggar who comes by.
They provide much more than enough for the guests, as the custom is on those days to feed the poor in villages and towns. Unless the family is in mourning, drinking songs are sung suitable to the guests, of whatever position.
Fires are lighted on the eve of S. Stephen's Day, and also on New Year's Day and Epiphany, as well as on the morning of S. John the Baptist's Day, when the people jump over the midsummer fires and cry: ”From one S.
Giovanni to another, may aching feet be far from me!” On New Year's Day the children get an apple or an orange from the mother, and go to the father, asking him to silver it; he sticks a ten-kreuzer piece or two into it, and they go on to friends and relations with the same request.
Every village has its church (some have three or even more), every hilltop has its sanctuary, and each island its holy place. In Cattaro, till the beginning of the nineteenth century, churches and convents occupied a third of the area within the walls, and each n.o.bleman had his private chapel in his villa. The Bocchesi were noted for their honourable fidelity to their word once given, and this probity is still recognised in their commercial dealings. The married sons usually live in the house till the father's death; then the property is divided, and each takes his own house. If the mother is alive she lives with the eldest son. The house master divides the food, giving sufficient to each one, so that he would sometimes go short himself if the girls and daughters-in-law were not always ready to offer him the best part of their portions. The country women of Montenegro always kiss the hand of a male acquaintance in greeting. On the road the man is met on mule-back smoking, the woman on foot with a load, and they neither of them would consent to change their position, and put the load on the mule and make the man walk. The men wear full breeches, a waistcoat and sash round the waist, and a thick whitish wool coat over it, which is sometimes girded with the sash, leggings, and the usual raw-hide shoes. On the head is a black silk cap with a magenta centre embroidered with gold thread. The women wear a coat of the same shape, but of lighter material, and sleeveless, over a kind of jacket, and on the head the same shaped cap with a handkerchief draped over it and hanging down at the back.
[Ill.u.s.tration: MONTENEGRINS IN THE MARKET, CATTARO]
Cattaro has about 2,000 inhabitants, of whom scarcely ten families are old-established; all the old families are dead, or have emigrated. Part of the present population are Italian immigrants; part are Albanian and Montenegrin families (to which nationality many of the country people also belong), who, either for purposes of trade or craft, have settled in the town. From many towns in Austria come the sub-alterns, who have married and now live here. The usual language is Croat, but Italian is generally understood, and songs with the Venetian accent may be heard.
But all are much interested in the ”Marinerezza,” the finest festival of the Bocche, held on February 3. On January 27 the preliminaries commence. The marine officers arrange themselves on the seat before the cathedral at midday. As soon as the clock has struck the second stroke of 12 the ”little sea director,” a boy of nine or ten, comes out on the gallery above the door, armed and in national costume, and, in Croat, delivers a short speech announcing the beginning of the festival, and calling the citizens to take part in it. At the end he takes off his cap, waves it, and greets the standard of S. Trifone with three ”Slava!”