Mantua, Diocese of

MANTOVA, DIOCESI di. – Diocese and provincial capital in Lombardy.

It has an area of 2,024 sq. km, with 375,000 inhabitants, of whom 374,586 are Catholics; it has 153 parishes served by 312 diocesan priests and 16 religious priests; it has 1 seminary, 2 male religious communities, and 86 female ones (Annuario Pont., 1951, p. 263).

I. HISTORY

It is surrounded on three sides by the Mincio. Its name derives from the Etruscan infernal divinity Mantus, which reveals its origin; whereas a legend made Manto, daughter of Tiresias, its founder (Dante, Inferno, XX, 52-99). It was conquered by the Gauls and then by the Romans; the veterans of Julius Caesar received a portion of its lands. It was devastated by Alaric in 401; occupied and fortified by the exarchs of Constantinople; taken by the Lombards; and then passed to the Canossa. In 1601 it surrendered to Henry IV; in 1126 five consuls were appointed; it was favorable to the Empire, especially in the time of Bishop Garsedonius; but it took part in the alliance of the League and fought at Alessandria and Legnano in 1167. Various families then contended for the city, including the Casaloldi, the Riva, the Poltroni, the Arlotti, and the Bonacolsi, whose lordship ended in Aug. 1328, when they were driven out in a violent brawl in Piazza Sordello; the lordship of the Gonzaga family then arose (marquises and later dukes of M.), around which the history of M. revolved for more than three centuries. It then declined, and M., after various vicissitudes, passed to the Austrian Empire in 1707. It was besieged by the

French in 1796; in 1799 the Austrians entered it; but with the Peace of Lunéville in 1801 it was retaken by the French, becoming capital of the department of the Mincio until 1814; it was then annexed to the Lombard-Venetian Kingdom in 1815; Ciro Menotti rose in revolt without success, and later came the Belfiore massacre (1851), until, by the Peace of Vienna of 11 Oct. 1866, it was annexed to the Kingdom of Italy.

The origins of the Church of Mantova are obscure. A letter from the deacon Crispo of Milan to Mauro, bishop of M., dates from the end of the 7th or the beginning of the 8th century (MGH, Epistolae, III, p. 698, n. 7). The first bishop of certain date is Laiofo, present at the Synod of M. in 827 (P. Paschini, Le vicende politiche e religiose del Friuli nei secoli nono e decimo, in Nuovo archivio veneto, new series, 20 [1911], pp. 240 ff.).

Egilulf is then known from a letter of Pope Giovanni VIII of the year 881; Pietro, mentioned in a privilege of Lothair of the year 945; then Guglielmo in 962; Gombaldo in 981; Giovanni in the time of Otto III; Ilulfo, who received privileges from Henry II and Conrad II; Marciano in the time of Henry III; under Eliseo, two councils were held at M., the first in 1053 by Leone IX, the second by Alessandro II in 1064. Under Gregorio VII there was a schism caused by the supporters of Henry IV against Bishops Ubaldo and Ugo. For a long time the bishops were simultaneously also podestàs of M. In 1235 Uguccione degli Avvocati killed Bishop Guidotto, and from then on the civil authority of the bishops of M. declined. In 1466 the cardinal Francesco Gonzaga became its bishop; the cardinal Sigismondo Gonzaga was its administrator in 1511; in 1521 his nephew Ercole was made bishop of M.; in 1563 the cardinal Federico Gonzaga was its administrator, and in 1565 the cardinal Francesco Gonzaga; subsequently, in 1574 and 1593, respectively, Marco Fedele Gonzaga and Francesco Gonzaga are found as bishops of M. The bishops of M. were suffragans of the patriarchate of Aquileia until 1453, when Niccolò V made M. immediately subject to the Holy See. In 1803 it became suffragan to Ferrara, and in 1819 to Milan. From 1884 to 1893 the bishop of M. was Msgr. G. Sarto (b. Pio X).

In 1472, through the work of A. De Micheli, the Divina Commedia and the Decamerone were printed there.

Among the illustrious Mantovani, besides Virgilio, born at Andes (today Pietole), are remembered the troubadour Sordello of Goito, Baldassare Castiglione, s. Luigi Gonzaga (v.), the blessed Alberto da M., Alberto Gonzaga, bishop of Ivrea, Antonio Gonzaga, Bartolomeo de' Fanti, the b. Elisabetta Picenardi; the fathers Teofilo Folengo, Antonio Possevino, etc.

In 1624 it acquired a university-level institution entrusted to the Jesuits, who had been established at M. since 1584. The Accademia Virgiliana arose by decree of Maria Teresa in 1767, with its own theater (Teatro scientifico).

II. ARCHAEOLOGY

In the Cathedral, since 1776, and originating from the demolished church of S. Agnese, there has been preserved a Christian sarcophagus from the end of the 4th century, formerly gilded, depicting Christ among the twelve Apostles. On the lid, in the center, is the Nativity; on one side, Christ on the mountain between two disciples; on the other, a wedding scene, with a notary in the act of transcribing the document onto the diptychs (Wilpert, Sarcofagi, I, pl. 30 and p. 39; pl. 74, 5 and 6, p. 91; II, pp. 283, 338–39). A Christian inscription, discovered in 1785 in the church of S. Benedetto, commemorates a “Thomas vir honestus negotiator,” who died in 540 (CIL, V, 4084).
BIBLI. — Eubel, I, pp. 324-25; II, p. 185; III, p. 234; IV, p. 230; F. P. Kehr, Italia Pontificia, VII, 1, Berlin 1913, pp. 305-54; Lanzoni, II, pp. 943-44; L. Volta, Compendio della storia di M., 5 vols., Mantua 1807-38; S. Davari, Notizie storiche topografiche della città di M., there 1903; V. CASTORI, M. e suoi dintorni, there 1925; R. Quazza, M. attraverso i secoli, there 1933. On the Gonzaga: Torelli-Luzio, L'Archivio Gonzaga di M., Mantua 1920-22. Enrico Josi

III. ART

The archaeological documentation of ancient M., an Etruscan and subsequently Roman city, is fairly abundant,

MANTOVA, PIOCESI di — Piazza Sordello and the façade of the Cathedral (1736). The bell tower dates from the 11th century. On the right, the ducal Palace (13th–14th centuries) — Mantova.

while less significant are those recalling the troubled civic life of the early Middle Ages, before M. flourished anew during the Romanesque period. Monuments of note from this era are the Rotonda di S. Lorenzo, built around the year 1000 on the ruins of Roman buildings; the bell tower of the church of S. Gervasio and the other of the Cathedral; as well as various civil buildings wholly or partly dating from that period, such as the oldest parts of the Palazzo della Ragione, the Arenario and the Palazzo del Broletto. On the latter’s corner tower—where an inscription records its construction in 1227—there is also a crude monument to Virgilio... “mantuanus poetarum clarissimus,” testimony to the great honor in which, even during the Middle Ages, the poet of Aeneas was held in his native land.

The church of Gradaro, with its grand ogival portal, signed Jacobus et Gratunola Ognabennus, a work of the late 13th century; that of S. Francesco; the oldest parts of the Cathedral; the bell tower of S. Andrea, dating from 1414; the former Palazzo dei Bonacolsi; that of the Capitano del Popolo; and the castle of S. Giorgio, erected by the architect Bartolino da Novara, are instead Gothic constructions. But it was during the 15th century and then in the 16th, under the rule of the Gonzaga, that M. was transformed and, through the work of the great artists summoned to that court, became one of the most splendid cities in Lombardy. Indeed, it was during the principate of the marquis Ludovico (1444–78) that Leon Battista Alberti, Luca Fancelli and Andrea Mantegna arrived in M.; while in the time of the marchioness Isabella d’Este (1454–1539), wife of Francesco II, extremely precious works of ancient and modern art were assembled in the Gonzaga palace, formed by a complex of buildings from various periods and having become one of the most splendid in Italy. Under Federico II, Giulio Romano was invited to M. (1524), at the suggestion of Baldassar Castiglione. The most notable monuments of that period are, along with Mantegna (v.) in the Palazzo Ducale, S. Andrea, the chapel of the Incoronata near the Cathedral, S. Sebastiano and the Palazzo del Te. S. Andrea, where Mantegna’s tomb is also located, was conceived by Alberti, but executed in its general conception by Fancelli and, toward the end of the 16th century, in the construction of the two arms of the crossing, by A. M. Viviani; it was then completed with a unified character, according to the original plans, between 1732 and 1782 by Paolo Pozzo and Filippo Iuvara, who vaulted its dome. S. Sebastiano, like the chapel of the Incoronata near the Cathedral, is also an Albertian work. The Palazzo del Te, on the other hand, is an architectural work by Giulio Romano, who through his activity in the field of interior decoration as well gave local taste a strong character, which continued throughout the 16th century, as is evident in the Palazzo di Giustizia, designed by Bertani toward the end of the century.

Among the works of the Baroque period, particular mention should be made of the church of S. Maurizio, with its tall characteristic façade; that of S. Barnaba, which houses in the s. Romualdo the major work of Giuseppe Bazzani, the ingenious Mantuan painter of the 18th century; and that of S. Filippo. In the field of civil architecture, the Palazzo dei marchesi Sardi, by the architect Francesco Gefflis; the archbishop’s palace; that of the marchesi Cavriani, from the second half of the 18th century; and finally the Mantovani house in Via Giovanni Chiassi are especially noteworthy. During the 18th century, besides Bazzani, the Veronese Giorgio Anselmi left important paintings in M.; while the Neoclassical taste soon established itself in the city through the work of Paolo Pozzo, who in 1779 transformed several rooms of the Palazzo ducale, and subsequently through that of Luigi Canonica, to whom the Teatro sociale (1822) is owed. The most notable work of the 20th century is, within the Piazza Virgiliana, whose composition dates back to 1797, the monument to the great poet, conceived by Luca Beltrami; the sculptures, however, are by E. Quadrelli and G. Menozzi.

Emilio Lavagnino