Tivoli, Diocese of

TIVOLI, Diocese of. - City and diocese in the province of Rome.

The diocese has an area of 620 sq km with a population of 70,000 inhabitants, all Catholics, in 45 parishes served by 68 diocesan priests and 20 regulars; it has a seminary, 5 male religious communities and 34 female ones (Ann. Pont. 1953, p. 424).

Tibur, a very ancient city of Latium, rises on the two banks of the Aniene, at the foot of Monte Ripoli. At first a settlement inhabited by people of the Mediterranean race (Siculi, Sicani, Aborigines), it was later, according to tradition, occupied by a colony of Greeks from Arcadia. Its principal cult was that of "Hercules Victor," venerated in a grand temple; Vesta also had a special cult there. It was part of the Latin League and fought strenuously against Rome until, subjugated in 337 B.C., it became a Roman municipium, assigned to the Camilia tribe. In the surrounding area the Romans had many villas; Augustus loved to stay there and it was the preferred residence of Maecenas and of Horace; the most splendid was that of the emperor Hadrian. P. Sulpicius Quirinius, governor of Syria at the time of the census in Palestine when Jesus Christ was born there, although a native of Lanuvium, had his tomb near T., not far from Ponte Lucano. The Plautii Silvani, originally from T., had vast estates there and the well-known tomb near Ponte Lucano. In an inscription of the 3rd century with the list of the members of a Tiburtine funerary college of Tenuiores (CIL, XIV, 3649) there appear Christian names, such as Laurentius, Exuperantius, and others. Between the 3rd and 4th centuries T. is said to have had a bishop Quirinus; the first certain bishop is Paulus. A burial place, perhaps Christian, with loculi and arcosolia, was discovered near the Ponte dell'Acquoria in 1928; not far away a ring with a carnelian had come to light bearing engraved the well-known acrostic ΙΧΘΥΣ. Traces of Christianity have been thought to be recognizable in some formae of the imperial necropolis on the right bank of the Aniene. The slow development of Christianity in T., hindered by the persistent cult of Hercules from which great profit was drawn, intensified in the 5th century. In the year 467 a Tiburtine, Simplicius, son of Castinus, was elected bishop of Rome. Under his impulse the Tiburtine bishop Candidus (A.D. 465-504) founded the church of St. Peter (today the Carità) and built the churches of St. Euphemia and St. Eugenia and the small basilica of St. Symphorosa (v.) at the place of the martyr's burial, at the ninth mile of the Via Tiburtina. In deference to Simplicius, the wealthy Goth Valila founded in 471 on one of his properties near T. the church of St. Mary in Cornuta, endowing it with the "massa Cornutensis"

and rich sacred furnishings described in a notarial deed known as the Carta Cornutiana. At that time the territory of the Tiburtine diocese, corresponding to that of the ancient Roman municipium, included the upper Aniene Valley, with the Sublacense region. During the Gothic War, in 344, T. siding with the Emperor of the East, was garrisoned by a troop of Isaurians; through a disagreement between Greeks and Tiburtines the Goths of Totila were treacherously introduced; the destroyed fortifications were later repaired by Totila himself. In the course of the 6th century the Basilica Laurentius must have been erected, in the old Forum of the city, on the ruins of part of the complex of the temple of Hercules Victor, the first phase of the present-day cathedral of St. Lawrence. It had annexed a baptistery, fed by the waters of the Aniene, and the episcopium; the center of Tiburtine life in the Middle Ages. A document of the persistent contamination of Christianity and paganism is a sepulchral epigraph of the year 613 (CIL, XIV, 3896) from the oratory of St. Alexander, annexed to the Cathedral, in which the widow Leta, invoking respect for her tomb and that of her children, calls down on violators the wrath of Pluto and wishes that the same end as that of Ananias and Sapphira befall them. Honorius I (625-38) dedicated on the Via Valeria, near T., a church dedicated to the memory of St. Severinus, an ascetic monk forerunner of St. Benedict. Also in the 7th century the remains of the temple of the goddess Bona, on Monte Affiano, were converted into a temple dedicated to the archangel St. Michael. A second Tiburtine pope was John IX (v.). In 945 there is the first mention of a church and Benedictine abbey dedicated to the martyr Vincent venerated at the eighteenth mile of the Via Tiburtina. At the locality Collegrasso, in the territory of Montecelio, were found the remains of a small basilica and of a trichora erected over a tomb situated in a hypogeum of the imperial age. The primitive construction, of tufelli and bricks, of the martyr's memoria dates to the 5th or 6th century; a complete restoration was carried out in the 10th century by the Benedictines with new pictorial decoration in a series of clipeate images. Of the small basilica with little naves divided by marble columns there are still visible the tiny presbytery, the small abbatial seat, and the remains of the schola cantorum; annexed was an open-air cemetery with inscriptions of the 4th or 5th century; there were also found epigraphs of the previous pagan burial place. The complex, abandoned by the monks and half-destroyed through the removal of materials, suffered its final damage in the battle of Casal Battista between the Colonna and the Orsini, in 1498. In the 10th century some ruined pagan temples became Christian churches; in the Castrovetere, the arx of Roman Tibur, in whose center the church of St. Paul had already been erected, the two small temples, one known as the temple of Vesta, of circular form, the other rectangular as the temple of the Sibyl, became respectively the churches of St. Mary and of St. Gior-

John. The temple of Diana, near the ancient Baths, was converted into the church of S. Andrea, and a nymphaeum of a Roman villa, near Porta Scura, was dedicated to St. Mary of the Tower. In the year 1001, Otto III, favoring the Romans in their continuous disputes with Tivoli, besieged the city, which, having surrendered, was placed under the imperial standard. From that time the decisive Ghibelline predominance in Tivoli over the Guelph element began; the former was supported by the imperial Benedictines of Farfa, established near the church of S. Maria Maggiore, the latter by the Benedictines of Subiaco, more loyal to the Pontiff, whose monastery stood near the church of S. Clemente, among the ruins of the Roman amphitheater. Toward the end of the 12th century or in the early years of the 13th, the celebrated triptych with the image of the Savior, preserved in the Cathedral, a distinguished relic and palladium of the city, was executed, perhaps by a monk of Farfa. In 1085, Henry IV and the antipope Clement III, during the siege laid to Rome, stayed at Tivoli until the liberator of Gregory VII, Robert Guiscard, arrived. Tivoli, a most strongly fortified key to the Abruzzi, a safe harbor for the enemies of Rome and its rival, was hated by the Romans, who longed for its destruction, but unlike Tusculum (destroyed in 1191), it was saved by the valor of its sons: in 1142 the besieging Romans were put to flight and then again defeated at Quintiliolo the following year. The animator of the resistance was a distinguished bishop of Tivoli, Cardinal Guidone (1125-54), who in 1138 consecrated the church of Sts. Andrew and Sabas, now demolished (inscription in the Villa Gregoriana), and the church of S. Valerio. Eugene III in 1146, fleeing from Rome which had risen in revolt with Arnold of Brescia, moved with his court to Tivoli, and returning from France, came back there in 1153 and died there. In 1155 Tivoli saw Pope Adrian IV and Frederick Barbarossa, encamped at Ponte Lucano because of a new insurrection of the Romans, solemnly celebrate the feast of St. Peter there in the open air. On that occasion the Tiburtines offered the keys of the city to the powerful sovereign, but the Emperor wished Tivoli to remain faithful to the Pontiff, saving the imperial rights. The bell tower of the Cathedral, the reconstruction of the churches of S. Pietro (la Carità) and of S. Giovanni Evangelista (formerly S. Cristoforo), and the compilation of the illuminated codex containing the register of the Church of Tivoli date from the 12th century. Between the end of the 12th century and the early years of the 13th, the wooden group of the Deposition, preserved in S. Lorenzo, and the frescoes of the church of S. Silvestro with episodes from the life of the Saint, in which the influence of Nordic art is evident, were executed. In 1216-1217, under Bishop Giovanni Antonio Colonna, St. Dominic founded in Tivoli one of the first hospices of his Order; Alexander IV in 1252 granted to the Friars Minor the church of S. Maria Maggiore, formerly of the Benedictines, also dedicated to St. Francis; it was then renovated in the Romanesque-Gothic style. A part of the adjoining convent was used as the seat of the city government. In 1224 Cardinal Ugolino, bishop of Ostia, later Gregory IX, consecrated the underground chapel of the Duomo, where the image of the Savior was long preserved. The Romans again besieged Tivoli in 1253, until through the intervention of Innocent IV a treaty was signed in 1259 by which Tivoli, while maintaining its autonomy, was obliged to pay the Romans an annual census of 1000 lire and to accept a count sent from Rome to administer justice; the Commune was governed by a capomilizia and the bishops also exercised political power. In 1285 Honorius IV granted the church of S. Biagio to the Dominicans. At the end of the 13th century the Franciscan Iacopo Torriti painted the icons of the Madonna preserved in S. Francesco. The first mention of the evocative ceremony of the Inchinata (v. below) dates from 1305. In the same age a local artist executed the greatly venerated image of the Virgin of the church of Quintiliolo. During the residence of the popes at Avignon, Cola di Rienzo, marching against the Colonna of Palestrina, harangued the Tiburtines from the top of the loggia dei Palloni, near the Duomo, to incite them to follow him in the enterprise. Between 1370 and 1381 Tivoli was afflicted by hostilities against Count Corrado of Anticoli, who refused to pay them tribute, which ended with the victory of the Tiburtines. During the disastrous Western Schism, in 1378, Urban VI, gravely ill, found refuge in Tivoli; shortly afterward the partisans of the antipope Clement VII, encamped at Ponte Lucano, were put to flight by the Tiburtines joined with the Bretons of the condottiere John Hawkwood. In the 15th century Tivoli took an active part in the age-old feud between the Orsini and the Colonna and, because of its position, in the struggle between the Angevins and the Aragonese for possession of the Kingdom of Naples. Pius II with his court in 1461 stayed in the convent of the Friars Minor at S. Francesco, dictated there the pages of his Commentaries, in which he describes Tivoli, its surroundings and the Villa Adriana, and also decided the erection of the Rocca Pia, entrusting the execution to the pupils of Filarete, Varrone and Niccolò fiorentini. Sixtus IV stayed for some time in that Rocca and there promulgated the constitution Quemadmodum operosa, of 29 Aug. 1475, which confirms the celebration of the Jubilee every 25 years, already decreed by Paul II. Angelo Lupi (1471-85) was bishop of Tivoli, whose tomb is in the Cathedral, and who arranged for the institution of the hospital Confraternity near the church of S. Giovanni Ev. In 1522 Adrian VI, in the new disputes between Tiburtines and Romans, ruled that Tivoli belonged to the Holy See and made it the seat of a governorship. During his stay in the Rocca Pia, Paul III in 1539 approved the Rule of the nascent Society of Jesus presented to him by St. Ignatius of Loyola. One of the first colleges founded by the Jesuits was that of Tivoli near the church of S. Salvatore, already existing not far from the present Palazzo del Comune (1549). In the Conclave of Julius III (1549) Cardinal Ippolito d'Este the younger was appointed Governor of Tivoli; through his lordly prodigality and refined artistic taste, the old Palazzo del Governo near the church of S. Francesco and the underlying Valle Gaudiosa were transformed by Pirro Ligorio into the marvelous Villa d'Este. In the midst of the war between Paul IV and Philip II, the Duke of Alba, in 1556, occupied Tivoli and wintered there with his troops, fortifying it; after the conclusion of peace, in the following year, Paul IV spent October there. In 1571, Mons. Bandini Piccolomini, archbishop of Siena, founded in Tivoli the Accademia degli Agevoli, dissolved at the end of the 17th century. Through the munificence of Cardinal Matteo Contarelli, a church was erected in 1587 in honor of St. Symphorosa, afterward called del Gesù, officiated by the Jesuits, almost entirely destroyed in the air raids during the Second World War. In 1638 Urban VIII amputated the territory of the diocese by uniting various castles of the upper Aniene Valley to the abbey of Subiaco (v.) created abazia nullum. From 1657 to 1662 Cardinal Giulio Roma, a Milanese, was bishop of Tivoli; among his other munificences are the complete reconstruction of the cathedral of S. Lorenzo and the erection of the Seminary. Tivoli had a second academy in 1716 with the foundation of the Colonia arcadica sibillina, aggregated to the Arcadia of Rome, which had as its first custodian Canon Giovanni Carlo Crocchiante, historian of the churches of Tivoli: it ceased its activity in 1850. St. Clement Mary Hofbauer in 1771 spent six months as a hermit at Quintiliolo, near Tivoli, before entering the Congregation of the Redemptorists. In 1826 an extraordinary flood of the Aniene caused serious damage to the town of Tivoli with many victims; Gregory XVI commissioned the architect Clemente Folchi to divert the river, whose overflowing waters, channeled into two tunnels dug into the depths of Monte Catillo, plunge down the opposite slope forming the great waterfall. The marvelous works, inaugurated on 7 Oct. 1835, were completed with the construction of the Gregorian bridge and the creation of the evocative Villa Gregoriana.

Gioacchino Mancini

THE INCHINATA OF TIVOLI

This is the name given to the festival held at T. for the Assumption. It no longer has the importance it had in the past. After heralds on horseback and the pages of the districts had proclaimed the festival, on the evening of 14 August a grand procession was arranged; it was opened by seven servers of the Confraternity of the Savior, carrying large candlesticks, followed by the guilds of the various arts, each with its own "talamo" (a small triumphal float adorned with flowers and bearing the statue of its patron saint), the confraternities and the magistracy that carried the icon of Christ, the trumpeters, the patricians, the militia and the people.

The procession, by the glow of torches, reached the bridge of Cornuta (now replaced by the Ponte Gregoriano), and after invoking peace from the Lord, turned the image of the blessing Christ toward the waters, prayed to it to protect the city from the fury of the river, and threw a lighted candle into the whirlpools. On the return, the procession halted at the hospital, where a bouquet of flowers was presented to the prior. The hospital chaplain incensed the image of the Savior, repeated the invocation for peace, and, having dipped a bundle of aromatic herbs in rose water, washed its feet three times. The procession then made its way to the Piazza di S. Maria Maggiore, where the "bowing" took place. The Virgin moved to meet her Son; three times the two images bowed to each other beneath very green triumphal arches, then, followed by the floats of the guilds, they entered the church, where they remained all night, one facing the other: the people believed that they exchanged whispered words of filial and maternal love. The next day, 15 August, the image of the Savior was led back to the Cathedral. - See plate XVII.

Paolo Toschi