DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.67375#0176
134
NAPLES AND ITS ENVIRONS.
But here adversity had long since passed the point
where any sweetness could result, and the venomous
tyrants of Spain displayed no single beneficent character-
istic in their government of Naples. A radical change
alone could bring relief, and only the hope which would
come with a government by their own sovereigns could
arouse the Neapolitans to struggle for new attainments
of any sort.
The public works in Naples in the last half of this cen-
tury are almost too few and unimportant to be mentioned.
The Count of Onate erected the first theatre in Naples,
the Teatro di S. Bartolommeo, which was destroyed when
that of S. Carlo was built. This viceroy also erected the
Fontana della Selleria, which long since disappeared,
and in 1651 the grand staircase of the royal palace was
constructed by his command. In 1668 a dock adjoining
the arsenal was built under Don Pedro Antonio of Aragon.
Perhaps Don Federigo de Toledo, Marquis of Villafranca,
did greater injury to Naples than the others had done
good, when, in 1671, after being viceroy but two months,
he carried to Spain the bones of Alfonso I., which he
disinterred in the church of S. Dominico Maggiore,
together with the statues of the four rivers which he took
from the fountain of the Molo, the statue of Venus from
the fountain of Castel Nuovo, and the celebrated statues
and steps of the fountain Medina, the work of Giovanni
da Nola.
The sun of the seventeenth century set in darkness and
gloom in Naples, and the dawn was still more than thirty
years distant. Historians who delve more deeply than
we propose to do for the causes of effects now in opera-
tion, attribute all the evils that have since existed in
Naples to the influence of the Spanish dominion, which
cultivated no good, and developed all the evil tendencies
in the Neapolitan character. Much time is required for
NAPLES AND ITS ENVIRONS.
But here adversity had long since passed the point
where any sweetness could result, and the venomous
tyrants of Spain displayed no single beneficent character-
istic in their government of Naples. A radical change
alone could bring relief, and only the hope which would
come with a government by their own sovereigns could
arouse the Neapolitans to struggle for new attainments
of any sort.
The public works in Naples in the last half of this cen-
tury are almost too few and unimportant to be mentioned.
The Count of Onate erected the first theatre in Naples,
the Teatro di S. Bartolommeo, which was destroyed when
that of S. Carlo was built. This viceroy also erected the
Fontana della Selleria, which long since disappeared,
and in 1651 the grand staircase of the royal palace was
constructed by his command. In 1668 a dock adjoining
the arsenal was built under Don Pedro Antonio of Aragon.
Perhaps Don Federigo de Toledo, Marquis of Villafranca,
did greater injury to Naples than the others had done
good, when, in 1671, after being viceroy but two months,
he carried to Spain the bones of Alfonso I., which he
disinterred in the church of S. Dominico Maggiore,
together with the statues of the four rivers which he took
from the fountain of the Molo, the statue of Venus from
the fountain of Castel Nuovo, and the celebrated statues
and steps of the fountain Medina, the work of Giovanni
da Nola.
The sun of the seventeenth century set in darkness and
gloom in Naples, and the dawn was still more than thirty
years distant. Historians who delve more deeply than
we propose to do for the causes of effects now in opera-
tion, attribute all the evils that have since existed in
Naples to the influence of the Spanish dominion, which
cultivated no good, and developed all the evil tendencies
in the Neapolitan character. Much time is required for