[ 192 ] METEOROLOGICAL DIARY, BY W. CARY, STRAND, Fahrenheit's Therm. Day of Morning. 8 o'clock 11 o'clock Barom. South Sea Stock, July 28, 104; July 30, 103; Aug. 2, 103. Old South Sea Ann. Aug. 11, 921; Aug. 14, 92. J. J. ARNULL, Stock Broker, Bank-buildings, Cornhill, late RICHARDSON, GOODLUCK, and Co. J. B. NICHOLS AND SON, 25, PARLIAMENT-STREET. 105 19 240 105 19 240 87 pm. 85 83 pm. 91 105 19 80 81 pm. 1044 194 79 80 pm. [194] MINOR CORRESPONDENCE. E. I. C. says, “The design on the Whaplode gravestone (vol. xcix. part ii. p. 590), which Mr. Oliver confessed himself unable to elucidate, was pointed out by him and understood by me, to be the lower device on the first stone in the engraving, and certainly not the saltire inscribed on a circle, about which no difficulty was expressed. The device in question so closely resembled the figure of a thunderbolt found on all Roman antiquities, that I felt no difficulty in pronouncing it to be an imitation of that classical emblem. I must add that I see nothing in Mr. Oliver's last letter on the subject, (vol. c. part i. p. 591) to induce me to alter my opinion." TOPOGRAPHUS observes—“ On any point of British Topography it is so natural to seek information from your Magazine, that I trust you will forgive me for troubling you with a query respecting an obscure place, not mentioned, to the best of my knowledge, in any of our old books or maps of the roads. Mr. Ireland, in hisPicturesque Views on the River Thames,' vol. 11. p. 47, says, when in the vicinity of Old Windsor, Passing Ouseley towards Egham,' &c. Suspecting that it might derive its name from the ancient family of Ouseley (whose pedigree, with others of the old Shropshire and Northamptonshire families, had for some time engaged my attention) I requested a friend residing near Egham to visit the place, and communicate to me all that he could learn respecting it. He found there but one building with its offices, a kind of inn or public-house, which from a sign of Five Bells is called The Bells of Ouseley.' It stands close to the river Thames, among some fine old trees of considerable size. It appears from a printed handbill now before me that the estate of Beaumont Lodge, other tenements, and the Bells of Ouseley,' were advertised for sale at Garraway's Coffeehouse in London on the 15th of September, 1801. Is this the place to which Mr. Ireland, as above quoted, alludes? Any information respecting its name and origin will oblige. The Gentleman's Magazine for January, 1799, contains some curious particulars, with a view of the monument of the Ouseley family in Northamptonshire; from whom this place may perhaps have derived its name." A CORRESPONDENT writes "A portion of a Parish Register, beginning in 1671, containing baptisms, marriages, and burials, each leaf or page signed Tho. Frank, Rector,' and the names of divers Churchwardens very regularly until 1689, has fallen into my hands, which I could wish to restore to the place to which it belongs, but have no means of ascertaining of what parish this Thomas Frank was Rector, and the names, though many of them very common, affording no clue to a discovery, not one parish in Buckinghamshire, occurring to me as being likely to own it: nor is there the name of one persou or family of note, though probably many to whom such an authentic document might eventually be important. It strikes me that Bedfordshire might possibly comprise the parish, but only from the similarity of some very common names there in divers places. In one place, William Brittain and Mary Page, widdow, were marryed on ye thirteenth of February, 1682; both these persons were inhabitants of North Crawley in ye county of Bucks: Tho. Frank, Rector; George Gillett, Thomas Grumont, Churchwardens.'-On the blank page at the beginning is T. F. 1783 to whom this relates, whether to a relative of the Rector, Mr. Frank, or not, is entirely unknown. It was purchased amongst the offal of an attorney's office in London, as is asserted, many years ago and by a subsequent sale has been transferred to the inquirer. The very strange name of Roger Ventiman occurs in 1688. It must have been some very small parish, the marriages scarcely averaging half a dozen in a year. L. says, "Any particulars relative to the late General Haviland, his family connections, or military appointments and services, in addition to those recorded in vol. LIV. p. 719, will be thankfully received. It is presumed that the Christian name of Mrs. Haviland was Salisbury; that she was sister of Mrs. Townley Balfour, and mother of Mrs. Ruxton Fitzherbert, both of Ireland. In p. 2, a reference is made to Thornton's two Plates of the scaffolding used for restoring the north gable of the transept of Beverley Minster to its perpendicular; and we have to add that reduced copies of these plates, with full explanations, are published in Oliver's History of Beverley. We have no recollection of the article which Mr. WETHERELL says was sent sixteen months ago, and the subject is now gone by. The reply to X. "on Clerical Farmers," in our next. J. P. of Hanwell's favour is received. ERRATA. Vol. c. i. p. 515, a. l. 24, Katharine, dau. of Lord Haversham, married Mr. White, an attorney.--Banks's Extinct Peerage. -P. 561, the late Major Rennell's name was James, not John.-P. 629, 1. 3 and 1. 6, for Jeremiah xlvii. read xlvi.- -Part ii. p. 162, col. 1,6 lines from bottom, for Aug. father, read sister. The sisters were devotedly 26, read July 26.-P. 189, a. l. 33, for attached to each other.-P. 225, b. 1. 5 from bottom, for Nicholas Hardinge, read George Hardinge. THE GENTLEMAN'S MAGAZINE. SEPTEMBER, 1830. ORIGINAL COMMUNICATIONS. OF THE NOBILITY AND GOLDEN BOOK OF GENoa. HE title of NOBLE was introduced coat of arms; and accordingly several Tinto Lombardy by the Emperor of the great families strengthened Theodosius, and after the lapse of many centuries bestowed on those principal citizens of Genoa who had ruled the State as Consuls, or in other high offices. The records of the Republic do not go farther back than the year 1100 (thirteen years later than the completion of the earliest record in England, Domesday Book), and it appears by them, that in 1159, when Pope Alexander III. wrote to the city of Genoa, he addressed Consuls with the title of Noble. In the year 1200, Leone King of Armenia wrote to the Vicar of Genoa, with the like title of Noble, which epithet was at that period so great, that Comnene the Greek Emperor, and Innocent III., gave it to Conrad the eastern Emperor, and to the King of Dalmatia. There were no laws in the Republic to prevent its honours (in other words its offices and employments) being given to any citizen of merit; nevertheless they were always borne by members of certain families, the splendour of whose birth, and the greatness of whose wealth, induced the people to elect them to the dignities of the state: these families were either descendants of the great nobles of Italy, or came from Germany and France, bringing into Genoa the blood of many sovereign houses from those ultramontane provinces: but in the year 1257, the people having become weary of the nobles as rulers, elected Simon Boccanegra "Captain of the People," and formed a party of citizens (designated the popular faction) little inferior to the nobles, either in birth or riches, to oppose the nobles, and from that year until 1527, the Republic was torn to pieces by the quarrels of these two parties. One of the most extraordinary consequences of these intestine tumults was the formation of Albergos, or an union of many noble families, thenceforth using one surname, as well as one themselves by such additions, made in solemn assemblies of members of each family, committed to writing, legally drawn out by a notary, and signed by all parties; thus, in 1448, the Grimaldis formed an Albergo, and aggregated to themselves various illustrious families, as the Castello, the Cebas, the Carlis, and the Olivas; all of whom were thenceforth named "Grimaldi." To redress, however, the misfortunes, and eradicate the fatal distinctions arising from the factions of nobles and plebeians, it was determined in the year 1528, chiefly at the instance of Andrew D'Oria, to create an order of nobility, whose members should be selected from both parties; and it having been ordained that the qualification for ranking as noble should be the possession of six mansions in Genoa by any one family, a census was taken, and 28 families (and no more) were found possessing the requisite qualification; excepting, however, the Adornos and Fregosas, whose contentions had so long caused civil wars in the city, that they were intentionally omitted, although afterwards allowed, with many other great citizens, to rank in the same class. All party distinctions being thus abolished, the 28 families, and those who had been incorporated with them in the manner presently to be mentioned, were declared nobles, and to them was given the right of conferring a similar distinction on ten persons in every year: it was at the same time decreed that the Doge and Magistrates should be chosen, without any restriction, from those families; and that their names, surnames, and posterity, as well as of those to be thereafter ennobled, should be registered by the College of Proctors of the Republie, in a book thenceforth to be called The Book of Nobility, or the Golden Book. The names of the 28 families 196 Of the Nobility and Golden Book of Genoa. thus first ennobled, were Calva, Cattanea, Centurione, Cibo, Cicala, D'ORIA, FIESCHI, Fornari, Franchi, Gentile, Giustiniana, Grilla, GRIMALDI, Imperiali, Interiani, Lercara, Lomellina, Marina, Negra, Negrona, Pallavicina, Pinella, Promontoria, Salvaga, Saoli, SPINOLA, Vivaldi, Uso di Mare. To each of these Alberghi, or families, were at the same time added or aggregated* about 20 other great families, who were to take the names and arms of those of the 28 to whom they were annexed, and thus an order of Nobility was created, amounting, according to Casoni, a Genoese historian, to 594; but of these, the 28 Alherghi were beyond all comparison pre-eminent, and the four Alberghi of D'Oria, Grimaldi, Fieschi, and Spinola, were in like manner pre-eminent among the 28, as they also were amongst the Princes of the great empires of Europe; thus the D'Orias were Princes of Germany, bore the imperial eagle for arms, enjoyed the personal friendship of the Emperor Charles V. and were offered the sovereignty of Genoa-the Grimaldis, who were descended in the male line from the royal house of France, and had long been adjudged to be a sovereign house, by virtue of their principality of Monaco, intermarried with the family of Lorraine, were Princes of the empire, had the imperial eagle granted in 1497 for a chief in the shield of one branch of the family, and were created in 1525 Counts Palatine and Cavallerones, or perpetual Knights; they also coined their own money in Monaco, and were ranked by the Kings of France as the third foreign princely house of that kingdom :—the Fieschis were Sovereign Counts of Lavagne, descending from the ancient Dukes of Burgundy, whose arms they retained, having changed the colours; they were perpetual Vicars of the empire, and coined their own money; they have given two Popes and many Cardinals to Rome, and the Dukes of Savoy, Counts of Mountserrat, and Dukes of Milan, from whom all Christian Princes descend by the mother's side, have allied with the house of Fieschi. However, in the course of the succeeding half century, the ancient nobility *This act of aggregating above 500 families to 28, and changing their names, is probably the only instance of such a transaction in Europe. [Sept. (those who were noble before the year 1528) becoming extremely jealous of the later created nobility, distinguished themselves as the Porto Vecchio, or Porto di San Luco, while their more modern brethren were designated the Porto Nuovo, or Porto di San Pietro, the aristocratic Porto Vecchio refusing to intermarry with their less fortunate compeers. Different factions paraded the streets with their different banners, and much blood was shed; the Porto Vecchio had a sky-blue banner, and the Porto Nuovo a green flag; hence the saying that the nobles had sangue. celeste, or sky-blue blood, and not red, like that of other people. The dissentions in the Republic having but small cessation, a civil war was kindled, in the year 1574, and the interference of the Pope, the Emperor, and the King of Spain became necessary to stop its ravages. New laws were enacted in 1576, under the inspection and with the assistance of Commissioners from Rome, Germany, and Spain, and they continued in force, with little variation, until the French revolution. Amongst other ordinances, it was decreed, that all citizens admitted to the great offices of government should be comprehended in one only order under the name of NOBLES, and the distinctions of new and old nobility, and all other distinctions, should be abolished. That those nobles who by virtue of the laws of 1528 had changed their surnames and arms for those of the 28 Alberghi, should retake their own ancestors' names and arms; but it was permitted for the aggregated families to continue the assumed names, in conjunction with those of the Alberghi to which they were attached. Illegitimate persons, and those of bad fame, or engaged in mechanical pursuits, were excluded from nobility. The names found in the ancient Book of Nobility (that of 1528) were to be extracted by the Doge's Chancellor in the presence of the Doge and two of the Senators, with their Christian and surnames, and those of their fathers and of their children; and all future names or additions to the nobility were to be made only by the Chancellor, in the presence of the Doge and two Senators; and a duplicate of this book of the Nobility was to be made: one copy was to be preserved by the Doge, the other by the Proctors of the Republic. To add or alter even a letter in the book was high treason. |
