with the republican party, which he hated, he publicly protested against all editions published without his sanction, and expressed his chagrin in a letter to his friend the abbot of Caluso, who consoled him by reminding him "that Milton had written in favour of the execution of Charles the First of England, and yet was admired by people who looked upon that monarch as a martyr." In a similar spirit, Alfieri declined to be a member of the Academy of Sciences of Turin, then called the "National Institute," after that of Paris. He would not, he wrote to his friend the abbot, belong to a society which had ejected from its bosom such men as Cardinal Gerdil, Count Balbo, and the Cavaliere Morozzo, on the plea that they were royalists. "And I, who have never been a royalist, will have nothing to do with republicans of the present fashion; for my republic is not like theirs." Alfieri now turned his attention to the composition of comedies, and with such industry did he work, that before the end of the year 1802, though obliged by illness to suspend his labour for many months, he produced six pieces, each occupying only a week in composition. Some of these were satires on the various systems of governments. These, and the continuation of his Autobiography, were now his principal literary avocations.
The severity of his application had long seriously affected his health, which now completely broke down under increased study. Over-abstemiousness aggravated, instead of mitigating, his distemper, and even the entreaties of his devoted companion could not induce him to remit his toil. On the 3rd of October, 1803, he was attacked with fever, and gout in the stomach, and expired on the morning of the 8th, watched through the long night by the same loving eyes that twenty-five years before he had looked upon with such delight. He was buried in the church of Santa Croce, in Florence, between the tombs of Michel Angelo and Machiavelli. A monument of white marble was raised to him by the countess of Albany, and executed by his friend Canova in 1810. It bears a portrait of Alfieri, which is said to be a striking likeness. For the inscription which he had designed for himself, has been substituted a better and a simpler one—"Vittorio Alfieri Astensi, Aloisia e principibus Stolbergis Albaniæ Comitessa." This most interesting woman survived the poet more than twenty years, and was ever faithful to the memory of him she loved. After death the wish of both was fulfilled, as she was laid by his side in the church of Santa Croce.
Beyond all question, Alfieri was one of the most remarkable men of his age. Having the misfortune to be born wealthy, and left without a father in his infancy, he wasted his early years, and yet redeemed, by his after life, the errors and follies of youth. As a writer, he may be said to have wrought a revolution in the dramatic literature of Italy. Finding nothing higher than the operas of Metastasio, or the comedies of Goldoni, his daring and ardent genius created the classic tragedy of Italy, and for the first time made it a part of the literature of the country. He has been differently judged by different critics, but none withhold from him the praise of being a man superior to all around him. French writers are scant in their encomiums, but they, too, have the generosity to admit that "he largely contributed to sustain the literary honour of his country, and even acquired for it a new glory, creating a style of poetry which up to that she did not possess." Augustus Von Schlegel, in his criticism, is severe beyond what is just, and while he dwells upon the faults of Alfieri, scarcely appreciates his merits. "His language," he says, "is so barren of imagery that his characters seem altogether devoid of fancy; it is broken and harsh, he wished to steel it anew, and in the process, it not only lost its splendour, but became brittle and inflexible. When we read the tragedies of Alfieri, the world looms upon us dark and repulsive." But Schlegel should have remembered the strength and enthusiasm, the love of freedom, and the nobility of thought that are to be found so largely in the works of Alfieri; things all the more admirable, that they were till then unknown for ages in the land from which he sprang. Perhaps the judgment of Sismondi is the truest: "The creation of a new Italian drama by Alfieri is a phenomenon which strikes us with astonishment. He has united the beauties of art, unity, singleness of subject, and probability, the properties of the French drama, to the sublimity of situation, character, and the important events of the Greek theatre, to the profound thoughts and sentiments of the English stage." The effects of the works of Alfieri were as wide in their operation as they have been permanent. "The influence of his writings," says another critic, "has been immense; far greater, perhaps, in the rest of the Peninsula than in his own country. He gave tone, not only to the language which he was not born to speak, but to the character of a people to which he scarcely belonged. He wound up the Italian mind to a higher pitch than it had ever reached since the old Republican times."
Alfieri was tall in stature, and had a noble and commanding air; though marked with pride, his face was intellectual, thin, and long, with a lofty and expansive forehead, round which his hair, which was red, fell in thick masses, and his whole air was that of one who was born to command.—Vita d'Alfieri—Biog. Univ., Copping.)—J. F. W.
ALFIROUZABADI, Abou-dh-dhaher-Mohammed-Ibn-Yakoub, an able and learned Arabian lexicographer, was born a.d. 1328-29, at Karezoun in the province of Shiraz, though, as the name indicates, his family came originally from Firouzabad. He was a great traveller, and was honourably received at more than one court—among the rest, at that of the Sultan Timour. Alfirouzabadi expended the stores of information he had amassed in compiling his celebrated Arabic dictionary, "Alkamousou-l-Mohitt," printed at Calcutta in 1827. He died a.d. 1414-15.—A. M.
ALFON, Juan, a Spanish painter, who decorated several relic-chases for the cathedral of his native Toledo. Lived about 1418.
ALFONSO. The dynasties of kings who bore this name will be found in the following order:—1st, Alfonsos of Asturias and Leon, and of Leon; 2nd, Alfonsos of Castile, and of Castile and Leon; 3rd, Alfonsos of Aragon and Navarre; 4th, Alfonsos of Naples; 5th, Alfonsos of Portugal; 6th, Alfonsos d'Este. The others of the name follow in the usual alphabetical order:—
ALFONSO I., king of Asturias and Leon, son of Pedro, duke of Biscay, succeeded Favilla, son of Pelayo, in 739. He early distinguished himself in encounters with the Moors, and for his pre-eminent valour, was rewarded with the hand of Pelayo's daughter, Eresminda. His dominions, at his death, extended from the western shores of Galicia into Aragon, and from the Bay of Biscay to the confines of Toledo. He was surnamed "El Catolico" (the Catholic), an epithet expressive of his zeal for the church. He died at Cangas in 756.—J. S., G.
ALFONSO II., king of Asturias, succeeded his uncle Bermudo in 791. He was the son of Froïla I., assassinated in 768, but the usurpers Silo and Mauregato had successively occupied the throne till 788; and although old enough at the death of the latter to have assumed the reins of government, the nobles who had been concerned in the murder of his father, preferred intrusting the supreme power to the brother, rather than the son of Froïla. Bermudo abdicated in favour of his nephew, and retired to a monastery. A conspiracy of nobles shortly after succeeded in its object, the imprisonment of Alfonso; but he was rescued at the end of three months, and again established on the throne. He carried on occasional wars with the Moors, but piously devoted most of his time to the decoration of Oviedo, his capital, by fine churches and other public buildings. Several of these were of great magnificence. He died in 842.—J. S., G.
ALFONSO III., king of Asturias and Leon, surnamed the Great (el Magno), succeeded his father Ordono I. in 866. His reign was as much characterized by civil discord as by splendid conquests. His career of victory in the Mohammedan territories was liable to constant interruptions from revolts at home, in which his nearest relations were frequently the ringleaders. For upwards of thirty years he continued to enlarge his dominions at the expense of the Moors; and, instead of the limited kingdom of his predecessors, reigned over an expanse of fertile territory that touched the Pyrenees on one side, and the Douro on another. But neither the renown of his conquests, nor the wisdom of his government, could secure to this illustrious prince the attachment even of his family; and to avoid the bloodshed which must have attended the suppression of a revolt in which his sons were concerned, he resigned his crown to Garcia the eldest. His death occurred two years after, in 912. Alfonso III. was the last to bear the title of king of Asturias. His successors in the kingdom of the north of the Douro preferred the title of king of Leon.—J. S., G.
ALFONSO IV., king of Leon, son of Ordono II., succeeded his uncle Froïla II. in 924. Weak and vacillating in his character, he occupied fruitlessly for six years the throne of his ancestors, and then leaving the government in the hands of his brother, Ramiro II., retired into a monastery. A year after, he
