Canto IV CXIV
Where is the rock of Triumph, the high placeWhere Rome embraced her heroes? where the steepTarpeian--fittest goal of Treason's race,The promontory whence the traitor's leapCured all ambition? Did the Conquerors heapTheir spoils here? Yes; and in yon field below,A thousand years of silenced factions sleep--The Forum, where the immortal accents glow,And still the eloquent air breathes--burns with Cicero!
The field of freedom, faction, fame, and blood:Here a proud people's passions were exhaled,From the first hour of empire in the budTo that when further worlds to conquer failed;But long before had Freedom's face been veiled,And Anarchy assumed her attributes:Till every lawless soldier who assailedTrod on the trembling Senate's slavish mutes,Or raised the venal voice of baser prostitutes.
Then turn we to our latest tribune's name,From her ten thousand tyrants turn to thee,Redeemer of dark centuries of shame--The friend of Petrarch--hope of Italy--Rienzi! last of Romans! While the treeOf freedom's withered trunk puts forth a leaf,Even for thy tomb a garland let it be--The forum's champion, and the people's chief--Her new-born Numa thou, with reign, alas! too brief.
Words in this poem
- forum n.
- A market place or public place in Rome, where causes were judicially tried, and orations delivered to the people. [L.; akin to foris, foras, out of doors. See Foreign.]
- veiled a.
- Covered by, or as by, a veil; hidden.
- redeemer n.
- One who redeems.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Canto IV CXIV is in the public domain. This text is taken from Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, Project Gutenberg ebook #5131; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Lord Byron, Canto IV CXIV, in Childe Harold's Pilgrimage (1812–1818), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #5131, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/byron-childe-harold/canto-iv-cxiv.html, id L06616.
Form and metre
Canto IV CXIV is 27 lines in 3 stanzas of 9 lines each. Every stanza rhymes ABABBCBCC, the Spenserian stanza. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 87%). 94% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.2 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 26% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in the Spenserian stanza, other poems in iambic pentameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 ABABBCBCC placeA · steepB · raceA · leapB · heapB · belowC · sleepB · glowC · ciceroC
- 2 ABABBCBCC bloodA · exhaledB · budA · failedB · veiledB · attributesC · assailedB · mutesC · prostitutesC
- 3 ABABBCBCC nameA · theeB · shameA · italyB · treeB · leafC · beB · chiefC · briefC
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Where is the rock of Triumph, the high place | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Where Rome embraced her heroes? where the steep | 10 | ··˘/·/˘··· |
| Tarpeian--fittest goal of Treason's race, | 10 | ˘/˘/˘··/˘· |
| The promontory whence the traitor's leap | 10 | ·/˘˘˘··/˘· |
| Cured all ambition? Did the Conquerors heap | 10 | ··˘/˘··/˘· |
| Their spoils here? Yes; and in yon field below, | 10 | ·········· |
| A thousand years of silenced factions sleep-- | 10 | ·/˘··/˘/˘· |
| The Forum, where the immortal accents glow, | 11 | ·/˘··˘/˘/˘· |
| And still the eloquent air breathes--burns with Cicero! | 12 | ···/˘····/˘· |
| The field of freedom, faction, fame, and blood: | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| Here a proud people's passions were exhaled, | 10 | ···/˘/˘·˘/ |
| From the first hour of empire in the bud | 10 | ···/·/˘··· |
| To that when further worlds to conquer failed; | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| But long before had Freedom's face been veiled, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| And Anarchy assumed her attributes: | 10 | ·/˘˘˘/·/˘· |
| Till every lawless soldier who assailed | 10 | ·/˘/˘/˘·˘/ |
| Trod on the trembling Senate's slavish mutes, | 10 | ···/˘/˘/˘· |
| Or raised the venal voice of baser prostitutes. | 12 | ···/˘··/˘/˘· |
| Then turn we to our latest tribune's name, | 10 | ····//˘/˘· |
| From her ten thousand tyrants turn to thee, | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| Redeemer of dark centuries of shame-- | 10 | ˘/˘··/˘˘·· |
| The friend of Petrarch--hope of Italy-- | 10 | ·······/˘˘ |
| Rienzi! last of Romans! While the tree | 9 | ····/˘··· |
| Of freedom's withered trunk puts forth a leaf, | 10 | ·/˘/˘····· |
| Even for thy tomb a garland let it be-- | 10 | /····/˘··· |
| The forum's champion, and the people's chief-- | 10 | ·/˘/˘··/˘· |
| Her new-born Numa thou, with reign, alas! too brief. | 12 | ········˘/·· |
Notes from the edition 4
E. H. Coleridge's notes to Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, The Works of Lord Byron, Poetry vol. II (John Murray, 1899; Project Gutenberg #25340). Bracketed passages are the editor's; unbracketed are Byron's own (Cantos I-III) or John Cam Hobhouse's (Canto IV, his 'Historical Notes'). Digit footnotes ('[17]') are informational and numbered continuously through the whole book; end-notes keyed '[n.B.]' (Byron) or '[n.H.]' (Hobhouse) follow each canto and are numbered afresh from 1 there. Both kinds are placed here by matching each note's own quoted words against the site's text, not by the number or stanza the note states, because the site's text (Gutenberg #5131) and this edition (#25340) are different editions with different stanza counts in Canto I. Lettered footnotes ('[h]', '[dn]') are manuscript and edition variant readings and are not harvested, matching the treatment of Don Juan's and byron-works-3's lettered notes.
- Stanza 1, line 1 [The archaeologists of Byron's day were unable to fix the exact site of the temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus on the Capitoline. "On which side," asks Hobhouse (Hist. Illust., p. 224), "stood the citadel, on what the great temple of the Capitol; and did the temple stand in the citadel?" Excavations which were carried on in 1876-7 by Professors Jordan and Lanciani enabled them to identify with "tolerable certainty" the site of the central temple and its adjacent wings, with the site of the Palazzo Caffarelli and its dependencies which occupy the south-east section of the Mons Capitolinus. There are still, however, rival Tarpeian Rocks--one (in the Vicolo della Rupe Tarpea) on the western edge of the hill facing the Tiber, and the other (near the Casa Tarpea) on the south-east towards the Palatine. But if Dionysius, who describes the "Traitor's Leap" as being in sight of the Forum, is to be credited, the "actual precipice" from which traitors (and other criminals, e.g. "bearers of false witness") were thrown must have been somewhere on the southern and now less precipitous escarpment of the mount.]
- Stanza 1, line 5 [M. Manlius, who saved the Capitol from the Gauls in B.C. 390, was afterwards (B.C. 384) arraigned on a charge of high treason by the patricians, condemned, and by order of the tribunes thrown down the Tarpeian Rock. Livy (vi. 20) credits him with a "foeda cupiditas regni"--a "depraved ambition for assuming the kingly power."]
- Stanza 1, line 9 [Compare Gray's Odes, "The Progress of Poesy," iii. 3, line 4--"Thoughts that breathe, and words that burn."]
- Stanza 3, line 5 [Nicolas Gabrino di' Rienzo, or Rienzi, commonly called Cola di' Rienzi, was born in 1313. The son of a Roman innkeeper, he owed his name and fame to his own talents and natural gifts. His mission, or, perhaps, ambition, was to free Rome from the tyranny and oppression of the great nobles, and to establish once more "the good estate," that is, a republic. This for a brief period Rienzi accomplished. On May 20, 1347, he was proclaimed tribune and liberator of the Holy Roman Republic "by the authority of the most merciful Lord Jesus Christ." Of great parts, and inspired by lofty aims, he was a poor creature at heart--a "bastard" Napoleon--and success seems to have turned his head. After eight months of royal splendour, purchased by more than royal exactions, the tide of popular feeling turned against him, and he was forced to take refuge in the Castle of St. Angelo (December 15, 1347). Years of wandering and captivity followed his first tribunate; but at length, in 1354, he was permitted to return to Rome, and, once again, after a rapid and successful reduction of the neighbouring states, he became the chief power in the state. But an act of violence, accompanied by treachery, and, above all, the necessity of imposing heavier taxes than the city could bear, roused popular discontent; and during a revolt (October 8, 1354), after a dastardly attempt to escape and conceal himself, he was recognized by the crowd and stabbed to death.
Petrarch first made his acquaintance in 1340, when he was summoned to Rome to be crowned as poet laureate. Afterwards, when Rienzi was imprisoned at Avignon, Petrarch interceded on his behalf with the pope, but, for a time, in vain. He believed in and shared his enthusiasms; and it is probable that the famous Canzone, "Spirto gentil, che quelle membra reggi," was addressed to the Last of the Tribunes.
Rienzi's story forms the subject of a tragedy by Gustave Drouineau, which was played at the Odeon, January 28, 1826; of Bulwer Lytton's novel The Last of the Tribunes, which was published in 1835; and of an opera (1842) by Richard Wagner.
(See Encyc. Met., art. "Rome," by Professor Villari; La Rousse, G. Dict. Univ., art. "Rienzi;" and a curious pamphlet by G. W. Meadley, London, 1821, entitled Two Pairs of Historical Portraits, in which an attempt is made to trace a minute resemblance between the characters and careers of Rienzi and the First Napoleon.)]
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