Photography as power dominance and resistance through the italian lens marco andreani - Own the eboo
Photography as Power Dominance and Resistance Through the Italian Lens Marco Andreani
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Italy Through The Red Lens: Italian Politics And Society In Communist Propaganda Films (1946–79)
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ISBN (10): 1-5275-1812-4
ISBN (13): 978-1-5275-1812-4
A Body to Fear: Representability, Recognition and the Making of the Criminal Woman
Nicoletta Pazzaglia
Photographing Averages: Photography, Statistics and Literature in Fin-de-siècle Italy
Maria Grazia Lolla
A Photogenic War: Public and Private Production in the Visual Representation of the Fascist Ethiopian War (1935-36) in the Cigarini Photographic Collection
Benedetta Guerzoni
Part Two: Images of Power and Propaganda
The Discovery of Optical Power: Italian Great War Propaganda
Gabriele D’Autilia
Table of Contents vi
Chapter V ................................................................................................
133
Italy Advances: Photographic Documents, Documentaries and Techniques of Manipulation in Fascist Propaganda
Marco Andreani
Chapter VI ...............................................................................................
174
Still Images, Stalled Narratives, Power Pictured: Photography in the Age of Personal Reinvention
Pasquale Verdicchio
Part Three: Activism of the Image and Resistance
Chapter VII ..............................................................................................
192
Human Sacrifice: the Scapegoat in Partisan Photographs at the End of the Italian Civil War in 1945
Martina Caruso
Chapter VIII ............................................................................................
215
Photography as Counter-Power: Theory and Practice of Political Images in the 1970s
Christian Uva
Chapter IX ...............................................................................................
239
Photography and Materiality in Italy in the 1960s and 1970s: Mario Cresci’s Work between Urban Activism and Participatory Planning
Nicoletta Leonardi
Chapter X ................................................................................................
269
Sex and Death in Italian Images
Luana Ciavola
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
We are indebted to several people and institutions that contributed to the realization of the present work. First of all, a special thank goes to our contributors for having accepted to be part of this collection and for the patience they put into following the steps of the publication process. We are grateful to Marco Purpura from U.C. Berkeley for collaborating to the initial phases of this project and organizing with us the photography panels for the American Association of Italian Studies Annual Conference in Zurich, 2015–from which this project originated.
We would like to express our sincerest appreciation to Kevin ReganMaglione from the University of Oregon for the linguistic editing of the manuscript and to Silvia Milani for helping us with the final editing and formatting of the present volume. A special thank goes to Nicola Carmerlenghi from Dartmouth College and The Italian Art Society for organizing with us the four panels on Photography (two on photography and power and two on photography and writing) for the American Association of Italian Studies Annual Conference in Zurich, 2015. We also thank the American Association of Italian Studies for hosting our panels in Zurich.
We would like to thank Nicoletta Leonardi from the University of Turin for the precious suggestions and help she offered throughout these years. We express profound gratitude to David Forgacs from New York University for accepting to write the introduction of the present book.
We would like to thank all institutions and photographers who granted us permission to publish their photographs: Museo di antropologia criminale “Cesare Lombroso,” Turin; Ospedale psichiatrico San Lazzaro, Reggio Emilia; Ospedale psichiatrico provinciale di San Clemente, Venice; Polo Archivistico, Reggio Emilia; Istituto per la storia del risorgimento Italiano, Rome; Istituto Luce-Cinecittà, Rome; Istituto nazionale per la storia del movimento di liberazione in Italia (INSMLI), Milan; Fototeca Istoreco, Reggio Emilia; CRAF - Centro di ricerca e archiviazione della fotografia, Spilimbergo; Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna; Alinari; Mario Cresci; Letizia Battaglia; and Tano D’Amico.
We express extreme appreciation to the Institutions who helped us funding this project. In particular we thank the Italian Art Society for awarding us a “Samuel H. Kress Foundation Travel Grant” and the
Acknowledgements
Department of Romance Languages at the University of Oregon for a “James T. and Mary Alice Wetzel Graduate Scholarship” that allowed the collection of archival material.
LIST OF FIGURES
Fig. 1.1 Unknown photographer. Fire-raiser, from the series of women Russian criminals, 1890s ...................................................... 9
Fig. 1.2 Davide Cicala. Portrait of a madwoman, Voghera asylum, 1980s .................................................................................................... 10
Fig. 1.3 Fratelli Alinari. Ritratto di una giovane donna, 1872 .................. 16
Fig. 1.4 Fratelli Alinari. Trebbiatura a Calcinaia, 1890-1900 .................. 18
Fig. 1.5 Fratelli Alinari. Allieve della scuola per ragazze in Via della Scala, a Firenze, ritratte durante una lezione di cucito, 1907 ............. 19
Fig. 1.6 Davide Cicala. Portrait of a madwoman, Voghera asylum, 1880s .................................................................................................... 21
Fig. 1.7 Davide Cicala. Portrait of a madwoman, Voghera asylum, 1880s .................................................................................................... 21
Fig. 1.8 Emilio Poli. Portrait of a group of female inmate, 1892 .............. 23
Fig. 1.9 Emilio Poli. Portrait of a madwoman, 1892 ................................. 24
Fig. 1.10 Emilio Poli. Portrait of a madwoman, 1892 ............................... 25
Fig. 1.11 Unknown photographer. Portrait of a young female patient before and after recovery, 1880s .......................................................... 27
Fig. 1.12 Unknown photographer. Portrait of an elderly patient before and after recovery, 1880s .......................................................... 28
Fig. 2.1 Cesare Lombroso and Guglielmo Ferrero. European and American female geniuses, 1903 .................................................. 53
Fig. 2.3 Cesare Lombroso and Guglielmo Ferrero. Frontispiece of La donna delinquente, la prostituta e la donna normale, 1903 ....... 57
Fig. 2.4 Giovanni Muffone. Fotorevolver Enjalbert, 1887 ........................ 67
Fig. 3.1 Unknown photographer. Gino Cigarini (centre) with a friend and an unidentified woman, also present in some other shots of the collection, 1935-37 .................................................................... 81
Fig. 3.2 Unknown photographer. A school class in Adua, December 1935 ..................................................................................................... 83
Fig. 3.3 Unknown photographer. Victims of the Gondrand massacre, 1936 ..................................................................................................... 85
Fig. 3.4 Unknown photographer. I grandi centometristi Adua, 1936 ........ 87
Fig. 3.5 Unknown photographer. I grandi lavoratori, 1936 ...................... 87
Fig. 3.6 Unknown photographer. The fording by a Luce truck, probably during the march to Gondar, 1936 ........................................ 89
Fig. 3.7 14° army photo team. Bridge on the Tacazzè, 1935-37 ............... 92
Fig. 3.8 Unknown photographer. Gino Cigarini and the 14° army photo team, 1935-37 ................................................................... 93
Fig. 4.1 Luca Comerio. The poet Gabriele D’Annunzio inaugurates the monument to I Mille at the Quarto Rock, near Genoa, 5 May 1915 .. 111
Fig. 4.2 Achille Luciano Mauzan. Il soldato di Mauzan, 1917 ............... 125
Fig. 4.3 Unknown photographer. An Italian infantryman near the corpse of an Austro-Hungarian soldier, 1918 .................................... 126
Fig. 4.4 Unknown photographer. Austro-Hungarian prisoners in the concentration camp of Pompei Valley, June 1918 ................... 128
Fig. 5.1 Istituto Nazionale Luce. La Guardia della Rivoluzione, 1932 ... 152
Fig. 5.2 Istituto Nazionale Luce. Edifici Pubblici, 1932 ......................... 153
Fig. 7.1 Noi Donne panel at the Exhibition of the Liberation, June 1945 ........................................................................................... 197
Figs 7.2-7.4 Renzo Vaiani. Reconstructed torture scene of Alfio Guarnieri at Villa Cucchi, 1947 .................................... 200-201
Fig. 7.5 L’esercito clandestino italiano, 19 March 1945 ......................... 206
Fig- 7.6 Cesare Barzacchi. Two Partisans shaving the head of a woman who ostensibly was a collaborator during the war, 1964....... 208
Fig. 8.1 The first page of the newspaper Il Giorno with the two pictures that display Floris grasping onto the ankle of one of the terrorists and the guard’s fatal wound, 27 March 1977 ...................... 222
Fig. 8.2 The third photo, inserted separately in the newspaper Il Giorno, in which the two militants are depicted climbing on the scooter while the transporter lies on the floor, 1971 ...................................... 224
Fig. 8.3 Paolo Pedrizzetti. A famous shot taken in via De Amicis in Milan during a demonstration in which an exponent of Autonomia Operaia is seen to hold a pistol pointing at the height of man, 14 May 1977 ..... 226
Figs 8.4-8.5 Tano D'amico. Militants Paolo Tomassini wounded on the ground, and Leonardo Fortuna (Daddo), who rescue him in Independence Square in Rome, 2 February 1977 .............................. 232
Fig. 8.6 Tano D’Amico. The infiltration of police agent Giovanni Santone in the chaos following the sit-in, 12 May 1977 .... 233
Fig. 9.1 Mario Cresci. Manifestazione di protesta dei terremotati siciliani/Roma, 1968 .......................................................................... 243
Fig. 9.2 Mario Cresci. Manifestazione di protesta dei terremotati siciliani / Roma, 1968 ........................................................................ 244
Fig. 9.3 Mario Cresci. Esercitazioni militari, 1968 ................................. 245
Fig. 9.4 Above: Mario Cresci. Giuliano Cosolo putting up Esercitazioni militari on an advertising billboard, Rome, 1968. Below, left and right: Mario Cresci. Photographic documentation of the urban action carried out in Rome with Esercitazioni militari, 29 August 1968 ................. 246
Fig. 9.5 Mario Cresci. 1968 Roma, 1968 ................................................. 247
Fig. 9.6 Mario Cresci. Roma-Valle Giulia 1968, 1968 ............................ 249
Fig. 9.7 Unknown photographer. Photographic documentation of Mario Cresci’s exhibition at Il Diaframma Gallery in Milan, 1969... 251
Fig. 9.8 Mario Cresci. From the series Fotogrammi d'affezione, 1967 ... 254
Fig. 9.9 Mario Cresci, Aldo Musacchio, Ferruccio Orioli and Raffaele Panella. Comune di Tricarico: Quaderno del piano , 1967 .. 256
Fig. 9.10 Mario Cresci. From the series Interni Mossi, 1967 .................. 257
Fig. 9.11 Mario Cresci. From the series Ritratti reali, 1970-1972 .......... 259
Fig. 9.12 Mario Cresci. Matera. Immagini e documenti, 1975 ................ 262
Fig. 9.13 Mario Cresci. Matera 1978 Modello in legno di Angelo Pietro Di Cuia. L’Uomo con la frusta è alto cm. 12, 1978 ................ 264
Fig. 10.1 Letizia Battaglia. A woman, prostitute and drug dealer, killed by Mafia together with two of her clients because she did not respect its rules, 1982 ............................................................ 284
Fig. 10.2 Letizia Battaglia. A little girl dish-washing in a restaurant in Monreale, 1979 .............................................................................. 286
PREFACE
MARCO ANDREANI AND NICOLETTA PAZZAGLIA
This book is the result of ideas ensuing from two panel discussions on the relationship between photography and power in Italy which we organised, in collaboration with Marco Purpura and the Italian Art Society, at the American Association of Italian Studies Annual Conference in Zurich in May 2014. These panels included talks given by various American and Italian speakers. Given the wide range of interesting points which emerged during these discussions we soon realised that it would be worth taking things further by exploring such themes via an in-depth publication.
This book joins a series of books embracing the renewed interest in photography in the field of Italian Studies (Hill and Minghelli 2014; Alù and Pedri 2015)1, bearing witness both to the wealth of material via which the history of Italian photography has been disseminated and to the presence of many fields of research which at times have barely been explored. Photography as Power aims to join together the work of photography historians, experts in Media Studies and in Italian film and literature, in a variety of articles touching on fields ranging from fin-desiècle positive sciences to the First World War, from the Fascist regime to the Resistance, from the 1960's to the Years of Lead, and up to and including the 1990's and the political rise of Silvio Berlusconi. While by no means claiming to be exhaustive, this book hopes to tackle various related points of view so as to guide non-Italian readers offering a versatile yet practical tool with which to approach some of Italy's key moments in culture and history, all of which can be re-visited here via an analysis of the crucial role played by the photographic image during each of these moments. In particular, the articles in this book explore the dual role of photography which can be seen both as an instrument of power, in the hands of those controlling the centres for production and dissemination of knowledge and information, and as a tool for resistance and for the critical
analysis of the representations promoted by the dominant centres of power.
Via a careful reconstruction of the aims and communication strategies of the various commissioning bodies, as well as their modes of communication set against the historical, social and cultural contexts of the production and dissemination of the photos in question, the writers bring to light the ideologies, vested interests, and blurring of truths in agendas hiding behind the apparently incontrovertible truth of the photographic document. For it cannot be denied that a great part of the power of the photograph–by virtue of the mechanical and chemical process at the heart of its production with no intervention from Man–derives from "our implicit faith in the truth of a photographic record", even where we find ourselves viewing subjects that have clearly been "misrepresented, distorted, even faked" (1938, 50-1), as Beaumont Newhall writes. Photography "almeno agli occhi della doxa e del senso comune, non può mentire", adds Philippe Dubois (at least in the view of doxa and public opinion, is not able to lie; 1996, 26, emphasis in original). Yet it is equally undeniable that even the most anonymous photograph from a stylistic and formal point of view is still the result of the arbitrary choice of a fragment removed from the context of time and space, cut via the frame determined and in equal measure conditioned by a subjective point of view. Viewed in this light, photography is by definition partial and hence can lend itself to any attempt to blur the lines or mislead when representing reality. Judith Butler–whose writings together with those of Michel Foucault, Jacques Lacan, Susan Sontag and John Tagg are key points of reference in this book when it comes to questions of power and representation–argues that photography is a "structuring scene of interpretation" (Butler 2009, 67), meaning that the ways in which subjects are framed create systems of perception within which recognition occurs: "The 'how' not only organizes the image, but works to organize our perception and thinking as well" (71). For it is the dual presence of both of these aspects–the ever partial yet subjective nature of the photograph combined with its impersonal ability to automatically reproduce reality–which enables photography to be put to use as a vehicle for such biased messages of incontrovertible truth.
Taking these suggestions as a starting point the essays in this book attempt to address a series of questions. For example, how did late nineteenth century medical and social scientists, including the famous anthropologist and criminologist Cesare Lombroso, use photographs in support of their hypotheses? Why was it that in the First World War the Italian state put its faith in the use of photography to gain credence with
members of the general public, publishing carefully reassuring images of a war seemingly free from acts of atrocity? What propaganda strategies led to photographic images becoming the tool of choice legitimising the power and imperialistic ambitions of Benito Mussolini? Later on, in what way did the 1960's artist Mario Cresci, by contrast, use photography as the ideal weapon to deconstruct the establishment, as a tool with which to set in motion processes of participatory democracy? How was it that photography was used as a form of counter-power and counterinformation running against the established order and the main organs of the press during the 1970's, or as an act of provocation and of rebellion against the socio-political system of the Italy in the 1990's?
The answers to this series of questions use an alternative method to the traditional approach of photography historians discussing photography as art in Italy. Such writings were often highly conditioned by Benedetto Croce's authorial take on aesthetics, and generally focussed on a series of great photographers selected solely on the basis of the aesthetic value attributed to their work.2 The rich array of illustrations to be found in this edition, however, are mainly made up of photo-reportage pictures taken by the likes of Tano D'Amico or Letizia Battaglia, and from the sociological or anthropological photos taken by Mario Cresci in Basilicata or, for the most part, from archive images of pictures taken by unknown or nonprofessional photographers (soldiers, scientists), anonymous workers and photographic companies. The essays in this current book are perfectly in line with research in Italy that, from the end of the 1970's, began to critically question the dominant ideals of Croce's historiographic approach. Critics have since begun to focus their attention on the photographic image not so much as a work of art resulting from a disinterested eye, but as one of the most oft-used tools of communication in the contemporary world, where images are used with specific practical aims in political, propagandistic, scientific or social fields, as the result of carefully chosen plans and strategies which can be traced to exact moments set in each given historical and social context.3
For it is within this vein of thought that it is also possible to trace literature that looks at the specific relationship between photography and power in Italy, mostly covering interesting yet scattered contributions, often circumscribed to specific historical areas and periods. By keeping only to the most relevant key texts, referring readers to the specific bibliographies in each chapter of this book, it can be seen that some ideas were already to be found here and there in some of the best-known books on photography published in Italy during the second half of the 1970's (Gilardi 1978; Vaccari 1979, 29-37; Bollati 1979; Bertelli 1979, 137-46
and 169-83). From the start of the 1980's Adolfo Mignemi carried out various studies looking the archives containing the photographic images created for purposes of propaganda under the Fascist regime and the Resistance (Mignemi 1982, 1995a and 1995b; De Luna and Mignemi 1997; Mignemi and Solaro 2005). Likewise, it is also possible to see similar findings when it comes to the relationship between power and photography in the research of Uliano Lucas on the history of photojournalism in Italy, above all when looking at his work regarding the indepth visual information that was so often "denied" as a result of political conditioning or in keeping with market demand from publishers (Bizziccari and Lucas 1981; Lucas 2006; Agliani and Lucas 2015). Among the most extensive treatises on this theme are two books on this subject worth mentioning–Il potere da Giolitti a Mussoni 1900-1945 (Power from Giolitti to Mussoni 1900-1945) and Il potere da De Gasperi a Berlusconi 1945-2000 (Power from De Gasperi to Berlusconi 19452000)–which make up the first of three volumes on L'Italia del Novecento: Le fotografie e la storia (Twentieth Century Italy: The Photographs and History) (2005), edited by Luca Criscenti, Gabriele D'Autilia and Giovanni De Luna. The Italian State is central in these books together with other political figures all examined via the way in which they used photographs to represent themselves, society, and various historical events, so as to disseminate the representation of a national identity which was created as much by what was removed from sight as by what was highlighted, or shown only partially or with a biased leaning. Finally, the writings of David Forgacs are of particular interest in that they examine the relationships between Italy's cultural industries and the political and economic powers (1990) and, above all, the role played by photography in within the one-directional and generally irreversible relationships of power–on which many of the processes of representation are founded, as well as the exclusion of those places and social groups which are deemed to be marginal compared with those placed centrally when building a sense of the Italian identity (2014).
In conclusion, Photography as Power is an attempt to highlight the various declinations of the photographic device from the moment that it has been used as a tool of power in the specific context of Italy's situation. It constitutes above all an invitation to pursue a line of research which, as Forgacs wrote in his introduction, demonstrates "the current vitality of the history of photography as a means for enhancing our understanding of the social, cultural and political history of Italy".
Notes
1 Both published by the University of Toronto Press, these two volumes gather together contributions by researchers of various different nationalities on the subject of the relationship between photography and literature, the national identity, culture and the idea of modernity in Italy.
2 In these instances the main reference point is Newhall's history of photography published by in 1949, which was based on the concept of photography as "un'unica grande categoria metastorica" (a singularly unique meta-historical category) where the "capolavori dell'arte fotografica" (great works of art in photography) were all gathered together (Russo 2011, 218).
3 For the development and limits of photographic historiography in Italy see Russo 2011 (185-234).
Bibliography
Agliani, Tatiana, and Uliano Lucas. 2015. La realtà e lo sguardo: Storia del fotogiornalismo in Italia . Turin: Einaudi.
Alù, Giorgia, and Nancy Pedri, eds. 2015. Enlightening Encounters: Photography in Italian Literature. Toronto–Buffalo–London: University of Toronto Press.
Bertelli, Carlo. 1979. "La fedeltà incostante: Schede per la fotografia nella storia d'Italia fino al 1945." In Carlo Bertelli, and Giulio Bollati. Storia d'Italia: Annali 2, vol. 2, bk. 1, L'immagine fotografica: 1845-1945. Turin: Einaudi. 57-198.
Bizziccari, Maurizio, and Uliano Lucas, eds. L'informazione negata: Il fotogiornalismo in Italia 1945/1980. Bari: Dedalo. Bollati, Giulio. 1979. "Note su fotografia e storia." In Carlo Bertelli, and Giulio Bollati. Storia d'Italia: Annali 2, vol. 2, bk. 1, L'immagine fotografica: 1845-1945. Turin: Einaudi. 5-55.
Butler, Judith. 2009. Frames of War: When is Life Grievable? London–New York: Verso.
Criscenti, Luca, Gabriele D'Autilia, and Giovanni De Luna, eds. 2005. L'Italia del Novecento: Le fotografie e la storia. 3 vols. Turin: Einaudi.
De Luna, Giovanni, and Adolfo Mignemi, eds. 1997. Storia fotografica della Repubblica sociale italiana. Turin: Bollati Boringhieri.
Dubois, Philippe. 1996. L'atto fotografico. Ed. Bernardo Valli. Urbino: QuattroVenti. First published 1983.
Forgacs, David. 1990. Italian Culture in the Industrial Era 1880-1980: Cultural Industries, Politics and the Public. Manchester–New York: Manchester University Press.
—. 2014. Italy's Margins: Social Exclusion and Nation Formation since 1861. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Gilardi, Ando. 1978. Wanted! Storia, tecnica ed estetica della fotografia criminale, segnaletica e giudiziaria. Milan: Mazzotta.
Hill, Sara, and Giuliana Minghelli, eds. 2014. Stillness in Motion: Italy, Photography and the Meaning of Modernity. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
Lucas, Uliano, ed. 2006. Il fotogiornalismo in Italia 1945-2005: Linee di tendenza e percorsi. Turin: Fondazione italiana per la Fotografia–La Stampa.
Mignemi, Adolfo, ed. 1982. Sì e no padroni del mondo: Etiopia 1935/36; Immagine e consenso per un impero. Novara: Istituto storico della Resistenza in provincia di Novara P. Fornara.
Preface
—. ed. 1995a. Storia fotografica della Resistenza. Turin: Bollati Boringhieri.
—. ed. 1995b. Tra fascismo e democrazia: Propaganda politica e mezzi di comunicazione di massa. Turin: Gruppo Abele.
Mignemi, Adolfo, and Gabriella Solaro, eds. 2005. Un'immagine dell'Italia: Resistenza e ricostruzione; Le mostre del dopoguerra in Europa. Milan: Skira.
Newhall, Beaumont. 1938. Photography: A Short Critical History . New York: Museum of Modern Art.
—. 1949. The History of Photography: From 1839 to the Present Day. New York: Museum of Modern Art.
Russo, Antonella. 2011. Storia culturale della fotografia italiana: Dal Neorealismo al Postmoderno. Turin: Einaudi.
Vaccari, Franco. 1979. Fotografia e inconscio tecnologico. Modena: Punto e virgola.
INTRODUCTION
PHOTOGRAPHY, POWER, ITALY
DAVID
FORGACS
The relation between photography and power operates on several different levels. The taking of a photograph is itself an act across which power relations often play out. In the police photograph of an arrested suspect, the photograph of a patient in a mental institution, the ethnographic photograph of an indigenous person taken in the field or in a studio, the magazine cover of a naked or partially dressed woman, or the photograph of a poor urban area taken for a slum clearance programme, the photographer has the power, or embodies the power of the person or institution that commissioned the photograph, to fix the subjects in a precise pose, objectify them in the frame and attach a set of predetermined meanings to their image.
The circulation of photographs in public also involves power of one kind or another: the power of advertising images to seduce and to persuade viewers to buy, of election images to prettify a candidate, vilify a rival or create a scare about an issue, of pictures of beautiful but abject 'poster children' to attract donations to a humanitarian charity while reinforcing the idea that those children, and the countries they live in, are dependent on the benevolence of rich countries.
In the early years of photography the fact of possessing or not possessing a camera, and of having or lacking the means to reproduce and distribute a photograph, were themselves relations of power, embedded in larger power relations. The anthropologist could 'capture' an image of an indigenous person in a British or French colony and take it home for the edification of an audience at a geographical society in London or Paris, but the indigenous person could not reciprocate by capturing and sharing an image of the anthropologist. Those power relations were also spatial relations, intrinsic to the structure of European imperialist domination, and were not reversible. Even an everyday photograph taken within a family can have oppressive power relations embedded in it. A parent can coax an
unhappy child to 'be good' and smile for the camera. A group photograph of smiling guests at an arranged wedding ceremony can hide the coercive relations behind the marriage contract.
But the power relations in and around photography can also work in the opposite direction. A photographer may be invited to record an injustice or atrocity to help draw public attention to it. This was the case of the photographs of mutilated Congolese adults and children taken by foreign photographers in 1905 and 1906, which helped prove to the rest of the world the atrocities committed in King Leopold's Congo Free State. Or a photograph taken for one purpose can be appropriated and its meaning can be reversed. This is what happened when some of the lynching photographs printed by white Americans as mementoes of their power were republished in the black American press. The photograph of two young black men hanging from a tree in Marion, Indiana, with a large crowd of white people peering or smiling at the camera, was first published on the front page of a local newspaper on 8 August 1930 under the headline "Marion is quiet after double lynching". It was republished two months later in the black newspaper Crisis with an ironic caption, "Civilization in the United States, 1930", which reversed its first meaning. No longer a record of an act of popular justice that had pacified an angry white community, the photograph now exposed the pretence of civilisation upheld by that same community. Twenty-five years later, David Jackson's photographs of the horribly mutilated face of Emmett Till, the 14-year-old boy lynched in Mississippi in 1955, had an even greater impact. It was Emmet's mother, Mamie Till Bradley, who had invited Jackson to take the photographs of her son laid out in the morgue. They were published in Jet and other black American magazines and then in a four-page spread in Life, giving the case national visibility, searing the violence of the lynching into the white liberal conscience and helping galvanise the civil rights movement. In all these cases photography was used to enable historically disempowered subjects to challenge a prevailing power structure.
Each of the essays in this book deals with a different aspect of the relations between photography and power in Italy. Taken together, they constitute the most comprehensive treatment of this topic in any language. The book covers the whole age of the photograph as a technology and a medium, from the mid nineteenth century to the digital images of today. The first Italian photographs were taken in 1839 in Turin, shortly after the daguerreotype process was launched in Paris. There are extant calotypes of shelled buildings in Rome following the defeat of the short-lived Republic in 1849, a daguerreotype of Garibaldi taken in 1851, and a pair of stereoscopic photographs of the bodies of soldiers killed in the Battle of
Melegnano in 1859, all before Italy became a unified nation in 1861. From then on, Italy followed a similar trajectory to that of other modern industrializing countries in its adoption of photography, both technologically and in the proliferation of its social uses and users. These included studio portraiture, military and police photography, anthropological and medical documentation, fine art, fashion, advertising, journalism, and, not least, millions of personal and family photographs, from those taken on the first affordable amateur cameras (Kodak opened its Italian subsidiary in 1905) to those taken today on smartphones that can be shared almost immediately with one's followers on social media.
At the same time, there are a number of peculiarities of Italy's history as a nation-state that have made the relations between photography and power within it distinctive. In my book Italy's Margins (2014) I drew attention to the important role played since the late nineteenth century by photography, as well as by writing and later by film and television, in producing stereotypes of the Italian nation as containing primitive or backward areas and people, who were thereby symbolically displaced outside its civilised core. These 'marginalised' people lived in poor and disease-ridden peripheries of Italy's cities, in its colonies overseas, in rural areas of the south of the country, in mental asylums, in 'nomad camps'. In a separate essay I argued that similar kinds of visual marginalisation were at work in news photographs and television pictures of migrants and asylum seekers arriving in Italy from various countries of origin in the global south. I sought to demonstrate how, in this way, photography and visual media in Italy played an important role as an agent of political and ideological power, forming widely accepted ideas about the shape and structure of the nation. I also showed how photographs have been used, albeit less frequently, to challenge and counter those prevailing ideas.
There are several other aspects of Italy's history that have distinctively shaped the relations in it between photography and power. Three of them are worth highlighting here, since they are directly addressed in this book. The first is the long tenure in power, from 1922 to 1943, of a Fascist government, the first of its kind to emerge in the world, which sought to impose its own propaganda images and restrict the circulation of images it considered undesirable. The role of photography in Fascist propaganda, from the 1932 Exhibition of the Fascist Revolution to illustrated magazines, is examined in detail by Marco Andreani in his chapter. Benedetta Guerzoni, drawing on the photographs and written directives in the archive of Gino Cigarini, a photographer and movie camera operator embedded with the Italian army during Italy's war of colonial aggression in Ethiopia in 1935-36, reconstructs the assiduous care taken by the
regime to control the work of the army's photographic teams. Martina Caruso's chapter shows, by contrast, how photographs taken in or about the antifascist Resistance in 1943-45 often used a set of visual codes that directly opposed the image of the virile Fascist hero. The antifascist was often portrayed as a heroic martyr, as a paradoxically 'empowered victim'.
The second aspect is the intensity and duration of collective protests in the 1960s and 1970s against the political and economic system then in place in Italy, and the often ferocious backlash against those protests by parts of the Italian state, sometimes in collusion with foreign powers.
Nicoletta Leonardi examines the political photography of Mario Cresci from those years, which used various techniques of display, including montage and multiples of the same image, to attack figures of power or create solidarity with demonstrators, as well as his photo-activism in the economically depressed areas of Italy's south. Christian Uva's chapter looks at some of the ways in which photographs, as well as video and film, were enlisted during the 1970s in the service of 'counter-power' by activists in protest movements.
The third aspect is the entrenched presence in certain parts of Italy of organised crime, sometimes protected by the state, at other times in conflict with it. Luana Ciavola's chapter looks, among other things, at Letizia Battaglia's photographs of victims of mafia killings in Sicily in the 1980s, and reminds us of their role in raising public awareness of the violence and power of the mafia and in helping build a grassroots movement against it and those corrupt politicians who protected it.
All the other chapters in this book have important things to say about photography and power in Italy and they all draw on original research.
Nicoletta Pazzaglia examines the convergence between police and medical photographs taken in the late nineteenth century. She pays particular attention to photographs of women held in mental institutions or detained by police, where the convention of a frontal portrait, shot against a bare background, decontextualises, deindividualises and defeminises the woman, turning her into a generic criminal or psychiatric 'type'. Maria Grazia Lolla explores the connections between photography and statistics in nineteenth century Italy and shows that, although photographs were supposed to capture each individual's unique identity, they were often used in practice to represent statistical 'averages' rather than individuals. Gabriele D'Autilia, examining photographs taken during the First World War, which Italy engaged in from 1915 to 1918, argues that, despite military censorship, many photographs marked an abrupt break with preceding conventions of visual representation by showing a shocking reality, from the traumatised look on combatants' faces to landscapes
devastated by bombardment. Pasquale Verdicchio argues that in modern photographs of political personalities, from Benito Mussolini to Silvio Berlusconi and Donald Trump, it is the person, not the issues they represent, that is the essential message conveyed.
Overall, these chapters demonstrate the current vitality of the history of photography as a means for enhancing our understanding of the social, cultural and political history of Italy. They also show the wide variety of research methods that are being used today in working with photographs as historical sources. Until very recently, hardly any historians took photography seriously as a field of study in its own right. At most, they used photographs in a book or an article to illustrate something that they had already described in writing, as visual supplements to their written text. Now, instead, more historians, and not just cultural historians, recognise that photographs are primary sources and objects of study in themselves. Every photograph is always taken or commissioned by someone for some purpose. The relations between the photographer and his or her subject, and the reproduction and circulation of a photograph, can sometimes be reconstructed from contemporary sources, and when they cannot, they may sometimes be inferred by comparison with similar examples. The present book shows this new history of photography at work, shining a light on the multiple interconnections between photography and power in modern Italy.
PART ONE:
THE NATIONAL BODY AND ITS OTHERS
CHAPTER I
A BODY TO FEAR: REPRESENTABILITY,
RECOGNITION AND THE MAKING OF THE
CRIMINAL WOMAN
NICOLETTA PAZZAGLIA
Introduction
The two photographs below belong to the collection of Museo di antropologia criminale Cesare Lombroso (Cesare Lombroso Museum of Criminal Anthropology) in Turin and depict a fin-de-siècle Russian criminal woman (see Figure 1.1) and a mad woman from the Voghera asylum in Italy (see Figure 1.2). A viewer familiar with paintings of the period can detect the social status of the mental patient from the Voghera asylum. The simple clothing and the foulard recall images of women peasants, especially as they were depicted in paintings of the Macchiaioli school, important at the time. Aside from a cloth covering the woman's hands–that is clearly unusual–the position of both bodies appears to be identical to that of traditional portraits of sane women. What made these women criminals at all? Italian anthropologist and criminologist Cesare Lombroso, although not a photographer himself, extensively used photography in his studies on criminality.1 Photography was used–Allan Sekula suggests–to establish and delimit "the terrain of the other" (1992, 7), defining the typology of deviance and social pathology.2 Still, in what sense is this otherness delimited in these portraits and why would a nineteenth century spectator perceive these women as fearsome and dangerous? This essay explores the ways in which the notion of female deviancy and criminality was constructed in fin-de-siècle photographic portraits of women considered degenerate by contemporary society that include convicted women and the mentally ill.
In my analysis, I pay particular attention to the mise-en-scène. First introduced in 1858 by British psychiatrist H. W. Diamond, this specific mise-en-scène was employed in the representation of the mentally ill. The unanimous opinion among critics is that the empty background and the use of the frontal portrait format served to put emphasis on facial expressions. Didi-Huberman, for example, suggests that the prominence given to facial expressions–the so-called facies–was employed to crystallise each mental illness into a specific type (2003, 48). The movement of the soul, made visible through the face, created a direct link to brain alterations, considered as the origin of mental disorders (49). Later on, with Alphonse
Bertillon's invention of the mug shot in the early 1880s, this exact mise-enscène was also adopted and standardised within criminal and police photography. With Bertillon's mug shot, the criminal's body found its public visibility; it became a body that could be classified, studied and most importantly it became a body that could be recognised as the dangerous and fearful figure of the criminal. The collaboration between police photography and periodical press allowed a widespread circulation of these portraits. Mug shots of criminals were one of the first photographs to be published in periodicals, newspapers and magazines and the public, especially working class, was an avid audience for these portraits (Gilardi 2003, 55).
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7, but it seems that there were four children in all. Those who write the more common form of Suarez are more explicit, and deserve at least equal credit with Gomara
[68] Velazquez was married not long after his arrival in Cuba to the daughter of Contador Cuéllar The bride died within the same week Herrera, dec i lib ix cap ix ‘Velazquez fauoreciala por amor de otra su hermana, q tenia ruin fama, y aun el era demasiado mugeril ’ Gomara, Hist Mex , 7 Delaporte, Reisen, x 141-2, assumes that Cortés won the love of her whom Velazquez wished to possess; while Gordon, Anc Mex , ii 32, supposes that the bride had been the object of Velazquez’ gallantry; hence the trouble Folsom, on the other hand, marries one of the Suarez sisters to Velazquez, and calls him the brother-in-law of Cortés Cortés, Despatches, 9, 11-12
[69] Gomara, Hist Mex , 7, insists that Velazquez had no motive for anger except the refusal of Cortés to marry. The meeting of conspirators at his house gave plausibility to the charges of his enemies. By others it is even stated that at these meetings Cortés defended the governor against the charges of the conspirators and overruled their plots. De Rebus Gestis Ferdinandi Cortesii, in Icazbalceta, Col. Doc., i. 325-6. The preponderance of evidence, however, is against this supposition.
[70] ‘Estando para se embarcar en una canoa de indios con sus papeles, fué Diego Velazquez avisado y hízolo prender y quísolo ahorcar.’ Las Casas, Hist. Ind., iv. 11. He was cast in the fort prison, lest the army should proclaim him general. ‘Timebat ne si quis,’ etc. De Rebus Gestis Ferdinandi Cortesii, in Icazbalceta, Col. Doc., i. 325 and 326-7.
[71] In De Rebus Gestis Ferdinandi Cortesii, in Icazbalceta, Col. Doc., i. 326-7, it is related that Cortés broke the ropes holding him by means of a stick, and filed the padlock of the chains. Seizing a bludgeon he advanced on the sleeping jailer, resolved to break his head if he moved But Cristóbal de Lagos either slept or pretended not to hear the noise as Cortés seized the sword and shield at his head Swinging open a small window, Cortés slid down and hurried to the sanctuary, giving on the way a word of cheer and advice to the conspirators who were held within the prison
[72] ‘Cortés tuuo por cierto q lo embiariã a santo Domingo o a España ’ Gomara, Hist Mex , 7 There would have been no reasons for his fears on this score, if he possessed papers implicating Velazquez, as Gomara states Another version is that the alcaldes imposed a heavy sentence on Cortés, after his capture, and that Velazquez, on being appealed to by Duero and others, was noble-minded enough to grant a pardon. He discharged him from his service, however, and had him placed on board a ship for Española. Torquemada, i. 348.
Herrera says that Catalina lived near the church, and while Cortés was making love to her an alguacil named Juan Escudero, whom Cortés afterward hanged in Mexico, came up behind him and pinioned his arms, while the soldiers rushed to his assistance Dec i lib ix cap ix ; Cortés, Residencia, i 63, etc Las Casas, Hist Ind , iv 11; De Rebus Gestis Ferdinandi Cortesii, in Icazbalceta, i 327-8, give minutely the mode of capture
[73] Broke the pump and crawled through, ‘Organum pneumaticum,’ etc De Rebus Gestis Ferdinandi Cortesii, in Icazbalceta, Col Doc , i 329
[74] The current of the Macaguanigua River did not allow him to enter it, and elsewhere the breakers would upset the boat Stripping himself, he tied to his head certain documents against Velazquez, held by him as notary of the ayuntamiento and clerk of the treasurer, and thereupon swam ashore He entered his house, consulted with Juan Suarez, and reëntered the temple, armed Gomara, Hist. Mex., 7. De Rebus Gestis Ferdinandi Cortesii, in Icazbalceta, vi. 329-30, refers to a friend of Cortés chained in the same ship’s hold, and states that Cortés rowed ashore. On the way to the house of Suarez he narrowly escapes a patrol. Having secured arms, he proceeds to cheer his captive partisans, and then enters the sanctuary. At dawn the captain of the vessel from which Cortés escaped comes also to the temple, to secure himself against Velazquez’ wrath, no doubt, but is refused admission into the sacristy by his fellow-refugee, who suspects the man, and fears that the provisions may not outlast the siege. In Herrera, dec. i. lib. ix. cap. viii., Cortés drifts about on a log and is finally cast ashore.
[75] So the story was current at the time, and I doubt not it contains some degree of truth, notwithstanding Las Casas, Hist. Ind., iv. 11-12, scouts it as a pure fabrication He knew both men; Velazquez as a proud chief, exacting the deepest reverence from those around him, and making them tremble at his frown; while Cortés was in those days so lowly and humble as to be glad to curry favor with the meanest servants of the governor The good bishop is evidently prejudiced In De Rebus Gestis Ferdinandi Cortesii, in Icazbalceta, Col Doc , i 332-4, the facts are a little elaborated and contradictory, as usual Cortés escapes the guard round the church, and reaches the farm ‘Halloh, señores!’ he shouts, ‘Cortés is at the door, and salutes Señor Velazquez, his excellent and gallant captain.’ Velazquez is astonished, yet pleased, at the arrival of one whom he always had regarded as a friend and beloved brother. He orders supper and bed to be prepared; but Cortés insists that none shall approach, or he will lance them. He demands to know what complaints there are against him. He abhors the suspicion of being a traitor, and will clear himself. ‘Receive me,’ he concludes, ‘in your favor with the same good faith that I return to it.’ ‘Now I believe,’ answers Velazquez, ‘that you regard as highly my name and fame as your own loyalty.’ They shake hands, and Cortés
now enters the house to fully explain the misunderstanding. After supper they retire to one bed. In the morning the messenger, Diego Orellana, arrives to announce Cortés’ flight, and finds them lying side by side Cortés will not proceed with the expedition just then; but after arranging his affairs he joins, to the delight of the general, who follows his advice implicitly, as he had done in former campaigns After their victorious return Cortés enjoys greater honors than ever Peralta, who also gives the story at length, states that Cortés surprised Velazquez asleep At the request of the governor he gave himself up to the jailer in order to be formally released Nat Hist , 58-62 Still Peralta is a little confused
[76] She was received by Cortés in Mexico, after the conquest, with great distinction; but died in about three months after her arrival
[77] Las Casas, who, as usual, will have a fling at Cortés, writes: ‘Tuvo Cortés un hijo ó hija, no sé si en su mujer, y suplicó á Diego Velazquez que tuviese por bien de se lo sacar de la pila en el baptismo y ser su compadre, lo que Diego Velazquez aceptó, por honralle.’ Hist. Ind., iv. 13. Among Cortés’ children a natural daughter by a Cuban Indian is mentioned, Bernal Diaz, Hist. Verdad., 238, but it is not likely that Cortés would ask the governor to stand godfather to a natural child. The same writer makes Velazquez the groomsman or sponsor at the marriage. ‘Fue su padrino, quando Cortés se velò con Doña Catalina;’ Id., 13; Vetancvrt, Teatro Mex., pt. iii. 109. Although compadre is not unfrequently used as a mere term of friendship, it is not likely to have been applied by a marriage padrino; hence the title of co-father indicates that it originated at the font.
[78] An office granted only to men of note and to leading conquistadores. Solis, Hist. Mex., i. 46. It conveyed the title of ‘muy virtuoso señor,’ the governor being called ‘muy magnífico señor,’ Pacheco and Cárdenas, Col. Doc., xii. 225, and permitted the holder to walk side by side with the governor Herrera, dec ii lib iii cap xii ‘Auia sido dos vezes Alcalde en la Villa de Sãtiago de Boroco, adõde era vezino: porque en aquestas tierras se tiene por mucha honra ’ Bernal Diaz, Hist Verdad , 13 He does not refer to him as alcalde at Santiago de Cuba, where the fleet is fitting out, as he clearly states Gomara, Hist Mex , 4, mentions merely that he was here before the quarrel with Velazquez Some writers assume that Santiago de Cuba is the same as Santiago de Baracoa, but Herrera, loc cit , and others, observe the distinction.
CHAPTER V.
SAILING OF THE EXPEDITION. 1518-1519.
T Q L D I I H C , C - -C T C C U C
C E B B P E E T B C P G M M C T S S H T G ’ J D S V —D S —C
T F R V R O D
C T F P S C , T H R G S C O C D C .
With relations so lovingly established, and with a personal knowledge of the military genius of Cortés, and the strength and versatility of his character, it would seem that here would be the first instant choice of the governor for the command of the important expedition now in preparation. But the quality of the man required did not altogether hinge on merit. As we have seen, Velazquez required for his purpose an anomalous creation. He must be able but humble; able to command men, and able likewise to obey his chief; honest to Velazquez, but false, if necessary, to all the world else. It was not an Alexander or an Alcibiades that was wanted; not so much a man as a thing: “Piper, non homo,” as Petronius Arbiter said; pungent as pepper, and not a human being.
Be this as it may, the sordid friendship of Láres and Duero prevailed with the governor, and on the 23d of October, 1518, his instructions to Hernan Cortés, commander-in-chief of the expedition, were drawn up before the notary, Alonso de Escalante, in accordance with the permission granted by the authorities at Santo Domingo, which limited the enterprise to exploration; the privilege to colonize depending on royal favor for which Velazquez must sue in Spain.[79]
One would think that after these twenty-five years of experience there could be found no ecclesiastic or ruler so childish as to expect morality or humanity from the wolves of Spain let loose among the naked and defenceless of America. And yet we find the friars of Española, in pursuance of the devout and high-minded views expressed by Velazquez, subscribing to instructions which enjoin Cortés to observe a conduct befitting a Christian soldier, as if there were any reasonable hope of his doing so. He must prohibit blasphemy, licentiousness, and gambling among his men, and on no account molest the natives, but gently inform them of the glory of God, and of the Catholic king. Possession must be taken in Velazquez’ name and the secrets of the country ascertained. Search must be made for Grijalva and Olid, and for the Christian captives supposed to be in Yucatan. We might again mark the double-dealing of the governor, who discharges Grijalva for not having settled contrary to his instructions, while charging the new commander not to seize the country, yet expecting him to do so.[80] The instructions consist of thirty clauses, and the document reflects no credit on the scrivener.[81]
Man and his character are subject to environment. Neither is finished until decay has well set in. Long before the receipt of his commission the adolescent Cortés was a creation of the past; even the adult Cortés was a different being before and after his
appointment. His action now was the expression of new intuitions. Always under the influence of turbulent emotions, his ambition had suddenly become more aggressive. In pure impulses, in refined feelings, in noble instincts, he was essentially defective. He harbored no ideal of duty, such as we have seen in the mind of Grijalva. His code of ethics was neither broad nor catholic. And notwithstanding his great respect for religion, so great indeed as to excite suspicion that he cared very little for it; notwithstanding his outward piety, and his devotion to the church, the lighter immoralities fitted him with an ease and grace that hampered his movements not in the least. Yet for all this the alcalde of Santiago suddenly became a great man, not in name only, but actually; wellnigh revolutionizing the society of which he himself was the product. To him, and to others, his commission was a match applied to explosive material, letting loose the latent force. The leaders of the first gulf-shore expeditions, Córdoba, Grijalva, and Cortés, present themselves before us in relatively increasing proportions. Córdoba, the first, was least, though a most gentlemanly and kind-hearted pirate. Grijalva, though second to Cortés in talents and fame, was far before him in honesty. During the preparations which quickly followed the appointment of Cortés, the inherent qualities of the man developed to a degree alarming alike to friends and enemies, and astonishing to himself. He found his nature a strong one, with magnetic attractions, and an affinity with danger. He found himself possessed of that higher courage of the mind which begets self-confidence, breeds the hero, and ends in the achievement of the uttermost. And genius was there; he began to feel it and to know it: the genius of ambition and egotism, whose central figure was himself, an all-prevailing sentiment, before which right, religion, humanity, and even life itself, must be subservient. His rapidly evolving will was becoming ponderous, overwhelming. Fame was becoming to him what ambition was to Columbus; only he possessed his idea instead of being possessed by it. Sufficiently educated for the purposes of
statecraft, opportunity alone was needed to enable him to turn every weapon to the furtherance of his own designs. Without attempting to pry into the occult, he now began to see things with a large and liberal eye. Life was assuming tremendous realities, which bridled impulse; yet it was an ordeal he believed he could face. While in sophistry he found himself equal to Euripides, he began to put on bombast such as Æschylus could not have scorned, and to display an energy as sublime as that of Archilochus; yet all this time his good sense was supplemented by graceful courtesy. All who worship the bright wit and intellectual versatility that flatter ambition and yield unscrupulous success may henceforth bow the knee to Hernan Cortés.
No sooner was his commission sealed than Cortés set himself about the task of collecting his many requirements. His own few thousand pesos of ready money were quickly spent; then he mortgaged his estates, and borrowed to the uttermost from his friends. Velazquez was free with everything except his substance; free with his advice and ostentation, free with the ships of others, and willing to sell to the expedition the products of his farm at exorbitant prices. Nevertheless the investment to the governor, as well as to Cortés, was large, the former furnishing some ships of his own and some money, the whole cost of vessels and outfit being about twenty thousand ducats.[82]
Establishing places of enlistment throughout the island, Cortés roused to action his many friends, both in person and by letter. At principal settlements the expedition was proclaimed about the streets, in the king’s name, by the beating of drums and the voice of the crier. One third of the proceeds of the adventure was promised the soldiers and subalterns, two thirds going to the outfitters.[83] A banner of black taffeta was embroidered with the royal arms in gold, and blue and white flames surrounding a red cross, and round the border it bore the inscription, “Amici sequamur crucem, si nos
habuerimus fidem in hoc signo vincemus.” Friends, let us follow the cross, and if we have faith under this sign we shall conquer.[84]
Assuming a dress and bearing more fitting a military commander, Cortés threw open his doors, and by judiciously combining the frank joviality of a soldier with the liberal hospitality of a man of wealth, he rapidly drew to his adventure all the available men of the island. There were not lacking those to sneer at this assumption of preëminence, which flaunted it so bravely with plume and medal, with martial music and retinue, saying, here was a lord without lands.[85] But they little knew the strength and firmness of him who, having once put on the great man, would lay the livery down but with his life. This soldierly display, always taking to the Castilian fancy, could scarcely be called affectation, for the genius which commands success was present, and the firmness of resolve was covered with such pleasing affability as to render its presence scarcely suspected. With his fine soldierly qualities were financial and executive ability, and fair common sense, a rare combination in a Spanish cavalier. While loving adventure he did not altogether hate ideas. His world now spread itself before him, as divided into two unequal classes, those that use others, and those that are used by others, and he resolved himself forever into the former category. Like Diogenes, though enslaved at Crete, Cortés felt that if he could do one thing better than another it was to command men. Coupled with this egotism was the sensible intuition that the mastery of others begins with self-mastery. Indeed his command over himself, as well as over others, was most remarkable. “By my conscience!” was a favorite oath, which implies not brutal passion. At times a swelling vein in the forehead, and another in the throat, indicated rising anger, manifested also by a peculiarity of throwing off his cloak; but the voice would remain decorous, and the words seldom passed beyond a “Mal pese á vos!” May it bear heavily upon you. To the insolent soldier, whom we shall often find overstepping the bounds of
prudence, he would merely say, “Be silent!” or “Go, in God’s name, and be more careful if you would escape punishment.” Equally composed in argument, he wielded his persuasive powers to their best advantage. Rio de Avenida, the Rushing River, was at one time a nickname, and later he affected long hair and lawsuits. At the gaming-table, to which he was greatly addicted, he won or lost with equal sang-froid, ever ready with a witticism to smooth the varying course of fortune. Though he did not hesitate as gay Lothario to invade the family of another, most unreasonably he was very jealous lest his own family should be invaded. While liberal to friend or mistress, and ready to sacrifice almost anything to gain an object, he was not always regarded as over-generous by his men, too many of whom were of that class, however, that nothing would satisfy. Although a fair eater, he drank but little, and confined himself to simple diet. This moderation also extended to dress, which, before his elevation, was not only neat but tasteful in its rich simplicity, ornamented with few but choice jewels, and with little diversity. A love of pomp, however, developed with his rising fortunes, more particularly in the way of showy residences and a large retinue, which accorded well with the courtly manners native to the Spaniard claiming noble blood. Cervantes says that in the army even the niggardly become prodigal.
Cortés found the way of throwing into his cause not only himself, but others, in some respects as able as himself. His liberal measures and enthusiasm became infectious, and brought to enrolment wealthy volunteers, who furnished not only their own outfit, but helped to provide others.[86] Within a short time there joined over three hundred men, among them some high in the service and confidence of the governor—instance, Francisco de Morla his chamberlain, Martin Ramos de Láres a Basque, Pedro Escudero, Juan Ruano, Escobar, and Diego de Ordaz mayordomo of
Velazquez, and instructed by him to watch proceedings and secretly report.
The harbor of Santiago at this time presented a busy scene. There were the hurrying to and fro of laborers and recruits, the clang of carpenters’ hammers upon ships undergoing repairs, the collecting of goods, and the loading of vessels. Every day the landing was enlivened by the presence of the governor, often arm-inarm with his most dutiful and compliant captain-general, surrounded by gayly dressed attendants and followed by half the town. On one of these visits of inspection, while engaged in friendly conversation respecting the progress of affairs, the Governor’s jester, Francisquillo, who was present, as usual, performing his antics before his master, cried out, “Ah, friend Diego!” Then to Cortés, “And how fares our brave captain, he of Medellin and Estremadura? Be careful, good master, or we shall soon have to beat the bush for this same Cortés.” Velazquez laughed heartily, and turning to his companion exclaimed, “Compadre, do you hear this fool?” “What, señor?” replied Cortés, pretending preoccupation. “He says you will run away with our fleet,” replied Velazquez. “Pay no attention to the knave, your worship; I am very sure these infamous pleasantries never emanated from his mad brain,” rejoined Cortés, deeply chagrined. And ere the laugh died away on the lips of the governor his timid breast was chilled by fearful forebodings. What if it were true, thought Velazquez, and this fellow, whom I have lifted from his low estate, should declare for himself on reaching New Spain? Then he called to mind his late quarrel with Cortés, and the courage, energy, and determination displayed by the latter throughout. The governor trembled when he thought of it. About him were enough of the disappointed only too ready to fan these suspicions into a flame. [87]
I regret having to spoil a good story; but the truth is, the drama reported by Bartolomé Las Casas, and reiterated by Herrera and
Prescott, was never performed. It tells how Cortés put to sea, Prescott asserts the very night after the jester’s warning; and that in the morning, when the governor, early roused from his bed, rushed down to the landing with all the town at his heels, Cortés returned part way in an armed boat and bandied words with him. Beside being improbable, almost impossible, this version is not sustained by the best authorities.[88] The fact is, some time elapsed, after the suspicions of the governor had first been aroused, before the sailing of the fleet, during which interval Grijalva with his ships returned.
Gomara states that Velazquez sought to break with Cortés and send only Grijalva’s vessels, with another commander; but to this Láres and Duero, whose advice was asked by the governor, made strong objection, saying that Cortés and his friends had spent too much money now to abandon the enterprise, which was very true; for like the appetite of Angaston which came with eating, the more Cortés tasted the sweets of popularity and power, the more stomach he had for the business. And the more the suspicions of the governor grew, the greater were the captain-general’s assurances of devotion, and the firmer became the determination of Cortés and his followers to prosecute this adventure, in which they had staked their all.[89]
Warned by Láres and Duero of every plot, Cortés hurried preparations, sending friends to forage, and shipping stores with the utmost despatch, meanwhile giving secret orders for all to be ready to embark at a moment’s notice. Finally, the hour having come, on the evening of the 17th of November, with a few trusty adherents, Cortés presented himself before the governor, and politely took his leave. It fell suddenly on Velazquez, in whose eyes all movements relating to the expedition had of late become the manœuvres of men conspired to overreach him. But having neither the excuse nor the ability to stop the expedition he let the officers depart.
By playing with the devil one soon learns to play the devil. From the governor’s house Cortés hastened to the public meat depository, seized and added to his stores the town’s next week’s supply, and left the keeper, Fernando Alfonso, a gold chain, all he had remaining wherewith to make payment.[90] It was a dull, dry, gray November morning, the 18th, very early, after mass had been said, when the squadron, consisting of six vessels, sailed out of Santiago harbor amidst the vivas of the populace and the inward cursings of the governor.[91] But of little avail was Velazquez’ remorse; for Cortés carried no Æolian wind-bags to drive him back from his destination.
Despatching one of the vessels to Jamaica[92] for provisions, Cortés touched at Macaca for further supplies, and thence steered for Trinidad, where he was received with demonstrations of enthusiasm by the alcalde mayor, Francisco Verdugo brother-in-law of Velazquez, and by other hidalgos, who placed their houses at his disposal. Raising his standard before his quarters, he proclaimed the expedition and invited volunteers, as he had done at Santiago. Soon his force was augmented by over one hundred of Grijalva’s men. Here also joined several captains and hidalgos, afterward famous in New Spain adventure. There were the five brothers Alvarado, Alonso de Ávila, Gonzalo Mejía afterward treasurer at Mexico, Cristóbal de Olid, Alonzo Hernandez Puertocarrero cousin of the count of Medellin, Gonzalo de Sandoval who became so great a friend of Cortés, Juan Velazquez de Leon a relative of the governor, and others.[93] From the plantations of Santi Espíritu and elsewhere came many. This Cortés beheld with proud satisfaction, and welcomed these important acquisitions with martial music and peals of artillery.
In seeking supplies Cortés paid little heed to rights of property, so long as he obtained what he needed; he was subsequently not a little proud of his success. “By my faith,” he boasts in Spain in 1542,
“but I did play the corsair genteelly.” Among the arbitrary purchases was that of a vessel from Jamaica laden with provisions for the mines, for which the owner might accept promissory notes or nothing.[94] Another vessel from the same place, on the same mission, Cortés sent Ordaz to seize and convey to Cape San Antonio, or perhaps to San Cristóbal where we afterward find him, there to await the fleet. This captain, it will be remembered, was the spy of Velazquez, and to him, therefore, rather than to another, was given this mission, to prevent his watching proceedings at Trinidad. The commander of the seized vessel was Juan Nuñez Sedeño, who was induced to join the expedition.[95] Meanwhile in the breast of Velazquez was stirred afresh the poison of jealousy by an astrologer, one Juan Millan, employed by the enemies of Cortés to work on the fears of the governor. The result was the arrival at Trinidad, in hot haste, of two messengers from the governor, with orders for Verdugo to detain the fleet, the command of which had been transferred to Vasco Porcallo. Moreover, all the retainers of Velazquez were called upon to aid in deposing Cortés. It was no difficult matter, however, for Cortés to persuade Verdugo of two things: first, that there were no grounds for Velazquez’ fears, and secondly, if there were, force would now avail him nothing. So strong was Cortés in his position that he could easily lay the town in ashes should its authorities attempt to interfere in his purposes. Taking one of the messengers, Pedro Lasso, into his service, by the other Cortés wrote Velazquez, in language most respectful, begging him to believe that he would always be true to his God, his king, and his dear friend and governor. In like notes the robin and the screech-owl muffle their voices when danger is near, so as to conceal the distance, and make themselves seem far away. Thus passed twelve days, according to Bernal Diaz, at Trinidad, when one of the vessels was despatched to the north side of the island for supplies, and the fleet departed for San Cristóbal, then Habana,[96] while Pedro de Alvarado, with fifty
soldiers and all the horses, proceeded thither overland, adding to their number at the plantations on the way.
One night during the voyage to San Cristóbal, the flag-ship was separated from the other vessels and stranded on a reef near Isla de Pinos. With skill and promptness Cortés transferred the contents in small boats to the shore, set free the lightened vessel, and, reloading, joined his captains at San Cristóbal. This accident delayed him seven days, during which time there was no small stir among his men at San Cristóbal as to who should command the fleet in case its captain-general failed to appear. Conspicuous among these questioners was Ordaz, who claimed precedence as Velazquez’ representative. But the arrival of the commander put an end to the controversy and spread unbounded joy throughout the armada. Landing, he accepted the hospitality of Pedro Barba, lieutenant of Velazquez. Among those who joined him here were Francisco Montejo, the future conqueror of Yucatan, and Diego de Soto, who in Mexico became the mayordomo of Cortés. Again the commander rid himself of Ordaz by sending him with a vessel to the plantations near Cape San Antonio, there to await the fleet. The artillery was landed and cleaned; the cross-bows were tested and the firelocks polished. Cotton armor was secured. More provisions being required, Quesada, the Episcopal tithe-collector, contributed his stock.
Warranted, as he thought, by his success and prospects, and well aware of the effect on the Spanish mind of some degree of ostentation and military display, Cortés put on the paraphernalia of still greater leadership, and appointed a chamberlain, a chief butler, and a mayordomo, in the persons of Rodrigo Rangel, Guzman, and Juan de Cáceres, which pomp he ever after maintained.[97] Gaspar de Garnica now arrived with letters from Velazquez to Barba, Ordaz, Leon, and others, ordering and entreating them to stop the fleet, arrest Cortés, and send him a prisoner to Santiago. It was of no avail, however. Soldiers, officers, even Barba himself, were
enthusiastic for Cortés, who once more wrote the governor, in terms as courteous as they were costless, and shortly afterward, on the 10th of February, 1519, the fleet again set sail.[98] Guaguanico, on the north side of Cape San Antonio, was the place appointed for muster and apportionment.[99] Meanwhile Pedro Alvarado was sent forward with sixty soldiers in the San Sebastian to bring Ordaz to the rendezvous, but driven by a gale beyond his goal and near to Yucatan, he thought it useless to return, and so proceeded to Cozumel Island, where he arrived two days before the others. The expedition consisted of twelve vessels, the flag-ship or capitana of one hundred tons, three others of from sixty to eighty tons, and the rest small brigantines and open craft, including a transport commanded by Ginés Nortes. The soldiers numbered five hundred and eight, and the sailors one hundred and nine, including officers and pilots. The priests present were Juan Diaz and Bartolomé de Olmedo, of the Order of Mercy. Under Juan Benitez and Pedro de Guzman were thirty-two crossbowmen; thirteen men only carried firelocks, the rest being armed with swords and spears. The artillery consisted of ten bronzed guns and four falconets, and was in charge of Francisco de Orozco, aided by Mesa Usagre, Arbenga, and others. About two hundred Cuban Indians, together with some native women and negro slaves, were brought for service, despite the prohibitory clause in the instructions. Sixteen horses receive the minute description and glowing encomium of the soldier Diaz, and play an important part in the coming campaign. The supplies included some five thousand tocinos, or pieces of salt pork, six thousand loads of maize and yucca, fowl, vegetables, groceries, and other provisions. For barter were beads, bells, mirrors, needles, ribbons, knives, hatchets, cotton goods, and other articles.[100]
The force was divided into eleven companies, each under a captain having control on sea and land. The names of the captains were Alonso Hernandez Puertocarrero, Alonso de Ávila, Diego de
Ordaz, Francisco de Montejo, Francisco de Morla, Escobar, Juan de Escalante, Juan Velazquez de Leon, Cristóbal de Olid, Pedro de Alvarado, and Cortés, with Anton de Alaminos as chief pilot.[101]
From this list it will be seen that those but lately regarded as of the Velazquez party received their full share in the command. This cannot be attributed so much to the captain-general’s sense of fairness, which forbade him to take advantage of interests voluntarily intrusted to his care, as to a studied policy whereby he hoped to win for his purposes certain men of influence, whom it would, for that matter, have been dangerous to remove.
Before the review, Cortés addressed his soldiers in a speech as shrewd and stirring as that of Marcius at Corioli. Pointing to the thousands of unbaptized, he awakened their religious zeal; dwelling on the grandeur of the undertaking, he stimulated their ambition; referring to the vast wealth these lands contained, he excited their cupidity. Greater and richer lands than all the Spanish kingdoms, he called them, and inhabited by strange races, only awaiting submission to their invincible arms. Their whole fortune was invested in the fleet that carried them; but who would regret so trifling an expenditure when compared with the glorious results to follow? They were setting out upon a career of conquest in the name of their God, who had always befriended the Spanish nation; and in the name of their emperor, for whom they would achieve greater deeds than any ever performed. Riches lay spread before them; but like good and brave men they must look with him to the higher and nobler reward of glory. “Nevertheless,” he archly added, “be true to me, as am I to you, and ere long I will load you with wealth such as you have never dreamed of. I will not say it is to be won without hardships; but who of you are afraid? We are few, but we are brave. Let us therefore on with the work so well begun, joyously and confidently to the end!”[102] There is no passion so artful as avarice in hiding itself under some virtue. Sometimes it is progress, sometimes patriotism,
but its warmest cloak has ever been religion. There is a double profit to the devotee whose religion gratifies his avarice, and whose avarice is made a part of his religion.
On the morning of February 18th mass was said, the campaign standard blessed, and Saint Peter invoked, whereupon the prows were pointed toward the islands of the west. All the vessels were to follow the flagship, whose light should be their guide by night; in case of separation they were to steer for Cape Catoche and thence proceed to Cozumel.[103]
FOOTNOTES
[79] ‘Fray Luys de Figueroa, fray Alonso de santo Domingo, y fray Bernaldino Mãçenedo, q eran los gouernadores, dieron la licencia para Fernando Cortés como capitan y armador cõ Diego Velazquez.’ Gomara, Hist. Mex., 12. The Fathers no doubt required to know the name of the commander. ‘His litteris Cortesius confirmatus,’ is the statement in De Rebus Gestis Ferdinandi Cortesii, in Icazbalceta, Col. Doc., i. 344, in reference to their permit. This authority intimates that Salcedo, at a later date probably, obtained license from the Fathers for warfare in Yucatan and for the settlement of the mainland, but this is not confirmed anywhere Id , 350
[80] Evidently Velazquez desired his captains to disobey instructions and colonize He could not officially authorize them to do so, not having as yet received permission from Spain Neither Velazquez nor Cortés had any intention in this instance of confining this enterprise to trade, or protecting the natives, or imposing morality upon the men It was well understood by all that licentiousness and plunder were to be the reward for perils to be undergone ‘Atque etiam quod Grijalvae prætentâ causa auxilii ferendi quod Alvaradus postulabat, ire licebat,’ is the pointed observation in De Rebus Gestis Ferdinandi Cortesii, in Icazbalceta, Col. Doc., i. 343-4. Bernal Diaz, Hist. Verdad., 13, refers to promises of Indian repartimientos in the new regions as an inducement for volunteers. Cortés’ statement at Vera Cruz, that he had no order to settle, means nothing in view of the motives then actuating him. Secret agreements between governors and lieutenants for defrauding the crown and promoting their own aims were only too
common; and this is overlooked by those who trust merely to the instructions for arguments on this point.
[81] The full text of the instructions is to be found in Pacheco and Cárdenas, Col. Doc., xii. 225-46; Col. Doc. Inéd., i. 385, 406; Alaman, Disert., i. App. ii. 1-27, with notes, reproduced in Zamacois, Hist Méj , ii 791-815 The Muñoz copy, given in Prescott’s Mex , iii 434-9, preserved the original spelling in the preamble, but the clauses are abbreviated, though Prescott does not appear to be aware of it
[82] The ownership of the expedition has been a moot question, some authors regarding it as pertaining chiefly to Velazquez, while others accord it wholly to Cortés and his friends According to Gomara, after receiving the vessel brought by Alvarado, and another provided by Velazquez, Cortés, aided by his friends, bought two large and two small vessels before leaving Santiago; and at least two more were bought after this with bills forced upon the owners The rest of the fleet appears to have been made up from the transport spoken of and from Grijalva’s vessels. The latter is to be regarded as Velazquez’ contribution, for in the testimony before the royal council in Spain, Montejo, the trusted friend of the commander, declares that on delivering them over to the governor he received the order to join Cortés, with the vessels, of course. His statements, and those of the captain Puertocarrero, confirmed by the letter of the ayuntamiento of Villa Rica to the emperor, agree that, from their own observations and the accounts given by others, Cortés must have contributed not only seven vessels, but expended over 5000 castellanos on the outfit, beside procuring goods and provisions, while Velazquez furnished only one third, chiefly in clothes, provisions, wines, and other effects, which he sold through an agent to the company, the witnesses included, at exorbitant prices Montejo had heard that Velazquez contributed three vessels, but whether these were exclusive of Grijalva’s fleet is not clear He is also supposed to have lent Cortés 2000 castellanos, and to have given twelve or thirteen hundred loads of bread, and 300 tocinos, beside 1800 castellanos in goods, to be sold to the party at high prices Every other supply was furnished by Cortés, who maintained the whole force without touching the ship’s stores, while remaining in Cuba, no doubt. Col. Doc. Inéd., i. 487-90. Puertocarrero adds that Cortés’ liberality to men in advancing means and outfits was generally admitted. He himself had received a horse from the commander. He gives a list of the outrageously high prices charged by Velazquez for his supplies. Id., 491-5. Another member of the expedition states that Cortés furnished seven vessels, and Velazquez three, two more belonging to the latter joining the fleet afterward. Cortés paid for all the outfit. Extract appended to Carta del Ayunt. de V. Cruz, in Col. Doc. Inéd., i. 419-20: ‘Casi las dos partes ... á su (Cortés) costa, asi en navios como en bastimentos de mar.’ ‘Todo el concierto de la dicha armada se hizo á voluntad de dicho Diego Velazquez, aunque ni puso ni gastó él mas de la tercia parte de ella La mayor parte de la dicha tercia parte fué emplear sus
dineros en vinos y en ropas y en otras cosas de poco valor para nos lo vender acá (V. Cruz) en mucha mas cantidad de lo que á él le costó.’ Carta de la Justicia de Veracruz, 10 de julio, 1519, in Cortés, Cartas, 8; Pacheco and Cárdenas, Col Doc , xiv 37 Claiming to have no ready money of his own, Velazquez took for the expedition 1000 castellanos from the estate of Narvaez in his charge Gomara, Hist Mex , 12-13 ‘Salió de la Isla de Cuba con quince navíos suyos ’ Cortés, Memorial, 1542, in Cortés, Escritos Sueltos, 310 Peter Martyr assumes that Cuban colonists furnished the fleet with the governor’s consent, and elected Cortés commander Dec iv cap vi Solis, Hist Mex , i 61, considers that Velazquez held only a minor share in the expedition. Montejo stated in a general way that he spent all his fortune on joining the expedition. Cent. Am., 1554-55, 127-30, in Squiers MS. In De Rebus Gestis Ferdinandi Cortesii it is asserted that Cortés expended 6000 pesos of his own, and 6000 ducats borrowed money, beside what Velazquez lent him; his expenditures being in all 15,000 pesos. Velazquez gave not one real, but merely sold goods at exorbitant figures, or made advances at a high interest, even the vessels provided by him being transferred to the commander under an expensive charter. ‘Sunt pretereà, multi Hispani viri boni qui et nunc vivunt, et qui cum ea classis de qua agimus, apparabatur, aderant. Hi in hujus causæ defensione, cujus apud Consilium Regium Indicum Cortesius est accusatus, testes jurati asserunt Velazquium nihil omnino ex propriâ facultate in Cortesii classem impendisse ’ This would indicate that Montejo and Puertocarrero’s testimony was confirmed by many others The agent, Juan Diaz, who attended to the sale of the goods and the collection of the advances, fell in the retreat from Mexico, and his money was lost Icazbalceta, Col Doc , i 345-9 This testimony by members of the expedition merits the foremost attention in the question, particularly since the fewer statements on the other side are based wholly on supposition. It is somewhat qualified, however, by the consideration that both Montejo and Puertocarrero were stanch friends of Cortés, and that the letter of the ayuntamiento was prepared in his presence. It must also be borne in mind that a goodly proportion of the share attributed to him consisted of vessels and effects obtained upon his credit as captain-general of the fleet, and also in a semipiratical manner. The statements in Cortés, Memorial, and in De Rebus Gestis Ferdinandi Cortesii, indicate, beside, a hardly warranted attempt to regard Velazquez’ contribution chiefly as a loan to the commander or to the party, his vessels being spoken of as chartered. Another proportion belonged to wealthy volunteers. On the whole, however, it may be concluded that Cortés could lay claim to a larger share in the expedition than Velazquez; but the latter possessed the title of being not only the discoverer, through his captains, of the regions to be conquered, but the projector of the expedition Oviedo, while believing that the fleet belonged with more right to the governor, feels no pity for the treatment he received, in view of his own conduct to Diego Colon Complacently he cites the proverb: ‘Matarás y matarte han: y matarán quien te matare ’ As you do unto others, so shall be done unto you Oviedo asserts that he has seen testimony
showing that Cortés and his men did not sail at their own expense, but from his own statement it appears that the instructions of Velazquez, wherein he speaks of the expedition as sent in his name, is the chief feature in this so-called testimony; i 538-9 Las Casas naturally sides with Velazquez, and estimates that he expended over 20,000 castellanos; he had no need for, nor would he have stooped to a partnership, at least with a man like Cortés Hist Ind , iv 448 Herrera, dec ii lib iii cap xi , copies this, and Torquemada, i 359, reverses this figure in favor of Cortés
[83] Testimonio de Puertocarrero, in Col Doc Inéd , i 491 ‘Mãdo dar pregones, y tocar sus atambores, y trompetas en nombre de su Magestad, y en su Real nombre por Diego Velazquez para que qualesquier personas que quisiessen ir en su compañía à las tierras nuevamente descubiertas â los conquistar y doblar, les darian sus partes del oro plata, y joyas que se huviesse, y encomiendas de Indios despues de pacificada.’ Bernal Diaz, Hist. Verdad., 13. Mark here the promise of encomiendas to the volunteers. The word ‘doblar’ doubtless meant to explore or to sail round the new islands. Bernal Diaz does not fail to observe that the royal license had not yet arrived to warrant these proclamations.
[84] See Landa, Rel. de Yuc., 23; Tapia, Rel., in Icazbalceta, Col. Doc., ii. 554; Fancourt, Hist. Yuc., 27, leaves out the middle sentence; Gomara, Hist. Mex., 15; Torquemada, i. 364, and others give only the Spanish translation. Prescott says the flag was of velvet, and attributes the sign to the labarum of Constantine, which, to say the least, is somewhat far-fetched. Bernal Diaz, Hist. Verdad., 13, places the motto upon ‘estandartes, y vanderas labradas de oro cõ las armas Reales, y una Cruz de cada parte, juntamente con las armas de nuestro Rey ’
[85] ‘Se puso vn penacho de plumas con su medalla de oro.’ Bernal Diaz, Hist. Verdad , 13 ‘Tomo casa Hizo Mesa Y començo a yr con armas, y mucha compañía De que muchos murmurauan, diziendo que tenia estado sin señorio ’ Gomara, Hist Mex , 13
[86] Cortés himself was very liberal in advancing money or necessaries Puertocarrero, loc cit This cavalier received a horse which Cortés bought at Trinidad with gold fringes taken from his mantle Bernal Diaz, Hist Verdad , 14 ‘Dio a muchos soldados dineros con obligaciõ de man comun ’ Gomara, Hist Mex , 12
[87] Las Casas, Hist Ind , iv 450-1; Herrera, dec ii lib iii cap xi Bernal Diaz, Hist Verdad , 13, relates the incident as having occurred on the way to Sunday mass. The fool, whom he calls Cervantes, was walking in front of his master and Cortés, uttering nonsense in prose and rhyme; finally he said in a louder voice, ‘By my faith, master Diego, a nice captain have you chosen: one who will run away with the fleet, I warrant, for he has courage and enterprise.’ Duero, who walked
