Note 8 — Chapter VIII · NORTH TIROL—THE INNTHAL. INNSBRUCK.

Ferdinand the First’s reign has many mementos in Innsbruck. He built the Franciscan church, otherwise called the heiligen Kreuzkirche and the Hofkirche, which, tradition says, had been projected by his grandfather, Kaiser Max, though there is no written record of the fact; and he raised within it a most grandiose and singular monument to him, which has alone sufficed to attract many travellers to Tirol. The original object of the foundation of the church seems to have been the establishment of a college of canons in this centre, to oppose the advance of Lutheran teaching. It was begun in 1543, the first design having been rejected by Ferdinand as not grand enough, and consecrated in 1563. He seems to have been at some pains to find a colony of religious willing to undertake, and competent to fulfil, his requirements; and not coming to an agreement with any in Germany or the Netherlands, ultimately called in a settlement of Franciscans from Trent and the Venetian provinces, consisting of twenty priests and thirteen lay-brothers. The chief ornaments of the building itself are the ten large—but too slender—red marble columns, which support the plateresque roof. The greater part of the nave is taken up with Maximilian’s monument—cenotaph rather, for he lies buried at Wiener-Neustadt, the oft-contemplated translation of his remains never having been carried into effect. It was Innsbruck’s fault, as we have seen, that they were not originally laid to rest there, and it is her retribution to have been denied the honour of housing them hitherto. The monument itself is a pile upwards of thirteen feet long and six high, of various coloured marbles, raised on three red marble steps; on the top is a colossal figure, representing the Kaiser dressed in full imperial costume, kneeling, his face being directed towards the altar—a very fine work, cast in bronze by Luigi del Duca, a Sicilian, in 1582. The sides and ends are divided by slender columns into twenty-four fine white marble compartments,8 setting forth the story of his achievements in lace-like relief. If the treatment of the facts is sometimes somewhat legendary, the details and accessories are most painstakingly and delicately rendered, great attention having been paid to the faithfulness of the costumes and buildings introduced, and the most exquisite finish lavished on all. They were begun in 1561 by the brothers Bernhard and Arnold Abel, of Cologne, who went in person to Genoa to select the Carrara tablets for their work; but they both died in 1563, having only completed three. Then Alexander Collin of Mechlin took up the work, and with the aid of a large school of artists completed them in all their perfection in three years more. Around it stands a noble guard of ancestors historical and mythological, cast in bronze, of colossal proportions, twenty-eight in number. It is a solemn sight as you enter in the dusk of evening, to see these stern old heroes keeping eternal watch round the tomb of him who has been called ‘the last of the Knights,’ der letzte Ritter. They have not, perhaps, the surpassing merit of the Carrara reliefs, but they are nobly conceived nevertheless. For lightness of poise, combined with excellence of proportion and delicacy of finish, the figure of our own King Arthur commends itself most to my admiration; but that of Theodoric is generally reckoned to bear away the palm from all the rest. They stand in the following order.