young’s TRAVELS IN FRANCE.
56 8
hundred and fifty braccia) higher than Milan, — and that of Lugano two hundred feethigher than thofe, with a nearly regular declivity to the Po *.
There are authors who have afferted, that agriculture is improved in confequence ofgreat trade or manfaCtures only ; but the infiance of the itnmenfe irrigation in the Mi-lanefe, effected by thefe and many other canals, too numerous to mention, will not allowof ftich a conclufion being general; and to (hew that my opinion is not without foun-dation, a very brief review of the fiate of Milan , fo far as it refpeCts thefe periods, willnot be difpleafing to a reflecting reader.
In 1177, when the canal de Navillio Grande was made, the republic of Milan hadbeen gradually forming for about two hundred years f ; but thefe dominions were ex-ceedingly confined ;—Lodi, Pavia, Mantua, Verona, Crema, Tortona, Como, Ber-gamo, Brefcia, Piacenza, Parma, Genova, Afti, Vercelli, Novara, Cremona, Ivrea ,Padua, Alba, Trevifo, Aquileia, Ferrara, Reggio, Modena , Bologna, Imola, Cefe-na, Forli , Rimini, Fano, and Ancona,—-were at that time independent republicswhich united againft Milan, in 1162, with the Emperor Frederick I. and befieged anddefiroved it. This fingular faCt that in fifteen years after one of the mod fignal defini-tions that could be brought upon a city, there Ihould be found energy enough in a pettyrepublic, to undertake a work which is in the prefent age regarded as an honour toLombardy mult be admitted as a proof, that the trade and manufactures of that periodcould have been but very inconfiderable.
Milan , however, unquefiionably arofe to great power and profperity ; and our bufi-nefs is to inquire into that period, whence we may judge how much its commerce mightinfluence the perfection to which fhe has carried agriculture.
lot 2, Civil war; the nobility driven out by the people.
1056, The government changed.
1067, Meadows watered. Guili/ii, iv. 122.
1127, Como deftroyed by Milan .
11 c3, Frederick Barbaroffa interpofes.
1162, Milan taken and deftroyed.
1167, The people of Milan living in tents and cabins. To,
1177, Navillio Grande continued to Milan .
1191, Grant of waters to Pavia, for irrigation, by the Emperor Henry VI.
1 204, The nobility expelled.
1210, The archbifhop’s revenue 80,000 fiorini d’oro, equal to ten millions of livresnow.
j 216, A woollen manufacture.
1220, The canal of the Muzza made.
1221, The archbifhop and nobles expelled.
1 237, War againft the Emperor Frederick II .
1240, Government reduced to pay in paper money ; the origin of all that has palledfince in Europe .
1 2^7, The nobility expelled.
_The Navillio Grande begun to be made navigable.
• Verri, Storia Ji Mi'ano. I ■ 83. tom. i. p. 5.
y Storia di Milano, p. Verii. 4to. 1783. tom. i. p. 142. J Verri, tomo i. 4. 17;.