hic and Renaissance
details.

There is also a Byzantine civil casket at Capodistria, with traces of
ancient gilding upon it. It has the usual rosettes in the borders, and
small plaques with figure subjects. On the front there are three gods
and goddesses, separated by a repetition of the border pattern. The
handle and fastenings are later in date.

Just inside the Porta della Muda is the Piazza da Ponte, so called after
the Podesta Lorenzo da Ponte, who in 1666 had the very curious fountain
erected, in which he imagined a further memorial of himself by the
punning design of the bridge, so unsuitable for its position. In front
of the Palazzo Tacco is a column with a statue of S. Giustina, set up to
commemorate the battle of Lepanto, at which Domenico di Tacco commanded
a ship fitted out at his own expense.

[Illustration: THE PIAZZA DA PONTE, CAPODISTRIA

_To face page 92_]

In the churches on Good Friday a crucifix was laid on the chancel steps.
Women and children knelt round and kissed it. In one or two of them a
dead Christ, life-size and painted, was exhibited behind glass. There
was also the "tomba," a custom to which one is used in Italy. A few men
joined in the devotion. The Good Friday procession is over half a mile
long, and takes two hours to get round the town, starting from the
cathedral west door at twilight. It is formed in great part of the
ancient confraternities (among which that of S. Maria is mentioned as
early as 1082), who carry some 200 implements and standards, torches,
candelabra, wax tapers, figures of saints, and lanterns. At the end of
the procession a rich baldacchino is borne aloft above the priest who
carries the Host. "Mazzieri" (from the mace which they carry as sign
of authority) keep order. Other processions by daylight take place on
Corpus Domini and S. Nazario (June 19). The people have always been fond
of such displays, and till the seventeenth century there was a great
function at the departure of the rector, who was solemnly bidden
farewell by one of the syndics or nobles in the cathedral. These Istrian
coast towns have always shown enlightenment in the matter of education.
In 1699 a school was opened in Capodistria for the sons of citizens and
patricians, in which Latin, Greek, Italian, mathematics, rhetoric, and
physics were taught. And, in order that poor and talented young men
should not be cut off from the possibility of learning, this town, and,
after its example, Isola,