' It is a wonder that funerals were not also treated in the
same way.
It was the practice, both at the Carnival and on other occasions, to
represent the triumphs of ancient Roman commanders, such as that of
Paulus Aemilius under Lorenzo the Magnificent at Florence, and that of
Camillus on the visit of Leo X. Both were conducted by the painter
Francesco Granacci. In Rome, the first complete exhibition of this kind
was the triumph of Augustus after the victory over Cleopatra, under
Paul II, where, besides the comic and mythological masks, which, as a
matter of fact, were not wanting in the ancient triumphs, all the other
requisites were to be found--kings in chains, tablets with decrees of
the senate and people, a senate clothed in the ancient costume,
praetors, aediles, and quaestors, four chariots filled with singing
masks, and, doubtless, cars laden with trophies. Other processions
rather aimed at setting forth, in a general way, the universal empire
of ancient Rome; and in answer to the very real danger which threatened
Europe from the side of the Turks, a cavalcade of camels bearing masks
representing Ottoman prisoners, appeared before the people. Later, at
the Carnival of the year 1500, Cesare Borgia, with a bold allusion to
himself, celebrated the triumph of Julius Caesar, with a procession of
eleven magnificent chariots, doubtless to the scandal of the pilgrims
who had come fm the Jubilee.
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