of wood and used by the elder men to sit on. The Masai are not
hunters of big game except lions, but they eat the eland and kudu.
The domestic animals are cattle, sheep, goats, donkeys and dogs.
Only women and the married men smoke. The dead are ordinarily
not buried, but the bodies are carried a short distance from the
village and left on the ground to be devoured by hyenas, jackals and
vultures. Important chiefs are buried, however, and a year later
the eldest son or successor recovers the skull, which is treasured as
a charm. The medicine men of Masai are often the chiefs, and
the supreme chief is almost always a medicine man.
The Masai believe in a nature-god as a supreme being—Ngai (“sky”)—and his aid is invoked in cases of drought by a ceremonial chant of the children, standing in a circle after sunset, each with a bunch of grass in its hand. They have creation-myths involving four gods, the black, white, grey and red deities. They believe there is no future for women or common people, but that such distinction is reserved for chiefs. Pythons and a species of snake are revered as the reincarnated forms of their more celebrated ancestors. A kind of worship is paid to the hyena in some districts: the whole tribe going into mourning if the beast crosses their path. The Masai also have a vague tree-worship, and grass is a sacred symbol. When making peace a tuft is held in the right hand, and when the warriors start out on a raid their sweethearts throw grass after them or lay it in the forks of trees. But the oddest of their superstitious customs is the importance attached to spitting. To spit upon a person or thing is regarded as a sign of reverence and goodwill, as among other Nilotic tribes. Newly born children are spat on by every one who sees them. Johnston states that every Masai before extending his hand to him spat on it first. They spit when they meet and when they part, and bargains are sealed in this way. Joseph Thomson writes, “being regarded as a wizard of the first water, the Masai flocked to me ... and the more copiously I spat on them the greater was their delight.” The Masai has no love for work, and practises no industries. The women attend to his personal needs; and trades such as smelting and forging are left to enslaved tribes such as the Dorobo (Wandorobo). These manufacture spears with long blades and butts and the peculiar swords or simés like long slender leaves, very narrow towards the hilt and broad at the point. Most of the Masai live in the British East Africa Protectorate.
See A. C. Hollis, The Masai, their Language and Folklore (1905); M. Merker, Die Nasai (1904); Sir H. H. Johnston, Kilimanjaro Expedition (1886) and Uganda Protectorate (1902); Joseph Thomson, Through Masai-land (1885); O. Baumann, Durch Massai-land zur Nilquelle (1894); F. Kallenberg, Auf dem Kriegspfad gegen die Massai (1892).
MASANIELLO, an abbreviation of Tommaso Aniello (1622–1647),
an Amalfi fisherman, who became leader of the revolt
against Spanish rule in Naples in 1647. Misgovernment and
fiscal oppression having aroused much discontent throughout
the two Sicilies, a revolt broke out at Palermo in May 1647, and
the people of Naples followed the example of the Sicilians. The
immediate occasion of the latter rising was a new tax on fruit,
the ordinary food of the poor, and the chief instigator of the
movement was Masaniello, who took command of the malcontents.
The outbreak began on the 7th of July 1647 with a riot
at the city gates between the fruit-vendors of the environs and
the customs officers; the latter were forced to flee, and the
customs office was burnt. The rioters then poured into Naples
and forced their way into the palace of the viceroy, the hated
Count d’Arcos, who had to take refuge first in a neighbouring
convent, then in Castel Sant’ Elmo, and finally in Castelnuovo.
Masaniello attempted to discipline the mob and restrain its
vandalic instincts, and to some extent he succeeded; attired in his
fisherman’s garb, he gave audiences and administered justice
from a wooden scaffolding outside his house. Several rioters,
including the duke of Maddaloni, an opponent of the viceroy,
and his brother Giuseppe Caraffa, who had come to Naples to
make trouble, were condemned to death by him and executed.
The mob, which every day obtained more arms and was becoming
more intractable, terrorized the city, drove off the troops
summoned from outside, and elected Masaniello “captain-general”;
the revolt was even spreading to the provinces.
Finally, the viceroy, whose negotiations with Masaniello had
been frequently interrupted by fresh tumults, ended by granting
all the concessions demanded of him. On the 13th of July,
through the mediation of Cardinal Filomarino, archbishop of
Naples, a convention was signed between D’Arcos and Masaniello
as “leader of the most faithful people of Naples,” by which the
rebels were pardoned, the more oppressive taxes removed, and
the citizens granted certain rights, including that of remaining
in arms until the treaty should have been ratified by the king
of Spain. The astute D’Arcos then invited Masaniello to the
palace, confirmed his title of “captain-general of the Neapolitan
people,” gave him a gold chain of office, and offered him a
pension. Masaniello refused the pension and laid down his
dignities, saying that he wished to return to his old life as a
fisherman; but he was entertained by the viceroy and, partly
owing to the strain and excitement of the past days, partly
because he was made dizzy by his astonishing change of fortune,
or perhaps, as it was believed, because he was poisoned, he lost
his head and behaved like a frenzied maniac. The people
continued to obey him for some days, until, abandoned by his
best friends, who went over to the Spanish party, he was murdered
while haranguing a mob on the market-place on the 16th of July
1647; his head was cut off and brought by a band of roughs to
the viceroy and the body buried outside the city. But the next
day the populace, angered by the alteration of the measures
for weighing bread, repented of its insane fury; the body of
Masaniello was dug up and given a splendid funeral, at which the
viceroy himself was represented.
Masaniello’s insurrection appealed to the imagination of poets and composers, and formed the subject of several operas, of which the most famous is Auber’s La Muelle de Portici (1828).
See Saavedra, Insurreccion de Napoli en 1647 (2 vols., Madrid, 1849); A. von Reumont, Die Caraffa von Maddaloni (2 vols., Berlin, 1849); Capasso, La Casa e famiglia di Masaniello (Naples, 1893); V. Spinazzola, Masaniello e la sua famiglia, secondo un codice bolognese del sec. xvi. (in the review Flegrea, 1900); A. G. Meissner, Masaniello (in German); E. Bourg, Masaniello (in French); F. Palermo, Documenti diversi sulle novità accadute in Napoli l’anno 1647 (in the Archivio storico italiano, 1st series, vol. ix.). See also Naples.
MASAYA, the capital of the department of Masaya, Nicaragua,
13 m. W.N.W. of Lake Nicaragua and the city of Granada, on
the eastern shore of Lake Masaya, and on the Granada-Managua
railway. Pop. (1905), about 20,000. The city is built in the
midst of a very fertile lowland region, which yields large
quantities of tobacco. The majority of the inhabitants are
Indians or half-castes. Lake Masaya occupies an extinct crater;
the isolated volcano of Masaya (3000 ft.) on the opposite side of
the lake was active at the time of the conquest of Nicaragua in
1522, and the conquerors, thinking the lava they saw was gold,
had themselves lowered into the crater at the risk of their lives.
The volcano was in eruption in 1670, 1782, 1857 and 1902.
MASCAGNI, PIETRO (1863– ), Italian operatic composer,
was born at Leghorn, the son of a baker, and educated for the
law; but he neglected his legal studies for music, taking secret
lessons at the Instituto Luigi Cherubini. There a symphony by
him was performed in 1879, and various other compositions
attracted attention, so that money was provided by a wealthy
amateur for him to study at the Milan Conservatoire. But
Mascagni chafed at the teaching, and soon left Milan to become
conductor to a touring operatic company. After a somewhat
chequered period he suddenly leapt into fame by the production
at Rome in 1890 of his one-act opera Cavalleria Rusticana,
containing a tuneful “intermezzo,” which became wildly popular.
Mascagni was the musical hero of the hour, and Cavalleria
Rusticana was performed everywhere. But his later work
failed to repeat this success. L’Amico Fritz (1891), I Rantzau
(1892), Guglielmo Ratcliff (1895), Silvano (1895), Zanetto (1896),
Iris (1898), Le Maschere (1901), and Amica (1905), were coldly
or adversely received; and though Cavalleria Rusticana, with its
catchy melodies, still held the stage, this succession of failures
involved a steady decline in the composer’s reputation. From
1895 to 1903 Mascagni was director of the Pesaro Conservatoire,
but in the latter year, having left his post in order to tour through
the United States, he was dismissed from the appointment.
MASCARA, chief town of an arrondissement in the department
of Oran, Algeria, 60 m. S.E. of Oran. It lies 1800 ft. above
the sea, on the southern slope of a range forming part of the
Little Atlas Mountains, and occupies two small hills separated
by the Wad Tudman, which is crossed by three stone bridges.
The walls, upwards of two miles in circuit, and strengthened by
bastions and towers, give the place a somewhat imposing
