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ALFIERI ALFONSO 295 which fairly redeemed the lost opportunities of his youth. By the year 1782 he had produced 14 dramas. In 1785 he followed the countess to France, and upon the death of her husband in 1788 is believed to have been married to her in that country, although the relation was never publicly acknowledged, and there is no positive evidence to sustain it. He continued to reside in France, and was engaged in superintending the publication of an edition of his works in Paris when the French revolution reached its first alarming crisis. Compelled to flee the country, with the loss of almost everything he had possessed there, he returned to Florence, where, in the society of the countess of Albany, he passed the remainder of his life. His latter years were clouded by various troubles, but he still pursued his literary labors. He wrote sa- tires, panegyrics, and sonnets, translated Vir- gil and Terence, and when nearly 50 years of age began the study of Greek. He died of an attack of gout, tenderly cared for to the last by the countess of Albany, who caused a monu- ment, sculptured by Canova, to be erected over his remains in the church of Santa Croce. His dramatic works comprise 21 tragedies, 6 come- dies, and a "tramelogedia," a name invented by himself. He also produced translations from the Greek dramatists, an epic poem in four books, a treatise on tyranny, and a number of satires and lyrical pieces, including five odes on the American revolution. After his death ap- peared his Misogallo, a collection of satirical pieces in prose and verse, inspired by a lively hatred of the French nation ; and his auto- biography, in which he records with singu- lar frankness the story of his life. Alfieri's reputation rests almost exclusively upon his tragedies. Their literary rank is permanent. Remarkable for a vigor and intensity of expres- sion worthy of the best days of Italian litera- ture, their classic subjects and stern outline, however opposed to the romantic school, have a grand and solemn charm. Though simple to meagreness in construction, and admitting of little by-play or scenic effect, they are said to hold an Italian audience spell-bound by the nervousness of the language and the condensed energy and passion with which the higher pas- sages are infused. Saul, Mirra, Oreste, and Filippo are considered the best. To Alfieri belongs the distinction of having founded the Italian school of tragedy. Avoiding pedantic obedience to Greek or French models, he em- bodied the earnestness of the one and the mod- ern form of the other in the language of his country. He was a man of strong likes and dis- likes and a violent temper, but candid, inde- pendent, and generous to a fault. Two marked peculiarities of his character were his detesta- tion of the French and his fondness for horses. He was a liberal in politics, although his faith in democracy is supposed to have been somewhat shaken by the excesses of the French revolu- tionists ; he hated kingcraft, and prized his own nobility chiefly that he was free to abuse it. Two editions of Alfieri's complete works havo been published 22 vols. 4to, Pisa, 1808, and 22 vols. 8vo, Padua, 1809-'10. The best edi- tion of his tragedies, autobiography, and some of his minor works, is contained in the Milan collection of the Italian classics, entitled Opere scelte (4 vols..8vo, 1818). ALFONSO, the name of several kings of Spain and Portugal, also written ALONSO, ALONZO, ALPHONSO, and in Portuguese AFFONSO. There were five in Aragon, six in Portugal, and twelve in Leon and Castile. The kingdom of Leon is generally considered to have commenc- ed with Alfonso l'., the Catholic, who was elect- ed about 739 king of Asturia, subsequently called the kingdom of Leon and Oviedo, and died in 757. He carried on a war of extermi- nation with the Moors. Alfonso II., the Chaste, grandson of the preceding, elected king in 791, died in 842. He is famous in the national an- nals for having abolished the annual tribute of 100 Christian maidens to the Moors. In his reign lived the great Bernardo del Carpio, the hero of Spanish romance. Alfonso III., the Great, son of Ordoflo I., born in 848, king in 8,66, died in 912. He extended the limits of the Christian rule to the Guadiana, put down a rebellion fomented by discontented nobles in favor of his son Garcia, but afterward abdicated, and won a victory over the infidels as general of his son's troops. Alfonso VI., the Valiant, son of Ferdinand I., born in 1030, succeeded to the throne of Leon in 1065, and died in 1109. Under the preceding reign the kingdoms of Leon and Old Castile had been united, and af- ter much internal warfare with his brothers, among whom the father had parcelled out the kingdom, Alfonso made himself master of Leon, Old Castile, the Asturias, and Galicia. His successes against the Moors led to the invasion of the peninsula by the Almoravides from Af- rica, against whom Alfonso furnished assist- ance to his old enemy the king of Seville, but ineffectually. Rodrigo Diaz de Bivar, the celebrated Cid, lived in this reign. Al- fonso VI. died without heirs male, and the united crowns fell to his daughter Urraca. She married Alfonso I. of Aragon, who in her right claimed the crown of Castile and Leon. The marriage was, however, dissolved on account of Queen Urraca's misconduct. Alfonso VII. or VIII. (see ALFONSO I. of Ar- agon), RAIMONDEZ, son of Queen Urraca and her first husband, Count Raymond of Bur- gundy, born in 1105, died in 1157. He was proclaimed king of Galicia in 1109, was for some time at war with his mother, and suc- ceeded her in Leon and Castile in 1126. In 1135 he was crowned emperor of Spain, though he hardly possessed a third of it, and did not transmit the title. Alfonso X., the Wise, king of Leon and Castile, born in 1226, succeeded his father Ferdinand III. in 1252, and died in 1284. He compelled the king of Granada to do homage to the crown of Castile, and to pay a considerable sum of money. In 1256 Alfonso