Giuseppe Chiarini - Revision history

Djando: /* Equestrian, Circus Entrepreneur */

2025-08-11T23:22:47Z

‎Equestrian, Circus Entrepreneur

Djando: /* Enter Giuseppe Chiarini */

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‎Enter Giuseppe Chiarini

Djando: /* The Chiarini Family */

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‎The Chiarini Family

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‎Enter Giuseppe Chiarini

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‎Australia, China And Japan

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‎Australasian Encore

Djando: /* China And The Orient */

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‎China And The Orient

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‎Australasian Encore

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‎Australasian Encore

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‎Image Gallery

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 Giuseppe Chiarini (1823-1897) was perhaps the most influential circus director of the nineteenth century: During a professional career that spanned fifty-eight years, his extensive and incessant international tours led him from Europe to North and South America, to India and Asia, and down to Australia.  In many places that had not yet been exposed to the circus, Chiarini’s was the first circus the locals had ever seen&mdash;and this exposure sometimes triggered there the creation of an indigenous circus inspired by Chiarini’s shows.
-Over the years, Chiarini performed for Tsar Nicholas I of Russia, Emperors Maximilian I of Mexico, Dom Pedro of Brazil, and Mitsuhito of Japan, King Rama V of Siam, an assortment of Indian Rajahs, and for various government officials and politicians. His ''Royal Italian Circus''&mdash;which could become ''Royal Spanish Circus'' when needed&mdash;was in fact an American enterprise based in California. A true circus man, Chiarini was indubitably a citizen of the world.
+Over the years, Chiarini performed for Tsar Nicholas I of Russia, Emperors Maximilian I of Mexico, Dom Pedro of Brazil, and Meiji of Japan, King Rama V of Siam, an assortment of Indian Rajahs, and for various government officials and politicians. His ''Royal Italian Circus''&mdash;which could become ''Royal Spanish Circus'' when needed&mdash;was in fact an American enterprise based in California. A true circus man, Chiarini was indubitably a citizen of the world.
 ===The Chiarini Dynasty===

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 ===Enter Giuseppe Chiarini===
-[[Image:Giuseppe_Chiarini.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Giuseppe Chiarini]]Giuseppe Chiarini was born in 1823 in Rome, then the capital of the Papal States. His father, Gaetano, was a trick rider and horse trainer who had worked for the Franconis&mdash;and Giuseppe himself would later be known as a pupil of [[The Franconi Dynasty|Adolphe Franconi]], which was indeed an excellent reference. In time, the young Chiarini became a remarkable horse trainer, high-school rider, and a versatile all-around equestrian.
+[[Image:Giuseppe_Chiarini.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Giuseppe Chiarini]]Giuseppe Chiarini was born in 1823 in Rome, then the capital of the Papal States. It has been said that his father, Gaetano, was a trick rider and horse trainer who had worked for the Franconis&mdash;and Giuseppe himself would later be known as a pupil of [[The Franconi Dynasty|Adolphe Franconi]], which was indeed an excellent reference. This is possible, although not documented. Nonetheless the young Chiarini would become a remarkable horse trainer, high-school rider, and a versatile all-around equestrian.
 At age sixteen, Giuseppe joined the company of another great Italian equestrian and director, [[Alessandro Guerra]] (1782-1862)&mdash;whose aggressive performing style had won him the nickname, "Il Furioso."  With him, Chiarini went to perform from Vienna, where Guerra was based, to Eastern and Northern Europe, and to St. Petersburg, then the capital of Imperial Russia, where Guerra opened a resident circus in 1845. Giuseppe stayed in St. Petersburg until the end of 1846, at which time Guerra’s circus was overcome by the competition of [[Paul Cuzent]]’s ''Cirque de Paris'' (which was to become [[Russia%27s_First_National_Circus|Russia’s first Imperial Circus]]). Guerra and most of his company, including Chiarini, returned to Vienna.

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 Over the years, Chiarini performed for Tsar Nicholas I of Russia, Emperors Maximilian I of Mexico, Dom Pedro of Brazil, and Mitsuhito of Japan, King Rama V of Siam, an assortment of Indian Rajahs, and for various government officials and politicians. His ''Royal Italian Circus''&mdash;which could become ''Royal Spanish Circus'' when needed&mdash;was in fact an American enterprise based in California. A true circus man, Chiarini was indubitably a citizen of the world.
-===The Chiarini Family===
+===The Chiarini Dynasty===
-Giuseppe Chiarini came from a large and ancient Italian family of traveling entertainers, whose first recorded appearance was at the Foire Saint-Laurent, one of France’s oldest fairs, in 1580. Many Chiarinis, more or less directly related to Giuseppe, have since been chronicled in popular entertainment and circus history&mdash;a very diverse crowd of acrobats, ropedancers, puppeteers, ballet dancers, and equestrians.
+The Chiarinis were a large and ancient Italian family of traveling entertainers, whose first recorded appearance was at the Foire Saint-Laurent, one of France’s oldest fairs, in 1580. Many Chiarinis, more or less directly related, have since been chronicled in theater, popular entertainment and circus history&mdash;a very diverse crowd of acrobats, ropedancers, puppeteers, ballet dancers, and equestrians.
 In his novel, ''Die Vagabunden'' (1895), the German poet Karl von Holtei immortalized one of them, Francesco Chiarini; in the 1780s, this Chiarini managed a company of acrobats and puppeteers, and ran a very successful ''Théâtre d’Ombres Chinoises'' (shadow puppet theater). His daughter, Angélique, a celebrated equestrienne, had been featured in 1793 at the [[The Franconi Dynasty|Amphithéâtre Franconi]]&mdash;the former [[Philip Astley|Amphithéâtre Astley]]&mdash;in Paris, and later in the troupe of [[Jacques Tourniaire]].
 Another branch of the Chiarini family was that of the "''Première Grande Troupe Mimo-Chorégraphique Chiarini (créée en 1710, aux Fuanmbules de Paris, par son Grand-père)''" ("The premier great mime-choreographic Chiarini company, created by his grandfather in 1710 at Paris’s Théâtre des Funambules"), from which came the famous nineteenth-century ropedancer, [[Adélaïde Chiarini]].
 ===Enter Giuseppe Chiarini===

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 ===Enter Giuseppe Chiarini===
-[[Image:Giuseppe_Chiarini.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Giuseppe Chiarini]]Giuseppe Chiarini was born in 1823 in Rome, then the capital of the Papal States. His father, Gaetano, was a trick rider and horse trainer who had worked for the Franconis&mdash;and Giuseppe himself would later be known as a pupil of [[The Franconi Dynasty|Adolphe Franconi]], which was indeed an excellent reference. In time, the young Chiarini became a remarkable horse trainer, high-school rider, and a versatile all-around equestrian.
+[[Image:Giuseppe_Chiarini.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Giuseppe Chiarini]]Giuseppe Chiarini was born in 1823 in Rome, then the capital of the Papal States. His father, Gaetano, was a trick rider and horse trainer who had worked for the Franconis&mdash;and Giuseppe himself would later be known as a pupil of [[The Franconi Dynasty|Adolphe Franconi]], which was indeed an excellent reference. In time, the young Chiarini became a remarkable horse trainer, high-school rider, and a versatile all-around equestrian.
 At age sixteen, Giuseppe joined the company of another great Italian equestrian and director, [[Alessandro Guerra]] (1782-1862)&mdash;whose aggressive performing style had won him the nickname, "Il Furioso."  With him, Chiarini went to perform from Vienna, where Guerra was based, to Eastern and Northern Europe, and to St. Petersburg, then the capital of Imperial Russia, where Guerra opened a resident circus in 1845. Giuseppe stayed in St. Petersburg until the end of 1846, at which time Guerra’s circus was overcome by the competition of [[Paul Cuzent]]’s ''Cirque de Paris'' (which was to become [[Russia%27s_First_National_Circus|Russia’s first Imperial Circus]]). Guerra and most of his company, including Chiarini, returned to Vienna.

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 Images published in the Australian newspapers show that his big top was now a modern, two-pole American tent&mdash;much stabler than a single-pole tent, and easier to set up. (Not to mention that it also allowed an open, pole-free ring!) The Stoodleys were still with the company, as well as the Walhalla Brothers, the Faust Family, and the aerial gymnasts French and Angelo. The British clown [[James Holloway]], father of Chiarini’s former stalwart, Kate Holloway, had then joined the company.
-[[File:Chiarini_Circus_-_Emperor's_Visit.jpg|thumb|left|400px|Visit of the Emperor of Japan to Chiarini's Circus (1886)]]At the beginning of 1886, Chiarini’s company visited Hong Kong and the Philippines, and sailed to Macao (then a Portuguese enclave in China), where they landed in May. Another successful Chinese tour ensued, interspersed by visits to Seoul, in Korea, and to Japan: The ''Royal Italian Circus'' was in Yokohama at the end July, and would also visit Nagasaki, Kobe, Kyoto, Osaka, and Tokyo. When the company requested permission to enter Japan, it listed a multinational group of Italians, Americans, Germans, Australians, French, British, Greeks, and Dutch&mdash;and thirteen men from Manila, who were the show musicians.
+[[File:Chiarini_Circus_-_Emperor's_Visit.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Visit of the Emperor of Japan to Chiarini's Circus (1886)]]At the beginning of 1886, Chiarini’s company visited Hong Kong and the Philippines, and sailed to Macao (then a Portuguese enclave in China), where they landed in May. Another successful Chinese tour ensued, interspersed by visits to Seoul, in Korea, and to Japan: The ''Royal Italian Circus'' was in Yokohama at the end July, and would also visit Nagasaki, Kobe, Kyoto, Osaka, and Tokyo. When the company requested permission to enter Japan, it listed a multinational group of Italians, Americans, Germans, Australians, French, British, Greeks, and Dutch&mdash;and thirteen men from Manila, who were the show musicians.
 These Japanese stands were enormously successful. In November 1886, Chiarini and his company performed in Tokyo for the Emperor Mitsuhito and his court; it was the first time the Meiji Emperor had ever seen a circus performance, and he presented Chiarini with $5,000 in gold. The Meiji era (1868-1912) marked the opening of Japan to the West and the industrial world, and Chiarini’s visit was an event of importance: Japanese nobility, government officials, and businessmen feted the company, and the Japanese artists Yoshu Chikanobu and Masanobu Sakuradai issued wonderful prints of Chiarini’s performance&mdash;which are today much sought-after collectibles.

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 ===Australasian Encore===
-[[File:Chiarini_Ad_-_Wellington.png|Ad for Chiarini's circus in Wellington, New Zealand (1879)|thumb|300px|right]]After a tour of California and Nevada, Chiarini returned home and, on September 20, 1879, set sail for Auckland, New Zealand, where he arrived one month later with a company of 32 performers and employees. He hired the remaining personnel locally, since the ''Royal Italian Circus'' was later reported to have a total of 75 persons working for it. The menagerie included twenty-six horses; five Shetland ponies; two zebras; a bison; a guanaco; three tigers, and three cubs born en route to Auckland; and an apparently large collection of performing dogs.
+[[File:Chiarini_Ad_-_Wellington.png|Ad for Chiarini's circus in Wellington, New Zealand (1879)|thumb|280px|right]]After a tour of California and Nevada, Chiarini returned home and, on September 20, 1879, set sail for Auckland, New Zealand, where he arrived one month later with a company of 32 performers and employees. He hired the remaining personnel locally, since the ''Royal Italian Circus'' was later reported to have a total of 75 persons working for it. The menagerie included twenty-six horses; five Shetland ponies; two zebras; a bison; a guanaco; three tigers, and three cubs born en route to Auckland; and an apparently large collection of performing dogs.
 The show was in large part similar to what he had presented in San Francisco, with a few changes of personnel. After Auckland, Chiarini performed in Nelson, Wellington, Wanganui, Christchurch, Asburton, and Timaru, before sailing to Australia. On land, the circus traveled on a special thirty-four cars train, including boxcars for the animals and equipment, and carriages for the personnel.

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 ===China And The Orient===
-[[File:Chiarini_Poster_1881.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Chairini in Calcutta (1881)]]In 1881, Chiarini’s circus visited India, Malaysia, Burma, Ceylon (today’s Sri Lanka), and Singapore&mdash;from where Giuseppe, who was performing there in June, reported a calamitous string of deaths in the company, among whom his tiger trainer, Charles Warner, of smallpox in Calcutta (he was replaced by Harry Ager); his boss canvasman, Andy Johnson, of cholera in Malaysia; and Mrs. Henry Charles Lee, the mother (or stepmother) of Lavater Lee, after giving birth to a son in Burma.
+[[File:Chiarini_Poster_1881.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Chairini in Calcutta (1881)]]In 1881, Chiarini’s circus visited India, Malaysia, Burma, Ceylon (today’s Sri Lanka), and Singapore&mdash;from where Giuseppe, who was performing there in June, reported a calamitous string of deaths in the company, among whom his tiger trainer, Charles Warner, of smallpox in Calcutta (he was replaced by Harry Ager); his boss canvasman, Andy Johnson, of cholera in Malaysia; and Mrs. Henry Charles Lee, the mother (or stepmother) of Lavater Lee, after giving birth to a son in Burma.
 In India, the circus traveled as usual by train. At the end of his Indian tour, in March 1882, Chiarini and his company set sail for Manila and the Philippines, then a Spanish colony, where the company performed as the ''Royal Spanish Circus'', as it had done long before in South America. Then, Chiarini and his troupe sailed to Hong Kong.

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 Image:Giuseppe_Chiarini.jpg|Giuseppe Chiarini
 File:Circo_Chiarini_1876.jpg|Circo Chiarini in São Paulo (1876)
 File:Chiarini_Poster_1881.jpg|Chiarini's Circus in Calcutta (1881)
 Image:Chiarini_Chikanobu.jpg|Chiarini's Circus in Japan, by Yoshu Chikanobu (1886)