Here’s a little more info on how to see more of Roman Florence. And, although I typically don’t post advertisements for businesses, this one includes very interesting information about Roman ruins in Florence.
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Happy Birthday, dear Rome!
April 21 is the day the eternal city celebrates its official birth.
This year the capital celebrates its 2,770th birthday. Known as Natale di Roma, the annual birthday celebration is based on the legendary foundation of Rome by Romulus in 753 BC.
Buon compleanni, Roma!
You don’t look a day over 1000!
Now, let’s refresh our memories:
You will remember from your history lessons that Rome was founded as a small settlement atop the Palatine Hill (the hill within the Roman Forum complex), a settlement that would one day become the Caput Mundi (capital of the world).
Archaeology can be used to determine how Rome was actually founded, but it is through the stories orally passed down through history that gives us the colorful legendary story, filled with love, death, nurture and triumph and casts two baby boys, Romulus and Remus, alongside a she-wolf as the protagonists of one of the the world’s most fascinating tales.
The orphaned twins, Romulus and Remus, were the sons of Mars, the God of War, and Rhea Silvia, the daughter of the ex-King Numitor of Alba Longa.
Rhea’s uncle Amulius was threatened by the young babies, convinced that one day they would overthrow him, just as he had done to Rhea’s father. Rhea was forced to forsake her children and an order was given to drown the twins in the River Tiber. Remarkably, the twins survived this brutal attempt at their lives. A she-wolf found the babies and kept them alive by caring for them like they were her pups.
After the she-wolf gave Romulus and Remus a chance at life, Faustulus, a shepherd, adopted them as his own. He raised the boys as leaders of a group of shepherd warriors.
Growing stronger every day, the twins eventually learned that their mother was the daughter of the Kind of Alba Longa; they stormed the empire, claiming their right as heirs, killing the uncle who ordered their death, and reinstating their grandfather as the king.
Having had their revenge, the brothers returned to the place where the she-wolf had found them and set out to build a city of their own.
As so often happens in epic myths (and real life), the two power hungry brothers had a series of disagreements. Romulus ended up killing his brother Remus in a fight and thus Romulus then became the king of the city that they had founded atop the Palatine Hill. He named it “Rome”.
If you’ll be in Rome this weekend, and want to join the party, here’s a resource for activities planned:
http://www.natalidiroma.it/english_3.html
Roman Florence, wherefore art thou?
Buried, about 9 feet under. Did you realize that the true foundation of Florence is entirely Roman?
However, in Florence, unlike Rome, where majestic stretches of crumbled pillars and shells of temples lie in plain site, the ruins in Florence are much more discreet. They pose a difficult but thrilling challenge for the determined history buff to sniff out.
First, an aside. Just before and during Easter, the weather in Florence was spectacular. I started to believe that summer was just around the corner.
Then it cooled off–suddenly and drastically. With rain. I was caught dressed for summer, not believing that winter could possibly crop up again. Boy, was I wrong!
So, with the cooler weather, yesterday seemed like a great day to go underground and catch up on my history lessons by visiting the Roman ruins under the Palazzo Vecchio in the heart of Florence. And that’s how this complicated, historical post got started. Sorry, but every now and then I have to learn something new and today, Roman Florence is it.
This is how Roman-era Florence was laid out.
In case you didn’t remember, Florence was founded by the Romans as a military camp situated on the Via Cassia, the main route between Rome and the north. We even know who established Florence: Lucius Cornelius Sulla in 80 BC.
Lucius Cornelius Sulla built Fluentia as a settlement for his veteran soldiers. The camp was originally named Fluentia, as it was built between two rivers; the name, of course, was later corrupted to Florentia. Sulla built the camp on the orders of Caesar, who specified the building of a military outpost or a castrum, to be built over a 1,800-meter plot that is today the historic center of Florence.
The castrum was quadrangular, enclosed by fortifying walls punctuated by towers and four central gates at cardinal points.
As you can see from the map above, Fluentia was laid out in the style of an army camp with the main streets, the cardo and the decumanus, intersecting at the center. These two major cross-axial streets divided this new Roman settlement into a grid; the cardo ran north-south and was called via Cassia, linking Florentia to Rome. Today that street is called via Roma. The 2nd major roadway was the decumano running east-west. The former decumano is now named both the via degli Strozzi and the via degli Speziali, running parallel to the Arno.
The cross-point of the Roman cardo and decumano is in current-day Piazza della Repubblica. The sculpture that adorns the piazza marks the point of the intersection of the 2 Roman streets.
When standing in the piazza today, to appreciate Roman-era Florence, you must think away all of the currently standing 19th-century palazzi and glitzy cafes in the Piazza della Repubblica, replacing them in your mind’s eye with ancient Roman temples, markets, and courts. For, originally, this area was the Roman period Forum.
The map below shows you where Roman Florence existed within the context of the current city.
The map above outlines the original Roman walls, as well as Via Roma and Via del Corso, and shows you how Florentia, now approximately 3 meters below the modern Florence street level, continues to shape the fabric of the city.
Indeed, the Piazza Della Repubblica has very proud ancient origins for it was once the civic heart of the Roman city, the forum urbis. Around the square was the curia, the ancient senate, and a triad temple dedicated to pagan gods Jupiter, Juno, and Minerva.
If you walk north on via Roma, to the site of the present day Piazza del Duomo, this was the second Roman center of the city; its ruined temples are now buried beneath the Baptistry and Duomo.
South along what would have been the camp’s eastern wall, now the via del Proconsolo, a left turn at via degli Speziali leads to where the eastern city gate would have been. The east gate led to the city’s thermal baths, traces of which can be found inside a modern hotel.
Several street names pay homage to the Roman city, reminding passersby of the more ancient Florence that has been both literally and figuratively buried by history. For example, Via delle Terme is sited where the Roman bath house was located.
Other traces of Rome survive: if you go west along via degli Speziali and turn right onto via delle Farine, you are led to Piazza Sant’Elisabetta. Here survives the Torre Bizantina della Pagliuzza, the oldest tower of Florence, dating back to the sixth century. It is now incorporated into Hotel Brunelleschi, which houses a museum in the tower containing artifacts found during the restoration, including ruins of a Roman calidarium, the classical version of a steam room.
Many other remnants of Roman life can be found. From Piazza della Signoria, which was also an open public space in its Roman past, one can find the former site of the ancient south gate in the city walls. (Near it, in front of the Chanel boutique, notice a map of the ancient Roman city to help guide you on.) And, while you are in the Piazza della Signoria, be sure to notice an ancient Roman treasure. There are a few demure Roman works among the Renaissance statues in the Loggia di Lanzi: this elegant Roman woman pictured below is one such example.
After admiring the Roman lady, leave the piazza by walking along the north side of the Palazzo Vecchio on Via dei Gondi. You will notice that the street slopes down. This is because you are walking down into the ancient Roman theater. The formerly steep steps are now nothing more than a slight slope, built over with centuries of history, but the parts of the theater still exist and you can visit them by going into the Palazzo Vecchio and buying a ticket to see the excavations. That’s what I did yesterday.
The modern excavations have made it possible to bring back to light ruins of ancient thermal baths and other services related to this outdoor theater designed to accommodate 5,000 spectators. The excavation is now open to the public and you enter the area from inside the courtyard of the Palazzo Vecchio.
We just walked down the sloping road that leads from the facade of the Palazzo Vecchio to the street behind it, the via dei Leoni. The theater in its heyday would have looked something like the diagram below.
A side elevation of the Roman theater would have resembled the diagram below, with increasingly large arches emanating from the stage area toward the back, where the balcony seats would have been.
This is the site of a Roman semicircular theater along the back of Palazzo Vecchio and Palazzo Gondi (follow the curved street of via dei Leoni); the theater was positioned at a slight angle within the city walls and is clearly visible in the same old map.
The diagram above shows the more or less rectangular Palazzo Vecchio situated on top of the Roman theater. The theater is the shape that looks like a lemon wedge, with the rectangular Palazzo Vecchio superimposed on top of it.
The studies have shown that it was a relatively big theater, capable of seating 8000-10000 spectators; the auditorium (cavea) had its back towards Piazza della Signoria and the scene was along the actual Via dei Leoni. The theater remained active until the fifth century, then, following the crisis of the Roman Empire, it gradually fell into disuse and decay, subject to damage and looting.
The archaeological excavations brought to light some parts of the radial corridors, on which the auditorium was set in a semicircle, the vomitorium (the central corridor through which the public could access the theater), and the edge of the orchestra platform.
During the following eras, the radial corridors of the theater (burelle) were used in various ways: as landfills, burial places, animal shelters or for a time even as prisons (12th and 13th centuries).
In the Medieval period, typical tower houses were built over the theater’s remains.
The construction and expansion of Palazzo Vecchio marked the ultimate demise of the Roman theater, the memory of which was gradually lost.
It’s only in the second half of the 19th century that the Roman remains “hidden” under Florence begin to resurface, especially during the heavy architectural transformation of the city due to the shift of the Italian capital to Florence in 1865.
Like other structures from the Middle Ages, subsequent layers have come to light: wells, the foundations of houses and other buildings.
Here are the pictures I took yesterday inside the excavations:
Then, looking further afield, there is the Via Vacchereccia, across from Palazzo Vecchio, leads to via Roma (which turns into via Calimala at this point; this is Italy and nothing is simple); this is where the south gate would have opened up to the ancient market place.
The south end walls continued along via delle Terme, turning 90 degrees north on what is now via de’ Tornabuoni. Where via de’ Tornabuoni and via degli Strozzi cross stood the west gate of the Roman city. The west walls turned at a right angle at what is now via dei Banchi, leading to via de’ Cerretani, and the north gate stood where via de’ Cerretani crosses via Roma.
Also from the Roman period, the current day Piazza San Firenze is the site of a Temple of Isis.
Before I end this long complicated post about Roman Florence, please notice the amphitheater, looking a lot like the Roman Colosseum, below.
This picture is of a wooden scale model of Fluentia, as it was originally laid out, with the semi-circular theater we’ve been discussing visible on the city’s walls, just above the model of the oval amphitheater.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Amphitheatre_of_Florence
Outside the walls of the Roman castrum was a second Roman theater, just in front of what is now Piazza Santa Croce: its circular form is still traceable in via Torta and via de’ Bentaccordi.
Archeological excavations carried out for years by Archaeological Cooperative,
under the scientific direction of Superintendence for Archaeological Heritage of
Tuscany, revealed an ancient Roman amphitheater was located precisely under
what is nowadays, and was during the Renaissance, the heart of Florence,
Piazza della Signoria and Palazzo Vecchio. The discovery was announced
during the 2014 UNESCO World Forum on Culture and Cultural Industries.
The following sources informed this post:
http://www.turismo.intoscana.it/allthingstuscany/tuscanyarts/palazzo-vecchio-underground/
And my later post.
Rome’s birthday and her rose and Japanese gardens
I’m headed to Roma soon!
Start your engines!
Rome its 2,770th birthday on Friday 21 April, with events lasting until Sunday 23 April. Known as Natale di Roma, the annual birthday celebration is based on the legendary foundation of Rome by Romulus in 753 BC.
On the roses, see:
http://www.wantedinrome.com/whatson/romes-rose-garden-2/
On Japanese garden, see:
http://www.wantedinrome.com/whatson/japanese-gardens-in-rome-3/
Villa Gamberaia, Settignano
There’s a beautiful spot just outside Florence.
Last week I paid my first visit to the Villa Gamberaia, the 17th-C villa near Settignano, in the hills just outside of Florence. It is a lovely trip out into the country and up into the colline beyond Firenze.
The villa has a lovely, formal 18th-century terraced garden, beautifully restored and open to anyone who presents themselves to the front gate. There is an entrance fee.
The villa, originally a farmhouse; was owned by Matteo Gamberelli, a stonemason, at the beginning of the 15th century. His sons Giovanni and Bernardo became famous architects under the name of Rossellino. After Bernardo’s son sold it to Jacopo Riccialbani in 1597, the house was greatly enlarged, then almost completely rebuilt by the following owner, Zenobi Lapi; documents of his time mention a limonaia and the turfed bowling green that is part of the garden layout today.
In 1717 La Gamberaia passed to the Capponi family. Andrea Capponi laid out the long bowling green, planted cypresses, especially in a long allée leading to the monumental fountain enclosed within the bosco (wooded area), and populated the garden with statues, as can be seen in an etching by Giuseppe Zocchi.
By that time, the villa already stood on its raised platform, extended to one side, where the water parterre is today. The parterre was laid out with clipped broderies in the French manner in the eighteenth century, as a detailed estate map described by Georgina Masson demonstrates. Olive groves have always occupied the slopes below the garden, which has a distant view of the roofs and towers of Florence.
The setting was praised by Edith Wharton, who saw it after years of tenant occupation with its parterre planted with roses and cabbages. Wharton attributed the preservation of the garden at the Villa Gamberaia to its “obscure fate” during the 19th century, when more prominent gardens with richer owners, in more continuous attendance, had their historic features improved right out of existence.
Shortly after Wharton saw the villa, it was purchased in 1895 by Princess Jeanne Ghyka, sister of Queen Natalia of Serbia, who lived here with her American companion, Miss Blood, and thoroughly restored it. It was she who substituted pools of water for the parterre beds.
During World War II, the villa was almost completely destroyed. Marcello Marchi restored it after the war, using old prints, maps and photographs for guidance.
Georgina Masson also wrote about seeing Villa Gamberaia; she saw it after it was restored by Marchi.
The monumental fountain set in a grotto in the steep hillside at one lateral flank of this terraced garden has a seated god next lions in stucco relief in a niche decorated with pebble mosaics and rusticated stonework.
Earl Grey Tea: bergamot oil and black China tea
You know how much I love bergamot.
Did you know that ever since the 19th C., bergamot oil has also been used to give a distinctive aroma and flavor to one of the most popular teas in the world.
Earl Grey is made from a blend of dark China teas treated with the bergamot oil or peel.
It is always said that the tea was named after the second Earl Grey of Howick, Britain’s prime minister from 1830 to 1834. The story revolves around a diplomatic mission to China, when Grey is supposed to have rescued the son of a Chinese mandarin from drowning. The mandarin was said to have been so grateful that he sent a box of bergamot-scented China tea to Grey in London.
There are several things in this story that don’t add up, not least that Grey never set foot in China and bergamot grew only in Calabria.
Nevertheless, it is certain that the English developed a taste for scented teas at about this time, blending Indian and Sri Lankan leaves, dousing them with oil of bergamot and naming the mixture Earl Grey in honour of their prime minister.
Earl Grey tea is still produced in the same way and consumed with undiminished enthusiasm in England. By the mid 19th C., bergamot was produced on an industrial scale, and harvesting the fruit and extracting its oil involved the entire community in the coastal Calabrian villages between Villa San Giovanni and Brancaleone.
The job of picking the bergamot was given to boys and the youngest men in the villages of Calabria. They used pruning knives to remove any stalks that might pierce or damage the skins of other fruit, and then placed the fruit gently in a basket lined with sacking to give it further protection from bruising or chafing that could cause the oil to ooze from its skin and be wasted.
When a basket was full it weighed about thirty kilos. It was the women’s job to hoist the baskets on to their heads and carry them in from the fields to the fabbrica. Here, the working day began at 4 a.m. and finished at 4 p.m.
The skin of a bergamot is so full of oil that it will begin to seep out at the slightest pressure, so initially it was extracted simply by pressing and turning the peel of the fruit against a sponge. The sponge was then squeezed into a glass phial and the liquid was left to settle and separate.
The oil produced by this ancient method is unrivalled, and according to one ‘nose’ in the perfume industry, the difference between it and oil extracted mechanically is ‘just the same as the difference between a bull and a bullock’.
In 1844 the macchina calabrese, the ‘Calabrian machine’, was invented by Nicola Barillà, and this revolutionized the laborious extraction process. A few bergamots of similar size were placed between two metal cups. The lower cup was covered in spikes to hold the fruit still and the upper one was armed with sharp blades. Two men took it in turns to operate the handle that rotated the cups, and the combination of pressure and the movement of the upper cup made oil and water spray out of the peel and fall into a copper bowl.
Finally, the mixture of grated peel and oil would be strained through woollen sacks that were hung from a rack and left to drip into another copper bowl. All of the copper bowls used during the extraction process were lined with tin to prevent the oil reacting with the copper.
Attlee, Helena (2015-01-05). The Land Where Lemons Grow: The Story of Italy and Its Citrus Fruit (Kindle Locations 2412-2422). Countryman Press. Kindle Edition.
Volare
My sunshine existence
A rambling repeat of some of my favorite sunshiny images from just the past few weeks in this lovely locale of Tuscany! I feel so blessed.
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Do the culinary arts follow the same patterns as the visual arts?
Noooo! reveals this clever author:
Cooking does not necessarily follow the same chronology as other fields of creative endeavor.
People did not start eating with more perspective in the Renaissance.
Nor, for that matter, did they dine more ornamentally in the Baroque period,
or more rationally during the Enlightenment.
Dickie, John (2008-01-08). Delizia!: The Epic History of the Italians and Their Food (Kindle Locations 1136-1138). Atria Books. Kindle Edition.
Wow! Florence celebrates Easter Sunday with a bang!
I’ve witnessed some celebrations in my life. But, I can honestly say I’ve never seen anything quite like what happens every Easter morning in Florence!
The celebration that takes place in and in front of the Duomo is somewhere between a Chinese New Year spectacle, combined with something you might see in a festival in India, with some Roman Catholic overtones.
Honestly, I’m still scratching my head!
So, I got to the Piazza del Duomo about 9:45 and already the crowds were thick. I was able to nab a pretty good spot to watch part of the parade arrive in front of the Duomo.
Then I moved to a better spot to see the Carro. Unfortunately, by 10 a.m. the crowds were super thick.
The white oxen festooned with floral wreaths pull the antique Carro to the front of the Duomo and park it there, lining it up with a mechanical dove that will shoot out of the church at the right moment, and alight the Carro.
The beloved Carro or Brindellone returns to piazza del Duomo every year on Easter Sunday. Housed 364 days of the year in via il Prato, this cart filled loaded with fireworks is paraded through the city streets, arriving in front of Santa Maria del Fiore at around 10am. After the cathedral’s morning mass, much pomp and circumstance ensues all leading to the festivity’s ending in a pyrotechnic spectacle.
A dove-shaped rocket called the colombina is ignited inside the cathedral and then runs along a wire out to the Brindellone, which it ignites.
No matter how many pictures I post, nothing will take the place of these Youtube videos. Stay with it, the fireworks are incredible. Not sure how it celebrates the Resurrection of Christ, but that’s not a problem in this famous Florentine celebration!
Legend has it that if the Brindellone alights completely as planned, Florence will have a bountiful harvest and a great year. From the looks of it, 2017 will be a boon year in Firenze!
Enjoy the following videos! Buona Pasqua!
On Easter Sunday every year, Florence celebrates the religious holiday in a very special way. The Scoppio del Carro, or the “Explosion of the Cart”, dates back over 350 years. An elaborate wagon built in 1622 and standing two to three stories high is pulled by a pair of white oxen decorated with garlands through the streets of Florence to the square between the Baptistry and Cathedral.
This tradition finds its origins in events that are partly historic and partly legendary. A young Florentine named Pazzino, a member of the noble Pazzi family, apparently took part in the First Crusade in the Holy Land in 1099, where he gave ample proof of his courage (he was the first to scale the walls of Jerusalem and raise the Christian banner).
When he came home, he brought back three flints from the Holy Sepulchre that he received for his act of courage. This reliquary, today preserved in the Church of SS. Apostoli, lies behind the Florentine celebration for the Resurrection of Christ.
Today, the ceremony still bears a strong resemblance to the way in which it has been celebrated for centuries. Starting around 10am, a priest rubs Pazzino’s three flints together until they spark and light the Easter candle; this, in turn, is used to light some coals which are placed in a container on the Cart and the procession delivers the Holy Fire to the Archbishop of Florence before Santa Maria del Fiore, better known as il Duomo. The cart is accompanied by drummers, flag throwers and figures dressed in historical costume as well as city officials and clerical representatives.
get back, lauretta! 
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