Leaning Tower of Pisa

Does in fact lean, and it leans a lot. So does the big Cathedral next to it. The tower has been stopped from continuing to lean and now forty tourists per thirty minutes are allowed to climb up to the top. (not us - reservations required way in advance). The cathedral is undergoing serious work to shore it up right now.

Inside the Basilica, no ordinary cathedral here, was one fancy dan pulpit. carved in marble from 1301 to 1310 by Giovianno Pisanno. Everything carved represents a faith foundational belief or Bible story.  The details are detailed. And one of the repeated stories in paintings, frescos and in marble relief is the killing of the innocents that precipitated the flight of Mary and Joseph to Egypt. Well this story is told here as well.

Altar too was somewhat fancy.

And like the D'uomo in Florence, there was a baptistry building.

We got to go up to the upper story in this one and while we were up a man began singing down below. Quite impressive acoustics and very beautiful effect.

From the second level of the baptistry I got this photo of the leaning tower and leaning Basilica. The front of the Basilica is pretty fancy too.

My favorite building in the Pisa complex was the Composanto Monumental (Monumental Cemetery).  This was a huge structure built over dirt from Golgotha brought back by boat by the Second Crusade and put under the building so that people buried here would be buried in sacred soil. This is just a fraction of the size. It is actually quite large as each of the two lateral sides are very long.

The building was slightly damaged during WWII by an errant Allied bomb but is now repaired. The frescos inside are quite faded and are peeling off the walls in many places but are slowly being restored.  They tell stories of heaven, hell, saints, Bible stories and heroic acts of crusaders.

 

Around the room are various crypts and funeral urns over 1000 years old and into the 20th century.   There were statutes, busts and all kinds of memorandum added by various nobles and churchmen alike. I particularly liked this of a Italian military(?) man who died in 1920. Undoubtedly a hero from WWI.  

There was no mincing the matter of death either, note the skull and cross bones at the lower half of this tomb in the floor. A coat of arms is on the upper half. There were many tombs in the floor.

And a Crusader, I think, lies under this stone, in Holy Land dirt. Makes for a good story anyway, and I am sticking with it. If not this one, then certainly one we walked over.

This is one well visited site. Cannot overstate, well visited. From around the world and taking pictures galore.

A very common pose was to act as if one were holding the tower up or pushing it over. Here you can see a couple of people doing one or the other.  

And here a family doing both. Patt and I did neither.

Of course you should ask Charles and Linda for their photos!  Classic!

Traveling in Tuscany

After leaving Florence we went to Lucca and stayed in a villa on the edge of town and visited the old walled city and other towns in the area.  \This bridge from medieval times was on the road to Barga.  

On the way back, (Barga does not make the blog) we stopped by the very scenic town of Bagni de Lucca on the Lima river.

Apparently they did not get along with their neighbors back in the day as the city was well fortified, replete with very old timey watch towers, which despite my aversion to being a knight in shining armor, I really liked. Old coats of arms once decorated the little arch things. Back in the day I bet it looked good. This was part of a row of battlements along the river bank.

The main city plaza, well THE city plaza was also a market place, guy with camper trailer to my left was selling flowers. The plaza was an ideal place for a late morning cup of coffee.  

More city walls, Italian flag, green, white red vertical colors, and arch to a bridge.

Across the bridge, an old apartment building that if you notice in the next to top floor left window someone was shaking out laundry or something.

Just a not so old bridge we passed on the road, built in 1847 or some recent year like that. Most of what we were looking at was 10th to 16th century, and often built on Roman and Etruscan ruins.

Lucca was a rather large town that maintained its city walls and gates, this was one of them. City streets were narrow and relatively haphazard by my reckoning.

Within the gate, there were several mechanisms to thwart invaders, note the locking teeth on the wooden inner gate that could be lowered as a first barrier.  It was not the only one. The moat had been filled to make a drive, but was maintained around part of the permitter.

The city walls were still thick and could take a pounding from cannon fire and provided for very good fields of fire for defenders to give attackers quite a difficult time. That is of course if the sun did not bother the defenders as much as it apparently does Charles, Linda and Patt. The sergeant of the guard better put them on lookout duty facing west in the morning and east in the evening.

Florence: a few last photos

That folks is the sarcophagus of none other than Nicholas Machiavelli. Yes-sir-re-bob. One in the same, and in a church too. A big fancy church — the Basilica Santa Croce,   "Might makes right" and all that stuff. This guy's philosophy of leadership would not lead one to believe he would be comfortable in a church but here he is with gilded marble too. This church had a all star cast of bodies around in a number of sarcophagi.  Galileo and Michelangelo happen to be the only name that come to mind now, but Marconi was born in Florence and had a plaque in the church. Florence had something special going there for a while.   

We toured the Pitti Palace, not the Pity Palace nothing pitiful about this place, and these boys collected art with a passion—  check out this room. This is what I call decorating a room.  Walls covered in paintings, middle of the room with sculpture, and ceiling with art work too. Went all out on the crown molding too if you will notice. No need for wall paper, if you have a spare wall, get someone to do a fresco.

Patt liked this room, thought we should make an addition to the house back home and furnish it in a smiler fashion. Problem is that the current lot is not hig enough for the room. The chandelier would fit in our den-family room though if we took out all the furniture and cut out some of the floor. I liked  some of the nude sculptures in the niches around the room.  

That is the Duomo in the background. It sorta dominates the plaza and is just plain impressive.  Meant to have more photos in the previous post about it.

From the inside, it is actually rather plain.

And the doors of the baptistry.

And from the reliquary in the one of the larger churches we were in. I meant to remember, perhaps Santa Croce. This is a jaw bone, one of the more impressive of the bones collected. This particular collection of the relics of the saints was also impressive as it had some all-star saints among those collected. We are talking a couple of the original 12 and others you have heard of.

And this relic just happens to be a piece of a robe that belonged to St Francis of Assisi. Says so right on the little plaque. I am not a big fan of relics, some people must have been at one time because they are displayed in some mighty fancy containers.

We left Florence for Lucca, a much smaller but equally quaint tourist town west of Florence. Charles had the responsibility of renting a car for the four of us. I knew not to expect a Volvo or Range Rover or big Mercedes, but this was being just a little too conservative. These cars park vertically like a motor cycle have about as much power as a lawnmower, appear to have all the comfort of a milking stool, and roominess of a small pill box.  We'll manage.

Florence has some atmosphere too

Photo was taken while walking out on the street where our hotel was. Through the arches was a plaza where we had late night meals and a lunch or two. Turning right was the main square with the Duomo a couple of blocks away.  

Having lunch in the aforementioned plaza. Note accordion players in background playing Italian songs. Unfortunately they were short on 50s music.

One of the narrow streets, there were some more like this. All seemed to provide deep shade.

There are a lot of positions I would not have wanted to hold in olden days and knight is one of them.  Armor wearing does not look comfortable, sight lines out of most of the helmets look pretty poor, the weight of the weapons appear to be a bit more than I could have handled on a good day, and the consequences of being in conflict seem to be pretty severe.

Oh, and as far as getting into one of these armor suits, they appear to only come in small sizes.  Apparently there were no large broad shouldered knights.

And this is the Duomo, or St Mary of the Flowers Basilica. There were three buildings, a Basilica (church), a tower, and a baptistery (separate building just for baptisms). These buildings were built by the Medici's not because the town needed another church as far as I could tell, but because they thought they needed a bigger fancier one than any other family. You know, my church tower is bigger than….

One thing this does is employ artists, the ceiling inside of the baptistery was amazing. The roof had concentric panels that told bible stories, Joseph, Creation, Jesus' life, and events from Genesis. The doors were 3-d carved, cast bronze.  

Back side of the Duomo at night - it is most impressive - day or night.

Lots of statutes of Hercules beating the crap out of someone, male or female, apparently does not matter, usually with a club though occasionally he strangled people. There is one statute we saw where another Greek god he was wrestling grabbed Hercules where it would get his, Hercules', attention. As a result of seeing all these statutes, I am no longer a fan of the big H.

Check out one of Cosimo Medici's murals. This is the Great Hall in one of his houses.  

The view of the same wall from the balcony.

And a view of the ceiling.

He liked art

The "lucky boar of Florence".  People wait in line to touch this bronze pig and get their photo taken.  Now I will not get sick, will make lots of money, come back to Florence, have lots of children, triumph over my enemies, win lotteries, drive fast cars, and have a picture made of me touching the the lucky boar of Florence. I don't know how lucky this boar was, one of my favorite meals I had while in town was pasta and boar sauce (that one not so lucky).

Florence and Cosimo Medici

That is Cosimo Medici and me in one of the piazzas in Florence. I like Cosimo. Cosimo was a highly successful banker, read rich like he was the Pope's and the Vatican's banker - for real, and he lead Florence to military success over the neighboring city states establishing Florence as a leading independent City State.

Though Cosimo lived in the late 1300s early 1400s he liked to picture himself as a Roman General like Caesar and so did dress up. And that is him below. Me, I liked the Lone Ranger and did dress up too, but stopped about the time I was 10 or 11. Of course, I was not the Pope's banker either.

Cosimo liked art. He and his descendants were major sponsors of artists like Michelangelo and this painting of the Holy Family. A revolutionary painting too. They are not pictured as royalty. Notice that? Bet you did't at first. Also the folds in Mary's robes are special and the men in the background are in the poses of Roman and Greek Gods for a reason I forgot but the placement of all the people do form a cross. Just a little art appreciation here for you.

Sculpture is a specialty of public places in Florence. Here is Aeneas doing heroic deeds. Lots of naked bodies on display. Men seemed to suffer particular indignities over the centuries as a result too.

The Arno River runs through town and wouldn't you know it. Several picturesque bridges cross it.  This is one of the more picturesque. The second story passageway above the colonnade along side the river,  crossing the bridge and in the photo below emerged from the building we were in, the Uffizi Museum.

The Uffizi was the initial home of the Medici family until they felt it was too small and they built a new summer home across the Arno. The passageway was was their way to get from "one 'place' to the other"  without having to be on the street. Sometimes families did not get along with other families in Florence. The towers built as part of the palaces here are for protection as well as my tower is bigger than your tower.

Over the years the Medici family started buying art, especially one of the Pope's nephew Medici family leaders Ferdinand - perhaps though Cosimo did some buying too, and they purchased a lot of portraits and commissioned a lot too. I liked these two among several. The young man is by Guisto Sustermans who painted during the mid 1600s.

I forgot who painted this woman who is believed to be a nice of Cosimo as it is believed the necklace she is wearing belonged to Cosimo's wife. Any rate, note the detail and precision of the artist. These guys were good.

Check out the eye and the hair. The hair looks like it was just washed and was prepared especially for the sitting. Each individual hair captured —

Now check out the detail in the jewelry in the gown she was wearing. And the jewelry around her neck. Yes a little care and detail. Some skill involved. This is why I like classical art.

Oh and Michelangelo was a pretty good at carving too. This is David. There were a lot of people trying to see him. They should. David is dressed in a sling shot and is holding a rock. Either about to or just has killed Goliath. You will have to ask Michelangelo.

My photos simply did not do this sculpture justice. Check it out on the internets.

We are in Lucca now and have continued to have difficulty with internet, especially uploading photos to the blog, so not sure how regular blogging will be. Florence was nearly impossible, here it is a bit better and we will have more "down" or slow time so hopefully I can catch up a bit.