Tag Archive for: Italy

Hi Folks!

The panoramic view from Castel San Pietro over Verona gives only a hint of the beauty of this marvelous city. The bridge in the photo was built by Romans and is called the Ponte Pietra. The tall construction is the bell tower of Verona Cathedral. I could go on and on about the sights in Verona. The Roman and medieval landmarks in Verona are just overwhelming and the restaurants serve the finest dishes in northern Italy. It is no wonder that three of Shakespeare’s plays are set in Verona. Although Shakespeare never even visited the city, what a shame.

Verona is known as the city of love. If you are planning to visit there, you should see Baz Luhrmann’s document Romeo + Juliet (1996) to get into the right mood for diving into Verona’s vivid social life. The document is about Romeo DiCaprio and his girlfriend Juliet Capulet who lived in Verona some years ago. One could say that they had some difficulties in their relationship. It only shows that not even all the Veronese have luck in their love.

The courtyard beneath Juliet’s balcony is the most visited sites in the town. Aaw, people are so romantic. But for real, get a grip! It’s only a balcony and you can see it in the photo right below.

– Gart

Verona – The balcony of Juliet’s house

Hi Folks,

Who would have thought that one of the most remarkable medieval monuments is located in a town that’s famous for its cheese and ham. The Baptistery of Parma is made of pink marble. The construction work begun in the 12th century under the supervision of architect Benedetto Antelami. Based only how the Baptistery looks outside, I can understand why it’s considered to remarkable. But what’s really astonishing is that there is only one storey and no interior walls in the Baptistery. It’s basically one very tall room on ground level.

I heard from a reliable source that Benedetto enjoyed his Parmigiano Reggiano and Prosciutto a bit too much. And as we all know, such a heavy diet makes you drowsy. Who cares about adding floors and walls in the drawings when you’ve had one cheese chunk too many. Luckily Benedetto wasn’t a big fan of Spumante. Otherwise the pink marble could be just a pile of rocks next to Parma Cathedral’s bell tower.

– Gart

Hi Folks,

This is Colosseum, or more formally the Flavian Amphitheatre. I didn’t know men could build such things. After it was completed in 80 AD, it was included in different versions of the list of Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.  The poet Martial (40-102 AD) went even a little bit further. He instructed to lose the whole list of Seven Wonders as, “Rome’s Colosseum is the world’s one and only truly amazing building”.

Some blood has bled on the arena’s dirt, and Maximus, the gladiator best known to the modern world, totally nailed it: “What we do in life echoes in eternity”. The amphitheater served as a venue for gladiator fights, animal hunts, executions and re-enactments of famous battles for nearly 5 centuries. The events were enormous: In 107 contests involved 11,000 animals and 10,000 gladiators during the 123 days. At least 50,000 spectators could fit into the arena to chant Life! in support to their favorite gladiators. And sometimes the crowd convinced the emperor to save their favorite’s life.

Regardless of earthquakes, stone-robbers, tourists and the amount of water flown under the bridge, the Colosseum still stands. And that is good news to all of us. Namely, already the ancient Romans knew the following:

          “As long as the Colosseum stands, so shall Rome; when the Colosseum falls, Rome shall fall; when Rome falls, so falls the world.”

-Gart

Hi Folks!

This, my friends, is a nuraghe. Nuraghes were built by Nuragic people; I do not think the similarity in the name of the people and the construction is a coincidence. Nuragic people inhabited Sardinia some 3000 years ago up to the second century AD. There are over 7 thousand nuraghes in Sardinia. I have heard that nuraghes are not very popular these days, and I guess it is understandable. For instance in Costa Smeralda (a very posh area in Sardinia) some houses cost over 300.000 EUR per square meter (I know, sounds unbelievable but Costa Smeralda is the priciest place in Europe). Imagine owning a house over there and then your kids start begging: “daddy, mommy please buy us a trampoline”. Now you already paid a few millions for the house and the backyard, but just cannot fit a trampoline on your yard when there’s already a patio, possibly a pool and definitely a barbeque and then! An ancient nuraghe takes most of the space. In those moments you might begin to wonder how on earth could I get rid of the nuraghe or would it just be easier to buy a bigger lot. After all, the nuraghe has been sitting there for couple of thousand years before You.

Santu Antine is one of the largest nuraghes in Sardinia. It used to be some kind of a fortress. I guess there isn’t a clear consensus on the function of the nuraghes – we know quite little of the people who built them. I would be surprised if Nuragic had been that much different from you and me. And that’s why I am quite confident assuming that Nuragic lived in Nuraghes. I mean it would have kind of been non-intelligent to build a nuraghe and then sleep next to it in a hole in the ground.

– Gart