The Via Francigena

The Via Francigena is a medieval pilgrimage route that originated circa 990 AD when the Archbishop of Canterbury undertook a pilgrimage to Rome to meet Pope John XV.  When he returned to England he wrote of his experience traveling through France and Italy along with much spiritual contemplation about how the experience had benefited him.  The route he took thus became ‘popularized’ and emulated by many.  It became known as the Via Francigena mostly because a good deal of it cuts through France.  It is believed that this route was followed in 1219 (unsure of year) by St Francis who walked from Assisi to Rome to get the Pope’s blessing on his newly established Order of the Friars Minor.  Saint Francis (real name Giovanni di Pietro di  Bernardone; his nickname was Francesco because his mother was French) first walked to Rome in 1209 to meet with Pope Innocent III. 

It’s a very intriguing story in that one of the contentions the Church had with the Friars Minor was Francis’ insistence that the monks NOR the order actually own anything.  There was also the insistence that they live a life of poverty among the poor.  The property issue was not received well and this brought some contention between the Pope and Francis.  The Pope did not immediately accept this Order, but did so after some ‘modifications’.

The Via Francigena cuts through Viterbo and you can still walk in the steps of thousands of pilgrims through the centuries, including those of St Francis and his followers. 

Remember also that St Francis was the first environmentalist J and animal lover. 

Most High, all-powerful, good Lord,

all praise is yours, all glory, all honor,
and all blessing.

To you, alone, Most High, do they belong.

No mortal lips are worthy to pronounce your name.

All praise be yours, my Lord,

through all you have made,

and first my lord Brother Sun, who brings the day;

and through whom you give us light.

How beautiful is he, how radiant in all his splendor;

Of you, Most High, he bears the likeness.

All Praise be yours, my Lord, through Sister Moon

and the stars; in the heavens you have made them,

bright, and precious, and fair.

All praise be yours, my Lord,

through Brothers wind and air, and fair and stormy,

all the weather's moods,

by which you cherish all that you have made.

All praise be yours, my Lord, through Sister Water,

so useful, humble, precious and pure.

All praise be yours, my Lord, through Brother Fire,

through whom you brighten up the night.

How beautiful is he, how cheerful!

Full of power and strength.

All praise be yours, my Lord, through our Sister

Mother Earth, who sustains us and governs us,

and produces various fruits with colored flowers

and herbs.

All praise be yours, my Lord …

He might have quenched his thirst at this fountain......

Fabulocity!!

When fabulousness reaches a level of terrific speed, you find yourself experiencing what I call fabulocity.  And if there is any city in the world where this tends to happen DAILY, it’s Florence. Today was a full out, double-gelato-con-panna-in-a-sugar-cone kind of day.  I just had to hold on and run with it.   

I began my day at the Cappelle Medicee.  The Medici Chapels are split into three main areas that are available to tourists.  You actually enter into the crypt and there you find some tombs of ‘lesser’ family members.  There is also an awesome display of reliquaries that were owned by the family over the centuries.  Honestly, I love these.  I do!  There’s something very haunting and beautiful and mysterious about them.  And artistically, some are over the top beautiful.  I know some of you can’t get over the …. shall we call it ‘immorality’ of the relic business, but I don’t want to hear it.  They’re gorgeous.  Period. 

From there you go up a staircase to the main chapel where the more historically/politically important members of the Medici family are.  And… it’s breathtaking.  The ENTIRE room is created out of semi-precious stone and marble. 

Then the next floor up is where Lorenzo the Magnificent’s tomb is.  It is graced with an ‘autograph work’ of Michelangelo along with a work by Montorsoli and one by Montelupo.  Michelangelo did all three works for the tomb of Giuliano, Duke of Nemours (brother of Pope Leo X) where he portrayed the Duke as a military captain.

From there I meandered to Dante Alighieri’s neighborhood and to the church, Chiesa di San Marguerita, where he according to legend first saw Beatrice, the woman/child who would be the muse for his great work Commedia. 

I then walked to the mercato centrale, the huge market that is in the San Lorenzo neighborhood.  There are two levels.  The ground level is a bustling, loud, cheery, totally Italian scream-fest of vendors selling the most exquisite fruit, vegetables, breads, fish and meat and chickens like you have never seen in the US.  Okay, let me pause here and say something about the chicken we have in the states.  Why is it so big, and so uniform and so white and so…. Unreal?  Because when you first look at what a real chicken carcass looks like you will be concerned.  I’m concerned. 

You walk up the stairs and you find yourself in a very chic food court.  No Wetzel’s Pretzels here, darlings.  But you will find pasta with black truffle pearls … and a glass of wine.

I then walked to the convent of San Marco.  This was founded in the 13^th century and then enlarged in 1437 when Dominican monks from nearby Fiesole moved there at the invitation of Cosimo il Vecchio.  The expansion included a beautiful cloister walk and garden along with individual monk cells that are about 8’x6’.  He then commissioned Fra Angelico to paint a vast series of frescoes.  Each monk’s cell has one.  But the jewel in the crown is this one: The Annunciation.

Does this Titian make me look fat?

Ummm....

Uh.... I don't know....

From a distance.....

oh goodness.....  

Florence... it's more than just a plague town

I don’t know… maybe it’s just me… but when I’m in Florence and I’m standing by the river Arno which moves at snail speed and it’s hot and it’s humid and there are zillions of people, two words come to mind: Bubonic Plague.

Really. 

Out of all the cities in Europe, Firenze stands out as plague central.  I think it’s the river. 

HOWEVER, it is still glorious!  When I got off the train one of the first things I did was go have lunch at a marvelous trattoria.  I ordered a Quattro Stagionne  pizza that was thin as a cracker and a bowl of Tuscan white beans drizzled with olive oil.

Okay,,,,,, there is nothing better in the world.  I had to write a poem, an ODE to the Tuscan white bean:

Oh, Faggioli Blanci

The Ganymede of beans,

Puffy pillows of love, salty sweet beany goodness

Oh silent verdura gloriosa

Make me thy lyre!  (oh wait, I think that’s someone else’s line)

Bathing in olive nectar

Content in your perfection.

From the restaurant one meanders to the plague river and contemplates it.

Then you just simply must WALK like a MONKEY because this city is beyond fabulous.  Here I tucked into the Church of St Marguerite and ‘someone’ I thought it said Galliano but it’s not the designer.  Really, it’s not. 

Onward to the Duomo.  And there really are no words to describe the experience of seeing this church.  It’s otherworldly.  And it has become Florence’s most famous symbol.  It is Europe’s 4^th largest church and remains to this day the city’s tallest building.  Brunelleschi’s dome, finished in 1463, was the largest of its time and was built without scaffolding.  The outer shell is supported by a thicker inner shell that acts as a sort of platform for it. 

Then I visited San Lorenzo.  This was the parish church of the Medici family and was rebuilt via a commission to Brunelleschi to remake it in a classical style. 

From there it’s only a few misguided turns and a bit of being lost until you find yourself at Santa Maria Novella.  This is stunning.  Stunning, darlings.  It was built by the Dominicans between 1279 and 1357.  The lower Romanesque part of its façade was incorporated into one based on Classical elements, thanks to architect Leon Battista Alberti.  One of its many prizes is Masaccio’s Trinity, which shows the incorporation of linear perspective to in neat effect.

A Student's Life

I have had a very busy week with exams and projects and writing.... How do students do it?
I know how I manage it.... with dinners like this:

This is some cauliflower and pecorino stuffed ravioli along with a handful of penne and zucchini all mixed with a pesto sauce.  Just a side note on pasta sauces: it is so easy to make a basic sauce.  Yes, some olive oil, garlic, pepperoncino, add the cooked pasta and some pasta water and then toss in a bit of cheese.  Got it.  Super simple and divine.  But sometimes, curiosity leads you to the prepared sauce aisle at the IperCOOP where you just stare in wonder.  Oh, they have fabulous prepared sauces!  Wild boar, duck, meat with liver, mushroom, olive, you name it.  It's glorious and it's actually one of the VERY VERY FEW prepared foods you will find in an Italian supermarket.

Here you simply do not have aisle after aisle of prepared foods.  Things like rice mixes and soups and one pan casserole concoctions.  They don't do it. 

So the result is that one eats lots of 'whole foods', I guess.  This suits me fine. 

Tomorrow I am off to Florence for CONTINUING Glory and Beauty so stay tuned!!

Sunday.Home.Work

A rainy, stormy Sunday in Viterbo.  The perfect day to get caught up on homework.  I could be the only one here actually DOING homework which shows you what a GEEK I am.  Anyway, I have an Italian exam on Tuesday and I have set a goal to improve massively.  Not that the last one was bad but I do think I can do better.  Also, spent some time reading Purgatorio and getting ready for the Dante class this week. 

I went to mass at San Lorenzo this morning.  It’s the church dedicated to Santa Maria Liberatrice, which you may remember from an earlier post.  It’s just so splendid and very old school Catholic. 

Later in the day I returned to do a little more homework for my drawing class.  The theme of my drawing notebook is Dante associations in Viterbo, of which there are quite a few.  For example, Pope John XXI is mentioned in Paradiso, as Dante placed him among the virtuous physicians.  He is called Pietro Spano in Dante’s Comedia because he was Portuguese.  In fact, I think he might be history’s only Portuguese Pope.  He was made Pope and set up residence in the Papal Palace at Viterbo.  He had a room built for himself; a sort of studio where he could work on his various projects.  The room collapsed and he was killed.  He was Pope for only a little time, poor guy.  Following his death there was chatter that he was actually an alchemist or a necromancer and up to devious craft and that is why God squashed him.  Not sure about that.  But here is his final resting place in San Lorenzo.

This is the way to do homework.  In a centuries old church, next to a Pope, the sunbeams shining in on a Marian shrine, and the organist practicing:

St. Catherine of Siena

The field trip to Siena was to focus on the 12-14^th century contributions of artists, builders and ‘unwitting’ politicians, namely Catherine of Siena.  My medieval history class is putting a lot of emphasis on examining and re-evaluating the notion of static and (to some people’s minds) clear cut categories of human experience.  Namely, that the Middle Ages, the “dark” ages, lasted for about 1100 years before someone just came along and flipped the light switch on which brought everyone out from under the mushroom they were living under. 

Siena was a very important city for many reasons.  It vied with other ‘city-states’ in terms of its prestige and wealth, but really came to fame with the presence of St. Catherine of Siena (1347-1380).  Caterina di Giacomo di Benincasa was born in Siena in 1347 in the middle of the massive Bubonic plague epidemic.  She was one of twins, and her mother had them prematurely.  Her mother reportedly had already had 22 children (half of which had died) and so when these babies insisted on being born, most likely delivery induced by illness, she was helped by a wetnurse to care for the twin sister, Giovanna, to no avail.  Caterina flourished though and was given the nickname of Euphrosyne (Gk. for ‘joy’) as a young girl.

It was as a young girl that she began to have visions and visitations from Christ.  She was convinced that God had some special life in mind for her and so when at the age of 16 her parents began looking for suitable husbands for her, she cut off her glorious long hair and began fasting as a way of making herself unattractive.  Catherine’s desire was to dedicate her life to Christ and join the Dominican order.  And this her parents finally gave in to.

As a nun she became a brilliant scholar, logician and rhetorician.  She is known mostly for the prominent role she took in ending the Great Schism of the Church when the papacy was split between Rome and Avignon.

The Church of San Dominico in Siena has an interesting shrine dedicated to her.  In a side chapel, is her head.  This photo isn’t very good, unfortunately, but her head in encased in a gold casket.  The rest of her body is in Rome. 

The Duomo in Siena is enormous, even though its original plan was dashed because it was simply too ambitious for its time.  There simply wasn’t an architect around who could figure out the complexities of completing it according to its original scope.  But it’s so very beautiful with its distinctive black and white marble color scheme… and tribute to the Dominicans who were based there.

We also had a trip to the ‘crypt’ beneath the Cathedral.  Even though it’s not really a crypt it is referred to as such.  It’s actually a subterranean chapel of sorts that was only recently discovered.  What is marvelous is that the frescoes are in amazing shape because of being essentially sealed up all these centuries.  The colors, vibrancy and emotional intensity of these works is breathtaking.

Let's have a thorough look around: