![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Continued from yesterday's post...
The audio guide to the Galleria wasn't great as each entry went on for too long and darted across rather large rooms. The other sculpture highlight was the plaster model of Giambologna's Rape of the Sabine Women, with it's twisting orgasmic form portraying morals gone awry and sheer panic. The original is still in the Loggia dei Lanzi in Piazza Della Signoria, along with 15 other statues including a lion from the second century AD. He looks derpy and be has a ball. The rest of the exhibits focused on biblical themes, particularly wooden alters and adornments to various local churches. There was an interesting temporary exhibit on bibliophily, with a range of interesting books on display but after six hours I was all museumed out and wanted to head back to the hotel. We caught a glimpse of the Medici collection of musical instruments, which we had initially missed so we had to ask the museum lady whether we could go in again. Thankfully she consented. There were cellos and violins from the seventeenth century, and a range of instruments you wouldn't find in an orchestra today including the serpent, the trumpet marine and the hurdy-gurdy. There were also a few interesting inventions too including the vertical piano, which had the strings pointing upwards rather than behind the keys in a conventional piano in order to save space.
After this we did leave, grabbing a slice of pizza from a touristy place near the Duomo called Black Bar which was average at best before heading back to the hotel for a shower before our spa treatment which I have mentioned earlier. The pizza was expensive and indeed that is one thing that has surprised me about Italy - it's not cheap. Granted we have been going to tourist cities but in low season I would have expected things to be cheaper. €6 for a bottle of standard beer says everything and I've been burning through money since I arrived. It has been worth it but it has hurt the wallet somewhat.
Having had four days of heavy touring, we decided to take a break and have ourselves a lie-in on Friday morning. This was aided by two factors, the first not having the window open so the street noise was no longer a problem and the second having a cloudy day meaning the light from the Sun wasn't shining through our curtains. Unfortunately the room was quite hot and I had a nightmare that my current boss turned into my former boss so I was awake anyway, despite the comfort of the bed. Still, we were up for check out by midday and grabbed ourselves a few sandwiches, mine with Parma ham, before we headed over to the Duomo to take a closer look.
The cathedral in Florence is undoubtedly my favourite religious building in the whole world. Every time I look at it I cannot help but be dumbfounded by its sheer beauty. Coloured in green, pink and white marble, it's like a colourful version of York Minister but the adjacent Baptistry and Campanile give the square a greater completeness. You could pay €10 for entry into all of the individual parts of the Duomo but Wolfie opted against this as he's not a fan of heights and the cathedral was free anyway. He waited at the bottom while I climbed up the 414 steps of the Campanile, which is a little like one of the towers at Westminster had one of those towers been standing on their own, separate from the building. The Campanile or bell tower was begun by Grotto in 1334 and completed in 1359 by two successors. It matches the Duomo and the Baptistry in its green, pink and white marble cladding which is what makes this all so unique, not to mention stunning. The views from the top were equally stunning, with the full city layout observable. A lot of the city is built out of rich brown bricks, making for a rather distinctive look, and it's amazing to see just how small this city actually is. In the distance you can also spy the mountains which help grow the Tuscan grapes, which help to produce some of the best wine in the world, which we have been sampling quite considerably. At the top I paid €1 to use the binoculars where I could watch people meandering down the narrow streets and I spied the beautiful frontage of Santa Maria Novella near the station of the same name, again clad in the distinctive green, pink and white marble. On our way back to the station to head back to Rome, we had a closer look and were delighted to find a market around two obelisks right in front of the main entrance. It was a nice image with which to leave Florence as we had only seen the back of the church upon leaving the station on Wednesday. From the top of the Campanile, you also got a great view of the Duomo, including of the people who had climbed to the top. I decided against this, even though it was included in my ticket, as the view from there would be similar to that from the Campanile, it would be somewhere else Wolfie wouldn't go and I had already climbed the cupola of St Peter's in the Vatican. The Campanile was a little different to the others as you were effectively in a cage at the top but looking down was still a little dizzying, particularly down the central shaft, and it made me feel a lot of respect for those who had to get up to these heights to build it without cranes, not to mention those charged with painting frescos on the ceilings of these buildings. It's certainly not something I could do.
On the way back down the narrow stone stairs of the Campanile, which widened the further down you went but which still presented problems when encountering people coming up the other way, I bumped into a nice British elderly lady who asked me how much further it was to go. Sadly she had only climbed about one third of the tower and she had concerns for her daughter but I assured her it was worth it and she could take a break at any one of the four levels en route. She seemed quite happy with that.
After this, I met up with Wolfie at the bottom of the tower, skirting expertly past the giftshop, and we decided to view the Cathedral together, which was quite an empty space inside compared to the intricate detail of the exterior. Vast and stark would be two suitable adjectives but there were many aspects of beauty, including the tree of lit candles which were shimmering in the slight breeze as if carrying their associated prayers to God. There is a fantastic sixteenth century fresco in the cupola though, of The Last Judgement, painted by Giorgio Vasari and finished by Federico Zuccari. There are some interesting trompe l'oeil on the left-hand wall too, of fifteenth century condottieri including one of John Hawkswood, an Englishman who fought for Florence and is the only foreigner ever to be buried inside the Duomo. The same painter, Paolo Uccello, is also responsible for the clock on the inside of the building, painted in 1443.
In the crypt, there was a fantastic exhibition detailing the history of the church, from the fourth century through five stages to get to the modern building. There are still vestiges of the former churches still there, particularly from the ninth century incarnation and the Romanesque period of the twelfth century. A mosaic floor of terra-cotta tiles still exists from the ninth century, with a proud peacock the centerpiece along with the names of the 14 (I think) donors who made the floor possible. Supports from this period are still there too, along with stairs to the chancellery from the later twelfth century period. Tombstones from the 1300s are also in abundance, giving a fascinating glimpse into funerary rites at this time.
You needed a ticket to get into this section, which I already had but Wolfie didn't so he headed back to the hotel while I looked around. I did say I would return in fifteen minutes but I lost myself in the archaeology and must have stayed a lot longer. It was a bit like my visit to the catacombs underneath York Minister with Aremay a few years ago now, equally fascinating. With time running out, I could only have a sneak peak at the Baptistry (Il Battistero), which is believed to be the oldest building in Florence. This truly is a slice of Romanesque architecture, and served as the cathedral before the Duomo was built. Constructed in the early part of the twelfth century on the site of a Roman temple (which was constructed at the site of the crossroads of the two main roads in the city), this octagonal shaped building is divine, even with scaffolding around a lot of it. Stunning thirteenth century mosaics are inside the cupola while exteriorly, the guilded bronze doors designed by Andrea Pisano (south doors) and Lorenzo Ghiberti (north and east doors) add a lustre and godliness to the building, with Michaelangelo himself describing the east doors, which face the Duomo, as the 'Gates of Paradise'. The name has stuck.
After this rather brief expose to the Baptistry, I got lost in the side streets trying to get back to the hotel, meaning Wolfie away waiting for me when I arrived. It was at this time we checked out the statues at the Piazza Della Signoria and the Ponte Vecchio in the daytime, both already described, before grabbing some ice cream on the bridge and having a wander on the south side of the river where we came across the grandiose and slightly sinister Palazzo Pitti, which is now a museum complex containing five museums. Built of brown bricks with a large number of evenly spaced arched windows, you would be forgiven for thinking this looked a little like a Victorian railway station. It was actually built by Luca Pitti in 1457 and was continuously enlarged over the next 400 years or so. Pitti wanted to show the ruling Medici family his power and wealth and committed his savings to the project. The Medici were so impressed that ironically they bought the property in 1549. On a building opposite we also saw a plaque dedicated to Paolo Dal Pozzo Toscaneli but I need to translate the Italian properly to tell you what it means.
After this we headed to what would be our last sight of the day, the Galileo Museum which is on the north bank of the Arno just behind the Uffizi Gallery. There is a giant illuminated sundial in the front courtyard and we spent three fascinating hours here, looking at a range of scientific equipment that was in the Medici collections and the Lorraine collections. As well as the arts, the Medici were big patrons of the sciences as they realised the advantage the study of mathematics and physics would have in the art of war. Meanwhile, the Lorraine collections were largely those of Peter Leopold who ran Tuscany in the eighteenth century after the Medici reign ended. Consequently, the latter collection was dedicated to largely eighteenth century pursuits, particularly in the fields of electromagnetism and chemistry. Anatomy was also covered and there were wax models of different stages of pregnancy which were fascinating. The range of wooden equipment, many used to demonstrate scientific principles in popular entertainment amongst the upper classes at the time, also proved interesting. Meanwhile, the first floor Medici collection focused more on the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, which is more my period of history. Many of the instruments that Galileo himself used were in the collection, including two of his original telescopes and some astrolabes, while I found the terrestrial and celestial globes particularly fascinating, charting the world then and comparing it with the situation some 400 years later. TV screens detailed key scientific principles and explained some of the more peculiar equipment while the nine rooms of Medici and nine of Lorraine on the second floor proved nice balance. I also had fun saying 'astrolabe' and 'jovilabe' in a puppy voice over and over to Wolfie. Aside from a noisy troupe of local schoolchildren, there were very few other people there but like with the rest of the city, I imagine visiting in the summer would be a nightmare. After the tour, we enjoyed some of the interactive exhibits for children, which was great fun been though I have a degree in exactly this stuff. It was also great looking at a modern mechanical clock charting the movement of the planets relative to each other. Around this museum, Wolfie's smelly jacket was growing increasingly pungent - it started smelling after we got caught in the rain on Monday but as he hasn't brought a jumper and the temperature is around 13C he's being forced to wear it. It makes him a bit of a Whiffy Wilson.
With time running out to get some food and catch our train, we had to skip a small amount of the interactive bit but I got a guide before we searched for food. Sadly we couldn't find the restaurant Four Lions that the hotel recommended so we headed back there to search for more recommendations, which ended up being the excellent sandwich place I detailed in the last post. We chatted to the staff some more, when one of them who was off yesterday wished me a happy birthday and said she spent yesterday analyzing Shakespeare with her sister. She said it was hard but rewarding. The staff at the hotel were so chatty and great to talk to, meaning it was even more of a wrench to leave this wonderful city as it was already. Compounding the angst was that when we got to the station, we found our train was delayed by fifteen minutes so we had to hang around in the 1960s still terminal some more. We eventually caught the train, where we got free coca cola and crackers once again, before arriving into Rome some 100 minutes later. Due to the delay and the time we got checked in, we felt there was no point going out again so I've just been updating this journal, drinking beer and claiming my complementary free drink (which I forgot to do the first time we stayed at this hotel last Sunday through Wednesday). It's taken a while but I'm largely up-to-date now thanks to updating this on the train and looking forward to our final full day in Italy on Saturday.
The audio guide to the Galleria wasn't great as each entry went on for too long and darted across rather large rooms. The other sculpture highlight was the plaster model of Giambologna's Rape of the Sabine Women, with it's twisting orgasmic form portraying morals gone awry and sheer panic. The original is still in the Loggia dei Lanzi in Piazza Della Signoria, along with 15 other statues including a lion from the second century AD. He looks derpy and be has a ball. The rest of the exhibits focused on biblical themes, particularly wooden alters and adornments to various local churches. There was an interesting temporary exhibit on bibliophily, with a range of interesting books on display but after six hours I was all museumed out and wanted to head back to the hotel. We caught a glimpse of the Medici collection of musical instruments, which we had initially missed so we had to ask the museum lady whether we could go in again. Thankfully she consented. There were cellos and violins from the seventeenth century, and a range of instruments you wouldn't find in an orchestra today including the serpent, the trumpet marine and the hurdy-gurdy. There were also a few interesting inventions too including the vertical piano, which had the strings pointing upwards rather than behind the keys in a conventional piano in order to save space.
After this we did leave, grabbing a slice of pizza from a touristy place near the Duomo called Black Bar which was average at best before heading back to the hotel for a shower before our spa treatment which I have mentioned earlier. The pizza was expensive and indeed that is one thing that has surprised me about Italy - it's not cheap. Granted we have been going to tourist cities but in low season I would have expected things to be cheaper. €6 for a bottle of standard beer says everything and I've been burning through money since I arrived. It has been worth it but it has hurt the wallet somewhat.
Having had four days of heavy touring, we decided to take a break and have ourselves a lie-in on Friday morning. This was aided by two factors, the first not having the window open so the street noise was no longer a problem and the second having a cloudy day meaning the light from the Sun wasn't shining through our curtains. Unfortunately the room was quite hot and I had a nightmare that my current boss turned into my former boss so I was awake anyway, despite the comfort of the bed. Still, we were up for check out by midday and grabbed ourselves a few sandwiches, mine with Parma ham, before we headed over to the Duomo to take a closer look.
The cathedral in Florence is undoubtedly my favourite religious building in the whole world. Every time I look at it I cannot help but be dumbfounded by its sheer beauty. Coloured in green, pink and white marble, it's like a colourful version of York Minister but the adjacent Baptistry and Campanile give the square a greater completeness. You could pay €10 for entry into all of the individual parts of the Duomo but Wolfie opted against this as he's not a fan of heights and the cathedral was free anyway. He waited at the bottom while I climbed up the 414 steps of the Campanile, which is a little like one of the towers at Westminster had one of those towers been standing on their own, separate from the building. The Campanile or bell tower was begun by Grotto in 1334 and completed in 1359 by two successors. It matches the Duomo and the Baptistry in its green, pink and white marble cladding which is what makes this all so unique, not to mention stunning. The views from the top were equally stunning, with the full city layout observable. A lot of the city is built out of rich brown bricks, making for a rather distinctive look, and it's amazing to see just how small this city actually is. In the distance you can also spy the mountains which help grow the Tuscan grapes, which help to produce some of the best wine in the world, which we have been sampling quite considerably. At the top I paid €1 to use the binoculars where I could watch people meandering down the narrow streets and I spied the beautiful frontage of Santa Maria Novella near the station of the same name, again clad in the distinctive green, pink and white marble. On our way back to the station to head back to Rome, we had a closer look and were delighted to find a market around two obelisks right in front of the main entrance. It was a nice image with which to leave Florence as we had only seen the back of the church upon leaving the station on Wednesday. From the top of the Campanile, you also got a great view of the Duomo, including of the people who had climbed to the top. I decided against this, even though it was included in my ticket, as the view from there would be similar to that from the Campanile, it would be somewhere else Wolfie wouldn't go and I had already climbed the cupola of St Peter's in the Vatican. The Campanile was a little different to the others as you were effectively in a cage at the top but looking down was still a little dizzying, particularly down the central shaft, and it made me feel a lot of respect for those who had to get up to these heights to build it without cranes, not to mention those charged with painting frescos on the ceilings of these buildings. It's certainly not something I could do.
On the way back down the narrow stone stairs of the Campanile, which widened the further down you went but which still presented problems when encountering people coming up the other way, I bumped into a nice British elderly lady who asked me how much further it was to go. Sadly she had only climbed about one third of the tower and she had concerns for her daughter but I assured her it was worth it and she could take a break at any one of the four levels en route. She seemed quite happy with that.
After this, I met up with Wolfie at the bottom of the tower, skirting expertly past the giftshop, and we decided to view the Cathedral together, which was quite an empty space inside compared to the intricate detail of the exterior. Vast and stark would be two suitable adjectives but there were many aspects of beauty, including the tree of lit candles which were shimmering in the slight breeze as if carrying their associated prayers to God. There is a fantastic sixteenth century fresco in the cupola though, of The Last Judgement, painted by Giorgio Vasari and finished by Federico Zuccari. There are some interesting trompe l'oeil on the left-hand wall too, of fifteenth century condottieri including one of John Hawkswood, an Englishman who fought for Florence and is the only foreigner ever to be buried inside the Duomo. The same painter, Paolo Uccello, is also responsible for the clock on the inside of the building, painted in 1443.
In the crypt, there was a fantastic exhibition detailing the history of the church, from the fourth century through five stages to get to the modern building. There are still vestiges of the former churches still there, particularly from the ninth century incarnation and the Romanesque period of the twelfth century. A mosaic floor of terra-cotta tiles still exists from the ninth century, with a proud peacock the centerpiece along with the names of the 14 (I think) donors who made the floor possible. Supports from this period are still there too, along with stairs to the chancellery from the later twelfth century period. Tombstones from the 1300s are also in abundance, giving a fascinating glimpse into funerary rites at this time.
You needed a ticket to get into this section, which I already had but Wolfie didn't so he headed back to the hotel while I looked around. I did say I would return in fifteen minutes but I lost myself in the archaeology and must have stayed a lot longer. It was a bit like my visit to the catacombs underneath York Minister with Aremay a few years ago now, equally fascinating. With time running out, I could only have a sneak peak at the Baptistry (Il Battistero), which is believed to be the oldest building in Florence. This truly is a slice of Romanesque architecture, and served as the cathedral before the Duomo was built. Constructed in the early part of the twelfth century on the site of a Roman temple (which was constructed at the site of the crossroads of the two main roads in the city), this octagonal shaped building is divine, even with scaffolding around a lot of it. Stunning thirteenth century mosaics are inside the cupola while exteriorly, the guilded bronze doors designed by Andrea Pisano (south doors) and Lorenzo Ghiberti (north and east doors) add a lustre and godliness to the building, with Michaelangelo himself describing the east doors, which face the Duomo, as the 'Gates of Paradise'. The name has stuck.
After this rather brief expose to the Baptistry, I got lost in the side streets trying to get back to the hotel, meaning Wolfie away waiting for me when I arrived. It was at this time we checked out the statues at the Piazza Della Signoria and the Ponte Vecchio in the daytime, both already described, before grabbing some ice cream on the bridge and having a wander on the south side of the river where we came across the grandiose and slightly sinister Palazzo Pitti, which is now a museum complex containing five museums. Built of brown bricks with a large number of evenly spaced arched windows, you would be forgiven for thinking this looked a little like a Victorian railway station. It was actually built by Luca Pitti in 1457 and was continuously enlarged over the next 400 years or so. Pitti wanted to show the ruling Medici family his power and wealth and committed his savings to the project. The Medici were so impressed that ironically they bought the property in 1549. On a building opposite we also saw a plaque dedicated to Paolo Dal Pozzo Toscaneli but I need to translate the Italian properly to tell you what it means.
After this we headed to what would be our last sight of the day, the Galileo Museum which is on the north bank of the Arno just behind the Uffizi Gallery. There is a giant illuminated sundial in the front courtyard and we spent three fascinating hours here, looking at a range of scientific equipment that was in the Medici collections and the Lorraine collections. As well as the arts, the Medici were big patrons of the sciences as they realised the advantage the study of mathematics and physics would have in the art of war. Meanwhile, the Lorraine collections were largely those of Peter Leopold who ran Tuscany in the eighteenth century after the Medici reign ended. Consequently, the latter collection was dedicated to largely eighteenth century pursuits, particularly in the fields of electromagnetism and chemistry. Anatomy was also covered and there were wax models of different stages of pregnancy which were fascinating. The range of wooden equipment, many used to demonstrate scientific principles in popular entertainment amongst the upper classes at the time, also proved interesting. Meanwhile, the first floor Medici collection focused more on the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, which is more my period of history. Many of the instruments that Galileo himself used were in the collection, including two of his original telescopes and some astrolabes, while I found the terrestrial and celestial globes particularly fascinating, charting the world then and comparing it with the situation some 400 years later. TV screens detailed key scientific principles and explained some of the more peculiar equipment while the nine rooms of Medici and nine of Lorraine on the second floor proved nice balance. I also had fun saying 'astrolabe' and 'jovilabe' in a puppy voice over and over to Wolfie. Aside from a noisy troupe of local schoolchildren, there were very few other people there but like with the rest of the city, I imagine visiting in the summer would be a nightmare. After the tour, we enjoyed some of the interactive exhibits for children, which was great fun been though I have a degree in exactly this stuff. It was also great looking at a modern mechanical clock charting the movement of the planets relative to each other. Around this museum, Wolfie's smelly jacket was growing increasingly pungent - it started smelling after we got caught in the rain on Monday but as he hasn't brought a jumper and the temperature is around 13C he's being forced to wear it. It makes him a bit of a Whiffy Wilson.
With time running out to get some food and catch our train, we had to skip a small amount of the interactive bit but I got a guide before we searched for food. Sadly we couldn't find the restaurant Four Lions that the hotel recommended so we headed back there to search for more recommendations, which ended up being the excellent sandwich place I detailed in the last post. We chatted to the staff some more, when one of them who was off yesterday wished me a happy birthday and said she spent yesterday analyzing Shakespeare with her sister. She said it was hard but rewarding. The staff at the hotel were so chatty and great to talk to, meaning it was even more of a wrench to leave this wonderful city as it was already. Compounding the angst was that when we got to the station, we found our train was delayed by fifteen minutes so we had to hang around in the 1960s still terminal some more. We eventually caught the train, where we got free coca cola and crackers once again, before arriving into Rome some 100 minutes later. Due to the delay and the time we got checked in, we felt there was no point going out again so I've just been updating this journal, drinking beer and claiming my complementary free drink (which I forgot to do the first time we stayed at this hotel last Sunday through Wednesday). It's taken a while but I'm largely up-to-date now thanks to updating this on the train and looking forward to our final full day in Italy on Saturday.
