Orvieto - A Medieval Experience by Richelle Mehlhaff

[A view of Orvieto (and the Duomo Cathedral) from the clock tower]

On Friday we left for an overnight trip to Orvieto, a Medieval hill town outside of Rome. We took the train for about an hour which dropped us off just outside the walls of the town. When we arrived we had to take the Funicolare, a kind of tram, up a steep hill into town.

[Amy, Jess, Julie, Heather, Marco and Nicolette wait outside the tracks of the Funicolare leading up to Orvieto!]

The first thing we saw when we got into the heart of Orvieto was the incredible gothic Cathedral, called the Duomo.
[The facade of the Duomo, containing amazing mosaics and marble friezes]

Besides the gleaming mosaics on the front of the Duomo, one of the most interesting aspects of this church is the alternating white (travertine) and black-basalt stones used to construct the walls. This was a common decorative trait for churches in southern Italy.

[The group with a side view of the Duomo showing the alternating Travertine and Black -Basalt local stone.]
The Duomo was built in the late 13th century, and contains the 15th century frescoes by Luca Signorelli called the Last Judgement. This set of frescoes covers three walls in the Chapel of San Brizio inside the Duomo. We studied pictures of these frecoes with Lisa on Thursday, it was really impressive to see them in person.

Exploring the city gave us beautiful views of the Italian countryside.
[Bryan, Reed, Cami, and Matt contemplate life in the hills of Italy]

Orvieto, which is built on top of a porous volcanic rock, has an extensive underground system of tunnels which the Midieval inhabitants used to escape from the elevated city if it was under siege. There are usually tours of the underground, but not during the winter season.


Another interesting site in Orvieto is the well of St. Patrick. Though we did not visit the well as a group, a few brave souls discovered that contrary to popular belief, the well was indeed open! The well is 62 meters (203 feet) deep, with a double spiral staircase all the way to a bridge at the bottom of the well. Pope Clement the VII built the well in 1527 when he took refuge in Orvieto, and feared that his pursuers would take over the city’s external water supply.
[Matt, Bryan, Marco, and Heather in the Well of St. Patrick (picture taken by Reed)]

Before we left Orvieto on Saturday we climbed to the top of the clock tower and got a stunning view of the city, check out this video and hear the clock chime in the background!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gv5EmLU_A5U
After climbing so many stairs (the clock tower, and the well) everyone was glad to come home to Rome and rest for a day before class started up again.

[Cami and Jenna bravely look over the wall of the city into the fog and cliffs below]

CIAO!

Orvieto Prep

Roma Reporta 1/15/09
by Marco Manuel

This afternoon after the second day of Italian class we had our first in class lecture with Lisa in preparation for our trip to Orvieto this weekend. This was our first formal where we sat down and discussed about a couple various art topics so that in the later excursions of the quarter we'll be more ready and able to look at artwork with a more critical eye. We briefly touched on the concepts of perspective, depth, and space while we analyzed a few pieces of art showing how it evolved from the middle ages into the Renaissance.

The point which I found very interesting is that the the middle ages most art was done for the church and usually little credit was ever taken by the artist because art was more of a part of architecture and still considered a craft rather than appreciated as art.

We looked a few works by Giotto, Masaccio, Da Vinci, and Signorelli, who painted a majority frescoes in a church we will visit when we go to Orvieto.
Some of the works we viewed today are below.

Giotto

Masaccio, The Tribute Money

Da Vinci, Madonna of the Rocks

Signorelli

The Roman Triumph and the Arch of Constantine

Roma Reporta 1/14/09
The Roman Triumph and the Arch of Constantine
by Marco Manuel

Today we met at Trajan’s Forum and then made the trek over to the Arch of Constantine where Matt told us about the Roman Triumph and the Arch of Constantine. The Roman Triumphs were the celebrations of Rome’s victories over their enemies for various conflicts and wars. A triumph was usually held in the honor of a specific general or emperor (magistrate) who led the campaign. It was a senate sanctioned event. Upon returning to Rome the general and or emperor would be honored and celebrated with a long parade like procession that would last all a day. Usually commemorative monuments would often be built in honor and remembrance of the military victory, often times in the form of an Arch such as the Arches of Severus, Titus, and the largest, Constantine. These monuments and processions would show that the military campaigns were not in vain and would propagate a message of success and accomplishment that demonstrated the war was all worth it and really not that bad.

The Arch of Constantine specifically is interesting in that it was built ten years after his return to Rome and that his Arch steals/borrows portions from other pieces of architecture at the time. This arch contains rather large friezes from works dedicated to Trajan, Hadrian, and Marcus Aurelius and a relatively smaller portion of the arch depicts Constantine’s campaign. The smaller rectangular pieces above the small arches are depictions and the two round pieces on the East and West ends are depictions of Constantine.


After Matt’s presentation we took a spontaneous trip up the hill behind il Colosseo to La Chiesa dei Quattro Corinati. This was actually a really cool excursion and despite the misleadingly longer walk up hill than anticipated it was worth the hike because we were able to see the Cloister of the church and a chapel which had some frescos about Constantine’s legendary conversion to Christianity as told by the Christians that we had discussed in Mary’s history class a few days before.

First Italian Class - Heather Kraft

Allora.

I don’t think I have heard any word as much as this popular Italian phrase during our time here. Our Italian teacher was especially fond of it, like many other natives I have passed by. It is a cultural word, something of lingual filler, with a rough translation of “then.”

Hopefully soon the constant battering of frustrated alloras will cease as our Italian approves. Today was our first day of Italian class which we are taking through Italiadea, a nearby school for teaching Italian to foreigners. Mary met us at the Portone and led us on a short walk through the Campo to find our building. Our classes are in a Piazza but at first we went to the Piazzo, which was across the street. We quickly found out where we should be and crossed the street but not before Mary told us about the building we had been in. Vatican City was not the only gift of land from the Romans, other cites within the Rome were given as well. The building we accidentally stumbled on was one of those buildings; technically part of Vatican City.

Mary took her leave after we were seated in class. We were treated with a lecture on how to learn a language and encouraged to give it our all and not be afraid of our peers. Then we were introduced to our teacher, Paola.

We began by learning our alphabet and our pronunciation. Unlike English, the “ch” sound is hard, like an English k. For example, chiave (“key”) is pronounced key-ya-vay. We also practiced our “gli” sound, which is a particularly Italian sound, similar to “lee.” After two hours we left with practice books and the ability to ask “What does that mean?” (Che cosa significa), “My name is..” (Mi chiamo..) and recite our alphabet.

After being let out, the class scattered to grab a quick lunch before Mary’s class. Richelle, Cami, Kelly and I grabbed a quick bite of pizza before heading to the Campo de Fiori for shopping in the market. We ran into Lisa who gave us some quick tips on buying meat.

The Campo Market

After that it was time for Mary’s class which was spent on the topic of the topic of Florence, guilds and Dante. We discussed the Boundelmonte murder which was the origin of the Guelf and Ghibelline conflict; a civil war that would divide Florence over the next hundred years.

Allora.

Ciao belli!

YUM!

Trajan's Column and The Pantheon - Amy Kilian

Today we walked to Trajan’s Column, and to the Pantheon for our presentations. Again there was the threat of rain but luckily (unlike our trip to the Forum) it never really evolved into an actual downpour. We assembled at a vantage point from which we could see the Forum, Markets, and Column of Trajan, and Cami gave us an introduction to Trajan’s life and deeds. Trajan was a military leader even before he became emperor, and this skill as a general shaped his reign. Namely, he lead the conquests of Dacia, from which he acquired the spoils to build this grand structure; the biggest of the Fora. Many, however, had mixed feelings about his conquests and a major role of the forum was to legitimize this war. He did this in many cases by downplaying the violent element of war and concentrating on the more peaceful elements such as building projects, victory sacrifice, etc. This can be seen in the scenes chosen for his column. By far (in my opinion) the most important message of the forum and column, which can be evidenced by the carvings on the column base, is that the empire became opulent from the spoils of this Dacian war. My favorite scene though, is the depiction of the Roman "testudo" or turtle formation, used in warfare.



Many costly materials were used in the building of the forum, and the grand scale itself draws attention to this. In addition to the column, the forum contained the Basilica Ulpia (a large law court that was given his family name), libraries, and most importantly, the Markets of Trajan. This market was essentially the first shopping mall. It was a grand structure containing stalls for everything from groceries to exotic and expensive wares. A building like this would have been a great gift to the people, reinforcing again that the wars in Dacia were ultimately beneficial to the populus.

After discussing these buildings of Trajan, we walked to the Pantheon. On the way, Lisa treated us to coffee at Tazza d’oro, arguably one of the best coffee shops in Rome. I have to say that my macchiato was excellent and the service was very good, especially considering that we were a relative stampede of people.

Alex presented the Pantheon to us; a stunning monument that is made even more amazing by the fact that it is still standing. This can be attributed to its appropriation as a Christian church. The original Pantheon was built by Marcus Agrippa during the reign of Augustus but the building that stands today was built much later by Hadrian and is completely different architecturally. The original structure was a traditional temple in form, but was struck by lightening and destroyed enough times over the years that people began to think the monument displeasing to the gods. When Hadrian built (and designed) his version, it had a completely different orientation, design, and function. The function of the new building is not completely known but because it does not follow a typical temple form, many believe that it was more of an audience hall from which Hadrian could orate or dispense justice.



Architecturally the building is miraculous. It has a solid concrete dome that was not surpassed in size until quite recently. Many theories have evolved about how this was actually done, but historians do believe that great wooden scaffolding was used in some manner to help in the casting of the dome.



Hadrian, was a follower of astrology, divination, and philosophy, especially that of the Pythagoreans. Because of his interest in these fields, the Pantheon is wrought with number symbolism that reflects ideas of celestial order. By counting architectural elements in the dome, rotunda, and porch, one finds representations of the sun, moon, marriage, justice, and a myriad of other elements. Even if one does not understand these mystical codes, the building itself is a marvel to behold. One needs only to watch the progression of sunlight that streams in from the oculus onto and around the dome above, to feel the grandeur and magnificence of roman imperial architecture.