Le ova' mpriatorio (eggs in Purgatory) is a traditional Neapolitan dish, the origins of which are lost in time. The recipe involves eggs cooked in tomato sauce so that the egg white turns red to symbolize souls in Purgatory struggling to escape from the surrounding flames. Variations of this simple but tasty dish abound all over Italy and are having a bit of a revival due to the celebrations of the 700th anniversary of the death of Dante Alighieri in 1321.
According to a popular legend, the Great Poet's favourite food was eggs. The story goes that he was sitting on his habitual stone outside the Cathedral in Florence when a passerby asked him what he enjoyed eating most and Dante replied “A boiled egg”. When the same person passed some time after, he asked: “With what?” And Dante answered “With salt”.
What the author of “The Divine Comedy” actually preferred to eat is unknown, however, Dante's alleged stone still sits against the south wall of the Cathedral and attracts many tourists. The “Stone” is actually a lump of rock, rather uncomfortable for sitting on. Probably there was actually a stone bench on the spot once upon a time.
M. Stenhouse
Info: www.portanapoli.com
The recent cold spell has held up the arrival of swallows, house martins and swifts this year, according to LIPU (Lega Italiana Protezione Uccelli), the Italian Society for the Protection of Birds.
For the last few years, LIPU has denounced a steady decrease in the numbers of these birds, symbols of spring. One of the reasons is the reduction of suitable habitats, especially in the case of the house martin, which builds its nest of mud and straw under overhanging gables and cornices. These features have largely disappeared in modern buildings, leaving less and less space for the birds to reproduce.
Efforts to make amends, however, are arriving from some unexpected areas. The abandoned electricity plant ENEL at Piombino (Tuscany), earmarked for demolition, is creating an alternative structure to house the colony of two hundred nesting birds concentrated under the eaves of the former engine-room. ENEL, with the backing of a group of conservation partners - the WWF Nature reserve of Padula Orti-Bottagone, the Italian Swallow and Swifts Group and the Swift Conservation organization, has commissioned architect Riccardo Stoppioni to build a replacement steel structure, complete with a string of artificial nests for the birds.
Similar initiatives are being carried forward in Parma with tunnel entrances to garages which reproduce the former nesting places in farm barns. In addition, the medieval Hospital and desecrated Church of San Francesco Del Prato is being adapted to accommodate the birds by opening up all the old gaps which were in the facade and were subsequently blocked. These holes, however, will only be big enough to let the swallows use them and not the pigeons, which would otherwise move in and take over the nesting spaces!
Info: www.lipu.it
One sector that has held up well in Italy despite the current crisis is the cheesemaking industry. The world famous Parmigiano Reggiano saw a production increase of 4.9% in 2020, while its “little sister”, Grana Padana, registered a sales increase of 4.3%, according to latest figures published by AFIDOP, the Italian Cheesemakers Association.
The most interesting up-and-coming Italian cheese, however, is ewe's milk cheese – collectively known as “pecorino”, with its main production areas in Sardinia and in Lazio. The town of Bracciano, that overhangs the lake of the same name, has been nominated “City of Cheese 2021” by the National Organization of Cheese Tasters (ONAF Italia) to encourage the production of the local speciality cheese, Caciofiore di Columella, and launch it on the international market. Only four cheesemakers in the region still produce this cheese, which has a noble history, dating back to ancient Roman times.
Info: Tel. +39.02.72021817 www.afidop.it www.onaf.it
The birth of a baby can become a big event in a country like Italy where the birth rate continues to fall dramatically. In a little town like Vallepietra (Lazio), the 300 inhabitants are celebrating the arrival of the first baby born into their community during the past six years.
The parish priest set all the church bells ringing to greet the new arrival and the citizens were out in the street in force to applaud the proud young parents when they arrived home with their new born girl. The devout were convinced that their prayers had finally been answered.
Vallepietra is a well-known centre of pilgrimage, with its ancient Sanctuary of the Trinity, tucked among the rugged mountains in the heart of the Monte Simbruini Regional Nature Park. The little church contains an 11th century fresco of three seated figures, each holding a book in the left hand and with the right hand raised in blessing.
Info: www.santuariovallepietra.it
The church bells of Venice ran out in chorus at 4 pm last week on to salute what is believed to be the 1600th anniversary of the city's founding. According to tradition, the date refers to the laying of the first stone of the Church of St. James at the Rialto on the 25th March 421.
The Covid pandemic has held up many of the planned celebrations (some 230 proposals right up to 2022) are pending. However, the city council has confirmed that two major events will go ahead as planned – the Salone Nautica (Boat Show) at the Arsenale (29th May - 6th June 2021) and the Architectural Biennial starting on the 22nd May 2021.
Preparations for the major celebrative exhibition “Venetia 1600. Nascita e Rinascita” (Venice 1600. Birth and Rebirth) is also planned to take place at the Ducal Palace from the 11th September 2021- 27th March 2022.
The long-awaited ban on colossal cruise ships entering the lagoon and dwarfing the Church of San Marco should also come finally into effect, to the joy of environmentalists and conservationists who have been petitioning for years to have the ships directed away from the monuments and treasure of this unique city. Until a suitable tourist port can be built, the ships will now be diverted to the container harbour at neighbouring Porta Marghera, hopefully from 2022.
The Istituto Giannina Gaslini of Genoa, Italy's third largest paediatric hospital, has launched the “Space for Children” project, an interactive digital game sponsored by the ESA Europa (European Space Agency) to help young children cope with the additional anxiety caused by the Covid epidemic.
The games, available on a free app for smartphone or tablet, consist of four video games, geared at children 7-9 and 10-12 age groups, created by HYPEX, an Italian start-up interactive video designer.
Paediatricians and psychologists working with young patients at the Gaslini hospital have reported increasing psychological problems in the children in their care, including irritability, sleep difficulties, worries and separation anxiety that have escalated due to the additional difficulties caused by the pandemic.
The Gaslini is not new to initiatives aimed at alleviating hospital stays for young patients and their families. In summer, the Institute opens its “Gaslini Beach”, a specially reserved seaside playground connected directly from the hospital via an underpass.
The Gaslini is a public research institute, founded in 1938. It averages 50,000 recoveries per year, including 600 foreign children from 60 different countries.
Info: Tel. +39.010.56361 www.gaslini.org www.hypex.nl
Valle d'Astino, on the outskirts of Bergamo (Lombardia) has won the top award in the National Landscape Contest 2020-21. The 60 hectare valley, lying among the hills on the city doorstep has been subjected to a long re-qualification process, spearheaded by the Fondazione della Miseracordia Maggiore (MIA) (Foundation of Greater Mercy) a charitable organization dating from 1265.
The Foundation bought the valley, which also contained an ancient ruined monastery, in 2007. The area was completely overgrown and neglected, with the earth impoverished due to years of exclusive cultivation of maize, and the Foundation gradually began to transform it into the present Eden, with garden allotments, organic farms, vineyards, fruit orchards and herb gardens. Part of the valley has been taken over by the Botanical Garden Lorenzo Rota of Bergamo, which cultivates 1,200 varieties of plants.
The old monastery, with the frescoed 16th century Church of the Holy Sepulchre and the cloister, has now been restructured and transformed into a multi-cultural centre for music, theatre and films.
The National Landscape Award qualifies Valle d'Astino as Italy's candidate for the European Landscape Prize, instituted in 2008 by the Council of Europe, for the best territory re-qualification and landscape recovery initiative.
Info: info@visitbergamo.net Tel. +39.035.320402 www.premiopaesaggio.beni.culturali.it
Coronavirus restrictions forced Parma, Capital of Culture 2020, to move many of its events and exhibitions to 2021, including the major exhibition at the Ducal Colorno Palace of the vast 18th century collection of china and ceramics gathered by the Duchess Luisa Elisabetta of France and her husband Filippo di Borbone.
The collection contains rare pieces from the leading factories of Europe, such as Meissen, Sévres, Vincennes, Chantilly, Doccia and Capodimonte, and was dispersed after the Unification of Italy and the suppression of the Duchy of Parma. The exhibition has gathered together many of the most precious porcelain figurines and decorated plates that are now part of the collections of Italian museums and institutions like the Quirinale Palace (official Residence of the President of Italy), the Royal Museum of Torino, the Uffizi Gallery and the Villa Medici Museum of Poggio di Caiano.
Princess Luisa Elisabetta, known as “Babette”, daughter of Louis XV of France, was a passionate collector, purchasing many of the most refined pieces during her frequent visits to Versailles. Her husband, whom she called “Pippo”, shared her enthusiasm and her tastes. The couple, who had both come from two of the wealthiest and most luxurious royal courts of Europe, set themselves the task of modernizing and refining the gloomy and rundown residence allotted them in Parma, as demonstrated in the letters and archive documents also on show in the exhibition, containing items like proposed architectural plans and furniture designs, engravings and a cookery book of 18th century recipes.
The exhibition is due to re-open on the 15th May and, Covid permitting, will run until the 19th September 2021.
Info: Tel. +39.0521.312545 www.reggiadicolorno.it
The Italian Ministry of Culture has put a definite ban on the use of the 12th century Trisulti Abbey as a base for the Dignitatis Humanae Institute (DHI) set up by Benjamin Harnwell, considered to be the European representative of former White House strategist and noted populist Steve Bannon.
The DHI took over the lease of the abandoned monastery in 2017 on condition that they would fund restoration and upkeep, and that it would be used exclusively for academic and cultural purposes. The extremist political ideologies accredited to the DHI founders, however, alarmed the local population as well as the Cultural Ministry, which has been locked in a legal battle to revoke the lease for the last three years.
The Abbey is one of the finest Carthusian monasteries in Lazio, first founded in 996. Crowning a hilltop in the Ernici Mountains and surrounded by oak forests, for centuries it was a sought-over haven of respite for pilgrims on the way to the Holy Land. The present building dates from 1204 with later baroque modifications to the Abbey Church of St. Bartholomew, where visitors can admire “The Glory of Paradise” ceiling painting by Giuseppe Caci (1683). Its gardens are laid out in the classic Italian style with geometric beds delimited by box hedges. It also possesses a fine 18th century pharmacy decorated with trompe-l'oeil frescos and grotesques. Another of its claims to fame is the invention of the popular liqueur Sambuca, invented by the monks and infused from local herbs.
The last four monks, all elderly, were transferred from the Abbey a few years ago, leaving it empty. It is now looking for a new occupant who will respect its unique historic and spiritual character as “a place of peace”.
Info: Tel. Ciociaria Turismo +39.0775.211417 www.collepardo.it
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