Tuscan Traveler

As holidays go, Italy shines the brightest in the Spring when Easter approaches. Florence goes all out with flowers, but it is the chocolate eggs that are most impressive. Throughout the city shop windows bloom with vibrantly-wrapped chocolate treats from creamy white to mild ganache to darker fondente to extra noir.

The Palazzo Vecchio reflected in Rivoire's Easter window

Long before the Easter Bunny started delivering sugary eggs, the ancient Romans believed that “omne vivum ex ovo” – all life comes from the egg – and it was commonly a symbol of new birth after the winter when everything has lain dormant.

It is all in the details

There is some evidence that in ancient Roman culture eggs were decorated with vegetable dyes, such as beets and carrots, and then given as gifts during the spring festivals.

Vestri bursts forth with chocolate eggs

Easter tradition in Renaissance Italy originally called for eggs colored red. Some say that following the death of Christ, Mary Magdalen traveled to Italy to spread the word of the resurrection. In an audience with a skeptical Emperor Tiberius Caesar, an egg she had brought as a gift miraculously turned red, symbolizing the blood of Christ.

Easter egg for nut lovers

As chocolate became increasingly popular in the early 20th century, the sharing of colored hard-boiled eggs started to fade in Italy and chocolate eggs took their place.

Pretty in pink

Chocolate eggs became increasingly elaborate. They range from the tiny solid milk chocolate to the massive, showy hollowed out eggs containing small toys and even elaborate gifts, such as iPods and diamond rings. Wrapped in foil, cellophane, and sometimes silk with massive bows and even decorated with dangling toys, these creations are a feast for the eyes before they are just a feast.

Easter Eggs for toddlers, too.

The very popular Kinder Eggs are by Ferrero, a family company based in the Piedmont region. ‘Kinder Surprise’ eggs are a treat for children all year long, but at Easter the company’s production ranges from tiny ‘mini-eggs’ to the giant special eggs produced as a limited edition.

Huge chocolate egg honoring Italy's 150th Anniversary of Unification

After the solemnity of Lent, the extravaganza of chocolate Easter eggs can only lead to a return to the Mediterranean diet before it’s time to set up the ombrellone on the beach in June.

Pellegrino Artusi, author of the famous Italian cookbook La Scienza in Cucina e l’Arte di Mangiare Bene (The Science of Cooking and the Art of Eating Well), is the father of Italian cuisine. This year – the 100th anniversary of his death – will be remembered with special events and celebrations, especially in Forlimpopoli, Artusi’s birth place, and Florence, the city where Artusi spent his life.

Pellegrino Artusi was 71 when he wrote and published his iconic book

Artusi made his fortune as a silk merchant, but after retiring he devoted himself to fine dining. In 1891, at the age of 71, he completed the 600+ page tome in which he included amusing anecdotes and menus, as well as recipes. He couldn’t find a publisher and so self-published the large volume. It took him four years to sell a thousand copies. The self-published second edition sold faster, so he increased the print-run of the third. Then, all the hard work paid off – the book was discovered by the middle class.

Self-published First Edition 1891

One of the reasons for its popularity is that Artusi wrote his book entirely in Italian – this at a time when most professional chefs were French-trained, and their books were so sprinkled with French terminology that they were hard for the uninitiated to follow. Also, Artusi was a bon-vivant, a noted raconteur, and a celebrated host; he knew many of the leading figures of his day and read widely in the arts and sciences. Almost half his recipes contain anecdotes or snippets of advice on subjects as varied as regional dialects and public health: while you may open the book to find out how to make Minestrone or a German cake, you will probably read on to find out how Artusi escaped cholera, or what the Austrian troops who occupied Northern Italy in the 1840’s were like.

He also created an appendix of menus: “As it frequently occurs that one finds himself unsure of what dishes to select when one has to offer a dinner” Artusi wrote, “I thought it well to provide this appendix, which gives the menus for an elegant dinner for each month of the year, as well as several menus tailored for specific holidays. I’ve omitted desserts because the seasons, with their various fruits, will council you better than I could. Even if you can’t follow these menus to the letter, they’ll at least give you some ideas that will make your selections easier.”

Artusi's photo superimposed on the XIII edition (1909)

Artusi’s book stands with Manzoni’s great novel, I Promessi Sposi (The Betrothed), and the music of Verdi as works that not only are great unto themselves but represented a sense of identity and self-worth to a nascent country with no nationalistic feeling … Artusi chose to give Italians their definition by telling them how they ate … Anyone who seeks to know Italian food avoids Artusi at his or her peril. He is the fountainhead of modern Italian cookery,” wrote Fred Plotkin in Gastronomica.

Before Artusi died in Florence in 1911, more than 200,000 copies had been already sold. Today, the book is a perennial best seller in Italy and the recipes are still used. It has been translated in Spanish, Dutch, German and English. In 2003, the University of Toronto Press, published a new English translation that is still  in print.

The most recent English translation

L’Artusi, as the book is called in Italy, went on to become one of the most read books of the time, a household icon, and a source of inspiration for generations of cooks. There is even an Italian language iPhone app that contains all of Artusi’s 790 recipes.

Although he became famous for his first book, Artusi wrote another – a practical manual for the kitchen – in 1904, with over 3,000 recipes, simply entitled Ecco il Tuo Libro di Cucina (Here is Your Cookbook). Last month, Artusi became a fictional amateur detective in a popular murder mystery written by Pisan Marco Malvaldi – Odore di Chiuso (Smells Stuffy).

Sergio Staino for Casa Artusi - Impossible to eat 'lite' with Artusi

The 100th anniversary events and initiatives to celebrate Artusi include conferences in Florence and Folimpopoli about Artusi and his work, Artusi-themed dinners held in different Italian cities on the 17th of March, Italy’s new national holiday to celebrate Italy’s unification, theatrical performances, various demonstrations and videos, and a national competition.

In Florence, on 31 March, an exhibition, entitled Pellegrino Artusi: il tempo e le opere, will open at the National Central Library. The exhibition will show original work and documents in the life of Artusi and his relationship with the world of publishing. The ‘Artusian’ celebrations will continue in June with a week of culinary stands in Piazza d’Azeglio; in November there will be an Artusi Week, involving catering schools in Florence, as well as restaurant and hotel owners.

Giuseppe Garibaldi resigned his commission of leader of the army of Unification (I Mille) on September 18, 1860 and retired to his home on the island of Caprera off the coast of Sardinia. He was 53  years old and recovering from a battle wound.

1860 Garibaldi fights for Italy's unity

In 1861, at the outbreak of the American Civil War, Garibaldi was approached by a representative of the United States Government, reportedly on behalf of President Abraham Lincoln. The Union Army was in disarray and Lincoln was unhappy with those in command. He needed a proven military leader.

As Herbert Mitgang wrote in his fascinating and very detailed article in American Heritage Magazine (October 1975):

“The offer came at a moment in Garibaldi’s life when he lived in semi-exile—too little of a politician to scheme for personal advancement, too much of a national idol to be put behind bars on the Italian mainland. The hero of the movement for a unified Italy, he had led a spectacularly successful revolt against a reactionary regime in Sicily and in Naples—the so-called Two Sicilies—in 1860, but now he was in temporary retirement.

On lonely Caprera, a wild, rocky island covered with juniper and myrtle and stunted olive trees, below La Maddalena off the northeastern corner of Sardinia, Garibaldi tended his vines and figs, built stone walls to fence in his goats, and looked out to the sea, dreaming. The conqueror of the kingdom of the Two Sicilies, in gray trousers and slouch hat, his red shirt and poncho flapping in the wind, refused all titles and honors for himself and sought only lenience for his followers. “How men are treated like oranges—squeezed dry and then cast aside!” he said.

He had wanted to march on Rome, against the “myrmidons of Napoleon in,” supposedly there to protect the pope, and defeat the Bourbon troops. But Victor Emmanuel II, king of Sardinia and now of Sicily and Naples as well, decided that French help was needed to complete unification of Italy and called off Garibaldi’s advance. Going back to Caprera, Garibaldi leaned against the steamer rail and said to his legion of Red Shirts: “Addio—a Roma!”

Abraham Lincoln’s Offer

1866 Garibaldi leads Italy against Austria

Through the letter, dated July 17, 1861,  from Secretary of State William H. Seward to H.S. Sanford, the U.S. Minister in Brussels, Garibaldi was offered a Major General’s commission in the U.S. Army.

On September 18, 1861, Sanford sent the following reply to Seward:

“He [Garibaldi] said that the only way in which he could render service, as he ardently desired to do, to the cause of the United States, was as Commander-in-chief of its forces, that he would only go as such, and with the additional contingent power – to be governed by events – of declaring the abolition of slavery; that he would be of little use without the first, and without the second it would appear like a civil war in which the world at large could have little interest or sympathy.”

In other words, according to Italian historian Petacco, “Garibaldi was ready to accept Lincoln’s offer but on one condition: that the war’s objective be declared as the abolition of slavery. But at that stage Lincoln was unwilling to make such a statement lest he worsen an agricultural crisis.”

Although President Lincoln did not have Garibaldi leading his troops, he did have Union soldiers trained by Garibaldi. The “Garibaldi Guard” was the nickname given to the 39th New York Volunteer Infantry Regiment that fought in the American Civil War. Many of the regiment’s members were Italian Americans who had served under Garibaldi in Italy.

Lincoln reviews the 39th New York Volunteer Infantry Regiment- the Garibaldi Guard

Garibaldi never joined the Union Army, but he kept track of the American Civil War’s progress. In August 6, 1863, still unhappy with the political outcome of Italy’s Unification, he wrote directly to President Lincoln.

In the midst of your titanic struggle, permit me, as another among the free children of Columbus, to send you a word of greeting and admiration for the great work you have begun. Posterity will call you the great emancipator, a more enviable title than any crown could be, and greater than any merely mundane treasure, You are a true heir of the teaching given us by Christ and by John Brown. If an entire race of human beings, subjugated into slavery by human egoism, has been restored to human dignity, to civilization and human love, this is by your doing and at the price of the most noble lives in America.

It is America, the same country which taught liberty to our forefathers, which now opens another solemn epoch of human progress. And while your tremendous courage astonishes the world, we are sadly reminded how this old Europe, which also can boast a great cause of liberty to fight for, has not found the mind or heart to equal you.

Giuseppe Garibaldi, Scritti politici e militari, ed. Domenico Ciàmpoli, Rome 1907

If Abraham Lincoln had been able to obtain the services of the brilliant Giuseppe Garibaldi, the American Civil War may have ended in short order. As it was, for his military expeditions in South America and Europe (Italy, Austria and France), Garibaldi is known as the “Hero of Two Worlds”.

Italy will spend 2011 celebrating the 150th anniversary of its unification – known as the Risorgimento (Resurgence). From a land of city-states, many under foreign domination, Italy became a country in 1861.

Most historians agree that the unification of Italy started in 1815 with the end of Napoleonic rule, but it took a tortuous path through the insurrections of the 1820s and 1830s and the abortive revolutions of 1848-1849. The War of 1859 created the Kingdom of Sardinia that encompassed most of northwestern and central Italy, including Tuscany. But the move to unify the peninsula stalled there. The rich north had had nothing to gain and little interest to take on the burden of the poor south or to confront the pope in the Papal States.

Garibaldi and his army of Red Shirts

Giuseppe Garibaldi was the true hero who kick-started the final unification of Italy. In early 1860, he gathered about a thousand of volunteers (I Mille) in Genoa for an expedition by sea to Sicily.

Progress of unification by December 1959

The Kingdom of Two Sicilies (yellow on map), which ruled over not only the island, but most of the southern third of the mainland, had long been a corrupt government, oppressing a restive underclass. Although the Garibaldi Red Shirts were less skilled and ill equipped, they had tremendous success, gathering thousands of volunteers as they moved through the countryside. They occupied Sicily within two months. Garibaldi claimed Sicily in the name of Victor Emanuel II, King of Piedmont, Sardinia and Savoy. He then crossed to the mainland and marched his troops to Naples.

After Garibaldi’s success made full unification of Italy a real possibility, Piedmontese troops, under the command of Victor Emanuel II, used the riots and uprisings in the Papal States (red on map) as a reason to move south under the pretext of maintaining order. In 1860, two thirds of the Papal States joined the Kingdom of Sardinia and Rome was left alone. The Piedmontese army bypassed Rome and the remaining Papal States and marched south to Naples to help Garibaldi’s troops defeat the remaining armies of the Kingdom of Two Sicilies.

1861 Orange & Pink Unified - Red Papal State - Green Austrian Venetia

On September 18, 1860, Garibaldi gave up command of his army and all lands to the south, including Sicily and Naples, to Victor Emanuel II, signifying the unity and formation of the Kingdom of Italy, which was formalized by the new parliament on March 17, 1861. Victor Emanuel II was crowned the first King of Italy.

Although a Kingdom of Italy had been formed, it did not include all of Italy. The missing parts were Rome and Venetia. Venetia was annexed in 1866. Rome and the remaining Papal States became part of the union in 1870.

Throughout the year Tuscan Traveler will highlight events and stories relating to the unification of Italy.

I don’t know why, but when I truly get burnt to a crisp by the often not-so-sunny life in Tuscany, I think of taxi cabs. I’ve done it before and I will do it again.

Maybe it helps me realize this too will pass.

Right now, we are waiting for the P.M. to ride off into history despite the propping up Hillary Clinton was forced by Wikileaks to do this last week.

So I cheer myself up by the realization that the taxi situation in Florence has, hopefully forever, been changed for the better by a new cooperative of all-female taxi drivers – inTaxiFirenze.

inTaxiFirenze - Florence's new Women-owned Taxi Service

As most visitors to Florence know taxi rides are quite expensive. However, they are also one of the only ways to get home if you’re out past bus hours and far away. Going in groups is one way to cut the cost, but night time rates include an extra fee.

Also, in most instances you can’t just flag down a cab; you must call by phone for one or go to a taxi stand (in front of the train station, in Piazza della Repubblica, Piazza San Marco, Porta Romana, behind the Duomo, etc.).

Two months ago, I had to call for cabs for ten clients in the rain. To call, you give the address where you need to be picked up to a phone operator and wait for the dispatcher to give the name of the taxi which is coming to pick you up (e.g., “Parigi 23”). The dispatcher will also tell you how long before the taxi arrives, which usually is within three to five minutes. To get three cabs, I had to call three times.  On the second call the dispatcher, who had caller i.d., argued with me about whether this was the first cab or an extra. On the third call the operator refused to answer.

Taxi Stand behind the Duomo

Supposedly, women traveling alone in a taxi are entitled to a 10% discount between the hours of 9pm to 2am. There is also a discount of 15% for hospital destinations between the visiting hours of 1pm-3pm and 7-9pm. These discounts will not be applied unless you insist on them.

But back to the good news. There are nine women who have formed an all-female taxi service in Florence that operates from 5am to 11pm daily. All of the drivers in this new taxi cooperative speak English. Word is that they are becoming quite popular and are getting a lot of negative pressure from the good-ol’-boy network in the taxi union. More information about this service (in Italian) can be found at: www.inTaxiFirenze.it, Their telephone number is longer and not as easy to remember as those for regular cabs, but  in a cell phone’s memory it is just a click away:  055 200 1326.

Frequent Rider Card for inTaxi Service

InTaxiFirenze also offers a frequent-rider program. After ten rides you get a discount of 5 euro off the fare for the next trip. “Service with a smile” has never been a thought that entered my head when I entered a Florentine taxi until I met the ladies at inTaxi.

One of the joys of living in Italy is not only the chance to visit places where Renaissance artists, poets, dukes and popes wandered the same hallways and alleys, but to visit locations where no less dramatic, but much more recent history took place.

To Americans under 60 years of age World War II in Europe is often a vague set of facts found in a history book – a short chapter or two. Italy, like Normandy, provides a full semester’s course on the sociological background, politics, alliances, military strategies, and both tragic and victorious outcomes, especially from 1942 to 1945 – the Italian Campaign.

American Sicily-Rome WW II Cemetery at Anzio/Nettuno

TuscanTraveler.com has a special interest in the American Cemeteries, located at Anzio/Nettuno and Florence. So it is a pleasure to find that Anne Saunders, an American researcher, has compiled a guide to almost every location in Italy where one can undertake a full study of the history of World War II and the Italian Campaign.

Front Cover

A Travel Guide to World War II Sites in Italy describes and provides directions to over one hundred World War II museums, monuments, cemeteries and battlefields. The tours, with complete directions, travel times, maps and other helpful hints, focus on a particular city or region, following the Allied and German armies as they battled from southern to northern Italy.

American soldiers in battle outside of Lucca (November 1944)

It might be more accurate to call this book “A Short History and Travel Guide of the Italian Campaign” because in this small volume (100 pages) Anne provides concise descriptions of the years leading up to Italy’s alliance with Germany, the Allied landing in Africa and Sicily, and the subsequent important battles and strategic decisions that led to the German surrender. Sections recounting the history lead into to description of the pertinent museums, cemeteries (American, Commonwealth, German, Polish, French and others), memorials and monuments.

Gothic Line near Lucca

I learned that the Gothic Line was built by forced labor and that I want to go immediately to see the dramatic mountainside German Military Cemetery at Traversa where more than 30,000 German soldiers are buried. My only quibble with Anne’s book is that she fails to describe the beautiful flower gardens in which the Commonwealth soldiers are buried – not on the outside of the plots, but actually around each tombstone, as if they lie in an English country garden forever.

Commonwealth Beach Head Cemetery in Anzio

Anne, a true researcher, provides an exhaustive bibliography and even a list of films about the Italian Campaign.  She also provides hotel and transportation suggestions. Archival WWII photos illustrate the guidebook. For more information regarding the Italian campaign, read about WWII Italy and/or visit Anne’s complete and informative online page of news and links.

Anne Saunders has a BA from Wellesley College, MA from Columbia University, and PhD from the University of South Carolina. She taught for over twenty years at the College of Charleston, where she is now a research associate. A lifelong fan of Italy, she spent four summers there doing research for the guidebook. I would like to know more about how she got the inspiration to undertake the years of travel and study that resulted in this informative and very helpful guide.

Connect to Anne’s Amazon Author Page. To view the book’s table of contents and selected pages, click on its Amazon web page. Visit where to buy for a list of stores and web vendors in the USA, Canada, the UK, Italy, and elsewhere.

Every year in September (this year it was on the 5th) the Synagogue in Florence holds an Open House for the general public. This year it was a chance for everyone, Florentine and tourist, alike, to enjoy the exquisite restoration of one of the most beautiful buildings in the city, while munching on great food, listening to interesting speakers and music, as well as poking into parts of the grand edifice that are not usually open.

Florence Synagogue with its impressive copper dome

The Open House is part of a Europe-wide Day of Hebraic Culture, which included 62 locations across Italy: Giornata Europea della Cultura Ebraica.

In Florence, a bus was provided to take visitors to four other locations, including the Uffizi, the Palazzo Vecchio, and the Pitti Palace, where works by Jewish artists, modern and not, were displayed.

The walls are painted from floor to ceiling in intricate designs

In the garden of the synagogue, there were stands with food and books, a children’s lab and music. Free guided tours of the synagogue, its new expanded museum and of the Jewish cemetery in the Oltrarno were offered.

The Florence Synagogue, one of the most beautiful in Europe, was built between 1874 and 1882. The architects were Mariano Falcini, Professor Vincenzo Micheli, both Catholic, and Marco Treves, who was Jewish. Their design integrated the architectural traditions of the Islamic and Italian worlds.

Detail of the ceiling below one of the small domes

Layers of travertine and granite alternate in the masonry, creating a striped effect. Old photographs show bold red and beige stripes, but the colors of the stone have faded over time. The overall form of the synagogue is the cruciform plan, similar to the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul. The corner towers are topped with horseshoe-arched towers themselves topped with copper onion domes in the Moorish Revival style. Three arches form the main entrance, above it rise tiers of windows, with their paired arches sharing a single column.

The moorish designs incorporate Jewish symbols

Inside the building every square inch is covered with colored designs incorporating Moorish patterns, but with Jewish symbols and texts.

During World War II, Fascist soldiers used the Synagogue as a vehicle garage. In August 1944 retreating German troops worked with Italian Fascists to blow up the synagogue, but the Italian resistance managed to defuse most of the explosives. Only a limited amount of damage was done. The synagogue was restored after the war. It was restored again after it was damaged by the Flood of 1966.

This past year, the dome was strengthened and resurfaced in copper and a new wing of the museum was added on the top floor. These improvements, coupled with the new lighting, makes a visit a must for those who haven’t been inside in the last few years.

The 2010 Open House drew more than 60,000 in Florence. This is the first year the synagogues of Italy went all out to involve their cities in the exhibition of masterpieces created by Jewish artists.

A couple of days every week a phenomenon overwhelms even the most hardened Florentine.  It is know to some as the “boat people” scrooge. It happens on the days when gigantic cruise ships dock at Livorno. Thousands of pastel-clad tourists shod in flip-flops are unloaded and stuffed into dozens of buses, which transport them to Florence for eight hours of hot, humid sightseeing. They are herded from the Academia to the Uffizi to the Duomo, then through Piazza Signoria and across the Ponte Vecchio.

To escape the armies of sweating, sore-footed deck-crawlers, the wise visitor to Florence will decide on a Bardini Day – a morning in the cool blue-walled confines of the Palazzo Bardini (Museo Stefano Bardini), a lunch in the Bardini Garden(Il Giardino Bardini), and a late afternoon in the hill-topping Villa Bardini.

Grand Hall of the Palazzo Bardini

Palazzo Bardini

The faithful reader of Tuscan Traveler already knows a bit about the Stefano Bardini Museum near the Arno so there is no need to repeat it all again, except to say that on September 6 and September 13, at 11am, free English language tours are being offered of the Bardini Museum by  Con gli Occhi di … And to repeat that the museum is almost always empty so it is soothing to wander through Stefano Bardini’s stuff before emerging into the noonday sun turning left to Borgo San Niccolo’ and then right to the entrance of the Bardini Gardens. (One caveat: To complete a full Bardini Day, it must be done on Saturday, Sunday or Monday because these are the only days the Museo Bardini is open.)

Bardini Garden

The Bardini Garden, unlike its popular well-worn cousin, the Boboli (a ticket to one gets the visitor into the other), is practically empty at all times. It is spread over almost ten acres, set on a 70 meter slope – the view from the top is panoramic. (The garden is open seven days a week from 8:30am to 6:30pm, so a Bardini Day can start here.)

View of the Duomo from the Bardini Garden

Although it is named for the last owner, Stefano Bardini, throughout the centuries the garden has had several owners, predominantely the Mozzi family, who owned the property and the palazzo at its base off and on from the 13th century to the 1880s. The garden is now state-owned property, as a result of a testamentary donation by Ugo Bardini, Stefano’s son, in the 1960s. It was then abandoned for over 40 years.  Restoration started in 1998 and it opened to the public in 2005.

Baroque staircase climbs the Bardini Garden

The garden is divided into three sections: 1) English wood in the west; 2) the baroque staircase in the center; and 3) the agricultural part in the east. Each part has its own history and a richness of components, among which water and sculpture play an essential role. Secluded pathways, grand vistas, flowering arbors, shaded benches and a high loggia, allow the visitor to create their own personal experience in the garden.

Looking out of the Villa Bardini to the edge of the English woods in the Bardini Garden

The loggia, with its spectacular view of the historic center of Florence, the cathedral dome, and the Arno River, is the perfect place for an hour or two respite. Lunch, aperitivi, as well as coffee and sweets are offered. On the perfect Bardini Day, one should plan to arrive at the loggia around 1pm to be refreshed and restored before going on to the Villa Bardini, only a couple of minutes away from the café.

Villa Bardini

Villa Bardini stands at the top of the garden and opens on to Costa San Giorgio, just up the street from where Galileo lived. The original 14th century villa was restructured and enlarged in the 17th century by the architect Gherardo Silvani for his friend Francesco Manadori (it was previously known as Villa Manadora or as Villa Belvedere, because of its magnificent view). It was later acquired by Stefano Bardini, who further enlarged it and the surrounding gardens. Bardini also added the loggia and a limonaia (greenhouse for citrus trees).

Designed by Roberto Capucci

Abandoned for years, the villa, which once contained even more of the antique collections of Bardini, has been restored and transformed into a cultural center to host exhibitions, concerts, conventions and conferences,. It incorporates two new museums: the Roberto Capucci Museum containing many of the famous designer’s sculptural ball gowns and elegant party dresses); and the Pietro Annigoni Museum, dedicated to this contemporary painter, whose work was inspired by the great artists of the Renaissance.

Detail of afternoon dress by Capucci

Until October 17, 2010, the Villa Bardini is also hosting a temporary exhibit that is associated with the Caravaggio exhibits at the Pitt and the Uffizi – Caravaggio and Modernity.

Palazzo Web Site

Garden Web Site

Villa Web Site

Graffiti is known worldwide, but word itself has nothing to do with scrawls on walls. In Italy, the words sgraffito and sgraffiti come from the Italian word sgraffiare (”to scratch”), ultimately from the Greek γράφειν (gráphein), meaning “to write”.

Graffiti, the bane of all modern cities in the form of spray paint, in its original sense refers to marks scratched onto a surface with a tapered point. The graffito technique has been used since prehistoric times. Decades ago, my father showed me graffito animals, birds and people carved on the tufa cave walls in northern New Mexico. But in Florence, starting in the 1400s, it was a technique of wall design, where the top layer of pigment or colored plaster is scratched through to reveal an underlying layer.

Elaborate 16th century graffiti on Bianca Cappello's house

“The historian and artist Giorgio Vasari recorded the graffito technique step by step. First, one paints the wall of a palazzo with a layer of lime plaster, coloured with burnt herbs or other dark pigments. Once the first layer is dry, another is painted on, this time of white plaster, distributed uniformly. On top of this second layer are laid punched-out designs, or stencils, which are reproduced on the wall with powdered charcoal (referred to as tecnica dello spolvero in Italian). A tapered awl is then used to trace the resulting pattern on the wall, cutting through the layer of white plaster to reveal the darker, underlying layer. Thus, by using the same colours as a palazzo’s frescos, the graffito designs could be used to add shadow and depth to the overall decoration.” (FirenzeTurismo.it)

Allegorical graffiti on the façade of Palazzo Ramirez de Montalvo

My favorite examples of historic graffiti in Florence were created during the second half of the 16th century, when the graffito technique was used to design Mannerist allegories incorporating grotesque (meaning in the style of the “grotto”) designs and figures. These are still partially visible on the façade of the Palazzo Ramirez de Montalvo in Borgo degli Albizi and fully realized on the House of Bianca Cappello (grotesque sgraffito decoration by Bernardino Poccetti, 1566) on Via Maggio.

When using the term graffiti to mean defacing buildings, Michelangelo has the dubious pleasure of allegedly being one of the first famous graffiti artists – not with paint, but in the caveman version of scratching a design with a sharp point. On the corner of the Palazzo Vecchio, the one nearest to the Uffizi Gallery, any visitor to Florence can find a carving of a man’s face.

Did Micheangelo deface the front of the Palazzo Vecchio?

There is more than one version of the story, but the artistry is attributed only to Michelangelo. One version states that ever willing to take a dare, and supremely confident, Michelangelo turned his back, carving free-hand without looking, into the pietra serena of the city hall’s wall, he etched his own profile into the stone. Another variation has it that he carved blindly the likeness of a personal foe, so that Florentines would never forget the man’s face.

Sanctioned graffiti for OPEN YOUR EYES TO Comics DAY

Last week, a one-day comics festival, OPEN YOUR EYES TO Comics DAY, came to Florence. Via del Corso was decorated with four modern graffiti wall decorations – sanctioned by the mayor. These were not scratched into walls, but painted on to wallboard. They won’t last 400 years, but they are better than the scourge that defiles most of Florence’s walls.

To be continued …

Tuscan Traveler took a brief sojourn in Venice with a very short wish list. The first priority was to eat as much great seafood as possible. That done, the search was on for the glass menagerie that includes tiny hand-made mosquitoes.

Tiger Mosquitoes by Bruno Amadi

Bruno Amadi presides over a zoological garden of fragile plants, animals, fish, birds and frogs in a narrow back ally near the San Polo church. But the bugs are the best – a house fly so life-like you will want to swat it, mosquitoes balancing on spindly legs thinner than a human hair, and beetles in iridescent colors.

Mr. Amadi works with glass rods (lumi) and a flame to create his masterpieces. He first consults reference books and the National Geographic Magazine to assure that his creations are true to life. He will spend hours getting the spots on a Poison Dart Frog just right.

A Grasshopper Eyes a Sweet Pea Lunch

Venice is full of glass, but after you see the work of Bruno Amadi and almost pick up one of his pea pods to savor the spring sweetness, you will never be satisfied with fake ladybugs and seahorses seen in windows around every other corner.

Lume di Amadi

Address:  San Polo 2747, 30100 Venezia (Vaporetto Stop: San Sivestro)

Telephone:  +39 041.38.089

Hours: Mon. – Sat. 9am – 12:30pm, 3pm – 6pm (wise to call ahead)