Epiphany in Florence

Annamaria on Monday

Since the Feast of the Epiphany falls on Monday this Year, I am taking license to rerun a previous post on the subject.  Here is what I and my friends in Florence will be celebrating. 

January 6^th, the twelfth day of Christmas, is the traditional end of holiday celebrations in Italy.  These days, many Italians call the day by the name of the Christmas witch.

Santa Claus has taken over the role of delivering Christmas gifts in the rest of the world, but though the old man from the North Pole can be seen hereabouts, so also can the traditional Italian bringer of gifts—La Befana.

In Italian folklore, La Befana, flying on a broom, comes down the chimney and brings good children candies, fruits, and little gifts and bad children lumps of coal.  These days—Italians being a child-friendly race—the lumps of coal are actually very dark caramels.

The name La Befana is thought to be a corruption of the word “epiphania,” the name for the feast commemorating the visit of the three kings to the infant Jesus.  Those oriental visitors brought the newborn baby gifts.  And their legend figures in the lore of La Befana.  There are many version of her connection with the wise men’s journey to the babe in Bethlehem.  My favorite has her a loving mother whose child has died.  Following the star leading them to Jesus, the kings from the east pass her way.  Mad with grief, on hearing of the child they seek, she imagines that he is her son.  She too goes with gifts for the child.  Delighted to receive her, the infant Jesus gives her a gift in return.  She will be the mother of every child in Italy.  On the eve of January 6^th every year, she goes to every house where there is a child and leaves gifts.  Like a good mother, she rewards the good children with sweets and admonishes the bad ones with lumps of coal.

Anthropologists trace the legend of La Befana back to new-year pagan celebrations of ancient Rome, during which gifts were exchanged and fertility and agriculture celebrated.  As you can imagine, those New Year’s feasts had a licentious and raucous character.  Here is Ottorino Respighi’s musical portrayal of the modern celebration in the Piazza Navona in which you will hear echoes of those riotous Romans of old.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GsLj3wlycPw

Detail of Gozzoli's gorgeous Adoration of the Magi in the Palazzo Medici-Ricardi

Here in Florence, the city celebrates La Befana with a parade in Renaissance costume.

I celebrated with friends at lunch in my favorite restaurant in the world.  Tortino ai carciofi, osso buco alla fiorentina, pera carmelatta.  EXQUISITE! 

 

The elegant gentleman in this picture, I am so sorry to have to say, has since left us. He took great pride in his native city and taught me a great deal about it.  Ti manco, Marcello.

The Countess of Albany

Annamaria on Monday

My post last week about my Alfieri family name drew a number of admiring responses from the men of MIE about the amour of the great italian poet Vittorio Aflieri.  That lady is interesting for more reasons than her hairdo.  So here she is:

Princess Louise of Stolberg-Gerden had a hard life before she met the dashing Vittorio.  She was born in 1752 in Mons, then the Austrian Netherlands (now Belgium).  Her linage was extremely swanky, but she had two big problems when it came to being a high-tone European princess.  For one thing, her family was poor and became even worse off when her father died in battle while fighting on the Austrian side in the Seven Years' War.  Even worse than that, her family was Catholic--which severely limited the main chance for any princess then (or now for that matter): wedlock.  With the patronage of Empress Maria Teresa, Louise was able to secure the best anyone could manage for her--a place in the Convent of St. Waudru in Mons.  This was where she had to stay until she received an offer of marriage.

The convent where Louise stayed until Charlie proposed

To our ears, the proposal that came might seem quite advantageous.  She was to wed one of the most famous Catholic Royals of her age: Bonnie Prince Charlie aka Charles Edward Stuart aka The Great  (actually not so great) Pretender.  Yes, him--the Jacobite claimant to the thrones of England and Scotland.

Charlie in his palmy days

Grandson of James II of England, Charlie was born in Rome, educated there and in Bologna.  Lots of swell people around Europe, including Louis XV of France, thought Charlie's daddy was the rightful King.  Louis, of course, was also taking side bets that the Stuarts' harrying of the ruling Protestants could only be good for France.

Backed by the Frenchies, Charlie invaded Scotland in an effort to restore his papa to the throne, had some early success, and then practically single handedly--through stupid strategies--lost the Battle of Culloden.  (An aside: The Crown commander, "Stinking Billy" Duke of Cumberland, doesn't come off any better.  He was as vicious as Charlie was dumb.)

Anyway, Charlie got out of Scotland in one piece and spent the next couple of decades in exile, drinking, seducing women, and keeping his delusions alive.  At some point, someone hit on the idea that if Charlie got married to a nice Catholic girl, the pope would support his pretension to his granddad's throne.  They went looking for Miss Right, and they found Louise.

The regal couple were married by proxy on the 28th of March 1772.  A few weeks later, they met up face to face in Italy and renewed their vows.  Charlie was 52; Louise was 20!

The groom at Louise's wedding

They moved to Rome, and he set out trying to make a baby.  When his efforts didn't pay off after two years, the pope and his other powerful allies lost interest in him.  Louise found herself--not the Queen of England and Scotland as she had been led to expect, but just a sad princess married to a disappointed old man with no pretensions to glory, who had turned nasty into the bargain.

Charlie took up drinking, spouse abuse, and the comfort of various mistresses.  He moved himself and his wife to Florence and changed their titles to Count and Countess of Albany.  Shortly thereafter, Count Vittorio Alfieri entered Louise's life and within two years of meeting, they secretly became lovers.  Ten years later, after many attempts to get away from the violent Charlie, Louise--through the good offices of King Gustav of Sweden--was granted a decree of separation, which gave her a legal right to live away from her no-longer-bonnie prince.

As time went on, word leaked out about her relationship with the Italian poet.  Little by little, members of the European aristocracy began to shun Louise.  By 1787, the couple abandoned the subterfuge and began to live together openly--in Paris and in Florence.  Even after Charlie died, they continued to stay together without the blessing of the Church.

Home Sweet Home

The Salon

In their palazzo in Florence, Louise became hostess of a famous salon attended by the leading intellectual and artistic lights of the era.

Louise and Vittorio stayed together until he died.  Louise buried him the Church of Santa Croce, between Michelangelo and Machiavelli.

She lived on in Florence for another nineteen years.  Her tomb is nearby his.

Viva L'Amore!

Freude Schoener: Celebrating the New Year in Florence

Annamaria on Monday

Over the next several weeks, I will be traveling in Italy and France, and I am hoping to take you with me.  Here is an account of my first joyful hours on this longest trip of my life so far.

Arriving from New York by way of Madrid on New Year's Eve, I had just enough time to unpack, grab a coffee and a snack and gussy myself up for the festivities, delightfully arranged by my Florentine friends.

Good-bye to 2015

On may way to meet them at the Ponte alle Grazie,
I passed the via Calzaiuoli ......

and through the Piazza della Signori, where the revelers were gathering.

And then along the Arno, with San Miniato upon the distance...

and the old tower lit with changing colors.

We arrived at Maggio Musicale Fiorentino's new, beautiful opera house, just three years old.

Nicoletta and Paola with your reporter in the lobby.

My ticket to a heavenly performance of Beethoven's 9th.

Before the concert, a lively, clear, detailed introduction by a musicologist.

Afterwards, the orchestra, soloists, and chorus accept enthusiastic kudos from the audience.

Back at my place, we sit down to a lovely dinner, planned and prepared by
Nicoletta and Paola, beginning with antipasti and a lovely Sauterne, and including
a main course of lentils and cotechino--the traditional good luck New Year's
meal of the Italians--to bring health and prosperity in the year ahead.

And of course a lovely dessert and bubbly.

At One AM there were still throngs along the street below my windows...

 I gazed at the view from my sitting room (where I sit now
writing this blog).  In the wee hours the orchestra in the piazza
serenaded me with some of my absolute favorites from the film
scores of the great Ennio Moricone.  I only hope these great joys
are a harbinger of what's to come for us all and our world in 2016.

January 1

A New Year's Day treat of major proportions.

If you haven't seen this film, correct your error immediately.  It is brilliant.  I think it is Spielberg's best.  The screen play is fabulous and the art direction splendid.  To say nothing of the great actors and editing.  I know.  I am gushing.  See and then decide if I am wrong.  Best of all is the theme, showing how wrong a people can go if they succumb to fear and fear-mongering.  The film is historical, but this is the story that had to be told RIGHT NOW.  THIS MINUTE!!

Which brings me back to Beethoven and his choice of Schiller's Ode to Joy as the text of the sublime final movement of his masterpiece.  For you to enjoy today, I have chosen my fellow New Yorker's genius conducting of the Vienna Philharmonic.  Music and musical performance do not get better than this.

Here are some thoughts to ponder while you wait for it to boot up:  

This symphony could never move us as it does without the human voices.   Let your mind dwell on their words.  "Joy, beautiful spark of Gods....Be embraced, millions/This kiss to the entire world....Those who dwell in the great circle/Pay homage to sympathy/It leads to the stars...Endure courageously, millions!/Endure for a better world...All sinners shall be forgiven/And hell shall be no more...."

Happy New Year, my dear, dear friends.

Firenze 2015: First Days

If what you see here makes you envious, I would not be surprised.

I have recently revealed some ups and downs of my recent times.  Today, I take you to a purely pleasurable a couple of days.

I have the enormous good luck of owning an apartment in the historic center of Florence.  The chain of random events that had to have happened to bring me to this reality boggles my mind.  The odds were all against me.  But here I am.  Let me show you what my first day and a half here have been like.

It is my habit, immediately on arriving, to have a meal at my favorite restaurant in the entire world: La Buca dell'Orafo, five minutes from home.  After being served inedible airplane dreck for my previous two meals, I was too hungry to photograph the first and second courses.  Here are the desserts from Saturday's lunch.  The pears have an impossibly thin but crunchy sugar glaze.

Just at dawn Sunday, from the window in my room:

Snapshots of a stroll on a gorgeous sunny Sunday morning:

The Arno, taken from the Ponte Vecchio

Rowing machine, Florentine style.

Ponte alle Grazie.  The 1397 bridge, along with several medieval palazzi along the shoreline were blown up by the Nazis in August of 1944.  The original bridge had no strategic value.  As far as I know, it was destroyed out of spite.

The church of San Frediano

Ognisanti

A lovely place for a coffee, a January Sunday morning warm enough to enjoy it outside.

Santa Maria Novella

Piazza Santa Maria Novella looking across from the church.

Piazza del Duomo

Piazza dell Signoria

Sunday lunch at La Cantinetta da Verazzano:

A souvenir of a memorable day gone by, with Leighton, without whom there would be no Murder is Everywhere:

Annamaria - In her element on Monday