When asked, “Which archaeological site should I visit, Pompeii or Herculaneum?” I will inevitably answer, “Go to Oplontis!”

The patrician villa excavated under the modern town of Torre Annunziata, belonged to the Emperor Nero, famous for his appreciation of music and the arts, but more so for his cruelty. The villa was home to his beautiful and devious wife Poppea until she died after her husband kicked her in the stomach when she was heavily pregnant. (She should have been more careful; Nero had ordered the murder of his mother Agrippina as well…)

While it is hard to imagine much domestic bliss within these walls, the villa itself is extraordinary to behold. It contains some of the finest and best preserved wall paintings to have survived from early Imperial times. Visiting Oplontis is like taking a voyeuristic tour into the lives of the imperially rich and famous.  It is amazing how the aura of power and wealth is still palpable in the spacious hallways, frescoed walls and shaded garden with its vast swimming pool. It makes you want to walk on tiptoe or talk in a whisper; as if at any moment you might find yourself in the presence of the emperor, lounging in the calidarium or strolling along its cloistered porticos.

The complex was swallowed in ash during the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 A.D.  Fortunately, the roof of the building survived, preserving the interior for posterity.  Even the doors are visible, poignantly cast in the solidified ashes.

While on a heritage tour with an Italo-American family who had come to meet their Italian relatives, we spent some time with their family near the tiny hilltop village of S. Giorgio la Molara in the province of Benevento.

This is a vast farming region of rolling hills and an immense checker-board effect is created by the colors of the crops: predominant are the powder blue of the sky, the rich browns of the tilled fields and the grey-greens of olive, tobacco and corn, with golden necklaces of tabacco neatly hanging to dry on wooden racks.

At first glance it’s an idyllic scene, with sheep grazing in the meadows, far from the drama of Naples or the exhaltation of the Amalfi Coast.  But it’s a stark, spartan place, where in the early part of the last century lives were torn apart by back-breaking labor, famine and emigration and where even today familes live isolated lives highlighted only by births, baptisms, weddings and funerals.

As we travelled through the countryside, huge turbines harvested the Autumn winds and I reflected that nothing here goes to waste.  And then I was struck by how this stark landscape, viewed from the air, might seem like some titanic game of chess, with the huge windmills posing as pawns on an awesome and endless chessboard.

Read published article at Italian Notebook

I wound my way up the narrow road towards the tiny, secluded sanctuary of S. Lucia in Sassinoro. I was on my way to meet Giovanna, a volunteer in the shrine’s wee gift shop.  She and her husband Giorgio were part of the family I was researching for a heritage tour.

Like many holy places, the legend surrounding S. Lucia in Sassinoro began in the spring of 1600 as a shepherd’s tale.  A number of sheep had been mysteriously disappearing and just as mysteriously reappearing again after a few minutes, so the shepherds decided to follow the flock as they grazed.  They discovered that the animals were going in and out of a split in the rocky face of the mountain.  They squeezed through the narrow crack and made their way into the hillside until they reached a grotto where they were suddenly blinded by the appearance of a beautiful woman and a handsome young man bathed in shimmering light.

They ran home to tell of their miraculous encounter and returned with the town priest to verify the account.  In the grotto they found a statue of S. Lucia and S. Michele!  The town fathers decided to erect a place of worship on the spot and construction of the sanctuary began in 1622 and was completed in 1643.

Today this quaint little church nestles quietly into the mountain above the village of Sassinoro. But once inside, the feeling becomes one of awe as the apse is dramatically set into the huge overhanging face of the grotto. It is still possible to squeeze through the original path which the shepherds took on all fours, to view the ancient statues of S. Lucia and S. Michele.

S. Lucia is the patron saint of the blind and a small room off the side of the church is filled with reliquaries containing silver ex-votos donated by faithful worshipers who have regained their sight after praying to her.

A Circus Comes to Sassinoro

On the day of my visit to the sanctuary, I had an experience so glorious in its absurdity that it had to be documented and shared.

While admiring the inside of the church of S. Lucia in Sassinoro, my host Giovanna pointed out the last-minute preparations being made for a wedding that was to take place shortly: the bride and groom’s seats and pew had been padded with white satin drapery; the central aisle carpeted with a white runner and strewn carefully with orange rose petals.  Bouquets of yellow flowers decorated the pews on either side of the carpet, creating a strong visual perspective towards the magnificent, suspended cross with its incredible, rocky backdrop.

As we walked out into the dappled sunlight I began to say my goodbyes, but my eyes were drawn to a strange apparition on the far side of the courtyard, standing directly opposite a white marble statue of Padre Pio.  Like the glimmering image of St. Michael in the dark grotto of 1600, a young man stood, emanating a blinding light.  I had to blinked twice to make sure my eyes weren’t deceiving me.

He was olive-skinned and decked from head to toe in shades of cream and white.  A diamond-studded clasp closed the lapels of a jacket made out of what seemed to be upholstery fabric; a smaller pin glinted at his throat in place of a tie.  While the unhemmed pants billowed out over his cream-coloured boots, a jauntily-held white cane brought my gaze back to ruffled shirt-cuffs peaking out from the jacket sleeves.  The whole thing was topped off by a top hat studded with sequins.

Could this be St. Barnum or Bailey, I wondered, or was it a character out of a Savoyard production of Gilbert & Sullivan? The total effect was of a ring-leader at a circus and I watched, tranfixed, to see whether he would pull a rabbit out of his hat.

“Oh my God”, I gasped slowly, “It’s the groom!”

Two considertions broke into my mind.  What kind of person could have suggested this bizarre outfit and had the young man had to pay for it?

At that moment the bride’s entourage pulled up at the the gate below, cars piling up behind the her 10-meter limousine which huffed to a halt at the bottom of the stairs.  Out spilled a cresting wave of white tulle.

This gal must have been a long-standing member of the congregation of S. Lucia because the lenses of her glasses were thick as bottle-bottoms. Her father  - also dressed in white, but with an interesting shade of purple shirt and tie – helped her out of the car and proudly led her up the stairs.  Not to be outdone, her mother wore a red strapless gown while her aunt videoed the procession from behind in a tight-fitting black dress with a striking cleavage.  Someone at the top of the steps shouted down to the bride as she bravely navigated the stairs that she was lifting her dress too high for decency…

The riotous assembly regrouped in the sunlit churchyard, as the four-year-old bridesmaid augustly took her place behind the couple and holding the end of veil in her tiny hands.

Padre Pio, unperturbed by the garish show, calmly blessed everyone as they entered into the shadows of the church.

See Italian Notebook article on the web

(di seguito testo italiano)

“This is Don Gennaro, the exorcist for southern Italy.” I found myself shaking hands with a short, jovial man who looked to me like Friar Tuck. But after a day full of wonders, should this have come as a surprise?

The Benedictine Abbey at Cava dei Tirreni, which at first glance looks to be a rather a dreary place with an unprepossessing 18th century façade made of grey lava stone, is home to what was once one of the most magnificent, powerful and opulent seats of temporal power in Italy.

The building was begun almost 1000 years ago by Alferius Pappacarbone, a nobleman from Salerno who took Benedictine orders to live as a hermit. But he was called back to Salerno by Prince Guainmarius to head the monasteries in his principality. By then a famed and holy man, Alferius soon attracted other mystics and hermits and in 1011 the foundations of the Abbey were laid.

But what began as a hermit’s simple abode grew into a huge administrative complex which, in the Middle Ages, held jurisdiction over more than 400 abbeys, priories and churches between Rome and Palermo. It could accommodate as many as 3000 friars.

It is now possible to visit the Abbey to admire the ornate baroque cathedral with its magnificent marble inlays and chapels, Romanic cloisters squeezed under the overhanging rock, Catacombs, Longobard Cemetery and Museum.

One of the most extraordinary places, visible during National Culture Week (April 18-26) are the Archives, home to over 80,000 books and 15,000 ancient manuscripts and parchments. Throughout the week (and upon appointment) the library’s the curator will permit visitors to see and photograph a few of the library’s greatest treasures. Among these is a priceless Visigoth Bible dating from the 9th Century A.D.

These visits have been made possible thanks to the perseverance of a woman, Angela Russo, who, with energy and dedication has worked closely with the Abbey to ensure that the incredible art and artefacts contained in this immense cave can be admired by a larger public.

For more details or to book a guided tour contacted Angela Russo at: angela_russo04@fastwebnet.it or telephone: 347.1946957.

versione italiana:

L’ Abbazia nella Cava

“Sono Don Gennaro, l’Esorcista per il Sud Italia”. Con queste parole si presentava: sorridente, bonario nel sorriso e nella figura rotondetta; ma dopo una giornata fitta di scoperte, di che dovevo sorprendermi?

L’Abbazia Benedettina di Cava dei Tirreni alla prima occhiata può non impressionare con la sua facciata barocca in pietra vulcanica così tipica di queste regioni, ma nella sua storia è stata una sede di grande potere temporale e spirituale ancora testimoniato dalla sua inaspettata opulenza.

La fondazione si deve quasi 1000 anni fa ad Alferio Pappacarbone, giovane rampollo di nobile famiglia Longobarda che prese gli ordini Benedettini a Cluny e fu incaricato dal suo principe di riorganizzare i monasteri della sua terra.
Era però molto forte la sua vocazione all’eremitaggio, a cui si ritirò nella grande grotta (Cava) che da il nome alla località.

Anche in ritiro comunque la sua fama di santità fece nascere un tale seguito di fedeli e confratelli che l’eremo si sviluppò in Cappella e poi Abbazia, arrivando ad ospitare anche 3000 monaci, con possedimenti e autorità su chiese e parrocchie da Roma a Palermo.

Visitando l’Abbazia si possono ammirare la Cattedrale con i suoi magnifici marmi intarsiati, il chiostro Romanico incassato nella montagna incombente, e nelle cripte le zone più antiche, con le celle originarie, un cimitero Longobardo, resti Romani, ed il Museo.

Inoltre di straordinario interesse e valore, sono la Biblioteca e Archivio ricchi di quasi 100.000 tra volumi, documenti e pergamene antiche. Durante la Settimana Nazionale della Cultura (18-26 Aprile), previo appuntamento, il Curatore della raccolta mostrerà ai visitatori alcuni veri tesori di arte e storia medievale, tra cui una Bibbia in Visigoto del secolo IX.

Queste visite sono possibili grazie alla perseveranza della Sig.ra Angela Russo che ha dedicato grandi energie alla collaborazione con l’Abbazia perché lo spirito, i manufatti ed i capolavori di questa vera Cava delle meraviglie siano più conosciuti dal pubblico.

Per maggiori informazioni o per prenotare una visita guidata contattare Angela Russo: angela_russo04@fastwebnet.it oppure Cell. 347.1946957

By Penny Ewles-Bergeron, writer, artist, … finding the many good things in Naples.

See the original article with photos at Italian Notebook

Some people have fairies at the bottom of their garden. We have the oldest military academy in Europe at the end of our street. La Nunziatella was founded in 1787 to turn out officers for the kingdom of Naples.

These days the boys study strategy, topography, firearms practise, horse riding and all manner of sports within a classic Italian school programme.

Twice a year the cadets parade to Piazza del Plebiscito for a grand ceremony. And we rush to the balcony.

At other times you see them out and about, dressed either in summer white buttoned jackets and blue trousers or their winter black with dramatic cloaks and spadini – short dress swords - always on display. You’d think there has been a mass breakout from the opera house!

But you have to dress and act the part when you live and work in a splendid red citadel like la Nunziatella.