Lunch at Ruspoli Castle

Ruspoli Castle seen from the gardens

still life  at the castle kitchen 

corridor to the castle chapel 

   

The town of Vignanello  was in full festival mode  this week for the beginning of  Carnival coincided  with  the feast days of two local saints, Santa Giacinta Marescotti and San Biagio.

the Duomo of Vignanello faces the Castello 

Giada holds her copy of my
latest book  

plan of the castle's  Renaissance gardens 

warming up by the fireplace

Family coat of arms and portraits  in main salone

Ruspoli ancestors tower over Fulvio 

 We were guests of Donna Giada Ruspoli for lunch at her family  Castello, which dominates the town of Vignanello, sharing the main piazza  with the Duomo.

with Donna Giada Ruspoli 

 Arriving to the piazza the noise level increased as we struggled against  the icy winds that channeled down the narrow main street: besides the celebratory fireworks that reverberated off the  Duomo and castle walls the  town  band was  playing and the traffic  in the tiny piazza worked itself into gridlock.

family portraits  and candles 

crossing the moat 

One must cross the moat to enter the castle’s  massive entrance  doors and once inside  the  guests  enjoyed bruschette and aperitivi in the warm glow of portable heaters. 

Elisa and Claudio Fochetti, Fulvio and Elizabeth 

Elizabeth  with Santino, the castle's gardener extrordinaire 

Some hardy guests   braved the cold to cross a further  moat  which connects the castle with its famous  Renaissance gardens.  

the Renaissance gardens 

three young guests in the castle 's main salone 

Many of those invited  were specialists in antique music  who had come  up from Rome for the day. Others hailed from places further away: Portugal, Oxford and  Brazil.

guests enjoyed lunch and desserts...

...around the tables and  the fireplace

Lunch was served in two living rooms on the piano nobile  and guests served themselves at a buffet table  in the main  room decorated with  family portraits and with the best views over the garden.   

Donna Giada and Signor Fochetti

Chiara Pelliccia,  Giorgio Monari, Francesco Maria Ruspoli and Donna Giada Ruspoli 

Following lunch  Dr. Chiara Pelliccia winner of  the Prince Francesco Maria Ruspoli international prize for music studies   spoke about  her research on  the cantata da camera of 17^th century musician, Giovanni Lorenzo Lutier  and  Dr.Giorgio Monari presented the “Miscellanea Ruspoli” studies in Baroque music .
Your comments (commenti anche in italiano o portoghese sono benvenuti )  are welcome.  

Winter weekend in Italy: music, protests, conferences and commemorations

This winter weekend  is grinding to a close and a busy one it was. 
 I will let the photos tell the story, with a " No comment"  on my part. 

Your comments instead  are  very welcome. How many of these happenings  did you  attend?  

The weekend  began with a full house and attentive audience for the conference "Artisti e Archeologi Stranieri in Etruria"  sponsored by Archeotuscia  at the Prefecture of Viterbo. 

 Thanks to all who partecipated. 

Saturday morning the cold north wind did not keep hundreds  from protesting in front of the Town Hall in the main piazza. 

 Problems include the prolonged closure of public schools,  arsenic and  chlorine in the water and many others, as one can imagine in  a town where the administration  was voted in  by  only 36% of the citizens.

Sunday morning:  a bright sunny day,  no wind but  total confusion due to the unexpected  parade of gigantic  tractors  followed by a few horsemen, that invaded the historic center. 

Drums frightened the horses while flag throwers tried to enliven  

 Piazza della Rocca, known for a non-functioning, ugly fountain.

The local priest gave a sermon to those gathered  in the piazza  between the Duomo and the town hall.

camping gear of a scout troop  on church steps 

no comment

no comment 

no comment 

At 11:30 the Day of Memory commemoration was held, as it was in most Italian towns, to remember the deportation of the Jews in 1943.   

telling  true stories of the Shoah 

Prof. Stefano Grego's   personal memories of 1943 

 
 The afternoon saw a large gathering at Opera Extravaganza's  house concert  featuring violinists newly arrived in Vetralla. They performed music by Mozart and Tartini.  
The audience included  music lovers living in the area but of  many different nationalities: Irish, Italian, Finnish, Australian, Indian, English, American, German and Rumanian.

Monica Sanfilippo and Luigi De Filippi   

Susanna Ohtonen   and  costumes 

Monica Sanfilippo explains  Giuseppe Tartini (1692-1770) 

DeFilippis' violin  from Pesaro,  dated 1680,

Keeping up with Happenings in Italy

Members of the   foreign  community  mix with locals 

In the good old days before the revolution in communications caused by internet and computer based publications, there were English language daily newspapers in  Italy dispensing  news, information,classified and listings of events and  happening.

The days of the Daily American and  Daily News  are  gone forever, replaced by dozens  of  Italian and English  online magazines and  newspapers. 

Professional journalists who have kept up with the  new media are competing with newly arrived bloggers for  readership. 

 The result is a plethora of on-line resources  readily available at the click of a mouse. Never before has there  been so much information available  for newly arrived expats, it is definitely easier to learn one's way around the maze of living in Italy. 

 Wanted in Rome  still prints  a paper edition on sale at various points in the city including the Anglo American bookshop on Via della Vite near the Spanish Steps.

 The Florentine  can be found throughout  Florence  in its paper format or on line. Is there an English language magazine published  in your area? 

TimeOut  magazine  has both online and print magazines  in major cities worldwide: besides Rome there is the original for New York plus Istanbul and London.  

The American magazine   has  great lists of events, happenings, and restaurant listings .  It is published by the dean of Rome's English journalists, Christopher Winner. 

For those living in or visiting the Northern Lazio, Viterbo, Tuscia, Etruria areas here are some other tips for keeping up with the local happenings. Drop us a line in the comments box with your  favorites:

·   In towns and villages throughout Italy the walls are plastered with locandine or wall posters announcing festivals, processions, celebrations and musical events which are abundant in the summer months.

·  Get  on  mailing lists  of associations in your  area. For the Olgiata area contact Paola at  Welcome Neighbor.   

·  Interested in archeology conferences and excursions?  Join  the 370 members of Archeotuscia for a rich calendar of outings in the northern Lazio area. See below for  this week's happenings. 

·   Tuscia Web  is just one of the many on line news sources for  Viterbo and environs. Others are Teresa Pierini's La Tua Etruria. 

·  La Loggetta is a bi-monthly  magazine written by local experts with a subscription of  25 euro. It can be  delivered to you  worldwide. www.laloggetta.it

  For musical afternoons and house concerts in the N. Lazio area   check out Opera Extravaganza . 

     Ask to be on their mailing list for updates on concerts.

Massimiliano Darida and Maria Lunella Reedy
delighted the audience at yesterday's concert

part of the international  audience  

·    Some faithful readers  may  remember  the 70+ issues of   Elegant Etruria Newsletter  that I emailed  to hundreds  of addresses  in the mid-1990s, a labor of love which helped to give information to the  burgeoning  international community of Rome's northern suburbs.    Feedback was rare,  but the huge  mailing list  and connections  made,  became a highly prized  (and envied) piece of information.

·   Mailing lists, email invitations…these have now been  surpassed  by the many blogs published  in English in central Italy.  Sign up(scroll to the bottom of the page and leave your email)  to receive  the  weekly edition of  this blog 50yearsinItaly,  one of many in English. Please share the names of your favorites with a comment  at the bottom of the page. 

And in case you havn't heard yet, here are just a few of the interesting happenings taking place this week in the Viterbo area: 

• Friday, 25th Jan. in Viterbo I will be  presenting an illustrated conference for Archeotuscia  entitled  “Foreign Artists and Archeologists in  Etruria” .  To be held at Sala Coronas, 2nd floor, the Prefecture of Viterbo (Piazza dei Priori, near the City Hall) at  5 p.m.  on Friday 25th January. All  are welcome to attend.

Francesco Aliperti & Georgia of Edizioni Archeoares 

  

delegation of Air Force students 



Mario Bracci Devoti, Fabiano  B.  & Chief Inspector Orlandini 

• Photos of Friday Jan. 25th  conference in Viterbo.





• Saturday, 26th Jan. in Vetralla,  Destinatario Sconosciuto at the Museum  of Vetralla. 
• Your comments are welcome. Commenti in italiano  sono benvenuti! 

The Guinness of Bonfires

The 8 metre high  bonfire
Photo F. Pignatale 

 
 Il Focarone of Bagnaia is the biggest of the hundreds of  bonfires   that are lit all over Italy on the night of January  16^th-17^th in honor of  St. Anthony Abbot, healer and protector of livestock. 

tower and entrance to medieval Bagnaia 

 For the entire  week preceding  the festival,  groups of young people were hard at work setting up  the  eight-metre tall mass of tree  trunks and other  timber in the middle of the piazza.

The expert  builders must   insure that the bonfire will burn evenly  so it does not collapse on one side.

Il  Focarone, ready for lighting 

The   mid-winter bonfire  is  a tradition that is  strongly felt  by the Bagnaioli, as the townspeople are called.

 The  festivities begin  at 5 p.m.  with a  procession of costumed dignitaries representing important characters in the town’s long and sometimes tragic history. 

as night falls  the festivities begin 

These include  La Pucciarella, a young girl who defended Bagnaia when the  Lanzichenecchi lay siege to the town in 1527.

the piazza  resembles, in miniature, Rome's  Piazza del Popolo

 The flag throwers are followed by the igniting of the bonfire at 6:30 p.m.  

   The flames leap higher than the village rooftops heating up  the piazza and the crowds who come from Viterbo and other  nearby  towns.  

 Bagnaia is mostly known for its magnificent Renaissance  Villa Lante gardens, which are a perfect retreat in sultry summer weather,  so it is a surprise to discover this tradition offering respite from winter's cold.