Travel without Limits

Bari, Polignano, Castellana Grotte, Alberobello, Taranto, Corfù, Benitses

This itinerary was conceived to satisfy the legitimate desire to travel and to get to know each other. In order for the travel to be an inclusive and stimulating experience and for us to enjoy its magic to the full, we have designed a path that is as free from architectural barriers, but rich in cultural stimuli and scenic beauty. This is not a “different” itinerary, but an itinerary for everyone, without any limits, as the title suggests. Bearing this in mind, we have decided to include in the tour that we propose shere ome of the destinations of all the itineraries already conceived within the Polysemi portal, which meet as much as possible the necessary requirements for travelers with special needs; these itineraries are told by intellectuals who traveled before us between Puglia and the Ionian Islands. During the construction of this itinerary we realized how various projects have recently been carried out to adapt architectural, landscape and cultural heritage in terms of accessibility for some types of needs; however, there is still much work to be done to ensure real usability for all travelers. In our “limitless” itinerary, places without barriers that hinder mobility and practicability have been included; for each destination, any aids that guarantee the usability of the place for different types of needs have also been indicated. We have created mini itineraries summarized through visualized maps, which facilitate their consultation.

The first stop on our itinerary is Bari. Whether you arrive by plane or reach the city by train, the journey can begin safely, since both the airport and the central railway station are accessible. In particular, further restructuring works are currently underway at Bari Central Station which will guarantee improved usability. We would like to point out that the “light path” starts right from the station, with a route designed for the blind and visually impaired that runs for about 2.5 km in the Murat center of Bari. It is one of the longest tracks in the world and is made of tactile bricks that indicate free routes, relative detours, road crossings and obstacles that can be overcome; however, it should be noted that the traffic lights are not equipped with acoustic signals, so we recommend accompanying blind people. Pier Paolo Pasolini arrived in Bari in 1951, and the great poet and filmmaker will accompany us in our descovery of the Muratian village of the Apulian capital, the city to which he dedicated the story Le due Bari. Arriving in the evening in an unknown city is a adventure for every traveler and for Pasolini the arrival in Bari takes on the features of an adventure with Kafkaesque outlines.

This is what he writes:

Kafka, ci vuole Kafka. Scendere dal rapido, non potere entrare in città né avanzare di un passo fuori dal viale della stazione, può accadere solo al personaggio di un’avventura kafkiana […], io ero rimasto solo, a tremare, nel piazzale rosso, verde, giallo della stazione: in me lottavano ancora la seduzione dell’avventura e un ultimo residuo di prudenza. (P. P. Pasolini, Le due Bari)

The feeling of bewilderment felt by the poet must not frighten us: it is the same feeling that each of us could experience once arrived at the central station of the Apulian capital and we see an orthogonal checkerboard grid of streets open in front of us, which can all seem the same and are the result of a 19th century urban restyling project promoted by Gioacchino Murat. The new Bari, developed outside its old medieval walls according to the nineteenth-century aesthetic canons of modern European cities, is an orderly succession of streets and avenues that draw a geometric pattern which is totally foreign and almost juxtaposed with the disordered Mediterranean texture of the alleys that characterize the old Town.

It is better not to take a random road, as Pasolini did: «così senza aver deciso nulla, scelsi una strada, una delle tante, piena di scritte luminose e mi incamminai», we recommend instead to continue along via Sparano, the wide pedestrian shopping street in Bari. Here you can admire Palazzo Mincuzzi, one of the most beautiful and extravagant Art Nouveau buildings in Bari.

At the end of Via Sparano the traveler can continue along Corso Vittorio Emanuele; from here we have outlined three possible paths:

Itinerary

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At the end of Via Sparano, turning right and taking Corso Vittorio Emanuele, the Teatro Margherita stands out scenographically in its elegant liberty forms; today it represents the Polo of contemporary arts, a prestigious venue for exhibitions and international art exhibitions, equipped with accesses and accessible routes.

As soon as you pass the Margherita theater, a short distance from Piazza IV Novembre, the ancient port basin of Bari opens; in dialect it is called ‘nderre alle lanze’, that is to say land on the spears, with reference to the landing of small and typical boats of fishermen who, even today, are not too different from those who enchanted Pasolini. Here the traveler will be able to watch, as happened to the poet, the colorful secular ritual that takes place every morning: the sale of fish on often improvised stalls, the tastings of octopuses and raw molluscs taken by tourists and citizens.

From the Teatro Margherita going south, you can go towards the sea, which is a constant presence of Pasolini’s Bari and reveals itself in its Adriatic splendor especially in the morning.

As Pasolini writes:

Alzato il sipario del buio, la città compare in tutta la sua felicità adriatica.

Senti il mare, il mare, in fondo agli incroci perpendicolari delle strade di questa Torino adolescente: un mare generoso, un dono, non sai se di bellezza o di ricchezza. Davanti al lungomare (splendido), sotto l’orizzonte purissimo, una folla di piccole barche piene di ragazzi (i ragazzi baresi alti e biondi, coi calzoni ostinatamente corti sulla coscia rotonda, la pelle intensa, solidi) si lascia dondolare nel tepore della maretta. Nella luce stupita si incrociano i gridi dei giovani pescatori: e senti che sono gridi di soddisfazione, che il mare dietro la rotonda è colmo di pesciolini trepidi e dorati. E mentre il mare fruscia e ribolle, senti dietro di te con che gioia la città riprende a vivere la nuova mattina! (P. P. Pasolini, Le due Bari)

We therefore recommend walking along the wide sidewalk of the city promenade in the morning, when the colors of the sky and the sea are reflected in each other. The sea is always next to the traveler, flanked by a rhythmic succession of cast iron lampposts that allows you to glimpse the shapes of the city with its perfectly recognizable silhouettes, from the bell tower of the Cathedral to the monumental fascist buildings. Continuing our walk in a southerly direction, the city seems to undergo a metamorphosis, the elegant Liberty-style buildings and the bright colors of the marina give way to the ostentatious monumentality of Fascist architecture which in the 1920s and 1930s redesigned this stretch of the Bari coast.

Continuing along the seafront, we recommend a visit to the Corrado Giaquinto Provincial Art Gallery which is located on the top floor of the former Palazzo della Provincia, now home to the Metropolitan City of Bari. The building has an accessible lift; however, there are no aids for the visually impaired or blind, in addition to the audio guides. The building is one of the most representative of the Bari architecture in the fascist period, characterized by the eclectic recovery, in a monumental key, of elements of the Italian and ancient Roman civic Renaissance tradition. An interesting route of southern art runs from the Middle Ages to the twentieth century along the sixteen rooms of the city museum.

Continuing the walk along the Lungomare, for those who wish it is possible to reach the town beach of Pane e Pomodoro which, thanks to the No Barrier project financed by the Interreg Italy-Greece 2007-2013 program, has been equipped with the infrastructure and aids necessary to improve its usability (for example by people with reduced mobility or elderly people).

Itinerary

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At the end of Via Sparano, turning right and taking Corso Vittorio Emanuele, at the intersection with via Cavour, we find, on the left, Piazza Ferrarese, the true antechamber of the historical center. Here, on Easter 1957, the writer from Piedmont Lalla Romano also arrived on a journey that would take her to Greece. This “long, wide, calm” square evokes family memories.

The square, which is today one of the night spots of nightlife in Bari, owes its name to a merchant from Ferrara who lived and made his fortune in Bari in the seventeenth century. It is still possible to observe the pavement of the Roman Via Appia-Traiana which used to pass through Bari precisely in this point of the city. On the left is the Murat room, an environment that hosts contemporary art exhibitions and, a little further away, you can see the apse area of a small church, called La Vallisa, dating back to the eleventh century. This place, which is now used as a diocesan auditorium, was the church of the community of Ravellese and Amalfi merchants in the Middle Ages.

On the right of the square is the building which was once the ancient municipal fish market. Piazza Ferrarese has always represented the elegant entrance to the old city which, through narrow streets, alleys and wide, introduces the traveler to its centre which holds many surprises. Traveling through the alleys of the city, the traveler cannot help but notice how Bari Vecchia seems to shine with its own particular light, in spite of the narrow and shady alleys.

Pasolini wrote:

Qui tutto è chiaro: anche la città vecchia, dalla chiesa di San Nicola al castello svevo pare perennemente pulita e purificata, se non sempre dall’acqua, dalla luce stupenda. (P. P. Pasolini, Le due Bari)

In the light of Bari, in 1964 Pasolini will dedicate intense verses whose reading could make the continuation of our itinerary more poetic and would let us discover the jewels of the old city.

Un biancore di calce viva, alto,

– imbiancamento dopo una pestilenza

– che vuol dir quindi salute, e gioiosi

mattini, formicolanti meriggi – è il sole

che mette pasta di luce sulla pasta dell’ombra viva, alonando, in fili

di bianchezza suprema, o coprendo

di bianco ardente il bianco ardente

d’una parete porosa come la pasta del pane

superficie di un medioevo popolare

– Bari vecchia, un alto villaggio

sul mare malato di troppa pace –

un bianco ch’è privilegio e marchio

di umili – eccoli, che, come miseri arabi,

abitanti di antiche ardenti Subtopie,

empiono fondachi di figli, vicoli di nipoti,

interni di stracci, porte di calce viva,

pertugi di tende e di merletto, lastricati

d’acqua odorosi di pesce e piscio

– tutto è pronto per me – ma manca qualcosa.

(P. P. Pasolini, Un biancore di calce viva, in Poesie in forma di rosa)

Moving from Piazza Ferrarese we reach Piazza Mercantile.

The traveler can walk along via Venezia, called the “wall” of Bari that runs along the historical center and from which it is possible to enjoy the beautiful view of the promenade.

We cannot leave Bari Vecchia without visiting one of its most important monuments, the Basilica of San Nicola, which has been a privileged destination since the Middle Ages for many pilgrims.

Yesterday’s wayfarer only arrived after passing the Castle and the Cathedral through Via delle Crociate. Once he reached the current via Palazzo di Città, a street whose ancient name was Ruga Fragigena, that is, Francigena street, the square finally opens where the Basilica of San Nicola stands majestically, in its powerful Romanesque forms. In this route, we point out two different accesses: going along the promenade in the north direction, you can access the Basilica from a side road that allows you to get directly to the Basilica square. Alternatively, walking north on the wall you will find a staircase that allows direct access to Strada Palazzo di Città, or behind the Basilica.

The Basilica is accessible from the side entrance in the cloister, via a ramp. Inside this monument, in the crypt with an oriental and Byzantine atmosphere, the relics of St. Nicholas are preserved, revered by both Catholics and Orthodox; from the remains of his body, stolen by a group of sailors from Bari in 1087 from the city of Myra, it is believed that he still oozes a miraculous liquid with healing powers, called manna. Pilgrims’ travel diaries speak about it. Anselmo Adorno, a cultured Flemish nobleman, after coming back from his pilgrimage to Jerusalem in the second half of the 15th century, visits the Nicolaian basilica and gives us a ‘devoted’ description:

Adorno writes:

Le spoglie [di San Nicola] riposano in un’arca di marmo sotto il grande altare della cripta. La parte anteriore dell’altare è istoriata con immagini sbalzate in argento. Sempre sul fronte dell’altare c’è una porticina attraverso cui, da un foro che penetra all’interno del monumento, ove una lampada accesa pende da una catena d’argento, si distinguono le reliquie di S. Nicola. Da esse dicono che scaturisca un olio santo, ovvero un liquido con cui vengono unti occhi e fronti delle persone nelle festività solenni, così come fu nel tempo in cui noi fummo a Bari, cioè nel giorno di S. Nicola.

Adorno, Itinéraire d’Anselme Adorno en Terre Sainte)

Itinerary

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At the end of Via Sparano, turning left we take Corso Vittorio Emanuele and after a while on the left we find the Piccinni Theater.

The theater has recently been renovated and reopened to the public; on occasion of the inauguration the project Il Teatro Piccinni was presented … in all senses, realized thanks to the collaboration with the Rotary Club Bari Sud and the Rotary Club Venezia, with the sponsorship of UICI (Unione Italiana dei Ciechi e degli Ipovedenti) of the Province of Bari. The project led to the creation of a multisensory panel with visual, tactile and audio information which recounts, through the use of different languages, the characteristics of the building and offers useful information on the historical-cultural value of the theater; the panel is positioned at the main entrance and close to the secondary entrance, used in particular by people with motor disabilities.

Continuing on Corso Vittorio Emanuele and turning on the right near the Palazzo della Prefettura you get to the Norman Swabian Castle, a monument with accessibility standards which we recommend.

When talking about the most authentic corner of Bari Vecchia, the writer Lalla Romano says:

Penetriamo, per vicoli, nella città vecchia; viva e insieme remota, piena di infanzia.

Una piazzetta irregolare, strana, meravigliosa. Da un lato casucce in vario movimento e colori, un po’ come una scena (in terra sono sparsi resti di ortaggi, dopo il mercato), e di fronte la mole austera, semplice, chiara, di un castello di pietra. Castello svevo (o normanno: nomi che fanno sognare). Sulla prima rampa corrono giocando, gridando, bambini. Il Duomo incombe con la sua maestà su un’altra piazzetta paesana, piccola, allegra. (L. Romano, Diario di Grecia)

Going along the perimeter of the castle, on the right you can see the Cathedral of San Sabino.

The entrance to the Cathedral is possible via a ramp located on the side. Access to the basement is also guaranteed.

We leave Bari and its monuments to continue the itinerary southwards, along the Adriatic coast, to stop in Polignano.

We recommend the traveler to spend a few days in this renowned tourist and seaside destination, built sheer above the sea on a deep ravine dotted with prickly pears, famous for giving birth to the singer Domenico Modugno. The landscape features of Polignano attracted the well-known documentary filmmaker Folco Quilici, who made a documentary film about Puglia in the seventies of the twentieth century, flying over the region from the sky aboard a helicopter. From that journey a book was then written, in four hands with the well-known anglist and intellectual Mario Praz. When Quilici flew over Polignano he immediately caught the characteristics that still make it a unique country:

Quilici writes:

Difficilmente si potrebbe immaginare un habitat che in sé riassuma più di questo un’immagine archetipa di un paese del sud, le case candide, il cielo azzurro, il mare blu. È nello stesso tempo difficile immaginare un habitat fuso con altrettanto vigore, ma al contempo con altrettanto rispetto, nella natura del luogo. (F. Quilici, Puglia)

However, it is not necessary to glide on Polignano by helicopter to appreciate its charm and grasp its characteristics – even by train, the Adriatic town does not disappoint the traveler.

Luigi Fallacara, who is an Italian poet and writer close to the movements of the Florentine avant-garde, originally from Bari, wrote the following as he describes Polignano:

Appena scesi dalla stazione, vi sorprende questa terra luminosa di mandorli in fiore. Le case bianche e rosa hanno un non so che di provvisorio e d’inattuale, come si gli uomini, ogni alba, le costruissero per una festa marina che debba durare un sol giorno.

A Polignano, l’ora è soltanto mattutina. […] Il mare è glauco e lontano, la brezza vi posa su un velo cinereo che l’appanna. Ogni suono è attutito, ogni aspetto vivente appare inconcepibile, […]. Parlare di bellezza qui è vano; la bellezza rapisce un sol senso. Qui bisogna parlare di immersione nell’elemento, di qualcosa che investe tutto l’essere e lo getta, con un balzo repentino, aldilà dalla storia degli uomini e dei tempi. Vi sentite affacciati ai primordi della terra, alle soglie dei mondi che tremarono di luce, dapprima, sotto le acque verdi, agli stupori degli essere che videro, per la prima volta, emerse dai ciechi fondi marini, le scogliere curvarsi aeree, dentro l’azzurro dei cieli. (L. Fallacara, Polignano)

Throughout the year, the Apulian town is animated by a lively cultural life that revolves around a rich program of events that are organized in the medieval village and numerous initiatives promoted by the Pino Pascali Museum of Contemporary Art; the large and panoramic rooms of this museum structure fully satisfy all the accessibility criteria. The museum, which is spread over three floors, one of which is underground, is equipped with an elevator, an external ramp and health facilities dedicated to the specific needs of people with limited mobility. However, we point out the absence of specific aids for blind or partially sighted people.

Leaving the museum behind us, we recommend a walk along the seafront using the accessible road that takes the traveler to Largo Ardito from which it is possible to enjoy a fantastic panorama.

From this point the traveler who wishes can continue the walk to the historical center and go into the alleys. For example, once you arrive in Piazza Aldo Moro, you can cross the Arco Marchesale and continue up to the balcony that opens to the left of the Chiesa Matrice, which is dedicated to S. Maria Assunta and is accessible from a side entrance.

From Polignano we move towards Castellana. The town is best known for the complex of its natural caves, the longest underground network in Italy. As part of the 100% accessible Caves project, a team of specialized operators guarantees the opportunity to live in safety the experience that this incredible underground environment is able to give, taking into account the different special needs of travelers. Excursions are organized for people with physical, mental, intellectual, relational and sensory disabilities. It should be noted, however, that due to the structural characteristics, accessibility is guaranteed in some sections only for wheelchairs with a maximum width of 65 cm. The visit has dedicated times and methods and the traveler can either choose a short itinerary, lasting about 90 minutes, or a more demanding complete itinerary (up to the White Grotto) lasting about 3 hours. A sign-language video guide of the Caves itinerary has also been devised, to allow deaf travelers to take advantage of this service. All the information and contacts for any visits are available on the Grotte di Castellana website (reservations are required).

Le us tell you the story of these caves by considering the Piacenza writer Vincenzo Piovene, who in the mid-1950s published his famous Journey to Italy, a reportage to discover Italy in the years immediately preceding the economic boom.

Piovene wrote:

Le grotte di Castellana, in provincia di Bari a poca distanza dal mare, ma presso i confini di quella di Taranto, possono servirci da introduzione alla parte più bella della Puglia. Le Murge, altopiano roccioso nella parte elevata, nella parte più bassa ricoperto di terra fertile che permette le coltivazioni, sono il nucleo centrale della Puglia, tra il Tavoliere ed il Salento. Questo è il Carso del Sud; Grotte e spelonche lo traforano; più famosa di tutte quella di Castellana. Per quanto cronache imprecise ci parlino di esplorazioni compiute da gente del luogo nel Sette e nell’Ottocento, fino a vent’anni fa di queste grotte era nota soltanto una voragine rotonda, quasi un gigantesco pozzo, circondato dai lecci, che si apriva sulla collina. Superstizioni popolari vi collocavano l’inferno. Franco Anelli, dell’Istituto Italiano di Speleologia che allora aveva sede a Postumia, calatosi nella voragine nel 1938, trovò nella parete il corridoio con il quale si inizia l’itinerario sotterraneo, e cominciò l’esplorazione scientifica. Le grotte furono sistemate l’anno seguente, ma il vero inizio della loro celebrità è del 1949. In anni ancora più recenti, coi fondi della Cassa del Mezzogiorno, ebbero l’attrezzatura di oggi per il turismo e per la ricerca scientifica, l’edificio per la direzione, il Museo di Speleologia, gli accessori. Ho percorso con Franco Anelli, che adesso ne è il direttore, queste che sono di gran lunga le più belle grotte italiane. Il confronto con quelle di Postumia veniva con lui naturale. Il regno sotterraneo di Castellana, rispetto a quello di Postumia, ha sale forse meno ampie, ma corridoi più lunghi, più misteriosi e capricciosi, più sfarzo di alabastri, più varietà di stravaganze, piogge di stalattiti ancora più fitte, ed una profusione di cortine diafane, dove la pietra diventa così sottile da imitare la muffa e il velo; e soffitti di stalattiti di impareggiabile bianchezza. (G. Piovene, Viaggio in Italia)

From Castellana, our itinerary now stops in Alberobello, the famous trulli town that is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, a pleasant surprise in terms of hospitality and accessibility.

The literary guide of this part of our itinerary will again be Pier Paolo Pasolini who defines Alberobello as a country with perfect shapes:

[…] un paese perfetto la cui forma si è fatta stile nel rigore in cui è stata applicata. Dal primo muro all’ultimo, non un corpo estraneo, non un plagio, non una zeppa, non una stonatura. L’ammasso dei trulli nel terreno a saliscendi si profila sereno e puro, venato dalle strette strade pulitissime che fendono la sua architettura grottesca e squisita. […] Ogni tanto nell’infrangibile ordito di questa architettura degna di una fantasia, maniaca e rigorosa – un Paolo Uccello, un Kafka – si apre una frattura dove furoreggia tranquillo il verde smeraldo e l’arancione di un orto. E il cielo…È difficile raccontare la purezza del cielo […] un cielo inesistente, puro connettivo di luce sulle prospettive fantastiche del paese. (P. P. Pasolini, I nitidi trulli di Alberobello).

The trullo, a distant heir of the typically Mediterranean construction model of thòlos, has a characteristic truncated-conical shape. It is a dry construction that was born from the need of farmers to make the stony limestone soil of the area cultivable. Farmers were forced to remove the abundant layers of rock in the soil and decided to use them as a building material. Hence, as observes the poet from Montemurro in Lucania, Leonardo Sinisgalli, «l’astuzia contadina da un segreto o da un caso trasse una regola. Che per adattarsi alle virtù del materiale riuscì a sottrarsi al rigorismo della geometria». (L. Sinisgalli, Prefazione alla La valle dei trulli di M. Castellano)

About twenty years before Pasolini’s trip from Puglia, Tommaso Fiore, an intellectual engaged in denouncing the poor living conditions of the peasant classes, spoke of the trulli of Alberobello. In his Lettere pugliesi, collected in Popolo di formiche, he writes:

Avrai sentito parlare anche a Torino dei nostri trulli, diamine! […] sono minuscole capanne tonde, dal tetto a cono aguzzo, in cui pare non possa entrare se non un popolo di omini, ognuna con un piccolo comignolo ed una finestrella da bambola, e con quella buffa intonacatura sul cono, che è la civetteria della pulizia, e dà l’impressione di un berretto da notte ritto sul cocuzzolo d’un pagliaccio, con anche, per soprammercato, una croce o una stella in fronte, dipinta con calce! (T. Fiore, Un Popolo di formiche)

Pasolini is astonished at this bizarre popular architecture and states:

Di un trullo isolato si potrebbe parlare solo con i termini della cristallografia. Tutti corpi solidi vi sono fusi mostruosamente per dar forma a un corpo nuovo, delicato, leggero. I tetti a punta, di un nero cilestrino, si staccano improvvisi da questa base contorta e armoniosa, per riempire il cielo di magiche punte. (P. P. Pasolini, I nitidi trulli di Alberobello).

The traveler will be able to discover the charm of this Apulian country, unique in its kind – although today partially compromised by the numerous kitsch souvenir shops for the use and consumption of unsustainable tourism -, along the accessible sidewalks that start from the shoulders of the Basilica and lead in the pedestrian area of the center, up to Piazza del Popolo where you can enjoy the panoramic view of the Monti district, the most characteristic part of Alberobello.

From the village of the trulli our itinerary proceeds to the next stop: Taranto. A city of a thousand contradictions marked dramatically by the events linked to the ILVA steel plant which with its poisonous fumes ended up obscuring its more sunny and bright face. The traveler, however, can find the signs and testimonies of marvelous Taranto along the vast Lungomare of the city, which is famous for its sunset views that enchanted poets and writers and, above all, he can visit its archaeological museum: the Marta.

This museum structure is fully accessible, thanks to the external ramp and the elevators located inside. Although there are no specific aids for conditions of sensory disabilities, after communication via email to man-ta@beniculturali.it, it is possible to access the museum rooms accompanied by your guide dog or other pets whose support is certified to therapeutic treatments (pet-therapy).

We enter its rooms ideally following Paolo Rumiz, a famous writer and journalist who arrived in Taranto in 2015, following the route of the ancient Via Appia on foot. The story of this incredible journey has become a book, entitled Appia which can be used as a guide and point of reference. Rumiz writes:

[…] è vietato andarsene da Taranto senza aver visto il museo archeologico. All’ex-convento dei frati alcantarini si deve andare semplicemente perché ce lo ordina la bellezza, e la bellezza se ne frega se Roma è distratta e lontana, se a Taranto non arriva nessun Frecciarossa e non c’è aeroporto. […]

In quelle sale venerabili abita una delle meraviglie d’Europa. Un’antichità che non è marmo freddo ma scintillio di ori e argenti, gioielleria greca sepolta e riemersa dalle necropoli del IV e III secolo avanti Cristo. Taranto delle grandi botteghe degli orafi, Taranto trionfo di un universo femminile che Roma è ancora lontana dal concepire. Taranto dagli orecchini a navicella tintinnanti di pendagli, dalle foglie d’alloro e dai petali rosa in lamina d’oro zecchino. Taranto degli anelli, dei monili, delle teste di leone, fucina di smalti favolosi, cristalli di rocca, granulati d’oro, anelli, cammei e raffinati sigilli. (P. Rumiz, Appia)

From Marta, crossing Piazza Garibaldi and taking Via D’Aquino, the traveler can easily get to the Lungomare, from which it is possible to admire the beautiful Aragonese Castle.

Unfortunately the structure is not completely accessible; we would like to point out for anyone wishing that visits to the facility are carried out free of charge at specific times.

We leave Taranto and Puglia to continue the itinerary on the island of Corfu, in the Ionian Islands of Greece. Today there are many ferry companies that depart from Bari or Brindisi equipped with all the comforts needed to meet the needs of every type of traveler. However, it is preferable to travel by plane; it should be said at the outset that due to the shape of the Ionian Islands, they are not always easily visited or accessible. Notwithstanding this, in recent years, especially in Corfu, initiatives have been undertaken that have made some of the most beautiful beaches accessible to everyone, through easy access to the sea thanks to floating ramps. We point out in particular the beaches of Benitses, which will also be one of the stages of our itinerary on the island.

The discovery of the beauty of Corfu begins for all travelers from the sea, when they are about to land on the island and from the deck of the ship or from the window of their cabin they begin to glimpse the contours.

Gerald Durrell, a famous English naturalist, as a child, moved with his family to the island, a few years before the outbreak of the Second World War. The memories of that incredible experience have inspired his very successful book entitled My family and other animals, from which an appreciated television series has also been drawn recently. In the opening pages of his bestseller he describes the moment when Corfu finally appears on the horizon. His words are well suited to describe what the traveler will see, as he reaches the island and, at dawn, faces the ferry pier:

[…] Il mare gonfiava i suoi azzurri e levigati muscoli ondosi mentre fremeva nella luce dell’alba, e la schiuma della nostra scia si allargava delicatamente dietro di noi come la coda di un pavone bianco, tutta scintillante di bollicine. Il cielo era pallido, con qualche pennellata gialla a oriente. Davanti a noi si allungava uno sgorbio di terra color cioccolata, una massa confusa nella nebbia, con una gala di spuma alla base. Era Corfù, e noi aguzzammo gli occhi per distinguere la forma delle sue montagne, per scoprirne le valli, le cime, i burroni e le spiagge, ma non ne vedemmo che i contorni. Poi, tutt’a un tratto, il sole spuntò sull’orizzonte e il cielo prese il colore azzurro smalto dell’occhio della ghiandaia. Le infinite e meticolose curve del mare si incendiarono per un istante, poi si fecero d’un intenso color porpora screziato di verde. La nebbia si alzò in rapidi e flessibili nastri, ed ecco l’isola davanti a noi, le montagne come se dormissero sotto una gualcita coperta scura, macchiata in ogni sua piega dal verde degli ulivi. Lungo la riva le spiagge si arcuavano candide come zanne tra precipiti città di vivide rocce dorate, rosse e bianche. Doppiammo il promontorio, le montagne scomparvero e l’isola si trasformò in un declivio dolce, macchiato dall’argentea e verde iridescenza degli ulivi, interrotta qua e là dal dito ammonitore di un cipresso stagliato contro il cielo. (G. Durrell, La mia famiglia e altri animali)

To the traveler who is instead reaching Corfu by plane the marvellous arrival on the island will not appear less beautiful, as the famous art critic Mario Praz described it in the 1930s during one of his travels to Greece:

Nuvole dai riflessi di piombo strisciano sopra Corfù. I biancastri promontori dell’isola sfilano in basso, a sinistra. Oltre la plumbea nube si scopre un promontorio azzurro nel sole. Giochi d’ombre e di luce sulla bella isola verde, un lembo di sabbie fulve a occidente, sul mare aperto; e infine la città con le sue fortezze, i suoi grigi tetti antichi e i suoi cipressi, e, di fronte alla rada, un’isoletta simile a una distesa pelle di toro. Tra noi e la terraferma passano veli irridescenti; in uno strappo si mostra un quieto laghetto tra i monti.

Ci abbassiamo; il motore tambureggia, l’idrovolante si tuffa sotto ondate di nuvole, tra i monti dell’isola. Per un momento tutto è opaco intorno; poi uno squarcio di turchino intenso, e questa terra che mi lascio alle spalle, con queste isolette che ne sono la fuggente retroguardia, è l’ultimo lembo di suolo greco. Ma non è un saluto da dio che mi viene alle labbra. Perché la Grecia è più grande; noi occidentali la portiamo nell’anima anche sotto le più inospiti latitudini. (M. Praz, Viaggio in Grecia)

Once disembarked, the elegant and at the same time colorful historical center of Corfu, which has been inserted among the UNESCO world heritage sites, will not leave the traveler indifferent; we recommend to stop in one of the many cafes that are located on Liston, the long road arcade built by the French in the image of Rue de Rivoli in Paris on the large and verdant Piazza della Spianada.

Here it was not unusual until a few decades ago to come across cricket matches, a very popular sport in Corfu, brought by the British during the period of their protectorate on the island.

We point out that not far from the city of Corfu, just 14 kilometers south, there is the village of Benitses, a popular tourist destination and a renowned seaside resort which is equipped to allow travelers with walking difficulties to take advantage of its enchanting beaches. Special ramps are in fact available to allow independent access to the sea; there are also bathrooms, showers and dedicated lockers.

This area is known for its beautiful sandy and pebbly beaches, the traveler will also be able to discover it through the words of Gerald Durrell who, right between these coves and inlets, used to spend long afternoons in the company of his trusted dog Roger:

Un pomeriggio, in una calura languida in cui sembrava che tutto dormisse all’infuori delle cicale, Roger e io ci incamminammo […].

L’isola sonnecchiava sotto di noi, scintillante come un acquerello appena dipinto, nella foschia dell’afa: ulivi grigioverdi, cipressi neri, rocce multicolori lungo la costa, e il mare levigato e opalescente d’un azzurro martin pescatore, verde giada, con qualche lieve increspatura sulla sua superficie liscia dove si incurva intorno a un promontorio roccioso e fitto di ulivi. Proprio sotto di noi c’era una piccola baia lunata col suo bordo di sabbia bianca, una baia così bassa e con fondo di sabbia così abbagliante che l’acqua era di un azzurro pallido, quasi bianco.

This itinerary ends in the crystalline sea of Corfu, a sea over whose waters myths, heroes and traveling writers have traveled.

BARI – ITINERARIO 1

	1. Railway Station ACCESSIBILITY: barrier-free route (with ramp and elevator), tactile route from the station entrance to the platforms USABILITY: sound and visual information systems available to the public
$G:\materiale polysemi gennaio\mincuzzi palazzo.png$	2.Palazzo Mincuzzi ACCESSIBILITY: absence of barriers for mobility USABILITY: internal lift to access upper floors
$C:\Users\Lucia\Desktop\108NIKON\DSCN9487.JPG$	3.Corso Vittorio Emanuele
$C:\Users\Lucia\Desktop\108NIKON\DSCN9481.JPG$	4. Teatro Margherita ACCESSIBILITY: external ramp
	5.Lungomare Nazario Sauro
	6. Pinacoteca Provinciale ACCESSIBILITY: lift inside the building to access the Pinacoteca USABILITY: audio guides
	7. Pane e Pomodoro Beach ACCESSIBILITY: concrete walkway with steel handrail to access the shoreline USABILITY: accessible cabin / dressing room

BARI – ITINERARIO 2

	1.Stazione ferroviaria ACCESSIBILITÀ: percorso senza barriere (in piano, con rampa, con ascensore), percorso tattile dall’ingresso della stazione ai binari FRUIBILITÀ: sistemi di informazioni al pubblico sonori e visivi
$G:\materiale polysemi gennaio\mincuzzi palazzo.png$	2. Palazzo Mincuzzi ACCESSIBILITÀ: assenza di barriere per la mobilità FRUIBILITÀ: ascensore interno per accedere ai vari piani
$C:\Users\Lucia\Desktop\108NIKON\DSCN9487.JPG$	3. Corso Vittorio Emanuele
	4. Piazza Ferrarese
$C:\Users\Lucia\Desktop\108NIKON\DSCN9528.JPG$	5. Piazza Mercantile
$C:\Users\Lucia\Desktop\108NIKON\DSCN9515.JPG$	6. Via Venezia/la Muraglia Barese
	7. Basilica di San Nicola ACCESSIBILITÀ: rampa esterna laterale

BARI ITINERARIO 3

	1.Stazione ferroviaria ACCESSIBILITÀ: percorso senza barriere (in piano, con rampa, con ascensore), percorso tattile dall’ingresso della stazione ai binari FRUIBILITÀ: sistemi di informazioni al pubblico sonori e visivi
$G:\materiale polysemi gennaio\mincuzzi palazzo.png$	2. Palazzo Mincuzzi ACCESSIBILITÀ: assenza di barriere per la mobilità FRUIBILITÀ: ascensore interno per accedere ai piani superiori
$C:\Users\Lucia\Desktop\108NIKON\DSCN9491.JPG$	3. Teatro Piccinni ACCESSIBILITÀ: assenza di barriere per la mobilità FRUIBILITÀ: pannello multisensoriale con informazioni di tipo audio, visivo e tattile
$C:\Users\Lucia\Desktop\108NIKON\DSCN9495.JPG$	4. Castello Svevo ACCESSIBILITÀ: assenza di barriere per la mobilità (piano terra e primo piano) FRUIBILITÀ: audioguide; ascensore per accedere al piano superiore
	5. Cattedrale S. Sabino ACCESSIBILITÀ: rampa esterna laterale FRUIBILITÀ: possibilità di accedere al piano seminterrato

ITINERARIO POLIGNANO-CASTELLANA GROTTE-ALBEROBELLO

POLIGNANO

$C:\Users\Lucia\Desktop\108NIKON\DSCN9374.JPG$	1.Fondazione Pino Pascali ACCESSIBILITÀ: assenza di barriere per la mobilità FRUIBILITÀ: ascensore interno per accedere al piano inferiore
$C:\Users\Lucia\Desktop\108NIKON\DSCN9380.JPG$	2. Lungomare
$C:\Users\Lucia\Desktop\108NIKON\DSCN9397.JPG$	3.Vista Panoramica (Largo Ardito)
CASTELLANA/ALBEROBELLO
$C:\Users\Lucia\Desktop\108NIKON\DSCN9359.JPG$	1.Grotte di Castellana ACCESSIBILITÀ: presenza di ascensore FRUIBILITÀ: il percorso è garantito per carrozzine di larghezza pari a 65 cm. Audioguide, visite tattili, videoguida LIS
	2.Alberobello

TARANTO

$C:\Users\Lucia\Desktop\108NIKON\DSCN9419.JPG$	1.Museo Marta ACCESSIBILITÀ: rampa esterna FRUIBILITÀ: ascensore interno per accedere ai piani superiori; possibilità di accesso con cane guida personale munito di guinzaglio e museruola o animale domestico con certificazione di supporto per cure terapeutiche (previa comunicazione)
$C:\Users\Lucia\Desktop\108NIKON\DSCN9429.JPG$	2.Lungomare

CORFU

	1.Corfu
	2.Benitses

The Writers’ Island

Corfu: Benitses, Kanoni, Kassiopi, Palaiokastritsa, Kalami.

The island of Corfu, which has always attracted many travelers due to its natural and artistic beauties, is also one of the most appreciated and described islands by writers. Authors have written a lot on this beautiful Greek island, from Homer – and the identification of Corfu with Scheria, the land of the Phaeacians −, Boccaccio and Shakespeare – who imagined it as the setting of The Tempest – to the twentieth-century writers Cecchi, Romano and Mario Praz, to name but a few. In particular, the brothers Gerald and Lawrence Durrell, who had moved from England to Corfu in 1935, were enchanted by it. The youngest, Gerald, who would have become a renowned naturalist, set a successful book on the island: My Family and other Animals. This novel has been the basis for a TV series recently, which has been acclaimed by the audience and critics. Lawrence, the eldest brother, an internationally renowned writer and poet, made Corfu the protagonist of some of his best known literary masterpieces, like Prospero’s Cell. A Guide to the Landscape and Manners of the Island of Corcyra (Corfu) and The Greek Islands. The beauty of Corfu impressed also the famous American writer Henry Miller, who visited Lawrence Durrell on the island in 1939. The reminiscences of that experience, which led the author to travel all over Greece for nine months, gave birth to his book The Colossus of Maroussi, a sort of travel journal.

In this short itinerary we suggest the traveler discover the charm of Corfu that enchanted these writers, retracing the places described in their books.

However, we warn the traveler that the charm and atmosphere we are looking for – as Gerald Durrell pointed out – were summed up on some British Admiralty maps, which showed: “in grande l’isola e la costa limitrofa. Infondo c’era una piccola leggenda che diceva: AVVISO: poiché le boe che segnalano le secche sono spesso fuori posto, si raccomanda ai naviganti di stare in guardia quando si rasentano queste coste” (G. Durrell, La mia famiglia e altri animali)

For many travelers, including our writers, the discovery of Corfu beauty starts from the sea, when they are going to land on the island and can make out its outlines from the ship deck or their cabin window.

Gerald Durrell described this moment, a sort of epiphany, using words that can be applied to what the traveler will see when he reaches Corfu by sea, following this itinerary, and appears at the ferry deck at dawn:

However, the traveler who chooses to get to Corfu by plane will appreciate the beautiful sight of the arrival on the island as well, as Mario Praz, a famous Anglicist and art critic, described it in the 1930s during a trip to Greece:

Nuvole dai riflessi di piombo strisciano sopra Corfù. I biancastri promontori dell’isola sfilano in basso, a sinistra. Oltre la plumbea nube si scopre un promontorio azzurro nel sole. Giochi d’ombre e di luce sulla bella isola verde, un lembo di sabbie fulve a occidente, sul mare aperto; e infine la città con le sue fortezze, i suoi grigi tetti antichi e i suoi cipressi, e, di fronte alla rada, un’isoletta simile a una distesa pelle di toro. Tra noi e la terraferma passano veli iridescenti; in uno strappo si mostra un quieto laghetto tra i monti.

Whether we reach Corfu by ferry or plane, it welcomes the traveler with its “case ammucchiate a casaccio, persiane verdi spalancate come ali di mille farfalle” (G. Durrell, La mia famiglia e altri animali)

The town architecture – Lawrence Durrell points out – is Venetian:

The houses above the old port are built up elegantly into slim tiers with narrows alleys and colonnades running between them; red, yellow, pink, umber – a jumble of pastel shades which the moonlight transforms into a dazzling white city built for a wedding cake. (L. Durrell, Prospero’s Cell. A Guide to the Landscape and Manners of the Island of Corcyra)

The traveler may not remain indifferent to the elegant and colorful Corfu old town: we suggest following its alleys and then stopping at one of the many cafés in the long colonnaded street built by the French to imitate Rue de Rivoli in Paris upon the wide and lush Esplanade square. Also the famous New York writer Henry Miller used to stop at these cafés and pubs: with his friend Lawrence Durrell, he spent long nights there “seduto a bere qualcosa che non hai voglia di bere” (H. Miller, Il Colosso di Marussi).

Among the old town alleys, the bell tower of Saint Spyridon Church – the patron saint of Corfu – stands out with its red dome that recalls San Giorgio Church in Venice.

He is a very venerated saint by the Corfiots, who dedicate to him four processions over the year, during which the town is full of faithful or simply curious people: the streets are tinged with the bright colors of the Orthodox monks’ and priests’ clothes and the whole island shines in the light of fireworks. It is not easy to explain the rituals and the Byzantine atmosphere that connotes the devotion to this saint; hence let Gerald Durrell, who wound up in the joyful town on Saint Spyridon day with his strange family, tell us how deeply people venerate the relics kept in the saint’s church.

Young Durrell writes:

La città era più affollata e più chiassosa del solito, ma non avevano alcun sospetto che stesse accadendo qualcosa di speciale […]. Domandai a una vecchia contadina che mi stava accanto che cosa stesse succedendo, e lei mi guardò tutta raggiante d’orgoglio.

«È Santo Spiridone, kyria» mi spiegò. «Oggi possiamo entrare in chiesa a baciargli i piedi». Santo Spiridione era il patrono dell’isola. Il suo corpo mummificato era chiuso in una bara d’argento nella chiesa […]. Era un santo molto potente e in grado di esaudire le preghiere, di curare le malattie e di fare per la gente un mucchio di altre cose prodigiose, se uno aveva la fortuna di trovarlo nello stato d’animo giusto quando gliele chiedeva. Gli isolani lo venerano, e metà degli abitanti maschi dell’isola si chiamano Spiro in suo onore. Quel giorno era un giorno speciale, evidentemente avrebbero aperto la bara e consentito ai fedeli di baciare i piedi della mummia, chiusi nelle loro babbucce, e di chiedere al santo tutto ciò che volevano. La varietà della folla dimostrava quanto i Corfioti amassero il loro santo […]. Questo cupo e multicolore cuneo di umanità si muoveva lentamente verso la porta oscura della chiesa, e noi fummo sospinti avanti, travolti come una colata di lava. […] L’interno era buio come un pozzo, illuminato soltanto da una serie di candele che baluginavano come crochi gialli lungo la parete. Un prete barbuto, con l’alto cappello e le vesti nere, aleggiava come un corvo nella penombra, facendo disporre la folla in una sola fila che attraversava la chiesa, passava davanti alla grande bara d’argento e usciva in strada da un’altra porta. […] Non appena raggiungeva la bara, ognuno si chinava, baciava i piedi e mormorava una preghiera, mentre in cima al sarcofago la faccia nera e disseccata del santo spiava attraverso un pannello di vetro con un’espressione di profondo disgusto. Era sempre più chiaro che, lo volessimo o no, avremmo baciato i piedi di Santo Spiridione. (G. Durrell, La mia famiglia e altri animali)

Blessed by Saint Spyridon we may continue our itinerary to discover the island that writers and poets loved so much.

Lawrence Durrell writes:

Corcyra is all Venetian blue and gold – and utterly spoilt by the sun. […] The southern valleys are painted out boldly in heavy brush-strokes of yellow and red while the Judas trees punctuate the roads with their dusty purple explosions. Everywhere you go you can lie down on grass; and even the bare northern reaches of the island are rich in olives and mineral springs. (L. Durrell, Prospero’s Cell. A Guide to the Landscape and Manners of the Island of Corcyra)

Surrounded with this landscape, we may travel along the south coast, following the route that connects Perama to the nice village of Benitses. Here, in a panoramic area, only 4 kilometers from Corfu town, we can find the villa where the Durrell family stayed at the beginning when they arrived in Greece from England in 1935. The house, which Gerald Durrell called “la villa color rosa fragola” (The Strawberry Pink Villa) in his novel, can be now rented on Airbnb by the traveler, although it does not retain much of its original appearance.

The surrounding landscape preserves much of the charm described by Gerald Durrell:

La collina e le valli tutt’intorno erano un piumino di uliveti che balenavano come pesci guizzanti nei punti dove la brezza sfiorava le foglie. A metà pendio, protetta da un gruppo di cipressi alti e sottili, era annidata una piccola villa color rosa fragola, come un frutto esotico che ammicchi tra il verde. I cipressi ondeggiavano gentilmente nella brezza, come se per il nostro arrivo fossero intenti a dipingere il cielo di un azzurro ancora più vivido. (G. Durrell, La mia famiglia e altri animali)

Benitses area is also famous for its beautiful sandy and pebble beaches; we suggest the traveler enter the clearings and copses of the hills that slope gently down into the sea, in search of some bays or natural inlets, as young Gerald used to do with his faithful dog Roger:

Un pomeriggio, in una calura languida in cui sembrava che tutto dormisse all’infuori delle cicale, Roger e io ci incamminammo per vedere fin dove riuscivamo ad arrampicarci sulle colline prima che facesse buio. Attraversammo gli uliveti, striati e chiazzati di un sole abbagliante, dove l’aria era afosa e immobile, e finalmente, usciti dai boschi, ci inerpicammo su un nudo picco roccioso dove ci sedemmo a riposare. L’isola sonnecchiava sotto di noi, scintillante come un acquerello appena dipinto, nella foschia dell’afa: ulivi grigioverdi, cipressi neri, rocce multicolori lungo la costa, e il mare levigato e opalescente d’un azzurro martin pescatore, verde giada, con qualche lieve increspatura sulla sua superficie liscia dove si incurva intorno a un promontorio roccioso e fitto di ulivi. Proprio sotto di noi c’era una piccola baia lunata col suo bordo di sabbia bianca, una baia così bassa e con fondo di sabbia così abbagliante che l’acqua era di un azzurro pallido, quasi bianco. (G. Durrell, La mia famiglia e altri animali)

Near Benitses, on a hill overlooking the landscape, the traveler may visit Achilleion, a neoclassical-and Pompeian-style palace, where Empress Elisabeth of Austria, better known as Sisi, and later also German Kaiser Wilhelm II enjoyed staying. The writer Henry Miller did not like this site at all, although it is still appreciated by many tourists. He captured perfectly its decadent and showy atmosphere and wrote:

Corfù è un tipico luogo di esilio. Il kaiser soggiornava qui prima di perdere la corona. Una volta feci il giro del palazzo per vedere com’era. A me tutti i palazzi sembrano una lugubre tetraggine, ma questo manicomaniale del Kaiser era la peggior cianfrusaglia su cui mi sia mai capitato di posare gli occhi. Sarebbe un ottimo museo di arte surrealista. (H. Miller, Il Colosso di Marussi)

We do not know if the traveler visiting Achilleion will share Miller’s view, but we are sure that, as the American novelist, he will be impressed by the view on Kanoni bay, enjoyed from its terraces and gardens. Miller writes: “[…] di fronte al palazzo abbandonato c’è una località chiamata Kanoni, da dove si ha la veduta sulla magica Toten Insel”.

The Toten Insel mentioned by Miller is Pontikonisi island, which many scholars consider as the subject of the famous painting by the Symbolist artist Böcklin, Die Toteninsel, that is Isle of the Dead.

This place, definitely evocative, is just a high cliff overlooking the sea, surrounded with a small cypress wood, which can be accessed by boat from the port where the white Vlacherna Monastery rises. From a distance, the monastery as well seems an island surrounded by the sea. The Greeks, less romantically, call Pontikonisi Mouse Island and, according to an enduring tradition, it is one of the sites mentioned in the Odyssey.

Lawrence Durrell gives more details on this legend:

In the dazzle of the bay stands Mouse Island whose romance of line and form (white monastery, monks, cypresses) defies paint and lens, as well as the feebler word. This petrified rock is the boat, they say, turned to stone as a punishment for taking Ulysses home. (L. Durrell, Prospero’s Cell. A Guide to the Landscape and Manners of the Island of Corcyra)

Most of Corfu charm we would like to show the traveler during this itinerary is linked in various ways to the Homeric echoes of many island sites, not only Pontikonisi, which would be the ship Neptune turned into a rock in the Odyssey, as Durrell had said. Let the British writer introduce us to this legendary sites:

In this landscape observed objects still retain a kind of mythological form – so that through chronologically we are separated from Ulysses by hundreds of years in time, yet we dwell in his shadow. […] the archeologist come and go, each with his pocket Odyssey and his lack of modern Greek. (L. Durrell, Prospero’s Cell. A Guide to the Landscape and Manners of the Island of Corcyra)

Corfu has always been identified with Homeric Scheria, the island of the Phaeacians, where “l’eroe dal multiforme ingegno” landed after leaving Ogygia and the nymph Calypso. In Odyssey VI, Odysseus is said to have been shipwrecked off the island coasts where he met the beautiful Nausicaa, who was playing ball on the shore with her maids. The nice princess took the hero to the court of her father, Alcinous, the King of the Phaeacians. “A sud della città di Corfù, – Durrell writes – la penisola di Paleopolis dovrebbe essere il sito dove sorgeva l’antica città; ma non è rimasto nulla dei portici, delle fontane e delle colonne della favolosa capitale”. (L. Durrell, Prospero’s Cell. A Guide to the Landscape and Manners of the Island of Corcyra)

“South of Corfu town, the peninsula of Paleopolis is supposed to be the site of the ancient town; but there is nothing left of the arcades and the fountains and columns of the fabulous capital”. (L. Durrell, Prospero’s Cell. A Guide to the Landscape and Manners of the Island of Corcyra)

The writer proceeds:

Three towns contend for Ulysses and Nausicaa; Kassopi in the north, with is gigantic plane-tree and good harbour, its bluff ilex-grown fortress where the goats graze all day, might have well been a site for such a fantasy”, the above-mentioned Mouse Island, and “Last and most likely is Paleocastrizza, drenched in the silver of olives on the north-western coast. The little bay lies in a trance, drugged with its own extraordinary perfection – a conspiracy of light, air, blue sea, and cypresses” (L. Durrell, Prospero’s Cell. A Guide to the Landscape and Manners of the Island of Corcyra)

We suggest the traveler reach these magical places in the island: firstly, Kassiopi, which is still a pleasant fishing village in the northern part of Corfu island.

The origins of this town date back to Roman times and due to its location in a bay protected from the Corfu channel streams, it was a popular harbor among the sailors of the past and Medieval pilgrims headed east. Many legends and stories are told on Kassiopi, not only linked to Odysseus and Nausicaa. Medieval travel journals tell that on that site there was once a strong town, destroyed by the deadly exhalations of a dragon that raged against the people, formerly committed to sodomy. Sailors and pilgrims, when they took shelter in the bay, used to pray in a small chapel dedicated to the Virgin, which was always lit up by a lamp. The lamp was said to exude a miraculous oil able to cure any fever. Overtime it was said that this chapel hosted also a miraculous icon, known as Virgin Kassopitra, painted by Luke the Evangelist.

The chapel, so renowned in the past, can be still visited, although there is little left of its original appearance, since it was seriously damaged during the 16^th century due to the Berber raids. The devotion to the small church was so deep that it was promptly rebuilt by the Venetians in 1590. The icon deemed miraculous can be only remembered, but the traveler may guess its form thanks to a 17^th-century copy that reproduces it and has become an appreciated object of devotion.

The remains of a castle, probably Byzantine, overlook Kassiopi bay giving the place a romantic and picturesque air. From the main road of the village a road starts and winds up to a hill: on top, the traveler may visit this fortress partly covered with plants, which has been an important Norman, Angevin and Venetian citadel over the centuries.

Also Lawrence Durrell was enchanted by this site and wrote:

Kassopi among the other candidates, has a style entirely its own. […]. The village finds its axis in a giant tree whose shadow falls equally upon the tavern and the church. A good harbour, Kassiopi is the port of call for the carbide fishers, and under the ancient fortress the waves shatter themselves upon ledges of clean granite and arcs of dazzling pebbles. Empty beaches to the north and south stun you by their silence and emptiness, and the egg-like perfection of pebbles. Here and there, in patches of sand, you may see the weird ideograms left by the feet of herring-gulls, the only visitors.

Visitors from Rome came here in the past for summers of indolence and solitude. […] and here the mad flabby Nero (who had translated himself from a weak human being into a symbol of kingship and all its evils) sang and danced horribly at the ancient altar to Zeus. […] (L. Durrell, Prospero’s Cell. A Guide to the Landscape and Manners of the Island of Corcyra)

Durrell gives us a last suggestion:

“Kassopi must be seen on a festival day”, when it is possible to see the folkloric dances of women, dressed in traditional clothes, who tread hypnotically in a circle and whose songs mingle with the sound of the bagpipes and fiddles or the drum beat.

Now we may move from Kassiopi towards Palaiokatritsa, on the west side of the island, one of the most beautiful sites in Corfu.

Besides its beautiful beaches and the view from the hills over the two Corfu seas, the Adriatic and the Ionian Seas, the traveler may visit the old monastery, which dates back to the 13^th century but was extensively restored in the following centuries. Located on a steep promontory connected to the island by means of a thin strip of land, it is the Monastery of Palaiokastrìtsa, whose name means “Quella (la madre di Dio dell’antico castello” (…), with reference to the old Byzantine kastron nearby: the Angelokastron, the most western fortress in the island.

The monastery is a group of small old buildings, close to each other and covered with white plaster. A small courtyard opens inside and leads to the church, which hosts an iconostasis rich in valuable Byzantine icons.

We would like to end this itinerary in the wonderful Kalami village, located in a scenic bay overlooking Albania not far from Palaiokastritsa. In Kalami we can find the house where Lawrence Durrell received his friend Henry Miller.

Now the villa called «The White House» is home to a romantic restaurant by the sea, and it is possible to rent a room on the upper floor. In 1937 the British writer described it as follows:

It is April and we have taken an old fisherman’s house in the extreme north of the island –Kalamai – Ten sea miles from the town, and some thirty kilometres by road, it offers all the charms of seclusion. A white house set like dice on a rock already venerable with the scars of wind and water. The hill runs clear up into the sky behind it, so that the cypresses and olives overhang this room in which I sit and write. We are upon a bare promontory with its beautiful clean surface of metamorphic stone covered in olive and ilex: in the shape of a mons pubis. This is become our unregretted home. A world. Corcyra.

[…] White house, white rock, friends, and a narrow style of loving: and perhaps a book which will grow out of these scraps, as from the rubbish of these old Venetian tombs the cypress cracks the slabs at last and rises up fresh and green. (L. Durrell, Prospero’s Cell. A Guide to the Landscape and Manners of the Island of Corcyra)

Miller was definitely one of the friends who enlivened Durrell’s white house in Kalami; he came here, persuaded by his friend Lawrence, as he tells us:

Ricevevo dalla Grecia lettere del mio amico Lawrence Durrell, che di Corfù aveva praticamente fatto casa. Anche le sue lettere erano meravigliose, ma per me un po’ irreali. Durrell è un poeta e le sue lettere erano poetiche: producevano in me una certa confusione, per via che sogno e realtà si mescolavano sapientemente. In seguito avrei scoperto che questa confusione è reale e non tutta dovuta alla facoltà poetica. Ma allora pensavo che egli caricasse le tinte, che questo fosse un modo di indurmi ad accettare i suoi ripetuti inviti ad andarlo a trovare. […]

Pensavo, quando questi messaggi araldici arrivavano a Villa Seurat in una fredda giornata estiva parigina, che egli si fosse fatto di coca prima di ungere la penna. (H. Miller, Il Colosso di Marussi)

Durrell’s letters had the desired effect and, in 1939, a few months before the Second World War, Miller reached his friend in Corfu. That trip, which took the writer also to other Greek sites, gave birth to one of his best books, The Colossus of Maroussi. It has accompanied us throughout some steps of this itinerary, which ends here in the nice Kalami. We would like to say goodbye to the traveler, by sharing the American writer’s thoughts and hopes expressed at the end of his travel book. Miller writes:

Quando parlo dell’effetto che questo viaggio in Grecia ha prodotto su di me la gente sembra stupefatta e ammaliata. Dicono di invidiarmi, si augurano di poterci andare un giorno anche loro. Perché non lo fanno? Perché nessuno può godere l’esperienza che desidera finché non è pronto ad accoglierla […] La luce della Grecia mi ha aperto gli occhi, mi è penetrata nei pori, ha ampliato tutto il mio essere. […]. Pace a tutti gli uomini, dico, e vita più copiosa! (H. Miller, Il Colosso di Marussi)

Itinerary Of Myths And Heroes

Canosa, Ruvo, Bari, Egnazia, Gravina, Altamura, Taranto, Corfù, Lefkada, Itaca

The Itinerary of myths and heroes is a journey that will guide the traveler or reader through the archaeological areas of Puglia, along the Appian Way and its deviationes, between mythological tale and history, following the historical writings of famous authors from the past such as Orazio as well as prestigious contemporary writers like Paolo Rumiz; these travellers have crossed and described this Way. The main stops will be Canosa, Ruvo, Bari, Egnazia, Gravina, Altamura and finally Taranto, one of the most important centres of Magna Graecia, which boasts one of the most beautiful archaeological museums in the world: Marta. Following this itinerary, the traveler will finally be invited to cross the Adriatic to reach the Ionian Islands, which enjoy a unique position in the mythical and epic Western imaginary. The Homeric poems, which are set in this fascinating and fantastic insular world, have over time led people to overlap the literary image of the island of the Phaeacians with the real image of Corfu, and to consider Ithaca as the home of the most famous traveler of all times: Ulysses. Entire generations have been fascinated by a journey that perhaps never took place; although the historical-archaeological evidences are very few and do not allow for a sure identification of the Ionian Islands as the actual theatre of the peregrinations described in the Odyssey, «il turista che, appressandosi per mare alla Grecia, oggi vede da lontano Itaca – as Umberto Eco notes – prova un’emozione omerica». The travellers who are interested in following this itinerary will be invited to go in search of those Homeric emotions by following these islands with the Odyssey in their hands and guided by an educated eighteenth-century writer and traveler, Saverio Scrofani, who has left us intense descriptions of these places, full with mythological and classical suggestions in his book Viaggio in Grecia.

Our itinerary begins in Puglia with the poet Orazio, who in 37 BC at the age of 28, together with Maecenas, Cocceius and Virgil, travelled from Rome to Brindisi. Years later, the memory of that experience became the theme of the fifth satire of the first book from Saturae by the Latin poet. Known as Iter Brundisinum, we advise the traveler to follow the route. Horace and his traveling companions reach Puglia from Benevento and instead of following the main road of ancient Appia, also referred to as regina viarum, choose a way that was still secondary at the time. As time went by, this alternative route became one of the most important routes in the South: the Appian Trajan Way, the route axis built between 108 and 110 AD at the behest of Roman emperor Trajan.

Our first Apulian stop is Canosa which, in Horace’s words, is a city where bread is harder than stone and “che è stata fondata un tempo dal valoroso Diomede”. (“Qui locus a forti Diomede est conditus olim“). The image of the Achaean hero is linked to the birth of many Apulian centres. Legend has it that upon returning from the Trojan War he landed on these shores and founded numerous cities, including Canosa. The relations between Puglia and the Greek civilisation are very ancient, as evidenced by the foundations of numerous settlements linked to the Minoan, Mycenaean and Achaean universe as early as the second millennium BC. This contributed to the dissemination of legendary and mythological stories in various ways linked to the heroes of the Trojan war. Among all, Diomedes is one of the most beloved characters, the protagonist of romantic legends. The hero, who is Ulysses’ companion, after escaping from a conspiracy orchestrated by his wife at the behest of Aphrodite, landed in Daunia and chose this land, which the gods wanted him to call ‘Terra Felice’, to found several cities. The borders were traced with gigantic stones that Diomedes had brought with him from Thrace and threw the three remaining ones into the sea. These became as many islets, i.e. the Diomede Islands, today known as the Tremiti Islands. It is not only the myth and legend of its foundation that testifies to the antiquity of Canosa, but also the numerous archaeological finds that emerged from the subsoil and some of its most beautiful monuments. Just twenty minutes from the centre in the Archaeological Park of San Leucio, the traveller can visit the remains of a Paleo-christian Basilica immersed in a verdant countryside of olive trees and vines, which are built on an already-existing Italic temple from the third century BC; according to scholars, this was dedicated to goddess Minerva. Among tall columns in white marble surmounted by Ionic capitals and Byzantine pulvinos, polychrome mosaic fragments of fine workmanship are still visible. In the ancient temple you can admire the Corinthian capital, which is of rare beauty, with a female protome, the drums of numerous fluted columns and the feet of a gigantic telamon.

After visiting the annexed Antiquarium, we continue our itinerary towards Ruvo di Puglia. Upon arrival, his illustrious travelling companions are “stanchi, come chi ha percorso un lungo tratto e reso più difficile dalla pioggia”.

From an exceptional artistic point of view and despite some nineteenth-century repainting, the vase presents in the foreground the figure of the mortally-wounded giant, who collapsed supported by the Dioscuri. The god of the sea Poseidon and his companion Amphitrite witness the scene, while a female figure, a personification of Crete, flees scared of losing the protection of her guardian.

In Ruvo, the ancient Rubi, an important stopping point along the Appian Trajan Way, ancient history and myth – the two cornerstones of this itinerary – once again meet. The town is an important agricultural centre of the Apulian Murgia and its origins date back to the time of the Peucetians, an ancient Italic population which had already settled in these lands as early as the seventh century BC. It was a Roman municipality and its importance is linked to its strategic position along the route that connected the inland areas of the region with the port cities of the Adriatic coast. Getting here following Horace’s journey, the traveller cannot leave Ruvo without first visiting the Jatta Museum, not only for the rich heritage of Apulian vases that it hosts, but also for the museographic framework in which they are exhibited: the neo-classical Jatta Palace. The Museum is one of the very few examples of a private collection in Italy, formed between 1820 and 1935, which remained intact and set up according to the late nineteenth-century taste. It contains a valuable collection of over 2000 vases found in the Ruvo area thanks to the commitment and the passionate archaeological research carried out by Giovanni Jatta and his family. The Jattas wanted to put an end to the nineteenth-century widespread practice of plundering ancient tombs and burial grounds for commercial and speculative purposes; for this reason, they began to purchase artefacts on the antiques market and to preside over excavation campaigns, thus saving a large part of the historical and archaeological heritage from grave robbers and smugglers. The precious family collection constitutes the Jatta Museum Collection. One of the museum’s most valuable pieces is found in Room 4: it is an Attic crater that probably dates back to the fifth century BC; it represents a scene from the Argonautics by Apollonio Rodio, the Death of Talos. Here the myth reappears. Talos was a giant demon, the keeper of Crete, who was killed by the Dioscuri, Castor and Pollux, with the help of Medea, in order for Jason to land on the island after conquering the golden fleece.

We leave Ruvo, its myths and its archaeological treasures, to continue our journey along the Appian-Trajan way to reach Bari, briefly defined by Horace as a “fishy” city.

The traveller who arrives today in the Apulian capital is more likely to be captured by the medieval aspect of the city, which instead preserves its archaeological treasures in the recently restored Archaeological Museum of Santa Scolastica, on the Lungomare Imperatore Augusto; this runs under the ancient city wall. Here the remains of ancient Roman columns are still aligned, probably belonging to buildings that have disappeared today. Among these, the traveller will come across one of the milestone columns of the Trajan Way, found in the immediate vicinity. The dedicatory inscription in honour of the emperor Trajan and the indication of the CXXVIII (128) mile distance from Bari and Benevento are still visible on it.

In the heart of the alleys of the historical centre, among which we recommend visiting the Cathedral of San Sabino and the Basilica of San Nicola, the traveller will be able to take a suggestive journey back in time, visiting the exhibitions set up in Palazzo Simi – Operative Centre for Archeology -, in Via Lamberti 1. Inside this Renaissance mansion you can appreciate both vertically and horizontally a dense archaeological stratification that shows the long history of Bari and its pre-existing archaeological features characterising the subsoil through its finds, tools and ceramic artefacts.

From Bari, our itinerary to discover the archaeological heritage and the mythological stories of the Apulian cities and towns leads us near Monopoli, on the Adriatic coast, where there are the remains of an ancient settlement dating back to the Bronze Age: Egnazia.

The Latin poet, after arriving in what had already become a thriving Roman city, quips about local legends and writes:

Egnazia, costruita in ira alle Ninfe, ci offrì motivi di risa e di scherzi, giacché desiderava convincerci che l’incenso sulla soglia del tempio si consuma senza fiamma. Ci creda Apella il giudeo, non io: io infatti ho imparato che gli dei conducono vita tranquilla e, se qualche prodigio la natura produce, non sono gli dei irati a mandarlo giù dall’alto tetto del cielo. (Orazio, Satire, I, V)

Egnazia, the ancient Gnathia of Messapi, still preserves the remains of its ancient walls, which also attracted the attention of another illustrious traveller, like us, in search of the ancient: Baron Von Riedesel, a correspondent of the famous archaeologist Winckelmann from the late eighteenth century, to whom he described the site with the following words,

[…] si veggono, ancora, le sue antiche mura, che si elevano di qualche palmo dal suolo, e son di pietra da taglio, posto a crudo, ossia senza calce e cemento; inoltre, una tomba antica, una conserva di acqua sotterranea, che può aver servito a dei bagni, e che si riconosce essere stata decorata di stucco; ed infine, un altro edificio sotterraneo, di forma quadrata, con un’apertura in ogni angolo, probabilmente, per dargli luce ed aria. Io lo credo, del pari, una conserva d’acqua, essendo necessarii simili edificii in un paese di pianura come questo, nel quale mancano buone sorgenti, e nel quale bisogna ricorrere all’acqua piovana. (H. Von Riedesel, Viaggio attraverso la Sicilia e la Magna Grecia)

Still today the traveler will be able to appreciate the ruins of Egnazia, once an important Roman civitas foederata, then municipium, located along the Trajan Way, within its scenic position in front of the sea. The Roman city experienced its maximum development at the turn of the second and third centuries AD.

The paved route axis of the imperial way is still perfectly legible; to its sides one could find the shops, the forum, the civil basilicas and a vast sanctuary from the Augustan period.

The area has been the subject of numerous study campaigns and archaeological excavations and, since 2016, numerous paths have been opened to the public, allowing tourists to visit the city supported by modern multimedia technologies. The finds from the excavations of Egnazia are now preserved in the nearby Giuseppe Andreassi National Museum.

After this archaeological walk and if the season allows for it, the traveler could take a dip in the clear waters of the Adriatic which sometimes dangerously touch the archaeological area “Invisa alle Ninfe”. Many equipped bathing establishments follow each other along this stretch of coast.

At this point in our itinerary, we leave the poet and his group to proceed towards Brindisi, while we will divert our journey towards the inland areas of the region to reach Taranto, reconnecting to the original route of the Appian Way.

If Horace can be considered as one of the most illustrious travellers of Puglia among the ancient writers, in much more recent times, in 2015, another famous writer and well-known journalist, Paolo Rumiz, ideally picked up the baton. Together with a group of friends, he travelled along the ancient Appian Way from Rome to Brindisi, partly following the course of Horace’s iter brundisinum, unlike the poet, who remained faithful to the oldest route layout. The story of this incredible journey has become a book, entitled Appia, which, by welcoming the wishes of its writer, we have chosen to use as a guide during the last Apulian stages of this journey on the routes of myths and heroes.

The journey that we propose to the traveler is the one that from Gravina leads to Taranto, retracing exactly the route of one of the most important paths of antiquity, one that can aspire to become the Italian Way of Santiago and that Rumiz «come un pifferaio magico» invites us to follow both physically and with our imagination.

The writer arrives in Puglia after crossing Lazio and Campania, from the border with Basilicata, and writes the following:

Dalla Basilicata alla Puglia un lungo andare nel silenzio, fra panorami e infinite e nude distese a seminativo. […] Scampoli di tratturo Tarantino-Appia Antica conducono su e giù verso Gravina, gioiello che prende il nome dal canyon inserito nel Parco nazionale dell’Alta Murgia. Sul lato del burrone opposto a quello dell’attuale città, nel sito di Botromagno, che fu colonizzato dai Peuceti, i Romani avrebbero costruito la stazione di Silvum. (P. Rumiz, Appia)

We advise the traveler to stop in this town, which is built on the slopes of a deep ravine, with unique landscape features, to discover the many crypts, rupestrian churches and its monuments.

We leave the task of describing this evocative place to Paolo Rumiz:

Sull’orlo del precipizio che le dà il nome, Gravina emerge in fondo a una lunga spianata stepposa tipo Arizona. Il contrasto fra la luce calcinata della città e l’ombra smisurata del burrone è impressionante. […] Ma quello che fa la vera differenza è che Gravina è una città in negativo: scavata nella pancia del tufo più che costruita attraverso muri maestri. […]

Il solido tufo di Gravina fa sì che il segno dell’Appia si perda in un labirinto di tracce di carriaggi e antichi marciapiedi. […]

Sulle mappe antiche il nome attuale della città non esiste. Al suo posto, nell’itinerario dell’Appia è segnata Sylvium. Ma Gravina, secondo alcuni, non ha nulla a che fare con questa. E allora Sylvium dov’è? (P. Rumiz, Appia)

To answer this question, our journalist and traveler interpellates the archeology experts who reveal that today’s town is very likely to be the neighbour of Sylvium, heir to a Greek centre called Sidinon, a term that derives from the Greek word «Side» which means pomegranate. On some coins, which were found in the hill west to the deep ravine that cuts the town in two, this toponym can be read. In this case, it is better to head towards this hill called Botromagno with Rumiz. Although the archaeological area has remained fortunately intact, as the medieval and modern town of Gravina has developed on the opposite side of the ravine, the site is difficult to reach and visit.

“Gravina – as Rumiz states – è una città verticale, un condominio rupestre con le case dei ricchi in alto e quelle dei poveri in basso. Ma ecco che proprio questa città termitaio ha la particolarità unica di avere le sue stratificazioni storiche in orizzontale. Una di fronte all’altra, anziché una sopra l’altra, come normalmente succede”. He then goes on:

Botromagno, oltre la gola, sembra impersonare il “doppio” sepolcrale della città dei vivi. “Botros” per i Greci era nient’altro che il canyon, per cui il toponimo – per dirla con il Signore degli Anelli – può essere efficacemente tradotto con “Gran Burrone”. Ma “burrone” è esattamente come dire “gravina”, parola antichissima derivante dall’accadico “Grab” – fossa, tomba –, tuttora usata nel tedesco, ma con in più una connotazione sacra legata alle acque. (P. Rumiz, Appia)

The traveller visiting Gravina cannot help but notice that the surrounding area is characterised by a vaguely sepulchral aura, conferred by the numerous caves used as necropolis and the ancient burial grounds along the sides of the ravine. Moreover, if he is lucky, he may come across some villager ready to tell him the stories and legends that populate these rocks. Paolo Rumiz met Pino who told him how the village elders believed that ancient demons still lived in that place. Rumiz writes:

Quando passo lì accanto la sera, sento voci, vedo fiaccole alle finestre, dice Pino, ricordando che Gravina è luogo di abitazione e di culto da tempo immemorabile. Mio nonno disse che una notte aveva udito urla umane e un rombo di carri e cavalli al galoppo. Era corso dal parroco a raccontare la visione e quello gli aveva dato alcune effigi benedette per proteggersi dai demoni. Ebbene pochi giorni dopo, proprio in quel luogo, furono trovate due tombe greche, e nessuno tolse dalla testa al nonno l’idea che le grida fossero uscite da quella finestra sull’Ade. (P. Rumiz, Appia)

We leave Gravina, its caves and its stories, to continue our itinerary along the Appian Way on the steps of Rumiz who, after crossing the Murgia, passes through Altamura, according to some scholars the ancient city of Blera, the next stop within our journey. The journalist describes his difficulties walking this stretch of road:

Se c’è un luogo dove sul tracciato dell’Appia non ci sono dubbi, ce lo abbiamo davanti. Lo dicono gli itinerari romani, la Tabula Peutigeriana, le carte IGM del secondo dopoguerra. […] Scavalchiamo le recinzioni, rimontiamo i terrapieni e camminiamo contromano tra i guardrail come lagunari, sfiorati da automobilisti allibiti. […] Ecco dove l’archeologia diventa intralcio per l’italico potere cementizio. Per questo, anche in Apulia, l’Appia è apertamente ignorata dai sindaci e dai loro tirapiedi. Più comodo far finta che non ci sia. (P. Rumiz, Appia)

The traveller, who is following this itinerary on foot, by train or by other means, once arrived in Altamura will be fascinated by this centre populated since prehistoric times. Just in the countryside of this rich agricultural town the first and only intact and complete prehistoric hominid skeleton was discovered and is known as the Man of Altamura.

We recommend a visit to the historical centre of the town with its majestic Cathedral and finally a walk through the narrow streets and its cloisters, which Rumiz describes as follows:

Altamura vecchia è acustica del labirinto allo stato puro. Trillo biforcuto di rondoni, solitario canto greco di donna, fruscio di panni stesi. Luce violenta, che ti spinge a parlare sottovoce anziché a gridare più forte. Passeri che tacciono, aspettando la sera. Enormi nubi immobili nonostante il vento. […] Il genius loci aborre il rombo dei rettilinei e si rintana nei “claustri”, piazzette nascoste, dove regna un borbottio claustrale, da accademia talmudica. Diverticoli che ripetono il motivo del grembo femminile. Altamura è una “polis” in miniatura, che si rintana in mille viottoli. Non guarda all’esterno, ma verso il proprio centro. (P. Rumiz, Appia)

From the labyrinthine Altamura, with its cloisters, small courtyards in which votive shrines are often still set up, and which suddenly open up between the narrow alleys, we continue our journey towards Taranto.

Our journey following the one of the writer, which has become our guide on the Via Appia, continues through the lands between Puglia and Basilicata. After crossing the municipalities of Laterza and Castellaneta, we eventually begin to see the Ionian Sea and unfortunately also Ilva, the huge iron and steel plant that stands at the gates of Taranto.

This is the story of Paolo Rumiz’s arrival in the city:

[…] oltre una distesa di agrumeti, al termine di un lungo piano inclinato, appare la striscia cobalto dello Jonio, il più greco dei mari. E, poco a sinistra, sotto una massa di nubi portatrici di pioggia, un’altra visione. Inquietante. Una cresta dentata che fuma, come quella di uno stegosauro, trapassata dai fulmini, immensa eppur lontanissima. L’Ilva.

Ci aspetta sornione, a fauci spalancate, in fondo alla nostra strada. Si è disteso apposta sul cammino dell’Appia Antica col corpo smisurato e la pancia abitata dal fuoco perenne. Tra noi e Taranto è l’ultimo ostacolo. Un passaggio obbligato, come la Sfinge dei Greci, come il Maligno appostato sui ponti delle fiabe. (P. Rumiz, Appia)

Even the traveller who is following this route, before being able to appreciate the beauties of the Ionian capital, will have to overcome the “Sphinx”, pass the blanket of smoke that surrounds the city, which was once the terminus of the Appian Way, before Brindisi became the terminal. In all likelihood he will have to circumvent the abandoned reddish buildings of the Tamburi district, where workers of the iron and steel factory were staying and which, as a mirage of development and well-being, soon turned out to be a very dangerous nightmare for the population and the environment. However, Taranto is not only Ilva. With its scenic location on a natural inlet of still crystal clear waters, the city will astonish the traveller, as Rumiz explains:

Ma ecco Taranto Vecchia, aggrappata all’isolotto che fa da intercapedine tra il Mar Grande e il Mar Piccolo. Reti colorate alla greca, odore di pescheria di una volta, vicoli più autentici che a Sorrento, popolane sfrontate, case che il tempo ha lasciato invecchiare in pace. […] Sul lato della città nuova, due poderose colonne doriche, di gran lunga anteriori alla tracciatura dell’Appia, snobbano il presente voltando le spalle all’acciaieria e dicono che la storia di Taranto che conta è tutta anteriore al dominio romano. Taranto significa una grande epopea ignorata. (P. Rumiz, Appia)

This Tarantine epopeia, according to legend and myth, began around 2000 BC., when Taras, Poseidon’s son, would have arrived in the city on the back of a dolphin. According to Strabo, a Greek geographer and historian who lived at the end of the 1st century BC, it was a group of Spartans led by Falanto who founded Taranto in 708 BC.

In the last decades of the fourth century, the city was one of the most powerful and prosperous colonies in Magna Graecia, as evidenced by the exports of vases and ceramics throughout the Mediterranean and the numerous capitals that were mobilised to erect incredible works of art and refined products of goldsmith’s art, today exposed in the Marta Museum, one of the Italian and European museum excellences.

Let us enter its halls following the story narrated by Rumiz:

After admiring the splendours of Taranto’s past guarded at Marta, the traveller is now left to continue his journey along the Appian Way to reach Brindisi; with its port the city of Brindisi is still today, as in the past, one of the embarkation points par excellence towards the East and Greece. On one of the ferries which connect the city of Alto Salento to Greece, we leave Puglia to land in the Ionian Islands. The crossing will last only one night and at dawn the traveller will be able to see from afar the island that has always been identified as Scheria (Phaeacia): Corfu. It took eighteen days for Ulysses to reach it, after leaving beautiful Calypso in Ogygia.

With the Odyssey in hand, in its poetic translation by Ippolito Pindemonte, a scholar and poet with solid classicist foundations yet close to the pre-romantic sensibility who lived at the turn of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Ulysses’ arrival in Corfu will introduce us to the Homeric dimension of this last part of our itinerary.

Lieto l’eroe dell’innocente vento,

La vela dispiegò. Quindi al timone

Sedendo, il corso dirigea con arte,

Né gli cadea su le palpèbre il sonno

Mentre attento le Pleiadi mirava,

E il tardo a tramontar Boòte e l’Orsa

Che detta è pure il Carro, e là si gira,

Guardando sempre in Orïone, e sola

Nel liquido Oceàn sdegna lavarsi

L’Orsa, che Ulisse, navigando, a manca

Lasciar dovea, come la diva ingiunse.

Dieci pellegrinava e sette giorni

Su i campi d’Anfitrite. Il dì novello

Gli sorse incontro co’ suoi monti ombrosi

L’isola de’ Feaci, a cui la strada

Conducealo più corta, e che apparìa

Quasi uno scudo alle fosche onde sopra.

(Odyssey, V, 346-361.)

(R. Nicolì, Introduction to Viaggio in Grecia by Saverio Scrofani, POLYSEMI Digital Library)

As he wrote:

Finalmente, dopo otto giorni di navigazione, ecco le Montagne dell’Epiro, ecco gli scogli Acrocerauni, ecco Corfù. A questi nomi mille idee mi si affollarono in mente: Alessandro, Pirro, Nausica, Alcinoo, Ulisse occuparono ad un tratto la mia fantasia: io non mi stancava di riguardare da lontano quelle rocche e quei monti così famosi. (S. Scrofani, Viaggio in Grecia, Letter V)

In these verses we can follow Odysseus who is happy at the helm of his raft oriented through the stars, as advised by beautiful Calypso, always keeping the Chariot to the left, the only star that never changes position. On the eighteenth day, the shady mountains of the Phaeacian island appear.

The arrival on the Greek coasts has always aroused an incredible emotion in the writers of every age, who above all between Enlightenment and Romanticism chose Greece as the ideal home of Western culture. Let us read for example the emotion of the Sicilian prolific intellectual Saverio Scrofani as he saw the Ionian Islands on the horizon during his 1794 journey undertaken in the wake of the Enlightenment Grand Tour, with a look at ancient Greece that «anticipa l’adesione lirica che il mito dell’Ellade conoscerà nei grandi romantici europei». (R. Nicolì, Introduction to Viaggio in Grecia di Saverio Scrofani, POLYSEMI Digital Library). As he wrote:

Still today when coming to Corfu by ship the traveller can observe the looming of the Albanian mountains on the horizon – which excited Scrofani and which we like to imagine as the same shady mountains that Ulysses saw – and, entering the port, the gaze will be captured by the bulk of the Old Venetian Fort with its ramparts on the sea.

As he landed on these shores, Ulysses met beautiful Nausicaa who took him to the city in the palace of his father Alcinous, king of the island. There are many places here that compete for the primacy of having been the theatre of this first meeting; among them are Paleocastrizza on the west coast, about thirty kilometres far from the city of Corfu and, on the east coast, the bay of Kanoni.

Once landed in Corfu, the traveller can only start wandering around Kerkyra, the main centre of the island, in an attempt to recognise the city of the Phaecians.

As described in the Odyssey:

È la città da un alto

Muro cerchiata, e due bei porti vanta

D’angusta foce, un quinci e l’altro quindi,

Su le cui rive tutti in lunga fila

Posan dal mare i naviganti legni.

Tra un porto e l’altro si distende il foro

Di pietre quadre, e da vicina cava

Condotte, lastricato; e al fôro in mezzo

L’antico tempio di Nettun si leva.

(Odyssey, VI, 366-373)

Nothing remains of the high walls sung in these verses or of the paved hole and even less of the temple of Neptune neither in Kerkyra nor in the other towns of the island – to the point that the cultured Sicilian traveller Scrofani struggled to hide the disappointment and wrote:

[…] dove son dunque i resti della reggia e de’ giardini d’Alcinoo? Non si vede più nulla. Il tempo distrugge, è vero, le fabbriche e le coltivazioni; ma le fonti, ma i fiumi che le irrigavano dove sono? Temo che tutte le bellezze e le magnificenze d’Alcinoo, le porte d’oro, le mura d’argento, i chiodi di gemme, non siano un effetto della fantasia d’Omero come le statue ch’ei fa lavorare per lo scudo d’Achille. Se si vuole prestar fede al racconto del poeta, qui presso era il luogo dove Ulisse fu rigettato dalla tempesta; qui ha dovuto nascondersi e qui mostrarsi nudo alla figlia del re. Ecco la fonte dove Nausica lavava i panni quando il re d’Itaca le si scoperse, quando ella se ne innamorò, quando le sue ancelle lo rivestirono dopo aver in un segreto abboccamento ottenuta la protezione della padrona. Ma come è possibile che Ulisse, giunto in Feacia, non sapesse riconoscere le montagne dell’Epiro che le stanno in faccia, né la stessa Leucade che doveva quasi scoprire co’ propri occhi? Di più: Ulisse, un re, un viaggiatore, un eroe che ritorna dopo aver distrutto il regno di Priamo, ignora poi qual popolo abiti in quell’Isola e quali sieno i Feacesi? Eppure Corfù non è distante che 100 miglia da Itaca. Misero colui, che ardisse oggigiorno scrivere un poema su questo gusto. Che dico? Felice chi potesse solamente imitarlo. (S. Scrofani, Viaggio in Grecia, Lettera X)

Never mind if the traveler arrived in Corfu will not see the traces of Alcinoo’s palace as happened in Scrofani,: the island and the city will still be able to enchant him with their Venetian and Oriental charm, their incredible landscape and beautiful beaches.

There is another place closely related to the Homeric tale: the islet of Pontikonissi, a few kilometres south to the centre of Kerkyra. According to a tenacious tradition it would be the ship by which the Phaeacians brought Ulysses back to Ithaca. It is said that Poseidon petrified and sank the boat here out of revenge, when they came back home.

The verses of book XIII from the Odyssey describe the moment in which the God of the Sea, after talking to Zeus, operates the prodigy and, after approaching the ship and with a touch of hand, turned it into stone – into what the legend wants it to be today precisely known as the rock of Pontikonissi:

“[…] quando

I Feacesi scorgeran dal lido

Venir la nave a tutto corso, e poco

Sarà lontana, convertirla in sasso

Che di naviglio abbia sembianza, e oggetto

Si mostri a ognun di maraviglia; e in oltre

Grande alla lor città montagna imporre”.

Lo Scuotiterra, udito questo appena,

Si portò a Scheria in fretta, e qui fermossi.

Ed ecco spinta dagl’illustri remi

Su per l’onde venir l’agile nave.

Egli appressolla, e convertilla in sasso,

E d’un sol tocco della man divina

La radicò nel fondo. Indi scomparve.

(Odyssey, XIII, 188-201)

The traveller will decide whether to believe this legend or not; however, it is an absolutely advisable experience to visit this high cliff on the sea, surrounded by a cypress grove, reachable by boat from the pier where the white Monastery of Vlacherna of the seventeenth century is located.

Before leaving Corfu and continuing the itinerary towards the island of Lefkada and finally towards ‘rocky’ Itaca, we advise the traveller to visit the Villa Mon Repos which hosts an interesting archaeological collection with finds from the ancient area of Paleopolis and the Archaeological Museum located in via Vraila Armeni n.1. Here, among other interesting finds, the pediment of an archaic temple dedicated to goddess Artemis is preserved and exposed, bearing the impressive mythological figure of one of the Gorgons, according to the British poet and writer Lawrence Durrell, the famous Medusa.

Here in Corfu is the story of another terrifying woman of classical mythology, Medea, who got married on the island, with Jason, the traveling hero wandering all over the Mediterranean in search of the golden fleece together with the Argonauts. According to mythology it was Alcinous himself, the king of the Phaecians, who welcomed Medea and Jason to the island and made them marry. The wedding was followed by an intense night of love. It is precisely during that night that Medea, the famous film by Pasolini starring Maria Callas, begins.

Now what the traveller is left to do is to follow Ulysses’ example and continue the journey. Although the beauties of Corfu invite you to stay, the time has come to set sail and continue our itinerary of myths and heroes towards Lefkada, taking advantage of the connections by sea that are made available for the Ionian Islands. Along our route we will come across the two small islets of Paxos and Antipaxos. You do not need to touch the ground to encounter myths and history again. Not too far from the waters we are sailing, one of the most famous battles of the ancient world was fought, i.e. the battle of Actium, where the dreams of love and power between Antonio and Cleopatra broke. Legend has it that the two lovers feasted on these islets on the eve of the fatal battle. This stretch of Ionian sea is also a jewel of biodiversity, where it is possible to admire some rare marine species such as the hawksbill turtle and the monk seal.

We arrive in Lefkada, which is called Santa Maura by Venetians. Today the island is famous for its pristine beaches and for being a favourite destination for walkers and hikers.

In addition to its natural beauty, in the Classical and Romantic imagination Lefkada is famous for its white cliffs immortalised by painters and sung by many poets; it is from these cliffs that the poet Sappho decided to throw herself into the sea to end her tormented love with Phaon.

Saverio Scrofani is clearly excited as he writes the report of his 1794 trip to Greece in the form of an epistolary report which was published in 1799:

Al far del giorno ci trovammo in faccia a’ famosi regni d’Ulisse: questa è Leucade, quella è Itaca, quella è Ceffalonia, quello è il Zante. Ecco il capo Colonna e le ruine del tremendo tempio d’Apollo. […] dall’alto di quello scoglio che sto osservando co’ propri occhi, che biancheggia da lontano e spaventa, in quel mare profondo che si frange a’ suoi piedi, funesto sempre a’ nocchieri e sempre agitato, si precipitò e perì ebria d’amore, di dispetto, di noia la divina, la sensibile, l’appassionata Saffo. E i Sacerdoti, gl’interpreti, i ministri de’ numi avevano inventato quest’assassinio? E i numi che amavano l’umanità e l’innocenza, i numi che punivano le altrui sceleraggini lasciarono sussistere per più secoli quest’esempio della lor tirannia e della loro impotenza? O come ti vedrei volentieri, Faone, in mezzo a Tizio ed a Sisifo pagar la pena della tua durezza: ti vedrei rodere… Ma questo rimprovero è sicuramente un’ingiustizia, un effetto della mia fantasia riscaldata. Qual colpa ebbero Faone, i preti, i numi? L’uno non poté amar Saffo, e quando non si può non v’ha colpa; gli altri la tolsero dagli affanni che soffriva amando chi non l’amava: in effetto la morte è il solo efficace rimedio per un amore non corrisposto. Alle porte d’ogni città, si dovrebbe trovare un salto di Leucade: gli amanti disperati ritornerebbero saggi o finirebbero di penare, e i governi sarebbero più tranquilli. (S. Scrofani, Viaggio in Grecia, Lettera XI)

It is said that the ancients believed that one could directly reach the underworld or at least the river Acheron by jumping from these cliffs. In fact, according to Strabo, it seems that the dive from the Lefkada cliff was a fairly common practice in classical antiquity and that Apollo’s priests performed it regularly. The jump, which probably also had some propitiatory function, was called Katapontismos.

We leave his romantic cliffs of Saffo to reach the longed-for destination of Ulysses’ journey and the last part of our journey.

In verses 26-33 of Canto IX of the Odyssey, Ithaca is briefly described as follows: its landscape is dominated by the high Monte Nerito, on which the winds break; it is surrounded by the neighbouring islands most moved to the East, like luxuriant Zakynthos. The earth is harsh and mountainous, yet good nurturer of young people:

[…] dove

Lo scotifronde Nérito si leva

Superbo in vista, ed a cui giaccion molte

Non lontane tra loro isole intorno,

Dulichio, Same, e la di selve bruna

Zacinto. All’orto e al mezzogiorno queste,

Itaca al polo si rivolge, e meno

Dal continente fugge: aspra di scogli,

Ma di gagliarda gioventù nutrice.

(Odyssey, IX, 26-33)

What is left to do is to suggest the traveller who wants to experience the Homeric dimension of the island some excursions in the surrounding area. Moving about 10 km south of Vathy, the main centre of Ithaca, near the village of Anemothouri, one can encounter the true or alleged Arethusa source, that is, where Ulysses in the Odyssey is said to have met his trusted servant Eumaeus, who used to go there to let the pigs water.

The path, albeit not always easy, offers panoramas and very suggestive views. A simple blue sign indicates the site where the source is located.

Another place we suggest to visit is the natural ravine, near the famous beach of Dexa, known as the grotto of the Nymphs, “the convex cavern”, where the hero made sacrifices in honour of the divine creatures. Here you can also improvise new Indiana Jones in search of the treasures that Ulysses is said to have hidden near the cave. By reading the verses of the Odyssey that sing this place, the traveller will be able to recognise the landscape, which is characterised by the fronds of the olive trees that still today embellish this stretch of the Iacese coast sacred to the nymphs called Naiaids; between amphorae and vases where the bees produce honey, they weave purple drapes of incredible beauty on marble looms.

As Homer sang:

[…] Spande sovra la cima i larghi rami

Vivace oliva, e presso a questa un antro

S’apre amabile, opaco, ed alle ninfe

Nàiadi sacro. Anfore ed urne, in cui

Forman le industri pecchie il mel soave,

Vi son di marmo tutte, e pur di marmo

Lunghi telai, dove purpurei drappi,

Maraviglia a veder, tesson le ninfe.

(Odyssey, XIII, 126-132)

Finally, we head to Mount Aetos, near the small village of Alalkomenés. On this summit, the famous archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann was able to find the city of Troia with the Iliad in his hands; he also managed to find the remains of Ulysses’ palace. There are still no archaeological evidences to confirm this hypothesis, but based on recent excavations, another place in Ithaca has become a candidate for the site where the Greek hero’s palace would be.

Near the small village of Stavròs, on the small hill of Pelikata, in the northern part of the island, among hills covered with olive trees and planted with vines, near a small archaeological museum, the remains of a palace with Cyclopean age walls have been identified dating back to the Mycenaean era; we like to imagine that long ago it was able to certainly host some noble warrior or aristocrat, if not Ulysses and faithful Penelope.

Qui dunque visse, quell’uomo eloquente, e in conseguenza artificioso, che dopo aver fatto il pirata fra questi scogli infecondi, fu poi cagione in Asia della strage e del pianto di migliaia d’uomini e di cui Omero ha fatto un eroe? Qui i Proci assediavano Penelope, qui visse Telemaco, qui Mentore filosofava, qui scese Minerva a proteggere Ulisse, a conversare con lui? (S. Scrofani, Viaggio in Grecia, Letter XI)

Let us conclude at the end of this itinerary, as Scrofani suggests, that “I geografi, egl’istorici ne disbrighino la questions far loro”, since, after paraphrasing some verses of the Greek poet Kostandinos Kavafis, we are certain that even without having the answers to our Homeric doubts:

[…] non per questo Itaca ti avrà deluso

Fatto ormai savio, con tutta la tua esperienza addosso

già tu avrai capito ciò che Itaca vuole significare.

(K. Kavafis, Itaca)

The Ionian Islands in Lawrence Durrell’s eyes

Alberobello, Brindisi, Corfu, Lefkada, Ithaca, Cephalonia, Zakynthos

In the 1970s, the British poet and writer Lawrence Durrell wrote The Greek Islands, the book on which this itinerary is grounded. It has never been translated into Italian in full, despite the awards won and its publishing success. It is not a common guidebook, but as «The Times» reviewers pointed out, it is a valuable volume, almost as one of the illuminated codices in the Patmos Monastery. It is a travel book written by a traveler who had just lived on the Greek islands and drawn inspiration for some of his literary masterpieces, Bitter Lemons and Prospero’s Cell. These texts are both a base for The Greek Islands, where the historical, artistic, mythological and sociological in-depth analysis of the classical Greek world and the modern age, along with clear and ironical writing, contributes to make it an ideal means of acquiring a special knowledge of the Greek islands today. It is a book conceived and written, as the author states, to answer the main questions the travelers may ask themselves when sailing from one Greek island to another: what would I have been glad to know about the island I reached? And what would I feel sorry to have missed while I was there?

Following this itinerary, contemporary travelers, guided by Lawrence Durrell’s words, personal reminiscences, evocative descriptions, British irony, and by his studies on Greek culture not only may answer the questions that led the author to write this book, but also may know the Ionian Islands through the eyes and sensibility of a great twentieth-century writer, who was enchanted by these lands so as to choose them as his own home for many years.

As every traveler knows, a trip starts before leaving, hence our itinerary, accepting our eminent guide’s suggestions, will start by inviting the reader to catch the signs coming from the journey, namely the ferry route that heads for the Ionian Islands, passing through Puglia, which has always been a route towards the East. Durrell writes:

The traveller, slipping southward along the heel of Italy, as if down a Christmas stocking full of small treasure-towns and unexpected monuments, first feels the intimations of a frontier coming to meet him a good way before he reaches the little terminal town of Brindisi. (L. Durrell, The Greek Islands.)

In the 1970s, in Durell’s eyes, the south of Italy is still a wild area, dotted with charming green villages as the Itria Valley, «a strange and picturesque land of trulli, as they call those funny yet quite elaborate conglomerations of clay pots stuck together anyhow […]».

Hence we should wear that strange “Christmas stocking” and run throughout Italy – by train or by car – in order to get to Brindisi. The Apulian town, where the Via Appia once ended, marks the border between Italy and Greece. It is not a traditional frontier, a land boundary, but a sea border: it is the Adriatic Sea, then connecting to the Ionian Sea, that divides Puglia from Greece. Beyond that stretch of sea, the traveler does not know what to expect from the Greek islands that are waiting for him somewhere, concealed by the darkness of the night when he gets on the ferry connecting Puglia and Corfu. The traveler and the writer wonder:

What is that gives a frontier its magic? Not the fact that it is a territorial or political boundary, for these are artificial, dictated by history. A sudden change of scenery may be sometimes partly responsible, but often the change from one country to another is not accompanied by any change of flora and fauna (Italy to Greece, for example, France to Spain). Perhaps it is language that gives to the crossing of a frontier its definitive flavour of voyage. Whatever the answer, the magic is there. The traveller’s heart will beat to a new rhythm, his ear pick up the tonalities of a new tongue; he will examine the strange new coinage with curiosity. Everything will seem changed, including the air he breathes. L. Durrell, The Greek Islands.)

While he thinks of the shift from Italy to Greece, Durrell reminds us that we are leaving Julius Caesar’s territory and reaching Alexander the Great’s home, two figures who embody the huge differences between these countries that meet in Brindisi, at least virtually. Durrell states:

There is a formidable difference between Rome and Athens, between Italian and Greek; and those with any classical knowledge are astonished to find how constant it is even today. On one side the Italy of finesse and often of finickyness – cherished and tamed by its natives into a formal sweetness. And on the other side Greece, a wild garden with everything running to ruin – violent, vertical and sky-thrusting… undomesticated. One thinks of Roman Italy for whom Nature was always wife, nurse and muse; whereas for Greece she was something wilder, something terrible and unbroken – mistress and goddess without mercy all in one. And their heroes have been different from time immemorial. The traveler watches a tanker come in and make fast, while with half of his mind he wonders if in modern Greece he will come upon traces of Odysseus, the ancient hero. (It is nearly time to go.) (L. Durrell, The Greek Islands.)

Durrell warns the traveler against matching the mythological and classical imagination with the sites he is going to visit, a particularly dangerous attitude when it comes to the Greek world. We suggest the traveler who is following this itinerary should not make this naive mistake and we embrace Durrell’s warning:

A fondness for mythology and folklore is perhaps a handicap when one visit classical sites. It is unwise to spend too much time contrasting the present with the past, since leads inevitably to dissatisfaction with the present for not being romantic enough. (L. Durrell, The Greek Islands.)

The writer is accompanying us with his words also on the ferry which is ready to set sail when the night comes.

The crossing lasts one night and at dawn, when he awakes, the traveler will have nearly arrived. Durrell seems to follow the ship journey with his words, over the nautical miles, and we can see the Greek land before our eyes, as in a short film: Corfu island is hunched up to the right of the vessel and the Albanian mountains seem painted in by the sun as it struggles to rise behind them.

The ferry simply forges straight ahead, apparently going to crash into the range of golden mountains before the islands. Gradually we can make out the main channel and the Old Venetian Fortress with its ramparts on the sea.

Now the ship turns abruptly and heads south, leaving Albania on its left. The view is dominated by a big domed mountain called Pantokrator: the traveler who decides to climb to the top may stare out upon the two seas, the Adriatic and the Ionian Seas, on which Corfu and the near islets stand.

In the writer’s eyes, there is an immediate connection between the dawn that tinges both the sea and the islands with its soft light and the Homeric description of Eos, the rosy-fingered goddess of the dawn, who precedes the morning and Apollo’s arrival on her chariot.

Guido Reni, Aurora, Casino Pallavicini, Rome –public domain-

As he docks, the traveler cannot help admiring the beauty of the town. “È avvertito – as Durrell explains – non ne troverà di più carine in Grecia e col passare del tempo ciò diventerà sempre più evidente”.

In Corfu, the arrival of ferries coming from Brindisi usually takes place early in the morning, when the elegant old town cafés are already open and ready to serve breakfast, the first breakfast of our itinerary with the poet, who writes:

The old town is set down gracefully upon the wide tree-lined esplanade, whose arcades are of French provenance and were intended (they do) to echo the Rue de Rivoli.

The best cafés are here and the friendliest waiters in all Christendom. (L. Durrell, The Greek Islands)

The traveler is now along the Liston, the long colonnaded street built by the French to imitate Rue de Rivoli in Paris upon the wide and lush Esplanade. In this square, people could once watch the unexpected show of cricket matches, one of the most popular sports in Corfu, still practised, which was introduced on the island by the English. Durrell explains:

There is no place in the world where English are more enjoyed and admired than on the island of Prospero.

As for what they left behind, the cricket comes upon one as rather a shock – the noble sweep of the main Esplanade with its all tall calm trees is suddenly transformed into an English cricket field […].

Under the charmed and astonished eye of the visitor a marquee is run up and two teams dressed in white take possession of the ground. […]

What is singular is the deep and pensive appreciation of the game in an audience very largely consisting of Greek peasants who have never had the chance to play it. They have presumably come in to town to shop from some nearby village, and now here they are, apparently deeply engrossed in this foreign game while their fidgeting mules are tied to trees on Esplanade.

(L. Durrell, The Greek Islands.)

Let’s leave the Esplanade and have a long walk across the narrow old town streets, which open just behind this elegant square. The writer may guide us in discovering them:

The tall, spare Venetian houses with their eloquent mouldings have been left unpainted for centuries, so it seems. Ancient coats of paint and whitewash have been blotched and blurred by successive winters, until now the overall result is a glorious wash-drawing thrown down upon a wet paper – everything running and fusing and exploding. But more precise, though just as eloquent, are the streets between the houses, each a deep gully made brilliant with washing hung out to dry from every balcony – bright as bunting. The great spread of colour moves and sways in the light dawn breeze in a way that reminds one of tropical seaweed. The red dome of the Church of St Spridion shines aloft with its scarred old clock face; the church which houses the mummy of the island’s patron saint. If he knows what is good for him, the traveller will make an indispensable pilgrimage to this dark fane, whose barbaric oriental decoration smoulders among the shadows like the glintings of a fire opal. He will kiss the sacred slipper or a suitable icon and light a candle to place in the tall sconce as he utters a prayer – the subject of which he will confide to nobody. In this way his journey will be under good auspices and the whole of Byzantine, modern and ancient Greece will be waiting with open arms. (L. Durrell, The Greek Islands)

Hence, we suggest the traveler visit Saint Spyridon Church, a popular pilgrimage destination all over the Orthodox world. The saint is so important to the Corfiots that he almost identifies with the island. With his irony, Lawrence Durrell dwells on the Saint’s story and the forms of devotion to Spyridon that enliven Corfu life at least four times a year:

What about the history of the island saint? His enormous prestige and influence in the island to this day would justify discussing him here. The relic – and he is a real mummy, a funny little old man like Father Christmas – lies in a chased silver casket in the church of his name which was built in 1589. […] Whoever has seen St Spiridion make a progress round the town is not likely to forget the pomp and magnificence of the strange and baroque procession – the monks and priests like a moving flower-bed with their brilliant gonfalons raised on high. The little figure of the saint lies sideways in his sedan chair, pale and withdrawn, as if in prayer. There are four such processions a year; they take place on Palm Sunday and Easter Saturday, on 11 August and on the first Sunday in November. Naturally the summer appearances benefit from the light – that of August being most sumptuous and colorful.

[…] For a long time Spiridion had not done very much except make routine cures for epilepsy or religious doubts. […] this same old saint had once dispersed fleets, riding upon the afternoon mistral to do so, and even repulsed the plague more than once […] (L. Durrell, The Greek Islands)

When the traveler comes out of Saint Spyridon Church, whose inner darkness is lit up only by the faithful’s votive lamps and faint candle flames that are reflected in the ceiling and sumptuous liturgical ornament golden stuccoes, he is suddenly enveloped in the warm midday light. It is now that the visitor – our guide points out – may catch the magic of Greek light. He writes as follows:

Coming out of the dark church in to the market he will be almost blinded by the light, for the sun is up; and it is now that impact of this extraordinary phenomenon will begin to intrigue him. The nagging question, ‘In what way does Greece differ from Italy and Spain?’ will answer itself. The light! One hears the word everywhere ‘To Phos’ […].

This confers a sort of brilliant skin of white light on material objects, linking near and far, and bathing simple objects in a sort of celestial glow-worm hue. It is the naked eyeball of God, so to speak, and it blinds one. […].

Each cypress is the only one in existence. Each boat, house, donkey, is prime – a Platonic prototype of a sudden invention;

(L. Durrell, The Greek Islands)

Our guide – Lawrence Durrell – warns the traveler that, at the end of his first day in Corfu, he could be tempted to extend his stay, as many other travelers did. In tavernas or cafés you may frequently hear stories of people who came to spend just a pleasant afternoon or some days on the island and then decided to stay and live there. One of these is the writer who is guiding us to discover the island of Odysseus or old Prospero – as other scholars say –, the main character of William Shakespeare’s The Tempest.

Indeed Corfu, besides being identified, rightly or wrongly, with the Homeric island of the Phaeacians for ages, was also associated with the magic setting of the Shakespearian play. Durrell narrates:

Another, not less speculative, line of mad reasoning has suggested that Corfu is the site which (perhaps by mere hearsay) Shakespeare chose for his last play The Tempest. You may groan as you read this. Is it not enough to have one’s brain criss-crossed and fuddled with the attributes of Greece’s great ace-personality? Must the British shove their alchemical Prospero into the island? […]

One of the magical things in The Tempest is the way the atmosphere of the island is experienced and conveyed by shipwrecked souls when they come ashore. The sleep – the enormous spell of sleep which the land casts upon them. They become dreamers, and somnambulists, a prey to visions and to loves quite outside the ordinary boundaries of their narrow Milanese lives. […]

You will realize that this is exactly what happened to the conquerors who landed here – they fell asleep. The French started to build the Rue de Rivoli but fell asleep before it was finished. The British, who had almost a hundred-year lease on the place, decided that it need a seat of Government and built a most elegant one with imported Malta stone, […]. But they fell asleep and the island slipped from their nerveless fingers into the freedom it had always desired. Freedom to dream. (L. Durrell, The Greek Islands)

The beautiful palace mentioned by Durrell, which the British built as the residence of the Governor is Villa Mon Repos near the old port. Surrounded with a lush garden, among lanes and tree-lined paths, there are the ancient ruins of some shrines dedicated to the Olympians; its interior hosts a museum that exhibits the finds coming from the old area of Paléopolis.

Moving to Via Vraila 1, in the center of Kerkyra, we can reach the Archaeological Museum of Corfu, which remained closed for many years and has been recently reopened to the public. It exhibits the pediment of an archaic temple, probably dedicated to Artemis. This impressive find depicts the terrible image of a Gorgon, almost certainly Medusa.

Corfu, Archaeological Museum, pediment of a Doric temple, a detail of Medusa (author: Di Dr.K. – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=16832867)

Durrell tells us the story of this fascinating mythological character:

For she, the mother of the Gorgons, was obviously the warden to the chthonic Greek world just as St Spiridion was the warden of the Byzantine world and the modern. The Medusa, more than life-size, is something which profoundly hushes the mind and heart of the observer who is not insensitive to myth embodied in sculpture. The insane grin, the bulging eyes, the hissing ringlets of snake-like hair, the spatulate tongue stuck out as far as it will go – no wonder she turned men to stone if they dared to gaze on her! She has a strange history, which is not made easier to understand by the fact that several versions of it exist. It is somehow appropriate that in her story we should come upon the name of Perseus, who performed a ritual murder on her, shearing off her head with a scimitar provided by Hermes. It was, in fact, a murder performed with full complicity of the Olympians; the equipment for such a dangerous task (one glance and he would have been marmorealized) consisted of a helmet of invisibility (courtesy of Hades), winged sandals for speed (the Graiae daughters) and a sack for the severed head […]

[…] There are other good things in the little museum but nothing which has such strong vibration; Medusa is indeed the second warden of Corfu, and her existence provides an insight into the nature of the ancient Greek world which one continues to encounter as one journeys among the islands. (L. Durrell, The Greek Islands)

Let’s leave the enigmatic Medusa warding Corfu town off and continue our itinerary in the surrounding villages along the indented coastlines of the island and its uplands.

Moving from the east coast to the west coast, about thirty kilometers from Corfu town, the site of Palaiokastritsa is worth visiting: here, according to one of the Homeric legends, Odysseus met the beautiful Nausicaa.

Several places in Corfu contend for this first encounter, including the evocative Kanoni bay, on the east side.

Neither the beautiful princess nor Alcinous were able to hold the hero on the island, despite enticement and a marriage proposal, hence Odyssesus decided to leave for his homeland Ithaca by the fast ship he received as a gift. Also the traveler, although Corfu beauties invite him to stay longer, should now set off and continue his itinerary in the other Ionian Islands.

Following our guide’s suggestions, by a pair of binoculars we may fully enjoy the sea scenery met when sailing north towards Lefkada. Along this route, we come across the two small islands Paxos and Antipaxos.

Lefkas cliffs (author: almekri01 is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

The sea the traveler is sailing is rich in stories, and he may have already crossed it with his imagination or reading a school book in the past. Durrell writes:

Even now, standing at the rail, you can turn your eyes on the far lagoons where the Battle of Actium was fought, and see herons flapping about, or the white star of a rising pelican, or the shape of a family of golden eagles moving in slow gyres on the blue. On the other side of you there are two islands of little note – Paxos and Antipaxos. […] The only other interesting piece of history concerning this tiny spot is probably fiction – though it is pleasant to think it might have been true. Antony e Cleopatra are said to have had a dinner party here on the eve of Actium – where so many of their hopes were destroyed. (L. Durrell, The Greek Islands)

This stretch of the Ionian Sea not only is linked to myth and history, but is also a gem of biodiversity where you may admire some rare marine species as the hawksbill turtle and the monk seal. Now it is a rarer event due to pollution, but the writer had the chance to see it.

It is in this channel that I have seen, on more than one occasion, the huge plate-like form of the hawksbill turtle spinning languidly about in the wake of the vessel. It can reach a metre in length, this strange animal, and is astonishingly agile in the water. It is only one variety of sea-creatures which you may be lucky enough to glimpse as the boat furrows its path on down towards the Lefkas Channel […]

One should recall another not infrequent visitor to these caves and quarries among the deserted islands; it was once quite a usual sight, but has now become increasingly rarer. The little monk seal – a brownish mammal (monachus monachus) whose fur is not particularly fine but which has, or had, a delightfully unconstrained manner, presumably because it always found secret coves to breed in and to fish from […]. (L. Durrell, The Greek Islands)

Let’s finally stop over in the “piccola triste isola di Lefkada (o Santa Maura)” as Durrell calls it. The island, which is actually linked to the mainland by means of a raised road, was a real peninsula in the past. Today it is famous for its unspoilt beaches and as one of the hikers’ favourite destinations. The writer warns that “the visitor who really wants to explore it must be prepared for long and stony trudges and longish, bumpy drives”.

In addition to its natural beauties, in the classical and Romantic imagination, Lefkada is famous for its white cliffs – depicted by painters and poets –, from which the poetess Sappho decided to fall into the sea to end her tormented love for Phaon.

With his British irony, Durrell tells the traveler the story of the unhappy poetess; hence he writes:

Whatever the limitations of Lefkas, it has one feature which commands the attention of the world – the White Cliffs from which the poetess Sappho made her ill-fated leap into eternity. Was it an accident or intent? […] Confused legends suggest that the ancients believed that one could leap straight down into Underworld from here – or at least link up with the River of the Dead, the Acheron. Other traditions say that one could cure oneself of the pangs of disprized love by making the leap, and that this is what Sappho had in mind. […]

As far as Sappho is concerned, it seems that something went wrong. For in the time of Cicero and Strabo the jump was often, and quite safely, accomplished. The priests of Apollo performed it regularly without hurting themselves, and boats were organized to recuperate jumpers. Sometimes plumes and wings were attached to the shoulders of those who chose to leap. The jump itself was called Katapontismos, and one wonders if it did not have some ancient propitiatory function. (L. Durrell, The Greek Islands)

The traveler, if quite physically fit and strong, may follow the path that winds steeply up to Cape Lefkas lighthouse, where a temple of Apollo rose and Sappho’s white cliffs stand. Although they are less typical than the cliffs of Dover, no famous people have never thought of jumping over them and into the English Channel – the British writer recalls.

Our itinerary proceeds towards Ithaca and Cephalonia, as Durell recommends us. Nydri, which was a picturesque fishing village once – today it looks more like a tourist bazaar – is the starting point for boat trips which, before reaching the main islands, stop over on the less known islets of the archipelago that stud the sea journey.

In Ithaca the traveler may discover the most Homeric island of the Ionian group, guided by Durrell’s words. He writes:

Ithaca, which reverberates with the Homeric legend, is a delightfully bare and bony little place, with knobbly hills, covered in holm-oak, which come smoothly down into the sea, into deep water which is rich in fish. […] The entry into Vathy harbour will set the atmosphere for a first visit – it is most remarkable as well as beautiful. The bare stone sinus curves round and round – it is like travelling down the canals of the inner ear of a giant. One is sized with a sense of vertigo. […]

The harbour of Vathy is obviously the old Phorkys, where the Phaeacians deposited Odysseus on his return home […] (L. Durrell, The Greek Islands)

The traveler who wants to enter the island mythological dimension should make some ‘Homeric’ excursions Durrell suggests: he may search for the real or presumed fountain of Arethusa, and then go into the beautiful grotto of Nymphs, not far from Dexa beach, where Odysseus is said to have hidden the treasures the Phaeacians had given him, or finally reach Mount Aetos. Here, the famous archaeologist Schliemann, who was able to discover the site of Troy holding The Iliad in his hands, claimed to have also found the ruins of Odysseus’ palace.

The writer points out:

The Homeric sites are not all a hundred-per-cent satisfactory from the point of view of identification; but, without being too indulgent or too gullible, one can certainly believe in the fountain of Arethusa […]. One can also combine a bit of home-made piracy with piety and scrabble about in the grotto of Nymphs, in the hope of finding something left over from the treasure Odysseus buried there under the direction of Athena. (L. Durrell, The Greek Islands)

The fountain of Arethusa is a natural spring, about ten kilometers from Vathy, where according to legend Eumaeus, Odysseus’ swineheard, took his pigs to drink and met the hero just landed on the island. However, in Durrell’s view, the most “vexing” problem is to identify the site of the town and the palace of Odysseus. Real or presumed archaeologists are divided on the different hypotheses.

In the northern part of the island, near the small village of Stavros, on Pelikata Hill, among hills covered in olive groves and vines, there are a small archaeological museum and the ruins of a palace with Cyclopean walls. Today, thanks to recent archaeological excavations, it has been identified as the possible palace of Odysseus, which the archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann had previously located near Alalkomenés, close to Mount Aetos.

To the north of Stavros, about a half-hour walk, there are the remains of a sixth-century BC tower, called Homer’s schoolhouse.

Durrell writes ironically:

The less said the better about the site which popular local folklore describes as being the ancient schoolhouse where Homer learned his alphabet…though the view is pleasant enough. This time it is the village folklorists who are being tedious. And yet, so vexing is this whole business that one would not be surprised one day to find out that the obstinate village tradition has a glimpse of truth in it. (L. Durrell, The Greek Islands)

Let’s leave the scholars with their doubts about the Homeric sites and enjoy the view from Ithaca gentle hills.

After a last walk in the pretty town of Vathy, unfortunately seriously damaged by the 1953 earthquake, the traveler may get ready for the next stop of the itinerary: Cephalonia.

Among the many beautiful beaches of the island, Myrtos is worth mentioning, a very long and white expanse of sand, located about ten kilometers from the main isthmus of Cephalonia. Only one scenic route that starts from the center of Divarata leads to this heavenly place.

Unfortunately, there is little left of the historic centers of its towns or of the Venetian buildings that once characterized the island. They were destroyed by the 1953 earthquake. Due to this disaster, which regularly strikes the Greek islands, Cephalonia seems to lack a heart, a “centre of gravity” – Lawrence Durrell points out.

Nevertheless, following the writer’s suggestions, we invite the traveler to get to Assos, a picturesque village on the north-east coast of the island, uniquely located close to a cypress hill and a promontory still dominated by a 16^th-century Venetian fortress.

Another site that is worth visiting is the Melissani Cave, forgotten over the centuries. According to myth, the Nymph Melissani committed suicide due to her unrequited love for the god Pan. Besides mythology, this cave is particularly evocative, since it hosts a sparkling lagoon.

In Cephalonia, the traveler may make several excursions on the lush inland mountains, dotted with vineyards that produce the fine wine the island is known for.

After tasting a glass of Robola, one of the best wines in the area, we may reach the last stop of our itinerary: Zakynthos. The island, described by Ugo Foscolo and Dionysios Solomos, is surrounded by the sea from which Venus, the goddess of beauty and love, was born according to one of the main versions of myth.

Zakynthos offers the traveler an amazing scenery characterized by white cliffs rising straight from crystal-clear waters.

Let’s gain a better understanding of the island, guided by Lawrence Durrell:

Subject to wind and weather, the traveller comes at Zante (Zacynthos), the younger sister of Corfu. Zante, in the past, enjoyed a reputation for even greater natural beauties than Corfu and for the splendours of her Venetian architecture which, despite the frequent earthquake tremors, manage to keep a homogeneousness of style that made the capital one of the most splendid of the smaller towns in the Mediterranean. Only in Italy itself could one find this sort of baroque style, fruit of the seventeenth-and eighteenth-century mind. Then, in 1953, came the definitive earthquake which engulfed the whole of the Venetian past and left the shattered town to struggle to its knees once more. This it has done, in a manner of speaking; but it is like a beautiful woman whose face has been splashed with vitriol. Here and there, an arch, a pendent, a shattered remains of arcade, is all that is left of her renowned beauty. The modern town is… well, a modern town.

Zakynthos town, despite losing its old appearance, of which only fragments and the remains of a Venetian fortress are left, was almost entirely rebuilt in an elegant and vaguely Neoclassical style that gives it a very romantic air.

The patron saint of the island is Saint Dionysios, whose relics are worshipped in the capital’s cathedral. The original church was destroyed during one of the frequent earthquakes that stroke Zakynthos. The new building, erected in the middle of the twentieth century close to the ferry port, has lost its old charm externally, but keeps valuable artworks and various holy icons inside.

Lawrence Durrell narrates that the Saint, in popular devotion, seems to compete with the patron saint of Corfu, Saint Spyridon, on miracles.

He writes:

The patron saint of Zante is St Dionysios – anything Spiridion can do for Corfu, he can do better for Zante. He should be visited and candle-primed with respect – one should not play about with the spring weather in the Ionian. […]. By reputation he occupies himself to the exclusion of other preoccupations with fishermen of the island, and every year he is presented with a pair of new shoes on his feast days. (L. Durrell, The Greek Islands)

After leaving also this Saint, we should say farewell to the traveler come to Zakynthos following the itinerary conceived and written by Lawrence Durrell. The author’s intimate and deep knowledge of these islands that he chose as his homeland for many years clearly emerges from his words. Hence, we would like to share the writer’s hope and imagine the traveler holding a book in his hands – maybe Durrell’s book on the Ionian Islands – years after he returned home:

“Years later, in the pages of a book, the traveller will find a grain sand from this spot, and perhaps a pressed flower or leaf to remind him of something he has never forgotten”.

Eminent Author Reports

Bari, Polignano, Taranto, Gravina, Massafra, Alberobello, and Martina Franca

The itinerary “eminent author reports” winds its way through some of the most beautiful Apulian sites, which can be discovered by the traveler through the words and texts by great twentieth-century writers, poets, and documentary film directors. Documentaries and eminent author reports will accompany the reader or tourist across the towns in the land of Bari and Taranto, with reference to a period when the region was not known to the general public as a tourist destination yet and few people knew the secrets of its beauty and history. It is sometimes a journey back in time, made to explore those Apulian country areas where peasants and day laborers lived in conditions of severe poverty up to fifty years ago, and hamlets and villages where totally left out of modernization and economic growth.

Important authors as Tommaso Fiore, Raffaele Carrieri, Alfonso Gatto, Mario Praz, and Folco Quilici documented these realities, describing them in pictures and words that represent the itinerary common thread. The route we propose is thus a journey across places and time to get a deep insight into Puglia and will not prove anachronistic by virtue of the link with contemporary times provided by the texts by Alessandro Leogrande: native of Taranto, the prematurely dead intellectual may be considered the true heir of the great investigative writers on Southern Italy problems thanks to his books on Taranto.

In the 1960s, Italian Esso assigned the documentary film director Folco Quilici the task of making a series of documentary films on the Italian regions by helicopter. This successful project – L’Italia vista dal cielo – gave birth to various volumes, each on a certain region, written in collaboration with important Italian authors and scholars.

In 1974 the documentary film on Puglia was made, and its text was written by the Anglicist and literature and art critic Mario Praz; in the same year, a book called Puglia was published: it was signed by Praz, who wrote the introduction, and Quilici, who wrote the texts that gave a commentary on photographs. Hence, we may ideally get on their helicopter and start our itinerary, which will stop off in Bari, Polignano, Taranto, Massafra, Gravina, Alberobello, and Martina Franca, hoping that Puglia may become a fascinating discovery as it happened to Folco Quilici. After his flights over the region, he wrote:

La Puglia è stata, per me, un momento di scoperta […] appena s’entrava in Puglia e s’andava verso Taranto le strade si tendevano, a sottolineare la profondità d’una pianura di cui anche se si vola alti non si riusciva ad intravedere la fine, se non sull’alto del mare, scintillante limite a tutti i nostri spostamenti. Campi, campagne, strade e sentieri, elementi d’un mondo reale, punti di riferimento preciso, concreto, abitudinario. (F. Quilici, Puglia)

The charm of the region, now an appreciated tourist destination, was discovered quite late and the first to make its beauties known and dispel prejudices and fallacies were foreign travelers, as Praz recalls.

[…] il primo a capire la magia della regione fu […] un giornalista tedesco, Paul Schubring, che sulla «Frankfurter Zeitung» del 1908 pubblicò una serie di articoli in cui offrì la chiave del segreto con queste memorabili frasi: «Si crede generalmente che la Puglia sia un deserto monotono, un paese privo d’attrattive speciali e proprie della terra italiana. Ma chi crede a questo cartello, non mangia vitello. […] L’immenso piano della campagna, leggermente ondulato, il mare così maestoso, il cielo così infinito e sereno costituiscono una trinità grandiosa e singolare» […] La Puglia per l’uomo di poca fantasia è una piatta e monotona pianura, e a lui pare, ignaro dell’etimologia, che la parola Tavoliere rispecchi esattamente la cosa (e deriva invece dalle tabulae censuariae ossia il libro dove erano registrati i terreni posseduti dal fisco in quei territori che i re aragonesi destinarono prevalentemente al pascolo. (M. Praz, Puglia)

An attentive traveler will easily realize that the best word to describe the region, its ancient history and art and historical growth is ‘amazing’, as Folco Quilici and Mario Praz observed in the 1970s – and earlier Cesare Brandi. Praz wrote:

Invero che c’è di più sorprendente dell’associazione della Puglia con le Crociate, dell’insediamento in Puglia d’un imperatore germanico che sognava la restaurazione dell’impero Romano, della creazione d’uno stile decorativo «sui generis» che si designa come barocco pugliese? E sorprendente ancora che sui campi di Puglia, a Canne, parve per un momento decidersi la sorte della potenza romana. […] si può talora dubitare se la regione che è sotto di noi sia proprio italiana, perché non richiamano queste distese di ulivi la Tunisia?

E a quale terra lontana appartiene questa steppa? E queste bianche ripe o «falaises», non fanno pensare alle bianche ripe di Dover? E le fungaie di trulli: non abbiamo visto simili abitazioni in Cappadocia? Alvei di torrenti, le «lame» dalle pareti verticali in cui sono scavate grotte trogloditiche: non è questo il paesaggio che i pittori primitivi, come Starnina, immaginavano fosse la tebaide degli eremiti? […] Questa laguna (vicino a Taranto) ha la luce degli atolli del Pacifico. (M. Praz, Puglia)

The various Apulian landscapes and historical periods – from antiquity to the Byzantine, crusade and Swabian Middle Ages, pass before the traveler’s eyes through the words of Quilici and Praz, introducing and anticipating what may be discovered along this route.

Before landing in Bari, the first stop of our itinerary, the traveler may admire the Medieval historic centers of the coastal towns, each with its own white and beautiful Romanesque cathedral that is reflected in the sea.

Mario Praz tells their stories:

Si risvegliavano nel fervore dei traffici le città marittime, si consolidavano le istituzioni comunali, e una rivolta, capeggiata da Melo da Bari (1009-12) contro i catapani bizantini provocò in suo aiuto l’intervento dei Normanni, che in pochi decenni s’impadronirono di tutta l’Italia Meridionale. Gli ambiziosi disegni dei sovrani normanni […] e quel generale movimento dei popoli europei sulle vie del Levante che furono le crociate, riportarono la Puglia a una prosperità quale aveva conosciuto ai tempi della Magna Grecia; e sorsero a partire dal secolo undicesimo le grandi cattedrali, quella di Troia con la grandiosa porta di bronzo di Oderisio da Benevento, la basica di San Nicola di Bari, circondata da quattro cortili un tempo limitati da muri e torri, la cattedrale di Trani, la cattedrale di Bitonto, la più matura espressione del romanico pugliese, la cattedrale di Siponto, il Duomo Vecchio di Molfetta che specchia nel mare le sue cupole simili a tende tartariche; a cui seguirono, anch’essa sulla riva del mare, la cattedrale di Giovinazzo, purtroppo manomessa, e quella di Altamura. (M. Praz, Puglia)

Arrived in Bari, we may visit the cathedral dedicated to Saint Sabinus at the heart of the old town.

Praz wrote:

[…] l’importante monumento è il perno attorno al quale ruota la capitale della regione, qui l’intraprendenza, il carattere vivacissimo della città è trasparente […]. All’opposto dei suoi quartieri storici, la città nuova presenta, […], un piano tipico dell’urbanistica del razionalismo, iniziato per decreto di Murat. (M. Praz, Puglia)

Bari old town, whose plan recalls the Mediterranean East, seems a maze of alleys and houses, close to each other, contained within the two architectural and symbolic poles of the Medieval town: the castle and the Basilica di San Nicola (Basilica of Saint Nicholas). Between the two poles, a story covering nearly three thousand years unfolds, made up of mosaics, churches, niches, confraternities, noble palaces, arches and courtyards that suddenly open behind corners which could seem blind to the traveler.

A second town, known as centro murattiano (Murat district) – to which Mario Praz refers above – is juxtaposed to this old town, “Bari Vecchia”.

There is no real boundary: the two towns met once the medieval walls were demolished, but never merged or blended. One single broad street – Corso Vittorio Emanuele – divides these two urban settlements; crossing it, we leave the quasba and the Middle Ages behind and walk into the Murat district, characterized by elegant nineteenth-century plans. This second town is a simple parallelepiped, within which all streets are arranged in a grid plan. The sea is in the north and marks the city border, hence walking along the center, it seems that all streets stretch out and disappear along the horizon, where the blue Adriatic Sea meets the sky.

The town, with such clearly different souls – the ancient soul of the historic center and the modern one of the Murat district – is united in the intense devotion to the patron saint who came from the sea: Saint Nicholas. Not the cathedral but rather one of the most beautiful Romanesque basilicas in southern Italy, the Basilica of Saint Nicholas, is dedicated to him.

Inside this monument, a famous place of pilgrimage since the Middle Ages, the saint’s relics are kept, worshipped both by the Catholics and Orthodox Christians; a miraculous healing liquid, called manna, is said to exude from his relics, smuggled in 1087 in Myra by a group of sailors from Bari.

Mario Praz, in his introduction to the book on Puglia written with Folco Quilici, tells how Saint Nicholas preserves, in all respects, a special relationship with the Adriatic Sea, to which every year Apulian fishermen offer an ampulla containing the holy manna, as a sort of nuptial fecundation. He writes:

Oggi il ruolo taumaturgico del santo sembra essere passato in sottordine, e quasi divenuto un pretesto per uno degli spettacoli pirotecnici di cui van pazze le moltitudini meridionali, pericoloso scialo d’un paese povero, che fa pensare alla «porzione maledetta» che certe tribù d’indiani del Nord America sacrificavano ogni anno per malintesa munificenza. Tra il saettare di centinaia di bengala in pieno giorno la statua d’argento di San Nicola, circondata di mazzi di fiori bianchi, garofani e calle, montati su lunghe aste pure d’argento, va in mare, mentre il vescovo che apre la processione di barche gitta in mare un’ampolla con la manna di san Nicola. Questa fecondazione nuziale a beneficio degl’industriosi abitanti di Bari è ancora più trasparente, da un punto di vista freudiano, dello sposalizio di Venezia col mare simboleggiato nell’anello che il Doge gittava dal Bucintoro nell’Adriatico. La cerimonia di Bari è accompagnata dall’urlo lacerante delle sirene delle imbarcazioni raccolte intorno al motopeschereccio che reca la statua del santo: trasparente e strepitosa allusione, anche questa, a quell’orgasmo a cui si potrebbero applicare certe parole di d’Annunzio: «urlò come se in lui si compiesse lo strappo atrocissimo», e: «Di lontano, di lontano veniva quel torbido ardore, dalle più remote origini, dalle primitive bestialità delle mescolanze subitanee, dall’antico mistero delle libidini sacre». (M. Praz, Puglia)

We suggest the traveler visit, during his stay in Bari, the beautiful basilica, which documents the very close relationship between the town and the Adriatic Sea. Built close to the sea, which often flooded its spaces, became the ‘sacred’ landmark for all travelers who left from or landed on these shores. Also Luigi Fallacara, an Italian poet and writer from Bari, close to Florence avant-garde movement, highlighted this characteristic:

[…] oggi, ove una vita febbrile tende a trasformare tutto in città di pietre e di verde, ove il mare s’allontana sempre più, respinto dai palazzi e dalle gettate, ancora il calore e la vibrazione dell’aria indicano un mare che non si vede, si sente.

Ma la basilica di san Nicola leva sempre la sua bianchezza triangolare, come una vela latina, sulle umili case della città vecchia, e nella sua cripta, l’altare d’argento che custodisce le ossa del Santo ha verdezze e cilestri di onda marina. Le colonne antiche sono corrose, come fossero piantate nel fondo del mare e sembra che tutte, come quella miracolosa che è difesa dalla cancellata di ferro, siano state divelte da misteriosi templi subacquei e rotolate dalla tempesta, per alzare questa grotta ove il mormorio della preghiera sussulta, simile a un flutto veemente. (L. Fallacara, Il paese nato dal mare)

The itinerary may proceed southwards: along this route we are going to meet many hilly or coastal towns that seem white, made shinier by the sunlight. Let’s stop off in Polignano.

We suggest the traveler spend some days in this renowned tourist and seaside destination, which overlooks the sea and is located on a deep ravine dotted with Indian figs, not only to enjoy its crystal-clear waters, but also to get lost in the white alleys of the old town, also known as the birthplace of the singer Domenico Modugno. The Apulian town, not only in summer, but all over the year, is animated by a lively cultural life centered around the initiatives promoted by the Pino Pascali Museum of Contemporary Art and a rich event program organized in the Medieval hamlet. Also Quilici’s helicopter flew over Polignano and he immediately caught the features that still make it a unique town. He wrote:

However, we do not need to fly over the town by helicopter, as Folco Quilici did, to appreciate its charm and identify its features: the Adriatic town does not disappoint the traveler when reached by train.

Fallacara wrote:

A Polignano, l’ora è soltanto mattutina. Arrivati ai Pizziglioni, scoglio alto sul mare, compatto e frastagliato alla superficie da buche circolari, da rilievi aspri e duri come coltelli, di calcare giallastro, sembra di camminare sulla luna. […] Il mare è glauco e lontano, la brezza vi posa su un velo cinereo che l’appanna. Ogni suono è attutito, ogni aspetto vivente appare inconcepibile, […]. Ma, scendendo la buia scalinata della grotta Palazzese, la potenza del mare v’investe. Vi appare dapprima ai piedi della scala, azzurro, profondo, freschissimo. E quando vi si scopre la roccia alzata delle grotte sovrapposte, sentite di essere in presenza d’un mistero marino che vi si svela. […] Parlare di bellezza qui è vano; la bellezza rapisce un sol senso. Qui bisogna parlare di immersione nell’elemento, di qualcosa che investe tutto l’essere e lo getta, con un balzo repentino, aldilà dalla storia degli uomini e dei tempi. Vi sentite affacciati ai primordi della terra, alle soglie dei mondi che tremarono di luce, dapprima, sotto le acque verdi, agli stupori degli esseri che videro, per la prima volta, emerse dai ciechi fondi marini, le scogliere curvarsi aeree, dentro l’azzurro dei cieli. (L. Fallacara, Polignano)

Let’s leave the spectacular town of Polignano to head for the next stop of this itinerary: Taranto. To reach it, we suggest not entering the highway, but opting for the secondary roads that cross the inland area of the region southwards, so that the traveler may discover a part of Puglia which was outside any tourist routes until a few decades ago and has been rediscovered recently in all its beauty: the Murgia.

Tommaso Fiore, native of Altamura, one of the main twentieth-century Apulian intellectuals and writers, devoted to Apulian countries some of his remarkable works, including Un popolo di formiche. It is the account of a journey from the Tavoliere to the Murgia: a journey across the sites and history of southern peasants. It is an epistolary report, consisting of the Lettere pugliesi he wrote in 1925 and sent to the magazines Rivoluzione liberale by Gobetti and Coscientia. He creates nearly a new literary genre – between the essay, the report, and the story – to describe the neglected South, discovering a world “serrato nel dolore e negli usi, senza conforto, senza dolcezza”, as Carlo Levi will point out. In the book, published in 1952, Fiore, our guide in this part of the itinerary, wrote:

[…] Non occorre dirti che c’è anche una Puglia non letteraria, non retorica, del tutto ignorata, desolata, tetra, respingente, disperata, da tutti per calcolo e per viltà trascurata, quella della Murgia di nord-ovest e dei suoi anche più rozzi contadini. […] Se scendi da Bari per la Bari-Taranto, prendendo la Gioia-Rocchetta, puoi percorrere tutta questa zona dalla Sella di Gioia, […] sino alla Sella di Minervino. Per tutta la sua larghezza di una cinquantina di chilometri s’innalza a terrazze sempre più elevate sino ad un massimo di 686 metri, con isoipse parallele al mare, talché chi ascende questa gradinata per la Bari-Taranto o la Bari-Altamura, può, nei vari punti cui raggiunge la linea di displuvio, godere il doppio spettacolo dei due versanti, di quello dell’Adriatico, intensamente alberato di ulivi e mandorli, con in fondo le forti tinte azzurrine e viola del mare e qua e là gl’innumerevoli borghi distesi come strisce bianche, e quello poi della brulla solitudine murgiana. […] Il paesaggio, nella sua desolata sconfinatezza, nella sua assenza di linee forti, suggestiona ed invita l’occhio a frugare con uno struggimento di morte. […] Ma dall’orizzonte, invano spiato, ci richiamano qualche lembo di strada e le innumerevoli indicazioni dei solchi, dei muretti di pietra a divisione dei poderi, che s’innalzano, si arrampicano, discendono su per le Murge, dovunque s’intersecano e si arruffano come una capellatura. […] A primavera i terreni meno magri diventano enormi riquadri di verdi, fra cui arde qualche fiammata della senape in fiore, e il piano si raccende tutto del giallo di narcisi, del rosso di papaveri selvatici, del bianco di ombrelline. (T. Fiore, Un popolo di formiche)

In another letter included in his Lettere pugliesi and collected into Un popolo di formiche, Fiore describes one of the aspects of the Murgia landscape the traveler will surely notice: the dry stone walls, recently included in the UNESCO’s list of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. The dry stone walls, considered as one of the most harmonious expressions of the relationship between man and nature, arise mainly from the peasants’ labor: in order to till the land and make it more easily cultivable, they had to remove the abundant limestone layers and thus stacked stones without using any other material except dry soil.

These walls still decorate the Murgia countryside, nearly as white embroideries on dark soil.

Fiore proceeds:

Ora, dopo Putignano, sempre tra folta vegetazione, e dove si stende qualche straccio di vecchia boscaglia comitale di querce, spuntano trulli innumerevoli dal terreno, […] e dovunque muri e muretti, non dieci, non venti, ma più, molti di più, allineati sui fianchi di ogni rilievo, orizzontalmente, a distanza anche di pochi metri, per contenere il terreno, per raccoglierne e reggerne un po’ fra tanto calcare. Mi chiederai come ha fatto questa gente a scavare ed allineare tanta pietra. Io penso che la cosa avrebbe spaventato un popolo di giganti. Questa è la murgia più aspra e sassosa; per ridurla a coltivazione, facendo le terrazze, come mi dicono si sia fatto nel Genovesato, sulle colline di S. Giuliano fra Pisa e Lucca, sul lago di Garda, nelle cinque Terre oltre la Spezia e di qualche altro luogo, non ci voleva meno della laboriosità di un popolo di formiche. (T. Fiore, Un popolo di formiche)

Let’s leave the country that opened before our eyes along one of the provincial roads connecting Bari to Taranto and continue to ideally follow Folco Quilici’s helicopter course to enjoy, thanks to his words, an aerial view of the landscape where the Ionian capital rises. Quilici wrote:

[…] Sulla costa ionica, oltre Taranto ci apparvero – come se d’un tratto fossimo nel Pacifico del Sud – lagune e atolli delle Taumatu; non magia né allucinazione: ma reale sovrapposizione di due realtà geografiche, un esotismo subito smentito da quel mediterraneo vero, quasi da iconografia che s’affrettò a riapparire davanti ai nostri occhi quando – poco dopo – sorvolammo il vecchio quartiere dei pescatori di Taranto. (F. Quilici, Puglia)

Taranto stands on the innermost point of a spectacular gulf: a part of the urban area develops on the mainland, Taranto nuova; the oldest part – Taranto vecchia, with its typical fisherman district mentioned by Quilici – stands on a small island, which looks to the open sea, the Mare Grande, south-west, whereas is reflected in the natural inlet of an inner sea, called the Mar Piccolo, north-east. Here, the traveler may get lost in the old town, connoted by a confused Medieval plot of passageways and alleys in a Middle East style, and overlooked by a beautiful Renaissance castle, now home to the Italian Navy. This area, which was in a state of considerable decline up to a few years ago, is now trying to revive its lost and authentic beauty, not without difficulty. Such beauty allows us to go back in time to the age when the town was one of the most important centers in Magna Graecia. The traces of this glorious past survive and blend into Taranto streets and squares, where it is easy to find classical archaeological finds and ruins.

Raffaele Carrieri, a well-known writer, poet and art critic from Taranto, illustrated and documented the extremely singular way in which the town perceived, and still perceives to some extent, its relationship with antiquity. He spoke of that in the insert on Puglia, published in 1974 in the weekly Epoca, which had commissioned great authors and journalists to write a series of monographs on the Italian regions.

Carrieri wrote:

L’antichità dalle mie parti non può essere riassunta in un manuale di archeologia. I muratori che costruiscono le case trovano punti d’appoggio sui fusti delle colonne doriche che spuntano dal terreno. Nell’oratorio della chiesa della Trinità, a Taranto, su una colonna del tempio di Artemis, hanno costruito il castelletto delle campane. Con i pezzi di anfiteatro si sono alzati muri maestri, torri e torrioni, e anche un teatro dove cinquant’anni fa ho assistito a un’opera, “Nina pazza per amore” del concittadino Giovanni Paisiello. Quando ero ragazzo giocavo a nascondino nelle necropoli disseminate fra orti e giardini. C’erano gruppi di piccole tombe coi posti puliti: i greci si tenevano assieme nella morte scegliendo luoghi ameni e ventilati, il più vicino possibile alla costa, al mare. Mi sono sempre meravigliato della esiguità delle loro tombe, come se i pugliesi dei primi secoli fossero tutti fanciulli e fanciulle. Le suppellettili rintracciate nelle minuscole necropoli sono delicate anforette, lacrimatoi, lucerne, piccoli anelli e piccolissimi orecchini. E corone d’ulivo di una sottile e tremula foglia d’oro da mettere in testa nelle danze campestri. Quante volte mi sono riconosciuto fra le piccole Tanagre esposte nelle bacheche del Museo di Taranto. Non certo fra gli Dei barbuti e le ninfe con gli amorini a cavalcioni, e nemmeno fra satiri e fauni. Cercavo la mia origine fra le figurette minori: venditori di stoviglie, piccoli acrobati virtuosi del salto mortale e giocolieri imberbi, molto maliziosi sia nelle mani che negli occhi. (R. Carrieri, Puglia)

Not only is meeting antiquity an ordinary experience in Taranto, but the traveler may also enjoy wonderful views – particularly evocative at sunset – while walking along the beautiful town promenades. This aspect impresses Guido Piovene, a writer from Vicenza, who describes it as follows in the chapter of Viaggio in Italia (1957) on the Ionian town: “Taranto vive tra i riflessi, in un’atmosfera traslucida adatta a straordinari eventi di luce. La bellezza dei suoi tramonti è luogo comune”. (G. Piovene, Viaggio in Italia)

Also Mario Praz, a cultured Anglicist and art critic, did not remain indifferent to the sight of light that is reflected in the town seas. His words – unlike Piovene’s words – dated back to the period when Ilva, one of the major steel companies in Europe, had already opened in town. Hence, they are tinged with sadness, almost predicting the devastating effects of the chimney stacks, whose fumes would have soon engulfed the town and its inhabitants.

Praz wrote:

[…] Ed è un magico momento di luce su questo suo mare a ricordarci quei versi famosi dell’idillio di Andrea Chénier che cantano della giovane tarantina portata dalle onde del mare verso il sacrificio per essere uccisa da mostri divoranti. Traducendo la leggenda in termini contemporanei come non vedere quei versi concretizzarsi nella visione di uno sviluppo industriale che sembra veramente divorante.

Lasciamo la nuova Taranto alle sue industrie, orgoglio e problema della regione. Lasciamo l’antica Taranto ai suoi musei, ricordo delle sue origini di primo insediamento greco dell’Italia del Sud. (M. Praz, Puglia)

These lines, written in the 1970s, catch the two different and opposed sides of Taranto: on the one hand, there is the town of Ilva and workers’ suburbs, which has hastily grown around the industrial plant; on the other hand, there is the town connoted by huge archaeological heritage, abundantly emerged from Taranto subsoil and now kept and displayed in the new MArTA, one of the best archaeological museums in Italy, which may aim to become “il volano per la sua rinascita”, as Alessandro Leogrande hoped.

In this itinerary devoted to eminent author reports we will try to know better just these two aspects of the town, through Leogrande’s words, published in 2018 in the posthumous book on Taranto, Dalle Macerie. Cronache dal fronte meridionale, which collects the various articles and reports previously written by the author.

Leogrande wrote as follows:

Arrivando a Taranto in treno, lo sguardo è inevitabilmente portato a seguire il degradare del paesaggio verso il litorale. I campi coltivati a grano, a ulivo, a vite cedono lentamente il passo alla macchia mediterranea che accompagna le coste basse e sabbiose fino alla città: gli ultimi chilometri di ferrovia si dividono fra la monotonia irregolare degli arbusti bassi e verdi e la comparsa del mare, generalmente calmo. Poi, tutto a un tratto, ecco spuntare i primi segni della fabbrica: quell’impressionante ammasso di acciaio, cemento e fumo che devasta la terra su cui si erge. Ciminiera dopo ciminiera, cumolo di ghisa dopo cumolo di ghisa, deposito dopo deposito, la distesa sconfinata dell’Italsider occupa un territorio di quasi duemila ettari, una superficie, cioè, persino più estesa di quella occupata dall’intera città: un universo chiuso che negli anni, nei decenni, non ha accettato altro rapporto con il territorio circostante che non fosse quello di puro dominio. Così i dirigenti dell’Italsider hanno sempre pensato alla città di Taranto: come sudditanza da controllare, mera manodopera da impiegare in una produzione a ciclo continuo di cui interessano solo gli introiti e i favori che si riescono a garantire. In nome di questo è stato sacrificato tutto: l’ambiente, l’assetto urbanistico, le condizioni di vivibilità. Tutto è stato posposto in nome dell’industrialismo, in nome di un’ipotesi di sviluppo – non era che una delle ipotesi – elevata a dio infallibile e permaloso. (A. Leogrande, Dalle Macerie. Cronache sul fronte meridionale.)

This assumption, obstinately pursued, led to profound consequences in terms of health and environmental degradation, which Taranto is still dramatically suffering. Yet there was an alternative way forward, specified by Leogrande: cultural heritage and the promotion of the extremely rich history of the town.

Leogrande wrote:

Si dice da più parti che la cultura farà risorgere Taranto. Peccato però che – di fronte alla mancata soluzione del disastro industrial-ambientale dell’Ilva, alla crisi del porto, allo sfilacciamento del tessuto urbano – la cultura venga spesso citata a vanvera. Ridotta quasi a un piatto di lenticchie da cui prendere a piene mani, nella speranza di sostituire un’improbabile, nuova “monocultura” a quella precedente dell’acciaio. […] Un progetto culturale che superi il localismo potrà essere organizzato solo a partire da due poli: il rinnovamento del Museo archeologico Marta, quale polo di ricerca legato al resto della città e del paese, e il rapporto con Matera capitale della cultura europea nel 2019. […]

Camminare per le sale del Marta provoca una strana emozione. È come scoperchiare una botola e scoprire trenta secoli di Storia, tutti insieme, alle nostre spalle. […] è possibile scorgere il flusso del tempo, dai primi insediamenti di un popolo di artigiani presso lo Scoglio del Tonno fino alla mutazione della città nell’alto Medioevo, intorno all’anno Mille. Proprio in quest’ottica è possibile percepire almeno due cose. La città è stata per millenni attraversata dai molteplici flussi culturali, artistici, commerciali che hanno solcato il Mediterraneo da sponda a sponda. […] A lungo il Museo è rimasto un corpo estraneo un corpo estraneo rispetto alla città. Oggi può essere, accanto ad altre cose, il volano per la sua rinascita. Prima ancora di un fattore di attrazione turistica (non è per questo in fondo che si fanno innanzitutto i musei?), può diventare un contenitore all’interno del quale ritrovare il flusso della propria storia e avviare una nuova fase di racconto di sé. […] Ma per fare tutto questo è importante che la città non consideri il museo (e quindi la propria Storia) come un corpo estraneo. Ma un luogo aperto con cui dialogare e da cui trarre ispirazione. (A. Leogrande, Dalle Macerie. Cronache sul fronte meridionale.)

Among the rooms of MArTA, the traveler following this itinerary may rediscover the brighter facet of Taranto, that of Magna Graecia, dissipating the toxic fumes of Ilva chimney stacks for a while. He/she may admire the various treasures here kept and displayed: vases, statues, and jewelry that document this colony’s wealth. Mario Praz tells its story:

La rozzezza dell’imitazione dei vasi greci nei vasi apuli che spesso indulsero a richiami troppo realistici […], e che si sono continuati a produrre e falsificare, non ci faccia concludere che quella civiltà fosse pallidamente periferica e provinciale. Da Taranto si diramarono altri stanziamenti greci, come Gallipoli e Otranto, e risentirono dell’egemonia tarantina le città messapiche, il più cospicuo vestigio delle quali sono le mura megalitiche di Manduria, a triplice cerchia, […] dinnanzi alle quali morì nel 338 a. C. il re Archidamo di Sparta. La floridezza economica della Taranto greca ci è particolarmente attestata dai monili, dagli orecchini, dalle collane, e soprattutto dal grande diadema fiorito, d’oro, conservati nella Sala degli ori del Museo di Taranto. I Romani, all’epoca della loro conquista, furono soprattutto colpiti dal gran numero delle statue esistenti in città, molte delle quali opere di celebri scultori greci, come il colossale Eracle di Lisippo che fu trasportato a Roma e poi a Costantinopoli ove fu distrutto, e il colossale Zeus di bronzo dello stesso scultore, opere create entrambe appositamente per la capitale della Magna Grecia. Tra gli esemplari più insigni della statuaria tarentina la statua bronzea di Poseidone, «modellata da un artista», scrive Carlo Belli, «che oltre a conoscere tutti i segreti del mestiere, sente la divinità e la trasfonde con un impeto plastico quasi irruente». Tra le ceramiche più degne di nota il lekythos, scoperto nel 1907, rappresentante Edipo e la Sfinge:

un paradigma di pose che si ritrova nel vaso greco che dovette ispirare il quadro di Ingres. Ma del destino della Taranto greca si potrebbero ripetere oggi due versi del famoso idillio di André Chénier: «Elle est au sein des flots, la jeune Tarentine/Son beau corps a roulé sous la vague marine». E nessuna Teti l’ha sottratta «aux monstres dévorants». (M. Praz, Puglia)

Let’s leave Taranto, its terrible aspects and splendor, to continue our itinerary and explore the area of Puglia between Bari and Taranto, close to the border with Basilicata, which is connoted by a nearly surrealist landscape, characterized by lame [1], gorges and deep ravines. Among the many natural caves carved out rock, a very singular form of settlement – known as rock civilization – developed in this territory, which extends from Gravina to Mottola and Massafra. People have long thought that these hermitages, mainly used as places of worship, were inhabited only by Eastern monks and monastic communities. Actually, it was found that the rock churches and the crypts represented only one of the possible forms of living in a cave. Between the 10^th and the 15^th century, dwellings and entire hamlets were excavated from the sides of lame and ravines by local people who chose life in caves as a conscious alternative to urban life. It was a real ‘rock civilization’, which left the traces of its long history as paintings and frescoes on these stone walls. Flying over Puglia by helicopter, Folco Quilici could not remain indifferent to the natural sight of ravines, and felt the need to land at this territory to visit it:

[…] e così sorvolando le serre rocciose di Puglia a ridosso del confine lucano, come non sentire la necessità di scendere nell’ombra di quei canaloni, di quegli spacchi, calarsi nei più profondi anfratti e illuminare – nel buio delle grotte che quella pietra rossa nasconde – lo sguardo immobile dei monaci basiliani presenti ancora nei loro dipinti, eremiti un tempo vivi nelle loro preghiere, oggi eterni nei loro affreschi, corpo unico con la roccia delle volte e delle pareti più profonde? (F. Quilici, Puglia)

The traveler, as Quilici did, may make an exciting excursion among these caves to visit the mysterious frescoed rock churches, guided by Mario Praz, one of our ideal travel companions, who wrote:

All’aspetto solare della civiltà greca se ne oppone nella Puglia un altro, che data dal tempo del lungo dominio bizantino. Non che gli Elleni cercassero soltanto la luce del sole (c’è il lato ctonio della loro religione), e i monaci basiliani soltanto le grotte; ma certo le «laure» («laura» resterà in russo nome di monastero) di Gravina o Massafra posson fornire argomenti a coloro che come Carducci vedevano come intessuta di sole tenebre la religione medievale. […] Nelle caverne quegli eremiti basiliani si creavano anticamere del Paradiso, e praticavano riti, digiuni, penitenze, regolati da minute prescrizioni come quelle del cerimoniale della corte bizantina. Tutto si faceva a ricetta, l’impiego delle veglie come l’iconografia delle sacre storie avveniva con la regolarità di un computer o, per rimanere nel Medioevo, con la rigida giustizia distributiva dell’oltretomba di Dante. E una forma che fa pensare al digradante imbuto dell’Inferno dantesco e alla torre scaglionata del Purgatorio è quella della, settecentesca però, scala di Santa Maria della Scala a Massafra, che fronteggia l’alta parete traforata dalle caverne eremitiche. Nella cripta della Buona Nuova il più notevole è un affresco della madonna col Bambino, ma più interessante è, nella cappella-cripta della Candelora, la madonna che tiene il Bambino per mano, […]. Anche Mottola è ricca di cripte, alcune, come quella di San Nicola, in aperta campagna; le rocce e le cripte son di solito dissimulate dagli ulivi. E ancora una volta un miraggio di terre lontane sorprende il viaggiatore ché il Brandi di colpo si sentì in Anatolia. L’ingresso della cripta di San Nicola gli ricorda l’ingresso del tempio ittita di Jazilikaia a Bogazkoi, insolitamente, per l’Anatolia, alquanto alberato e circondato di cespi di rose canine, come la cripta di San Nicola lo era di fiori fitti e minuti. […] (M. Praz, Puglia)

[1] T. N.: Depressions in the ground with gentle slopes, due to the karst processes in Puglia.

The traveler, as Quilici did, may make an exciting excursion among these caves to visit the mysterious frescoed rock churches, guided by Mario Praz, one of our ideal travel companions, who wrote:

Going through ravines, the itinerary followed by Quilici and Praz leads to Gravina area.

Around twenty years before Praz, Alfonso Gatto, a hermetic – and at times surrealist – intellectual and poet close to Quasimodo, Sinisgalli and Zavattini, who was also a writer, journalist, art critic, and painter, came to Gravina during a long trip to Puglia. Here he produced a series of news reports, published in various issues of the weekly Epoca, from 1950 to 1951. He will lead us to one of the most evocative rock churches in Gravina.

Gatto wrote:

Le «gravine» sono valli d’erosione scavate nel tufo, corse dalle acque soltanto nel periodo delle grandi piogge. Le pareti nude e verticali appaiono sforacchiate irregolarmente da numerose grotte, abitazioni trogloditiche nel Medio Evo e, purtroppo, in alcuni paesi anche ai nostri giorni. A Gravina di Puglia, esiste forse la gravina più profonda di tutta la regione, la più spettacolare. Il rione Fondovico s’addentra nelle sue gole e per una stradetta che segue la parete del burrone dà l’ingresso alla chiesa-grotta di San Michele scavata nella roccia e con un diffuso colore giallo azzurro sulle pareti, traccia d’antichi affreschi. L’atmosfera della chiesuola circolare, aperta al culto per due giorni l’anno, diventa sempre più remota, a mano a mano che si resta soli col suo silenzio. In un vano sulla destra, attraverso una grata, si vede l’ossario delle vittime dei saraceni nel 983. E si sa, per averla vista entrando, che sopra la chiesa- grotta, un’altra grotta, detta di San Marco, raccoglie pure cataste di scheletri. I fedeli hanno messo loro accanto piccole statue di Santi e persino qualcuno dei Re Magi. La vista sulla gravina ci aveva tutti ammutoliti; era d’una nudità assoluta, più sola di una necropoli e d’una fortezza. Invano avevano cercato di renderla «storica» con alcuni cipressetti turistici che le erano stati piantati nel mezzo.

L’unica cosa umana era il piccolo orto che la custode allevava, ricamava quasi, su piccoli zerbini di terra stesi nell’incastro della roccia. (A. Gatto, Puglia, terra promessa -2. La terra dei fiumi morti, in «Epoca» 23.06.1951)

Our special reporters – the poet Alfonso Gatto, Quilici, and Praz – were impressed in the Alta Murgia town by something that, unlike the rock churches located in the depths of the ravines, rises in the town center before the eyes of the traveler: the façade of the church of Santa Maria delle Grazie. These are Praz’s impressions:

[…] ma quel che impressiona a Gravina, e non richiede altra fatica che quella di alzare gli occhi come si alzerebbero per un fuoco d’artifizio, è la facciata di Santa Maria delle Grazie: e che altro se non un magnifico fuoco d’artifizio è quell’aquila enorme che spiega i vanni nella parte più alta della facciata, sorgendo da un castello a tre torri come da macchina pirotecnica? Ha gli occhi di smalto, ma potrebbero anche sprizzare raggi. Qui siam lontani dalla civiltà rupestre, siamo anzi in periodo barocco e l’aquila e le torri formano lo stemma del vescovo Vincenzo Giustiniani da Chio: una facciata parlante, dunque a gloria di un vescovo. (M. Praz, Puglia)

Alfonso Gatto writes:

Questo potrebbe essere il frontespizio di un libro sulla Puglia da scrivere a occhi chiusi, da dettare ricordandolo. […] Un vento caldo, che è come il trasalire stesso della luce e dell’immobilità, attraversa a tratti la Puglia e sveglia dal sonno i braccianti e gli spigolatori caduti nel letargo della stanchezza o bocconi sul lastrico dei paesi in cui dal buoi fresco d’un caffè parla la voce della radio. […] Potremmo dire di un lungo treno merci che si fermò, in quel pomeriggio di giugno, alla stazione delle ferrovie secondarie di Gravina, davanti alla Chiesa della madonna delle Grazie, una chiesa con una grande aquila scavata lungo tutta la facciata. Era uno spettacolo irreale, la locomotiva nera in quella deserta periferia di campagna ove la chiesa aveva fulminato sulla sua porta, in un’amplissima morte, l’unica immagine viva che potesse destarla. (A. Gatto, Puglia terra promessa. Fantasma di un paese, in «Epoca», 16, giugno, 1951)

Our itinerary now leads us southward, in Upper Salento, towards the beautiful and noble town Martina Franca in the province of Taranto. To reach it, we may stop off in Alberobello and go through the Itria Valley, currently an exclusive tourist destination, also known as the country of trulli.

Praz comments Quilici’s shots along the route towards Martina Franca in these words:

L’approccio alla piccola città (che paese non può chiamarsi davvero) è graduale come un crescendo rossiniano. Fra il verde dei vigneti appaiono i primi trulli. Prima singoli e sparsi, poi a coppie, a agglomerati, capezzoli bianchi di mucche capovolte e interrate, piccole Sante Giustine da Padova, piccoli San Marchi di Venezia imitati da un bimbo con sabbie candide come quelle di Santos, o addirittura moschee, tende di Sciti o di Tartari, qualcosa di orientale, di favoloso e fiabesco, una Disneyland che mai fantasia ne sognò uguale, terra di gnomi o degli «hobbits» del «Signore degli anelli» di Tolkien; […] (M. Praz, Puglia)

We are going to arrive in Martina Franca but, before exploring its elegant historic center, we may pass by Alberobello.

Praz writes:

La città appare come cinta d’assedio da un esercito di bianchi padiglioni che, al contrario delle nere tende di Tamerlano, annunziano pace anziché strage. L’origine di questo pacifico assedio è quanto mai pratica e prosaica, derivando dal sistema d’enfiteusi che permise ai contadini di avere ciascuno il suo proprio appezzamento di vigna in affitto venticinquennale che in seguito si consolidò in proprietà: è tutto qui il segreto di questo grande prato fiorito di bucaneve di calce viva che si stende a perdita d’occhio. (M. Praz, Puglia)

Leaving Alberobello towards our ultimate destination, Martina Franca, we are going through a country area dotted wih trulli that slowly disappear until reaching the threshold of the noble Itria Valley town. Praz may lead us into the city:

La campagna e la periferia con i trulli sono il lato plebeo di Martina Franca, ma il lato patrizio è tutt’altra cosa.

Dal viale Bellini si penetra in Via Pergolesi (come appropriati i nomi dei musicisti a questa città musicale!) ed ecco si snoda il meandro miracoloso: prima una facciata barocca che nell’angustia della strada torreggia, San Domenico, e poi un palazzo dopo l’altro, palazzi dalle porte e dalle finestre incorniciate di «cartouches» rococò, curve e controcurve, «rocailles» e svolazzi, piccole facciate, piccoli cortili, piccole viuzze come in una città di bambole, abbandonate dalle favolose abitatrici per far luogo alle prosaiche famiglie d’oggi; poi, d’un tratto, l’ampio respiro d’una piazza, e là in fondo il sogno, come avviene nei veri sogni, trapassa in un altro sogno, quasi per la magia di un «micromegas» volteriano. Quella chiesa rococò il cui colore diventa roggio nella luce del tramonto, è un frammento di Baveria o di Austria che s’inserisce d’un tratto, come se Mozart si sovrapponesse a Vivaldi? Il centro della fronte, una cascata di merletti di pietra, dal color terracotta del basso a quello di rabarbaro, d’un rosa venato di verde, in alto: per riprendere la felice immagine di Cesare Brandi, che lo paragona a una retata di pesci guizzanti, nella luce del tramonto si pensa alla ricca assise delle triglie. […] Un’altra fettuccia di strada dal nome standardizzato (Corso Vittorio Emanuele), anch’essa fiancheggiata da palazzetti e balconi rococò (di nuovo una Celetna Ulice o una via Malá Strana per bambole) conduce al Palazzo Ducale, la residenza di questo finisterre del rococò europeo, di cui non s’è accorta nessuna delle vecchie guide. (M. Praz, Puglia)

Our guides, the itinerary reporters, realized how beautiful Martina Franca was and led the traveler here to spend the last days of his/her journey. We hope the itinerary proposed is exciting as a flight, that of the great documentary maker Folco Quilici, whose course we have followed in order to discover Puglia, guided by eminent investigative writers, reporters and poets who took and described these routes.

An Itinerary for Enchanted Travelers

Bari, Alberobello, Massafra, Taranto.

Pier Paolo Pasolini went on a journey across Puglia in 1951 and there he wrote a report, published in the Roman newspaper Il Quotidiano in the same year. A more structured publishing project, Le Puglie per il viaggiatore incantato, left unfinished, should have arisen from the notes kept during the journey, which led the writer from Bari to Lower Salento.

In this itinerary we suggest the traveler play the role of a modern and enchanted flâneur and penetrate the streets of Apulian towns, as Pier Paolo Pasolini did in 1951 when he got to Bari by train, a town that was “sconosciuta, distesa contro il mare”.

By walking, Pasolini, as if he fulfilled the legacy of Walter Benjamin – a sophisticated and enchanted city traveler –, became together an archaeologist, a journalist, a director able to get views and angles, and a sociologist who identifies the signs of modernity and the traces of the past that coexist in towns in order to turn them into a narrative.

Pasolini, as a flâneur, is able to interpret a town and turn it into a story: in Le due Bari the light, the porous rocks, and the streets and alleys of the old town become poetry, or in the lyric poem Un biancore di calce viva, he captures pictures and shots of Massafra and other Apulian towns to make them the locations of his masterpiece The Gospel According to St. Matthew.

Hence, our traveler, following in Pasolini’s footsteps, should practice the elegant art of flânerie by poetically going through the towns described by the writer and wandering there to listen to the stories he can tell.

Our journey starts, as in a novel, in a railway station at dusk – the station of a provincial town that might be the same as many others; however, in Pasolini’s view, the arrival at Bari station is a Kafkaesque adventure.

The poet’s feeling of confusion is the same as that the traveler feels when he arrives at the Apulian county town central station and sees an orthogonal grid of streets, resulting from the urban 19^th-century restyling project promoted by Gioacchino Murat. The new Bari, developed outside its old Medieval walls, according to the 19^th-century aesthetic canons of modern European cities, is an organized series of streets and boulevards that form a geometric grid which is totally different from and almost juxtaposed to the confused Mediterranean pattern made up of alleys and passageways that connote the old town.

A random street should be entered, as Pasolini did: «così senza aver deciso nulla, scelsi una strada, una delle tante, piena di scritte luminose e mi incamminai».

The traveler will be in one of the various bourgeois streets of the Murat district: wide streets that seem «boulevards o avenidas» where «si sente sospesa l’euforia del progresso di questa città che in pochi anni, rotti i legami che imprigionavano i pugliesi con tutti i meridionali a un difficoltoso complesso, ha raggiunto il livello delle città del Nord meno vocate al silenzio». (P. P. Pasolini, Le due Bari)

Bari, Corso Cavour in a vintage photograph.

Pasolini enters Corso Cavour, a street lined with flowerbeds and now ancient trees, in particular holm oaks, which protect from the heath during summer days and make you enjoy the walk along this boulevard, enlivened by an active social and commercial life. Pasolini writes:

quei salumai, droghieri, farmacisti e macellai aperti alle dieci di sera, e tutta quella luce vuota, sui passanti spinti qua e là in disordine come da un vento di periferia e i gridi dei ragazzi, superstiti nell’alta serata», che catturarono l’attenzione e la curiosità di Pasolini, oggi hanno lasciato il posto a negozi alla moda, gelaterie e ristoranti; permane identico l’andirivieni disordinato della gente e dei giovani che popolano questa strada e le vicine di quella «risonante allegria» di cui «è piena questa città.

In Corso Cavour we can find some of the most beautiful buildings in the new town: the Teatro Petruzzelli, Palazzo Atti, the Bank of Italy and Chamber of Commerce monumental palaces.

Going along the whole street northwards, we get to the sea, where the Teatro Margherita today a contemporary art hub and home to international art shows and exhibitions – stands out at the end of the street in its elegant Stile Liberty shapes.

In the town described by Pasolini and enjoyed by the traveler, the Adriatic Sea is a constant presence and shines with splendor especially in the morning:

Alzato il sipario del buio, la città compare in tutta la sua felicità adriatica.

Hence, we suggest going along the town promenade, Lungomare, in the morning, when the sky and sea colors are reflected into each other. From the Teatro Margherita we go ahead southwards to the town beach called Pane e Pomodoro. The sea always runs along the traveler, lined with a rhythmic sequence of cast iron lampposts that gives a glimpse of the town shapes, those clearly recognizable silhouettes, from the Cathedral bell tower to the monumental fascist buildings.

Not far from Piazza IV Novembre, the old dock of Bari opens, called ‘n-dèrr’a la lanze’ in local dialect, i.e. a terra delle lance, with reference to the landing place of the typical small fishing boats, which are still not so different from those that enchanted Pasolini. Here, the traveler – as the poet did – can witness the colored secular ritual occurring every morning: the fish sale on often improvised stalls, the octopus processing and the tasting of raw molluscs, which attracts numbers of tourists and citizens.

Proceeding southwards, the town seems to change: the elegant Stile Liberty buildings and the port vivid colors give way to the ostentatious monumentality of fascist architecture, which restyled this segment of Bari’s coast in the 1920s and 1930s. As a curtain, these buildings of great architectural value concealed the urban area behind, conversely characterized by the crumbling and cheap buildings of popular districts, which still lie behind the Lungomare.

At the end of our walk along the Lungomare, we suggest the “enchanted traveler” visit the Corrado Giaquinto Provincial Picture Gallery, hosted on the last floor of the former Palazzo della Provincia, now home to the Metropolitan City of Bari. It is one of the most representative buildings of fascist architecture in Bari, which eclectically revives, in monumental terms, the Italian civic Renaissance and classical Roman tradition elements. An interesting southern art itinerary winds through the sixteen rooms of the town museum, spanning from the Middle Ages to the twentieth century.

Walking across the town, it will be easy to appreciate the cheerfulness of Bari people. Pasolini is fascinated by the sunny and light-hearted nature of this town and its inhabitants.

[…] i baresi si divertono a vivere: ci si impegnano col cuor leggero, e col cuor leggero vanno discutendo di affari per le strade, prendendo il caffè, si recano a lavoro, senza avere nemmeno il sospetto che questo non rappresenti una piacevole avventura. […] E l’allegria dei baresi è seria, sicura e salubre: su queste teste solide il delicato biondo veneziano dei capelli (che è la carezza dell’Adriatico), perde in languore e acquista in chiarezza. Qui tutto è chiaro: anche la città vecchia, dalla chiesa di San Nicola al castello svevo, pare perennemente pulita e purificata, se non sempre dall’acqua, dalla luce stupenda. (P. P. Pasolini, Le due Bari)

Together with Pasolini, we reached the threshold of the old town, where the poet’s Kafkaesque adventure ends, but our journey does not. In 1964 Pasolini dedicated intense verses to Bari vecchia, and poetry may lead us through these alleys:

Un biancore di calce viva, alto,

– imbiancamento dopo una pestilenza

– che vuol dir quindi salute, e gioiosi

mattini, formicolanti meriggi – è il sole

che mette pasta di luce sulla pasta dell’ombra viva, alonando, in fili

di bianchezza suprema, o coprendo

di bianco ardente il bianco ardente

d’una parete porosa come la pasta del pane

superficie di un medioevo popolare

– Bari vecchia, un alto villaggio

sul mare malato di troppa pace –

un bianco ch’è privilegio e marchio

di umili – eccoli, che, come miseri arabi,

abitanti di antiche ardenti Subtopie,

empiono fondachi di figli, vicoli di nipoti,

interni di stracci, porte di calce viva,

pertugi di tende e di merletto, lastricati

d’acqua odorosi di pesce e piscio

– tutto è pronto per me – ma manca qualcosa.

(P. P. Pasolini, Un biancore di calce viva, in Poesie in forma di rosa)

As you enter Bari vecchia, you feel like being in a white labyrinth of streets and alleys enhanced by sunlight, a maze of houses and white chianche[1] that get tangled up, in a lively town, populated with humble people, poor Arabs, numerous children and grandchildren – as Pasolini wrote.

To get a better picture of the true Bari vecchia, we can follow secondary itineraries in search of the stories and legends in the town alleys, since – as Marco Polo states in Invisible Cities by Calvino – describing the appearance and architecture of a town is not enough to describe the town itself.

We suggest the traveler enter a very typical street, Strada Meraviglia, where there is a balcony over a nice 16^th-century arch, the subject of a romantic legend.

The arch is said to have been built in a single night to let two lovers, who lived opposite each other, meet secretly and love until dawn, against the girl’s family wishes. The story of Bari Romeo and Juliet made this part of the town popular, attracting young couples and romantic tourists. Actually, the story of the balcony as a ‘go-between’ seems different. Arches are a very common architectural solution in Bari vecchia – they are at least fifty –, mostly built to create small passages between the town alleys. The one in Strada Meraviglia was built on a previous 13^th-century structure and commissioned by the noble family Meravigli or Meraviglia – arrived in Bari within the entourage of Queen Isabella of Aragon – to connect two palaces they owned.

[1] Translator’s Note: Limestone slabs, typical of Apulian architecture. They are used as paving stones or covers for the conical roofs of trulli.

Bari vecchia, Arco Meraviglia

Our itinerary discovering the old town stories leads the “enchanted traveler” to an alley, called Strada Quercia, within walking distance of the Castello Svevo. At number 10 there is a small sculpture, fixed under a balcony, a Moor head, known to local people as the cape du turk. It is an apotropaic mask, which portrays a severed head, with hair in a turban, mustaches and vaguely staring eyes. Although it is a very common decorative motif in Apulian art, which frequently appears in cathedral and castle capitals, in the carved gates of basilicas, and in various liturgical ornaments, a macabre legend arose about this small Bari vecchia sculpture, set in the age when the Arabs ruled the town.

In fact, between 847 and 871 Bari was an Emirate. Although it seems that no traces were left of this short political season, Islamic culture permeated and clearly penetrated the town and the region in pre-Norman times, when Apulia was at the center of a Mediterranean crossroads.

Legend has it that the severed head belonged to Emir Muffarāg, who ruled Bari between 853 and 856 and tried to convert Bari people to Islam. It is said that, on the night of 5 January, in order to show his own courage, the emir decided to face a witch, a legendary creature of Apulian folklore, the dreaded Befanì. She used to wander on Epiphany Eve night, marking the doors of the people close to death and decapitating whoever bumped into her. Such was the destiny of the unlucky emir, whose head remained petrified and fixed to that site.

We can leave this alley and its story behind to discover, together with Pasolini, one of the most typical aspects of the old town and its people «che vive molto all’aperto seduta sulle soglie della casa».

In the old town, life takes place in the street and, almost always, the doors of the houses are open. The white streets, smelling of detergent, host improvised sitting rooms, small craft workbenches, stalls and real kitchens. The alley that opens once you cross the Arco Basso, close to Piazza Federico II, recently renamed Strada delle orecchiette, is today a tourist attraction. Here, Bari women, sitting next to each other on the doorstep, make typical local pasta every day.

Not only is food made and sometimes eaten in the street, but children still play outdoors in Bari vecchia: it is frequent to come across groups of kids who improvise football matches in the paved squares and town alleys.

We like imagining that Pasolini, very keen on football and always willing to participate in improvised matches in the street, as his close friend Ninetto Davoli tells, would have enjoyed playing in the square of Santa Maria del Buon Consiglio, where until a few decades ago groups of kids competed and dribbled among the ruins of a 10^th-century basilica, avoiding Roman columns.

This square, where even the footballer Antonio Cassano is said to have trained when he was a child, is at the end of the peninsula on which Bari vecchia stands, and is almost concealed among the town streets.

The traveler, going down some steps to fill a gap in height with the road level, will realize not to be in a real square, but to be walking through the nave of a 10^th-century basilica, with no roof and side walls. This area is embellished with beautiful marble columns – topped by decorated capitals with plant motifs – lined up in parallel rows and resting on a base that reveals the presence of ancient mosaics.

This church, as the alleys through which this itinerary has led us, has an old story to be told and, after all, it does not matter if it is true or legendary. A bloody conflict is reported, happened in 946, between the Byzantine aristocrats and the people. The inhabitants of Bari gathered in the church – once called S. Maria del Popolo – are said to have set a trap to put an end to the hateful custom allowing the lords to exercise the jus primae noctis over new brides. The plan succeeded and many noblemen died. Hence, the Byzantines in the town gave up ‘taking home’ – as they used to say – newly married girls. Since then, the church has changed its name, with reference to the decision made just within its walls, and is now known as Madonna del Buon Consiglio to the people of Bari.

Let’s leave Bari, with its stories and legends, “una città a cui ci si affeziona”, a town the “enchanted traveler” may leave, but “con la segreta promessa di ritornarci”.

From the Apulian county seat, let’s travel south-west with Pasolini heading towards Alberobello, «forse il capolavoro delle Puglie». (P. P. Pasolini, I nitidi trulli di Alberobello).

During the journey, we may admire the landscape characterized by an intense land color, by dry stone walls and olive trees.

[…] tra Murgia e Adriatico la terra è arancione, un leggero tappeto arancione arabescato da muretti dello stesso colore e da radi boschi di ulivi d’un verde carico, vicino al celeste, tra cui ogni tanto, compare un gregge di pecore color malva. (P.P. Pasolini, I nitidi trulli di Alberobello).

The picturesque Murgia agricultural center we reached following Pasolini was recognized as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1996, thanks to the considerable architectural value of its typical houses: the trulli, which give the town nearly a fairy-tale dimension.

The town of the trulli is connoted by perfect shapes, in Pasolini’s view:

un paese perfetto la cui forma si è fatta stile nel rigore in cui è stata applicata. Dal primo muro all’ultimo, non un corpo estraneo, non un plagio, non una zeppa, non una stonatura. L’ammasso dei trulli nel terreno a saliscendi si profila sereno e puro, venato dalle strette strade pulitissime che fendono la sua architettura grottesca e squisita. […] Ogni tanto nell’infrangibile ordito di questa architettura degna di una fantasia, maniaca e rigorosa – un Paolo Uccello, un Kafka – si apre una frattura dove furoreggia tranquillo il verde smeraldo e l’arancione di un orto. E il cielo…È difficile raccontare la purezza del cielo […] un cielo inesistente, puro connettivo di luce sulle prospettive fantastiche del paese. (P. P. Pasolini, I nitidi trulli di Alberobello).

The trullo, which descends from the typically Mediterranean building technique of the thòlos, with its recognizable truncated cone shape, is a dry-stone dwelling that arises from the peasants’ knowledge and mind. In order to make the area stony limestone soil cultivable, the peasants had to remove the abundant rock layers in soil and decided to use them as building material. Hence, Leonardo Sinisgalli notes, «l’astuzia contadina da un segreto o da un caso trasse una regola. Che per adattarsi alle virtù del materiale riuscì a sottrarsi al rigorismo della geometria». (L. Sinisgalli, Prefazione alla La valle dei trulli di M. Castellano)

The building skill of Alberobello peasants had been admired, about two decades before Pasolini’s Apulian trip, by Tommaso Fiore, an intellectual committed to denouncing the peasants’ miserable life conditions. In his Lettere pugliesi, collected into Popolo di formiche, he writes:

Avrai sentito parlare anche a Torino dei nostri trulli, diamine! Tu però forse non sai che la zona dei trulli ad Alberobello è stata dichiarata monumentale, né più né meno che la passeggiata archeologica di Roma. Ma io ad Alberobello, di memorando, di eccezionale, di veramente monumentale non ci ho trovato che la laboriosità dei contadini e degli agricoltori…(T. Fiore, Un Popolo di formiche)

Tommaso Fiore describes the trulli using these words:

[…] sono minuscole capanne tonde, dal tetto a cono aguzzo, in cui pare non possa entrare se non un popolo di omini, ognuna con un piccolo comignolo ed una finestrella da bambola, e con quella buffa intonacatura sul cono, che è la civetteria della pulizia, e dà l’impressione di un berretto da notte ritto sul cocuzzolo d’un pagliaccio, con anche, per soprammercato, una croce o una stella in fronte, dipinta con calce! (T. Fiore, Un Popolo di formiche)

Pasolini is struck before these strange popular architectural structures:

Also the modern traveler, reaching Alberobello, has the impression that he is in a timeless place and in a magical dimension, yet these buildings are quite recent and arise not from magic, but from more practical reasons – precisely, from tax reasons. The trulli of the Apulian Murgia are closely linked to the reputation and black legend of Gian Girolamo Acquaviva d’Aragona, Count of Conversano, known as “Guercio di Puglia” (cross-eyed). The dreaded feudal lord, renowned for his lack of scruples and his very ambitious policy, ruled these territories in the seventeenth century on behalf of the Spanish viceroys. Local tradition has it that the count, greedy for profits, contravening the royal prohibition on building new towns, had allowed for the construction of trulli, to better exploit the agricultural resources of those lands and the peasants’ work. They say that during the royal inspections, the Guercio asked to quickly demolish the cones, built with the dry stone technique and thus easy to be dismantled, and to rebuild them once the Spanish ‘tax assessment’ had finished.

Today Alberobello, one of the most popular tourist destinations in Puglia, has lost much of the charm Pasolini noticed. He had the privilege to walk through its main square not yet invaded by tourists eager for kitsch and cheap gadgets now sold at any corner. That is why, here, we suggest the traveler a slight detour. He can find, 5 km north-west, a real treasure of Apulian historic and artistic heritage, the small church of Barsento, which dates back to AD 591.

We may leave the gentle hills of the Murgia and, going through a landscape that seems to slope down slowly in terraces towards the Gulf of Taranto, get to Massafra together with Pasolini:

[…] una città che sorge su un colle spaccato a metà da un torrente. Si immagini una prospettiva del Tevere, la più grandiosa, la più aerea, e, al posto dei palazzi, delle cupole, dei muraglioni – e dell’acqua – un abisso di rocce. Aggrappate a queste rocce, col loro stesso colore, le vecchissime casa di Massafra, spaccata come il colle a metà dalla profonda gola. (P. P. Pasolini, I nitidi trulli di Alberobello)

This characteristic small Apulian town, which will become one of the locations of the film The Gospel According to St. Matthew, is built on the two sides of the deep S. Marco ravine. Three bridges connect the two slopes today, the eastern slope where the new town lies and the western one where the old town stands. In its territory there are various rock settlements and churches, not only shelters for Italo-Greek monastic communities, but signs of a real civilization that had chosen to live in a cave.

The enchanted traveler, following Pasolini, will discover the «puro medioevo» of Massafra, its streets, bridge and fort:

[…] si aggrovigliano, come visceri, i vicoli e le stradine scoscese, attraverso cui si regrediscono fino nel cuore del tempo. Il puro medioevo, intorno. Ti spingi giù verso il basso e arrivi alle mura di un forte, svevo o normanno, puntato come uno sperone verso là dove l’abisso di Massafra si apre sulla pianura sconfinata. (P.P. Pasolini, I nitidi trulli di Alberobello)

The fort the poet refers to is the Castle, reachable through the winding Via Terra, to the left of Piazza Garibaldi. It is a majestic large 16^th-century edifice that overlooks the whole village, established on a previous castle dating back to the 10^th and 11^th centuries. Currently owned by the town council, the castle hosts the Town Library and the Museo storico e archeologico della Civiltà dell’Olio e del Vino (Historical and Archaeological Museum of Oil and Wine).

We invite the traveler to get lost in the alleys of the old town, which «intorno al motivo dell’abisso di rocce che le si apre nel cuore e l’allarga in spazi vuoti e grandiosi, è di una coerenza che fa pensare al rigore dello stile». (P.P. Pasolini, I nitidi trulli di Alberobello)

The modern speculative building has not undermined the pure Midlle Ages of Massafra yet, a place where time seems to stand still. «Il tempo in un dato anno, o secolo, si è fermato, e la città si è serbata fuori di esso, fossile e incorrotta». (P. P. Pasolini, I nitidi trulli di Alberobello)

This dimension of suspended time led Pasolini, after visiting Palestine, to choose this small town, along with other Apulian towns, as a location for one of his masterpieces: The Gospel According to St. Matthew.

We can leave Massafra with the image of the poetic scenes of The Gospel According to St. Matthew and continue our journey: following La lunga strada di sabbia by Pasolini, we reach Taranto, a city that «brilla su due mari come un gigantesco diamante in frantumi».

Actually the town is located only on the Ionian coast, but two seas and «due lingue di terra, che si protendono […] l’una in direzione dell’altra» – as Guido Piovene wrote in his famous Viaggio in Italia, published in the mid-1950s –, represent the two souls of Taranto.

In fact, the town stands on the innermost point of a spectacular gulf: a part of the urban area develops on the mainland, Taranto nuova; the oldest part – Taranto vecchia – stands on a small island, which looks to the open sea, the Mare Grande, south-west, whereas is reflected in the natural inlet of an inner sea, called the Mar Piccolo, north-east. The two seas are connected only in two points, through the natural channel of Porta Napoli and the artificial and navigable channel that separates the historic urban settlement from the wider and more modern part of the town.

Much has changed since Piovene went to the Ionian city: Taranto is no longer a «città perfetta» (perfect town) and to live there «è come vivere nell’interno di una conchiglia, di un’ostrica aperta»

«Anche nella Lunga strada di sabbia di Pasolini – Alessandro Leogrande recalls – c’è ancora un’Italia del prima. Non è difficile scorgere le tracce di una Taranto che non c’è più, quasi un’altra città su cui ne è stata edificata un’altra, in pochi anni, […]. Le immagini fissate su carta da Pasolini sono le ultime prima della costruzione dell’Italsider; pertanto rileggerle è un po’ come collocarsi dalla parte opposta della parabola», before the town bore the heavy consequences – in terms of health and environmental degradation – of one of the biggest industrial hubs in Europe and of inconsiderate political management that kept the population in check, asking it to barter its own health for work.

On the contrary, Pasolini could admire: «Qui Taranto nuova, là Taranto vecchia, intorno i due mari, e i lungomari. Per i lungomari, nell’acqua ch’è tutto uno squillo, con in fondo delle navi da guerra, inglesi, italiane, americane, sono aggrappati agli splendidi scogli, gli stabilimenti».

The “enchanted traveler”, in search of an authentic Taranto, may find the signs of a town that bet it would come to light from the grey smokes of its chimneys and the efforts to promote cultural renewal aimed at restoring the beauty of this place. Such beauty, rather than lost, is concealed by a fog of indifference: beyond it, the town not only may offer fascinating landscapes, but also reveal its rich cultural heritage and ancient history.

This itinerary can start from Taranto nuova, characterized by an elegant French-style 19^th-century plan, and admired also by Guido Piovene, with its «piacevoli strade […] decorate da vetrine di dolci». The writer from Vicenza, who wrote his famous Viaggio in Italia in the mid-1950s, dedicated praising words to the Ionian city:

[…] nonostante i grandi edifici di gusto discutibile del tempo fascista e la loro falsa grandezza, Taranto nuova è amabile, e la sua grazia naturale è più profonda e più forte della retorica […]. Passeggiandovi si hanno frequenti scorci sui due mari. (G. Piovene, Viaggio in Italia)

Going through the beautiful Lungomare Vittorio Emanuele III, which runs along the new town, we may enjoy a delightful view, since «Taranto vive tra i riflessi, in un’atmosfera traslucida adatta a straordinari eventi di luce. La bellezza dei suoi tramonti è luogo comune». (G. Piovene, Viaggio in Italia).

Along this road, brightened up by lush gardens, we come across the ruins of some Roman columns.

Taranto has this characteristic, its past emerges from subsoil: the area now occupied by the new town was a necropolis in ancient times and, over the centuries, it has returned myriad archaeological finds. Those that were not stolen by generations of thieves and grave robbers, have enriched the heritage of one of the most important archaeological museums in Italy, the Marta.

At the end of this walk along the sea, we should cross the ponte girevole – a swing bridge built at the end of the 19^th century, which opens in the middle to allow for the passage of industrial vessels – in order to enter the old town, «un monumento per se stessa». Here, the traveler may get lost again in the confused Medieval plot of passageways and alleys already met in Bari vecchia.

Per riparare l’interno della città dagli attacchi nemici, forse dal vento e dal calore, le abitazioni lungo il porto formano un muro ermetico, ed i vicoli aperti perché si possa penetrarvi, molto più stretti delle calli più strette di Venezia, piuttosto che vicoli sono interstizi, fessure tra una casa e l’altra, quasiché fossero tagliate con una lama. La città interna è chiusa come in un guscio d’uovo. […] All’interno del guscio si ha poi una matassa di strade, strette ma pulite ed asciutte secondo il costume pugliese. (G. Piovene, Viaggio in Italia)

The beautiful Castello Aragonese overlooks the old town. It was commissioned by Ferdinand of Aragon between 1481 and 1492 and today it is home to the Italian Navy, which has one of its most important arsenals just in Taranto.

After a visit inside this Renaissance architecture gem, the traveler may proceed with its walk along the shore of the Mar Piccolo, where the typical fishing district extends. Today the town is trying to revive the authentic beauty of this place, partly undermined by wide degradation areas and crumbling buildings. Yet the place preserves a particular decadent charm: walking, it is easy to imagine it as the illustration of «una novella orientale, di quelle dove i pesci parlano e sputano anelli preziosi». (G. Piovene, Viaggio in Italia).

Our itinerary aimed at discovering Puglia as described by Pasolini and the other writers and travelers, who accompanied us with their words, ends her. After this journey we will share with the poet the memory of «Bari, il modello marino di tutte le città» and will have «nella memoria, cattedrali e poveri ragazzi nudi, confuse città pericolanti», and in our eyes the pictures of «una regione che si trasforma, si muove in piccole ondulazioni, si ricopre di ulivi». (P. P. Pasolini, La lunga strada di sabbia)

The enchanted traveler may not follow Pasolini to Greece, where this itinerary would like to lead him. In 1969, the writer had a holiday with the divine Maria Callas, documented only by photographs, on the Onassis family’s private island located off Lefkada and today owned by an anonymous tycoon and thus not open to visitors. It is the island of Skorpios, but this is another story, a story of unfulfilled love and of another journey.

The Passion Itinerary

Ruvo, Canosa, Molfetta, Bari, Taranto, Corfu, Lefkada

This itinerary was conceived as a journey across Italy and Greece during the evocative Catholic and Orthodox Easter celebrations. The journey, which develops in Ruvo di Puglia, Canosa, Molfetta, Bari, and Taranto and, in the Ionian Islands – Corfu and Lefkada – will allow the traveler to come into contact with colored processions, Passion plays, culinary customs and old ritual traditions, often between religion, folklore and apotropaic beliefs.

The historian Franco Cardini writes:

La celebrazione della Pasqua è senza dubbio una delle più antiche della liturgia cristiana […]. Probabilmente già dal I secolo i cristiani festeggiavano la Pasqua, che presto dovette essere collegata anche alla prima domenica di plenilunio di primavera […]. (F. Cardini, I giorni del sacro: i riti e le feste del calendario dall’antichità a oggi.)

The Catholic church inherited rituals and ceremonies belonging to preexistent religions and had to enrich salvation symbolism, embodied by Christ’s resurrection, with further meanings, typical of rural and pastoral Mediterranean civilizations. In fact, Easter represents also the spring celebration of plants and fields that come back to life after winter.

In the week before Easter, Puglia turns into a big stage where the episodes of Christ’s death and resurrection are performed live as Sacre Rappresentazioni^[1] or processions. In almost every town, confraternities, cultural associations or Pro Loco (local tourist offices) organize events, parades, and music shows that mark the dates of Easter liturgy and the end of winter. A clarification is thus necessary: the traveler who will choose to follow this itinerary may not cover all the stages since the dates of the different events overlap. However, he/she may select the events to be attended in person or ‘virtually’, following their slow pace through the works of the literary guides chosen in the proposed journey.

In the Christian liturgical tradition, precisely emulated by the popular one, Easter time is connoted by great festivals and processions that culminate in the Holy Week, but start during Lent, namely forty days before Easter. The anthropologist and art historian Emanuela Angiuli explains:

La liturgia cattolica fa iniziare il ciclo con il mercoledì delle ceneri, primo giorno di quaresima. In molte località [della Puglia], ancora oggi, la quaresima – periodo di preparazione della morte e resurrezione di Cristo, caratterizzato da divieti alimentari e sessuali, giacché non si consuma carne, non si contraggono fidanzamenti né matrimoni – è rappresentato dalla Quarantana, un pupazzo fatto di pezze nere, il petto trafitto da penne di gallina, appeso ai crocicchi, dondolante come uno spettro. (E. Angiuli, La Pasqua, in Viaggio in Provincia)

1. T. N.: Italian theatrical forms that deal with religious episodes.

One of the places mentioned by the writer is Ruvo di Puglia: a small town in Apulian Murgia, surrounded with vineyards and olive groves, with a thousand-year history linked to agricultural tradition. Here our itinerary may start.

During Lent we can see some puppets hung on the balconies of the Medieval old town alleys: they represent an old lady wearing mourning who is considered the Carnival’s widow. On Eastern Sunday these puppets are burnt using firecrackers. The ritual, called the burst of Quarantane, indicates the end of penance and the victory of life over death, as well as the victory of spring over winter. Emanuela Angiuli narrates:

Ogni giorno la Quarantana perde una piuma, finché nel giorno della Resurrezione, scoppia, riempita di petardi, buttando per aria altri mille stracci neri. Uscita dalla fantasia e dalle feste medievali, la vecchia pupazza incarna l’altra faccia della passione, una sorta di Addolorata alla rovescia, maschera pagana di quell’angoscia di distruzione che l’inverno – interruzione del tempo produttivo, della speranza alimentare – apporta nell’immaginario contadino. […] Le cerimonialità quaresimali, ridotte oggi a processioni di accompagnamento funebre e ad azioni teatrali nelle sacre rappresentazioni, appartengono in realtà ad una concezione festiva apocalittica, propria delle culture agro-pastorali nel mondo mediterraneo pre-cristiano. (E. Angiuli, La Pasqua, in Viaggio in Provincia)

The Holy Week rituals in Ruvo, included within the Italian intangible heritage by IDEA, Istituto centrale per la demoetnoantropologia, do not end with the folkloric burst of Quarantane, but continue throughout Easter, starting on Friday before Palm Sunday.

The procession of the Vergine Desolata is particularly moving; it takes place on Passion Friday^[2], namely one week before Good Friday. The statue of the Virgin dressed in black – also called Madonna del Vento since they say a singular breeze always blows during the procession – is carried on the shoulders of the members of the “Purificazione di Maria Santissima Addolorata” Confraternity. The Virgin’s procession starts from the church of San Domenico and ends at the Cathedral.

2. T.N.: It is the term that before the Second Ecumenical Council of the Vatican indicated Friday preceding Palm Sunday.

Canosa, women dressed in black who accompany the procession of the Vergine Dolorosa

(Αuthor: Luigi Carlo Capozzi – it:Utente:Campidiomedei – Transferred from it.wikipedia to Commons da Fradeve11 using CommonsHelper., CC BY 1.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4282013)

It has been found that in the Holy Week processions – especially the penitential ones, in which drama prevails on liturgy – the protagonists are female characters as the Vergine Desolata or Addolorata (Our Lady of Sorrows) who grieve over the loss of their child, just like the goddess of fertility Ceres/Demeter mourned her daughter Persephone’s death; this confirms the close link between Easter rites and rural pre-Christian rituals:

Sembra quasi di percepire, nei lunghi percorsi che l’Addolorata attraversa, rappresentata da una statua o da una donna vestita di nero, alla ricerca del Figlio, […] il lamento di Cerere, della grande madre Cibele, menomata all’improvviso, nella mitologia greca e romana, di quella “parte di sé” che rendeva feconda e fertile la terra con l’arrivo della primavera. (E. Angiuli, La Pasqua, in Viaggio in Provincia)

Many of these processions, despite dating back to the Middle Ages, have rituals that directly recall Greek and Roman tradition. For example, the procession of Mater Dolorosa in Canosa is accompanied by the crying of ladies dressed in black that clearly evoke the pagan mourners, women that hurried to grieve for the dead and sing funeral songs during funerals.

Let’s leave Ruvo and Canosa, after visiting the most interesting monuments in these sites, specified in the related links, and head for Molfetta, located on the Adriatic coast in the norther side of Bari, to participate in the Good Friday procession. The intense dramatic force of this show is also enhanced by the singular musical accompaniment provided by the band, one of the features of Apulian folklore events and religious ceremonies.

The Bari musicologist Pierfrancesco Moliterni will introduce us to this melodic world:

All’interno della cultura della festa patronale e della particolare funzione che in essa riveste la banda da giro, caratteristica ed esclusiva è la sua presenza – durante le cerimonie religiose della Quaresima e delle Settimana Santa – nella cittadina di Molfetta. La processione delle statue che simboleggiano la passione di Cristo […] viene preceduta da un particolarissimo “sottogenere” della grande banda da giro: la cosiddetta bassa banda, o banda dei “tammurr” (tamburi). Essa è composta da pochissimi suonatori, di solito in numero di quattro, i quali intonano una specie di trenodia che risuona alla testa della processione, per richiamare l’attenzione dei fedeli all’imminente passaggio cerimoniale.

Il suono di una melodia triste e dolce insieme (flauto) intervallata dal rullo del tamburo militare (cui viene allentata la cordiera d’acciaio per impedire le vibrazioni sulla pelle e sortirne effetti lugubri e cupi) e da colpi profondi di grancassa, viene interrotta da improvvisi squilli di tromba.

La processione vera e propria delle statue oggetto di culto è poi preceduta e seguita dalla banda di Molfetta, che l’accompagna per tutto il tragitto cittadino secondo un preciso cerimoniale musicale, che si tramanda da anni. Le partiture e le singole parti di queste marce funebri del Venerdì santo molfettese sono conservate presso le Arciconfraternite della Morte e di S. Stefano, che ne dispongono solo in occasione delle rispettive processioni-spettacolo. (P. Moliterni, La Processione del Venerdì Santo a Molfetta, in Viaggio in Provincia.)

To attend this event, you should be ready to spend a sleepless night, since traditionally on Thursday night you should visit an odd number of altars of repose – called sepolcri –, set up in the old town churches, have a frugal meal of tuna, capers and anchovies and wait until 3 in the morning when the statues of Misteri (Mysteries), 16^th-century Neapolitan school wooden images, leave the church of Santo Stefano and are taken in procession through Molfetta streets.

Following the procession, you may appreciate the old town with its colored port, in whose waters the Cathedral of San Corrado is reflected.

The next stop of this itinerary is Bari, where the most impressive Easter event is the Processione dei Misteri (Procession of the Mysteries) on Good Friday. The beauty of its statues, Neapolitan or Venetian school wooden sculptures or dressed puppets dating back to 17^th and 18^th centuries, makes it stand out.

The scenic organization of the ceremony is rich and consistent as told by Nicola Cortone, an expert of popular art and local history:

La processione si distingue per le preziose vesti e gli ornamenti, la nobiltà dell’apparato dei portatori (rigorosamente vestiti di nero e guanti bianchi), la melodia delle musiche di bande e i pittoreschi inserti nel corteo di fanciulli e fanciulle, rispettivamente vestiti da guerrieri romani (Costantino) e Sant’Elena, con riferimento al rinvenimento della Croce da parte della imperatrice madre. La presenza di Sant’Elena dona una impronta bizantina alla processione, forse in origine riservata soltanto alla croce.

Gli altri personaggi, via via aggiunti nel corso del tempo, appartengono da un lato al teatro medievale e dall’altro ad una sorta di pellegrinaggio itinerante al Santo Sepolcro.

Attraverso i Misteri in pratica si ripercorrono le stazioni della “Via Crucis” venerate dal pellegrino […]. (N. Cortone, Passione per una settimana, in Bari Vecchia. Percorsi e segni della storia.)

Another distinctive feature connotes Bari procession on Good Friday, making it unique, namely the traditional rivalry between two confraternities that long paraded at the same time, each with its own statues, producing an odd duplication effect as well as causing disputes and brawls over the right of way.

In the 18^th century the Processione dei Misteri (Procession of the Mysteries) was organized by the confraternity “Maria Santissima Della Purificazione” and by the Franciscan Reformanti that let their statues exit the church of Vallisa. However, there was a similar procession in town on Good Friday: it started from the church of San Pietro delle Fosse, near the port, and was arranged by Friars Minor Observants. When the religious order was suppressed in 1809, the confraternity’s statues were moved to the church of San Gregorio, belonging to the Basilica di San Nicola. The two processions continued to compete and, when the parades crossed, they caused such disorder that the Archbishop had to intervene and in 1852 established that the Misteri (Mysteries) of Vallisa would have been taken in procession in even years, whereas the Misteri of San Gregorio in odd years. This archbishop’s order is still effective. Cortone writes:

La processione dei Misteri baresi, oltre che storica, diventa pittoresca e polare nella duplicazione della serie delle statue. (appartenenti alle due gloriose confraternite già citate), che dopo un lungo periodo di conflitti e tensioni sull’ordine delle precedenze, attualmente “escono” ad anni alternati dalle rispettive chiese […].

Ad esse è stato affibbiato dal popolino una duplice denominazione di chiangeaminue (“piagnoni”, quelli della Vallisa) e venduluse (“ventosi”, quelli di S. Gregorio), capaci cioè di sollevare vento o scrosci di pioggia in occasione della loro uscita. (N. Cortone, Passione per una settimana, in Bari Vecchia. Percorsi e segni della storia.)

While a sleepless night was required to take part in Molfetta procession, the traveler should be in shape to follow Bari procession, since it is the longest in Puglia, together with the one in Taranto. The statues cover various parts of the city, from the old town to Libertà district, behind the promenade, for fifteen hours.

Many scholars, anthropologists and historians have focused on the Holy Week processions: one of the best known in the region is definitely the «solenne e notturna» procession of the incappucciati (hooded figures) in Taranto, the next stop of the Passion itinerary. We deemed right and proper that a writer from Taranto should be our guide, the young intellectual Alessandro Leogrande, dead prematurely. He devoted a chapter of his report on Taranto, Dalle Macerie. Cronache sul fronte meridionale, to the Processione dei Misteri (Procession of the Mysteries). Hence, his words can lead us to the town alleys while the procession parades.

Leogrande describes it as follows:

Una decina di statue raffiguranti i momenti della Passione dondolano nella notte sorrette da uomini. Sono statue scolpite nel legno secoli addietro, i loro colori sono accesi, i loro volti rotondi, sofferenti. […]

Tra l’una e l’altra ci sono le coppie di Perdoni, cioè coppie di confratelli incappucciati che precedono a piedi scalzi sull’asfalto con la stessa lentezza con cui avanzano i gruppi che sorreggono le statue. Sembrano danzare. Ondeggiano con movimenti appena percettibili, da sinistra a destra, da destra a sinistra, sospingendosi ogni volta di qualche centimetro in avanti. Il verbo preciso è nazzicare, la loro camminata si chiama nazzicata.

In fondo, la banda musicale suona marce funebri che paiono una lunga nenia, mentre ai lati della strada un carnaio umano variamente assortito piange, ride, prega, scatta foto, osserva attentamente, sfiora sensualmente il corteo che si snoda per le strade della città.

È la Processione dei Misteri di Taranto. Esce ogni anno dalla chiesa del Carmine nel primo pomeriggio del Venerdì Santo e vi farà ritorno solo nella tarda mattinata del giorno successivo. Insieme alla processione gemella, quella dell’Addolorata, che esce il giovedì notte dal portone di San Domenico e vi fa ritorno il venerdì all’ora di pranzo, costituisce un pezzo di Sud barocco, sopravvissuto allo scorrere dei secoli e conficcato nella nostra modernità. […]

[…] tra le due Processioni c’è un’enorme differenza: quella dell’Addolorata si snoda tra i vicoli della città vecchia e approda nella città moderna solo per poche centinaia di metri;

mentre quella dei Misteri, benché sia nata nella medesima isola, si è poi spostata interamente nella città nuova.

Se nella prima la coincidenza tra luogo e rito appare perfetta, nella seconda lo stridore è molto forte. Si fa evidente soprattutto nelle prime ore, quando accanto alla Processione dei Misteri c’è la Diretta Televisiva della Processione dei Misteri, e c’è talmente tanta gente in strada che il percorso è transennato. Quando le telecamere si spengono, la gente si dirada e la gran parte dei tarantini va a dormire dopo aver sgranocchiato lupini o panzerotti con la mozzarella e il pomodoro, a “fare” la processione rimangono solo i Perdoni, i loro confratelli, pochi famigliari e qualche fedele con un cero acceso in mano.

[…] Un senso di morte e disperazione sembra salire dalle viscere della città. […] Il passato rimosso della città sgorga fuori all’improvviso, e con esso i suoi fantasmi, le sue inquietudini, la richiesta ancestrale di una grazia o di un miracolo, mentre in lontananza le ciminiere dell’Ilva illuminano la notte e le onde del mare rimescolano l’acqua nel golfo. (A. Leogrande, Dalle Macerie. Cronache dal fronte meridionale)

Taranto, Processione dei Misteri (Procession of the Mysteries), Ecce Homo

These events, which attract the crowds to Apulian town for days, are not free from contradictions: the original religious and educational value on which the shows – demanded by the post-Tridentine ecclesiastical hierarchy – were grounded, has now reduced. While some believers consider Easter processions as a key moment in their religious sensibility, many people now perceive them as a custom event, an opportunity to eat typical food or merely to attend a show neglecting its deep meaning. The anthropologist Emanuela Angiuli writes:

I visi delle statue scomposti dal dolore, i tratti disperati delle Vergini Desolate, la vivezza delle carni piegate ed illividite delle figure del Cristo, non sono semplici prodotti di abilità artistiche, ma referenti puntuali, segni di un’apocalisse precipita nella storia culturalmente controllata, nella quale gli “umili” entrano ed escono indossando gli abiti della penitenza, con la testa coperta di spine, le spalle schiacciate dal peso delle croci, in una sequenza di quadri in cui i protagonisti vivono la morte della propria condizione di sfruttati e subalterni. (E. Angiuli, La Pasqua, in Viaggio in provincia)

The discordant ambiguity of these events highlighted by Alessandro Leogrande in the Processione dei Misteri description takes a more dramatic tone in another book he wrote, published in 2011, Il Naufragio, which is about the tragedy of the ship Kater i Rades, full of migrants, that sank in the Strait of Otranto just on Good Friday night, a deadly Friday, while the Procession of the Mysteries paraded in Taranto:

La folla segue la processione dei Misteri, […]. Stipato tra la folla il Capitano Fusco si ritrova a fissare la statua chiamata “Ecce Homo”: un Cristo triste con la corona di spine posta sulla testa insanguinata e una pezza rossa intorno al corpo nudo. Osserva i suoi occhi. Guardano verso il basso. Più che di dolore sono carichi di stupore. Quell’uomo, scolpito nel legno tre o quattro secoli prima, non sta provando compassione per il mondo, ma stupore. Una profonda meraviglia, velata di tristezza, per la violenza, il non senso, l’indifferenza, l’ignavia, l’impossibilità di raddrizzare le cose. Quel Cristo dai lineamenti popolari sembra un innocente piombato improvvisamente in mezzo a una mattanza. Lo dicono i suoi occhi. Pensa e ripensa questa idea che gli è balenata in testa: un agnello in mezzo alla mattanza. Ma poi si distrae, è infastidito dai flash, dalle urla, dalle risate di un uomo grasso con in mano un pezzo di focaccia al pomodoro che gronda olio da tutte le parti.

Questa processione non ha niente di religioso, pensa. È tutto fuorché un evento religioso. È fatta di urla, non di silenzio. Di sovraesposizione, non di riflessione. Così si allontana e si dirige verso la macchina… (A. Leogrande, Il Naufragio)

Let’s leave Puglia, with its processions and rituals and continue the Passion Itinerary in Greece, in the Ionian Islands, to take part in the celebration of Orthodox Easter. If the traveler is lucky, the dates will not overlap. In fact, the Orthodox kalendar is different from the Catholic one. Hence, Easter is celebrated in Greece after the Latin festivities. Determining the date of Easter day was one of the main worries for Early Middle Ages ecclesiastical intellectuals, considering that complex secular calendars, called tabulae paschales, were elaborated in order to facilitate the determination of Easter day.

The difference between the Catholic and Orthodox dates lies in the adoption of the Gregorian calendar in the West, whereas in the Orthodox context the Julian calendar remained effective.

Easter is definitely the most important feast day of the year in Greek religion, in which Byzantine mysticism combines with purely insular folklore. In particular, Corfu island is famous for the events that enliven every village, making this period of the year one of the best moments for the town secret discovery, provided that you like confusion.

The great Sicilian writer and anthropologist, Giuseppe Pitrè, one of the leading folklore experts, has devoted a paragraph of his monumental book Archivio per lo studio delle tradizioni popolari, published in 1899, to Corfu Easter. The paragraph title is Usi pasquali nell’isola di Corfù, and the feast is described as follows:

La più graziosa delle città elleniche è senza dubbio Corfù. Tra gli usi pasquali tuttora in vigore i più caratteristici sono i seguenti: al momento di sciogliere le campane il Sabato Santo, si gettano dalle finestre gli utensili rotti conservati in casa durante l’anno, cosicché per qualche minuto è pericoloso trovarsi fuori di casa. Vetri, stoviglie volano per l’aria e con fracasso ingombrano il suolo. Quei buoni isolani dicono di cacciare tutta quella robaccia poco gradita dietro a Giuda in segno di disprezzo.

Altra usanza è quella degli spari. Questa dura dal mezzogiorno del Sabato Santo a quello della Domenica di Pasqua. È un bombardamento non interrotto.

Rivoltelle, vecchi fucili e pistole, mortai, tutto viene posto in opera.

Caratteristica quanto mai la processione nel Castello alla mezzanotte del Sabato Santo. La ricchezza degli apparati, l’intervento della truppa e delle autorità, l’ora e le fiaccolate multicolori, danno alla funzione un’aria affatto speciale. Tipica e commovente pei sensi che nasconde la veglia che si fa con l’agnellino la notte del Sabato santo. Al mattino della Domenica di Pasqua ogni casa sgozza sul limitare il suo agnellino. Il sangue scorre per le vie, e col sangue stesso ancora caldo si disegnano croci sugli usci e sulle pareti. (G. Pitrè, Archivio per lo studio delle tradizioni popolari.)

Corfu, Saint Spyridon procession on Palm Sunday

During our stop in Corfu we may discover what has changed and how enduring certain traditions are, more than one century after the Sicilian writer’s study.

The ritual celebrations start on Saturday preceding Palm Sunday. This day is celebrated in memory of the miracle that restored Lazarus of Bethany to life, with traditional songs performed by choirs coming from all island’s villages. The girls, wearing traditional clothes, go round the houses and chant songs called kalanda of Lazarus. On this occasion, people eat typical biscuits called koulorakia or Lazzarakia, since their shape recalls that of Lazarus’ body wrapped up in the shroud.

On Palm Sunday, in a town decorated in red, as purple cloths are hung on every balcony, the relics of the patron saint, Saint Spyridon, are taken in procession, followed by a joyful crowd of believers and the eighteen Philharmonic Orchestras of the island. This habit has recurred every year since 1629 when, according to hagiographic legend, Agios Spyridon freed the island from the terrible plague. Besides being an extremely fascinating event, which ends with music concerts in the old town, it is also one of the only four circumstances in which it is possible to see the saint’s relics through Corfu alleys. The English writer Lawrence Durrell, genuinely fond of the island, where he lived for several years, wrote that Saint Spyridon and Corfu nearly identify with each other, since they are closely linked: “The island is really the Saint: and the Saint is the island”. The writer describes this procession as follows:

The saint lies quite composed in his casket. He is a mummy, a small dried-up anatomy, whose tiny feet (clad in embroidered slippers) protrude from a vent at the bottom of his sarcophagus. […]

Four times a year is the Saint’s casket borne on triumphal procession round the town; while on Christmas Eve and at Easter he is placed on a throne in the church and accessible to all comers. But the processions are something more than empty form. From early morning the streets are crowded with the gay scarves and headchiefs of peasants from outlying districts who have come in to attend the service; every square is alive with hucksters’ stalls selling nuts, ginger-beer, sweetmeats, carpet-strips, buttons, lemonade, penholders, bootlaces, toothpicks, lucky charms, ikons, wood carving, candles, soap and religious objects.[…].

The procession is led by the religious novices clad in blue cassocks and carrying gilt Venetian lanterns on long poles; they are followed by banners, heavy and tasselled, and rows of candles crowned with gold and trailing streamers. The huge pieces of wax are carried in a leather baldric – slung, as it were, at the hip. After them comes the town band – or rather the two municipal bands, bellowing and blasting, with brave brass helmets of a fire-brigade pattern, glittering with white plumes. Now troops in open order follow, backed by the first rows of priest in their stove pipe hats, each wearing a robe of unique colour and design – brocade of roses, maize, corn. grass-green, kingcup-yellow. It is like a flower bed moving. At last the archbishop appears in all is pomp, and since he is the signal for the Saint to appear, all hands begin to make the sign of the cross and all lips lo move in prayer. The Saint is borne by six sailors under an old canopy of crimson and gold, supported by six silver poles and flanked by six priests. He is carried in a sort of sedan-chair, and through the screen his face appears to be more than ever remote, determined, and misanthropic. (L. Durrell, Propero’s Cell. A guide to the landscape and manners of the island of Corfu)

As in Italy, the most heartfelt day in the Holy Week is Friday, the Passion day, also called Epitaph Friday, namely the day of Sepolcri. All over the island, every church takes its own Epitaph in procession, in a flower-adorned canopy. The faithful follow their parish Epitaph emulating the rhythm of the sad funeral marches played by music bands.

On the following day, Holy Saturday, the earthquake after Jesus’ death – as told in the Gospels – is performed in the church of Kyra Panagia Faneromeni, in Agiou Spyridonos square, on early morning; the faithful beat the pews creating such a noise that the church seems to shake.

Later, the patron saint – Spyridon – parades through Corfu streets again with his sepulcher, in memory of the ban imposed by the Venetians on taking Epitaphs in procession on Good Friday.

The most colorful and typical time of Orthodox Easter in the island is 11 in the morning, namely the start of the show in which botides are smashed.

Big terracotta vases, painted red, are thrown in the street from the old town balconies, and smash into a thousand pieces. The origin of this custom, linked by Giuseppe Pitrè to the popular will to drive Jude away, according to other scholars recalls the Venetian tradition of throwing old objects from the windows at New Year.

At late night, just before midnight, the Resurrection is finally celebrated and the island sky is lit up with fireworks. The faithful sing joyful songs, following the music played by philharmonic bands, and wish each other a Happy Easter using the traditional formula Χριστός ανέστη (Jesus has risen).

In the villages the custom of sacrificing the Easter lamb and marking the house doors with its blood is still alive. This tradition probably recalls the period when, as Franco Cardini writes, “in un ormai lontano plenilunio di primavera, […] il sangue dell’agnello sacrificato protesse le case degli Ebrei dal passaggio dell’Angelo”. The Book of Exodus narrates that, before Israelites’ deliverance from slavery in Egypt, an angel sent by God would have hit every Egyptian firstborn and saved Israelites, who marked their doors with the blood of a sacrificed lamb, as ordered by Moses complying with God’s will: “[…] quand’io vedrò il sangue, passerò oltre, e non vi sarà piaga su di voi per distruggervi, quando colpirò il paese d’Egitto”. The lamb, a victim in the Exodus and king in the Apocalypse, is still one of the most powerful Catholic and Orthodox symbols of Easter. Resurrection Sunday is the day of food, when Corfu people, after Lent fast, enjoy rich meals of lamb and goat meat.

If Easter festivities take solemn and spectacular tones in Corfu, in the other Ionian Islands the traveler may have a more intimate and less social experience. Hence, we have chosen Lefkada as the last stop of our itinerary. With its white cliffs, famous for the poet Sappho’s suicide on account of her love, the island, which is still outside mass tourism routes, is a place where life has a slow and natural pace and Easter is the most important event of the year. The rituals take place all over the Holy Week, when the villages are adorned, the houses are painted white and the streets are cleaned. Godfathers and godmothers give their godchildren new and white clothes, along with an Easter candle. On Holy Thursday women paint the eggs red and on Good Friday the parade of Epitaphs takes place. On Saturday at midnight the faithful’s candles are lit up and a cross is drawn on the house doors by their smoke, while the bells ring and the fireworks explode in the sky with their colors. On Sunday the Agàpi ceremony takes place: the Greek word refers either to love in its divine and Platonic dimension or to holy libations. In fact, after reading the Gospel in twelve different languages, an extremely rich meal of roasted lamb meat and honey cakes is enjoyed.

The traveler who has taken this itinerary may symbolically join the Easter banquet. After going through the Passion days, with dramatic ritual processions, Sacre Rappresentazioni, and litanies, time for joy and rebirth as well as our time for return has come. Our itinerary, which ends here, has led us to visit wonderful places and also to discover old Mediterranean traditions related to our religion Gospel events and to man’s nature: over millennia men, with their own contradictions, have turned their fears and sufferings into rites and celebrated their divinities and great nature’s cycles.

The routes to Arcadia

BARI, CORFU: Pontikonisi, Benitses, ITHACA:Vathy, Anogi

Itinerary – The routes to Arcadia

This itinerary suggests a journey across Puglia and Ionian Greece following in the footsteps of Lalla Romano and Emilio Cecchi. The title is derived from Cecchi’s travel journal Et in Arcadia ego and Vincenzo Consolo’s essay on Lalla Romano Et in Arcadia Lalla.

In Spring 1934 Cecchi had traveled with his son across the Ionian Islands and the Peloponnese, reaching Crete. That experience gave birth to a book published in 1936, whose single chapters had already been published as reportage articles.

Greece as perceived by Cecchi is a land where mythological past and present coexist. The author captures its features through his writing, in which the poetic and elegiac tone that connotes the description of landscapes and monuments sometimes becomes ironic and derisive when he portrays the ‘ugly’ neo-Hellenic style or modern building, which had already started to corrupt Greek towns, firstly Athens. Arcadia, recalled in the title of his book, becomes the symbolic destination where we may retrace not only the universal features of Greek culture, but also ourselves. Similarly, Lalla Romano in her Diario di Grecia – the account of a short eight-day trip with her husband, made at Easter in 1957 (first published in 1960 and, in a longer version, in 1974) describes literary and mythological Greece enlivened by her own childhood memories and by the continuing quest for truth, hence the trip «si concretizza così in un’esperienza di attualizzazione di un mito lontano» (G. Dell’Aquila, L’Adriatico di Lalla Romano) becoming as universal as intimate.

Emilio Cecchi and Lalla Romano will thus become the literary guides of this itinerary, inviting us to experience this journey as a quest for our personal corner of Arcadia.

The itinerary starts with Lalla Romano on a train that led her from Milan to Brindisi, where she sailed for Greece aboard a ship called Angelika.

The traveler who goes through Puglia by train today may enjoy the writer’s landscape descriptions and imagine being in an old wagon, which certainly lacks the comforts now offered by high-speed trains, but have a particular fascination that Lalla Romano expresses in the following words:

Il treno è foderato internamente in cuoio scuro, impresso a disegni floreali.

- È di prima della guerra, – dice Stefano.

Prima dell’altra guerra! Quando c’era quell’eleganza ambigua (ma forse ogni eleganza lo è) che ha intravveduto nella nebbia dell’infanzia chi è nato prima del ’14.

Il nostro scompartimento è angusto, ammobiliato, vestito; tempestato di borchie, ganci, rampini lucidi di ottone. Anche la scaletta mobile, ridicolmente piccola, è interamente rivestita di panno blu a disegni.

[…] Accanto al lavabo c’è una saponetta verde piccolissima.

Continuo la perlustrazione. Apro lo sportellino in basso, e ne estraggo la coppa di maiolica. Ha un lunghissimo labbro, un lunghissimo manico: sembra uno strano animale o fiore esotico.

La rinfilo, e sale dal basso il vento e il rombo delle rotaie. La custodia in cui la coppa si incastra ha la sua forma precisa ed è rivestita di panno come gli astucci dei gioielli. (L. Romano, Diario di Grecia)

What remains unchanged on a train journey along the Apulian coast, either on an early 20th-century train or a state-of-the-art one, is the beauty of landscapes that rapidly alternate as seen from the windows: a series of sudden visions, from Gargano to Bari, that Lalla Romano captures and returns as quick sketches, outlined through the region colors rather than in words.

She writes:

Ogni campagna intravveduta all’alba dal buio e dal chiuso di un treno è una apparizione di purezza: esangue, fredda. Ma l’alba del Sud è calda, più che non sia nei nostri paesi l’aurora. Una dolcezza d’Oriente è in quell’aria, d’oro verde sono le foglie nuove della vite e del fico.

È la Puglia. Il monte Gargano già si allontana, di un azzurro poco più intenso del cielo. Si distingue ancora il profilo da cittadella crociata di Monte Sant’Angelo e la falcatura luminosa, celeste, del golfo di Manfredonia.

Trani. Cerco con gli occhi, riesco a vedere – alta, bianca – una fronte del Duomo, volta a guardare lontano sul mare.

Il treno si è fermato. La nettezza marina è nell’aria tra le case bianche. […]

In Puglia vedo i primi papaveri. Radi frammezzo ad altri fiori selvatici, di un rosso più intenso dei nostri; non solo di quelli chiari di montagna, anche di quelli emiliani, accesi, che ho visto infuocare intere distese di campi. Questi hanno un colore prezioso: non sensuale, mistico.

Le strade tra i campi, profilate dai muretti a secco di pietre tonde, bianche, sono polverose: strade buone a percorrersi a piedi scalzi o a dorso di mulo, al massimo in biroccio.

Nel mezzo di un campo, ogni tanto, una costruzione conica di pietra, un rozzo trullo non imbiancato: embrionale cupola, affine alle antiche tombe o tesori. (L. Romano, Diario di Grecia)

Bari Vecchia, Piazza Ferrarese

Along with the writer, we may get off the train in Bari and enjoy the first stop of our journey.

Just outside the station, the town reveals itself in its modern and 19^th-century appearance, that of the Murat district, an organized series of wide bourgeois streets and elegant boulevards that form a geometric grid which is totally different from and almost juxtaposed to the confused Mediterranean pattern made up of alleys and passageways that connote the old town. It is here that we are quickly heading, together with Lalla Romano, leaving the modern town behind: “troppo occidentale, «milanese», per la nostra ansia di Oriente”.

After running through Via Sparano and Corso Vittorio Emanuele, almost seamlessly, we may see Piazza Ferrarese, a real introduction to Bari Vecchia. Lalla Romano perceived it as “una piazza, lunga, ampia, calma”. She said: “Mi riesce familiare – a me provinciale – quasi l’avessi davvero attraversata, tanti anni fa, un giorno di passeggiata scolastica, ‘in fila’”.

The square, which today is one of the spots of Bari nightlife, is named after a merchant from Ferrara, who lived and made his fortune in Bari in the 17^th century. It is still possible to see the pavement of the Roman road Via Appia-Traiana, which passed exactly through this part of the town in the past. On the left there is the Sala Murat, which hosts contemporary art exhibitions and, slightly farther, we may see the apsis area of a small church, called Vallisa, dating back to the 11^thcentury. This place, today a diocesan auditorium, was the church of the Ravello and Amalfi merchant communities that were in town in the Middle Ages.

To the right of the square, there is the building that once was the old city fish market.

Piazza Ferrarese has always been the elegant entrance to the old town, which introduces the traveler to its heart, full of surprises, through alleys, passageways, and squares.

Hence, looking for the authenticity of Bari, we may follow the writer:

Penetriamo, per vicoli, nella città vecchia; viva e insieme remota, piena di infanzia.

We have just reached Piazza Federico II, framed by the two architectural and symbolic poles of the town, the Castello Svevo and the Cathedral of San Sabino at a distance, dedicated to the Virgin Hodegetria. We suggest the traveler visit these two town monuments before continuing his/her walk.

Behind the Cathedral, the intricate maze of Bari Vecchia alleys opens, recalling Mid-Eastern towns. Here people live in the extremely white and clean streets, where children play and adults do their daily tasks; improvised shops alternate with stalls, where women make fresh local pasta by hands worn out by experience. We recommend stopping by the alley now known as ‘strada delle orecchiette’, in Via Arco Basso, where the old town housewives, sitting next to each other on the doorstep, make and wrap up orecchiette, one of the Bari gastronomic delights.

The lively old town alleys attracted Lalla Romano’s attention: she was in Bari at Easter and could see the bakers’ shop windows full of typical products, as scarcelle and Easter taralli, also called occhi di Santa Lucia.

She writes:

Le strade sono così piccole che noi abbiamo l’impressione di essere giganti; tanto più che esse sono formicolanti di bambini piccoli, i quali ne portano in collo altri piccolissimi.

Qualcuno è incantato davanti a una vetrina; vetrina di panettiere, che espone ovetti per l’imminente Pasqua. Uova col guscio fissate a un disco di pasta che le attraversa. […]

Vi è povertà in queste strade, anzi, miseria; ma è miseria bianca, non nera. Le case sono tutte intonacate di fresco, candide.

Ai crocicchi, tavolinetti espongono mercanzia minuscola, quasi inesistente, uguale a quella con cui si giocava da bambine «a vendere»: boccette, polverine, qualche pizzico di semi. (L. Romano, Diario di Grecia)

The visit shall end in the most symbolically important place in Bari Vecchia, the square where the imposing and beautiful Romanesque Basilica di San Nicola stands out.

Romano described the meeting with the lively people crowding around the church in these words:

San Nicola, circondato di spazio, è immenso. Fa pensare a un Medioevo luminoso.

Dentro, monaci fraseggiano dal coro. Sopraggiungono anche qui bambini, entrano coi fratellini incollo, li fanno sedere, additano loro i monaci: li portano in chiesa per tenerli buoni.

Fuori, altri bambini corrono, si radunano cheti, ripartono chiassosi. Su un parapetto uno piccolo, di un anno al massimo, già sicuro corre sui piedini nudi e ogni tanto, invece di cadere, fa un piegamento e poggia le palme davanti ai piedi, il culino in aria, nudo. (L. Romano, Diario di Grecia)

For centuries the Basilica that is reflected in the Adriatic Sea was a landmark for sailors, pilgrims and travelers heading towards or coming back from the East, who immediately faced its shape when approaching the port. Lalla Romano perceives the sea that flows through Bari Vecchia, nearly lapping around the basilica foundations, as a prelude to a forthcoming journey. She wrote: “Andiamo a guardare il mare. È celeste e luccica, presagio di favolosi viaggi”.

The writer’s morning in Bari ends here and the traveler may follow her while she crosses the Murat district again, returning to the station, and stops in front of Laterza bookshop in Via Sparano:

Riattraversiamo la città nuova, così milanese c’è perfino «il Motta».

Lunga la via centrale Stefano mi mostra a dito l’insegna di un negozio. Leggo: G. Laterza e Figli. Dio mio! Come ho potuto scordarmene? Le edizioni Laterza sono state il latte, per noi. Vagheggiate, centellinate nelle biblioteche al tempo dell’adolescenza squattrinata, poi i primi gelosi acquisti: l’Estetica di Croce, la Nascita della tragedia.

Attraversiamo la strada, con la reverenza e la curiosità del caso. La vetrina è piena di Santi. Di statuine della Madonna del sacro Cuore. Dunque tradimento è l’anima del commercio! Ecco una buona signora col suo ragazzetto, vanno ad acquistare da Laterza un catechismo o una Piccola Filotea.

Giriamo l’angolo, e nelle vetrine di là i veri Laterza stanno allineati, distanziati signorilmente, nel sottile rarefatto silenzio del pensiero laico. (L. Romano, Diario di Grecia)

Today the Motta café mentioned by the writer, which was a pre-dinner point of reference for Bari people on Sundays for several years, no longer exists, but it is still possible to enter the historic bookshop and publishing house Laterza in Via Sparano. Laterza enlivened Bari cultural life for over a century, but now the shop windows that excited Romano, grown up reading the books edited by these southern publishers, are reduced and pressed against the sparkling windows of prestigious clothing brands that took over part of its premises.

After leaving Bari, the writer will catch a train to Brindisi where she will sail for Greece. Today the traveler may choose to leave directly from Bari port that regularly connects the town with the Ionian Islands.

Now we can enjoy the journey and the view from the cabin to observe Puglia at a distance, which in the eyes of the writer “pare già una memoria”, with a sort of “sua malinconia occidentale”. She writes:

Il mare, calmo, è esso stesso elemento del silenzio, è uno spazio incorporeo, una eterea pianura che introduce a un viaggio al di là del tempo. […]

Ci stacchiamo dall’Italia.

Un tremito, un trapestio profondo, sussulti: la nave si muove. Ci troviamo nel salone di poppa e le vibrazioni, l’incipiente rullio sono sensibili, eccitanti.

Lo scenario dietro le vetrate si sposta: l’alta città murata, grigio-rosa, scivola all’indietro, s’inclina di sbieco, si allontana.

La nave raggiunge e supera un favoloso castello svevo ormai cupo, notturno, sul mare ancora chiaro, si scioglie dagli abbracci, dai lunghi tentacoli dell’immenso porto e scivola via nel crepuscolo.

A mano a mano che la nave si immerge nella solitudine delle acque e della notte, provo uno sgomento e insieme un’esaltazione: come se avessimo iniziato un viaggio supremo, verso una beatitudine difficile e incorporea. (L. Romano, Diario di Grecia)

The ship landed in Corfu on 18 April 1957 in the morning. The island appeared to the writer in the morning light and her imagination was soon attracted by the Old and New Venetian Fortress, which trace and protect its coasts. She described them as follows:

Si profila una fortezza grigia e verde, a forti spalti, a zone dirupate, erbose: una fortezza antica, in abbandono. Ci devono essere sentieri costeggianti le mura, per le passeggiate domenicali delle famiglie; fossati e cunicoli per i giochi dei ragazzi, prati per le greggi e i loro pastori. Come nella fortezza che Redburn-Melville salutò salpando da New York.

Nel punto dove attracchiamo, abbiamo di faccia un’altra fortezza, meno antica ma non meno solitaria e dormente.

Ventosa, la vasta banchina è chiusa in fondo da un viale di tozzi platani come una piazza di paese. Vicino a riva, bancarelle di paccottiglia: minime anforette rosse e nere, rosari turchi di ambra gialla.

Autobus e jeeps ci porteranno a visitare l’isola. (L. Romano, Diario di Grecia)

Also Emilio Cecchi, a sophisticated traveler and polished writer, arrived in Corfu in the morning about twenty years earlier, in 1934, and he told about that experience in the first pages of his book Et in Arcadia Ego:

È assai bello arrivare in un’isola ancora addormentata, e con appena qualche pagliuzza di sole in cima ai monti. Così dormiva Corfù. E dal molo appressandoci alle abitazioni, e forse a motivo di quelle persiane abbassate alle finestre sulla marina, si aveva un senso come a giungere di sorpresa, clandestinamente. […]

Nelle stradette era il silenzio della città che ha fatto tardi la notte fumando e chiacchierando; un odorino di cicche che macerassero nella guazza: lo stesso umido tanfo che all’alba si sente nei caffè appena aperti […]. Deserto era anche lo spiazzo del mercato, con intorno sbilenche baraccucce d’aspetto balneario. Soltanto usciti dall’abitato, e inoltrandoci velocemente nella campagna, si incominciò ad incontrare qualcuno: contadini sul loro asinello, donne che con una corda si tiravano dietro la capra; e accosto ad ogni casa colonica, legato al piuolo, un giovenco, come un monumento votivo.

E più s’andava avanti, più le ragazze e le donne diventavano belle. […]

Erano, queste, mistiche immagini bizantine: le immagini più bizantine che abbia mai veduto fuor che nei musei e nei mosaici. Pallidi i volti, incorniciati di panni neri, gli occhi stellanti, trapunte le vesti composte a pieghe ed angoli simmetrici. E in quell’avvallamento verde e senza sole, sotto la cupola del cielo bianchiccio, stavano con una grazia maestosa ed inutile di pitture bizantine mezzo scancellate. […] (E. Cecchi, Viaggio in Grecia. Et in Arcadia ego.)

We suggest the traveler follow the writer, who is leaving Corfu town center to head for Gastouri village, where Achilleion lies, “la villa della povera Elisabetta d’Austria, poi di Guglielmo II, oggi passata al governo greco”.

The name of this monument, as well as the name “Corfu”, reminds Lalla Romano literary and especially Romantic echoes. The writer recalls:

Corfù. Da bambina mi piaceva ripetere questo nome; e il verso del Pascoli:

nel solingo Achilleo di Corfù

Inutile, adesso, ridurlo a quello che è; per me è ancora bello: pieno di silenzio, e di una lontana musica settecentesca. Ignoravo cosa fosse l’Achilleion, e quando seppi che era stato il rifugio di una regina infelice, il fatto non mi disturbò, ma non aggiunse nulla all’incanto di quel nome. (L. Romano, Diario di Grecia)

With a more disillusioned and sometimes discrediting look, Emilio Cecchi leads us inside this palace with its ostentatiously neoclassical style. Famous for being Empress Sisi’s beloved residence, is still one of the main tourist attraction in the island. Cecchi writes:

Avete voglia a combinare esposizioni retrospettive di vita e costume dell’Ottocento, mettendoci ogni finezza di satira archeologica! Per fare un Achilleion occorsero niente meno che i sedimenti di due Imperi. Il cattivo gusto, la tristezza di due Imperi. A mezza costa. Fra palmette, bambù e viti americane, il prodotto di questa grandiosa collaborazione sta, sbreccato e spaesato, come il relitto di un mondo assolutamente estraneo, come un enorme polipaio lasciato in secco dal mare.

Lievemente, dinanzi alla villa, il giardino discende fino a una terrazza semicircolare, protesa sul panorama con l’aria di un ponte di comando d’una nave ammiraglia. […]

Fra le aiuole, un nudo di Frine, dozzinali frammenti di scavo, bassorilievi di donne scarmigliate e ploranti che vorrebbero sembrar greche, ma il liberty si sente lontano un miglio. Per vialetti e pergole inselvatichiti, s’arriva al ponte di comando, sul quale pavoneggia un altissimo Achille di marmo grigio, stile Thorwaldsen. […]

Presso la villa, altra scultura bavarese del Pelìde, ma questa volta moribondo, e intorno disseminati marmi e bronzi d’Amori, Muse e Lottatori: il più trito repertorio ellenistico che va a gran tiratura sulle cartoline illustrate. (E. Cecchi, Viaggio in Grecia. Et in Arcadia ego.)

We may continue our visit inside Achilleion together with Cecchi:

[…] Finalmente s’entra. C’è di tutto. Divani rococò. Stipi moreschi, intarsiati d’ebano e madreperla. E in bella cornice, scialbe istantanee eseguite dall’imperatore. […]

Quanto ad Elisabetta [Elisabetta II d’Austria, l’imperatrice Sissi], vestigia del suo gusto personale sono nella cappella a pianterreno. E la cappella sembrerebbe quasi romanica, se il catino dietro l’altare non portasse un affresco floreale, se alle pareti non fossero murate riproduzioni di terracotte della Robbia, e i candelieri di ottone e varia suppellettile non provenissero dalle lontananze d’ancor altre civiltà: nel complesso, un bazar triste e meticoloso. […]

Sulle brezze ioniche, Elisabetta ascoltava echi della canzone di Heine. Ma Guglielmo, rimirando Achille, pensava che con pochi ritocchi si poteva benissimo presentarlo come Sigfrido. Böcklin ebbe la prima, primissima idea dell’Isola dei Morti. (E. Cecchi, Viaggio in Grecia. Et in Arcadia ego.)

The writer is ironical about the fictitious and unproven identification of Pontikonisi island with the subject of the painting by the Symbolist artist Böcklin. This place, definitely evocative, is just a high cliff overlooking the sea, surrounded with a small cypress wood, which can be accessed by boat from the port where the Vlacherna Monastery rises. Here Lalla Romano arrived and our itinerary stops off.

From a distance, the white monastery as well seems to the writer an island surrounded by the sea:

Un mare liscio come un lago, e come un lago cinto di colli ondulati vicini e lontani, in una luce specchiante di miraggio, nel sentore amarognolo della primavera. Nel mare due piccole isole, sorprendenti: una bianca e una nera. Quella bianca – bianchissima, di calce – è un convento, ha un campanilino piatto e due campane; è unita alla terra da un pontile di sassi. L’altra, un po’ più indietro, nero-azzurra di cipressi e di pini. Quale sia la più misteriosa, non so.

[…] Il sentiero mi par familiare, uguale a quelli che scendono su Punta Chiappa di Camogli. Ora si vede che oltre al breve pontile dell’isola bianca, a destra corre un lungo molo o gettata di cemento che raggiunge l’altra riva e racchiude così un’ampia laguna.

Mentre trottiamo sul sottile cammino a fior d’acqua verso il convento bizantino, vediamo sfilare lentamente sul molo a lato un asinello col suo basto, e sopra un bambino; dietro ad esso un uomo che si appoggia a un bastone. La povertà e gentilezza «umbra» di quelle figure fa sembrare preziosa la pace del bianco convento.

Quando si entra è diverso. Nell’intimità questa pace è vera. La chiesa, piccola, nera dentro, è per me montanara col suo pavimento di legno, coi suoi ex voto vecchi e naïfs. I quadri sono icone.

Usciamo. Il mare fa specchio. Qui veniva a pregare la regna infelice dell’Achilleion. (L. Romano, Diario di Grecia)

Lalla Romano moves from the small white Orthodox monastery where Empress Sisi prayed to Pontikonisi small island, which, according to ancient legend, besides inspiring Böcklin’s painting – the subject of Cecchi’s irony – was just the Phaeacians’ ship Neptune turned into stone to punish them for helping Odysseus. The writer expresses the emotions and memories evoked by this place in these words:

L’isola nero-boscosa è vicina, pare debba mettersi a navigare, come una nave mimetizzata. È il contrappasso del mito, perché quell’isola è la nave dei Feaci. Mentre risaliamo il sentiero «ligure», incantevoli bambini ci porgono rametti fioriti che odorano fresco, dolce. Bambini scalzi, muti e sorridenti come i nostri di montagna quando sono davanti a forestieri. Sono insistenti come ospiti, non come mendicanti. Non chiedono infatti, offrono. Distribuiamo soldini, soldini greci, fin che ce n’è. Quando non ne abbiamo più ci mettono lo stesso in mano i rametti. (L. Romano, Diario di Grecia)

Together with our literary guides, we may continue our itinerary through Corfu, where the Venetian elegance that connotes architecture and streets harmoniously combines with the Mediterranean East fascination that characterizes orthodox churches and local people habits and customs. Lalla Romano writes:

[…] attraversiamo a piedi la città. Non so se sia veneziana come dicono, certo è occidentale, genovese direi, con le sue case alte, bianche e rosa.

[…] guardo le bottegucce. Si piomba nella più remota infanzia, per chi l’ebbe paesana come me. Bottegucce povere, polverose, buie; per entrare si salgono – o scendono – scalini. Odore di carrube, di canfora; vi si vendono ceri, cartoline, ogni cosa. (L. Romano, Diario di Grecia)

There are places and moments in Corfu that allow you to completely immerse yourself in the harmonious union between Italian, Western, and Latin style and Orthodox culture that connotes the town, as when – for example – a baptism is celebrated in the beautiful Saint Spyridon Church. Emilio Cecchi had the opportunity to witness it and offers the traveler a vivid description, so as he/she can enjoy the atmosphere as well. Let’s enter the church with the writer:

[…] nella chiesa ortodossa di San Spiridione, genti accorrevano vociferando, quasi ci fosse, che so, un tentativo rivoluzionario. Scontrandosi come le formiche, si davano attorno con gialli candelini accesi. Ma poiché nessuno accennava a manomettere le lampade d’oro e d’argento a modello di barca, e d’argento anch’esso il sepolcro del santo, faceva presto a chiarirsi che, nonostante le stride, forse non stava succedendo niente di male.

Era infatti un battesimo. E la ressa e l’entusiasmo dei parenti fino al settimo grado; […] cantando le preci, il prete cercava di soperchiar quegli strilli; ma intanto gli si scioglievano, sulla nuca e le orecchie, crollando sotto la stola, grosse pesanti trecce brune, vere trecce da donna, da donna anzianotta; che a noi, non abituati, vedendole in testa ad uomini, fanno un effetto un po’ discostante. A leggerne negli storici, è così poetica la vita nella chiesa cristiana, i primi decenni dalla vita di Gesù. […] Eppoi , guardandoli meglio, si vede che sono della stessa pasta della gentuccia che popola certe pagine di Aristofane, di Teocrito; ma diventati più gravi, pudichi, eroi. Il senso di questo greco cristianesimo, casalingo, primordiale, è fra le più delicate e commoventi intuizioni che subito s’incontrano dall’altra parte dello Ionio. […]

Dalle pareti di San Spiridione, dorate pitture venezianeggianti (con i fortilizi, i marmi, la lingua, fra le tante nostre testimonianze su queste rive) guardano quella agitazione, quella dolorosa vivacità di stirpi urtate, confuse, consunte, quel disordine che in Corfù già sente di turchesco e carovaniero: guardavano con la serena dignità dell’occhio latino. (E. Cecchi, Viaggio in Grecia. Et in Arcadia ego)

Let’s leave Emilio Cecchi, Saint Spyridon and Corfu, and proceed with our itinerary sailing for Ithaca, together with Lalla Romano.

The crossing to the most Homeric island will offer the traveler incredibly beautiful Mediterranean landscapes, to which the writer could not remain indifferent. She recalls:

Scivoliamo tra isole bianche e petrose, nel sole. Danno un’impressione quasi cruda di nudità.

Forse consiste, l’essere isole, in quella leggerezza di uccello appena posato, e in quell’irremovibilità, insieme, di statue che si debbono aggirare. Appaiono con nostro stupore; con nostro rimpianto dileguano. […] Stiamo costeggiando Itaca, ci dirigiamo verso un porto. Le rive sono vicine. Aspre, montuose, carsiche. Poco sopra l’orlo del mare corre un sentiero che sembra però naturale, non tracciato dall’uomo. Silenzio e deserto. Luce pomeridiana, un poco più calda ma non meno chiara della mattinale. La terra che traspare tra la pietra bianca, è rossa. Lo strano sentiero non è mai stato calpestato, o chissà? (L. Romano, Diario di Grecia)

The arrival at Ithaca aroused in the writer the same emotions that today many travelers feel when they get to this hilly island, where finally Odysseus landed after long vicissitudes and many adventures, as told in the Odyssey. Romano perceives Ithaca as something more than an Ionian Island: not only is it the Homeric hero’s homeland, but to some extent it is the island of every traveler, “è la patria, la casa di tutti”, where we may identify the heart of our civilization and culture. Lalla Romano wrote:

Itaca. Commuove che sia davvero petrosa. Del resto, prima è stata un’isola come le altre, un’isola senza nome; e dopo, la patria di Ulisse. Anzi, la patria, la casa di tutti noi. Non più Itaca di un’altra, dunque. (L. Romano, Diario di Grecia)

The writer starts to ask her guide some information on the places mentioned in the Odyssey:

Il Mitropulos [Mitropulos è il nome fittizio della guida greca di Lalla Romano], interrogato se la città che vediamo sia nel posto di quella di Ulisse, dice che no, che la baia di Ulisse era un’altra e indica una valletta profonda, in ombra e boschiva. – Là, – dice era l’approdo di Ulisse –. Stiamo già passando oltre, ma ho veduto – o sognato di vedere? – un filo di fumo, azzurrino. Eppure la valletta appariva disabitata. Lo straordinario del resto è che esista, intravveduta in qualche parte quaggiù. (L. Romano, Diario di Grecia)

Various hiking trails still lead to true or assumed places connected to Homeric tradition. These paths are not always easy to follow and, ironically, looking for them may become an epic adventure, as for the long distances to be covered mostly on foot and the poor road signs as well. They are clearly legendary sites, on which archaeologists have held opposing views. Aware of this, we suggest the traveler, once arrived in the island par excellence, visit the Fountain of Arethusa. This natural spring, ten kilometers from Vathy – the main center of Ithaca – is the site where in Homer’s narration Eumaeus, Odysseus’ swineherd, took his pigs to drink and met the hero, just landed in the island.

Near Stavròs village in the northern part of the island, among hills covered with olive trees and vines, there are a small archaeological museum and the remains of a palace with Cyclopean walls, today identified with the possible Odysseus’ palace. It is the same palace that the archeologist Heinrich Schliemann, who brought to light Troy’s ruins guided by Homer’s poems, had previously located near Alalkomenés, close to Mount Aetos.

In addition to these sites connoted by mythological and literary charm, Ithaca offers the traveler further attractions: very beautiful natural bays and beaches, the port town of Vathy – the island’s main center – and other small villages, nestled in the hills. Romano wrote:

[…] nella rada ben chiusa dalle colline la nuova Itaca bianca, rosa, piccolo borgo sul mare.

Dopo, guarderò uomini e case. Ora guardo le colline in cerchio. Piene di forza e povere. Dolci. Dolci nelle linee ferme e calme, prive di ogni vaghezza di alberi o prati o coltivi. Qualche albero c’è, a piccoli gruppi, radi, due o tre, anch’essi di natura aspra, non sognante. Non è dolcezza. È ritmo, severo. È un senso, concluso, di unità. (L. Romano, Diario di Grecia)

We suggest the traveler get lost in the villages and hills that excited Lalla Romano. The old capital of Ithaca is certainly worth visiting; it is located 500 meters in height and about fourteen kilometers from Vathy. Here it is possible to admire the ancient church of Panagia with its valuable Byzantine frescoes. Our itinerary ends in this place and we should leave the island at dusk as Lalla Romano did saying goodbye to Ithaca in these words:

Partiamo verso sera. L’isola è più misteriosa, più solitaria. […]

Non c’è spiaggia né scogliera, il mare lambisce la roccia carsica, come se avesse sommerso una valle. Ciò dà l’impressione di un evento recente, in quest’aria senza tempo.

E del resto, perché questo luogo è antico? Immemoriale è la storia dei monti e dei mari, e questo mare non è più antico di un altro.

Ma questa è la Grecia: vale a dire siamo noi, uomini, antichi. (L. Romano, Diario di Grecia)

It is time we took our leave of the traveler and the island sharing the Greek poet Kostantinos Kavafis’ wishes:

[…] Sempre devi avere in mente Itaca –
raggiungerla sia il pensiero costante.
Soprattutto, non affrettare il viaggio;
fa che duri a lungo, per anni, e che da vecchio
metta piede sull’isola, tu, ricco
dei tesori accumulati per strada
senza aspettarti ricchezze da Itaca.
Itaca ti ha dato il bel viaggio,
senza di lei mai ti saresti messo
in viaggio: che cos’altro ti aspetti?

E se la trovi povera, non per questo Itaca ti avrà deluso.
Fatto ormai savio, con tutta la tua esperienza addosso
già tu avrai capito ciò che Itaca vuole significare.

(K. Kavafis, Itaca)

Walking with Sisi

Corfu: Mount Pantokrator, Kanoni, Benitses, Palaiokastritsa, Lakones, Agia Kyriaki, Evropouloi

Itinerary – Walking with Sisi

In this itinerary we suggest the traveler discover the beauties of Corfu, ideally walking next to Empress Elisabeth of Austria, known as Sisi, who deeply loved Greece, especially this island where she spent long holidays in search of that inner peace she seemed to miss at the imperial court of Vienna.

During her stays on the island, the empress loved going on long walks and excursions that the traveler may retrace through the diary pages of her Greek mentor and tutor Constantin Christomanos, who often accompanied her in her journeys. In Christomanos’ pages, the memories of his trips and walks with the empress acquire a fairy-tale dimension, where classical and Homeric echoes coexist with his heightened Romantic sensibility.

We may start our itinerary following the empress’ journey: on 15 March 1892 she left from Pula on the imperial yacht Miramar, sailing for Corfu together with her tutor Constantin. The journey across the Adriatic Sea is quiet – a nearly idyllic moment – as she tells her mentor:

La vita sulla nave è qualcosa di più che un semplice viaggiare. È una vita migliore, più vera. […]. È come trovarsi su un’isola da cui sono banditi tutti i fastidi e i rapporti umani. È una vita ideale, chimicamente pura, cristallizzata, in cui sono assenti i desideri e si perde il senso del tempo. Avere la percezione del tempo è sempre doloroso perché ci trasmette la percezione della vita. […]. La vita sulla nave è molto più bella di qualsiasi sponda. Le mete di un viaggio sono desiderabili soltanto perché tra noi e loro si frappone il viaggio. […] Sapere che devo presto ripartire mi emoziona e mi fa amare qualsiasi luogo. E così, ogni volta, io sotterro un sogno che svanisce troppo in fretta, per inseguirne un altro. (C. Christomanos, Elisabetta d’Austria nei fogli di diario di Constantin Christomanos)

On 17 March, the yacht reached the Ionian Sea and at dawn entered the narrow channel that opens between the northern end of Corfu and the Epirus mountains. The traveler, who still gets to the Ionian Islands by ship through the Adriatic Sea, may admire from the deck the landscape described by Christomanos:

I monti neri come pece, spiccavano sul pallido verde-grigio del cielo. Le rotonde colline rocciose della riva di Corfù erano coperte da una bassa sterpaglia, nera anch’essa, che si disegnava con incerti contorni su quel fondo scuro. Molti di quei cespugli dovevano essere in fiore, poiché di tanto in tanto arrivava alla nave un profumo intenso, come di miele frammisto, frammisto all’odore che esalava dalle rocce bagnate. Là dove le colline assopite erano cinte dal mare spumeggiante, si scorgevano macchie scure che facevano pensare a caverne insondabili. Una fascia appena increspata lambiva quietamente la riva sassosa, quasi la baciasse nel sonno. (C. Christomanos, Elisabetta d’Austria nei fogli di diario di Constantin Christomanos)

Mount Pantokrator catches Sisi’s eye: with its twin peaks that arch, it recalls the stance of a Greek statue. Approaching the island as the morning comes, the traveler, along with the beautiful empress, may observe the mountain tops that start sparkling at dawn, giving the landscape a mythological dimension.

Christomanos writes:

[…] un’atmosfera sovrannaturale fatta di rosea polvere d’oro, nella remota distanza e nel fulgore di una mitica età degli dei. Anche a non saperlo s’intuiva che qui era la patria della «dea dalle dita rosate» e di Febo dai bianchi destrieri. Poi le rose sono cadute sul torso di pietra del Pantokrator. (C. Christomanos, Elisabetta d’Austria nei fogli di diario di Constantin Christomanos)

Guido Reni, Aurora, Casino Pallavicini, Rome

The imperial ship proceeds towards Garitsa bay, a «lingua di terra tutta ricoperta di vegetazione», where during Sisi’s times “come da una cornucopia gli alberi e i fiori si rovesciavano sul litorale; aloe e palme levavano alte le loro chiome nell’azzurro”. Today a delightful promenade runs along this bay and offers a very evocative view that stretches from the Old Venetian Fortress to the lighthouse.

Photograph of Corfu Town R02.jpg: Marc Ryckaert (MJJR)derivative work: ויקיג’אנקי – This file was derived from: Corfu Town R02.jpg:, CC BY 3.0,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=31692771

Following this road, we may easily reach the nice 19^th-century palace Mon Repos. It was built in 1826 with a neoclassical colonial style, as the residence of the British Lord High Commissioner of the Ionian Islands and hosted the empress for at least a year. Sisi used to swim near this spot of the island that she called “giardini di Alcinoo”. Here, there is a natural cave among the rocks that the empress considered her own “grotta di Calipso”.

Let’s continue to follow Sisi’s yacht that, after crossing Garitsa bay, heads for the bay where Pontikonisi island lies. According to an enduring tradition, it is “il porto feacico dove Odisseo s’imbarcò sulla nave veloce per far ritorno ad Itaca” (C. Christomanos, Elisabetta d’Austria nei fogli di diario di Constantin Christomanos).

The empress and her travel companion could not remain indifferent to such an evocative place. He describes it as follows:

Era un angolo appartato, come se facesse parte di un altro mondo, ancora immerso in un pallido sopore sotto un involucro di seta luccicante. Ma in mezzo alle acque assopite si levava un fascio di neri cipressi che cingevano una chiesetta bianca; e dove la rupe che reggeva i cipressi si tuffava nel mare, questo si tingeva di rosso per il riflesso dei rossi gerani. Quell’isola mi sembra il modello dell’Isola dei morti di Böcklin […]. Quei cipressi laggiù somigliano a sogni cupi, e i fiori rossi che si specchiano nell’acqua con i loro riflessi sono sacri a Persefone. (C. Christomanos, Elisabetta d’Austria nei fogli di diario di Constantin Christomanos)

Christomanos was not the only one to identify the Greek islet with the place portrayed by the famous Swiss Symbolist painter. Fantasies as well as literary and artistic echoes proliferated on Pontikonisi, which the Greeks prosaically called “Mouse Island”. Legend has it that the rock is the Phaeacians’ ship Neptune turned into stone as an act of revenge; further, according to others, it could be the islet where William Shakespeare imagined setting The Tempest.

On 17 March 1892 the imperial sloop lands at Benitses bay, near the village of the same name. Today, this pleasant hamlet, fourteen kilometers from Corfu town, is a popular tourist destination and an appreciated seaside resort due to its beautiful pebble and sandy beach. Among the wooded hills surrounding the area, the ruins of an ancient Roman villa are still visible.

Corfu, Achilleion

Author: No machine-readable author provided. Tasos Kessaris assumed (based on copyright claims). – No machine-readable source provided. Own work assumed (based on copyright claims)., CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1173278

Sisi’s residence lies in the southern part of Corfu island, between Benitses and Gastouri, at the top of a hill: it is Achilleion Palace, built at the end of the nineteenth century. The empress went there once landed with her faithful tutor Constantin, who dwells – in his diary – on the description of this Pompeian-style villa, which is a little kitsch today, but still able to attract many tourists thanks to its beautiful gardens and Sisi’s constant appeal.

Christomanos’ pages will lead us through the luxury spaces of this building:

Il palazzo è incassato nella montagna. Il lato anteriore ha tre piani, mentre sul retro vi è un unico piano che dà su un’ampia terrazza a giardino con alberi secolari. La facciata guarda sulla strada maestra che da Corfù porta alla spiaggia di Benizze attraversando il bianco villaggio di Gastouri e passando davanti al castello. Un alto muro bianco e la cortina fronzuta degli ulivi fanno da riparo contro gli sguardi indiscreti. […] Sulla strada si apre un grande cancello di ferro con la scritta «AXIΛΛΕΙON». Una rampa sale dolcemente verso il portico antistante il castello: poderose colonne sostengono l’ampia veranda dei centauri. Il secondo e il terzo piano rientrano in modo da lasciare spazio a due logge, a destra e a sinistra della veranda dei centauri, con la quale comunicano; (C. Christomanos, Elisabetta d’Austria nei fogli di diario di Constantin Christomanos).

Un peristilio accompagna il lato dell’edificio che si apre sul giardino pensile. La parte inferiore delle colonne è colorata di rosso cinabro; i capitelli, dipinti di azzurro e di rosso, con ricche dorature, si stagliano mirabilmente contro la parete retrostante, in rosso pompeiano, nella quale sono affrescati grandi medaglioni che rappresentano leggende classiche […] e paesaggi ispirati all’ Odissea. […] Di fronte a ogni colonna del peristilio è collocata una Musa di marmo, in grandezza naturale, con Apollo Musagete in testa. (C. Christomanos, Elisabetta d’Austria nei fogli di diario di Constantin Christomanos)

The statues – Sisi told to her friend – are supposed to be ancient, bought by Prince Borghese in Rome, who had to “vendere i suoi dèi” in order to avoid bankrupt.

The Achilleion gardens let the traveler enjoy an enchanting view, the same that impressed the empress of Austria. In Christomanos’ pages it is described as follows:

[…] il mare, che sembra quasi salire verso l’orizzonte, disegna sul marmo bianco una linea scura, color vino: una linea tracciata nell’immensità di segreti inespressi, aldilà di ogni comprensione…E ancora più alti si ergono nel pulviscolo dorato i monti violetti dell’Albania. Non lontano una fitta macchia di allori accentua la classicità dell’insieme. (C. Christomanos, Elisabetta d’Austria nei fogli di diario di Constantin Christomanos)

The entire building is centered on the symbolic and decorative subject of the Homeric hero Achilles. One of the empress’ favorite statues portrays dying Pelides. Characterized by a certain Romantic sentimentality and an intensified sculptural quality of the forms, the statue is located on one of the panoramic terraces overlooking the sea.

Elisabeth admits that she had dedicated her palace to the Homeric hero who “personifica l’anima greca, la bellezza del paesaggio e degli uomini. […] La sua volontà era l’unica cosa che avesse sacra. È vissuto solo per i suoi sogni, e per lui il suo dolore valeva più della vita intera”.

Leaving Achilleion, we may follow Sisi and her Greek tutor on an excursion along Corfu west coast, which still boasts the best beaches and villages in the island. On 20 March they headed for Palaiokastritsa, in order to visit a very old monastery that seems to rise in the middle of the sea, on a steep promontory connected to the island by means of a thin strip of land.

In Christomanos’ diary the monastery and the route taken are described in detail and we suggest the traveler follow it, ideally walking with Sisi.

The Greek tutor writes:

Non appena si abbandonano le strade carrozzabili, ci si addentra ogni volta nel sacro bosco di ulivi. Tutta Corfù è un immenso uliveto selvatico che cresce, oggi come secoli e millenni fa, sempre sulle stesse zolle, sempre vicino al respiro del mare. […] Camminavamo nella calda, fremente penombra, in mezzo a tronchi contorti che sembrano avere un’anima, […] d’improvviso, attraverso le fronde tremolanti degli ulivi, abbiamo indovinato un luccichio, ancora più inebriante dell’azzurro del cielo o dello splendore del sole che abbracciava gli alberi: il mare! – l’altro mare, quello occidentale, che non si vede dalla costa feacica dell’isola ma di cui si avverte sempre la vicinanza. Ben presto, da un’altura, lo sguardo si perde su una distesa senza fine, inverosimilmente azzurra, più azzurra del cielo, più azzurra di qualsiasi idea di azzurro, più beata di ogni beatitudine. (C. Christomanos, Elisabetta d’Austria nei fogli di diario di Constantin Christomanos)

Here it is possible to see the Monastery of Palaiokastrìtsa, whose name means “Quella (la madre di Dio dell’antico castello” (…), with reference to the old Byzantine kastron nearby: the Angelokastron, the most western fortress in Corfu.

Christomanos’ narrative proceeds:

Il monastero – un complesso di piccole costruzioni antiche, strette l’una all’altra sotto uno stesso involucro di intonaco bianco e sovrastate da una cupoletta rotonda di tegole, un piccolo cortile lastricato e, infondo a questo la chiesa con la porta spalancata. […] In fondo alla chiesa, un’antichissima iconostasi di legno con la doratura tutta annerita. Davanti alle cupe immagini dei santi, di cui si distinguevano appena gli occhi bianchi in mezzo ai grandi anelli delle aureole, lumini a olio verdi e rossi ardevano dentro lampade d’argento appese a catene. Le loro fiammelle, perdute in un sogno, si affievolivano a tratti per rianimarsi subito dopo. C’era un forte odore di ceri spenti, di vecchio legno tarlato, di polvere e muffa. In nessun altro luogo si aveva così netta l’impressione di essere trascinati indietro nel passato dell’anima. (C. Christomanos, Elisabetta d’Austria nei fogli di diario di Constantin Christomanos)

Let’s leave the monastery and its Byzantine icons behind and continue our itinerary, following Sisi and her travel companion on their trip to Lakones, located on a mountain close to Palaiokastritsa holy building.

In Christomanos’ diary this picturesque village is described as follows:

In alto, verso la metà del pendio rivestito di ulivi e cipressi, abbiamo visto il villaggio di Lakones – quasi un filo di perle bianche –, dietro il quale le rocce salgono ancora, costellate di fiori gialli e viola, a formare delle coppe rotonde come seni nudi. Il villaggio di Lakones è un insieme di povere casupole d’argilla imbiancate a calce e abbarbicate alle rocce come nidi d’uccello saldati tra loro. Sui tetti a terrazza garofani e gerani fiammeggiano dentro cassette di legno; davanti alle porte, tra pilastri segnati dal tempo, stanno accovacciate donne di rara bellezza; qua e là grassi maiali si godono il sole sulla strada; (C. Christomanos, Elisabetta d’Austria nei fogli di diario di Constantin Christomanos)

After having a walk across the roads of this village, which preserved its old authenticity, and a break in its cafés or craft shops, we suggest the traveler another itinerary the empress enjoyed in Corfu.

This path starts in Gastouri village, near Achilleion, and heads for the hill of Agia Kyriaki, “l’unico luogo in cui tutto mi piaccia davvero – Elisabeth tells – qui potrei persino venire meno ai miei princìpi e fermarmi per sempre”. It is a pleasant twenty-minute excursion, with various panoramic spots. At the end of the walk, mostly among lush vegetation, you get to a small chapel built at the top of the hill, where you may enjoy a wonderful view of the island’s eastern coast and the picturesque Pontikonisi.

Finally, we may finish this itinerary across the island places dear to Empress Elisabeth of Austria, by visiting Villa Kapodistrias, which today is a museum dedicated to Ioannis Kapodistrias, a politician and diplomatic who became the first governor of the independent Greek state in 1828. The beautiful residence of the Greek national hero is not far from Corfu town, about ten kilometers from the centre, in a village called Evropouloi.

To get there, Sisi and her faithful tutor Constantin had to walk for hours – as they used to – through orange groves and olive trees. Christomanos writes:

Il mare splendeva nel sole ed era coperto di schiuma. Mugghiava stentoreo, senza riprendere fiato. […] Nella Villa Capodistria – l’antica proprietà del conte Capodistria, che fu il primo reggente greco, una residenza di campagna in stile veneziano, molto segnata dal tempo – ci sono venuti incontro il fattore e sua figlia. Una gigantesca magnolia, carica di calici di un lilla pallido, dava ombra al cortile. Due cipressi montavano la guardia davanti alle persiane verdi di una finestra chiusa. Il giardino era inselvatichito, invaso dalle confuse malinconie di piante avvezze a cure assidue per decenni e ormai lasciate a un solitario rigoglio. Dalla casa in gran parte disabitata, dal cortile col suo acciottolato a mosaico, dal giardino spirava l’ineffabile poesia dell’abbandono. (C. Christomanos, Elisabetta d’Austria nei fogli di diario di Constantin Christomanos)

This garden, which is still one of the main attractions of the Kapodistrias Museum we suggest visiting, has something in common with the melancholy of the beautiful empress, who has become the icon and “simbolo di un mondo condannato”, as E. M. Cioran writes.

Now we may leave this place and say goodbye to Sisi, hoping this itinerary has allowed the traveler to discover “i segreti delle montagne e delle onde […] i legami profondi tra gli uomini e le rose e i sogni” (C. Christomanos, Elisabetta d’Austria nei fogli di diario di Constantin Christomanos), thanks to the walks proposed across this magic island, just as Christomanos did.

The Pilgrim’s Tales

Canosa, Molfetta, Bari, Mottola, Corfu, Kassiopi

Itinerary – The Pilgrim’s Tales

In this itinerary the traveler is invited to ideally hold the pilgrim’s staff or, more secularly, to become a wayfarer, in order to go along the Apulian stretch of the road known as Via Francigena in the South or Via Sacra Longobardorum, rich in history, art and culture. Following the route of an old Roman consular road never completely abandoned, the Via Appia-Traiana, we will get to the region’s port towns, which have always been key embarkation points for pilgrims, Crusaders, Templars or merchants who wanted to reach the fabulous East over the Middle Ages. Following in their footsteps and guided by their stories and travel journals, we will finally head for the Ionian Islands, a nearly necessary step for people who once sailed towards or from the Holy Land or the rich eastern markets.

The itineraries that led from the West to overseas lands, in particular to Jerusalem, have created material, spiritual and cultural paths over time, a system of waterways and overland routes that crossed Europe and the Mediterranean, at the center of which there are just Puglia and the Ionian Islands, with their docks and holy sites.

The itinerary we are about to follow along the southern stretch of the Via Francigena is not only a journey of faith, but one of the main routes of Mediterranean culture; following it, we can discover how nature, history and artistic heritage contribute to make our journey not a single journey, but many, as the polished traveler, literary man and art historian Cesare Brandi wrote. Together with the pilgrims of the past, he will guide us to discover these lands.

We suggest the traveler start his journey in spring, as Medieval pilgrims did:

Quando pioggia d’aprile ha penetrata

l’aridità di marzo e impregnata

ogni radice e vena dell’umore

la cui virtù ravviva ogni foglia e fiore;

e in folto di brughiere e boschi spogli

Zeffiro ingemma teneri germogli

con mite soffio, e metà del corso

il sole nell’Ariete ha già percorso,

e quando gli uccelletti fan concerto

e tengono di notte l’occhio aperto,

così com’essi loro natura inclina,

[…] allor la gente viaggia pellegrina

e vanno a santuari, quei palmieri, in lidi anche remoti e forestieri […]

Geoffrey Chaucer, I racconti di Canterbury, Prologo

Puglia, a long strip of land nestled between the Apennines and the Adriatic Sea, with its 400 km of lands alternating extraordinarily diversified landscapes and architecture and 800 km of swimming coastline, is crossed by a network of roads that intersect the main Via Francigena’s route.

Our itinerary will start going along one of these roads, that leading travelers from Canosa to the Adriatic coastal road. We will reach the coast and stop off in Molfetta to proceed to Bari, a town known for Saint Nicholas’ sanctuary. Finally, before sailing for Greece, we will make a small detour, as Medieval pilgrims did when they got to the Apulian coast through the Via per compendium, which connected Taranto to Brindisi. This route, reported in the oldest itineraries, will allow us to visit the rock sanctuaries located along the ravines that connote this area.

Ancient pilgrims and modern travelers are impressed by the natural beauty of this land, more than by its artistic heritage and monuments; Cesare Brandi, during his pilgrimage in Puglia, describes it as follows:

La Puglia è un meraviglioso, austero, paese arcaico. L’unico dove si assiste ancora allo spettacolo incontaminato, e per interminabili distese, di una flora anteriore alla calata degli indeuropei: solo ulivi e viti, viti e ulivi, le piante che nel nome, tenacemente conservato e trasmesso, rivelano ancora di essere state trovate sul posto dagli invasori ariani (C. Brandi, Pellegrino di Puglia).

As the 20^th-century polished wayfarer, many Medieval pilgrims praised the Apulian landscape. Two educated Flemish noblemen, Giovanni and Anselmo Adorno, who landed in this region in the 15^thcentury coming back from the Holy Land, wrote in their fascinating travel journal that they had never seen such a fertile land or such beautiful olive groves:

La Puglia o Apulia […] credo che sia la più fertile al mondo per la produzione di olio e di grano. Produce in abbondanza anche dell’eccellente vino, […] ci sono boschi di ulivi, che è piacevole attraversare. È possibile altrove, come in Siria, in Barberia, vedere boschi di ulivi, tuttavia questi ci sono sembrati più piacevoli a guardarli e più grandi. (A. Adorno, Itinéraire d’Anselme Adorno en Terre Sainte)

The green of olive trees and vines and the gold of wheat will accompany us in our journey along the road that, between the end of the 11^th century and the beginning of the 12^th century, will become the preferred itinerary not only by pilgrims, but also by the Crusaders who had to sail for the Holy Land. One of these Crusaders was Prince Bohemond, who sincerely loved Puglia, in particular Canosa, the first stop of our itinerary.

An important town in Roman times, thanks to its proximity to the river Ofanto and its strategic location at the intersection between the roads coming from the Apennines and Puglia, it became the heart of Norman power and the seat of a prestigious diocese. Just in this town we can visit the mausoleum – whose shapes are inspired by the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem and Islamic architecture – commissioned by Bohemond next to the Cathedral (The Cathedral of Canosa).

The Norman prince, son of Robert Guiscard, had participated in the occupation of Antioch becoming its ruler and spent an adventurous life, rich in love, kidnappings and conquests that made him stay in the East for many years before returning to Puglia.

(“File:Paolo Monti – Servizio fotografico (Canosa di Puglia, 1970) – BEIC 6358124.jpg” by Federico Leva (BEIC) is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0 )

Cesare Brandi, whose literary and artistic pilgrimage stopped off in Canosa, may tell us something more about the prince and guide us to know this unusual 12^th-century monument with marble walls that are externally decorated with a light succession of blind arches. Rather than a funeral monument, it seems a precious casket or reliquary, as those the pilgrims took back home from the East.

Come s’arriva là davanti, e sembra un cofanetto d’avorio, si penserebbe piuttosto alla cappella privata o alla tomba di una possente gentildonna sul tipo di Galla Placidia o a un marabutto arabo, mai al ricettacolo del più straordinario personaggio della Prima Crociata, a quel colosso di nome e di fatto che fu Boemondo, il figlio di Roberto il Guiscardo. Orlando fra i Paladini, e, nella Prima Crociata, Goffredo di Buglione e Tancredi, sono riusciti a sopravvivere per merito della Poesia. A Boemondo che, al suo tempo, fu di tutti il più famoso, non è toccata uguale sorte […] Boemondo è mezzo eroe e mezzo farabutto, e come farabutto riesce ad innalzarsi fino all’eroe: resta sempre il figlio di quella malaugurata razza di avventurieri senza un soldo a cui aveva appartenuto suo padre. Se la leggenda o la poesia l’avessero passato al filtro, a quest’ora, il bello scrigno marmoreo sarebbe famoso al mondo, e il nome di Canosa suonerebbe almeno come quello di Roncisvalle […]. Orlando sembra d’averlo conosciuto come una persona morta presto e di cui tutti in famiglia dicevano bene, con Tancredi siamo andati a scuola[…]; questo Boemondo, cinico, traditore, insaziabile, ma nato capo con i capelli biondi, Boemondo non si arriva a vederlo. (C. Brandi, Pellegrino di Puglia)

The traveler may visit the evocative small temple that keeps Bohemond’s remains according to legend; he may admire the beautiful double-leaf bronze door adorned with Islamic decorative motifs. On the left side, we may read part of an inscription celebrating the crusade prince: non hominem possum dicere, nolo deum. (I can neither call him man, nor God.)

Leave Bohemond and Canosa behind and proceed to Molfetta, which, as other Apulian coastal towns, was an important bridge between the East and West when its wide port became the landing place of crusade sailing ships and Venetian galleys, now replaced by a lively and colored fishing boat fleet that enlivens its life.

The Adriatic town is reflected in the Adriatic Sea of this picturesque port, with its walls:

vecchie mura che ancora cingono, ammansite e utilizzate a case, sopra a cui scorre una strada anulare, la città vecchia, minuscola e complicatissima città. Ancora più che a un labirinto o a un meandro, fa pensare d’essere entrati in una serratura: né solo per quella porta che può simulare il foro della chiave. Le straducole strettissime e alte seguono un itinerario proprio, e non hanno mai un punto d’arrivo preciso, una piazza, una chiesa. Si direbbe, se quelle ci sono, che la costeggiano, vi arrivano per la tangente: cunicoli scavati nella pietra tenera e chiara su cui arrivano i riflessi del mare. (C. Brandi, Pellegrino di Puglia)

The pilgrims arriving here in the Middle Ages had two important devotional landmarks, which will become also the stages of our itinerary: the cathedral and the sanctuary of Madonna dei Martiri.

The Cathedral of San Corrado (The Cathedral Of Molfetta) stands out between the blue of the Adriatic Sea and the sky, along the Medieval walls and overlooking the sea. The saint, the dedicatee of the beautiful church in Molfetta, was a noble German pilgrim who had arrived in town from the Holy Land. His relics and the renown of his miracles increased both the flow of travelers seeking grace and Molfetta’s fame. Brandi writes:

[…] impossibile evitare il tono solenne per questo solennissimo monumento tagliato nella pietra a spigoli vivi come una pietra preziosa, estratto dall’Armenia si direbbe, e posato sulla sponda di un porticciolo vero e attivo, pieno di barche e bragozzi, che si carica e si scarica di pesce alle sue ore. […] I riflessi del mare (ndr) danzanti e capricciosi, rappresentano il fascino saltuario, ma indimenticabile della Cattedrale, a cui le varie fasi costruttive non riescono a incrinare una monumentalità così imponente e diretta da sembrare raggiunta tutta in una volta. E non lo è, perché le fasi restano indubbie, e i successivi colpi di timone: ma quale intelligenza, quale prescienza nel ricucire le parti diverse. Le tre cupole non sono meno splendide all’interno, quando il rivestimento prismatico, con angoli così aguzzi, le fa parere tende tartariche issate sul tetto della Cattedrale. Dopo San marco a Venezia, è forse la chiesa dagli spazi più misteriosi: quel senso aspirante o da incubatrice che hanno le tre cupole, la cui presenza è davvero inscindibile e talmente preparata dalle volte delle navate laterali, a mezza botte, rampanti, che sembrano spalle curve a sostenere il peso superiore o ben piuttosto il volo aereo di un volteggio. Così le cupole si issano scavalcando la chiesa. (C. Brandi, Pellegrino di Puglia)

Once out of the church, the traveler cannot miss the experience of walking in the old town of this Adriatic city:

[…] e si vien presi nelle volute, nei giri viziosi delle viuzze, che sembrano come i fili, ma sempre lo stesso, di un gomitolo, ci si sente consegnati a uno spazio volubile, a un percorso interno alle cose, che mai ci consentirà una libera uscita, o, pur così tangente al mare, una veduta sul mare con borghese panchina. Il percorso diviene allora una segreta dimensione di spazio che non è più nostro: ed è in questo, che lo sviluppo delle vie diviene come un brancolare a mosca cieca. Ma un brancolare luminoso che la pietra tenera e bianca, d’un bianco leggermente livido e rosato, come la pelle di chi sta sempre vestito, restituisce con quel saltellio di luci marine, screziate dalle onde robuste e rovinose che stanno per inghiottirsi, un morso alla volta, questa meravigliosa città vecchia di Molfetta. (C. Brandi, Pellegrino di Puglia)

After passing through the old town, on the other spur that delimits the mouth of the port, we can see the Sanctuary of Madonna dei Martiri with its hospital, where both the Crusaders and the pilgrims heading towards or coming back from the Holy Land were hosted and cured. Following the First Crusade, the South of Italy housed a number of hospitals – facilities used for the pilgrims’ rest – managed by Knights Hospitaller, Templars and Teutonic Knights.

The Molfetta sanctuary was erected in 1162 and, shortly after, the hospital was also built (The Ospedale Dei Crociati (Crusaders’ Hospital)). It was one of the few that remained almost intact. The traveler may still see its longitudinal plan structure, divided into three naves of the same-height by means of strong cruciform piers. The building has parallel barrel vaults, marked by transverse round arches. The area is lighted up by a series of single-lancet windows facing the sea.

Once left the Ospedale dei crociati (Crusaders’ Hospital), as the wayfarers of the past, we suggest visiting the Molfetta sanctuary of Madonna dei Martiri, where we can still admire the icon, considered miraculous and thaumaturgic, which according to legend came from the Holy Land, rescued by the Crusaders in 1188, in the aftermath of the fall of Jerusalem. It is the icon of Madonna dei Martiri (Our lady of the Martyrs), a considerably repainted board that represents the iconographic type of the tender Virgin: its dating is uncertain, but it was probably made in the 14^th century.

Pilgrims, always in search of a divine sign, could not remain indifferent to this place, therefore Molfetta, from being just a stage, became a place of pilgrimage in a short time. The renown of its sanctuary was connected to that of the icon as a miraculous object.

In his travel journal, the pilgrim Anselmo Adorno goes into a detailed description of the miracles made by the worshipped icon:

La Chiesa Nostra Signora dei Martiri è situata ad un miglio da Molfetta sul mare; è grande e frequentato luogo di culto. Sono sepolti numerosi corpi di martiri: perciò è chiamata Nostra Signora dei Martiri. Si trova isolata sul litorale con alcune case di pertinenza della medesima chiesa. I preti che amministrano la chiesa abitano nelle case vicine e danno accoglienza ai pellegrini in caso di bisogno. In essa c’è l’immagine di Nostra Signora, che compie molti miracoli, così come leggiamo in chiesa. Stando all’interno abbiamo ascoltato un prete di Barletta raccontare uno dei grandi miracoli compiuti sulla nave dove si trovava.

Questa nave era andata dispersa nella tempesta. Spinti dal padrone che promise la metà del suo bastimento a Nostra Signora dei Martiri, coloro che si trovavano a bordo e che speravano di salvarsi fecero un voto alla Vergine. Compiuto il voto, la Vergine apparve loro sulla prua della nave. Apparve anche un giudeo coperto di lebbra, che si mise ad adorarla, che chiedeva di essere liberato dalla malattia e dal pericolo del mare e si dichiarò subito cristiano. E grazie a tutto questo la nave giunse nel porto di Corfù. La Beata Vergine fece in questo luogo altri miracoli. Per questo motivo annualmente confluiscono molti pellegrini.

(A. Adorno, Itinéraire d’Anselme Adorno en Terre Sainte)

In the 15^th century, the sanctuary was very popular among pilgrims and, today as in the past, in such a crowded place one could be victim of petty or serious thefts, as Fra’ Mariano da Siena tells in 1431, coming back from his pilgrimage in the Holy Land and passing through Molfetta.

[…] e venimo a rinfrescarci a Morfetto.[…]

e visitammo S. Maria de’ Martiri , e mentre che noi eravamo in Chiesa , fu tolta la tasca con molte coselline, che valevano parecchi fiorini , a uno de’ nostri compagni . Questa Chiesa è cosa

di grande devozione […] (Mariano da Siena, Del viaggio in Terra Santa fatto e descritto da ser Mariano da Siena nel secolo XV)

Let’s leave Molfetta and, going forward along the Adriatic coastal road, head for Bari, considered by Medieval pilgrims not as a mere stage of their hard journey, but mainly the town that houses one of the most popular sanctuaries of Medieval Christianity. It is the Basilica di San Nicola (Basilica of Saint Nicholas), a church that assumes immense importance in the history of Bari’s civic identity. Although it is not the town cathedral but a pilgrimage church, it is definitely the dearest sacred building to Bari people and the most frequented building by pilgrims over the centuries.

Hence, the journey of the pilgrims arrived in Bari leads to the Basilica that keeps the remains of the saint who came from the sea. This place became the ideal intersection between the major waterways and overland routes leading to or coming from Jerusalem and Saint James of Compostella, the ultimate destinations of Medieval pilgrimage main routes.

Today’s and yesterday’s wayfarers may reach it only after entering the old town urban fabric.

Cesare Brandi writes:

Quasi a picco sul mare […]. Dal mare viene la sua vita e la sua morte, i commerci e le flotte piratesche dei Saraceni. Da questa apertura che deve essere al tempo stesso chiusura nasce il carattere asserragliato della città vecchia, le strade come cunicoli e le ampie oscure volte che le scavalcano. […]. Sembra che, prima delle strade, sia stata fatta una costruzione tutta di massello, e poi forata da strani, industri litofagi. […]. Bari vecchia è l’aggregato arabo, e quando non è Gerusalemme, è Damasco: le volte hanno il senso del mercato coperto, che sia Bazar o Suk. E sono anche le volte di un paese che vuole deviare e rompere i venti gelidi che vengono da Settentrione, e ripararsi dal sole che, d’estate, ossia otto mesi l’anno, calcina gli occhi e le pietre. (C. Brandi, Pellegrino di Puglia)

In this maze of streets, after running along the castle (The Castello Svevo (Norman-Swabian Castle)) and the cathedral (The Cathedral Of Bari), and having followed the present Via delle Crociate, we get to Via Palazzo di città, once called Ruga Francigena, namely Francigena way. This road, which crosses the old town and finally leads to the square of the Basilica di San Nicola (The Basilica Di San Nicola (Basilica Of Saint Nicholas)), in its name, reminds us that we are following exactly the stretch of the old European pilgrimage route that ran through Bari, in order to allow the pilgrims to visit Saint Nicholas’ sanctuary, worship his relics, and get blessing to continue the rest of their journey safely.

The pilgrims of the past, along with us, often tried to make their arrival in Bari coincide with the day dedicated to the patron saint, namely 8 May. Through their writings, we may evocatively travel backwards in time to discover habits and customs of this religious and popular festival that still attracts pilgrims and tourists.

This journey backwards in the devotional imagination starts in the Basilica crypt, accessed through a staircase in the aisle which leads the faithful to an Oriental and Byzantine mystical dimension, thanks to the abundance of icons, lamps, precious metal ornaments, fabrics and embroideries that contribute to make the view of Saint Nicholas’ relics – here kept – extremely evocative. Anselmo Adorno describes them in his journal:

Le spoglie riposano in un’arca di marmo sotto il grande altare della cripta. La parte anteriore dell’altare è istoriata con immagini sbalzate in argento. Sempre sul fronte dell’altare c’è una porticina attraverso cui, da un foro che penetra all’interno del monumento, ove una lampada accesa pende da una catena d’argento, si distinguono le reliquie di S. Nicola. Da esse dicono che scaturisca un olio santo, ovvero un liquido con cui vengono unti occhi e fronti delle persone nelle festività solenni, così come fu nel tempo in cui noi fummo a Bari, cioè nel giorno di S. Nicola.

(A. Adorno, Itinéraire d’Anselme Adorno en Terre Sainte)

Many pilgrims of the past visited the sanctuary to get a miraculous liquid, called manna, that was said to exude from the saint’s body.

Continuous flows of pilgrims, coming from both the East and West, have kept on crowding the tomb of the Bari saint over the centuries, as Emile Bertaux writes at the end of the nineteenth century:

[…] sin dai primi giorni di maggio, la città vecchia, che con i suoi vicoli tortuosi stringe le mura della basilica fortificata dai re angioini, si agita e trabocca. I visitatori hanno preso d’assalto la chiesa; si sono stabiliti nelle navate laterali e persino nelle cappelle; sono lì accampati, dormono, mangiano. […] Così scendono fin giù nella cripta, con la testa che batte sugli scalini, e quando si rialzano vacillanti, vedono al di sopra della buia folla, tra le colonne annerite, la volta rivestita d’argento, tutta rutilante di luci, e il massiccio altare d’argento, dove il corpo di San Nicola, nell’ombra, stilla una miracolosa manna. […]. È necessario che ogni famiglia porti via la sua bottiglia piena del misterioso liquido che stilla dalle ossa di San Nicola come da fonte inesauribile. (E. Bertaux, Sur les chemins des pèlerins et des émigrantes, 1897)

The town still dresses up for three days, 7, 8 and 9 May, and commits entirely to the saint’s celebrations, between the sacred and the profane. We suggest the traveler who arrived here through this itinerary ideally join the festival and plan his trip so as to enter the joyful atmosphere that pervades Bari during Saint Nicholas’ days, as the ‘Apulian pilgrim’ Cesare Brandi did. He introduces us into the merry and chaotic folk dimension that prevails in the town with his words:

[…] per i festosi viali di Bari, archi di lampadine a non finire, che rientravano l’uno nell’altro, come cerchi concentrici di un tiro a segno. La strada, fitta di popolo a contatto di gomito – e del resto – sembrava ridotta a un palcoscenico in lieve pendenza. […]

Gli archi luminosi non erano le sole luci, sotto le stelle compiacenti, della vigilia della festa: non potevano mancare i fuochi, quest’altro costoso lusso del Meridione, dei poveri che si danno allo scialo. E in quanto allo scialo, per San Nicola, i Baresi si sprecano. […] Si comincia, appunto, dalla sera della vigilia, quando una tremolante caravella a ruote, fra nubi di fumo e modeste crepitanti torce di fuoco greco, con un’immagine di San Nicola a bordo e alcuni vecchietti in costume da Cena delle beffe, passa tra la folla della città fino a trascorrere sotto gli archi luminosi. Questa rievocazione del famigerato furto perpetrato dai Baresi a Mira, in gara nobilissima coi Veneziani, è dunque una specie di Sacra Rappresentazione, senza preti e senza canti, dove la voce è messa solo dai botti dei fuochi d’artificio, […]. (C. Brandi, Pellegrino di Puglia)

The celebrations will continue on the following day, 8 May: «quando – writes Brandi – il Santo va in mare, sotto un sole, che, se anche è maggio, è già piena estate, in un cielo che è chiaro come in Africa» on a fishing boat, which recalls the link between the town and the sea and the arrival, by the same sea, of Saint Nicholas’ relics, smuggled in the 11^th century in Myra (Turkey) by a group of sailors from Bari.

Brandi says:

Il Santo va in mare, vestito, sulla statua d’argento, di paramenti d’oro e circondato, invece che da torce e flabelli, da mazzi di fiori nuziali – garofani bianchi e calle – montati su lunghe aste d’argento, come quelle che reggono i baldacchini. Il Vescovo in persona, che comanda la processione, getta allora un’ampolla con la manna di San Nicola. […] Il mare, allora, questo eterno ricetto materno, la Teti antica e dell’inconscio, alla fecondazione nuziale risponde con l’urlo subitaneo e lacerante, discorde fino a raggiungere il più implacabile salasso elettrico, di non so quante sirene, dalle navicelle, dai trabiccoli, dai motopescherecci, raccolti attorno al motopeschereccio del Santo, come le api intorno all’Ape regina. […] Ora la fecondazione è avvenuta, il santo si riposa, la gente dalla terra esulta, perché il patto col mare, la parentela indissolubile, è per il bene della terra. […] Il pubblico straboccante, meravigliosamente nero e rosso, brulicava sul lungomare, fitto come puntini di un quadro di Seurat. Finché il Santo rimane in mare, il brulichio non cesserà. (C. Brandi, Pellegrino di Puglia)

The following day Saint Nicholas’ statue returns to its beautiful Romanesque Basilica: the traveler may decide whether to embark soon, under the saint’s protection, or continue his journey across Puglia for a while, before catching one of the ferries that regularly connect the Apulian county seat to the Greek islands.

Many pilgrims of the past chose to embark from Brindisi, as an alternative, and reached the town of Upper Salento following the route of the Via Appia-Antica; in particular, the stretch of road connecting Taranto to Brindisi was frequently taken all over the Middle Ages.

In the area surrounding this road, it is possible to admire the cave Apulian environment (The Rock Civilization In Puglia): entire hamlets, shrines, and hermitages carved out of rock will guide the visitor to enter a mystical dimension, connoted by a delicate charm, which is totally different from that of the imposing Romanesque basilicas we left along the coast. A dense network of roads winds between Massafra, Mottola and Gravina, where the pilgrim’s route meets the ancient transhumance path.

Our literary guide, Cesare Brandi, looking for rock crypts – as we do – reaches Mottola, a town in the province of Taranto, located as he says:

su un’altura che non è un’altura, ma per le Puglie lo diventa: e si vede di lassù uno dei paesi più armoniosi che vi siano, con in fondo il mare. Armoniosa è infatti la discesa degli ulivi corvini, densi come gomitoli, nel pullulare del primo verde delle viti […] armoniosi grani fitti, arditi, rigidissimi, come capelli a spazzola, accanto ai ricciuti boccoli di verde opaco e gagliardo delle fave. Non mi stancavo di guardarlo, quel paese, così scoperto e largo e disteso, che il mare quasi pareva appena l’orice di tanta morbida bellezza.

Invece bisognò staccarsi dal panorama e andare in cerca delle cripte. Naturalmente qui ce n’era un visibilio, volendo: ma a me interessava soprattutto quella di San Nicola, e speravo che trovandosi in aperta campagna, bisognasse cercarsela a piedi […]. Non fui deluso. A un certo punto si arrivò all’antico convento ridotto ad abbazia, e lì la strada campestre finiva.

(C. Brandi, Pellegrino di Puglia)

The rock church of San Nicola, one of the nicest among the «Mirabili Grotte di Dio» (Charles Diehl), was venerated for centuries not only by the town inhabitants, but also by Crusaders and pilgrims – whose steps we are following in – who reached Taranto and Brindisi to sail for the Holy Land.

The church is on the edge of a small ravine and can be accessed through stairs carved out of rock.

This underground sanctuary has a cruciform plan inscribed in a quadrangular hall, divided into three naves. They are separated only by two massive pillars, according to a structure that could be also found in Syria from the 6^th century. The chancel of the church, called bema, isolated from the rest of the interior by means of an iconostasis, is divided into three different cells, each with its own altar. The interior, almost entirely frescoed, has one of the most interesting pictorial cycles in Puglia in terms of quality and preservation, dating back to the period between the 11^th and the 13^th century. This place has been defined as the Sistine Chapel of the Southern Italy rock civilization.

Our traveler, after this detour, should proceed and head for the Ionian Islands, a nearly necessary step for people who sailed towards the East or the Holy Land in the Middle Ages.

The time of leaving was not pleasant for all travelers, especially for armed pilgrims, namely the Crusaders, who left the safe Apulian coasts. The poet Tannhäuser, an unwilling Crusader of Frederick II’s retinue in 1228, regrets the joy he is leaving behind when abandoning the beautiful land of Puglia in a lyric poem. His verses allow us to go back in time and imagine how enjoyable the life of dames and knights could be in the imperial palaces of the region. In the context of the Apulian landscape, romantic meetings, jousts and hunts gladdened the days of those who might stay, unlike the poet.

Beato colui che ora può cacciare con il falcone sui campi di Puglia! […]

alcuni vanno alle fonti, gli altri cavalcano guardando il paesaggio ‒ questa gioia mi è tolta ‒ quelli caracollano accanto alle dame […]

io non caccio all'arco con i cani, io non uccello con i falconi, […], e nessuno mi può rimproverare di portare corone di rose […]

neanche mi si può attendere dove cresce il verde trifoglio, né cercare nei giardini accanto alle belle giovani […]

io fluttuo sul mare.

(Tannhäuser, in A. Martellotti, Il viaggio controvoglia del crociato Tannhäuser)

Corfu, Kassiopi

(Bejo, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3086242)

Sailing from the Adriatic coast, it is possible to reach Ithaca, Cephalonia and Corfu, where the threatening channel of Butrint, with its dangerous streams, was waiting for those who wanted to continue their journey. When pilgrims or merchants passed through this area, it was advisable for various reasons to stop at the natural shelter of Kassiopi bay, in the northern part of Corfu island.

Today the traveler may visit this pleasant fishing village, which dates back to Roman times and may learn its history, discovering its literary imagination described in the pilgrims’ diaries that tell about dragons, magic lamps, hermitages, chapels and miraculous icons, as the one vaguely recalled in the small church of Virgin Kassopitra, who protects sailors and travelers.

Medieval pilgrims tell that Kassiopi was once a strong town, now totally desert due to the deadly exhalations of a dragon that raged against the people, formerly committed to sodomy. Sailors and pilgrims started to regularly frequent a small chapel always lighted up by a lamp. The lamp miraculous oil was said to cure any fever. Overtime it was told that this chapel hosted also a miraculous icon, known as Virgin Kassopitra, portraying the Virgin painted by Luke the Evangelist. (M. Bacci, Portolano sacro. Santuari e immagini sacre lungo le rotte di navigazione del mediterraneo tra tardo medioevo e prima età moderna).

The chapel, so renowned in the past, was seriously damaged during the 16^th century, due to the Berber raids, but was promptly rebuilt by the Venetians in 1590. The icon deemed miraculous has now disappeared, but has been replaced by a 17^th-century votive icon that reproduces it and is still an object of devotion.

It is also mentioned in the travel journal of Marquess Nicolò d’Este travelling to the Holy Sepulcher, written by his faithful chancellor, Luchino dal Campo.

He wrote:

Et andando il Signore al suo viaggio, la sira andò alla isola di Corfù, in uno porto chiamato Nostra Dona da Casopoli. E qui, gittato ferro e la barcha all’acqua, andò in terra a la giexia di Nostra Donna , ove li è una lampada denanti alla sua figura, la quale sempre arde e sempre sta piena di olio, ní mai se ne mette guzzo di olio; et fu dato de un certo legno bagnato del dicto olio a tucta la compagnia da uno calogiero che sta lì, e disse esser bono de guarir ogni febre. E, visitato questa figura la qual fa miracoli, andorono a vedere uno castello chiamato Casopoli, molto bello ma disabitato per uno serpente il quale habitava lì e avelenava tucto il paexe. (Luchino dal Campo, Viaggio del Marchese Nicolò d’Este al Santo Sepolcro, 1413)

The castle, mentioned by Medieval pilgrims and travelers, can still be visited. From the main road of the village another road starts and winds up to a hill overlooking the bay. On top we can find the ruins of the original Byzantine fortress, surrounded by plants. The castle was conquered in the 11^th century by a man we have already met in our itinerary in Canosa, Prince Bohemond. The Norman dominion over Corfu did not last long and the castle was controlled by the Byzantine emperors until the arrival of the Angevins in 1266. Finally, the castle was destroyed by the Venetians in the 14^th century, when they took control of the island. Only at the beginning of the 18^th century they decided to rebuild the castle in order to limit the Ottoman raids.

Our pilgrimage searching for beauty and discovering Medieval monuments, stories and legends, closely linked to the place identity, ends on this island and on this fortress that allows us to overlook the Strait of Corfu, aware that the end of this journey may become the start of another itinerary or another story.