Rome to Bari

Friday, October 23, 2015

Rome to Bari

After goodbyes, we left for the Rome Termini, the main train station, where we caught the 7:50 AM fast train to Bari, a port town in the far southeast of Italy on the heel.  We arrived at about 12:30 and the six of us took two taxis to our hotel, which precipitated the first real crisis of our trip.  The first taxi with three of our group took the only parking space in front of the hotel.  Three of us in my taxi were in the back seat, and my carry-on bag, containing my medications, my computer, etc. was on the front passenger seat, with our luggage in the trunk.  Well, our taxi stopped in the middle of the narrow street, blocking traffic while we unloaded, during which time very impatient Italian drivers were stuck behind him.  We got the bags from the trunk to the curb and the driver took off with my carry-on bag still on the front seat!  I ran after him but he was gone.

The front desk people were wonderful, springing into action.  Of course we had no idea which taxi company had taken us.  They called the two largest ones, they called the taxi dispatch at the train station, and we waited.  It wasn’t too long before the taxi showed up!  Great relief!

We checked in, had a quick lunch, and met ido, our guide, at 2:30 for a walking tour of Bari.  An important port:

As a crossroads, Bari has seen multiple ethnic groups, and (long story) because of a relic in the local main church, there is a great connection with the Orthodox churches, especially the Russian.  We visited the church:

We were surprised that in this Catholic church was an Orthodox section with the kinds of sights not usually seen in a Catholic church:

Walking back to the hotel we passed a pasta “factory” where they were hand-making orecchiette:

Tomorrow we leave Bari and start our tour of Apulia.

Back to Rome

Thursday, Oct. 22, 2015

Rome

We began the day with study of a poem of Immanuel Frances (1618-c. 1710) an Italian poet and rabbinical scholar.  It is titled, “The Old Whore’s Lament”:

Where are the merchants who used to chase after me to purchase my favors?

O malevolent Time!

Nowadays, they abhor my company; when I call for them, there is no answer.

How has my merchandise been brought so low!

How can I possibly sell it, when there is no buyer?

Once they would have given all their wealth for it.

Now I would be lucky if they took it free of charge.

Haim made us aware of parallels to parts of Lamentations; I found them hard to see.

We began our touring with a visit to the Roman ghetto, created in 1555 and in operation until the unification of Italy, when it was abolished in 1870.  Just outside the walls is the Fountain Monumentale delle Tartarughe (Turtle Fountain) which served as the water source for the entire ghetto:

  

As we walked into the small ghetto, we saw small brass plaques which have been placed in the streets in front of homes from which were taken the Jews of Rome who were murdered at Auschwitz:

  

The evacuation of Rome’s Jews took place on a single day, October 16, 1943, and that day is memorialized by a plaque:

We stood under the plaque and read sections from Robert Katz’s Black Sabbath, A Journey Through a Crime Against Humanity detailing the response of the Romans and of the Vatican to the Nazi genocide.

We then visited the Jewish Museum where we met with a remarkable woman, Anna Foa, who is a professor at the Sapienza University in Rome.  She lectured to us on the history of the Jews in Rome with particular attention to the events of WW II and the Shoah, and took questions.  She was delightful and very informative.

The Great Synagogue was built in 1904 and is adjacent to the museum:

It is an historic building, first because of the terrorist attack of 1982, but mostly because it was the location of the first ever visit of a pope to a synagogue.  That was Pope John Paul II in 1986.  The synagogue still functions for some of the 14,000 Jews who currently live in Rome, and there is a daily minyan.  The building was spared during WW II as were most of the important buildings of Rome.

After lunch a free afternoon!  Shopping and packing took up the time, as we leave tomorrow. 

We met again at 5:00 for a wrap-up study session, sealing the memories of our travels.  Then a farewell dinner in one of the kosher restaurants in the ghetto.  It has been an amazing trip.  Haim has put together an incredible two-month course on the history of Italian Jewry, and we did the whole thing in ten days.  There's lots more in our reader to study after we get home.

Most of our fellow students are going home, but tomorrow we will take the fast train to Bari in the far southeast of Italy (on the heel) and begin a walking tour of Apulia with Marcia and Eric Birken and Sheila and Peter Philippsohn.  So, more to come!

Pitigliano: Little Jerusalem

Wednesday, October 21, 2015

Pitigliano

We left Florence at a late 8:15 AM for Rome, with a stop at Pitigliano on the way.  Of course, on the bus we finished the talk about the relationship of the Jews to the Medicis, the Church, and the civil Florentine authorities.

Pitigliano is a small Tuscan hill town which was a refuge for Roman and Florentine Jews when the ghettos were imposed.  It began as an Etruscan city and has beautiful and substantial walls:

It is a vertical place:

A part of the city is dubbed “Little Jerusalem”:

It is here where the remnants of the Jewish community have been turned into a museum.  We met there with a remarkable woman, Elena Servi, who is a member of one of the remaining six Jewish families (26 people) in Pitigliano.  

She related her history during WW II, as many of the town’s Jews were saved by fellow townspeople and farmers in the countryside, at great risk to themselves.  A number of these people are honored at Yad Vashem.

We toured the museum and learned of life for the Jews in the town.  Here’s the remaining bread oven:

We went to the synagogue which was fully functional with a resident rabbi until 1938.  A note about Jewish edifices in Italy: all of them, every single one, even in a small hill town in the middle of nowhere, have a military presence guarding them  This has been an Italian government policy ever since a terrorist attack against the Great Synagogue of Rome in 1982.  In the photo below note the soldier:

The interior is lovely:

There is a plaque commemorating a visit by the Grand Duke in 1822:

The Jewish cemetery is outside of the walls, down below:

After our delightful visit we boarded the bus for the trip to Rome, which took up the rest of the day.

Incredible Florence

Tuesday, October 20, 2015

Florence

A day so full that Haim faced a rebellion at the end, but that’s a story yet to come.

We awoke at 6:30, not fully rested, and at 8:00 began our walk to the Galleria della Accademia.  Despite having timed tickets, there was a very long line, so, putting on our earpieces, we had a study session while we stood in line to get in, focusing on Boccaccio’s Decameron, specifically “Day The First Abraham the Jew, at the Instigation of Jehannot de Chevigne, Goeth to the Court of Rome and, Seeing the Depravity of the Clergy, Returneth to Paris and There Becometh a Christian.”  It’s a wonderful tale, and there’s much to discuss and think about.

Ultimately we entered, and began a tour with our guide, starting with the astonishing “Rape of the Sabine Women” from 1856 by Giambologna:

 We next toured the Instrument Museum section, full of beautiful instruments, none of which are ever played.  This includes a Stradivarius violin which has never been played.  To me this is a travesty.  These instruments are made to be heard not to be looked at, and keeping them as specimens to view violates their purpose.  Our Smithsonian, for example, has a complete quartet of Stradivarius instruments which are constantly loaned out to be heard.  That’s not the philosophy here, however. 

We next went to see the Michelangelo David.  We had a delightful lecture on the David from our guide, and there’s much to learn.  David, of course, is now indoors, but originally he was where there is now a copy in the Piazza della Signora, and the gaze which now simply looks away, originally faced Rome, the traditional Florentine rival.  David here is portrayed as a Greek god, and there’s lots to be thought about when combining the bible story and the goal of Michelangelo.  The statue is magnificent:

After finishing our tour of the Galleria, we walked to the synagogue:

We had a tour of the synagogue, built in 1882 in Moorish style, with a Byzantine basilica form, after the lifting of the restrictions on Jewish life.  It was done in such a way as to reflect the assimilation of Jews into Florentine life.  The Aron Chodesh is enormous, and held 130 Torahs which dated from the 15^th to the 17^th c.

We walked the streets of the Florence ghetto, and standing on a street corner at the entrance to the ghetto we reflected on the relationship of the Mecicis and the Jews of Florence.  It was complicated and quite up and down.  This plaque was in our study book:

COSIMO DEI MEDICI, GRAND DUKE OF TUSCANY

AND HIS SON THE MOST SERENE PRINCE FRANCESCO

MOTIVATED IN ALL THINGS BY GREAT PIETY

WILLED THAT THE JEWS BE ENCLOSED IN THIS PLACE

SEGREGATED FROM THE CHRISTIANS BUT NOT EXPELLED 

SO THAT THROUGH GOOD EXAMPLE THEY MIGHT COME

TO BOW THEIR STUBBORN NECKS TO CHRIST'S LIGHT YOKE

YEAR OF THE LORD 1571

We discussed what it meant to be segregated but not expelled.  We next walked back to the Duomo for a tour of the 13^th c. cathedral:

There are so many treasures inside that choosing what to show is difficult.  Here is a mosaic of the crowning of Mary from 1300:

Interestingly, the walls are devoted to famous Florentines, not to saints.  Here’s Dante:

And the decorations reflect the works of those memorialized.  Here’s a descent into hell on a ceiling:

 We next walked to the Palazzo Vecchio, the secular heart of the city and the place where the city government was housed:

In front is a statue of Neptune, another reflection of the fascination of Renaissance Florence with the Roman past:

In the Palazzo we studied the proclamations which are in the city archives from August 27, 1463.  These included a number of regulations concerning the Jews, such as this one:

All Jews whatsoever, male and female, more than twelve years of age, included or not included in the Condotta with the city of Florence, and whether they reside in the city of Florence or not, are required to wear within the City of Florence the sign of "O"-that is, a large yellow "O" on their garments over the left side of their chest so that it might be readily seen, and that such distinctive sign must be at least a third of a cubit in circumference, and at least a finger in thickness, under pain of ....

And:

 Jews are permitted to keep, read, study and copy their sacred books and books of science of whatever sort [libri di scienza di qualunche ragione si fussino] except those infamous and condemned writings [infamati et incolpati] of the community of Cortona, or any books against the Christian faith.

Finally we climbed up to the fourth floor of the palace and were able to have a great view of the city from a balcony there.  At this point, 5:15 PM, Haim began another lecture, this one on the resolution of conflicts between the Levantine Jews and the Italian Jews in the civil courts.  Members of our group were sprawled on the floor, leaning on posts, dozing standing up, and about two of us were able to pay attention.  It was time to quit for the day, and in as gentle a way as we could, we told Haim he had lost us.  He looked around, somewhat surprised, as I think his energy is so amazing that he doesn’t realize the rest of us are ordinary mortals.  We ended our day and staggered back to the hotel.

Medici Library and Siena

Monday, October 19, 2015

A truly remarkable day.  I’m going to violate my self-imposed rule of no more than ten photos per day because there’s so much to tell.

Our day was supposed to start at a reasonable 9:15 with a trip to Siena, but something which Haim had been trying to arrange came through.  So, we left the hotel at 8:00 and walked about 15 minutes to the Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana at the Basilica of San Lorenzo.  The Basilica was designed in 1418 by Brunelleschi, and the cloister, which is where the Laurentian library is, was completely designed by Michelangelo, including a famous set of stairs which we used to enter:

 There is a diamond motif (representative of the Medici family) throughout.  Here is a floor:

The ceiling:

The windows are not Michelangelo’s, but rather are Flemish and are wonderful:

One of the librarians had come in early to show us the library, and had pulled a few treasures which would be of special interest to our group.  They were spectacular.  As an example, here is a 1295 complete manuscript Tanakh (Hebrew Bible):

The opening page (B’reishit):

The very first printed Soncino bible (1488):

And a number of incredible volumes.  This was a very special experience.  We left the library at 9:15 and drove into the countryside towards Siena.  We are just past the grape harvest and just before the olive harvest.  We arrived in Siena and had a walking tour of the city with an explanation of the 17 districts which compete in the annual horse race around the Piazza del Campo, the main square.  People are very attached to their districts, and rivalries are great.  Siena has the world’s oldest continually functioning bank, and has been a commercial and trade center for a very long time.  The Duomo, consecrated in 1179, dominates the town, and is the most prominent example of use of the city’s colors, white and black:

The floor contains 56 marble panels which are extraordinary.  Here’s one showing the she-wolf nursing Romulus and Remus which is part of Siena’s story as well as that of Rome!

The dome is magnificent:

And the altar, by Michelangelo, is beautiful:

We had lunch on the famous and beautiful Piazza del Campo:

Joyce had the best meal we’ve had in Italy here, a ricotta ravioli with truffle sauce and sage.  After lunch we visited the synagogue:

We studied Joseph Da Modena’s “Trouble in the Siena Ghetto” from 1633 and a detailed responsum by Rabbi Yosef Colon (1420-1480) on not drinking wine.  I don’t know where Haim finds these things!  It is pages long on what to do if a person at a table doesn’t drink wine, especially if he is the one who says the blessing over it.

We then left Siena and traveled through the beautiful countryside:

We came to the very beautiful Terra di Seta kosher wine estate where we had a tour and a talk from the owner about his vineyard, olive grove, and winemaking.  The meshgiach was there as it is pressing season, and he poured samples of three different wines for us and discussed kosher wine.  The Chianti Classico was very good:

Back to Florence, exhausted!