31 May

NEW - Alessandro Allori – painter

Artist was Bronzino’s favourite pupil

Prolific painter Alessandro Allori, whose style of painting was to influence many other famous artists in the late 16th century, was born on this day in 1535 in Florence.  His father, who was a sword maker, died when he was five. The painter Agnolo Bronzino became guardian of the Allori family and little Alessandro spent a lot of his time in the artist’s workshop while he was growing up.  Bronzino was the court painter for Cosimo I de’ Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany. He painted mainly portraits, but also some religious and allegorical subjects. It is said that Allori was his favourite pupil.  Allori was so close to him that he incorporated Bronzino’s name into his own, as can be seen on the inscription on one of his paintings that was dated 1552  – Alessandro Allori, foster son of Agnolo Bronzino. He even sometimes signed himself Alessandro Bronzino or Alessandro Bronzino-Allori.  Read more…

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Andrew Grima - royal jeweller

Rome-born craftsman favoured by the Queen of England

The jewellery designer Andrew Grima, whose clients included the British Royal Family, was born on this day in 1921 in Rome.  Grima, whose flamboyant use of dramatically large, rough-cut stones and brilliant innovative designs revolutionised modern British jewellery, achieved an enviable status among his contemporaries.  After the Duke of Edinburgh had given the Queen a brooch of carved rubies and diamonds designed by Grima as a gift, he was awarded a Royal Warrant and rapidly became the jeweller of choice for London’s high society, as well as celebrities and film stars from around the world.  He won 13 De Beers Diamonds International Awards, which is more than any other jeweller, and examples of his work are kept by the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths.  Read more…

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Angelo Moriondo - espresso machine pioneer

Bar and hotel owner invented way to make coffee faster

Angelo Moriondo, the man credited with inventing the world’s first espresso coffee machine, died on this day in 1914 in Marentino, a town in Piedmont, about 20km (12 miles) east of Turin.  Moriondo, who was 62 when he passed away, was the owner of the Grand-Hotel Ligure in Turin’s Piazza Carlo Felice and the American Bar in the former Galleria Nazionale on Via Roma.  He came up with the idea of a coffee machine essentially in the hope of gaining an edge over his competition at a time when coffee was a hugely popular beverage across Europe and in Italy in particular, but which still depended on brewing methods that required the customer to wait five minutes or more to be able to raise a cup to his mouth.  Moriondo figured that if he could find a way to make multiple cups of coffee simultaneously he would be able to serve more customers more quickly. Read more…

Paolo Sorrentino - film director

Seventh Italian director to win Best Foreign Film at Oscars

The film director Paolo Sorrentino, whose 2013 movie La grande bellezza won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film, was born on this day in 1970 in Naples.  The award put him in the company of Federico Fellini and Vittorio De Sica in landing the Oscar for Best Foreign Film, a prize that has been won by only seven Italian directors in the history of the Academy Awards.  Fellini scooped the honour four times and De Sica twice. The other successful Italian directors are Elio Petri, Giuseppe Tornatore, Gabriele Salvatores and Roberto Benigni.  La grande bellezza - released for English-speaking audiences as The Great Beauty - was the first Italian winner since Benigni’s Life is Beautiful was named as Best Foreign Film in 1998.  Sorrentino’s 2021 semi-autobiographical movie The Hand of God - È stata la mano di Dio in Italian - was nominated for an Oscar.  Read more…

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Tintoretto – painter

Dyer’s son whose work still adorns Venice

Renaissance artist Tintoretto died on this day in 1594 in Venice.  Known for his boundless energy, the painter was also sometimes referred to as Il Furioso.  His paintings are populated by muscular figures, make bold use of perspective and feature the colours typical of the Venetian school.  Tintoretto was an expert at depicting crowd scenes and mythological subjects and during his successful career received important commissions to produce paintings for the Scuola Grande di San Marco and the Scuolo Grande di San Rocco.  Tintoretto was born Jacopo Comin, the son of a dyer (tintore), which earned him the nickname Tintoretto, meaning 'little dyer'.  He was also sometimes known as Jacopo Robusti as his father had defended the gates of Padua against imperial troops in a way that was described as ‘robust’ at the time.  Read more…

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Book of the Day:  Renaissance & Mannerism, by Diane Bodart

From the 15th to the 16th centuries, Western European culture flourished thanks in part to the astonishing achievements of such Renaissance artists as Da Vinci, Donatello, Raphael, Botticelli, Michelangelo and Mannerist painters including El Greco, Pontormo and Tintoretto. In Florence, the cradle of the Renaissance, artists pursued ancient classical ideals of harmony and naturalism and in architecture, forms of perfection and grandeur. Mannerists, in the early 16th century, valued exaggeration, elongated figures, unnatural lighting and vivid (even lurid) colours, to impact more tension and emotion in their work. Renaissance & Mannerism is a stunning volume that follows these two key movements in art history, providing authoritative background from a top scholar, rich cultural context and a wealth of exquisite reproductions of period paintings, sculptures, churches and palazzos.

Diane Bodart is an art historian born in 1970 in Rome. She is professor of Southern Renaissance and Baroque Art at Columbia University in New York. 

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Alessandro Allori – painter

Artist was Bronzino’s favourite pupil

Alessandro Allori's 1570 painting, The Pearl
Fishers, is considered to be his masterpiece

Prolific painter Alessandro Allori, whose style of painting was to influence many other famous artists in the late 16th century, was born on this day in 1535 in Florence.

His father, who was a sword maker, died when he was five. The painter Agnolo Bronzino became guardian of the Allori family and little Alessandro spent a lot of his time in the artist’s workshop while he was growing up.

Bronzino was the court painter for Cosimo I de’ Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany. He painted mainly portraits, but also some religious and allegorical subjects. It is said that Allori was his favourite pupil.

Allori was so close to him that he incorporated Bronzino’s name into his own, as can be seen on the inscription on one of his paintings that was dated 1552  – Alessandro Allori, foster son of Agnolo Bronzino. He even sometimes signed himself Alessandro Bronzino or Alessandro Bronzino-Allori.

It was also Allori who completed Bronzino’s last fresco, The Martyrdom of Saint Lawrence, in Basilica di San Lorenzo in Florence, which Bronzino was unable to finish before his death in 1572.

Allori spent six years studying in Rome, where he was highly influenced by Michelangelo’s work. On his return to Florence, he also became one of the leading painters for the members of the Medici family who ruled Florence at the time.

Much of his work displays the complicated, twisting poses typical of Florentine Mannerist painting. To help him paint realistic figures he conducted anatomical research, which included the dissection of human corpses supplied by the Hospital of Santa Maria Nuova in Florence.

He painted altarpieces, frescoes and portraits and also designed tapestry, having been made director of the Florentine tapestry factory in the 1570s.

In 1570, Allori painted The Pearl Fishers, a landscape showing figures diving for pearls, for the Studiolo of Francesco I de’ Medici in Palazzo Vecchio and this is generally considered to be his masterpiece. Working under the guidance of Giorgio Vasari, Allori’s painting shows the influence of Michelangelo, with its figures in complex poses as they dived, which became emblematic of late Florentine Mannerism.

A self-portrait that Allori is thought
to have painted in about 1555

Allori was the father of the painter Cristofano Allori, who was born in 1577 and was taught to paint by his father. Alessandro Allori had many other pupils, including Giovanni Bizzelli.

Suffering from gout, Allori died in Florence in 1607. He is buried with many other famous artists from the period in the Cappella di San Luca (Chapel of the Painters) at the Basilica della Santissima Annunziata in Florence. 

After his death, Allori’s style of painting was to influence artistic developments in Tuscany for another 50 years. 

It is estimated that anywhere between 100 and 200 of Allori’s works have survived. The largest single collection is held by the Uffizi Gallery in Florence; others are in galleries around the world or in private collections.

One work, a 16th century portrait of Eleonora of Toledo, the first wife of Cosimo I de’ Medici, was returned to the Gemaeldegalerie in Berlin in 2006 after spending more than half a century in the possession of British broadcaster Charles Wheeler.

Wheeler, who worked as a foreign correspondent for the BBC for 61 years until his death in 2008, was given the painting, which measures only 16cm by 12cm, as a gift by a contributor to a programme he was making while working at the BBC’s Berlin Bureau in 1952. 

He assumed it was a copy but liked it enough to take it with him on various assignments around the world before it found a more permanent home on a bookshelf in his office.

It was not until 54 years later, while making a programme about missing art, that he decided to look into the history of the painting.

His enquiries revealed that it was not a copy but a priceless original, one of an estimated 400 paintings at the Gemaeldegalerie that had been looted or destroyed during World War Two.

The Palazzo Vecchio in Florence's Piazza
della Signoria is a familiar landmark

Travel tip:

Palazzo Vecchio, which Allori helped to decorate with his painting, is the town hall of Florence. It overlooks the Piazza della Signoria as well as the gallery of statues in the Loggia dei Lanzi. The palace was originally called the Palazzo della Signoria, after the Signoria of Florence, the ruling body of the Republic of Florence.  The building acquired its current name when the Medici Duke's residence was moved across the Arno to the Palazzo Pitti. The cubical palazzo is made of solid rusticated stonework topped by a simple tower with a clock, known as the Torre d’Arnolfo after its designer, Arnolfo di Cambio. The Palazzo Vecchio acquired renewed importance as the seat of united Italy's provisional government from 1865 to 1871, at a moment when Florence had become the temporary capital of the Kingdom of Italy.  Although most of the building is now given over to a museum, since 1872 it has housed the office of the mayor of Florence, and it is the seat of the City Council.

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The Basilica della Santissima Annunziata, with
its facade by Giovanni Battista Caccini

Travel tip:

Alessandro Allori is buried in the Chapel of San Luca in the Basilica della Santissima Annunziata in Piazza della Santissima Annunziata. The chapel has belonged to the artists’ confraternity since 1565. Many artists are buried in its vault, including Benvenuto Cellini, and Pontormo. Inside there are murals by Alessandro Allori and works by other famous painters from his period. The Basilica, in the San Marco district of Florence, was founded by the Servite order in 1250 and later rebuilt by Michelozzo between 1444 and 1481. The facade of the church is by the architect Giovanni Battista Caccini. It was added in 1601 to imitate the Renaissance-style loggia of Filippo Brunelleschi's facade of the Foundling Hospital, which defines the eastern side of the piazza. 

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More reading:

Bronzino, the Medici court painter who became the master of Mannerism

Giorgio Vasari, the painter and architect credited with being the first art historian

Cosimo I de’ Medici, the first Grand Duke of Tuscany

Also on this day:

1594: The death of painter Tintoretto

1914: The death of coffee machine pioneer Angelo Moriondo

1921: The birth of royal jeweller Andrew Grima

1970: The birth of film director Paolo Sorrentino

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30 May

Giacomo Matteotti - martyr of freedom

Politician kidnapped and murdered by Fascist thugs

A brave and historic speech made in the Italian parliament on this day in 1924 marked the start of a crisis for Benito Mussolini's Fascist government.  The young socialist politician who delivered the speech, denouncing the Fascist victory in the general election held in April of that year as having been won through fraud and violence, was subsequently kidnapped and murdered.  Giacomo Matteotti, the 29-year-old founder and leader of the Unified Socialist Party, accused Mussolini's party of employing thugs to intimidate the public into voting Fascist and said that changes to electoral law were inherently corrupt in that they were framed to make a Mussolini government almost inevitable.  Matteotti, who had already written a controversial book about the Fascists' rise to power, knew the risk he took in making the speech. Read more…

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General Giulio Douhet - military strategist

Army commander was one of first to see potential of air power

The Italian Army general Giulio Douhet, who saw the military potential in aircraft long before others did, was born in Caserta, north of Naples, on this day in 1869.  With the arrival of airships and then fixed-wing aircraft in Italy, Douhet recognized the military potential of the new technology. He advocated the creation of a separate air arm commanded by airmen rather than by commanders on the ground. From 1912 to 1915 Douhet served as commander of the Aeronautical Battalion, Italy’s first aviation unit.  Largely because of Douhet, the three-engine Caproni bomber - designed by the young aircraft engineer Gianni Caproni - was ready for use by the time Italy entered the First World War.  His severe criticism of Italy’s conduct of the war, however, resulted in his court-martial and imprisonment. Only after a review of Italy’s catastrophic defeat in 1917 in the Battle of Caporetto was it decided that his criticisms had been justified. Read more…

Andrea Verga - anatomist and neurologist

Professor among founding fathers of Italian psychiatry

The anatomist and neurologist Andrea Verga, who was one of the first Italian doctors to carry out serious research into mental illness, was born on this day in 1811 in Treviglio in Lombardy.  Verga’s career was notable for his pioneering study of the criminally insane, for some of the first research into acrophobia - the fear of heights - which was a condition from which he suffered, and for the earliest known experiments in the therapeutic use of cannabis.  For a number of years, he held the post of Professor of Psychiatry at the Ospedale Maggiore in Milan. He also founded, in conjunction with another physician, Serafino Biffi, the Italian Archives for Nervous Disease and Mental Illness, a periodical in which research findings could be shared and discussed.  Verga also acquired an in-depth knowledge of the anatomy of the bone system and the nervous system. Read more…

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Giovanni Gentile – philosopher

The principal intellectual spokesman for Fascism

Giovanni Gentile, a major figure in Italian idealist philosophy, was born on this day in 1875 in Castelvetrano in Sicily.  Known as ‘the philosopher of Fascism’, Gentile was the ghostwriter of part of Benito Mussolini’s The Doctrine of Fascism in 1932. His own ‘actual idealism’ was strongly influenced by the German philosopher, Georg Hegel.  Gentile's rejection of individualism and acceptance of collectivism helped him justify the totalitarian element of Fascism.  After a series of university appointments, Gentile became professor of the history of philosophy at the University of Rome in 1917.  While writing The Philosophy of Marx – La filosophia di Marx – a Hegelian examination of Karl Marx’s ideas, he met writer and philosopher Benedetto Croce. The two men became friends and co-editors of the periodical La Critica until 1924, when a lasting disagreement occurred over Gentile’s embrace of Fascism.  Read more…

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Book of the Day: Mussolini's Italy: Life Under the Dictatorship, 1915-1945, by Richard Bosworth

For almost all nations, the First World War was an unparalleled disaster, but the Italian experience especially was to have catastrophic consequences. Weakened and embittered, trying and failing to come to terms with 600,000 dead and with an entire generation of men militarized by fighting, Italy gave birth to a new form of political life: Fascism.  Richard Bosworth brings to life the period when Italians participated in a vast and ultimately ruinous political experiment under their dictator, Benito Mussolini, and his fascist henchmen. The fascists were the first totalitarians, aiming to reshape Italy and its people utterly. Their regime was based on a cult of violence and obedience. Yet, despite this, Italians found ingenious ways of adapting, limiting, undermining and ridiculing Mussolini's ambitions for them. The heart of this book is its engagement with the life of these ordinary Italians and their families, struggling through terrible times. In Mussolini’s Italy: Life Under the Dictatorship, Bosworth creates a powerful, plausible and entertaining picture of Italian life and a regime which - as the world hurtled towards the cataclysm of the Second World War - was to force humiliation, defeat, invasion and the utter collapse of the nation state.

Richard Bosworth is one of the world’s leading writers on Italy under the Fascists.  He is a former professor of history at the University of Western Australia and a senior research fellow in history at Jesus College, Oxford.

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29 May

Michele Schirru - would-be assassin

Anarchist executed for plotting to kill Mussolini

The Sardinian-born anarchist Michele Schirru was executed by firing squad in Rome on this day in 1931.  Schirru, a former socialist revolutionary who had emigrated to the United States, had been arrested on suspicion of plotting to assassinate the Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini.  Seized at an hotel in Rome in February 1931, having arrived in the capital about three weeks earlier, he was tried by the Special Fascist Court and after he had loudly declared his hatred of both fascism and communism was found guilty.  A death sentence was handed down at a further hearing on May 28 and the execution was carried out at first light the following day at the Casal Forte Braschi barracks on the western outskirts of Rome, where 24 Sardinian soldiers had answered the call to volunteer for the firing squad.  Schirru died screaming ‘long live anarchy, long live freedom, down with fascism’.  Read more…

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Katie Boyle – actress and television presenter

Daughter of Italian Marquis became the face of Eurovision

Television personality Katie Boyle was born Caterina Irene Maria Imperiali di Francavilla on this day in 1926 in Florence.  The actress, who became known for her appearances on panel games such as What’s My Line?, and also for presenting the Eurovision Song Contest on the BBC, died in 2018 at the age of 91.  She was the daughter of an Italian Marquis, the Marchese Imperiali di Francavilla, and his English wife, Dorothy Kate Ramsden.  At the age of 20, Caterina moved from Italy to the UK to begin a modelling career and she went on to appear in several 1950s films.  In 1947 she had married Richard Bentinck Boyle, the ninth Earl of Shannon, and although the marriage was dissolved in 1955, she kept the surname, Boyle, throughout her career.  Boyle was an on screen continuity announcer for the BBC in the 1950s and then became a television personality. Read more…

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Baldassare Cossa – Antipope

The colourful career of a pirate who became a pope

Baldassare Cossa, who reigned as Pope for five years under the name of John XXIII, was deposed as pontiff on this day in 1419. Stripped of his powers, he had been accused of charges that included piracy, rape, and incest, but he was still later appointed Cardinal Bishop of Frascati by a subsequent pope, Martin V.  Cossa is now known in history as an Antipope, because he was appointed as John XXIII during the Western Schism, a split within the Catholic church in the 14th and 15th centuries.  Bishops in Rome and Avignon, France, were simultaneously claiming to be the true Pope and were eventually joined by a line of Pisan claimants, from which Cossa was appointed.  The papacy had resided in Avignon since 1309, when Rome was wracked by political chaos and violence, but Pope Gregory XI returned it to Rome in 1377. Read more…

Franca Rame – actress, writer and politician

Artistic collaborator and wife of Dario Fo

The actress and writer Franca Rame, much of whose work was done in collaboration with her husband, the Nobel Prize-winning actor, playwright and satirist Dario Fo, died in Milan on this day in 2013 at the age of 83.  One of Italy's most admired and respected stage performers, her contribution to Dario Fo’s work was such that his 1997 Nobel prize for literature probably should have been a joint award. In the event, on receipt of the award, Fo announced he was sharing it with his wife.  Rame was also a left-wing militant. A member of the Italian Communist Party from 1967, she was elected to the Italian senate in 2006 under the banner of the Italy of Values party, a centre-left anti-corruption grouping led by Antonio Di Pietro, the former prosecutor who had led the Mani pulite (“Clean Hands”) corruption investigation in the 1990s.  Read more…

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Saint Bona of Pisa

Pilgrim was unusual for travelling extensively in 12th century

Tour guides and flight attendants might wish to raise a glass today to Saint Bona of Pisa, whose feast day is celebrated every year on May 29.  Pope John XXIII canonised Bona in 1962 and made her the patron saint of her native city of Pisa, as well as the patron saint of Italian tour guides and flight attendants.  This was because Bona, who was born in 1156 in Pisa, used to take parties of pilgrims on the potentially dangerous journey to Santiago de Compostela in north west Spain, where James the Great, one of the 12 apostles of Jesus, is honoured.  Bona was born in the parish of San Martino in Guazzolongo in Pisa. When she was three years old her father left home and never returned, leaving her family in financial difficulties.  It is said that when Bona was about seven years of age, the figure on a crucifix in a church held its hand out to her.  Read more…

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Virginia de’ Medici – noblewoman

Duchess was driven mad by husband’s infidelity

Virginia de’ Medici, who for a time ruled the duchy of Modena and Reggio, was born on this day in 1568 in Florence.  She protected the autonomy of the city of Modena while her husband was away, despite plots against her, and she was considered to have been a clever and far-sighted ruler.  Virginia was the illegitimate daughter of Cosimo I de’ Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany and his mistress, Camilla Martelli.  Her paternal grandparents were Giovanni dalle Bande Nere and his wife Maria Salviati, who was the granddaughter of Lorenzo the Magnificent. Her maternal grandparents were Antonio Martelli and Fiammetta Soderini, who were both members of important families in Florence.  In 1570, Cosimo I contracted a morganatic marriage with his mistress, Camilla, on the advice of Pope Pius V, which allowed him to legitimise his daughter.  Read more…

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Book of the Day: Book of the Day: Mussolini: The Rise and Fall of Il Duce, by Christopher Hibbert

With his signature insight and compelling style, Christopher Hibbert explains the extraordinary complexities and contradictions that characterised Benito Mussolini. Mussolini was born on a Sunday afternoon in 1883 in a village in central Italy. On a Saturday afternoon in 1945 he was shot by Communist partisans on the shores of Lake Como. In the 62 years between those two fateful afternoons, Mussolini lived one of the most dramatic lives in modern history. In Mussolini: The Rise and Fall of Il Duce, Hibbert traces Mussolini's unstoppable rise to power and details the nuances of his fascist ideology. This book examines Mussolini's legacy and reveals why he continues to be both revered and reviled by the Italian people.

Christopher Hibbert was an English writer, historian and biographer. He has been called "a pearl of biographers" (New Statesman) and "probably the most widely-read popular historian of our time and undoubtedly one of the most prolific" (The Times). Hibbert was a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and the author of many books, including The Story of England, Disraeli, Edward VII, George IV, The Rise and Fall of the House of Medici, and Cavaliers and Roundheads.

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28 May

Luigi Capuana - author and journalist

Sicilian was leading figure in verismo movement

The author and journalist Luigi Capuana, one of the most important writers of the verismo movement that flourished in Italy in the late 19th century, was born on this day in 1839 in Mineo, a medieval town in southeast Sicily, in the province of Catania.  Verismo - meaning ‘realism’ - sought to portray society and humanity in the manner of a photograph, objectively representing life as it really was, stripped of romanticism, usually among the lower classes, using explicit descriptive detail and realistic dialogue.  Capuana, who was influenced by the French writers Honoré de Balzac and Émile Zola, and his fellow Sicilian Giovanni Verga were two of the earliest advocates of the movement, which was at its peak in the final quarter of the 19th century.  It declined in popularity in the early 20th century but its principles were revived in the neorealism movement that dominated Italian cinema in the immediate years after World War II.  Read more…

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Muzio Attendolo Sforza - condottiero

Mercenary captain who founded Sforza dynasty

Muzio Attendolo Sforza, who is recognised as the founder of the Sforza dynasty that ruled the Duchy of Milan from 1450 to 1535, was born on this day in 1369 in Cotignola, a town in Emilia-Romagna about 25km (16 miles) west of Ravenna.  A career soldier who made his fortune as a mercenary captain - a condottiero - Muzio was a key figure in many of the wars between rival states across Northern Italy in the late 14th and early 15th century, eventually losing his life on the battlefield.  He acquired the name Sforza initially as a nickname but it was eventually adopted as a family name. His illegitimate son, Francesco, one of Muzio’s 16 known children, became the first Sforza Duke of Milan through his marriage to Bianca Maria Visconti, whose father, the last Visconti Duke of Milan, died without a male heir.  Some accounts have it that the Sforza family grew from peasant origins. Read more…

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Caravaggio and a death in Campo Marzio

Hot-tempered artist killed man in Rome in row over a woman

The brilliant late Renaissance artist Caravaggio committed the murder that would cause him to spend the remainder of his life on the run on this day in 1606.  Renowned for his fiery temperament and history of violent acts as well as for the extraordinary qualities of his paintings, Caravaggio is said to have killed Ranuccio Tomassoni, described in some history books as a ‘wealthy scoundrel’, in the Campo Marzio district of central Rome, not far from the Piazza Monte D'Oro.  The incident led to Caravaggio being condemned to death by order of the incumbent pope, Paul V, and then fleeing the city, first to Naples, eventually landing in Malta.  It was thought that the two had a row over a game of tennis, which was gaining popularity in Italy at the time, and that the dispute escalated into a brawl, which was not unusual for Caravaggio. Read more…

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Geminiano Giacomelli – composer

Farnese duke encouraged musician to develop his talent

One of the most popular composers of opera in the early 18th century in Italy, Geminiano Giacomelli (sometimes known as Jacomelli) was born on this day in 1692 at Colorno near Parma.  From 1724, when his opera Ipermestra was performed for the first time, up to his death in 1740, Giacomelli composed 19 operas.  His best known work was Cesare in Egitto (Caesar in Egypt), which he produced in 1735.  As a young child he had studied singing, counterpoint and the harpsichord with Giovanni Maria Capelli, organist and composer at the Farnese court and maestro di cappella at the cathedral in Parma.  After moving to Piacenza, Giacomelli became maestro di cappella in the ducal parish of San Fermo. In 1719 he became maestro di cappella to the Farnese court and also at the Chiesa della Madonna della Steccata. Read more…

The night Maria Callas made an audience weep

La Scala witnesses a stunning performance

Maria Callas gave a stunning performance that has gone down in history as her greatest ever portrayal of Violetta in La traviata on this day in 1955 at La Scala opera house in Milan.  After the opening night of the production on 28 May, it was reported in the press that Callas had driven the audience into a frenzy with her wonderful singing and powerful acting as she played the part of Giuseppe Verdi’s doomed heroine, who was a beautiful courtesan.  The character of Violetta is considered by opera experts to be one of the three finest roles ever portrayed by Callas and it is ranked alongside her performances in Vincenzo Bellini’s Norma and Gaetano Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor.  The staging by director Luchino Visconti for the 1955 production of La traviata provided the perfect setting for Callas with its ornate décor and costumes.  Read more…

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The Last Supper goes back on display

Leonardo’s masterpiece put on show again at last

After more than 20 years of careful restoration, the world famous wall painting by Leonardo da Vinci, The Last Supper, was put back on display for visitors on this day in 1999.  The masterpiece, which shows the different expressions on the faces of the disciples at the moment Jesus says the words, ‘One of you will betray me’, was finally back where it belonged on the wall of the refectory of the Church of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan.  Commissioned by Ludovico Sforza, Duke of Milan, Leonardo began work on The Last Supper (known as Il Cenacolo in Italian) in 1495 and he completed it four years later. He felt traditional fresco painting techniques would not adequately capture the intensity he wanted so he experimented by painting on to dry plaster on the wall of the refectory.  But his new method was not as durable as the traditional one and the painting deteriorated quickly. Read more…

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Leandro Jayarajah - cricketer

Father was a pioneer of game in Italy

Leandro Jayarajah, the former captain and head coach of Roma Capannelle Cricket Club, was born on this day in 1987 in Rome.  His father, Francis Alphonsus Jayarajah, usually known as Alfonso, is a Sri Lankan national who founded what became the Capannelle club in 1978 and was one of the pioneers of organised cricket in Italy.  Alfonso was co-founder in 1980 of the Federazione Cricket Italiana, under whose auspices an Italian cricket championship has been played since 1983.  Capannelle, which takes its name from the racecourse in Rome, the Ippodromo Capannelle, where the club plays its home matches, have been Serie A champions on several occasions, including under Leandro’s leadership in 2013.  The club began life as the Commonwealth Wandering Giants Cricket Club, changing its name when the chance to use the green space in the middle of the racecourse as a permanent home presented itself in 1983.  Read more…

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Book of the Day: The Benefactor: A Novella, by Luigi Capuana; translated by Nicolina Lettieri

Luigi Capuana’s The Benefactor is a long novella written at the turn of the 20th century, one of the most accomplished examples of Italian Verismo, a literary movement devoted to the realistic observation of social life and human psychology.  The story is set in the small Sicilian town of Settefonti, where the unexpected arrival of an Englishman, Pietro Kyllea, disturbs the fragile balance of local society. Kyllea announces his intention to purchase vast stretches of neglected land in the barren district of Tirantello and transform them into productive farmland. What appears at first as a practical economic project soon becomes a source of suspicion, fascination, and rivalry among landowners, notables, and townspeople. Through the reactions of the community, Capuana explores the conflict between tradition and change, between entrenched social hierarchies and the disruptive force of individual initiative. Rumours spread, alliances shift, and hidden tensions surface, revealing the psychological mechanisms that govern collective behaviour. Beneath the outward simplicity of events, the narrative exposes deeper questions of pride, illusion, moral responsibility, and social power.

Luigi Capuana was an Italian critic and writer who was one of the earliest Italian advocates of realism. Capuana influenced many writers, including the novelist Giovanni Verga and the playwright Luigi Pirandello, who were his friends.  Nicolina Lettieri is a writer and translator. 

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27 May

Giuseppe Tornatore - writer and director

Oscar winner for Cinema Paradiso

The screenwriter and director Giuseppe Tornatore, the creator of the Oscar-winning classic movie Cinema Paradiso, was born on this day in 1956 in Bagheria, a small town a few kilometres along the coast from the Sicilian capital Palermo.  Known as Nuovo Cinema Paradiso in Italy, Tornatore’s best-known work won the award for Best Foreign Language Film at the 62nd Academy Awards following its release in 1988.  The movie, written by Tornatore, tells the story of Salvatore, a successful film director based in Rome who returns to his native Sicily after hearing of the death of the man who kindled his love of the cinema, the projectionist at the picture house in his local village, who became a father figure to him after his own father was killed on wartime national service.  Much of the film consists of flashbacks to Salvatore’s life as a child in the immediate post-war years. Read more…

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Lucrezia Crivelli – lady in waiting

Mystery of the beautiful woman in painting by Leonardo

Lucrezia Crivelli, mistress of Ludovico Sforza, Duke of Milan, who was for a long time believed to be the subject of a painting by Leonardo da Vinci, died on this day in 1508 in Canneto sull’Oglio in Lombardy.  Crivelli served as a lady in waiting to Ludovico Sforza’s wife, Beatrice d’Este, from 1475 until Beatrice’s death in 1497.  She also became the Duke’s mistress and gave birth to his son, Giovanni Paolo, who went on to become the first Marquess of Caravaggio and a celebrated condottiero.  Crivelli lived for many years in the Castello of Canneto near Mantua under the protection of Isabella d’Este, the elder sister of Beatrice, until her death in 1508.  Coincidentally, her former lover, Ludovico Sforza, is believed to have died on the same day in 1508 while being kept prisoner in the dungeons of the castle of Loches en Touraine in France. Read more…

Giovanni Battista Beccaria - physicist and mathematician

Monk who explained how lightning conductors work

The physicist, mathematician and Piarist monk Giovanni Battista Beccaria, whose work with electricity confirmed and expanded upon the discoveries of the American polymath and Founding Father Benjamin Franklin, died in Turin on this day in 1781.  At the age of 64 he had been ill and in pain for some years but was working right up to his death on a treatise on meteors.  For much of his life, Beccaria had been occupied in the study of electricity with particular focus on the discoveries made by Franklin, with whom he corresponded regularly.  He successfully explained such things as the workings of the Leyden Jar and the Franklin square, two devices in which static electricity could be captured and stored, and why pointed objects could discharge electrified objects at a distance.  He was also able to explain why lightning rods, or lightning conductors, protect a building. Read more…

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Bruno Vespa – television journalist

TV host opened the door to late night political debate

Bruno Vespa, the founding host of the television programme Porta a Porta, was born on this day in 1944 in L’Aquila in Abruzzo.  Vespa has fronted the late night television talk show, which literally means ‘Door to Door’ in English, since Italy's state broadcaster Rai launched the programme in 1996.  Vespa became a radio announcer with Rai when he was 18 and began hosting the news programme Telegiornale Rai a few years later.  He had begun his career in journalism by writing sports features for the L’Aquila edition of the newspaper, Il Tempo, when he was just 16 years old.  On television, he became well known for interviewing influential world figures just before they became famous, an example being his programme featuring Cardinal Karol Wojtyla, the year before he was elected as Pope John Paul II.  Read more…

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Book of the Day: Giuseppe Tornatore: Emotion, Cognition, Cinema, by William Hope

The nature of the spectator’s emotional and intellectual engagement with films has attracted increasing critical scrutiny over the past decade, and theoretical frameworks have been elaborated to analyse how and why viewers are moved by what they see on screen. Viewer responses are influenced by factors including genre expectations, involuntary physiological reactions to what is seen and heard, shifting attachments towards screen characters, and by specific devices within a film’s mise-en-scène, such as lighting and colour. Giuseppe Tornatore: Emotion, Cognition, Cinema is a film-by-film analysis of the work of the Oscar-winning director, a study that examines the nature of the strong affective charge that characterizes his films, and which also explores the cognitive and intellectual appeal of Tornatore’s cinema. The volume illustrates the ways in which an affective and intellectual synergy can develop between a film’s aesthetics and its conceptual agenda, as instantiated by films such as the celebrated Cinema Paradiso. The affective power that characterizes Tornatore’s work has long been acknowledged by critics, and while analysing the configurations of visual, aural, and narrative devices that generate such intensely poignant viewing experiences, the volume also elucidates the ways in which the director’s stylistic approach intensifies the significance of a range of social and cultural questions affecting Western society, issues that lie at the heart of his films.

William Hope is a lecturer in Italian language and film at the University of Salford, and his main research area is Italian cinema from the 1970s to the present day. 

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26 May

NEW - Francesco Berni - poet

The short turbulent life of a witty satirist   

Tuscan writer Francesco Berni, whose satirical verses poked fun at two Popes and one of his contemporary Italian poets, died on this day in 1535 in Florence.  Berni became known for his distinctive style of burlesque writing, which imitated serious literary forms in a humorous way. This technique became known as ‘bernesco’ and was a device later used by many other poets.  Some people believed his death, when he was in his thirties, was due to having been poisoned in revenge for refusing to take part in a plot to kill either Ippolito de’ Medici or an Italian Cardinal named Giovanni Salviati, but this is not certain.  Berni was born in either 1497 or 1498 in Lamporecchio in Tuscany. His father, Niccoló, who was a doctor, came from an established Florentine family, but he was poor. Berni spent his early years living in Florence, moving to Rome when he was about 20. Read more…

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Alberto Ascari - racing driver

F1 champion killed amid eerie echoes of father's death

Racing driver Alberto Ascari, who was twice Formula One champion, died on this day in 1955 in an accident at the Monza racing circuit in Lombardy, just north of Milan.  A hugely popular driver, his death shocked Italy and motor racing fans in particular.  What many found particularly chilling was a series of uncanny parallels with the death of his father, Antonio Ascari, who was also a racing driver, 30 years previously.  Alberto had gone to Monza to watch his friend, Eugenio Castellotti, test a Ferrari 750 Monza sports car, which they were to co-drive in the 1000 km Monza race.  Contracted to Lancia at the time, although he had been given dispensation to drive for Ferrari in the race, Ascari was not supposed to test drive the car, yet he could not resist trying a few laps, even though he was dressed in a jacket and tie, in part to ensure he had not lost his nerve after a serious accident a few days earlier.  Read more…

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Napoleon becomes King of Italy

French Emperor places Iron Crown of Lombardy on his own head

Napoleon Bonaparte was declared King of Italy on this day in 1805 in Milan.  He crowned himself at a ceremony in the Duomo using the Iron Crown of Lombardy.  The title King of Italy signified that Napoleon was the head of the new Kingdom of Italy, which was at that time a vassal state of the French Empire. The area controlled by Napoleon had previously been known as a republic, with Napoleon as its president.  But Napoleon had become the Emperor of France the year before and had decided Italy should become a Kingdom ruled by himself, or a member of his family.  Before the ceremony, the Iron Crown had to be fetched from Monza. The crown consisted of a circlet of gold with a central iron band, which according to legend was beaten out of a nail from Christ’s true cross, found by Saint Helena in the Holy Land. Read more…

Luca Toni - World Cup winner

Striker one of stars of 2006 triumph in Germany

The footballer Luca Toni, who played an important role in Italy’s achievement in winning the soccer World Cup in Germany in 2006, was born on this day in 1977 in the small town of Pavullo nel Frignano in Emilia-Romagna.  Toni scored twice in Italy’s 3-0 victory over Ukraine in the quarter-finals before starting as the Azzurri’s main striker in both the semi-final triumph over the hosts and the final against France, in which they eventually prevailed on penalties. Toni hit the bar with one header and saw another disallowed for offside in the final.  The goals were among 16 he scored in 47 appearances for the national team but it was his remarkable club career that makes him stand out in the history of Italian football.  A muscular 6ft 4ins in height and hardly the most mobile of forwards, he was never seen as a great player, more an old-fashioned centre forward.  Read more…

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Book of the Day:  Renaissance Florence on Five Florins a Day, by Charles FitzRoy  

This fascinating and fact-packed guide provides all the practical advice you need for a journey back to the golden age of one of Europe’s great cultural cities. Take in the sights and sounds, marvel at Brunelleschi’s sublime cathedral dome, wonder at the sculptures and paintings that have made this the art capital of its day, and lose yourself in the thrilling (and often riotous) local feasts and festivals. Along the way, you will find out about the most important and influential families in Florence, the up-and-coming artists Michelangelo and Leonardo, and the humanist philosophers battling the Church. Here, too, is the darker side of life in the city, from its taverns and brothels to the grisly punishments meted out to wrongdoers and the reckless rabble-rousing of Savonarola. Also featured is invaluable advice if you’re planning to travel outside of Florence to the stunning cities of Pisa, Siena, Arezzo and Cortona – including how to recognize and avoid bandits, mercenaries and condottieri. Renaissance Florence on Five Florins a Day will appeal to travellers, museum-goers or anyone who wonders what it would really have been like to visit this model of Renaissance culture.

Charles FitzRoy is a direct descendant of Charles II. Educated at Magdalene College, Cambridge, he trained as an art historian under Professor David Watkin. He is the author of Italy: A Grand Tour for the Modern Traveller and Italy Revealed, and runs Fine Art Travel, a company that organises cultural tours throughout Europe, including Italy.

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Francesco Berni - poet

The short turbulent life of a witty satirist   

Francesco Berni depicted in a
18th century drawing 

Tuscan writer Francesco Berni, whose satirical verses poked fun at two Popes and one of his contemporary Italian poets, died on this day in 1535 in Florence.

Berni became known for his distinctive style of burlesque writing, which imitated serious literary forms in a humorous way. This technique became known as ‘bernesco’ and was a device later used by many other poets.

Some people believed his death, when he was in his thirties, was due to having been poisoned in revenge for refusing to take part in a plot to kill either Ippolito de’ Medici or an Italian Cardinal named Giovanni Salviati, but this is not certain.

Berni was born in either 1497 or 1498 in Lamporecchio in Tuscany. His father, Niccoló, who was a doctor, came from an established Florentine family, but he was poor. Berni spent his early years living in Florence and, when he was about 20, he entered the service of Cardinal Bernardo Bibbiena and his nephew, Angelo Dovizi, and moved to Rome with them.

At the time of the election of Pope Adrian VI, Berni circulated some witty verses that may have caused offence and he then found himself having to leave the capital city for a while and moved to live in Abruzzo. He returned in 1523 and accepted a post as a clerk, or a secretary, to Gian Matteo Giberti, who had an important role as datary to Pope Clement VII, which was a powerful post, responsible for processing official documents, granting dispensations and conferring benefices.

However, Berni found his duties working for Giberti irritating but, in the meantime, earned himself some celebrity because of his inventive satirical poetry. In about 1530, he was able to relinquish his post to concentrate on his writing, having obtained a canonry in Florence Cathedral, an office that relieved his precarious financial situation.

The writer’s Tuscan translation of Orlando Innamorato, a work that had been composed by the Renaissance author Matteo Maria Boiardo, went on to eclipse the original version, as it was preferred by many readers. The original had been written in the less popular Ferrarese dialect, making it more difficult for a lot of people to read. 

Pope Clement VII was one of Berni's
targets for his satirical verse

Berni’s play La Catrina, which was described as a lively, rustic farce, was also highly regarded at the time, but Berni was to become more well-known for his burlesque poetry.

Some of his output is regarded as savagely satirical, such as his verses attacking his fellow Tuscan poet, Pietro Aretino, and those aimed at the Popes, Adrian VI and Clement VII. 

However, some of his most popular work, which was written in the style of Petrarchan verse, was inspired by relatively unimportant, everyday subjects, such as a poem he wrote mocking his friend’s shorn beard.

Sadly, Berni died, at the age of about 38. After his death, a story circulated that he had been poisoned by Duke Alessandro de’ Medici for having refused to poison the Duke’s cousin, Ippolito de’ Medici, but this has never been proved one way or the other. It was also claimed in a letter written at the time that Berni died from ingesting the poison that he had refused to administer to Cardinal Giovanni Salviati, a Florentine diplomat.

Whether either story is true or not, it is thought more likely that Berni’s mysterious death occurred as a result of being caught up in the political intrigues going on at the time among the Medici, rather than because he had seriously offended any of the targets of his satirical verses. 

Berni’s acclaimed translation and revision of Boiardo’s Orlando Innamorato has also provided scholars with a clue about his own opinions about religion. In one of his poetic introductions to a canto, he revealed that he was favourably disposed toward the new Reformation principles being introduced in Italy at the time, which may explain the bitterness of some of his remarks in the satirical verses that he had written about the Church.

Several streets in Italian cities have been named after the poet. You can find a Via Francesco Berni in Florence, Empoli, Pietrasanta, Varese, and Verona.

Packets of brigidini, Lamporecchio's speciality
wafer biscuits, on sale at a market

Travel tip:

Lamporecchio, where Francesco Berni was born, is a comune - municipality - in the province of Pistoia in Tuscany. It is about 13km (eight miles) south of Pistoia. The town is known for the invention of brigidini, which are thin, anise-flavoured wafers, and the berlingozzo, a cake typically eaten during the Carnival. The noble Rospigliosi family, of which Pope Clement IX was a member, has its roots in Lamporecchio. With a population of around 7,500,  Lamporecchio is located in the Valdinievole, a valley that extends between Pistoia and Lucca, in an area halfway between the Fucecchio Marsh and the hills of Montalbano, which are planted with vineyards and olive trees. Halfway along the valley - and a good base for visiting the area - is the town of Montecatini Terme, famous for its thermal baths that can be enjoyed in the town’s Liberty-style spa resorts.

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Brunelleschi's colossal dome of the Cattedrale di
Santa Maria del Fiore dominates the skyline

Travel tip:

Berni achieved financial security and was able to concentrate on his poetry after 1530 when he obtained a canonry at Florence Cathedral. Otherwise known as Santa Maria del Fiore, or the Duomo of Florence, the cathedral dominates the city skyline with its immense, brick-built dome designed by the Florentine Renaissance architect Filippo Brunelleschi. It was built without scaffolding and given an inner shell to provide a platform for the timbers that support the outer shell. The architect died in 1446 before it was completed, but a statue of Brunelleschi was erected in Piazza del Duomo. The dome was his greatest achievement, and would forever define the city of Florence. It remains, to this day, the largest masonry dome in the world.

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More reading:

How satirist Giuseppe Parini mocked the aristocracy of 18th century Milan

Why Pietro Aretino was both admired and feared by the nobility

Ludovico Ariosto, Renaissance author of the epic poem, Orlando Furioso

Also on this day:

1805: Napoleon Bonaparte was declared King of Italy

1955: The death of racing driver Alberto Ascari

1977: The birth of footballer Luca Toni

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