Antonio Maria Valsalva – anatomist

Work by brilliant professor benefits astronauts today

A line engraving of Antonio Maria Valsalva
by Romuald Ceracchi

Antonio Maria Valsalva, a much respected anatomist, died on this day in 1723 in Bologna.

Valsalva’s research focused on the anatomy of the ear and his discoveries were so important that a piece of equipment used by astronauts today is named after him.

The Valsalva device in spacesuits allows astronauts to equalise the pressure in their ears by performing the Valsalva manoeuvre inside the suit without using their hands to block their nose. It has also been used for other purposes, such as to remove moisture from the face.

Valsalva was born in Imola in 1666. He received an education in humanities, mathematics and natural sciences before going on to study medicine and philosophy at Bologna University. He later became Professor of Anatomy at Bologna University.

His main interest was the middle and inner ear and it was Valsalva who coined the term Eustachian tube for a part within the ear. It was named after the 16th century anatomist Bartolomeo Eustachi who had described the tube in his written work.

The Valsalva manoeuvre, the forcible exhalation against a closed airway, often practised by people to equalise pressure between the ears when on an aeroplane, is still used by doctors today to help them with diagnosis in certain situations.

Valsalva’s most substantial contribution to the field of medicine was his detailed, illustrated work about the anatomy, physiology and pathology of the ear, published in 1704.

Valsalva died after a stroke in 1723 and was buried in the church of San Giovanni in Monte in Bologna.

Imola's well-preserved Rocca Sforzesca dates back to the 14th
century, when control was disputed by powerful families

Travel tip:

Imola, where Antonio Valsalva was born, is a City in the province of Bologna in Emilia-Romagna. It dates back to Roman times and there are many fascinating historic buildings to see in the centre. The castle, the Rocca Sforzesca, is well preserved, and is nowadays the home of an internationally respected piano academy and the Cinema d’Este, which shows films in July and August. Imola is also home to the Autodromo Internazionale Enzo e Dino Ferrari, a famous automobile racing circuit. 

Bologna's historic university, founded in 1088, is the
oldest in the world

Travel tip:

Bologna University was founded in 1088 and is the oldest in the world. There is a portrait of Valsalva in the university’s oldest surviving building, the Archiginnasio, which is now a library. It is open Monday to Friday from 9am to 7pm, and on Saturdays from 9am to 2pm and is just a short walk from Piazza Maggiore and the Basilica di San Petronio in the centre of the city.



More reading:

The founding father of Italian psychiatry, Andrea Verga

The professor who turned pathology into a science

Samantha Cristoforetti, Italy's firsy female astronaut

Also on this day:

1891: The birth of Sardinia's first prime minister of Italy, Antonio Segni

1925: The birth of Olympic showjumper Raimondo D’Inzeo 

(Picture credits: Sforza Castle at Imola by Ruben Alexander via Creative Commons)

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Renata Tebaldi – opera singer

Performer with a beautiful lirico soprano voice

Renata Tebaldi pictured in 1961

Opera singer Renata Tebaldi was born on this day in 1922 in Pesaro.

Said by the conductor Arturo Toscanini to possess ‘the voice of an angel’, Tebaldi had a long stage career and made numerous recordings.

Her parents had separated before her birth and she grew up in the home of her maternal grandparents in Langhirano in the province of Parma in Emilia-Romagna.

Tebaldi was stricken with polio at the age of three but later became interested in music and sang in the church choir. She was sent to have piano lessons but the teacher decided she should study singing instead and arranged for her to attend the conservatory in Parma. She later transferred to Liceo Musicale Rossini in Pesaro.

Tebaldi made her stage debut in 1944, while Italy was still at war, in Arrigo Boito’s Mefistofele at the Teatro Sociale in Rovigo but her beautiful voice first began to attract attention in 1946 when she appeared as Desdemona in Giuseppe Verdi’s Otello in Trieste.

She auditioned for Toscanini who was immediately impressed by her and she made her debut at Teatro alla Scala in 1946 singing in a concert to mark the reopening of the theatre after the Second World War.

Mario Del Monaco was famous for his
portrayal of Giuseppe Verdi's Otello

The following year, she played her first operatic role - Eva in Wagner’s Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg - at the same opera house.

Toscanini encouraged her to learn to sing the part of Aida and to rehearse in his own studio.

She made her debut in the role at La Scala in 1950 alongside Mario Del Monaco, which helped launch her international career.

In 1950 Maria Callas was taken on at La Scala as a substitute Aida when Tebaldi was indisposed.

There were rumours of rivalry between them for the rest of their careers although Tebaldi considered herself to be a lyric soprano and Callas considered herself to be a dramatic coloratura soprano.

Nonetheless, partly for the sake of peace, Tebaldi decided to spend a lot of time in the United States. She made her debut at the Metropolitan Opera in New York in 1955, where she sang regularly until her last appearance in 1973, signing off as she had begun with a performance as Desdemona in Otello.

She retired from singing completely in 1976 and died at the age of 82 at her home in San Marino.

A small museum dedicated to Tebaldi has been opened in the stables of the Villa Pallavicino in Busseto - Verdi's home town - which is also the home of the National Giuseppe Verdi Museum. Among the exhibits are many costumes and mementoes from her personal life, including letters from John F Kennedy and Rudy Giuliani, the former Mayor of New York.

The Teatro Lirico Giuseppe Verdi in Trieste, where
Renata Tebaldi enjoyed her first success

Travel tip:

Teatro Lirico Giuseppe Verdi in Trieste, where Tebaldi had her first big stage success, was built to replace a smaller theatre and inaugurated as Teatro Nuovo in 1801. It was the site of the premiere of Verdi’s opera Il Corsaro in 1848 featuring soprano Giuseppina Strepponi, who Verdi later married. Within hours of Verdi’s death in 1901 the theatre had been renamed in honour of the composer.

The Castle of Torrechiara towers above the town
of Langhirano, near the city of Parma

Travel tip:

Langhirano, Renata Tebaldi’s home town, is situated about about 90km (56 miles) west of Bologna and about 20km (12 miles) south of Parma in Emilia-Romagna. It is known for the big 15th century Castle of Torrechiara, perched on high ground overlooking a valley, where a music festival dedicated to Renata Tebaldi is held each summer. Although Tebaldi died in San Marino, she was buried at Langhirano Cemetery.

More reading:

Chance opportunity that turned cellist Toscanini into a conductor

Arrigo Boito - the composer who fought under Garibaldi

What made Mario Del Monaco one of the great Otellos

Also on this day:

1690: The birth of virtuoso violinist Francesco Maria Veracini

1891: The birth of Corradino d'Ascanio, designer of the Vespa scooter

(Picture credits: Renata Tebaldi by Umberto Borsò; Castle of Torrechiara by Fabio Macor via Creative Commons)


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Charles Edward Stuart – royal exile

Bonnie Prince Charlie’s heart will forever be in Frascati 

A portrait of Charles Edward Stuart - Bonnie
Prince Charlie - painted by Allan Ramsey in 1745

The Young Pretender to the British throne, sometimes known as Bonnie Prince Charlie, died on this day in 1788 in Rome. 

The man who would have been King Charles III was born and brought up in Italy where his father, James, the son of the exiled Stuart King James II, had been given a residence by Pope Clement XI.

Charles Edward Stuart was raised as a Catholic and taught to believe he was a legitimate heir to the British throne.

In 1745 Charles sailed to Scotland hoping to gather an army to help him place his father back on the thrones of England and Scotland. 

He defeated a Government army at the Battle of Prestonpans and marched south. He had got as far as Derbyshire when the decision was made by his troops to return to Scotland because of the lack of English support for their cause.

They were pursued by King George II’s son, the Duke of Cumberland, who led troops against them at the Battle of Culloden in 1746. Many of his soldiers were shot and killed and the surviving Jacobites fled. They were pursued by Cumberland ’s men, who committed atrocities against them when they were caught. 

Charles had to hide out in the Scottish moors until he could get away by boat to France, as commemorated in the Skye Boat Song.

Bonnie Prince Charlie died in Rome at the age of 67 after suffering a stroke. He was initially buried in the cathedral in Frascati, where his brother Henry Benedict Stuart was the Bishop. 

When Henry died in 1807, the remains of Bonnie Prince Charlie were moved to the crypt of St Peter’s in Rome, where they were laid to rest with his father and brother.

The Cattedrale San Pietro in Frascati, which
houses the tombstone of Charles Edward Stuart

Travel tip:

Frascati is an ancient city 20 kilometres south east of Rome in the Alban Hills. Inside the main church, Cattedrale San Pietro, is the tombstone of Charles Edward Stuart, also known as Bonnie Prince Charlie or the Young Pretender. When his body was moved to St Peter’s, his heart was left in Frascati in a small urn under the floor below his monument. Among the art works in the church is a Madonna attributed to Domenichino.


Travel tip:

Bonnie Prince Charlie was born and died in Palazzo Muti in Rome, an ochre-coloured building in Piazza dei Santi Apostoli, which became the official Stuart court in exile. This residence had been given to them by the Pope, who recognised them as the rightful kings of Great Britain and Ireland.


More reading:

The founding of the Papal Swiss Guard

Europe's first free public school opens in Frascati

How Domenichino rivalled Raphael

Also on this day:

1888: The death of the saint, Don Bosco

1933: The birth of Mafia boss Bernardo Provenzano




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Elsa Martinelli – actress

Tuscan beauty was spotted by Kirk Douglas

The actress Elsa Martinelli in a 1965
appearance in the TV show The Rogues

Actress and former model Elsa Martinelli was born Elisa Tia on this day in 1935 in Grosseto.

She moved to Rome with her family as a teenager and was discovered by designer Roberto Capucci in 1953 while working as a barmaid in the city.

Her stunning looks helped her to become a successful fashion model and she eventually began playing small parts in films.

As Elsa Martinelli she appeared in Claude Autant-Lara’s Le Rouge et Le Noir in 1954.

Her first important role came a year later when Kirk Douglas is said to have seen her on a magazine cover and told his production company to hire her to appear opposite him in the film, The Indian Fighter.

In 1956 she won the Silver Bear for Best Actress at the Berlin Film Festival for playing the title role in Mario Monicelli’s Donatella.

Martinelli married Count Franco Mancinelli Scotti di San Vito and they had a daughter, Cristiana, in 1958.

Ten years later, after she had split up with her first husband, Martinelli married photographer and furniture designer Willy Rizzo.

In the 1950s and 1960s she attended lavish parties and events in Rome with celebrities such as Anita Ekberg, Maria Callas, Sophia Loren, Carlo Ponti and Harold Robbins.

More reading: Federico Fellini, film director, born 20 January, 1920

Martinelli went on to have a long string of film and television credits to her name.

She appeared in the 1992 comedy film Once Upon a Time and most recently in the television series, Orgoglio, in 2005.

The Cathedral in Grosseto
Photo by Waugsberg (CC BY-SA 3.0)

Travel tip:

Grosseto, where Elsa Martinelli was born and lived as a child, is in the centre of Tuscany, about 14 kilometers from the sea and surrounded by walls commissioned by Francesco I de Medici in the 16th century, There is a 13th century Cathedral with a façade of black and white marble as well as many beautiful old palaces in the centre of the city.


Travel tip:

Rome in the late 1950s and early 1960s was considered the most desirable place in the world in which to party. The economy was booming, designers, such as Roberto Capucci, had made the city synonymous with the word glamour and American directors flocked to make their films at Cinecittà, the studio complex south of the city. This golden era is epitomised by Federico Fellini’s film La dolce vita (The Sweet Life), featuring Marcello Mastroianni as a reporter who follows every move of the celebrities who frequent Rome’s exclusive nightclubs and live in the city’s historic, aristocratic villas.

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