30 March

Fortunato Depero - artist

Futurist who designed iconic Campari bottle

The Futurist painter, sculptor and graphic artist Fortunato Depero, who left a famous mark on Italian culture by designing the conical bottle in which Campari Soda is still sold today, was born on this day in 1892 in the Trentino region.  Depero had a wide breadth of artistic talent, which encompassed painting, sculpture, architecture and graphic design. He designed magazine covers for the New Yorker, Vogue and Vanity Fair among others, created stage sets and costumes for the theatre, made sculptures and paintings and some consider his masterpiece to be the trade fair pavilion he designed for the 1927 Monza Biennale Internazionale delle Arti Decorative, which had giant block letters for walls.  Yet it is the distinctive Campari bottle that has endured longest of all his creations, which went into production in 1932 as the manufacturers of the famous aperitif broke new ground by deciding to sell a ready-made drink of Campari blended with soda water.  It was the first pre-mixed drink anyone had sold commercially and Depero, who was already working with the Milan-based company on a series of advertising posters and stylish black-and-white newspaper ads, was tasked with creating a unique miniature bottle in which the new product would be packaged..  Read more…

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Rimini Proclamation

Opening statement of the Risorgimento came from a Frenchman

The first political proclamation calling for all Italians to unite into a single people and drive out foreigners was issued on this day in 1815 in Rimini.  But the stirring words: ‘Italians! The hour has come to engage in your highest destiny…’ came from a Frenchman, Gioacchino (Joachim) Murat, who was at the time occupying the throne of Naples, which he had been given by his brother-in-law, Napoleon.  Murat had just declared war on Austria and used the Proclamation to call on Italians to revolt against the Austrians occupying Italy. He was trying to show himself as a backer of Italian independence in an attempt to find allies in his desperate battle to hang on to his own throne.  Although Murat was acting out of self-interest at the time, the Proclamation is often seen as the opening statement of the Risorgimento, the movement that helped to arouse the national consciousness of the Italian people. It led to a series of political events that freed the Italian states from foreign domination and unified them politically.  Murat’s Proclamation impressed the Milanese writer Alessandro Manzoni, who wrote a poem about it later that year, Il proclama di Rimini.  Read more…

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Ignazio Gardella – architect

Modernist who created Venetian classic

The engineer and architect Ignazio Gardella, considered one of the great talents of modern urban design in Italy, was born on this day in 1905 in Milan.  He represented the fourth generation in a family of architects and his destiny was determined at an early age. He graduated in civil engineering in Milan in 1931 and architecture in Venice in 1949.  Gardella designed numerous buildings during an active career that spanned almost six decades, including the Antituberculosis Dispensary in Alessandria, which is considered one of the purest examples of Italian Rationalism, and the Casa alle Zattere on the Giudecca Canal in Venice, in which he blended modernism with classical style in a way that has been heralded as genius.  During his university years, he made friends with many young architects from the Milan area and together they created the Modern Italian Movement.  He worked with his father, Arnaldo, on a number of projects while still studying.  On graduating, he set up an office in Milan, although he spent a good part of his early career travelling, sometimes with a commission but at other times to study.  Read more…

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The Sicilian Vespers

How the French lost control of the island they were ruling

As the citizens of Palermo walked to vespers - evening prayers - in the church of Santo Spirito on this day in 1282, a French soldier grossly insulted a pretty young Sicilian woman.  The girl’s enraged fiancé immediately drew his dagger and stabbed the soldier through the heart.  The violence was contagious and the local people exploded in fury against the French occupying forces. More than 200 French soldiers were killed at the outset and the violence spread to other parts of Sicily the next day resulting in a full-scale rebellion against French rule. This bloody event, which led to Charles of Anjou losing control of Sicily, became known in history as the Sicilian Vespers.  King Charles was detested for his cold-blooded cruelty and his officials had made the lives of the ordinary Sicilians miserable.  After he was overthrown, Sicily enjoyed almost a century of independence.  There have been different versions given of the events that led to the rebellion against the French and it is not known exactly how the uprising started.  But to many Italians the story of the Sicilian Vespers has always been inspirational.  Read more…

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29 March

NEW - The Ghetto - Venice’s Jewish quarter

District began as area of enforced segregation

The Doge of Venice, Leonardo Loredan, pronounced a decree creating Venice’s historic Ghetto on this day in 1516.  It meant that the Jewish population of the city, who were already obliged to live under restrictions in place since the 13th century, were forced to move to an island in the northwestern part of the Cannaregio sestiere and could not live in any other district.  There are a number of theories about how it came to be known as the ghetto, the most plausible of which is that the area was known to Venetians by the dialect word geto - foundry - as it used to be home to a factory making heavy iron cannons for the Venetian fleet. The word may have acquired an ‘h’ in its spelling to reflect its mispronunciation by the early inhabitants, mainly German jews, who incorrectly gave it a hard ‘g’ rather than the soft one of the dialect.   Whatever its etymology, ghetto subsequently became a word used to refer to any deprived urban area dominated by one ethnic or religious group, often with negative connotations of deliberate racial segregation.  Yet the history of the Venice Ghetto was not wholly about racial persecution, even though anti-Jewish sentiments played a part.  Read more…

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Terence Hill – actor

Film star progressed from cowboy roles to popular parish priest

Terence Hill was born as Mario Girotti on this day in 1939 in Venice.  He became an actor as a child and went on to have many starring roles in films, particularly spaghetti westerns.  He took up the stage name Terence Hill after it was suggested as a publicity stunt by the producers of one of his films. It is said he had to pick from a list of names and chose one with his mother’s initials.  Terence Hill later became a household name in Italy as the actor who played the lead character in the long-running television series, Don Matteo.  Hill lived in Germany as a child but then his family moved to Rome, the capital of Italy’s film industry. When he was 12 years old, Hill was spotted by director Dino Risi and given a part in Vacanze col gangster, an adventure movie in which five youngsters help a dangerous gangster escape from prison.  Other film parts quickly followed and at the height of his popularity, Hill was said to be among the highest-paid actors in Italy.  His most famous films are They Call Me Trinity and My Name is Nobody, in which he appeared with Henry Fonda. Another of his films, Django, Prepare a coffin was featured at the 64th Venice film festival in 2007.  Read more…

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Edoardo De Martino – painter

Naval officer who painted battle scenes was a favourite of British royal family

Edoardo Federico De Martino, an artist who became famous for his paintings of warships and naval battles, was born on this day in 1838 in Meta, just outside Sorrento.  At the height of his success, De Martino worked in London, where his paintings of ships and famous British naval victories were held in high regard by Queen Victoria.  He went on to work as a painter for Queen Victoria’s son, King Edward VII, and he often accompanied the King on naval tours.  De Martino was born in the small town of Meta, to the northeast of Sorrento, which had a long history of boat building.  He served as an officer in the Italian Navy but by the time he was 30 his main interest was painting.  He became associated with the School of Resina, a group of artists who painted landscapes and contemporary scenes that gathered in Resina, a seaside resort south of Naples, now incorporated into the towns of Herculaneum and Portici. Influenced by his fellow artists, De Martino eventually went to live and work in Naples.  He found fame after moving to London, where he painted scenes from the battles of Trafalgar, the Nile and Cape San Vincenzo.  Read more…

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Enea Bossi - aviation pioneer

Claimed first pedal-powered flight in 1936

Enea Bossi, the aviator credited - albeit disputedly - with building the world's first human-powered aeroplane, was born on this day in 1888 in Milan.  It was claimed that in 1936 Bossi's Pedaliante aircraft flew for approximately 300 feet (91.4m) under pedal power alone.  Piloted by Emilio Casco, a robustly built major in the Italian army and an experienced cyclist, the Pedaliante - or pedal glider - is said to have taken off and covered the distance while remaining a few feet off the ground, although in the absence of independent verification it is not counted as the first authenticated human-powered flight, which did not take place until 1961 in Southampton, England.  The following year, as Bossi attempted to win a competition in Italy offering a prize of 100,000 lire for a successful human-powered flight, Casco succeeded in completing the required 1km (0.62 miles) distance at a height of 30 feet (9m) off the ground.  The Pedaliante, which had been built by the Italian glider manufacturer Vittorio Bonomi, was disqualified, however, on account of having used a catapult launch to achieve its altitude.  Read more…

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Castruccio Castracani - condottiero

Mercenary soldier who ruled Lucca 

Castruccio Castracani, a condottiero who ruled his home city of Lucca from 1316 to 1328, was born on this day in 1281.  His relatively short life - he died at the age of 47 - was taken up with a series of battles, some fought on behalf of others, but latterly for his own ends in the conflict between the Guelphs and the Ghibellines that dominated medieval Italy as part of the power struggle between the Papacy and the Holy Roman Empire.  Castruccio's story inspired a biography by Niccolò Machiavelli and later a novel by Mary Shelley.  Born Castruccio Castracani degli Antelminelli, he was from a Ghibelline family and therefore a supporter of the Holy Roman Emperor in opposition to the Guelphs. He was exiled from Lucca at an early age with his parents and others by the Guelphs, then in the ascendancy.  Orphaned at 19, he lived initially in Pisa before moving to England, where he lived for some years and displayed a skill in the use of weapons that earned him victory in some tournaments and won the favour of King Edward I.  However, after committing a murder, even though it was for reasons of honour, he was forced to leave England and went to France.  Read more…

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Francesco Faà di Bruno - advocate for poor

Entered priesthood after appeal to pope

The blessed Francesco Faà di Bruno, a talented academic from a wealthy family who devoted much energy to helping the poor, disadvantaged and elderly, was born on this day in 1825 near Alessandria in Piedmont.  He was a supporter of Italian unification and indeed was wounded in the cause as a commissioned lieutenant in the Piedmontese Army during the First Italian War of Independence. Yet he could not accept the anti-Catholic sentiments of many of the movement’s leaders.  At the age of 51 he became a priest, although only after the intervention of Pope Pius IX, who stepped in to overrule the Archbishop of Turin, who had rejected Francesco’s credentials on the grounds that he was too old.  He was beatified 100 years after his death by Pope John Paul II.  Francesco was the youngest of 12 children born to Lady Carolina Sappa de' Milanesi of her husband, Luigi, a wealthy landowner whose various titles included Marquis of Bruno, Count of Carentino, Lord of Fontanile, and Patrizio of Alessandria.  His family were of a strong Catholic faith and encouraged a concern for the poor among all their children.  Read more…

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The Ghetto - Venice’s Jewish quarter

District began as area of enforced segregation

The Campo di Gheto Nuovo, heart of the Ghetto
district of the Cannaregio sestiere

A decree creating Venice’s historic Ghetto was pronounced by the Doge of Venice, Leonardo Loredan, on this day in 1516.

It meant that the Jewish population of the city, who were already obliged to live under restrictions in place since the 13th century, were forced to move to an island in the northwestern part of the Cannaregio sestiere and could not live in any other district.

There are a number of theories about how it came to be known as the Ghetto, the most plausible of which is that the area was known to Venetians by the dialect word geto - foundry - as it used to be home to a factory making heavy iron cannons for the Venetian fleet. The word may have acquired an ‘h’ in its spelling to reflect its mispronunciation by the early inhabitants, mainly German Jews, who incorrectly gave it a hard ‘g’ rather than the soft one of the dialect. At some time later, it acquired a second 't', although street signs in Venice have only one.

Whatever its etymology, ghetto subsequently became a word used to refer to any deprived urban area dominated by one ethnic or religious group, often with negative connotations of deliberate racial segregation.

Yet the history of the Venice Ghetto was not wholly about racial persecution, even though anti-Jewish sentiments played a part.

Giovanni Bellini's 1501 portrait
of Venetian Doge, Leonardo Loredan

Venice was actually more tolerant towards its Jewish inhabitants than many European cities in the late 15th and early 16th centuries, although that is not to say they enjoyed freedom as it would be defined today.  Many citizens saw them as a threat to the Republic’s commercial and financial sectors, so there were laws in place prohibiting Jews from working in certain professions and requiring them to wear yellow badges and hats to identify them.  

However, the commercial acumen that some regarded with suspicion was also a benefit to the city. Jewish merchants provided money and goods for the republic’s military defences and when the 1516 decree was passed it was only after a long and heated debate. 

The Republic’s governing council recognised that successful Jewish businesses had become vital to Venice’s economy, yet were under pressure from the Catholic Church, which had ruled that Christians and Jews should not live together at the Third Lateran Council of 1179. There was also the problem of Jewish refugees arriving in Venice in increasing numbers as they fled persecution elsewhere in Europe.

The 1516 decree therefore had a strong element of compromise, a way of appeasing the Catholic Church and addressing the fears of Venice’s non-Jewish population but also of providing the reward of security to the Jewish population in recognition of their contribution to the Republic’s coffers.

The Jews of the Ghetto therefore enjoyed a certain amount of freedom. They were allowed to work and follow recreational pursuits in any part of the city, so long as they returned to the island before nightfall.  Gates erected at entry points were locked at night, yet it was as much a fortress as a prison. The watchmen - paid for by the Jewish community - were there to stop people leaving but also to ensure no unwanted visitors got in.

Indeed, over subsequent years, the Venice Ghetto came to be seen as a haven, with Jews expelled from Portugal and Spain adding to its population, along with Jews displaced from the Veneto by the Habsburg army during the War of the League of Cambrai and from the eastern Mediterranean by the Ottomans. In time the population swelled to more than 5,000.

The Ghetto is notable for its tall buildings, built
to accommodate a rapidly growing population

It was as much a consequence of this that the area became one of deprivation, rather than by any deliberate persecution by the authorities.

As more and more people squeezed into the neighbourhood, overcrowding became rife.  With space limited, the concept of multi-storey dwellings was explored, with laws passed allowing houses in Cannaregio to be a third taller than those in the rest of the city. However, unscrupulous landlords not only charged exorbitant rents but instructed builders to squeeze as many floors as possible into the height allowed, often rendering them cramped and airless and a breeding ground for infectious diseases.

Yet for all its problems, the area became the centre of a vibrant and colourful culture, a reflection of the diverse roots of its inhabitants. For example, the immigrants from the eastern Mediterranean dressed as they had at home, the men sporting turbans, the women wearing expensive silks and jewellery, in stark contrast to the modest and austere dress of the German Jews.

The Ghetto became a centre of trade not only for Jewish residents and visitors but also for Christian Venetians, who poured into the district every morning, attracted by the shops selling everyday supplies, cloth and books that lined the main streets, alongside the ubiquitous moneylenders. 

In addition to places of worship - there were eventually five synagogues, one each for the German, Italian, Spanish, and Levantine communities, and a fifth that may have been French - there was also a theatre, an academy of music, literary salons, an inn and a hospital.

The Scuola Grande Spagnola still offers regular
religious services to Venice's Jewish community

Nonetheless, the freedom of the rest of the city was not restored to the Jewish population until 1797, when the French Army, commanded by 28-year-old General Napoleon Bonaparte, occupied Venice and forced the dissolution of the Republic. The Ghetto's gates were removed, with Jews given the same status as other citizens.

The wealthier inhabitants jumped at the opportunity to move out, some even buying palaces on the Grand Canal.  Yet many of the poorer Jews chose to continue living in the area and others were forced back only months later by the new Austrian administration.  It was not until Venice became part of the unified Italy in 1866 that full emancipation was regained.

The Ghetto remained a focal point for the city’s Jewish community until the Second World War, when the arrival of the Germans in 1944 signalled a dark period in the area’s history, with some 246 Jews from all parts of Venice herded back into the Ghetto for deportation.

Today, the Ghetto - just a few minutes' walk from the Santa Lucia rail station - is still a centre of Jewish life, with two of the five synagogues - the Scuola Grande Spagnola and the Scuola Levantina - still offering religious services. Ironically, only a few of Venice’s approximately 500 Jewish residents actually live in the area, largely because it is too expensive, many young Venetian professionals having chosen it as a trendy area to live.

The entrance to the Museo
Ebraico di Venezia

Travel tip: 

The Museo Ebraico di Venezia - the city’s Jewish museum - is situated in the Campo di Gheto Nuovo, between the two most ancient Venetian synagogues, the Scuola Grande Tedesca and the Scuola Canton. Founded in 1953, it includes important examples of goldsmith and textile manufacture in the Jewish tradition made between the 16th and the 19th centuries and a wide selection of ancient books and manuscripts, and exhibitions dedicated to the cycle of the most important Jewish festivities, with many ritual objects.

The Banco Rosso was a hybrid of
bank and pawn shop

Travel tip:

The preponderance of Jewish moneylenders in Venice at the time of the Ghetto’s establishment was largely because Christians were forbidden by their religious leaders to lend money with interest. The demand for loans, however, remained strong and the Jewish community established banks in Venice which were coded by colour - red, green and black - depending on their function. The Banco Rosso, which can also be found on the Campo di Gheto Nuovo, was a hybrid of bank and pawnshop. It has been restored and is open to visitors, who learn that its name is derived from the red receipt that customers received when pawning an item. Some have speculated that this practice is why even today people who owe money to their bank are said to be “in the red”.

Also on this day:

1281: The birth of condottiero Catruccio Castracani

1825: The birth of Francesco Faà di Bruno, advocate for the poor

1838: The birth of Edoardo De Martino, a painter notable for his depictions of naval battles

1888: The birth of aviation pioneer Enea Bossi

1939: The birth of actor Terence Hill

(Picture credits: Tall buildings, street name sign by Andreas H. from Pixabay; Campo di Ghetto Nuovo by Marc Ryckaert; Museo Ebraico by Arie Darzi; Scuola Spagnola by Didier Descouens, via Wikimedia Commons)

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28 March

Alberto Grimaldi - film producer

Spaghetti Western trilogy gave Naples producer his big break

Film producer Alberto Grimaldi, who boasts an extraordinary list of credits that includes Last Tango in Paris, The Canterbury Tales, Man of La Mancha, Fellini's Casanova, 1900, Ginger and Fred and Gangs of New York, was born in Naples on this day in 1925. Grimaldi trained as a lawyer and it was in that capacity that he initially found work in the cinema industry in the 1950s.  However, he could see the money-making potential in production and in the early 1960s set up his own company, Produzioni Europee Associate (PEA).  His first three productions, cashing in on the popularity in Italy of westerns, enjoyed some success but it was a meeting with Sergio Leone, the Italian director, that earned him his big break. Leone, whose first venture into the western genre, A Fistful of Dollars, had been an unexpected hit both for him and the young American actor, Clint Eastwood, was busy planning the sequel when a dispute arose with his producers over the cost of the movie.  As it happened, Grimaldi's first production, The Shadow of Zorro, had been filmed, like A Fistful of Dollars, on location in Spain.  Read more…

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Fra Bartolommeo - Renaissance great

Friar rated equal of Michelangelo, Raphael and Leonardo

Fra Bartolommeo, the Renaissance artist recognised as one of the greatest religious painters, was born on this day in 1472 in Savignano di Vaiano, in Tuscany.  Also known as Baccio della Porta, a nickname he acquired because when he lived in Florence his lodgings were near what is now the Porta Romana, Bartolommeo created works that chart the development of artistic styles and fashion in Florence, from the earthly realism of the 15th century to the grandeur of High Renaissance in the 16th century.  His most famous works include Annunciation, Vision of St Bernard, Madonna and Child with Saints, the Holy Family, the Mystic Marriage of St Catherine, God the Father with SS Catherine of Siena and Mary Magdalene and Madonna della Misericordia.  Bartolommeo always prepared for any painting by making sketches, more than 1,000 in total over the years he was active.  Around 500 of them were discovered at the convent of St Catherine of Siena in Florence in 1722, where nuns were unaware of their significance.  He is also remembered for his striking profile portrait of Fra Girolamo Savonarola, the fanatical priest under whose influence he came in the 1490s.  Read more…

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Anselmo Colzani - opera star

Baritone who had 16 seasons at the New York Met

Anselmo Colzani, an operatic baritone who was a fixture at the Metropolitan Opera in New York in the 1960s and 1970s, as well as La Scala in his home country, was born on this day in 1918 in Budrio, a town not far from Bologna.  His stage career continued until 1980, when he made his final stage appearance in one of his signature roles as Scarpia in Giacomo Puccini’s Tosca.  Although his repertoire was much wider, his reputation became strongly associated with the works of Puccini and Giuseppe Verdi, with Jack Rance in Puccini's Fanciulla del West and the title role of Verdi's Falstaff, as well a Amonasro in Aida and Iago in Otello among his most famous roles.  Colzani’s association with the Met began in March 1960 after he was approached by Rudolf Bing, the opera house’s general manager, following the sudden death of Leonard Warren on stage during a performance of La Forza del Destino.  A few weeks later, Colzani took over Warren's role in Verdi's Simon Boccanegra. It was not only the first time he had sung at the Met, but the first time he had sung the role.  Read more…

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