Giovanna Trillini - fencing champion

Four-times Olympic champion in foil

Giovanna Trillini won eight
Olympic medals, including four golds

The Olympic fencing champion Giovanna Trillini, one of Italy’s most successful female athletes, was born on this day in 1970 in Jesi, a medieval town in the Marche region.

Trillini won the individual gold medal in the foil event at the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona and was part of Italy’s gold-medal winning group in the team foil at Barcelona in 1992 as well as at Atlanta in 1996 and Sydney in 2000.

She competed at five consecutive summer Olympics between 1996 and 2008 and her total medal haul of eight, including one silver and two bronze medals in the individual foil, makes her Italy’s fifth most successful Olympian and the third most successful female competitor.

After winning individual gold in Barcelona, she was honoured by being asked to be the flag bearer for the azzurri team at the opening ceremony for the Games in Atlanta four years later.

Trillini’s career also encompassed 19 medals in world championship events, including nine golds, and six in the European championships.

Born into a sporting family, Trillini was encouraged to take up fencing by her two brothers, Ezio and Roberto, who were both regular competitors in the sport, in which Italy has a long tradition.

She studied at the University of Urbino, graduating in Sports Science, and developed her fencing skills under the master fencer Ezio Triccoli, another native of Jesi, who set up the Club Scherma Jesi in 1947, in order to teach the art he had learned from a British army officer while he was a prisoner of war during World War II.

Trillini on the medal podium after
her triumph in Barcelona in 1992

Triccoli, who died in 1996 at the age of 81, was responsible for training numerous champions, including Trillini’s close rival and team-mate, Valentina Vezzali, who was also born in Jesi.

Vezzali won gold in the individual foil at three consecutive games, in 2000, 2004 and 2008. Between them, Trillini and Vezzali dominated the foil scene throughout the 90s and 2000s. Only Vezzali, with six golds, has been more successful than Trillini in terms of Olympic medals.

Trillini won the foil competition at the fencing World Cup four times, in 1991, 1994. 1995 and 1998, but undoubtedly would have been champion on many more occasions but for the presence of Vezzali, four years’ her junior, to whom she was runner-up no fewer than seven times.

At the age of 38, Trillini was a beaten semi-finalist in the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, losing 15-10 to Nyam Hyun-Hee of Korea, who went on to lose to Veazzali in the final. She lost to another Italian, Margherita Granbassi, in the third-place final, before announcing her immediate retirement from the sport, claiming that her performance against her opponent in the semi-final had been deliberately undermarked to prevent an all-Italian final.

She made a comeback in 2010 but retired again two years later after failing to reach pre-2008 levels in her performance.

Fencing, which dates back to the Renaissance era in Italy, is a sport in which Italians have enjoyed success throughout the history of the Olympics. 

Seven of Italy’s top 10 Olympians in terms of medals won have been fencers, while no nation has won more gold medals in fencing than Italy, with 49 to date.

It remains Italy’s most successful Olympic sport in all disciplines. The next best in terms of gold medals won is cycling with 33, followed by athletics with 19.

The city of Jesi has well preserved walls
built along the lines of its Roman defences

Travel tip:

Jesi, alternatively spelled Iesi, which was the site of a settlement in the fourth century BC, has developed as an industrial centre but maintains its cultural heritage within perfectly preserved medieval walls, built along the lines of its old Roman defences between the 13th and 14th centuries.  Notable buildings include the Cathedral of San Settimio in Piazza Federico II, the nearby 12th century church of San Floriano, which once contained paintings by Lorenzo Lotto that are now housed in the Pinacoteca Civica.  The Teatro Giovanni Battista Pergolesi, named in honour of the 18th century musician and composer who was born in Jesi, stands in the elegant Piazza della Repubblica.

The Renaissance Palazzo Ducale in Pesaro, one
of many attractions away from the beach

Travel tip:

Jesi is in the northern part of the Marche region, only 25km (16 miles) from the Adriatic coast and the stretch between Ancona and Pesaro that includes Senigallia and Fano. Like many Italian coastal resorts, the towns and cities in the area popular for their wide expanses of sandy beach also have much history to commend them. Fano, for example, revels in its Roman past, having been established in 49BC by Julius Caesar in 49 BC, when it was named Fanum Fortunae. Caesar Augustus protected the city with monumental walls and the Arco d'Augustus, the primary gateway into the city, still remains, along with some sections of the walls.  Pesaro, which is the region’s second largest city with 94,000 residents, is another magnet for sun-seekers but also boasts a city centre criss-crossed with narrow, medieval streets, several pretty squares and a number of beautiful Renaissance palaces.

Also on this day:

1500: The birth of Federico II Gonzaga, Duke of Mantua

1510: The death of Renaissance master Sandro Botticelli

1963: The birth of motorcycle world champion Luca Cadalora 

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16 May

Laura Pausini - singer-songwriter

Grammy Award-winner has sold more than 70 million records

One of Italy's best-selling recording artists of all time, pop singer-songwriter Laura Pausini, was born on this day in 1974 in Solarolo, in the province of Ravenna.  The first Italian female performer to win a Grammy Award, Pausini's records have sold more than 70 million copies worldwide, more than both Zucchero and Eros Ramazzotti, two giants of Italian popular music.  The figure is all the more remarkable for the fact that Pausini has only scratched the surface of the English-language market, which is by far the most lucrative.  She records mainly in Italian but has also enjoyed considerable success with recordings in Spanish and Catalan. She is the first non-Spanish artist to sell more than a million copies of a single album in Spain.  Pausini's background and upbringing always made it likely she would pursue a career in the music industry.  Her father, Fabrizio, is a pianist who played as a session musician for Abba's Anni-Frid Lyngstad and with a group from which was formed the best-selling Italian band Pooh. Later in his career, after he had established himself as a piano bar artist, he encouraged Laura to sing.  Read more…

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Mario Monicelli - film director

Life’s work put him among greats of Commedia all’italiana

Mario Monicelli, the director who became known as ‘the father of Commedia all’italiana’ and was nominated for an Oscar six times, was born on this day in 1915 in Viareggio.  He made more than 70 films, working into his 90s.  He helped advance the careers of actors such as Vittorio Gassman, Marcello Mastroianni and Claudia Cardinale, and forged successful associations with the great comic actors Totò and Alberto Sordi.  Commedia all’italiana was notable for combining the traditional elements of comedy with social commentary, often addressing some of the most controversial issues of the times and making fun of any organisation, the Catholic Church in particular, perceived to have an earnest sense of self-importance.  The genre’s stories were often heavily laced with sadness and Monicelli’s work won praise for his particular sensitivity to the miseries and joys of Italian life and the foibles of ordinary Italians. He claimed the lack of a happy ending actually defined Italian humour and that themes drawn from poverty, hunger, misery, old age, sickness, and death were the ones that most appealed to the Italian love of tragi-comedy.  Read more…

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Massimo Moratti - business tycoon

Billionaire chairman oversaw golden era at Internazionale

The billionaire tycoon and former chairman of Milan’s Internazionale football club, Massimo Moratti, was born on this day in 1945 in Bosco Chiesanuova, a small town in the Veneto about 20km (12 miles) north of Verona.  His primary business, the energy provider Saras, of which he is chief executive, owns about 15 per cent of Italy’s oil refining capacity, mainly through the Sarroch refinery on Sardinia, which has a capacity of about 300,000 barrels per day.  Moratti is estimated to have net wealth of about €1.28 billion ($1.4 billion) yet is said to have spent close to €1.5 billion of his personal fortune on buying players during his chairmanship of Inter, which lasted from 1995 until 2013 and encompassed a period of unprecedented success.  Between 2005 and 2011 Inter won the Serie A title five times, the Coppa Italia and the Supercoppa Italiana four times each, the Champions League once and the FIFA World Club cup once.  The five Scudetti came in consecutive seasons from 2006 to 2010, equalling the league record.  The only comparable period was the 1960s, when Massimo's father, Angelo, was chairman and Inter won three scudetti and the European Cup, forerunner of the Champions League, twice, with the team known as Grande Inter – ‘the great Inter’.  Read more…

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Maria Gaetana Agnesi – mathematician

Brilliant scholar gave her time and money to the poor

Maria Gaetana Agnesi, the first woman to write a mathematics handbook, was born on this day in 1718 in Milan.  Maria became a mathematician, philosopher, theologian and humanitarian and was also the first woman to be appointed as a mathematics professor at a university.  She was one of at least 21 children born to Pietro Agnese, a wealthy man whose family had made their money from silk production. Her mother was his first wife, Anna Fortunato Brivio, who was from a noble Milanese family.  Maria was soon recognised as a child prodigy, who could speak Italian and French by the time she was five and had learnt Greek, Hebrew, Spanish, German and Latin by the time she was 11.  When she became ill at the age of 12, it was thought to have been because of excessive studying and reading, but after she was prescribed vigorous dancing and horse riding to improve her health, she suffered convulsions and was then advised to moderate her activities.  By the time Maria was 14 she was studying ballistics and geometry. Her father regularly invited learned men to his house to listen to her read and to discuss philosophical questions with her.  Read more…

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15 May

Anna Maria Alberghetti - singer and actress

Child prodigy who rejected Hollywood to become Broadway star

The actress and operatic singer Anna Maria Alberghetti was born on this day in 1936 in the Adriatic resort of Pesaro.  She moved with her family to the United States in her teens and became a Broadway star, winning a Tony Award in 1962 as best actress in a musical for her performance in Bob Merrill’s Carnival, directed by Gower Champion.  Alberghetti was a child prodigy with music in her blood. Her father was an accomplished musician, an opera singer and concertmaster of the Rome Opera Company, who also played the cello. Her mother was a pianist.  They influenced the direction in which her talent developed and by the age of six she was singing with symphony orchestras with her father as her vocal instructor.  After success touring Europe, Anna Maria was invited to perform in the United States and made her debut at Carnegie Hall in New York at the age of 14. Given the state of Italy after the Second World War, the idea of settling permanently in America became too attractive for the family to resist.   At that time, Anna Maria’s focus was on a career as an opera singer but the American cinema industry was obsessed with European actresses.  Read more…

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Pippo Barzizza - band leader

Musician was an Italian pioneer of jazz and swing

The musician and bandleader Giuseppe ‘Pippo’ Barzizza, who helped popularise jazz and swing music in Italy during a long and successful career, was born on this day in 1902 in Genoa.  Barzizza was active in music for eight decades but was probably at the peak of his popularity in the 1930s and 40s, when he led the Blue Star and Cetra orchestras.  He continued to be a major figure in popular music until the 1960s and thereafter regularly came out of retirement to show that his talents had not waned.  He died at his home in Sanremo in 1994, just a few weeks before his 93rd birthday.  As well as arranging the music of others, Barzizza wrote more than 200 songs of his own in his lifetime, and helped advance the careers of such singers as Alberto Rabagliati, Otello Boccaccini, Norma Bruni, Maria Jottini and Silvana Fioresi among others.  In addition to his skills as a writer, conductor and orchestra leader, Barzizza was an accomplished player of a range of instruments, including violin, piano, saxophone, banjo and accordion.  A child prodigy on the violin, Barzizza was able to play a Mozart symphony almost before he could read.  Read more…

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Claudio Monteverdi – composer

Baroque musician who gave us the first real opera

The composer and musician Claudio Monteverdi was baptised on this day in 1567 in Cremona in Lombardy.  Children were baptised soon after their birth in the 16th century so it is likely Monteverdi was born on 15 May or just before.  He was to become the most important developer of a new genre, the opera, and bring a more modern touch to church music.  Monteverdi studied under the maestro di cappella at the cathedral in Cremona and published several books of religious and secular music while still in his teens.  He managed to secure a position as a viola player at Vincenzo Gonzaga’s court in Mantua where he came into contact with some of the top musicians of the time. He went on to become master of music there in 1601.  It was his first opera, L’Orfeo, written for the Gonzaga court, that really established him as a composer.  In the early 17th century, the intermedio, the music played between the acts of a play, was evolving into the form of a complete musical drama, or opera. Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo was the first fully developed example of this and is the earliest opera still being regularly staged.  Read more…

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14 May

NEW - Ludovico Manin - the last Doge of Venice

Surrender to Napoleon ended La Serenissima’s independence 

The man who would become the last of Venice’s 120 Doges, Ludovico Giovanni Manin, was born on this day in 1725. The Doge was the highest political office in Venice, its history going back to the seventh century, when the Venetian Lagoon was a province of the Byzantine (Eastern) Roman Empire and, in common with other provinces, was governed by a Dux (leader).  By the 11th century, when Venice had become an independent republic, the Doge was more of a figurehead, the head of a ruling council, and the title tended to be given to one of the oldest and most respected members of Venetian nobility.  Manin was 64 by the time he was elected but his eight years in post were significant in that they ended with the fall of La Serenissima - as the Venetian Republic was grandly known - its 1,100 years of independence ending with surrender to the French army of Napoleon Bonaparte, who subsequently handed control of the city to Austria.  The eldest of five sons of Lodovico III Alvise and Lucrezia Maria Basadonna, the great-granddaughter of cardinal Pietro Basadonna, Ludovico went straight into public life after completing his studies at the University of Bologna.  At 26 he was elected captain of Vicenza, then of Verona and finally Brescia, before being appointed procurator de ultra of Saint Mark's Basilica in 1764.  Read more…

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Marco Zanuso - architect and designer

Innovative ideas put Italy at the forefront of contemporary style

Marco Zanuso, the architect and industrial designer whose innovative ideas helped revolutionize furniture and appliance design in Italy after the Second World War, was born in Milan on this day in 1916.  Influenced by the Rationalist movement that emerged in the 1920s, he was one of the pioneers of the Modern movement, which brought contemporary styling to mass-produced consumer products.  His use of sculptured shapes, bright colours, and modern synthetic materials helped make Italy a leader in furniture fashion.  Italy had for many years been something of a trendsetter in interior design but during the post-War years, with the fall of Fascism and the rise of Socialism, there was a sense of liberation among Italian creative talents.  With the recovery of the Italian economy there was a substantial growth in industrial production and mass-produced furniture. By the 1960s and 1970s, Italian interior design reached its pinnacle of stylishness.  Zanuso was at the forefront, producing designs that used tubular steel, acrylics, latex foam, fibreglass, foam rubber, and injection-moulded plastics.   Read more…

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Aurelio Milani - footballer

Centre forward helped Inter win first European Cup

Aurelio Milani, who helped Inter-Milan become the second Italian football club to win the European Cup, was born on this day in 1934 in Desio, about 25km (15 miles) north of Lombardy’s regional capital.   Inter beat Real Madrid 3-1 in the final Vienna in 1964 to emulate the achievement of city rivals AC Milan, who had become the first European champions from Italy the previous year.  Milani, a centre forward, scored the all-important second goal in the 61st minute after his fellow attacker Sandro Mazzola had given Inter the lead in the first half, receiving a pass from Mazzola before beating Real goalkeeper Vicente Train with a shot from outside the penalty area.  Madrid, whose forward line was still led by the mighty Alfredo di Stefano with Ferenc Puskas playing at inside-left, pulled a goal back but Mazzola added a third for Inter.  But this was the so-called Grande Inter side managed by the Argentinian master-tactician Helenio Herrera, who coached them to three Serie A titles in four years and retained the European Cup by defeating Eusebio’s Benfica 12 months later, when the final was played in their home stadium at San Siro in Milan.  Read more…

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Battle of Agnadello

The day Venice lost most of its mainland territory

Venetian forces were defeated by troops fighting on behalf of France, Spain and the Pope on this day in 1509 at Agnadello in Lombardy.   As a result, the Republic of Venice was forced to withdraw from much of its territory on the mainland of Italy. The writer Niccolò Machiavelli later wrote in his book, The Prince, that in one day the Venetians had ‘lost what it had taken them 800 years of exertion to conquer.’  Louis XII of France, the Emperor Maximilian, Ferdinand II of Aragon and Pope Julius II had formed the League of Cambrai with the aim of dismantling the mainland empire of Venice as they all had their own claims to areas held by the Venetians.  The French army left Milan on April 15 and invaded Venetian territory. Venice had organised a mercenary army near Bergamo commanded by the Orsini cousins, Bartolomeo d’Alviano and Niccolò di Pitigliano, who had been ordered to avoid direct confrontation with the advancing French but just to engage them in light skirmishes.  By May 9 Louis had crossed the Adda river at Cassano d’Adda and the Orsini cousins decided to move south towards the River Po in search of better positions.  Read more…

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Ludovico Manin - the last Doge of Venice

Surrender to Napoleon ended La Serenissima’s independence 

Ludovico Manin was Doge of Venice
from 1789 until its fall in 1797 

The man who would become the last of Venice’s 120 Doges, Ludovico Giovanni Manin, was born on this day in 1725.

The Doge was the highest political office in Venice, its history going back to the seventh century, when the Venetian Lagoon was a province of the Byzantine (Eastern) Roman Empire and, in common with other provinces, was governed by a Dux (leader).

By the 11th century, when Venice had become an independent republic, the Doge was more of a figurehead, the head of a ruling council, and the title tended to be given to one of the oldest and most respected members of Venetian nobility.

Manin was 64 by the time he was elected but his eight years in post were significant in that they ended with the fall of La Serenissima - as the Venetian Republic was grandly known -its 1,100 years of independence ending with surrender to the French army of Napoleon Bonaparte, who subsequently handed control of the city to Austria.

The eldest of five sons of Lodovico III Alvise and Lucrezia Maria Basadonna, the great-granddaughter of cardinal Pietro Basadonna, Ludovico went straight into public life after completing his studies at the University of Bologna.

At 26 he was elected captain of Vicenza, then of Verona and finally Brescia, before being appointed procurator de ultra of Saint Mark's Basilica in 1764. 

Noted for his generosity, honesty and kindness as a governor, he married Elisabetta Grimani in 1748 but the marriage produced no children. 

The conclave of the Venetian Grand Council at
which Ludovico Manin formally abdicated

Despite his own failing health, he was elected Doge in March, 1789, a few months before the start of the French Revolution. Although Venice was even then regarded as a playground for the rich, its own wealth had been in decline for some years, and Manin had to oversee policies designed to reduce the republic’s financial obligations.

These included cutting the size of Venice’s merchant and military fleets to the degree that when Napoleon’s series of empire-building wars reached Italy, it was clear that Venice would be unable to defend itself.  Manin declined to enter the coalition of Italian states formed to counter Napoleon’s advance in 1795 and Venice declared itself neutral.

However, Napoleon had signed a secret deal with Austria, his most powerful rival for European dominance, to cede control of Venice to Austria in exchange for territories in the Netherlands, which meant he ignored Venice’s neutrality and came after the city anyway.

Manin refused an ultimatum from the French to surrender and on 25 April, 1797, the French fleet arrived at the Lido. Venice responded by sinking one of the French vessels but with only seven warships of their own to call on, the prospects for defending the city were remote and the French needed no second bidding to launch an attack.

The reaction of Manin and the Venetian Grand Council was to pass a motion to dissolve the republic and put the city under French rule.  After all the formalities of the surrender were completed, 4,000 French soldiers entered the city on 16 May and staged a parade in Piazza San Marco - St Mark's Square.

The Manin Chapel at the church
of the Scalzi in Venice

It was a humiliation for Venice, the first time that foreign troops had set foot in the city, but worse was to come. Despite having agreed to hand Venice to the Austrians, Napoleon first wanted to help himself to its treasures and triggered a large-scale looting operation by his troops, who also destroyed what remained of the Venetian fleet and the Venice Arsenal.

Manin, meanwhile, was offered the chance to become interim head of the new Venice but refused, returning the ducal insignia and withdrawing to Palazzo Dolfin Manin, his residence on the Grand Canal.

It was a lonely life. He refused to answer the door even to friends and his meek surrender to the French did not go down well with Venetians, who jeered and insulted him when he ventured out.

Manin died of heart problems in October, 1802. His remains were interred in the family tomb, in a chapel designed by Jacopo Antonio Pozzo, in the Church of the Scalzi in Venice, near the present railway station of Venice Santa Lucia.

The Palazzo Dolfin Manin is now
an office of the Banca d'Italia

Travel tip:

The Palazzo Dolfin Manin, the home of Ludovico Manin, is a 16th century palace on the Grand Canal, a short distance from the Rialto Bridge in the sestiere San Marco. It was built in 1536 for the Dolfin family by the great Florentine architect Jacopo Sansovino, whose work in Venice includes the Biblioteca Marciana, opposite the Doge’s Palace in Piazzetta San Marco, which connects St Mark’s Square with the waterfront. Sansovino created the palace by merging two existing structures and adding a facade in white Istrian stone with a portico of six arches. Inside are works by Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, who decorated the palace for the wedding of Ludovico Manin and Elisabetta Grimani. The palace remained in the possession of the Manin family until 1867, when it was bought by the Banca Nazionale del Regno, forerunner of the Banca d’Italia, which still has its Venice headquarters in the building.

The Chiesa degli Scalzi fronts on to
the Grand Canal near the railway station

Travel tip:

The Chiesa degli Scalzi, site of the Manin family tomb and Ludovico’s final resting place, can be found immediately next to Venice’s Santa Lucia railway station, at the foot of the bridge of the same name. Formally known as the church of Santa Maria di Nazareth, it takes its other name from the Carmelite religious order of which it was the seat, the Discalced, which means ‘without shoes’ or ‘scalzi’ in Italian. Designed by Baldassare Longhena, best known for the magnificent Basilica di Santa Maria della Salute at the end of the Grand Canal where it meets the Lagoon, its sumptuous interior includes paintings by Tiepolo and sculptures by Giovanni Maria Morlaiter. The Venetian Late Baroque facade is the work of Giuseppe Sardi, while the statues mounted at various points on the facade were sculpted by Bernardo Falconi.

Also on this day:

1509: The Battle of Agnadello 

1916: The birth of designer Marco Zanuso

1934: The birth of footballer Aurelio Milani

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13 May

The first Giro d'Italia

Tour of Italy cycle race ran from Milan to Naples and back

A field of 127 riders left Milan on this day in 1909 as Italy's famous cycle race, the Giro d'Italia, was staged for the first time.  Those who lasted the course returned to Milan 13 days later having covered a distance of 2,447.9 kilometres (1,521 miles) along a route around Italy that took them through Bologna, Chieti, Naples, Rome, Florence, Genoa and Turin.  The winner was Luigi Ganna, an Italian cyclist from Lombardy who had finished fifth in the Tour de France in 1908 and won the Milan-San Remo race earlier in 1909.  Only 49 riders finished.  Second and third places were also filled by Italian riders, with Carlo Galetti finishing ahead of Giovanni Rossignoli.  The race was run in eight stages with two to three rest days between each stage. It was a challenge to the riders' stamina. The stages were almost twice as long as those that make up the Giro today, with an average distance of more than 300 km (190 miles). The modern Giro covers a greater distance in total at 3,481.8 km (2,163.5 miles).  Thankfully, the route was primarily flat, although it did contain a few major ascents, particularly on the third leg between Chieti in Abruzzo and Naples, which took the race across the Apennines.  Read more…

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Daniele Manin - Venetian leader

Lawyer who led fight to drive out Austrians

The Venetian patriot Daniele Manin, a revolutionary who fought to free Venice from Austrian rule and thereby made a significant contribution to the unification of Italy, was born on this day in 1804 in the San Polo sestiere.  Manin had Jewish roots. His grandfather, Samuele Medina,  from Verona, had converted to Christianity in 1759 and took the name Manin because Lodovico Manin, the last Doge of Venice, had sponsored his conversion.  He studied law at the University of Padua and then took up practice in Venice. As his practice developed, he gained a reputation as a brilliant and profound jurist.  He harboured a deep hatred and resentment towards the Austrians, to whom control of the city passed after the defeat of Napoleon in 1814. The city became part of the Austrian-held Kingdom of Lombardy-Venetia.  Manin's first physical act to advance the cause of liberation was the presentation of a petition in 1847 to a body called the Venetian Congregation, an advisory assembly that had no actual powers. The petition listed the grievances of the Venetian people but Manin’s frankness was not to the liking of the Austrians, who arrested him in January 1848 on charges of treason.  Read more…

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Giuliano Amato – politician

‘Doctor Subtle’ is still working in his 80s

Giuliano Amato, who has twice served as prime minister of Italy and today sits in Italy’s Constitutional Court, was born on this day in 1938 in Turin.  During his first period as prime minister, for 10 months between 1992 and 1993, a series of corruption scandals rocked Italy, sweeping away the careers of many leading politicians. Amato was never implicated, despite being close to Bettino Craxi, the leader of the Italian Socialist party, who was investigated by Milan judges in the probe into corruption that became known as Mani pulite, which literally means ‘clean hands’. Craxi was eventually convicted of corruption and the illicit financing of his party.  Amato has earned the nickname ‘dottor sottile’ the sobriquet of the medieval Scottish philosopher John Duns Scotus, which is a reference to his perceived political subtlety.  Born into a Sicilian family living in Turin at the time, Amato spent his early years growing up in Tuscany.  He attended the Collegio Medico Giuridico, which is today the Sant’Anna School of Advanced Studies, part of Pisa University, and obtained a degree in law. He also received a Masters degree in comparative law from Columbia Law School.  Read more…

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Francesco Pistocchi – singer and composer

Child prodigy who wrote many operas and also taught

Francesco Pistocchi, a singer who became known to audiences as Pistocchino, died on this day in 1726 in Bologna.  Pistocchi left the world many operas, oratorios and cantatas he had composed, which are now highly regarded for their melodic elegance and colourful harmony.  Born Francesco Antonio Mamiliano Pistocchi in Palermo in 1659, Pistocchi became a child prodigy because of his beautiful soprano voice. He began performing as a singer in public at the age of three and the first music he composed, Capricci puerili, was published when he was just eight years old.  Believed to have become a castrato, Pistocchi made regular appearances as a singer in Bologna’s cappella musicale at the Basilica of San Petronio, where his father was a violinist, from 1670 onwards.  He later had a brilliant opera career as a contralto, touring in Italy and Germany and serving at the court in Parma in the 1680s.  His opera, Il leandro, was premiered at Teatro alle Zattere in Venice in 1679.  In 1696 Pistocchi became Court Kapellmeister for the Duke of Ansbach in Germany. His operas, Il Narciso and Le pazzie d’amore e dell’interesse, were presented in Ansbach in the late 1690s.  Read more…

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12 May

Zeno Colò - Olympic skiing champion

Downhill ace reached speeds of almost 100mph with no helmet

Zeno Colò, the first Italian to win an Olympic alpine skiing title when he took the downhill gold at the 1952 Oslo Winter Games, died on this day in 1993, aged 72.  The winner, too, of the downhill and giant slalom World championship titles in Aspen in 1950, Colò achieved his success during a brief window in a life spent on skis.  Deprived of prime competitive years by the Second World War, part of which he spent as a prisoner of war, he began his career late, in 1947 at the age of 27, only to be banned for life in 1954 under the strict rules defining amateur status after he endorsed a brand of ski boots and a ski jacket.  Colò was born in Tuscany but in a mountainous part of the region in the village of Cutigliano, which is 678m (2,044ft) above sea level and is just 14km (9 miles) from Abetone, one of the largest ski resorts in the Apennines, with more than 50km (31 miles) of ski slopes, several of which were designed by Colò himself.   He began competitive skiing at the age of 14 and was selected for the Italian national team at 15. The outbreak of war brought his career to a stop but he maintained his skills as a member of an army alpine patrol in Cervinia, close to the Swiss border.  Read more…

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Cosimo II de' Medici - patron of Galileo

Grand Duke of Tuscany maintained family tradition

Born on this day in Florence in 1590, Cosimo II de' Medici, who was Grand Duke of Tuscany from 1609 until his premature death in 1621, was largely a figurehead ruler during his 12-year reign, delegating administrative powers to his ministers.  His health was never good and he died from tuberculosis aged only 30 yet made his mark by maintaining the Medici family tradition for patronage by supporting the astronomer and physicist Galileo Galilei.  Galileo, from Pisa, had been Cosimo's childhood tutor during the time that he was Professor of Mathematics at the University of Padua.  From the beginnings of the Medici dynasty, with Cosimo the Elder's rise to power in 1434, the family supported the arts and humanities, turning Florence into what became known as the cradle of the Renaissance.  Cosimo the Elder gave his patronage to artists such as Ghiberti, Brunelleschi, Donatello and Fra Angelico.  His grandson, Lorenzo the Magnificent, supported the work of such Renaissance masters as Botticelli, Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo.  Galileo, who also had the patronage of Cosimo's eldest son and heir, Ferdinando II de' Medici, dedicated his treatise Sidereus Nuncius, an account of his telescopic discoveries, to Cosimo.  Read more…

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Giovanni Battista Viotti – violinist and composer

Brilliant musician wrote the melody for the Marseillaise

Violinist Giovanni Battista Viotti, who was to become court musician to Marie-Antoinette and composed 29 violin concertos, was born on this day in 1755 in Fontanetto Po in the region of Piedmont.  Among Viotti’s many compositions for the violin, string quartets and the piano, his violin concerto No. 22 in A Minor became particularly well known.  He is also credited with having composed the original music of La Marseillaise, the national anthem of France, 11 years before it was officially published by another composer.  Viotti’s musical talent was spotted early and he was taken into the household of Principe Alfonso dal Pozzo della Cisterna in Turin, where he received a musical education.  This prepared him to become a pupil of the virtuoso violinist and composer Gaetano Pugnani, while still a teenager, funded by the prince.  Viotti served at the Savoy court in Turin from 1773 to 1780, before travelling with Pugnani in Germany, Poland and Russia.  He went to France alone, where he made his debut as a violinist in 1782 in Paris.  He was an instant sensation and became court musician to Marie-Antoinette at Versailles.  Read more…

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Silvio Scaroni - fighter pilot

World War I ace was air force commander in World War II

Silvio Scaroni, a fighter pilot whose tally of aerial victories in the First World War was bettered only by Francesco Baracca among Italian flying aces, was born on this day in 1893 in Brescia.  Flying mainly the French-designed Hanriot HD.1 single-seater biplane, Scaroni had 26 confirmed successes out of 30 claimed.  Baracca, who was shot down and killed only a few months before the war ended, was credited with 34 victories.  Recalled to service, Scaroni became commander of the Italian air forces in Sicily during the Second World War, in which role he clashed with Luftwaffe chief Hermann Goering, who claimed Scaroni did not provide enough support to Germany’s attempts to destroy strategically vital British bases on Malta.  Scaroni enlisted first with the Italian Army as a corporal in the 2nd Field Artillery. With the Italian entry to the First World War looking more likely - they took a neutral position at first - he transferred to the Italian Air Service in March, 1915, flying his first missions in September of that year as a reconnaissance pilot. Piloting French-built Caudron G.3 aircraft, he carried out 114 scouting missions in 20 months.  Read more…

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