20 November

Emilio Pucci – fashion designer

The heroic, sporting, creative genius behind the Pucci label

Don Emilio Pucci, Marchese di Barsento, who became a top fashion designer and politician, was born on this day in 1914 in Florence.  Pucci was born into one of the oldest families in Florence and lived and worked in the Pucci Palace in Florence for most of his life. His fashion creations were worn by such famous women as Marilyn Monroe, Sophia Loren and Jackie Kennedy.  A keen sportsman who swam, skied, fenced, played tennis and raced cars, Pucci was part of the Italian team at the 1932 Winter Olympics in New York, although he did not compete.  He studied at the University of Milan, the University of Georgia, and Reed College in Oregon, where he designed the clothes for the college skiing team.  Pucci was awarded an MA in social science from Reed, where he was known to be a staunch defender of the Fascist regime in Italy. He was also awarded a doctorate in political science from the University of Florence.  It was his success as a fashion designer that would in time make his name but before that came some wartime experiences that were extraordinary to say the least.  In 1938 Pucci joined the Italian air force and served as a torpedo bomber, rising to the rank of captain and being decorated for valour.  Read more…

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Giorgio de Chirico – artist

Founder of the scuola metafisica movement

The artist Giorgio de Chirico, who founded the scuola metafisica (metaphysical school) of Italian art that was a profound influence on the country’s Surrealist movement in the early 20th century, died on this day in 1978 in Rome.  Although De Chirico, who was 90 when he passed away, was active for almost 70 years, it is for the paintings of the first decade of his career, between about 1909 and 1919, that he is best remembered.  It was during this period, his metaphysical phase, that he sought to use his art to express what might be called philosophical musings on the nature of reality, taking familiar scenes, such as town squares, and creating images that might appear in a dream, in which pieces of classical architecture would perhaps be juxtaposed with everyday objects in exaggerated form, the scene moodily atmospheric, with areas of dark shadow and bright light, and maybe a solitary figure.  These works were much admired and enormously influential.  During military service in the First World War he met Carlo Carrà, who would become a leading light in the Futurist movement, and together they formed the pittura metafisica (metaphysical painting) movement.  Read more…

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Queen Margherita of Savoy

Princess and fashion icon who became Queen of Italy

Margherita Maria Teresa Giovanna of Savoy was born on this day in 1851 in Turin.  The little girl, who was to later become the Queen consort of Italy, was the daughter of Prince Ferdinand Duke of Genoa and Princess Elisabeth of Saxony. She was educated to a high standard and renowned as a charming person with a lively curiosity to learn. A tall, stately blonde, she was not considered a beauty but nonetheless had many admirers.  Having first been suggested to marry Prince Charles of Romania, she instead married her first cousin Umberto, Prince of Piedmont, in April 1868 when she was just 16. The following year she gave birth to Victor Emmanuel, Prince of Naples, who later became King Victor Emmanuel III of Italy. He was to be their only child.  Margherita was crowned Queen of Italy in Naples when Umberto succeeded his father to the throne in January 1878 and she was warmly welcomed by the Neapolitan people.  It was not a particularly good marriage for Margherita. Umberto maintained an affair with a long-term lover, Eugenia Attendolo Bolognini. Read more…

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Diocletian - Roman emperor

Restored stability but launched cruel purge

A Roman cavalry commander who went under the name of Diocles was proclaimed Emperor on this day in 284.  He was given the full name Gaius Aurelius Valerius Diocletianus Augustus according to official inscriptions. He ruled as Diocletian.  He was sole emperor, albeit initially with a disputed claim to power, until 286, joint-emperor until 293, and co-emperor in a tetrarchy until 305.  Born at Salona, a coastal town in Dalmatia (now Solin in Croatia) into a family of humble status in 244, Diocletian rose to power through his military background.  After climbing through the ranks, he became cavalry commander to the Emperor Carus. After the death of Carus in 283, while on a campaign in Persia, power passed to his two sons, Numerian and Carinus.  When Numerian was allegedly murdered by his Praetorian Prefect, Arrius Aper, in 284, Diocletian was proclaimed as emperor by Numerian’s troops. He took it upon himself to avenge the death of Numerian by killing Aper with his own hands.  At the start, however, Diocletian’s power was restricted to the areas controlled by his army, thought to be Asia Minor and Syria. The remainder of the empire was loyal to Carinus.  Read more…

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Giampiero Combi - goalkeeper

Juventus stalwart who captained Italy’s 1934 World Cup winners

The footballer Giampiero Combi, who is considered to be one of the best Italian goalkeepers of all time, was born on November 20, 1902 in Turin.  Combi, who spent his entire career with his home-town club Juventus, was Italy’s captain at the 1934 World Cup, which Italy hosted and won, the team coached by Vittorio Pozzo and inspired by the revered Inter Milan striker Giuseppe Meazza defeating Czechoslovakia after extra time in the final of the 16-team tournament.  The achievement in front of excited Italian supporters in Rome capped a marvellous career for Combi, although it came about only by chance.  He had announced that he would retire at the end of the 1933-34 domestic season at the age of 31, having made 40 appearances for the azzurri. But Pozzo had persuaded him to be part of his squad to provide experienced cover for the emerging young Inter star Carlo Ceresoli.  In the event, Ceresoli suffered a broken arm in training a few weeks before the tournament and Combi found himself as the number one. He performed immaculately throughout, conceding only three goals in 510 minutes of football.  Read more…

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Book of the Day: Giorgio de Chirico: Life and Paintings, by Fabio Benzi

Giorgio de Chirico was one of the most controversial and consequential artists of the twentieth century a key member of the Paris avant-garde, he was a major influence on other artists, especially the nascent surrealists. His repertoire of motifs - empty arcades, elongated shadows, mannequins, trains - created images of forlorn emptiness that became iconic. Artists inspired by de Chirico s early work include Yves Tanguy, Pablo Picasso, Max Ernst, Salvador Dali, and Rene Magritte. His influence also extended beyond painting and included writers and poets Guillaume Apollinaire, Andre Breton, John Ashbery, and Sylvia Plath, filmmakers Jacques Prevert and Michelangelo Antonioni, and even David Bowie, who admired de Chirico's genderless tailors dummies that inspired his music videos. After the Great War, he turned toward neoclassicism and bitterly fell out with the surrealists and the mainstream modernist movement in the process, becoming an outspoken outsider of the art world. Giorgio de Chirico: Life and Paintings offers an in-depth examination of the artist's life and work by the world's foremost De Chirico authority. Based on new archival research, it offers a fresh view of de Chirico s relationship with surrealism, fascism, forgery, and the European avant-gardes.

Fabio Benzi is considered the world s foremost expert on Giorgio de Chirico. He is a professor at the University of Chieti-Pescara and a board member of Fondazione de Chirico, and he has curated exhibitions in Rome, Venice, Milan, Moscow, Paris, Vienna, New York, Tel Aviv, Istanbul, and London.

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19 November

Johnny Dundee – world champion boxer

Sicilian changed his name to sound non-Italian

The boxer Johnny Dundee, who was a child when his family emigrated to the United States, was born in Sciacca, a town on the southwest coast of Sicily, on this day in 1893.  Dundee, regarded by many boxing historians as the first of the great Italian-American fighters, had more than 330 fights in a 22-year career in the ring.  At the peak of his career, in the 1920s, Dundee won both the world featherweight and world junior-lightweight titles.  Dundee’s real name is thought to have been Giuseppe Curreri, although some boxing records have his second name as Carrora.  The large numbers of Italian immigrants arriving in New York at around the turn of the 20th century, few of whom spoke any English, sometimes overwhelmed officers at the city’s processing station on Ellis Island and mistakes in recording details were common.  There are variations, too, in accounts of how old Giuseppe was when his family uprooted him from his childhood home, with some saying he was just five but others suggesting he was nine.  What seems not in dispute is that his family joined other Italian families in the Lower East Side of Manhattan. Read more…

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Luigi Beccali - Olympic athlete

Milanese runner brought home Italy's first track gold

Luigi Beccali, the first Italian to win an Olympic gold medal in track and field events, was born on this day in 1907 in Milan.  Although Italy had won gold medals in fencing and gymnastics in previous Games, Beccali's victory in the 1,500 metres at the 1932 Olympics in Los Angeles was the first time an Italian had won gold in a running event.  His victory came out of the blue since the field included several runners with top credentials, including New Zealand’s Jack Lovelock and America's Glenn Cunningham.  Beccali had a reputation as a determined competitor but his results were relatively modest next to those of the favourites.  However, in May of 1932 he had posted a mile time of four minutes 11.5 seconds in Milan which was only four tenths of a second slower than Cunningham's time in winning the 1932 National Collegiate Athletics Association championships.  The three heats at Los Angeles were won by Lovelock, Beccali, and Cunningham, who posted the best time of 3:55.8 in winning the first heat.  In the final, Beccali timed his run superbly, working his way through the field to take the lead from Canada's Phil Edwards, who had started to pull away over the last lap, with 100m remaining. Read more…

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Pino Rauti – politician and journalist

Writer chronicled the story of fascism in Italy

Pino Rauti, leader of the neo-fascist Social Idea Movement, was born Giuseppe Umberto Rauti on this day in 1926 in Cardinale in Calabria.  Rauti was to become a leading figure on the far right of Italian politics from 1948 until his death in 2012.  As a young man he had volunteered for the Guardia Nazionale Repubblicana of Benito Mussolini’s Italian Social Republic and he then went on to join the Spanish Foreign Legion.  After his return to Italy, Rauti joined the post-fascist Italian Social Movement (MSI). He became associated with Julius Evola, a leading fascist philosopher, and became editor of his journal, Imperium.  Rauti joined the staff of the Rome-based daily Il Tempo in 1953 and later became the Italian correspondent for the Aginter Press, a fake press agency set up in Portugal in 1966 to combat communism.  In 1954 he established his own group within MSI, the Ordine Nuovo, but he became disillusioned with MSI and his group separated from the party two years later.  Rauti’s name was linked with a number of terror attacks, including the Piazza Fontana bombing in Milan, which caused 17 deaths. Read more…

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Giuseppe Volpi - businessman and politician

Founder of the Venice film festival

Businessman and politician Count Giuseppe Volpi of Misurata was born on this day in 1877 in Venice.  Volpi was responsible for bringing electricity to Venice and the north east of Italy in 1903 and had an influence on the development of Porto Marghera, the industrial complex across the lagoon from Venice.  In 1932, as president of the Venice Biennale, Volpi arranged the first Venice Film Festival. It took place between 6 and 21 August on the terrace of the Hotel Excelsior at the Venice Lido.  The first film to be shown at the festival was Rouben Mamoulian’s Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde.  The festival was considered a success and was held again in 1934 from 1 to 20 August, when it involved a competition for the first time.  In 1935 the Film Festival became a yearly event in Venice and the Coppa Volpi (Volpi Cup), an award for actors, was introduced for the first time.  Count Volpi received a personal letter from Walt Disney in 1939 thanking him, as president of the Biennale, for the prize awarded to Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs at the film festival. This letter is now in the historical archives of the Biennale.  Read more…

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Pope Clement VII

Calamitous papacy of a vacillating Medici

Giulio di Giuliano de’ Medici, remembered as the unfortunate Pope who was imprisoned in Castel Sant’Angelo in Rome, was elected on this day in 1523 as Pope Clement VII.  Clement VII also went down in history for refusing to allow the King of England, Henry VIII, to annul his marriage to Catherine of Aragon, causing England to break away from the Catholic Church forever.  One month before Giulio de Medici’s birth, his father was murdered in Florence Cathedral in what is referred to as the Pazzi conspiracy. His mother is believed to have been Fioretta Gorini, the daughter of a university professor, and Giulio was born illegitimately in May 1478 in Florence.  Giulio spent the first seven years of his life living with his godfather, the architect Antonio da Sangallo, the Elder. Then Lorenzo the Magnificent took over, raising him as one of his own sons, alongside Giovanni, the future Pope Leo X, Piero and Giuliano. Young Giulio received a humanist education at Palazzo Medici and became an accomplished musician. He studied canon law at the University of Pisa and accompanied his cousin, Giovanni, to the conclave of 1492 when Rodrigo Borgia was elected Pope Alexander VI.  Read more…

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Book of the Day: New York City’s Greatest Boxers, by Jose Corpas

For many years, New York City was considered to be the fight capital of the world. Local venues put on shows almost daily, and the mecca of boxing, Madison Square Garden, hosted boxing regularly. Fans flocked from one arena to the other to catch all of the action. New York City's Greatest Boxers is a photographic journey featuring over 180 photographs showcasing many of the outstanding boxers who helped make up the city's colorful history. New York City's biggest boxing stars are all found here, from legendary champions like Terry McGovern and Benny Leonard to local stars and celebrities like Joe Miceli, Tiger Jones, and Tony Danza.

Jose Corpas, former boxer, trainer, and cornerman, is a boxing historian and member of the International Boxing Research Organization. An official with USA Boxing Metro, he also founded the Web sites Professional Boxing Rankings and Big Apple Boxing.

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18 November

NEW - Gianni Mazzocchi - publisher

Business success marred by personal heartache

The publisher Gianni Mazzocchi, a magazine editor-proprietor who founded more than 15 national magazines, of which several titles, including Il Mondo, L'Europeo and Quattroruote, continued to be published long after his death, was born on this day in 1906 in Ascoli Piceno in Marche.  Mazzocchi became a publisher by accident after quitting university to support his family. But through a combination of boundless energy and a chance meeting with the architect and designer Gio Ponti, he launched himself as a magazine proprietor with enormous success.  His life was bookended by personal heartache. His early years were marred when illness and misfortune struck his family. Towards the end of his life he suffered the ordeal of having his eldest daughter kidnapped and was then left a widower, the stress of the episode being blamed for the sudden death of his wife.  Mazzocchi, whose father was a breeder of silkworms at a time when such skills could yield a good living, seemed destined for a career in the law after winning a scholarship to study jurisprudence in Rome.  But the family’s prosperity abruptly collapsed.  Read more…

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Alfonso Ferrero La Marmora - military leader

General who became prime minister of Italy

Alfonso Ferrero La Marmora, a general and statesman who became the sixth prime minister of Italy, was born on this day in 1804 in Turin.  A graduate of the Turin Military Academy, La Marmora went on to play an important part in the Risorgimento, the movement to create a united Italy.  One of his older brothers was Alessandro Ferrero La Marmora, who founded the Italian army’s famous Bersaglieri corps, which entered French-occupied Rome in 1870 through a breach in the wall at Porta Pia and completed the unification of Italy.  Alfonso La Marmora went into the army in 1823 and first distinguished himself in the Italian wars of independence against Austria.  In 1848, La Marmora rescued the Sardinian king, Charles Albert, from Milanese revolutionaries who had resented the king’s armistice with the Austrians. Afterwards he was promoted to general and briefly served as minister of war.  La Marmora suppressed an insurrection at Genoa in 1849 and commanded the Sardinian forces in the Crimean War in 1855.  Later, while serving as minister of war again, he reorganised the Italian army.  He then served as premier of Piedmont, governor of Milan and as the king’s lieutenant in Naples.  Read more…

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Stefano Cardu - builder and architect

Sardinian who made fortune in Siam

The builder and architect Stefano Cardu, who enjoyed a lucrative relationship with the government of Siam in the late 19th century, was born on this day in 1849 in Cagliari, Sardinia.  Cardu built many important buildings in Siam - now Thailand - including a royal palace, the national military college and a luxury hotel to house foreign diplomats, as well as contributing to the country’s expanding infrastructure with roads and bridges.  The company he built up provided him with considerable wealth and when he returned to Cagliari he donated his collection of Siamese art, antiquities and other items to the city. They have been preserved in a museum that can be visited today.  It is not known with certainty how Cardu came to be in Siam. After he died in 1933, an obituary appeared in a newspaper in Sardinia that claimed he was shipwrecked off the coast and swam to the shore pursued by sharks, although the story has not been corroborated.  The account may be true, nonetheless.  Born into a family of carpenters, he acquired some knowledge of design and construction as he was growing up, although his ambition was to sail ships.  Read more…

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Gio Ponti - architect and designer

Visionary who shaped more than 100 buildings

Giovanni ‘Gio’ Ponti, one of the most influential architects and designers of the 20th century, was born on this day in 1891 in Milan.  During a career that spanned six decades, Ponti completed more than 100 architectural projects in Italy and abroad and also designed hundreds of pieces of furniture, decorative objects and household items.  As an architect, he made a significant impact on the appearance of his home city. The Pirelli Tower, which for 35 years was Italy’s tallest skyscraper, is the building for which Ponti is most famous, but it is only one of 46 in Milan.  He also designed the Montecatini buildings, the Torre Littoria (now known as the Torre Branca) in Parco Sempione, the San Luca Evangelista church in Via Andrea Maria Ampère, and Monument to the Fallen in Piazza Sant’Ambrogio.  Ponti’s work was by no means confined to Milan, however.  Elsewhere in Italy, he designed the Mathematics Institute at the University of Rome, the Carmelo Monastery in Sanremo, the Villa Donegani in Bordighera, the Gran Madre di Dio Concattedrale in Taranto and the Hotel Parco dei Principi in Sorrento.  Read more…

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Attilio Bertolucci - poet

Pastoral scenes and family life inspired writer from Parma

Writer and poet Attilio Bertolucci was born on this day in 1911 in San Lazzaro, a hamlet in the countryside near Parma in Emilia-Romagna. Bertolucci wrote about his own family life and became renowned for the musicality of his language while describing humble places and human feelings. He became an important figure in 20th century Italian poetry and was the father of film directors Bernardo and Giuseppe Bertolucci.  Attilio Bertolucci was born into a middle-class, agricultural family. He began writing poems at the age of seven and published his first collection of poems, Sirio, when he was 18.  He went to study law at the University of Parma when he was 19, but soon gave it up in favour of literary studies. He also went to the University of Bologna to study art history. He went on to teach art history at the Maria Luigia boarding school in Parma.  He became a book reviewer and theatre and film critic for the Parma newspaper, La Gazzetta, and developed anti-fascist feelings along with other intellectuals at the time. He worked as foreign editor for the poetry publisher, Guanda, and introduced a range of modern poetry from overseas to Italy.  Read more…

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Eleonora Gonzaga – Holy Roman Empress

Pious princess who promoted the arts and education

Eleonora Gonzaga, Princess of Mantua, Nevers and Rethel, was born on this day in 1630 in Mantua.  She grew up to marry the Holy Roman Emperor, Ferdinand III, and established a reputation as one of the most educated and virtuous women of her time.  Eleonora became fascinated by religious poetry, founded a literary academy and was a patron of musical theatre.  As Holy Roman Empress she developed the cultural and spiritual life at the Imperial Court in Vienna, continuing the work of her great aunt, also called Eleonora, who had introduced opera to Vienna in the early part of the 17th century.  Vienna subsequently became recognised as the music capital of Europe.  Eleonora was the second child of Charles Gonzaga, Duke of Nevers, who was heir to the Duchy of Mantua, and Maria Gonzaga, who was heiress to the Duchy of Montferrat.  She was given a good education, became fluent in French, Spanish and Italian and learnt about literature, music and art.  Having become interested in poetry, she composed religious and philosophical poems herself.  A marriage was arranged for her with the Holy Roman Emperor, who imposed the condition that the Duchy of Mantua had to remain loyal to the Empire.  Read more…

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St Peter’s Basilica consecrated

Artists helped design magnificent church

The stunning Renaissance Basilica of St Peter in Rome was completed and consecrated on this day in 1626.  Believed to be the largest church in the world, Basilica Papale di San Pietro in Vaticano was built to replace the original fourth century Basilica that had been constructed on what was believed to be the burial site of St Peter.  Bramante, Michelangelo and Bernini were among the many artistic geniuses who contributed to the design of the church, which is considered to be a masterpiece of Renaissance architecture.  Located within Vatican City, the Basilica is approached along Via della Conciliazione and through the vast space of St Peter’s Square.  The magnificent central dome of the Basilica dominates the skyline of Rome and the balcony above the entrance, where the Pope makes appearances, is instantly recognisable because of the many times it has been shown on television.  It is believed that St Peter, one of the disciples of Jesus, was executed in Rome on 13 October, 64 AD during the reign of the Emperor Nero. He was buried close to the place of his martyrdom.  The old St Peter’s Basilica was constructed over the burial site 300 years later.  Read more…

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Book of the Day: Censorship and Literature in Fascist Italy, by Guido Bonsaver

The history of totalitarian states bears witness to the fact that literature and print media can be manipulated and made into vehicles of mass deception. Censorship and Literature in Fascist Italy is the first comprehensive account of how the Fascists attempted to control Italy's literary production. Guido Bonsaver looks at how the country's major publishing houses and individual authors responded to the new cultural directives imposed by the Fascists. Throughout his study, Bonsaver uses rare and previously unexamined materials to shed light on important episodes in Italy's literary history, such as relationships between the regime and particular publishers, as well as individual cases involving renowned writers such as  Moravia, Da Verona, and Vittorini. Censorship and Literature in Fascist Italy charts the development of Fascist censorship laws and practices, including the creation of the Ministry of Popular Culture and the anti-Semitic crack-down of the late 1930s. Examining the breadth and scope of censorship in Fascist Italy, from Mussolini's role as 'prime censor' to the specific experiences of female writers, this is a fascinating look at the vulnerability of culture under a dictatorship.

Guido Bonsaver is University Lecturer in Italian and Fellow of Pembroke College, Oxford, also a tutor at Merton, Queen's, and Wadham College. As well as working on censorship during the Fascist regime, he has studied immigration in contemporary Italian cinem and is currently working on the influence of US culture in Post-Unification Italy.

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Gianni Mazzocchi - publisher

Business success marred by personal heartache

Gianni Mazzocchi working on an edition
of Domus, his first magazine venture

The publisher Gianni Mazzocchi, a magazine editor-proprietor who founded more than 15 national magazines, of which several titles, including Il Mondo, L'Europeo and Quattroruote, continued to be published long after his death, was born on this day in 1906 in Ascoli Piceno in Marche.

Mazzocchi became a publisher by accident after quitting university to support his family. But through a combination of boundless energy and a chance meeting with the architect and designer Gio Ponti, he launched himself as a magazine proprietor with enormous success.

His life was bookended by personal heartache. His early years were marred when illness and misfortune struck his family. Towards the end of his life he suffered the ordeal of having his eldest daughter kidnapped and was then left a widower, the stress of the episode being blamed for the sudden death of his wife. 

Mazzocchi, whose father was a breeder of silkworms at a time when such skills could yield a good living, seemed destined for a career in the law after winning a scholarship to study jurisprudence in Rome.

But the family’s prosperity abruptly collapsed when Mazzocchi’s father lost his business to a confidence trickster. With both his mother and sister in poor health and his father struggling with mountainous debts, Gianni abandoned his studies in order to find work. He moved to Milan, believing that opportunities were likely to be more plentiful in the northern city.

Gio Ponti, the architect and designer,
put his trust in Mazzocchi's talents

His first offer of work came from Father Giovanni Semeria, a prominent Catholic priest concerned with fund-raising projects aimed at improving the lives of victims of poverty in southern Italy.  Mazzocchi was charged with typing up manuscripts of books Father Semeria produced and sold to raise money.

This gave him an introduction to publishers and book traders in Milan and it was not long before he found a permanent position paying enough for him to send money home as well as keep himself.

It was through Father Semeria that Mazzocchi met Ponti - with whom he shares a birthday - who was impressed enough by the young man’s talents to invite him to take over the running of his own architecture and design magazine, Domus, which was facing closure.

Mazzocchi and Ponti assembled a group of backers and Mazzocchi launched a new publishing company, taking over all aspects of administration and marketing while Ponti concentrated on the content. Over time, Mazzocchi increased his stake in the company, becoming sole proprietary by 1940, and began to publish other titles, using Domus as the template.  Able to anticipate public appetites, he turned a magazine about needlework into an early fashion title and acquired another that foresaw the growing interest in homes and interior design.

His first venture into news magazines came with Panorama, which appeared in 1939 as a fortnightly chronicle of public events. It was closed down after a year by the Fascist authorities, which was enough to persuade Mazzocchi to steer clear of news for the remainder of World War Two.

Panorama, which is still published today, was revived by the Mondadori publishing house and could be seen as an opportunity that slipped through Mazzocchi’s hands, but he had his own successes in the news market. 

L'Europeo became Italy's leading
news magazine under Mazzocchi

After the war, he launched L’Italia libera, a centre-left daily newspaper, and then, in partnership with Arrigo Benedetti, L’Europeo, for which a team of leading journalists was assembled. Finding a market along Italy’s growing intellectual class, the magazine prospered sufficiently for Mazzocchi to expand still further.

A second major news magazine, Il Mondo, launched in 1949, became Italy’s leading political title, before Mazzocchi expanded his interests to include car magazines such as Quattroruote and L’Auto Italiana. He had a car collection of his own that included Ferraris and Alfa Romeos.

Mazzocchi married one of his editors, Emma Robbutti, and they had two daughters, Maria Grazia and Giovanna. But their world was shattered in May 1978 when Maria Grazia, by then a journalist aged 33 and the mother of her own two sons, disappeared after leaving her father’s editorial offices to meet a friend for dinner.

It eventually transpired she had been kidnapped, a not uncommon occurrence in Italy in the 1970s as gangs snatched individuals, usually prominent or wealthy members of Italian society or their relatives, for political or criminal purposes.

The motive in this instance was simply to extract money. The original demand was for three billion lire but Mazzocchi secured his daughter’s release for one and a half billion after she had been held for two months. Maria Grazia was physically unharmed but the psychological strain was too much for her mother, Emma, who died within days of her release.

Gianni Mazzocchi was himself never the same man, losing much of the energy that had seen him work into his 70s. He died in 1984 at the age of 77, being laid to rest in a family mausoleum he had built at Gignese on Lake Maggiore.

His younger daughter, Giovanna, took over the running of the business, while Maria Grazia became president of the Domus Academy, a private school of design founded by her father two years before his death.

The elegant Piazza del Popolo at the centre of 
the town is Ascoli Piceno's focal point

Travel tip: 

Ascoli Piceno, where Gianni Mazzocchi was born, is a beautiful small city located in the Marche region of Italy, about 30km (19 miles) inland from the Adriatic coast. It is known for its picturesque mediaeval architecture and rich cultural heritage. Main attractions include the Piazza del Popolo, noted for the honey-coloured travertine stone of its paving and the historic buildings around it. Lined with cafes and restaurants, the square is a lively meeting place. Other places worth visiting include the Palazzo dell’Arengo, which houses a museum showcasing the history of the city, the Ventidio Basso Theatre and the Cathedral of Sant’Emidio, which dates back to the fifth century and houses an altarpiece by Carlo Crivelli. According to traditional accounts, Ascoli Piceno had some 200 towers in the Middle Ages, of which around 50 can still be seen today.

The Giardino Alpinia above Gignese offers
stunning views across Lake Maggiore

Travel tip:

Located in a scenic position on the slopes of Mount Mottarone, overlooking Lago Maggiore, Gignese, where Mazzocchi was laid to rest in the family tomb, is said to have been founded by Genesio Dotti, from Genoa, in the 12th century.  It has strong connections with both the Visconti and Borromeo families.  Gignese became well known for the manufacture of umbrellas and today boasts the Museo dell’Ombrello e del Parasole (Museum of the Umbrella and Parasol), which houses an interesting and unique collection of umbrellas and parasols from the period between 1840-1940.  A nearby attraction is the Giardino Alpinia in the hamlet of Alpino, a botanical garden dedicated to the flowers and grasses of the Alps. The panoramic views from the garden’s natural balcony include Lake Maggiore and Lake Orta, the Lombardy plain and the Alps.

Also on this day:

1626: The consecration of St Peter’s Basilica in Rome

1630: The birth of Eleonora Gonzaga – Holy Roman Empress

1804: The birth of military leader Alfonso Ferrero La Marmora

1849: The birth of builder and architect Stefano Cardu

1891: The birth of architect and designer Gio Ponti

1911: The birth of poet Attilio Bertolucci

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17 November

Andreotti jail sentence stuns Italy

Ex-prime minister found guilty of conspiracy to murder

Giulio Andreotti, who was Italy’s prime minister on seven occasions and an almost permanent presence in Italian governments from 1947 until 1992, was handed a 24-year prison sentence on this day in 2002 when a court in Perugia found him guilty of ordering the killing of a journalist.  The verdict was greeted with shock and consternation across Italy given that Andreotti, by then 83 years old, had been acquitted of the charge in the same courtroom three years earlier.  The appeal by prosecutors against that acquittal had not been expected to succeed and, in contrast to the original trial, the hearing attracted only modest media interest, with only a handful of reporters present when Andreotti’s fate was announced, at the end of a six-month process.  This time the court ruled that Andreotti had, in fact, conspired with associates in the Mafia to murder journalist Carmine ‘Mino’ Pecorelli, the editor of Osservatore Politico, a weekly political magazine in Rome, who was shot dead on a street in the capital in 1979. The charge had been based on the evidence of Tommaso Buscetta, the Mafia pentito - or supergrass - who had been the key figure in the so-called Maxi Trial a decade earlier in Palermo. Read more…

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Bronzino – master of Mannerism

Florentine became Medici court painter

The Mannerist painter Agnolo di Cosimo – better known as Il Bronzino or simply Bronzino – was born on this day in 1503, just outside Florence.  Bronzino is now recognised as the outstanding artist of what has become known as the second wave of Mannerism in the mid-16th century.  His style bears strong influences of Jacopo Pontormo, who was an important figure in the first wave and of  whom Bronzino was a pupil as a young man in Florence.  The Mannerist movement began in around 1520, probably in Florence but possibly in Rome. In the evolution of art it followed the High Renaissance period.  Typical of Mannerist painters is their use of elongated forms and a style influenced by the attention to detail allied to restrained realism that was characteristic of the Renaissance masters Raphael, Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci.  Bronzino became best known for his portraits, which were detailed and stylishly sophisticated, in which the subjects were superbly realistic but also tended to wear stoical, rather haughty expressions.  He also paid particular attention to fabric and clothing, his works often notable for his recreation of textures. Read more…

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Umberto I assassination bid

First attempt to kill the king is foiled

An unsuccessful attempt was made on the life of King Umberto I of Italy on this day in 1878 in Naples.  Umberto was making a tour of the kingdom accompanied by his wife, Queen Margherita, and the Prime Minister, Benedetto Cairoli.  While saluting the crowds in Naples from his carriage, Umberto was attacked by a young man, Giovanni Passannante, who was employed as a cook at the time, but was later described as an anarchist. Passannante jumped on the carriage and attempted to stab the King. Umberto warded off the blow with his sabre but the Prime Minister, who came to his aid, was wounded in the thigh.  This was the first of three attempts on the life of Umberto I, who despite being nicknamed il Buono (the good), lost popularity with his subjects as his reign progressed.  He had won the respect of people because of the way he conducted himself during his military career and as a result of his marriage to Margherita of Savoy and the subsequent birth of their son, who was to become King Victor Emmanuel III.  But Umberto became increasingly unpopular because of his imperialist policies and his harsh ways of dealing with civil unrest.  Read more…

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Premiere of Verdi’s first opera

Oberto, Conte di San Bonifacio performed at La Scala

Giuseppe Verdi’s first opera to be performed made its debut at Teatro alla Scala in Milan on this day in 1839.  Oberto, Conte di San Bonifacio, which Verdi had written over a period of four years, is an opera in two acts. It is thought to have been based on an existing libretto by Antonio Piazza, reworked as a new libretto by Temistocle Solera, an Italian novelist.  Piazza’s libretto had been given to Verdi by Pietro Massini, director of the Società Filarmonica, a choral group to whom he had been introduced by Vincenzo Lavigna, the maestro concertatore at La Scala, of whom Verdi was a private pupil.  It was given the title of Rocester and Verdi was keen to see it produced in Parma, at the opera theatre nearest to his home town of Busseto, where he held the post of maestro di musica of the municipal orchestra.  However, Parma said they had no interest in staging new works and instead an approach was made to Milan. Whether Rocester actually became the basis for Oberto is subject to some disagreement among academics.  Verdi is said to have been invited to meet the La Scala impresario, Bartolomeo Merelli, who had been given good reports of Oberto’s musical quality and offered to put it on during the 1839 season. Read more…

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Calisto Tanzi - disgraced businessman

Man at the centre of the Parmalat scandal 

Calisto Tanzi, the business tycoon jailed for 18 years following the biggest corporate disaster in Italian history, was born on this day in 1938 in Collecchio, a town in Emilia-Romagna, about 13km (8 miles) from the city of Parma.  Tanzi was founder and chief executive of Parmalat, the enormous global food conglomerate that collapsed in 2003 with a staggering €14 billion worth of debt.  Subsequent criminal investigations found that Tanzi, who built the Parmalat empire from the grocery store his father had run in Collecchio, had been misappropriating funds and engaging in fraudulent practices for as much as a decade in order to maintain an appearance of success and prosperity when in fact the business was failing catastrophically.  Of all those hurt by the collapse, the biggest victims were more than 135,000 small investors who had bought bonds in the company, some of them trusting Parmalat with their entire life savings.  Between 2008 and 2010, Tanzi was found guilty by four different courts of fraud, of the fraudulent bankruptcy of Parmalat, the fraudulent bankruptcy of Parmatour, a travel industry subsidiary, and of false accounting at Parma, the football club he owned.  Read more…

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Giovanni Pico della Mirandola – philosopher

Writer of the 'Manifesto of the Renaissance' met an early death

Renaissance nobleman and philosopher Giovanni Pico della Mirandola died on this day in 1494 in Florence, sparking a murder mystery still not solved more than 500 years later and that led to the exhumation of his body in 2007.  Pico became famous for writing the Oration on the Dignity of Man, which was later dubbed the 'Manifesto of the Renaissance'.  At its heart, the Oration proposed that man is the only species of being to which God assigned no specific place in the chain of being and that man could ascend the chain through the exercise of his intellectual capacity, and for that reason it stresses the importance of the human quest for knowledge.  Renowned for his memory as well as his intellect, he could recite Dante’s Divine Comedy line-by-line backwards and by the time he was 20 he has mastered six languages.  But he made enemies and it his thought that his death at the age of just 31 was the result of poisoning because of concerns that he had become too close to hellfire preacher Girolamo Savonarola, an enemy of Florence's ruling Medici family.  It was Savonarola himself who delivered the funeral oration when Pico was buried at the Convent of San Marco in Florence where he was the Prior.  Read more…

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Book of the Day: Cosa Nostra: A History of the Sicilian Mafia, by John Dickie

Recognised as 'The first truly definitive English-language study of this myth-laden subject and a pleasure to read' (Sunday Times), Cosa Nostra is the compelling story of the Sicilian Mafia, the world's most famous, most secretive and most misunderstood criminal fraternity.  The Mafia has been given many names since it was founded 140 years ago: the Sect, the Brotherhood, the Honoured Society, and now Cosa Nostra. Yet as times have changed, the Mafia's subtle and bloody methods have remained the same. Now, for the first time, Cosa Nostra reconstructs the complete history of the Sicilian mafia from its origins to the present day, from the lemon groves and sulphur mines of Sicily, to the streets of Manhattan.  Described by journalist and presenter Andrew Marr as 'Monumental and gripping', Cosa Nostra is a history rich in atmosphere with the narrative pace of the best detective fiction, and hailed in Italy as the best book ever written about the Mafia.

John Dickie is Professor of Italian Studies at University College London (UCL). He is an internationally-recognised specialist on many aspects of Italian history and culture and his books have been translated into more than 20 languages. His history of Italian food, Delizia!, was turned into a six-part series for Italian television.

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16 November

Tazio Nuvolari – racing driver

Man from Mantua seen as greatest of all time

Tazio Nuvolari, the driver many regard as the greatest in the history not only of Italian motor racing but perhaps of motorsport in general, was born on this day in 1892 in Castel d’Ario, a small town in Lombardy, about 15km (9 miles) east of the historic city of Mantua.  Known for his extraordinary daring as well as for his skill behind the wheel, Nuvolari was the dominant driver of the inter-war years, winning no fewer than 72 major races including 24 Grands Prix.  He was nicknamed Il Mantovano Volante - the Flying Mantuan.  From the start of his career in the 1920s, Nuvolari won more than 150 races all told and would have clocked up more had the Second World War not put motor racing in hibernation.  As it happens, Nuvolari’s last big victory came on September 3, 1939, the day the conflict began, in the Belgrade Grand Prix.  When he died in 1953 from a stroke, aged only 60, his funeral in his adopted home city of Mantua attracted at least 25,000 people.  His coffin was placed on a car chassis pushed by legendary drivers Alberto Ascari, Luigi Villoresi and Juan Manuel Fangio, at the head of a mile-long procession.  Read more…

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Maurizio Margaglio - ice dancer

Multiple champion remembered for famous fall

The ice dancer Maurizio Margaglio, who enjoyed a prolifically successful partnership with Barbara Fusar-Poli from the mid-1990s to the early part of the new century, was born on this day in 1974 in Milan.  Margaglio and Fusar-Poli were national champions of Italy nine times and in 2001 they became the first Italian pair to become World champions, winning in Vancouver ahead of the defending champions Marina Anissina and Gwendal Peizerat of France.  They were European champions the same year, during a remarkable season in which they won every event they entered.  Yet they never won an Olympic title in three attempts, and as well as their successes they are remembered as much for the calamity that befell them at their home Olympics in Turin in 2006. In their first appearance in international competition for four years, Margaglio and Fusar-Poli were in the gold medal position, leading by a full half-point over the Russian favourites and two-time World champions, Tatiana Navka and Roman Kostomorav, after the opening compulsory dance section of the competition.  Yet just seconds away from potentially consolidating their lead in the original dance section, disaster struck.  Read more…

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Sofonisba Anguissola – Renaissance artist

Portrait painter paved the way for other women artists

Painter Sofonisba Anguissola died on this day in 1625 in Palermo at the age of 93.  As a young woman Anguissola had been introduced to Michelangelo in Rome, who had immediately recognised her talent.  She served an apprenticeship with established painters, which set a precedent for women to be accepted as students of art in the 16th century. Her success later in life paved the way for other women to pursue serious careers as artists. Many of her paintings can still be seen in prestigious galleries all over the world.  Anguissola was born in Cremona in Lombardy in 1532 to noble parents who believed they had a connection to the ancient Carthaginians and named their first daughter after the tragic Carthaginian figure, Sophonisba.  All their children were encouraged to cultivate their talents and five of the daughters became painters, but Sofonisba was the most accomplished and became the most famous.  Sofonisba was 14 when she was sent with her younger sister, Elena, to study with Bernardino Campi, a respected portrait and religious painter. When he moved to another city, she continued her education with Bernardino Gatti.  Read more…

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San Giuseppe Moscati - doctor

Brilliant young doctor recognised for his kindness

Doctor and scientist Giuseppe Moscati was beatified by Pope Paul VI on this day in 1975.  Giuseppe was renowned for his kindness and generosity to his patients and even before his death people talked of ‘miracle’ cures being achieved by him.  He was canonised by Pope John Paul II in 1987 and his feast day is 16 November.  Moscati was born into a big family in Benevento in 1880. His father, a lawyer and magistrate, was active in the church and Giuseppe inherited his piety.  The family later moved to Naples and Giuseppe enrolled in the medical school of the University of Naples in 1897.  On graduating he went to work in a hospital but continued with his brilliant scientific research and attended Mass frequently.  When Vesuvius erupted in 1906 he helped evacuate all the elderly and paralysed patients before the roof collapsed on the hospital under the weight of the ash.  He worked tirelessly to research ways to eradicate cholera in Naples and personally cared for many of the soldiers wounded in the First World War.  He was compassionate to the poor and often gave them money as well as free medical treatment and a prescription.  Read more…

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Book of the Day: Nuvolari, by Christopher Hilton

Tazio Nuvolari is widely regarded as the greatest racing driver of all time. In Nuvolari, a fascinating assessment of the driver's life, Christopher Hilton seeks to understand Nuvolari the man - and the Nuvolari legend as it unfolded.  Using original documentary material, race reports of the time from several countries and the recollections of Nuvolari's contemporaries, the author recreates the excitement generated by his driving and the impact it made on motorsport. Nuvolari's virtuosity at the wheel came with a competitive instinct so fierce that he repeatedly broke cars and his own body. The author captures many aspects of Nuvolari's strong personality, a personality which, in the days before intrusive journalism, was virtually unknown. The extraordinary performances that decorated Nuvolari's long career form the backbone of the narrative - the 1930 Mille Miglia, the 1935 German GP, the 1938 British GP at Donington, the 1948 Mille Miglia. Published half a century after Nuvolari's death, this biography is an invaluable addition to motor racing history and essential reading for anyone interested in the sport.

Christopher Hilton is a leading authority and writer on contemporary and historic motorsport and has written more than 30 books. He has specialized in biographies of modern Formula 1 drivers such as Michael Schumacher and the late Ayrton Senna, but also produced a ground-breaking study of the Donington Grands Prix of 1937 and 1938, as well as the definitive biography of motorcycle champion Mike Hailwood.

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15 November

NEW - Bernardino Nogara - Vatican financial advisor

Former engineer laid foundations for financial strength of the Papacy

The engineer-turned-investment manager Bernardino Nogara, who in 1929 was appointed by Pope Pius XI to look after the financial dealings of the newly-independent Vatican City, died on this day in 1958 in Milan.  Nogara had returned to his homeland - he was born in Bellano, around 80km (50 miles) north of Milan on the shore of Lake Como - upon retiring from his position as Director of the Special Administration of the Holy See in 1954, at the age of 84. Although details of the Vatican’s finances have traditionally been shrouded in secrecy, Nogara is thought to have swelled the papal coffers by hundreds of millions of dollars during his 25 years in charge.  Yet he is regarded by many commentators as a controversial figure because of the nature of some of his investments. He was alleged to have put money into companies whose businesses could be seen to be incompatible with Catholic Church doctrines, made loans to Mussolini’s Fascists, and clandestinely invested in companies that both enabled and profited from the deadly aggression of the Axis powers in World War Two.  Nogara’s background was in engineering.  Read more…

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Enzo Staiola - actor

Child star of neorealist classic Bicycle Thieves

Enzo Staiola, who found international fame as an eight-year-old boy as one of the stars of the Oscar-winning neorealist drama Bicycle Thieves, was born on this day in 1939 in Rome.  Staiola’s character in Vittorio De Sica’s 1948 film was Bruno Ricci, the eldest child in a working class Roman family desperately trying to survive in the hard economic climate that followed the end of the Second World War.  The central character in the film is Bruno’s father, Antonio, who lands a job posting advertising bills around the city but is required to have a bicycle to transport himself, his ladder and bucket to wherever his services are required.  Antonio buys a bicycle after pawning some of the family’s few possessions of value only to have it stolen on his first day at work. The remainder of the film follows Antonio and Bruno as they try to find the bicycle.  The essence of the neorealist genre was that directors achieved authenticity by eschewing the use of professional actors in favour of ordinary people who lived in the city or neighbourhood where the action was set.  De Sica chose Lamberto Maggiorani, a steel factory worker, to play the part of Antonio.  Read more…

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The murder of Pellegrino Rossi

Political assassination opened way to creation of Roman Republic

One of the key events during the revolutionary upheaval of 1848 in Italy took place on this day in that year when the politician Count Pellegrino Rossi was murdered at the Palazzo della Cancelleria, the seat of the government of the Papal States in Rome.  The event precipitated turmoil in Rome and led eventually to the formation of the short-lived Roman Republic.  Rossi was the Minister of the Interior in the government of Pope Pius IX and as such was responsible for a programme of unpopular reforms, underpinned by his conservative liberal stance, which gave only the well-off the right to vote and did nothing to address the economic and social disruption created by industrialisation.  Street violence, stirred up by secret societies such as Giuseppe Mazzini’s Young Italy movement, had been going on for weeks in Rome and Rossi had been declared an enemy of the people in meetings as far away as Turin and Florence.  There was also anger in Rome at Pius IX’s decision to withdraw the support of the Papal Army from the First Italian War of Independence, being fought between the Kingdom of Sardinia (Piedmont) and the Austrian Empire.  Read more…

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Francesco Rosi - film director

Documentary style put him among greats of Italian cinema

The film director Francesco Rosi, one of Italy's most influential movie-makers over four decades, was born on this day in 1922 in Naples.  Rosi, who made his directing debut in 1958 and filmed his last movie in 1997, built on the fashion for neo-realism that dominated Italian cinema in the immediate post-war years and his films were often highly politicised.  Many of his works were almost pieces of investigative journalism, driven by his revulsion at the corruption and inequality he witnessed in the area in which he grew up, and the dubious relationships between local government and figures from the crime world.  His film Hands Over the City, for example, starring Rod Steiger as an unscrupulous land developer, sought to show how the landscape of Naples was shaped by greed and political interests.  The film's disclaimer stated that “All characters and events narrated in this film are fictitious, but the social reality that created them is authentic.”  The Mattei Affair, which starred Gian Maria Volonté - himself a political activist - tells the story of Enrico Mattei, a former Italian resistance fighter who rose to be head of ENI, the state-owned oil company, and died in a plane crash in Sicily.  Read more…

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Annunzio Mantovani - conductor

Orchestra leader brought light relief during World War Two

Conductor and composer Annunzio Paolo Mantovani - best known simply as Mantovani - was born on this day in Venice in 1905.  The music produced by his orchestras, which became known as ‘the Mantovani sound', brought pleasure to millions and his recordings were best sellers in Britain and the US before the Beatles came on the scene.  Mantovani’s father, Benedetto Paolo Mantovani, who was known as ‘Bismarck’, was a violinist and leader of the orchestra of Teatro alla Scala opera house in Milan, at the time Arturo Toscanini was conductor.  The Mantovani family moved to England in 1912 after Bismarck was appointed conductor of the orchestra at Covent Garden.  Young Annunzio Mantovani studied the violin and piano in London before joining a touring orchestra. He quickly became a violin soloist and then a conductor.  He went on to form his own orchestra, which toured the country, made radio broadcasts and recorded albums for Columbia and Decca.  His music was popular with the troops, who danced to it with their sweethearts when they came home on leave during the Second World War. Read more…

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Roberto Cavalli – fashion designer

Florentine who conceived the sand-blasted look for jeans

The designer Roberto Cavalli was born on this day in 1940 in Florence.  Cavalli has become well-known in high-end Italian fashion for his exotic prints and for creating the sand-blasted look for jeans. From an artistic family, Cavalli has a grandfather, Giuseppe Rossi, who was a talented painter whose work is on show in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence.  As a student, Cavalli attended an art institute where he learnt about printing textiles and in the early 1970s he invented and patented a printing process for leather and began creating patchworks of different materials.  When he took samples of his work to Paris he received commissions from such fashion houses as Hermes and Pierre Cardin. At the age of 32, Cavalli presented the first collection in his name in Paris and then showed it in Florence and Milan.  He opened his first boutique in Saint Tropez in 1972 and added further boutiques in Italy and other parts of France.  In 1994 he showed the first sand-blasted jeans in his autumn/winter collection and then worked with Lycra to invent stretch jeans in 1995.  In 2001 he opened his first café store in Florence and this was followed by the opening in Milan of the Just Cavalli café and another boutique on the fashionable Via della Spiga.  Read more…

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Book of the Day: God's Bankers: A History of Money and Power at the Vatican, by Gerald Posner

Based on an investigation nine years in the making, God’s Bankers traces the political intrigue of the Catholic Church and shines a light into the Vatican’s legendary secrecy, its accumulation of wealth and its byzantine financial entanglements across the world. Told through 200 years of prelates, bishops, cardinals, and the Popes who oversee it all, Gerald Posner uncovers an eyebrow-raising account of money and power in one of the world’s most influential organisations. God’s Bankers is a revelatory and astounding saga marked by poisoned business titans, murdered prosecutors, and mysterious deaths written off as suicides; a carnival of characters from Popes and cardinals, financiers and mobsters, kings and prime ministers; and a set of moral and political circumstances that clarify not only the church’s aims and ambitions, but reflect the larger tensions of more recent history. In a narrative as exciting as a mystery thriller, Posner reveals with extraordinary precision how the Vatican has evolved from a foundation of faith to a corporation of extreme wealth and power.

Gerald Posner was one of the youngest attorneys ever hired by the Wall Street law firm of Cravath, Swaine & Moore. As an investigative journalist, he is the author of 11 books, including New York Times bestsellers, and one a finalist for the Pulitzer in History. Two of his best-known titles are Case Closed: Lee Harvey Oswald and the Assassination of JFK, and Killing the Dream: James Earl Ray and the Assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.

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