Another Piece o’ Pisa

July 18, cont'd.: In the last entry, I left us about to head into the Baptistery, which was really just a perfect structure all around (yeah, pun intended). Absolutely stunning.

A little bit of detail at the entrance:

This building looked like a huge birthday cake, all bedecked and topped off with a crown. Up close it was even more beautiful when you could examine those intricate carvings. Magnificent. Not only is this the largest baptistery in Italy, it's reputed to be the largest in the world.

I should mention here that all the buildings in this piazza are designed in the very local Pisan Romanesque style, which is really beautiful, especially in this gleaming white marble.

The Baptistery was begun in 1153. Because it took two centuries to finish, the style, which begins (lower level) with the Romanesque, shifts to Gothic on the upper level--by the time they got to that level styles had changed. It's sort of like any fashion, I guess. Also, the roof is interesting in that it has red clay tiles on most of it, but the east-facing section has lead tiles (which was a very prestigious building material in the 12th-13th centuries). The east side was more protected from the weather, so the lead could be used there with less danger of corrosion.

Inside, the look tended more toward simplicity. The baptismal font, of course, was central to the place, but there was a whole lot more to view. Before we moved on from the font, we had to admire the obligatory and beautiful sculpture of St John the Baptist.

One of the panels (2 to each of the eight sides) on the baptismal font:

Moving on, there was more interesting detail than I had expected: a few special crypts...

...and a pulpit by Nicola Pisano, the father of Giovanni, who designed and sculpted the even more ornate pulpit in the Duomo next door (they were a famous father-son team of sculptors):

Amazing exquisite detail!

While Terrie got some respite from the heat by sitting on the marble steps that ran along the walls, Cindy and I climbed the 75 steps to the gallery--which actually provided the most comprehensive view of the interior.

From here we could get the best view of the intricate floor inlays:

While we were up in the gallery, a guard came in to demonstrate the reverberation of the Baptistery (this happens every 30 minutes). Unfortunately, I didn't get my phone turned on in time, so I missed getting a good recording of that moment. However, here's a good YouTube clip: https://youtu.be/i8aaDlFa1-I?si=o8GpyrPAffQ1CsRm

The reason I was slow in turning my camera toward the action below is because I was standing in line to take a picture of the Duomo out a window that was set up specifically for this purpose. All of the windows were screened, but the screen in this one window had a rectangular hole cut in it to allow all of us eager tourists to get the perfect shot. Of course I had to line up with the others. But it is a great view:

There is an almost imperceptible tilt to the cathedral--and by the way, the baptistery also leans a bit.

The baptistery had a series of stained glass windows celebrating various individuals. This one really struck me:

As you can see, it features Pope Saint John Paul II--but what intrigued me were the images at his feet--a very contemporary series of references to the world he lived in.

There was one last place we wanted to visit, the Camposanto Monumentale, or Monumental Graveyard. I felt as if we had saved the best for last.

A little history: This was established in 1277 to accommodate the graves that until that time were scattered around the church of the Duomo: at first the sarcophagi were placed in the uncovered central space of the cemetery which, according to tradition, was filled with the holy soil brought from Palestine at the time of the Second Crusade in 1146.

This place is deceptively large. It doesn't look so big from the square in front of the cathedral, but once you're inside it goes on and on--with over 2600 square meters of frescoes. And of course hundreds of crypts and sarcophagi. But it's the frescoes that kept us there for a very long time. They were created by many of Italy's great artists of the 14th through early 17th centuries.

From Wikipedia:

An Allied bomb fragment in 1944 started a fire that burned for three days, causing the lead roof to collapse and destroying most of the sculptures and sarcophagi and compromising the frescoes.

An initial effort to rescue the frescoes was by Deane Keller of the U.S. Army's Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives program. Pieces of the frescoes were salvaged and a temporary roof was erected to prevent further damage.

At the end of WWII, restoration was begun in earnest--and continues to this day. Restoring the frescoes was extremely complicated, but much progress has been made. Given the sheer expanse of the frescoes, and the meticulous, delicate work of the restoration, I think that work will go on for many decades to come. We saw some artists working on a very small section of wall when we were there, and it looked as if they would be on that same section for a very long time.

Here are some of the monumental frescoes. My photos can't even begin to adequately represent these paintings.

This is a closeup of a small section of the mural above:

A particularly graphic representation of the Inferno:

This one feels a bit more upbeat:

There were so many interesting crypts, but this one was especially eye-catching:

This chapel is, I believe, the Aulla Chapel, and the lamp is the very incense lamp that Galileo Galileo used for calculation of pendular movements when it was hanging in the cathedral.

Looking out into the original graveyard where the sacred soil lies to this day:

I admittedly have qualms calling soil collected during any of the Crusades holy, but there it is.

This final fresco is based on a vision of Hildegard von Bingen:

Unfortunately, this isn't my photo. The one I got was so bad I had to delete it and drag this one from the internet. Spectacular image.

By the time we had made it through the Camposanto, we had worked up a hunger for food and resting. So we went on search of a restaurant and found one that fortunately did not have any open outside seating. That was great, because we wanted to sit inside in air conditioning. We had a delightful lunch. Terrie found something on the menu that was gluten-free, so we could all three have a really good meal. When it came time for dessert, we asked what there was that was gluten-free and were told that nothing fell into that category. But there was crème caramel!! And we knew that shouldn't have any wheat flour in it. We asked our server to ask in the kitchen to confirm it would be okay for Terrie--and of course the server came back with the good news that they were not ruining their crème caramel by adding flour to it. Lunch ended on a sugar high and satisfaction that we had had a lovely time in Pisa despite the awful heat.

As we left the restaurant, we passed a street vendor who was making little figures from straws and grasses. They were beautiful and whimsical, but we had no room in our suitcases to pack something like that. So we walked on.

What a dayit was! We were ready to head back to Pistoia to collapse back into the cool comfort of our farmhouse--and that's just what we did, with one last farewell picture:

And that was our big day outside of Pistoia.

Next up: one last supper in Pistoia, and then on to Firenze and home--but not before we had excellent adventures in Firenze.

More to come. Don't go away just yet... 😊