It’s much bigger and, arguably, more important than any of the towns we’ve seen so far – but, even taking those advantages into account, it’s easily the most dynamic, vibrant and interesting. At one time it had a poor reputation, but since 2000 it has been given a facelift so that now it rivals all the other top Italian tourist destinations. It is a city of red brick buildings, yellow, cream and terracotta painted plaster walls, mediaeval (leaning) towers and endless porticoed pavements.
The Basilica has a huge floor area (5th largest!) but is unfinished because building was blocked by the Pope when it was planned to build it bigger than St Peters. So the front is only half marble clad, and the side transepts stick out into space. And its been like that for 500 years!
It also has a 67m long sundial on the floor by means of which, in the 1600s, Cassini worked out that we needed leap years!
Bologna has a brand new museum telling the city’s story from the Etruscan era to the present day. This covered a lot of ground and was very well presented. It kept us amused for a couple of hours.
Bologna is, of course, famous for having the oldest University in Europe. In the oldest University building is a 17th century anatomy theatre.
This was partly rebuilt after allied bombing, but it still has two unusual ‘skinless’ statues, carved in wood, but with all the muscle groups showing!
After that lot we needed lunch. Emilia Romana is renowned for it’s fine local cuisine – but I don’t seem to be getting
the hang of it. Yesterday I indulged my
inner 7 year old with pizza and ice cream, and today I went for chicken curry and rice. I’ll never be a foodie!
Helen’s track of the day:
Fly Me To The Moon by Frank Sinatra.
I know, all these days in Italy and no mention till today. Well, a few Sinatra songs were played at the restaurant last night so here he is, and please celebrate one of the best musical arrangements in all of popular songs. And for me a great memory of an evening in a Bologna trattoria, with the pasta dish you might expect and much bonhomie, or whatever the Italian equivalent is, from the fella in charge of the place.