jere7my | More from the last capital of Rome (Reply)

Procession of 26 Martyrs in Sant'Apollinare Nuovo

Saturday, July 4 - Ravenna

[Edit: Sant'Apollinare Nuovo, pictured above, is where the traveling choir of seniors suddenly burst out with the Ave Maria — one of the most magical moments of the trip. I felt so privileged to be there. I've uploaded an mp3 of the last 45 seconds of their performance, if you'd like to listen to it while looking at the purty pictures. I don't own the rights to their performance, obviously, but I don't think they'd mind. If they do, I'll take it down.]

One of the things I like about Ravenna is its small-town approach to historical preservation. It's not really a small town — about 150,000 people live there — but it feels that way, and they seem to have a pragmatic attitude toward the treasures they steward, as though the local politics of some arts board are the only concerns they need to satisfy. Given a crumbling 16th-century fortress (the Rocca Brancaleone), they turned the interior (rather brilliantly) into a public park for watching movies and riding merry-go-rounds. Their city museum* is a maze of echoing galleries: priceless, minutely detailed ivory carvings next to a room filled with empty, dusty glass cases, then Bronze Age potsherds beside racks of medieval weapons beside a wall display of children's crayon drawings. In Sant'Apollinare Nuovo, home of some of the most stunning ancient mosaics in the world — important enough that the UN named it a World Heritage Site — they installed a light-up neon halo and cross on a statue of St. ~~Francis~~ Anthony, presumably because somebody thought it would be pretty (unless there was a horrible misunderstanding about the Baptistry of Neon). I think that's how Ravenna has always been, apart from the one or two moments in history when it was important — an out-of-the-way corner of the world that happened to be the capital of the western world for a few years, with all the remnants of sudden grandeur that that implies. Since then, they've just been going about their business.

This was our second of two days in Ravenna. We saw San Vitale (photos in a forthcoming post), the museum, Sant'Apollinare Nuovo, the Mausoleum of Theodoric (after a long hike along the railroad tracks), and the Rocca Brancaleone. Pictures behind the cut.

This is the unlikely group of seniors out of whom that music came. Sorry about the quality — this is a still from a video.

I really wish I'd noticed the neon when I was there. I might've been able to figure out how to light it up. Presumably one drops a coin in a slot somewhere.

I like the clumsy folk-art quality of the figures on the ceiling, contrasted with the glorious mosaics. I'm curious about the inscription — the cardinal named there was actually a pope, unless there was another Boniface Caetanus with a diagonal river on his crest. Note also the old-style roman numerals: CIↃ for M and IↃ for D. Parentheses around a number means "multiply by 1000" (so CVↃ would be 5000), and half parentheses (a medieval innovation) mean halve that.

The three magi, wearing the most awesome pants magi have ever worn.

I do not know what this vicious-looking chapel decoration was. A lamp, maybe? The inscription around the top says "PAX HOMINIBUS BONAE VOLUNTATIS" (peace and good will toward men), which is not the impression I get.

Another mystery. Clearly this is a frightfully sacred bit of stucco, illuminated as it was by multiple spotlights, but it was completely unlabeled. I also know nothing about the bowling balls stuck to the chapel walls.

Notice anything odd about this mosaic, showing the Palace of Theodoric? Here's a closer look:

Theodoric and his court used to be pictured here, between the pillars — this was his palace chapel, originally. But they were Arians, and Pope Gregory the Great was not so keen on Arians; in 560, he had the arches blacked out and curtained. But the job is incomplete — you can see disembodied hands and fingers floating on the pillars.

Moving on to another church, Santa Maria in Porto. We didn't do more than peek inside, but I helped an old woman down the stairs. She called me "principe".

Across the street, in the Parco della Pace, is this fabulous planetarium, covered in sundials and analemmas and astronomical charts.

On our way to the Mausoleum of Theodoric, we happened to see a classic car meet-up as they were breaking up and driving away.

The Mausoleum of Theodoric. Not so grand as the two I posted from Rome (Augustus's and Hadrian's), but still striking, sitting on the outskirts of town in a grand grassy park. The stones were laid without mortar. It was featured, thinly disguised, in the opening scenes of Guy Gavriel Kay's Sarantine Mosaic.

The interior is quite bare now, but this porphyry bathtub was the Gothic king's sarcophagus. Scraps of inscription are still visible on the walls in places. This was taken in the upper chamber, facing the spot I was standing for the previous photo.

Here's what it would look like if it were made of sugar cubes!

The entrance to the Rocca Brancaleone. It was built by the Venetians during their occupation, with a big gate pointing towards Venice in case they needed to escape.