Naples: Life, Death & Miracles supplement 1

By Jeff Matthews

This is Supplement 1 (A-Z) of the second edition of the encyclopedia, Naples: Life, Death & Miracles. With the original 4 volumes and this supplement of 78,000 words in 133 entries, the entire set contains about 800,000 words in 823 separate essays, anecdotes and observations about Naples, Italy. The entries are relatively short, averaging fewer than 1000 words each. They cover history, music, literature, architecture, mythology, biography and general culture and traditions. They are meant to inform as well as amuse, and they range in style from the lighthearted to the serious and scholarly.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jeff Matthews
• Release date: Jun 13, 2012
• ISBN: 9781476427768

Jeff Matthews

I am a longtime resident of Naples and have written about the area extensively. I have also taught English, linguistics and music history at local schools, universities as well as for the US military campus of the University of Maryland in Europe. I am originally from Los Angeles, California.

Book preview

Naples: Life, Death & Miracles

a personal encyclopedia

2nd edition

Supplement 1

by Jeff Matthews

Copyright 2012 Jeff Matthews

Smashwords Edition

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

* * * * *

Introduction

Please see main introduction at the beginning of volume 1.

Supplement 1 to Naples: Life, Death & Miracles

This supplement consists of about 78,000 words divided into 133 entries.

Table of Contents

agricultural archaeology

Alberobello

Angevin Fortress

Angevin Naples

Antonino Stadium

Aspromonte (Garibaldi's defeat)

Buy this suit, or else.

Camaldoli

Campanella, Tommaso

Carditello (Bourbon lodge)

Carminiello ai Mannesi

Cerulli, Enrico

Chiesa del Cenacolo

Child labor

Chinatown

Christ of Maratea

City Walls

Coleman, Charles C.

Colors

Comic books & E. De Filippo

Concezione al Chiatamone

Congregazioni (Palazzo)

Coppola (Villaggio)

Coral trade

Cosenza, Luigi

Cremation

Crispi, Francesco

Cryptic Inscriptions

Cultures, Universal Forum

Cypress Grove

Damecuta, Villa

Daniele, Pino

emigration

Early modern humans in S. Italy

English cemetery

ex-cons

extra-communitari

exultet rolls of S. Italy

Farinelli

Fascist plot to kidnap Croce

Fascist symbol

Ferdinand II

Ferdinand IV (a sidelight)

Fèscina

Film Dubbing

Firrao (Palazzo)

Fountains of Naples

Free Pizza

Fruit of Christmas

Gaeta

Galdieri

Geophysics Observatory (Ischia)

Gesù delle Monache

Ghostbusters

Ghost Towns

Goodyear Blimp

Grand Hotel Londres

Gravina (Palazzo)

Great White Fleet

Greek language in Southern Italy

Grotto of the Dog

Haas (villa)

Holy Apostles, church of

Hooligans

Ice-skating in Naples

Incoronata (church)

Industrial Arts Museum

Italian Institute for Historical Studies

Italian Institute for Philosophical Studies

Islam in Naples

Jessel, Leon

Jewel theft (from down under)

Journals & newspapers (old)

Language(s) & Communication

Latin & Bank Robbers

Living Will

Madonna of Buon Consiglio

Maglione, Mario

Majo (villa)

Malta

Maraval (Villa)

Marcellino & Festo monastery

Marine museums

Marlow, William

Marotta, Giuseppe

Mastriani, Francesco

Matera

Maxantia tomato

Med. Shipping Company (Msc)

Mercalli scale & earthquakes

Merola, Mario

Metropolitana (airport)

Monte Santangelo

Mounuments in May

multiculturalism

Music & exploding heads

Napoli Italia Theater Festival

Neapolitan Baroque, painters

Nessun dorma

Niemeyer Auditorium

Nisida & Carlo Poerio

Norway in Naples

Otranto

Padula

Palasciano, F.

Parthenope, Return of

Parthenope University

Piedigrotta Festival

Pio Monte della Misericordia

Red House in Anacapri

Retrosanti

Salas, Esteban

San Gennaro al Vomero

San Gennaro, Chapel of the Treasure

San Gennaro demoted!

San Michele Arcangelo

San Nicola alla Carità

San Nicola, visit from old

Sant'Antonio delle Monache a Port'Alba

San Tarciso Martire

Santo Spirito (The Church of the Neapolitans)

Sister Italia

S.M. delle Grazie a Toledo

Solimena, Francesco

Southern Italians in Argentina

Sovente, Michele

Thermotoga neapolitana

Trams & trolleys, new

Umberto (Corso)

Underground Video!

Walk this way (or not)

White Stands

Zoomafia

* * * * * * *

—A—

agricultural archaeology

"Agricultural archaeology" is a relatively new term—at least to me. It means the study of crops that have been typical of an area through the ages in order (1) to better understand the history and culture of the area, and (2) to help sustain biodiversity. In the local area, for example, it is of interest to us to know what the Romans of Pompeii ate. In some cases, they ate the same things that modern residents of the area eat—the lunga di Sarno, for example, a hazel nut characteristic of the areas around Vesuvius for at least 2,000 years; also, Cato and Columella both spoke of the cabbages and onions of Pompeii. A convention was signed recently in the presence of the president of the Campania region and the regional clerk for agriculture, that will protect the lunga di Sarno as well as other species of agricultural crops typical of the area. Protect, here, includes encouraging local farmers not to desert traditional crops.

* * * * *back to table of contents* * * * *

Alberobello

(Original entry by Jeanne Manfredi. Reprinted with permission.)

I Love You, Trulli—or,

Toto, I don't think we're in Kansas anymore...

Inland from the city of Bari, on the road to Alberobello, tiny white stone houses topped with gray slate, cone-shaped roofs begin to dot the countryside. As more and more small clusters of these little houses appear on each side of the road, you begin to wonder, Am I still in Italy? Have I been magically transported into some fairy tale country? Then, after arriving in Alberobello, smack in the middle of a whole village of these strange little trulli, suddenly you know. You've discovered the Land of Oz. It's MUNCHKINLAND!

A trullo (two or more make trulli), built out of the plentiful local stones, is a rectangle outside, an oval inside and a triangle on top. The lower edges of the steep cone roofs come down to meet all the different heights of the walls and the peak above the little front door, making the whole structure look as quaint as an English thatched cottage or as cute as a gingerbread house.

Seldom do you see just one lonely trullo by itself, for as a family grows so does their tiny one room house. A new trullo is nestled right up beside the first one, naturally, with an opening made in their common wall to connect the two. Later, if the family wants even more room, it's simple, just add another one, then another, each with its very own pointy headed roof. Some have also added lofts under their roofs. And, a few very fancy ones are even two-story, such as the most famous one in Alberobello, built in 1780. It's called Il Trullo Sovrano, making it truly one prince of a place.

Actually Alberobello looks like two different towns. On one slope is the standard pleasant Italian village. On the other slope it is all trulli, hundreds and hundreds of them climbing up and down the picturesque little narrow walking streets. It's almost a surprise to see that the men and women who live and work there are regular size folk and not Munchkins, the little people, after all. For, without being cutesy, it is all just plain adorable—and fun.

Some trulli have been turned into small shops for the tourist trade. So, as you stroll around among the little houses, you find a few of the usual souvenir shops, but most display the handicrafts of the local artisans. Others offer the wines, jams and other tempting foodstuffs that are specialties of the region.

At the top of the hill, there is a sprawling trulli hotel where the night can be spent in your own private trullo. However, since meals are included in the price, it is a bit pricey. Much better bargains can be found in one of small hotels in the standard Italian part of town, within easy walking distance to and from the trulli section.

Where did this unique style of architecture come from? A good guess is that the name trullo comes from the Greek tholos, the name for a conical-shaped, domed tomb, such as those earliest ones found at Mycenae, (i.e., Agammemnon's tomb) and in Crete, dating from the early Bronze Age. Similar domed tombs of later eras are to be found all through the Mediterranean world, including Southern Italy.

However, even earlier, perhaps around 3000 BC, peoples from the Mid-East, looking for a more fertile land, migrated westward. Some of these wanderers finally settled down in what is now La Puglia, bringing with them their primitive culture. The native stones lying about all over the fields, ready to be easily picked up, were first used to build their tombs. Eventually, as this method of construction evolved, they also began to build primitive domed dwellings, with empty spaces inside to shelter them during bad weather—the forerunner of our cozy family home, without the monthly rent or the 30 year mortgage.

A story that one hears in Alberobello is that the origin of the conical roof has to do with the ease of dismantling and reassembling at tax time! Roofed buildings—again, this is what they say—were taxed more than open stalls or sheds; thus, when the tax collector was in the area, you simply took down the roof of your house, paid the lower taxes and reassembled the roof after he left. (I hope that's a true story!)

These prehistoric colonists also brought along their magic symbols, which are still being used as special designs of white stone set into the roof of a trullo. Later, Greek and Christian symbols, such as the cross, were added to the ancient ones. However, even today, many of the doors face east, toward that first god of all, the Sun.

The Pinnacoli or Pinnacle, the knob-like balls at the very top of all the trulli, are also throwbacks to the ancient worship of the Sun god. All through the ages, such religious symbols have been placed at the apex of a house, a temple or a church to represent the union between a people and their gods.

Much of the region of La Puglia is full of undiscovered treasures—at least, undiscovered by most American and English tourists. For instance, just a short distance from Alberobello is one of the great natural wonders of Italy, the Caverns of Castellana (Le Grotte di Castellana). These are tremendous underground caves with spectacularly beautiful rock formations, plus stalactites and stalagmites that abound in a fantasy of colors.

Going from Munchkinland to Fantasyland sound more like a trip to Disneyland, but it's really even better. It's REAL. Trulli it is!

* * * * *back to table of contents* * * * *

Angevin Fortress (Maschio Angioino)

I finally got to take a tour of the Maschio Angioino, the great Angevin Fortress, down at the port of Naples. It's the first time that I have actually been in, around and over the premises and allowed to indulge my inner twelve-year-old—that is, to get up there on the ramparts behind the battlement where they keep the merlons, crenels, ballistrarias and bartizan turrets. For those of you who know less about medieval fortress architecture than you should, that is the place you stood to pour the boiling oil on the invaders.

The fortress is also called the Castelnuovo (New Castle) to distinguish it from the older Castel dell'Ovo. It was built by the Angevin King, Charles I, as the new royal palace when he moved the capital of the kingdom from Palermo to Naples in the 13th century. Only a few bits of the original structure have remained over the centuries, such as the Palatina Chapel. The original structure was built in only four years and was finished in 1282. It then fell into disrepair, accelerated by an earthquake; thus, the structure you see today is a makeover started by the Aragonese in the 1450s and completed by the Spanish in the mid-1500s.

The castle has seen a number of events highly significant in the history of the city. In 1294, the castle was the scene of the abdication of Pope Celestine V. At least in Dante's version of the afterlife, Celestine resides in Hell. The Divine Comedy places him just past the gates of Hell among the Opportunists—(in John Ciardi's translation)—"...the nearly soulless whose lives concluded neither blame nor praise...[and in reference to Celestine]...I recognized the shadow of that soul who, in his cowardice, made the Grand Denial...". (To play the Pope's advocate, I remind you that Dante was really upset at the fact that Celestine, by quitting, left the door open to the subsequent Pope, Boniface VIII, corrupt and, in Dante's view, responsible for much of the evils that then befell Dante's city of Florence.)

Here, too, in 1486, the infamous Baron's Plot against the king was brought to a conclusion with the arrest of the conspirators. Also, in the 1300s, during the great flowering of Italian medieval literature, King Robert of Anjou received such eminent poets as Petrarch and Boccaccio. Inside the castle is a vast courtyard, a 14th century portico, and the elegant facade of the Palatina Chapel. Although Giotto and his pupils did the original frescoes inside the chapel, very little of their work remains today. Much of the sculpture seen on the grounds is from the Aragonese period (the mid-1400s) and is the work of disciples of Donatello.

Popular legend says that a crocodile used to prowl the dungeon; it feasted on upstart barons who incurred the wrath of the Aragonese king. Accepting the idea of a renegade Egyptian crocodile jumping ship in the port of Naples in the Middle Ages and settling down in the castle requires some suspension of disbelief, admittedly. Yet, it's a good story and no doubt served to keep potential trouble makers in line. The moat that surrounds the building was, apparently, just a defensive ditch and was never filled with water.

Very recent archaeology has laid bare the structures that were on the site before the Angevins moved in to build their castle: (1) the foundations of a Franciscan convent that was torn down (the residents were given property for a new convent that still stands, the Church of Santa Maria La Nova); (2) Roman baths. The site was part of a vast complex running along the shore to the height of Pizzofalcone and around to the small isle of Megaride, site of the Egg Castle and presumed site of the villa of Licinius Lucullus, the Roman consul whose festive life-style has given us the expression, Lucullan splendor.

As of this writing, considerable work has gone to opening the fortress to the public and to push the structure back into the historical consciousness of Neapolitans. It is, after all, the first royal residence in the city, even though it was overshadowed by later Spanish palaces and, then, the great Royal Palace of the Bourbons. At present, The Palatina Chapel is open, as is the Civic museum, which houses an art collection. Also, a part of the collection of the Filangieri Museum from downtown Naples has been set up on the premises while that museum is closed for repairs. The castle hosts periodic conventions, and the Naples City Council convenes there.

* * * * *back to table of contents* * * * *

Angevin Rule in Naples

—(an easy guide for those with Medieval Attention Deficit Disorder)

The first change of dynasties (that is, from the Normans to the Hohenstaufens) in the Kingdom of Sicily (later known as the Kingdom of Naples) was so peaceful that most people didn't notice. In the 1150s, the last Norman king (dynasty #1) died without a male heir. One of his granddaughters, however, had married the son of the German emperor Barbarossa. Their child would become Frederick II and, thus, the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies passed to German rule. It was peaceful and domestic—just like your in-laws coming to stay with you and take over your house for a few years, that's all.

The second change, however—from the German Hohenstaufens (dynasty#2) to French Angevins (dynasty #3)—was so violent that the whole European continent noticed. Frederick II of Hohenstaufen (see vol. 2), the strong, almost messianic, Holy Roman Emperor, was at the heart of the power struggle between those (the Ghibellines) who favored a strong empire and those (the Guelphs) who favored an all-powerful church. When he died in 1250, the situation was at somewhat of a stand-off. Frederick's death, however, was the opportunity for a combined Papal and pro-church French Anjou (Angevin) army to break the stalemate; they invaded the Kingdom of Sicily and did battle with Manfred (see vol. 2), Frederick's heir, already on his way to becoming an able ruler in his own right. The southern half of the peninsula was thus torn by a brutal war of succession. Manfred was killed in battle and victory went to the French. And so King Charles of Anjou arrived in 1266 and began two centuries of Angevin rule of southern Italy, a period that continued the tradition of a monarchy ruling a large kingdom in the south of the peninsula, while the rest of Italy was fragmenting into city communes and duchies. The first thing Charles did was to capture Manfred's heir, the teenaged Corradin, and have him beheaded in Piazza Mercato in Naples. There was no sense in taking chances.

Charles then moved the capital of the Kingdom of Sicily from Palermo to Naples. That put him closer to his French interests but at the same time removed him and his capital, physically, from Sicily. That then led to some Angevin fragmenting when a seemingly trivial incident in Palermo set off the episode of the Sicilian Vespers in 1282 (see Mike and Lola...vol. 2). It turned into a successful anti-French revolt, which resulted in the Angevins being expelled from Sicily. The Sicilians called on an Aragonese king, Peter, to rule them and thus became part of one of the most obscure, yet fascinating confederations in European history, the Crown of Aragon (see vol. 1). The episode also set the stage for the concept of the Two Sicilies—the Aragonese one on Sicily and the Angevin one on the mainland, each claiming to be the real Sicily. It was a shaky start for Charles of Anjou; he lost a big chunk of the kingdom and then had to contend with pesky naval tactics from Sicily as far north as Naples—pesky enough to capture and hold Ischia and Capri for a while and even to kidnap Charles' son and hold him as a bargaining chip. His son, Charles II, was released and it was he who eventually managed a truce with Sicily. It gave the Angevins some time to build a kingdom from their base in Naples.

If there was a Golden Age of Angevin Rule, it was under Charles II's son, Robert, crowned in 1310, so well-thought of historically, that his by-name is Robert the Wise. He ruled until 1343, during which time Naples began to look like a medieval capital; work would begin or approach completion on some of the city's most important monuments, including the Maschio Angioino, the Duomo, San Lorenzo, Santa Chiara and San Martino. It was a time when artists, craftsmen and traders from elsewhere in Italy and Europe came to Naples to work and where illustrious men of letters such as Boccaccio lived and wrote of the happy, peaceful, generous and magnificent Naples.

Angevin rule of the Kingdom of Naples (still called the Kingdom of Sicily at the time) continued for another century, and it was as opposite from a Golden Age as you can imagine. The period had all those elements we associate with the Middle Ages: plots, crossbows & drawbridges, incompetent rulers, petty barons, murder, torture and long-suffering serfs. The most agonizingly complex episode is the one in which Queen Joan I of Naples (see Joans, Keeping up with the...vol. 2) apparently murders her husband; said husband's brother, Louis of Hungary, then invades Naples to get revenge; Joan flees to France; Louis and his Hungarians don't get their revenge, but they do sack Naples and leave with the silverware; Joan returns, marries Otto von Brunswick, supports an anti-Pope against the legitimate Pope and is ex-communicated; the real Pope then offers the crown of Naples to Louis of Hungary. He says no and gives it to his nephew, Charles of Durazzo. The armies of Joan and Otto then clash with the armies of Charles in the streets of Naples. Charles wins. Joan and Otto go to prison in the Castel dell'Ovo. Otto dies and Joann is moved to another prison where she is murdered, probably on the command of Charles. (I left a lot out, but you get the idea.)

Charles, however, is murdered and his queen and son/heir, Ladislaus, then hole up in Gaeta for ten years while Naples is enmeshed in struggle by various claimants to the throne. Ladislaus returns and takes the city in 1394. He reigns until 1414. At his death the throne passes to his sister, the second Joan. The last 20 years of her rule are the last of real Angevin rule in Naples. It is a dark and thoroughly nasty period, devoid, as far as I can tell, of any redeeming light or virtue.

(The early 1400s were pretty bleak elsewhere in the world, as well, so maybe Naples has no special claim to misery: in 1401, Tamerlane sacked Baghdad and slaughtered thousands; in 1403, the Doge of Venice imposed the world's first quarantine against the Black Death; Joan of Arc was burned at the stake in 1431. Yet, on the other hand, for you Pollyannas, the University of Leipzig was founded in 1409, and in 1421, a translation into Latin of the Geography by 2nd-century Greek astronomer, Ptolemy, revives the old crazy notion that the world might be round. Somewhere in the middle is the Battle of Agincourt (1415) which at least gave us rousing battlefield rhetoric, if only in literature, a couple of centuries later.)

"From this day to the ending of the world,

But we in it shall be remembered-

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;

For he to-day that sheds his blood with me

Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,

This day shall gentle his condition;

And gentlemen in England now-a-bed

Shall think themselves accurs'd they were not here,

And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks

That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day."

Joann II died in 1435. By complex rules of heredity, the throne of Naples passed for a few years to René of Anjou. The Aragonese rulers of Sicily then made war on the Angevins of Naples and won. Alfonso of Aragon took the throne of Naples in 1443 and proclaimed that he had reunited the Two Sicilies.

* * * * *back to table of contents* * * * *

Antonino Stadium

A few years ago the Naples superindendency for archaeology managed a partial restoration of another bit of ancient Rome among the many in Pozzuoli. This one was the Antonino stadium, built in the mid-second century A.D. It was an athletic field, the second largest one in the Roman world, measuring 260 meters by 65 meters, and the site of a regular Roman Olympiad on the earlier Greek model. The stadium is on the via Domiziana, the road that has connected Naples and Pozzuoli since ancient times and is located near the modern Olivetti complex of offices and small businesses. The ancient stadium has been through countless seismic disturbances; also, the via Domiziana was broadened in 1932, which cut into the grounds; and since the 1960s, the area has been subject to severe urbanization. Nevertheless, they restored at least part of, but so far the site has not been opened to the public, lack of funding for maintenance and supervisory personnel being the excuse, as usual.

* * * * *back to table of contents* * * * *

Aspromonte (Garibaldi's Defeat)

If you have studied a bit of Italian history, you know that the most important military episode in the unification of the