Bridges over the Arno

Yesterday, Donald and I decided to take a walk through Altrarno, the neighborhood of "the other side" of the Arno river, which bisects Florence. There are bridges across the river every few blocks, and we decided to cross the nearest bridge. It is especially nice because it is one bridge away from the Ponte Vecchio, which is lined with shops. It is a good place to take photos of the Ponte Vecchio, and also, there are wide open views of the Arno upstream.

As we loitered on the bridge, taking photos and enjoying the view, I noticed a padlock on the railing, with two or three smaller locks attached to it. "Odd", I thought. "Do bicyclists keep their locks here for when they go to Florence?"

About halfway across the river, I found a chain with about five padlocks attached to it. I was reminded of a gate with multiple locks, so that different people with different keys all have access to the area. I revised my assumption. "Maybe a group of people are sharing this chain, but they bicycle into town at different times, so they only need one chain."

However, on the other side of the river, I encountered a bundle of locks that completely blew away the shared chain concept away.Here, I spied a bundle of at least 20 padlocks linked to each other in total disorganization. I pointed it out to Donald. "What do you think this is about?" I asked. He shook his head. Hard to say. We pondered the locks for a few minutes, sharing ideas, but none of our ideas seemed plausible.

We walked around the Altrarno neighborhood, to the Pitti Palace, to Chiesa de Santa Spirito. It rained. We stopped in a bakery to have cafe and cookies. Cafe and cookies is the best way to let your feet recover from hours of walking. For 3 Euro, you can get 2 fabulous cups of coffee, prepared to your order, and a couple of cookies too. But, I digress.

Eventually, we wandered back to the Ponte Vecchio, the most notable bridge over the Arno, lined with gold shops and filled with tourists. Even at 4:00PM on a rainy Sunday, the bridge was filled with tourists carrying umbrellas.

Halfway across the bridge, Donald pulled me aside. "Come look at the river," he said. At the center point of the bridge, there is a 2 meter space without shops, where the river is viewable. My attention was distracted from the river by the railing around a small statue. The railing was covered with hundreds of padlocks. Hundreds.

On the fence, there was an explanatory sign, in brass, in Italian and English: "It is forbidden to attach locks to the railing." Which came first, I wondered, the padlocks or the sign? Was the plethora of padlocks a social statement?

Why the padlocks? Search the Internet for "Padlocks" and "Arno", and you will find the answer.

The Legend of Ponte Vecchio Padlocks

The Ponte Vecchio (wikipedia)

Ponte Vecchio: Travel to Florence

ADDENDUM for those of you lacking time for research: couples write their names on one side of the padlock, the date on the other side, then lock it to the railing, and throw the key into the Arno, symbolizing the eternity of their love. There are indications that this is an American tradition, and not an Italian one. Personally, I imagine piles of keys under these bridges...

Li Cornici

This is what a frame shop looks like in Florence, and I see one every two or three blocks. This makes me think there must be MILLIONS of unused frames in this city, all large, wooden, and mostly gilded.Florence was the birthplace of the Renaissance. The cathedrals, churches and palazzos are filled with art. There are statues in the piazzas, the occasional painting on the walls along the street. We are surrounded by art as frescos, paintings, sculpture, mosaics.

These frame shops are a reminder of all the paintings that are damaged, destroyed, discarded or ignored. Were they all poor quality? the work of beginners or would-be artists lacking in talent? We will never know because they are gone.

But I think about the bronze statue of Pope Julius II, created by Michelangelo, 3 times lifesize, 10,000 pounds of bronze. While Michelangelo was painting the frescoes in the Sistine chapel, the status was pulled down from its pediment in Bologna by angry citizens, then melted down, and forged into a cannon. We know what happened to the statue, but what did these frames hold? And think about it: the frame survived, but the art did not.

The Streets of Rome and Florence

The streets of Rome are paved with little 3-inch blocks of basalt, a volcanic rock. They are set down in arcing patterns across the streets, or in diagonal rows. Where two streets meet, an artistic pattern develops as the bricks from one street meet the bricks of its cross-street. They are separated by about a half-inch of sand, and they are amazingly even to walk on. Even the Roman women in their heels are able to walk on the carpet of bricks that pave Rome. There must be millions of these little blocks paving the streets of old Rome.

One day I looked out of our window, and workmen had dug a hole in the street about 4 feet square and 3 or 4 feet deep. Although they had cordoned off their work area, I couldn’t tell what they were doing under the street. Electricity? Cable? Sewers? Who knows. A pile of black cubes sat to one side of the hole. At the end of the day, we happened to walk home past the worksite, and there was no evidence that anything had happened in that place. The hole had been filled in, and the bricks put back in their places. I commented to Donald that digging up an asphalt street is a major ordeal in the United States. It takes jackhammers or special machines to pull it up – the tearing up of our Roman street was a silent process – and then after the hole was filled in, how long to get the street repaired? And for years you would see that patch where the hole was. Here, in Rome, just another little task that they do. And don’t forget the 3-hour break in the middle of the day for lunch.

We immediately noticed that the streets in Florence are different. They are paved with large slabs of stone, some square, some rectangular. They are all different sizes, but the smallest are about one foot square. Most of them have regular gouges, as though lions used them for scratching posts. The surfaces themselves are uneven. Because of the uneven surfaces, walking in the street is even more dangerous than dodging cars and scooters. The slabs tend to be slippery when wet, and even when dry, footing can be difficult.

The Crystal Ship

We live in a California home built in 1948 – not exactly a tract house, but a typical post-war home with three bedrooms, one bath, wooden sash windows and 7 ½ foot ceilings.

Our home away from home, our apartment in Rome, was in a 16^th century building with walls 2 feet thick, shuttered windows, and a rooftop patio. I stopped Donald one morning as we exited the door to the street, to take a photo of him closing the front door: green double doors with brass doorknobs in the center of each.

That night, when I reviewed my photos of the day, I was surprised to see that next door there was an antique store. We had arrived after a 20 hour transatlantic flight, exhausted and bleary. The next two days, we had been intent on our plans for the day. We had not noticed the antique store.

So, on day four in our apartment, I purposely stopped to look in the window of our neighboring antique shop. Hanging prominently in the window over an Italian inlay desk, illuminating baroque frames and silver candlestick holders, was the chandelier of my dreams: a chandelier in the shape of a ship.

This spectacular piece reminded me of the Santa Maria, the flagship of Columbus’ fleet, with three masts, a long bowsprit pointing off the prow, and an aftcastle rising high in the back. It was a chandelier designed to inspire the imagination. I looked up the Santa Maria on the internet that night and it matches the chandelier– it is a carrack, the ship that first sailed to the New World. The first ship to circumnavigate the globe in Magellan’s fleet was also a carrack. The carrack was the ship of the Age of Exploration, the ship that changed history, and this chandelier had the potential to change my life.

It was about 3 feet wide, not counting the bowsprit, and hung at least four feet from ceiling to keel. It was massive, and it was amazing.

Our imaginations were on fire. We named it “The Crystal Ship”, and began to imagine bringing it though customs. How much must it weigh? It would never fit in the luggage compartment of the jet. It would have to be shipped to California. And then, a little math. With 7 ½ foot ceilings, a four foot high chandelier would actually be sitting on the dining room table. Is the table even 3 feet wide? We would have to hang the Crystal Ship so that it sailed the length of our table. If we put all the leaves in the table, maybe we would be able to serve 4 to 6 people, clustered in two groups at each end of the table. We would dine in the dazzling light of the Crystal Ship.

But then there was the question: how much would such a fabulous crystal ship chandelier cost?

We didn’t want to know.

Every day we stopped at the window and contemplated life with the crystal ship. We never entered the shop, and never asked the price. We are changed, though. The Crystal Ship will be waiting for us in Rome, calling us back. It is like the Trevi Fountain – because we have seen the Crystal Ship, we know that we will have to return, some day, to see it one more time, and imagine.