17 July 2016

Day in Bergamo

Saturday before yesterday we went to a baptism and met Carlo Mongiovi, who was my companion in Bergamo 50 years ago.  Yesterday, our p-day, we drove the hour north-east to Bergamo.  I recognized some of the landmarks in the "new" parts of the city of about 115,223 population. The alps start just north of town, where there is the famous water bottler San Pelegrino, sold all over the world. We easily found a parking garage and walked a few blocks to the funicolare, which is a little tram that goes up steep hills.  We rode up to the Cità Alta (high city).  We walked further up a few blocks to the piazza near the duomo and town hall. Everywhere you go in Italy you walk a lot, and some of the streets are steep, although they sometimes have stairs, and were definitely not built for cars.

This the old city square, with a biker filling his water jug from the fountain.  All of the water in Italy is potable, unless there is a sign that says it isn't.  However, Italians still buy a lot of bottled water, and it is cheap, like less than 20 US cents for 1.5 liters, and they always sell it "naturale" and "frizzante", the latter being fizzy with carbonation, either natural or artificial.  Notice the winged lion of St Mark in the upper left in the pix. It is the symbol of Venice, because Venice ruled this part of Italy a long time ago.

This is the city hall with its bell tower.  Italians love bells and they always chime on the hour and half, and sometimes 15 minutes, and church bells ring for everything, including masses, weddings, funerals, etc.

The first thing we saw on the other side past the town hall is the ancient 8 sided baptistry, obviously built for immersion baptisms.  To the left in this picture is a very large basillica, which is a type of church, and to the left of the basillica is the city's duomo.  Yes, two very large churches side by side, with the duomo being newer (1500s) and smaller than the basillica.


Myrna by one of two red marble lions near the door to the basillica.  The steps in the back of this picture lead to the duomo, bishop's church, or cathedral.  The two churches are, s you can see, very close to each other, but were built at different times.

I tried to sit on his rump, not an original idea as you can tell from the butt-polished red marble, but I slid off easily.

Inside the larger basillica I immediately headed for the organ.  It is a very large organ, and you can see the pipes behind on either side of the high altar, which was not in use.

As soon as we entered the basillica we could hear, very well amplified, the mass going on in a side chapel.  It was the Saturday 11 am mass, and about 6 people were in attendance.  On Sundays and holidays they use the high altar between the two sets of organ pipes, and use the organ.  There were also tourists milling around the basillica, like we were, oblivious to the mass being said.

This is the spot from which I took the picture of the priest in the picture above, I just came in close with my telephoto lens as to not bother the worshipers, You can see how large the church is by looking up.

If you go to the middle of the church and look up you see the ceiling, the inside of the dome. We have been in a lot of churches in Italy, thus far, but Myrna remarked this the most ornate we have been in so far.

On one of the side walls there is a fresco of the Last Supper, painted about 200 years before Leonardo was born and painted his most famous picture of it.  I know the date this one was painted because of a sign, in Latin, by the frescos:.

The date is MCCCXLVII, or 1347, if my Roman numeral reading is correct in this Latin sign.  Reading Roman numerals comes in handy in Italy as they still use them a lot.

There are also a lot of tapestries on the walls in this basillica.  They were made in Italy, although the most famous tapestries were made during middle ages in Belgium.  In the middle of the pix is a large wooden music stand, the music was hand written large enough for the singers to read, since they weren't printing it in those days.

There were some of the most ornate confessionals I have ever seen, of carved wood, with a tapestry behind.

I zoomed in on this depiction, above the confessional, of the circumcision of Jesus.  Notice the size of the knife and expression on Jesus' face.  No wonder Italians don't circumcise.

There was this nice Adam and Even with the snake, in which they are more clothed than usual; maybe they didn't read the part about fig leaves. The fig tree in the public park by where we live has figs, and I test them frequently, so I can pick some when they are ripe.

And this crucifix with a Jesus, obviously from the middle ages.

In the middle is the same crucifix as above, but you can see it in context, with the two sets of organs (actually two separate organs co-joined by the fairly new console) on the sides. Below this is the "high" altar, used for more important masses. Now we leave the Basillica and go to the duomo next door.  This is the area where the high altar is in that impressive church.

The canopy signifies that the bishop sits under it when he is enthroned.  There are two preaching pulpits in this church, accessible by the stairs.  This is a Baroque era church, with large impressive paintings, and no fresco work.

In front of the old high altar (where the priest's back is to the congregation, as it was in the bascillica when he was saying mass) is this more modern altar with some saints bones in the silver bone box under the altar.

And within a side altar (notice the marble work in the floor) was a cute very small pipe organ, where in many churhes is an old pump organ.  Obviously these Bergamosci are pretty sophisticated, or rich to have a little pipe organ to give pitch to the signing.

This is the relatively modern looking basement under the duomo, where some bishops are buried.

There was this sign, in the duomo, listing all of the bishops of this church, starting with S. Narno, from the 3rd century, with the second, Saint Viatore who served from 343 to 344, with a few gaps here and then. We have seen these signs in many duomos in Italy.

Back outside this is the front of the basillica with its two doors, but to one church.

And with all of this old stuff on the walls was a new sign, in glass not to hide the old work,  that says, loosely translated, "where ever there are Christians one must find an oasis of mercy in the desert of indifference" by the current pope, Francis.  We then went to a museum, literally under the new duomo.  It was made only about 25 years ago after they had excavated the old Roman ruins below the duomo.  They had used some of the old Roman stones to build these new churches, and other things in the city.

The signs were in Italian and English below.

An old Roman burial box.

An old Roman high heeled shoe, although they also wore sandals.

Fertility gods from before the time of Christ

Rings and a blade of a sword

Spurs, look sort of like the kind dad wore, not much has changed in 2000 years in the spur world.

Pottery, glassware and coins, all found down under the duomo during excavation.

The old Roman floors were pretty fancy too.

The streets in Cità Alta are all pretty narrow, although there were a few cars and everyone had to get out of the way when they came down the streets.
 

There are uniformed policemen, and they are friendly and helpful, for the most part.

We walked past an open door to the backside of a basement bakery, and saw a baker.  You can see a large mixer in operation and many sacks of flour and ingredients for the many kinds of bread and pastries he was making, in front of him. It was pretty hot down there, which is probably why the door was open.


But we also walked past scenes like this, between old homes with beautiful, peaceful garden areas.

We went in several more churches.  In this one they were having a festa for a saint and there were quite a few people milling around.  They normally don't have the blue curtain, only on her day.

Near one of the exits of the old walled city was another clock and bell tower.  This was near the ancient university.

Going out the gate you can see the old walls of the city below.

On our way back to the funiculare we were hungry, so we stopped by a shop that sold french fries (only french fries), which were hand cut and fried and sold in a cone and eaten with a wooden spear. They put different sauces on the top, and were the best we have have, so far, in Italy.


But after a few more blocks  of walking we were still a little hungry, and decided we needed to eat polenta (corn meal mush) in the city famous for it. So we stopped by a little shop and had one bowl, which we split.  Myrna was not too excited.  Actually they put the polenta in the bottom of the bowl and some pasta sugo (not chili beans, which would have been good), on top. Myrna commented it wasn't as bad as she feared.  We sat next to a random couple (him in the back of both pix).

They were also eating polenta.  She noticed Myrna's name tag and addressed her as Sorella (Sister) Hoopes and said she is also a sorella, then said she has been a member of the church for 20 years and the man was being baptized that very evening.  So we had a pleasant polenta experience with them. She said they now have two large wards and a branch in Bergamo, where 50 years ago, we only had one grandma, Nonna. In fact, this woman even knew who Nonna was, and that she had died about the time she was baptized.  Small world!

We rode down the funicular, and you can sort of see the sprawling new city through the glass.  We left Bergamo and went to a very large shopping mall. I bought a new white shirt and Myrna bought a blouse.

It was another wonderful day in sunny Italy, and it wasn't even too hot.