My Perugia Travel Diary continue… June 19, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Aquarium, Art Gallery, Asia, China, Coliseum, Denmark, Destination, Dolphinarium, Egypt, England, Europe, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Greenland, Gymnasium, Iceland, Istanbul, Italy, Library, Memorial, Morocco, Museum, Norway, Oceanarium, Paris, Planetarium, Poland, Restaurant, Round The World, The Nile , add a commentMass cremation pits containing ashes and charred bones indicate that he feared a plague, but Carthaginian skeletons with all their teeth have been disinterred as well as the tombs, yielding cataphracts as well as bones, of thirty Carthaginian nobles.
Spello, the most appealing of the Umbrian hill towns, is still enclosed by Roman walls with five gates, the main one bearing the legend “Splendidissima Colonic Julia Hispellum” over the arch. According to Spellan tradition, a phallus carved in the inner wall of the Porta Urbica does not celebrate Orlando’s (Roland’s) amatory prowess but the range and perfect arc of his actus mingendi. Spello is noted for its restaurants and truffled cooking, its steep, winding, and narrow streets—all one-way only—its Roman towers and amphitheater. A Vocabolaro del Dialetto Spellano, compiled by NicolettaUgoccioni and published here last year, contains, at a thumb-through guess, 20,000 words in current usage—by a population of only 6,800. (more…)
Holyroodhouse: The most romantic of all the palaces in the British Isles May 25, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Denmark, England, France, Hotels, Netherlands, Scotland , add a commentIf you walk down between the soaring grey skyscrapers of old Canongate from west to east, you come in the end to the Palace of Holyroodhouse, which lies half in Edinburgh and half in the bald grey wilderness that rises to Arthur’s Seat. It is architecturally perhaps not very exciting to most people, though it is an interesting and an elegant building, but its associations with Mary, Queen of Scots, with the Young Pretender, and with Charles X in his penniless exile, make it by far the most romantic of the British royal palaces. There are several legends about its founding, and historically the most probable is the following: St Margaret, the second Queen of Malcolm Canmore and the sister of Edgar Atheling, brought with her to Scotland in 1068, a gold casket in the shape of a cross, covered by an ebony carving of the Saviour and containing a sizable piece of the True Cross. (more…)
Queluz: A rose pink palace in the French eighteenth-century style May 8, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Accommodation, Air Tickets, Bank Note, Beach Resorts, Brazil, Denmark, England, Europe, Flight Schedule, Hotels, Italy, Library, Lisbon, London, Memorial, Museum, Portugal, Restaurant, Spain, Sweden, Travellers Cheque , add a commentThe palace of QUELUZ, near Lisbon, is elegantly rustic in a way that is very characteristic of Portuguese life and manners. It has a seductive grace, for its muted beauty grows on the beholder gradually, until at length the splendours of a more conventionally royal building seem almost vulgar in comparison.
The rose-pink colour-washed facade is cunningly designed with two low semi-circular wings springing out from a small central block. The southern side ends in a black onion dome above the chapel, and goes on at right angles in a series of dependent buildings of different sizes. The northern wing now contains a luxury restaurant in the original kitchens of the palace. (more…)
The Royal Palace STOCKHOLM: One of the finest examples of French taste outside France Part 1 April 26, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Accommodation, Beach Resorts, Denmark, Europe, Finland, Russia, Sweden , add a commentThe Swedes must have felt they were well on the way to becoming a great Continental power at the end of the seventeenth century. Already, during the Thirty Years’ War, Sweden’s small but well-trained armies had distinguished themselves in central Europe under the leadership of their king, the dynamic Gustavus Adolfus. A quarter of a century later, Gustavus X had beaten the Danes by yet another stroke of brilliant generalship. This defeat did not finally settle the long drawn-out quarrel between the two countries, but it forced Denmark to give up the fertile southern part of the Swedish peninsula. (more…)
The Amalienborg: A group of four lovely palaces around an octagonal piazza continue… April 24, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Accommodation, Beach Resorts, Denmark, Paris , add a commentIt was not until after the final front elevation for the palaces was ready that the sites were presented by the King in 1750 to four noblemen, but on the condition that the facades of the palaces should correspond exactly to Eigtved’s design, while the gentlemen were left free with regard to the interior. The four chosen persons were: Geheimeraad Joachim von Brockdorff, General Greve C. F. von Levetzau, Baron Severin Leopold Løvenskiold and Overhofmarskal Greve Adam Gottlob Moltke.
A. G. Moltke was the one among these four best qualified in every way as the owner of a house in building. Besides being very rich, he was one of the King’s closest friends and, in addition, unquestionably one of the most influential men in the country. He was, moreover, a man of wide culture and is rightly regarded as having been one of Denmark’s greatest personalities in the eighteenth century. His interest in art of every kind was intense, and he was actively engaged in the encouragement of art, for instance in his office of President of the Academy of Art. (more…)
Kronborg: Hamlet’s pinacled castle at Elsinore on the Baltic shore continue… April 23, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Air Tickets, Beach Resorts, Denmark, Flight Schedule, Italy, Lodges, Memorial, Museum, Netherlands, Sweden , add a commentThe distinctly military purpose of Kronborg, already mentioned, is undoubtedly the reason why Kronborg in its architecture is so different from other more or less contemporary Danish buildings, whose style, like Kronborg’s, must be characterised by the very broad term ‘ Scandinavian renaissance style ‘. This, at least where Denmark is concerned, is a style in which decoration plays far the most important part, whereas the plan is still rather medieval, despite certain efforts to pay attention to symmetry. The decoration has generally been inspired by, if not directly copied from, Flemish and German copperplate engravings, and besides, many of the stone-masons working in Denmark at the time had been brought from the Netherlands. (more…)
Kronborg: Hamlet’s pinacled castle at Elsinore on the Baltic shore April 23, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Accommodation, Air Tickets, Airlines, Beach Resorts, Denmark, Hostels, Hotels, Lodges, Memorial, Museum, Sweden, Travel Insurance, Travellers Cheque , add a commentKronborg is situated outside Elsinore, on the coast, forty kilometres north of Copenhagen, and on the promontory farthest to the north-east of Zealand. Although close to Elsinore, Kronborg is not really, and never has been, that town’s citadel. Even more than is the case today, Kronborg in former times stood apart from Elsinore. In those days, as the old pictures show, the open stretch between the castle and the town was still broader, and the great fortifications then as now surrounded the castle only, while the town remained defenceless.
Kronborg stands at the narrowest part of the Sound between Denmark and Sweden. On the journey by sea from the north towards Copenhagen the towers of the castle are the first thing to come into view. In former times this sight certainly more often than not gave cause for mixed feelings, especially to captains of foreign merchant vessels. For, from 1425 until 1857, the ships had to cast anchor at Kronborg and there pay a toll for passage through the Sound, both sides of which until I 66o were Danish territory. As this toll yielded a large revenue, which went direct to the King’s own privy purse, the Danish kings bestowed great care on Kronborg, which by virtue of its guns was expected to ensure payment of the toll. (more…)
