Cahokia Mounds, the Late Woodland Culture September 28, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Air Tickets, Cars, Europe, Museum, Rail Pass, Sightseeing, Tickets, Tour, USA , 2commentsThis 2,200-A0 (890HA) site is situated just to the east of St Louis, in southern Illinois, close to Collinsville (not, confusingly, near the town of Cahokia). It is the remains of a large city and ritual complex which was first occupied around AD 700, developed, flowered, declined and was abandoned by AD 1500. At its peak it covered some six square miles (1,550ha) and had a population of about 20,000. It was certainly the largest community in prehistoric times in what is now the USA, and its influence extended for great distances. (more…)
One day in Germany Speyer Cathedral, World Famous Heritage September 10, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Air Tickets, Belgium, Europe, Germany, Hotels, Netherlands, Rail Pass, Scotland, Sightseeing, Switzerland, Tickets, Tour , 3commentsSituated in Rhineland-Palatinate, this extensively rebuilt Romanesque structure is the largest cathedral in Germany. Although it dates from the eleventh century, the origins of the site are much older.
To the Celts it was known as Noviomagus, and the Romans called it Civitas Nemetum. The cathedral has evolved on a former pagan holy place, for the site was occupied by a Roman temple dedicated to the Celtic goddess Nantosvelta. It is even thought `probable that buildings from the Roman period were converted to construct the church’.’ It is likely that the site was considered sacred ‘even before the Roman temple was built’ . (more…)
The EXhilaration Adventure, real Hiking Mountain Trail, Kebnekaise Mountain Station continue… July 18, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Air Tickets, Beach Resorts, Cars, Flight Schedule, Hostels, Hotels, Lodges, Motel, Restaurant, Sweden, Switzerland, Wellington , 2commentsIt was soon clear that the man had no idea what he was doing. He shouldn’t have been in the mountains. I asked him where his gear was. “Over there,” he said, pointing to the corner of the room. There was a tiny rucksack, a summer sleeping bag and a pair of Wellington boots. “Is that all?” I asked.
“Shit man, I didn‘t expect this. I came straight down the path from Abisko. It was beautiful the first two days. Which way did you come?”
“Over the mountains through Lapporten.”
“What was it like up there?”
“Cold and too much snow.”
“Where are you going?” (more…)
Passing on Victoria Water Falls, Shooting the Zambezi, Escape into Africa July 10, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Botswana, Hotels, Lodges, Passport, South Africa, Tour, USA, United Kingdom, Victoria Falls, Zambia , 4commentsA white line still bisected the bridge, but its meaning had gone and the menace with it. Now the only sentry was a baboon sitting on a fence barking at a warthog on the other side of the road.
Early morning, sun up but cool, just two of us on the bridge at Victoria Falls, between Zimbabwe and Zambia. We looked down at the pale green Zambesi 300 feet below. Cecil Rhodes had wanted the bridge built close enough to the Falls to catch the spray. Usually it does. However, this was September and the “Falls” in front of us were just a curtain of rock. The rains had been good; not good enough, though, to make up for years of drought.
Only on the Zimbabwean side did the river reach over and plunge in. Its noise was like distant motorway traffic.
We were about to go down the river on a rubber raft. We were to start at the bottom of the Falls and travel six miles down the Zambesi through zigzagging gorges . . . and over nine rapids. Why on earth had we agreed to it? Sarah didn’t even like putting her head under water in the bath. As for me, the wake of a passing launch under a scull on the Thames was the nearest I’d ever got to white water. (more…)
Ambitious attempt: CASERTA June 15, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Europe, Spain, USA , add a commentThe royal palace of Caserta, which lies about 15 miles north of Naples, probably represents the most ambitious attempt to rival Versailles. Appropriately enough it was begun by one of Louis XIV’s great-grandsons, Charles III, who founded the Neapolitan Bourbon dynasty. Born in 1716, Charles was the son of Philip V of Spain and his second wife Elizabeth Farnese. Since he was not in the direct line of succession to the Spanish throne, his ambitious mother contrived to have him made Duke of Parma and Piacenza in 1731. Three years later, during the confusion brought by the War of Polish Succession, she dispatched a Spanish army to appropriate the kingdom of Naples for her son. (more…)
Blenheim Palace June 6, 2008
Posted by dodo in : France, London, Museum, USA , add a commentBlenheim Palace was given by the British nation to John Churchill, first Duke of Marlborough, in recognition of his great victories over the armies of Louis XIV. Of these, the Battle of Blenheim on the Upper Danube, where he collaborated with Prince Eugene, was the first and most brilliant. In recent times, Blenheim has acquired added lustre from its association with Sir Winston Churchill, who was born there on November 30, 1874. The historical significance of Blenheim is matched by its architectural interest, for the palace represents the culmination of English Baroque, a style whose real value has only recently been recognised. (more…)
Splendour Versailles June 6, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Italy, Lodges, Paris, USA , add a commentIn size and splendour Versailles has few peers in the history of Western palace building. In fact, the Roman Palatine itself is perhaps the only building complex that can rival the grandeur and historical influence of this palace. And like the Palatine, Versailles has undergone many changes, though fortunately far less actual destruction, even during the French Revolution.
Versailles was the creation of the Sun King, Louis XIV, who reigned for nearly three-quarters of a century from 1643 to 17154 And because practical requirements, new currents of taste and political upsets have led to many changes, a fair degree of imagination is needed to visualise the palace at the height of its glory. And Versailles repays the effort handsomely. (more…)
River Thames bank: Historic royal palace of Hampton Court June 1, 2008
Posted by dodo in : England, Europe, Jerusalem, London, Museum, Spain , 4commentsThe historic royal palace of Hampton Court stands on the north bank of the River Thames about 11 miles west of Charing Cross in London. This large complex is in fact two palaces in one, for as one moves eastwards from the west front the Tudor wings built in the time of Henry VIII yield to later work designed by Sir Christopher Wren for William and Mary. These two halves represent two distinct and important periods in the history of English architecture—the late medieval Perpendicular style tinged with Renaissance elements and the English Baroque affected by French and Italian influence. Yet overall unity is preserved by the use of warm-toned brickwork and the more-or-less symmetrical balancing of successive low wings. (more…)
The Doge’s Palace May 30, 2008
Posted by dodo in : France , 4commentsBetween the great church of St Mark’s and a broad quay looking out over the lagoon stands the Doge’s Palace, the most impressive secular building in Venice. Until the fall of the Venetian Republic in 1797, the palace combined the functions of senate house, administrative centre, residence of the chief of state, hall of justice, public archive and prison. Devastated by five major fires in the course of its history, the Doge’s Palace has always been sumptuously rebuilt. Today the palace stands as a visible symbol of the glory and power of the Venetian state.
The city of Venice came into existence as a place of asylum for refugees from the Upper Adriatic towns devastated by the barbarian armies that swept across the disintegrating Roman Empire. First came the Huns, then the Ostrogoths, though the coalescence of the tiny Venetian state seems to date from after the Lombard invasion in 568. At first the settlers were dispersed over the islands of the lagoon, with their principal focus at Malmocco on the Lido. But during the eighth century, the appearance of a new menace—the Franks caused the removal of the administration to the inaccessible island of Rialto in the centre of the muddy lagoon. (more…)
The Pitti Palace May 28, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Italy, Luxembourg, Museum, Paris , add a commentFor about three hundred years the Pitti Palace in Florence was the chief residence of the Grand Dukes of Tuscany, first the Medici family, then their successors of the House of Lorraine. When Tuscany became part of the new kingdom of Italy in 1860, ownership of the palace was acquired by the ruling House of Savoy, and it was used by King Victor Emmanuel II as his official residence during the brief period (1865-71) when Florence was the capital of Italy. The buildings and grounds now belong to the state and are fully open to the public.
As the name suggests, the palace was not originally a Medici residence. The nucleus of the present complex was built during the 15th century by Luca Pitti, the principal lieutenant of Cosimo de‘ Medici, the ruler in all but name of republican Florence. While we can follow the stages of Luca’s political career in some detail from contemporary records and diaries, his true character is hard to assess. (more…)
Windsor Castle: A fortress gradually converted into the residence of Kings May 24, 2008
Posted by dodo in : France, London , add a commentWindsor Castle is a unique combination of a fortress, royal palace, a tomb of kings and queens and a glorious church in which the ideals of Christian chivalry are cherished and kept alive. This diversification of purpose is a fortuitous development, for it was as a stronghold to secure the western approaches to London that the Normans first chose this commanding site on a chalk outcrop above the Thames. The precise date of the construction of the first fortifications is not known, but Windsor Castle is mentioned in the Domesday Book of 1086 when it probably consisted of no more than the central keep, an artificial chalk mound fifty feet high surmounted by a wooden blockhouse. There were doubtless outlying palisades which would give adequate protection in an assault until the garrison could be mustered in the keep, where a deep well (still to be seen under the floor of a room in the Round Tower) would enable the defenders to withstand a siege. (more…)
The Wawel Castle Carcow: The centre of splendid historical and cultural tradition April 22, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Europe, Hungary, Italy, Poland , add a commentThe Vistula, the main Artery of Poland, has two moments of glory in its long meandering course, when it flows through the country’s two capitals : through Cracow, the old capital, and then, flowing on northward in a great curve, through Warsaw, the present-day capital, two hundred miles away as the crow flies. In Cracow, the waters of the Vistula move slowly past the foot of the Wawel, the great rocky hill that overlooks the city and surrounding countryside, and from which rise the majestic walls of the fortifications, the proud outline of the cathedral with its soaring bell-tower and the massive form, lightened by its large windows, of the royal castle, where the kings of Poland used to live.
Cracovia totius Poloniae urbs celeberrima (` Cracow the most famous city of all Poland ‘) was the description of a chronicler. And it is still true, for the old capital has had an eventful history, in which the Wawel castle has frequently had a vital part to play. As a fortified hill, the Wawel itself had occupied a position of the first importance from the very earliest times. Towards the end of the first millenium, during the formation of the Polish state (whose first capital was not, however, Cracow), the dwelling-place of the local prince was built on the Wawel, first in wood and later, during the tenth and eleventh centuries, in masonry. (more…)
Egypt Temple of Karnak April 17, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Air Tickets, Cairo, Credit Card, Egypt , 5commentsIn fact, Karnak is not a temple; it is a complex of temples. Today’s visitor arrives there easily from Luxor, only a couple of miles away. We have already referred to Luxor as the modern town that grew up where Thebes was; in reality the true ancient center, the heart of the New Kingdom’s political and religious life, must have been Karnak. The first impression one has when crossing the threshold of the first pylon (there are many pylons at Karnak), and finding himself amid the ruins of what was the greatest ancient Egyptian sanctuary, is that he will not be able to make any sense out of it. Even the Giza pyramids, although mysterious looking, have an internal logic; they are closed up in themselves and one intuitively experiences them, even when we don’t understand them. Karnak does not offer this possibility. Walking along the courtyards, rooms, columns, obelisks, statues, and miles of hieroglyphic inscriptions, the visitor soon loses any capacity to link one element or monument with another. Therefore one must return to Karnak again and again. Even then, as we have warned, he must avoid searching among the monuments with aesthetic or rational criteria — in short, modern, Western standards. And we have also said that the true temple of Amon was always the sanctuary that formed the central nucleus. All the various additions made over the course of centuries have their own value per se; they are separate nuclei whose presence is independently justified by ceremonial needs, by new ideological lines, or by new links between the various divinities. (more…)
Other Nineteenth Dynasty Temples April 11, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Cairo, Egypt, Memorial, The Nile , add a commentIn discussing the great cult and ceremonial temples of the Eighteenth Dynasty, we did not explore the mortuary temples of the kings because they have been so poorly preserved. Their outer stones were taken off to be used for new constructions, and their inner cores became submerged by the flood waters and later covered over by cultivated fields. Their poor condition was probably also due to the fact that the further away, in time from the death of the king to whom these temples were dedicated, the more the cult tended to languish and then completely die. No pharaoh would be particularly interested in restoring the mortuary temple of one of his predecessors, and even less so in using the structures again, so that we have few remains of the Eighteenth Dynasty mortuary temples. However, it is known that the plan of these temples, in general, was not much different from that of Hatshepsut’s temple at Deir el-Bahri ; that is, it had terraces and arcaded courtyards. (more…)
The Monuments in the Shadows continue… April 5, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Cairo, Egypt, Embassy, Europe, The Nile , add a commentWe begin to encounter many Western sources in the fifteenth and, particularly, the sixteenth centuries, when the pilgrims were joined by merchants. The frontiers of the Orient were opened to European merchants at the beginning of the sixteenth century, and the first European ambassadors began to install themselves in Egypt on a permanent basis. This was accompanied by an increase in the number of publications with accounts of journeys to eastern lands, and the taste for the foreign spread among cultivated Europeans. A visit to the pyramids was an adventure that might be dangerous, as there was the risk of being attacked by Bedouins. Despite this, many Europeans went there and then published accounts of their experiences. Among other things, we owe to these hardy adventurers the report of one of the first cases of “tourist exploitation,” on the part of the inhabitants of Giza. Although the Great Pyramid had been open for some time, the natives regularly blocked the entrance after every visit, in order to be able to “open” it up again for the next visitors and thus get a tip. At the end of the sixteenth century, Sakkara was added to the itinerary; the visitors liked to enter the mastabas and unearth the mummies in order to open them up and look for jewels. (more…)
The Dawn of Moden Archaeology in Egypt continue… April 5, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Egypt, Embassy, Europe, France, Museum, Paris, USA , add a commentEven the Rosetta Stone did not automatically solve the problem. Scholars assumed correctly that the three forms of writing contained the same text, but this was not enough to decipher the Egyptian language in detail. It was here that the figure of Champollion emerged in all his greatness.
Born in France in 1790, Champollion, even as a child, dreamt of deciphering the hieroglyphic signs. He began to study assiduously in order to learn all he could about ancient Egypt and Coptic Egypt. By the time he was twenty-one, Champollion was already a professor at the University of Grenoble and when copies of the Rosetta Stone inscriptions appeared in France, he was among the many scholars who examined them. Although various other European scholars made contributions — particularly the English physician, Thomas Young — it was Champollion who persisted, and after years of indefatigable work, he was able in 1822 to announce the decipherment of the tablet as well as a system for reading hieroglyphic script. (more…)
The Renaissance April 4, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Accommodation, Dominican Republic, England, France, Italy , add a commentThe 14th century saw a new spirit of intellectual inquiry, which was democratized by the invention of printing and radicalized by the Reformation in religion and a Renaissance, first in literature and, afterwards, in architecture. In England the new wealth of the laity led to the development of domestic architecture, which was encouraged by Henry dissolution of the monasteries. In Italy, the seat of Roman antiquity, the scholarship of Dante Alighieri (1265-1321), Petrarch (1304-74) and Boccaccio (1313-75) was celebrated by a national interest in classic literature, which paved the way for a revolt against medieval art.
The fall of Constantinople to the Turks in 1453 led to an influx of Greek scholars to Italy, especially to Florence, a city of great military and political power. Florence had conquered Pisa in 1406 to gain a valuable seaport, and had gone on to take Milan and Lucca, becoming a powerful republic, the centre of European Renaissance art and a place of religious intrigue, from where the pious and indefatigable Dominican friar Savonarola (1452-98) simultaneously challenged the papal authority of Alexander VI and the tyranny of the powerful Medicis. Rome meanwhile awoke from the poverty of medieval feudalism to welcome the return of the popes from Avignon. Nicholas V (144755), Julius II (1503 - 13) and LeoX (151322) became great patrons of the arts. (more…)
Ancient Greece, the Link Between Greece and Egypt March 28, 2008
Posted by flyman in : Africa, Cairo, Egypt, Italy , 1 comment so farThe links between Greece and Egypt developed first through Grecian military interventions during the 26th Dynasty (664-525Bc) to rescue Egypt from the Assyrian yoke, and second by trade. Greek craftsmen and artists helped to restore, albeit for a relatively short time, the architectural characteristics of the Old Kingdom, until, in 525Bc, Egypt fell under Persian rule for the first of two occasions during which a succession of pharaohs failed to establish the type of cultural, religious and political stability that enabled the great building works of earlier Dynasties to be undertaken. The last native pharaoh was Nectanebus II, but Egypt was effectively under Persian control until the arrival in 332Bc of Alexander the Great, whose capital Alexandria became the intellectual heart of Greek scholars and artists. From the stepping stone of Crete in the Mediterranean to the Aegean Sea builders, artists, architects and craftsmen travelled by sea or through Asia Minor and Troy to play a part in one of the most important turning points in architecture.
Although the Greeks followed their predecessors in Egypt, Mesopotamia and Anatolia in establishing their principal architectural works in the service of religion, the revolutionary aspect was rooted in the belief that beauty must be considered as a subject in its own right and that the philosophical search for all things beautiful will naturally lead to the perfect temple. However, the Greeks, like many other early civilizations, were subject to invasions, warring and catastrophes before they settled to build the great monuments that mark the Hellenic and Hellenistic periods (650-30Bc). (more…)
