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Tuesday 9 October 2012

TRAVEL: Lazio, ITALY

Poussin's Rape of the Sabines

Palazzo Parisi in the Sabine Hills
 - an antique land with Roman remains



The Palazzo Parisi was once a Roman fort and still has its dungeons. The family house of Arabella Lennox-Boyd [see my Gresgarth Hall blog entry of May 2, 2012 ]. Praised by Virgil, Sabine olive oil, as produced here, is excellent!

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Sant'Ivo alla Sapienza by Borromini once opened
 on Sunday morning - now only on a Wednesday
 so I was unable to revisit its amazing interior 
       
      Crochet ears covers to keep flies away
 
The Convent of Trinità dei Monti at the top of the Spanish Steps, founded in the late 15th century by the French Minimes.  In 1798, when as a result of the French Revolution, the convent was devastated and became studios of the French Academy - Villa Medici - where Ingres lived and worked.  In 1828, the Pope intervened and the Sacré-Coeur order opened a school.  The Trompe L'Oeil room of ruins [see my Curiosity blog entry of July 16, 2012] is firmly closed for restorations to take place.  





Happily there are charming wall paintings of the walls of the Refectory - paint on the walls
NOT frescoes [which are wet and absorbed by the plaster] the former are more difficult to restore.





BUT the great surprise is a corridor which is an enchanting 16th Century sun dial, more correctly, a Catoptric dia by Pierre Maignan.    

            
   ...and another corridor of strange anamorphic perspective
     



The highest hill of Rome, known as Mons Vaticanus, now called Monte Mario - The disease has spread!
[see Pont de l’Archevêché my Paris Part II blog entry of January 26, 2012] - t

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