Transcript Diapositiva 1

A BRIEF GUIDE TO SORRENTO
Sorrento is located on a tuff coast and is reflected in the Gulf of Naples, fascinating tourists and visitors, attracted by
breathtaking views and landscapes. The town gives its name to the Sorrento Peninsula, a great area extended from Vico
Equense to Massa Lubrense. This area, thanks to its geographical shape, suspended between the green hills and the blue
of the seas, is from the time immemorial a great attraction of the southern Italy. The Sorrento coast is one of the most
popular destinations of the entire Campania region. It is also the ideal destination for Italian visitors and foreign tourists,
that want to plan excursions to Capri, Ischia, Pompei, Amalfi, Positano, Ercolano, Paestum and Vesuvius, places located at
a distance of 50 Kilometres.
Sorrento was first a Phoenician colony , after that it became a port frequented by Greeks for the commercial activity with
Naples and with others southern cities. It was named by Greeks “Syrenusion” or “Syreon” that means Siren’s land. The
Sirens were the mythological creatures half woman and half fish, that Homer told in his famous work “Odyssey”. These
creatures with their song could fascinate the sailors. After the rule of Oscans and Sannites it was submitted by Romans.
The Romans appreciated so much the beauties of this place that during the imperial period it was elected an holiday
destination of patricians, as the numerous villas witness.
From time immemorial Sorrento has exercised a particular charm which has attracted poets and literary men like Goethe,
Lamartine, Stendhal, De Bouchard, Byron to D’Annunzio, Ibsen, Douglas, musicians like Rossini, Liszt, Mendelssohn,
Wagner, painters like Pinelli, Fernet, Lindstrom, photographers like De Luca and the brothers Alinari, directors like De
Sica, Gallone and Mastronardo. Among the famous visitors of Sorrento we can remember also Enrico Caruso, Giacomo
Casanova, Scipione Breislak, Marion Crawford, Charles Dickens, Helman Melvill, Friedtich Nietzche ed Axel Munthe.
This coasting town was included in the eighteenth- century among the main destinations of the Ground Tour, a journey
among the most significant Italian cities, that was made by the foreign intellectuals who wanted to study in depth the
Italian history, art and culture.
SORRENTO HIGHLIGHTS
The Basilica of Saint Antonino
The Cathedral
The Sedil Dominova
Correale Di Terranova Museum
ARTISTIC GOODS
Saint Francis’ cloister
LANDSCAPE
GOODS
NATURAL
GOODS
Marina Grande
Mineralogical Museum
ETHNOGRAPHICAL
GOODS
The Museum-Workshop
of Wood Intarsia
The Historic Centre
The Deep Valley Of Mills
ARCHAEOLOGICAL
GOODS
Sorrento cape
The Antique Walls
Georges Vallet Archaeological Museum
THE BASILICA OF SAINT ANTONINO
From Piazza Tasso, proceeding along De Maio Street, you arrive, in 5 minutes, at the
Basilica of Saint Antonino, set in the homonymous square.
The Basilica was erected in the XI century in the place where an antique oratory (IX
century), dedicated to Saint Antonino stood, there where rested the mortal remains of
the Saint that here found refuge during the Longobard invasion.
The Church is rich with elements of spoil, like the column shafts coming, most
probably, from the numerous Roman country homes present in the area.
On the right side of the Church you can admire a splendid portal of the XI century
with an architrave supported by Corinthian capitals of the Roman era.
On the inside of the Church jealously guarded are valuable paintings of Giovanni
Bernardo Lama and the representation of the siege of Sorrento in 1648, a splendid
painting by Giacomo Del Po in 1687.
Even the Vestry of the Church merits to be visited because it preserves two precious
treasures: the fragments of an antique and elaborated majorica pavement and a
beautiful Neapolitan Christmas crib of the XVII century, from the school of
Sammartino, with statues made by the most famous sculptors of the kind. The clothes
of the shepherds are made of precious fabrics enriched by valuable laces and cured in
the smallest details.
In a crypt - remade in 1753 -the tomb of Saint Antonino is arranged, patron of the
city of Sorrento.
Of remarkable interest is the collection of votive offerings present in the Church
donated particularly by seamen who have escaped shipwrecks.
In the lobby which precedes the Church, are preserved 2 cetacean ribs posted as
memento of the most famous miracle attributed to the patron Saint of Sorrento. It is
narrated, in fact, that a whale had swallowed a child and that the Saint liberated the
young boy drawing him safe and sound from the mouth of the whale.
As testimony of this wonderful miracle, the Sorrentines placed these two whale bones
at the entrance of the Basilica erected in honour of the Saint.
CATHEDRAL
In the cathedral of Sorrento couldn’t lack the examples of the local art, famous in all Italy:
the wood intarsia. The cathedral of the town overlooks the street Corso Italia and it’s
adorned with furnishings realized with ancient techniques of inlaid work. It was built at the
beginning of the fifteenth century with a romantic style and later it was restored several
times until the restoration of 1924 during which were rebuilt entirely its front. The church,
in addition to the baptistery where was baptized Torquato Tasso, maybe the most famous
citizen of the town, contains a great number of paintings of the Neapolitan School of the
eighteenth century and is characterized also by a grand campanile.
SEDIL DOMINOVA
It is refined monument, built around 1450 and perfectly
preserved, it is the ideal place where met the
representatives of the local nobles to discuss about matters
related to the political and administrative life of the city.
The only witness in all region Campania of the ancient
aristocratic meeting point is that one of Dominova with an
open loggia, surmounted by arches with a square base and
that is closed on the two sides by two balustrades and a
majolica tiled dome of the seventeenth century. Very
interesting are the frescos of the seventeenth century
which represent the architectonic perspectives. The inner
small lounge preserved the marble inscriptions that now
are at the museum Correale di Terranova in Sorrento. In
the area opposite Sedile Dominova once stayed a small
fountain. From this fountain was given to the square the
name “ Schizzariello” that means a small squirt of water.
CORREALE DI TERRANOVA MUSEUM
The Correale Museum is located on what was once land belonging to the
territory called Cape of Cervo or Xeres, given to Zottola Correale in 1428 by
Queen Joanna II of Angevin. The small building Correale built there was
restructured in 1700 and in the early 1900s, with Pompeo and Alfredo Correale
became a sort of cultural coterie. On their deaths the Correales donated both the
land and building, with all the works of art it contained, to the city of Sorrento.
The Correale is a Museum “Without kilometres of corridors in attendance,
mansize” said the late Franco Russoli. In fact, wandering through its twenty
rooms is like visiting an old patrician house with all its furnishings, its little
unknown master pieces from which it’s hard to detach oneself. What does this
small but precious jewel-case contain? On the ground floor is the archeological
section with Greek and Roman remins found on Sorrentine territory as well as
remains from the antique Cathedral of St. Renato. On the same floor is a room
dedicated to Tasso which holds his precious works along with the poets funeral
mask. On the two upper floors are precious pieces of 1700s furniture in
Neapolitan and Sicilian style porcelain by Doccia and Giustiniani, Venetian glass
and statuettes from 1750 by the Royal Capodimonte manufacture. The walls hold
works by major painters from the Neapolitan School of the 1600s and 1700s like
Luca Giordano, Salvator Rosa, Giacomo Del Po, De Mura, il Vaccaro as well as
the most prestigious names from the “School of Posillipo" such as Duclere,
Pitloo and Giacinto Gigante who with their water-colours alone merit a visit to
the museum as these are considered their finest works. Not to be missed is the
room dedicated to the old masters of Sorrentine marquetry like Damora and
Gargiulo. Another sight which is not to be missed is the view from the orange
grove which ends in a Belvedere overlooking the entire Gulf.
IL CHIOSTRO DI SAN FRANCESCO
A few metres from Piazza Sant'Antonino, where the Basilica dedicated to the patron saint of Sorrento stands, in Piazza
Francesco Saverio Gargiulo - in the vicinity of the Villa Comunale - rises a historic triptych set in a tuff wall known in Peninsula
as "conventual complex of San Francesco d'Assisi". The elements which characterize the triptych are: the Church, the Monastery
and the Cloister.The Church, which dates back to the XIV century, is a triumph of baroque style with rich stucco decorations. It
is a church cradle of precious "treasures of our memory" like a majestic wooden main door of the 1500's, two frescoes of '700
portraying Sant'Antonio of Padova and San Giacomo, returned to the light during restoration work in 1926, and a splendid
wooden statue of San Francesco with Christ Crucified. On the outside of the Church- in 1992 - a bronze statue representing San
Francesco has been placed, created by the sculptor Alfiero Nena. Near the Church a Monastery is erected, founded in the VII
century, given to the Franciscan monks in the XIV century, and a beautiful Cloister.
The Cloister is a perfect fusion of different architectural styles, on two sides of the porch we find crossed tuff arches, stylistic
expression of the late fourteenth century; instead, on the other two sides impressive round arches on octagonal pillars are
erected. The attentive eye can notice the presence of numerous elements of spoils coming from pagan temples, skillfully
integrated architecturally and used as corner pillars.
During the summer period, the Cloister is transformed and becomes the background for works of art exhibitions and of the
Sorrentine Musical Summer, an extraordinary continuation of appointments bound to music with the presence of artists coming
from all over the world. Rich with flowers, plants and ornamental trees, the Cloister is almost a place of tales, with its typical arch
structure and the melodious chirping of the birds that in the spring elect this spot as their favourite residence, seems to transport
visitors backwards in time, in an antique tale of the Arabian world.
Visit it on a splendid, sunny day. In the shade of the porches or under a tree, you can savour all the magic of a place enveloped in
silence, coloured by stupendous flowers made brilliant by the sunshine and rich in scents which mingle in the air.
MARINA GRANDE
You can reach this place trough a road that goes downhill, with large steps. This
road has origin from the end of the street “Sopra le Mura”. After few steps you
reach to the gate of Marina Grande which preserves, despite the successive
restorations, the typical Greek structure and it’s dated around the IV century
B.C. From this gate entered the Turkish pirates, sacked Sorrento in 1558. Going
beyond this gate you are behind a typical fishing village, represented by a fusion
between the Moorish architecture and the real local style. From this
combination arise architectonic forms, bizarre and picturesque like the houses,
built in the tuff cliff and that are still inhabited. Here arises also St. Anne’s
church, the patron saint of the village, was built at the end of the seventeenth century and
later extended. On this beach, in a shipyard under the open sky were built the famous
“Sorrento fishing boats”, a typical wood boat with a sail, these boats were long from 6 to
12 meters, easy to handle and reliable, unsinkable. The mastery skill of Sorrento artisans
was so great that the fishing boats were used by the fishermen of the Gulf of Naples and
of the islands. Heirs of this tradition are the fishing motor boat that are built still today in
Sorrento and its surroundings.
THE ANTIQUE WALLS
The historic centre of Sorrento, of Greek-osca origin, coincides ith the area
included in the 16th century walls (1551-1561) still visible today in many points.
The remains of the Greek walls, today, can still be admired in the "sopra le Mura"
(over the Walls) area; an antique pre-Roman door exists as well, a few metres
underneath the actual gate of "Parsano Nuovo" (New Parsano) continued to respect the urban plan
designed in the tuff by the Greeks, and in particular built the walls to strengthen the city using big
isodomic blocks as their predecessors had done.
During the Roman domination the city of Sorrento was completely surrounded by walls with 5 entrance
doors - two in the direction of the sea and three of the land - and a series of towers built to defend the
doors deduced as being the most vulnerable: "Porta di Marina Grande" (Large Coastline Door) and
"Porta Piazza Tasso" (Door of Tasso Square).
These walls, remained a protection of Sorrento during the whole medieval age.
The invasion of the Saracens, ferocious Turkish pirates, for centuries has upset the peace of the small
town. They arrived secretly and silently from the sea and raided the small settlements along the coast,
then went back up towards the centre of the small town to complete their work.
From the towers, strategically positioned along the walls, the sentinels would sound the alarm and the
people would leave their occupations and escape.
The ferocity of the Saracen invasions induced the Sorrentines to remake and strengthen the walls; the
works, started in 1551, were terminated 10 years later, in 1561.
Still today, through the remains of those powerful walls and of those towers wisely built, it is possible to
breath in the past, to perceive the efforts and the work done to build, rock upon rock, those walls with
the hope that the Saracens would not be able to cross them...
SORRENTO CAPE
This locality, halfway between Sorrento and
Massa Lubrense, reachable also by bus,
contains the Regina Giovanna Beaches and
the archaeological site of the villa of Pollio
Felice. To reach this area you have to go
along a narrow street, shaded by olive and
orange trees, with the walls covered by ivy,
which goes down along the ramp degrading
to the sea. The cliff is dedicated to the
queen Giovanna Durazzo d’Angiò, who ,
according to a legend, came to lower herself
into this sheet of sea. All the space behind
the top of the mountain is occupied by
remains of a great Roman villa, that
belonged maybe to the patrician Pollio
Felice, built at the time of the emperor
Domiziano (81-96 A.D.) and was also sung
by the Latin poet Stazio in his poem
“Silvae”. Going on you can reach the
“Solara” a expanse of cliffs corroded by the
sun, a summer destination of hundred
bathers.
GEORGES VALLET ARCHAEOLOGICAL MUSEUM
In order to understand the territory, let's not absolutely miss a
visit near Museo Archeologico Territoriale Georges Vallet,
which through the preserved finds, it gives evidence of the
different phases of population and transformations of the
peninsula, from prehistory to the Roman age. The first
archaeological museum of the peninsula, rich in didactic and
multimedia supports, offers to visitors a heterogeneity of objects,
such as: arrows ends of neolithic era, little jugs, examples of
sculpture, archaic architecture and many others.
MUSEO BOTTEGA DELLA TARSIA LIGNEA
A NEW MODEL OF MUSEUM FOR THE DECORATIVE ARTS
The building that houses the Museobottega stands on via S. Nicola and is part of an ancient urban nucleus. Its eighteenth century
structure is typical of a provincial townhouse with more consequential pretensions. The Museobottega is a polyfunctional
structure designed to requalify those sectors of the decorative arts which have not only a past worthy of being recorded but also
a productivity which needs to be sustained and helped to renew its contents. In the structure the cataloguing and display of the
historical production serves as the introduction to a more ample programme going beyond the conservation of our heritage.
There is a need for training programmes in the specific sectors of craft activity, and an autonomous production based on the
techniques and materials which represent the best in the tradition of each craft.
THE HISTORICAL COLLECTION
is introduced by the exhibition of objects and furniture produced in the nineteenth century wich focuses on the technical and
decorative characteristics of the various intarsia workshops then active in Italy. This is designed to give to the visitor a better
understanding of the specific features of the craft as it was practised in Sorrento. The exhibition of local ware is preceded by an
extensive selection of paintings, prints and photographs of the setting for this local craft. Different sections in the Museobottega
illustrate the evolution of production techniques, the materials used, the decorative motifs and the details of design which
characterise the local production in inlaid wood. After recognising the part played by the local School of Art in training successive
generations of craftsmen, the exhibition terminates with the work of local master craftsmen produced during the nineteenth
century.
RESEARCH AND PRODUCTION
The principal objective of the Museobottega is to ensure continuity for the tradition of intarsia work in Sorrento by
commissioning and marketing products reflecting a cultural renaissance in the craft. It is many years since the artisan represented
a composite figure uniting manual skills with design acumen, once the secret of his success. The only way to contrast the
impoverishment of the various sectors of the arts and crafts seems to be to accompany the artisan with a person well versed in
the culture of the craft, able to offer assistance in the conceptual phase of production. The production of the “Alessandro
Fiorentino Collection” is the tangible result of such collaboration. Intarsia work has always been considered a decorative addition
to the item to which it was applied, whereas here production has been based on a new equilibrium in which the finished product
is a univocal expression of formal structure.
THE HISTORIC CENTRE
Between the town walls rest the monuments, churches and the testimonies
of antique civilizations; walking through the streets of the historic centre,
the antique Greek-Roman structure is still legible, memory represented
vividly in via Pietà, via S. Cesareo, via Padre Reginaldo Giuliani and via
Tasso.
Along these antique streets, small dim lights aligned on the walls of tuff,
reveal the treasures and tell the secrets of the historic centre.
Via Pietà, an antique major decuman, timidly exhibits the Arab-Byzantine
decorations of the Veniero Palace and the Correale Palace with its
majestic courtyard with majorica tiles of the 1700's.
Along the other decuman - via S. Cesareo - it's possible to admire "Sedile
di Porta" and "Dominava", where the nobility of Sorrento reunited; inside
the City's coat of arms and those of the local patrician families are
portrayed. Its majorica tiled dome dates back to the 1600's.
Continuing along via P.R. Giuliani and via Tasso, the portals of the
antique noble homes, designed in Catalan style, appear majestic. It is
between these streets that at dawn a scent of bread and sweets just taken
out of the oven is diffused; and as the moon slowly gives up its place to
the sun, voices are multiplied and mixed with the murmurs, footsteps and
the thousand colours of the marketplaces that cheer up the historic centre
daily. Then there is the "Casa Fasulo" where Torquato Tasso, an illustrious
Sorrentine poet, found hospitality.
The centre of Sorrento is extremely rich, each alley, shop, church and
building, has a story to show and tell. Each corner hides a legend to be
narrated and findings to be admired just waiting for visitors "greedy" for
history and culture, to satisfy.
THE DEEP VALLEY OF MILLS
(Il Vallone dei Mulini)
In the historical centre of Sorrento, behind Tasso Square, it is possible to admire from
above - in a suggestive perspective - a natural extraordinary spectacle: The Deep Valley
of the Mills. The Deep Valley encircles on the south-east side, the tuffaceous block of
the present historical centre of Sorrento; observing it from above a characteristic rift
of the rock is visible, that carves profoundly and transversely the tuffaceous platform.
This incisive rift has originated from the vastest eruption which shook the
Mediterranean about 35,000 years ago.The potent eruption filled the entire calcareous
valley with debris between Scutolo Point and the Cape of Sorrento; the waters which
passed through the valleys - finding them clogged up with volcanic materials - searched
for a new path towards the sea cutting progressively through the tuffaceous bank.
The valleys became privileged places of the human's settlement. The pre-historic cave of
the Conca (Nicolucci Cave), on the uphill of the Valley of Large Seashore
(Marina Grande) and the settlement of Gaudo in Piano of Sorrento, remain two tangible traces of this
phenomenon. The Valley of the Mills is incised by two streams of water: Casarlano-Cesarano and Saint Antonino. The lack
of water has contributed to form very narrow gorges, only in the point where the two streams of water meet the gorge
widens and forms a vast area at the feet of the Villa "La Rupe".
The name Valley of the Mills, derives from the existence of a mill - functioning since the beginning of the '900's - used for
grinding wheat. Attached to the mill, rose a sawmill which furnished chaff to the Sorrentine cabinet makers. Everything is
completed by a public wash-house used by the women of the people.
The creation of Tasso Square, since 1866, determined the isolation of the mill area from the sea, provoking a sharp rise of
the percentage of humidity, which made the area unbearable and determined its progressive abandon.
The new microclimate favoured the development of a thriving and spontaneous vegetation in which the dominant element is
the Phillitis Vulgaris, a splendid and rare model belonging to the fern family.
Today it is possible to have access to the remaining part of the Deep Valley crossing antique ramps engraved into the tuff
with entrance from a trapdoor near the Stragazzi parking.
Equip yourself with binoculars and camera and observe from above the remains of the mill and the splendid savage
vegetation. The best position is Fuorimura Street, behind Tasso Square.
IL MUSEO MINERALOGICO CAMPANO (MINERALOGICAL MUSEUM)
Less than fifty meters from Piazza Umberto I, the ‘heart’ of Vico Equense, one can immerse themselves in the secrets of nature and in those of
the evolution of life by visiting the Museo Mineralogico Campano christened in 1992 by the Fondazione Discepolo, founded in collaboration by
the Discepolo family and the community of Vico Equense.
The large display rooms give home to a grand collection of minerals coming from all parts of the world, collected in his fifty years of research by the
engineer Pascuale Discepolo, which the museum has seen a notable growth in activity thanks to his exhibitions. The central nucleus the
collections on display are the 3,500 minerals, from a total of 5,000 prize winners of the Discepolo collection, belonging to 1,400 different
specimens coming from all over the world. The functional allurement of the museum was adopted from other scientific museums regarding the
placement of the nine classes in which the world of minerals are divided. The expositions are arranged also dedicated to the oxides, native elements,
sulphites, sulphates, carbonates.
Interestingly, however, the section dedicated to the minerals from Vesuvio-Monte Somma (Vesuvius and Mount Somma) and the brightly
coloured fluorescent ones lit up under the light of an ultraviolet lamp are quite the sight. In 1997 a palaeontological section was christened that
displays examples of Permian reptiles (250,000,000 years old) like the ‘Mesosaur’, and the ‘Notosaur’. Among the other specimens on display are two
‘Dinosaur Eggs’, other fossils of vegetation and animals relative to the principal eras of the evolution of life on earth. In March 1999 the Museum
attempted to create a dioramic model for ‘Ciro’, the ‘Scipionyx Samniticus’, a baby dinosaur discovered in Pietraroia (Benevento) along with
numerous finds of dinosaurs from North America donated by the famous Canadian palaeontologist Philip J. Currie, first honoured with the “Capo
d’Orlando” scientific award, known in the area of Vico Equense where in the 19th century he recovered fish fossils from the Cretaceous period.
Among the others of mention decorated with this award are Professor John Forbes Nash, who inspired the film “A Beatiful Mind”, Nobel Prize
winner in Economics in 1994, and Professor Riccardo Giacconi, Nobel Prize winner in Physics in 2002. In March of 2001 the section dedicated to
gems was opened which holds over 500 priceless stones with various facets, given by the architects Ezio De Felice and Eirene Sbriziolo. In
November 2002 the Museum presented it’s anthropological section with discoveries of stone found in North Africa, and donated by Angelo Pesce.
www.museomineralogicocampano.it