If access to the sea determined the future of Pisa as a race of sailors and adventurers, Siena’s location in the arid mountains was equally significant. Despite the great beauty of the landscape, the fact is that Siena lacked water and was subject to serious droughts.
Trash bins in front of an old church may ruin the photograph but they cannot ruin Pisa. A brief look,at the dark side of contemporary Italy.
The Lombard kingdom, aiming at a unified Italy, was defeated by the combined forces of the papacy and the Church, but the summoning of the Franks was a disastrous mistake, and the Lombard Kingdom became the foundation of all subsequent Italian development.
Or at least col aereo. After 13 days of wasting hours –and money–on renewing my passport, it arrived this morning in time to proceed with plans to fly to Munich for a ridiculously long layover…….
The immediate burdens of empire are born by the conquered subjects, but in the long run it has the people of the imperial nation that find themselves overtaxed to support the endless wars and swamped by subject peoples, allies, or just about anyone who can get to the frontier.
If Christianity is difficult to conceive without the Old Testament, then Christendom is an impossibility without the legacy of Greeks and Romans, and the Etruscans made no small contribution to the character and culture of Rome, though very little of the Etruscan legacy is obvious.
Why go to Tuscany in the Winter, when you can go to Sicily, Crete, or Costa Rica? Everyone has read or seen Under the Tuscan Sun, but who wants to endure “Under the Tuscan Wind, Rain, and Flooding?”
