Casa del Mutilato (The House of the Mutilated of War), the seat of the provincial section of the national amputees and war wounded. The statement inscribed across the top of the entry arch translates to: “The wounds which we bear have injured our bodies so much but the spirit is still untamed.” The motto on the. left column of the entry arch translates to: “Triumphant in the sacrifice.”
On a wall of the Casa del Mutilatto a statement written in chalk across the wall on the side of the Casa del Mutilato states: “Diconoo di amare gli animali ma non amani gli animali. Odiano gli esseri umani e basta qualunque scusa per dar sfogo alla loro sete di violenza.” This translates to: “They say they love animals but they don’t like animals. They hate human beings and use any excuse to give vent to their thirst for violence.”
The Palazzo delle Finanze is located in the historic piazza dedicated to Vincenzo Bellini across from the Massimo Bellini Theater. The Palazzo was built in neoclassical style, e.g. the grandeur of scale, the simplicity of geometric forms, and the dramatic use of columns across the facade. Also visible above, in the center of the piazza, is the Fountain of the Dolphins.
The author of the Fountain of the Dolphins, Giambattista Vaccarini, also built the Church of the Abbey of St. Agatha where, in the adjacent courtyard, the fountain was originally placed. In the 19th century it was dismantled and the parts were kept in the labyrinth of the Bellini Garden. Only in 1952 it was recomposed and placed in the middle of Piazza Bellini. During the reconstruction, the sculptor Salvatore Giordano added two copies of dolphins, in addition to restoring the existing ones.
Catania’s opera house project was entrusted in 1870 to the Italian architect Andrea Scala who started to manage the building with Carlo Sada‘s help, another important Italian architect. Because of few financial incentives at that time, the theatre’s building finished in 1887 and it was inaugurated on May 31st 1890 with a wonderful show of “Norma” by Vincenzo Bellini, a local famous composer, that was already known in the whole peninsula.
Vicenzo Bellini’s "Norma" is a tragedy in two acts that take place in 50 B.C. Gaul. Act II ends with Norma, a druid priestess, with her lover by her side, on the sacrificial pyre, where they are both engulfed by the flames. The opera features Bellini's signature long melodies and is considered a masterpiece of the bel canto genre, which is defined by a highly expressive style of singing. "Norma" also features one of the all-time great soprano arias, "Casta diva” (a prayer for peace to the goddess of the moon). As such, the opera is considered a defining role for operatic sopranos, including Maria Callas, who gave 89 stage performances (1948 to 1965) several of which exist on live recordings.
During his lifetime Rossini enjoyed success as a composer of comedies as well as tragedies. However he is best known today for his comic operas—and particularly for Il Barbiere di Siviglia (The Barber of Seville). The plot follows the escapades of a barber, Figaro, as he assists Count Almaviva in prising the beautiful Rosina away from her lecherous guardian, Dr Bartolo, so she can be with her one true love. The opera ends with Figaro persuading Bartolo’s notary to wed Almaviva and Rosina with Bartolo arriving too late to do anything but bless the marriage.
The harp was considered an instrument of divine/heavenly music. Putti are chubby male infants who either play the role of angelic spirits in religious works, or act as instruments of profane love.
Above the 2nd floor arched windows of the theater are busts of famous Italian composers from the 16th to the 19th century.
Palestrina was a composer of late Renaissance music. The central representative of the Roman School, with Orlande de Lassus and Tomás Luis de Victoria, Palestrina is considered the leading composer of late 16th-century Europe. Primarily known for his masses and motets, which number over 105 and 250 respectively, Palestrina had a long-lasting influence on the development of church and secular music in Europe, especially on the development of counterpoint.
Giovanni Battista Pergolesi (lft) was an Italian Baroque composer, violinist, and organist, leading exponent of the Baroque; he is considered one of the greatest Italian musicians of the first half of the 18th century and one of the most important representatives of the Neapolitan school. Pergolesi created works of high artistic value and historical importance, which include L'Olimpiade, considered one of the masterpieces of the opera seria of the first half of the 18th century and the Stabat Mater, among the most important works of sacred music of all time. Domenico Cimarosa (rt) was an Italian composer of the Neapolitan School and of the Classical period. He wrote more than 80 operas, the best known of which is Il matrimonio segreto (1792); most of his operas are comedies.
In 1776 Paisiello was invited by the empress Catherine the Great of Russia to Saint Petersburg, where he produced his masterpiece, Il barbiere di Siviglia. In 1816, Rossini set a revised version of the libretto to music under the title of Almaviva ossia la inutil precauzione. Rossini's opera, now known as Il barbiere di Siviglia, is now acknowledged as Rossini's greatest work, while Paisiello's opera is only infrequently produced. Perhaps the best-known tune he ever wrote is "Nel cor più non mi sento" from La Molinara, immortalized when Beethoven composed piano variations based on it. Paganini also wrote violin variations based on the same tune.
In addition to writing 39 operas, Rossini also wrote many songs, some chamber music and piano pieces, and some sacred music. He set new standards for both comic and serious opera before retiring from large-scale composition while still in his thirties, at the height of his popularity.
Coppola’s greatest success was with the opera: Nina pazza per amore (Rome, Teatro Valle, February 1835) which earned him great popularity, and which thrilled the spectators of all the main theaters of Europe. From 1839 to 1842, and from 1850 to 1871 he lived in Lisbon as director of music at the Teatro S. Carlo, as well as of the theater of Count Farrobo, for which he wrote three operas in Portuguese and one French. In the 1873 he settled in Catania where, at the special invitation of the Municipality, he took over the direction of the city's musical institutes. He lived there for the rest of his life.
Saverio Mercadante composed as prolifically as Gaetano Donizetti or Gioachino Rossini and his development of operatic structures, melodic styles and orchestration contributed significantly to the foundations upon which Giuseppe Verdi built his dramatic technique. After 1831 he composed some of his most important works, including Il giuramento which was premiered at La Scala on 11 March 1837 in Milan. There were aspects of this work which moved Italian opera in a new direction, i.e., while the music contains a reliable Italian lyricism it moves away from ornamentation for its own sake. Mercadante used the orchestra not as a pale accompaniment to dramatic action, but as a full partner in the drama. The French soloist Jean-Pierre Rampal notably recorded several Mercadante concertos for flute and string orchestra.
After Rossini moved to Paris in 1824, Pacini and his contemporaries (e.g., Nicola Vaccai, Michele Carafa, Vincenzo Bellini, Gaetano Donizetti, and Saverio Mercadante) collectively began to change the nature of Italian opera and took bel canto singing in a new direction. Orchestration became heavier, coloratura was reduced, especially for men's voices, and more importance was placed on lyrical pathos. While there were exceptions, romantic leads were assigned to tenors (in Rossini's time, they were frequently sung by alto or mezzo-soprano women). Villains became basses or later baritones (while they often were tenors for Rossini). Over time, far more emphasis was placed on the drama. Pacini and his contemporary Nicola Vaccai exerted a strong influence on Bellini.
Gaetano Donizetti is best known for composing almost 70 operas. Along with Gioachino Rossini and Vincenzo Bellini, he was a leading composer of the bel canto opera style during the first half of the 19th century and a probable influence on other composers such as Giuseppe Verdi. Like Verdi, he was intimately involved in the creation of the librettos for his operas.
Vincenzo Bellini is known for his long-flowing melodic lines for which he was named "the Swan of Catania." In 1898, Giuseppe Verdi "praised the broad curves of Bellini's melody: 'there are extremely long melodies as no-one else had ever made before'." Born in Catania, Bellini began his formal studies in 1819 at the Real Collegio di Musica di San Sebastiano in Naples. He would go on to compose a total of 11 operas over the course of 10 years. While in Milan, between 1827 and 1831 he produced four great masterpieces, Il pirata, I Capuleti e i Montecchi, La sonnambula, and Norma. His last work was I Puritani, which premiered in January of 1835 in Paris.
In his early operas, Verdi demonstrated a sympathy with the Risorgimento movement which sought the unification of Italy. The chorus "Va, pensiero" from his early opera Nabucco (1842), and similar choruses in later operas, were much in the spirit of the unification movement. After his success with the opera Aida (1871), he followed with three late masterpieces: his Requiem (1874), and the operas Otello (1887) and Falstaff (1893). His operas remain extremely popular, especially the three peaks of his 'middle period': Rigoletto, Il trovatore and La traviata.
The neo-Baroque-style facade of the theater designed by Andrea Scala, with the assistance of the Milanese architect Carlo Sada, was inspired by the Jacopo d'Antonio Sansovino (1486 – 1570) classic of the Marciana National Library of Venice. which architect Andrea Palladio (1508 - 1580), thought was the best building erected since Antiquity.
Theater goers line up for tickets to Tosca, music by Giacomo Puccini, Libretto of Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa
In the foyer of the theater there are two busts: on the right, the architect of the theater, Carlo Sada (1849-1924) and on the left, Guseppe Sciuti, the painter of the theater curtain entitled, Il trionfo dei catanesi sui libici (1883) - The triumph of the people of Catania over the Libyans.
Bellandi celebrated Bellini by painting a ceiling fresco in which he was surrounded by his major operas: Norma, La sonnambula, I puritani and Il pirata, Norma, The Sleepwalker, The Puritans and The Pirate, respectively.
The theater hall has four tiers of boxes beyond the gallery and is of great decorative richness. It is purported to be one of the most beautiful of those built in the 19th century in Italy. During a tour of the theater I was told that the boxes above the fourth tier had limited visibility and therefore cheaper tickets were sold to those who were blind.
According to some specialized reviews, the “Bellini” holds the best acoustical in the whole world thanks to the combining of a recurring architectural feature, the classical horse shoe shape, and three attributes: the territorial basis, a prehistorical lava flow offering a great echo chamber, the Amenano river flowing underneath, which gives uniformity to the sound, and the bas-relief engravings, not only simple decorations, but operational for a perfect distribution of the sound waves.
The best lyric singer in the world, Maria Callas, who performed many times in Teatro Massimo Bellini, said that this theatre is featured by a surpassing acoustics. Many other important musicians of the 20th century appeared in this stage, like Luciano Pavarotti, Riccardo Muti and Renata Scotto. Every year, it hosts an opera and ballet season, a symphonic season and a chamber season. Rich in decorations and allegorical symbols that bestow an elegant style to the building.
The bas-relief engravings assist the sound quality, as music sounds better in a more reverberant space, with longer reverberation times and carefully positioned reflecting surfaces that allow the audience to hear a blend of the instruments and the musicians to hear themselves.
The elephant can be seen in the center of this bas-relief engraving behind a man standing with a lance and shield. Catania was referred to as the “city of the elephant” in a report by an Arab geographer from the 2nd half of the 10th century. At that time, the inhabitants of Catania are said to have seen the elephant as a symbol of protection from the eruptions of Mount Etna.
The coat of arms of Catania consists of different elements: 1. The crown recalls the rule of the kings of Aragon over Sicily; 2. S.P.Q.C. stands for Senatus Populusque Catanensium (the Senate and People of Catania); 3. A stands for Saint Agatha, the patron saint of the city, to whom the cathedral is also dedicated; and 4) as stated above, an elephant as a symbol of protection from the eruptions of Mount Etna.
Minerva was the Roman virgin goddess of music, poetry, medicine, wisdom, commerce, weaving, and the crafts. Minerva is thought to have invented the flute by piercing holes into boxwood. She enjoyed the music, but became embarrassed by how it made her face look when her cheeks puffed out to play. Because of this she threw it away and it landed on a riverbank where it was found by a satyr.
Mercury, in Roman religion, god of shopkeepers and merchants, travelers and transporters of goods, and thieves and tricksters. He is commonly identified with the Greek Hermes, the fleet-footed messenger of the gods.
The Museum of Sicilian Marvels and Knowledge was created with the aim to enhance Sicilian cultural legacy and to make it public through the representation of its main assets as a result of the university's centuries-old research, teaching and educational activities.
The monument is in honor of archbishop and cardinal, Giuseppe Benedetto Dusmet (1818 - 1894), who was admired for his devotion to charity for the poor. The base has four reliefs depicting events of charity. The inscription has an anti-Marie Antoinette quote: “Sin quando avremo un panettello noi lo divideremo col povero” (As long as we have a cake we will share it with the poor).
During the Roman era, the site was home to a pagan temple dedicated to the goddess Ceres. In 1329 the Queen consort of Sicily Eleonora d'Angiò promoted the construction of the primitive convent and church of St. Francis of Assisi to the Immaculate Conception in gratitude to the Virgin for the escaped danger deriving from the eruption of Etna that same year. In 1693, an earthquake destroyed the monument. The façade was built around 1854 with three statues on the 2nd level, representing, rt to lft – St. Anthony of Padua, the Immaculate Conception behind a railing, and St. Francis of Assisi, and a statue of St. Agatha holding a tablet on the bottom level, left.
The Roman Theater was built in the 2nd century near the Roman era pagan temple dedicated to the goddess Ceres - a site marked today by the bell tower of The Church of St. Francis of Assisi to the Immaculate Conception in the background.
The Roman Theatre of Catania, built in the 2nd century, follows a common design of many ancient Roman theaters. It was built with seats rising along the hillside, where spectators would have faced south and towards the sea. The theatre ceased to be used between the 5th and 6th centuries. Archaeological work on the site was not begun until the 18th century under the Ignazio Paternò Castello, Prince of Biscari.
The theater’s auditorium (cavea section) originally measured 322 ft. deep, consisting of 21 rows of seats divided into wedges or cunae, seating nearly a maximum of 7,000 spectators, smaller than the theaters at Taormina and Siracusa by 1,000-3,000 seats.
The orchestra section had a diameter of nearly 72 ft. Behind the stage it likely had a scaenae frons decorated with marble columns, that gave it depth and complexity. The scaenae frons is the elaborately decorated permanent architectural background of a Roman theater stage used both as the back scene and as the actors’ dressing room. The form may have been intended to resemble the facades of imperial palaces and tended to have architectural decorations combined with luxurious ornamentation.
Below the seats (cavea section) in the Roman Theater are the vomitoria or exit passageways. A vomitorium is a passage situated below or behind a tier of seats in an amphitheater or a stadium, through which big crowds can exit rapidly at the end of an event. Vomitoria can also be pathways for actors to enter and leave stage, The Latin word vomitorium, plural vomitoria, derives from the verb vomō, vomere, "to spew forth".
The site of the Roman Theater was not cleared of houses that had been built into the structure, as is evident here, until 1959. Some of the marbles and artefacts recovered during excavations and restorations are on display in the adjacent Casa Pandolfo and Casa Liberti.
Euterpe was one of the nine Mousai (Muses), the goddesses of music, song and dance. In the Classical era, when the Mousai were assigned specific literary and artistic spheres, Euterpe was named Muse of lyric poetry. Her attribute was the double-flute. Euterpe's name was derived from the Greek words eu- and terpô, meaning "giver of much delight."
In works of art Eros was usually represented as a beautiful boy, close upon the age of youth. In later times be also appears as a child with the attributes of a bow and arrows, or burning torches, and in a great variety of situations. According to Greek myths and literature, Eros was a very mischievous child who liked to cause trouble by making everyone he met fall in love.
In ancient Greek religion and mythology, the Muses are the inspirational goddesses of literature, science, and the arts. They were considered the source of the knowledge embodied in the poetry, lyric songs, and myths that were related orally for centuries in ancient Greek culture. Melete, Aoede, and Mneme are the original Boeotian Muses, and Calliope, Clio, Erato, Euterpe, Melpomene, Polyhymnia, Terpsichore, Thalia, and Urania are the nine Olympian Muses.
Piazza del Duomo is the main city square in Catania, flanked by both the centers of civic (city hall at Palazzo degli Elefanti) and religious power (Duomo or Cathedral of Saint Agatha). The Cattedrale di Sant'Agata was originally constructed in 1078–1093, on the ruins of an ancient Roman Thermae (Achillean Baths), by order of Roger I of Sicily, who had conquered the city from the Islamic emirate of Sicily. At the time it had the appearance of a fortified church (ecclesia munita). The devastating 1693 earthquake leveled most of the structure. Giovanni Battista Vaccarini designed the present Baroque structure and façade in 1711.
The Elephant Fountain with its black basalt statue of an elephant, commonly called u Liotru, has become the emblem of the city of Catania. An ancient legend tells of an elephant that allegedly hunted ferocious animals during the founding of Kατάvη. Under Muslim rule, the city was known as Balad-el-fil or Medinat-el-fil, meaning "city of the elephant." The Liotru did not become an official symbol of the city until 1239: before then, following a series of uprisings in order to move from being merely the domain of a bishop-count to a state-owned city.
The façade Duomo has three levels with Corinthian columns in granite, perhaps taken from the Roman Theatre of the city. All the orders are decorated with marble statues of Saint Agatha over the gate, Saint Euplius on the right and Saint Birillus on the left. The main door, in wood, has 32 sculpted plaques with episodes of the life and martyrdom of Saint Agatha, papal coats of arms and symbols of Christianity.
Saint Agatha’s tomb was originally in a cave in Catania, but then her body was taken to Constantinople for about nine years, before being brought back to Catania in 1126. It now rests in the Cattedrale di Sant'Agata. The Cathedral also houses the tomb of Catania’s famous opera composer, Bellini.
The legend of St. Agatha states that the Roman prefect Quintianus wanted her to marry him, but when she rebuffed him he first had her sent to a brothel and then, when she resisted all attempts to participate, he had her tortured by cutting off her breasts in addition to other torments. However, that night Saint Peter appeared to her and cured her wounds. Refusing to renounce her faith, she died in prison around 215 CE. An eruption of Mount Etna occurred a year after her death and many fled in terror to her grave. Her veil was taken and held against the onrushing flames, and suddenly the danger ceased.
St. Attalus was martyred in Lyon, 171 CE, with St. Blandina and 3 other Christians. They were exposed to the beasts in the amphitheater before being placed on a hot iron seat. Eusebius, in his account of the first centuries of Christianity, in his Ecclesiastical History, circa 324 CE, concluded: “After they were exposed and insulted for six days, the martyrs’ bodies were burned to ash and swept by the wicked into the Rhone, which flows nearby, so that not even a trace of them would still appear on earth. They did this as if to conquer God and defeat their rebirth so that, as they said, “they might not have any hope of resurrection, because of which they have introduced a strange new cult, ignored torture, and gone joyfully to death. Now let’s see if they will rise again and if their god will save them.”
Pope Sixtus II, whose statue as a young man (previous photo above) is on the exterior of the Duomo, was bishop of Rome from 31 August 257 until his death on 6 August 258. He was martyred (beheaded) along with seven deacons, including Lawrence of Rome, during the persecution of Christians by the Emperor Valerian. Originally, in the register above the history paintings, the decoration of the Sistine Chapel consisted of twenty-eight portraits of early popes who had died as martyrs, which includes Botticelli’s imaginary portrait of Pope Sixtus II.
The excavated part of the amphitheater is now accessed by an ironwork gate. In 1906 the gate was decorated with some fragments of marble columns which were originally part of the upper loggia, two fragmentary Ionic columns, and part of an architrave (inscribed with AMPHITHEATRVM INSIGNE ("Eminent Amphitheater"). The iron gate is at the center, between the columns which have capitals, which support the architrave.
The Amphitheater of Catania was built in the Roman Imperial period, probably in the 2nd century CE, on the northern edge of the ancient city at the base of the Montevergine hill. Only a small section of the structure is now visible, below ground level, to the north of Piazza Stesicoro. This area is now the historic center of the city, but was then on the outskirts of the ancient town and also occupied by the necropolis of Catania.
The amphitheater of Catania is the most complicated and largest of all the amphitheaters in Sicily. The structure centered on an elliptical arena, surrounded by radial walls and vaults supporting the seating of the cavea, which had 14 steps and 32 aisles. A gallery ran around the outside of the structure, on which the external facade is mounted. The arena had a maximum diameter of 77 yds and a minor diameter of around 55 yds, with a circumference of 210 yds. The external diameter was 137 x 115 yds, while the external circumference was 338 yds.
From the theatre's dimensions it can be calculated to have held 15,000 spectators and almost double that number with the addition of wooden bleachers for standing spectators. According to an unconfirmed tradition, it was intended that naumachiae (staged sea battles) take place in the amphitheater, using the ancient Roman aqueduct of Catania to fill the arena with water.
The inscription installed on the excavated amphitheater “per me civitas catanensium sublmatur a Christo (Through me, the City of Catania is raised up by Christ), a statement attributed to Saint Agatha, who is meant to have been martyred nearby.
The Church of the Furnace (Sant’Agata alla Fornace), which is also dedicated to Saint Blaise (Chiesa San Biagio), was only a simple chapel in the 4th century. In 1098 it was enlarged slightly but they could not build beyond the current dimensions because of the bastions of the Roman amphitheater and prison which flank it. Still visible today through a port-hole, in the chapel on the right hand side, is the furnace which at the time of the persecutions was used for the tortures and was the place where Saint Agatha was forced to roll naked on burning coal in her martyrdom. Having survived this torture, her breasts were cut off and she died in prison.
The monument was commissioned by the comune of Catania to celebrate the native composer of opera, Vincenzo Bellini (1801-1835). Designed and sculpted by Giulio Monteverde, and inaugurated on 9/21/1882. Bellini is seated atop a column, but leaning forward, with a manuscript on the left knee. Below him is a seven register pyramid - the musical notes. Around him are four statues representing four of his operas: Norma, I puritani, La sonnambula, and Il pirata.
Santa Agata al Carcere was built in the 16th century adjacent to a modest-sized building where, according to tradition, the incarcerated Agatha received St. Peter who had come to heal the wounds inflicted by torture on her breasts. Kept inside is the outstanding panel by Bernardino Niger depicting St. Agatha conducted to martyrdom (1588). On the exterior, the uppermost floor of the church’s facade houses the church bells, and is decorated with a relief depicting Saint Agatha, flanked by two reclining angels offering her the palm of martyrdom.
The main altarpiece of Santa Agata al Carcere is a depiction of the Martyrdom of Saint Agatha by “Bernardino Niger grecus.” The painting depicts the Ancient Roman amphitheater in Catania behind the saint as she is taken by soldiers sent by Quintianus, who had been refused by Agatha due to her commitment to Christ.
Saint Agatha's Vision of Saint Peter in Prison shows the imprisoned Agatha of Sicily having a vision of a visit from an angel and Peter the Apostle, who heals the wounds inflicted by torture on her breasts. According to legend, after having Agatha stretched on a rack, her flesh torn with iron hooks, burned with torches, and whipped, Quintianus. ordered that her breasts be twisted and torn and then be cut off. After being sent back to prison in this mutilated state, Agatha saw Saint Peter appear to her and miraculously heal her wounds with a father’s love.
