Orvieto

In discussion at TripAdvisor I learned of Freud's journey to Orvieto in 1897 and its importance in development of his concepts.

Someone asked why he would have gone to Orvieto. The answer is surely in that Orvieto was on the rail line from Florence to Rome... and magnificence of the location and the cathedral. As seen in this our blog entry in 2010.

It is very likely that in 1897 Freud was armed with a Baedeker, legendary travel guide. And carrying the burden of his father's death the year before.

My Baedeker for Central Italy and Rome is the 1909 edition. It's an excellent guide to Orvieto, given that most things in Orvieto of interest predate 1909 and the text may have been the same in 1897.

any images can be enlarged by clicking on them

Title page and map frontispiece Baedeker Central Italy and Rome 1909

Orvieto is found in Route 11. These routes of Baedeker are interesting to compare with most current routes.

The route from Florence to Rome was not the present straight-ish line of fast trains but set out here.

And this is the Orvieto text. It speaks of the funicular. Freud would have taken the old funicular, replaced in 1900 by the new funicular. See history. This is of course a very modern old-new transition. Compare the Chiesa Nuova [New Church] in Rome, which replaced an older church in 1575.

to remind - click on images to enlarge

The work most inspiring Freud was by Luca Signorelli, in what was then in 1909 and earlier the Capella Nuova [New Chapel] now known as the Capella San Brizio for the name of a saint featured in a painting there. See the top of page 102 above.

Click here for a detailed description of the San Brizio Chapel and photos of the works of Signorelli. Enter here the origins of psychoanalysis, the influence on the mind of Sigmund aged 40.

If you can't remember this page later, then it's almost certainly Signorelli Parapraxis.

So there you have it, a life challenge: can you remember this page or remember the term Signorelli Parapraxis? I leave to stranger minds to interpret outcomes.

....For more, read Nicholas Fox Weber's strange and self-indulgent Freud's Trip to Orvieto.

basic; start of blog

We are going to Italy again later this year, 2020, pandemic permitting. From 14 September to 17 November. We took out travel insurance before the current virus in China was declared an event of concern by our travel insurer.

In 2011 and 2018 we were in Italy for some weeks, using public transport.

This time we go to places best reached by car. Renting a car in Italy can be complicated. By booking early we got some discounts on leasing a new Citroen.

An extended visit anywhere can be expensive. It gets a bit less expensive as you extend the visit and if you hunt accommodation less expensive. We have found excellent places to stay. Both in their own right and as bases for wandering. The restrictions on driving cars into the centre of cities and towns in Italy mean that you don't go between city centres with cars.

So we are staying 'on the edge' of famous places. But as Italy is freckled with beauty there's no disadvantage, unless your intention is simply to visit famous places... and return home with an American accent?

We will arrive very early on 14 September at MXP, the Milan airport at Malpensa. Arriving at a time when tourist numbers begin to decline, when weather is still warm but temperatures declining. Arriving in the north to follow the sun south.

It is not wise to drive far on day 1, after 24 hours of travel. We have all day to travel to a suburb of Iseo, on Lake Iseo, a less visited lake northeast of Milan. Staying here from Monday to Friday, 14-18 September.

This will be a place for recovery from flight, practical steps like buying SIM cards for phones and a basic stock of provisions for apartment life over following weeks. I note in passing that it's not wise to drive around with a car packed with belongings, we drive between bases and get everything out of the car before jaunts.

From there, on Friday 18 September, we travel to Rivalta sul Mincio, to stay here in a village on the Mincio River near Mantova. Here are entries about Mantova in a blog about a trip we had to cancel in 2017

We will stay in Rivalta until Sunday 27th September, when we will drive to Lugo, a town on the edge of Ravenna. We have booked there for four weeks. You will see from this map some of the places to visit in all directions. We have chosen to stay longer because of that wider area (good train services too) and because it's a real working town, with history, with amenity. And most importantly because the airbnb host is such a positive person, see reviews at link above.

Ravenna was the capital of the western world for a time in the first millennium CE. And holds an important place in the history of mosaics. Hence this movie here. But also see this note of mine in 2017.

From Lugo we originally planned to wander back to the Milan airport but then discovered that the Citroen leasing program is very happy for us to drop the car in Rome. So we will go through Le Marche towards Rome. As usual the trajectory determined in part by interesting accommodation. Often enough the look of an airbnb apartment, as advertised, reflects the character of a town. We are not attracted to staying in agroturismi - isolated rural properties.

We will begin in Le Marche with two nights in a hotel in Montemaggiore al Metauro. Near Urbino, etc. One of the reasons I write in English rather than Phoenician or Carthaginian is that just below that 'big hill' in 207BCE, Hannibal's brother, bringing siege engines and reinforcements was defeated in the Battle of Metaurus. And up on this hill Churchill stood to watch the Eighth Army go forward in August 1944. See the movie Churchill and know he had to be kept from joining the D-Day landings on 6 June 1944. This indicates that he was almost killed on this venture to Adriatic Italy two months later. There is a Churchill Museum in Montemaggiore al Metauro.

Oh and this cries out for a little movie, showing a little bit of Le Marche landscape (near the coast, not so mountainous).

From there to San Severino Marche, where we had planned to be in 2017, but they had major problems with earthquake and storms then. From 20 October to 6 November.

Staying here for two weeks. Many places to dawdle or sit, wander the map.

We hope that Mafalda Minnozzi, better known in Brazil, might be performing in the Feronia Theatre while we are there. It seems an annual event for her to return home.



This is her movie about growing up in San Severino Marche. Delightfully not a travel promo.




We were then startled to find we could rent an apartment in the centre of Orvieto, with a garage, from 2 to 6 November. When I first visited Orvieto in 1968 the cathedral (duomo) begun in the 1300s was not quite finished, arguments about the doors. Doors now in place.

Orvieto as seen in 2010, pretty much as in 1310?

Our 2010 visit was recorded here. The duomo remains one of the most remarkable, gobsmacking sights on the planet as you come around a corner to see it. And I've just learned about the influence of Orvieto on Freud.



On 6 November we will drive to Fiumicino (160km through the hills and down the coast, not via the crowded Autostrada del Sole straight to Rome) and say goodbye to the car.

We will be in Rome from 6 to evening of 17 November. Staying here.  This map shows the distance from where we stayed for four weeks October-November 2018, in Monti.

This screenshot zooms in on that part of Trastevere, or load map at Google maps by clicking here. Such treasures close at hand, or the Trams 3 and 8 to wander further afield.

The market in Piazza di San Cosimato retains character, here interviews with some people of the market