Art for Advent (23): ‘Ten Saints’ by Giovanni D’Angelo D’Amato

Ten saints depicted on two panels of a 16th century predella in Ravello by Giovanni D’Angelo D’Amato (Photographs: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Patrick Comerford

While I was travelling through the Sorrento and Amalfi region of Italy earlier this year, I was delighted to find that each town and city had its own cathedral or duomo, and that each duomo, almost invariably had its museum, often with a treasure of art works collected locally but largely unknown beyond the locality.

Typical of these cathedrals is the Duomo in Ravello. Although Ravello is a small town with only 2,500 inhabitants, it is known for its annual opera festival and the town is a Unesco World Heritage site that includes the Villa Rufolo, where the gardens inspired the setting for Wagner’s Parsifal.

The Duomo in the town centre was originally built in 1086, although the later façade dates from the 16th century. Inside, there is a pair of striking pulpits.

The cathedral museum has a small but interesting collection of religious artefacts, and I have chosen two 16th century paintings from this museum as my choice of Art for Advent this morning [23 December 2013].

These two paintings, which are oil on wood, are the work of Giovanni D’Angelo D’Amato, and are part of a polyptych he painted for the Trinity Benedictine Monastery in Ravello, depicting the Transfiguration, Our Lady of the Rosary, and the Mysteries of the Rosary.

The abbey was suppressed in 1812, and the Benedictine nuns there were moved to the Monastery of Salerno. However, the convent and its possessions became the property of the Church of Saint Michael the Archangel in Torello. Later, the paintings were later moved from Torello to the cathedral museum in Ravello.

This morning’s paintings form a predella that depicts an array of saints and martyrs.

The first painting depicts (from left):

1, Saint Benedict, the founder of western monasticism.
2, Saint Hieronymus or Jerome, who translated the Bible into Latin (the Vulgate).
3, Saint Augustine of Hippo, one of the first systematic theologians; in a famous sermon, Saint Augustine said: “God was made man, that man might be made God.”
4, Saint Aniello, an Italian Franciscan saint.
5, Saint Pantaleon, a fourth century martyr who was the patron of medicine.

The second painting depicts (from left):

6, Saint Francis of Assisi.
7, Saint Leonard, a sixth century abbot and the patron of prisoners.
8, Saint Mary Magdalene.
9, Saint Scholastica, the twin sister of Saint Benedict.
10, Saint Ursula, who was martyred on a pilgrimage to Rome; she was from south-west Britain, and is shown here with the flag of England, the cross of Saint George.

I have not chosen these paintings because of their tenuous associations with Christmas – Saint Francis is credited with creating the first Christmas crib, while Saint Leonard was converted to Christianity at Christmas 496. Instead, I have chosen them because, with only two days to go to Christmas we should remember that our Christian faith has been handed down through the centuries by saints and martyrs, by faithful monks and nuns, by bishops and theologians, by writers and translators, and by the whole heavenly company.

Our Christmas celebrations should never forget how the faith has been passed on down the generations, often at a cost but always by people who trusted more in advent of the Kingdom of God than in the present attractions of the kingdoms of this world.

And these saints remind us that the Incarnation is an ever-present reality. As Saint Augustine once said: “Do not grieve or complain that you were born in a time when you can no longer see God in the flesh. He did not in fact take this privilege from you. As he says, ‘Whatever you have done to the least of my brothers, you did to me’.”

Tomorrow: ‘The Nativity,’ by Edward Burne-Jones

Art for Advent (22): Presepe in Duomo dei San Filippo e Giacomo, Sorrento

The Nativity scene inside the main doors of Sorrento’s cathedral is on display all year (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Patrick Comerford

In our Gospel reading this morning, the Fourth Sunday of Advent (22 December 2013), we read Saint Matthew’s account of the Nativity (Matthew 1: 18-25), and the fourth and final candle on the Advent Wreath which is lit this morning, is a reminder of the Virgin Mary.

My choice of a work of Art for Advent this morning is the Presepe or diorama, the traditional nativity scene in the Cathedral in Sorrento, the Duomo dei San Filippo e Giacomo.

Although Christmas in Italy has become more-and-more commercialised and internationalised each year, it is not all that long ago since the main Christmas decorations were limited to the traditional presepio or presepe, or nativity scene, which reached an high level of intricate detail in recent decades.

The tradition of recreating the Nativity with a presepio (the word literally means crib) dates back to the 13th century.

These nativity scenes are examples of Italian rustic art, and are often very elaborate affairs, and feature scenes conflated from the first Christmas alongside imaginative scenes from 19th century towns and villages. They often have hundreds of hand-made figures, individually and lovingly crafted, including artisans in traditional costumes working at their trades and merchants and bankers at their stalls and tables carrying out their daily business.

The manufacturers now even make figures of celebrities, sports stars and politicians to place in the presepio along with the traditional characters. In some places, you may see Barack Obama or Silvio Berlusconi among the shepherds.

Each church erects elaborate Nativity displays with these hand-carved miniatures depicting scenes from the Christmas story and every-day old town scenes. Many families also have one in their home and shops sell complete stable scenes, or the figures to make your own, in the weeks before Christmas.

Part of the Nativity scene inside the main doors of Sorrento’s cathedral is on display all year (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

In Sorrento, the Christmas celebrations still focus on the Nativity, with many events and concerts. During December, the churches in Sorrento have had their presepio or nativity scene on display. However, in the duomo or cathedral, it seems as it is forever Christmas, for the large presepio just inside the main doors is on display all year.

The cathedral, dedicated to the apostles Saint Philip and Saint James, stands halfway along the Corso Italia in the heart of Sorrento. It was first built in the 11th century was rebuilt in the Romanesque style in the 15th century, and has a marble altar, pulpit and throne dating from the 16th century, and a pair of 12th century doors from Constantinople.

The cathedral, which I visited a few times this year, is best known for its collection of 17th-century art, including paintings by Giacomo del Po and Oronzo Malinconico. The Italian poet Torquato Tasso was baptised in the baptistery which has been restored.

Part of the Nativity scene inside the main doors of Sorrento’s cathedral is on display all year (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Tomorrow: ‘Ten Saints’ by Giovanni D’Angelo D’Amato.

Four cathedrals and a missed opportunity for mission in Italy

Everyone wants to squeeze into the Piazzetta in Capri town, which is crowded by day and by night (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Patrick Comerford

The Piazzetta, in the heart of Capri town, is crowded by day and by night, with available space packed. The square buzzes with life, as the café tables fill what is officially known as Piazza Umberto I, and tourists crane their necks, hoping to catch a glimpse of preening glitterati and glamorous celebrities who can afford to holiday here while day trippers return to the resorts before evening falls.

I Faraglioni ... Capri’s striking offshore rock stacks that soar out of the sea (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Everyone who comes to Capri wants to see I Faraglioni, the striking offshore rock stacks that soar out of the sea, and the Blue Grotto or Grotta Azzurra. Others want to see the Villa San Michelle, the home of Sweden’s best-known writer Axel Munthe, the site of the Villa Jovis, the luxurious home of the decadent Emperor Tiberius, and the Giardini di Augusto, once owned by the German industrialist Krupp. And some come to see the villa that inspired Gracie Fields lived as she sang On the Isle of Capri.

Everyone who comes to Capri seems to end up in the Piazzetta, enjoying the blue sea below or simple “people watching.”

The best views of the square – and of other people – are from the top of the flight of steps leading up to Santo Stefano, Capri’s former cathedral, built in the square in the 17th century, on the site of a sixth century Benedictine monastery. The church was built in Capri’s flamboyant baroque style, with small cupolas, vaulted ceilings and molded chapels. The cathedral clock tower and the archbishop’s palace nearby are now used as the Municipio or town hall.

Around the corner from the square, the façade of Santo Stefano is squeezed into a narrow side street. Inside, the inlaid marble floor surrounding the main altar includes fragments from the Villa Jovis, and the treasures include a silver statue of San Costanzo, the island’s patron.

But few tourists get to see inside the former cathedral. Outside, a sign warns people against sitting on the steps, and the church opens in the evening only. By then, the last day-trippers have caught the hydrofoils and ferries back to Sorrento and Naples, leaving behind only the rich and the famous who can afford the high prices of Capri’s hotels.

Peace and calm in the gardens of the Villa San Michele (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

It seems the church in Capri is missing a great opportunity for welcome and mission. Instead, we communed with nature in the gardens of the Villa San Michele, and said our prayers in the chapel in a small cemetery in Anacapri on the corner of Via Cimitero and Via Caproscuro.

The grave of Major John Hamill from Co Antrim in Anacapri (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

In a quiet corner of the Cimitero acattolico di Capri – literally “the non-Catholic Cemetery of Capri” – we came across the grave of Major John Hamill from Co Antrim, who was killed on 4 October 1808 while fighting with the British garrison resisting Napoleon’s invasion of Capri. The first plaque was placed on his grave by his kinsman, John Hamill, on 3 October 1831, and the grave was restored in 1914, after an appeal in The Irish Times, by the military historian and philanthropist Sir Lees Knowles, who was also involved in the Guinness Housing Trust.

Ravello’s pair of pulpits

Ravello is known for its beautiful views of the coast below (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

If we were disappointed by the closed doors of Santo Stefano, we found warmer and heartier welcomes in three other cathedrals during our week in the Sorrento and Amalfi area: the cathedrals in Ravello, Amalfi and Sorrento.

Tiny Ravello (population 2,500) is known for its beautiful views of the coast below, for the Ravello Festival and for the Villa Rufolo, built in 1270, and its gardens. Boccaccio mentions the villa in his Decameron and it inspired Wagner’s stage design for his opera Parsifal (1880).

Preparing the cathedral in Ravello for a wedding (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

But visitors often miss out on Ravello’s much older Duomo or cathedral on the other side of the square, built in 1080. The entrance to the cathedral has two bronze doors depicting 54 scenes of the life and Passion of Christ. These bronze doors are one of only two dozen pairs of bronze doors in Italy.

Although the cathedral was being prepared that afternoon for a wedding, we were welcomed inside, entering through the museum on side street on the north side of the cathedral.

The ‘Gospel Pulpit’ in Ravello is supported by six roaring lions (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Inside, the cathedral’s richly ornamented interior is a riot of sculpted white marble, which holds a third century sarcophagus, marble slabs decorated with mosaics, and the skull of Saint Barbara. Behind the altar, there is a vial that is said to hold the blood of Saint Pantaleone, the town’s patron saint, and a fragment of the Saint Thomas placed in the side of the Risen Christ.

But the gems in the cathedral are the two 13th century, decorated, marble pulpits in the central nave, adorned with glittering mosaics: the Gospel Pulpit on the right of the central nave, and the Epistle Pulpit on the left.

The ‘Epistle Pulpit’ in Ravello tells the story of Jonah and the Whale (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

The Gospel Pulpit, dating from 1272, displays dragons and birds on spiral columns, supported by six roaring lions, and the heraldic arms of the Rufolo family who built the Villa Rufolo, with profiles of family members above the doors of the pulpit. The Epistle Pulpit depicts the story of Jonah and the Whale.

Wedding bells in Amalfi

Behind Amalfi’s lively seafront is an attractive small town with narrow alleyways and hidden courtyards (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Earlier that day, down on the coast below Ravello, we visited Amalfi, once an independent Byzantine republic, then from 839 to 1135, one of Italy’s four great maritime republics with a fleet to rival the naval powers of Pisa, Genoa and Venice. Later, it was the Knights of Saint John were founded here. Today it has a lively seafront but it is an attractive small town, with narrow alleyways, hidden courtyards and a population of 5,500 – before the tourists and day-trippers arrive in the morning, or once they have left in the evening.

Amalfi also claims to be the home of Flavio Gioia, an imaginary 14th century mariner and inventor who never existed but who, nevertheless, is said to have perfected the compass and to have determined the direction of true north.

The Cloister of Paradise is enclosed by rows and colonnades of Moorish-style, white, slender, interlaced columns (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

A few steps north of the statue of Flavio Gioia on the seafront, the town’s main square, Piazza Duomo, is dominated by Amalfi’s Duomo or cathedral which stands over the town centre at the top of a steep flight of steps.

At the top of the steps, this cathedral also has an impressive pair of bronze doors, dating from 1066, but originally from Constantinople.

But the cathedral in Amalfi is, in fact, a pair of cathedrals: the Duomo di Sant’Adrea (Cathedral of Saint Andrew) and the older Duomo del Crocifisso (Cathedral of the Crucifixion). Beside the paired cathedrals is the Chiostro del Paradiso or Cloister of Paradise, and below the crypt with relics of the Apostle Andrew.

Once again, although the cathedral was preparing for a wedding, I was welcomed and allowed to enter through the Cloister of Paradise. This was once ancient cemetery of the nobility of Amalfi, and is enclosed by rows and colonnades of 120 Moorish-style, white, slender, interlaced columns erected in 1266.

The cathedral dates from 596, but the original cathedral now serves as a museum. The newer cathedral, built in 1100, was originally in Romanesque style, concealed by the sumptuous baroque reordering of the 18th century.

The shrine of Saint Andrew in the crypt in Amalfi’s cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

In the crypt below, the cathedral claims its greatest relic – the head and bones of Saint Andrew, the first Apostle. During the Fourth Crusade in 1204, the head and bones were removed from a church in Constantinople by the papal envoy, Cardinal Pietro Capuano, and were buried in the crypt in Amalfi in 1208.

To this day, a crystal phial is placed on top of the sepulcher on some days in the church calendar for the past 750 years, and a dense liquid is collected. But similar sepulchers and similar miracles are claimed in Rome and in Patras in Greece. The “miracle of the phial” overshadows the other treasures of the crypt, including statues by Michelangelo and Bernini.

The atrium in Amalfi is built of striped marble and stone in a mixture of Spanish baroque, Moorish-Arabesque and Italian Gothic styles (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

As the wedding was about to begin, I stepped out into the extravagant atrium, built of striped marble and stone in a mixture of Spanish baroque, Moorish-Arabesque and Italian Gothic styles, with open interlaced arches. Below me spread the delights of Amalfi as the clock in the campanile above chimed mid-day. The bride had arrived to applause from tourists and shopkeepers and was climbing the 62 steps covered with a long red carpet to.

Sorrento’s cathedral and cloisters

The cathedral in Sorrento is used by local Anglicans on Sunday afternoons (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

The fourth cathedral we visited was the Cattedrale dei Santi Filippo e Giacomo (Cathedral of Saint Philip and Saint James) in Sorrento (16,500 people). It is used at 5 p.m. on Sunday afternoons by the local Anglican community, which is linked with Saint Mark’s Church in Naples, as well as Bari and Capri.

Although it was the height of summer, the parish was between incumbents, the parish website was down, and there was no Anglican service that afternoon. But we were not disappointed.

The Nativity scene inside the main doors of Sorrento’s cathedral is on display all year (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Yet again, this cathedral, which stands halfway along the Corso Italia in the heart of the town, has 12th century doors from Constantinople. It was first built in the 11th century was rebuilt in the Romanesque style in the 15th century, and has a marble altar, pulpit and throne dating from the 16th century. It seems as it is forever Christmas in this cathedral, for the large presepio just inside the main doors is on display all year.

The Franciscan Cloisters, beside the Villa Comunale in Sorrento (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Away from the buzz of Piazza Tasso and tourist attractions of the Marina Grande and Marina Piccola, once again we found peace and quiet the shady gardens of the Villa Comunale and the 13th century cloisters next door to the Franciscan church, shortly before yet another wedding ceremony began.

Offering a warm welcome

The closed doors and the cold reception at Santo Stephano in Capri reminded me of a similar experience many years ago in Santorini, where I was stunned into silence as I watched a priest brush tourists off the steps of the church as they watched the setting sun. He had missed an opportunity for mission once again. With a little imagination, he could have affirmed their joy in God’s creation, and invited them in to pray and see the church once the sun had set.

Both experiences were in sharp contrast to the open doors we experienced in other three small towns, and with the liturgical and cultural vitality we experienced later this summer in Christchurch Cathedral, Dublin, and Saint Canice’s Cathedral, Kilkenny.

In those two Irish cathedrals, the dean and the community know visitors are neither a nuisance nor an easy source of income through entry charges. Cathedrals and their liturgical and cultural life are at the heart of the ministry and the mission of the church; otherwise, they are in danger of being irrelevant to the life of the world around us.

A secret garden with a decorative majolica wall in the courtyard of the Casa Grande Correale, the 18th century Correale Mansion, in Sorrento (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Canon Patrick Comerford is Lecturer in Anglicanism, Liturgy and Church History, the Church of Ireland Theological Institute. This essay and these photographs were first published in October 2013 in the Church Review (Dublin and Glendalough) and the Diocesan Magazine (Cashel, Ferns and Ossory).

Harriet Monsell – a Mother Superior with Limerick & Killaloe connections

I flew back form Naples to Dublin yesterday [10 July 2013] to find the following full-page article, with its connections with Naples, is published on p 17 of the current [July/August 2013] edition of Newslink, the diocesan magazine of the Diocese of Limerick and Killaloe, edited by Joc Sanders:

Harriet Monsell – a Mother Superior with
Limerick & Killaloe connections

by Rev. Patrick Comerford

Editor: Patrick has kindly given his permission to reprint this from a post dated 26th March 2013 on his inspiring blog revpatrickcomerford.blogspot.ie.

It is of great local interest, and an example of the lives of Christian sacrifice to which members of our diocese have been called over the years.

Harriet Monsell (1811-1883) is one of the few Irish-born women to be remembered in the Calendar of Saints in Common Worship in the Church of England, her commemoration falling on 26th March.

Harriet Monsell was the founder of the Community of Saint John Baptist, an order of Anglican nuns dedicated to social service. By the time she died on Easter Day, 25 March 1883, the order had numerous houses, including houses in England, India and the Americas.

The Hon Harriet O’Brien was born in 1811, the third daughter and the eighth of nine children of Sir Edward O’Brien (1773-1826) of Dromoland Castle, Co Clare. Her father was the MP for Ennis in the Irish House of Commons (1795-1800) and MP for Co Clare in the Westminster Parliament (1802-1826), until he resigned the seat for health reasons.

When Edward O’Brien died in 1837, his widow Charlotte (née Smith), who was a devout Anglican, moved to London with their four daughters, then to Dublin and to other places. The second daughter, Grace, never married, but the other three daughters, including Harriet, married Anglican priests: Catherine married Charles Harris, Bishop of Gibraltar; and Anne married Canon Arthur Martineau of Saint Paul’s Cathedral, London. Of the four sons, Lucius O’Brien (1800-1872) succeeded his father as MP for Co Clare and later inherited a family title as the 13th Lord Inchiquin; while William Smith O’Brien (1803-1864), was a leader of the Young Ireland revolution in 1848, was tried for treason, deported to Tasmania, but later returned to live in Co Limerick.

On 21 September 1839, Harriet married Charles Henry Monsell (1815-1850) while he was studying and receiving medical treatment at the University of Dublin. They moved to Oxford the following year. There, while he completed his studies, they came under the influence of the Oxford Movement. Charles was the third son of the Ven Thomas Bewley Monsell, Archdeacon of Derry, and after his ordination he became his father’s curate. Later, he became a canon of Saint Mary’s Cathedral, Limerick.

Harriet Monsell as a girl

Because of his continuing ill health, the couple spent much of their later married life in Europe, most often in Naples.

After Canon Charles Monsell died in 1850, Harriet continued her affiliation with the Oxford Movement. She began working in the railroad and army village of Clewer among former prostitutes and unmarried mothers at a House of Mercy. The house had been founded some years earlier by Mrs Mariquita Tennant, who was a Spanish refugee, a convert to Anglicanism and a clergyman’s widow. However, due to ill health, Mrs Tennant moved to nearby Windsor, where she soon died.

Harriet Monsell moved to Clewer with her sister Catherine and her husband, the Revd Charles Harris, later Bishop of Gibraltar.

After Charles Harris moved to another parish in 1852, Canon Thomas Thellusson Carter became the Rector of Clewer and the Warden of the House of Mercy. Soon, Harriet Monsell professed religious vows with two other women, and became Mother Superior of one of the first Anglican religious orders since the Reformation.

The women lived according to a rule attributed to Saint Augustine of Hippo and at first they were called the Sisters of Mercy. They later changed their name to reflect their inspiration from Saint John the Baptist’s call to penitence. During the new order’s first five years, it expanded from assisting about 30 marginalised women to dedicating a building to serve about 80 women.

As the Community of Saint John Baptist, the nuns were guided by Mother Harriet, with her energy and humour. They extended their original mission to running about 40 institutions, including mission houses in parishes, as well as orphanages, schools and hospitals.

Mother Monsell, founder of the Community of Saint John Baptist

Mother Harriet retired to Folkestone in 1875 for health reasons, although she was occasionally able to visit the communities she founded.

She died on the morning of 25th March 1883, which was both the Feast of the Annunciation and Easter Day that year. Because of this coincidence, her commemoration in the Calendar of the Church of England has been moved to 26 March.

The order she founded continues to this day. They will shortly move to a new house and Education Centre being built at Ripon College Cuddesdon, near Oxford, which will be known as Harriet Monsell House. Their presence at the college “is eagerly awaited in order to complement our rhythm of prayer and help deepen our spiritual formation as a community.”

Photographs reproduced by kind permission of the Mother Superior of the Community of St John the Baptist, Begbroke, Oxford.

Finding cloistered seclusion in the busy bustle of Sorrento

The cloisters beside the Chiesa di San Francesco are a haven away from the bustle of tourism in Sorrento (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Patrick Comerford

The final day of the seven-day programme on the Sorrento Coast was billed as a “full day at leisure, to relax and take in those amazing views ... and practice your Italian.” There was an optional tour of an ice cream factory, with the promise of a delicious gelato to enjoy. But instead I spent the morning at the pool, and noon had passed before two of us caught a local train on the Circumvesuviana line that runs from Naples for one last visit to Sorrento.

Sorrento is a small town with only 16,500 people, but dates back to the Greeks and to the Romans, who knew it as Surrentum. The Greek historian Diodorus Siculus said Sorrento was founded by Liparus, son of Ausonus and grandson of Odysseus and Circe.

In classical times, there were temples of Athena and of the Sirens. This was the only temple of the Sirens in the Greek world, and may explain the origins of the town’s name.

In the 19th century, Sorrento became one of the most desirable tourist destinations in Italy, visited by Byron, Keats, Goethe, Ibsen and Walter Scott. But today it is a bustling busy tourist centre for visitors on their way to or from the Sorrento Coast, the Amlafi Coast, Capri and its neighbouring islands, or even Vesuvius, Pompeii and the Bay of Naples.

The square in front of the station commemorates Giambattista De Curtis, who wrote the song Torna a Surriento (‘Come Back to Sorrento’) with his brother Ernesto De Curtis.

The Piazza Tasso in the centre of Sorrento is at the heart of life for most tourists in Sorrento (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

It was a short walk from the rail station to Piazza Tasso in the centre of Sorrento, where we had dinner on Sunday evening on the busy terrace of the popular Fauno Bar. The square is named after Sorrento’s own poet Torquato Tosse (1544-1595), author of the Gerusalemme Liberata. The square has statues to both Tasso and Saint Anthony, and opposite the Fauno Bar stands the baroque Church del Carmine.

The Sedil Dominova ... now a workingmen’s club but once the seat of Sorrento’s ruling nobility (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

From Piazza Tasso, we squeezed our way through the bustling boutiques and tourist shops that line the narrow Via Cesareo, selling limoncello, T-shirts, leather bags, postcards and souvenirs.

At the corner of the narrow Via Cesareo and Via Giuliani, in the heart of old Sorrento, in a tiny square called Largo Dominova is the beautiful Sedil Dominova, with the campanile of Sorrento Cathedral on Corso Italia in the background.

This “new seat of the nobility” is a unique piece of slowly decaying gentility, first built in the 14th century, and rebuilt in the 16th century. The building once belonged to the sedile (seat) – effectively the town council – and it there the nobles met and deliberated and decided the course of civic life of Sorrento.

Inside, extravagant frescoes decorate the Sedil Dominova (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

It is an open loggia with expansive arches, balustrades, and a green-and-yellow-tile cupola. It is covered with extravagant frescoes from the 18th century, with amazing trompe l’oeil columns and the coats of arms of the noble families, including the D’Angio and Durazzo families.

Sorrento’s nobles were deprived of their civic role by King Ferdinand IV, the Bourbon King of Naples and Sicily – bent on revenge, perhaps, because he had been deposed twice: once by the revolutionary Parthenopean Republic in 1799, and again by Napoleon in 1805.

This building is last surviving example of the ancient seats of nobility in the Campania region. Today, it is a workingmen’s club, the Societa Operaia di Mutuo Soccorso, with pensioners sitting on the terrace beneath the dome playing cards and sipping coffee. One loud-mouthed tourist – making a virtue of his tiny knowledge of Italian as he read the sign for the working men’s club – exclaimed to his companions: “Oh look, I’ve found the opera house.”

We had lunch on the tiny square that is Largo Dominova in the pizzeria that is named after the Sedil Dominova, and then walked down Via Giuliano to Via San Francesco.

The cloisters in the Franciscan convent have been built in a hybrid mixture of architectural styles (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

From the outside, the Church of Saint Francis (Chiesa di San Francesco) looks like a modern church its simple white marble façade was rebuilt in 1926. However, the church is much older, and was founded in the eighth century as an oratory by Saint Anthony, the patron saint of Sorrento, who first dedicated the church to Saint Martin of Tours.

In the 14th century, Franciscan friars transformed this into a church, and it was later rebuilt in the baroque style and embellished with stucco decorations.

Beside the church, the Franciscan convent has a cloister with a hybrid mixture of many architectural styles, from the fourth to the 16th century: rounded arches on two sides, with Arabic ones on the other two.

These tranquil, secluded cloisters, with overhanging bougainvillea, colourful summer flowers and tree-shaded corners, have a quiet, contemplative environment. As we arrived, the cloisters were being prepared for a wedding, but they are also used for musical evenings and concerts.

Beach huts at the Marina Piccola below the Villa Comunale (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

From the convent and the cloisters, we strolled on into the Villa Comunale, with its gardens overlooking the Marina Piccola and views out across the Bay of Naples. Below us, there were tinny beaches, swimmers, people on pedaloes and in kayaks, and – that most English of seaside institutions – rows of beach huts.

We then walked back to the cathedral, and up to the Bastioni di Parsono, between Corso Italia and Via del Aranci, to see a surviving section of Sorrento’s old Roman walls and bastion.

The courtyard inside the 18th century Casa Grande Correale or Correale Mansion on Via Santa Maria della Pieta with its decorated majolica walls (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

We made our way to Piazza Tasso through Via Santa Maria della Pieta, another narrow street running parallel to Corso Italia, lined with hidden elegant villas and mansions, and from there to the station and Circumvesuviano back to Seiano.

We entertained until the second or third station by a group of young buskers. Back in Seiano in the evening, we had dinner once again in Ma che Bonte, looking out across the Bay of Naples at the outline of Mount Vesuvius and at the pink, orange and purple streaks left in the sky after the sun had set.

Looking out at the Bay of Naples and the outline of Mount Vesuvius during dinner in Ma che Bonte in Seiano (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

‘Capri makes you forget everything,’ but is it true ‘it’s best not to linger’?

Small boats and a tiny stretch of beach at Marina Grande, the main port of Capri (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Patrick Comerford

’twas on the Isle of Capri that I found her
Beneath the shade of an old walnut tree
Oh, I can still see the flow’rs bloomin’ round her
Where we met on the Isle of Capri

She was as sweet as a rose at the dawning
But somehow fate hadn’t meant her for me
And though I sailed with the tide in the morning
Still my heart’s on the Isle of Capri

Summertime was nearly over
Blue Italian sky above
I said “Lady, I’m a rover,
Can you spare a sweet word o’love?”

She whispered softly “It’s best not to linger”
And then as I kissed her hand I could see
She wore a lovely meatball on her finger
’twas goodbye at the Villa Capri

Summertime was nearly over
Blue Italian sky above
I said “Lady, I’m a rover,
Can you spare a fine word o’love?”

She whispered softly “It’s best not to linger”
And then as I kissed her hand I could see
She wore a plain golden ring on her finger
’twas goodbye on the Isle of Capri
’twas goodbye on the Isle of Capri
’twas goodbye on the Isle of Capri

The villa where Gracie Fields once lived at the Marina Piccola in Capri (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Frank Sinatra’s recording of this popular song in 1958 came as mass tourism was about to explode in post-war northern Europe. But his lyrics are much cruder than the version recorded in 1934 by Dame Gracie Fields, who had a villa on the island:

’Twas on the Isle of Capri that he found her
Beneath the shade of an old walnut tree
Oh, I can still see the flowers blooming ’round her
Where they met on the Isle of Capri

She was as sweet as a rose at the dawning
But somehow fate hadn’t meant it to be
And though he sailed with the tide in the morning
Still his heart’s in the Isle of Capri

Summertime was nearly over
Blue Italian sky above
He said, lady, I’m a rover
Can you spare a sweet word of love
She whispered softly, it’s best not to linger
And then as he kissed her hand he could see
She wore a plain golden ring on her finger
’Twas good-bye on the Isle of Capri

Somewhere far away, over Naples Bay
I heard a quaint lover’s story
It’s magic thrill holds a spell on me still
It’s a story old, that’s been sadly told
Down by the shore in the moonlight
How love began for a girl and a man

’Twas on the Isle of Capri that he found her
Beneath the shade of an old walnut tree
Ha-ha-ha-hahhhhhh, ha-ha-ha-hah
Where they met on the Isle of Capri

She was as sweet as a rose at the dawning
But somehow fate hadn’t meant it to be
Ha-ha-ha-hahhhhhh, ha-ha-ha-hah
Still his heart’s in the Isle of Capri

Summertime was nearly over
Blue Italian sky above
He said, lady, I’m a rover
Can you spare a sweet word of love
Ha-ha-ha-hah, ha-ha-hah, ha-ha-hah-hah
Ha-ha-ha-hah, ha-ha-hah, ha-ha-hahhh
She wore a plain golden ring on her finger
’Twas good-bye on the Isle of Capri.

Of course, “a plain golden ring” is more delicate than Sinatra’s “lovely meatball.”

It is still high summer, so I can hardly sing “Summertime was nearly over.” But with the “Blue Italian sky above” on Monday [8 July 2013], I sailed from Sorrento to the isle of Capri in the Bay of Naples.

There are white cliffs, hidden grottos and caves, and blue water all along the coasts of Capri (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Capri is am enchanted isle, with its white cliffs, grottos and caves hidden in the deep blue sea, and the villages of Capri and Anacapri hanging on perilously to the edges of cliffs and rocks.

There is no place in the Bay of Naples that is more sought after, and none that is more glamorous. This tiny island is swamped by day trippers in these summer months, with ferries and hydrofoils from Sorrento, Naples, Positano and Amalfi, taking anywhere from 20 to 80 minutes to reach the island and arriving seemingly every two to three minutes.

In less than half an hour, we had arrived from Sorrento at Marina Grande, the island’s main port, but instead of heading straight into the island’s towns, Capri and Anacapri, we began our day with a boat tour around the island’s rocky coastline, with grotto after grotto interspersing a series of perpendicular cliffs.

Beneath the Villa Jovis, where the Emperor Tiberius threw his enemies off the cliff-top into the sea (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

We headed around the Punta del Capo, beneath the site of Villa Jovis, the eastern summit of the island, where the Emperor Tiberius lived a life of debauchery and, according to Suetonius and Tacitus, he threw his enemies off the cliff-top to certain death in the sea below.

Capri has been inhabited since early times. The Greek geographer Strabo, Capri was once part of the mainland, and in the Aeneid, Virgil says Capri was populated by the Greek people of Teleboi who came from the Ionian Islands.

Tacitus records twelve imperial Roman villas in Capri. The soon-to-be Emperor Augustus swopped the neighbouring island of Ischia to the north with the Greek residents of Capri in 29 BC, and made his new Sea Palace his main residence on the island. He built temples, villas and aqueducts, and planted gardens so he could enjoy his private paradise.

Tiberius, his successor, built a series of villas at Capri, including the Villa Jovis, one of the best-preserved Roman villas in Italy. In 27 AD, the Emperor Tiberius moved permanently to Capri, running the Empire from there instead of Rome until his death then years later.

After the Western Roman Empire collapsed, Capri became subject to Naples, and in the centuries that followed it was regularly attacked and spoiled by pirates. In 866, the Emperor Louis II gave the island to Amalfi. A century later, Pope John XV gave the island its first bishop in 987. But the pirate raids continued and reached their peak in the mid-16th century when Barbarossa and Turqut Reis captured the island in 1535 and 1553 for the Ottoman Turks.

The rocks of I Farglioni have come to symbolise Capri (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

We soon came to I Farglioni, passing under the 60 metre long tunnel in the middle arch in the rock stacks that soar to a height of almost 110 metres and that have become symbolic of Capri.

As we passed by Marina Piccola, a lagoon-like harbour, we were pointed to the villa where Gracie Fields lived after falling in love with Capri and deciding to linger a little longer on the isle. She spent a fortnight on Capri with John Flanagan and Augustus John after reading Norman Douglas’s hedonistic novel South Wind, and declared: “I knew that that if only one small blade of grass on this gentle, wonderful, place could belong to me, I would be happy.”

Her wish came true in 1933 when she bought a ramshackle house for £11,000. A year later, she recorded The Isle of Capri in 1934. But Mussolini’s Fascist dictatorship was its height, and mass tourism did not develop until the 1950s, at the same time as Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby and other recording artists were making their own versions of her pre-war hit.

At the Green Grotto or Grotta Verde, the water was still that distinctive blue of Capri. We sailed on around Punta Carena, the south-westerly tip of the island with its lighthouse and along the western coast of Punta dell’Arcera and the Blue Grotto (Grotta Azzurra). There little boats were jostling with one another to take tourists two-by-two or alone into the Blue Grotto.

Small boats jostle with one another to take tourists into the Blue Grotto (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

This is the most visited place on Capri’s coastline. The modern fascination with Capri began with the book, the Discovery of the Blue Grotto on the Isle of Capri, in which the German painter and writer August Kopisch describes his stay on Capri in 1826 and his discovery or rediscovery of the Blue Grotto.

By the late 19th century, Capri was a popular resort for European artists, writers and celebrities.

The grave of John Hamill in a hidden corner in the cemetery in Anacapri (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Back at Marina Grande, we were taken by minibuses to Anacapri, where, in a small corner in the cemetery behind the bus station we found the grave of Major John Hamill from Co Antrim, who was killed on Capri in 1808 while fighting against Napoleon’s invasion of Capri. Napoleon captured Capri in 1806, but his troops were quickly dislodged by British forces, and the naval base on Capri became Britain’s “Second Gibraltar” until the French recaptured Capri in 1808. It returned to the Bourbon Kingdom of Naples in 1815 after Napoleon’s defeat at Waterloo.

In the gardens of the Villa San Michele on the edges of Anacapri (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

From the cemetery we strolled on to the Villa San Michele, built by the Swedish doctor and author Axel Munthe (1857-1949), who lived there in the last century and made it the setting for his bestseller The Story of San Michele (1929).

The villa is now owned by the Swedish government and is used as a cultural centre and museum. We whiled away the rest of the morning here over coffee before returning to Capri for lunch.

Forgetting everything in the Augustus Gardens on the edges of Capri town (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

After lunch we also visited Friedrich Alfred Krupp’s Giardini di Augusto (Augustus Gardens), overlooking the rocks of I Farglioni. Lenin was a guest of Maxim Gorky in 1910 in his house near the Giardini di Augusto. There, it is said, he remarked: “Capri makes you forget everything” – an expression that may well have provided the inspiration for Somerset Maugham’s 1945 short story The Lotus Eater.
By late afternoon, there was time for a short walk on one of the two small pieces of sand on the shore line at Marina Grande. But ’Twas good-bye on the Isle of Capri, for the ferries were leaving for Sorrento, and there was no option to remain and spend the evening Down by the shore in the moonlight, nor was there time to find out whether “Capri makes you forget everything.”

In the evening, we had dinner in Ma che Bonte, the restaurant and pizzeria in Seiano below the Moon Valley Hotel, looking out across the Bay of Naples and at the pink, orange and purple streaks left in the sky after the sun had set.

Saying farewell to Capri (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Traffic stands still as villagers stage procession through Seiano’s streets

The statue of the Madonna is carried shoulder-high to applause from the church in Seiano (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Patrick Comerford

In twos and threes, it seems a large number of people in my tour group took the Cicumvesuviana local rail link into Sorrento on Sunday [7 July 2013], and spent a few hours strolling through the streets of the old town and around its harbours.

The Anglican church in Naples also uses the Roman Catholic Cathedral in Sorrento on Sunday afternoons, and I had planned to go there. But a new priest is taking up an appointment later this month, and so instead I went to church this morning in the local parish church of Saint Mark the Evangelist in Seiano.

After an hour or two in the sunshine at the hotel pool, two of us caught the train into Sorrento. From Piazza Tasso, we walked down the steep gorge that divides the town to the Marina Piccola (small harbour) for lunch in La Scogliera, looking out at the ferries and boats leaving for Naples, Capri and the small islands in the bay.

A small storm blew up with some thunder and a little lightning. None of this deterred those who were determined to make the most of their holiday in this part of southern Italy. But we wondered whether the crossing to Capri the next day would be calm.

The Cathedral of Saint Philip and Saint James ... used most Sunday afternoons by Sorrento’s Anglicans (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

After lunch, we caught a bus back up through the deep gorge to the Piazza Tasso, and strolled along the Corso Italia, Sorrento’s main shopping street, with its arched side passages, hidden palazzos and gothic mansions. As we passed the bars and cafés it was possible to judge from the roars and shouts in each how Andy Murray was progressing at Wimbledon.

Halfway along the Corso Italia, the Cattedrale di San Filipo e Gicomo (Saint Philip and Saint James), which offers hospitality to local Anglicans most Sunday afternoons, has an interesting presepio nativity scene inside the main west door.

The procession makes its way through the back streets of Seiano on Sunday evening (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

We returned to Seiano in the evening, in time to watch a procession of a locally venerated statue of the Virgin Mary through the village streets.

As the statue was brought out of Saint Mark’s Church, the bells pealed out, the waiting crowd burst into applause and the local brass band struck up. Robed men in the red capes and white albs of the local archconfraternity and burial society preceded the parish priest in prayer and the burly villagers who carried the statue on their shoulders.

As the procession moved through the streets of Seiano, firecrackers were let off, confetti poppers were burst, petals were strewn along the route. Flags of white and gold and crimson banners were draped from balconies, and the band played out as the priest led those in the procession in decade-after-decade of the rosary.

Police block traffic on the road between Sorrento and Naples to allow the procession to criss-cross through the village streets (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

There is only main road along the coast to Sorrento, but the local police were not shy about holding back the flow of traffic in each direction to allow the procession to criss-cross unimpeded from one side of the village to the other time and again.

Eventually, we left the procession and Seiano behind us and caught the bus back into Sorrento for a late supper at Fauno, looking out at the passeggiatta in Piazza Tasso – another form of Sunday folk ritual.

It was after midnight when we got back to the hotel, where yet another wedding party was dancing late into the night.

Three weddings and some cathedrals on the Amalfi coast

Looking down on the Amalfi coast from Ravello (Photograph: Patrick Comerford (2013)

Patrick Comerford

I spent Saturday [6 July 2013] along the Amalfi Coast, which stretches along the southern coast of the peninsula east of Sorrento.

With its steep shoreline, towering cliffs, rocky outcrops, hairpin bends, with the shimmering blue sea below and one pretty coastal town or pastel-coloured village after another, the Amalfi Coast is a popular location for motor advertising shots and the weekend traffic also showed how this a popular destination for both Italians and the thousands of tourists staying in the Naples and Sorrento area.

I had no mid-life-crisis, open-topped red sports car for today’s journey. Instead, I travelled by coach with the four dozen or so people in our group along the only land route on the Amalfi Coast – the 40 km stretch along the Strada Statale 163, running along the coastline from Positano in the west to Vietri sul Mare in the east.

The rocks of Sirenuse ... home to the Sirens who may have given their name to Sorrento (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Below us in the blue sea for the most part of the journey we could see the tiny islands that form Li Galli Archipelago. United the 19th century there were known as Sirenuse and the said to be the home of the mythical Sirens who lured sailors unto the rocks and who may have given their name to Surrentum or Sorrento.

In the 10th and 11th centuries, the Duchy of Amalfi was an independent statelet based on the town of Amalfi. This coastline was part of the Principality of Salerno, until Amalfi was sacked by the Republic of Pisa in 1137.

The Amalfi Coast is known for limoncello, a liqueur produced from locally-grown lemons (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

In 1997, the Amalfi Coast was listed as a Unesco World Heritage Site and as a cultural landscape. This area is also known for limoncello, a liqueur produced from lemons grown between February and October in the terraced gardens along the coast.

After the unification of Italy, the Amalfi coast has enjoyed a huge economic revival, boosted in the late 20th century by international tourism.

Our first stop was in Positano, a village and commune , mainly in an enclave in the hills leading down to the coast. It was a port in the mediaeval Amalfi Republic.

The church of Santa Maria Assunta has a dome made of majolica tiles and a 13th century Byzantine icon of a black Madonna. According to local legend, the icon was stolen in Byzantium and was being shipped across the Mediterranean by pirates when a terrible storm blew up in the sea near Positano. The frightened sailors heard a voice on board saying: “Posa, posa!” (“Put down! Put down!”) The sacred icon was taken off the boat and carried to the fishing village, and only then the storm abated.

Positano prospered in the 16th and 17th centuries. However, by the mid-19th century, the town had fallen on hard times, and more than half the population emigrated, mostly to Australia.

By the first half of the 20th century, Positano was a relatively poor fishing village. It began to attract large numbers of tourists in the 1950s, especially after John Steinbeck published his short story ‘Positano’ in Harper’s Bazaar in May, 1953.

“Positano bites deep,” he wrote. “It is a dream place that isn’t quite real when you are there and becomes beckoningly real after you have gone.”

After we gone through Positano and stopped briefly on the eastern edge of the town for the panoramic view and freshly squeezed orange juice and once again at a ceramic shop at Grotta dello Smeraldo before continuing on to the harbour town of Amalfi.

I had an internal debate between boats and architecture: would I go on a boat trip with the others out into the Bay of Salerno? Or would I visit the Duomo in Amalfi on my own?

The portico of the Duomo di Sant’Andrea looks down onto the Piazza Duomo below (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

I plan to visit Capri on Monday, so architecture won the day today, and I climbed the broad steep steps to the Duomo di Sant’ndrea. And I was just in time too, for a wedding was about to begin, and by the time the boat-trippers returned the bride had arrived and the cathedral was closed to visitors.

The Cloisters of Paradise with their ornate Moorish-style colonnades (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

The cathedral doors were cast in bronze in Constantinople in the 11th century. But the entrance to the cathedral is through the beautifully named Chiostro del Paradiso or Cloisters of Paradise, with its ornate Moorish-style colonnades of white-washed, interlaced arches, palm trees, and inner garden.

The cloisters lead into the museum in the former Basilica di Crocifissio, with bare walls and an eclectic collection of ecclesiastical artefacts, including a bishop’s sedan chair made in Macao in the 18th century, along with paintings, mitres and vestments.

The richly decorated ceiling of the crypt below the Duomo in Amalfi (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Steps lead down to the crypt, with its richly decorated baroque ceiling and a shrine containing the body of Saint Andrew, who gives his name to the cathedral above. The apostle’s body was brought to Amalfi by the Knights of Saint John of Jerusalem, who brought it here in 1204, having plundered it in Constantinople which contains.

The body is buried deep beneath the shrine – although the saint’s head is in Patras in Greece – but the shrine includes a small vessel placed above the coffin to catch a miraculous fluid that is said to flow from the saint’s body ever since the 14th century.

Away from the bustle of the square in the front of the cathedral and back from the busy beach and harbour, the back streets and the stepped side streets were quiet and cool in the mid-day sun.

From Amalfi, we climbed up through the cultivated terraced mountainside and the hairpin bends to Scala, where we had lunch in the Margheritta Hotel, in a balcony looking down on the road we had had climbed in our two small buses.

The ornate Gospel pulpit in the Duomo in Ravello (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

From Scala, we travelled back down to Ravello, once an independent city state. This was also the setting for part of Richard Wagner’s Parsifal, and here DH Lawrence wrote part of Lady Chatterley’s Lover.

The Duomo, dedicated to Saint Pantaleone, was being prepared for a wedding, but once again I had arrived in time to see the inside of the cathedral and its museum.

The duomo has two ornately decorated pulpits – an Epistle pulpit and a Gospel pulpit. The Gospel pulpit has twisted columns patterned with mosaics resting on six carved lions.

There was time to look inside the tropical gardens of the Villa Rufolo, which inspired Klingsor’s magic garden and the stage design of Wagner’s Parsifal.

Although we could see it from the balconies of Ravello, we never got as far as Salerno.

As we sat to dinner back in the Grand Hotel Moon Valley, a wedding was taking place by the pool, and some of us joined the happy families until late in the evening.

The bride dances at the third wedding in a day (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)