This morning, as every year, I visited the traditional Christmas books’ exhibition and I had the opportunity to attend a lecture about the star crossed love between Raffaello Sanzio, the famous painter and the beautiful Fornarina, made immortal by one of his paintings.
Who was that woman is not clear but many say she was Agostino [...]
Yesterday I spent the night at Villa d’Este, the alchemical villa of Ippolito d’Este, Lucrezia Borgia son, Hercules offspring.
Villa d’Este
Aurora Consurgens
Muses of Sicily, essay we now
A somewhat loftier task! Not all men love
Coppice or lowly tamarisk: sing we woods,
Woods worthy of a Consul let them be.
Now the last age by Cumae’s Sibyl sung
Has come and gone, and the majestic roll
Of circling centuries begins anew:
Justice returns, returns old Saturn’s reign,
With a new breed of men sent [...]
December 8, 2008
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