Sun FINALLY!!!!

---

10:06 pm

This morning we headed out to Assisi, the home of Saint Francis and Lady Claire. We hoped on a bus for a 45 minute drive to Assisi and got a quick nap in along the way. Our first stop in Assisi was the Cathedral of Saint Mary of the Angels. This Baroque Cathedral was built around the place where Saint Francis chose to live out the rest of his life in a little one room church and the place where he laid down on the earth and died. Assisi, like Gubio is built on a hill. Back in Francis’s time the top of the hill was reserved for the highest class and then the class rank went down as you went down the hill. So the place where Francis (who believed in giving away absolutely everything that you have and following god) chose to live the rest of his life was out even farther than where the leopards would have lived. This was Francis’s way of humbling himself even more.


Saint Mary of the Angels is an extremely interesting church because of the fact that the little one-room church where Francis lived now resides within the walls of the larger Cathedral. Even though Francis believed in not owning any worldly possessions and he despised everything having to do with money, the church that was built in honor of him was built in the over-the-top ornate Baroque style. The church also had a small chapel that was built over the play where Francis died. The best part of the church was one set of baroque sculptures on one of the walls. Baroque sculpture is known for looking like there is lots of movement or wind blowing through it. There were several layers of angels sculpted to look like they were in flight and at the very top, right above you, was an angel holding an olive leaf crown right above you like it was about to drop it on your head. The contrast between this church and the quaint little church inside of it was pretty interesting. It makes one wonder what Saint Francis would have thought about the churches that were built in his honor. Personally the baroque style of the church wasn’t my favorite.


After grabbing lunch we headed up the hill of Assisi on a bus to the Basilica of Saint Francis. The basilica was a really good representation of renaissance architecture. When Saint Francis died it was his request to be buried at this spot because it was once the hill where prisoners were executed, and Francis wanted to be buried humbly there. Two years after his death, when Saint Francis was canonized his wish was granted, although I doubt he would have approved of the grandeur of the basilica built in his honor. It is divided into two different churches, a lower church and an upper church that is literally on top of the other one.


The lower church was where the body of Saint Francis actually resides. The church was GORGEOUS!!!! It had a lower ceiling than most churches with and its ribbed vault ceilings were edged in wonderful red patterns. The ceiling was a deep, rich, navy blue with gold stars painted on them. Along the sides of the church are little side chapels each of which is devoted to a different saint. Inside each of those chapels were gorgeous frescos in styles ranging from medieval to renaissance to baroque. There is also stairs that lead down to a chamber beneath the sanctuary where Saint Francis’s remains that the remains of the rest of the early Franciscan friars are. After Francis’s death his body was hidden by his top friar so that it would not be stolen. For years people pilgrimage to that spot and prayed to the alter in the sanctuary where his body was suppose to be but in fact the body remained hidden. It wasn’t until centuries later that his body was discovered in its hiding place and Saint Francis’s remains were put in a pillar beneath the sanctuary.


This whole church was extraordinarily beautiful but my ultimate favorite part was the fresco at the front of the church which depicted the last judgment. It was reminiscent of Michelangelo’s final judgment portrayal in the Sistine chapel, but this was equally as gorgeous. The portrayal of the demon’s pulling people down into purgatory and the angels pulling other up into heaven was phenomenal, as were the people’s expressions. The Franciscans were even portrayed helping to pull people up out of hell and into heaven. In the very center of the fresco, beneath Jesus laying judgment on the people of earth, the devil himself was chained up with snakes crawling all over him. It was AMAZING!!! My favorite artwork of the day! Dr. Lees said that he had never been able to see that fresco before because it had been under restoration and hidden behind large scaffolding for the last 2 years. We were extremely lucky to have seen it.


The upper church in the Basilica of Saint Francis was a more typical gothic style church with the high ceilings. The church is known for the 25 frescos that go around the exterior walls, each one depicting a famous story from Saint Francis’s life. The frescos were really wonderful and there is a debate over whether or not they may be the work of the famous medieval painter “Giotto” (who is straight out of my art history text book!!) At first all of the frescos were said to be by him and his students but now people have really begun to challenge whether they are his or not.


The other interesting thing about this cathedral were the fresco on either side of the nave of the church. The painters chose to use lead in their paints and there for much of those frescos have been ruined. However, due to the oxidation of the lead in the paint on of the paintings has literally reversed its colors. It looks like a negative of the painting. It was extremely interested and almost spooky in a way.
After the Basilica of Saint Francis we were free to explore other areas of Assisi. First we stopped in at a church for Mary that once was an Etruscan temple to the goddess Minerva. The outside of the church still looks like an old Greek temple, while the inside was redone in a baroque style. (Talk about your medieval trading space, temple edition) Often we are finding sacred spaces that have been built over top of or made out of other sacred spaces.


We decided to hike to the very top of Assisi where there was an old, early medieval castle and a great view of the city. So we started walking up, and up, and up, and up until we finally reached the castle. The view was really stunning but the castle cost 5 Euro to get into. Since we didn’t have enough time to really enjoy 5 Euro’s worth, we walked around and enjoyed the view and the outside of the castle.
After heading back down the EXTREMELY steep hills in Assisi we did some shopping at the little stores along the way and stopped in at the church where Saint Francis was baptized. Then we met up with Dr. Lees to head back to the bus that would take us back to Perugia. Instead of going back down to the hill to the Basilica of Saint Francis and then taking a city bus to Saint Mary’s to get on the bus to Perugia, he took us back up THE REAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAALY STEEP HILL to the very top again to a bus station that he thought would have the buses back to Perugia, not only the city-wide buses at Saint Francis. We got there at 6 and the bus wasn’t going to come till 6:45 so we had some time wander and then sit after a REALLY long day of walking. Well.. when it was 6:40 and still no Perugia bus had gone by we realized that Dr. Lees had made a bit of a mistake. According to him a police officer had told him that the Perugia buses came to that bus stop, but apparently it was only a city-wide bus stop, and the last bus for Perugia left at 6:45. So we BOOKED IT back down the hill (there was a shorter, less steeper way up there that we discovered while we were wandering) to the Basilica and searched for any sign of a bus to Perugia. Dr. Lees finally found us some taxi vans that would take us back. I don’t particularly want to know how much that mistake cost us in bus tickets/taxi fair but it meant that we didn’t have to sleep on park benches in Assisi!

After a nice taxi-van ride back to Perugia we headed out to Lucy’s again for her 5 Euro buffet and celebrated Traci’s 21st birthday. Most of the festivities were postponed when we found out we were leaving at 7:45 the next morning for Orvieto! We plan to do a little celebrating tomorrow night after Orvieto!


The weather was mostly beautiful, and it only sprinkled a little while we were outside the Basilica. We even got warm enough after climbing the giant hill to get to the castle that we took our coats. Tomorrow we are praying for more good weather!
Chow!
Katelyn

---

Comments

[R.C.HAW]

I NEED A SHORT PROGRAM.
KATE, IF YOU ARE POSSIBLY IN IOWA ON JUNE 2ND [WED] I NEED A SHORT PROGRAM FOR ROTARY, LET ME KNOW IF THERE IS A REMOTE POSSIBILITY. LOVE YA' GP.HAW

[KatelynHaw]

I will be back in Iowa on June 2nd, what time of day would you need it? I work that morning, and then have class until 3:00 but if its at night I may be able to. What kind of a program where you thinking?