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Paradoxplace Italy Photo Pages
Lucca
Back to Paradoxplace Tuscan Photo Galleries
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The Duomo
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The Upper Facade sports two "knotted marble columns" where the four columns and knot have been carved out of a single block.
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A Poitou Romanesque moment - a horse and rider occupy a central spandrel slot on the cathedral's facade - here it is the French Saint St Martin of Tours doing his cloak splitting act. The Telamon figures are pure Romanesque - beast faces off against (or mates with) beast, tails entwined, and man embraces devil (?).
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Labours of the Months
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The Duomo facade incorporates 12 "labours of the month" bas relief panels with accompanying small Zodiac signs in the spandrels. The months read from right to left - starting with foot warming in January on the right of the photo above, and finishing with preparing a pig for Christmas Dinner on the left of the photo below. Before noticing these reliefs the Paradox had never heard of labour of the month / zodiac cycles, and what ensued is history. Interestingly the latter months of the year are spelt with an "-er" rather than "-re".
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Fishing in February (under Aries the ram and a one fish Pisces)
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Decanting wine in October (under Sagittarius the centaur archer and Scorpio the scorpion)
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The Basilica of San Michele
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The Basilica of San Michele - Two angel trumpeters proclaim Archangelo Michele killing a dragon, above a facade with 4 more knotted marble columns.
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San Frediano
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| more to come |
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Giacomo Puccini (Dec 1858 - Nov 1924 (65)) - genius son of Lucca and composer of La Boheme (1896), Tosca (1900), Madam Butterfly (1904), Turandot (not performed till after his death - 1926) et al, said that his favourite instrument was his shot gun - very country Tuscan!
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All original material on this site © Adrian Fletcher 2000-2013 - The contents may not be hotlinked, or reproduced without permission
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