Italian v4 TOTALe - Level 1, 2, 3, 4, & 5 Set - Windows/Macintosh° Ancona ° Bologna ° Catania ° Civitanova ° Como
° Firenze ° Florence ° Genoa ° Lucca ° Milan
° Modena ° Naples ° Palermo ° Prato
° Salerno ° Torino ° Venice ° Verona
In the 19th Century, Italy was one of the most overcrowded countries in Europe.
Many Italians began considering the possibility of leaving Italy to escape
low wages and high taxes. Most of these immigrants were from rural communities
with very little education. From 1890 to 1900, 655,888 arrived in the United
States, of whom two-thirds were men.1850 to 1930 is a significant period because this was a peak time for Italian
immigration to the United States. 17 million immigrants had their first contact
with the United States on Ellis Island. Many Italians who came to America
settled on the East Coast where they opened stores and restaurants featuring
foods from home, their neighborhoods often called "Little Italy."
This was also true of San Francisco, where the Italian community
established restaurants and farmer's markets in the North Beach area of the
City. They prospered. On October 31, 1854, the Cortes steamed into
San Francisco with Signora Barili Thorn, Miss P. Patti, and other members
of the Italian Opera Troupe. They made their first appearance in Ernani.
Madame Barili Thorn, assisted by Signora Becherini, Signs. Leonardi, Lanzoni,
Scola and Laglaise, performed the principal parts. Barili was enthusiastically
received, and the representation was highly successful.
Ancona
In
III and I centuries b.C. Romans went to the Marche area with an interest in
controlling the territory and opening access to the Adriatic. They built two
important roads -- Salaria and Flaminia -- which would connect Tyrrhenian
and Adriatic seas.
The city prospered under the Romans, and its harbor was enlarged (2d cent.
A.D.) by Emperor Trajan. In the 9th century , Ancona became a semi-independent
maritime republic under the nominal rule of the popes, to whose direct control
it passed in 1532.
The port of Ancona eventually became of one the most important seaside trading
centers facing the East, with commercial and cultural links with the Near
East . . . in addition to people and goods filling the quay along the shoreline,
early paintings show forests of masts.
For a long period of time the coastal region was threaten by the Saracen pirates.
Residents fled inland and growth slowed along the coastline.
Naples
Courier, April 1, 1822, London, Middlesex, United Kingdom
Mount Vesuvius, which had been for several months in a state of
total inaction, on Friday, the 22d February, showed signs of renewed
vigour; on the following night it was in a very great activity, and on
Sunday night (the 24th Feb.), the volcano exhibited a very grand
eruption. A broad stream of lava descended the cone, and seemed
to turn off in an angle, and run down the mountain towards Rosina
and Portici; the flames above the crater were lofty and continued;
an unremitting discharge of fiery masses, which were thrown up in
the air to a great height, issued from the mouth, and the groans of the
mountain were heard in Naples, like distant thunder. About ten
o'clock on that evening the view from the city was particularly striking
—the wide river of fire ran on in majestic slowness; innumerable pale
torches were seen coasting its sides, on which some bold and curious
persons seemed every now and then to be treading ; the flames were
reflected across the bay, and threw a strong glare on the buildings
and on the faces of thousands of spectators, who had gathered on
the Molo, Santa Lucia, and other open places, to gaze at the magnificent
conflagration.
On Monday (2Sib Feb.) the eruption was much less considerable;
in the evening, the Princess of Partano, the King's wife, ascended
to the hermitage of San Salvattore. On Tuesday (26th) loud rumbling
noises were heard in Naples, at very short intervals, during all the
day; the quantity of smoke which issued from the volcano was so great
that the sun was quite discoloured ; its reflex was of a murky red tint,
and the atmosphere was heavily clouded. Religious processions were
made in the little towns at the foot of the mountain, which have so
often suffered from their dangerous neighbour. Towards evening,
as appearances promised a good night's work, we sat off from Naples
to view the operations nearer; the road to Resina was covered with
people going and returning, like a fair; when we reached the
spot where strangers are, on common occasions surrounded by
guides, and asses and mules, to conduct them up the mountain, we
found that no animals were to be procured, and it was with difficulty
we could get a stupid old man for a cicerone, who rendered us no other
service than carrying a torch. The ascent was thronged with people,
some pushing on eagerly to the objects of their curiosity, and others
returning and discussing what they had seen; far below San Salvatore
we saw the stream of fire rolling along a wide hollow, and approaching
the path by which we were going up : it was then, however,
at a considerable distance, and its course was very slow. On reaching
the hermitage we refreshed ourselves as well as the crowd there
assembled could permit; we then continued, and for shortness
traversed the lava chiefly formed by the eruption of January, 1821;
we reached the foot of the cone just where the stream was descending; we found it about thirty feet wide; it was not liquid lava,
but composed of ashes, ignited stones, and old masses of volcanic
ejections, swept away in its course and heated again; these lumps
rolled over each other, producing a strange clinking noise; some of
them were of very great size, and the whole stream, though descending
a steep cone, moved but slowly.
Beyond this principal stream, midway u up the cone, was an opening, whence very large stones and other burning matter were continually thrust out ; this mouth fed a scattered stream, beyond which was another narrow stream, proceeding (like the principal one) from the crater; they both united with the main body in the deep hollow below, and rolled on towards the road which leads from Silesia up to the hermitage. The quantity of spectators standing by the sides of this burning river was astonishing: we, with great many of the more adventurous, determined to ascend the cone; we therefore passed a little to the left of the great stream, and began to scramble through the deep loose cinders and ashes which cover this part of the mountain, and render it at all times a most fatiguing climb. A little path or tract formerly existed, in which the guides hud laid masses of lava to facilitate the mounting, but it was just in that line that the present eruption descended, and we were in consequence obliged to go up over the sand and cinders in which we stuck up to our knees, and at every three steps lost one on an average. After a most breathing toil of an hour and a half, we found ourselves, with a few others, on the edge of the grand crater; hence the coup-d 'ail was terrifically sublime; the flames rushed out of the mouth and threw themselves in the air in a broad body to the elevation of at least a hundred feet, whilst many of the fiery stones flew up twice that height; the flames fell back into the mouth and then burst out again, as though impelled by a fresh impulse, like the blast of a bellows; in the descent some of the stones and lumps of cinder returned into the mouth, but the greater part fell outside of the flames like the jets of a fountain.
While we were standing on the exposed side of the crater, very intent in observation, all of a sudden the volcano gave a tremendous roar; it was like the crash of a long line of artillery, and was instantly succeeded by such a discharge of stones as we had never before seen, at the same moment the wind, which was very high, gave an irregular gust, which directed a good part of the stones towards where we were posted; our situation was for a minute or two very perilous, but there was no shelter near, and we stood still, looking at the descending shower which fell around us; we, however, happily sustained no other injury than a short alarm, and having some ashes dashed in our faces by stones which fell near us. Two or three gentlemen who were ascending the cone after us, were not quite so fortunate, for many of the stones failing outside of the ridge, rolled down the side with great velocity, loosening and carrying with them lumps of cold lava, & c , some of which struck those persons on the legs with great violence, and nearly precipitated one of them headlong to the foot of the cone.
After this, we thought we had seen enough, and turned to go down; the descent is as easy as the ascent is difficult; the cinders and ashes slide away beneath the feet; nothing is necessary but to step out (the quicker the better) to keep one's equilibrium and to avoid the fixed or large stones and pieces of lava—we were not more than ten minutes in reaching the point, whence it had taken us an hour and a half to mount. In coming down we were struck with the strange appearance of the torches of companies ascending and descending; they formed a pale wavering line from Resina to the hermitage, and thence to the cone they were scattered about in thick and fantastic groups. On reaching the hermitage we found it so crowded that we could not enter; the large flat around was covered like a crowded fair by people of all nations and of all ranks from the beautiful and accomplished Countess of Fiquelmont, wife of the Austrian Ambassador, to the Austrian sergeant and his wife who bad come to see the blasting mountain; numbers of people had come from the towns and villages below with bread and wine, and fruit and aqua-vita, all of which articles seemed in very great demand. The motley scene was light by the bright silvery moon, and the red towering flames at the summit of the volcano.
We took some slight refreshment, and repaired homewards in the midst of as gay groups as ever returned from scenes of festivity and joy. When we got lower down, we found that the lava had approached very near to the road, and had already seized upon a fine vineyard, which was blazing very brilliantly. After our retreat, we learned that the lava traversed the road. On Wednesday, the 27th, the eruption was in a great measure; tranquillized; still, however, crowds of people continued going up the mountain, and an Austrian Officer, who bad come from Capua to see it, was unfortunately killed on the ridge of the cone, by a large stone striking him on his head. On Thursday scarcely anything but smoke issued from the crater, and it has continued in this peaceful state ever since.
The news of the eruption reaching Rome, induced crowds of Englishmen to set off immediately for Naples; on Saturday and Sunday above 20 carriages arrived here, where, to the no small mortification of the travellers, all the business was finished.
Venice
As Goths and Ostrogoths drove through Italy in the 5th and 6th centuries,
the people of Veneto took shelter on the islands off their coast, then began
building houses on the lagoon-like islands, developing the boats known as
gondolas in the process. From these desperate beginnings, Venice grew to become
a great maritime power, both in terms of military might and in its commercial
trading with Byzantium and Constantinople.
The Venetians participated in—and profited off of—the Crusades by supporting
both sides in trade. The city finally defeated its main competitor, Genoa,
in 1381.
Venice reached the height of its power in the 15th century, but declined after
the 16th century. At its height, it controlled much of what is now Greece,
as well as a large chunk of Italy. However, plagues fostered by the stagnant
water greatly hurt the city and eventually led to its downfall. The Turks
took advantage of this weakness by encroaching on the Venetian empire gradually,
by way of its Grecian territories. Also, when the Portuguese discovered the
Cape Route to India and the East, Venice's shipping monopoly was rendered
far less relevant. Venice fell to Napoleon in 1797, and eventually became
part of the unified Italy in 1866.
This study digs deeply into an "other" slavery, the bondage of Europeans by north-African Muslims that flourished during the same centuries as the heyday of the trans-Atlantic trade from sub-Saharan Africa to the Americas. Here are explored--perhaps for the first time--the actual extent of Barbary Coast slavery, the dynamic relationship between master and slave, and the effects of this slaving on Italy, one of the slave takers' primary targets and victims.
