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Concentrating Solar Power Technology
Woodhead Publishing Series in Energy

Concentrating Solar
Power Technology
Principles, Developments,
and Applications

Second Edition

Edited by
Keith Lovegrove
Managing Director, ITP Thermal Pty Ltd, ITP Energised Group, Canberra,
Australia

Wes Stein
Chief Research Scientist, Energy, CSIRO, Newcastle, NSW, Australia

An imprint of Elsevier
Woodhead Publishing is an imprint of Elsevier
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This book and the individual contributions contained in it are protected under copyright by the
Publisher (other than as may be noted herein).

Notices
Knowledge and best practice in this field are constantly changing. As new research and experience
broaden our understanding, changes in research methods, professional practices, or medical
treatment may become necessary.
Practitioners and researchers must always rely on their own experience and knowledge in evaluating
and using any information, methods, compounds, or experiments described herein. In using such
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including parties for whom they have a professional responsibility.
To the fullest extent of the law, neither the Publisher nor the authors, contributors, or editors,
assume any liability for any injury and/or damage to persons or property as a matter of products
liability, negligence or otherwise, or from any use or operation of any methods, products,
instructions, or ideas contained in the material herein.

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A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress
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ISBN: 978-0-12-819970-1 (print)
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Author bio

(* ¼ main contact)

Primary editor and Chapters 1* and 2*

Dr. Keith Lovegrove is the managing direc-

tor of ITP Thermal Pty Ltd, which leads work
on solar thermal and hydrogen energy sys-
tems within the ITP Energised group of com-
panies. He has over 30 years of experience in
renewable energy combined with 15 years of
teaching experience in undergraduate and
postgraduate courses in energy systems and
systems engineering. He was previously the
leader of the Solar Thermal Group at the Aus-
tralian National University. In that role, he
was the lead inventor and design and con-
struction team leader of the 500m2 Genera-
tion II Big Dish solar concentrator,
recognized with a Light Weight Structures Association of Australia, 2009
design award and a 2011 citation from the Institute of Engineers Australia
ACT Engineering Excellence awards. Keith is currently a member of the Uni-
versity of Adelaide’s Centre for Energy Technology advisory board, the Aus-
tralian Renewable Energy Agency’s Advisory Panel, the Australian Solar
Thermal Energy Association board, and chair of the Australian Solar Thermal
Research Institute steering committee.
Keith Lovegrove
ITP Thermal Pty Ltd
ITP Energised Group
Canberra
ACT, Australia
E-mail: [email protected]

xix
xx Author bio

Editor and Chapter 1

Wes Stein is a Chief Research Scientist for

Solar Technologies at CSIRO. He has been
active in CSP research for over 25 years
and was instrumental in establishing the
National Solar Energy Centre at CSIRO,
including building Australia’s first solar
tower. He is also a Chief Technologist for
the Australian Solar Thermal Research
Institute where he leads the development of
strategies and technologies for the next gen-
eration of CSP. Prior to CSIRO, he worked in
the power industry for 20 years in power
station operation and design, as well as
investigating and developing new energy
technologies for utilities. Wes represents Australia on the International Energy
Agency’s Solar PACES Executive Committee, the predominant CSP
international body.
Wes Stein
CSIRO Energy
Newcastle
Australia
E-mail: [email protected]

Chapter 2
John Pye is a researcher in the Australian
National University Solar Thermal Group
and also lectures in the Department of
Engineering.
John Pye
Research School of Electrical
Energy and Materials Engineering
Australian National University
Canberra
ACT
Australia
E-mail: [email protected]
 Author bio xxi

Chapter 3

Richard Meyer is co-founder and managing

director of Germany-based Suntrace. From
2006 to 2009, he headed the technical analy-
sis and energy yield teams of Epuron and
SunTechnics. From 1996 to 2006, Richard
worked for DLR (German Aerospace Cen-
ter), where he set up the satellite-based ser-
vices SOLEMI and DLR-ISIS for
analyzing the potential for CSP. He co-
founded the IEA Task ‘Solar Resource
Knowledge Management’, for which he is
the representative to the SolarPACES Exec-
utive Commitee. Dr Richard Meyer holds a
diploma in geophysics and a PhD in physics
from Munich University.

Kaushal Chhatbar is a solar energy profes-

sional with 9 + years of international experi-
ence in solar energy business with rich
experience in project development of solar
concentrating technologies and photovoltaics
(PV). He now focuses on solar PV – diesel
hybrid power plants with/without electrical
energy storage and rooftop solar PV plants.
Kaushal is a mechanical engineer with a
Master’s degree in Renewable Energies from
University of Oldenburg, Germany. During
his master’s, he did his thesis on resource
assessment for solar power plants, especially
concentrating solar power plants (CSP) and
its impact on their yield. Kaushal has hands on experience in the installation
and maintenance of solar radiometers and has published several research papers
on this topic.
xxii Author bio

Simon Weber is a data analyst of Germany-

based Suntrace. He has a Diploma (MSc) in
Geophysics and is specialized in remote
sensing. Applied to the field of large scale
solar, he has contributed to various projects
across the globe. For the highly specialized
expert advisory firm Suntrace, he is conduct-
ing the assessment of solar resource for CSP
and PV projects. Furthermore, Simon man-
ages and carries out on-site solar measure-
ment campaigns.
Richard Meyer∗, Martin Schlecht,
Kaushal Chhatbar, and Simon Weber
Technology & Innovation
Suntrace GmbH
Hamburg
Germany
E-mail: [email protected]

Chapter 4

Martin Schlecht is co-founder and manag-

ing director of Germany-based Suntrace, a
highly specialized expert advisory firm in
large scale solar. His responsibilities include
the assessment of CSP and PV project sites
and their feasibility. He has a Diploma
(MSc) in mechanical engineering and more
than 15 years’ work experience in the power
industry, covering fossil-fired, concentrating
solar thermal and photovoltaic, including
international hands-on project development
and project implementation.
Richard Meyer and Martin Schlecht∗
Technology & Innovation
Suntrace GmbH
Hamburg
Germany
E-mail: [email protected]
 Author bio xxiii

Chapter 5
Natalia Cald
es, graduate in economics and
business administration from the Universi-
dad Pompeu Fabra of Barcelona, MsC in
applied economics from the University of
Wisconsin-Madison, and PhD in agricultural
and natural resources economics from the
Universidad Polit
ecnica de Madrid, Spain.
Working in CIEMAT since 2004, her
research focuses on energy policy as well
as socio-economic and environmental
impact assessment of energy projects. She
has participated in several European Com-
mission and National research projects
focusing on renewable energy cooperation policies as well as externalities of
power generation technologies. From 2012 to 2015, she coordinated the EU
funded project BETTER which aims at assessing the opportunities and barriers
associated to renewable energy cooperation between Europe and neighbouring
countries.
Before joining CIEMAT, she worked in the field of development economics
for various United Nations Agencies as well as for the International Food Policy
Research Institute in Washington DC (https://www.ifpri.org). Among other
tasks, she was involved in the impact evaluation of various poverty reduction
programs in Latin America and Africa. Prior to that, she also worked as a trade
analyst for the Spanish Commercial Office in Sydney, Australia.
In her free time, volunteers at Energı́a Sin Fronteras (ESF), a foundation that
supports rural electrification and water projects in less developed countries.
You may visit ESF web page at http://www.energiasinfronteras.org/.

Yolanda Lechón, PhD in agricultural engi-

neering for the Polytechnic University of
Madrid, she is the Head of the Energy Sys-
tem Analysis Unit of Energy since 2013.
Her main research activities have been
focused in the economic evaluation of the
external costs and benefits associated to
the production and consumption of energy,
the application of the ExternE methodology
to the evaluation of externalities of energy
and transport, Life Cycle Sustainability
Assessment of energy technologies and pro-
cesses with special focus on biomass,
xxiv Author bio

biofuels and solar thermal technologies, environmentally and socially extended

economic input output modelling to evaluate socioeconomic and environmental
effects of energy technologies and energy system modelling using techno eco-
nomic partial equilibrium optimization models.
She has participated in several European Commission and National research
projects and has participated as evaluator in several international R&D pro-
grammes and is co-author of more than 80 papers and book chapters and more
than 60 contributions to conferences and workshops.
Natalia Cald
es∗ and Yolanda Lechón
Energy System Analysis Unit
Energy Department
CIEMAT
Madrid
Spain
E-mail: [email protected]; [email protected]

Chapter 6

Prof. Dr. Werner J. Platzer is a physicist

and received his PhD from the Albert-Lud-
wigs-University Freiburg in 1988 on the
material optimization of transparent insula-
tion. He has been working for more than
30 years for Fraunhofer ISE in Germany in
R&D of solar thermal energy, facade tech-
nology, and energy efficiency in buildings.
Since more than 15 years however his focus
is on concentrating solar thermal technology
for process heat and power. Being Professor
at the Faculty for Environment and Sustain-
ability, University of Freiburg he teaches and
supervises Master and PhD students. He is
chairman of IEC TC 117 on the standardiza-
tion for solar thermal electricity (CSP) and has been actively involved in many
European and international projects on CSP and Solar Process Heat. He has
authored more than 200 articles and conference papers.
 Author bio xxv

David Mills has worked in non-imaging

optics and solar concentrating systems from
1976. At the University of Sydney, he ran the
project that created the double cermet selec-
tive absorber coating now used widely on
solar evacuated tubes and developed the
CLFR concept. He was Cofounder, Chair-
man and CSO of both SHP P/L and Ausra
Inc. (later Areva Solar). He has been Presi-
dent of ISES (1997–99), first Chair of the
International Solar Cities Initiative, and
VESKI Entrepreneur in Residence for the
State of Victoria (2009).

Wilson Gardner is a mechanical engineer

from the University of Newcastle, NSW.
He is a research engineer and project leader
at CSIRO’s Division of Energy Technology
with 25 years of experience. In 2008 he
joined the lead team of the Australian opera-
tions of Ausra Pty Ltd (part of Ausra, Inc.,
formerly Solar Heat and Power), which then
became Areva Solar and he helped further
develop the CLFR technology and commis-
sioned the first CLFR system to be connected
to the grid via saturated steam to Liddell
power station in 2009. From 2012 he has been responsible for the engineering
design of various high-temperature solar thermal receiver systems and project
delivery of those systems at CSIRO. He has authored and coauthored several
conference papers and scientific publications on solar thermal energy systems.
Werner J. Platzer∗
Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems ISE
Freiburg im Breisgau
Germany
E-mail: [email protected]

David Mills
Formerly Ausra Inc
Mountain View
CA
United States
Wilson Gardner
CSIRO National Solar Energy Centre—Solar Thermal Technologies
Newcastle
Australia
E-mail: [email protected]
xxvi Author bio

Chapter 7

Eduardo Zarza Moya, Industrial Engineer

with a PhD, born in 1958. At present he is
the R&D Technical Coordinator at the Plata-
forma Solar de Almerı́a. He has an experi-
ence of 34 years with solar concentrating
systems, and he has been the Director of
national and International R&D projects
related to solar energy and parabolic trough
collectors. He participated in the elaboration
of the Implementation Plan for the Strategic
Energy Technology (SET) Plan for Concen-
trated Solar Power (CSP). Member of the
Scientific and Technical Committee of
ESTELA (European Solar Thermal Electric-
ity Association) and Spanish representative
at the SolarPACES Executive Committee.
Eduardo Zarza Moya
CIEMAT—Plataforma Solar de Almerı́a
Almerı́a
Spain
E-mail: [email protected]
 Author bio xxvii

Chapter 8

Lorin L. Vant-Hull (BS in Physics, Univer-

sity of Minnesota, 1954; MS, UCLA, 1956;
PhD, California Institute of Technology,
1960–67: thesis in Low Temperature Phys-
ics) has been involved in Concentrating
Solar Energy since 1972. He joined the
Physics Department at the University of
Houston in 1969 and became a Full Profes-
sor of Physics in 1973, the year he received
NSF (RANN) funding for the first feasibility
study of the Central Receiver concept,
“Solar Thermal Power Systems Based on
Optical Transmission”. This study, with MacDonnell Douglas Astronautics
as a subcontractor, led directly to the design and construction and successful
operation of the concentrating central receiver pilot/demonstration plants, Solar
One (water-steam) converted later to Solar Two (molten salt) as 10 MWe grid
connected plants. The computer codes developed under his direction to solve
the design, optimization, layout, and performance issues at these plants have
been used in many studies funded by DOE, NREL, SANDIA, and many major
engineering firms in the development of central receiver plant designs around
the world. He was a member of the joint US-Russia solar specialists team, spent
an eight month sabbatical at the L-M University in Munich and a three month
term as a Visiting Scientist at CSIRO, Australia. He served for 44 years as an
Associate Editor and Reviewer for the Journal of Solar Energy, and has been on
the board of TXSES, ASES, and ISES. He retired from the University as a Pro-
fessor Emeritus of Physics in 2001, but has continued as a consultant.
Lorin L. Vant-Hull
Emeritus Professor of Physics University of Houston
Houston
TX
United States
E-mail: [email protected]
xxviii Author bio

Chapter 9

Wolfgang Schiel, Diplom Physicist, born in

1948 in Hamburg, has over 30 years’ experi-
ence in solar engineering of Dish/Stirling
systems, Parabolic Trough collectors, and
the Solar Updraft Tower. After his degree
at the University of Hamburg he worked
with the German Aerospace Research Estab-
lishment in Stuttgart. In 1988 he joined
schlaich bergermann und partner and
became Managing Director of sbp sonne
gmbh in 2009.

Thomas Keck, Mechanical Engineer, born in

1959 in Stuttgart, joined schlaich bergermann
und partner in 1988 and works as design engi-
neer and project manager for Dish/Stirling
systems, Heliostats, and PV trackers.
Wolfgang Schiel and Thomas Keck∗
schlaich bergermann partner (sbp)
Stuttgart
Germany
E-mail: [email protected]; [email protected]

Chapter 10
Steve Horne is Co-Founder and Chief Tech-
nical Officer at SolFocus. He began design-
ing the concept of SolFocus’ CPV solar
technology in 2005. Before co-founding Sol-
Focus, Steve was the Director of Engineering
at GuideTech, a leading semiconductor test
equipment company, and had previously
spent 6 years running a technology consult-
ing firm Tuross Technology. He served as
Vice President of Engineering at Ariel Elec-
tronics and his early career experience
includes commissioning two 500 MW steam
generated power plants in New South Wales,
Australia.
 Author bio xxix

Dr John Lasich is founder and Director of

RayGen Resources Pty Ltd which develops,
manufactures, and deploys the companies’
world leading solar cogeneration technol-
ogy, producing heat and dispatchable
power for industrial and utility
applications.
John has 35 years in the ‘mainstream’
and ‘renewable’ energy sectors including
10 years in the petrochemical, manufactur-
ing, and power industries before entering
the solar industry. He has held the position
of CTO for some 20 years creating new
solar technology and winning several Engi-
neering Excellence awards. His experience
also includes automated solar module production along with design, construc-
tion, and operation of significant energy projects in Australia and
internationally.
John holds a PhD degree in solar energy. As a pioneer in the technology, he
has been awarded many patents and been an invited speaker at international
conferences, publishing several ‘World Firsts’ including a world record system
efficiency of 40.4% in collaboration with UNSW. John is a member of the Inter-
national Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) standards committee. Recently he
received the Distinguished Alumnus award from Victoria University for his
contribution to the solar industry and accepted the Governors’ ‘Export Innova-
tion’ award for ground-breaking exports to China.
Steve Horne
SolFocus Inc.
Victorville
CA
United States
E-mail: [email protected]

John Lasich∗
Raygen Resources Pty Ltd
Nunawading
VIC
Australia
E-mail: [email protected]
xxx Author bio

Chapter 11

Wolf-Dieter Steinmann has been working

at the German Aerospace Center (DLR)
since 1994 and is working in the area of
medium and high temperature heat storages
for applications in power plants and process
industry. He was project manager of the DIS-
TOR, PROSPER, and NextPCM projects
dealing with the development of latent heat
storages and of the CellFlux project aiming
at new concepts for sensible heat storage.
He completed his PhD thesis on solar steam
generators and has worked on the simulation
and analysis of the dynamics of thermody-
namic systems.
Wolf-Dieter Steinmann
German Aerospace Center (DLR)
Institute of Engineering Thermodynamics
Stuttgart
Germany
E-mail: [email protected]

Chapter 12

Prof. HongGuang Jin is academician of

Chinese Academy of Sciences; professor
and director of Laboratory of Distributed
Energy System and Renewable Energy, Insti-
tute of Engineering Thermophysics, Chinese
Academy of Sciences (CAS); and president
of Chinese Society of Engineering Thermo-
physics. He received his Ph.D. degree at
Tokyo Institute of Technology, Japan in
1994. His experience and related research
background are in the fields of thermophy-
sics, chemical engineering, simulation of
energy conversion processes, analysis energy
systems, system synthesis for polygeneration
system, demonstration of CCHP, and solar thermal power plants. He is the princi-
pal inventor of a novel power system with chemical looping combustion for CO2
capture. He has received National Natural Science Award.
Discovering Diverse Content Through
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fortresses, keeping watch and ward over the merchant city. These,
of course, are of modern date; but some of them have been
reconstructed on the ancient sites, and still encrust, as can be seen
at a glance, towers and walls which did their duty in the olden times.
For a season, indeed, there was more to be protected than
merchandise, for, till lately, Genoa was the principal arsenal of the
Italian kingdom; but this has now been removed to Spezzia. Italy,
however, does not seem to feel much confidence in that immunity
from plunder which has been sometimes accorded to “open towns,”
or in the platitudes of peace-mongers; and appears to take ample
precautions that an enemy in command of the sea shall not thrust
his hand into a full purse without a good chance of getting nothing
better than crushed fingers.
But in the lower town we are still in the Genoa of the olden time.
There is not, indeed, very much to recall the city of the more strictly
mediæval epoch; though two churches date from days before the
so-called “Renaissance,” and are good examples of its work. Most of
what we now see belongs to the Genoa of the sixteenth century; or,
at any rate, is but little anterior in age to this. The lower town,
however, even where its buildings are comparatively modern, still
retains in plan—in its narrow, sometimes irregular, streets; in its yet
narrower alleys, leading by flights of steps up the steep hill side; in
its crowded, lofty houses; in its “huddled up” aspect, for perhaps no
single term can better express our meaning—the characteristics of
an ancient Italian town. In its streets even the summer sun—let the
proverb concerning the absence of the sun and the presence of the
doctor say what it may—can seldom scorch, and the bitter north
wind loses its force among the maze of buildings. Open spaces of
any kind are rare; the streets, in consequence of their narrowness,
are unusually thronged, and thus produce the idea of a teeming
population; which, indeed, owing to the general loftiness of the
houses, is large in proportion to the area. They are accordingly ill-
adapted for the requirements of modern traffic.
Genoa, like Venice, is noted for its palazzi—for the sumptuous
dwellings inhabited by the burgher aristocracy of earlier days, which
are still, in not a few cases, in possession of their descendants. But
in style and in position nothing can be more different. We do not
refer to the obvious distinction that in the one city the highway is
water, in the other it is dry land; or to the fact that buildings in the
so-called Gothic style are common in Venice, but are not to be found
among the mansions of Genoa. It is rather to this, that the Via
Nuova, which in this respect holds the same place in Genoa as the
Grand Canal does in Venice, is such a complete contrast to it, that
they must be compared by their opposites. The latter is a broad and
magnificent highway, affording a full view and a comprehensive
survey of the stately buildings which rise from its margin. The
former is a narrow street, corresponding in dimensions with one of
the less important among the side canals in the other city. It is thus
almost impossible to obtain any good idea of the façade of the
Genoese palazzi. The passing traveller has about as much chance of
doing this as he would have of studying the architecture of Mincing
Lane; and even if he could discover a quiet time, like Sunday
morning in the City, he would still have to strain his neck by staring
upwards at the overhanging mass of masonry, and find a complete
view of any one building almost impossible. But so far as these
palazzi can be seen, how far do they repay examination? It is a
common-place with travellers to expatiate on the magnificence of
the Via Nuova, and one or two other streets in Genoa. There is an
imposing magniloquence in the word palazzo, and a “street of
palaces” is a formula which impels many minds to render instant
homage.
But, speaking for myself, I must own to being no great admirer of
this part of Genoa; to me the design of these palazzi appears often
heavy and oppressive. They are sumptuous rather than dignified,
and impress one more with the length of the purse at the architect’s
command than with the quality of his genius or the fecundity of his
conceptions. No doubt there are some fine buildings—the Palazzo
Spinola, the Palazzo Doria Tursi, the Palazzo del’ Universita, and the
Palazzo Balbi, are among those most generally praised. But if I must
tell the plain, unvarnished truth, I never felt and never shall feel
much enthusiasm for the “city of palaces.” It has been some relief to
me to find that I am not alone in this heresy, as it will appear to
some. For on turning to the pages of Fergusson,[1] immediately after
penning the above confession, I read for the first time the following
passage (and it must be admitted that, though not free from
occasional “cranks” as to archæological questions, he was a critic of
extensive knowledge and no mean authority):—“When Venice
adopted the Renaissance style, she used it with an aristocratic
elegance that relieves even its most fantastic forms in the worst age.
In Genoa there is a pretentious parvenu vulgarity, which offends in
spite of considerable architectural merit. Their size, their grandeur,
and their grouping may force us to admire the palaces of Genoa; but
for real beauty or architectural propriety of design they will not stand
a moment’s comparison with the contemporary or earlier palaces of
Florence, Rome, or Venice.” Farther on he adds very truly, after
glancing at the rather illegitimate device by which the façades have
been rendered more effective by the use of paint, instead of natural
color in the materials employed, as in the older buildings of Venice,
he adds:—“By far the most beautiful feature of the greater palaces
of Genoa is their courtyards” (a feature obviously which can only
make its full appeal to a comparatively limited number of visitors),
“though these, architecturally, consist of nothing but ranges of
arcades, resting on attenuated Doric pillars. These are generally of
marble, sometimes grouped in pairs, and too frequently with a block
of an entablature over each, under the springing of the arch; but
notwithstanding these defects, a cloistered court is always and
inevitably pleasing, and if combined with gardens and scenery
beyond, which is generally the case in this city, the effect, as seen
from the streets, is so poetic as to disarm criticism. All that dare be
said is that, beautiful as they are, with a little more taste and
judgment they might have been ten times more so than they are
now.”
Several of these palazzi contain pictures and art-collections of
considerable value, and the interest of those has perhaps enhanced
the admiration which they have excited in visitors. One of the most
noteworthy is the Palazzo Brignole Sale, commonly called the
Palazzo Rosso, because its exterior is painted red. This has now
become a memorial of the munificence of its former owner, the
Duchess of Galliera, a member of the Brignole Sale family, who, with
the consent of her husband and relations, in the year 1874
presented this palace and its contents to the city of Genoa, with a
revenue sufficient for its maintenance. The Palazzo Reale, in the Via
Balbi, is one of those where the garden adds a charm to an
otherwise not very striking, though large, edifice. This, formerly the
property of the Durazzo family, was purchased by Charles Albert,
King of Sardinia, and has thus become a royal residence. The
Palazzo Ducale, once inhabited by the Doges of Genoa, has now
been converted into public offices, and the palazzo opposite to the
Church of St. Matteo bears an inscription which of itself gives the
building an exceptional interest: “Senat. Cons. Andreæ de Oria,
patriæ liberatori, munus publicum.” It is this, the earlier home of the
great citizen of Genoa, of which Rogers has written in the often-
quoted lines:—
“He left it for a better; and ’tis now
A house of trade, the meanest merchandise
Cumbering its floors. Yet, fallen as it is,
’Tis still the noblest dwelling—even in Genoa!
And hadst thou, Andrea, lived there to the last,
Thou hadst done well: for there is that without,
That in the wall, which monarchs could not give
Nor thou take with thee—that which says aloud,
It was thy country’s gift to her deliverer!”
The great statesman lies in the neighboring church, with other
members of his family, and over the high altar hangs the sword
which was given to him by the Pope. The church was greatly altered
—embellished it was doubtless supposed—by Doria himself; but the
old cloisters, dating from the earliest part of the fourteenth century,
still remain intact. The grander palazzo which he erected, as an
inscription outside still informs us, was in a more open, and
doubtless then more attractive, part of the city. In the days of Doria
it stood in ample gardens, which extended on one side down to a
terrace overlooking the harbor, on the other some distance up the
hillside. From the back of the palace an elaborate structure of
ascending flight of steps in stone led up to a white marble colossal
statue of Hercules, which from this elevated position seemed to keep
watch over the home of the Dorias and the port of Genoa. All this is
sadly changed; the admiral would now find little pleasure in his once
stately home. It occupies a kind of peninsula between two streams
of twentieth-century civilization. Between the terrace wall and the
sea the railway connecting the harbor with the main line has
intervened, with its iron tracks, its sheds, and its shunting-places—a
dreary unsightly outlook, for the adjuncts of a terminus are usually
among the most ugly appendages of civilization. The terraced
staircase on the opposite side of the palace has been swept away by
the main line of the railway, which passes within a few yards of its
façade, thus severing the gardens and isolating the shrine of
Hercules, who looks down forlornly on the result of labors which
even he might have deemed arduous, while snorting, squealing
engines pass and repass—beasts which to him would have seemed
more formidable than Lernæan hydra or Nemaean lion.
The palace follows the usual Genoese rule of turning the better side
inwards, and offering the less attractive to the world at large. The
landward side, which borders a narrow street, and thus, one would
conjecture, must from the first have been connected with the upper
gardens by a bridge, or underground passage, is plain, almost
heavy, in its design, but it does not rise to so great an elevation as is
customary with the palazzi in the heart of the city. The side which is
turned towards the sea is a much more attractive composition, for it
is associated with the usual cloister of loggia which occupies three
sides of an oblong. This, as the ground slopes seaward, though on
the level of the street outside, stands upon a basement story, and
communicates by flights of steps with the lower gardens. The latter
are comparatively small, and in no way remarkable; but in the days
—not so very distant—when their terraces looked down upon the
Mediterranean, when the city and its trade were on a smaller scale,
when the picturesque side of labor had not yet been extruded by the
dust and grime of over-much toil, no place in Genoa could have
been more pleasant for the evening stroll, or for dreamy repose in
some shaded nook during the heat of the day. The palazzo itself
shows signs of neglect—the family, I believe, have for some time
past ceased to use it for a residence; two or three rooms are still
retained in their original condition, but the greater part of the
building is let off. In the corridor, near the entrance, members of the
Doria family, dressed in classic garb, in conformity with the taste
which prevailed in the sixteenth century, are depicted in fresco upon
the walls. On the roof of the grand saloon Jupiter is engaged in
overthrowing the Titans. These frescoes are the work of Perini del
Vaga, a pupil of Raphael. The great admiral, the builder of the
palace, is represented among the figures in the corridor, and by an
oil painting in the saloon, which contains some remains of
sumptuous furniture and a few ornaments of interest. He was a
burly man, with a grave, square, powerful face, such a one as often
looks out at us from the canvas of Titian or of Tintoret—a man of
kindly nature, but masterful withal; cautious and thoughtful, but a
man of action more than of the schools or of the library; one little
likely to be swayed by passing impulse or transient emotion, but
clear and firm of purpose, who meant to attain his end were it in
mortal to command success, and could watch and wait for the time.
Such men, if one may trust portraits and trust history, were not
uncommon in the great epoch when Europe was shaking itself free
from the fetters of mediæval influences, and was enlarging its
mental no less than its physical horizon. Such men are the makers of
nations, and not only of their own fortunes; they become rarer in the
days of frothy stump oratory and hysteric sentiment, when a people
babbles as it sinks into senile decrepitude.
Andrea Doria himself—“Il principe” as he was styled—had a long and
in some respects a checkered career. In his earlier life he obtained
distinction as a successful naval commander, and in the curious
complications which prevailed in those days among the Italian States
and their neighbors ultimately became Admiral of the French fleet.
But he found that Genoa would obtain little good from the French
King, who was then practically its master; so he transferred his
allegiance to the Emperor Charles, and by his aid expelled from his
native city the troops with which he had formerly served. So great
was his influence in Genoa that he might easily have obtained
supreme power; but at this, like a true patriot, he did not grasp, and
the Constitution, which was adopted under his influence, gradually
put an end to the bitter party strife which had for so long been the
plague of Genoa, and it remained in force until the French
Revolution. Still, notwithstanding the gratitude generally felt for his
great services to the State, he experienced in his long life—for he
died at the age of ninety-two—the changefulness of human affairs.
He had no son, and his heir and grand-nephew—a young man—was
unpopular, and, as is often the case, the sapling was altogether
inferior in character to the withering tree. The members of another
great family—the Fieschi—entered into a conspiracy, and collected a
body of armed men on the pretext of an expedition against the
corsairs who for so long were the pests of the Mediterranean. The
outbreak was well planned; on New Year’s night, in the year 1547,
the chief posts in the city were seized. Doria himself was just
warned in time, and escaped capture; but his heir was assassinated,
and his enemies seemed to have triumphed. But their success was
changed to failure by an accident. Count Fiescho in passing along a
plank to a galley in the harbor made a false step, and fell into the
sea. In those days the wearing of armor added to the perils of the
deep; the count sank like a stone, and so left the conspirators
without a leader exactly at the most critical moment. They were thus
before long defeated and dispersed, and had to experience the truth
of the proverb, “Who breaks pays,” for in those days men felt little
sentimental tenderness for leaders of sedition and disturbers of the
established order. The Fieschi were exiled, and their palace was
razed to the ground. So the old admiral returned to his home and his
terrace-walk overlooking the sea, until at last his long life ended, and
they buried him with his fathers in the Church of S. Matteo.
Not far from the Doria Palace is the memorial to another admiral, of
fame more world-wide than that of Doria. In the open space before
the railway station—a building, a façade of which is not without
architectural merit—rises a handsome monument in honor of
Christopher Columbus. He was not strictly a native of the city, but he
was certainly born on Genoese soil, and, as it seems to be now
agreed, at Cogoleto, a small village a few miles west of the city. He
was not, however, able to convince the leaders of his own State that
there were wide parts of the world yet to be discovered; and it is a
well-known story how for a long time he preached to deaf ears, and
found, like most heralds of startling physical facts, his most obstinate
opponents among the ecclesiastics of his day. Spain at last, after
Genoa and Portugal and England had all refused, placed Columbus
in command of a voyage of discovery; and on Spanish ground also—
in neglect and comparative poverty, worn out by toil and anxieties—
the great explorer ended his checkered career. Genoa, however,
though inattentive to the comparatively obscure enthusiast, has not
failed to pay honor to the successful discoverer; and is glad to catch
some reflected light from the splendor of successes to the aid of
which she did not contribute. In this respect, however, the rest of
the world cannot take up their parable at her; men generally find
that on the whole it is less expensive, and certainly less
troublesome, to build the tombs of the prophets, instead of honoring
them while alive; then, indeed, whether bread be asked or no, a
stone is often given. So now the effigy of Columbus stands on high
among exotic plants, where all the world can see, for it is the first
thing encountered by the traveller as he quits the railway station.
One of the most characteristic—if not one of the sweetest—places in
Genoa is the long street, which, under more than one name,
intervenes between the last row of houses in the town and the
harbor. From the latter it is, indeed, divided by a line of offices and
arched halls; these are covered by a terrace-roof and serve various
purposes more or less directly connected with the shipping. The
front walls of houses which rise high on the landward side are
supported by rude arches. Thus, as is so common in Italian towns,
there is a broad foot-walk, protected alike from sun and rain,
replacing the “ground-floor front,” with dark shops at the back, and
stalls, for the sale of all sorts of odds and ends, pitched in the
spaces between the arches. In many towns these arcades are often
among the most ornamental features; but in Genoa, though not
without a certain quaintness, they are so rude in design and
construction that they hardly deserve this title. The old Dogana, one
of the buildings in the street, gives a good idea of the commercial
part of Genoa before the days of steam, and has a considerable
interest of its own. In the first place, it is a standing memorial of the
bitter feud between Genoa and Venice, for it is built with the stones
of a castle which, being captured by the one from the other, was
pulled down and shipped to Genoa in the year 1262. Again, within
its walls was the Banca di San Georgio, which had its origin in a
municipal debt incurred in order to equip an expedition to stop the
forays of a family named Grimaldi, who had formed a sort of Cave of
Adullam at Monaco. The institution afterwards prospered, and held
in trust most of the funds for charitable purposes, till “the French
passed their sponge over the accounts, and ruined all the individuals
in the community.” It has also an indirect connection with English
history, for on the defeat of the Grimaldi many of their retainers
entered the service of France, and were the Genoese bowmen who
fought at Cressy. Lastly, against its walls the captured chains of the
harbor of Pisa were suspended for nearly six centuries, for they were
only restored to their former owners a comparatively few years
since.
Turning up from this part of the city we thread narrow streets, in
which many of the principal shops are still located. We pass, in a
busy piazza, the Loggia dei Banchi Borsa—the old exchange—a
quaint structure of the end of the sixteenth century, standing on a
raised platform; and proceed from it into the Via degli Orefici—a
street just like one of the lanes which lead from Cheapside to
Cannon Street, if, indeed, it be not still narrower, but full of tempting
shops. Genoa is noted for its work in coral and precious metals, but
the most characteristic, as all visitors know, is a kind of filigree work
in gold or silver, which is often of great delicacy and beauty, and is
by no means so costly as might be anticipated from the elaborate
workmanship.
The most notable building in Genoa, anterior to the days when the
architecture of the Renaissance was in favor, is the cathedral, which
is dedicated to S. Lorenzo. The western façade, which is approached
by a broad flight of steps, is the best exposed to view, the rest of
the building being shut in rather closely after the usual Genoese
fashion. It is built of alternating courses of black and white marble,
the only materials employed for mural decoration, so far as I
remember, in the city. The western façade in its lower part is a fine
example of “pointed” work, consisting of a triple portal which, for
elegance of design and richness of ornamentation, could not readily
be excelled. It dates from about the year 1307, when the cathedral
was almost rebuilt. The latter, as a whole, is a very composite
structure, for parts of an earlier Romanesque cathedral still remain,
as in the fine “marble” columns of the nave; and important
alterations were made at a much later date. These, to which belongs
the mean clerestory, painted in stripes of black and white, to
resemble the banded courses of stone below, are generally most
unsatisfactory; and here, as in so many other buildings, one is
compelled, however reluctantly, “to bless the old and ban the new.”
The most richly decorated portion of the interior is the side chapel,
constructed at the end of the fifteenth century, and dedicated to St.
John the Baptist; here his relics are enshrined for the reverence of
the faithful and, as the guide-books inform us, are placed in a
magnificent silver-gilt shrine, which is carried in solemn procession
on the day of his nativity. We are also informed that women, as a
stigma for the part which the sex played in the Baptist’s murder, are
only permitted to enter the chapel once in a year. This is not by any
means the only case where the Church of Rome gives practical
expression to its decided view as to which is the superior sex. The
cathedral possesses another great, though now unhappily mutilated,
treasure in the sacro catino. This, in the first place, was long
supposed to have been carved from a single emerald; in the next, it
was a relic of great antiquity and much sanctity; though as to its
precise claims to honor in this respect authorities differed. According
to one, it had been a gift from the Queen of Sheba to Solomon;
according to another, it had contained the paschal lamb at the Last
Supper; while a third asserted that in this dish Joseph of Arimathea
had caught the blood which flowed from the pierced side of the
crucified Saviour. Of its great antiquity there can at least be no
doubt, for it was taken by the Genoese when they plundered
Cæsarea so long since as the year 1101, and was then esteemed the
most precious thing in the spoil. The material is a green glass—a
conclusion once deemed so heretical that any experiment on the
catino was forbidden on pain of death. As regards its former use, no
more can be said than that it might possibly be as old as the
Christian era. It is almost needless to say that Napoleon carried it
away to Paris; but the worst result of this robbery was that when
restitution was made after the second occupation of that city, the
catino, through some gross carelessness, was so badly packed that it
was broken on the journey back, and has been pieced together by a
gold-setting of filigree, according to the guide-books. An inscription
in the nave supplies us with an interesting fact in the early history of
Genoa which perhaps ought not to be omitted. It is that the city was
founded by one Janus, a great grandson of Noah; and that another
Janus, after the fall of Troy, also settled in it. Colonists from that ill-
fated town really seem to have distributed themselves pretty well
over the known world.
More than one of the smaller churches of Genoa is of archæological
interest, and the more modern fabric, called L’Annunziata, is
extremely rich in its internal decorations, though these are more
remarkable for their sumptuousness than for their good taste. But
one structure calls for some notice in any account of the city. This is
the Campo Santo, or burial-place of Genoa, situated at some
distance without the walls in the Valley of the Bisagno. A large tract
of land on the slope which forms the right bank of that stream has
been converted into a cemetery, and was laid out on its present plan
rather more than twenty-five years since. Extensive open spaces are
enclosed within and divided by corridors with cloisters; terraces also,
connected by flights of steps, lead up to a long range of buildings
situated some distance above the river, in the center of which is a
chapel crowned with a dome, supported internally by large columns
of polished black Como marble. The bodies of the poorer people are
buried in the usual way in the open ground of the cemetery, and the
floor of the corridors appears to cover a continuous series of vaults,
closed, as formerly in our churches, with great slabs of stone; but a
very large number of the dead rest above the ground in vaults
constructed on a plan which has evidently been borrowed from
catacombs like those of Rome. There is, however, this difference,
that in the latter the “loculi,” or separate compartments to contain
the corpses, were excavated in the rock, while here they are
constructed entirely of masonry. In both cases the “loculus” is placed
with its longer axis parallel to the outer side, as was occasionally the
method in the rock-hewn tombs of Palestine, instead of having an
opening at the narrower end, so that the corpse, whether coffined or
not, lies in the position of a sleeper in the berth of a ship. After a
burial, the loculus, as in the catacombs, is closed, and an inscription
placed on a slab outside. Thus in the Campo Santo at Genoa we
walk through a gallery of tombs. On either hand are ranges of low
elongated niches, rising tier above tier, each bearing a long white
marble tablet, surrounded by a broad border of dark serpentine
breccia. The interior generally is faced with white marble, which is
toned down by the interspaces of the darker material, and the effect
produced by these simple monumental corridors, these silent records
of those who have rested from their labors, is impressive, if
somewhat melancholy. In the cloisters, as a rule, the more
sumptuous memorials are to be found. Here commonly sections of
the wall are given up to the monuments of a family, the vaults, as I
infer, being underneath the pavement. These memorials are often
elaborate in design, and costly in their materials. They will be, and
are, greatly admired by those to whose minds sumptuousness is the
chief element in beauty, and rather second-rate execution of
conceptions distinctly third-rate gives no offense. Others, however,
will be chiefly impressed with the inferiority of modern statuary to
the better work of classic ages, and will doubt whether the more
ambitious compositions which met our eyes in these galleries are
preferable to the simple dignity of the mediæval altar tomb, and the
calm repose of its recumbent figure.
The drive to the Campo Santo, in addition to affording a view of one
of the more perfect parts of the old defensive enclosure of Genoa, of
which the Porta Chiappia, one of the smaller gates, may serve as an
example, passes within sight, though at some distance below, one of
the few relics of classic time which the city has retained. This is the
aqueduct which was constructed by the Romans. Some portions of
it, so far as can be seen from below, appear to belong to the original
structure; but, as it is still in use, it has been in many parts more or
less reconstructed and modernized.
The environs of Genoa are pleasant. On both sides, particularly on
the eastern, are country houses with gardens. The western for a
time is less attractive. The suburb of Sanpierdarena is neither pretty
nor interesting; but at Conigliano, and still more at Sestre Ponente,
the grimy finger-marks of commerce become less conspicuous, and
Nature is not wholly expelled by the two-pronged fork of
mechanism. Pegli, still farther west, is a very attractive spot, much
frequented in the summer time for sea-bathing. On this part of the
coast the hills in places draw near to the sea, and crags rise from
the water; the rocks are of interest in more than one respect to the
geologist. One knoll of rock rising from the sand in the Bay of Pra is
crowned by an old fortress, and at Pegli itself are one or two villas of
note. Of these the gardens of the Villa Pallavicini commonly attract
visitors. They reward some by stalactite grottoes and “sheets of
water with boats, under artificial caverns, a Chinese pagoda, and an
Egyptian obelisk;” others will be more attracted by the beauty of the
vegetation, for palms and oleanders, myrtles, and camellias, with
many semi-tropical plants, flourish in the open air.
We may regard Genoa as the meeting-place of the two Rivieras. The
coast to the west—the Riviera di Ponente—what has now, by the
cession of Nice, become in part French soil, is the better known; but
that to the east, the Riviera di Levante, though less accessible on the
whole, and without such an attractive feature as the Corniche road,
in the judgment of some is distinctly the more beautiful. There is
indeed a road which, for a part of the way, runs near the sea; but
the much more indented character of the coast frequently forces it
some distance inland, and ultimately it has to cross a rather
considerable line of hills in order to reach Spezzia. The outline of the
coast, indeed, is perhaps the most marked feature of difference
between the two Rivieras. The hills on the eastern side descend far
more steeply to the water than they do upon the western. They are
much more sharply furrowed with gullies and more deeply indented
by inlets of the sea; thus the construction of a railway from Genoa to
Spezzia has been a work involving no slight labor. There are, it is
stated, nearly fifty tunnels between the two towns, and it is strictly
true that for a large part of the distance north of the latter place the
train is more frequently under than above ground. Here it is actually
an advantage to travel by the slowest train that can be found, for
this may serve as an epitome of the journey by an express: “Out of
a tunnel; one glance, between rocks and olive-groves, up a ravine,
into which a picturesque old village is wedged; another glance down
the same to the sea, sparkling in the sunlight below; a shriek from
the engine, and another plunge into darkness.” So narrow are some
of these gullies, up which, however, a village climbs, that, if I may
trust my memory, I have seen a train halted at a station with the
engine in the opening of one tunnel and the last car not yet clear of
another.
But the coast, when explored, is full of exquisite nooks, and here
and there, where by chance the hills slightly recede, or a larger
valley than usual comes down to the sea, towns of some size are
situated, from which, as halting-places, the district might be easily
explored, for trains are fairly frequent, and the distances are not
great. For a few miles from Genoa the coast is less hilly than it
afterwards becomes; nevertheless, the traveller is prepared for what
lies before him by being conducted from the main station, on the
west side of Genoa, completely beneath the city to near its eastern
wall. Then Nervi is passed, which, like Pegli, attracts not a few
summer visitors, and is a bright and sunny town, with pleasant
gardens and villas. Recco follows, also bright and cheerful, backed
by the finely-outlined hills, which form the long promontory
enclosing the western side of the Bay of Rapallo. Tunnels and
villages, as the railway now plunges into the rock, now skirts the
margin of some little bay, lead first to Rapallo and then to Chiavari,
one with its slender campanile, the other with its old castle. The
luxuriance of the vegetation in all this district cannot fail to attract
notice. The slopes of the hills are grey with olives; oranges replace
apples in the orchards, and in the more sheltered nooks we espy the
paler gold of the lemon. Here are great spiky aloes, there graceful
feathering palms; here pines of southern type, with spreading holm-
oaks, and a dozen other evergreen shrubs.
Glimpse after glimpse of exquisite scenery flashes upon us as we
proceed to Spezzia, but, as already said, its full beauty can only be
appreciated by rambling among the hills or boating along the coast.
There is endless variety, but the leading features are similar: steep
hills furrowed by ravines, craggy headlands and sheltered coves;
villages sometimes perched high on a shoulder, sometimes nestling
in a gully; sometimes a campanile, sometimes a watch-tower;
slopes, here clothed with olive groves, here with their natural
covering of pine and oak scrub, of heath, myrtle, and strawberry-
trees. A change also in the nature of the rock diversifies the scenery,
for between Framura and Bonasola occurs a huge mass of
serpentine, which recalls, in its peculiar structure and tints, the crags
near the Lizard in England. This rock is extensively quarried in the
neighborhood of Levanto, and from that little port many blocks are
shipped.
Spezzia itself has a remarkable situation. A large inlet of the sea runs
deep into the land, parallel with the general trend of the hills, and
almost with that of the coast-line. The range which shelters it on the
west narrows as it falls to the headland of Porto Venere, and is
extended yet farther by rocky islands; while on the opposite coast,
hills no less, perhaps yet more, lofty, protect the harbor from the
eastern blasts. In one direction only is it open to the wind, and
against this the comparative narrowness of the inlet renders the
construction of artificial defenses possible. At the very head of this
deeply embayed sheet of water is a small tract of level ground—the
head, as it were, of a valley—encircled by steep hills. On this little
plain, and by the waterside, stands Spezzia. Formerly it was a quiet
country town, a small seaport with some little commerce; but when
Italy ceased to be a geographical expression, and became practically
one nation, Spezzia was chosen, wisely it must be admitted, as the
site of the chief naval arsenal. A single glance shows its natural
advantages for such a purpose. Access from the land must always
present difficulties, and every road can be commanded by forts,
perched on yet more elevated positions; while a hostile fleet, as it
advances up the inlet, must run the gauntlet of as many batteries as
the defenders can build. Further, the construction of a breakwater
across the middle of the channel at once has been a protection from
the storms, and has compelled all who approach to pass through
straits commanded by cannon. The distance of the town from its
outer defenses and from the open sea seems enough to secure it
even from modern ordnance; so that, until the former are crushed, it
cannot be reached by projectiles. But it must be confessed that the
change has not been without its drawbacks. The Spezzia of to-day
may be a more prosperous town than the Spezzia of a quarter of a
century since, but it has lost some of its beauty. A twentieth-century
fortress adds no charm to the scenery, and does not crown a hill so
picturesquely as did a mediæval castle. Houses are being built, roads
are being made, land is being reclaimed from the sea for the
construction of quays. Thus the place has a generally untidy aspect;
there is a kind of ragged selvage to town and sea, which, at present,
on a near view, is very unsightly. Moreover, the buildings of an
arsenal can hardly be picturesque or magnificent; and great
factories, more or less connected with them, have sprung up in the
neighborhood, from which rise tall red brick chimneys, the
campaniles of the twentieth century. The town itself was never a
place of any particular interest; it has neither fine churches nor old
gateways nor picturesque streets—a ruinous fort among the olive
groves overlooking the streets is all that can claim to be ancient—so
that its growth has not caused the loss of any distinctive feature—
unless it be a grove of old oleanders, which were once a sight to see
in summer time. Many of these have now disappeared, perhaps from
natural decay; and the survivors are mixed with orange trees. These,
during late years, have been largely planted about the town. In one
of the chief streets they are growing by the side of the road, like
planes or chestnuts in other towns. The golden fruit and the glossy
leaves, always a delight to see, appear to possess a double charm by
contrast with the arid flags and dusty streets. Ripe oranges in
dozens, in hundreds, all along by the pathway, and within two or
three yards of the pavement! Are the boys of Spezzia exceptionally
virtuous? or are these golden apples of the Hesperides a special
pride of the populace, and does “Father Stick” still rule in home and
school, and is this immunity the result of physical coercion rather
than of moral suasion? Be this as it may, I have with mine own eyes
seen golden oranges by hundreds hanging on the trees in the streets
of Spezzia, and would be glad to know how long they would remain
in a like position in those of an English town, among “the most law-
abiding people in the universe!”
But if the vicinity of the town has lost some of its ancient charm, if
modern Spezzia reminds us too much, now of Woolwich, now of a
“new neighborhood” on the outskirts of London, we have but to pass
into the uplands, escaping from the neighborhood of forts, to find
the same beauties as the mountains of this coast ever afford. There
the sugar-cane and the vine, the fig and the olive cease, though the
last so abounds that one might suppose it an indigenous growth;
there the broken slopes are covered with scrub oak and dwarf pine;
there the myrtle blossoms, hardly ceasing in the winter months;
there the strawberry-tree shows its waxen flowers, and is bright in
season with its rich crimson berries. Even the villages add a beauty
to the landscape—at any rate, when regarded from a distance; some
are perched high up on the shoulders of hills, with distant outlooks
over land and sea; others lie down by the water’s edge in sheltered
coves, beneath some ruined fort, which in olden time protected the
fisher-folk from the raids of corsairs. Such are Terenza and Lerici,
looking at each other across the waters of the little “Porto;” and
many another village, in which grey and white and pink tinted
houses blend into one pleasant harmony of color. For all this part of
the coast is a series of rocky headlands and tiny bays, one
succession of quiet nooks, to which the sea alone forms a natural
highway. Not less irregular, not less sequestered, is the western
coast of the Bay of Spezzia, which has been already mentioned.
Here, at Porto Venere, a little village still carries us back in its name
to classic times; and the old church on the rugged headland stands
upon a site which was once not unfitly occupied by a temple of the
seaborn goddess. The beauty of the scene is enhanced by a rocky
wooded island, the Isola Palmeria, which rises steeply across a
narrow strait; though the purpose to which it has been devoted—a
prison for convicts—neither adds to its charm nor awakens pleasant
reflections.
To some minds also the harbor itself, busy and bright as the scene
often is, will suggest more painful thoughts than it did in olden days.
For it is no preacher of “peace at any price,” and is a daily witness
that millennial days are still far away from the present epoch. Here
may be seen at anchor the modern devices for naval war: great
turret-ships and ironclads, gunboats and torpedo launches—evils,
necessary undoubtedly, but evils still; outward and visible signs of
the burden of taxation, which is cramping the development of Italy,
and is indirectly the heavy price which it has to pay for entering the
ranks of the great Powers of Europe. These are less picturesque
than the old line-of-battle ships, with their high decks, their tall
masts, and their clouds of canvas; still, nothing can entirely spoil the
harbor of Spezzia, and even these floating castles group pleasantly
in the distance with the varied outline of hills and headlands, which
is backed at last, if we look southward, by the grand outline of a
group of veritable mountains—the Apuan Alps.
 IX

THE TUSCAN COAST

 Shelley’s last months at Lerici—Story of
his death—Carrara and its marble
quarries—Pisa—Its grand group of
ecclesiastical buildings—The cloisters
of the Campo Santo—Napoleon’s life
on Elba—Origin of the Etruscans—
The ruins of Tarquinii—Civita
Vecchia, the old port of Rome—
Ostia.

T HE Bay of Spezzia is defined sharply enough on its western side

by the long, hilly peninsula which parts it from the
Mediterranean, but as this makes only a small angle with the
general trend of the coast-line, its termination is less strongly
marked on the opposite side. Of its beauties we have spoken in an
earlier article, but there is a little town at the southern extremity
which, in connection with the coast below, has a melancholy interest
to every lover of English literature. Here, at Lerici, Shelley spent
what proved to be the last months of his life. The town itself, once
strongly fortified by its Pisan owners against their foes of Genoa on
the one side and Lucca on the other, is a picturesque spot. The old
castle crowns a headland, guarding the little harbor and overlooking
the small but busy town. At a short distance to the southeast is the
Casa Magni, once a Jesuit seminary, which was occupied by Shelley.
Looking across the beautiful gulf to the hills on its opposite shore
and the island of Porto Venere, but a few miles from the grand
group of the Carrara mountains, in the middle of the luxuriant
scenery of the Eastern Riviera, the house, though in itself not very
attractive, was a fit home for a lover of nature. But Shelley’s
residence within its walls was too soon cut short. There are strange
tales (like those told with bated breath by old nurses by the fireside)
that as the closing hour approached the spirits of the unseen world
took bodily form and became visible to the poet’s eye; tales of a
dark-robed figure standing by his bedside beckoning him to follow;
of a laughing child rising from the sea as he walked by moonlight on
the terrace, clapping its hands in glee; and of other warnings that
the veil which parted him from the spirit world was vanishing away.
Shelley delighted in the sea. On the 1st of July he left Lerici for
Leghorn in a small sailing vessel. On the 8th he set out to return,
accompanied only by his friend, Mr. Williams, and an English lad. The
afternoon was hot and sultry, and as the sun became low a fearful
squall burst upon the neighboring sea. What happened no one
exactly knows, but they never came back to the shore. Day followed
day, and the great sea kept its secret; but at last, on the 22d, the
corpse of Shelley was washed up near Viareggio and that of Williams
near Bocca Lerici, three miles away. It was not till three weeks
afterwards that the body of the sailor lad came ashore. Probably the
felucca had either capsized or had been swamped at the first break
of the storm; but when it was found, some three months afterwards,
men said that it looked as if it had been run down, and even more
ugly rumors got abroad that this was no accident, but the work of
some Italians, done in the hope of plunder, as it was expected that
the party had in charge a considerable sum of money. The bodies
were at first buried in the sand with quicklime; but at that time the
Tuscan law required “any object then cast ashore to be burned, as a
precaution against plague,” so, by the help of friends, the body of
Shelley was committed to the flames “with fuel and frankincense,
wine, salt, and oil, the accompaniments of a Greek cremation,” in the
presence of Byron Leigh Hunt, and Trelawny. The corpse of Williams
had been consumed in like fashion on the previous day. “It was a
glorious day and a splendid prospect; the cruel and calm sea before,
the Appennines behind. A curlew wheeled close to the pyre,
screaming, and would not be driven away; the flames arose golden
and towering.” The inurned ashes were entombed, as everyone
knows, in the Protestant burial ground at Rome by the side of Keats’
grave, near the pyramid of Cestius. Much as there was to regret in
Shelley’s life, there was more in his death, for such genius as his is
rare, and if the work of springtide was so glorious, what might have
been the summer fruitage?
As the Gulf of Spezzia is left behind, the Magra broadens out into an
estuary as it enters the sea, the river which formed in olden days the
boundary between Liguria and Etruria. Five miles from the coast,
and less than half the distance from the river, is Sarzana, the chief
city of the province, once fortified, and still containing a cathedral of
some interest. It once gave birth to a Pope, Nicholas V., the founder
of the Vatican Library, and in the neighborhood the family of the
Buonapartes had their origin, a branch of it having emigrated to
Corsica. Sarzana bore formerly the name of Luna Nova, as it had
replaced another Luna which stood near to the mouth of the river.
This was in ruins even in the days of Lucan, and now the traveller
from Saranza to Pisa sees only “a strip of low, grassy land
intervening between him and the sea. Here stood the ancient city.
There is little enough to see. Beyond a few crumbling tombs and a
fragment or two of Roman ruins, nothing remains of Luna. The fairy
scene described by Rutilus, so appropriate to the spot which bore
the name of the virgin-queen of heaven, the ‘fair white walls’
shaming with their brightness the untrodden snow, the smooth,
many-tinted rocks overrun with laughing lilies, if not the pure
creation of the poet, have now vanished from the sight. Vestiges of
an amphitheater, of a semicircular building which may be a theater,
of a circus, a piscina, and fragments of columns, pedestals for
statues, blocks of pavement and inscriptions, are all that Luna has
now to show.”
But all the while the grand group of the Carrara hills is in view,
towering above a lowland region which rolls down towards the
coast. A branch line now leads from Avenza, a small seaport town
from which the marble is shipped, to the town of Carrara, through
scenery of singular beauty. The shelving banks and winding slopes of
the foreground hills are clothed with olives and oaks and other trees;
here and there groups of houses, white and grey and pink, cluster
around a campanile tower on some coign of vantage, while at the
back rises the great mountain wall of the Apuan Alps, with its
gleaming crags, scarred, it must be admitted, rather rudely and
crudely by its marble quarries, though the long slopes of screes
beneath these gashes in the more distant views almost resemble the
Alpine snows. The situation of the town is delightful, for it stands at
the entrance of a rapidly narrowing valley, in a sufficiently elevated
position to command a view of this exquisitely rich lowland as it
shelves and rolls down to the gleaming sea. Nor is the place itself
devoid of interest. One of its churches at least, S. Andrea, is a really
handsome specimen of the architecture of this part of Italy in the
thirteenth century, but the quarries dominate, and their products are
everywhere. Here are the studios of sculptors and the ateliers of
workmen. The fair white marble here, like silver in the days of
Solomon, is of little account; it paves the street, builds the houses,
serves even for the basest uses, and is to be seen strewn or piled up
everywhere to await dispersal by the trains to more distant regions.
Beyond the streets of Carrara, in the direction of the mountains,
carriage roads no longer exist. Lanes wind up the hills here and
there in rather bewildering intricacy, among vines and olive groves,
to hamlets and quarries; one, indeed, of rather larger size and more
fixity of direction, keeps for a time near the river, if indeed the
stream which flows by Carrara be worthy of that name, except when
the storms are breaking or the snows are melting upon the
mountains. But all these lanes alike terminate in a quarry, are riven
with deep ruts, ploughed up like a field by the wheels of the heavy
wagons that bring down the great blocks of marble. One meets
these grinding and groaning on their way, drawn by yokes of dove-
colored oxen (longer than that with which Elisha was ploughing
when the older prophet cast his mantle upon his shoulders), big,
meek-looking beasts, mild-eyed and melancholy as the lotus-eaters.
To meet them is not always an unmixed pleasure, for the lanes are
narrow, and there is often no room to spare; how the traffic is
regulated in some parts is a problem which I have not yet solved.
Carrara would come near to being an earthly paradise were it not for
the mosquitos, which are said to be such that they would have made
even the Garden of Eden untenable, especially to its first inhabitants.
Of them, however, I cannot speak, for I have never slept in the
town, or even visited it at the season when this curse of the earth is
at its worst; but I have no hesitation in asserting that the mountains
of Carrara are not less beautiful in outline than those of any part of
the main chain of the Alps of like elevation, while they are
unequalled in color and variety of verdure.
To Avenza succeeds Massa, a considerable town, beautifully situated
among olive-clad heights, which are spotted with villas and densely
covered with foliage. Like Carrara, it is close to the mountains, and
disputes with Carrara for the reputation of its quarries. This town
was once the capital of a duchy, Massa-Carrara, and the title was
borne by a sister of Napoleon I. Her large palace still remains; her
memory should endure, though not precisely in honor, for according
to Mr. Hare, she pulled down the old cathedral to improve the view
from her windows. But if Massa is beautiful, so is Pietra Santa, a
much smaller town enclosed by old walls and singularly picturesque
in outline. It has a fine old church, with a picturesque campanile,
which, though slightly more modern than the church itself, has seen
more than four centuries. The piazza, with the Town Hall, this church
and another one, is a very characteristic feature. In the baptistry of
one of the churches are some bronzes by Donatello. About half a
dozen miles away, reached by a road which passes through beautiful
scenery, are the marble quarries of Seravezza, which were first
opened by Michael Angelo, and are still in full work. There is only
one drawback to travelling by railway in this region; the train goes
too fast. Let it be as slow as it will, and it can be very slow, we can
never succeed in coming to a decision as to which is the most
picturesquely situated place or the most lovely view. Comparisons
notoriously are odious, but delightful, as undoubtedly is the Riviera
di Ponenta to me, the Riviera di Levante seems even more lovely.
After Pietra Santa, however, the scenery becomes less attractive, the
Apuan Alps begin to be left behind, and a wider strip of plain parts
the Apennines from the sea. This, which is traversed by the railway,
is in itself flat, stale, though perhaps not unprofitable to the
husbandman. Viareggio, mentioned on a previous page, nestles
among its woods of oaks and pines, a place of some little note as a
health resort; and then the railway after emerging from the forest
strikes away from the sea, and crosses the marshy plains of the
Serchio, towards the banks of the Arno.

It now approaches the grand group of ecclesiastical buildings which

rise above the walls of Pisa. As this town lies well inland, being six
miles from the sea, we must content ourselves with a brief mention.
But a long description is needless, for who does not know of its
cathedral and its Campo Santo, of its baptistry and its leaning tower?
There is no more marvelous or complete group of ecclesiastical
buildings in Europe, all built of the white marble of Carrara, now
changed by age into a delicate cream color, but still almost dazzling
in the glory of the mid-day sun, yet never so beautiful as when
walls, arches, and pinnacles are aglow at its rising, or flushed at its
setting. In the cloisters of the Campo Santo you may see
monuments which range over nearly five centuries, and contrast
ancient and modern art; the frescoes on their walls, though often ill
preserved, and not seldom of little merit, possess no small interest
as illustrating medieval notions of a gospel of love and peace.
Beneath their roof at the present time are sheltered a few relics of
Roman and Etruscan days which will repay examination. The very
soil also of this God’s acre is not without an interest, for when the
Holy Land was lost to the Christians, fifty-and-three shiploads of
earth were brought hither from Jerusalem that the dead of Pisa
might rest in ground which had been sanctified by the visible
presence of their Redeemer. The cathedral is a grand example of the
severe but stately style which was in favor about the end of the
eleventh century, for it was consecrated in the year 1118. It
commemorates a great naval victory won by the Pisans, three years
before the battle of Hastings, and the columns which support the
arches of the interior were at once the spoils of classic buildings and
the memorials of Pisan victories. The famous leaning tower, though
later in date, harmonizes well in general style with the cathedral. Its
position, no doubt, attracts most attention, for to the eye it seems
remarkably insecure, but one cannot help wishing that the
settlement had never occurred, for the slope is sufficient to interfere
seriously with the harmony of the group. The baptistry also
harmonizes with the cathedral, though it was not begun till some
forty years after the latter was completed, and not only was more
than a century in building, but also received some ornamental
additions in the fourteenth century. But though this cathedral group
is the glory and the crown of Pisa, the best monument of its
proudest days, there are other buildings of interest in the town
itself; and the broad quays which flank the Arno on each side, the
Lungarno by name, which form a continuous passage from one end
of the town to the other, together with the four bridges which link its
older and newer part, are well worthy of more than a passing notice.
The land bordering the Arno between Pisa and its junction with the
Mediterranean has no charm for the traveller, however it may
commend itself to the farmer. A few miles south of the river’s mouth
is Leghorn, and on the eleven miles’ journey by rail from it to Pisa
the traveller sees as much, and perhaps more, than he could wish of
the delta of the Arno. It is a vast alluvial plain, always low-lying, in
places marshy; sometimes meadow land, sometimes arable. Here
and there are slight and inconspicuous lines of dunes, very probably
the records of old sea margins as the river slowly encroached upon
the Mediterranean, which are covered sometimes with a grove of
pines.
Leghorn is not an old town, and has little attraction for the
antiquarian or the artist. In fact, I think it, for its size, the most
uninteresting town, whether on the sea or inland, that I have
entered in Italy. Brindisi is a dreary hole, but it has one or two
objects of interest. Bari is not very attractive, but it has two
churches, the architecture of which will repay long study; but
Leghorn is almost a miracle of commonplace architecture and of
dullness. Of course there is a harbor, of course there are ships, of
course there is the sea, and all these possess a certain charm; but
really this is about as small as it can be under the circumstances.
The town was a creation of the Medici, “the masterpiece of that
dynasty.” In the middle of the sixteenth century it was an
insignificant place, with between seven and eight hundred
inhabitants. But it increased rapidly when the princes of that family
took the town in hand and made it a cave of Adullam, whither the
discontented or oppressed from other lands might resort: Jews and
Moors from Spain and Portugal, escaping from persecution; Roman
Catholics from England, oppressed by the retaliatory laws of
Elizabeth; merchants from Marseilles, seeking refuge from civil war.
Thus fostered, it was soon thronged by men of talent and energy; it
rapidly grew into an important center of commerce, and now the
town with its suburbs contains nearly a hundred thousand souls.
Leghorn is intersected by canals, sufficiently so to have been
sometimes called a “Little Venice,” and has been fortified, but as the
defenses belong to the system of Vauban, they add little to either
the interest or the picturesqueness of the place. Parts of the walls
and the citadel remain, the latter being enclosed by a broad water-
ditch. The principal street has some good shops, and there are two
fairly large piazzas; in one, bearing the name of Carlo Alberto, are
statues of heroic size to the last Grand Duke and to his predecessor.
The inscription on the latter is highly flattering; but that on the
former states that the citizens had come to the conclusion that the
continuance of the Austro-Lorenese dynasty was incompatible with
the good order and happiness of Tuscany, and had accordingly voted
union with Italy. The other piazza now bears Victor Emmanuel’s
name; in it are a building which formerly was a royal palace, the
town hall, and the cathedral; the last a fair-sized church, but a
rather plain specimen of the Renaissance style, with some handsome
columns of real marble and a large amount of imitation, painted to
match. There are also some remains of the old fortifications, though
they are not so very old, by the side of the inner or original harbor.
As this in course of time proved too shallow for vessels of modern
bulk, the Porto Nuovo, or outer harbor, was begun nearly fifty years
since, and is protected from the waves by a semicircular mole.
Among the other lions of the place, and they are all very small, is a
statue of Duke Ferdinand I., one of the founders of Leghorn, with
four Turkish slaves about the pedestal. The commerce of Leghorn
chiefly consists of grain, cotton, wool, and silk, and is carried on
mainly with the eastern ports of the Mediterranean. There is also an
important shipbuilding establishment. It has, however, one link of
interest with English literature, for in the Protestant cemetery was
buried Tobias Smollet. There is a pleasant public walk by the sea
margin outside the town, from where distant views of Elba and other
islands are obtained.
The hilly ground south of the broad valley of the Arno is of little
interest, and for a considerable distance a broad strip of land, a level
plain of cornfields and meadow, intervenes between the sea and the
foot of the hills. Here and there long lines of pine woods seem
almost to border the former; the rounded spurs of the latter are
thickly wooded, but are capped here and there by grey villages,
seemingly surrounded by old walls, and are backed by the bolder
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