Monday, February 19, 2018

Urbane Urbino

After the Riviera, we started to head north again, to Urbino, another walled hilltop city, still in the Marche region. It's probably chiefly known for its Renaissance dukedom, and as the birthplace of Raphael. We parked at the foot of the hill, and it took quite some time to figure out how to get up into the city. I found a staircase where you can walk up inside the fortifications, but the promised elevator remained elusive. As it was a while before we could check in to our hotel, we left our bags in the car and set out to see a bit of the city before lunch. (We eventually did find the elevator to bring our bags up, you have to go inside the tourist office and pay a euro to use it, then it pops out on top of the city wall next to a cafe.)

 We were staying in an "antique room" dating from 1544, which was pretty fun. I've never been in a hotel room with a "feature well" before!

We ended up buying a light fixture similar to the star-shaped one on the ceiling here. They seem to be traditional in the area, also appearing in the Ducal Palace
The well
On the city walls with the Ducal Palace to the right
View of the surrounding countryside from the walls
Before lunch, we went to the Oratorio of St John the Baptist, a small 14th century chapel covered with frescoes by the Salimbeni brothers. It's so pretty. It's kind of unbelievable you can have these tiny little buildings filled with such treasures that no-one has ever heard of. Imagine the big deal this would be most places in the world.



This photo gives a sense of the monumental scale of the frescoes
Panorama of the crucifixion scene and the right-hand wall, with scenes from the life of John the Baptist

Expressive lamentations at the Crucifixion. And... is that kid kicking the other kid in the face?
Detail of the crucifixion scene with a naughty dog

St John the Baptist at work, with bonus dog curled up on a pile of clothes. Haven't quite mastered the "standing on top of a river" thing though

Nice naturalistic detail of someone disrobing to be baptised

Hey, it's the KKK getup from the Perugia paintings. This seems to have been how members of the confraternity dressed

The Oratorio also offered great views of the Ducal Palace rising over the rooftops


As you can see, it was a beautiful, warm day and lunch was a local speciality, crescia. Kind of like a stuffed flatbread, but much flakier. With the addition of lard in the dough, it's really more like a pastry than a bread, and 100% delicious. We went to a little hole in the wall place and queued for ages, but it was so worth it.

Photo doesn't do justice to the deliciousness, but I promise you it was cheesy meaty flakey pastry goodness. We went there twice in our time in Urbino

1 comment:

  1. Great post. What interesting paintings. I think they included real children and one was definitely kicking the other!

    ReplyDelete

Feed the Comment Monster! Rawrrrr

Note: only a member of this blog may post a comment.