StI was enchanted by the light of Arpino, in the province of Frosinone. Have you never been there? Go there. The city is clean. The buildings restored and tidy. Friendly and smiling people. You are in an Italy that seemed lost. The landscape is intact. No wind turbines are seen mocking the sky. The architectures in the distance are measured, without havoc or scars.
Arpino, in the province of Frosinone (photo Getty Images).
The pride of the city is Cicero, whose prose elegantly dresses a sober, never abstruse, deeply secular thought. Cicero is always convincing. What amazes in his temperament is the ability to interpret human and spiritual values well before Christianity: “The life of the dead is in the memory of the living”; “Death is not a sunset that erases everything but a passage, a migration and the beginning of another life for each life”.
A community which, in the pride of such a great man, preserves his fundamental values, is destined to be happy; and you feel it even today walking through the streets, so much so that Cicero’s actuality is in the very singular habit of Certamen latinum ancient and modern. A competition of worldwide resonance for the best translation of a passage from Latin. This year the authors subject to the test for the hundreds of competitors will be Cicero and Erasmus of Rotterdam.
The Certainly di Arpino is among the most important cultural initiatives in Italy. The Latin language tells a fundamental part of our history but above all of our culture, from literature to law to medicine. In short, Latin is anything but a dead language.
The medieval Tower of Cicerone stands on the Acropolis of Arpino (photo Getty Images).
The Certainly di Arpino guards and preserves this heritage through a constant awareness-raising activities in schools. For this reason the ministry with its patronage intends to recognize its importance.
Singular patron, not in competition with the dominant and warrior San Michele in the church of the same name in a canvas by Cavalier d’Arpino, Cicero is present and alive and his protection is equivalent to that of the Madonna of Loreto: soothes spirits in the testimony of pride that can be read on a plaque in Latin on the medieval entrance gate from the East to Arpino, Porta Napoli: «O Wanderer, you are entering Arpino, founded by Saturn,/ city of the Volsci, Municipality of the Romans, birthplace of Marcus Tullius Cicero/ Prince of Eloquence and Caius Marius Seven times Consul. / The triumphal eagle, having flown from here to the Empire, submitted to Rome / the whole world, recognize his prestige, and live in health ».
It is necessary, after years of oblivion, to return to that lost greatness vestiges of which remain in the Acropolis with the polygonal megalithic walls and the picturesque pointed arch. The walls develop not only in flat stretches, where they sometimes rise to more than six meters in height, but also along the orographic slopes, becoming the foundations of houses, gardens and palaces.
Vittorio Sgarbi with a barn owl in Arpino (Frosinone).
Inside the Acropolis the so-called “Tower of Cicero” dominates, where a seraphic barn owl awaits me for a comparison, undisturbed accomplice of arcane thoughts. The city opens up, with its churches and palaces, in the streets animated by calm and happy people, rewarded by the privilege of living dominating the Liri valley from a stone Olympus, as if suspended.
The sensation is accompanied by that of a protection within the city wallsin buildings as solid as fortresses as the powerful structure of the Cavalier d’Arpino hotel appears, a sixteenth-century woolen mill cheered by a lively and active owner, Sonia Schiavo, who smiles thinking of the festive days that await her, between Easter and the Passion living and the Certainly.
The city comes alive with the fervor of women: the geologist Maria Manuel, Augusta Rea, Stefania and Chiara Quadrini. From the very lively city club, we move on to the large and silent spaces of Palazzo Sangermano under the Aurora of the Sicilian Giuseppe Sciuti and to the always majestic and well-restored Palazzo Borromeo and Iannuccelli that Senator Massimo Struffi graciously left to the Australians Alison and Katherine Holland. Arpino is alive. There are also sheltered places such as the square of Santa Maria di Civita which emerges with its Baroque façade above the temple dedicated to Mercury Lanario, protector of wool producers.
Pointed arch in the acropolis of Civitavecchia located in the municipality of Arpino in the province of Frosinone (photo Ipa).
Another kind and cultured woman presides over this sanctuary and brings out precious tables by Cavalier D’Arpino. This is Maria Vittoria Battilorocustodian, with her husband Carlo Carrelli, more of the spirit than of the things of that preserved district of Arpino.
Cicero has spoken and speaks; but in Arpino it is the women who act, and the city thrives on their enthusiasm and desire. I haven’t seen such an animated community for a long time, and I would like to be part of it, in an endless spring.
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