Traditions

When your grandparents bring you up, getting cured with peculiar medical remedies is as natural as getting double portions on your dinner plate because you’re the youngest. We all got warm milk, honey and a drop of rum when we …

A masked parade on the waters of Venice’s canals. The Doge’s ball. Thousands of masks walking around the city. From the party on the Rio del Cannaregio to the parade in Piazza San Marco, where one can see the most …

Rome, caput mundi and glorious mother of western civilization, wasn’t the first power to rule over the peninsula. Naturally enough, a lot happened before that faithful April 21, 753 BC, the date selected by Latin historian Varro as the beginning …

Close your eyes and image Sicily in all its glory, some two thousand years ago.  A precious stone set in the crystal blue Mediterranean, she was the envy of every nation: the Greeks conquered it, longing to settle in such …

I’m not a great fan of the fantasy genre — exception made for a recently discovered love for the Harry Potter saga: yes, I know. I come about 20 years  late — but who doesn’t know about J.R.R. Tolkien? Add …

A beautiful article appeared a while back on the renowned pages of the New York Times. It was an incredibly entertaining and informative account of the author’s voyage to one of Italy least known corner, Basilicata, a region mostly associated …

Confetti, what a delicious word. The Italian confetti, that is.  Confetto comes from the Latin for preparing (conficere) especially when talking about food. What’s delicious about a Latin word, you may ask? Of course, a confetto in today’s Italy is …

The iconic FIAT 500, symbol of Italy’s post war economic renaissance, became part of MoMA’s permanent collection last year, but 2019 brings even more lustre to the tiny Italian four-wheels, as it will be one of the centrepieces of The …

The beautiful walled city of Volterra, an ancient Etruscan town some 45 miles southwest of Florence, is famous for its well-preserved medieval ramparts, museums and archeological sites, and atmospheric cobblestone streets. Fans of American author Stephanie Meyer know it as …

Gladiators: the stars of the ancient Roman world: but it’s not gold all that glitters.  Before Pompeii and Hercolaneum were rediscovered by archaeologists in the 18th century, we knew relatively little about them and the way they lived, but today, …