'Lucrezia Borgia—victim of her times'

"Why may I not go down the grave with thee? Wood that my fire might warm this frigid ice, and turn this tears this dust to living flesh, and give the unknown the joy of life. And then would I boldly, ardently confront the man who snapped our dearest bond and cry, cruel monster, see what love can do?”

-- Barbara Torello, 1508, a poem about her close friend Lucrezia Borgia's mourning following the assassination of her spouse Alfonso of Aragon

 

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'Lucrezia Borgia—victim of her times'

George Dunea

For five hundred years, society has unfairly blackened the name of Lucrezia Borgia—in history, literature, even in opera. Living at a time when girls could be disposed of at their parents’ whim, she became a child-bride at eleven, was contracted to be married five times, had a least ten pregnancies, and died from puerperal fever at age thirty-nine. She has been mispresented in the works of Victor Hugo, Alexander Dumas, and Gaetano Donizetti; described as a seductress, a poisoner, and a witch; and supposed to have killed her husband, slept with her brother, and committed incest with her father.

Lucrezia was the daughter of Pope Alexander VI Borgia and his mistress Vannozza. A Catalan from the area of Valencia in Spain, Borgia was made a cardinal by his uncle Pope Callixtus III in 1456 and was unanimously elected Pope in the year when the soldiers of Christopher Columbus set foot in the Americas.

Alexander Borgia was intelligent and shrewd, devious and ruthless, and avid for money and possessions. Charming and possessing a great sense of humor, he had a limitless lust for beautiful women and great sexual power. He fathered some eight or nine children. He devoted himself to enlarging the territory of the papal estates, promoting his relatives, and carving a kingdom out of the scattered states of Northern Italy. Stories of his debauched activities at the Vatican are legion, though some need to be taken with a grain of salt.

con't....

 

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Lucrezia Borgia - Wikipedia

Lucrezia Borgia: Is Her Bad Reputation Deserved? | HistoryExtra

The Heavens Conspire - Lucrezia Borgia: Life, Love, and Death in Renaissance Italy 

The Borgias (2011 TV series) - Wikipedia

 

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Lucrezia Borgia: Pretty Poison | Full Documentary | Biography

366,684 views - August 5, 2022

Biography

The story of the illegitimate daughter of a Renaissance Pope. Reports say that she killed her enemies with arsenic-drenched rings and may have had an incestuous affair with her father, in this documentary from Biography.

con't....

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The enduring power of rumors

I remember when I was a child, I used to read different mystery comic books, and back then they were very intense, eerie and thought provoking. An adult could enjoy them just as much as a child. Most often there were multiple tales throughout one thick colorized comic. For some reason I recall one tale where a particular man murdered his wife for her fortune. At the end when he seemingly had gotten away with it, suddenly he starts choking on some food. On this very last tale, on the very last page, and one the very last image it showed a attractive woman with a very evil grin, dressed in a grand black dress, holding a bottle of poison, hovering over him as he's presumably dying on the floor (it showed him turning green!).

The caption said something like... the evil spirit of Lucrezia Borgia has returned to do him in. I guess he just couldn't be allowed to get away with it, so she just magically made an appearance to do him in! Who better than Miss Borgia to get the job done? I had no idea then who she was, but it sort've imprinted her name in my mind as synonymous with a wicked woman. The simple truth is that the ambitious Borgia family was hated by their rivals, and they spread rumors about Lucrezia because her father was using her to garner more power, and they wanted to deter anyone of power and influence who may wish to marry her. It's as old as time: don't like someone?; tell lies about them!.... especially if they have the raw power to make it stick.

 

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Lucrezia Borgia’s Love Letters – Milan, Italy - Atlas Obscura

 

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"The prettiest love letters in the world"

-- Lord Byron

  

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Pragser Wildsee, Südtirol

 

Pragser Wildsee

Currently on Windows 10 Spotlight

This lake seen here at the base of Seekofel Mountain in the Südtirol. I couldn't find the exact Spotlight image. Seekofel Mountain is part of the Dolomites.

The Pragser Wildsee, or Lake Prags, Lake Braies (Italian: Lago di Braies; German: Pragser Wildsee) is a lake in the Prags Dolomites in South Tyrol, Italy. It belongs to the municipality of Prags which is located in the Prags Valley.

In recent years, the lake earn the nickname of "Pearl of the Alps" due to its increasing popularity among tourists.

 

Seekofel Mountain, Sudtirol

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Note: I'm backdating this from August 28, 2022. I'm currently living in Sonoma, California. I'll explain in detail later.

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IMF wants to institute "social credit scoring" to the world (based on "internet browsing history")

'IMF wants credit scores to be based on browsing'

Nick Farrell - Fudzilla.com - August 20, 2021

So that is most of the world stuffed

A post from the International Monetary Fund suggests that it would be a good idea to base your credit score on your browsing habits.

If the idea is followed, it could mean some serious changes in the way credit is obtained and mean you could be denied a mortgage based on what you were viewing.

Four researchers presented their findings from a working paper that examines the current relationship between finance and tech and sees the possibility of using the data from your browsing, search, and purchase history to create a more accurate mechanism for determining the credit rating of an individual or business.

The concept of using your web history to inform credit ratings is framed around the notion that lenders rely on hard-data that might obscure the worthiness of a borrower or paint an unnecessarily dire picture during hard times.

con't....

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A Look Inside China’s Social Credit System | NBC News Now (NBC News; videop; 6-4-19)

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I recall seeing a bumper sticker once that read "LEGALIZE FREEDOM." Unfortunately, it keeps going in the opposite direction, and those whom we may believe would be against it are often in full support of it. Shills in many of these various global institutions, foundations, and think tanks have been discussing issues like this since the mid-90s that I know of. After 911, some of the things they discussed were outrageous, and few of it actually came into being. Super-insider Zbigniew Brzezinski used to be a really good source for this type of "futurism" because it actually ended up happening, but he's gone now. Often the strategy is for them to ask for much more power than they actually want, while other times it's to test the waters to see what they may be able to get away with.

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Carnic Alps - First days of November (2009)

 

CARNIA - CADORE First days of november....

North Wolf

Dolomites

Cadore Valley

Carnia

Carnic Alps

Carni

 

Cadore Valley

Friuli

Valle di Cadore

Cadore

Dolomites

 

Dolomites

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Church of Santa Maria del Rosario (Gesuati) in Venice - 18th century baroque architecture

Church of Santa Maria del Rosario(Gesuati)

The Church of the Gesuati, the largest convent complex in XVIIIth century Venice, was built between 1726 and 1735 for the Dominican Order to replace the smaller church that still stands beside it, which had become too small to hold all the parishioners. The Dominican Order took over from the Jesuates (from whom the church took its name) in 1668, when the order was suppressed. Giorgio Massari was the architect who designed the church and the decorations in the interior, with the help of two great artists of the time: Giambattista Tiepolo and Gian Maria Morlaiter. The three definitively established their fame in the city thanks to the remarkable work they did on the church. There is a beautiful harmony to the interiors, with the striking ceiling frescoes by Giambattista Tiepolo, featuring three splendid frescoes representing “The Virgin Appearing to St. Dominic”, “The Institution of the Rosary” and “The Glory of St. Dominic”, surrounded by a number of monochrome medallions.

 

Gesuati (Wikipedia)

Santa Maria del Rosario (St. Mary of the Rosary), commonly known as I Gesuati, is an 18th-century Dominican church in the Sestiere of Dorsoduro, on the Giudecca canal in Venice, northern Italy. The classical style building has a well-lit interior and is exceptional in preserving its original layout and Rococo decoration intact. The church and almost all its sculpture and paintings were created within a thirty-year period: construction began in 1725, the church was consecrated in 1743, and the last sculptural decoration was in place by 1755.

 

Baroque (Wikipedia)

The Baroque is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1740s.

baroque (Websters)

Baroque came to English from a French word meaning "irregularly shaped." At first, the word in French was used mostly to refer to pearls. Eventually, it came to describe an extravagant style of art characterized by curving lines, gilt, and gold.

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Mariani Nut Company (Yolo County)

Since cow milk isn't really necessary for an adult diet, as it was intended by nature in order to help a calf to gain a ton or two, the various almond, walnut, and other "milks" can work fine for diet and for recipes that ask for milk. Also, cow milk has a lot of sugar; 13 grams per cup on one label that I looked at recently. Last week I purchased some walnut milk, which has only 2 grams of sugar and is not a GMO food. I didn't even look at the producer, which I saw today was the Mariani Nut Company (or Mariani Family Orchards) in Winters, California; founded in 1906.

From the container/label:

Meet the family

For five generations, the Marianis have been farming the land in California. Enjoy our family's labor of love any time of the day for a simply better way to live the good life.

I would venture a guess that the Mariani family, who were originally from Croatia, was either "Istrian Italian" or "Dalmatian Italian." For example, the famous race car driver Mario Andretti was born in Montona, Italy; however this town is now part of Croatia. There were a lot of Venetians who had lived in those regions going back centuries, particularly in Istria. I don't claim to know who has the better irredentist claim to Trieste or Istria, but it has long been in intellectual and historical dispute. In any case, the Mariani family has an interesting history: Our Family Story. There has also historically been a large Croatian-American population in San Francisco and the greater bay. The Mariani Nut Company is located in Yolo County, east of Napa County and north of Solano County. I purchased the "Original Walnutmilk" at Safeway.

Mariani.com

Mariani Nut Company (facebook)

 

 

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I'm backdating this from October 21. I'm not going to be posting much for perhaps five or six months, as my mother's passing has taken an unexpected legal turn. Things are very uncertain for me as of now, and I have to address it.

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Italian Cheese Board: Four famous northern cheeses

Italian Cheese Board (Safeway)

Last week I purchased an item at the supermarket chain Safeway called 'Italian Cheese Board'. Not that it was particularly fancy, but they were very tasty cheeses; four little stacks of northern cheeses which are well known in America, stacked on top of a hard waxed cardboard backing. There are other cheeses a bit off the beaten path of course, but I thought it significant that these four are so well-known worldwide. Of course Parmesan--originating from Emilia and Lombardia--would be the equivalent to Swiss, feta, gouda, muenster, cheddar, etc. Aged and in slices, it was very adequate in this product. Officially, the name is Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese.

Aged and delicious Asiago cheese has increased much in popularity in recent years, and is similar to Parmesan, but it also seems to be a bit like aged gouda. It originates in Veneto and Trentino, and is very adequate in this product. Provolone cheese should be well-known to any cheese lover, and originates in the Po Basin of Lombardia and Veneto. It's somewhat like white American cheese, but is also a bit like Helvetica cheese from Switzerland. Now "provolone valpadana" is not the same as "provolone del Monaco" originating from the Naples area.

Fontina cheese, which originates in the Aosta Valley, is similar to Swiss cheese. In the Alps or Apennine Mountains, some cheese is traditionally stored for six months or so in a cave for aging. Although well packaged, the damp conditions are perfect. Some of these caves are fancy, but many are just small rural caves where individuals or families can age home made cheese. In Lombardia I saw the name for these caves once from a book I have, but I couldn't locate it; I want to say a "cave grotto," but I think it was another word that starts with a "g." It showed a small cave with a heavy old fashioned door. This method goes back many centuries. In more urban settings, cheese is stored in deep cellars to age, although I think the cave method seems to be more effective for the best results. The dampness is probably the key. There are also special wooden boxes constructed for aging cheese, some very small for a family home.

Fontina cheese aging in a damp Alpine cave

Top 20 Most Popular Italian Cheeses

A Trip to a Cheese Cave, Arona, Piedmont, Italy

Valentine Warner visits the Fontina Cheese Caves, Aosta Valley, Italy

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