Galileo's Fingers (and a Tooth): Italy Trip Guest Post by Evan Michelson, TV's "Oddities" and Morbid Anatomy Library

Below, the third guest post by Evan Michelson of TV's "Oddities" and the Morbid Anatomy Library documenting our trip through Italy supporting our book-in-progress on the history of the preservation and display of the human body.

In this post, she responds to some very unique science age relics (see above) housed at the amazing Florence Science Museum (now the Museo Galileo):

These two reliquaries contain a total of three fingers and one tooth from the revered mathematician, astronomer and physicist Galileo Galilei - the father of modern science and one of the greatest theoretical minds that mankind has ever known. He is a secular saint and a "martyr to science," a man convicted and imprisoned by the Inquisition for the crime of Copernicanism; he advocated for a heliocentric model of the solar system - the idea that the Earth revolves around the Sun. This was heresy according to the Roman Catholic Church, and it took 300 or so years for the Vatican to finally relent (somewhat) and issue a half-hearted apology. It is an egregious chapter in Western cultural history, and it highlights one of the central schisms between faith and science.

I have wanted to visit these particular digits for many years, and I fully expected my knees to go weak. Strangely enough, nothing of the sort happened. The power of Christian relics are both devotional and emotional - they conjure up the presence and the physical reality of the Saint; they allow the faithful to understand and commune with the very human aspect of a person who has been elevated to a more abstract state of high holiness. A secular figure such as Galileo generally needs no such reminder: we know that he lived, and we know what he accomplished. His fingers and that one tooth seemed improbable and curious - less like objects of reverence than slightly whimsical (and grisly) souvenirs.

A case on the other side of the room, however, contained Galileo's personal scientific instruments, including two telescopes of his own design. Galileo was (in addition to everything else) an inventor, and he was the first to improve on an original Dutch design by boosting the magnifying power of a spyglass considerably while creating a non-inverted image. He then trained these simple tubes at the Heavens. It was at that moment that modern astronomy was born; our solar system and our galaxy became comprehensible. We understood for the first time that the Milky Way that spills across the night sky is made of stars. I looked upon those unassuming tubes of wood, glass and leather, and finally I felt an overwhelming awe.

You can find out more about the Museo Galileo by clicking here. You can read future posts by Evan both on this blog and on her Facebook page, which you will find by clicking here. The images are mine.

Palermo's Capuchin Catacombs: Italy Trip Guest Post by Evan Michelson, TV's "Oddities" and Morbid Anatomy Library

Below you will find a second guest post by Evan Michelson of TV's "Oddities" and the Morbid Anatomy Library which will document our three-week trip through Italy supporting our book-in-progress exploring the history of the preservation and display of the human body in Italy.

Here, she waxes poetic on Palermo's rightfully renowned Capuchin Catacombs, best known to some as the final resting place of Rosalia Lombardo ("The Sleeping Beauty") and to others from Marco Lanza's The Living Dead. We were both more than happy to pay a sizable "photography fee" in order to have over two hours alone--all restriction gates opened, front doors locked to the public--in this dark, quiet, wonderful, overwhelming, sad, and, we both agreed, utterly perfect place.

Above is a photo of Evan with her favorite--piece? specimen? artifact?--from a workroom in which the mummies are restored. Here, we were able to get close enough to touch stacks of mummies in dusty wooden coffins donned in rolling swaths of antique Sunday best, floral wreaths topping grinning skulls, hands folded demurely in white gloves. Not to mention a fully costumed child skeleton in a crate (see above) and the odd skull.

More (many, many more!) images to come in the book, but we promised the keeper that we would restrain ourselves from online use. But let me say this: as those who have been will assure you, neither words nor photographs really suffice to communicate the grim magnificence of this place; A focus of both Evan and I's pilgrimage longings for decades, it not only did not disappoint but astounded. We both agreed it was the most spectacular, most overwhelming, most perfect macabre site we have have ever had the luck to experience.

A few days ago Joanna and I visited the Capuchin Catacombs in Palermo; they have been an obsession of mine for many years - a grotesque dream.

We had the whole place to ourselves for two hours, every gate unlocked, the doors shut behind us. In my imagination it had been only a few chambers, but the whole complex is actually quite large and it houses thousands of mummified corpses, all dressed in their finest; they are hung on the walls, laid out on crude wooden slabs and stuffed into elaborate coffins; they line corridors and adorn special chapels. To say that it was stunning and overwhelming would be an understatement - we were both giddy and disbelieving. There I was, in the place of my dreams; it was a profound experience that transcended every other deathly place I've ever visited.

It was the clothing that did it, that and the somewhat crude method of mummification practiced by the monks. The result is mummies in every state of decay: some not much more than skeletons, others with their faces artfully peeling away; there are only a handful that are eerily well preserved. They all wear gorgeous linens, laces, silks and woolens, their feet in lovely shoes, their hands stuffed into dainty gloves. The effect is uncanny, fascinating and strangely personal. These are real people, their post-mortem body language a grotesque parody of life. Long after the muscles stiffen the skin continues to shrink, harden and slough away, giving rise to hideous and comical expressions alike. The stuffed, hanging bodies, obeying the call of gravity, slump and lean in intimate ways.

This photo was taken in a disused restoration room - abandoned a while ago when the money ran out. The baby in the box is just one of many children brought here to spend some portion of eternity dressed in its Sunday best, welcoming curious strangers.

You can find out more about the Palermo Capuchin Catacombs by clicking here. You can read future posts by Evan both on this blog and on her Facebook page, which you will find by clicking here. Top three images are Evan's; the rest are my own.

Stay tuned for more posts from our new convent lair in Florence!

Carcere Penitenziati Museum, Palermo: Italy Trip Guest Post by Evan Michelson, TV's "Oddities" and Morbid Anatomy Library

Below you will find the first of a series of guest posts by Evan Michelson--star of TV's "Oddities" and Morbid Anatomy Library scholar in residence--which will haphazardly document our three-week trip through Italy collecting images and information for our book-in-progress exploring the history of the preservation and display of the human body in Italy.

In this post, Evan shares her thoughts on a macabre relic of Palermo's history under Spanish rule: the Carcere Penitenziati Museum, a former Inquisition prison and torture site turned museum. The visual highlight of this museum was the charming, Catholic-imagery-heavy, Darger-esqye graffiti covering the walls of many of the prisoners' cells (see above) which was, our guide suggested, perhaps less a reflection of ardent faith than a means to impress the guards and increase the odds that they would be judged innocent of heresy.

Following is Evan's thoughts on our visit:

These delicate and fascinating images are scratched onto the walls of individual cells in the Carcere Penitenziati prison here in Palermo - a place of imprisonment used by the Inquisition. Many of these images were created in the 17th century by unlucky souls confined here for being heretics, Jews, reformers and various other non-believers; these inmates decorated the walls while awaiting violent "conversion" by torture (if death did not take them first).

Apparently the prison guards allowed (or even encouraged) the inmates to create these pictures, which were produced by using wet bricks as a kind of chalk. The prisoners were thus able to express their hopes and fears while awaiting the unspeakable tortures that took place in a small room just a few feet down the corridor (close enough, perhaps, for the future "penitents" to hear the screams).

Our thoughtful guide helped us unravel the meaning of some of these images: first we see the Inquisition personified as a crescent-shaped monster (a theme repeated elsewhere; top image), swallowing up traditional Biblical characters (this piece is quite large and flows from one wall to another). Next there is Christ's passion, but the figures surrounding him are of Spanish (rather than Roman; second image down) origin, perhaps illustrating the fact that this particular "penitent" came from Spain; he is paying witness to his own personal journey to Golgotha. The third image down depicts the host and the chalice - a scene of transubstantiation. Although these are by turns crude and surprisingly accomplished, many of them have a whimsical quality that belies the horrifying conditions under which they were created.

There is beautiful writing all over these walls (some in English); many of the texts are prayers, but there are also heart wrenching autobiographical passages. This place of great suffering and death is serene and beautifully preserved in a new museum that has only been open for two years. Until somewhat recently these rooms were government offices, and a few of the cells had been bureaucratically whitewashed ("criminal!" chimed our guide). Our informed (and passionate) docent later lamented the lack of ordinary hours and access to many of Italy's lesser-known cultural treasures, but this quiet, low-key and out-of-the-way little museum is a thoughtful addition to the grander, shinier cultural attractions.

You can find out more about the Carcere Penitenziati Museum by clicking here. You can read future posts by Evan both on this blog and on her Facebook page, which you will find by clicking here. Top three images are Evan's; the rest are my own.

Stay tuned for more posts from our trip as we head from Palermo to Florence.

Arrivederci Naples! A Few Final Views, and Off to Palermo

Today: off from Naples to Palermo to meet good friend and fellow trouble maker Evan Michelson--star of TV's "Oddities" and Morbid Anatomy Library scholar in residence--where we will commence a three-week trip through Italy collecting images and information for our book project investigating "the history of Western culture as revealed through the preservation and display of the human corpse." 

Evan and I plan to post regularly here about the amazing things we encounter, so stay tuned for that.

In the meantime, a few final images from my beloved Naples, "the most macabre of cities... [where] the dead are played with ... like big dolls..." (The Necrophiliac, Gabrielle Wittkop)

You can also find out more about our project here.

Eros and Thanatos at Milan's Cimetero Monumentale: "Dedizione: Don't Tell Anyone The Cause of my Death," Funerary Monument, Piero da Verona, 1914

On a recent trip to Italy with Evan Michelson--co-star of TV's "Oddities" and Morbid Anatomy Library scholar in residence--we paid an impromptu, jet-lagged visit to the wonderful Cimetero Monumentale in Milan. We were both struck by the over-the-top--and, for a cemetery, odd--sexiness of so many of its funeral monuments, particularly the one shown above. I was trying to get to the bottom of this peculiar phenomenon when I came across the following lengthy discussion of the very monument in the book Italian Memorial Sculpture 1820-1940: A Legacy of Love; As it is quite fascinating, I quote it here in its entirety here:

Milan has one of the most enigmatic of erotic monuments. Conceived by Piero da Verona ... for Maria Beruccinia in 1914, it is subtitled Dedizione and inscribed 'Non dire ad alcuno perché sona morta' ... Dedizione translates as "devotion' in English, but in Italian its earlier meaning was 'surrender' or 'submission' and, by extension, 'self sacrifice.' Our curiosity is further incited by the inscrutable inscription 'Don't tell anyone why I'm dead' or, more liberally, 'Don't tell anyone the cause of my death.' The particular kind of graceful femininity was preceded in the works of Canonica and of Domenico Trentacoste... Da Verona must also have been receptive to the sensuality of the 'Genoese Symbolist School"... while the pose may specifically reflect contemporary photography, ranging from artistic poses to soft pornography.... One's immediate reaction is to ask what on earth a sculpture like this is doing in a cemetery. Is there malice in its presence there or in the eye of the beholder?

Evan and I will be returning to Italy in mid-February to finish our project, so expect many more posts like this one. And please--if anyone knows of any must-see Italian Catholica or Anatomica that we should make sure to work into our itinerary, shoot me an email at morbidanatomy [at] gmail.com!

This book, and many other books like it, resides in The Morbid Anatomy Library. The library will be open to the public next Saturday from 2-6. Image is ©Joanna Ebenstein, 2012; click to see larger, more detailed version.