Reading Up At The Museo dell'Archivio Storico del Banco di Napoli

What a great spin on a pile of old, useless, dusty bank accounting books. The bank of Naples probably has warehouses full of the giant tomes. Leave them to rot? Nope, create an interesting space, cram it floor to ceiling with the books, have some displays and, bam, you opened a cool museum.

Typical room. Grab a volume, stay a decade.

Details. Some books are open so you can see how much someone owed for three cows. The reading is thick.

Typical room? How about typical rooms. Wandering gets dizzy with information.

No limit on book thickness, whatever the binder could wrap. Yep, these books are from the 1700s and earlier. A later ID label- typing!

Sometimes pages are just wrapped, like old laundry. Washing the accounts.

Cattedrale di Santa Maria Assunta In Naples

The heart of central Naples is the imposing duomo, Cattedrale di Santa Maria Assunta. Big on the outside, lots of areas to explore on the inside.

Front marble facade in the dying light of the afternoon.

Central apse, soaring. The cathedral is named for Mary and there's a Mary statue for donations. She wears the crown in this house.

More Mary, looking blue and theatrical with the background curtain.

More nooks. A trophy room, full of religious icons, offerings, and booty. The underground crypt, carefully watched by a marble sculpture of donor Cardinal Carafa.

Bling on bling. The Royal Chapel of the Treasure of St. Januarius. You get marble in multiple colors and inlays, statues of famous peeps, gold details and giant paintings. What else will encourage you to utter a prayer?

Details Of Naples, Italy

Naples is a riot of big attractions and bustle all around. People, cars, food, churches, trash. In yo' face. Crane the neck, dip the head, look a little deeper and some details emerge.

Historic district apartments open right to the small streets. They spy on you, you peek at them.

Always renewing the old, a church in a Christo-like covering. A priest delivering joy and death, flowers and skull.

It's always raining at the butcher. Actually, the dripping water is a tank, keeping the offerings moist.

Overwhelming curio shop. Good luck. Levitating laundry.

The seafood stall, Jesus always watching.

About that trash. Breeding and piling. Religious body parts for sale at a street market.

Alley shrine, well lit.

Great Graffiti In Naples, Italy, Part Two

This blog could last to infinity just on Naples graffiti examples. More highlights:

The city's patron saint, San Gennaro, looms large. And so handsome.

Curious mashup, political revolutionary Che Guevera and drug snorting football superstar Diego Maradona. Just break whatever rules you desire. Actress Julie Andrews, channeling the lovely sounds of music and a smooth action Uzi machine gun.

A bird and cat, taking a pause from fighting to ponder a fish. Whoa.

Jacked she-devil. Walk on. Surreal artist celebrity Salvador Dali, parodying yummy Chupa Chups lollipops. Kind of Spanish for Suck.

Best piece of graffiti in the city, a loving, heartfelt tribute to iconic actress Monica Vitti. She had recently died, in early 2022 at the age of 90. Vitti is best known for being a bit of a muse for director Michaelangelo Antonioni, starring in his groundbreaking films L'Avventura, La Notte, and Red Desert. Do yourself a favor, and the world, seek out and watch their films.

Great Graffiti In Naples, Italy, Part One

Naples has a reputation as a trashy, messy, kind of crazy part of Italy. Guilty. And what goes well with an undercurrent of mayhem? Graffiti. Mix it all up and you have a city that could be a bit of a back lot for a New York in the 1980s movie production.

Classic graffiti medium, a Metro train.

Two bigwigs of Naples, patron saint San Gennaro (Saint Januarius) and subversive Renaissance artist Caravaggio. Just kicking it, reading the papers. A more recent art world celeb, Jean-Michelle Basquiat, parodying for Starbucks. Graffiti, have fun with it.

The real patron saint of the city, football star and god, Diego Maradona. Shrines to him are everywhere.

More fun with art parody. Vermeer, Bitches and getting things done, magic. Michael Jackson as Marilyn Monroe in Andy Warhol's iconic portrait. Sweet.

No matter what alley you duck down, the graffiti is there to greet you.

Heroic Herculaneum

A city in a hill. The hill is a quirk of preservation, a great lava flow from an erupting Mount Vesuvius in October, AD 79. The small city started to be re-discovered in 1709 by Prince d'Elbeuf, when he bought the site and started poking around water wells for artifacts.

Overview with the modern city in the background. It's a small, compact place with a grid layout. Large, public areas have yet to be excavated.

Bring your wheat, get it stone ground into flour. A fishy mosaic in a room attached to the bath house.

Take a seat, share you bench with a fellow sweater. The grand, arched interior of the bath house.

Domestic spaces with lovely frescos. No self-respecting house is without some wall bling.

As at all major archaeological sites in Italy, work continues.

The Posterity Of Pompeii

Pompeii is probably the best place in the world to visit if one wants a great idea of how ancient Roman society lived. And died. A sophisticated, developed civilization with a bad ending. At least at Pompeii.

Let's start our tour at the big amphitheater. Do you want lawn or stone seating?

The delicate, perfectly squared layout of the columns in the courtyard of Casa degli Epidii. Venus, enjoying herself. Who wouldn't? A fresco at the villa Praedia di Giulia Felice.

Mosh pit. Tourists snapping every which way at the central forum plaza. Makes one lose their head.

Decay and rebuilding. Much of the ruins are still, well, in ruin. No matter, bring in some scaffolding and endless post-doc archeo students and get preserving.

Back at the amphitheater, looking for a cell signal. "Augustus, can you hear me now?"