(PISA, Italia, Saturday 17 June 2000)
La Stampa Giornale
La Stampa Reporter in PISA, Fiorella Minervino
294 Steps and a Curse
Pisa. When words are spoken about the Tower of Pisa inevitably the thought runs to his instability, to the inclination, to possible yeldings, to that pernicious "lean" to her as monument and to us as possible visitors. The Tower has well more than the charm of danger, it is before all a work of art, a jewel of architecture started in August of 1173 (1174 according to the Pisan calculation). The plan and the beginning of the work are, for the most part, attributed (starting with Vasari) to Bonanno from Pisa, who created the unfortunate bronze shutters of the Porta Reale Door of the Pisa Cathedral, destroyed by fire in the early part of 1500. More fortunate and still visible, the magnificent door of St. Ranieri in the right transept of the Cathedral.
The construction on the Tower stopped at the third floor, already at that time the ground was yelding. After a century, in 1275 the work started again on this miracle of statics, with three more floors according to a line that, correcting the inclination, extended to bend in the opposite direction. It was none other than Giovanni Pisano, child as well as student of Nicola, who continued against dissents with the administration of Siena, to collaborate on the arduous assignment, it seems with Giovanni of Simone.
Only in the second half of 1300 came the bell cell addition, by work, it seems, of Thomas Pisano. Dressed again in white marble, the Tower was equipped with decoration similar to that of the apse of the Cathedral: a first order of arcades on semicolumns followed by six orders of loggias and the cylindrical bell cell; finally the architectural hangings to the sides of the door of entry.
On the inside the bell tower is cylindrical. 294 steps conduct well, with the open spiral staircase to each floor from an exit onto the external gallery, above the last floor; the bell cell where there are 7 bells. Here Galileo climbed for his experiments on the fall of gravity.
Copyright ©1999 Editing Credits Publikompass
