Naples Sites

Naples is all about the churches. I start scribbling notes on paper like a schoolboy finishing his term paper. I look at my notes and I think to myself, there's a whole lot of church in these notes. So I have decided to keep my notes to a minimum as I try to spare the painstaking details.

1. The Duomo of Naples
For every major Italian city there exists a Duomo. A Duomo is essentially a cathedral. Moreover, it represents the city. Even still, it becomes a great landmark. For example: "Turn left at the Duomo" or "If you pass the duomo, you have gone too far".



For every city there is a duomo. For every Duomo there is a story. Here is where the story begins:

Imagine that you were a person that did good things in life. Imagine you were a person that did good things in life for others. Enter San Gennaro, a Saint - or what I call a "do gooder". This person performed miracles a. lah Jesus Christ. Unfortunately, he was doing such a good job that the rest of the church turned Jealous. Of course, they do what any logical body of authority would do - behead the bastard. So in 305, San Gennaro was beheaded for doing too many good things.
Moral of the story: Good Guys finish last.

Ok, so there's more to it than that. Many years later, his body is brought to Naples to the Duomo. In 1989, there was hemoglobin found in the blood. Hemoglobin is the part of the red blood cells where oxygen was found. When oxygen is found, the blood liquifies. The only problems with this is that our guy Gennaro has been dead for 1500 years. Again, the superstitious people of Naples believe this to be another miracle of St. Gennaro. His blood supposedly liquifies 3 times a year. What a treat.

So if you are wondering what you can do with your body when you pass on, you can
a) be creamated
b) donate your body to science
c)become buried
d)try to have someone see if your blood liquifies. If so, you too may be able to get your owqn chapel and perform miracles...All without lifting a finger, or a bone.

2. Museo Arceologico Nazionale

So this is the big museum of Naples. Its biggest claim to fame is that many of the original statues and relics from the A.D. 79 Pompeii eruption have been stored here. The original statues of Artemis (goddess of hunting) and her bro Apollo (god of light and reason) are stored here. Some of the other big highlights:
*You get to see the famous God with the earth on the back. He is famous for coming up with that slogan "I have the weight of the world on my shoulders"
*A piece of a Meredian line replica the signs of Zodiac. For all of the non DaVinci Code readers, the Prime Meridian line is located in Greenwich, England. The Meridian line was used back in the day to tell time depending on how it was reflected by the sun.
*Sex room. No joke. There is a separate Ancient World of Sex. There are brothel pictures and decorations, sex organ charms, and phallic symbols everywhere. Some of the charmers are a statue of a bull with a penis in his mouth and some good oil on canvas porn of Venus (the love goddess) and Mars (her lover).

3. Napoli Soterranea (Underground Naples)

Beginning 400 feet below, Travelling Lisa and I go to discover Napoli Soterranea, the underbelly of naples. After 3 days in exhausting sickness and stifling heat it's nice to go underground. Yes, today we are venturing underneath the city.


Lisa and I are touring with a humble guide from Poland. She has a good command of the language, and tells us more about the history. We venture underground to find a labyrinth of tunnels and sisterns. The system of tunnels served as old backstage parlors for actors in the ampitheatre above. Years later, it served as an aqueduct for the entire city. And during World War II, it served as a bomb shelter for many. See the engraving of a bomb sketch that is more than 50 years old below --







We hear one story of the Pozatelli. It goes something like this.
Water from rivers and channels flowed under the tunnels and eventually collected into what are called sisterns. The sisterns represented the water supply for a particular region. Think of sisterns like you would think of fire hydrants. They are full of water, and the only people that can use them are studly firemen that women fantasize about.
Enter the Pozatelli. The original woman fantasy. They risked their lives daily to set up ropes and well systems to provide water for the rest of the community. They also would be known to leave presents for women they fancied. They stole from the rich and gave to the poor -- The original robin hoods of our time. They were usually short, and wore long coats to protect them from the elements. As we walk through the sisterns, you see the entrances where the pozatelli had to climb from. Batman had nothing on these guys.





The underground had indeed served as an ampitheatre in its time and so the following is a brief anectdote on Nero - the emperor and performer...
So Naples is the oldest city in Italy. Because of this, Naples had earned much props throughout the region. Many actors which to perform here. In fact, Nero the emperor performed here in AD 79. Honestly, I could care less about his acting. He did however manage a stint of good luck when he forced his audience to stick around after one of his shows. All 3000 of them stayed for a couple of encores while one of the most brutal earthquakes struck the area. Many people in Naples died. However, everyone in the Ampitheatre was saved.




As we leave the underground tour, we say a humble farewell to our tour guide. Looking back as I type this email, there are countless other sites in Naples that we miss...Countless castles and curches, more churches, and probably some more piazzas with jesus. But you get the idea. Naples is rich with history once you scratch its surface. All they need to do now is to work on the smog.