New Section: Livorno/Leghorn in Quotes Thursday, Nov 1 2012

As already done for the Old English Cemetery, I created a new page with a collection of quotes from travellers’ accounts regarding the city of Livorno (or Leghorn). The new section will be evolving with time, as new quotes are found from the travel journals of the 17th-19th centuries. The page is accessible from the main blog page, or by clicking the next link:

-> Leghorn/Livorno in Quotes <-

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Shame! The “English Cemetery” of Pisa. Sunday, Sep 2 2012

If you happen to visit the city of Pisa by bus, chances are that your bus parks at the large bus parking area on Via Pietrasantina, a few hundred yards away from the world heritage site of Piazza dei Miracoli, where thousands of tourists visit the leaning tower everyday.
In this case, unfortunately, you might also happen to walk down Via Pietrasantina to reach the famous square, risking at the same time your life and

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On Tobias Smollett’s grave(s)… Reality or poetic licence? Thursday, Mar 29 2012

Tobias Smollett’s grave in the Old English Cemetery of Livorno has always sparked people’s interest: numerous visitors were attracted to the English Cemetery just to see the tomb of the great Scottish writer and historian. Some of them even took pieces of marble off as souvenirs, or left messages inscribed on the monument. Many travellers left short accounts on their visit to the cemetery and to Smollett’s tomb. Later on, the apparent mystery of its wrong inscription led to a written confrontation between Consul Montgomery Carmichael and Col. Buchan Telfer on the pages of The Times. More recently, after WWII, some concerned readers wrote to the Editor of The Times to denounce the state of neglect of the cemetery and of Smollett’s grave. The newspaper even published two pictures of the burial ground, of which one portrayed the writer’s monument at that time (1953).

The following picture shows

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