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English: Milan Cathedral, Milan, Italy.
Italiano: Il Duomo of Milan Italy.
Available on YouTube at http://youtu.be/r6YUEEotp_Q
The American writer and journalist, Mark Twain, visited Milan in the summer of 1867. He dedicated Chapter 18 of Innocents Abroad to Milan Cathedral, including many physical and historical details, and a, now, uncommon visit to the Roof. He describes the Duomo as follows:
"What a wonder it is! So grand, so solemn, so vast! And yet, so delicate, so airy, so graceful! A very world of solid weight, and yet it seems . . . a delusion of frostwork that might vanish with a breath ! . . The central one of its five great doors is bordered with a bas-relief of birds and fruits and beasts and insects, which have been so ingeniously carved out of the marble that they seem like living creatures - and the figures are so numerous and the design so complex, that one might study it a week without exhausting its interest . . . everywhere that a niche or a perch can be found about the enormous building, from summit to base, there is a marble statue, and every statue is a study in itself . . . Away above, on the lofty Roof, rank on rank of carved and fretted Spires spring high in the air, and through their rich tracery one sees the sky beyond . . . (Up on) the Roof . . . springing from its broad marble flagstones, were the long files of the Spires, looking very tall close at hand, but diminishing in the distance . . . We could see, now, that the statue on the top of each was the size of a large man, though they all looked like dolls from the street . . . They say that the Cathedral of Milan is second only to Saint Peter's at Rome. I cannot understand how it can be second to anything made by human hands".
Milan Cathedral at night.
Photo: 8 February 2011.
Author: Luca Volpi.
(Wikimedia Commons)
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In Italian Hours, Henry James describes “a certain exhibition that I privately enjoyed of the relics of Saint Charles Borromeus (sic). This holy man lies at his eternal rest in a small, but gorgeous sepulchral Chapel . . . and, for the modest sum of five francs, you may have his shrivelled mortality unveiled and gaze at it with whatever reserves occur to you. The Catholic Church never renounces a chance of the sublime for fear of a chance of the ridiculous . . . especially when the chance of the sublime may be the very excellent chance of five francs.
"The performance in question, of which the good San Carlo paid in the first instance the cost, was impressive certainly, but as a monstrous matter or a grim comedy may still be. The little Sacristan, having secured his audience, lighted a couple of extra candles and proceeded to remove from above the Altar, by means of a crank, a sort of sliding shutter, just as you may see a shop-boy do of a morning at his master's window. In this case, too, a large sheet of plate-glass was uncovered, and, to form an idea of the étalage, you must imagine that a jeweller, for reasons of his own, has struck an unnatural partnership with an undertaker.
English: Interior of Milan Cathedral.
Polski: Wnętrze Katedry Duomo (Mediolan - Włochy).
Photo: 25 August 2012.
Source: Own work.
Author: Spens03.
(Wikimedia Commons)
"The black mummified corpse of the Saint is stretched out in a glass coffin, clad in his mouldering Canonicals, Mitred, Crosiered and Gloved, glittering with votive jewels. It is an extraordinary mixture of death and life; the desiccated clay, the ashen rags, the hideous little black mask and skull, and the living, glowing, twinkling splendour of diamonds, emeralds and sapphires.
"The collection is really fine, and many great historic names are attached to the different offerings. Whatever may be the better opinion as to the future of the Church, I can't help thinking she will make a figure in the world so long as she retains this great fund of precious "properties," this prodigious capital decoratively invested and scintillating throughout Christendom at effectively-scattered points.”
IN POPULAR CULTURE.
Luchino Visconti's 1960 film, Rocco e i suoi fratelli, set in Milan, has a scene which takes place on the Roof of the Cathedral.
Polski: Mediolan - katedra.
English: Milan Cathedral.
Italiano: Milano - Duomo.
Photo: 31 August 2012.
Source: Own work.
Author: Andrzej Otrębski.
(Wikimedia Commons)
Many Milanese-dialect speakers, reminded by the centuries needed to complete the Duomo, use the "Fabbrica del Duomo" ("Fabrica del Dom" in the dialect) as an adjective (sometimes humorously, sometimes not) to describe an extremely long, too complex task, maybe even impossible to complete. The Italian phrase, "mangiare a ufo", stemming from the Milanese dialect, mangià a uf, meaning "being paid for a job not done", comes from the fact that the goods used to build the Duomo wore the inscription "A.U.F.", shorthand for Latin "Ad Usum Fabricae" (to be used for the construction) and were exempt from taxation.
A souvenir model of the Cathedral was thrown at the nose of Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, during an attack on 13 December, 2009.
In the song, "In Every Age", from the musical, Titanic, the building (Milan Cathedral) is compared with the Pyramids and the Titanic, as one of the greatest feats of architecture.
Several lavish shots of the Duomo are featured in the Italian film, I Am Love, (2009).
In the novel, "The Wary Transgressor", by James Hadley Chase, the main protagonist is seen working as an unofficial guide at the Duomo.
THIS CONCLUDES THE ARTICLE ON MILAN CATHEDRAL.
