Rome in brief [antikvár]

ROMÉ in bríef THE ART OF WRITING GUIDES must be taken as a serious matter. Besides the necessary culturaí background, the direct knowledge of places and things and the reSiability of the sources, it requires a sense of dimension and the other sense of orientation, as if the author was accompanying the tourist, showing him, in the same area, at one time, everything that can be of interest to him . So used to write, twenty years ago, the lamented Luigi Bottazzi, an expert on Román matters, pleasant divulger, severe, just and impartial judge. Another Romanist, Leone Gessi, author of one of the best guides of Romé, to whomever asked him how could he alone have written so many things about Romé, used to answer: by loving . Not a rhetorical expression, but an effective reality. I hope that Emma Amadéi drew her inspiration from this spiritual line when she wrote the synthetic Guide of Romé for the Ente Provinciáié per il Turismo: a guide which is humán, simple, confidential, faithful, lovable and useful. Hard task and full of responsibility. Once came to my mind the idea of taking note of the inaccuracies of somé guides. One, pubblished in French, showed the name of the great Borromini translated with an inexplicable Borromée. In one of the many guides published during the Jubilee Year, was written that Mazzini had declared the Román Republic in 1849: Mazzini arrived almost a month later than the historic event. Elsewhere, the famous talking statue called the Babuino , then in the court-yard of a palace in the homonymous Street, was reported missing. Other inaccuracies or misprints, the Dante Alighieri , housed in the Tower of the Anguillara, while it was. and still is, the House of Dante with its rich library. Furthermore, the Church of St. Eligio, architectonic jewel by Raphael, was defined chapel ... Nonsense might have said Petrolini. Agreed. Only inaccuracies caused by the most inexplicable reasons and very similar to the excusable slips and axcused mishaps of every great and small actor. Fortunately many other guides have been published: written by Giuseppe Lugli and by Valerio Mariani; that of Leone Gessi is still considered among the best. Besides, of course, that of the Touring Club. Amongst the files relatíve to the Guides . I find one edited by the EPT. It is a few years old. It was written by Carlo Galassi Paluzzi in miscellaneous form with the co-operation of Salvatore Aurigemma, Carlo Cecchelli and Carlo Pietrangeli. This edition was rapidly exhausted. Therefore, it was necessary a new Guide . In 1950, Leone Gessi wrote that a guide should be modest, clear, simple and confidential. It must listen and repeat the occult and clear voices of