David

David is a masterpiece of Renaissance sculpture created between 1501 and 1504, by the Italian artist Michelangelo. It is a 5.17-metre marble statue of a standing male nude. The statue represents the Biblical hero David, a favoured subject in the art of Florence. Originally commissioned as one of a series of statues of prophets to be positioned along the roofline of the east end of Florence Cathedral, the statue was placed instead in a public square, outside the Palazzo della Signoria, the seat of civic government in Florence, where it was unveiled on 8 September 1504.

The statue has been reproduced many times. The plaster cast of David at the Victoria and Albert Museum has a detachable plaster fig leaf which is displayed nearby. The fig leaf was created in response to Queen Victoria's shock upon first viewing the statue's nudity, and was hung on the figure prior to royal visits, using two strategically placed hooks.

The David was originally intended to be placed high up on the facade of Florence’s Duomo. But when people saw the final product, they realized it would be a waste to hide him up there. So, a commission made up of artists (including Botticelli and Leonardo) and leading citizens was formed to decide where to put it. The placement in front of the main entrance to the Palazzo Vecchio was favoured by members of the new Republican government, who transformed the David into a political statement. He was set up as an image of strong government as well as a warning to all who pass. The David displaced another statue, the Judith and Holofernes by Donatello, that previously stood in that location.

In 2010, a dispute over the ownership of David arose when, based on a legal review of historical documents, the Italian Culture Ministry claimed ownership of the statue in opposition to the city of Florence, where it has always been located. Florence disputes the state claim.

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Roman Forum

The Roman Forum (Forum Romanum) was the central area of the city around which ancient Rome developed. Here was where commerce, business, prostitution, cult and the administration of justice took place. Space where religious activities were conducted and the communal hearth of the city.

The Roman Forum was designed by the architect Vitruvius with proportions 3:2 (length to width). For centuries, the Forum Romanum was the site of the city's most important public buildings, such as the Arch of Septimius Severus, built in AD 203 and the Roman Forum Rostra or platforms for public speeches. The reliefs on the triple arch represented many of Rome's victories over oriental tribes and the Rostra was decorated with prows of warships captured during battles. The Roman Forum became the spectacular showcase of the Roman Empire filled with beautiful statues and architecture.

Today, archeological excavations continue along with constant restoration and preservation. Long a major tourist destination in the city, the Forum is open for foot traffic along the ancient Roman streets which are restored to the late Imperial level. The Forum Museum (Antiquarium Forense) is found at the Colosseum end of a modern road, the Via dei Fori Imperiali.

This small museum has a significant collection of sculpture and architectural fragments. There are also reconstructions of the Forum and the nearby Imperial Fora as well as a short video in several languages. It is entered from the Forum by the side of Santa Francesca Romana and is open from 08:30 to one hour before sunset. Admission is 12 Euros.

In 2008 heavy rains caused structural damage to the modern concrete covering holding the "Black Stone" marble together over the Lapis Niger.

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Mount Vesuvius

Mount Vesuvius, on the west coast of Italy, is the only active volcano on mainland Europe. It is best known because of the eruption in A.D. 79 that destroyed the city of Pompeii. Mount Vesuvius is considered to be one of the most dangerous volcanoes in the world due to the large population of the city of Naples and the surrounding towns on the slopes nearby.

The volcano is classed as a complex stratovolcano because its eruptions typically involve explosive eruptions as well as pyroclastic flows. Vesuvius and other Italian volcanoes, such as Campi Flegrei and Stromboli, are part of the Campanian volcanic arc. The Campanian arc sits on a tectonic boundary where the African plate is being subducted beneath the Eurasian plate.

Vesuvius has erupted many times since and is the only volcano on the European mainland to have erupted within the last hundred years. Today, it is regarded as one of the most dangerous volcanoes in the world because of the population of 3,000,000 people living nearby and its tendency towards explosive (Plinian) eruptions. It is the most densely populated volcanic region in the world.

The area around Vesuvius was officially declared a national park on June 5, 1995. The summit of Vesuvius is open to visitors and there is a small network of paths around the mountain that are maintained by the park authorities on weekends.

There is access by road to within 200 metres of the summit (measured vertically), but thereafter access is on foot only. There is a spiral walkway around the mountain from the road to the crater.

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Amalfi Coast

The Amalfi Coast is a stretch of coastline on the southern coast of the Sorrentine Peninsula in the Province of Salerno in Southern Italy. The Amalfi Coast is a popular tourist destination for the region and Italy as a whole, attracting thousands of tourists annually.

The Amalfi Coast remained isolated geographically until the 19th century when Ferdinand II, the Bourbon King of Naples, commissioned the construction of a road connecting the villages dotting the coastline. The Amalfi Coast road reached Amalfi by the middle of the century, and this provided the access that today allows countless tourists each year to experience the beauty of the Amalfi Coast.

The Amalfi Coast lies in a Mediterranean climate, featuring warm summers and mild winters. It is located on the relatively steep southern shore of the Sorrentine Peninsula, leaving little room for rural and agricultural territories. The only land route to the Amalfi Coast is the 40 kilometres long Strada Statale 163 which runs along the coastline from the town of Vietri sul Mare in the east to Positano in the west.

The Amalfi Coast is known for its production of limoncello liqueur as the area is a known cultivator of lemons, known as sfusato amalfitano in Italian, which are grown in terraced gardens along the entire coast between February and October. Amalfi is also a known maker of a hand-made thick paper which is called bambagina. Other renowned local products are a particular kind of anchovies (local Italian: alici) from Cetara, and the colorful handmade ceramics from Vietri.

In 1997, the Amalfi Coast was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site as a cultural landscape.

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Mount Etna

Mount Etna is an active stratovolcano on the east coast of Sicily, Italy, close to Messina and Catania. It lies above the convergent plate margin between the African Plate and the Eurasian Plate. It is the tallest active volcano on the European continent, currently 3,329 m high, though this varies with summit eruptions. It is the highest mountain in Italy south of the Alps.

Etna is one of Sicily's main tourist attractions, with thousands of visitors every year. The most common route is through the road leading to Sapienza Refuge, lying at the south of the crater at elevation of 1910 m. It hosts a large parking, several bars, a hotel, and is a starting point for the cable car. From the Refuge, a cableway runs uphill to the elevation of 2500 m; from there, visitors can take a drive with special terrain vehicles, or take a long walk to the designated crater area at 2920 m.

There are two main points of departure for a trip on Etna: Etna Sud (la Sapienza) from which you may either walk or take the cable car to 2,900m, from there it is a 2-4 hour round trip to the summit craters, although there is no need to go that far to get a good feel for the majesty of the mountain. The other point of departure is Etna Nord (Piano Provenzana) from where you may walk or take 4X4 buses up to the observatory at 2,400m. You may walk to the summit craters from there.

Mount Etna is one of the most active volcanoes in the world and is in an almost constant state of activity. The fertile volcanic soils support extensive agriculture, with vineyards and orchards spread across the lower slopes of the mountain and the broad Plain of Catania to the south. Due to its history of recent activity and nearby population, Mount Etna has been designated a Decade Volcano by the United Nations. In June 2013, it was added to the list of UNESCO World Heritage Sites.

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Trevi Fountain

The Trevi Fountain, or Fontana di Trevi in Italian, is Italy’s largest and most famous Baroque fountain, standing 85 feet high and 65 feet across. Baroque art, a popular European art form between 1600 and 1750, is characterized by highly ornate and decorative art and architecture.

The Trevi Fountain that stands in Trevi Square today was designed by Roman architect Nicola Salvi. Building began in 1732 and concluded three decades later. Before his death in 1751, Salvi chose young artist Giuseppe Pannini as his successor. The fountain that stands today has work expressed in the original sketches from Bernini, Salvi and Pannini.

Coins are purportedly meant to be thrown using the right hand over the left shoulder. This was the theme of 1954's Three Coins in the Fountain and the Academy Award-winning song by that name which introduced the picture. An estimated 3,000 Euros are thrown into the fountain each day. The money has been used to subsidize a supermarket for Rome's needy; however, there are regular attempts to steal coins from the fountain.

The Trevi Fountain has appeared in famous films, securing itself a place in popular culture. It can be seen in Fellini’s “La Dolce Vita” and the 1953 Gregory Peck and Audrey Hepburn movie “Roman Holiday.”

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Colosseum

The Flavius amphitheatre is the biggest and most imposing in the Roman world, but is also the most famous monument in Rome and is known as the "Colosseum" or "Coliseum". Started by Emperor Vespasian of the Flavia family, it was opened by his son Titus in 80 A.D.

The highly ostentatious opening ceremony, lasted one hundred days during which people saw great fights, shows and hunts involving the killing of thousands of animals (5000 according to the historian Suetonius). For the opening, the arena space was filled with water for one of the most fantastic events held in Roman times, naumachias – real sea battles reproducing great battles of the past.

The Colosseum could hold, it is estimated, between 50,000 and 80,000 spectators, and was used for gladiatorial contests and public spectacles such as mock sea battles, animal hunts, executions, re-enactments of famous battles, and dramas based on Classical mythology. The building ceased to be used for entertainment in the early medieval era. It was later reused for such purposes as housing, workshops, quarters for a religious order, a fortress, a quarry, and a Christian shrine.

The Colosseum today is now a major tourist attraction in Rome with thousands of tourists each year paying to view the interior arena, though entrance for citizens of the European Union (EU) is partially subsidised, and entrance is free for EU citizens under eighteen or over sixty-five years of age.There is now a museum dedicated to Eros located in the upper floor of the outer wall of the building. Part of the arena floor has been re-floored. Beneath the Colosseum, a network of subterranean passageways once used to transport wild animals and gladiators to the arena opened to the public in summer 2010.

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Leaning Tower of Pisa

The Leaning Tower of Pisa is a freestanding bell tower located in the city of Pisa in Italy. Like its name suggest, it actually does lean to one side. The tower started to lean during construction because the foundation was built on soft ground that had difficulty supporting the weight. The lean became worse as construction continued for several decades. Between 1990 and 2001 it was stabilized and the lean was partially fixed.

The height of the tower is 55.86 metres from the ground on the low side and 56.67 metres on the high side. The width of the walls at the base is 2.44 m. Its weight is estimated at 14,500 metric tons. The tower has 296 or 294 steps; the seventh floor has two fewer steps on the north-facing staircase.

Construction of the tower occurred in three stages across 199 years. Work on the ground floor of the white marble campanile began on August 14, 1173, during a period of military success and prosperity. This ground floor is a blind arcade articulated by engaged columns with classical Corinthian capitals.

The Leaning Tower of Pisa became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1987. Also included in this designation were the cathedral, cemetery and the baptistery.

In May 2008, after the removal of another 70 metric tons of ground, engineers announced that the Tower had been stabilized such that it had stopped moving for the first time in its history. They stated it would be stable for at least 200 years.

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The Musée d'Orsay

The Musée d'Orsay is a museum housed in a grand railway station built in 1900. Home to many sculptures and impressionist paintings, it has become one of Paris's most popular museums.

The museum building was originally a railway station, Gare d'Orsay, constructed for the Chemin de Fer de Paris à Orléans and finished in time for the 1900 Exposition Universelle to the design of three architects: Lucien Magne, Émile Bénard and Victor Laloux. It was the terminus for the railways of southwestern France until 1939.

The Gare d'Orsay was inaugurated on the 14th of July 1900 for the Paris World Exposition and was considered a masterpiece of industrial architecture. But soon the platforms had become too short for the now much longer trains and as early as 1939, the gare d'Orsay was out of use as a train station. Over time it was used as a parking lot, as a shooting stand, as a theatre location and even as a reception center for prisoners of war.

The train station had been completely abandoned since 1961 when it was saved from demolition by the French president Pompidou. In 1978 his successor, president Giscard d'Estaing, decided to use the Gare d'Orsay as a museum for 19th and 20th century art.

It would not only contain paintings, but it would also cover different art forms, including sculptures, engravings, photos, film, architecture and urbanism.

Restoration of the Musée d'Orsay, as it is now called, started in 1979 and finally on the 29th of November 1986, the museum was inaugurated by the French president, François Mitterrand.

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Palais Garnier

The Palais Garnier is a 1,979-seat opera house, which was built from 1861 to 1875 for the Paris Opera. It was originally called the Salle des Capucines because of its location on the Boulevard des Capucines in the 9th arrondissement of Paris, but soon became known as the Palais Garnier in recognition of its opulence and its architect, Charles Garnier.

The Palais Garnier is probably the most famous opera house in the world, a symbol of Paris like Notre Dame Cathedral, the Louvre, or the Sacré Coeur Basilica." This is at least partly due to its use as the setting for Gaston Leroux's 1910 novel The Phantom of the Opera and, especially, the novel's subsequent adaptations in films and Andrew Lloyd Webber's popular 1986 musical.

The Palais Garnier also houses the Bibliothèque-Musée de l'Opéra de Paris (Paris Opera Library-Museum). Although the Library-Museum is no longer managed by the Opera and is part of the Bibliothèque nationale de France, the museum is included in unaccompanied tours of the Palais Garnier.

The interior of the Opéra Garnier building is even more impressive than its exterior. The marble Grand Staircase has a height of 30m/98ft! The 54m long Grand Foyer features a mosaic covered ceiling and a large number of chandeliers. It is so luxurious that it can be compared with the corridors in Versailles.

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