Showing posts with label Magliana. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Magliana. Show all posts

Saturday, June 27, 2020

VIADUCT OF THE MAGLIANA DISTRICT

VIADOTTO DELLA MAGLIANA
Autostrada Roma - Aeroporto

1965 Riccardo Morandi (1902/89)
Built in the bend of the Tiber River, where the Magliana district is at beginning of the Rome-Fiumicino highway

“On June 28, 1965 a landslide, extended in width for about 200 meters, hit the Magliana bend of the River Tiber and the motorway bridge still under construction at the time. The designer Riccardo Morandi - commissioned by ANAS to remedy - identified two possible solutions: either rebuilding the ruined stretch, with a deck based on sets of poles inserted in the ground in great depth; or cross over the whole area of the landslide with a suspension bridge with a single arch. ANAS chose the second option, the most ambitious and never attempted in Rome until then” (Antonella Anappo - Il Ponte Morandi, Monografia)

“In a continuous research, which does not consider technology for its own sake and at the same time is devoid of formal preconceptions, Morandi designed works marked by a perfect balance between functionality, rigor of structural solutions and quality of the final image. (...) He studied the prestressed concrete, developing a system, for which in 1948 won the first of seven patents related to his name” (Enciclopedia Treccani)

Sunday, September 1, 2019

St. PASSERA

S. PASSERA
Via S. Passera 1 - Magliana

Probably built in the fifth century AD on the ruins of a ROMAN MAUSOLEUM of the late second/early third century AD, still visible

The church is mentioned in the sources for the first time in the eighth century

The present church dates back to the thirteenth century

Here were kept the relics of the martyrs Sts. Cyrus and John, brought to Rome in the year 407. They were two doctors from Alexandria in Egypt killed during the persecution of Diocletian (284/305), which took place in the year 303

The Catholic Church does not include any S. Passera in the lists of saints and, according to historical sources, no saint has ever existed under the name Passera

The curious name Passera (sparrow) is mentioned in the sources only since 1317 and it comes maybe from a contraction of S. Prassede (St. Praxedes), the saint to whom the church was originally dedicated, and of whom a relic was preserved here

The name could also come from the phonetic corruption of the title Abbas Cyrus (father Cyrus), from which S. Abbaciro, given to the church

Over the centuries the term underwent a distortion in the popular language, becoming Appacero, Pacero, Pacera and, finally, Passera

APSE

Two orders of frescoes of the fourteenth century:

In the upper part “Jesus and Sts. Peter, Paul and John the Evangelist”

In the lower part “Virgin Mary and Child with Sts. Praxedes, Cyrus and John martyr with two images of laymen, probably the patrons”

ARCHAEOLOGICAL EXPLORATIONS

The underground of the church, buried after 1706, was rediscovered only in 1904

On the north wall there are some faded frescoes “Cycle of Goddess Dike” with the goddess holding a pair of scales, a bird and a boxer

On the south wall “Sheep and red lines”

In the vault “Large six-pointed and eight-pointed star and decorative motifs”

There are some unrecognizable images in the counter façade
At the end of the thirteenth century a “Virgin Mary and Child” was painted here, but it was stolen in 1968

Tuesday, December 26, 2017

MAGLIANA BRIDGE

PONTE DELLA MAGLIANA
1930/48 designed by Romolo Raffaelli
It was swept away by a flood of the Tiber in 1937 when it still had not been completed
Bombed and damaged in 1943 by the Germans during the Battle of Magliana
Bombed and destroyed by the Americans in 1944
Rebuilt in 1948 200 m away by Ignazio Guidi (1904/78), Cesare Valle (1902/2000) and Carlo Cestelli Guidi for the Allegri firm without the previous fascist decorations
It is 224 m long (735 feet) and is made up of seven arches in reinforced concrete and travertine. The central bay can be opened and it is made of steel