CONTENT
5
6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 24 26
28
Fam. Bazzero Fam. Biraghi Fam. Bizzozero Fam. Fraschini Fam. Lavezzari Maderna Fam. Mayer Fam. Perego Fam. Petazzi Fam. Tiburzi Fam. Vallardi
30 32 34 38 40 42
44
Fam. Bianchi Fam. Colombo Fam. Fuoco Fam. Ganna Fam. Mauri Fam. Sartorelli
46 48 50 52
Fam. Balconi Fam. Bruni Fam. Monti Fam. Olimpia - Inghini
54 56 58
82
62
Fam. Nodari Fam. Olcese
64 66 68 70 72 74 76 78 80
Fam. Angelini Fam. Billi Fam. Bramati Fam. Brusotti Fam. Campari Fam. Fornasari Fam. Guaita Fam. Riva Fam. Verganti
84 86 88 90 92 94
Fam. Calamida Fam. De Franceschi Fam. Fraschini Fam. Ramponi Fam. Sayno Fam. Valentini
Foreward
Beyond their primary purpose as places where the dead are buried and mourners congregate to pay their last respects, cemeteries also attract people for their amenable surroundings. Some cemeteries in London are frequented by office workers who sit on benches and munch sandwiches during their lunch breaks. Highgate Cemetery is fascinating for the many trees and the ivy and moss which cover some of the gravestones, but it is also renowned for the tomb of Karl Marx which still appeals to the curiosity of tourists as well as some devoted pilgrims. The Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris attracts tourists because of the many famous people like Edith Piaf, Maria Callas and Jim Morrison who is buried there. In Milan’s Cimitero Monumentale there are shady trees and like all urban cemeteries, the comforting silence provides relief from the hurly-burly of the city outside. Apart from the many interesting sculptures, the sepulchers go from quite simple gravestones to some very imposing mausolea – up to 20 meters high – commissioned mostly by the families of wealthy industrialists from about 1880 to 1940. The cemetery displays a myriad of artistic trends and tastes spanning the 150 years since its inauguration in 1866 right up to our times. It has often been said that it is an open-air gallery of art, but to be a bit more precise, what is really meant is that the place is a gallery of funereal architecture and sculpture. However, that is not enough for us because apart from the arts of architecture and sculpture, only until very recently one other area of applied art which is very prominent in this place was completely ignored. That is the boundless variety of lettering styles showing the names of the deceased on the gravestones and monuments. On this occasion, there should be no necessity to explain why the multifarious forms of the letters
of our alphabet are to be regarded as an applied art that is at least on a par with others such as jewelry or ceramics. But if there are any doubts, a fleeting glance at the photos shown on these pages ought to be enough to settle the matter. Nonetheless, not all lettering in the cemetery can be considered to be particularly artistic or creative; and though many of the inscriptions were industrially manufactured in metal, even these have a historical background that is worth understanding. A great many other inscriptions were designed specifically by an architect for a certain monument and the letters were either carved into stone by skilled craftsmen as incised ‘v’ cuts or left in relief with the background lowered by the use of mechanical tools. Like the architecture of the monuments, most of the letterforms are stylistically classifiable and can be more or less accurately pigeon-holed into categories such as Roman caps, revived Lombardics, Art nouveau, Art deco, etc. In each of these categories (about which information is given further on) a basic stylistic idea can be be interpreted in many variations. Like the monuments on which they are placed, the letterforms of lots of other inscriptions are unclassifiable in as much as they are the eccentric or delightfully whimsical conceptions of the architects. Clearly, the century and a half that the cemetery has already chalked up mean that no claim can be made for the lettering of the funereal inscriptions to be at all representative of the history of our alphabet – the capitals of which were invented by the Romans more than 2,000 years ago. Though hardly any of the letterforms in the cemetery have precise typographic equivalents as fonts, there is much to be learned and much to be enjoyed by students of typography.
5
Roman
Art Nouveau
Art Decò
Sans-serif
Others
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
New Gothic
Art Nouveau
Art Decò
Sans-serif
Others
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
New Gothic
Roman
Art Decò
Sans-serif
Others
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
New Gothic
Roman
Art Nouveau
Sans-serif
Others
56
57
58
59
60
61
New Gothic
Roman
Art Nouveau
Art Decò
Others
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
New Gothic
Roman
Art Nouveau
Art Decò
Sans-serif
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95