M A RT I N R A N D A L L T R AV E L A R T • A R C H I T E C T U R E • G A S T R O N O M Y • A R C H A E O L O G Y • H I S T O R Y • M U S I C • L I T E R AT U R E
2013 & October–December 2012
Contents
Finland................................................................. 44
Britain’s leading provider of cultural tours........................4–6
Germany......................................................... 64–77
Scotland.......................................................162–167
India................................................................80–87
Spain............................................................168–189
List of tours by country........................... 7–9 Tour descriptions.............................. 10–205
Armenia.......................................................... 10–11
Austria............................................................ 12–15
Belgium................................................................. 16
Bosnia-Herzegovina..............................................17
Croatia...................................................................17 Czech Republic...............................................17–20 Denmark..............................................................149
Egypt...............................................................21–23
England.......................................................... 24–39 Estonia............................................................40–41
Ethiopia.......................................................... 42–43
Romania...................................................... 158–160
France............................................................. 45–63
Russia...........................................................161–162
Greece..............................................................77–79
Serbia.................................................................. 162
Ireland................................................................... 89 Israel................................................................ 88–89
Sweden................................................................ 189
Switzerland......................................................... 189
Italy............................................................... 90–144
Turkey......................................................... 190–196
Latvia.................................................................... 40
Uzbekistan.................................................. 202–203
Jordan...........................................................144–145
U.S.A.......................................................... 196–201
Lithuania.............................................................. 40
Wales..........................................................204–205
Malta................................................................... 146 Montenegro........................................................ 162 Morocco.......................................................147–148
Norway................................................................149
Oman.......................................................... 150–151
Palestine.......................................................152–153
Portugal...................................................... 153–157
Lecturers’ biographies.................... 206–211 Making a booking.................................. 212 Booking conditions................................. 212 Booking form..................................213–214 Tours by date...................................215–219
M A RT I N R A N D A L L T R AV E L A R T • A R C H I T E C T U R E • G A S T R O N O M Y • A R C H A E O L O G Y • H I S T O R Y • M U S I C • L I T E R AT U R E
Voysey House, Barley Mow Passage, London, United Kingdom W4 4GF T 020 8742 3355 F 020 8742 7766 info@martinrandall.co.uk www.martinrandall.com
Dear traveller, I was telling my fellow director, Fiona Urquhart, after my freak re-emergence as one of our lecturers for a day, how rewarding it was to be reminded of our clients’ extraordinary keenness and desire to learn, of the amazing range of knowledge they bring and of their indefatigable good spirits. You should write that down, she said. And so I have. The trouble is that its insertion here spoils the letter I had already drafted, which was something to do with steering the company through to its twenty-fifth anniversary at the end of 2013. But it seems the right time to turn it around, cut the boasting and to acknowledge you, our clients, and your inestimable contribution to the growth and development of Martin Randall Travel over nearly a quarter of a century. It is platitudinous to say we wouldn’t be here without you, but I want to say that our clients make us the luckiest tour operator in the world. The pleasure of your company, albeit largely vicarious, and your expressions of appreciation, has made the journey privileged and pleasurable. I hope to see you, or your name on a list, later this year or next year. If you are a first-timer with us, you are equally welcome of course. Perhaps even more so. With best wishes,
Martin Randall
8th June 2012
5085
Directors: Martin Randall (Chief Executive), Sir Vernon Ellis (Chairman), Chris Denton, Ian Hutchinson, Neil Taylor, Fiona Urquhart Registered office: Voysey House, Barley Mow Passage, London W4 4GF. Registered Company no. 2314294 England. VAT no. 527758803
Britain’s leading provider of cultural tours Detail from Santiago Cathedral, engraving c. 1890.
At Martin Randall Travel we aim to provide the best planned, best led and altogether the most fulfilling and enjoyable ‘cultural’ tours available. Within the areas of the world on which we concentrate – principally Europe, India and the Middle East – we offer an unsurpassed range of holidays focusing on art, architecture, music, archaeology, history or gastronomy. They are designed for people with enquiring minds and a desire to learn, understand and appreciate.
Inventive and pioneering, MRT has for twenty-five years led the cultural tours market by incessant innovation and by setting the benchmarks for itineraries, operational systems and service standards. Widely emulated, much imitated, never surpassed. MRT is one of the most respected specialist travel companies in the world.
First-rate lecturers
Expert speakers are a key ingredient of all our holidays. Academics, writers, curators, broadcasters and researchers, they are selected not only for their knowledge but also for their ability to communicate that learning to a lay audience. Their brief is to enlighten and stimulate, not merely to inform. And they also have to be good travelling companions. We select our lecturers through reputation, interview and audition, and provide them with guidance and training. Most of our tours are also accompanied by a trained tour manager, one of our staff or a freelance professional.
Many of our holidays incorporate special arrangements for admission to places not generally open to individual travellers, or for access at times when they are closed to the public. In innumerable small ways, we lift the experience for our clients above standards and services which are regarded as normal for tourists. We bring organisational skills of a high order to our large and complex events, principally our all-inclusive music festivals.
Travelling in comfort
We select our hotels with great care. All have been inspected, and many have been stayed in, by a member of our staff. Hundreds of others have been seen and rejected. Obviously comfort ranks high among our criteria, together with service standards and warmth of welcome, and we also set high priority on charm and appropriate style. An important consideration is location. For city-based tours, there is a strong preference for the historic centre, where this does not conflict with the criterion of quiet. Carlsbad, Czech Republic.
Original itineraries, meticulously planned
Rouen, engraving from Mediaeval Towns: Rouen, 1899.
Our itineraries are original, imaginative, well-paced and carefully balanced. Thorough research and assiduous reconnaissance underpin the design process. Knowledge of the subject matter and the destination combine with meticulous attention to practical matters to ensure an enriching and smooth-running experience. 4
b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Engraving, c. 1880.
The small-group principle is not applied to tours on which there are private concerts, arranged by ourselves. Not the least attractive aspect of travelling with MRT is that you are highly likely to find yourself in congenial company, self-selected by common interests and endorsement of the company’s ethos.
Care for our clients
Most of the hotels we use are rated as 4-star, with some 5-star and a few 3-star. We invest similar efforts into the selection of restaurants, menus and wines. For flights and trains, we try to choose the most convenient departure times and airports, although for many routes there is little choice of either. Seats on Eurostar are in ‘superior class’. We can provide a holiday without the international flights or trains if you prefer, allowing you to make your own arrangements for international travel. (It is usually possible to make other variations to the package. There is an administrative fee of at least £40.)
We aim for faultless administration from your first encounter with us to the end of the holiday, and beyond. Personal service is a feature. And if anything does go wrong, we will put it right or compensate appropriately. We want you to come back again and again – as most of our clients do. Counter to attitudes widespread in the travel industry, we never forget our clients are responsible adults, deserving of respect and courtesy at all times.
Value for money, and no surcharges
The price includes nearly everything, not only the major ingredients such as hotel, transportation and the costs of the lecturer, but also tips for waiters, drivers and guides, wine with meals, airport taxes and credit card charges.
Wall painting at Karnak 1896; top right: Rheims Cathedral.
Small groups and congenial company
We strictly limit the numbers on our small-group tours. The maximum allowed on a tour, which ranges from 15 to 22, is stated in each tour description. The average is somewhere between, though occasionally tours run with as few as 7 or 8. The higher costs of smaller numbers are outweighed by the benefits of manoeuvrability, social cohesion and access to the lecturer. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
We do not levy surcharges for fuel price increases, exchange rate changes, additional taxes or for any other reason. The price published in this brochure is the price you pay.
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Fitness and age
Financial security
Ours are active holidays, with walking an unavoidable element. They are also group holidays, which means that participants need to move around together at a pace which is comfortable for the majority. The amount of walking varies. On some tours there is a lot on streets that are steep or poorly paved, on others you may need to scramble over fallen masonry and uneven ground. More usually it is just a case of getting from one place to another within a town. Coaches can rarely enter historic city centres or get right to the entrance of a country house or concert hall. Like a convoy, groups move at the pace of the slowest; slow walkers reduce the time at the places everyone has come to see. Our tours should not present problems for anyone who manages everyday walking and stair-climbing without difficulty. But please consult us if you have any doubts about your ability to cope. If for any stage, including the airports, you would like the use of a wheelchair then these holidays are unlikely to be suitable for you. It is also unlikely that you would cope if you habitually use a walking stick.
We do have some tours which are designated as walking holidays and offer countryside hikes as an integral ingredient. There is another scale of fitness requirements for these. Age limit. We regret that applications for small-group tours from people who would be aged eighty-one or over at the time of the tour will not be accepted. We know this is a harsh and somewhat arbitrary rule but it has virtually eliminated instances of tours being spoilt for the majority because of the inability of one or two individuals to cope. There is no age limit for our own largescale music festivals (Rome, Seville, Bach Journey, Danube, Yorkshire, Rhône), though the same fitness criteria apply, because there is more opportunity to move at your own pace. And there is no limt for our UK music weekends and symposia. Illustration, right: Agrigento, Temple of Castor, wood engraving c. 1885.
The Association of Independent Tour Operators. Martin Randall Travel is a member of AITO, an association of specialist travel companies most of which are independent and ownermanaged. Admission is selective, and members are subject to a code of practice which prescribes high standards of professionalism and customer care. To contact the Association visit www.aito. co.uk or call 020 8744 9280.
Walking tours
A small but growing number of our tours include country walking as an integral part of the itinerary. They fall, very loosely, into two categories, the less and the more strenuous. The less strenuous – the majority – have walks usually for only half the day, usually of not more than about 5 miles (8 km), often less. The tours falling into this category in 2012 and 2013 include Walking the Danube, Walking in Tuscany, The Cotswolds, Walking Hadrian’s Wall and Walking in Madeira. The more strenuous tours have walks of up to 10 miles (16 km) a day. For 2013, these are Walking in Sicily and Walking to Santiago. Both categories remain ‘cultural’ tours in that they are accompanied by a lecturer who provides talks and commentary, as on all our other tours. On the less strenuous tours, the mornings or afternoons without walks are spent in the usual MRT activities of looking or listening, or, sometimes, resting.
AITO Trust. As a member of the AITO 5085 Trust Ltd, we have provided a bond to meet the requirements of the Package Travel Regulations 1992. Protection is provided for holidays without flights commencing in and returning to the UK, and for holidays for which you have chosen not to purchase the flight element. ATOL. If you book your holiday with flights included you are protected by the ATOL scheme because we hold an Air Travel Organiser’s Licence granted by the Civil Aviation Authority. In the unlikely event of our insolvency, either the CAA or the AITO Trust will ensure that you are not stranded abroad and will arrange to refund any money you have paid to us for an advance booking.
For all the walking tours participants need to be well used to country walking and to have a good level of fitness. Invariably there are ascents and descents, climbs over stiles and terrain which is uneven or stony. Only in weather conditions which are so extreme as to be dangerous would a walk be cancelled. The distance of each walk and the nature of the terrain are given in detail in each tour description, and further information and advice is given to participants in advance. 6
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Tours by country a list of holidays by date can be found on pages 215-218 Armenia Armenia...........................................................10
Austria Connoisseur’s Vienna......................................12
The Schubertiade.............................................13 Operetta in Austria.........................................13
Mozart in Salzburg.........................................14
Salzburg Summer............................................15
Belgium Flemish Painting.............................................16
Bosnia-Herzegovina The Western Balkans.......................................17
Croatia
English Music in Yorkshire.............................39
London Days...................................................39
The Narrow Sea...............................................45 The Welsh Marches.......................................204
Estonia The Baltic States..............................................40
Ethiopia Ethiopia...........................................................42
Finland Finland: Aalto & Others.................................44
Savonlinna Opera............................................45
France The Narrow Sea...............................................45 Brittany............................................................47
The Western Balkans.......................................17
Anjou & Poitou...............................................49
Czech Republic
French Gothic..................................................52
Bohemia...........................................................17 Connoisseur’s Prague......................................19 Music in Dresden & Prague at Christmas......67
Denmark Opera in Oslo, Gothenburg
& Copenhagen..............................................149
Egypt Ancient Egypt.................................................21 Sinai.................................................................21
England Walking Hadrian’s Wall.................................24
The Age of Bede..............................................25 Northumbria....................................................26
Mediaeval East Anglia....................................27
The Cathedrals of England.............................28
Royal Palaces...................................................29 The Victorian Achievement.............................30
Art & Industry................................................32 Great Houses of the South West....................34 Great Houses of the North..............................35 Weston Park....................................................36
The Cotswolds.................................................37 Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Stained glass (English) from The Magazine of Art 1882.
The Danube Music Festival.............................15
Walking the Danube.......................................15
Music Weekends & Symposia.....................38–9
Mediaeval Normandy......................................50 History of Impressionism................................53 Le Corbusier....................................................54
The J.S. Bach Journey......................................73
The Rite of Spring...........................................57
King Ludwig II...............................................75
Alsace...............................................................56 Opera in Paris & Versailles.............................57
Mediaeval Burgundy.......................................57 Châteaux of the Loire......................................59 Roman & Mediaeval Provence.......................60
Toulouse & Albi..............................................61 Modern Art on the Côte d’Azur.....................62 The Rhône Music Festival...............................63
Music in Nice & Montecarlo...........................63
The Pyrenees..................................................168
Germany
Beethoven in Bonn..........................................74
Art in Munich.................................................76
Greece Classical Greece...............................................77
Minoan Crete..................................................79
India Essential India.................................................80 The British Raj.................................................82
Rajput & Mughal Rajasthan...........................85 The Indian Mutiny..........................................87
Alsace...............................................................56
Temples of Tamil Nadu...................................87
Berlin, Potsdam, Dresden...............................65
Bengal by River...............................................87
Music in Berlin................................................64
Kingdoms of the Deccan.................................87
The Ring in Berlin...........................................66
Ashoka & Buddhist India...............................87
Art & Music in Dresden.................................66 Music in Dresden & Prague at Christmas......67
Mediaeval Saxony............................................69
Bauhaus & Expressionism...............................70
Organs of Bach’s Time....................................72
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Israel Israel & Palestine.............................................88
Ireland Wexford Opera Festival..................................89
Tours by country
Tours by country continued
Italy
Ravenna & Urbino.........................................109
Montenegro
The Duchy of Milan........................................90
Lucca..............................................................110
The Western Balkans.......................................17
Opera in Turin & Milan.................................92
Piero della Francesca.....................................112
Morocco
Genoa & Turin................................................92
Florence......................................................... 114
Gastronomic Piedmont...................................94
Leonardo da Vinci.........................................118
Munch in Oslo..............................................149
Writers’ Florence...........................................120
Opera in Oslo, Gothenburg
Gardens & Villas of the Italian Lakes............91
Torre del Lago...............................................111
The Ring at La Scala.......................................92
History of Medicine......................................113
Turin at Christmas..........................................93
Florence Revisited.........................................116
Morocco.........................................................147
Norway
Florentine Palazzi..........................................119
Bergen Festival..............................................149
Villas of the Veneto.........................................97
Medici Villas & Gardens..............................121
& Copenhagen..............................................149
Art History of Venice......................................99
Walking in Northern Tuscany......................123
Stresa Festival..................................................95
Friuli-Venezia Giulia.......................................96 Palladian Villas................................................98
Walking in Tuscany.......................................122
Modern Art in Italy.......................................100
Southern Tuscany..........................................124
Venetian Palaces............................................102
Art in Le Marche..........................................126
Venice Revisited.............................................101
The Heart of Italy..........................................125
Verona Opera.................................................103
Opera in Macerata & Pesaro.........................127
Writers’ Venice...............................................103
The Etruscans................................................128
Parma & Bologna..........................................105
Caravaggio.....................................................130
Parma Verdi Festival......................................107
Ancient Rome................................................132
Opera in Venice.............................................103
Trasimeno Music Festival..............................127
The Venetian Hills.........................................104
Connoisseur’s Rome......................................129
Courts of Northern Italy...............................106
A Festival of Music in Rome.........................131
Dark Age Brilliance......................................108
Pompeii & Herculaneum..............................133 Naples: Art, Antiquities
‘Bronze statue of David’ from The Illustrated London News 1888.
& Opera.........................................................134 Normans in the South...................................135 Basilicata........................................................137
Martina Franca..............................................137
Sardinia..........................................................138
Palermo Rediscovered...................................139
Oman.............................................................150
Palestine Israel & Palestine.............................................88 Palestine.........................................................152
Portugal Lisbon Neighbourhoods................................153
The Douro......................................................154 Walking in Madeira......................................156
Romania Monasteries of Moldavia...............................158 Saxon Transylvania........................................159
Russia St Petersburg.................................................. 161
Scotland
Gastronomic Sicily........................................140
Grampian Gardens........................................162
Walking in Sicily...........................................143
Edinburgh Festival........................................165
Jordan
Edinburgh at Christmas................................167
Sicily............................................................... 141
Essential Jordan.............................................144
Latvia The Baltic States..............................................40
Lithuania The Baltic States..............................................40
Ardgowan......................................................164 Scotland: the Borders....................................165
Serbia The Western Balkans.....................................162
Spain The Pyrenees..................................................168
Gastronomic Catalonia.................................170
Opera in Spain...............................................171
Malta Malta..............................................................146
Tours by country
Oman
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The Road to Santiago....................................171 Walking to Santiago......................................173
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Castile & León..............................................175
Aragón........................................................... 176
Christmas & New Year
Art in Madrid................................................179
Modern Art on the Côte d’Azur at Christmas.............................................62
Gastronomic Spain........................................178 Extremadura..................................................180
Music in Berlin at New Year...................64
Granada & Córdoba......................................183
Music in Dresden & Prague at Christmas.............................................67
Valencia..........................................................182
Andalucía.......................................................185
Turin at Christmas..................................93
Gastronomic Andalucía................................187
Florence at Christmas........................... 114
Seville: a Festival of Spanish Music..............188
Palermo at Christmas............................139
Off-beat Andalucía........................................188
Zurbarán & the Golden Age........................189
Sweden Opera in Oslo, Gothenburg
& Copenhagen..............................................189 Drottningholm & Confidencen....................189
Switzerland Le Corbusier....................................................54
The Lucerne Festival......................................189
Turkey Istanbul..........................................................190
Ottoman Turkey............................................191 Connoisseur’s Istanbul...................................192 Classical Turkey.............................................192 Eastern Turkey...............................................194
U.S.A. The Ring in Seattle........................................196
West Coast Architecture...............................198 Art in Texas...................................................199
Santa Fe Opera..............................................201
Uzbekistan Transoxiana....................................................202
Edinburgh at Christmas........................167
Awards
AITO (Association of Independent Tour Operators) Travel Company of the Year: 2006, 2008, 2009. Travel Advertising Awards, Best Brochure: Gold Award 1998, 1999, 2000, 2002, 2006, Silver Award 2003. The Observer, Best Travel Brochure 1996. Italian State Tourist Office, The Most Intriguing Tour Operator 1998; Best Cultural Tour Operator 2009. National Geographic, 50 Tours of a Lifetime 2008, 2009. Travel Marketing Awards, Best Press Consumer Advertisement, Silver Award 2009. Direct Marketing Awards, Best Use of Copy, Silver Award 2009.
Sustainable tourism
We adhere to the AITO charter which includes a commitment to raising the level of environmental awareness. We have been awarded three stars under the AITO Sustainable Tourism assessment scheme. We travel by rail rather than by air from London on some of our European holidays. We limit group size, one benefit of which is to reduce environmental impact. All our brochures are printed on paper obtained from sustainable sources. Our sustainable tourism policy is published in full at www.martinrandall.com.
Wales
The Age of Bede......................................25 The Cathedrals of England.....................28 Royal Palaces...........................................29 Art & Industry........................................32 English Music in Yorkshire.....................39 Ethiopia...................................................42 The Rite of Spring...................................57 The Rhône Music Festival.......................63 King Ludwig II.......................................75 The Ring at La Scala...............................92 Stresa Festival..........................................95 Opera in Venice.....................................103 Parma Verdi Festival..............................107 Florentine Palazzi..................................119 The Etruscans........................................128 Martina Franca......................................137 Walking in Northern Tuscany..............123 Munch in Oslo......................................149 Opera in Oslo, Gothenburg & Copenhagen......................................149 Walking in Madeira..............................156 Grampian Gardens................................162
The Welsh Marches.......................................204
Scotland: the Borders............................165
Opera in Cardiff............................................205
Edinburgh at Christmas........................167
Front cover illustration: Rome, view of the San Lorenzo Gate, copper engraving by Luigi Rossini c. 1820. Inside front cover: Durham, steel engraving c. 1850. This brochure was produced in-house. Most of the text was written originally by Martin Randall and all staff have been involved in editing and proofing, as was Julia Macrae. Lecturers and Lisa Freedman also contributed. It was designed principally by Jo Murray with input also from Fiona Urquhart and Martin Randall. Derek Brown (Harvest Media Ltd.) prepared it for our printers. It was printed by Purbrooks, London in July 2012. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
New tours
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Zurbarán & the Golden Age................189 Connoisseur’s Istanbul...........................192 Art in Texas...........................................199 Santa Fe Opera......................................201
Tours by country
Armenia Monasteries & modern-day Yerevan 19–26 June 2013 (mz 614) 8 days • £2,780 Lecturer: Alan Ogden The first officially Christian state, with monasteries dating from the seventh century. Outstanding mountain landscape, including the foothills of Mount Ararat. Yerevan, a sensitively remodelled former Soviet city, with squares, cafés and vibrant street life. Comfortable hotels and surprisingly good food. Of all the lands straddling east and west, the nation of Armenia is perhaps least like a gateway and most like a frontier. ‘Unique’ is a lazy and unenlightening epithet with which to characterise distant lands, but Armenia, both ancient and new, both Asian and European, both a melting-pot and defiantly individual, is fully deserving of the description. Its long and tenacious history is one of frequent tragedy and renewal. At its apogee in the first century bc, Armenia stretched from the Mediterranean to the Caspian, and almost to the Black Sea. For the next three centuries, however, Armenia would suffer conquest and reconquest as the Romans and the Parthians traded blows in the southern Caucasus, with intermittent periods of self-rule keeping the flame of independence alive. It was in large part to keep themselves distinct from the two vast empires on either hand that the Armenians adopted the new religion of Christianity in AD 301, developing a new alphabet a hundred years after that. These two markers of Armenian identity survived domination by Byzantines, Arabs, Mongols, Turks and Russians, as did many spectacular religious buildings, which were built to withstand not just invasions but earthquakes too. Armenia’s sacred architecture was a greater influence on mediaeval Europe than is commonly assumed, after its round towers and cross-plans were noted by returning crusaders. Thick-walled, built from tuff or basalt, and housing a particularly severe strain of eastern Christianity, there is a resplendent austerity about these churches which is only heightened by their frequently spectacular natural surroundings. Many of the finest, including the rock-hewn Geghard and the UNESCO world heritage site of Echmiadzin, are easily visited from the capital, Yerevan. And while calling Yerevan the most sensitively-remodelled of all Soviet cities may sound like damnation with the faintest praise imaginable, today it is attractive and confident, its proliferation of cafés, galleries and public spaces making it a truly pleasant
Armenia
Yerevan, mid-18th-century engraving.
place to spend time. In the north of the country are two more UNESCO-listed monasteries, at Sanahin and Haghpat, and detailed thirteenthcentury frescoes. Meanwhile Yerevanis live, work and socialise in the literal and metaphorical shadow of Ararat, still Armenia’s most emotive symbol despite now being on Turkish land. Like the resurgent Christianity in the monasteries, like the native alphabet, the land itself is not just a reminder of Armenia’s past but a constant and relevant presence for today.
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Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 2.00pm from London Heathrow to Yerevan, arriving c. 11.30pm (time in the air: c. 5 hours 30 minutes). Transfer to the hotel in the heart of the city. Day 2: Yerevan. A leisurely start this morning. The afternoon begins with a visit to the comprehensive and fascinating State Museum of Armenian History. At the National Art Gallery see collections from Armenia, Russia and Western Europe. Overnight Yerevan. b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
monastery that overlooks it. The Hellenic temple at Garni is the last remaining preChristian site in Armenia. Much of the monastery at nearby Geghard is carved out of the cliffside. Overnight Yerevan. Day 7: Khor Virap, Noravank, Yerevan. Visit the Khor Virap monastery in the foothills of Mount Ararat, where St Gregory the Illuminator was imprisoned before converting Armenia to Christianity. Noravank, the masterwork of the architect and sculptor Momik, is perhaps the most beautiful of Armenia’s thirteenth-century monasteries. Overnight Yerevan. Day 8. The early morning flight from Yerevan arrives Heathrow at c. 7.30am.
Practicalities Price: £2,780 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on bmi flights (aircraft: Airbus 321); accommodation as described below; travel by private air-conditioned coach throughout; breakfasts, all lunches and all dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admission to museums, churches and sites; all tips for restaurant staff, drivers and guides; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer and a local guide. Single supplement £280. Price without flights £2,120. Visas: These are required for all foreign nationals. We obtain the visa for anyone flying with the group (if flying independently it costs c. £6). Passports must be valid for at least six months after the tour ends. Hotels: In Yerevan (5 nights): a recentlyrenovated, international 5-star hotel on the central square, impersonal but with excellent facilities. In Dzoraget (2 nights): in a wonderful riverside location, a small and stylish hotel, equivalent to a 4-star. Food: surprisingly good for carnivores, but options for vegetarians are very limited and special dietary requirements cannot be catered for at all. Day 3: Echmiadzin, Yerevan. The seat of the Armenian Apostolic Church, Echmiadzin is also a UNESCO world heritage site. The Holy Lance that pierced Christ’s side is held in its treasury. The vast ruined cathedral at neighbouring Zvartnots is awe-inspiring. Back in Yerevan, the Museum of the Armenian Genocide is all the more powerful for its simplicity. Overnight Yerevan. Day 4: Amberd, Dzoraget. In the morning, visit the Matenadaran, a repository of 17,000 illuminated manuscripts before driving to Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Dzoraget via the idyllic ruins of the 11thcentury Amberd Fortress. Overnight Dzoraget. Day 5: Akhtala, Alaverdi. The thirteenthcentury frescoes in Akhtala are strongly influenced by Byzantium. The monasteries at Haghpat and Sanahin, both UNESCOlisted sites, are perhaps the finest examples of Armenian sacred architecture. Overnight Dzoraget. Day 6: Lake Sevan, Yerevan. Drive to Lake Sevan, and the peerlessly situated Sevanavank
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How strenuous? You will be on your feet for long periods. Many of the sites are reached by steep, uneven steps often without handrails. The tour would not be suitable for anyone who has difficulties with everyday walking and stairclimbing. There are some long coach journeys (average distance by coach per day: 64 miles). Small group: the tour will operate with between 12 and 22 participants. Flight schedules can change at short notice. We recommend you keep diaries clear for a day either side of these dates.
Armenia
Connoisseur’s Vienna Art, architecture, music & private visits Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 9.30am from London Heathrow to Vienna. An afternoon walk in and around the Hof burg, the Habsburg winter palace, a vast agglomeration from six centuries of building activity. See the incomparable collection of precious regalia and objets d’art in the Treasury, and the church of St Augustine. Day 2. Drive around the Ringstrasse, the boulevard which encircles the old centre and is the locus classicus of historicist architecture. The Secession building, built in 1898 as an exhibition hall for avant-garde artists, contains Klimt’s Beethoven Frieze. Visit the Piaristenkirche, a Rococo church. Concert at the Wiener Konzerthaus with the Berlin Philharmonic, Simon Rattle (conductor), Sarah Fox (soprano), Anne Sofie von Otter (mezzo soprano): Mahler, Symphony No.2, ‘Resurrection’ .
Vienna, Am Hof, engraving 1780.
4–10 June 2013 (mz 588) 7 days • £2,870 (includes 3 performances) Lecturer: Dr Jarl Kremeier Art, architecture, music: the main sites as well as lesser-known ones. Plus several special arrangements for out-ofhours visits or private buildings. One opera at the Staatsoper and two orchestral concerts at the Konzerthaus with the Berlin Philharmonic and Vienna Symphony Orchestra. With this array of music, visits to the chief sights and museums and privileged access to places not normally accessible to the public, this tour will provide an exceptionally rich and rounded cultural experience. Whether or not you have been to the city before, it will present Vienna in a truly memorable way. Grandiloquent palaces and labyrinthine mediaeval streets; broad boulevards and quiet courtyards; at times embattled on the frontier of Christendom, yet a treasury containing some of the greatest of European works of art; an imperial city without an empire: Vienna is a fascinating mix, a quintessentially Central European paradox.
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The seat of the Habsburgs, pre-eminent city of the Holy Roman Empire and capital of a vast multinational agglomeration of territories, Vienna is magnificently equipped with buildings which were created by imperial, aristocratic and government patronage. But the history of Vienna is shot through with diversity, difference and dissent, and some of the choicest items we see were created in defiance of mainstream orthodoxy. A feature of this tour is the number of specially arranged visits to private palaces or institutions which are not generally open to the public or are off the beaten track. Because of the privileged nature of these visits we can only name a few of them here, but they include Baroque palaces, nineteenth century halls, pioneers of modernism, churches and a synagogue. And then there is the music. As home for Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Brahms, Mahler and countless other composers, Vienna is pre-eminent in the history of music. We have chosen to include an opera at the Wiener Staatsoper, and two concerts at the Wiener Konzerthaus.
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Day 3. Walk through the Roman and mediaeval core to see a cross-section of architecture including Gothic and Baroque churches and some of Vienna’s most enchanting streetscapes. A tour of the Parliament building, a splendid example of enriched NeoClassicism, and visit a late-19th-century town house on the Ringstrasse. In the afternoon see the magnificently displayed collection of imperial tableware and the glorious library hall by Fischer von Erlach. Visit to and dinner at the Kunsthistorisches Museum, one of the world’s greatest art collections. Day 4. See three buildings by Otto Wagner, the leading turn-of-the-century architect: the Emperor’s private railway station at Schönbrunn, the architect’s own villa (exterior) and the hospital church ‘Am Steinhof ’, the finest manifestation of Viennese Secessionism. Visit the Museumsquartier, an art centre in the imperial stables, including the Leopold Collection of Secessionist art. Concert at the Wiener Konzerthaus with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, James Conlon (conductor), Alisa Wellerstein (cello): Dvořák, Cello Concerto in B minor, Op.104; Zemlinski, ’The Little Mermaid’. Day 5. Guided tour of the Synagogue (Josef Kornhäusel, 1824), followed by a private visit to a chapel not normally open to the public. Another special arrangement to see a grand 18th-century hall. The rest of the afternoon is free. Opera at the Wiener Staatsoper: La Cerentola (Rossini). Day 6. The Jesuit church was spectacularly refurbished c. 1700 by the master of illusionist painting, Andrea Pozzo. Visit the great hall of the Academy of Art and the magnificent Liechtenstein Palace which was built at the turn of the 17th and 18th centuries by the richest family in the Habsburg Empire. b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Operetta in Austria Day 7. On sloping ground overlooking Vienna lie the palaces and gardens of Schloss Belvedere, one of the greatest Baroque ensembles, housing museums of Austrian art including paintings by Klimt and Schiele. The flight arrives Heathrow at c. 6.30pm. Please note: because the itinerary is dependent on a number of appointments with private owners, the order and even the content of the tour may vary – at the time of publication, the music tickets have not yet been confirmed.
Practicalities Price: £2,870 (deposit: £300). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled Austrian Airlines flights (Airbus 320), coach travel for the airport transfers and on two other occasions, music tickets for the opera and concerts costing c. £350, accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 2 lunches and 4 dinners, with wine, water and coffee, admission charges for all included visits to museums, etc., all tips for waiters, hotel staff and drivers, all airport and state taxes; services of the lecturer. Single supplement £280. Price without flights £2,650. Music tickets: these will be confirmed in December 2012.
July or August 2013 Full details available January 2013 Contact us to register your interest Though operetta is identifiable as a distinct genre of music theatre in Paris in the 1850s and largely the creation of Jacques Offenbach, its most glittering, enduring and widely-loved manifestations were created in Vienna and the Habsburg Empire from the 1870s to the 1920s. This tour provides an intense and authentic dose of operetta in its Austrian heartland, where the art form in its traditional guise is still very much part of the living culture. The distinct Viennese species had its origins in the importation of dance forms into comic opera, a grafting administered by the ‘Waltz King’ Johann Strauss himself. From this developed the irresistible, voluptuous and romantic sound, rich in melody. Applied to libretti with clever plots, witty repartee and heart-string-tugging sentimentality, the result is of enormous appeal. Together with the glamorous and Ruritanian worlds which are the standard mise-en-scènes, Viennese operetta is undeniably escapist and nostalgic, for operetta for all its frivolity and jollity flourished at a time of great social and political and artistic
Hotel: a 5-star hotel belonging to an international chain, well located on the Ringstrasse. Decor is traditional. The included lunches and dinners are at the hotel and selected restaurants.
Day 1. Fly at c. 1.00pm from Heathrow to Munich and continue by coach into the beautiful Salzkammergut region of Austria to Bad Ischl, site of the annual Lehár Festival. Two nights are spent here. Day 2: Bad Ischl. Emperor Franz Joseph stayed in Bad Ischl every summer from 1854 to 1914, turning the little valley town into one of 19thcentury Europe’s most fashionable spas. Visit to the Kaiservilla, still the private property of a Habsburg. There is free time in which to enjoy the historic town centre, wooded park and the Léhar Museum in the composer’s house. The Kongress- und Theaterhaus is the venue for Im weißen Rössl (White Horse Inn) by Ralph Benatzky, the last great composer of operetta, with contributions by Robert Stolz (1930). Overnight Bad Ischl. Day 3: Dürnstein, Baden. Drive by coach from Bad Ischl to Baden bei Wien, digressing for lunch at Dürnstein, a ravishingly attractive little town on the prettiest stretch of the Danube. In Baden, home of the ‘Operetta Sommer’ festival, settle into the hotel before a talk and a pre-theatre supper. Performance in the late 19th-century Sommerarena of Boccaccio by Franz von Suppé (1879), one of the most successful of Viennese Offenbach-style operettas. Overnight Baden bei Wien. Day 4: Baden, Mörbisch. Baden bei Wien was once a major health resort, among whose lowlier habitués were Mozart and Beethoven. There is time to explore before driving to the Seefestspiele Mörbisch for dinner and the operetta. Located on the Neusiedlersee, a lake whose shores are Austrian on one side and Hungarian on the other, the festival at the open-air theatre is an authentic institution with spectacular productions on an enormous stage. We see no less a masterpiece than Der Zigeunerbaron (The Gypsy Baron, Johann Strauss II, 1885). Overnight Baden bei Wien.
How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking on this tour. Public transport, metro or tram will be used on some occasions. Average distance by coach per day: 6 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
The Schubertiade June 2013 Details available autumn 2012 Contact us to register your interest
From a Bavarian cartoon of 1910.
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206.
upheaval – and indeed blithely carried on during the First World War. This tour will be carefully pieced together from the offerings of the leading four or five different operetta festivals, once their programmes have been announced. The itinerary here is based on the 2011 festivals.
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Sample itinerary
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Day 5: Baden. Reached on foot from the hotel through a park and rose garden, Baden is a charming town in which to wander and relax, largely Biedermeier in style (early 19thcentury soft-core classicism) with galleries and cafés, alleys and squares. Musical associations abound. Alternatively, Vienna is only an hour away by tram. On the cusp between opéracomique and operetta, Der Verschwender (The Spendthrift) by Conradin Kreutzer with a libretto by Ferdinand Raimund (1834) is a delight, a sort of music hall Schubert. Day 6. After a leisurely start, fly from Vienna to London Heathrow, arriving c. 3.30pm.
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Mozart in Salzburg The annual winter festival 24–30 January 2013 (mz 460) 7 days • £3,340 (includes 7 performances) Lecturer: Richard Wigmore
with Le Cercle de l’Harmonie, Jérémie Rhorer (conductor), Julia Kleiter (soprano), Renata Pokupic (mezzo soprano), Benjamin Bruns (tenor): Mozart, Symphonies No.12 and No.29; Pasquale Anfossi, Arias from ‘Lucio Silla’.
Daily attendance at the Mozartwoche, the annual festival celebrating the composer’s work in the town of his birth.
Day 6. Guided tour of the Mozarteum Archive. Some free time or join the optional walk to St Sebastian’s cemetery where several members of the Mozart family are buried. Early dinner at a famous old restaurant. Opera at the Haus für Mozart: Lucio Silla (Mozart) with Les Musiciens du Louvre Grenoble, Salzburger Bach Choir, Marc Minkowski (conductor), Marshall Pynkoski (director), Rolando Villazón (Lucio Silla), Olga Peretyatko (Giunia), Marianne Crebassa (Cecilio), Inga Kalna (Lucio Cinna), Eva Liebau (Celia).
An outstanding programme, primarily Mozart, performed by leading orchestras, chamber groups and soloists. The best-preserved Baroque city in northern Europe in a wonderful alpine setting. Five-star hotel close to the Mozarteum. Salzburg is that rare thing, a tiny city with world-class standards in nearly everything the discerning visitor – and resident – would want. It is miraculous that such charm, and such grandeur, and, above all, such unparalleled weight of musical achievement should be concentrated in so small a place. A virtually independent city-state from its origins in the early Middle Ages until its absorption into the Habsburg Empire in the nineteenth century, Salzburg’s days of glory had all but slipped into the past by the time Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was born there. He became the unwitting instigator, postmortem, of Salzburg’s transformation from minor ecclesiastical seat to the world’s foremost city of music festivals. There are five of them. The Mozartwoche (Mozart Week) held in January every year celebrates Salzburg’s most famous son with musicians famed worldwide for their Mozart interpretations. Our tour allows the concerts to be interspersed with a gentle programme of walks and an excursion to some of the finest art and architecture and scenic beauty in the region. But plenty of free time is also allowed for individual exploration of the city, or just for relaxing to prepare for the next concert. The city has several museums - a recent addition is a Museum of Contemporary Art in a cliff-top location overlooking the city, and the city’s principal museum, the Carolino Augusteum, has at last been transferred to a part of the Archbishop’s palace. Also, relatively recent is the complete refurbishment of the Kleines Festspielhaus, one of the smaller auditoria, now renamed the Haus für Mozart.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 9.30am from London Heathrow to Munich. After a drive from Munich to Salzburg, visit the excellent museum in the Mozart family home. Day 2. As on most mornings, the day starts
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Day 7. The flight from Munich arrives at London Heathrow c. 2.30pm.
Practicalities German woodcut c. 1930.
with a lecture in the hotel at 9.30am. Concert at the Mozarteum with the Emerson String Quartet, Menahem Pressler (piano): Mozart, String Quartet in D, K.499; Piano Quartet in E flat, K.493; Adagio and Fugue in C minor, K.546; Piano Quartet in G minor, K.478. Visit Mozart’s birthplace. Concert at the Großes Festspielhaus with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, Sir Simon Rattle (conductor): Mozart, Symphonies No.39, No.40 and No.41. Day 3. Walk through the heart of the old city with a local guide. Free afternoon, opportunity for further exploration such as the buildings by Fischer von Erlach, greatest Austrian architect of the Baroque era, or the Archbishop’s Palace, which houses the city museum. Concert at the Großes Festspielhaus with the Vienna Philharmonic, Gustavo Dudamel (conductor), Maria João Pires (piano): Wagner, ‘SiegfriedIdyll’; Mozart, Piano Concerto in D minor, K.466, Serenade No.9 in D. Day 4. Concert at the Mozarteum with Cappella Andrea Barca, András Schiff (soloist & leader): Beethoven, Piano Concerto No.4 in G; Schubert, Symphony No.4, ‘Tragic’; Mozart, Piano Concerto in B flat, K.595. Free afternoon. Concert at the Mozarteum with Les Musiciens du Louvre Grenoble, Marc Minkowski (conductor), Sonya Yoncheva (soprano), Christian Helmer (baritone): Gluck (re-scored by Wagner), overtures from ‘Iphigenia in Aulis’; Mozart, overtures from ‘Don Giovanni’; Wagner, Symphony in C. Day 5. After a lecture depart for an excursion through the ravishing landscapes of the Salzkammergut to Bad Ischl. Some free time in Salzburg. Concert at the Stiftung Mozarteum
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Price: £3,340 (deposit £350). This includes: music tickets (cost c. £885); flights (economy class) with British Airways (Airbus A319 Jet); hotel accommodation; breakfasts, 3 lunches and 3 dinners, with wine, water, coffee; private coach travel; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £260 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £3,190. Music tickets: will not be confirmed until August 2012. Hotel: located two minutes walk from the Mozarteum and just across the river from the Festspielhaus. A 5-star family-run hotel in an old building which has been impeccably converted. Luxurious but not lavish. Included lunches and dinners are in the hotel and in carefully selected restaurants elsewhere. How strenuous? A fair amount of walking is unavoidable, and the tour is planned on the expectation that participants walk to and from the concert venues; average distance by coach per day: c. 45 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206. b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
The Danube Music Festival Private concerts in palaces, churches & historic theatres 16–23 August 2013 Details available October 2013 Contact us to register your interest Nine concerts linking the music of the AustroHungarian empire to some of the region’s finest palaces, churches and country houses. All are exclusive private performances for festival goers. World-class musicians. Accommodation on a luxury river cruiser on the Danube. This festival combines music and architecture in a singularly beguiling way. The palaces, churches, abbeys, country houses, concert halls and theatres in which the concerts take place are among the most magnificent or delightful buildings along the Danube. But the value of the juxtaposition goes deeper than visual attraction. The buildings are generally of the same period as the pieces performed in them, and in some places there are specific historical associations between the two. Matching music and place – that is the governing principle of this festival. 2012 will be its nineteenth year. The world-class musicians are from Austria, Hungary and the Czech Republic and provide concerts of rich and varied music exploring the repertoire of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The audience is small – no more than 120 – which when taken with the relatively intimate size of most of the venues results in a rare intensity of musical experience. To this exceptional artistic experience is added a further pleasure, the comfort and convenience of a first-class river cruiser which is both hotel and principal means of travel. It is possible to pay an advance deposit in order to secure a place – ask us for details.
The Danube above Linz, wood engraving c. 1880.
Walking the Danube Attends six concerts from The Danube Music Festival. Six country walks of between two and five miles while the festival audience travels by ship. Accompanied by a musicologist. The Austrian stretch of the Danube valley is, for much of its length, of considerable beauty, with much variety of landscape – cultivated lowlands, forested peaks, open alluvial plains, vine-clad hillsides, upland pastures, and, of Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
course, the mighty river meandering towards the Black Sea. There are pine and fir and larch, but broadleaves predominate – beech, birch, oak, poplar. Walking remains incomparably the best mode of locomotion through scenery on which the eye would like to linger. Only on foot can one stop at will to savour a panoramic vista or to zoom in to a flower, hear the birds or smell the earth. For lovers both of walking and of music, this is a perfect holiday.
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Salzburg Summer August 2013 Details available October 2012 Contact us to register your interest
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Flemish Painting From van Eyck to van Dyck of paintings by van Eyck and other Bruges painters. Day 3: Antwerp. The great port on the Scheldt has an abundance of historic buildings in the old centre, and possesses museums and churches of the highest interest. Three of Rubens’s most powerful paintings are in the vast Gothic cathedral. The Royal Museum of Fine Arts is closed for renovation until 2017. However, highlights of its impressive collection are on display in the cathedral, and in the recently opened Museum van der Stroom, a striking new structure of red stone and curved glass panels. See also the house and studio Rubens built for himself and the Mayer van der Bergh Museum which has a small but outstanding collection including works by Bruegel. Wood engraving after a triptych by Quentin Metsys, from The Flemish School of Painting, 1885.
3–7 July 2013 (mz 631) 5 days • £1,580 Lecturer: Richard Williams An unrivalled opportunity to experience the Golden Age of Flemish painting in the beautiful, unspoilt cities in which it was created. Visits to all the main centres of Flemish art: Antwerp, Brussels, Bruges, Ghent and Louvain. Central base in Ghent, to keep travelling time to a minimum. First-class train travel from London. Few travellers are aware just how attractive and unspoilt are the ancient cities of Flanders, or how glorious are the paintings of the Flemish school when displayed in their original environment. Towards the end of the Middle Ages, Ghent, Bruges, Antwerp and Brussels were among the most prosperous and progressive cities in Europe. Though ruled successively by two of the most illustrious European dynasties – the Burgundian dukes of Burgundy and the House of Habsburg – these great cities were virtually independent. Their flourishing cultural life sustained one of the most brilliant episodes in the history of art. The Golden Age of Flemish painting was inaugurated at the beginning of the fifteenth century by the brothers Hubert and Jan van Eyck, whose consummate skill with the new art of oil painting resulted in pictures which have never been surpassed for their jewel-like brilliance and breathtaking naturalism. The tradition of exquisite workmanship was continued with the same tranquillity of spirit by such masters as Hans Memling in Bruges
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and with greater emotionalism by Rogier van der Weyden in Brussels and Hugo van der Goes in Ghent. Hieronymus Bosch was an individualist who specialised in the depiction of diabolical nastiness. The sixteenth century saw a shift towards mannerist displays of virtuoso skill and spiritual tension, though the outstanding painter of the century was another individualist, Pieter Bruegel. A magnificent culmination was reached in the seventeenth century with Peter Paul Rubens, the greatest painter of the Baroque age. His works are of an unsurpassed vitality and painted with a breadth and bravura which exploited to the utmost the potential of the technique of oil painting.
Itinerary Day 1: Leuven, Ghent. Depart at c. 11.00am from London St Pancras by Eurostar to Brussels. Drive to the university city of Louvain, In St Peter, in the chapel for which it was painted, is the marvellous Institution of the Sacrament by Dirch Bouts. Walk around the old centre, including the splendid Gothic town hall and peaceful Béguinage (religious community). Drive to Ghent for dinner.
Day 2: Ghent, Bruges. Visit the great altarpiece in the cathedral of Ghent, the Adoration of the Mystic Lamb by Hubert and Jan van Eyck, one of the greatest masterpieces of the Flemish School. Walk around the attractive historic centre, passing canals, guild halls and the castle. In Bruges see the Gothic Church of Our Lady, housing tombs of the Valois dukes and Michelangelo’s marble Madonna and Child and the Groeninge Museum which has a wonderful collection
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Day 4: Bruges. With its extensive and highly picturesque streetscape constructed of melancholy dark red brick, Bruges is the loveliest of Netherlandish cities. The mediaeval Hospital of St John is now a museum devoted to Hans Memling and contains many of his best paintings. See the market place with its soaring belfry, Gothic town hall and Basilica of the Holy Blood. Return to Ghent in time to see the Bosch paintings at the Fine Arts Museum. Day 5: Brussels. Rising to prominence later than the other cities and thriving in the 19th and 20th centuries, Brussels nevertheless retains splendid palaces and guildhouses around the Grand Place. The Fine Arts Museum is one of the best in Europe, and presents the most comprehensive of all collections of Netherlandish painting as well as international works (the 19th- and 20thcentury collections are currently closed for renovation but are due to re-open in November 2012). Take the Eurostar from Brussels to London St Pancras, arriving c. 6.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,580 (deposit £200). This includes: rail travel (first class, standard premier) on Eurostar; private coach for transfers and excursions; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and three dinners with wine, water and coffee; light meals and drinks on the Eurostar; all admissions to museums, etc. visited with the group; all gratuities for restaurant staff, drivers; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £210. Price without rail travel by Eurostar £1,420. Hotel: all nights are spent in Ghent in a comfortable 4-star hotel, excellently located b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Bohemia beside the town hall. Rooms are well-equipped and all have double beds. Included dinners are in good restaurants. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of standing in museums and walking on this tour, often on cobbled or roughly paved streets. Average distance by coach per day: 63 miles. Small group: this tour will operate with between 10 and 19 participants.
Christmas & New Year Modern Art on the Côte d’Azur at Christmas.............................................62 Music in Berlin at New Year...................64 Music in Dresden & Prague at Christmas.............................................67 Turin at Christmas..................................93
2–9 September 2013 (ma 673) 8 days • £2,630 Lecturer: Michael Ivory The historic heart of Central Europe, with a richly diverse architectural heritage, recently restored and looking better than ever. Charming, beautifully preserved towns, from Gothic to Art Nouveau – including Dvorak’s birthplace, and the legendary spa of Marienbad. An extraordinarily rich offering of Bohemian painting and sculpture. Enchanting landscape of rolling farmland, lakes, hills and forest. Can be combined with Connoisseur’s Prague. Draw two lines across a map of Europe, from Inverness to Istanbul and from Málaga to Moscow: the place where they cross is Bohemia. The heart of Europe thus crudely determined turns out to be a region whose
Art, architecture, history & landscape at the heart of Europe
political, social and cultural developments. (In one of these expansionist moments, over three hundred years before A Winter’s Tale, it acquired a coast.) But Fate seems to have decreed that each rise was soon to be followed by a fall. The most recent was a double fall – dismemberment and desecration by the Nazis was followed by a forty-year incarceration behind the Iron Curtain. Paradoxically, Communist rule helped to preserve a wonderful architectural patrimony, the most abundant in Central Europe. Ideologically inspired contempt for and neglect of its heritage was constrained by lack of means to modernise, rebuild or demolish (thanks to a baleful economic model), a mixture that acted like a mildly corrosive aspic: there was deterioration but little destruction. But since the Velvet Revolution of 1989, a surge of restoration and rehabilitation has transformed both the architectural set pieces and the humbler buildings. The built environment and the art of Bohemia have never looked better. There are towns with streets and squares
Florence at Christmas........................... 114 Palermo at Christmas............................139 Edinburgh at Christmas........................167
The Western Balkans September 2013 Details available October 2012 Contact us to register your interest
Karlštejn, mid-19th-century steel engraving.
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
exact whereabouts and current political description may challenge not a few of you, and which is synonymous with a decorously dissolute lifestyle. Yet there were times when Bohemia was a significant European power, enjoyed a thriving economy and marched in the vanguard of
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with façades from every century from the fifteenth to the early twentieth; a remarkable variety of castles and country houses, most retaining fine furnishings and pictures; magnificent churches and abbeys, mediaeval and Baroque; distinctive works of art in excellent galleries. And the landscape is
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Bohemia continued
enchanting, mostly gently hilly, sometimes rugged, much of it wooded interspersed with fertile fields of pasture or arable, large tracts surprisingly empty. The River Vltava is a recurring feature, cutting a curvaceous course from south to north, and so are the many small lakes, most formed in the Middle Ages for the cultivation of fish.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 10.20am from London Heathrow to Prague. Drive to a country house hotel near Liblice where there is time to settle in and for an introductory talk before dinner. The next three nights are spent here. Day 2: Kutná Hora, Kačina. In the Middle Ages, the silver mines at Kutná Hora made the city wealthy. Now a small provincial town of great charm, it possesses a wonderful cathedral, perhaps the finest Gothic building in Central Europe, the creation sequentially of Bohemia’s two finest mediaeval architects. Set in a landscaped park, the country house at Kačina is a marvellous classical design of the early 19th century with a circular library, theatre, and a sequence of fine rooms. Overnight Liblice. Day 3: Nelahozeves, Troja. Nelahozeves is a magnificent house of the mid-16th century, externally retaining the aspect of a fortress but internally embodying Italianate Renaissance elegance. Restituted to the Lobkowicz family, the furnishings and works of art are excellent. Dvořák’s birthplace museum is in the village. Built as a riverside retreat, Villa Troja is a fine 17th-century Italianate mansion with painted hall and delightful formal French garden. Overnight Liblice. Day 4: Karlštejn, Orlik, Zvikov. Drive to South Bohemia via three castles. Karlštejn was built by Emperor Charles IV, whose reign (1346–78) saw Bohemia reach its apogee. A chapel embedded in the impregnable keep, with its walls of semi-precious stones, gilded vault and 130 panel paintings is the most opulent surviving mediaeval interior. Above the confluence of two gorges, Zvikov has a unique two-storey, 13th-century arcaded courtyard. Orlik Castle was domesticated in postmediaeval times and has a fine collection of French empire furniture. First of three nights in Hluboká nad Vltavou. Day 5: Hluboká, Ceský Krumlov. Summer home of the Schwarzenbergs, dominant dynasty of South Bohemia, the Gothic Revival mansion of Hluboká is sumptuously furnished. The adjacent state art collection has good mediaeval and 20th-century Czech works. Clustered around a bend in the upper reaches of the Vltava, Ceský Krumlov is a
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highly picturesque little town. The hilltop castle was largely rebuilt in the 16th and 18th centuries; among its treasures are a hall painted with masked revellers, an excellently preserved theatre and a formal garden. Tickets may be available for a performance of an opera in the Baroque theatre. Please enquire. Overnight Hluboká. Day 6: Jindřichuv Hradec, Třebon, Zlatá Koruna. Jindřichuv Hradec is a pretty little town whose extensive aristocratic residence is notable for its Renaissance parts, in particular a beautiful rotunda. At the heart of a district of lakes formed in the Middle Ages to cultivate fish, Třebon is another delightful little town, still partly walled. Zlatá Koruna is a Cistercian monastery with a fine 13th-century chapter house and Baroque halls. Overnight Hluboká. Day 7: Kratochvile, Plzeň, Kladruby. Secluded within a walled garden amid particularly lovely countryside, Kratochvile is the finest Renaissance villa in the country. Continue to West Bohemia. The centre of the city of Plzeň adheres to its 13th-century grid plan; Gothic cathedral, the world’s third largest synagogue (1880s), good art gallery and varied street frontages. The Baroque-Gothic monastery church at Kladruby (1720s) is a masterpiece by Bohemia’s most original architect, Giovanni Santini. Overnight Mariánské Lázny. Day 8: Mariánské Lázny (Marienbad). For most of the 19th century and into the 20th, Marienbad was one of Europe’s most fashionable spas, with patronage from monarchs (Edward VII) to mavericks (Marx, Chopin, Wagner). White, yellow and ochre, from serene classicism to riotous ‘Renaissance’, the hotels and spas gather around a lovely landscaped park. Fly from Prague Airport, arriving Heathrow c. 5.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,630 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (Airbus 320); travel by private coach; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, six dinners and three lunches with wine, water and coffee; admission charges for all museums and places visited; all tips for waiters, drivers and guides; all airport and state taxes; the services of the lecturer and local guide. Single supplement £110. Price without flights £2,460. Hotels. Near Liblice, 40 km north of Prague (3 nights): a recently opened 4-star hotel and conference centre converted from an 18th-cent. country house, charming and well run. In Hluboká nad Vltavou (3 nights): a 4-star hotel converted from an auxiliary building belonging
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to the neighbouring mansion, lavishly and characterfully decorated. In Mariánské Lazny (1 night): a modern hotel in the centre of town, and though adequately comfortable this may disappoint after the other two (few hotels here take bookings for fewer than 7 nights). How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking on this tour, some of it up slopes or up steps (250 steps are climbed during the visit to Karlštejn for example). To be able to enjoy the tour it would be essential to manage daily walking and stair-climbing without any difficulties. Average distance by coach per day: 104 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Combining with Connoisseur’s Prague 9th September. At the end of Bohemia, the coach continues to Prague with anyone who is combining the tour with Connoisseur’s Prague, which begins tomorrow. The rest of the day is free. Overnight Prague. 10th September. Morning walking tour of Prague Castle and the cathedral with a local guide. Connoisseur’s Prague begins at c.3.45pm at the hotel.
Practicalities Price for combining the two tours. You pay the price of Bohemia with flights (£2,630) and the price of Connoisseur’s Prague without flights (£2,370), unless of course you are arranging your own flights. To both these figures you need to add single supplements if you are booking a double room for sole occupancy. Price of the additional night in Prague. We have arranged a special rate at the hotel of £110 per person sharing a room or £140 for a double room for sole occupancy, including breakfast. This also includes the walking tour on the morning of 10th September. Please let us know in writing if you would like to take up this option.
Music in Dresden & Prague at Christmas, 20–27 December 2012. See page 67–68. b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Connoisseur’s Prague Art, architecture & design, with privileged access Prague, etching by J.C. Vondrous 1924.
10–16 September 2013 (ma 674) 7 days • £2,540 Lecturer: Michael Ivory Inaccessible and hidden glories as well as the traditional stars of this endlessly fascinating and beautiful city. Special arrangements and private visits. Museums and galleries have been transformed in recent years, and new ones added. A focus on Czech art, architecture and design from the late 19th century to the 1930s. Can be combined with Bohemia. This is an experience of Prague like no other. The capital of Bohemia needs no introduction as the most beautiful city in Central Europe, with plenty to delight the cultural traveller for a week or more. Yet many a façade screens halls and rooms and works of art of the highest interest which can scarcely ever be seen except by insiders. Other fine places are open to visitors but hard to get to. Gaining access to the inaccessible is a major strand of this tour. Pursuing the private and straying off the beaten track will not be at the expense of the well-known sights, among which are some of the most fascinating buildings and artworks. But here participants are enabled to focus on the essentials and as far as possible to visit when crowds have subsided. Prague enjoys an unequalled density of great architecture, from Romanesque to modern, but it is the fabric of the city as a whole rather than individual masterpieces which make it so special. The city has the advantage of a splendid site, a crescent of hills rising from one side of a majestic bend in the River Vltava with gently inclined terrain on the other bank. A carapace of red roofs, green domes and gilded spires spreads across the slopes and levels, sheltering marvellously unspoilt streets and alleys and magically picturesque squares. Though the whole gamut of Czech art and architecture is viewed, the tour has an emphasis on the period from the 1870s to the 1920s. The spirit of national revival and the achievement of independence (in 1918) inspired a ferment of creativity among artists, writers and composers. A bewildering variety of styles drew on earlier Bohemian traditions, led Art Nouveau into highly innovatory directions and pioneered some radical and unique features at the dawn of modernism. Another high point in Prague’s history was the fourteenth century, when Kings of Bohemia were also Holy Roman Emperors and the city became one of the largest in the western world. The Gothic cathedral rising Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
from within the precincts of the hilltop Royal Castle is one of the many monuments of that golden age, and the exquisite panel paintings from this era, now excellently displayed in the Convent of St Agnes, are among the chief glories of the city. Subordination within the Habsburg Empire from the sixteenth century curtailed Bohemia’s power but not its wealth or architectural achievements: some of the finest Renaissance buildings in Central Europe arose here. In the eighteenth century, some of the richest landowners of the Baroque age built palaces here. In the city where Mozart had his most enthusiastic audiences and where Smetana and Dvořák reached fulfilment, there is still a rich musical life in a range of beautiful historic opera houses and concert halls. There will be the opportunity to attend performances. Our itinerary does not list by any means all that you see. Nor does it indicate all the slots for free time, which is necessarily a feature of a tour of such richness and variety.
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Itinerary Day 1. Fly from London to Prague at c. 10.30am. After settling into the hotel, there is a first exploration of the ancient core of the city on the right bank of the Vltava. A dense maze of dazzlingly picturesque streets and alleys converges on Old Town Square, surely the prettiest urban space in Europe, with shimmeringly beautiful façades – mediaeval, Renaissance, Baroque and Art Nouveau. Then a special visit to the Obecni dům (‘Municipal House’) to see the glorious suite of assembly rooms created 1904–12, a unique and very Czech mélange of murals and ornament. Day 2. Two very different buildings continue the tour of the Old Town: the Gothic Tyn church, at the heart not only of Prague but also of Czech history, and, by very special arrangement, the superb Art Deco reception rooms of the Mayor’s Residence. There follows the 13th-century Convent of St Agnes, where one of the world’s greatest collections of mediaeval painting is brilliantly installed.
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Connoisseur’s Prague continued
The Wallenstein Palace, steel engraving c. 1850.
A walk in and around Wenceslas Square, threading through a succession of arcades, takes in some outstanding turn-of-thecentury architecture and decoration and early modernist masterpieces. Day 3. Drive up to Prague Castle for a first visit to this extensive and fascinating hilltop citadel, residence of Dukes and Kings of Bohemia from the 10th century and now of the President. The Old Royal Palace rises from Romanesque through Gothic to Renaissance, the chief glory being the largest stone hall in Europe and its extraordinary vaulting. There follows privileged access to a wonderful sequence of halls not open to the public, dating from the 1570s to the 1930s (state occasions permitting). Walk through a sequence of delightful gardens on the south slope down to the Lesser Town. Day 4. Begin with the Moorish style Jubilee Synagogue of 1908 and the rare Rondo-Cubist Legion’s Bank of the 1920s. The Veletržni (Trade Fair) Palace of 1928 now houses fascinating Czech art of the 19th and 20th cents., a remarkable holding of modern French art and, from 2012, Alphons Mucha’s 20 vast canvases of his ‘Slav Epic’, which ranks as the concluding episode in the 400-year European tradition of history painting. Return to the Castle District to see the delicately arcaded Belvedere in the Royal Gardens, the finest Renaissance building in Prague, and the cathedral of St Vitus, a pioneering monument of High Gothic, richly embellished with chapels, tombs, altarpieces and stained glass. Day 5. The Klementinum is a vast Jesuit complex with library halls and chapels. See also in the Old Town the church of St James, a
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Gothic carcass encrusted with Baroque finery after a fire in 1689. Walk across 14th-century Charles Bridge, the greatest such structure in Europe, wonderfully adorned with sculptures. In the Lesser Town visit the infrequently opened Wallenstein Palace, a rare example of a 1630s residence (now the Senate), and St Nicholas, one of the finest of Baroque churches in Central Europe. Free afternoon. Day 6. Sunday morning traffic enables efficient mopping up by coach of treasures south of the centre, among them St John Nepomuk ‘on the Rock’, a little Baroque masterpiece (rarely accessible), the bizarre phenomenon of Cubist houses and the fortress of Vysehrad, rising high above the river and enclosing a cemetery with the graves of many great Czechs. There is a special tour of the National Theatre (1869–83) to which all the leading Czech artists of the time contributed, and a quick visit to the Prague Museum to see the extraordinarily detailed model of the city made in the 1830s. A riverside country retreat, Villa Troja is a 17thcent. Italianate mansion with a French formal garden. Day 7. Strahov Monastery has commanding views over Prague and two magnificent library halls, which by special arrangement we enter. Then walk down the hill, passing the formidable bulk of the Černín Palace and the delightful façade of the Loreto Church, for some free time at the Castle. There is an excellent museum of Czech 19th-cent. art, the Lobkowicz Palace with Canaletto’s paintings of London and the recently installed Treasury of St Vitus. The flight returns to London Heathrow at c. 5.00pm.
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Practicalities Price: £2,540 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (aircraft: Airbus Industrie 320); private coach for airport transfers and some excursions; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts and 4 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and Czech guideinterpreter. Single supplement £310 (double room for sole occupancy). Price without flights £2,370. Hotel. Very well located in the Old Town close to Obecní dům, this characterful hotel built in 1904 retains most of its original Art Nouveau decor. Recently refurbished and upgraded, it is given a 5-star rating though elsewhere in Europe it is unlikely it would be rated more than 4-star. Good restaurant and café. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking, much of it on roughly paved streets, some on inclines. The tour would not be suitable for anyone with difficulties with everyday walking and stair-climbing. Music. It is also usually possible to obtain tickets for operas and concerts. Programme details will be sent to participants when programmes are published. Small group: this tour will operate with between 10 and 18 participants.
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Ancient Egypt From Cairo to Abu Simbel 7 –18 October 2013 (ma 743) 12 days • £3,840 Lecturer: Dr Angus Graham A comprehensive introduction to the magnificent Egypt of the Pharaohs, with visits to the principal pyramids, temples and ancient sites, from Giza to Abu Simbel. A full schedule, but time for rest and contemplation. A meticulously planned land tour, offering far greater scope and more efficient use of time than a Nile cruise. Egypt has fascinated European travellers from the time of Herodotus, who wrote the first surviving account of the ancient land. The sheer antiquity and breadth of Egyptian civilization cannot but reduce the visitor to awe, whether it be Napoleon with his famous exhortation to his troops in front of the Pyramids that forty centuries looked down upon them, or the more humble modern traveller exploring the tombs in the Valley of the Kings. Nearly two thousand years separate King Menes (Narmer), the unifier of Upper and Lower Egypt around 3100 bc, and Rameses II, the builder of Abu Simbel, and it was yet another thousand years before Egypt became a province of Rome. Throughout this time Egypt has also been a fertile source of legend. The fifty daughters of Danaus fled from a marriage threat by the fifty sons of Aegyptus, as recounted by Aeschylus; and if Euripides is to be believed, Helen of Troy may have sojourned on the banks of the Nile. Biblical references abound of a land of both oppression and refuge. Patriarchs found sustenance in Egypt, Moses led his people forth, and the Holy Family fled there from the wrath of Herod. Egypt was the first major country to be subdued by the forces of Islam, and the line of conquerors reached a turning-point with Napoleon, who brought an army not only of soldiers but also of scholars. He left both groups to continue without him, and the scholars laboured throughout the land to produce the monumental Description de L’Égypte. The vast detective work of deciphering hieroglyphic script was commenced through the discovery of the Rosetta Stone in 1799, thereby eventually producing the key to our present understanding of ancient Egypt. Nowhere in the world have so many monuments survived for so long, on such a scale and in such good condition. The magnificence of Egypt’s standing monuments, Pharaonic, Coptic and Islamic, is supplemented by an unrivalled series of tomb sculptures and Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
paintings and by superb collections of jewellery and artefacts in the Egyptian museums. And through the midst of the land, with its origins in the deep south, flows the Nile, which with its annual inundation was the source of all that has made Egyptian civilisation great.
Itinerary Day 1: Luxor. Fly at c. 3.00pm directly from London Heathrow to Luxor, arriving c. 9.30pm (time in the air: c. 4 hours 45 minutes). First of five nights in Luxor. Day 2: Luxor. A leisurely day with talks by the lecturer outlining the main themes of the tour. Morning visit to Luxor Museum. Free afternoon. Overnight Luxor. Day 3: Luxor. Full day visiting the Theban West Bank, the city of the dead and the
Day 5: Denderah. Morning visit to the wellpreserved and roofed Ptolemaic-Roman Temple of Hathor at Denderah. Return to Luxor experiencing the rural landscape of Upper Egypt providing reflections of ancient times. Overnight Luxor. Day 6: Edfu, Kom Ombo, Aswan. Drive south through the agricultural landscape and view the desert edge of Southern Upper Egypt to see the Temple of Horus at Edfu, the most complete of the Egyptian temples. At Kom Ombo visit the remains of the unique double temple to Sobek and Haroeris (Horus the elder), teetering on the banks of the Nile. First of three nights in the ancient border city of Aswan. Day 7: Kitchener’s Island, St Simeon, nobles’ tombs. Travel by boat to the Old and Middle Kingdom tombs cut into the rock high on the West Bank. Island of Plants (Kitchener’s
Fragment of a wall painting from Egyptian Pictures by Revd Samuel Manning c. 1875.
Valley of the Kings, where the New Kingdom pharaohs are buried in magnificently decorated rock cut tombs, the vast royal mortuary temples erected as Houses of Eternity for the cult of the king. Visit the Tombs of the Nobles containing exquisite reliefs and painted festival and funeral scenes and the village of the royal workmen, Deir el Medina, who built and decorated the royal tombs, a rare settlement site, with their beautifully decorated tombs with perfectly preserved colour. Overnight Luxor.
Island), a lush botanical garden with tropical vegetation imported by the eponymous British soldier. Optional visit by camel to the lonely seventh-century ruined fortress-monastery of St Simeon, situated on the edge of the desert. Alternatively, take a bird watching trip through the cataract at Aswan on a motor boat, accompanied by an ornithologist. The Nubian Museum has excellent collections of Nubian life from the Neolithic to the present. Overnight Aswan.
Day 4: Luxor. The ancient site of Thebes and the vast temple complex of Karnak including the spectacular temple of Amun and the open air museum. Free afternoon. Evening visit to Luxor temple, a well preserved structure completed by Rameses II. Overnight Luxor.
Day 8: Temple of Philae, High Dam. The High Dam is one of the engineering wonders of the world. View in the distance the brooding hulk of Kalabsha temple, relocated to the banks of Lake Nasser as the High Dam was built. Between the High Dam and the Old Dam, the
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Egypt
Ancient Egypt continued
Temple of Philae, dedicated to the goddess Isis, reconstructed on a landscaped island following the flooding of the original island. The ancient granite quarries where a flawed obelisk dating to the 18th Dynasty lies unfinished. A free afternoon. Final night Aswan. Day 9: Abu Simbel, Cairo. Fly to Abu Simbel to visit the dramatic twin temples of Rameses II and his great royal wife, Nefertari, on the shores of Lake Nasser. Transfer by air to Cairo for the first of three nights. Day 10: Giza, Cairo. On the edge of Cairo at Giza is the largest and most renowned complex of Pyramids, the solar boat museum and the Sphinx. Afternoon visit to the Museum of Egyptian Antiquities to view the richest collection of Pharaonic art in the world, including treasures from the tomb of Tutankhamun. Overnight Cairo. Day 11: Dahshur, Saqqarah, Cairo. Drive to the Dahshur pyramid field to view and visit the pyramids predating the Giza pyramids, the
cathedral-like interior of the Red Pyramid is an engineering marvel. Saqqarah, the necropolis of the ancient capital city of Memphis. The Step Pyramid complex contains the earliest pyramid and Egypt’s first building in stone, the pyramid of Teti, containing the Pyramid Texts relating the king’s ascent to the stars. The Mastaba of Mereruka has detailed and finely rendered painted scenes of daily life. Overnight Cairo. Day 12: Cairo. Fly from Cairo, arriving London Heathrow at approximately 1.30pm.
Below: Karnak, wood engraving from The Land of the Pharaohs c. 1890.
Practicalities Price: £3,840 (deposit £300). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled Egyptair flights London to Luxor (aircraft: Airbus A320-100), Aswan-Abu SimbelCairo (aircraft: Airbus 320) and Cairo to London (aircraft: Boeing 777-300). Hotel accommodation as described below. Breakfasts, six lunches (some are picnics) and seven dinners, including wine, water and coffee. All admission to museums, sites, etc., visited with the group. All gratuities for restaurant staff, drivers, local guides. All state and airport taxes. The cost of the Egyptian visa (if flying with the group). The services of the lecturer and a local guide. Single supplement £340. Price without international flights £3,260. Hotels: Luxor (5 nights): locally rated 5-star hotel on the banks of the Nile with delightful gardens, part of the Sofitel group. Aswan (3 nights): a 4-star hotel on the Nile, recently refurbished. Cairo (3 nights): a new 5-star boutique hotel, centrally located. All hotels have open-air pools. How strenuous? This tour is not suitable for anyone with any difficulty with everyday walking or stairclimbing. Visits to the archaeological sites involve walking over rough and uneven ground. There are some early starts, and the heat during the day can be tiring. Average distance by coach per day: 25 miles. Visas: required for most foreign nationals. If you are flying with the group we will arrange for it to be issued on arrival (the cost is included in the tour price); if you are flying independently we can arrange a visa on arrival, with a transfer, for a charge. Passports must be valid for 6 months from entry into Egypt. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants. Working in partnership with the Egypt Exploration Society (EES). Our partnership means that clients who book this tour automatically become members of the EES. Founded in 1882, this historic Society is one of the leading archaeological units working in Egypt today. Membership allows you access to their extensive library, discounts on lectures and evening classes, as well as a subscription to their Newsletter and biannual magazine, Egyptian Archaeology.
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206.
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Sinai Copts, Byzantines & Landcruisers 13–21 October 2012 (mz 405) 9 days • £3,400 Lecturer: Nicole Douek
Contact us for full details or visit www.martinrandall.com
St Catherine’s Monastery, engraving from Picturesque Palestine 1882.
An exploration of Christianity and monasticism in Egypt. Talks on its long and varied history and a visit to St Catherine’s Monastery. A wilderness experience in sublime desert landscapes – only for those who are fit and have stamina. Egypt has a great many superlatives: the longest river in the world, the tallest pyramids, the most ancient script, and a civilization that survived, seemingly without many changes, for over 3000 years. However, it is not often that Egypt is associated with the birth of Christianity. According to tradition, the new Christian faith is said to have been preached in Alexandria by the Evangelist Mark, sometime around 60 ad. By the 2nd century the new faith was embraced by Alexandrian Jews, Greeks and native Egyptians, gradually spreading south into the Nile Valley. It is here that monasticism was established, as a result of the persecution of Christians by Roman emperors. Some sought refuge in desert settlements, whereas others chose to live in solitude as hermits. By 391, the Byzantine emperor Theodosius outlawed paganism and Christianity became the official religion of the Roman empire. Recently, the Coptic community of Egypt has experienced an extraordinary spiritual and ethnic revival, and the ancient monasteries are growing in size and in importance, preserving the beliefs, and the art of the early Christians, as well as the Coptic language. To this day, the patriarch of the Coptic church is selected from among the monks of the monastery of St Anthony. This is our journey on this tour, to explore the places where Christianity was born. But we will also travel through the Sinai peninsula, that ‘great and terrible wilderness’ of the Old Testament. It is at its heart that the events narrated in Exodus took place, and it is on top of Mount Sinai that Moses is said to have received the Ten Commandments. Another first, with the birth of Judaism, the most ancient form of monotheism. By the time the emperor Justinian founded the monastery of St Catherine in the sixth century, the monastery and Gebel Musa already had become places of pilgrimage. Its fame, now, is also due to the extraordinary collection of icons housed in the new museum curated by the Byzantine scholars of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
With the arrival of Islam, this same area was on the route taken by Islamic conquerors into the Maghreb and, later, Muslim pilgrims on their way to the holy city of Mecca. The library of the monastery preserves a ‘firman’, a decree, signed by the prophet Mohammed, commanding his armies to respect the ancient sanctuary and its monks. In fact, the Sinai peninsula has always been a place of passage. Jutting into the Red Sea, and wedged between the Gulf of Suez and the Gulf of Aqaba, it is a link between Asia and Africa, and it has always had great strategic value. Not only did its vast quantities of minerals attract empire builders, but it has been the natural route for countless armies marching to or from the ancient Levant. Along these same routes travelled caravans of traders transporting their goods to the markets of Egypt. In recent years Sinai has seen enormous and rapid changes – a
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new pipeline that brings fresh water from the Suez Canal to the various parts of northern Sinai, desalination plants in coastal towns, and of course, tourism on its eastern shore, where diving and snorkelling have created new resorts along its coral reef. Our tour concentrates on the ‘real’ Sinai, with its vast landscapes and its vivid colours, its high granite mountains, its volcanic outcrops and golden sand dunes, its acacia groves and hidden oases, its emptiness and solitude. We trace the history of this land and explore the events that led to the creation of the three great monotheistic religions of our world.
Practicalities – in brief Price: £3,400 (deposit £300). Single supplement £320. Price without flights £3,010. See the website or ask for full details.
Egypt
Walking Hadrian’s Wall Roman civilization at the edge of an Empire
The Wall near Housesteads, wood engraving c. 1888.
the five full days there is a walk of between two and three hours, covering between two and four miles. The slow progress is in part due to stops to examine the archaeology and to take in the wonderful views. But also the terrain is often quite rough, and periodically there are rises and falls, sometimes quite steep, though rarely of more than 50 metres and often aided by rough-hewn stone steps recently made for the Hadrian’s Wall Path. It is not a tough trek but nevertheless it should only be attempted by people whose regular country walks include some uphill elements. A coach takes you to the start of each walk and meets you at the end, eliminating the need to retrace steps or carry much except water and waterproofs. Each day has been planned to provide a balanced mix of archaeology, more general sight-seeing and cross-country trekking, and for this reason the walks do not constitute a linear progression. On most days you return to the hotel by 5.00pm, allowing plenty of time to relax before dinner.
Itinerary 19–25 May 2013 (mz 574) 7 days • £1,790 Lecturer: Professor David Breeze The archaeology and history of the largest Roman construction in northern Europe. The most spectacular stretches accessible only on foot, this is also a walking tour through some of the most magnificent scenery in England. Excursions from coast to coast include all the major Roman sites and relevant museums. One hotel throughout, the best in the region. Traversing England from the Tyne estuary to the Solway Firth, the Wall was conceived and ordered by Emperor Hadrian in ad 122 to mark and control the northernmost limit of the Roman Empire. The ambition was extraordinary, its fulfilment – far from the pools of skills and prosperity in the Mediterranean heartlands of the Empire – astonishing: a fifteen-foot-high wall 75 miles long through harsh, undulating terrain with 80 milecastles, 161 intermediate turrets and flanking earthwork ditches and ramparts. Fifteen or sixteen forts, many straddling the Wall, housed a garrison of 12–15,000 soldiers from radically different climes elsewhere in the Empire including Syria, Libya, Dalmatia, Spain and Belgium. A populous penumbra of supply bases and civilian settlements grew up
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nearby. As a feat of organisation, engineering and will power, Hadrian’s Wall ranks among the most extraordinary of all Roman achievements. Its story does not end with its completion within Hadrian’s reign because for the remaining three centuries of Roman control there were constant changes both to the fabric and to its administration and occupation. A study of the Wall leads to an examination of practically every aspect of Roman civilization, from senatorial politics in Rome to the mundanities of life of ordinary Romans – and Britons – who lived in its shadow. But the Wall itself remains the fascinating focus, and the subject of endless academic debate. It’s not even clear what exactly it was for. For the modern-day visitor the Wall has the further, inestimable attraction of passing some of the most magnificent and unspoilt countryside in England. Happily, archaeological interest is greatest where the landscape is at its most thrilling, and it is in this central section, furthest from centres of population, that the tour concentrates. The principal excavated sites can be visited with no more exertion than on an average sightseeing outing, but to see the best surviving stretches of the Wall, and to appreciate the vastness of the Roman achievement, to view many of its details and to immerse fully in the scenic beauties, there is no substitute for leaving wheels behind and walking along its course. How strenuous are the walks? On each of
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Day 1: Housesteads. The coach leaves Newcastle Central Station at 2.15pm (or from the hotel at 1.30pm) and takes you straight out to Housesteads. With standing remains of up to 10 feet, this is the best preserved of the Wall’s forts and evocatively reveals the usual panoply of perimeter walls and gateways, headquarters building, commander’s palatial residence, granaries, hospital, latrines. Remote and rugged, there are superb views. Day 2: walk Steel Rig to Cawfields; Corbridge. The first walk is perhaps the most consistently rugged as it follows long, well-preserved stretches of the Wall through moorland above the cliffs of the Whinsill Crag; a thrilling walk (2 3/4 miles, up to 2 1/2 hours). Pub lunch. Corbridge began as a fort in the chain built by Agricola c. ad 85 but left to the south by Hadrian’s Wall it became a supply depot and then a largely civilian town. Day 3: walk Housesteads to Steel Rig; Chesters. Again for much of the route the Wall rides the crest of the faultline of dolerite crags, dipping and climbing. There are spectacular stretches, excellently preserved milecastles, staggering views: moorland, lakes, conifer forests to the north, richly variegated greens, plentiful livestock, distant vistas to the south (3 1/2 miles, up to 2 3/4 hours). Pub lunch. Chesters, the most salubrious of the forts (lavish bath house), built for 500 Asturian cavalrymen, in enchanting river valley setting. Day 4: Vindolanda, Hexham. The fort and town of Vindolanda is the site of ongoing b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
The Age of Bede Anglo-Saxon Northumbria & the Lindisfarne Gospels excavations which are revealing everyday artefacts including, famously, the ‘postcard’ writing tablets which uniquely document details of everyday life. See the surviving Roman remains in local churches, including the fine 13th-century abbey church in Hexham. Day 5: walk Gilsland to Birdoswald; Chesters, Brocolitia. Walk through low-lying and pretty farmland with streams and wild flowers. The only mile with both milecastles and turrets visible, and good lengths of Wall (2 miles, 1 hour). Pub lunch followed by a couple of archaeological remains, the Mithraic temple at Brocolitia and the bridge abutments across the river from Chesters. Day 6: walk Walltown to Cawfields; Carlisle, Bowness-on-Solway. The final walk is spectacularly varied, from rocky hilltops to lowland pasture (3 1/2 miles, 2 1/2 hours). Great Chesters fort has good remains of gates and other structures, with lengths of the Wall up to two metres high. Drive to Carlisle to see the Wall collections in the Tullie House Museum, and continue to the evocative estuarial landscape of the Solway Firth. The Wall ended at the remote village of Bowness-on-Solway. Day 7: Newcastle, Wallsend. At aptly named Wallsend and now engulfed in the Tyneside conurbation, Segedunum was the most easterly of the forts, the layout clearly seen from a viewing platform. In Newcastle the Great North Museum has the best collection of objects excavated along the Wall. The coach takes you to the Newcastle station by 2.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,790 (deposit £200). This includes: hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 3 lunches and 5 dinners with wine, beer, water, coffee; private coach; all admissions (English Heritage members will be refunded c. £20); all tips; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement £120. Hotel: A 19th-century Jacobean-style mansion, Matfen Hall is a fine country house hotel offering excellent service. It has large, well equipped bedrooms, a variety of Victorian and contemporary public spaces, a very good restaurant, two bars for informal meals, spa facilities, a garden and an extensive landscaped park (now a golf course). How strenuous? Please read the last two paragraphs of the introduction above. You should not consider this tour unless you possess a well-used pair of walking boots, are more than averagely fit, have good balance and a head for heights. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
25–29 July 2013 (mz 638) 5 days • £1,100 Lecturer: Major Imogen Corrigan In 2013 only. Examines the remarkable efflorescence of culture and learning in Anglo-Saxon northern England. Based around a temporary exhibition of the Lindisfarne Gospels lent to Durham Cathedral by the British Library. Jarrow, Monkwearmouth, Holy Island, Hexham and other Anglo-Saxon sites. Studies also Durham Cathedral, perhaps the greatest Romanesque building in Europe, with special arrangements. For a few decades around ad 700, a handful of monasteries in Northumbria became beacons of culture and learning in a Britain that was largely tribal, warlike and unstable. Within a century Viking raiders extinguished these fragile flickers of civilization, and destruction and division again ruled the land. England – as it can now be called – steadily recovered, and on the eve of the Norman Conquest had become one of the best-governed and most prosperous territories in Europe. But in the two decades after 1066 the ever-troublesome north was again laid waste. It is little short of miraculous therefore that the Lindisfarne Gospels, the greatest work of art of its age, should be among the few surviving remnants of Anglo-Saxon Northumbria. Normally only a couple of leaves are on show in the British Library in London, but in the summer of 2013 several pages will be displayed in Durham to celebrate the opening of the new cathedral treasury. The Gospels provide a context for visits to the most significant Anglo-Saxon remains in the area – Jarrow and Monkwearmouth, the two-campus monastery to which the Venerable Bede was attached; church architecture at Whittingham and Hexham; and sites of powerful resonance, of the royal court at Yeavering and Lindisfarne itself, now known as Holy Island. The tour introduces a cast of remarkable men – Benedict Biscop, Aiden, Cuthbert, Bede, characters of extraordinary tenacity, learning, piety and courage. One of the great intellectuals of the Middle Ages, the Venerable Bede (673–735) wrote on science and the measurement of time and on languages and literature as well as compiling a work of inestimable value, History of the English People. Durham Cathedral, last resting place of Cuthbert and Bede, is a subsidiary theme of the tour. In the opinion of some the finest
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Anglo-Saxon illuminated letter, engraving c. 1860.
Romanesque church in Europe, its massiveness and defensibility express the often tenuous hold on the region by institutions representing southern-based royal government.
Itinerary Day 1: Durham. The tour begins with a talk at 2.45pm at the hotel in Durham (where all four nights are spent). Then walk through the wonderfully unspoilt town to the cathedral treasury, newly installed in a cloister undercroft, to see the exhibition of the Lindisfarne Gospels. Among the most celebrated illuminated books in the world, the manuscript was made by Eadfrith, Bishop of Lindisfarne (died ad 721) in honour of St Cuthbert, who is buried in the Cathedral. There is the opportunity to attend Evensong here. Day 2: Jarrow, Monkwearmouth. The monasteries at Monkwearmouth and Jarrow, 10 miles apart but one institution, were founded in 674 and 681 by Benedict Biscop, whose five journeys to Rome resulted in a unique network of international contacts and awareness of European artistry. Parts of the original chapels survive, with stained glass and stone carvings. ‘Bede’s World’ is an excellent museum, with a living Anglo-Saxon farm adjacent. There is the option of time at the National Glass Centre, which displays contemporary glass. Day 3: Durham. All day is spent in and around Durham Cathedral, one of the greatest Romanesque churches in Europe and one of the most impressive of English cathedrals. Mighty towers rise above the encircling river
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The Age of Bede continued
How Strenuous? This tour would not be suitable for anyone who has difficulty with everyday walking and who cannot stand for long periods of time. Average distance by coach per day: 55 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Northumbria June 2013 Details available September 2012 Contact us to register your interest
New tours The Age of Bede......................................25 The Cathedrals of England.....................28 Royal Palaces...........................................29 Art & Industry........................................32 English Music in Yorkshire.....................39 Ethiopia...................................................42 The Rite of Spring...................................57 The Rhône Music Festival.......................63 King Ludwig II.......................................75 The Ring at La Scala...............................92 Hexham Abbey, steel engraving after Thomas Allom c. 1840.
Wear, while the interior cannot but move with its power and piety. The bulk of the building is little altered since the forty-year building campaign begun in 1093. There are special arrangements and access to parts not generally open. Day 4: Holy Island, Yeavering. The monastery on the little island of Lindisfarne (later ‘Holy Island’) was founded in ad 635 by an Irish monk from Iona, St. Aidan, and became an important centre for scholarship and missionary activity. A place of remarkable charm and tranquillity, there are Anglo-Saxon fragments, ruins of the Norman priory, and a castle, turned into a home by Edwin Lutyens. On the journey back to Durham visit Yeavering, evocative site of a royal settlement. Day 5: Escombe, Hexham. The tiny Saxon church at Escomb was built c. ad 675, a rare survival. A lovely market town on a bluff above the Tyne, Hexham grew around a
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monastery founded by in 671 by St Wilfrid. The magnificent mediaeval church is postConquest except for the crypt, the largest surviving expanse of Anglo-Saxon architecture in England. The coach sets down at Newcastle Central Railway station before 3.00pm and returns to Durham before 3.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,100 (deposit £150). This includes: hotel accommodation as described below; private coach throughout; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 3 dinners with wine, water, coffee; admission to the cathedral and churches, exhibitions and sites; all tips for waiters, drivers, guides; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £80.
Hotel: the Durham Marriott Hotel Royal County (AA****) is well located just outside the old city centre between a road and the river. The building is 17th-century and modern.
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Stresa Festival..........................................95 Opera in Venice.....................................103 Parma Verdi Festival..............................107 Florentine Palazzi..................................119 The Etruscans........................................128 Martina Franca......................................137 Walking in Northern Tuscany..............123 Munch in Oslo......................................149 Opera in Oslo, Gothenburg & Copenhagen......................................149 Walking in Madeira..............................156 Grampian Gardens................................162 Scotland: the Borders............................165 Edinburgh at Christmas........................167 Zurbarán & the Golden Age................189 Connoisseur’s Istanbul...........................192 Art in Texas...........................................199 Santa Fe Opera......................................201 b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Mediaeval East Anglia Cathedrals, castles, parish churches 24–28 June 2013 (mz 617) 5 days • £1,070 Lecturer: John McNeill Two cathedrals, Norwich and Ely, major Romanesque buildings with glorious Gothic additions. Three great keeps at Castle Rising, Castle Hedingham and Framlingham. Fine parish churches including Long Melford, Lavenham and East Harling. Based in Bury St Edmunds. Famed for its mediaeval wool churches and for the virtuosic qualities of its Romanesque architecture, East Anglia boasts the greatest concentration of mediaeval buildings to survive in any region of England. It is also an area whose towns and villages have grown little since 1500, and whose mediaeval infrastructure remains relatively clear. This is perhaps most apparent in Bury St Edmunds, whose street plan is still that of the new town laid out, along with the abbey, in the aftermath of the Norman Conquest. Thus Bury is an irresistible and ideal base for the tour. The major buildings to be visited are, of course, East Anglia’s two mediaeval cathedrals at Ely and Norwich. Both retain a substantial Romanesque core, and were magnificently refurbished between the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries. Bury St Edmunds is also within easy reach of some of the finest castles and parish churches in England, and the majority of buildings visited fall into these latter categories – the great twelfth-century castles at Castle Rising, Castle Hedingham and Framlingham, and the incomparable late mediaeval churches of Lavenham, Long Melford and Gipping.
glass) and guild-financed Woolpit (spectacular hammerbeam roof ). Day 3: Long Melford, Lavenham, Castle Hedingham, Thaxted. A short drive south to Holy Trinity at Long Melford, a building dazzling not only for its scale but for the quality and quantity of its late 15th-century decoration, most famously the great run of stained glass donor portraits which light the north aisle. Then to that other ‘rich clothier’s church’, Ss. Peter and Paul at Lavenham, whose heraldically-enriched elevations and screenwork make such an excellent foil to Long Melford. The afternoon is divided between the de Vere Earls of Oxfords’ mighty 12th-century keep at Castle Hedingham and the stunning late mediaeval elevations of Thaxted. Day 4: Gipping, Framlingham, Bury St Edmunds. A morning in north Suffolk. Gipping, Sir James and Lady Ann Tyrell’s jewel of a chantry chapel, remote, moated and all of a piece. Framlingham, a striking complex of church and castle that made the town the most potent symbol of seigneurial power in Suffolk. A free afternoon to wander at leisure in Bury St Edmunds, suggestions include the parish church of St Mary’s with magnificent hammerbeam roof and the remains of the Abbey of St Edmunds. Day 5: Castle Acre, Castle Rising, King’s Lynn. A morning in west Norfolk. Castle Acre, Cluniac priory church and proud possessor of the finest of all East Anglian Romanesque
arcaded façades. Castle Rising, a stunning juxtaposition of a castle built for Henry I’s widowed queen, Alice, and the sumptuously decorated late Romanesque parish church of St Lawrence. Break for lunch in King’s Lynn and return by coach to Ely station by 4.00pm, and then to Bury by c. 5.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,070 (deposit £200). This includes: coach transfers from the hotel in Bury or Ely railway station, and throughout the tour; accommodation as described below; breakfasts and 3 dinners in the hotel restaurant with wine, water and coffee; all admissions and donations; tips for drivers and waiters; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £140. Hotel: in Bury St Edmunds throughout. A 3-star hotel in an historic coaching inn in the centre of town. Rooms are warmly furnished and all have ensuite bathrooms. There is a good restaurant. Limited parking space is available (please request when booking). How strenuous? There is a lot of standing around for the church and castle visits. You must be able to undertake the necessary walking at the speed of the group. There is quite a lot of driving and getting on and off the coach. You will need to arrange your own travel to Ely or to Bury St Edmunds. Average distance by coach per day: 75 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Bury St Edmunds, St James, late 18th-century engraving.
Itinerary Day 1: Ely. The coach leaves the hotel at Bury St Edmonds at 1.00pm and Ely railway station at 2.00pm. At Ely Cathedral study the Lady Chapel, monastic precincts and all, a complex whose Romanesque crossing tower famously collapsed in 1322 and whose replacement is quite simply the most inventive response to disaster 14th-century Europe has to show. All four nights are spent in Bury St Edmunds. Day 2: Norwich, East Harling, Woolpit. Visit Norwich Cathedral, beginning with the choir and progressing through transepts and nave to the superlative late mediaeval cloisters. The afternoon is spent in two contrasting parish churches, aristocratically-financed East Harling (excellent 15th-century screen and Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
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The Cathedrals of England Ten of the greatest buildings in the country 20–28 March 2013 (mz 501) 9 days • £2,520 Lecturer: Tim Tatton-Brown 2–10 October 2013 (ma 732) 9 days • £2,520 Lecturer: Jon Cannon A new tour for 2013. A study of ten of Britain’s greatest buildings – their history, architecture, sculpture, stained glass and life today. Built between the Norman Conquest and Henry VIII’s Reformation, with Coventry Cathedral a moving exception. Organ recitals exclusively for us and many other special arrangements. Some lovely unspoilt towns are seen. Five hotels and quite a lot of driving, but the itinerary is uncrowded with time for rest and independent exploration. This is an architectural journey that would be hard to equal for intensity of aesthetic delight. As a way into the minds and lives of the people of the Middle Ages, likewise it would be difficult to surpass. Personalities of extraordinary capability and vision will be revealed, and craftsmen shown to possess not only the skills of their trade but also the initiative to work out solutions to practical problems. The tour ranges across England – north, south, east and west – to see ten of the greatest buildings in the country, and some of the most glorious mediaeval architecture to be found anywhere. Connoisseurs may carp at the omissions, but logistics exclude only a couple of cathedrals of comparable beauty, magnificence and interest. With an average of little over one cathedral a day, there is plenty of time at each to really get to know them, to look, learn and understand, to assimilate, appreciate and contemplate. All but one are mediaeval, Norman (as Romanesque is generally called in Britain) and Gothic. It is easy to underestimate the length of time the Middle Ages encompasses: the span from the earliest work we see on the tour to the latest, from the Norman Conquest to the Reformation, equals that from the Reformation to the present day. There was huge variety in the building arts during those 460 years. The one non-mediaeval cathedral on the itinerary is Coventry. Rebuilt after the Second World War, not only is it a treasure house of mid-twentieth-century art but it is a moving monument to rebirth and reconciliation.
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Everywhere there will be special arrangements to enable you to see more than most visitors. Organ recitals are being organised specially for us at some cathedrals. There are also opportunities to hear their excellent choirs at Evensong. Cathedrals come with cities, and many of these were little changed during the era of industrialisation and now rank among the loveliest in England. Much beautiful countryside is traversed as well. For centuries, British scholars and critics laboured under an inferiority complex, believing English Gothic to be a defective derivative of the thoroughbred French version, inferior according to the degree to which it departed from the soaring, clean-limbed and impeccably rational paradigms across the Channel. That cultural cringe has all but evaporated in the last couple of generations, not least because evidence has been piling up that masons and architects in England had entire confidence in their inventiveness and deliberately chose to shun French conventions. English Gothic is characterised by extraordinarily enriched detail, engaging oddities and knowing inconsistencies, by happily treating each component vessel as a separate unit, by concern for picturesque effects as much as for sublimity of impact of bold engineering.
Itinerary Day 1: Ely. The coach leaves London at 9.30am for Ely, a surprisingly remote and rural location for one of England’s greatest cathedrals. The mighty Norman nave (c. 1110–30), with its thick walls, tiers of arches and clusters of shafts, leads to the crossing and its unique octagonal tower. Rebuilt after the collapse of its predecessor in 1322, this is a work of genius. The Lady Chapel, also in the Decorated style, is the largest and perhaps the finest in the country. Overnight Lincoln. Day 2: Lincoln. Also largely by-passed by modern urban development, Lincoln’s hilltop site above the plain renders the cathedral the more imposing. Largely of the Early English and Decorated phases, it has always been revered as one of the finest of Gothic cathedrals, its fascinations enhanced by myriad minor inconsistencies and variations which reveal the struggle for solutions at the frontiers of artistic fashion and technological capability. The steep streets of the ancient town are a delight. First of three nights in York. Day 3: Durham. By train to Durham (40 mins), where the topography and riverside walk provide surely the most exciting approach to any English cathedral. Massive towers rise above the trees which cling to the steep
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embankment, a defensible bulwark in the frequently hostile North. Largely completed in the forty years after 1070 and little altered since, the nave and quire with their great cylindrical pillars, distinguished by their engraved patterns, constitute perhaps the greatest Romanesque church in the world. Overnight York. Day 4: York. York Minster is the largest of English mediaeval cathedrals. A Norman predecessor determines some of the proportions, but above ground it is all Gothic, from Early English to Perpendicular but predominantly 14th-century, demonstrating more French Rayonnant influence than any other major English church. It houses a large quantity of original stained glass, and the polygonal chapter house is without peer. The city retains its mediaeval walls and an exceptional quantity of historic buildings. Overnight York. Day 5: Coventry. Coventry Cathedral is perhaps internationally Britain’s best-known 20th-cent. building. Rebuilt 1956–62 to designs by Sir Basil Spence beside the ruins of the old cathedral bombed in 1940, it is both a showcase for some of the best art of the time (Graham Sutherland, John Piper, Jacob Epstein) and a moving symbol of rebirth and reconciliation. Finish the day with a walk through Stratford-upon Avon, a delightful town which has retained many buildings from Shakespeare’s time there. Overnight Stratford. Day 6: Gloucester, Bristol. The procession of tall cylindrical pillars in Gloucester’s nave are unadulterated Norman, but, following the burial of the murdered Edward II in 1327, the eastern parts are exquisitely veiled in the first large-scale appearance of Perpendicular architecture. The east window is the largest in Europe. The nave of Bristol Cathedral is by the greatest of Victorian ‘Goths’, G.E. Street, and the eastern parts are among the most innovative and beautiful of early-14th-cent. buildings in Europe. First of two nights in Wells. Day 7: Wells. All day is spent in Wells, an exceptionally unspoilt little city with a fortified bishop’s palace, 14th-cent. houses of the vicars choral and much else of charm and interest. Wells was one of the first cathedrals in England to be built entirely in Gothic style. Its screened west front, eastward march of the nave, marvellous sequence of contrasted spaces of the east end, serene chapter house and Decorated cloisters all contribute to the cathedral’s exceptional allure. The strainer arches supporting the sagging tower are among the great creations of the Middle Ages. Overnight Wells.
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Day 8: Salisbury. One of the most uplifting experiences in English architecture, Salisbury is unique among the great Gothic cathedrals in England in that it was built on a virgin site and largely in a single campaign, 1218–58. To homogeneity are added lucidity of design and perfection of detail. Completed a century later, the spire at 404 feet was the tallest building in Britain until 1894. The close is the finest in the country, and the town beyond is an extensive expanse of historic fabric. Overnight Winchester. Day 9: Winchester. Winchester Cathedral is Europe’s longest church, reflecting the city’s status intermittantly from the 9th to the 17th cents. as the seat of English government. The transcepts are unembellished early Norman (1080s), raw architecture of brute power, whereas the mighty nave was dressed 300 years later in suave Perpendicular garb. The profusion of chantry chapels constitutes an enchanting collection of Gothic micro-architecture. Wall paintings, floor tiles and the finest 12thcent. Bible are among other treasures. Leave Winchester after lunch and return to central London before 4.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,520 (deposit £250). This includes: hotel accommodation as described below; private coach throughout; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 6 dinners with wine, water and coffee; admission and donations to all cathedrals visited; all tips for waiters, drivers, guides; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement £230. Hotels. Lincoln (1 night): a historic building close to the cathedral, the Castle Hotel has recently been thoroughly refurbished. Rooms are not large but are comfortable and welldesigned, and the restaurant is excellent. York (3 nights): The Grange is also in a historic building with a new wing, bedrooms are individually and charmingly designed, the public spaces are lovely and the service and the restaurant are very good. Stratfordon-Avon (1 night): the modern Q Hotel is located on the edge of the historic centre of the town. The style is contemporary with neutral colour schemes, comfortable if rather lacking in character. Wells (2 nights): The Swan, in a building of 15th-cent. origin in a narrow street close to the cathedral. While retaining its historic atmosphere it has been well refurbished. Winchester (1 night): excellently located overlooking the cathedral, The Wessex (Mercure) is a 1960s building with both traditional and modern elements in the décor. Rooms at all the hotels, being city-centre historic properties, vary in size and outlook. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Gloucester Cathedral, drawing reproduced in Francis Bond, An Introduction to English Church Architecture, 1913.
How strenuous? Unavoidably, there is quite a lot of walking on the tour. You ought to be able to walk at about three miles an hour for up to half an hour, and to negotiate steps. Two of the hotels do not have lifts. There are four days without any coach travel, but there is an average on the remaining five days of 73 miles by coach. Small group. This tour will operate with between 12 and 22 participants.
Royal Palaces August 2013 Details available September 2012 Contact us to register your interest
The Welsh Marches, 16–20 September 2013, see page 204.
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The Victorian Achievement Architecture, Industry & Art in Lancashire & Yorkshire 27 August–3 September 2013 (mz 664) 8 days • £1,850 Lecturer: Dr Paul Atterbury Studies the social history, industrial archaeology, architecture and art of the reign of Queen Victoria, a period when Great Britain led the world in trade, industry and ideas. Includes some of the most beautiful architecture of the era and immensely impressive works of engineering – canals, railways, bridges. Painting and sculpture in all its manifold variety features; many of the country’s best collections of Victorian art are in the region. The historical, social and economic context is an important strand of the tour, with attention to the lives of some of the greatest Victorians. A subsidiary theme is the remarkable postindustrial regeneration of recent years. Athens, Florence, Manchester: there is no fourth. Another risible Victorian polemic? No. The essence of this proposition concerning the paramount importance of Manchester in the history of civilization remains valid. The impact of the industrial cities of Victorian Britain in shaping the modern world cannot be overestimated. But the era still needs rescuing from twentieth-century disdain. Ignorance and misunderstanding remain deep and widespread. The truth is that nineteenth-century Britain was one of the most dynamic and innovative societies in history, and that Victorian cities, as the principal material manifestation of that great age – and their post-industrial reincarnation – are among the most fascinating
features of the United Kingdom. In the earlier decades of the century Britain led the world in industrialisation and technology, dominated world trade and became the world’s wealthiest nation. It can also be claimed that Britain was a leader in the development of ideas, the extension of education, the practice of philanthropy and social amelioration and the advance (if haltingly) of political reform. Meanwhile the British Empire grew and grew, almost by accident, and became the most extensive the world has ever seen, and the best administered. London might have been the world’s biggest city and the seat of government of the Empire, but the crucible of progress did not lie beside the Thames. The great inventors were mainly from the north, railways were at first a northern phenomenon, and the north was the source of many of the great ideas of the age, free trade among them. The arts, too, particularly architecture, were less Londoncentric than they became subsequently; a very large proportion of the great buildings of Victorian England are in the northern counties. (Liverpool has more listed buildings than any city outside London.) For variety, vigour, muscularity, ambition, technological boldness, ingenuity, symbolism and, yes, beauty, Victorian architecture has few peers in all history. Much of the interest of this tour lies in the built environment: palatial town halls, Pirenesian warehouses, fabulously embellished churches, noble Philosophical Institutes, mansions for the rich and tenements for the poor. But of no less interest are the stunningly impressive engineering accomplishments – canals, railways, bridges – whether their aesthetic power arises from raw functionalism or historicist adornment. Victorian painting and sculpture is an
St George’s Hall, Liverpool.
important part of the tour; a good proportion of the country’s finest collections are in the North West. The best is world-class, the PreRaphaelites in particular, but irrespective of artistic merit the art is fascinating for what it reveals of Victorian attitudes and mores as well as for what it purports to depict. A week’s holiday in Manchester, Leeds and Liverpool is an unusual proposition, and this itinerary is probably unique. We might not have risked it a few years ago but recent regeneration has reversed decline and dramatically assisted the transformation to the post-industrial era. As a trio of cities to visit they should be considered to rank with, say, Bologna, Parma and Verona, or Augsburg, Nuremberg and Regensburg: there is as much of artistic and architectural interest to see, and arguably the historical significance is greater.
Itinerary Day 1: Manchester. Assemble at the Midland Hotel in Manchester and leave at 2.15pm for a walk to see many of the great Victorian buildings which still predominate in the city centre. A palatial manifestation of municipal pride, Alfred Waterhouse’s Town Hall (1867– 77) is one of the most splendid buildings of the era, an imaginative Gothic design with glorious interiors and murals by Ford Madox Brown. First of two nights in Manchester. Day 2: Manchester. The industrial landscape of Castlefield encompasses the world’s first passenger railway station (1830), the nodal point of England’s most important canal network and other monuments of the industrial revolution. The City Art Gallery has a superb collection of Victorian paintings, particularly Pre-Raphaelites. An afternoon by coach includes the soaring beauty of Bodley’s St Augustine at Pendlebury. Overnight Manchester.
Day 3: Manchester, Saltaire, Leeds. The John Rylands Library (Basil Champneys) is late Victorian architecture at its most refined. In 1853 Titus Salt consolidated his five cloth factories into one, added a model town and named it Saltaire. It survives intact, a monument to Victorian ameliorism and to 21stcentury regeneration. Arriving in Leeds, visit the stupendous Classical town hall (Cuthbert Broderick 1853) and dine in a restaurant under the great oval roof of the Corn Exchange (also Broderick), a masterpiece of Victorian commercial architecture. First of two nights in Leeds. Day 4: Leeds, Bradford. The industrial heritage of Leeds: a vast 1840s mill, an Egyptian-style mill and factory chimneys imitating mediaeval
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Italian towers. The retail and commercial district is the most extensive and unspoilt area of Victoriana in Britain, with dazzlingly elaborate arcades and endlessly inventive façades. An afternoon in Bradford (20 minutes by train), source in the 1850s of two-thirds of Britain’s woollen cloth. Retaining a mediaeval street pattern on a sloping site, the centre has a magnificent set of Gothic Revival buildings. Overnight Leeds. Day 5: Leeds, Liverpool. Among the sights today are the 1830s Parish Church, a key monument in the history of the Gothic Revival, an amazing Venetian Gothic warehouse disrupting the Georgian serenity of Park Square and the Municipal Buildings complex with the Art Gallery, Library and Tiled Hall. By coach from Leeds to Liverpool. First of three nights in Liverpool.
accommodation as described below; breakfasts and six dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admissions and donations for churches, museums and galleries; all tips for drivers and restaurant staff; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £270. Hotels. All are excellently located within walking distance of much that is seen on the tour and among the more comfortable hotels in each city. Manchester (2 nights): The Midland, a large elaborately adorned Victorian hotel, recent refurbishment blending something of its original character with modern comforts. Leeds (2 nights): Queen’s Hotel is a very comfortable 1930s establishment which has retained Art Deco interiors and offers excellent service. Liverpool (3 nights): in a salubrious
area between the cathedrals, the Hope Street Hotel brings good modern design and comforts into a 19th-century factory and adjacent 1960s police station. How strenuous? This tour would not be suitable for anyone who has difficulty with everyday walking and who cannot stand for long periods of time. Average distance by coach per day: 25 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Manchester Town Hall, etching by Thomas Riley 1895.
Day 6: Liverpool. The Albert Docks (1843) is one of the most impressive constructions of the century, ruggedly functional but perfectly proportioned. Time for exploration, lunch and a museum or two (Tate Liverpool is here). See other waterside buildings, including the enormous Tobacco Warehouse. To the salubrious suburb of Sefton Park and two fine late Victorian churches, St Agnes (JL Pearson 1883) and St Clare (Leonard Stokes 1899). Overnight Liverpool. Day 7: Liverpool. St George’s Hall is but the most magnificent of a group of buildings which is unequalled as a display of potential for variety of classical architecture. Another is the Walker Art Gallery with an outstanding collection of Victorian painting. Explore the architectural riches of the central business district including the former Bank of England (Cockerell 1845) and cast iron Oriel Chambers (1864). Finally Giles Gilbert Scott’s Anglican Cathedral, begun in 1904 so not quite Victorian but the superb, sublime culmination of the Gothic Revival. Overnight Liverpool. Day 8: Port Sunlight. Cross the River Mersey to Port Sunlight, the exceedingly pretty and superbly appointed township started in 1888 for workers at Lord Leverhulme’s adjacent soap factory. The Lady Lever Art Gallery is outstanding for English painting of the 18th and 19th centuries with masterpieces by Millais, Leighton, Burne Jones and others. Drive to Manchester, reaching Piccadilly Station by 3.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,850 (deposit £200). This includes: rail travel between Leeds and Bradford (return); coach transfers throughout the tour; Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
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Art & Industry Invention, manufacture and design in 18th-century England
The Iron Bridge at Coalbrookdale, etching & engraving c. 1800.
24–30 June 2013 (mz 618) 7 days • £1,670 Lecturers: Paul Atterbury with Dr Tristram Hunt mp A new tour for 2013. The 18th-century Industrial Revolution when Britain led the world in technology, invention, manufacture and commerce. Highly significant industrial archaeology. Fine and applied arts, created with the wealth generated by industrialisation or which was the outcome of new factory processes. Houses of both employers and employees. In a putative ‘Concise History of World Civilization’, Britain might garner a few mentions (Magna Carta, Parliamentary democracy) but would probably be awarded only one substantial passage. This would be an account of the Industrial Revolution of the eighteenth century. The modern world began in the English Midlands. It is difficult to overestimate the global
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impact of the technological developments which took place in this relatively out-of-theway region of Europe (there were few roads in pre-modern Shropshire and Staffordshire). Enabled by the abundance of accessible mineral resources, propelled by an Enlightenment spirit of enquiry and experiment and forged by the enterprise and ambition of a few exceptional individuals, Britain came to lead the world in manufacturing, commerce and science through to the middle of the nineteenth century. Places have been chosen to show most of the main constituents of the Industrial Revolution, water power and steam, coal and iron, textiles and pottery, the factory system and urbanisation, canals and roads (railways are reserved for a future tour!). Sights include the visible remains of early industrial enterprise of the highest importance. Art and architecture paid for by the proceeds of industrialisation, or which were the industrialised products themselves, and the houses of entrepreneurs and workers, constitute the other major strand. C.P. Snow’s ‘Two Cultures’ was a feature of Britain’s later decline; ‘art’ and ‘industry’, were not recognised as distinct and antagonistic categories in the
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eighteenth century. The subsequent two centuries are not ignored. Indeed, much of the industrial archaeology and the art we see takes us well into the later twentieth century. Indeed, in the Potteries the tour may be joined by historian Dr Tristram Hunt, who happens to be the local Member of Parliament (subject to confirmation). The tour concentrates on five centres. Two are the upper reaches of fast-moving rivers, the Seven in Shropshire, now dubbed Ironbridge Gorge, and the Derwent in Derbyshire. (Both, incidentally, are now tranquil and fairly rural, the Derwent Valley in particular being a place of outstanding beauty.) The six towns of the Potteries in Staffordshire were a unique concentration of the pottery industry – as indeed they still are; the fourth is the group of towns in the West Midlands know as Black Country, and the fifth is Birmingham, ‘workshop of the world’.
Itinerary Day 1: Birmingham. The coach leaves from New Street Railway Station at 11.45am and b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
there follows a walk around a nexus of canals – Birmingham famously has more canals than Venice. Soho House, recently restored, was the home of Matthew Boulton and a meeting place of the Lunar Society, a group of progressive thinkers, scientists and manufacturers who played key roles in the Industrial Revolution. Continue to Telford for the first of three nights there. Day 2: Ironbridge Gorge. This short stretch of the upper River Severn (a unesco Heritage Site) was at the end of the 18th cent. the most heavily industrialised location in the world. The blast furnace at Coalbrookdale where Abraham Darby I in 1709 achieved the smelting of iron with coke, and thus ushered in the modern world, survives as part of a fascinating Museum of Iron. Abraham Darby III was largely responsible for the Iron Bridge of 1779, an epoch-making structure of powerful beauty as well as an icon of the Industrial Revolution. Two mansions lived in by the Darby family overlooking the works retain original furnishings. Overnight Telford. Day 3: Dudley, Wightwick. The Black Country is contender for the title ‘birthplace of industry’, named after the smoke from the unequalled density of mines, workshops and factories. An outstanding museum shows historic industrial installations, including a replica of a Newcomen steam engine of c. 1717, many in working order, and rescued houses, shops and other buildings, furnished as a hundred years ago. Wightwick Manor was built at the end of the 19th century by a factory owner, a veritable shrine to the the Pre-Raphaelites and the Arts and Crafts movement. Overnight Telford. Day 4: Barlaston, Stoke-on-Trent. Josiah Wedgwood was a genius of the Industrial Revolution, dedicated equally to improvements in design and technology, to natural philosophy and commerce, to social amelioration and progressive politics. The award-winning Wedgwood Museum, one of the finest ceramics museums in the world, well documents the development of an iconic English brand. Currently there is the threat of closure and dispersal; in that event, the recently re-opened Spode museum would be substituted. In the afternoon there is a special tour of Stoke-onTrent which, subject to his availability, will be with Tristram Hunt MP. Stoke remains the world’s foremost pottery city despite the loss of much mainstream production. First of three nights in Stoke. Day 5: Stoke-on-Trent. The Gladstone Pottery Museum is the only complete Victorian pottery factory: original workshops, bottle ovens, historic products. Emma Bridgewater is an inspiring example of success for a new company Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
in an old industry. The factory tour shows traditional crafts in the service of modern designs. The Potteries Museum & Art Gallery in Hanley excellently displays Staffordshire wares and other ceramics, another outstanding museum. Overnight Stoke. Day 6: Derwent Valley, Derby, Cheadle. A stretch of the River Derwent in Derbyshire is birthplace of the modern textile industry (and another unesco Heritage Site). The world’s first water-powered cotton spinning mill, built by Richard Arkwright in 1771, survives at Cromford, and his 1783 Masson Mills are equipped with 19th-cent. machinery. The Derby Museum and Art Gallery displays many paintings by Joseph Wright, one of Britain’s finest 18th-cent. painters, who excelled at innovatory scenes of industry and scientific experiment and portraits of industrialists. The Church of St Giles at Cheadle, 1841–7, A.W. Pugin’s masterpiece, has been called ‘the outstanding English church of the 19th century’. Overnight Stoke. Day 7: Birmingham. Established in Birmingham’s Jewellery Quarter in 1881, JW Evans is an exceptional survival of a historic factory where little has changed for a century. At the Museum & Art Gallery the new Birmingham History Galleries are due to open in 2012, and the largest public collection
of Pre-Raphaelite paintings in the world are among the exhibits. There is a walk to see some of the great architecture from Birmingham’s heyday before finishing at New Street Station by 3.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,670 (deposit £200). This includes: hotel accommodation; private coach travel; breakfasts, 3 lunches, 5 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; services of the lecturer. Single supplement £120. Hotels. Telford (3 nights): The Telford Golf and Spa Hotel (QHotels) is a modern hotel in a quiet location on the edge of town. Swimming pool, fitness centre, spa. Stoke-on-Trent (3 nights): though incorporating the shell Etruria Hall, Josiah Wedgwood’s home, this is also a new hotel, adequately comfortable, lively. Of both it can be said that the rooms are comfortable, the restaurants not bad and the service willing and that they are the best in their localities. How strenuous? Some walking is unavoidable on this tour, which would not be suitable for anyone who has any difficulty with everyday walking and stair-climbing. Average distance by coach per day: 40 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
Wood engraving from The English Illustrated Magazine, 1884.
Tours to Scotland and Wales can be found on pages 162–167 and 204–205 respectively.
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Great Houses of the South West Wiltshire, Gloucestershire, Somerset, Dorset, Devon most sumptuous English interior of the Stuart period. Also of the 17th century, Kingston Lacy is noted for its lavish interiors and outstanding art collection of Spanish, Italian and Flemish Old Masters. Both houses have important gardens and parkland. Overnight Bishopstrow. Day 3: Longleat, Corsham. Longleat was one of the largest and architecturally most progressive of Elizabethan houses, and is set in a ‘Capability’ Brown park. Corsham (Wiltshire) is an Elizabethan mansion enlarged in the 18th century and again in the 19th to display a collection of Old Master paintings, still in situ. Overnight Bishopstrow.
Longleat, engraving from Historic Houses of the United Kingdom 1892.
3–10 September 2013 (ma 671) 8 days • £2,920 Lecturer: Anthony Lambert Great country houses, historic gardens and parks in Wiltshire, Gloucestershire, Somerset, Dorset and Devon. Major examples of a huge range of styles from the twelfth century to the twentieth. Many houses contain outstanding picture collections and exceptional furniture. Special arrangements and out-of-hours visits. Hotels in former country houses. The landscapes seen on this tour are immensely varied and endlessly alluring – the noble chalk downs of Wiltshire, the evocative Levels of Somerset, the enchanting patchwork fields of Devon, the verdant hidden valleys of Exmoor, the little hills of Dorset. The houses seen are equally varied. Lacock and Longleat and Montacute are among the finest of Henrician and Elizabethan mansions in England. The Stuart era is superbly represented by the incomparable Wilton House, star of the first phase of Palladian classicism in England, and by the Dutch classicism of Dyrham, while the eighteenth century is wonderfully exemplified at Stourhead and by the delicious Adam interiors at Saltram. Victoria’s reign has magnificent ambassadors in Highclere and Tyntesfield, and the Edwardian continuation is beautifully if eccentrically demonstrated at Castle Drogo. Real castles are represented by the extraordinary Berkeley, still
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a family home, and, if now more picturesque than defensive, at Dunster. A first-rate country house is more than a house. Clustering around are gardens, auxiliary buildings and a park – at Stourhead, perhaps the most influential one in the world – and beyond lie working farms and enterprises of all sorts. And of course inside the house there are furnishings and works of art and gadgets and utensils and curios: in many of the houses on this tour these moveables are of a quality and a quantity which surpass the collections of all but a couple of dozen of Britain’s museums. Corsham and Kingston Lacy in particular are renowned for their picture collections. Word must be added about the hotels on this tour, all three of which are excellent, and two of which are former country houses.
Itinerary Day 1: Highclere. Leave London at 11.00am and drive (1h 40m) to Hampshire, arriving at Highclere in time for lunch. Begun in 1838 by Charles Barry (architect of the Houses of Parliament) for the Earl of Carnarvon, it is one of the grandest and most opulent houses of the age. (Now known to millions as Downton Abbey.) The Egyptian antiquities here are of international importance. Spend the first of four nights in a country house hotel in the village of Bishopstrow, Wiltshire. Day 2: Wilton, Kingston Lacy. Inigo Jones contributed to the design of Wilton House, the outstanding achievement of the first phase of Palladianism in England. The double-cube room, with paintings by Van Dyck, is the
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Day 4: Stourhead, Montacute. Though built in two phases, 1720s and 1790s, Stourhead is the perfect classical villa. The landscaped park of the 1740s is the most important of its kind, with a lake, temples, careful planting and contrived, if seemingly natural, vistas. Montacute is a magnificent Elizabethan house with the longest long gallery in England. An outstation of the National Portrait Gallery, it is hung with 16th- and 17th-century pictures. Garden layout and architecture survive. First of two nights in Taunton. Day 5: Saltram, Castle Drogo. Drive across Devon to Saltram, a largely 18th-century house with lavish Robert Adam interiors and fine pictures and furnishings. There are dramatic views of the Plym Estuary. A rugged Dartmoor setting overlooking the Teign Gorge matches Sir Edwin Lutyens’s imaginative exercise in mediaevalism at Castle Drogo, though inside there are all the latest in early 20thcentury comforts. Fine Arts & Crafts garden. Overnight Taunton. Day 6: Dunster, Tyntesfield. Drive between the Quantocks and Exmoor to the famously picturesque village of Dunster. Atop a wooded hillock, the castle of Norman origin long ago domesticated its defensive features, notably in the Carolean age. The great Gothic Revival mansion of Tyntesfield has hardly changed since the nineteenth century, caught in a time warp and stuffed with the authentic bric-abrac of a Victorian country house. First of two nights in a country house hotel in Colerne, Wiltshire.
Day 7: Berkeley, Lacock. The keep of Berkeley Castle dates to 1117, the bulk of the rest to 1340–61. Little has been altered since, and yet it is still the private home of its builders, a family that served Edward the Confessor. The contents – tapestries, paintings, furniture – are magnificent. In one of the loveliest villages in England, Lacock Abbey retains a cloister from the nunnery dissolved by Henry VIII and given to a courtier. There are Georgian modifications b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Great Houses of the North Derbyshire, Yorkshire, Durham, Northumberland and being the home of William Fox Talbot, a window which was the subject of the first ever photograph. Overnight Colerne. Day 8: Dyrham. Transformed from a Tudor mansion at the end of the 17th century, Dyrham Park externally is mild Baroque in golden Bath stone, and inside exquisitely Anglo-Dutch with pictures and furnishings to match. It has scarcely changed since. Return to central London c. 4.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,920 (deposit £250). This includes: accommodation as described below; breakfasts and five dinners (with wine, water and coffee); transport by luxury private coach; admission to all the houses and gardens; tips for waiters, drivers and guides; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement £320. Hotels. Bishopstrow House (3 nights): the house dates from the early 19th century and has been a hotel for 35 years. Public rooms maintain a country house décor, whilst bedrooms have been recently refurbished to a more modern style and have all mod cons. The Castle Hotel, Taunton (2 nights): an awardwinning family-run hotel, pleasingly decorated and with excellent service. Lucknam Park Hotel, Colerne, Wiltshire (2 nights): this 5 star hotel is a fine example of a country house hotel, set in 500 acres of parkland and with a Michelin-starred restaurant. Bedrooms have a traditional décor with a safe, hairdrier, and teaand coffee-making facilities. There is an indoor and outdoor swimming pool. How strenuous? Unavoidably, there is quite a lot of walking on this tour and it would not be suitable for anyone who has difficulties with everyday walking and stair-climbing. Coaches can rarely park near the houses, many of the parks and gardens are extensive, the houses visited don’t have lifts (nor do all the hotels). Average distance by coach per day: c. 95 miles. Memberships: National Trust members (with cards) will be refunded c. £80. Current annual membership is £53 or £88.50 for a couple. Small group: the tour operates with between 12 and 22 participants.
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The Gallery, Hardwick Hall, wood engraving from The Magazine of Art, 1887.
13–22 May 2013 (mz 566) 10 days • £3,160 Lecturer: Gail Bent The finest country houses and gardens in northern England, from mediaeval to Victorian, with an emphasis on the eighteenth century. Unhurried: there is plenty of time to rest, relax and absorb. Only two hotel changes. Some of the most glorious countryside in England, plus a few items other than houses. Excellent hotels and good food. The country house is Britain’s most distinctive contribution to the world’s cultural heritage. Other countries have them of course, but none in such profusion, such variety, and in such a state of completion and preservation. Cutting a swathe through the northern half of England, from Derbyshire to Northumberland, this tour includes a remarkable number of the greatest and grandest. One feature of the English country house is that it usually resides in the country; on the Continent the town often presses around the forecourt. And the countryside in England is among the loveliest in the world, and the most varied; on this tour you pass by gently rolling farmland with green fields, ancient hedges, majestic trees and contented livestock, and by the rugged beauty of upland moors.
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All aspects of the country house are studied – architecture, furniture, decoration, works of art; gardens and parks; historical context and daily life; conservation and custodianship. Many of the houses have marvellous gardens. The leisurely pace is a distinctive feature, with an average of fewer than two houses per day and the inclusion of a few items other than country houses. Time is allowed for relaxing and reflecting and exploring on one’s own. Special arrangements comprise another significant feature with many out-of-hours openings and access to parts not normally seen by visitors.
Itinerary Day 1: Kedleston (Derbys). The coach leaves Derby railway station at 1.45pm. One of the supreme monuments of Classical architecture and decoration in England, recreating the glories of Ancient Rome in the foothills of the Peak District, Kedleston Hall (1759–65) was the creation of Sir Nathaniel Curzon and, initially, three architects, of whom Robert Adam emerged the victor. The sequence of grand rooms for entertainment and show are homogeneous and complete (with furnishings designed by Adam), an impeccable manifestation of aristocratic wealth, education and taste. Spend the first of three nights near Chatsworth.
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Great Houses of the North continued
acres of fine gardens. A free afternoon in York. Overnight York. Day 6: Burton Agnes (E Yorks), Castle Howard (N Yorks). Burton Agnes Hall is a final flourish of the Elizabethan age, red brick and cream stone, topiary, marvellous carving and plasterwork, Impressionist and modern paintings: ‘the perfect English house’. Designed by John Vanbrugh in 1699, Castle Howard is one of the few major Baroque buildings in England and the most palatial house on the tour. Excellent works of art and park with famous temples and follies. Private dinner at Fairfax House in York, a Georgian town house. Overnight York.
Castle Howard, the temple, engraving from Historic Houses of the United Kingdom, 1892.
Day 2: Chatsworth, Haddon (Derbys). The home of the Duke of Devonshire, Chatsworth House was rebuilt in the 1690s with the scale and sumptuousness of a palace and further augmented in the 1820s. The steady acquisition of fine furniture, sculpture and pictures created one of the finest private art collections in the world. ‘The most perfect English house to survive from the Middle Ages’, Haddon Hall evolved from c. 1370 to the 17th century after which nearly 300 years of disuse preserved it from alteration. The gardens are exceptionally lovely. Overnight near Chatsworth. Day 3: Hardwick, Bolsover (Derbys). Hardwick Hall (1590) is the finest of all Elizabethan great houses, a highpoint of the English Renaissance, the façade famously more glass than stone. The unaltered interiors are decorated with stucco reliefs and filled with contemporary textiles and furniture. Bolsover Castle is an elaborate Jacobean folly, a splendid late-Renaissance sequence of rooms in mediaeval fancy dress. Overnight near Chatsworth. Day 4: Harewood (W Yorks). Harewood House is one of the grandest and most beautiful of English country houses, architecture by John Carr (1772) and Charles Barry (1843), interiors by Adam, furniture by Chippendale and park by ‘Capability’ Brown. There are excellent paintings, Italian Renaissance to modern. First of three nights in York. Day 5: Newby, York (N Yorks). A Williamand-Mary house (1693), Newby Hall was subject for the next two centuries to refurbishment and extension of the highest quality, one set of rooms (by Adam) designed to house a collection of Roman sculpture. 25
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Day 7: Raby, Auckland (Co. Durham). Within the formidable 14th-century fortifications of Raby Castle are suites of rooms of the 18th and 19th centuries. There are good paintings, furniture and Meissen animals and a deer park. Excellent art collections in a vast building in the guise of a French château make the Bowes Museum one of the surprises of the north. Grandest of English episcopal palaces, Auckland Castle was refitted in Neo-Gothic style and contains 12 superb paintings by Zurbarán. First of three nights in Newcastle. Day 8: Belsay, Wallington (Nthumb). After Sir Charles Monck’s return from Greece in 1805 he built Belsay Hall in a severely Grecian style. Delightful woodland gardens lead to a mediaeval castle. Wallington Hall dates to 1688 but was refurbished in the mid-18th and mid-19th centuries, the latter resulting in an arcaded two-storey hall with scenes of Northumbrian history painted by William Bell Scott. Overnight Newcastle. Day 9: Seaton Delaval, Cragside (Nthumb). On a cliff-top site outside Newcastle, Seaton Delaval was the last of Vanbrugh’s magnificent mansions. Innovatory management has followed its acquisition by the National Trust in 2009. A wonderful sequence of lateVictorian taste and technology, Cragside is a romantic Tudor-style pile (1869–84) designed by Norman Shaw for William Armstrong, inventor and manufacturer. Overnight Newcastle. Day 10: Alnwick (Nthumb), Newcastle. Since 1309 the seat of the Percys, Dukes of Northumberland, Alnwick Castle externally remains a striking mediaeval fortress while the interiors are a lavish exercise in Victorian mediaevalism. There is a superb painting collection and a new 12-acre garden. The coach takes you to Newcastle railway station by 3.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £3,160 (deposit £300). This includes: hotel accommodation as described below; private coach throughout; breakfasts and 7 dinners with wine, water, coffee; admission to houses, gardens and sites; all tips for waiters, drivers, guides; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement £320. Hotels: near Chatsworth (3 nights): Located on the Chatsworth Estate, the Cavendish Hotel has been an inn for centuries. All bedrooms have good views and elegant décor with original artwork. In York (3 nights): The Grange, ten minutes on foot from the Minster, has been beautifully converted from a Georgian town house and the decoration and furnishings combine period and modern; very good restaurant; no lift. In Newcastle (3 nights): Jesmond Dene House, a 19th-century mansion in a quiet wooded suburb which opened as a hotel in 2007. Stylishly decorated, very comfortable, exceptional service, good amenities, garden, excellent restaurant. How strenuous? Unavoidably there is quite a lot of walking on this tour and it would not be suitable for anyone with difficulties with everyday walking and stair-climbing. Coaches can rarely park near the houses, many of the parks and gardens are extensive, the houses visited don’t have lifts (nor do all the hotels). Average distance by coach per day: c. 60 miles. Memberships. National Trust: members (with cards) will be refunded c. £40. Current annual membership is £53 or £88.50 for a couple. English Heritage: members (with cards) will be refunded c. £15. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
Weston Park A country house weekend October 2013 Details available October 2012 Contact us to register your interest
Tours to Scotland and Wales can be found on pages 162–167 and 204–205 respectively.
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The Cotswolds Walking through some of the best of English countryside 9–16 September 2013 (ma 694) 8 days • £2,420 Lecturer: Dr Steven Blake Nine walks through some of the loveliest countryside in the world with stops to enjoy buildings and landscape features. A carefully selected itinerary which favours the lesser-visited and less accessible places over some of the more touristy ones. Several outstanding gardens are a feature, as are manor houses and a handful of the finest parish churches in the country.
Itinerary Day 1: Coln Valley. The tour starts at Cheltenham Spa railway station at 2.00pm. Leaving luggage on the coach, walk for five miles following the path of the River Coln, past the picturesque villages of Coln St Dennis, Coln Rogers and Winson. Approach Bibury and the hotel on foot, passing Arlington Row, the renowned terrace of cottages that led William Morris to refer to Bibury as the most beautiful village in England. Day 2: north Cotswolds. A morning visit to the 4,000-year-old Neolithic burial chamber
houses. Walk from Stanway to Stanton (2 miles) and have lunch at a local pub. Drive to Sezincote, built in the Mogul style of Rajasthan and the inspiration for the Brighton Pavilion. Day 5: southern Cotswolds. Rodmarton Manor is a supreme example of the Arts and Crafts tradition, having been built and furnished entirely by local craftsmen. Drive to Westonbirt Arboretum, a feast for the eyes regardless of season, whether the wildflowers in early summer or the natural fireworks of autumn. There follows a special visit to the gardens at Highgrove, the country house of the Prince of Wales – to be confirmed.
One hotel throughout, a 16th-century country house. The Cotswolds famously encompasses some of the loveliest countryside in England. Loveliness belongs not only to the countryside but also to the buildings that go with it – viscerally pretty villages, farmsteads, manor houses and market towns. An essential ingredient of the winning formula is the building stone, seemingly 80% honey and 20% lichen, extruded from the hills on which they stand and sculpted by generations of masons who honed their craft with instinctive good taste. The vernacular is timeless and utterly beguiling, though it incorporates some of the grandest and proudest town houses in England. Some could almost have been designed by Andrea Palladio himself – and some practically were, the designs transmitted to Gloucestershire artisans through the innumerable copycat pattern books which buoyed up English provincial building for a couple of centuries. Parish churches are a particular glory of the Cotswolds. Mostly mediaeval, they range from the diminutive, artless and additive – often blessedly under-restored and un-modernised – to the great churches in the larger villages and towns with soaring arcades, acres of glass, elaborately sculptured tombs and towers and spires to rival any in the country. Where did the money come from? Wool. Prized as the best in Europe by the Merchant of Prato in the fourteenth century, wool and cloth manufacturing was the basis for solid prosperity from the Middle Ages to the Industrial Revolution – when the water power of the hills and valleys pushed the region to the forefront before the advent of steam power knocked it back again. Thus the Cotswolds slumbered, ripe for discovery as a rural idyll by the bicyclemounted aesthetes and romantics of the late Victorian era.
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Fairford, St Mary’s, wood engraving 1896 after a drawing by W.H.J. Boot.
of Belas Knap, the finest long barrow in Gloucestershire, followed by a walk along the Cotswold Way (2 miles) to Sudeley Castle, famous for its honeyed stone and magnificent gardens. After a break for lunch there is another walk (3 miles), through the attractive town of Winchcombe to Hailes, to visit the ruins of a 13th-century Cistercian abbey and a Romanesque church with wall paintings. Day 3: the Eastleaches, Fairford. Visit the churches of Eastleach Martin, Eastleach Turville and Southrop on foot (2 miles). The magnificent Perpendicular St Mary at Fairford is Britain’s only parish church with a complete set of mediaeval stained glass windows, and of the highest quality too. In the afternoon, walk in Lodge Park, a Cotswold estate containing a rare 17th-century grandstand surrounded by water meadows. Day 4: Stanway and Sezincote. Visit Stanway House, one of the Cotswolds’ loveliest manor
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Day 6: central Cotswolds. Beginning and ending in Sapperton, walk (5 miles) through undulating woodland and pasture, with periodic open vistas. Pass a number of buildings in the Arts and Crafts style. Cirencester is a flourishing market town with modern metropolitan businesses amidst streets with many 17th- and 18th-century delights. The soaring magnificence of St John the Baptist is of cathedral-like proportions. Return for a while to Bibury before driving to Quenington for a late afternoon exploration of the village, followed by dinner at a private manor house. Day 7: Chipping Campden. Walk to Chipping Campden from Dover’s Hill (1 mile), enjoying spectacular views over the escarpment. Possibly the most beautiful of all Cotswold towns, it is a gilded masterpiece of limestone and craftsmanship and home to one of the very finest wool churches in the area. Walk (4 miles) to the gardens at Kiftsgate and on to Hidcote
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The Cotswolds continued
The Schubert Ensemble A weekend of chamber music at The Castle Hotel
Manor Gardens, one of the most inventive and influential gardens of the 20th century. Day 8: Painswick. Visit the unfinished Victorian Woodchester Mansion and then Painswick for lunch at a restaurant. The flamboyant Painswick Rococo Garden is the only compete survivor from the brief 18thcentury period of English Rococo Garden design. The coach returns to Cheltenham Spa railway station by 4.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,420 (deposit £250). This includes: accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 2 lunches and 5 dinners with wine, water and coffee; private coach throughout; admissions; all tips; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £330. Hotel: Bibury Court Hotel is a Grade I listed 16th-century country house. The rooms vary in size, and the décor of the whole hotel has been recently refurbished. The service is friendly, and prides itself on quirky, individual touches.
23–25 November 2012 (mz 433) 2 nights • 4 concerts Price: £690 (Garden Room £820) Contact us if you would like to see fuller details or visit www.martinrandall.com The Programme Friday 23rd November, 5.45pm Vaughan Williams, Piano Quintet Schubert, ‘Trout’ Quintet Saturday 24th November, 10.30am Schumann, Piano Quartet in E flat, Op.47 Fauré, Piano Quartet No.2 in G minor, Op.45 Saturday 24th November, 5.45pm Enescu, Piano Quintet in A minor, Op.29 Schumann, Piano Quintet in E flat, Op.44 Sunday 25th November, 10.30am Mahler, Piano Quartet Movement Mendelssohn, Piano Quartet in F minor, Op.2 Elgar, Piano Quintet in A minor, Op.84
Practicalities Prices (all are per person): £690 or £820 in a Garden Room. Deposit £100. The price includes: admission to all four concerts; two nights’ accommodation at The Castle Hotel; two breakfasts, two afternoon teas and two dinners (with wine, water and coffee); all interval drinks; all gratuities for hotel staff. There is no single supplement although some double rooms may be released at a later stage for single use at a supplement of £50. Hotel: The Castle Hotel in Taunton is one of the loveliest hotels in England, renowned for its excellent and caring service, for comforts traditional and modern and for its kitchen. It has been owned and run by the Chapman family for sixty years. Music weekends have been held here since 1977, and Martin Randall Music Management took over the running of them in 2003. Concerts are held in the air-conditioned Music Room, which, the size of a large drawing room, facilitates musical experiences of exceptional intimacy and power.
How strenuous? This tour should only be considered by those who are used to regular country walking, with some uphill content. The paths are usually on grassy tracks or through woodland, combined with some paved road. Climbing and crossing stiles are a regular feature on these paths. Strong knees are essential, as are a pair of well-worn hiking boots with good ankle support. There are nine walks of between 1 and 6 miles. Average distance by coach per day: 42 miles.
‘Le Concert’, lithograph by Louis-Léopold Boilly (1761–1845)
Membership. National Trust: members (with cards) will be refunded c. £15. Current annual membership (2012) is £53 or £88.50 for a couple. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
Walking & Literature in the Lakes June 2013 Details available October 2012 Contact us to register your interest The Narrow Sea, 26 June–7 July 2013, see pages 45–46.
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English Music in Yorkshire Bedrooms are individually and charmingly decorated and well equipped. The majority have a bath with a shower above. Most are a good size, and the largest, with a sitting area and separate dressing room, overlook the garden in the remains of the twelfth-century castle. Single rooms – for which there is no supplement – are fairly small and have a single bed. Tickets to individual concerts: £20. Please contact the Castle Hotel if you wish to purchase these. Telephone: 01823 272 671.
Music Weekends & Symposia Forthcoming 2012–2013 season Details available summer 2012 Contact us to register your interest Travel Writers at the Castle 16–18 November 2012 The Castle Hotel, Taunton So far confirmed: Benedict Allen, William Dalrymple, John Gimlette, Robin Hanbury-Tenison, Justin Marozzi, Iain Sinclair & Sara Wheeler The Endellion String Quartet Beethoven & Britten 18–20 January 2013 The Castle Hotel, Taunton Politics & Politicians 8–10 February 2013 The Castle Hotel, Taunton The Wihan Quartet Mozart, Schubert & Dvořák 22–24 February 2013 The Castle Hotel, Taunton A Schubertiade in Newcastle His Last Works (1826–28) 15–17 March 2013 Jesmond Dene House, Newcastle Performances by: Stephan Loges, Steven Osborne, Martin Roscoe, Roger Vignoles & Elizabeth Watts. The Aronowitz Ensemble 26–28 April 2013 The Castle Hotel, Taunton Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
22–27 September 2013 Details available November 2012 Contact us to register your interest
Distant view of York, engraving from Cathedrals, Abbeys & Churches of England & Wales Vol.I, 1896.
London Days Several dates through the year Contact us to register your interest Non-residential, day-long events to inform and inspire. Concentrating on particular themes, predominantly art, architecture and history. Some Days involve long walks. Details of London Days are released intermitantly, as they are launched. Sample days in 2012: The Complete London Hogarth All the paintings. 13 July 2012 and 26 October 2012. Lecturer: Lars Tharp. Across London on Foot From Hyde Park Corner to Tower Hill exclusively through parks, alleys and backstreets. 5 October 2012. ‘The Gods’, engraving from Highways & Byways in London, 1903.
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The Baltic States Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania 6–18 May 2013 (mz 560) 13 days • £3,220 Lecturer: Neil Taylor Three former Soviet countries with distinctive identities, diverse histories and bright futures. Charming, well-preserved towns, an unspoilt landscape and a rich architectural heritage from Gothic to Art Nouveau. An extensive legacy from German, Polish, Russian and Swedish occupations. A tour focussed on history, politics and culture. Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania: the regaining of independence in 1991 by these three states was a happy outcome of the demise of the Soviet Union. Of all the fragments of that former super-power, the Baltic States are perhaps the countries with the brightest future and the least clouded present. Though geographical proximity leads the countries to be conventionally thought
Estonia
of together as a single entity, the degree of difference between them is surprisingly great in terms of ethnicity, language, historical development and religion. The Estonians are of Finno-Ugric origin and their language has nothing in common with their Latvian or Russian neighbours. Lithuanian history has for much of the postmediaeval era been linked with Catholic Poland, whereas Estonia and Latvia were early recipients of Protestantism. In the eighteenth century these states succumbed to the bear-hug of the Russian Empire – and only after the First World War did they achieve full independence. In 1940, with the annexation by the Soviet Union, they once more fell under Russian rule. Between 1941 and 1944 they had the additional suffering of the German Occupation. Yet the Baltic States were always among the most prosperous and liberal of the Soviet republics, and among the most independent-minded. Surprise ranks high among the responses of the visitor now – surprise that there is so
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much of interest and beauty, and surprise that the Iron Curtain was indeed so opaque a veil that most of us in the West could remain so ignorant of these countries and their heritage. Surprise, perhaps, that on the whole the region functions with considerable efficiency and sophistication.
Itinerary Day 1: Tallinn (Estonia). Fly at c. 1.30pm from Gatwick to Tallinn. First of three nights in Tallinn. Day 2: Tallinn. The upper town has a striking situation on a steep-sided hill overlooking the Baltic with views over the city. Among the mediaeval and classical buildings are the Toompea Palace (Parliament), Gothic cathedral and late 19th-century Russian cathedral and the 15th-century town hall (visit subject to confirmation). Continue through the unspoilt streets of the lower town with its mediaeval walls, churches and gabled merchants’ houses
b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
and see the church of the Holy Ghost and the City Museum. Visit St Nicholas, a Gothic basilica with a museum of mediaeval art. Overnight Tallinn. Day 3: Lahemaa National Park (Estonia). Drive east into an area now designated as a national park. The charming manor houses of Palmse and Sagadi have full 18th-century classical dress disguising the timber structure. Lunch is in a roadside inn, with wooden buildings – a former postal service station on the road to St Petersburg. Overnight Tallinn. Day 4: Tartu (Estonia). Drive through a gently undulating mix of woodland and fertile fields, with traditional vernacular farmsteads. Tartu is in some ways the cultural capital of Estonia, the university having been founded in 1632. There are fine 18th- and 19th-century buildings, especially the town hall and university and there is a visit to the restored Jaani church. Overnight Tartu.
Day 5: Cesis (Latvia). Enter Latvia travelling through hilly landscape renowned for its beauty. Cesis is an historic and well-preserved small town with church and ruined castle. Its manor house Ungurmuiza (about 10 miles out of town) is constructed in wood with a baroque façade and interior. The drive continues via Straupe, another attractive village. First of three nights in Riga. Day 6: Riga (Latvia). Explore Latvia’s capital on foot. The Art Nouveau district is a residential quarter of grand boulevards, with classical, historicist and outstanding façades. Within the extensive Old Town there are mediaeval streets, Hanseatic warehouses, Gothic and Baroque churches and 19thcentury civic buildings. There are visits to the Menzendorff House, a restored merchant’s house and now a museum, Gothic St Peter with its distinctive tall spire and the cathedral, which is the largest mediaeval church in the Baltic States. Overnight Riga.
Tallinn, the Upper Town, lithograph c. 1840.
Day 7: Riga. A drive via the market, formerly Europe’s largest, situated in five 1920s Zeppelin hangars, followed by a visit to the fascinating outdoor museum of vernacular buildings. Free afternoon when possibilities include the National Art Museum, Occupation Museumor the Jewish Museum. Overnight Riga. Day 8: Rundale (Latvia), Siauliai, Kaunas (Lithuania). Rundale was one of the most splendid palaces in the Russian Empire, built from 1736 by Rastrelli for a favourite of Empress Anna. Lunch is in the palace restaurant. Lithuania is entered via the town of Bauska and there is a stop in Kedainiai to visit the regional museum. First of two nights in Kaunas. Day 9: Kaunas (Lithuania). A diverse historic town with a wealth of architecture. Near the central square are a number of churches and the Town Museum. The Ciurlionis Art Museum has works of Lithuania’s most famous composer and artist. Other afternoon visits include the Resurrection Church and the Synagogue. Overnight Kaunas. Day 10: Pazaislis, Vilnius (Lithuania). At Pazaislis is a magnificent Baroque nunnery and pilgrimage church, one of the architectural gems of Eastern Europe. Continue to Vilnius which, far from the sea, has the feel of a Central European metropolis, with Baroque the predominant style. Afternoon walk to the bishop’s palace (now the Presidential Palace), the university, and the Church of St John. First of three nights in Vilnius. Day 11: Vilnius. Walk to the Gates of Dawn, the Carmelite church of St Theresa, the former
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Jewish ghetto, the cathedral and the exquisite little Late-Gothic church of St Anne. Visit the church of Saints Peter and Paul with outstanding stucco sculptural decoration and see the Museum of Applied Arts. The recently opened National Gallery houses 20th and 21stcentury Lithuanian art. Overnight Vilnius. Day 12: Vilnius. Kazys Varnelis House Museum is an eclectic private collection of art and maps. Visit the Church Heritage Museum. Free afternoon when suggestions include the Genocide Museum, Vilnius Picture Gallery or the Theatre and Music Museum. Overnight Vilnius. Day 13: Vilnius. Fly from Vilnius to London Gatwick, via Riga, arriving c. 12.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £3,220 (deposit £300). This includes: air travel (economy class) on Air Baltic and Estonian Air flights (Boeing 737); travel by private coach throughout; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 3 lunches and 9 dinners (including one light one) with wine, water and coffee; all admission to museums, sites, and donations to churches; tips for restaurant staff, drivers, guides; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer and local guides. Single supplement £390. Price without flights £2,980. Hotels: in Tallinn (3 nights): a small stylish hotel in a turn-of-the-century building. In Tartu (1 night): modern, centrally located with a good restaurant; decor is quite bright. In Riga (3 nights): a modern well-located hotel with views over the park (but expect some street noise). In Kaunas (2 nights): newly-opened in a 19th-century mansion with modern features. In Vilnius (3 nights): an elegant and comfortable hotel in an excellent location. All hotels have a local 4-star rating with acceptable levels of comfort, good service and a central location. Showers are more common than baths. How strenuous? This is a long tour with four hotel changes and some long coach journeys. There is a lot of walking, some of it on cobbled or roughly paved ground. Average distance by coach per day: 56 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206.
Estonia
Ethiopia Tracing one of Africa’s most fascinating histories Yeha, the first Christian capital at Aksum, the complexes of rock-hewn churches at Lalibela and their less well-known counterparts in eastern Tigray. Here three days are spent exploring these remarkable places of worship. The lonely monasteries on the islands of Lake Tana and the imperial capital at Gondar, visited by James Bruce in the eighteenth century, are also included. The result is a journey which balances comprehensiveness with selectivity, which sees nearly all the outstanding buildings and artworks without cramming the days to excess. The modern bustle of the multicultural capital Addis Ababa is also sampled while – and this can scarcely be overstated – providing a sequence of some of the grandest landscapes in the world.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 9.00pm from London Heathrow for the 7-hour flight to Addis Ababa (currently the only direct flight from London).
Adua, wood engraving c. 1875.
27 February–14 March 2013 (mz 473) £4,850 • 16 days Lecturer: Professor David Phillipson 9–24 October 2013 (ma 746) £4,850 • 16 days Lecturer: Professor David Phillipson A new tour for 2013, journeying through the most striking landscapes Africa has to offer. Three days exploring the remote and littlevisited rock-hewn churches of East Tigray, the country’s best kept secret. Lalibela: Jerusalem in Ethiopia, one of the wonders of Africa. We spend three nights here. A full day on the beautiful and eerie Lake Tana, with visits to secluded monasteries. Led by an archaeologist with over 40 years experience working in East Africa. A more relaxed pace than is the norm for Ethiopian tours, and maximum 18 participants. Ethiopia is always a surprise to the first-time visitor. Much of it comprises an isolated plateau, riven by deep gorges, that has ensured its physical separation both from its African neighbours and from the lands across the Red Sea. Its peoples and their cultures are also
Ethiopia
distinct; and for thousands of years this has been reflected in their history and art. Periodic famines notwithstanding, much of Ethiopia is highly fertile. Its farmers exploit a unique range of crops, some of which are cultivated nowhere else on earth. In rural areas one can still see ox-ploughing, hand-reaping and threshing and grinding using techniques that have been practised for millennia. Yet the country is now modernising itself with enormous rapidity, only a few decades after some areas were first penetrated by outsiders. Roads are being built into areas previously inaccessible, hydro-electric schemes are bringing electricity to many settlements previously without, and daily flights take visitors to sites that until fairly recently required travelling for more than a week on the back of a mule. The itinerary concentrates on the country’s northern highlands, with Lake Tana and the headwaters of the Blue Nile, where there have been three thousand years of literate civilisation. Christianity became the official religion even before it enjoyed that status in the Roman Empire, and churches carved from solid rock preserve the sanctified atmosphere of a land where, in Gibbon’s words, ‘the Aethiopians slept near a thousand years, forgetful of the world by whom they were forgotten’. Sites visited include the ancient temple at
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Day 2: Addis Ababa. Touch-down c. 6.45am. The rest of the morning is free; hotel rooms are at your disposal and breakfast and lunch are served. The collections of the National Museum of Ethiopia, the most comprehensive in the country, range from 3.5 million-year ‘Lucy’ to the more recent Axumite and Early Christian periods. Overnight Addis. Day 3: Addis Ababa, Hawzien. The Institute of Ethiopian Studies, an ethnographic museum in Haile Selassie’s palace, is dedicated to Ethiopia’s rich mix of ethnic groups and includes an impressive collection of manuscripts and icons. Fly c. 3.00pm to Mekele and drive to Hawzien. Visit Abraha-wa-Atsbaha church en route. First of three nights in Gheralta. Day 4: Gheralta. The Teka Tesfai church cluster, including one of the finest churches in the area, Medhane Alem Adi Kasho. Picnic lunch in the countryside. Overnight Gheralta. Day 5: Gheralta. Eastern Tigray is big sky country, mountain peaks like ragged teeth and arid plains. Scattered throughout this dramatic scenery are several isolated churches, many of them unknown to the outside world until very recently. The day is spent exploring a selection of these, still the focus of worship by the surrounding communities just as they were hundreds of years ago. Final night in Gheralta. Day 6: Axum. Leaving early, our final destination is Axum but we visit the 7thcentury bc temple of Yeha and the Church of Abuna Aftse on the way. Continue past the ‘Teeth of Adwa’, scene of Emperor Menelik II’s victory over the Italian army in 1896, before b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
arriving in Axum early evening. First of two nights in Axum. Day 7: Axum. The stelae field in Axum is home to some the world’s largest free-standing stone monuments, many dwarfing the obelisks found further north in Egypt. Sculpted from a single piece of rock and intricately decorated, these massive structures highlight the city’s prestige in the ancient world when Axum was a flourishing, powerful capital. After seeing the museum, we visit the tombs of King Kalib and Gebre Meskel, the Ezana inscription and the Cathedral of Tsion Maryam – the most sacred Christian site in Ethiopia and, according to local belief, the resting place of the Ark of the Covenant. Overnight in Axum. Day 8: Axum, Lalibela. Fly c. 11.00am to Lalibela and the remarkable hidden rock-hewn churches, their scale testament to the faith and devotion of early Christian followers. After lunch at the hotel we visit the South-Eastern cluster including the fortified twin churches of Gabriel and Rafael, Beta Merkurios (dedicated to the saint martyred in the third century) and the impressive Beta Emmanuel and Beta Abba Libanos, reputedly built overnight with the help of a group of angels. First of three nights in Lalibela. Day 9: Lalibela. This day is dedicated to the north-eastern cluster where the sophistication and sheer scale managed by the craftsman is best exhibited. Lalibela’s largest church, Beta Madhane Alem (Saviour of the World), as well as Beta Maryam, acknowledged as Lalibela’s oldest and most elaborate, are incorporated. Beta Masqal, Beta Danagel, Beta Mika’el and Selassie Chapel complete the complex. Overnight in Lalibela. Day 10: Lalibela. Choice between two visits in the morning: the monastery of Nakuta La’ab or the remote but remarkable church of Imrahanna Kristos, located in a cave of Mount Abuna Yosef (the drive is uncomfortable and not suitable for those prone to motion sickness). There is some free time in the afternoon before a sunset visit to Lalibela’s most well-known and breathtaking church, Beta Giyorgis. Final night in Lalibela. Day 11: Lalibela, Gondar. Fly c. 9am to Gondar. The seat of the royal family in the 17th and 18th centuries, the town of Gondar, if not as impressive in scale as Lalibela, is home to some important sites, most notably the royal enclosure of Emperor Fasilidas (a unesco World Heritage site) where Indian, Turkish and Portuguese influences are displayed. Fasilidas’ pool, the location for one of Ethiopia’s most colourful Timkat (Epiphany) celebrations, is also visited. Overnight Gondar. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Day 12: Gondar, Bahir Dar. Morning visit to the church of Debre Birhan Selassie (Mountain of the Enlightened Trinity), founded in 1690 and displaying some of the most beautiful examples of ecclesiastical art in Ethiopia. In the afternoon we drive along the shores of Lake Tana to the quiet and picturesque town of Bahir Dar. First of two nights in Bahir Dar. Day 13: Bahir Dar. Through the early morning mist, we take a boat to the Zegie Peninsula. Under a lush green canopy are the round churches of Ura Kidane Mehret and Beta Maryam. Complete with thatched roofs, ostrich egg-adorned crosses and brightly coloured murals, they are the focus for the local community as well as a sanctuary for the abundant plant and bird life. In the afternoon we visit one of the lake’s more remote churches, Narga Selassie. Built in the 18th century on the island of Dek for the Princess Mentewab, it is different in style from the other Tana churches and includes a stone etching of the 18th-century Scottish explorer James Bruce. Overnight Bahir Dar. Day 14: Bahir Dar, Addis Ababa. After a drive through some wild and unspoilt countryside, we walk over the 17th-century bridge constructed by the Portuguese to a view point of the spectacular Blue Nile Falls (during the February departure the water level will be low). The afternoon is free; suggestions include the local market and the Blue Nile outflow to Lake Tana. Flight c. 9.30pm to Addis Ababa. Day 15: Addis Ababa. Visit Entoto Maryam Church, Menelik’s capital prior to the establishment of Addis Ababa and the scene of his coronation in 1882. There is free time in the afternoon to visit Addis’ sprawling market, the Mercato. Overnight Addis Ababa. Day 16. Fly from Addis Ababa to London, via Rome, arriving Heathrow c. 5.30pm
Practicalities Price: £4,850 (deposit £400). This includes: flights (economy class) with Ethiopian Airlines (Boeing 767 300 for international flights & Bombardier Q400 for internal); private coach for all other journeys; accommodation as described below; all breakfasts, all lunches (including 3 picnics)and 13 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all airport and local taxes; the services of the lecturer, tour manager and local guides. Single supplement £530. Price without flights £4,100.
houses. Axum (2 nights): the best hotel in the town with excellent views over the stelae park and church. Lalibela (3 nights): a former government-owned hotel in close proximity to the church complexes, quiet and comfortable. Gondar (1 night): located high above the town, this hotel has spectacular views of Gondar and the surrounding countryside. Bahir Dar (2 nights): situated on the shores of Lake Tana’ this newly opened 5-star lodge has the best accommodation available and includes a spa and health centre. Flight schedule changes are common. We recommend you keep diaries clear for 24 hours either side of the tour dates. Food is basic, the options for vegetarians are very limited and special dietary requirements cannot be catered for at all.
Visas. British citizens and most other foreign nationals require a tourist visa. The current cost for UK nationals is around £14. This is not included in the price of the tour because you have to obtain it yourself. We will advise on the procedure but you will need to submit your passport to the Ethiopian Embassy in your country of residence prior to departure. Processing times vary from country to country, but UK residents should expect to be without their passport for up to 10 days. Passports must be valid for 6 months from entry into Ethiopia. How strenuous? A good level of fitness is essential. Unless you enjoy entirely unimpaired mobility, cope with everyday walking and stairclimbing without difficulty and are reliably sure-footed, this tour is not for you. Uneven ground and irregular paving are standard. On some days there are fairly steep ascents to remote churches. There are some long coach journeys on uneven terrain (we will be using modified buses) during which facilities are limited and may be of poor quality. Most sites have some shade but the Ethiopian sun is strong, even in the cooler seasons. Average distance by coach per day: 45 miles. Small group: between 10 and 18 participants. Working in partnership with The Ethiopian Heritage Fund. The Ethiopian Heritage Fund, a UK registered charity, was set up in August 2005. Working together with the Ethiopian Church and the Ministry of Culture and Tourism in Ethiopia, their aim is to promote and organise the conservation of early Ethiopian churches and their contents and to provide advice on their maintenance.
Hotels. Addis Ababa (3 nights): smart, modernised, centrally-located 5-star hotel. Gheralta (3 nights): lodge with spectacular scenery, accommodation in local style stone
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Ethiopia
Finland: Aalto & others 20th-century architecture & design 29 June–6 July 2013 (mz 624) 8 days • £2,470 Lecturer: Dr Harry Charrington Journey through Finland surveying the works of Alvar Aalto, ‘the poet of International Modernism’. See also major buildings by other twentiethcentury Finnish architects and look at other areas of design and art. Four hotels and quite a lot of travelling – through scenery of forest and lake. Led by Dr Harry Charrington, an architect who lived in Finland and worked in Aalto’s office. Design is as associated with Finland as bacon with eggs. It is extraordinary what impact such a small country – which only gained independence in 1917 – has had on the look of things in the twentieth century. Finland was a late starter. From its time at the periphery of European civilization and the following period as a remote part of the Swedish empire, there is not much to show other than vernacular domestic architecture and castles. Only in 1812, when the territory became a Russian grand duchy, did Helsinki acquire a spacious and monumental NeoClassical centre to rank among the most impressive.
Really interesting art and architecture begins in the later nineteenth century with National Romanticism, a manifestation of aspiration towards national self-determination. The music of Sibelius is well enough known, but the architecture of Eliel Saarinen deserves much wider acclaim, and the brilliant, haunting paintings of Albert Edelfelt and Akseli GallénKallela will come as a revelation. These are not isolated figures, for the turn of the century was a highly productive time. But one name stands out: Alvar Aalto. Revered by architects around the world, it is not inconceivable that he will come to be regarded as the greatest architect of our era. His designs differ radically from mainstream mid-twentieth-century modernism architecture in that they are imbued with humanity and an organic beauty. His employment of curved forms and concern with colour and texture provide a spectrum of beauties forbidden to hard-line modernists, and his buildings have a strong sense of place, exemplified by widespread use of that very un-modern but quintessentially Finnish material, wood. Aalto is the poet of International Modernism. He also invented the bent plywood chair. Some of the twentieth century’s finest furniture, glass, ceramics and textiles have been created in Finland, much of it inspired by the principles which imbued Aalto’s work.
Itinerary Day 1: Helsinki. Fly at c. 10.20am from London Heathrow to Helsinki. Walk around the Neo-Classical heart of the city and see Senate Square, the domed cathedral, then down to the colourful Market Square by the old harbour. Stay two nights in Helsinki. Day 2: Helsinki, Hvitträsk. A morning architectural walk includes Aalto’s Finlandia Hall (1975) and Saarinen’s Railway Station (1919). The Ateneum, Finland’s foremost art museum, houses a collection of brilliant National Romantic pictures. The open-air museum on the coast at Seurasaari shows the whole history of Finnish vernacular building. Day 3: Otaniemi, Seurasaari, Paimio. In the morning visit Aalto’s Technical University in Helsinki’s Otaniemi area. Drive out to Hvitträsk, Saarinen’s home and studio. In Paimio is Aalto’s Sanatorium (1929–33), a classic of modern architecture for which he designed widely-imitated timber furniture. Overnight Turku. Day 4: Turku, Noormarkku. Turku is Finland’s oldest city, and has a mediaeval cathedral. Visit the cemetery by Aalto’s contemporary Erik Bryggman, followed by a walk through Turku’s city centre. In the afternoon see the Villa Mairea in Noormarkku, the most beautiful of Aalto’s private houses. Overnight Seinäjoki. Day 5: Seinäjoki, Petäjävesi. Seinäjoki has a striking complex by Alvar Aalto: the Cross of the Plains church which dominates the townscape, parish hall, town hall-cum-theatre, clad in dark blue tiles, and library. See the UNESCO-listed wooden church by Leppanen in Petäjävesi. Visit the Alvar Aalto Museum, an art museum with a display of Aalto’s life and works. Overnight Jyväskylä. Day 6: Jyväskylä, Säynätsalo. Aalto went to school in Jyväskylä and set up his first independent practice here. Representative of his early, ‘pre-functionalist’ buildings is the Trade Union Club (1923-5), his first important commission. The Teachers’ Training College (1952-7, now university), is one of the finest manifestations of his ‘red’ period, with warmhued bricks. See Aalto’s town hall (1952) at Säynätsalo and a summer house at Muuratsalo. Stay two nights in Helsinki.
Finnish tar boats, after a drawing by V. Blomstedt 1900.
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Day 7: Helsinki. Walk to Aalto’s Rautatalo (The Iron House) Office building (1951-55) and through the ongoing development of the old Aurora railway yards, passing Kiasma Gallery of Contemporary Art. Visit Aalto’s Finlandia Hall (1961-75) and then continue to the Olympic Stadium. Visit the National b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
The Narrow Sea A history of the English Channel Pensions Institute (Aalto, 1952-56), considered by many members of the Aalto atelier as its finest construction. There is some free time in Helsinki. Dinner is in the Savoy Restaurant designed by Aalto. Day 8: Helsinki. In the morning visit Käpylä, a remarkable wooden garden-city from the 1920s, then on to Finland’s Bloomsbury of Tuusula Lake with its turn of the century villa for Sibelius as well as the Kokkonen Villa by Aalto. Continue to Helsinki airport and fly to Heathrow, arriving at c. 5.15pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,470 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled Finnair flights (aircraft: Airbus 321); travel by private coach throughout; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts; 2 lunches and 6 dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admission charges to museums and sites visited with the group; all tips for restaurant staff and drivers; all airport and state taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £270. Price without flights £2,250. Hotels: in Helsinki (4 nights in total): a central, recently renovated, modern hotel. In Turku (1 night): a hotel near the river. In Seinäjoki (1 night): a relatively new, centrallylocated hotel. In Jyväskylä (1 night): a small traditional hotel; there are no lifts but porterage is arranged. All the hotels used on this tour are conveniently located and have a local 4-star rating. They are more functional than charming but with good standards of comfort. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking on this tour and four hotel changes. It should not be undertaken by anyone who has difficulty with everyday walking. Average distance by coach per day: 76 miles. Small group: this tour will operate with between 12 and 22 participants. Please contact us if you are interested in combining this tour with Munch in Oslo, 26–29 June 2013 (see page 149).
Savonlinna Opera July 2013 Contact us now for the full details or visit www.martinrandall.com Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Étretat, wood engraving c. 1885 from The Illustrated London News.
26 June–7 July 2013 (mz 620) 12 days • £3,640 Lecturers: Major Gordon Corrigan & Major Imogen Corrigan Follows the coasts and immediate hinterland of the south of England and the north of France. Conceived as a history of the English Channel, it visits many of the most famous sites in AngloFrench history. A variety of art, architecture, townscape and landscape. Two lecturers: a military historian and a mediaevalist. Highway for migrants, merchants, invaders and travellers of all sorts, and barrier, moat, defence, between two of the most cussedly independent and self-regarding nations in the world: the English Channel both connects and separates, attracts and repels. While the history of ‘the Narrow Sea’ is a history of the people – and peoples – who have sailed across, in either direction and for whatever purpose, it is especially a history of the relations between the French and the English. Sometimes it is a history also of the inhabitants of all of Great Britain (occasionally with bit parts played by North American allies), and of the peoples and governments of Continental countries beyond France.
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The journey leads from eastern Kent along the south coast of England as far as Portsmouth. Here you take ship to Normandy and, again hugging the coast, travel almost as far as Flanders before returning to London by train through the Channel Tunnel. The tour deals primarily with history, not art history, with sites rather than sights; aesthetic and scenic merit is plentiful but incidental. Seeing the location of momentous events and understanding how the topography influenced the outcome adds immeasurably to an understanding of history. Familiarity with place can also be profoundly moving, and a tour which includes the battlefields of Hastings, Crécy, Agincourt, Dunkirk and D-Day is rich in emotional potential. Most of the sights – and sites – are not military, though castles and fortifications do figure prominently. A Gertrude Jekyll garden, the finest Roman floor mosaics in northern Europe, the mother of all Norman churches, a window designed by Braque; bow-fronted Regency seaside architecture and fairy-tale elaborations of Louis treize style, towns and villages of exceptional charm, one-time ports from which the sea has receded and ‘progress’ has passed by: these are among the sights on offer. Much is surprisingly off the beaten track, and we have sometimes opted for the less well-known – deserted Winchelsea instead of teeming Rye for example, old-fashioned Eastbourne instead of busy, trendy Brighton.
Finland, France
The Narrow Sea continued
Of course, the contrasts between France and England will be found fascinating, but there are surprising contrasts within each country as well.
Itinerary Day 1: Pegwell Bay, Sandwich. Leave central London by coach at 10.30am for the east coast of Kent. Some of the most significant landings in the early history of England were on Pegwell Bay and the Isle of Thanet, Romans in AD 43, the first Angles, St Augustine in 597, the first Vikings to settle. Massive walls survive from the principal Roman port of Richborough, a cross marks the site of St Augustine’s first sermon. Visit Sandwich, described by Pevsner as ‘the completest mediaeval town in England’, and which used to be the major port of southeast England. Overnight near Dover. Day 2: Dover, Deal, Walmer. Rising above the emblematic White Cliffs, Dover Castle, ‘the key to England’, was the most important stronghold in the country; in continuous use until recently, it includes a Roman lighthouse, Norman keep, and World War II tunnels. The little conurbation of Deal and Walmer was site of Julius Caesar’s landings in 56 and 55 BC and preserves two of Henry VIII’s Italian-designed coastal forts. Walmer Castle was converted into a residence by the Duke of Wellington and subsequent Masters of the Cinque Ports. Overnight near Dover. Day 3: Romney Marsh, Dungeness, Winchelsea. Martello towers, defence against Napoleon’s planned invasion, punctuate the coast road though Hythe and Dymchurch. Romney Marsh is a dead flat expanse whose
waterways gradually dried, marooning several ports miles inland. At its seaward apex lies the desolation of Dungeness, shingles, marine flotsam, tumbledown fishermens’ cottages, lighthouses. Oh, and a nuclear power station. Winchelsea, hill-top Cinque Port laid out to a 13th-century grid plan, with a church of cathedral-like proportions. First of two nights near Battle.
Godwinson, the pretty little harbour town of Bosham reached its peak 1000 years ago. Spend a leisurely morning here, and visit Fishbourne Roman Villa, a magnificent complex whose floor mosaics rank among the finest in Europe. Return to Portsmouth for the 5-hour crossing on a large modern ferry to Ouistreham (Caen). Dinner is on board. First of three nights in Bayeux.
Day 4: Battle, Pevensey, Eastbourne, Bexhill. Study the field of the Battle of Hastings where William Duke of Normandy triumphed over King Harold in 1066. The Normans camped on the eve of battle at Pevensey Castle, a Roman fort with mediaeval additions. The most genteel of English seaside towns, Eastbourne was developed and carefully controlled by Dukes of Devonshire. Take a boat trip to view Beachy Head, the most dramatic of England’s chalk cliffs. Visit the De La Warr Pavilion at Bexhill, a Modernist masterpiece (Mendelsohn & Chermayeff 1935).
Day 7: Bayeux, Utah Beach, Omaha Beach. Bayeux is a pleasant town with a fine mediaeval cathedral, but the outstanding object here is the Bayeux Tapestry. Depicting Harold’s perjury and William’s Conquest, this 70 metres of embroidery is without parallel either as artwork or as document of mediaeval life. The afternoon is devoted to the American landings; visit Utah Beach, St Mère Eglise and the American cemetery at Omaha Beach where 9,385 servicemen are buried.
Day 5: Portsmouth. First used as a naval base under the Tudors, Portsmouth is now the principal home of the Royal Navy; building and maintaining the fleet constituted Europe’s largest industrial enterprise in the 18th century. Prize exhibits in the Historic Dockyards are HMS Victory, Nelson’s flagship at the Battle of Trafalgar, and the Mary Rose, pride of Henry VIII’s fleet which sank ingloriously before the monarch’s eyes and was salvaged in 1982; the museum containing personal belongings salvaged from the wreck is as impressive. Overnight Bosham. Day 6: Bosham, Fishbourne, to France. Associated with King Cnut and Harold Deal Castle, engraving 1832.
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Day 8: Operation Overlord. Explore sites of the Allied landings of 6th June 1944. Visit first Pegasus Bridge, captured by the British Airborne Division in the early hours of D-Day. Sword, Juno and Gold were code names for the beaches in the British sector, evocative because they are largely unchanged. Segments of Mulberry Harbour, the floating dock, can still be seen off Arromanches. See also well-preserved German gun emplacements at Longues-sur-Mer, relics of the Atlantic Wall, the largest construction project of the 20thcentury, rendered impotent within hours. Day 9: Caen, Honfleur. Founded by William the Conqueror, the Abbaye aux Hommes at Caen became the model for dozens of Norman churches in England. Drive along the coast through several towns developed as holiday resorts in the 19th century, of which Deauville and Trouville were the most salubrious; hotel and villa architecture adopted bloated variants of historic French styles. There is free time to explore Honfleur, an utterly charming fishing village, now crammed with art galleries and antique shops. There is a good art collection in the Eugene Boudin Museum. Overnight near Honfleur. Day 10: Le Havre, Etretat, Varengeville, Dieppe. Cross the Seine estuary by the new bridge and drive through Le Havre, rebuilt after the war by Auguste Perret, proselytiser of concrete. Continue to Etretat, a little town on a bay bounded by chalk promontories scooped into arches by wind and sea, famously painted by Monet. Georges Braque is buried at Varengeville in the incomparably sited clifftop church. The gardens of Bois des Moutiers are a Lutyens and Jekyll collaboration and beautifully maintained. Pass through Dieppe, one of the earliest seaside resorts, and scene b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Brittany Megaliths to Monet of the disastrous but salutory Allied raid in August 1942. First of two nights in Montreuil. Day 11: Montreuil, Crecy, Agincourt. There is free time in the pleasant little town of Montreuil, location of General Haig’s headquarters from 1915, and fine views of the countryside from impressive ramparts. Afternoon excursion to two battlefields, the most famous on French soil in British mediaeval history, both English victories against the odds: Crecy (1346, Edward III and the Black Prince) and Agincourt (1415, Henry V). In both cases little of the topography has changed and even the woods have similar perimeters. Day 12: Boulogne, Dunkirk. Travel northwards through open, rolling countryside. Outside Boulogne, the 50-metre Colonne de la Grande Armée with a statue of Napoleon commemorates the gathering in 1805 of 150,000 troops (preparing for the aborted invasion of England). Continue to Dunkirk from where in 1940 heroic resistance by French and British units enabled the evacuation of 350,000 Allied troops in hundreds of craft. Board a Eurostar train at Calais Frethun, slip through the Channel Tunnel and arrive at London St Pancras at c. 4.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £3,640 (deposit £300). This includes: ferry Portsmouth–Caen (Brittany Ferries); rail travel (1st class, standard premier) on Eurostar Calais–St Pancras; travel by private coach; hotel accommodation; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 11 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturers. Single supplement £370 (double for sole use). Hotels: all of a good standard and all have restaurants. Wallets Court, near Dover (2 nights), a converted manor house and outbuildings situated in farmland. Powdermills Hotel near Battle (2 nights), a Regency country house hotel in extensive parkland. The Millstream, Bosham (1 night), pretty hotel in pleasant surroundings with a relaxed atmosphere. In Bayeux (3 nights), a newly opened 4-star hotel, centrally located. Near Honfleur (1 night), modern, spacious and tranquil 3-star hotel overlooking the estuary. In Montreuil (2 nights), business-oriented 3-star hotel in a recently converted seminary; lacks character but has an excellent restaurant. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking, some long coach journeys and 6 hotels. Average distance by coach per day: 77 miles. Small group: 10–22 participants.
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A fishing village in Brittany, etching 1909.
4–11 June 2013 (mz 589) 8 days • £2,240 Lecturer: Caroline Holmes Brittany’s landscapes captured and cultivated: gardens, châteaux and historic towns. Beautiful Belle-Ile, with an optional coastal walk. The inspiration for colonies of Impressionist and Post-Impressionist artists. The landscapes of Brittany are variously dramatic, fertile and rugged, framed by jagged coasts or broad sands. The granite bedrock can be seen carved into poignant sixteenthcentury churchyard calvaries and piled high in Quimper’s two spires. The wealth of stone tools that have been found confirm the early agricultural skills of prehistoric Bretons. Armorica stems from Ar Mor, literally land of the sea, to distinguish Brittany’s coasts from the forested interior, Ar Goat, that sheltered wolves, boar and deer as well as Druidic rites. Over the centuries the fruits of its sea, fields, orchards and gardens fed their bodies and souls with a robust simplicity. Large tracts remained remote from and almost untouched by metropolitan France. In the late nineteenth century avant-garde artists came to see Brittany as an inspirational rural idyll and flocked from Europe, America and Australia.
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It was already popular when in 1888 Paul Sérusier, Emile Bernard and Paul Gauguin formed the School of Pont-Aven. Nearby, Monet painted the wild seas and rocks off Belle-Ile and met the critic who was to become his lifelong friend and biographer, Gustave Geffroy. Australian Impressionist John Peter Russell married Marianna Antoinetta Mattiocco, Rodin’s favourite model, and in 1889 built a house at Port Goulphar where they entertained Sisley, Matisse and numerous other artists. In 1894 Sarah Bernhardt took up summer residence in the Fort; her guest list was to include Edward VII. This tour presents a broad sweep of history, prehistory, art and landscape. It is led by a garden historian who has close family ties to Brittany.
Itinerary Day 1. Join the tour in central London at 4.00pm and travel by coach to Portsmouth, or join at Portsmouth Harbour railway station at c. 6.00pm. Take the overnight ferry to St Malo; have dinner and spend the night on board. Day 2: St Malo. The Heroic Age of Saint Malo came with the discovery of the New World: for 200 years it claimed to be the busiest port in France. After a morning lecture, walk around the exceedingly attractive old centre and visit the ramparts and castle dating to the 13th
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and 14th centuries. The malouinières were the luxurious châteaux built for rich ship-owning merchants in the 17th and 18th centuries as country villas accessible to the city by water or land. Visit the excellent garden of Le Montmarin. Overnight St Malo.
8 km), during which we visit the Musée Sarah Bernhardt and the fort that was her summer home at the Pointe des Poulains. Lunch in the small port of Sauzon. Return to the hotel via the Jardin la Boulaye that nestles in the sheltered heart of the islands. Afternoon walk in the footsteps of Monet to view the jagged Aiguilles de Port-Coton. Overnight Belle-Ile.
Day 3: Pleyben, Daoulas, Quimper. Pleyben’s 16th-century church, triumphal arch and calvary are amongst the finest in Brittany, the sculpture in intractable granite blending technical skill with unidealised naturalism. The Abbaye de Daoulas has a good Romanesque cloister and monastically inspired herb gardens. Well situated at crossroads between sea and land, Quimper is the capital of the Cornouaille region. First of three nights in Quimper.
Day 8. Return by ferry to mainland France and transfer by coach to Nantes airport via the mediaeval walled city of Guérande, centre of the Fleur du Sel Guèrande industry dating back 1,500 years. The flight from Nantes to London City Airport arrives at c. 6.55pm.
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Day 4: Quimper. The cathedral of St Corentin is the finest example of Gothic architecture in Brittany, with a sumptuous modern high altar in gilded and enamelled bronze. The Musée des Beaux Arts contains paintings by Dutch, Flemish and Italian artists and an exceptional collection of French paintings and drawings including 19th-century Breton scenes. In 1690 Jean-Baptiste Bousquet created the first faïencerie or pottery in the Locmaria district. Visit the workshop now owned by HBHenriot. A fine selection of pottery as well as archaeological finds and local arts and crafts are housed in the Musée Départemental Breton.
Price: £2,240 (deposit £200). This includes: overnight with Brittany Ferries, Cityjet flight (economy class, Fokker 50), coach travel, return ferry to Belle-Ile; accommodation as below; breakfasts and 6 dinners with drinks; all admission to gardens, museums, sites etc.; tips for restaurant staff, drivers; all state taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager; hire of radio guides for better audibility of the lecturer. Single supplement £250 (double room for sole use). Contact us for a price without international ferry travel and flight. Hotels. The first night is on a large, modern ferry. We have reserved suites for people travelling in pairs, which are quite spacious with sitting area and an outside window. For single travellers we have booked small twins which are simple but adequately comfortable with en suite facilities and an outside window. In St Malo (1 night): a newly opened 4-star hotel located inside the old city walls. Rooms are modern and well appointed. In Quimper (3 nights): a functional 3-star hotel five minutes from the cathedral and museums. On Belle-Ile (2 nights): a spa hotel, a member of the Relais and Châteaux group, with fine coastal views.
Day 5: around Quimper. An excursion to three very different gardens – plantsman, breeder, and family. Those of the Parc Botanique de Cornouaille were started in 1983 by M. Gueguen, a plant collector who worked for Hilliers in England. The Parc de Boutiguéry extends to 15 hectares along the banks of the River Odet where new, warm colours have been bred into the rhododendrons. At the Manoir de Kérazan sweet chestnuts grow alongside pines, palms and flowering shrubs. The house is a showcase of Breton workmanship: fine collections of the Quimper faïencerie, Bigouden furniture and paintings by local artists. Day 6: Pont-Aven, Ile de Gavrinis. Towards the end of the 19th century, Pont-Aven was almost overrun by avant-garde and aspiring artists. The chapel of Trémalo still harbours the 16th-century polychrome statue that inspired Gauguin’s Le Christ Jaune. Continue south and catch a boat to the Ile de Gavrinis, home to a cairn containing 23 orthostats with a wealth of symbolic patterns unmatched elsewhere. Catch the late afternoon ferry to Belle-Ile where two nights are spent. Our hotel is on the site of Australian painter John Russell’s house and retains the views which inspired him to live, paint, and host here for twenty years. Day 7: Belle-Ile. Optional morning walk along the beautiful northern Côte Sauvage (c.
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How strenuous? A lot of walking and standing around. Three hotel changes plus one night on a ferry. Sure-footedness and walking shoes are essential for the (optional) walk on Belle-Ile. Average distance by coach per day: 63 miles. Small group: between 10 to 22 participants.
Quimper, wood engraving c. 1880.
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206.
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Anjou & Poitou Mediaeval art & architecture 22–30 June 2013 (mz 611) 9 days • £2,240 Lecturer: Dr Alexandra Gajewski Superb Romanesque and early Gothic buildings. Exceptionally well-preserved historic town centres. Rural drives along beautiful river valleys. First class rail travel on Eurostar. The ancient counties of Anjou and Poitou boast the richest and the most diverse collection of Romanesque monuments in France. The result of this is that not only does a great deal of ecclesiastical building survive from a specific period, but that the patterns of survival make it possible to piece together something of the circumstances that brought individual churches into being. The idea of the tour is to take advantage of this, combining buildings which are otherwise difficult to get at in the rural hinterland, with the great monuments of Angers, Poitiers and Le Mans. This region had been a pioneer in the development of feudalism, one of the effects of which was the growth of lay control over abbeys and collegiate churches. This meant that long established buildings were restored and new foundations established, and the region became a crucible of innovation in sculptural and architectural style. The frame of the western French church was subject to a series of changes of form and identity that were among the most dramatic of twelfth-century Europe. The development of a mature Romanesque and Gothic architecture forms the core of the expedition, and the extravagantly carved screen façades of the Loire valley and Poitou will be a feature. The early 13th-century predilection for aisleless and hall church designs, domedup rib vaulting and polychromed surfaces will be given corresponding prominence. Nor will wall painting be neglected, on both glass and plaster, for the high spaces of St-Savin-surGartempe possesses one of the most beguiling cycles of frescoes of Romanesque Europe, while the east window of Poitiers cathedral frames some of its greatest 12th-century glass. And though that rich vein of Carolingian and early Romanesque building has been largely superseded, a vein that marked out the Loire valley as one of the great stamping grounds of early mediaeval architectural thinking, enough remains to gain a sense of the range and monumental achievements of eleventh-century design in the region.
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Angers, the Hôtel de Pincé, from Etchings on the Loire by Ernest George 1875.
Itinerary Day 1: by Eurostar from London St Pancras at c. 9.30am to Paris. Continue by coach to Angers. First of four nights in Angers. Day 2: Cunault, Fontevraud, Chinon. Drive along the south bank of the Loire, stopping at the light and spacious priory church of NotreDame-de-Cunault. Fontevraud, a vast monastic city, houses four communities on the same site: Plantagenet royal mausoleum, octagonal kitchen, Renaissance cloister. Chinon is home to Henry Plantagenet’s ‘beloved castle in the middle of France’. Day 3: Angers. See magnificent and littleknown Romanesque sculpture from the Benedictine cloister of St-Aubin. Visit the château, a major 13th-century royal castle now housing Louis d’Anjou’s remarkable Apocalypse tapestry, the cathedral, the earliest and grandest of the ‘Angevin Gothic’ churches, and the jewel-like hall choir of St-Serge. Cross the river Maine to the Doutre, where Henry Plantagenet founded the Hôpital St-Jean and the Ronceray abbesses financed the inventive parish church of La Trinité.
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Day 4: Le Mans, Pirmil, Asnières-sur-Verge. The day is devoted to the Maine with the morning at Le Mans cathedral, a building in very select league indeed, whose nave juxtaposes 11th-century aisles with a 12thcentury elevation, and whose choir stands as one of the supreme statements of Gothic architecture. Spend a gentle afternoon returning via the finest of the Mancelle parish churches and see the sculpture of Pirmil acting as a foil for the marvellous wall paintings at Asnières-sur-Verge. Day 5: St-Jouin-de-Marnes, Poitiers. Slip south over the border with Poitou to St-Jouinde-Marnes whose monastic church carries the earliest of the elaborately carved western French screen façades. The afternoon is spent in Poitiers. See Notre-Dame-la-Grande with its superb show front overlooking the former market place. St-Hilaire was the resting place of a celebrated 4th-century bishop and is a major pilgrimage church. First of four nights in Poitiers. Day 6: Poitiers. Spend the morning in the mediaeval town. See the cathedral, a majestic 12th- and 13th-century hall church. Ste-
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Mediaeval Normandy Romanesque, Gothic, Renaissance
Radegonde demonstrates an engaging amalgam of Romanesque and Gothic themes. Free afternoon. Day 7: Civaux, St-Savin-sur-Gartempe, Chauvigny. A day among the painted churches of the valleys of the Gartempe and Vienne. Civaux has a vast and enigmatic Merovingian cemetery and adjacent early medieval painted crypt. St-Savin-sur-Gartempe has the most extensive, most splendid cycle of Romanesque wall painting to survive in France. At Chauvigny see the dramatically situated seigneurial castle and collegiate church.
24–31 May 2013 (mz 579) 8 days • £2,520 Lecturer: Dr Cathy Oakes Superb examples of Romanesque and Gothic architecture. A mediaeval architectural history tour, with due attention to other architectural periods. First-class rail travel on Eurostar. Based in Rouen and Bayeux in 4 and 5-star hotels.
Rouen, Palais de Justice, steel engraving c. 1850.
Day 8: Melle, Nuaillé sur Boutonne, Aulnay. Drive along the camino, the pilgrimage road running south-west towards Santiago de Compostela. Visit all three of the great Romanesque churches at Melle, St-Savinien, St-Pierre and St-Hilaire, the last with a majestic ‘Constantinian Rider’ fantastically perched above the north portal. Nuaillé-surBoutonne has a tiny parish church with a beautifully carved portal and Aulnay is home to a spellbinding small-scale pilgrimage church.
During the late ninth century, Norse raiding parties first pillaged, then occupied, the coastal reaches of northern France. The effect on Carolingian France was catastrophic and, as its governmental systems collapsed, France disintegrated into a patchwork of small feudal domains. Normandy was one of the most significant of these, and after the old Norse chieftain, Wrolf the Gangler, was granted the lordship of all lands north of the rivers Epte and Andelle in 911, the duchy was set on expansion. With feudalism came Christianity, the adoption of the French language and the emergence of one
Day 9: Nouaillé-Maupertuis. Final visit to the wonderfully ramshackle and picturesque 12th-century Benedictine abbey at NouailléMaupertuis. Take the TGV (high speed train) from Poitiers to Paris and continue by Eurostar to London St Pancras arriving c. 5.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,240 (deposit £200). This includes: rail travel (first class, standard premier) by Eurostar and TGV (times are confirmed 2 months before departure); travel by private coach; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 6 dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Superior room throughout (including a suite in Poitiers, two sharing only) £200 per room. Single supplement £210. Single supplement with superior room in Angers £280. Price without Eurostar £2,030. Hotels: In Angers (4 nights) a conveniently situated in the centre of town, a 3-star hotel with renovated rooms, varying in size. In Poitiers (4 nights) a centrally located 3-star hotel, refurbished in Art Deco style with spacious if slightly austere rooms. How strenuous? A considerable amount of walking and standing around is involved. You will need to lift your own luggage on and off the train and wheel it within stations. Average distance by coach per day: 77 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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of the most far-reaching and influential schools of architecture to grace mediaeval Europe. It is no exaggeration to see in the events of 1066 something quite central to the English sense of self-identity, events which are relayed in the Bayeux tapestry. But the most visible reminders of William’s success at Hastings are the great Norman castles and churches which are such familiar landmarks of English towns. Their origins lie in the pioneering eleventh-century buildings of Jumièges, Rouen and Caen. This development of a mature Romanesque architecture places Normandy at the forefront of an initiative which was to have profound consequences for later mediaeval Europe – the development of the integrated and articulate church on a colossal scale. This alone would be justification for the tour, but while Normandy’s Romanesque buildings have often been the subject of lavish praise, that distinctive late twelfth- and early thirteenth-century architecture, of polished surfaces, giddying spires, and inventive geometry, remains less widely appreciated. It is also the case that the buildings undertaken in the aftermath of the Hundred Years War have been sadly overlooked by historians of the period. And yet these are characterised by an extraordinarily welldeveloped interest in the picturesque and the fantastical, by myriad angles, flickering tracery, and twisted, slate-hung roofs. They number among the most accomplished buildings of late mediaeval Europe.
Itinerary Day 1: Les Andelys, Château Gaillard. By Eurostar at c. 10.30am from London St Pancras to Paris, and by coach to Les Andelys. From the ruins of the Château Gaillard, a 12th-century fortification, there are fine views of the River Seine. Below in Grand Andely is the church of Notre-Dame (16th- and 17thcentury). First of three nights in Rouen. Day 2: Rouen. Unquestionably the greatest city of Normandy, and one which retains enough of its historic fabric to rank among the most architecturally enthralling cities of northern Europe. Visits include the wonderfully inventive cathedral, the Palais de Justice, Musée des Antiquités and the important late Gothic churches of St-Ouen and St-Maclou. Day 3: Caudebec-en-Caux, Fécamp, Jumièges, Boscherville. Drive along the Seine to Caudebec-en-Caux to see the virtuosic parish church of Notre-Dame. Continue to the mighty abbey of La Trinité at Fécamp. The afternoon is spent at the peerless ruined abbey of Jumièges, one of a handful of buildings which might be said to mark the arrival of Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
mature Romanesque architecture in Europe and finally, the altogether more intimate spaces of St-Martin-de-Boscherville. Day 4: Evreux, Conches-en-Ouche, Bernay. The transition from Romanesque to Gothic in Norman architecture is most apparent at Evreux cathedral. The nearby church of Evreux St Taurin houses one of the most celebrated mediaeval reliquaries. Conches-en-Ouche displays one the finest sequences of late mediaeval and early Renaissance stained glass. Bernay Abbey is the essential starting point for an understanding of Norman Romanesque. First of four nights in Bayeux.
drive to Cerisy-la-Forêt to visit the stunning Romanesque abbey church. Day 8: Sées. Drive to Sées cathedral, arguably the greatest 13th-century church built in Normandy, juxtaposing a breathtakingly light and intimate Rayonnant east end with an altogether sturdier early 13th-century nave. Drive on to Paris and return by Eurostar to London St Pancras arriving at c. 7.00pm.
Detail of the Bayeux Tapestry, wood engraving 1878.
Day 5: Bayeux. The Bayeux tapestry, subject of much scholarly attention and an object whose splendour and importance can scarcely be overstated, one of those rare ‘marvels’ which exceeds expectations. Bayeux cathedral is an exceptional building whose piecemeal 13th-century rebuilding programme had the effect of producing an essentially Gothicised Romanesque interior. Free afternoon. Day 6: St-Gabriel-Brecy, Caen, Rucqueville. At St-Gabriel-Brecy visit the intact mediaeval precinct which houses the remains of a Roman priory. Caen, capital of Basse-Normandie, offers a feast of celebrated Romanesque buildings, the great abbey churches of StEtienne and La Trinité and Henry I’s great castle hall, all buildings of the first rank and all built c. 1065 to c. 1140. Day 7: Lessay, Coutances, Cerisy-la-Forêt. An excursion into the granite country of the Cotentin peninsula. Lessay has a hauntingly beautiful Romanesque abbey while the cathedral at Coutances is a superb example of Norman 13th-century Gothic. In the afternoon
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Practicalities Price: £2,520 (deposit £250). This includes: rail travel by Eurostar (1st class, standard premier) from London to Paris (times confirmed 3 months before departure); private coach travel; hotel accommodation; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 5 dinners with wine, water, coffee, plus light meals on the Eurostar; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £340. Price without Eurostar £2,290. Hotels: in Rouen (3 nights): a modern 3–star hotel in the historic centre of Rouen, a few minutes walk from the Cathedral. In Bayeux (4 nights): a newly-opened 4-star hotel a few minutes walk from the cathedral. How strenuous? A lot of walking, some on roughly paved streets, and a fair amount of standing around. You need to be able to carry your luggage on and off the train and within the stations. On some days there is a lot of coach travel; average distance per day: 82 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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French Gothic Cathedrals of Northern France Day 4: St Denis. On the outskirts of Paris, the burial place of French kings, St Denis was an abbey of the highest significance in politics and in the history of architecture. In the 1140s the choir was rebuilt, and the pointed arches, rib vaulting and skeletal structure warrant the claim that this was the first Gothic building. 100 years later the new nave inaugurated the Rayonnant style of Gothic with windows occupying the maximum possible area. First of two nights in Chartres. Day 5: Chartres. The cathedral at Chartres, begun in 1145 and recommenced in 1195 after a fire, is the finest synthesis of Gothic art and architecture. Sculpture and stained glass are incorporated into an elaborate theological programme, creating a whole which is far greater than the sum of its parts. The full day here provides time for unhurried exploration of the building and space to reflect and absorb. See also the church of St Pierre. Rheims Cathedral, from The Magazine of Art 1890.
9–15 September 2013 (ma 676) 7 days • £1,980 Lecturer: Matthew Woodworth The cradle of Gothic, northern Europe’s most significant contribution to world architecture. Nearly all the most important buildings in the development of Early and High Gothic, with an entire day at Chartres. Unparalleled examples of stained glass, sculpture and metalwork. Gothic was the only architectural style which had its origins in northern Europe. It was in the north of France that the first Gothic buildings arose, it was here that the style attained its classic maturity, and it is here that its greatest manifestations still stand. From the middle of the twelfth century the region was the scene of unparalleled building activity, with dozens of cathedrals, churches and abbeys under construction. Architects stretched their imaginations and masons extended their skills to devise more daring ways of enclosing greater volumes of space, with increasingly slender structural supports, and larger areas of window. But Gothic is not only an architectural phenomenon. Windows were filled with brilliant coloured glass. Sculpture, more life-like than for nearly a thousand years yet increasingly integrated with its architectural setting, was abundant. The art of metalwork thrived, and paint was everywhere. All the arts were coordinated to interpret and
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present elaborate theological programmes to congregations which included both the illiterate lay people and sophisticated clerics. Nearly all the most important buildings in the development of the Early and High phases of Gothic are included, and the order of visits even follows this development chronologically, as far as geography allows. A whole day is dedicated to the cathedral at Chartres, the premier site of the building arts of the mediaeval world.
Itinerary Day 1. Travel by Eurostar at c. 1.00pm from St Pancras to Lille. Drive to Laon and the hotel. First of three nights near Laon. Day 2: Noyon, Laon. One of the earliest Gothic cathedrals (c. 1150), Noyon’s four-storey internal elevation marks the transition from the thick-walled architecture of the Romanesque to the thin-walled verticality of Gothic. Laon is spectacularly sited on a rock outcrop. Begun c. 1160, the cathedral is the most complete of Early Gothic churches and one of the most impressive, with five soaring towers. Day 3: Rheims, Soissons. Rheims Cathedral, the coronation church of the French monarchy, begun 1211, is a landmark in the development of High Gothic with the first appearance of bar tracery and classicizing portal sculpture. At the church of St Rémi the heavy Romanesque nave contrasts with the light Early Gothic choir. Soissons Cathedral is a fine example of the rapid changes which took place in architecture at the end of the 12th century.
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Day 6: Mantes-la-Jolie, Beauvais, Amiens. Visit the 12th-century collegiate church at Mantes-la-Jolie. Beauvais Cathedral, begun 1225, was, with a vault height in the choir of 157 feet, the climax in France of upwardly aspiring Gothic architecture and the highest vault of mediaeval Europe. Overnight Amiens. Day 7: Amiens. The cathedral in Amiens is the classic High Gothic structure, its thrilling verticality balanced by measured horizontal movement. Drive to Lille for the Eurostar to London St Pancras, arriving c. 6.15pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,980 (deposit £200). This includes: Eurostar (1st class, standard premier); private coach travel; hotel accommodation; breakfasts and 5 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager; hire of radio guides for better audibility of the lecturer. Single supplement £180 (double room for sole use). Price without Eurostar £1,800. Hotels: in Chamouille (3 nights): a few kilometres from Laon, a comfortable 3-star hotel in an attractive position beside a lake. In Chartres (2 nights): a centrally located 4-star hotel; rooms differ in size and decor. In Amiens (1 night): a new 3-star hotel; excellent location close to the cathedral. How strenuous? A fair amount of walking and standing around. Some long coach journeys. You should be able to lift your luggage on and off the train and wheel it within the station. Average distance by coach per day: 89 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
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History of Impressionism Paintings & places in Paris & Normandy Etching by Renoir.
16–21 June 2013 (mz 596) 6 days • £2,220 Lecturer: Dr Frances Fowle The birthplace of Impressionism, with visits to key locations associated with the artists. The finest collections of Impressionism in France, including the recently renovated Impressionist galleries at the Musee D’Orsay. Coincides with an Impressionist festival in Normandy with major exhibitions in Rouen, Le Havre, Giverny and Fécamp. First-class rail travel by Eurostar from London and good hotels in Rouen and Paris. Far more Impressionist pictures can be seen in the region covered by this tour than in any other territory of comparable size. This should be no surprise, as this is the region where Impressionism was born and where it was most practised, and the tour visits some of the key sites in that development. Attention is also paid to the precursors – Pre-Impressionists such as Eugène Boudin and Jongkind – and to some PostImpressionist successors. As it was for mainstream artists, so it was for rebels and innovators: throughout the nineteenth century and into the twentieth, Paris was the centre of the art world. All the French Impressionists spent time here, many lived here for most of their lives. Yet the essence of their art – the recording of the world about them as it presented itself to their eyes in its immediate, transitory aspect – required them to spend time in the countryside. And the countryside they frequented most was in the north and north-west of Paris, the broad valley of the meandering Seine and of its tributaries the Oise and the Epte, and on to the coast. This can be illustrated by the case of Claude Monet, the most consistent exponent of Impressionism. He was born in Paris in 1840 and was brought up from 1845 in Le Havre on the Normandy coast before returning to Paris to study painting. Though Paris remained the centre of his artistic world, he made frequent painting expeditions to river and sea, and from 1871 he made his homes in the suburbs, progressively further downstream at Argenteuil, Vétheuil, Poissy and finally, in 1883, at Giverny. Impressionism was developing at the same time as seaside tourism on France’s northern coast (the Mediterranean was not a holiday destination until later) and the relationship between the two is fascinating. Water, fresh or salt, was an important ingredient of Impressionist pictures, its fleeting, changing, evanescent qualities similar to the characteristics of light they sought to capture on canvas. Indeed, water is the theme of the 2013 Impressionist festival in Normandy, with the Musée des Beaux Arts in Rouen exhibiting a great many works by Monet, Renoir, Cézanne and Manet, among others, on loan from the USA, Canada and Japan as well as Europe. The Musée Malraux in Le Havre will focus on Pissarro and his harbour paintings, while the museum in Fécamp brings together paintings by Monet inspired by its impressive cliffs and coastline. The exhibition at the Musée des Impressionnismes in Giverny will study the use of colour and water in the works of Paul Signac. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Itinerary Day 1: Paris. Leave London St Pancras at c. 10.30am by Eurostar. In Paris visit the Musée Marmottan which, through a donation by Monet’s son, has one of the world’s largest collections of Impressionists paintings. Continue to Rouen in Normandy where four nights are spent. Day 2: Honfleur, Le Havre. Honfleur is an utterly delightful fishing village at the mouth of the Seine, now crammed with art galleries and antique shops. In the museum are many works by Eugène Boudin, a major influence on the Impressionists. Cross the Seine estuary to Le Havre. After a recent donation and refurbishment, the Musée André Malraux has become the second largest collection of Impressionists in
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France and in 2013 hosts the exhibition Pissarro & the Harbours. Day 3: Giverny. The morning is devoted to the premier site in the history of Impressionism, Monet’s house and garden at Giverny where he lived from 1883 until his death in 1926, designing and tending the gardens which grew in size as his prosperity increased. Also at Giverny is the newly reconstituted Musée des Impressionismes (formerly Le Musée d’Art Américain) displaying the exhibition Signac, the Colours of Water. Return in the mid-afternoon to Rouen to study the cathedral, the subject of over 30 of Monet’s paintings. Day 4: Rouen, Fécamp, Étretat. Spend the morning in Rouen at the Musée des Beaux Arts, which will host the exhibition Reflected Colour,
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History of Impressionism continued
Le Corbusier Through France & Switzerland
Impressionism and the Water’s Surface. Paintings depicting the river Seine, rowing boats, bridges, floods and Venice, all such fascinating subjects for the Impressionists, are to be displayed. Drive in the afternoon to Fécamp, site of the dramatic coastline that Monet loved to paint for the exhibition The Cliffs of Monet. Continue to Étretat to see the Porte d’Amont and the Porte d’Aval. Day 5: Auvers, Paris. Auvers-sur-Oise was a popular artists’ colony, frequented by Impressionists and Post-Impressionists. See sights associated with Van Gogh, who spent the last few weeks of his life here, and the studio of Daubigny. Return to Paris and visit the Musée des Beaux Arts in the Petit Palais, an underappreciated collection for which space has recently been expanded. Overnight Paris. Day 6: Paris. Walk through the Tuileries Gardens to the Orangerie where an excellent collection of Impressionists, Monet’s famous water-lilies and 20th-century paintings are housed. Cross the river to the Musée d’Orsay; here, in newly renovated galleries, are displayed not only the world’s finest collection of Impressionism but also masterpieces by important precursors such as Courbet and Millet. Return to London by Eurostar, arriving St Pancras at c. 5.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,220 (deposit £200). This includes: travel (1st class, standard premier) on Eurostar; private coach within France; accommodation; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 4 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager; hire of radio guides for better audibility of the lecturer. Single supplement £290 (double for sole use). Price without Eurostar £1,990. Hotels: in Rouen (4 nights): a modern 3–star hotel in the historic centre of Rouen, a few minutes walk from the Cathedral. The rooms are well-appointed and comfortable. In Paris (1 night): a comfortable 4-star hotel with an excellent location near the Louvre. Refurbished in a traditional style. How strenuous? A fair amount of walking, particularly in the town centres, as well as standing in art galleries, and some long drives. You will need to lift your luggage on and off the train and wheel it within stations. Average distance by coach per day: 82 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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Left: La Tourette, photo from The Architectural Review June 1961; right: sketches of the Villa Savoye.
20–28 April 2013 (mz 532) 9 days • £3,240 Lecturer: Dr Harry Charrington A wide survey of works by one of the greatest architects of all time. From Paris through the east of France and the Swiss Jura to Lyon and Marseille. First-class rail travel by Eurostar and TGV. Le Corbusier has left later generations of architects a problem. It sometimes seems that whatever design solutions they may dream up, Corb arrived there before. And that is without conscious imitation of the master, though no architect has been more imitated. His energy, his gimlet intelligence and his ambition would have made him master of whatever profession he had chosen, but the fertility of his artistic genius and joy in creation turned him into one of the greatest architects of all time, and the most influential one of the twentieth century. The exploration of the origins of the look of the modern world will be a fascinating aspect of this tour, but it is likely that the dominant impression will be of the sheer beauty of Le Corbusier’s buildings. There is far more of subtlety, nuance, sophistication and variety than might be expected of someone often simplistically classed as one of the instigators of International Modernism. He was an individual, not merely a representative of a style
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or movement. His impact was felt not only through his buildings – which are scattered across four continents – but also through numerous unexecuted projects, voluminous writings, and lecture tours. This tour concentrates on the rich seam of his works to be quarried in Paris and in an arc out to the east of France, through the Swiss Jura and down through Lyon to Marseille – much of it passing fine natural scenery. It covers a considerable distance, but does give as complete a picture of Le Corbusier’s architecture as can be expected in a tour of this duration. Begin in Paris where Le Corbusier settled when he was thirty, and emerged as a central figure in what became the intellectual capital of Europe in the inter-war years. End in Marseille where Le Corbusier finally realised his collectivist vision of the Mediterranean good life. Some buildings are in private hands and we see them from the outside, others are public and accessible, and a few will be entered by special arrangement. For some participants it will be a voyage of discovery, for others a pilgrimage to long-revered sites. None is likely to be disappointed.
Itinerary Day 1: Paris. Travel by Eurostar at c.10.30am from London St Pancras to Paris. Paris is the site of Corb’s purest statements and of his b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
pieces of Corbusian town planning actually executed with the master’s involvement, and the site became the largest ensemble of his buildings outside Chandigarh. Also designed by Corbusier are the Maison de Culture, with its dramatically canted side wall, the sports stadium, and the Unité d’Habitation. The astonishing church of St Pierre was finally completed in 2007, and there is a revelatory Le Corbusier museum. Free afternoon in Lyon to explore the historic centre or some of Lyon’s striking modern buildings (Tony Garnier, Renzo Piano) or the Jean Nouvel opera house. Day 8: Marseille. Travel south by TGV. All his life Corb had been concerned with issues of housing, urbanism and community, and the fruits of his thinking are to be found in the ‘Unité d’Habitation’ apartment blocks. The one at Marseille (1945–52), though dogged by opposition and delays, is the most monumental embodiment of these theories. Overnight in Marseille. Day 9: Marseille. Some free time in Marseille or join the lecturer for a walk through the old town. Return home by plane, arriving at London Gatwick at c. 5.35pm.
Marseilles, rue Cannebière, wood engraving c. 1875.
first large commissions. Visit Villa la RocheJeanneret which now houses the Fondation Le Corbusier, and the Immeuble Molitor (1934) in which Le Corbusier created the top floor apartment for himself. First of two nights in Paris. Day 2: Paris. On the western outskirts, at Poissy, is Le Corbusier’s lyrically beautiful Villa Savoye (1929), one of the icons of the 20th century. Back in central Paris see Jean Nouvel’s Institut du Monde Arabe, a remarkable building with splendid views of the city. Walk through the Quartier Masséna, home to the Bibliothèque National de France (Dominique Perrault, 1996) and a new development that includes the Jardin des Grands-Moulins, created in 2011. Overnight Paris. Day 3: Paris, Besançon. At the Cité Universitaire, the Pavillon Suisse (hall of residence, 1930) became one of the most influential buildings of International Modernism. The Pavillon Brésilien (1959) attempts an expression of national style while the Atelier Ozenfant (1922) (exterior) was the studio-residence of painter-critic and fellow purist. Take the TGV (high speed train) from Paris to Besançon. First of three nights in Besançon. Day 4: La Chaux-de-Fonds (Switzerland). The son of a watchmaker, Le Corbusier’s home town for thirty years was La Chaux-de-Fonds, and here he built his first houses. The Villa Fallet (1908) (exterior), was a commission Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
obtained by Le Corbusier when he was only 18, and the Villas Stotzer and Jacquemet (exterior) when he was still under the influence of the Arts and Crafts movement and Ruskin. Classicism, rationalism and modern building techniques began to prevail in the Villas Jeanneret (1912, for his own family) and Schwob (1916) (visit by special arrangement). See also Le Corbusier archive material in town library (by special arrangement). Overnight Besançon. Day 5: Ronchamp, Besançon. Drive into the countryside to the Benedictine monastery at Ronchamp, whose hill-top chapel, NôtreDame-du-Haut (1950), resulted in charges of treachery from hard-line modernists but has proved prophetic in embracing organic, sculptural values. Some free time in Besançon, a lovely hill town dominated by a massive citadel. Overnight Besançon. Day 6: Arc et Senans, L’Arbresle. The route turns southwest, with a break at La Saline Royale, the remarkable industrial complex in romantic Neo-Classical style (1775) by Ledoux, one of Le Corbusier’s inspirations. His second monastic commission, the hillside Couvent de La Tourette at l’Arbresle, was obtained because his agnosticism was regarded as of less significance than the sacred values of his architecture. Continue south to Lyon. First of two nights in Lyon. Day 7: Lyon, Firminy-Vert. The new town at Firminy-Vert (1956–70) was one of the few
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Practicalities Price: £3,240 (deposit £300). This includes: rail travel (1st class, standard premier) on Eurostar, TGV (2 journeys, train times not confirmed until 2 months before departure); flight Marseille to London with British Airways (aircraft: Boeing 737); travel by private coach; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts and 6 dinners with wine, water, coffee, plus light meals on Eurostar; all admissions; all gratuities for restaurant staff, drivers, guides; all state taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £250. Price without international travel £2,960. Hotels: in Paris (2 nights): a 4-star hotel near the Louvre, refurbished in a traditional style. In Besançon (3 nights): a recently renovated 3-star hotel in the historic centre. Décor is contemporary. In Lyon (2 nights): a stylish 5-star hotel, well-situated on the Presqu’île. In Marseille (1 night): a 4-star hotel in a 1950s building overlooking the harbour. Bright, modernist décor. How strenuous? This is a tiring tour with a lot of travel and several hotel changes. There is also quite a lot of walking within the cities visited. For the train journeys you will need to be able to carry your luggage on and off the train and within the stations. Average distance by coach per day: 38 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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Alsace Both Sides of The Rhine in France & Germany 3–10 September 2013 (ma 672) 8 days • £2,630 Lecturer: Dr Cathy Oakes Architecture, art and history around the Upper Rhine in France and Germany. Mediaeval and Early Modern periods predominate. Exceedingly lovely towns and villages, amid lush landscapes of vineyards, rolling farmland and wooded hills. Stay in one hotel throughout, a beautifully restored 16th-century Alsatian Inn. Rail travel from London to Strasbourg by Eurostar and TGV. It is one of the oddities of modern Europe that Alsace belongs to France. Historically, culturally and linguistically, the region has had more in common with its German neighbour to the east of the Rhine. Alsace is a hybrid. The Alsatians are descendants of the Teutonic tribes who settled here in the fifth century. In the Middle Ages most of the region, along with a chunk of Switzerland, formed part of the German duchy of Swabia, which owed allegiance to the Holy Roman Empire. Two of the imperial families, the Hohenstaufen and the Habsburgs, had their principal domains in the region, on both sides of the Rhine. The major cities – Strasbourg, Colmar and Freiburg – were among the greatest of the independent free cities of the Rhineland, the economic powerhouse of transalpine Europe. Only in relatively recent history has the Upper Rhine become a disputed border between antagonistic powers. In the Middle Ages and for long after the river was not a
divisive factor but a unifying highway, the meeting place for goods, peoples and ideas from both sides. The acquisition by France in 1648 of the left bank – modern-day Alsace – paid no heed to linguistic, religious or cultural considerations. Indeed, it reverted to the German Empire for 47 years after the FrancoPrussian war of 1871. This tour ignores modern national boundaries. This way the immensely rich artistic and cultural heritage can be fully appreciated, and stylistic variations be seen as regional inflections rather than national differences. A leitmotif of the tour is the exceptionally rich collection of late mediaeval altarpieces. Alsace is also rich in mediaeval church architecture, both Romanesque and Gothic.
Itinerary Day 1: London to Strasbourg. Leave London St Pancras by Eurostar at c. 9.30am for Paris, and continue by TGV (high-speed train) to Strasbourg. Arriving before 5.00pm, there is plenty of time to settle into the hotel, for an introductory talk and dinner. All seven nights are spent in Strasbourg. Day 2: Strasbourg. Since the High Middle Ages, Strasbourg has been one of the most important intellectual and cultural centres of Europe, and is now seat of the European parliament. The cathedral, constructed and adorned over several centuries, is one of the greatest monuments of Gothic art and architecture in Europe. Visit also the cathedral museum and the church of St Thomas (extravagant tomb of Maréchal de Saxe) and enjoy the picturesque streets and canals.
Day 3: Colmar. Colmar is an exceedingly attractive town with richly ornamented halftimbered and stone buildings lining the streets and canals. The Gothic church of St Martin contains the Virgin of the Rose Garden, an altarpiece by Schongauer (1473). The Musée d’Unterlinden has an outstanding collection of 15th- and 16th-century pictures, chief of which is Grünewald’s Issenheim altarpiece, the most searing of all images of the Crucifixion. Day 4: Molsheim, Rosheim, Obernai. A day of small places. Molsheim has a Jesuit church and a Carthusian monastery. The chapel of St Ulrich in Avolsheim was built in the 10th century and contains 13th-century frescoes. In Obernai, visit the Romanesque church of St Pierre. Rosheim possesses a number unspoilt mediaeval houses and the 12th-century church of St Pierre et Paul. In the heart of wine-producing countryside, Obernai is partly surrounded by fine ramparts. Day 5: Kaysersberg, Murbach. Kaysersberg is a remarkably unchanged mediaeval village with delightful houses, castle, bridge, and a church with a very fine carved altarpiece. In the afternoon drive south through the lovely hill scenery of the Massif du Ballon d’Alsace. Nestling in wooded hills, the Romanesque abbey at Murbach was the most important in the region, and its Romanesque church is correspondingly magnificent. Day 6: Niederrotweil, Freiburg, Breisach. Cross the Rhine to Germany. The parish churches at Breisach and Niederrotweil each have a most beautiful late Gothic altarpiece carved by the so-called Master HL with an extraordinary swirling design. Freiburg im Breisgau is one of the best preserved old towns in Germany. At its centre is the minster, a magnificent Gothic construction with the tallest spire completed in the Middle Ages. The excellent city museum has recently reopened after major restoration. Day 7: Strasbourg. Free morning followed by a visit to the Palais Rohan and its museums of fine and decorative arts in the afternoon. Day 8: Leave Strasbourg at c. 10.45am by TGV for Paris and continue by Eurostar to London St Pancras, arriving c. 4.45pm.
Strasbourg, after a late-19th-century drawing.
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Mediaeval Burgundy Abbeys & churches of the high Middle Ages Practicalities Price: £2,630 (deposit £250). This includes: rail travel (1st class, standard premier) by Eurostar from London to Paris; TGV from Paris to Strasbourg (times confirmed two months before departure); private coach travel; accommodation as below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 5 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £360. Price without Eurostar £2,410. Hotel: a beautifully restored, wellestablished 4-star hotel, located close to the cathedral and the Palais Rohan. Rooms maintain many of the original features of the building, but decor is contemporary. Included dinners are at selected restaurants elsewhere. How strenuous? There is a fair amount of walking and standing around within the towns. Many town centres are only accessible on foot, and paving may be cobbled or uneven. You need to be able to lift your luggage on and off the train and wheel it within stations. Average distance by coach per day: 55 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
The Rite of Spring May 2013 Details available December 2012 Contact us to register your interest
Opera in Paris & Versailles 12–16 April 2013 Contact us now for the full details or visit www.martinrandall.com Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
8–15 June 2013 (mz 598) 8 days • £2,320 Lecturer: John McNeill Superb collection of Romanesque and early Gothic buildings. Exceptionally well-preserved historic towns. Rural drives through beautiful landscapes. First class rail travel. The key to understanding mediaeval Burgundy is its situation, a cradle of wooded hills drained by three great river systems flowing, respectively, to the north, south and west. Not only did this lend the area the status of a lieu de passage, but it guaranteed its importance, ensuring that the mediaeval duchy was open to the forms and traditions of far-flung regions. Remarkably, much of Burgundy’s mediaeval infrastructure survives. Even extending back as far as the ninth century, for in the interlocking spaces of the lower church at St-Germain d’Auxerre one might catch a glimpse of western Carolingian architecture and painting, a glimpse that presents this most distant of periods at its most inventive and personal. It is equally the case that while the great early Romanesque basilicas which once studded the underbelly of the Ilede-France are now reduced to a ghost of their former selves, what survives in Burgundy is sublimely impressive, as one might see in that great quartet of crypts at Dijon, Auxerre, Flavigny and Tournus. As elsewhere, the twelfth century is well represented, though the depth of exploratory work undertaken here cannot fail to impress. The fundamental Romanesque research was probably conducted to the south, at Cluny and in the Brionnais, but the take-up in central Burgundy was immediate, and in the naves of Vézelay and Autun one might see two of the most compelling essays on the interaction of sculpture and architecture twelfth-century Europe has produced. Nor were Cistercians slow to tailor Burgundian architecture to suit their needs, and though her great early monasteries have now perished at least Fontenay survives, ranking among the most breathtaking monastic sites
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Dijon, Notre Dame, engraving from the Journal Universel c. 1870.
of mediaeval France. Gothic also arrived early, and there began a second wave of experimentation, tentative at first but blossoming in the centre (where the new choir at Vézelay is the first intimation we have that Gothic architecture had a future outside northern France) into perhaps the most lucid of all architectural styles. It is thus no surprise that the thirteenth century saw the region at the cutting edge of Europe. At Auxerre a definitive account of space as illusion took shape, and at Semur-en-Auxois a theatre of stone clambered aboard the church. Moreover, the patrons invested heavily in glass. No thirteenth-century church was without it - and most have retained it, blazing the interior with a heady combination of light, meaning and colour. This sublime vigour even continued into the later middle ages, where under the Valois dukes of Burgundy Dijon became a major artistic centre, attracting artists of the calibre of Rogier van der Weyden and Claus Sluter.
Itinerary Day 1. Take the Eurostar at c. 9.30am from London St Pancras to Paris and then onwards by TGV (high-speed train) to Mâcon. Continue by coach to Tournus where two nights are spent. Day 2: Cluny, Berzé-la-Ville, Tournus. Cluny is the site of the largest church and most powerful monastery in mediaeval France. Study the magnificent remains of the church and monastic buildings. The tiny chapel at Berzé-la-Ville was perhaps built as the abbot of Cluny’s private retreat, and is embellished with superb wall paintings of c. 1100. At Tournus
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Mediaeval Burgundy continued
see the striking and immensely influential early 11th-century monastery. Day 3: Beaune, Autun, Dijon. The 15thcentury Hôtel-Dieu in Beaune houses Rogier van der Weyden’s Last Judgement. The stalwart Romanesque church of Notre-Dame has fine tapestries. At Autun the cathedral of St Lazare is celebrated for its sublime sequence of Romanesque capitals and relief sculptures by Gislebertus. First of three nights in Dijon. Day 4: St Thibault, Semur-en Auxois, Fontenay. The church of the market town of St Thibault has a 13th-cent. choir that is the most graceful Burgundian construction of
the period. The fortified hill town of Semuren Auxois has a splendid Gothic collegiate church. The tranquil abbey of Fontenay is the earliest Cistercian church to survive and has an exceptionally well-preserved monastic precinct. Favigny-sur-Ozerain is a lovely little town. Day 5: Dijon. A day dedicated to Burgundy’s capital and one of the most attractive of French cities with many fine buildings from 11th to 18th centuries. St Bénigne has an ambitious early Romanesque crypt. Notre-Dame is a quite stunning early Gothic parish church. The palace of the Valois dukes now houses a museum with extensive collections of work from the period of their rule (1364–1477).
Day 6: Saulieu, Avallon, Vézelay. Visit the Basilique St-Andoche in Saulieu, with carved capitals depicting flora, fauna and biblical stories. Drive north to Avallon, whose fine Romanesque church is spectacularly situated above the river Cousin. Vézelay, a picturesque hill town whose summit is occupied by the abbey of La Madeleine, was one of the great pilgrimage centres of the Middle Ages, and has one of the most impressive of all 12th-century churches for both its architecture and its sculpture. First of two nights in Auxerre. Day 7: Auxerre. The morning includes the magnificent Carolingian crypt of St Germain and the cathedral, a pioneering 13th-century building with exceptional glass and sculpture. The afternoon is free. Day 8: Sens. The striking cathedral of Sens is among the earliest Gothic churches of Europe, housing important glass and an exquisitely carved 12th- and 13th-century west front. The diocesan museum also houses an extensive collection of Roman and mediaeval antiquities. Take the Eurostar from Paris arriving London St Pancras c. 6.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,320 (deposit £250). This includes: Eurostar (first class, standard premier) London to Paris, and TGV (high-speed train) Paris to Dijon (times confirmed 2 months before departure); private coach; accommodation as described below; breakfasts and 6 dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admissions; all tips for waiters and drivers; all state taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £280 (double room for sole use). Price without Eurostar and TGV £2,010. Hotels: in Tournus (2 nights): 4-star hotel formerly a 15th-century guard house, located on the ramparts of the town. In Dijon (3 nights): a centrally located, comfortable 4-star hotel furnished to a high standard. In Auxerre (2 nights): a 3-star hotel in a delightful 18thcentury hôtel particulier. How strenuous? Quite a lot of walking, some of it on steep hillsides, and standing around. Plenty of coach travel and three hotels. You will need to be able to lift your luggage on and off the train and wheel it within stations. Average distance by coach per day: 70 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Vézelay, Abbey of La Madaleine, after a drawing by René Piot, c. 1920.
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Châteaux of the Loire The Renaissance in France Château de Langeais, after a drawing by A.B. Atkinson from Touraine and Its Story 1906.
26–29 May 2013 (mz 581) 4 days • £1,490 Lecturer: Caroline Holmes Only the best of the houses and gardens in the region. Stay at a château hotel in the centre of the area. First-class rail travel on Eurostar. The region around the lower reaches of the Loire was exceptional in a country still dominated by over-mighty French monarchs and riven by factionalism until well into the seventeenth century. The relative stability of a territory submissive to royal writ, the prosperity arising from highly productive agricultural land and river-borne trade, and the excellent hunting, all provided the conditions for a building boom. Especially towards the end of the fifteenth century and during the first half of the sixteenth, a plethora of palaces, hunting lodges and country retreats were erected at the behest of members of the royal family, their mistresses and their loyal followers. These beautiful residential buildings have become paradigmatic in popular culture for furnishing the world-wide image of a fairy-tale palace. More importantly they were seminal in architectural history by constituting the first significant ultramontane manifestation of the Italian Renaissance. The sudden and whole-hearted admiration for all things Italian documented by the châteaux of the Loire was stimulated, ironically, by French invasions of Italy which began under Charles VIII in 1494 and came to an end under François I thirty years later. The distinctive and affecting feature of these buildings was that Italianate motifs were grafted onto what were essentially Flamboyant Gothic forms. Round-headed arches, square-headed windows, classical pilasters and ancient Roman candelabra decoration blend with cylindrical towers and turrets, conical spires, high-pitched roofs and elaborate dormers to produce an effect which is Italianate but unmistakably French. It was not a case of importing wholesale the principles of Brunelleschi and Bramante but the creation of an original – and highly influential – synthesis. Most of the châteaux are well furnished and much decoration survives or has been well recreated (contrary to the widespread myth that French châteaux are empty). Several of them have gardens, among which are some extraordinarily fine recreations of the original Renaissance design. This itinerary provides a balanced and varied selection, and aims to sidestep the crowds.
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Itinerary Day 1: Chenonceau. Travel by Eurostar at c. 9.30am from London St Pancras to Paris. Continue south by coach to Chenonceau. Of surpassing beauty and surmounting a bridge across the River Cher, the Château of Chenonceau (‘des Dames’) is deservedly one of France’s most treasured sights. Transformation of the castle began in 1515 and continued intermittently for much of the 16th century. Stylistically it leads from an embellished castle keep to the supremely successful Mannerism of the long galleries across the river. Continue to the hotel in Chargé where all three nights are spent. Day 2: Azay-le-Rideau, Langeais, Villandry Lapped by the River Indre, Azay-le-Rideau is a jewel of the French Renaissance, replete with angle turrets, elaborate gables, classicising pilasters and evocative interiors. With its formidable defensive towers Langeais, reconstructed from the 1470s, is scarcely affected by Renaissance taste and has a good collection of mediaeval furniture and tapestries. Villandry is an excellent 1530s château with three arcaded wings but its chief glories are the tiers of formal gardens, recreated in the 20th century according to 16th-century designs and principles. We visit in the late afternoon, when the crowds have subsided, and return to the hotel at c. 7.00pm. Day 3: Beauregard, Blois, Chambord. Beauregard has a unique 17th-century gallery lined with 327 portraits of historical persons. The three wings of the castle at Blois were built in the latest fashion respectively for Louis XII from 1498, François I from 1515 and, the brother of Louis XIII (by Mansart) from 1635.
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There is time in the delightful town of Blois to see its gardens, churches and museums. The creation of François I and the most ambitious of the Loire châteaux, Chambord startles by its vast size. Outstanding are the double helix stairway and the fantastical roofscape of cones, wedges, elaborate gables and chimney stacks. Day 4: Cheverny. Built in the 1630s, Cheverny is as elegant and restrained as Baroque can get and is unmistakably French with its chiselled façade and dramatic roofline, and sumptuously decorated and furnished interiors. Drive to Paris and then continue by Eurostar to London St Pancras, arriving c. 7.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,490 (deposit £200). This includes: return rail travel by Eurostar (1st class, standard premier) from London to Paris; private coach for transfers and excursions; hotel accommodation as described below; all breakfasts and 3 dinners with wine, water and coffee, plus meals on Eurostar; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer; hire of radio guides for better audibility of the lecturer. Single supplement £180. Price without Eurostar £1,270. Hotel: a 4-star hotel in Chargé in a converted château and manor house on the river Loire. Rooms are traditionally-furnished and spacious. How strenuous? Although a short tour there is quite a lot of standing around and walking. You need to be able to lift your luggage on and off the train. Average distance by coach per day: 119 miles (most driving is on days 1 & 4). Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
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Roman & Mediaeval Provence The south of France in the middle ages 11–17 October 2013 (ma 738) 7 days • £2,060 Lecturer: Dr Alexandra Gajewski The many fine Roman remains had a decisive impact on mediaeval architecture and sculpture. Truly great secular buildings, including the papal palace at Avignon, and pre-eminent Romanesque churches. A natural setting of exceptional attractiveness. Led by an architectural historian. Based throughout at a 4-star hotel in Avignon. Can be combined with The Rhône Music Festival, 17–24 October 2013. Famed for its natural beauty, its wealth of Augustan and second-century monuments, and the quality and ambition of its mediaeval work, Provence can seem the very essence of Mediterranean France. But its settlement was – historically – surprisingly concentrated, and the major Roman and mediaeval centres are clustered within the valleys of the Durance and Rhône. This is the area which was marked out for development in the first and second centuries AD, and the range and quantity of Roman work which survives at Orange, St-Rémy and
Arles is impressive. Indeed, as one moves into the Late Antique period it is precisely this triangle which blossoms – and in Arles one is witness to the most significant Early Christian city of Mediterranean Gaul. This Roman infrastructure is fundamental, and the pre-eminent Romanesque churches of Provence may come as something of a surprise, being notable both for a predilection for sheer wall surfaces and an indebtedness to earlier architectural norms. But it is above all the sculpture which is most susceptible to this sort of historicising impulse. The Romanesque sculpture of Provence is more skilfully and self-consciously antique than any outside central Italy, and is often organised in a manner designed to evoke either fourth-century sarcophagi, or Roman theatres and triumphal arches. The façade of St-Trophime at Arles is a well-known examples of this, but it is a theme we also encounter in many of the smaller churches – places such as Pernes-les-Fontaines and Montmajour – where exquisite friezes of acanthus and vinescroll are used to both elaborate and articulate exteriors of stunning delicacy. For once the truly great late mediaeval buildings we see are secular – René d’Anjou’s superb donjon and château at Tarascon and, supremely, the mighty papal palace at Avignon.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 1.30pm from London Gatwick to Marseille. Drive to Avignon, where all six nights are spent. Day 2: Avignon. The Palais des Papes is the principal monument of the Avignon papacy, one-time site of the papal curia and by far the most significant 14th-century building to survive in southern France. The collections of late Gothic sculpture and painting in the Petit-Palais act as a splendid foil to the work at the papal palace, while the cathedral houses the magnificent tomb of Pope John XXII. Day 3: Pernes-les-Fontaines, Vaison, Venasque. Gentle stroll through Pernes, a delightful fortified river town with an important Romanesque church and 13thcentury frescoed tower. At Vaison-la-Romaine the sublime late Romanesque cathedral is attached to a northern cloister. Drive over the Dentelles de Montmirail to the stunning early mediaeval baptistery at Venasque. Day 4: Villeneuve, Orange, Tarascon, Pontdu-Gard. A day spent mostly within sight of the Rhône, beginning with Pope Innocent VI’s now ruined Charterhouse at Villeneuve-lezAvignon. The day’s highlight is Orange, site of the greatest of all surviving western Roman Avignon, Palais des Papes, aquatint by Sir Francis Barry.
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Toulouse & Albi The Haut-Languedoc & the Rouergue theatres. Visit René d’Anjou’s mighty riverside château at Tarascon and that astonishing feat of engineering that brought water over the River Gardon at the Pont-du-Gard.
of the great churches on the pilgrimage route to Compostela. The tympanum depicting The Last Judgement is one of the most beautiful and sophisticated works of Romanesque art and the treasury contains many fine works of Mediaeval art including some from the Carolingian era and the shrine of Ste Foy. Rodez cathedral, a manifestation of north European dominance and orthodoxy, built after the Albigensian Crusade, is attributed to Jean des Champs.
Day 5: St-Rémy-de-Provence. Drive along the northern flank of the Alpilles to St-Rémy-deProvence, Glanum of old, and proud possessor of one of the truly great funerary memorials of the Roman world, the cenotaph erected in honour of the grandsons of Augustus, Gaius and Lucius. Some free time. Day 6: Montmajour, Arles. Explore the superlative complex of churches, cemeteries and conventual buildings that once constituted the abbey of Montmajour. In Arles the amphitheatre is a justly famous early 2ndcentury structure of a type developed from the Colosseum. The Romanesque Cathedral of St-Trophime is home to one of the greatest cloisters of 12th-century Europe. The Musée de l’Arles Antique houses a quite spellbinding collection of classical and early Christian art.
Albi Cathedral, engraving after a drawing 1895.
Day 7: Silvacane, Aix-en-Provence. At Silvacane, a major late 12th-century Cistercian abbey, the monastic buildings descend a series of terraces down to the River Durance. Finally visit Aix, where the cathedral provides an enthralling end to the tour, with its extraordinary juxtaposition of Merovingian baptistery, Romanesque cloister, 13th-century chancel and late mediaeval west front. Fly from Marseille, arriving at London Gatwick at c. 5.00pm, or take the train to Lyon at c. 2.00pm to join The Rhône Music Festival (contact us to register for advance details for the festival).
9–15 October 2012 (mz 395) 7 days • £2,520 Lecturer: Dr Alexandra Gajewski
Practicalities
Itinerary
Price: £2,060 (deposit £200); this includes: flights (economy class) with British Airways (Boeing 737); travel by private coach; hotel accommodation; breakfasts and 4 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager; hire of radio guides for better audibility of the lecturer. Single supplement £270. Price without flights £1,840.
Day 1. Fly at 2.30pm from London Heathrow to Toulouse.
Hotel: 4-star hotel in Avignon, a converted 16th-century convent. Some rooms are in a modern extension. Near the Palais des Papes. How strenuous? Quite a lot of walking is involved, particularly in the town centres. There are some long days and coach journeys. Average distance by coach per day: 53 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Contact us for the full details or visit www.martinrandall.com One of the most beautiful regions in France. Predominantly Mediaeval but with many fine examples of Romanesque and Late Gothic. Based throughout in Toulouse.
Day 2: Toulouse. The Jacobin, a Dominican church, resembles a monastic refectory on a vast scale. The buildings of the Augustinians survive as a museum with a splendid collection of Romanesque sculpture. The eastern arm of the cathedral, perhaps by Jean des Champs, is joined to a nave of local workmanship on a much smaller scale, to bizarre effect. Day 3: Moissac, Cahors. The abbey at Moissac was extremely influential in 11th and 12th centuries. Enclosed in a meander of the river Lot, Cahors was a flourishing commercial and university town in the Middle Ages. The Valentré bridge is a remarkable example of mediaeval military architecture and the cathedral has a fine Romanesque tympanum and Renaissance cloisters. Day 4: Conques, Rodez. Conques is very much off the beaten track but was once one
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Day 5: Albi. Spend the whole day in Albi, a small town of considerable charm set on the banks of the river Tarn. The cathedral is a potent symbol of the crushing of the Cathars, the building being as much a fortress as a church. There is a remarkable carved stone rood screen in late Flamboyant Gothic style. Visit the Toulouse-Lautrec Museum, housed in the episcopal palace, the greatest collection of this local artist’s work. Some free time to explore the historic centre, predominantly mediaeval and renaissance, with a number of wellpreserved brick, timber and stone mansions. Day 6: Castres, Carcassonne. Drive through the Montagne Noire, the southernmost tip of the Massif Central. Stop at the pleasant small town of Castres, which has a museum dedicated to the works of Goya. The spectacular walled town of Carcassonne in the valley of the Aude, with crenellated walled circuit, was famously restored by Violet-le-Duc. Visit the exquisite church of St Nazaire, with fine stained glass and statues. Day 7: Toulouse. The basilica of St Sernin is the most famous and most magnificent of the great pilgrimage churches in southern France on the route to Compostela, and a major monument of Romanesque architecture. Fly Toulouse to London Heathrow (arrive 7.00pm).
Practicalities – in brief Price: £2,520 (deposit £250). Single supplement £340 (double room for sole use). Price without flights £2,370. Hotel: 4-star hotel in a 17th-century convent set back from the Place du Capitole,Toulouse. How strenuous? Quite a lot of walking and some days involve a lot of driving. Average distance by coach per day: 89 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants. For fuller details, contact us or visit www.martinrandall.com
The Pyrenees, 7–16 May 2013 see pages 168–169.
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Modern art
on the Côte d’Azur 16–23 October 2012 (mz 401) 8 days • £2,310 Lecturer: Monica Bohm Duchen Christmas departure: 21–28 December 2012 (mz 446) 8 days • £2,820 Lecturer: Monica Bohm Duchen 5–12 March 2013 (mz 499) 8 days • £2,360 Lecturer: Professor John Milner 10–17 October 2013 (ma 736) 8 days • £2,360 Lecturer: Monica Bohm Duchen Europe’s greatest concentration of classic modern art in the idyllic Mediterranean setting where it was created. Old and new collections, with outstanding work by Renoir, Bonnard, Braque, Leger, Miro, Giacometti, Cocteau, Chagall, Matisse, Picasso.
Natural resources and climate have drawn invaders and visitors to Nice and its surroundings from the Greek colonists of classical times to the jet-set of today. But from the late nineteenth century a special category of visitor – and settler – has transformed the Côte d’Azur into the greatest concentration of modern art in Europe. Monet first visited Antibes in 1883; Signac bought a house in the fishing village of StTropez in 1892. Matisse’s first visit to the Midi in 1904 transformed his art, and from 1918 he spent more time on the Côte d’Azur than in Paris. Matisse, Chagall and Picasso are merely among the most illustrious of the artists who chose to live in the South of France. Many of their fellow modernisers followed suit: Braque, Bonnard, Dufy, Picabia. This tour is an extraordinary opportunity to see how modernity relates to the past as well as the present, and how gallery displays can be centred on the art, the location or the patron/collector. In Matisse’s Chapelle du
Rosaire at Vence, traditional arts and crafts have been revived by a modern genius, as in the monumental mosaic and glass designs of Léger which can be seen at Biot. There are also echoes of collecting habits of earlier eras in the Villa Ephrussi de Rothschild. The mixture of past and present and the juxtaposition of the Goût Rothschild with the beauty of its location are breathtaking. (Graham Sutherland drew exotic flowers and plants in the extraordinary gardens.) At Antibes the Picasso Museum is housed in the Château Grimaldi, lent to Picasso as studio space in 1946 where he produced lifeaffirming paintings. Old and new galleries abound, such as the Fondation Maeght, St-Paul-de-Vence, whose building (designed by José Luis Sert, 1963) makes it a work of outstanding sympathy to its natural surroundings, in gardens enlivened by Miró’s Labyrinthe and other sculptures.
Visits to the coastal towns and villages which inspired the artists.
Cannes, etching by Frederick Farrell, 1920s.
Stay in Nice throughout.
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Itinerary Day 1: Nice. Fly at c. 11.45am from London Heathrow to Nice (in March from Gatwick at c. 12.00 midday). There is an afternoon visit to the Musée des Beaux Arts Jules Cheret, concentrating on their 19th- and early 20thcentury holdings (Monet, Renoir, Dufy, etc.). All seven nights are spent in Nice. Day 2: Nice, Vence. The Marc Chagall Museum has the largest collection of the artist’s works, notably the seventeen canvases of the Biblical Message, set in a peaceful garden in a salubrious Nice suburb. Vence, an artists’ colony, has the Chapel of the Rosary, designed and decorated by Matisse. Day 3: Antibes, Vallauris. Most of the paintings Picasso produced in his studio in the Château Grimaldi in 1946 have been donated to the town of Antibes. Vallauris is a centre of contemporary pottery revived by Picasso, whose masterpiece War and Peace is here. Day 4: St-Tropez, Biot. Drive west to StTropez, which has been popular with artists since Paul Signac settled here in 1892. The Musée de l’Annonciade is one of France’s finest collections of modern art (Signac, Maillol, Matisse, Bonnard, Vlaminck, Braque). Continue to Biot and visit the renovated Musée National Fernand Léger, built to house the artist’s works bequeathed to his wife.
Day 6: Nice. The Musée Matisse unites a wide range of the artist’s work; sculpture, ceramics, stained glass as well as painting. The afternoon is free in Nice; suggestions include the Musée
Day 7: Villefranche, Menton. In Villefranche is the small Chapelle St-Pierre, decorated by Cocteau. Along the coast to Menton, the last French town before Italy, is a new Cocteau museum (opened in 2011) and the Salle des Mariages, also painted by Cocteau. Day 8: Le Cannet. The first museum dedicated to the works of Bonnard opened in Le Cannet in 2011. Fly from Nice arriving at London Heathrow c. 4.30pm (in March arriving at London Gatwick at c. 4.45pm). In recent years, renovation work has led to museum closures. At the moment all visits listed are possible but we cannot rule out the possibility of changes.
Practicalities Price: £2,310 (Oct. 2012), £2,820 (Dec. 2012) £2,360 (all 2013) (deposit £300 Dec. 2012; all other departures £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on British Airways flights (Airbus 319); private coach; accommodation; breakfasts and 5 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer; hire of radio guides for better audibility of the lecturer. Single supplement £280. Price without flights £2,170 (Oct. 2012), £2,630 (Dec. 2012) £2,180 (all 2013). Hotel (December 2012): stylish 4-star hotel partially built into the cliff and overlooking the Promenade des Anglais. Rooms are furnished in modern Provençal style and most have a balcony. All have a sea view. Dinners are at good restaurants. Hotel (all other departures): in Nice, a charming 4-star hotel, a short walk from the Promenade des Anglais. Rooms are comfortable but vary in size. Public areas are limited. Staff are friendly. Dinners are at good restaurants. How strenuous? There is a fair amount of walking and standing around in museums. Average distance by coach per day: 51 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
The Rhône Music Festival 17–24 October 2013 Details available November 2012 Contact us to register your interest The latest addition to our series of all-inclusive music festivals on European waterways. Private performances by world-class musicians in venues appropriate to the music. Talks on the music and on the history of the region. Stay aboard a first-class river cruiser.
Music in Nice & Montecarlo March 2013 Contact us now for the full details or visit www.martinrandall.com From The Foreign Tour of Brown, Jones & Robinson 1904.
Day 5: Cap Ferrat, St-Paul-de-Vence. Drive east to St-Jean-Cap-Ferrat to see the paintings, sculpture and furniture of the Villa Ephrussi de Rothschild, a mansion set in attractive gardens. The Maeght Foundation at StPaul-de-Vence is renowned for its collections (Picasso, Hepworth, Miró, Arp, Giacometti, but not all works are shown at once) and for its architecture and setting.
d’Art Moderne et d’Art Contemporain with its excellent collection of post-war art.
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
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Music in Berlin Art, architecture & music in the German capital New Year departure: 28 Dec. 2012–2 January 2013 (mz 448) 6 days • £2,680 (with 4 performances) Lecturer: Tom Abbott 20–25 February 2013 (mz 472) 6 days • £2,470 (with 4 performances) Lecturers: Professor Jan Smaczny & Tom Abbott Berlin possesses some of the finest art galleries and museums in the world and offers the highest standards of music and opera performance. It is endowed with a range of historic architecture and is the site of Europe’s greatest concentration of first-rate contemporary architecture. Once again a national capital, it is also one of the most exciting cities on the Continent, recent and rapid changes pushing through a transformation without peacetime parallel. One of the grandest capitals in Europe for the first forty years of the last century, it then suffered appallingly from aerial bombardment and Soviet artillery. For the next forty years it was cruelly divided into two parts and became the focus of Cold War antagonism, a bizarre confrontation between an enclave of western libertarianism and hard-line Communism. Since the Wall was breached in 1989 the city has been transformed beyond recognition. From being a largely charmless urban expanse still bearing the scars of war, it has become a vibrant, liveable city, the very model of a modern major metropolis. The two halves have been knitted together and cleaning and repair have revealed the patrimony of historic architecture to be among the finest in Central
Europe. The art collections, formerly split, dispersed and often housed in temporary premises, are now coming together in magnificently restored or newly-built galleries. Berlin possesses international art and antiquities of the highest importance, as well as incomparable collections of German art. The number and variety of museums and the quality of their holdings make Berlin among the world’s most desired destinations for art lovers. With three major opera houses and several orchestras, Berlin is a city where truly outstanding performances can be virtually guaranteed.
Itinerary for New Year Day 1. Fly at c. 1.00pm from London Heathrow to Berlin Tegel. Take an orientation tour by coach: Reichstag, Brandenburg Gate, Pariser Platz and Unter den Linden. Visit the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church. Day 2. A morning walk walk through the oldest part of the city to ‘Museums Island’. Visit the Alte Nationalgalerie which superbly displays European painting of the 19th century including the finest collection of German Romantics. Then walk through the oldest part of the city, the Nikolaiviertel. Free afternoon. Opera at the Deutsche Oper: The Barber of Seville (Rossini). Day 3. Excursion to Potsdam which in the 18th century developed into Brandenburg-Prussia’s second capital and acquired fine buildings, parks and gardens. Sanssouci, created as a retreat from the affairs of state by Frederick From Pen Drawing & Pen Draughtsmen by Joseph Pennell, 1897.
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the Great, is among the finest 18th-century complexes of gardens, palaces and pavilions to be found anywhere. Visit his single-storey palace atop terraces of fruit trees, the Chinese Tea House and the orangery and see the city centre with its Dutch Quarter and NeoClassical buildings. Lunch in Potsdam before returning to Berlin. Opera at the Staatsoper (Schiller Theater): La Bohème (Puccini). Day 4, New Year’s Eve. Return to Museum Island to visit the Neues Museum, the stunning new home to the Egyptian Museum (among others), restored and recreated by British architect David Chipperfield. Also visit the Pergamon Museum, home of one of the world’s finest collections of Near Eastern antiquities including the eponymous Hellenistic altar from Anatolia. Concert at the Philharmonie with the Berlin Philharmonic, Sir Simon Rattle (conductor), Cecilia Bartoli: includes Dvořák, Slavonic Dance in C; Ravel, Daphnis et Chloé Suite No.2; Brahms, Hungarian Dance No.1. Day 5, New Year’s Day. The ‘Kulturforum’ developed before 1989 on wasteland close to the Wall as the site for several major museums, the State Library and Philharmonie (concert hall by Hans Scharoun). Visit the Gemäldegalerie, one of Europe’s major collections of Old Masters. Potsdamer Platz, for 50 years an even greater expanse of wasteland, became in the 1990s Europe’s greatest building project with an array of international architects participating. Concert at the Staatsoper with the Staatskapelle Berlin, Daniel Barenboim (conductor), Anna Samuil, Anna Lapkovskaja, Johan Botha, René Pape: Beethoven, Symphony No.9. Dinner is in the roof-top restaurant in the Reichstag, with the opportunity (without queuing) to walk around Foster’s dome. Day 6. Visit the Jewish Museum in the celebrated and expressive building by Daniel Libeskind before flying home at c. 4.30pm, arriving at Heathrow at c. 5.30pm.
Itinerary for February Day 1. Fly at c. 2.00pm from London Heathrow to Berlin Tegel. Take an orientation tour by coach: Reichstag, Brandenburg Gate, Pariser Platz and Unter den Linden. Visit the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church. Day 2. Start with a lecture as on most days then walk through the oldest part of the city to ‘Museums Island’. Visit the Neues Museum, recently restored and recreated by British architect David Chipperfield, and the Alte Nationalgalerie with European painting of the 19th century including the finest collection of German Romantics. Free afternoon. Opera at the Deutsche Oper: The Trojans (Berlioz). b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Berlin, Potsdam, Dresden Potsdam, Sansouci, the Communs, wood engraving c. 1880.
Day 3. Schloss Charlottenburg, the earliest major building in Berlin, is an outstanding Baroque and Rococo palace with splendid interiors. Free afternoon. Concert at the Philharmonie with the Berlin Philharmonic, Sir Simon Rattle (conductor), Miklos Perenyi (cello): includes Lutoslawski, Cello Concerto; Schumann, Symphony No.2. Day 4. Potsdamer Platz, for 50 years a great expanse of wasteland, became in the 1990s Europe’s greatest building project with an array of international architects participating. The ‘Kulturforum’ developed before 1989 on land close to the Wall as the site for several major museums, the State Library and Philharmonie. Visit the Gemäldegalerie, one of Europe’s major collections of Old Masters. Free afternoon. Opera at the Staatsoper (Schillertheater): The Barber of Seville (Rossini). Day 5. Walk to the Pergamon Museum, home to of one of the world’s finest collections of Near Eastern antiquities including the eponymous Hellenistic altar from Anatolia. Free afternoon: suggested visits include the Altes Museum (Classical sculpture and artefacts) and the Bode Museum (sculpture and paintings). Evening opera at the Staatsoper (Schillertheater): Aida (Verdi). Day 6. Visit to the Jewish Museum followed by lunch in the rooftop restaurant in the Reichstag, with the opportunity (without queuing) to walk around Foster’s dome. Fly at to London Heathrow arriving at c. 6.50pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,680 (New Year) £2,470 (Feb.) (deposit £250). This includes: music tickets costing c. £420 (New Year) c. £325 (Feb.); flights with BA (New Year), Lufthansa (Feb.) (Airbus A319); private coach travel; metro tickets; hotel accommodation; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 4 dinners, with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturers. Single supplement £240 (New Year). £220 (Feb.). Price without flights £2,550 (New Year), £2,330 (Feb.). Hotel: an elegant hotel decorated in Regency style, close to Unter den Linden. Rooms are of a good size and excellent standard. Music: first category tickets are confirmed for all operas and concerts. Weather (New Year): it will be cold and probably freezing at least some of the time. How strenuous? Quite a lot of walking and standing around in art galleries. Average distance by coach per day: 5 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
9–16 September 2013 (ma 707) 8 days • £2,440 Lecturer: Dr Jarl Kremeier Chief cities of Brandenburg-Prussia and Saxony, rich in fine and decorative arts. Internationally important historic and contemporary architecture. Rebuilding and restoration continues to transform the cities. Berlin is an upstart among European cities. Until the seventeenth century it was a small town of little importance, but by dint of ruthless and energetic rule, backed by the military prowess for which it became a byword, the hitherto unimportant state of BrandenburgPrussia became one of the most powerful in Germany. By the middle of the eighteenth century, with Frederick the Great at the helm, it was successfully challenging the great powers of Europe. Ambitious campaigns were instituted to endow the capital with grandeur appropriate to its new status. Palaces, public buildings and new districts were planned and constructed. At nearby Potsdam, Frederick’s second capital, he created the park of Sanssouci, among the finest ensembles of gardens, palaces and pavilions to be found anywhere. Early in the nineteenth century Berlin became of international importance architecturally when Karl Friedrich Schinkel, the greatest of Neo-Classical architects, designed several buildings there.
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Berlin has museums of art and antiquities of the highest importance. The Pergamon Museum and Gemäldegalerie are among the best of their kind and the recently opened Neues Museum, designed by David Chipperfield, provides an excellent setting for the Egyptian collection. The reunited city is now one of the most exciting in Europe. A huge amount of work has been done to knit together the two halves of the city and to rebuild and restore monuments which had been neglected for decades. Dresden was the capital of the Electorate of Saxony. Though it suffered terrible destruction during the War, rebuilding and restoration now allow the visitor to appreciate once again something of its former beauty. The great domed Frauenkirche has now been triumphantly reconstructed. Moreover, the collections of fine and applied arts are magnificent. The Old Masters Gallery in Dresden is of legendary richness, the Green Vault is the finest surviving treasury of goldwork and objets d’art, and the Albertinum reopened in 2010 to display a fine collection of nineteenth and twentieth-century art.
Itinerary Day 1: Dresden. Fly at 9.10am from London Heathrow to Berlin Brandenburg International and drive to Dresden. Take an introductory walk around the old centre of Dresden. First of three nights in Dresden. Day 2: Dresden. The Zwinger is a unique
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gardens, pavilions and a mausoleum. The Berggruen Collection of Picasso and classic modern art is also here and will have reopened after extensive renovation works. Some free time. Day 6: Berlin. In the 1990s Potsdamer Platz was Europe’s greatest building project and showcases an international array of architects (Piano, Isozaki, Rogers, Moneo). Scattered around the nearby ‘Kulturforum’ are museums, the State Library and the Philharmonie concert hall (Hans Scharoun 1956–63). The Gemäldegalerie houses one of Europe’s major collections of Old Masters. Choose between the Neue Nationalgalerie (changing exhibitions in a Mies van der Rohe building) or the Museum of Musical Instruments. In the evening, visit Norman Foster’s glass dome capping the Reichstag and have dinner in the roof-top restaurant.
Statue of Frederick the Great, wood engraving c. 1880 from Pictures From the German Fatherland.
Baroque confection, part pleasure palace, part arena for festivities and part museum for cherished collections. Visit the excellent porcelain museum and the fabulously rich Old Masters Gallery. The Green Vault of the Residenzschloss displays one of the world’s finest princely treasuries. Day 3: Dresden, Pillnitz, Groß-Sedlitz. Take a boat trip to Pillnitz, a summer palace in Chinese Rococo style, with park, gardens and collections of decorative art. Drive back to Dresden, visiting the terraced garden of GroßSedlitz en route. Day 4: Dresden, Berlin. Stroll in DresdenNeustadt on the right bank of the Elbe, little damaged in the War. Visit the domed Frauenkirche, the Protestant cathedral. Leave for Berlin by coach in the afternoon. Survey the historic architecture along and around Unter den Linden: the Arsenal, Schinkel’s Guardhouse, Frederick the Great’s Opera House, the Gendarmenmarkt with twin churches and concert hall. Relatively recent additions include the British Embassy (Michael Wilford) and the Holocaust Memorial. First of four nights in Berlin. Day 5: Berlin. Drive to Schloss Charlottenburg, the earliest major building in Berlin, an outstanding summer palace built with a Baroque core and Rococo wings, fine interiors, paintings by Watteau, extensive
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Day 7: Potsdam. The enclosed park of Sanssouci was created as a retreat from the affairs of state by Frederick the Great. It consists of gardens, parkland, palaces, pavilions and auxiliary buildings. In the afternoon, visit his relatively modest single-storey palace atop terraces of fruit trees, the exquisite Chinese teahouse and the large and imposing Neues Palais. Drive through Potsdam town centre with its Dutch quarter and cathedral by Schinkel. Day 8: Berlin. Spend the morning on ‘Museums Island’: the Altes Museum, a major Neo-Classical building by Schinkel, displays the collection of Classical antiquities; the Alte Nationalgalerie houses an excellent collection of 19th-century paintings and sculptures; the Neues Museum (elaborately restored under the direction of British architect David Chipperfield) is the new home of the Egyptian Museum (famous for the bust of Nefertiti); the Pergamon Museum has one of the world’s finest collections of Near Eastern antiquities, including the eponymous altar. Fly from Berlin Brandenburg International to Heathrow, arriving c. 6.45pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,440 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on Lufthansa flights (Airbus A320); travel by private coach and metro within Berlin; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 5 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; tips for waiters, drivers, guides; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £280. Price without flights £2,240.
Hotels: in Dresden (3 nights): a traditional 5-star hotel in a reconstructed Baroque building, tastefully decorated, with a personal, friendly atmosphere, 20 minutes walk from the Zwinger. Rooms vary in size.; in Berlin (4 nights): an elegant hotel decorated in Regency style, located close to Unter den Linden. Rooms are of a good size and of excellent standard. Music: details of opera performances will be circulated nearer the time. We will endeavour to obtain tickets as requested. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking required and standing in museums. Average distance by coach per day: 44 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
The Ring in Berlin 3–11 April 2013 (mz 507) This tour is currently full A 21st-century production of the Ring Cycle and collaboration between the Berlin Staatsoper and Teatro alla Scala, Milan. Conducted by Barenboim. Visits on most days to study the art, architecture and history of Berlin, especially more recent developments. This tour is full, however contact us to receive details for The Ring at La Scala in June 2013.
Art & Music in Dresden May 2013 Contact us now for full details or visit www.martinrandall.com
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206.
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Music in Dresden & Prague At Christmas 20–27 December 2012 (mz 443) 8 days • £2,880 Lecturers: Professor Jan Smaczny & Tom Abbott (in Dresden only) In Dresden: Un Ballo in Maschera (Verdi) and Hänsel und Gretel (Humperdinck) at the Semperoper. In Prague: Rusalka (Dvořák) and Swan Lake (Tchaikovsky) at the State Opera House. Talks by a musicologist. Programme of walks and visits with an art historian (in Dresden) and Czech guides (in Prague). Two historic 5-star hotels in both Old Towns. Dresden, capital of Saxony, was Prague’s nearest metropolitan neighbour (Vienna is twice the distance), and so the corridor of cultural exchange between the two cities was crucial to the history of both. From early in the seventeenth century, Dresden has been one of the most important operatic centres north of the Alps. Performing in the magnificent 19th-century theatre designed by Gottfried Semper, the modern company has built upon the long-standing tradition of high standards of musicianship and visually exciting (if not avant-garde) productions to ensure a consistently high
standard of performance. Prague has three opera houses in regular use, two of which are visited on this tour, although we only attend performances at the State Opera. The oldest, and one of Europe’s most regularly functioning eighteenth-century theatres – Don Giovanni had its première here – is the Estates Theatre. Mozart operas still continue to be performed there frequently. The other two were added in the second half of the nineteenth century, serving the Czech and German communities respectively. What is now called (misleadingly) the State Opera, with a wonderful interior of Bavarian Rococo inspiration, compensates for its lack of funding with enterprise and energy to achieve fine artistic results. This tour is led by a musicologist whose main contribution will be to give talks on the performances and on Prague as a musical city. The programme of walks and excursions will be led by an art historian in Dresden and local guides in Prague.
Itinerary Day 1: London to Berlin. Fly at c. 10.00am from London Heathrow to Berlin and travel by coach onto Dresden. Dinner in the hotel. First of three nights in Dresden. Day 2: Dresden. Introductory walk of the Altstadt to include the Catholic Court Church,
a splendid Italianate building. Visit of the great domed Frauenkirche, the Protestant Cathedral whose painstaking reconstruction was completed in 2005. Some free time. Early evening dinner. Evening opera at the Semperoper: Un Ballo in Maschera (Verdi) with Carlo Montanaro (conductor), Giorgio Berrugi (Riccardo), Marco Di Felice (Renato), Marjorie Owens (Amelia), Tichina Vaughn (Ulrica), Carolina Ullrich (Oscar), Ilhun Jung (Silvano), Tilmann Rönnebeck (Tom), Tomislav Lucic (Samuel). Day 3: Dresden. Walk to the Zwinger, a unique Baroque combination of pleasure palace, arena for festivities and showcase for cherished collections, and a visit to the Old Masters Gallery, one of Europe’s finest collections, particularly strong on the Italian and Netherlandish painting. Some free time in the afternoon or join an optional guided tour of the excellent Porcelain Collection, also housed in the Zwinger. Evening opera at the Semperoper: Hänsel und Gretel (Humperdinck) with Mihkel Kütson (conductor), Barbara Senator (Hänsel), Romy Petrick (Gretel), Sabine Brohm (Gertrud), Milana Butaeva (Witch), Elizabeth Zharoff (Sandman/Dew Fairy). Day 4: Dresden, Prague. Morning visit of the Residenzschloss to see the wonderful contents of the Green Vault, one of the world’s finest princely treasuries, once again displayed in Dresden, mid-19th-century lithograph.
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Music in Dresden & Prague at Christmas continued
their original venue. Drive beside the Elbe through forested hills and cross into the Czech Republic. Arrive in time to settle into the hotel before dinner. First of four nights in Prague. Day 5: Prague. Walk through the Old Town, a dense maze of streets and squares with buildings of all ages and an exceptionally lovely main square. A guided tour of the Estates Theatre, where Don Giovanni had its première in 1786, and a visit to the Obecni dům (‘Municipal House’) to see the glorious suite of assembly rooms created 1904–12. Optional
midnight mass at St Vitus Cathedral. Day 6: Prague, Christmas Day. An optional early drive to Prague Castle to attend mass in the Cathedral, or follow by coach midmorning. The Castle is an extensive complex with buildings of many centuries. Visit the mediaeval Royal Palace with amazing lateGothic vaulting and the Cathedral of St Vitus, a pioneering monument of High Gothic, richly embellished with chapels, tombs, altarpieces and stained glass. Optional walk through the Lesser Town which remains the most picturesque and unspoilt part of Prague. Evening ballet at the State Opera House: Swan Lake (Tchaikovsky). Day 7: Prague. Th e Klementinum is a vast Jesuit complex with library halls and chapels. See also in the Old Town the church of St James, a Gothic carcass encrusted with
Baroque finery after a fire in 1689. Walk across 14th-century Charles Bridge, the greatest such structure in Europe, wonderfully adorned with sculptures. Visit the infrequently opened Wallenstein Palace, a rare example of a 1630s residence (now the Senate), and St Nicholas, one of the greatest of Baroque churches in Central Europe. Free afternoon. Evening Opera at the State Opera House: Rusalka (Dvořák). Day 8: Prague. Fly from Prague to Heathrow arriving at c.12.15pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,880 (deposit £300). This includes: first category tickets for 3 opera performances and 1 ballet; air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (aircraft: Airbus A319 & A320 jet); private coach for some excursions and airport transfers; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts, two lunches and five dinners, with wine, water and coffee; all admission charges for museums, sites, etc.; all gratuities for restaurant staff, drivers, guides; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturers and the Czech escort, while in the Czech Republic. Single supplement £260 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £2,650. Hotels: in Dresden (3 nights): 5-star hotel in a reconstructed Baroque building, tastefully decorated with a friendly, personal atmosphere. 15 minutes walk from the Semperoper. In Prague (4 nights): 5-star hotel built in 1904 that retains the Art Nouveau theme throughout. Comfortable and elegant but not fussy with a good restaurant and café, helpful staff and wellequipped rooms. Excellently located opposite the Obecni dum, a short walk from the Old Town Square. Music tickets: first category tickets for the Semperoper (Dresden) are confirmed. The tickets for the State Opera (Prague) as well as the cast are due to be confirmed in the summer. How strenuous? There is a lot of walking, some of it over steep and roughly paved streets which can be tricky when wet or frozen. One dinner is after the opera. Average distance by coach per day: 18 miles. Weather: cold, often below freezing at least at the beginning of the day, though buildings are well heated. Snow is possible, but blue skies for much of the time are likely. Small group: this tour will operate with between 12 and 20 participants.
Prague, 20th-century etching.
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Mediaeval Saxony Carolingian, Ottonian, Romanesque Quedlinburg, wood engraving c. 1840.
15–23 July 2013 (mz 636) 9 days • £2,130 Lecturer: Dr Joachim Strupp One of the most fascinating areas of early mediaeval art and architecture. Straddling the former border between East and West Germany and still relatively little visited. Some delightful landscape and attractive towns. In amassing territory which stretched from the Atlantic to Bohemia and from the Baltic to central Italy, Charlemagne believed that he was recreating the ancient Roman Empire. Vivid expression was given to this belief by the attempts to emulate Roman forms by the builders and artists who worked on his innumerable projects of construction and embellishment. Few of these survive, but some of the most enlightening are to be seen in Saxony. The election of Henry of Saxony in 919 to the royal throne of Germany brought to an end a century of disunity and baronial misrule and ushered in a period during which the Saxon kings – two Henrys and three Ottos – achieved a partial reconstitution of Charlemagne’s empire and brought about the emergence of a nation state, arguably the first in Europe. ‘Old’ Saxony, which comprised the Harz mountains and the undulating plains to the north, became the most powerful of the German duchies as well as forming the kernel of the German nation. Subsequently the region gradually lost its pivotal role in national and international affairs; even the name slid across the map to denominate another part of Germany. A consequence of the region’s central importance in the early Middle Ages is that Old Saxony has no peers in northern Europe for the wealth of Ottonian and early Romanesque architecture, sculpture, precious metalwork and other arts. A consequence of subsequent decline is that much of this heritage is situated in some amazingly lovely and unspoilt little towns amidst a largely rural landscape of wooded hills and rolling farmland. Split after the war between West and East, the region is still far from recovering the popularity it had with travellers in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
Itinerary Day 1: London to Hanover. Fly at c. 1.00pm from London Heathrow to Hanover Airport and drive down to Paderborn. Overnight in Paderborn. Day 2: Paderborn, Corvey. At Paderborn Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
are the fascinating archaeological remains of Charlemagne’s palace and a modern reconstruction of the Ottonian replacement. The 13th-century cathedral has a western tower and spire similar to its pre-Romanesque predecessor. Also see the treasury in the Diocesan Museum. The westwork of the Abbey at Corvey is among the most important of surviving Carolingian buildings. Drive to Hildesheim for the first of two nights. Day 3: Hildesheim. Hildesheim is of enormous importance in the history of Romanesque art and architecture. The cathedral and its treasury are closed for restoration but some of the major works (it is renowned for some of the earliest and best bronze sculpture of that era) are on show at the church of St Michael and the Roemer and Pelizaeus Museum. A pinnacle of Ottonian achievement embodying many influential innovations, the six-towered church of St Michael was begun in 1010. Overnight Hildesheim. Day 4: Hildesheim, Goslar. Goslar is a lovely little town with outstanding Ottonian art and architecture, of which the palace is a rare secular survival. Works of art including a bronze altar are in the museum. First of five nights in Quedlinburg. Day 5: Quedlinburg, Gernrode. Quedlinburg is not only a wonderfully preserved mediaeval town but has the authentic feel of a place not spruced up for the tourist trade. The castle hill is crowned by the collegiate church of St Servatius, begun 1070, and contains another of Germany’s finest treasuries. The Wipertikirche has a 10th-century crypt. St Cyriakus at Gernrode is a church of exceptional beauty; begun 961, it is the oldest large-scale Ottonian building surviving. Overnight Quedlinburg.
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Day 6: Halberstadt. Halberstadt was a major city in the Middle Ages. The Romanesque Church of Our Lady contains life-size reliefs of apostles. The cathedral is the largest Frenchstyle Gothic church in Germany after Cologne, and has a very rich treasury, being particularly good for mediaeval textiles. The rest of the afternoon is free in Quedlinburg. Day 7: Magdeburg. Magdeburg was the favoured residence of Otto the Great. The cathedral, standing on a bluff above the River Elbe, is the first Gothic building in Germany and a veritable museum of mediaeval sculpture. Overnight Quedlinburg. Day 8: Königslutter. Königslutter am Elm has a very fine church and cloister from the abbey founded in 1135 and built by Lombard masons; the sculpture is superb. Visit the Monastery and church of St Pankratius in Hamersleben, a hidden gem of Romanesque architecture. Overnight Quedlinburg. Day 9: Braunschweig. Braunschweig (Brunswick) was residence of Henry the Lion, one of the most powerful princes in 12thcentury Europe. The Romanesque cathedral has extensive frescoes of c. 1220, a rare survival. Opposite stands Henry’s castle; now a museum, it displays the Lion Monument, the first free-standing monumental bronze sculpture since Roman times. Fly from Hanover and arrive at Heathrow at c. 5.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,130 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on flights with Lufthansa (operated by bmi and Germany Wings) (aircraft: Embraer RJ145 and Airbus A319); travel by private coach; breakfasts, 1 lunch
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Mediaeval Saxony continued
Bauhaus & Expressionism
Weimar Dessau Chemnitz Berlin
and 6 dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admission to museums, etc.; all tips for drivers, restaurant staff; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £180. Price without flights £1,950. Hotels: Paderborn (1 night): modern 4-star hotel in the centre. Hildesheim (2 nights): right in the centre, a modern 4-star hotel. Quedlinburg (5 nights): a family run hotel converted from a half-timbered house on the main square, tastefully decorated and furnished, and well equipped. All three hotels have good restaurants. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking on this tour, some over uneven ground. Average distance by coach per day: 89 miles. Small group: this tour will operate with between 10 and 22 participants. Bauhaus Foundation Dessau.
Modern art & architecture Finland: Aalto & Others.........................44 History of Impressionism........................53 Le Corbusier............................................54 Modern Art on the Côte d’Azur.............62 Bauhaus & Expressionism.......................70 Modern Art in Italy...............................100 Munch in Oslo......................................149 Art in Texas...........................................199
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11–16 June 2013 (mz 616) 6 days • £2,060 Lecturer to be announced The art, design and architecture of last century’s most influential art school. Includes the Bauhaus college buildings & several pioneering examples of modernism. A day is spent in Chemnitz, since 2007, home to excellent collections of Expressionist works. The Bauhaus was unquestionably the most influential art school of the twentieth century. Much of the look of the modern world has been shaped by its principles and practices. The artists, architects and designers associated with the Bauhaus have exerted an enormous influence, on the modern movement and on art education in many parts of the world. Chief among them were Walter Gropius and Mies van der Rohe (both directors of the school), Josef Albers, Marcel Breuer, Lyonel Feininger, Wassily Kandinsky, Paul Klee, Oskar Schlemmer and László Moholy-Nagy. The influence of the Bauhaus is all the more astonishing since its life was brief – it lasted just fourteen years – and its history turbulent and tragic. Though widely admired internationally from the outset, the school was subjected to constant stresses and strains, from ideological and political opponents, economic crises and governmental interference. Founded in Weimar in 1919, it was forced to relocate first to Dessau and then to Berlin, where, in 1933, it met an ignominious end at the hands of Nazi stormtroopers. Ironically, its closure speeded the rapid world-wide dissemination of its ideas
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and designs as many of its masters and students fled abroad. The Bauhaus wanted to eradicate the distinction between artist and craftsman, to stimulate the natural creativity of its students, to understand and exploit fully the inherent qualities of natural and man-made materials, and, above all, to design objects for industrial mass production in a way which took account both of aesthetics and economy. There were constant, often heated debates: between the Expressionists and the Constructivists; the craftsmen and the industrial designers; between the apolitical and the politically engaged. The intellectual energy generated by these debates contributed to an enormously creative atmosphere. By studying the surviving work produced at this educational hothouse in the places in which it was made, unique insights can be gained into the nature of our own man-made environment and the development of modernism. This tour visits all the most important sites, some by special arrangement, of the Bauhaus schools and of buildings designed and furnished by the school’s workshops. Expressionism is Germany’s other great contribution to twentieth-century art, and this tour includes recently refurbished collections of Expressionist paintings in Chemnitz and Berlin. The movement began before the First World War and flourished until, again, the coming of the Third Reich. A powerful reaction against svelte academic orthodoxy, Expressionism sought to express meaning or emotional experience through raw, primitivist and boldly colourful forms.
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Itinerary Day 1: Weimar. Fly at c. 8.45am from London Heathrow to Berlin. Drive to Weimar, the lovely small court city which as home to Goethe, Schiller, Liszt and other luminaries was a centre of the German enlightenment; the constitution of 1919 was drawn up in the town which gave its name to the ill-fated Republic whose dates coincide with those of the Bauhaus. Visit the Haus am Horn, built and furnished by the Bauhaus workshops. First of two nights in Weimar. Day 2: Weimar. Visit the original Bauhaus Building by the Belgian Henry van de Velde (1904–5) when director of the school of arts and crafts which was predecessor to the Bauhaus; this contains reconstructed Bauhaus work destroyed by the Nazis (murals and reliefs by Schlemmer, Herbert Bayer and Joost Schmidt). Visit the Bauhaus Museum and van de Velde’s house in Belvederer Allee, his interiors for Nietzsche’s villa, and Gropius’s Expressionist, abstract Trades Union Monument. Overnight Weimar. Day 3: Chemnitz, Dessau. By coach to Chemnitz, birthplace of Ernst Ludwig Kirchner and Karl Schmidt-Rottluff, where the day is spent exploring Expressionist collections in two museums. The Museum Gunzenhauser (opened 2007) shows a range of artists but is particularly strong on Münter and von Jawlensky, and the Museum am Theaterplatz, a Schmidt-Rottluff collection. Lunch at Villa Esche, designed by van de Velde, before continuing to Dessau, whose mayor secured the Bauhaus in 1923 after nationalist forces evicted it from Weimar. First of two nights in Dessau.
Day 6: Berlin. The Bauhaus was closed in 1932 by the Dessau authorities and moved to Berlin, where it survived only six months. There are two major post-war buildings by Bauhaus exiles, the Bauhaus Museum designed by Gropius, which has the largest collection of Bauhaus products, and the Neue Nationalgalerie by Mies van der Rohe (changing exhibitions). En route to the airport see architecture with Bauhaus connections, including the AEG turbine factory (Peter Behrens, 1908–9). Fly from Berlin to Heathrow, arriving c. 5.30pm.
night): an elegant hotel decorated in Regency style, close to Unter den Linden. Rooms are of a good size and excellent standard. How strenuous? There is a fair amount of walking and standing around in museums on this tour, and there are some long coach journeys; average distance per day: 79 miles. Small group: the tour will operate with between 10 and 22 participants.
Practicalities Price: £2,060 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on British Airways flights (Airbus 320); travel by private coach travel throughout; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts and three dinners and three lunches, with wine, water and coffee; all admission charges to museums, sites, etc.; all gratuities for restaurant staff, drivers; all airport and government taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £160. Price without flights £1,900. Hotels: in Weimar (2 nights): a stylish and historic 4-star hotel in a very central location, with good rooms, good service and a good restaurant. In Dessau (2 nights): a 4-star hotel with spacious, modern rooms. In Berlin (1
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206.
Weimar, lithograph 1920 after von Ellen Torngrist.
Day 4: Dessau. Visit the restored Bauhaus Building (1926), designed by Walter Gropius, incorporating student accommodation, a workshop wing with a spectacular glass wall, a theatre and a canteen. View other Bauhaus buildings in Dessau, among them staff houses, the Labour Exchange (both by Gropius) and the Törten Estate (Gropius, Meyer and Muche). Overnight Dessau. Day 5: Potsdam, Berlin. The Einstein Tower in Potsdam by Erich Mendelsohn is the outstanding example of Expressionist architecture. In outer Berlin see estates inspired by the Garden City Movement and the Brücke Museum which documents the first Expressionist grouping, founded in Dresden in 1905 by Kirchner. The Museum Berggruen, due to re-open in 2012, is a magnificent collection of classic modern art with a focus on Paul Klee, member of the Blaue Reiter group and teacher at the Bauhaus for ten years. Overnight Berlin. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
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Organs of Bach’s Time Silbermann & Baroque organs in Saxony & Thuringia 3–7 July 2013 (mz 629) 5 days • £1,680 Lecturers: James Johnstone & Tom Abbott
Day 2: Pomßen, Naumburg. The village of Pomßen has a church with an organ of the 1660s, a delightful instrument which is more Renaissance than Baroque, set in a painted wood ensemble of gallery, chest and panelled ceiling. The church of St Wenceslas in Naumburg has a major Hildebrandt organ of 1748. There is also time for the cathedral with its exceptional 13th-century sculpture. Overnight Bad Lauchstädt.
Recitals on the finest Baroque organs to survive, some of them instruments which Bach and Handel knew. Accompanied by organist James Johnstone, a Bach specialist, who gives recitals and demonstrations in association with the local organists, and by Tom Abbott, art historian.
Day 3: Rötha, Störmthal, Altenburg. Visit two small towns outside Leipzig with outstanding organs. In the fine mediaeval church of St George in Rötha there is a Silbermann organ tested in 1721 by Johann Kuhnau, Bach’s predecessor in Leipzig. Störmthal has an organ by Hildebrandt which was inspected and approved by Bach in 1723 and is still in its original condition. The court city of Altenburg is one of the rarely visited jewels of the former DDR, with a hilltop ducal residence featuring mediaeval fortifications, Baroque apartments and a quite remarkable collection of Italian Renaissance paintings. The chapel has a fine organ by Trost of 1739. Overnight Freiberg.
The organs are located in towns and villages off the beaten track. For a maximum of 32 participants, the format of this tour is a hybrid between our own-brand music festivals and our small group tours. The tour can be combined with The JS Bach Journey (7–13 July 2013). With clocks, organs were the most complex of mechanical instruments developed before the Industrial Revolution. As such they were a source of awe and admiration far beyond musical cognoscenti and their makers often enjoyed a level of fame greater than the musicians who played them. The greatest of the composers for the organ, Johann Sebastian Bach, had the good fortune to live at a time and in a place where organ-building reached a peak of excellence which perhaps has never been surpassed. This was not entirely coincidence: interaction between players and makers was an important element in refining the skills of both sides. The most famous of these organ builders was Gottfried Silbermann. He was born the son of a carpenter in the mountainous backwoods of Saxony in 1683, gained an almost monopolistic grip on keyboard manufacturing in the region and died a rich man in 1753. Nearly thirty of his fifty Saxon organs survive, some very nearly in original condition. They are famous – and always were – for their distinctive sounds, from the silver flutes to the strong and characterful 16’ Posaune in the pedal. Other organ builders whose work we see and hear on this tour include Zacharias Hildebrandt (1688–1757), an apprentice and later a rival of Silbermann, and Heinrich Gottfried
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Wood engraving from The Magazine of Art 1883.
Trost (c.1680–1759). All had some sort of collaborative or critical relationship with JS Bach. This tour selects some of the finest instruments in a region exceptionally richly endowed with historic organs. Many are located in village churches far from cathedral or court, leading the visitor through terrain which is rural and remote. None on this itinerary are in large cities, and most of the towns visited have wonderfully picturesque historic centres. Some organs have been hardly altered since they were built. The tour is accompanied by organist James Johnstone, who performs regularly in Europe and America and who has won several prizes for his recordings. The eight included recitals are exclusive to this group and twenty to thirty minutes long, performed by James Johnstone or the local organist. The maximum number of participants is limited to thirty-two.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c.11am from London Heathrow to Berlin and continue by coach (c. 2 hours) to Bad Lauchstädt, a charming little town which was a prestigious resort in the 18th century; first of two nights in Bad Lauchstädt.
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Day 4: Freiberg, Frauenstein, Helbigsdorf.Freiberg cathedral is one of the most beautiful of Late Gothic buildings in Germany and has retained an exceptional panoply of furnishings. The organ by Silbermann (1711–1714) is one of the world’s finest instruments; three manuals, 44 stops, largely unaltered. There also is another Silbermann masterpiece (1718–19), brought here from another church. In the afternoon drive out to Frauenstein, where Silbermann spent his childhood, and visit the museum dedicated to him. Overnight Freiberg. Day 5. Drive to Berlin and fly to London Heathrow, arriving c. 3.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,680 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on British Airways flights (Airbus A319); travel by private coach; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts and 3 dinners, with wine, water and coffee. All organ recitals, admissions to museums, visits, etc.; all tips for drivers, guides, waiters;
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The Johann Sebastian
Bach Journey Woodcut c. 1930.
all taxes; the services of the two lecturers. Single supplement £40. Price without flights £1,460. All recitals are subject to confirmation from the relevant churches. Changes to the itinerary are possible. Hotels: Bad Lauchstädt: situated in the historic centre of the town, the hotel opened in 2000 and is designed in the late Baroque style of the buildings that surround it. Freiberg: well-situated hotel with a colourful history as a prison, cigar factory and school. Rooms are comfortable and bathrooms have either a shower or a bath. How strenuous? There is a lot of coach travel with some long journeys. Average distance by coach per day: 105 miles. Group size: this tour will operate with a maximum of 32 participants.
Festivals 2012-2013 The Danube Music Festival.....................15 Music Weekends in Taunton & Newcastle..............................38 English Music in Yorkshire.....................39 The Rhône Music Festival.......................63 The J.S. Bach Journey..............................73 A Festival of Music in Rome.................131 Seville: a Festival of Spanish Music......188
7–13 July 2013 Details available in October 2012 Contact us to register your interest A pilgrimage to the places where Johann Sebastian Bach lived and worked. 9 private concerts and 9 venues in the course of the week. Talks on the music by Sir Nicholas Kenyon. Stay in Mühlhausen, Weimar and Leipzig. Journeying to the places where Johann Sebastian Bach lived and worked is an experience as near to pilgrimage as is offered by the history of music. And hearing his music in buildings which he frequented, or even where it was first performed, must rank among the highest delights available to music lovers. This unique festival provides the opportunity.
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Nine concerts in nine different venues present a comprehensive range of Bach’s output, alongside works by other members of his family, contemporaries and predecessors. We are engaging artists and ensembles who are world leaders in performance of the repertoire. The distances travelled are not great, but the event is emphatically a journey, with three changes of hotel. It starts, as Bach did, in the little towns and cities of the principality of Thuringia, and finishes, again like Bach, in the free city of Leipzig. The audience stays in Mühlhausen, Weimar and Leipzig, and the concerts take place here and in five other towns. Admission to the concerts is exclusive to those who take a complete package which includes hotels, flights from the UK, travel by private coach, dinners and lectures. Except in Mühlhausen, where the only hotels are 3-star, a range of hotels from 3-star to 5-star is offered, enabling a choice between four different prices.
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Beethoven in Bonn All the symphonies 2–8 October 2012 (mz 414) 7 days • £2,460 (includes 5 concert tickets) Lecturer: Professor Barry Cooper
the lake. Concert: Beethoven, Symphony Nos 5 & 8; Steven Stucky, new work. Day 6: Cologne. Optional excursion to Cologne (by rail) with five hours for independent exploration. Cologne was the largest city in Roman Gaul and the largest city in northern Europe in the Middle Ages. Outstanding architecture includes several Romanesque churches and the Gothic cathedral, vast, prolix and supremely beautiful. Museums include the Römisch-Germanisches Museum (Roman and early mediaeval collection) the cathedral treasury (reliquary of the Three Magi) and the Wallraf-Richartz Museum (Old Master paintings) and the Schnütgen, a superb display of mediaeval art. Concert: Martin Gubringer and Matthias Schmitt, Ghanaia II (Africa), with Martin Grubinger & Friends; Beethoven, Symphony No.9.
Five concerts at the Beethovenhalle with the Philharmonia Orchestra under Esa-Pekka Salonen. Includes some of the many museums of this former capital city and an optional day in Cologne. 4-star hotel overlooking the Rhine. Bonn was the seat of the PrinceArchbishops of Cologne, ex-officio one of the eight Electors of the Holy Roman Empire and temporal ruler of one of the weightier principalities in the German-speaking lands. Its location on the Rhine, Europe’s great thoroughfare, and not far from France and the Netherlands helped to ensure that it was no cultural backwater. During Beethoven’s youth the electoral court maintained a corps of musicians which ranked with the largest of such establishments – larger than those, for example, in Salzburg or Eszterháza. Beethoven’s father and grandfather had been among their number, and Beethoven himself may well have been content to have settled into lifelong electoral service, his Olympian talents nurtured by the security of a salaried existence. But the French Revolution and subsequent conquest of the Rhineland eliminated that possibility. The study visit he made to Vienna at the age of 22 became a lifelong exile. Maybe distance made the heart grow fonder, but his letters suggest he had the warmest memories of his home town and enduring affection for his Bonn friends and some (not all) of his family. Bonn’s honourable cultural history contributed to its choice as the temporary (as was expected at the time) seat of government of the Federal Republic of Germany in 1947. Despite the accumulation of parliamentary paraphernalia, government buildings and embassies it never shed its provincial, small-town feel, hence the notorious epithet, ‘a small town in Germany’. Then in the 1990s Berlin became the German capital again. The spectre of empty ministries, boarded-up shops and urban decay loomed, but such was the assiduity of the city fathers and the generosity of central government
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Engraving c. 1860.
that employment has actually risen and cultural amenities much enhanced. Most of the major museums and art galleries reopened in rebuilt or refurbished buildings after the loss of capital status. The annual International Beethoven Festival is a major event, featuring world-class orchestras and artists from around the world.
Itinerary Day 1. Travel by rail from London to Cologne, leaving St Pancras at 9.00am and changing at Brussels. Continue by coach to Bonn, arriving in time for a talk and dinner. Day 2: Bonn. A morning walk follows a route linking places associated with Beethoven: family homes, school, churches, the Electoral Palace, the tavern he frequented, memorial sculpture and the Beethovenhalle. Free afternoon. Concert: Beethoven, Symphony Nos 1 & 7; Unsuk Chin, Violin Concerto with Viviane Hagner (violin). Day 3: Bonn. Guided visit of the Haus der Geschichte, an excellent museum of the history of Germany since 1945, followed by some free time with the opportunity to visit the adjacent Kunstmuseum Bonn, a good collection of 20thcentury art, especially August Macke. Concert: Beethoven, Symphony Nos 2 & 3; Brett Dean, ‘Testament’ for orchestra. Day 4: Brühl. Drive to Brühl to visit Schloss Augustusburg, residence of the Prince-Archbishops of Cologne and one of the most magnificent 18th-cent. palaces and gardens in Germany. Free afternoon. Concert: Beethoven, Symphony Nos 4 & 6; Joseph Phibbs, new work. Day 5: Maria Laach. Cruise upstream along the Rhine past wooded hills, vineyards and small towns. Disembark at Remagen and drive into the hills to visit Maria Laach, an abbey with one of the most complete and satisfying of Romanesque churches. Lunch here and time to walk around
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Day 7: Bonn. Visit the graves of Beethoven’s mother and Robert Schumann then arrive in Cologne in time for another short visit before boarding the train home. The Eurostar arrives at London St Pancras at 8.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,460 (deposit £250). This includes: 5 concert tickets costing c. £410; return rail travel (superior class Eurostar; 1st class into Germany and back); accommodation as described below; all breakfasts, 2 lunches, 4 dinners with wine, water, coffee; private coach travel; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; services of the lecturer. Single supplement £170. Price excluding all rail travel £2,310. Hotel: overlooking the Rhine, this is the best hotel in Bonn. Built in 1956, public areas retain stylish features of that era, bedrooms are modern. There is a good restaurant, terraced gardens. Ten minutes on foot to the city centre and twenty minutes to the Beethovenhalle. How strenuous? The tour is planned on the expectation that participants walk to concerts and that they are able to lift their own luggage onto trains. Average distance by coach per day: c. 25 miles. Small group: 12–22 participants.
Alsace, 3–10 September 2013, see page 56.
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King Ludwig II & the Wittelsbach palaces of Bavaria 10–15 July 2013 (mz 633) 6 days • £2,270 (including 1 music ticket) Lecturer: Tom Abbott A new tour for 2013. Explore eight royal palaces and castles set against the breathtaking backdrop of Germany’s most beautiful state. Learn about the lives, loves and legacies of King Ludwig II and the House of Wittelsbach, rulers of Bavaria for over 700 years. Art and architecture from the Renaissance through to Late Romanticism, much of it opulent and theatrical. See a Munich Opera Festival production of Wagner’s Tristan & Isolde. Germany’s large and beautiful south-eastern state of Bavaria is an established destination for Martin Randall Travel, with a number of tours over the years dedicated to a variety of themes. This tour, new for 2013, has a different focus, that of the legendary ‘Swan King’ Ludwig II and the House of Wittelsbach from which he hailed, and his extraordinary architectural and cultural legacy. Architecturally and artistically, the tour encompasses outstanding examples of Renaissance, Baroque, Rococo, Neo-Classical and Romantic styles as well as Ludwig’s fairytale follies. Historically it examines the eccentric world of one of Europe’s most controversial monarchs and in the story of what, until German unification, counted as one of the continent’s most important little states. For music there is a production in Munich’s State Opera House of Wagner’s epoch-making Tristan and Isolde, the first performance of which in 1865 was lavishly supported by Ludwig II. The composer was the king’s most treasured and revered companion. Indeed, his extravagant patronage of Wagner, whose every luxurious demand was met, and his mania for building new palaces, very nearly bankrupted the Bavarian state. It is true that Ludwig II’s predilection for aesthetic absorption over political and legal leadership gained him fierce opposition and criticism, but this handsome young king and his elaborate castles are responsible for a considerable proportion of Bavaria’s appeal today. Ironically, the dream world into which the sovereign retreated in order to escape the responsibilities of state now benefits Ludwig’s former kingdom in a way it never did when he inhabited it. Was he, to quote one of his more defamatory monikers, insane? Or simply weak, of solitary disposition, and therefore tragically unsuited to the role imposed upon him at a time of Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Bavaria’s considerable political fragility and conflict with Prussia, Austria and France? Once deposed in 1886, was the cause of his untimely death suicide, did it take place at the hand of murderous detractors, or was it mere accident? Was he an impotent and irresponsible sybarite or a luminous benefactor of the arts?
Itinerary Day 1: Schleissheim, Munich. Fly at c. 9.30am from London Heathrow to Munich. Between airport and city, the palace and garden at Schleissheim form a rare ensemble of Baroque taste from an early 17th-cent. retreat, through the 1684 Lustheim pavilion at the far end of a canal of absolutist straightness, to the magnificent Neues Schloss, begun 1701 but whose progress continued haltingly into the Rococo period. There are a gallery of Baroque art, sculpted stucco in the state apartments of exceptional quality, Hofgarten (Court Garden) and a collection of Meissen porcelain in Schloss Lustheim. First of two nights in Munich.
Day 2: Munich. The Residenz in the centre of the city was the principal Wittelsbach palace and seat of government, a magnificent sprawl of buildings, courtyards, state apartments and museums of every period from Renaissance to the end of the 19th century. There are fine works of art and sumptuous interiors of the highest importance, especially the Rococo interiors and the Cuvilliés Theatre (subject to confirmation as the theatre can close for rehearsals at short notice). Opera at the Nationaltheater: Tristan & Isolde (Wagner), Kent Nagano (conductor), Gary Lehman (Tristan), René Pape (Marke), Petra-Maria Schnitzer (Isolde). Day 3: Nymphenburg, Linderhof, Murnau. Drive to the city’s outskirts and the palace and park of Nymphenburg, birthplace of Ludwig II. An extensive complex including bathhouses and the Rococo Amalienburg lodge. After lunch drive to Ettal, site of the only one of Ludwig II’s commissioned castles to have been completed. 1870s Linderhof was reputed to have been the King’s favourite castle; draws,
Linderhof, wood engraving from The Magazine of Art 1887.
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like Herrenchiemsee, on French influences, lavish interiors in Renaissance and Baroque styles, extravagant terrace gardens including grottos and Oriental adornments. First of three nights in Murnau am Staffelsee. Day 4: Hohenschwangau, Neuschwanstein. Drive south to Hohenschwangau castle, site of Ludwig II’s childhood, owned by his parents Maximilian II of Bavaria and Princess Marie of Prussia. Majestic lakeside Alpine location, frescoes featuring medieval SwanKnight Lohengrin which led to Ludwig II’s obsession with Wagner. Then continue to Neuschwanstein, the famous fairytale turreted castle ordered by Ludwig II in homage to Wagner though never completed. Day 5: Herrenchiemsee. In the countryside southeast of Munich and surrounded by a park, woodland and a great lake, Schloss Herrenchiemsee is a copy of Versailles. Ludwig II’s megalomaniac hymn of homage to the absolutism of Louis XIV, his final folly, brought the Bavarian state to the brink of bankruptcy. Day 6: Berg and Starnberg. Leave Murnau, drive to Berg and the mock Gothic castle to which Ludwig II retreated from his ministers, and where he was placed under house arrest after his forced abdication in 1886 on grounds of insanity. Lake Starnberg surrounds the castle and is the scene of Ludwig II’s death and that of his doctor, officially by drowning. Visit the Memorial Chapel and have lunch in Starnberg. Fly from Munich, arriving at London Heathrow c. 4.30pm.
Art in Munich 12–16 August 2013 (mz 649) 5 days • £1,580 Lecturer: Tom Abbott A short and sharp study of the art and architecture of the Bavarian capital. Includes a visit to the Lenbachhaus (due to reopen in Spring 2013), an outstanding collection of German Expressionist painting. Option of combining with The Danube Music Festival. The capital of Bavaria is perhaps the most attractive of Germany’s cities, and few cities in Europe are better endowed with great art. The allure of the cityscape, the abundance of cultural activity, the relatively relaxed lifestyle and generally amenable ambience make it the most sought-after place in which to live and work in Germany. The seat of the Wittelsbachs, who ruled Bavaria from 1255 until 1918 as Munich, wood engraving after Samuel Reed from The Illustrated London News 1865.
Counts, then Dukes, as Electors from 1620 and finally in the nineteenth century as Kings, Munich became one of the best-endowed places in Europe artistically and architecturally. The accompanying lecturer, Tom Abbot, is a cultural historian with a wide range of knowledge and a deep understanding of contemporary Germany.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 11.00am from London Heathrow to Munich. An afternoon walk passes through the core of the historic city. See the vast Gothic cathedral, the pioneering Baroque Church of the Theatines and the 19thcentury city hall. Day 2. The morning is spent in the Residenz, rambling palace of the Wittelsbach dynasty, Dukes, Electors and Kings of Bavaria, with sumptuous interiors of the highest art-historical importance from Renaissance to Romantic, and a marvellous Rococo theatre. The Königsplatz is a fine assembly of Neo-Classical architecture
Practicalities Price: £2,270 (deposit £250). This includes: flights (economy class) with Lufthansa (Airbus 319); private coach travel; 1 opera ticket (cost c.£130; hotel accommodation; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 4 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £160. Price without flights £2,110. Hotels: Munich (2 nights): friendly, familyrun hotel in a central location. Rooms are traditionally furnished, there is a snack bar but no restaurant. Single rooms are doubles for single use. Murnau (3 nights): rambling 5-star hotel on the outskirts of Murnau with a country house feel; rooms vary in size and are restrained in decoration; two restaurants, spa and swimming pool. How strenuous? This is a strenuous tour with long coach journeys and a lot of walking and standing around in the castles and gardens. Average distance by coach per day: 65 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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Classical Greece The Peloponnese, Attica & Athens including the Glyptothek, a museum of Greek and Roman sculpture. The Lenbachhaus has an outstanding collection of German Expressionist paintings (at the time of printing the Lenbachhaus was due to reopen in Spring 2013, so this visit is subject to confirmation). Day 3. By coach along some of the principal streets and boulevards of the city to see architecture of the 19th and 20th centuries. Disembark in the vicinity of the main art galleries and visit the Alte Pinakothek, one of the world’s greatest collections of Old Masters and the Neue Pinakothek, paintings from the 18th to the early 20th centuries; some free time; you may choose to also visit the Brandhorst Museum, which opened in 2009, the Pinakothek der Moderne or join a guided tour of the Art Nouveau Villa Stuck. Day 4. On the edge of Munich, Nymphenburg is one of the finest palace complexes of the 17th and 18th centuries, with main palace, park, gardens and pavilions. The delightful Amalienburg represents the apogee of secular Rococo interiors, and the carriage museum has sleighs made for King Ludwig II. Returning to the centre of Munich, visit the little Baroque church of St John Nepomuk created by the Asam brothers. Day 5. Free morning for revisiting museums, seeing others (the Bavarian National Museum has excellent collections of sculpture and decorative arts) or shopping. Fly from Munich to London Heathrow arriving at c. 4.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,580 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled Lufthansa flights (Aircraft: Airbus A320); hotel accommodation for four nights as described below; travel by private coach and U-Bahn (metro); breakfasts and three dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admission charges; all state and airport taxes; all gratuities for restaurant staff, drivers; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £60. Price without flights £1,400. Hotel: friendly, family-run, centrally located. Rooms are traditionally furnished, snack bar, but no restaurant. Single rooms are double rooms for single use. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking and standing around in galleries. Participants need to be able to keep up with a group of averagely fit people. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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Corinth, wood engraving from Greek Pictures 1890.
20–29 April 2013 (mz 531) 10 days • £3,160 Lecturer: Henry Hurst 28 September–7 October 2013 (ma 689) 10 days • £3,160 Lecturer: Dr Oswyn Murray A comprehensive survey of the principal Archaic, Classical and Hellenistic sites in mainland Greece. Highlights include Mycenae, Olympia, Delphi. In Athens, a full day on the Acropolis and in the ancient Agora. The Ancient Greeks had far greater influence on western civilization than any other people or nation. For two and a half millennia, philosophy and ethics, the fundamentals of science and mathematics, prevailing notions of government and citizenship, literature and the visual arts have derived their seeds, and a large amount of their substance, from the Greeks. In the words of H.D.F. Kitto ‘there gradually emerged a people not very numerous, not very powerful, not very well organized, who had a totally new conception of what human life was for, and showed for the first time what the human mind was for.’ Whatever the depth of our Classical education, there is a deep-seated knowledge in all of us that the places visited on this tour are of the greatest significance for our identity and way of life. A journey to Greece is like a journey to our homeland, a voyage in which a search for our roots is fulfilled.
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In no field is the Greek contribution to the modern world more immediately evident than in architecture. The grip upon the imagination that the Greek temple has exerted is astonishing, and in one way or another – ranging from straightforward imitation of the whole to decorative use of distorted details – has dominated nearly all monumental or aspirational building ever since. A striking and salutary conclusion, however, which inevitably emerges from participation on this tour, is that the originals are unquestionably superior. This is also true of sculpture. This tour includes nearly all of the most important archaeological sites, architectural remains and museums of antiquities on mainland Greece. It presents a complete picture of ancient Greek civilization beginning with the Mycenaeans, the Greek Bronze Age, and continuing through Archaic, Classical and, to a lesser extent, Hellenistic and Roman Greece. It also provides a glimpse of the spiritual splendour of Byzantine art and architecture. It is a full itinerary, but the pace is manageable. Plenty of time is available on the sites and in the museums, allowing opportunity both for adequate exposition by the lecturer and time for further exploration on your own.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at midday from London Heathrow to Athens. The little port of Nauplion is one of the most attractive towns in mainland Greece. Arrive here in time for dinner. First of three nights in Nauplion. Day 2: Nauplion, Tiryns, Mycenae. Today’s
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theme is the Mycenaean civilization of the Argolid Plain, the Greece of Homer’s heroes (16th–13th centuries bc). Visit Tiryns, a citadel with massive Cyclopean walls of enormous blocks of masonry, and Mycenae, reputedly Agamemnon’s capital, with Treasury of Atreus (finest of beehive tombs) and Acropolis (Lion Gate). There are spectacular views from the 18th-century Venetian Fortress of Palamidi. Day 3: Corinth, Epidauros. The site of Ancient Corinth has the earliest standing Doric temple on mainland Greece, and a fine museum with evidence of Greece’s first large-scale pottery industry. Epidauros, centre for the worship of Asclepios, god of medicine, where popular magical dream cures were dispensed, remains here and includes the best-preserved of all Greek theatres. Day 4: Arcadia, Bassae. Drive across the middle of the Peloponnese, through the beautiful plateau of Arcadia and past impressive mountain scenery. A stunning road leads to the innovatory and well-preserved 5th-century Temple of Apollo (in a tent for protection) on the mountain top at Bassae (3,700 feet) and through further breathtaking scenery to Olympia. Overnight Olympia. Day 5: Olympia. Nestling in a verdant valley, Olympia is one of the most evocative of ancient sites; never a town, but the principal sanctuary of Zeus and site of the quadrennial pan-Hellenic athletics competitions. Many
fascinating structures remain, including the temples of Hera and Zeus, the workshop of Phidias and the stadium. The museum contains fragments of pediment sculpture, among the most important survivals of Classical Greek art. First two nights in Delphi. Day 6: Delphi. Clinging to the lower slopes of Mount Parnassos, Delphi is the most spectacularly evocative of ancient Greek sites. Of incalculable religious and political importance, the Delphic oracle attracted pilgrims from all over the Hellenic world. The Sanctuary of Pythian Apollo has a theatre and Athenian Treasury, and the Sanctuary of Athena has a circular temple. The museum is especially rich in Archaic sculpture. Some free time amidst the austere beauty of the valley. Day 7: Hosios Loukas, Athens. Visit the Byzantine monastery of Hosios Loukas in a beautiful setting in a remote valley, one of the finest buildings of mediaeval Greece with remarkable mosaics. Walk in the Plaka district of Athens. First of three nights in Athens. Day 8: Athens. The Acropolis is the foremost site of Classical Greece. The Parthenon (built 447–438 bc) is indubitably the supreme achievement of Greek architecture. Other architectural masterpieces are the Propylaia (monumental gateway), Temple of Athena Nike and the Erechtheion. At the Theatre of Dionysos plays by Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides were first performed. The new Acropolis museum has superb Archaic and Classical sculpture, including some by Phidias
and his assistants. The Agora (market place) was the centre of civic life in ancient Athens, with the small Doric Hephaisteion, the bestpreserved of Greek temples. Day 9: Athens. Kerameikos Cemetery was where Athenians were buried beyond the ancient city walls. The refurbished National Archaeological Museum has the finest collection of Greek art and artefacts to be found anywhere. The vast Corinthian Temple of Olympian Zeus was completed by Hadrian 700 years after its inception. Some free time. Day 10: Athens. Drive to the 5th-century Temple of Poseidon at Sounion, overlooking the sea at the southernmost tip of the Attic peninsula, visited by Byron in 1810. Fly from Athens, arriving Heathrow c. 4.40pm.
Practicalities Price: £3,160 (deposit £300). This includes: air travel (economy class) on British Airways flights (Airbus A320); private coach travel (day 8 is on foot); accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 2 lunches and 7 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips for waiters, drivers and guides; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer and a local guide. Single supplement £370. Price without flights £2,930. Hotels: in Nauplion (3 nights): a small comfortable hotel in a converted 19th-century mansion situated near the harbour. In Olympia (1 night): a characterful hotel outside the town. In Delphi (2 nights): a modern hotel a short coach ride from the archaeological site. In Athens (3 nights): smart hotel near the picturesque Plaka quarter. How strenuous? This tour has three hotel changes and some long journeys. You will be on your feet for lenghtly stretches of time in some cases on exposed sites and walking over rough terrain. Sure-footedness and agility are essential. Average distance by coach per day: 70 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Athens, Library of Hadrian, from a drawing by J. Fulleylove reproduced in The Studio 1895. Opposite page: Crete, Mount Ida, wood engraving 1890.
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Minoan Crete History & archaeology 15–24 April 2013 (mz 540) 10 days • £2,550 Lecturer: Dr Alan Peatfield
isthmus, Vasiliki shows the beginnings of palatial architecture in its use of a west court. Overnight Sitia. Day 8: Knossos, Hania. Second visit to Knossos and a private visit of outerlying buildings. Drive to Hania, the spiritual capital of Crete, a beautiful town with delightful restaurants and good craft shops. First of two nights in Hania.
Concentrates on the extraordinary civilization of the Minoans, but also pays due attention to Classical and later cultures. Plenty of time for Knossos and the main sites and includes many remote and little-visited ones. Wonderful, contrasting landscapes at a beautiful time in the island’s calendar. ‘Land of contrasts’ is the king of clichés, but for Crete it is difficult to avoid, not only because of the variety of natural environments but also because of the influence these have had on the built environment and the history of the island. The contrasts in the landscape, vegetation and people are dramatic. Crete has its ‘deserts and jungles, its arctic and its tropics’. The high mountains and upland plains are bleak and remote; the gorges in the highly erosive limestone are lush. The west provides a retreat from the more developed stretch of north coast between Iràklion and Agios Nikolaos. The south is difficult of access, scored by gorges and with the Asterousia mountains dropping sharply to the sea. The Sphakia region further west on the south coast is one of the most culturally distinct regions. Lying between Europe, Africa and the Near East, variety also marks the island’s cultural legacy. The tour will focus primarily on the Bronze Age civilization of the Minoans. Flourishing in the second millennium BC, the Minoans created the first great palace civilization of Europe. Their art is wonderfully expressive, and its influence spread throughout Greece, Egypt and the Near East. Pottery, sealstones, frescoes and architecture reached peaks of excellence unforeseen in the prehistoric Aegean. Mycenaean, Hellenistic, Classical Greek, Roman, Byzantine, Venetian and Turkish domination followed. The books written on the island’s World War II history alone fill a bookshelf. And yet throughout these millennia of foreign occupation and domination, Crete remained strong and proud and retained its own unique and captivating character. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 12.15pm from London Heathrow to Iràklion via Athens. First of four nights in Iràklion. Day 2: Knossos, Iràklion. The capital of Minoan Crete and centre of the Bronze Age Aegean, Knossos is shrouded in myth both ancient and modern. At its peak it comprised a magnificent palace with courts, religious buildings and mansions. Excavated by Sir Arthur Evans at the turn of the century, his reconstructions not only protect the excavated remains but grandly illustrate the splendour of palatial civilization. Visit the Archaeological Museum which houses the island’s largest collection of Minoan art. Overnight Iràklion. Day 3: Gortyn, Phaestos, Agia Triada, Matala. A day in the Mesara, a rich agricultural plain along the south coast. Gortyn was the Roman capital of Crete; a famous 5th-century BC inscription has details of Greek law. On a ridge Phaestos is the second largest Minoan palace. Agia Triada, interpreted as the summer resort for Phaestos, has beautifully sited and architecturally elaborate villas. Visit the charming town of Matala, a harbour of Roman Gortyn, with rock-cut tombs in a cliff nearby. Overnight Iràklion. Day 4: Arhanes, Vathypetro, Iràklion. Another pretty town, Arhanes possesses remarkable archaeological remains and one of the best excavated cemeteries on Crete, Phourni (this is a closed site and permission for access can be withdrawn). The town also has a beautiful museum. Another ‘villa’ site, Vathypetro is situated in verdant farmland overlooking the Pediadha district of Central Crete. Some free time in Iràklion. Overnight Iràklion. Day 5: Malia, Agios Nikolaos. At Malia visit the Minoan Palace and houses belonging to the Minoan town. The Archaeological Museum at Agios Nikolaos houses a fine collection of Minoan art. First of three nights in Sitia. Day 6: Sitia, Toplou, Zákros. The museum at Sitia has a good collection of artefacts from eastern sites of the island. Positioned in the barren low hills of east Crete, Toplou monastery has a history of fierce resistance to the island’s various invaders. Káto Zákros, at the foot of the Gorge of the Dead, is an excavated Minoan palace. Overnight Sitia. Day 7: Gournia, Vasiliki. The largest excavated Minoan town, Gournia’s over seventy cramped houses lie dotted about the hillside with a mini-palace at the top. Situated on the Ierapetra
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Day 9: Aptera, Hania. One of the most powerful Graeco-Roman city states, Aptera is a huge site with Roman ruins, a theatre and a Turkish fort. See the British war cemetery at Souda Bay. Moni Agias Triadas on the Akrotiri peninsula above Hania was founded in 1630 by Venetian nobles and has some of the finest monastic architecture on the island. Overnight Hania. Day 10. Fly to London Heathrow via Athens, arriving c. 3.30pm. The opening of sites on Crete is arbitrary and can be influenced by the politics at the time of the tour. This may mean that at short notice not all sites listed can be visited.
Practicalities Price: £2,550 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled flights with Aegean Airways via Athens (aircraft: Airbus Industrie A321 & A320); travel by private coach; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts, four lunches and five dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admissions to museums and sites; all tips for restaurant staff, drivers and guides; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer and a local guide. Single supplement £160. Price without all flights £2,280. Hotels: Iràklion (4 nights): family-run 3-star hotel with small but wellappointed rooms. Good location by the Venetian port. In Sitia (3 nights): Large, 4-star resort hotel on the edge of town. In Hania (2 nights): 4-star hotel well located close to the old town and port. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking and scrambling over archaeological sites and this tour is not suitable for anyone who is not surefooted. Average distance by coach per day: 56 miles. Small group: 10–22 participants.
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Essential India Delhi, Varanasi, Khajuraho, Orchha, Agra 22 February–8 March 2013 (mz 480) This tour is currently full 15–29 November 2013 (ma 771) 15 days • £5,550 Lecturer: Dr Giles Tillotson Includes some of India’s most celebrated sites and also lesser-known but quintessential places. Arrangements for special access a feature. Spends more time at the centres visited than most mainstream tours, and free time is allowed for rest or independent exploration. Varanasi, one of the oldest continously inhabited cities in the world, and the most sacred in India; the Hindu temples of Khajuraho; Rajput and Mughal forts, palaces and funerary monuments. No less than seven unesco World Heritage Sites visited. The rich and fertile riverine plains of northern India have long formed a corridor allowing migrations and invasions to spread across the Subcontinent. The result is an area of fascinating cultural diversity.
Like the Ganges and the Yamuna, the sacred rivers of Hindu lore, this tour runs through the modern state of Uttar Pradesh and neighbouring Madhya Pradesh. But these geo-political boundaries do not restrict it thematically. Participants are treated to a comprehensive overview of the history of the Subcontinent, from the emergence of Hinduism and Buddhism to the decline of the Mughal Empire, the last Islamic power before the British Raj of the nineteenth century. Located on the banks of the Ganges, Varanasi is India’s most sacred place and claims to be the oldest continuously inhabited city in the world. Founded by Lord Shiva, the city is mentioned in scriptures dating from the early Vedic period, in the second millenium bc. It was known as Kanchi, the Luminous, during the life of the Buddha who visited on several occasions on his way to Sarnath nearby where he preached his first sermon. Pilgrims still flock here to wash away their sins in the holy Ganges. The modern Varanasi is also a place of learning and culture, with the first Hindu university in India. The Chandelas of Khajuraho and the Bundelas of Orchha are two Rajput clans
tracing lineage to the Lunar Dynasty from Varanasi, a commonly used device to claim political authority. The eleventh-century Chandelas built intricately carved temples in Khajuraho, today celebrated (and often misunderstood) for their sensual carvings. They are superb examples of the Nagara or northern style of sacred architecture, with its linear succession of halls leading to the sanctum, topped by a Sikhara, or mountain-peak tower. Later Bundela Rajputs built impressive palaces and temple-like cenotaphs in the lush landscape of northern Madhya Pradesh. Their palaces bring together elements borrowed from both the Rajput and Mughal traditions, while their funerary architecture asserts their dynastic authority. The buildings and arts of the Mughals in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries are often regarded as the apex of India’s artistic achievements, a prestige due no doubt in no small part to its best-known representative, the Taj Mahal, a creation which hovers somewhere between architecture, jewellery and myth. White marble is typical of the late period, while earlier buildings are of red sandstone – the deserted capital of Akbar at Fatehpur Sikri, and the Red Forts of Agra and Delhi.
The fort at Agra, wood engraving from The Illustrated London News, 1857.
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Delhi is among a rare elite of the world’s cities which have been capital of several successive regimes. With most new ruling powers establishing their headquarters on a site adjacent to its predecessors, the architectural legacy ranges from a monumental thirteenthcentury minaret to the majestic expansiveness of Lutyens’s New Delhi. Empire succeeds empire; eighteen years after the Viceroy took up residence in Government House it was handed over to an independent India.
Wood engraving from The Magazine of Art, 1886.
Itinerary Days 1 & 2: London to Delhi. Fly from London Heathrow at about noon and after a 51/2 hour time change reach the hotel in New Delhi c. 3.00am. Free morning, lunch in the hotel. The severely beautiful 15th-cent. tombs of the Sayyid and Lodi dynasties are located in the serene Lodi Gardens, close to the hotel. Humayun’s striking tomb, with its high-arched faÇades set in a walled garden, is an important example of early Mughal architecture. First of two nights in Delhi. Day 3: Delhi. Visit the imposing Red Fort, founded in 1639 under Shah Jahan. Exquisite pietra dura work remains intact in the throne pavilion. Together with the fort, the Jami Masjid, India’s largest mosque, dominates Old Delhi with its minarets and domes. Rickshaw through the labyrinthine streets near Chandni Chowk. After lunch, visit New Delhi where Lutyens, Baker and other British architects created a grand city with unique designs. Baker’s Secretariat buildings on the Raisina hill are Classical buildings at first glance but closer attention reveals Mughal motifs. Subject to special permission, it may be possible to visit the manicured gardens and interior of the vast Rashtrapati Bhavan, the former Viceroy’s residence. Day 4: Delhi to Varanasi. Fly from Delhi to Varanasi at c. 10.30am. After lunch in the hotel, drive to Shivala Ghat for a walk, visiting the hidden shrines of the old town and experiencing the busy life along the river. Ends at Dasaswamedha Ghat, named after the ancient ten horse sacrifice which took place here in mythical time. A boat ride along the Ganges ends with the evening prayer ceremony (Aarti), a ritual going back to the Vedic Age. First of three nights in Varanasi. Day 5: Sarnath, Varanasi. Buddha preached his first sermon at Sarnath and the site remains an active Buddhist centre. The Dhamek stupa in the Deer Park marks the spot where the Buddha sat to preach. The museum houses the 3rd-cent. bc lion capital which has become the symbol of modern India since independence. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
An afternoon visit to the Bharat Kala Bhavan, the university museum, is followed by a private visit to a contemporary art gallery. Day 6: Jaunpur. Drive to Jaunpur where the ruins of the fort and mosques are striking reminders of its brief importance as an Islamic centre in the 14th and 15th cents. The 16thcent. Akbari Bridge has magnificent arches that span the Gomati River. Return to Varanasi for some free time. Day 7: Varanasi to Khajuraho. An early morning boat ride to witness the morning prayers and ablutions of the devout is followed by a walk amongst the sacred temples and holy ponds of the south part of the city, near the Assi Ghat. Breakfast on the ghats (stepped embankments). Fly at noon to Khajuraho. First of two nights in Khajuraho. Day 8: Khajuraho. Visit the spectacular group of temples built during the Chandela Rajput dynasty, famous for the beautifully carved erotic scenes. The awe-inspiring 11th-cent. Kandariya Mahadev Temple is one of the finest examples of North Indian temple architecture, richly embellished with sensuous sculptures. Nearby, the Jagadambi Temple contains excellent carvings of Vishnu. The Lakshman Temple has attractive female brackets. In the afternoon visit the intricately carved Jain Temple. The Chaturbhuj Temple is unique in its absence of any erotic depictions. Day 9: Khajuraho to Orchha. Drive to Orchha. Located close to the Betwa River on dramatic rocky terrain, Orchha’s former glory as capital of the Bundela kings is evident in the multi-chambered Jehangir Mahal with lapis lazuli tiles and ornate gateways. The Raj Mahal palace contains some beautiful murals with religious and secular themes. Elegant Royal Chhatris (cenotaphs) line the ghats of the Betwa. First of two nights in Orchha. Day 10: Orchha. A walk in the old town includes a visit to the Lakshmi Temple whose architecture incorporates fortress elements and whose 19th-cent. frescoes depict scenes of the
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1857 Mutiny. The high-ceilinged Chaturbhuj Temple follows a cross plan, representing the four-armed Krishna. Lunch is on the banks of the Betwa before driving the short distance to the towering 18th-cent. fort of Barua Sagar which played an important role in the Mutiny. The rest of the day is free. Day 11: Datia, Dholpur, Agra. Drive to the little-visited rural town of Datia to see the 17th-cent. palace of the Bundela ruler Bir Singh Deo. Here Mughal and Rajput styles blend in the decoration of the many-layered residence. Drive to Dholpur for lunch at a former royal residence before continuing to Agra. Take an evening stroll near the Yamuna river for a rewarding view of the Taj Mahal. First of three nights in Agra. Day 12: Agra. Rise early to visit the Taj Mahal in the first light of day. Return to the hotel for breakfast and then visit the magnificent Red Fort. The Jehangiri Mahal despite its name was built by Akbar and is the best preserved of the palaces built during his reign. Later additions by Shah Jahan include the glorious mirrorinlaid Sheesh Mahal and the elegant marble Khas Mahal. Free afternoon. Day 13: Fatehpur Sikri, Agra. Drive to Fatehpur Sikri, a new capital built by Akbar (1570) but abandoned after a mere 15 years. The walled city occupies a ridge with excellent views. The palace complex consists of a series of courtyards and beautifully wrought red sandstone pavilions. In the Diwan-i-Khas an intriguing column fuses architectural styles and religious symbols. On return to Agra, visit the Itamad ud Daula, an exquisite garden tomb, and the Chini ka Rauza Tomb, notable for its tiled exterior. Day 14: Sikandra, Delhi. Drive to Delhi via Akbar’s mausoleum at Sikandra, built on his death in 1605. Set in a traditional char-bagh, it has no central dome unlike other Mughal mausolea. In Delhi, visit the Qutb Minar, site of the first Islamic city of Delhi, established in 1193 on the grounds of a defeated Rajput fort.
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Essential India continued
The British Raj Bombay, Calcutta, Delhi: history & architecture
The towering minaret and its mosque survive as testament to the might of the invaders. Overnight Delhi. Day 15: Delhi. Fly from Delhi at c.12.30pm to London Heathrow, arriving c.4.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £5,360 (February), £5,550 (November), (deposit £450). This includes: air travel (economy class) on flights with British Airways: return London to Delhi (Boeing 747–400) and with Jet Airways: Delhi to Varanasi (Boeing 737–800), Varanasi to Khajuraho (Boeing 737–800); travel by private air-conditioned coach; accommodation as described below, breakfasts, 11 lunches (including 2 packed) and 9 dinners with wine or beer, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; airport taxes; the service of a lecturer. Single supplement £760 (February), £820 (November). Price without international flights: £4,670 (February), £4,960 (November). Hotels. Delhi (4 nights) dating to early 1900s, it retains colonial charm and is ideally situated in the heart of Lutyen’s Delhi. Attractive garden and swimming pool. Varanasi (3 nights) a large, functional yet comfortable 4-star hotel with contemporary touches to the recently renovated rooms. It is conveniently located close to the centre, but removed from the bustle in its 40-acres of private garden, with a pool. Khajuraho (2 nights) a modern hotel, walking distance from the main site, surrounded by a well-tended garden. Rooms are spacious and light with large windows overlooking the pool or garden. Orchha (2 nights) the most basic of the hotels on this tour, located very near to the main sites. The rooms are adequately equipped and have air conditioning. There is a garden and pool. Agra (3 nights): a comfortable, wellrun, modern 4-star close to the main sites with a spacious internal garden with pool.
5–17 January 2013 (mz 451) 13 days • £6,220 Lecturers: David Gilmour & Professor Gavin Stamp Led by two eminent lecturers, a historian of the Raj and a specialist in Victorian and Edwardian architecture. Visits the major centres of British power, still India’s leading cities – Bombay (Mumbai), Calcutta (Kolkata) and Delhi. There is an extraordinary wealth of Europeanstyle architecture from the late eighteenth century to the middle of the twentieth. Little-visited treasures as well as the major ones feature, with private visits and special access a feature of the tour. An archetypical case of the MRT policy of travelling less and seeing more, with four days in each of the cities and free time.
In a history of the world’s empires, British India would stand out as an extreme oddity. Both the way in which India was acquired and the means by which she was governed and administrated were exceptional. It is not much of an exaggeration to say that the Subcontinent became British almost by accident. There was never an official expansionist strategy, and indeed time and again governments in London urged restraint or proscribed further territorial enlargement. When on occasion enthusiasts conceived grand designs they were usually stymied by the doctrine of ‘masterly inactivity’. Extraordinarily, for the first two-and-a-half centuries of British presence, India was not ruled by the Crown but by a commercial firm. The Honourable East India Company was founded in 1599, one of several such European enterprises initiated at the time to trade with the East via the recently discovered sea routes. But unlike most of the others, the EIC was not regarded as an arm of government and did not receive state subsidy. Only in the aftermath of the Mutiny of 1857–8 did India come to be ruled from Westminster and Whitehall. Calcutta, Government House, a drawing by Desmond Doig c. 1960.
How strenuous? A good level of fitness is essential. Unless you enjoy entirely unimpaired mobility, cope with everyday walking and stair-climbing without difficulty and are reliably sure-footed, this tour is not for you. A rough indication of the minimum level of fitness required is that you ought to be able to walk briskly at about three miles per hour for at least half an hour, and undertake a walk at a more leisurely pace for an hour or two unaided. Uneven ground and irregular paving are standard. There are some long coach journeys during which facilities are limited and may be of poor quality. Most sites have some shade but the Indian sun is strong, even in the cooler seasons. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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British India was initially a trading enterprise, with treaties willingly entered into by local rulers. Military means were used intermittently to defend the status quo or for piecemeal consolidation of interests. Conquest is an inappropriate term to describe the process of acquisition. And it was not as a consequence of military defeat that the British withdrew in 1947. Colonisation is also a term to be used warily. Plantations were rare, settling very much the exception (and planters were often a thorn in the flesh of the administration). Most Britons who went to India expected to end their days in Britain. India was a place to seek adventure and to pursue a career, rarely a place to which to emigrate. If the imperial venture had its roots in trade, its fulfilment manifested itself in bureaucracy. At the height of the Raj, about a thousand Anglo-Indians administered a population of 300 million. The Indian Civil Service was perhaps the most efficient and least corrupt in history. There was no shortage of arrogance and prejudice; but devotion to duty, sense of service, religious tolerance and idealism concerning the benefits of their work were abundantly prevalent. It was not lost on some that their mission to inculcate the native population with Enlightenment values – order, justice, liberty, democracy and equality before the law – must lead inevitably to emancipation and independence. Most of those joining the Indian Civil Service in the twentieth century believed that their function was to prepare native Indians to take over. Considering independence came nearly seventy years ago, it is perhaps surprising that so much physical evidence of the Raj survives. The centres of the major cities are astonishingly, bizarrely British. Bombay is perhaps the world’s greatest Gothic Revival townscape, the classical architecture of Calcutta can be spoken of in the same breath as St Petersburg, New Delhi is the ‘new town’ of the twentieth century. It is startling to see so many buildings which seem to have been transported bodily from Manchester, Glasgow, Bristol or London – except that many are very much bigger than their peers in Britain. Except, also, on closer inspection, adaptations to the climate are evident. Some are designed by major British architects – George Gilbert Scott and Edwin Lutyens among them – but most are by less familiar names, British-based competitionwinning practices who found a moment of glory in the sun, architects who settled in India for years or decades, and, towards the end, native Indian talent. Indo-Saracenic architecture, an Orientalist hybrid, is a fascinating phenomenon. A Battle of the Styles raged in Victorian India in Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Gothic Revival buildings. We finish with the eclectic home of the Royal Bombay Yacht Club, the oldest such institution in Asia. Evening free.
from Curry & Rice by Capt. George Atkinson 1859.
parallel with the Gothic-Classical debates back home: to impose our native styles as would any conqueror, proclaiming the superiority of British civilisation, or legitimise our role as rulers by appropriating Indian styles? There will be much to debate on this tour.
Itinerary Days 1 & 2: London to Bombay (Mumbai). Fly from London Heathrow at c. 10am, and after a 5 1 /₂-hour time change reach the hotel in Bombay in the early hours of the following morning. The rest of the night constitutes the first of four nights in Bombay. Day 2: Bombay. Nothing is planned before a pre-lunch talk. Our hotel, a domed Edwardian pile which is one of the most famous in India, faces the Gateway of India, an Orientalised triumphal arch marking the spot where King George V and Queen Mary landed in 1911. In the afternoon we walk around the Victorian heart of Bombay, seeing the major public buildings which make it the most complete Gothic Revival city outside England: the Secretariat, the High Court and, above all, the University. Other buildings include Watson’s Hotel, a mid-Victorian structure of prefabricated cast-iron, and the Prince of Wales Museum, an Edwardian building in the IndoSaracenic style which houses, amongst much else, a collection of both European and Indian paintings. Day 3: Bombay. The Gothic Victoria Terminus railway station was clearly inspired by St Pancras in London. The Gothic Revival Afghan Memorial Church is also a melancholy reminder of the first of Britain’s several disastrous interventions in Afghanistan. St Thomas’s Cathedral, typical of so many Anglican churches in India: a Classical building adapted to the climate and filled with poignant monuments to British merchants, soldiers and administrators who never returned home. The Sassoon Library and the University Library, erected from designs sent out by Sir Gilbert Scott, two of the more remarkable
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Day 4: Bombay. In the morning we experience a rather older India with a visit by boat to the famous caves on Elephanta Island, with their rock-cut architectural forms and sculptures dating from the 5th to the 8th centuries. In the afternoon we visit by special arrangement the Dr Bhau Daji Lad Museum, the oldest in the city, founded as the Victorian and Albert Museum in 1855. Remainder of the afternoon free. Day 5: Bombay, Calcutta (Kolkata). Visit Mani Bhavan, the house which was used as Gandhi’s political headquarters in Bombay from 1917 until 1934 and from which he launched his campaign of civil disobedience against British rule. Then drive to the airport and fly to Calcutta, where we stay at the Oberoi Grand, a late 19th-cent. building. First of four nights in Calcutta. Day 6: Calcutta. Established in 1690, Calcutta flourished as an East India Company trading post and later as the capital of British India, especially after Clive’s victory over the Nawab of Murshidabad in 1757. Located in the vicinity of Dalhousie Square at the heart of the city are St John’s Church, with the tomb of Job Charnock the city’s founder, Town Hall, Writers’ Building, General Post Office and High Court (Gothic, unlike most of Calcutta). Government House, begun in 1799 by Governor-General Marquess Wellesley, was the grandest of the palaces. The Rabindra Bharati Museum is an 18th-cent. house which was the home of the poet and writer Rabindranath Tagore. Cross the Howrah Bridge, the huge cantilever steel structure over the Hooghly river opened in 1943, to see the Howrah Station, an Edwardian building which is still a vital testament to the importance of the railway in unifying British India. Day 7: Calcutta. St Paul’s Cathedral, one of the few Gothic buildings in Calcutta, contains many good memorials and a superb BurneJones window. The domed Edwardian Baroque Victoria Memorial, by far the grandest building in Calcutta, was founded by Lord Curzon as a museum of British India and contains a magnificent collection of paintings and sculpture. The Belvedere was the residence of the Lieutenant Governors of Bengal and now houses the National Library. Finally we see the home of Warren Hastings, the controversial early Governor-General, which is a stuccoed Classical villa typical of its time, followed by the house in which the novelist William Makepeace Thackeray was born in 1811.
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The British Raj continued
and the Viceroy’s House (now residence of the President) in which Sir Edwin Lutyens integrated Mughal, Hindu and Buddhist elements into his monumental Classical concept. Also by Lutyens, Hyderabad House is one of the palaces built for native princes; another such palace, Jaipur House, close to the All India Arch at the end of the long vista from Viceroy’s House, is now the National Gallery of Modern Art. Among the buildings designed by Lutyens’s disciples are the Anglican cathedral by Henry Medd and the Garrison Church by Arthur Shoosmith, an astonishing building which is a 20th-cent. monument of rare distinction. Day 13: Delhi to London. Fly from Delhi at c. 1.30pm, and arrive in London at c. 5.30pm.
Practicalities
Calcutta, engraving 1895.
Day 8: Calcutta. South Park Street Cemetery is a beautiful as well as poignant burial ground in which so many of Calcutta’s early residents lie in or under remarkably magnificent and sophisticated monuments. The La Martinière Schools, one for girls, one for boys, were established under the will of the French mercenary Major General Claude Martin. The Indian Museum was established in 1814 by the Asiatic Society; its present home opened in 1878 and was the work of Walter Granville, architect of the Post Office and the High Court. It contains India’s most important collection of sculpture. Day 9: Calcutta. The Maghen David Synagogue of 1884 and the Armenian Church of 1707 survive as reminders of the cosmopolitan nature of the city before Independence. The Marble Palace is one of the grandest of the many stuccoed merchants’ houses which gave rise to Calcutta being known as the ‘City of Palaces’; built in 1835 by Raja Rajendra Mullick, behind its colonnades is housed a remarkable collection of antiquities and art (by private arrangement). Fly to Delhi at c. 5.30pm. First of four nights in Delhi. Day 10: Delhi. On this first day we shall explore the area north of Old Delhi. It was here that some of the fiercest fighting took place during the 1857 Mutiny; we see the Flagstaff Tower and the Mutiny Memorial. Here also
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the move of the capital from Calcutta to Delhi was announced at the 1911 Coronation Durbar; visit the temporary Viceregal Lodge, now part of Delhi University, occupied by the Viceroys until the new palace designed by Lutyens for them was ready. Located inside the Kashmir Gate of Old Delhi, scene of desperate fighting in 1857, is St James’s or Skinner’s Church, with its unusual centralized plan built by a cavalry officer, Colonel James Skinner, in the 1830s. Day 11: Delhi. This day is devoted to the magnificent Islamic architecture of Delhi. Delhi is a very ancient city but its principal architectural glories date from the 17th century when it was the capital of the Mughal emperors. Shah Jahan began the Red Fort and its palace in 1639 (the British nearly demolished them after 1857) with its open diwans (audience chambers) and the Moti Masjid (Pearl Mosque) of white marble. The huge Jami Masjid (Friday Mosque) with its two noble minarets is one of the very finest Islamic buildings, and the 16th-cent. garden mausoleum of the Emperor Humayun is an outstanding example of earlier Islamic design. Day 12: New Delhi. The day is devoted to New Delhi, established in 1911 and inaugurated twenty years later. The magnificent group of government buildings at the heart of the low-density plan include the Secretariat and Parliament, both by Sir Herbert Baker,
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Price: £6,220 (deposit £500). This includes: air travel (economy class) on flights with Jet Airways: London to Mumbai (Boeing 777–300), Delhi to London (Boeing 777–300); travel by private air-conditioned coach; accommodation as described below, breakfasts, 9 lunches (including 2 packed), 6 dinners with wine or beer, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; airport taxes; the service of two lecturers. Single supplement £840. Price without international flights: £5,430. Hotels. Mumbai (4 nights): an iconic landmark and masterpiece of Indo-Saracenic architecture, comfortable and centrally located. Calcutta (4 nights): a long-established luxury hotel located in the city centre, impeccable service, pool in courtyard gardens. Delhi (4 nights): dating to early 1900s, it retains colonial charm and is ideally situated in the heart of Lutyens’s Delhi, attractive garden and swimming pool. How strenuous? A good level of fitness is essential. Unless you enjoy entirely unimpaired mobility, cope with everyday walking and stair-climbing without difficulty and are reliably sure-footed, this tour is not for you. A rough indication of the minimum level of fitness required is that you should be able to walk briskly at about 3 miles per hour for at least half an hour, and undertake a walk at a more leisurely pace for an hour or two unaided. Uneven ground and irregular paving are standard, including in cities. Average distance by coach per day: 14 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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Rajput & Mughal Rajasthan Delhi, Jaipur, Bundi, Chittorgarh, Jodhpur, Nagaur 2–17 December 2012 (mz 442) 16 days • £5,520 Lecturer: Dr Giles Tillotson Architecture, art and history amid the enthralling landscapes and beautiful cities, forts and palaces of north-west India. The Hindu Rajput clans of northern and central India claim family trees going back to the sixth century. The Muslim Mughal empire lasted from 1527 to 1857, at its peak encompassing most of the Subcontinent. The tour includes less visited places as well as major ones, spends more time at each place and includes a number of special arrangements. The Rajputs, rulers of large tracts of northern India, trace their origins to the sixth century ad or earlier. They built some of India’s greatest temples, established a sophisticated court culture and, all too ready to put into practice a chivalric and militaristic ethos, became the main bulwark of resistance to Islamic invasion. The Mughals, the last and most refined of India’s Muslim dynasties, originated in Central Asia and Afghanistan, being descendants of both Timur (Tamerlaine) and Genghis Khan. Babur conquered the Kingdom of Delhi in 1527, and his successors extended the empire to include at its peak all the Subcontinent except for its southernmost tip. They remained rulers until 1857, though after the death of the Aurangzeb in 1707 their power and territories withered rapidly. It is ironic therefore that Rajputs and Mughals came to an accommodation. Rajput maharajas served as imperial commanders and as regional governors, while at home, in the fortified cities of Rajasthan, they developed a courtly culture in tandem with that of their imperial overlords but drawing too on older traditions. This composite courtly culture is among India’s best known and most admired phenomena, permeating a range of arts from painting and textiles to jewellery and precious artefacts. The proper setting for all these arts were the courtyards and pavilions of their palaces, which rank among the world’s most striking and beautiful works of secular architecture. Their appearance is further enhanced by their setting in the dramatic landscape of Rajasthan, which encompasses both desert plains (in the north-west), and rugged hills and ravines (in the south-east). This tour covers many of the finest forts, palaces, gardens and cities built by the Rajputs in Rajasthan and by their Mughal overlords in and around Delhi. Including Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
the most famous sites and some less known ones, it also visits the best museums, public and private. A distinguishing feature is that longer is spent at the sites than is the norm for tours to Rajasthan, resulting in a much deeper understanding and appreciation of this extraordinarily rich episode of artistic and architectural creation.
Itinerary Day 1: London to Delhi. Fly from London Heathrow to Delhi at c. 12 noon, and after a 5 1/2 hour time change reach the hotel in New Delhi c. 3.00am for the fisrt of three nights there.
Day 3: Delhi. The Red Fort and the Friday Mosque, major monuments of Mughal rule, dominate Old Delhi. As we shall often see, the formidable bulk of the fortress shelters exquisite delicacy (pietra dura work of Shah Jahan’s 1640 throne pavilion). The Jami Masjid is India’s largest mosque. Then by auto-rickshaw through the labyrinthine streets near Chandni Chowk. The Purana Qila, the Old Fort, marks the site of Emperor Humayun’s 16th-cent. capital. His tomb is a pioneering example of Mughal architecture and garden design. Day 4: Delhi, Jaipur. In the morning visit the National Museum’s outstanding collection of Indian miniatures. Fly from Delhi to Jaipur at c. 3.00pm. First of four nights in Jaipur.
Jaipur, etching by Mortimer Menpes (1855–1938).
Day 2: Delhi. Nothing is planned before a pre-lunch talk. The first Islamic city of Delhi was established in 1193 by the conquering ruler Muhammed of Ghur; the afternoon outing is to the earliest Islamic buildings in India, the towering 12th-cent. minaret of Qutb Minar and its mosque, built using masonry from plundered Hindu temples. A stroll in the serene Lodi Gardens takes in the 15th-cent. tombs of the Sayyid and Lodi dynasties, relatively simple but beguiling in design.
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Day 5: Jaipur. Founded in the 18th cent. by the prominent Rajput ruler Sawai Jai Singh, the design of Jaipur demonstrates its creator’s obsession with mathematics and science. The City Palace contains an unsurpassed collection of textiles and arms. The Jantar Mantar, the 1730s observatory is equipped with massive astronomical instruments that are astonishingly accurate. A walk takes in the many-windowed façade of the pink sandstone Hawa Mahal (Palace of Winds) and attractive havelis.
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Rajput & Mughal Rajasthan continued
Day 6: Jaipur. The forbidding hilltop mediaeval Jaigarh Fort has impressive ramparts, a network of passages and a 16thcentury canon foundry. Athwart a natural ridge below, the magnificent yellow walls of the 18th-cent. Amber Palace conceal fine craftsmanship – mirrored chambers, latticed windows, carved alabaster. The former duckhunting lodge Jal Mahal is situated in the middle of a lake (visit by special permission). The Nahargarh (Tiger) Fort houses the lavish 19th-cent. Madhavendra palace built for the Maharaja’s nine wives. Overnight Jaipur. Day 7: Jaipur. The dramatically located site of Galta outside Jaipur features temples, leisure pavilions, sacred water spring and tanks. Designed by Sir Samuel Swinton Jacob, the Indo-Saracenic Albert Hall (1867) houses a museum of art and artefacts from Rajasthan and elsewhere. The rest of the day is free. Day 8: Bundi. Drive south to the less frequented but highly picturesque town of Bundi, flanked by the Aravalli Hills. There is an initial exploration on foot before driving further to the step wells south of the city, including the Dhai Bhau ki Kund and the richly decorated 17th-cent. Raniji ki Baoli with reliefs of Vishnu. The Chaurasi Khambon cenotaph has 84 pillars supporting its two levels. First of two nights in Bundi. Kota and the Chambai River, after a drawing by C.W. Waddington 1933.
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Day 9: Bundi. Dating from the 17th cent., the palace complex of Bundi spills down the hillside beneath the forbidding mediaeval Taragarh Fort. The palace, Chattar Mahal, contains delicate stone work and remarkable murals, among the finest examples of Rajput painting, and a later cloistered courtyard which has an excellent collection of miniatures. There is time to enjoy the palace grounds. Visit also the Sukh Mahal, a summer pleasure palace facing the attractive Jait Sagar lake. Day 10: Kota, Menal, Chittorgarh. Drive to the neighbouring kingdom of Kota, whose eponymous capital has a reputation for miniature painting equal to that of Bundi. The walls of the City Palace (1625) are laden with murals and mirror inlay, and the museum contains a good collection of royal memorabilia. Lunch is in a turn-of-the-century palace designed by Swinton Jacob. At the ancient Hindu site of Menal the Shiva temples overlook a precipitous gorge. First of two nights in Chittorgarh (Chittor). Day 11: Chittorgarh. Seized by the Mewar dynasty in ad 764, Chittorgarh became the principal bastion against Muslim invaders until they abandoned it in 1568. The day is spent exploring the ruined palaces and temples strewn along three miles of rocky hilltop. Scarred from battles, it is the site of poignant episodes in Mughal and Rajput history. Outstanding are the 15th-cent. Rana Kumbha Palace and a Jain temple, Shingara Chauri Mandir, but it is the totality which is so impressive.
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Day 12: Chittorgarh to Jodhpur. The coach journey today is around 200 miles. With an 8.30am start and morning, lunchtime and afternoon stops, we should be at the hotel not long after 6pm. First of three nights in Jodhpur. Day 13: Jodhpur. The capital of one the largest Rajput states in western Rajasthan is presided over by the magnificent Mehrangarh Fort. Courtly life is well represented here by the fine collections such as a silver elephant howdah and a gilded palanquin. The buildings of the lively Old City are painted in a variety of blues. Jaswant Thada, the large 19th-cent. memorial of Jaswant Singh II and cremation ground of the Marwar rulers, stands resplendent in white marble. Day 14: Nagaur. Through desert landscapes to Nagaur, a sufi centre. Visit Ahhichatragarh Fort, founded in the 4th century and developed and embellished in the 18th. Pre-Mughal and Mughal architecture is well preserved in the palace chambers; there are ingenious ventilation and irrigation systems. The minarets of the Akbari Masjid, built by Akbar, are visible from afar. Day 15: Jodhpur to Delhi. Free time is followed by a visit and lunch at the 20th-cent. Umaid Bhavan Palace, which fuses art deco, Rajput and Jain architectural styles in its immense halls. Fly from Jodhpur to Delhi at c. 4pm. Day 16: Delhi to London. The direct flight from Delhi is scheduled to arrive at London Heathrow at c. 4.30pm.
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India 2012-2013 Practicalities Price: £5,520 (deposit £450). This includes: air travel (economy class) on flights with British Airways: return London to Delhi (Boeing 747–400) and with Jet Airways: Delhi to Jaipur (Boeing 737–700), Jodhpur to Delhi (737–800); travel by private air-conditioned coach; accommodation as described below, breakfasts, 12 lunches (including 2 packed) and 9 dinners with wine or beer, water, coffee; all admissions; all tip; airport taxes; the service of a lecturer. Single supplement £880. Price without international flights: £4,870. Hotels. Delhi (3 nights): dating to the early 1900s, it retains colonial charm and is ideally situated in the heart of Lutyens’s Delhi. Attractive garden and swimming pool. Jaipur (4 nights): an 18th-cent. palace in Indo-Islamic style, its former grandeur combining with contemporary touches. Extensive grounds and a pool. Bundi (2 nights): a white classical palace, turned into the most comfortable hotel in town. Chittorgarh (2 nights): a 16th-cent. Rajput fort, converted into a simple, yet charming hotel. Jodhpur (3 nights): a boutique hotel located in the heart of the walled city beneath the Fort, successfully combining modern and traditional design. Swimming pool. Gurgaon (1 night) comfortable and functional 4-star close to the airport. How strenuous? A good level of fitness is essential. Unless you enjoy entirely unimpaired mobility, cope with everyday walking and stair-climbing without difficulty and are reliably sure-footed, this tour is not for you. A rough indication of the minimum level of fitness required is that you ought to be able to walk briskly at about three miles per hour for at least half an hour, and undertake a walk at a more leisurely pace for an hour or two unaided. Uneven ground and irregular paving are standard. There are often fairly steep ascents to hilltop forts and temples. There are some long coach journeys during which facilities are limited and may be of poor quality. Most sites have some shade but the Indian sun is strong, even in the cooler seasons. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Temples in Bihar, aquatint 1812.
The Indian Mutiny
Bengal by River
23 October–5 November 2012 (mz 407) This tour is currently full
10–23 February 2013 (mz 474) This tour is currently full
Rajput & Mughal Rajasthan
Essential India
2–17 December 2012 (mz 442) 16 days • £5,520 Lecturer: Dr Giles Tillotson
The British Raj 5–17 January 2013 (mz 451) 13 days • £6,220 Lecturers: Sir David Gilmour w& Professor Gavin Stamp
Temples of Tamil Nadu
22 February–8 March 2013 (mz 480) This tour is currently full 15–29 November 2013 (ma 771) 15 days • £5,550 Lecturer: Dr Giles Tillotson
Ashoka & Buddhist India 1–14 March 2013 (mz 485) 14 days • £4,920 Lecturer: Charles Allen
14–26 January 2013 (mz 450) 13 days • £3,880 Lecturer: Professor Adam Hardy
For full details of any of the tours listed here, please contact us for the dedicated brochure or visit www.martinrandall.com
Kingdoms of the Deccan
Our programme for the next season of India tours will be available in late 2012. Contact us now to register your interest.
1–14 February 2013 (mz 470) This tour is currently full For lecturers’ biographies see page 206. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
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India
Israel & Palestine Archaeology, architecture & art in the Holy Land 16–25 October 2012 (mz 411) 10 days • £3,660 Lecturer: Dr Garth Gilmour 12–21 February 2013 (mz 476) 10 days • £3,990 Lecturer: Dr Garth Gilmour 1–10 October 2013 (ma 726) 10 days • £4,130 Lecturer: Dr Garth Gilmour Some of the most significant and evocative archaeological sites in the western hemisphere. Ancient and mediaeval and modern architecture, from Herod to Bauhaus – Jewish, Roman, Christian and Islamic. Enthralling vernacular building in ancient walled towns; varied landscapes, from rocky deserts to verdant valleys. Several days in Jerusalem – surely the most extraordinary city on earth? Ancient Canaan, the bridge between Egypt, Phoenicia, Syria and Mesopotamia; land of the Patriarchs, home to the Philistines, the Jebusites and the tribes of Israel. A land where the kingdom of David triumphantly rose around 1000 bc and where the splendour of Solomon’s Temple was created. Jews, Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, Greeks, Romans and Turks all made their mark; the history of the land is characterised by conquest and exile. Herod the Great (37–4 bc) was one of the greatest builders of the ancient world. Christianity brought a new wave of construction after Emperor Constantine and his mother, St Helena, in the fourth century ad consecrated the sites associated with Jesus. The final monotheistic religion to arrive was Islam when in ad 637 Caliph Omar conquered Jerusalem. Another religion, and yet another monumental building, this time the Dome of the Rock. The Crusaders instigated another burst of building activity, planting European Romanesque and Gothic churches and castles tempered by local techniques. Mamluks and Ottomans trampled and rebuilt, and after the First World War, with Jewish immigration accelerating, the British were left to hold the rope until the establishment of Israel in 1948. Jerusalem is the most extraordinary city in the world. Within the walls – and the complete circuit survives, the current edition being sixteenth-century – it is a vibrant, authentic Middle Eastern city, but one with sharply distinct communities and largely composed of ancient and mediaeval masonry. Nowhere else is the historical interpretation of archaeological
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The Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Jerusalem, steel engraving after Thomas Allom c. 1850.
remains so crucial to current political debate. Israel and Palestine are extraordinary places where Biblical names on road signs demonstrate the closeness of the distant past and where history, politics and religion are impossible to separate. The tour is led by an archaeologist, and uses the remains to illuminate peoples and civilizations of the past. It is not a pilgrimage tour in that buildings and sites are selected for intrinsic aesthetic or historical merit rather than religious association. The tour ranges across two countries (Palestine may be recognised as a sovereign state by the time these tours run), and in none:
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strictly speaking, the old walled centre of Jerusalem is neither Israel nor Palestine.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 2.20pm from London Heathrow to Tel Aviv, and then drive to Jerusalem, reaching the hotel c. 10.30pm. Four nights are spent here. Day 2: Jerusalem. The buildings in the Old City and around (the walled kernel has shifted over the millennia) comprise an incomparable mix of ages and cultures from the time of King b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
David to the present day, while continuing to be a thriving, living city. The massive stones and underground tunnels of Herod’s Temple Mount are highly impressive survivals from the ancient world. In the afternoon a walk along a section of the ramparts leads to further Romanera structures in the Ecce Homo Convent and the Bethesda Pools, and to the Crusader church of St Anne. View the seeming panorama of belfries, domes, minarets and city wall from the Mount of Olives. Overnight Jerusalem.
Day 7: Sea of Galilee, Tzefat. Visit first the archaeological site of Tell Hazor, and then ascend the Galilean highlands to the mediaeval synagogues and cobbled streets of the town of Tzefat. The churches of the Heptapegon are locations of Jesus’s ministry where pilgrims from all over the world share the sites. See the remains of the fishing village of Capernaum, Jesus’s most permanent residence and site of a 5th-century synagogue. Take a boat on the Sea of Galilee, and overnight Tiberias.
Day 3: Jerusalem, Bethlehem. The intact 7thcent. Dome of the Rock stands majestically in the vast Haram ash-sharif complex, complete with Umayyad and Mamluk buildings and the El-Aqsa Mosque, all on the site of Solomon’s Temple. Drive through the ‘Separation Wall’ into occupied territory on the West Bank. On the edge of the Judaean Desert, the Herodion is a remarkable fortified palace and tomb complex built for King Herod. The 4th/6thcentury Church of the Nativity at Bethlehem is one of the greatest buildings of its era, and probably the oldest church in continuous use for Christian worship. Overnight Jerusalem.
Day 8: Akko, Caesarea. Akko (Acre) was the principal city of the Crusaders, though the vaulted halls surviving from that period lie below an enthralling maze of narrow streets, Ottoman khans and modern suqs. Drive beside the Mount Carmel range to Caesarea, founded by Herod the Great and capital of Judaea for over 600 years. Once the largest city of the eastern Mediterranean, remains include the Herodian theatre, Byzantine residential quarters and a Crusader church. First of two nights Tel Aviv.
Day 4: Jerusalem. Mainly Constantinian and Crusader, but confusingly complex, compartmentalised and embellished with later ornamentation, a proper study of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre reveals a deeply fascinating building. Among the items seen during the rest of the day are the Roman colonnaded Cardo, the largely 13th-century Armenian Cathedral, and a 17th-century synagogue. Free time is an alternative, possibly with a visit to Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Museum. Overnight Jerusalem. Day 5: Masada, Ein Gedi. Drive through Israel to the Dead Sea Valley, the lowest place on earth. Rising high above the Judaean desert, Herod’s fortified palace of Masada, last redoubt of the Jewish rebellion against Roman occupation, is one of the most impressive archaeological sites in the Levant. A little to the north lies the oasis of Ein Gedi, where there is time to enjoy the botanical gardens or for a swim in the Dead Sea. One night is spent at Ein Gedi. Day 6: Qumran, Jericho, Galilee. Re-enter occupied Palestinian Territories. Qumran is the site of the settlement of the Essenes, a Jewish sect, where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found. The palm-shaded oasis of Jericho is the world’s most low-lying town and perhaps its oldest continuously inhabited one, the Tell as-Sultan dating back 10,000 years. Nearby, Hisham’s Palace is a remarkably well preserved 8th-century Umayyad palace. Continue north, re-enter Israel and spend the first of two nights in Tiberias.
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Day 9: Tel Aviv, Jaffa. Tel Aviv began as an English-style garden city suburb of Jaffa, sprouted a Bauhaus extension (the ‘White City’, a unesco Heritage Site) and grew remorselessly in the later 20th century. The Museum of Art has Impressionists and Post-Impressionists, the Eretz Israel Museum incorporates the Tell Qasile excavations and an outstanding collection of ancient and mediaeval glass. Jaffa (Japheth) was a port city from the time of Solomon and remains a charmingly picturesque enclave. Overnight Tel Aviv. Day 10: Jerusalem. Drive back to Jerusalem to visit the excellent Israel Museum. This incorporates, among other collections, the Shrine of the Book which houses the Dead Sea Scrolls and the outstanding archaeological collection. Fly in the afternoon from Tel Aviv, returning to Heathrow at c. 9.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £3,660 (Oct. 2012), £3,990 (Feb. 2013), £4,130 (Oct. 2013) (deposit £300). This includes: flights (economy class) with El Al (Boeing 777-200); private coach travel; hotel accommodation; breakfasts, 5 lunches and 7 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer, tour manager and local guides. Single supplement £490 (Oct. 2012), £650 (both 2013 departures). Price without flights £3,300 (Oct. 2012) £3,610 (Feb. 2013), £3,750 (Oct. 2013). Hotels. In Jerusalem (4 nights): a 5-star hotel in West Jerusalem within walking distance of the Old City. In Ein Gedi (1 night): a renovated kibbutz near the Dead Sea with
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comfortable cottages set among beautiful botanic gardens. In Galilee (2 nights): a longestablished 5-star hotel by the lake in Tiberias. Tel Aviv (2 nights): a 5-star hotel with all expected amenities and well-appointed rooms. Visas: are obtained on arrival at no extra charge for most nationalities. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking, some of it over rough ground and uneven paving, and sure-footedness is essential. Average distance by coach per day: 36 miles. Small group: between 14 and 22 participants.
Archaeology Ancient Egypt.........................................21 Walking Hadrian’s Wall.........................24 The Age of Bede......................................25 Ethiopia...................................................42 Classical Greece.......................................77 Minoan Crete..........................................79 The Etruscans........................................128 Ancient Rome........................................132 Pompeii & Herculaneum......................133 Sardinia..................................................138 Palermo Rediscovered...........................139 Sicily....................................................... 141 Essential Jordan.....................................144 Oman.....................................................150 Palestine.................................................152 Classsical Turkey...................................192 Eastern Turkey.......................................194 Transoxiana............................................202
Ireland:
Wexford Opera October or November 2013 Details available March 2013 Contact us to register your interest
Israel
The Duchy of Milan Territory of Visconti and Sforza 6–13 May 2013 (mz 551) 8 days • £2,470 Lecturer: Dr Luca Leoncini
which survives remarkably intact, and houses a museum. A late afternoon drive out to the Certosa di Pavia, perhaps the most richly endowed monastic foundation in Italy, and mausoleum of both the Visconti and the Sforza. First of four nights in Milan.
Palaces, castles, abbeys – the heritage of some of the richest and most powerful rulers in late mediaeval Europe.
Day 5: Milan. Visit the spectacular marble Gothic cathedral and the surrounding area, site of the headquarters of the rival powers of municipality, bishop, duke and commune. Then, Sant’Ambrogio, a most important early mediaeval church with a very rich treasury and S. Satiro, a jewel of the early Renaissance. Further visits include the Brera, one of Italy’s finest art galleries with most of the greatest Italian artists represented and the Poldi Pezzoli collection.
Great fresco paintings a major feature. Based in Milan and the attractive small town of Cremona. Passes through some beautiful Lombard countryside and little-visited historic towns. A telling indication of the esteem that Milan enjoyed is that Leonardo da Vinci chose to spend much of his working life there rather than in other Italian cities which are now more commonly associated with artistic endeavour. It is often forgotten that the wealthiest and most powerful territory in mediaeval and Renaissance Italy was the Duchy of Milan, and its eponymous metropolis was probably the largest city in Europe. The ruling dynasties here were the Visconti and, after their extinction in 1450, the Sforza. They produced a succession of the most feared tyrants in Italy – but also created around them the most glittering court in the peninsula, the rival of any in Europe. Artists, musicians and men of letters flocked here to participate in the unending spectacle of court life, and to compete for the unparalleled opportunities for the exercise of their genius. It was not only in the metropolis that the Visconti and Sforza and men of talent left their mark. Throughout their Duchy – approximately coterminous with modern-day Lombardy – there is an abundance of beautiful old cities, buildings and works of art. It is an additional pleasure, moreover, to discover an area of Italy little frequented by tourists. One of the most distinctive features of the region is the quantity of very fine Romanesque churches. Gothic buildings demonstrate the Duchy’s close connections with northern Europe. With the presence of Leonardo and Bramante, the Duchy was a cradle of the High Renaissance and Lombard builders exported the Italian style all over Europe. A fascinating feature is the series of Visconti and Sforza strongholds; the fierce and functional forms, tempered by the region’s principal building material, a lustrous red brick, can achieve great beauty. The fertile plains with their centuries-old farmsteads and villages are most alluring, and are surprisingly unspoilt by industrial development. Much of the countryside through which you pass is designated a National Park.
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Day 6: Vigevano. A 25-mile drive from Milan, Vigevano is another surprisingly attractive little town, which has at its heart one of the largest castles in Italy, a major Sforza palace and stables. Adjacent is a beautiful arcaded square and several churches of interest. Some free time in Milan. Pavia, after a drawing by Inglis Sheldon-Williams 1928.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly with British Airways at midday from London Heathrow to Milan. First of three nights in Cremona. Day 2: Cremona. The birthplace of Monteverdi, Stradivarius and Guarini, Cremona has one of the finest squares in Italy, composed of the cathedral, Italy’s tallest mediaeval campanile, baptistery and Gothic civic buildings. The Romanesque cathedral here is magnificent, and richly embellished with 16th-century paintings. Visit S. Sigismundo, a basilica built to commemorate a Sforza marriage. Other visits include S. Agostino where there is a Perugino, and the civic museum. Day 3: Soncino, Lodi. Morning visit to the little walled town of Soncino, which has one of the finest of Sforza fortresses. Then on to Lodi, another highly attractive town, with L’Incoronata, a richly decorated Renaissance church, and nearby at Lodi Vecchio, an impressive Gothic church. Day 4: Pavia, Certosa di Pavia. Drive through the National Park straddling the River Ticino to Pavia, the most illustrious Lombard city after Milan. Outstanding here are the Romanesque churches, S. Michele and S. Pietro, the brick-built Renaissance cathedral and the vast 14th-century Visconti Palace,
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Day 7: Milan. Visit the Renaissance church of Sta Maria delle Grazie, in whose refectory is Leonardo’s Last Supper. Then the vast and imposing Castello Sforzesco, which contains Michelangelo’s Pietà and finally the Ambrosiana gallery. Day 8: Castiglione Olona. The last morning is spent in the tiny hill town of Castiglione Olona with its wonderful frescoes by Masolino. Fly from Milan, arriving London Heathrow at c. 5.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,470 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (Airbus 320); private coach; accommodation as described below; breakfasts and 4 dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admissions; all tips for waiters, drivers; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £360 (double room for sole use). Price without flights £2,260. Hotels: Cremona (3 nights): stylish, small 4-star close to the main square. The very modern design may not be to everyone’s taste. Milan (4 nights): a smart, traditionallyfurnished 4-star hotel close to the Duomo. Dinners are at selected restaurants. How strenuous? A lot of walking, some on uneven ground. Average distance by coach per day: 40 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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Gardens & Villas of the Italian Lakes Como & Maggiore 18–24 April 2013 (mz 520) 7 days • £2,560 Lecturer: Steven Desmond 19–25 September 2013 (ma 700) 7 days • £2,560 Lecturer: Steven Desmond Among the loveliest and most romantic spots on earth – the summer retreat of the wealthy, aristocratic and intellectual since the time of Pliny. Some of the finest gardens in Europe, glorious in their design and range. Sublime mountain scenery, the inspiration of Shelley and Stendhal. Historic lakeside hotels. The gardens of the Italian lakes fall into two categories: formal, terraced, parterred, allegoried and enclosed summer residences of native landowners, and the expansive, landscaped villa grounds of the rich and splendid. Some are small, others huge; some ostentatious, others retiring; some immaculate, others picturesquely mouldering. Many are the former homes of Austrian aristocrats, Napoleonic grandees, bel canto composers or British seasonal emigrants. All respond to the setting, gazing out across bays and peninsulas, or up to mountain scenery of heroic dimensions. The tour is divided between Lake Como and Lake Maggiore. Lake Como, the home of Pliny, is intensely romantic: Shelley, Bellini and Stendhal found inspiration here on the shores of a long and slender lake divided in three parts. The little town of Bellagio surveys all three from its glittering headland, and provides a convenient (and luxurious) base for visiting the lakeside villa gardens. Lake Maggiore is altogether broader and more open, extending northwards into Switzerland, with the air of an inland sea. The great western bay includes the famous Borromean Islands, among them the contrasting garden retreats of Isola Bella and Isola Madre. As early as 1686 Bishop Burnet gushed that these were ‘certainly the loveliest spots of ground in the World, there is nothing in all Italy that can be compared to them’. Our tours are scheduled at times of the year when there is the possibility Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
of clear, brilliant sunshine. Each lake, each shore, each promontory and island, has its own character, but everywhere is pervaded by the abundance of light, perfume and natural beauty.
Itinerary Day 1: Bellagio. Fly at midday from London Heathrow to Milan. Drive to Bellagio on Lake Como. First of three nights in Bellagio. Day 2: Bellagio. The neoclassical Villa Melzi at Bellagio was built in 1810 for Francesco Melzi d’Eril, vice-president of Napoleon’s Italian Republic. It overlooks the lake in an undulating English landscape park, richly planted and decorated with ornamental buildings. The Villa Serbelloni, probably built on the site of one of Pliny the Younger’s two villas on Lake Como, occupies the high ground above Bellagio. The woods offer magnificent views to all parts of the lake. The mediaeval remnants, 16th-century villa and later terraces are the setting for planting schemes in a backdrop described by Stendhal as ‘a sublime and enchanting spectacle’. Day 3: Lake Como. Villa Carlotta on the western shore of Lake Como, built as a summer residence for a Milanese aristocrat, combines dramatic terracing, parterre and grottoes with an extensive landscape park and arboretum. The house contains notable collections from the Napoleonic period. The Villa Balbianello occupies its own headland projecting into the middle of Lake Como, and can only be approached by boat. This glorious site is terraced to provide sites for lawns, trees, shrubs and a chorus of statuary. The villa stands among groves of oak and pine. Day 4: Renaissance villa gardens. At the Villa Cicogna Mozzoni at Bisuschio, north of Varese, the 16th-century house and garden are thoroughly intertwined; the courtyard of pools and parterres leads to a water staircase, grottoes and giochi d’acqua. Lunch at the villa. The Villa della Porta Bozzolo, tucked away in a mountain valley near Lake Maggiore, is a hidden treasure of a garden, shooting straight up a dramatic hillside from the village street of Casalzuigno. The beautiful 17th-century villa is unexpectedly set to one side to increase the visual drama. First of three nights in Pallanza.
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Lake Como, wood engraving c. 1880, from Picturesque Europe Vol III.
Day 5: the Borromean Islands. Isola Bella is one of the world’s great gardens (and correspondingly popular), a wedding cake of terraces and greenery floating improbably in Lake Maggiore. The sense of surrealism is enhanced by the symbolic statuary and the flock of white peacocks. Isola Madre is the ideal dessert to follow Isola Bella: a relaxed, informal landscape garden around a charmingly domestic villa. Visual entertainments include the marvellous plant collection, revitalised by Henry Cocker in the 1950s, the chapel garden, puppet theatre and ambulant aviary.
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Gardens & Villas of the Italian Lakes continued
Genoa & Turin Palaces & galleries
Day 6: Pallanza. The Villa San Remigio at Pallanza is an Anglo-Italian evocation of a Renaissance garden made at the turn of the 20th century. Intensely overlaid with sentiment and stuffed with detail, it lingers in romantic decay. The Villa Taranto is an extravagant piece of 20th-century kitsch created by Henry Cocker for his patron, the enigmatic Neil MacEachern. The alarmingly gauche design is superbly planted and maintained with loving zeal by the present staff. Day 7. Fly from Milan to London Heathrow, arriving at c. 5.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,560 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (Airbus 319); travel by private coach, boat and public ferry; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 4 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips for waiters and drivers; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £240 (double room for sole occupancy). Price without flights £2,340. Hotels: Bellagio (3 nights): excellently situated on the edge of the lake, a historic 5-star hotel with lavishly decorated public rooms and well-appointed bedrooms (they vary in size). Pallanza (3 nights): a recently renovated, privately owned 4-star Belle Epoque hotel with lakeside gardens; bedrooms vary in size. Rooms with a lake view are available on request and for a supplement. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking as some of the gardens are extensive, and all have uneven ground. Participants need to be fit and sure-footed. The average distance by coach per day is 23 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Opera in Turin & Milan February 2013 Contact us now for the full details
The Ring at La Scala June 2013 Contact us now for the full details
Italy
Turin, from Incidents of Travel & Sketches of Remarkable Places 1875.
22–28 October 2012 (mz 412) 7 days • £1,880 Lecturer: Dr Luca Leoncini 15–21 April 2013 (mz 527) 7 days • £1,920 Lecturer: Dr Luca Leoncini Two cities, often unaccountably overlooked. One, a leading republic of mediaeval Italy and birthplace of Columbus; the other developed on a grand scale in the 17th and 18th centuries. Magnificent palaces and churches, from mediaeval to Baroque. Exceptional picture collections with particularly fine examples of Van Dyck and Rubens. Secret cities, despite the allure of botched alliteration, would have been an absurd subtitle for two such major places, but did seem to suggest itself because of the rarity with which Britons find themselves there. But every art lover should go. The prevailing images are perhaps still predominantly commercial and industrial, but not only do both Genoa and Turin have highly attractive centres but both are distinguished by the preservation of a large number of magnificent palaces and picture collections. Genoa lays claim to the largest historic centre of any European city. It was one of the leading maritime republics of mediaeval Italy (with Marseilles it remains the largest port in the Mediterranean), and enjoyed a golden age
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during the seventeenth century. In the 1990s civic improvements and building restorations were undertaken to prepare the city for celebrations connected with the quincentenary of Columbus’s first voyage to the Americas, and the cultural momentum has continued. In the earlier seventeenth century, Genoa was artistically the equal of almost anywhere in Italy except for Rome and Naples. More than any other Italian school of painting, the Genoese was indebted to the Flemish school: Rubens made a prolonged visit to Genoa in 1605 and Anthony Van Dyck was based there from 1621 to 1627. Many of his paintings remain here. Turin, the leading city of Piedmont, was formerly capital of Savoy and later of the kingdom of Sardinia. Developed on a grand scale in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the historic centre is laid out on a regular plan with broad avenues and spacious piazze. Architecture is mainly Baroque and classical. Guarino Guarini and Filippo Juvarra, among the best architects of their time, worked here for much of their lives.
Itinerary Day 1: Genoa. Fly at c. 10.30am from London Gatwick to Genoa. In the afternoon see palaces in the Via Balbi, one of the grandest streets in Europe, including the Palazzo Reale which has a magnificent stairway, splendidly furnished rooms and a fine collection of pictures. First of three nights in Genoa. Day 2: Genoa. Visit some of the main monuments of mediaeval Genoa. The Cathedral of S. Lorenzo, built 12th–16th centuries, possesses many works of art and a fine treasury. Palazzo Spinola has good pictures, Van Dycks in particular. Visit the church of S. Luca with its beautifully decorated interior and the churches of Il Gesù and San Donato. Day 3: Genoa. See the Via Garibaldi, lined with magnificent palazzi, most from the 16th century and retaining sumptuous interiors of the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries. Palazzo Rosso has fine furnishings and excellent pictures. See also the adjacent church of the Annunciation, the Palazzo Doria Pamphilj with Perin del Vaga frescoes and the Piazza S. Matteo, formed by the imposing palaces of the Doria family, which overshadow the small family church of S. Matteo. Free time in the afternoon. Possible visits include the refashioned dock area (architect: Renzo Piano) and further churches and galleries. Day 4: Cherasco, Turin. Leave Genoa and take a cross-country route through the beautiful countryside and wine-producing b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Turin at Christmas Palaces, porticos & piazze area of Le Langhe. Stop in Cherasco which has a 14th-century Visconti castle for a typical Piedmontese lunch. See the magnificent royal hunting lodge of Stupinigi (Filippo Juvarra, 1730) en route to Turin. First of three nights in Turin. Day 5: Turin. A morning walk through beautiful Piazza S. Carlo, with arcades and 18th-century churches. Visit the little church of S. Lorenzo, a Guarini masterpiece, the cathedral, with Guarini’s Chapel of the Holy Shroud, and the sumptuous Consolata church. Afternoon visit to the Palazzo Madama in the centre of Piazza Castello, now housing the City Art Museum, and the Royal Palace, built 1660, with wonderful interiors from the 17th–19th centuries. Walk via the metal dome and spire of the 19th-cent. Mole Antonelliana and the Palazzo Carignano by Guarini. Day 6: Turin. Morning visit to the Galleria Sabauda, an excellent picture collection housed inside the Guarini’s Palazzo Dell’Accademia. Visit the votive church of Superga, a magnificent hilltop structure by Juvarra.
21–27 December 2012 (mz 441) 7 days • £1,980 Lecturer: Dr Luca Leoncini Great art and architecture, particularly rich in palaces. A grand city unaccountably neglected by tourists, despite being a major cultural centre. Includes an excursion to the village of Saluzzo, an unknown jewel at the foot of the Alps. Spreading across a plain at the foot of the Alps and along the upper reaches of the River Po, the gracious, spacious capital of Piedmont takes visitors by surprise with the beauty of its location and its streetscape. Turin was developed on a grand scale in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries as the capital of Savoy, an independent state from
reputation which has unjustly deterred cultural tourists), this is not evident in the centre. Within Italy Turin now has a reputation for a high quality of life, and is repositioning itself as one of the major cultural centres in the north of the country. The 2006 Winter Olympics were the catalyst for an extensive programme of civic regeneration and restoration. The proximity to the mountains not only brings visual benefits but helps to make the city one of the most agreeable in Italy in which to live.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 2.45pm from London Gatwick to Turin. Day 2: Turin. Morning walk through beautiful Piazza S. Carlo, with arcades and 18th-century churches. Visit the little church of S. Lorenzo,
Day 7: Turin, Venaria. Visit the Pinacoteca Giovanni and Marella Agnelli at Lingotto which has a small but excellent quality collection in a building designed by Renzo Piano. Outside Turin is the magnificent royal palace of Venaria (Amedeo Castellamonte, 1659) reopened in 2007 following extensive renovation work. Fly from Milan Malpensa returning to London Heathrow c. 6.30pm (2012) or from Turin returning to Gatwick c. 6.15pm (2013).
Practicalities Price: £1,880 (2012), £1,920 (2013) (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (Airbus 319); private coach for excursions and transfers; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 3 lunches and 4 dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admissions; all tips for waiters, drivers and guides; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £310 (2012), £330 (2013) (double room for sole use). Price without flights £1,720 (2012), £1,770 (2013). Hotel: Genoa (3 nights): a 5-star hotel close to the Palazzo Reale. Turin (3 nights): a 4-star hotel, comfortable, elegantly furnished and very central. Meals are in the hotels and carefully selected restaurants. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking and standing in museums. Average distance by coach per day: 25 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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Turin, engraving from The Illustrated London News, 1861.
the Middle Ages and a kingdom from 1720. Later exchanges of territory led to the title of Kingdom of Sardinia. In the nineteenth century Piedmont became administratively and industrially the most advanced state in Italy, and the springboard for the risorgimento. Turin was the first capital of the newly united and independent Italy, 1861–65. The historic centre is laid out on a regular plan with broad avenues and piazze of remarkable architectural homogeneity. Guarino Guarini (1624–83) and Filippo Juvarra (1678– 1736), among the best architects of their time, both worked here for much of their lives. Though once a major industrial centre (a
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a Guarini masterpiece, and the cathedral, with Guarini’s Chapel of the Holy Shroud, and the sumptuous Consolata church. In the afternoon visit the Palazzo Madama in the centre of Piazza Castello, rebuilt and enlarged many times, and now housing the City Art Museum. Walk past the metal dome and spire of the 19th-century Mole Antonelliana and the Palazzo Carignano by Guarini. Day 3: Turin, Venaria, Stupinigi. The Royal Palace in Turin was built in 1660 and has wonderful interiors from the 17th–19th centuries. Outside the city is the magnificent Royal Palace of Venaria (Amedeo
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Turin at Christmas continued
Gastronomic Piedmont Some of the finest food & wine in Italy
Castellamonte, 1659) reopened in 2007 after extensive renovation work. See the exterior of the royal hunting lodge of Stupinigi (Filippo Juvarra, 1730) en route to Villa della Regina, a luxurious residence built at the beginning of 17th century on the hill of Turin. Day 4: Turin, Manta, Saluzzo. Drive to the castle of Manta to see the beautiful Fountain of Youth and Heroes and Heroines fresco cycles dating back to the beginning of the 15th century. Walk around the charming historic centre of the mediaeval town of Saluzzo at the foot of Mount Monviso (3841m above sea level) and visit Casa Cavassa, a typical and very well preserved local Renaissance palace and the church of San Giovanni from the beginning of XIV century with flamboyant Gothic interior. Day 5: Turin, Superga. Free morning. After Christmas lunch drive up to the Basilica di Superga, the burial site of the Italian Royal family, a votive church designed by Juvarra magnificently sited on a hill overlooking the city and mountains. Day 6: Turin. Morning visit to the Galleria Sabauda, an excellent picture collection housed inside Guarini’s Palazzo Dell’Accademia. Some free time and the opportunity to visit the Egyptian Museum, one of the best in Europe. In the afternoon visit the Pinacoteca Giovanni and Marella Agnelli at Lingotto which has a small but excellent collection in a building designed by Renzo Piano. Day 7: The flight from Turin arrives at c. 7.00pm at London Gatwick.
Practicalities Price: £1,980 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on British Airways flights (Airbus 319); travel by private coach; hotel accommodation; breakfasts, 4 dinners and 3 lunches with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement £230 (double for single occupancy). Price without flights £1,820. Hotel: a recently renovated 4-star hotel, comfortable, elegantly furnished and central with efficient staff. Dinners and lunches are in the hotel and carefully selected restaurants. How strenuous? Quite a lot standing in palaces and galleries. A lot of uphill walking in Manta and around the historic centre of Saluzzo. Average distance by coach per day: 27 miles. Weather: cold but not harshly so, and often clear at this time of year. Rain should not be ruled out. Small group: between 10 and 20 participants.
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6–12 October 2012 (mz 396) 7 days • £2,660 Lecturer: Marc Millon 5–11 October 2013 (ma 731) 7 days • £2,660 Lecturer: Marc Millon One of the most celebrated gastronomic regions in Italy, centre of the ‘Slow Food’ revolution. Wine and food production studied at source, including visits to Alba, white truffle capital of the world, and a number of Barolo wineries. Superb restaurants, from simple trattorias to the Michelin-starred. Beautiful landscapes: upland pasture, rolling hills, sloping vineyards and hazelnut woods. Time also for exploring the art and architecture of ancient towns and villages. Gastronomically, Piedmont is undoubtedly one of Italy’s most interesting regions. Its wines are superb, the food produced there is varied and the delicious cooking ranges from traditional country fare to creatively modern cuisine. Moreover, the region is the centre of the Slow Food revolution which is transforming gastronomy in Italy and beyond. There is also another winning feature: many Piedmontese in the food and wine business have a desire to share their passion, and welcome interested visitors with generous amounts of their time and produce. In part this may be because visitors are relatively few, despite the high reputation which Piedmont enjoys. For this tour we have bypassed Turin in favour of spending time in the countryside, seeing the origins of the food and wine and meeting the producers. This bucolic exile is not at the expense of culinary excellence; you will find superb restaurants, from simple rustic trattorias where Granny’s recipes are still gospel, to Michelin-starred and innovative establishments, all serving some of Italy’s finest food. The study and enjoyment of wines is a large part of the tour. Barolo is the dominant wine – noble, austere and complex, and the Nebbiolo grape is used for the elegant, tarry Barbaresco, and various other DOCs. We meet makers, chosen as much for their charm and communicativeness as for their wines, in some cases study their vines and the wine-making process, and taste the results. Among the foods we investigate, truffles are significant – Alba is something of a truffle capital – but the mountain cheeses, particularly the prestigious Castelmagno, make an equally powerful
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impression. Landscape is another of the great pleasures of the tour. As its name suggests, Piedmont reaches from high pastures to alluvial plains, and much of it is used for agriculture (or small family-run farms). The Langhe hills are among the most beautiful in Italy, the flanks almost entirely carpeted with vineyards, the summits sporting castles, little mediaeval towns or ancient farmsteads.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 10.15am from London Gatwick to Genoa and drive north to Bra, an attractive market town with some fine architecture. Dinner is at a Slow Food restaurant. Stay four nights in Bra. Day 2: La Morra, Alba. There is a tasting at Rocche Costamagna, a winery in the hilltop village of La Morra which has been in the family for 300 years, a well-known producer of Barolo and other Nebbiolo and Barbera wines. There is a truffle seminar and lunch in Alba, chief town of the Langhe. Dinner is in b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
The Val Lucerne, Piedmont, steel engraving after William Brockedon (1787–1854).
Pollenzo at a Michelin-starred restaurant. Day 3: Bra, Monforte d’Alba, Piozzo. Study the local wine-making process at the Ascheri winery adjacent to the hotel. Wine tasting and lunch at a small, family-run estate. Truffle hunting in woods around Piozzo. The landscape between Dogliani and Murrazano is a patchwork of vineyards and rumpled hills, woods and pasturage. Dinner is independent in Bra (plenty of choice, including the hotel). Day 4: Asti. The lovely little city of Asti, centre of another famous wine and food area, is set amidst the gently undulating Monferrato hills. Barbera and Dolcetto grapes predominate, but white wines are also produced, including the sparkling Moscato d’Asti. Visit a nougat producer and there is time to see something of the town: narrow, twisting mediaeval streets, the grand Gothic cathedral, tower houses and 18th-century palaces. Lunch and cooking demonstration at an outstanding restaurant. Some free time in Bra. Day 5: Bra, Cherasco, Cuneo. Most of the morning is free in Bra. There is the option of Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
visiting a traditional sausage maker or a wine tasting. Alternatively, there is a guided walk of c. 6 km across the vine-clad hills of the Barolo region. Leave Bra for Cherasco, a little walled town with good architecture and the Italian capital of snail farming. Lunch is at a familyrun restaurant here. In the castle at Manta there are some marvellous mediaeval frescos. Continue to Cuneo where two nights are spent. Day 6: Castelmagno, Cuneo. The steep-sided valley of the river Grana is the sole source of one of Italy’s finest cheeses, Castelmagno. Visit a farm to see aspects of its production. Continue to mountain pastures (c. 1,700 metres) above Castelmagno to a pilgrimage church for a mountain-top picnic of bread and cheese bought today and wine acquired during the week. Back in Cuneo there is time to explore its magnificent Neo-Classical square, ancient arcaded streets and fine churches. In the evening there is a cooking demonstration followed by dinner at a Michelin-starred restaurant. Day 7: Rivoli. Drive to Castello di Rivoli,
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one of the palaces of the royal house of Savoy established in hunting grounds around Turin. Rebuilt in the 18th century, though never finished, a museum of contemporary art has been installed here. Lunch here at one of the best restaurants in Piedmont, Combal Zero. On the way to the airport, briefly visit the palace at Venaria. Fly from Turin, arriving London Gatwick at c. 6.15pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,660 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (Boeing 737); travel by private coach throughout; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 5 lunches, 1 picnic and 4 dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admissions to museums, etc. visited with the group; all food and wine tastings; all tips for waiters and drivers; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and the tour manager. Single supplement £180 (double room for sole use). Price without flights £2,550. Hotels: Bra (4 nights): a 4-star hotel refurbished to a very modern but enjoyable design using locally-made materials as much as possible. Service is enthusiastic, rooms are comfortable and it is a 10-minute walk from the city centre. Cuneo (2 nights): an excellently situated 4-star just off the ancient arcaded Via Roma, the decor is traditional and tasteful with dark woods and faux-Rococo wall paintings. Staff are helpful and there is a good restaurant. How strenuous? There is a fair amount of walking involved. Participants on the optional 6 km walk on Day 5 need to be used to hiking up and down hills. Surefootedness is essential for truffle hunting in the woods. Average distance by coach per day: 57 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
Stresa Festival September 2013 Details available March 2013 Contact us to register your interest
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206.
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Friuli-Venezia Giulia The border lands of northeast Italy 7–13 October 2013 (ma 733) 7 days • £1,720 Lecturer: Dr Joachim Strupp A wide variety of Italian art and architecture: Roman, Byzantine, Gothic, Renaissance, Palladian. Tiepolo is a predominant theme and the tour is based in Udine where he worked early in his career. Cumbersome by name, complex by history, the region of Friuli–Venezia Giulia is tucked within the north-eastern borders of Italy and bound by Austria, Slovenia, the Veneto and the Adriatic. Much of the region was ceded to Italy by Austria only after the First World War; a border dispute with Yugoslavia rumbled into the 1970s. Understandably, it is marked by variety – ethnic, linguistic, cultural, gastronomic and topographical. The south and centre consist of a broad alluvial plain whose glistening fecundity is fed by rivers descending from the Julian Alps and the Dolomites. The mediating foothills produce some of the finest white wines in the world. Populous and prosperous, there are many towns with historic kernels where virtually every period of Italian art and architecture is represented, from Roman to modern. Some of the early
century as Tiepolo spent the years of his early maturity in Udine. Udine is the base for the tour. A lively city, it has an extensive historic centre with a succession of enchantingly picturesque streets and squares and a central piazza as fine as almost any in Italy. The other big city visited is Trieste, for centuries the principal Austro-Hungarian outlet to the sea and one of the most important ports in the Mediterranean.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 1.45pm from London Gatwick to Venice. Drive to Udine where all six nights are spent. Day 2: Udine, Cividale. In Udine, visit the main piazza with its Gothic and Renaissance loggias, and the cathedral, basically Gothic but much augmented later. The main theme is Tiepolo, the greatest painter of the 18th century, who created several major works in the cathedral, the Oratorio della Purità and the Archbishop’s Palace. Cividale is in the hills bordering Slovenia. Founded by Julius Caesar and capital of the first Lombard duchy in Italy, the ‘Tempietto Longobardo’ possesses the finest 8thcentury sculpture to survive in Europe. Day 3: Aquileia, Grado, Palmanova. See two of Italy’s best early-mediaeval churches, the Basilica at Aquileia, rebuilt in the 11th century but retaining a 4th-century mosaic floor, and S. Eufemia at Grado with mosaics, pulpit and silver altar frontal. Aquileia was a major Roman city and seat of the patriarchate while Grado was its outer port. Palmanova was begun in 1593 as a frontier fortress town by a Venetian state fearful of the encroaching Turks. With a nonagonal plan, it is equipped with the full panoply of Renaissance fortifications.
Cividale, by F. Hamilton Jackson 1906.
mediaeval buildings are particularly striking and important – Aquileia, Grado and Cividale. There is much fine Renaissance painting and architecture: Palladianism was the dominant creed for a couple of centuries after Palladio’s death, and in addition to painters who established themselves in Venice there are several lesserknown figures of talent who are not well known outside the region. Painting reached another climax in the eighteenth
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Day 4: Trieste. Before 1919 Trieste was the principal seaport of the Habsburg Empire and the busiest port in the Mediterranean, and its broad straight streets and 19th-century buildings have a distinctly Viennese cast. After a troubled 20th century its fortunes have revived since 1989. This is demonstrated through grand seafront architecture and the Museo Revoltella, the well-stocked mansion of a 19th-century financier. Towering above, the ancient Capitol has remains of the Roman forum,
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castle and the cathedral of S. Giusto, an agglomeration of buildings from the 5th century onwards with Byzantine mosaics. Day 5: Udine. A hillock at the centre is the site of the castle, an imposing 16th-century residence housing the art gallery, a fine collection of paintings by artists from the region. Other places visited include S. Maria di Castello, the oldest church in Udine, S. Giacomo with its Renaissance façade and the chapel of the Monte di Pietà with its Baroque sculpture. Free afternoon; possibilities include the Museum of Modern Art. Day 6: San Daniele, Spilimbergo, Pordenone. Three towns in the broad valley of the River Tagliamento. The Renaissance frescoes by Pellegrino di San Daniele in the church of Sant’Antonio at San Daniele are the finest in the region. Spilimbergo has a Gothic cathedral with 14th-century frescoes, and a castle courtyard with painted façades. Snaking through Pordenone an arcaded street widens towards the town hall and cathedral, which contains fine paintings including some by G.A. Sacchis, called Il Pordenone. Day 7: Villa Manin. The property of the last doge of Venice, the Neo-Palladian Villa Manin is one of the largest villas in Venetia. Built during the 17th and 18th centuries, it has extensive arcaded courts, Baroque sculpture in the vast garden and frescoed interiors. Fly from Venice, arriving Gatwick c. 6.45pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,720 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on British Airways flights (Boeing 737); travel by private coach; breakfasts and 4 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £140 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £1,550. Hotel: a 4-star hotel in one of the principal squares in the centre of Udine. How strenuous? Quite a lot of walking necessitated, some of it uphill. Average distance by coach per day: 53 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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Villas of the Veneto Palladio, his predecessors, his successors 21–28 October 2012 (mz 408) 8 days • £2,150 Lecturer: Dr Michael Douglas-Scott Studies villas from the beginning of the Renaissance to the end of the 18th century. Palladio’s most famous works are included. Some time also for a choice selection of delightful little towns. Stay in Vicenza throughout. This tour differs from the shorter Palladian Villas tour in that it ranges more widely historically. While it includes Palladio’s most famous works and some of his lesser-known ones, it also presents the development of the Renaissance villa with examples from the fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries, from vestigially fortified country mansions and Renaissance humanist retreats to Baroque and Neo-Classical elaborations on the theme. In addition to Vicenza, where the tour is based, there are visits to the historic little towns of Bassano, Castelfranco and Montagnana, the latter two retaining their mediaeval circumvallation. Much of the countryside is delightful, with low wooded hills, varied cultivation and a backdrop of mountains. Most of the villas on the itinerary are privately owned, some visited by special arrangement. Therefore the selection and order of visits may vary from the description here.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 9.45am from London Heathrow to Venice. A fitting opener for the tour, the Castello Giustiniani of c. 1520 sports a castellated (but undefendable) curtain wall and a house with the earliest domestic twostorey Renaissance loggia. Day 2. Villa Caldogno dates from 1570 and has often been attributed to Palladio. The vast estate of the Castello Porto-Colleoni has an impressive loggia flanked by rectangular towers. The 18th-century Villa Cordellina Lombardi at Montecchio is a masterpiece of the neo-Palladian architect Giorgio Massari, with frescoes by Tiepolo. Day 3. Early Palladio is represented by Villa Pisani Ferri, small if majestic and his first independent masterpiece, and the superbly proportioned Villa Pojana Maggiore. La Rocca Pisana is a hilltop villa with ‘Serlian’ windows by Palladio’s amenuensis Vincenzo Scamozzi. See Palladio’s Villa Pisani, now a bank, in the charming little town of Montagnana. Day 4. In Vicenza, look at a number of palazzi by Palladio, including the Palazzo Thiene Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
The Villa Foscari ‘La Malcontenta’, from an 18th-century etching.
(by special arrangement) and the handsomely porticoed Palazzo Chiericati (now the civic art gallery). Other buildings are the Basilica, the mediaeval town hall encased in noble classical guise (under restoration), and the Teatro Olimpico, Palladio’s last work (1580) and the earliest theatre of modern times. Drive to ‘La Rotonda’, the most famous of Palladio’s buildings, domed and with four porticoes. Villa Valmarana ‘ai Nani’ is a building of the 17th and 18th centuries with frescoes by Giambattista and Domenico Tiepolo. Day 5. At Quinto Vicentino, the Villa Thiene, though incomplete, is representative of Palladio’s maturity. One of Palladio’s first works, the Villa Godi Malinverni is an austere cubic design with lavish frescoes inside. Lunch is served in the villa. See the wooden bridge by Palladio at Bassano and art gallery with paintings by the 16th-century Bassano family. The Villa Barbaro at Maser was built by Palladio for two highly cultivated Venetian brothers and is wonderfully decorated with frescoes by Veronese. Day 6. Originally a hunting lodge built in 1568, Villa Emo Capodilista is a grand edifice designed by Dario Varotari, a pupil of Veronese. Villa dei Vescovi at Luvigliano is an early 16th-century arcaded villa formerly used as a Summer retreat for the bishops of Padova. The afternoon is free in Vicenza.
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Day 7. The elegant Villa Cornaro at Piombino Dese has a two-storey portico, and the Villa Emo at Fanzolo beautifully combines the utilitarian and the noble. In the cathedral of Castelfranco is Giorgione’s Madonna Enthroned. Day 8. Pass several summer retreats of Venetian patricians beside the canal between Padua and the Lagoon. The Villa Foscari, ‘La Malcontenta’, is one of Palladio’s best-known and most beautiful works. The flight from Venice arrives at Heathrow c. 2.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,150 (deposit £200); this includes: air travel (economy class) on British Airways flights (Airbus 319); travel by private coach; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 4 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £390. Price without flights £1,980. Hotel: a comfortable and hospitable 4-star hotel in the centre of Vicenza. Rooms vary in size and decoration. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking as the coach can rarely get close to the villas or enter town centres. The average distance by coach per day is 53 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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Palladian Villas The greatest house builder in history 9–14 October 2012 (mz 392) This tour is currently full 23–28 April 2013 (mz 535) 6 days • £1,760 Lecturer: Dr Joachim Strupp 4–9 June 2013 (mz 591) 6 days • £1,760 Lecturer: Dr Michael Douglas-Scott 8–13 October 2013 (ma 737) 6 days • £1,760 Lecturer: Dr Michael Douglas-Scott A survey of nearly all the surviving villas and palaces designed by Andrea Palladio (1508-80), the world’s most influential architect. Stay throughout in Vicenza, Palladio’s home town and site of many of his buildings. With many special appointments, this itinerary would be impossible for independent travellers. Utility is the key to understanding Palladio’s villas. In sixteenth-century Italy a villa was a farm, and in the Veneto agriculture had become a serious business for the city-based mercantile aristocracy. As the Venetian maritime empire gradually crumbled before the advancing Ottoman Turks, Venetians compensated by investing in the terra ferma of their hinterland. But beauty was equally the determinant of form, though beauty of a special kind. Palladio was designing buildings for a clientele who, whether princes of commerce, traditional soldier-aristocrats or gentlemen of leisure, shared an intense admiration for ancient Rome. They were children of the High Renaissance and steeped in humanist learning. Palladio was the first architect regularly to apply the colonnaded temple fronts to secular buildings. But the beauty of his villas was not solely a matter of applied ornament. As can be seen particularly in his low-budget, pareddown villas and auxiliary buildings there is a geometric order which arises from sophisticated systems of proportion and an unerring intuitive
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sense of design. It is little wonder that Andrea Palladio became the most influential architect the western world has ever known. Most of his finest surviving villas and palaces are included on this tour, as well as some of the lesser-known and less accessible ones. Please note that most of the villas are privately owned and require special permission to visit. The selection and order of visits may therefore vary a little from the description here.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 1.45pm from London Gatwick to Venice and drive to Vicenza.
Day 5. Drive along a stretch of the canal between Padua and the Venetian Lagoon which is lined with the summer retreats of Venetian patricians. The Villa Foscari, ‘La Malcontenta’, is one of Palladio’s best known and most enchanting creations. Explore one of Palladio’s most evolved, most beautiful and most influential buildings, the Villa Cornaro at Piombino Dese. Day 6. The Villa Pojana, an early work, is restrained but of noble proportions and contains models of Palladio’s works. The Villa Cordellina Lombardi is a fine example of 18th-century Palladianism. Fly from Venice to London Gatwick, arriving c. 6.45pm.
Day 2. See in Vicenza several palaces by Palladio including the Palazzo Thiene and the colonnaded Palazzo Chiericati. His chief civic works here are the Basilica, the mediaeval town hall nobly encased in classical guise, and the Teatro Olimpico, the earliest theatre of modern times. The hilltop ‘La Rotonda’, a ten-minute drive away, is the most famous of Palladio’s buildings, domed and with four porticoes. Adjacent is the 17th-century Villa Valmarana ‘ai Nani’ with frescoes by Giambattista and Domenico Tiepolo.
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Day 3. The Villa Pisani at Bagnolo di Lonigo, small but of majestic proportions, is considered by many scholars to be Palladio’s first masterpiece. The Villa Badoer at Fratta Polesine, from the middle of his career, is a perfect example of Palladian hierarchy, a raised residence connected by curved colonnades to auxiliary buildings.
Hotel. We use two different 4-star hotels in Vicenza in 2013. In June & October: just outside a city gate of Vicenza, well located and comfortable. A fairly undistinguished exterior screens attractively furnished, moderately sized, air-conditioned bedrooms. In April: a small establishment in the centre of Vicenza, opened in 2008. It occupies a historic building but the decor is contemporary. Rooms are quite small and are air-conditioned.
Day 4. In the foothills of the Dolomites, Villa Godi Malinverni is an austere cuboid design with lavish frescoes inside, and at the lovely town of Bassano there is a wooden bridge by Palladio. The Villa Barbaro at Maser, built by Palladio for two highly cultivated Venetian brothers, has superb frescoes by Veronese, while the Villa Emo at Fanzolo typically and beautifully combines the utilitarian with the monumental.
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Price in 2013: £1,760 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled flights with British Airways (Boeing 737); travel by private coach; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 3 dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admissions; tips for waiters and drivers; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £140. Price without flights £1,580.
How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking as the coach can rarely get close to the villas or enter town centres. Average distance by coach per day: 70 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants. Woodcut from Palladio, I Quattro Libri dell’ Architettura.
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Art History of Venice Painting, sculpture, architecture
The Circumcision, engraving c. 1820 after Giovanni Bellini.
11–17 March 2013 (mz 488) 7 days • £2,320 Lecturer: Polly Buston The glories of the world’s most beautiful city, with an emphasis on the art and architecture of the Renaissance. Special arrangements include an after-hours visit to San Marco and a tour of a private palace. Avoids the crowds of busier months, and an even smaller group than most of our tours. For the world’s most beautiful city, Venice had an inauspicious start. The site was once merely a collection of mudbanks, and the first settlers came as refugees fleeing the barbarian destroyers of the Roman Empire. They sought to escape to terrain so inhospitable that no foe would follow. The success of the community which arose on the site would have been beyond the wildest imaginings of the first Venetians. By the end of the Middle Ages Venice had become the leading maritime power in the Mediterranean and possibly the wealthiest city in Europe. The shallow waters of the lagoon had indeed kept her safe from malign incursions and she Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
kept her independence until the end of the eighteenth century. ‘Once did she hold the gorgeous East in fee, and was the safeguard of the West, Venice, eldest child of liberty.’ Trade with the East was the source of that wealth and power, and the eastern connection has left its indelible stamp upon Venetian art and architecture. Western styles are here tempered by a richness of effect and delicacy of pattern which is redolent of oriental opulence. It is above all by its colour that Venetian painting is distinguished. And whether sonorous or poetic, from Bellini through Titian to Tiepolo, there remain echoes of the transcendental splendour of the Byzantine mosaics of St Mark’s. That Venice survives so comprehensively from the days of its greatness, so little ruffled by modern intrusions, would suffice to make it the goal of everyone who is curious about the man-made world. Thoroughfares being water and cars nonexistent, the imagination traverses the centuries with ease. And while picturesque qualities are all-pervasive – shimmering Istrian limestone, crumbling stucco, variegated brickwork, mournful vistas with exquisitely sculpted details – there are not half-a-dozen cities in the world which surpass Venice for the sheer number of major works of architecture,
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sculpture and painting. Venice in early spring has one overwhelming advantage over other seasons: fewer tourists. With most of the noisy, gaudy trappings of the tourist industry packed away, the beauties of the city are more readily appreciated, and the sense of her past greatness even more captivating. There may be rain, there will probably be morning mists and it will be overcast for at least some of the time, but equally likely are days of unbroken sunshine and brilliant blue skies, with a wonderful clarity in the air.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at midday from London Gatwick to Venice. Cross the lagoon by motoscafo (water taxi) to the hotel. There is an introductory walk in Piazza San Marco. Day 2. The morning walk includes S. Zaccaria and S. Giovanni in Bragora, two churches with outstanding Renaissance altarpieces by Vivarini, Bellini and Cima. The Scuola di S. Giorgio degli Schiavoni has a wonderful cycle of painting by Carpaccio. In the afternoon cross the bacino to Palladio’s beautiful island church of S. Giorgio Maggiore and then to
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Art History of Venice continued
Santa Maria dei Miracoli, engraving c. 1820.
Modern Art in Italy With the Venice Biennale October 2013 Details available September 2012 Contact us to register your interest
New tours The Age of Bede......................................25 The Cathedrals of England.....................28 Royal Palaces...........................................29 the tranquil Giudecca to see his best church, Il Redentore. In the evening there is a special after-hours private visit to the Basilica of S. Marco, an 11th-century Byzantine church enriched over the centuries with mosaics, sculpture and various precious objects. Day 3. In the morning see the incomparably beautiful Doge’s Palace with pink Gothic revetment and rich Renaissance interiors. Cross the Grand Canal to the Dorsoduro district, location of the great Franciscan church of S. Maria Gloriosa dei Frari which has outstanding artworks including Titian’s Assumption, and the Scuola Grande di San Rocco, with dramatic paintings by Tintoretto. Day 4. Cross the lagoon by motoscafo to the island of Torcello, once the rival of Venice but now scarcely inhabited. Virtually all that remains of the city is the magnificent VenetoByzantine baptistry and cathedral with its 12th-century mosaics. Continue by vaporetto (water bus) to the pretty glass-making island of Murano. Back in Venice, see Titian’s St Lawrence in the Gesuiti. Day 5. In Dorsoduro, visit the church of S. Sebastiano with decoration by Veronese, and the nearby Scuola Grande dei Carmini with fine ceiling paintings by Tiepolo. In the afternoon visit the vast gothic church of SS. Giovanni e Paolo, the early Renaissance S. Maria dei Miracoli with its multicoloured stone veneer, and S. Giovanni Crisostomo with its Bellini altarpiece. Day 6. Spend the morning in the Accademia, Venice’s major art gallery, where all the
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Venetian painters are well represented. The afternoon is free. Day 7. The Ca’ Rezzonico is a magnificent palace on the Grand Canal, now a museum of 18th-century art. Travel by motoscafo to Venice airport. Fly to London Gatwick, arriving c. 5.00pm.
Art & Industry........................................32 English Music in Yorkshire.....................39 Ethiopia...................................................42 The Rite of Spring...................................57 The Rhône Music Festival.......................63 King Ludwig II.......................................75 The Ring at La Scala...............................92
Practicalities Price: £2,320 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on British Airways flights (aircraft: Airbus 320); travel between Venice Airport and hotel by water-taxi, some journeys within Venice by vaporetto; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 3 dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admissions to museums, galleries, etc.; all tips for restaurant staff, drivers; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £380 (double for single occupancy). Price without flights £2,210. Hotel: an elegant and historic hotel on the Grand Canal, opposite the Salute. It is maintained to a high standard and has a good restaurant. Rooms are elegantly furnished and decorated. How strenuous? The nature of Venice means that the city is more often than not traversed on foot. Although part of her charm, there is a lot of walking along the flat and up and down bridges; standing around in museums and churches is also unavoidable. Small group: between 8 and 18 participants.
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Stresa Festival..........................................95 Opera in Venice.....................................103 Parma Verdi Festival..............................107 Florentine Palazzi..................................119 The Etruscans........................................128 Martina Franca......................................137 Walking in Northern Tuscany..............123 Munch in Oslo......................................149 Opera in Oslo, Gothenburg & Copenhagen......................................149 Walking in Madeira..............................156 Grampian Gardens................................162 Scotland: the Borders............................165 Edinburgh at Christmas........................167 Zurbarán & the Golden Age................189 Connoisseur’s Istanbul...........................192 Art in Texas...........................................199 Santa Fe Opera......................................201 b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Venice Revisited Lesser-known & less accessible treasures 6–11 November 2012 (mz 423) 6 days • £2,010 Lecturer: Dr Luca Leoncini This is a tour for those who are familiar with the main buildings and museums of Venice and who now want to explore some of the lesser-known places. ‘Lesser-known’ does not imply less beautiful or interesting; the riches of Venice are so profuse that few visitors, even the most regular, have seen all that is worth seeing. A glance at the list below will show that some of the places are by no means obscure, merely a little off the beaten track or difficult to get into. Others are indeed alluringly arcane. But perhaps the greatest attraction of the tour is that there will be several visits to places not generally open to the public. Some are private institutions, a couple are private homes, all are accessible only by special arrangement. There will also be some free time in which to revisit places not included on the tour or just to relax. We shall obtain information about any music there may be and endeavour to get tickets as requested. Because the tour is dependent on the kindness of many individuals and organisations, we do not give a detailed itinerary here but merely list most of the places we intend to take you to.
Walks off the beaten track include a special guided tour of the Ghetto and its synagogues, around the markets and former trading houses of the Rialto district and Cannareggio, a tranquil area of the city little known to visitors.
tips for drivers, restaurant staff, guides; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £390 (double for single occupancy). Price without flights and motoscafo transfer £1,870.
Among the religious foundations visited are the cloisters and conventual buildings of the island church of S. Giorgio Maggiore, the Scuola dei Carmini with paintings by Tiepolo and the Scuola Grande di S. Giovanni Evangelista with its grand Renaissance stairway and a magnificent hall.
Hotel: an elegant and historic hotel on the Grand Canal, opposite the Salute. A former residence of Tiepolo, it is maintained to a high standard and has a good restaurant. Rooms are elegantly furnished and decorated.
Flights: fly at c. 9.45am from London Heathrow and return on Day 6 at c. 2.15pm.
How strenuous? There is a lot of walking on this tour, particularly up and down bridges, and standing about in galleries, churches and in the streets. Small group: between 10 and 18 participants.
Practicalities Price: £2,010 (deposit £200); this includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (Airbus 319); travel between Venice Airport and the centre by water taxi and some journeys within Venice by water bus; accommodation as described below; breakfasts and 3 dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admissions to museums; all
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206.
A Venetian street, after a drawing by D.Y. Cameron, c.1900.
A special private visit to the Basilica of S. Marco, the finest Byzantine-style church in the West, the mosaic-encrusted interior illuminated exclusively for your benefit, an opportunity not only to see the church without crowds but also to visit chapels not normally open to the public. Private palaces are a special feature: there will be visits to two or three family-owned palazzi with splendid 17th- and 18th-century interiors. Church buildings visited include the little Romanesque cloister of Sant’ Apollonia, Sansovino’s S. Francesco della Vigna with a façade by Palladio and altarpieces by Veronese, S. Giovanni in Bragora with a painting by Cima da Conegliano, the Gothic church of Madonna dell’ Orto with paintings by Tintoretto and the island church of Il Redentore by Palladio. Visit Murano the glass-making island to see SS. Maria e Donato with 12th-century mosaics, S. Pietro Martire with paintings by Bellini and Tintoretto and the glass museum. Museums and picture collections visited include the Seminario Patriarcale, which has paintings from churches suppressed under Napoleon, and the Museo Correr which presents the history of Venice and has many fine pictures. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
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Venetian Palaces The greatest & best-preserved palaces of La Serenissima 13–17 November 2012 (mz 428) This tour is currently full 5–9 March 2013 (mz 486) 5 days • £2,020 Lecturer: Dr Michael Douglas-Scott 12–16 November 2013 (ma 770) 5 days • £2,080 Lecturer: Dr Michael Douglas-Scott Explores many of the finest and best-preserved palaces, once homes to the city’s wealthiest nobles and merchants. Access to many by special arrangement, including some which are still in private hands. Also a private after-hours visit to San Marco. Stay in a converted palace on the Grand Canal, now a 4-star hotel.
Venice’s mercantile oligarchs expressed their own family wealth and status. These Case (in Venetian parlance Ca’) were built throughout the city. In the absence of primogeniture, many branches sprung from many of the two hundred-odd noble families, leading to several edifices of the same name – an obstacle for would-be visitors. These houses were unlike any other domestic buildings elsewhere in the world: erected over wooden piles driven into the mud flats of the lagoon, they remained remarkably uniform over the centuries in their basic design, combining the functions of mercantile emporium (ground level) and magnificent residence (upper floors). They were however built in a fantastic variety of styles, Veneto-Byzantine, Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque and Rococo. Sometimes there is a touch of Islamic decoration. As new families bought their way into the aristocracy during the long period of the Republic’s
readily accessible to the public. Others are opened only by special arrangement with the owners, whether a charitable organisation, branch of local government, or descendants of the original occupants. Some of these cannot be confirmed until nearer the time. A private, after-hours visit to the Basilica San Marco, the mosaic interior illuminated for your benefit, is a highlight of this tour. As is an opportunity to see up close ‘the most beautiful street in the world’, the Grand Canal, from that most Venetian of vantage-points, a gondola.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at midday from London Gatwick to Venice. Cross the lagoon by motoscafo (water taxi) and travel up the Grand Canal to the doors of the hotel. There is an introductory walk in Piazza San Marco. Day 2. Visit the Palazzo Ducale, supremely beautiful with its 14th-century pink and white revetment outside, late Renaissance gilded halls and paintings by Tintoretto and Veronese inside. See the palazzi on the Grand Canal from the viewpoint of a gondola. The former Casinò Venier (by special arrangement) is a uniquely Venetian establishment that was part private members’ bar, part literary salon, part brothel. There is an after-hours private visit to the Basilica San Marco, an 11th-century Byzantine style church enriched over the centuries with mosaics, sculpture and various precious objects (by special arrangement). Day 3. Designed by Longhena (c. 1667) and Giorgio Massari (c. 1751), the Ca’ Rezzonico is perhaps the most magnificent of Grand Canal palaces, and contains frescoes by Tiepolo; it is now a museum of 18th-century art. Visit the grand ballroom of late 17th-century Palazzo Zenobio (by special arrangement). In the afternoon visit the Ca’ Grande (16th-century, now publicly owned) and the Palazzo Grimani, a monumental edifice of the early 16th century by Sanmicheli.
Palazzo Pisani Moretta.
Just as Venice possesses but a single ‘Piazza’ among dozens of campi, it has only one building correctly called a ‘Palazzo’. The singularity is important: the Doge’s Palace (Palazzo Ducale), like the Piazza San Marco, was the locus of the Serenissima’s public identity and seat of her republican government. Unlike her rivals in Florence and Milan she had no ruling dynasties to dictate polity, by contrast developing a deep aversion to individual aggrandizement and over-concentrated power. While the person and Palazzo of the Doge embodied their municipal identity, it was in their private houses that
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economic and political decline, they had their residences refurbished in Rococo splendour by master artists such as Giambattista Tiepolo. Many of these palaces have survived the virtual extinction of the Venetian aristocracy and retain their original, if faded, glory. Palaces for nobles will be considered in conjunction with those for the non-noble cittadino (wealthy merchant) class and the housing projects for ordinary Venetian popolani, which rise cheek by jowl in the dense urban fabric. Some of the places visited are familiar and
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Day 4. With its elegant tracery and abundant ornamentation, the Ca’ d’Oro, also on the Grand Canal, is the most gorgeous of Venetian Gothic palaces; it now houses the Galleria Franchetti. The 13th-century Fondaco dei Turchi is a unique survival from the era; today it is the natural history museum. In the afternoon visit the 16th-century Palazzo Corner Spinelli that now houses the Rubelli fabrics archive and Palazzo Contarini dal Zaffo-Polignac (both by special arrangement). Day 5. Visit Palazzo Pisani Moretta on the Grand Canal, a Gothic palace with lavish 18th- and 19th-century interiors (by special arrangement). The 17th-century Palazzo b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Writers’ Venice James, Byron, Browning & others in La Serenissima Albrizzi has some of the finest stucco decoration in Venice (by special arrangement). Travel by motoscafo to Venice airport. Fly to London Gatwick, arriving c. 6.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,020 (March), £2,080 (November) (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on British Airways flights (Airbus 320); travel between Venice Airport and hotel by private water-taxi, some journeys by vaporetto and one by gondola; accommodation as described below; breakfasts and 3 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement £280 (both departures) (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £1,870 (March), £1,930 (November). Hotel: a 4-star deluxe in a converted palace on the Grand Canal near Campo Sant’Angelo and the Rialto Bridge. The decoration is 18thcentury Venetian style. Canal view rooms and suites are available on request. There is a small bar and lounge but no restaurant. How strenuous? The nature of Venice means that the city is more often than not traversed on foot. Although part of her charm, there is a lot of walking and crossing of bridges; standing around in museums and palaces is also unavoidable. Small group: between 8 and 18 participants.
Venice lagoon, etching 1881 by William Scott.
24–28 October 2012 (mz 410) 5 days • £1,760 Lecturer: Gregory Dowling Reader: Adrian McCourt Great figures of English, American and Italian literature in Italy’s most alluring of cities. Visit places they frequented and inhabited, which inspired them and which they described.
Verona Opera July & August 2013 Contact us now for the full details
Opera in Venice September 2013 Details available March 2013 Contact us to register your interest
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Led by a literary historian and with an actor who reads relevant passages in pertinent places. An historic hotel on the Grand Canal. Venice has been both the star and the stage of many of the world’s finest writers and, from the early Renaissance, when the city became the richest trading power of the age, it has been a constant draw for the creative. Though Venice has produced few outstanding writers of its own – Goldoni and Casanova are rare exceptions – the calibre of its admirers is beyond question. In the Renaissance, the great scholar Petrarch, the ‘Father of Humanism’, left the city his painstakingly collected library of classical works, while for those who knew it only by repute, like Shakespeare, it became a synonym for wealth, majesty and the frailty of mankind. By the end of the seventeenth century, Venice’s economy was in decline, but its reputation for indulgent pleasure was certainly not and well-born young men, completing their Grand Tour, considered it an essential
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item on their itinerary. For writers of the time, from Voltaire to Lord Byron, the city’s fading splendours and decadent lifestyle were to become emblematic of the lapsed glories of ancient civilisations and the perils of hedonism. Its aesthetic reputation was reborn in the nineteenth century, under Ruskin’s admiring spotlight, and in his wake came Robert Browning and the great American realist Henry James. But the city as a catalyst for the imagination remains a constant. From Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited to Daphne Du Maurier’s Don’t’ Look Now, from Ian McEwan’s The Comfort of Strangers to Donna Leon’s detective Brunetti, it has become an eternal archetype of beauty, melancholy and decay.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 1.45pm from London Gatwick to Venice. Cross the lagoon by motoscafo (water taxi) to the hotel. There is a late afternoon introductory walk to see ‘The Bridge of Sighs’, memorably described by Byron, and Piazza San Marco. Day 2. Walk along the Riva degli Schiavoni, passing the site of Petrarch’s house, where he hosted Boccaccio, and the Pensione Wildner, where James wrote Portrait of a Lady. The Scuola di S. Giorgio degli Schiavoni has the wonderful cycle of painting by Carpaccio, described by both Henry James and Ruskin In the afternoon visit the Ca’ Rezzonico, a magnificent palace on the Grand Canal where Browning stayed and died (it is now a museum
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The Venetian Hills Renaissance art in the foothills of the Dolomites
of 18th-century art), and Goldoni’s house close to the Rialto.
Cadore, Titian’s house, wood engraving from The Magazine of Art 1883.
Day 3. Visit several Venetian palazzi this morning which hosted Lord Byron: the 16thcentury Palazzo Mocenigo was his home from 1818 to 1819 (visit subject to confirmation); Palazzo Benzon was once owned by the Querini family who hosted many of the great 19th-century literati; the 17th-century Palazzo Albrizzi has some of the finest stucco decoration in Venice (special arrangement). The Countess Albrizzi hosted Byron at many of her receptions. The afternoon is free. Day 4. By vaporetto across the lagoon to the cemetery island of San Michele to see the graves of writers Ezra Pound and Joseph Brodsky. On the mainland, Campo SS. Giovanni e Paolo was the setting for a scene of Byron’s Marino Faliero and a crucial scene in James’ The Aspern Papers. Nearby is Campo S. Maria Formosa, memorably described by Ruskin. Palazzo Grimani, an eclectic palace which belonged to the wealthy Grimani family and hosted their collection of antiquities, was visited by Byron among others. In 1816 Byron studied the lives and language of the monks of the Armenian monastery on the island of San Lazzaro.
3–7 October 2013 (ma 729) 5 days • £1,680 Lecturer: Dr Joachim Strupp
Day 5. By motoscafo to Venice airport. The flight arrives at Gatwick at c. 5.00pm.
Ravishingly beautiful landscapes from vine-clad foothills to the peaks of the Dolomites.
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Altarpieces and frescoes by Venetian masters, mediaeval to Rococo.
Price: £1,760 (deposit £200); this includes: air travel (economy class) on British Airways flights (Boeing 737); travel between Venice Airport and hotel by water-taxi, some use of vaporetto; accommodation as described below; breakfasts and 3 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and reader. Single supplement £340 (double for sole use). Price without flights and motoscafo transfer £1,610. Hotel: an elegant and historic hotel on the Grand Canal, opposite the Salute. A former residence of Tiepolo, it is maintained to a high standard and has a good restaurant. How strenuous? A lot of walking along the flat and up and down bridges; standing around in museums and churches is also unavoidable. Small group: between 8 and 18 participants.
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206.
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Some of the loveliest hill towns in Italy, including the birthplace of Titian. Good hotel in a picturesque village. ‘Hills’ and ‘Venice’ are not accustomed to finding themselves in the same sentence; sited on (and sometimes under) an estuarial lagoon, elevation above (or below) sea level in Venice is measured in centimetres. But on a clear day a range of hills can be seen rising to the north. On a very clear day the snowy peaks of the Dolomites come into view. Towards the end of the Middle Ages the proud little communities which populated these hills one by one submitted to the rule of La Serenissima, as did much of northern Italy. Political hegemony was followed by cultural influence, clearly manifested still in the disorientating sight of Venetian-style Renaissance palazzi set against precipitous pine-clad hillsides. But the cultural forces did not flow only in one direction. As is often the case with an artistically flourishing metropolis, many of the creators were outsiders. Titian was born in the rugged Cadore mountains, Cima from the gentler hillside town of Conegliano, Marco
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Ricci from hilltop Belluno, Il Pordenone from the town on the plain from which he took his name. These and many other artists enjoyed successful careers in Venice, but most kept in contact with their natal towns, accepting commissions for, or donating paintings to, their parish church. These hill towns are among the loveliest in Italy, and they are set in ravishing landscapes which range from vine-clad foothills to soaring limestone peaks. Most of them are quite small, but the architectural ambitions of their inhabitants were otherwise: the historic centres are dense with fine buildings and arcaded streets which give protection from mountain downpours and summer sun. The ostensible theme of this tour is painting of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, but other aspects of the art and history of the region will not be ignored. The base is Follina, a tiny community which grew up around a monastery in the mountains.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 1.45pm from London Gatwick to Venice. Drive through the hills to Follina where all four nights are spent. Day 2: Vittorio Veneto, Conegliano. The tiny city of Serravalle (now joined with Cèneda to form Vittorio Veneto), occupying a gorge scoured by the River Meschio, has a fine group of mediaeval and Renaissance buildings, 15th-century frescoes in the chapel of S. Lorenzo and a Titian in the cathedral. Cèneda has a small diocesan picture collection and in the church of Santa Maria b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Parma & Bologna The Via Emilia an exquisite Annunciation by Previtali. Drive to the birthplace of Giambattista Cima del Conegliano, the lovely town from which the artist took his name, that spreads down a hillside below the remains of a castle. Visit Cima’s house and the cathedral to see one of his greatest works (1492).
Ages the region fragmented into a number of independent city states which, whether under a communal or despotic form of government, constructed mighty town halls, vast churches and splendid palaces, and caused great works of art to be created. At the beginning of the modern era, they were parcelled out between a motley collection of usually foreign and invariably unenlightened rulers, and they slumped into a torpor from which they did not recover until the Risorgimento. Nevertheless, a succession of great artists continued to appear, particularly in sixteenthcentury Parma and seventeenth-century Bologna, while the relative lack of prosperity resulted in the preservation of the city centres. One aspect of the allure of Bologna, one of the two bases for this tour, and other towns here is that they successfully reconcile the often incompatible features of economic wellbeing and ancient, unspoilt and enchantingly picturesque streetscape. The cities now enjoy an envied reputation within Italy for quality of life and gastronomic excellence. Parma, one of the loveliest of the smaller cities in Italy, has been chosen as the other base for this tour.
Day 3: Pieve di Cadore, Belluno. Titian was born in the little town of Pieve di Cadore; see here the family home and the parish church with paintings by Titian and family. In the afternoon drive north along the valley of the Piave into an ever more dramatic mountain landscape. Sitting athwart a promontory looped by the Piave, Belluno is a beautiful little city with a Renaissance cathedral and Venetianstyle palaces. Among the fine paintings is an exquisite Madonna and Child by Cima in the Museo Civico. Day 4: Bassano, Feltre. Bassano del Grappa is a highly attractive town in the foothills of the Dolomites with a series of picturesque squares with painted façades. Home of the prolific Bassano family of painters, there are several of their works in the art gallery. Stacked up along the ridge of a hill, Feltre is another architectural outpost of Venice with striking buildings in various styles. See the Rizzarda collection of early 20th-century arts and crafts and the 1802 theatre in the town hall. Day 5: San Fior, Pordenone. Descend to see a string of Renaissance altarpieces in little towns on the densely populated plain at the foot of the hills. San Fior, riven by canals and streams, has an altarpiece by Cima. Pordenone has a delightful arcaded main street, widening towards the town hall. In the cathedral are several works by Il Pordenone and other 16thcentury painters. Fly from Venice airport, arriving at Gatwick c. 6.45pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,680 (deposit £200). This includes: flights (economy class) with British Airways (Boeing 737); private coach; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 2 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £70. Price without flights £1,510. Hotel: in Follina, a 4-star hotel installed in former abbey buildings (the abbey clock strikes through the night). Modern design; comfortable, air-conditioned. There is a good restaurant in the sister hotel across the road. How strenuous? Quite a lot of walking, some uphill. Average distance by coach per day: 62 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Bologna, steel engraving c. 1850.
8–15 April 2013 (mz 514) 8 days • £2,100 Lecturer: Dr Roberto Cobianchi Art and architecture in major cities and small towns in the region of Emilia-Romagna which lie along the Roman road, the Via Emilia. Romanesque architecture and 16th-century painting are particularly strongly represented. Based in the utterly charming ducal city of Parma and in the university city of Bologna, ennobled with miles of arcaded streets. Bound by the River Po to the north and the Apennines to the south, this wedge of Italy is replete with fascinating cities and great works of art, yet is still undeservedly neglected by cultural travellers. With probably not one hundredth of the visitors which Florence and Venice receive and many fewer than, say, Verona or Siena, one can view great architecture and world-class art works without the dispiriting intrusions of a large-scale tourist industry. Across this undulating plain, one of the most fertile in Italy, the Romans founded a large number of prosperous towns and linked them by the Via Emilia which ran from Milan to the Adriatic coast. In the Middle
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Itinerary Day 1: Parma. Fly at c. 3.00pm from London Gatwick to Bologna, drive to Parma. First of five nights in Parma. Day 2: Parma. Parma is of great importance in particular for its High Renaissance school of painting. The cathedral and baptistery are outstanding for their Romanesque architecture and sculpture. See the astonishingly vital and illusionistic frescoes by Correggio in the cathedral, as well as the church of S. Giovanni and the exquisite Camera di S. Paolo. In the Palazzo della Pilotta is a good art collection and a rare Renaissance theatre. Day 3: Cremona, Fidenza. Once a major Lombard city state, Cremona has one of the handsomest squares in Italy with a Romanesque cathedral, Italy’s tallest mediaeval campanile, baptistery and Gothic civic buildings. Fidenza has a beautiful Romanesque cathedral, with excellent sculpture. Day 4: Piacenza, Parma. Piacenza, which is on the border of Lombardy, has many mediaeval buildings on its Roman grid plan, among them an outstanding town hall and Romanesque cathedral. From the Renaissance there is the beautiful church of the Madonna di Campagna and the equestrian statue of Alessandro Farnese is a masterpiece of Baroque sculpture. Some free time in Parma. Day 5: Fontanellato, Sabbioneta. Fontanellato
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is a little town with an enchanting moated castle containing wonderful frescoes by Parmigianino. Sabbioneta was built as an ideal city on an almost miniature scale: a magical assembly of ducal palace, theatre, one of the world’s first picture galleries and all the appurtenances of a Renaissance ducal town. Day 6: Modena, Torrechiara. Modena, capital since the 16th century of the Este dukedom, has one of the finest Romanesque cathedrals in the region, with marvellous 12th-century sculpture by Wiligelmo. The Galleria Estense is particularly good for 16th- and 17thcentury painting. The castle in Torrechiara has 15th-century frescoes. First of two nights in Bologna. Day 7: Bologna. Bologna is one of the most attractive of the larger cities in Italy, with Renaissance arcades flanking the streets. At its mediaeval heart are massive civic buildings and the vast Gothic church of S. Petronio, with sculpture by Jacopo della Quercia. The Pinacoteca Nazionale is one of Italy’s finest picture galleries (Raphael, Carracci family, Guido Reni). Finally, see the early mediaeval S. Stefano and S. Domenico, with the tomb of St Dominic.
Courts of Northern Italy 12–19 May 2013 (mz 558) 8 days • £1,980 Lecturer: Dr Michael Douglas-Scott 22–29 September 2013 (ma 708) 8 days • £1,980 Lecturer: Dr Fabrizio Nevola Northern Italy’s independent city states: Mantua, Ferrara, Parma, Ravenna and Urbino. Some of the greatest Renaissance art and architecture, commissioned by the powerful ruling dynasties: Gonzaga, Este, Sforza, Farnese, Montefeltro and others. Highlights include the most glorious concentration of Byzantine mosaics and important work by Alberti, Mantegna, Piero della Francesca and Correggio.
After the collapse of the Roman Empire, Italy gradually fragmented into numerous little territories. The city states became fiercely independent and were governed with some degree of democracy. But a debilitating violence all too often ensued as the leading families fought with fellow citizens for dominance of the city council and the offices of state. A common outcome from the fourteenth century onwards was the imposition of autocratic rule by a single prince, and the suspension of democratic structures: but such tyranny was not infrequently welcomed with relief and gratitude by a war-weary citizenry. Their rule may have been tyrannical, and warfare their principal occupation, but the Montefeltro, Malatesta, d’Este and Gonzaga dynasties brought into being through their patronage some of the finest buildings and works of art of the Renaissance. Many of the
Day 8: Bologna. See Carracci frescoes in former Palazzo Magnani Salem (subject to confirmation, by special arrangement). Fly from Bologna to London Gatwick arriving at c. 2.15pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,100 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (Boeing 737, Airbus 319); travel by private coach; accommodation as described below; breakfasts and 5 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions to museums, sites, etc.; all tips; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £260. Price without flights £1,990. Hotels: Parma (5 nights): a 4-star hotel in the historic centre. Rooms are furnished in a variety of styles. Bologna (2 nights): a 4-star hotel located in the historic centre. Rooms are elegantly furnished and are of an adequate size. How strenuous? There is a lot of walking on this tour, and it would not be suitable for anyone who has difficulties with everyday walking or stair-climbing. Average distance by coach per day: 50 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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Princely art of the Renaissance
leading artists in fifteenth- and sixteenthcentury Italy worked in the service of princely courts. As for court art of earlier epochs, little survives, though a glimpse of the oriental splendour of the Byzantine court of Emperor Justinian can be had in the mosaic depiction of him, his wife and their retinue in the church of San Vitale in Ravenna. It is not until the fifteenth century, in Mantegna’s Camera degli Sposi at Mantua, that we are again allowed an unhindered gaze into court life.
Itinerary Day 1: Mantua. Fly at c. 9.15am from London Gatwick to Bologna. Drive to Mantua where the first four nights are spent. After a late lunch, visit the Ducal Palace, a vast rambling complex, the aggregate of 300 years of
extravagant patronage by the Gonzaga dynasty (Mantegna’s frescoes in the Camera degli Sposi, Pisanello frescoes, Rubens altarpiece). Day 2: Mantua, Sabbioneta. In the morning visit Alberti’s highly influential Early Renaissance church of Sant’Andrea, the Romanesque Rotonda of S. Lorenzo and Giulio Romano’s High Renaissance cathedral. In the afternoon, drive to Sabbioneta, an ideal Renaissance city on an almost miniature scale, built for Vespasiano Gonzaga in the 1580s; visit the ducal palace, theatre and one of the world’s first picture galleries.
Parma, theatre in the ducal palace, lithograph 1822.
Day 3: Parma, Fontanellato. Parma is a beautiful city; the vast Farnese Palace houses an art gallery (Correggio, Parmigianino, Holbein) and an important Renaissance theatre (first proscenium arch). Visit the splendid Romanesque cathedral and octagonal baptistery and see the illusionistic frescoes of tumultuous heavenly host by Correggio in Camera di S. Paolo. The moated 13th-century castle in Fontanellato has a fresco by Parmigianino. Day 4: Mantua. After a free morning, an afternoon walk takes in the exteriors of Alberti’s centrally planned church of S. Sebastiano, and the houses that court artists Mantegna and Giulio Romano built for themselves. Also visit Palazzo Te, the Gonzaga summer residence and the major monument of Italian Mannerism, designed and with lavish frescoes by Giulio Romano. Day 5: Ferrara was the centre of the city-state ruled by the d’Este dynasty, whose court was one of the most lavish and cultured in Renaissance Italy. Pass the Castello Estense, a moated 15th-century stronghold, and visit the mediaeval cathedral. The Palazzo Diamanti houses the art gallery. The Palazzo Schifanoia is an Este retreat with elaborate allegorical frescoes. First of three nights in Ravenna. Day 6: Ravenna, Classe. The last capital of the western Roman Empire and subsequently capital of Ostrogothic and Byzantine Italy, Ravenna possesses the world’s most glorious concentration of Early Christian and Byzantine mosaics. Visit the Mausoleum of Galla Placida, lined with 5th-century mosaics, the splendid centrally planned church of S. Vitale with 6th-century mosaics of Emperor Justinian and Empress Theodora, and S. Apollinare Nuovo basilica with mosaic Procession of Martyrs. Drive to Classe, Ravenna’s port, which was once one of the largest in the Roman world; virtually all that is left is the great Basilica of S. Apollinare.
in the Oratorio di San Giovanni. In the afternoon, visit the Palazzo Ducale, a masterpiece of architecture and exquisite relief decoration, which grew over 30 years into the perfect Renaissance secular environment and the excellent picture collection in the palace (Piero, Raphael, Titian). Day 8: Cesena, Rimini. The Biblioteca Malatestiana in Cesena contains over 300 valuable manuscripts and many incunabula in original presses. In Rimini visit the outstanding Tempio Malatestiano, designed by Leon Battista Alberti, which contains superb decoration by Agostino di Duccio and particularly fine sculptural detail. Fly from Bologna, arriving at London Gatwick c. 8.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,980 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on British Airways flights (Boeing 737); private coach; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 4 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement £230. Price without flights £1,870. Hotels: Mantua (4 nights): a 4-star hotel a short walk from the historic centre. The decor is minimalist but stylish. Ravenna (3 nights): a bland modern façade hides a small, welcoming 4-star hotel. The room decor is a little austere but comfortable. How strenuous? There is a lot of walking, much of it on steep and roughly paved streets: agility, stamina and sure-footedness are essential. Coaches are not allowed into historic centres. Many of the historical buildings visited are sprawling and vast. Average distance by coach per day: 88 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Parma Verdi Festival October 2013 Details available May 2013 Contact us to register your interest
Day 7: Urbino. Drive into the hills to Urbino, the beautiful little city of the Montefeltro dynasty. See the exquisite Gothic frescoes Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
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Dark Age Brilliance Late Antique & Pre-Romanesque and intense spirituality. Early Christian forms were endorsed throughout the whole of the Adriatic seaboard, and the second half of the tour embraces Aquileia, Grado, Poreč (Parenzo) in Croatia and Concordia Sagittaria. The theme is rounded off with the astonishing little eighthcentury church in Cividale in the foothills of the Julian Alps which preserves the earliest monumental sculpture of the Middle Ages.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 3.00pm from London Gatwick to Bologna. Drive to Ravenna for the first of three nights.
Ravenna, Santa Vitale, engraving 1906 from The Shores of the Adriatic.
14–21 October 2012 (mz 400) This tour is almost full 29 September–6 October 2013 (ma 724) 8 days • £1,920 Lecturer: Dr Ffiona Gilmore Eaves A journey through north-east Italy to Croatia, via Ravenna, Torcello and Cividale. Includes some of the finest art and architecture of the Early Middle Ages to be found anywhere. Byzantine heritage of unique range and richness, with exceptional mosaics. It is now commonplace to believe, contrary to the assumptions of centuries, that the Dark Ages which succeeded the glories of the Roman Empire were not so dark, and that the later history of the Empire was not so glorious. A concomitant reappraisal has led to the acceptance of Early Christian and Byzantine art not as a regression to primitivism – an aspect of the decline and fall – but as one of the most brilliant chapters in the history of Western art. But it remains true that in the territories of the Western Empire from the fifth to the ninth century there was little in the way of
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monumental building or large-scale artistic production. Only in a few dispersed pockets was the flame of ambitious artistic and intellectual endeavour kept alive. A string of such pockets gathered around the northern end of the Adriatic and northeast Italy, the last redoubt of the Empire in the West. Born of an Umbrian past and raised in Imperial retreat, Ravenna remains anchored in the Adriatic marshes, humbled by the rise of her great neighbours, Bologna and Venice, and unhindered by later political commerce. The effect of this marginal status has been to spare her Early Christian buildings and leave a Byzantine heritage of unique range and richness. Given the intensity with which Ravenna developed between 402, when Honorius chose it as his capital, and 751, when the last of the Exarchs returned to Constantinople, it makes a fitting introduction to Early Christian and early mediaeval culture in north-eastern Italy. Arising from the need to cater for the spiritual requirements of newly-emancipated Christianity, the clarity and humanism of the classical tradition were superseded by images and decoration designed to instil a kind of sacred dread, and to intimate the glories of the world to come. Mosaic was the key element in creating church interiors of awesome splendour
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Day 2: Ravenna. Begin with an exploration of the 5th-century forms at the cathedral and Orthodox Baptistery, and the superlative 6th-century ivory throne of Maximian in the Museo Arcivescovile. In the afternoon study Arian Ravenna at the Arian Baptistery and Theodoric’s great Palatine church of Sant’ Apollinare Nuovo. Investigate the 5th-century basilica design which provided Theodoric’s court with its most immediate models, Galla Placidia’s splendid ex-voto basilica of San Giovanni Evangelista and Bishop Neon’s San Francesco. Day 3: Ravenna, Classe. The Mausoleum of Galla Placidia is the earliest Christian structure in Europe to retain its mosaic decoration in its entirety. The church of San Vitale is the greatest 6th-century building of the West; the invention with which form, colour, space and narrative meaning are combined is breathtaking. This is followed by the collections of the Museo Nazionale, which complement Ravenna’s buildings. Travel by coach to Theodoric’s superb Mausoleum and to the ancient port of Classe for the great 6th-century basilica of Sant’Apollinare. Day 4: Pomposa, Concordia Sagittaria. Drive north to the Po delta. Pomposa is an important 8th-century Benedictine abbey, richly extended by Abbot Guido’s magnificent 11th-century porch and campanile. Lunch in Chioggia. The Roman road station at Concordia Sagittaria, whose modest mediaeval cathedral was built alongside a 4th-century basilica and martyrium, is splendidly revealed through archaeological excavation. Stay four nights in Cividale. Day 5: Cividale. Although founded as Forum Julii in the 1st century bc, Cividale is best known to historians as the site of the earliest Longobard settlement in northern Italy, and most celebrated by art historians for the astonishing quality and quantity of the 8thcentury work which has survived here. See the b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Ravenna & Urbino Byzantine capital, Renaissance court superb ‘Tempietto’ of Santa Maria in Valle, Longobardic work in the cathedral museum, and spectacular early mediaeval collections in the archaeological museum. The afternoon is free in Cividale. Day 6: Poreč (Croatia). Drive south, cross Slovenia and enter the part of Croatia formerly known as Istria. The sole object of the excursion is to visit Poreč (Parenzo), a longish journey justified by the existence of an unusually complete 6th-century cathedral complex: basilican church, baptistery and bishop’s palace. The church proper was built above an earlier basilica c. 540 by Bishop Euphrasius, whose complete episcopal throne is set within an apse which, for once, has retained its full complement of furnishings and fittings. Day 7: Aquileia, Grado. Aquileia was a major Roman city whose influential cathedral was complete by 319. Sections of walls and mosaic pavements were preserved within the present 11th-century cathedral, a rather wonderful survival. The Longobard sack of 568 resulted in the removal of the see to the more defensible position on the coast at Grado, whose two great 6th-century churches, Santa Maria della Grazie and the cathedral, also have outstanding floor mosaics.
17–21 April 2013 (mz 518) 5 days • £1,350 Lecturer: Dr Michael Douglas-Scott 2–6 October 2013 (ma 728) 5 days • £1,350 Lecturer: Dr Luca Leoncini A study in contrasts: one a city with origins as a major Roman seaport, the other an enchanting little Renaissance settlement high in the hills. In Ravenna, some of the greatest buildings of late antiquity with the finest and best-preserved Byzantine and Early Christian mosaics. In Urbino the ducal palace, the greatest secular building of the Early Renaissance. Why combine them? Both are somewhat out of the way, yet near to each other. First run 28 years ago and still a firm favourite. Ravenna was once one of the most important cities in the western world. The last capital of the Roman Empire in the West, she subsequently became capital of the Gothic
Practicalities Price in 2013: £1,920 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (Boeing 737); travel by private coach; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 5 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £180 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £1,770. Hotels: Ravenna (3 nights): a bland modern façade hides a fairly basic but friendly and comfortable 4-star hotel. Cividale (4 nights): a simple, functional and friendly 3-star, located in the centre of town. Dinners are at a selection of local restaurants. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking in town centres, some of it over uneven ground. Average distance by coach per day: 76 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Byzantine mosaics at Ravenna are the finest in the world. Urbino, by contrast, is a compact hilltop stronghold with a very different history and an influence on Renaissance culture out of all proportion to her size. The Ducal Palace, built by the Montefeltro dynasty over several decades, is perhaps the finest secular building of its period. Piero della Francesca, Raphael and Baldassare Castiglione were among those who passed through its exquisite halls. The justification for joining in one short tour these two centres of diverse artistic traditions is simple. They are places to which every art lover wants to go but which are relatively inaccessible from the main art-historical centres of Italy, yet are close to each other. For many years this has been one of our most popular tours.
Itinerary Day 1: Ravenna. Fly at c. 9.15am (October), c.3.00pm (April) from London Gatwick to Bologna. Drive to Ravenna, where all four nights are spent. Day 2: Ravenna. The so-called Mausoleum of Galla Placidia has the earliest mosaic scheme in Ravenna (mid-5th century, with 4th-century insertions). The National Museum is outstanding, particularly for Byzantine Ravenna, Mosaics in S. Apollinare, 20th-cent. engraving.
Day 8: Torcello. Drive to the Adriatic and take a water taxi to the island of Torcello in the Venetian lagoon, a major city while Venice was little more than a fishing village. Visit the largely 11th-century cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta and adjacent Greek-cross reliquary church of Santa Fosca. Fly from Venice to London Gatwick, arriving at c. 6.45pm.
3–7 October 2012 (mz 387) 5 days • £1,350 Lecturer: Dr Luca Leoncini
kingdoms of Italy and of Byzantine Italy. Then history passed her by. Marooned in obscurity, some of the greatest buildings and decorative schemes of the late antique and early mediaeval era were allowed to survive unmolested until the modern age recognised in them not the onset of decadence and the barbarity of the Dark Ages but an art of the highest aesthetic and spiritual power. The Early Christian and
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ivory carvings. The Orthodox baptistry has superlative Early Christian mosaics. S. Apollinare Nuovo has a mosaic procession of martyrs marching along the nave. The centrally planned church of S. Vitale is Ravenna’s finest and has some of the most magnificent mosaics (including portraits of Emperor Justinian, Empress Theodora and their entourage).
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Ravenna & Urbino continued
Lucca Sculpture & architecture in northern Tuscany
Day 3: Ravenna. The Cathedral Museum possesses fine objects, including an ivory throne. Visit the Cooperativa Mosaicista, a laboratory for the restoration of mosaics (by appointment only and subject to confirmation) and the Mausoleum of Theodoric. The afternoon is free. Day 4: Urbino. The Palazzo Ducale grew during 30 years of Montefeltro patronage into the perfect Early Renaissance secular environment, of the highest importance for both architecture and architectural sculpture. The picture collection in the palace includes works by Piero della Francesca, Raphael and Titian. There are exquisite International Gothic frescoes by Salimbeni in the Oratory of St John. Day 5: Classe, Rimini. Drive to Classe, Ravenna’s port, which was one of the largest in the Roman Empire. Virtually all that is left is the great basilica of S. Apollinare. Continue to Rimini and visit the Tempio Malatestiano, church and mausoleum of the Renaissance tyrant Sigismondo Malatesta (designed by Alberti, fresco by Piero della Francesca, sculpture by Agostino Duccio). Drive on to Bologna airport for a late afternoon flight arriving at Gatwick at c. 8.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,350 (2012 & 2013) (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (aircraft: Boeing 737); travel by private coach for transfers and excursions; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts and 3 dinners including wine, water and coffee; all admissions to museums, sites, etc; all gratuities for restaurant staff, drivers and guides; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £130 (2012) £140 (2013) (double room for sole occupancy). Price without flights £1,220 (2012) £1,230 (2013). Hotel: a bland modern façade hides a somewhat basic but friendly and comfortable 4-star hotel. Decoration of its rooms is rather austere. Included dinners are at a selection of nearby restaurants. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking and standing in museums. The coach cannot be used within the town centres. Average distance by coach per day: 65 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Lucca, San Martino, engraving c. 1800.
22–28 April 2013 (mz 522) 7 days • £1,980 Lecturer: Dr Antonia Whitley A leisurely exploration of one of the most beautiful and engaging of Tuscan cities. Exceptional Renaissance ramparts enclosing a city rich in sculpture, painting, and Romanesque architecture. Excursions to Prato, Pistoia, Pisa, Barga and a villa. Work by Florentine masters, including Filippo Lippi, Donatello and della Robbia.
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Nowhere in Tuscany can claim to be undiscovered. Some places are more undiscovered than others, however, and for no good reason Lucca is one of the most underrated of ancient Tuscan cities. Many know of its exceptional attractions, but few allow themselves the opportunity of getting to know it properly. Only by staying for several nights, and by allowing time to absorb, observe and reflect can real familiarity develop – not only with its historic fabric and works of art but also with the rhythm of life of its current inhabitants. For Lucca is not a museum but an agreeable and vital lived-in town. b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
To the approaching visitor, Lucca immediately announces its distinctiveness and its historical importance, while at the same time secreting the true extent and glory of its built heritage. The perfectly preserved circumvallation of pink brick, ringed by the green sward of the grass glacis, is one of the most complete and formidable set of Renaissance ramparts in Italy. Unlike many Tuscan cities, Lucca sits on the valley floor. This and the traces of the gridlike street pattern – albeit given a mediaeval inflection – betray its Roman origin. Within the walls, the city is a compelling masonry document of the Middle Ages. There is a superb collection of Romanesque churches with the distinctive Lucchese feature of tiers of arcades applied to the façades and flanks. There is good sculpture, too, including the exquisite tomb of Ilaria del Carretto, and some quite exceptional (and exceptionally early) panel paintings. Looming over the dense net of narrow streets are the imposing palazzi of the mercantile elite, including some grand ones from the age of Baroque. The Romanesque theme of the tour will be continued on the excursions to the nearby cities of Prato, Pistoia and Pisa, where the style has its greatest manifestation in Tuscany in the ensemble of cathedral, baptistery and campanile (the now not-quite-so-leaning tower) at Pisa. Likewise mediaeval sculpture features prominently in all these places. The Renaissance is represented by some of the best loved works of the Florentine masters – by Filippo Lippi and Donatello at Prato cathedral, for example, and by the della Robbia workshop in Pistoia. There are also visits to small towns and to a country villa of the eighteenth century.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 10.45am from London Gatwick to Pisa and drive to Lucca. On the way visit the Romanesque basilica of San Piero a Grado. Day 2: Lucca. Visit San Michele in Foro and the cathedral of San Martino, Romanesque churches with important sculptures (tomb of Ilaria del Carretto) and paintings, and Torre Guinigi. In the afternoon drive to the Villa Torrigiani which has a 19th-century landscaped garden with a sunken garden from the 1750s. Day 3: Prato. Drive inland to Prato, a city that built its wealth on cloth-working. The mediaeval cathedral has outstanding Renaissance sculpture and painting, notably Donatello’s pulpit with dancing putti and the Filippo Lippi frescoes, restored in the last decade. Santa Maria delle Carceri is a rare Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
example of an Early-Renaissance centrally planned church. The Museo della Pittura Murale has good paintings by both Lippis, Lorenzo Monaco and Paolo Uccello. Day 4: Barga, Lucca. Drive up through forested hills to Barga, a delightful little town with a fine Romanesque cathedral at its summit. The afternoon in Lucca is free. Day 5: Pistoia. The exceptionally attractive town of Pistoia has important art and architecture. Buildings include the octagonal baptistry and the cathedral, both at one end of the main square, and the Renaissance hospital, Ospedale del Ceppo. Sculpture includes the pulpit in Sant’Andrea carved by Giovanni Pisano, one of the finest Gothic sculptures south of the Alps, a unique silver altarpiece in the cathedral, the product of 150 years’ workmanship, and the coloured terracotta frieze by the della Robbia workshop on the Ospedale. Day 6: Pisa. In the High Middle Ages Pisa was one of the most powerful maritime city-states in the Mediterranean, the rival of Venice and Genoa, deriving great wealth from its trade with the Levant. The ‘Campo dei Miracoli’ is a magnificent Romanesque ensemble of cathedral, monumental burial ground, campanile (‘Leaning Tower’) and baptistry, all of gleaming white marble. Among the major artworks here are the pulpit by Nicola Pisano (1260) and the 14th-century Triumph of Death fresco. There is an optional afternoon walk to the historic centre. Day 7: Lucca. Visit the Romanesque church of San Frediano, one of the finest in Lucca, with façade mosaics and a chapel sculpted by Jacopo della Quercia. The Villa Guinigi, a rare survival of a 14th-century suburban villa, is now a museum with outstanding mediaeval panel paintings. The flight from Pisa arrives London Gatwick at c. 4.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,980 (deposit £200). This includes: flights (economy class) with British Airways (Boeing 737); travel by private coach for transfers and excursions; hotel accommodation; breakfasts and 4 dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admissions to museums, galleries, etc. visited with the group; all gratuities for restaurant staff, drivers; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £240 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £1,870. Hotel: an excellently situated 4-star, within the city walls of Lucca. The staff are helpful and friendly. Dinners are at selected restaurants outside the hotel.
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How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking, much of it on roughly paved streets. The tour is not suitable for anyone with any difficulties with everyday walking and stair climbing. Average distance by coach per day: 38 miles Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Torre del Lago July 2013 Details available autumn 2012 Contact us to register your interest
Opera
Operetta in Austria.................................13 Savonlinna Opera....................................45 Opera in Paris & Versailles.....................57 Music in Berlin at New Year...................64 Music in Berlin........................................64 The Ring in Berlin...................................66 Music in Dresden & Prague at Christmas.............................................67 Wexford Opera Festival..........................89 Opera in Turin & Milan.........................92 The Ring at La Scala...............................92 Stresa Festival..........................................95 Verona Opera.........................................103 Opera in Venice.....................................103 Parma Verdi Festival..............................107 Torre del Lago.......................................111 Opera in Macerata & Pesaro.................127 Naples: Art, Antiquities & Opera.........134 Opera in Oslo, Gothenburg & Copenhagen......................................149 Opera in Spain.......................................171 Drottningholm & Confidencen............189 The Ring in Seattle................................196 Santa Fe Opera......................................201 Opera in Cardiff....................................205
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Piero della Francesca 13–18 April 2013 (mz 524) 6 days • £1,960 Lecturer: Dr Antonia Whitley A journey to nearly every surviving work in Italy by the Early Renaissance master. Big cities and tiny country towns: Urbino, Monterchi, Arezzo, Sansepolcro, Perugia, Florence and Milan. This tour is an exhilarating study of one of the best-loved and most intriguing artists of the fifteenth century. It also takes you to a select handful of some of Italy’s loveliest places and best-stocked galleries, and through some of her most enchanting countryside. Though the theme is a specialised one, the tour is by no means intended only for serious students of the subject. Few art lovers are untouched by the serenity and beauty of the high-key palette of Piero’s works; even fewer would be unmoved by seeing most of his surviving works in the towns and landscapes in which he created them. Born about 1412 in the small town of Sansepolcro on the periphery of Florentine territory, Piero spent little of his life in the Tuscan capital to which most provincial artists flocked. Though he was not without influence, he had no ‘school’ or direct successors. A mathematician, his images beguile with their perfect perspective, architectonic form and monumentality. There is little documentation for his life, and he seems to have been a slow worker. Few works survive, despite the fact that he lived until the age of 80.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 10.45am from London Heathrow to Pisa. Drive to the hotel in Città di Castello for the first of four nights. Day 2: Urbino. Drive through mountains to the hilltop town of Urbino. As one of the most enlightened and creative courts of the Renaissance, it has an importance in the history of art out of all proportion to its small size. Piero possibly contributed to the design of the beautiful Ducal Palace, which houses his exquisite Flagellation of Christ and the Madonna di Senigallia. Visit San Bernardino, where Federigo da Montefeltro was buried. Day 3: Perugia. Perugia, the capital of Umbria, is one of Italy’s most beautiful towns. The National Gallery of Umbria in the mediaeval town hall has a polyptych with The Annunciation by Piero. There is a wealth of other monuments, including a fine merchants’ hall with frescoes by Perugino.
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Street in Arezzo, wood engraving 1888.
Day 4: Sansepolcro, Arezzo, Monterchi. Borgo Sansepolcro was Piero’s birthplace and home town. Visit the museum in the former town hall, where Piero’s early masterpiece, Madonna della Misericordia, a panel of St Julian, and the marvellous Resurrection fresco are housed. Walk around the town centre, passing Piero’s house and the Romanesque Gothic cathedral. Drive on to Arezzo: San Francesco, where in the choir is Piero’s great fresco cycle, The Legend of the True Cross, executed over a twenty-year period. In the cathedral is the fresco Mary Magdalene. At Monterchi see Piero’s beautiful fresco The Madonna del Parto. Day 5: Florence. The Uffizi contains the portrait panels of Federigo da Montefeltro, Duke of Urbino, and his wife Battista Sforza. Travel by first class rail to Milan (c. 2 hours). Overnight Milan. Day 6: Milan. In Milan the Poldi-Pezzoli Museum and the Pinacoteca di Brera contain paintings by Piero. Fly from Milan Linate to London Heathrow, arriving at c. 5.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,960 (deposit £200). This includes: flights (economy class) with British Airways (Boeing 737, Airbus 319); travel by private coach and 1st class rail; hotel accommodation; breakfasts and 4 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admission to museums, churches, etc.; all tips for restaurant staff, drivers; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £210 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £1,830. Hotel: Città di Castello (4 nights): a central 4-star hotel, renovated respecting the original architecture; a successful blend of old and new, with helpful staff. Milan (1 night): a smart, traditionally-furnished 4-star hotel close to the Duomo. Dinners are at selected restaurants. How strenuous? There is a fair amount of walking, some up and down hills and cobbled streets. The historic centres are generally closed to traffic. This tour involves of a lot of driving. Average distance by coach per day: 77 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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History of Medicine Florence, Bologna & Padua in the age of humanism 16–22 September 2013 (ma 695) 7 days • £2,220 Lecturers: Professor Helen King & Dr Fabrizio Nevola Italy’s two oldest university towns, Bologna and Padua, where Galileo once lectured. Fascinating early anatomical theatres, with an exploration of the anatomical work of Leonardo and Michelangelo.
afternoon visit the Museo del Bigallo, a 14thcentury orphanitropium. Day 3: Pisa. In the High Middle Ages Pisa was one of the most powerful maritime city-states in the Mediterranean, the rival of Venice and Genoa, deriving great wealth from its trade with the Levant. The ‘Campo dei Miracoli’ is a magnificent Romanesque ensemble of cathedral, monumental burial ground, campanile (‘Leaning Tower’) and baptistry.
Some of the best scientific museums in Italy, plus a special arrangement to see the earliest pharmacy in the world.
Day 7: Bologna. Some free time. Fly from Bologna to London Gatwick, arriving at c. 2.15pm.
Accompanied by both a leading historian of medicine and an art historian. It is almost impossible to over-emphasise the leading role that Italy played in creating the civilization of the modern world. Developments in the arts of painting, sculpture and architecture during the Italian Renaissance came to dominate the art of the western world until the beginning of the last century. Humanism, a range of intellectual endeavour which built on the achievements of the classical world, matured into the critical, liberal attitude which underlies current modes of thought and ideas about education. From patisserie to opera, boarding schools to astronomy, in countless areas of human endeavour and intellectual achievement a seminal Italian input can be traced. In no field is the contribution of Italy greater than in the science of medicine. Bologna and Padua are homes to the oldest universities in Italy – indeed, in Europe – and their medical schools have for centuries made important contributions to the study of anatomy and the practice of surgery. Florence also has a good range of historical medical institutions, as well as the finest artistic patrimony of any city in the world. This unique tour is jointly-led by a leading Professor of Classical medicine and an architectural historian.
Itinerary Day 1: Florence. Fly at c. 11.00am from London Gatwick to Pisa. Visit the Museo Galileo, which covers scientific studies from the Medici right through to current theory. First of three nights in Florence. Day 2: Florence. See the Farmacia di Santa Maria Novella, the oldest pharmacy in the world. The rest of the morning is spent at the Natural History Museum, ‘La Specola’, is the oldest scientific museum in Europe, and also houses an excellent anatomical section. In the Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Day 6: Padua. A full-day excursion to Padua, an important university city where Galileo once lectured. In the university itself, items include Galileo’s chair, William Harvey’s emblem and, above all, the sixteenth-century Anatomical Theatre, the oldest in the world. The Palazzo Ragione has representations of early alchemy and medicine, and frescoes that make up one of the largest existing astrological cycles. Visit Giotto’s fresco cycle in the Arena chapel, one of the landmarks in the history of art, and the multi-domed Basilica of St Anthony which contains many great works of art.
Bologna University, engraving c. 1900 after Margarite Janes.
The ‘Campo Santo’, for centuries the burial place of the Pisan upper classes, was built using earth brought back from Golgotha during the crusades and has frescoes depicting death. In the afternoon visit the botanical gardens. Day 4: Florence. See the Ospedale degli Innocenti, a children’s orphanage designed by Brunelleschi, before visiting Casa Buonarotti, house of Michelangelo’s family, which has models revealing his unprecedented knowledge of anatomy. Lunch is at a restaurant on the Piazzale Michelangelo before a visit to San Miniato al Monte, the Romanesque abbey church with panoramic views of the city. Some free time. Leave Florence for Bologna, where the next three nights are spent. Day 5: Bologna. The Archiginnasio has an eighteenth-century anatomical theatre and écorché figures by Lelli. At the oldest university in Italy visit the Museo di Palazzo Poggi, which has sections devoted to obstetrics and anatomical waxworks. The museum of mediaeval art is housed in a Renaissance palace, notable for tomb reliefs depicting university lectures of the period.
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Practicalities Price: £2,220 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (aircraft: Boeing 737); private coach for transfers and excursions; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 4 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £350. Price without flights £2,070. Hotels: Florence (3 nights): a delightful 4-star hotel in a very central location. The rooms are stylishly decorated. Bologna (3 nights): an elegant 4-star hotel in the heart of Bologna, rooms vary in size and decor but are all classically furnished and comfortable. Dinners are at selected restaurants close to the hotels. How strenuous? There is a lot of walking on this tour and it would not be suitable for anyone who has difficulties with everyday walking or stair-climbing. Average distance by coach per day: 63 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
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Florence Cradle of the Renaissance 12–18 November 2012 (mz 427) 7 days • £2,040 Lecturer: Dr Roberto Cobianchi Christmas departure: 22–29 December 2012 (mz 445) 8 days • £2,450 Lecturer: Dr Michael Douglas-Scott 18–24 February 2013 (mz 475) 7 days • £2,100 Lecturer: Dr Roberto Cobianchi The world’s best location for an art-history tour: here were laid the foundations of the next 500 years of western art. Still retains an astonishly dense concentration of great works of art. The Renaissance is centre stage, but mediaeval and other periods also figure prominently. Avoids the crowds of busier months, and a smaller group than usual, 8–18 participants. A first visit to Florence can be an overwhelming experience, and it seems that no amount of revisiting can exhaust her riches, or stem the growth of affection and awe which the city inspires in regular visitors. For hundreds of years the city nurtured an unceasing succession of great artists. No other place can rival Florence for the quantity of first-rate, locally-produced works of art, many still in the sites for which they were created or in museums a few hundred yards away. Giotto, Brunelleschi, Donatello, Masaccio, Botticelli, Michelangelo, Raphael, Leonardo – these are some of the artists and architects whose works will be studied on the tours, fully justifying Florence’s epithet as the cradle of the Renaissance. Florence is, moreover, one of the loveliest cities in the world, ringed by the foothills of the Apennines and sliced in two by the River Arno. Narrow alleys lead between the expansive piazze, supremely graceful Renaissance arcades abound while the massive scale of the buildings impressively demonstrates the wealth once generated by its precocious economy. It is now a substantial, vibrant city, yet the past is omnipresent, and, from sections of the mediaeval city walls, one can still look out over olive groves. Though the number of visitors to Florence has swelled hugely in recent years, it is still possible during winter, and with careful planning, to explore the city and enjoy its art in relative tranquillity.
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Itinerary for November & February Day 1. Fly at c. 10.45am from London Heathrow to Pisa and drive to Florence in time for an afternoon visit to the Byzantine mosaics and Renaissance sculpture in the baptistry. Day 2. In the morning visit the Piazza della Signoria, civic centre of Florence with masterpieces of public sculpture. The Palazzo Vecchio, fortified civic centre of the republic, has several rooms designed by Vasari and containing works by Michelangelo, Donatello and Ghirlandaio. Study further Renaissance statuary at the church-cumgranary of Orsanmichele. In the afternoon visit the cathedral and associated buildings and artworks: the polychromatic marble cathedral capped by Brunelleschi’s massive dome and the museum with works of art from both the cathedral and baptistery. Day 3. A Medici morning includes San Lorenzo, the family parish church designed by Brunelleschi, their burial chapel in the contiguous New Sacristy with Michelangelo’s largest sculptural ensemble and the chapel in the Palazzo Medici-Riccardi which has exquisite frescoes by Benozzo Gozzoli. Visit the Laurentian Library, Michelangelo’s most substantial building in Florence. The afternoon is devoted to the Uffizi, Italy’s most important art gallery, which has masterpieces by every major Florentine painter as well as international Old Masters.
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Day 4. Brunelleschi’s Foundling Hospital, begun in 1419, was the first building to embody stylistic elements indisputably identifiable as Renaissance. See Michelangelo’s David, the ‘Slaves’ in the Accademia and the frescoes and panels of pious simplicity by Fra Angelico in the Friary of S. Marco. Lunch is at a restaurant on the Piazzale Michelangelo before a visit to San Miniato al Monte, the Romanesque abbey church with panoramic views of the city. Day 5. Walk to the vast Franciscan church of Santa Croce, favoured burial place for leading Florentines and abundantly furnished with sculpted tombs, altarpieces and frescoes. The museum of sculpture at the Bargello has famous works by Donatello, Verrocchio, Michelangelo and others. Free afternoon. Day 6. See the frescoes by Masaccio in the Brancacci Chapel, which constitute the single most important work of painting of the Early Renaissance. Visit Santo Spirito, Brunelleschi’s last great building, with many 15th-century altarpieces, and the extensive Boboli Gardens at the top of which is an 18th-century ballroom and garden overlooking olive groves. In the afternoon visit S. Maria Novella, the Dominican church with many works of art (Masaccio’s Trinità, Ghirlandaio’s frescoed sanctuary) and S. Trinita with fine frescoes by Ghirlandaio. Day 7. In the morning visit the redoubtable Palazzo Pitti which houses several museums b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
including the Galleria Palatina, outstanding particularly for High Renaissance and Baroque paintings, before driving to Pisa Airport. The flight arrives at Heathrow at c. 4.15pm.
the ‘Slaves’ sculpture in the Accademia. In the afternoon visit Santa Maria Novella, Dominican church with many works of art. In Santa Trinita there are fine frescoes by Ghirlandaio.
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Day 7. See the Masaccio fresco cycle in the Brancacci Chapel, which constitutes the most important work of painting of the Early Renaissance. Visit Santo Spirito, Brunelleschi’s last great church, and the extensive Boboli Gardens, at the top of which is an 18th-century ballroom and garden overlooking olive groves. In the afternoon visit the polychromatic marble cathedral capped by Brunelleschi’s massive dome, and the museum with works of art from the cathedral and baptistry.
Day 1. Fly at c. 10.45am from Heathrow to Pisa, then transfer by coach to Florence. See the Byzantine mosaics and Renaissance sculpture in the baptistry in the late afternoon. Day 2. Visit the Bargello, a mediaeval palazzo housing Florence’s finest sculpture collection with works by Donatello, Verrocchio, Michelangelo and others. The granarycum-church of Orsanmichele has sculpture by Donatello, Michelangelo, Ghiberti and Verrocchio. In the afternoon, study the buildings and sculpture in the Piazza della Signoria before entering the Uffizi, one of the world’s greatest art galleries, for the rest of the afternoon. Day 3. A Michelangelo morning: visit the Laurentian Library, his most substantial building in Florence, and the New Sacristy of San Lorenzo, burial chapel of the Medici family and Michelangelo’s largest sculptural ensemble. See the exquisite frescoes by Benozzo Gozzoli in the chapel of the Palazzo Medici Riccardi. In the afternoon, visit the vast Franciscan church of Santa Croce, favoured burial place for leading Florentines and abundantly furnished with sculpted tombs, painted altarpieces and frescoes.
Day 8. The redoubtable Palazzo Pitti houses several museums including the Galleria Palatina, outstanding particularly for High Renaissance and Baroque paintings. Travel by coach to Pisa and fly to Heathrow, arriving at c. 4.15pm. Left: Florence, Duomo, wood engraving c. 1880; below: Gian Bologna’s Virtue Chaining Vice in the Barghello, engraving from The Magazine of Art 1883.
Price for Christmas 2012: £2,450 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (aircraft: Airbus A319); private coach travel; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch (Christmas Day) and 5 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all taxes; all tips; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement £220 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £2,270. Prices for November 2012 & February 2013: Price: £2,040 (Nov. 2012), £2,100 (Feb. 2013) (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (Airbus 319); private coach for airport transfers; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 4 dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admissions for museums, etc.; all tips for restaurant staff, drivers; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £240 (Nov. 2012 & Feb. 2013) (double for sole use). Price without flights £1,820 (Nov. 2012), £1,870 (Feb. 2013). Hotel: a delightful 4-star hotel in a very central location. Rooms are stylishly decorated. Dinners are at selected restaurants nearby. How strenuous? There is a lot of walking and it would not be suitable for anyone with difficulty in everyday walking and stair climbing. Average distance by coach per day: 25 miles. Weather (Christmas). Fairly cold but often clear at this time of year. Rain should not be ruled out.
Day 4, Christmas Day. Free morning, with a range of options for a church service. Christmas lunch in Piazzale Michelangelo followed by an afternoon visit is to the Romanesque abbey church of San Miniato al Monte which affords panoramic views over Florence.
Small group: between 8 and 18 participants.
Day 5: Siena. Day trip by coach to Siena, most beautiful of Italian hill towns. Walk through exquisite streets to Il Campo, the main scallopshaped ‘square’, visit the Palazzo Pubblico, the elegant 14th-century town hall, with frescoes by Simone Martini, Ambrogio Lorenzetti and others. Visit the splendid cathedral of white and green marble, many times enlarged, and the baptistry. In the cathedral museum see Duccio’s Maestà, the finest mediaeval painted altarpiece to be found anywhere. Visit the hospital of Santa Maria della Scala, which has a rich collection of 15th-century frescoes.
Christmas & New Year Modern Art on the Côte d’Azur at Christmas.............................................62 Music in Berlin at New Year...................64 Music in Dresden & Prague at Christmas.............................................67 Turin at Christmas..................................93
Day 6. See Brunelleschi’s Foundling Hospital (1419), the first building wholly in Renaissance style. The Early Renaissance is wonderfully and colourfully represented by the enchanting paintings by Fra Angelico in the Friary of San Marco. See Michelangelo’s David and Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
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Florence at Christmas........................... 114 Palermo at Christmas............................139 Edinburgh at Christmas........................167
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Florence Revisited Art off the beaten track & in private collections Day 4. See Ghirlandaio’s Adoration of the Magi in Brunelleschi’s Foundling Hospital and Michelozzo’s plan of Santissima Annunziata. There are frescoes here and at the Chiostro dello Scalzo by Andrea del Sarto and other Mannerist masters. The Cenacolo di Sant’Apollonia has a Last Supper by Andrea del Castagno, and another by Perugino’s workshop at the Cenacolo di Foligno. Free afternoon.
The Arno, looking west from the Ponte Vecchio, engraving by Prof. Delamotte from The Makers of Florence 1888.
19–25 November 2012 (mz 430) 7 days • £2,130 Lecturer: Dr Joachim Strupp Designed for those already familiar with the main sites, concentrating on places privately owned or not easy to access. A medley of pleasures, from mediaeval to modern, pursuing a number of key themes. A few places outside Florence – Fiesole, Poggio a Caiano, Carmignano, Artimino, Galluzzo. The B list? An A list by the standards of nearly everywhere else in the world. So abundant are Florence’s artistic riches that some masterpieces elude all but the most regular visitors. And those that are in private ownership, or for which access is only by special arrangement, are beyond the reach of all but the well-connected resident, unless you join this tour, which has been designed specially for those who are familiar with the main sights. As an introduction to Florence, it would be decidedly eccentric. As a week spent in pursuit of great art and architecture in one of the most beautiful cities in the world, it will be a delight. In quality and importance, the art seen far exceeds that on many of our tours to regions which have been less creative. But in Florence, even the second division is a world-beater. One of the reasons why many of the items on this itinerary are usually missed is simply because they are, geographically, peripheral, being located in the suburbs, or, even if within walking distance of the centre, they are away from the main clusters of monuments and museums. Subsidiary themes will emerge, such as depictions of the Last Supper, and the brief but
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brilliant episode of Mannerist painting. But the tour is a medley of pleasures, from mediaeval to (nearly) modern, from the famous to the little known, from the hard-to-find to the (nearly) impossible to get into. And then there is the beauty of Florence itself, and the charm of its surroundings. There will also be free time in which you could re-visit some of the major museums and monuments. Many of the visits are by special arrangement and are dependent on the generosity of owners or institutions. There is the chance that one or two visits may have to be withdrawn, but suitable alternatives will be arranged.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 10.00am from London Heathrow to Pisa. Drive to Florence. Visit the Museo ‘Firenze com’era’ which illustrates the history of the city. Day 2. See Ghirlandaio’s Last Supper at Ognissanti and Perugino’s tranquil Crucifixion in Sta Maria Maddalena dei Pazzi. The grand 17th-century Palazzo Corsini has the finest private collection in Florence, with pictures by Botticelli, Bellini, Sebastiano, Rosso, etc. (subject to confirmation). Day 3. The Last Supper by Andrea del Sarto at San Salvi is the greatest 16th-century picture in Florence. Visit the Badia Fiesolana near Fiesole, a 15th-century church with a Romanesque façade, and S. Domenico, which has paintings by Fra Angelico. In Fiesole, see mediaeval and Renaissance altarpieces in the cathedral and S. Francesco, and the wellpreserved Roman theatre. The Villa Medici is one of the earliest of the family’s country retreats.
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Day 5. Walk through the Vasari Corridor from the Uffizi to the Pitti Palace, viewing the Medici collection of artists’ self-portraits. In and around the Pitti Palace there is a range of museums, the great picture collection of the Galleria Palatina and at the top of the Boboli Gardens the Porcelain Museum in an 18thcentury ballroom. There is a visit to a private palace with paintings by Pontormo (subject to confirmation). Day 6. Poggio a Caiano was the country retreat of Lorenzo il Magnifico, and a highly important monument in the history of grand country houses. At Carmignano is the exquisite Annunciation by Pontormo. Artimino is another Medici villa. The Carthusian monastery at Galluzzo has beautiful cloisters and paintings by Pontormo. Day 7. Fly from Pisa to London Heathrow, arriving c. 3.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,130 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (Airbus 319); private coach travel outside the city centre for the transfers and excursions; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, one lunch and four dinners with wine, water and coffee; admission for all the included visits; all tips for restaurant staff, drivers, guides; all airport and state taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £240 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £1,970. Hotel: a delightful, recently renovated 4-star hotel in a very central location. Rooms are stylishly decorated. Dinners are at selected restaurants nearby. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking, and the tour would not be suitable for anyone who has any difficulties with everyday walking or stair-climbing, or standing for long periods of time in museums. The average distance by coach per day is 24 miles. Small group: between 8 and 18 participants. Right: Florence, via dei Neri, between the Palazzo Vecchio and the Uffizi, etching 1937. b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Leonardo da Vinci Tracing the roots of the Renaissance master
The Last Supper, steel engraving c. 1860.
17–21 October 2012 (mz 404) 5 days • £1,840 Lecturer: Charles Nicholl Works by the artist and places associated with his life in Milan and Florence. A morning in Vinci, to see his birthplace and the museum dedicated to his scientific achievements. Led by the most renowned biographer of Leonardo. Regard for Leonardo’s work has, if you will excuse the pun, seen a renaissance in 2011. The National Gallery’s major exhibition of works from collections outside Italy has seen an unprecedented response from the public. It seems only right, then, that we run a tour for 2012 which focuses on his most important works within Italy. Florence was the cradle of the Renaissance and home to an unrivalled quantity of first-rate, locally-produced works of art. At the age of fourteen, Leonardo moved here to become an apprentice to Verrocchio, in whose studio his technical training began. The tour begins here to explore areas of the city in which the artist lived and worked, as well as seeing important works by Verrocchio in the Bargello and by Leonardo in the Uffizi. To the west of Florence is Vinci, Leonardo’s childhood town in the Tuscan countryside, a
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charming place with a fine museum displaying many of his designs for machines and tools. The remote hamlet of Anchiano in which he was born is also visited. In the fifteenth century Milan was capital of the most powerful territory in Italy and, when Leonardo was employed there, probably the largest city in Europe. It is here that he received some of his most important commissions, notably The Last Supper for the wall of the refectory of Santa Maria delle Grazie. Two nights are spent in Milan, with two visits to The Last Supper and also to the Pinacoteca Brera, one of the world’s great galleries, for a study of works influenced by Leonardo. An exploration of sites around the city where the artist left his mark completes the tour.
Itinerary Day 1: Florence. Fly at c. 8.45am from London Heathrow to Pisa. There is an afternoon walk to see the sites of Leonardo’s father’s office and his master Verrocchio’s workshop. First of two nights in Florence.
Day 2: Florence. A morning lecture is followed by the great sculpture museum in the Bargello, which possesses a collection by Leonardo’s master Verrocchio, including his David, thought to be the likeness of a young Leonardo. The Palazzo Vecchio was the fortified civic centre of the republic and has several rooms designed by Vasari. In the afternoon visit the Uffizi (by appointment) for several major works
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by Leonardo, including the Annunciation and Adoration of the Magi.
Day 3: Vinci, Milan. Drive to Vinci in the Tuscan hills where the artist was born. The Museo Leonardiano has one of the largest collections of Leonardo’s technological designs and models constructed from them, housed in a 12th-century castle. Continue through olive groves to the reconstructed farmhouse where Leonardo was born, which now houses some of his early drawings of the Tuscan countryside. Lunch is at a typical Tuscan restaurant in the hilltown of Artimino. In the afternoon, travel by first class rail to Milan for the first of two nights.
Day 4: Milan. The first of two visits to Leonardo’s Last Supper. The Dominican friary of S. Maria delle Grazie was lavishly endowed by Duke Ludovico Sforza in the 1490s, the consequences including Bramante’s monumental eastern extension of the church and the Last Supper on the wall of the refectory. The Pinacoteca Ambrosiana has works by Raphael, Bramantino, Luini and other contemporaries and followers of Leonardo. Visit the Brera, one of Italy’s major art collections. Day 5: Milan. The Castello Sforzesco, the vast fortified palace of Leonardo’s ducal patrons, has room decorations attributed to him and houses works of art and artefacts including Michelangelo’s Rondandini Pietà. Return to the Cenacolo Vinciano for a second viewing of
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Florentine Palazzi Defence, humanism, magnificence & beauty Leonardo’s Last Supper (there is a time limit for each visit). Return to London Heathrow arriving at c. 4.45pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,840 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (Airbus 319/320); travel by private coach and first class rail; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 3 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £260 (double for sole use). Price without flights £1,660. Hotels. In Florence (2 nights): a delightful, recently renovated 4-star hotel in a very central location on Piazza Santa Maria Novella, with stylishly decorated rooms. In Milan (2 nights): a smart, traditionally-furnished 4-star hotel close to the Duomo. How strenuous? A lot of walking. This tour is not suitable for anyone who has difficulties with everyday walking or stair-climbing. Historic centres are generally closed to traffic. Average distance by coach per day: 26 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
6–10 Nov. 2013 (ma 769) 5 days • £1,920 Lecturer: Dr Joachim Strupp
patron rather than the architect. A Renaissance palazzo was intended as a statement of dynastic ambition, its facade emblazoned with coats of arms, its interior trumpeting the family name in every visual detail. Fortunes were spent – and lost – keeping up with the Medici. Many palaces remained unfinished through lack of funds (neither the Gondi nor the Rucellai were complete at the time of their founder’s death); and even more – including the Pitti and the Davanzati – changed hands through financial necessity within a generation. By the end of the sixteenth century, the Florentine palazzo was being adapted to accommodate more elaborate households and lifestyles, but splendour remained their defining characteristic. Certainly no Renaissance patron would have felt embarrassed by the endeavours of his 17th- and 18th-century successors, such as Alessandro Capponi or the Corsini family.
A new tour for 2013. An examination of one of the most fascinating aspects of the Florentine Renaissance, the private palace. Mediaeval, Baroque, NeoClassical and 19th-century examples as well. Several special arrangements to see palaces not usually open to the public. Renaissance Florence experienced one of the most spectacular property booms of all time. From the second half of the fourteenth to the beginning of the sixteenth century as many as 100 private palazzi were built throughout the city. The period was also one of the pivotal moments of western architecture, witnessing a design revolution that was to have an impact on the rest of Europe and the Americas for 500 years. In the preceding couple of centuries, intense clan and class rivalries required palazzi to be highly defensible structures. Like many Italian cities, Florence bristled with tower houses, of which several stubs can still be seen, and the massive Palazzo Vecchio, the town hall, retains its fortress-like aesthetic. While an intimidating monumentality remained a design feature of the Renaissance palace, decreasing lawlessness and increasing wealth fortuitously combined with new humanist concepts of ‘magnificence’ and ‘virtue’ by which the elite were required to demonstrate their greatness with ‘fitting expenditure’. Constructed on a magnificent scale, three times the height of a three-storey building today, its spread was equally expansive, frequently swallowing up a multitude of smaller dwellings. And the design of these highfashion mansions represented a dramatic shift in architectural language. The credit for their creation, however, remained the
Outline itinerary More details are available on application. Day 1. Fly at c. 10.45am from London Heathrow to Pisa and transfer by coach to Florence in time for a late afternoon visit to the Palazzo Vecchio. Day 2. Palazzo Davanzati, Palazzo Strozzi, Palazzo Rucellai. By special arrangement, Palazzo Corsini and Palazzo Lanfredini. Day 3. Palazzo Medici-Riccardi, and by special arrangement Palazzo Pandolfini and Palazzo Capponi all’Annunziata. Day 4. Uffizi, Vasari Corridor (special arrangement), Palazzo Pitti (private visit to some parts). Day 5. Fly from Pisa to London Heathrow, arriving c. 4.15pm.
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Palazzo Strozzi, engraving after a drawing by Mrs Oliphant, c. 1888.
Practicalities Price: £1,920 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (Airbus 319); private coach for airport transfers; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 3 dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admissions for museums, etc.; all tips for restaurant staff, drivers; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £160 (double for sole use). Price without flights £1,750. Hotel: a delightful 4-star hotel in a very central location. Rooms are stylishly decorated. Dinners are at selected restaurants nearby. How strenuous? There is a lot of walking on this tour and it would not be suitable for anyone who has difficulties with everyday walking or stair-climbing. Average distance by coach per day: 21 miles. Small group: between 8 and 18 participants.
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Writers’ Florence Visitors, residents & exiles: literary lives & literature Borgo San Iacopo, Oltrano, after a drawing by A.H. Hallam Murray 1904.
16–20 October 2012 (mz 397) 5 days • £1,680 Lecturer: Jonathan Keates Reader: Adrian McCourt Florence has a remarkable place in the history of English literature as so many important writers visited the city or lived here. See places they frequented and inhabited, which inspired them and which they described. Attention is also paid to American, French and German writers, and to great Italians. Led by a literary historian and by an actor who reads relevant passages in pertinent places. Were the role of Florence in the history of the visual arts to be comparable to that of, say, Bournemouth, the name of the ancient city on the Arno would still resound as one of the cultural centres of Europe. As a city of literature, she has few rivals. The Italian language as we know it is basically mediaeval Tuscan, refined, burnished and standardised by Dante, Petrarch and Boccaccio, all (more or less) fourteenthcentury Florentines. They not only laid the foundations of one of the great bodies of world literature, but provided a lingua franca for the politically fissiparous peninsula – and for courtly and cultured communication for the rest of civilized Europe during the Renaissance and Early Modern periods. Italian literature, however, plays a subsidiary role in this tour: English (and American) predominates. The Athens on the Arno was an extraordinary magnet for writers of all sorts. Milton was a precocious visitor (he met Galileo), but it was
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from the beginning of the nineteenth century that a trickle became a flood – Shelley, Byron and Scott; the Brownings, Dickens and Eliot; Henry James, Forster and Lawrence. These are just some of the bigger names; the penumbra of lesser men of letters, diarists, historians and critics is countless. The English and American communities in and around Florence may have numbered 30,000 at the turn of the nineteenth century. A sunny place for shady people? Some were running away (there was a perceptible increase after the trial of Oscar Wilde), but climate, beauty, cheap servants and the presence of fellow aesthetes were honourable enough reasons for voluntary exile or short-term sojourn. There would have been few who chose Florence who were not motivated by the presence of its mighty cultural achievements, and, by extension, by the presence of people of similar cultivation, tastes and interests. The heart of the tour consists of historical discourse, biographical narrative and literary interpretation provided by writer, historian and critic Jonathan Keates, illustrated with pertinent texts read by an actor. The result should be an enriched understanding of the work of a number of great writers, and a novel and illuminating perspective on the most alluring of all Italian cities.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly c. 11.00am from London Gatwick to Pisa and drive to the hotel near Sta Maria Novella. Visit the church where Boccaccio began his Decameron; Henry James frequently stayed in the piazza, as did Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, translator of The Divine Comedy. Dante was a major influence on Milton, whose Florentine sojourns in 1638 and 1639 enhanced his erudition but spurred his love of English liberty; we see where he lived.
Day 2. Via del Tornabuoni was at the heart of fashionable Florence in the 19th century, and two literary cafés of that era are still in business today. George Eliot stayed here in 1860 while researching Romola. Across the Arno, pass the building where Dostoevsky finished The Idiot in 1868–9. Celebrated by Florentines for her support of the Risorgimento, Elizabeth Barrett
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Browning lived with Robert in Casa Guidi from 1847 till her death in 1861, now restored and furnished to resemble its appearance then. Day 3. Pass the boarding house where Shelly lived 1819–20 and composed Prometheus Unbound and Ode to the West Wind. Santa Croce is the burial place of the humanists Bruni, Alberti and Machiavelli, and of Michelangelo and Galileo; Dante is commemorated by a cenotaph. Stendhal’s Syndrome is named after the writer’s collapse here. The model for the Pension Bartolini in Room with a View, where E.M. Forster stayed in 1901, is nearby. In the English Cemetery lie Walter Savage Landor, Frances Trollope and Elizabeth Browning. Day 4. By special arrangement, visit La Pietra, perhaps the finest villa in the vicinity of Florence, until 1994 the home of Harold Acton, writer, aesthete and host. The little hilltop town of Fiesole, which overlooks Florence, was regarded as an essential ingredient in a cultured visitor’s itinerary. Visit the gardens of the Villa Medici, the cathedral and the convent of San Francesco. Day 5. Fly from Pisa, arriving London Gatwick c. 4.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,680 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) with British Airways (aircraft: Boeing 737); hotel accommodation; breakfasts, 3 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all tips; all state and airport taxes; hire of radio guides for better audibility of the lecturer; the services of the lecturer and the actor. Single supplement £230 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £1,520. Hotel: a recently renovated 4-star hotel in a very central location. Rooms are stylishly decorated and have either a bath or a shower. Dinners are at nearby restaurants. How strenuous? A lot of walking. This tour is not suitable for anyone with difficulties with everyday walking or stair-climbing. The average distance by coach per day is 34 miles. Small group: between 10 and 19 participants.
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Medici Villas & Gardens Renaissance design in the Tuscan countryside 22–26 May 2013 (mz 577) 5 days • £1,730 Lecturer: Dr Katie Campbell Visits many of the surviving Medici villas and gardens around Florence, together with other outstanding examples in the region. Ideal time of year to see Tuscany in bloom. Based in Florence throughout, with time to explore the city. Towards the end of his life, when he was the most successful banker in Europe and effective ruler of Florence, Cosimo de’ Medici, Pater Patriae, liked nothing better than to visit his county estate to prune his vines, tend the garden and enjoy the company of family, scholars and poets. Already the Renaissance ideal of villa life had been born: relaxation through simple country pursuits away from the stench and stress of city life, an agreeable house and garden attached to the estate, and intellectual and aesthetic stimulation. Plague and siege had periodically driven patricians into the countryside during the Middle Ages, but it needed the more settled conditions of the 15th century and the decline of banditry to allow this practice to become regular and voluntary. The century also saw the
rise of a new impulse: the growing intensity of interest in the writings of classical authors and the desire to emulate all things ancient Roman. Virgil’s pleasure in the countryside and the Younger Pliny’s encomia upon the charms of villa life were powerful catalysts in bringing about the notion of what constitutes a good weekend, which survives to this day. The earliest Medici villas were essentially fortified farmhouses, though Cosimo’s architect, Michelozzo, added a certain comfort and grandeur. However, architecturally the biggest step forward was taken by Cosimo’s grandson, Lorenzo il Magnifico when in 1480 he commissioned Giuliano da Sangallo to design the villa of Poggio a Caiano with a classical temple front – the first time one had been added to a residence. Raised in the 16th century to Grand Ducal rank with virtually absolutist powers in Tuscany, the Medici family built and re-built extravagantly on their various country estates, lavishing particular attention on the gardens. With their grand scale, formal avenues, varying altitudes, complex parterres, sculptural incidents, grottoes, fountains and bizarre jokes, they led the world. The villas absorbed much of the energy of Bernardo Buontalenti, Bartolomeo Ammanati, Giambologna and many of the other leading architects, sculptors, and engineers of the day.
Itinerary Day 1: Poggio a Caiano. Fly at c. 11.00am from London Gatwick to Pisa. Visit Poggio a Caiano, built 1480 for Lorenzo il Magnifico by Giuliano da Sangallo, the first substantial country residence to incorporate symmetrical planning and have a classical temple front. Drive to Florence, where all four nights are spent. Day 2: Fiesole. Unlike earlier Medici villas which were all adapted from older structures, the Villa Medici at Fiesole was built ex novo. The first to provide a stunning view over Florence, it was built by Michelozzo in the 15th century and later became home to Sibyl Cutting and her daughter Iris Origo. The garden of the adjacent Villa Le Balze was designed by Cecil Pinsent for the American philosopher Charles Augustus Strong as a revival of the Italian Renaissance ideal, and is arguably the most charming and best-preserved of Pinsent’s work. In the afternoon, see the Villa La Pietra, once the property of Sir Harold Acton, and originally built by Francesco Sassetti, general manager of the Medici Bank in the 15th century. There is an Italianate garden, formal but imaginative, and much sculpture. Day 3: Trebbio, Settignano. Drive through Florence, The Boboli Gardens, aquatint c. 1820.
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Medici Villas & Gardens continued
Walking in Tuscany Art, architecture & landscapes in Val d’Orcia & Chianti
the very attractive Mugello region north of Florence to an early Medici villa rebuilt by Michelozzo, Il Trebbio, a grandly fortified manor house with machicolations and battlemented towers. Lunch nearby. The Villa Gamberaia at Settignano is one of the most perfect examples of garden architecture. Its present form originated in the 18th century and was then adapted into a late-19th-century marvel with formal water garden and tall hedges, beautifully maintained. Day 4: Florence. The museum ‘Firenze com’era’ is now housed in the Palazzo Vecchio, and has paintings by Utens of the principal Medici villas in 1599. Visit also the Boboli gardens, the grandest and most famous of all Medici gardens, situated behind the Palazzo Pitti, the main seat of the Medici grand dukes. Free afternoon in Florence. Day 5: Castello. The Villa Medicea at Castello was designed by Tribolo and completed by Buontalenti for Duke Cosimo I. Its gardens were laid out in the 1540s, and were claimed by Vasari to be the ‘richest, most magnificent, most ornate…of all Europe’. Nearby is the Villa della Petraia, with its frescoed courtyard, fountain by Giambologna and fine park: given to Cardinal Ferdinando by his father in 1568, it was transformed by Buontalenti in 1576 and adapted in the 19th century for the King of Italy. Fly from Pisa to London Gatwick, arriving c. 4.00pm. Most of the villas on the itinerary are privately owned and many require special permission to visit. It must be understood therefore that the selection and order of visits may vary from the description given here.
Practicalities Price: £1,730 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (Boeing 737); private coach for transfers and excursions; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 3 dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admissions; all taxes; all tips; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement £210 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £1,550. Hotel: a delightful 4-star hotel in a very central location; rooms are stylishly decorated. How strenuous? There is a lot of walking. Some gardens are very large, many are on sloping ground and the coach is often not able to set down at the entrance to sites. Average distance by coach per day: 44 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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15–22 October 2012 (mz 402) This tour is almost full 6–13 May 2013 (mz 550) 8 days • £2,370 Lecturer: Dr Antonia Whitley 23–30 September 2013 (ma 712) 8 days • £2,370 Lecturer: Dr Antonia Whitley Five half-day walks through through exquisite landscape of soaring Cypress, olives and vines. Art history away from the tourist throngs – mediaeval fortress towns, Romanesque churches, Renaissance palazzi, Sienese painting. Based in two tiny towns in topographically diverse areas of Tuscany. Three wine tastings, in Montalcino, Chianti and Badia a Coltibuono. To walk through quintessentially Tuscan landscapes, along chalky tracks lined with soaring cypress trees and flanked by neat rows of vines and well-kept olive trees, must surely be one of life’s great pleasures. The walks selected here pass through farmland and woodland, where primrose, violet and cyclamen
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nestle below chestnut, holm oak and beech. Pine trees grace the higher terrain. Walking is conducive to observing at close quarters the variations of plant, animal and birdlife in this enchanting countryside. But if seeing the artistic and architectural delights in these parts of Tuscany is your aim, this tour also offers opportunity to do so. We avoid the tourist throngs in the larger towns and cities and concentrate on the smaller and less-visited places. Mediaeval fortress towns, Romanesque churches, Renaissance palazzi and paintings of the Sienese school are particularly in evidence here. Sometimes these are seen at the beginning or the end of a morning’s walk, sometimes during a half day spent in leisurely exploration of one of the enchanting little cities or settlements. All are seen in the enlightening company of an art historian. And while the walks are taxing enough to ensure that hearty evening meals are fully deserved, they are not so strenuous as to detract from enjoying the ever-changing views and natural, agricultural and constructed sights. We take trouble to ensure that much of what you eat is produced from fine local ingredients, including Pecorino cheese (whose pungent flavour is due to the herbs grazed by ewes on the unique clay soils south of Siena) and the prized salami of the cinta senese pigs. The food b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Day 3: Sant’Antimo, Montalcino. Walk down from near Montalcino through a pretty valley, part vineyard, partially wooded, punctuated by farmsteads, and arrive at the remote and serene monastery of Sant’Antimo (c. 5.5 miles). This most beautiful of Romanesque churches is in part constructed of luminous alabaster. Once an impregnable fortress and now centre of Brunello wines, Montalcino is a hilltop community with magnificent views and a collection of Sienese paintings in the civic museum. There is a wine tasting here. Return by coach to Pienza. Day 4: Montepulciano, Monticchiello. Montepulciano is one of the most picturesque of Tuscan hill towns, with grey stone palaces piled up towards the main square at the apex. The cathedral here is rich in Renaissance works of art, while outside the walls is a centrally planned church, a Renaissance masterpiece. The mediaeval hamlet of Monticchiello, with views across Val d’Orcia, is the starting point for a late-afternoon walk through a valley leading to Pienza (c. 4 miles).
‘A Road in Tuscany’ after a drawing by D.Y. Cameron c. 1900.
is often perfectly complemented by a glass of one of the world’s finest red wines. As this tour is based for three nights in Radda in Chianti, today still the nucleus of Tuscan viticulture and where the noble Sangiovese vine is most prevalent, opportunity is allowed for tastings of these robust reds. We also visit a producer of some of the finest Chianti Classico, in a former monastery where thirsty monks made a wine similar to the sophisticated Chianti produced today.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 8.45am from London Heathrow to Pisa. Drive to Pienza, a gem of Renaissance architecture created by Pope Pius II as a tribute to his place of birth, which is the base for four nights. Day 2: San Quirico, Pienza. Drive to the little walled town of San Quirico d’Orcia. Visit the Collegiata with its splendid portals and the Horti Leonini, public gardens dating to the 17th century. Walk back to Pienza (c. 6 miles) through rolling, open farmland of rare beauty, visiting the Romanesque church of Corsignano before the steady climb to Pienza. In the afternoon, gently explore this little city where at the centre the cathedral, episcopal palace and Pius’s own palazzo form a harmonious group. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Day 5: Monte Oliveto Maggiore, Asciano. The monastery of Monte Oliveto Maggiore is a fine complex of Early Renaissance art and architecture, the cloister having 36 frescoes by Signorelli and Sodoma (1505–8). Break the journey in Asciano, a delightful town sitting in the heart of the Crete Senesi, a name deriving from the chalky Sienese earth. Radda in Chianti, once the capital of the Chianti League established in 1250, is one of the most attractive of the region’s settlements. Stay three nights in Radda. Day 6: Gaiole in Chianti, Badia a Coltibuono. From Gaiole, walk a pleasantly varied route through Chianti countryside with woodland, vineyards and breath-taking vistas (c. 6 miles). Badia a Coltibuono, a former abbey founded by Vallombrosan monks, has an important history of viticulture. Lunch and wine tasting at the estate restaurant before a visit to the abbey’s 16th-century frescoed refectory, gardens and wine cellars. Day 7: Volpaia. The well-preserved hamlet of Volpaia hides sophisticated wine cellars within its mediaeval walls. The village is dedicated to the arts and wine-making, ensuring its original architectural features remain intact. Walk down through the estate’s impressively maintained vineyards to the valley floor before a climb to Radda (c. 5 miles).
Practicalities Price in 2013: £2,370 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (Airbus 320); travel by private coach; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 2 lunches (including wine-tasting) and 5 dinners with wine, water and coffee; 1 separate wine tasting with a talk on Chianti Classico; all admissions; all tips for restaurant staff and drivers; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement £290 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £2,140. Hotels: Pienza (4 nights): a former friary dating to the 15th century close to the main square; bedrooms vary in size and are simply decorated; terrace with formal gardens and impressive view and restaurant serving good Tuscan cooking. Radda (3 nights): a 17thcentury manor house with historical links to Chianti wine production; several lounges, terrace with valley view, restaurant and outdoor pool; rooms vary in size. How strenuous? This tour should only be considered by those who are used to regular country walking, with some uphill content. Strong knees and ankles are essential, as are a pair of well-worn hiking boots with good ankle support. Walks have been carefully selected but some steep rises are unavoidable and terrain can be loose under foot, particularly in wet weather. There are five walks of between 4 and 6 miles. Average distance by coach per day: 44 miles. Small group: between 10 and 18 participants.
Walking in Northern Tuscany October 2013 Details available November 2012 Contact us to register your interest
Day 8: Fly from Pisa, arriving London Heathrow at c. 2.30pm. For lecturers’ biographies see page 206.
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Southern Tuscany The Sienese Contado & the Val d’Orcia 13–19 May 2013 (mz 575) 7 days • £2,040 Lecturer: Dr Fabrizio Nevola
you will be familiar with the main places of interest). Palazzo Piccolomini (1460s) contains the archives and a museum displaying beautifully painted covers of civic records. Visit the art collection of the Palazzo Chigi Saracini. The imposing cathedral, a Romanesque and Gothic construction of white and green marble, offers an outstanding array of sculpture and painting. Especially deserving of close attention are the crypt and Pinturicchio’s frescoes in the Piccolomini Library.
Hilltop towns and villages, spectacular countryside. Based throughout in the charming Renaissance town of Pienza. A good mix of architecture and art with a day spent in Siena. This tour is representative of a type in which there is a shift of emphasis away from the major masterpieces of a region towards the lesser delights, from a concentrated diet of cultural achievement familiar from text books towards a mélange of landscape, less accessible art and a sense of the continuity of life and community amidst ancient masonry. All six nights of the tour are based in the small hill town of Pienza. Formerly called Corsignano, it was the birthplace of Pope Pius II, humanist, historian, traveller, autobiographer and patron of architecture. Between his election in 1458 and his death in 1464, he commenced the rebuilding of his home town and provided it with a cathedral, bishop’s palace, town hall, a palace for himself and a new name. Consequently Pienza entered the annals of architectural history as the earliest example of Renaissance town planning. If you delight in places which lie off the beaten track, in tiny hill towns where vineyards clamber up to the fourteenth-century walls, in majestic landscapes of storm-tossed hills punctuated by cypresses, in the discovery of great architecture and exquisite paintings in unexpected places, in tracing a maze of alleys scarcely changed for 500 years, this tour is likely to please.
Itinerary Day 1: Pienza. Fly at c. 11.00am from London Gatwick to Pisa Airport. From there drive to Pienza, arriving in time to settle into the hotel before dinner. All six nights are spent here, with its trailblazing Renaissance architecture and set in some of the best of Tuscan landscape. Day 2: Pienza, Monte Oliveto Maggiore. In the morning, a leisurely exploration of Pienza, the tiny hill town rebuilt 1459–64 by Pope Pius II in accordance with Renaissance ideals. The cathedral and palaces grouped around the main piazza were designed by Bernardo Rossellino in collaboration with his papal patron. Visit the Palazzo Piccolomini, and the cathedral. In the afternoon visit the monastery of Monte Oliveto Maggiore, an exquisite complex of Early Renaissance art and architecture, the
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Day 6: Montepulciano, Pienza. The main thoroughfare of Montepulciano, lined with grand palaces, winds circuitously through this once important city, with the Piazza Grande at the summit. The cathedral here is rich in Renaissance works of art. Outside the town, the centrally planned church of San Biagio by Antonio da Sangallo is one of the masterpieces of the Renaissance. Return mid-afternoon to Pienza and visit the diocesan museum in the restored Palazzo Borgia. Day 7: Pienza. Fly from Pisa to London Gatwick, arriving c. 4.00pm.
Practicalities main cloister having 36 frescoes by Signorelli and Sodoma (1505–8). Day 3: Sant’Antimo, Montalcino, Bagni Vignoni, La Foce. Located in a remote valley, the partly ruinous monastery of Sant’Antimo has a strikingly beautiful Romanesque church, in part constructed of luminous alabaster. Once an impregnable fortress and now centre of Brunello wines, Montalcino is a walled hilltop village with magnificent views and a collection of Sienese painting in the museum. Bagni Vignoni has a central square occupied by an arcaded Renaissance piscina. Villa La Foce, former home of Iris Origo, has a garden designed by Cecil Pinsent. Day 4: San Leonardo al Lago, Montesiepi, Cetinale, San Galgano. In the parish churches of San Leonardo al Lago and Montesiepi are two remarkable Sienese paintings of the Annunciation, respectively by Lippo Vanni and Ambrogio Lorenzetti. Villa Cetinale is a fine 17th-century garden excellently restored by the late owner Lord Lambton. At San Galgano are the impressive Gothic ruins of what in the 13th century had been one of the richest Cistercian abbeys in Italy. Day 5: Siena. Siena, City of the Virgin, is the most beautiful of Italian hill towns. You can opt to join the lecturer for her personal selection of some of the choicest items or go your own way (the itinerary assumes that
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Price: £2,040 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (Airbus 320); travel by private coach; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 4 dinners with wine, water and coffee; a wine tasting; all admissions; all tips for restaurant staff and drivers; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement £290 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £1,920. Hotel: The hotel is a former convent dating back to the 15th century excellently situated off the main square of the town. Rooms vary in size and are simply decorated. Some bathrooms have a bath with shower fitment and some a shower only. There is a terrace with formal gardens and impressive views. The restaurant offers good Tuscan cooking. How strenuous? There is a lot of walking on this tour, much of it on the steep and roughly paved streets of the hill towns. Average distance by coach per day: 76 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Illustration: Siena, The Palazzo Pubblico, engraving c. 1890. b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
The Heart of Italy Tuscany & Umbria Assisi, etching c. 1930.
17–24 March 2013 (mz 496) 8 days • £2,100 Lecturer: Dr Helen Langdon 15–22 September 2013 (ma 692) 8 days • £2,160 Lecturer: Dr Luca Leoncini One of our most popular tours – an excellent survey of the art and architecture of Umbria and Tuscany, heartland of the Renaissance. Based throughout in the hilltop town of Spello, amidst ageless undulating countryside. Perugia, Arezzo, Assisi and significant smaller towns away from the main tourist centres. Avoiding the major centres, this tour concentrates on the smaller towns and cities – the centri minori – of Umbria and Tuscany. Spread across the heart of Italy, these regions contain a disproportionately large quantity of what the country is most loved for: ancient streetscapes crammed onto hilltops, exquisitely undulating countryside of olive, cypress and vine, and an abundance of wonderful art. Rarely can the spirit of the Middle Ages be so potently felt as in the hill towns of central Italy. That such small communities could have built each dwelling so massively, raised churches and public buildings of such magnificence and created works of art of such monumentality inspires awe bordering on disbelief among today’s visitors. This is also the heartland of the Renaissance, and several of the leading artists of the era were natives who worked here before being inveigled to the great metropolises of Florence and Rome. Many of the most important and beautiful of Italy’s incomparable patrimony of paintings and frescoes are included on this tour. The great Giottesque cycle at Assisi stands at the beginning of the modern era of art, Piero della Francesca’s Arezzo frescoes are among the greatest achievements of the Early Renaissance and the Last Judgement frescoes by Signorelli in Orvieto are on the cusp of the High Renaissance. While in the field of architecture Romanesque and Gothic predominate, there are many major Renaissance buildings, including the centrally planned churches at Todi and Montepulciano. The man-made environment melds with the natural in a picturesque union of intense beauty. It is a landscape of rumpled hills, sometimes rugged and forested, sometimes tamed in the struggle to cultivate, always speckled with ancient farmsteads, fortified villages and isolated churches. Even from the central piazze of many of these towns there are Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
views of countryside which seems scarcely to have changed for centuries.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 10.30am from London Heathrow to Rome. Drive to Spello, the small, quiet town which is the base for this tour. Day 2: Assisi. Drive the short distance to Assisi and spend much of the morning at San Francesco, mother church of the Franciscan Order. Here is one of the greatest assemblages of mediaeval fresco painting, including the controversial cycle of the Life of St Francis. In the afternoon walk through the austere mediaeval streets and visit the church of S. Chiara and the Romanesque cathedral. Day 3: Spello, Montefalco. The small hilltop town of Spello has fine Roman remains and richly coloured Renaissance frescoes by Pinturicchio in the church of S. Maria Maggiore. Montefalco is another delightful
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hilltop community with magnificent views of the valley below and hills around. In the deconsecrated church of Francesco are frescoes by Benozzo Gozzoli. Some free time in Spello. Day 4: Perugia, capital of Umbria, is one of the largest and loveliest of Italian hill towns and has both major works of art and architecture and an authentic, age-old liveliness of a prosperous market town. Morning visits include the Palazzo dei Priori, the mediaeval town hall now housing the National Gallery of Umbria, and a merchants’ hall. An afternoon walk includes an impressive Etruscan city gateway, the mediaeval walls and the richly carved façade of the Renaissance church of S. Bernardino. Day 5: Pienza, Montepulciano. The humanist Pope Pius II was born in the tiny town of Pienza and instigated the rebuilding of its centre in accordance with Renaissance ideals. The cathedral, episcopal palace and his own palazzo form a harmonious group.
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The Heart of Italy continued
Art in Le Marche a wealth of lesser-known fine art & architecture
Montepulciano is one of the most picturesque of Tuscan hill towns with a centrally planned Renaissance church and a cathedral with several outstanding works of art. Day 6: Sansepolcro, Arezzo, two cities which were laid out on alluvial plains. Borgo Sansepolcro, with a regular grid pattern betraying its Roman origin, was the home town of the 15th-century painter Piero della Francesca; see his Resurrection and other works by him in the local museum. Arezzo was one of the great cities of Tuscany in the Middle Ages, and was also a Roman foundation. In the church of S. Francesco is Piero della Francesca’s masterpiece, the fresco cycle of The Legend of the True Cross. See also the cathedral and a Romanesque church with an altarpiece by the 14th-century Sienese painter Pietro Lorenzetti. Day 7: Todi, Orvieto. Visit S. Maria della Consolazione, Todi, a centrally planned Renaissance church influenced by Bramante’s ideas. Continue to Orvieto where the glistening marble Gothic cathedral dominates this entrancing hilltop town. Among its treasures are the low relief sculptures by Maitani and the apocalyptic Last Judgement frescoes by Signorelli (1505). Day 8: Bagnaia. Break the return journey to Rome with the wonderful Renaissance gardens at the Villa Lante at Bagnaia. Lunch here before flying from Rome, arriving London Heathrow at c. 7.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,100 (March), £2,160 (September) (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (Airbus 319); private coach travel; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 4 dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admissions; all tips for restaurant staff, drivers; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £170 (double for sole use). Price without flights £1,930 (March), £1,950 (September). Hotel: a modest 4-star in the centre of Spello, converted from a family palazzo dating back to the 17th century. Furnishings are in keeping with the history of the building. There is a frescoed lounge and a terraced garden with views of the countryside. Rooms are comfortable but vary in size. How strenuous? There is a lot of walking, much of it on steep and roughly paved streets: agility and sure-footedness are essential. This tour involves a lot of coach travel. Average distance by coach per day: 95 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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Loreto, engraving 1700.
10–18 June 2013 (mz 600) 9 days • £2,460 Lecturer: Polly Buston Explores the small cities in the hills and valleys of the Marche. Paintings by Crivelli and Lotto provide pegs around which the tour is planned. Wonderful landscape and streetscape. Nearly everywhere hilly and in some parts mountainous, the Italian Marches have always been difficult of access. Even now, away from the coast the roads are slow, as is the pace of life. The Marches look and feel much like the Italy of a generation ago, and compared with Tuscany and Umbria there are few tourists. For some travellers these are sufficient reasons for going there immediately, and that is without citing the captivating landscape and the innumerable unspoilt hilltop towns. Ragged hills are spattered untidily with pasturage, fruit trees, vineyards and woods, and each peak is crowned with a pink-grey clump of walls and towers. The topography did not lead to poverty or cultural backwardness, however,
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and tucked away in churches and museums are many gems of mediaeval and Renaissance art. If you seek a succession of mainstream masterpieces which provide the shock of recognition, the Marches should not be a priority for you. For the adventurous aesthete, however, the region has plenty to delight and much of great merit. Two painters in particular are associated with the area, Carlo Crivelli and Lorenzo Lotto, and the best of the pictures by these wayward geniuses are pegs around which this tour has been designed. Carlo Crivelli (c. 1435–1494) was one of the greatest artists of the Early Renaissance. Avidly collected in the nineteenth century, he became an embarrassment to art historians in the twentieth because he didn’t fit into the received schemes of stylistic development. He persevered with gold backgrounds, low relief ornament and elaborate framing long after they were abandoned elsewhere in Italy. But within these conservative conventions he created an emotionally charged use of line, powerfully tactile detail, virtuosic use of perspective and intensity of expression. Lorenzo Lotto (c. 1480–1557) was similarly individualistic, and his works evince similar emotional power. Also born in Venice, most b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Day 3: Recanati, Loreto. A charming town, Recanati spreads along the ridge of a neighbouring hill; four of Lotto’s paintings are in the museum, including the famous Annunciation. Then spend the afternoon in Loreto, another great pilgrimage centre, where some of the finest artists and architects of Renaissance Italy worked, including Bramante, Signorelli, Melozzo da Forli and Lotto, several of whose last works are here. Day 4: Cingoli, Tolentino. From the perimeter of the hilltop town of Cingoli there are magnificent views over vast tracts of rolling landscape. Arising from dour mediaeval streetscape, the church of San Domenico contains a masterpiece by Lotto, the Rosary Madonna. Now something of a backwater, the shrine of S. Nicola da Tolentino once made the town a major pilgrimage destination and the sumptuous church has fine mediaeval frescoes. Day 5: Ancona, Jesi. The ancient port of Ancona clings to the cliffs around a busy harbour with the beautiful pre-Romanesque cathedral of S. Ciriaco at the summit. Other churches contain an Assumption by Lotto and a Crucifixion by Titian, and the art gallery has works by Crivelli, Lotto and Titian. From here drive through some of the loveliest landscape so far, high and hilly but undulating and cultivated, to Jesi, a handsome little city with a Renaissance town hall and a superb Rococo palace, now an art gallery. of his long and peripatetic career was spent in small cities in the Venetian Empire and the Marches. While the major figures of Italian painting – Bellini, Raphael and Titian – provided the foundations of his style, he was also influenced by the angular expressiveness of German painting.
Itinerary Day 1: Urbino. Fly at 9.30am from London Heathrow to Bologna, and drive to Urbino, Duke Federico da Montefeltro’s principal residence and one of Italy’s loveliest towns. Overnight Urbino. Day 2: Urbino, Recanati. Unravel the building history and examine the interior of the finest Renaissance palace in Italy, built over half a century from the 1450s for the dukes of Urbino, with the loveliest of all arcaded courtyards, serene halls of state, beautifully carved ornament and exquisite study. The art collection includes paintings by Piero della Francesca, Raphael and Titian. An afternoon walk takes in the outstanding International Gothic frescoes by the Salimbeni brothers. Drive to Recanati, first of four nights here. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Day 6: Monte S. Giusto, Fermo, Montefiore dell’Aso. Drive through the hills and towards the coast, first stopping at Monte San Giusto to see the great Crucifixion by Lorenzo Lotto, described by Berenson as the finest of the 16th century. In the hilltop town of Fermo there is a sequence of architectural delights and at Montefiore dell’Aso a Crivelli is preserved in the Collegiata. First of three nights in Ascoli Piceno, an exceedingly attractive little city, ringed by rivers and wooded hills. Day 7: Ascoli Piceno. Explore the centre of Ascoli, an unspoilt agglomeration of mediaeval, Renaissance and Baroque buildings around arcaded squares and narrow streets. One of Crivelli’s finest altarpieces is in the cathedral and paintings by him and others in his circle are in the diocesan and municipal museums. In the afternoon, there is some free time to see other churches and their artworks and to explore other picturesque parts of the town. Day 8: Monte S. Martino, Offida. Drive through the foothills of the Monti Sibillini, among the most dramatic ranges in the Apennines to the village of Monte San Martino. Here, there is a little church with four excellent 15th-century polyptychs, by Carlo Crivelli, his brother Vittore and two
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‘Crivelleschi’. Offida is built on a spur and ringed by walls with a 13th-century church at its apex and a delightful 18th-century theatre in the main square. Day 9. Fly from Rome Fiumicino, arriving at London Heathrow c. 3.15pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,460 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (aircraft: Airbus 319 and Boeing 737); hotel accommodation as below; travel by private coach; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 6 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £260. Price without flights £2,250. Contact us for a price for a room with a hill view. Hotels: Urbino (1 night): converted from a monastery building and centrally located opposite the Ducal Palace. Recanati (4 nights): a former private palazzo, rooms are furnished and decorated a contemporary style. Ascoli (3 nights): a converted Renaissance palace in the heart of the city with many original features. Rooms are spacious, stylishly decorated and comfortable. All three hotels are rated locally as 4-star. How strenuous? There is a lot of hilly driving and walking on steep, cobbled streets. Average distance by coach per day: 86 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Opera in Macerata & Pesaro August 2013 Details available December 2012 Contact us to register your interest
Trasimeno Music Festival July 2013 Details available February 2013 Contact us to register your interest
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The Etruscans Italy before Rome 23–29 September 2013 (ma 710) 7 days • £1,780 Lecturer: Dr Nigel Spivey A new tour for 2013. Visits some of the most important and bestpreserved Etruscan sites in Lazio and Tuscany. Explores a remote part of Italy’s history, and areas of Italy’s heartland which few tourists reach. ‘The mysterious Etruscans’. For several centuries they flourished in the area between Rome and Florence, creating a federation of twelve cities and living in notorious splendour. Then, as the little village of Rome expanded into an empire-building Republic, the Etruscans succumbed, and were almost obliterated from history. Only since the nineteenth century has the extent of Etruscan civilization been brought to light, and the Etruscans restored as ‘true ancestors’ of modern Italy. Our route is an exploration of the best archaeological sites and museums in northern Lazio, southern Tuscany and along the Tyrrhenian coast. By burying their dead with care and extravagance in cemeteries laid out with urban grandeur, the Etruscans left many clues as to their existence. We follow their trail, which leads to museums in mediaeval castles
and tombs cut from cliffs and rocks amid rich agricultural land, a ‘city of the dead’ shaped in volcanic stone. Brightly-painted scenes of feasting and dancing have been revealed on subterranean walls. This is a landscape riddled with tombs (about half a million of them), but the atmosphere is far from morbid. The tour offers an opportunity to visit a series of fascinating places on an itinerary that would challenge the independent traveller, journeying through beautiful countryside via some of the most charming and under-visited towns in Lazio and Tuscany. It is accompanied, as always, by an expert in the field. Nigel Spivey has excavated at the sites of Cerveteri and Tuscania, both visited by the group, and studied Etruscology at Rome, Cambridge and Pisa for a dissertation on Etruscan vases.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 11.00am from London Heathrow to Rome Fiumicino. Drive to Viterbo, where the first three nights are spent. Day 2: Tarquinia, Barbarano Romano. The unesco site of the Necropoli dei Monterozzi, part of a once thriving Etruscan city, has outstanding examples of painted tombs depicting everyday life and scenes of the journey to the next world. The charming but rarely visited town of Tarquinia has possibly the best Etruscan museum in Italy, housed in the
splendid 15th-century Palazzo Vitelleschi. Its extensive collection of pottery, jewellery and carved sarcophagi is testament to the prosperity attained by Tarquinia over the course of the 7th and 6th centuries bc. In the afternoon visit the rock tombs of San Giuliano within the natural park at Barbarano Romano, and Castel D’Asso, which has examples of cube tombs dating from the 4th century bc. Overnight Viterbo. Day 3: Tuscania. Prosperous and powerful in Etruscan times, Tuscania is now a pretty hill town. Visit three tombs in the surrounding area, including the monumental Tomba del Dado, which provides fascinating insight into Etruscan residential architecture. Articles found in some of these tombs and others in the area are in the archaeological museum in Tuscania, visited this afternoon. Overnight Viterbo. Day 4: Vulci, Grosseto. The vast archaeological park in Vulci contains many Etruscan remains above ground, a startling contrast to the subterranean sites. The ruins of the Casa del Criptoportico (2nd–1st century bc) map out rooms with mosaic floors, and a long dromos leads to an underground covered portico. In the afternoon visit the archaeological museum inside the Castello della Badia and the vertiginous adjoining bridge. Drive to Grosseto where the next three nights are spent. Day 5: Vetulonia, Sovana. In the morning visit
Paintings from Cervetri, wood engraving from Cities & Cemeteries of Etruria, Vol I, 1878.
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b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Connoisseur’s Rome With private visits including the Sistine Chapel Rome, Basilica of St Peter, copper engraving c. 1780.
the tombs surrounding the town of Vetulonia, including the Tomba della Pietrera (630–600 bc), a particularly large example of a tholos tomb topped with a mound of earth. Continue to picturesque Pitigliano for lunch before exploring the nearby archaeological park at Sovana. Walk along one of the Etruscan roads flanked by towering walls of tufaceous rock and see several noteworthy tombs, including the Tomba della Sirena, decorated with a sculpture of the mythological Scylla. Overnight Grosseto. Day 6: Populonia. Drive to the coast to visit the archaeological park at Populonia. The burial grounds here date to the 9th century bc and the sculpted legs of stone funeral beds can be seen. The highest point of the park offers a spectacular view of the bay of Baratti and the Necropoli delle Grotte, with two storeys of tombs. The afternoon is free in Grosseto. Day 7. In the morning drive down the coast to the unesco site at Cerveteri, a city of necropolises ranging from the hut-like to the sumptuous based on the homes of the city’s wealthy inhabitants. Fly from Rome Fiumicino, arriving at London Heathrow c. 5.00pm.
Practicalities £1,780 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (Airbus 320); travel by private coach; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 2 lunches (including 1 picnic) and 4 dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admission charges to museums, sites etc; all tips for restaurant staff and drivers; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement £90. Price without flights £1,570. Hotels: Viterbo (3 nights): the only decent 4-star hotel within walking distance of the historic centre, though the standard is more 3-star. Rooms are functional. Grosseto (3 nights): a comfortable 4-star hotel, excellently located within the city walls, elegantly furnished, and with friendly staff. How strenuous? Unavoidably there is a lot of walking on this tour, much of it over uneven ground. It is not suitable for anyone who has difficulties with everyday walking and stairclimbing, as fitness and sure-footedness are essential. Coaches cannot always park near the sites, many of which are vast. Average distance by coach per day: 92 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
26 February–3 March 2013 (mz 477) 6 days • £2,480 Lecturer: Dr Helen Langdon 27 February–4 March 2013 (mz 478) 6 days • £2,380 Lecturer: Dr Joachim Strupp
are occasionally subject to cancellation, but our network of contacts and know-how would enable us to arrange alternatives. Some better known and generally accessible places are included in the itinerary as well, so the tour should appeal both to those who are unfamiliar with the city as well as to those who have been many times before.
Extraordinary artistic riches which are difficult to access or are rarely open to the public.
Itinerary
Out-of-hours visit to the Sistine Chapel. Highlights of the Renaissance and Baroque. As appealing for those new to the city as for frequent visitors. Many of Rome’s artistic riches are not easily accessible to the visitor. The emphasis of this tour is on places which are difficult of access or are rarely open to the public – on treasures which lie beyond normally impenetrable portals. Privileged access also takes the form of visits to places outside their normal opening hours. Instead of sharing the Sistine Chapel with hundreds of other visitors, around forty Martin Randall Travel clients, from two tours which apart from one other private visit do not meet, will have the place to themselves for a couple of hours. The two tours overlap so that the high cost of private admission to the Vatican museums is spread between the two. What we manage to include varies each time we run the tour. Though it is likely that most of the places mentioned in the itinerary given below will be visited, arrangements depend on the generosity of owners and institutions and
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Day 1. Fly at c. 12.45pm from London Heathrow to Rome. Day 2. See Bernini’s oval church of S. Andrea, and in the monastery the rooms of St Stanislav Kostka with sculpture by Pierre Legros. The ceiling fresco by Guido Reni in the Casino dell’Aurora in the garden of the Palazzo Pallavicini Rospigliosi is one of the greatest works of 17th-century classicism. In the afternoon visit the early-Christian basilica San Clemente, notable for its three historical layers. The Sancta Sanctorum, adjacent to St John Lateran, part of the mediaeval papal residence, is decorated with Cosmati mosaics (1278). Day 3. The Palazzo della Cancelleria, begun in 1485 by Cardinal Riario, is a masterpiece of Early Renaissance secular architecture and has frescoes by Vasari of the life of Pope Paul III. The Palazzo Colonna is an agglomeration of building and decoration of many centuries, and has a collection which includes works by Bronzino, Titian, Veronese and Guercino. The 17th-century Great Hall is surely one of the most magnificent secular rooms in Rome. Palazzo Doria Pamphilj holds a famous picture collection. S. Ignazio has illusionistic ceiling
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Connoisseur’s Rome continued
Caravaggio From Lombardy to Rome
painting by Andrea del Pozzo. Day 4. By special arrangement, visit the 16th-century Villa Medici, now the seat of the French Academy. The Villa Madama (now used for diplomatic receptions), designed by Raphael and Antonio da Sangallo the younger for Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici, is one of the most important, as well as most beautiful, of Italian Renaissance villas. The delightful Villa La Farnesina has frescoes by Raphael. Day 5. Within the private precincts of the Order of the Knights of Malta is a church by G.B. Piranesi. In the evening there is a private visit to the Vatican palace to see the Sistine Chapel and the adjacent Stanze. With Michelangelo’s ceiling fresco, his Last Judgement on the end wall and the quattrocento wall frescoes, together with Raphael’s frescoes in the Stanze, this is the most precious assemblage of painting in the western world. Day 6. See Borromini’s trick of perspective in the arcade of the Palazzo Spada. Visit the Ara Pacis, Augustus’s monumental altar of peace. The flight to Heathrow arrives at c. 7.00pm. This gives a fair picture of the tour, but there may be substitutes for some places mentioned and the order of visits will probably differ.
Practicalities Price: £2,480 (mz 477), £2,380 (mz 478), (deposit £250). This includes: flights (economy class) with British Airways (Airbus 319); travel by private coach; accommodation as described below; breakfasts; 1 lunch and 3 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions, including a private visit to the Vatican Museums; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and the tour manager. Single supplement £390 (mz 477), £310 (mz 478). Price without flights £2,260 (mz 477), £2,160 (mz 478). Hotels. (mz 477): a 5-star hotel in a 17thcentury palazzo just off the Via Condotti at the bottom of the Spanish Steps. Public rooms are fairly small but comfortable and bedrooms are furnished in traditional style with antiques. (mz 478): a recently renovated 4-star hotel and former 17th-century convent just south of Piazza del Popolo. Public areas and rooms mix traditional and contemporary styles, and rooms are spacious and comfortable. How strenuous? Despite the central location of the hotel there is unavoidably a lot of walking. The historic area is vast, and vehicular access is restricted. A coach is used on some occasions but otherwise the city is traversed on foot. Average distance by coach per day: 9 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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The Entombment of Christ, engraving after Caravaggio’s painting in The Art Journal 1862.
7–13 October 2013 (ma 734) 7 days • £2,870 Lecturer: Dr Helen Langdon Unhurried appreciation of the finest painter of the Italian Baroque, in the company of his foremost biographer. Almost twenty Caravaggio canvasses in all: most in some of Italy’s greatest art museums, some in their original chapels, and one in private hands. First class rail travel between Milan and Rome. When Caravaggio died in 1610 aged 38 he was the most famous painter in Italy, and the most influential. His reputation slumped in subsequent centuries but in recent decades his stock has risen steadily to a new peak. His works are now widely regarded as the most immediately compelling and dramatically
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charged in the whole history of Italian art. With unflinching realism, stark contrasts of light and shade and intense emotional power, his art burst upon the tired, febrile artistic scene of fin-de-siècle Italy like a Damascene conversion. His paintings were radically innovatory, even shocking; his personality was arrogant, tempestuous and violent. Accused of murder, he fled Rome and sought exile successively in Naples, Malta and Sicily, time and again obliged by further conflict to make a fresh start. Nevertheless, in his own lifetime connoisseurs clamoured for works. His patrons and protectors were among the richest and most powerful of cardinals, bankers and aristocrats. Though paintings by him now hang in museums around the world, many remain in the cities where he produced them, some still in the chapels for which they were made. This tour begins in Lombardy, including the small town from which the artist took his b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
name. It ends in Rome, where he established both his reputation and his notoriety. Throughout it allows unhurried viewing of many of his finest paintings. The focus on a single artist provides not just a thematic stringency, but also a springboard to enhance the appreciation of the arts of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Italy.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. midday from London Heathrow to Milan. There is an introductory lecture in the hotel. Stay two nights in Milan. Day 2: Milan, Caravaggio. Visit the Brera, one of the premier art collections in Italy, which includes the Supper at Emmaus. In the afternoon drive out to the town of Caravaggio for an introductory walk. Day 3: Milan, Rome. Visit the Pinacoteca Ambrosiana to see Caravaggio’s Still Life: Basket of Fruit. In the afternoon travel to Rome in first class on a Frecciarossa train, a journey of less than four hours. Stay four nights in Rome. Day 4: Rome. Walk in the street where Caravaggio rented rooms near the Corso, and see three churches containing major religious paintings, including San Luigi dei Francesi (The Calling of St. Matthew), Sant’Agostino (Madonna di Loreto), and Santa Maria del Popolo (The Conversion of St. Paul and The Crucifixion of St. Peter). In the afternoon visit the Galleria Doria-Pamhilj to see Caravaggio’s
Rest on the Flight into Egypt and Penitent Magdalene.
Day 5: Rome. The Palazzo Barberini holds several important works, including Judith beheading Holofernes. Continue to the Villa Ludovisi, which houses Caravaggio’s early ceiling painting Jupiter, Neptune and Pluto (special arrangement). More paintings by Caravaggio and his peers are seen in the Capitoline Museums, which also house a breathtaking and recently-renovated collection of Ancient Roman statuary. Day 6: Rome, Vatican City. Cross the river into Trastevere for the gallery in Palazzo Corsini (St. John the Baptist) and the nearby Santa Maria della Scala. Later visit the Vatican’s painting gallery, including Caravaggio’s Entombment of Christ, for long his most famous work. Some free time to explore the rest of the Vatican follows. Day 7: Rome. In the morning visit the Villa Borghese, which contains Sick Bacchus and Boy with a Basket of Fruit amongst others. The rest of the day is free before transferring to the airport. Fly from Rome arriving at London Heathrow at c. 7.00pm. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
There is a possibility that not all of the works mentioned above will be seen; sometimes galleries loan them at very short notice.
Practicalities
Art in Italy Genoa & Turin........................................92
Price: £2,870 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel with British Airways (economy class); travel by coach, minibus and rail (first class); accommodation as described below; breakfasts; 1 lunch; 4 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips for waiters, porters and drivers; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement £460 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £2,660.
Turin at Christmas..................................93 Friuli Venezia-Giulia...............................96 Art History of Venice..............................99 Modern Art in Italy...............................100 The Venetian Hills.................................104 Parma & Bologna..................................105 Courts of Northern Italy.......................106
Hotels: Milan (2 nights): a 4-star Belle Epoque style hotel excellently located 50 metres from the Duomo. Rome (4 nights): a 4-star hotel a short walk from Piazza Farnese, traditionally furnished and has a courtyard garden.
Dark Age Brilliance..............................108
How strenuous? Despite the central location of the hotels there is unavoidably a lot of walking in this tour. In Rome, the historic area is vast, and vehicular access is increasingly restricted. On many occasions we get about on foot and even when a coach is used there is often a walk of several hundred metres due to traffic restrictions. This tour would not be suitable for those who have difficulty with everyday walking and stair–climbing. Participants need to be able to lift their own luggage onto and off coaches and trains. Average distance by coach per day: 14 miles.
Florence Revisited.................................116
Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Lucca......................................................110 Piero della Francesca.............................112 Florence................................................. 114 Leonardo da Vinci.................................118 Southern Tuscany..................................124 The Heart of Italy..................................125 Art in Le Marche..................................126 Connoisseur’s Rome..............................129 Caravaggio.............................................130 Ancient Rome........................................132 Naples: Art, Antiquities & Opera.........134 Palermo Rediscovered...........................139
A Festival of Music in
Rome
Angel by Carpaccio, wood engraving 1905.
4–9 November 2012 (mz 422) 6 days • Prices from £2,630 Six private performances of Roman music, in appropriate and glorious architectural settings. Performances by some of the world’s leading specialists in the genre – among them the Gabrieli Consort & Players, La Venexiana, Accademia Bizantina and Modo Antiquo. Lectures on the music and on the art and architecture of Rome.
Contact us for the full details or visit www.martinrandall.com 131
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Ancient Rome Art, architecture, history, with the Augustus exhibition was relieved of responsibility for half the Empire when Constantinople was founded; it lost its capitular status first to Milan and then to Ravenna; it was sacked by the Goths in AD 410. At one point during the Middle Ages the population shrunk to a hundredth of its ancient peak. As late as the nineteenth century the Forum was known as the Campo Vacchino because cows grazed among the ruins. After more than a millennium of destruction it is surprising that so much remains. Again, the sheer scale impresses the observer, but so also does the extraordinary high level of skill in art, craft and construction, and the sophistication of a society which produced such accomplishments. This tour will look at the visible remains of Ancient Rome and bring them alive by placing them in the context of the tumultuous history and of everyday life, which reached peaks of refinement and ease while never banishing the lewd, violent and squalid.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 9.15am (2012), c. 11.00am (2013) from London Heathrow to Rome. Walk around the temples of the Largo Argentina, the Theatre of Marcellus and the Forum Boarium.
4–9 October 2012 (mz 416) 6 days • £2,310 Lecturer: Angus Haldane 13–19 October 2013 (ma 739) 7 days • £2,880 Lecturer: Angus Haldane A comprehensive exploration of Rome’s ancient remains, in situ and in museums. Devised to grasp the scale and topography of the ancient city, capital of an empire and spiritual home of every Roman citizen. A new addition for 2013 – an extra day of visits, including the temporary exhibition Augustus: The Vision of a New Era which celebrates the bimillenial of the first Roman emperor’s death. Also includes visits outside Rome: Ostia, the well-preserved ancient port of Rome, and Tivoli, for Hadrian’s enormous villa complex. Good 4-star hotel near Piazza Farnese.
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When the Aurelian walls were built around Rome in the third century ad, the area enclosed was about fifty times that of Londinium and the present-day City of London. Rome’s population at that time was around a million, a figure not surpassed by any city in the world until the nineteenth century (by which time the world’s population had increased tenfold). Such was the scale of ancient Rome – formidable to any modern city-dweller with a little historical imagination, awesome, incredible even, to most citizens and subjects of the Empire. The size was appropriate for the capital of an empire which stretched from Upper Egypt to the Cairngorms, and from Atlantic Africa to Babylon, but the impedimenta of imperial administration were not the sole determinants of its size and status. As a kernel from which the Empire grew, and protagonist in myth and history, it was a spiritual home for every Roman citizen, and the fount of civilization. Of course, decline and fall ensued. Rome
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Day 2. Morning walk, including the Ara Pacis, Augustus’ monumental altar of peace. The Pantheon is the most complete of Roman buildings to survive. The Forum Romanum, the civic, religious and social centre of Ancient Rome, has the remains of many structures famed throughout the Empire. Walk along the Via dei Fori Imperiali, past Trajan’s Column and Trajan’s Market, a remarkable shopping centre. Day 3. Visit the Colosseum, the largest of ancient amphitheatres, and the Arch of Constantine, sculpturally the richest of triumphal arches. The Palatine Hill was the site of the luxurious palaces of successive emperors. In the afternoon, visit the Capitoline Museums which have important collections of ancient sculpture. Day 4. See the awesome bulk of the ruins of the Baths of Caracalla. Drive to Ostia, the ancient port of Rome, comparable to Pompeii for its state of preservation. Day 5. Drive to Tivoli to see Hadrian’s Villa, designed entirely by him and inspired by sites he visited during his travels in the Empire, undoubtedly the richest building project in the Roman Empire. Lunch is in a good restaurant. Some free time in Rome. Day 6. Morning visit to the church of Santa Maria degli Angeli, built on the site of the b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Pompeii & Herculaneum Antiquities of the Bay of Naples Baths of Diocletian. Palazzo Massimo, home to the majority of the National Roman Museum’s collection, contains wonderful Roman frescoes and stuccoes. Day 7 (2013 only): Augustus Imperator. Visit the Scuderie del Quirinale (Papal Stables), a splendid 18th-century building restored to become a museum and only accessible to the public for just over a decade. See here the exhibition Augustus: The Vision of a New Era, which celebrates the bimillenial anniverary of the first Roman emperor’s death. The Museo della Civiltà Romana houses an impressive and comprehensive collection, illustrating the history of Roman civilization, from its origins to the 6th century ad. Fly from Rome Fiumicino to London Heathrow, arriving at c. 7.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,310 (2012), £2,880 (2013) (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (aircraft: Airbus 320/321); private coach travel for transfers and excursions; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 4 dinners including wine, water, coffee; all admission charges to museums, exhibitions, sites etc; all tips for restaurant staff, drivers, guides; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £360 (2012), £510 (2013) (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £2100 (2012), £2,670 (2013). Hotel: a 4-star hotel in an excellent location a short walk from Piazza Farnese and Trastevere. Bedrooms are furnished with traditional cherry wood furniture. There is a courtyard garden.
10–15 October 2012 (mz 419) 6 days • £1,740 Lecturer: Angus Haldane 15–20 October 2012 (mz 421) 6 days • £1,740 Lecturer: Dr Ffiona Gilmore Eaves 8–13 April 2013 (mz 512) 6 days • £1,820 Lecturer: Angus Haldane 21–26 October 2013 (ma 745) 6 days • £1,820 Lecturer: Angus Haldane One of the most exciting tours possible dealing with Roman archaeology. Two principal sites, both buried by the eruption of Vesuvius in AD 79 and preserved with unparalleled completeness. A unique insight into everyday life in the Roman Empire. Important early Greek settlements, including Paestum, Cumae and Pozzuoli. Campania’s felicitous climate, fertile soil and natural harbours have attracted settlers since ancient times. Prosperity invariably ensued. The Greeks founded some of their earliest colonies here, among them Naples and Paestum, the site of the latter preserving three of the most complete Doric temples to be found anywhere. Campania was one of the most favoured areas in the Roman Empire. To the riches generated by trade, agriculture and naval
dockyards there were added the proceeds of leisure industries as it became a holiday destination for wealthy citizens from Rome. Some of the most desirable towns and private villas in the peninsula were built here. However, the infamous eruption in ad 79 of Mount Vesuvius completely buried two busy and salubrious towns on the Bay of Naples, Pompeii and Herculaneum, one with volcanic ash and the other with mud. Paradoxically, this sudden obliteration preserved the towns with a level of completeness which has no parallel with any other archaeological site in the world. Excavation has revealed them almost in their entirety, providing a unique insight into everyday life in the Roman Empire. Even the smallest and most fragile objects of daily use have survived, along with wall paintings, floor mosaics, precious jewellery and household utensils. The immediacy and vividness with which the imagination is able to grasp a past civilization is startling and unique.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 1.00pm from London Gatwick to Naples. Drive to the hotel above the town of Vico Equense where all five nights are spent. Day 2: Paestum. Paestum was a major Greek settlement and is one of the most interesting archaeological sites in Italy. Three outstanding Greek Doric temples stand in a remarkable state of preservation. Visit also the excellent museum which has a very rare ancient Greek painting and early metopes. Day 3: Cumae, Baia, Pozzuoli. Spend the day around the Bay of Naples at some little-
How strenuous? There is unavoidably quite a lot of walking. The historic area is vast, and vehicular access to the centre is increasingly restricted. A coach will be used on several occasions, but otherwise the city is traversed on foot. Average distance by coach per day: c. 19 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
Illustration, previous page: Arch of Titus, wood engraving c. 1880. Right: Vesuvius, engraving c. 1820. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
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Pompeii & Herculaneum continued
Naples: art, antiquities & opera Naples, Teatro San Carlo, late 19th-cent. engraving.
visited but exciting sites. Cumae was the first Greek settlement on mainland Italy. The archaeological museum of the Phlegraean fields in Baia has interesting marble and bronze statues from the Imperial period. The port of Pozzuoli with a well-preserved amphitheatre and market. Day 4: Pompeii. Since the first excavations in the 18th century, ancient Pompeii has been one of the world’s most famous archaeological digs. The fascination of the site lies not only in the major public buildings such as the theatre, temples and the forum but also in the numerous domestic dwellings, from cramped apartments to luxurious villas. Day 5: Herculaneum, Naples. At Herculaneum, engulfed by mud rather than ash, timber and other combustibles are better preserved. A smaller settlement consisting largely of villas for the well-to-do, private dwellings are the centre of interest. The Archaeological Museum in Naples has one of the finest collections in the world, and is the principal repository for movable objects excavated at Pompeii and Herculaneum. Day 6: Oplontis. Visit the newly excavated villa at Torre Annunziata (ancient Oplontis), which may have been the home of Poppaea, wife of Nero. It is one of the loveliest of ancient sites, with rich wall paintings and a swimming pool. Fly from Naples to London Gatwick, arriving c. 7.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,740 (2012), £1,820 (2013) (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on British Airways flights (Boeing 737); private coach for transfers; accommodation; breakfasts, 3 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager; local guides where required. Single supplement £150 (2012), £260 (2013) (double room for sole use). Price without flights £1,640 (2012) £1,670 (2013). Hotel: a modern 5-star hotel on the hilltop above the town of Vico Equense. Rooms are spacious and air-conditioned and look out onto the hotel garden. The hotel restaurant has a Michelin star. There is a swimming pool (open subject to weather) and a terrace with views of the Bay of Naples and Vesuvius. The staff are efficient and friendly. Rooms with a sea view are available on request and for a supplement. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking, some of it over the rough ground of sites. Surefootedness is essential. Average distance by coach per day: 65 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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22–27 October 2012 (mz 417) 6 days • £1,890 Lecturer: Dr Helen Langdon May 2013 Details available October 2012 Contact us to register your interest Selects the best of the art, architecture and antiquities in Naples. In 2012: performance of Bizet’s Les Pêcheurs de Perles at the recently restored Teatro San Carlo. Also visits the palaces and gardens at Caserta. Naples is one of those rare places whose very name kindles a kaleidoscope of conflicting images. A highlight of the eighteenthcentury Grand Tour, it is now all but ignored by mainstream tourism. Royal capital of the largest of the Italian kingdoms, in the twentieth century it became a byword for poverty and decline. Once it basked in a reputation for supreme beauty – ‘see Naples and die’; now it enjoys notoriety as a pit of urban ills – chaos, congestion, corruption and Camorra. Until recently there was some truth in all of these images of modern Naples. But the city has changed – not entirely, but it is one of the most heartening examples of inner-city regeneration of the last decade or so. Traffic is still appalling, but much of the historic centre is now pedestrianised. A burst of prosperity has transformed the ancient shopping and artisan districts. Restoration of buildings and works of art has further increased the beauty of the city, and more churches and museums are more
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often open and accessible. Its museums display some of the finest art and antiquities to be found in Italy, and major architectural and archaeological sites are located nearby. The Teatro San Carlo is one of the most important in operatic history, with many premières to its credit. One of the oldest and largest in Europe, it was built in 1737, restored after a fire in 1818, and has just emerged in all its glory from major refurbishment. Naples is a city of the south. In many ways it has more in common with Seville or Cairo than with Florence or Milan. It is a city of swaggering palaces and stupendous churches, of cacophonous street life and infectious vitality. Exciting, exhausting, energising.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 1pm from London Gatwick to Naples. Visit the Royal Palace in the afternoon, a majestic pile in the heart of the city overlooking the harbour. Day 2. A walk through the old city centre includes the cathedral of San Gennaro which has an interior of astounding richness and major paintings by Domenichino and Lanfranco. Also seen are two works by Caravaggio, his Martyrdom of St Ursula in a bank and his Seven Works of Mercy in the chapel for which it was commissioned. Drive into the hilly suburbs to visit the palace of Capodimonte, originally a giant hunting lodge. Here is located one of Italy’s greatest art galleries, with a magnificent range of art from the Middle Ages onwards. b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Normans in the South Castles & cathedrals in Puglia & Campagna Day 3. A second walk in the centre of Naples including the Cappella San Severo, a masterpiece of Baroque art and craft with multi-coloured marbles and virtuoso sculptures, and S. Chiara, an austere Gothic church with Rococo tile-encrusted cloister. The afternoon is spent at the National Museum, one of the world’s greatest collections of Greek and Roman antiquities. Many items come from the excavations at Pompeii and Herculaneum. Day 4. High on a hill with stunning views over the Bay of Naples, the monastery of San Martino has a church of extraordinary lavishness of art and decoration and a museum of fine and decorative arts. Free afternoon before the performance at the Teatro San Carlo, the oldest major working theatre in Europe. Recent restoration has returned it to its former splendour. Les Pêcheurs de Perles (Bizet): Gabriele Ferro (conductor). Day 5. A few miles outside Naples, the royal palace at Caserta, begun 1751, is Italy’s most magnificent and accomplished emulation of Versailles. An awesome absolutist statement, the apartments are superbly decorated and furnished and it is set within parkland and gardens equally magnificent in scale. In Caserta there is also a visit to the 18th-century gardens at the Casale dei Duchi di Bovino, a cross between the formal Italian and the landscaped English style. Lunch is at a private villa.
9–17 October 2012 (mz 394) 9 days • £2,210 Lecturer: Matthew Woodworth 19–27 March 2013 (mz 498) 9 days • £2,320 Lecturer: John McNeill 9–17 April 2013 (mz 516) 9 days • £2,320 Lecturer: Christopher Newall An architectural tour of one of the most sophisticated kingdoms in mediaeval Europe. Splendid Norman legacy of Romanesque, with churches of unprecedented size and grandeur. Later architecture of equal magnificence, with an elaborate flowering of Baroque. Attractive, well-preserved town centres and a dramatic landscape of raw limestone.
personal gain. By the end of the century they had expelled the Byzantines from the mainland and the Saracens from Sicily, and by 1127 all Sicily and southern Italy was ruled by one Norman king. This cosmopolitan kingdom was one of the best administered and most culturally sophisticated in Europe. As in England, in the wake of conquest there arose splendid new churches of unprecedented size and grandeur. A mixture of French, Lombard, Byzantine, Saracenic and ancient Roman elements, south Italian Romanesque is one of the most distinct and beautiful of the variants of this truly international style. Prosperity and creativity continued after the extinction of the Norman dynasty in 1194 by the Hohenstaufen from Germany. In the first half of the thirteenth century the region was dominated by the extraordinary Emperor Frederick II, ‘Stupor Mundi’, ‘Wonder of the World’. He was as courageous and ambitious in artistic and intellectual spheres as he was in S. Valentino, Bitonto, from The Shores of the Adriatic by F. HamiltonJackson, 1906.
Day 6. Fly to Gatwick, arriving at c. 2.15pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,890 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on British Airways flights (aircraft: Boeing 737); travel by private coach; hotel accommodation; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 3 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; 1 opera ticket; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Seaview supplement £140 (per room). Single supplement £290 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £1,710. Hotel. A 4-star hotel on the waterfront c. 10 minutes’ walk from the Royal Palace. Rooms are elegantly decorated but do vary in size. How strenuous? A large part of central Naples is inaccessible to traffic, including coaches. Pavements can be uneven, some roads are steep, traffic unpredictable. Participants need to be averagely fit and able to manage everyday walking and stairclimbing without difficulty. Average distance by coach per day: 10 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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The Norman conquest of southern Italy was one of the most remarkable episodes in mediaeval history. Whereas England was subjugated by a sizeable and highly organised Norman army, the ‘Kingdom in the Sun’ was won by small bands of soldiers of fortune. They trickled in during the eleventh century when the tangled political situation and incessant feuding made the area ripe for exploitation by ambitious knights in search of adventure, lands and
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administration, diplomacy and war. Much later there was another artistic outburst, appropriately international but characteristically idiosyncratic: a highly elaborate version of Baroque architecture and decoration. The heel and spur of boot-shaped Italy, Puglia is remote from the better-known parts of the peninsula, and its raw limestone landscape wholly different from the silky
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Normans in the South continued
richness of central and northern Italy. The last day of the tour is spent across the Apennines in Campania. This region presents another face of Italy, distinctly southern but with an equally cosmopolitan and pan-Mediterranean cultural history.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 12.30pm from London Heathrow to Brindisi, via Rome, and drive on to Lecce. First of three nights in Lecce. Day 2: Casarano, Gallipoli, Otranto. Explore the Salentine Peninsula, the southernmost tip of the heel of Italy. Churches visited include Sta Maria di Cerrate (12th-century Romanesque complex) and Casarano (5thcentury mosaics and frescoes). Gallipoli was the centre of Byzantine Italy until conquered by the Normans in 1071; the old town is on an off-shore island. Otranto, captured by Normans in 1068, has a cathedral with outstanding 12thcentury floor mosaics. Day 3: Lecce. Lecce is distinguished by an elaborate style of Baroque and Rococo decoration wrought in the soft, honey-coloured tufa of the region, the outstanding examples being the cathedral and the church of Sta Croce. See also the Norman church of SS Nicolò e Cataldo, founded by Tancred, and the Roman theatre. Some free time. Day 4: Brindisi, Bitonto. Possessing the safest natural harbour on the Adriatic, the provincial capital of Brindisi has been of intermittent strategic importance for over twenty-four centuries. Visits include the Romanesque churches of Sta Maria del Casale, with Byzantine frescoes and polychrome façade, and San Benedetto. Bitonto has one of the finest of Romanesque cathedrals with good sculpture and an Early Christian lower church. Continue to Trani where the next four nights are spent. Day 5: Bari, Trani. Bari, capital of Puglia, has an extensive and unspoilt mediaeval quarter beside the sea. The Basilica of S. Nicola, begun in 1087, is not only the first but also the greatest of Puglian Romanesque churches; the episcopal throne here is remarkable. Also visit the cathedral (1170) and later mediaeval Angevin castle. Back in Trani, visit the magically beautiful Romanesque cathedral on the waterfront. Day 6: Castel del Monte, Canosa. Castel del Monte, situated on an isolated peak, is Frederick II’s extraordinarily sophisticated hunting lodge and one of the most intriguing secular buildings of the Middle Ages. Canosa di Puglia has an 11th-century cathedral and the tomb of Bohemond.
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Castel del Monte, lithograph after Edward Lear c. 1850.
Day 7: Troia, Melfi, Venosa. Troia is a lovely town with a Pisan-style Romanesque cathedral. The hilltop town of Melfi was for a while the main centre of Norman power in Italy. The impressive but unfinished monastery of La Trinità at Venosa was built from the 12th century over an early Christian church. Day 8: Benevento, Salerno. Cross the Apennines to Campagna. Benevento was a strategic Roman colonia, Lombard Duchy and Norman from 1081. The arch of Trajan is one of the finest surviving Roman triumphal arches. Sta Sofia has a magnificent 12thcentury cloister. The seaport of Salerno has an 11th-century cathedral with a fine sculpted portal and a 12th-century ivory altarpiece. Overnight Vico Equense. Day 9: St Angelo in Formis. The Basilica of St Angelo in Formis has outstanding 11th-century frescoes. Fly from Rome to London, arriving Heathrow at c. 7.15pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,210 (2012), £2,320 (2013) (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled Alitalia flights (aircraft: Airbus 321); travel by private coach; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 5 dinners with wine, water, coffee;
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all admissions; all taxes; all gratuities for restaurant staff, drivers and guides; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £320 (2012), £360 (2013) (double room for sole use). Price without flights £2,040 (2012), £2,140 (2013). Hotels: Lecce (3 nights): a stylish 5-star hotel in an excellent location near the church of Sta Croce in the historic centre. Rooms are spacious and elegantly furnished. Trani (4 nights): a charming 4-star hotel converted from a 15th-century convent, although service and maintenance are not always quite up to North European standards. We are using two different hotels in Vico Equense (1 night): in 2012, a simple friendly 3-star. Rooms vary in size, decor and outlook; there is a terrace and views of the sea. In 2013, a smart, modern 5-star hotel in the village of Seiano, close to the town of Vico Equense. Rooms are bright, spacious and air-conditioned; there is a terrace with views of the Bay of Naples. Dinners are in the hotels or selected restaurants. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking on this tour, some of it over rough ground. Average distance by coach per day: 88 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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Basilicata Italy’s undiscovered south 3–8 May 2013 (mz 547) 6 days • £1,720 Lecturer: Rowena Loverance A region rich in archaeological collections and Norman and Romanesque architecture. Unknown and unspoilt – a chance to explore the countryside and small towns of southern Italy with few other tourists. Based throughout in Matera, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, staying in a cave hotel. While it may be tendentious to claim that anywhere in Italy remains ‘unknown’, the region of Basilicata does seem to offer one of the few remaining opportunities to experience an unspoilt and unfamiliar region. As in-step to the heel of Puglia and the toe of Calabria, Basilicata has always missed out on the flow of visitors and the concomitant income that its neighbours have attracted as springboards to the eastern Mediterranean and to Sicily. This also partially explains its historic reputation as one of the poorest regions of Italy. But while undeniably without the more spectacular or influential cultural achievements other Italian regions may boast, humble Basilicata has sufficient fascinating sites and a varied cultural heritage to enthral the visitor. Matera is the cultural capital. Most impressive are the Sassi, the hundreds of caves that are attractively tiered along the two ravines that thrust into the heart of the town. Developed, enhanced and inhabited for over a thousand years, the caves were cleared as slums around the 1950s but are now being thoughtfully and sympathetically re-developed. Equally surprising is the rest of Matera, which feels more like a vibrant historic town located in say Emilia Romagna or the Veneto than in one of the allegedly least developed parts of Italy. This energetic if provincial atmosphere is heightened by the improvements that have recently transformed the town. But the tour enjoys the whole of Basilicata. Passing through verdant and rolling hills, there are visits to Melfi and Venosa, both of which possess mighty Norman fortresses and evocative Romanesque churches, and lovely Montescaglioso to the south, sprawling across the hills and whose imposing Benedictine abbey flourished under the Norman lords. On the coast, there are the important Ancient Greek settlements of Metaponto and Policoro. Basilicata seems set to become a major destination for discerning visitors. We would recommend this tour to those who would like to experience it before this happens.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 9.30am from London Heathrow to Bari, via Milan. Drive to Matera where the tour is based throughout.
Day 2: Matera. The morning walk includes the church of San Giovanni Battista (1220), the Baroque church of San Francesco d’Assisi and the archaeological museum. The cathedral (exterior only), a fine example of southern Italian Romanesque, dominates the city. Lunch is provided today: local cheese, cured meats and wines. Afterwards walk down the Sasso Caveoso to see a handful of cave churches, many of them with frescoes. Day 3: Venosa, Melfi. Drive to Venosa to visit the impressive but unfinished monastery of La Trinità built over an early Christian church. Walk through the charming town centre and see the archaeological collection in the late 15th-century castle. Continue to Melfi for lunch in a family-run restaurant. The impressive Norman castle hosts a good archaeological museum. The Norman origins of the cathedral, rebuilt in the late 17th century, are still visible in the splendid bell tower. Day 4: Montescaglioso, Matera. Drive to the hilltop town of Montescaglioso, overlooking the Bradano valley, to visit the Benedictine abbey of St Michael the Archangel, one of the largest and most impressive abbeys in southern Italy. Visit the recently excavated subterranean city at Piazza Vittorio Veneto. The afternoon is free in Matera. Day 5: Metaponto, Santa Maria d’Anglona, Policoro. The Ancient Greek city of Metaponto was one of the most important Greek settlements in the West; though its site is ruinous the museum display charts most of its history. Isolated in countryside, Santa Maria d’Anglona is a lovely church rich in late 12thcentury frescoes. There is a picnic lunch here. Visit the Museo Archeologico della Siritide in Policoro which has exhibits from the former Greek colonies of Siris and Heraclea. Day 6: Matera. The Crypt of Original Sin outside Matera is known as the ‘Sistine chapel’ of cave wall paintings; only recently opened to the public it is not only an outstanding discovery for the history of early mediaeval art but is also an example of the most advanced conservation techniques. Fly from Bari to London Heathrow, via Milan, arriving c. 6.00pm.
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Detail of a map 1833.
Practicalities Price: £1,720 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled Alitalia flights (Airbus 320); private coach for excursions and transfers; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 2 lunches, 1 picnic and 3 dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admissions to museums, etc., visited with the group; all gratuities for restaurant staff, drivers and guides; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer and the tour manager. Single supplement £110 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £1,490. Hotel: in Matera, a stylish 4-star hotel located in the Sasso Caveoso, overlooking the ravine. The cave-rooms, spread over different levels, are spacious and furnished with all modern comforts. Dinners are in carefully selected restaurants. How strenuous? Matera’s topography and the hotel’s location mean that there is a lot of walking up and down hills and cobbled steps which can be slippery. Coaches cannot be used within the town centres. Good mobility, surefootedness and agility are essential. Average distance by coach per day: 66 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Martina Franca July 2013 Details available January 2013 Contact us to register your interest
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Sardinia Archaeology, architecture & art Diocesano has a 15th-century Flemish triptych. The afternoon is spent in the Cittadella dei Musei: the excellent archaeological museum has important finds from the Nuraghic, Phoenician and Roman periods and the art gallery has works by the foremost Sardinian retable painter, Pietro Cavaro. Day 3: Barumini, Tuili. The Nuraghe Su’ Nuraxi is the largest of the Bronze Age nuraghi, with an impressive central tower constructed of basalt. At nearby Tuili, the unprepossessing Chiesa di San Pietro houses an exquisite retable by the Maestro di Castelsardo (c. 1500). Return to Cagliari for a free afternoon. Stroll around the mediaeval ramparts or visit the few Baroque churches.
Gagliari, Sardinia, late-19th-century engraving from Gazetteer of the World, Vol.II.
7–15 May 2013 (mz 549) 9 days • £2,460 Lecturer: Dr Roberto Cobianchi Includes the best of the island’s material culture, from Neolithic and Bronze Age, through Punic and Roman to mediaeval and Renaissance. The unique Bronze Age nuraghi are a striking feature, as are Tuscan-style Romanesque churches and 16th-century Catalan altarpieces. Wonderful mix of sites from the south to the north following the west coast of the island. Despite being the second largest island in the Mediterranean, Sardinia’s cultural treasures remain largely undiscovered by travellers. Its extraordinary jagged coastline and clear blue seas have earned it a deserved reputation for beach tourism, with villas and resorts clinging to the cliffs along the Costa Smeralda. Yet the wealth of prehistoric sites, Punic and Roman remains and Pisan-Romanesque churches make it a fascinating destination for those prepared to forego the luxury of the north-west coast and explore inland. As with all the larger islands in the Mediterranean, Sardinia was plundered and settled by a succession of pirates and empire builders, though due in large part to its rugged and impenetrable landscape, Sardinian identity was never wholly extinguished. Her Bronze Age settlements truly set it apart. Deep gorges, craggy limestone and slate mountain ranges and swathes of verdant countryside hide over 7000 nuraghi, peculiar conical stone structures which were forts, palaces and simple domestic dwellings. Much is left to the imagination as
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little is known about these edifices, though digs are leading to some fascinating insights. Evidence of Phoenician power on the island can be seen at Tharros on the west coast, established in the eighth century bc in a strategic position jutting into the sea in the Gulf of Oristano. Later colonized by the Romans, the site is a remarkable example of a coastal city-state. Finds can be seen in Sardinia’s superlative collection of archeological museums, in Cagliari, Sassari and Oristano. The decline of the Roman Empire left Sardinia open to Goths, Lombards, for a short spell the Byzantines, and to the new Muslim empires of North Africa and Spain. The Pisans and Genoese in the eleventh century left an indelible mark on the island with their superb Romanesque churches in the Logudoro region, indeed some of the finest in Europe. Rule by the Kingdom of Aragón brought a Spanish dimension to the island’s culture, most evident today in the Catalan-Gothic architecture of the fishing port at Alghero and, concealed in mediaeval churches in tiny villages the length of the island, sumptuous sixteenthcentury retables which rival coeval ones on the Italian mainland.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 12.15pm from London Heathrow to Cagliari, via Rome. First of three nights in Cagliari. Day 2: Cagliari. Walk up the Bastione St. Remy, an immense late nineteenth-century gateway to the Castello district. The cathedral has a remodelled Pisan-Romanesque façade and a sculpted pulpit from 1160. The Museo
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Day 4: Paulilatino, Oristano. The Basilica di Santa Giusta, erected in 1135, is one of the earliest of the Tuscan Romanesque churches. The Nuraghe Santa Cristina is the most picturesque nuraghic site, surrounded by olive groves and with an astounding underground shrine from the second century bc. At Oristano there is a fine collection at the archaeological museum, a 14th-century polychrome statue by Nicola Pisano in the cathedral and a Catalan crucified Christ in San Francesco. First of two nights in Oristano. Day 5: Tharros, San Salvatore. Tharros is a magnificently located Punic and Roman site, with fine views over the Gulf of Oristano. The nearby Byzantine Church of San Giovanni in Sinis is the oldest of Sardinia’s churches. Visit the Church of the Saviour, which has an underground hypogeum with fourthcentury frescoes depicting animals and Roman mythology. Return through the marshes of the lagoon, stopping for lunch at a fish restaurant by the lake where ancient fishing techniques are still in use. Day 6: Borruta, Bonorva, Torralba, Sassari. San Pietro di Sorres is the most superbly situated Romanesque church in Sardinia, with typical Tuscan black and white stone banding. The church overlooks the Valle dei Nuraghi where there is a concentration of nuraghic sites. Visit Nuraghe Santu Antine, the most complex nuraghic site in Sardinia. The cliff necropolis of Sant’Andrea Priu was used for burial in the second and third centuries bc. In the main chamber are exquisite fragments of later Roman and Byzantine frescoes. Continue to Sassari for the first of three nights. Day 7: Alghero, Churches of the Logudoro. Alghero is a picturesque seaside town, still functioning as a commercial fishing port. A Catalan colony for nearly 400 years, the Spanish influence can be seen in the CatalanGothic architecture of the old town. Visit the b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Palermo Rediscovered Art, archaeology & architecture nearby domus de janus site Anghelu Ruju, a fine example of the pre-nuraghic hypogea found all over the island. Drive to see two examples of Pisan-Romanesque churches, each in a very different setting in the rural landscape. Santa Maria del Regno has a magnificent ornate retable from 1515. Sant’Antioco di Bisarcio, built in 1090, has been rebuilt over the centuries and has a French Gothic-style portico. Day 8: Sassari, Porto Torres. The morning is spent in Sassari, which has a network of charming mediaeval streets culminating in stately 19th-century piazze. The cathedral of San Nicola has one of Italy’s most lavish Baroque façades. There is a large collection of pre-historic, Punic and Roman artefacts in the Museo Sanna, as well as excellent models of the nuraghi and tomb complexes. At Porto Torres, the Basilica di San Gavino is a monumental Romanesque structure, Sardinia’s earliest and finest, with almost thirty Roman columns flanking the nave. The Copper Age sanctuary of Monte D’Accoddi is entirely unique in the Mediterranean, reminiscent of the tombs of the Aztecs. Day 9. Fly from Alghero to London Heathrow, via Rome, arriving c. 3.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,460 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled Alitalia flights (Airbus 319); travel by private coach; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 4 lunches (including 1 picnic) and 5 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement £180 (double for sole use). Price without flights £2,220.
18–24 November 2012 (mz 424) 7 days • £2,260 Lecturer: Christopher Newall Christmas departure: 20–27 December 2012 (mz 444) 8 days • £2,620 Lecturer: Dr Roberto Cobianchi One of the most fascinating cities in Italy, much improved recently. Includes access to private palaces and to places outside public opening hours. Excursions to several other towns and sites in western Sicily: Cefalù, Bagheria, Monreale, Segesta. Sicily’s heritage of art, architecture and archaeological remains is exceptionally rich and varied, and Palermo is by far the most interesting of the island’s cities. Staying here for all seven nights, the tour also has excursions to some of the best of the island’s patrimony outside the city. Ancient classical remains are prominent, with some of the finest standing Doric temples to be seen anywhere at Segesta and Agrigento. In the ninth century ad, when Byzantine rule was supplanted by that of Muslim Arabs, Palermo became the leading city on the island and famous throughout Europe for the beauty of its hillside position, its
tradition of craftsmanship and its enlightened administration. In the 11th century, Arab rule was swept aside by conquering Normans. By succumbing to the luxuriant sophistication of their predecessors they distanced themselves as far as is imaginable from their rugged northern roots. From a Palermo-based cosmopolitan court they ruled with efficiency and tolerance an affluent and cultured nation. The unique artistic blend of this golden age survives in the Romanesque churches with details of Norman, Saracenic, Levantine and classical origin. Byzantine mosaicists were extensively employed, and more wall and vault mosaics survive here than in all of Byzantium. The tour includes not only the Norman buildings in Palermo but also the cathedrals at Cefalù and Monreale. The prosperity and power of Sicily began to wane from the later Middle Ages, but pockets of wealth and creativity remained, as Gothic and Renaissance creations demonstrate. Artistically, however, a final flourish was reached in the Age of Baroque when churches and palaces were erected in Palermo and throughout the island which are as splendid and exuberant as anywhere in Europe. Always a seething, vibrant city, enlightened local government has made Palermo cleaner, safer, and altogether more enjoyable than even a few years ago. The tour includes a number of special arrangements to gain access to private palaces or visit buildings outside opening hours.
Hotels: Cagliari (3 nights): a recently refurbished 4-star hotel, externally unattractive but internally clean and bright, with spacious rooms. Oristano (2 nights): the only centrallylocated 4-star hotel in the town, in need of refurbishment. Bedrooms are a good size if a little dated. There is a pleasant garden, and the restaurant is good. Sassari (3 nights): a 3-star hotel close to the historic centre but rooms are simple, small and ill-lit. These hotels are the best in their localities, but possibly among the least best on any of our tours. How strenuous? A lot of walking, some over rough ground at archaeological sites or over cobbled or uneven paving. Fitness and surefootedness are essential. Some long journeys. Average distance by coach per day: 44 miles.
Mosaic from the Palatine Chapel, Palermo, engraving 1881.
Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
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Itinerary: November 2012 Day 1. Fly at c. 12.30pm from London Heathrow to Palermo, via Rome. Overnight Palermo where all six nights are spent. Day 2: Palermo. A morning walk through the old centre includes a visit to several oratories. La Martorana and San Cataldo are two outstanding Norman buildings. Visit the Chiesa del Gesù, an extraordinary example of Palermitan Baroque with a profusion of marble inlay, stucco and sculpture. Day 3: Cefalù, Bagheria. Cefalù, a charming coastal town, has a massive Norman cathedral with outstanding mosaics and an art gallery with paintings by Antonello da Messina. Visit the Greek temple of Himera, and Bagheria, just outside Palermo, which has a series of Baroque and neo-classical villas of nobility. The remarkable but faded Villa Palagonia has a fine external staircase and is adorned with grotesque statuary. Day 4: Monreale, Palermo. Monreale dominates a verdant valley west of Palermo, and its cathedral is one of the finest Norman churches with the largest scheme of mosaic direction to survive from the Middle Ages. In the afternoon visit the Castello della Zisa, an Arab-Norman palace, recently restored. Dinner in a private palace. Day 5: Palermo. In the morning, explore the Palace of the Normans, containing the Palatine Chapel (private visit) and Hall of King Roger, both with outstanding mosaics. Visit S. Giovanni degli Eremiti, a Norman church with five cupolas and a garden, and the cathedral, a building of many periods, with royal and imperial tombs. The afternoon is spent at the Galleria Regionale della Sicilia (Palazzo Abatellis), which has an excellent collection of 15th–cent. pictures. Day 6: Segesta, Palermo. One of the most evocative of ancient Greek sites, Segesta has a magnificently sited temple and theatre. Free afternoon in Palermo. In the evening, there is a visit and reception by special arrangement to an otherwise inaccessible palazzo, with astonishing Rococo interiors and many original furnishings (used in Visconti’s The Leopard). Day 7. Fly from Palermo to London Heathrow, via Milan, arriving c. 6.00pm.
Itinerary: Christmas 2012 Day 1. Fly at c. 12.20pm from London Heathrow to Palermo, via Rome. Overnight in Palermo where all seven nights are spent. Day 2: Palermo. A morning walk through the old centre includes visits to several oratories and an excellent collection of pictures in the 15thcentury Palazzo Abatellis. Visit a private palace and dinner here by special arrangement. Day 3: Agrigento. A full day excursion to Agrigento to see the ‘Valley of the Temples’, one of the finest of all ancient Greek sites, with two virtually complete Doric temples, other ruins, and superb archaeological museum. Day 4: Palermo. Visit the cathedral this morning, a building of many periods, with royal and imperial tombs, followed by the Teatro Massimo. A free afternoon is followed by a reception in a private palazzo, with astonishing Rococo interiors and original furnishings (used by Visconti for ‘The Leopard’). Day 5: Monreale. Monreale dominates a verdant valley southwest of Palermo, and its cathedral is one of the finest Norman churches with the largest scheme of mosaic decoration that survives from the Middle Ages. Visit the Castello di Zisa in the afternoon, an ArabNorman Palace. Day 6, Christmas Day: Segesta, Palermo. In the morning drive to Segesta, one of the most evocative of ancient Greek sites, with magnificently sited temple and theatre. Back in Palermo, Christmas lunch is in a local restaurant. Day 7: Cefalù, Bagheria. Cefalù, a charming coastal town, has a massive Norman cathedral with outstanding mosaics. Bagheria on the fringes of Palermo is a district of aristocratic Baroque and Neo-Classical villas. The remarkable if faded Villa Palagonia has a fine external staircase and is adorned with grotesque statuary. Day 8: Palermo. Before leaving Palermo, the extraordinary 12th-century Palace of the Normans, containing the Palatine Chapel and Hall of King Roger, both with outstanding mosaics. The Norman church of S. Giovanni degli Eremiti has five cupolas and a garden. Fly from Palermo to London Heathrow, via Rome, arriving c. 7.00pm.
Practicalities Price (November): £2,620 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled Alitalia flights (Airbus 321); coach travel throughout; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 2 lunches and 5 dinners (including one at a private palace), with wine, water and coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £280 (double for sole use). Price without flights £2,380. Price (Christmas): £2,260 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled Alitalia flights (Airbus 321); coach travel throughout; accommodation as described below; breakfasts and 4 dinners (including one at a private palace) with wine, water and coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £180 (double for sole use). Price without flights £2,070. Hotel. A 16th-century palazzo converted into a charming 4-star hotel in the centre of Palermo. Rooms combine classical furnishings with modern comforts and the terrace has fine views over the city. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking, sometimes over the rough terrain of archaeological sites. This tour not suitable for those with walking difficulties.Average distance by coach per day: 49 miles. Weather (Christmas). Winter weather in Palermo can be balmy and dry, but visitors should allow for the possibility of low temperatures and some rain. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants (except Christmas, which will have a maximum of 20).
Gastronomic Sicily April 2013 Details available August 2012 Contact us to register your interest
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206.
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Sicily Centre of Mediterranean civilizations 14–26 November 2012 (mz 437) 13 days • £3,860 Lecturer: Dr Ffiona Gilmore Eaves 18–29 March 2013 (mz 497) 12 days • £3,620 Lecturer: Dr Luca Leoncini 23 September–4 October 2013 (ma 717) 12 days • £3,780 Lecturer: Christopher Newall 14–25 October 2013 (ma 747) 12 days • £3,780 Lecturer: Dr Roberto Cobianchi Covers the whole island, including the main sights and many lesser-known ones. The whole gamut – Ancient Greek, Roman, mediaeval (particularly Norman), Renaissance, Baroque and later. A full tour but carefully paced. Hotel changes kept to a minimum – only three hotels in twelve days. By virtue of both size and location, Sicily is the pre-eminent island in the Mediterranean. It is the largest, and it is also close to the sea’s
centre, a stepping stone between Europe and Africa and a refuge between the Levant and the Atlantic. The result is that throughout history Sicily has been viewed as a fortuitous landfall by migrating peoples and a prized possession by ambitious adventurers and expansionist princes. And as the Mediterranean has been catalyst and disseminator of a greater variety of civilizations than any other of the world’s seas, the island has acquired an exceptionally rich encrustation of art, architecture and archaeological remains. For the Phoenicians, Sicily was a nodal point in their far-reaching trading empire, but from the seventh century bc they were increasingly displaced by colonies established by the Greeks. Exploiting the enormous potential of the island, these rapidly outpaced their rugged home territories to become the most prosperous of all Hellenic colonies. At Segesta and Agrigento there survive some of the finest standing Doric temples to be seen anywhere. Great wealth accrued under Roman rule when the island was clothed in fields of corn, and endless oak forests and abundant fauna provided sport for grandees and emperors. One of them has bequeathed to us on the floor of his luxurious villa the most splendid
Roman mosaics to have survived. Overrun by Germanic barbarians in the fifth century, Sicily was wrested back for the twilight of classical civilization by the Byzantines, but at the cost of military campaigns which devastated the island. Byzantine rule was in turn supplanted from the ninth century by Muslim Arabs, and a period of prosperity and advanced civilization ensued. Two hundred years later Arab rule was swept aside by conquering Normans, who, by succumbing to the luxuriant sophistication of their predecessors, distanced themselves as far as is imaginable from their rugged northern roots. The unique artistic blend of this golden age survives in the Romanesque churches with details of Norman, Saracenic, Levantine and classical origin. Byzantine mosaicists were much employed. The wealth and power of Sicily began to wane again from the later Middle Ages as a succession of German, French and Spanish dynasties exploited the island with colonial disregard for long-term interests, but pockets of wealth and creativity remained as Gothic and Renaissance masterpieces demonstrate. Artistically, however, a final flourish was reached in the Age of Baroque which saw the erection of churches and palaces as splendid and exuberant as anywhere in Europe. Taormina and Mt Etna, steel engraving c. 1850.
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Sicily continued
Syracuse, engraving from The Picturesque Mediterranean Vol.II 1891.
The raw beauty of the landscape changes continually across the island. The Sicilians can be as welcoming as Italians anywhere, but the island continues to retain its enigmas, and differences with the mainland sometimes seem profound. There may be itinerary changes due to closures for restoration work which happen fairly frequently in Sicily.
Itinerary (2013 only) Day 1: Palermo. Fly at c. 12.15pm from London Heathrow, via Rome, to Palermo, the largest and by far the most interesting city on the island; capital of Sicily from the period of Saracenic occupation in the 9th century, it reached a peak under the Normans and again during the Age of Baroque. First of six nights in Palermo. Day 2: Palermo. Morning walk through the old centre includes a visit to several oratories and outstanding Norman buildings including San Cataldo. Drinks at a private palace, usually closed to the public. In the afternoon see the excellent collection of pictures in the 15thcentury Palazzo Abatellis. Day 3: Monreale, Cefalù. Monreale dominates a verdant valley southwest of Palermo, and its cathedral is one of the finest Norman churches with the largest scheme of mosaic decoration to survive from the Middle Ages. Cefalù, a charming coastal town, has a massive Norman cathedral with outstanding mosaics and an art gallery with painting by Antonello da Messina. Day 4: Segesta, Selinunte. With its magnificently sited temple and theatre,
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Segesta is one of the most evocative of Greek sites. Selinunte, founded c. 650 bc, is a vast archaeological site, renowned for its wellpreserved temples on the eastern hill and the acropolis. Day 5: Agrigento. A full day in Agrigento to see the ‘Valley of the Temples’, one of the finest of all ancient Greek sites with two virtually complete Doric temples, other ruins and a good museum. Day 6: Palermo. Visit the 12th-century Palace of the Normans, containing the Palatine Chapel and Hall of King Roger, both with outstanding mosaics. S. Giovanni degli Eremiti is a Norman church with five cupolas and a charming garden. The cathedral, a building of many periods, has grand royal and imperial tombs. Free afternoon. Day 7: Palermo, Piazza Armerina. In Palermo visit the Zisa, an Arab-Norman Palace. Drive through the interior of Sicily. At Piazza Armerina are the remains of one of the most sumptuous villas of the late-Roman Empire, whose floor mosaics comprise the most vital and colourful manifestation of Roman figurative art in Europe. Due to ongoing restoration work, not all rooms are open to the public all of the time. Continue across the island for the first of three nights in Taormina. Day 8: Taormina. Visit the famed Roman theatre, with spectacular views over the sea to Calabria and inland to Mount Etna. The rest of the day free: one of the earliest and still one of the most attractive of Mediterranean resorts, Taormina has an area of secluded beaches joined by funicular to the town.
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Day 9: Taormina, Catania. Drive along the coast to Catania, with a fine Baroque centre. Here there are special visits to a private palazzo and a Byzantine chapel, where we have a light lunch with tasters of local produce. Day 10: Syracuse. Founded as a Greek colony in 733 bc, Syracuse became the most important city of Magna Græcia. Afternoon walk on the island of Ortygia, the picturesque and densely built original centre of Syracuse and see the Caravaggio painting in the church of Santa Lucia alla Badia. Visit the 5th-century bc Greek theatre, the largest of its type to survive, the stone quarries and the Roman amphitheatre. First of two nights in Syracuse. Day 11: Noto, Syracuse. Rebuilt after an earthquake in 1693, Noto is one of the loveliest and most homogenous Baroque towns in Italy. Day 12: Syracuse. Visit the excellent museum of antiquities in Syracuse. Fly from Catania, via Rome, to London, arriving Heathrow at c. 7.00pm. Please contact us for the itinerary and prices for the 13-day version in 2012, or visit www.martinrandall.com
Practicalities Prices in 2013: £3,620 (March), £3,780 (Sept. & Oct.) (deposit £350). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled Alitalia flights (Airbus 319); travel by private coach; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 5 lunches (including 1 picnic) and 7 dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admission charges to museums, sites, etc.; all tips for restaurant staff, drivers, guides; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement £390 (March), £430 (Sept. & Oct.). Price without flights £3,390 (March), £3,550 (Sept. & Oct.). Hotels: Palermo (6 nights): a 16th-century palazzo renovated to become a 4-star hotel in the centre, furnished to a high standard. Taormina (3 nights): a 3-star, charming, family-run hotel, in the old town, with its own garden (rooms vary in size and outlook). Syracuse (2 nights): a 4-star hotel, centrally situated on the island of Ortygia. How strenuous? A lot of walking, some of it over rough ground at archaeological sites and cobbled or uneven paving. Fitness and surefootedness are essential. Some long journeys. Average distance by coach per day: 73 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
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Walking in Sicily Crater & coast: in the footsteps of history 15–22 October 2012 (mz 413) 8 days • £2,220 Lecturer: Christopher Newall 15–22 April 2013 (mz 533) 8 days • £2,280 Lecturer: Dr Ffiona Gilmore Eaves Five walks of between 3 and 7 miles through immensely varied scenery, from the lava fields of Etna to salt lake flats along the coast. Much of archaeological interest, and visits to Syracuse, the greatest of west Greek cities, and to the Baroque city of Noto. Two hotels, in Taormina with beautiful sea views and in the centre of Syracuse. Sicily is well chronicled in history and literature as one of the most fascinating destinations in Europe. Her archaeological and historical sites delight visitors to the Mediterranean’s largest island, but, fortunately, few of them explore the hugely varied landscapes on foot. Locals rarely indulge in country walking, and shepherds met on mountain paths are aghast that people choose to walk for a holiday. Yet walking can provide the key to understanding and appreciating this intoxicating island. We have included walks that are relatively unknown and countryside that is not easily accessible, but keeping in mind the principles of travelling less and seeing more, we hope to have designed an itinerary giving a fuller flavour of what Sicily can really offer. Mount Etna, peaking as Europe’s highest active volcano at nearly 11,000 feet, and sitting within a designated regional park covering 224 square miles, demands attention but also respect. Volcanologists venture perilously close to the crater’s lip in the name of research, but for hikers there are remarkably varied and interesting paths to explore on the northern flank. The distinctive climate and volcanic soils nurture a plethora of wild flowers, with orchids flourishing in both spring and late autumn. On the lower slopes, areas that were once covered with holm oak are now cultivated for citrus fruits and for wine, intensely flavoured reds and whites that are garnering approval throughout Italy and beyond. Above these, at 6,500 feet, Europe’s southernmost beech trees are thriving, as are birch, considered an endemic species. Another thousand feet and the thorny shrub known locally as spino santo (Astragalus siculus) covers the ground, and mountain flowers such as senecio, violets and cerastium flourish. Twenty miles inland from Syracuse, the ten-square-mile Pantalica Nature Reserve, set on a plateau with gorges plunging through Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
the limestone to the Anapo and Calcinara river valleys. It contains what is thought to be Europe’s most extensive open-air necropolis, where the earliest rock tombs can be dated to the thirteenth century bc. Later civilisations have also left their mark; the faint frescoed walls in an almost-hidden cave church have lasted remarkably well in this somewhat harsh environment. A coastal walk alongside the salt-water lagoons of the Vendicari Nature Reserve provides another category of experience. The pantani are a haven for birds, and with luck flamingos can be spotted in all seasons. Mediaeval watchtowers, an old tonnaro (tuna cannery) and a fishery punctuate this landscape, highlighting the importance of sea-faring trade in this part of Sicily. Fifteenth-century merchants in Noto shipped carob, grain and almonds from the port of Vendicari, and until
beautifully restored at this former masseria. Return to Syracuse in time for an early evening walk on Ortygia, including the magnificent Duomo and the recently re-opened Museo Bellomo, home to Antonello da Messina’s Annunciation, now beautifully displayed. First of three nights on Ortygia. Day 3: Pantalica Nature Reserve, Syracuse. Drive to Pantalica, where a series of paths within this spectacular reserve follow the Anapo river bed and former railway lines or meander high along the plateaux; water levels in the river and local conditions determine today’s walk, maximum 10 km. Return to Syracuse to see pieces recovered from the site, as well as some of the highlights of sculpture and ceramics from Sicily’s Greek colonies in the excellent Archaeological Museum. Day 4: Syracuse, Noto, Taormina. Visit
Tourists inspecting Mount Etna, engraving c. 1830.
the 1940s tuna was caught and tinned here. These walks have been chosen to make the most of the protected parks in Sicily, thus helping efforts to restore, waymark and maintain the paths in this remarkably unspoilt land on the edge of Europe. This itinerary describes the April 2013 departure.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 12.15pm from London Heathrow to Catania via Rome. Drive to Syracuse in time for dinner. Day 2: Vendicari Nature Reserve, Syracuse. Drive south to the salt-lagoons and nature reserve at Vendicari for a level walk along the sandy paths, c. 5km. Visit the Villa Romana del Tellaro, where a small but superb set of Roman mosaics depicting scenes of hunting has been
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the 5th-century bc Greek theatre, the stone quarries and the Roman amphitheatre in Syracuse’s Archaeological park. Drive to Noto, one of the loveliest and most harmonious Baroque towns, before driving north to Taormina, in time for an introductory walk through the town before dinner. Day 5: Taormina, Castelmola. Perched on the hilltop at 500m above sea level, and thought to be the site of Tauromenion’s Acropolis, this small but thriving mediaeval village offers dramatic views across the Straits of Messina, the first Greek site in Sicily at Naxos, and across the hills to Mount Etna. A moderatestrenuous circular walk of 8km starts from the hotel on a paved path, which is almost all uphill, and returns downhill via a more rustic path lined with prickly pear, olive and fruit orchards. Visit Taormina’s famed GrecoRoman theatre and the small Roman Odeon.
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Walking in Sicily continued
Essential Jordan The major Roman, Christian & Islamic sites
Day 6: Mount Etna, Piano Provenzano. Lessvisited and less-well known than the southern slopes, Etna’s northern flank nonetheless provides plenty of interest and atmosphere. A moderate circular walk (c. 5km) on the lava fields from the great eruptions of 2002 with a local volcanologist allows time to appreciate what was known as Mongibello, mountain of mountains. Lunch at a rustic restaurant, returning to Taormina for a free afternoon. Day 7: Forza d’Agrò, Taormina. An unspoilt village with panoramic views of the Peloritani mountains and Etna, Forza d’Agrò is the starting point for an 8km countryside walk, reaching 547m above sea level. It follows shepherds’ tracks through olive groves and terraces; some terrain is very uneven on this path and requires sure-footedness. Return to Taormina for a tasting of some Sicilian wines. Day 8: Taormina. Drive to Catania for the flight to London Heathrow via Rome, arriving at c. 7.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,220 (2012) £2,280 (2013) (deposit £250). This includes: flights (economy class) with Alitalia (Airbus 320); travel by private coach; hotel accommodation; breakfasts, 3 lunches (including two picnics) and 4 dinners with wine, water, coffee, and 1 wine-tasting; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement: £280 (2012), £290 (2013). Price without flights: £2,020 (2012), £2,050 (2013). Hotels: Taormina (4 nights): a 3-star, charming, family-run hotel in an excellent location in the old town with its own garden and swimming pool (open subject to weather conditions). Service is friendly and efficient; rooms are spacious but not opulent and vary in outlook. Syracuse (3 nights): located moments from the Duomo in the heart of Ortygia, this 4-star hotel is efficiently run. Rooms may overlook an inner courtyard or streets and rooftops. How strenuous? This tour should only be considered by those who are used to country walking with some uphill content. Strong knees and ankles are essential, as are a pair of well-worn hiking boots with good ankle support. Walks have been carefully selected but some steep rises are unavoidable and terrain can be loose underfoot, particularly in wet weather. The walk on Etna involves walking at an altitude of c.1,800 metres above sea level for c. 5km. There are 5 walks of between 5 and 8km. Average distance by coach per day: 34 miles. Small group: between 10 and 18 participants.
I ta ly, J o r d a n
Petra, Ed-Deir (‘The Monastery’), lithograph by Louis Haghe after David Roberts c. 1850.
9–17 October 2012 (mz 393) 9 days • £3,180 Lecturer: Jane Taylor 26 March–3 April 2013 (mz 505) 9 days • £3,180 Lecturer: Jane Taylor 26 October–3 November 2013 (ma 761) 9 days • £3,180 Lecturers: Sue Rollin & Jane Streetly Outstanding monuments of several civilizations – Nabatean, Roman, Early Christian, Umayyad, Crusader. Petra is the most spectacular archaeological site in the Middle East; we spend three nights here. Jordan possesses the most spectacular archaeological site in the Middle East – Petra, ‘rose-red city, half as old as time’, that easternly fascinating, westernly Baroque, altogether extraordinary city of the desert. Hidden in the mountains at the confluence of several caravan routes, much of its finest architecture is hewn out of the living rock, brilliantly coloured sandstone striated with pinks, ochres and blue-greys. Its builders, the Nabateans, drew on a range of Mediterranean and oriental styles to create a novel synthesis reminiscent of the more ebullient examples of Imperial Roman architecture. Egyptian, Assyrian and Hellenistic influences are also evident. The Nabateans were an Arabian people
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who were first recorded in the 4th century bc and grew rich by controlling the trade routes across an empire which stretched from Saudi Arabia to Syria. With Petra their capital, nomadic desert traders became administrators and city-dwellers. They eventually submitted to incorporation in the Roman Empire. Decline, however, soon set in, and it seems that by the 8th century ad Petra had virtually become uninhabited. Jordan is also rich in remains of many other civilizations. It lay within the wealthy Roman provinces of Syria and Arabia; Jerash is one of the best preserved and most beautiful of Roman cities. The remains of many Byzantine churches and some very fine floor mosaics are scattered through the hills and valleys which were the setting of many events recorded in the Old Testament. The art of Islam is represented by the forts, hunting lodges and desert retreats of the sophisticated and pleasure-loving Umayyad dynasty of the 8th century. The castles of the Crusaders and their Arab opponents are among the most impressive examples of military architecture anywhere. As a constant backdrop are mountains, gorges and deserts of awesome beauty. The current Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan started life after the First World War, following the downfall of the Ottoman Empire, its borders an almost arbitrary outcome of the Franco-British re-ordering of the Levant. Something of a backwater then, and constantly buffeted since by the disputatiousness of larger neighbours, Jordan has against the odds succeeded in steering a precarious course to survival, stability and modest prosperity. b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 5.05pm from London Heathrow to Amman (time in the air: c. 5 hours). Arrive at the hotel at c. 12 midnight. First of three nights in Amman. Day 2: Jerash. Drive north through red earth hills with olive groves and Aleppo pine woods. Jerash, ancient Gerasa, a leading city of the Decapolis and very prosperous in the 2nd and 3rd centuries ad, is one of the best-preserved and most beautiful of ruined Roman cities and we spend a whole day there. Among the more spectacular remains are an oval piazza, the Cardo with its flanking colonnades, triumphal arches, food market, hippodrome, theatres, magnificent temples of Zeus and Artemis and several early Christian churches. Day 3: Umayyad desert residences. In the desert to the east of Amman are remarkable survivals from the early Islamic Umayyad dynasty, 7th- and 8th-century small pleasure palaces, hunting lodges and forts. Qasr Amra (a UNESCO world heritage site) the best preserved and most beautiful, with wall paintings; the fortress-like desert complex of Qasr Kharana; the fort of Azraq, originally Roman, rebuilt in the 13th century and used by T.E. Lawrence as his HQ for two months 1917–18.
climb, via the Soldier Tomb complex, up to the High Place of Sacrifice (c. 800 steps) where the sacrificial furnishings are still clearly visible. Day 6: Petra. For the second day in Petra walk again through the Siq and pass through the necropolis gorge, the ‘Street of Façades’ to study the more open area around the paved and colonnaded street. The remains of various structures include two mighty buildings, the ‘Great Temple’ and Qasr al Bint. Recent excavations have revealed what is almost certainly a cathedral with mosaic floors. Climb up (over 800 steps) to one of the finest rockcut façades, Ed-Deir (the Monastery), and some staggering views of hills and valleys of contorted rock. Day 7: Little Petra, Dead Sea. ‘Little Petra’, a narrow gorge with three natural widenings, is seen as a religious centre, perhaps connected with vine or grain harvest with carved façades and chambers and a fragment of naturalistic Nabatean painting. A spectacular descent through rugged and ragged sandstone leads to Wadi Araba, part of the Jordanian section of Wood engraving after Carl Haag, from The Graphic, 1887.
Day 4: Amman, Karak. The citadel in Amman was the religious and political centre of the ancient city. Here are the remains of the Temple of Hercules, the rebuilt Umayyad palace and the city Archaeological Museum. Leaving Amman, drive southwards along the Biblical King’s Highway. The 12th-century Crusader castle of Karak, modified by the Mamluks in the 13th cent., is an impressive example of mediaeval military architecture with many chambers surviving. First of three nights in Petra.
Day 8: Mount Nebo, Madaba. Drive up from the Dead Sea, flanked by dramatic mountain scenery. Visit the Byzantine church with remarkable mosaics on Mount Nebo, the reputed burial site of Moses. At Madaba visit the archaeological park, where many mosaics are preserved, and see the unique 6th-century mosaic map of the Levant in the church of St George. Day 9. Drive to Amman airport (1 hour). Arrive Heathrow c. 3.30pm. There may be slight variations to this itinerary depending on the preferences of the lecturer.
Practicalities Price: £3,180 (deposit £300). This includes: air travel (economy class) with Royal Jordanian (Airbus A310); travel by private coach; breakfasts, 7 lunches (incl. 2 picnics) and 4 dinners (plus meals on flights) with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the cost of your visa; the services of the lecturer and Jordanian guide. Single supplement £420. Price without flights £2,780. Hotels: all the hotels are locally rated as 5-star. In Amman (3 nights): a modern hotel with well-equipped and comfortable rooms. In Petra (3 nights): hotel close to the site, modern but in part fitted out in traditional Arab style; comfortable, capacious and well-equipped bedrooms, several restaurants and cafés, swimming pool. In Sweimeh (2 nights): on the Dead Sea, an extensive hotel with buildings scattered through lush tropical gardens; shady lounges, antique or traditional-style furnishings, spa and health centre. Included dinners are good quality buffets.
Day 5: Petra. The Siq, the narrow milelong crevice with its Nabatean carvings and hydraulic system would itself merit a detour, but it is just the prelude to one of the most astonishing archaeological sites in the Middle East (also a UNESCO world heritage site). Emerging from the Siq, the visitor is confronted by the temple-like façade of the ‘Treasury’, vast in scale, classical in vocabulary, Hellenistic in inspiration but uniquely Nabatean, the first of innumerable carved façades, mainly tombs, created in the living rock. There are also impressive remains of built monuments in the heart of the city, from grand temples, public buildings and churches to houses. Not the least striking feature is the multicoloured, striated but predominantly red sandstone. After lunch, return to the hotel or Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
the Great Rift Valley. Here, the lowest place on Earth, Bedouin encampments give way to banana and tomato plantations and then to the Dead Sea. Stop at the Sanctuary of Lot, containing the remains of a 7th-century church. Reach the hotel on the shore midafternoon, relax and swim. First of two nights in Sweimeh.
Visas: required for most foreign nationals. Passports do not have to be submitted in advance. A group visa is issued on arrival (the cost is included in the price of the tour as long as you are travelling with the group). Passports must be valid for six months beyond the dates of the tour. How strenuous? This tour is quite demanding and you must be capable of walking all day over rough sites. Average distance by coach per day: 72 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
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Malta World heritage Malta, from Neolithic to now impression. Ousted from Jerusalem and then Rhodes, this order of maritime warrior monks arrived in Malta in 1530 and ruled until 1798. After nearly losing the country to the Ottoman Turks in The Great Siege of 1565, the Knights built a near-impregnable new city on a rocky peninsula between two harbours: Malta’s delightful diminutive capital, Valletta. Despite the ravages of the Second World War, Valletta remains fundamentally the Knights’ city although one area has just received a very 21st-century makeover. Badly bombed and minimally restored, the City Gate area has been redesigned by the architect of the Pompidou Centre and the London Shard, Renzo Piano.
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Valetta, engraving after Charlie Wyllie c. 1890.
14–20 October 2013 (ma 735) 7 days • £2,100 Lecturer: Juliet Rix A wonderful exploration of this fascinating, diverse island, led by the author of its most comprehensive guide. A visit to the world’s earliest stone temples, amongst a concentration of other astonishing major historic sites. Visit the rural and picturesque Gozo Island, with stunning natural features. Malta has an extraordinary 7000-year history beginning with the arrival of a little-known people from Sicily who became the creators of Malta’s unique Neolithic temples. Older than the Great Pyramids and the famous standing stones at Stonehenge, Malta’s temples were built between 3600 and 2500 bc – they are megalithic architecture constructed a millennium before Mycenae. All the temples are unesco World Heritage Sites, as is the unique Hal Saflieni Hypogeum, the extraordinary triplelayered tomb complex cut from solid rock where the ‘Temple People’ buried their dead. And this is just the start of the story. Malta, with its perfect natural harbours, was desired by every trading or invading nation in the Mediterranean from the Phoenicians and Romans to both sides in the Second World War. Each occupier has left its mark from Roman-Byzantine catacombs to British red letter boxes. The Knights of St John Hospitaller, commonly referred to as ‘The Knights of Malta’ have, of course, left the greatest
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Day 1: Valletta. Fly at 11.00am from London Heathrow to Malta. Drive to Valletta, a peninsula flanked by fine natural harbours and once the most strongly fortified city in Christendom. Here, survey the massive fortifications protecting the landward approach and view the Grand Harbour from the ramparts.
Day 2: Hagar Qim, Mnajdra, Ghar Lapsi. Drive through attractive countryside to the prehistoric temples overlooking the sea, Hagar Qim and Mnajdra. In the afternoon, see the ancient trackworks, Clapham Junction cart ruts.
Day 3: Valletta. The morning is spent in two museums housed in important Knights’-period buildings - The National Museum of Archaeology, home of the unique ‘Fat Ladies of Malta’ and other original carvings from the Neolithic Temples; and the Museum of Fine Art. Visit the charming Manoel Theatre, a rare survival of the early 18th century and the Co-Cathedral of St John, one of the most interesting of Baroque buildings, which has lavish carved wall decoration, ceiling paintings by Mattia Preti, magnificently carved tombs and two paintings by Caravaggio. Finally, see the Grand Master’s Palace with state rooms, tapestry hall and armoury. Day 4: Paola, Valletta. In Paola, the Hal Saflieni Hypogeum is a unesco World Heritage Site and the only prehistoric underground temple in the world. The Tarxien Temple site is the
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most complex in Malta and would have been the most decorative. The afternoon is free in Valletta. Day 5: Gozo. A thirty-minute ferry crossing to the island of Gozo, which is more rural and less populated than Malta. See the temple of Ggantija, amongst the oldest of Malta’s prehistoric monuments. The chief town is Victoria, which has a citadel, cathedral, museum and Sicilo-Norman houses. Fungus Rock, Gharb and Ramla Bay are all of geological, historical and mythical interest respectively. Day 6: Mdina, Rabat, Mosta. Mdina, Malta’s ancient capital, is an unspoilt citadel of great beauty, centre of the indigenous aristocracy, with mediaeval walls, grand palazzos and Baroque cathedral. Spreading below is the town of Rabat, with Early Christian catacombs. Afternoon drive to Mosta with the third largest dome in Europe. Day 7: Vittoriosa. Cross the Grand Harbour by boat, to see churches, forts, and the World War II museum in Vittoriosa. Fly to London Heathrow arriving at 7.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,100 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) with scheduled Air Malta flights (Boeing 737, Airbus 320); travel by private coach; breakfasts, two lunches and three dinners with wine, water, coffee; admissions to museums and sites; gratuities for waiters, drivers and local guides; the services of the lecturer and local guide. Single supplement £240. Price without flights £1,990. Hotel: a deluxe 5-star in Valletta, furnished with style and character, the best in Valletta and just outside the city gates. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking on this tour, some of it over the rough ground of sites. Valletta is relatively hilly. Average distance by coach per day: 15 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants. Looking for Latvia or Lithuania? See pages 40 for The Baltic States (travels to Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia).
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Morocco Cities & empires 14–25 September 2013 (ma 690) 11 nights • £3,960 Lecturer: James Brown From Tangier to Marrakech, including the imperial cities of Fez and Meknes. Spectacular landscapes: the Atlas Mountains, valleys, palm groves, woodland, desert. See the sun set over the sand dunes at Merzouga and visit the magnificent Roman ruins at Volubilis. Quite a demanding tour with some long drives. Morocco, just a cannon’s shot from Gibraltar and the ports of Spain, has always commanded the respect and fascinated the imagination of Europe. It was one of the last nations to fall under colonial occupation in 1912 and the first to win its independence from the French in 1956. The very same Grand Vizier who greeted the first French Governor had the satisfaction of ushering out the last colonial ruler before his death. Even to fellow Muslims, it was the near legendary ‘al-Maghrib al-Aqsa’, the land of the setting sun, perched on the north-west corner of the African continent where the known world ended and the sea of darkness began. Its boundaries are defined by four mountain ranges which shelter the fertile Atlantic plains and by three seas: the Mediterranean, the Atlantic and the sand sea of the Sahara. Unlike some parts of the Middle East and North Africa, Morocco was not heavily settled by Arabs after the Islamic conquest in the late
7th to early 8th century. Instead the indigenous Berber tribes of the area converted gradually to Islam and created cities and empires with a uniquely Moroccan flavour. One of the first of these cities was Sigilmassa in the Tafilalt oasis, a tribal watering hole which became a thriving Saharan port city from whence camel caravans set out for West Africa laden with salt from mines in the desert and other northern products which were exchanged in ancient Ghana and Mali for gold, slaves, ostrich feathers, ivory and gum. From Sigilmassa, caravans wended their way north and east to the great entrepots of North Africa, Egypt and the Middle East. Within a couple of decades, Fez was founded in North Morocco as a rival political centre and another stage in the great caravan trade across the Maghrib. In the late 11th century Marrakech emerged in the same way. This rich trade could not help but attract Christian European attention and by the 15th century, the Portuguese had captured Ceuta hoping for a share of the profits. Spain, England, the Netherlands and even the Scandinavian countries were quick to follow, using the Mediterranean ports like Tangier to access the riches of Morocco. Sultanates rose and fell on the profits of this trade which finally dwindled in the 19th century. The sites along the tour’s route tell of the mediaeval Islamic empires of Morocco, founded by Arab conquerors and the Berbers of the region, and of their European trading powers, lured to Africa by tales of gold and other exotic treasures. The long drives, often winding along the ancient trade routes, reveal the dramatic landscapes of Morocco from fertile olive groves to snow-capped mountains
and long deep green palm oases which taper into the desert like ribbons trailing from mountain to desert.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 7.30pm from London Heathrow to Tangier (time in the air: c. 2 hours 45 minutes). There will be a snack in your hotel room on arrival. First of two nights in Tangier. Day 2: Tangier. A morning walk investigates both the traditional walled Muslim city and the relics of the famous turn-of-the-century international city. Visit the Anglican Church, the Kasbah quarter, including the museum, the Petit Socco square and the Mendoubia garden. Some free time. Day 3: Tetouan, Chefchaouen. The heirs of Granada. Drive east over the Anjera hills to the city of Tetouan, settled by refugees from Andalucía whose Moorish culture is clearly identifiable in the streets of the old city, the products of the artisan school and the archaeological museum. Drive south to Chefchaouen to visit the kasbah and then on to Fez for the first of three nights. Day 4: Volubilis, Meknes. In impressive isolation on the edge of the olive-covered Zerhoun hills lie the ruins of Volubilis, the capital of Roman Morocco, with triumphal arch, basilica and mosaics. Though it boasts an old walled trading city, a Merenid Madrassa and an intimate palace museum to rival Fez, Meknes is yet overwhelmed by the vast ruins of the 17th-century imperial city established by the powerful Sultan Moulay Ismail to house his Negro slave army.
The Atlas Mountains with Fez in the foreground, aquatint 1811.
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Day 5: Fez. A full day to explore the extraordinary walled mediaeval city of Fez that stands at the heart of Moroccan culture. Highlights include the Bou Inania Madrassa and the Karaouyine Mosque, as well as the pungent Tanneries. Afternoon tour of the city walls and some free time. Day 6: the Middle Atlas. Pick up the old caravan trail south, stopping at Midelt before crossing the nomad-grazed high plateau of the Middle Atlas and descending along the Ziz valley to the Tafilalt oasis on the edge of the Sahara. First of two nights in Erfoud. Day 7: the Tafilalt Oasis, Merzouga. Visit Tafilalt, including the exposed mounds and ruined mud walls that were once the glittering mediaeval city of Sigilmassa. Evening excursion to see the sunset over the sand dunes of the desert of Merzouga. Day 8: Erfoud to Ouarzazate. Follow a chain of palm-filled valleys west, crossing through the old market town of Tinerhir and the Dades valley. See the extraordinary tapering towers of the kasbahs dotted along the route. Leave the main road for the Todra Gorge with its vividly contrasting colours of bright green vegetation set against red, brown and orange rock faces. Overnight Ouarzazate. Day 9: the High Atlas. Cross the High Atlas mountains, stopping at Taourirt and the celebrated kasbah village of Aït Benhaddou before twisting through the high passes. Descend through woodland on the north face of the mountains down to the red city of Marrakech for the first of three nights. Day 10: Marrakech. A morning devoted to the architectural achievements of the Saadian dynasty, paid for by the sale of sugar produced nearby. The dazzling decorative excess of the Saadian tombs and the gaunt simplicity of the ruins of the El Badi Palace are balanced by the calm munificence of the Ben Youssef Madrassa. There is an afternoon visit to the Marjorelle gardens, with its bamboo groves and date plantations. Day 11: Marrakech. The Koutoubia minaret is the oldest of the three Almohad towers constructed in the 12th century in Marrakech, Rabat and Seville and it stands 70 metres high. The late-19th-century Bahia Palace of the chief minister Ba Ahmad shows the continuity of artistic styles from Saadian era. Free afternoon to visit the world famous markets and Djemaa el-Fna square. Day 12. Fly from Marrakech to London via Casablanca arriving Heathrow c. 4.45pm.
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Marrakesh, woodcut from Agenda P.L.M., 1926.
Practicalities Price: £3,960 (deposit £350). This includes: flights (economy class) with Royal Air Maroc (Boeing 737); private air-conditioned coach; accommodation as below; breakfasts, 7 lunches and 8 dinners with wine or soft drinks (not all restaurants serve alcohol), water, coffee or tea; all admissions; all tips; the services of the lecturer and local guides. Single supplement £440. Price without flights £3,690. Hotels: Tangier (2 nights): comfortable but dated 5-star hotel, centrally located; Fez (3 nights): excellent 5-star hotel within the medina; Erfoud (2 nights): friendly but comparatively basic hotel; Ouarzazate (1 night): functional 4-star hotel; Marrakech (3 nights): characterful and tranquil riad-style hotel, within the kasbah quarter of the medina; rooms vary in size and outlook. All hotels have swimming pools.
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Visas: not required by British citizens. Nationals of other countries should check their requirements. How strenuous? A long and tiring tour with a lot of walking on rough ground, through narrow streets and busy markets, frequent hotel changes and some lengthy coach journeys. Average distance by coach per day: 80 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206. b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Munch in Oslo Celebrating 150 years since the artist’s birth 26–29 June 2013 (mz 622) 4 days • £1,660 Lecturer: Dr Frank Høifødt Two exhibitions form this major retrospective of Edvard Munch (1863–1944), in Norway’s National Gallery and in the Munch Museum. Visit also Munch’s summer home at Åsgårdstrand and his studio at Ekely. Special arrangements to see paintings beyond the galleries. Based in a family-owned 5-star hotel in the centre of this sleek Nordic capital. Led by Dr Frank Høifødt, a former curator of the Munch Museum. Edvard Munch (1863–1944), Norway’s greatest artist, created one of modern art’s most recognised images. For its multitude of admirers, his 1893 painting The Scream encapsulates all the angst of the modern age. This tour provides an exhilarating and unrepeatable opportunity to explore the artist’s work and to understand his development as an artist and a man. Munch himself was a conflicted character. After a sickly childhood, marked by the death of his mother and beloved sister, he was raised by an aunt and his doctor father, a difficult, melancholic figure. At the age of seventeen he began training at the Oslo School of Design. Though his early work was influenced by Impressionism, by the time he was in his twenties he had begun to develop an art intended to express profound emotion. With its violent exaggeration of line and colour, his ‘soul painting’ (generally regarded as the precursor to Expressionism) both scandalised and revolutionised. The Oslo of Munch’s childhood was a small, provincial town and in the 1880s Munch left to paint in Paris, where he was inspired by the work of Van Gogh and Gauguin, and then in Berlin, where his Bohemian lifestyle caused as much outrage as his art. By 1902, however, he had begun to receive widespread critical recognition. Munch’s Frieze of Life, begun in the late 1880s, is his (never completed) masterwork. This monumental series took as its themes the most fundamental human experiences – love, death, jealousy, separation – themes Munch was to explore repeatedly through his paintings, pastels, prints and sketches. Reworked and revised over a thirty-year period, the Frieze of Life includes many of his most celebrated works. After a nervous breakdown in 1909 Munch returned to Oslo, where he lived, in solitude, at his estate Ekely at Skøyen. On his death Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
in 1944, he bequeathed over 1,000 paintings, 4,500 drawings and 18,000 prints to the city of Oslo, now housed in the Munch Museum. Our tour focuses on two major retrospectives marking the 150th anniversary of Munch’s birth, but also offers the opportunity to explore Oslo, now an exciting capital, and various significant locations in Munch’s life, including his boyhood homes and the sites of many of his paintings.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 10.15am from London to Oslo (Gardamoen Airport) and drive to the hotel in the centre of the city. An introductory walk sets the scene with sites related to Munch’s family and his paintings in the town hall and university. Day 2. The exhibition at the National Gallery is dedicated to the years up to 1903 and includes the most extensive reconstruction of The Frieze of Life to be displayed since Munch’s death. Other significant works include his early versions of The Sick Child and The Scream. The afternoon walk covers areas of the city where Munch lived, the cemetery where he is buried and motifs in his paintings such as the Old Aker Church. End at the Freia chocolate factory where Munch painted a mural in the staff canteen. Day 3. The second part of the retrospective, at the Munch Museum, covers the years 1903– 1944. It includes Munch’s experiments with Modernism, his landscape paintings of rural life in Norway, and later versions of The Scream and The Sick Child. Spend the afternoon at Åsgårdstrand, Munch’s summer house on the Oslofjord which is now a small museum. Here he painted The Girls on the Bridge. Return to Oslo for dinner at the 1930s Kunstnernes Hus (Artists’ House). Day 4. There is free time this morning. Among Oslo’s other museums are the National Museum of Architecture and the Astrup Fearnley Museum of Contemporary Art, newly installed in a building by Piano. Then, by special arrangement, visit Munch’s studios at Ekely in Oslo’s suburbs. The artist died here in 1944. Continue to the airport for the flight to London. Arrive Heathrow c. 6.30pm.
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Practicalities Price: £1,660 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) with SAS (Boeing 737); private coach travel; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts and 2 dinners with a glass or two of wine, water and coffee; admission to the exhibitions and all other admission costs; all tips for waiters, drivers and guides; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement £260 (double room for single use). Price without flights £1,480. Hotel. A family-run 5-star hotel in the heart of Oslo, a very short walk from the National Gallery. Decoration throughout is classical but restrained; bedrooms are comfortable and well equipped. There is a bar and good restaurant. How strenuous? This is a short tour but nonetheless involves a lot of walking and standing around in museums. Participants need to be fit. Average distance by coach per day: 49 miles. Small group: between 10 and 19 participants. Combining tours: please contact us if you are interested in combining this tour with Finland: Aalto & Others, 29 June–6 July 2013 (page 44).
Bergen Festival May 2013 Details available December 2012 Contact us to register your interest
Opera in Oslo Gothenburg & Copenhagen 27 May–3 June 2013 Details available October 2012 Contact us to register your interest
Norway
Oman The essence of Arabia 4–14 January 2013 (mz 453) 11 days • £4,380 Lecturer: Professor Dawn Chatty Remarkable landscape, hill forts, traditional souqs, archaeological sites. The toehold of Arabia, with a diverse population reflecting its mercantile past. Accompanied by a social anthropologist. All the hotels are comfortable, some are superb, plus a night in a desert camp.
Wilfred Thesiger was motivated to cross the Empty Quarter not only by his desire to gain further recognition as a traveller but by the hope that he would find peace and solitude in the remote desert landscapes. He also yearned to gain the friendship of the Bedu who journeyed with him and whom he encountered during his traverse. The possibility of travelling to little-visited locations, relaxing in inspiring surroundings and developing understanding with new peoples is no less possible in Oman in 2013 than it was in 1946. The country provides a diverse range of extraordinary natural beauty: deserts, This could be Oman (due to the water system and architecture) but it is infact Algeria, engraving c. 1875.
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mountains, wadis, beaches. Visitors also experience the kindness and friendliness of the Omanis. With relatively few, although gradually increasing number of visitors a year, Oman is still not over-developed, unlike some of its neighbouring Gulf states. Evidence of settlement dates back to the fourth millennium BC with early indications of dependence on trade. First copper and then frankincense (southern Oman is one of the few places in the world where the ‘sacred frankincense’ still grows) played a key role in the country’s history. Desire to control the supply of frankincense led to incorporation in the Achaemenid and Sassanian empires until the Persians were forced out in the seventh century. Omanis readily embraced Islam and submitted to the Umayyad and the Abbasid Caliphate. Trade and naval power continued to expand. Occupied by the Portuguese from 1507 to 1650, Oman flourished again after their departure with an empire reaching into East Africa, particularly Zanzibar, and the Indian Ocean. Treaties agreed with the British to protect communications with India marked the beginning of a special relationship, which continued beyond the formal termination of the protectorate in 1971. Meanwhile, the division of the Omani empire between the sultan of Zanzibar and the sultan of Muscat in 1856 resulted in economic decline for both and internal conflicts in the latter. Successive sultans failed to tackle the problems and Oman stagnated. The coming to power of Sultan Qaboos bin Said in 1970 heralded a new era. Though its oil revenues are relatively small, they have been used wisely to the benefit of the Omani people, for infrastructure, employment and education. Development has been rapid but controlled, guided by a determination to preserve Omani traditions. Our comprehensive itinerary includes the highlights of this vast country: from the inland forts of Nizwa and Jabrin to the little-visited archaeological sites of Al-Balid and Khor Rori, from the mountain scenery in the Western Hajar to the remoteness of the Wahiba Sands, from the bustling capital Muscat to the contrasting landscapes of the southern region of Dhofar. Other features of this tour are the opportunity to camp overnight in the Wahiba Sands, stay by the Indian Ocean and shop in souqs suffused with the scent of frankincense. Oman is opening up to a privileged few.
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Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 9.30pm from London Heathrow for the seven-hour flight to Muscat. Day 2: Muscat. Touch-down at c. 8.30am. Hotel rooms are at your disposal for the morning. Greater Muscat is spread out along the coast with a dramatic mountain backdrop. Visit the Natural History Museum and the privately owned Bait al Zubair housing the family collection of Omani artefacts. Once home to the British Council, Al Baranda is now a museum depicting Muscat’s maritime history. First of two nights in Muscat. Day 3: Barka, Nakhl, Awabi. By 4-wheel-drive to the traditionally-furnished 17th-century fortified house Bait Na’aman. Nakhl Fort perches grandly on the foothills of the Western Hajar Mountains. Drive through the unusual ophiolite landscape to Awabi to visit its stone and mudbrick fort. Overnight Muscat. Day 4: Muscat, Nizwa. With seven minarets, the Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque is impressively ornate. Leave Muscat by 4-wheeldrive for Nizwa. Afternoon visit to the 17thcentury Nizwa Fort, palace, seat of government and prison. Some free time to explore the fascinating souqs and markets. First of two nights in Nizwa. Day 5: Jabrin, Nizwa area. The most impressive fort in Oman is at Jabrin; sensitively restored, the plasterwork, wood carvings and painted ceilings are magnificent. Bahla is home to a range of craft workers, pottery being particularly noteworthy. Bahla Fort, dating from pre-Islamic times (World Heritage Site, interior closed for restoration). The rarelyvisited archaeological site of Al Ayn is a collection of Bronze Age beehive tombs sitting atop a rugged ridge with the Jebel Misht as a backdrop. Overnight Nizwa.
afternoon flight to Salalah, which despite its size is considered Oman’s second city and capital of the Dhofar region. First of three nights in Salalah. Day 9: Khor Rori, Al Balid. The ruins at Khor Rori, were formerly known as Sumhuraman which was an important frankincense trading port 2,000 years ago, forwarding this precious commodity to Damascus and Rome. Al Balid, ancient Zafar, flourished in the 11th and 12th centuries and was visited by Marco Polo. The museum exhibits finds from the ruins of Al Balid and other artefacts from the area. Overnight Salalah. Day 10: Salalah. Morning tour of the city, the recently-completed mosque and Al Hafa souq with stalls of frankincense. The afternoon is free to relax by the Indian Ocean. Overnight Salalah. Day 11: A mid-morning flight to Muscat connects with the early afternoon flight to London, arriving Heathrow c. 7.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £4,380 (deposit £400). This includes: all air travel (economy class) on scheduled Oman Air flights (aircraft: Airbus Industrie A330300, Boeing 737-800); travel by private airconditioned coach or 4-wheel-drive vehicles; hotel accommodation; breakfasts, all lunches (2 picnics) and all dinners with wine or soft drinks
(not all restaurants serve alcohol), water and coffee (except on picnics), plus meals on flights; all admission charges to museums, sites, etc.; all gratuities for waiters, guides, drivers, etc.; all state and airport taxes; the cost of the group visa; the services of the lecturer and local guide. Single supplement £530. Price without flights £3,780. Visas: required for most foreign nationals. We will arrange for these to be issued on arrival, the costs of which are included in the tour price. Passports must be valid for at least six months after the tour ends. Hotels: Muscat: (2 nights): recently-renovated 5-star hotel within an exclusive resort, the best in the region. Nizwa (2 nights): comfortable 4-star hotel, with a swimming pool. Wahiba Sands (1 night): luxury camp in individual tents with private facilities. Sur (1 night): modern 4-star hotel. Salalah (3 nights): 5-star hotel, high standards of comfort and service. How strenuous? This is a busy and active tour and participants need stamina and fitness. There are some long journeys by 4-wheeldrive or coach (average distance per day: 102 miles), two internal flights and 4 changes of accommodation. Walking is necessitated over the uneven terrain of archaeological sites, desert and hill forts. Small group: this tour will operate with between 8 and 18 participants.
Etching, 1927, by E. J. Detmold.
Day 6: Nizwa, Wahiba. Drive to Ibra, the once opulent market town which stood on the trade route linking the interior to the coast. Arrive at Wahiba Sands, a sea of high rolling dunes. Watch the sunset and camp overnight in the desert. Day 7: Wahiba, Sur. Travel by 4-wheel-drive through the spectacular desert scenery. Until the 20th century Sur was famous throughout Arabia as a major trading port with East Africa. See the charming fishing village of Al Ayjah, the shipyards still in operation and the displays of traditional dhows at Fath al Khayr Park. Overnight Sur. Day 8: Sur, Salalah. The Maritime Museum has exhibits on shipbuilding and life in coastal Oman. 4-wheel-drive to Muscat to catch an Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
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Palestine Archaeology & architecture of the West Bank Pools’, a series of reservoirs 9 km away, visited next. Return to Bethlehem for lunch and drive into the Judaean desert to visit the Orthodox monastery of Mar Saba, perched in a gorge and with a beautiful chapel (limited access for women). Overnight Bethlehem. Day 3: Hebron (Al-Khalil), Judaean Desert. The Herodian phase of the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron is one of the most impressive buildings of the ancient world. The interior is Crusader and Mamluk, and is now divided between Muslims and Jews. We also see a 19th-century Russian church here. Hebron is volatile and this visit may be cancelled at short notice. The Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, not significantly changed since ad 339, is one of the greatest of Early Christian buildings; five aisles and monumental Corinthian colonnades. Overnight Bethlehem.
Hebron, steel engraving c. 1860.
18–26 March 2013 (mz 502) 9 days • £3,250 Lecturer: Dr Felicity Cobbing A pioneering tour which includes the major archaeological sites and the most significant historic buildings on the West Bank. There are two nights in East Jerusalem. Provides an insight into a territory much in the news but little visited in recent years. Palestine is a land of limestone hills with the humped contours of a children’s picture-book. The surface is generally a grey-green impasto of olives and scrub, sometimes beautified with the striations of ancient terraces, farmed intermittently in clefts and nooks, grazed where vegetation is harsh and coarse. Then there are the hills of the Judaean desert, crinkled, barren rock, khaki with a dusting of white. Straggling along crests and down hillsides, Palestinian towns and villages are given visual unity by white limestone cladding – a requirement introduced during the British mandate and still adhered to. They express individualism, enterprise and struggle. By contrast, the Israeli settlements crowning many a peak are fortress-like high-density clusters. Recent history and current affairs cannot be ignored in this part of the world but the focus of the tour is archaeology, architecture
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and more distant history. Scattered across the West Bank are some very remarkable sites and buildings. The creations of Herod the Great, among the most impressive structures of the ancient world, feature prominently, and there are significant remains from the Hellenistic, Roman, Byzantine, Umayyad, Crusader and Ottoman eras. A particular feature are the desert monasteries, often in dramatic and inaccessible locations. Tourism is hardly new to Palestine: pilgrimage tours follow well-worn routes, quickly bouncing back after intermittent periods of strife, but other sorts of specialist tours are relatively rare. There has been investment in hotels and infrastructure in recent years, and the people are generally very welcoming.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 8.30am from London Heathrow to Tel Aviv (Israel) and drive through the Separation Wall to Bethlehem (Palestine). Reach the hotel in time for a lecture and dinner. Four nights are spent here. Day 2: Herodion, Solomon’s Pools, Mar Saba. The Herodion is an extraordinary fortified palace built by King Herod 24–15 bc on an artificial hill. There are extensive remains of defences, cisterns and baths and superb views. It was supplied with water from ‘Solomon’s
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Day 4: Jerusalem. Spend the day in the Old City of Jerusalem (ruled de facto by Israel but claimed by Palestine). This is the most extraordinary city on Earth, a vibrant Middle-Eastern enclave split between rival communities and composed of mediaeval and ancient masonry. Walk along the city’s impressive ramparts, visit the Church of St Anne and Armenian Cathedral. Overnight Bethlehem. Day 5: Bethlehem to Jericho. The journey down to the Dead Sea is broken at a modern museum of ancient mosaics. The palm-shaded oasis of Jericho is a place of superlatives, the world’s most low-lying town and arguably its oldest continuously inhabited one. The lowest strata of Tell as-Sultan are 10,000 years old and there is a unique tower of c. 7000 bc. Hisham’s Palace is a remarkably well-preserved 8th-century Umayyad palace. The Monastery of Temptation is inserted in the high cliff overlooking the site and can now be reached by cable car. First of two nights in Jericho. Day 6: desert monasteries. The theme of the day is monasticism in the Judaean hills, beginning with the community of Jewish zealots at Qumran where the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered, and continuing to functioning Christian monasteries in the wadis. According to Muslim tradition, Nabi Musa is the burial place of Moses and has Mamluk, Byzantine and Ottoman parts. There is an optional walk to the 19th-century Greek Orthodox monastery of St George in Wadi Kelt with free time in Jericho as an alternative. Overnight Jericho. Day 7: Sebastia, Nablus, Jerusalem. Amid lovely countryside north-west of Nablus, Sebastia (Samaria) is a fascinating archaeological site with extensive remains spreading over a hill, principally Roman and b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Lisbon neighbourhoods Art, architecture & gardens in & around the capital Hellenistic but reaching back much earlier. In Nablus, Jacob’s Well is enshrined in a church which was begun by the Crusaders and completed last century. Overnight East Jerusalem. Day 8: Jerusalem. Haram ash-Sharif, alias the Temple Mount, Herod’s great retaining wall supporting a platform now adorned with some of the earliest and finest Islamic buildings, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Constantinian and Crusader. Free afternoon in the old city. Overnight East Jerusalem. Day 9: Jerusalem. The Rockefeller Museum, formerly the Palestinian Archaeological Museum, has finds from some of the sites visited on this tour, including Hisham’s Palace. After lunch drive to Tel Aviv airport. The flight arrives at Heathrow c. 8.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £3,250 (deposit £300). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (aircraft: Boeing 767); private coach for all other journeys; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 7 lunches and 5 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; airport taxes; the services of the lecturer, tour manager and local guides. Single supplement £310. Price without flights £2,780. Hotels. The first two are international chain hotels used largely by religious package tours but they are comfortable and well equipped, rated locally respectively as 4-star and 5-star. In Bethlehem (4 nights): a flamboyant late 19thcentury mansion with bedrooms in a modern building around a garden to the rear; in Jericho (2 nights): a high-rise building outside the centre. In Jerusalem (2 nights): the most prestigious 5-star hotel in East Jerusalem.
8–13 April 2013 (mz 530) 6 days • £1,720 Lecturer: Adam Hopkins Superb and varied collections of decorative and fine arts as well as some of the best examples of Portuguese ceramic tiles. Palaces and gardens are well represented including the National Palace at Sintra and the Rococo Royal Palace at Queluz. Rejuvenation in the last decade has transformed Lisbon into a vibrant and attractive city. Each of Lisbon’s neighbourhoods has its own atmosphere and its own treasures – and the same is emphatically true of the nearby hill – or mountain – of Sintra, with palaces and gardens, and a tendency for mist to hang romantically about its peak. Despite the nation’s money troubles and the city’s pockets of poverty, Lisbon itself remains one of the most romantic capitals of Europe. The Alfama neighbourhood rises high to east of centre, its castle synonymous with the fortunes of early Lisbon and with fine views of the bellying Tagus below. The centre itself – the ‘Baixa’, at river level, was built on a grid plan by the dictator Pombal in the eighteenth century, one of the great successes of early town planning. Above to the west rises the ever more lively – and stylish – Bairro Alto or High District and far beyond, where the Tagus reaches out towards the Atlantic, comes Belém. King Manuel the Fortunate, his coffers swelling with the riches of India, envisaged a new Bethlehem for a new Christian mission to the East. The result: two of Portugal’s great buildings: the Belém tower, feet washed by the river, and the gorgeous Jerónimos Monastery, itself
once standing on the foreshore. Add to these, museums and galleries with fine and applied arts of the highest level, swelling hills and the constant presence of the river, glimpsed when least expected, not to mention the world’s finest grilled sardines.
Itinerary Day 1: Lisbon. Fly at c. 1.30pm from London Heathrow to Lisbon and drive to the hotel. Day 2: Belém, Alfama. Drive to the Jerónimos Monastery at Belém, an outstanding example of the exuberant Manueline style with fine carving and vaulting. On the banks of the Tagus are the monument to the ‘Explorers’ and the Torre de Belém (fortress) – also Manueline with Moorish decoration. Continue to the Castelo de São Jorge – arab castle conquered by the Christians in 1147, embellished over centuries by Portugal’s kings, destroyed and now restored. Descend with views of the labyrinthine Alfama to the Romanesque cathedral. Once fortified, now much remodelled, it has a fascinating and important archeological site in its cloister. End the day at the Museu Nacional do Azulejo (ceramic tiles), a superb collection of one of Portugal’s great art forms with pieces from the 15th cent. to the present day. Day 3: Lapa, Bairro Alto. Drive to Lapa to the Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga with 15thand 16th-century Portuguese works of art – displayed in a beautiful palace. Back in the centre of Lisbon, walk around the Bairro Alto, a now fashionable hub of theatres, boutiques, cafés and restaurants. Visit the highly ornate church of São Roque and the ruined Convento do Carmo and its archaeological museum.
Visas: are obtained on arrival at no charge for most nationalities. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking, some of it over rough ground and uneven paving, and sure-footedness is essential. Average distance by coach per day: c. 41 miles. Small group: between 14 and 22 participants. Working in partnership with the Palestinian Exploration Fund. By booking on this tour, clients will automatically become PEF members, have access to the extensive PEF library and resources as well as benefit from expert advice on the ancient Levant from members of staff. Israel & Palestine, 16–25 October 2012; 12–21 February 2013; 1–10 October 2013 (page 88). Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Lisbon, Rossio Square, wood engraving 1890.
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Palestine, Portugal
Lisbon Neighbourhoods continued
The Douro From Porto to Pinhão
Day 4: Queluz, Sintra. Drive to the royal palace and gardens at Queluz, built for the Infante Dom Pedro, a version of Versailles tempered by a Rococo elegance and a more intimate scale. Continue to the beautifully situated town of Sintra, the favoured summer residence of the kings of Portugal for six centuries, and much praised in poetry and prose. Visit the Palácio Nacional with its curious oast-house-like conical towers and remarkable 16th- and 17th-century azulejos. Lunch in the elegant 18th-century Palácio de Seteais, now a hotel. Visit the gardens of Quinta da Monserrate, laid out in 1856 for Sir Francis Cook, first Visconde de Monserrate, and his curious Mughal style mansion with restoration nearing completion. Day 5: Benfica. Free morning. Drive to Benfica in the afternoon and visit by arrangement the Palácio dos Marqueses de Fronteira. The tile work is excellent, particularly the Battle Room depicting the War of Independence against Spain 1640–1668. Drive back to the centre to visit the Medeiros e Almeida Foundation, an excellent and varied collection of decorative and fine arts, assembled by the Medeiros family in the 20th century. Highlights include the French and Chinese collections, and an impressive British thunder box. Day 6: Lisbon. The morning is spent at the Gulbenkian Museum, an outstanding private art collection given to the city of Lisbon and beautifully displayed in a modern building. Continue to the airport for the flight to Heathrow, arriving c. 6.45pm.
Practicalities Price £1,720 (deposit £200). This includes: flights (economy class) with Air Portugal (Airbus 320); private coach travel; hotel accommodation; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 3 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions and donations; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Supplement for a superior room £150 (price per room, two sharing). Single supplement £300. Price without flights £1,540.
22–29 May 2013 (mz 576) 8 days • £2,170 Lecturer: Adam Hopkins One of the most remote and picturesque corners of Europe. Variety of visits including major museums, mediaeval and Baroque architecture, gardens, Paleolithic art and wine tastings at private estates. Journeys of immense beauty by rail and boat. One of our more leisurely tours. The upper reaches of the Douro in Portugal present a landscape of extraordinary beauty and tranquillity. The banks rise steeply into the surrounding hills which are clothed with terraced vineyards, patches of woodland, little villages and quintas. Until recently one of the remotest clefts in western Europe, the region remains remarkably unspoilt and difficult of access. It is best approached by train; a journey into mountains that begins at the mouth of the river in Porto (Oporto). The capital of northern Portugal, Porto is synonymous with the port wine trade, which since time immemorial has been dominated by the British. Hence an architectural peculiarity of Porto: the serene Neo-Palladianism of buildings by John Carr of York and his imitators cheek-by-jowl with the highly wrought, startlingly pigmented and lavishly gilded Baroque style of churches and public buildings. Baroque was virtually introduced by another foreigner, the Tuscan painter-architect Nicolau Nasoni who had a hand in the design of many churches and houses in the city and along the Douro. Porto is also relatively unspoilt, retaining a
jumble of historic architecture on its undulating even precipitous site, but it is also a city of parks and gardens and the occasional flash of ultramodern architecture. This is not a tour in pursuit of masterpieces, rather an exploration of delicious scenery and ancient townscapes in a most beautiful but often overlooked corner of Europe. The port wine industry is a subsidiary theme, along with the excellent red wines now produced here. The pace on this tour is slower than on many.
Itinerary Day 1: Porto. Fly at c. 12.00 midday from London Gatwick to Porto. Introductory talk and time for a stroll along the river front before dinner.First of three nights in Porto. Day 2: Porto. Porto is dense with historic architecture and falls steeply down to the River Douro. The principal monuments are set amidst the rise and fall of the upper part of the town, reached by steep alleys and steps. The cathedral is basically 13th-century with later embellishments, many by the painter-architect Nicolau Nasoni. The Clerigos Church with its wonderful Baroque tower is also by Nasoni, the church of the Misericordia has good Flemish paintings and São Francisco has an amazingly rich carved and gilded interior. Also see the magnificent decorative tiles, azulejos, in the railway station and visit the Factory House (by special arrangement), a club of British port wine traders founded in the 18th century. Overnight Porto. Day 3: Porto. See the façade of the Hospital de São António designed by John Carr of York (1770). The Soares dos Reis was Portugal’s first national museum and has collections of Portuguese fine and decorative arts, and
Hotel: a comfortable hotel of generous proportions with an air of faded grandeur and old-world charm. Bedrooms are bright, with good storage; some are in need of updating. Adjacent to Rossio Square and rated locally as 5-star but more comparable to 4-star. How strenuous? A short but busy itinerary with a lot of walking and standing around. Terrain is often uneven and steep. Average distance by coach per day: 12 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
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the nearby Museu Romântico in the Quinta da Macieirinha has a garden and 19thcentury furnishings. Álvaro Siza’s Fundação de Serralves is set in an attractive park and houses contemporary art. Rem Koolhaas’s new concert hall is stunning. Cross the Douro for a tasting at a port lodge and study the scene of Wellington’s impulsive and brilliant 1809 river crossing which enabled him to finish Marshal Soult’s still-warm lunch. Day 4: Porto, Douro Valley, Pinhão. Free morning in Porto. Early afternoon train journey up the Douro Valley which becomes increasingly rural, unspoilt and beautiful, with vineyards, patches of woodland and quintas clinging to the hills. Pinhão is a tiny town with a hotel in a former port lodge overlooking the Douro. First of four nights in Pinhão. Day 5: São João de Tarouca, Lamego. At the village of São João de Tarouca, there are paintings by Grão Vasco (1506–42) and Gaspar Vaz (1490–1569) in the church beside which are the ruins of the first Cistercian abbey in Portugal (1169). Continue to the busy little town of Lamego, replete with Baroque mansions and dominated by the pilgrimage church of Nossa Senhora dos Remédios atop a ceremonial stairway. The town museum in the former episcopal palace contains a series of panels by Grão Vasco. See also the cathedral, largely Renaissance behind a Romanesque belfry and has a Gothic west front. Day 6: Vale do Côa. Up the Douro is the small town of Vila Nova Foz Côa with church with Manueline doorway. Close to the border with Spain the River Côa valley holds one of the greatest archaeological finds of recent years, an extensive array of outdoor Paleolithic art, the largest in Europe. There are well-preserved engravings of auroch, horse, deer and goat along a long stretch of steeply slate-banked river. Visit one of the key sites by 4WD, then continue on foot. Return to Pinhão on the train beside the Douro.
Porto, wood engraving c. 1870
Practicalities
Day 8: Vila Real. The Palácio de Mateus at Vila Real, a Nasoni design made familiar by the rosé wine label, is a fine 18th-century manor house, well furnished and with gardens including a box tree avenue. Continue to Porto airport for the flight to London Gatwick, arriving c. 3.45pm.
Price: £2,170 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled TAP (Air Portugal) flights (Airbus 319); private coach for transfers and some excursions, some rail and boat travel; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts, two lunches and five dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admission to museums, churches, wine estates, etc.; all tips for restaurant staff and drivers; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement £320 (double for sole occupancy). Price without flights £2,010.
Left: Portuguese muleteer, engraving c. 1820.
Hotels: in Porto (3 nights): an excellently situated 4-star hotel in the historic centre, on the right bank of the river Douro. In Pinhão
Day 7: the Douro by train and boat: a leisurely day in the heart of the wine-making area. Travel by rail downstream to the Quinta do Vallado; visit and lunch here. Sail back to Pinhão on a private rabelo boat.
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(4 nights): a delightful hotel surrounded by vineyards and with gardens and terrace overlooking the river. How strenuous? Visits in Porto are on foot and uphill (via some flights of steps). The archaeological park requires sure-footedness. Travel is by coach, train and boat. Average distance by coach per day: 37 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206.
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Walking in Madeira Garden of the Atlantic 4–10 March 2013 (mz 487) 7 days • £2,380 Lecturer: Dr Roland Randall A new tour for 2013. Five half-day walks through Madeira’s magnificent landscapes: coastal, woodland and mountainous. A focus on both Madeira’s formal gardens and its natural flora and wildlife. The lecturer is an academic ecologist with a speciality in islands. Two contrasting hotels: Madeira’s most famous hotel located in bustling Funchal and a tranquil Quinta in a spectacular coastal location. Sitting in the sub-tropical Atlantic, closer to Morocco than to Portugal, Madeira is a startling island, rising high and steep from the ocean. Consisting overwhelmingly of basalt rock, which started spewing from the earth’s core around 130 million years ago, the land of Madeira itself is probably two-and-a-halfmillion years old. The volcanic nature of this island produces
not only steep gorges radiating from the rugged central mountains – the highest of which, Pico Ruivo, stands at 1,861 metres above sea level – but also accounts for the spectacular coastal scenery. This tour explores both settings. A well maintained footpath gives access to the summit of Pico Ruivo, and the gardens of our hotel at Santana on the north coast have direct access to a stunning coastal path. A hugely varied number of plants and trees enjoy this dynamic combination of fertile soil and warm temperatures. Bananas and vines, two of Madeira’s major exports, flourish on the coastal plains, while lush deciduous vegetation covers the higher mountain slopes. As is standard on remote islands, there has been considerable speciation, and more than seven hundred plant species are indigenous to Madeira. Of particular interest are the laurisilva woodlands, the large house leeks, woody sow-thistles and marguerites, the beautiful shrubby Echium species and the curious Dragon tree. By exploring the terrain on foot we examine these species and their setting in greater and more rewarding detail. Aside from the ecological and horticultural aspects of this tour, there is also the
opportunity to study the history of the island’s greatest export, Madeira wine. Although established as a Portuguese colony since Prince Henry the Navigator’s expedition landed in the early fifteenth century, it was during the period of Spanish ownership that a commercial treaty was established with the British in 1660. This marked the beginning of the wine trade, which has been significant ever since. We have organised a private tasting and visit to a winery that has been operating on the island for over two hundred years.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 1.30pm from London Gatwick to Lisbon and connect to a flight to Funchal, arriving in time for a late dinner. First of four nights in Funchal. Day 2. Morning walk (level and easy terrain, with short descent at end, c. 5 km) along the Levada dos Tornos. Starting in the hills above Funchal, we walk to the Blandy family estate at Palheiro for lunch and a guided visit. The extensive sub-tropical gardens, first acquired by John Blandy in 1885, have been continually
Funchal, wood engraving c. 1870.
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developed by the family. Some free time to enjoy the camellias, centennial trees, the rose garden and myriad other flowers and climbers. Overnight Funchal.
New tours
The Age of Bede......................................25
Day 3. A guided tour of Funchal’s historic centre. The Mercado dos Lavadores (farmers’ market) is a brilliantly vibrant showcase of the island’s produce. Visit the Gothic Cathedral of Our Lady of the Assumption, with its whitewashed walls and mudéjar-inspired ceiling, and the lush gardens of the English Church. Drive to Madeira’s easternmost peninsular, Ponta do São Lourenço, for an afternoon walk (c. 5 km, level terrain) in a rugged, almost lunar, landscape, home to fossils, cacti and the odd flash of desert flowers. Overnight Funchal.
The Cathedrals of England.....................28 Royal Palaces...........................................29 Art & Industry........................................32 English Music in Yorkshire.....................39 Ethiopia...................................................42 The Rite of Spring...................................57 The Rhône Music Festival.......................63 King Ludwig II.......................................75 The Ring at La Scala...............................92
Day 4. A morning lecture at the Jardim Orquídea which houses the rarest and most unusual collection of orchids on the island. The Jardim Botánico located in the Quinta of Bom Sucesso is home to over 100 species of indigenous plants, as well as tropical and subtropical fruit trees and coffee trees, sugar cane and popular medicinal plants. Private evening visit to the Blandy Wine Lodge and a Madeira wine tasting. Overnight Funchal. Day 5. In the cool hills above Funchal is the unesco Biosphere site at Ribeiro Frio, where a botanical garden and trout hatchery sit among quiet glades. Walk (3 km) along the path to Balcões and back, with views of the craggy valleys below, followed by a picnic lunch. Continue to Santana for the first of two nights. Day 6. Morning walk (4 km, level terrain) along the Levada do Caldeirão Verde from Cova da Roda to Queimadas, in the shade of holm oak, eucalyptus and ginger; a picnic lunch is provided here. Afternoon walk (moderate, 5.6 km, a stoney path with some steep sections) to Madeira’s highest peak, Pico Ruivo, with wonderful 360° views stretching to the horizon, and a dramatic vista down to the small town of Curral das Freiras. Overnight Santana. Day 7. Drive to Funchal airport at Machico for the flight to Lisbon, whence a connection to London. Arrive Heathrow c. 5.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,380 (deposit £250). This includes: flights (economy class) with TAP (Air Portugal) (Airbus 320); private coach travel; accommodation; breakfasts, 3 lunches (2 picnics) and 5 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer, tour manager and additional guides for the country walks and town visit. Single supplement £370 (double for sole use). Price without flights £2,140. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Stresa Festival..........................................95 Opera in Venice.....................................103 Parma Verdi Festival..............................107 Florentine Palazzi..................................119 The Etruscans........................................128 Martina Franca......................................137 Walking in Northern Tuscany..............123 From The Foreign Tour of Brown, Jones & Robinson, 1904.
Hotel. In Funchal (4 nights): arguably the best hotel on the island, this famous 5-star luxury hotel is set in subtropical gardens overlooking the Atlantic. Rooms are elegant in décor with sea or garden views. There are three excellent restaurants to choose from. In Santana (2 nights): a tranquil 4-star hotel located on the northern coast with wonderful views of unspoilt Madeira. Included meals are in the hotels and selected restaurants. How strenuous? These walks can be rated as easy to moderate, but this tour should only be considered by those who are used to regular country walking with some uphill and downhill content. Strong knees and ankles are essential, as are a pair of well-worn hiking boots with good ankle support. Walks have been carefully selected but some steep rises and falls are unavoidable and terrain can be loose under foot, particularly in wet weather. This tour is not suitable for people who suffer from vertigo. There are five walks of between 3 km and 5.6 km. Average distance by coach per day: 19 miles. Small group: between 10 and 18 participants. For lecturers’ biographies see page 206.
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Munch in Oslo......................................149 Opera in Oslo, Gothenburg & Copenhagen......................................149 Walking in Madeira..............................156 Grampian Gardens................................162 Scotland: the Borders............................165 Edinburgh at Christmas........................167 Zurbarán & the Golden Age................189 Connoisseur’s Istanbul...........................192 Art in Texas...........................................199 Santa Fe Opera......................................201
Walking tours
The Schubertiade (with hill walking).....13 Walking the Danube...............................15 Walking Hadrian’s Wall.........................24 The Cotswolds.........................................37 Walking & Literature in the Lakes........38 Walking in Tuscany...............................122 Walking in Northern Tuscany..............123 Walking in Sicily...................................143 Walking in Madeira..............................157 Walking to Santiago..............................173
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Monasteries of Moldavia In the foothills of the Carpathians 4–10 October 2013 (ma 730) 7 days • £1,920 Lecturer: Alan Ogden Fortified 15th and 16th-century Orthodox monasteries, wonderfully painted. Scenically enchanting. Also provides insight into modern Romania. Some long coach journeys and two internal flights. During the second Millennium, Romanian history was defined by its geographical juxtaposition to expansionist states. Resistance to foreign domination from the fourteenth to the sixteenth centuries led to the gradual establishment of independent principalities – Wallachia (c.1310), Moldavia (1359) and Transylvania (1541). Four years after the fall of Constantinople (1453), Stefan cel Mare (Stephen the Great) became Prince of Moldavia and for the next fifty years led a spirited defence against constant Turkish invasions, safeguarding much
of Western Europe in the process. It was against this backdrop that Stefan and his son, Petru Rares, established almost thirty fortified monasteries and churches deep in the foothills of the Carpathian Mountains in Southern Bucovina, the north-western region of the present-day Romanian province of Moldavia. Keeping church and state intact was key to their survival as one of the last Christian states in south-eastern Europe. Peasant armies would gather for battle inside the monasteries’ walls, and to educate and entertain the illiterate soldiers and campfollowers the exteriors of the churches were adorned with paintings of biblical stories and other Christian themes, including a number of anti-Ottoman messages. Byzantine in style as befits their Orthodox congregation, the frescoes have remarkable finesse of draughtsmanship and chromatic refinement. Although the north-facing walls have been damaged by centuries of rain and wind, the images on the other walls have astonishingly retained their original vivacity, including the remarkable intensity of colour – from the greens of Sucevita, to the pinks of Humor and
Convent of St Mary (Romania?), early 19th-century aquatint.
the famous blue at Voronets. Annexed by the Habsburg Empire in 1775, Southern Bucovina remained under Austrian control until 1918 when it was ceded to Romania. During this period of Catholic rule, many of the monasteries had to close and thus fell into disrepair; others continued to function but with greatly reduced roles. Persecuted by the Communist regime from 1948 onwards, it is only since 1990 that the monastic communities have become active again. The Bucovina landscape is one of gently rolling hills, dense woods, broad rivers and picturesque villages with pastel painted houses and riotous flower beds. Horses are still to be found in harness, ploughing the fields and transporting produce to markets. The welcome you will receive in Romania is sure to be warm and the hospitality generous.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at 2.30pm from London Heathrow to Bucharest. Overnight Bucharest. Day 2. Bucharest. The National Art Museum with its comprehensive collection of 14th- to 20th-century Romanian art. Visit the world famous Peasants Museum and its outdoor collection of village house. Stavropoleos Church (1724), a harmonious blend of Renaissance and Baroque features. Internal flight from Bucharest to Suceava. Drive to Gura Humorului. First of four nights in Gura Humorului. Day 3. Humor, Rasca, Voronets. The interior frescoes at the church at Humor (1530) are unsurpassed. Rasca (1540), located in a remote valley, is a charming working monastery and boasts a Ladder of St John on its South wall. Voronets Monastery (1488), considered by many to be the most splendid in Bucovina, offers a magnificent Last Judgment. Overnight Gura Humorului. Day 4. Arbore, Sucevita, Moldovitsa. Arbore’s (1501) superbly executed frescoes on the western wall, with a notably green cast, contain scenes from the Lives of St Nicholas, St George and St Paraskeva. In bucolic surroundings, Sucevita (1595) with its beautifully preserved frescoes is the last of the great painted monasteries in Bucovina. Moldovitsa’s (1532) remote position and fortifications have protected its frescoes from invaders and marauders alike. Overnight Gura Humorului. Day 5. Dragomirna, Putna. Dragomirna, now a community of nuns, was founded in 1608 by Anastasie Crimca whose magnificent legacy of writing and illumination can be seen in the museum. Putna, built between 1466 and 1481, is where Stefan the Great is buried; it
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Saxon Transylvania Towns, villages & fortified churches on the edge of Europe still houses an active community of monks and its museum displays many priceless treasures including mediaeval manuscripts. Overnight Gura Humorului. Day 6: Iasi. Drive through Bucovina to explore Iasi, the capital of the former Principality of Moldavia. The Church of the Three Hierarchs built by Basil the Wolf in the 17th century and its Cathedral which hosts the relics of St Paraskeva. The magnificent Palace of Culture with a fine collection of Grigorescus. Overnight Iasi. Day 7. Fly early morning from Iasi to Heathrow via Bucharest, arriving at c. 2.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,920 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled international and national Tarom Airlines flights (Airbus A318 and Aerospatiale ATR42); accommodation as described below; travel by private coach throughout; breakfasts, all lunches and all dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admission to museums, churches and sites; all tips for restaurant staff, drivers, guides; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer and a local guide. Single supplement £160. Price without all flights £1,650. Hotels: in Bucharest (1 night): a centrally located 5-star hotel with excellent service and facilities. In Gura Humorului (4 nights): a recently built 3-star hotel located 37km southwest of Suceava, ideally located for exploring the surrounding area, bathrooms have showers, not bath tubs. The standards of comfort, equipment and service are quite acceptable and commensurate with its category. In Iasi (1 night): a small 4-star hotel in the historic centre, rooms are reasonably sized and elegantly furnished. In Bucharest and Iasi single rooms are doubles for sole occupancy, in Gura they are real singles. Flights: these can change, in time and/or routing, even at short notice. How strenuous? Participants must be reasonably fit as you will be on your feet for long periods. The tour would not be suitable for anyone who has difficulties with everyday walking and stairclimbing. Some long coach journeys. Average distance by coach per day: 64 miles. Small group: the tour will operate with between 12 and 22 participants.
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Viscri, fortified church, etching c. 1930.
7–15 June 2013 (mz 597) 9 days • £2,290 Lecturer: Bronwen Riley A region of Romania with enclaves of Hungarian and German culture. Gothic churches massively fortified against eastern incursions, a unique phenomenon. Towns emerging from Communist-era depredations to rank with the most picturesque in central and eastern Europe. Exceedingly attractive countryside where traditional rural life continues. A tour of Transylvanian fortified churches: surely catering to a somewhat specialist taste? The case in favour: first, this unique phenomenon is visually astounding and historically enthralling. Second, of dozens of surviving examples, we have selected a choice few, each of which exhibits a feature which sets it apart from the others. Third, seeing these places necessitates seeing some extraordinarily unspoilt villages and a way of life you will not see anywhere else. And all this amidst enchanting countryside. Horses still pull carts and ploughs, chickens and ducks wander the unpaved streets, rows of handsome houses of identical design and layout follow a plan set out in the Middle Ages. Many of these ‘Saxon’ villages date to the twelfth or thirteenth centuries when north Europeans, predominantly Germans, were recruited to
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migrate to Europe’s borderlands to farm, build, mine and trade. In due course they also became bulwarks against incursions from the East, first Tartars and then, beginning in the fifteenth century, the Ottomans, a more formidable foe. Hence the extraordinary fortifications around their village churches, constructed as citadels to protect the whole village, permanently stocked in expectation of a sudden siege. Oscillating between independence and Hungarian and Romanian suzerainty, Transylvania is one of the principalities which make up modern Romania (a large country, two thirds the size of Germany). Through good times and bad, the ‘Saxons’ remained a prominent, even dominant, feature of the region until the end of Communism in 1989. Then, within a couple of years, 90% moved to Germany. The time to see these villages is now. Congregations are tiny or nonexistent, the villages partially repopulated with people who care nothing about heritage. With the scant resources of the poorest member of the EU, their fate seems to be either irreversible decay or emasculation and Disneyfication for the tourist industry. The final argument in favour of this tour is that there is plenty else to see. The towns are marvellous survivals, emerging from grime and dereliction to reveal cityscape as lovely and architecturally interesting as anywhere in the former Austro-Hungarian empire. There are the finest collections of 16th to 18th-century oriental carpets you will ever see – hanging in
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Saxon Transylvania continued
Buildings range from the 13th to the 19th centuries with a fine 15th-cent. church with good furnishings and a superb altarpiece of 1490. Located in an exceptionally lovely valley, hillsides striated with terraces for (now vanished) vines, the splendid Gothic church of Biertan soars above its formidable fortifications and the charmingly modest village below. Day 5: Sibiu. One of the best preserved of the ‘Seven Towns’ of Saxon Transylvania, Sibiu has been only patchily restored but contains beautiful squares, fine architecture and a picturesque net of streets, stairways and alleys. The remarkable art gallery in the Brukenthal Palace includes works by Van Eyck, Titian, Lotto and Brueghel. Nearby is an open-air museum, one of the best of its kind in Europe with a collection of 350 re-erected vernacular buildings from all over Romania.
Sighisoara, woodcut c. 1930.
churches. There is a nineteenth-century palace as exquisitely wrought as any in Europe. Oh, and there is a Jan Van Eyck which you can bet the Joneses next door haven’t seen.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 11.00am from London Heathrow to Bucharest where the first two nights are spent. Day 2: Bucharest. Ceausescu obliterated swathes of the capital’s historic architecture but good things remain. The Lipscani quarter was surprisingly little molested and is now undergoing comprehensive restoration. The Orthodox Stavropoleos Church (1720s) is splendid, and the Peasant Museum well displays artefacts from all Romania. The National Art Museum has a superb collection of mediaeval art as well as Romanian impressionists and masterpieces of European painting. Day 3: Sinaia, Viscri. The road north passes through the Transylvanian Alps and the royal summer resort of Sinaia. Here visit the beautiful series of Art Nouveau rooms in a little palace built 1899–1903 for the heir apparent Ferdinand and Queen Marie. Continuing northwards, see the first of that unique Transylvanian phenomenon, the fortified church. A spectacular eruction of walls and towers overlooks the remote, impoverished but well preserved Saxon village of Viscri. Overnight Sighisoara, where four nights are spent. Day 4: Sighisoara, Biertan. On top of a hill, natural defensiveness supplemented by impressive military engineering, Sighisoara is a highly picturesque little town.
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Day 6: Targu Mures, Malancrav. Targu Mures is endowed with an array of buildings in a Hungarian version of Arts & Crafts and Secessionist styles. The 1913 Palace of Culture – concert hall, art gallery, ceremonial halls – is as fine as any comparable building in Central Europe. Orthodox churches range from the timber and artisanal to the grand and splendidly painted. The village church at Malancrav is celebrated for the remarkably well preserved murals of 1421. Day 7: Sighisoara, Prejmer. There is free time in the morning in Sighisoara. Possible activities include the Monastery Church and the History Museum. On the way to Brasov, stop at Prejmer for one more fortified church. The inner face of the 12m curtain wall is spectacularly encased with emergency accommodation and storage chambers. First of two nights in Brasov, formerly the leading city of Transylvania. Overnight Brasov, where two nights are spent. Day 8: Brasov. With a wonderful jumble of facades from, principally, the 18th to the early 20th centuries, Brasov is as handsome a provincial city as anywhere in eastern Europe. The Black Church is the largest Gothic church in Romania, and the interior is enlivened with nearly 100 oriental carpets. Much of the day is free to enjoy the streetscape, the cafés, the museums (the Ethnographical collection is
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fascinating). Outside the walls, there is a cable car to the top of an adjacent hill. Day 9: Sinaia. Return to the mountain resort of Sinaia, this time to see Peles Castle, summer retreat of the Romanian royal family, built, extended and embellished 1875–1914. The sequence of sumptuous interiors, with astonishingly richly carved woodwork, is as fine as any of its sort in Europe, and the original contents are intact. Descend to the Wallachian plain and fly from Bucharest, returning to Heathrow c. 6.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,290 (deposit £250). This includes: flights (economy class) with British Airways (Airbus 320); travel by private coach; accommodation as described below; 3 lunches and 6 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £240. Price without flights £2,020. Hotels. Bucharest (2 nights): a centrally located 5-star hotel with excellent service and facilities. Sighisoara (4 nights): a new hotel in the lower town 8 minutes on foot to the upper town. Decor tends to peasant chic, but it is comfortable and rooms are of a good size and standard. Brasov (2 nights): a large multi-storey slab conveniently (if shockingly) situated next to the historic centre. Pretentious but adequately comfortable despite traces of its communist-era genesis. Service in all these hotels is generally helpful, smiley and efficient. All are locally rated as 5-star, though they would be 4-star or less in most other countries. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking in city centres and in villages over terrain that is often uneven, sometimes unpaved and not infrequently steep. Sure-footedness is essential; if you regularly use a walking stick, this tour would be challenging. Participants ascend the higher parts of churches and fortifications entirely at their own risk! There is a lot of coach travel, including six journeys of around two hours, over roads of variable quality. Outside big towns, loos are nonexistent or dire. Average distance by coach per day: 130 km. Small group: 10–22 participants.
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St Petersburg Pictures & palaces 10–16 May 2013 (mz 555) 7 days • £3,320 Lecturer: Dr Alexey Makhrov 20–26 September 2013 (ma 705) 7 days • £3,320 Lecturer: Dr Alexey Makhrov St Petersburg is perhaps the grandest city in Europe, and one of the most beautiful. Magnificent architecture of the 18th and 19th centuries, especially the palaces of the Romanovs, nobility and merchants. Outstanding art collections, the Hermitage being the largest art museum in the world. Founded by Peter the Great in 1703, the city of St Petersburg was intended to demonstrate to the world not only that Russia was a European rather than an Asian nation, but also that it was an immensely powerful one. This ‘window on the West’ became the capital of the Russian Empire until the government moved back to Moscow in 1918. Peter’s wish was amply fulfilled: with the assistance of Dutch, Italian and French architects – Russians were to take over later in the century once they had mastered the mysteries of Western art and architecture – St Petersburg was laid out as the grandest city in Europe, with buildings on a monumental scale. The palaces of the imperial family and of the fabulously wealthy magnates vied with each other, and with the military establishments and government institutions, to dominate the river front, the broad avenues and the vast squares. Although one of the newest of Europe’s great cities, St Petersburg is the one least affected by 20th-century building. Despite the well-publicised economic and political troubles Russia has undergone in recent years, there has been a surge of cleaning and restoration which has accentuated the beauty of the city. As impressive as the architecture of St Petersburg are the contents of the museums and art galleries. The Hermitage is one of the world’s greatest art museums, with an immensely rich collection of paintings, sculpture, antiquities and decorative arts filling the enormous Winter Palace of the Romanovs. The Russian Museum comes as a revelation to most visitors, for apart from icons (and there is a wonderful collection) the great achievements of Russian painters, particularly during the 19th century, are scarcely known outside the country.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 9.30am from London Heathrow to St Petersburg (time in the air: c. 3 hours 15 minutes). There is time to settle into the hotel before dinner. Day 2. Explore the north bank of the Neva and Vasilevskiy Island which, as the original intended site of the city, has some of St Petersburg’s earliest buildings including the Twelve Colleges and the Peter-Paul Fortress. Visit the Menshikov Palace, an early 18thcentury residence with impressive Petrine decoration. Drive via the Kazan Cathedral with colonnaded forecourt to the Alexander Nevsky Monastery, an extensive Baroque layout and cemetery with graves of many famous Russians. Day 3. Walk to the remarkable Neo-Classical buildings of the Synod, Senate and Admiralty. The first visit to the Hermitage, one of the world’s greatest art collections, housed in Rastrelli’s Winter Palace and contiguous buildings; walk around to understand the layout and to see the magnificent interiors. An afternoon by coach taking in the sumptuous Marble Palace (exterior), designed by Rinaldi in Baroque and Neo-Classical style and the
wonderful group of Smolny Convent and Cathedral, also by Rastrelli. Day 4. A full-day excursion to two of the summer palaces about 20 miles from St Petersburg, both set in extensive landscaped parks with lakes and pavilions. At Tsarskoye Selo, formerly Pushkin, the main building is the outsized Rococo Catherine Palace by Rastrelli, its richly ornamented interiors painstakingly restored after war damage. At Pavlovsk, also well restored, the graceful Neo-Classical Great Palace with encircling wings was in part built by Scotsman Charles Cameron. Day 5. The Russian Museum, in the imposing Mikhailovsky Palace, has Russian painting from mediaeval icons to the vast canvases of the Romantics and Realists of the 19th century. An afternoon excursion to Peterhof (by hydrofoil, weather permitting), the magnificent palace on the Gulf of Finland with cascades and fountains. Day 6. Drive through the city. The Baroque Cathedral of St Nicholas, with its gilded domes, is a memorial to Russian navy sailors who perished at sea. Visit the late 19th-century
St Petersburg, The Winter Palace, north-west corner, wood engraving c. 1870.
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
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St Petersburg continued
Grampian Gardens Houses, castles & the Granite City
Yusupov Palace, one of the finest in the city and scene of Rasputin’s murder. The second visit to the Hermitage to concentrate on specific aspects of the collections and to pursue individual passions. Day 7. Some free time for independent exploration: perhaps the Hermitage again, or places not yet visited such as the Dostoyevsky Museum, City Museum, Academy of Arts, or a boat ride on the Neva. Fly to Heathrow, arriving c. 5.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £3,320 (deposit £300). This includes: flights (economy class) with British Airways (Airbus 321); travel by private coach; hotel accommodation; breakfasts and 5 dinners, with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and a local guide. Single supplement £410 (double for sole use). Price without flights £3,010. Hotel: an excellently located superior hotel in the city centre, within easy walking distance of the Hermitage. Very comfortable, with good service and restaurant. Visas: British citizens and most foreign nationals require a visa (current cost c. £85 – not included in the price of the tour). We will advise on the procedure but you will need to send your passport to the Russian Consulate in the two month period before departure. Visa issuing times vary from country to country but UK residents should expect to be without their passport for approximately 2 weeks. Music: details of opera and ballet performances will be sent to participants about one month before the tour and tickets can be requested. How strenuous? There is a fair amount of standing in galleries and walking on this tour. Traffic congestion means coach journeys can be long and frustrating. Average distance by coach per day: 13 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
The Western Balkans September 2013 Details available October 2012 Contact us to register your interest
Russia, Scotland
18–24 August 2013 (mz 663) 7 days • £1,970 Lecturer: Caroline Holmes A new tour for 2013. Varied garden concepts from the Renaissance to the present day, with equally diverse architectural accompaniments. Special arrangements to visit private gardens. Breathtaking landscapes. One hotel throughout, a five-star country house hotel on the outskirts of Aberdeen. The long summer days bring the gardens of north-east Scotland into their floral zenith. Their settings vary from a laird’s stronghold to Victorian Scottish Baronial, while the concepts range from Renaissance symbolism to a retired physics professor’s evolutionary planting. Aberdeen, the Granite City, was described as the one haunting and exasperatingly lovable city in Scotland. Its public parks and gardens are legendary, and has been ten times winner of the Royal Horticultural Society’s Britain in Bloom award. Visits within Aberdeen include the Cruickshank Botanic Garden in the mediaeval burgh of Old Aberdeen which hosts a nationally important collection of over 2,500 plants. This tour, however, concentrates on a unique collection of highly personal gardens created over the past 400 years. A number of outstanding early walled gardens are amongst the highlights. The fascinating garden – or Pleasaunce – at ruined Edzell Castle was created at the time of the accession of James VI to the English throne. Its carved walls and recreated parterre pressent a unique example of Renaissance symbolism, a tribute to the newly united crown and to fashionable intellectual games. The Baroque is represented by the gardens at Pitmedden, originally laid out in 1675. They have been restored by the National Trust for Scotland to enable visitors to delight in the elaborate parterres and dazzling herbaceous borders characteristic of the seventeenth century. Newly restored Victorian formal terraces frame elegant Haddo House, designed by William Adam in the 1730s, in its eighteenth-century setting of beautiful park and woodland landscaping. Grampian’s numerous castle gardens are as instructive as they are inspiring. The glorious, floriferous 1920s gardens punctuated with historic topiary below the enchanting sixteenth-century tower house, Crathes Castle, are considered to be Scotland’s Sissinghurst. The walled garden at Drum Castle is as noted for its exceptional collection of historic roses
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as the magnificent baronial fortress of Fyvie Castle is for its range of indigenous Scottish fruit and vegetables. The visits have been designed to provide the greatest possible insight into the relationship between the gardens and their architectural setting. At many of the destinations, we will be joined by the designer, owner or head gardener.
Itinerary Day 1: Drum. You join the tour either at the hotel in Aberdeen at 1.45pm or at Aberdeen Airport at c. 2.15pm. Owned by the Irvine family, Drum Castle consists of a mediaeval keep, a Jacobean mansion and a Victorian extension. The walled garden has been designed to illustrate the history of roses. Return to Aberdeen where all six nights are spent. Day 2: Kildrummy, Douneside. One of Scotland’s finest water gardens, Kildrummy was reputedly planned by Japanese designers for the Edwardian soap manufacturer James Ogston. Water and plants flow abundantly in a setting of historic significance. After the deaths of their three aviator sons in WWII, Lady Rachel MacRobert created a trust in their memory which runs Douneside House and its newly planted gardens as a holiday country house for serving or retired officers. Day 3: Arbuthnott, Glenbervie, Edzell. The Arbuthnott House gardens were laid out in 1685 and have been evolving ever since, with an emphasis on flowers. Glenbervie House dates back to the 13th century and the walled garden has been in continuous cultivation for 300 years, latterly around a Victorian folly. The Moncrieff greenhouses are filled to capacity with passionflowers, bougainvilleas and vines. At Edzell, the walled garden perfectly encapsulates the educated mind in 1604 – Liberal Arts, Cardinal and Moral Virtues, the seven known planets. The family heraldic device dominates in stone and plantings. Day 4: Findrack, Torphins, Crathes. Findrack is a private garden, redesigned by Michael Balston over the last 15 years, a harmonious mixture of traditional pavilions and doocot with exuberant planting and excellent streamside water garden. Crathes Castle, a turreted fantasy dating to 1553, has famous gardens featuring great yew hedges and colourful double herbaceous borders. One of the finest in north-east Scotland, it was created from 1926 by Sir James and Lady Sybil. Day 5: Haddo, Fyvie, Pitmedden. Aberdeenshire’s first classical house, Haddo was built in the 1730s and became home of the Lord Aberdeen, Prime Minister 1852–55. There is a pretty Victorian terraced garden b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Haddo House, Aberdeen, engraving from The Illustrated London News, 1857.
leading to lakes, walks and monuments. Fyvie is the Edwardian dream of a Scottish castle and possesses an American woodland garden with rhododendrons and an 18th-century walled garden newly replanted with Scottish fruit and vegetables. The architectural framework of the Great Gardens at Pitmeddon is excellent – Le Notre influence is evident – and the clipped box and yew, colourful bedding and uplifting mottoes have been magnificently restored. Day 6: Aberdeen. The Botanic Garden was endowed by Miss Anne H. Cruikshank in 1898 for teaching and research in botany at the University of Aberdeen. There is an independent afternoon or an optional visit to Provost Skene’s House, dating from 1545 and showing rooms in 17th-, 18th- and 19th century décor. Day 7: Rubislaw Den. In Rubislaw Den is an acre of immaculate, imaginative gardens created by Tom Smith, retired Professor of Physics, original but at the same time a microcosm of Charles Jencks and Ian Hamilton Finlay in his use of words and rocks. The coach returns you to the hotel in Aberdeen by 2.30pm and the airport by c. 3.00pm. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Practicalities Price: £1,970 (deposit £200). This includes: private coach travel; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, one lunch and four dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admission to gardens, houses, museums; tips for restaurant staff, drivers; all gratuities; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £340 (double room for sole use). Hotel: The only five-star hotel in Aberdeen and a member of the Small Luxury Hotel of the World group. It is stylish, very comfortable and offers good amenities. There is a garden, an excellent restaurant serving local Grampian produce and spa facilities. How strenuous? A lot of walking and standing in gardens. Paths are often uneven so surefootedness is essential. Quite a lot of time is spent on the coach on narrow, country roads. Average distance by coach per day: 62 miles.
Houses & Gardens Great Houses of the South West............34 Great Houses of the North......................35 Weston Park: Country Houses Weekend......................36 Brittany....................................................47 Châteaux of the Loire..............................59 Gardens & Villas of the Italian Lakes....91 Medici Villas & Gardens......................121 Walking in Madeira..............................157 Grampian Gardens................................162 Ardgowan: Country House Weekend..164 Scotland: the Borders............................165
Small group: this tour will operate with between 10 to 22 participants.
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Ardgowan A country house weekend in the west of Scotland Stuart was built in the last two decades of the 19th century by one of the richest men in the world, the third Marquess of Bute. The picture collection is superb. Beautifully maintained by the current Marquess, the house is surrounded by extensive gardens and noble woods. Day 3: Culzean, Dumfries House. Drive through rolling Ayrshire farmland to Burns Cottage, the poet’s birthplace. Continue to the clifftop Culzean Castle, Robert Adam’s boldest creation, with oval stair hall and round drawing room with views out to sea. Also by Adam, Dumfries House, famously saved for the nation with the help of the Prince of Wales in 2007, is a perfect Palladian composition which retains unspoilt interiors and a unique set of Chippendale furniture. We have an after-hours tour followed by dinner in the house.
Ardgowan, steel engraving c. 1850.
20–25 June 2013 (mz 612) 6 days • £2,340 Lecturer: Caroline Knight Stay as guests at Ardgowan, a grand 18th-century country house which remains a private home, not a hotel nor a museum. Visit other country houses in the vicinity, some not generally open to the public, all by special arrangement or with privileged access. Pass through the stunning coastal and Lowland landscapes of western Scotland. A country house party as much as a study tour, there is time for leisure around the house and garden of Ardgowan. The key feature of this tour is that the participants are not accommodated in a hotel. They are guests in a private home. A biggish home admittedly, an architecturally distinguished eighteenth-century country house with excellent pictures, exceptional furniture and gardens which spread out to the coast overlooking the Firth of Clyde. Some negatives. You will find no minibar in your room, no television, let alone airconditioning. Rugs may reveal generations of use, the bathroom may be a few yards down the corridor, the shower may be Edwardian and there is no reception (although staff are on hand). If you are not put off so far, the compensations include bedrooms the size of an average sitting room laden with antiques and books, and the opportunity to roam at leisure
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through the hall, drawing room, library and dining rooms. You are also free to wander in the adjoining gardens and woods. Ardgowan is a superb mansion of the 1790s designed by a follower of Robert Adam. For this very special tour it is the base for excursions to other country houses in the vicinity, at nearly all of which special arrangements will have been made exclusively for this group. In journeying between them, you pass through some heart-stoppingly lovely landscapes – lochs and sea, lowland heath and mountains, rolling farmland and forests. As much country house party as study tour, there is plenty of time at leisure at Ardgowan. The house is a textbook case of the challenges facing current owners of historic properties of the first rank. Our hostess, Lady Shaw Stewart, is an art historian and a prominent figure in the field of historic buildings in Scotland. The lecturer, Caroline Knight, is her sister. She is also an art historian and has a speciality in the country houses of Britain.
Day 4: Ardgowan, Kelburn. The morning is spent at Ardgowan, entirely free or with the option of an in-depth tour to study some aspects of the house. In the afternoon visit Kelburn Castle, property of the Earl of Glasgow and in the same family for 800 years. Part remains a defensible tower house, and there is a lovely set of rooms of c. 1700. Day 5: Strachur, Inveraray. Take a ferry across the Firth of Clyde to the Cowal Peninsula and drive to Strachur House. The property of Sir Charles and Lady Maclean is a fascinating 18th-century mansion of middling size; its 20th-century history is entwined with the western Balkans. Inveraray Castle is the ancestral home of the Dukes of Argyll. Despite its four corner towers and Gothic windows, it is entirely 18th-century, and inside are some extraordinarily fine rooms and a very good art collection. Day 6: Glasgow. Holmwood House was designed by Alexander ‘Greek’ Thomson and was built in 1857–8 for James Cooper, a local businessman. From here the coach takes you to Glasgow Railway Station by 12.30pm and to Glasgow Airport by 1.10 or 4.30pm.
Practicalities
Day 1: Ardgowan. The coach leaves Glasgow Railway Station at 2.15pm and leaves Glasgow Airport at 3.00pm. Continue west to the coast of the Firth of Clyde and reach Ardgowan in time for afternoon tea. After settling in to your rooms, there is a tour of the house and gardens followed by some free time, drinks and dinner.
Price: £2,340 (deposit £250). This includes private coach for transfers and excursions; ferry to the Isle of Bute and the Cowal Peninsula; accommodation as described above and below; breakfasts, three lunches and five dinners with wine, water and coffee; admission charges to all the properties visited; all gratuities; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £250.
Day 2: Mount Stuart. Cross by ferry to the Isle of Bute. Magnificent in scale and in lavishness of decoration and furnishing, Mount
Accommodation. It cannot be emphasised enough that Ardgowan is a private house, not a hotel. Please read again the first two
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Itinerary
Scotland: the Borders Castles, houses, gardens & abbeys paragraphs of this tour description. Bedrooms vary in size, furnishings and facilities. While each room has its own bathroom, in some cases this is a few yards along a corridor. All have baths, some have showers over the bath as well. Towels, bathrobes and toiletries are provided. There is a lift to the first floor.
7–13 July 2013 (mz 640) 7 days • £2,180 Lecturer: Amanda Herries
How strenuous? A fair amount of walking is unavoidable. Coaches can rarely park near the entrance to houses and grounds are often extensive. Most of the houses visited do not have lifts. However, the pace is relatively leisurely with more free time than is usual for a short tour. Average distance by coach per day: 56 miles.
A wide variety of architecture, interiors and gardens in glorious settings.
Small group: 10 to 18 participants.
Weston Park
A new tour for 2013. Special arrangements and out-of-hours visits.
Dramatic Borders landscapes, from lowlands to uplands. One hotel throughout, a country house in the grounds of the Roxburghe Estate. The Scottish Borders are bounded to the north by brooding Highlands and to the south by the uplands of England, and consist largely of lowland but very varied countryside, hills and moorland in the west and agricultural plains in the east.
The ascent of James VI of Scotland to the English throne in 1603 and the Act of Union of 1707 marked a steady cessation of mutual antagonism, though intermittently there were outbreaks of hostility. Echoes of the past remained ever present. It’s still possible, for example, to view the cradle in which Mary Queen of Scots rocked her baby son, James, at Traquair House, the oldest inhabited house in Scotland. Originally a royal hunting lodge, it retains the secret passage and priest hole once necessary in a Catholic household. Perhaps, however, the house which encapsulates the Borders above all others is Sir Walter Scott’s Abbotsford. Scott is one of the most influential figures in Scotland’s later history, with a reputation which reached far beyond his best-selling ‘Waverley’ novels. Scott created a Scotland of noble deeds and swashbuckling heroes, and Abbotsford, built near the site of the Battle of Melrose, was a mansion to match his vision, and a meeting
Country house weekend October 2013 Details available October 2012 Contact us to register your interest
Edinburgh Festival August 2013 Details available March 2013 Contact us to register your interest
Abbotsford, mid-19th-century steel engraving.
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Throughout the Middle Ages, the demarcation between England and Scotland was a matter of incessant dispute, the turbulence of the times expressed by the remains of fortifications and of powerful religious foundations. The majestic ruins of Scotland’s great abbey churches – Jedburgh, Dryburgh, and Melrose (where the heart of Robert the Bruce lies in a leaden casket) – are a memorable feature of the tour.
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place for the greatest figures of the age. The template for the Scottish ‘Baronial’ style, the exterior is encrusted with sculpted stones from mediaeval ruins, the interiors hung with heraldry and arms. While the need for fortifications receded with the first Stuart king, castle imagery remained a constant. At Georgian Mellerstain, the family home of the Earls of Haddington, Scotland’s finest architect, Robert Adam,
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Scotland: the Borders continued
created an elegant battlemented conceit, the first in his ‘castle style’, soon to be replicated throughout the country. The Borders are as rich in art and artefacts as they are in architecture, and the ducal mansions at Bowhill, the Duke of Buccleuch’s 46,000-acre estate, and Floors, the castellated fantasy belonging to the Duke of Roxburghe, boast exceptional collections of paintings, silver, porcelain and furniture. At Manderston, a no-expense-spared Edwardian country house near Berwick on Tweed, visitors can enjoy the only silver staircase in the world. Garden visits complete the picture of this mellow landscape, threaded with rivers famous for their fishing and which powered the Scottish textile industry, the region’s source of wealth. There are visits to the arboretum of the Royal Botanic Gardens Edinburgh at Dawyck, the Japanese inspired valley at Stobo, a secret gem and a complete contrast to the more urban residential garden at Inveresk in the Georgian outskirts of Edinburgh.
Itinerary Day 1: Edinburgh. The coach leaves Edinburgh Airport at 2.00pm and Edinburgh Waverley Station at 2.45pm. Stop at Inveresk Lodge Garden, a surprising haven in a Georgian hamlet on the outskirts of Edinburgh. Continue to the Roxburghe Country House Hotel where all six nights are spent. Day 2: Manderston, Paxton. Built in the late 18th century, Manderston was completely
rebuilt in the early 1900s with breathtaking ‘Adam Revival’ interiors. Paxton House, designed by John Adam in grand 18thcentury Palladian style and almost untouched, houses paintings from the National Galleries of Scotland and a remarkable collection of Chippendale furniture original to the house. Day 3: Bowhill House, Melrose, Dryburgh. Bowhill House is one of the three family seats of the Dukes of Buccleuch and has been in the family of the Montagu-Douglas-Scotts since the mid 18th century. It contains an outstanding collection of paintings, decorative arts and furniture. Contrasting with its opulence, the ruins of the great mediaeval abbeys of Melrose and Dryburgh serve as a reminder of the former wealth and power of religious orders destroyed in the Reformation. Day 4: Mellerstain, Floors Castle. Unique in being built by both William Adam and his son Robert, Mellerstain House has some of the finest Adam interiors, with a classic enfilade of rooms, exquisite plasterwork and a magnificent Great Gallery. Floors Castle, the largest inhabited house in Scotland, is on a grand scale. Started by William Adam and built for the first Duke of Roxburghe in the 1720s, it was given the fairytale touch in the 19th century and houses tapestries, art and antiques collected through three centuries. Day 5: Hawick, Jedburgh, Monteviot House Gardens. A brief visit to Hawick illustrates the former source of wealth of the Borders, the textile industries based on the lush pasturelands
Melrose Abbey, steel engraving c. 1860 from Gazetteer of the World Vol.V.
for the sheep and the tumbling rivers for water power. In the pretty market town of Jedburgh the Romanesque walls of the Augustinian Abbey survive. Monteviot House has 30 acres of gardens in a variety of styles benefitting from the Borders climate. Day 6: Traquair, Dawyck, Stobo. One of the most romantic houses in the Borders, Traquair is an almost untouched 16th- and 17thcentury Scottish castle house, a high Catholic stronghold still lived in by a royal Stuart descendant. Dawyck arboretum, an offshoot of the Royal Botanic Garden in Edinburgh, takes advantage of an inland climate, while Stobo, by contrast, is a secret Japanese valley. Day 7. Abbotsford. Built on the banks of the River Tweed by the novelist, poet and man of letters Sir Walter Scott, Abbotsford has become an atmospheric shrine full of Scott’s memorabilia. His interpretations of Scottish history earned him a worldwide reputation still intact today. Return to Edinburgh Waverley Station by 3.00pm and Edinburgh Airport by 4.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,180 (deposit £200). This includes: private coach travel; hotel accommodation; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 5 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £340 (double room for sole use). Hotel: The Roxburghe Country House Hotel, based in an 18th-century manor house, is set in the grounds of the 50,000 acre Roxburghe Estate. The hotel has a traditional décor and public rooms are comfortable and pleasant. Service is excellent. Bedrooms in the main house have a country house décor whilst those in the courtyard are more contemporary. Bedrooms include all mod cons. There is a good restaurant and lovely garden. How strenuous? A lot of walking and standing in gardens and houses. Paths are often uneven so sure-footedness is essential. Quite a lot of time is spent on the coach on narrow, country roads. Average distance by coach per day: 55 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Looking for the rest of the UK? See pages 24– 39 for England and pages 204–205 for Wales.
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Edinburgh at Christmas Edinburgh Castle, from Greyfriar’s churchyard, wood engraving after a drawing by Samuel Read, from Leaves from a sketchbook, 1875.
22–27 December 2012 (mz 447) 5 nights • £1,980 Lecturer: Gail Bent A new tour for 2012. Architecturally one of the best-stocked cities in Britain, Edinburgh also has museums and collections of international significance. A selective programme of walks and visits and talks by an architectural historian. Stay at the 5-star Balmoral on Princes Street. There are few cities with a more dramatic topography than Edinburgh, the volcanic crags of Castle Rock and Arthur’s Seat forming the famous skyline above an equally famous plateau. And few cities have a centre comprising two such very different parts, side by side, and each among the finest of its kind. Architecturally, Edinburgh is one of the most diverse and rewarding cities in Europe. The higgledy-piggledy Old Town, tumbling down the hill below the mighty Castle, remains essentially mediaeval in layout and fabric, a dense accumulation of variegated buildings without peer in the British Isles. The contrast with the New Town is total: a consistently Neo-Classical, stringently planned eighteenthcentury enclave laid out with regularity, symmetry and spatial generosity. Busy Princes Street is the interface, a largely Victorian boulevard. The wealth of historic buildings, museums and art galleries exceeds that of all but a few capitals of a country of its size. Edinburgh is enjoying something of a renaissance, and most of the museums, major and minor, have benefitted hugely from renovation and extension in the last couple of decades. The tour is enhanced by special arrangements to see places which are not generally accessible, or out of usual visiting hours. The hotel is the Balmoral, belonging to the elite Rocco Forte group and perhaps the best in Edinburgh. Formerly the North British, it is built over Waverley Station, has a frontage on Princes Street and enjoys views of Edinburgh Castle.
Itinerary Day 1. Assemble at the hotel and leave on foot at 2.30pm for a visit to Edinburgh Castle. Scotland’s premier ancient monument, though the army still has a presence there, it incorporates building from the 12th century to the 20th and has a range of displays including the Crown Jewels (‘the Honours of Scotland’). Return to the hotel for dinner. Day 2. In lovely countryside an hour south of Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Edinburgh, close to the River Tweed, Traquair House is an excellent example of 16th- and 17th-century architecture, and Scotland’s oldest inhabited house. Opened specially for us, there is a tour and lunch in the dining room. Back in Edinburgh, a short walk includes the High Kirk of St Giles, a 15th-century Gothic church, where there is a concert at 6.00pm. Day 3. Recent renovation has transformed the National Portrait Gallery, revealing its late Victorian magnificence while creating an exciting introduction to Scottish history. Housed in a classical masterpiece by William Playfair (1828), the collection of Old Master painting in the Scottish National Gallery is among the finest in the world, spanning all schools from 15th-century Flemish to PostImpressionist. Robert Adam’s dome in Register House is his largest room. Day 4, Christmas Day. The morning is free. There are several services to choose from, and many walking possibilities. After lunch, walk up Calton Hill and see an assembly of monuments including the National Monument, a reproduction of the Parthenon (Edinburgh: ‘the Athens of the North’.) Day 5. A morning exploration of the Old Town, a dense mass of narrow streets and alleys spreading either side of the Royal Mile which leads down from the Castle to Holyroodhouse. National Museums Scotland is an amalgamation of two institutions, one a presentation of the history of Scotland through many objects and pictures in a 1990s architectural masterpiece, the other an eclectic mix of items both local and exotic in a renovated Victorian building.
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Day 6. The Palace of Holyroodhouse, still a royal residence, dates largely to the reign of Charles II and has fine interiors and works of art. Adjacent is the Queen’s Gallery, which displays items from the royal collection. The tour ends at the hotel by 12.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,980 (deposit £200). This includes: accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 2 lunches and 4 dinners with wine, water and coffee; admissions to museums and sites; tips for drivers, waiters; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £250 (double room for single occupancy). Hotel: the historic 5-star Balmoral, belonging to the Rocco Forte group, enjoys a prime location at the corner of North Bridge and Princes Street. Elegant and comfortable, there are welcoming public areas, excellent service and spacious rooms with restrained décor. There are two restaurants.
Weather: temperatures will be low, particularly at the beginning and end of the day and snow is possible. Music: we hope to be able to offer the opportunity to book music tickets when the programmes are published. Details will be sent approximately two months before departure. How strenuous? Most visits are on foot and there is quite a lot of standing in galleries and houses. To participate in the walks you will need to be able to walk at about 3 mph for at least half an hour at a time. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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The Pyrenees Catalonia, Rousillon & the Comte de Foix 7–16 May 2013 (mz 553) 10 days • £2,830 Lecturer: John McNeill Thorough survey of Romanesque and Gothic architecture. Delves deep into the Pyrenees but also takes in low-lying and coastal Catalonia. Scenically and architecturally stunning, but a lot of driving on minor roads, and five hotels. During the Middle Ages the Pyrenees supported two very distinct ways of life: the fundamentally urban civilisation of the coastal reaches, mercantile in ambition and Mediterranean in outlook, and that unsung, tireless village culture which flourished in the high places and valleys inland. Here in the remote mountains a rural and essentially feudal Christianity emerged, consecrated in innumerable small Romanesque churches and largely immune to news from elsewhere. The mediator was monasticism, introduced uncertainly at first but becoming in fact a vehicle of political will under the mighty Oliba of Cerdagne. Oliba’s early foundations, at Ripoll, Cuxa and Canigou, embody this ambition and are among the seminal essays of Romanesque architecture in Europe. They found a reflection in the parish churches of the High Pyrenees and, moderated by the vernacular of Catalonia,
resulted in some of the most serene and beautiful buildings of twelfth-century Europe. Even more remarkably, these churches were largely spared the calamities of the post– Renaissance period, leaving their glorious marble sculpture intact and preserving, albeit often in museums, the finest of their paintings. These early achievements were enhanced by the arrival of the Cistercians, invited by Count Ramón Berenguer to fill the void left by the expulsion of the Moors from south–western Catalonia, and their monasteries at Poblet and Santes Creus remain even more complete than Fontenay or Fossanova. Neither were the cities neglected: ever more responsive to distant developments, Girona, Barcelona and Lérida were provided with cathedrals of the first rank. Shortly after came that extraordinary flowering of late mediaeval mercantile culture which transformed the previously neglected market towns of the north, St-Girons, Foix and StBertrand-de-Comminges.
Itinerary Day 1: Terrassa, Vic. Fly at c. 11.15am from London Heathrow to Barcelona. Drive to Terrassa, a stunning and largely early medieval precinct arranged around three churches. Continue to Vic for the night. Day 2: Ripoll, San Juan de Las Abadesas, Arles-sur-Tech, Collioure. Oliba’s astonishing monastery of Sta Maria at Ripoll has one of the
greatest libraries of early mediaeval Europe. San Juan de las Abadesas is a Romanesque church founded in 887 by Count Wilfred the Hairy as a Benedictine nunnery. Cross into France to Arles-sur-Tech, famed for its tranquil cloister and 12th-cent. sculpture. Continue to the pretty seaside town of Collioure for the first of four nights. Day 3: Serrabone, St Martin de Canigou, St Michel de Cuxa. Drive in the morning into the foothills of the Canigou Massif. Serrabone abbey church has a magnificent 12th-cent. carved choral tribune in pink marble. The extraordinary Benedictine monastery of St Martin du Canigou is pinned against a steep spur of Mont Canigou. St Michel de Cuxa, important early mediaeval foundation, was gloriously refurbished by Abbot Oliba during the early 11th cent. Overnight Collioure. Day 4: Girona, St Pedro de Roda. Back into Spain to visit Girona. The Gothic Cathedral, perhaps the finest in Catalonia, houses important illuminated manuscripts and tapestries in the chapterhouse. The early Romanesque abbey of San Pedro de Roda has wonderful views of the coast. Day 5: St Martin de Fenollar, Elne. The Romanesque chapel at Fenollar has tiny spaces that carry the most complete cycle of mediaeval wall paintings to have survived in French Catalonia. See also the fortified cathedral at Elne and fine Pyrenean marble sculpture at St Genis des Fontaines. Free time in Collioure. Day 6: Montségur, Foix. Drive in the morning drive beneath the northern flank of the Pyrenees to Montségur, the great Cathar redoubt and scene of the virtual obliteration of the Albigensian cause. There is an arresting three-towered feudal castle at Foix and a spacious late mediaeval preaching church at St Volusien. Overnight St Girons. Day 7: St Lizier, St Bertrand de Comminges, Arties. The Cathedral of St Lizier has a Romanesque cloister and a 14th-cent. brick tower. St Bertrand de Comminges is aisleless and majestic and perhaps the most accomplished late mediaeval building in the High Pyrenees. Drive via the secluded Aran Valley to Arties. Walk over the bridge to the 12th-cent. Sta Maria with a fine sculpted north door and baptismal font. Overnight Arties. Day 8: Vielha, Taull, Val de Boí. See remote Romanesque churches of the high mountains. Vielha is abundant with Romanesque sculpture. Taull has a superb pair of 12th-cent. churches: San Climent, with columnar nave and slender bell-tower and Sta Maria has a bell-tower to outdo even that of its great neighbour. San Joan de Boí has a small and beautifully proportioned
Girona, cloister of San Pedro, engraving c. 1860
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Monastery of Poblet, late-18th-century engraving.
single-apsed church. First of two nights in Lérida. Day 9: Lérida, Poblet, Santes Creus. Lérida Cathedral is a sprawling complex of Gothic architecture, painting and sculpture. Poblet has a breathtaking Cistercian church containing tombs of the mediaeval monarchs of Aragón and a magnificent group of conventual buildings. Santes Creus has a slightly later Cistercian abbey with a superbly sculpted cloister and chapter house. Day 10: Barcelona. Drive to Barcelona and visit the Museum of Catalan Art; a superb collection of mediaeval painting and sculpture from many of the churches visited on the tour. The mid afternoon flight from Barcelona arrives at Heathrow at c. 5.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,830 (deposit £300). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways flights (Airbus 320); travel by private Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
coach; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 7 dinners, with wine, water and coffee; all admissions; all tips for waiters and drivers; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Supplement for a superior room in Collioure £150 (price per room, two sharing). Single supplement £260 or £420 (superior room in Collioure). Price without flights £2,660. Hotels: In Vic (1 night): an excellent 4-star Parador. In Collioure (4 nights) a comfortable 4-star overlooking the bay. In St Girons (1 night): a splendid 3-star French coaching house with good restaurant. In Arties (1 night): a 4-star Parador in the Arán Valley. In Lérida (2 nights): a centrally located 4-star, member of a reliable Spanish chain.
Tours with John McNeill Mediaeval East Anglia............................27 Mediaeval Burgundy...............................57 Dark Age Brilliance (2012, full)...........108 Normans in the South...........................135 The Pyrenees..........................................168 The Road to Santiago............................171
How strenuous? A fairly full tour with a lot of driving, at times on minor roads, and walking, some of it over steep terrain. Average distance by coach per day: 96 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
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For lecturers’ biographies see page 206.
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Gastronomic Catalonia Fine food & wine, art & architecture 16–22 September 2013 (ma 721) 7 days • £2,660 Lecturer: Gijs van Hensbergen Eat well, drink well: 3-Michelin-starred lunches, the second best restaurant in the world, award-winning chefs and quality wine producers. Sightseeing ranges from mediaeval to Modernist art and architecture. Contrasting bases: the centre of Barcelona and a converted farmhouse outside Figueres. Also includes the lesser-visited city of Girona, and a day in the northernmost reaches of the region, crossing into France.
Americas introduced the key ingredients for the Provençal and Catalan table: tomato, potato and paprika. The Barcelona food markets are among the most beautiful and enticing in the world. Set out in cartwheels under ceilings of Art Nouveau stained glass, the stalls fan out from their fresh fish hub. Marble sinks soak the milky salt cod; cornucopia of fruit and vegetables are displayed with the subtlety of a still-life; butchers offer specialities and recipes upon request; the mushroom man has thirty varieties, fresh and dried. At the outer edges are the dealers in frutos secos and artisan cheeses that never find their way out of Catalonia. In the city of the exuberance and riotous colour of Antoni Gaudí’s architectural confections, it is but a little way to the tour
Pellicer, also the chef at one of the most up to date establishments in town. The brothers Joan and Josep Roca are the masterminds behind El Celler de Can Roca with 3 Michelin stars and voted second best restaurant in the world in 2012. However, there is far more to Catalonia than Barcelona, and historically the region extends into France. There are the fishing ports and the countryside, the Pyrenees and the Vallées Orientales, and the wines: Priorato, rich and tannin-steeped; Cavas which demonstrate brilliance and clarity; sweet Moscatel, peasant foil for the great Gewürztraminer experiments of the last decade; Penedès reds, as good with meat as slightly chilled with fish. Catalan wine is enjoying an extraordinary renaissance.
Itinerary Day 1: Barcelona. Fly at c. 11.15am from London Heathrow to Barcelona, capital of Catalonia and cosmopolitan market place. Take an afternoon walk and visit a chocolate emporium. Dinner has a 1900s theme with recipes from the gent de bé – Barcelona’s legendary good families – at the neo-Baroque Casa Calvet designed by Gaudí. First of three nights in Barcelona. Day 2: Barcelona. Spend the morning in the Art Nouveau Boquería with its extraordinary displays of fresh produce. The Barri Gotíc is the most complete surviving Gothic quarter in Europe and houses some of the finest eating establishments and food suppliers in Catalonia. A wine tasting includes rarities from the Priorato and Penedès. In the afternoon visit the Palau de la Música, the highly ornate concert hall designed by Gaudí contemporary Domenech i Montaner. Dinner is a tapas walk.
Barcelona, La Rambla, engraving c. 1890.
Food is at the very core of Catalan existence, and the glorious variety of Catalan gastronomy reflects both the universal passion for food and the diverse cultural history of Catalonia. Food culture, husbandry and interest in medical and dietary matters reach back to the period when the Greeks first settled at Empúries to worship the healing image of Asklepios. The Carthaginians followed, bringing lentils, chickpeas and fava beans; the Romans introduced the vine and olive. Four centuries of Moorish domination brought a passion for sweetmeats, spices and aubergine. The Catalan larder expanded further in the late Middle Ages when control over Mediterranean trade routes brought pasta from Naples and the discovery of the
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de force of a zarzuela fish stew, shot through with a firework display of saffron, bright red peppers and the creamy smooth burnt allioli sauce. The mar i muntanya dishes – the original surf and turf – marry together a remarkable blend of game, fowl or rabbit with langouste, enriched with a subtle chocolate sauce. The pioneering Nouvelle Catalan cuisine offer new tastes and complex techniques which find their echo deep into France, even to the Lycée Palace. The chefs that create them are some of the most talked about in and outside Barcelona. Sergi Arola was Spanish chef of the year 2004 and is the former assistant of Ferrán Adriá. The late Santi Santamaría was the first Catalan chef to be awarded 3 Michelin stars; his restaurant Can Fabes is now run by Xavier
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Day 3: Barcelona. On the slopes of Montjuïc are the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya, which houses the greatest collection of Romanesque frescoes in the world, plus fine Gothic and modern collections, and the Mies van der Rohe Pavilion. Lunch is in the rooftop restaurant of the stylish 5-star Hotel Arts where Sergi Arola (chef of the year, 2004) has added yet another twist to contemporary Catalan cooking. In the afternoon visit Gaudí’s La Pedrera building of 1906–10. Day 4: Barcelona, Sant Celoni, Mas Pau. Take a morning walk in Gaudí’s Parc Güell before leaving Barcelona. Lunch is in the small town of Sant Celoni, in the late Santi Santamaria’s 3-Michelin-starred restaurant, now run by Xavier Pellicer. Visit the 16th-cent. manor house of Mas Pau. First of three nights in Mas Pau. Day 5: Girona. Girona has a compact b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
The road to Santiago The pilgrimage route through Northern Spain mediaeval Jewish quarter and Gothic cathedral towering over the river. Important illuminated manuscripts and tapestries are displayed in the chapterhouse. Lunch is at El Celler de Can Roca, recently voted second best restaurant in the world. Day 6: Collioure (France), La Selva de Mar, Mas Pau (Spain). Drive into France to the pretty port of Collioure, a favoured retreat for Matisse and the Fauves. Light lunch of anchovies, a key local industry. Return to Spain, and the coastal town of La Selva de Mar to visit the vineyard of one of the Empordà’s finer producers. Dinner in the Michelin-starred restaurant at Mas Pau, home to chef Xavier Sagrista, founding partner of El Bulli with Ferran Adrià. Day 7: Figueres. Free time in Figueres to visit the Dalí museum. Drive south to Barcelona for the flight to Heathrow, arriving c. 5.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,660 (deposit £250). This includes: flights (economy class) with British Airways (Airbus A320 jet) travel by private coach and some use of the metro in Barcelona; hotel accommodation; breakfasts, 4 lunches and 5 dinners (incl. 3 light ones), with wine, water, coffee; all wine and food tastings; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £220. Price without flights £2,440. Hotels: in Barcelona (3 nights): a 4-star hotel very well placed for buildings by Gaudí; rooms are modern, comfortable but on the small side; rooftop terrace and Michelin-starred restaurant (the chef is Basque – Martín Berasategui – and so this is an option for an independent meal). Near Figueres (3 nights): converted 16th-cent. farmhouse set in gardens; renowned for its restaurant with comfortable rooms alongside. How strenuous? Meals can be long and large and so expect some late nights. A lot of walking in Barcelona, some of it over uneven paving. Average distance by coach per day: 52 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Opera in Spain April 2013 Details available autumn 2012 Contact us to register your interest Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Santiago Cathedral, Pórtico de la Gloria, wood engraving c. 1970.
30 August–11 September 2013 (mz 669) 13 days • £3,420 Lecturer: John McNeill One of the great historic journeys of the world. Includes all the major sites and deviates to many lesser-known ones. An architectural pilgrimage by coach – not a spiritual one on foot – for lovers of Romanesque and Gothic. ‘By land it is the greatest journey an Englishman may go.’ So wrote Andrew Boorde, physician and former bishop of Chichester in his 1542 First Book of the Introduction of
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Knowledge. The road to Santiago has rarely been without plaudits, from Godescalc, bishop of Le Puy in 950, to Paula Gerson, scholar and sceptic in 1993. What was claimed to be the tomb of St James was discovered in 813 in the wilds of Galicia and soon began to attract pilgrims. Roads and bridges were built along the approaches which soon coalesced into a standard route. Hospices and monasteries were founded and secondary shrines became established. Variously described as the Camino Francés, the Milky Way and the Road Beneath the Stars, the route exerted a pull which was pre-Christian, but the discovery of an Apostolic tomb and the renewal of the infrastructure conspired to make Santiago the
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The Road to Santiago continued
most celebrated of all mediaeval journeys – a byword for Chaucer’s pilgrims, a destination to vie with Jerusalem and Rome. The funds poured into such an enterprise were immense, resulting in an incomparable range of mediaeval – particularly Romanesque – and Renaissance monuments. With cathedrals such as Burgos, León and Santiago, monasteries of the calibre of San Millán de la Cogolla, Silos and Leyre, the paintings of Jaca and Miraflores, the metalwork of San Isidoro, the textiles of Las Huelgas, the road to Santiago does not want for masterpieces. But equally impressive is the landscape, a memorial backdrop through which all must pass – the limestone cliffs and tumbling watercourses of Aragón and Navarra, the forests of chestnut, oak and acacia of the Rioja, the vast wheat fields of Castile and the green, slate-divided fields of Galicia. We have two itineraries in 2013: The Road to Santiago – travelling by coach – and Walking to Santiago. They are markedly different in focus; the former is very much an architectural tour, and the latter a walking tour. But both are journeys in which you are conscious always of participating in a thousand-year-old flow of humankind which constitutes one of the most powerfully felt shared experiences in the spiritual and aesthetic history of Europe.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 5.15pm from London Heathrow to Bilbao. Drive to Argómaniz (80 km), arriving at c.10.00pm. Overnight Argómaniz. Day 2: Pamplona, Roncesvalles. The day is spent in the foothills of the Pyrenees. Reflecting its proximity to France, Pamplona cathedral has a cloister which constitutes perhaps the finest achievement of High Gothic in Spain. Roncesvalles Pass was scene of the famed rearguard action of Charlemagne’s paladin Roland, and has a renowned pilgrims’ church and hospice. Drive through the spectacular gorge of the Urrobi river. First of two nights in Sos del Rey Católico. Day 3: Sos del Rey Católico, Sangüesa, Leyre, Jaca. At Sos, the church of San Esteban has a frescoed apse. Sta María la Real in the little town of Sangüesa has superb architectural sculpture, including some by a craftsman from Burgundy. The monastery of San Salvador de Leyre maintains Gregorian offices in a fascinating church with a good crypt and western portal. Jaca, below the Somport pass, has a Romanesque cathedral with a magnificent collection of mediaeval wall paintings. Overnight Sos del Rey Católico.
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Day 4: Eunate, Puente la Reina. At Eunate a mysterious round chapel with encircling arcade, rising from the midst of a cornfield. Puente la Reina is the point where pilgrim roads from France converged, and is equipped with hospices, churches and an amazing bridge. Overnight Sto Domingo de la Calzada. Day 5: Nájera, Sto Domingo de la Calzada, Burgos. See the Royal tombs at Santa María la Real in Nájera. Sto Domingo cathedral has Renaissance and Baroque accretions, and a cockerel still crows over the shrine of the saint. Arrive at Burgos, which grew up at the foot of the fortress of the Kings of Castile. The magnificent cathedral is crowned by a multitude of pinnacles and open-work spires and combines French and German styles; remarkable vaults, 16th-cent. choir stalls and a wealth of sculpture. Two nights in Burgos. Day 6: Burgos, Quintanilla de las Viñas, Sto Domingo de Silos. Free morning in Burgos. In the afternoon drive to the Visigothic chapel at Quintanilla de las Viñas. Sto Domingo de Silos is the largest and finest Romanesque monastery in Spain, and has an epoch-making 12th-cent. cloister with magnificent sculpture. Overnight Burgos. Day 7: Burgos, San Miguel de la Escalada. The Carthusian monastery and royal mausoleum of Miraflores has superb 15th-cent. sculpture by Gil de Siloé. Just outside Burgos is the Early Gothic convent of Las Huelgas Reales, a place of royal burial. Pressing westwards, we stop at San Miguel de la Escalada, an elegant Mozarabic gem. First of two nights in León. Day 8: León. Former capital of the ancient kingdom of León, the city has many outstanding mediaeval buildings. The royal pantheon of San Isidoro is one of the first, and finest, Romanesque buildings in Spain, with important sculptures. The cathedral is truly superb: Rayonnant Gothic, with impressive stained glass. The monastery of San Marcos (our hotel) has a splendidly exuberant Plateresque façade. Overnight León. Day 9: Lena, Orbigo, Villafranca del Bierzo. Drive through the Puerto de Pájares (mountain pass) to Sta Cristina de Lena, an exquisite 9th-cent. church. Return to the camino via the valley of the Luna. Puente de Orbigo is a 13th-cent. bridge which carried pilgrims over the River Orbigo. Villafranca del Bierzo was an ancient haunt of hermits and anchorites and subsequently studded with churches and hospices. Overnight Villafranca del Bierzo.
guarding the bridge over the Miño and Vilar de Donas, decayed and evocative knights’ church. Finally: Santiago de Compostela, goal of the pilgrimage. Three nights in Santiago. Day 11: Santiago de Compostela. The morning is dedicated to the great pilgrimage church, the shrine of St James, one of the most impressive of all Romanesque churches; also outstanding treasuries. Explore the university quarter and the narrow picturesque streets and visit Sta María del Sar, where walls splayed and buttressed support a charming Romanesque church against its cloister. Overnight Santiago. Day 12: Santiago de Compostela. Free day. Day 13: Santiago de Compostela. Drive around midday to La Coruña. The flight arrives in London Heathrow at c. 4.45pm.
Practicalities Price: £3,420 (deposit £350). This includes: air travel (economy class) on Vueling flights (Airbus 320); private coach; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 2 lunches and 9 dinners, with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips for drivers and waiters; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £390 (double room for sole use). Price without flights £3,210. Hotels: in Argómaniz (1 night): 4-star parador out of town, simple rooms. In Sos del Rey Católico (2 nights): 4-star parador with views of surrounding countryside. In Sto Domingo de la Calzada (1 night): 4-star parador in the heart of town. In Burgos (2 nights): 4-star hotel in the centre of town. In León (2 nights): 5-star parador in grandiose Plateresque pilgrim hostel. In Villafranca del Bierzo (1 night): 4-star parador, recently renovated. In Santiago de Compostela (3 nights): 5-star parador, for centuries the abode of the grander pilgrims. Most paradors insist on half-board so dinners are mainly in hotels. How strenuous? We stress that this is a long tour with a lot of coach travel, seven hotels and a lot of walking, often on uneven ground. The tour would not be suitable for anyone who has difficulties with everyday walking and stairclimbing. Average distance by coach per day: 85 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
Day 10: Villafranca to Santiago. Three churches punctuate the final stretch of the journey: O Cebreiro, site of a great Eucharistic miracle, Portomarín, a Templar foundation
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Walking to Santiago on foot for selected sections of the pilgrims’ way 4–15 June 2013 (mz 590) 12 days • £2,980 Leaders: Adam Hopkins & Gaby Macphedran 10–21 September 2013 (ma 682) 12 days • £2,980 Leaders: Adam Hopkins & Gaby Macphedran The last great pilgrimage route in Christendom which still attracts walkers; scenically wonderful with much fine architecture. Selected sections from the Pyrenees through northern Spain to Santiago de Compostela. Walking in comfort: good hotels; luggage transferred separately; maximum of 15 participants. Still one of the most splendid walking routes in Europe, the Camino de Santiago runs almost 500 miles across northern Spain to the supposed tomb of St James, Sant Iago. Normally, the journey takes a month on foot. We are setting out to walk the highlights in twelve days, taking in the most historically charged and beautiful sections.
For earlier pilgrims, the lure was a reduction of the soul’s time in Purgatory; now the motives are more usually historical and cultural, and sometimes also deeply personal. Religious commitment is less in evidence. But for many who undertake the magnificent walk there is also a spiritual dimension. Asceticism is not a necessary ingredient. Instead of staying in bunk beds in pilgrim hostels, we repose in hotels, some among Spain’s finest. Instead of carrying huge packs with all our necessities, we carry only our own day sacks while the luggage moves by road. Our vehicles intersect with walkers every two or three hours, allowing respite to anyone who needs to ride. We eat well, often picnicking in deep country, and try some of the fine wines grown along the route. But as with all pilgrimages this is a linear walk, involving a new hotel each night except on two rest days. We are like pilgrims, rather than tourists, visiting monuments along the route and what time and tiredness allow at the end of the day’s walking. There will be interpretative commentary by the lecturer and an introduction to the major buildings. But the experience of walking the camino is what is essentially on offer, along a route which has for centuries compelled the imagination.
Itinerary Day 1: Biarritz to Roncesvalles. Leave from Biarritz Airport following the arrival of the flight from London Stansted (currently 3.05pm) (flights are not included – see ‘Practicalities’). Drive to Roncesvalles for the night. Day 2: Roncesvalles to Lintzoáin/Erro, total walk 16 km. Weather permitting, we start at the summit of the pass and drop down on foot to Roncesvalles, traditional starting point of the pilgrimage in Spain. It has a fine collegiate church preserving memories of Sancho the Strong of Navarre. From here, walk downward through rustic, gentle sub-Pyrenean landscape and stately stone-built villages. After a picnic lunch, drive to the Monasterio de Yuso at S. Millán de la Cogolla. Overnight S. Millán. Day 3: Nájera to Santo Domingo de la Calzada, total walk 20 km. Drive to Nájera, another of the burial places of the royal house of Navarre. Climb through red sandstone with vines in rocky corners, through varied irrigated crops and out into rolling wheat country with mountains lying north and south - this is a good day for striding out. Lunch is in a village café. Afternoon walkers continue to Santo
Burgos, copper engraving c. 1700.
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Domingo de la Calzada where there is time to visit the cathedral. Overnight Sto Domingo.
Procession leaving Santiago Cathedral, after Muirhead Bone 1938.
Day 4: Villafranca Montes de Oca to Agés, total walk 15.8 km. Begin with an hour’s walk uphill into mildly mountainous country, passing a disturbing monument to victims of Civil War assassination. Cross a plateau and continue through pine and oak forest to a beautiful valley enclosing the monastery of San Juán de Ortega (fine Gothic church). Picnic in the woods. Afternoon walkers continue to the village of Agés. Drive to Burgos for the first of two nights. Day 5: Burgos, rest day. Rest, nurse feet and loiter in this Castilian city rich in memories of El Cid and mediaeval pilgrimage, Wellington and Franco. There is time to see the magnificent cathedral, the charterhouse of Miraflores (superb sculpture by Gil de Siloé), and the monastery of Las Huelgas (fine architecture and images relevant to the camino). Day 6: León, rest day. Drive to León with its fine Gothic cathedral and Spain’s finest stained glass. See also the church of San Isidoro, with unique Romanesque paintings. The Parador of S. Marcos, our hotel, is one of the major historic buildings of the pilgrim route Overnight León. Day 7: Puente de Orbigo to Astorga, total walk 18 km. About one hour into the walk, we make a modest ascent and suddenly the plains are over. There are two or three small climbs this morning through remote-feeling countryside and wheat fields ending in shady corners under small oaks. We picnic with views down to the cathedral of Astorga. Stalwarts continue the walk into town. Here, the bishop’s palace was designed by Gaudí and there is a charming town hall. Overnight Astorga. Day 8: Astorga to Rabanal del Camino, total walk 20.6 km. Walk out through Astorga’s old town. An hour and a half brings us to wellpreserved Castrillo de Polvazares, former centre of the interesting Maragatos tribe, obscure in its origins but throughout history Northern Spain’s muleteers. A mix of path and lane leads slowly upwards with views opening into the mountains of León. After a picnic lunch continue walking to Rabanal del Camino. Drive from here to Villafranca del Bierzo for the night. Day 9: Triacastela to Sarriá, total walk 18.5 km. Drive to Triacastela via O Cabreiro, first port of call in Galicia for pilgrims, with Celtic buildings and ancient church. The walk starts low and climbs through Galician-green valley and into country of tiny hamlets where cows chew the cud in dark mediaeval sheds. Sunken tracks, ferns and ivy abound and there is later a
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fine upland feel. After a picnic lunch we begin a slow descent to Sarriá. Overnight Sarriá.
at the time of booking, or you can make the bookings yourself using the details below.
Day 10. Phase 1: Sarriá to Ferreiros. Phase 2: Monte del Gozo to Santiago de Compostela. Total walk 17.5 km. Walk 13 km from Sarriá to Ferreiros and take a picnic lunch before driving on to Monte del Gozo. Here pilgrims once fell to their knees at the first view of the cathedral spires of Santiago (harder to see now through eucalyptus). Walk a further 4.5 km through suburbs into increasingly ancient city centre and right into the Parador, another important and beautiful historic building. First of two nights in Santiago de Compostela.
We provide airport transfers around the following flights:
Day 11: Santiago. The cathedral is a Romanesque masterpiece with a magnificent carved portal. Here those who wish may attend Pilgrim’s mass at midday. The rest of the day is free. Day 12. Drive to La Coruña Airport in time for the flight to London Heathrow (currently departing at 2.40pm).
Practicalities Price: £2,980 (deposit £300). This includes: airport transfers from Biarritz (day 1) and to La Coruña (day 12) and all other road travel by comfortable nine-seater vans (flights are not included); accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 8 lunches (6 are picnics) and 8 dinners, with wine, water and coffee; admission costs; tips for waiters; the services of the lecturer and tour manager and additional driver/baggage handler. Single supplement £340 (double room for single use). Flights are not included in the cost of the tour as the most convenient outbound flight is with Ryanair and we cannot make a booking without knowing the passenger name. We can book flights on your behalf, quoting the fare
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Day 1: depart London Stansted 12.15, arrive Biarritz 15.05 (Ryanair flight FR 372). Day 12: depart La Coruña 14.40, arrive London Heathrow 15.40 (Vueling VY 7100). Hotels: as quasi-pilgrims we lodge in a different place each night except on rest days, ranging from relatively workaday to very grand: Roncesvalles (1 night): recently opened 3-star hotel in an 18th-cent. building. In S. Millán de la Cogolla (1 night): 4-star hotel beside the monastery of Yuso. In Sto Domingo de la Calzada (1 night): 4-star parador, former mediaeval pilgrim hospital. In Burgos (2 nights): 4-star hotel in a converted palace. In León (1 night): 5-star parador in grandiose Plateresque pilgrim hostel. In Astorga (1 night): 3-star modern hotel in the centre. In Villafranca del Bierzo (1 night): a 4-star, newly-refurbished parador. In Sarriá (1 night): a modern hotel near river. In Santiago de Compostela (2 nights): 5-star parador, in the former pilgrims’ hospital. How strenuous? We cover up to 82 miles of the 500-mile route with an average of 10–14 miles walking per day. Fitness is essential; do not book this tour in order to get fit. Participants should be used to walking cross-country, uphill and down and be able to walk pleasurably for several hours at a time. Safety and comfort are our main concern and there are opportunities to retire. Packing: with limited luggage space in vans and almost daily hotel changes it is essential to pack light and small. Dress is informal throughout. Small group: between 7 and 15 participants. b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Castile & León Ancient kingdoms in the heart of Spain 30 September–8 October 2013 (ma 696) 9 days • £2,420 Lecturer: Gijs van Hensbergen Spain’s most beautiful cities: Salamanca, Segovia, Avila. Architectural magnificence throughout including the cathedrals of Burgos and León. Much fine sculpture as well. Walled villages, grand monasteries, hilltop castles and a backdrop of vast, undulating landscape. Includes the Palace of El Escorial (16thcentury).
complete with battlements and 88 turrets. The 12th-cent. Basilica of San Vicente has fine sculpture. First of two nights in Salamanca. Day 2: Salamanca. Distinguished by the honey-coloured hue of its stone, Salamanca is one of the most attractive cities in Spain and home to its most prestigious university. See the magnificent 16th-century Gothic ‘New Cathedral’ and austere Romanesque ‘Old Cathedral’, the 18th-century Plaza Mayor and superb, elaborate Plateresque sculpture on the façades of the university and church of San Esteban. The University has 15th- and 16th-century quadrangles, arcaded courtyards
in Spain, with important sculptures. The cathedral is truly superb Rayonnant Gothic with impressive stained glass. The afternoon is free to visit the archaeological or contemporary art museums. Overnight León. Day 5: Palencia, Lerma, Santo Domingo de Silos. The small town of Palencia has a fine cathedral which contains sculpture by Gil de Siloé and Simon of Cologne and paintings by El Greco and Pedro Berruguete. The village of Lerma has a wealth of buildings from the early 17th century including an arcaded main square with ducal palace and the Collegiate church of San Pedro. After a lamb lunch, drive in the late
Good food: suckling pig, slow-roast lamb and kid; good wine of the Ribera de Duero. Since their fusion under one crown in the eleventh century, the ancient kingdoms of Castile and León have been responsible for some of the most emblematic periods of Spanish history. These former rival territories established themselves as the heart of Spain and exerted great influence over language, religion and culture far across the mediaeval map. Innumerable castles were built here (hence ‘Castile’) for this was the principal battleground of the Reconquista, the five-hundred-year war of attrition against the Moors which reclaimed Spain for Christendom. The region occupies much of the Meseta, the vast and austere plateau in the centre of the Iberian peninsula. Here are many of Spain’s finest cities, buildings and works of art. Lovers of Romanesque will feel particularly satisfied for there are many excellent examples of the style. Great Gothic churches are another magnificent feature, the cathedrals at León, Burgos, Segovia and Salamanca among them. French, German and English influences are to be found, though the end result is always unmistakably Spanish. Another striking aspect of the tour is the wealth of brilliant sculpture, especially of the late-mediaeval and Renaissance periods. Castles, of course, abound, and some of the defensive curtain of frontier cities such as Avila are remarkably well preserved. As well as the prominent cities, we include a number of lesser-known places, all strikingly attractive, many with outstanding buildings or works of art, all barely visited by tourists.
Sto Domingo de Silos, lithograph c. 1840.
and original lecture halls. The Convento de las Dueñas has a Plateresque portal and an irregular, two-tiered cloister.
Itinerary
Day 3: Zamora, León. On the Roman road that connected Astorga to Mérida, Zamora rose to importance during the Reconquista as a bastion on the Duero front. Much of its Romanesque architecture survives, including the cathedral of Byzantine influence. Drive to León, former capital of the ancient kingdom and visit the monastery of San Marcos (our hotel) with an exuberant Plateresque façade, magnificent late-Gothic church, Renaissance chapels and fine choir-stalls. Overnight León.
Day 1: Avila, Salamanca. Fly c. 11.00am from London Heathrow to Madrid. Drive to Avila: a fortress town built during the Reconquista, it retains its entire circuit of 11th-cent. walls
Day 4: León. A morning walk to some of the outstanding mediaeval buildings of the city. The royal pantheon of San Isidoro is one of the first, and finest, Romanesque buildings
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afternoon to Santo Domingo de Silos, which has the finest Romanesque monastery in Spain, outstanding for the sculpture of the 12thcentury cloister. First of two nights in Lerma. Day 6: Burgos, Quintanilla de las Viñas, Covarrubias. Drive to Burgos, the early capital of Castile, whose cathedral combines French and German Gothic styles and has remarkable vaults and 16th-century choir stalls. On the outskirts is the convent of Las Huelgas Reales with its important early Gothic church. Visit the Visigothic chapel at Quintanilla de las Viñas. Covarrubias is an attractive walled village with a mediaeval Colegiata containing fine tombs. Day 7: El Burgo de Osma, San Esteban de Gormaz, Segovia. El Burgo de Osma is a walled town with arcaded streets and one of
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Castile & León continued
Aragón Hidden Spain: Teruel, Zaragoza, Jaca
the finest Gothic cathedrals in Spain. At San Esteban de Gormaz see the 12th-century churches of San Miguel and Del Rivero with exterior galleries. Built on a steep-sided hill, Segovia is one of the loveliest cities in Spain and architecturally one of the most richly endowed. First of two nights in Segovia. Day 8: Segovia. Straddling the town, the remarkable Roman aqueduct is one of the biggest in Europe. See the outstanding Romanesque exteriors of San Martín, San Millán and San Esteban and the circular Templar church of La Vera Cruz. An afternoon walk includes the cathedral, a soaring Gothic structure, and the restored Alcázar (castle), dramatically perched at the prow of the hill. Day 9: El Escorial. This vast retreat-cumpalace-cum-monastery-cum-pantheon was built from 1563 to 1584 for Philip II, successfully embodying his instructions for ‘nobility without arrogance, majesty without ostentation, severity in the whole’. Fly from Madrid, arriving Heathrow at c. 5.45pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,420 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled Iberia flights (aircraft: Airbus 321); travel by private coach for transfers and excursions out of town centres; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 6 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager; hire of radio guides for better audibility of the lecturer. Single supplement £270 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £2,290. Hotels: In Salamanca (2 nights): an attractive 4-star hotel in a converted palace, close to the Cathedrals and other key sites. In León (2 nights): 5-star Parador in grandiose Plateresque building; public areas are impressive, bedrooms less so. In Lerma (2 nights): a 4-star Parador in the Ducal Palace. In Segovia (2 nights): a centrally located 4-star hotel in a converted 16th century casa-palacio. Rooms vary in size and some are small but all are well-equipped. How strenuous? This is a fairly long tour with a lot of walking in town centres, some of it on cobbled streets and uphill. It should not be undertaken by anyone who has difficulty with everyday walking and stairclimbing. Average distance by coach per day: 117 miles. Small group: this tour will operate with between 10 and 22 participants.
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The Pyrenees near Jaca, lithograph c. 1850.
1–9 October 2013 (ma 727) 9 days • £2,440 Lecturer: Adam Hopkins One of the least-visited regions of Spain and yet one of the richest in history, architecture and landscapes. Stretches from Teruel to Jaca – in the foothills of the Pyrenees. As diverse a tour as we offer with Paleolithic and Neolithic cave painting, Roman remains, Moorish palaces, Spain’s finest examples of Mudéjar, Romanesque castles and churches. Themes of military history: El Cid, Peninsular War, Civil War. Visit Goya’s birthplace and see his ‘Horrors of War’. You cannot know Spain unless you know Aragón, that former kingdom rich in fine landscape, history and architecture, including Arab works and the Arab-Christian style known as Mudéjar, here at its most extravagant and surprising. It is the swiftly-flowing River Aragón, running down from the High Pyrenees, which gave its name to one of the most dynamic
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mini-kingdoms of early mediaeval Europe. Soon Aragón advanced to meet the Moorish occupiers of the Ebro basin and wrested Zaragoza (Roman Caesar Augusta) from them. From there, it was on to smaller Teruel and the rugged sierras which flank it, to establish, in the end, a shield-shaped territory. With Catalunya, Aragón came to rule Sicily, southern Italy and most of Greece, truly a power in the Mediterranean. Later, in the fifteenth century, it became a partner for Castile in forging the identity for what we know today as Spain. But since then it has been side-lined in the political structure, enabling it, through misfortune, to retain and still convey a sense of its early origins. The landscape is as dramatic as the history. The peaks and summer pastures of the highest Pyrenees fall almost entirely within Aragón. Dropping south, the Ebro valley is like a winding oasis between deeply eroded, dry clay banks. South again lies steppe country, sometimes desert-like, turning finally to a territory of cliff and gorge. Here Neolithic man left paintings in rock shelters. The architectural legacy is outstanding. The early stonemasons and architects of Aragón, in tandem with French craftsmen on the Aragonese Pilgrims’ Way to Santiago, produced some of the most charming b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Romanesque buildings in Spain, marked by particularly engaging stone carving. The castle of Loarre is arguably Spain’s finest Romanesque military construction. This is matched in beauty and surprise-value by the Arabesques and interlocking arches of the (Arab) Aljaferia Palace in Zaragoza. The intermingling and development of the two styles gives us Mudéjar, built by Moorish artisans and architects for Christian masters, full of fantasy, in brick and multiple ceramic decoration. The four Mudéjar towers of Teruel are among the wonders of Spain. Military history gives us El Cid Campeador. Though touted as a Christian hero, he worked for years as a mercenary general for the Moorish rulers of Zaragoza. During the Peninsular War – known in Spain as the War of Independence – Zaragoza endured two exceptionally bitter sieges. During the civil war of 1936–39, Belchite, close to Zaragoza, was furiously contested – and left in ruins as a warning for the future. The three-month battle for Teruel, fought in sub-zero temperatures from December 1937, was one of the most cruel of defeats for the Spanish Republic. Add to all of this four different wine regions, each with its own denominación de origen; pottery still made in the Arabic tradition; intriguing country towns; and robust, big-city Zaragoza, studded with major monuments.
Itinerary Day 1: London to Teruel. Fly at c. 9.15am from London Heathrow to Madrid. Drive to Teruel with a stop en route (c. 190 miles) arriving at the hotel at about 6.30pm. First of two nights in Teruel. Day 2: Teruel, Albarracín. Albarracín is a gorge-ringed hill town founded by Arabs and long ruled by its Christian reconquerors as an independent enclave. The defensive wall high on the ‘landward’ side, mediaeval streets and narrow site make it one of the most remarkable spots in Aragón. Close by lies a tract of wellwooded country above red sandstone cliffs. Here Palaeolithic and Neolithic communities painted animals and humans in rock shelters. More serious walkers can trek out to Albarracín through a gorge (there is a less energetic walk on offer). Back in Teruel, see the little city’s famous Mudéjar towers. The cathedral has a painted ceiling which gives an extraordinary insight into mediaeval life. Overnight Teruel. Day 3: Teruel, Daroca, Zaragoza. Spend the morning in Teruel and visit the mausoleum of the famous Lovers of Teruel who perished for love of one another, and the fine Provincial Museum housed in an Aragonese mansion. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
the western Pyrenees for three nights. Day 7: Sos del Rey Católico, Leyre, Jaca. In remote hill country, Sos del Rey Católico is one of the chief sites of the mediaeval kingdom: Ferdinand of Aragón was born here in 1452 and the town retains much of its mediaeval atmosphere. The monastery of San Salvador de Leyre maintains Gregorian offices in a fascinating church with a good crypt and western portal. Visit the cathedral of Jaca with fine stone carvings and outstanding Romanesque paintings in the recently restored diocesan museum. Overnight Jaca. Day 8: San Juan de la Peña, Echo, Jaca. The monastery of San Juan de la Peña, dramatically sited under a bulging rock face is the burial place of the kings and queens of early Aragón and a key site in Spanish religious history. Some free time in Jaca. Overnight Jaca.
Zaragoza, steel engraving c. 1840.
Drive north to Daroca, a well-preserved mediaeval town of great beauty and curiosity. Continue to Zaragoza, capital of Aragón. First of three nights in Zaragoza. Day 4: Zaragoza. Visit the mediaeval/ Renaissance cathedral with Mudéjar work and the Lonja, fine Gothic/Renaissance Exchange. In the newer part of town, see the Fine Arts Museum and the adjacent monument to the Napoleonic sieges of the city. The Aljafería is an Arab palace incorporating brilliant additions by Ferdinand and Isabella. The Basilica of El Pilar is an 18th-century temple of pilgrimage built around the pillar on which the Virgin Mary appeared to St James. Ceiling paintings include works by Goya. Overnight Zaragoza. Day 5: Belchite, Fuendetodos, Zaragoza. Belchite was the site of fierce fighting in 1937 which left the town completely ruined. In open and semi-desert country, the visit is an eerie experience. At Fuendetodos, in equally bleak country, Goya’s birthplace has been wellrestored. The Museum of Etching contains the Caprichos, Disparates, and Horrors of War. Free afternoon in Zaragoza. Overnight Zaragoza. Day 6: Huesca, Loarre, Jaca. Huesca, second ‘capital’ of infant Aragón, has a cathedral, with a dramatic altarpiece. Follow the river Gállego as it flows past the extraordinary rock formations of Riglos de los Mallos. Emerge from the sierras to encounter the Castle of Loarre, arguably the finest Romanesque military building in Spain. Drive up to Jaca in
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Day 9: drive east out of Aragón into Catalonia; a journey of some two-hundred miles, broken by a stop for lunch. Fly from Barcelona Airport, arriving at London Heathrow at c. 6.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,440 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled Iberia Airlines and British Airways flights (aircraft: A321 and A319) travel by private coach throughout; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 4 lunches and 6 dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admission to museums, sites, etc.; all tips for restaurant staff and drivers; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement £170 (double room for sole use). Price without flights £2,290. Hotels: in Teruel (2 nights): 3-star parador on the outskirts of town, rooms are comfortable if slightly soulless. In Zaragoza (3 nights): new 4-star hotel in an attractive turn-of-the-century building in the historic centre; comfortable, well-equipped rooms. In Jaca (3 nights): charming, friendly 3-star hotel, recently refurbished. Dinners are in hotels and good restaurants. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking on this tour, some of it fairly strenuous. It should not be undertaken by anyone who is not sure-footed. Average distance by coach per day: 98 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
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Gastronomic Spain Art, food & wine in Madrid & Castile some of Spain’s finest wines. There is a chance to taste the legendary Vega Sicilia and the extraordinary Pesquera wines of Alejandro Fernández. But there are other masterpieces that rarely travel – Teofilio Reyes, the wines of the brothers Perez Pascuas or the new reservas of Pago de Carraovejas. The mediaeval wealth of Spain with its booming wool trade is also recorded in its earthier peasant cuisine of lamb roasts, suckling pig and mountain stream trout. Walks through this landscape give us views into monastery gardens, Moorish irrigation systems and the now protected Cañadas Reales, the royal sheep trails that criss-cross Castile.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 11.00am from London Heathrow to Madrid. Dinner takes the form of an evening tapas walk through old Madrid. First of three nights in Madrid. Segovia, engraving c. 1840.
15–22 October 2012 (mz 398) 8 days • £2,580 Lecturer: Gijs van Hensbergen Exploration of food in Spanish history and art. Contrasts fine dining in Madrid with the rustic fare of Segovia and Castilian villages. Other regions (Catalonia, Galicia, Basque Country) are well represented, as are the worldrenowned wines of Rueda and Ribera de Duero. Great art at the Prado, Romanesque architecture and the Bourbon palace at La Granja. Spain is without a doubt Europe’s best-kept culinary secret. No other country maintains such a strong and passionate link to its gastronomic past, yet no other country’s cuisine is so frequently misunderstood. This tour uncovers some of the great secrets of Iberian cuisine and its powerful sense of the regional and also celebrates the variety and depth of Spanish wine. The wealth and quality of Spanish food, as is to be expected, rests first and foremost on the quality of its primary produce: the acorn-fed hams of the wild Iberian pig, the truffles from Guadalajara, asparagus from Ávila, giant fava beans from La Granja, extra virgin olive oils from Catalonia, wild herbs from Soria, saffron from Teruel, goose neck barnacles from Galicia and cod cheeks from Bilbao. But Spain’s food heritage also holds up a mirror to its complex historical past. Dishes
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and flavours send out echoes of Greek, Phoenician, Visigoth and Moor. There is the Passover fare of Sephardic Spain, the subtle Arabian sweetmeats, the austerity of Philip II, the extravagances of the Bishop, marzipan pastries and thyme flavoured honey prepared by the Carmelite nuns, pastas from Naples and the explosion in tastes derived from the new produce of the Americas. Then there is the hugely popular street food of the religious fiestas held all over Spain, every saint’s day being associated with a different dish. Madrid – the nation’s melting pot – is the only place to start a journey through the astonishing variety of Iberian cuisine. Every region has its supper club and its favourite bar in Madrid. But food means more than just the pleasure of the table. It sits at the heart of tertulia culture, with its often passionate and heated debates. From the court to the playhouse, from the nineteenth-century novels of Perez Galdos to the contemporary paintings of Miquel Barceló, food remains the protagonist. This tour also provides a chance to see some of the dishes of the seventeenth-century table and to steal through its larders courtesy of Velázquez, Zurbarán, Luis Meléndez and Sánchez Cotán. There are tiled Valencian kitchens to see and wonderful examples of Spanish earthenware. All this is put into context with a journey out into the northern meseta plain. Favoured by hot summers which are tempered by the cooling winds blowing off the sierra, the Ribera del Duero – the Golden Triangle – produces
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Day 2: Madrid. Morning walk to the Museum of Decorative Arts (with an 18th-century tiled Valencian kitchen) followed by a visit to the National Museum of Archaeology. Walk through the Salamanca quarter for a seafood lunch at one of Madrid’s best Galician restaurants. In the evening a sampling of jamón iberico (cured ham) with wines to match. Day 3: Madrid. A visit to the Museo del Prado focuses on food depicted in Goya’s tapestry cartoons and the still lives of Sánchez Cotán, Zurbarán and Melendez. Olive oil tasting followed by lunch in the Chamartín quarter. Free afternoon; we suggest the Reina Sofía Museum, Spain’s national collection of 20thcentury art including Picasso’s Guernica. Day 4: La Granja de San Ildefonso, Segovia. Leave Madrid and drive north through the spectacular Navacerrada Pass to the village of Valsaín. Taste the beans of La Granja here before carrying on to San Ildefonso. Walk through the formal gardens of the mountainside Bourbon palace before lunch at José María serving Segovia’s famous suckling pig. Early evening walk through the historic centre. First of four nights in Segovia. Day 5: Ribera del Duero. Drive out into Castilian countryside where Peñafiel’s crusader castle dominates the landscape of ‘The Golden Triangle’. Visit the world-renowned bodegas of Alejandro Fernández. Return to Segovia via Sta María la Real de Nieva, convent founded by Catherine of Lancaster in 1393. Light dinner savouring ‘New Castilian’ cuisine. Day 6: the Royal Sheep trails. Follow the Cañadas Reales, mediaeval highways of shepherds across Castile. Visit the Romanesque church at Sotosalbos, home of the 12th-century b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Art in Madrid The great galleries gourmet priest Arcipreste de Hita. Game and wild mushroom lunch. Walk through the picturesque walled village of Pedraza followed by an early evening tasting of Vega Sicilia and other legendary great wines.
the ‘big three’ are interspersed with less-visited collections, many of them recently restored. The great Spanish painters – including El Greco, Murillo, Velázquez, Goya, and Picasso – are of course magnificently represented on the tour, but the collecting mania of the Habsburgs and Bourbons and their subjects has resulted in a wide range of artistic riches which will surprise and delight. There is a large number of outstanding paintings by Titian and Rubens, for example, and the Prado has by far the largest holding of the bizarre creations of Hieronymus Bosch.
Day 7: Sepúlveda, Segovia. Sepúlveda is one of Castile’s best preserved meseta towns with Romanesque churches and cliff-hanging Jewish quarter. Typical wood-fired roast lamb lunch. Free afternoon in Segovia with a final dinner of immense originality. Day 8. Late morning departure for Madrid Airport, arrive Heathrow at c. 4.30pm
Itinerary
Practicalities Price: £2,580 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on Iberia Airlines flights (Airbus 321); private coach; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 6 lunches and 4 dinners (including the ham tasting and tapas walk) with wine, water and coffee; all wine tastings; all admissions; all tips for waiters and drivers; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £260 (double room for sole use). Price without flights £2,470. Hotels: in Madrid (3 nights): an excellently located hotel, a short walk from the Prado, rated locally as 4-star. In Segovia (4 nights): a charming 4-star hotel in a converted palace; rooms vary in size. How strenuous? There is a fair amount of walking on this tour, some of it uphill. Lunches tend to be long and large. Average distance by coach per day: 58 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Day 1. Fly at c. 11.15am from London Heathrow to Madrid. Start with a first visit to the Prado Museum, which is among the world’s greatest art galleries; concentrating on the Spanish school. Settle into the hotel before dinner. Velasquez, The Infante, Don Baltazar Carlos, wood engraving 1883.
24–28 October 2012 (mz 409) 5 days • £1,380 Lecturer: Gail Turner 6–10 May 2013 (mz 552) 5 days • £1,460 Lecturer: Gijs van Hensbergen Can be combined with Seville: A Festival of Spanish Music, 10–15 May 2013. 2–6 October 2013 (ma 741) 5 days • £1,460 Lecturer: Gail Turner Two visits to the Prado plus the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection and the Reina Sofía, home to Picasso’s Guernica. Lesser-known places include the Sorolla Museum, Archaeological Museum and Goya frescoes at San Antonio de la Florida. While the Museo del Prado alone might justify a visit to Madrid – and this tour has two sessions there – the city has other excellent collections which reinforce its reputation as one of the great art centres of Europe. This city of Velázquez and Goya has been enormously enhanced over the years by the installation of the ThyssenBornemisza Collection and the Reina Sofía Museum. Both these and the Prado have undergone major extension work under architects Jean Nouvel (Reina Sofía), Manuel Baquero and Francesc Plá (Thyssen) and Rafael Moneo (Prado). New exhibiting spaces, restaurants and lecture theatres lend even greater lustre to these world-class galleries. Our stints at
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Day 2. The morning walk includes the Royal Academy of Fine Arts, home to works by Goya, Zurbarán, Ribera and Murillo, and the Museum of Decorative Arts, with an 18th-century tiled Valencian kitchen. The afternoon is spent at the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection, housed in the 18th-century Palacio de Villahermosa; one of the world’s largest private art collections until its purchase by the Spanish state in 1993. Day 3. Begin at the Archaeological Museum, good on ancient Iberian civilization and Roman Spain (currently closed for renovation but due to reopen in early 2013). Continue to the Lázaro Galdiano Museum, with works by El Greco, Goya and Murillo. The afternoon is free to allow for temporary exhibitions (details nearer the time) or a visit to the 18th-century Royal Palace. Day 4. Travel by coach to the Sorolla Museum, in the charming house of the eponymous Impressionist painter. Continue to the chapel of San Antonio de la Florida, Goya’s burial place and home to his ceiling frescoes, and the arcaded, balconied Plaza Mayor, centrepiece of Habsburg town planning. In the afternoon there is a second visit to the Prado, this time primarily to see the Italian and Netherlandish schools. Day 5. Walk to the Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, one of the greatest modern
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Art in Madrid continued
Extremadura Landscape, architecture, rural life
art museums and home to Picasso’s Guernica plus works by Miró, Dalí and Tàpies. Fly to London Heathrow, arriving c. 5.45pm. Full details for Seville: A Festival of Spanish Music will be published in September 2012. Contact us to register your interest.
Practicalities Prices: £1,380 (2012), £1,460 (2013), (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled Iberia Airlines flights (Airbus 320); coach for transfers and excursions; accommodation as described below; breakfasts and 3 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips for waiters, drivers and guides; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £160 (2012), £230 (2013). Price without flights £1270 (2012), £1,310 (2013). Hotel (October 2012): a small and excellently located hotel, a short walk from the major museums and opposite the Prado; rated locally as 4-star but more comparable to a 3-star; café but no restaurant. Hotel (2013): a small and excellently located 5-star hotel, part of a reliable Spanish chain. Rooms are comfortable and décor is contemporary. How strenuous? There is lot of standing. Average distance by coach per day: 5 miles. Small group: between 8 and 19 participants.
‘A Village in Spain’, by Isabel Codrington, etching and drypoint c. 1920.
14–22 March 2013 (mz 495) 9 days • £2,140 Lecturer: Adam Hopkins Remote and unspoilt: one of the most consistently beautiful regions in Europe. Monumental cities of the Conquistadors: Trujillo, Cáceres, Plasencia, packed with palaces and churches. Mérida has excellent Roman remains. Monasteries of Guadalupe and Yuste, both in splendid isolation in the hills. Other visits include a livestock farm with tractor ride, opportunity to walk in the hills. Extremadura means ‘beyond the Douro’, a designation coined by the conquering Christians as they bludgeoned their way southwards against the Moors. The Moors were finally defeated; but much of the countryside of Extremadura remains unsubjugated. Together with the adjoining Alentejo in Portugal, this, though tawny as a lion’s pelt in sweltering midsummer, is the largest ‘green’ region in western Europe. Monfragüe in the Tagus gorge has a colony of griffon vultures, the Iberian lynx is still a resident in the south, hawks and other birds of prey abound. The Sierra de Gata in the north, the Sierra de Guadalupe in the centre and the
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wild country of the south-west round Jerez de los Caballeros all remain rough and remote. Equally, Extremadura is cattle country, with fighting bulls and the local Retinta breed making the most of some of the gentler lands. In the autumn, when there are acorns to be eaten, the black-foot pig, source of the finest of mountain hams, comes on the scene. The landscape has a mixed array of well-spaced trees, mainly holm oak and cork oak, which together with the wild grasses constitute the habitat known as dehesa. The river valleys, notably the Tiétar and Guadiana, are now well-irrigated and grow fruit and vegetables: apricots, cherries and peppers. From the south comes wine, much improved of late. There is virtually no industry which is not based on agriculture. This tour offers a walk in the Guadalupe mountains, hoping to come close to the spirit of a countryside where many ancient ways survive. However, the history and architecture are as rewarding as the landscape. Before the Visigoths and Moors, this was a major Roman centre, with Mérida – Augusta Emerita – the capital of the western province of Lusitania. It remains the major Roman site in Spain. Above all, this is conquistador country. An astonishing proportion of the leaders of the rough bands which savaged South and Central America, in the names of king and queen and Christianity, came from Extremadura. b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Trujillo and Cáceres are well-known for the rich monumentality of palaces assembled by conquistadors returning with their ill-gotten gains and by their descendants. The spiritual centre was and remains the shrine of Guadalupe. Here a rich and beautiful Hieronymite monastery grew up, with swirling Moorish-Gothic tracery and a suite of paintings by Zurbarán. The little mountain town which formed beneath the monastery is balconied and full of geraniums, one element of a varied vernacular architecture which is a particular Extremeñan pleasure. Zafra, in the south, is a white town, intermediate between Andalucía and the stony sobriety of Old Castile. Most curious is Plasencia in the north, where seven roads lead out of the arcaded plaza and two cathedrals stand back to back. The most moving is Yuste, the monastery to which the Emperor Charles V retired, gout-ridden and exhausted. He chose it, he said, because of its climate of continual springtime. In its deep rurality and concentration of human monuments, Extremadura is a far cry from ‘ordinary’ Europe.
Itinerary Day 1: Zafra. Fly at c. 10.00am from London Heathrow to Seville, via Madrid. Drive north to the small town of Zafra. The towered castle where Hernán Cortés was received by the Duke of Feria en route for the conquest of Mexico is now the parador. Overnight Zafra. Day 2: Zafra, Jerez de Los Caballeros. In Zafra begin with the two adjacent squares, the Plaza Grande and the (smaller) Plaza Chica and the Collegiate Church (with an altarpiece by Zurbarán). Lunch is in a rural restaurant. The afternoon is spent in Jerez de los Caballeros, once a Templar town, with famously ornate Baroque church towers. Overnight Zafra. Day 3: Mérida, Guadalupe. The Roman legacy of Mérida includes architecture both grand and domestic: theatre, villas, temples, fortresses. See also Moneo’s outstanding National Museum of Roman Art. The tiny town of Guadalupe is hidden in hills. Columbus prayed here and gave its name to a Caribbean island. Overnight Guadalupe. Day 4: Guadalupe. There is the choice of a walk in the Guadalupe mountains, or time to stroll at leisure through the village. In the afternoon see the monastery, with splendid church, Mudéjar cloister and sacristy with Zurbarán’s paintings. The museum contains exceptional vestments. Overnight Guadalupe. Day 5: Trujillo. Drive down the mountains to Trujillo, a hilltop conquistador town (birthplace Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
of Pizarro). The magnificent, irregular main square is surrounded by conquistador mansions and the grand church of S. Martín. Climb up to the Gothic church of Sta María and the castle with fine views of the surrounding countryside. Continue to Cáceres for the first of three nights. Day 6: Cáceres. The historic town centre is enclosed within almost perfectly preserved Moorish walls and is a myriad of narrow streets and squares lined with Renaissance mansions. Visit the Provincial Museum housed in the 17th-century Casa de las Veletas, built over an 11th-century Arabic cistern. Free afternoon. Overnight Cáceres. Day 7: Arroyo de la Luz, Alcántara, El Vaqueril. The 16th-century church at Arroyo de la Luz has a remarkable altarpiece by Luís de Morales. At Alcántara, the Roman bridge spanning the Tagus dates to 106 ad. Finca el Vaqueril is an Extremaduran ranch with Retinta cattle and pata negra pigs. Our visit includes lunch and a tour of the ranch on a tractor trailor. Overnight Cáceres. Day 8: Monfragüe, Plasencia, Yuste, Jarandilla de la Vera. Pause in Monfragüe Natural Park to see colony of griffon vultures at Salto de Gitano on the Tagus. At Plasencia, start in the arcaded Plaza Mayor and then visit the two cathedrals, Renaissance and Gothic backing into one another (restoration work in progress), also a fine ethnographic museum of traditional rural life and handcraft. Drive into the hills to the monastery of Yuste to which the Emperor Charles V retired in 1556, building a gent’s des. res. right up against the fabric of the Gothic monastery. Get a moving insight into the last days of the man who once ruled most of Europe and Latin America. Spend the final night in the Parador at nearby Jarandilla de la Vera. Day 9: leaving Extremadura. Drive to Madrid Airport for the lunchtime flight which arrives at London Heathrow c. 3.40pm.
Hotels: in Zafra ( 2 nights): 4-star parador in the 15th-century castle with a marble Renaissance patio and decorated Mudéjar ceilings in some public rooms. In Guadalupe (2 nights): 4-star parador in the converted 15th-century pilgrims’ hospital of St John the Baptist. In Cáceres (3 nights): 4-star hotel of character adjoining the historic centre of town. Rooms are comfortable and functional. In Jarandilla de la Vera (1 night): 4-star parador with historic connections to Charles V. Rooms vary in outlook. Included meals are largely in the hotels with a couple in restaurants. How strenuous? There is a lot of walking in town centres, sometimes on uneven ground, and sure-footedness is essential. Optional walks, especially in the Sierra de Guadalupe require a greater level of fitness. There is also a large amount of coach travel. Average distance by coach per day: 80 miles. Small group: this tour will operate with between 12 and 22 participants.
Tours with Adam Hopkins Lisbon Neighbourhoods........................153 The Douro..............................................154 Walking to Santiago..............................173 Extremadura..........................................180 Valencia..................................................182 Granada & Córdoba..............................183 Andalucía...............................................185 Off-beat Andalucía................................188 Aragón................................................... 176
Practicalities Price: £2,140 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel on British Airways and Iberia (economy class) flights (aircraft: Airbus 320) travel by private coach throughout; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts, two lunches and six dinners with wine, water and coffee; all admission charges to museums, sites, etc.; all tips for drivers, waiters, guides; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Single supplement £210 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £1,960.
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For lecturers’ biographies see page 206.
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Valencia art & architecture, Mediaeval to modern 6–10 November 2012 (mz 426) 5 days • £1,370 Lecturer: Adam Hopkins A handsome, vibrant city on the Mediterranean seaboard, excellent for its variety of art and architecture, good food and wine. Gothic highlights include the Silk Exchange and Royal Chapel at Santo Domingo. Possibility of attending an opera or concert at Calatrava’s striking Palau de les Arts Reina Sofia. One of Spain’s greatest fine arts museums, and its first modern art gallery, Impressionist collections and Arabic ceramics. Valencia, Spain’s third city, is elegant and open-spirited, filled with Mediterranean light – though you only glimpse the sea when you go down to the beach to sample a paella, Valencia’s great contribution to gastronomic pleasure. From Arab times until today, Valencia has meant and still means rice – and oranges. Valencia’s architecture reflects the city’s exuberant success in Gothic days and the newly-thrusting, ultra-modern regionalism has brought the America’s Cup here twice in the past six years. Santiago Calatrava’s vast, fantastical and gleaming showpiece, the City of Arts and Sciences, set in a dried-out river bed as the culmination of 14 kilometres of park, is undoubtedly its supreme expression.
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Calatrava, Valencian-born engineerarchitect supreme, has always had his critics: today voices are raised about operating cost and maintenance and the general sense of grandeur. But few could deny the beauty of the cascading glass, the gleaming steel and dazzling concrete, the acrobatic forms of his assemblage of outsize buildings – opera house, science museum, sports stadium, arboretum-walkway along with an oceanarium by the older but also interesting architect Felix Candela. The complex and indeed the whole city should not be missed by anyone who wants an overview of modern Spain. Evidence of the vigour of the city’s culture over the centuries is everywhere. The Fine Arts Museum is one of the most important in Spain, excellent in particular for Gothic and Renaissance painting – Valencia was Spain’s first port of call for many Renaissance ideas. The city’s luminous 19th-century painting, increasingly appreciated today, is also much in evidence. The IVAM was Spain’s first major gallery of modern art with an impressive permanent collection and important temporary exhibitions. The presence of the National Ceramics Museum, in a lush rococo palace, reflects continuous production of top-class ceramics from the 13th century onwards – Moorish in technique and design, its best elements perpetuated in what came after. The Moors made mediaeval Valencia. Christians from Aragón reconquered it in 1238. The new masters built on Arab civilisation to
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achieve Mediterranean prominence and their own Gothic splendours. In an exuberant 19thcentury city-centre, Art-nouveau and art-deco flourished, as Santiago Calatrava does today in the Turia riverbed.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 10.00am from London Heathrow to Madrid and connect on a flight to Valencia. Arrive in time for an introductory talk. Day 2. The cathedral, a curious mix of Romanesque, Gothic and Baroque, has a splendid chapter house and paintings by Goya. Great examples of secular 15th-century Gothic include the Silk Exchange with its magnificent hall of pillars and the Generalitat with a sequence of richly decorated rooms (subject to confirmation).Housed in its exuberantly Churrigueresque palace, the collections of the National Ceramics Museum range from Moorish lustre ware to Picasso. Day 3. The complex of the Colegio del Patriarca has a Renaissance courtyard and a museum with Flemish and Spanish paintings. The church of Corpus Cristi has 16th-century frescoes and a Last Supper by Ribalta. Santo Domingo, a Gothic friary, has a Royal Chapel with ribless vault and an outstanding 14th-cent. chapter house (visit by special arrangement). Cross the 16th-century Royal Bridge to the Fine Arts Museum, one of the best in Spain,
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Granada & Córdoba With Málaga, Úbeda & Baeza with works by Valencian, Spanish and Flemish masters. Day 4. Drive via the Quart Towers, a massive 14th-century city gateway, to IVAM (Instituto Valenciano de Arte Moderno): a collection of international painting, sculpture and photography with good temporary exhibitions. The home and studio of the Benlliure family of Impressionist painters has a large art collection and a romantic garden. Drive to the seafront for a paella lunch overlooking the Mediterranean. Take an optional excursion to Manises, centre of ceramic production since Arab times, with an excellently presented ceramics museum. Day 5. Spanning the dry bed of the diverted River Turia is a Calatrava trademark, the ‘Peineta’ bridge, and, below it, a metro station he designed. Further along is his Ciudad de las Artes y las Ciencias consisting inter alia of an arboretum, a soaring edifice that houses the science museum and the nearby opera house (exteriors only). Catch the early afternoon flight to Madrid, and then a connection to London Heathrow, arriving at c. 5.45pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,370 (deposit £150) This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled British Airways and Iberia Airlines flights (Airbus A320); private coach throughout; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 3 dinners, with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips for restaurant staff, guides, drivers; all taxes; the services of the lecturer, tour manager and local guide. Single supplement £130 (double room for sole occupancy). Price without flights £1,160. Hotel: A 4-star hotel installed in an 18thcentury palace in a very central location next to the National Ceramics Museum. Rooms are small but well-equipped and tastefully decorated. How strenuous? Coach access is restricted in the historic centre and there is a lot of walking and standing around in museums.Average distance by coach per day: 9 miles. Optional music: we hope to be able to offer tickets to an opera or concert at the Palau de les Arts. Programmes are released in summer 2012. Small group: between 8 and 22 participants.
Left: Valencia, the market place, wood engraving 1870 after Samuel Read from Leaves From a Sketch Book. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Granada, The Alhambra, A German etching c. 1910.
22–29 April 2013 (mz 534) 8 days • £2,380 Lecturer: Adam Hopkins 4–11 November 2013 (ma 768) 8 days • £2,380 Lecturer: Gijs van Hensbergen Ample time at the key sites of Moorish Spain: the Alhambra in Granada and the Mosque in Córdoba, with time also for the lesser-known. Visits the Picasso Museum and newly opened Carmen Thyssen collection in Málaga and the small Renaissance towns of Úbeda and Baeza. Southern Spain - savage peaks soar over passes that are snow-bound in winter, while plains below are well-watered by spring rivers, hot, harsh and arid in the summer, mellow in late autumn and winter. The cities reveal the magnitude of past achievements through the greatness of the architecture and the brilliant elaboration of decoration. Andalucía was a bountiful Roman province, in Arab times the scene of highly sophisticated Umayyad and Nasrid princedoms and a major province of the most powerful kingdom in (Christian) Europe’s sixteenth Century. The artistic riches are immensely varied, though the unique distinguishing mark is the heritage from eight hundred years of rule
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by Muslims from North Africa and Arabia. Arab Córdoba became the capital of alAndalus and the largest city in Europe, market for all the luxuries of East and West and scene of Europe’s most splendid court until its fall to the Reconquistadors in 1236. The mosque, La Mezquita, was one of the largest anywhere, and arguably the most beautiful; Christian possession in the sixteenth century created within it a totally contrasting cathedral. Granada was the last Islamic princedom in Spain, only falling to the Christians in 1492. The concatenation of palaces and gardens of the Alhambra, with its cascading domes and gilded decoration like frozen fireworks, is one of Spain’s most enthralling sights. Although millions of tourists pour through Málaga Airport every year en route to the Costa del Sol, comparatively few set foot in the old town. The narrow streets, palm-lined squares and seafront promenades conserve Phoenician, Roman, Moorish, Gothic, Baroque and late-nineteenth-century monuments. Birthplace and childhood home of Pablo Picasso, the city boasts a major collection of his works, while the new, eponymous museum of Carmen Thyssen Bornemisza includes some excellent 19th-century Spanish art with Andalusian themes. Continued overleaf.
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Granada & Córdoba continued
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 10.00am from London Gatwick to Málaga. Visit the recently-opened Carmen Thyssen museum with its fine collection of old masters and 19th-century Spanish painting. Overnight Málaga. Day 2: Málaga. Begin at Picasso’s birthplace, which houses a small collection of his belongings and some ceramics. The Picasso Museum is magnificent, combining Phoenician ruins beneath, a fine 16th-century palace and a collection which places emphasis on his earlier works and the women in his life. There is time also to see the Alcazaba, a predominantly 11thcentury Moorish construction with fine views from its terraces. In the afternoon drive north to Granada. First of three nights in Granada. Day 3: Granada. The 13th-century Arab palaces of the Alhambra ride high above the city. They are often reckoned to be the greatest expression of Moorish art in Spain, with exquisite decoration and a succession of intimate courtyards. Adjacent are the 16th-century Palace of Charles V and the Generalife, summer palace of the sultans, with gardens and fountains.
Day 4: Granada. Morning walk through the Albayzín, the oldest quarter in town, including El Bañuelo (Arab baths). (The Archaeological Museum - with a fine façade - is currently closed for renovation.) Climb up to San Nicolás from where there are fine views of the Alhambra. In the late afternoon visit the Cathedral and Royal Chapel which retains Isabel of Castile’s personal collection of Flemish, Spanish and Italian paintings. Day 5: Baeza, Úbeda. Drive to Baeza, once a prosperous and important town and now a provincial backwater of quiet charm set among olive groves stretching to the horizon. It has a 16th-century cathedral by outstanding regional architect Andrés de Vandelvira and many grand houses of an alluring light-coloured stone. In Úbeda walk to the handsome Plaza Vázquez de Molina, flanked by elegant palaces including Vandelvira’s Casa de las Cadenas and the present day parador. The church of El Salvador was designed by Diego de Siloé in 1536. Continue to Córdoba for the first of three nights. Day 6: Córdoba. From the middle of the 8th century Córdoba was the capital of Islamic
Spain and became the richest city in Europe until its capitulation to the Reconquistadors in 1236. Visit the Alcázar, mediaeval with earlier architectural remains (and good Roman mosaics), and the narrow streets of the old Jewish quarter, including the 14th-century synagogue. The Fine Arts Museum (optional visit), with Plateresque façade and one delightful ceiling, houses some good Spanish paintings. La Mezquita (mosque) is one of the most magnificent of Muslim sites, for some the greatest building of mediaeval Europe. It contains within it the 16th-century cathedral. Day 7: Córdoba. Morning visit to the Archaeological Museum, housed in brand new galleries and a Renaissance mansion, with a fine collection of Roman and Arab pieces. Drive out to the excavations of Medina Azahara, with remains of a huge and luxurious 10th-century palace complex. Free afternoon in Córdoba. Day 8. Drive back to Málaga via the pretty town of Antequera. The flight arrives at London Gatwick at c. 4.15pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,380 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) with British Airways (Boeing 737); private coach; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 4 dinners, with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips for waiters, drivers, guides; all taxes; the services of the lecturer, tour manager and a local guide. Single supplement £260 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £2,230. Hotels: in Málaga (1 night): a functional and comfortable 4-star hotel in the centre. In Granada (3 nights): a 5-star hotel in a converted convent, close to the Royal Chapel; rooms are comfortable and contemporary; more comparable to a 4-star. In Córdoba (3 nights): 4-star hotel in a converted 18th-century mansion; a short walk from the mosque. How strenuous? There is a lot of walking, some of it uphill and some over uneven ground. Average distance by coach per day: 44 miles. Small group: this tour will operate with between 12 and 22 participants.
Córdoba, the Puerto del Sagrario of the Mosque, steel engraving c. 1840.
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Andalucía Spain’s southern province 15–25 October 2012 (mz 403) This tour is currently full 14–24 October 2013 (ma 740) 11 days • £3,140 Lecturer: Adam Hopkins Three nights in each of the major cities: Granada, Córdoba and Seville. Begin in Málaga with the Picasso Museum and newly opened Carmen Thyssen collection, and also visit the lesser-known towns of Baeza, Úbeda and Ecija. Varied itinerary covering the great Moorish sites, mediaeval, Renaissance and Baroque architecture, fine art collections and gardens. For many, Andalucía is Spain’s most fascinating and varied region. Varied geographically: stretching southwards from the Sierra Morena to the Mediterranean, it encompasses the permanent snow of the Sierra Nevada as well as the sun-scorched interior. And varied culturally: here it is possible to see great art and architecture of both Islamic and Christian traditions side by side – even, at Córdoba, one within the other. For Spain is unique in Western Europe in having been conquered by an Islamic power. The Moors first crossed from Africa in AD 711, and in the south of the country they stayed for nearly eight centuries. The Moorish civilization of the cities of Andalucía was one of the most sophisticated of the Middle Ages. There are also tantalising glimpses of the preceding Visigothic kingdom, and remains of the still earlier Roman occupation – the province of Baetica was one of the most highly favoured in the Roman Empire. Later, both Jews and gypsies made their influence felt, but overwhelmingly the dominant contribution to man-made Andalucian heritage has been created by and for unwavering adherents to Catholicism. The Christian religion does not get much more intense than in southern Spain, and its artistic manifestations rarely more spiritually charged. The unification of Spain which was ensured by the marriage in 1469 of the ‘Catholic Kings’, Ferdinand and Isabella, ushered in the period when Spain became the dominant power in Europe. This also coincided with the discovery of the Americas. The cities of the south, particularly Seville, were the immediate beneficiaries of the subsequent colonisation and inflow of huge quantities of bullion and of boundless opportunities for trade and wealth creation. The result was a boom in building and a cultural renaissance, a Golden Age which lasted into the eighteenth century, long after Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Seville Cathedral, mid-18th-century engraving.
the economy had cooled and real Spanish power had waned. The relative poverty and torpor of subsequent centuries allowed much of the beauty of the glory days to survive to the present time, when a revival of prosperity, now threatened, has enabled extensive restoration and proper care of the immense artistic patrimony.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 10.00am from London Gatwick to Málaga. Visit the recently-opened Carmen Thyssen museum with its fine collection of old masters and 19th-century Spanish painting on Andalusian themes. Overnight Málaga. Day 2: Málaga. Begin at Picasso’s birthplace, which houses a small collection of his belongings and some ceramics. The Picasso Museum is magnificent, combining Phoenician ruins beneath, a fine 16th-century palace and a collection which places emphasis on his earlier works and the women in his life. There is time also to see the Alcazaba, a predominantly 11thcentury Moorish construction with fine views from its terraces. In the afternoon drive north to Granada. First of three nights in Granada. Day 3: Granada. The 13th-century Arab palaces of the Alhambra ride high above the city. They are often reckoned to be the greatest expression of Moorish art in Spain, with exquisite decoration and a succession
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of intimate courtyards. Adjacent are the 16th-century Palace of Charles V and the Generalife, summer palace of the sultans, with gardens and fountains. Day 4: Granada. Morning walk through the Albayzín, the oldest quarter in town, including El Bañuelo (Arab baths). (The Archaeological Museum - with a fine façade - is currently closed for renovation.) Climb up to San Nicolás from where there are fine views of the Alhambra. In the late afternoon visit the Cathedral and Royal Chapel which retains Isabel of Castile’s personal collection of Flemish, Spanish and Italian paintings. Day 5: Baeza, Úbeda. Drive to Baeza, once a prosperous and important town and now a provincial backwater of quiet charm set among olive groves stretching to the horizon. It has a 16th-century cathedral by outstanding regional architect Andrés de Vandelvira and many grand houses of an alluring light-coloured stone. In Úbeda walk to the handsome Plaza Vázquez de Molina, flanked by elegant palaces including Vandelvira’s Casa de las Cadenas and the present day parador. The church of El Salvador was designed by Diego de Siloé in 1536. Continue to Córdoba for the first of three nights. Day 6: Córdoba. From the middle of the 8th century Córdoba was the capital of Islamic Spain and became the richest city in Europe until its capitulation to the Reconquistadors
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Andalucía continued
Málaga, engraving c. 1890.
in 1236. Visit the Alcázar, mediaeval with earlier architectural remains (and good Roman mosaics), and the narrow streets of the old Jewish quarter, including the 14th-century synagogue. The Fine Arts Museum (optional visit), with Plateresque façade and one delightful ceiling, houses some good paintings by Spanish masters. La Mezquita (mosque) is one of the most magnificent of Muslim sites, for some the greatest building of mediaeval Europe. It contains within it the 16th-century cathedral. Day 7: Córdoba. Morning visit to the Archaeological Museum, housed in brand new galleries and a Renaissance mansion, with a fine collection of Roman and Arab pieces. Drive out to the excavations of Medina Azahara, with remains of a huge and luxurious 10th-century palace complex. Free afternoon in Córdoba. Day 8: Ecija, Seville. The many church towers of Ecija are visible from afar across the surrounding plain. Of the numerous Baroque mansions see the Palacio de Peñaflor and Palacio del Marqués de Benameji, and visit the Gothic-Mudéjar church of Santiago. Drive to Seville. Walkthrough the Barrio de Santa Cruz, a maze of whitewashed alleys and flowerfilled patios, to the Casa de Pilatos, the best of the Mudéjar style palaces, with patios and azulejos. First of three nights in Seville.
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Day 9: Seville. Walk to the church and hospital of the Caridad, Seville’s most striking 17thcentury building, with paintings by Murillo and Valdés Leal. The cathedral is one of the largest Gothic churches anywhere (‘Let us build a cathedral so immense that everyone... will take us for madmen’). The Capilla Mayor, treasury and sanctuary are of particular interest. Free afternoon. Day 10: Seville. The Alcázar, the fortified royal palace, is one of Spain’s greatest buildings; built by Moorish architects for Castilian kings, it consists of a sequence of apartments and magnificent reception rooms around courtyards and gardens. Further exploration of the Barrio de Santa Cruz. Afternoon at the Fine Arts Museum, the best in Spain after the Prado.
Hotels: Málaga (1 night): a functional 4-star in the centre. Granada (3 nights): a 5-star in a former convent; rooms are comfortable and contemporary; more comparable to a 4-star. Córdoba (3 nights): a 4-star in an 18th-century mansion, a short walk from the mosque. Seville (3 nights): a charming 4-star hotel located a short walk from the cathedral and Barrio de Santa Cruz. Included meals are in carefully selected restaurants. How strenuous? A lengthy tour with four hotels, a lot of walking on uneven ground and uphill, and a fair amount of coach travel. You need to be fit. Average distance by coach per day: 33 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
Day 11. Drive back to Málaga for the afternoon flight to London Gatwick arriving c. 4.15pm.
Practicalities Price in 2013: £3,140 (deposit £300). This includes: air travel (economy class) on British Airways flights (Boeing 737); private coach; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 7 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips for waiters, drivers and guides; all taxes; the services of the lecturer, tour manager and guides. Single supplement £510 (double room for single use). Price without flights £3,000.
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Gastronomic Andalucía Food, wine, art & architecture 5–12 April 2013 (mz 510) 8 days • £2,920 Lecturer: Gijs van Hensbergen Journey south from Las Pedroñeras in La Mancha in a sweeping curve through Andalucía: Ubeda, Baeza, Córdoba, Seville, Jerez, Cádiz, Aracena. Surveys the history of the region with its cuisine: Roman, Jewish, Moorish, Christian; from the simplest cooking to the elaborate and contemporary. Some of Spain’s greatest monuments are here including the mosque at Córdoba and Seville Cathedral, but also good museums, small towns and spectacular countryside. ‘Al-Andalus’ (the Andalucía of the Moors) are words which immediately evoke fantasies of displays of sweetmeats, saffron stained rice and jewels of livid red pomegranate. Exotic flavour combinations are countered by the simplicity of perfectly prepared fish; flaking, moist and ivory white. Sophisticated techniques are often tempered by the deeply felt philosophy that, yes, less can be more. Gastronomic Andalucía is a true feast of the senses: earthy smells are countered by elusive and piquant tastes; sherries, montillas and punchy red ‘caldos’ of La Mancha wine stand up perfectly to the pickled escabeches of game, the deep-flavoured fish soups, and the marriage of almonds, lemon-steeped olives and air-dried tenderloin of albacore tuna. The backdrop of Gastronomic Andalucía is no less exotic: Ubeda and Baeza, the twin cities of Spain’s Renaissance, are surrounded by stands of olive trees that lead the eye out to the horizon and the sierras beyond. The mosque in Córdoba, at the very heart of the Caliphate, makes a complete nonsense of the received wisdom about the so-called Dark Ages. Seville’s barrio of the Santa Cruz still offers up phantom vistas of an extraordinary cosmopolitan past. Andalucía, it must be remembered, has a large variety of climates. In the mountains above Seville the hams of the wild Iberian pig dry perfectly into a product that is second to none. Sea breezes around Sanlucar signal the flavour of salt on the tongue. South to Baeza, off the tourist track, we enter the land of olives, and a tasting at the family run Castillo de Canena, where Spain’s Business Woman of the Year 2008, Rosa Vañó, inducts us into the arcane wonders of olive oil tasting, and where, close by, the unpretentious Casa Juanito, the Spanish gourmet’s choice of ‘true’ authenticity has for decades put it in the Top Ten of restaurants in Spain. Córdoba, of course, needs no advertising but a fourteenth-century convent Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
restaurant on the edge of the gypsy quarter is just one way of retiring from the Caliphate’s wealthy past and the powerful midday sun. Perfectly fried aubergines are a foil for the oxtail, fillets of fish with herbs and oil are trapped in a flash, in a film of the lightest batter and laid out on a bed of the speciality, fried lettuce. Oaky Montilla wine is taken standing. Seville, Jerez, Cádiz are worlds on their own. Sherry houses are famous for producing unique tastes. Less known are the almacenistas, passionate amateurs, whose houses, basements, shops, and even living rooms are turned over to storing and nursing their barrels. Cádiz’s legendary restaurant El Faro takes fish frying to a new level with wafer thin pancakes of miniature shrimp and is the best place in Spain to eat line caught bass baked in a salt crust. The tour ends in Seville with Michelin-starred and Basque chef, Martin Berasategui’s take on Andalusian cuisine.
Itinerary Day 1: London to La Mancha. Fly at c. 9.15am from London Heathrow to Madrid. Drive south into La Mancha to the small walled town of Belmonte. In the surrounding countryside visit the vineyards of Pesquera, of Ribera de Duero fame, for a tasting and dinner. Overnight in Belmonte. Day 2: La Mancha to Andalucía. In Belmonte visit the Gothic church of San Bartolomé and the superbly sited 15th-century castle before leaving for lunch in nearby Las Pedroñeras. Here Michelin-starred chef Manuel de la Osa marries bohemian bonhomie with a passion for garlic. Drive through the magnificent pass of Desfiladero de Despeñaperros and enter Andalucía. The handsome town of Ubeda has streets and squares lined with palaces, one of which is our hotel. First of two nights in Ubeda.
Day 3: Ubeda, Baeza. The twin towns of Ubeda and Baeza thrived in the 16th-century and are richly endowed with Renaissance monuments. Spend time in both with lunch in Baeza at Casa Juanito. The Arab Castle of Canena is deep in olive-grove country of the Guadalquivir valley and home to the Vañó family, famed producers; tasting and visit here. Overnight Ubeda. Day 4: Córdoba, Seville. Drive west to Córdoba and focus on La Mezquita, one of the largest and most beautiful mosques in the world, and within it the 16th-century cathedral. Walk through the old Jewish quarter, with 14th-century synagogue, to a chilled aperitif and a Moorish lunch. Continue to Seville for an evening tapas walk through the flower-filled Barrio de Santa Cruz. First of four nights in Seville. Day 5: Seville. Begin at the Alcázar, one of Spain’s greatest buildings, built by Moorish architects for Spanish kings, with its courtyards, gardens and magnificent tapestries. The 15th-century cathedral is one of the largest Gothic churches anywhere, with a Late Gothic retable and paintings by Murillo, Zurbarán and Goya. In the afternoon visit the Fine Arts Museum, the finest collection in Spain after the Prado. Dinner is at a local familyrun restaurant with a private Flamenco show. Overnight in Seville.
Córdoba, La Torre de la Carrahola, wood engraving c. 1870.
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Gastronomic Andalucía continued
Seville: a festival of Spanish Music
Day 6: Jerez de la Frontera, Cádiz. Drive south to Jerez, at the heart of sherry production. Special arrangements include a tasting at the Lustau bodega and Bodegas Tradición with its own art collection. Continue to the historic port of Cádiz; laid-back and unspoilt, and with a renowned fish restaurant. There is time after lunch to visit the city museum with a significant archaeological collection. Overnight in Seville. Day 7: Sierra de Aracena, Sanlucar la Mayor. Drive north to the Sierra de Aracena, the low mountains which form the border with Extremadura. Here we taste the exquisite jamón ibérico. There is an optional walk in the foothills along farm tracks lined with oak, chestnut and olive trees and livestock. Alternatively remain in the town of Aracena. The evening is spent at Martin Berasategui’s Michelin-starred restaurant, Santo. Overnight in Seville. Day 8: Seville. Free morning in Seville; we suggest visiting the church and hospital of the Caridad, with paintings by Murillo and Valdés Leal. Drive to Seville airport for the flight to London, via Madrid, arriving c. 5.15pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,920 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on scheduled flights with Iberia (Airbus A321, A318 & A340); private coach travel throughout; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 5 lunches (including 1 ‘tasting’ lunch) and 5 dinners (including one light dinner and a tapas walk) with wine, water and coffee; all other tastings; all admission to museums and sites; all tips for waiters, drivers and guides; all state and airport taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £230 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £2,720. Hotels: in Belmonte (1 night): a rustic hotel in a 16th-century house in the old town; simple but charming. In Ubeda (2 nights): a 4-star Parador in a Renaissance palace on the most handsome square in town; comfortable rooms, traditionally furnished. In Seville (4 nights): a pretty hotel in the Barrio Sta Cruz created from several contiguous palaces connected by open-air patios; rooms vary in size and outlook, locally rated as 4-star. How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking over uneven ground and up and down hill (as well as an optional country walk). Some days involve a lot of driving. Average distance by coach per day: 101 miles. Small group: this tour will operate with between 12 and 22 participants.
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Andalucían musicians, mid-19th-century engraving.
10–15 May 2013 Details available September 2012 Contact us to register your interest Nine concerts – all of which are private – in a series of historic buildings in southern Spain’s most beautiful city. Top class musicians: Ex Cathedra, the Dufay Collective, Orphénica Lyra, Carlos Bonell, Javier Perianes, London Haydn Quartet, the Orlando Consort, Contrapunctus Choir. Lectures on the music and other aspects of Sevillian history and culture. The package includes accommodation, flights between the UK and Seville, most meals and much else besides. Also included are a day excursion and concert in the historic port town of Cádiz and a choice of pre- and post-festival tours. Renaissance and Baroque Seville was a place of prosperity and dynamism, and as a consequence the arts flourished. Musicians and composers in particular found many eager patrons, and the city became a centre of music the equal of anywhere in Europe. This festival is a journey from Islamic, Jewish and Christian music of mediaeval Spain, through the musical glories of Seville’s Golden Age, to the works of Spanish composers of the early 20th century, so heavily influenced
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by Andalucian culture. Leading exponents of Spanish music – from Spain, Britain and Morocco – perform in a variety of beautiful historic buildings. Matching music with place – that is the raison d’etre of this festival. Carefully planned with regard to pace, balance, musical type and architecture, the experience is enhanced with talks, dinners, optional visits and the company of like-minded fellow participants.
Off-Beat Andalucía a pre-festival tour 6–10 May 2013 Details available September 2012 Contact us to register your interest
b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Zurbarán & the Golden Age 6–12 November 2013 Contact us now for the full details or visit www.martinrandall.com
Festivals 2012-2013
Francisco de Zurbarán (1598–1664) was one of the greatest masters of the school of Seville, renowned for his powerful interpretations of monastic life in 17thcentury Spain.
The Danube Music Festival.........15 Music Weekends in Taunton & Newcastle..................38
Follow his career from Seville, where he first set up his workshop in 1614, through Extremadura to Madrid, culminating with the Prado’s great collection of his work.
English Music in Yorkshire.........39 The Rhône Music Festival...........63 The J.S. Bach Journey..................73
Focus also on other masters of the Spanish Golden Age: Morales, Pacheco, Velázquez, Murillo, Valdés Leal and Juan Martinez Montañés.
A Festival of Music in Rome.....131 Seville: A Festival of Spanish Music...........................188
This highly focused art tour provides a superb survey of Zurbarán, and the context in which he worked, in some of southern Spain’s most attractive cities, towns and villages.
The Long Gallery of the Prado, after a drawing by Joseph Pennell 1903..
The Lucerne Festival
Opera in Oslo, Gothenburg & Copenhagen 27 May–3 June 2013 Details available October 2012 Contact us to register your interest
August or September 2013 Details available January 2013 Contact us to register your interest
Drottningholm & Confidencen August 2013 Details available February 2013 Contact us to register your interest
Left: Lucerne, detail from a wood engraving c. 1890.
Le Corbusier (through France & Switzerland), 20–28 April 2013 (mz 532), see page 54. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
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Sweden, Switzerland
Istanbul Byzantine & Ottoman metropolis 23–29 September 2013 (ma 713) 7 days • £2,240 Lecturer: Professor Judith Herrin An extraordinarily diverse city: Roman remains; outstanding Byzantine buildings; glorious mosaics and frescoes; Ottoman mosques and palaces. Stay in the heart of the Sultanahmet. The radical transformations this city underwent are vividly expressed by its changes of name: Byzantium, Constantinople and Istanbul. The capital successively of the Byzantine and Ottoman Empires, it is one of the most beautiful and fascinating cities in the world. Initially a modest Greek city, it was chosen by Constantine as the site of the new capital of the Roman Empire and inaugurated in ad 330. The Byzantine Empire continued in direct succession to the Roman, and its capital became one of the largest cities in mediaeval Europe, the guardian of classical culture and a bastion of Christianity. The city walls were the most powerful in the western world, and while the Byzantine empire gradually shrank before the onslaughts of Persians and Arabs and Latin Crusaders, it was not finally extinguished until 1453 when Ottoman Turks captured the city. In the century and a half after the Ottoman conquest the city steadily acquired some of the finest Islamic architecture in the world, aided by the example of Haghia Sophia, the architect Sinan and the brilliant tile factories at Iznik. Minarets and mosques now dominate the skyline, but churches, temples, palaces and other pre-Ottoman buildings, whole or fragmentary, and the arts which decorated them, are to be found in abundance. Istanbul has evolved into a melting-pot of cultures, with a lively streetlife and colourful bazaars. The city’s international outlook is epitomised by its division between Europe and Asia, now linked by modern bridges crossing the mighty Bosphorus.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at 11.30am from London Heathrow to Istanbul. A short stroll around the Hippodrome before dinner, originally constructed c. ad 200 by Septimus Severus, it was completely rebuilt on a larger scale by Constantine and inaugurated in ad 330. It was at the centre of civil life in Byzantine Constantinople. Day 2. A day spent concentrating on the Byzantine monuments. Begin with Haghia Sophia, the 6th-century church which is the
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chief monument of Christian Byzantium. The ornamental pavement belonging to the Byzantine Great Palace is displayed in the small Mosaic Museum. Fethiye Camii, former church of the Pammakaristos, now part functioning mosque, part mosaic museum. The Kariye Camii (St Saviour in Chora) possesses the finest assemblage of Byzantine mosaics and frescoes to survive anywhere. Day 3. Yerebatan Saray is a remarkable colonnaded cistern. The Archaeological
its suburbs. See Beylerbei Palace, an imperial summer residence during the late Ottoman Empire. The Sadberk Hanim Museum is a mansion with fine collections spanning the whole period of Anatolian civilizations. Day 7. Drive beside the Golden Horn to the suburb of Eyüp where there is an important Islamic shrine. Continue along the massive Byzantine land walls to the Yediküle Fortress. Fly from Istanbul, arriving Heathrow c. 3.15pm.
Istanbul, the Golden Horn, from a drawing c. 1890.
Museum has an outstanding collection of ancient art and artefacts, Hellenistic and Roman sculpture, and sarcophagi. Visit the mosque complex of Sultan Beyazit II, with fine portals, minarets and courtyards. Optional walk through the Grand Bazaar and free time. Day 4. Sultan Ahmet Camii (Blue Mosque) is the last of Istanbul’s imperial mosques. Contrast the large and imposing Süleymaniye complex (the tombs are currently undergoing restoration), masterpiece of the great architect Sinan, with his beautiful small Rüstem Pasha Camii. Brief walk through the Spice Bazaar. The excellent Islamic Museum in the Ibrahim Pasha Palace has textiles and various artefacts. Finish with another small Sinan mosque, the Sokollu Mehmet Pasha Camii. Day 5. Topkapı Palace was the Sultan’s residence and the political centre of the Ottoman Empire. Now used to display the Imperial Treasury, it contains the finest surviving collection of Islamic precious objects and an outstanding collection of Chinese porcelain. Free afternoon to explore independently. Day 6. Travel by private boat along the Bosphorus, the historic and beautiful strait which divides Europe from Asia, for superb views of Istanbul and the villas and castles of
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Practicalities Price: £2,240 (deposit £200). This includes: air travel (economy class) with Turkish Airlines; (Airbus 310, Boeing 737); travel by private coach and boat; accommodation as below; breakfasts, 1 lunch and 5 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and a Turkish guide. Single supplement £290 (double room for single occupancy). Price without flights £2,000. Hotel: An elegant hotel, locally rated as 5-star, in the heart of the Sultanahmet, close to the Blue Mosque; rooms are spacious, stylishly furnished and well equipped; roof terrace with views of the Bosphorous. Visa: British nationals need a visa. This is obtained upon arrival at the airport and currently costs £10 (not included in tour price). Nationals of other countries should check their requirements. How strenuous? You will be on your feet a lot. Istanbul is quite hilly and not suitable for anyone with difficulties with everyday walking and stairclimbing. Average distance by coach per day: 9 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants. b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Ottoman Turkey Bursa, Iznik, Istanbul, Edirne 12–19 May 2013 (mz 557) 8 days • £2,520 Lecturer: Jane Taylor Stay in Istanbul, capital from 1453, and the earlier Ottoman capitals of Bursa and Edirne. See fine Ottoman buildings, which constitute perhaps a high point of Islamic architecture. Study Iznik ceramics and tiles, as well as textiles and craft work in wood and metal. In the world of Islam the 16-century architecture of the Ottoman Empire has few peers. The supreme architect, and the most prolific, was Sinan. With the 6th-century church of Haghia Sophia as the inspiration for many of his buildings, the pupil constantly strove to surpass the master in engineering skill and aesthetic refinements. Bursa, the first capital of the embryonic Ottoman Empire, is now a vibrant growing town, in an attractive setting at the base of the Uludağ mountain. The tour appropriately begins here, in order to trace the development of Ottoman art and architecture by seeing its early manifestations first. At nearby Iznik, in the 16th century, the era of Süleyman the Magnificent, ceramics achieved a peak of perfection, not only in tableware but also in tiles, using a process which has amazingly been lost to history. Istanbul, formerly Constantinople, was the largest city in the world both in late antiquity and in the Middle Ages. Its fall to the Ottomans in 1453 put their empire on a level with the Persian and Roman empires of the past. It is a deeply fascinating place, with a bewildering history and a mix of opposing cultures, but mosques and minarets still dominate the skyline. Edirne, formerly Adrianopolis, is an astonishing town, a once thriving capital, rich in architectural treasures, now beached on a byway and rarely reached by tourists. The greatest of all Sinan’s mosques is here.
plateau beneath. Mosques were built by each Sultan from 1326 to 1451, outstanding being the Yeşil Cami (Green Mosque) and Yeşil Türbe (Green Tomb) with extensive tilework by the Masters of Tabriz. See the mosque and tombs of the Muradiye complex. Situated in the old commercial centre are Ulu Cami (Great Mosque) and the caravanserais whose rents funded the mosques and served the textile trade, famous for its silk velvets. Day 3: Iznik. Drive to Iznik, formerly the flourishing Roman town of Nicæa, capital in the 13th century of the Byzantine emperorsin-exile; now a charming and unspoilt country town within concentric circuits of Roman and Byzantine walls. The museum in the beautiful hospice of Nilüfer Hatun tells the story of ceramic production from the Byzantine period to the great frit wares of the 16th century. Continue northwards and re-cross the Bosphorus. First of three nights in Istanbul. Day 4: Istanbul. Begin with monuments of the Byzantine city around the hippodrome, chief of which is Haghia Sophia, greatest of all Byzantine buildings and the inspiration for many Ottoman mosques. The nearby Yerebatan Saray is a remarkable colonnaded cistern. There is an excellent museum of Islamic and Turkish art in the Ibrahim Pasha Sarayi. The Kariye
Camii (St Saviour in Chora) has some of the finest Byzantine mosaics and wall paintings in the world. Optional visit to the old commercial district and Covered Bazaar. Day 5: Istanbul. Topkapi Sarayi, the palace of the Ottoman Sultans, is arranged around a series of courtyards. Apart from the magnificent Harem (living quarters of the royal family), other buildings house fine collections of Turkish arts and Chinese porcelain. A fine work by the great Ottoman architect Sinan is the Süleymaniye Mosque, the enormous and elegant complex includes medreses, shops and tombs (currently undergoing restoration) overlooking the Golden Horn. The mosque of Rüstem Pasha is small but brilliantly embellished with tiles. Nearby is the colourful and aromatic spice market. Day 6: The Bosphorus. Travel by private boat along the Bosphorus to Sariyer. Visit the Sadberk Hanim Museum, which combines two exceptional private collections, one ethnographic and the other archaeological. Lunch by the Bosphorus. Overnight in Edirne, near the border with Greece and Bulgaria. Day 7: Edirne. European capital of the Ottoman Empire until 1453. The Eski Camii (Old Mosque) shows the continuation of one of the traditions established at Bursa. The mosque
Edirne, copper engraving c. 1800.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 10.30am from London Heathrow to Istanbul (approximate time in the air: 3 hours 30 minutes). Cross the Bosphorus from Europe to Asia. A short ferry ride across the Sea of Marmara cuts the journey time. Continue the drive south through mainly agricultural land with peach trees and olive groves. First of two nights in Bursa. Day 2: Bursa. This first settled capital of the Ottoman Empire after its capture from the Byzantines in 1326 retains the sights of the old centre, but the new town now sprawls onto the Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
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Ottoman Turkey continued
Classical Turkey Greeks & Romans in Anatolia
and hospital complex of Sultan Beyazit II, is delightfully situated on the banks of the Tunca. The Üç Serefeli Mosque was the first Ottoman mosque to have a courtyard, and the first step towards the classical building style of the 16th century, exemplified by the nearby Selimiye, Sinan’s masterpiece. Return to Istanbul for the final night. Day 8: Istanbul. Sultan Ahmet Camii (Blue Mosque), despite its fame, marks the beginning of the decline of Ottoman architecture. Drive past the massive Byzantine walls to Eyüp Sultan Camii. Fly to Heathrow, arriving c. 7.30pm.
Practicalities Price: £2,520 (deposit £250). This includes: air travel (economy class) on British Airways flights (aircraft: Boeing 767); travel by private coach throughout; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 2 lunches and 6 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and of a local guide. Single supplement £70. Price without flights £2,290. Visa: British nationals need a visa. This is obtained upon arrival at the airport and currently costs £10 (not included in the tour price). Nationals of other countries should check their requirements.
Ruins at Ephesus, English aquatint 1830.
8–17 October 2012 (mz 389) 10 days • £3,390 Lecturer: Dr Oswyn Murray 8–17 April 2013 (mz 513) 10 days • £3,390 Lecturer: Dr Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones
Hotels: Bursa (2 nights): a recently refurbished modern hotel conveniently located near the city centre. Istanbul (4 nights in total): well located in the Sultanahmet area, this hotel is locally rated as 5-star, with elegant rooms and a roof terrace. Edirne (1 night): a converted 16th-century caravanserai with a sense of the traditional local hostelry, the best available hotel, fairly basic but adequate.
The most prosperous region of the ancient Mediterranean world.
How strenuous? There is quite a lot of walking within the towns, and paving is uneven. On some days there are several hours of driving. There are three hotel changes. Average distance by coach per day: 66 miles.
Scenically varied and spectacular: coast, mountain and plain.
Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
Connoisseur’s Istanbul April 2013 Details available November 2012 Contact us to register your interest
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The finest collection of Hellenistic and Roman city ruins to be found anywhere. All the major sites and many which are off the beaten track or difficult to get to.
The Turks were latecomers to Turkey. Greeks had settled on the western fringes over two thousand years before and, as recounted in The Iliad, had been meddling in Anatolian affairs a few centuries earlier still. After the demise of the Mycenaean civilization of Homer’s heroes, large numbers of Hellenes migrated from Greece to Aegean Anatolia and its offshore islands. First, around 1100 bc, Aeolians came to settle in the northern part of this coastal area, then Ionians moved into terrain further down the coast, to be followed at the end of the tenth century by Dorians who established themselves yet further south.
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They founded cities all along the Aegean coast and in due course along the river valleys into the heart of Anatolia and along the Mediterranean coast to the south. Most of the peoples the Greeks encountered eventually became Hellenised. No less than the Greeks of Greece proper, Asian Greeks contributed to the ‘Greek miracle’ by supplying philosophers, mathematicians, sculptors, architects and other civilization-builders of genius. The canon of classical architecture owes much to the Asian cities – not least the Ionic order, which appears in the gigantic temples of the Ionic coast, prodigies of architecture produced by the confluence of civilisations in the region. The Asian Greek cities succumbed willingly to Alexander. Freed from the Persian threat, they piled up the riches – material and architectural – of the Hellenistic period and became more numerous, more prosperous and more progressive than the western Greeks. They slipped with equal ease into membership of the Roman Empire. Imperial Rome was besotted by the Greek achievement. Greek culture proved more enduring than Roman, and after the fifthcentury collapse of the western empire the use of Latin soon languished. Despite the subsequent collapse of trade, the destruction of the Aegean cities by the Sassanids and the invasions of Anatolia by Selçuk and Ottoman Turks, the Greek language and other aspects of Greek culture and Christianity, the new b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
religion of the Greeks, were never entirely extinguished in Asia Minor. The abandoned ancient cities now comprise the most magnificent set of Archaic, Classical and, particularly, Hellenistic and Roman remains. While the proximity of some of the sites to holiday resorts and cruise ports means that they are also among the most visited, others are still relatively difficult of access and far from the beaten track. And the settings are usually ravishing: whether coastal, mountain or plateau, the landscapes provide a backdrop for this tour of extraordinary beauty.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 11.25am from London Heathrow to Izmir (via Istanbul). Dinner in the hotel. First of three nights in Izmir. Day 2: Pergamon. Under the Hellenistic Attalid dynasty, Pergamon became the most powerful city-state in Asia Minor, rivalling Athens and Alexandria as a centre of culture. On a steep-sided hill are remains of Attalid palaces, Temple of Dionysus and Altar of Zeus (most of which is now in Berlin), the Greek theatre and remains of the library, Temple of Athena and Attalid palaces. The Asclepieon and ‘Temple of Serapis’ (Red Fort) lie on flat ground below. Day 3: Sardis, Izmir. Drive inland to Sardis, capital of the Kingdom of Lydia, whose last independent ruler was the wealthy Croesus (560–546 bc), it later became an important Roman city. See the impressive remains of the Temple of Artemis, the reconstructed ‘Marble Court’, gymnasium and the 3rd-century synagogue, the largest in the ancient world. Free time in Izmir, Greek Smyrna. Day 4: Ephesus. Drive south to Ephesus, the principal port and commercial centre on the Aegean coast under the Roman Empire and capital of the province of Asia, with a population of 400,000 in the 2nd-century ad. The most popular pagan pilgrimage destination in the Graeco-Roman world, the city was also key to the development of Christianity. Ruined by the sedimentation of its estuary and finally sacked in the 7th-century, Ephesus has become the most extensively excavated site of the ancient world. Begin with the remains of the Temple of Artemis, before the first visit to the main site which has an abundance of paved streets, public buildings, temples, gymnasia and courtyard houses. Among the more striking buildings are the Library of Celsus and the theatre, originally seating 24,000 and scene of the protest against St Paul described in the Acts of the Apostles. First of three nights in Kusadasi. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Day 5: Priene, Didyma, Miletus. A small city of the Dodecapolis in southern Ionia, Priene is magnificently sited above the Maeander plain. Its hillside site ill-suiting it for Roman commerce, the remains date largely from the late Classical and early Hellenistic periods, and it exhibits one of the earliest of grid street layouts. The Temple of Athena Polias at the summit was designed by the architect Pythius. Didyma was a sanctuary with an oracle which, for a time, rivalled that at Delphi. Impressive remains of the colossal Hellenistic Temple of Apollo. Miletus, massive, well-preserved Roman theatre, baths of Foeustina, wife of Marcus Aurelius. Day 6: Selçuk, Ephesus. In Selçuk see the restored Basilica of St John at the top of Ayasuluk hill, and the Isla Bey mosque at the bottom. A second visit to the vast site of Ephesus, or a free afternoon in Kusadasi. Day 7: Aphrodisias. Leave the coast and drive into the interior of Anatolia. One of the most beautiful classical sites in Turkey, Aphrodisias was the centre of a Roman cult of Aphrodite. An important school for the production of high quality and widely exported sculpture, there are many fine examples in the museum. Among the architectural remains are the Temple of Aphrodite and the largest and most complete stadium to have survived from the ancient world. Overnight Pamukkale. Day 8: Hierapolis, Antalya. Hierapolis prospered under the Romans and Byzantines as a centre of thermal healing, and the nearby modern resort of Pamukkale still prospers. Founded by (and named after) Attalus II of Pergamum, Antalya was the principal port in Pamphylia in ancient and Byzantine times. Some free time to explore the charming old town with restored Ottoman period houses. First of two nights in Antalya. Day 9: Perge, Aspendos, Termessos, Antalya. Colonised by the Greeks after the Trojan War, Perge has substantial Hellenistic and
Roman gates and colonnaded streets. While the Roman aqueduct at Aspendos is the bestpreserved in Asia Minor, the marvellously complete theatre is the best-preserved in the whole of the Roman world. Afternoon visit to the one of the country’s finest archaeological museums with exhibits from prehistory to Ottoman. Day 10. Fly from Antalya (via Istanbul) arriving Heathrow c. 3.15pm.
Practicalities Price: £3,390 (deposit £350) This includes: air travel (economy class) on Turkish Airlines flights (Airbus A330, Boeing 738); travel by private coach throughout; accommodation as described below; breakfasts, 7 lunches (some are picnics) and 8 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and of a Turkish guide. Single supplement £370. Price without all flights £3,080. Hotels: in Izmir (3 nights): large, modern 5-star hotel overlooking the Citadel and old port. In Kusadasi (3 nights): old-fashioned yet elegant 4-star hotel, rooms have balconies and views across the Aegean. In Pamukkale (1 night): large, impersonal spa hotel with swimming pools. In Antalya (2 nights): beautiful boutique hotel within the old city walls with original 19th century frescoes. Visa: British nationals need a visa, this is obtained upon arrival at the airport and currently costs £10 (not included in the tour price). Nationals of other countries should check their requirements. How strenuous? This tour covers long distances by coach and much of the walking is over rough ground at sites which requires agility and stamina. There are three hotel changes. Average distance by coach per day: 80 miles. Small group: 12 to 22 participants.
Didyma, elevation of the Temple of Apollo (now a ruin), steel engraving c. 1850.
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Eastern Turkey Archaeology, architecture, history & landscapes
Kars, steel engraving c. 1840.
18 May–2 June 2013 (mz 571) 16 days • £4,270 Lecturer: Rowena Loverance A journey through lesser-known Turkey from Gaziantep to Lake Van, to Mount Ararat and the Black Sea. Wide ranging themes, spectacular landscapes and varied architecture: mountains, valleys, plains and coast; Byzantine and Georgian churches, Seljuk mosques and Armenian monasteries. The tour tells a story as much about the neighbouring countries it doesn’t visit as the country it does. The majestic scenery of eastern Anatolia is the setting for this ambitious tour, which, while remaining firmly within the borders of modern-day Turkey, encompasses an extraordinary range of historic and contemporary cultures. From the broad river valleys of the south to the vertiginous Alpine passes in the north, this part of Anatolia has always been a crossroads, whether for Abraham, patriarch of the three Near Eastern
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faiths, as he followed the Fertile Crescent from Ur to Canaan, or for the Greek mercenaries hired to fight for the Persian king Cyrus, who had to make their way back to their homeland across the Anatolian plateau and the Pontic Mountains. The tour journeys through the cradle of civilization between the Euphrates and the Tigris, where human settlement in the towns of Urfa and Harran goes back to the fifth millennium BC. It includes a Neolithic religious sanctuary, Urartian citadels and Roman frontier towns, Byzantine churches and Seljuk mosques and madrassas. It reveals cultures and civilizations which have almost disappeared from the historical record – early Christian monasteries of the Tur Abdin, Georgian churches of Tao-Klarjeti and the lost Armenian city of Ani. It even takes in the sites of two mediaeval coronations – of the Armenian king Gagik Artzruni on the island of Aktamar in 908 and the Byzantine emperor of Trebizond, Alexius III Comnenos, at the monastery of Sümela in 1349. Far from being backward-looking, though, this tour offers a remarkable opportunity to meet people trying to forge their present-day identities: the Kurds of Diyarbakir, the Syrian
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Orthodox monks and nuns of the Tur Abdin and of course, the Muslim population of Turkey itself, whose efforts to work out what it means to live in a secular Islamic country are and will continue to be of huge significance for us all.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at 12 midday from London Heathrow to Istanbul and then to Gaziantep, reaching the hotel c. 11.30pm (total flying time c. 4 hours 30 mins). Overnight Gaziantep. Day 2: Gaziantep to Şanliurfa. After a leisurely start, visit the Gaziantep Museum home to one of Turkey’s most extraordinary collections of mosaics, relocated from the nearby site of Zeugma before the area was flooded by the construction of the Birecik Dam. The mosaics, dating from the 2nd and 3rd centuries BC, are testament to the wealth of the region and are amongst the finest examples anywhere to be found. Drive to the banks of the Euphrates for a boat excursion before continuing to Şanliurfa. First of two nights in Şanliurfa. Day 3: Şanliurfa, Harran. Şanliurfa, or Ancient Edessa as named by Alexander the b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Great, an early Christian centre of learning and now a pilgrimage town for Muslims. See the complex of 12th-century mosques purported to mark Abraham’s birthplace and the citadel which dominates the skyline. In the afternoon visit Harran, settled since the 5th millennium BC and crossroads of trade routes linking Assyria to Anatolia. See the beehive houses scattered throughout the plain and the archaeological remains of the 8th-century Ulu Camii and Crusader Citadel. Overnight Şanliurfa. Day 4: Şanliurfa to Mardin. With views of the Taurus mountain range drive through groves of olive trees into the surrounding hills to see the extraordinary excavations at Göbekli Tepe. Dated to c. 10,000 BC, it is perhaps the earliest known man-made place of worship and challenges current ideas about the Neolithic. Continue East, driving parallel to the Syrian border, to Mardin, with Artukid monuments and tiers of stone-built houses. Spend the first of two nights in Mardin.
Day 9: Van, Çavuştepe. Capital of the kingdom of Urartu in the 9th century BC, Van (ancient Tushpa) was rival to Assyria. Explore the massive steep-sided Van Castle, first investigated by Austen Henry Layard in the 1840s, and the trilingual inscription from the time of Xerxes which contributed to the decipherment of cuneiform. At Çavuştepe, from the same era, see the basalt foundations of the fortress-palace of Sarduri-Hinili, the sacrifice area, open-air temple, cemetery and cisterns. Continue to the magnificent Hosap Castle, the finest example of a Kurdish castle to be found anywhere in Turkey. Overnight at Lake Van. Day 10: Mount Ararat, Kars. Drive through the Artüs Mountain range toward the Iranian border, to the İshak Paşa Palace positioned at the base of Mount Ararat. A magnificent example of 18th-century Ottoman architecture, it is a fascinating mixture of architectural styles: Seljuk, Iranian, Georgian and Armenian. Drive up through pasture land
Day 6: Dara, Diyarbakir. Visit Dara, the remains of a Roman city built in the 6th century to protect the Roman border with Sassanian Persia. See the necropolis, church and water cistern, so vast in size it exceeds even the Basilica cistern in Istanbul. Continue to Diyarbakir renowned for its basalt architecture and as a symbol of Kurdish identity. See the Byzantine walls and the Ulu Camii with its adjoining madrassa; built in 1091, the first of the Seljuk mosques of Anatolia, but retaining Byzantine elements. Overnight Diyarbakir. Day 7: Diyarbakir to Van. Take a late morning flight from Diyarbakir to Ankara, connecting with the early afternoon flight to Van. Arrive at the hotel at c. 5.00pm. Spend the first of three nights at Lake Van. Day 8: Akdamar Island. Take a boat to the gorgeous 10th-century Church of the Holy Cross, seat of Armenian king Gagik Artzruni, who was crowned here in 908. Built in 921, the church is made of local sandstone with a pyramidal roof and 13th-century bell tower. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Armenian architecture. Unlike Ani, Kars bears the marks of subsequent Ottoman and Russian occupation. Visit the Armenian Church of the Holy Apostles and the Seljuk castle and Ulu Camii. Overnight Kars. Day 12: Kars to Erzurum. Follow the Aras river west through the Aladaglar mountains; magical scenery of fields of gorse and fern, pristine river beds and deep ravines. Cross the river over the beautiful six-arched Çobandede bridge. In Erzurum, the principal city of eastern Anatolia, visit the magnificent Seljuk Ulu Camii, with its wooden dome, and also the twin-minareted Çifte Minare Medrese, its entrance adorned with stalactite porches. First of two nights in Erzurum. Day 13: Ösk Vank, Khakhuli, Erzurum. All day excursion to visit the 10th century Georgian monasteries of Ösk Vank and Khakhuli north of Erzurum. Known as TaoKlarjeti, this area was an important part of medieval Georgia, ruled by the Bagratid kings. Both monasteries were founded by David the Great: Khakhuli, an important literary centre, retains its cross-dome triple-apsed church, with fine relief carvings and frescoes still surviving. Ösk Vank is even more impressive, with scallop-shell arches, high relief mouldings and sculpted column capitals. Overnight Erzurum.
Mount Ararat, mid-19th-century engraving.
Day 5: Tur Abdin, Mardin. All day excursion to visit the Syrian orthodox limestone monasteries in the remote Tur Abdin. Deyrul Zafaran, built in 495 and once the seat of the Syrian Orthodox patriarch has some beautiful stone work in the chapel which holds the patriarchal throne. Mor Gabriel, surrounded by pistachio trees, now largely restored dates from 397 and is still a working monastery. The Church of the Mother of God at Anitli is little visited but with its octagonal church and intricate stone-carving is one of the most beautiful in the Tur Abdin. Overnight Mardin.
Faded frescoes adorn the interior, while the exterior has relief carvings of Biblical stories, mythological animals and Gagik himself. A verdant enclave surrounded by pea-green waters and snow capped mountains, the setting is idyllic. Lunch on the lake, the rest of the afternoon is free. Overnight Lake Van.
and fields of poppies following the Armenian border north to plateaus with spectacular mountain vistas. First of two nights in Kars. Day 11: Ani, Kars. Once the capital of mediaeval Armenia, Ani is now a deserted city standing sentinel above the Arpaçay river, the border between Turkey and Armenia. Its walls, towers and minarets retain many of their foundation inscriptions, and its ruined churches and cathedral display the variety and quality of
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Day 14: From Erzurum to Trabzon. Drive north through the Pontic Alps, in the steps of Xenophon’s Ten Thousand with spectacular views. Along the Karasu, the northernmost branch of the Euphrates, to Aşkale, with its ruined Byzantine fortress. Over the 2390m Kopdagi Pass, the Black Sea watershed, into the Çoruh valley, passing the huge fortress of Bayburt. Over the Zigana Pass, where the Ten Thousand caught their first glimpse of the sea.
Turkey
Eastern Turkey continued
The Ring in Seattle Wagner in the Emerald City
Descend through temperate forests to Trabzon, the historic port town on the Black Sea. Visit the Pavilion where Atatürk stayed in 192. First of two nights in Trabzon. Day 15: Sümela Monastery, Trabzon. To Sümela Monastery, founded in the 4th century, it clings to sheer rock facing the Al tindere Valley. Though in a ruinous state, many of the monastic buildings survive, with 18th- and some 14th-century frescoes. In Trabzon, visit the beautiful late-Byzantine church of Aya Sophia, with 13th-century frescoes and frieze. Overnight Trabzon. Day 16: Fly from Trabzon (via Istanbul) arriving Heathrow at c. 3.15pm.
Practicalities Price: £4,270 (deposit £350). This includes: all flights (economy class) with Turkish Airlines (Boeing 737–800); private coach travel; hotel accommodation; breakfasts, 13 lunches (incl. 1 picnic) and 14 dinners with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and local guide. Single supplement £410. Price without flights £3,880.
Valkyries, after a painting by A.V. Heyden.
Visa: British nationals need a visa, which is obtained upon arrival at the airport and currently costs £10 (not included in the tour price). Nationals of other countries should check their requirements.
2–11 August 2013 (mz 648) 9 nights • £4,920 Lecturer: Barry Millington
Hotels. In Gaziantep (1 night): a large international, charmless but comfortable hotel. Şanliurfa (2 nights): a boutique hotel, walking distance from the Citadel. In Mardin (2 nights): 4-star hotel in the town centre with well-equipped, comfortable rooms. In Diyarbakir (1 night): a converted Caravanserai with a magnificent basalt-stone courtyard. In Van (3 nights): a new 5-star hotel set back from the shores of Lake Van; spacious bedrooms with lake-views. In Kars (2 nights): 3-star hotel, friendly but basic; the best available. In Erzurum (2 nights): 5-star hotel with all the expected ameneties in the mountains above Erzurum. In Trabzon (2 nights): 4-star hotel with roof-top restaurant and views of the Black Sea.
The stunning sets by Thomas Lynch, rooted in the natural world, evoke the landscape of the Pacific Northwest.
How strenuous? A long and demanding tour with some early starts and days with a lot of coach travel (but roads are good and the coach carries refreshments). Participants should be able to manage everyday walking and stairclimbing without difficulty. Archaeological sites involve scrambling over rough terrain and surefootedness is essential. The average distance by coach per day is c. 71 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
T u r k e y, U . S . A .
Another strong cast in Seattle’s renowned Ring.
The music is interspersed with visits to the city’s museums and galleries as well as trips out to Tacoma and by sea-plane to the San Juan islands. Led by Wagner expert, Barry Millington, who gives talks on the operas. Some visits are accompanied by Professor John Webster, a lecturer from the University of Washington. Perhaps only Bayreuth enjoys greater international prestige than Seattle for its stagings of Wagner’s Ring Cycle. This remains a remarkable achievement, but in 1975, when Seattle Opera mounted its first Ring, it would have been inconceivable. Since then Seattle itself has undergone a transformation from a visibly declining port to one of America’s most fashionable and desirable metropolises. For a while it was the fastest growing city in the US; the southward drift has reversed, and Frasier was not alone on his flight from the East Coast.
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Cultural depth has followed its well-known business successes. New world class buildings include the Central Library designed by Rem Koolhaas and the Seattle Art Museum where major expansion was completed in 2007 alongside the opening of their new sculpture park. Frank Gehry’s museum of music sits beside the most recent home of Seattle Opera, the Marion Oliver McCaw Hall, a stunning building of glass and steel by LMN Architects. The Ring in 2013 will again be directed by Stephen Wadsworth who received great acclaim for his cycle on its first appearance. The cast list for 2013 is a mix of Wagnerian stalwarts and new blood. The British soprano Alwyn Mellor, acclaimed as one of the most thrilling Wagner singers of the new generation, takes the role of Brünnhilde. The German tenor Stefan Vinke, who also stars in the Covent Garden Ring this autumn, sings Siegfried, while Stuart Skelton, who unfailingly combines virility with a dark, lyrical beauty of tone, is Siegmund. The American baritone Greer Grimsley, who has established himself as a firm favourite both in Seattle and elsewhere, returns in the role of Wotan/Wanderer. Asher Fisch, the highly regarded principal guest conductor of Seattle Opera, once again brings his special talents to this most challenging of undertakings. The natural setting of the ‘Emerald City’ is stupendous, with the snow-capped Olympic mountains, the massive peaks of the Cascade volcanoes and the island-dotted expanses of b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Puget Sound. The itinerary includes a day by sea-plane out into the Sound, as well as time for exploration of the city’s museums and galleries. Of course the main focus is the music and we allow ample opportunity to relax, reflect and prepare for each performance. Talks are given by Wagner expert and editor of The Wagner Journal, Barry Millington and some visits are accompanied by Seattle resident, John Webster, Professor of English at the University of Washington. An additional bonus of this tour is that we have allowed two nights in Seattle, not one, to recover from jet lag before the first performance.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 3.00pm from London Heathrow direct to Seattle, arriving c. 4.30pm (time in the air: c. 9 hours). Drive to the hotel. Day 2. Walk through Seattle’s oldest district, Pioneer Square, now rejuvenated with galleries, bookstores and cafés. Tour of ‘underground’ Seattle and a harbour cruise with views of the city skyline and Olympic mountains. Early evening lecture at the Central Library, designed by Rem Koolhaas, followed by dinner. Day 3. After a morning lecture walk through Downtown to the Seattle Art Museum which houses good collections of north-western American and Asian art. A free afternoon. Early dinner then drive to the Marion Oliver McCaw Hall. Das Rheingold, Greer Grimsley (Wotan), Stephanie Blythe (Fricka), Richard Paul Fink (Alberich), Mark Schowalter (Loge), Lucile Beer (Erda), Dennis Petersen (Mime/Fafner), Andrea Silvestrelli (Fasolt), Wendy Bryn Harmer (Freia), Jason Collins (Froh), Markus Brück (Donner), Renee Tatum (Flosshilde), Cecelia Hall (Wellgunde), Jennifer Zetlan (Woglinde).
back to Seattle, landing on Lake Union. Day 6. Most of the day is free; we suggest a visit to the Olympic Sculpture Park, a new development on a former industrial site overlooking the ocean with works by prominent American artists and the Asian Art Museum. An afternoon lecture is followed by dinner. Siegfried, Alwyn Mellor (Brünnhilde), Stefan Vinke (Siegfried), Dennis Petersen (Mime/ Fafner), Greer Grimsley (The Wanderer), Richard Paul Fink (Alberich), Lucile Beer (Erda), Jennifer Zetlan (Forest Bird), JC Casiano (The Bear). Day 7. Tacoma. Day trip south to Tacoma, a regenerated mill town, now home to a clutch of good museums and commercial galleries in a riverside setting. Visits include the very good art museum (mainly modern and contemporary), numerous glass works by local boy Dale Chihuly (among them his 500ft Bridge of Glass) and the Washington State History Museum. Day 8. Free morning. We recommend the Museum of Flight, an excellent collection of aircraft and the opportunity to board Concorde and Air Force One. Afternoon lecture followed by dinner. Götterdämmerung, Alwyn Mellor (Brünnhilde), Stefan Vinke (Siegfried), Markus Brück (Gunther), Wendy Bryn Harmer (Gutrune), Richard Paul Fink (Alberich), Luretta Bybee (First Norn), Stephanie Blythe (Second Norn/Waltraute), Margaret Jane Wray (Third Norn), Renee Tatum (Flosshilde), Cecelia Hall (Wellgunde), Jennifer Zetlan (Woglinde).
Price: £4,920 (deposit £400). This includes: good tickets for all four operas (cost c. £870); flights (economy class) with British Airways (Boeing 747); travel by private coach; hotel accommodation; breakfasts, 2 lunches and 5 dinners with wine, water, coffee (plus meals on flights); all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and local guides. Single supplement £420 (double room for single use). Price without flights £4,210. Flight upgrades: we can request these; price subject to availability. Visas: British citizens can enter the USA without a visa providing they apply for the visa waiver online and have a machine-readable passport. The current charge is $14. We will advise on this. Hotel: a comfortable hotel in Downtown and walking distance from the key sites (the opera house is reached by coach). Warm, traditional furnishings, good restaurant, gym, friendly staff, comparable to a 4-star. How strenuous? A fair amount of walking. Participants should be able to manage everyday walking and stairclimbing without difficulty. Average coach travel per day: 14 miles. Small group: between 12 and 22 participants.
Day 9. Free day. Fly at c. 6.45pm from Seattle to London Heathrow. Day 10. Arrive London Heathrow c. 11.45am. Mt Tacoma in Washington State, wood engraving c. 1890.
Day 4. Morning lecture. The University of Washington is an attractive campus of landscaped parkland. Tour here with Professor John Webster including the main library. Lunch at the hotel is followed by free time. Die Walküre, Alwyn Mellor (Brünnhilde), Greer Grimsley (Wotan), Margaret Jane Wray (Sieglinde), Stuart Skelton (Siegmund), Stephanie Blythe (Fricka), Andrea Silvestrelli (Hunding), Wendy Bryn Harmer (Gerhilde), Renee Tatum (Grimgerde), Jessica Klein (Helmwige), Tamara Mancini (Ortlinde), Cecelia Hall (Rossweisse), Luretta Bybee (Schwertleite), Sarah Heltzel (Siegrune), Lindsay Ammann (Waltraute). Day 5. San Juan Islands. Spectacular journey by sea-plane across the Puget Sound to the San Juan Islands, northwest of Seattle. Visit the sculpture park, a small but good collection of contemporary works and English Camp. Lunch is on the waterfront at Friday Harbour. Fly Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Practicalities
Looking for tours in the UK? See pages 24–39 for England, 162–167 for Scotland and 204–205 for Wales.
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West Coast Architecture A century of building in Arizona & California
San Francisco, wood engraving 1891.
7–19 September 2013 (ma 675) This tour is currently full For the full details, contact us or visit www.martinrandall.com The whole gamut of architecture, 1908 onwards, some of it usually closed to the public. Begin at Frank Lloyd Wright’s Taliesin West in Scottsdale, Arizona, and end at his Hanna House in Stanford, California. Louis Kahn, Charles and Ray Eames, Rudolf Schindler, Richard Neutra, Bernard Maybeck, Greene & Greene are also well represented. Contemporary architects include Rafael Moneo, Frank Gehry, Mario Botta, Herzog & de Meuron, Richard Meier, Paolo Soleri, Arata Isozaki, Michael Graves. Great landscapes, from desert to coast and into the Napa Valley, plus a stunning journey by rail from L.A. to San Francisco through countryside not seen by road. Time to visit the excellent art collections at the Getty Center, Norton Simon, de Young and Legion of Honor Museums. Four bases: Phoenix (Arizona), La Jolla (California), Los Angeles, San Francisco.
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Modernism was made for California. Just as it was on the West Coast that the twentieth century’s dominant art form, the movie, was to flourish, so Modernist architecture blossomed unencumbered by the concerns and limitations of the Old World. Here was a climate that adored flat roofs and a hilly topography of brilliant views that called for structural daring, a place with a selfconscious lack of history in which displaced Europeans – and Americans freed from the waspish East Coast – could create whole new worlds and life-styles facing the seemingly boundless freedom of the desert and the Pacific. Superlatives abound: the ‘cast stone’ of Louis Kahn’s Salk Institute is perhaps the most sublimely generous construction of post-war architecture; Charles and Ray Eames’s Studio House the most witty and charming; while right at the beginning of the century, Greene & Greene and Bernard Maybeck’s Arts & Crafts was as vivid a reimagining of William Morris as you can imagine. Equally remarkable are the cities, from the captivating milieu of San Francisco to its unfathomable cousin Los Angeles, the City of 4 Ecologies: hills, mesa, littoral, autopia. The chutzpah of patron and architect hasn’t let up in the twenty-first century with Richard Meier’s hilltop Getty Center, Raphael Moneo’s Cathedral of Our Lady of Our Angels – both in L.A. – and Herzog & de Meuron’s de Young Museum in San Francisco.
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If one looks for a beginning to all this, beyond the fragments of the Pueblo and the Spanish Mission architecture, it is found in Frank Lloyd Wright. While Europeans spent the 1920s and 30s playing catch-up to Wright’s disciplined Prairie houses, he went wild in the West. In Los Angeles, beginning with the extraordinary Hollyhock House, he demonstrated a virtuosity on California’s slopes equal to that he’d achieved on the flat expanse of the Mid-West. Wright’s approach was extended by his ex-pupils Rudolf Schindler and Richard Neutra who threw away the cloak of their native Vienna to create a series of exquisite, ecologically responsive dwellings that would lead to the ‘Case Study Houses’ and the ‘Bay Area School’ around San Francisco. Wright also built his combined home and fellowship at Taliesin West in the desert outside Phoenix. Gradually shaped over thirty years, this complement to his earlier Taliesin East, is Wright at his most successful – and moving. A blurring of building and landscape formed from desert rocks and sand, its inspiration lies in the light touch of the native Sinagua Indians. Paolo Soleri’s eco-city of Arcosanti, still being constructed today far out in the Arizona desert, pays homage to Taliesin and is either a suggestion of an ecologically viable future, or the American Dream at its most indulgent and eccentric.
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Art in Texas Outstanding collections in city & desert 16–27 October 2013 (ma 742) 11 nights • £4,630 Lecturer: Gijs van Hensbergen A new tour for 2013. World class collections of art and sculpture, public and private, housed in exceptional buildings. Big names include the Kimbell in Fort Worth, Menil in Houston, Blanton in Austin, McNay in San Antonio, Fine Arts in Dallas and Houston, and Donald Judd’s Chinati Foundation. The range is considerable from Renaissance to contemporary, European and American, with emphasis on the modern. The variety continues in city and landscape: big brother Houston, leafy and lush; to tiny Marfa, way out west in the desert; alongside the Rio Grande to prettified San Antonio; to end in Dallas, the home of hospitality and a terrific arts scene. Led by art historian, Gijs van Hensbergen, an expert on American collections and collectors. The cultural resonance of ‘Texas’ may not be overwhelming, yet the oil and livestock barons of this southern state were philanthropists to rival any on the eastern or western seaboards. The result: art collections of staggering richness in buildings developed by the leading architects of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Among the highlights are some of the very personal collections these patrons of the arts acquired. The Meadows Museum in Dallas, for example, the gift of oilman Algur Meadows, houses the finest display of Spanish Art outside the Prado. While John and Dominique de Menil’s dazzling Menil Collection in Houston – built up with money from the Schlumberger oil-drilling fortune – contains over 15,000 works by the greatest names of twentiethcentury European and American art. Painter and heiress Marion Koogler McNay, too, used an oil fortune to establish The McNay – the first modern art museum in the Lone Star State – in her colonial revival mansion in San Antonio. But private wealth in Texas has always been matched by public investment and the entire history of art is abundantly represented in the major city galleries. The Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, one of the largest in the US, has an extraordinary 62,000 works spanning six thousand years, while the Dallas Museum of Art is as renowned for its Impressionists and Post Impressionists as Austin’s The Blanton is for its Renaissance masterpieces. The searing Texan landscape, with its Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Engraving 1891 after a painting by Frederick Remington (1861–1909)
expanses of sand and scrub and distant sierras, is a work of art in its own right, and a visit to Marfa provides the moment where art, architecture and nature meet. The Chinati Foundation was established by minimalist sculptor Donald Judd to display large installations of his own work and other leading contemporary sculptors and, in its wake, this tiny desert town has become one of the liveliest contemporary art scenes in the US. As rich as the art is the architecture. The Dallas Arts District includes buildings by four Pritzker Prize winners (Norman Foster, Rem Koolhaas, I.M. Pei and Renzo Piano); while in Houston, admirers of Mies van der Rohe can view one of his very rare museum buildings at the Fine Arts Museum followed by Piano’s simple and striking cypress-clad Menil. However, it is without doubt Louis Kahn’s Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth that shows off these big hitters at their memorable best.
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Itinerary Day 1: London to Houston. Fly at c. 10.30am from London Heathrow to Houston, arriving c. 2.30pm local time (flying time c. 9 hours). Drive to the hotel in Houston’s ‘Museum District’ with time to settle in before dinner. First of three nights in Houston. Day 2: Houston. The morning is spent in the Museum of Fine Arts, an outstanding collection built up over the last century. Highlights include the Impressionists and American art of the 19th and 20th centuries, but there is much variety from the Renaissance to contemporary works by minimalist Dan Flavin. It is architecturally varied too with extensions by Mies van der Rohe and Rafael Moneo. Bayou Bend houses a good collection of American decorative and fine art, with beautiful gardens around. Overnight Houston. Day 3: Houston. The Menil is one of the
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Art in Texas continued
The Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, Texas, 1969–72, architect: Louis I. Kahn (pool currently under restoration). Photograph: Michael Bodycomb. ©2004 Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth.
world’s greatest private collections of modern art. Across the road is another Piano museum dedicated to Cy Twombly’s abstract works. Also visited are the Rothko Chapel, built as a sanctuary for fourteen of the artist’s canvases, and Richmond Hall, a grocery store converted into a Dan Flavin light installation. Some free time to return to the Fine Arts Museum or walk in the neighbouring Rice University campus. Overnight Houston. Day 4: Houston to Marfa. Fly to El Paso, in westernmost Texas, and drive south across the Chihuahuan Desert (c. 190 miles) through a landscape of scrub and shrub, fringed by distant sierras. Marfa is little more than a handful of dusty intersections and yet is laden with western charm. Thanks to Donald Judd, it also has a thriving contemporary arts scene and a sophistication out of all proportion to its size. Evening visit to Judd’s home and his library (by arrangement). First of two nights in Marfa. Day 5: Marfa, the Chinati Foundation. Judd’s decision to convert 340 acres of former US military land into an art installation stemmed from a need to escape the East Coast and a desire to display large-scale installations in a setting which linked art with landscape. Works by Judd, John Chamberlain and Dan Flavin have been joined over the years by Carl Andre, Ingólfur Arnarson, Roni Horn, Ilya Kabakov, Richard Long, Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen. Most of the day is spent here with some free time to visit Marfa’s excellent bookstore and main street. Overnight Marfa. Day 6: by train to San Antonio. Drive to nearby Alpine to catch the ‘Texas Eagle’ which snakes its way through deepest countryside to bordertown Del Rio and then onto San Antonio (train journey time: 8 hours; dinner on
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board). Arrive at San Antonio c. 9.45pm. First of two nights in San Antonio. Day 7: San Antonio. The McNay was the first modern art museum in Texas and alongside the excellent 19th and 20th-century works is a substantial sculpture collection in the landscaped park and a new wing for temporary exhibitions. Guided tour of the nearby Botanical Garden which well represents the diverse ecology of Texas. Free time to visit The Alamo, of Davy Crockett fame, and the Cathedral, where Crockett is buried. Overnight San Antonio. Day 8: Austin, Dallas. Drive north via Austin, a major university city and the state capital. Visit the Blanton Museum of Art, with fine collections of Renaissance as well as 20thcentury American art. Brief stop at the Harry Ransom Center, an incredible resource of rare books and manuscripts. Continue to Dallas (c. 195 miles), arriving early evening. First of three nights in Dallas. Day 9: Dallas. Begin with Philip Johnson’s Thanksgiving Chapel and JFK Memorial before continuing to the Arts District. The Dallas Museum of Art is one of the finest in the US. Next door is the Nasher Sculpture Center, a superb collection including works by Calder, Chillida, Serra, Hepworth, and a ‘skyspace’ by James Turrell in the gardens. Some free time – the Asian Art Museum is a possibility. Overnight Dallas. Day 10: Fort Worth, Dallas. The day is spent in Fort Worth and its astonishingly rich ‘Cultural District’. The Kimbell Art Museum is a magnificent collection, particularly the European paintings with Titian and Tiepolo to Matisse and Mondrian. Kahn’s
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building is sublime: a series of barrel vaults providing lighting and acoustic perfection for the masterworks. Across the road is The Modern (designed by Tadao Ando), another collection of 20th-century greats: Pollock, Hockney, Picasso, Bacon and a room of Sean Scully canvasses. See also the Amon Carter Museum of American art including works by Frederic Remington and Charles M. Russell, the two greatest artists of the American west. Overnight Dallas. Day 11: Dallas. Leave the hotel late morning for the Meadows Museum, a world-renowned collection of Spanish art, particularly strong on the Golden Age. Continue to Dallas-Fort Worth Airport for the overnight flight to London, departing c. 5.45pm. Day 12. The flight arrives London Heathrow at c. 8.45am.
Practicalities Price: £4,630 (deposit £400). This includes: international air travel (economy class) with British Airways (Boeing 777) and a further flight between Houston and El Paso (airline and times subject to confirmation nearer departure); first class rail travel from Alpine to San Antonio; private coach for all other transfers and excursions; accommodation as described below; all breakfasts, 4 lunches and 7 dinners (including a simple one on board the Texas Eagle) with wine, water and coffee (plus meals on flights); all admission charges and donations; all tips for restaurant staff, drivers, guides and porters; all taxes (federal, state, city and airport); the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £440 (double room for single occupancy). Price without the international flights £3,970. b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Santa Fe Opera Music in the mountains of New Mexico Visas. British citizens do not need a visa to enter the USA providing their passport is machine-readable. We will advise on this. Nationals of other countries should check their entry requirements with their local US consulate. Hotels. In Houston (3 nights): a contemporary hotel next door to the Fine Arts Museum; rooms are smaller than the norm in the US; good restaurant. In Marfa (2 nights): hotel built in 1930 in colonial style and the focal point of town; lots of charm and quirkiness and faded in parts. In San Antonio (2 nights): attractive hotel in colonial style well located on the River Walk. In Dallas (3 nights): comfortable hotel in Uptown Dallas with spacious bedrooms, restaurant and terrace. How strenuous? This is a long tour with a lot of travelling and a significant time difference to contend with. There is a fair amount of walking and standing around in museums. Fitness and stamina are essential. Average distance by coach per day: 62 miles. Music. There may be an opportunity to attend an opera, concert or play in Dallas. Programmes will be sent nearer the time. Small group. This tour will operate with between 14 and 22 participants.
Modern art & architecture Finland: Aalto & Others.........................44 History of Impressionism........................53 Le Corbusier............................................54 Modern Art on the Côte d’Azur.............62
The Marriage of Figaro, from a synopsis published c. 1930.
Bauhaus & Expressionism.......................70 Modern Art in Italy...............................100 Munch in Oslo......................................149 Art in Texas...........................................199
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
13–22 August 2013 (mz 652) Full details available September 2013 Contact us to register your interest
Oscar, by Theodore Morrison, based on the life of Oscar Wilde with American countertenor David Daniels; La Donna del Lago (Rossini) with Joyce DiDonato.
One of the world’s great summer opera festivals in the spectacular setting of the New Mexico mountains.
Santa Fe is small, charming, colourful; our hotel extremely comfortable; visits around the performances include some of the excellent museums and historic sites; we allow two nights to acclimatise before the first opera.
In 2013: The Grand Duchess of Gerolstein (Offenbach) with Susan Graham; Verdi’s La Traviata and Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro;
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A new tour for 2013.
U.S.A.
Transoxiana Silk Road cities: Khiva, Bukhara & Samarkand 7–17 May 2013 (mz 556) 11 days • £3,100 Lecturer: Professor James Allan 3–13 September 2013 (ma 685) 11 days • £3,100 Lecturer: Professor Hugh Kennedy Some of the most glorious sights in the Islamic world. Magnificent mosques and madrassas, acres of wonderful wall tiles, intact streetscape, memorable landscapes. Remote, difficult of access and remarkably unspoilt. Traditional dress is still the norm. Oxiana, Tartary, Turkestan, Khiva, Bukhara, Samarkand: names to produce a frisson. They evoke alluring images of shimmering turquoise domes and exquisite glazed wall tiles, of lost libraries and renowned scholars, of the delicious decadence of the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám, of gardens, poetry and wine, of the fabulous riches of the Silk Road between China and Christendom. Less agreeable images are also induced: of Ghengis Khan and Timur (Tamerlane), the most far-reaching conquerors in history; of the tyranny and cruelty of the khans, perpetuating
the last redoubts of mediaeval misrule; of the Great Game, the nineteenth-century Cold War between Britain and Russia; of terrain as hostile as the tribesmen and petty tyrants who inhabited its desert and mountain fastnesses; and of a post-Soviet penumbra of Stans of suspect politics and allegiances. The three cities of the subtitle lie now in Uzbekistan, independent since 1991 but an entity which has its origins in late nineteenth-century Russian imperialism, which agglomerated a number of independent khanates, and whose borders were settled in the 1920s. It lies at the very centre of Central Asia. One of only two double land-locked nations in the world, it has a capital which is a thousand miles north of the Indian Ocean (Afghanistan and Pakistan intervene), 1,400 miles east of the Black Sea and 400 miles from Xinjiang, China’s largely Islamic western province. This is as the crow flies; extremes of topography and climate as well as banditry slowed or terminated the progress of earthbound travellers. A slave-trading oasis khanate, Khiva was, and remains, the smallest of the three cities. It is perhaps the most intact and homogenous urban ensemble in the Islamic world, with biscuit-coloured brick and blue and turquoise maiolica. In Bukhara, gorgeously adorned architecture spanning a thousand years still
rises above a streetscape of indeterminate age. Samarkand has the largest and most resplendently caparisoned historic buildings of all. There are also visits to Shakhrisabz, which has breathtaking remains of Timur’s palace, and to Tashkent, the spacious modern capital with the good museums and galleries. Space is not at a premium in this part of the world. Broad tree-lined boulevards encircle the historic town centres and no expanding girdle of high-rise apartments disfigures the approach. Modernity has made relatively unobtrusive inroads: in one of the few nations on earth which has escaped the countryside scourge of ferroconcrete and breeze block, the whitewashed villages and farmsteads with their awnings of vines would hold few surprises for Tolstoy. Nearly all the women are to some extent in traditional dress, brightly coloured ankle-length dresses, and so are some of the older men. In the wake of economic liberalisation since independence, streets and courtyards are draped with the dazzling hues of carpets and textiles; the glories of the Silk Road in its heyday are not hard to imagine.
Itinerary Day 1. Fly at c. 9.00pm from London Heathrow for the seven-hour flight to Tashkent (currently the only direct flight). Days 2 & 3: Tashkent. Touch-down c. 8.00am. Hotel rooms in the centre of Tashkent are at your disposal for the morning. The History Museum of the People of Uzbekistan is within walking distance if you want to venture out before lunch. Afternoon drive around the city centre, a modern city with wide avenues, spacious parks, glistening new government buildings. Among the places seen during the two days are the Hazret Imam complex, a group of mosques and madrassas (seminaries) from the sixteenth to the twentieth centuries; the Timur Museum and park, a homage to the newly elevated national hero with 13th to 16th-century artefacts and models of some of the buildings seen on the tour; the Fine Arts Museum with collections from pre-Islamic sculpture to twentieth-century painting; free time for the Museum of Applied Arts or the Choroz Bazaar. Fly c. 6.00pm on day 3 to Urgench and drive the 20 miles to Khiva. First of two nights in Khiva.
Khiva, wood engraving 1889 from Russian Pictures.
Day 4: Khiva. No modern intrusions spoil the timeless fabric within a rectangle of crenellated and turreted ramparts. Most of the buildings are 19th-century, but such was Khiva’s isolation and conservatism that to the inexpert eye they could date to any time from the 16th century. The Friday Mosque, a forest of carved wooden columns some dating to the 10th century, the
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Tash Hauli Palace, whose harem quarters constitute the loveliest secular spaces in Central Asia, and the Paklavan Mahmoud Mausoleum where tiled interiors reach a peak of opulence. Day 5: from Khiva to Bukhara. The 280 mile journey starts and finishes in an unspoilt landscape of green fields, plentiful trees and adobe farmsteads while the central section is undulating desert, specked with tufty shrubs which are briefly green in the spring. There are periodic sightings of the meandering Oxus, the mighty river crossed by Alexander the Great in 329 bc. Reach Bukhara in time for a walk before dinner. First of three nights in Bukhara. Day 6: Bukhara. Genghis Khan ensured in 1220 that with notable exceptions (including the Kalon Minaret, at 48 metres then the tallest in the world) little of Bukhara’s first golden age remains, but of the second, the 15th and 16th centuries, there survives much magnificent architecture, lavishly embellished. Today’s walks take in the vast Kalon Mosque (finished 1514) with a capacity of 10,000, the small and serene Baland Mosque, several grand madrassas, the formidable citadel of the Khans and the Zidan, their infamous prison. Take tea in the shade of mulberry trees around a 15thcentury pool. Day 7: Bukhara. Free morning; there is plenty more architecture to see, and museums, bazaars, carpet workshops. By coach in the afternoon to places outside the centre of the city. The perfectly preserved 10th-century Samani Mausoleum and the remains of the 12th-century Namaz Goh Mosque display fine terracotta decoration. The Emir’s summer palace, 1911, is a riotous mix of Russian and traditional Bukharan decoration with rose garden, aviary and swimming pool.
A street in Tashkent, wood engraving c. 1890.
adjacent Ak Serai Mausoleum and the Shahi-Zinda, an ensemble of mausolea gorgeously apparelled in many types of glazed tiles. Day 10: Samarkand. Commissioned by Timur, the Bibi Khanum Mosque is an exercise in gigantism and impresses despite partial destruction and over-zealous restoration. The adjacent Bazaar is a traditional produce market. Optional visits to the Afrasiab History Museum which documents preIslamic Samarkand and to the remains of the extraordinary observatory built by Ulug Bek in the 15th century. Some free time. Day 11: Tashkent. Drive to Tashkent. The flight arrives at Heathrow at c. 8.00pm.
Day 8: Shakhrisabz. A 4-hour drive across a fertile plain where wheat and cotton flourish. Shakhrisabz was transformed by Timur (1336– 1405) whose home town it was. An astounding survival is the most imposing palace portal in the history of architecture, an arch 22 metres wide with a wondrous range of tiled decoration. Further Timurid remnants include a mosque complex with three turquoise domes. Cross a mountain range (broadleaf woods, fissured granite, pasturage) and drop down to the plain of the Zarifsan river, and to Samarkand. First of three nights in Samarkand.
Practicalities
Day 9: Samarkand. The Registan, ‘the noblest public square in the world’ (Lord Curzon, 1889), bounded on three sides by magnificent madrassas of the 15th and 17th centuries. The Museum of History, Culture and Art has collections from pre-Islamic as well as Islamic periods. Other places seen are the Gur Emir Mausoleum, burial place of Tamerlane, the
Visas: required for most foreign nationals. Passports must be submitted individually to the visa agency CIBT for approximately two weeks. The cost of the visa is included in the tour price. Passports must be valid for at least six months after the visit to Uzbekistan. Non-UK nationals should check their entry requirements with the relevant authorities. Further instructions will
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Price: £3,100 (deposit £300). This includes: air travel (economy class) with Uzbekistan Airways (Boeing 757); entry visa and handling fee; private coach throughout; accommodation as described below; all breakfasts, lunches and dinners with wine, water, coffee (plus meals on flights); all admissions; all tips for restaurant staff, drivers, guides, porters; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £160 (double room for sole use). Price without flights £2,580.
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be issued upon booking. Hotels: Tashkent (first morning & 1 night): smart, modernised, centrally-located 5-star hotel. Khiva (2 nights): a converted madrassa, impressively restored, each room a former student’s cell opening onto the courtyard. Bukhara (3 nights): a modern 4-star hotel in the centre of the old city, adequately comfortable and excellently located. Samarkand (3 nights): a very comfortable 5-star hotel. Flight schedule changes are common. We recommend you keep diaries clear for 24 hours either side of the tour dates. Food is basic, the options for vegetarians are very limited and special dietary requirements cannot be catered for at all. How strenuous? A demanding tour which begins with an overnight flight. A lot of walking, some over rough ground. Fitness and stamina are essential. 3 days involve a lot of coach travel; average distance per day: 80 miles. Small group: between 14 and 22 participants.
For lecturers’ biographies see page 206.
Uzbekistan
The Welsh Marches Castles, abbeys & parish churches 16–20 September 2013 (ma 678) 5 days • £1,140 Lecturer: Major Imogen Corrigan Well-balanced survey of the outstanding mediaeval monuments of the Welsh Marches. Churches and castles from Norman to late Perpendicular. Beautiful drives through rolling verdant landscapes.
The Welsh Marches possess one of the richest collections of mediaeval monuments to survive in England. The entity is a creation of the Norman Conquest, and was a means of establishing a series of powerful earldoms from which the subjugation of Wales could be effected. Unusually, it is an area where one can pick out examples from every important postConquest phase of castle and church building, from the exceptionally early great hall at Chepstow castle to Sir William Herbert’s
stunning late fifteenth-century remodelling of Raglan. As conceived by William the Conqueror, the March consisted of three earldoms – Herefordshire, Shropshire and Cheshire – with William Fitz-Osbern, Earl of Hereford and Roger de Montgomerie in Shropshire being initially the most active of the earls. The Normans settled this land by creating an interlocking series of castles, markets and churches, exemplified in the great new towns of Chepstow and Ludlow, along with a complementary network of monasteries at sites such as Chepstow, Abergavenny and Wenlock. By the early twelfth century, smaller castellans – sub-tenants like Hugh the Forester at Kilpeck – were beginning to build stone parish churches, such as the sumptuously decorated Romanesque church in Kilpeck. A significant element of the tour is aesthetic, and concerned with the type of architecture that developed in the thirteenth century. As with much of southern England, Worcestershire and the Welsh Marches experienced a large-scale rebuilding during the period c. 1220–c. 1300 – the greatest evidence for which is to be found in the monastic churches at Tintern, Abbey Dore, Wenlock Priory, and Haughmond. Along with Worcester Cathedral, these constitute some of the most inventive buildings of mediaeval England, immeasurably enhanced by the remarkable survival of their secular counterparts such as Stokesay.
Itinerary Day 1: Worcester, Kilpeck, Abbey Dore. The coach leaves Worcester Shrub Hill railway station at 2.00pm. Kilpeck is perhaps the best known of all English Romanesque parish churches, and certainly the most beautifully sculpted. The Cistercian abbey at Abbey Dore has a stunning choir. First of two nights in Abergavenny.
Tintern Abbey, wood engraving c. 1870.
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Day 2: Raglan, Tintern, Chepstow. A day along the river Wye. Raglan is the most enthralling of late mediaeval Welsh castles. Tintern is a dazzling amalgam of piers, tracery, dwarf walls and dispersed stonework overshadowed by a stupendous west front. The planning of Chepstow crystallises the classic pattern of Norman conquest and settlement, as adumbrated in what remains of the most magnificently fortified castle. Overnight Abergavenny. Day 3: Abergavenny, Stokesay, Ludlow. Drive across the Black Mountains to the delightful castle and manor house at Tretower Court. Visit the amazingly well-preserved late 13thcentury residence at Stokesay Castle. St Mary’s b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Opera in Cardiff Jephtha, La Bohème, Così fan tutte Ludlow is the epitome of a great late mediaeval Marcher parish church. First of two nights near Shrewsbury. Day 4: Wenlock, Buildwas, Haughmond. A trio of monastic sites: Cistercian Buildwas, Cluniac Wenlock Priory and Augustinian Haughmond, all sustaining substantial elements of their late 12th-century fabric and offering contrasting answers to the question of how to lay out a monastic precinct in a wellwatered landscape. Overnight near Shrewsbury. Day 5: Worcester. Worcester cathedral, proud possessor of the earliest centrally-planned chapter-house in England as well as a majestic early Anglo-Norman crypt, historiated cloister, and early 13th-century presbytery and choir. End at Worcester Shrub Hill station by 1.00pm.
Practicalities Price: £1,140 (deposit £150). This includes: accommodation as described below; private coach throughout; breakfasts and all dinners, with wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips for waiters and drivers; all taxes; the services of the lecturer. Single supplement £120 (double room for single occupancy). Members of English Heritage (with cards) will be refunded c. £20. Hotels: in Abergavenny (2 nights): The Angel Inn, a former Georgian coaching-inn, now a 3-star hotel with comfortable rooms and excellent restaurant. North of Shrewsbury (2 nights): the Albright Hussey is a family-owned 4-star hotel in a Grade II listed country house; good service and well equipped rooms. How strenuous? A lot of walking and standing around, sometimes on rough ground; fitness is essential. A lot of driving on narrow lanes; average distance per day: 61 miles. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
Looking for the rest of the UK? See pages 24–39 for England and 162–167 for Scotland. Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
Cardiff, National Museum of Wales, by Joseph Pike 1927.
4–7 October 2012 (mz 406) This tour is currently full October 2013 Details available January 2013 Contact us to register your interest In 2012: Jephtha (Handel), La Bohème (Puccini) and Così fan tutte (Mozart) with Diana Montague, Robert Murray, Elizabeth Watts, Neal Davies and Giselle Allen. Excursions and talks with Simon Rees, dramaturg of Welsh National Opera. 5-star hotel in the Cardiff Bay development. Since moving into its new home in 2004 Welsh National Opera has gone from strength to strength, with a critically acclaimed chorus and orchestra. After a painful decade of architectural controversy during which the first scheme was ditched, the WNO now have a fitting base in Cardiff. The new architects, Percy Thomas, were instructed to build something ‘unmistakeably Welsh and internationally outstanding.’ The result: The Wales Millennium Centre, a massive structure of slate, glass and steel, built to withstand the lashings of the elements on its coastal location and embodying the natural resources and industries of Wales. It has the largest orchestra pit in the United Kingdom, and while the auditorium seats 1,850, it is acoustically excellent. The Millennium Centre is one of many projects in Cardiff Bay, a development that has transformed the old docks of the city into
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a waterfront stretch of exciting design. Our five-star, ultramodern and light-filled hotel is a key element in the Bay and has variously been referred to by journalists as thrilling, sexy, soothing and solicitous. The centre of the city is an admirable Edwardian exercise in town planning, imperious and compact.
Itinerary Day 1. Assemble at the hotel at c. 3.30pm for an introductory lecture. Jephtha (Handel). Day 2. Walk through the newly developed Cardiff Bay, a mix of late 19th-century red brick and challenging constructions of glass and steel including the Millennium Centre. The Cardiff Bay Barrage, a masterly piece of engineering across the Ely and Taff estuaries. La Bohème (Puccini). Day 3. After the morning lecture, a guided tour of the Wales Millennium Centre. Visit the National Museum of Wales which has one of the finest collections of Impressionist paintings in the UK. Così fan tutte (Mozart). Day 4. Disperse after breakfast.
Practicalities – in brief Price: £960 (deposit £100). Single supplement £180 (double room for single occupancy). Hotel: 5-star hotel, in Cardiff Bay. How strenuous? All visits are on foot, including walking to the opera house from the hotel, a leisurely 15 minutes away. Small group: between 10 and 22 participants.
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Lecturers
Lecturers
Monica Bohm-Duchen Lecturer, writer and curator specialising in 20thcentury art. She studied at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem before graduating in English Literature and History of Art from UCL, and with an MA in Art History from the Courtauld. She has lectured for the National Gallery, Tate, Royal Academy, Courtauld, Sotheby’s and Birkbeck College.
Dr Xavier Bray Art historian specialising in Spanish art and sculpture and Chief Curator of Dulwich Picture Gallery. Former posts include Assistant Curator of 17th and 18th-century European paintings at the National Gallery, London, where he curated numerous exhibitions: El Greco, Caravaggio: the final years, Velázquez and The Sacred Made Real: Spanish Painting and Sculpture 1600–1700. He completed his PhD at Trinity College, Dublin.
Professor David Breeze Former Chief Inspector of Ancient Monuments in Scotland, President of the Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaeological Society and holder of three honorary Professorships. He is the author of the English Heritage guide-book to Hadrian’s Wall and coauthor with Brian Dobson of the basic text book on the Wall. He has also written on the Antonine Wall and has recently published a book on the Frontiers of the Imperial Empire. James Brown Historian specialising in Morocco and with a wider interest in the history of the Muslim world and global history. He studied at the universities of Oxford and Cambridge and SOAS. He has worked as a journalist and teacher, and is currently planning post-doctoral research on the relations between Morocco and Europe in the 18th and 19th centuries.
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James Brown
Dr Steven Blake Historian and lecturer, specialising in the history of Cheltenham, Gloucestershire and mediaeval architecture. He worked for thirty years at
Professor Tim Blanning Emeritus Professor of Modern European History at the University of Cambridge, Fellow of Sidney Sussex College and Fellow of the British Academy. Among his many books are a study of Emperor Joseph II, the award-winning The Culture of Power and the Power of Culture, the bestselling The Pursuit of Glory: Europe 1648-1815, and the much-translated The Triumph of Music in the Modern World. His most recent book is The Romantic Revolution.
Xavier Bray
Gail Bent Expert on British architectural history and historic interiors and an interior designer and artist. She studied at Toronto and Leeds Universities and Edinburgh College of Art and has taught at the University of Leeds, Christ Church Oxford, York and Nottingham. She lectures for The Art Fund, The National Trust and NADFAS.
Cheltenham Art Gallery & Museum and has served on many society councils in the West Country. He obtained his PhD from Reading University and is a Fellow of the Museums Association and the Society of Antiquaries.
Monica Bohm-Duchen
Dr Paul Atterbury Lecturer, writer, curator and broadcaster specialising in the art, architecture and design of the 19th and 20th centuries. Has published many books on pottery, porcelain, silver and antiques, also on canals and railways, and two books on the Thames. He has worked as external curator of the V&A on a number of exhibitions, including Pugin & the Victorian Vision and was Historical Advisor to Royal Doulton in Stoke-on-Trent. He is a long standing expert on BBC’s Antiques Roadshow.
Tim Blanning
Charles Allen British writer and historian, he was born in India, where several generations of his family served under the British Raj. His work focuses on India and South Asia in general. Among his many books are Plain Tales from the Raj: Images of British India in the Twentieth Century (1975), Lives of the Indian Princes (1984), The Buddha and the Sahibs: the Men who Discovered India’s Lost Religion (2002), Kipling Sahib: India and the Making of Rudyard Kipling (2007) and Ashoka: The Search for India’s Lost Emperor (2012). In 2012 he is filming a documentary in India on Ashoka.
Steven Blake
Professor James Allan Expert in Islamic art and architecture and Middle-Eastern archaeology. He read Arabic at Oxford, where he also completed his doctorate and has worked for the Ashmolean and as a field archaeologist in Jerusalem and at Siraf. President of the British Institute of Persian Studies, 2002–6 and now lectures for the faculty of Oriental Studies at Oxford.
Gail Bent
Paul Atterbury
James Allen
Charles Allen
Tom Abbott Specialist in architectural history from the Baroque to the 20th century with a wide knowledge of the performing arts. He graduated in Psychology and Art History from Carleton College, Minnesota and studied at the Louvre School of Art History in Paris. Since 1987 he has lived in Berlin and has organised and led many academic tours in Germany.
Professor John Bryan Professor of Music and Head of Music and Drama at the University of Huddersfield. He regularly contributes to BBC Radio 3’s early music programmes and is artistic adviser to York Early Music Festival. He is a member of the Rose Consort of Viols and Musica Antiqua of London and is currently leading a project entitled ‘The Making of the Viol in Sixteenth-Century England’.
Polly Buston Art historian with an MA in French with English from Edinburgh University as well as an MA from the Courtauld Institute. She lectures at the Courtauld Summer School and works for art history publishers as editor and picture researcher. She was co-author of Titian’s Venice, a multimedia project accompanying the 2003 National Gallery Titian exhibition.
Dr Katie Campbell Started her career as a journalist and fiction-writer before obtaining a PhD in landscape history. She now works as a writer, lecturer and tour guide, and helps to run Bristol University’s MA in Garden History. Recent publications include Icons of Twentieth Century Landscape Design, Policies & Pleasaunces: A guide to the Gardens of Scotland and Paradise of Exiles: The Anglo-American Gardens of Florence. Jon Cannon Writer, lecturer and broadcaster whose research focuses on English cathedrals. He presented and co-wrote the BBC’s How to Build a Cathedral and has published Cathedral: the great English cathedrals and the world that made them. He teaches at Bristol University and was previously Communications Manager for English Heritage and for the Royal Commission on the Historical Monuments of England. Dr Harry Charrington Architect and lecturer in architecture at the University of Bath with a particular interest in the history of modernism. He read Architecture at Cambridge, where he was the founding editor of Scroope: Cambridge Architectural Journal, and subsequently combined academia and practice in both England and Finland. He obtained his PhD from the LSE on Alvar Aalto and has published widely on his work, including his recent book (with Vezio Nava) Alvar Aalto: the Mark of the Hand. Professor Dawn Chatty Professor of Anthropology and Forced Migration at the University of Oxford. She has long been involved with the Middle East as a university teacher, development practitioner, and advocate
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Dr Michael Douglas-Scott Associate Lecturer in History of Art at Birkbeck College, specialising in 16th-century Italian art and architecture. He studied at the Courtauld and Birkbeck College, University of London and lived in Rome for several years. He has written articles for Arte Veneta, Burlington Magazine and the Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes.
Professor Gregory Dowling Professor of American Literature at Ca’ Foscari University of Venice. Read English at Oxford University and has published widely including scholarly works on English and American literature, a co-edited anthology of American poetry about Venice and a guidebook to Byron’s Venice. He is non-fiction editor for the journal Able Muse, a member of the editorial board of the comparative poetry journal Semicerchio and contributes to the Time Out guide to Venice.
John M. Fritz Studied Anthropology at the University of Chicago and is currently Associate Professor of Archaeology at the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia. Since 1981, with George Michell, he has co-directed a team of researchers at Hampi, carrying out intensive documentation of surface remains, and has written on the city’s layout and cultural meaning. Among his joint publications are Where Gods and Kings Meet: the Royal Centre at Vijayanagara, City of Victory, New Light on Hampi and Hampi, a Story in Stone. Dr Alexandra Gajewski Specialist in mediaeval architecture. She read Art History at Münster University followed by a PhD in Gothic architecture in northern Burgundy from the Courtauld. She has lectured at the Courtauld, Birkbeck and the V&A and was recently visiting Assistant Professor at the University of Michigan.
Dr Ffiona Gilmore Eaves Read Archaeology at Cambridge followed by a PhD on the early church at Porec. She has lectured for the WEA, for whom she founded and managed a study tours section, and for various extra-mural departments. She is the co-author of Retrieving the record: a century of archaeology at Porec published by the University of Zagreb.
Professor Richard Evans Regius Professor of History and President of Wolfson College at the University of Cambridge and Gresham Professor of Rhetoric at Gresham College, London. He is author of numerous books on Central European history including The Coming of the Third Reich, The Third Reich in Power and The Third Reich at War, and is currently
David Gilmour Historian and Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and a former Research Fellow of Oxford University. Formerly a journalist and more recently a reviewer for the Financial Times, Spectator, Independent on Sunday and the New York Review of Books. His award-
David Gilmour
Alexandra Gajewski
John Fritz
Frances Fowle
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Nicole Douek
Dr Frances Fowle Senior Curator of French Art at the National Gallery of Scotland and Senior Lecturer in History of Art at the University of Edinburgh. She is also a Trustee of the Burrell Collection and has curated several major exhibitions at the National Gallery of Scotland, including Impressionism and Scotland and Van Gogh and Britain. Her publications include Monet and French Landscape: Vetheuil and Normandy and Impressionism, Urbanism Environment.
Nicole Douek Egyptologist who studied Ancient History and Egyptology at University College London. Lectures regularly at the British Museum and at the Metropolitan Museum in New York and is co-author of Great Events of Bible Times. She has excavated at Memphis with the Egypt Exploration Society, and has led many tours in Egypt, Jordan, Syria and Libya. Consultant to the BBC for programmes on the ancient Near East.
Richard Evans
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working on the 1815 to 1914 volume in the Penguin History of Europe.
Steven Desmond Landscape consultant, specialist in the conservation of historic parks and gardens and architectural historian. Obtained an MA in Conservation from York and lectures for Buckingham and Oxford Universities as well as NADFAS. He is an advisor on historic gardens for the National Trust and broadcasts for the BBC and writes for Country Life. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Horticulture and Professional Associate of the Royal Horticultural Society.
Gregory Dowling
Major Gordon Corrigan mbe Military historian and former officer of the Royal Gurkha Rifles. He served mainly in the Far East, but also in Berlin, Cyprus, Belize and Northern Ireland. Author of Wellington, A Military Life; Mud, Blood and Poppycock: Britain and the First World War and Loos 1915, The Unwanted Battle. Television appearances include Napoleon’s Waterloo and Battlefield Detectives. He is an Honorary Research Fellow of the Universities of Birmingham and Kent, a Fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society and a Member of the British Commission for Military History.
Steven Desmond
Major Imogen Corrigan Specialist in Anglo-Saxon and mediaeval history. She spent twenty years in the army, retiring in the rank of Major, then obtained a first-class degree in Medieval History and has been studying and lecturing ever since. Currently researching a PhD at the University of Birmingham and has just published her first book, The Race for the Sky: the Building of our Medieval Cathedrals.
Imogen Corrigan
Professor Barry Cooper Professor of Music at the University of Manchester. His books include Beethoven & the Creative Process, Beethoven’s Folksong Settings and Beethoven in the Master Musicians series. In 1988 his completion of the first movement of Beethoven’s unfinished 10th Symphony was performed at the Royal Festival Hall and he has recently published a new edition of Beethoven’s thirty-five piano sonatas for the Associated Board.
Gordon Corrigan
Dr Roberto Cobianchi Art historian and lecturer. He completed his PhD at Warwick University and was a Rome Scholar at The British School in Rome and fellow of the Biblioteca Hertziana, Rome, and Villa I Tatti, Florence. His research includes iconography and patronage of the late Middle Ages to the Baroque.
Barry Cooper
Dr Felicity Cobbing Executive and Curator of the Palestine Exploration Fund in London. She has excavated in Jordan with the British Museum, and worked throughout the Middle East, particularly Syria and Lebanon. Widely published on the archaeology and the history of archaeology in the Levant, she is co-author with Dr Raouf Sa’d Abujabber of Beyond the River – Ottoman Transjordan in Original Photographs.
Felicity Cobbing
Harry Charrington
Katie Campbell
John Bryan
for indigenous rights. Her doctoral research in Syria and Lebanon among Bedouin sheep herders as well as her later work among camel nomads in the Sultanate of Oman has given her a breadth of field-based experience from the Levant to the Gulf.
Lecturers
Lecturers continued
Michael Ivory Landscape architect, writer, translator and lecturer. He studied Modern Languages at Oxford followed by a Postgraduate Diploma in Landscape Design. He is a former lecturer at the University of Central England and committee member of the British Czech & Slovak Association. His publications include the Insight pocket guide: Czech Republic, Key Guide Prague and Berlitz Czech Republic.
Dr Frank Høifødt Art historian, lecturer and writer. He is an expert on the life and works of Edvard Munch and was for years a curator at the Munch Museum in Oslo. He has published extensively on the artist, most recently Munch (Tate Publishing 2012). He is a former director of the Vigeland Museum and is Associate Professor at the University of Oslo.
James Johnstone Organist specialising in the Baroque. He is Professor of early keyboards at Guildhall School of Music and Drama and Trinity College of Music. He has performed and recorded extensively as a soloist and with the Gabrieli Consort & Players and Florilegium. He reformed the chamber group Trio Sonnerie and recorded the Bach Motets on the historic organ in Naumburg with Trinity Baroque.
Caroline Holmes Garden historian, writer and design consultant. Lectures for Cambridge University Institute of Continuing Education and NADFAS. She has presented series on both TV and BBC Radio Four. Books include: Monet at Giverny, Follies of Europe – architectural extravaganzas and Impressionists in their Gardens – living light and colour. Garden consultancies include the Royal Opera House’s New Production Campus for the Performing Arts and Notre-Dame-de-Calais.
Professor Hugh Kennedy Professor of Arabic at SOAS and formerly Professor of Middle Eastern History at the University of St Andrews. He studied at the Middle East Centre for Arab Studies in Beirut, and read Arabic and Persian at Cambridge. He is author of The Early Abbasid Caliphate; The Prophet and the Age of the Caliphates; Crusader Castles and Muslim Spain and Portugal.
Adam Hopkins Journalist and author, now living in a mountain village in Spain. He studied at King’s College, Cambridge and has contributed extensively to national newspapers in Britain on Spanish culture and travel. His books include Spanish Journeys: a Portrait of Spain, Holland: its History, Paintings and People and Crete: its Past, Present and People. Together with his wife, Gaby Macphedran, he has devised many tours in Spain and Portugal.
Sir Nicholas Kenyon Read History at Balliol College, Oxford. In 2007 he became Managing Director of the Barbican Hugh Kennedy
James Johnstone
Michael Ivory
Henry Hurst
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Caroline Holmes
Henry Hurst Former Reader in Classical Archaeology at Cambridge University. His special interest is the archaeology of ancient cities and he has been an excavating archaeologist, working at Carthage for many years and more recently in Rome. He has travelled widely in Greece and Turkey.
Professor Judith Herrin Mediaeval historian with degrees from Cambridge and Birmingham. She holds a Research Fellowship and is Professor Emerita at King’s College, London, was formerly Professor of Byzantine History at Princeton University. Her books include The Formation of Christendom, A Medieval Miscellany, and Women in Purple.
Tristram Hunt
Lecturers
Dr Tristram Hunt mp Member of Parliament for Stoke-on-Trent since 2010. His award-winning books include Building Jerusalem: The Rise and Fall of the Victorian City (2004), he is a frequent broadcaster on TV and radio and he writes regularly for The Guardian, The Times and elsewhere. He has special interests in urban regeneration, manufacturing and heritage.
Amanda Herries Art historian, author and lecturer, now living in south-west Scotland. She read Archaeology at Cambridge and then worked as a decorative arts specialist at the Museum of London. This was followed by seven years living in Japan and she has written extensively on the influence of Japanese gardens and plants in the west. She is a contributing cataloguer for the Public Catalogue Foundation project and is a Trustee of the National Trust for Scotland.
Adam Hopkins
Gijs van Hensbergen Art historian and author specialising in Spain and the USA. His books include Gaudí, In the Kitchens of Castile and Guernica and he has published in the Burlington Magazine and Wall Street Journal. He read languages at Utrecht University and Art History at the Courtauld, and undertook postgraduate studies in American art of the 1960s. He has worked in England, the USA and Spain as exhibitions organiser, TV researcher and critic and is currently working for prolonged periods of time in New York.
Frank Høifødt
Professor Adam Hardy Architect and architectural historian specialising in the architecture of Indian temples. His publications include Indian Temple Architecture: Form and Transformation and The Temple Architecture of India. He has been involved in the design of several Hindu temples in the UK, and is currently the architect for a new temple near Bangalore to be built in the style of the Hoysala dynasty. Professor of Asian Architecture at Cardiff University, where he runs the research centre PRASADA.
Judith Herrin
Angus Haldane Studied Classics at Oxford University with a particular emphasis on Roman history, literature and art. He subsequently studied for a postgraduate degree in Byzantine and Renaissance art at the Courtauld Institute, has taught Greek and Latin and has lectured on the ancient world in Italy and in Greece.
Amanda Herries
Dr Angus Graham Academic tutor in Egyptian Archaeology at the University of Sunderland. He studied Egyptian Archaeology at UCL from where he also obtained his PhD. He is the Field Director of the Egypt Exploration Society’s Theban Harbours and Waterscapes Survey and has worked on archaeological projects at Giza, Memphis, Karnak and Edfu.
Gijs van Hensbergen
Dr Garth Gilmour Biblical archaeologist based at Oxford University, where he also obtained his doctorate. He has lived in Israel and excavated at the Philistine sites of Ekron and Ashkelon. His interests include eastern Mediterranean trade in the Late Bronze Age and the archaeology of religion in ancient Israel and he is currently researching the Palestine Exploration Fund’s excavation in Jerusalem in the 1920s.
Adam Hardy
Angus Haldane
Angus Graham
Garth Gilmour
winning biographies include Curzon: Imperial Statesman, and The Long Recessional: The Imperial Life of Rudyard Kipling. Other work includes The Ruling Caste, a study of the administration the Subcontinent during the reign of Queen Victoria.
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Dr Luca Leoncini Art historian specialising in 15th-century Italian painting. His first degree and PhD were from Rome University followed by research at the Warburg Institute in London. He has published articles on the classical tradition in Italian art of the 15th century and contributed to the Macmillan Dictionary of Art. He has also written on Mantegna and Renaissance drawings.
Dr Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones Lecturer in Ancient History at the University of Edinburgh and a specialist in the history and culture of ancient Iran, Egypt and Greece. He studied Classics and Drama at Hull University and obtained his MA in Ancient History and PhD from Cardiff University. He has contributed to history documentaries for Channel 4, the History Channel and the BBC.
Dr Rosie Llewellyn-Jones An authority on colonial India from the 18th to the 20th century. She has published books on Lucknow including Engaging Scoundrels: True Tales of Old Lucknow and Lucknow, City of Illusion. Her book Mutiny, The Great Uprising in India: Untold stories, Indian and British won critical praise. She lectures for the Asian Arts course at the V&A. She is currently Secretary of BACSA (British Association for Cemeteries in South Asia) and works as part-time archivist at the Royal Society for Asian Affairs. Rowena Loverance Byzantine art historian specialising in sculpture, mosaics and icons. She studied History and Archaeology at Oxford and is Head of e-learning at the British Museum and a Visiting Research Fellow at King’s College, London. Her publications include the illustrated history Byzantium and Christian Art. Dr Alexey Makhrov Russian art historian and a graduate of the St Petersburg Academy of Arts. Obtained his PhD
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Patrick Mercer
Dr Helen Langdon Studied at Cambridge, and received a doctorate from the Courtauld. She has contributed to many academic journals, and is the author of several books, including The Gallery Goers Guide, Claude Lorrain, Holbein, and Caravaggio: a Life. From 2002–3 she was Assistant Director of the British School at Rome, and later Research Fellow at the
Professor Richard Langham Smith Music historian and broadcaster with a particular interest in early music and 19th- and 20th-century French music. He has published widely on Debussy and Berlioz and has taught at Lancaster and Exeter universities and the Royal College of Music. In 1994 he was admitted to the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres at the rank of Chevalier. He read Music at York University where he specialised in Baroque performance.
John McNeill
Anthony Lambert Historian, journalist and travel writer. He has worked with and for the National Trust in various capacities for almost thirty years. His books include Victorian & Edwardian Country House Life and he writes regular profiles of country houses for the Historic Houses Association magazine. He has written numerous travel and guide books, and contributes to a wide range of newspapers and magazines.
Getty Institue, LA, and Visiting Fellow at Yale. In 2010 she curated the exhibition, Salvator Rosa; Bandits, Wilderness and Magic, at Dulwich Picture Gallery in London.
Alexey Makhrov
Dr Jarl Kremeier Art historian specialising in 17th- to 19thcentury architecture and decorative arts; teaches Art History at the Berlin College of Acting and the Senior Student’s Department of Berlin’s Freie Universität. He studied at the Universities of Würzburg, Berlin and the Courtauld, is a contributor to Macmillan’s Dictionary of Art, author of a book on the Würzburg Residenz, and of articles on Continental Baroque architecture and architectural theory.
Rowena Loverance
Caroline Knight Architectural historian specialising in 16th- to 18th-century British architectural and social history. She studied History and History of Art at London University, followed by an MA at the Courtauld Institute. She is Course Director of the V&A’s High Renaissance-Baroque Year Course, author of many articles and of London’s Country Houses.
Rosie Llewellyn-Jones
Professor Helen King Professor of the History of Classical Medicine at Reading University. Her publications include Hippocrates’ Woman: Reading the female body in ancient Greece and Greek and Roman Medicine. Holds research fellowships at Cambridge, Newcastle and in the Netherlands and visiting professorships in the US and Canada and at the Peninsula Medical School (Exeter and Plymouth).
Richard Langham Smith
Helen Langdon
Caroline Knight
Helen King
Centre in London. Previous roles include: Music critic for The Times and the Music Editor of The Listener; Editor of Early Music, Chief Music Critic of The Observer; Artistic Adviser to the South Bank Centre’s festival Mozart Now; Controller, BBC Radio 3 (1993); Director and Controller of the BBC Proms, Live Events and Television Classical Music.
from the University of St Andrews followed by post-doctoral work as a Research Fellow at Exeter University. He is now studying International History and Politics at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies Geneva.
John McNeill Specialist in the Middle Ages and Renaissance, with degrees in art history from the University of East Anglia and the Courtauld. He lectures at Birkbeck College’s Faculty of Continuing Education, Birkbeck College and Oxford’s Department of Continuing Education. He is Honorary Secretary of the British Archaeological Association and author of the Blue Guide: Normandy and Blue Guide: Loire Valley. Has edited collections of essays on mediaeval Anjou, King’s Lynn and the Fens and the mediaeval cloister. Patrick Mercer MP OBE Military historian and politician. He read History at Oxford and then spent 25 years in the army, achieving the rank of colonel, and subsequently worked for BBC Radio 4 as Defence Correspondent and as a freelance journalist. Member of Parliament for Newark and Retford since 2001. He is the author of two books on the Battle of Inkerman. Professor John Milner Art historian, painter, writer and exhibition organiser, specialising in 19th- and 20th-century art in France and Russia. He studied at the Courtauld, where he currently tutors MA and PhD students, and has lectured at the National Gallery, Tate, Royal Academy of Arts and the Henry Moore Institute. His books include The Studios of Paris: the Capital of Art in the late Nineteenth Century.
Barry Millington Chief music critic for London’s Evening Standard and editor of The Wagner Journal, Barry Millington is also author/ editor of numerous books, including the Master Musicians Wagner and The Wagner Compendium. He has contributed Wagner articles to The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians and The New Grove Dictionary of Opera. He acted as dramaturgical adviser on Lohengrin at the Bayreuth Festival and the Ring in Tokyo and is well-known as a broadcaster. Marc Millon Wine, food and travel writer. Born in Mexico, he was raised in the USA before studying English Literature at the University of Exeter. Together with his wife, he has pioneered a series of illustrated wine-food-travel books including The Wine and Food of Europe, The Wine Roads of Italy
Lecturers
Lecturers continued
Dr Cathy Oakes Graduated from Oxford and worked in the
Lecturers
David Phillipson
Geoffrey Norris A leading specialist on piano-playing and a regular broadcaster on BBC Radio 3. He was for many years the Chief Music Critic of The Daily Telegraph. His publications include Rachmaninoff and contributions to the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians.
Alan Ogden
Charles Nicholl Author of the acclaimed biography, Leonardo da Vinci: the Flights of the Mind and numerous other books, most recently, The Lodger, an intimate study of Shakespeare’s life in London in the first years of the 17th century. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, and recipient of the Hawthornden prize, the James Tait Black prize for biography and the Crime Writers’ Association ‘Gold Dagger’ award for non-fiction.
Cathy Oakes
Christopher Newall Art historian, lecturer and writer. As well as being a specialist in 19th-century British art, he has a deep interest in Sicily, its architecture and political and social history. A graduate of the Courtauld Institute, he has organised various exhibitions including Pre-Raphaelite Vision: Truth to Nature (Tate Britain 2004). His interest in John Ruskin led tot he MRT tour ‘Ruskin’s Venice’, and he is currently working on an exhibition of Ruskin’s drawings for venues in Canada and Scotland.
Geoffrey Norris
Dr Fabrizio Nevola Senior lecturer in Architectural History at the University of Bath, specialising in urban and architectural history of Early Modern Italy. He obtained his PhD at the Courtauld Institute and has held fellowships at the University of Warwick, the Medici Archive Project, and Harvard University’s Villa I Tatti (Florence). He has published widely including the award-winning Siena: Constructing the Renaissance City.
Charles Nicholl
Dr Oswyn Murray Classics Fellow at Balliol College, Oxford for almost forty years, widely travelled in Greece and a specialist on Greek drinking customs and the history of pleasure in general. Author of Early Greece, The Greek City and In vino veritas and over a hundred articles, mainly on Greek history. He was history editor of the Oxford History of the Classical World, and is a regular contributor to the Times Literary Supplement.
Christopher Newall
Fabrizio Nevola
Oswyn Murray
Marc Millon
and The Food Lover’s Companion Italy. He also has his own wine company, importing Italian wines from small family estates.
Education Department at the V&A. She ran the art history programme for the Department for Continuing Education at Bristol where she completed her PhD on late mediaeval Marian iconography and now holds a similar post at Oxford University. She has published on French and English Romanesque and on Marian iconography.
he taught for two years in Italy and for three at Kyoto University. He has published novels, poetry, translations of works of art history and reviews of books on music, and has written libretti for children’s opera and oratorio with Welsh composer Mervyn Burtch.
Dr Alan Peatfield Archaeologist specialising in the Minoan Bronze Age Civilisation of Crete. He was awarded his PhD in Greek Archaeology from University College London. From 1984–1990 was Knossos Curator for the British School at Athens and has been a lecturer at University College Dublin since 1991. He has excavated on Crete, notably at Knossos and he writes on Minoan religion and ancient Greek combat.
Juliet Rix Writer and broadcaster with a particular interest in the history and pre-history of Malta. She studied History of Art at Cambridge and is the author of the Bradt Guide: Malta and Gozo. Her 25-year career in journalism has involved working for the BBC and writing for magazines, online media and British national newspapers.
Alan Ogden Following a career in international PR, Alan is now a travel writer and historian. His books include Fortresses of Faith: the Kirchenburgen of Transylvania; Winds of Sorrow: Travels in Transylvania and Through Hitler’s Back Door: SOE in Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria. He has travelled extensively in Eastern Europe and Central Asia.
Professor David Phillipson Professor of African Archaeology at Cambridge University until his retirement in 2006, and also Director of the Museum of Archaeology & Anthropology there. Actively engaged in the study of Ethiopia, and was awarded the Society of Antiquaries of London ‘Frend Medal’ for his research on the archaeology of Ethiopian Christianity. Emeritus Fellow of Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge, Honorary Professor at UCL, a Fellow of the British Academy and a former President of the British Institute in Eastern Africa.
Dr Roland Randall Biogeographer and author on ecology and geomorphology. He obtained his degree and PhD at Cambridge, and his MSc at McGill, Montreal. He helped to set up the School of Environmental Science at the University of Ulster followed by teaching at Cambridge and became a Life Fellow at Girton in 1977. He is a Chartered Environmentalist and Fellow of the Institute of Ecology & Environmental Management and an ecological consultant to the National Trust and Scottish Natural Heritage. Simon Rees Dramaturg of Welsh National Opera since 1989. After studying English at Cambridge,
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Bronwen Riley Editor of the English Heritage Red Guides. After reading Classics at Oxford, she worked for Country Life and Tatler and wrote obituaries for the Daily Telegraph. Bewitched by Romania during the Nineties, she took an MA at the Courtauld, specialising in post-byzantine art in Romania and in 2008 published her book Transylvania. Other publications include the English Heritage Red Guide to Great Yarmouth Row Houses and Greyfriars’ Cloister.
Sue Rollin Archaeologist, interpreter and lecturer. She studied at London University (Institute of Archaeology and SOAS) and at Heidelberg University and her linguistic repertoire includes three ancient Near-Eastern languages and several modern European ones. She has taught at UCL, SOAS and Cambridge University and interpreted for the EU and UN. With Jane Streetly she has written Blue Guide: Jordan and Istanbul: A Travellers’ Guide. Dr József Sisa Head of Department at the Research Institute for Art History at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences in Budapest. He specialises in the 19th century, in particular public buildings, country houses, Gothic revival and garden history. A native Hungarian with fluent English, he lectures in the UK, across Europe and the USA and coedited The Architecture of Historic Hungary. Professor Jan Smaczny Hamilton Harty Chair of Music at Queen’s University, Belfast, and an authority on Czech music. An author, broadcaster and journalist, he has published books on the Prague Provisional Theatre, Dvořák’s Cello Concerto and music in 19th-century Ireland. He is a graduate of the University of Oxford, has studied at the Charles University in Prague and has worked extensively in university education.
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Dr Giles Tillotson Fellow (and former Director) of the Royal Asiatic Society, he has been Reader in History of Art and Chair of Art & Archaeology at SOAS. His specialisms include the history and architecture of the Rajput courts of Rajasthan and of the Mughal cities of Delhi and Agra; Indian architecture in the period of British rule and after Independence and landscape painting in India. Books include Taj Mahal, Jaipur City Palace, Mughal India and The Tradition of Indian Architecture.
Gavin Stamp
Neil Taylor A leading expert on the Baltic States, he travels there as visiting university lecturer, tourism consultant and tour leader. He read Chinese at Cambridge and has worked in tourism in China, the USSR and many Third World countries. His publications include The Bradt Guide: Estonia, The Bradt Guide: Tallinn, The Bradt Guide: Baltic Cities, A Footprints Guide to Berlin.
Christie’s and at the Courtauld and lectures for various institutions including the National Trust, the Art Fund, and also for the University of Cambridge International Summer School and the Courtauld Institute Summer Course. Dr Antonia Whitley Art historian and lecturer specialising in the Italian Renaissance. She obtained her PhD from the Warburg Institute, University of London, on Sienese society in the 15th century and has published articles on related topics and lectured for the National Gallery. She currently teaches at King’s College, London, and has led many tours in Italy.
Richard Wigmore Music writer, lecturer and broadcaster for BBC Radio 3. He writes for The Daily Telegraph, BBC Music Magazine and Gramophone and gives classes in Lied history and interpretation at Birkbeck College, London. He read French and German at Cambridge and later studied Music at the Guildhall. His publications include Schubert: the complete song texts and Pocket Guide to Haydn.
Matthew Woodworth Studied History of Art and Architecture at Brown University, Rhode Island, and obtained his MA from the Courtauld. He has just completed his PhD on the architectural history of Beverley Minster at Duke University, North Carolina. He is currently teaching in Elgin, Scotland, and writing one of the volumes for Pevsner’s Buildings of Scotland Series. He has published articles on English Gothic architecture, French Gothic sculpture, and the re-use of Gothic in the postmediaeval period.
Gail Turner Art historian, lecturer and artist with a special interest in Spanish history and art. She read Modern History at Oxford, and completed her MA at the Courtauld. She has worked at Tate Britain, the Arts Council, as a consultant for
Richard Wigmore
Antonia Whitley
Gail Turner
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Roderick Swanston
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Jane Taylor Has worked as teacher, publisher, writer, photographer and television producer. She studied Mediaeval History and Moral Philosophy at the University of St Andrews and since 1989 has lived in Amman. Her books include Testament to the Bushmen (with Laurens van der Post), Imperial Istanbul, Petra and the Lost Kingdom of the Nabataeans, Yemen: Land and People (with Sarah Searight) and Jordan: Images from the Air.
Joachim Strupp
Roderick Swanston Music historian, critic and lecturer, formerly a Professor at the Royal College of Music and President of the Incorporated Society of Musicians (2008–2009). He is a broadcaster on BBC Radio 3 and 4, widely known for combining immense learning with wit and enthusiasm and
Tim Tatton–Brown Archaeologist and architectural historian. He has been Consultant Archaeologist for Canterbury, Rochester, Chichester and Salisbury Cathedrals, and for Westminster Abbey, Lambeth Palace and currently for Westminster School. He is VicePresident of the Royal Archaeological Institute. Books include The English Cathedral and The Abbeys & Priories of England.
Nigel Spivey
Dr Joachim Strupp Fellow at the University of Buckingham and organises adult art education events and tours. He studied Art History at the universities of Nuremberg and St Andrews, where he also taught and has lived in Venice and Florence for several years. He specialises in the sculpture of the Italian Renaissance, though his interests include German and Italian art of most ages.
is a regular speaker on Martin Randall Travel festivals.
Jan Smaczny
Jane Streetly Co-author of Blue Guide: Jordan and Istanbul: A Traveller’s Guide. She was born and brought up in Trinidad, studied French and Spanish at university and now works as a conference interpreter and travel writer. She is a Fellow of the Royal Geographic Society and has travelled widely throughout Europe, Latin America and the Middle East.
József Sisa
Gavin Stamp Honorary Fellow of both the Royal Incorporation of Architects in Scotland and the Royal Institute of British Architects and honorary Professor of the University of Glasgow. He taught History of Architecture at the Mackintosh School of Architecture, Glasgow, and is a former chairman of the 20th-Century Society and Director of the Victorian Society Summer School. His research interests are 19th- and 20th-cent. British architecture and he has published on Alexander ‘Greek’ Thomson, the Gilbert Scott dynasty and Sir Edwin Lutyens.
Sue Rollin
Andrew Spooner Military historian specialising in the Great War and has operated his own battlefield tours since 1988. He organises specialist study days for colleges and museums throughout the country and is a regular visiting lecturer at the Imperial War Museum Duxford. He has appeared in documentaries for the BBC and Channel 4.
Juliet Rix
Bronwen Riley
Simon Rees
Roland Randall
Dr Nigel Spivey Senior Lecturer in Classical Art and Archaeology at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Emmanuel College. Among his publications are Understanding Greek Sculpture, Greek Art, Enduring Creation, The Ancient Olympics and Songs on Bronze. He presented the BBC2/PBS series How Art Made the World.
Lecturers
Booking details Making a booking 1. Provisional booking
We recommend that you contact us first to make a provisional booking which we will hold for one week. To confirm it please send the booking form and deposit within this period.
2. Definite booking
3. Our confirmation
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treat sympathetically a wish to withdraw from a tour to a troubled region even if the FCO does not advise against travel there.
Fill in the booking form and send it to us with the deposit (specified in the price paragraph of the tour description). It is important that you read the Booking Conditions at this stage, and that you sign the booking form. Full payment is required if you are booking within ten weeks of departure.
Upon receipt of the booking form and deposit we shall send you confirmation of your booking. After this your deposit is nonreturnable except in the special circumstances mentioned in the Booking Conditions. Further details of the tour will also be sent at this stage.
Booking Conditions Please read these
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Our promises to you
We aim to be fair, reasonable and sympathetic in all our dealings with clients, and to act always with integrity. We will meet all our legal and regulatory responsibilities, often going beyond the minimum obligations. We aim to provide full and accurate information about our holidays. If there are changes, we will tell you promptly. If something does go wrong, we will try to put it right. Our overriding aim is to ensure that every client is satisfied with our services.
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We ask that you read the information we send to you.
Specific terms
Our contract with you From the time we receive your signed booking form and initial payment, a contract exists between you and Martin Randall Travel Ltd. Eligibility We reserve the right to refuse to accept a booking without necessarily giving a reason. You need to have a level of fitness which would not spoil other participants’ enjoyment of the holiday by slowing them down – see the ‘How strenuous?’ guidance at the end of every tour description and the entry on page 6 of this brochure. With this in mind, we do not accept bookings from anyone who would be aged 81 or over at the time of the tour (we make an exception for certain MRT music festivals). Insurance It is a requirement of booking that you have adequate holiday insurance. Cover for medical
Booking details
Passports and visas British citizens must have valid passports for all tours outside the United Kingdom. For most countries the passport needs to be valid for six months beyond the date of the tour. If visas are required we will advise UK citizens about obtaining them. Nationals of other countries should ascertain whether visas are required in their case, and obtain them if they are. If you cancel If you have to cancel your participation on a tour, there would be a charge which varies according to the period of notice you give. Up to 57 days before the tour the deposit only is forfeited. Thereafter a percentage of the total cost of the tour will be due:
between 56 and 29 days: between 28 and 15 days: between 14 days and 3 days: within 48 hours:
40% 60% 80% 100%
We take as the day of cancellation that on which we receive written confirmation of cancellation. If we cancel the tour We might decide to cancel a tour if at any time up to eight weeks before there were insufficient bookings for it to be viable. We would refund everything you had paid to us. We might also cancel a tour if hostilities, civil unrest, natural disaster or other circumstances amounting to force majeure affect the region to which the tour was due to go. Safety and security If the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office advises against travel to places visited on a tour, we would cancel the tour or adjust the itinerary to avoid the risky area. In the event of cancellation before the tour commenced we would give you a full refund. We would also
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Consumer protection AITO Trust. As a member of the AITO Trust Ltd, we have provided a bond to meet the requirements of the Package Travel Regulations 1992. Protection is provided for holidays without flights commencing in and returning to the UK, and for holidays for which you have chosen not to purchase the flight element. ATOL. If you book your holiday with flights included you are protected by the ATOL scheme because we hold an Air Travel Organiser’s Licence granted by the Civil Aviation Authority. In the unlikely event of our insolvency, either the CAA or the AITO Trust will ensure that you are not stranded abroad and will arrange to refund any money you have paid to us for an advance booking. The limits of our liabilities As principal, we accept responsibility for all ingredients of a tour, except those in which the principle of force majeure prevails. Our obligations and responsibilities are also limited where international conventions apply in respect of air, sea or rail carriers, including the Warsaw Convention and its various updates. If we make changes Circumstances might arise which prevent us from operating a tour exactly as advertised. We would try to devise a satisfactory alternative, but if the change represents a significant loss to the tour we would offer compensation. If you decide to cancel because the alternative we offer is not acceptable we would give a full refund. English Law These conditions form part of your contract with Martin Randall Travel Ltd and are governed by English law. All proceedings shall be within the exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of England and Wales.
b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
Booking form
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Booking form continued
PASSPORT DETAILS. Essential for airlines and in case of emergency on tour (not applicable for tours in the UK). Title
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We prefer payment by cheque, debit card or bank transfer, although we can also accept payment by credit card. CHEQUE. Please make cheques payable to Martin Randall Travel Ltd, and write the tour code on the back (e.g. mz 123). DEBIT OR CREDIT CARD. I wish to pay by Visa, Mastercard or Amex. Please charge my card. Card no. Start date Expiry date
BANK TRANSFER. Please give your surname and tour code (eg mz 123) as a reference and ask your bank to allow for all charges. Account name: Martin Randall Travel Ltd Royal Bank of Scotland, Drummonds, 49 Charing Cross, London SW1A 2DX Account number 0019 6050 Sort code 16-00-38 IBAN: GB71 RBOS 1600 3800 1960 50; Swift/BIC: RBOS GB2L Please tick here if you have paid by bank transfer:
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M A RT I N R A N D A L L T R AV E L A RT • A R C H I T E C T U R E • G A S T R O N O M Y • A R C H A E O L O G Y • H I S T O R Y • M U S I C
Voysey House, Barley Mow Passage, London, United Kingdom W4 4GF
Telephone 020 8742 3355 Fax 020 8742 7766 info@martinrandall.co.uk www.martinrandall.com
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Dates For a list of holidays by country, see pages 7-9 October 2012 2– 8 Beethoven in Bonn (mz 414) Prof. Barry Cooper................................74
24–28 Writers’ Venice (mz 410) Gregory Dowling...............................103
24–28 Art in Madrid (mz 409) Gail Turner........................................179
November 2012
3– 7 Ravenna & Urbino (mz 387) Dr Luca Leoncini...............................109
4– 7 Opera in Cardiff (mz 406) Simon Rees.........................................205 4– 9 Ancient Rome (mz 416) Angus Haldane...................................132
4– 9 A FESTIVAL OF MUSIC IN
ROME (mz 422)..............................131 6–10 Valencia (mz 426) Adam Hopkins......182
December 2012 2–17 Rajput & Mughal Rajasthan (mz 442) Dr Giles Tillotson.................................85
20–27 Palermo at Christmas (mz 444) Dr Roberto Cobianchi.........................139 20–27 Music in Dresden & Prague at Christmas (mz 443) Professor Jan Smaczny & Tom Abbott....67
6–12 Gastronomic Piedmont (mz 396) Marc Millon........................................94
6–11 Venice Revisited (mz 423) Dr Luca Leoncini...............................101
21–28 Modern Art on the Côte d’Azur at Christmas (mz 446) Monica Bohm-Duchen..........................62
9–14 Palladian Villas (mz 392) Dr Joachim Strupp................................98
13–17 Venetian Palaces (mz 428) Dr Michael Douglas-Scott..................102
22–27 Edinburgh at Christmas (mz 447) new Gail Bent................................167
9–17 Essential Jordan (mz 393) Jane Taylor.........................................144
16–18 Symposium at The Castle Hotel: Travel Writers.....................................39
28– 2 Music in Berlin at New Year (mz 448) Tom Abbott...........................64
8–17 Classical Turkey (mz 389) Dr Oswyn Murray.............................192
9–15 Toulouse & Albi (mz 395) Dr Alexandra Gajewski........................61
12–18 Florence (mz 427) Dr Roberto Cobianchi.........................114
21–27 Turin at Christmas (mz 441) Dr Luca Leoncini.................................93
14–26 Sicily (mz 437) Dr Ffiona Gilmore Eaves....................141
22–29 Florence at Christmas (mz 445) Dr Michael Douglas-Scott..................114
9–17 Normans in the South (mz 394) Matthew Woodworth..........................135
18–24 Palermo Rediscovered (mz 424) Christopher Newall.............................139
13–21 Sinai (mz 405) Nicole Douek................23
23–25 Music weekend at The Castle Hotel: The Schubert Ensemble (mz 433)......38
10–15 Pompeii & Herculaneum (mz 419) Angus Haldane...................................133 14–21 Dark Age Brilliance (mz 400) John McNeill......................................108 15–20 Pompeii & Herculaneum (mz 421) Dr Ffiona Gilmore Eaves....................133 15–22 Walking in Sicily (mz 413) Christoper Newall..............................143
19–25 Florence Revisited (mz 430) Dr Joachim Strupp..............................116
From The Foreign Tour of Brown, Jones & Robinson, 1904.
15–22 Gastronomic Spain (mz 398) Gijs van Hensbergen...........................178 15–22 Walking in Tuscany (mz 402) Dr Joachim Strupp..............................122 15–25 Andalucía (mz 403) Adam Hopkins...185 16–20 Writers’ Florence (mz 397) Jonathan Keates..................................120 16–23 Modern Art on the Côte d’Azur (mz 401) Monica Bohm-Duchen..........62 16–25 Israel & Palestine (mz 411) Dr Garth Gilmour................................88
17–21 Leonardo da Vinci (mz 404) Charles Nicholl...................................118 21–28 Villas of the Veneto (mz 408) Dr Michael Douglas-Scott....................97 22–27 Naples: Art, Antiquities & Opera (mz 417) Dr Helen Langdon..............134 22–28 Genoa & Turin (mz 412) Dr Luca Leoncini.................................92
23– 5 The Indian Mutiny (mz 407) Patrick Mercer mp.................................87 Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
215
Dates
Dates continued
January 2013 5–17 The British Raj (mz 451) David Gilmour & Prof. Gavin Stamp...........................82
4–14 Oman (mz 453) Prof. Dawn Chatty............................150
14–26 Temples of Tamil Nadu (mz 450) Prof. Adam Hardy................................87 18–20 Music weekend at The Castle Hotel: The Endellion String Quartet....................................39 24-30 Mozart in Salzburg (mz 460) Richard Wigmore.................................14
February 2013 1–14 Kingdoms of the Deccan (mz 470) John M. Fritz.......................................87
15–17 Music weekend at Jesmond Dene: A Schubertiade in Newcastle Richard Wigmore.................................39 17–24 The Heart of Italy (mz 496) Dr Helen Langdon.............................125 18–26 Palestine (mz 502) Dr Felicity Cobbing............................152 18–29 Sicily (mz 497) Dr Luca Leoncini......141 19–27 Normans in the South (mz 498) John McNeill......................................135 20–28 The Cathedrals of England (mz 501) new Tim Tatton Brown....................28 26– 3 Essential Jordan (mz 505) Jane Taylor.........................................144
Music in Nice & Montecarlo.............63
23–28 Palladian Villas (mz 535) Dr Joachim Strupp................................98 23–30 Gastronomic Sicily...........................140 26–28 Music weekend at The Castle Hotel: The Aronowitz Ensemble...................39
3– 8 Basilicata (mz 547) Rowena Loverance.............................137
6–10 Art in Madrid (mz 552) Gijs van Hensbergen...........................179
6–10 Off-beat Andalucía (mz 561) Adam Hopkins....................................188
6–13 Walking in Tuscany (mz 550) Dr Antonia Whitley............................122
April 2013
10–23 Bengal by River (mz 474) Dr Rosie Llewellyn-Jones......................87 12–21 Israel & Palestine (mz 476) Dr Garth Gilmour................................88 18–24 Florence (mz 475) Dr Roberto Cobianchi.........................114 20–25 Music in Berlin (mz 472) Prof. Jan Smaczny & Tom Abbott.........64 22–24 Music weekend at The Castle Hotel: The Wihan Quartet............................39 22– 8 Essential India (mz 480) Dr Giles Tillotson.................................80 26– 3 Connoisseur’s Rome (mz 477) Dr Helen Langdon.............................129 27– 4 Connoisseur’s Rome (mz 478) Dr Joachim Strupp..............................129
27–14 Ethiopia (mz 473) new Prof. David Phillipson..........................42
Opera in Turin & Milan.....................92
March 2013 1–14 Ashoka & Buddhist India (mz 485 Charles Allen........................................87
4–10 Walking in Madeira (mz 487) new Dr Roland Randall............................156
5– 9 Venetian Palaces (mz 486) Dr Michael Douglas-Scott..................102
5–12 Modern Art on the Côte d’Azur (mz 499) Prof. John Milner..................62 11–17 Art History of Venice (mz 488) Polly Buston.........................................99 14–22 Extremadura (mz 495) Adam Hopkins....................................180
Dates
3–11 The Ring in Berlin (mz 507) Barry Millington & Tom Abbott...........66 5–12 Gastronomic Andalucía (mz 510) Gijs van Hensbergen...........................187 8–13 Pompeii & Herculaneum (mz 512) Angus Haldane...................................133 8–13 Lisbon Neighbourhoods (mz 530) Adam Hopkins....................................153 8–15 Parma & Bologna (mz 514) Dr Roberto Cobianchi.........................105 8–17 Classical Turkey (mz 513) Dr Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones...................192
9–17 Normans in the South (mz 516) Christopher Newall.............................135
Connoisseur’s Istanbul new..........192
May 2013
8–10 Symposium at The Castle Hotel: Politics & Politicians..........................39
Opera in Spain.................................171
6–13 The Duchy of Milan (mz 551) Dr Luca Leoncini.................................90 6–18 The Baltic States (mz 560) Neil Taylor...........................................40 7–15 Sardinia (mz 549) Dr Roberto Cobianchi.........................138 7–16 The Pyrenees (mz 553) John McNeill......................................168 7–17 Transoxiana (mz 556) Prof. James Allan................................202
10–15 SEVILLE: a Festival of Spanish Music.........................188
12–16 Opera in Paris & Versailles................57
10–16 St Petersburg (mz 555) Dr Alexey Makhrov............................161
15–21 Genoa & Turin (mz 527) Dr Luca Leoncini.................................92
12–19 Courts of Northern Italy (mz 558) Dr Michael Douglas-Scott..................106
13–18 Piero della Francesca (mz 524) Dr Antonia Whitley............................112
15–22 Walking in Sicily (mz 533) Dr Ffiona Gilmore-Eaves...................143 15–24 Minoan Crete (mz 540) Dr Alan Peatfield.................................79 17–21 Ravenna & Urbino (mz 518) Dr Michael Douglas-Scott..................109 18–24 Gardens & Villas of the Italian Lakes (mz 520) Steven Desmond....................91 20–28 Le Corbusier (mz 532) Dr Harry Charrington.........................54 20–29 Classical Greece (mz 531) Henry Hurst.........................................77 22–28 Lucca (mz 522) Dr Antonia Whitley............................110 22–29 Granada & Córdoba (mz 534) Adam Hopkins....................................183
216
12–19 Ottoman Turkey (mz 557) Jane Taylor.........................................191
13–19 Southern Tuscany (mz 575) Dr Fabrizio Nevola............................124 13–22 Great Houses of the North (mz 566 Gail Bent.............................................35 18– 2 Eastern Turkey (mz 571) Rowena Loverance.............................194 19–25 Walking Hadrian’s Wall (mz 574) Prof. David Breeze...............................24 22–26 Medici Villas & Gardens (mz 577) Dr Katie Campbell.............................121 22–29 The Douro (mz 576) Adam Hopkins....................................154 24–31 Mediaeval Normandy (mz 579) Dr Cathy Oakes....................................50 26–29 Châteaux of the Loire (mz 581) Caroline Holmes...................................59 b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
27– 3 Opera in Oslo, Gothenburg & Copenhagen new......................149
The Rite of Spring new...................57
Art & Music in Dresden....................66
Naples: Art, Antiquities & Opera....134
Bergen Festival.................................149
June 2013 4– 9 Palladian Villas (mz 591)
Dr Michael Douglas-Scott....................98
Dr Jarl Kremeier..................................12
3– 7 Flemish Painting (mz 631) Richard Williams.................................16
7–13 THE J.S. BACH JOURNEY (mz 630)..........................73 7–13 Scotland: the Borders (mz 640) new Amanda Herries......................165 10–15 King Ludwig II (mz 633) new Tom Abbott..........................................75 15–23 Mediaeval Saxony (mz 636) Dr Joachim Strupp................................69
25–29 The Age of Bede (mz 638) new Major Imogen Corrigan........................25
Savonlinna Opera...............................45
Martina Franca new......................137
Verona Opera...................................103 Torre del Lago..................................111 Trasimeno Music Festival................127
La Madonna di S. Girolamo, engraving after Correggio c. 1900.
4–10 Connoisseur’s Vienna (mz 588)
4–11 Brittany (mz 589) Caroline Holmes.....47 4–15 Walking to Santiago (mz 590) Adam Hopkins & Gaby Macphedran...173
7–15 Saxon Transylvania (mz 597) Bronwen Riley...................................159
8–15 Mediaeval Burgundy (mz 598) John McNeill........................................57
10–18 Art in Le Marche (mz 600) Polly Buston.......................................126 11–16 Bauhaus & Expressionism (mz 616).....................70 16–21 History of Impressionsim (mz 596) Dr Frances Fowle.................................53 19–26 Armenia (mz 614) Alan Ogden...........10 20–25 Ardgowan (mz 612) Caroline Knight.................................164 22–30 Anjou & Poitou (mz 611) Dr Alexandra Gajewski........................49 24–28 Mediaeval East Anglia (mz 617) John McNeill........................................27
24–30 Art & Industry (mz 618) new Dr Paul Atterbury & Dr Tristram Hunt mp.......................32 26–29 Munch in Oslo (mz 622) new Dr Frank Høifødt...............................149 26– 7 The Narrow Sea (mz 620) Majors Gordon & Imogen Corrigan......45 29– 6 Finland: Aalto & Others (mz 624) Dr Harry Charrington.........................44
The Schubertiade................................13
Walking & Literature in the Lakes new.............................38
Northumbria......................................26
The Ring at La Scala new...............92
July 2013 3– 7 Organs of Bach’s Time (mz 629) James Johnstone & Tom Abbott..............72
Te l e p h o n e 0 2 0 8 7 4 2 3 3 5 5
217
Dates
Dates continued
August 2013 2–11 The Ring in Seattle (mz 648) Barry Millington................................196
12–16 Art in Munich (mz 649) Tom Abbott..........................................76 13–22 Santa Fe Opera (mz 652) new......201
16–22 Walking the Danube (mz 651) Richard Wigmore.................................15 16–23 THE DANUBE MUSIC FESTIVAL (mz 650).........................15 18–24 Grampian Gardens (mz 663) new Caroline Holmes.................................162 27– 3 The Victorian Achievement (mz 664) Dr Paul Atterbury................................30 30–11 The Road to Santiago (mz 669) John McNeill......................................171
Salzburg Summer...............................15
Royal Palaces new...........................29
Operetta in Austria............................13
Opera in Macerata & Pesaro............127
Verona Opera...................................103
Edinburgh Festival...........................165
Drottningholm & Confidencen.......189 The Lucerne Festival........................189
September 2013 2– 9 Bohemia (ma 673) Michael Ivory.......................................17 3–10 Alsace (ma 672) Dr Cathy Oakes.........56
3–10 Great Houses of the South West (ma 671) Anthony Lambert..................34 3–13 Transoxiana (ma 685) Prof. Hugh Kennedy...........................202 7–19 West Coast Architecture (ma 675) Dr Harry Charrington.......................198 9–15 French Gothic (ma 676) Matthew Woodworth............................52
9–16 Berlin, Potsdam, Dresden (ma 707) Dr Jarl Kremeier..................................65 9–16 The Cotswolds (ma 694) Dr Steven Blake...................................37
10–16 Connoisseur’s Prague (ma 674) Michael Ivory.......................................19 10–21 Walking to Santiago (ma 682) Adam Hopkins & Gaby Macphedran...173 14–25 Morocco (ma 690) James Brown.......147 15–22 The Heart of Italy (ma 692) Dr Luca Leoncini...............................125
16–20 The Welsh Marches (ma 678) Major Imogen Corrigan......................204
Dates
16–22 History of Medicine (ma 695) Prof. Helen King & Dr Fabrizio Nevola........................113 16–22 Gastronomic Catalonia (ma 721) Gijs van Hensbergen...........................170 19–25 Gardens & Villas of the Italian Lakes (ma 700) Steven Desmond...................91 20–26 St Petersburg (ma 705) Dr Alexey Makhrov............................161 22–27 ENGLISH MUSIC IN YORKSHIRE new........................39 22–29 Courts of Northern Italy (ma 708) Dr Fabrizio Nevola............................106 23–29 Istanbul (ma 713) Prof. Judith Herrin.............................190
23–29 The Etruscans (ma 710) new Dr Nigel Spivey.................................128
23–30 Walking in Tuscany (ma 712) Dr Antonia Whitley............................122 23– 4 Sicily (ma 717) Christopher Newall.............................141 28– 7 Classical Greece (ma 689) Dr Oswyn Murray...............................77 29– 6 Dark Age Brilliance (ma 724) Dr Ffiona Gilmore-Eaves...................108 30– 8 Castile & León (ma 696) Gijs van Hensbergen...........................175
Opera in Venice new.....................103
The Western Balkans new...............17
Stresa Festival new..........................95
October 2013
7–18 Ancient Egypt (ma 743) Dr Angus Graham................................21
8–13 Palladian Villas (ma 737) Dr Michael Douglas-Scott....................98
9–24 Ethiopia (ma 746) new Prof. David Phillipson..........................42
10–17 Modern Art on the Côte d’Azur (ma 736) Monica Bohm Duchen...........62 11–17 Roman & Mediaeval Provence (ma 738) Dr Alexandra Gajewski........60 13–19 Ancient Rome (ma 739) Angus Haldane...................................132 14–20 Malta (ma 735) Juliet Rix.................146 14–24 Andalucía (ma 740) Adam Hopkins....................................185 14–25 Sicily (ma 747) Dr Roberto Cobianchi.........................141
16–27 Art in Texas (ma 742) new Gijs van Hensbergen...........................199 17–24 THE RHÔNE MUSIC FESTIVAL new.............................63 21–26 Pompeii & Herculaneum (ma 745 Angus Haldane...................................133 26– 3 Essential Jordan (ma 761) Sue Rollin & Jane Streetly..................144
Wexford Opera Festival.....................89
Parma Verdi Festival new..............107
Modern Art in Italy..........................100
Walking in
Northern Tuscany new.................123
Opera in Cardiff...............................205
1– 9 Aragón (ma 727) Adam Hopkins....................................176
2– 6 Art in Madrid (ma 741) Gail Turner........................................179
1–10 Israel & Palestine (ma 726) Dr Garth Gilmour................................88
2– 6 Ravenna & Urbino (ma 728) Dr Luca Leoncini...............................109
Weston Park new............................36
November 2013 4–11 Granada & Córdoba (ma 768) Gijs van Hensbergen...........................183
6–10 Florentine Palazzi (ma 769) new Dr Joachim Strupp..............................119
6–12 Zurbarán & the Golden Age (ma 766) new Dr Xavier Bray.......................189
2–10 The Cathedrals of England (ma 732) new Jon Cannon...............................28
15–29 Essential India (ma 771) Dr Giles Tillotson.................................80
3– 7 The Venetian Hills (ma 729) Dr Joachim Strupp..............................104
4–10 Monasteries of Moldavia (ma 730) Alan Ogden........................................158 5–11 Gastronomic Piedmont (ma 731) Marc Millon........................................94
12–16 Venetian Palaces (ma 770) Dr Michael Douglas-Scott..................102
December 2013
7–13 Friuli-Venezia Giulia (ma 733) Dr Joachim Strupp................................96
We will run about eight Christmas and New Year tours. Details will be available in the spring of 2013. Contact us to register your interest.
Right: The Galerie des Glaces, Palace of Versailles, engraving 1855 from The Illustrated London News.
7–13 Caravaggio (ma 734) Dr Helen Langdon.............................130
218
b o o k o n l i n e a t w w w. m a r t i n r a n d a l l . c o m
M A RT I N R A N D A L L T R AV E L A R T • A R C H I T E C T U R E • G A S T R O N O M Y • A R C H A E O L O G Y • H I S T O R Y • M U S I C • l i t e r at u r e
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