journeys past (Italy, Greece)

 a very few pics that I scanned from my old album

Timeless Venice of the Doges
This is always how I remember Venice- mysterious and beautiful beyond belief with misty September sunsets. It felt like stepping into the swirling mists of a time machine and surely on the other side I would glimpse the gondola of a thirteenth century Doge gliding through the canals to his palace.
The Basilica of Santa Maria della Salute is across the canal, erected after the Black Death in 1630 in thanks to the Virgin of Health.





 On the Senate Steps a sacrilege,
"et tu Brute" as quoted by historian Tacitus

 my photos of the eternal city and of my travels some years ago are few, I had no skill at that time and some were lost in many moves but I remember coming up out of the modern Roman subway to face the ancient colliseum - one of the first major archaelogical sites I had seen and I had to catch my breath in awe.  I must go back with a proper camera!!

                                                                           

......and once upon a time I lived in Greece!!

Athens on canvas
This is from when I lived in the old Plaka District of Athens on Odos Vyronos or Byron Street named after the English Poet Lord Byron who fought and died in the Greek war of Independence

the isles of Greece, the isles of Greece...

Pompeii

Villa garden in Pompeii- the romans perfected leisure time -and relaxation in general!
In a Roman garden you might find  roses (absolutely) , violets, lilies, anemones, poppies, forget me nots and wildflowers, along with fruit trees and many herbs.

this is a copy of a garden fresco from Pompeii I have  hanging in my house

Libet iacere modo sub antiqua ilice,

Modo        in   tenaci             gramine;

Labuntur        altis          interim         ripis          aquae,

Queruntur            in         silvis          aves

It          is         pleasing         now     to       lie        under      an           old        oak         tree

Now   in  the  clinging    grass,

And   meanwhile   waters   flow into   full   streams,

The             birds         are          complaining         in        the       woods - Horace