SOCRATES – COMENIUS
MAKING MEDIEVAL CULTURE AND TRADITIONS ALIVE IN OUR OWN DAYS
REPORT ON THE TEACHING EXPERIENCE IN CAGLIARI
3RD – 10TH NOVEMBER 2006
Our Estonian (Siiri, the coordinator, Aivi, an English teacher and Anne, a music teacher) and Portuguese (Carlos, the headmaster, and Fatima, the coordinator) colleagues arrived in Cagliari on 3rd November, in the afternoon, so we all went for a pizza together with some other colleagues from our school, who were interested in meeting them and also …practising their English!
On Saturday our school headmaster, Mr Giuseppe N. Casu, welcomed them all, and then the … Medieval Day started! A society, called Memoriae Milites, gave us all an interesting historical introduction on Sardinia ending up with Medieval times, very different here from other Italian regions. Memoriae Milites’ main purpose is motivating young people, so that they can learn more about their own history, and they certainly were very successful, especially when they all decided to wear their Medieval costumes and weapons and start fighting in the school gym. After the Medieval performance some music followed – both students and teachers joined in singing in the theatre hall. We had 4 pieces, Beethoven’s Ode to Joy – European anthem , Azzurro, a very well-known Italian song, No potho reposare, in our own local language, Sardinian, and finally one in English, Joy to the world, by Handel. In the afternoon we had an international Mass in English, during which Anne, the Estonian music teacher played the organ, then we all went for a walk in the city centre and eventually to a traditional Sardinian restaurant for dinner. The same friends who were in the church with us, John, from Ireland, and Alphonse, from India, joined us and we had a great time together. Food was delicious… and drinks too!
On Sunday morning we went to the Medieval part of Cagliari, called Castello ( Castrum Karalis), for a visit to the Archaeological Museum (which really is a must for anyone interested in Sardinia’s past. There is a very unique section on Nuragic Civilization including many small bronze statues, or “bronzetti”, representing warriors, athletes, hunters, mothers, wild animals, everyday objects. These figures were votive offerings and they were found in the very ancient towers called “nuraghi”. They constitute the main source of information about this obscure phase of the island’s history.) and the Art Gallery (with an excellent collection of primarily Catalan and Sardinian religious art from the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries). In the afternoon we went to one of the city parks, called Colle San Michele, where a Medieval tournament took place and then had some Italian pasta with some friends and colleagues.
On Monday morning our Portuguese and Estonian colleagues presented their own schools to our students in the theatre hall. They were so successful that we asked them to repeat for different groups of students. Our students were extremely interested in learning more about schools in Estonia and Portugal and seeing some pictures of their friends in those
two countries. The Estonian music teacher, Anne, also wore the Estonian national costume and described it to our students. As the weather was really beautiful we drove along the south-east coast of Sardinia together with a colleague called Silvana, who teaches Italian and History at our school. It was so mild that our Estonian colleagues said that it was just like summer in their own countries: even the sea water seemed to be warm! As a matter of fact, our summers are very long: we usually go swimming from May to October!
On Tuesday morning we had an early start at school to join Silvana in one of her History classes, during which students presented their reports on “Woman’s role in society in Sardinia and mainland Italy”. There were some striking differences. For example, one of the best-known and best-loved of Sardinia’s rulers, Eleonora of Arborea (c.1340 – 1404), made significant contributions to the evolution of civil rights on the island with her promulgation of a book of law, the Carta de Logu, in Oristano, especially focusing on women. Then we joined another colleague, Pierandrea, in a computer science lab class. Estonian and Portuguese colleagues presented their schools to some of Silvana and Anna’s students and then we had some time for shopping before going to a beautiful archaeological site, Nora, at about 30 km from Cagliari (being a tourist guide, Anna, the coordinator, guided the tour). Nora was founded by the Phoenicians in the ninth century BC and settled later by Carthaginians and Romans. Now partly submerged under the sea, because of an earthquake followed by a seaquake which took place before the end of the fifth century AD, the site shows some interesting buildings, for example a temple, with a single column still standing, thermal baths, a small, perfectly functioning theatre still used for concerts, a rich Roman villa with well-preserved black, white and ochre-coloured mosaic floors. Roberto, the school driver, took us back to Cagliari at about 5:30 p.m. Later Mariella, an English teacher, who was in Slovenia at the first meeting, went to the city centre for a walk with our Estonian and Portuguese colleagues and then they had dinner together.
On Wednesday we had a full-day excursion to Sanluri and its museums. First of all we went to the Capuchin Ethnographic Museum, including religious items (vestments, psalters and items of religious art) and also a practical selection of working items, evoking the highly active part the community played on the island in a variety of occupations. We continued with a visit to Sanluri Castle, called “Castello di Eleonora d’Arborea”, after Sardinia’s warrior queen. The castle was built in the thirteenth century and it was the venue for a treaty signed by her father, Mariano IV, and the Aragonese king, Pedro IV. Unfortunately peace didn’t last for long and in 1409, after Eleonora’s death, Pedro’s son, Martino, won a definite victory at Sanluri. This defeat marked the end of Arborea’s resistance, and was followed by the swift occupation of almost the whole island by Aragonese forces. This castle is the only still inhabited Medieval castle in Sardinia. The castle also includes a museum on Italy’s struggle for independence in the nineteenth century, but also on World War I and II, and a collection of some 400 wax figurines. After a picnic we went to Villamar and admired the murals (wall paintings) all over the village and Las Plassas with its distinctive conical hill, on top of which we could see the fragments of a twelfth century castle, a landmark for miles around. We took some beautiful photos of the church dedicated to St. Mary Magdalene, in Las Plassas, with the castle in the background, and then we reached Barumini and had a look at the largest nuragic site on the island, and also one of the oldest, dating from around 1500 BC. The name
of this mildly hilly area is “Marmilla”. Its very name, thought to derive from “mammella”, or breast, conjures up the shape of the land, the flat expanses interrupted by small, solitary protuberances, often round and regular in appearance. Any of them could hide one of these ancient towers called “nuraghi”. We were back at about 5:00 p.m., so that our Estonian and Portuguese colleagues could rest for a while, and then we met some friends and colleagues in a restaurant, called “Opera Prima”, where we had a traditional pasta dish, pasta with fresh artichokes and “bottarga” (fish roe, very typical Sardinian).
On Thursday we went to one of our colleagues’ (Maria Grazia) Maths class and then, as everybody wished, especially because of our beautifully warm Sardinian autumn, we let our Estonian and Portuguese colleagues have the rest of the day off before leaving Sardinia.