Pisa

Pisa is a backwater Italian town known worldwide for its leaning tower. Apart from the tower, there is almost nothing else interesting in Pisa. The town has only 88 thousand people and is quite dull and grey.

A river of an unpleasant dirty color flows through Pisa. This river floods, so there is no waterfront.

Taking advantage of the river floods, city services turn a blind eye to the garbage that literally fills the waterfront. Spring comes, it wash away.

In the alleys stand as many as six trash bins. I don’t even know that many types of trash. A sign on the bins says that filming is in progress. Utter madness.

The city itself is not in a bad condition per se. Just a couple of places where the plaster chipped off.

Somewhere, this even worked for Pisa’s good. Beneath the fresh paint lies a whole cultural layer, so it’s not a shame to leave a piece of the house untoched.

The streets of a typical Italian town are narrow and almost treeless.

Sometimes Pisa reminds of Istanbul. There is such a high-culture frankness here. Next to the 13th-century architecture, could easily be a vegetable market with a plastic tablecloth with flowers.

Or a father could simply walk with his son along the parapet by the river. In some Berlin, he would have been deprived of parent rights.

Amazing doorbells.

Wonderful door.

An analemma was found on one of the houses. This is a curve representing the position of the sun at noon throughout the year. A plate with a hole is fixed above it, through which a sunbeam passes. If the beam hits the curve exactly, it is currently noon. I have never seen such a convoluted way of telling time.

A couple of interesting buildings were found on the main square of Pisa. This palace was built by order of the Medici in 1564.

Absolutely incredible painting.

Next to it stands an equally beautiful chapel from the same period.

So, the tower. If one walks through the entire city, closer to the outskirts he can find a large field where stands the main city cathedral.

It’s called plainly: Pisa Cathedral. An absolutely exquisite example of Italian architecture.

The cathedral was built way back in 1092. At that time, there was no Italy yet. Its territory consisted of numerous separate city-states, one of which was the Republic of Pisa — a tiny country formed around the city of Pisa.

In some textbooks, this era is referred to as the “period of feudal fragmentation,” hinting at its backwardness. In reality, it was a period of maximum flourishing for small independent states, one of which was the Republic of Pisa.

Look for yourself: does this architecture resemble the work of backward feudal lords?

Next to every respectable cathedral, a bell tower must be built — a tall tower with a bell at the top. At the appointed time, the bell-ringer ascends the bell tower and rings the bell, calling people to worship.

So for the Pisan Cathedral a bell tower was being built, but then something went wrong: the ground beneath the tower turned out to be of varying densities, causing the tower to lean.

At that time, the Republic of Pisa was at war with Florence, so construction was halted. This was the only thing that saved the tower from falling: during the break, the ground had a chance to slightly strengthen.

After 80 years, construction resumed, and they came up with the idea to make the remaining floors on the left and right sides varying heights to compensate for the lean. Eventually, it was completed somehow.

It was decided to make the very top part, where the bell is located, vertical (relative to the ground). To achieve this, it was built with a tilt at the same degree but in the opposite direction. However, this was in the 14th century, and since then, the tower has continued to slowly lean.

Now the tower has one angle, while the top has different, which was perfectly straight 500 years ago.

Therefore, calling the Pisan tower leaning is incorrect. From a scientific point of view, it is skewed the fuck out.

Moreover, the lean at the base looks 10 times more scary.

By the way, no Galileo ever dropped anything from the tower. That’s fairytales.

What is true is the crowds of nincompoops still taking pictures “like me holding tower up”.