Published on Saturday, November 10, 2018 by Kathy McCabe History tells us that the city of Pompeii was destroyed when Mount Vesuvius erupted on August 22, 79 AD – or was it two months later? Experts now believe that could be the case, as an inscription written in charcoal on the wall of a newly excavated home in Pompeii may indicate that Vesuvius erupted on October 17, 79. According to historians, the inscription, whic...

Published on Saturday, November 3, 2018 by Kathy McCabe Travelers flying to Milan next summer will need to plan ahead or take an alternate route, as Milan’s Linate Airport will be closed from July 27 to October 27, 2019 for renovations, including repaving the runway. The fifth-busiest airport in Italy, Linate sees more than 9 million passengers annually. Instead, passengers can fly through Milan Malpensa Airport, whic...

Published on Friday, October 5, 2018 by Kathy McCabe Starbucks’ first Italian location, which opened in early September in Milan, is switching up its menu to appeal to a country with an unrivaled coffee culture. Gone are the Frappuccinos, the green-and-white to-go cups, and the American-style donuts and pastries, replaced with a focus on more classic coffee drinks and food that appeals to Italians’ palate. The up...

Published on Wednesday, August 29, 2018 by Kathy McCabe To combat Islamophobia and celebrate ancient Middle Eastern culture, two Florence museums have teamed up to stage an exhibit on Islamic art and the reciprocal relationship between Florence and Islam. The exhibit, titled “Islamic Art and Florence from the Medici to the 20th Century,” runs through Sept. 23 at the Uffizi Gallery and the Bargello Museum, showcasing 25...

Published on Thursday, August 23, 2018 by Kathy McCabe Thanks to a July agreement between Italian aerospace companies and Virgin Galactic, Italy could soon launch itself into the nascent world of space tourism. On a recent visit to the White House, Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte talked about “launching, as soon as possible, new planes that, crossing the atmosphere, will be able to connect Italy and the United Sta...

Published on Saturday, June 23, 2018 by Kathy McCabe Cheesemakers in Italy’s Parmesan-producing regions produced 147,000 tons of Parmigiano Reggiano cheese in 2017, breaking all-time records for the cheese’s production. The 3.6 million wheels of cheese sold totaled 2.2€ billion in sales and increased production by 5 percent from 2016 and 10 percent from 2014, according to Italy’s Parmigiano Reggiano consortium. ...

Published on Saturday, June 16, 2018 by Kathy McCabe Olive oil, the liquid gold essential to Italian and other Mediterranean cuisines, existed in Italy much earlier than previously thought, according to Davide Tanasi, an Italian researcher and assistant professor of history at the University of South Florida. By analyzing residue found on a Bronze Age ceramic jar that was found in Sicily in the 1990s, Tanasi discovered ...

Published on Friday, June 1, 2018 by Kathy McCabe People have long marveled at the remains of human beings preserved in the ashes of Pompeii in the 79 AD eruption of Mount Vesuvius. Men, women and children were trapped in situ, sometimes in family groups, sometimes alone, nearly 1150 in total rediscovered. But a recent find will help everyone to understand more about the role of animals in this region’s ancient ...

Published on Tuesday, May 29, 2018 by Kathy McCabe They say a picture is worth a thousand words, and if two rare 16th-century Italian sketches could talk, their words would be “Thank goodness we’re home!” Florence’s Uffizi Galleries recently acquired the sketches, the work of Giovan Francesco Rustici and Giovanni Catesi, at an Uffizi Galleries auction at Christie’s in New York City. Both artists created t...

Published on Friday, May 25, 2018 by Kathy McCabe Summer is a happy season, and it’s made even happier each year when the international Blue Flag program heralding the world’s cleanest beaches announces it choices. For 2018, a great number of those in Italy are set along the Tyrrhenian Sea in Tuscany. You might find it impossible to choose, and it just gets tougher when you widen the Blue Flag map out to the r...