Giornale: Scuderie del Quirinale

Lauren and I ended up at the Scuderie del Quirinale accidentally. We had just gotten lunch after our day in the Forum Romanum and were both exhausted. I did not really pay attention while when we were walking to lunch and when we went to leave we realized we had no idea where we were. We walked for a little until Lauren pointed saying “I see the Spanish Steps!” Relieved we ventured towards the steps, knowing the familiar Spagna metro stop was nearby. However, as we kept walking towards the steps I sensed that something was off. I hadn’t had time to put in my contacts that morning but the blurry stairs in the distance didn’t look quite right. Slowly the road became more of an incline and I began to sweat. Lauren complained that this was “worse than the Janiculum” and I should’ve realized then but it was only when we reached the top of the steps, that were indeed not the Spanish Steps, when I said “I think we’re on the Quirinal Hill.”

My suspicions were confirmed by a helpful plaque that read Piazza Del Quirinale and we stayed in the center of the piazza catching our breath. I remember that there was a huge obelisk at the center and I looked up at it in awe. I remember that clearly because unlike the other piazzas we had been to, the Piazza Del Quirinale was silent. There were occasional cars that passed but other than that there was a kind of intimidating calm about the place that I wasn’t used to seeing in Rome. I was able to appreciate the obelisk in the square with more focus than I had ever been able to in the past. And even though I wasn’t sure who the figures were on by its side, I understood the impact that they had.

We wandered around the hill not sure of what we were looking for when we passed a building and a sign caught my eye. It said something about a Leonardo Da Vinci exhibit and when I read more closely I saw the words Scuderie del Quirinale. I’m not sure how I pulled it from the back of my brain--I had only looked at the solo excursion list once-- but I said “I think that this is one of the Museums we could go to for our writing.” We ventured inside and were met with a long white hallway. After paying the entry fee and getting our audio guides we climbed a sloping spiral staircase and found ourselves in the middle of the Da Vinci exhibit.

I’m not sure about Lauren but my audio guide failed me. The numbers on the exhibit didn’t line up with the buttons and I ended up abandoning it after about five frustrating minutes. I walked around in confusion. When I usually think of Da Vinci I think of Mona Lisa and The Last Supper type things. This exhibit was not focused on his paintings at all. It seemed like it was more dedicated to Da Vinci’s skill through inventions and how they innovated the world around him.

Throughout the exhibit there were pictures of Da Vinci’s sketches and with them models of those sketches that had been made more recently. The largest of these models were the impressive flying machines that he had designed. All based off of Da Vinci’s study of birds and their anatomy, these different sets of mechanical wings were something that I’d never seen anything like. One of the information stands I read explained how Da Vinci felt he was contributing to “man’s ancient desire to fly which is embodied by the story of Daedalus and Icarus.” As I stared at the machines, I tried to picture someone actually attempting to fly with one and shuttered as images of Icarus falling from the sky went into my head. I think that in a day and age where airplanes are so commonplace in some ways we have lost the romanticism that is often associated with flying. In a world without airplanes, flying was still considered a type of magic or just something that birds could only do.

Walking around the rest of the exhibit there was one particular room which blew me away. The museum had recreated Da Vinci’s own personal book collection based on book lists found in his codices. All of the original books besides one called the Codex Laurenzianus had been destroyed. The sheer size of the collection was impressive, let alone the content that the books contained. In his collection there were many familiar names like Dante, Ovid, and Pliny. On the wall behind all these books there was a quote from Da Vinci himself that read “Ricordo de’ libri ch’io lascio serrati nel cassone” which through my rough google translate powers I found to mean: “I remember the books that I leave locked in the chest.” Something about this quote sent chills through my body. I have always loved reading and when I was younger it was all I did in my freetime. However, since I’ve gotten older, that pastime had begun to fade from my life. I made a promise to myself that when I was in Rome I was going to make the time to read a book. My mom had given me Circe, the novel written by Madeline Miller, for my birthday and I packed it for my trip. But over the first week in Rome it had been left untouched. Going to the Scuderie del Quirinale ended up being a happy accident because the first thing I did when we got back to St. John's was start reading my book.