Palermo, the Survivor by Kamin Mohammadi
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Sicily is the Elizabeth Taylor of islands, a survivor. How could it otherwise manage to bear the dubious honour of being home to Mount Etna, Europe’s largest active volcano? In so many ways Sicily is the essence of what we expect of Italy. It is the only place in the country to have a dish named after an opera (spaghetti alla Norma); it practically invented the vendetta, and certainly did invent the Mafia. It has survived the Greeks, Romans, Arabs, Normans, Swabians, Spanish and even Mussolini. It has been flattened innumerable times by major earthquakes and volcanic eruptions and each time it has simply picked itself up and dusted itself down and rebuilt. It lives daily with corruption, poverty and the politics of the underworld. But it still survives. And, does it with such ebullience that it makes you gasp.
So, how could one city possibly be the centre, the quintessence of this tough and beautiful island? How do you get to be the capital of Sicily?
Drive into Palermo on a hot summer’s day, and this will be the last question on your mind. Probably you will be trying to survive the chaos of Palermo’s traffic and the extreme randomness of the driving of its inhabitants. For a law-abiding Brit driving in Italy may be stressful, but in Sicily it goes beyond that. Get to Palermo and it feels just frankly dangerous.
But, a while you realise there are rules governing this melee of metal and car horns. All you have to do is move in your own path and let everyone else take care of themselves. Which they invariably do, particularly the swarm of Vespas that plague the roads. The first time I parked at a steep angle to the kerb I felt liberated from my buttoned-up Britishness. This was after 24 hours in Palermo.
Once free from the terror of driving, you might want to return to our original question. A wander around Palermo’s busy, noisy streets reveals it to be an architectural curry: chunks of Norman style served up with a tasty sauce of Arab, seasoned with Baroque splendour, stirred in with the art nouveau Liberty style and finished with a sprinkling of Fascist design. Washing flaps from lines stretched between 15th-century palazzo, and concerts are held in the shells of buildings bombed out since the Second World War. Stuck out at the edge of Europe, closer to Africa than to its mother continent, Palermo has amalgamated, fused and adapted itself to whatever political wind has blown through it, in the process making up its own inimitable style and culture as it has gone along, rough-edged but vibrant.
Palermo’s superb location has always been its major attraction. Occupying a sweeping bay on the Tyrrhenian Sea, beneath the limestone peaks of the Monte Pellegrino, Palermo is backed by the fertile Conco d’Oro valley (the Golden Shell). This brought the Phoenicians who colonised it in 8th century BC (relatively late by Sicilian standards). They called it Ziz – meaning flower – and used it to counterbalance the advance of the Greeks in Western Sicily. From then Palermo’s long career of occupation by different races bloomed, passed from conqueror to conqueror like a prized baton until the Arabs arrived in 831AD, and recognising in Palermo an earthly paradise, made it their capital.
One long look at the faces of the Palermitans tells the story of the city’s history as the melting pot of nations: dark hair from the Arabs, the light grey or blue eyes of the Normans, the flamboyance of the Spanish, the exuberance of the Italians. The Arabs left palaces, their gardens teeming with orange, lemon and pomegranate groves, the bustling markets of the Vucciria and atmospheric streets of the Kalsa.
The Normans absorbed the many cultures living in Palermo and gave them religious freedom, and although they demolished the mosques, their use of Arab architects and craftsmen created the most sublime of Palermo’s monuments, such as La Martorana with its Norman foundation and Arab domes, the Norman palace, the unforgettable Cappella Palatina and the unmissable monastery of Monreale.
The small, fine interiors of the chapel and King Roger’s room in the palace contain some of the most stunning examples of the melding of Christian and Muslim art you will see anywhere in the world. The different uses of the tiny gold mosaics tell a harmonious story of 12th-century Palermo: the ceiling of the Capella is undoubtedly Arab with its wooden honeycomb arches, the cupola and apse was worked by Greek masters while the Latin inscriptions on the nave indicate the work of Italian artists.
Palermo remained the capital of Sicily but, like the rest of the island, was ruled by absentee monarchs, blown about by the uncertain winds governing Europe’s ruling families. The 16th century Spanish viceroys ushered in another great age of building and the curvaceous Baroque city started to grow up from the Quattro Canti which still divides the city into four quarters.
After Garibaldi passed through Sicily in 1860s, the island was finally joined to a unified Italy and the wealthy and aristocracy enjoyed a Belle Epoque, moving the centre of the town to the area around the Piazza Ruggerio Settimo where a new wave of building gave the city its famous version of art nouveau. The two theatres, Massimo and Politeama which demarcate the boundaries of the New Town are perfect examples of the Liberty style.
Intensive Allied bombing in 1943 accelerated a decline that had started in many ways, centuries before. The Mafia’s infiltration of every level of official life in Palermo diverted much-needed funds and sucked the city dry of its life force. Shambling, crumbling and stagnating, Palermo in 20th century never lost its charm but became like a city awaiting death.
But, like its motherland Sicily, Palermo has risen again.
Its renaissance started under ex-mayor Leoluca Orlando, who in his four terms revolutionised the city. Probably still the Mafia’s top assassination target, Orlando refused to award tenders to companies who had links with the Mafia, thus starting to weaken the stranglehold of the Mafioso economy. There were 250 Mafia-related murders in 1985 – his first year in office – but only eight in the last year of Orlando’s office in 2000, none of which related to organised crime.
He also vowed to renovate Palermo’s old centre, rather than demolish and rebuild. New mayor Diego Cammarata continues to make urban renewal one of his priorities. The reopening of the magnificent Teatro Massimo in 1997 bore testament to Orlando’s efforts. Called the city’s secular cathedral, the Massimo is now central to Palermo’s rich and varied cultural life. And the narrow streets of the Kalsa and the Vucciria are safe again to wander at night.
Like its driving, Palermo is a city with an extra gear; like its cuisine, it serves up life with a bit more spice; like its culture it presents life with more vivid drama, and like the manners of its inhabitants, Palermo combines the chaos with an intelligence that goes beyond mere charm. It is the epitome of true elegance, born of centuries of survival with grace.