Here we are at the third episode of urban hiking in the old town of Modena city.
If you are interested you will find the first and second episodes here:
While walking around, it can happen that I pass in front of buildings in which I have spent a lot of time in the past. This was the home of a college I attended, where I studied mineralogy, petrography, and geochemistry, but ...
... from that street is possible to have a great view of the most important historic monument of Modena: the Cathedral.
If you wanted to dwell on all the images, sculptures, bas-reliefs, doors, and columns, ... of the outside parts of the cathedral it would take weeks to see everything in detail ...
... not to mention the bell tower named "La Ghirlandina"
... a few years ago a team of experts (some of whom were my colleagues at university) studied the stones that make up the tower, one by one.
The back of the cathedral is also full of interesting details
If you look carefully to the right of the windows you will notice the presence of strange grooves and geometric shapes in the bas-relief: they are the ancient local measures imprinted in the stones as they served as a reference for merchants ...
.... as the near square was the seat of the market.
A large square where people could (and can) meet. A large square even in name: Piazza Grande (literally: Big Square)
End of the third part (maybe there will be another one).
Stay tuned.
All images were taken by me with the smartphone camera. Some of them were slightly modified to mask some people's faces.
