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With the days finally made the beautiful, what's better than a walk in the countryside is exploding with colors and scents after the long winter?
near Trieste, just across the border with Slovenia, there is a corner of the countryside where time seems to stand still for a couple of centuries ago: in a remote corner of the green of the torrential Risano basin, lies the rural village of Hrastovlje (in Italian Hrastovlje, the ancient Hrastovlje) whose name derives from Hrast (oak) and oglje (coal).
get there is simple: you pass the border of Italy Rabuiese the A1 motorway and exit at Crni Kal, continuing to the intersection with road 208, from here towards Buzet (Buzet ) to find directions to our destination.
When you step into this place, quite intimate and isolated, one is amazed by the peace and the silence that reigns there. The town is situated in the northern slopes of Mount Closed (m. 299), site of a prehistoric fort. Hrastovlje consists of a few houses, built of gray paving stones typical of the area with interesting details such as arcades and amid a campaign of well-cultivated area and production of fine muscat.
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The village, in 1208, was donated by the Emperor of Germany, Conrad II the Salic, the Patriarchs of Aquileia, and was feud in the twelfth century to the Bishops of Trieste, which then passed it to Neuhaus ( a feudal family of low-ranking German) that kept it in the fifteenth and sixteenth century, even after Hrastovlje that went to the Venetian Republic by the Treaty of Trent in 1535.
A plaque with Latin inscription, placed above the entrance to the tabor, recalls that in 1581 the villa was sold by Neuhaus Hrastovlje illustrious doctor Koper source Zarotti Alessandro Padua. During the war between the Venetians and Austrians in 1615, the Venetian Marco Loredan, the administrator of the region, said guard the country from Cernide (village militia) to contain the attacks of the Archduke Uscocchi and their allies.
As I wrote before, the country gather at the foot of a limestone that rises upward dall'arenaria the valley and it is up here that we find it more valuable: the ancient castle, typical of early medieval fortress with a church surrounded by walls of four-sided 32 m. long and 16 m. wide.
In reality this is not a real castle, but the fascination with these ancient stones know release is only a suggestion.
dates from the late sixteenth century, irregular plan with two towers at opposite corners that served as lookouts against the Turkish raids. The castle was built by the family Neuhaus on the site of an ancient prehistoric pile and almost certainly used the same stone was already set cone.
leave the car, walk the short stretch of road that leads uphill to the site.
The bulk of the defensive wall surrounding the church stands stern and the walls are in good condition. in short we are in front of the entrance arch with wrought iron gate and stone shelves on which ran the walkway, this time a door was equipped with a drawbridge.
Hrastovlje of Tabor, in limestone, was built to offer shelter to people in an emergency. E 'equipped with louvers that open on walls of the towers. From an ancient text we know that the walls were polygonal and surrounded by a ditch with two entrances: the Main Gate and New Gate.
We find the gates are open
be closed but if you can call the cell. 0038631432231 (also speak Italian) and a few minutes later someone from the country will rise to the fortress to open up and guide you. In any CSAO the gate there are all indications of the case.
We access the interior of the old fence
the center of which we can admire the simple forms of the church that was built on an existing building, probably of the thirteenth century, we notice the date on the lintel of 1776, when it was completed a restoration.
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The church has a bell tower.
This place of worship, built by the Bishop's Curia of Koper, is dedicated to SS. Trinity. E 'in Romanesque-Gothic style and was consecrated in 1475. To enter the holy place should pay for a ticket a couple of euros. Inside, we are amazed by the bright tones with which its walls were painted. Two rows of four columns without capitals divide it into three naves with vaulted ceiling;
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the Baroque high altar, a marble, is dedicated to St. Marco.
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But our attention is rapt, as I wrote before, completely frescoed walls and show different scenes: the most famous is the "Dance of Death" or "Dance Macabre", on the south side , which expresses an exemplary sense of equality of all men in the face of death and its inevitability in rendering justice to all alike.
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Compared to other "Dance of Death" in Italy, France and Germany, this has some peculiar: it has a pattern from right to left instead of dancing skeletons and seems to fall out in the direction of another skeleton sitting on a throne holding the aperitif lid of a tomb in which they are intended to come all the eleven characters portrayed, each alternating with a skeleton: the pope, the king, queen, the cardinal, the bishop, Monaco, the bourgeois, the usurer, the young, the lame, and finally a baby.
The west wall opens to the left, the "Betrayal of Judas", while you develop the right scene of "Jesus before Pontius Pilate "and" The Flagellation. "Even the higher-end" Jesus crowned with thorns, "the" Delivery of the Cross, the Crucifixion and the Deposition. On the south wall, in addition to the "Dance of Death" are the closing scenes of the Passion and the north wall the "Nativity." The southern wall of the vault is dedicated to the first six days of creation in the southern part look to the left, representing the seventh day, and then the cycle of "Adam and Eve "from the collection of the forbidden fruit to the killing of Abel by Cain. that illustrate the interesting parts of the year and the related agricultural jobs in the province of Istria in the Middle Ages.
The technique by which these decorations were executed art shows very simple, with an accuracy of proportion and perspective plans, however, taken together, the paintings evolve expressive grace made with considerable skill and realism, also favored the use of brilliant hues.
to execute the frescoes was John Castua, commissioned by the Neuhaus, and the work was completed in 1490. These frescoes were discovered in 1949 when the sculptor Joze Pohlen was responsible for carrying out some work on the church and almost by accident was under a thick layer of lime traces of frescoes.
Since then the Institute for the Protection of Ljubljana monuments began the slow and difficult work of cleaning, which made a re-emergence of the most impressive and disturbing series of frescoes throughout Europe.
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A visit to this jewel and indispensable, this indeed marks a moment of synthesis of the various cultural components found in Istria and figurative in the late Middle Ages.
All together, walls, castle, church and country form an extraordinary medieval setting and there is no doubt that Hrastovlje be considered among the most interesting monuments of Istria.
Best wishes.
parlànnone cor should arispetto ... "(6) 
!..." "I work at the limit of expenditure - he concludes 
