Friday 7. [7 February 1902] A most beautiful day. We went up by tram
to Monreale. As we rose the Conca d'oro with its lovely backing of
hills slipped into full beauty below us, a garden of lemons, golden fruit
from the boughs and golden oxalis beneath in the grass. A thin veil of
blue mist hung over Palermo and the first reaches of sea. The
Cathedral is a revelation of beauty. It is all covered with exquisite
decoration, mosaics above and a high dado of marble panels set in
thin lines of mosaic, gold and red and blue. In the choir a lavish
decoration of marble, green and dark red ...... and stars set in the thin
band of mosaic. The thrones near the altar perfect. Above these
marbles stretches a pale gold on which is pictured all the Old and all
the New Testament. The figures are quite formal and Byzantine, the
groups evidently a sort of atelier treatment of the scenes - they are
almost the same in the Cappella Palatina - but the general effect is
superb. Above the apse is a half length of Christ blessing with 2
raised fingers, not quite so good as that at Cefalu I thought, but still
very impressive. The pictures of the Ark afforded me exquisite
pleasure, especially one of Noah helping the lion out onto Ararat.
The Ark looked very crowded! We went up onto the roof from whence
we had a wonderful view over the Conca d'oro, then down to the
cloisters, as wonderful in their way as the church, the capitals all
different and of most lovely designs, the columns of an endless
variety of patterns. At the corners are groups of 4 columns - they look
at first as if they were of Renaissance arabesques, but when you look
closely you see they are all grotesque, but of the fine very low ......
which distinguishes this Saracen Norman. After lunch I went out
shopping and into the Duomo. Lovely south door - Saracen they say.
Anyhow it's most extraordinary to see how they used and altered
Gothic, not entirely understanding its meaning. The capitals of the
infinitely slender shafts are not really capitals at all, but most
elaborate fine cut acanthus leaves laid along the top of the columns.
The same leaves are laid above the capitals conceiling[?] the first
spring of the arch. On the whole the detail is apt to be better than the
proportion of the whole structure. The great battlemented length of the
Duomo with its rather insufficient airy towers and massive inchoate
blocks of building about the transept is not very good as a whole.
The west front, too, quite wonderful as workmanship, presents rather a
confused appearance - the parts don't seem to work into a whole nor
to be members of a general big design. Inside it's all 18th cent.
twaddle, except the 4 great sarcophaguses which are most splendid,
Roger with his kneeling Saracens and exquisite canopy and Fred. II
with his great porphyry simplicity, very fine. After tea Hugo and I
drove round the base of the Pellegrino [Pellegrino, Mte] and saw a
beautiful view from the Iegeia[?].