DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.67375#0416
326
NAPLES AND ITS ENVIRONS.
So much Blue Grotto literature already exists that
nothing could be added to increase its value. It is better
to select some of the excellent things that have already
been said of it. Doubtless this cave was well known to
former generations and peoples; but the knowledge of it
had long been lost when it was re-discovered by August
Kopisch, the artist Fries, and Angelo Ferraro, a sailor,
on August 17, 1826. After giving notice of his discovery
and the names of his companions, and announcing the
name they had bestowed on it, Kopisch says: —
“ It is a remarkable phenomenon, the water seeming to fill
the grotto with blue fire. Every wave appears like a flame.
At the back part of the grotto is an old passage leading into
the rock, perhaps to the Tower of Damecuta above, where
tradition reports that young maidens were formerly imprisoned
by Tiberius; and it is possible that the grotto was his secret
landing-place. ... It is most beautiful in the morning, be-
cause in the afternoon the light is stronger and the mysterious
charm thereby diminished. The picturesque effect will be in-
creased, if the visitor can, like ourselves, carry with him into
the cave burning torches.”
The author of “ Notes on Naples ” says: —■
‘ ‘ A sparry roof worked by the living waters spreads, like a
pavilion, its low wide arches on every hand ; cells and shelves
and adamantine halls, bluer than the blue heaven you have left
and they will never see, are above you, and beneath, and far
within, and all around ; silent, too, as sleep, except for the
infant echoes of the rippling water, and the light drip, at inter-
vals, of the suspended oar. The waves, which are the cavern’s
pavement, are like the turquoise stone, as delicate, but more
luminous, and transparent as light, as they undulate around in
their soft hues, suffusing the sunken rocks, the submarine wall,
and the arched roof above you fretted with its stalactites. A
color as of violet is in the air, and in the vault’s more distant
depths there is a purple like the starry night. Nay, the very
NAPLES AND ITS ENVIRONS.
So much Blue Grotto literature already exists that
nothing could be added to increase its value. It is better
to select some of the excellent things that have already
been said of it. Doubtless this cave was well known to
former generations and peoples; but the knowledge of it
had long been lost when it was re-discovered by August
Kopisch, the artist Fries, and Angelo Ferraro, a sailor,
on August 17, 1826. After giving notice of his discovery
and the names of his companions, and announcing the
name they had bestowed on it, Kopisch says: —
“ It is a remarkable phenomenon, the water seeming to fill
the grotto with blue fire. Every wave appears like a flame.
At the back part of the grotto is an old passage leading into
the rock, perhaps to the Tower of Damecuta above, where
tradition reports that young maidens were formerly imprisoned
by Tiberius; and it is possible that the grotto was his secret
landing-place. ... It is most beautiful in the morning, be-
cause in the afternoon the light is stronger and the mysterious
charm thereby diminished. The picturesque effect will be in-
creased, if the visitor can, like ourselves, carry with him into
the cave burning torches.”
The author of “ Notes on Naples ” says: —■
‘ ‘ A sparry roof worked by the living waters spreads, like a
pavilion, its low wide arches on every hand ; cells and shelves
and adamantine halls, bluer than the blue heaven you have left
and they will never see, are above you, and beneath, and far
within, and all around ; silent, too, as sleep, except for the
infant echoes of the rippling water, and the light drip, at inter-
vals, of the suspended oar. The waves, which are the cavern’s
pavement, are like the turquoise stone, as delicate, but more
luminous, and transparent as light, as they undulate around in
their soft hues, suffusing the sunken rocks, the submarine wall,
and the arched roof above you fretted with its stalactites. A
color as of violet is in the air, and in the vault’s more distant
depths there is a purple like the starry night. Nay, the very