So I finally made it to the Monumentale in Torino, twice in fact, and while it was the last of the three great Italian cemeteries I visited in was the first to be created, founded in 1827 and officially open in 1829. From outside the Porta Suza train station take the no 13 tram and change at Rossini to get the 68 bus from the stop on Via dell'Accademia Albertina. Or you can, as I discovered, walk there as it isn’t too far and you’ll be almost as quick as the teeny tiny bus which crawls along.
It was the busiest of the trio and the vast modern sections are well tended and attended (for want of a better word). Like Staglieno it has its own internal bus service and it needs it, the place is gigantic, so big that large plots are still available to be used in the future. At one point as I left one arcade to see yet another huge one laid out before me I felt dismayed by the scale of the place.
The historic, sculpture filled part takes up less than half the site, the modern sections still very much in use make up the majority of the graveyard.
Just a small part of the modern sectionWhile it lacks the erotic work in abundance at Staglieno or the vast mausoleums and Art Deco tombs of Milano it is still very much worth a visit for the general variety and sheer quality of many of the pieces on display.
It can boast probably Bistolfi’s greatest creation, his Angel of Death, a truly scary looking apparition, but would you know it? It is currently covered in scaffolding and trapped behind a condensation covered Perspex sheet. I’d quickly checked Work and the Breath of Life in Milano before heading to Torino and can confirm that it too is still surrounded by that horrible pink scaffolding more than a year on.
Primo LeviThere are few internationally known personalities buried here either, probably the best known is in one of the three Jewish sections. Local lad Primo Levi is here, author of the classic Auschwitz survivor memoir IF THIS IS A MAN and its incredible companion piece, THE TRUCE. This was the quietest part of the cemetery while I was there, not another person in sight, an odd experience as the rest of the place is so busy. There are several small chapels and arcades in the historic sections where you’ll suddenly find you are all alone with just the birdsong (or in one section, piped sacred music).
There is a type of bird there too which sounds exactly like a human making a “tut tut tut” sound, so if you hear that don’t worry, you’re not being told off, it’s just the wildlife. I was conscious however of the “no unauthorised photography” sign I spotted just inside the main entrance gate, something Geonova and Milano don’t have. Fortunately nobody seemed to be policing this, though the first time I heard that bird I thought they were.
Marchionesse Elisabetta Sanese tomb, by Giuseppe Bogliani, 1835. The “star” of the piece though is not the dying Marchionesse but the survivor showing her piety by the deathbed, the actress Carlotta Marchionni who lifts her mother’s hand to her head for a parting blessing. Jean Servais tomb, by Lorenzo Vergnano, 1892Bizarrely enough this Etruscan style tomb had no name on it.Giuseppina Castellazzo tomb, detailOne of the star attractions of the cemetery. Laura Vigo grave, by Pietro Canonica, 1908Casana family tomb, by Davide Calandra, 1910Grave of Teresa Fererro, who went under the stage name of Isa Bluette. She was a showgirl, actress and singer who died aged 41 in 1939. Her curious grave by Giacomo Giorgis seems to portray her “playing” dead, her husband’s photograph by her head. They were apparently married when she was on her deathbed. He, actor Nuto Navarinni’s name is also on the tomb so I suppose he’s in there too, though he was married twice more after Isa’s demise and lived till 1973.Calagaris family mausoleum. This bonkers tomb from 1954 particularly caught my eye. Designed by Fillipo Chriss it’s made from ceramic plaques. Giuseppe Durio tomb, Grief Comforted by Memories by Leonardo Bistolfi, 1901 When Hannibal’s army finally irrupted into Italy from the Alps close to Torino it found ready and willing allies among the local tribe, whom the Romans called “Celts”. Obviously this family chose to identify with the ancient ancestors with this magnificent Celtic cross. This extravagant tomb of industrialist Giuseppe Pongiglione is filled with fantastic details including a stone train, a rat and a large moth emerging from a chrysalis. Pongiglione strides proudly from his open grave, watch in hand, confidently expectant of his assured place in eternity, a punctual angel on hand to guide him, more servant than heavenly host. Sculpted by Lorenzo Vergnano, it’s subject had a great deal of say in how he was to be portrayed, indeed the work was completed 15 years before his death in 1886. Unfortunately it’s in urgent need of restoration and the marble and iron are rotting away, so much for eternity.Stone trainDoctor Giacinto Pacchiotti tomb, by Luigi Contratti, 1896. The doctor is shown as a philanthropist, giving comfort to the deathbed figure who dominates the piece. Usually a father or mother, here it is an anonymous workman wearing a pair of wonderfully sculpted boots.Amalia Porcheddu Dianesi tomb, by Edoardo Rubino (sculptor) and Giulio Casanova (architect), 1912 Grave of Francesco Ballada, 1933. Died age 11Interesting one this, the grave of Antonio Marro. This is his life sized portrait. He died in 1913 and was a leading figure in the young fields of psychiatry and sociology; he’s portrayed literally measuring a mind as though the exterior could equate the interior life of a person, however the skull doubles as a traditional pre-Christian symbol of mortality. He was also fascinated by criminal psychology. There are schools and hospitals dotted over Italy named after him today. One of his less commendable legacies was his son Giovanni, a eugenicist who became a “racial scientist” during the Fascist era, writing junk like “The Superiority of the Italian Race” in which he compares Jews to octopi because “slimy creature, it is almost symbolic of evasiveness, but it grasps everything, and everything sticks to the tentacles and suckers around its formidable masticatory apparatus.” And so on. The Nazi fellow traveller died in 1951 and his main legacy is in the museum of Ancient Egyptian artifacts to which he contributed as an archaeologist and curator, the finest in Italy and a major tourist attraction in Torino.My favourite in the whole graveyard, it wouldn't be out of place in Staglieno, a stunning piece by Giacomo Ginotti (sculptor) and Crescentino Caselli (architect) called The Wake at the Sepulcher. It is the tomb of Brondelli di Brondello who died in 1886.A few days later I made it back to Staglieno. At hotels in both Torino and Genova I was given tourist information maps, and while both cemeteries were within the boundaries covered by the maps neither of them were marked and yet both are fascinating places and Staglieno in particular is one of the world’s wonders. Staglieno update to follow soon.
One advisory note. If you are planning a visit, all three graveyards are closed on Mondays.
Famiglia Davigini