Diggers and dahlias: Hubris and humility on the Lower Rhine
Colossal I. The digger. Biggest in the world. New example of the mythical German Efficiency: quick strip mining, quick reclamation.
http://www.swapmeetdave.com/Humor/Workshop/Trencher.htm
Toto, I've a feeling we're not in Lisbon anymore.
The now-named Aachen Cathedral served as the womb, the crown room of the Holy Roman Empire, 936-1521. Following that of Charles the Great, Karl der Große, Charlemagne.
Legend interwoven with fact, cognomina names become, misnomers abound. The Holy Roman Empire was neither Roman (in fact denominated the resurgence of the first powerful post-Roman autochthonous kingdoms) nor an Empire. The Barbarians, of which Charles was the greatest, were no barbarians.http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/new-light-on-the-dark-ages-who-are-you-calling-barbaric-779158.html
Karl der Große, Charles the Great, or Charlemagne. Hubris or Humility? The debate rages. Wasn't he content to rule over his small kingdom composed of Germanic Franks? Was he surprised when Pope Leo III snuck up and crowned him Emperor on Christmas Day, 800 A.D. How could he have been so blind as to ignore the Imperial Crown resting await on the altar? Was Leo merely powerbroking, taking refuge under the wing of the newly emergent autochthonous European powers? or acting in misogynistic hatred of Irene of Constantinople?
All doubts aside, the house of worship was built to inspire awe.
Built, embellished with spoils: columns from Ravenna, marble slabs from the palace of the reluctant executioner, Pontius Pilate; the relics: Mary's cloak, St. John the Baptist's beheading cloth, Christ's loincloth and ... his ... (relic to bad translation) ... Jesus's diaper.
Forsaking discussion of the authenticity of the artifacts, I admired the conceit of bringing back the Christ's intimate childhood clothing. Asking us to pray before it.
A more conventional relic:
http://www.allposters.com/-sp/Charlemagne-742-814-Posters_i8677104_.htm
The Virgin statue swaying above it was, however, beauteous.
At the risk of being redundant: misnomers abound.
Charlemagne's crown was never Charlemagne's. It was forged, possibly in the reign of Otto I, cerca 990, probably in this fertile flood plain of the Moselle and Rhine as they begin their fecund journey to the sea in the Netherlands. It ended up crowning the heads of the French monarchs (mistakenly named for the Franks), later falling victim to Republican ire, only to be later emulated by the Looter Emperor Bonaparte.
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My sensations rested that night just over an unmarked border at Rolduc, the Former Abbey of Regular Canons of St. Augustine in Kerkrade, Holland. Where in 1104, young priest Ailbertus had come after abandoning his home monastery. He'd found the monastic discipline too lax. They started building with the crypt. Built. Buried. Left.
Today, the beds pay silent testimony to monastic discipline. Either that or they represent an experiential lesson in population control as taught by the United Nations University housed in the same building.
The doorknobs bear humble to witness to humility, grace.
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Next day, Maastricht. The reservation requested: quaint room, comfortable bed. More beautiful doorknobs. They threw in attentive desk service and a coffee shop right around the corner. But no proof of residency.
A 30 minute chat at the door revealed that the caprice of politicians extends even to supposedly modern Holland. Hardworking blokes at the coffee shop had had to let go 20 employees since the restriction against tourists visiting the smoking rooms. Far less savory characters dealing in much less pure substances graced the sidewalks outside our hotel.
Splurged at the Le Courage.
http://www.lecourage.nl
If acidic wines complement alkaline foods, does it correlate that magnificent food best be accompanied by tart service?
Their website extols another experience: 'You arrive as clients and leave as friends.'
Only, I quipped, if you have a reservation.
The finish, however, was excellent: the cheese plate was varied regionally and in terms of its sharpness. The passion fruit sorbet, sublime.
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The City of Thorn
Thorn Abbey.
Torn of its earlier beauty (except the archive which managed to archive Romanesque frescos), the hands of supplication remain.
Heraldry displayed of the aristocratic women who ruled their own independent city there, 992-1795. Some visitors seemed to have wanted to share their own heraldry in the surreptitious hubris of the vandal:
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One hour's travel through my stereotypical image of Germany: densely packed pine trees covered in confecctioners' snow. It was Belgium, though. As was the beer watering the Carnival carryings-on at the pub in Robertville. Fact is we left for the hotel before the zoo became over watered.
The warmth of Gart's handshake and the openness of his talk almost made up for the malfunction of his heating system (Hoge Venen-Fagnard in Waimes-Sourbrodt, Belgium). Giggles with pre-pubescent girls over several multi-lingual games of Uno (Flemish, French, German and English) added to the warm charm.
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After nursing hangovers and confabulating about their effect on creativity, we landed in Monschau, scented with mustard, mulled wine, castles and miniature chapels. Gatlinburg, in its most ancient, poshest dreams.
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Then, the Moselle. The vineyards. The chimneys. A prayer for mystical connection realized. And recounted later as I spreche not a word of Deutsch.
My most prized souvenir: water labels.
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Colossals III, IV and V.
The Throne Room of Emperor Constantine. The Trier Cathedral. The Papal Church of Saint Mary.
Constantine was the man who singlehandedly married the earthly power of the Roman Empire to the emergent spiritual power of Christianity.
Had a right to be tempted by a smidgeon of hubris.
As the throne room might have been, contemporaneously:
http://jerusalemwalks.com/id121.html
The room is awe. Its current munificence extrapolated by its lack of adornment. Today's mind wanders at the wonder: 1.5 million individually branded Roman bricks. From the fall of the Empire until the Prussians revamped Teuton hubris, no one was able to fill this cavernous space.
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Next day, splendor overload led me to wonder:
Would not any one person powerful and prideful enough to build anything of that size today gain my scorn? Megalomania, surely, is out of fashion?
Modern preferences for egalitarianism married with the meltdown of organized religion led me to ask: who will build the monuments of tomorrow? How will they be built?
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"With your feet", the answer of Peter Zumthor. Tomorrow's monuments will be of and for humility. Such meekness tore tears from my eyes.
For a beautiful photo essay, see: http://www.archdaily.com/106352/bruder-klaus-field-chapel-peter-zumthor/
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Koln brought the scent of cologne, the oldest perfume factory: Farina. The most restful vespers of the Monastic Society of Jerusalem at Great Saint Martins (Colossal VI) . Thankfulness that enough wealth still remains to maintain the 60 stone masons that work, full-time, to sustain the gothic heights of the Koln Cathedral (Colossal VII) .
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Professors Meirsheimer and Van Evera postulated that the best thinkers are those who maintain simultaneously high levels of hubris and humility, a 'hubrility' measure, if you will (neologism thanks to my friend Gerry Brennan). The latter allows them to learn. The former gives them the mojo to think, question and create. (http://mearsheimer.uchicago.edu/pdfs/A0025.pdf)
My hubris? I sleep in a spoliated bed.
(http://jewelsofwisdom.tumblr.com/lucybickley'squilt)
My humility? I carry a bean in my pocket.
No magic bean.
A dried kidney. A formerly pod-dwelling seed of a leguminous plant, dried, reddish brown and smooth. It lives in my pocket. Today anyway. A tool for subjugating the third-grade masses that make up my adversary.
Ah, I almost forgot about the dahlias from the banks of the Moselle.
And because I (falsely?) prefer the humility over the hubris, let me leave you with a song:
...with my face to the rising sun...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2VZ3oWo--AM