Harry Potter Morning Light

In Botticelli's "Spring", Chloris, the god of flowers on the right side of Venus, is chased by the god of the west wind. The god of the wind uses cold colors and has a strange expression, as if representing the cold winter, while the god of flowers overflows from his mouth, as if to resist him.

Flowers can cover the earth that has experienced the withering of winter with a colorful coat, and the delicate petals are also easily withered by the cold wind. Is such a composition suitable for the decoration of the wedding room?

Generally speaking, the layout of a new house must have a beautiful meaning. Chloris is the Greek name of the flower goddess Flora. In ancient Greece, the west wind represents spring. The word zephyrus is derived from zephyr, which means gentle breeze. Chloris, who represents joy, can fully show beauty and vitality in the west wind. She will not run away because of fear, but will regard the west wind as her lover made in heaven.

On the contrary, Florence, although it is also in a Mediterranean climate, is controlled by subtropical high pressure in summer. The water temperature of the Mediterranean is lower than that of the land, which increases the influence of the subtropical high pressure, and it is hot and dry. In winter, the temperature in the Mediterranean is relatively high, forming a low pressure that attracts the westerly wind, which greatly strengthens the westerly wind. The winter is cold and humid. Botticelli, who lived in Florence, would depict the god of the west wind in the painting as having nothing to do with the "gentle wind".

There are many ceiling decorations in the Sforza Castle, most of which are Gothic. Like the roofs of Milan Cathedral and Santa Maria del Fiore, the dome of Florence Cathedral is considered the "primrose" of the Renaissance.

Francesco Sforza did not live in the Sforza Castle, although the castle was built for his wedding with Princess Visconti.

His son Galeazzo began to use the Sforza Castle as a place to live instead of a simple military purpose. Almost all the ceilings in the castle have been decorated, and each has its own style, except for the murals of the "Mulberry Hall" (sala delle asse) designed by Leonardo da Vinci, which were smeared with plaster. It was so completely destroyed that it was almost impossible to repair it. Someone used mulberry trees and wooden frames to restore the hall almost one-to-one on the parade square, accidentally forming a pavilion.

The Duke usually lived in the "Duke's Courtyard". According to Galeazzo's request, the stairs were designed to be very flat because he had to ride a horse to the second floor. The "Officers' Club" was on the second floor of the "Little Fortress", which was almost driven by Ludovico Sforza. There is a hospital on the side of the parade ground next to the "Little Fortress". It was built by the Spanish. Some of the building materials inside were taken from the Maria Cathedral, which was demolished after the collapse of the Milan Cathedral. When the Austrian and Tsarist Russian coalition forces invaded Milan, the French wounded were there.

Georgiana did not go in. She only looked outside and found that there was a red pattern under the eaves. It was a collective pattern composed of vines. It looked delicate and delicate, very Moorish style.

Although Sicily was transferred to the Bourbon royal family through a treaty, Sicily still follows Spanish customs, and even the carnival has Spanish characteristics. It also began in the 16th century under Spanish rule. In the Sicilian Carnival, there are no gorgeous costumes and masks, but there are large-scale float parades.

Among these constantly updated floats, there is always a special float, which is the winner of the previous spring carnival. This carnival is for "fiori", which can be understood as flowers or lovers in Italian. For example, the Italian name of the Piazza de' Fiori in Rome is (campo de fiori).

Dante's Divine Comedy mentioned a Sicilian bull. It was not a real bull, but an ancient Greek torture. It was probably to put people into a bronze bull and burn them. If people screamed inside, it would sound like the sound of a bull. Later, the Roman Inquisition continued to use this torture device. It is said that this way, people don't have to see the process of being burned to death.

The ancient Roman Flora Festival was a grand festival. In order to celebrate the Flora Festival, the Romans would also prepare floats. However, as the Roman customs changed, the Flora Festival gradually changed. After the fall of Rome, this festival disappeared for a time.

Chloris, who spit out flowers, became Flora. Should she still be bound by the dogma of the church in the wedding room?

Persephone was a girl who was abducted by Hades while picking flowers. She had been with her mother Demeter since she was a child and had never thought about marriage, even though she was the goddess who managed seeds.

Malta's climate is unpredictable. Although it has a Mediterranean climate with drought in summer and rainy winter like Florence, it is actually affected by the warm air mass of the Sahara and the low-pressure air mass of Europe. In October and November, it is their busy farming season, and cotton is planted on the island's limited land.

Malta is not far from Sicily. When Malta suffers from heat and drought, how much better can the weather in Sicily be?

There is a kind of granary in Spain, which is suspended, not stored in a cellar. Although the land in Spain is very dry and buried underground without worrying about moisture, rodents can cause damage.

If Sicily is viewed as an inverted triangle, the two ends of the triangle are Messina and Palermo. During the Punic Wars BC, the Romans used Messina as a base, and the Carthaginians used Palermo as a base. Even 2,000 years after the war, this hostility between the cities still exists, and both cities call themselves the capital of Sicily.

Constantinople once had a huge grain market. The nine-headed sea monster on the Black Sea was described in the Iliad and the Odyssey. Like the Phoenix, it was classified as a "paradoxical creature" by Linnaeus and did not exist. However, for grain merchants who had to pass through the Bosporus and the nearby Dardanelles, those who blocked the passage with abandoned ships, chains and Greek fire and charged tolls were not much different from Hydra.

The Byzantines once laid iron chains underwater, which had a defensive effect and could trap ships that wanted to pass. But the Turks used rolling logs and lubricants when attacking the city. Their ships drove on oiled rolling logs to avoid the chains and enter the Golden Bay.

The huge grain market in Byzantium was a bank and could also be used as a reserve for defending the city. The grain trade routes in the Black Sea and the Mediterranean have always provided food for Constantinople, converging in the Bosporus to form a "black road". When the Ottomans conquered Constantinople, they cut off the trade routes out of the Black Sea and built new fortresses along the Black Sea coast to store food and feed the soldiers and citizens of the new empire.

When the "Black Road" on the sea was closed, people remembered the "Black Road" on land. This road existed before the Common Era, when people used cattle to transport wheat from the Ukrainian plains to the north of the Black Sea.

Empires such as Persia, Athens, Rome, Byzantium, Mongolia, Venice, Genoa, etc. rose and fell, but this road has always been prosperous. The word empire comes from the ancient Greek word emporion, which refers to the port that supplies food. There was a group of "Chumak" caravans on this road. They followed the Milky Way and sang songs about Persephone all the way.

Unsprouted wheat grains are like Persephone, and they must be carefully preserved. The Genoese had set up colonies in Crimea. In 1347, a fleet transporting grain from Genoa arrived in Messina. There may have been a few rats mixed in, or the crew carried bacteria. The Black Death then spread outward in three ways, quickly spreading to North Africa, the whole of Italy and Spain, and then landing in France, Britain, and Germany.

As grain slowly accumulated on the southern coast of the Black Sea, the Grand Duchy of Moscow also tried to retake Istanbul. Ivan found Sophia, the niece of Constantine XI, in 1472 and proposed to her. Then he decided to use the Byzantine double-headed eagle as the national emblem of the Grand Duchy of Moscow. In 1547, Ivan IV was crowned "Tsar".

In 1768, Catherine II launched a war against Turkey, sending more than 100,000 people across the plains and the Black Sea to occupy Odessa and nearby areas. Odessa then became a new city for Tsarist Russia to export grain. The ground there was flat, unlike medieval cities. Wheat grown in black soil wheat fields was transported to Odessa by ox carts. Workers moved sacks onto Greek ships and transported them to Livorno, Liverpool, London and other European cities to supply the war, and wealth poured into the Russian Empire established by Peter the Great.

Sicily did not change much in the first half of the 17th century, although Spain continued to collect taxes to deal with the war in the Low Countries and the Thirty Years' War. Sicily is a wheat-producing area, and wheat production is easily affected by natural conditions. The "Golden Basin" is mountainous. Due to the increase in population, there is insufficient storage space on the island. After having enough food for themselves, farmers tend to export the remaining food to Spain, Venice, Crete and other places where the price of food is higher than their purchasing power.

The Messinese monopolized the silk trade on Sicily, both raw silk and finished products. This was a privilege they bought from the King of Spain. In order to maintain this privilege, Messina had to send envoys to Spain regularly to request confirmation from the court, and the Spanish viceroy had to spend half of his time living in Messina. Before 1669, the dispute between Palermo and Messina was whether the Spanish viceroy should live in Messina half of the time instead of staying in Palermo all the time.

In 1669, the Turks took Crete from the Venetians after sieging it for 22 years.

In the same year, Mount Enot erupted, and more than a mile of lava rivers flowed on the land of Sicily. At this time, the Spanish viceroy ordered not to rescue the disaster, but to prevent the Ottomans from attacking Sicily.

Although the volcanic eruption did not cause the same damage as the great earthquake in 1693, the volcanic ash caused a reduction in grain production in Sicily, and the poor harvest lasted for many years. Even under the implementation of a strict rationing system, some people starved to death.

It is also difficult to find Baroque towns in Sicily. The only three were rebuilt after the earthquake in 1693. They are all located in the southeast corner of Sicily, which is the other tip of the Sicily triangle besides Messina and Palermo. It is said that the ground cracked during the earthquake and groups of people were swallowed up. It is said that 5% of the people on the island died, and the only remaining university in Sicily was completely destroyed.

In 1453, the Ottomans began to drive out Europeans, and in 1492, Queen Isabella of Spain drove out the Moors, resulting in a large number of wanderers in the Mediterranean. They had no means of making a living and could only become pirates. Christians settled in Sicily, Malta, Dalmatia and even Spain, while the Moors went to Barbary.

The discovery of the new route would have a devastating impact on Mediterranean trade, so the Ottomans were reluctant to allow Western ships to pass through the Strait of Gibraltar, and the legend of the Barbary Coast was born.

The Sicilians and North Africans had maintained friendly relations and traded with each other, but after the fall of Constantinople, the conflict between the Spanish and the Ottomans was inevitable, so the trade between Sicily and North Africa was mainly carried out by smugglers and pirates.

In order to eliminate these pirates, both Spain and the Ottomans formed a navy. At the beginning, this navy was mainly composed of Slavs. Also because of famine, many Ottomans joined the Usco pirates. Everyone was an ordinary person, just wanting to survive.

The most powerful of these pirates was Barbarossa. He did not have a drop of Ottoman blood, but he conquered Algiers. Later, he went too far and annexed a port very close to Marsala in western Sicily. Charles V of the Holy Roman Empire did not sit idly by. He prepared a fleet to launch an expedition to Tunisia occupied by Barbarossa.

Not long after, the Ottoman Sultan gave the command of the entire navy to the pirate leader Barbarossa. At the beginning, the Ottoman navy had the upper hand until the siege of Malta ended in 1565. The offense and defense changed easily, and Europe defeated the Ottoman navy in Gibraltar in 1571.

The Sicilian fleet was probably left at that time. It was a large-scale naval battle fought entirely with galleys. Palermo and Messina were the main shipbuilding centers on the island. They built galleys. Not only was it difficult to recruit rowing crews, but after the end of the maritime hegemony between Britain and Spain in 1588, the "Invincible Armada" suffered heavy losses. The remaining fleet's control over the Mediterranean was weakened, and it was unable to cut off the connection between Istanbul and the Moorish palace in North Africa. The Spaniards were completely driven out of Tunisia.

In 1677, France had already fought Messina, and the French navy had destroyed the main force of the Sicilian fleet. The French did not understand why Messina proposed the monopoly of silk, and most importantly, to make Messina the capital of Sicily, and to grant them all the rights of the city's free port and exemption from tariffs, instead of following the arrangements of the victor.

Messina sent envoys to Versailles, but they were coldly received. Not only did they rank behind the Maltese representatives, but they also returned empty-handed.

Then France and Messina exchanged fire on land, and many villages, farms, olive trees and mulberry trees were destroyed. A large number of people ran to the southeast with their families, resulting in the concentration of population in southern Sicily.

In 1679, the eldest princess of France, Marie Louise, became the Queen of Spain, and France withdrew its troops. The new viceroy came to Messina City Hall, melted the church bronze bell that had summoned the citizens to revolt, confiscated the property of the local rebellious nobles, and in the same year Spain ceded one-third of Santo Domingo to France.

At that time, the Franco-Dutch War had just ended, and Princess Louise's husband, Carlos II, suffered from multiple genetic diseases and was physically weak. The princess's marriage was unfortunate. She cried all day long, and even the peasants passing by felt sorry for the little girl.

She died in 1689 from falling off a horse, and Sicily entered the 1990s. At this time, the population of Messina was reduced by half, and the past prosperity was gone.

Then in 1701, the War of the Spanish Succession broke out. The Treaty of Utrecht adjusted the relationship between the countries, and Duke Vittorio of Savoy became the King of Sicily.

He was crowned in Palermo and was incredibly crowned as the King of Jerusalem. Of course, he had no jurisdiction over Jerusalem, and even Sicily was only nine-tenths. Utrecht retained all of Philip V's private property in Sicily, which was not subject to the jurisdiction and legal control of the King of Sicily.

The king stayed in Sicily for a year and then returned to Piedmont, and civil servants and accountants from Piedmont flooded into Sicily. But he was rebuked by the Pope soon after returning to Turin. There was a 600-year-old tradition in the papal bull, which dates back to the agreement between Frederick II and the Pope before the "Great Void". The marriage of Frederick II's parents made him the natural heir to Sicily, but the emperor tried to realize the hereditary system of the throne, which was opposed by the Vatican. If he accepted the crown of the Holy Roman Empire, he would have to give up the crown of Sicily, and the King of Sicily would automatically have the status of a papal envoy.

The King of Spain remarried again. The new queen, the niece of the Duke of Parma, was plain-looking and uneducated, but she had a steely will to make the influence of France disappear from the Spanish court.

Sicily once again became a battlefield, with Austrians and Spaniards ravaging villages and farmland on the island at the same time until the Treaty of London in 1720 determined that Sicily was part of the Holy Roman Empire.

Later, Naples and Sicily became a unified country, and the King of Naples was taken away by British warships shortly after Napoleon appeared in Egypt. Although Britain won the Battle of Aboukir, the French Army and the Austrians went to war again in Italy.

After the French evacuated from the port of Malta, the British Navy intercepted several Sicilian grain ships and quelled the riots on the island of Malta.

Who the British robbed and who was robbed became an unsolved case.

"You mean, Sicily has no way to provide food to Malta? Is it from Russia?" Georgiana asked.

"I don't know, I'm just an old man who can't go far away. Everything I know is hearsay." Zoisite looked at Fredley, "But he may know the answer."

"I just became an ambassador not long ago, and Sir Hamilton is in the UK." Fredley said with a smile.

"Now you know why those who participate in the secret ceremony choose to keep it secret?" Zoisite looked at Georgiana and said.

The god present in the bridal chamber is Venus. The process of harmony should be happy, not guilty. The young couple can share the "darkest secret" that cannot be seen by outsiders, without worrying that the husband will misunderstand that she is not chaste enough, or that she will go to hell for lust.

This is also one of the purposes of marriage.

Perhaps because "Spring" is a mural, it will not be thrown into the fire by Savonarola. Who would have thought that Botticelli would burn his own work in order to follow Savonarola.

The book "The Godfather" once said: To change Sicily, there must be a moral volcano erupting to ignite this land.

Because of the fertile land, Sicily attracted the Greeks.

But didn't the barren Malta attract competition?

"What's wrong with your leg?" Georgiana looked at Zoisite. "How do you know so much?"

"Most of it is hearsay and reading books, which is one of my few hobbies." Zoisite touched her leg. "I know what you want to ask. Is my leg related to the secret ritual?"

"Related?" Georgiana asked.

Zoisite looked at Fredley.

"Can we have some privacy?" Zoisite asked.

"Of course." Fredley said, and was about to leave.

"Be careful with your coat, Mr. Ambassador." Georgiana reminded.

He looked down at the gorgeous embroidery on his body, and left without saying a word, and Zoisite's servants also left.

There were only two of them left on the "dance floor".

"I think that kind of ritual seems to be related to Druidism, which requires being in a state of suspended death and resurrecting, but I am not so lucky. Only half of my soul came back." Zoisite looked up at her and said.

"What about the other half?" Georgiana asked.

"Maybe I got lost." Zoisite smiled helplessly. "Have you found your way home, Pomona."