Mount Cicero

Mt. Ceceri is a popular wooded mountain for hiking located directly next to Fiesole, with viewpoints for the greater Florence area. While exploring the paths that man has carved through this once wilderness, one can encounter open quarries, caves, and even the spot of the alleged flight of Leonardo da Vinci's machine in 1506.

“The kindly master said: “My son, the city that bears the name of Dis is drawing near, with its grave citizens, its great battalions.”... But not before we’d ranged in a wide circuit did we approach a place where that shrill pilot shouted: “Get out; the entrance way is here.”

This location is reminiscent of two environments/topics discussed in class. The most obvious is the wilderness. This mountain, once complete wilderness, has been carved out as a place for people to escape from the urban lifestyle that has encroached to the border of this place over the centuries. This leads into the second topic, the border between the natural and urban. The mountain is the closest semblance of true nature within eyeshot of the Florentine urban sprawl. Additionally, with its placement directly next to Fiesole, it is a stark reminder of how these natural borders are not rigid, and never can be as long as humans attempt to claim an ecological dominance over the planet.