The "Magic Gate" - Gold Available to the Skillful Code-breaker

In one of the corners of the park inside the central Roman square of Piazza Vittorio Emanuele II (familiarly called "Piazza Vittorio" by the Romans), amid the mix of market stalls, traffic noise, the international atmosphere of the shops run by Chinese and Indian people, and the old late 19th Century buildings, and people rushing everywhere, standing there quietly there is a riddle made of stone, awaiting a skillful code-breaker to solve it.


The gate is what remains of the former palace of the Marquise Palombara, who built it in the second half of 17 Century, and which has been demolished to build today's Piazza Vittorio Emanuele II. 

The Marquise Palombara, who was interested in Alchemy, and who was one of the alchemists of the Palazzo Riario (currently home to the Accademia dei Lincei, the world's most ancient scientific academy), the most illustrious of which was Queen Christina of Sweden, who moved to Rome and  who studied alchemy, having been influenced by the great mathematician and scientist Cartesius, who was her teacher when she was young. We know from the ancient reports that he had his palace on the Esquilino hill built with symbols related to Alchemy.


The legend has it that the Magic Gate was built after a mysterious pilgrim was hosted in the villa for one night, and that, the following morning, he disappeared leaving behind some gold leaves and a sheet of paper explaining the secret to perform an achemcal transmutation. Bring unable to interpret what was written in symbols on the paper, the Marquise decided to have those symbols engraved on the Gate (according to some historians, on all of the 5 gates of the villa, 4 or which were lost) hoping that someone could decipher it.


So the Porta Magica is still standing there, awaiting the skillful code-breaker who can discover the secret to create gold. 

Ancient Superstitions - The Number 17

Unlike most countries around the world, in Italy the unlucky number is 17, not 13. This superstition has a story that traces back to ancient Rome, and refers to 2 specifical facts:


- The number 17 in Roman numbers is written as XVII (X=10 + V=5 + I=1 + I=1, Total = 17). Mixing up the letters, the only Latin word that can be formed is: VIXI, perfect tense of the verb VIVO (to live), which means "I used to live" and thus "I'm dead". 


- 17th Legion of the Roman Army was totally destroyed during the disastrous defeat suffered by the Romans in 9 AD in the German woods near the town of Teutoburg. The legion, at the command of the Consul Quintilius Varus was ambushed by the local troops, and, overpowered by the enemy, caught by surprise and stuck in the muddy soil, was exterminated to the last man. The defeat had such a great effect on Roman people that Legion no. 17 was never reformed, and number 17 became an infamous number, and it stayed as a symbol of bad omen.


The bad luck reputation of number 17 survived until today, to the point that in many contexts  in Italy  no.17 is skipped (or replaced by 16/B), and even on Alitalia flights, there is no row 17.