Palermo Finds

During one of our leisurely strolls through the back streets of a winter day in Palermo, I spotted some old, decayed but even at a distance, fascinating structure.

We tip-toed through debris of broken glass, weeds, discarded tires and found ourselves at the outer walls of an old monastery.

Open and passable, the rooms on the street level all seemed like cells and all interconnected. Strewn across the floor of many were books, rotting and rotten. In one room there were several bookshelves, also decayed. I hastily rifled through the stacks and found three books that were not too moldy, not wet and nearly intact.

I carried them in my luggage all through our journey, and brought them home only to find myself shortly thereafter on the road and disconnected from all my personal belongings.

Now, at rest, I've been going through everything I own, and rediscovered the journals. I posted two on FPn but these pages were loose and from a different book.

The first two are journals that appear to be records of expenses and daily logs. These loose papers are signed by an Eminence of some rank and appear to be about enrollment. The pages have dates and confirmation signatures in two different hands or at least in two different inked pens. The dates appear in the late 1880s while the logs date to the 20th century.

It is unlikely that I will return to Sicily, but I may ask Mario or Vincenzo if they know anything about these treasures. Mario, more than Vincenzo, is a history buff and likely to have a clue.

Now if I can only recall where in the streets of Palermo we made this discovery.