[jyrr]

Dear all,

One of the pioneers of color photography Sergei Prokudin-Gorskii made series of photos in Italy about 100 years ago. Unfortunately the documentation and the titles of the photos are far from perfect. I am participating in a project of history enthusiasts, trying to identify unknown locations. We have been looking for this particular location for at least 4 years by now.

Please take a look at the photo below. It is titled incorrectly as being made on the island Capri. In case you recognise the location then please respond here.

You may find the existing description and download the original (40MB TIF file) from the website of United States Library of Congress here:
http://www.loc.gov/pictures/collection/prok/item/prk2000000407/

About Prokudin-Gorskii and his collection:
http://www.loc.gov/pictures/collection/prok/

Lot of errors in documentation related to Italy are corrected already, but I sincerely hope that you can help us out with this one...

Regards,

Jüri.

 

['99]

in effetti non sembra un paesaggio tipicamente caprese. :shifty:

 

[sst125]

carpi ?

 

[vecchiaguardia]

Quella sullo sfondo sembra la tipica fornace di cui era piena la val Padana a inizio '900... un po' poco per tentare una identificazione.

 

[Van Loon]

Qualcosa del genere, insomma.

 

[vecchiaguardia]

Più o meno

In ogni caso qui sullo sfondo abbiamo un'azienda agricola, non una fornace.
Certo, se la foto è davvero del 1912 avrebbero fatto in tempo a demolire tutto e convertire ad altro uso. La sponda del fiume Secchia sembra corrispondere in pieno...

 

[sst125]

a me da l' idea piu' di un canale piuttosto che di un fiume .
e piu' precisamente un' area di attracco posta lungo un canale .

 

[jyrr]

Qualcosa del genere, insomma.

Pretty close visually. Thank you all for efforts so far, there is still hope.

sst125 mentioned Carpi, that was one of my candidates some time ago too. However, it took me about 2 years to accidentally discover that besides Capri there is Carpi. Carpi is situated conveniently on the photographer's actual route. The landscape is flat, there are rivers and canals and also some bridges and hydroelectric plants, that have similar brickwall barriers.

Unfortunately the local people from Carpi I contacted with last year, did not recognise the location on the photo. Actually it could be anywhere on Lombardy plains, or even somewhere else.

J.

 

[vittorio tauber]

It's either the Po Valley or the Venitian Plane for sure.

Unfortunately the landscape of those places has dramatically changed since, so it is quite likely that the view portrayed is lost and unrecognizable forever - unless the farm and factory chimney in the background have been some way recorded.

 

[italiano_pellicano]

probably this place is in Veneto

 

[vittorio tauber]

Lombardy or Venetia most likely. Unlikely Piedmont or Emilia-Romagna.

The canal or reservoir is quite intriguing as a reference.

 

[gruber]

Sergey Prokudin-Gorsky visited Italy and wester Europe several times between 1905 and 1915.

I think that Carpi could be a good answer to the question.

Between Rubiera and Carpi there's an old artificial canal, The Mills Canal.
It was built in the XII century and it runs from Rubiera to Carpi via Campogalliano, Panzano and Gargallo.

Today the canal runs north east to Moglia, in Mantua territory; all along the shores there are farms and old ruins of ancient furnaces with the typicall chimney.

In this picture between Rubiera and Carpi, there is the canal, the bridge, old farms and the ruins of abandoned furnace.

At this link there's a note about the Mills Canal, in italian:
http://books.google.it/books?id=jVt...w#v=onepage&q=carpi canale dei mulini&f=false


You could send an e-mail to the municipality of Carpi and ask them if anyone recognizes the place.


Between Carpi and Mantua district the canal is wide over 30 meters, as in the picture.
I took this one from street view.
The landscape is really similar.

 

[italiano_pellicano]

for sure not is carpi for the boats in the photo

 

[gguyNA]

Decisamente Pianura Padana, cercheri in zone già industrializzate all'epoca perchè sullo sfondo vedo una ciminiera!

 

[jyrr]

It's either the Po Valley or the Venitian Plane for sure.

Remarkable, that before this thread was started, at least 2 people have suggested the Po Valley too.

There are ruins that look somewhat similar from distance through trees and bushes. The location is at the river Po, right at the border of Veneto with Emilia-Romagna. But there are no signs of a bridge or waterfront barrier, so most likely this is no match.
StreetView: Villanova Marchesana, Idrovora

A photo from the website of Comune di Villanova Marchesana:

J.

 

[gruber]

Sono piccole barche dei pescatori, cosa comune sui grandi canali, all'epoca.
E il Canale dei Mulini era navigabile sino dal '500.

 

[vittorio tauber]

The stream (provided it's a flow - not a basin) is too wide to be placed south of the Po River IMHO. So I'd get rid of Emilia-Romagna and Carpi as a location.
Moreover there's no mountain view in the background, so it's unlikely the place is Piedmont (although I have to admit it's not a decisive point, and the weather is hazy so mountains might be fading).

The bricola (or dolphin) right in the picture is a clue -not an evidence- the water stream is Veneto Region. the utmost flat plane is another clue heading to Veneto.

 

[gruber]

Più che una bricola, che è formata da 2 o 3 pali e serve solo per delimitare la parte navigabile del canale/fiume/lagona, mi sembra una palina da ormeggio.
Ma se la bricola è tipica del veneziano o del rodigino... la palina è comune a tutti i corsi d'acqua e i laghi italiani. E non.

 

[vittorio tauber]

I found another picutre incorrectly marked as "In the isle of Capri".

http://www.loc.gov/pictures/resource/prokc.20219/?co=prok

This is the typical lombard prealpine landscape of the Lake region (the thin belt between Orta Lake and Garda lake). Does anyone agree?

Unfortunately this gives no clue more in order to identify the plane landscape above.

 

[vittorio tauber]

Più che una bricola, che è formata da 2 o 3 pali e serve solo per delimitare la parte navigabile del canale/fiume/lagona, mi sembra una palina da ormeggio.
Ma se la bricola è tipica del veneziano o del rodigino... la palina è comune a tutti i corsi d'acqua e i laghi italiani. E non.

The palina (pole) within the water flow is quite uncommon along Italian rivers because the risk of being torn away by floods is high.
Mainland bitt is the rule.