page_title: Carrara
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Carrara / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Carrara, Italy. Identifier: cassiersmagaz401911newy (find matches) Title: Cassier's magazine Year: 1891 (1890s) Authors: Subjects: Engineering Publisher: New York Cassier Magazine Co. Contributing Library: Smithsonian Libraries Digitizing Sponsor: Smithsonian Libraries View Book Page: Book Viewer About This Book: Catalog Entry View All Images: All Images From Book Click here to view book online to see this illustration in context in a browseable online version of this book. Text Appearing Before Image: GIANT STRING OF OXEN HAULING MARBLE IN CARRARA., ITALY will be so shattered by the explosionthat the waste marble is much morethan the block which is loosened. Theheight of the quarries, however, al-lows the block to slide down theslopes of the mountains by gravity,and in this way a mass weighing somuch that it could not be lifted bythe power available can be lowered bymeans of block and tackle to the foot of the mountain to be shaped into aform so that it can be sent away. While some of the miners havedrills operated by steam and electricpower, much of the work is donewith the hand-power mill. Apparatusfor grooving the marble has not asyet been employed, except in a fewworks, the bulk of the product beingobtained by blowing it out. The METHODS OF STONE QUARRYING 147 Text Appearing After Image: 148 CASSIERS MAGAZINE holes are drilled where, in the judg-ment of the quarry director, the ex-plosive will be most effective, but be-fore being charged they are usuallyenlarged by pouring nitric acid intothem, which eats away the interior.The explosive is then inserted. Inrecent years the electric current hasbeen used to ignite it, but in many ofthe larger operations the fuse is stillemployed. The charges are not always sodistributed that the block desired isloosened, so a second blast is fre-quently necessary to completely de-tach the mass, when some of theneedless surface is cut off on thespot with chisel and mallet. Thenthe material is ready to be trans-ported to the marble mills in the val-ley or to Avenza for shipment bywater. As the quarry may be severalmiles from the railroad advantage istaken of its height. If the marble isa very large piece an inclined planemay be made, down which the blockslides upon a wooden sledge, con-trolled by ropes fastened about it,which are run thro Note About Images Please note that these images are extracted from scanned page images that may have been digitally enhanced for readability - coloration and appearance of these illustrations may not perfectly resemble the original work.
context_page_description: Carrara is a city and comune in Tuscany, in central Italy, of the province of Massa and Carrara, and notable for the white or blue-grey marble quarried there. It is on the Carrione River, some 100 kilometres west-northwest of Florence. Its motto is Fortitudo mea in rota.
context_section_description: There were known settlements in the area as early as the 9th century BC, when the Apuan Ligures lived in the region. The current town originated from the borough built to house workers in the marble quarries created by the Romans after their conquest of Liguria in the early 2nd century BC. Carrara has been linked with the process of quarrying and carving marble since the Roman Age. Marble was exported from the nearby harbour of Luni at the mouth of river Magra.
  In the early Middle Ages it was a Byzantine and then Lombard possession, and then, it was under the Bishops of Luni who started to write the city's history when the Emperor Otto I gave it to them. It turned itself into a city-state in the early 13th century; during the struggle between Guelphs and Ghibellines, Carrara usually belonged to the latter party. The Bishops acquired it again in 1230, their rule ending in 1313, when the city was given in succession to the Republics of Pisa, Lucca and Florence. Later it was acquired by Gian Galeazzo Visconti of Milan.
  After the death of Filippo Maria Visconti of Milan in 1447, Carrara was fought over by Tommaso Campofregoso, lord of Sarzana, and again the Malaspina family, who moved here the seat of their signoria in the second half of the 15th century. Carrara and Massa formed the Duchy of Massa and Carrara from the 15th to the 19th century. Under the last Malaspina, Maria Teresa, who had married Ercole III d'Este, it became part of the Duchy of Modena.
  After the short Napoleonic rule of Elisa Bonaparte, it was given back to Modena. During the unification of Italy age, Carrara was the seat of a popular revolt led by Domenico Cucchiari, and was a center of Giuseppe Mazzini's revolutionary activity.
  At the end of the 19th century Carrara became the cradle of anarchism in Italy, in particular among the quarry workers. The quarry workers, including the stone carvers, had radical beliefs that set them apart from others. Ideas from outside the city began to influence the Carrarese. Anarchism and general radicalism became part of the heritage of the stone carvers. According to a New York Times article of 1894 many violent revolutionists who had been expelled from Belgium and Switzerland went to Carrara in 1885 and founded the first anarchist group in Italy. Carrara has remained a continuous 'hotbed' of anarchism in Italy, with several organizations located openly in the city. The Anarchist marble workers were also the driving force behind organising labour in the quarries and in the carving sheds. They were also the main protagonists of the Lunigiana revolt in January 1894.
  In 1929, the municipalities of Carrara, Massa and Montignoso were merged in a single municipality, called Apuania. In 1945 the previous situation was restored.
  Carrara is the birthplace of the International Federation of Anarchists (IFA), formed in 1968.
caption: Carrara in 1911.
exif: {}