The House of Acanthus - (inspired by The Nowhere Legion by SBH.) Last Update: 8 June 2013

[Diocletianus]

Absolutely amazing ! I began reading yesterday at nigth and I couldn't stop reading. Your story is captivating ! You have truly a gift in writting !

+ rep well derserved !

[Diocle]

Diocletianus, now I'm happy! And I can write, and write and write....the story is diabolic and terrible, but you'll enter in it so slowly that you will not realize even be entered into hell.......I hope to have you here until the end! Thanks dear friend!

[Knonfoda]

Knon I do not find the words, your post is much more than I deserve! You are too good with my work! Thank you my dear friend!
But your post is also very interesting, you understand deeply the structures of this work.
I try to close the gap between my poor English and the readers using emotions, and descriptions and feelings so the reader can find more materials than my linguistical abilities are able to give him. The same, as you noticed, for the images: I use them to reflect the story and to open new imaginative spaces, so it is like two binary running parallel each one reflection of the other.

An AAR by me? I have one but I do not know if it will be ever competed in my mind...Here some points about the story:

Title: "Heart of Darkness"
Timeframe : II century AD, the tale starts in the year 192 AD, Commodus is Augustus (and he is a good guy!)
Location : Agri Decumati, Aquitania, Alps and Liguria.
Main Character: a young man belonging to the
COHORS I LIGURUM ET AQUITANORUM MILLIARIA CIVES ROMANORUM EQUITATA
Storyline : A horror greater than one mind can bear, a revenge without end, a love that can not finish!

Again, you are right: some parts are real life, some name is true, some characters are real persons, some places are real places, but nothing remain unchanged, when the reality become word, and the word become tale, nothing.......all this story is about the reality and the finction, the images and the reality, the madness and the sanity, the concept of limit between real world and its reflections in our minds......but all this is perfectly explained in the work:[/CENTER]

Diocle, as I have said, I think this is an excellent piece of "pseudo-fiction" and I say pseudo because, as you have said, you incorporate elements of real life within it. I agree that the "emotional" angle is very useful and definitely helps the reader both bridge and ignore the "language gap". I don't think your English is as bad as you claim it is, but it is very helpful to feel as you do, so that the actual grammar takes a back seat.

As for the AAR, I can only echo what I said in my PM, and say that you must start writing it. Now.

[First Citizen Gallienus]

The images you use do a great job in assisting the reader paint mental pictures. Berly started reading this but it's getting late. I must sleep! Keep up the good work Diocle!

[Diocle]

Thanks for your kind words, about this work Gallienus.

Sorry dear readers, but I'm discovering that writing a story is really an hard task!
I discovered some new informations about the fuel and the speed and the distances, of the SM79, so I've had to take again Google Earth, and I had to create the correct dinamic for the Battle of Souda Bay.
Then, as I said, I discovered that I needed a new character, the Radioman, and I had to erase the previous one, but this changed some detail, and this story is all about small details so it was not easy.

To be short: In the end, it should had been online Wednesday, then Saturday now I'm trying to charge the update Sunday, sorry and thanks for your interest.

[SeniorBatavianHorse]

Don't worry, Diocle, and please update in your own time. Don't feel pressurised into updating if you are not happy about it! I would rather wait a week for a quality update than read a rushed one!

[Diocle]

Thanks as always SBH, for your words, your work, your constant encouragement!

Here the update! It has been quite hard to close this last update, I had to change the scene, the caracters, and the time of the story. It was not easy for me, but I hope that in the end the work will be interesting for you, my beloved readers!

Here, you'll fly over the plains of Africa on an Italian Torpedo Bomber called Savoia Marchetti 79s (SM79s), you discover the tought of the young prof. Ottavio, and you'll meet his friends and an hero of the Italian Torpedo Bombers, good reading to all, with some fear for the new terrain I'm exploring, I hope you'll like the text!

[Diocle]

THE HOUSE OF ACANTHUS

EXIGUA PARS EST VITAE QUAM NOS VIVIMUS
"A SMALL PART OF THE LIFE IS THAT WE LIVE"

5000 METERS ABOVE SEA LEVEL

Are the 8:30 of the morning of November 24, 1940, we are flying at a speed of 380/420 km/h at an altitude of 5000 Mt., we are flying from two hours and half and we are about 1000 Km. into the Sudan, no enemy plane in sight, perfect visibility from crosswind North-North-West, the other three SM 79 are in perfect formation, at 12:00 we’ll arrive at Camp xxxxxx in Libya.

In the plane there is a terrible cold, the sky is dark blue and the air is crystal, the roar of the engines Alfa Romeo 128 RC 18 is music, it is aggressive and deep at the same time, when you come down to the ground and not listen it any more, you feel almost a sense of insecurity, I've never been so happy in my life!
Or rather, the only feeling like this that I can remember was when we were browsing sailboat with my father, in Bordighera, I was a kid, he was at the helm, and I was maneuvering the sail, I remember the feeling of the Mistral wind on the face, splashing of the waves on the skin, the thud of the sail that swells when we turned the boat, we were happy; We did not speak, but we were close each other as we have never been on the land, at home, in those moments I and my father were understanding each other, without need to communicate, at home everything was different: he thought to his work, shipyards, and Affairs, politics, I don't think I've ever enjoyed none of those things and he clearly understood this.
We had never really quarrelled, my father and I, I just had different dreams from him, I wanted to travel, visit distant places, like India which my granddad had many times described me, I wanted to travel and tell what I was watching drawing maps, because a map is more than just a graphical representation of a physical space, a good map tells, for those who know how to read it, a history;

a map is like a book and maybe more, because it's an open book, in permanent becoming, on the paper an infinite number of directions and possibilities intersect each other, ancient stories and unpredictable developments, a good map is like a mirror of the world containing all the pasts and all the possible futures.
I loved my English grandfather, and when I was a kid and I asked him "Grandpa what have I to do?" not knowing what choice I had to take, he told me: "you decide what you want, but be sure that what you decide is really what you want.", his response at the beginning had me almost irritated but then, growing up, I had understood what he intended to suggest, he didn't want to impersonate me in the choices but he was suggesting me to be constantly aware of what I wanted and then do it without hesitation, with all my will.
I had not ever menaged to apply his advice, all my decisions were always taken, taking into account the wishes of my father, my mother, the conventions of the world to which I belonged, but this time no! This time I had decided, with conviction, to do what I really wanted, even at the cost of making suffer the people I loved, I wanted to enlist me and I would have done this at all costs.
That's why I'm here and I'm happy, I wanted to do exactly what I'm doing now!
That's why I had, for the first time violently quarrelled with my father, when I announced that I would leave for the war.
I still remember his words when he realized that I was speaking seriously: "In war you die stupid! You don't have to die, thou are my son; everything I have is meaningless without you! I can keep you out from this damn madness, with all the relations I have in Confindustria and in the ministries you might do the war in a royal cab! The war is for fools, who have nothing to lose, it is not for you Ottavio, you have a role in life! "
On this we were in agreement! But different were our ideas about the kind of role I should have had in life.
I did not give up, Naval Academy, first of course and then the choose of become an Air Observer of the Royal Italian Navy, so I could do what I wanted and get away from that golden prison.
I have a plan, almost a good map, for my life: after the war, a few more years in the Hydrographic Institute of the Navy, then with my engineering degree and the practice at the Hydrographic Institute, I will be able to do the cartographer as work, I will marry Martina, the girl that I love, and we will travel around the world, they all need good maps, industry, politicians, military, everyone!

"Otto? Sorry if I interrupt the drafting of your ‘De Bello Africano’, but I need to know if we are going well, look at the position with precision and confirm to me the route! "
The voice of Max in the intercom, brought me back to reality.
"Yes Commander, a minute and I’ll tell you everything!"
Max, the best Commander that you could dream of, he was simply the perfect Commander for any Savoia Marchetti 79s crew; before the war Max was a test driver for the SIAI Marchetti, he has seen the birth of this aircraft, he knows all its secrets, so that we have experimental engines on board, that is why we are the fastest ‘Hunchback’ of all Italian North Africa: 500 km/h if we wanted to pull the neck to engines! Max is not authoritarian, he doesn't need it, because he is authoritative, he is about 15 years older than me, he is married and has two beautiful children, he makes you feel safe at all times, always at your disposal, he seems to keep everything under his control, there is no fear of error when Massimo Zuccari is the pilot!

Max attended the Torpedo Bombing School and he has already sunk several British ships, but now we're on the route Libya – Ethiopia; being arrived a few months ago, I haven't attended any torpedoing, but the others had, we are here to travel between Addis Abeba and Bengasi, because we have to supply the guys in Ethiopia, the Colony is isolated and from the sea doesn't get anything, and we are the only possibility of contact with the motherland, all supplies passing through air transport, because the Brits are blocking the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean.
All right we are perfectly on route without any error! I announce the route to Max and I return to the maps, what an incredible spectacle was Africa seen from 5000 meters! The Sudan with its deserts but especially Ethiopia, I would never have believed that Ethiopia was a place so beautiful! The plateau of arid desert rock becomes amazing deep green wooded peaks moving westward, a land incredibly ancient and at the same time absolutely wild, a real spectacle, it feels incredibly ridiculous to do the bosses here! Here we are nothing for this people and this land, no one can ever be master of Africa, and it is almost ridiculous to bring our European war here in this ancient land, carved by time and nature like an enormous palimpsest .

I never get tired of watching the ground which flows beneath the aircraft, it is like watching a highly detailed map, but silent, without any graphic indication and without fixed meanings, it is up to us to give a rational meaning to images of these boundless landscapes; drawing a route is like searching through the myriad choices contained in a map, the right one; I see almost physically the routes, they are as bright ribbons that take place on these immense landscapes, indicating to me any possible future.

At this point, I imagine the smiling elongate eyes, light brown, of Martina, almost gold in the sunlight, and I’m almost able to listen her words: "But, com’on Ottavio, a route is only a line on the paper!", but I believe that I would be able to explain her what I mean: a route is a line that connects two or more points in the space, but then it adds the time factor to the map, once connected those dots indicate the possibility of a displacement, a route is pure potential energy, because it describes a possible movement, choosing a route a route is like to choose a destiny, reducing to one, the bundle of endless possibilities.
The numbers of altitude, longitude, azimuth, and so forth, are not only numbers but quality invisible of the places, the Etruscans would have used the expression Genius Loci, and God knows if they were right, not all numbers are good, as well as the places they represent, and therefore not all routes are equal, there are good and bad routes, sometimes it seems to me that I can perceive the intrinsic harmony of numbers in a good route, a right direction in labyrinth of endless choices.

I stop, I can no longer continue, Antonio is singing for more than twenty minutes ' O sole mio ' first confined itself to whistle now is singing at full volume! It's unbearable!
"Anto, have you to go on with this for a while?"
"Excuse me, Admiral! Two stanzas and the final recovery and then I'm done! Is it a hassle for you?"
"No, not much a hassle, if it makes you feel good, continue as well!"
"But it isn’t a problem of well-being, it is that I'm bored, Admiral!
Admiral how is going on the book? Is it good? Then when you’ll finish it, can I read it? I tell you guys, this man will become a famous writer! "

Then he resumed undaunted! Antonio is one of the two gunners, he is at Breda 7, 7 mm on right, Giovanni a big guy from Belluno, who no one knows why is in the Aviation, he is the Radio Man and gunner in the fixed position in the' hump ' of the Breda 12.7 mm machine gun.
Antonio is also an excellent mechanic, as well as a formidable sniper, he would be a good person but is frankly unbearable. He has targeted me since I arrived.
Maybe I have discovered myself being a little elitist since I got here, but I come from the Navy, where the relationships between officers and NCOs are very rigid, if you give too much confidence to a NCO you get punished, perhaps the discipline in the Navy is too formal but here there isn’t any!
Antonio is a Neapolitan of Castellamare, a true fascist but also a good man, nevertheless he takes too much freedoms, every time I get on board in the plane he makes the whistle that mimics the whistle on the ships when an officer boarding! Or he shouts: “Officer on the deck!” It is not possible! If I could I'd already sent him in military prison at Gaeta, to freshen up his mind!
He is also a good soldier, somehow he manages to make everyone laugh and he's really essential as mechanic, he worked in ALFA ROMEO, he knows everything about the engines, and always manages to give us 5 or 10 Km/h more, that under certain circumstances may save your life! Max bears him and Antonio is smart enough to understand well what's the limit, and he never exceeds it, but nonetheless he manages to be distasteful, he always tells the wrong joke at the wrong time, he is insinuating, and he always puts his nose in the affairs of the others, I don't like him.

While writing and updating the route, other three hours had passed, we had arrived home, we are in Libya now, today no attacks by the British, all went very well.
Ten minutes and we are landing in xxxxxx Camp, Max is bringing down gently the ‘hunchback’, we are tired and the cold is really terrible, I don't feel nearly the fingers, 1000 mt. Now it starts to enter the hot air of the Libyan desert, we are flying from hours now in the immense desert between Sudan and Libya, yellow ocher, no landmarks, only the dunes moving slowly and continuously, a red-hot sea, motionless and in permanent motion, the wind draws ripples in the sand just like the sea, but here they are sculpted on the surface of the waves of ochre sand, a place midway between the hell on Earth and the absolute beauty. Now you can clearly see the Italian base, some tents, some prefabricated, trenches and antiaircraft fixed emplacements, the Tricolor flag looks like a colored coriander lost in that immensity. In the background to ensure some sense to that installation, there is a heavy vehicle track, rather than a real way, that loses itself northwards.
We're almost out of gas, we have covered more than 2000 Km, and after five hours and half of flight we find ourselves frozen in the middle of the Libyan desert. We are the first to land, the other planes have already taken position to follow us, Max slides his bomber on the sandy slope as if it were a small single-seater aircraft, nothing shocks, simply perfect, the voice of Max in the intercom, tells us: "Dear passengers, the captain thanks you for choosing the Regia Aeronautica airlines, wishes you pleasant stay and reminds you that we will be again on the move in an hour not a minute more! ". General applause and some scream, and while the hot sand bursts trought the lateral positions of two Breda machineguns, we land, running on the track, the speed decreases from 180, to 120, then 80 Km/h, then the plane stops after a sweet side tack to the left which frees the track for the next incoming Bombers.

When I get down on the ground I notice that I have an incredible thirst, the legs don't support me and the sudden heat after those 5 hours of freezing stuns me, then light is blinding, the whole thing is worsened by clouds of sand raised by propellers moving again. I can hear Antonio that screams over the noise of the engines, teasing the ‘Bersaglieri’ who have flocked around the plane, to see if there were any parcels for them, or just to relax a little in that endless monotony: "Quiet, there is nothing for you! ...You run and we fly, comrades! ... "
Max is still standing near the SM79, and he is speaking with an officer, probably about the gasoline supplies, I headed to a tent that indicated me a Bersagliere, there I find water, coffee and cakes, heat begins to make itself felt, "Courage Giovanni, it won't be your Dolomiti Mountains but you have to admit that the landscape is truly enchanting!" it is the voice of Guido the second pilot, who is entering the tent with Giovanni, who is cursing against dust, that is the way in which he calls the desert sand.
When the other crews arrive, the tent really becomes too crowded, I go out after one last sip of coffee, and I wanted a place outside with a little of shadow, I find it behind a prefabricated storage and basement near the main tent, here I find Guido sitting on a empty bin, he is writing what appears to be a letter, holding the sheet on his crossed legs and smoking a Macedonia, he looks like comfortably sitting at a table of a café of via Veneto in Rome!
"Can I sit next to you?", I ask him, "But please, my dear! I think nobody will remonstrate!" he says while gives me the packet of cigarettes, while I think that I never smoked before the war, I take a cigarette, light it and I sit on a bin beside him.
"Excuse me Otto, what day is today?", it was typical of Guido, all the people at war count the days meticulously, to know how much time remains before the end of the service or before the license, but him not, he seemed to pass through that war as a spectator, concerned perhaps, but random.
The 14th Count Guido Di Carpegna had become my best friend during those months on SM79, he was two years older than me, he was a Roman Aristocrat, and we immediately found good together: same school, the Classic Lyceum and then the University, he Law and I Engineering, more or less the same social environment and the same relations, so I found good to speak to him.
But our characters were the opposite, and maybe that's why we pleased each other: he was a great exponent of an aristocracy perhaps too old to feel any real enthusiasm for anything in life, I threw myself in this adventure headfirst, and lived everything as a challenge to myself and to my limits. I was exploring the life out of the protection of my small bourgeois world, and I was excited. Guido instead, seemed a visitor passing through in life as one who, as he cannot longer pull back, is trying at least to make and receive the least possible damage; his footsteps in life were light, and a studied laziness, was keeping him away from the emotions too intense, while the right amount of lightness of spirit, was protecting him from the horrors of life.
"Today is the 24 November, Guido."
"Thank you, you know, it will be the heat or maybe it's that I have never went very well with dates."
While he was writing, I was looking at him and I noticed the blond tuft, fell on his forehead, it seemed that even his hair looked for the most comfortable position and lower energy consumption.
I think that those months had not been easy for me without him, Guido had demonstrated the rare ability to understand when I needed help, or even just a friend with whom I could exchange two words to overcome the fear, that at certain moments in war becomes suffocating, well in those moments he was always present, close to me! He appeared, you don't know how, maybe with two glasses of Cognac in his hand, or when you turned around you found that he was there, offering you his package of Macedonia cigarettes.
It is a priceless quality knowing when others need us, sensitivity and tact, and great generosity are needed.
The strange thing is that Guido is a great pilot, as Max told me, he flew as early as 16 years with the Count his father, and he was good, very good at flying, he had had more than a chance to have a 79 all his own, but he always refused! He preferred to be an excellent second, less responsibilities, but no disgrace, after all he was there in the cockpit, taking the bullets of warships in the face, but in this way he didn’t decide the fate of others, he had chosen the ranks than the Command. Also this was one of the reasons why I liked him, Guido is the best friend I ever had, and I will not lose him even when the war will be over.

The flight to Benghazi has been a real pleasure, the heat had become unbearable. Every takeoff, for me, is a magic moment, the moment when I observe from my position in the ventral 'gondola' under the plane, that giant detaching the shadow from the ground, is always a time filled with magic, I don't know exactly why, but always it seems to violate some physical law, losing weight or entering another space other than the known space.
The slow flow of Libyan landscape takes us down to the Mediterranean sea, now the sky is filled by the ancient reflection of that closed ‘Sea Our', that contains the absolute blue, the blue ‘Mantle of Madonna' as it was called by the painters of the Middle Age; This ancient enveloping colour, fills the entire space of vision, and it is almost a physical pleasure, being immersed in it, you feel like home again, even if you aren’t.

Are the three o'clock in the afternoon when we land in Benghazi, we are at liberty, tiredness now is great and reaching our barracks is a blessing for everyone.
At six in the evening, in a sunset, typical of the season, in which the Red, Orange, Purple, Yellow and Green seem to scream in the evening sky, I'm waiting Guido, who is in regular and inevitable delay, in my Midnight blue cloth uniform of the Royal Navy.
I am close to a group of Palm trees at a fixed emplacement of anti-aircraft artillery, no one speaks and who speaks does it almost softly, the sunset seems to deaden all sound.
When he arrive he is accompanied by Ettore, his faithful little Russel Terrier, collected during a mission in Somalia, in a British abandoned base, Ettore wandered alone among the shacks, they gazed to each other eyes, and they have been pleased, Ettore has immediately chosen Guido as his new master, and Guido was unable to escape those hazel eyes above that pair of white gentleman’s mustache , the two have become inseparable, and I must say that they are really a perfect couple!
"Sorry for the delay, I had a duty to be completed. But it was worth, do you know?, Great news! "
"From home? So everything good from yours? "
"Certainly, from home! I combined the marriage of Ettore! She is called Sissy and she is a small Jack Russel bought by my mom! Isn't it fantastic? So Ettore will find his emotional stability!"

On the left Emanuele Buscaglia with the cap, on the right Max.

When we enter the bar at the military airport in Benghazi I see Max coming toward us, he takes me under his arm and says, "Come with me, I want to present you Buscaglia, the 278th has arrived!"
Buscaglia was already a legend, he and his squadron had made incredible attacks in Alexandria, Egypt and Crete, torpedoing the cruiser HMS Kent, the Cruiser HMS Liverpool plus a wealth of other English vessels, all crews were around him, Max takes off, reaches Buscaglia, they were old friends, and tells him: "Emanuele, I present you our new Navigator, the Lieutenant of Vessel Ottavio Costaguta, great cartographer and writer! Now we're back at full strength! "
Buscaglia was a man of medium stature, a pretty face, simple ways and direct, and always ready to joke, somehow the perfect anti-hero: not knowing what to do, I performed instinctively an impeccable military greeting, as I had learnt at the Naval Academy, including heels: "Liutenant of Vessel Costaguda Ottavio, it's an honour to meet you, Sir!"
Buscaglia looks at me between the ironic and amazed, then he puts in my hand a glass of cognac, gives me a nice pat on the back and says to the others "Guys we're good! The Navy has come to get us out of trouble! "
While I turn red and then green and the uproar of laughter fills the room, Guido at the piano, plays with grace, the Hymn of the Royal Navy. Meanwhile, Buscaglia's hand on my shoulder loosens the tension and helps me overcome the embarrassment, that man has true charisma, and his presence here announces that something is going on.

March of the Italian Royal Navy

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

********

"THE NOWHERE LEGION" AAR by SeniorBatavianHorse.

-The color images from the plane come from Luxchamp the Great, He now is an indispensable part of this work and story, thanks for your help Lux!

- The Black and White images are historical images from various publications and sources, they are really interesting documents from a legendary plane, still quite mysterious, because few exemplars and crews survived the war.

-The crews in the photos are real Italian crews of WWII, and many of them died in action, all them are Silver and Golden medals, great part in Memory, I respect those men and this work is also a way to remember them all and all the men of both sides who lived and died in that terrible war. The photos are only suggetions by me, to help the imagination of the readers and maybe to create some interesting reflection with the written text.

[Rex Anglorvm]

I really enjoyed the update, a nice change of pace, the North African campaign interests me as my Great Uncle was in the 8th Army from 1941-43.

Fantastic pictures too

[SeniorBatavianHorse]

A wonderful and very immersive update, Diocle - the change in pace and narrative into Ottavio's diary has been masterfuly done and captivated me while almost making me forget about the diary level! Again, you are demonstrating a great gift for writing and story-telling. You have me completely hooked and more than once I was smiling in appreciation at your own writing while reading sly winks to my own work.

This needs to be opened up to a wider audience - and I strongly urge you to think about developing it here and then moving it towards publication at some future date.

On a side note, I like the fact that you are taking time to update and then update a long section. It allows me to look forward to each one and savour it at the same time.

[Scottish King]

Nice update! I liked the pictures.They greatly enhance the story. Can't wait to see what's up for the boys next.

[Diocle]

I really enjoyed the update, a nice change of pace, the North African campaign interests me as my Great Uncle was in the 8th Army from 1941-43.

Fantastic pictures too

Thanks Rex, and yes also I'm interested in the Southern Front! My dad was in the Italian Royal Navy, so I have many stories from inside the Navy of that time. WWII has been an horrible war, and Italy was really on the wrong side, the loser side and the evil side, the war almost destroyed this country!
And being also a political war, it created a great amount of hate, that is still alive in Italy, between the two sides that fought a Civil war between 1943/'45 after the fall of fascism regime.
The most strange thing is that when I talk with old persons about the war, they all say that those terrible days has been also the best days of their lives! It is probably the fact that all people remember the youth as a beautiful time, but probably during the war there is a common feeling that unites the people, it will be the fear, the hate, the sense of common suffering, but this gives strenght to personal memories of the people.

A wonderful and very immersive update, Diocle - the change in pace and narrative into Ottavio's diary has been masterfuly done and captivated me while almost making me forget about the diary level! Again, you are demonstrating a great gift for writing and story-telling. You have me completely hooked

Thank you SBH, your continued support is helping me very much, and words like these are an important impulse for me to contine my struggle with the Holy Language of Shakespeare and SBH!

more than once I was smiling in appreciation at your own writing while reading sly winks to my own work.

Yes! But this is your fault! If you write work like the Cartographia, you should take into account that people can be impressed by your images and concepts!
Now seriously: The Nowhere Legion is The Nowhere Legion, but the Cartographia is special for me! I do not know how to explain....so I'll use art, in the end it is my terrain: The Nowhere Legion is painting, a great fresco painting, a cycle like the 'Stanze' di Raffaello in Vatican, but the Cartographia is sculpture! of the best quality! Its images remain sculpted in the mind! It is quite difficult don't being influenced! Even the Language is sculpted! Extraordinary experience reading the Cartographia! Do you know? it makes me want to take pencil in hand and draw! Really a lot of images and concepts and ideas!

This needs to be opened up to a wider audience - and I strongly urge you to think about developing it here and then moving it towards publication at some future date.

Do you know that I am obligated to believe thy words? I must believe the words of the best writer here, I must believe to the author of the Ostraka plays, The Nowhere Legion and the Cartographia, I must respect the words of SBH because of his work here, his writings, and his intellectual honesty. So, why do I so scared? Why so many doubts?......well, anyway thanks again, I'm astonished!

I like the fact that you are taking time to update and then update a long section. It allows me to look forward to each one and savour it at the same time.

This is the most strange thing of this work: It was born like Athena from the mind of Iuppiter, (No, I don't see myself as Iuppiter, for now....), as to say that from the start, the story was born completed, finished, in all its chapters, and I'm only following the steps. The main problem is the translation and my verbosity, so the single update going out of my mind, becomes a little fat....

Nice update! I liked the pictures.They greatly enhance the story. Can't wait to see what's up for the boys next.

Thanks Scottish King! Yes I've found a lot of good pictures expecially about the SM79, I like that machine! It is strange and interesting, as all the projects of the engeneer Alessandro Marchetti, all his drawings have great personality. But I must say that I like all the old machines of WWII they are more understandable for me, they are more human, if we can use the word human for machines created to kill human beings! About the boys of Max, well the next days will be hard days.......

[Chelchal]

A very moving story, Diocle, of decent men on the wrong side of history.

I'm reminded what Ciano said of Duke of Aosta when the latter died of disease in a British POW camp:

"So dies the image of a Prince and an Italian. Simple in his ways, broad in outlook, and humane in spirit."

One could say the same about Ottavio!

[Diocle]

Thanks Chelchal please remain here, if you can, I need all the best friends around to continue this strange tale, and until now, all your posts have been intelligent, interesting and informative, like this one! Stay here!....please.

[Chelchal]

haha very well I shall

[Shankbot de Bodemloze]

Diocle, I'm sorry I haven't been able to comment as often as I would like. But it is great to see you aren't short of readers.

As many have said, I too love the pictures you included - they really bring and already lively tale to life. Your writing is how everyone else has said, so I'll just let you read through them again.

+rep and great work mate.

[Diocle]

Thank you very much Lord Shankbot! I like your new Avatar! It offers me the opportunity to explain the conditions of meteo here in Italy!
Yes because the nice face of your new Avatar is perfectly suited to describe the face of a poor man, who is trying to write at 35°/37° of temperature!
I hoped to use the night's hours, but even at night the situation doesn't change. So the update that should be online tomorrow will be delayed to Tuesday or Wednesday! When the climate will change, and the African anticyclone, should be wiped out!!!

Meanwhile I collected a lot of materials, informations, images and, using Goggle Earth (it is a wondeful source!) I calculated all the movements on the map, and I'll be able to show some good image of the Theatre of operations during the Winter of 1940.
Before the update I'll charge a small Appendix about the machine on which Ottavio is flying, and some interesting Youtube videos about the SM79 in actions, then the update.

[Shankbot de Bodemloze]

You are welcome. Although I do feel sorry for you, right now I have got raining buckets.

I'll look forward to seeing the SM79s, and of course the update!

[Diocle]

THE HOUSE OF ACANTHUS

APPENDIX:
SAVOIA MARCHETTI 79 - TORPEDO BOMBER

The Savoia-Marchetti S.M.79 Sparviero ("Sparviero" is the Italian word for "Sparrowhawk") was a three-engine Italian bomber with a wood and metal structure that saw service in World War II. Originally designed as a fast passenger transport aircraft, this low-wing monoplane, in the years 1937--39, set 26 world records that qualified it, for some time, as the fastest medium bomber in the world. The S.M.79 first entered action in the Spanish Civil War and during World War II saw duty on all fronts. But it became famous and achieved many successes as a torpedo bomber in the Mediterranean theater. The S.M.79 was an outstanding aircraft and was certainly the best known Italian aeroplane of World War II. It was easily recognizable due to its distinctive fuselage "hump", and was well-liked by its crews who gave it the nickname Gobbo Maledetto ("damned hunchback"). It was the most widely produced Italian bomber of World War II, with some 1,300 built and remained in service in Italy until 1952.

Here an interesting video by 'Istituto Luce' with SM79 in bombing action, the sound is the original, so if you are not interested you can close it.

Another original short movie by Istituto Luce, with SM79 Torpedo bombing a Brtish convoy, the audio is original and propaganda.

This is a nice collection of images of SM79 with original '40 song:

Specifications (SM.79-III)

Savoia Marchetti 79
General characteristics

• Crew: 6 (pilot, co-pilot, flight engineer/gunner, radio operator, bombardier, rear gunner)
• Length: 16.2 m (53 ft 2 in)
• Wingspan: 20.2 m (66 ft 3 in)
• Height: 4.1 m (13 ft 6 in)
• Wing area: 61.7 m² (664 ft²)
• Empty weight: 7,700 kg (16,975 lb)
• Loaded weight: 10,050 kg (25,132 lb)
• Powerplant: 3 × Alfa Romeo 128-RC 18 radial engines, 642 kW (860 hp) each

Performance

• Maximum Speed: 460 km/h (286 mph) at 3,790 m (12,450 ft)
• Range: 2,600 km (1,615 mi)
• Service ceiling: 7,500 m (24,600 ft)
• Rate of Climb5.3 m/s (1,050 ft/min)
• Wing loading: 165 kg/m² (33.8 lb/ft²)
• Power/mass: 0.173 kW/kg (0.106 hp/lb)

Armament

• Guns: ** 1 × 20 mm (0.79 in) forward MG 151 cannon
  
  • 1 × 12.7 mm (0.5 in) dorsal Breda-SAFAT machine gun
  • 2 × 7.7 mm (0.303 in) machine guns in lateral "waist-gun" ports (optional)
  
  
• Bombs/Torpedoes: 1,200 kg (2,645 lb) internal bomb load or one (two rarely) external 450 millimetres (17.72 in) torpedoes

[SeniorBatavianHorse]

Wonderful - it is refreshing to see films from WWII from the Italian side. Usually it is American, German and British stuff. You are certainly building up this aeroplane in my eyes to an almost mythic status!