Sunday, February 19, 2006

Sniveling Origins Uncovered in Italy

The following is part of an e mail I recieved from the artist Greg Sobran, who has serendipitously uncovered some backround on snivelers while doing some reading on Renaissance Italy. The exerpt reads:
" By the way, I've dug up the "no sniveling" origins from 15th
century Italy. This is from Ross Kings recent book on Michelangelo.
It seems this early reformer, sort of a fundamentalist sort name
Savonarola, was preaching a pessimistic fire and brimstone sermon and
got the partying folk in Florence kind of bummed-out. His followers
got the nickname Piagnoni, or "Snivelers". He encouraged followers
to burn their mirrors, paintings, perfumes, musical instruments,
fancy clothing, etc. in his "Bonfire of Vanities". He doesn't
exactly sound like the life of the party. Anyhow, the populous
seems to have tired of him after a while and he ended up in one of
his bonfires before having his ashes tossed into the Tiber. Scratch
one sniveler."
~Greg
Gregory Sobran
The image above is of Savonarola, Girolamo (1452-1498), one of the Piagnoni, or snivelers. My name being Vagnoni, of course the Piagnoni moniker struck a chord. Am I a descendant of some centuries-old snivelers? Yikes

3 Comments:

At 5:41 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Are you a descendant of some centuries-old snivelers? If so, be twice as proud for having overcome your heritage.

Everyone in my family swung from trees, yet I overcame that to hang out with a bunch of drunks that can barely stagger through the streets of Key West!

Alice DaMonkey

 
At 6:50 AM, Blogger MotorCityBaby said...

Yes
according to the book the "Da Snivelli Code", descendents of the Sniveller continue the bloodline today. It was to be a secret society, but due to the expansion and the popularity of 'snivelling' in the general public, it is no longer underground. Banned from bars, parties and all of MY construction jobs- snivellers find themselves gathering at events in Texas and other places where they can preach the end of the world, how much money the are not making due to environmental rules, why is it wrong to wiretap, its just a device to keep in touch,,,and a variety of other current snivel topics... No snivelling!

 
At 9:49 AM, Blogger Vicki said...

Agreed. As your establishment is the last bastion of the non-sniveller, not only have you overcome this embarassing blotch on your lineage, you carry the torch for others to emulate your great accomplishment.

I look forward to your upcoming docu-novel, "The Last Temptation of Snivellers." It is sure to cause a groundswell of controversy and will be required reading of Motorcitybaby's construction crews.

Salute'

 

Post a Comment

<< Home