Leaning Tower, etc.

Italy's famed Leaning Tower of Pisa was last week in danger of being blown to marble bits. The Germans were reported using it as an artillery observation post. Unlike the treasure-strewn city of Florence, 49 miles away, Pisa had not been declared an open city. Other jeopardized treasures of Pisa, beside the 179-foot tower begun in 1174, included:

P: The white marble Tuscan-Romanesque Cathedral, begun in the 11th Century.

P: The Romanesque Baptistery, dating from 1153, containing an ornate 13th-Century pulpit by Niccola Pisano, an octagonal font built in 1246 by Bigarelli of Como.

P: Treasures of Pisa's leading gallery, the Museo Civico, including Pisan sculpture of the 14th and 18th Centuries, Flemish and Florentine tapestries, paintings by Gentile da Fabriano, and Il Sodoma (Giovanni Antonio Bazzi).

Words of concern appeared in the Vatican's Osservatore Romano: "[May the belligerents] reflect seriously upon the moral consequences of deliberate destruction of Pisan monuments."

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