Known and celebrated since antiquity, the Carrara Marble Quarries have been the destination, over the centuries, of an infinite number of merchants, architects, sculptors, stonemasons, geologists, geographers, naturalists or simply curious people, attracted by the preciousness of the material, the lunar landscape and the titanic relationship existing between man and the mountain.
Strabo already spoke of it, at the time of Emperor Tiberius, when Carrara’s marbles were known as lunar marbles (from the nearby city of Luni, whose ruins can be visited a few kilometers from the modern city), while Dante placed there the cave of the soothsayer Aronte, “among white marbles.” Famous visitors, from Michelangelo to Giambologna and Canova, left their signatures on the aedicule of Fantiscritti (a Roman-era relief now preserved in the Academy of Fine Arts), or entrusted their impressions to travelogues that may have known wide circulation (such as those of Charles Dickens).
The extraction sites are enclosed, almost in their entirety, in a grand natural amphitheater, divided morphologically into three deep valleys, to which correspond the well-known basins of Torano, Miseglia and Colonnata. The marble that outcrops from these mountains is a metamorphic rock, i.e., formed by the transformation of a previous rock as a result of strong variations in temperature and pressure. Its origin dates back to the Lower Jurassic, almost two hundred million years ago, when northwestern Tuscany was covered by the sea: calcareous sediments deposited on the seafloor, at depths that were not excessive, then began to overlap, compacting, originating a large rock platform. In more recent times, the continuous evolution of the earth’s crust subjected this original rock to very complex uplifts and folds, causing a complete recrystallization of calcium carbonate. The limestone was transformed into marble and the complex geological structure of the Apuan Alps was outlined.
Many link Carrara’s name only to the most prized quality of Statuario, which is particularly popular with sculptors, but there are as many as seven main varieties of the material extracted from the area’s quarries: ordinary Bianco has small flecks or veins, and lends itself to a variety of uses, but Venato, characterized by a greater presence of grayish streaks, is also in high demand among architects and designers. Bardiglio, with its color between cerulean and bluish, boasts a noble tradition as a comprimario, having always accompanied the more common whites, in the creation of floors and altars, and has provided the material for an infinite number of niches and bases for sculptures made in the noblest Statuary, by far the most celebrated material. To these are added Arabescato, with its persuasive textures, Cipollino, far less common, and the precious Calacatta, particularly prized in the variety furrowed by golden yellow veins.
Excavation, after Roman times, experienced a long pause, and it was not until the late 1200s that there was a real revival of activity in the marble basins. The techniques, which had remained unchanged for centuries, began to evolve in the late 1700s, with the introduction of the first blasting launches. At the same time, downstream, the first industrial water-powered factories opened for polishing and cutting marble.
In the second half of the nineteenth century the world of quarrying experienced tremendous development, supported by technological innovations such as the helical wire and the penetrating pulley. An impressive infrastructure, inaugurated in 1876, directly linked the quarry sites to the railroad and to the loading dock built at the marina: the Marble Railway, remained active until 1964, but its structures, bridges, tunnels and viaducts, are still largely passable.
The introduction of diamond wire cutters and drilling machines, combined with the development of road transport, thus marked the inexorable advance of quarry areas, in the second half of the twentieth century.
The fruits of industrialization and advances in technology have profoundly changed the historic relationship between man and the mountains, which has taken a heavy toll on many generations of Carrara’s people. In recent decades, the drastic reduction in the number of workers, in the face of an exponential increase in quarrying, has triggered a heated debate about the future of the mining basins: the challenge of the future, a very difficult one, will be to reconcile environmental protection, labor and historical heritage.