Why is the Alfa Romeo 8c Spider considered man eating serpent?”
A smouldering Italian sun showers its blessings on the long, red bonnet of an Alfa Romeo as it bellows around an Italian test track. Whoah! Worn rear tyres slide wide and the fronts follow. The windscreen’s shadows swing wildly across the cockpit as the car slews first one way then the other. There’s a shudder through the frame as the rear end collects itself and my shoulders thud into the seat. Back on the throttle, the engine’s Stentorian blast rips the shimmering air, tyre smoke receding in the mirrors. This is work? Hard to justify in anyone’s language, except perhaps Italian. I grin like a Cheshire cat, but my head is full of trams and birthdays. Trams? Pay attention. The tram terminus on Milan’s Piazza Castello is opposite the leafy entrance to the Castello Sforzesco and its Filarete Tower. It was there in 1910 that legend places Romano Cattaneo, a young draftsman who worked for a new Milanese car maker, Societa Anonima Lombarda Fabbrica Automobili (ALFA) and had been asked to de
The tram terminus on Milan’s Piazza Castello is opposite the leafy entrance to the Castello Sforzesco and its Filarete Tower. It was there in 1910 that legend places Romano Cattaneo, a young draftsman who worked for a new Milanese car maker, Societa Anonima Lombarda Fabbrica Automobili (ALFA) and had been asked to design the company’s badge. Perhaps it was a stifling day like this. Maybe he was dallying over a cappuccino as he idly looked across, past the big fountain, to the tower. At its top was the crowned, man-eating serpent of the Visconti family. Eureka! Why not pilfer the coat of arms from the city’s one-time ruling family – the biscione snake, with the crusader’s red cross on a white background? It was there, almost 100 years ago, that one of the world’s most convoluted yet recognisable car badges was born. And while countless redesigns have been effected, every Alfa Romeo has sported the snake and the cross for a century. In the run-up to the company’s centenary, it’s as well
