Saving Italy's Art During WW2
Witness History
BBC
4.5 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 11 October 2017
⏱️ 10 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Italy's great works of art were threatened by bombing and looting during World War Two. But a plan known as 'Operation Rescue' was devised to keep the paintings and sculptures safe. Some were hidden in remote spots, others were moved to the Vatican. Pasquale Rotondi was a leading figure in the operation, his daughter Giovanna Rotondi spoke to Alice Gioia about his wartime work.
Photo: St George by Andrea Mantegna, circa 1460.(Credit DeAgostini/Getty Images)
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Choosing what to watch night after night the flicking through the endless |
| 0:06.8 | searching is a nightmare we want to help you on our brand new podcast off the |
| 0:11.8 | telly we share what we've been watching |
| 0:14.0 | Cladie Aide. |
| 0:16.0 | Load to games, loads of fun, loads of screaming. |
| 0:19.0 | Lovely. Off the telly with me Joanna Paige. |
| 0:21.0 | And me, Natalie Cassidy, so your evenings can be a little less |
| 0:24.9 | searching and a lot more auction listen on BBC sounds just before this |
| 0:30.3 | BBC podcast gets underway here's something you may not know. |
| 0:34.4 | My name's Linda Davies and I commission podcast for BBC Sounds. |
| 0:38.3 | As you'd expect, at the BBC we make podcasts of the very highest quality featuring the most knowledgeable experts and genuinely |
| 0:46.0 | engaging voices. What you may not know is that the BBC makes podcasts about all kinds of things like pop stars, |
| 0:54.2 | poltergeist, cricket, and conspiracy theories. |
| 0:57.6 | And that's just a few examples. |
| 0:59.4 | If you'd like to discover something a little bit unexpected. |
| 1:02.8 | Find your next podcast over at BBC Sounds. |
| 1:06.0 | You're listening to the Witness Podcast. |
| 1:08.0 | History is told by the people who were there. |
| 1:10.6 | With me, Alicia Joya. Today, I'm going back to World War II and the battle to save Italy's priceless |
| 1:17.4 | artworks for the nation. I've been speaking to Javan Aratundi, whose father was one of the key figures in Operation Rescue, and who |
| 1:25.2 | spend the war hiding art from bombardment and looting. My dad had a great sense of duty and he put his life at risk to |
| 1:38.0 | my dad had a great sense of duty and he put his life at risk to save those artworks, not for a personal gain, but because |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from BBC, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of BBC and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.

