11:02PM: Listening to a fireworks display somewhere in the distance. Not sure what they are celebrating, unless it is fashion week kicking off, but I don’t think I am anywhere near the three main fashion streets of Via Condotti, Via Borgognona, or Via Frattii and the fireworks sound like they are in a piazza not too far away.
Sitting and decompressing and trying to put the day in order in my head. Lots of history that I walked through today, not too many pictures though as some of what I saw today didn’t allow photography inside.
The day started with breakfast: chunks of pineapple heated up in a skillet until they were soft and juicy, then cooking a pair of chicken sausages in the pineapple juice, adding a trio of tomatoes that I squeezed for their juices to help moisten the pan before cooking them along with the sausages, and a piece of bread to get some carbs for energy later in the day. Turned out better than expected, the pineapple was the most expensive bit of my grocery trip last night at a tray for six euro, about a third of which went into breakfast.
After that a not-quite-lukewarmm shower. Not cold, just warm enough to do its job, which worked as it helped wake me up and kept me from spending too long soaking in the shower.
Then out the door to meet up with everyone at 12:30. We all met up in the Piazza de Santa Maria in Trastevere again, our designated meeting spot, and Meg went over the revised schedule for the next few days. Thankfully, Lynn typed it up and mailed it to us all because I was distracted by a couple of little kids kicking a soccer ball around. Robert was playing some with them, and I joined in and got a couple kicks on the ball.
After Meg ran down the updated itinerary, we all wandered down to the tram stop (Lynn broke off along the way and headed to the Rome Center to do some work and email us the updated itinerary) and we took the tram over to near Piazza Venezia where Il Vittoriano stands and looks out-of-place with its bright white marble walls.
From there we walked up the Capitoline Hill again…
Back down the far side…
And to the entrance of the Coliseum.
I broke off from the group right as we got inside, which I have mixed feelings about now.
On one hand, I moved through the Coliseum relatively quickly, which I didn’t mind because I didn’t actually enjoy it as much as I expected. Loud noisy crowds, rude people, and it was so completely in ruins it was hard for me to really picture it as it once might have been. But I only spent just under and hour there, so I had a lot of afternoon free to see other bits of Rome.
On the other hand, if I had stayed with the group and listened to the bits Katie had from the Rick Steves guide those pages might have explained it a bit better and I might have appreciated what I was seeing more, but it would have taken longer and I might not have had the time to go on to see the other things that I did.
After I left the Coliseums exit, I headed east through Piazza del Colosseo, down Via Labicana, turning right onto Piazza di San Clemente.
From the outside, the Basilica of San Clemente didn’t look like much of anything, just another set of stuccoed walls with a door on the south wall marked with a sign showing a simple line drawing of a camisole and indicating that bare shoulders weren’t allowed inside.
There was also a nicely dressed young man with a wicker basket, asking for donations by the door. He was, apparently, a con man. I overheard one of the people working at the ticket booth later, when I was buying my ticket to see the excavation, explaining to a British woman that they were aware of him and that he was a con man but they had talked to the police before and they couldn’t do anything because he was on the public sidewalk and wasn’t identifying himself as being associated with the church (though his black suit was priestly looking, just lacking the white collar band) but was just asking for donations for an unspecified cause.
Inside, the basilica was much like St. Paul’s in London: overwhelming you with art. It was nowhere near the scale of St. Paul’s, but the art was everywhere and overwhelming. I had come just to see the excavations, but I sat a while on the wooden pews and just tried to take everything in. No photos were allowed inside, which is just as well as I might have spent an hour or more there just trying to capture everything on camera. In the end, I just tried to see as much as I could, tried to take in as much as possible, and then dropped 3EU for the guide book they were selling by the ticket booth.
The ticket to see the excavations itself only cost me 3.50EU with my Marylhurst ID. Technically only students 26 and under with ID are supposed to get in, and I am more than a decade past that, but they didn’t ask me my age (apparently I don’t look it) and I got the student rate and went in.
Going underground, down into the 4th-10th century early Christian church, this was the first time Rome’s age really felt real to me.
The Forum and the Coliseum are old, but they are also practically theme parks with the huge crowds, the constant noise, and all the vendors selling tchotchkes everywhere around outside. Don’t misunderstand me, they were amazing, the Forum in particular, but aside from being in a state of ruin it was hard for me to get a real feeling of age, of time having passed. A physical sense of antiquity, of time, rather than an intellectual sense. Body instead of Brain.
Descending into the earth, going down the steps from the hot Romano afternoon into the early Christian basilica, something about that descent just felt like a descent into the past.
Again, no photos allowed in the excavation, and it is hard to really describe the frescoes that I saw down there. But I’ll try to describe the ones that really stuck in my head.
Going down the steps the first I saw was on the right, 9th century, “Miracle of Saint Clement”. Saint Clement was a first century pope, which was a surprise to me as I hadn’t realized that they had popes that early. The legends about him include the Romans tying him to an anchor and throwing him into the Black Sea. A year later the tides receded and a beautiful tomb for him, built by angels, was revealed. Every year after the tides would miraculously recede for a brief time, revealing the tomb. The miracle depicted in the mural is that one year a child was lost in the high tides surrounding the tomb, and then exactly one year later as the waters receded the child was found safe and alive within the tomb.
The next one that made an impact on me is a 9th century fresco of either the Ascension of Christ into the heavens (born aloft by a pair of angels) or the Assumption of the Virgin Mary into the Heavens. Apparently there is some controversy over which it is a depiction of, but either way it is impressive to look at. There is also near the middle bottom, a big oval indent where something once was. The little notes to read by it stated that relics of some sort likely once had been embedded into the wall as part of the fresco there.
Closer to the descent into the lower level was “St Clement and Sisinnius”. The fresco depicts part of the legend of Sisinnius and Clement: Sisinnius following his wife Theodora to a Christian meeting but being struck blind and deaf because he was not a believer, Clement visiting him later in the evening to pray for his sight and hearing to be restored, and then a demented Sisinnius calling for Clement to be hauled away but being deceived into mistaking some marble columns for him. It dates to the end of the 9th century and is famous for being the earliest example of the transition (aside from some signatures) of the movement from Latin to vernacular Italian.
Speaking of marble columns, I had heard about how early buildings recycle bits and pieces of earlier ones but here in the early basilica there were all these marble columns but none of them matched. Some where smooth and cream colored, others were light tan and vertically fluted, some had fluting in a spiral up the column, and one was a green that resembled jade more than marble. They were all clearly looted from other buildings and brought to hold up the basilica ceiling.
Heading downstairs again brought about the physically sensation of going back in time. The lowest level was damper than the one above, and you could hear the sound of a stream flowing through the area. The Mithraic temple was not much restored, it actually looks much like the picture I’d found before. What you can’t see in that photo are the sall things like the designs on the ceilings in the hallway you are standing in to look at it: geometric patterns of squares with a symbol inside, looking much like modern ceiling designs actually.
Being down there had a very palpable sense of age to me, rooms that were truly ancient. Small little chambers, one of which had a panel pulled away to reveal the stream that flowed behind the walls of the building.
I spent about ninety minutes there. Going through it once, from start to finish, and then since the end of the trip brings you back to the stairs I started at, I went through it again a second time just to take it all in.
It had started to cool off a little by then. I went to sit outside in the courtyard attached to the modern basilica. There were blocks of ancient aged wood that were used as benches and I sat down atop one of them and ate my lunch while listening to the little fountain in the courtyard.
I wasn’t tired yet after all of that so I decided to walk some more, see some more of Rome. I picked a direction and wandered for a while. The city changes a lot once you get a few blocks away from the Forum and Coliseum, away from the tourist areas you start seeing more of what it is like to live in the city. So I just walked and let myself get lost for a while.
When I finally decided to choose a destination, a last site to see before heading home, I decided to swing by Trajan’s Column since Robert had mentioned seeing it in his wandering last night and had been impressed by it up close.
The way Rome seems to change a roads name every couple blocks had me confused for a bit when I pulled out my map and started navigating my way there, but getting lost in Rome just seems to mean discovering incredible views you hadn’t planned on. Like the Piazza Quirinale, which apparently contains the home of the Italian president (something I didn’t know at the time, but explains the heavily armed guards).
Wandering downhill from there, I just happened to glance to the left when walking past a doorway and saw this amazing church. I walked over to glance inside, and right as I crossed the doorway the bells began to ring the hour. Inside the organist was playing softly, possibly practicing for the evening service.
Again, no photos were allowed inside, and again it was overwhelming with the art. In particular, on the arch above the main altar, there was this amazing painting called “The Fall of the Rebel Angels” by Giovanni Odazzi. Some sort of optical illusion is at work, because it truly looks as if the angels are falling out of the painting, from the arched ceiling, towards the ground where you are looking up at it.
There was also a lower crypt area filled with art and statues, including some relics if I understood correctly. Unfortunately the little guide I picked up at the church (and dropped some change into the offertory in return) is all in Italian and I can’t quite make heads or tails of it (and I am too tired to load up Google for translation right now).
The church turned out to be the Basilica of the Holy Apostles. One on my list to go back and visit once I’ve brushed up my sketching skills a little, as I’d love to just sit and sketch some of the art and architecture in there. My descriptions are doing the basilica little justice, but I knew (and still know) so little about what I was looking at that I can’t describe it and do it justice.
From there it was a short walk the rest of the way to Trajan’s Column. Unfortunately the sun was at such an angle, and so bright out, that I am not sure how well my photos turned out.
I didn’t stay too long, first place in Rome that I actually felt in danger of being pickpocketed as a couple times as I moved to get a different angle of photo of the column I’d get the sense of someone behind me, look around to make sure I wasn’t stepping in the way of someones photo, and catch someone an arm-length and a half away suddenly change directions and walk away as I turned to look at them. Odd enough behavior, because I was standing a little out of the flow of traffic so no reason to pass that close to me in the first place, that I decided to move on after snapping just a few photos.
I was impressed by Trajan’s Column, the details on the artwork, that they got all of the individual pieces that were stacked to form the column, to get them to lineup so well. I’d really like to see a copy of the columns designs printed out on a long sheet of paper, something I could look at up close to see all the details and how the story is told. It’s a bit like looking at the Bayeux Tapestry in 3D.
From there I walked the short bit back to the Piazza Venezia, hopped on the tram, got off near the grocery store to get some yoghurt and eggs, met Krista and Celeste in the store and said hello, and headed back to crash and have another salad for dinner (now with added berry yoghurt).
And write this blog post to try to help process everything I saw today.