About ten minutes after we left the hotel we realized we had dressed for to warm of weather and that it could rain at any moment. Luckily, right before it started raining, we took shelter in a near-by museum – the Mercati di Traiano – an ancient Roman market which also happened to be the place where Julius Caesar lived in the first century AD. There were many statues that were actually in Caesar’s Palace back on 150 AD. A lot of which were recovered from sewers within the city. The actual marble of the courtyard where Caesar is said to have said “Friends, Roman’s, Countrymen” and “Y Tu Brute” is still there. There was a piece of a statue recovered that was about six feet long that was just part of a hand of one of the statues in Caesar’s Palace so you can image how big the actual statue was.
It was a great place to go to get out of the rain, but we decided to buy some ponchos and head over to the Colusseum. Good thing we did because it started raining pretty hard for the next few hours (even though ponchos look awful…let’s be honest, they keep you dry). One thing about me and Scotty, we are troopers – rain or shine, we will stay on schedule. Plus, we are only in Rome once, and we had to see The Colusseum and Forum at least once in our lives right?
The Colusseum was huge. It was cool to see where the animals and prisoners were taken underground before they were let into the Colusseum to fight/be executed. You can see all of the passageways of the ground floor of the Colusseum because they have removed the middle layer. It’s surprising to me that so many people were so entertained by watching humans die at the hand of animals. According to Wikipedia, there was once a contest “involving 11,000 animals and 10,000 gladiators over the course of 123 days.” It reminds me of when people used to be hung or stoned to death in front of their entire towns. According to our map, “Its real name is the Flavian Amphitheater. It was begun under Emperor Vaspasian in 72 AD and finished under his son Titus in 80 AD. Back then - the amphitheater could contain more than 70,000 people. It is organized in three orders of 80 arches adorned respectively with Doric, Ionic and Corinthian columns.” It had a great view of the Arch de Constantine and we ran into a random cat living on one of the sets of stairs. Truly random.
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Right when we were leaving the sun started shining again and we were excited, because the light was beautiful and perfect for us to go see “The Forum” which is a term for the Roman Ruins. A lot of the ruins have had to be uncovered because of harsh whether in the sixteenth century. The Forum was extremely peaceful… beautiful gardens, birds chirping, the smell of rain and orange trees… it was very heavenly. We got to see where they use to host chariot races and where they used to meet and have famous ceremonies. It is said to be the most famous place in ancient Rome. According to our map it was "damaged by a fire in 283 AD and restored under Emperor Diocletian. From the fourth century, it began to fall into decay, echoing the fate of Rome itself.”
Our favorite part of the Forum was the end because it was sunset and we got to see the second and third of the three main arch’s in Rome – The Arch of Titus & The Arch of Septimius Severus - and a bunch of standing columns from the ancient Roman ruins in the middle of a meadow. It was beautiful.
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Day 3
We decided to wake up early to head to the Vatican because we heard that if we got up early we wouldn’t have to wait in lines. We took a bus to Vatican City and decided to visit Saint Peters Basilica first. The square surrounding Saint Peter’s Basilica is beautiful…It is the biggest square in Rome and makes you feel as if you were living in Roman times yourself. There are 140 statues of Saints, works by Bernini, surrounding the square and beautiful fountains and columns surround the 340 meter area. Turns out, that lines are actually worse in the mornings and that we should have come in the afternoon for shorter lines. We are happy we got started early however, because the Vatican + The Sistine Chapel + St. Peter’s Basilica took us about eight hours to get through.
Our favorite part of the Basilica was the shear size of the basilica itself. Michelangelo wanted it to be PERFECT and didn’t listen to anyone when they told him what to do with it. Apparently he didn’t have many friends because he was a “my way or the highway” kind of person. We loved the “Pieta” with the Madonna holding Jesus – obviously… it’s only one of the most famous works of art in history. We also loved the Bernini bronze piece in the center of the basilica – it is a Baroque sculpted bronze canopy called a baldachin. There is a statue of St. Peter within the basilica where you are supposed to rub the right foot of the statue (but rub both just in case) and he will bless you personally. The renaissance art within the basilica is breathtaking and most of the art in the basilica is a mosaic… yes, little pieces of glass/marble making up the works of art. Talk about attention to detail. There are many saints that have been buried within the basilica and have been embalmed/preserved and made into wax figures so that they can be shown to the public. Scotty and I found this a bit creepy, but cool none-the-less.
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We keep feeling like we are living in the movie/book The Davinci Code/Angels and Demons. Apparently they filmed part of Angels and Demons in the St. Peters Basilica square. There is a secret passage-way between the square and the castle that popes have escaped to in war times.
The Vatican is extremely hard to explain… as are most things in Rome… you kind of have to see them in person to see how amazing everything is. It has been the Pope’s residence since 1377. Since 1377, 265 Popes have lived there. Vatican City is an independent state ruled by the Pope so it is technically separate from Rome and its own country with its own citizens. The Vatican museums have so many little details sculpted into the ceiling and walls and building in general. There are halls and halls and ceilings upon ceilings of amazing, brilliant art. It’s impossible to look at it all. There were thousands of statues, thousands of paintings, thousands of PEOPLE too. It’s hard to move and breathe. 40,000 people per day visit the Vatican.
We ended in the Sistine Chapel (Scott’s favorite part of the day) with the famous ceiling frescos Michelangelo painted in 1481 and “Last Judgment” painting by Michelangelo in 1535 (he painted this when he was 60). Apparently Michelangelo painted everyone naked within “Last Judgment” and the church did not like that so they asked him to paint clothes on the figures. Michelangelo refused, so the church left the clothes off until Michelangelo died. They then had another artist paint clothes onto the figures. I am baffled by the fact that they would deface the work of art like this. Michelangelo painted them naked because he said that on judgment day, we will all be naked before God. I think is very true and the piece is not the same without what was intended by the artist. I am personally just not a fan of anyone’s artwork being changed without their consent.
Picture from the web:
We are having a blast.
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