I've been to Italy before, but somehow, never to Rome. This is more of a problem than you might think given my long fascination with ancient Rome that goes
well beyond the meme. I would only be on the ground for four days, but I would move fast, seeing many of the objects of my obsession, Pictures aren't grouped chronologically but rather by era, so if you notice the weather changing from photo to photo that's why. I realized that in Rome, it's also not possible to keep the eras fully separate (see: the view of St. Peter's Basilica from the Palace of Augustus Caesar, modern art in the Vatican, columns built into medieval houses, the Marcus Aurelius column in front of the Prime Minister's residence.)
I. Ancient Rome (~390 BC-AD 400):
I.I Imperial Fora
I.II Nero's Palace (Domus Aurea)
I.III The Pantheon
I.IV Largo di Torre Argentina, Site of Julius Caesar's Assassination
I.V Coliseum
I.VI Aqueducts
I.VII Miscellany
-I.VII.I Baths
-I.VII.II Walls, Roads, and Tombs
-I.VII.III The Mithraeum
-I.VII.IV Miscellanous
II. Renaissance and Baroque Rome (~1400-1800):
II.I The Vatican
II.II Fountains
II.III Miscellany: Steps, Palaces, Rocks, and Basilicas
III. Modern Rome (1800-present):
III.I: The Victor Emmanuel II Monument
III.II: Art and Neighborhoods
Food
Pragmatic Tips
General Observations on Rome
Historical Remarks For Those So Inclined
New Alternate History Branchpoints
Projects Back Home
I.I Ancient Rome: the Imperial Fora
I was mostly in Rome to see the cultural fossils of classical antiquity. I've been fascinated with Roman history for a long time and with particular emperors even beyond what the meme would suggest, and I was actually worried I would end up overwhelmed with the local version of
Stendhal syndrome. Carl Jung had the same concern and syncoped at his travel agent's office and ended up never making the trip. I was in fact moved to tears on walking into the Coliseum that I was finally there, but didn't dissociate. Maybe I was just happy that I beat Carl Jung.
For non-nerds: Roman history breaks down into the Republic, then in the late first century BC Julius Caesar established the Empire, and the Empire broke into two periods, the Principate from the late first century BC until AD 235 (which is what most people think of when they think about Rome), the Dominate (from 284 until the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in 476 where many of the patterns of life in medieval Europe began to appear), with the Crisis of the Third Century in between those two periods.
For your edification, my ranking of Principate dynasties:
- Nerva Antonine Dynasty: remains underrated, high hit rate for good emperors
- Julio-Claudian: the OG's but really only had two solid ones (Augustus and Claudius)
- Flavian: a kind of strange interregnum between the two above, they get credit for stabilizing the empire after Nero.
- Severan: losers who led Rome to the Crisis of the Third Century, already showing some of the bad signs thereof during their reign.
Above, looking down from the Palatine Hill toward the Capitoline Hill. Below, the Arch of Titus.
I was surprised at how much brick there was (Roman bricks were very flat by modern standards.) Not even the Romans can make everything out of marble, even here in the very center of ancient Rome.
Above and below: looking at the old alley where doctors practiced and sold medicine. Even two thousand years ago, medical center parking was bad.
"Pile of marbles"? Come on, make something up. Remains of Galen's clinic or something. (It actually might be.)
This is the
Temple of Vesta with its attendant
virgins. But before you get too excited about the representation of women here, if a Virgin broke her vow, she wasn't just fired, she was buried alive.
Above and below: Temple of the Dioscuri (Castor and Pollux.) Marble cracks and can break after 2000 years, but brick just gets rounded off and kind of melts over that timeframe. Still, the Roman brick after 2000 years looks a lot better than the adobes in California after less than 200 (see e.g. El Cuervo Adobe in Penasquitos Canyon, San Diego
here, constructed no earlier than 1837, and San Diego gets less than half the rainfall of Rome.)
Entering the Imperial Fora, where the emperors lived. The concept of emperor was very much that of an office or institution, with a "first among equals" feel. It was not officially a family institution like later royalty in the medieval period, and there was not a specific imperial palace. Some were big - Augustus, the first full emperor, had a big palace but his personal rooms within it were relatively small and there were guest rooms as well where visitors could watch chariot races at the Circus Maximus. Again, I was fortunate to say that at no point did I think I would trade my actual home for one of these places.
This trip made me wonder
how Washington D.C. will look in 2000 years.
Above: The large white building in the high distance at center-right is the back of the Victor Emmanuel monument. Below, the three large arches are part of the Basilica of Maxentius (Constantine's rival, ultimately defeated and killed at the Battle of Milvian Bridge; that's when Constnatine thought he saw a cross on the sun and began his conversion to Christianity.) I found it oddly disconcerting that the signs name the places in modern Italian ("Basilica di Massenzio"); it's obvious enough, but somehow there's a different flavor in Italian than Latin, and it must be strange to speak a language so close to that of ancient Latin. It would be like reading the Old English epic of Bear-Wolf.
Entering the Farnesian Gardens - built by a wealthy family in the 1500s, later taken by the Spanish Bourbons (hence the fleurs de lis scattered around, I guess.) Yes it's Renaissance era but it's right in the middle of the Forum area.
Above, a coffin with a Dionysian theme from the late second century, with Christian frescoes, obviously later. I try my best not to be biased, but the skill evident in sculptures from the classical pagan era is just not matched by these later paintings.
I always imagine what it's like to live right next to somewhere of this level of significance. This place occupies a true causal high ground - a time traveler could make a great many disturbances in different places around the world that would be unlikely to upset any balance, but even the most minor change here for a period of half a millennium could have consequences echoing through all of time. I'm sure the shock wears off after move-in day. (I found a one bed one bath for US$1550 a month in that area - compare to just under twice that for the same space in San Francisco's Marina District.)
Above and below: Temple of Julius Caesar. Something about
looking on my works ye mighty,
summer grass, etc.
Above: the Lacus Curtius, once believed to be a gateway to hell, which is extremely metal. Below: Location of the Lapis Niger, under which Romulus was believed to be buried.
The entire area was used for grazing cattle in the early medieval period, during the Lombard occupation after the end of the Gothic Wars. Oddly enough, it was here that Asimov's "cribbin' from Gibbon" came back to me, imagining the Second Foundation scholar talking to a hostile farmer
in vulgar dialect in the shadows of Trantor's ruins.
Above and below, Trajan's Market and Forum resp. (Nervan-Antonine dynasty, one of the five good emperors in the second century.) After that, Trajan's Column. I like that better than an arch.
The remains of the Temple of Saturn. The orange-tan building right behind it is the Italian Parliament, featuring an equestrian statue of Marcus Aurelius in a square designed by Michelangelo. This is unfair. Germany gets a national anthem written by Beethoven, Italy gets a Parliamentary square designed by Michelangelo - come on now.
Fine, here's the Severan Arch. Now go let the Principate end during your dynasty you piece of shit.
Above, the rock under those trees is the Tarpeian Rock, which was used for executions. After prisoners were stwuck (
vewwy woughly) they were thwown off the wock, and to the floor. Below, now we're getting to where Augustus lived during his reign.
That long sandy gravel strip in the depression is the old Circus Maximus, where chariot racing occurred. Yes you can walk on it if you want, and on two separate days it was actually the shortest route to where I wanted to go. This is where the suites were where visitors could stay and watch. The NFL doesn't have hotel rooms overlooking the field in its stadiums, which seems like leaving money on the table. Two more pics below of the Circus Maximus, one from Ulysses Travel looking back across at the Augustus complex, and another from Google Maps with the Circus at lower-center.
Above, St. Peter's Basilica in the distance.
Above: the Temple of Venus. Venus was a big deal because the Caesar family claimed descent from the goddess herself, though it was actually designed by the later emperor Hadrian - the most underrated emperor, and
not just because of the wall. He was responsible for more of the remaining charismatic structures than any other emperor, and realized (against the current of public and elite opinion) that eternal expansion was not sustainable. He was the
James K. Polk of emperors. I picked flowers growing wild in front of the Temple of Venus and took them home to present to the wife and daughter. Points! Points for Daddy! Two below, detail inside the temple. Below that, the temple is right across from the Coliseum.
Above and below: Julius Caesar. You know you're a nerd when you can recognize the emperors, or notice family resemblance (eg between Marcus Aurelius and Commodus.) Also I think that Dessler from
Space Battleship Yamato looks like him.
I was chagrinned to realize that by this time, I was officially Roman-ed out, and I left the Forum area. Luckily there was pizza and gelato to be had nearby.
I.II Nero's Palace (Domus Aurea) (
Domus? Nominative? Yes)
Nero was not a well-liked emperor. The last of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, he was deposed and driven to suicide. He was so bad that, 2000 years later, you know he was bad, and Christians and Jews were worried he would come back alive and get them, which is why they
talked about him in code in Revelations. As part of the campaign to literally erase his memory, the Coliseum was built over the site of his massive pool, and his palace was buried by Trajan. This only adds to the unwelcomingness of the place as you walk through the dark chambers, which feel more like a massive tomb. We were in there for an hour and a half. If you have a chance to see the Domus Aurea, do it.
The stoic philosopher
Epictetus was the secretary to one of Nero's advisors, and certainly frequented these halls. A quote from him I encountered while reading during the trip: "For even sheep do not vomit up their grass and show to the shepherds how much they have eaten; but when they have internally digested the pasture, they produce externally wool and milk. Do you also show not your theorems to the uninstructed, but show the acts which come from their digestion." Joe Byerly's interpretation is that "he's using the sheep as a metaphor for the pursuit of wisdom. The purpose of self-development isn’t to tell everyone we are doing it or to gain knowledge to impress bosses, but to let it show in our actions." This is a good thing for medical trainees to remember: we'll see your knowledgebase based on the treatment decisions you make, don't just recite Robbins Pathology text. (Seneca was often here as well until Nero made him kill himself. A sort of limited
burning of books and burying of scholars in China.)
In some places you could see where fifteenth and sixteenth century adventurers/grave robbers drilled in through the ceiling. Around here they had installed headsets for a pretty amazing VR experience.
As atmosphere and sepulchral as the buried palace of a notorious emperor is, in movies we always imagine the opening of a tomb and subsequent historical discovery Changing Everything. But it never does. Did you know in the 1970s we found a whole new book of the Bible? Yes, really and literally. You can
read it right here at this link. See, no one cares, religious or otherwise.
Hic sapientia est
Back out into the light of day. That concrete wall you see standing up behind the trees is the Coliseum. Below: a playground on the site of Trajan's Baths, which sit atop Nero's Palace.
I.III Ancient Rome: The Pantheon
You come around a corner and there it is: a 2000 year old temple, first built during the reign of Augustus, restored after a fire during the reign of Hadrian, converted later to a Christian church. Called the Pantheon because multiple gods were worshipped there, it features a dome with a skylight, made from 5500 tons of concrete.
My second surprise encounter with Raphael on this trip, who asked to be interred here.
When I first read about it, I wondered about the skylight - that meant when it rained, it would just rain right into the Pantheon! And since it was raining that morning, I now knoww that indeed it doe! You can see below that the middle is fenced off, and the holes in floor for water to drain out.
I.IV Ancient Rome: Largo di Torre Argentina, Site of Julius Caesar's Assassination
Above, the Curia of Pompey where Caesar was stabbed to death. Afterward, Augustus declared it a cursed place and ordered it closed up. They don't seem to have any special celebration in the Ides of March, which was a few days before my visit and to my mind seems like a major missed opportunity. Below: the area is known for stray cats, who were trying to stay warm this chilly rainy morning. Someone needs to write a story where each cat is the reincarnation of one of the conspirators. This is Pindarus, on top of Cassius.
>
Looks like Pindarus finally got up.
Above: This is ASL (Awesome Sign Language) communicating a) "Et Two, Brute?" b) that Caesar's assassination was very metal, and c) that it must have been a very shocking experience for him.
Below, Brutus getting a drink.
I.V Ancient Rome: the Coliseum
Built on the former site of Nero's massive pool by Emperor Vespasian, as part of the program of
damnatio memoriae to erase the shameful reign of Nero from Roman history.
Above: you come out of the aptly-named Colosseo Metro stop and it's right in front of you. What a pain it must be digging new tunnels here for the Metro (forget
(
a farmer just trying to make a living finding the occasional tablet in a field, this is full-on
Tecnochtitlan-level construction-interfering density.) Below: Constantine's Arch.
Imagine the excitement of walking into what was almost certainly the biggest arena in the world. (Come on Marcus,
relax and enjoy the experience. I may be an Epicurean rather than a stoic, but I'm still not a fan of
the Blues or the Greens.)
I guess this is where I should disclose that I haven't yet seen Gladiator (but I've been to
Ait Ben Haddou, does that count?) If you're planning a trip, the Coliseum and in particular the basement or upper levels tours are the hardest to get, but for me the arena floor was fine. The Coliseum was the most boring part of the central ancient Roman area to me. Guys hitting each other? Who cares! Show me the palace and temples! Show me where the Senate met!
Where I was standing was the floor of the arena. The reason there is so much space and structure underneath is that this is where animals were kept, and doors would open in the floor of the arena and rhinos or lions or elephants would appear. It could also be filled with water for ship battles. A related thought: the Romans were often contrasted as brutish compared to the Greeks who originated so much philosophy and culture. But it was the Romans who
built things, while the Greeks debated.
The Coliseum was a wonder for its time, but if you haven't been there and you're seeing it in detail for the first time, you're no doubt noticing it's about the scale of a good-sized high school football stadium. This is about what I expected. My reaction was not to diminish this achievement, but rather "look how much they did almost two thousand years ago, and how thankful I am to be living in an age of modern miracles that this can seem modest."
People planning to visit the ancient sites of Rome are often warned not to be devasted that there might be scaffolding or other marks of modernity around the structures. In this case, no doubt masons came to work on with carts of bricks, same as this van is here doing whatever it's doing. Besides being necessary to keep the structures intact, the signs of ongoing work are a concrete reminder that history isn't something we're isolated from - we're further downstream but we're still in the same river. I find that exhilarating. Otherwise, it would just be like visiting a movie set.
I.VI Ancient Rome: Aqueducts (Parco degli Acquedotti)
The aptly-named park is in the southern part of the city. It was a nice day and lots of locals were out enjoying it including a band setting up. Easy walking distance from the several Metro stops. One of the aqueducts is more recent (Renaissance) but the rest were built by the ancient Romans.
The far southern part of the city is known for modern architecture (including a post-war neighborhood with an actual grid system designed for driving, Appio-Claudio) and for Cinecittà, the Italian Hollywood. While in this area I thought briefly about taking a tour
of the set of HBO's Rome just as a goof or some meta-commentary on
Umberto Eco's hyper-reality (I'm not sure there's a difference.) But my
increasingly limited seconds in not only Italy, but in the world stops me from doing things as a goof.
I.VII Ancient Rome Miscellany: Baths, Mithraeum, Tomb of the Scipios, Baths, Walls, Gates, Isolated Landmarks, and More Baths
I.VII.I Ancient Rome Miscellany: Baths
So many
terme (baths.) Besides Diocletian, there were may I ran across without really looking for them: Caracalla, Trajan, Titus, and (sort of) Alexander Severus. I was finding baths without looking for them. There were baths coming in the windows. These Romans must have been the cleanest people in history.
Above, the beginning of the Baths of Diocletian, now the National Museum of Rome. Again the old structure joins directly into a modern one. Diocletian is another of my favorites but reigning as he did after the Crisis of the Third Century (ending it in fact) he began the formal division of the empire, and actually only visited Rome once. He did some
pretty good persecuting but
didn't understand inflation at all.
Above: these stone boxes were all coffins. I didn't check under the lids because after 17 centuries they probably got a little ripe.
The inside of the bath building is now used as an art museum, but obviously heavy on the archaeology. Here is another carved coffin, with detail below that on Medusa's head.
"Know yourself"
A drunken figure above. Below, the interior courtyard of the baths was lined with recovered statues.
Above and below: the Nymphaeum of Alexander Severus, another Severan Dynasty loser who sucked.
I.VII.II Ancient Rome Miscellany: Walls, Roads, and Tombs
Rome had two walls: the Servian, built in the 300s BC, and the Aurelian, built in the AD 270s. Both were principally meant to keep invaders out. Large parts of both are stil standing, particularly the Aurelian. I went to look for the Colline Gate on the Servian, the
closest approach of Hannibal and the Carthaginian forces during the Second Punic War. While the Servian Wall has no remnants here (and hence the Colline Gate is long gone), the Aurelian Wall is still present just a few hundred meters east, and in it, the Porta Pia, designed by Michelangelo.
Looking south along the Aurelian Wall. The British embassy is immediately inside it here.
Two slides above, the Servian Wall at Termini Train Station in central Rome, from above, and from inside McDonald's (image credit to The Roman Guy and Gmaps.) (Go
here to see it on the map.)
One of my dreams since I was 12 was to walk along
the Appian Way, and here I was. While using it to walk to the Tomb of the Scipios and the Appian Gate of the Aurelian Wall, a very blunt-ended brown snake (like the one below) quite lazily sought its way along the path in front of me. Cautiously (because I don't know what snakes are venomous or not in this country) I used a long stick to get it off the trail. Wondering (of course not unreasonably) if a snake crossing one's path on the Appian Way was some sort of omen, I identified it and looked it up. It was probably an orbettino, or Italian slow worm (
Anguis veronensis or
fragilis.) Image credit Monaco Nature Encylopedia, because goddammit my phone died so you'll also have to look at random internet pictures of the Tomb and the Appian Gate.
And sure enough: "...according
to some traditional beliefs, the hazelworm was nothing less than the Serpent that had tempted Adam and Eve with fruit from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil in the Garden of Eden, and was therefore also accorded such alternative names as the Paradise Snake and the Worm of Knowledge..." The
Celts were more positive: "...they were revered as creatures of the earth, symbolizing the underworld and hidden knowledge."
The Tomb of the Scipios is interesting but also requires a reservation, which I did not make and had to content myself with seeing from outside. At first I was sad about this, but the good Scipios aren't even in there anyway (eg Africanus and Aemilianus.)
(Photos courtesy Pro Loco di Roma, dmofrancigenasudlazio.it, Turismo Roma, Wiki, and Rome Art Lover)
Next, the Appian Gate in the Aurelian Wall, also called the San Sebastiano Gate. This is some people's commute! (It certainly was the Friday early evening I was there, traffic was rough as a pedestrian.)
Above, supposedly the oldest street in Rome, about 25 centuries. If only Caltrans did such a good job, ZING HEY-O! Below,
the Bard of the Central Coast has gone international. If you think
this Bard gets a little blue,
check out the graffiti at Pompeii (hilarious, but not work safe.)
I.VII.III Ancient Rome Miscellany: the Mithraeum
A Mithraeum is a temple of Mithras. The Basilica of San Clemente was was a Roman home and recently in the basement, a Mithraeum (temple to
Mithras) was discovered.
Mithraism was a contemporary of early Christianity and was practiced in underground temples throughout the empire, especially by soldiers (there was a Mithraeum at
Hadrian's Wall, and a bigger one you can see by special appointment right under the Circus Maximus). What happened to this religion? It wasn't singled out for persecution by Christians once they had the upper hand, and certainly not by pagan Romans who collected gods (there was a fashion in the first century of gods with Egyptian animal heads and Greek-sculpted bodies in Augustus's palace - later you'll see a good one in the Vatican.) In the first century AD if someone asked you to predict which religion would eventually replace Roman paganism, you would've been hard-pressed to choose the weird offshoot of Judaism over Mithraism. (Side note: Ridley Scott's recent science fiction series
Raised by Wolves features an alternate history where Mithraism did in fact become the dominant religion, and Mary Gentle's
Ash: A Secret History features of a Joan of Arc-like character in an alternate medieval Europe where Christianity and Mithraism coexist.)
First two above: I thought I was pretty edgy, just going to a Christian church to see Mithras, until I was walking through the Vatican and saw this
much bigger statue of Mithras. Oh well. Below: the basilica itself was nice too.
I.VII.IV Ancient Rome Miscellany: Miscellaneous
Above and below: persistent ancient structures built into modern buildings and interacting with streets and sidewalks. The building above is the Casa dei Crescenzi, built in the 11th century and reusing classical material.
Above the Arch of Janus. Below that, the Temple of Hercules Victor. The Mouth of Truth is right across the street from this but there was always a line and my scrupulous honesty is in no need of confirmation. St. Valentine's skull is in the church though, that seems like a romantic date on February 14th.
Above and below, the column of Marcus Aurelius in front of the Prime Minister's house. I don't know if Signora Meloni was in.
I had lunch across from the Temple of Hadrian, which now houses Rome's stock exchange.
Above, the Arch of Gallienus and a nice
nasono. Below you can see in an ink drawing from the mid-1700s that the area around the arch was not well-developed at that time. This is about a 15 minute walk from the Coliseum.
Above: the Chapel of San Zenone has (supposedly) a fragment of the column on which christ was suspended
while he was flogged.
A random foot. I don't think we know who it belonged to. Found via Atlas Obscura.
II. Renaissance and Baroque Rome
II.I Renaissance and Baroque Rome: The Vatican
Despite being a metropolitan complex less than 1 square mile completely surrounded by Rome, and without its own water source, electricity or currency, the Vatican is officially a separate country. The history behind this (briefly) is: church made official religon of Roman Empire in fourth century, western empire falls in fifth century, Ostrogoths take over, then Visigoths, then Constantinople reunites Italy with the empire again for a couple decades, then the Lombards. Then, in the eighth century, the Franks (specifically, Charlemagne's father Pepin) defeated the Lombards and gave the land in central Italy to the Church, which became the Papal States, with the Pope as their leader. The Papal States persisted until the mid-1800s when Victor Emmanuel II took over everything except Rome itself. In 1870, when the French troops guarding it for the Pope left to defend against the Prussians, Victor Emmanuel moved in, and took Rome as well. In the 1920s Mussolini approached the Pope and worked out the current arrangement where the Vatican is its own
play-country. Prior to this, the Pope considered himself a "prisoner" and even excommunicated Victor Emmanuel, though he never excommunicated Hitler or Mussolini - the best explanation for which is that the morality of the Catholic church and the Pope is driven primarily by worldly politics and self-interest rather than any universal moral considerations. The walls here reminded me of the
Shogun's fortress in Tokyo.
Most relevant to us today is that over the centuries, the Vatican has accumulated quite a trove of art, starting in earnest with Sextus in the 1400s. Practical tips: get your tickets ahead of time, and be there on time. I was 25 minutes early and they wouldn't even let me get in line until 10 minutes before my time slot. Also, the museum tickets don't get you into St. Peter's Basilica or the Square. Pope Francis was hospitalized and quite ill forweeks prior tomy trip, and I really didn't want him to kick off andviid my tickets, so I found myself
humming this.
A note on the tone I occasionally take toward the Church of Rome throughout this post: if you're offended, you can either move your finger one inch and click away from the post - or alternately, you can read
this,
this, and/or
this, after which
I dare you to comment, report me, or otherwise complain. This organization and its adherents have
less than zero claim to any moral high ground and you would be better off, and your children safer, going to your local fast food franchise or car dealership for moral guidance, and I do mean that literally.
There were more ancient artifacts in the collection than I was anticipating, though I kind of raced through here to get ahead of the crowd since I was here for more recent work.
The tour is very well-conceived in the sense of building to the grand finale of the Sistine Chapel ceiling, with some denouement afterward.
(Below you can see the Mithras statue I included above, which is in the "animal room".)
A mirthful yet relevant tale from college: after learning about Goedel's theorem my freshman year, I proposed to a friend that we should call up the Vatican and ask "Hey, would you consider Christianity consistent" (in which case it would necessarily be incomplete) "or complete?" (in which case it would be inconsistent.) My friend said, "They would know that one. They would pass around the phone laughing, saying 'Hey we got another Goedel guy.'" I said, "Fine, I would ask to talk to the dumbest cardinal" and my friend said "Even he would know his way out of that one." Fastforward over 3 decades, and everyone I asked there seemed uninterested in engaging. On a lighter note, one of the security guards had the House of the Rising Sun by the Animals as his ringtone.
Ceiling panels. There is no rest for the eyes here.
Tapestries.
I had read about the map room and was looking forward to seeing it, but it caught me by surprise and on entering it even my cold dead heart skipped a beat. Looking down this passage reminded me of a beautiful and baroque version of
the light sequence at the end of 2001. (Which in turn reminds some people of Guitar Hero.)
I don't understand what's going on with this one given the obvious ability of the sculptor on the next one. Is this representing a theater mask of some sort?
This is a painting of the defeat of the Ottomans
on Kahlenberg Mountain outside Vienna, which is the closest the Vatican comes to showing members of Islam or any competing faith - meaning, a religion distinct from Christianity and a
going concern and competitor. Indeed, large parts of the museums are dedicated to pre-Christian pagan art and even Mithras. Why no Islam or Buddhism? For the same reason that in the lobby of a Microsoft facility, you might find a primitive computer from Xerox on display, but you won't find an iPhone.
The intensity of the beauty continues to build.
What are they looking at? Yes, the School of Athens. I didn't know it was here. Another surprise. If you're starting to feel a little overwhelmed, imagine being there. Brilliant though Raphael was, he was the
last opener before Michelangelo.
A little surprised to see this here, especially since it's not even the original. In this place, why bother?
Above: some more modern art to cleanse the palate, an
El Anatsui piece, who is very distinctive if you've ever seen his work before. Walking through all these galleries, contrasting all the realistic visual art (i.e., all non-decorative art before about 1900) with the small collection of modern art, it seems obvious that something like this transformation is about to happen to writing. With art the catalyst was the camera, and with writing it's AI. Today we look with amazement at the "manual" realism of the old masters, but learning to paint like this today has more modest returns - because of cameras. Starting around the 1870s, people like Van Gogh and Seurat and Cezanne anticipated how artists would (have to) move away from realism into more abstraction that simultaneously reflected deeper truths about how we humans see the world. A hundred years from now people might be amazed at the psychology of a Dostoyevsky or simple hard prose of Hemingway, but the human-produced short stories and novels will be the verbal equivalent of impressionism or surrealism.
And then, the headliner. Photography is forbidden inside the chapel, which seems transparently to protect their intellectual property given that no one uses flashes anymore. I'm embarrassed to admit until I walked into this room, I didn't realize the Creation of Adam is merely one panel of very many -
enjoy them all here. The one that most stuck out to me was Adam, Eve, and the Serpent in the Garden of Eden.
Any of these ceilings would be stunning in any other environment, but after the Sistine Chapel, it's hard for them to compete.
I realized here that there's not much stained glass in the Vatican.
The Vatican takes an approach not unlikely many other larger modern attractions (for instance, the Harry Potter Studio in London) which has gift shops interspersed throughout. I bought postcards there but the Vatican post office was a pain about mailing them - cash only, and they wouldn't let me use their pens at the Vatican post office to write on the card (one thing this micro-nation does have is a post office.)
I did find the exit interesting. Like a steep Guggenheim.
Above: someone praying right there at the Vatican walls, right in the lord's crosshairs, and yet no one helping. The possibilities are that either the Christian god is not all powerful, and/or not good, and/or that somehow this person's life situation is good. Below: the local temple of American capitalism. I've never seen anyone arguing over whether cheeseburgers are real.
The next few are all from St. Peter's Square.
Above: again the
problem of theodicy. That's a homeless person sleeping on the threshold of the Vatican. The problem of theodicy is, if a god is good, and a good is all-powerful, how can evil exist? Since we see suffering in front of our eyes, at least one of the first two conditions is not true. (People try to get out of this by saying our frail human minds can't actually reason out what's going on, but then why would they even waste their time trying to figure it out and change anyone else's mind?) Below: the Passetto di Borgo, a secret escape passageway from the Vatican to the Castle Sant'Angelo (originally Hadrian's Mausoleum.) It was used at least once, in the 1500s when Charles V's army sacked Rome by accident.
Above, where the Passetto ends, at the castle (behind the trees.) Below, the castle at the Tiber, then looking back at St. Peter's. I of course did the thing and physically touched the Tiber.
II.II Renaissance and Baroque Rome: Fountains
The Quattro Fiumi Fountain by Bernini in the Piazza of Navona is by far the best fountain I saw in Rome, and I have difficulty understanding why Trevi Fountain is so much more popular. The space that makes up the Piazza was originally the Stadium of Domitian, where noble Diocletian served justice to Agnes for being a virgin.
Ave noble Diocletian!
The next three: not far away is Trevi Fountain and as you can see even in the off-season it's overrun by tourists. I can't imagine what this area would look like in July, and don't want to.
I stumbled across the Quattro Fontane intersection in the course of walking from the President's palace to the Porta Pia in the Aurelian Wall on Via Venti Settembre. Sculptors were Fontana and da Cortona.
And below, another work by the aptly named Fontana that I randomly stumbled across a few minutes later, dell'Acqua Felice (or the Fountain of Moses.)
II.III Renaissance and Baroque Rome Miscellany: Steps, Palaces, Rocks, and Basilicas
After visiting Eastern Europe, you really appreciate that it was the
western Roman Empire that fell. As you might have noticed from the pictures above, originally my trip was all about ancient ROme, but oddly enough, studying for the trip compelled me to read up on Charlemagne, the Western Schism, the Papal States, the unification of Italy, and the last century of Italian history including its modern politics. Like most Americans, my view of the history of Italy was "Roman Empire...dark ages...art and a couple scientists, something something, Mussolini." I also now have a much better appreciation of Prime Minister-Presidential systems now.
I think most republics, including our own, would benefit from this.
The next three are the Spanish Steps. The police have taken to aggressively keeping people from sitting on them because it is a working thoroughfare, but at 8:30 on a rainy Saturday morning this wasn't a problem.
Below: the rock that according to legend,
Roland struck with the sword Durendal. Also shocking. Yes I know that this is medieval and not Renaissance, sue me.
The President's complex. Previously the king's residence. The Prime Minister's place isn't bad but it's not much compared to this, I think by design. Similarly, until I understood the division of powers in a constitutional monarchy, I never understood how 10 Downing Street could look like a depressing little accounting office.
Above and below: the Maria Maggiore Basilica.
Sadly, the
Magic Door has been vandalized so access is blocked off. Below, a nice little park (Villa Carpegna) between my hotel and the Metro station.
III. Modern Rome (1800-present)
III.I Modern Rome: The Victor Emmanuel II Monument
In studying for the trip, I learned a lot about the formation of modern Italy and the Papal States before that. Italy is unique in Europe in a) not having a monarch (not until the 1800s - the Pope ruled the Papal States but it was not a hereditary position and instead elected from the worldwide Catholic church; that said, the last non-Italian Pope before John Paul II was in the 1500s, similar to baseball's "World" Series.) b) Unifying under a new monarch - with Mason-like ideals in the mid-to-late 1800s, who had a Republican general (Garibaldi) fighting for him and c) abolishing their monarchy less than a century later. I found this monument unexpectedly moving and possibly the best example of embodying the ideals of the time into architecture, on Capitoline Hill no less. The interior strongly anticipates (or maybe partly defined?) art deco.
III.II Modern Rome: Art and Neighborhoods
Above: the aforementioned statue of Marcus Aurelius in front of Parliament, in a square designed by Michelangelo. Below: if you're the government of the city of Rome,
of course you're going to use SPQR on public works or use the Romulus and Remus crest on your government buildings, because how awesome is that? I mean I'm sure
your local seal or symbol is fine but it's not the same.
Above and below: Roman alleys near the Coliseum. You don't have to go far down an alley to get away from the tourist crowds, tourist prices, and tourist quality food.
The next few are the Jewish quarter. As far as feeling like a medieval city, this was my favorite part of Rome.
Below, probably the prettiest synagogue I've seen.
Far from the Jewish quarter but near the President's palace along the Via Venti Settembre, I also found this spot interesting. Probably they're all right here because the original church of St. Andrew is right across the street.
Above and below: where I had lunch one day, wandering back through the narrow streets.
Above and below: a futurist exhibition in one of the buildings in the Farnesian Gardens above the Imperial Fora. A friend in college, in comparing the psychology of the New World to the Old, commented that having a constant reminder of their ancestors' greatness (or in some cases the greatness of the people they colonized, e.g. Mexico, "screws them up" - gives them a kind of inferiority complex that prevents attempts at greater achievement. While I don't think this is correct (the single example of China falsifies it) it's an interesting idea and I think of it often. I especially thought of it every time I ran across modern art in Rome. The upside is that people in societies with unbroken cultural lineage aren't so ignorant to think that they're the first to think of things; another downside is to automatically suppress a creative impulse that may actually be novel. Futurism is an early twentieth-century school of art that was very much a reaction to the oppressiveness of the past in Italy. (I'm unaware of modern artistic movements in China with a similar violent rejection of the overwhelming weight of history, but in that case political activity may have blown off the same steam.) Futurism did end up somewhat tainted by its association with Mussolini.
We have bocce courts around Sonoma County as well but they have a certain "air". This was just an honest down-to-Earth bocce court, with old guys playing.
Near the Coliseum I stumbled onto a fundraiser as an Ethiopian church was letting out, which is the one time I ate non-Italian food. If you can get a big plate of Ethiopian for 5 euro, come on. (Although, I was sorely tempted as you can see in the next picture. I used to have a thing about getting Mexican or Chinese in other countries, but it's usually not great, and why waste a meal?)
Next time in Rome: Porta Maggiore Basilica, Mausoleum of Augustus, walk the Milvian Bridge (site of Constantine's victory), Trastevere neighborhood, and some
Enrico Fermi tourism
FOOD
Above, my first real dinner in Rome, pasta all'amatriciana as I recall. As you can see however, sadly even the Italians have fallen to the custom of ordering online via QR codes.
- I tried three new red varietals, of which I very much liked Montepulciano. Nero d’Avola was fine. Then both last and least, Cesenese might now be my least favorite red varietal.
- Roman pasta and pizza includes more ham, eggs, and salt than other regions (Spanish influence?.) I ate: rigatoni all'amatriciana, pasta alla gricia, cacio e pepe, and carbonara.
- Modern Romans like to drink bitter things. I tried Chinotto soda and a rose-flavored drink as a mixer and didn't love them. Even the spritz drink has a bitter taste to it. Capuccino and macchiato are no less bitter and disgusting in Rome than anywhere else (coffee drinks taste bad, that's why people put cream and sugar in it. If there was no drug value, no one would drink it. I'll fight you.)
- At one point I broke the "cappuccino curfew" by accident (had it after a late lunch when I meant to ask for a macchiato) and no one cared, at all.
- I realized there are three approaches to developing a cuisine: 1) Big hunks of expensive stuff - steakhouse, high-end French cuisine 2) chopped up bits of tasty stuff, maybe with something cheap that can be mass produced like a noodle (Italian, Chinese) and finally 3) we need to consume something to avoid starvation (Russian, old timey North European food in general.)
- Also, I flew through Istanbul and my main takeaway: Turkish sour cherry juice is fantastic. Note: it has no health benefits. It just tastes really good. Drink it because it tastes good. You don't need another reason.
PRAGMATIC TIPS
- Above all else - buy tickets to historical sites directly from the Italian authorities if possible. Not Viator, not another tour company. You will pay much more and the horror stories of tours being canceled without refund from these third-party hucksters are legion. Those tour and guide companies are basically scalpers, but even worse because you're not even guaranteed a ticket! Here is the Coliseum ticket site. The Italian authorities are clearly sick of it and taking steps to shut the scalpers down.
- Rome is walkable but in the suburbs, the sudewalks are incredibly narrow or altogether non-existent, which makes it less walkable.
- The Circo Massimo Metro station has two separate entrances for the two directions on the line, and if you enter the wrong one, you have to exit and buy another ticket. It's very stupid. So, for Circo Massimo, before you go through the gates, make sure the train on that side is going the direction you want. Otherwise the Metro is fine, the machines do contactless payments and are programmed in multiple languages. I never felt in danger of being pickpocketed but I also keep everything in front pockets. The trains do get crowded and I estimate about half the riders were tourists.
- I got to experience a sciopero, a transit strike. It was more like a light tap, since the Metro lines I was using had zero disruption. Locals did seem to avoid the system on those days. I thought I was conscientiously checking online if any were imminent but this one still snuck up on me.
- Scams: the "where are you from" guys selling bracelets are still out, but not as many as online info would suggest - either because it's not high season, or possibly too many people have seen the videos, no one stops for them, and the scam is ruined (let's have a pity party one two three AWWWWWWWWWW.) Also, I'm not the most smooth and street-smart character out there but come on, what an obvious scam, how can anyone fall for this. (If they try to put the bracelet on, withdraw your arm; if they drop it, smirk and say "Signor, hai lasciato cadere il tuo braccialetto."
- It's true that the post office can change your money. That said, not all of them are set up to do it, and the one time I did it, the clerk was clearly not used to the process. Amd after the fee and the bad exchange rate, it would've just been better going to a major bank’s ATM.
- Do NOT assume you can always pay with credit. I don't think you can say that everyone in tourist-relevant businesses in Tome takes cash for all purchases. I ran into this twice my second day in Rome, first at a bakery in(she had a credit device but said it was only for groceries; it looked very dusty - lip service to some legal requirement?) and later the same afternoon an osteria tucked down an alley where I had lunch. Fortunately at the latter the host was happy to take $US but couldn't make change, so this lunch almost doubled in price. The Vatican post office also is cash-only.
- The nasoni (below) are free, free-flowing water faucets throughout the city. Tourists get nervous about the safety of drinking out of them. I used them regularly and never had any problem.
- Saturday night it was very hard to find a place to eat without a reservation (3 tries), even in the outer parts of the city.
- Crossing the street is very much a negotiation between pedestrians and drivers, unlike other places I've been. It's either pedestrian is god (eg California) or pedestrians will definitely die if not exercising utmost caution. My wife hates when I cross against traffic, understanadably as she's actually been hit by cars twice. I explained that not everyone sucks at crossing the street as badly as she does. That definitely made my marriage better.
GENERAL OBSERVATIONS ON ROME
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Despite the stereotype, I found that Italians are really not more emotionally demonstrative than other Europeans, and probably not even as much as Americans. Also, the amount of disorder - litter, open hostility or other disruptive behavior that I witnessed, was almost always less than in the US.v
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Occasionally you see Italian military (not Carabinieri) stationed around the city. This is the ongoing 2008 effort Strade Sicure (Safe Roads) intended as a general crackdown on crime. Well, is it working? Articles I could find were generally data-free and seemed to boil dpwn to "I like it" or "I don't like it."
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One night I had a drink in the hotel bar one night and the pianist played an interpretation of The Godfather. I mean come on.
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We should adopt collectives for groups of tourists from different countries (e.g., a pack of Germans, a herd of Americans, a pride of Japanese, an unkindness of French, etc.)
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There are wild parrots in Rome. I saw the greatest number at Piazza Vittorio Emanuele. I expect most cities in the developed world with minimal nights below freezing have colonies by now.
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Italian and Spanish are similar enough that if you speak one, you can things and follow many conversations. Speaking is a different story mostly due to articles and pronouns, but they start to click quickly and I think people are used to Spanish-speakers communicating inelegantly in espitaliano. Related: I heard a lot of Spanish, including Mexican Spanish, spoken by tourists, and not as much French as I would have expected. Many Italians speak decent English and between that and my half-assed espitaliano, we got by. (For example, thanks to the guy who helped me find Tomb of the Scipios when the Polizia who worked at a nearby intersection had no clue, and told me it was what turned out to be an abandoned police observation stand!)
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The electronic screech-beep of the Metro doors closing is quite similar to Clowncore's Toilet or the beginning of Meshuggah's Future Breed Machine. Also, there is a Metro stop called Cipro. I looked for Levoquin or Avelox but apparently they weren't cool enough to make the cut. While I'm making medication jokes, on the Metro I kept overhearing snatches of conversation in Italian and thinking people were saying "olanzapine”, thus showing a) I should work less b) I should get irony points for having auditory illusions of the name of an antipsychotic.
HISTORICAL REMARKS FOR THOSE SO INCLINED
The first sustained European Empire in the
Iron Age, and after the Axial Age as well. When we ask what made the Romans so successful, part of the answer must be that its timing was good. Any empire arising during this period in the Silk Road Old World (Europe, Asia, North Africa) was going to have a similar impact on the future - as the Han Dynasty and the Maurya Empire did. Rome's Principate and Dominate also neatly fit the
200-250 year cycle of states shown more clearly by China. It's often pointed out that from first powered flight to Moon landing was 66. But I find it more unnerving that from first use of specialized tools in the Upper Paleolithic, to nuclear fusion and AI, was about 40,000 years, which in biological or geological terms is the blink of an eye. (One one hundred thousandth of the history of life on Earth.) Given how rapidly life appeared and therefore how likely it was, either you must conclude a) we're alone as an intelligent species because we're the first, b) we're surrounded by, and looking right at, evidence of intelligence but don't recognize it or c) you're very concerned about the Great Filter, as I am. Consistent with Epicurus, enjoy yourself; regardless, we'll both be dead soon enough.
China is an experiment in what might have happened if the Roman Empire never ended, but just kept getting new dynasties. Europe is like China if the Warrings States period never ended.
What if this was reversed?
Historical lesson: you can consistently dominate foes when you have better technology. No surprise there - but once they're using the same weapons and have the same organization, your days of automatic superiority are numbered, especially if you're operating far from home or in unfamiliar environments. Hence, the growing dominance of the German tribes in the western half of Europe, and for much of
the rest of European history. This does raise the question, why didn't Celts follow this pattern? Yes, they did sack Rome at one point, but were gradually replaced by both Romans and Germans.
As an erstwhile follower of Epicurus I'm disappointed that there are no Epicurean sites, and no OPEN Neo-Pythagorean sites (the Basilica of Porta Maggiore is there but not open). The death of syncretism in the Middle East and West with the Abrahamic religions (as compared to Asia) continues to be an interesting topics. Imagine an alternate history of Europe with overlapping Christian, Roman, Mithraic, Epicurean, Neo-Platonist, Neo-Pythagorean, and Stoic halls and temples.
It seems amazing that Rome is not all excavated already, especially in the context of having been in a literate place for the entirety of its existence. Goes to show that a) these things take interest, time, and money that doesn't exist in any meaningful amounts for such endeavors until the industrial age and b) people have to go on living their life and not recording every single thing that happened where there house stands.
People are often drawn to the analogy of Athens as Britain, and Rome as America, but I feel this relies on a superficial attraction to Greece having put colonies in Italy, and Greece as a source of "higher culture." (It's worth nothing that for all Greece's philosophers, it was Rome that built the aqueducts.) A better analogy would be Britain as Rome, and America as Constantinople.
Strauss used Jerusalem and Athens as symbols of faith and reason, two poles of human experience. More accurately, they're two poles of human cognition. There is a third, Rome, the pole of authority.
Trump is not America's Nero (in significance, though maybe in personality defects.) He's maybe Commodus (who wants the trappings of the office, but not the work, and casts aside the values of his predecessors after the soft life they allowed.) I fear he's most likely America's first barracks emperor, i.e. Maximinus Thrax, who inaugurated the Crisis of the Third Century. There's another parallel that I don't like, with "wokeism" as the Christianity spreading instead of through soldiers and merchants, through academics and mobile white collar upper middle class business people, with Trump as Julian the Apostate (I don't like this only because I like Julian the Apostate.)
NEW ALTERNATE HISTORY BRANCHPOINT SUGGESTIONS INSPIRED BY THIS TRIP
- Ancient Rome with steam engines. (Hero built his device and did more withi it than just piss off his neighbors.)
- Pepin didn't make the Donation, he just took the place of the Lombards he defeated as the new rulers of Italy
- The Western Schism never ended. Today there would be the French Catholic, and the Roman Catholic Churches. What would this have meant for the Reformation?
- Constantinople and the Eastern Roman Empire surviving the Ottoman siege until the present day. No migration of scholars and artists to Italy in the 1400s, no increased incentive for European merchants and explorers so desperate to find a naval route around the Middle East that they try to sail around the back of the world.
- Or the opposite, the Turkish landing at Otranto succeeding and ending up with divided Italy and a Turkish Muslim south. (Otranto got lucky with a change in ruler that encouraged a Turkish withdrawal, same as with the Mongols in Eastern Europe in the 1200s. If this were a series people would be demanding "How many times are they going to use this trick?!?")
- Charles V took advantage of his troops rioting to actually capture Rome and absorb the Papal states; or, in reaction to the sack by Charles V's rioting troops, Pope Innocent expanded the Papal States militarily, in the process becoming a new force in Europe, but also an actual enemy of the Holy Roman Empire - and doing away with the idea of a universal morality separate from secular power.
PROJECTS BACK HOME
- Find, and drink, local grape cider. For science.
- What was different about Rome that allowed it to expand and build massive, useful works (like the aqueducts, unlike the pyramids?) A value that turned status competitions into capital investments into the commons, e.g.emperors spending money on public works and a sense of asabiya (per Khaldun and Turchin)?
- To watch: Spaghetti Westerns, Gladiator, and everything by Fellini, starting with Satyricon.
Speaking of Satyricon (by Peteonius, the ancient Roman novel the Fellini film is based on) I see why it's not taught in high school. Because it is abjectly filthy. I may not finish it. It's that gross.
Has anyone tried to graph collapse metrics for all of Italy starting with the Julio-Claudian Dynasty and extending until the Donation of Pepin? Rome itself obviously emptied out by the seventh century, but what about the Italian Peninsula as a whole? What was the population and per capita wealth? Life expectancy? Did people leave, or Italy turned back into a Malthusian trap and there were die-offs from the Dominate civil wars and the Gothic War, from which the peninsula couldn't recover?
Above and below: welcome sights after a very long nonstop via Istanbul. Weather and vegetation at home are very similar to Rome in retrospect. Plus, bonus shots on Taylor Mountain, no thanks at all to Sr. Ricardo Hierba. And a good time was had by all at the
Jack London Yacht Races.
Finally: I made a friend who went back to his governmental position in the Middle East shortly after we met - he refers to me as a very great friend, and I was touched to learn that he defended not only my honor to some common soldiers who were ridiculing me, but that of my wife. Terrific people, the Romans.
FIN
