Our Roman Holiday — Part I

Ruins and Churches

Ruins

Our first full day in Rome was spent touring the ruins of ancient Rome — including the Colosseum, the Forum, and parts of Palatine Hill.

The Colosseum was very impressive. Not beautiful, for it doesn’t have much air of beauty about it at all. What makes it remarkable is the feat of its sheer size, having been built around the 1st century (AD 80). It’s immense. The Colosseum was used as the arena for the gladiator contests.

Outside view of the Colosseum.

Only 1/3 of the structure remains today –at its height it held 50,000 people!

View of the inside of Colosseum

What you’re seeing here is the underground tunnels beneath the playing surface. The original was covered with a wooden floor sprinkled with sand. You can see part of a re-created floor in this photo. The underground tunnels are where the animals and prisoners were held (for up to 3 days at a time) in total darkness, before being thrown into the arena to fight. One can only imagine what it must have been like to hear everything going on above your head and know what awaited you.

This Colosseum was used as a political tool by the Emperor. The motto was “bread and circuses”. Basically, the Emperor could control the people by keeping them fed and entertained. The “games” at the Colosseum were free to the public, and people would even get to participate by “voting” which gladiators or prisoners would be allowed to live or die. By giving them that kind of power, the Emperor was free to exercise real power over the people.

It made me glad that all we have now is football!

Churches

There are A LOT of churches in Rome. We saw, maybe 1/4 of them. Maybe that. Granted, many of them are no longer used as churches, but none the less, they are all over.

The first one we went to was San Pietro in Vincoli (St. Peter in Chains). This church was built in the 5th century and houses the chains that held St. Peter when he came to Rome, before his execution. It also has a sweet Michelangelo statue of Moses, about to bring down a world of hurt on the golden calf worshipping Israelites.

St. Peter’s chains

Sorry it’s a little blurry!

The next day we attended Sunday Mass at the Pantheon. The Pantheon was built in 27 BC as a temple to all the gods. However, due to fires, the current structure was built in AD 120. Some say it is the most influential building in art history. It’s dome was the model for the Florence dome which kicked off the Renaissance. Even the US Capitol building in DC’s dome is inspired by the Pantheon. Unfortunetly, when we were there there was a scaffold on one half of the front, taking away from the outside appearance.

Inside the church, the dome is as high as it is wide – 142 feet. At the top of the dome the the oculus, which is 30 feet across and the only light source in the church. The Pantheon is the oldest building the world that is used as a Catholic Church. However, it did not become a church until the middle ages. 2009 was the 1400th anniversary as a church!

the dome and oculus

Whew! I have six more churches to write about, but this is getting long, so maybe I’ll have to do two church posts. I hope you don’t mind!

And oh yes, one last thing: Are there any questions about the trip I can answer? I’m hoping I’ll get to cover the major things, but if there’s anything I don’t mention that you’d like to know, ask!