The Great Continental Gallivant, Part the Third: The Circus Maximus, Roman Churches, and Pompeii

Our third day in Rome was somewhat of a mish-mash, as we all had a list of sites we wanted to see, but none of them fit any particular theme. We decided that the best solution would be to take the subway to the Circus Maximus, which is located in the southern part of ancient Rome. It was Imperial Rome’s largest hippodrome, or chariot racing circuit. The sport of chariot racing had originated in ancient Greece, and the Romans adapted it with enthusiasm, as they did with so many Greek customs. Those who have seen Ben-Hur will of course remember the climactic chariot racing scene (along with the galley scene, probably the only part anyone remembers), which was staged in a very accurate replica of the Circus Maximus. In Imperial times, chariot races would be staged between four chariots: red, green, blue, and white, and each charioteer would have an enthusiastic fanbase, much as modern day sports teams do, complete with all of the swooning girls and riots that such a fanbase entails. The Circus was also the place where particularly hated criminals would be publicly executed, and thus the place where Christians would be thrown to lions and so forth.
Today hardly anything remains of the Circus; a few areas of the southwest turn have been uncovered and excavated, and a gravel path outlines where the racetrack would have run. Most of the Circus was hauled off during medieval times to act as building materials, with the only identifiable piece being the Flaminio Obelisk which was moved by Pope Sixtus V to the Piazza del Popolo in the 16th century. We walked down the track, staging a few silly stunts, and then proceeded to Santa Maria in Cosmedin, an ancient basilica from the 6th century. It was built on the Temple of Pompeiian Hercules, and heavily embellished in 782 by Byzantine Greeks fleeing the Iconoclast Controversy in the Byzantine Empire. The basilica contains the gilded skull of Saint Valentine, as well as an ancient piece of sculpture in the shape of a head with an open mouth, called la Bocca della Verita (the Mouth of Truth). The statue was probably an ancient Roman fountain or manhole cover portraying one of the gods. According to legend, if a person puts their hand in the statue’s mouth and speaks a lie, the statue will bite that person’s hand off. Fortunately for my left hand, legend is wrong in this case.
After Santa Maria in Cosmedin, we took a meandering path back toward the Forum and Colosseum, with the eventual goal of trying St. Peter in Chains again. Our way took us through a few small and venerable basilicas, and thence behind the Forum, and stopped there to bask in the sun and gaze upon the ruins. Then we walked around the Forum and Colosseum, and to the Lateran Basilica. The basilica was originally a palace and law court built by the Laterani family in the early period of the Roman Empire. It was used after Constantine I as a conciliar building, hosting most famously the synod which condemned Donatism in 313. Eventually the palace was demolished and the basilica extended to become the official cathedral of Rome. The church also has a negative side to its history, as in order to finance its reconstruction in the late 15th and early 16th centuries, the Vatican revived the sale of indulgences, which drove Martin Luther to post the 95 Theses in 1517 and begin the Reformation.
The church is constructed much like St. Peter’s, with an interior of marble and gilt stone, mosaics, and frescoes. Massive statues of the apostles adorn the gigantic columns which support the roof, each statue at least twice as large as a normal person. The grandeur of the church is somewhat fitting, as it is the official seat of the Diocese of Rome (St. Peter’s being technically part of Vatican City, a different country), and we were suitably awed.
To walk to St Peter in Chains, we chose a route that went past the excavations of the Domus Aurea, the palace of the Emperor Nero. The palace, whose name translates to “House of Gold” in English, was built between 64 and 68 AD on land cleared by the fire which had devastated Rome. It was a lavish edifice, sheathed in pure white marble, decorated in frescoes and mosaics. The palace was designed for parties: of over 300 rooms, not one was designed as a bedroom. However, the palace was a politically embarrassing monument for Nero’s descendants, and it was covered over with dirt and the Baths of Titus and of Trajan.
When we arrived, we found St. Peter in Chains closed (again), and then went our separate ways. I and two others went to the Monument to Victor Emmanuel II, known colloquially as the “Wedding Cake” or the “Typewriter.” It was designed in 1895 to commemorate Victor Emmanuel II, the first king of the unified Italian state, but was not completed until 1935. It generated much controversy during its construction, which entail the destruction of much of the medieval area of the Capitoline Hill. Today, the monument holds Italy’s Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, as well as a museum commemorating the Italian Wars of Unification from 1815-71.
For the fourth day, we went south, traveling by an early train to Naples. After that, I and a friend boarded the Circumvesuviana, a train which travels from Naples, around Mount Vesuvius, and back, and which stops at the excavations of Pompeii. Pompeii was a prosperous Roman town which dominated the area until 79 AD, when Mount Vesuvius erupted and covered the town and all its inhabitants under more than 60 feet of volcanic ash and pumice. The city was rediscovered in 1748, and has been under excavations since then. The city provides much of the basis for current historical thought on everyday life in the Roman Empire due to the remarkable level of preservation. It is not only the human bodies which have been mummified: objects of wood, such as doors, and cloth have also been fossilized by the eruption and thus preserved.
During our time there, me and Demi (my friend) spent three hours crawling over about one-fifth of the excavations, examining them without guidance from tour, book, or talking piece of plastic and trying to figure out what it was we were seeing. Of note (and these can be seen on the webalbum) were a bakery/grain mill, a tavern, and a ruined shrine to the muses. The mills, all four of them, are still intact, as are the ovens and the stone basins used to hold bread dough. The mills (the conical structure made of granite) would be powered by running water coming through the aqueducts. Grain would be dumped in the top and would trickle down and be ground between the rotating millstone and the conical base. There were at least two other bakeries which we found, but they were in lesser stages of intactness.
The tavern (the two pictures of counters with holes in them) was one of many in the city. The holes are stone vats in which wine would be stored, and cooled by the stone. It would be served to customers in pewter mugs which were chained to the counter to prevent theft. The taverns were popular places for Romans to meet, and were even frequented by the upper classes on occasion.
The final picture, the shrine, holds no particular value other than that I thought it might make a nice picture. After we left Pompeii, we made a moderately mad dash for our train back to Rome. The next morning we both arose early, though we made for different airports. I flew out of Rome International, as opposed to the two other domestic airports. I left Rome at 10:30 on a plane for Malta, but that’s a tale for another blog post (and yes, I will try to write faster, so you can all delete the incendiary emails I know you’re waiting to send me).