Ah, the wonders of cool autumn Michigan days! Wil and I made it home safe and sound, and now have only to worry about moving into our new home in a few days. In the meantime I have just a couple more blog posts worth of pictures...here we go!
We planned our final day in Rome so that we could concentrate on the Via Appia Antica, or ancient Appian Way. This is the road that began in 312 BC and extended 350 miles to Brindisi, in the heel of Italy's boot! This is the road on which Sparticus and his army were slaughtered in 71 BC! This is the road on which St Peter met Jesus, before returning to Rome for his martyrdom! This is the road to which Wil and I tried to walk from our apartment, and the reason we ended up hopelessly lost in ancient farmland! (We weren't lost. -Wil)
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| Google Maps image of the Appian Way and associated regional park, which is the part of the picture not covered in city buildings. We walked around most of the northern and central parts of the park in this map (we clocked 10 miles total!) |
Most of our morning we spent wandering through the Caffarella Valley, part of the regional park protecting the Appian Way and surrounding land. It's really quite beautiful and bucolic, a nice break from the crush of the city. In Roman times a senator named Herodes Atticus held most of the land as part of his estates. Eventually the valley became farmland, and other parts of his holdings passed on to new owners.
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| Nymphaeum of Aegeria, a brick construction surrounding a natural spring. Likely part of the waterworks of a nearby villa in the 2nd century AD; Herodes Atticus had it constructed after his wife's death. |
The Via Appia Antica begins in Rome and traverses 350 miles. However, most of the famous catacombs, churches, mausoleums, and villas are located on the 10-mile stretch of road closest to Rome's city center. When we finally found the Via Appia Antica, we were about at mile 4, and we worked our way back to Rome from there. Our first stop was the Circus of Maxentius, constructed by Emperor Maxentius in the 300s AD. It's the best preserved Circus of ancient Rome but weren't used for long; Maxentius lost his status soon after. On the same site is the Mausoleum of Romulus, built after the death of Maxentius's young son. It only just opened to visitors this year!
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| Circus of Maxentius. A few towers surrounding the track remain, and you can still discern the track and some of the outline of the Circus. |
Our next stop was the Mausoleum of Caecilia Metella, matriarch of an important Roman family. The tomb was constructed on a hill in the 1st century BC; for a long time it was used as a point of reference in maps of the area.
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| Tomb of Caecilia Metella (round tower, left) and attached castle (right). The castle now shows off statues and pieces of buildings from the area. |
After this were the Catacombs of Saint Sebastian (there were a ton of other catacombs but we just toured one). They started out as pagan burial temples and crematoria (still intact in the catacombs), but as Romans converted to Christianity it became a Christian area. After his martyrdom, St Sebastian's remains were interred here; the remains of Sts. Peter and Paul also resided here for a while. With 7 miles of underground passages, the catacombs hold 100,000 tombs (!!), as well as a small shrine to St Sebastian. Sebastian's remains are now located in the chapel above the catacombs. Finally we found the Church of Domine Quo Vadis. The stories stay that Peter was leaving a less than receptive Rome to evangelize elsewhere, and he met Jesus on the Appian Way. Peter asked Jesus where He was going (Domine, quo vadis?), and Jesus told Peter that he needed to return to Rome and preach as he was meant to do. Peter returned to Rome (and his subsequent crucifixion), and Jesus's footsteps were sunk into the stone where He stood.
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| Shrine at the chapel of St Sebastian. The footsteps of Jesus sunken into stone are above the altar. In the case above that are one of the arrows that killed Sebastian, and part of the pillar to which he was tied during execution. |
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| Altar in the chapel with St Sebastian's remains, and a sculpture of him pierced with arrows. |
At the northern end of the Via Appia Antica we encountered the Porta Appia or Porta San Sebastiano, the largest and best preserved gate in Rome's Aurelian walls. The walls enclosed the seven hills of Rome and Campus Martius, and remain remarkably intact around this gate!
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| Porta Appia, a highly trafficked area in ancient Rome due to monumental importance of the Appian Way entering the city. |
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| Just inside the gate...not sure what this is but it looked cool! I speculate aqueduct. |
Our final stop of the day were the Baths of Caracalla: the second largest Roman public baths. Built in the 200s AD, the baths were splendidly decorated with detailed mosaics and enormous marble statues. They had cold, warm, and hot baths, as well as a gymnasium, swimming pool, and library. Today some of the wall and floor decorations remain; most statues were moved into museums.
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| Ruins of the baths from the garden area. |
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| Original floors intact, and staircases visible still. |
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| Super cool! |
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| Part of the second story floor mosaics. The second story collapsed into the first and archaeologists recovered many of these large intact pieces. |
We tried to visit the Spanish Steps and Trevi Fountain, but they were so clogged with tourists that we didn't bother staying to take pictures. Visiting the fairly unpopulated Appian Way monuments was an excellent use of our last full day in Rome!
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