Ancient Rome

We started our day with a walk round a couple of Rome’s 900 or so churches. Byzantine mosaics have always held an attraction, as despite their age, they retain jewel-like colour and sparkle and we hadn’t realised that several of Rome’s early basilicas have excellent examples. First up is Santa Maria Maggiore, one of Rome’s four basilicas, second only to St Peters in importance and containing one of the best preserved Byzantine interiors and lots of mosaics. A service was being held, so we had to stand at the back and couldn’t get a good look at the mosaics in the apse, however we took a short tour to the loggia, so see the mosaics telling the miracle of the snow in which Mary appeared to Liberius in his sleep telling of snow and lo and behold snow fell in August showing where the church should be built. This is still celebrated annually with a festival including petals falling and lots of fake snow!

Santa Prassede occupies the site where St Praedes harboured Christians on the run from persecution. She collected blood and remains of martyrs which she put in the well where she was later buried. No service here, and we got quite close to the apse, but the lighting was poor and the altar canopy obscured part of the apse. The better mosaics were in the mausoleum chapel built for Theodora, mother of Pope Paschal I which is decorated like a sparkly jewelry box although the photos don’t do it justice at all.

Next the main event of the day was to look at remains of Ancient Rome. We started with the forum which was the centre of early Rome with government offices, temples, shops and meeting places.

Well what to say, there were lots of ruined bits and pieces of buildings that were very old and we caught some atmospheric snaps.

We then climbed up to the Palantine Hill which was the most desirable address in Rome and has ruins of various residences as well as baths and a stadium for exercising horses.

Last, but not least, the Colosseum, which is very large and very impressive and presently undergoing a €25m renovation to spruce it up.

Everywhere in Rome seems to be in chaos due to the building of the third metro line, which is causing large areas to be cordoned off with diggers in action.

We thought we might end the day as we began, with a couple more churches containing mosaics and stopped at Santi Cosma and Damiano, entered through a lovely Renaissance cloister and containing naturalistic mosaics in the apse of the two saints being presented to Christ by St Peter and St Paul with St Felix and St Theodore looking on.

Finally, San Clemente, a C12 basilica with quite a stunning interior including mosaics and frescos but unfortunately no photos allowed. Downstairs is an earlier church with frescos of San Clemente and below this a mithraic temple with a statue of Mithras slaying the bull, but we were out of energy, looked at the postcards in the shop and saved the €10 each entrance.

Fortunately just a short walk to dinner at Trattoria Re di Roma, a pretty restaurant with great food, both of us having salad and pasta – we might return tomorrow!

Have you noticed the photos are a little under-par? Well I have a new camera and it and I are not quite seeing eye to eye at the moment. The results are not a patch on my old camera – in my view grainy and not crisp. Anyway I’m stuck with it for the rest of the trip, but unless it pulls its socks up it won’t be coming away with me again!