Abandoned - 9 June 2012

Just Around the Corner

I am finally learning my way around this quarter, but every once in a while something jumps out at you - like this fountain.  Recognize it?  A copy of this fountain sits in Huntington Park right across from Grace Cathedral.  It knocked my socks off.  There are some minor differences, but it is mostly all there. I slept in late.  I think that I work hard when I travel, and forget the toll that it takes.

Once I get on my way past the fountain is see an open church door - a church dedicated to the Theotokos.  It is quite lovely, and has a program of decoration that is developed around all of the aspects of the life and status of the Virgin.  Here is a door spandrel filled with a Tree of Life, planted by the living water (placed over the baptistery).  i sat for a bit to take it all in.  Sometimes there's too much and your mind misses things.  Better to wait a bit.  So I did.

On my way to the Forum I have a bit of any early lunch at a Pizzeria that Barton and I visited some 23 years ago now.  The outdoor eating area was once covered with netting, but vines have now covered that over, making the place quite pleasant.

The crowds at the Forum are minimal, and I am grateful.  I'm going to be selective in my viewing.  I go to the curia and am delighted to find that changes have been made.  No longer a big, empty room, the floor has been restored, and there is a temporary exhibition of Roman glass.  There are explanations as to the history of the building/room, and its construction and reconstruction over time.  Once used as a church (what wasn't) you can still see traces.  What excited me, however, is the recovery of the platform on which the praeses sat, along with the base of the statue of Victory that had been placed there.  There is also a huge porphyry statue, thought to be Trajan, that was found behind the curia.  They will be uncovering stuff here for centuries.  The road that divides the forum traiano has been blocked off, and will, I suspect, be carefully removed to uncover the history that lies beneath.

I walk over to the house of the Vestal Virgins.  It is quiet in the atrium, lined with the cellar of the women who lived there, and lined also, on one side with the remains of statues of the virgins who kept the flame alive in the past.

Only two of the statues had faces, and I wanted to look at them; to see who it was that lived here, who it was that tended these gardens and devoted their lives to the community hearth.  In the Vth Century the Emperor Theodosius ordered that the whole complex be abandoned - a centuries old community sent on their way.  I imagined the scene.

On the northern end of the atrium they have uncovered, under two other buildings what they think was the original building dedicated to these women and the hearth.  Layers upon layers reveal the human experience here, and the need for a hearth.

As I make my way up to the Palatine, I return to the Neronian cryptoportus, a long underground tunnel that connected parts of the ancient palace that stood there.  What is fascinating are the stucco decorations that still exist there.  I wonder if there is a finger-print.

Livia's house in closed.  Augustus' house is closed - pericolo!  The domus grifoni which I visited in 2009 is closed.  I see the door where it is - nondescript and unmarked.  I wonder how many other doors there are where treasures can be seen.

The Flavian Palace is overwhelming, and much of it is closed as well, so I walk down the path that will eventually get me to the exit.  Along the way, however I see some really beautiful and interesting things.

On the hill that descends down tower the circa massimo there is a large stand of olive trees.  As you move along you can glimpse the Colosseum off in the distance, but to all intents and purposed, deep in the midst of Rome, you are in the Latin countryside.  Beautiful.

There is a rock yard that once was a magnificent temple built by the Emperor Elagabalus.  Nothing is left of it other than the foundations.  As I walk toward the east I come upon a vista that towers over the Arch of Constantine, the site of the Colossus that stood to its east and gave the Colosseum its name, the Colosseum itself, and the hills with the domus aura beyond.

There is a covered area, and below it are ruins recently uncovered.  Suetonius writes about a "revolving" dining room that the Emperor Nero had built.  Most thought that it was an exaggeration.  Here, however, seems to be the foundations for a circular room, below which was machinery and structures that may have supported such a room.  Fascinating.

I am thirsty beyond belief, but I trudge on wanting to see, finally, the back-to-back temples dedicated to Roma and Venus. Originally a blank wall separated to the two cellar that held the cult figures of the two goddesses.  Later, two apses were built back to back, as seen in the picture to the left.  Only a small fragment remains of the Roma figure, and a great deal of her temple was encroached upon by a church.

Thirst over takes me, and I go to one of those tourist places by the metro.  It's a coke and a hot dog.  Sugar, salt, fat, and water - oh, and some carbonation as well - it's all that I needed at that point.  Even though I have been selective, I've spent a great deal of time in the forum, and I begin to wend my way back to the hotel.  I need more water and have a granita limone as well.  I sit and savor both.

I spend a little time at the Trajan complex.  By the Trajan Column, you can see the puzzle that the archaeologists have to deal with here (and everywhere, really).  There are buildings upon buildings.  You can see the foundation stones that sit below the foundations of the buildings that surrounded the column.  What a wonder it is for those who uncover and decipher this stuff.

I'm exhausted.  No supper, just writing and bed.