This Gets Really Old

May 11

Because it was Sunday and we have been to so many churches named for the Virgin Mary and St. Peter, we decided to give the pagans equal time.

We strolled to the Colosseum, which is little more than a mile from the hotel. Much of the way is the same as going to St. Peter in Chains, but at one point you take the left instead of the right fork and walk through a park full of people on the grass. There is an ancient ruin, and the people hang their clothes on the fence that surrounds it. Maybe they live in the park.

Coming on the Colosseum that way is fun. You see the top of it from a good way off. When you first see the whole thing, you turn a corner on a snaking path down a steep hillside. You’re about even with the third level of the building. The path snakes down and you come out of the park across a wide street from the Flavian Amphitheater, which is the building's original name.

I read somewhere that the name "Colosseum" comes from a colossal statue of Nero that stood nearby.

The street is blocked to traffic, at least on Sunday, and people are walking all over it. Some of them are dressed like movie gladiators. If you pay them, they will hand you a plastic sword and pose with you for a picture. Somehow a gladiator in a T-shirt and Bermuda shorts isn’t very imposing.

The Colosseum was kind of packed, to say the least, and took maybe 45 minutes in line to buy tickets, which let you into the first and second levels of the amphitheater and also into the Forum. If you want to see the subterranean structures or the third level of the Colosseum, you have to pay extra for a tour. 

There is a lot of shallow graffiti scratched into the walls. While we were in line to buy tickets I noticed one name, Benvenuto, a rough scratch through the patina on the stone, possibly made with a key or other less-than-artistic instrument.

Now, if it had been Cellini, he would have brought in the guys from his studio and  had them do it up right.

I have to say this about the Colosseum, though. If you’re short of time in Rome, it should be the first place on your list to skip. This is one of the few places that I have visited where seeing the photos is as good as the real thing. There is nothing there. A lot of crumbling masonry. Some restored bits. 

There is no information, for instance, about where the seats were, or where a lot of the stairs went. These stairs go up between floor-to-ceiling brick walls, and end at another, shorter wall with no outlet except to climb over the sill and jump. If people sat there all seats but the first row would have had severely restricted views. 

There is a boring exhibit about early writing with some notes about libraries that were destroyed so long ago that nobody really knows much about them.

One sign describing the games had an interesting bit. The lunch interval included the exposure of condemned criminals to the wild beasts who tore them apart. You want fries with that?

We were inside the Colosseum for about an hour. It was about two when we left, so we went to the only restaurant in sight and shared an OK salad. I had my first glass of wine for the day, a fairly tasty montepulciano.

Now, the really big attraction (for me, anyhow) is what’s left of the Forum. It grew over time, but was the center of life in old Rome.

Outside the Forum itself is the remains of twin temples to Roma, the spirit of the city, and Amor, another name for Venus. The temples, which are largely broken down now, stood back to back, because “Roma” is “Amor” spelled backwards. Clever, those old Romans.

The Arch of Titus is at one end and the Arch of Septimius Severus at the other. Titus is the Emperor who conducted the Jewish war, which Josephus wrote about. Septimius Severus beat up somebody else.

By the time they were both in office, Rome was living as much off plunder as it was from any other source of income. Not really a sustainable economic model. You had to go conquer people to plunder them. Then you had an even bigger, more unwieldy empire to run.

There is so much cool stuff—well, remains of cool stuff—between the two arches. You walk down the Via Sacra, the Holy Way. Very cool. Very rough and rocky. But hey, the guide book says this is the oldest road I'll ever walk. I don't know for sure about that, but who am I to argue?

There’s the temple to the God Julius, who was cremated on the site of the temple. There’s the dissolving remains of an altar, the ara Caesaris, where people throw coins. I saw lots of coins and a kid threw another one while I was there.

I didn’t ask why. Maybe it’s for luck—like maybe you’re hoping to become dictator for life, like Julius Caesar. Or maybe it’s because they want a public figure assassinated.

I shot a video and there was a stand of three columns, which were familiar from photos, but I forgot what they were. They were part of the Temple of Castor and Pollux, and according to a sign nearby were put up during a restoration sponsored by Tiberius.

Tiberius may have  been the face on the coin mentioned in the Gospels: “Render unto Caesar” etc.

One of my favorite finds was a spot I had never heard of before, the umbilicus urbis, the center (literally belly button) of the city. This was the omphalos of Rome, where the dead met the living through a crack in the ground.

The Senate house, or Curia, is still standing, pretty much intact, which surprised me.

There were other buildings, entire basilicas, whose stones had been sold in the Middle Ages to quarriers, who carried them away. Just the stubs of columns and a few rocks remain behind.

We wandered around the Forum for two or three hours, when they rang alarm and threw us out.

Joanna took the picture of the day, “Harry Gets a Kick Out of the Forum.” It was taken just as they were kicking us out.

From the Forum we strayed up to the Vittorio Emmanuele monument, built for the 50th anniversary of the unification of the country. It looks like something Mussolini would have built, but in fact, Musso hadn’t even gotten started on his career when this went up. So we can’t blame the Fascisti.

There are more forums, the Imperial Forums, named for Julius Caesar, Augustus, and Trajan, next to to the monument. Like the original forum, today they are just fragments of rock lying on the ground. You can’t go down into them. You have to stand at today’s ground level and look down maybe a dozen or twenty feet to the old level.

We took a cab back to the hotel for a brief rest and then went to a neighborhood restaurant called Elettra that had been recommended to us by a lady at the hotel. We had spaghetti with clams, and after we were assured that it would be served with the head and tail, ordered broiled sea bass.

I’m not much of fish eater but I do like it cooked whole. Like chicken, you have to cook it in the skin and on the bone if you want it to keep its flavor.

We had a half bottle of one of the best Chiantis I’ve ever had. Yeah, I know you’re supposed to drink white with fish. And I do take white sometimes with lunch or breakfast, especially the white Cotes du Rhone, but I don’t like most white wine. This was San Leonino Chianti Classico, “castellina in Chianti” (whatever that means, but I’m noting it in case I can get it back in New Jersey, which remember, is an honorary province of Italy). The wine had a strong flavor, which I expect a Chianti to have, but it didn’t have too sharp a bite, and with the food it was perfect.

We stopped at the corner for some more wine. Actually, Joanna had a few sips from two glasses that I ordered. Then just as I was about to settle the tab, the bartender served up a mixture that looked like, but wasn’t quite the same as, Campari and soda, so I had one of those too. I’m not sure what it was, but it was bitter and good.

And good night. Sweet dreams.