While visiting the Colosseum, Forum and Trevi Fountain, it is difficult not to get caught up in the feelings of the past. Supposedly, the Emperor sat in the best seat for the games; but while standing on the second level of five, my feeling is that the senators and politicians had the best seat in the house. All the seats were made of marble except the fifth level (women and children's level). From the second floor on up the floors were made of brick in a herring bone pattern. The basement consisted of rooms for animals, gladiators and storage of scenery. The colosseum actually had lifts to bring animals, gladiators and scenery up from the basement level. Standing on the second level, one is amazed at the enormity/greatness of the building. It is also difficult to understand the cruelty of man on man or animal. During a 100 day inauguration, 5,000 animals were killed, and in a 3 day event 1000 animals were killed.
Ten years ago, 2 trees and a vine were planted on the ruins of the Forum. One tree is an olive tree to represents of olives/olive oil industry; the second tree is a fig tree to honor the myth of Romulus and Ramos' survival as infants; the vine is representative of the wine industry.
The myth surrounding Romulus and Ramos: It is said that the infants were found by a she wolf and she suckled them for survival. Romulus founded Rome and Ramos has two possible stories. One is that he died and the other is that he went off to establish Sienna.
For a geography class at Kent, I wrote a paper about the sadness of flooding the Yangtze River and drowning the ruins along the river; so much will be lost. When I come away from this trip, I hope that my experiences will leave me with a more profound respect of culture of the past and future. I've already formed love for gellato :-) Gellato was never one of my favorites at home, but it is a nicer texture than ice cream and very good here.
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Pammers! I really enjoyed reading your blog. You took a different approach to your blog than I did and I really liked that. I appreciate your attention to detail. Your facts were great! I can't wait to try my first gelato and become part of the gelato fan club. Keep on posting and I am looking forward to reading more.
ReplyDeleteThe Trevi Fountain was the coolest!! I'm glad we stumbled upon it. I agree with you about the seating in the Colesseum. I would have liked to be up higher because it was probably a better view. The trees that were planted in the Roman Forum were cool and I like how you told the stories becase I didn't remember what the fig tree was for. Like Dayna I also can't wait to try my first gelato!!!
ReplyDeletePam, I also enjoyed reading your blog. You have a great attention to detail. This will make reading all your blogs very enjoyable. In the future be sure to incorporate the reading. Say directly, in your blog, "according to so and so...". I know I wasn't really clear about it until after you blogged. Don't worry about this one. It is fine, satisfactory, and acceptable as is.
ReplyDeleteI was also very intrigued with the facts about the Colosseum. And I felt exactly the same way about the higher seats being the better view. I enjoyed the story of the founding of Rome, which is a fable that always sparked my interest. Although I have not tried gelato yet, I am pumped to see what all the hype is about.
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