On our 4th day in Rome, still struggling with the jet lag, we finally ventured out beyond the local
supermercados and such. A veteran of four years of Latin (Vicki had two), first with Mr. Scott and then mostly with Mrs. Henry, and then listening rapturously to Respighi's
Pines of Rome, and especially its "Pines of the Appian Way" (the Toscanini version always the best) from the 11th grade on (thank you, Rev. Bragg), I was keen to march a few miles along the Appian Way, the
Via Appia Antica. The roadway is 2,300 years old, paved over innumerable times, no doubt, but still sports the incredible assortment of shrines, churches, tombs, catacombs, and such that make it famous, even in our day. It was the first Roman highway, "the queen of the long roads," enabling the legions to march south in a hurry if needed, begun in 312 BC and named for its founder, the Censor and later Consul Appius Claudius Caecus. On Sundays, the City of Rome limits motorized traffic to just residents and tour buses, and one can walk the Way some distance. Our fatigue and the heat of the day limited us to just the first three miles. Alas, beyond that point, the traffic really thins out and, I have read, the Way becomes nearly rural. Next time...
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Prato Smeraldo, where we are camped, is on the far south
side of the city, on the Via Ardeatina, and thus it was
expedient, we thought, to take the bus cross-wise to the
Via Appia Antica, rather than the Metro into the city and
back out; and so it worked out, after an hour searching
for the transfer point between routes 720 and 218 |
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The San Sebastian Portal on the ancient city wall; it is the largest of the wall's
portals; rebuilt five times over the centuries |
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| And we're off |
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As elsewhere in Rome, free, clean water; bring your own plastic bottles; Appius
Claudius also was responsible for the first great Roman aquaducts |
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The first big sight along the Way is the church of Quo Vadis, where Peter, hoping
to make a clean get-away and not get crucified, ran into Jesus, who shamed him
into returning; "quo vadis" means "Jeez, what are you doing here?!" |
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The church stands on the spot where J and P met; the above stone, a replica,
reputedly has J's footprints (size 9.5 wide); the original stone is at the Vatican
Museum; several nuns were visiting, photographing and then kissing the
stone, sort of a Blarney Stone moment, I guess |
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| Hugely symbolic interior decor |
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| Random unidentified ancient shrine |
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| Along the Appian Way |
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Pines of the Appian Way; actually there were more cedars than than pines; plus
three excellent garden centers |
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Cacti of the Appian Way; outside a large old building,
someone's incredible collection of perhaps a hundred mature
and varied specimens |
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Entrance to the catacombs of San Sebastian; we did the catacomb thing back in
1979, we think; and still have our little clay oil lamp souvenirs (in a box in
Missoula) |
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Part of the villa and circus and mausoleum of the emperor Maxentius; had it
been Trajan or Hadrian or Augustus, or even Claudius, we might have gone in |
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| Free admission this day, but we were fading quickly in the heat |
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Best of the mausoleums, that of Caecelia Metella, wife of Crassus' son, late
Republic |
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| Facing |
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| The Way ahead, largely pedestrian; but we were pooped |
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And mile marker III was as far as we got this
day |
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We lifted our spirits with a nice light lunch at the Garden of Giulia and Fratelli;
and then headed back |
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| An ancient arch just inside the Portal San Sebastian |
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| Christian graffiti |
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| And a bit of the huge Aurelian Wall |
