Saturday 22 October 2011

I got up this morning and made my usual breakfast in Roma: low-fat granola with fat-free yogurt and 4 espressos.  After consulting some notes I headed for the centro storico, the historic center of town, to spend the day examining various sites. I’m giving a paper that deals with topography of the ancient city so I wanted to walk around some of the places that I’ll be covering.

The central part of Rome in the bend of the Tiber is now completely full of shops, restaurants, cafes, and businesses. In ancient times, this was the Campus Martius, the Field of Mars, dedicated to Rome’s war god.  In the Roman Republic it really was a field, where soldiers could drill and where some of the elections for high-ranking magistrates were held.  Augustus turned the Campus Martius into a park with monuments supporting his regime and family, including the Ara Pacis Augustae (the Altar of Imperial Peace), the original Pantheon which was rebuilt a century later into the magnificent structure that still exists, and the Solarium Augusti. The Solarium was a gigantic sundial so big that the pointer was a huge obelisk brought from Egypt.  This cast a shadow on a park-sized pavement of marble and not only told the time, but pointed out Augustus’ birthday.  Later emperors continued building in the area. Domitian built a racetrack that eventually became Piazza Navona (hence the shape).  In later ages the entire area was taken over by shops and housing until it reached its present crowded state. Many of the main sites in Roma are in the centro storico, including Campo dei’ Fiori, the Pantheon, Piazza Navona, the Trevi Fountain, and a zillion medieval, renaissance and baroque churches.

After spending the day in the centro storico, I crossed the Ponte Sisto, a fifteenth-century footbridge across the Tiber joining the centro to Trastevere.  For dinner I bought some of my favorite Roman street food: suppli and arancini.  These are balls of risotto with various fillings (meat, mozzarella, tomato) that are then deep-fried. I stopped at the market and bought a handful of fresh mixed greens for a salad, and sat on the steps of the fountain in Piazza di Santa Maria in Trastevere to eat.  A woman was playing cello in the piazza. She had recorded piano accompaniment, and played works by Schubert, Saint-Saens, and Mendelssohn.  The cellist was extremely good, and I sat in the late afternoon light for a long time listening to her.  One thing I love about Roma is the (usually high) quality of the street musicians. 

After the impromptu concert I returned to my apartment, did some reading and writing, made some calls and went to bed.