There have been soooo many travel stories about Rome, my take will be to barely touch on the famous, kinda, and dwell on Rome’s neighbourhoods, odds and ends, and as an extra extra, visit Hadrian’s Villa and Tivoli, just east of the city.
Rome’s neighbourhoods: Trastevere
Just south of Vatican City and the Castel Sant’Angelo is the funky neighbourhood of Trastevere.
You can get your bohemian vibe here along the winding streets and alleys - hip stores, trattorias, bars and pizzerias pepper the squares and streets. The night comes alive with al fresco dining, buskers, live music and, thankfully, few tourists. Trastevere is, ummm, worn, but still charming. The less visited southern and western areas still exude a ‘60s charm. Five academic institutions make their home here, so youth is much in evidence. Sergio Leone and Ennio Morricone, both of spaghetti westerns fame, both went to the same Catholic private school here. The hub of the passeggiata (evening stroll) is the Piazza di Santa Maria (the Basilica is worth a look, full of original medieval mosaics).
If you’re a “flea-marketer” check out Rome’s biggest one at the Porta Portese, every Sunday morning till 2 PM. Buyer beware, lots of el-cheapo knock-offs.
Fairly modest from the outside, the Villa Farnesia is a hidden gem, not yet discovered by the hordes, with paintings by Raphael and Peruzzi – interior decorations in the Renaissance style. If you want genuine Italian food, with an old city atmosphere and reasonable prices, this is your neighbourhood. Try Barbara & Federica of Rome - eat like the locals. For one of the best pizzerias in Rome, it’s Dar Poeta, but you’ll probably wait in the forever, anytime, queues; best cheap restaurant with a terrasse is Carlo Menta for pastas, try the lasagna fatte in casa (well, of course ‘fatte in casa’, where else). For deserts, it has to be Two Sizes, for the best tiramisu in town, that is after you have waited in line, again. For gelato: Fatamorgana, 66 flavors, 24 vegan, spoiled for choice.
Trieste
This mostly residential neighbourhood is far-ish from the crowds, still, the area offers a trendy nightlife scene, up-scale dining and plenty of innovative cocktail bars. Try out Ristorante Toscana La Mora for steak, or Pizzeria San Marino for wood fired pizza, For a different take on seafood: StuPisci, really a hole-in-the-wall, but highly recommended. For live music, the Cotton Club, for up-scale dining: Salotto Trieste, for desserts: Rivareno.
The catacombs of Priscilla are here, OK, so not for everyone, but it’s ahhh, an unusual ‘attraction’. There are several of these around Rome. This one, run by an order of nuns, is known for having the oldest image of the Virgin Mary in existence.
The reason why you’ve come here in the first place is the Quartiere Coppede section of the neighbourhood and is Rome’s answer to Gaudi’s Barcelona. Rome is full of ‘stuff’, but this architecture is truly odd and wholly ‘other’. Walk the streets and see Art Deco, Art Nouveau, with a clash of Greek, Roman and Baroque styles, all eccentric curved lines, sensuous Gaudi style ironwork, all jumbled together in a frenzy. Check out the Fontana delle Rane (Fountain of the Frogs) in Piazza Mincio.
Centro Storico
So, everyone’s heard of the Spanish Steps, but how many have visited the church at the top of the steps – the Santissima Trinita dei Monti, a true Renaissance church, with an obelisk in front of it, the Obelisco Sallustiano, commissioned by the Emperor Aurelian in the 3rd century.
The Romans were crazy for obelisks, especially Egyptian ones. The Piazza del Popolo has an outstanding example: the Flaminian obelisk. Built around 1300BC for the Temple of the Sun in Heliopolis, it is made of a single block of red granite, sides carved with hieroglyphs. There’s also the Lateran obelisk, 1460BC, built by Tutmosis III, the tallest brought to Rome; St. Peter’s square has a monumental Egyptian obelisk, in fact there are fifteen total in Rome, but the pièce de resistance is Trajan’s column, 100 ft high – Roman in origin - celebrating the victory of Emperor Trajan in the Dacian wars. A 620-foot frieze winds around the column 23 times, recounting events in these battles. His ashes are buried at its base and the top carried a statue of Trajan, himself… then, of course, much later, he was dumped and a statue of St. Peter the Apostle was mounted in top.
Everybody goes to see the Colosseum… it’s nice… but how many have visited Augustus’ Mausoleum, nearby, next to the Tiber. Worth a look. Same with the Trevi Fountain, but did you know that it is the terminus of the Vergine Aqueduct, the only one from ancient times, STILL in use today, or that the central figure is the god of the sea, Neptune standing on a scallop shell being pulled by two horses and two Tritons. Not everyone knows that at the right of the Fountain, is a small rectangular pool with two small spouts – the Fountain of Lovers – young lovers who drank from the pool would stay in love and faithful forever.
Did you know that right next door is the magnificent Quirinal Palace, so under-rated, former home of Popes... it has housed thirty popes, four Kings and twelve Presidents of the Republic, and, yes, it was built on the site of a Roman temple, lately unearthed. In front on the Piazza del Quirinale is an, ummm, obelisk, what do you know? a fountain, and statues of those rascals, Castor and Pollux, taming the wild horses.
Did you know that Quirinius was a Sabine (tenth century BC) war god. A bit of useless information. Not so useless, is the gorgeous sculpture by Giambologna of the Abduction of the Sabine Wemen, outside the Uffizi gallery in Florence.
The Piazza Navona is unparalleled for its Baroque beauty, with three fountains, including that masterpiece by Bernini, the Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi, representing the four great rivers of the time (did they not know about the Mississippi or the Amazon), so… the Danube, the Nile, the Ganges and the Plata,(the Plata?), with, ummm, an obelisk in the centre. The Fountain of the Moor is at the southern end, and the northern end hosts the Neptune fountain. In the centre is the baroque Sanctae Agnetis in Agone church, built in the 17th century.
BUT, did you know that the Piazza sits on the former Stadium of Domitian, built in the form of an ellipse, such as the Circus Maximus, with a length of 800 ft, and a width of 300 ft with seating on the perimeter as high as 100 ft, patterned on the Colosseum, hosting 30,000, and, at least, at the outset, hosting athletic games, including gladiatorial contests, later it was put to more, ahh, unsavoury uses.
Just a couple of streets south is the Campo del Fiori, just south of the chic Corso Vittorio Emanuele, the best outdoor market we have seen yet. The variety is endless and copious, meats, cured salamis and such, breads, pastries, cheeses galore, fruity beverages, knick-knacks, flowers, OK, no live chickens, ducks, rabbits etc., as in some rural locales in France, but also with shops on the sides on the square full of wines and liqueurs, you will find just about everything you need, overlooked by the statue of the philosopher Giordano Bruno. In centuries past, the Campo was also the place of execution, and so it was for poor Giordano, in 1600, for the error of stating that the stars were other suns, with, potentially life on them, that the universe is infinite and has no ‘center’, that he doubted the Catholic dogmas of eternal damnation, the Trinity, the virginity of Mary, and the transubstantiation of the bread and wine. He also proposed reincarnation…so of course, he was burnt at the stake, head down, in the Campo, and on that cheery note, we’ll move on.
Vatican City
So, not really a Rome neighbourhood, a country in its own right, the smallest in the world at half a square kilometer, it is, now, the home of the Pope. If you are a devout Catholic, this is your ultimate pilgrimage destination. If you are everybody else, this is a must-see for its art and architectural treasures, St. Peter’s Basilica, the Sistine Chapel, and the 26 (count them!) Vatican museums. So yes, by all means, admire La Pieta, that masterpiece by Michelangelo, now protected (like the Mona Lisa) behind bullet-proof glass. Note the frail, smaller-than-normal stature of Jesus, done so by design, a masterpiece of humanism, and the youth of Mary, seemingly younger than Jesus.
(could not get a clear shot through the glass)
The Sistine Chapel, the place where the cardinals are locked in to elect a new pope…its fame relates to the frescoed sides and ceiling by Botticelli, Pinturicchio, Rosselli, as well as the ceiling and the Last Judgement by Michelangelo…regarded as one of the major artistic accomplishments of humanity (did you know that underwear was added later to the Chapel frescoes!!)
The museums hold treasures. The most valuable item in the Vatican is a bathtub, err, a porphyry basin in the Pio Clementino Museum worth a cool $2 billion.
Little known, but so worth it are visits to the Niccoline Chapel with its 15th century frescoes, the Raphael Loggia, The Pauline Chapel has more works by Michelangelo - he added a self-portrait to one of them. The Etruscan Museum has bronze figures from 5th century BC. Actually, the museums hold over 7000 works of art – several visits would not cover them all.
St. Peter’s Basilica is the largest church in Christendom, but not, in fact, the mother church of the Catholic faith, which honour is held by the Archbasilica of St. John Lateran.
St. Peter’s is hard by Emperor Hadrian’s mausoleum, more about him later, converted into a fortress for the use of Popes (nothing was sacred or safe in those days, not very different from today) and renamed Castel Sant’Angelo. The interior of St. Peter’s is vast. As you approach, you are dwarfed by the immensity of the place, putting you in the appropriate humbleness that you might not have thought you had. It takes time to take in the dozens of apses with altars and frescoes, the monuments to over a dozen popes, marbles, some outstanding.
Two curving staircases lead underground to the level of the old Constantinian church, above the burial site of St. Peter. The piece de resistance is the Baldachin above the main altar held up by four helical columns.
Ralph Waldo Emerson described St. Peter’s as: “an ornament of the earth…the sublime of the beautiful.” Another observed that: “St. Peter’s is the reason why Rome is still the centre of the world”.
I like little tucked-away places, not too $$$ or, in some way, special, so try Restaurant e Pizzeria Taverna del Seminario, or if you want the reputed oldest restaurant in Rome, it is La Campana – recorded in the same street in 1518, right near the Piazza Navona.
Now, for something completely different:
Hadrian’s Villa…
… is such a misnomer. My idea of a villa is a rather largeish structure suitable for all-year entertainment. I could have a ‘villa’ if I had enough cash…maybe by Lake Como in the Italian Alps… Well, not if you are the Emperor of Rome. This ‘villa’ sits on, at least a square kilometer of land, larger than the ancient city of Pompeii, and consists of thirty monumental buildings, fountains, gardens, pools (reflecting and otherwise).
Just 30 Kilometers east, from the Center of Rome and hard by the town of Tivoli, home to another World Heritage Site: The Villa d’Este, famous for its hillside Italian Renaissance Gardens, and a great many fountains (16th century). In fact, Tivoli was a magnet for the wealthy and connected. Augustus Caesar, the poet Horace and Zenobia, the captive queen of Palmyra all had residences in Tivoli…supposedly it had good water… (but that’s another whole story).
The Villa, run by a whole host of slaves, miles and miles of tunnels connected the various buildings, large enough to drive a mule drawn cart through, so the slaves would never be seen above ground to disturb the idyllic surroundings. Small baths were for the emperor and his best friends with colored mosaic tiles on the walls, the mosaics are gone but the attachment holes are clearly visible, the big baths were for all the slaves and others since they felt that everyone had a right to be clean and healthy!!
He was a little ahead of his time especially in how he treated his slaves. He decreed for the first time that the children of slaves could not be taken away from their parents until the age of 16. Slaves could buy their freedom, and he had extensive barracks built for his Praetorian guard.
He was also told by his physician that seven or eight times around the reflecting pool was considered beneficial for the digestion. The rectangular reflecting pool was built on a hillside so that the whole thing had to be buttressed!! from beneath. Still standing after 2000 years!!
The other similar pool in a valley had on one end an al-fresco set of outdoor buildings where the guys could dine outdoors. Lots of domes and half-domes connected in the back to underground tunnels. On the menu were lots of veggies, with fowl and lots of fish - no beef, no pork.
The baths were monumental in proportions and the large thermae had domes with a central oculus to let steam out – a feature which was repeated at the Pantheon, also built by Hadrian.
The so-called “Maritime Theatre” was Hadrian’s private retreat, an island surrounded by a circular pond, with two drawbridges, it had its own baths, triclinium (dining area), and library… also used for his more, ummm, ‘private’ encounters.
As the villa required copious water, it was fed by four, yes four, aqueducts. At its height when Hadrian ruled from there, the site housed several thousand servants, slaves and sundry staff.
This re-creation of Hadrian’s villa is worth a view:
Tivoli also has this amazing castle: Rocca Pia, built by Pope Pius II in 1461. You see, Tivoli, or as it was known then: Tibur, since Roman times, really objected to being under the thumb of the Roman see, and rebelled regularly, so Pope Pius II built this imposing castle, Rocca Pia (Pius’ Rock), fittingly named, to keep those unruly sorts firmly under his heel…later used as a prison, currently closed.
Nearby, is a very well-preserved Temple of Vesta, the goddess of the hearth, home and family – well-preserved because it was converted into a church: Santa Maria della Rotonda. The Christian additions disappeared in the 16th century.
Of the original 18 Corinthian columns, ten are still standing. The style of the building has been replicated in England, France, Poland and even California.
During the ‘Grand Tour’ era, Tivoli became a destination for novelists, musicians, painters and poets, coming to be inspired by ancient works of art and the bucolic landscape.
I hope I have given my readers a slightly different perspective on Rome ++ (have to go back, after all we did throw a coin into the Trevi).
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