Rome – A historical marvel like no other where you can cover from 4 BC to 21 AD in one day. The amount of significance of this ancient city, wisdom and monuments exceed the processing capacity of human brains. You can spend lifetime in this city trying to decipher the history let alone, use the lessons, to live a meaningful life.
Things that I learnt while I was Rome-ing here:
- Colosseum was named after the Statue of Colossus of Nero. The original statue was destroyed due to jealousy of a ruler. After a failed attempt of moving the statue to a new temple – specifically design to outshine the Colosseum. Colossus of Nero was destroyed in earthquakes or as per the guide brought down by elephants and chopped and/or as most things in Rome got stolen, lotted and metal scavenged.
- Arena in Latin (harena) means Sand. The Arena in the Colosseum symbolises the Sand which was placed on top of a wooden platform; for the gladiators to fight.
The Colosseum was built by stolen Gold from the second temple in Jerusalem. It is approximated that 30,000kg of Gold was brought back from Roman siege and invested in this marvel. Nowadays it’s hard to even find the globetrotting marble (from Afghanistan, India, Nigeria and Middle East) which covered ever millimetre of Colosseum’s floor – as it was all stolen & looted by locals in the dark era. The loss of glory days in the Guide’s eyes was quite evident pointing at the raw ground – which is like 80% of modern Colosseum’s floor.
I was surprised to know that Gladiators weren’t the only ones who fought in the Colosseum. Given, the religious duties of Romans and need to balance associated human vices. Every morning there were exotic animal fights with elaborate betting before the scheduled mainstream events. I like the balance of morning spirituality with afternoon gambling winnings – before the blood spill extravaganza.
There has been one African emperor of Rome. As a happenstance also the only one who died of natural causes. As for the rest of the emperors they died at the hands of mates, senators, wives, children’s, cousins and brothers. Afterall, nothing says love of family then them actually f*cking killing them.
It took ~2.5 hours to flood the arena for water sports after the land sports which involved bringing exotic animals from other countries, showcasing them and then killing them.
The Colosseum also served as a social justice hall. As, criminals used to be beheaded in public for justice before daily gladiator fights. In today’s terms that’s equivalent to prime time beheading on Instagram, Tik Tok and Facebook along with Free to Air TV for controlling crime in the country.
- Speaking of Instagram; as I bowed on the floor to take my masochistic and unnecessary yoga picture in the Colosseum. The gravel cut into my hands and I started bleeding in the arena. My fellow traveller and a complete stranger at that stage Jason (a kind soul & airline host) handed me a United Airline antibacterial swipe and said – Now you can tell people you’ve bled in the Arena like the Gladiators. I was like yeah they bled for survival, glory and roman capitalism while mine is more like echo chamber self falla**o.
The famous dictator of Italy and principal founder of fascism Mussolini was more of an emperor in his own right. Its fascinating when what you can do with a oppressive, discriminatory and hyper nationalistic ideology if you pour inheritance of Roman Empire into the political manifesto.
Fascism featured historical greatness of Cesar and ancient history of Augustus and Vatican’s approval of religious sanctity and piousness. The Italians have a close personal and heart felt association with the Vatican, as their Royal Family or pathway to God though eye watering monuments, unmatched artistic impressions and Mecca of Catholicism.
- The Mussolini defined the modern Italy as the heir to the Roman Empire and overall Italy during the Renaissance promotes the cultural identity of Romanitas (Roman-ness). Italian fascism historically sought to forge a strong Italian Empire as a Third Rome, identifying ancient Rome as the First Rome and Renaissance-era Italy as the Second Rome.
The headline of Third Rome vision – The dude f*cked up the temple of Cesar to make way for his parade through the Forum as the Emperors post conquering a continent or country. The ancient Roman Emperors used to go from Colosseum to the Roman Forum marking their victory. The pictures of before and after of places are mesmerising but the human need to create history with weaving their own narcissism in it is fascinating.
- The overall destruction of First Rome artefacts, alternation of Second Rome to create his Third Rome. Mussolini’s militia based artefacts to date remain in Rome and due to deep entrenchment it is hard to part from the fascist political ideology and experienced past of the city and country.
Cesar was killed in the senate and stabbed 23 times – led by his best mate Brutus. His famous last words – Et tu, Brute? (You too, Brutus?). They claimed to be acting over fears that Caesar’s unprecedented concentration of power during his dictatorship was undermining the Roman Republic. Cesar’s dead body was placed on a ramp in the Roman Forum by one of his (real) friend. The allies of Cesar regained the power by a speech at the time of his death despite killers (senators) being present in that gathering witnessing the aftermath of their act.
The Vatican City is an independent state and country. Its population is about 700 people, how cool is that. That’s mainly pope, some nuns and 500+ Swiss guards. In hopes of winning the support of the people, Mussolini created the conflicted area and ever changing landscape of Vatican a permanent independent state in 1929. The state was expanded to current parameters which is precisely 0.44 square metre or 1/7th of Central Park in New York.
The people of Vatican have their own passports, number plates, titles, currency, banking system and coins. The car plates are blue and locals see it as finding Prince Charles driving on streets for a easy pay out opportunity at times.
Vatican City was the richest country on planet pre covid (so did I hear) but now they’re like coping up with loses of no visit and building it up again.
The Pope has the freedom to say ‘I don’t want to be Pope anymore’ and has the freedom to abdicate his position. It happened back in 2015 and a couple of times before that as well. Then the sacred 115 cardinals vote on one person to become the new Pope. Given the nature of religious and ritualistic importance – it is probably the biggest event in the country that year. In Vatican, there’s a smoke which is flared to tell the ceremony is underway or has concluded – black for voting and white when a new Pope is elected. The voting is conducted in Sistine Chapel.
- During my visit, I found something fascinating that Kodak – once a mammoth and now a forgotten – Nokia of imaging world absorbed into the Apple & Gram reality. The company which went broke despite inventing digital cameras overinvested in camera films. Funnily, they paid for restoration of the Sistine chapel. Therefore, at present no one can take pictures inside the Chapel despite Kodak being bankrupt. They still have the copyright to one of the most religious Christian site on the planet.
All in all Rome has a paradoxical existence – On one hand we have history of emperor’s who inspire people for hope, meaning & purpose through conquest, bravery and wisdom. On the other hand, you have humans who play God by promoting submission to their whims, oppressive excellence by class structures, caricature of ancient mythology in their own persona and blood sport for entertainment – the Instagram, TikTok and OG Television of Roman empire aka Colosseum. My favourite fact, it was again an echo Colosseum (chamber) for hollow (posthumous) popularity, ego, narcissism and evidence of the only thing guaranteed by actual God’s about human i.e., they will play God’s themselves.
For me, soaking in the wisdom of the city was the highlight. Being able to walk in the steps of fathers of Stoicism fathers like Marcus Aurelius and Seneca in the streets of the city. The ability to absorb the excellent lives of exceptional beings and yet just human like us. Even in the light of above, I can’t believe the Rulers of the same empire parted life altering philosophies such as:
“People who are excited by posthumous fame forget that the people who remember them will soon die too. And those after them in turn. Until their memory, passed from one to another like a candle flame, gutters and goes out – Meditations, Marcus Aurelius”
I noted, that some do the ones who did not follow status are the only ones who have present day status here. With the wheel of time, the new Gods keep on changing old ones to become (Insta Reel/Tik Tok fashion) Gods. I can’t even imagine the challenge of anchoring bias and identity entanglement of the locals. I did observe that the locals are stuck in the conundrum of how much to learn from past, adjust the narratives, embrace it, embody it and then use all of that to life their (new age glorious) life.
I think in all of this they must forget to focus on future, live in the now and rely on ancient history for glory, novelty and hope (national funding). Again, why shouldn’t they, for instance, they have their own monuments, artefacts (stolen/saved/possessed), to pyramids, to St Peters church which makes atheists tear up on the sheer beauty of art, spirituality and life.
It’s a privilege and curse to have such rich history of Empires, God’s, Emperor’s, Dictators and constant reminder of all that when you open your eyes to morning coffee & what have you done with your life lately epiphany.
I don’t know if I would want to live in reality or just keep yearning the past using present day breaths….A gorgeous place filled with beauty, architecture from Augustus, to Titus to Michelangelo and humbling experience in how little we know and how much Romans had dexterity on and what they built and experience they created in absence of travelling, presence of slavery, physical strength, lobbying power, assassinations, Machiavellian behaviour for glory, ego and ruling.
P.S. As a traveller, I know every place has a value trade off – In Rome you see signs of being stuck in the past. For example the horrible public transport system. Buses don’t stop when you wave, train infrastructure is horrible but on the flipside you see everything on foot (partially forced to do so). Being said that, I’ve seen NY subway, Tokyo’s confusing trains, inability to breathe in London’s underground, DCs train system, Istanbul’s horizontal & vertical trains, My mother’s horror stories of trains in Pakistan, Paris’s public transport to San Francisco and Boston. I don’t know if it’s the CrossFit Knee injury or generally exhaustion of brain capacity after visiting museums here that’s it sticks out like a thorn for a tourist!
A must visit marvel for self reflection, growth & actual evolution of the world!
