A Roman Holiday: (Some of) the Crew does Rome

Sunday: I wake up, and start getting ready to pick them up for the airport. I decide to check online to see if their flight is on time. The flight isn’t there.

They arrive tomorrow morning.

Monday: Mike and Pat actually arrive! I meet them at Ostiense train station and we head back to my apartment. We then head to Tre Scalini in Monti for lunch, weaving through a group of young Italians holding glasses of wine and cigarettes right outside the entrance.

3 glasses of wine, sausages with truffle oil, eggplant parmesan, porchetta, and mozzarella di bufala later, my phone rings. My roommate calls: OURAPARTMENTISFLOODING-CANYOUGETHEREFAST.

Mike, Pat, and I sprint back to my apartment, where Mandy is in the bathroom with buckets trying to contain the scalding hot water that is jetting out of the wall. Our radiator (which I thought was a towel heater) had busted off the wall. Mandy’s room is partly flooded and the floor outside the bathroom is flooded. Towels everywhere, windows open, two Italian neighbors in our palazzo are staring in from the window, chainsmoking, another Italian neighbor is pacing around in our apartment trying to find the valve to shut off the water. Mike and Pat take over the bucket scene, dumping the water into the toilet, while Mandy talks with our landlord (who also doesn’t know where the water valve is), with the adjoining scala (our building, or “stairwell”) manager (ours is nowhere to be found)—I sprint to the hardware store to get a hose to try and more easily direct the water into the toilet (“il tubo! Ho bisogno il tubo!”). Needless to say, eventually the water stopped, because the scala manager turned off the water to the entire building. Two visits of the plumber later, it was finally fixed. Welcome to Italy, Mike and Pat.

Tuesday: Che bella giornata. The sun seems to cure all ills and worries. Cappuccinos, the Pantheon, Piazza Navona, Via del Corso, Piazza del Populo, and then a picnic in the gardens of Villa Borghese (the “Central Park” of Rome) with prosciutto, salami, pecorino cheese, bread, beer, and olives. Yes please.

Threw coins in the Trevi fountain, gelato.

Wednesday: 150^th Anniversary of Italy’s Unification!!

 Pouring Rain.

Lovely extended late morning coffees.

 Free amazing art in Rome:

Basilica di San Agostino: Caravaggio’s Madonna di Loreto

Chiesa di San Luigi dei Francesi: Caravaggio’s Calling of Saint Matthew, Inspiration of Saint Matthew, and Martyrdom of Saint Matthew.

Gelato 2: Teatro Gelato (tucked in a small square off via del Coronari).

Saint Peter’s Basilica.

Aperitivo turned dinner: a nice bottle of Barolo (my first), sold to us by a leather-jacket clad Italian man who continued to tell us about the bottle (and Barolos in general) after we already told him multiple times we were buying it. He even broke out the Italian Somelier book and showed us exactly which wine it was. More prosciutto, Grano Padano, bread, olives. The wine was ok…nice, but not as strong and full-bodied as we thought it would be. The 3 euro bottle of Prosecco that followed however (which I bought at the Circo Massimo Farmer’s Market) was FANTASTIC.

Finally, at 11pm, I drag Mike, Pat, and my friend Katy out for the Notte di Tre Colore (night of three colors, i.e. Italy’s flag), because many of the museums were open for free until 2 am. Our timing couldn’t have been better—we made our way through the crowds up Via Fori Imperiali, past the Colosseum lit up with hundreds of Italian flags, to Piazza Venezia, where Trajan’s column and the Vittore Emmanuele monument, built to celebrate Italy’s unification, was brilliantly lit up green, white, and red. As we reached the packed square at midnight, fireworks burst over the Colosseum and the Celian Hill. The large gold ones that shimmer into weeping willows are, and will always be, my favorite. For some reason, whenever I see them something stirs a peculiar feeling within me that I can only describe as a kind of mix of The Great Gatsby, fourth of July memories, and the Lord of the Rings.

We traverse across the city (traffic was crazy) to the Ara Pacis museum, which houses the immense Ara Pacis, the emperor Augustus’s altar and monument to the Pax Romana, or Peace of the Roman Empire after his imperial conquests abroad. For this evening only, the original colors were projected onto the now white, marble altar (it, like everything in antiquity was colorfully painted). And the colors of the floral wreaths and festoons, Rome personified as a goddess, Tellus (Mother Earth), and images of Aeneas (the warrior who mythically founded Rome after returning from the Trojan war) were brought to life.

In the basement of the museum was a show by Marc Chagall (Russian Artist of the 20^th century). Art on top of art on top of art: only in Rome .

Thursday: Saint Patty’s Day!

More pouring rain.

More leisurely late morning coffees.

San Lorenzo, the “communist” (read: student and less affluent) area of Rome for dinner at Il Pommodoro (not impressed with the Carbonara) and cheap beers. Lots of graffiti and drugs. Oh kids today.

A Guiness, whisky, and bailey’s at Cork’s Inn for Saint Patrick’s day. After all, he is Pat’s namesake.

Friday: DAY TRIP.

Train from Termini to Orvieto. Funicular up to the medieval town. Views of Umbrian countryside, narrow cobblestone streets, lined with wooden window shutters, winding between stone churches and buildings. Long lunch at La Grotte del Funaro. DELICIOSO. Black truffle crostini, salami, sausage, cianghiale (wild boar) prosciutto, white wine from Orvieto, fresh (egg) tonarelli pasta with black truffles, gnocchi, stracci di pasta (“rags” of pasta)…oh my.

Prosecco and the Duomo of Orvieto. UNBELIEVABLE. The striped cathedral of alternating white travertine and black basalt was built in the fourteenth century and houses the famous San Brizio chapel with the masterpiece frescoes of Luca Signorelli. The vivid colors and various angels make the figures appear like they are popping out of the wall—a demon with green buttocks, Dante, a young, scornful Raphael, the resurrection of the flesh of the dead—and the tangles of contorted naked bodies prefigure and influence Michaelangelo’s Last Judgement of the Sistine chapel 40 years later.

 A train ride and sunset later, we were back in Rome.

I love day trips.

Saturday:  Last day

Circus Maximus and Circus Maximus Farmer’s Market.

The Catacombs of Priscilla.

A long late-afternoon coffee with Pat outside a café near my apartment. Of all the things we did and saw, sitting with Mike and Pat, talking about budgets, jobs, coffee, best movies of our generation—just hanging out—meant the most to me. Having them here was a wonderful clashing of worlds. My life in Rome colliding with my life in Minnesota, with my life in Boston—when I used to visit them in New York.

A last, huge dinner in Testaccio at La Fraschatta di Mastrio Giorgio. Pizzatelle, Foccaccia, meat and cheese platter, fiori di zucca, bucatini all’amatriciana, spaghetti con cichori e pecorino. Their famous tiramisu. And after a dangerous mojito near a packed, Saturday night Piazza Navona.

Sunday: Marathon di Roma!

Despite the city being shut down for the marathon, Pat and Mike made it to their flight.

Still missing them.

Thinking like an ancient Roman with Professor Andrew Riggsby

On Tuesday I met with Dr. Andrew Riggsby, Professor of Classics and Art History at University of Texas-Austin, at the American Academy in Rome. Here in Rome, the American Academy is housed a beautiful palazzo on the Janiculum hill, located on the western side of the city across the Tiber river. I often go to their library when I need a particular book in their collection for my research, or when I get homesick for Dartmouth’s Sanborn House Library, which looks so similar. Large, high windows line the two main reading rooms; the floors, tables, and bookshelves are all dark wood, on each table is an antique-style lamp with a green lamp shade and at the end of each bookshelf a bronze bust of Academy Fellows of time past. And, of course, the best part, the bookshelves are full of books of all sizes and colors, some so old you’re sure they’ll creak when you open them, some with that spanking-new-book smell, some small with worn, cloth covers, some large and leather-bound. Professor Riggsby won the American Academy’s prestigious Rome Prize for 2010-11 and so is here in Rome as an American Academy Fellow to research his latest project: “Think like an Ancient Roman: Essays in Cognitive History.”

Over tea and Russian tea cakes (or Mexican Wedding Cakes, as Professor Riggsby informed me they are called in Texas) he described the three main parts of his project: deliberate organizational devices, the organization of time and space, and the role of general cognitive factors in persuasion used by ancient Romans. The first part, deliberate organizational devices, was inspired by his reading what ancient Roman authors wrote about rhetoric, the art of persuasive speech. Quintilian, a first-century CE Roman author, discusses the different aspects of rhetoric by presenting the leading theories concerning a particular aspect and then states what he considers to be the “correct” theory. Often in explaining these theories, he uses a “tree” form to organize the information. Think family tree: he begins with one subject, which branches into others, which in turn branch into others, and so on. However, at one point, while describing his own “correct” theory, he warns the reader not to teach this theory because his students will not understand it. While taking notes on this theory, Professor Riggsby found himself needing to draw a table to organize the information and began to wonder about the way ancient Romans were organizing their thoughts and information. It turns out ancient Romans rarely use this “table” form (which Riggsby defines as a tool that correlates both on its vertical and horizontal axes) as a cognitive organizational tool; instead, they most often employ the “tree” form. Professor Riggsby also mentioned modern cognitive research that concluded that many different cultures and societies employ this “tree” form of organization, while the “table” form is used far less.

What devices do we use to organize our thoughts and reach conclusions? How are we persuaded by the method in which an argument or opinion is formed? According to the ancient Roman authors different methods bring about different conclusions, and can be used to the rhetorician’s benefit. But I can’t help but wonder: Do certain cognitive devices such as the “tree” form or “table” help in reaching more “correct” conclusions? Or only in persuading an audience? I’m looking forward to seeing what Professor Riggsby will conclude about this “tree” vs. “table” phenomenon in ancient Roman culture and the insights it will provide into our own thinking.

Ancient Roman Houses

This morning I went to see the ancient roman houses that have been excavated beneath the Basilica di Santi Giovanni e Paulo on the Celian Hill. The basilica above them was built in the 12th century and when you walk in the nave and apse are lined with all of these large chandeliers! I’ve never seen so many chandeliers in a church before (or any chandeliers, now that I think about it). They are from the renovations done on the interior of the church in the 18th century.

But–EVEN BETTER–beneath the basilica are the remains of 2nd and 3rd century Roman houses that are extraordinary. They began as stores and then eventually were converted into a large Roman domus or home. This was then bought by the Christian community, which established a titulus–a community center/meeting place–here officially in 499. Frescoes from the 3rd and 4th century survive on the walls and are fantastic. One room features genii–which are basically naked youths with capes–surrounded by ducks, peacocks, and other birds. Another room even had a nymphaeum–fountain–in it, with mosaic floors–some with stones of all colors and some just black and white–and then a HUGE fresco on the wall of a naked woman, hair styled, wearing a large stone necklace, reclining on a couch (Titanic anyone?) and being served by different persons. The colors were so vivid. And some were so soft and others really bright. There was even a room they have labelled a wine cellar (but I don’t know of the evidence for it).

Interestingly, it may also have served as a burial place at some point, because funerary remains (including inscriptions and parts of altars) were found in the excavations- some dating as early as the 2nd century.

I was clopping around staring with my mouth wide open during the entire visit, trying too hard to figure out exactly what each room was. I was the only one in there and I must have looked suspicious with my books, notebook, and backpack because 2 of the attendants followed me the whole time reminding me not to take photos. When I was leaving I had a chat with them in my limited Italian and they turned out to be incredibly friendly.  They told me that because it’s pretty quiet there this time of year I could come back and study whatever I wished. But no photos.

WOOT. GOOD DAY.

Snow, a Dead Emperor’s Daughter, and the Catacombs

I’m dreaming of a white Christmas…It snowed here this afternoon! Very rare for Rome. For a second when I looked out the window of the German Archaeological Institute today, I couldn’t remember where I was. Minnesota, Boston, New Hampshire? No, Rrrrrrrrrrrroma.

 This evening was my fifth and last visit to the Catacombs of Saint Agnes on Via Nomentana in Northeastern Rome. As it turns out, going to the catacombs and the adjoining mausoleum of a dead emperor’s daughter on a dark, sleeting, Friday evening is not most Romans’ idea of fun. Hm. I got them both all to myself.

 I finished taking my photographs of the fourth-century mosaics of the Mausoleum of Costanza. They are stunning. The mausoleum is a circular, domed building, reminiscent of the Pantheon—the circular temple to “all gods” in the center of Rome. Like the Pantheon, there is even an oculus (a hole in the middle of the dome opening to the sky), but Costanza’s has been filled with cement. The whole space was dark, except for the brilliantly lit dome separated from its surrounding ambulatory (circular walkway) and the illuminated fourth-century mosaics that cover it by 12 pairs of re-used ancient Roman columns. Oh the mosaics! I used to hate mosaics. I don’t know why, but as an undergrad I specifically remember not liking them. But as the light washed over them in the mausoleum, the technicolored tesserae of grape harvests, vines, and geometric designs shimmered in waves. I could almost hear the squishing of the grapes underneath the feet of the three blue men stomping on them. My neck hurt from looking up, but I couldn’t stop staring. I am focusing on non-elite Roman burials. This, miei amici, is an elite burial if there ever was one. Yet, despite being called the “Mausoleum of Costanza,” Constantine’s daughter, who died in 354 CE, it is now thought that this circular, domed building was not built until the 360s and for her younger sister Helena, who married the emperor Julian the Apostate (361-363, so called because he tried to re-establish the pagan cults in Rome after Constantine stopped funding them with imperial money around 313 CE).

Some of the catacomb inscriptions are still stuck up on the walls of the stairway leading down into the basilica, which rests over the catacombs. The basilica seemed smaller, but more elegant than my last visit. The only people there were me, the janitor, and the tour guide to the catacombs. Thank god she didn’t remember me from before so she didn’t think I was stalking her. Not stalking her, but stalking the halls of death into which we were about to descend…

Just as creepy as I remember, but…WARM. They were so cold before. Snow in Rome, the catacombs warm, what next?!? I asked her about this on my one-on-one tour and she said that because of the tufa, the catacombs remain at a constant 14 degrees Celsius. Guess it just depends on the weather outside.

 OTHER FUN FACTS ABOUT THE CATACOMBS OF SAINT AGNES

The catacombs of Saint Agnes are some of the smallest in Rome and they still run for 6 km underground.

They consist of 3 levels and once contained over 5,000 burials. However, only about 1,200 inscriptions have been found here. And of these, there are only 837 listed in Volume VIII of ICUR (Inscriptiones Christianorum Urbum Romanis, the MASSIVE tomes of inscriptions I spend too much time with). First, where are the other 3,800 inscriptions? And where are the remaining 363?

 Anyway, I had a nice chat with the guide and she showed me things I hadn’t seen before—the original catacombs entrance, the original tufa quarry from which the catacombs originated. Awesome.

I have more to tell but realizing that I was the only person in the catacombs on a Friday night made me realize I need to speak with real people. So, off I go…

Two Equations of the Day

Perfection = the enemy of the good.

Postal service in Italy < Postal service in Turkey

(= goodbye kindle and indoor soccer shoes )

An Interpretive Crux

As I work on my database and research on the catacombs and their inscriptions, artwork, and archaeology, I am continually trying to narrow down and refine my research/argument for the article I will write at the end of the year. In doing this, I have been thinking a lot about interpretation, particularly because here in Rome you can’t avoid the visible layers upon layers of history—the ancient monuments rising above modern streets, the inscriptions and pieces of sarcophagi immured in the walls of the churches, the renovations, baroque paintings with mannerist sculpture, etc.

I have been working from a very helpful research outline given to me by one of my professors at Harvard (What, Thesis, Method, Theoretical Framework, Why),  but I keep finding myself at an interpretive crux.

So, below I have laid out: 1) Project Goals, 2) Article Outline/Proposal , and 3) my problems and questions. In the end, I think it comes down to what academia is and what it is doing.  

This is where I am at currently:

 Project goals:

 This project will result in (1) an article to be submitted to an academic journal for publication and (2) a digital online catalogue of photographs and research on the inscriptions, images, and architecture of the funerary monuments of non-elite women and slaves in third- to fifth-century Rome of the catacombs of Sant’ Agnese and the catacombs of San Pietro e Marcellino to be made available to Dartmouth College students and faculty through the Department of Religion’s website.

 Article Outline / Proposal:

 (1 – What. 2 – Thesis. 3 – Method. 4 – Theoretical Framework. 5 – Why.)

 1. What?

My project will investigate the inscriptions, visual art, and archaeology of the funerary monuments of the catacombs of Sant’ Agnese and San Pietro e Marcellino in Rome, Italy to analyze the practices of commemorating the social and religious identities and roles of non-elite Christian women and slaves of third- to fifth-century CE Rome. (For my article, I will be narrowing this down to one inscription or funerary monument or one set of inscriptions / funerary monuments.)

 2. Thesis/Goals

My goals are:

1) To identify the tools/ discourses/ rhetorics those who were buried here and their families used to commemorate the deceased (because if there’s one thing I learned from all my reading on funerary inscriptions, it’s that they only tell us about commemorative practices and not about actual social/religious roles of those commemorated).

2) Ask what these inscriptions were doing in that catacomb at that time (that is, ask about the social setting of the burials, the intended audience of the burials, whom they excluded, and who had access).

And lastly, 3) ask how the history of the use and scholarship of the catacombs has affected our interpretation of this (or this set of) inscriptions/burials.

 3. Method

Ideally, the following (although 2 and 3 still seem problematic to me):

1) Research context (Location, history, etc.)

2) Look at every available inscription of the Sant’ Agnese Catacomb and tally the words and formulae used.

3) Look at each piece of art and tally what narratives are used, and what architecture is used.

 In other words:

An evaluation of what we do and do not have:

1. Outer location and context. Where located? What surrounds? History of surrounding area. (Why here?)
2. Inner location and context. History of construction of catacomb. How many burials? How many loculi? How many in cubicula? How many arcosolia? Architecture in catacomb? Archaeological map.
3. How many inscriptions have survived? What is on inscriptions? What formulae used? How many marked female? How many marked male? Roman social strata identified? How many marked slave? How many unmarked? Etc.
4. Visual art. Is there any? What narratives/visual rhetoric are used?

 What is commemorated on the material that survives (albeit incomplete)? What tools/discourses/rhetorics are they using?

 4. Theoretical Framework.

The Critical-Rhetorical Approach, as articulated by Elisabeth Schussler Fiorenza.

Not what they mean, by how they mean and what they do.

 What are these tools doing? How are they being used?

(Who are they including and excluding? What can we learn about the social setting of the burials? For whom are these texts written? What can we learn about the intended audience? Who had access? Who has access to catacombs? Are burials asserting power? Asserting social status?)

 How have the catacombs been used throughout history? How have these inscriptions(s)/funerary monument(s) been used throughout history? For what has it been used? Who has been excluded?

 I find myself particularly interested in how the catacombs and their burial remains have been used over time. First, they’re used for burial. Next, Pope Damasus uses them to control and direct the masses of Catholic Christians, during which he erases the memory of several female saints by commemorating twin male saints in their place. This continues from the fifth to ninth centuries with the itineraria, which control and direct the masses of Christians that make pilgrimages to Rome to visit these relics. Then, beginning in the ninth century they are forgotten because most of the relics are moved inside churches (“translated”). When they are rediscovered during the Protestant reformation, they are again used as tools of power by the Catholic Church: they are used to “prove” the origins of Catholic Christianity, and as such, always the questions asked of them are directed towards origins and “Christians” – despite various different kinds of people buried there (not to mention the lack of scholarship, until very recently, on the Jewish catacombs which predate the Christian catacombs). And even now, the Catholic Church still controls nearly all the catacombs, controls access, and controls what information is being given to the tourists who take the tours of the five catacombs open to the public. The inscriptions and remains are either: 1) in the catacombs, 2) in the walls of the church complex, or 3) in various museums. It still seems like are being used to show the antiquity and thus power and legitimacy of the Catholic church. Or in the case of state museums, I suppose the antiquity and thus power and legitimacy of Rome/Italy.

 5. Why?

I am having problems with this question.

 I think this could be used as a tool to examine our own culture today. It is not the same kind (nor do have a comparable amount) of evidence, so we cannot compare it to burial practices today, but we can still use it to ask the following questions: What do we commemorate today? Why? For whom? What does this say about our culture? What do we think about this?

 But, is it the role of a scholar to offer her opinion as to what it says about our culture and what it says about how we should live today? (I think ideally it SHOULD be the role of a scholar to do this, because if we can’t do anything about the past, then the only benefit studying it provides us with is to learn from past mistakes…but perhaps not).

 I keep coming back to the question: Why does any of this matter? What is it contributing to the world? Of course I’ve thought a lot about the importance of understanding history because it affects the way we understand ourselves, our culture, etc., but in the end, if it isn’t doing anything to improve something today, then does it really matter?  

More thoughts…

I keep finding myself thinking that everything I research and write is conjecture and interpretation, from what I choose to select as “data” (here the tools/discourses/rhetorics used in the inscriptions) to the questions I choose to ask of them (What are they doing, who has been excluded, etc.). How do we know which is the best way to do it? Is there a best way? Or just different ways? It seems like we can never actually know how they were used or what they were doing in the past. Is all we can do to offer our own opinion?

The history of the scholarship has affected how we view these and what questions we have asked of them. And what they are doing now affects how we view them and what questions we ask of them. How do I take this into consideration, while at the same time acknowledging that their modern/present context influences how we view them as well? How do I acknowledge that I am using my own lens? How do I acknowledge the role of the process of scholarship?

 Lately, I feel like scholarship is just a form of art, from the topics we select as the focus of our work, to the questions we ask of it, to the process of finding the “data” to answer these questions, to writing it into “scholarly” papers. But instead of calling it art, we call it a much safer and more dignified name, Scholarship. or Research. And our art hides under the guise of “true knowledge” or the illusion that we are finding “fact” or “certainty.”

Hm.

The Eagle, the Dragon, and Joan Jonas.

 

Saturday, November 28, 2010

Italian word of the day: aiuole = grass.

Went to exhibit in Palazzo Venezia: I Due Imperi. L’aqulia e il Dragone.

The Two Empires. ______ and the Dragon. What is “L’Aquila”?

The Eagle.

The Eagle and the Dragon.

FASCINATING.

Juxtaposes material evidence from Roman Empire (200 BCE – 476 CE) and the Qin and Han Dynasties in China (200 BCE – 200 CE).

First room: Roman stuff. SPEECH. LESS. Statues, frescoes, styluses, coins, speculum (yes, apparently Romans had vaginal specula).

The picture of our own age in the future, taken in the past.

Group of Bottles, a casserole dish, a spoon, and other kitchen utensils.

 Label: “The female world.”

?

Second room, more Roman frescoes. Vivid colors. Soft colors. Oh those feet. “Dancer.”

 

Third Room. Chinese stuff.

WOW.

Full Chinese suit of Jade. Jade sarcophagus.

 Delicate model buildings. Over 5 feet tall.

 Nearly all funerary evidence.

Tombs of the wealthy.

 What does this say about death?

Only the wealthy reach immortality?

What would someone think of our culture 2,000 years later based solely on funerary evidence?

Ate thanksgiving leftovers. 

7:05 pm. Michael came over. Brought Banoffee. O.M.G. New favorite thing.

 8:30 pm. Joan Jonas opening at Galleria Allessandro Bonomo.

Small but beautiful space.

 Louis Viutton boots, fur coats, cruella devile hair…

Art world extraordinaire…

Wikipedia says:

 “Born in 1936 in New York City, Joan Jonas is a pioneer of video and performance art and one of the most important female artists to emerge in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

She began her career in New York City as a sculptor. By 1968 she moved into what was then leading-edge territory: mixing performance with props and mediated images, situated outside in natural and/or industrial environments.

Jonas’ video performances between 1972 and 1976 pared the cast down to one actor, the artist herself performing in her New York loft as Organic Honey, her seminal alter-ego invented as an “electronic erotic seductress,” whose doll-like visage seen reflected bits on camera explored the fragmented female image and women’s shifting roles. Drawings, costumes, masks, and interactions with the recorded image were effects that optically related to a doubling of perception and meaning. For Jonas, in Organic Honey and earlier performances, the mirror became a symbol of (self-)portraiture, representation, the body, and real vs. imaginary, while also sometimes adding an element of danger and a connection to the audience that was integral to the work.

Jonas is a professor of visual arts at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

Her works include: Organic Honey’s Visual Telepathy (1972), The Juniper Tree (1976), Volcano Saga (1985), Revolted by the Thought of Known Places… (1992), Woman in the Well (1996/2000), her portable My New Theater series (1997–1999), Lines in the Sand (2002), and The Shape, The Scent, The Feel of Things (2004).

Joan Jonas is represented in Paris and New York by Yvon Lambert Gallery^[1].”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joan_Jonas