We’ve seen a lot of stuff so far on our trip to Italy across three different cities. Over the past two weeks, about seven of those days have been in Rome and we’ve used them to see many of the big sights. Don’t get me wrong, there are still many big sights to see like the Vatican, the Forum, and Campo di Fiori, but since we’re going to be spending the vast majority of our time remaining in the Eternal City, I feel like now is the time we can begin wandering to more of the off beat attractions the city has to offer.
Today was the beginning of that exploration. After breakfast at the apartment and a lazy morning of doing laundry and getting ready, we headed out on a walk to the nearby Aventine Hill.
Right next to a busy road that leads along the River Tiber there’s a gate that leads up a series of switch backed ramps and staircases to scale the hill. As you go up this hill, you get a great view of the city. This is the same place that leads to the Aventine Terrace we went to our first week. We arrived in the same garden of orange trees that is behind the terrace, but this time, rather than coming for the views from the terrace, we really came for the church adjacent to it, the Basilica of Santa Sabina.
We didn’t realize what this was the last time we were here, but after some research we found it is one of the oldest Christian churches in Rome, dating back to the 400s. It is one of the few examples of what early basilicas looked like and houses several examples of very early Christian art. Needless to say, we had to go in.
We walked into the foyer and one of the walls is lined with early Christian etchings and symbols. I’m not sure if they’ve found these at times when they’ve restored the building or if they’ve always been there incorporated into the wall, but it’s really interesting to see the early Christian symbols, especially since we can’t read the writing. We saw many similar symbols when we went to the catacombs which were started around a similar time. Also in the foyer are a set of carved wooden doors with panels depicting several biblical scenes, including one of the earliest artistic depictions of the crucifixion. The doors are immense, which make the carvings at the top a little hard to fully see, but the detail is pretty remarkable and it is fascinating to see what scenes were chosen and how really early Christians depicted them.
After seeing these things, we were excited to explore the inside of the church, but alas, we didn’t realize it was closed on Monday mornings. Guess we’ll have to come back.
With this small disappointment, we made our way back down the hill. The boys were running down the path enjoying themselves until the slope got a little steep and Silas was betrayed by a dislodged cobblestone. His momentum carried him face first into the ground, giving him a pretty good bump. Poor little guy. It was a hard fall, but he recovered quickly and still insisted walking the rest of the way down.
Close by we entered another church, this one called the Santa Maria in Cosmedin Church. We came here to find the legendary Mouth of Truth or Bocca della Verita, but oh did we find so much more. Inside the church we had the fun little surprise of seeing the skull of St. Valentine housed in a small glass box. There is supposedly some dispute on whether this is the skull of the real St. Valentine since there are others out there with the same claim, but whether it is or not, any time you see a skull in a small ornate glass box it’s pretty interesting regardless whose it is.
Then in the front of the church, there was a man standing next to a small set of stairs. After providing a small offering, we were able to descend down into to see the crypt of someone who I believe was a former Pope (I feel like these are starting to become a dime a dozen in churches here, but still cool.) The room has a small crypt at the back and the walls are lined with empty shelves carved into the rock which originally held relics associated with the buried individual. The most interesting things in the room to me were some old stones that are a part of the church foundation, but date much earlier to the 2nd century BC and were thought to be left from the Altar to Hercules which was originally on the site. The other interesting thing was Silas sticking his finger up through a hole in one of the stone shelves and going “weeoooo weeeoooo”.
Back upstairs outside the front of the church in a little gated area stood the Mouth of Truth. Beren was very excited for this part and had been looking forward to it all morning. The Mouth of Truth is an enigmatic, ancient circular carving of a pagan god with holes for eyes, nostrils, and mouth. Not much is known about it other than the legend surrounding it. Legend has it, when you approach the face you are supposed to stick your hand in its mouth. If you are untruthful, you will lose your hand.
It was weird because there were little places where they asked for an offering as you approached The Mouth, but come on, this is a depiction of a pagan god. We happily sidestepped that. We all put our hands in, and were a little nervous to do so, but were all deemed truthful!
Once out of the church we made our way across the street to quickly look at the Temple of Hercules Victor, which is the oldest temple still standing in Rome dating back to the 2nd century BC and legend says neither flies or dogs will enter it. It’s closed off so we were unfortunately unable to test that. On our way we stopped at a Roman water fountain for a drink.
This is where I will finally do a short and exciting aside to talk about Roman drinking water. First off, it is delicious right out of the tap. This was one of the things I missed most when we were in Florence because the water up there was funky. All around the city, there are little fountains for you to refill a water bottle or grab a quick refreshing drink. The strange thing is, unlike American fountains where you push a button, these are always flowing. There is a constant stream of water coming out of the fountain and disappearing into a hole in the ground. So when you want to fill a bottle, you just stick it in the stream. But if you have no bottle, that’s when the fun begins. There is a little hole on the top of the spout and when you plug the bottom, it redirects the stream upward where you can bend down and take a sip. Ingenious!
This had been a jampacked morning and we were hungry. We made our way across the Tiber into the winding maze of alleys that is Trestavere. We stopped in another beautiful church along our walk as we waited for places to open for lunch and ultimately found a place where we enjoyed some traditional Roman fare outdoors under an umbrella.
Lunch was delicious and filling and afterwards Allison and I lugged the boys back to the apartment for nap. As with most of our afternoons, we took a little nap too before I started work.
When the boys got up, they went to the playground with Allison, which reportedly was very busy. They tried to play with some of the other kids, but communication proved to be a bit difficult. Beren did muster up the courage to say Ciao to a little girl, though.
After that everyone came back and Allison ran down to the corner for a couple pizzas to bring back. We ate together before I went back and finished my workday. Thankfully, because of daylight savings time, it now ends more around 10 PM than 11 PM.