Summer Solstice in (Ancient) Rome

I thought…what a great place to celebrate the summer solstice or midsummer, but so far I have not come across any type of advertised festival or event online, so I must come up with something to do myself.  Thinking about the meaning of the longest day of the year….I look back at the year so far and think of all of those new year’s “intentions”.  How have they been going?  Am I on track?  Is there anything that needs adjustments?  I make some mental notes.

I make a plan to go a bit south to the Appian Way, the famous ancient Roman road that once stretched 430 miles to the sea.  I rent a bike and ride about a total of 10 miles round trip from the entrance of the park. Riding over the original large cobblestones, like the ones located around the Coliseum, I enjoy walls and gates with hidden villas behind, vast countryside and early Roman ruins.

Appia Antica

Villa along the way

Villa in the countryside

Ruins along the way

I stop for a salad of artichoke, watercress and mozzarella before a 45-minute tour of San Sebastian catacombs.  Simon, our English speaking tour guide, takes us 4 meters or more under the ground to reveal the 2^nd to 6^th century Christian catacombs or burial grounds. More than 100,000 bodies were buried in the over 65,000 graves that stretch out under Rome’s soil.  Only five of the sights are open to the public.   Walking through the narrow cool hallways, Simon describes the various Christian symbols, the anchor, the fish and the dove.  We see the stamp pressed into the soft terracotta that covers the chambers.  On this stamp is the ruler of Rome, so we have en exact time stamp for each grave.

 

SanSebastian Catacombs

Inside catacombs

One of the three masoleums

Close-up

But that is not all, Simon takes us several more meters deep to the earlier Roman (pagan) graves.  Unlike the Romans that slid the bodies into the walls, the Romans practiced cremation.  The structures where the cremanes are found are more like mausoleums, small buildings with elaborately decorated ceilings and frescos painted on the ceilings and walls.  When these mausoleums were discovered, they were in pristine condition and no restorations were needed.  They were beautifully preserved in the Roman soil.

My day was complete as I stumble onto one of the last areas of town that I want to visit… Capitoline Hill.  This area was the sight of the original Forum and Temple of Jupiter from the 1^st century and is considered the spiritual, economic and political center of ancient Rome.  Today is typifies the blending of the past and present as buildings from the various centuries are literally built one on top of the other.

It is also the sight of Michelangelo’s Marcus Aurelius on horseback in Piazza del Campidoglio, the Capitoline Museums, Santa Maria in Aracoeli church and the Victor Emmanuel monument. The sun is setting and my day is complete as I welcome the summer solstice, renewed and redirected.