Post 6

Post 6

June 15,

Today we went to the church called Santa Maria of Saint Clemente. That was a church that was built upon layers of other churches, mainly a temple then two churches above that. Before the churches existed, there was a temple for the Mithra religion, which is a religion that many people followed back in ancient Roman times, built around the beginning of the first century, or in late B.C.. All the temple that was there for us to see was a tiny, single room with enough space for an alter and a few people at a time. I think that mostly soldiers and their family's would go there to pray and do rituals. It was buried due to a great fire that happened in 64 A.D. when Emperor Nero was in charge, and it was not resorted back to its original state and it would eventually become the foundation for the Church of Saint Clemente. I am not sure how deep we were, but it was very far underground, at least it felt like it when we were going down several stairs to get there.
This was really deep under the surface of the main church that we can see today.

Then we went up to where the first church was and looked around at the paintings/frescos that were left over and we listened to our guest professor, whom I do not remember their name. She was a professor from the Accent Center here. The first painting that we saw was of the the Saint himself and she told us that this painting we were looking at was located right over his tomb. Although, his body was not there underneath it like it would have been many years ago. Then we moved on to another painting which had a story behind it.

The story goes, there was a Roman senator who had a son, named Alexis and he raised him like a normal Roman and he was about to get married to a young girl, then he realized that he did not want that life. So after his wedding day, he told his wife that he loved her and moved on to go on his own live as a beggar in some other country in the middle east, I can not remember what country. Anyways he was there for a while and then he moved to another country for some time and then he came back to Rome. When he returned to Rome, he ran into his father one day, which is shown on the painting. However, his father does not recognize him and Alexis does not tell him what his real name is. He did ask his father for place that he could stay at for a while? His father told the man, aka Alexis, that his home was open; yet Alexis decided to chill under the staircase at his father's home for 17 years. When I heard that, I was like wow; I would have not like to live under a staircase for that long. Then Alexis knew that he was dying, so he asked for some paper and a pen or writing utensil and he wrote the story of his life and then left it for his family to see. The next scene on the painting was the pope visiting Alexis before his death, and then the last scene is on the right side showing Alexis dead on his bead and the family crying very hard about the fact that they did not know that their son had lived with them for several years and they did not treat him like a son. His wife was also there too, grieving like everyone else is. I was in awe when I heard that story, I don't think that I could do that for 17 years.

After that, we looked at some more paintings around there and herd their stories. I have to say that the one about the Alexis was my favorite.

Then we went up to the main level of the church, which was built in the 10th century, maybe if not earlier than that, but regardless of what its age was, it was a beautiful church there. wE learned about some more frescos or paintings that were there, one of Saint Catherine, and that was a interesting story about her protecting Christianity with her life. If I understood it correctly.

Here is the outside of the church. This is all I could get.

Here is our group

I apologize for not having a lot of pictures, because we were not allowed to take any inside; which was a huge downer for me.

After that, we went to the Gladiator school which was not too far away from the colosseum. There was not much left, but It was cool to see though at least. It was called the Ludus Magnus. It was built by Domitian.

Here is the School.

Another view of the school. 

The gladiator school again.

After that, we got to listen to Alexis, who was our last and one of the greatest presenters of our group. She had a presentation on the Arch of Constantine. That arch is the one that is located right next to the colosseum. I think it is pretty cool, aside from the Arch of Titus, I will always like that one.

Arch of Constantine.

Here is Alexis by her arch, Arch of Constantine.