I’m spending a week in The Eternal City with my class. We’re going to the major sights (St. Peter’s Basilica, the Forum, Ostia, The Vatican Museum), but on Wednesday we have a day at leisure to visit other sites or spend more time in places we’ve already been. What are some places that I absolutely cannot leave Rome without visiting? Grazie!
Well, you’ve probably already done these, but if you hang around outside of the Collesium or the Forum, you can get a free, and IMHO, excellent tour given by an American run tour group. I can’t remember their names but they are mentioned in most tour books. They give the free tours in the hopes that you will sign up for one of their more expensive tours, but you are under no obligation to do so.
If not, I would just spend a day walking around, eating at cafes and people watching. You won’t go wrong taking time to just enjoy the sights.
The Pantheon is definitely worth visiting. Originally a Roman temple, it was converted into a Christian church in [cough cough]AD.
The Spanish Steps: some really famous… steps in Rome. Famous for… being some steps.
The Trevi Fountain where, tradition has it, throwing three coins into the fountain guarantees you will return to Rome.
Hadrian’s Mausoleum: it’s on the banks of the Tiber somewhere. I wouldn’t consider it essential, but it was interesting. I think it’s official name is Castel Sant’Angelo.
There are some amazing catacombs just outside Rome that were used by very early Christians.
The Collosseum is definitely required visiting for tourists, even if you only stand and look at it from the outside.
Piazza Navona is a lovely square with fantastic architecture.
Alex B.
When I was in Rome, the one place I wanted to see–but couldn’t find in the time I had–was the Protestant Cemetary, burial site of both Shelley and Keats. Next time I’m there, it’s the first place I’m looking for; I found all the cool places already mentioned in this thread!
I recently spent a few days in Rome, and the thing that blew me away was the Pantheon. It’s been standing there, like that, for 2,000 years. Absolutely amazing.
The Borghese gardens are (IMHO) the most beautiful part of the whole city, and the villa there boasts several breathtaking sculptures by Bernini.
If you’re in a mind to get in touch with your own mortality, visit the cemetery of the Capuchin friars, commonly known as the “Bone Church”. Really macabre, very creepy. Laughing teenagers walk in, sobered (and slightly older) people walk out.
One very important tip: use your film on taking pictures of people, not of the artwork or the tourist sights. Buy lots of postcards instead, as these a) will usually have better pictures, and b) will be labeled. Once you get home, one photograph after another of picturesque rubble makes for a dull collection.
I was there a few months ago, and yeah, that made my jaw drop.
Truly an amazing city, enjoy.
These are all great suggestions. You can’t swing a dead cat in Rome without hitting wonderful architecture and sculpture. I remember visiting a church that had nothing but Bernini sculptures.
There are small restaurants near the Pantheon where you can just have a coffee and take it all in.
But I have only one additional suggestion: gelato…as much and as often as you can eat. There is no finer ice cream on the planet.
The story goes that the Pantheon’s ceiling was originally covered in bronze. The Barbieri family had it all pulled off, and had Bernini design the enormous baldachino for St. Peter’s Basilica, to be made from the bronze.
Note also that St. Peter’s is not the official cathedral of Rome, despite the fact that the Pope presides there. That distinction is held by San Giovanni in Laterno, which is definitely worth a visit. It has a gold ceiling, and a series of statues along both side of the main aisle that are fantastic.
If you’re a cat lover, a fun little aside is Torre Argentina. Besides being the place where Julius Caesar was stabbed by Brutus and his cohorts(!), it’s currently the location of a stray cat humane society type group, who care for around 250 cats who live in the ruins, and try to get them adopted away. Seeing an entire herd of cats lounging around on 2300-year-old Roman ruins is not something you can see just anywhere.
[QUOTE=FlyingDragonFan]
The story goes that the Pantheon’s ceiling was originally covered in bronze. The Barbieri family had it all pulled off, and had Bernini design the enormous baldachino for St. Peter’s Basilica, to be made from the bronze.
QUOTE]
Thus the Latin quip:
Quod non fecerant barbari, fecerunt Barberini. “What the barbarians had not done, the Barberini did.” That is, despoil the Pantheon of its valuable roof.
My own suggestion: the Palazzo Altemps. It’s right off Piazza Navona and is one of the smaller museums that form the Museo Nazionale. There are some really great sculptures there. The main branch of the Museo Nazionale, Palazzo Massimo alle Terme, is also a must see.
I love cats so I enjoyed the Torre Argentina, but keep in mind that it is also sort of distressing/saddening to see the condition so many of these cats are in, although the lovely folks who work there do their best to care for them. The Protestant Cemetary also has a cat colony, and is a more pastoral atmosphere. I couldn’t get in while I was in Rome, some sort of private event. The guard was quite rude to me.
What time of year are you going? If the weather is good, why not take some time to enjoy a little dolce far niente, and pick up some nice crisp bread, cheese, grapes, prosciutto and wine at a small local grocery shop (alimentari)(remember most shops are closed from 12:30 to 4:30, so plan accordingly!), and have a picnic on the grass at the Circus Maximus?. Great history of the Circus Maximus here.. After a frazzling few days getting jostled around by other tourists and with sore feet and dodging the odd pickpocket, sitting in the sun with a nice lunch and watching the world go by in Rome, on the very spot where charioteers raced for glory is pretty sweet!
And bythe way, if you haven’t read “I Claudius,” and “Claudius The God,” before you go…get cracking. I know they’re novels, but they take place in many of the buildings that you’ll be standing in, and describe the construction of the buildings you’ll be seeing, and the politics behind them. Graves was a very good classical scholar, as well a damn good storyteller. You’ll enjoy your time in the Forum and Palatine Hill a lot more, having read his gossipy tales of Livia’s dealings with the Head Vestal, believe me!
If you’re not entirely “ruined out,” visit the Baths of Caracalla. Immense, nearly 175 feet high inside the tepidarium: estimated that the baths could hold 1,600 bathers at a time. Really impressive (if you’re a history geek like me).
The Pantheon is perhaps the most wonderful building in the world. It is certainly my favorite piece of architecture.
Rome also has my second favorite architectural structure: San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane, a Baroque church designed by Borromini. Not far from that, you can find Santa Maria della Vittoria, another beautiful Baroque church which features Bernini’s famous Ecstasy of St. Theresa in the Cornaro family chapel.
Other churches are significant for their paintings–for instance, San Luigi dei Francesci features the Contarelli Chapel, which has wonderful paintings by Caravaggio; the church of Sant’Ignazio has an amazing Baroque ceiling by Fra Andrea Pozzo–just to name a few.
For art museums, I’d add some collections of ancient Greek and Roman sculpture–for instance, in the Conservatori Palace on the Capitoline (Campodoglio) Hill. I would also advise that when visiting the Vatican Museums to be expecting a huge collection of Renaissance and classical art–I’ve seen a lot of people go there expecting to walk straight into the Sistine Chapel, which you only get to after walking through several long corridors. Take the time to enjoy those long corridors, which include famous frescos by Raphael among other masterpieces. Just be careful not to be trampled by herds of tour groups intent on going straight to the Sistine Chapel.
Also be sure to visit the Trastevere neighborhood on the south bank of the Tiber. It doesn’t have as many tourist sights (although it does have some wonderful Early Christian buildings) which means less tourists and better restaurants.
Dining at a good (i.e., authentically Roman, not necessarily expensive) restaurant can be almost as much fun as sight-seeing.
Ooh, I forgot about the Contarelli Chapel. When we were there the building immediately next door had a Dali exhibit, and we had to walk past a copy of his Venus with Drawers to get to the chapel. Very strange juxtaposition.
Temple Of Romulus/Church of Santi Cosma e Damian. This little building on the Via Sacra is fascinating for a several reasons. The doors facing Via Sacra are the original doors from the early fourth century, though they are not now used. It was dedicated to the deified, recently departed son of the Emperor Maxentius in 307, making it one of the last Pagan monuments. After being converted to a church and dedicated to Cosma and Damiani in the early 500s, a remarkable mosaic of Christ and the Apostles was put over the apse. What I love about this mosaic is that the figures are all dressed in togas, and that in this case, this is presumably not an attempt by some artist to evoke an earlier, “classical” time, but a depiction of people wearing clothes that were known to the people of the artist’s time.
It was in 609, I believe. At any rate, that was the year they put up the Column of Phocas in the Forum, dedicated to the current Byzantine emperor, who nominally ruled Rome. The Column of Phocas is considered the last ancient monument in the Forum, though by that time we’re getting well into the early Middle Ages.
God, I loved Rome. I wish I were going!!
and the column of Phocas is relevant, I was going to explain, because it was erected to commemorate the conversion of the Pantheon to a church.
I wonder what they did with the Pantheon between the late fourth century, when all Pagan worship was prohibited, and the early seventh century when it became a church?