After spending nearly two months here in Rome, I have gotten to see nearly all there is to see of Ancient Rome. This past weekend, I got to see a different side of Italy when we traveled to Pompeii. Between the two I got to see a lot of differences, along with a few similarities.
Some of the first things I saw while in Rome were the Coliseum and the Roman Forum. My first thought when I saw these, was "how in the world could someone build these massive, beautiful buildings 2000 years ago?" I mean the Coliseum was ahead of its time. It came complete with a retractable roof, and it could be flooded to reenact historic naval battles. This, along with the forum were very practical and state of the art. As for the forum, it was the same thing. It was hard imagining everything before it came to ruins, and how they possibly were able to built such big and beautiful buildings. One thing I noticed was that after Constantine, everything was influenced by religion, more specifically Christianity. If something was once a pagan temple, it was turned into a church.
This is where I see a lot of difference with Pompeii. In this time there was no religion. Pompeii was where some of the first brothels in the world were started. Sexual intercourse between two men was common, and the wealthy sat around and devoured food until they would vomit. I do not think that the ancient Romans would have partaken in any of these activities and I think that the main reason for that is because of religion/Christianity.
One of the main similarities I did see between these two groups of people is the fact that they were both so far ahead of their times. Our tour guide mentioned how the people of Pompei had running water, baths, and even had a rudimentary railroad (a track for horse and buggy's to travel on, the width of this track is still used to this day on railroads). Much like the Romans who had the Coliseum which had many of the same features of a stadium in present day, and they too had running water with the aqueducts. I also noticed how both groups of people enjoyed sports. At Pompeii our guide pointed out a gym where athletes trained, much like the gladiators of Rome who also trained in order to stay in shape for their fights.
When I first saw the Coliseum I thought the same thing. I was amazed at what they were able to build at that time. It was 2,000 years ago and it’s still there. The Forum too was home to many great temples and I’m sure they were very beautiful before all the flooding and the fire.
ReplyDeleteThere was religion in Pompeii. It just wasn’t Christianity. They had their gods as well, whom they prayed to. Romans too practiced vomiting their food. It was seen as very high class because the majority of the people were going hungry and they had so many resources that they could afford to do this.
I myself was wondering the reason why the Romans never had partaken in sexual intercourse the way that people in Pompeii had. You brought up a good point that it was because of religion. Because religion was so important in Rome, and also the center of the church, it would have been difficult to be involved with both
ReplyDelete