June 3rd: Republican Rome

Today we explored sites and artifacts from Republican Rome. To start off the day, we made the trek from the Piazza Mazzini, where we're all staying, over to the Capitoline Museum. Located on the Capitoline Hill between the Roman Forum and Campus Martius, the museum is filled with ruins, statues, and other artwork of Rome. During our visit Cari gave a presentation on the Temple of Jupiter Maximus, which was the first temple of Jupiter. It was really interesting to hear about all of the history surrounding the site, such as how many times the temple burned down and was immediately rebuilt because it was so important to the Roman people. I was also really excited to see the famous statue of Marcus Aurelius on a horse, as seen below:

Equestrian Statue of Marcus Aurelius

Because the museum is located on top of a hill, we were able to look out into the Roman Forum, which we visited yesterday. It really helped put things into perspective by being able to see all of the forum at once, instead of just seeing the parts that we walked through yesterday. I was able to really appreciate just how large the site is.

View of the Roman Forum from the Capitoline Museum

After leaving the museum, we walked a bit to San Nicola in Carcere. Like many churches in Rome, this was once a temple to a pagan god. That wasn't too noticeable on the inside, but on the outside it was clear to see that the current church was built around columns from an older temple. It would have been nice to be able to go into the basement of the church and look at the foundations of  the older temple, but we didn't get the chance to do so because you had to have reservations. 

Interior of San Nicola in Carcere

I really enjoyed both of these sites today and I am even more excited for all we're going to see in the next couple of weeks, even with all of the walking outside in the hot weather!