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I have taken these photos at various points in the last couple of years, but I never thought they were up to much. I am rather unhappy about publishing them when so many of my f-list are so astonishingly good. However!

My mother's flat is within a short walk of the Via Latina, which is probably the most ancient road still in use in Rome, and so I took a few photos of Via Latina and Porta Latina:
The Aurelian walls near Porta Latina
The Aurelian Walls were built late in the history of the Empire, in 258 AD, and they were put up in a devil of a hurry, using everything that was at hand. Archaeologists have found all sorts of things within them. They are nevertheless huge and imposing.

Porta Latina from the inside
Roma - Porta LatinaPorta Latina, on the other hand, is remarkably tiny, obviously not one of the city's main ways out. Notice the modern quarter on the other side - my mother lives a few blocks and a couple of turns down the road.

Roma - Porta Latina
Via Latina. This unremarkable street is the most ancient road in Rome and in Italy.

Roma, i giardini pubblici di Porta Latina
A delightful public park beside Porta Latina.

Roma, una Madonnina a Porta Latina
An image of the Blessed Virgin in the wall overlooking the Via Latina roadway. Notice the fresh flowers. Rome (and indeed Italy) are full of these.

Roma, San Giovanni a Porta Latina
The ancient church of St.John at Porta Latina. Not to be confused with the mighty Cathedral of St.John Lateran.

Roma, il pozzo di San Giovanni a Porta Latina
Unusually, there is a well near the church entrance...

Roma, le iscrizioni sul pozzo di San Giovanni a Porta Latina
...I could not decipher the inscription.

Roma - San Giovanni a Porta Latina
Inside St.John at Porta Latina. The southern half of Rome's historic centre has several churches that go back to the Dark Ages or even to the late Roman Empire. This one, I seem to remember, dates from the eighth century.

----------------------------------------------
And while we're at it....
Fat boy in cold weather
...this is what I look like. Sorry!

(to be continued...>
(deleted comment)

Date: 2010-04-14 10:49 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] fpb.livejournal.com
In general, being born Italian means that 70% of the time you feel sorry for anyone who isn't, and 30% you feel like ripping your passport, changing your name, and becoming Bolivian, Upper Voltan, anything but Italian!! In general, it depends on what the politicians or your fellow-countrymen have done that day.
(deleted comment)

Date: 2010-04-14 01:04 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] fpb.livejournal.com
It is demanding. I guess that is one reason why a lot of Italians feel a sense of collective inferiority. And the heritage really is unimaginable - you can literally stumble in every village, at the turning of any road, on to treasures that would be famous across the world and be celebrated as central to national identity in any other country. Last year I went to visit - for research reasons - a neat little town called Ceprano, in the hills south-east of Rome, and wouldn't you know it - apart from the Roman and pre-Roman antiquities I was there to investigate, I found, almost without looking, a wonderful ancient Dark Age church that was actually closed and locked because it was not currently in use! The whole country is like that - there is always something to discover.

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