Tesserae of Travels Through Life - Words, photos and moments of mosaics.
For All the Marble
For All the Marble

For All the Marble

Oh the humanity. There are people everywhere. I have been visiting the most iconic sights the last two days – the Roman Forum, the Colosseum, the Pantheon and the Piazza Navona. I was so relieved today when I had my Roma Pass and walked by the neverending queue to buy tickets for the Colosseum. How can I make this happen for the Vatican Museum line-up? I think I’ll have to pay extra for a reservation. Rome is a popular place.

Outside the Pantheon
Outside the Pantheon
Pathway full of people all the way to the Arch of Septimius Severus
Pathway full of people all the way to the Arch of Septimius Severus

You can literally trip over lumps of marble sticking out of the ground all around the ancient sites. Random pieces of columns are everywhere. Up on the Palatine, the location of Imperial Roman palaces, I found a couple of columns that were a gorgeous yellow. Turned out to be Numidian marble, Numidia having been in North Africa around where Tunisia and Libya are today. The marble was used a lot in the Pantheon as well.

Yellow marble column
Yellow marble column
Marble-clad interior of the Pantheon
Marble-clad interior of the Pantheon

And since I’ve used mosaics in the title of the blog, I’ll end with a couple of mosaics that I’ve seen so far. The first one was made with tiny tesserae. The other comes from the Colosseum.

Theatre mosaic from the Capitoline Museum
Theatre mosaic from the Capitoline Museum
Wild Animal Hunt
Wild Animal Hunt

2 Comments

  1. I can’t believe how crowded it is in Rome! Love the mosaics. I hope you can skip the line-up at the Vatican.

    Your blog tells me I’m following it, and this post came in my email (along with your email), so it all seems to be working …

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