one of my favourite aspects of living in Rome is that we often have the opportunity to visit the relics of saints on their actual feast days. in addition to giving our eyes and minds a break from the visual overload if we tried to squeeze everything in to a week-long trip, this slower pace allows us to join in the universal church's celebrations in an unforgettable way.
so, on Valentine's Day this year, we decided to visit St. Valentine! there are actually a few different St. Valentines (St. Valentine of Rome, St. Valentine of Terni, and another St. Valentine who was martyred in Africa). St. Valentine of Rome was a bishop who was martyred in the third century. he famously ministered to other Christians who were persecuted under Emperor Claudius Gothicus, including performing marriage ceremonies for them. it is said that he also cut hearts out of parchment paper and gave them to the persecuted Christians as a reminder of God's love. while imprisoned for his own faith, he prayed for the healing of the jailer's daughter who was born blind. he was sentenced to death for his refusal to recant his faith, and left a note for the jailer's daughter signed "Your Valentine". his relics have been moved around to various churches, but his skull remains on display at the church of Santa Maria in Cosmedin.
so that morning, after dropping Greta off at school, we headed over to Santa Maria in Cosmedin. the church stands directly across the street from two ancient pagan temples, at the base of the hill leading to the Circus Maximus. the location of the building dates back to the earliest Roman times, as it was part of the Forum Boarium, and in fact, the crypt of the church holds a group of tufa (stones) from the 2nd century B.C. the current church was rebuilt in the eighth century, and now it is the church of the Melkite community (mostly Syrian and Iraqi Catholics) celebrating the Byzantine Rite. but the church is a tourist hotspot for an entirely secular reason: the huge marble disk mounted at one end of the portico, known as the Mouth of Truth (La Bocca della Verita). in the movie Roman Holiday, this is where Gregory Peck's character pretended to lose his hand, to the shock of Audrey Hepburn's character. the story goes that if a liar puts his hand in the creature's mouth, his hand will be bitten off. every single time i've walked past here, there have been people lined up out the door waiting for their opportunity to stick their hands in the mouth. we haven't done it ourselves yet -- i'll wait in line to go into St. Peter's or the Colosseum, but not this!
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| Santa Maria in Cosmedin |
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| ruins of ancient Roman temples across the street |
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| the line for the Mouth of Truth (it's that white disk on the far wall) |
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you can walk right up on the other side of the fence to get a good look at the mouth without
waiting for an hour, if you don't care about having your own picture taken with it! |
so we bypassed the crowds to enter the church itself. the most notable feature of the church is its medieval schola cantorum, the enclosed area for the singers, flanked by two pulpits (one for the Gospel reading, one for the other readings). on the right side stands the huge Paschal candlestick -- the base dates from the thirteenth century, while the intricately designed shaft dates from the eighteenth century.
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beyond the schola cantorum stands the thirteenth-century baldacchino.
the altar holds relics of St. Hilary, St. Cyrilla, and St. Coronatus. |
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| a little blurry due to the dim lighting -- but check out that Paschal candle! |
and then, finally, the reason we'd come: the chapel of St. Giovanni Battista de Rossi, in which is kept St. Valentine's skull. today, it was prominently displayed atop the altar. we said a prayer before heading back out into the brilliant sunshine.
since we had another few hours free to wander, we decided to meander back up the river and poke our heads into whichever churches struck our fancy (which is -- Catholic nerd alert! -- one of our favourite hobbies). just beyond this fascinating building with an amalgamation of architectural styles, we decided to check out St. Nicholas in Prison (San Nicolo in Carcere), which is undergoing significant reconstruction.
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| it's kind of like the architectural version of a Mad Lib |
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| inside St. Nicholas in Prison -- named for the real St. Nick. |
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| lots of work going on! |
then we continued up the hill past the Theatre of Marcellus (which at first glance could be confused for the Colosseum!), up the Cordonata steps designed by Michelangelo to the Piazza del Campidoglio overlooking the Roman Forum.
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| a statue of Marcus Aurelius (the original now stands in the Capitoline Museums in the piazza) |
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the Palazzo Senatorio, originally built in the eleventh century and rebuilt several times. Michelangelo designed
the staircase in front as well. the statues of the river gods of the Nile (left) and the Tigris (right) are from the 1st century AD. |
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| Romulus and Remus suckling from the wolf |
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| the Roman Forum (the Arch of Septimius Severus is on the left) |
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| probably not the first or the last time that multiple bottles of wine have been consumed here |
we had a bit of time before Nick needed to get back to the office, so we decided to explore the Basilica of Santa Maria in Aracoeli. this church is sandwiched between the Vittorio Emanuele monument to the left and the Campidoglio to the right. all of the local bus stops in this area are called "Aracoeli" as well. the name derives from a medieval legend that Caesar Augustus asked a prophetess about whether he should be given the title of a living god. she replied that "the future ruler will descend from the sun". while he was standing in this area, he had a vision of a young woman standing on an altar and holding a child. he then built an altar on this spot and called it the Ara Coeli ("heavenly altar").
the first church in this area was a Byzantine monastery from the seventh century. over the years, the church was abandoned and then later re-founded as a Benedictine monastery. in the fourteenth century, when the papacy had moved to Avignon, Cola di Rienzo battled his way to power in Rome, asking the people to donate to build the staircase that currently leads to the church, as an act of thanksgiving to Our Lady of Aracoeli after an outbreak of the plague. a statue of di Rienzo still stands in the garden.
the interior of the church is absolutely gorgeous. the coffered ceiling recounts the Battle of Lepanto in 1571, a battle between Christian armies and the Ottoman Empire.
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| the chapel of St. Bernadine of Siena |
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| the chapel of the Crucifixion |
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| fragments of a fresco from the 1300s |
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| reconstruction work underway on one of the side chapels |
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| the Baroque high altar with a wooden icon of the Madonna d'Aracoeli that dates to the tenth century |
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| just imagine me screech-whispering "WALK! WALK! WALK!" and you'll have the right idea |
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| a better view of the high altar |
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| the stained glass window bears the image of three bees, the symbol of the Barberini family |
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the chapel of St. Gregory the Great. under the altar rests the body of Blessed John of Triora,
a Franciscan missionary to China who was martyred in 1816. |
behind the main altar is a small chapel dedicated to the Holy Child. the original
Santissimo Bambinello statue was a 15th or 16th century statue of Baby Jesus, carved from a piece of olive wood from the Garden of Gethsemane. many miraculous healings have been attributed to it. the original statue was stolen in 1994 and has never been recovered, so the current statue is a replica. people come to leave messages and written prayer requests here.
finally, we made our way to one of the most unique chapels in the church: the tomb of St. Helena, Empress of Rome. her monument stands alone to the left of the high altar, at the spot where the original Ara Coeli erected by Caesar Augustus is supposed to have been built.
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| the lighting made it quite hard to take a good picture! |
our Valentine's Day celebrations continued over the next few days with cards and gifts for the girls from family back home. there wasn't any kind of party or Valentine exchange at Greta's school -- i was relieved not to have to scurry around to make 30 Valentines, and also grateful that she's not old enough to feel ripped off not having a school Valentine party!
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| fun with stickers (i have no idea where she got the inspiration for this pose...) |
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| thank you, Grammie! |
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| thank you, Nana! (don't be fooled by their weird faces ... they were super excited!) |
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