Imperial Fora/Colosseum

Today, we went to see the Imperial Fora, which are a group of four different forums (Forum of Caesar, Augustus, Peace and Trajan) to the north of the Roman Forum that were added on during the Empire. First, we saw that of Peace, which was constructed by Nerva and connected the main Forum to that of Augustus. In the Forum of Augustus, we saw the remains of the Temple of Mars Ultor (Avenger), which Augustus erected after he regained the Roman Standard lost by Crassus back from the Parthians and enacted revenge on the conspirators of Julius Caesar. Trajan's Forum was the most impressive, in my opinion. He not only had a huge market place and library, but a massive Column which stood in the middle of it. The Column shows a pictorial account on a spiraling relief of his campaigns against the Dacians in the early 2nd century AD. On top of it is a statue of St. Peter (it was swapped out later by Pope Sixtus V for the original statue of Trajan). This definitely is one of the most impressive things I've seen thus far. Then, we went into the Imperial Fora Museum, which had some nice things but was relatively small and thus skippable. Finally, as we headed towards the Colosseum, we saw the Temple of Venus, standing in the Forum of Caesar. We then proceeded into the Colosseum, one of the most impressive sights in the world! It was simply breathtaking to view it from the inside. I only could imagine what it would have felt like to witness a Roman gladiatorial contest with all the gore and excitement encompassing everyone. Sitting between the Roman Forum and the Colosseum is the monumental Arch of Constantine. After our on-site class was finished, I walked back up towards the Forum of Caesar and entered the Mamertine Prison, which was Rome's maximum security prison that held prisoners, such as Jugurtha, Vercingetorix, Peter and Paul. The tour of the prison was very cool, because they incorporated sound effects and dimmed lights to give it that eerie, demoralizing feeling the prisoners would have had (except for the Christians, of course). Afterwards, I proceeded to the University. Tonight during evening lecture was our first reading quiz and I had yet to start any of the readings (as usual due to my exploratory nature), so I spent the majority of the afternoon catching up on reading and eating Gelato, my new vice.