Roma

Cast of Characters

Campo dé Fiori

Caffè San Pietro

Colosseo

Foro Romano

Chiesa del Gesu

Pantheon

P. Navona

S. Pietro

Il Papa

S. Eustachio

S. Maria Trastevere

Trastevere

Bocca Verità

Fontana di Trevi

Museo Vaticani

Villa Borghese

Vittorie

Mangia!

Loose Ends

Desktops

Trastevere comes from the Latin "Trans Tevere" (across the Tiber [River]). In ancient times this green neighborhood was the home of noble families including Julius Caesar and, it is reputed, Cleopatra. After the fall of the Roman Empire it became the Jewish trading center. In the early Middle Ages the Jews moved to the other side of the river (the quarter that later became the Ghetto) and Trastevere became the main working-class district.

The panorama above is the Torre Argentina, in the center of which are remains of several (pre Caesar Augustus) Republican Temples). Just behind the Campo dé Fiori, this is the terminus of several subway lines. One day we decided to take the tram - the ferroviare ("iron horse") - on the very short trip from the Largo Argentina to Trastevere. On other days we walk, leaving Campo dé Fiori down the Via di Gabonani to the Via Arenula, crossing the Tevere via the Ponte Girabaldi, just west of the Isola Tiberina, the island in the Tiber. Everything is so close by; the walk takes perhaps fifteen minutes, twenty with Isaac walking under his own power. (The following panorama is the view just after we disembark from the trolley.)

From here it's but a short walk to the Chiesa di S. Maria Trastevere. If you like orange juice you'll want to visit this piazza.

Once we disembarked the ferroviare we strolled back toward the river on the Viale di Trastevere, enjoying the shops and the sunshine. If memory serves we stopped off at the San Francisco caffè; another caffè macciati caldo down the chute. At the river we had to choose whether to stroll the Vicolo del Cinque, where one of our favorite restaurants was, or to follow the Lungotevere (along the Tevere) forther downstream. Vicolo del Cinque is a trendy quarter of town, a very desirable place for foreign artists and other visitors. Cicki lives here; Devin lives nearby. We decide on the river. Along the motorway which parallels the river we find a memorial marker of someone who died in an accident. Do you see the picture of the deceased at the top of the marker, and the VolksWagen logo at the bottom? Then we walked down to the river's level and watched driftwood get churned in the wash. We walked past the hospital on the Isola.

Then we crossed the Ponte Palatino to visit the Bocca Della Verità (Mouth of Truth).