Dorigen Caldwell and Lesley Caldwell, eds, Rome:
Continuing Encounters Between Past and Present. Aldershot: Ashgate,
2011.
Reviewed by Christina Szilagyi
“It is true to say that
there is no single classical past to which all subsequent ages refer, but
several, which were privileged at different times and which evoked different
ideas of antiquity and its contemporary relevance.”[1] Through a series of essays, this book
introduces its readers to the different ways in which Rome has been seen – in
person, on maps, on the page and in film, and through archaeology. These varied visions of the Eternal City have
been used to any number of ends, from political and religious to artistic and
historical; and any of these purposes have had difficulty pointing to one
particular time or place in the city to suit their needs. There is simply too
much history, in too many layers, to separate in the perception of the
city. The Caldwells’ volume is intended
as an interdisciplinary approach, thus while the entire volume is of interest
to the student of the city of Rome, of particular interest to the historian are
the essays on Roman archaeology (chapters one and nine), maps of the city
(chapter two) and the political uses of perceptions of the city (chapters five
and six).
While it was not
uncommon in the centuries after the dissolution of the Western Roman Empire to
“resource” material from ruins, there was “a perception from very early on that
Rome was uniquely embellished and should therefore be preserved.”[2] It is the method of preservation that seems
always difficult to determine. Should an
entire building that has no current use be preserved for its own sake, or is it
enough to document it before demolishing?
Often buildings were preserved by repurposing, in part or in whole. Caroline Goodson, in the book’s first essay
“Roman Archaeology in Medieval Rome,” discusses how there came a change in the
early Medieval era from building churches away from the monuments of the
ancient city to using existing buildings or building anew in the center of the
city. These new buildings, wherever
possible, echoed the ancient architectural styles of their surroundings. The same was true of houses, which if they
could not be matched architecturally to their environs, would be given a false
front to create a similar appearance.
“Though the uses of the buildings were
different, the new houses carried on traditions of the previous centuries of
building in the Forum as they preserved both street frontage and the monumental
layout of the area, and its architectural design principles.”[3]
Despite a desire to
maintain the appearance of the old, Goodson goes on to say “there was never a
moment when the Fora were entirely ancient or entirely new, but part of a continuum
of construction, demolition, and reconstruction which continued for centuries.”[4]
Structures are not the
only issue when dealing with the archaeological remains of a city. Religious relics, especially in a city like
Rome, hold great importance in and of themselves, as do their places of
discovery. By the time we come to the
Middle Ages, cults of saints had for centuries been venerated at a particular
place, usually the burial site of the patron saint. This did not change even as land changed
hands and was used for other purposes, and even when churches were built up
over these sites, many came not to visit the new building, but to be near the
“sacred stratigraphy” beneath it.[5]
Archaeological questions
lead to political ones as well, because it is often the case that the
determination of what is to be done with any given plot of land is in the hands
of those who run the city, be it the Church or a secular power. Regardless of the location, when politics
comes into play it is rare, if ever, that the best interests of antiquities
themselves, or their use in study, are foremost in mind. The authors tell us of Roman temples being
repurposed into churches, with all of the requisite destruction of pagan
materials. Later, some of these churches
were repurposed to serve secular needs, with all of the requisite destruction
of religious material. This is discussed
in Aristotle Kallis’ essay, “‘Reconcilation’
or ‘Conquest’? The Opening of the Via
della Conciliazione and the Fascist Vision for the ‘Third Rome’”, which focuses
on the Fascist attempts to repurpose the entire city, in one way or another, to
legitimize themselves as the ultimate culmination of all of Roman history.
The final essay,
“Archaeology and the Modern City: Thoughts on Rome (and Elsewhere),” by Daniele
Manacorda, discusses how antiquities in general have been dealt with since Late
Antiquity. He discusses how the Medieval
and Renaissance Popes were “favourably disposed towards research into
antiquity, [but] were in fact the perpetrators of the systematic destruction of
the ancient city, which was plundered piece by piece for the construction of
buildings.”[6] He also echoes an issue brought up in other
essays in the book: how people dealt with archaeological pieces and their
preservation (or lack thereof).
Manacorda tells us the pieces were often appreciated “if for nothing
more than the technical skill they demonstrated, which was greatly admired,”
but that was less important than how they could be used in the current project.[7]
When it comes to maps of
the city, these could be attempts to show the entire history of the city in one
depiction. The concern was not religious
versus political, as with the antiquities, but with functional versus
artistic. In the Medieval and
Renaissance periods, the artistic generally won out, as “city portraits were
intended to distill essential, idealized qualities of character as well as physical
appearance.” The mapmakers often
emphasized individual elements of the city to give the viewer a feel for the
long history of the city: “individual elements, such as the equestrian statue
of Marcus Aurelius or the new St. Peter’s, were mined for their power to
distill the city’s history and its current resurgence with the greatest
eloquence in the least space.” Medieval
and Renaissance mapmakers sought to combine the old and new Romes into a
beautiful, though completely inaccurate, representation of the city. We can be thankful that by the end of the
Renaissance, mapmakers no longer wished to portray the long history of Rome,
but to show a somewhat accurate depiction of the contemporary city, one that
might be a useful tool with which to navigate.
In the end, the question
is what to do with Rome? All of essays
center around a theme of how to maintain some awareness of the entirety of
Roman history while also allowing the city to become modernized, and if that is
feasible. The authors lead us to believe
that, with some care, it is indeed possible.
The difficulty is well summed up in a quote from Ferdinand Gregorovius
on witnessing the takeover of the city in 1870:
“The Italians gained possession of
Rome and the most venerable of historical legacies that never gave a people a
seat more exulted and never imposed a mission more difficult and a duty more
grievous than this: to be the great conservator and the renewer of Rome.”
Christina Szilagyi
Delta College
[1]
Caldwell and Caldwell, 2.
[2] Ibid.
[3]
ibid, 23.
[4]
Ibid, 25.
[5]
Ibid, 28.
[6]
Ibid, 208-209.
