(piano music) - [Steven] I'm with Dr. Bernie Frischer, the creator of Rome Reborn. It's a beautiful day, and we're flying low over the Tiber River. - [Bernie] This is Rome
in the year 320 C.E. You see this big plaza, that's the so-called Circus Flaminius, beyond which is a theater,
the Theatre of Marcellus, and to the left is the Capitoline Hill. - [Steven] And now we're
approaching a large stadium, a place for sporting events. - [Bernie] This is the Circus Maximus used for the chariot
races among other things, it also was used for parades, for example The Triumphal Parade. It could seat up to, we
think, 250,000 people. It was quite a big complex. - [Steven] And there's
an island in the middle, around which the chariots would race. You can see right in the middle
of that, the large obelisk. - [Bernie] This is one of the first two very tall obelisks
brought from Egypt to Rome by the first Emperor Augustus. It symbolized to the Egyptians,
and the Romans knew this, a sunbeam, and the Romans
thought this was appropriate for the Circus because the Circus itself had a temple of the sun god. - [Steven] And this temple
to the sun is placed directly across from the
imperial box and just to the left of the stadium is the palace. - [Bernie] The Great Imperial Palace. At the end of the Circus
Maximus is a triumphal arch. We know that was dedicated
to the Emperor Titus and celebrated his victory
over the province of Judea. The reason that there's a
triumphal arch of Titus here is that the parade known
as the triumphal procession went through the Circus
Maximus and all along the triumphal procession
there were temples, triumphal arches and other monuments. - [Steven] And aligned
with the Arch of Titus, we can see in the distance
one of the great Bath complexes of ancient Rome. - [Bernie] That's the Baths of Caracalla. Now we're looking at the Caelian Hill, you can see the Claudian
Aqueduct in the valley between the Caelian hill and
to our left the Palatine Hill, you see a plume of smoke going up from the imperial bath complex
on the Palatine hill. To our right we're passing by a great complex, a garden in the
middle of which is a temple, and that's the temple
of the Divine Claudius. Claudius was made a god after his death and Nero incorporated
this piece of land into the Golden House, which covered 120 acres. - [Steven] What I find so
fascinating is that so much of the ancient architecture
that I associate with Rome in the Colosseum District is
really a reaction against Nero, as a reaction against his excesses. - [Bernie] Everywhere
you look, the selfishly expropriated public
land under Nero is given back to the public, and
the public was very happy. These are all public facilities,
so think of the Colosseum, beyond that where you have
some smoke coming out, those are baths, the Baths of Trajan. It's open to the public. In front of that is the
smaller bath complex, the Baths of Titus. - [Steven] We're now flying just over the Arch of Constantine which
is another landmark that survives into the modern era. - [Bernie] Yeah so another triumphal arch. In front of that you see that cone, that's the Meta Sudans, the Great
Fountain, and to the right is the Flavian Amphitheater,
also known as the Colosseum. But you can see why it
was called the Colosseum in the Middle ages, not in antiquity. Because of that enormous
100 foot tall bronze statue, which is a statue of the sun god. Now that was originally a statue of Nero. After his death, the Vespasian
had the head taken off and had it converted to
a statue of the sun god. We see just beyond the second
arch of Titus in the city. - [Steven] And just to the right of that the Basilica of Maxentius and Constantine. - [Bernie] Yes. - [Steven] And these are
all structures that remain. And now we're just
veering off to the left, and at the top of the hill is the palace, we're seeing it from the other side. - [Bernie] Yeah this is the palace at the top of the Palatine. Because the emperors lived
up there, the word palace became synonymous with
where a leader would live. We're turning now away from the palace and looking over toward the Roman Forum. - [Steven] In the
ancient era the Forum was a place for oratory, it
was a place for government. - [Bernie] In the republic, yes. It was a place for
meetings of the Assembly, as well as the Senate. The Senate had its own building, but the people would assemble
in front of the speaker's roster or platform to listen
to their leaders explain policy, propose laws,
and debate each other when they were running for public office. - [Steven] We seem to be
flying through the smoke of the Temple of Vesta. - [Bernie] The Temple
of Vesta, famous for its eternal flame, and beyond
that is the triple arch of Augustus, it celebrates
the restoration by the Parthians in modern day
Iran of military standards. Interestingly, if we're
looking now at a rostra, a speaker's platform right ahead of us, that's a late antique rostra, dating to the end of the third century AD. - [Steven] But we can see the original just a little further on. - [Bernie] Yes, bookending the Forum Plaza at the other end is another
rostra, the Augustan Rostra originally built by Julius Caesar. - [Steven] And in between the rostra, there's this beautiful
equestrian sculpture. - [Bernie] This was actually the early third century AD
emperor Septimius Sevverus, and we know about the statue being there both archaeologically from
the remains of the base, but also from coins that illustrate it. - [Steven] We're surrounded
by public buildings and by temples. - [Bernie] We can see over the right the Temple of Castor and Pollux. Straight ahead is the Temple
of the Divine Julius Caesar. If you look closely, you can
see the colt statue inside. We know about that from a
coin that illustrates it. Caesar was shown as an augur, a priest. Up in the pediment of the
temple you see a star. It illustrates the comet that
was seen in the sky over Rome in the summer after
Caesar's assassination. - [Steven] We're surrounded by columns, and these were honorary columns. - [Bernie] Yes, in front of the law court known as the Basilica Julia. And we know from Pliny that
to portray a human on top of a column was in
effect, to make him a god, or make him god-like. What we see now in front of us is one of the two Trajanic reliefs,
that interestingly enough, in their backgrounds
illustrates the Roman Forum as it appeared in the time of the emperors Trajan and Hadrian. A lot of people are surprised
to see to see that set up here on the Forum Plaza. That's actually where they were found at the end of the 19th century. - [Steven] But now they're in the Senate. - [Bernie] They were moved
there in the 20th century to protect them from the elements. - [Steven] When you go into
the Senate to see them, you don't see these blues,
you don't see those yellows, you don't see these greens. Almost all Roman sculpture was painted. - [Bernie] This is one of
the great breakthroughs of the last 10 years or so, development of a number
of noninvasive techniques to detect color, even
little traces of pigment left on the surface of white marble. Now we're seeing the
so-called Statue of Phocas. It's called the Statue of
Phocas because it was excavated at the beginning if the
19th century and they found an inscription to the
Byzantine emperor Phocas. But we think that Phocas'
inscription was added on top of an older inscription to
the Tetrarch Diocletian. And he is therefore the figure
shown on top of the column. - [Steven] We're now looking up the hill that leads to the capital line. - [Bernie] Masking the
hill is the Tabularium or the state record
office in the background. In front of it are three temples. To the left the Temple of Saturn, in the center the Temple
of Vespasian and Titus, worshiped as gods after their
deaths, and to the right, the Temple of Concordia
that celebrated the harmony between the social classes
of Rome, and then during the Empire it symbolizes
the harmony between the Imperial family and the Roman Senate. We're passing over the
Augustan rostra now, and just to the right is
the Arch Septimius Severus. He left a very big mark in the Forum. - [Steven] And his arch even today overshadows so much of the Forum. - [Bernie] Yes, it's very well preserved. - [Steven] Let's move
now to the Imperial Fora. As opposed to the Roman
Forum, these are fora that individual emperors built
to honor their own rule. - [Bernie] Fora is the plural of forum, so the Roman Forum and the Imperial Fora. Starting from the time of Julius Caesar, it was recognized that the old
Roman Forum was too crowded. If you were an emperor and you wanted to honor your favorite god,
or eventually after you died have a temple to yourself,
you needed to build a new public space. Where better to do that than adjacent to the old Roman Forum? So Julius Caesar's Forum
which we're now over, uses the backside of the
Senate as a part and parcel of this new Forum Julium,
the Forum of Julius Caesar, which is dominated at
the end of its main axis by the Temple of Venus
Genetrix, his favorite goddess. The other emperors followed
suit, so across the way is the Forum of Augustus,
dominated by the temple of his favorite god, the
god Mars, the war god. - [Steven] The temple is actually flanked by two hemicycles. - [Bernie] Yes, and in
those hemicycles were niches with some of Rome's leading
historic figures, and also the Julian ancestors of Augustus going all the way back to Aeneas. - [Steven] You can see other imperial fora that are squeezed in,
especially the Transitorium. - [Bernie] Yeah the Transitorium is also called the Forum of Nerva. It's basically just a
monumentalization of the argulatum the street that runs next
to the Senate house into the Roman Forum and then
going into the other direction to the east into the subura,
the slummy part of Rome filled with tenements
where lots of people lived. - [Steven] But if the Transitorium is squeezed in, you would never say that about the Forum of Trajan. - [Bernie] No, the last
one of these imperial fora is the Forum of Trajan
it's the biggest by far, it's fairly well preserved at the end of it is a
Temple of the Divine Trajan which was built after Trajan died but he actually started building this while he was still alive so in front of the temple is the Column of Trajan that celebrates his two victories over the Dajians, the people in modern day Romania. In flanking the column are two libraries. In front of the libraries
in the column is a bigger building the Basilica Ulpia which probably served as a law court and had some other functions. It was a big multipurpose space. - [Steven] Just coming into
view is one of the most famous extant Roman monuments, the Pantheon. - [Bernie] Now we're flying to the northern Campus Martius which was filled with funiary
monuments, temples, ustrinai, places where emperor's
bodies were cremated. The columns like the
column of Marcus Orelius. - [Steven] And the first Roman emperor built his own mausoleum,
the Mausoleum of Augustus. - [Bernie] We can see this round structure in the northern most part
of the Campus Martius. - [Steven] Now we've just swung around so we have a great view of the Pantheon. - [Bernie] We can really see
the Pantheon we have this hypothetical arch that a lot
of people think was in front of the Pantheon and to its
left was the most prestigious shopping center of Rome the
Saepta Julia and next to that is this great Egyptian
Temple of the Goddess Isis, you can see two obelisks. - [Steven] So what we're seeing is a city that is filled with
monuments to Roman rulers. Monuments that celebrate
their achievements, their military victory, the wealth that they brought to the city. - [Bernie] Yes, but now as we turn and go back to the south and southern part of the Campus
Martius we see that these emperors were not only
selfish but they created a lot of public facilities and built up their popularity that way so we've just been flying
through the entertainment part of the city of Rome. - [Steven] When you walk through Rome now, this city that is so layered with history it's sometimes difficult
to reconstruct in your mind how these ancient monuments fit together. This recreation provides such rich detail it allows us to see the
city literally as if we had traveled back to the fourth century. - [Bernie] The idea is to
take all of the monographs and studies of the individual monuments and weave them together into something that gives us a synthetic
view of the whole city. In the past we've been able
to study just the Pantheon or just the Roman Forum again it could take decades of your life. Now thanks to this new 3D
technology within a very short amount of time even just
a day I would really say the average person can know
more about the ancient city than even a PhD in the field
of Roman Archeology did five or 10 short years ago. (piano music)
