Italica! Ancient Roman Ruins

For our last class excursion we went to Italica on Thursday (Sept 19). It is an ancient Roman village that was founded in 206 BC. 2,200 years ago. Blows my mind. This is my second Roman amphitheater actually, and it reminded me of the one we saw in Jordan. This one is so much older though. Either way, the village was founded to settle the injured Roman soldiers after a Carthaginian defeat in the Second Punic War. The named it Italica after their Italian roots.

The village only lasted until about the 3rd century (still like 400 years, and to put that in perspective, 1776 was only like 237 years ago). It went through 2 Roman emperor dynasties, and is kept up pretty well because of an odd change in the River, which left the village undisturbed for years.

This is the Roman amphitheater, where they had gladiator fights and animal shows.

What I didn't know though, is that the animals were kept in tunnels underneath the amphitheater and when they were released for the shows, they actually stayed in this lower level of the stage. When they weren't using animals in shows, they had a cover for this GIANT hole they would put over.

The Romans took GREAT pride in their floors, all hand crafted mosaics, and each "house" (which actually housed like 40 people) was named for its specific plaza mosaic.

This was the kitchen, each "house" typically had free meals and bread in the "plazas" of the houses. This is also the plaza of the house. And me casually standing next to a 2,000 year old column as if I am taking a senior picture. I thought it'd be a nice contrast to my real senior pictures with the plastic column they had me lean on.

Here is the Statue of Venus, which was built in the 2nd century. Casual.

There is still so much more, but I am getting tired of waiting for the pictures to load.