Natalie Hostetter

March 3, 2014

Today we took our second tour with Virginia! We started off the tour taking some back streets of Rome to lead us to a beautiful church with a very interesting story. Virginia asked us if we noticed anything unusual about this church and we all agreed that there was a large deer head statue atop the church with a cross behind it. Well, she began to explain to us that a deer with a cross in the middle of the horns represented a sign of adultery; so flashing the hand signal (similar to the American hand signal for the Texas Longhorns) in Italy was a very bad signal that meant adultery. There was a specific family that saw this deer then converted to Christianity at the time where Christianity was condemned and thus were executed. On a happier note, she pointed out a beautiful Coat of Arms and reminded us that a Coat of Arms is sort of like the signature on any building or monument of the family that created it.

The next spot we visited was two columns dating all the way back to 65 AD! Incredible!! I believe that these are the last remaining remnants of the ancient emperor Nero (Baths of Nero). After Nero died, there was a domination of his memory. His name was cancelled; his name was never remembered in part due to the fact that he had a massive estate including a personal zoo and even a lake. The next emperor was a member of the Flavian family and shortly after confiscated Nero’s property and built the Coliseum “for the Roman people” to help solidify his power with the Roman people. Virginia also told us that the Coliseum was built in a short 8 years and can hold a massive 50,000 people and be evacuated in just 15 minutes because there are so many exits.

One of the last spots we visited was the Trevi Foundation and holy moly it was even more beautiful than you could ever imagine. There were so many people from around the world gathered around to throw a coin in and make a wish! I, of course, made a wish of my own and I am still waiting patiently to see if Tim Tebow wants to marry me. No signs yet but I’ll keep y’all posted. Ciao!