View Article: September 11

	September 11
	written by Anabelle Sutcliffe / 07.04.2004

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Itinerary

We boarded the bus and travelled along with the UW European Studies program to Hadrian's Villa, a 300 acre summer palace about an hour and a half from Rome. The palace was built in 118-134 A.D. for the emperor Hadrian. Shawn set us free to wander and explore the palace grounds individually. One of the most beautiful areas of the villa was the large reflecting pool. Carved white marble statues lined the edge of a long rectangular pool and reflected in the green waters. The three remaining statues were still in surprisingly good condition. There were even a few fish swimming around in the pool. The vaulted ceilings of the baths were still visible as well as some frescos on the walls of the small guest rooms surrounding the baths. Colored mosaics inside the ruins where also visible in some areas. Most of the mosaics were made of blue or black and white squares. We all met back at the gates to the Villa where Shawn showed us his most recent purchase, an extending yard stick with a time-line history written across it.
After a lunch break in the small town of Subiaco, we visited the Benedictine monastery about 15 minutes away. The road to the monastery was so small and narrow, our bus driver had to honk the horn around every corner as a warning to other drivers coming in the opposite direction. The monastery is built right into the rocky hillside overlooking a deep green valley. It is the last of 12 Benedictine monasteries that were once built there that is still in good condition. We learned that St. Benedict was the founder of Western monastisim (about the 6th C.). We were guided around the monastery by one of the last three remaining monks living there, Father Giovanni. He turned out to be quite the entertaining monk, cracking jokes all along the way and even trying to recruit nuns from our group.

Highlights

While on our tour of the monastery, we learned about the life of the monk and why monasteries were built. In earlier times, religious men used to leave civilization to go live in the hills as hermits. They filled their time thinking inwardly and analyzing thoughts which eventually led many of them to insanity. These religious men then decided to live together as Monks and pray together in churches called monasteries.

The monk's life consists of collective prayer and work for God, all based on the rule of St. Benedict. This rule is designed specifically to keep the monk's from going crazy. They pray 8 times a day in groups as well as hold Mass. The prayers are supposed to start at 3am and continue on in three hour intervals. This type of ritual is called Cononic prayer, however the monks that now live in the monastery apparently no longer begin their day at 3am.

Images

Hadrians Villa

Some of the ruins still standing

Benedictine Monastery

The monastery

Father Giovanni

Columns and parts of buildings on the grounds of Hadrians Villa are surrounded by a small canal. Olive trees which covered much of the empty land on the villa can be seen in the background. This place looked to me like some sort of meeting area because it was very open and circular in design. The mosaic floor in this area was still intact under the doorways and arches. The canal seems as though it could either have been used for transportation or simply for decoration.

The second picture shows how the Benedictine Monastery is carved into the rocky hillside overlooking Subiaco. The arched doorway on the left is the main entrance to the monastery. It is difficult to see in the picture but the rocky ledge over the monastery partly hangs over the small patio garden within the monastery walls. There is statue of St. Benedict inside this patio with his hand held up towards the rock, holding it up to protect the monks from a rockslide.

The third image is our tour guide, Father Giovanni. He is wearing a typical monk's uniform, a long black hooded robe that hangs down to the ground. This picture was taken just next to the monk's gardens overlooking the deep valley below. The roses that are growing in the garden are apparently the same ones that St. Benedict jumped into when he was tempted by the Devil.

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