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Melancholy of the Antique World |
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written
by nmdaybaz / 10.24.2005 |
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| melancholy of the antique world |
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Part 1: |
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As one walks through the Forum, crumbling ruins are all that remain of the once majestic structures that graced Rome. Only three columns represent what used to be a grand temple dedicated to Vespasian and Titus, while pieces of rubble beside it are no longer identifiable to which monument they once belonged. The dictionary defines melancholy as “sadness or depression of the spirits,” a definition which is aptly suited for the Forum itself. The spirits of those who walked the Forum during its days of glory seem to linger about, helpless to the deterioration of their buildings.
The ancient Romans had a pessimistic view of the afterlife. In contrast to some of the religions of present day, it was not a time to look forward to or to celebrate. The underworld was not a paradise for them. But in the same manner of humanity throughout the ages, they desired immortality. For the ancient Romans, this was not achieved through their dreary afterlife, but through the memories of the living. In order to insure that their memory would remain perpetuate throughout the ages, they created monuments and statues, as a way to leave a permanent footstep in time.
Creating these large permanent structures required time, energy, and above all: money. Money and power came hand in hand, and thus if one was not wealthy or powerful, there would be no symbol to maintain one’s memory in the minds of the living. The monuments that remain today- and the people that are written about in history books- are great generals, orators, and emperors- people of power. They are the ones with the means to construct a column over a hundred feet high, or accomplish such feats that their images are carved onto a massive arch. The ordinary plebian of ancient Roman times vanishes with his death; he has no such monument to carry on his memory.
Yet even with their grand structures to bring the names of the powerful to the surface in the present, nothing material lasts forever. People have looted the Forum throughout the ages, using the carefully constructed buildings as a quarry. Mother Nature herself has wreaked havoc on the monuments: through earthquakes and floods sending columns toppling down and by weathering the fine inscriptions away. Thus the “dreams loom and vanish” as their tangible presence in the world is erased.
The melancholy in the Forum is that of a greatness being lost forever, and of those that have already been lost. Once gone, the ancient Romans rely on the structures they have left behind to carry on their name into immortality. With the absence or deterioration of these representations however, their memory is at risk of being lost forever into the “immutable ebony.” Not only is their memory lost, but they are powerless to stop it- there is “no crying out, no convulsions—nothing but the fixity of the pensive gaze.”
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Part 2: |
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Pompeii conveys a very different type of melancholy to the visitor than that of the Forum. There is again the “sadness and depression of spirits” as one walks through the streets of the ancient city, yet the feeling is unlike any previously experienced. The shops and homes lining the streets of this city were not left in anticipation of future generation’s memories. They were functional places used everyday by the city’s inhabitants. The ruts in the cobblestones from the carts that passed through the streets everyday are still visible, bits of ancient advertisements for the various vendors linger on the sides of some stores and the mosaics lining the floors of homes can be seen through the doorways. These were not monuments erected to establish immortality for the individual, these were built for the functionality of the inhabitant’s present.
The reason that these ruins remain today is not because each individual passed on in their own time and consciously left their legacy behind to the future generations, but because of a natural disaster taking the lives of the entire city. The citizens of Pompeii had no warning of their imminent destruction. They continued about their everyday lives, unaware that the home they woke up in that morning would serve as the only physical representation of their lives after the eruption. The generals and emperors of the Forum made conscious decisions to build their monuments for others to remember them once they were gone. The people of Pompeii had no time for such decisions. In part, this lack of conscious choice gave the citizens of Pompeii an equality that is not present in the Forum. Women and men, the elderly and children, all the citizens of Pompeii lost their lives to Vesuvius and had a similar chance of their homes or impressions of their bodies being discovered. It didn’t depend upon who had the most wealth or power, anyone who was in the town at the same moment lost their lives to the eruption.
Walking throughout the ruins of the ancient city feels like walking through a ghost town. One can imagine the people chattering as they shopped, and the sound of the wheels rolling over the cobblestones. There is such sadness in knowing that all these lives were carried on in such ignorant bliss before they were obliterated. Instead of the melancholy for the memories of the great Romans that are deteriorating in the Forum, this melancholy is for the lives themselves that were lost in the eruption with only the physical remnants of their city behind as a reminder.
In contrast to the two sites discussed above, the Pantheon is in a much different situation. Instead of being a deteriorating ruin which merely stays static while people walk through and observe it, the Pantheon continues to function as a practicing church. Though not originally intended to be a Christian church, it still is able to fulfill a purpose. In this way one doesn’t feel a sense of melancholy as they visit the monument, because it still lives on with a function in today’s world. The function may change throughout time, as it has, but it is at least a living member of the present.
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