Rome via Brooklyn

Today was extra spicy, the heat wave was really kicking into full gear. I sweat right through all my clothes but in the end it was worth it. I started off the day by heading to a cat sanctuary for disabled cats with Fannie. We met Hamood there and entered a small room that held some of the cats that were up for adoption. It was located right next to an ancient Roman ruin where I heard Caesar had died. The cats were absolutely adorable! My favorite was a little blind cat that came right up to us demanding pets. Most of the cats were either old, had bad kidneys or couldn’t see so it was nice that someone was able to give them a temporary home until they found a loving family.

After the cat sanctuary we made our way over to the museum where we were meeting the rest of the class. The first museum was really amazing and had some gorgeous coffins. My personal favorite is shown in the image below.

I was immediately drawn to this one because of its size in comparison with the other sarcophagi, being possibly the biggest one I’ve seen on the whole trip. I also immediately noticed the large lion heads on the corners of the sarcophagus. This reminded me of a previous sarcophagus we saw that had four lions laying on the lid. This is very clearly an apotropaic symbol to protect the person who was laid to rest ine this sarcophagus. I also noticed what looked like four winged cupids or children at the top of the sarcophagus that most likely represented the four seasons, which is a common motif on ancient Roman sarcophagi. 

There were a lot of great presentations today by Safa, Paola and my personal favorite Fannie, though I might be more than a little biased :). They were all incredible and gave a great insight into Roman history that I did not previously know about.

I also presented my own extra presentation with permission of professor Yarrow. It was really amazing to teach the class on the mythology of goddess hermaphroditus. They aren’t a very commonly known goddess so I’m sure many of my fellow classmates were not familiar with their mythology. I’m planning on getting a tattoo depicting Hermaphroditus as a way to remember my adventures in Rome and as a representation of my own queerness as a trans woman.