Click on images below to enlarge:
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| The usual basic breakfast at the hotel.
| The streets near the Vatican have tall trees and wide sidewalks, more
pedestrian-friendly than other places in Rome.
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| Vatican
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| The Vatican, surrounded by walls, is a fortress-country.
| Saint Peter's Basilica, as seen from the roof of the Vatican.
Artificially brightened.
| One small part of the Vatican's gardens. If you look closely, you'll
see it's actually an orangery.
Artificially brightened.
| The ornate facade of the building overlooking the courtyard garden.
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A relief of men carrying meat on skewers and of horses stomping on mens'
heads. Okay, the relief is of something more serious, but that's what I
see when I look at it. It's deep--the figures emerge a foot from the
slab.
The base of the Column of Antoninus Pius.
| I like the softness of the paintings in this room, Apostoli e Angeli
Musicanti (apostles and musician angels).
| In this altarpiece, S Antonio Abate E Santi by Antonio Vivarini,
Christ is the only one not in relief.
| The fairytale Giovanni Santi by Giovanni Santi reminds me of the
Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.
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| The gruesome paintings David e Il Leone (David and the Lion) by
Pietro Berrettini da Cortona and Giuditta by Orazio Gentileschi.
(animal sacrifice and decapitation)
| The menagerie that is Wenzel Peter's Adamo ed Eva nel Paradiso
Terrestre (Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden).
| Oddly, the Vatican Museum contains Buddhist casts from the Borobudur
Temple.
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One section of museum contained lots of pope carriages. All were very
gold.
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| Wooden horses?! (to pull one pope carriage)
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Also, there were a few jeeps and other vehicles as well, including one
box for the pope to be carried around by servants.
| The elaborate sarcophagus of Junius Bassus. It's quite a sarcophagus,
and that's just one side. It's all in relief. There are many
sarcophagi like this, sometimes with reliefs two heads (two figures)
deep.
This is actually a cast; the original sarcophagus is in the Treasury of
Saint Peter's.
| There were lots of reliefs and tombs; this picture is just a sample.
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| Heads on poles, but not in the traditional Christian sense.
| Plaques. I don't know what they say, but I like how they show a variety
of Greek handwriting.
| Large prints of Vatican stamps.
| A large building and its pine-cone, by a courtyard in the Vatican.
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| Tons of Greek and Roman busts.
| A panoramic movie showing a courtyard in the Greek/Roman/Etruscean part
of the museum.
| A picture of one side of the courtyard, with its reliefs and statues.
(I took this picture because the video isn't as high as resolution as
static photos.)
| Aaaaggghhhh!
Or, nooooooo!
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| The Laocoon, a famous statue (frankly I can't see why) depicts a
scene from the Trojan War I didn't know about.
| A description of the scene and of the statue.
| Another menagerie, this one in marble.
| An elaborately frescoed ceiling in the octagonal room of muses.
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| Some sculptures of muses. Can you identify them?
| More muses.
| Tall statues and busts of Roman emperors in a round room ("circular
hall"). The room has the same design/proportions as the Pantheon, just
in a smaller scale.
| Ceilings like this (art, statues, reliefs, adornments) are relatively
common in the Vatican Museum.
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Rome's cityscape as seen from an upper floor in a building in the
Vatican.
Artificially brightened.
| Statues on a ceiling of a random Vatican building.
| Leaf wreaths. One is dated B.C.E.; the other, 4th century C.E.
I
like them.
| The Vatican has a rooftop tennis court.
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