Rome: Imperial Forum, Coliseum, and Palatine Hill

I am sorry this has taken me sooo long! I've been busy with work (it starts a week earlier than I had originally thought!! Yikes!) and it took me a little longer to overcome the jet lag. Anyway, I'm going to upload these in batches so that I can organize them easier, and so that you can learn about the places we visited.

Shane in front of the Imperial Forum, the ruins from Ancient Rome

More Imperial Forum. I can't believe how many ruins still exist after all this time.

A view of the Coliseum from the road.
Here is a picture of the inside of the Coliseum. It wasn't exactly what I expected. I had thought it would be a lot bigger than it was, and I thought that there were still a few seats still in existence. There are no seats at all, and the stadium is much smaller than the Astrodome and other stadiums we have here in the U.S. In the middle, you can see remnants of the two underground levels where they kept the prisoners. It sure was amazing.

Behind the Imperial Forum is Palatine Hill. Palatine Hill is the place where, according to Roman mythology, Romulus and Remus were founded by the she-wolf that kept them alive. This is where Romulus decided to build Rome. It was really, really high and long and beautiful.

Behind the Palatine is the "Circus Maximus," which was used for entertainment and public games. You can't really tell from this picture, but there is a big "lap," sort of like at a track where people ran races. Christians were also killed here for sport. Other Christians were brought here before they went to the Coliseum to be killed.