YT YouTube2Text

YouTube2Text → Transcripts → Рим: повна історія вічного міста від болота до сьогодні | Історія на ніч

Рим: повна історія вічного міста від болота до сьогодні | Історія на ніч — Transcript

by Мунлайт - Історії на ніч · 12,905 words · 2,061 segments · language en · Watch on YouTube

Open in transcriber Summarize with AI Download SRT/VTT

Full transcript

0:00Greetings, friends. There are cities
0:03that we know as a picture. The
0:05Colosseum, the Forum, the Trevi
0:07Fountain. Everyone has seen these
0:09somewhere, even if they have never been
0:10to Rome. But a picture and a city are
0:13different things. A picture does not
0:16smell, does not make noise, and has no
0:18basements or sewers. A picture does not
0:21remember how it all began. Today we
0:24will try to see not the picture, but
0:27the city. What it was like before it
0:31became a symbol, and what remained
0:33after the symbol, it seemed,
0:35disappeared. 3,000 years is a serious
0:39undertaking for one story. Honestly, it
0:42is always a choice. We chose what
0:46seemed the least obvious, the rarest
0:48mentioned, the most alive. Much was
0:52left by the wayside. And if this story
0:54sparks interest, there is plenty more
0:56to dig into. Rome is inexhaustible in
0:59this sense. One question will guide us
1:02from beginning to end. A question that
1:06Rome poses to every city that came
1:08after it. What actually makes a city
1:11immortal? Not size or military might,
1:14not beauty or age, but something else.
1:17And we will approach the answer
1:19gradually. Through the swamp and the
1:22senate. Through bread. And circuses.
1:24Through fires and a thousand years of
1:27silence. Rome was built on agreements
1:31between patricians and plebeians,
1:34between Rome and its allies, between
1:36the emperor and the legions. So here is
1:40ours. You give a like in advance right
1:43now. I provide a story after which you
1:46will either fall asleep or want more.
1:50If the deal is not fulfilled, you know
1:51where the button is. You can take your
1:54like back. I accept this challenge. Get
1:58comfortable. Not in the sense of
2:01changing seats, but in the sense of
2:03truly finding a position where you can
2:05spend the coming time without the
2:07desire to stir. Turn off distractions.
2:10We are in no hurry. Write in the
2:14comments where you are listening from
2:15and what time it is for you. We are
2:17genuinely interested in this geography.
2:19It surprises us every time. If you have
2:21ideas for future cities or topics,
2:23write them there as well. We read
2:25everything. And if you manage to fall
2:28asleep today along with this story,
2:30write tomorrow about where
2:31approximately it happened. We aren't
2:35starting with the legend of the
2:36she-wolf and two brothers; we are
2:38starting with a swamp. Because it turns
2:41out that everything truly great begins
2:43right there. Imagine a valley between
2:47seven hills somewhere in the centuries
2:50BCE. Not a city, but a marshy lowland
2:55cut through by the Tiber. In spring,
2:59the river overflows and floods
3:01everything below the hills. In summer,
3:04the stagnant water turns into a
3:06breeding ground for malaria. The
3:09humidity is such that wood rots in a
3:12season, and sun-dried brick washes away
3:15after the first rain. People live up on
3:19the hills, where it is drier and there
3:21is at least some wind. The valley
3:25between them is no-man's-land, unfit
3:27for anything. Yet it is right here that
3:31a city will arise which will conquer
3:33half the known world. But first,
3:36engineering. The Etruscans, northern
3:39neighbors of the Latins, brought
3:41drainage technology to this region.
3:45What was later named the Cloaca Maxima,
3:47the Great Sewer, began as an open canal
3:50to divert water from the valley into
3:52the Tiber. Eventually, it was covered
3:56with stone vaulting, expanded, and
3:57integrated into the city's fabric. Some
4:01sections of this system were still in
4:04operation during the empire's peak, 600
4:06years after its construction. Part of
4:09it still functions today, if you
4:11believe the Roman utility services,
4:13though they have their own opinions on
4:16everything. When the valley dried out,
4:19space emerged. And the space between
4:23the hills is a natural meeting point
4:25for people from different hills. Here
4:30they began to trade, then negotiate,
4:33then argue in public, which in a sense
4:36is the beginning of politics. What
4:41would become the Roman Forum in a few
4:43centuries, the heart of the Republic,
4:46the place where the fates of provinces
4:49and generals were decided, started as a
4:51marketplace on a drained swamp. All
4:55that greatness grew literally out of
4:58the mud. Latins, Sabines, Etruscans—
5:03three peoples on neighboring hills,
5:05three languages, three sets of gods,
5:08three systems of customs that didn't
5:11like each other much. The Great Sewer
5:16drained the valley between them and
5:18inadvertently created neutral territory
5:20. The city did not yet exist, but the
5:24conditions for it were already in place
5:26. Shared infrastructure proved to be a
5:29stronger glue than shared blood or
5:32shared gods. This is a principle Rome
5:35would use for a long time and far
5:37beyond the borders of Latium.
5:40It should be understood that Rome was
5:42never a city in a beautiful location.
5:46It was a city in a convenient location,
5:49at the crossroads of trade routes, by
5:51the Tiber ford, where roads from the
5:53south, north, and the sea converged.
5:57And its creators from the very
5:59beginning had this reflex to turn the
6:01inconvenient into the convenient, a
6:04problem into an advantage. The swamp
6:06became the foundation. In the literal
6:09sense, the legends would come later.
6:13The she-wolf, two brothers, the sacred
6:15furrow, fratricide as an act of
6:17founding. All this would appear when
6:20the city needed an official biography.
6:23But that is another conversation, and
6:25we will return to it later. For now,
6:27let's remember the main thing. Rome
6:30began not with a myth, but with an
6:31engineering solution. And that, as it
6:34turns out, is very much in its style.
6:37Every great city at some point decides
6:39it needs a beautiful story about itself
6:41. Untrue, beautiful, something that
6:46explains why this city, why here, why
6:50now. Rome solved this question with its
6:53characteristic straightforwardness. It
6:56took two brothers, a she-wolf, the will
6:58of the gods, and fratricide. All
7:01together, and no one is bothered by the
7:03internal contradiction. Romulus and
7:06Remus, according to legend, were
7:08grandsons of King Numitor, who was
7:11overthrown by his own brother. Their
7:14mother, the Vestal Virgin Rhea Silvia,
7:16bore them by the god Mars, which
7:18already removed any awkward questions
7:21about their origin. The children were
7:23thrown into the Tiber, a she-wolf
7:25nursed them, and a shepherd raised them
7:27. Then the brothers returned power to
7:29their grandfather and founded a new
7:30city themselves. And here Romulus
7:34killed Remus, according to versions,
7:36either due to a dispute over omens or
7:38because he crossed the sacred furrow.
7:41Rome was named in honor of the one who
7:44survived. This is, of course, a myth,
7:47but a myth that performed a very
7:49specific job. Firstly, it gave the city
7:52a divine origin through Mars, which
7:54immediately placed Rome above
7:56neighboring Latin communities. Secondly
8:00, fratricide as an act of foundation is
8:02not just a dramatic detail. It is a
8:05metaphor for a monopoly on power. There
8:08can be only one city, there can be only
8:10one king. For anyone who doubts, we
8:13know how it ended for Remus. The royal
8:17period, which lasted by tradition from
8:19the city's founding in 753 to the
8:21expulsion of the last king in 509, left
8:24us seven names. Romulus, Numa Pompilius
8:28, Tullus Hostilius, Ancus Marcius, and
8:31then three Etruscan kings: Tarquinius
8:33Priscus, Servius Tullius, and
8:35Tarquinius Superbus. It is the presence
8:38of Etruscans on the Roman throne that
8:40speaks to the real balance of power in
8:42the region better than any legend. Rome
8:45of the 7th and 6th centuries BC is not
8:47the center of the world. It is a small
8:49settlement in the zone of Etruscan
8:51influence. But the kings left behind
8:55more than just names. Servius Tullius,
8:59credited with the first census and the
9:01division of the city into tribal
9:03districts, effectively laid the
9:05administrative foundation that would
9:08outlive him, the Republic, and even the
9:10Empire itself in some of its elements.
9:13The city was learning to count and
9:15organize itself. And this skill would
9:19prove more important than any military
9:20victories of the early period. The last
9:24king, Tarquinius Superbus, went down in
9:27history not so much for his actions,
9:29but as the cause of their cessation.
9:33His son raped the noble Roman woman
9:35Lucretia, she committed suicide, and
9:38her relatives rose in rebellion. The
9:40king was expelled. The Republic was
9:43born as a reaction to personal tyranny,
9:46as an oath that this would never happen
9:49again. Did they keep the oath? That is
9:52a separate question, but the moment
9:53itself is important. Rome invented for
9:55itself not only a legendary past but
9:58also a legendary transition to a new
10:00order. Romulus as the founder,
10:02Tarquinius as the last tyrant. Both
10:05images were needed by later Rome as
10:07reference points. The first explained
10:10where everything began. The second
10:13explained why things changed. Between
10:16them are two and a half centuries we
10:18know surprisingly little about, but we
10:21know what came after very well. 509 BC.
10:27Tarquinius is expelled. And the Romans
10:29face a question that humanity has
10:31solved in different ways in different
10:32parts of the world and at different
10:34times. If not a king, then who? The
10:38answer Rome provided proved to be so
10:40successful and so significant that its
10:43echoes are heard in the constitutions
10:45of the 21st century. Two consuls, not
10:48one, two, elected for a year. Each has
10:52the right to veto the other's decisions
10:54. This is not just a separation of
10:56powers. It is a built-in mechanism to
10:58block tyranny. If one wants too much,
11:01the other will say, "No." If both want
11:03too much, there is the Senate. The
11:07entire structure was designed around
11:09one fear: that there would never again
11:12be one man with unlimited power. The
11:15Senate in the republic was no
11:16decorative body. 300 men, initially
11:19exclusively patricians, then
11:20increasingly plebeians; an assembly of
11:23people who had experience, resources,
11:25connections, and long memories. The
11:28Senate did not issue laws in the modern
11:30sense, but its recommendations carried
11:32such weight that ignoring them meant
11:34entering into open conflict with the
11:36entire Roman elite at once. Caesar
11:38tried it. We know how that ended. But
11:42the republic had a crack from the very
11:44beginning. Patricians, the old
11:46aristocratic families, held the
11:48priesthoods, the magistracies, and the
11:50Senate in their hands. Plebeians, all
11:54other free citizens, paid taxes. They
11:57served in the army and had almost none
11:59of the privileges. This inequality was
12:03no secret, and the plebeians were not
12:05going to put up with it. 250 years of
12:08struggle; not a revolution, not a civil
12:12war in the classic sense, but a slow,
12:15stubborn pressure. Secessions, when
12:19plebeians literally walked out of the
12:21city and refused to serve in the army
12:23until they received concessions.
12:26Tribunes—new magistrates with the
12:28right to veto, untouchable by law,
12:30tasked with protecting ordinary
12:32citizens from the arbitrary power of
12:34the patricians. The Laws of the Twelve
12:37Tables, recorded around 450 BC. The
12:42first codification of Roman law, which
12:44made the law public and stopped
12:46allowing patricians to interpret it as
12:48they pleased. By the 1st century BC,
12:52plebeians had gained access to the
12:54consulship. To priestly colleges, to
12:57most magistracies. Technically, the
13:00republic became more open. But more
13:04open does not mean fair, because the
13:06new elite, emerging from the wealthiest
13:08plebeian families, quickly merged with
13:11the old patrician one and recreated the
13:13same closed system, only with a wider
13:16list of surnames. And Rome learned one
13:20more lesson, which it then applied
13:22constantly. To preserve the system, it
13:25must be reformed from time to time. Not
13:28radically, not down to the foundations.
13:30But enough so that those who could
13:32destroy it get something and walk away
13:34satisfied. It is cynically simple and
13:37at the same time brilliantly effective,
13:39at least up to a certain point. The
13:41moment when that effectiveness ended
13:43would come later. But for now, Rome was
13:47building its institutions, arguing,
13:49negotiating, and slowly becoming the
13:51city that would need its own face, its
13:53own voice, and its own place for public
13:55conversation. If you want to understand
13:59how Rome differed from most cities of
14:01its time, do not look at the temples or
14:03the walls. Look at the Forum, at what
14:07it existed for and how it was used.
14:11That will tell you more about Roman
14:13civilization than any list of conquests
14:16. The Roman Forum, an elongated plaza
14:19between the Palatine and Capitoline
14:21hills, was filled over time with
14:24temples, basilicas, triumphal arches,
14:26and rostra. But at its core, it was a
14:30place for conversation—public, loud,
14:32often brutal conversation—where
14:34everything was decided: laws, wars,
14:37sentences, triumphs. The city literally
14:41governed itself out loud in the open
14:43air, in the presence of anyone who
14:45wished to listen. Hence the
14:48extraordinary role of oratory in Roman
14:50culture. The ability to speak was not
14:53just an addition to power; it was power
14:55itself. Young aristocrats spent years
14:57studying rhetoric, not as an ornament,
15:00but as a weapon. Whoever could persuade
15:02the crowd and the Senate held influence
15:05, even without an army. But what about
15:07someone who had both an army and the
15:08gift of speech? They could have
15:10everything. Cicero is the best example
15:13and the best warning at the same time.
15:17A man of humble origin from the
15:19provincial town of Arpinum, he built
15:21his career solely through the power of
15:23his words, becoming consul, crushing
15:25the Catilinarian conspiracy, and
15:27earning the title Father of the
15:29Fatherland. And all of this without a
15:32single legion behind him. Only speeches
15:35, only persuasion, only the Forum. But
15:39the Forum gave power, and it also took
15:42it away. When Caesar came, then the
15:45Triumvirate, then Antony, Cicero found
15:47himself on the wrong side. His speeches
15:52against Antony, the Philippics, were
15:54brilliant and death-defying. Antony did
15:57not forget. After Caesar’s
15:59assassination, in the chaos of the
16:00struggle for succession, Cicero was
16:02placed on the proscription lists. His
16:05head and hands—the very hands that
16:07wrote the Philippics—were displayed
16:10on the rostra of the Forum, right where
16:12he had delivered his greatest speeches.
16:15This is not a digression; this is the
16:17theme itself. The Forum was a place
16:20where Rome talked to itself and where
16:22the price of a word was sometimes equal
16:24to the price of a life. A public space,
16:27like an arena in the broadest sense.
16:31Physically, the Forum changed along
16:32with the city. Every significant ruler
16:35added something of their own: a temple,
16:37a basilica, an arch in honor of a
16:39victory. The haze from sacrifices, the
16:42smell of torches at night, the roar of
16:44the crowd on election day, the silence
16:46after a sentence was announced. All of
16:50this layered upon itself for centuries.
16:53By the time of the Late Republic, the
16:55Forum was no longer just a plaza, but
16:57the memory of the city, recorded in
16:59stone and marble. The Republic it
17:02served would last for a few more
17:04generations after Cicero, but the
17:06cracks that had appeared long before
17:09him would only grow wider. The Forum
17:12would see much more: triumphs,
17:14executions, and speeches that changed
17:17the course of events. Until one day it
17:21would see a man who would decide that
17:23talk was no longer enough. But that is
17:25a chapter for another time. There are
17:28rivals who force you to become better.
17:31And there are rivals who force you to
17:33become different. Carthage, for Rome,
17:36was the second type. Three wars, nearly
17:39120 years. And in the end, not just
17:42victory, but a decision that still
17:45sparks debate among historians. The
17:47city was leveled, the land was cursed.
17:51Salt in the soil. Legend or not, the
17:53image speaks for itself. That is how
17:56you destroy not just a rival, but fear
17:58itself. Carthage was Rome’s mirror in
18:01the most uncomfortable way. Both were
18:04republics, both trading empires, both
18:06with ambitions for the entire
18:08Mediterranean. But with a different
18:10logic. Where Rome built roads and
18:12cities, Carthage built fleets and
18:14trading posts. Where Rome integrated
18:17the defeated, Carthage kept them at a
18:19distance. Two ways of building power.
18:22And they could not exist side-by-side
18:24indefinitely. The First Punic War began
18:29in 264 BC over Sicily, an island both
18:32sides considered their own. Rome,
18:38having never seriously fought at sea
18:40before, built a fleet in a few years by
18:42copying a captured Carthaginian ship.
18:45They literally took it apart,
18:47understood how it worked, built 200
18:50just like it, then learned how to sail
18:53them. It is very Roman to take
18:56something from others, improve it, and
18:58return it with interest. But the real
19:01test came with the second war, and a
19:04man named Hannibal Barca. He crossed
19:07the Alps with an army and elephants. In
19:10winter, through passes where modern
19:13climbers go today with high-quality
19:15gear. He lost half his army and most of
19:18his elephants along the way. And yet,
19:22he crushed the Roman legions at Lake
19:24Trasimene, then at Cannae—a battle
19:26still studied in military academies as
19:28an example of a perfect encirclement.
19:32For 16 years, Hannibal marched through
19:34Italy but could not take Rome. He could
19:37not, because most of Rome's allies did
19:39not defect to his side. This was the
19:42moment the Roman system of integration
19:44showed its true strength. People who
19:48had gained Roman citizenship or Latin
19:50rights were in no hurry to trade them
19:52for the promises of a Carthaginian
19:54general. Rome was losing battles, but
19:57it held its network together. Scipio
20:00Africanus did what seemed illogical.
20:02While Hannibal was ravaging Italy, he
20:05sailed to Africa and struck at Carthage
20:07itself. Hannibal was recalled to defend
20:10his home city. At Zama in 202 BC, the
20:13Carthaginian army lost, and with it,
20:16the idea of an equal rival for Rome in
20:19the Western Mediterranean died. The
20:22Third Punic War was no longer a war,
20:24but an execution. Carthage was taken
20:26apart stone by stone in three years.
20:29What had been built over centuries
20:30vanished in the time it took Rome to
20:32build a single aqueduct. And amidst the
20:36ashes of that city, Rome was left alone
20:38with its ambitions and its problems.
20:40Problems that no external enemy could
20:43ever drown out again. Victory over
20:45Carthage made Rome the most powerful
20:48city in the Mediterranean. It also
20:51planted a time bomb under the Republic
20:54that would detonate in a few
20:56generations. A paradox, but a perfectly
20:59logical one. Great victories change the
21:03victor no less than the defeated. The
21:06problem started with the land. While
21:09Roman peasant-soldiers fought for years
21:12in Spain, Africa, and Greece, their
21:14farms fell into ruin. Upon returning,
21:18they often found their land mortgaged,
21:20sold, or simply so neglected that it
21:23was impossible to restore without
21:25capital. And there was no capital.
21:27There was only the soldier’s pay,
21:30which was barely enough for the journey
21:32home. Instead, wealthy Romans bought up
21:35these lands and drove slaves onto them.
21:39Tens of thousands of people, brought
21:41from newly conquered provinces: Sicily,
21:44Spain, Greece, Asia Minor. Every
21:47victory meant a new flow of slave labor
21:50to the Italian market. Latifundia,
21:53large estates worked by slaves, pushed
21:56out small-scale farming. Just as
21:58inevitably as a big supermarket pushes
22:00out the corner shop. Only much more
22:03cruelly. Slaves in Rome were not a
22:06homogeneous mass. It was a complex
22:09hierarchy, from an educated Greek tutor
22:12in an aristocratic home to a man in a
22:14Spanish silver mine, where the average
22:16lifespan of work was measured in months
22:19, not years. Between them were
22:22craftsmen, domestic servants,
22:24gladiators, scribes, and doctors. A
22:27city of a million people needed all
22:29categories, and the demand never fell.
22:32But let us return to the landless
22:34peasants. They went to the city because
22:36there was nowhere else to go. Rome
22:39expanded, took them in, fed them with
22:41grain from Egypt and Sicily, and
22:42entertained them with spectacles. But
22:46the former independent farmer, who had
22:48a voice in the popular assemblies and
22:50could defend his position with arms,
22:52was turning into an urban proletarian,
22:53dependent on state bread and
22:55entertainment. Social degradation
22:58masked by satiety is a recipe for
23:01instability with a delayed effect. The
23:04military system was also cracking.
23:06Traditionally, a legionary could only
23:08be a citizen with a certain property
23:10qualification, a man who had something
23:12to defend. But when the small owners
23:15disappeared, the army began to
23:16experience a shortage of recruits.
23:19Marius's reforms at the end of the
23:21century BC would solve this problem by
23:23opening the legions to all comers. It
23:26would simultaneously create armies
23:28loyal personally to their generals, not
23:30to the republic. But that is a little
23:33later. Conquests brought Rome wealth
23:36that is hard to imagine. Gold and
23:39silver from provinces, tribute, trade,
23:41slave labor. All this accumulated in
23:44the hands of the nobility and the
23:45equites, a narrow elite that controlled
23:47the Senate and provincial
23:48administration. The gap between the
23:51richest and everyone else was becoming
23:54an abyss that rhetoric about Roman
23:56values and the valor of ancestors could
23:58no longer bridge. The republic, born as
24:01a counterweight to the tyranny of one,
24:03was imperceptibly turning into an
24:05oligarchy of a few hundred families.
24:07Someone had to notice this and say it
24:09out loud. And such people were found.
24:12Two brothers who are remembered to this
24:14day. Tiberius Gracchus was a quaestor
24:17in Spain when he saw what he could not
24:20help but see. Fields that formerly fed
24:24Rome were now worked by slaves to
24:27enrich a few families, while free
24:29citizens begged in the cities. He
24:33returned to Rome and decided to do
24:35something about it. In 133 BC, he
24:39became a tribune of the plebs and
24:42proposed a land reform. The proposal
24:47was essentially moderate: to limit the
24:50amount of public land one family could
24:52lease, and to redistribute the surplus
24:55to landless citizens. Nothing
24:58revolutionary. Simply a return to the
25:01old Licinian law, which already existed
25:04but had been ignored for decades. The
25:08Senate, however, reacted as if it were
25:10a declaration of war. His colleague,
25:12the tribune Marcus Octavius, imposed a
25:14veto. Tiberius did what no one before
25:18him had done. He brought the question
25:20of removing Octavius directly to the
25:23popular assembly and received support.
25:25It was constitutionally dubious and
25:28politically explosive. A tribune was
25:31removing a tribune through a mob vote,
25:33bypassing the Senate. The reform was
25:37passed, and a land commission was
25:39created. Tiberius was re-elected for a
25:42second term, which was also against
25:44tradition. In the summer of 133 BC, a
25:47group of senators led by Pontifex
25:50Maximus Scipio Nasica left the Senate
25:52session, grabbed chair legs, and headed
25:55to the Capitol where Tiberius was
25:58holding an assembly. He was killed
26:01right there. Along with him, several
26:03hundred of his supporters died. The
26:05bodies were thrown into the Tiber. A
26:07ritual denial of a proper burial.
26:10Public humiliation even after death.
26:13The precedent was terrible. Not the
26:15reform, the precedent. For the first
26:18time in Roman history, an internal
26:19political conflict was resolved by the
26:21physical elimination of an opponent.
26:24The senators essentially said: "There
26:26is a line beyond which we no longer
26:27talk. We strike." His younger brother,
26:31Gaius Gracchus, learned the lesson but
26:34drew the opposite conclusion from it.
26:37Becoming tribune in 123 BC, he acted on
26:41a larger scale and faster. A grain law
26:45guaranteeing cheap grain to the urban
26:47poor, a judicial reform limiting
26:49senatorial control over provincial
26:52courts, a program of colonization and
26:54road construction. He tried to build a
26:58broad coalition and almost succeeded.
27:03In 121 BC, the Senate declared a state
27:06of emergency, the first in Roman
27:08history with a*senatus consultum
27:10ultimum*. This was effectively
27:13permission for the consuls to act by
27:15any means. Gaius and his supporters
27:18retreated to the Aventine Hill. Consul
27:21Opimius struck with armed men. Gaius
27:25either died in battle or, according to
27:27another version, ordered a slave to
27:29kill him so he wouldn't be captured.
27:323,000 of his supporters were executed
27:34afterward. The Republic showed that it
27:38knew how to devour those who tried to
27:41fix it. And every subsequent reformer,
27:44looking at the fate of the Gracchi,
27:46made a choice: either retreat or take
27:49up arms. Cicero would retreat. Caesar
27:53would take up arms. Gaius, Marius, and
27:56Sulla are a dress rehearsal for what
27:59would happen with Caesar. Only without
28:02the finale. Marius was elected consul
28:06seven times, which in itself was a
28:08violation of all norms; he reformed the
28:10army and relied on the personal loyalty
28:13of the soldiers. Sulla took and led
28:16legions to Rome twice, which before him
28:18was considered literally unthinkable.
28:21The first time to regain command, the
28:24second to become dictator and rewrite
28:27the constitution. Then he voluntarily
28:30resigned his powers and went into
28:31retirement, where he died of natural
28:33causes, which was atypical for Roman
28:35dictators. Sulla left behind a system
28:38that was supposed to strengthen the
28:40senatorial republic. Instead, he left
28:43behind the realization: legions can be
28:45led to Rome. And if you win, you can
28:48get away with it. Gaius Julius Caesar
28:52was born in 100 BC into a patrician,
28:55yet impoverished, family. He spent his
29:01youth in debt and political intrigue,
29:03earning a reputation as a brilliant
29:05orator and a dangerous opponent. The
29:09Gallic Wars, which lasted from 58 to 50
29:13BC, transformed him into Rome's
29:15wealthiest and most popular general.
29:19And at the same time, into a problem
29:22the Senate didn't know how to solve.
29:25When the Senate demanded that Caesar
29:28disband his army and return to Rome as
29:31a private citizen, he faced a choice.
29:35Returning without an army meant a trial
29:37and almost certainly exile, or worse.
29:42Crossing the Rubicon River with his
29:44legions meant formally starting a civil
29:46war. In January of 49 BC, he crossed it
29:52. What happened next is known to
29:54everyone. Victory over Pompey,
29:58dictatorship, reforms, the Ides of
30:01March in 44 BC, and 23 dagger stabs in
30:04the Theater of Pompey, because the
30:06Senate was being renovated. The
30:10conspirators believed they were killing
30:12a tyrant and saving the Republic.
30:15Instead, they killed a man and set in
30:18motion a mechanism that destroyed the
30:20Republic for good. Because after Caesar
30:23came Octavian, and he drew his own
30:26conclusions: "No need to call yourself
30:28a dictator. No need to demonstratively
30:31concentrate power. You must keep the
30:34form of the Republic and quietly fill
30:36it with a different content." Princeps
30:39—the first among equals. No tyranny.
30:42God forbid. The Republic would
30:45technically exist for a few more
30:46decades after Caesar. The Senate would
30:49meet, consuls would be elected, the
30:51Forum would hum with speeches. But it
30:55would be a theater—beautiful,
30:56convincing, with good actors and one
30:59man behind the scenes who decided
31:01everything. The Forum, which we left at
31:05the end of the first chapter, would see
31:08all this and stay silent. Octavian
31:11returned to Rome after his victory over
31:14Antony and Cleopatra in 30 BC as a man
31:17who held the entire Roman world in his
31:20hands: provinces, legions, the treasury
31:23, the fleet. All of this formally or
31:26effectively submitted to him. The
31:29question wasn't whether he had power.
31:31The question was what to call it so
31:33that Rome would accept it. He chose the
31:36word*princeps*, first among equals. The
31:39first citizen; not a king, not a
31:41dictator, not a tyrant. Words that made
31:44the Roman elite start to twitch. Simply
31:46the first. In 27 BC, he solemnly
31:49returned power to the Senate and the
31:52people. And the Senate just as solemnly
31:55asked him to stay and lead. They played
31:58this scene with such conviction that
32:00some contemporaries perhaps even
32:01believed it. It was then that he
32:03received the title Augustus. Sacred,
32:05exalted. And the name Octavian
32:08disappeared from use forever. The
32:11genius of the system he built was that
32:14it abolished nothing. The Senate
32:18continued to meet. Consuls were elected
32:21, popular assemblies gathered.
32:24Everything looked like a republic. And
32:27at the same time, it was not. Augustus
32:31simply accumulated in his hands a set
32:33of traditional powers: tribunician
32:35inviolability, proconsular imperium
32:37over provinces where legions were
32:38stationed, and the right to convene the
32:41senate. Each of them individually had a
32:45precedent. Together they granted
32:47absolute power without a single new law
32:50. Rome under Augustus literally changed
32:54its face. He said that he found the
32:56city made of brick and would leave it
32:58made of marble. And these were not
33:01empty boasts. The Forum of Augustus,
33:04the Temple of Mars Ultor, the rebuilt
33:07Pantheon, new aqueducts, restored old
33:09temples. The building program lasted
33:13for decades and transformed the city
33:15center into what we recognize in
33:17reconstructions. Architecture as a
33:19political statement. Rome looks this
33:22way because its ruler is worthy of Rome
33:25. But Augustus understood that marble
33:28was not enough. He carried out moral
33:32reforms: legislation on marriage and
33:35childbirth, restoration of old
33:37religious cults, and support for poets
33:39who extolled Roman virtues. Virgil
33:43wrote the Aeneid, Horace his Odes, Livy
33:46a monumental history of Rome. All of
33:50this happened not without state support
33:53. A cultural program as a supplement to
33:56the architectural one. Power that
33:59shapes not only space, but also memory.
34:03He ruled for 45 years and died in his
34:06bed in the year 14 AD at the age of 75,
34:09which for a Roman ruler was an almost
34:12incredible achievement. The system he
34:17built proved to be so resilient that it
34:19survived several frankly bad successors
34:22. Caligula, Nero, names that became
34:25synonymous with tyranny, did not
34:28destroy the Principate. The system was
34:31stronger than the people who ran it.
34:33This is the most accurate assessment of
34:36Augustus. He built not just a regime,
34:39but an institution. Bad emperors
34:41spoiled it, good ones improved it. But
34:45it lasted another 200 years after him.
34:49Somewhere in the early 2nd century AD,
34:52Rome's population crossed the million
34:55mark. This was a figure that no
34:58European city would reach for the next
35:011,500 years. London would only approach
35:04it in the 19th century. What did that
35:07mean in practice: to feed, water, house
35:10, and somehow keep order for a million
35:13people? In the pre-industrial era. A
35:16question the answer to which is
35:18striking even now. Grain. It was the
35:22foundation and a constant source of
35:24anxiety. Rome consumed approximately
35:26200,000 tons of grain annually, mostly
35:29wheat from Egypt and North Africa.
35:32Egypt under Roman rule effectively
35:34became the emperor's personal pantry.
35:37The province was managed separately
35:39from the rest. Senators were generally
35:41forbidden from entering it without
35:42permission. The monopoly on the grain
35:45flow was too important. Ostia, a port
35:48city at the mouth of the Tiber, 20 km
35:51from Rome, received cargo ships from
35:54all over the Mediterranean. There,
35:57grain was reloaded onto flat-bottomed
36:00barges and pulled up the Tiber to the
36:03city's Horrea, huge granaries that
36:06stood along the bank. The Annona, the
36:09state grain supply service, tracked
36:12stocks, prices, and distribution. When
36:15something went wrong, a hungry mob in
36:17the city was a much greater problem
36:20than any external enemy. The real Rome
36:24did not smell of marble. It smelled of
36:27kitchens and cesspits, pitch and
36:29animals, wet wool and rancid oil. The
36:34streets were narrow, paved with uneven
36:36stone. And walking them at night
36:40without a torch meant risking both
36:42broken bones and the contents of
36:44chamber pots that residents of upper
36:46floors poured straight out of windows,
36:48after shouting a warning, if they were
36:50polite. Insulae, multi-story apartment
36:55buildings, were the Roman solution to
36:57the problem of housing density. Five,
37:00six, sometimes seven stories high. The
37:03ground floor was occupied by shops and
37:06wealthier residents. There, walls were
37:09thick, fire risks lower, and there was
37:11no need to climb stairs. Higher up, it
37:15was cheaper, tighter, hotter in summer,
37:17and colder in winter. The poorest lived
37:21on the top floors with the worst view
37:23of neighbors 'roofs and the highest
37:25risk of burning, as fires in the
37:27insulae were regular occurrences.
37:29Aqueducts supplied the city with about
37:32a million cubic meters of water daily.
37:34A figure that makes you think about
37:37your own utility habits. 11 main
37:40aqueducts, some over 100 km long,
37:42delivered water by gravity through
37:45arched bridges and underground tunnels.
37:48Fountains on the streets, thermal baths
37:50, private homes of the wealthy. All of
37:53this was held together by an
37:55engineering system whose maintenance
37:57required constant and expensive work.
38:00This city could not exist without the
38:03state that organized it. And the state
38:05could not exist without the city that
38:08legitimized it. A mutual dependence
38:10that was the true foundation of the
38:12empire. In 72 AD, Emperor Vespasian
38:16began building a new arena on the site
38:19of an artificial lake that belonged to
38:22Nero's complex. An eight-year
38:27construction, 100,000 cubic meters of
38:29travertine, four stories, 80 arches
38:32along the perimeter, and seating for
38:3450,000 spectators. The Flavian
38:38Amphitheater, that is its proper name.
38:41"Colosseum" would appear later, from
38:43the Latin "Colossus," because of the
38:45large statue of Nero that stood nearby.
38:48For a city of a million people, it was
38:51not just a spectacle; it was an
38:53operating system for crowd control. The
38:56formula "bread and circuses"(*panem et
38:59circenses*) belongs to the poet Juvenal
39:01, who wrote it with bitter irony. This
39:05is all the Roman people now want, who
39:07once bestowed commands and consulships.
39:11But the authorities perceived this
39:13formula not as a reproach, but as an
39:15instruction. Free grain calmed the
39:18stomach; spectacles calmed the mind.
39:22Gladiators were the stars of their time
39:25, in the most literal sense. Their
39:28names were written on city walls.
39:30Researchers find graffiti in Pompeii
39:32where specific fighters are discussed
39:35with assessments of their performances.
39:38A successful gladiator could gain
39:40freedom, money, female admirers, and
39:43status. An unsuccessful one, death.
39:46Although real statistics suggest that
39:49most duels did not end in death.
39:52Gladiators were expensive property, and
39:54school owners protected their fighters.
39:57But the Colosseum was not just about
39:59gladiators. Animal hunts, naumachia—
40:02sea battles with the temporary flooding
40:04of the arena—executions of criminals
40:06and enemies of the state, which turned
40:08into a public spectacle. All of this
40:11together made up a program that lasted
40:13for several days in a row during major
40:15holidays. Animals were brought from all
40:18over the empire: lions from Africa,
40:20bears from Britain, crocodiles from the
40:22Nile, elephants from India. The scale
40:26of the logistics is impressive, even
40:28without considering that all these
40:29animals were alive and did not always
40:31wish to cooperate. The psychology of
40:34the crowd in the Colosseum interested
40:36the Romans themselves. The stands,
40:39where senators and knights sat, saw one
40:41spectacle—refined and from a distance
40:44. The upper tiers, where women and the
40:47poor stood, saw another: a crowded
40:50space of people shouting the same thing
40:53at the same time. This effect of unity,
40:56when 50,000 people of different
40:59backgrounds, languages, and wealth
41:02share one moment. That is the true
41:04function of the arena. Not to entertain
41:07, but to remind us that we exist. The
41:11emperor in his place, in a special box
41:13that everyone could see—it is not
41:15just a privilege, it is a duty. To
41:18appear before the people, to decide the
41:19fate of a wounded gladiator with a
41:21gesture, to share a moment of tension
41:23and release with the crowd. All of this
41:25was work. Bad emperors ignored this
41:28work and paid for it in approval
41:30ratings, which had quite practical
41:33consequences in Rome. The Colosseum
41:36stood even after gladiatorial games
41:38ceased, and even after Rome emptied.
41:41Medieval families used it as a fortress
41:45, then as a quarry, then as a symbol.
41:49It still stands today, a bit worn, but
41:51recognizable from any angle. The city
41:55has changed around it ten times, but it
41:57just stands and watches. The period
42:00from the accession of Nerva in 96 AD to
42:03the end of Marcus Aurelius’s reign in
42:06180 AD. Roman and later historiography
42:11would call it a golden age or the reign
42:14of the five good emperors. Nerva,
42:17Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus Pius, Marcus
42:21Aurelius. Five consecutive reigns
42:24without slaughter during the transfer
42:26of power, without mass executions,
42:28without blatant madness in
42:30decision-making. Against the backdrop
42:33of what was before and after, it truly
42:35looks like gold. Trajan expanded the
42:39empire to its maximum limits: Dacia,
42:42Arabia, Mesopotamia. Trajan’s Column
42:45in Rome still stands and continues to
42:47tell of the Dacian campaigns in
42:49detailed reliefs that spiral upward. It
42:53is the best-preserved war reportage of
42:56antiquity. Hadrian traveled through the
42:59provinces personally, built and
43:01fortified borders, erected his wall in
43:03Britain and his own mausoleum in Rome.
43:06The very same one that would later
43:08become Castel Sant'Angelo. Pax Romana,
43:11the Roman Peace, is a reality and a
43:13construct at the same time. Inside the
43:17borders, there really was relative
43:19stability, trade, and a movement of
43:21people and goods on a scale the
43:23Mediterranean had not known before and
43:25would not see for a long time. The
43:28Greek rhetorician Aelius Aristides
43:30wrote about Rome in the 2nd century
43:32with admiration, noting that borders
43:34had become almost invisible for an
43:36ordinary person. Travel wherever you
43:39want, trade with whoever you want. This
43:41was true for a certain category of
43:43people. But while Rome flourished in
43:46the center, the borders lived
43:48differently. The Danube front, the
43:51Rhine front, the Euphrates front. The
43:54legions stood there, and someone was
43:57constantly trying to get in or out.
44:01Marcus Aurelius spent almost his entire
44:03reign not in Rome or over philosophical
44:05notebooks, but in field camps on the
44:07Danube, fighting off the Marcomanni and
44:09Quadi. He wrote his Meditations between
44:13campaigns, which gives this text a
44:15completely different dimension than if
44:17he had written them in a luxurious
44:18library. And here it is worth
44:23mentioning the Antonine Plague, an
44:26epidemic that swept through the empire
44:29between 165 and 180 and claimed,
44:32according to various estimates, 5 to 10
44:35%of the population. Soldiers from the
44:39Parthian front brought the disease back
44:42to the legions. The legions spread it
44:45through the provinces, and trade spread
44:46it through the cities. Rome may have
44:49lost a quarter of a million people.
44:52Nobody knows for sure, because there
44:54was no one counting at the time. Marcus
44:58Aurelius died in 180 in a camp on the
45:01Danube and left behind his son,
45:04Commodus. One of the greatest
45:06disappointments in Roman history. A man
45:10who spent his entire reign on
45:12self-improvement and governance handed
45:14power to a man who dreamed of
45:16performing as a gladiator in the arena
45:19under the name Hercules. The principle
45:22of succession defeated the principle of
45:24selecting the best. And the Golden Age
45:27ended not with a bang, but with a quiet
45:30exhale. After Commodus, a crisis would
45:32come that would call everything into
45:34question. But before that, there were
45:37still 20 years of Rome at its peak,
45:40under the last of the five in a camp
45:42with a notebook of stoic thoughts on
45:44duty. 235 AD. Emperor Alexander Severus
45:52is killed by his own soldiers in a camp
45:54near the Rhine for trying to negotiate
45:56with the Germans instead of fighting.
46:00His successor, Maximinus Thrax, lasted
46:03three years. After him came Gordian I
46:06and II, father and son, both in the
46:09same year. Then Pupienus and Balbinus,
46:12elected by the Senate and killed by the
46:14Praetorians a few months later. This is
46:16just the beginning of the list. Over 50
46:20years, from 235 to 284, Rome changed at
46:24least 20 emperors. Most of them died a
46:28violent death at the hands of their own
46:31military. The system that had held
46:34power for two and a half centuries
46:36suddenly revealed its true
46:37vulnerability. It rested on the consent
46:40of the army, and the army was no longer
46:42united. It was scattered along the
46:45borders, broken into regional factions.
46:48And each faction had its own candidate
46:50for emperor. The crisis was not just
46:54political, it was systemic, and all
46:57elements reinforced each other in the
47:00worst possible way. The Plague of
47:04Cyprian, which broke out around 249,
47:07killed 5,000 people a day in Rome alone
47:09, according to some estimates; trade
47:12networks were shrinking, and cities
47:14were declining. Small-scale land
47:19ownership, already undermined during
47:21the Republic, finally collapsed under
47:23the pressure of endless requisitions
47:26and taxes. Money devalued at a speed
47:29reminiscent of the worst examples of
47:32the 20th century. The silver content of
47:36the denarius, the main coin, fell from
47:38about 80%under Augustus to less than
47:41five by the end of the crisis.
47:44Merchants refused to accept the coin at
47:46face value. The army demanded payment
47:49in kind. The state responded with
47:51requisitions. It was an inflationary
47:54spiral without brakes and without a
47:56central bank that could stop it.
47:59External pressure provided no respite.
48:03On the Rhine and Danube frontiers,
48:05Germanic tribes—the Alemanni, Goths,
48:07and Franks—pushed with growing
48:09strength and organization. In the East,
48:13the Persian Sassanid dynasty replaced
48:16the Parthians and proved to be a much
48:18more dangerous rival. In 260 AD,
48:21Emperor Valerian was taken prisoner by
48:24the Persian king Shapur. The first and
48:27only Roman emperor to be captured alive
48:29by the enemy. Shapur depicted this
48:32scene on a rock relief that has
48:34survived to this day. What did this
48:37crisis look like from the inside? A
48:38question rarely asked. For a person in
48:42a provincial town, somewhere in Spain
48:44or Asia Minor, the name on the coins
48:46changed more often than the seasons.
48:49Someone would arrive, collect taxes,
48:51and leave. Then another would come,
48:54claim the previous one was a usurper,
48:55and collect taxes all over again. The
48:59army would camp a kilometer away and
49:00either buy food or take it without
49:02permission, depending on the
49:04commander's mood. Diocletian managed to
49:07break this cycle when he came to power
49:10in 284 AD and implemented reforms so
49:12radical that he essentially created a
49:15new state on the ruins of the old one.
49:18But this was a different system, and
49:20within it, the city of Rome gradually
49:23ceased to be the center of the state
49:25that bore its name. Diocletian divided
49:29the administration of the empire among
49:31four rulers. The Tetrarchy, the rule of
49:34four, and he settled not in Rome, but
49:37in Nicomedia in the East. This was a
49:40symptom that few at the time read as a
49:42diagnosis. Rome was ceasing to be the
49:45functional center of the state. Too far
49:49from the Rhine border, too far from the
49:51Euphrates, too big and too expensive to
49:54manage. Constantine, having won the
49:59subsequent civil wars and consolidated
50:01power in his own hands by 324 AD, made
50:03two decisions that changed the next
50:06thousand years. First, he legalized and
50:10supported Christianity with the Edict
50:12of Milan in 313. Second, he founded a
50:16new capital on the site of the ancient
50:18city of Byzantium on the Bosphorus and
50:20named it in his own honor. The
50:23legalization of Christianity was
50:25primarily a political decision, albeit
50:27cloaked in religious rhetoric. In the
50:31early 4th century, the Christian Church
50:34was the only organization in the empire
50:36with a sprawling network, a unified
50:38administrative structure, a disciplined
50:41hierarchy, and ties in every city, from
50:43Britain to Mesopotamia. Integrating
50:47this network into the state structure
50:49meant gaining a ready-made
50:51administrative apparatus that would
50:52take too long to build from scratch.
50:55Constantinople was built
50:57demonstratively on the model of Rome.
50:59Seven hills, a forum, a senate, and a
51:01hippodrome instead of a Colosseum. A
51:04copycat city meant to surpass the
51:06original. Resources flowed there, power
51:09was concentrated there, and from there,
51:11the eastern provinces—the wealthiest
51:13and most urbanized parts of the empire
51:15—were governed. Rome remained a
51:18symbol, but ceased to be headquarters.
51:21For Rome itself, this meant a gradual,
51:23at first almost imperceptible, decline.
51:27Fewer state contracts, fewer officials,
51:29and less inflow of people and money
51:31from the provinces. The city of a
51:34million people began to shrink slowly,
51:37like air escaping from a balloon with a
51:39tiny hole. Residents didn't feel it
51:42daily, but over generations, the
51:44difference became noticeable.
51:47Constantine’s successors would turn
51:49support for the church into the state
51:51religion, while paganism was gradually
51:53pushed to the margins. Old temples
51:56would be closed or repurposed. The
51:59Vestal Virgins, who had kept Rome's
52:01eternal flame for 700 years, would be
52:03disbanded at the end of the century.
52:07The Olympic Games, held since 776 BC,
52:10were abolished in 393 as pagan. A
52:15thousand-year-old cultural layer was
52:16being stripped away faster than seemed
52:18possible. Yet Rome did not disappear or
52:22stop; it was living by inertia—a
52:24great, respectable, still-impressive
52:26inertia, rather than its own momentum.
52:30In August 410, the Visigoths, led by
52:33Alaric, entered Rome through the
52:35Salarian Gate. The city was looted for
52:39three days. Then Alaric moved south and
52:42died that same year from illness, never
52:44deciding what to do next. The Goths
52:49eventually settled in Aquitaine, in the
52:51southwest of modern-day France, and
52:53became foederati—allies of the empire
52:56they had just plundered. The material
53:00damage from the 410 looting was
53:02tangible, but not catastrophic. Rome
53:05had endured worse: fires, plagues, and
53:08famine. What it had not experienced
53:11before was a blow to the very idea of
53:12Rome. Rome was considered the eternal
53:15city, protected by the gods and its own
53:18invincibility. And yet, it fell. Saint
53:22Augustine wrote*The City of God*partly
53:24as an answer to the question troubling
53:26the intellectuals of the time: "If Rome
53:28has fallen, what is happening now with
53:30providence?" The next 65 years were a
53:34slow decay. The Huns emerged from the
53:37Eurasian steppes and, with their
53:39pressure, pushed Germanic tribes into
53:41Roman territory. Not always with
53:43malicious intent, often simply out of
53:45desperation. Attila ravaged the Balkan
53:48provinces and reached Gaul, but
53:50retreated after meeting with Pope Leo
53:53the Great. One of those scenes that is
53:55hard to explain rationally, but which
53:57nonetheless happened. The Vandals
54:00looted Rome again in 455. This time, it
54:04was more methodical and lasted longer.
54:08The last Western emperors were puppets
54:10in the hands of Germanic warlords who
54:13served Rome or used it as a backdrop
54:16for their own power. Romulus Augustulus
54:21, the last of them, was deposed in 476
54:24by Odoacer, a leader of the Heruli who
54:27served in the Roman army. Odoacer sent
54:31the imperial insignia to Constantinople
54:34with the message that the West no
54:36longer needed its own emperor.
54:38Constantinople accepted the regalia and
54:41did not object. The year 476 is a
54:44convenient date for textbooks, but the
54:46people who lived then did not know they
54:48were living at the turning point of an
54:50era. Odoacer governed Italy quite
54:53competently. The Senate continued to
54:56meet. Consuls continued to be elected
55:00until 534. The Church continued to
55:03function. Most institutions simply
55:05moved under a new jurisdiction, changed
55:08their signboards, and kept their
55:10procedures. The end of great systems
55:12rarely looks like an explosion; more
55:15often, it is like the gradual turning
55:17off of lights in empty rooms. First,
55:20they dim the distant ones where no one
55:21has lived for a long time, then the
55:23ones closer by. And at some point, you
55:25notice that you are sitting in the dark
55:27. But nobody remembers when exactly the
55:30last light was turned off. At its peak,
55:33somewhere in the 2nd century AD, about
55:35a million people lived in Rome. By the
55:396th century, only 20 to 50 thousand
55:42remained, depending on which researcher
55:44you believe and how you count. This is
55:48not a decline, it is a different order
55:50of magnitude. A city designed for a
55:54million, with its aqueducts, granaries,
55:57baths, and administrative apparatus,
55:59suddenly had to serve the population of
56:02a small provincial town. Aqueducts
56:06stopped one after another, not because
56:08they were destroyed, but because there
56:10was no one to maintain them. A complex
56:14engineering system requires constant
56:16supervision, repair, and personnel.
56:19When the personnel disappeared, the
56:21water disappeared along with them. The
56:23baths, which consumed thousands of
56:25cubic meters per day, closed. The
56:28fountains fell silent. People returned
56:30to wells and the Tiber, like their
56:32ancestors a thousand years before. The
56:35Forum, once buzzing with crowds and
56:38speeches, gradually became overgrown.
56:41Marble slabs were dismantled for
56:43building materials. Not by barbarians,
56:46but by the Romans themselves, who
56:48needed stone for new, smaller buildings
56:50. Temple columns went to churches,
56:54bronze statues were melted down. The
56:57Cloaca Maxima, which gave birth to the
57:00city, continued to function because its
57:02design did not require active
57:04maintenance, but it drained much less
57:07now. They grazed cows in the Forum;
57:11this is not a metaphor or an
57:12exaggeration. Medieval chronicles and
57:16archaeological findings confirm: the
57:18very square where Cicero delivered his
57:20Philippics, where Caesar triumphed,
57:23where the fates of provinces were
57:25decided, became a pasture. Locals began
57:29calling it Campo Vaccino, the cow field
57:31. An ironic twist of fate, inscribed
57:34directly into the topography. But the
57:37city was not empty and dead; it was
57:40different. A small, dense community
57:44living among giant ruins adapted what
57:47remained to new needs. The Colosseum
57:51became a fortress and a residential
57:53quarter, Hadrian's Mausoleum a castle,
57:55the Theatre of Marcellus an
57:57aristocratic family palace. The
58:00Pantheon, the only structure that
58:02survived almost entirely intact,
58:03survived precisely because it became a
58:05church in the 7th century and gained a
58:07protector in the person of the Pope.
58:10The ruins were the new landscape, and
58:12people lived in them as naturally as we
58:15live in modern cities. They grazed
58:17livestock between columns, built huts
58:20leaning against amphitheater walls, and
58:22buried the dead in old sarcophagi. It
58:25was not a tragedy in their perception.
58:28It was simply life among what was
58:29available. And in this diminished,
58:32quieted, reshaped city, something new
58:35was already growing. Something that
58:37would fill the vacuum and give Rome its
58:40next existence. Not at all like the
58:42previous one, but no less enduring.
58:45When the state retreats, someone takes
58:48its place. It is not a law of nature,
58:52but it is something that happens often
58:54enough to be considered a pattern. In
58:58Rome of the 6th and 7th centuries, this
59:01someone became the Church. Not because
59:04it craved power, although some of its
59:07representatives did, but simply because
59:09it was the only structure that remained
59:12. The Bishop of Rome, the Pope, did not
59:15inherit armies or treasuries from the
59:18empire. He inherited a network and
59:21authority: a network of parishes,
59:23monasteries, and church lands from
59:26Sicily to Britain. Authority that did
59:29not rely on legions, but on something
59:31much harder to destroy with a sword. In
59:34a city where the population had fallen
59:37to a few tens of thousands, the church
59:39fed the poor, settled disputes,
59:41negotiated with barbarian leaders, and
59:43organized bridge repairs because there
59:45was no one else to do it. Gregory the
59:50Great, who became Pope in 590, left
59:52behind correspondence totaling
59:54thousands of documents. An
59:57administrative miracle for a man
59:59managing a city during a plague, the
1:00:01Lombard threat, and the total collapse
1:00:03of civil authority. He negotiated with
1:00:07the Lombards personally when the
1:00:09imperial exarch in Ravenna could not or
1:00:11would not. He organized grain supplies
1:00:14from church estates in Sicily. He sent
1:00:18missionaries to Britain. Gregory was a
1:00:21bishop, but he functioned as the city's
1:00:24prime minister, without a government.
1:00:27Medieval Rome looked like a spider web
1:00:30in a broken window. The old urban
1:00:33fabric—the forum, the baths, the
1:00:35villas—was crumbling or standing
1:00:37empty. New development concentrated
1:00:40around churches and monasteries, which
1:00:42served as spiritual centers, shelters,
1:00:45hospitals, and warehouses all at once.
1:00:48The city pulled toward the Tiber and
1:00:50the Vatican Hill, where there was water
1:00:53and where St. Peter's Basilica stood
1:00:55over the apostle's grave. Pilgrims
1:00:58began to arrive. At first rarely, then
1:01:01more and more. Rome had something that
1:01:04no other Christian center could offer.
1:01:07The tombs of the apostles Peter and
1:01:09Paul, and catacombs with the relics of
1:01:11martyrs. The very fact of existing in
1:01:13the city where it all began. Religious
1:01:16tourism—pilgrimage—proved to be the
1:01:19economic foundation upon which medieval
1:01:21Rome slowly rebuilt itself. Not as a
1:01:24political center, but as a sacred site.
1:01:28It was a new existence. More modest,
1:01:30quieter, but more resilient. A city
1:01:33that survived as a church capital when
1:01:35everything else around it changed
1:01:37beyond recognition. Rome did not die.
1:01:40It changed its role. And in this new
1:01:42role, it would hold on for another
1:01:44thousand years before it began to build
1:01:46something again. 1420 year. Pope Martin
1:01:52V returns to Rome after decades of the
1:01:54Avignon Captivity, when the papal
1:01:56residence was in France and Rome was
1:01:58effectively left without a master. He
1:02:03enters the city and sees what
1:02:05eyewitnesses described: cows in the
1:02:07forum, wolves in the suburbs, most
1:02:09churches in a state of semi-collapse,
1:02:11and streets impassable due to trash and
1:02:14ruins. The population might be 20,000,
1:02:18perhaps less. Martin begins what would
1:02:21take the next 100 years. The systemic
1:02:24revival of the city as a papal capital.
1:02:27It was not about romance or nostalgia
1:02:29for antiquity. It was a political
1:02:32program. Rome had to look like a place
1:02:34where no one would doubt the authority
1:02:36of the one who ruled it. Churches are
1:02:39repaired, roads are paved, the Aqua
1:02:41Virgo aqueduct is restored, the first
1:02:43one in many centuries. Water returns to
1:02:46the city. Humanists and antiquarians
1:02:49arriving in Rome in the 15th century
1:02:52looked at the ruins quite differently
1:02:54than the medieval residents. Where the
1:02:57locals saw a convenient stone quarry,
1:03:00the newcomers saw Cicero and Virgil,
1:03:02grandeur and a lesson. Poggio
1:03:05Bracciolini wandered among the ruins
1:03:07with notebooks, recording inscriptions,
1:03:10fragments, and details. Rome was not
1:03:12yet being excavated systematically, but
1:03:14it was already starting to be read.
1:03:16Nicholas V, pope from 1447, formulated
1:03:20a program openly: "Rome must become the
1:03:23most beautiful city in the world,
1:03:25worthy of the See of Saint Peter."
1:03:29Under him, the reconstruction of the
1:03:31Vatican begins. The library grows to
1:03:33thousands of volumes. Architects and
1:03:36artists are invited. This is no longer
1:03:39survival, this is ambition.
1:03:41Michelangelo arrived in Rome for the
1:03:43first time in 1496 as a 20-year-old
1:03:47sculptor. He would die here in 1564 at
1:03:53the age of 88, having hardly left
1:03:55during the last decade. During this
1:03:58time, he would manage to create the
1:04:01Pietà, paint the Sistine Chapel,
1:04:03design the dome of Saint Peter's
1:04:05Basilica, and replan Capitoline Hill.
1:04:08At 75, he directed the construction of
1:04:10the largest dome in the world and
1:04:13climbed the scaffolding daily. A
1:04:15character that suited the city.
1:04:18Renaissance Rome is a city of contrasts
1:04:21so sharp that it sometimes seems
1:04:23incredible that they existed in the
1:04:25same space. The luxury of cardinal
1:04:28palaces and the poverty of
1:04:29neighborhoods around the corner,
1:04:31ancient marbles in papal gardens and
1:04:33filth on the streets. Brilliant artists
1:04:36and patrons who killed each other in
1:04:39feuds. Rome always knew how to hold
1:04:42opposites in one hand, not by resolving
1:04:44contradictions, but simply by living
1:04:46with them. If the Renaissance spoke to
1:04:51man through harmony and reason, the
1:04:53Baroque spoke through the body and
1:04:55emotion. The Rome of the 17th century
1:04:59became the world's largest stage for
1:05:01this new language. And two people more
1:05:05than others determined what this city
1:05:07looks like to this day. Gian Lorenzo
1:05:11Bernini and Francesco Borromini, rivals
1:05:13who hated each other with a consistency
1:05:16that almost commands respect. Bernini,
1:05:20the favorite of popes, socially
1:05:22brilliant, productive, with inhuman
1:05:24speed. Borromini, gloomy, lonely, so
1:05:28brilliant in detail that his curved
1:05:31lines and complex surfaces are still
1:05:33studied by architects. Bernini
1:05:36eventually won in the fight for
1:05:38commissions and fame. Borromini died by
1:05:41his own hand in 1667, leaving behind a
1:05:46few churches that are unlike anything
1:05:48else in the city. Saint Peter's Square
1:05:52with Bernini's colonnade is one of the
1:05:54greatest public spaces ever designed by
1:05:57a single person. 284 columns that
1:06:00embrace the square like arms in a hug.
1:06:03Bernini himself described it exactly
1:06:05that way. And the image is accurate. A
1:06:07space created for a mass of people, for
1:06:10a spectacle, for the feeling that you
1:06:12are received and embraced by something
1:06:15greater than yourself. This is not
1:06:18architecture or sculpture. This is
1:06:20psychology translated into stone.
1:06:23Fountains became the language of power
1:06:25in the Baroque era. The Trevi Fountain,
1:06:27the Fountain of the Four Rivers in
1:06:29Piazza Navona, the fountains in Piazza
1:06:31del Popolo. Each of them demonstrated
1:06:34both a technical achievement and the
1:06:36patron's generosity. Water in a city
1:06:39that had lived on wells for a thousand
1:06:41years was a miracle in itself. Water
1:06:44spraying upward and scattering in the
1:06:46air amidst sculptures—it was a
1:06:48spectacle designed for effect.
1:06:51Propaganda that needs no words.
1:06:54Pilgrims and travelers arriving in Rome
1:06:56in the 17th century entered a city
1:06:58designed as a machine for producing
1:07:01impressions. Straight streets leading
1:07:04to obelisks and squares, churches
1:07:07revealed suddenly after narrow alleys,
1:07:09perspectives calculated to seem longer
1:07:12or higher than they really were. Rome
1:07:16learned from its best students, the
1:07:18Roman directors of triumphs and
1:07:20spectacles, and applied those lessons
1:07:22with new technology and a new faith.
1:07:25The city became a capital once again.
1:07:27Not of a state, but of the imagination.
1:07:30And this role would prove to be very
1:07:32enduring. In 1798 French troops entered
1:07:37Rome and proclaimed the Roman Republic.
1:07:41Pope Pius VI, an old and sick man of 80
1:07:45, was taken to France as a prisoner. He
1:07:49died there a year later without
1:07:51returning. French commissioners
1:07:54described what they were taking from
1:07:56Rome: paintings, sculptures,
1:07:58manuscripts. Antique artifacts,
1:08:01everything that had value and could be
1:08:04transported. Some ended up in the
1:08:06Louvre, where they remain to this day.
1:08:10Napoleon treated Rome with the same
1:08:12ambivalence as any great idea he did
1:08:15not invent himself. On one hand, an
1:08:18obvious temptation. The city of Caesars
1:08:21, a symbol of empire, a source of
1:08:23legitimacy for someone wanting to build
1:08:25a new empire. On the other, the
1:08:29inconvenient reality of papal power,
1:08:31which did not fit into any rational
1:08:33management scheme. Napoleon tried to
1:08:36solve this in his own way. In 1809, he
1:08:39simply annexed the Papal States and
1:08:42declared Rome a free imperial city, the
1:08:45second capital after Paris. The next
1:08:49pope, Pius VII, was also taken to
1:08:51France, this time to Fontainebleau. He
1:08:56spent five years there, refusing to
1:08:58sign documents that would give Napoleon
1:09:01the church legitimacy he so desired.
1:09:05This stubbornness of an old man in
1:09:07captivity against Europe's most
1:09:09powerful war machine is one of those
1:09:12moments where character proves more
1:09:14important than armies. Napoleon
1:09:17eventually gave in and released the
1:09:20pope, because without a church blessing
1:09:23, his power seemed incomplete. Rome
1:09:27under French rule received a few
1:09:28practical things: a new street system,
1:09:31the first attempts at systematic
1:09:33excavations at the Forum, and house
1:09:35numbering. French administrators
1:09:38approached the city with Enlightenment
1:09:41rationalism, trying to organize,
1:09:43catalog, and make it manageable. Rome
1:09:46responded to this with its
1:09:48characteristic passive stubbornness. It
1:09:50accepted the new rules, continued
1:09:52living as it always had, and waited.
1:09:54After Napoleon's defeat, the pope
1:09:57returned to Rome in 1814 year. The city
1:10:02welcomed him with such enthusiasm that
1:10:05contemporaries were surprised. It
1:10:08seemed that 15 years of French rule
1:10:11left almost no trace on the sympathies
1:10:14of the population. Or they did leave a
1:10:18trace, but not the one Napoleon had
1:10:21counted on. Rome knew how to outwait.
1:10:24That is, perhaps, its greatest talent.
1:10:28Artifacts taken to Paris were partially
1:10:31returned after long negotiations, in
1:10:33which papal diplomat Antonio Canova
1:10:36traveled to Paris personally and
1:10:38brought back the majority. But not
1:10:41everything. And some of those things
1:10:44that did not return remain, to this day
1:10:46, a subject of delicate diplomatic
1:10:48conversations between Rome and Paris.
1:10:51The grand Rome of squares, fountains,
1:10:54and cathedrals existed in parallel with
1:10:57another city, which guidebooks did not
1:10:59write about and which official history
1:11:02mentions reluctantly. The shadow Rome
1:11:05was no less real and, at times, more
1:11:08alive. Courtesans in 16 th-century Rome
1:11:12had their own hierarchy, their own
1:11:14prices, and their own protection. The
1:11:18highest tier, the so-called honest
1:11:20courtesans, *cortigiane oneste*, were
1:11:23educated women who took part in
1:11:25intellectual discussions, wrote poetry,
1:11:28and knew Latin and Greek. Their clients
1:11:32were cardinals, ambassadors, artists,
1:11:34and bankers. Tullia d'Aragona wrote
1:11:37philosophical dialogues on the nature
1:11:39of love and published them under her
1:11:41own name. Veronica Franco in Venice
1:11:44corresponded with Tintoretto and
1:11:47Montaigne. It was a parallel
1:11:49intellectual world that existed outside
1:11:51the universities and academies, which
1:11:54were closed to women. Artists who
1:11:56created masterpieces for popes and
1:11:58cardinals often lived in poverty
1:12:00between commissions. The patronage
1:12:03system gave everything and, at the same
1:12:05time, took everything away. Dependency
1:12:08on a single patron meant that a change
1:12:10of pope or falling out of a cardinal's
1:12:12favor could leave a master without a
1:12:14livelihood in an instant. Some hid from
1:12:18creditors, some drank, some did both.
1:12:23Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio is a
1:12:26separate chapter in this subject. A
1:12:29genius who changed painting more
1:12:31radically than anyone in his century,
1:12:33and a man who lived like a chronic
1:12:35disaster. Fights, lawsuits, a murder
1:12:39during an argument over a ball game in
1:12:421606, and an escape from Rome, where a
1:12:45death sentence awaited him. He spent
1:12:49the next four years in Naples, Malta,
1:12:51and Sicily, creating masterpieces and
1:12:53fleeing the consequences of his own
1:12:55temperament. He died in 1610 on the way
1:12:59back to Rome, where he was perhaps
1:13:02going to be pardoned, of a fever, alone
1:13:05on a beach. The Jewish Ghetto,
1:13:10established in 1555 by Pope Paul IV,
1:13:12locked several thousand people into a
1:13:14few blocks between the Tiber and the
1:13:16Theater of Marcellus. The gates were
1:13:19locked at night. Jews were forbidden
1:13:22from practicing most trades, so they
1:13:24specialized in the trade of used
1:13:26clothing and money-lending. Not because
1:13:29they wanted to, but because everything
1:13:31else was closed to them. The Ghetto
1:13:34would exist until 1870 and would be
1:13:36abolished only after the unification of
1:13:38Italy. Shadow Rome was not an exception
1:13:42to the rule. It was the rule, just
1:13:44without the marble and the gilding. On
1:13:47September 20, 1870, Italian troops
1:13:52entered Rome through a breach in the
1:13:54Aurelian Wall near the Porta Pia. The
1:13:58papal guard offered symbolic resistance
1:14:01: a few shots, a few wounded, then the
1:14:04gates were opened. The Papal State,
1:14:08which existed in various forms for over
1:14:10a thousand years, ceased to exist in a
1:14:12single morning. Rome was becoming the
1:14:16capital of a unified Italy. And it
1:14:18immediately became clear that this was
1:14:20an extremely inconvenient city for such
1:14:22a role. Not because it was small or
1:14:26peripheral, but for the exact opposite
1:14:29reason: it was too heavy in its
1:14:31symbolic weight, too crowded with the
1:14:34past, and too complex for any practical
1:14:37solution. Build a new ministry, and
1:14:40you’ll find an ancient foundation.
1:14:43Lay a road, and you’ll stumble upon a
1:14:46necropolis. Rome resisted modernity not
1:14:49out of malice, but simply because
1:14:51beneath every step lay someone else’s
1:14:53modernity, which had long since become
1:14:56the past. The first census of 1871
1:15:01recorded 220,000 residents. For the
1:15:05capital of a nation with 20 million,
1:15:08that was few. Bureaucrats, officers,
1:15:12and deputies flocked from Turin,
1:15:14Florence, and Naples, looking at the
1:15:16city with a mixture of fascination and
1:15:18despair. There was essentially no
1:15:21sewage system. The systems in use
1:15:24partly dated back to antiquity. There
1:15:28was no transport, and housing was in
1:15:30short supply. Malaria persisted in the
1:15:32suburbs well into the 20th century. New
1:15:36neighborhoods began to grow from
1:15:37scratch, expanding rapidly without a
1:15:39plan or taste. According to
1:15:42contemporaries, speculators built up
1:15:44the Esquilino and Prati districts,
1:15:46demolishing villas and gardens that had
1:15:48stood there since the Renaissance. Rome
1:15:51of the 19th century, the city of popes
1:15:53and pilgrims, was starting to turn into
1:15:56a city of bureaucrats and power. The
1:15:59transformation was ugly yet inevitable.
1:16:03The question that arose from the very
1:16:05beginning and remains unanswered is who
1:16:08owns a city where every stone belongs
1:16:10to someone: antiquity, the Church, the
1:16:12state, or the tourist’s imagination.
1:16:16Who decides what to demolish and what
1:16:18to preserve? The new Italy’s first
1:16:21answer proved controversial and birthed
1:16:23contradictions that persist to this day
1:16:25. Rome was becoming a capital, but it
1:16:30remained itself: stubborn, tangled,
1:16:32impossible, and necessary. Benito
1:16:36Mussolini had a specific vision of what
1:16:38the capital of a Great Power should
1:16:41look like. It had to be readable. It
1:16:45had to show a straight line from the
1:16:47ancient to the new, from Caesar to the
1:16:49Duce. Everything that stood in the way
1:16:52of this line was to be demolished. In
1:16:551926, he began clearing the area around
1:16:58the Mausoleum of Augustus. Medieval and
1:17:02Renaissance quarters were torn down to
1:17:04reveal a view of the First Emperor’s
1:17:07tomb. In 1932, for the decade of the
1:17:11Fascist revolution, the Via dell'Impero
1:17:13was opened, a straight road from the
1:17:15Colosseum to Piazza Venezia, where
1:17:17Mussolini’s balcony stood. To pave it
1:17:21, several medieval quarters were
1:17:23demolished and excavated parts of the
1:17:25Forum were partially buried. They
1:17:28literally buried uncovered antiquity to
1:17:31build a road to another antiquity. This
1:17:35logic of destroying one past to
1:17:37highlight another very accurately
1:17:39reflects the nature of the regime.
1:17:41Selective memory as a tool of power.
1:17:44Rome had to demonstrate the version of
1:17:47itself that provided legitimacy to
1:17:48Mussolini. The city of Caesars, the
1:17:51city of empire, the city that always
1:17:54conquered and expanded. The Middle Ages
1:17:57did not fit into this scheme. Too
1:17:59complex, too ecclesiastical, too
1:18:01non-triumphant.
1:18:03The regime's architectural program
1:18:05combined two incompatible styles so
1:18:08convincingly that it is strange in
1:18:10itself. On one hand, an exhibition of
1:18:14ancient ruins, excavations, museums,
1:18:16and Trajan's Column in the center of
1:18:18new squares. On the other, the massive
1:18:22rationalist architecture of EUR, a new
1:18:25district in the south of Rome built for
1:18:28the 1942 World's Fair, which did not
1:18:30take place due to the war. Esposizione
1:18:35Universale Roma still stands today, a
1:18:38bit eerie and symmetrical, with arches
1:18:40that cite antiquity but on a scale that
1:18:43suppresses the individual. When the
1:18:48Allies bombed Rome in 1943, Mussolini
1:18:51was already falling. The city survived
1:18:54better than it might have. Partly
1:18:56because both sides tried to avoid
1:18:58direct strikes on the center. Rome was
1:19:02declared an open city, and it avoided
1:19:04the fate of Warsaw or Dresden. But the
1:19:07price it paid for 20 years of the
1:19:09regime is not just demolished
1:19:11neighborhoods. It is a rift in the
1:19:14urban memory that is harder to patch
1:19:16than rebuilding a house. In the summer
1:19:20of '43, Allied bombers attacked Rome
1:19:22for the first time. The strike on the
1:19:26San Lorenzo railway hub claimed about a
1:19:29thousand civilians and caused such
1:19:31shock that Mussolini fell that very
1:19:33week. A city that considered itself
1:19:37untouchable because of its significance
1:19:39suddenly realized that no symbolic
1:19:41value stops an aerial bomb. What
1:19:45happened next is one of the most
1:19:47unusual episodes of World War II in
1:19:49Europe. On August 14, '43, Rome was
1:19:52officially declared an open city,
1:19:55meaning a place that would not be
1:19:57defended or offer resistance, and
1:19:59therefore could not be a legitimate
1:20:02military target. Both sides formally
1:20:05accepted this status. The Allies
1:20:08continued bombing the outskirts and
1:20:10infrastructure but avoided the center.
1:20:13The Germans, occupying the city after
1:20:15Italy's surrender in September '43,
1:20:17also did not turn it into a fortress.
1:20:20The reasons on both sides were
1:20:22pragmatic, not humane. The Allies
1:20:25understood that the destruction of Rome
1:20:27and the Vatican would give Nazi
1:20:29propaganda invaluable material and
1:20:30alienate the Catholic population
1:20:32worldwide. The Germans understood that
1:20:36holding a fortress city during a
1:20:37retreat was too costly, and destroying
1:20:39Rome would make them pariahs in the
1:20:41eyes of Europe, even among those who
1:20:43might still support them. The nine
1:20:47months of Nazi occupation from
1:20:49September '43 to June '44 were a time
1:20:52for Rome that the city remembers
1:20:55differently than any other. The raids
1:21:00on Jews in October '43, when more than
1:21:03a thousand people were deported from
1:21:05the ghetto just a few blocks from the
1:21:07Vatican. The execution at the Ardeatine
1:21:11Caves in March '44. 335 hostages in one
1:21:15night in response to a partisan attack.
1:21:20These events left wounds in the city's
1:21:22memory that have not yet healed. On
1:21:26June 4, '44, American troops entered
1:21:29Rome. Two days later, the Allies would
1:21:33land in Normandy, and the liberation of
1:21:35Rome would disappear from the front
1:21:37pages. But for the city, this was a
1:21:39moment that divided time into before
1:21:42and after. General Mark Clark drove
1:21:44through the gates in a jeep, and the
1:21:47crowd threw flowers. The city emerged
1:21:50from the war with damaged suburbs, a
1:21:52traumatized memory, and a nearly
1:21:55untouched center. Not because it was
1:21:58loved, but because it was too important
1:22:01a symbol for all sides to destroy. This
1:22:04ability to survive through symbolic
1:22:06weight is another manifestation of the
1:22:09same logic that stretches from Alaric
1:22:11to Mussolini. Rome is too complex to
1:22:14simply break, even when one really
1:22:17wants to. On February 11, 1929, Benito
1:22:22Mussolini and Cardinal Pietro Gasparri
1:22:25signed three documents in the Lateran
1:22:28Palace that resolved an issue that had
1:22:31been hanging in the air for 60 years.
1:22:35Since the moment Italian troops entered
1:22:37in 1870, popes did not recognize the
1:22:41new Italy and called themselves
1:22:43prisoners of the Vatican. Now, the
1:22:46agreement gave the Church what it
1:22:49wanted: sovereignty. The Vatican City
1:22:53State, 110 acres—less than half a
1:22:56square kilometer—with a population of
1:22:59about 800 people, became an officially
1:23:01independent state, the smallest in area
1:23:04and one of the most influential in
1:23:06reach. It has its own army, the Swiss
1:23:11Guard, which has served since 1506 and
1:23:14has preserved Michelangelo's
1:23:16Renaissance uniforms to this day. Its
1:23:19own currency, its own mail, its own
1:23:22broadcaster, its own court, and its own
1:23:24prison, where, in truth, people were
1:23:26kept extremely rarely. Two governments
1:23:30in one city, and between them,
1:23:31everything is more complicated than it
1:23:33looks. Every day, thousands of people
1:23:36cross the border between the Vatican
1:23:38and Rome without even noticing, because
1:23:40there are no gates or queues there.
1:23:43There is only a white line on the tiles
1:23:45in front of Bernini's colonnade. Legal
1:23:47systems do not match, jurisdictions
1:23:50overlap, and sometimes they conflict.
1:23:53Cases involving church property or
1:23:56clergy can end up between two legal
1:23:58systems at the same time. And both
1:24:01systems might find they do not quite
1:24:04understand who has the final word. The
1:24:07Vatican Museums are one of the most
1:24:09visited museum complexes in the world.
1:24:12Every year, they receive 6–7 million
1:24:14visitors who walk through 20 km of
1:24:16galleries to the Sistine Chapel. The
1:24:19queue at the entrance in the morning is
1:24:21visible from satellite images or at
1:24:23least from any hill around. Revenues
1:24:25from tourism make the Vatican
1:24:27economically self-sufficient despite
1:24:29its microscopic area. The Vatican and
1:24:32Rome coexist in a mutual dependence
1:24:35that both sides do not discuss publicly
1:24:37. Rome needs the pilgrims and tourists
1:24:40that the Vatican attracts. The Vatican
1:24:43needs the city as a context, for
1:24:45logistics, the airport, and hotels.
1:24:48Between them are 90 years of diplomatic
1:24:51relations that stretch back to 1929 and
1:24:54occasionally crack, but never break
1:24:56completely. In the 1950s and 60s, Rome
1:25:01once again became the center of the
1:25:03world. This time, because of cinema.
1:25:09The Cinecittà film studio in the south
1:25:11of the city, built under Mussolini in
1:25:141937 as part of a propaganda program,
1:25:16turned into Europe's largest film
1:25:18complex after the war and attracted
1:25:20Hollywood productions with such force
1:25:23that journalists began calling it
1:25:25Hollywood. on the Tiber. The reasons
1:25:30were practical: cheap labor, sunlight
1:25:33for almost 300 days a year, and sets
1:25:36and props that remained from pompous
1:25:39fascist productions and were perfectly
1:25:42suited for ancient epics. Quo Vadis was
1:25:45filmed here in 1951 with 5,000 extras.
1:25:51Ben-Hur in 1959 with a reconstruction
1:25:56of Jerusalem on a set the size of a
1:25:59small town and chariot races that cost
1:26:02more than the studio’s entire
1:26:04previous year of operation. But
1:26:06alongside Hollywood super-productions,
1:26:09Rome was making its own cinema, and it
1:26:11turned out to be more important.
1:26:14Federico Fellini filmed La Dolce Vita
1:26:16here in 1960. A film that gave a name
1:26:21to an entire era and a whole way of
1:26:23existence. Via Veneto, with its cafes,
1:26:27hotels, and nightlife, became an icon
1:26:30and remains one to this day. Although
1:26:34Fellini himself said that by the time
1:26:36the film was released, the real Via
1:26:38Veneto was already disappearing,
1:26:40replaced by a tourist copy of itself.
1:26:44The word "paparazzi" became a symbol of
1:26:46a new culture where public and private
1:26:49life blended beyond recognition. Rome
1:26:53in the 1960s was the city where this
1:26:55happened first and where it was
1:26:57captured on film better than anywhere
1:26:59else. Cinecittà has seen ups and downs
1:27:04, the television crisis in the 1970s,
1:27:07the decline in the 1980s, and a revival
1:27:10in the 1990s when Martin Scorsese
1:27:13filmed Gangs of New York here. Today,
1:27:16the studio is operational, hosts series
1:27:19productions, and organizes tourist
1:27:22tours through sets left over from old
1:27:24productions. Ancient Rome, built of
1:27:27wood and plaster for some Hollywood
1:27:30epic, stands under the open sky and is
1:27:32slowly decaying. Another layer of the
1:27:35past waiting for its new purpose. 3
1:27:38million residents and about 40 million
1:27:41tourists a year. A city where traffic
1:27:46is gridlocked because a necropolis was
1:27:48found under the road, and construction
1:27:51is frozen for years, where a new hotel
1:27:54cannot be opened without archaeological
1:27:56expertise, and expanding a basement can
1:27:59turn into decades of legal and
1:28:01scientific procedures, where tourists
1:28:04throw coins into the Trevi Fountain,
1:28:07and the city collects about a million
1:28:10euros from the bottom each year and
1:28:12directs them to social needs. The metro
1:28:16in Rome is a tragicomedy in itself.
1:28:19Construction of the first line began in
1:28:22the 1930s, the second in the 1960s, and
1:28:25the third in the 1990s. And it is still
1:28:30unfinished, because every new
1:28:32excavation uncovers something new. At
1:28:35the Repubblica station, ruins of the
1:28:37Baths of Diocletian were found and
1:28:39placed behind glass so passengers could
1:28:42see antiquity right from the platform.
1:28:44Scaffolding stood on the Colosseum for
1:28:46years. simultaneously with restoration
1:28:50and new findings during that very
1:28:52restoration. The question of who is the
1:28:55master of this city became even more
1:28:57acute in the 20th century. The tourist
1:29:00economy is pushing residents out of the
1:29:03center. Rent prices in the historic
1:29:05center are such that most Romans simply
1:29:08cannot afford to live there. Airbnb and
1:29:11hotels occupy spaces where apartments
1:29:14once were. Tourists want to see Rome.
1:29:17and by their presence, they change what
1:29:20they want to see. And yet, the city
1:29:23holds up not because someone decided to
1:29:26preserve it, but because it is too
1:29:28complex to be easily changed. Every
1:29:32attempt to radically rebuild Rome has
1:29:34faced resistance made up of legal
1:29:37procedures, archaeological finds,
1:29:39church claims, municipal bureaucracy,
1:29:41and simply the character of residents
1:29:44who know how to wait longer than any
1:29:46government. Under the city, there are
1:29:50still undiscovered areas. There are
1:29:52quarters of catacombs that are unmapped
1:29:54. There are sections of the Forum that
1:29:57are unexcavated. There are aqueducts
1:29:59that are not fully studied. Rome is not
1:30:01exhausted and, it seems, never will be.
1:30:05We started with a swamp, a marshy
1:30:07valley between seven hills where
1:30:10nothing was supposed to grow, and we
1:30:12passed 3,000 years to a city where the
1:30:15subway has been under construction for
1:30:1745 years because, with every step,
1:30:20someone's past is revealed—too
1:30:22important to simply lay a tunnel
1:30:24through it. What actually makes a city
1:30:28immortal? We asked this question at the
1:30:31beginning and returned to it several
1:30:33times along the way. Now there is an
1:30:36answer, or at least a version that is
1:30:39hard to refute. Not walls. The Aurelian
1:30:42Walls were breached in a single morning
1:30:44in 1870. Not armies. Legions scattered,
1:30:49commanders perished. Legionaries were
1:30:52buried without names. Rulers, kings,
1:30:55consuls, dictators, emperors, popes,
1:30:57the Duce—all passed and vanished. Not
1:31:01even ideas, because ideas changed
1:31:04radically: from Republic to Principate,
1:31:07from paganism to Christianity, from
1:31:10empire to a church state, from papal
1:31:12monarchy to a tourist democracy. What
1:31:15remained was the ability to absorb.
1:31:18Rome took in those who came to conquer
1:31:20it: Etruscans, Sabines, Gauls, Goths,
1:31:23Lombards, Normans. And after a
1:31:25generation, they became Romans. Or Rome
1:31:28became their city. It is hard to say
1:31:31who absorbed whom, but the city
1:31:33continued. What remained was the
1:31:36ability to change purpose without
1:31:38changing itself. The Forum became a cow
1:31:42pasture, then an archaeological park.
1:31:46The Colosseum a fortress, a quarry, a
1:31:49symbol. Hadrian's Mausoleum a castle, a
1:31:53prison, a museum. Every structure
1:31:56outlived its purpose and found a new
1:31:58one. Not because someone planned it
1:32:02that way, but because it simply stood
1:32:04and waited. And memory remained as the
1:32:08city’s fabric. In Rome, it is
1:32:11impossible to walk without walking on
1:32:13someone's past, literally. Under the
1:32:16asphalt is a paved Roman road; under
1:32:18that, a necropolis. Under that, perhaps
1:32:21something else. The city is layered
1:32:24time, and every layer, so far, has gone
1:32:27nowhere. If you are still here, it
1:32:31means the story was worth your time.
1:32:34Thank you for making it to the end. Or
1:32:36for falling asleep somewhere along the
1:32:38way and finishing it in the morning.
1:32:40That counts too. Next time, another
1:32:43city. Which one? Write in the comments
1:32:46what you would like to hear. We read
1:32:49everything and choose what seems most
1:32:51interesting to tell. Your ideas have
1:32:54already brought us some of our best
1:32:56episodes. Good night or good morning,
1:32:59depending on when you are hearing this.
1:33:02Yeah.

About this transcript

This page contains the full transcript of Рим: повна історія вічного міста від болота до сьогодні | Історія на ніч by Мунлайт - Історії на ніч, generated from the public captions YouTube serves with the video. The transcript has 12,905 words across 2,061 segments, with the original timestamps preserved so you can click any line to jump to that moment in the embedded player.

What you can do with it

Use the transcript to take notes, quote the speaker, build a study guide, generate a summary with ChatGPT or Claude via the YouTube Summary tool, or export it as a timed subtitle file with YouTube to SRT. You can also re-open it in the transcriber to translate the transcript into 100+ languages.

Free YouTube transcript tool

YouTube2Text is a free YouTube transcript generator — no signup, no daily limit. Paste any YouTube link and get the full transcript instantly, with timestamps, click-to-jump, translation to 100+ languages, AI prompts for ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini, and exports to TXT, SRT, VTT, or Markdown.