Londinium!

The Museum of London is celebrating Roman London today with re-enactors, talks, demonstrations, competitions and drama in an event called Londinium!

Inside the main entrance, in the London before London foyer, several members of the Leg II Avg have set up a leather tent with all their Roman soldiers' equipment. They do drills with children and let us peek inside the tent. I see legionaries David and Simon (above) as well as Lyndsay and Thomas.

Gladiatrix and sometimes slave-girl Alisa shows slave chains and collars and almost makes one boy sick when she described how doctors took arrows out of wounded soldiers. Marcus Londinium Cato (AKA Cockney John) also gets to make people queasy when he brandishes a piece of nasty-looking medical equipment and is asked 'What's a hemorrhoid?'


In another part of the gallery, Roland Williamson is showing how Roman shoes are made. And dramatic interpreter Kate (above) has taken on the persona of freedwoman Martia Martina, who was taken from Caledonia aged 8. She is very funny, pretending to think people with only one name are slaves and not understanding what chips are.

It is a beautiful day so I wander outside to eat lunch and to watch parents and children happily have a go at working a Roman waterlifting machine. After my stuffed dormouse, I go back inside to admire the small but select collection of Roman objects in the museum. I've seen the collection many times but always find something new. I also have a surreal moment when I spot legionary Marcus Londinius Cato (above) also exploring the collection.

I finish my visit with a guided tour of the Roman wall outside the Museum. It was built in around AD 120, and used to be part of the fort in the north west corner. Our group gets to see part of the wall which is usually closed to the public. Appropriately enough, it's underneath the road known today as 'London Wall'.

You can see more & bigger photos on my public Facebook photo page

P.S. Watch Roman Mysteries season 2 Sundays on CBBC at 9.30am.

A Day in the Sabine Hills

I've just returned from three days in Italy, researching The Man from Pomegranate Street. I wanted to see what the Sabine hills would have been like in mid-September, the time of year when Titus died. I also wanted to see Lake Alba, where Titus's brother Domitian built an imperial villa. Domitian's villa was exactly where the papal palace is now at a town called Castel Gandolfo about ten miles southeast of Rome.

Having booked an EasyJet flight on impulse I set out from home early on the morning of Tuesday 16 September. Lisa Tucci is an Italian-American audioguide producer and blogger. I first met her after I sent an email raving about her wonderful audioguide to ancient Ostia. We subsequently met in London and when I told her I hoped to explore the Sabine Hills, she generously gave up a whole day to organize it.

My flight is on time and when I arrive at Ciampino Airport at 10.30am on Tuesday morning, there she is in her red Honda Civic. Sitting patiently in the back seat is Lisa's dog Trevor, named after Trevi, where she found him. He is so quiet that she often smuggles him on planes in her carry-on luggage!

We set straight off along the Via Salaria, the old salt road which led from the salt fields of Ostia up to the centre of Italy. After ten or fifteen minutes, we stop for a coffee at Il Glicine (Hyacinth) Bar & Osteria in Settebagni. This might have been near the spot where Titus got a fever in September of AD 81. Titus died a few days later - on 13 September AD 81 - at his family's rustic villa near Reate (modern Rieti).

It is a perfect autumn day. Sunny and mild with a few friendly clouds in the blue sky. We are following the route Titus took to get from Rome to his Sabine villa. According to Suetonius, Titus died at first stopping place out of Rome. Nobody knows quite where this was, though it may have been Eretum, where the Via Salaria met the Via Nomentana. Unfortunately, nobody knows where Eretum was either. Never mind. This is good enough. The countryside here is still quite flat, with plane trees lining the road and the blue Sabine hills in the distance up ahead.

As we continue along the Via Salaria, the road begins to climb. We see vineyards and hazelnut trees and my ears pop. Soon we reach Monteleone Sabina, which has impressive remains of a Roman amphitheatre. We briefly investigate these ruins, and let Trevor have a little sniff. Then Lisa points out an old Franciscan monastery on the top of a hill. The monastery has been converted to apartments, and a friend of hers occupies one of them. Claire Nelson is a sculptress who works in bronze and bronze-look resin. An expat British woman, she is going to put us in touch with some guides to the Sabine Hills at a lunchtime meeting. The dusty track to her house leads up through silver-grey olive trees. When we arrive, we are welcomed by some of Claire's dogs. LikeLisa, she can't bear to see an abandoned canine.

Claire greets us and gets in the back seat, next to Trevor, and soon we reach the Sabine town of Poggio Moiano, about 50 km northwest of Rome. The Ristorante Maria Fontana specialises in local seasonal produce. As we enter, we see slices of courgette and of aubergine laid out on tables to dry in the sunshine. This is all part of the preparation. Then the vegetables are brushed with olive oil and grilled. Susan Micocci and her husband Bruno arrive a few minutes after we were seated. Susan is a friend of Claire's and guide of the area. This restaurant was her choice. She is an expat New Yorker who married the delightful Bruno and has been in Italy ever since. She offers cooking courses, hiking tours and culture tours of the region, all in English or Italian. (You can find out more here) below: Bruno and Claire the sculptress with the owner of the restaurant.

We order antipasti to start and enjoy big plates of prosciuttio, salami, cheese, olives and a bowl of delicious chopped liver. Our grilled vegetables include aubergine and pumpkin! Yum. For main dish we have freshly made pasta or grilled veal steak. There is fresh crusty bread and either red wine or mineral water.

Over lunch, Susan tells me lots of wonderful facts about the Sabine Hills. She says that she and Bruno will take us up to Rieti and then to the Baths of Vespasian and the Villa of Titus. I go to the ladies room to wash my hands, and am so excited that I come running out to hear more and crash into the owner of the restaurant, who is also moving fast. We embrace for a moment in tears of laughter. It is like a scene from a slapstick comedy. Luckily he isn't carrying any plates of food!

After lunch we set off for Rieti in our two cars. Susan takes me in her car, so she can explain things, while Bruno goes with Lisa and Claire. Suddenly Susan realises her brakes aren't working! We stop by the ruined marble gate of a Sabine villa and Bruno comes to have a look. He takes over driving and we make our way carefully to a service station. Bruno decides the brakes will hold a little longer, so we continued cautiously on to Rieti.

At Rieti, Susan takes us to the Roman Bridge (only a small remnant) and explains how the Romans made brick vaults as foundations for the houses here. This area was prone to flooding in Roman times. Rieti was then known as Reate, after Rea Silva, the mother of Romulus and Remus. It's mainly medieval now, so we hurry on to the Terme di Vespasiano, the Baths of Vespasian. These baths are in beautiful green hills at a place called Cotilia, which used to be Cutiliae. The nearby area is famous for chestnuts, truffles and farro, a type of grain we call 'spelt'. It's also famous for its mineral waters.

On the main road, across from the modern Terme di Cotilia, is a public fountain. We stop so that we can taste the water. It is magnificent: the coldest, fizziest, eggiest water I've ever had! I can tell by the eggy taste that it's sulphur water. right: Susan and I at Lake Paternus

On we drive, into the late afternoon sunlight to Lago Paterno, a deep, beautiful and mysterious lake. Susan tells us that the Greeks who used to live here performed human sacrifices! The Flavian villa is on the hillside overlooking this lake. There are plans to start excavating it soon. This is the villa where both Vespasian and Titus died. Suetonius: 'He died in the same farmhouse as his father, on the Ides of September... aged forty-two.'

It is getting late now, and the sun is sinking, so we say goodbye to the wonderful Susan and Bruno. Susan gives me literature about the region and two DVDs. What generosity! Lisa and I drop Claire back at her monastery in Monteleone, where we watch the sun set and have a cup of PG Tips tea. Then Lisa drives me towards Lake Alba where I have booked two nights at the lakeside Hotel Castelgandolfo. As we leave Rome we see a huge orange moon rising on the eastern horizon and when I check into my room at the Hotel Castelgandolfo (which I highly recommend) I see the same moon, now higher and cooler, floating above its reflection on Lake Alba.

(You can see more & bigger photos on my public Facebook photo page)

A Day on Lake Albano

Wednesday 17 September 2008

I am woken by a strange, soft, clanging sound and open my eyes. I am in the Hotel Castelgandolfo, on tranquil Lake Albano, about 16 miles southeast of Rome. I throw open the curtains to see a beautiful dawn over the lake. The bells have stopped. Are they from a church? Soon they start again - hesitant, almost apologetic - and I hear the sound of a train. There it is, down below. The gentle clanging is the sound of the barrier coming down. I am struck by how quiet it is here. Apart from a distant barking dog and the bell of the level crossing, I can't hear a thing. Is it something to do with the acoustics of the lake?

At about 7.20 the sun appears over Mount Albano. The light comes straight through the window and into my eyes. I dress quickly and go downstairs. Breakfast is already laid out in the little dining room. I devour some cheese and plain yogurt and wash it down with a delicious espresso made by Eddie. Lorenzo the manager is there. I explain that I want to see remains of Domitian's villa which are inside the Papal Palace. He shakes his head sadly and says that nobody is allowed in. The only way the public can see inside is if they 'make a mess'. At first I think he means you can only have access if builders are there. Then he says: 'They make a mess on Wednesday and Sunday mornings.' A-ha! He means a Mass!

I grab my camera and notebook and go outside to explore. It is a beautiful, cool morning, with a pure blue sky. Deserted cobbled streets lead me to the Piazza della Libertà with its fountain. Here is the Bernini church of St Thomas of Villanova. And there is the Papal Palace, with two colourful Swiss guards standing in the entryway. This is the Pope's summer residence, which was built in the 17th century. It is built exactly on the site of Domitian's palace, which was designed by Rabirius, who also built Domitian's palace on the Palatine Hill. Somewhere inside the Papal Palace are Roman remains, including a bust of Polyphemus which was found in the nymphaeum of the villa's gardens. But unless I attend Mass, I can't go inside.* And unfortunately there is no Mass today. The Pope is off to Rome.

(On the following day I get a quick glimpse of the papal car going off to Rome again, and I leave a padded envelope with the Swiss guards. Inside is a letter addressed to 'Dear Holy Father', requesting access at some time in the future. I have included a signed copy of The Thieves of Ostia and the DVD. I have a brief mental image of important clerics coming in to see the Pope one morning, but he is deep in my book and waves them away impatiently...)

On this morning, I wander around Castel Gandolfo, admiring the view of the lake on one side and the plain and Tyrrhenian sea on the other. I walk down the hill towards the lake and see free ranging pigs and donkeys. It is the most glorious day - soft sunlight, perfect temperature, merest breeze - but with that touch of poignancy that comes in the autumn, when you know that summer is over and winter is coming. At the level crossing for the train station, a footpath called Via della Stazione zig-zags back up to the town. I check my watch and hurry back up: I am due to meet a geoarchaeologist at 10.30.

Antonia Arnoldus is a Dutch scholar who lives across the lake from Castel Gandolfo at a village called Rocca di Papa, the Pope's Rock. Antonia is a member of the Ostia website and she helped advise me when the production company of the TV series decided to set The Fugitive from Corinth in Italy rather than Greece. She told me about the sanctuary of Diana at Lake Nemi and also about grottoes and caves in this area.

When I booked my flights last week, I sent Antonia an email offering to take her to dinner. She generously offered to take me around the lake and said I could buy her lunch instead. I said Yes!

And here is Antonia, bang on the dot of 10.30. We get in her car and off we go. She points out her satellite tracking system and says she will give me a printout at the end of the day to show exactly where we have been.

As we skirt the northern edge of the Lake Albano, Antonia tells me that this is a volcanic region. Apparently there was one massive eruption 70,000 years ago and then another few eruptions roughly 40,000 years after that. The second set of eruptions created three crater lakes. Lake Albano, Lake Nemi and another lake. The third lake is now dry but Nemi is still here with ruins of a Temple of Diana and a Boat Museum commemorating Caligula's pleasure barges. We will go there for lunch.

At Palazzolo, we park near an ancient Roman tomb and walk on a green path through chestnut and oak woods. Antonia points out one small plant which is called 'pungitopo' in Italian. This means 'pricks the mouse'. You would put the leaves on top of meat to keep the mice off. As we pass through green dappled shade I notice again that the woods are absolutely silent. 'They've killed everything,' says Antonia. 'Everything except the wild boar.' 'Even the birds?' I ask. 'Yes, they love to eat little birds.' She shows me an impressive cave and later mossy rocks and ferns which betray a spring coming out of the mountain. 'When the springs get hot on Mount Vesuvius,' says Antonia, 'they get hot here, too. There is a geological connection which we don't entirely understand.' 'Plate tectonics?' I ask, trying to show off my knowledge. Antonia gives a wry smile. 'Like plate tectonics, but on a micro level.'

We come back through the silent green woods, glimpsing the blue water of the lake below us through the trees.

Back in the car, we drive a short distance to a 17th century mansion which is now a restaurant and hotel for luxurious wedding parties. A handsome Italian called Sandro shows us around. The Villa del Cardinale dates to 1629 and is called after the cardinal who built it. It is built on the site of a Roman villa belonging to a member of the Scipio family. That was his tomb we saw back in the woods.

The cool, tile-floored villa has stunning views of the lake. Sandro shows us some frescoes of the area as it would have looked four hundred years ago. We see the bridal suite and the banqueting rooms. In one dining room is a painting of Ovid writing a poem on a wax tablet. Underneath, the inscription reads:

Militat omnes amans, et habet sua castra eundo;
Attice, crede mihi, militat omnes amans...

This verse is slightly adapted from Ovid's Amores I.ix. Here is my attempt at a translation:

Every lover is a soldier, and has his camp wherever he goes;
Atticus, believe me, every lover is a soldier.

Near Palazzolo, where the Villa del Cardinale is located, is an area for horses. Antonia says they like the flat ground here because it has never been ploughed and is firm under their feet. She brings out a map she had brought to give me and shows me how the volcanoes occurred.

As we drive to Nemi, Antonia tells me about triple Diana. This goddess has three manifestations: the virgin huntress, the goddess of childbirth and also goddess of the moon. She has a temple down on the shore of Lake Nemi, a ‘very feminine lake’, whereas Jupiter’s temple was atop Mount Alba, overlooking the whole area as far as Rome.

When the full moon sets in the west you can sometimes see a triple moon: the moon in the sky, its reflection in the sea and its reflection in Lake Nemi. Before visiting the remains of Diana's temple, we go to lunch in the beautiful little town of Nemi at a restaurant called ‘Specchio di Diana’, which means ‘Diana’s Mirror’. The lake below us is small and round, and it does look like a mirror. We dine on antipasti and finish with the speciality of the region: vanilla ice cream with tiny wild strawberries. This leads to a discussion of ancient ice cream. Did they have it? We think so. Antonia mentions grattachecca, which is like granita but much coarser. This is grated ice with sweet fruit syrup drizzled on top. I have something like lemon grattachecca in my eleventh book, The Sirens of Surrentum.

After lunch we drive down to the site of Diana's Temple. Antonia actually excavated this site. Today there is very little to see, but devotees have erected a modern altar, with sticks of incense and dried flowers and other little offerings. There is even a notebook for you to write down your prayers or praise of the goddess. I make an entry of my own. Near the temple site is a fountain, of course. We stop to try the water. 'Yes,' says Antonia with satisfaction, 'That has the slightly sharp taste of volcanic water.'

Two pleasure barges belonging to Caligula were found at the bottom of Lake Nemi. They were exposed in the 1920's, when the lake was partially drained, and their remains are now housed in the MVSEO DELLE NAVI ROMANE not far from the Temple of Diana. You can see the reproduction keel of one, to give you an idea of how massive they were.

Julius Caesar had a lakeside villa at Nemi, and part of the modern road here has been stripped away to reveal the Roman road beneath. The Sacred Way or Via Sacra, led up from the Via Appia and all the way to the top of Mount Albano, now called Monte Cavo. Here, at the Temple of Jupiter, were yearly rites called the Feriae Latinae. These pagan rites continued well into the Christian era. We stop to admire the ancient road, parts of it in the dappled woods. Antonia says: 'Chestnut woods have a special kind of shade I would recognize anywhere.'

We drive up to the top of Monte Cavo. Only a few stones from great Jupiter's temple still remain. Most of the summit is given over to telecom discs and ugly aerials.

As we drive back to Lake Albano, Antonia shares her one rule of driving in Italy: 'Don't bump into anyone.'

On the way back into Castel Gandolfo - coming from the south this time - we stop to admire the amphitheatre. According to my sources, Domitian built one here along with a circus for chariot races. He loved his races, and tried to introduce two new factions, the golds and the purples. But they never caught on.

Our final mission is to see the 'emissario' of Lake Albano. Here is another fascinating story, told by Livy . Around 400 BC, the Romans were beseiging a town called Veii in Etruria, about 30 miles northwest of here, on the other side of Rome. An old man prophesied that the Romans would never conquer Veii unless Lake Albano was drained. The soldiers laughed. But back at Lake Albano, the water level began to rise. And rise. And rise. It was mid-summer and elsewhere rivers and creeks were drying out. Desperate to know what they had done wrong, the Romans sent an embassy to Delphi to enquire of the Sybil. And what was her answer? Sacrifice a dozen virgins on midsummer's eve? Sent a white bull into the sea? No. The Pythia's advice was very practical. 'Cut a channel in the mountain and drain off the water.' The old prophet and the Delphic oracle were in agreement. A channel was duly cut. The excess water drained away and the Romans conquered Veii. And here is the very channel - or 'emissario' as it is known - behind a little metal door in a stone wall. A huge arch with a tunnel carved into the living rock. 'Just like the engraving of Piranesi!' cries Antonia, who has never seen this before.

With dangling vine tendrils and strange glowing dragonflies, this is an atmospheric place. But there is no time to linger. The sun is low in the west and I have promised Antonia a well-deserved beer by the lakeside.

P.S. You can read the results of my research in Roman Mystery XVII, The Man from Pomegranate Street...

* Antonia later fixed it for us to get a private tour of Domitian's villa. My account of it is HERE.

The Roman Mysteries books are perfect for children aged 9+ especially those studying Romans as a topic.

An Afternoon in Rome

by Caroline Lawrence

Thursday 18 September 2008

Today is the last day of my three-day flying visit to Italy, to gather sensory detail and fun facts for the last book in the Roman Mysteries series, The Man from Pomegranate Street, about the mysterious death of the emperor Titus and the succession of his younger brother Domitian.

After an event-packed day in the Sabine Hills and yesterday around Lake Alba, I decide to spend my last few hours in Castel Gandolfo just wandering around and soaking up atmosphere.

After a brief sighting of the Pope's car leaving the Papal Palace, and a nice espresso in Piazza della Libertà, I walk down to the lake for lunch at a waterside trattoria. At around 2.30, I catch the little train from the Castel Gandolfo station.

The train runs parallel to the old Appian Way, and there are several stops with romantic names. One of them is Acqua Acetosa, which means something like 'Vinegary Water'. Antonia later tells me that water with a slightly sharp taste, often naturally carbonated, is associated with volcanic activity, like the water we tasted below Nemi the day before. Antonia says that the Appian Way follows an ancient lava stream and is marvellously straight with a gentle and constant slope which must have amazed the Romans.

The train also stops at Capannelle ('Little Sheds'). This last name is particularly appropriate as there are lots of stables here. I wonder if there were stables here in Roman times, too. After the train pulls out of Capannelle, I see one of the best-preserved aqueducts from the right hand window, to the north. This is the Aqua Marcia, built in 144 BC. It is still impressive today.

We arrive in Rome 45 minutes out of Castel Gandolfo, and I set out from Termini on foot. It's another glorious day, the warmest so far, but not too hot. I take snaps of a colourful news kiosk, building works (Rome is not looking her best) and in a pasticerria window, some cookies called 'Brutti ma Buoni'. (That means 'ugly but good') A sign tempts me off my planned route to investigate the 'Citta dell'Acqua', some underground remains of another aqueduct, the Aqua Virgo. This little museum is near the Trevi fountain and, as usual, you go down to go back in time. It is cool down here and I can hear the splash of running water.

Presently I emerge again and try to find the Piazza Navona, where my artist friend Dennis Cigler lives. Dennis is another expat American, living in Rome. I first met him a few years ago when I did an author event at Marymount International School. He is art teacher there. Dennis is very creative and bohemian, and 'when we were young and beautiful' he used to run with a crowd of Italian celebrities like Antonioni and Fellini. I look for someone to ask directions from, but EVERY SINGLE PERSON I meet is also clutching a map and looking lost. In stark contrast to peaceful Castel Gandolfo, Rome is packed with tourists.

The Trevi Fountain is twenty people deep. No chance of tossing a coin in there today.

The Pantheon is heaving with sightseers.

The Piazza Navona, when I finally find it, is clogged with plebs.

Worse, the beautiful Bernini fountain of the Four Seasons in the Piazza Navona is boarded up for renovation. At last I find the little cobbled backstreet where Dennis lives. I press the button and he buzzes me in. As I step out of the lift and into his apartment, I enter another world. He has covered the walls with Graeco-Roman or Egyptian type frescoes. Books line the walls and in his bedroom is an enormous sphinx head from the Cinecittà set of Cleopatra. There are glowing Turkish carpets, jewel-coloured cushions and indoor plants lit emerald by the late afternoon sun. 

The windows let in a cool breeze that causes the curtains to swell and subside, as if the whole afternoon was asleep and breathing deeply. In Dennis' studio, there are objets d'art everywhere, and some of Dennis' dreamlike paintings. He also does etchings, like this one of the Bernini fountain in the Piazza Navona. 

I don't have long - I have to make my way back to the train station at 5.00pm - but an hour is long enough for us to catch up a little on what is happening. By serendipity, a friend of Dennis' happens to be in Rome and he calls her to encourage her to drop by. Kristin has just been to see a collection of medieval tapestries. The subject? The Emperor Titus!

Dennis is something of a pagan. His nickname for himself is 'Dionysus', he has a Facebook application for 'what were you in your previous life' and he freely admits to being a sun-worshipper. When I mention the magnificent moon I saw rising over Lake Alba on my first night here, he says casually, 'Oh yes. The moon is in Pisces at the moment.' My jaw drops. That is exactly the kind of thing Domitian's astrologer Ascletario would have said two thousand years ago when the Romans were obsessed with omens, portents and horoscopes. As the French say: Plus ça change, plus c'est la meme chose. 'The more things change, the more they stay the same.'

And really, that's what my books are all about.

Roman World Day

The British Museum is one of the best resources in the world. Today was Roman World Day, with storytelling, workshops, demonstrations, films and talks, many linking with the current Hadrian Exhibition.

I arrived just after noon, to find some of the legionaries from the Leg II Aug already outside and chatting to tourists. They had pitched a leather tent in front of a beautiful mural of Hadrian's wall and they looked great with their armour gleaming in the sunshine. All the re-enactors put in very long days but they are always cheerful, enthusiastic and helpful. Inside I found more re-enactor friends in the atmospheric Great Court. There was Nodge, who made my first sponge-on-a-stick, his wife Janet (with a wonderful Roman rag doll) and their daughter Helen, too. Gus the auxiliary was on duty, with his Phrygian cap and later with his bow and arrows. There was a Roman food lady and a Roman tempura painter and Helen the seamstress. Chris the potter and his lovely daughter Rebecca were present, too. Plus some 'exotic dancers from North Africa'.

Gaius the scribe was there, too. He presented me with a beautiful papyrus scroll of Horace's ode, the one with my favourite Latin motto: Carpe diem or 'Seize the day'.

While I was going around the stalls of the re-enactors, I met several young fans... just by chance. One of them, Xavier, actually had a battered copy of The Secrets of Vesuvius with him. I also met Sam, who has read all my books, and his sister Matilda. Sorry if you were there and I didn't see you!

Later, I dropped in on some of the readings and lectures. I listened to David Stuttard telling about Roman love poetry in the late Republic and early Empire. He had an actor with him to read some of my favourite poetry, including 'Odi et amo' by Catullus. I also heard Sally Pomme Clayton give an enthusiastic reading of Ovid near the base of a column from the famous Temple of Ephesus. The Emperor Hadrian was there, too, fielding questions from fans young and old. These talks took place all over the museum - in places I don't always go - so I discovered and re-discovered some of the wonderful artifacts and works of art in the BM.

After an hour or two, I went outside to enjoy the sunshine with dozens of other tourists. It was a perfect English day, sunny with fluffy clouds and a cool breeze. I resisted going to my favourite Starbucks across the street from the British Museum, and nibbled on a piece of cheese washed down with diet Coke. Yum.

After my lunch I went back inside for a talk on Roman cooking by Valentina Daprile from Carluccio's. She didn't know as much about Roman food as expert Sally Granger, but the food she prepared was good Italian food and might have been like something known to Flavia and her friends. Valentina made a gustatio (starter) of porcini mushrooms with truffle and olive oil; a mensa prima (main dish) of pork with herbs, apples and honey; and a mensa secunda of sheep's-milk cheese with honey and nuts. Yes, the Romans loved their honey.

Behind the Scenes

Watch* behind-the-scenes clips and occasional episodes on the official BBC Roman Mysteries site (click the writing)



*If you live outside the UK, you might not be able to watch because of licensing restrictions.

Roman Mysteries Season Two

the four friends & their bodyguard

It was exciting to see such great publicity in the run-up to the premiere of Season Two of the Roman Mysteries TV show today.

There have been reviews in almost all the major UK papers, including The Times, The Independent, The Sunday Times and The Mail on Sunday. Here are some excerpts:

'The Roman Mysteries is a tremendous way for younger viewers to learn about Roman history... they graft child-friendly adventure on to careful research... with the help of a strong cast and healthy-looking budget...'
The Times

'Impressively staged children's drama - a sort of Rome for pre-teens - about four friends in AD79.'
The Independent

It's the Famous Five in togas – or, given this week's plot about well-muscled gladiators hitting town, the tweenage Spartacus...'
The Sunday Times

'The adventure series set in ancient Rome returns, with some nice acting by the young cast...'
The Mail on Sunday

'... a high-quality drama series, aimed at children...'
DigiGuide

'...you certainly don't have to be a child to enjoy this adventure series set in the days of the Roman Empire and boasting some very decent production values, convincing fight scenes and crucially, good storylines.'
East Anglian Times

The Gladiators from Capua, BBC adaptation of the Roman Mystery

What do I think of the series as the writer of the books on which it is based? Some of the TV episodes are a lot like the books. The Colossus of Rhodes and The Slave-girl from Jerusalem follow my stories closely. However, other episodes don't.

For example, today's episode - The Gladiators from Capua - is a completely different story from the book. This is because the BBC didn't quite have the budget to reproduce the opening day at the Colosseum when 50,000 people watched a tightrope-walking elephant, 4,000 animals slaughtered in the morning beast hunt, criminal executions at lunch, carefully paired gladiatorial combats in the afternoon and sea-battles in the flooded arena by night. Also, the actor who plays Titus (Nicholas Farrell) was unavailable so they decided to use the excellent Duncan Duff as Domitian instead. In spite of the changes, the characters and spirit of the books remain true.

On the whole there aren't too many moments when I run screaming from the room.

Children who aren't as sensitive as the author will get a good idea of what Ancient Rome looked like and will be carried along by an exciting story with four different kids doing brave and funny things. It might even inspire them to read the books!

Caroline Lawrence on the Bulgarian set of Roman Mysteries season 2

Both seasons of the BBC Roman Mysteries TV series are now available in the UK and Europe on DVD and they are free if you have Amazon Prime. They are a good resource to use in tandem with the 17+ books in the Roman Mysteries series. Perfect for children aged 9+, especially those studying Greeks, Romans and Egyptians as a topic in Key Stage 2. 

Roman Istanbul

Friday 16 May 2008

I always like to go to the countries where my books are set to get details about the geography, flora, fauna and cuisine. Many aspects won’t have changed since Roman times and those are the things I’m looking for. I am like a detective, trying to find the past in the present. At the moment I am researching the penultimate Roman Mystery, The Prophet from Ephesus.

On our first day in Istanbul we are taken to the site of the hippodrome, the ancient chariot racecourse. Nothing much is left of it, apart from one or two columns, but there is a nice relief sculpture of important Romans watching the races.

Then our tour takes us underground, to some cisterns below an ancient church. I am in for a treat.

When I was in Alexandria last year, I wanted to see one of the many cisterns that lie below that city, but was told by our tour guide that there weren’t any! This was an Egyptian guide who didn’t even know what lay beneath the city. (Bad Kuoni Tours!) But I have found what I’m looking for here in Istanbul. As in Alexandria, these catacombs have columns and vaulted roofs. There is even an upside down head of Medusa.

Hagia Sofia church, the Blue Mosque and the Topkapi Palace are beautiful, too, but there is nothing Roman here.

I slope off early from the Topkapi Palace and I make my own way to the nearby Archeology Museum. There is a peaceful garden here among the sarcophagi and columns, shaded by pines and patrolled by feral cats. In the museum I see some of the best pieces from sites like Miletus, Ephesus and Aphrodisias. One of my favourites is a woman wearing the distinctive Flavian hairdo. (That doesn’t mean her hair is like Flavia’s, it means she lived in the time of the emperoros Vespasian, Titus or Domitian, all of whom had the nomen Flavia.)

The next day we are given an hour in the Egyptian spice market. There are all sorts of goodies for sale, including a man who sells leeches by the jar. Richard buys £30 worth of spices from a dealer who calls himself Al Pacino Turko, the Turkish Al Pacino. He has photos of himself with lots of famous people, like Julio Inglesias and Miss Denmark. So I get a photo, too! I think we could have bought the same spices for half the price in ASDA but I guess it's not every day that your grocer is Al Pacino.

After our tour of the spice market, we take a cruise on the Bosphorus. The following day we drop in on the Sunday service at the Greek orthodox church. I see women writing prayers on scraps of paper. In Roman times people scribbled prayers on paper or cloth or even metal and hung them on sacred trees or left them in the temple of the appropriate god or goddess.

Later, in another service at the Anglican church in Istanbul, the rather formal liturgy is enlivened by a cat chasing a cockroach back and forth beneath the pews.

But the highlight of my time in Istanbul is a visit to a three hundred year old hammam...

A Day at the Roman Baths

Saturday 17 May 2008

OK, it’s not a real Roman bath, but it’s probably the closest thing. A hammam - or Turkish bath - is a direct descendant of the Roman bathhouse. I describe my visit to a Moroccan hammam in From Ostia to Alexandria with Flavia Gemina. And what better place to experience a Turkish bath than in Turkey? There are several here in Istanbul but our guide recommends the 18th century Cagaloglu Hammam because it is nearest to our hotel, the Yashmak Sultan.

Men have the privilege of using the main entrance. Of course. The women’s part of the baths are reached on a sidestreet called ‘Hamam’. You enter a white marble vestibule to find rubber and wooden bath slippers in a rack on one side. Ancient Romans wore wood and leather clogs in the baths, too! You take a pair and go to the admissions desk. At this point the woman will ask you what tariff you want.

I choose the super but not deluxe as I only have an hour to spare. The super includes body scrub and massage but not the bubbles. It costs 68 Turkish lira, about £25. In Morocco a similar experience can be bought for under £5. But in Morocco you don’t get your own private cubicle with couch, shelf, mirror and hairdryer. This cubicle also comes with a heavy brass key which tells the bath assistants which tariff you have opted for. In addition, the numbered keys let them know in which order to serve you. On busy days it can get quite crowded, but at 5.45pm on a Saturday afternoon it isn’t too bad.

In my cubicle I find a light towel, like a tea towel: only bigger. It’s called a peshtemal. This is to cover your modesty as you pass through the rather public camekan, or changing room (the equivalent of the Roman apodyterium). In my cubicle, I take off my clothes, keeping just my briefs on. In a plastic carrier bag I have shampoo, conditioner, body lotion, a hairbrush and a scouring mitt from the Marrakech bazaar.

With my peshtemal wrapped around me, I pass through the camekan and proceed to a warm room where I find a lots of fluffy, clean, proper towels on a table. This room is called the soglukluk and is probably the Roman equivalent of the tepidarium, the warm room. You could sit here and chat to your friends without beads of sweat dripping from the tip of your nose.

I take a warm, fluffy towel (you have to bring your own to the hammams I visited in Morocco) and head towards the hot room, but an assistant sends me back, telling me the towels are for afterwards.

I put the towel back and move cautiously across the wet marble floor into a beautiful, steamy domed room lit by beams of sunlight. This is the hararet, the equivalent of the caldarium or the sudatorium. There are columns here supporting a high dome pierced by flower-shaped holes to let in air and light. Around the walls of this room are marble benches and marble shell basins with two brass taps above each - one for hot and one for cold - so you can mix the water to your liking. Shallow tin bowls float in these basins; you use them to tip water over yourself. The bowls look just like pateras, the flat, broad bowls Romans used to pour libations.

In the centre of the hararet is a hexagonal marble plinth. This is called the gobek tashi and it is where the bath assistants give you your scrub and massage. The female bath assistants wear bathing costumes. They are mostly Rubenesque of figure so I feel sylph-like in comparison.

I find a seat by one of the marble shell-basins and pour cool water over myself as I watch the masseuses at work. In the Fes hammam I received a rough but cheerful buffeting at the hands of an old Moroccan crone. I send up a prayer that I’ll get someone gentle. After fifteen minutes in the hot steamy room, one of the women calls me over.

Her name is Phyllis, which she indicates means ‘happy’. She doesn’t speak English, but knows enough words to get me to lie down on the warm, slippery, wet marble with a rubber cushion under my head. Then she takes my own scrubber and rubs first my front and then my back. Phyllis then sits me up and takes great delight in showing me the grey worms of dead skin she is sloughing off my body. Ewww! Fifteen minutes in the hot steam room have done their work.

After scrubbing me from neck to sole, she has me get off the platform and follow her to one of the shells. She sluices me down with lukewarm water, just the right temperature. Then it is back to the slab for a massage with a banana-scented mixture of soap and oil. She does my front, back, scalp, hands, feet, arms, everything. She is firm but not rough and it’s so relaxing that I almost drift off.

Finally she moves back to the marble bench and has me sit at her feet. If I hadn’t already washed my hair, she would have done it for me now. Instead, she sluices me over and over with cool water, just the right temperature. I’m done!

I slip on my clogs, and move carefully out of the domed steam room to the warm room. Here I take two of the proper towels – one for body, one for hair – and discard my peshtemal in the bin provided. Then back to my cubicle to put on some body lotion and lie down for five minutes. You must do this. I discovered the hard way when I left the Fes hammam in too much of a hurry and nearly passed out.

Phyllis is waiting in the camekan, sipping apple tea. If I didn’t have to rush, I could enjoy one, too. I give her a nice tip and go out into the warm Istanbul evening feeling relaxed, fragrant, tingly and cool. Later, looking at the literature about these baths, I discover that the Cagaloglu Hammam is one of 1000 Places to See Before You Die.

[The Roman Mysteries are perfect for children aged 9+, especially those studying Romans as a topic in Key Stage 2. Carrying on from the Roman Mysteries, the Roman Quests series set in Roman Britain launched in May 2016 with Escape from Rome.]

Life in the Shade

Monday 19 May 2008

My husband Richard and I are in Turkey for ten days, researching the penultimate book in the Roman Mysteries series, The Prophet from Ephesus. This book takes place in AD 81, when St John the Evangelist was still alive, and we're travelling with a tour which aims to visit the sites of the seven churches mentioned in the book of Revelation. These churches would have been flourishing around the time my book is set.

Today Pergamum (church 3) and Thyatira (church 4) are on the itinerary...

We set off for Pergamum just after 8.00am across flat, ugly, marshy ground, with factories spewing smoke. After half an hour the landscape becomes more pleasant, with fruit and olive trees. We are skirting the coast as we travel north and pass a pretty harbour with no houses but some big ships. Must be an industrial harbour. After an hour or so we are in golden hills studded with olive trees. The sea is still to our left, to the west. This was the area the Bible calls Galatia.

We pass a shaggy donkey by the side of the road and our coach slows to avoid a tortoise. We reach the site shortly after 10.00 in the morning. In ancient times, papyrus had to be imported from Egypt. The Anatolians from this area used sheepskin, instead, and we get the word ‘parchment’ from ‘Pergamum’. It is very hot, so we shelter in the shade of a big mulberry tree. The leaf of the white mulberry was the preferred food of the silk worm, but I prefer the fruit itself, picked right off the branch, sweet and sun-warmed.

The theatre here clings precipitously to the hillside. Was this what the writer of Revelation meant when he refered to ‘Satan’s Throne’? Probably not. He meant that Pergamum was the prime center of the emperor cult.

We scurry from the shade of the mulberry to the shade of a large fig tree. I’m sure that’s what ancient Romans spent most of their time doing: scurrying from one patch of shade to the next. That’s why Cicero’s term for the luxurious life of ease in Roman times was ‘life in the shade’, vita umbratilis. I imagine the scholar sitting in a breeze-cooled shaded colonnade, sipping chilled posca as he writes poetry or letters.

We hurry to the shade of a big plane tree while our guide informs us that there was a sanctuary to Asklepios here in Pergamum. Our guide calls it a health centre. There are lots of big green lizards here that throw their feet out when they run. I also hear the thin cry of a cicada or cricket and realise it’s the first I’ve heard. This is the only time I hear them on the trip, despite the heat. We leave the shade of the plane tree for the echoing coolness of a tunnel to the Asklepion. The sound of the cheeping sparrows is very loud here.

Our itinerary says we are going to lunch at the Caravan Restaurant, which sounds lovely, but we end up at a big new restaurant by the side of a busy road. Our lunch is flavoured with diesel fumes. But at least you can choose your own food. I have the delicious pickled red cabbage (Pliny the Elder would approve), white goat’s milk cheese and cold chicken. As usual, I only eat what Flavia and her friends would have eaten. I breakfast on olives, cheese and fruit and sometimes on yogurt with honey. Yum.

On our way to Thyatira, we pass through olive groves with the occasional dark finger of a cypress tree pointing to heaven. There are poplar trees everywhere, and beautiful red poppies in the grasses by the side of the road.

We make a ‘comfort stop’ at what seems to be a dreary service station. But we discover a wonderful lush grape arbour and a Turkish woman making stuffed pastry in a little kiosk. I love it when your expectations are confounded like this.

Thyatira is a fenced off square in the middle of a town, a scattering of fallen columns shaded by a pine tree, a palm, a pomegranate and an acacia. This was the Temple of Apollo, or the basilica, or both.

We head back to Izmir, passing through fertile fields and also past neat looking buildings for battery chickens. Our guide tells us something interesting. In England or America the farmer has a house surrounded by his fields. Here in Turkey, and the rest of the Med, the farmer lives in the village and commutes to his field. This makes me think of the passage in the New Testament when Jesus tells a parable about the farmer who builds a watchtower in his vineyard, so that someone can guard the fruit when it ripens. (Matt 21:33) The farmers’ modus operandi probably hasn’t changed in two thousand years.

On our way back to Izmir we pass through Manisia and traverse a pass through mountains forested with pines, birch and cypress. Ah! Life in the shade.

Sardis, Philadelphia, Hierapolis

Tuesday 20 May 2008

This morning we say goodbye to our Izmir hotel and by 8.30 we are on our way to Sardis, the capital of ancient Lydia. We arrive an hour later and when I step down off the coach, I see our entire group surrounding something and gazing down with delight. It is a pale brown dog lying on the ground and fawning for her adoring public. Every site seems to have its mongrel and they all seem to be related. We notice she has a tag in her ear, the Turkish equivalent of a collar, I suppose.

Sardis was located at the crossroads of a trade route, but it seems an odd place to have a crossroads, surrounded by strange hills, one of which has a rock formation which looks like a giant pointing to heaven. There are also a few standing columns from a Temple to Athena here – one of the biggest temples in the ancient world – and a building which might or might not be a synagogue.

What I never realised was what a big Jewish population Asia Minor had in Hellenistic and Roman times. Apparently, Alexander the Great sent 2000 Jewish families from Babylon and Mesopotamia to this part of the world. These Jews flourished here. This might explain why Christianity caught on so quickly here, in the first century AD it was little more than another sect of Judaism.

The day is overcast with a medium high scum of clouds, but it is still very hot and sultry. A congregation of sparrows are having an excited conference in a pine tree and in a mulberry a dove is cooing what sounds to me like ‘Chicago’. The Greeks thought she was saying ‘dekaocto’: eighteen. In Gerald Durrell's delightful book Birds, Beasts and Relatives, Theodore tells Gerry why the collared dove is called ‘the eighteener’:

‘The story goes that when Christ was carrying the cross to Calvary, a Roman soldier seeing that he was exhausted took pity on him. By the side of the road there was an old woman selling milk and so the Roman Soldier went to her and asked her how much a cupful would cost. She replied it would cost eighteen coins. But the soldier had only seventeen. He pleaded with the woman... but the woman avariciously stuck out for eighteen...the old woman was turned into a collared dove and condemned to go about repeating dekaocto...’

Philadelphia is a small collection of Graeco-Roman rubble in a town called Aleshehir. The ruins are so tiny they aren’t even marked on the map, but someone has planted lots of roses here, and it’s very pretty. We leave Philadelphia and set out for one of the most extraordinary places on earth, the calcium cascades of Pamukkale, known in ancient times as Hierapolis. Warm calcium-rich water bubbles from a mysterious spring somewhere on the mountain. Over thousands of years it has left semi circular pools of steaming water, framed by chalk white crystalline mineral deposits. Pamukkale means 'cotton castle', because it looks like white cotton but also because this area now produces cotton. At the top of the sparkling cliff was an ancient city, Hierapolis, which means ‘holy city’: it was originally a shrine which grew up to be a city. The cascades are going to be the setting for the climax of my next book, The Prophet from Ephesus, so I want to get details of the topography right.

We are heading east with the sea somewhere behind us and dramatic mountains ahead. We cross and re-cross the Meander River. From this distance, perhaps ten miles, the cascades look like a horizontal chalk cliff or perhaps the white gash of a marble quarry. It is quite low compared to the mountains behind. As we get closer, the cascades drop out of sight behind the trees which grow in this fertile soil. Everywhere are pomegranate trees with their red-orange trumpet-shaped blossoms. By late summer these blossoms will be pomegranates.

Now we are climbing a winding road through gorse dotted scrubby brown hills. I can see the Meander Valley to my left and pine woods to the right of the cascades. The coach lets us out into the heat of the day, the hottest yet. We pass through the barriers and into a long necropolis, tombs lining the northern approach to the city. The heat is ferocious and some of the older members of our party have taken a mini-bus. We pass between tombs and finally arrive in the delicious cool shade of a row of tall, dark, flame-shaped cypress trees. I notice that no birds perch in these trees. But there are hundreds of them excitedly chirping in the pine trees nearby.

Now we are passing through a gate built by Domitian, and wishing there was still a colonnade here and a monumental fountain there. How nice it must have been in Roman times to pass through the arch of the city gate and find a cool, shady colonnade and splashing fountains right by the side of the road.

We visit the Antique Pool, where bathers can still swim in warm sulphur-scented waters among ancient columns. Then we take off shoes and socks and wade in some of the pools along with a couple of hundred other tourists. The water is warm and the ‘floor’ quite rough. If you were pursuing a criminal mastermind and slipped and fell here, you could hurt yourself.

Finally our bus takes us on to our hotel. I’d hoped the hotel was within walking distance of the cascades, so I could go back at sunset, but it isn’t. It’s one of a group of four big hotels a couple of miles from the cascades. It has an outdoor swimming pool and an indoor thermal pool.

Once we’ve checked in we check out the pools. I love the thermal pool. It's like a big hot smelly bath with geese spouting water. You have to put on little plastic shower caps but it’s still delicious. I have a good soak, and a dip in the outdoor pool, then get dressed and hire a taxi to take me back to the cascades in time for sunset. Only about a dozen people are up here now and it’s worth the extra expense. I can hear the sound of rushing waters and feel the warm breeze. The sky blushes pink, orange and apricot. The scallop-shaped pools mirror its beauty. Dusk lasts a long time and it’s nearly an hour after sunset before the first stars appear.