URBS SALVIA, the Roman town

3A and B worked on "Urbisaglia", in the province of Macerata, Marche, Italy.

Noi, ragazzi della 3 A e B del Liceo linguistico e socio-psicopedagogico di Cingoli, abbiamo partecipato al Progetto Comenio, un’occasione che ci ha permesso di unire l’interesse per la nostra storia locale a quello per la cultura e l’arte romana in Europa. Abbiamo quindi scelto di focalizzare l’attenzione sul sito di Urbs Salvia sia per la ricchezza del materiale archeologico rinvenuto, sia per i monumenti riportati alla luce che per i servizi al pubblico che il parco offre. Sono state realizzate alcune cartine tematiche del territorio con il rilievo dei vari siti archeologici e la riproduzione di alcune opere artistiche di rilievo. Il lavoro è stato concluso con una visita in loco che ci ha permesso di arricchire la nostra ricerca con materiale fotografico.

We started in December…

Cinzia Falleroni, the art teacher, is helping Giorgia to organise her work.

Everybody considered this activity a creative occasion to go back in time and space to revisit ancient places and recreate, through some drawings, a piece of history of our past.

Art: A nice opportunity to work together.

A piece of history…

The remains of the ancient Roman city of Urbs Salvia spread over an area of about 100 acres. The city had the status of municipium during the Republican Age and became a colonia under Augustus. It was the birthplace of some leading figures of the Roman Empire, such as the consul C. Fufius Geminus and Lucius Flavius Silva Nonius Bassus. Urbs Salvia was sacked by the Visigoths in 408-10 CE, during the Gothic-Byzantine wars, and suffered destruction over the years from earthquakes and plundering. The decadence of the town is described by the poet Dante Alighieri (1265-1321) in his Divine Comedy (Paradiso, XVI, 73-78).

This amphitheatre was wanted by Lucio Flavio Silva and dedicated to him after 81 CE.

temple

The “Criptoportico” is an underneath structure, made of four subways, three of which divided in two aisles by a line of pillars. In its inside you can admire wall frescos representing the “Pompeiano style” also known as “of the Royal Wall”. The paintings are manly ornamental and reproduce refined architectures or realistic and naturalistic scenes.

The Roman theatre drawn by the pupils.

theatre nowadays

The Roman theatre was built in 23 CE, on the Hellenic model. The structure presents a cavea (auditorium) divided in three tiers of seats with entrances on the different levels. Around the cavea there is a corridor with steps running to the top, where there was a sacellum (small temple).

In conclusion we can say that working on this topic was really interesting, we also discovered aspects of the history we didn’t know. We also had an exciting experience when we visited the remains and we were allowed to act pretending to be characters of the ancient Rome. What a wonderful moment!

Georgia and Ludovica acting

Arbusti Ilenia and Pascucci Francesca, class 3A, Liceo linguistico Cingoli