Ancient Churches in Rome: Such Proximity!

 

I've only recently realized that I have a very strong sense of place--one that I thought everyone had, but it seems is less common than I thought. What I mean is this: when I'm in a place, I almost instantly map emotions, feelings, music, and history to it, and then forever after, those emotions and those places and historical details are deeply linked to form a sort of a 4-dimensional "feeling" of the place. It's almost like an internal multi-dimensional word that lives inside my head that I see through my eyes when I'm there (or imaginging it). As if I'm looking through Google Glass or some sort of virtual reality glasses. I'm in it.

So this morning when I was mapping out the churches that I'll soon be visiting in Rome for my DFG-funded New Jerusalem research project--often churches that have mosaics that say something about the visual reception of the idea of the New Jerusalem in late antiquity--I rapidly found that I was creating an internal space inside my head. Simply by panning and zooming around on Google maps and dropping little red markers here and there.

I've been to Rome once before--in the dead of winter with my in-laws family. Due to the nature of the trip, I wasn't able to catch many of the ecclesiastical sites that were of interest to me. But prepping for my next trip there--a research trip simply to spend time in very, very old churches--I'm just getting carried away by how proximity, location, orientation, time, and landmarks fit together inside my mind and even my emotions.

Above all, I'm simply astounded at the extreme physical proximity of many of the churches and other ecclesiastical sites I am studying. 

For instance, the basilicas of S. Maria Maggiore, S Prassede, and S. Pudenziana are all off the same major city square. S. Maria Maggiore is at the centre, and St. Prassede and Sta. Pudenziana are just off the square:  

Look at those red dots (you can ignore the pink hotel add points). The physical distance between them in feet or meters is miniscule. 

Check out the next map for the measured distances. Walking from one to the next to the last would take what, 3 minutes? They are separated from each other only by the distance of about three regulation football pitches!

Crazy as it may sound, this all hits me on a very, very emotional level. My eyes were tearing up as I was plotting these on a map and my knowledge of each of these churches (especially their mosaics) was clicking into physical place with respect not just to temporal proximity (the mosaics were completed from early fourth century [S. Pudenziana] to early ninth century [S. Prassede]), but as regards to where they exist in physical space with respect to one another. 

It's simply overwhelming to me. And it explains so much about the art on an intuitive, almost primal, level. Not least how art creates mental "space" that people, not least the artists themselves, inhabit and in which they live and work, and indeed which works on them!

Much more to say about all this in due time, but the sheer emotional impact of their mere physical proximity is giving me shivers.