This delightful Roman fresco of boats and fish now housed at Palazzo Massimo alle Terme dates to circa 125-150 AD and was discovered along thee Via Portuense near the ancient San Paolo River Port in Rome. The fragment shows marine life swimming alongside a small boat (which is repeated) or gala vessel being rowed through the water, while one figure rides astride a dolphin.

But, the story of its discovery is also very interesting and I’ll discuss that below. It involves Mussolini.

The fresco is celebrated for its fluid artistic execution and vibrant, naturalistic depiction of maritime life. It offers a rare, casual glimpse into the decorative preferences of Rome’s bustling merchant and riverside districts during the Pax Romana.

We can see the artist’s fluid brushwork, in which he utilized quick, confident brushstrokes characteristic of later Roman wall-painting styles. This approach prioritized motion and atmosphere over rigid realism, capturing the shimmering quality of water and life beneath it.

The artwork borrows heavily from xenia (paintings of hospitality gifts like food) and traditional marine iconography. However, instead of framing the animals statically, it integrates them into a lively, continuous underwater narrative.

The composition relies heavily on empty space to simulate the openness of the Tiber or possibly the open sea, layering multiple fish and a solitary rowboat across a light backdrop. The focal point is a sleek, long hull equipped with rows of oars. Known as a gala boat or festive vessel, it was typically used for river transport, celebrations, or religious pageantry along the Tiber. Multiple figures are subtly suggested as rowers. A gala vessel (or boat) refers to an ornately decorated ceremonial watercraft used for festivals, pageantry, and religious processions. Unlike practical Roman merchant ships used for heavy cargo or rowed warships designed for battle, gala vessels were built exclusively for public display, luxury transport, and celebrations along waterways like the Tiber River or deep volcanic lakes. 

The surrounding waters are densely populated with anatomically identifiable Mediterranean sea life. Varieties of fish, including sea bass, sea bream, and mollusks, swim alongside the boat, showing the Romans’ deep familiarity with marine ecosystems. The “Tiber Illusion”: While the fish depicted are saltwater varieties, pairing them with a river-style transport boat highlights a popular artistic trope. Roman painters often created stylized, blended aquatic landscapes meant to evoke general abundance rather than exact biological geography.

Discovered at the San Paolo River Port along the Via Portuense, the painting did not originate from an imperial villa. Instead, it likely adorned a corporate office, a public building, or the private residence of a wealthy shipping magnate (navicularius) who managed the flow of goods into Rome.

Like many paintings preserved at Palazzo Massimo, this fragment was part of a larger trompe-l’œil wall design. It was meant to visually dissolve structural walls, opening up cramped, sun-baked brick interiors into refreshing, water-themed vistas.

But, there is even more to be fascinated by than the fresco itself. By that I mean that this fresco was discovered under the fascist regime of Benito Mussolini, specifically during the 1939-40 excavation at the Pietra Papa archaeological site, which was part of a major public works project to widen and clean the floodplains (golene) of the Tiber River.  Mussolini was obsessed with ancient Rome, frequently using Roman history, symbols, and architecture to legitimize his fascist state. He funded massive excavation projects across Rome to unearth imperial relics and tie his regime to the glory of the Roman Empire.

The widening of the Tiber riverbanks where the villa was discovered served a dual purpose. It was a functional infrastructure project to control river flooding and, at the same time, an opportunity for state-backed archaeologists to search for ancient monuments. When workers stumbled upon the Roman villa and its nearby public bathhouses, the state’s archaeological authority (Soprintendenza) stepped in. They meticulously detached the fragile plaster frescoes to protect them from the river works, transferring them directly into the state museum system. 

There are so many delights housed within the collections of this incredible museum complex. One after one, they are all delightful and expand our understanding of the varied artistic world of ancient Rome as well as the subsequent history of this fascinating country!

I have a few favorite places in Rome. This is one of them. I was lucky enough to visit it this summer and felt the same pleasure as always when there.

Located on the banks of the Tiber River, it is currently situated approximately where it would have been when built by Augustus. It is also next to the as yet unexcavated Mausoleum of Augustus. The museum housing the altar was designed by Richard Meier and while some critics don’t like the building, I do. I like the size, the design, the use of glass, the whiteness of the whole including the altar itself.

The Ara Pacis Augustae (Altar of Augustan Peace) is an altar in Rome dedicated to the Pax Romana. The monument was commissioned by the Roman Senate on July 4, 13 BC to honor the return of Augustus to Rome after three years in Hispania and Gaul and consecrated on January 30, 9 BC.

When built, it was in the northern outskirts of Rome, a Roman mile from the boundary of the pomerium on the west side of the Via Flaminia, the Ara Pacis stood in the northeastern corner of the Campus Martius, the former flood plain of the Tiber River and gradually became buried under 4 metres (13 ft) of silt deposits.

It was reassembled in its current location, now the Museum of the Ara Pacis, in 1938, turned 90° counterclockwise from its original orientation so that the original western side now faces south.

Above and below, you can see the next door monument, which is the not completely excavated mausoleum of Augustus, which I do hope will be revealed to the public within my lifetime. I remember seeing it when it was buried under earth.

Peace.

I found this video very interesting: https://smarthistory.org/ara-pacis/?tl=ara-pacis&sidebar=europe-1000-b-c-e-1-c-e

A classic spot in Rome remains virtually unchanged from when I first visited it in 1980s. May it always be so!

Just steps away from the Pantheon, the Tazza d’Oro is THE best place for coffee in Rome. Starbucks, eat your heart ❤️ out!

With a great little view of the Pantheon, I settled in with my iced caffe latte and cream filled brioche. Ti amo, Roma!🫶

Alla prossima!

On a recent visit to Rome I was delighted to see this pink confection hanging from a lion’s head doorknocker. I’ve love these pink or baby blue creations that announce the arrival of a new life in the home behind them.

This one is elaborate and seems built to last for a lifetime as a memory of the momentous occasion. It says, “Welcome Noemi” with the word welcome ending in an a for the feminine.

Welcome to the world, little Noemi! May your life be healthy and filled with beauty!

Paestum was begun by some ancient Greeks in southern Italy, about 55 miles southeast of present-day Naples. Originally founded as the Greek colony of Poseidonia around 600 BCE, it is famous today for housing three of the best-preserved ancient Greek Doric temples in the world. My first post on the site was devoted to the Temple of Athena, situated by itself on one far end of the site, see here: https://getbacklauretta.com/2026/09/01/the-temple-of-athena-paestum-italy-🇮🇹/.

In my research I found this succinct video that will explain the basics of what you want to know about this ancient city, not far from Naples. Just open the link.

https://www.britannica.com/video/video-tour-ruins-colony-Greek-Italy-Paestum/-207974

Above and below, you see the Second Temple of Hera, c. 450 BCE, the earliest of the 3 well-preserved temples on the site.

There are other remarkable structures still standing as well as the 3 famous temples. The city walls and amphitheater are largely intact, and the bottom of the walls of many other structures remain, as well as paved roads, that are reminiscent of what you see in Pompeii.

The site is open to the public and a short walk from the train station. There is a modern national museum within it, which also contains the finds from the associated Greek site of Foce del Sele, a place which I did not, unfortunately, get to visit.

Below, the earliest or first Temple of Hera, 550 BCE

Amazingly, it is possible to enter and walk through this ancient structure.

The first Temple of Hera, c. 550 BCE

Walking through the Second Temple of Hera allows a close up of some details.

In the photo above, you can see how closely situated the 2 temples dedicated to Hera are.

All three of the large temples at Paestum were constructed in the Archaic version of the Greek Doric order, dating from about 550 to 450 BCE. All are typical of the period, with massive colonnades having a very pronounced entasis (widening as they go down), and very wide capitals resembling upturned mushrooms. Above the columns, only the second Temple of Hera retains most of its entablature, the other two having only the architrave in place.

There are two Temples of Hera, right next to each other, while the Temple of Athena (see my earlier post https://getbacklauretta.com/2026/09/01/the-temple-of-athena-paestum-italy-🇮🇹/ ) is on the other side of the town center. There were many other temples, both Greek and Roman, which are far less well preserved.

Paestum is far from any sources of good marble. Unsurprisingly, the three main temples had few stone reliefs, perhaps using painting instead. Painted terracotta was used for some detailed parts of the structure. The large pieces of terracotta that have survived are in the related museum.

The whole ancient city of Paestum covered an area of approximately 120 hectares. Only the 25 hectares that contain the three main temples and the other main buildings have been excavated. The other 95 hectares remain on private land and have not been studied.

The ancient city was surrounded by defensive walls, which are largely intact. The walls are approximately 4.75 km (3 mi) long in its polygonal perimeter, typically 7 m (23 ft) high, and 5–7 m (16–23 ft) thick. Corresponding with the cardinal points, there were four main openings in the wall: Porta Sirena (east to the hills); Porta Giustizia (south, now to the modern village Paestum); Porta Marina (west to the sea); and Porta Aurea (north), which was later destroyed. Positioned along the wall were 24 square or round towers. There may have been as many as 28, but some of them (and Porta Aurea) were destroyed during the construction of a highway during the 18th century that effectively cut the ancient site in two.

If you are lucky enough to visit Paestum, I’d recommend a visit in late spring, early fall or winter, and suggest you need at least half a day to truly see the site. I would highly advise also visiting the related museum.

On my bucket list for decades, I finally made it to Paestum, this fascinating place where Greeks/Romans built/overtook some very important temples that are still extant!

In July of this year (2026), I was visiting a friend in nearby Irpinia and he took me to see Paestum. Here are some of my pictures of that fascinating site.

Paestum was established around 600 BCE by settlers from Sybaris, a Greek colony in southern Italy, under the name of Poseidonia (Ancient Greek: Ποσειδωνία). The city thrived as a Greek settlement for about two centuries, witnessing the development of democracy.

In 400 BCE, the Lucanians seized the city. Romans took over in 273 BCE, renaming it Paestum and establishing a Latin colony. Later, its decline ensued from shifts in trade routes and the onset of flooding and marsh formation. As Pesto or Paestum, the town became a bishopric (now only titular), but it was abandoned in the Early Middle Ages, and left undisturbed and largely forgotten until the 18th century.

This post is dedicated to the first structure: The Temple of Apollo. In an upcoming post, I will discuss the history of this place, which was originally Greek colony, known as Poseidonia, named after the sea god.

But for now, let’s take a look at this mesmerizing ancient structure, which despite its losses, stands proudly and quietly proclaiming the excellence of the Greeks who first colonized this locale around 600 BCE.

I am going to tell you the honest truth! As an art historian, I have taught college survey courses of world art history and lectured about this temple, but I have never had time before to research the site. I actually thought that the Temple of Athena was the entire site!

But wait, there’s a LOT more!

I’ll show you more soon! It’s vast and important!

This will be a bit of a confessional. But, having just returned from a weeklong visit to Sardegna for the first time, during the hottest heat wave in a summer of heat waves, I have a few things I need to get off my chest.

For years, as I have come to know Italy more thoroughly, I’ve thought of this island as a sort of magical locale. Italians worship the place! They talk about it as though it is the ultimate Italian destination for enjoying the beloved il mare. They say those words with a kind of reverence you would think would be reserved for religion. But that is my point. Enjoying the sea is a religion for them. Il sole is the diety. And Sardegna would seem to be the Garden of Eden.

There’s another island floating out there too, known as Corsica and owned by the French. Bring this topic up to an Italian and they will tell you that Corsica is 2nd rate in comparison to Sardegna. Why, I ask innocently? It is more wild, they say, untamed, and you can get better food on Sardegna (because it is Italian)! I was on the Italian island for a week and the food we found there (and I was with an Italian man who considers himself an expert on cuisine) was sub-par and overpriced. In fact we never had a good meal. The pizza we ate in Cagliari, at a restaurant recommended by our boat skipper and therefore someone who should know, was the worst pizza I’ve ever had in Italy!

However, in my naïveté I thought Sardegna must be a type of Shangrala! I’ve been to Hawaii and tropical places in Mexico and along the Central American eastern coastline and thought it must be something along those lines. I’ve also been to Capri and thought maybe Sardegna was similar.

Sardegna seemed in my mind to be a place of unimaginable beauty and dare I say a bit elegant, kind of like Capri when Jackie O was photographed in Italy in the 1960s.

Although you can take a ferry to the island, most Italians think that taking the less than hour long flight from Rome to Cagliari is the best way to get to the island, and then rent a car at the airport. Before going, I thought of this journey as the height of elegance and privilege for those really “in the know” as a super real Italian sort of thing to do.

I’ve just spent 8 days and 7 nights there and while there is much I have already posted and will continue to say about the incredible clear aquamarine colored water; the mountainous coastal rock formations best seen as we did from a boat, with various types of interesting strata and caves and passages around, through and even under the rocks; and the 2 truly amazing archaeological sites, as for the rest, the juice was not worth the squeeze for me. And in the 40 decree Celsius weather, none of the good things about Sardinia made the trip worthwhile for me when I was ready to faint from the heat. I apologize if I sound like a spoiled brat, but I’m just being honest.

For people who know me, they might well ask: How in the hell did I wind up there in early August for a full week when I am a seasoned traveler who is quite discerning when it comes to making plans. And, everybody knows I do not like heat and intense sun. I once spent 2 months in Germany, almost by accident, to get away from a Florentine summer of heat.

While I take full responsibility for having gone on the trip, in a way I was hoodwinked on the dates. I’ve been seeing an Italian man for several months and living through drama on an operatic level. We discussed taking a trip together to Sardegna and agreed that the end of August, early September would be the best time. In August all Italians who can leave home for the sea or the mountains. My neighborhood in Florence feels a bit like a ghost town in August (which I actually enjoy; but don’t think too much about it: the historic center is alive and full of sweating miserable tourists). So naturally Sardegna is full to the brim with Italians in August and in September things calm down and the weather is more to my liking.

I was in Denver for 3 weeks this summer, returning to Italy on July 14. This friend of mine who lives in Rome needed me to come back to Italy ASAP, and, once I returned to Florence, he needed me to get to Rome ASAP. Such drama! But I was gullibly involved and lacking in discernment, even when I knew I knew better. I call it my period of temporary insanity. I can assure you, it is over.

I went to see him when I was still jet-lagged from traveling from Colorado, but also exhausted from 3 whirlwind weeks making major life changes in the USA. He excitedly shoved his phone under my nose with the details of a trip to Sardegna when I first saw him and while I assumed that he was suggesting end of August, early September as we discussed, but in fact he had chosen late July early August. We booked it, I wasn’t paying attention. When he said he needed to make reservations at the Rome airport to park his car while we were gone, I was confused as to why he would do that 5 to 6 weeks in advance. That’s when I found out we were leaving for the island in 10 days not 30 and would be traveling during the peak tourist and hottest time of the summer. OMG. omg. omg.

But we went. I saw Sardegna. And honestly, the water alone is enough reason to go!

While there, I learned that the Italian way of going to the beach means you go in the morning, pitch an umbrella, get wet, sunbathe, maybe drink some water (my companion didn’t plan ahead or he would have packed a picnic), get wet, maybe take a few strokes, chat up your neighbors on the sand, sunbathe, get wet, maybe go to the snack bar, but if you eat there you then wait an hour before getting wet again because everybody knows you can’t go in the water until an hour has passed (as a child I was told the same, but that was back in the dark ages and now it’s been disproven, but YOU try to convince an Italian that their superstition is just a superstition and see how far you get!).

You might think that it’s nice to relax in the shade at the snack bar in your swimsuit and sandy feet and that you’ll be headed back to the hotel after this nice pausa, but you are mistaken! You will go back to the umbrella the blanket you have purchased that morning from an African man who sells his wares along the beach, going back and forth in the hot sun all day, putting up with bargaining from cheap locals (including my companion who was absolutely embarrassing). Your Italian neighbors on the beach of still sunbathing, maybe listening to music with AirPods, but primarily lying in the sun until their skin is almost black. Every Italian’s back I saw on this trip, and I saw a lot because I was at the beach and on boats and everyone is casually dressed in swimsuits or sundresses, was dotted with moles that would send an American to the dermatologist yesterday!

Yes, I could see the beginnings of skin cancer in all of them as I huddled under the umbrella, smeared with sunblock, and wearing my hat as well.

Sardegna is interesting. I enjoyed the opportunity to go and see. I’m glad I went. I will never turn down a chance to travel and see something new.

I see no reason to ever return.

And, anyway, if I go back out to an Island in this sea, I want to see Corsica for myself.

For me, the coastline of mainland Italy is more beautiful that what I saw in Sardegna. I’m thinking of the beaches at The Gulf of La Spezia, nicknamed the Gulf of Poets on the north-western coast of Italy and part of the northern Tyrrhenian Sea, specifically of Ligurian Sea. It measures some 4.5 by 3 kilometers.

The gulf is named for the Italian city of La Spezia, located at its middle point; at the gulf extremities are the two tourist resorts of Lerici (eastern) and Porto Venere (western).

The British poet and dramatist Percy Bysshe Shelley drowned in the Gulf in 1822 when the sailing boat he was on, the Don Juan, sank due to a severe storm. A copy of poems by fellow British Romantic writer John Keats was found in his pocket when his body was recovered from the Gulf.

The beaches there are beautiful, with brightly colored umbrellas and services such as restaurants and bathrooms. If I ever get a hankering for a beach in Italy, I will head there, or to Via Reggio.

Arrividerci, Sardegna!

It was interesting!

One post was not enough to share all the pictures with you. If you are able to get to Sardinia to see this site, I’d suggest that you can do the site justice in about 2 hours, stopping to read the labels if you desire. They are worthwhile and well done.

Just don’t go mid-day in August like I did.

A highlight of my recent week in Sardinia was visiting this archaeological site. I was completely uniformed about such locations on the island and it was a wonderful discovery to break that ignorance. Never mind that it was almost 40 degrees C when we arrived at the park, or that I’d been up that day since 4 a.m. to catch the flight from Rome to Sardegna. I was there and ready to learn.

Here’s the highlight of what I learned in that heat that day:

In the late 19th century, a severe storm off the coast of Sardinia revealed parts of an ancient Phoenicia-Punic tophet (ancient cemetery)! More than 100 years previously, the famous Nora Stone had been discovered, incorporated into a nearby church wall, but it wasn’t until 1889 that excavations began on the ancient city of Nora Archaeological Park, near Pula. The site is adjacent to the sea and, as sea levels rise, more is constantly being re-submerged.

When I returned home and began to study Nora, I found that in February of this year, 2026, National Geographic published the following article about Nora.

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/travel/article/nora-sardinia-italy. I quote it below. The pictures are all mine, taken that day. I can definitely recommend a visit to Sardinia and a call to this site. If I ever get there again, I want to visit the National Archaeological Museum of Cagliari (Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Cagliari). It is Sardinia’s premier archaeological repository. Located in the historic Castello district within the Citadel of Museums (Piazza Arsenale), it houses over 4,000 artifacts tracing 7,000 years of island history from the Neolithic to the Byzantine era. The Nora Stone is housed there; it is the ancient stone slab with writing on it from the Phoenician people. It is the oldest Phoenician writing ever found outside of their home land. It tells a story of a battle and uses the name “Sardinia”.

This ancient city in Sardinia was home to pirates—and is an archaeology lover’s dream

Nora doesn’t have the name recognition—or crowds—of Pompeii. But the well-preserved coastal settlement offers travelers a rare glimpse into the lives of the pirates, Vandals, Romans, Phoenicians, and Carthaginians who once laid claim to it.

Perched at the edge of a narrow peninsula in southern Sardinia, the ancient city of Nora is exposed to the elements. Wind, sun, salty air, and for centuries, even pirates. From every vantage point of the port city, residents and visitors can take in views of the Mediterranean Sea, which made Nora a thriving trade hub during the 8th century B.C.

Nora doesn’t have the name recognition, impressive towering structures, or crowds of tourists like Pompeii or Ephesus. The ancient city, now a significant archaeological site, offers history buffs a rare glimpse of over 1,500 years of life in the ancient Sardinian city—a 43-minute drive from Cagliari.

The complex history of Nora

The theater, marketplace, bath complex, old roads, and a temple—most of what’s above ground at Nora—date to the Roman period from 238 B.C. to the 5th century A.D.

But, during the Bronze Age, Sardinia was home to the Nuragic people, a seafaring society that left behind thousands of prehistoric stone structures—big cone-shaped towers called Nuraghi—scattered across the island’s hills. Although there’s no trace of the Nuragic civilization in Nora today, researchers believe the Nuragic people were the first inhabitants in this area.

“The theory is that these people were a fleet of pirates from different Mediterranean islands,” says Maria Paola Loi. “[Around the Iron Age], these megalithic cultures vanished for unexplainable reasons.” By the 8th century B.C., the site had started to take shape as a Phoenician trading outpost. Over a 1,500-year period, Nora was controlled by the Phoenicians, followed by the Carthaginians, and then the Romans after 238 B.C. It was also inhabited by vandals during the mid-5th century, the Byzantines in 535 A.D., and then abandoned around the 8th century due to Arab raids.

At its peak, Nora was home to 8,000 inhabitants. For centuries, Nora was one of the most important settlements in the western Mediterranean. “Nora, like no other ancient city, is at a minimal distance between Italy, Sicily, Africa, and Spain,” says Jacopo Bonetto, professor of classical archaeology at the University of Padova, who has coordinated Nora’s research activities since 1990. “For this reason, it is the best site to study how relationships between different cultures and civilizations have built history.”

During the Middle Ages, however, life along the Sardinian coast changed. “The shores of the island became really unsafe,” says Loi. Pirates from North Africa and the eastern Mediterranean frequently raided Nora, taking advantage of its vulnerable coastal position. Around the same time, the lagoons on the backside of the cape—now home to flocks of pink flamingos—were teaming with mosquitos. Residents contracted malaria, which spread quickly and continued to ravage the island until earnest efforts began to eradicate the disease in the late 1940s.

To escape both disease and attack, Nora settlers fled inland. The nearby town of Pula flourished instead because of its location further inland on the island. Because of these dangers, Sardinians developed a fear of the sea, Loi told me. Even today, residents are much more likely to be shepherds, goatherders, cattle breeders, and miners, rather than fishermen, she says.

As a result, no modern settlements were ever built over the ruins of Nora, preserving it for future research, according to Bonetto.

continuing the article:

What makes Nora special is what’s happening beneath your feet. Since it was unearthed in 1952, archaeologists have continued to excavate the site’s historic connections to Romans, Phoenicians, and Carthaginians. Some of the artifacts from the site (like an inscribed stone known as the Nora Stele) are on display at the National Archaeological Museum in Cagliari.

Archaeologists have uncovered an ancient burial ground from the Phoenician-Punic period, with underground tombs completely intact, including pottery, jewelry, and other funerary goods that had never been disturbed. Bonetto calls this discovery, “The most important testimony of the foundation and life of the Phoenician settlement.” It’s the only known Phoenician necropolis in Sardinia that has been excavated using modern scientific methods, and it helps establish Nora as one of the oldest settlements—if not the oldest—on the island.

At many large archaeological sites, active digs are typically fenced off or otherwise kept separate from visitor routes for safety and preservation, but at Nora, you may be able to see archaeologists at work. According to Bonetto, one particularly exciting moment was when they unearthed a trove of 18 silver coins in pristine condition in the Roman Temple. It’s rare to experience a place where “the history of the city is written—and rewritten—every day.

This modern structure below is the entrance to the archaeological park.

The blue chairs you see set up in the distance are for a nighttime cinema that is currently being shown. It presents a kind of dystopian landscape that stopped me in my tracks. What is this? Where am I? That reaction could partially have been a result of the blinding sun, the outrageous heat, and the fact that I’d gotten up that day at 4 a.m.

The site itself is very interesting. Remarkably, my companion and I were the only visitors. That may have been because most people are too smart to visit a stony site at mid day in August.

Below: a contrast between how the site looks today and a reconstruction of how it once looked:

First up is the little village of Buggerru

Right on to the sea!

Next: I think this is my best still shot!

The next 3 shots are from a 2nd cruise off the marina at Cagliari. It was the hottest day of the heat wave, over 40 degrees C on the water.

Still smiling despite the heat.

Nothing felt better than the water that day!