Nimes

For the last couple of years Balika has taught (in art history) about a little temple called the Maison Carree in Nimes, which is unique because it is a pre-Christian temple from the imperial Roman age (5 AD)- most (all really...) of which have been completely destroyed elsewhere, but remains intact in Nimes. It is a temple I've taught and has seemed important, but it hadn't sunk in... It turns out that this temple is not little- it's almost Parthenon-like in size and impact. Even better, its smack dab in the middle of Nimes. We were all blown away with Nimes and were shocked that Nimes isn't on the must-see list of places in France! But first, some background:

-Nimes was initially a city where the people worshipped the pagan god of the Spring. As the Roman empire underwent a campaign of expansion, a road linking major parts of the empire was built. This road,the Via Domitia, connected Italy to Spain and passed right through Nimes. As the Roman empire had just conquered Egypt they brought their pride with them, and established on Nimes' coat of arms (and money) an image of a crocodile chained to a palm tree. Today, this image is omnipresent.

-Emperor Augustus (first emperor of Rome, the emperor responsible for the Pax Romana, the time of Roman peace and prosperity) named Nimes the capital of the region and made it the glory of what is now France. Augustus gave the town a ring of ramparts six kilometres long, reinforced by fourteen towers, with gates of which two remain today. He had a forum built and an aqueduct was built to bring water from the hills to the north.

The most amazing thing- what remains! For one price, we got entrance to three sites: the amphitheater, the Maison Carree temple, and the Tour (tower) Magne. Entering the amphitheater, we were instantly impressed. Having taken students to Rome last year and toured the Colosseum I was expecting to see ruins. In fact, this amphitheater (almost 2000 years old!) is in fantastic shape; its condition is most likely due to the fact that the amphitheater has been almost continuously used throughout its history. Now it is used for bullfights where the goal of the fight is for things to be plucked off the bulls' horns by men in sequin suits and pink tights. Good stuff.

After lunch and the amphitheater we decided to tackle the 2nd sight: the temple. Glorious and shining from the outside we expected to be awed by what we saw inside. In fact, it was a 3D movie about gladiators and the history of Nimes that showed inside this temple. We crammed in with a big group of German teenagers and thoroughly enjoyed a 22 minute film featuring images of gladiator duels, espionage, and bull fights. Afterwards we needed some downtime and headed toward the last sight which we had read was in the middle of the Nimes Jardin de la Fontaine, which was laid out and planned while America was fighting its Revolutionary war.

The gardens were quiet (except for a bunch of school kids on a field trip and a few kissing couples in the grass) and stunning. As we entered through tall gold and black gates we saw, seemingly as an afterthought, a large temple on perimeter of the park. Drawing closer, we saw that this was a temple to Diana, goddess of the hunt, and we looked up to see the remnants of the massive arched roof, built with massive stone pieces. Apparently somewhere in this park are the remnants of the shrine to the original pre-Roman sacred spring, but we didn't know to look for it.

After walking through the gardens for a while Eilidh, Sven & Balika climbed the steps of the Tour Magne (one of the original ramparts for the defensive wall) to get a glimpse of the remarkable view. 223 steps for a fantastic view! Eilidh was very proud and Bella and Bubbe were glad to blow bubbles (Bella) and play scrabble on the ipad (Bubbe). The Tour Magne survived the last 2000 years quite well, but was almost demolished for one simple reason: Nostradamus had a vision that there was treasure underneath it and it was almost completely destroyed before the mission was aborted.

An ice cream and a glass of wine (and a raucous, wild game of Go Fish between Bubbe and the grand daughters) brought us up to the time that we had to drive to Avignon to pick up Fabienne, so we headed off. After a 30 minute wander through the wrong train station we eventually were able to pick up (and take home) Fabienne, who we haven't seen for far too long. Three years ago Fabienne left her home in Germany to brave Kodiak as an exchange student for the year (with my mom and sister) and is like one of the family. And now all the bedrooms are filled!