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Author David Barbaree takes his readers to Ancient Rome

4th May 2017

#TalkingLocationWith….. author David Barbaree, whose novel “Deposed” is set in the heart of Ancient Rome and published 4 May 2017.

David Barbaree

David Barbaree

I fell in love with Rome before I decided to write a novel set there. I was twenty-two, back-packing Europe for a month, and Rome was the first stop. The Eternal City is easy to love under any circumstance; as a wide-eyed young man, experiencing Europe for the first time, with a weakness for red wine and not a care in the world, I didn’t stand a chance. I sometimes wonder if the desire to write a novel set in Ancient Rome was the work of my subconscious, scheming to bring me back to the city. It’s entirely possible.

On that first visit, I aimlessly toured the city with friends, visiting the major historical sites, eating gelato three times a day. I would return to Rome twice more after deciding to write Deposed. Those visits were different. I had an agenda, research to advance, sites to see.

fullsizeoutput_224cFor me, the most important site to visit was the Roman Forum. Two thousand years ago, it was the heart of Ancient Rome, the beating pulse of the city and the empire. Unfortunately, because most of the buildings are gone or mere shadows of their former glory, nothing left except for a sad column or two, the Forum can often prove disappointing to visitors. This was my initial experience with the Forum. I surveyed the carnage from the Via dei Fori Imperiali and deemed it not worth the price of admission.

But the next time I visited Rome, I had done my homework. I had read up and prepared in advance. Two books in particular were indispensable in getting a sense of the Roman Forum in ancient times and making it fit with what remains today: The Roman Forum: A Reconstruction and Architectural Guide by Gilbert J. Gorski and James E. Packer; and The Roman Forum by David Watkin. In the former, Gorski and Packer use architectural illustration and archaeology expertise to reconstruct the Forum. It includes scaled digital plans and reconstructed aerial images. Watkin takes a different approach. His book features etches by the Giovanni Piranesi from the eighteenth century. These etchings fill in the gap between the Forum of ancient times and today, and shows its disuse over the centuries.

I had moments while touring the ruins, when the feel for the ancient Forum came through. I was standing in front of theBlog panel Temple of Saturn, the Capitoline Hill looming to my right, and the black stones of the Via Sacra that lead from the Capitoline through the length of the Forum to my left. I had a sense of the scale of the Forum, the towers of marble that it once held, and the swarm of people that populated it.

A lot of work went into researching Deposed. In way, though, I think that research can have a secondary purpose. It can help put you in the right frame of mind to have the epiphany needed to get a sense of a time and place, rather than just the facts.

Tips on Visiting:

Places to See:

If you are going to see the Roman Forum, I would suggest paying for a guided tour of the Forum itself, as well as the Palatine and the Coliseum. Research which company to use and organize it in advance.

The Pantheon is obviously a must. It is stunning and an incredible feat of engineering. After you’re done with the Pantheon, grab a coffee at the nearby Sant-Eustacchio.

Trajan’s Market is a beautiful, redbrick building, tucked in behind Trajan’s Forum. It is now home to the Imperial Fora Museumfullsizeoutput_1767 that showcases an impressive array of ancient artifacts. This is also a must see.

Where to Eat:

Trattoria Al Moro offers first class Roman cuisine and is a great dining experience.

Gelato:

Ciampini is located at Piazza San Lorenzo in Lucina. I’ve been told it has the best pistachio gelato in Rome – and pistachio, of course, is the only flavour that matters!

Deposed

 

 

Thanks so much to David for sharing how he came to set his wonderful novel in Rome and for personal top tips for the city! You can follow David on Twitter and you can buy his novel here

 

 

 

 

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For more books set in Rome – and drill down by genre and era – just click here.

 

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