March 6, 2018  The Vatican Museum and Sistine Chapel

 

The Vatican Museum is so massive, it would take days to see it all, so we followed Rick Steves' audio tour.  I have posted a tiny fraction of what we saw.

There were statues such as Apollo Belvedere.  Apollo, the Greek god of the sun, is hunting (his bow and arrow are gone).  He's 2000 years old, and is done in the Greek style....beautiful human form, and buck naked.

Apollo

Another Greek god?

Hercules and Clare

Hera - see description below

The Egyptian Room

Mummies

Mummy

You still can see the hair!

Paul loves dogs.  We figure the two of them would hit it off, if the dog/man was real.

Clare loves cats.  She would have made a great Egyptian!

The shadow-y person in the foreground is Fr. Brad.  We ran into him during our tour through the museum.

The tapestry room depicting scenes from the life of Christ.  These tapestries were created by students of the undisputed master of tapestries, Raphael.  First, they painted the scene on paper - full size and full color.  Then the pictures were sent to the famous weaving factories in Brussels.  There they were cut up into manageable strips, and placed on the looms.

The map room containing 40 maps from southern Italy to the end of the room, the Alps in northern Italy.

This is Christopher Columbus leaving for the New World.

The maps show the regions of Italy as they were in the 1500's.  These maps actually functioned as the Vatican's official maps, from 1582 (when they were painted) until the 19th century.

Room of paintings.  I love these next three!  The liberation of Peter by Raphael.  Look at his use of light.  The first and second show the radiance of the angel freeing Peter from prison. The third uses torch light and moon light.

The angel walking Peter past the sleeping guards.

The guards catching h-e-double hockey sticks from the guy in charge.

This room had many gifts the Popes have received from countries and dignitaries over the years.  This one is from Richard Nixon.

The tiny Vatican flag went to the moon and back by Apollo 11.

The crew.

The Sistine Chapel prohibited any photography, so if you want to see that, google it!  It was beautiful, as you would expect.  Several of us actually enjoyed Michelangelo's painting of The Last Judgment on the wall of the chapel as much or more than the ceiling.  I couldn't photograph that either, so google that one too. 

It was a big day and we all came home with full brains and tired feet!  Oh, the talent of human kind.  Have we lost it in our day and age?  You decide.  Ciao!