Cultural History Conference in Verona

In early August I attended a cultural history conference in Verona. This was my first big international conference and I enjoyed it immensely. The papers given at the conference were interesting, the city is beautiful, the weather was nice (although a bit too hot) and the company I had was excellent. Here are a few highlights from my week in Verona.

Verona

I arrived in Verona from Finland, where I'd been on summer holiday, on August 1st. With a few other Finnish attendees we had booked lodging for the whole week at a local student residence. The residence was close to the university of Verona and was comfortable, clean and relatively cheap. The conference started on Tuesday and lasted until Friday so we had time for some sightseeing too.

The best panel of the conference: me, Saara, Juha and Jasmin.

I had prepared a panel together with Juha Isotalo, Saara Kauppinen and Jasmin Lukkari. We gave papers on ancient beliefs about barbarians, Roman politicians, doctors and practitioners of magic (conference programme, abstracts). Our panel gave rise to a lot of questions and discussion. At the end we had to cut the questions short because we were running out of time and drinks were being served in the lobby. My own paper was about popular beliefs about Roman physicians (here are the slides). I enjoyed presenting my paper and thought it went well. I got good feedback and some great tips on how to proceed with my research. I will write more thoroughly about Roman doctors in another blog post later.

Ote esitelmästäni (kuva: Juha Isotalo)

We held our panel in the first session of the conference on Tuesday so for the rest of the week we could just enjoy other participants' papers. I listened to talks about pestilence, medieval theology, public administration in classical Athens and mysteries in late antiquity among other topics. During the conference I got to meet scholars from many countries such as the United Kingdom, Canada, Italy, Germany, Romania and, of course, Finland. About a quarter of the papers given at the conference and of the attendees were from Finland. All in all there were about 70–80 scholars in attendance and many more online. The contribution of the Finnish contingent was thus quite significant.

Conference dinner

Besides the conference programme we had time to explore Verona. We tried the local restaurants and bars and saw some of the most important sights. (We did avoid the balcony of Juliet, though.) A major highlight was the opera Aida which I saw at the Arena of Verona, a Roman amphitheater which is exceptionally well preserved and still in use. I was impressed by both the opera and the venue. We had bought cheap tickets so we sat on the original stone benches. It was extraordinary to think that we were sitting in the same seats as the Romans when they came to see entertainment at the arena. Lucky for us the entertainment was opera rather than public executions and gladiatorial fights.

Aida at the Arena of Verona

I also had time to visit a couple of archaeological museums. The first one was at the Roman theater of Verona which is also in use in the summer. Unfortunately this means that much of the theater can't be seen because of the modern seating and the scene.

Veronan roomalainen teatteri on yhä käytössä kesäisin.

The museum's collection consists of local finds that illustrate the history of Verona, and a great number of inscriptions which I was very interested in. One of the most curious ones was a warning not to defecate among the tombs or otherwise violate them. The one doing so was threatened with blindness.

Stercus intra cippos qui fecerit aut
violarit nei luminibus fruatur.

Me and the inscriptions :)
(photo: Saara Kauppinen)

We got to see even more inscriptions at the Museo Lapidario Maffeiano, which was founded around a collection gathered by Scipion Maffei who lived between 1675 and 1755 in Verona. The collection consists of inscriptions from all around the ancient Greek and Roman world and from different time periods. In addition to the typical honorary and funerary inscriptions there was even an epitaph for a horse from the 2nd century CE.

Museo Lapidario Maffeiano
(photo: Jasmin Lukkari)

"you, who outran the wandering birds and
beat the winds, graze no longer in the
Tuscan and Sicula woods, but in this tomb"
(CIL V 4512)

We visited several churches such as the Duomo, San Fermo and Sant'Anastasia. There was plenty of beautiful art and architecture, but what caught my eye were the scribblings on the walls of some of the churches. I'm no expert in these periods but based on the handwriting and the content I believe many of them to be from the middle ages or from the early modern period and not the product of tourists. For example in Sant'Anastasia there is a fresco depicting Virgin Mary and Jesus with all kinds of texts and drawings scratched in the plaster. I found some dates from the 15th century and the phrase Ave Maria. So at least some of the writings seem to be prayers to Virgin Mary, which makes sense considering the theme of the fresco.