Rome & Cathedrals

This trip has been so educational and has gone by so fast! I can't believe it's already the last day.  My mind is swimming through all the memories I've had here before I leave.  In Rome, I've been able to see the Roman Colosseum, bike through a portion of Rome, and visit the Vatican! 

Coming into this trip, I was looking forward to see the buildings, art, eat the food, and learn about the economics of Italy.  I was able to do all of those things.  Throughout my time here, I've learned so much of the history as well. Italy has a very prosperous history, but also a very sad history through lots of tragedies.  

One thing that has stuck out to me is the beautiful cathedrals.  I recently read an article talking about the great cathedral age of 1160-1280, years where cathedrals were built throughout Europe.  Each one has a bishop, but what's awesome was learning the economic history of them and seeing them.  When people think of cathedrals often times, they see them as a place of worship, or a place to forgive sin, or a place to take in people for the night.  What was interesting about the article that I read was the economic influences of them and their construction.  We like to imagine that the church through donations funded the creation of their churches, but throughout this time period, this did happen, but the Roman Catholic Church controlled the Papal, which means they were able to enforce taxes on urban fairs, and profits on trade and agriculture to get them built.  They were able to do this because before the Protestants, the Roman Catholic Church acted as a religious monopoly in all religious markets because of their control over the Papal. Seeing cathedrals was one of my favorite parts of this trip so I thought learning about that was interesting. Nonetheless, they're beautiful.  Below is pictures of Cathedrals in Orvieto and Amalfi!