We had a quiet morning getting the clothes washing done and giving Glenn a rest to get over his flu lurgy. It was around 24 degrees so very pleasant in the shade and then good for a swim before lunch.

After lunch we walked over to the Basilica that is is most significant piece of history in town.

The basilica was built very early in Christianity immediately after 313 AD. In that period the Edict of Milan put an end to religious persecution and the Christian community was legally able to build its first place of public worship. It’s mostly known here for the mosaics from that time. The basilica building itself is older as sections had been destroyed in the 5th century by Attila the Hun. The mosaics had been buried and survived.

We started in the main part of the basilica where the largest mosaic in Western Christianity is. This is why the Basilica has UNESCO world heritage status.

It’s really stunning when you go in.

To view these in VR you can download the app and go to the ‘Explore the Basilica in VR’ section. It’s worth it!

https://apps.apple.com/au/app/basilica-di-aquileia/id1456242635

The mosaic is in sections with motifs about Christianity or telling biblical stories.

At the top of the basilica was the altar and some complicated carved stone patterns out of solid rock. This would have taken a long time with hand tools.

There was a display explaining how mosaics were made with several layers.

We then went into the crypt under the altar built in the 9th century, while the beautiful frescoes were painted in the second half of the 12th century. On the vault there are 19 scenes narrating the History of Hermagora the first bishop here and the origins of Christianity in Aquileia. In the four lunettes there are displayed the scenes of the Passion of Christ and the Death of Mary.

There were also many relics of saints in fancy presentation boxes – pretty gory!

Leaving that crypt we then went down into another crypt of excavations. Other mosaics have been found from … abd layers have been dug underneath to find older mosaics from Roman houses in the 1st Century. This extended out under what is now the bell tower . This was the building destroyed by Attila the Hun in the 5th century.

We then left the basilica and went across the passageway to the baptistery with a large font.

At the side is the South Hall.

According to the blurb:

‘This mosaic, even though it has the same geometrical structure of the basilica mosaics, has a poorer and smaller decorative patterns. The middle decorations have important meanings but more stylized and not so realistic. Geometrical moduls can be found in the outer parts, whereas six lambs ( or sheep) are portrayed into six hexagons. On the western wall, one can see the beautiful mosaic of the peacock, found on the floor of the corridor connecting the Basilica and the Chromatius Hall.’

I thought they were still amazing.

Unfortunate the bell tower is closed at the moment so we couldn’t go up.

The heroes graveyard was still open and had soldiers from the First World War buried here. The unknown soldier in Rome came from here.

There was a strange bird call in the graveyard. Glenn tracked it down and found it was a Little girl Owl. Very unusual for it to make its presence known during daylight hours!

We were by now quite tired and needed some sustenance – so found a gelato shop. Glenn was happy he found liquorice flavour – his favourite. It’s still cheap here – about 2.5 euro for 2 flavours.

We then went for a walk and found more excavation areas- shops and houses, the cemetery – and not much to see but Roman baths.

Back at the campsite we had a cooling swim.

We had a quiet night and early bed.