Sneaky! Got a pic of a Swiss Guard in the Pope's while in the passage - he disappeared a second too late. 

Basilica de Santa Maria degli Angeli e dei Martiri. Michelangelo was commissioned to convert part of the Terme di Constantine into a church. 

Gorgeous Baroque window - anyone remember the name of this shape?  

Some fine early vaulting 

One of the last areas to see at the Baths: a small courtyard with bits of Roman graffiti affixed to the walls. The Romans didn't have word spacing which doesn't make it fun for us: "Apollinaris qui bixit annos XXVIIII - Qui fecit cum Bircina...Annos VIII in pace...nonas sep..." Dictionary out...can't be bothered. Something about A making peace with B in this year? 

Another Greek. The Discobolos, or disc-thrower. Roman copy of Gr.....you know the rest by now... 

An Egyptian obelisk and the back of the Pantheon from the steps of Santa Maria sopra Minerva (?). See it is brick. I think the builders either ran out of money, or it was stripped of its marble facing. 

Giant pine cones were everywhere and mean something in both Roman and Catholic symbolism...I forget what... 

Shinobu, Ivetta, Ben, Alison - courtyard at Vatican museum. Peacock signifies the incorruption of the flesh but was really another adoption from Roman paganism. 

Cool brass sculpture with a backdrop of the dome of St Peter's Basilica. Colour focus in b&w. 

The Apoxyomenos, thank goodness the Romans made copies of it. This one was found under the restaurant we'd dined at the night before. He embodies the 7 Canons of Proportion. Simply put, the length of his body measures no more than 7 times that of his head.

The incomparable Apollo Belvedere 

Cutting off the heads of tourists means cutting Apollo off at the knees 

A river god in the Vatican's Octagonal Courtyard

Beautifully pensive...can't remember who this is... 

Jason slew Medusa using the reflection in his highly burnished shield. Otherwise her gaze would have...*petrified* him.

Oops, he looked at her! 

Athena Parthenos is always my favourite 

Laocoon and his sons being suffocated by Poseidon's sea serpents for speaking against the Greeks during the battle of Troy. This is a Renaissance sculpture. 

The Persian god Mithras, adopted by the Roman military - a close call whether Mithraism or Christianity became the official religion of the Roman Empire. Here Mithras slays the white bull under a full moon, ushering in the Spring. 

Were it not for the Greeks, would the Romans have garden statuary? 

Nice statues in niches 

Captivating floor mosaic at the Museo Pio-Clementino, Vatican

Isis/Astarte, ancient Egyptian/Persian goddess of fertility adopted by the Romans 

Arrivederci!