Travel as Historical Progression

This is sort of a favourite topic of mine. Here in Vienna I give visitors a private historical tour of the 1st district. I love to point out that the wide pedestrian street known as the Graben was originally the moat around the old Roman fortifications. Tiefer Graben is another street that follows a boundary of the Roman encampment. Peterskirche was built atop a ruined Roman temple (and prides itself on having conducted a daily mass every day for the past 1,700 years.) Bits of Roman ruins can still be seen here and there, if you know where to look. I also like showing off fragments of the medieval city wall that still exist. The Ring Strasse itself follows the route of the medieval city walls. Unbelievably, a watch tower from the 1400s still exists. So far, I've found 5 cannon balls from the 1683 Ottoman Siege of Vienna and 1 from the Napoleonic wars. Some of the cannon balls are still stuck in walls! Flak towers from WWII are still here, as are apartments where Hitler lived when he was a starving painter. Strange traces of the Soviet occupation can also be found if you know where to look. I could go on and on. One of my favourite things about Vienna is its layers and layers of history. Every street is a path through the centuries.

Has anyone been aware of this in other places during their travels Constantly, and here at home too. Fifty metres from where I'm sitting there is a sunken lane which in places is 20 feet below the level of the surrounding fields. The reason for that is at least 2,000 years of use by cattle drovers. The main road into my village from the north is 30 feet below the surrounding fields; more people, more livestock, more carts. Of all the traces we leave on the landscape, roads are amongst the most permanent. Settlements tend to expand outward along existing roads, and when buildings are replaced they tend to be on the same ground (often the same foundations) as previous buildings. A 400 year-old cathedral is on the site of Norman church that burned down, which was on the site of a Saxon church, which was on the site of a Roman temple, which was a religious site all the way back to the Bronze Age. But the road beside it is probably in much the same place it has always been. Whether it's the layout of the streets in London or a country road that has a series of S-bends for no obvious reason, interpretation can be tricky. I have no way of knowing, but each time I drive through that particular set of bends I like to imagine the modern road is simply following the path taken by an Iron Age cowherd who walked his cattle back to the village through what even by that late date could still be described as the Wildwood, going round oaks whose great great grandchildren stand there today.

I just read that the Lincoln Highway across the country still exists and starts here in Times Square. I assume it refers to the Lincoln Tunnel! And it goes all the way to San Francisco. Also, I love how Broadway used to be a Native American trail. It's funny to look at any stretch of Broadway in the city and think of that, but I love how it doesn't fit the grid plan and goes all the way to Albany. We've been doing a lot of tours here recently, kind of a tourism at home thing, and it's been neat learning about these remnants of the past.

You can see this in just about any large town or city in Germany that existed prior to the late 17th century. In the very center, you usually find a town core with one or two churches, a Rathaus and a Markt. Moving out concentrically, the buildings usually hug tightly together and follow winding streets. Then, you hit either a ring road or park where the defensive wall once stood (or perhaps the wall still exists). Then, you generally see the modern housing estates, which tend not to be so tightly packed together, then collections of small industry and the big-box strip mall type stores. And beyond that, you find the pastureland and perhaps a few farm houses here and there. What I find interesting is if you look at paintings and drawings of walled cities from the late medieval and early modern periods, you find essentially the same general layout... of course, they didn't have Aldi back then...

When I visited Mont Saint-Michel I began thinking of modern-day tourists as equivalent to the pilgrims of the past who journeyed to the great cathedrals and sacred (or secular) spots in times long past. Especially at Mont Saint-Michel it was easy to visualize the narrow winding way up to the Abbey lined with stalls and small shops providing food, drink, and other articles desired or needed by visitors - even selling indulgences. I was also aware of this on the walkways in the piazza leading toward the Basilica di San Giovanni in Laterano in Rome. Today we see twirling stands of postcards and other cheap souvenirs probably mostly made in China, and cases of bottled drinks, etc. We may think of it as overly 'touristy' and perhaps a bit of blight against the magnificent backdrop of the site we came to see. But in essence it's only different superficially. Wherever tourists go, there will be merchants who try to provide the goods visitors seem to want. It's another link between today and ages that came before. In a similar vein, before visiting Florence I read voraciously about Michelangelo. One account described his daily life, the actual streets he walked on each day. It enriched my visit greatly to think of him as I walked the same streets and imagined him slipping into Santo Spirito under cover of darkness, where he was surreptitiously provided with cadavers for his study of anatomy. Then take that to Rome and see the fruit of his grim labors transformed into genius on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. This is what brings travel alive for me and makes me go back again and again.

...thanks so much for reminding me to buy the Ina Caro 'Paris to the Past' - I've had the Road to the Past as my go-to gift for all my Franophile
friends.

I just read that the Lincoln Highway across the country still exists and starts here in Times Square. I assume it refers to the Lincoln Tunnel! No, the Lincoln Highway pre-dates the Lincoln Tunnel, with which it was never associated, by 24 years. The route is via the Holland Tunnel. The Lincoln Highway was a tribute to Abraham Lincoln and was created in 1913. See the text of a wiki about the routing of the Lincoln Highway in Manhatten: 42nd Street from the intersection of Broadway at Times Square in New York City westward 6 blocks to the Hudson River. Holland Tunnel from New York City westward under the Hudson River to Jersey City, New Jersey.
(Note: The Lincoln Tunnel (opened in 1937), near 42nd Street, was not an original part of the Lincoln Highway. In 1913, Lincoln Highway travelers crossed the Hudson River via the Weehawken Ferry from New York City to Union City, New Jersey. In 1928, the Lincoln Highway was re-routed through the Holland Tunnel (opened in 1927) from New York City to Jersey City. However, the original Lincoln Highway Association made no attempt to map a route from Times Square to the Holland Tunnel, so today, use the West Side Highway, officially known as the Joe DiMaggio Highway, which uses Twelfth Avenue to Eleventh Avenue to West Street (not a part of the Lincoln Highway) to connect from the west end of 42nd Street down to east portal of the Holland Tunnel.)

YEs, I realized that belatedly. I hadn't had time to read the whole article when I posted that and made a seemingly reasonable, but false, assumption!

Rose, thanks for mentioning Ina Caro... it's been recommended so many times and I kept meaning to get it from the library but never did. Because of you mentioning it here I finally went and got it today... it looks so good and I can't wait to read it. Thanks!

There's an east/west road not far from where I live, called Chemin Cote.St Antoine. A couple of hundred years ago the part that is in my community was an Indian trail.

As many times as we have recommended Ina Caro's books, she should be sending us complimentary copies LOL. Unfortunately, she has only written two and I already own both.