And in this episode, I'm going right back to Rome's pagan roots, to a world of empires won and lost, holy ambitions fulfilled, a place where signs from heaven could change the course of history and men became gods. I want to find out just how this once-marshy wasteland became one of the world's holiest cities. Every July, Rome celebrates one of its favourite festivals. It's a Catholic celebration in which a statue of the Virgin Mary gets a tour of Rome along the River Tiber. And she's off. It's quite a bizarre sight, the mother of God, taking a ride on a motorboat. But it does sum up Rome today. Here, religious pageantry is the city's daily theatre, on the streets and on the water. Christianity rules the Holy City. But everywhere you look, paganism lurks just beneath the surface.


在这一集里，我将回顾罗马的异教根源，回顾这个世界里帝国的胜利与失落，实现的神圣宏图。这个世界里，来自天国的神迹可以改变历史进程，寻常的人类可以超凡入圣。我仅仅想探索这个曾经潮湿泥泞的废弃之地，是如何一步步成为世上最为圣洁的城市之一。每年七月，罗马都会庆祝它最喜欢的节日之一。这个天主教的节庆里，圣母玛利亚的雕像沿着台伯河在城内游经（get a tour不知怎么确切翻译…） 她现在要离开了。 这一幕看起来颇为奇特，一艘摩托艇载着上帝之母，但它却是罗马如今的写照。这里，宗教历史剧是这座城市日常剧院的一幕（这句翻得很奇怪），于市集闹处，在水面中央。天主教统治着这神圣城市。但是不管你向哪里看去，异教信仰就潜伏在城市的表面之下。