Scattered asround the Mediterranean are remains of the quarries which produced the coloured marble so lavishly used to make classical Rome the splendid city it was.
The story of marble told in stunning digital detail: its triumphs from the first to the third century AD, its strong silence and its rediscovery which inspired a new era of beauty.
A column of rose-coloured granite in the Pantheon. Two thousand kilometres away the site it was quarried from in rocky, desolate Egypt. From there it was transported across the desert to the Nile and sent down the river to the sea on rafts. A specially built ship carried it across the Mediterranean to Rome where it was erected with others in the Pantheon and the Basilica Ulpia. Rearing up in all their might and beauty like the other thousand creations in marble which made Imperial Rome unique. Marble came from all over the empire: golden yellow from Numidia, red from the Peloponnese, pink alabaster from Algeria, green from Thessaly, dark red from Thebaid.
A strictly scientific film, inspired by the book “Marmora Romania” by Raniero Gnoli, it explores the world of the “marble hunters” present and past, and their search for deposits of the “shiny stone”, at times more precious than gold. Panoply of the divine regality of Emperors, portraits of lovely women, warriors, slaves, mythical beings and golden divibities with precious inlays. “The shiny stone”, star of an “archaeological adventure”.
- Direction: FOLCO QUILICI
- Production: ISTITUTO LUCE
