28 May Bologna
Yesterday evening we made it to Bologna; the rain and dark skies made the city seem the least lively of everywhere that we have been so far but luckily the sun came out with bright blue skies today. Our first and only guided stop was to the University of Bologna and its operating theatre— not something I would normally be interested in seeing but it was pretty special to see because of the historical significance of it. The operating theatre was very different from what I thought it was going to look like, besides the raised table in the middle of the room and the seats lining the edges. The ceiling of the room and the walls were all carved wood decorated with animals, busts, and one or two anatomically correct figures.
More importantly though we were able to go inside this meeting/class room in the university. This room was also grandly decorated but this time with painted and wooden crests on the upper halves of the walls while the lower halves were covered by locked bookshelves that were sorted by topic and contained books written in a multitude of languages. There was also a locked, gated doorway that lead into an archives room with an innumerable amount of books from all ages. I feel like the books were definitely what impressed upon me the historical importance of the university as a whole, especially because of the overwhelming feeling I got from the archives room. Bologna was a very cool city to experience, mainly because of the change of pace and structural differences it provided contrasted against everywhere that we’ve been before.
