Halloween from the Celts

History of Halloween courtesy of the History Channel

I always play this video clip and show the article about the history of Halloween in my classes.  It does a great job showing the progression from the Celtic holiday Samhain to our modern concept of Halloween.

My Son Ethan the Pirate

Italian Architecture in Virginia

Besides the V and cross swords, the most well-known symbol of the University of Virginia is the Rotunda.  Anyone connected to the university or Charlottesville knows that this is the school Jefferson built.  He designed the buildings, gardens, and the academic curriculum.  However he did not create them brand new.  He used his studies and travels from Europe as inspiration.  I had the amazing pleasure to recently travel to Rome and got to experience Jefferson's inspirations first hand.  As a UVa grad the most powerful moment of my trip was standing in the Pantheon, which is the model for the Rotunda (finished in 1826 and added to the National Registrar for Historic Places on Oct. 15, 1966).  With its amazing dome and columns this 2000 year old building overwhelmed me.  This will be the first in a few blog posts about Italian culture influence on the third American President.