Historical Museum of Ecija

Ecija has a small little museum about the very dense history of the city.  America is such a new county that our history is minute in comparison to all of the places I have been visiting!  Apparently about a decade ago, when Ecija decided to build an underground parking lot beneath the big square (locally known as "El Salon") they discovered so many roman ruins and artifacts from Spain's earliest inhabitants!!  So they built this museum inside of an old palace!!

Inside look at the courtyard!

The Old Stables!

Very ancient and primitive stone carving of a bull.

An Old Crematorium

There were lots of stone carvings, very ornate tiny gold treasures, money, little oil lamps made out of clay, and even an old skeleton in a tomb.

Roman Era

I can't even begin to imagine how long this must have taken to hand carve the curls of his hair into this stone!

The museum also had about 7 enormous mosaics that were floors of old Ecijan palaces.  This one depicted several of the Greek gods, which was a very common theme for a mosaic, as was depicting the 4 seasons.

This mosaic illustrates the gift of wine and how it is made, as instructed by the Greek God who imparted this knowledge upon the populace.

 

Yet this statue of an Amazon is the prize of Ecija.  There are only 4 others in the wold, so it is a very big deal for Ecija to have one!!  This is what the museum states about her...

"Amazons, mythological characters related to goddess Artemis (Diana), were an archetype of women who were opposite to the female ideal in classic Greco-Roman world.  Amazons were wild, robust, skilled archers who rode horseback and were independent from men.

This ideal sculpture represents the Amazon in meditation befor her imminent death, almost fainting after being wounded in her right side, but containing her pain with serentiy.  She wears a tunic tucked and belted at the waist with a makeshift bit of a bridle from her horse."

On Friday night some of the other girls wanted to go to a dancing place.  So I rushed over after work  and got to the girls' apartment around 10pm.  I thought I was a little late, but to my surprise they were just getting ready.  They said that no one goes out here until 2 am!!!  Which is crazy because that is when all the places are closing up in the States.  So around 2:30 we finally left, and I was ready to go to sleep!  When we got there the club owner told us that a guy from the reality show Big Brother, the Spanish series, was there ate the club.  We told him that we were not from there & were not familiar with the show.  And he replied, "But you can touch him!!!!"   We all though that was so funny because it really illuminated the difference between men & women!

Anyway, there were not very many people there and hardly anyone was dancing.  People just stood around with drinks in their hand and people watched.  There were even several 65 year old people there, so needless to say the age range was pretty diverse. 

Anyone who was dancing definitely did NOT ever put their hands above mid-torso level.  Apparently that is very uncool here and if you do dance with your hands in the air, you really stand out as a foreigner.  All of these cultural differences are so interesting to me!!  Anyway, we only saw the guy from Big Brother for about 2 minutes getting his picture taken with people.  It was pretty uneventful, but a very interesting experience.

Michelle, Stephanie, Michell, & Me

Oh, I forgot to mention how I met the other Michelle (who is pictured on the left beside me in the photos above).  The English school that my kids go to forwarded my email address to her because she is also an au pair here in Ecija!!  She looks after twin 5 year olds, has been here since September, and is from Edinburgh, Scotland!  I really, really like her!!!  She has such a sweet and lovely way about her and has traveled all over the world.  She is going to be such a wonderful traveling companion!!    : )