PARAGRAPH FOR PRECIS

Of all the cities of a remote celebrity whose names have been perpetuated by history, for literature, for arts and arms, for virtue and for depravity, there is none which abounds in so many beautiful and sublime architectural evidences of former greatness as Rome. On its present comparatively small site, it has remains of almost every useful or ornamental structure. The spectator of reflection, feeling, and taste, looks with surprise at its once useful ornamental, triumphal arches, pleasure-crowded theatres, temples, pillars, pavements, health-giving baths, and gorgeous palaces. Of these perhaps none are so creative of pleasure to the imagination or of moral reflection as the Amphitheatre, begun by Vespasian and finished by Titus in the first century, and called by the Romans the Flavian or Vespasian’s Amphitheatre, and by the modern Italians, Colisei, from its vastness. It was erected from the materials of Nero’s Golden Palace, an object prodigious and splendid, but of disgust to the Roman people, and therefore destroyed by Vespasian. The awe with which we view its immense oval length and height is tempered by the varied beauty of the whole and its particular parts by the graceful orders rising on each other, with Corinthian pilasters and an attic, by the numerous arcaded statues, windows and the steps. We feel the profound silence and solitary, aspects of its numerous and untrodden ambulatories, captives and slaves and of martyrs to an unshaken faith, who, for many successive centuries, amused the thousands of spectators who occupied the surrounding seats and filled with horrid shouts the reverberating walls during the intervals of the groans of the dying gladiator or the cries of wounded and ferocious animals. This great and sanguinary portal to the next world, this honour and disgrace of Rome, this theatre of the cruel and vulgar joy of anguish, of terror, of wasted courage and despair, this defaced but still legible epitaph of great and guilty Rome, stands in its immensity and decay and has come out of the conflict of ages and of nations like an aged and venerable veteran, who, having himself survived dangers, witnessed innumerable deaths in mutilated and scared.

(356 words)

Make a precis of the above passage, and give it a heading and theme also.

SOLVED PRECIS 

Title:- Relics of Rome

Rome excels all the cities of the world in ancient monuments, which reflect its past glory, literature, art, culture and civilisation. Palaces, pillars, temples, health-giving baths and pavements present to the mind the scene of ancient Roman life. Vespasian’s theatre, which was finished by Titus, was the seat and centre of all activities.

Thousands of slaves and captives through their agony and fortune entertained the Roman citizens and spectators. They used to reveal vulgar things of life. Fights with the wild animals were the permanent source of cheap entertainment. The monuments, though shattered through the onslaughts of time, stand as symbols of ancient Roman civilisation and a reflection of cruelty committed on the innocent slaves and prisoners.

(118 words)

Theme:

The ancient monuments of Rome present to the mind the bewildering and glorious scenes of Roman life, art, culture and civilisation.