And so our walk draws to its close, though Ravenna never truly offers an ending. It prefers a quieter magic. A curve of worn brick, a bell fading across a square, the faint perfume of incense near an old doorway, gold light caught in mosaic tesserae that have outlasted kings, bishops, and conquerors alike.
What you have traced is not simply a route, but a palimpsest. One power claimed these streets, another blessed them anew, another raised fresh walls and altars over what had already been declared sacred. And still, the older visions remained, glimmering beneath the revisions. An Arian city became a Byzantine one, then something else again, yet nothing was ever entirely erased.
Even the ground tells that story. Ravenna has been lifted, layer upon layer, as if the city itself were rising above its own memory.
As you leave, keep this close: here, the past does not vanish. It waits, just below the surface, in the next threshold, the next fragment, the next shining layer.
