St. THOMAS AI CENCI

S. TOMMASO AI CENCI
Piazza delle Cinque Scole

It appears for the first time in the sources on the year 1114 in the MONTE CENCI area as mentioned in a plaque embedded in a wall in the atrium

Second consecration in 1240, maybe after a restoration

It was known as In Capite Molarum for the nearby mills (molendinis in Latin) along the River Tiber or In Mercatello for the square where the market was held weekly

It was built on the site of the TEMPLE OF CASTOR AND POLLUX, where the two huge statues of Castor and Pollux with horses were found and moved in 1585 on the Capitoline Hill

It was restored in the years 1559/75 for the Cenci family (Rocco Cenci, his nephew Christopher and the latter's son Francis, who in turn was the father and rapist of Beatrice Cenci) who had the patronage since 1554

“The origins of the Cenci family, despite the claims of two thousand years of antiquity, date back reliably to the mid-fourteenth century (...). They were engaged in commercial activities and were in close relationship with the Roman aristocracy. Since this period, progressive acquisitions of properties in the area by members of the family lead to the establishment of an actual fortress, with towers, residential wings and services for common use - a balneum (bathing complex), an oven, a loggia, slaughterhouses and warehouses - the center of which was the church of St. Thomas” (Angela Catalano)

Restored in 1881
It belongs to the Brotherhood of the coachmen

COUNTER FAÇADE
Lunette “Christ and the Samaritan Woman at the Well” and “Two Evangelists” by an anonymous artist of the end of 1500s just like the other two on either side of the main altar

On the right “Banner with Enthroned Virgin Mary and Child (back) and Our Lady of Sorrows between angels with symbols of the Passion (front)” by an anonymous artist of the beginning of the 1700s

1^st RIGHT - CHAPEL OF THE CROSS
“Wooden crucifix” 1700

MAIN ALTAR
The altar is supported by “Two trapezophori with lions’ feet in white marble”
Round panel in turquoise murra, a very rare marble
Baptismal font resting on “Triangular base with dolphins and acanthus leaves” both of the Augustan period (27 AC/14 BC), and probably found in the area
Tabernacle and balustrade 1626
Altarpiece “Incredulity of St. Thomas” 1612 by Giuseppe Vermiglio (1585/1635), the only authentic work of this painter from Piedmont influenced by Caravaggio

2^nd LEFT - CHAPEL OF St. FRANCIS
Vault “Stories of St. Francis” in 1612 by a late Mannerist anonymous artist influenced by Cavalier d’Arpino
Altarpiece “St. Francis praying in front of the crucifix” by an unknown artist of the end of 1500s

1^st LEFT - CHAPEL OF OUR LADY OF THE BAR
Cenci family patronage since 1453
Above the altar “Nativity of Jesus”, on the left “Nativity of the Virgin Mary” and on the right “Annunciation” 1565 by Girolamo Siciolante da Sermoneta (1521/80) a pupil of Perin del Vaga for Valerio Cenci
On the pilasters “Prophets” and on the vault “Stories from the life of St. Joachim” by Sermoneta with assistants

SACRISTY
“Cinerary urn” of the first century BC used as a water reservoir

St. MARY IN TRASPONTINA

S. MARIA IN TRASPONTINA

Via della Conciliazione 14

FAÇADE (made with travertine taken, in part, from the Colosseum) and CHURCH UNTIL THE 4^th CHAPEL built in 1566 by Giovanni Sallustio Peruzzi (?/1573), son of Baldassare Peruzzi 

It replaced an earlier church with the same name built closer to Castel Sant'Angelo 

1581/87 building up to the front pillars of the dome by Ottaviano Nonni aka Ottaviano Mascherino (1524/1606)

1635/68 building of the BELL TOWER, TRANSEPT and DOME by Francesco Peparelli (active since about 1626/d. 1641)

The construction of the church lasted therefore 102 years

It was the parish of the gunners of the nearby Castel Sant'Angelo who wanted a low dome, so as not to have their line of fire obstructed

VAULT

“Glory of the Virgin Mary” 1894 by Cesare Caroselli (1847/1927)

1^st RIGHT - CHAPEL OF St. BARBARA

Above the altar “St. Barbara” 1597 one of the masterpieces by Giuseppe Cesari aka Cavalier d'Arpino (1568/1640) for Pietro Aldobrandini

Frescoes “Stories of St. Barbara” 1610/20 by Cesare Rossetti (active 1593/1620) designed by Cavalier d'Arpino

Decorations with military guns, coats of arms and cannons

The breast in full view of the saint worried the patron Pietro Aldobrandini who didn't want his uncle, the Pope Clement VIII (1592/1605), to see the painting

The breast was covered only in the nineteenth century and revealed again in the twentieth century

“The fact that Caravaggio might have found ridiculous the St. Barbara painted by his former employer, can be guessed by the way he quoted her in the first version of St. Matthew and the Angel, destroyed in Berlin during the Second World War: in his cheeky androgynous angel Caravaggio mimicked the drapery and the curvy posture of the plump body of Barbara, a posture known among Mannerist as serpentine, and in particular he mimicked the way the flimsy fabric clung to the soft underbelly and to the just raised thigh, as well as her tousled hair” (Peter Robb)

2^nd RIGHT - CHAPEL OF St. CANUTE

On the altar “Ecstasy of St. Canute” 1686 by the Viennese Daniel Seiter (1649/1705)

S. Canute (about 1042/1086) was a Danish king, who was canonized in 1101. He planned to invade England and tried to increase the power of monarchy and church at the expense of nobility and common people

He was murdered in the wooden church of St. Albany in the city of Odense during a popular rebellion

3^rd RIGHT - CHAPEL OF OUR LADY OF CARMEL

In the nineteenth century the “Statue of Our Lady of Mount Carmel” was put here for veneration

The throne dates to 1922 and the statue, blessed by Pope Pius XI Ratti (1922/39), was crowned on the eve of the Feast of Mount Carmel (July 16) in 1928

On 12 September 2001, the day after the tragedy of the Twin Towers in the U.S., it was once again crowned by Pope John Paul II (1978 /2005), in St. Peter's Square, on the occasion of the 750th anniversary of the gift of the Scapular

4^th RIGHT - CHAPEL OF THE CROSS

Above the altar “Wooden Crucifix” from the old church

Frescoes “Stories of the Christ” 1649 by Bernardino Gagliardi (1609/1660)

5^th RIGHT - CHAPEL OF St. ALBERT OF TRAPANI

Canvas on the altar “St. Albert of Trapani” and frescoes in the vault “Stories of St. Albert of Trapani” 1614/20 by Antonio Circignani aka Pomarancio (about 1568/1629), son of Niccolò Circignani

RIGHT TRANSEPT or CHAPEL OF St. MARY MAGDALENE DE' PAZZI

Built in 1626 on the occasion of the beatification of the Florentine saint

Above the altar “Trinity, Virgin Mary, St. Mary Magdalene de' Pazzi and St. Joseph” by Giovanni Domenico Cerrini (1609/81) or G.B. Ricci (about 1550/1624)

Vault “Cross and angels with symbols of the Passion of Christ” by Cesare Caroselli (1847/1927)

MAIN ALTAR

1674 Carlo Fontana (1634/1714)

Altarpiece “Icon with the Virgin Mary and Child” 1216 brought from the Holy Land by the Carmelites

Superb ALTAR FRONTAL in opus sectile (inlaid marble)

“Angels” in stucco on the ciborium and in marble at the center by Leonardo Retti (active 1670/1709)

Statues on the doors of jasper at the sides of the ciborium:

On the right “Prophet Elijah” by Antonio Lavaggi (active in Rome in the second half of the seventeenth century) and “Prophet Elisha” by Vincenzo Felice (about 1657/1715)

On the left “St. Angelo martyr” by Alessandro Rondoni and “St. Albert of Trapani” by Michel Maille aka Michele Maglia (active in Rome in the second half of the seventeenth century)

“An absolute masterpiece is the altar for the Carmelites of S. Maria in Traspontina (...). having started from the very simple idea of a tabernacle, Fontana built a magnificent small temple with double columns in Sicilian jasper, a broken pediment on which there are two angels, by Leonardo Retti, flanking a monumental bronze dome shaped as a crown. The impression made on his contemporaries is evidenced by the initiative of the Confraternity of the Agonizing of S. Maria del Pianto that, in 1675, commissioned to Fontana 'a small temple with columns and a crown as dome' to celebrate the release of a person sentenced to death” (Helmut Hager - Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani Treccani)

CHOIR BEHIND THE ALTAR

“Stalls in walnut” 1651 by Filippo Gagliardi (about 1607/1659) also known as Filippo Bizzarro or Filippo delle Prospettive

On the walls to the left “Sacrifice of the Prophet Elijah on Mount Carmel” and “Birth of Jesus”, to the right “Liberation from the plague of the island of Cyprus thanks to S. Pier Tommaso” and “Birth of Mary” 1760/61 by Angelo Papi

LEFT TRANSEPT or CHAPEL OF St. ANDREW CORSINI

Above the altar “Virgin Mary appears to St. Andrew Corsini” by Giovanni Paolo Melchiorri (1664/1745)

Vault “Apparition of St. Andrew Corsini in the Battle of Anghiari” 1697 by Biagio Puccini (1673/1721)

5^th LEFT - CHAPEL OF St. ANGELO OF SICILY

Above the altar “Preaching of St. Angelo martyr” and on the sides and vault “Stories of St. Angelo” 1612 by G.B. Ricci (about 1550/1624), who was buried in this chapel in a tomb now lost

4^th LEFT - CHAPEL OF St. THERESA OF JESUS

Above the altar “Ecstasy of St. Theresa” 1698 masterpiece by Antonio Gherardi (1638/1702)

Ovals to the side of the beginning of the eighteenth century by Placido Celi

3^rd LEFT - CHAPEL OF Sts. PETER AND PAUL

Columns to which St. Peter and St. Paul would have been tied

Above the altar “Flagellation of Sts. Peter and Paul” and frescoes “Stories of Sts. Peter and Paul” by G.B. Ricci

2^nd LEFT - CHAPEL OF St. ELIJAH

Above the altar “Prophet Elijah between St. Antonio Abate and the blessed Carmelite Franco Lippi from Siena” by Giacinto Calandrucci (1646/1707) a pupil of Carlo Maratta

1^st LEFT - CHAPEL OF THE PIETÀ

Above the altar “Pietà” in terracotta of the fifteenth century

“Angels in wood” painted in imitation of marble by artists of the school of Ercole Ferrata (1610/86)

Frescoes of the years 1700/16

ORATORIO OF THE CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE

To the right of the church

Frescoes by the brothers Luigi Garzi (1638/1721) and Sebastiano Garzi

“Glorification of St. Albert” by Carlo Maratta (1625/1713)

COLONNA PALACE - COLONNA GALLERY (third part)

GALLERIA COLONNA

The collection was put together from 1650 by Cardinal Girolamo I Colonna (his grandfather was Marcantonio II Colonna the victor of Lepanto)

It was continued from 1666 by his nephew Grand Constable Lorenzo Onofrio Colonna and by his son Filippo II Colonna, who inaugurated the gallery in 1703

The building of the gallery was begun in 1654 by Antonio Del Grande (about 1625/79)

A document written by Antonio Del Grande mentions a collaboration with Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598/1680) but the active presence here of the great genius of Baroque art is not otherwise documented

Continued in the years 1693/1703 by Girolamo Fontana (1668/1701)

“It is the most spectacular work designed by Antonio Del Grande in the palace, which was gradually assuming the form of a huge complex with several courtyards, for which only in the eighteenth century, with the intervention first of Nicola Michetti, and then of Paolo Posi, there will be attempts to impose uniformity. The gallery (...) will be finished by Girolamo Fontana, but the wide body, divided into three spaces by two pairs of free Corinthian columns, demonstrates the ability of Del Grande to interpret courtly themes avoiding any rhetorical excess” (Manfredo Tafuri - Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani Treccani)

The 210 paintings dating from the fifteenth to the eighteenth century and the about 150 sculptures mostly ancient are shown to the public for one morning a week since the seventeenth century

STAIRS

“Isabella Colonna Salviati” by Pompeo Batoni (1708/87)

Antechamber

“St. Julian Hospitaller” maybe by Pietro Bonaccorsi aka Perin del Vaga (1501/47)

“Christ Crowned with Thorns” by Francesco Trevisani (1656/1746)

“Vision of St. Jerome” by Pier Francesco Mola (1612/66)

“Time steals away beauty” by Giuseppe Cesari aka Cavalier d'Arpino (1568/1640)

“He stands out thanks to a sensibility, become rare, for noble tranquility and grandeur. In contrast to the broken lines of the Zuccaris' school, he loves long lines that runs uninterrupted, with a distinctly melancholy ductus. In line with this approach, in him the modeling of bodies and of drapery does not show, as in his predecessors, the absolute tension toward a strong plastic fullness, but instead something consciously superficial. (...) Even in chiaroscuro, however treated with great care, he does not seek, as it happened for example in the school of Barocci, a surprising effect in patches, but he puts larger areas of well shaded tones alongside each other. Thanks to these qualities, Cavalier d'Arpino's works have an aristocratic touch” (Hermann Voss)

SIXTUS V SMALL PALACE

PALAZZETTO DI SISTO V

Via di Parione 7

Built at the end of 1500s for the wedding of the nephew of Sixtus V Peretti (1585/90) Flavia Peretti with Virginio Orsini

Now is the seat of the Pio Sodalizio dei Piceni (Pius Sodality of the Piceni) derived by the Association of Residents in Rome from Marche Region

The association was founded in early 1600s and, in 1633, it became the Brotherhood of the Holy House of Loreto

The LIBRARY contains about 14,000 books

Courtyard and roof terrace with frescoes by Paul Brill (1554/1626)

INSIDE LOGGIA

“Stories of Hercules and nudes” Giuseppe Cesari aka Cavalier d'Arpino (1568/1640) and Federico Zuccari (about 1542/1609)

ROOMS

Oil paintings on canvas such as:

“Our Lady of Mercy” by Federico Fiori aka Barocci (1535/1612)

“Virgin Mary with Child blessing aka S. Maria delle Grazie” 1494 by Antonio Aquili aka Antoniazzo Romano (about 1435-40/1508)

It was originally a processional standard and it was the only painting not to have been destroyed by the fire of 1591 in the church of S. Salvatore in Lauro

“The stylistic and compositional features, including the structure of the throne in a niche or the iconography of the sacred group, correspond to the subjects of Marian paintings of the nineties definitely attributed to Antoniazzo (...) here solved in a version with a more pronounced Umbrian character, derived from Pinturicchio. His original function as a standard makes it a typical product of the mature phase of the painter, when the demands intensified in his workshop for equipment and items to be carried in processions on the occasion of the annual festivals of the brotherhoods” (Anna Cavallaro)

“Cardinal Domenico Consolini” by Francesco Podesti (1800/95

“Christ Redeemer” attributed to Melozzo of Ambrosi aka Melozzo da Forlì (1438/94)

VATICAN MUSEUMS - GROOMS' ROOM

Sala dei Palafrenieri
 

Also known as Sala dei Chiaroscuri (chiaroscuri room) for the type of paintings, Sala dei Cubicularii (room of the guards) for the supervisors of the cubiculum (bedroom) of the Pope or, indeed, Sala dei Palafrenieri Grooms Room for those who used to transport the pope's chair

It was also known as Sala del Pappagallo (parrot's room) for here was the parrot in a cage, according to the custom documented since the eleventh century to keep a parrot in a room of the papal apartments wherever they were, even in Avignon

Massive and spectacular ceiling carved and gilded with Medici family symbols, maybe designed by Raphael

It had been decorated by Raphael in 1517 but it was repainted in the years 1560/82 by order of Pius IV Medici (1559/65) first and Gregory XIII Boncompagni (1572/85) after, by the brothers Federico Zuccari (about 1542/1609) and Taddeo Zuccari (1529/66) with “Apostles and Sts. Stephen and Lawrence” in fake niches and “Allegories of Virtues” in fake broken pediments

Other painters worked here including Giuseppe Cesari aka Cavalier d'Arpino (1568/1640), who debuted here with his first work (“Allegory of Fatigue” with Samson holding the door in Gaza), and the brothers Giovanni Alberti (1558/1601) and Cherubino Alberti (1553/1615

The five pillars that separate the room into two parts were inserted under Pius VII Chiaramonti (1800/23)

CAPITOLINE MUSEUMS - CAPITOLINE ART GALLERY (first part)

Pinacoteca Capitolina

The oldest public collection of paintings in the world founded in 1748 by Benedict XIV Lambertini (1740/58), advised by the cardinal Silvio Valenti Gonzaga, with the Collection Sacchetti of 187 paintings and expanded in 1750 with the Collection Pio di Savoia of 126 paintings in the new rooms especially built by Ferdinando Fuga (1699/1782) in 1749

Other acquisitions in late 1800s and early 1900s

ROOM I

Central Italy from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance

"Death and Assumption of the Virgin" about 1515 by Nicola Filotesio aka Cola dell'Amatrice (about 1480/1547) from the church of S. Domenico in Ascoli Piceno

"Even here Filotesio boasts a style based on mixing the art of Raphael, Leonardo and Pedro Fernandez, with results that have been defined anticlassical (Zeri, 1971) or carriers of heterodox instances anyway (Cannatà 1991). Worthy of note is the landscape in the back of the painting characterized by 'the more mysterious and powerful neoprospectic landscape paintings from those years' (Volpe 1984)" (Roberto Cannatà - Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani Treccani)

"Trinity" by Niccolò di Pietro Gerini (news in the years 1368/1416) in the lower part of the painting it also represented the buyer Francesco Datini, wealthy merchant of Prato, with his wife and daughter

Five panels with "Episodes of the infancy of Christ" 1378 by the Maestro di Campli painter active between Abruzzo and Lazio regions, indicative of the spread of Giotto's art even in smaller towns

Two half-length figures of saints "St. Bartholomew" and "St. Magdalene" about 1530 by the painter from Siena Bartolomeo Bulgarini (news in the years 1337/78)

"Presentation in the Temple" started by Francesco Raibolini aka Francia (1450/1517) and finished by Bartolomeo Passerotti (1529/92)

"The work was originally destined for the church of S. Domenico in Reggio Emilia and the artist from Bologna Francesco Francia had begun to paint in 1514. The work was soon interrupted and resumed several years later by another painter from Bologna, Bartolomeo Passerotti, who completed the picture with some modifications, including the original figure of the buyer who was on his knees transformed into a St. Jerome" (Web site of the Capitoline Museums - www.museicapitolini.org)

Large oil painting "Madonna with Child and Saints" 1513 by the Lucchese Agostino Marti (about 1482/1540) for Alberico Malaspina lord of Carrara

Oil on panel "Madonna and Child with Saints Nicholas of Bari and Martin of Tours" about 1496 by Gian Giacomo Alladio aka Macrino d'Alba from Piedmont (about 1470/1528). Probably painted during a short stay in Rome, which is represented in an imaginative landscape in the background

ROOM II

The sixteenth century in Ferrara

"Because of its geographical location - in the northeastern part of the Emilia-Romagna, a short distance from the sea - the city had of course close cultural relations with Venice, Padua and Bologna and in the fifteenth century it had become one of the main centers of Italian art. The painters of Ferrara, in particular in the first half of the sixteenth century, gather in their style proposals from both Venetian painting (in particular the use of color) and from Bolognese painting, from which they absorb formal elegance. Following the conquest by the State of the Church in 1598 the artistic heritage of Ferrara was literally ransacked and numerous paintings from the Este collections became part of the Roman collections" (Web site of the Capitoline Museums - www.museicapitolini.org)

"Annunciation" 1528 and "Madonna with Child in Glory" 1512/13 by Benvenuto Tisi aka Garofalo (about 1481/1559)

"Holy Family" about 1527 by the brilliant Giovanni Luteri aka Dosso Dossi (about 1486/1542)

"Flight into Egypt" about 1594 and "Adoration of the Magi" about 1600 by Ippolito Scarsella aka Scarsellino

ROOM III

Venice and its territory in the sixteenth century

"Baptism of Jesus" about 1512 by the great Venetian master Tiziano Vecellio (Titian) (about 1490/1576)

"Early painting by Titian where its buyer, Giovanni Ram, a Spanish merchant who lived in Venice, is depicted in the lower right, while witnessing the sacred scene, which opens onto a delicate landscape. The white and red of the cloth in the lower left part of the painting focus the attention and set the distances" (Web site of the Capitoline Museums -www.museicapitolini.org)

"Fortress" and "Temperance" ceiling panels about 1556, "Ascension" and "The Rape of Europa" by Paolo Caliari aka Veronese (1528/88)

"The author of what it will later be referred to as the 'doing big' of Venetian painting, Veronese combines formal elegance with a relaxed and innovative use of color, as in the great painting of the Rape of Europa (autographed replica of a work of the same subject now kept in the Palazzo Ducale in Venice), where the myth - the young Europa being abducted by Zeus in the form of a bull, and carried across the sea to the land that you will get her name - is represented in all of its phases, focusing particularly on the sensual figure of Europa, richly dressed" (Web site of the Capitoline Museums - www.museicapitolini.org)

"Portrait of a crossbowman" 1552 by Lorenzo Lotto (about 1480/1556)

"Christ and the adulteress" by Jacopo Negretti aka Jacopo Palma il Vecchio (about 1480/1528)

"Portrait of a Woman" about 1525 by Giovanni Girolamo Savoldo (about 1480/1548). Savoldo represents the woman next to a small dragon as St. Margaret, patroness of childbirth. Excellent example of his luminous silkiness and of his attention to detail and realism of the yet incredible representation

"Flagellation", "Crowning with Thorns", "Baptism of Jesus" and "Penitent Magdalene" by Domenico Robusti aka Tintoretto (1560/1635) son of the more famous Jacopo

"Good Samaritan" about 1540/50 by Jacopo da Ponte aka Jacopo Bassano (about 1510/92)

ROOM IV

Sixteenth century styles in Rome

"Diana and Endymion" 1660 by Pier Francesco Mola (1612/66) native of Canton Ticino in Switzerland

"A serene contemplation of nature is evident in Diana and Endymion painted for Bonaventura Argenti, a friend of Mola and famous musician for the papal chapel, for whom Mola worked on several occasions. The theme of the subject is masterfully played by Mola who manages to combine Carracci's models, the lunar atmosphere by Guercino and enchanted moments of the poetic fables of Poussin. Similar are the Bacchus of the Galleria Spada in Rome and the Boy with the dove (Toronto, Art Gallery of Ontario)" (Laura Possanzini - Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani Treccani)

"Erminia among the shepherds" by Giovanni Lanfranco (1582/1647) the most Baroque among the many Emilian painters active in Rome in the first half of the seventeenth century

"The poem of Tasso was well known and what the shepherd says to the girl dressed in the arms of Clorinda sent back to the meaning which had long been the goal of pastoral literature, namely insecurity and vanity of glory, futility of worldly conflicts, peace that is only to be found in simple things, in contact with nature. In his painting Lanfranco did not use the history of Erminia as a pretext for the landscape nor insisted on the pastoral atmosphere. He sought instead to create the atmosphere of the evening (the projection of the melancholic mood of Erminia) of the woods, in the back, which becomes a black and indistinct mass against the dim light that still lingers in the sky" (Giuliano Briganti - 1985)

"Moses drawing water from the rock" about 1642 and "Adoration of the Golden Calf" about 1642 by François Perrier (1590/1650) one of the twelve founders of the Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture, the French Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture

"Triumph of Flora" maybe by Nicolas Poussin (1594/1665)

"David and Goliath" about 1639 by Guillaume Courtois aka Borgognone (1628/79)

ROOM V

The sixteenth century in Emilia

"A precious testimony of the variety of artistic production which, alongside the great works for churches and public and private palaces, included smaller works for smaller rooms as well as copies of famous works, at the time in great demand from the market. Paintings of this type have had a fundamental role in the dissemination of new artistic proposals and to allow the study of the great masters of entire generations of young artists" (Web site of the Capitoline Museums - www.capitolini.net)

"Diana the huntress" about 1601 and "St. Anthony"1635 by Giuseppe Cesari aka Cavalier d'Arpino (1568/1640)

"Our Lady of Albinea" copy of the lost the original by Antonio Allegri aka Correggio said (1489/1534) formerly in the church of S. Prospero in Albinea in the province of Reggio Emilia

"Dispute of St. Catherine of Alexandria" by Prospero Fontana (1512/97) father of the painter Lavinia Fontana

"Mystic Marriage of St. Catherine of Alexandria" about 1595 by Pietro Faccini (about 1562/1602)