PIUS GATE

PORTA PIA

Piazzale di Porta Pia

INTERNAL FAÇADE

1561/65 by Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475/1564) for Pius IV Medici (1559/65), after the ancient NOMENTANA GATE of the Aurelian Walls at 75 m (246 feet) away, under which passed the ancient VIA NOMENTANA, had been walled up

Completed after Michelangelo's death by his followers Matteo Bartolani da Città di Castello (about 1527/about 1598) and Jacopo Del Duca (about 1520/1604)

“Coat of arms of Pius IV Medici” by Jacopo Del Duca with “Angels” by Nardo De Rossi, restored by Virginio Vespignani (1808/82)

The tools for barbers stylized in the decoration probably recall the profession of the Milanese family of Pius IV, namesake of the Florentine bankers

The marble was taken from the revetment of the Torre dei Conti, which in turn was taken from the Imperial Fora 

“Compared to the shrine of the Medici Chapel dating back some 40 years earlier, Michelangelo's forms have become even more complex, such as, for example, inserting a curved broken pediment in a triangular uninterrupted pediment. At the same time he shows great interest for the contrasts of texture in the composition, expressed in the smooth wall surfaces of the central part and the rough masonry of the side spans. The inventiveness he shows with the blind windows would be taken up and further developed by the seventeenth-century architects, such as Bernini and Borromini, who will owe a lot to the Roman works of Michelangelo” (Peter Murray)

EXTERNAL FAÇADE

1853/69 Virginio Vespignani (1808/82) who apparently was inspired by an engraving of 1568 that had to be close enough to the original plan by Michelangelo

In the niches “Statues of Sts. Agnes and Alexander” by Francesco Amadori (active in Rome 1836/67), placed by Vespignani at the will of Pius IX Mastai-Ferretti (1846/78) who wanted to remember the danger caused by the collapse of the roof's courtroom in the complex of St. Agnes, when he had visited it in 1855

The statues were damaged by shelling in 1870 and relocated here in 1929

During the skirmish on September 20, 1870 49 Italian Bersaglieri and 19 Papal soldiers were killed

In the rooms formerly used as Customs House there is the small

Museo Storico dei Bersaglieri

Historical Museum of the Bersaglieri

The Bersaglieri are a specialty corps of the Italian Army Infantry, famous for the plumed hat and to be the only military force in the world that in parades performs running and playing the trumpet

The corps was established in 1836 by Carlo Alberto of Savoy on the proposal of captain Alessandro La Marmora

The museum is currently closed for restoration

COURTYARD

Busts of the most distinguished representatives of the Bersaglieri Corps including the “Bust of Enrico Toti (1882/1916)”, a young Roman invalid (he had a leg amputated at the pelvis) who, despite his disability, volunteered for the First World War and was killed after he hurled his crutch against the enemy

LA MARMORA ROOM

“Bust of Alessandro La Marmora” founder of the Bersaglieri Corps and two rifles that he himself had invented

HALL OF HONOR

Various relics including the “Original Proposition” written by La Marmora himself to get from King Carlo Alberto the establishment of the corps

MEMORIAL

Dedicated to the more than 100,000 dead of the Bersaglieri

Saber of Alessandro La Marmora and his portrait

FIRST FLOOR

Memorabilia, documents and memories of the campaigns of the Risorgimento from 1848 to 1866

THREE ROOMS IN THE UPPER FLOOR OF THE SOUTH SIDE

Memorabilia relating to the colonial campaigns

FIRST FLOOR OF THE SOUTH SIDE

Memorabilia relating to the First World War, including the gun that killed at 16 hours on November 4, 1918 at Quadrivio di Paradiso (Crossroads of Heaven), the nineteen year old lieutenant Alberto Riva di Villasanta and his riflemen, the last men to die in the war

GROUND FLOOR OF THE SOUTH SIDE

Memorabilia relating to World War II

The museum also houses a HISTORICAL archive and a LIBRARY with material regarding, of course, the Bersaglieri Corps

VATICAN MUSEUMS - SISTINE CHAPEL (seventh part)

Last Judgment
 

Clement VII Medici (1523/34) called Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475/1564) in 1534 to complete the decoration of the Sistine Chapel with the Last Judgment

After Clement VII's death his successor, Paul III Farnese (1534/49), decided to confirm Michelangelo for the job which he began only in April 1536, twenty-four years after the ceiling

Michelangelo painted 391 figures on a surface of about 200 m² (2,152 square feet)

He covered the wall with another brick wall slightly tilted upward toward the chapel (26 cm - 10 inches), so that the dust would deposit less easily on the surface and so that the distortions of perspective could be visually correct

Perhaps he also wanted to give a greater effect of looming presence. This decision was the reason of his quarrel with his friend Sebastiano Luciani aka Sebastiano Del Piombo

Originally there was the “Coronation of the Immaculate in an Assumption scene” by Pietro Vannucci aka Pietro Perugino (about 1450/1523) who had also painted, maybe with Domenico Ghirlandaio, the panels below with “Birth of Jesus” and “Finding of Moses”

There were also two lunettes with “Ancestors of Christ” by Michelangelo himself

The official opening was on Christmas Day of 1541 after five years of work

The central point is Christ's gesture in the act of judging

Some scholars speculate that maybe the face of Jesus is the portrait of his beloved pupil Tommaso Cavalieri who may have been rather portrayed in the face behind St. Bartholomew

“This head of Christ is reminiscent of the one of the Apollo Belvedere: the conception of divine which it embodies is thus modeled on a pagan matrix. His face does not reproduce the traditional model that we know from the icons of the Eastern Church, recognizable in every fresco apse of the churches of Rome, in Raphael's Dispute as in the Transfiguration. (...) For the first time an artist commissioned by the Pope has dared to paint an 'unpublished' face of Christ rather than his recognizable portrait. (...) As this could have happened just a hundred meters away from the chapel in which the true image of Christ imprinted on Veronica's veil was worshiped, we are not able to explain in all clarity. (...) Art is not oriented anymore toward relics but toward archaeological finds of antiquity, taken as examples for all forms of artistic expression. Painting a youthful and beardless Christ is easily justified considering the Christian art of late antiquity” (Heinrich W. Pfeiffer)

A rotary movement affects all figures except those in the two upper lunettes with flying angels bearing some of the symbols of the Passion:

On the left the Cross, the Nails and the Crown of Thorns

On the right the Column of the Flagellation, the Ladder and the Rod with the sponge soaked in vinegar

Interestingly, the angels have no wings, perhaps to give the idea that angels are not so different from men after all

 

On the left the chosen ones who try to go to heaven. Below there are bodies resurrecting from death, including the face of Girolamo Savonarola, coming out of the ground

On the right the damned wrapped in a spiral, below them the boat with Charon

At the corner on the right there is the infernal judge Minos, to whom the artist, according to Vasari, gave the appearance of Biagio da Cesena, the papal master of ceremonies who was critical of Michelangelo

According to a sonnet by Pasquino Minos has the appearance of Cardinal Pierluigi Farnese, Pope Paul III's son and sodomite who raped the young Bishop of Fano, who then killed himself in shame

At the bottom on the left characters that represent the resurrection from death, two of them (one white and one black) helped with the Rosary. In the center a group of angels blowing their triumph with books of acts pure and impure

Close to Christ there is the Virgin Mary with her face down to avoid seeing his son in the act of judging: her power of intercession is now finished

Maybe Michelangelo represented the Virgin Mary with the face of his best friend Vittoria Colonna who may be have been represented in the face near St. Lawrence instead

Around Christ and the Virgin Mary there are saints:

St. John the Baptist

St. Andrew with the Cross

St. Lawrence with the gridiron

St. Bartholomew, maybe with the face of Pietro Aretino, holding the skin, which depicts the face of Michelangelo

“Probably the artist wanted to express the idea that only losing the shell represented by the body, man could be saved from earthly torments. More recent research shows a parallelism between the flayed skin in the hands of St. Bartholomew, and a passage of Dante's Divine Comedy - Par, I, 19-24 - in which the flaying of Marsyas is interpreted as a sign of divine inspiration of the artist” (Frank Zöllner)

St. Peter, maybe with the face of Paul III, giving back to Christ the keys of the church that has no more reason to exist

St. Sebastian with bow and arrows

St. Blaise with iron combs, repainted by Daniele da Volterra

St. Catherine of Alexandria with the wheel

Humanity is represented nude because we will no longer be able to hide anything in the tragic condition of human existence before the Judgment

Michelangelo was such a living legend that no pope dared to censor the nudities in the painting while he was alive

Eventually in 1565, right after Michelangelo's death, his pupil Daniele da Volterra (1509/66) was asked to cover the genitals and he was then called for this “braghettone”, the “panty painter”

There were other interventions in the following twenty years and many more in the following centuries

The fresco was finally restored in the years 1990/94 but the repainting of censorship of the sixteenth century were left being considered historical

“With the elimination of all architectural and spacial frameworks, and free representation of the masses of nude figures in a structure not broken down in scenes, nor responding to proportional representation and perspective of Renaissance painting, Michelangelo canceled the consistency of the immense wall of the Sistine Chapel, translating into an indefinite sky, without any suggestion of depth, but animated by an unstoppable chain of dynamic impulses. The Judgment expresses a tragic view of the condition and destiny of humanity, which does not conceal the anxiety about extreme divine judgment. It interprets the spiritual tension of those years” (Carlo Bertelli, Giuliano Briganti, Antonio Giuliano)

“In this the specificity of the talent of the great Florentine painter and sculptor is expressed: in the fact that he applied to frescos with multiple figures an idea that essentially comes from the sculpture of one isolated figure. Herein lies the genius of the Last Judgment, and its difficulties for those who have tried to imitate it” (Hermann Voss)

CAPITOLINE MUSEUMS - NEW PALACE (first part)

Palazzo Nuovo

Project by Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475/1564) only for a façade with no building

It was begun by Girolamo Rainaldi (1570/1655) in 1603 for Clement VIII Aldobrandini (1592/1605) 

The work was resumed and completed in the years 1654/55, after a long interval, by Carlo Rainaldi (1611/91) son of Girolamo for Innocent X Pamphili (1644/55)

It was licensed for use to the Guild of the Arts of Wool and Silk and then at the Guild of the Arts of Agriculture

The museum was established in 1734 by Clement XII Corsini (1730/40), who bought the Albani collection of 418 sculptures to which statues bought by Benedict XIV Lambertini (1740/58) were added later

The exhibition, which has remained substantially unchanged to this day, was arranged by the Marquis Alessandro Capponi

This is the first ever public collection of antiquities in the world from which all similar museums drew inspiration and were modeled on

CORTILE

Courtyard

Exedra by Filippo Barigioni (about 1680/1753), a pupil of Carlo Fontana, with "Marforio" the colossal statue of Oceano first century AD, one of the talking statues of Rome on which signs were posted with anonymous phrases, mostly sarcastic, like Pasquino

The name traditionally comes from Martis Forum (Forum of Mars)

It was moved to the Capitoline Hill in 1594 but it was already known in the Middle Ages, when it was described and drawn near the Arch of Septimius Severus, in the Roman Forum

Above "Bust of Pope Clement XII Corsini (1730/40)" the promoter of the museum of sculptures with marble plaque celebrating the opening

In the courtyard "Three granite columns with Egyptianising reliefs" from the early imperial period, probably originally located along the road leading to the main temple to Isis in Rome, the Iseo Campensis

On the sides "Statues of satyrs" second century AD from the Theatre of Pompey formerly exhibited in the courtyard of the Palazzo Della Valle

ATRIO

Atrium

"Statue of Minerva" second century BC from the original of the fifth century BC Athena Parthenos by Phidias (about 490/430 BC), the main cult statue in the Parthenon in Athens

"Statue of Faustina the Elder" portrayed as Ceres, with remains of gilding

"Group of Polyphemus" mistakenly restored in 1636 as Pan

"Endymion" from original of the end of the fourth century BC

Colossal statue of "Mars" end of first century AD from the Forum of Nerva, maybe part of the Temple of Mars Ultor in the Forum of Augustus and probably reproducing the cult image of the temple itself, which would have been of course be much larger. The lower part is a modern restoration

"Statue of Diana the huntress" from an original of the fourth century BC. "Juno Lanuvina" or maybe Ceres dating back to the early imperial age, from an original of the fifth century BC. It was found in the Vatican area

"Statue of woman with Julia Domna's portrait" with body copy from original of the middle of the fourth century BC and head-portrait of Septimius Severus' (193/211) wife of the beginning of the third century AD

Opposite "Statue of woman with Livia's portrait" 30/20 BC from the Belvedere Palace in the Vatican

Both statues are placed over "Bases with inscriptions of the heirs of Caius Cestius" 18/12 BC from the Pyramid of Caius Cestius

"Statue of Hadrian as Pontifex Maximus" 117/138 from the area of S. Stefano Rotondo

"Draped headless statue" in porphyry marble first century AD

Around the niches many Roman inscriptions are included, most of which are funerary ones

EGYPTIAN COLLECTION

Original Egyptian pieces set up in 1907 by the archaeologist Orazio Marucchi

They were mainly found in Rome in 1883 in the area of the Temple of Isis also known as Iseum Campensis, corresponding to the church S. Stefano del Cacco and surrounding area

In the same 1883 the collection of Egyptian antiquities formerly present in the Capitoline Museums was moved to the Vatican Museum where it still is now

"Caligula (37/41) rebuilt the temple more magnificent than ever, and gave a big boost to the neighborhood that once stood around the Egyptian Iseum. This district was formed by the dwellings of the priests who used to worship, but also artisans and traders, and corresponded - in the area and extent - to a similar 'Roman' neighborhood in Alexandria, where also stood a temple dedicated to Jupiter of the same size as the Iseum Campensis. This indicated the sense of equivalency that Rome had wanted to give Egypt and its former glory. Not vanquished people but nation on a par with Rome, as evidenced by the coin depicting two hands shaking, the Nile's and the Tiber's from the time of Antoninus Pius" (Anna Maria Partini)

"Columns with decorative plants"

"Crocodile" from the Ptolemaic or early imperial period in pink Aswan granite, incarnation of the god Sobek

"Two of Nectanebo II cynocephali" 359/341 BC gray granite embodiment of the lunar god Thoth

"Sphinx in pink granite" 144/30 BC from Via S. Ignazio

"Sphinx of Pharaoh Amasis II in basanite" 568/526 BC found near the apse of S. Maria sopra Minerva. The inscription on the breast of the pharaoh was sufficient for identification, although much of it had been scratched away, maybe by the Persians led by Cambyses II (son of Cyrus the Great and Darius I's father), who conquered Egypt six months after Amasis II's death

"Figured bell-krater" dark gray granite from the Canopus of Hadrian's Villa

"Fragment of capital bell-shaped" in marble first century AD

STANZETTE TERRENE

Small rooms on the ground floor

Epigraphic monuments, portraits and sarcophagi in three small rooms accessible from the Atrium through one door

"Fragments of Roman calendars" that Caesar defined with 365 days

"Minor Fasti" lists of magistrates

"Portrait of a member of the Julio-Claudian family" maybe Germanicus or his father Drusus Major

"Two male portraits" of the fourth century A D

Huge and significant "Attic Sarcophagus with scenes from the life of Achilles" with representations on the four sides dating to the early third century AD. It was found in 1582 or just before near the Monte del Grano between Via Tuscolana and Via Labicana. The quality and beauty of the relief are amazing

"Altar-urn of the builder, Titus Statilius Aper" with writing tools first century AD from the Janiculum Hill

"Funerary relief with three characters" early first century AD

"Base with labors of Hercules" first imperial age

"Aebutii family's funerary stele with measuring instruments" in travertine first century AD

"Cippus of Vettius Agorius Praetextatus" and his wife Fabia Paulina Aconia. He was a prefect of the fourth century AD, one of the last politicians who sought to protect and preserve the ancient Roman religion from the advance of Christianity. He was a priest and started several cults, as well as a scholar of literature and philosophy

SCALONE

Staircase

"Front of a sarcophagus with lion hunt" third century AD from the Appian Way

"Fragment of a sarcophagus with lion and antelope" in Pentelic marble of the late imperial period. The muzzle of the lion is represented schematically with expressionistically and artificially ferocious expression, but the ribs of the feline are realistically visible

"Statue of a priest in the act of bringing a vessel" with a not relevant female head copy of a Hellenistic original from Hadrian's Villa at Tivoli. The drapery is rendered in an exquisite and extraordinarily realistic way

CAPITOLINE MUSEUMS - PALACE OF THE SENATE

Palazzo Senatorio

Various civil buildings built over the Fortress of the Corsi family that had been built, in turn, over the ruins of the Tabularium, the State Archive of ancient Rome

It was renovated in 1299 and it kept until the sixteenth century the appearance of a fortified medieval public building

FAÇADE

1582/1605 by Giacomo Della Porta (1533/1602) with his collaborator Girolamo Rainaldi (1570/1655) who adapted the original design by Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475/1564). The only remaining parts that were built during Michelangelo's lifetime are the "Gateway" to the assembly room and the "Outside stairs", two converging ramps built in the years 1547/54 without the canopy on two columns which was in the original project by Michelangelo

BELL TOWER

1578/82 Martino Longhi the Elder (1534/91) in place of the medieval and higher than that of Michelangelo's project, on top of the cross in gold leaf and antique statue "Goddess-Minerva Rome"

CLOCK installed in 1806, formerly on the façade of the church of S. Maria in Aracoeli

To the left of the building TOWER OF MARTIN V Colonna (1417/31) about 1427 towards S. Maria in Aracoeli and TOWER OF NICHOLAS V Parentucelli (1447/55) 1453 towards the Forum

To the right of the palace TOWERS OF BONIFACE IX Tomacelli (1389/1404). The overhead passage was built in 1940

ENTRANCE HALL of Sixtus IV Della Rovere (1471/84) 1477

HALL OF THE CARROCCIO (Cart carrying flags during battle) with an inscription commemorating the gift of the Carroccio, from Frederick II to the Roman people, taken from the Milanese of the Northern League in the battle of Cortenuova in 1237

HALL OF THE FLAGS or OF THE BOARD 1847, so named for the banners of the fourteen districts of the Civic Guard

ASSEMBLY ROOM

1573/77 grand salon of the palace, formerly seat of the court of the Senator. From the postwar period it is known as AULA GIULIO CESARE (Julius Caesar Hall)

In the floor "Five Roman mosaics with floral and marine scenes" of the second century AD at the center of the modern checkerboard marble floor white and gray. They were taken from various rooms of a Roman villa in the area of Casal Morena on the Via Anagnina

Paintings on the ceiling and frieze "History of Ancient Rome" 1929/30 by Eugenio Cisterna (1862/1933) from Genzano

"Statue of Julius Caesar" and "Statue of Roman Admiral" dating back to Trajan's period (98/117)

In the outside wall remains of the 1299 loggia from the time of Boniface VIII Caetani (1294/1303)

PROTOMOTECA CAPITOLINA

Capitoline Museum of busts

Collection of busts of Italian celebrities originally displayed in the Pantheon by Antonio Canova:

"Pius VII" Chiaramonti (1800/23) 1807 and "Domenico Cimarosa" 1808 by Antonio Canova (1757/1822)

"One is surprised by how such weight of matter is transformed by the power of art and marble seems swollen for secret sounds, light, transparent, open to interpretation, like those eyes lost in the faraway distance, on the edge of a lovely melody" (Valentino Martinelli)

"Angelica Kauffmann" 1809 by Paolo Adolfo Kauffmann

"Masaccio", "Lorenzo Ghiberti", "Petrarch" and "Ludovico Ariosto" 1814/15 by Carlo Finelli (1785/1853) from Carrara, belonging to a family of sculptors including the great Giuliano Finelli

"Andrea Mantegna" by Rinaldo Rinaldi (1793/1873)

"Polidoro da Caravaggio" by Francesco Massimiliano Laboureur (1767/1831)

"Arcangelo Corelli" 1713/14 by Angelo De Rossi (1671/1715)

"Camillo Rusconi" by Giuseppe Rusconi (1688/1758) one of Camillo Rusconi's pupils but not related

Two great eighteenth-century Roman artists are represented, the sculptor "Pietro Bracci (1700/73)" 1794/95 the sculptor of the statue of Ocean in the Trevi Fountain and the extraordinary painter "Marco Benefial (1684/1764)" 1781/82 works by Vincenzo Pacetti (1746/1820) also Roman

"Anton Raphael Mengs" 1781 and "Giovanni Pichler" 1792 by the Irish Christopher Hewetson (about 1739/1797)