Monday, April 10, 2017

GIUSTINIANI PALACE

PALAZZO GIUSTINIANI
1585/87 Giovanni Fontana (1540/1614) and his more famous brother Domenico Fontana (1543/1607) for Monsignor Francesco Vento who sold it shortly after, in 1590, to the Giustiniani family, rich bankers from Genoa
Continued by Carlo Maderno (1556/1629), Girolamo Rainaldi (1570/1655) and his son Carlo Rainaldi (1611/91)
It was finished in 1678 maybe to a design of 1653 by Francesco Borromini (1599/1667)
The art collection of the Marquis Vincenzo Giustiniani ended up comprising about 1,600 pieces of ancient sculpture and about 600 paintings by such artists as Caravaggio (fifteen paintings!), Raphael, Giorgione, Titian and others
When the Giustiniani family became extinct at the end of the nineteenth century, the collection was dispersed and the palace became the seat of Freemasonry
Mussolini wanted to acquire it for the Senate, but the part that overlooks Piazza della Rotonda remained the property of Freemasonry until 1888 when the seat was moved to the Villa del Vascello
Today it houses the OFFICES OF THE SENATE and it is HOME OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE SENATE
The palace is in the area of the BATHS OF NERO AND ALEXANDER SEVERUS of which there are traces under building
VESTIBULE
“Front of a sarcophagus with lion hunt”
COURTYARD
“Nine ancient reliefs”
ROOM OF THE CONSTITUTION
It was formerly the library, where it was signed on December 27, 1947 by Enrico De Nicola, Alcide De Gasperi and Umberto Terracini the Italian Constitution which became effective on January 1, 1948
ROOM OF THE COLUMNS or ZUCCARI ROOM
Maybe by Francesco Borromini
Vault
“Five stories of Solomon” 1586/87 by Federico Zuccari (c. 1542/1609)
Walls
“Temperance” and fragments of other “Virtues” by Giovanni Baglione (1566/1643), Ventura Salimbeni (1568/1613), G.B. Ricci (about 1550/1624) or maybe Antonio Tempesta (about 1555/1630) and Pietro Paolo Bonzi aka Hunchback of Carracci (about 1576/1636)

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